guest editorial the international indigenous policy journal volume 4 issue 1 indigenous early parenthood article 13 march 2013 guest editorial rachel eni university of manitoba, rachel.eni@ad.umanitoba.ca recommended citation eni, r. (2013). guest editorial. the international indigenous policy journal, 4(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.13 guest editorial abstract the current special edition of the journal explores teen pregnancy and parenthood in canadian first nation and urban aboriginal communities. our better understanding of the factors associated with teen pregnancy in aboriginal communities is essential to making improvements in health and wellness and in fostering the involvement of youth in community economic and cultural development. keywords teenage pregnancy, aboriginal, early parenting creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/   g u e s t e d i t o r i a l the current special edition of the journal explores teen pregnancy and parenthood in canadian first nation and urban aboriginal communities. our better understanding of the factors associated with teen pregnancy in aboriginal communities is essential to making improvements in health and wellness and in fostering the involvement of youth in community economic and cultural development. the topic of teen pregnancy is of particular importance to me. i am honoured within aboriginal communities with the title of “kokum.” i am the grandmother of a little girl who is the child of teenage parents. my granddaughter is named adinah, “the delicate and delightful one.” she was born in a northern canadian blizzard just after the new year in a secondary hospital three hours from her community, away from extended family, although we all sat by our phones and computers eagerly awaiting her arrival into our lives. before her second birthday, adinah had already experienced hardships associated with poverty and, to speak frankly, those often accompanying young parenting. at the same time, she has been, from the moment she became known to her parents, the impetus for their change. it is because of adinah that her parents have decided to go back to school and participate in the educational, social, and cultural activities of their community. they struggle to create a better life for their child. many challenges persist. teenage pregnancy and parenthood in canadian aboriginal communities is a familiar story. though the birth of a child is a celebration of life not diminishable with timing or circumstance, there are undeniable factors commonly associated with early pregnancy and parenthood that constitute challenges at multiple levels. though traditionally, women might have had their babies young, the matter may be one that is very different in today’s world. for example, young women and men have many opportunities today that were not a part of traditional living in the past. today’s opportunities might not be as readily available to teenagers who are also parents. early pregnancy today might also mean that the child is born out-of-wedlock or out of a relationship with the child’s father, leaving fathers less likely to be involved in the daily lives of their children and therefore less likely to provide appropriately for them. often, many of us don’t come to realize how important and necessary our traditions and cultures are to our wellbeing until we are much older and have had the chance to reflect on what these things mean to us as individuals and in terms of our connection to our families and communities. in aboriginal communities, loss of culture and a sense of tradition are further complicated by colonization. knowledge of the traditional rituals of parenting and customs that help instruct parenting roles and responsibilities may be unknown to young parents and therefore impossible for them to draw upon when needed or to pass on to their children. what are the impacts of a loss of tradition on the healthy development of individuals and families? in the current special issue, many of the circumstances that surround teenage pregnancy and parenting are explored. brant castellano discusses economic deprivation and high fertility rates among aboriginal teenagers. she considers the challenges, consequences, and need to break the cycle of negative outcomes, very much achievable through education and community level support. interpretations of teenage pregnancy as being or not being problematic are issues 1 eni: guest editorial published by scholarship@western, 2013   explored in both cook, and eni and phillips-beck. in these articles, we see how personal insecurities, fears, and hope affect decisions to have a baby at a young age. fonda, and cardinal, cardinal, waugh, and baddour explore issues pertaining to spirituality and religious affiliation to discover whether there is a relationship between spiritual belief patterns and affiliation on the one hand and teenage sexuality and its consequences on the other. it is interesting indeed and may be the case that communities not demonstrably following a spiritual or religious path may have a different trajectory with regards to teen fertility than those with particular religious affiliation. fonda, eni, and guimond point to the practice of socially constructing social issues. when we say a thing is socially constructed we recognize our tendency to focus on subjective and conditional aspects of our social selves – rather than on any inherent or objective conditions naturally existing in a predesigned social world (the latter do not exist). in other words, we actually do define our own lives as being problematic or not problematic and act accordingly. what is most fascinating about this article within the current exploration of teenage pregnancy is that it forces us to look at what is possible, fixable, transformable – because the only reason a thing exists as a social issue in the first place might be because we refuse to stop defining it as such. then there are the grandparents. quinless’ research shows that living in multiple family households is common among teenaged lone mothers, particularly those living on reserve. multigenerational families provide important assistance to young mothers including income, childcare, and housework. though we often praise grandparents for their contributions to caregiving, what are the impacts on their health of our overreliance on them as primary caregivers? like others in aboriginal communities, many of the eldest generations struggle to find a healthy balance between work and family responsibilities, possibly without adequate resources. what are the consequences of teen parenting on their health? what are the long-term consequences of an absent generation of parents from the family on families as a whole and on the communities (as discussed previously by eni, harvey, & phillips-beck, 2009)? there are many challenging health and social consequences of teenage pregnancy and parenthood, for both mothers and children (guimond & robitaille, 2008). the articles in the current edition further emphasize this point. teenage pregnancy and parenting in aboriginal communities increase the vulnerability of youth who may be ill prepared for the responsibility of parenting and already disadvantaged socially and economically. guevremont and kohen report higher rates of inattention-hyperactivity and conduct disorders among children of teenage mothers on reserves. garner, guimond, and senécal find that first nation teenage mothers, compared to non-aboriginal teenage mothers, are less likely to graduate from high school, more likely to live in compromised living conditions, and have lower household income. other serious issues associated with early sexual relations are discussed, including: promiscuity, alcohol and use of drugs, and the risk of contracting a sexually transmitted infection (sti) or hiv/aids. hull introduces equity issues. aboriginal teenagers are less likely, if they are likely at all, to receive employment benefits (i.e., maternal or paternal benefits) due to their employment characteristics. mann further explores accessibility to reproductive health care services among 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 13 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/13 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.13   women living in remote northern communities and includes commentary, also from international agencies, on related sensitive issues. these works reveal to us the need for greater policy change in effecting better health through improved service accessibility. they may also point to specific instances of the causes of inequity. the purpose of this collection of research and policy articles is to better understand the issues that pertain to the topic of teenage pregnancy and parenthood in canadian aboriginal communities so that we may mobilize effective strategies for change. in her paper, wuttunee provides thoughtful analysis of this very issue. she asks: what tools for community economic development can be applied to move young parents into positions from which they can actively and meaningfully engage in local economies? wuttunee looks at effective supports for young people, supports for the development of independence, resilience, healthy sexuality, lifestyle, education, and training. mobilization strategies are essential, she writes, because the situation for youth comes with “too high a cost to ignore.” when i found out my child was having a baby, i cried. i cried because i feared that he now would not realize his potential beyond what i have experienced for myself. we live for our children. we want them to experience more fulfilled lives than we ever thought imaginable. after all, we live and work to benefit the 7th generation into the future – so it is my raison d’être to ensure that i, personally, with help of my generation, prepare the world so that it is as accessible as possible to young people so they can realize their potential, and so they, in their turn, can offer better opportunities for their children. that is our work.         3 eni: guest editorial published by scholarship@western, 2013   r e f e r e n c e s eni, r., harvey, c., & phillips-beck, w. (2009). in consideration of the needs of our caregivers: grandparenting experiences in manitoba first nation communities. first peoples child and family review, 4(2), 85 98. guimond, e., & robitaille, n. (2008). when teenage girls have children: trends and consequences. horizons, 10(1), 49 51. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 13 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/13 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.13 the international indigenous policy journal march 2013 guest editorial rachel eni recommended citation guest editorial abstract keywords creative commons license guest editorial reflecting on the state of the iipj and the condition of indigenous peoples around the world the international indigenous policy journal volume 3 | issue 4 article 2 october 2012 reflecting on the state of the iipj and the condition of indigenous peoples around the world jerry p. w hite university of western ontario, white@uwo.ca recommended citation white, j. p. (2012). reflecting on the state of the iipj and the condition of indigenous peoples around the world. th e international indigenous policy journal, 3(4) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.4.2 reflecting on the state of the iipj and the condition of indigenous peoples around the world abstract as we come to the end of 2012, it is natural for the iipj contributors, readers, staff, and volunteers to reflect on the work of the journal and on the reason we all contributed to that work. the year has been, by any standards, a real success. yet, when we look worldwide, there is still much work to be done. take, for example, the continuing gap in well-being; it is clear that there are some common problems across the more developed countries. where efforts to create real partnerships between indigenous peoples and governments have started, we hope they push forward. where they have not, then they must start. may this upcoming year, 2013, be a year we look back on with pride for the accomplishments that occur. keywords evidence-based policy, indigenous, well-being creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ r e f l e c t i n g o n t h e s t a t e o f t h e i i p j a n d t h e c o n d i t i o n o f i n d i g e n o u s p e o p l e s a r o u n d t h e w o r l d e d i t o r i a l f o r y e a r ’ s e n d 2 0 1 2 r e f l e c t i n g o n t h e p a s t y e a r o f t h e j o u r n a l as we come to the end of 2012, it is natural for the iipj contributors, readers, staff, and volunteers to reflect on the work of the journal and on the reason we all contributed to that work. the year has been, by any standards, a real success. we have published four issues including one special edition, “water and indigenous peoples;” one regular edition with a focus “economic development in indigenous communities;” and two regular editions. we tripled the number of policy papers, published 30 percent more research-focused contributions, and four editorial essays. over the year, more than 25,000 people used the journal articles for research and teaching purposes, which represented a 100 percent growth from year two. we look forward to reaching over 30,000 downloads of articles for research and teaching purposes in 2013. our acceptance rates have gone down as more scholars, policy analysts, and researchers submit their work. this is natural as space in the journal becomes more competitive. we have honored our commitment to short turn-around times, both peer refereed and editor comments so authors can rely on getting material out in quality formats while the research is most useful. we will maintain our pledge. i should note that our hosts, western university and berkley press, have used our exemplary record as goal in their on-line webinars. next year we will continue our pace of publishing with two special editions planned: one on early parenting and one on education. we will also publish two regular editions covering a spectrum of issues from around the world. as we look at the published material, it is clear that the vast majority comes from developed countries with indigenous populations. we are setting goals to reach out to communities, indigenous and nonindigenous scholars, and policy analysts in less developed countries particularly in latin and south america. we will work to keep our strong ties with canada, australia, new zealand, and the us. we are also looking at expanding our reach by publishing articles in languages other than english. such articles will be accompanied by high quality english executive summaries. thanks to everyone for your interest and support. we welcome feedback on how we might do even a better job in the coming years. r e f l e c t i n g o n w h y w e d e v e l o p e d t h e j o u r n a l the journal is an expensive undertaking, both in hours of work and finances. to create the quality of presentation, consistency of style, and website services and navigability takes considerable resources. we put these resources into the work because we passionately believe that with better evidence comes better policy and decision-making. it is critical that businesses, governments, administrations, individuals, and other institutions practice evidence-based decision-making and policy development. too long have policies and actions been directed at, and imposed on, indigenous peoples that are ideological, racialist, ethno-centric and/or politically motivated. evidence-based actions that recognize 1 white: reflecting on the state of the iipj published by scholarship@western, 2012 both “western “ and “indigenous knowledge” perspectives are bulwark against these problematic approaches. however, to do that we need the very best evidence! this doesn’t “drop from the sky – it comes from hard work,” to quote a long past philosopher. that work is quality research, new and traditional knowledge that emanates from the very clearest understandings of the world around us and the activities of living things in that world. the journal is a small part of a system that acts as a gatekeeper to sort the good from not-so-good and disseminate evidence and evidence-based policy that can play a role in changing the social and physical world in which we live. r e f l e c t i n g o n i n d i g e n o u s p e o p l e ’ s w e l l b e i n g in 2007, the united nations (2008) declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples was passed and countries around the world signed on to its many proposals. the declaration outlines central principles such as non-discrimination and fundamental rights, self-determination (including forms of autonomy and the right to participate in decisions that impact you), individual and collective cultural rights, and a right to the integrity of your culture, rights to territories, control over natural resources, and the right to socio-economic well-being. although indigenous peoples account for less than 5 percent of the world’s population, they are about 10 percent of the poor. within indigenous populations, a large proportion live in poverty; the peoples number 300 million and more than 100 million fall below the poverty line in their respective countries (world bank, 2011). in the world bank’s (2011) studies, there were few positives to note. basing their analysis on indicators that matched millennium development goals (under-five mortality, water deprivation, malnutrition, literacy, and net primary school enrollment), they find that in most or all countries and regions indigenous peoples have lower scores across these indicators than the nonindigenous populations (world bank, 2011). finally, the same meta-study found that the gap between indigenous and non-indigenous populations has maintained itself or increased across every region except china, india, and vietnam (world bank, 2011). given a large proportion of indigenous people in the world live in these countries, the relative improvement in poverty levels, health, and educational attainment is important. when we look at the continuing gap in well-being, it is clear that there are some common problems across the more developed countries. some of these commonalities include: • geography, including climate: the lands that peoples traditionally held or have been force into are not productive given current conditions. • manufactured dependency as part of colonial systems. • poor access to capital and other productive assets to generate and stimulate economic development. • ongoing barriers to self-determination that include governmental non-compliance with treaty and agreement rights. • limited access to many services, as well as the infrastructure needed to carry out those services themselves. • levels of human capital, measured in relative educational attainment and specific training, are low. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 4 [2012], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.4.2 • general health is lower when measured as life expectancy, and higher when measured in terms of infant mortality and chronic and infectious disease prevalence indicators, than the nonindigenous population. • specific health conditions, such as diabetes, tuberculosis, heart disease, and hiv/aids, show significantly higher incidence and prevalence rates. • community and collective trauma from centuries of colonial practices, including residential or boarding schools. taking up the declaration of indigenous rights (united nations, 2008) and working in partnership with the indigenous peoples to improve these conditions are necessary steps for governments and other institutions that wish to see an improvement in the well-being of indigenous and non-indigenous peoples, alike. in the words of wu hongbo (2012), coordinator of the second international decade of the world’s indigenous peoples: challenges persist, especially in recognizing [i]ndigenous peoples’ right to ownership, and use of their lands, territories and natural resources. it has become even more imperative that indigenous peoples are consulted about projects affecting their own communities. the principle of free, prior and informed consent must be fully operationalized and applied. corporations and extractive industries interested in exploiting resources located in indigenous territories, must abide by the principles and norms of corporate social responsibility. on 13 september this year, we celebrated the fifth anniversary of the historical adoption of the un declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples. let us all be guided by the principles and rights enshrined in the un declaration. let us make this declaration a living document where the world’s indigenous peoples, through their rights to self-determination, can freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development. (p. 2) where these efforts have started, we hope they push forward. where they have not, then they must start. may this upcoming year, 2013, be a year we look back on with pride for the accomplishments that occur. j e r r y p . w h i t e editor-in-chief, international indigenous policy journal director, aboriginal policy research consortium (international) 3 white: reflecting on the state of the iipj published by scholarship@western, 2012 r e f e r e n c e s hongbo, w. (2012). statement to the third committee agenda item “indigenous issues”. new york: united nations. retrieved from http://www.un.org/esa/socdev/unpfii/documents/usg_statement_unga_3ctee_67.pdf united nations. (2008). united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples. retrieved from www.u n .org/esa/socdev/unpfii/documents/drips_en.pdf       world bank. (2011). still among the poorest of the poor (indigenous peoples country brief). washington d.c.: author. retrieved from http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/2011/10/15198880/still-among-poorest-poor   4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 4 [2012], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.4.2 the international indigenous policy journal october 2012 reflecting on the state of the iipj and the condition of indigenous peoples around the world jerry p. white recommended citation reflecting on the state of the iipj and the condition of indigenous peoples around the world abstract keywords creative commons license reflecting on the state of the iipj and the condition of indigenous peoples around the world book review: mascarenhas, m. (2012). where the waters divide: neoliberalism, white privilege, and environmental racism in canada the international indigenous policy journal volume 4 | issue 3 article 4 january 2013 book review: mascarenhas, m. (2012). w here the waters divide: neoliberalism, w hite privilege, and environmental racism in canada rosie b. simms university of british columbia, simms.rosie@gmail.com recommended citation simms, r. b. (2013). book review: mascarenhas, m. (2012). where the waters divide: neoliberalism, white privilege, and environmental racism in canada. the international indigenous policy journal, 4(3) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.4 book review: mascarenhas, m. (2012). w here the waters divide: neoliberalism, w hite privilege, and environmental racism in canada abstract this article provides a critical review of michael mascarenhas' book, where the waters divide: neoliberalism, white privilege, and environmental racism in canada. keywords drinking water, governance, environmental policy, first nations, canada creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ book review mascarenhas, m. (2012). where the waters divide: neoliberalism, white privilege, and environmental racism in canada. landham, maryland: lexington books. 161 pp. $60.00 (hardcover). isbn-10: 0739168274 how and why is it that in canada, a developed country typically thought of as having an abundance of freshwater, over one hundred first nations reserve communities currently lack access to safe drinking water (health canada, 2013)? this is the complex question that michael mascarenhas delves into with his book, where the waters divide: neoliberalism, white privilege, and environmental racism in canada. the book sets out to analyze “how recent changes in environmental, social and economic conditions of production – most commonly referred to as neoliberalism – have influenced the daily and long-term social reproduction of a historically marginalized group: first nations in canada” (p. 14). specifically, mascarenhas examines how these changes have been manifested in the realm of drinking water governance for first nations, and the ways in which the process has produced and reinforced racial injustices. a key effort that mascarenhas makes throughout the seven chapters of this book is to expose what he calls the racial formation of the canadian state; in other words, to demonstrate how structural racism operates in canada such that “unjust impoverishment of first nations occurs alongside the unearned enrichment of white canadians” (p. 127). the book adopts pulido’s conception of white privilege for environmental justice analysis, where racism is defined not as an intentional, deliberate act, but rather as an invisible phenomenon embedded in the “economic arrangements, power relations, government agencies, corporations and industry associations that produces uneven health outcomes on a daily basis” (p. 85). for mascarenhas, white privilege in contemporary canadian society is strongly evidenced in the racial formation of drinking water services and governance for first nations. he points to regulatory abandonment the fact that there are no legally-binding drinking water standards on reserves unlike the rest of the country as a key example of the workings of white privilege, by which he means the social systems that put whites at an advantage. this idea is driven home through case studies in chapters 4 and 6 through which mascarenhas effectively demonstrates the non-incidental and discriminatory nature of water pollution and access patterns in canada; for instance, the siting of city sewage treatment plants and landfills directly upstream of first nations territories in ontario. the text does an excellent job of contextualizing the drinking water crisis within the history of colonization in canada, and contributes a novel analysis of first nations drinking water issues through linking conceptually to theories of environmental justice and racism. a fundamental premise of where the waters divide is that sweeping neoliberal reforms are occurring in canada (chapter 3) and, as such, there has been a move from stateto market-based water governance (chapter 1). the book argues that this neoliberal restructuring has entailed a shift in the dominant form of racism in canada. mascarenhas posits that under neoliberalism, the means but not the ends of racism have changed: “unlike the old racial formation, which was largely delivered by the hand of government and justified using biological categories, this new form of racism is presented in the language of the morality of the marketplace and the primacy of individual solutions to modern environmental and social problems” (p. 123). linked to this new pattern, a core idea is that neoliberalism is a form of racism without racists. the implications of this form of racism with respect to water governance are highlighted 1 simms: book review published by scholarship@western, 2013 in the book. here, mascarenhas argues that the privileging of expert discourses accompanying neoliberal water reform has resulted in narrow and hegemonic understandings of water management, technical expertise, competency, and knowledge. through this discourse about “practices that are seen as technical, administrative and apparently non-racial” (p. 8), first nations’ local contextualized knowledge about water and water governance is dismissed as illegitimate. this point is well-illustrated in chapter 5 with an analysis of the external control-based structure of indian and northern affairs canada’s (inac)1 programs and funding arrangements for water on reserves. drinking water funding is funnelled through external auditors and consultants instead of directly to first nations authorities and, despite a discourse of participation, first nations have little decision-making autonomy in drinking water planning. mascarenhas argues that this is racism without racists, such that “first nations are often blamed for their lack of expertise, culture of poverty and traditional approaches to modern problems” (p. 124). another consequence of neoliberal reform that mascarenhas describes lies in its implications for social reproduction for first nations, which is loosely defined as the elements required to sustain everyday life (chapter 4). here, mascarenhas argues that neoliberal market-based water management and neoliberal nature, “which emphasizes the register of the economy” (p. 75) is “particularly discriminatory towards indigenous peoples because it often ignores and trivializes the importance of water in sustaining the ways of doing things first nations have developed to survive and prosper” (p. 35). he highlights this through a case study with the akwesasne mohawk nation, whose livelihoods and traditional practices have been undermined by severe water pollution in the st. lawrence river. while the book makes these notable contributions, it is also marked by some weaknesses in both content and stylistic aspects. my main critique is that mascarenhas simply attempts to bring too many themes and details into one narrative. he introduces a wide range of major concepts (e.g. culture, empire building, social reproduction), each of which requires a background explanation. in providing the context to these concepts in the limited space available, mascarenhas makes passing reference to an extremely wide range of major events and ideas ranging from fordism, the early u.s. conservation movement, the oka crisis, green consumerism, to the events of 9/11, and so onwithout always providing information on why these details are relevant and necessary to the story he is telling about water and environmental racism in canada. at some level, the sheer range of details and coverage of concepts has the effect of obscuring some of the arguments specific to first nations, racism, and water governance. in a similar vein, i found myself wondering about the engagement with neoliberalism in this work. many of the phenomena described are situated as consequences of neoliberalism, although the linkages were not always clear. for instance, in chapter 3, he writes, “in contrast to previous forms of institutional racism in canada, neoliberal racism operates at the level of social reproduction” (p. 8). a bit more specificity and conceptual work to help us think through how we might understand these novel forms of racism in relation to past policies would have been a welcome addition. for instance, how do we connect contemporary policies to earlier moves such as the 1884 potlatch ban, which certainly had a deep impact on the ability of first nations to sustain their way of life? to provide another illustrative example, as mascarenhas writes, “a striking consequence of neoliberal reform…is that the ability to secure safe, healthy, and clean environs is becoming increasingly connected to, and reinforced by, social 1 in 2011, the department of indian and northern affairs canada was renamed aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.4 inequality and social privilege” (p. 9). again, this claim raises questions as to how it connects to earlier eras, since clearly the connection between inequality, privilege, and environments is not a new phenomenon. perhaps being even less generous to the author of this generally well-informed and compelling work, i also had several other points of frustration while reading. though mascarenhas clearly is an ally to first nations, there are problematic aspects related to the politics of representation in the book. some might object to the author’s claim that the book aims “to make sure...first nations voices were heard” (p. 19) (cf. kelm, 1999; spivak, 1988). as well, the text occasionally slips into some essentializing claims, such as “...women, as life-givers, have a special connection with water according to atk [aboriginal traditional knowledge] because both women and water are life-givers” (p. 97). while important to acknowledge that such relationships exist, i would suggest that more attention could have been given to the diversity of stories, relationships, and perspectives that exist across a diversity of nations. similarly, mascarenhas writes about a “first nations perspective” (p. 97) or that “first nations argue...” (p. 96), which are statements that run the risk of implying the existence of a unified, single first nations vision (p. 97). overall, mascarenhas has produced a work that contributes a valuable contemporary environmental justice analysis to a growing body of scholarship that addresses first nations drinking water issues in canada. while much has been said about the legal, regulatory, and public health dimensions of the first nations drinking water crisis (see for example boyd, 2011; macintosh, 2008; phare, 2009), with a few exceptions (see for example murdocca, 2010), the literature has shied away from explicitly framing the issue in terms of its racial dimensions. this is a critical missing link in the discussion that where the waters divide fills. while mascarenhas’ work focuses on the canadian context, the themes of this book are relevant to, and reflective of, the struggles to assert the right to self-determination in the realm of water access and governance faced by indigenous peoples worldwide. as the 2003 indigenous peoples kyoto water declaration describes: we see our waters increasingly governed by imposed economic, foreign and colonial domination, as well as trade agreements and commercial practices that disconnect us as peoples from the ecosystem. water is being treated as a commodity and as a property interest that can be bought, sold and traded in global and domestic market-based systems. these imposed and inhumane practices do not respect that all life is sacred, that water is sacred. (unesco, 2003, p. 2) where the waters divide provides strong theoretical support to this declaration through its environmental justice analysis of the impacts of neoliberal water reform on first nations in canada. 3 simms: book review published by scholarship@western, 2013 references boyd, d. (2011). no taps, no toilets: first nations and the constitutional right to water in canada. mcgill law journal, 57(1), 83 134. health canada. (2013). drinking water and wastewater – first nations and inuit health. retrieved from http://www.hc-sc.gc.ca/fniah-spnia/promotion/public-publique/water-eaueng.php#how_many kelm, m.e. (1999). colonizing bodies: aboriginal health and healing in british columbia. vancouver: university of british columbia press. macintosh, c. (2008). testing the waters: jurisdictional and policy aspects of the continuing failure to remedy drinking water quality on first nations reserves. ottawa law review, 39(1), 63 97. murdocca, c. (2010). “there is something in that water:" race, nationalism, and legal violence. law and social inquiry journal of the american bar foundation, 35(2), 369 402. phare, m.a. (2009). denying the source: the crisis of first nations water rights. surrey, b.c: rocky mountain books. spivak, g. (1988). can the subaltern speak? in c. nelson & l. grossberg (eds.), marxism and the interpretation of culture (pp. 271 – 316). urbana: university of illinois press. unesco. (2003, march). indigenous peoples’ kyoto water declaration. third world water forum, kyoto, japan. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.4 the international indigenous policy journal january 2013 book review: mascarenhas, m. (2012). where the waters divide: neoliberalism, white privilege, and environmental racism in canada rosie b. simms recommended citation book review: mascarenhas, m. (2012). where the waters divide: neoliberalism, white privilege, and environmental racism in canada abstract keywords creative commons license microsoft word book_review_copy edited.docx editors’ commentary: the challenges in improving indigenous educational attainment the international indigenous policy journal volume 4 issue 4 educational pathways of indigenous learners article 6 october 2013 editors’ commentary: the challenges in improving indigenous educational attainment jerry p. w hite university of western ontario, white@uwo.ca julie peters academica group inc., julie@academicagroup.com recommended citation white, j. p. , peters, j. (2013). editors’ commentary: the challenges in improving indigenous educational attainment. the international indigenous policy journal, 4(4) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.6 editors’ commentary: the challenges in improving indigenous educational attainment abstract education has been called the “new buffalo” for its potential to contribute to the economic, social, and political well-being of indigenous peoples in canada (stonechild, 2006). despite gains in education among aboriginal peoples in canada, there continues to be gaps in educational attainment. this editors' introduction explores some of the realities underlying educational trends among indigenous peoples in order to set the stage for the articles in this special edition of the international indigenous policy journal examining educational pathways among indigenous learners. keywords education, aboriginal, post-secondary education, indigenous, economic development creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ e d i t o r s ’ c o m m e n t a r y : t h e c h a l l e n g e s i n i m p r o v i n g i n d i g e n o u s e d u c a t i o n a l a t t a i n m e n t education has been called the “new buffalo” for its potential to contribute to the economic, social, and political well-being of indigenous peoples in canada (stonechild, 2006). to be sure, improvements in educational attainment can have important positive impacts. increasing educational attainment in communities leads to benefits such as economic development and growth, enhanced innovation, improved social cohesion, reduced reliance on social assistance, and positive inter-generational effects (wolfe & haveman, 2001). there have been real strides forward since the 1990s. in canada, for example, the absolute numbers of indigenous peoples completing high school and going on to postsecondary training have increased. clearly, there is a large and growing number of highly educated aboriginal peoples.1 for example: • the 1996 to 2011 period saw a total cumulative increase of 183,170 post-secondary education graduates. • in 2011, 281,765 aboriginal people reported post-secondary education as their highest level of educational attainment. • post-secondary education gains were achieved for all aboriginal groups (status and nonstatus, on reserve and off reserve, and first nations, inuit, and métis) (gordon & white, 2013). figure 1 shows these positive educational trends. that said, in order to make progress in canada and see real, lasting positive improvements take place, there are several realities that have to be understood. the first is: h i g h s c h o o l c o m p l e t i o n . the first reality is that there are still far too many indigenous youth who are not completing high school. if we look at the data from 1996 to the present, the numbers are staggeringly high: the number of indigenous persons without a high school diploma increased by 80,165 between 1996 and 2011. when we project the trend out to 2016 and 2021, we see a further increase of 50,000 people. table 1 provides details and figure 2 illustrates the alarming trend. 1 all the data and figures relating to post-secondary education and high school attainment are from the paper by catherine gordon and jerry p. white, “supply side of aboriginal post-secondary education in canada,” which was delivered at the indigenous issues in post-secondary education: transitions to the workplace conference in toronto, ontario, canada in october 2013. f i g u r e 1 . p o s t s e c o n d a r y e d u c a t i o n t y p e f o r a b o r i g i n a l p o p u l a t i o n a g e d 2 5 6 4 y e a r s , 1 9 9 6 2 0 1 1 , i n a b s o l u t e n u m b e r s . sources: statistics canada (1996, 2001, 2006, 2011). note. university below bachelor level became a category in the 2001 census; therefore, data are not available for 1996. t a b l e 1 . l e s s t h a n h i g h s c h o o l a n d h i g h s c h o o l a s h i g h e s t e d u c a t i o n a l a t t a i n m e n t f o r a b o r i g i n a l p o p u l a t i o n , 2 5 6 4 y e a r s , 1 9 9 6 2 0 1 1 i n a b s o l u t e n u m b e r s a n d 2 0 1 6 2 0 2 1 a s e s t i m a t e d n u m b e r s 1 9 9 6 2 0 0 1 2 0 0 6 2 0 1 1 i n c r e a s e 1 9 9 6 2 0 1 1 p r o j e c t e d 2 0 1 6 p r o j e c t e d 2 0 2 1 less than high school 156,605 171,710 189,395 236,770 80,165 253,165 278,983 high school 91,275 101,355 118,960 152,840 61,565 166,683 186,913 note. sources: gordon & white (2013); statistics canada (1996, 2001, 2006, 2011). f i g u r e 2 . h i g h e s t e d u c a t i o n a l a t t a i n m e n t l e s s t h a n h i g h s c h o o l a n d h i g h s c h o o l o n l y f o r a b o r i g i n a l p o p u l a t i o n , a g e d 2 5 6 4 y e a r s , 1 9 9 6 – 2 0 1 1 i n a b s o l u t e n u m b e r a n d 2 0 1 6 – 2 0 2 1 a s e s t i m a t e d n u m b e r s . sources: gordon & white (2013); statistics canada (1996, 2001, 2006, 2011). these findings underscore the observation by mendelson (2006) that a key to increasing postsecondary education is to improve completion rates from junior kindergarten to grade 12. we agree with mendelson and would extend this further to argue that there also needs to be a focus on early learning and childcare. we also note that there are many additional considerations in terms of improving graduation rates: some are resources; some are curriculum; some are social capital and norm issues; some relate to the policies and practices bred by colonialism; and still others relate to the lack of economic opportunity seen by indigenous youth, which dissuades them from seeking credentials (gordon &white, 2013). the second reality is: t h e g a p . there is an unacceptable 20-percentage point gap in post-secondary educational attainment between the aboriginal and non-aboriginal populations (see figure 3 below). the largest disparity is university attainment. projections by gordon and white (2013) for 5 and 10 years from now reveal that this alarming trend will continue. within our current policy system, the difference between non-aboriginal and aboriginal populations is projected to stagnate; the gap is estimated to widen for those living on reserve, all status aboriginals, and the inuit population. fundamental changes that appreciate the variation among aboriginal populations are warranted. 0 50,000 100,000 150,000 200,000 250,000 300,000 350,000 1996 2001 2006 2011 2016 (est) 2021 (est) less than high school high school only f i g u r e 3 . p o s t s e c o n d a r y e d u c a t i o n a l a t t a i n m e n t f o r t h e a b o r i g i n a l a n d n o n a b o r i g i n a l p o p u l a t i o n a g e d 2 5 6 4 y e a r s , 1 9 9 6 2 0 1 1 . sources: gordon & white (2013); statistics canada (1996, 2001, 2006, 2011). the third reality is the impact of colonialism: t h e h i s t o r y o f c o l o n i a l i s m . contact with europeans was not a positive experience and the subsequent 500 years have had disastrous impacts on indigenous civilizations. this has led to major problems that have impacted education in many ways. as peters (2013) noted: first nations have long had their own modes of education. these have not been static, but evolved, shifted, and changed over time. while each nation has its own education methods, common practices across nations have included ceremonies, oral histories, teaching stories, learning games, apprenticeships, formal instruction, and tag-along teaching (buffalohead, 1976 as cited in hampton, 1995). traditionally, the teachers were the community members, and each adult had a responsibility to each child to ensure they knew how to live a good life. […] indigenous modes of education were disrupted by the arrival of europeans […] but it is important to remember that indigenous knowledge and methods of teaching and learning have continued and are being revitalized. (peters, 2013, p. 6) in addition to disrupting traditional educational systems, the introduction of “european methods” and the imposition of government policies have inflicted great harm on communities and individuals. the residential school system, for example, has produced trauma that has been passed on intergenerationally. m a k i n g c h a n g e p a r t n e r b a s e d . the approaches canada and several other countries have used in trying to make change have lacked the needed consultation. as a signatory to the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip), canada has a commitment to respect and support the individual and collective rights of indigenous peoples outlined in the declaration (united nations, 2008). as peters pointed out (2013): 43% 54% 61% 62% 28% 38% 44% 42% 0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 1996 2001 2006 2011 non-aboriginal aboriginal while undrip is an aspirational document and does not have legal force, it is a powerful statement of the common concerns of indigenous peoples around the world. the articles of the declaration related to education reiterate what indigenous organizations in canada have been saying for decades: indigenous peoples have the right to control their own educational systems, provide education in their own languages and cultures, and to have the dignity and diversity of their cultures respected and reflected in educational institutions. (p. 204) the federal government of canada recently released a draft first nations education act (aboriginal affairs and northern development canada, 2013b; see also aboriginal affairs and northern development canada, 2013a). this proposal has been met by real opposition by first nations leaders. chief morley googoo, who chairs the assembly of first nations (afn) educational council, has stated that the act is unacceptable: “the proposal doesn’t acknowledge that first nations are ready to take care of their own education systems and programs” (cited in roman, 2013, para. 5). the afn has pointed out that there simply was not enough consultation on the content and it was not a partnership driven process. as well, critics have pointed out that there is no commitment by the government to resource the provisions of the new act (richards & mendelson, 2013). the final reality relates to: b a s i c i n e q u a l i t i e s . education is not an end in itself. we learn from formal institutions and our family, elders, and mentors throughout our lives. however, when it comes to attending school and all that entails, we want to put that learning to good use. in a way, people are drawn to engage in educational processes because they see a value in doing so. for a young person in piapot saskatchewan or nunavut to choose to stay in school, they need know there is a purpose: that is one of the elephants in the room. poor employment opportunities, lack of economic development, and other related conditions will discourage high school completion and dissuade youth from continuing to post-secondary education. therefore, economic inequalities are also a crucial part of the problem. we hope this edition of the international indigenous policy journal makes a contribution to the discussion taking place today in canada and other countries. r e f e r e n c e s aboriginal affairs and northern development canada. (2013a). developing a first nation education act. ottawa: author. aboriginal affairs and northern development canada. (2013b). working together for first nation students: a proposal for a bill on first nation education. ottawa: author. gordon, c., & white, j. p. (2013, october). supply side of aboriginal post-secondary education in canada. paper presented at the conference on indigenous issues in post-secondary education: transitions to the workplace, toronto. mendelson, m. (2006). aboriginal peoples and post-secondary education. ottawa: caledon institute of social policy. peters, j. (2013). selected cases on the continuum of first nations learning. doctoral dissertation in submission, department of sociology, western university. richards, j., & mendelson, m. (2013, november 7). time to negotiate a schools act for first nations (op. ed.). the globe and mail. retrieved from http://www.theglobeandmail.com/globedebate/time-to-negotiate-a-schools-act-for-first-nations/article15308627/ roman, k. (2013, october 24). first nations education act gets wary reception. cbc news. retrieved from http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/first-nations-education-act-draft-gets-wary-reception1.2187858 statistics canada. (1996). census of population, 1996 (table 94f0009xdb96001). retrieved from http://www12.statcan.gc.ca/english/census01/info/census96.cfm statistics canada. (2001). 2001 census of canada (catalogue number 99-012-x2001042). retrieved from http://www12.statcan.ca/english/census01/home/index.cfm statistics canada. (2006). 2006 census of population (catalogue number 97-560-xcb2006028). retrieved from http://www12.statcan.gc.ca/census-recensement/2006/index-eng.cfm statistics canada. (2011). 2011 national household survey (catalogue no. 99-012-x2011044). retrieved from http://www12.statcan.gc.ca/nhs-enm/index-eng.cfm stonechild, b. (2006). the new buffalo: the struggle for aboriginal post-secondary education in canada. winnipeg: university of manitoba press. united nations. (2008). united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples. retrieved from www.un.org/esa/socdev/unpfii/documents/drips_en.pdf wolfe, b., & haveman, r. (2001). accounting for the social and non-market benefits of education. in j. f. helliwell (ed.), the contribution of human and social capital to sustained economic growth and wellbeing (pp. 221 – 250). retrieved from http://www.oecd.org/innovation/research/1825109.pdf the international indigenous policy journal october 2013 editors’ commentary: the challenges in improving indigenous educational attainment jerry p. white julie peters recommended citation editors’ commentary: the challenges in improving indigenous educational attainment abstract keywords creative commons license editorsâ•ž commentary: the challenges in improving indigenous educational attainment aboriginal populations: social demographic and epidemiological perspectives the international indigenous policy journal volume 6 | issue 1 article 1 january 2015 aboriginal populations: social demographic and epidemiological perspectives don kerr king's university college at western university, dkerr@uwo.ca recommended citation kerr, d. (2015). aboriginal populations: social demographic and epidemiological perspectives. the international indigenous policy journal, 6(1). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.1 aboriginal populations: social demographic and epidemiological perspectives abstract this edited collection provides a valuable overview of aboriginal demography, with a primary yet not exclusive emphasis upon canadian research. it provides the reader with much insight not only into the major demographic, sociological, and health trends to characterize aboriginal peoples, but also some of the most serious conceptual and methodological issues that hinder research of this nature. with additional contributions from the united states, australia, new zealand, as well as the circumpolar northern regions of greenland, norway, sweden, finland, and russia, this book also addresses how aboriginal conditions in these countries may resemble or differ from those in canada. for this reason, this edited collection is valuable to those who are interested in using demographic, socioeconomic, and epidemiological data as a basis for guiding policy, both in canada and internationally. the contributions are by and large non-technical in nature and, for this reason, accessible to a wide readership. keywords demography, epidemiology, identity, census, survey research creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ book review aboriginal populations: social demographic and epidemiological perspectives edited by frank trovato & anatole romaniuk. (2014). the university of alberta press. isbn: 978-0-88864-625-5. available from http://www.uap.ualberta.ca/uap.asp?lid=41&bookid=1054 this edited collection provides a valuable overview of aboriginal demography, with a primary yet not exclusive emphasis upon canadian research. it provides the reader with much insight not only into the major demographic, sociological, and health trends to characterize aboriginal peoples, but also some of the most serious conceptual and methodological issues that hinder research of this nature. with additional contributions from the united states, australia, new zealand, as well as the circumpolar northern regions of greenland, norway, sweden, finland, and russia, this book also addresses how aboriginal conditions in these countries may resemble or differ from those in canada. for this reason, this edited collection is valuable to those who are interested in using demographic, socioeconomic, and epidemiological data as a basis for guiding policy, both in canada and internationally. the contributions are by and large non-technical in nature and, for this reason, accessible to a wide readership. demographic research on the aboriginal population is fraught with methodological and conceptual challenges, and several of the authors in this book explicitly address these sorts of difficulties. of particular concern in establishing sound policy, or for that matter in documenting social, economic, and/or epidemiological change over time, is the need to clearly delineate a target population for research. yet, this basic endeavor has been far from straight forward when conducting research on the aboriginal population of canada. the simple reality is that a substantial (yet unknown) number of canadians have some form of aboriginal ancestry, regardless of how many report in the canadian census. the aboriginal population has never evolved in isolation; that is, it has been impacted by a very long history of cultural exchange, mixed unions, intermarriage, and cultural and linguistic assimilation. while demographers have access to high quality data on total population size and distribution of canadians defined in terms of territory (province or territory, census metropolitan area, census tract, etc.), there are fundamental obstacles encountered whenever attempting to document population size or demographic change for populations defined in terms of ancestry or cultural identity. this has always been true in charting the cultural diversity of canada’s population, and has been shown to be particularly problematic in past efforts to makes sense of the demographic history of first peoples in canada. briefly, there is a substantial element of imprecision that enters into demographic research whenever focusing in on a population defined in terms of ancestry or cultural origin, as ultimately social scientists rely upon how persons might self-report or identify in a census or a survey. consider a few statistics: the chapter by goldman and deli reports that about a half century ago, in 1961, the dominion bureau of statistics (later to become statistics canada) documented only about 220,000 persons of aboriginal ancestry. this was clearly an undercount. earlier in the 20 th century, this figure was even lower, at only about 100,000 in the 1911 census. much like with the influence of canada’s first peoples on the shapes and habits of this country, 1 kerr: aboriginal populations published by scholarship@western, 2015 it is reasonable to conclude that its demographic weight has also been seriously understated in the historical time series. as was pointed out elsewhere by john ralston saul, canada’s history and national identity was initially defined by its “triangular reality” of the first peoples to inhabit it, and later the french in new france and the british colonists to follow. yet perhaps just as the cultural impact of first peoples on canadian society and its institutions has consistently been understated, so too has its relative demographic weight from a historical point of view. more recently, this situation has corrected itself. by 1991, the canadian census reported a near quintupling of this ancestry-based population relative to 1961, up to over 1,002,675. while this book stops at the 2006 census, let us fast-forward to the 2011 national household survey (nhs) and again this figure is up dramatically, to over 1,836,000 million canadians. in other words, while canada’s total population has grown by roughly 50 percent since 1961, persons reporting aboriginal ancestry increased by about 9 fold! to add to the complexity of this situation, statistics canada moves beyond ancestry to highlight what it calls the “aboriginal identity” population in its official publications, with the idea that some persons who report ancestry might not identify as being an aboriginal person. in the 2011 nhs, 1,400,685 canadians responded affirmatively to the identity question: “are you (is this person) an aboriginal person, that is, first nations (north american indian), métis or inuk (inuit)?” the distinction between the “ancestry” and “identity” was first introduced with the 1991 census, with the rationale that many persons who report ancestry have only a very loose or distant tie with their aboriginal ancestry. perhaps unexpected has been the phenomenal growth since 1991 in not only the ancestry-based population but also the identity-based population, up by 83% and 128% respectively. the chapter by guimond, robitaille, and senécal demonstrates how demography alone (births and deaths) is far from capable of explaining this dramatic population increase. the obvious explanation for the aforementioned growth relates to a shift in the manner in which canadians “self-identify” in the census (a process referred to by these authors as “ethnic mobility”). verma’s chapter demonstrates how past attempts to project the aboriginal populations have radically failed, as projection models traditionally consider the impact of birth, deaths, and migration alone. goldman and delic point out that while the aboriginal population of canada can be thought of as essentially “closed” from a demographic perspective (i.e., it increases only via natural increase, or births minus deaths, and is only negligibly impacted by international migration), it is far from being closed in the sense that other factors beyond “natural increase” impact upon it. while other chapters in this text demonstrate how the fertility and mortality conditions known to characterize first peoples have contributed to a relatively robust growth rate over time (see romaniuk’s comprehensive historical overview for example), demography alone cannot come anywhere close to explaining this phenomenal growth as observed in official statistics. in this context, what is the demographer, sociologist, or epidemiologist to do in making sense of demographic data? how does one chart the progress, or lack thereof, of first peoples relative to other canadians when the data as available in the census seems to lack temporal reliability? as pointed out by trovato and romaniuk in their introductory chapter, an uncritical reliance on census data can potentially lead to incorrect conclusions on the state of socioeconomic improvements in the aboriginal populations, and possibly lead to wrong policies. for example, while the aboriginal population might be better educated in 2011 than in 2001, how much of this is due to gains as made among the indigenous population in completing secondary school and 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.1 attending tertiary education and how much is merely due to having a climbing proportion of better educated people reporting aboriginal identity? while there have been some recent efforts—not mentioned in this book—on the part of statistics canada to disentangle some of these changes over time (via record linkage work with the 2001 census and 2011 nhs), this fundamental problem remains in the time series and can be considered a major obstacle to canadian researchers. other chapters highlight additional difficulties, yet one might add, this book is not forthright in terms of proposing alternatives to the status quo in terms of census data collection. in a particularly critical chapter on past government practices and the manner in which census data has been collected and interpreted, andersen argues that some of the categories developed by government officials and administrators appear to have almost taken on a life of their own, having more to do with what he labels “administrative convenience” than the measurement of “ancestry or cultural identity.” as a case in point, andersen considers the census category “métis,” which in his opinion captures a population that “has no real or no consistent basis of personal affiliation based on culture and belonging.” andersen may very well have a point in this context—consider the fact that only about 50,000 persons reported métis ancestry in 1961 (largely in manitoba, saskatchewan, and northwestern ontario)—whereas in the 2011 nhs, over 450,000 persons reported “métis identity,” across virtually all regions of the country. increasingly, this category appears to have become a catchall for persons who have some mixed european and aboriginal descent, without carefully distinguishing the nature of this ancestry or identity. andersen asks in this context, what “self-identification as métis in recent censuses might mean,” as a category that in his opinion has “no consistent basis of personal affiliation based on culture and belonging.” this category certainly captures much more than what was traditionally thought of as “métis culture.” for example, think of the “métis of red river, manitoba or the south branch métis of saskatchewan. with regard to these latter groups, we can think of common culture, identified in terms of a shared history, common ties and ancestry, unique language (michif, with various regional dialects), extensive kinship connections, collective consciousness, and distinct way of life in a specific territory or “homeland.” contrast this with the category of “métis” as collected via the census, which for andersen should not be considered a simple and straight forward form of ethnicity (though it contains elements of ethnicity within it), but more so an artifact of census procedure and measurement. in terms of policy implications, peters, maaka, and laliberté argue that the reliance upon these broad census categories can become problematic to the extent that “aggregation may result in a lack of support for initiatives that address specific needs and values of specific communities.” while demography is a discipline noted for its success in drawing generalization, there are potential hazards in terms of policy if one overlooks the diversity and heterogeneity of populations. understood, but what alterative might be proposed? as a recommendation, peters et al. suggest that the categories available for self-identification of aboriginal people in the census move to more specific identities. in turn, their chapter is constructive in pointing out that regardless of “census practices” (which asks whether one identifies, in a generic sense, as being “indian,” “aboriginal,” “first nations,” or “metis”), most persons when directly asked tend to self-identify as being part of specific subgroups (e.g., cree, ojibway, dene, red river métis, etc.). in fact, this is demonstrated through their own survey research in saskatoon. 3 kerr: aboriginal populations published by scholarship@western, 2015 the argument follows that census collection procedures tend to simplify, or aggregate, which is potentially problematic to the extent that this homogenizes indigenous identities. yet, it should be recalled that statistics canada also has its ancestry item in the census, which is open ended and does not force persons into specific identities. persons merely “self-identify” their ancestry, with up to four potential responses collected. using this information, along with specific geography or territory, it is potentially possible to conduct some rather detailed analyses. the territory now referred to as canada has always been noted for its remarkable cultural diversity (both before and after colonization by europe). yet, this issue of how we can best capture this diversity is far from straightforward, and analysts at statistics canada have been struggling with these issues for decades. inevitably, the census is limited in terms of what is possible, although the ancestry item in itself can potentially complement the aboriginal identity item in capturing greater detail in terms of culture, ethnicity, and/or ancestry. other chapters in this book are more specific in terms of focus: for example, the chapter by trovato completely bypasses this issue of “identity” by shifting the emphasis to the “registered indian” population (i.e., indigenous persons who for a variety of historic and political reasons hold legal indian status by virtue of the indian act). aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aancd) currently maintains the “indian registry system” (including information on the registration of all births and deaths to status indians), which has long allowed for the analysis of past fertility and mortality patterns. trovato’s analysis demonstrates the utility of this data: he charts the substantial gains that have been made in terms of mortality and life expectancy over the last 50 years, although quite disturbingly, status indian life expectancy continues to be 6 to 7 years lower than what is experienced by other canadians. with the indian registry, real demographic change is far easier to chart over time, as inclusion in this dataset is defined in terms of the indian act as opposed to “self identification.” similarly, voyageur makes reference to this same population as she highlights the gains observed over recent years in terms of education, human capital, not to mention important progress in terms of building more resilient community. while she partially relies on the census, with all of its aforementioned issues, she finds room for optimism in reading the data as available. as she writes, “first nations peoples have embraced meritocracy and are gaining educational credentials, starting businesses, and being elected into mainstream politics. they are raising their profiles and are working to shatter the stereotypes held by some mainstream citizens.” frideres also bypasses these difficulties associated with “identity” or “ancestry” by focusing on language use, which has always been far easier to measure in the census. in turn, the focus of his chapter is on the precarious status of most indigenous languages spoken in canada—there is no debating this basic fact. of the 60 languages, a substantial number are shown to be seriously endangered due to a low level of language transmission across generations. of particular interest here is his effort to link various structural factors (employment, education, income) to measures of linguistic continuity over time. other interesting contributions in this collection includes king’s epidemiological study highlighting the so-called “social determinants of health;” whereas whitehead and kobayashi’s take a rather different approach with an emphasis upon the more immediate “proximate causes of health” (poor diet, alcoholism) characteristic of specific disadvantaged communities. young’s chapter on “north-south disparities” draws systematic comparisons across canada, the united states, russia, as well as several scandinavian countries, demonstrating the importance of regional education levels in predicting and explaining health disparities. other international contributions of note include snipp’s insightful analysis of 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.1 american indian educational system, as well as contributions by prout, kukutai, and pool on the living conditions and demographic behavior of indigenous populations living in australia and new zealand. the similarities, as experienced by the indigenous populations across these various settings, can at times be striking to say the least. in sum, this book is of fundamental utility to those conducting research on aboriginal populations. trovato and romaniuk have brought forward a collection of papers of very high quality, many of which engage the reader in terms of some of the most difficult conceptual and methodological issues to characterize research of this nature. these issues are of fundamental importance to those working with demographic, epidemiological, and socioeconomic data, which in turn has immediate implications to those engaged in policy and administration. far from ignoring or obscuring some of the more difficult issues encountered in conducting demographic research of this nature, this book takes on these issues head on. for this reason, i consider this book as making an important contribution to the literature and a required reading to researchers, policy analysts, teachers, and students of social demography and native studies. d. kerr king's university college at western university 5 kerr: aboriginal populations published by scholarship@western, 2015 the international indigenous policy journal january 2015 aboriginal populations: social demographic and epidemiological perspectives don kerr recommended citation aboriginal populations: social demographic and epidemiological perspectives abstract keywords creative commons license microsoft word 421353-convertdoc.input.409279.7_dog.docx the portrayal of indigenous health in selected australian media the international indigenous policy journal volume 5 | issue 1 article 5 january 2014 the portrayal of indigenous health in selected australian media melissa j. stoneham curtin university, m.stoneham@curtin.edu.au jodie goodman curtin university mike daube curtin university recommended citation stoneham, m. j. , goodman, j. , daube, m. (2014). he portrayal of indigenous health in selected australian media. the international indigenous policy journal, 5(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.5 the portrayal of indigenous health in selected australian media abstract it is acknowledged that health outcomes for australian indigenous peoples are lower than those of nonindigenous australians. research suggests negative media in relation to indigenous australians perpetuates racist stereotypes among the wider population and impacts on the health of indigenous australians. this study examined the media portrayal of indigenous australian public health issues in selected media over a twelve month period and found that, overwhelmingly, the articles were negative in their portrayal of indigenous health. a total of 74 percent of the coverage of australian indigenous related articles were negative, 15 percent were positive, and 11 percent were neutral. the most common negative subject descriptors related to alcohol, child abuse, petrol sniffing, violence, suicide, deaths in custody, and crime. keywords indigenous, australia, media, health, news reporting creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ p o r t r a y a l o f i n d i g e n o u s h e a l t h i n s e l e c t e d a u s t r a l i a n m e d i a aboriginal and torres strait islanders (herein referred to as indigenous australian) comprise three percent of the australian population (australian government, 2013). distributed across the continent, indigenous australians are one of the most linguistically and culturally diverse populations in the world. it is commonly acknowledged that health outcomes for this group are lower than those of non-indigenous australians. although progress has been made in closing the gap, indigenous australians continue to experience a lower life expectancy with the current gap between indigenous and non-indigenous estimated at 11.5 years for males and 9.7 years for females (australian bureau of statistics, 2010). traditionally, the responsibility for tackling ill health has fallen to the health sector. while delivering health to those in need is one of the social determinants of health, the high burden of illness in many cases is due to the poor environmental conditions in which people are born, grow, live, work, and age. these unequal conditions are, in turn, a product of bad politics, poor social policies and programs, and unfair economic arrangements (world health organisation, 2008). according to calma (2013), the poor health of indigenous australians is a result of a failure to realise the right to health for indigenous australians. indigenous australians have not had the same opportunities to be as healthy as other australians or been able to take effective action to remedy long-standing and substantial health inequalities due to the relationship with mainstream society and services. making sense of the cultural health status of australian indigenous peoples requires an understanding of the relationship between the colonisation process, trauma, and its impact on health. the trauma, grief, pain, and anger that have resulted from the assimilation, segregation, and protectionist policies of the past are still present in the lives of australian indigenous people (hearn & wise, 2004). a parallel consideration is the definition that australian indigenous peoples have of health. the social and emotional wellbeing framework, developed by the australian government, acknowledges that wellbeing is part of a holistic understanding of life, integrating the life-death-life cycle. it recognises this whole-of-life view of health is essential to achieve positive life outcomes for australian indigenous peoples (department of health and ageing, 2004). although not recognised as a specific wellbeing factor within the above document, land has a powerful and persuasive underlying influence on australian indigenous wellbeing (garnett & sithole, 2007). the dispossession of australian indigenous people from their land and the subsequent loss of social, cultural, and financial capital has had a devastating effect on the health of indigenous people worldwide (hearn & wise, 2004). one of the factors impacting on the relationship of indigenous australians with mainstream society is the way in which the media portray indigenous people and issues. there is growing research that suggests negative media portrayals in relation to indigenous australians perpetuates racist stereotypes among the wider population and that this type of racism has a major impact on the health of indigenous australians (coffin, 2007; larson, gillies, howard & coffin, 2007; sweet, 2009). similarly, in new zealand, a number of mass media studies identified that mãori health is often framed in the deficit model (robson & reid, 2001); the media are routinely reporting that the mãori peoples are over-represented in national disease statistics (rankine et al., 2008) and are persistently constructed as sicker and poorer than members of the dominant cultural group (moewaka barnes et al., 2005). nairn, pega, mccreanor, rankine, and barnes (2006) also looked at media representation of māori peoples in new zealand and highlighted a number of examples where the media perpetuated racist discourse by using language that framed stories in a particular way (e.g., 1 stoneham et al.: portrayal of indigenous health published by scholarship@western, 2014 needy, passive objects of settler help), using only selective facts while leaving out crucial information, and excluding or conforming mãori stories to fit a certain ideology. this study aimed to examine the media portrayal of indigenous australians’ public health issues in selected media over a 12-month period. the objective was to determine the extent to which the portrayal was negative, positive, or neutral. m e t h o d s the data for this article were taken from the public health advocacy institute of western australia (phaiwa) mediawatch project. for context, western australia occupies the entire western third of australia and has a population of approximately 2.5 million people. of these, just under 90,000 are indigenous australians (australian bureau of statistics, 2012). the mediawatch daily service collates and distributes data on the types and variety of health-related issues covered in selected news services. the service ascertains the coverage of public health and advocacy related topics in print media in the west australian (western australia based paper; monday – saturday), the australian (national paper; monday – saturday), the sunday times (western australia based paper; sundays), and from the national australian broadcasting corporation (abc) online news service. mediawatch is collated in a table format and provides the following information: date, sources, section, page and/or weblink, topic(s), headline and summary or précis of the article. the aim of the present review was to capture information on australian indigenous health reporting including the identification of whether each story was positive, negative, or neutral. all articles from january to december 2012 were scanned and selected according to their relevance to australian indigenous health. to retrieve media stories relevant to indigenous australians’ health, a matrix of search terms comprising four categories was developed. the categories and examples of search terms were as follows: indigenous australian terms (e.g., aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples, first nation, etc.); public health issues identified as a priority issue addressed by phaiwa (e.g., injury, alcohol, environment and health, obesity, child health, etc.); public health risk factor terms (e.g., fast food, sugar, hygiene, sanitation, suicide, education, etc.); and geographic terms (e.g., remote, regional, metropolitan, etc.). as phaiwa operates on a social determinants of health philosophy, a broad range of risk factors that had the ability to impact on health and wellbeing were included. where permissible, boolean or proximity searching within terms was used, allowing the combination of search terms to enable enhanced targeting of more specific areas. for example, the term alcohol appeared in the matrix and with boolean or proximity searching could represent multiple terms such as alcohol-free communities or dry communities or alcohol abuse. articles were excluded if they had a non-australian focus, had a health care or health care providers focus, or had a specific clinical treatment focus. during 2012, phaiwa’s mediawatch program recorded 6,205 articles related to public health, advocacy, and phaiwa’s priority topics. the search strategy for australian indigenous articles yielded a total of 335 (5%) articles that uniquely addressed australian indigenous health. these articles were included for more detailed coding via a coding instrument and analysis. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.5 two experienced coders who collect data daily for the generic mediawatch service were used to code and analyse the australian indigenous articles. the project manager provided the coders with additional training to capture and extract relevant information using the specific australian indigenous matrix of descriptive search terms. the coding instrument used in this study included items (n = 42 coding items) distributed across the following two major areas: publication sources (i.e., publication, date, headline) and news story message content, which included the following subcategories��� • negative focus (e.g., abuse, racism, discrimination, inequity, poor, unhealthy, etc.), • positive focus (e.g. successful, healthy, cultural security, etc.), and • neutral focus (i.e., neither negative or positive). coding items within these subcategories consisted of a checklist of predetermined content terms (or keyword phases). however, given the diverse manners in which positive and negative health issues were described in the media, some terms were added throughout the analysis and related to rarely used adjectives (e.g., disgusting), similes, tonal qualities (e.g., sarcasm or emotional language), and metaphor use. each coder independently coded all sample stories and inter-coder reliability was supervised and established by the project manager. any discrepancies, including the addition of new content terms, were reviewed and resolved through consensus between the trained coders and project manager. descriptive analyses entailing categorical and frequency distribution were conducted to examine the profile of the articles’ content related to two areas: (1) publication type; and (2) the news stories’ content features, including the articles’ primary focus (i.e. positive, negative, or neutral). an article’s primary focus (i.e., positive, negative, or neutral) was determined by a combination of its headline, first paragraph, and the majority of text content. after reading the entire article, coders determined the primary focus. r e s u l t s when examining those articles with relevance to australian indigenous health, the articles were overwhelmingly negative in their portrayal of australian indigenous health. the negative articles comprised 74 percent of the coverage of australian indigenous related articles, with positive coverage amounting to 15 percent. neutral coverage totalled 11 percent. the most common subject descriptors for the negative australian indigenous related articles included alcohol, child abuse, petrol sniffing, violence, suicide, deaths in custody, and crime. figure 1 shows a breakdown of the categorised articles by negativity, positivity, and neutrality. figures 2 and 3 show the breakdown of the negative and positive australian indigenous news articles by subject descriptor and indicate the most common negative subjects covered in the media articles related to alcohol, child abuse, petrol sniffing, domestic violence, deaths in custody, and crime. the four most common positive subject descriptors included education, role modelling for health, sports, and employment. 3 stoneham et al.: portrayal of indigenous health published by scholarship@western, 2014 ! ! ! ! f i g u r e 1 . p e r c e n t a g e o f n e w s a r t i c l e s c a t e g o r i s e d a s n e g a t i v e , p o s i t i v e , o r n e u t r a l i n t h e i r p o r t r a y a l o f a u s t r a l i a n i n d i g e n o u s h e a l t h . ! ! 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 negative positive neutral pe rc en ta ge o f a rt ic le s 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.5 ! ! f i g u r e 2 . p e r c e n t a g e o f n e w s a r t i c l e s c a t e g o r i s e d a s n e g a t i v e b y s p e c i f i c s u b j e c t d e s c r i p t o r . 0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 al co ho l ch ild pr ot ec tio n/ ab us e/ ne gle ct/ de ve lop me nt pe tro l sn iffi ng fa mi ly/ do me sti c v iol en ce su ici de /y ou th su ici de de ath s i n c us to dy /c us tu dy cr im e in dig en ou s d isa dv an tag e ea r d ise ase fu nd ing dr ug s en vir on me nt al he alt h sm ok ing ho me les sn ess ed uc ati on ec on om ic m en tal he alt h ca nc er em plo ym en t ho us ing he alt h s er vic e d eli ve ry he art di sea se de me nt ia di ab ete s ey e d ise ase ot he r pe rc en ta ge o f a rt ic le s 5 stoneham et al.: portrayal of indigenous health published by scholarship@western, 2014 ! ! ! ! ! f i g u r e 3 . p e r c e n t a g e o f n e w s a r t i c l e s c a t e g o r i z e d a s p o s i t i v e b y s p e c i f i c s u b j e c t d e s c r i p t o r . 0 5 10 15 20 25 ed uc ati on ind ige no us ad vo cat es/ rol e m od el sp or t em plo ym en t he alt h s erv ice de liv ery ch ild he alt h/ rig hts ar ts fu nd ing so cia l p rog ram s ch ron ic dis eas e cu ltu re al co ho l pe rc en ta ge o f a rt ic le s 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.5 d i s c u s s i o n negative news reporting not only impacts upon the self-esteem of australian indigenous people, but also serves to perpetuate and justify negative australian indigenous stereotypes among the mainstream society and the prejudice and discrimination that is associated with such stereotypes (balvin & kashima, 2012). it is argued that such discrimination should be acknowledged as an “upstream” determinant of health. until changes occur in the way the dominant australian culture perceives and behaves towards australian indigenous people, public health, education, and employment initiatives may prove futile in efforts to reduce health inequalities (larson et al., 2007). the findings from this small media content analysis project, which found that, during 2012, 74 percent of articles in selected media about indigenous australians were negative, show the type of coverage that researchers and practitioners involved in australian indigenous health are increasingly concerned about. this predominantly negative, stereotypical portrayal of australian indigenous communities has devastating effects. racism that is perpetuated by influential figures in the public domain, in this case the media as the storytellers of our society, is particularly devastating in that it fuels racist attitudes among the general public (nairn et al., 2011; van dijk, 1993). as prominent australian indigenous child health advocate fiona stanley argued, “the more that the dominant culture reports negative stories about aboriginal people, the more that aboriginal children feel bad about being aboriginal” (cited in sweet, 2009:3). yet, it is not only children who are affected by this type of negative stereotyping. the disadvantage that indigenous australians suffer is a result of racism and oppression. when australian indigenous people are persistently portrayed as drunks, welfare dependents, and violent perpetrators, these stereotypes are often internalised and a sense of shame is experienced, which then presents barriers to participating in mainstream society, creating a cycle of disadvantage. other pathways between racism and health include stress and other negative emotions; health damaging coping strategies such as drugs, alcohol, and smoking; and unequal access to health services and other resources required for health such as employment and housing (nairn et al., 2006; paradies, harris & anderson, 2008; ziersch, gallaher, baum, & bentley, 2011). no one would argue that it is easy to generate negative stories about australian indigenous communities when we have reports stating that the estimated gap between indigenous and nonindigenous people’s life expectancy in australia is greater than in new zealand, canada, and the united states of america (australian institute of health and welfare [aihw], 2011), as well as the fact that australian indigenous mortality rates are 4 to 5 times higher than non-indigenous rates for people aged 25to 54-years (aihw, 2013) and that australian indigenous employment rates fell from 48 percent in 2006 to 46.2 percent in 2011 (australian bureau of statistics, 2012) and more than 26 percent of australia’s adult prisoners are indigenous, even though they represent just 2.5 percent of the country’s total population (leigh, 2012). although these issues are important to highlight, particularly from an advocacy perspective, they tell only half the story and rarely provide positive aspects or hopes for the future. the challenge is to draw attention to these issues and create a balanced view of australian indigenous health to policymakers. it would not be appropriate to criticise or blame the media in isolation for negative portrayals of australian indigenous health and other disadvantaged groups. advocates for australian indigenous health and wellbeing often draw attention to the disadvantages faced by australian indigenous people. indeed, the close the gap campaign is based on the premise that there should be more action to remedy the aboriginal life expectancy gap, and to achieve health and life expectation equality for australia’s aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples (council of australian governments [coag], 2007). drawing attention to problems such as these is a legitimate and 7 stoneham et al.: portrayal of indigenous health published by scholarship@western, 2014 well-tried approach for those who seek to generate action. media coverage of disadvantage and negative outcomes is often presented by journalists not simply as a good story, but in response to comments by advocates for action and as a means of expressing and generating concern and outrage as part of seeking change. there is also an important and legitimate role for media in reporting and commenting on reports that provide evidence of disadvantage. the intent of this article is not to criticise media for its portrayals, but to point to the opportunities for positive stories and to encourage health and other advocates to provide these stories to the media. there is a responsibility for those working in the field – academics, advocates, and others – to identify the good news and draw this to the attention of the media. the perception that media are generally more interested in presenting bad news than good news is well founded in reality (downie & kaiser, 2002). nonetheless, there is often a receptive audience for positive stories, particularly if well prepared and presented to appropriate media. those concerned with generating change should not be discouraged from publicising the data that makes their case, but should be encouraged to seek out and provide media with the many positive stories that can help to portray australian indigenous communities and people much more optimistically. one example of success in changing attitudes and beliefs towards positiveness is reflected in the work of chapman who has achieved significant results in his efforts at media advocacy to change health policy, attitudes, and behaviours around issues such as tobacco control (chapman, 2007), cancer (mckenzie, chapman, holding, & mcgeechan, 2007) and obesity (bonfiglioli, king, smith, chapman & holding, 2007). in 2008, the health research council of new zealand funded a project titled, media, health and wellbeing, with the aim being to improve media coverage in aotearoa (paradies et al., 2008). the public health advocacy institute of western australia has published a series of australian indigenous storybooks that portray only positive stories describing how individuals or organisations have improved the health and wellbeing of their communities. these positive stories, written largely by australian indigenous practitioners, look more deeply into issues and illustrate responsible and less sensationalist reporting on a diverse range of topics and issues including personal journeys, aboriginal art, language, education, sport, environmental stewardship, and preventive health projects (public health advocacy institute of western australia, 2013). similar advocacy efforts to change the style of media reporting and mainstream attitudes towards australian indigenous issues are needed. r e c o m m e n d a t i o n s changes in attitudes and beliefs can be achieved through a range of measures including mass media campaigns, media advocacy, and other approaches such as university courses that target prejudice and false beliefs (balvin & kashima, 2012; paradies, 2005). upskilling australian indigenous advocates in media advocacy is required. the public health advocacy institute of western australia (2013) conducts media training, and in our experience, many australian indigenous activists are not media savvy and have difficulty in getting their message out. specialised advocacy training for australian indigenous practitioners may be one way of balancing the power relationship between journalists and australian indigenous people and could be an achievable strategy for public health professionals to pursue. public health advocacy institute of western australia has also acknowledged that many australian indigenous people are hesitant about interacting with the media as they are often portrayed as always fighting and lacking leadership. sweet (2009) recommended that, if the media wanted to engage a 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.5 broader range of australian indigenous voices and expertise, they would have to learn to work differently and invest the time needed to develop respectful relationships and trust. therefore, a role for media organisations would be to develop ethical media policies and procedures that promote fair reporting of issues relating to australian indigenous communities, in addition to attending regular training on how to better promote cultural diversity in reporting. encouraging australian indigenous students to pursue university with a major in journalism would, in the longer term, ensure a balanced view to the reporting of australian indigenous issues. although this article has highlighted a number of examples to generate positive stories around indigenous health issues, there is a clear need for more applied research and interventions to determine how best to combat negative stereotyping. public health advocates need to reflect on their practices, underlying values, and assumptions. there is a need to continue to challenge cultural norms and values and take more responsibility for counteracting the negative effects of routine media portrayal of australian indigenous peoples through many avenues. these may include the submission of letters to the editor of print media to respond to a negative story, the drafting of positive media releases, and ensuring efforts are not tokenistic but rather concerted and committed. l i m i t a t i o n s as with all studies focused on the content of news texts alone, a limitation of this study is that we are unable to draw any conclusions about the impact of coverage on individual or community behaviours. content analysis, however, is a valuable method to examine the context of communication around health. though this study was exploratory in nature, it offers a first look at the landscape of the framing of messages and media around australian indigenous issues and could be used in future efforts to leverage the power of the media’s role to improve health communication and public education about australian indigenous issues and reporting protocols. finally, the inductive approach to some description terms, where additional adjectives were added to the coding list as the analysis progressed, may have led to bias. c o n c l u s i o n based on the results from this study, mainstream media misrepresents indigenous australians as drunks, child abusers, and petrol sniffers. these are a serious public health issues, but the majority of indigenous australians live without the over-consumption of alcohol, domestic violence, and the sniffing of petrol. the nature of media influence is constantly changing. yet, the power and ever increasing potential of the media remains constant. positive media waits to be tapped by those who advocate for “closing the gap” and improving australian indigenous health. media can be a vehicle that constantly reminds people to value our first australians and can be an advocacy tool to achieve policy change. yet, with 74 percent of the selected media offerings from this study portraying negative stories about australian indigenous health, there is a continuing role for public health professionals to remain vigilant, seek out and report positive stories, and provide ongoing media advocacy training to minimise these negative influences. continual portrayals of australian indigenous communities in a 9 stoneham et al.: portrayal of indigenous health published by scholarship@western, 2014 negative manner only perpetuate ignorance in a world much closer in proximity than ever before, and a media industry that is driven by negative stories. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.5 r e f e r e n c e s australian bureau of statistics. 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(2011). responding to racism: insights on how racism can damage health from an urban study of australian aboriginal people. social science and medicine, 73, 1045 1053. ! 13 stoneham et al.: portrayal of indigenous health published by scholarship@western, 2014 the international indigenous policy journal january 2014 the portrayal of indigenous health in selected australian media melissa j. stoneham jodie goodman mike daube recommended citation the portrayal of indigenous health in selected australian media abstract keywords creative commons license the portrayal of indigenous health in selected australian media barriers and levers for the implementation of ocap™ the international indigenous policy journal volume 5 issue 2 the governance of indigenous information article 3 april 2014 barriers and levers for the implementation of ocap™ * first nations information governance centre bmackay@fnigc.ca recommended citation first nations information governance centre, *. (2014). barriers and levers for the implementation of ocap™. the international indigenous policy journal, 5(2). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.2.3 barriers and levers for the implementation of ocap™ abstract this article discusses the obstacles to and supports for the implementation of the first nations principles of ocap™, specifically in the context of data holdings within aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc) and the government of canada. it cites three types of barriers (legal, knowledge and capacity, and institutional) that obstruct ocap™ and examines how federal legislation such as the privacy act and access to information act undermine these first nations principles. it continues by exploring supports available to help operationalize ocap™, including legal, policy, knowledge and capacity-based levers. it concludes by outlining how anndc’s increased knowledge about ocap™ could help support capacity building in first nations communities. keywords ocap, first nations, governance, data, information, stewardship, privacy, fnigc acknowledgments krista yao (nadjiwan law), contributor creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/     b a r r i e r s a n d l e v e r s f o r t h e i m p l e m e n t a t i o n o f o c a p ™ since its creation in 1998, the first nations principles ocap™ have become the de facto ethical standard not only for conducting research using first nations data, but also for the collection and management of first nations information in general.1 a set of principles that lay out the ground rules for how first nations data can and should be used, ocap™ (which stands for ownership, control, access and possession) provides guidance to communities about why, how, and by whom their information is collected, used, or shared. ocap™ reflects first nation commitments to use and share information in a way that brings benefit to the community, while minimizing harm. through the elements of ownership, control, access, and possession first nations are able to express their values related to community privacy and information governance. ocap™ was created by the first nations information governance centre (fnigc) to help guide the development of the first nations regional health survey (fnrhs), the only first nations-governed, national health survey in canada that collects information about first nation on-reserve and northern communities (first nations information governance centre, 2013). while the fnrhs is the leading example of how ocap™ can be operationalized, there are many other examples in first nations across canada including: ehealth record systems, research agreements, health surveillance, and fnigc’s new survey initiative, the first nations regional early childhood, education and employment survey (fnreees) (first nations information governance centre, 2013a). this article is intended as a discussion of the specific barriers and levers for the management and governance of first nations information or data generally, and specifically, in the context of shared data systems within aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc) and the government of canada. it is not intended as an attempt to define ocap™ or to discuss ocap™ criteria.2 b a r r i e r s l e g a l b a r r i e r s i d e n t i f y i n g a p p l i c a b l e l a w s . first nations data should be governed in a manner that respects personal privacy as well as community privacy and first nations information governance principles (ocap™). therefore, one of the first questions that must be answered when looking at any collection of first nations data is to identify what legislation applies in what context. first nations must be satisfied that there are appropriate protections for their personal privacy. where that is lacking, as a result of gaps in legislation or policy, then other tools must be used to fill these gaps. first nations must also be satisfied that there is appropriate protection for community privacy. since the                                                                                                                 1 throughout this article, the term “first nations data” and “first nations information” is intended to describe data about first nations, regardless of who has collected or who controls the data. 2 for more information about ocap™ its creation or its implementation, please visit fnigc’s section on ocap™ on its website at http://www.fnigc.ca/ocap 1 first nations information governance centre: barriers and levers for the implementation of ocap™ published by scholarship@western, 2014   concept of community privacy is not recognized in federal legislation, other tools and strategies must be utilized to apply ocap™. because of the federal crown’s relationship with, and responsibilities to first nations, canada collects and holds more information on first nations people than perhaps any other group in canada. aandc alone holds 210 data banks of first nations data (government of canada, 2013). the collection, use, and disclosure of this information is regulated by the privacy act (government of canada, 1985b), the access to information act (government of canada, 1985a), and the library and archives of canada act (laca), all of which apply exclusively to federal government institutions (see banks & hébert, 2004). while the privacy act protects personal information, the access to information act and the library and archives of canada act present legislative obstacles to ocap™ that are discussed below. most often, aandc collects information about first nations and their members through the first nation itself. however, none of the above three statutes apply to first nations. in some cases first nations may have their own privacy policies or laws. it is also possible that provincial or territorial legislation may apply to certain data holdings, such as personal health information. however, very often there is an absence of privacy regulation in first nation communities, both from the perspective of personal privacy as well as community privacy and ocap™ considerations. this gap can limit the capacity of first nations to exercise effective governance over their own data. l e g i s l a t i v e o b s t a c l e s . one of the most important principles within ocap™ is that first nations control the use and disclosure of first nations data. in other words, information (records, reports, data) that identifies any particular first nation or group of first nations should not be used or disclosed without consent of the affected first nation – regardless of where that information or data is held. unfortunately, this principle is defeated by canada’s access to information act: federal legislation passed in 1985 provides public access to government information via an access to information and privacy (atip) request (government of canada 1985a). atip legislation recognizes and allows the federal government to withhold from disclosure certain broad categories of information, such as: • information obtained in confidence from another government, • information injurious to the conduct of canada in federal-provincial affairs, • information that is part of ongoing law enforcement investigations, • information that could be injurious to economic interests of canada, • personal information, and • third party information, if it contains trade secrets, confidential financial, or commercial information (government of canada, 1985a). atip goes on to define “government” for the purposes of the first bulleted exception to include any level of government from municipality to the united nations and all of their organizations. however, the only first nations that are recognized as governments are those that have entered into self-government 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 2 [2014], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.2.3     agreements or “modern treaties” with canada, and “participating first nations” under the first nations jurisdiction over education in british columbia act (2006). that leaves an overwhelming majority of first nations in canada that are not recognized as “governments” for the purpose of engaging in confidential sharing of information with canada. 3 for these first nations, all information that is shared or provided, or that is collected from their members is available for release upon public request unless it falls under one of the exception categories described above. while these exceptions may protect the personal privacy of first nation members, it would not protect aggregate reports or demographic or survey data, nor would it protect any traditional knowledge, or reporting under contribution agreements. in fact, except for those few first nations that the act recognizes as “governments”, almost any information or data that first nations provide to canada or that canada collects from its members and other sources (as long as names and personal identifiers are removed) can be released to the public under the access to information act. this means that federal databases such as the non-insured health benefits (nihb) program, nominal rolls (education) data, financial reporting, and social services data are available upon request by canadian residents provided personally identifying information is stripped. as a result of the access to information act, aandc and other federal government institutions cannot withhold disclosure of a significant amount of first nations information within their control. this is particularly true with the digitization of data, allowing records to be easily stripped of personally identifying information and then released to the requesting public. this vulnerability is demonstrated through health canada’s release of nihb data to brogan inc., a health marketing and consulting company that was acquired in 2010 by global conglomerate ims health (dumas & chapman, 2010). health canada’s position was that de-identified nihb data was available anyway under atip; accordingly, the data is released to brogan (now ims health) to be sold for global pharmaceutical marketing and sales purposes. as long as personally identifying information is capable of being digitally “stripped” it appears to be the federal government’s position that the remainder of the data is subject to disclosure under atip. canada’s infosource regarding aandc data holdings lists over 200 categories of records that are held by the department. just a sampling of the categories includes: • band governance management system containing information on first nation by-laws, elections, estates, appeals, custom codes; • elementary and secondary data nominal roll;                                                                                                                 3 the situation is similar with most of the provincial and territorial equivalents to the access to information act. however, nova scotia and alberta recognize first nation governments as “governments” with the capacity to share confidential information without being subject to disclosure pursuant to an atip request. sharing data with these provinces is, therefore, much more manageable as community identifying information can be protected.   3 first nations information governance centre: barriers and levers for the implementation of ocap™ published by scholarship@western, 2014   • first nations and inuit youth employment strategy participant information; • post-secondary education data; • income assistance; • pre-employment and income support, • first nation child and family services; • the indian registry system (irs) containing detailed personal and biographic information about all first nation members. (government of canada, 2013) all of these databases can be stripped of personal identifiers and mined for any purpose through an atip request. this is entirely inconsistent with ocap™ principles because the remaining data still identifies individuals as first nations people and it still identifies first nation membership. the legislative conflict with ocap™ principles is further exacerbated through the library and archives of canada act, which mandates that all records (including electronic) in the control of federal departments or institutions be transferred to the archives when they are no longer used by the department or institution (banks & hébert, 2004). once transferred to the archives, even personal information becomes vulnerable to an atip request because the privacy act does not protect the privacy of personal information if the person has been dead for more than 20 years (government of canada, 1985b). this means that through atip and laca, even personally identifying information about first nations people can be released (20 years after death). since the federal government collects so much information about first nations, this exposes first nations and first nation families to significantly greater potential harm and continuing problems with ocap™. the combination of the access to information act and laca is the greatest barrier to the practical application of ocap™ principles for data within the control of any federal government institution. all first nations information collected through the multitude of federal programs and through reporting requirements with various departments is vulnerable to public release. no agreement or understanding amongst first nations and any federal department can avoid the application of this legislation. the legislation also applies to information acquired by the federal government through data sharing agreements and licenses to use wherein first nations and first nation organizations agree to share data tabulations and summaries with the federal government. entities such as the first nations information governance centre (fnigc) make significant efforts through the agreements to preserve ownership and other intellectual property rights, to limit use and access, and to obtain reporting and accountability for use and access. all are important applications of ocap™. however, in recognition that the tabulations and summaries are subject to release pursuant to an atip request, as soon as they are within the control of the federal government, fnigc strives to restrict the agreement to cover tabulations and summaries that are acceptable for public disclosure. unfortunately, first nations do not have the ability to restrict the amount or type of information that aandc collects via its normal operations and the databases described above. data sharing agreements, 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 2 [2014], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.2.3     service agreements, and licenses to use can be effective only if it is a first nation sharing with aandc. when aandc already holds the data, first nations have no ability to restrict access, use, or disclosure. k n o w l e d g e a n d c a p a c i t y b a r r i e r s l a c k o f a v a i l a b l e i n f o r m a t i o n . lack of knowledge or incorrectly assumed knowledge is often a preliminary barrier to understanding ocap™ and then, logically, to implementing ocap™ in the context of information management. ocap™ is not a four-criteria shopping list that researchers or other first nations data stewards may check off according to their own standards. ocap™ must be understood in the context of a particular first nation or first nations. it involves consideration of first nations governance structures, values, history, and expectations. what may work for one community may not be appropriate for another; what is acceptable at a national level may not be acceptable at a regional or community level. one of the challenges with knowledge barriers is that there is admittedly a lack of detailed or specific information as to: “what is ocap?” and “how do we make something ocap-compliant?” one of the reasons for this is that ocap™ may mean something different for each first nation. yet, there are some very common standards. u n r e l i a b l e i n f o r m a t i o n . it is also important that the source of knowledge be verified, since there are many myths and misconceptions associated with ocap™. for example, some believe that if a first nation individual is conducting research or holding data that the project is necessarily ocap™compliant. others believe that research ethics board approval covers all ethical requirements for first nations research. the tri-council policy4 also adds to the confusion (canadian institutes of health research, natural sciences and engineering research council of canada, & social sciences and humanities research council of canada, 2010). the lack of understanding or comprehension is not only an issue for government and university researchers: it is also present within first nation communities. first nations leadership have many priorities and concerns that they are faced with on a daily basis concepts such as information governance and assertion of first nations control over data can seem rather abstract when they are also dealing with issues such as clean drinking water and adequate housing. yet, it is no reason for government to omit consideration for ocap™ in these communities. c a p a c i t y l i m i t a t i o n s . a lack of capacity at the first nation level is a factor that stems from knowledge barriers as well as financial limitations. many individual first nation communities do not                                                                                                                 4the tri-council policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans (chapter 9 research involving the first nations, inuit and métis peoples of canada) is generally seen as the ethical standard for academic research, yet it presents ways to avoid first nations jurisdiction over first nations data, and does not meet ocap™ principles for first nations information governance (canadian institutes of health research, natural sciences and engineering research council of canada, & social sciences and humanities research council of canada, 2010). 5 first nations information governance centre: barriers and levers for the implementation of ocap™ published by scholarship@western, 2014   have the capacity5 to create their own information governance infrastructure, capable of securely holding a variety of first nations’ data (such as membership, health information, education information, housing, and social services). yet, this data exists and can end up being held without a vigorous security and privacy framework within a first nation or outside the first nation by government or other service providers that are not necessarily accountable to first nations for their stewardship and use of the data. i n s t i t u t i o n a l b a r r i e r s in addition to legal and capacity issues, barriers to the application of ocap™ principles arise on a very practical level from the culture of the organization that holds and uses information. a c a d e m i c c u l t u r e . in universities, for example, there is an academic culture where researchers assume that they own the data that they collect and that they hold all intellectual property rights to the data. the competitive culture of academic research often prevents collaborative thinking and attribution of research credit to the subjects of that research. assertions of first nation control or ownership over research data often lead to accusations of stifling research or preventing an un-biased reporting of research results. this reaction is a reflection of a researcher’s lack of knowledge or understanding about ocap™, but it also represents an academic culture that can view research as a commodity and a source of prestige and academic advancement. the biases and assumptions that arise from an academic culture can also be transferred to government when those same researchers become employed in the public service. a d m i n i s t r a t i v e p r e s s u r e . there are other practical and administrative barriers to the application of ocap™ principles in the collection, management, and sharing of information. one such roadblock arises due to the rigidity of institutional or government legal or contract staff that refuse to or are unable to modify their “standard-form contracts” whether they are service agreements, contribution agreements, or otherwise. many of these contracts have unreasonable and unwarranted demands regarding intellectual property, including the abandonment of moral rights and ownership of data. these requirements are inconsistent with ocap™ and changes to the agreements typically do not impact upon the services provided or delivered under the agreement. nonetheless, because of the bureaucracy involved in producing the template contracts and making amendments, there is often no ability to negotiate a more ocap™-acceptable agreement.6 time could also be considered an institutional barrier. it is very typical for funding (through contribution agreements or service agreements) to be significantly delayed. this often results in a “takeit-or-leave-it” proposition for first nations, who are often pressured into signing contracts in a manner that is inconsistent with ocap™ principles. first nations are then pressured with the choice of either abandoning ocap™ concerns so that funds can flow and commitments can be met, or abandoning important work due to ocap™.                                                                                                                 5 capacity can include: the necessary policy and procedural framework, secure facilities, technical personnel, agreements, privacy training, and the necessary financial resources. 6as a matter of clarity, this section describes agreements wherein first nations provide information or other records that they understand will be subject to release under atip. however, consistent with ocap™, the first nation would still retain ownership rights and moral rights in the product. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 2 [2014], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.2.3     when dealing with contract amendments and time constraints, government employees working with first nations also feel pressured and have proven to not only understand ocap™ concerns but also be capable of advocating for the necessary changes. this leads to frustration at the level of government staff as well, as they try to navigate their own bureaucratic processes. l e v e r s l e g a l a n d p o l i c y l e v e r s e n a c t i n g l e g i s l a t i o n . first nation laws are a tool that can help address some of the barriers associated with jurisdiction and capacity. a privacy law, with accompanying policies and procedures, would support a first nation in holding its own data. specifically, after conducting a jurisdictional review on applicable legislation, a first nation may find that there is no applicable privacy legislation. the absence of an enforceable privacy standard will impact upon the perception of privacy protection by first nation members as well as by government partners. it is no surprise that the only first nation that holds its own nihb data and first nations health institute system (fnhis) data, the mohawk council of akwesasne, is also one of the few first nations that also has its own privacy law. a first nation’s exercise of jurisdiction in the area of privacy protection also builds capacity within a community for privacy protection. such a law can deal with both personal privacy and community privacy, incorporating universal standards of personal privacy together with ocap™ principles. a first nation privacy and security infrastructure can then be built in a manner that supports the law and a community’s own values and principles regarding privacy. another tool that could be part of a privacy law, or be included as a separate piece, is a freedom of information or access to information law. this could be used by a first nation to regulate how information about the first nation and its members can be collected, used, and disclosed, again incorporating the community’s own values and principles regarding ocap™. a v o i d i n g a t i p . as described above, atip legislation is perhaps the most significant ocap™ barrier associated with government control over first nations data. the best lever in preventing this vulnerability is for the federal government to amend the access to information act and the library and archives of canada act. ideally, those amendments would see recognition of ocap™ principles and mechanisms to allow first nations to govern the collection, use and disclosure of the data within government control. more realistically, the federal government could follow the lead of provinces such as alberta and nova scotia, and simply recognize first nation governments as “governments” in the same manner as international, provincial, municipal, and other governments are already recognized. such an amendment would permit first nations to share confidential information with the federal government. apart from these types of amendments, there are some ways to work around the problems that atip presents: • records disposition authority: the library and archives of canada act requires all records in government control to be sent to the national archives, where they will eventually be made available to the public. to prevent the release of first nation information that could 7 first nations information governance centre: barriers and levers for the implementation of ocap™ published by scholarship@western, 2014   be harmful to first nations, a records disposition authority (rda) may be sought from the national archivist, permitting destruction. in practice, it seems to be very difficult to obtain an rda that permits the destruction of first nations data. however, it is authorized by statute and an rda has been obtained by health canada for some first nation health records.7 this work-around could be used to prevent the transfer of first nations data to the archives (including personal records) but it would be no help for records that are still held by a federal institution such as aandc. • limit disclosure of first nations data: another strategy to avoid the unwanted disclosure of first nations data under atip is for first nations to only disclose data to canada that they are prepared to have disclosed to the public in the event of an atip request. this option correctly assumes that all data is vulnerable to atip requests and therefore only releases data that first nations have already determined will not cause undue harm if released to the public. this is the strategy adopted by first nations in relation to the first nations regional health survey. as indicated above, this strategy would only be available where the first nation or first nations organization already has stewardship over the relevant data, information or reports and is sharing with the federal government. of course it would not apply for records already in government control. • change the data steward: the best and only reliable method of preventing application of atip is to prevent first nations data from being within the control of a federal institution. this can be done through: • first nations8 assuming stewardship of their own data; and • retaining a third-party data steward not subject to atip legislation. the third party could be a university, a provincial partner, or a private corporation. however, a legislative review would still have to be conducted to ensure that there are no other barriers in relation to an alternative data steward. for example, if a province were considered as a data steward, the province’s freedom of information legislation would have to be reviewed for similar barriers. in some provinces, colleges and universities also fall under provincial freedom of information legislation. in either case where data stewardship is moved to a first nation or to a third party, first nations and canada could govern the terms of access to and use of the data through a data-sharing agreement.                                                                                                                 7although that rda was not entirely satisfactory because it left discretion with the minister of health whether or not personal health records would be submitted to the archives. 8 this could also include a first nation organization, if that organization is directly accountable to first nations in accordance with their practices and customs. another government entity would not qualify because it would also be under atip. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 2 [2014], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.2.3     because canada would not have control over the data, it would not be subject to release under an atip request, yet the data could be used for the intended purposes. ideally, in order to be consistent with ocap™ principles of first nation “possession,” first nations or first nation-controlled organizations must be the data steward. however, there are some situations where a third party data steward may be necessary. these situations would arise when the first nation or first nation-controlled organization does not have the necessary capacity. for example, the first nation may not have the necessary security and privacy infrastructure; it may not have qualified personnel or equipment to perform data cleaning or other technical work on the data; or the data may contain personal health information that may be subject to provincial health information legislation with certain requirements or qualifications for health information custodians. as first nations’ capacity in the area of information governance grows, the need for third-party data stewards would naturally decrease. k n o w l e d g e a n d c a p a c i t y l e v e r s creating an infrastructure that contains appropriate laws, policies, procedures, and agreements can address most of the legal barriers to the application of ocap™. the remaining barriers can be overcome through sharing knowledge and building capacity. some knowledge levers might include: • sharing knowledge about ocap™ (background and application) with academics and government, helping to build a new culture for first nations information; and • educating government legal and contracting staff about ocap™, its requirements and how contracts may be amended to meet the needs and values of first nations and government. as discussed above, government staff that work closely with first nations and information governance tend to have a very good understanding of first nations concerns, ocap™ principles and the rationale behind the changes that first nations seek. if that level of understanding could migrate to all users of first nation data and to legal and contract staff, many of the identified barriers within government could be alleviated. in terms of building capacity for information governance within first nations communities, some levers to consider include: • making ocap™ tools available for use by communities, such as: • suggested ocap™ “standards”(i.e. how to preserve ownership and other intellectual property rights), • data-sharing agreement templates, • first nation privacy laws, and • privacy and security policies and procedures for first nations. 9 first nations information governance centre: barriers and levers for the implementation of ocap™ published by scholarship@western, 2014   • sharing ocap™ knowledge with communities and leadership; and • assisting in the development of first nation organizations as first nations data stewards. c o n c l u s i o n the limitations of the access to information act will always be a primary concern for first nations and a very strong motivation to limit federal government control over first nations data. the reality is that due to the atip process most information first nations share with aandc and other federal departments and institutions is not confidential and cannot be protected. limiting sharing and pushing for the transfer of first nations data out of government control are the only viable strategies for avoiding an atip. there are many examples of how this has been effectively accomplished in a manner consistent with ocap™ principles. other barriers are perhaps more easily confronted. knowledge and capacity barriers together with institutional barriers can be minimized with education and resources. aandc has already made significant efforts at increasing awareness and knowledge regarding the application of ocap™. this has helped to build relationships and further important projects. the next step would seem to be ensuring that the knowledge disseminates to all relevant areas of the federal department, including administration, legal support and the atip office itself. this would help to promote changes to the culture and administration that is traditionally resistant to change. aandc could also take a role in facilitating the flow of resources to first nation communities in order to develop knowledge and capacity for information governance. first nations and first nation organizations that have an infrastructure in place to ensure personal and community privacy will give aandc more potential options in terms of data governance, including the identification of potential data stewards. thus, the building of knowledge and capacity can only assist aandc in identifying suitable options for the stewardship of first nations data in a manner that fulfills ocap™ principles, while also meeting government requirements for the use and analysis of data, together with the protection of personal privacy. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 2 [2014], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.2.3     r e f e r e n c e s banks, s., & hébert, m. (2004). legislative summary: bill c-8: the library and archives of canada act. retrieved from http://www.parl.gc.ca/content/lop/legislativesummaries/37/3/c8-e.pdf canadian institutes of health research, natural sciences and engineering research council of canada, & social sciences and humanities research council of canada. (2010). tri-council policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans. retrieved from http://www.pre.ethics.gc.ca/pdf/eng/tcps2/tcps_2_final_web.pdf dumas, a., & chapman, m. (2010, july 3). data sharing agreement: first nations inuit health branch (fnihb) and brogan consulting inc. (resolution no.: 30/2010). winnipeg (mb): annual general assembly (can). first nations information governance centre. (2013a). about fnrees. retrieved from http://www.fnigc.ca/our-work/fnreees/about-fnreees.html first nations information governance centre. (2013b). about rhs. retrieved from http://www.fnigc.ca/our-work/regional-health-survey/about-rhs.html first nations jurisdiction over education in british columbia act (s.c. 2006, c. 10). retrieved from http://laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/eng/acts/f-11.75/page-1.html government of canada. (r.s.c. 1985a). access to information act, c. a-1, s. 13. government of canada. (2013). info source: sources of federal government and employee information. retrieved from government of canada, info source website: http://www.aadncaandc.gc.ca/eng/1353081939455/1353082011520/ government of canada. (r.s.c. 1985b). privacy act, c. p-21, a. 3 “personal information” (m). 11 first nations information governance centre: barriers and levers for the implementation of ocap™ published by scholarship@western, 2014 the international indigenous policy journal april 2014 barriers and levers for the implementation of ocap™ * first nations information governance centre recommended citation barriers and levers for the implementation of ocap™ abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license barriers and levers for the implementation of ocapâ—¢ cost implications of hard water on health hardware in remote indigenous communities in the central desert region of australia the international indigenous policy journal volume 3 issue 3 water and indigenous peoples article 6 september 2012 cost implications of hard water on health hardware in remote indigenous communities in the central desert region of australia heather browett flinders university, brow0600@flinders.edu.au meryl pearce flinders university, meryl.pearce@flinders.edu.au eileen m. willis flinders university, eileen.willis@flinders.edu.au recommended citation browett, h. , pearce, m. , willis, e. m. (2012). cost implications of hard water on health hardware in remote indigenous communities in the central desert region of australia. th e international indigenous policy journal, 3(3) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.6 cost implications of hard water on health hardware in remote indigenous communities in the central desert region of australia abstract the provision of services such as power, water, and housing for indigenous people is seen as essential in the australian government’s "closing the gap" policy. while the cost of providing these services, in particular adequate water supplies, is significantly higher in remote areas, they are key contributors to improving the health of indigenous peoples. in many remote areas, poor quality groundwater is the only supply available. hard water results in the deterioration of health hardware, which refers to the facilities considered essential for maintaining health. this study examined the costs associated with water hardness in eight communities in the northern territory. results show a correlation between water hardness and the cost of maintaining health hardware, and illustrates one aspect of additional resourcing required to maintain indigenous health in remote locations. keywords indigneous, water, health hardware, hard water acknowledgments thanks are extended to power and water, northern territory for funding this project. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ cost implications of hard water on health hardware in remote indigenous communities in the central desert region of australia there is a significant difference in the health of indigenous and non-indigenous australians. the life expectancy of indigenous australians is approximately 17 years less than that of the non-indigenous population. additionally, infant mortality is high in the indigenous population with 12.3 deaths per 1,000 live births compared to 4.2 deaths for the non-indigenous population. closing the gap is a federal government policy initiative aimed at improving indigenous health to achieve morbidity and mortality rates similar to those for non-indigenous australians. various methods for “closing the gap” have been suggested, including improving hygiene education, healthcare facilities, and access to health hardware (australian government, 2009a). health hardware refers to the items and facilities considered essential for maintaining adequate personal health (i.e. showers and toilets). the importance of health hardware to health outcomes was first outlined in relation to nine healthy living practices. of the nine healthy living practices – bathing, washing clothes, removing waste, improving nutrition, reducing crowding, decreasing the impact of animals and dust, minimizing trauma, improving temperature control – five require access to adequate water supplies (nganampa health, 1987). effectively functioning water-related health hardware is needed to provide adequate quantities of water for health needs. however, much of the central australian desert region suffers from highly mineralised groundwater, which, in most cases, is the only source of water available to the communities. groundwater is characterised by the type of geology it has been in contact with and the retention time within the aquifer (power and water corporation, 2009). generally, older groundwater (over 10,000 years old), like that found in central australia, has a “richer” mineral content than relatively young groundwater (less than 10 years old), such as that found in the northern part of australia (power and water corporation, 2009). hard water – the focus of this paper – is characterised by high levels of calcium and magnesium ions imparted into the water as “soft” rainwater passes through rock formations (jones, kinsela, collins, & waite, 2010). besides the high mineral content, the ph and temperature determine the water hardness and tendency towards scaling (mcmellon, 2010). scaling refers to the build-up of solid encrustations within, and on the outside of, materials where the water has been in contact, which leads to clogging, leaks, and breakages. in terms of nomenclature, a distinction is made between “hard water” and the “hardness” of water. hard water is a qualitative term used to describe the scaling behaviour of water, while hardness is a quantitative measure of calcium and magnesium ions in water (mcmellon, 2010). where communities rely on highly mineralised groundwater, particularly when the water is hard, health hardware is impacted by scale build-up, which, if left unchecked, can render the hardware ineffective and potentially impact on health (see background section below). to overcome these and many other impacts associated with living in the harsh desert environs of these remote communities, more frequent housing and infrastructure maintenance is required than is ordinarily the case in urban or rural areas. while there has been vast government expenditure on the construction of new houses in the remote indigenous communities, studies have highlighted the need for more funding for internal housing infrastructure maintenance (pholeros, 2002, 2011; willis, pearce, jenkins, wurst, & mccarthy, 2004), including water-related health hardware. while there is much anecdotal evidence on the impacts of scaling in communities in central australia, this paper provides the first quantitative account of the financial impacts of hard water in indigenous communities in this region. aim of the study this study examines the frequency of health hardware replacement and the associated costs of hard water in eight communities in the macdonnell shire and the central desert shire (figure 1) in the northern territory of australia. water hardness in the 72 remote indigenous communities was ranked to enable categorisation of the eight communities in the two central australian shires (see methodology section). the research then focused on one in-depth analysis in each category of hardness (high, medium, and low). 1 browett et al.: cost implications of hard water published by scholarship@western, 2012 figure 1: map of northern territory in australia and the study locations. background: the importance of health hardware in a context of indigenous social disadvantage substandard fixtures and a lack of maintenance have been identified as potential causes of dysfunctional health hardware, but there are additional factors that can adversely influence its performance. the links between the condition of indigenous housing – including issues such as crowding, infrastructure, tenure, and homelessness – and health outcomes are evident (bailie & wayte, 2006). further, mcdonald, bailie, grace, and brewster (2010) identify dysfunctional health hardware, overcrowding, and lack of effective hygiene education as possible contributors to poor health outcomes. while improvements to hygiene education were considered to have the most sustainable level of impact (mcdonald et al., 2010), knowledge of appropriate health practices is meaningless in the absence of items such as soap and running water. it cannot be taken for granted that these will be available in remote indigenous communities in australia. the importance of both the quality and quantity of water for health outcomes has been highlighted in studies by bailie, carson, and mcdonald (2004) and bailie and wayte (2006), respectively. a limited water supply affects all aspects of hygiene – bathing, doing laundry, washing hands, preparing food, and cleaning eating surfaces (bailie et al., 2004). thus, apart from the direct health implications of an inadequate quantity and quality of water supply, poor quality water can impact on health indirectly through malfunctioning health 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.6 hardware. the impacts of malfunctioning health hardware include reduced water heater efficiency, clogged internal plumbing and water appliances, increased the frequency of fixture replacement, and increased repair and maintenance costs (downing, 2000). the most costly issue occurs when scale accumulation causes the element in hot water systems to overheat and burn out (lloyd, 1998). problems around household maintenance in remote indigenous communities are exacerbated by poverty, social inequity, health disparities, and resource inequalities experienced by indigenous households, compared to most non-indigenous ones. this gross disadvantage extends across all measurable social determinants of health (anderson, baum, & bentley, 2007; baum, 2007). although government agencies provide an allowance for household maintenance in such disadvantaged remote communities, at a personal level, families experience high costs as a result of the impacts of hard water. for example, they have to purchase and use large volumes of particular soaps and other cleaning materials that are capable of lathering in hard water conditions (downing, 2000; pearce, willis, mccarthy, ryan, & wadham, 2008). the results of this paper will show that the government housing maintenance allowance is inadequate where water supplies are impacted by hardness. measuring hard water there are multiple ways to quantify hard water, and various indicators can be used for different purposes. the classification of water hardness, as per the australian drinking water guidelines (adwg), is shown in table 1. the adwg recommend that water hardness should be less than 200 mg/l. this guideline is for aesthetic value based on the ability of soap to form lather and the potential for scale build-up, rather than a health guideline. various indices are available to predict the scaling ability of water (ryxnar stability index, puckourius scaling index, stiff-davis index, calcium carbonate precipitation potential) (prisyazhniuk, 2007); however, the most common index and the measure used in this study is the langelier saturation index (lsi). table 1: levels of hardness that lead to corrosion or scaling mg/l calcium carbonate equivalent degree of hardness <60 soft, but possibly corrosive 60200 good quality 200-500 increasing scaling problems >500 severe scaling source: australian government, 2004 the lsi includes measures of water hardness, temperature, and ph to yield a number that predicts the calcium carbonate stability. if the value is positive, it indicates that the water is supersaturated with calcium carbonate and the water will have a tendency to form scale. conversely, if the value is negative, the water is undersaturated and would dissolve calcium carbonate. at zero, the water is in equilibrium and will neither scale nor dissolve calcium carbonate. in practice, however, water with an lsi value between -0.4 to 0.4 will not display enhanced calcium carbonate dissolving or corroding properties (prisyazhniuk, 2007). methodology water quality data – specifically hardness – were sourced from the power and water corporation, australia (henceforth referred to as power and water), the water and electricity service provider to the indigenous communities. two additional sets of data were collected. first, a quantitative data set derived from plumbing audits was analysed to determine the approximate frequency of health hardware replacement and the associated material and labour costs. secondly, qualitative data, obtained through interviews with key personnel and contract plumbers, complemented the quantitative data. ethics approval was obtained from the central australian human resources ethics board and the flinders university social and behavioural 3 browett et al.: cost implications of hard water published by scholarship@western, 2012 research ethics committee. all research was undertaken within the guidelines, and permission was sought for the publication of the work. selecting and categorising communities according to hard water (phase 1) water quality data (12 parameters) for the period october 2007 to october 2009 were obtained for the 72 indigenous communities serviced by power and water. this study examines two of them, namely water hardness and the langelier saturation index (lsi). the sampling method was purposive. the macdonnell shire and central desert shire (see figure 1 above) were selected as they contain communities with the highest prevalence of hard water and also communities without hard water problems because they access surface water (included for comparative purposes). this allowed for several factors, such as climate and rainfall, to be kept relatively constant, whilst allowing a range for comparability. financial, time, and access constraints limited the study to the two shires. it is recommended that future studies extend to other parts of australia, or elsewhere in the world, where hard water is known to impact on the functioning of infrastructure, but has yet to be quantified in terms of costs. data collection went from the initial (phase 1) broad-scale ranking of hardness in the 72 communities as outlined in table 2 to an in-depth analysis in three communities (one from each category of hardness) as outlined in figure 2. selection of the three in-depth study sites was based on the accessibility of the community and key personnel within the community. table 2: hardness parameters by which communities were categorised category key defining features high hard water lsi >0.9 hardness >400 mg/l medium hard water lsi 0.5-0.9 hardness 200-400 mg/l low hard water lsi <0.5 hardness <200 mg/l 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.6 figure 2: flow chart showing data collection phases and analysis. quantitative and qualitative data collection plumbing audits are conducted twice a year in every house in each community by experienced plumbing contractors. the audit examines and reports on the condition of all water-related components within each house. while the audits are being completed, any issues of public health and safety are addressed, while other tasks are reported to the shire councils for further work to be arranged. these quantitative data were analysed as outlined in figure 2 (phase 2). data from the plumbing audits were obtained for a 12-month period from july 2010 to june 2011 from invoices held by the macdonnell shire and central desert shire councils. properties that did not have data from two audits in the 12-month period were excluded from the analysis. titjikala, which has medium hard water, was subject to only one audit. however, it was conducted in the latter six months of the study period 5 browett et al.: cost implications of hard water published by scholarship@western, 2012 (january 2011), so it was assumed that all work required over the whole time period, including incidental works, would be captured in the audit. additional incidental work and local maintenance work was included in the dataset, but only for properties that had two completed audits. the incidental work generally occurred as a result of urgent housing maintenance requests. while much of the work was done by external contracted plumbers, some minor work was undertaken by the people within the community, depending on the skills required. all plumbing work is recorded and reported to the shire councils who then forward the costs to territory housing – the government agency responsible for funding (from a limited budget) housing maintenance in the 72 indigenous communities. qualitative data (phase 3; see figure 2) were obtained from four interviews conducted with the shire services managers (ssm) and the essential service officers (eso) in areyonga, titjikala, and yuelamu in july and august 2011. questions related to the impact of hard water and the frequency of health hardware fixture replacements. limitations based on the available data, it was not possible to determine whether replacements were preventative to ensure their ongoing function or if they were reactive as a result of reported malfunctions. furthermore, the data were not detailed enough to determine time lags between reporting of malfunctioning hardware and the subsequent repairs. due to the remote locations of many communities, where travel to the community can take up to six hours or more, it is possible that tenants could be without access to health hardware for extended periods. during such times neighbours’ facilities or community centres might be used, placing an increased strain on those resources. study setting australia’s indigenous population makes up 1-2 percent of australia’s total population of 20 million. twenty five percent of the 510,000 indigenous australians live in over 1,100 remote locations, with the concomitant challenges of service delivery (australian government, 2009a). of all the states in australia, the northern territory has the highest proportion of indigenous residents (28.5%), of which approximately 71 percent live in remote areas (mcdonald, baillie, brewster, & morris, 2008). of these communities, 88 percent rely primarily on groundwater supplies, 8 percent use a combination of ground and surface water, and 4 percent use freshwater springs and dams (power and water corporation, 2009). such a high reliance on groundwater arises from the arid environment of many locations, which only receive episodic rainfall. rainfall in central australia is highly variable and at times oscillates between drought and floods. the northern territory is divided into 11 local government areas known as shires. it is the responsibility of the shire to appoint and manage on-site essential service officers who are responsible for the communities’ power, water, and sewage systems. all contract maintenance work within the shires is administered centrally. two of the 11 shires (macdonnell and central desert) have comparatively more concerns with hard water as the seven communities with the highest lsi values in the northern territory are found there. of all the communities in the northern territory, the communities included in this study (with the exception of yuelamu and finke) fall within the upper 50 percent of lsi values. macdonnell shire macdonnell shire (land area: 268,887 km2) is the southernmost shire within the northern territory (see figure 1 above) and includes 13 communities (northern territory government, 2011). five of the communities were included in this research: areyonga, titjikala, finke, kintore, and santa teresa. alice 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.6 springs and yulara are enclaves within the macdonnell shire local government area. approximately 7,200 people reside within the remote communities in the shire (northern territory government, 2011). central desert shire central desert shire is located to the north of alice springs and is slightly larger than macdonnell shire with a land area of 282,089.76 km2, yet it has a smaller population of just 4,782 (northern territory government, 2011). the shire includes 11 indigenous communities, three of which were included in this research: yuelamu, yuendamu, and atitjere. a brief overview of each case study community is given below. study communities areyonga is located approximately 220 kilometres west of alice springs, approximately a 2.5 hour drive. the community has a transient population of around 300 people and has a school, swimming pool, and arts centre. the water supply at areyonga is taken from four groundwater bores located a kilometre from the town. they have an output that is sufficient to supply 430 kilolitres per day. while all four bores meet australian drinking water guidelines, water from bore 4 has a high mineral content and is only used if breakdowns occur in other infrastructure. the water is disinfected using calcium hypochlorite (power and water corporation, 2007). titjikala is situated 130 kilometres south of alice springs, a drive of approximately 1.5 hours. the community has a population of 265 and is situated within the boundaries of maryvale station – a large cattle station. titjikala takes water from two bores close to the community. it is pumped to an elevated tank, which stores enough water for at least four days. the water is disinfected using an automatic sodium hypochlorite dosing system (power and water corporation, 2009). yuelamu is approximately 290 kilometres northwest of alice springs. there is a recorded population of 300, but the population will frequently travel between yuelamu and yuendumu. yuelamu is one of only four remote communities in the northern territory that uses surface water. the dam contains good quality water that consistently meets the 29 australian drinking water guidelines for dam water (power and water corporation, n.d.). an ultra-violet disinfection system, in addition to a chlorine dosing system, is used to treat the water prior to household reticulation. while the water is of good quality, the area experiences low rainfall and a high evaporation rate. prior to 2007, the dam could provide the community with water, on average, seven out of ten years (power and water corporation, 2007). however, with the aud$1 million upgrade to the dam infrastructure to improve the catchment and retention of water, it is now predicted to be a reliable source of water in nine out of every ten years (power and water corporation, 2007). if levels in the dam become too low, groundwater can be accessed to supplement the supply, but the groundwater is of poor quality and not suitable for consumption. during these times, power and water has to supply packaged water to the community for consumption. results frequency of replacement seven different items of health hardware were examined. as communities with more houses would be expected to have a higher number of replacements, overall, the data were recorded as a per house measure to ensure comparability between communities. taps were the most frequently replaced item in all communities (table 3), with the highest frequency of replacement occurring in areyonga (lsi=1.34; high hard water) at an average of three taps (2.97/house/year) being replaced in each house every year. shower roses had a comparatively high frequency of replacement in yuendumu (lsi=0.72; medium hard water) and areyonga (lsi=1.34; high hard water) at 0.56/house/year and 0.66/house/year, respectively. interviews in areyonga revealed that this is a conservative estimate as staff will often use a hydrochloric acid solution to dissolve the 7 browett et al.: cost implications of hard water published by scholarship@western, 2012 scale build-up as a repair measure to avoid replacement. yuelamu (lsi=-0.14; low hard water) appears to be an anomaly with regard to shower roses, and no additional information was gained from the interviews that would explain the high frequency of replacement in a community that has consistently low replacement rates with regard to all other health hardware. spouts and toilet cisterns showed no clear trends with regards to the frequency of replacement. hot water systems were identified as having costly scaling issues. servicing is essential to increase hot water systems’ longevity and to maintain them at a level where they can be repaired, rather than replaced. there are few electric water heaters in use; solar hot water systems are most often installed. as with other health hardware, hot water systems may need replacing for reasons unrelated to hard water – such as cracked panels or split tanks. hot water systems were replaced most frequently in areyona and kintore at an annual rate of 0.47 and 0.34 per house, respectively. yuendumu, atitjere, santa teresa, and finke had similar rates of replacement ranging between 0.03 and 0.06/house/year. there were no recorded data on hot water system replacements in yuelamu; however, qualitative data showed that three systems were replaced in the previous year (a rate of 0.08/house/year), but all were a result of split tanks and, thus, not related to hard water. the rates of replacement and the equivalent time frames for areyonga (with very hard water), titjikala (with a mid-range water hardness), and yuelamu (without hard water) are shown in table 3. in general, items required the most frequent replacement in areyonga and had the longest life in yuelamu. in areyonga, all items, except toilet cisterns, required replacement at least once every 2 years. the replacement times in both titjikala and yuelamu ranged from 1 to 33 years. table 3: frequency of replacement (per house per year) of health hardware in areyonga (high hardness), titjikala (medium hardness), and yuelamu (low hardness). item areyonga (high) time (in years) titjikala (medium) time (in years) yuelamu (low) time (in years) yard tap 1.80 0.6 0.44 27 0.21 4.75 tap 2.97 0.3 1.03 12 0.25 4 spout 0.53 2 0.09 11 0.04 25 shower rose 0.57 2 0.22 5 0.32 3 cistern 0.13 8 0.03 33 0.07 14 tempering valve 0.50 2 0.34 3 0.00 hot water system 0.47 2 0.13 8 0.00 costs associated with hard water for each job, both material and labour costs are incurred, and, due to the remote location of many communities, travel expenses must often be covered as well. because travel expenses are recorded per community, they were incurred regardless of whether one incidental job was completed or a full community audit was undertaken. the cost of replacing items commonly affected by hard water was calculated using the frequency of replacement and the average cost of both the item and the labour. costs varied according to the brand and type of item that was installed. accordingly, an approximated average cost was used based on real cost data from plumbing invoices. the costs were calculated using only houses covered by the territory housing; community establishments, such as council offices or clinics, were not included. similarly, only the costs for health hardware that falls under the responsibility of territory housing and was reviewed twice a year as part of the audit were 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.6 calculated. costs for other health hardware, such as washing machines, that are the tenants’ responsibility were not included in the calculations. in determining the frequency of replacement, however, all replacements regardless of the cause were included, since, in many cases, the reasons for replacements were not recorded. material costs. the replacement of hot water systems was the greatest material expense. the cost of replacing a solar hot water system, the most common type found in the remote communities, was approximately aud$5,000. the tempering valve, a component of hot water systems, costs approximately aud$200 to replace. toilet cisterns were also costly at around aud$220, but were not replaced frequently. as expected, the replacement of hot water systems was the greatest expense in areyonga and titjikala, followed by the replacement of household tapware with an estimated cost of aud$100 per tap. replacing tapware was the most variable cost measure because the location and brand of taps used caused a large variation in the per item cost identified from the data. thus, while the cost of tapware appears to be high, the reliability of this estimation is less than that of other health hardware items studied. of the three case study communities, areyonga had substantially higher costs than either yuelamu or titjikala. the material costs for yuelamu were just 2 percent of the material costs in areyonga, and titjikala fell between the two extremes with costs around 30 percent of the costs in areyonga. labour costs. as with the material costs, average labour costs were calculated for each item replaced or repaired. this removed any confusion regarding the number of people working, the time spent on the repair, and the hourly cost of labour. labour costs varied depending on the complexity of the job; for example, the time required to replace a hot water system depends on the ease with which the old system can be removed and the new system installed. some of the smaller jobs, such as replacing an external tap, were done during the household audits, for which a one-hour labour cost per house was charged. these expenses would be incurred regardless of whether small replacements were undertaken or not; however, when calculating labour costs, each replacement was treated as though it was a separate job and not part of an audit. this could exaggerate the costs of labour, particularly for garden and household taps. of all the work done, the labour costs associated with hot water systems were the highest at approximately aud$800 per installation. labour costs associated with hot water systems in areyonga and titjikala were aud$376 and aud$104/house/year, respectively. in all three communities, a high proportion of labour costs were incurred replacing and repairing taps – between 38 and 42 percent of the total labour costs. as previously noted, this cost could be inflated as some of the replacements could occur within the allocated audit time. the labour costs associated with some items, such as yard taps (aud$60 labour/tap), were greater than the cost of materials (aud$10 tap). this was also the case for spouts and shower roses. the labour costs associated with household taps, cisterns, and tempering valves were slightly lower than the material costs – a difference of less than aud$100. hot water systems were the exception with very high material expenses (aud$5,000) and comparatively high labour expenses (aud$800). proportion of costs spent on labour, materials, and travel. given the vast distances between urban or rural centres and remote communities, travel and overnight accommodation costs tend to be high in australia. there is a fair degree of variability in the amounts charged by different contractors, so they are not included in the costs/house. for example, rates will vary according to the duration of the visit, meal expenses, and whether the roads to the community are sealed or unsealed. overall the three cost components – labour, materials, and travel – contribute differently to the total plumbing expenses associated with hard water in a community. in seven of the eight communities, the material costs constituted the largest proportion of the costs (40.0-68.5%), as seen in table 4. yuelamu was the exception with travel expenses representing the largest component (52.6%). this is despite having only the minimum of two annual trips in the 12-month period (july 2010 to june 2011). 9 browett et al.: cost implications of hard water published by scholarship@western, 2012 table 4: proportion of total costs calculated spent on labour, materials, and travel. hardness percentage (%) of total costs community labour materials travel areyonga high 21.6 68.0 10.4 kintore high 15.3 68.5 16.2 yuendumu medium 31.0 50.2 18.8 titjikala medium 20.8 62.0 17.3 atitjere medium 21.2 47.1 31.7 santa teresa medium 27.8 58.3 13.8 finke low 25.5 40.0 34.5 yuelamu low 26.6 20.8 52.6 note: hardness is categorised as high, medium, or low as defined in table 2. personal costs of hard water. while some of the direct costs (labour, materials, and travel) were quantified through the audit data, there are other indirect costs borne by community residents associated with hard water. scale build-up not only reduces the longevity of appliances, but also causes appliances to draw more energy to function. this can result in higher energy bills and a smaller quantity of hot water available, which is an additional burden on low-income indigenous families. according to one plumbing contractor interviewed, a 50 litre tank, if not serviced, could be expected to halve in volume within five years due to calcium build-up. the concomitant reduction in the quantity of hot water delivered can hinder healthy living practices, such as bathing and washing clothes, particularly if there are many people living in the house, which is often the case in indigenous households. overcrowding occurs in almost 20 percent of indigenous homes located in remote areas (bailie & wayte, 2006). at the time of the study the average income for indigenous people in remote and very remote locations was aud$267 and aud$356 per week, respectively, compared to aud$579 and aud$622 per week for non-indigenous people, who are usually in some form of employment, in these communities (australian bureau of statistics, 2012). without the government funding assistance for housing, many indigenous people could not afford the housing maintenance that has been outlined in this paper. while the personal costs were largely anecdotal in this study, other studies have quantified the costs of health consumables (such as soap and shampoo) in communities with hard water. for example, pearce et al. (2008) found that residents in a remote indigenous community with hard water in south australia spent, on average, 18.7 percent more per week (8.8% of their income) on health consumables, compared to residents in the metropolitan city of adelaide where hard water is not a concern. extrapolating these results to areyonga, a high hard water community, would mean that indigenous residents with an average “very remote” income would need to spend 27 percent of their income on water-related health hardware annually. tenants need to understand the importance of reporting malfunctions to the shire services manager. those who fail to do so may be without access to adequate quantities of hot or running water or properly flushing toilets because any non-operational fittings will only be discovered during household audits, which occur every six months. implications of the costs of hard water as seen in figure 3, the lsi of the eight communities shows a similar trend to that of house/year cost of health hardware (excluding travel costs). communities in the mid-range of hardness (yuendumu, titjikala, atitjere, and santa teresa) had similar lsi values with the costs/house/year within the range of aud$589 to aud$1,134; areyonga and kintore had elevated lsi levels and costs of aud$2,219 and aud$3,749, respectively; while yuelamu had the lowest lsi and noticeably lower costs of aud$141. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.6 figure 3: a comparison between the lsi in eight remote indigenous communities and the annual cost/house/year for water-related health hardware replacements and maintenance. indigenous housing authority northern territory allocates aud$1,700 per house annually for health and safety repairs and maintenance. comparing this amount with the findings of this study (figure 3), those living in areyonga would have a deficit of approximately aud$2,000 per house, or 117 percent, thus indicating that not all repairs could be undertaken. this could lead to a lack of access to running water and water-related health hardware, such as toilets. in titjikala, two thirds of the allocated aud$1,700 would be spent on waterrelated health hardware. in contrast, yuelamu would only use 8 percent of the allocation. this shows that, for communities in the high and medium hard water categories, a disproportionate amount of housing maintenance funds need to be spent on water-related repairs, compared to communities without hard water. browett (2011) modelled the cost of hard water against the lsi to provide a predictive indication of the cost/house/unit increase in hard water. length constraints preclude the details from being included here, but a brief summary of the key findings is given. based on a linear relationship between the lsi of a community and the predicted annual cost/house, results show that, for every 0.1 unit of change in lsi, a change of around aud$250/house could be expected. within limits, the results can be scaled; for example, a 0.2 reduction in lsi would save aud$500/house/year and a 0.3 reduction aud$750/house/year. the policy implications of these findings are discussed below. discussion and conclusion the aim of this study is to examine the cost implications of hard water in remote indigenous communities in the northern territory of australia. data were analysed to determine the relationship between the degree of water hardness and the maintenance and repair costs incurred. the results show that communities with hard water require more frequent replacements of health hardware items (such as taps, spouts, shower roses, and hot water systems) and have higher maintenance costs, compared to communities without hard water. this has implications for policy. 11 browett et al.: cost implications of hard water published by scholarship@western, 2012 currently, a ten-year agreement, entitled the national partnership agreement on remote indigenous housing, is in place. this agreement aims to address the issues of overcrowding, homelessness, and poor housing conditions in remote communities. funding of aud$5.5 billion has been allocated over ten years to provide 4,200 new houses in remote communities and upgrades to a further 4,800 houses (australian government, 2009b). in the northern territory, the australian and northern territory governments are working in partnership with the communities to deliver improved housing services. at a local level, the shires serve as agents for territory housing and manage some aspects of housing maintenance; however, funding for housing maintenance is allocated on an annual basis and is largely aggregated for the state or territory. furthermore, while the maintenance allowance may be appropriate for communities with “regular” water supplies, this study has shown that, where communities are highly impacted by water hardness, the allowance is inadequate. in such cases, if the water-related repairs are undertaken, they may be done at the expense of other repairs, which may be just as pressing (i.e., power-related needs), or some communities may be overlooked while the funding is spent where it is needed most. these findings are particularly pertinent given that 59 percent of communities in the northern territory have water supplies in the medium to high hardness category (power and water corporation, 2011). in other parts of central australia, hard water is also prevalent. the figures presented here are estimates based on the best data available; nonetheless, they provide a valuable base from which policy changes can be established. to date, maintaining and repairing systems is deemed as being preferable to installing water softening plants or other water treatment systems in the impacted communities. the results of this study will help agencies calculate monetary benefits and repayment periods as they choose appropriate mitigation measures and build business cases for the implementation of water quality improvement programs in remote communities. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.6 references anderson, i., baum, f. e., & bentley, m. w. (2007). beyond bandaids: exploring the underlying social determinants of aboriginal health. casuarina, northern territory, au: cooperative research centre for aboriginal health. australian bureau of statistics. (2012). demographic, social and economic characteristics overview. retrieved from http://www.abs.gov.au australian government. (2004). australian drinking water guidelines. national health and medical research council, natural resource management ministerial council. australian government. (2009a). closing the gap on indigenous disadvantage: the challenge for australia. canberra, au: department of families, housing, community services and indigenous affairs. retrieved from http://www.fahcsia.gov.au/sa/indigenous/progserv/ctg/pages/default.asp australian government. (2009b). national partnership agreement on remote indigenous housing. canberra, au: department of families, housing, community services and indigenous affairs. retrieved from http://www.fahcsia.gov.au/sa/indigenous/progserv/housing/pages/remoteindigenoushousing.aspx bailie, r. s., carson, b. e., & mcdonald, e. l. (2004). water supply and sanitation in remote indigenous communities: priorities for health development. australian and new zealand journal of public health, 28(5), 409-414. bailie, r. s., & wayte, k. j. (2006). housing and health in indigenous communities: key issues for housing and health improvements in remote aboriginal and torres strait islander communities. australian journal of rural health, 14(5), 178-183. baum, f. e. (2007). social capital. in carson, b., dunbar, t., chenhall, r. d. (eds.) social determinants of indigenous health (pp. 109-134). new south wales, nsw: allen and unwin. browett, h. (2011). evaluation of the impacts of hard water on health hardware in remote indigenous communities in the northern territory. (unpublished master’s thesis). flinders university, adelaide. downing, j. d. (2000). water softening trials in a remote central australian community – report on technical consultancy. bureau of rural sciences, canberra, au. jones, a., kinsela, a. s., collins, r. n., & waite, t. d. (2010). investigating scale formation and prevention in small water supplies reliant on groundwater. unsw water quality research centre, school of civil and environmental engineering, the university of new south wales, sydney, nsw 2052. lloyd, c. r. (1998). washing machine usage in remote aboriginal communities. australian and new zealand journal of public health, 22(6), 695-699. mcdonald, e., bailie, r., brewster, d., & morris, p. (2008). are hygiene and public health interventions likely to improve outcomes for australian aboriginal children living in remote communities? a systematic review of the literature. bmc public health, 8(153). doi:10.1186/1471-2458-8-153. mcdonald, e., bailie, r., grace, j., & brewster, d. (2010). an ecological approach to health promotion in remote australian aboriginal communities. health promotion international, 25(1), 42-53. 13 browett et al.: cost implications of hard water published by scholarship@western, 2012 mcmellon, g. (2010). correlation of potential and actual scale formation from groundwater in remote indigenous communities. 2010 summer scholarship report. northern territory: university of new south wales, centre for appropriate technology and water quality research, au. nganampa health. (1987). uwankara palyanyku kanyinjaku: south australian committee of review on environmental and public health within the anangu pitjantjatjara lands in south australia. alice springs: nganampa health. northern territory government. (2011). bushtel. retrieved from http://www. bushtel.nt.gov.au pearce, m., willis, e., mccarthy, c., ryan, f., & wadham, b. (2008). a response to the national water initiative from nepabunna, yarilena, scotdesco and davenport aboriginal settlements. dkcrc research report number 36. alice springs: desert knowledge cooperative research centre, uk. pholeros, p. (2002). housing for health and fixing houses for better health. environmental health, 2(4), 34-38. pholeros, p. (2011). health habitat: improving health through housing repair. architecture bulletin, 10, 10-11. power and water corporation. (n.d.). yuelamu water quality fact sheet. retrieved from http://www. powerwater.com.au/newsroom/publications power and water corporation. (2007). annual report. retrieved from http://www.powerwater.com.au/ newsroom/publications power and water corporation. (2009). indigenous communities of the northern territory drinking water quality annual report. retrieved from http://www.powerwater.com.au/_data/assets/ pdf_file/0016/22921/ies_ drinking_water_quality_2008-09.pdf power and water corporation. (2011). lsi for 73 communities in nt: water quality data (unpublished). alice springs. prisyazhniuk, v. a. (2007). prognosticating scale-forming properties of water. applied thermal engineering, 27(8-9), 1637-1641. doi: 10.1016/ j.applthermaleng.2005.12.004. willis, e., pearce, m., jenkin, t., wurst, s., & mccarthy, c. (2004). water supply and use in aboriginal communities in south australia. adelaide: worldwide online press. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.6 the international indigenous policy journal september 2012 cost implications of hard water on health hardware in remote indigenous communities in the central desert region of australia heather browett meryl pearce eileen m. willis recommended citation cost implications of hard water on health hardware in remote indigenous communities in the central desert region of australia abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license microsoft word 316534-text.native.1352034990.doc off balance: reflecting on the economic impacts of pregnancy in aboriginal youth the international indigenous policy journal volume 4 issue 1 indigenous early parenthood article 10 march 2013 off balance: reflecting on the economic impacts of pregnancy in aboriginal youth wanda wuttunee university of manitoba, wwuttun@cc.umanitoba.ca recommended citation wuttunee, w. (2013). off balance: reflecting on the economic impacts of pregnancy in aboriginal youth. the international indigenous policy journal, 4(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.10 off balance: reflecting on the economic impacts of pregnancy in aboriginal youth abstract many aboriginal leaders are focused on holistic approaches to bring physical, mental, and spiritual health to their citizens, allowing them to participate fully in a community’s future. however, teen pregnancy brings specific challenges that need to be addressed if, indeed, children are the future of aboriginal communities. this commentary looks at how the tools of community economic development (ced) can be applied to move young parents into positions from which they can participate in local economies. ced can be used to address contributing factors to teen pregnancies that are supportive of youth and appropriate to the community in question. young parents need support to develop the necessary independence and resilience. this brings challenges to community leadership to take steps to encourage the development of healthy sexuality and lifestyles, and to provide the needed education, training, and other community supports. if youth are the future of aboriginal communities, the cost of ignoring young parents and their children is much too high to ignore. french abstract déséquilibre : analyse des répercussions économiques de la grossesse chez les jeunes autochtones wanda wuttunee université du manitoba résumé de nombreux dirigeants autochtones mettent l’accent sur des approches holistiques afin de favoriser la santé physique, mentale et spirituelle de leurs citoyens, leur permettant ainsi de participer pleinement à l’avenir de leur collectivité. toutefois, la grossesse à l’adolescence engendre des difficultés particulières auxquelles il faut donner suite si, à n’en pas douter, les enfants représentent l’avenir des collectivités autochtones. le présent article examine l’application des outils de développement économique communautaire pour permettre aux jeunes parents de faire la transition qui s’impose pour participer aux économies locales. les outils de développement économique communautaire peuvent être utilisés pour éliminer les facteurs contribuant à la grossesse chez les adolescentes d’une manière qui soutient les jeunes et qui est adaptée à la collectivité en question. les jeunes parents ont besoin de soutien pour devenir autonomes et résilients. les dirigeants communautaires doivent donc prendre les mesures qui s’imposent pour favoriser le développement d’une sexualité et d’un mode de vie sains, ainsi que pour fournir le soutien nécessaire en matière d’éducation et de formation, de même que d’autres mécanismes de soutien communautaires. si les jeunes représentent l’avenir des collectivités autochtones, il ne faut pas fermer les yeux sur la situation des jeunes parents et de leurs enfants. spanish abstract desequilibrio: reflexiones sobre las repercusiones económicas del embarazo en la juventud indígena dra. wanda wuttunee universidad de manitoba resumen muchos líderes indígenas se basan en enfoques globales para aportar salud física, mental y espiritual a sus ciudadanos, permitiéndoles que participen plenamente en el futuro de la comunidad. sin embargo, los embarazos de adolescentes plantean retos concretos que han de tratarse ya que los niños son el futuro de las comunidades indígenas. en el artículo se examina la forma en que se pueden aplicar las herramientas de desarrollo económico comunitario para que los padres jóvenes puedan participar en las economías locales. el desarrollo económico comunitario puede usarse para tratar de los factores que contribuyen a los embarazos de adolescentes, de forma que apoyen a los jóvenes y sean apropiados para la comunidad en cuestión. los padres jóvenes necesitan apoyo para lograr la independencia y la resiliencia necesarias. esto plantea ciertas dificultades a los líderes de las comunidades a la hora de tomar medidas para fomentar el desarrollo de una sexualidad y de estilos de vida sanos y de proporcionar la educación, la capacitación y otros apoyos comunitarios necesarios. si los jóvenes son el futuro de las comunidades indígenas, hay que considerar el costo de no tener en cuenta a los padres jóvenes y a sus hijos. keywords teenacy pregnancy, early parenting, community economic development creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ o f f b a l a n c e : r e f l e c t i n g o n t h e e c o n o m i c i m p a c t s o f p r e g n a n c y i n a b o r i g i n a l y o u t h aboriginal leaders are focused on the physical, mental, and spiritual health of their urban and rural community citizens with the ultimate goal of self-governance and independence. achieving these goals requires opportunities for the inclusive participation of its citizens through economic activity. a holistic approach makes sense given the complex fabric of aboriginal communities (national collaborating centre for aboriginal health, 2009). indications of what types of communities leaders are working to build are found in themes such as: communities that are safe, clean places to raise families; and economic development creating a level of prosperity where each citizen is healthy and participating fully in current activities that lead to a hopeful and bright future. issues arising from teen pregnancy and young families will be examined within this context. while community-building goals can be advanced without full citizen participation, there is a cost in so doing. this article acts as a commentary on the impact of teen pregnancy from a community economic development (ced) perspective. lost opportunity is perhaps the greatest incurred cost when young teenaged women become pregnant. opportunities for success are impacted and the chances of leading a productive life, personally nurturing a strong family, and participating in and building a robust community economy are often altered. ced principles empower communities to accomplish their goals through the efforts of their citizens. a very important ced component is missing when young women and men are caught up with the huge demands of their families, leaving them unable to support a community process they can help enrich. they easily become unintentional role models for their children, young female relatives, and for other young women in their communities. in some cases, these young mothers are able to follow their dreams, but the paths taking them there can be difficult and daunting. community economic development challenges will also be discussed in this commentary, including reflections on how young parents move to a position where they participate in the local economy. the level of consistent support that fathers provide to young mothers for their children is critical, as is the support mothers receive from their parents, the school system, and the community. it is very likely that most teenage mothers will be on welfare, with few means of breaking that cycle, since their formal education often ends at some point during their pregnancy unless educational alternatives are accessible. other themes that will be examined include the likelihood that young women realize the extent to which the success of their communities lies with them. motherhood at a young age may have intergenerational impacts. from a traditional perspective, the child is at the centre of the community and, so, young motherhood is often encouraged because it is seen as following an acceptable path that has long historical roots. in contemporary reality, however, many aboriginal leaders carry a heavy burden that is poverty-driven. their ability to achieve community goals is handicapped by having to deal first with under or unemployed citizens including young mothers and fathers. it is important to recall the overwhelming statistics surrounding the issue of teenage pregnancy as described herein (see for example garner, guimond, & senécal, 2013; guèvremont & kohen, 2013, in this issue). briefly, teen pregnancy is linked to disadvantaged groups according to social and economic 1 wuttunee: off balance published by scholarship@western, 2013 indicators. moreover, there are significantly higher rates of pregnancy among aboriginal populations (e.g., 4 times higher for first nations teens, 12 times higher for inuit, and 18 times higher on reserve) than among the general population in canada. risk factors increase when the pregnant teen is part of the child welfare system. children of teen mothers are at greater risk of abuse, neglect, and becoming part of the child welfare system (ordolis, 2007). finally, this chapter draws on my 25 years of experience in examining aboriginal economic development and my personal perspective as a first nations woman. l o c a t i n g t h e a u t h o r i am a proud cree woman who is a member of red pheasant first nation, saskatchewan. i was raised in calgary so i embrace the term “cement” indian. that is my reality. my father, william wuttunee, grew up on our reserve and raised us to understand that no one owes us a thing. my father and my mother, bernice dufour, both emphasized education and independence as critical values for my four brothers and sisters. we were raised to embrace cree ceremony and tradition. we also accepted values that helped us succeed in the world. we were open to new ideas and my father always had the newest and the best in gadgets. traditional values of respect and humility were incorporated into our childhood. our sense of community was nurtured with regular visits to family who lived on our reserve. my siblings and i all proudly identify with our cree heritage and also celebrate our scottish, ukrainian, and french ancestry. taking a chance on getting pregnant was not an option when i was growing up. however, a number of family members and friends ended up getting abortions while in their teens. i started university right after high school. i earned three degrees: in business and law, followed by my phd. during that time, i married and had two children. neither my son nor my daughter faced the complex challenges of involvement with teen pregnancy. they are currently in relationships of more than a year, while completing their university and senior high school programs. they continue to deal with many difficult issues around drugs, alcohol, smoking, human sexuality, and relationships. while i don’t have personal experience of teen pregnancy, it was a topic of interest and concern when i was a teenager and remains so as a parent. in speaking to other mothers with pregnant teenage daughters over the years, i know that it is a very difficult time for everyone. it is a time that requires fortitude to handle problems with few easy answers and many hard choices. in my professional life, i was drawn to economic development issues, including how communities achieve their economic goals using community economic development strategies. it is the rural setting that interests me the most with regard to examining the economic impacts of teen pregnancy on youth, families, and communities. c o m m u n i t y e c o n o m i c d e v e l o p m e n t community economic development is more than economic development, which is focussed mainly on wealth creation. it incorporates community values into the process of building an economic base that can involve community members and, where appropriate, corporate and government partners. it provides opportunity and encourages individual participation in the development process. this results in an empowered community, focussed on success on their terms. this approach to ced gained popularity among many aboriginal communities, as well as the federal government, in the 1990s and 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 10 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/10 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.10 continues to be one of the main ced approaches today (canadian centre for community renewal, n.d.). if a community identifies issues of poverty related to lack of employment and dependence on assistance as the critical goal that needs addressing, then community efforts could incorporate strategies in a ced plan that deals with these issues in substantive and meaningful ways. a community’s ced plan is only as strong as its weakest members. thus, it makes sense for communities to have a long-term strategy that seeks the full participation of its members in the community’s economic plans (native women's association of canada, 2004). the focal point for ced activities would see members in training for real jobs in the community. obstacles, such as day care, transportation, addictions, and poverty, must be addressed. if the community has a high rate of teenaged pregnancy, examining the contributing factors is crucial as is tackling these issues in ways that are appropriate to the community. ced looks at cultivating community leadership and developing community wealth through the support of local business, creating co-operation, independence, and relevant development (economic development, community development, 2009). scrutinizing teenaged pregnancy in the context of a ced plan might include, for example, considering the following possible scenario, which is offered for illustrative purposes only (see also olsen, 2005): b o t h y o u n g p a r e n t s d r o p o u t o f s c h o o l . education and training are critical to participating in the community’s ced plan. pregnancy at a young age often disrupts education and makes future laborforce participation difficult, if not impossible. more often than not, a single parent family is created in this situation (best start: ontario's maternal, newborn and early child development resource centre and the sex information and education council of canada, 2008). t h e y o u n g m a n m a y t r y t o o b t a i n e m p l o y m e n t t o s u p p o r t h i s f a m i l y . due to lack of experience and young age, his opportunities will be few. it is likely that only unskilled jobs will be availabile with their attendent lack of stability and good wages. when times are slow, this junior person would have little job security. many aboriginal communities, unfortunately, have few jobs available for any community member. t h e p o v e r t y a n d a s s i s t a n c e c y c l e . it is easy for a teenaged single mother to slide into a cycle of poverty and assistance (standing committee on aboriginal peoples, 2003). this risk may be mitigated if the teenaged father is trying to support his family. however, given the quality of available opportunities, there is no guarantee that his family can be supported. the teenaged parents may try to survive as a family, but without their resepective families’ and community’s support their child will likely end up in state care (national collaborating centre for aboriginal health, 2005). the poverty cycle that many teenaged families find themselves in is often intergenerational. 3 wuttunee: off balance published by scholarship@western, 2013 f a m i l y a n d c o m m u n i t y s u p p o r t . the teenaged parent’s families may support the addition of a child into the community, which aligns with traditional beliefs that the child is the centre of the community. problems arise if the teenaged parent’s families have no resources to help meet additional expenses. this launches the poverty and assistance cycle for the young family. the community may support the young family, but there are likely to be few resources available to help beyond such things as babysitting assistance and the nursing station. alcohol and drug abuse are linked to teenaged pregnancy (anderson, 2002). if the baby is born with fetal alchol syndrome (fas), fetal alchol effects (fae), or other serious health issues, then the child will not have the same opportunities to be a fully contributing community member when he or she grows up that it might have had if the parents were more mature and the family more stable before taking on the responsibility of a child. this is only one possible scenario, but the challenges that arise for communities that want to achieve specific economic goals are clear. young people are the future of the community. if they are unable to develop skills and contribute for whatever reasons, then the future of the community is limited. independence and self-government are likely out of reach and there remains little to pass on to the next generation. consequently, the comunity’s quality of life is diminished. moreover, the value that ascribes the future of aboriginal communities to our children is an empty one. a robust and resilient community, able to meet the challenges of its environment, demands the commitment of all community members in this generation and among the generations yet to come (see mccracken, 2005). young aboriginal women are likely to be single mothers, living in poverty, without a high school diploma, and caught in the social assistance trap. all of this is borne out by the statistics (guimond & robatille, 2008). aboriginal women have many challenges to deal with as a result of colonization. their resilience, however, is documented in the literature in areas of culture, health, politics, and of course with their families (valaskakis, stout, & guimond, 2009; voyager, 2008). if our young women are not in a position to become educated, raise healthy families at a time in their lives when they have matured and are strong in mind, body, and spirit, and be able to join the economy if they desire, then the prognosis is dismal. it is not a question of young aboriginal women becoming mothers. rather, it is a question of whether personal resilience, as well as family and community support and resources, are available to them when they become teenage mothers (guimond & robatille, 2008). the paragrpahs that follow focus on the role of the parents, their families, and the community in the context of community economic development. o u t l i n i n g t h e i m p a c t s ordolis (2007) informs us that the close, communal practices associated with raising a child include the extended family and community. this is why a child is often welcomed into the family in many communities, no matter what the age of the parents might be. from an aboriginal perspective, women are crucial for nurturing relationships between the generations, since they are keepers of the culture who ensure that the people would always know who they are. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 10 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/10 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.10 as one woman explains, “we were taught that the time we are in is only borrowed from future generations – generations yet unborn. our thoughts, words and actions impact seven generations from now. it is these children held sacred by our mother earth for whom we must leave a true fire.” (ordolis, 2007, p. 31) there is immense pressure on mothers to birth and keep the baby. teenage mothers are expected to keep the baby in the community, whether or not adequate financial and social resources exist to ensure a good life for the child (olsen, 2005). community complacency in the face of this reality and the easy acceptance of teenage pregnancy by many parents ignores how out of control the situation has become (olsen, 2005). an elder warned that what was considered right in the past should not be imposed on young people today: i had my first child at 14… my grandchildren live in another world entirely. what was right and proper and expected of a young woman in my day should not be considered right and proper today… i cannot even imagine my grandchildren having children without tasting life. thirteen or 14 year-olds today are still babies. then, women cleaned skins, made boots, ran our own homes. i can’t see kids today doing that. (archibald, 2004, p. 8) today’s youth culture has great influence, too. consequently, taking alcohol and smoking during pregnancy is not considered taboo. such behaviour compromises the child’s health and often results in illnesses and damage, such as fas. such choices have far reaching short-term and long-term impacts on families who try to grapple with these issues. there are also impacts for their communities, whose members may need short-term health care or care for the rest of their lives as a result of substance abuse during pregnancy. l e a d e r s h i p political leaders are always aided by those persons around them who care about their communities. formal and informal leaders operate throughout communities by offering guidance and wisdom (e.g., elders), their time, direction, and role modeling for other community citizens of all ages. the ced process gives voice to their concerns and provides opportunities for their involvement. in the following section, i look at some of the general challenges facing leaders today and how can they begin to address teen pregnancy. education, employment, and income statistics demonstrate positive growth in many first nation communities (assembly of first nations make poverty history expert advisory committee, 2009). times have changed and some communities are well on their way to economic independence, reforming health and education policies (national aboriginal health organization, 2005), reviving culture, and improving the process of community governance. one challenge is that such change varies from community to community. moreover, this change can be frustratingly slow for many community members. in many of those communities working hard to move ahead, human resources are stretched thin and burnout among community members is all too common. economic development is often based on community stability, clear vision, and strong leadership. 5 wuttunee: off balance published by scholarship@western, 2013 according to the report entitled, “the state of the first nation economy and the struggle to end poverty” (assembly of first nations make poverty history expert advisory committee, 2009), improvement has been encouraging, although the first nation economy is especially vulnerable to recessions, which can reverse, at least for a time, positive changes gained over the last forty years. as the expert advisory committee’s report states: many first nation businesses are less well established, overrepresented in the primary resources sector and more likely to be engaged (and exposed) in the export of goods and services. the first nation labour force is younger, growing faster, has less union protection and seniority, and less education all of which make it more vulnerable in the current climate. (assembly of first nations make poverty history expert advisory committee, 2009, p. 5) the statistics referred to in the quote above are only some of the challenges facing aboriginal leaders and communities seeking economic autonomy. first nation young people in the labour market or about to enter it face especially challenging, even desperate, times in the labour market. this conclusion is drawn despite the favourable economic environment characterizing the last decade. as of 2006, aboriginal youth were disadvantaged in terms of educational achievement and the unemployment rate for those living on reserve was 38 percent, with some 27 percent unemployment for the overall aboriginal population. thirty-four percent of aboriginal persons living in a family context reported low incomes and as many as 77 percent of “unattached individuals” reported the same (assembly of first nations make poverty history expert advisory committee, 2009). s t r a t e g i e s f o r h e a l t h y s e x u a l i t y i n a c e d c o n t e x t although limited in its scope, the economic profile set out in the previous section underlines the fragility of aboriginal economies. young people are exposed to continuing unemployment and many face additional complications arising from teen pregnancy. it can be helpful to consider what other communities are doing in the face of similar trials. one example that robert anderson (1999) discussed is a ced plan formulated by the meadow lake tribal council in saskatchewan. community members outlined each person’s responsibility and role in meeting development barriers. this approach is unique because it is often much too easy to point a finger at a lack of funding, or federal government (ir)responsibility, or an inalienable right as the root cause of the situation. this simplistic response often results in significant delays, while a community holds its collective breath for some response from the government that is out of their control. instead, the empowered approach taken in the meadow lake tribal council example resulted in a community written document with personal accountability built into it. this approach requires that individuals have positive attitudes, appropriate training, and a will to support local, small businesses. families must maintain healthy lifestyles, offer holistic support, and nurture language, culture, and tradition. the first nation itself is required to offer effective and responsible leadership; thereby ensuring a strong future supported by economic development and a good standard of living for their members. the first nation’s role also inlcudes providing support for education, training, and wellness initiatives. this includes sufficient supports for small business. in the meadow lake tribal council 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 10 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/10 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.10 example, the roles and expectations of the tribal council and two levels of government were also laid out (anderson, 1999). what types of actions might be asked of community members to address teen pregnancy in such a way that young people and their children are not just statistics or, worse, on-going and unsolved problems (disant, 2008)? getting at the root causes of poverty and offering community perspectives are at the heart of the following example of a ced draft plan that addresses the challenges posed by teen pregnancy. t e e n s : take individual responsibility for healthy lifestyles. communities and adults need to understand why they are assets and, especially with regard to young women, their role in raising robust families and supporting their communities. according to godfrey’s (2006) work with youth: • when young people feel they are being heard, they feel the communities care, value and respect them. if they are a part of the decision-making, they begin to build self-respect, selfesteem and self worth. they begin to look at productive and healthy alternatives in their lives; • it helps them to be less afraid, and they begin to build leadership skills; • they know that the future lies in their hands, and they want to be positive leaders in their communities. having a voice and knowing it is valued, gives young people a path to make positive changes and meet the challenges they face. they would then be able to work with the adults in their communities, to overcome challenges and make positive changes. (p. 15). f a m i l i e s : talk about human sexuality and support young families so that grandchildren are not taken into state care (anderson, 2002) and focus on strengthening these young families. after reflection, it may become apparent that if the families of teenaged parents are not able to protect their future grandchildren from state care, then supporting good choices regarding sex, contraception, and reproductive health before pregnancy takes place should become a priority and also a community social value (irvine, 2009). c o m m u n i t y : place priority on keeping young people engaged in positive activities by offering activities that are attractive to everyone or offer a series of activities that can engage all youth in the community in one way or another. hockey is great, for example, but not everyone likes hockey; however, hockey can be complemented by other team sports. communities, parents, and teens need to ensure that healthy sexuality, healthy lifestyles, and topics on the family are raised with young people in appropriate settings, including school and small community gatherings. what can be learned from the values found in traditional teachings and reflected in the actions of role models, elders, and community leaders regarding teen pregnancy? informed, healthy decisions are the ultimate goal (young/single parent support network of ottawa-carleton, timmins native friendship centre, and the canadian institute of child health, 2000). all players, teens, their parents, and their community leadership need to work together to break the poverty cycle by working 7 wuttunee: off balance published by scholarship@western, 2013 with young families and offering them opportunities to complete their education, ways to look after their children, and help them to be strong, good parents. the result of this very community-specific process could begin to address some of the issues around teen pregnancy and encourage full community contribution to the ced plan. it is an approach that empowers children, youth, and families in developing healthier communities (blackstock, bruyere, & moreau, 2006). it is also useful for accomplishing other community economic development goals that would otherwise be stalled because of a lack of resources. finally, godfrey’s (2006) research results support this community approach: • by listening to youth, adults will know what types of activities and resources benefit youth in their communities. this will help communities build on strengths; • the people in the community are the main supports for youth. if they do not feel important in their communities, then they begin to feel lost and alone; • the youth expressed that they want a voice and they want to be heard, they know that they are the future and that the future lies in their hands. if we don't step up and hear them now, they’re afraid they will never be heard. positive leaders are needed in the communities to help guide the youth in the process of change. the youth feel that not only their futures lie in their hands, but adults as well. positive leaders and role models in the communities will help guide them (p. 15). p e r s o n a l r e f l e c t i o n s : w o r k i n g t o g e t h e r aboriginal teenagers are really no different than other canadian teenagers in issues of the heart. each has to figure out the answers to the big questions in their lives. these questions are complicated, especially when teenagers have to deal with poverty. they are often overwhelming when pregnancy enters their reality. this situation is also hard on small aboriginal communities, meaning that help from members of the larger community or nation may be useful. such help may come from communities that are setting examples in this area, or it may come from individuals that can give time and ideas. being sensitive to the damage stereotypes and low expectations have on young people can also make a difference. olsen (2005) describes how the impacts of such attitudes and stereotypes paint off-reserve first nations women as incompetent and substandard mothers who are more fertile, consume more drugs and alcohol, are sexually abusive or were sexually abused, and come from broken homes. the experience on reserve may be different but it is not necessarily easier. pregnant teenagers are nothing new – it has become a stereotype of its own in general society, as discussed in this issue by fonda, eni and guimond (2013). this is even more so in the case for aboriginal youth. the level of community acceptance of teenage pregnancy allows them to walk freely about the reserve, but they don’t feel any better about themselves. when everyone in their community and, indeed, in canada seems to have low expectations of them, youth end up having low expectations of themselves. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 10 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/10 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.10 if we flip these negative connotations on their head and consider that the situation for young teenaged women of different ethnicities is no different, it becomes obvious that: they are lively, intelligent and beautiful. they are daughters, granddaughters, cousins, sisters, and friends. they are enthusiastic sometimes and depressed sometimes. they have goals and dreams and hope they can accomplish them. they make good choices and bad choices. they like to shop, play soccer, eat burgers, party and attend music concerts. they love to dance. (olsen, 2005, p. 33) parents have similar issues with their sons. the goal is to keep young people on a straight path so they can enjoy bountiful lives, where everyone benefits. such a ced plan can only come together if the community is ready to work together. aboriginal children are the future. they are also at risk and highly marginalized (the working group of the national aboriginal youth strategy, 1999). they are being taken into state care in higher numbers than ever before and continue to be underprivileged. many of today’s first nations’ children will have children before they are ready, because they had teenage parents who lacked parenting skills and did not know how to take care of a family as well as they might have hoped. this cycle continues today and, because what affects the part affects the whole, it has social and economic ramifications for all of us, aboriginal or not. teenage mothers are a key to the success of ced goals of building strong aboriginal communities. they are the women who determine the strength of the families and the health of their young people, and who pass on critical cultural information to the next generation. teen mothers are a vital first nation resource. the cost of ignoring them is much too high (olsen, 2005). when i take stock of the changes in my world since i started working with aboriginal economies, i remember marveling at the growing sophistication in our leadership, the increasing levels of education, and the strength women in management positions. it is important to consider that some of the women leaders i knew were teenage mothers and, yet, they made it; they have met with undeniable success. today, i see more aboriginal students entering in my classes and a growing contingent of the same in the commerce degree program at my university. i see hope for major change. about 10 years ago, i travelled to communities up north where the overwhelming majority of children had fas. once i understood the permanent damage our children suffer from the poor choices of their mothers, i felt we had lost a generation. it is very challenging to make progress in communities when they are faced with the kind of fallout that fas children bring to themselves and those around them. as mentioned previously, fas is often linked to teenage pregnancy because many young women do not value, and lack information regarding, healthy pregnancies. the economic consequences tend to grow like a snowball rolling down a hill, moving from the family to the community to the general population. such consequences are far-reaching and very sad. moving through the ced plan i suggested in the previous section, we find are some very positive ideas that involve the whole community. that is where hope lies. s u m m a r y while there have been strides made in the first nation economy over the past 40 years, there are still many challenges to confront. young aboriginal people, especially, face daunting employment 9 wuttunee: off balance published by scholarship@western, 2013 challenges. their level of education is low and this curtails many opportunities that otherwise might be available. teenage pregnancy adds another layer of complication in communities that may have few economic opportunities themselves. while grandchildren are often embraced by the grandparents and sometimes by both sets of parents, often resources are not available over the long-term and the grandchild is taken into state care. many dreams are shattered as a result. economic self-sufficiency takes effort from every community member including teenaged parents and their offspring. it means resources must focus on healthy sexuality, which includes prevention and support for teenage mothers so the poverty cycle can be broken. this is an investment in the future, in their future. ced is one path that brings to the table a unity of effort that deals directly with issues and finds solutions that put community citizen participation at the heart of the process with minimal reliance on outside programs. outside programs and resources can be used judiciously but progress does not rest on them. all community citizens need to be able to participate in the economy according to their personal capacities and desires. the alternative is loss of community resiliency. this impacts all of canadian society. teenage pregnancy is not an easy situation to handle but the effort is worth it. honest conversations, better programs, thoughtful policy change, and meaningful community attitude shifts will create the opportunities necessary for real change and for economic resiliency. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 10 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/10 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.10 r e f e r e n c e s anderson, k. (2002). tenuous connections: urban aboriginal youth sexual health and pregnancy. toronto: ontario federatoin of indian friendship centres. anderson, r. (1999). economic development among the aboriginal peoples of canada. york university: captus press. archibald, l. (2004). teenage pregnancy in inuit communities: issues and perspectives. ottawa: pauktuutit inuit women’s association. assembly of first nations make poverty history expert advisory committee. (2009). the state of the first nation economy and the struggle to make poverty history. ottawa: assembly of first nations. best start: ontario's maternal, newborn and early child development resource centre and the sex information and education council of canada. (2008). update report on teen pregnancy prevention. toronto: government of ontario. blackstock, c. b., bruyere, d., & moreau, e. (2006). many hands one dream: principles for a new perspective on the health of first nations, metis and inuit youth. retrieved from www.manyhandsonedream.ca canadian centre for community renewal. (n.d.). community economic development. retrieved from http://www.cedworks.com/ceddefinition.html disant, m. h. (2008). pophealth notes: aboriginal youth and social inequalities in health. montreal: quebed population health research network. economic development, community development. (2009, march 5). economic development 101: development defined. retrieved from http://ecdevcomdev.blogspot.com/2009/03/economicdevelopment-101-economic.html fonda, m., eni, r., & guimond, e. (2013). socially constructed teen motherhood: a review. the international indigenous policy journal, 4(1). retrieved from http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/ godfrey, k. (2006). in their own words: aboriginal youth speak out on what concerns them. bc: the child and youth officer for british columbia, the first nations summit, the forum's community planning group. garner, r., guimond, e., & senécal s. (2013). the socio-economic characteristics of first nation teen mothers. the international indigenous policy journal, 4(1). retrieved from http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/ 11 wuttunee: off balance published by scholarship@western, 2013 guèvremont, a., & kohen, d. (2013). the physical and mental health of off-reserve first nations children of teen mothers. the international indigenous policy journal, 4(1). retrieved from http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/ guimond, e., & robataille, n. (2008). when teenage girls have children: trends and consequences. horizons: policy research iniative, 10 (1), 49 51. irvine, k. (2009). supporting aboriginal parents: teaching for the future. prince george, bc: national collaborating centre for aboriginal health. mccracken, m. (2005). young women work: community economic development to reduce women's poverty and improve income. winnipeg: prairie health centre of excellence. national aboriginal health organization. (2005). aboriginal women and girls’ health roundtable. ottawa: national aboriginal health organization. national collaborating centre for aboriginal health. (2005). understanding neglect in first nation families. prince george, bc: national collaborating centre for aboriginal health. national collaborating centre for aboriginal health. (2009). economic development as a social determinant of first nations, inuit and metis health. retrieved from http://www.nccahccnsa.ca/myfiles/nccah-factsheet-sdoh-economicdevelopment.pdf native women's association of canada. (2004). background document on aboriginal women's health for the health sectorial section following up to the canada-aboriginal peoples roundtable . ottawa: native women's association of canada. olsen, s. (2005). just ask us: a conversation with first nations teenage moms. winlaw, bc: sono nis press. ordolis, e. (2007). a story of their own: adolescent pregnancy and child welfare in aboriginal communities. first peoples child and family review, 3 (4), 30 41. standing committee on aboriginal peoples. (2003). urban aboriginal youth: an action plan for change. ottawa: government of canada. the working group of the national aboriginal youth strategy. (1999). national aboriginal youth strategy. ottawa: government of canada. valaskakis, g. g., stout, m. d., & guimond, e. (eds.). (2009). restoring the balance: first nations women, community and culture. winnipeg: university of manitoba press. voyager, c. (2008). firekeepers of the twenty-first century: first nations women chiefs. montreal: mcgill-queen's university press. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 10 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/10 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.10 young/single parent support network of ottawa-carleton, timmins native friendship centre, and the canadian institute of child health. (2000). pro-action, postponment, and prepartion/support: a framework for action to reduce teen pregancy in canada. ottawa: health canada. 13 wuttunee: off balance published by scholarship@western, 2013 the international indigenous policy journal march 2013 off balance: reflecting on the economic impacts of pregnancy in aboriginal youth wanda wuttunee recommended citation off balance: reflecting on the economic impacts of pregnancy in aboriginal youth abstract french abstract spanish abstract keywords creative commons license off balance: reflecting on the economic impacts of pregnancy in aboriginal youth the canadian environmental assessment act, 2012 and associated policy: implications for aboriginal peoples the international indigenous policy journal volume 4 | issue 3 article 1 january 2013 the canadian environmental assessment act, 2012 and associated policy: implications for aboriginal peoples denis kirchhoff university of waterloo, kirdenis@yahoo.ca holly l. gardner university of waterloo, hologardner@gmail.com leonard j. s. tsuji university of waterloo, ljtsuji@uwaterloo.ca recommended citation kirchhoff, d. , gardner, h. l. , tsuji, l. j. (2013). the canadian environmental assessment act, 2012 and associated policy: implications for aboriginal peoples. th e international indigenous policy journal, 4(3) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.1 the canadian environmental assessment act, 2012 and associated policy: implications for aboriginal peoples abstract despite canada’s positive reputation in international circles regarding environmental protection, there are recent signs that this is no longer warranted. recent changes to the canadian environmental assessment act (ceaa) clearly present governmental intentions to focus efforts on stimulating economic growth through more rapid resource exploitation at the expense of the environment. moreover, when assessing the impact of ceaa 2012 on aboriginal people, one must look beyond the act itself and take into account other pieces of policy to see the true effects because there are a number of other governmental initiatives that further weaken aboriginal peoples’ capacity to participate in the resource development review process for undertakings that affect their traditional lands. the result is the silencing of the people who are most affected by resource development. keywords canadian environment assessment act (ceaa) 2012, aboriginal peoples, canada, environmental assessment, resource development creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ t h e c a n a d i a n e n v i r o n m e n t a l a s s e s s m e n t a c t , 2 0 1 2 a n d a s s o c i a t e d p o l i c y : i m p l i c a t i o n s f o r a b o r i g i n a l p e o p l e s canada was founded on a federated system of government, with the powers of each level of government (federal and provincial) being specified in the canadian constitution act (1867) (formerly known as the british north american act). however, there was no mention of the environment in the canadian constitution act and, consequently, the responsibility for the environment has been shared between the federal and the provincial governments of canada. as such, two levels of environmental assessment have arisen in canada: an overarching federal assessment process and several regional (provincial and territorial) assessment processes. to harmonize the environmental assessment process in canada, formal environmental assessment agreements have been made between the federal government and several provincial governments, while other agreements have been reached through an ad hoc process. for the present article, we will be referring specifically to changes made to the federal process as currently outlined in the canadian environmental assessment act (ceaa, 2012a). for a number of years, canada has had a positive reputation in international circles with regard to its record on environmental protection. however, there are recent signs that this reputation is no longer warranted: the canadian federal government has downsized its public service and cut heavily into spending levels in many areas of governance, including that of environmental protection. in 2012, certain changes made to the ceaa clearly indicate the intention of the current canadian government to focus efforts to stimulate economic growth through more rapid resource exploitation at the expense of the environment. arguably, most of the recent changes come in response to pressures created by economic uncertainty and a financial crisis that started some five years ago. the impact of the ceaa 2012 on canada as a whole has been well described by gibson (2012) and doelle (2012), but little mention has been made about the implications of the ceaa 2012 for aboriginal (first nations, inuit, and metis) peoples in canada. some individuals contend that “the role of aboriginal peoples is a vital element of ceaa 2012” (damman & bruce, 2012, p. 83) since the ceaa 2012 contains “explicit requirements to assess changes to the environment that affect aboriginal peoples” (walls, 2012, p. 2). these environmental changes have been defined by representatives of the canadian environment assessment agency to include: • health and socio-economic conditions; • physical and cultural heritage; • current use of lands and resources for traditional purposes; • any structure, site or thing of historical, archeological, paleontological or architectural significance. (walls, 2012, p. 11) in essence, the ceaa 2012 requires responsible authorities (i.e., the canadian environmental assessment agency, canadian nuclear safety commission, and the national energy board) to establish participant funding programs, although this requirement does not apply if the federal minister has approved a provincial environmental assessment substitution process (walls, 2012). there are currently 1 kirchhoff et al.: ceaa 2012 and implications for aboriginal peoples published by scholarship@western, 2013     no clear criteria to decide on whether a provincial environmental assessment is considered an appropriate substitute to the federal environmental assessment process; the federal minister has discretion to make this decision (canadian environmental assessment act, 2012; gibson, 2012). furthermore, the canadian environmental assessment agency has recognized that the federal “crown has a legal duty to consult aboriginal peoples about the potential impact of decisions associated with federal conduct on their rights” (walls, 2012, p. 12). while it appears that the ceaa 2012 sets out laudable goals with respect to aboriginal interests and engagement in the environmental assessment process, it is our contention that all is not what it seems to be, especially taking into consideration additional canadian federal policy with respect to aboriginal people and the environment. one must look at the whole picture and not just at the ceaa 2012 to understand the true implications for aboriginal people with respect to environmental assessment. this article begins with a brief overview of canadian environmental assessment legislation since its introduction in the early 1970s and then describes and contrasts some of the main changes to the federal environmental assessment system implemented by the current government in 2012. we then discuss implications of the ceaa 2012 (and related government policy changes) with respect to the impact on aboriginal peoples’ capacity to participate meaningfully in resource development and environmental assessment in canada. b r i e f o v e r v i e w o f c a n a d i a n e n v i r o n m e n t a l a s s e s s m e n t l e g i s l a t i o n a n d s t r e a m l i n i n g environmental challenges occur frequently. approaches to mitigate damage, to halt developments and undertakings that are likely to cause serious problems and, in some cases, to compare alternatives and identify the most desirable options have been developed. one of the main ways of doing this is through environmental assessment (ea) processes of various types. the most entrenched form of environmental assessment is project-level environmental assessment, which is now common in virtually every part of the world. since the formal introduction by the united states of the national environmental policy act of 1969 (1970), environmental assessment has evolved substantially. in 1973, canada followed the u.s. example and introduced environmental assessment legislation at the federal level when the canadian environmental assessment and review process was implemented. p o t e n t i a l b e n e f i t s a n d e s s e n t i a l e n v i r o n m e n t a l a s s e s s m e n t r e q u i r e m e n t s for the past 40 years, environmental assessment has been helpful in minimizing and sometimes compensating for the environmental impact of proposed undertakings. despite perceived challenges and limitations in its application, ea has been described as one of the most important processes for incorporating potential environmental consequences of proposed projects into decisions regarding those projects (noble, 2010), with many potential benefits associated with its application. besides managing the effects of proposed undertakings (noble, 2010) by considering environmental effects and potential mitigation measures early in a project planning cycle, the use of environmental assessments can have many benefits, such as: • improving project design and planning; 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.1     • reducing project costs for proponents through early identification of potentially unforeseen impacts; • forcing planning agencies and some private sector interests to integrate the environment early in the planning and decision making process; • potentially integrating environmental, social and economic considerations • providing a means for public debate about the nature and direction of development; • facilitating learning, environmental education and informed decision making; • facilitating greater transparency and increasing public acceptability of proposed undertakings through participation. (adapted from noble, 2010, p. 17) moreover, international ea practice provides insight into essential requirements for ea “good practice” and assessments should follow these identified requirements for potential benefits of an ea application to take effect. it is beyond the scope of this article to comprehensively review the literature on essential requirements for ea good practice. instead, we present in table 1 a list of essential ea requirements developed by gibson (2012). according to the gibson (2012), they represent “core process design requirements for effective, efficient and fair [environmental] assessment.” (p. 181), and are derived from several sources in the international literature (see gibson, 2012). the canadian environmental assessment act is currently the legislative base that regulates environmental assessment in canada. the following sections describe the evolution of environmental assessment in canada and recent developments in canadian ea legislation. e v o l u t i o n o f e a l e g i s l a t i o n i n c a n a d a in contrast with the u.s. environmental assessment regime, the canadian government established a policy-based, federal environmental assessment process, which was not legally binding. this situation later proved to be challenging: “serious attention to environmental assessment requirements was essentially voluntary” (gibson & hanna, 2009, p. 22). as a result, assessments in canada were carried out inconsistently and in some cases not carried out at all. after much public criticism, the voluntary canadian environmental assessment process was incrementally strengthened in the 1970s and early 1980s (e.g., early public involvement was encouraged). in 1984, the environmental assessment and review process was amended and became the environmental assessment review process guidelines order (1984), which brought firmer language of obligation, but in practice still failed to secure more effective commitment to the environmental assessment process. not until a decision by the federal court of canada in 1989, when mr. justice cullen ruled that the guidelines order was legally binding, did the federal environmental assessment process in canada become mandatory. this ruling set the stage for the introduction of a legislated environmental assessment process. 3 kirchhoff et al.: ceaa 2012 and implications for aboriginal peoples published by scholarship@western, 2013     t a b l e 1 . r e q u i r e m e n t s f o r e f f e c t i v e , e f f i c i e n t , a n d f a i r e n v i r o n m e n t a l a s s e s s m e n t the process must be designed to: 1. apply to all potentially significant undertakings; 2. ensure effectively integrated attention to biophysical, social and economic considerations; 3. begin at the outset of deliberations on anticipated initiatives so as to inform decisions on purposes and alternatives as well as project selection and design; 4. establish clear requirements and predictable process expectations; 5. focus attention on the most significant undertakings, effects and opportunities for protection and enhancement; 6. facilitate open public engagement and learning; 7. aim for selection of most desirable options for enhancement of benefits as well as avoidance or mitigation of adverse effects; 8. improve decision-making consistency, impartiality, transparency and accountability; 9. integrate well with other objectives and processes; 10. provide authoritative means of enforcing requirements and ensuring monitoring and adjustment. note. adapted from gibson (2012). in 1990, a bill was proposed to create the canadian environmental assessment act (ceaa). it received legislative approval in 1992 but only came into force in 1995 (ceaa, 1992). according to gibson and hanna (2009), during this period, proponent departments heavily dominated deliberations and the result was “a law that is less ambitious than the previous guidelines order and full of openings to ministerial discretion”(p. 25). however, ceaa 1995, in its almost two decades of existence and despite the need for further improvements, still had some positive results, such as: covering most projects within the federal domain; providing opportunities for public participation, including participant funding for more effective public involvement; requiring attention to cumulative effects; and encouraging the development of follow-up plans. table 2 shows that ceaa 1995 certainly had some room for improvement; however, subsequent weakening of the federal ea system brought forth with the ceaa 2012 is unprecedented, and “particularly comprehensive and dramatic” (gibson, 2012, p. 180). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.1     t a b l e 2 . s t r e n g h s a n d w e a k n e s s e s o f t h e c a n a d i a n e n v i r o n m e n t a l a s s e s s m e n t a c t , 1 9 9 5 w e a k n e s s e s s t r e n g t h s restrictive definition of environment (focused on biophysical effects only) and narrow scope of environmental considerations to be addressed promotes examination of “alternatives to” a type of project and “alternative means” to carry out a project, and the needs for the proposed project focused mainly on mitigating negative environmental effects covered most projects within the federal mandate exclusive focus on projects (no openings to strategic environmental assessment) opportunities for public participation and participant funding sometimes late triggering of the act (i.e., environmental assessment begins late in the project planning/design process) clearly defined streams for major and minor undertakings examination of project’s purposes and alternatives not mandatory required attention to cumulative effects ineffective mechanisms to ensure adequate follow-up, monitoring and enforcement could be used to ensure a comprehensive and sustainability-based approach note. adapted from gibson (2012). it has been argued that the overall trend in the scholarly field of environmental assessment has been one of gradually expanded application, scope, openness, understanding and ambition (bond, morrisonsaunders & pope, 2012; gibson, 2012; gibson, hassan, holtz, tansey & whitelaw, 2005). it is a fact that resistance to environmental assessment obligations has always been present, either by proponents of a project who fear delayed approvals and increased cost or by government authorities who fear greater scrutiny and new obligations from an inherently more open, transparen,t and participatory process. pressures for a reduced role of environmental assessment in development approvals has grown in recent years, especially when governments look to stimulate economic growth and create jobs in response to economic recession (morgan, 2012). in canada, this continued pressure resulted in substantial changes made to the ceaa in 2012 in order to streamline the federal environmental assessment regime already in place. presented as a means of ensuring more timely decisions and efficient environmental assessments, the new act in effect drastically reduces the number of projects that undergo environmental assessments. more than 95% of projects that required an environmental assessment under the old act will now be exempt from it (which represents more than 6,000 assessments if we take the year 2010 to 2011 as reference). in addition, almost 3,000 ongoing environmental assessments were cancelled – including more than 600 involving fossil fuel energy and more than 200 involving a pipeline – immediately after the act came into force in july 2012 (ceaa, 2012b). from an aboriginal perspective, the streamlining changes to the ceaa 1995 have substantial implications, especially in terms of how effectively aboriginal people can participate in the environmental assessment and review process of new undertakings that may affect their traditional 5 kirchhoff et al.: ceaa 2012 and implications for aboriginal peoples published by scholarship@western, 2013     lands. the drastic reduction in the number of projects that undergo an environmental assessment in turn greatly reduces opportunities for aboriginal involvement. it has been suggested that the implemented changes are so drastic that the canadian federal environmental assessment regime can no longer be considered environmental assessment per se; the new federal environmental assessment process will be, for the most part, a process of gathering information rather than “a true planning process that engages governments and the public [including aboriginal peoples] in the early stages of project planning and design” (doelle, 2012, p.8). indeed, shortened timeline requirements under ceaa 2012 – a maximum of 365 days for environmental assessments by the canadian environmental assessment agency, and a maximum of 24 months for a review panel environmental assessment (walls, 2012) – will make it more difficult for remote and/or isolated aboriginal communities to fully participate in the environmental assessment process due to logistical constraints. r e c e n t d e v e l o p m e n t s i n c a n a d i a n e n v i r o n m e n t a l a s s e s s m e n t l e g i s l a t i o n a n d o t h e r r e l e v a n t p o l i c y the process through which the ceaa 2012 was introduced has been highly criticized for not having preliminary proposals and for being pushed too quickly through the legislative process with no debate about the implications of proposed changes (see for example doelle, 2012; gailus, 2012; gage, 2012; gibson, 2012; kennedy, 2012; russell, 2012). the ceaa 2012 was passed as part of the 2012 budget implementation bill, bill c-38, that brought changes to legislation largely unrelated to the budget itself, in only two months. in contrast, it took years to consult and draft the ceaa 1995, and well over two years to guide it through parliament in the 1990s (doelle, 2012). curiously, it was also a conservative federal government who passed the ceaa 1995 into law, accepting more than 100 amendments proposed during debate and review of ceaa 1995; on the other hand, it was a very different economic time. in 2009, a briefing document leaked to the press brought forth the first sign that the government was planning to make substantial changes to the federal environmental assessment system in canada. the document announced governmental intentions to “streamline” the federal environmental assessment regime by focusing on reducing duplication and improving efficiency in the federal environmental assessment process (ceaa, 2009; gibson, 2012). however, the proposed changes listed in the briefing document were only made known after the current government had a governing majority (after the 2011 election). the government used a 400-page omnibus budget bill, which was rammed through parliament in marathon sittings to ensure minimal openings for effective opposition (doelle, 2012; russell, 2012). in fact, all proposed amendments to bill c-38 were rejected and, as a result, no changes were made during the reading and review stages of the proposed omnibus budget bill, an unprecedented situation in parliamentary deliberations. in addition to repealing the ceaa 1995, the omnibus budget bill also brought sweeping changes to more than 70 different legislative pieces, including the fisheries act and the species at risk act. once approved, bill c-38 became the jobs, growth and long-term prosperity act (2012), which has major implications for when and how environmental assessments are conducted in canada. not long after bill c-38 passed through parliament and ceaa 2012 came into force, the canadian government proposed a second omnibus budget bill, bill c-45, presented on october 18, 2012, which once again, introduced major changes to legislation (more than 60 different bills were affected). bill c6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.1     45, now known as the jobs and growth act (2012), was passed and received royal assent on december 14, 2012 (government of canada, 2012). once again, it took only two months to rush the massive omnibus budget bill through the legislative process (government of canada, 2012). further changes were introduced to the fisheries act (1985), and the navigable waters protection act (nwpa, 1985) (now known as the navigation protection act) (abouchar & vince, 2012). implications for aboriginal peoples with respect to environmental assessment due to changes in these two acts are substantial. the second phase of changes to the fishery act are controversial: the act no longer protects the fish habitat per se; rather, it oversees fisheries, including commercial, recreational, and aboriginal (abouchar & vince, 2012). furthermore, the definition of “aboriginal fisheries” in bill c-38 focused on fishing for ceremonial purposes; the definition in bill c-45 has been altered to include fishing “for the purposes set out in a land claims agreement entered into with the aboriginal organization” (abouchar & vince, 2012, p. 80). potential implications remain to be seen, but, as has been pointed out by abouchar and vince (2012), further controversy is expected: who defines an aboriginal fishery? how will the proposed definition impact treaty and aboriginal rights? has the crown adequately consulted aboriginal people regarding impacts this revision may have on aboriginal and treaty rights? (p. 80) prior to amendments made to the nwpa, the federal government would have been involved in any project on a waterway in canada through an environmental assessment obligation (ceaa, 1992). bill c-45 resulted in a reduction in the scope of waterways covered under the nwpa and the federal government’s involvement in the environmental assessment process has been dramatically reduced. abouchar and vince (2012) have calculated that the new navigation protection act will apply “to just 100 lakes and coastal areas and 62 major rivers from among millions crisscrossing canada” (p. 80). because the canadian federal government’s revised environmental regulatory approach encompasses less of the environment (abouchar & vince, 2012), there will be a significant effect on aboriginal people since most waterways and waterbodies in canada, which are the lifeblood of aboriginal culture and identity, are no longer included in the environmental assessment process. r e s o u r c e d e v e l o p m e n t a n d a b o r i g i n a l f u n d i n g c u t s increasingly, resource development and related environmental assessments are affecting aboriginal homelands in canada, especially in northern parts of the country (mceachren, whitelaw, mccarthy & tsuji, 2011; tsuji, mccarthy, whitelaw & mceachren, 2011; whitelaw, mccarthy & tsuji, 2009). according to the canada economic action plan (2012), the current federal government wants to “unleash canada’s natural resource potential” through responsible resource development and by supporting more than 600 major energy and mining projects over the next decade (canada economic action plan, 2012). the manner in which resource development is now being proposed has led many critics to call it “irresponsible” resource development, which prioritizes rapid resource extraction while reducing environmental safeguards (see for example gailus, 2012). the plan aims to attract around $650 billion in investment to “quickly open up canada's oilsands, gas reserves and mining sectors to the world, making it easier for corporations to extract natural resources as long as they do it responsibly” (scoffield, 2012, p.2). how the term ”responsibly” is interpreted and applied is key, especially in the way that aboriginal peoples will participate in the decision-making process. 7 kirchhoff et al.: ceaa 2012 and implications for aboriginal peoples published by scholarship@western, 2013     the un declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip, 2007) is considered to be a global standard for aboriginal rights. originally, canada was one of only four countries (canada, usa, australia, and new zealand) to vote against the un declaration when it was adopted by the un general assembly in 2007. in the three years following its adoption, the canadian government aggressively campaigned against the un declaration, although it was finally endorsed by canada in 2010. professor james anaya, the un special rapporteur on the rights of indigenous peoples, has welcomed the recent statement of support by the canadian government mentioning that “opposition to the declaration [is] a thing of the past” (united nations, 2011, p.5). however, he further highlights that the outstanding challenge now is to implement the declaration’s provisions through concerted efforts at both the domestic and international levels (united nations, 2011). the un declaration includes a number of articles that recognize the need for a dominant state to respect and promote the rights of its aboriginal peoples as affirmed in treaties and agreements, including how aboriginals participate in decision-making processes that affect their traditional lands and livelihoods (undrip, 2007). the concept of free, prior, and informed consent promoted by the united nations is of paramount importance in terms of decision-making. for example, article 18 mentions that, indigenous peoples have the right to participate in decision-making in matters which would affect their rights, through representatives chosen by themselves in accordance with their own procedure, as well as to maintain and develop their own indigenous decision-making institutions. (p. 6) moreover, article 32 (2) of the un declaration states: states shall consult and cooperate in good faith with the indigenous peoples concerned through their own representative institutions in order to obtain their free and informed consent prior to the approval of any project affecting their lands or territories and other resources, particularly in connection with the development, utilization or exploitation of mineral, water and other resources. (p. 9) historically, aboriginal communities have been unable to effectively participate in the environmental assessment process of reviewing new undertakings, especially in the extractive industry (united nations, 2011). the lack of capacity to participate takes many different forms, including scarcity of resources (i.e., money, expertise, time) to review technical documentation produced during the assessment process prior to consultation efforts. this is exacerbated by the fact that many aboriginal communities are remote, fly-in communities, which poses an added logistical challenge to meaningful public participation (gardner,tsuji, mccarthy, whitelaw & tsuji, 2012; kirchhoff, isogai, tsuji, mccarthy & whitelaw, 2012). the result is a further barrier to proper engagement “as equals in consultation and negotiations”, and the perception by many aboriginal communities that consultation efforts by the extractive industry are “a mere formality in order to expedite their activities within indigenous territories” (united nations, 2011, p. 12). to counteract the lack of opportunity for participation, the canadian government provides funding that can be used not only to facilitate more meaningful aboriginal participation, but also to increase organizational capacity of aboriginal representative organizations to contribute to government policy and program development. provision of funding is also intended to increase aboriginal input to 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.1     legislation, policies and programs so that they are more reflective of aboriginal perspectives as well as to improve relations between the canadian federal government and aboriginal peoples (canadian heritage, 2005). aboriginal representative organizations are mandated by their memberships as representatives and advocates for the interests of members and are considered “the primary mechanisms through which the federal government has been able to collaborate on issues affecting aboriginal peoples” (aboriginal affairs and northern development canada [aandc], 2010, p.1). in addition, first nations tribal councils (a tribal council is made up of several first nations) also have a funding program that is focused on providing core funding to tribal councils “for the delivery of programs and services to affiliated bands” (aandc, 2012a, p.1). services include economic development, financial management, community planning, band governance, and technical services, which in part assists constituent first nations in matters related to the environmental assessment process (bell, 2012). however, in 2012, the federal government announced funding cuts to both aboriginal representative organizations and tribal councils, arguing that the cuts were meant to make funding “more equitable among organizations across the country” (aandc, 2012b). all national aboriginal representative organizations had a 10% funding reduction while all regional aboriginal representative organizations had either a 10% reduction or had funding capped at $500,000. as a result, some aboriginal representative organizations saw their funding cut by 80% (i.e., assembly of manitoba chiefs). similarly, there were huge cuts for tribal councils. given that all aboriginal representative organizations have had their funding reduced by at least 10%, it is difficult to understand the argument that the cuts were necessary to make funding more equitable. if this were the case, it would have meant that some organizations were getting too much while others were not getting enough. reducing funding for everyone does not make the funding program more equitable; rather, it reduces aboriginal capacity for participation even more. therefore, it is clear that, in addition to the recent changes to the federal environmental assessment regime through the introduction of the ceaa 2012, there are a number of other government initiatives that further weaken aboriginal capacity to effectively participate in resource development review processes including environmental assessment. d i s c u s s i o n a n d c o n c l u s i o n s the ceaa 2012 is solely focused on mitigation of adverse effects, with no mention made of enhancing positive effects (a characteristic of more advanced environmental assessment regimes and championed by environmental assessment experts). what is most astonishing from an academic perspectice is that all changes in the ceaa 2012 appear to go counter to what is suggested in the international literature as essential requirements for effective environmental assessments, following the principles for better or best practices (see for example international association for impact assessment [iaia] & institute for environmental assessment [iea], 1999). environmental assessment has been one of the most important instruments to provide a venue for meaningful public participation (booth & skelton, 2011; diduck, sinclair, pratap & hostetler, 2007). streamlined environmental assessment regimes such as ceaa 2012 exempt more undertakings from environmental review, narrow the range of waterways and water bodies that would necessitate an environment assessment, and set shortened timelines for assessments – thereby drastically reducing opportunities for participation by aboriginal communities in canada – which has daunting implications for the concept of free, prior, and informed consent promoted by the united nations (undrip, 2007). 9 kirchhoff et al.: ceaa 2012 and implications for aboriginal peoples published by scholarship@western, 2013     in addition, the cumulative impact of all exempted projects will now be overlooked, which is counter to the aboriginal worldview of the environment. from an aboriginal perspective, the changes introduced with the ceaa 2012, followed by a number of other recent government initiatives, further weaken aboriginal peoples’ capacity to participate in the resource development review process of undertakings that affect their traditional lands. the result is the silencing of the people who are most affected by resource development. given canada’s unique relationship with its aboriginal people, governed by aboriginal and treaty rights that are constitutionally entrenched, there is an obligation for responsible development that involves free, prior, and informed consent. one way to ensure responsible development is the inclusion of strategic (or regional) environmental assessment (sea) as a vital part of the ea regime. sea has the potential to serve as a venue through which assessments can be achieved in a timely, effective and efficient way, particularly in northern ontario. sea has emerged as a promising means of dealing directly with strategic issues in a way that has the advantages of project ea processes (e.g., integration of environmental concerns in planning and decision making, a more transparent, open, and participative process, etc.), but also has the necessary scope and mandate to influence higher-level decisions such as plans or programmes that set the stage for subsequent projects. moreover, sea has the potential to facilitate greater transparency and more effective public involvement at the strategic level. as such, sea could serve as a means for aboriginal peoples to participate and influence strategic initiatives that shape and guide project-level assessment and decisions and provide a mechanism through which aboriginal peoples could influence the kinds of projects and the pace of development that are going to happen on their traditional lands (rather than just receiving the details after projects have already been considered). lastly, recent budget cuts to aboriginal representative organizations and tribal councils further exacerbate the potential negative implications for aboriginal peoples as it relates to resource development and capacity to participate in a meaningful way in the environmental assessment process. indeed, the introduction of bills c-38 and c-45 and their impact on so many pieces of legislation (e.g., fisheries act, navigable waters protection act, indian act) has been seen as an assault on indigenous sovereignty and the protection of land and water; so much so, that a grassroots aboriginal movement called “idle no more” has emerged and gained momentum in an unprecedented way in canada in response to recent changes (idlenomore, 2012). clearly, when assessing the impact of the ceaa 2012, one must look beyond the act itself and take into account other pieces of policy to see the true effects on aboriginal people. we suspect a similar situation may exist in other countries: a situation whereby environmental assessment processes and aboriginal people are currently viewed through a single piece of legislation, but should actually be evaluated on a suite of policy pieces. further research is called for, perhaps through the use of case studies of aboriginal groups across canada, in order to evaluate and demonstrate in more detail the true implications of the numerous recent legislation changes introduced through bills c-38 and c-45. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.1     r e f e r e n c e s aboriginal affairs and northern development canada [aandc]. 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(2011). getting back to basics: the victor diamond mine environmental assessment scoping process and the issue of family-based traditional lands versus registered traplines. impact assessment and project appraisal, 29(1), 37 47. 13 kirchhoff et al.: ceaa 2012 and implications for aboriginal peoples published by scholarship@western, 2013     united nations (2011). report of the special rapporteur on the rights of indigenous peoples, james anaya extractive industries operating within or near indigenous territories. retrieved from http://www.ohchr.org/documents/issues/ipeoples/sr/a-hrc-18-35_en.pdf united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples [undrip] (2007). retrieved from http://social.un.org/index/indigenouspeoples/declarationontherightsofindigenouspeoples.a spx. walls, l. 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(2009). the victor diamond mine environmental assessment process: a critical first nation perspective. impact assessment and project appraisal journal, 27(3), 205 215. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.1 the international indigenous policy journal january 2013 the canadian environmental assessment act, 2012 and associated policy: implications for aboriginal peoples denis kirchhoff holly l. gardner leonard j. s. tsuji recommended citation the canadian environmental assessment act, 2012 and associated policy: implications for aboriginal peoples abstract keywords creative commons license the canadian environmental assessment act, 2012 and associated policy: implications for aboriginal peoples mutual incomprehension: the cross cultural domain of work in a remote australian aboriginal community the international indigenous policy journal volume 1 | issue 2 article 2 september 2010 mutual incomprehension: the cross cultural domain of work in a remote australian aboriginal community eva mcrae-williams batchelor institute of indigenous tertiary education, eva.mcrae-williams@cdu.edu.au rolf gerritsen charles darwin university recommended citation mcrae-williams, e. , gerritsen, r. (2010). mutual incomprehension: the cross cultural domain of work in a remote australian aboriginal community. the international indigenous policy journal, 1(2) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.2.2 his research is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in he international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. mutual incomprehension: the cross cultural domain of work in a remote australian aboriginal community abstract this article is set within the context of concerns about indigenous workforce participation disadvantage. it discusses conflicting life-worlds relating to work of both aboriginal and nonindigenous residents in ngukurr, a remote community in south east arnhem land in australia’s northern territory. it contrasts an indigenous social culture of kinship and relatedness to a western one where employment is central to identity and its formal rules shape behaviour. we investigate how these different social ideologies affect cross-cultural relationships and shape the formal employment domain in ngukurr. given that governments have moved to more assimilationist policies in recent years, there are important policy implications following from this mutual cultural incomprehension. keywords australia, aboriginal, indigenous, employment, economic, policy creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ introduction in western nations the indigenous population usually exhibits lower rates of workforce participation than the mainstream average. this is true for australia (biddle et al. 2008; rudd 2010), new zealand (department of labour 2007) and canada (statistics canada 2006), as well as for other nations (uno 2009:22; eversole et al. 2005 passim) and even the united states (cornell & kalt 1992). this paper examines this phenomenon in a remote australian community with an overwhelmingly indigenous population. conventional microeconomic explanations for employment disadvantage in this aboriginal settlement reflect those of similar remote or rural indigenous populations in australia (taylor 2006) and elsewhere (eversole et al. 2005). there are limited employment opportunities with a significant gap between the size of the labour force and the number of jobs generated in the local economy as well as inadequate physical infrastructure for many economic development proposals. low levels of education, limited opportunities for training, poor health, transport difficulties, and issues of alcohol and drug abuse are also factors affecting employment capacity. while recognising the importance of these contextual supply-side factors in explaining employment disadvantage in ngukurr, we do not focus on these specifically but, rather, discuss cross-cultural differences in the desire to be part of a capitalist orientated workforce. these cross-cultural differences have important implications for the effectiveness (again in conventional microeconomic terms) of the workplace supervision and task mobilisation assumed to be required for successful economic outcomes. this case study challenges the argument advanced for the usa by cornell and kalt (1992:270) that culture is not an insuperable barrier to indigenous economic development. we conclude that “culture”, as daily-ways-of-being in the world, is an important, almost sufficient, 1 mcrae-williams and gerritsen: mutual incomprehension published by scholarship@western, 2010 barrier to indigenous integration to some non-indigenous mores and social requirements, such as working for a living. ward (1998) has similarly suggested that culture is a formidable barrier to labour force participation amongst american indians in montana. based on ethnographic fieldwork conducted between 2005 and 2008, this article aims to capture the social complexity of work in the township of ngukurr, in australia’s northern territory, and its interaction with official policy contexts. the paper will first discuss employment as a central manifestation of non-indigenous culture and policy in ngukurr and will then explore the intersection between that and the life-worlds of aboriginal residents. finally, we draw out some policy implications of that intersection. ngukurr has a population of approximately 900 residents (abs 2006). formerly the roper river mission (1908-1968), ngukurr, like most remote aboriginal communities in the northern territory, was established primarily as a means of administering aboriginal welfare policies. its development included no modern economic base and the settlement has subsequently not acquired one. at present ngukurr is not economically sustainable beyond the provisions of the welfare state (taylor et al. 2000). consequently, for over three decades, aboriginal employment experiences have been principally shaped by the government employment initiative known as the community development employment program (cdep). the cdep is a government scheme that provides a community organisation the monetary equivalent of its participants’ unemployment benefits (plus fluctuating funding for equipment, training and administration), in order to create work positions within the community. individual participants forego their unemployment benefit entitlements and work a prescribed number of hours (16 hours a week) in a defined work activity for the equivalent income as salary (sanders 1988; altman et al. 2005). this program has been the primary source of aboriginal employment 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 2 [2010], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.2.2 in ngukurr for over three decades. it both shapes the employment domain and the employment experiences of both aboriginal and non-indigenous workers in the community. recent official policy debates around the cdep (commonwealth government 2009) have questioned the program’s future value in facilitating the transition of remote communities into ‘economically viable’ (in the orthodox microeconomic sense) settlements. however, moving to non-cdep based employment structures and policy comes up against the current realities of life in ngukurr. the centrality of work for non-indigenous people when the main author (mcrae-williams) first arrived in ngukurr it was arranged for her to take up a position as editor and facilitator of a local newspaper, the ngukurr news. one of the first insights gained by having this defined employment role was that she became an embodiment of the typical relationship dynamic between non-indigenous and aboriginal people in the community. at this time in ngukurr there were approximately 60 non-indigenous employees in the community (abs 2006). they principally worked in administrative/supervisory positions or in positions related to health, education, policing, or the local store. as in other remote aboriginal communities, the non-indigenous workforce in ngukurr was very transient (see also taylor et al. 2000: ch. 3). it was rare for non-indigenous persons to reside in the community for more than three years. cowlishaw (1999) refers to this ‘nomadism’ of white staff and proposes that it is legitimised through discourse around career paths and the value of professional development and experience. employment was the common reason for non-indigenous persons to be living in ngukurr. a significant proportion of these non-indigenous employees stayed without their partners or family. a minority of individuals, however, had come to the community with their partners, who subsequently also found employment (whether on a full-time or casual basis). 3 mcrae-williams and gerritsen: mutual incomprehension published by scholarship@western, 2010 non-indigenous employees, commonly called ‘staff’ usually only interacted with aboriginal people during work hours. in these work-based interactions, non-indigenous people were nearly always in a position of relative power, whether as a supervisor (boss), nurse, teacher, or program administrator. bern reveals that this bounded interaction is not a new phenomenon. he stated in the early seventies that, in ngukurr “most contact between staff and village people takes place in the work situation. this is invariably a relationship of inequality in which the european is in the super-ordinate position....” (bern 1974:98-99). it was obvious that structures of employment shaped most non-indigenous presence, behaviour, and experience in the community. this is unsurprising since work, understood as paid employment, is what distinguishes industrial societies from other forms of society (anthony 1977). for members of such societies, work socialises them and shapes political, educational, and social institutions. the centrality of work also endows employment with important psychological functions: it is a source of pride, fulfilment and social identity formation (see: furnham 1984, 1993; miller et al. 2002). regardless of whether they liked it or not, the lives of non-indigenous people revolved around work. the development of capitalism intrinsically linked the concepts of work and money, producing a dichotomy between work and leisure. the behaviour of non-indigenous people in ngukurr reflected an internalisation of this distinction. they primarily worked with (or for?) aboriginal people but confined relationships with them to the work domain, protecting their nonwork time from employment and aboriginal social intrusions. this was not an unreasonable response, for without instinctively establishing and maintaining this work/life dualism nonindigenous people would potentially ‘burn out’ (a term covering a variety of manifestations, from cynicism to depression) and leave the community or surrender to inertia. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 2 [2010], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.2.2 anthropology and its methods of participant observation provided an insight into the complexities and difficulties of relationships with individuals from different life-worlds and with different opportunities. due to both the research focus and mcrae-williams’ position with the newspaper, it was within the domain of employment that initial assumptions and expectations were first challenged. drawing from a discourse of community participation and empowerment (arnstein 1969), the assumption was that encouraging local employment with the newspaper would bestow authority on the locals and a sense of ‘ownership’ would result. this ownership over the employment domain was supposed to empower and build capacity, pride, and social identity. however, confounding these sensibilities, the aboriginal people working on the paper seemed ambivalent towards the workplace empowerment patronisingly bestowed upon them. their expectation was that mcrae-williams would lead the project, make the decisions, and direct their behaviour. their presupposition was that, as a non-indigenous person, mcraewilliams would fill the role of ‘boss’. this same assumption was made by the non-indigenous cdep coordinator, who provided time-sheets. it became clear that mcrae-williams was expected to perform authoritative and managerial roles for both non-indigenous and aboriginal people in the community. seemingly, the job was not about facilitating local participation, with its supposed benefits, but of supervising aboriginal cdep participants and taking responsibility for their adherence to the administrative requirements of the cdep scheme. paramount was filling in workers time sheets, or ‘signing-off’ on the exact number of hours they worked. official policy was attempting to make these workers employment-ready in the capitalist workplace by making them work-time conscious. 5 mcrae-williams and gerritsen: mutual incomprehension published by scholarship@western, 2010 this objective was constantly confronted by the social realities of employment in ngukurr. on a regular basis non-indigenous staff faced such challenges as: some aboriginal cdep participants not turning up for work, or not arriving at the right time, or not staying for the appropriate number of hours; or taking an unscheduled ‘break’; or, simply, just disappearing from their designated work area. the behaviours, activities, and etiquettes associated with normal/mainstream work environments, while not entirely absent, were consistently being challenged by many aboriginal people. non-indigenous people’s response amounted to a pre-occupation of encouraging conformity to their own expectations of work-time and the expectations inherent in cdep administrative regulations. this situation demonstrated that adherence to workplace rules is both a moral imperative and a practice enforced through processes of surveillance in work-central societies. shaped by this ideology, the state was trying to make the cdep scheme impose conformity to norms and rules on aboriginal participants. finding themselves responsible for monitoring time-sheets, non-indigenous supervisors became instruments of the state where employment and its links to citizenship are built into practice, institutions, and social philosophy. foucault (1977) suggested that the state is a principle of power that exercises control through the surveillance and discipline inherent in all modern hierarchical structures, including the workplace. in ngukurr, this surveillance and discipline occurred at several levels. for example, non-indigenous staff operated simultaneously as both ‘prison guards’ and ‘inmates’. as prison guards, they attempted daily to curb aberrant aboriginal work practices to encourage conformity to the rules of the state. pragmatically they also did this to maintain their own positions within the workplace, necessary in a culture where life revolves around employment. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 2 [2010], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.2.2 the power of the state with its fundamental dependence on employment had been embodied and internalised by non-indigenous staff, including ourselves. as inmates, non-indigenous (and aboriginal) supervisors in ngukurr were not simply tools of surveillance but were also workers, who felt they were under surveillance. this ambience of surveillance had colonised the non-indigenous mind. it was not uncommon to hear discussion and judgments being passed on another’s work ethic, work commitment, or behaviour. this phenomenon was both a product of the centrality of work to the culture of these non-indigenous persons and, also, a process by which it was reproduced. it was rationalised by arguments that, by conforming to state or program expectations, the possibility of maintaining or enhancing funding or other resources that may benefit the community was increased. this enabled non-indigenous people to understand their work as positive and purposeful and maintain motivation in a challenging environment. the point is that without understanding our own culture (mainstream australian or western culture) and how it shapes our world and life, we are unable to accord difference its proper recognition. beder (2000:263) claims that it is the social order that results from such work centrality that has “come to be seen as natural, desirable, morally right and inevitable”. yet that employment and its attached values are essentially cultural constructs often evades notice. consequently, non-indigenous people in ngukurr often viewed their aboriginal workers as lacking a work ethic or, even more extreme, as lazy and incompetent. it was only through our ethnographic fieldwork journey that we became aware of the challenges aboriginal people in ngukurr pose for mainstream work practices and expectations, which reflected different priorities indicative of distinct life-worlds. 7 mcrae-williams and gerritsen: mutual incomprehension published by scholarship@western, 2010 it was only through the eyes of aboriginal informants that our cultural presumptions about employment became obvious. one day while sitting in the centre of town, after a particularly anxious morning of failing to get the newspaper out on time, an old man sat down beside mcrae-williams and observed: “look those moonanga [white people]. like chooks with their heads cut off, playing at being busy” (mcrae-williams 2008:). the magic of work to the dominant culture was again driven home by the perplexity of a young aboriginal woman. she could not understand why, late at night in the midst of captivating and enticing social interaction, mcrae-williams was in a corner trying to get some sleep (for work the next day). the suggestion to those around was that mcrae-williams was “brainwashed” by work and had just been born that way and could not control it. the extent to which a work-centric way of viewing and being-in-the world was internalised was a recurring theme, a cultural obsession that never faltered. for most non-indigenous people in ngukurr it delineated time and structured our activities, playing a part in how we saw ourselves, interacted with others, and experienced meaning and purpose in life. the contrast with aboriginal social priorities was sharp. the centrality of relatedness to aboriginal people the aboriginal kinship system has been explained as a configuration of belonging (poirier 2005). each person is a node within a dynamic and complex network of agency, social relationships, and responsibilities. yet kinship – with its inherent notions of relatedness, autonomy, and acceptable authority – was not the only element defining how individuals engaged with one another in ngukurr. as musharbash (2003:252) highlighted, inter-personal interactions are as dependent “on ‘friendships’ and animosity, on life-histories, on personalities and inclinations as on kinship”. the point is that, in ngukurr, whether you focus on kinship structures, life-histories, or personalities, life is shaped by how you are relating to others around 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 2 [2010], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.2.2 you. for those from non-kin-based societies it is difficult to conceptualise what this actually means beyond the abstract: how being part of such a system might feel or how it can give shape and meaning to daily life. relatedness in ngukurr was a potent psychological and emotional investment. it was about being-in-the-world with others, showing and feeling love, compassion, care and concern. it was about being human. mullins’ (2007) discussion of ‘mobbing’ in aboriginal society reflects this point. he states that, mobbing is the activity of establishing, developing and maintaining identity with others, based on commonalities of place, descent, history or shared experience, developed and affirmed by means of the culturally patterned practice of sharing … any such alliance needs constant affirmation and activation. the price of neglect is rejection, hostility or even ostracism (mullins 2007: 33). the employment domain in ngukurr is not separate from kin relationships. rather it is formed and given meaning from within this framework. family is not left behind, when an individual enters a workplace. somebody may apply for a work position, show loyalty or disobedience in a workplace, change where they work, or disengage from the work environment altogether, as a way to demonstrate their present position in negotiations of relatedness. yet, as austin-broos (2003) noted, factors such as living in settlements, the introduction of commodities, and having access to cash have crucially changed how aboriginal people relate to each other. relations and relatedness are increasingly abstracting themselves from place, song, and rite. enormous weight is being placed on relatedness alone (austin-broos 2006:11). the impact of these changes is evident in ngukurr, where life has become a field of intense social drama permeated by both tragedy and comedy. while relatedness has not separated from the larger ontology of place and ceremony, processes of colonisation have fragmented a social field 9 mcrae-williams and gerritsen: mutual incomprehension published by scholarship@western, 2010 where establishing, retaining, and maintaining these links has become difficult. this tenuous world manifests itself through inter-group violence, entrenched suspicion, fear relating to sorcery, and complex deliberations about the proper application and future of aboriginal law. negotiating relatedness from within this degree of social and cultural disorder takes up much time and energy and is prioritised over formal employment expectations. aboriginal authority systems have been described as operating dynamically, principally determined by situation. for example, in ngukurr a person’s right to authority was context-based and often transitory. leadership or decision making rights were based on the relatedness of an individual to certain others, specific places and particular activities at distinct times. mullins (2007:35) stated that “where testing of relatedness is not at stake, commands can seem to be arbitrary expressions of another’s will… an infringement on one’s own autonomy”. it is this tension between autonomy and relatedness that underlies all social interaction and practice in australian aboriginal society (see: sansom 1980; liberman 1985; myers 1986; martin 1993). edge (1998) emphasised that in a relational society every individual is defined by a unique set of relationships and is subsequently different from all other people and is expected to be autonomous. according to edge (1998), aborigines value autonomy and the notion of ‘individuality’ in a deeper sense than do western individualists. in ngukurr the value placed on autonomy was reflected in child rearing practices, in people’s acceptance of the good and bad elements of personality, their aversion to telling others what to do, and a belief in their right to direct their own activities. it is, therefore, unsurprising that the value placed on relatedness and autonomy made working in supervisory positions in the formal employment domain difficult for many aboriginal people in ngukurr. as the comments of one woman effectively capture, 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 2 [2010], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.2.2 i ask them to do a job but some of them are my relatives so i ask them what job they would like to do. i try to organise them but they say i bin do that job on thursday i nomo [don’t] want that job. i try and write the roster but then i feel shame. i don’t know how to tell them what to do. [another woman states] “we should have a meeting tell them to listen to you”] [she replies] maybe 20 times we bin having that meeting and it’s still the same (mcrae williams 2008). if a supervisor failed to display compassion and empathy or did not respect a worker’s autonomy, it was seen as “not liking” the other person. in ngukurr an aboriginal supervisor demonstrated compassion by recognising that the worker may not want to do a particular task; may not want to do it now; or, may want to do something else altogether; and, that these possibilities were the prerogative of the worker. respecting their workers’ autonomy was the source of considerable stress for supervisors, who faced opposing pressure to enforce conformity to mainstream work practices and adherence to the rules of the cdep. for example, an aboriginal supervisor may be ‘shamed’ by others for not showing compassion for their workers’ feelings or a particular situation. not paying a worker, (i.e. withholding resources or not sharing), irrespective of whether they completed their work task or worked the prescribed hours, was for the supervisor to ignore their emotional link to the worker. predictably compassion usually took precedence over the enforcement of work rules. maintaining relatedness was essential to life well beyond the workplace. the expectation to show ‘compassion’ illustrates the absence of a boundary between work and life in ngukurr. yet, 11 mcrae-williams and gerritsen: mutual incomprehension published by scholarship@western, 2010 the formal employment policy of the cdep assumed western attitudes to and behaviour in the workplace. the value of autonomy within this relational society meant that being an effective ‘boss’ in ngukurr required great skill and endurance (both in formal employment and other domains). maintaining supervisory authority involved not simply reaching a deal in the workplace, but also negotiation of this relationship within all other facets of life. sustained authority needed constant maintenance and re-invention. aboriginal expressions of relatedness and work the behavioural expectations associated with being culturally, socially, and emotionally engaged with others in ngukurr did not simply vanish within the framework of formal employment. work for aboriginal people in ngukurr was essentially personal. this is in sharp contrast to the weberian impersonality that is a focal characteristic of western institutions. for example, “school and work are about doing a job, being on time, getting things done. at the core, they are not about how people who function in them are feeling or getting on with their lives” (burbank 2006:7). burbank found that while aboriginal people understood the financial benefits derived from work they did not ‘feel’ the point of work. as an example, she explained that: hunting and fishing feel good because one engages in them when one feels like it, perhaps because one feels like eating a certain kind of food or sharing food with kin. working in the shop may feel good one day, but not the next. yet the job requires that one be there, whether one feels like it or not, thus the sense of senselessness (2006:7). in ngukurr, most workers did not usually ‘feel’ work, although some work experiences were valued. the work/home divide and hierarchical structures were not internalised and did not 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 2 [2010], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.2.2 generate any higher level meaning. the attempt to ‘feel’ work by a minority of workers was unable to be sustained within the dominant culture. wholeheartedly feeling work meant to abandon their very sense of how to exist in the world. feeling work sporadically did not necessitate such a dramatic cultural shift. of course, cdep rules did not allow that distinction. the materialistic expression of aboriginal relatedness is often referred to as a system of demand-sharing, or as a “moral economy” (peterson 1993; peterson and taylor 2005). in this system it is ethically appropriate to ask a certain range of others for resources and the moral responsibility is on the one being asked to share (schwab 1995; macdonald 2000). as mullins (2007:33) has explained “the aim and result of such [sharing] activity is the formation of social alliances…any such alliance needs constant affirmation and activation”. refusing cooperation is seen as insensitive and destructive to those alliances. bird-david (1992) interprets this demand-sharing practice as about the ‘procurement’ of resources. it is not simply about finding and demanding resources but, rather, focuses on bringing about, obtaining by careful effort, prevailing upon, and persuading. she has stated that this is not dependent upon hunting and gathering (bird-david 1992:40; cf. hunt 2000). in ngukurr, plant and animal food resources associated with traditional hunting and gathering practices were only sporadically available. yet in the contemporary environment of welfare payments, wages, cash and commodities, procurement activities remained the primary means by which individuals acquired daily resources. bird-david (1992:40) notes “procurement’ is management, contrivance, acquisition, getting, gaining” and is deeply integrated into aboriginal existence and processes of self-understanding. aboriginal people in remote australia have only relatively recently been introduced to the cash economy. prior to the late 1960s the older generation worked on cattle stations. their 13 mcrae-williams and gerritsen: mutual incomprehension published by scholarship@western, 2010 remuneration was mainly in rations and clothing, not cash, and the work was seasonal (bunbury 2002). these workers were turned away from the pastoral industry, as it mechanised and shed labour following the official imposition of equal wages for aboriginal workers. so the welfare system provided most current residents of ngukurr with their introduction to cash. this secured and reinforced their almost exclusive focus on circulation and consumption (peterson 2005). as a consequence ‘passive welfare’ or ‘welfare dependence’ facilitates the reproduction of a culture, where relatedness and its expression through procurement and demand sharing remains central and inhibits individuals’ capacity to attribute meaning or value to formal/mainstream employment (pearson 2000). the aboriginal moral economy and employment in the ‘moral economy’, supported as it is by welfare payments, maintaining employment motivation was difficult for many individuals in ngukurr. those who were employed were perceived by others as having access to more resources – not simply increased finances but also access to telephones, vehicles, and other equipment – and were subjected to increased demands from others to affirm and express relatedness. as the comments of one middle-aged man illustrate … “why should i work, i get nothing but humbug [demands for resources] when i work” (mcrae-williams 2008:206). so the centrality of relatedness often conflicted with nonindigenous/mainstream expectations about appropriate workforce aspirations. the contradictions between a moral economy of procurement, which validates autonomy and relatedness, as against the formal rules and expectations of western-style employment, are fundamental to discussions about passive welfare or welfare dependency in remote aboriginal communities (pearson 2000). getting aboriginal people to conform to the behaviours and values of a work-centric society was the principle aim of colonial authorities like governments, 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 2 [2010], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.2.2 missions, and pastoral enterprises (stone 1974; reynolds 1981; powell 1982; rowse 1998). it is a fundamental aim of government policies today (commonwealth government 2009; working futures 2009). however, this continual work focus has had little impact on changing the waysof-being and world views of aboriginal residents in ngukurr. rules of relatedness continue to be privileged over official workplace rules and are enforced through ever-present aboriginal surveillance systems. in mainstream australia work has permeated all social institutions (educational, political, economic and cultural) and underpins many other contemporary ideological positions, giving them strength and validation. the centrality of work to western culture has meant that official notions of self-determination, community empowerment or development, have placed emphasis on particular and specific ways of engaging in and ‘taking responsibility’ for workplaces. that aboriginal people in ngukurr showed a preference for non-aboriginal ‘bosses’, a preference also documented elsewhere (taylor 1984; trigger 1992), challenges these western assumptions and questions the basis of such discourse. as articulated by coombs et al.: aborigines do not face the australian economy with their time fully available for employment or divided simply between 'work' and 'leisure'. rather they come with their time significantly allocated to aboriginal purposes and activities (1989:85-86). we do not argue that all aboriginal people in ngukurr fail to see the opportunities that employment provides, or are unconcerned about the lack of such opportunities within their community. rather, it is that they may not ‘feel’ this kind of work, since it is not the defining or central feature of their cultural, social, political, and personal lives. as one woman eloquently explained: 15 mcrae-williams and gerritsen: mutual incomprehension published by scholarship@western, 2010 you work for yourself, take responsibility for yourself, or maybe just your little family. i [am] always working for family, that’s my main job, being responsible to family. mother’s side, father’s side, husband ones, always working to show them i love and respect them. then i know they will be there for my son and be working for him (field notes, february 2008). relatedness versus policy it is well recognised that australian aboriginal relatedness is often in tension with western workplace structures and associated ideology (see: taylor 1984; fox 1985; cowlishaw 1999; austin-broos 2006). yet, it would seem that recognition remains only that. policies continue to create new discourses to support old directions, where notions of cultural difference continue to be sidelined. current indigenous public policy in australia, at both the federal (commonwealth of australia 2008) and territory (working futures 2009) government levels, assumes and promotes values that grate against those of an ingrained moral economy. communities are to be “normalised”, making them like mainstream rural settlements and promoting local businesses. so-called welfare dependency is to be ameliorated by enforcing individual work discipline through denying welfare payments for non-compliance with work tests and regulations. aborigines are to become western-oriented by purchasing their own homes and even moving to the larger regional towns to find employment. the presupposition of official policy, as a package of ‘normalising’ measures, is that socio-cultural change will follow (peterson and taylor 2005: 115). we suggest this official optimism may be unfounded. for example, there is evidence that when aborigines migrate to larger towns they do not improve their employment status (biddle 2009). this is not surprising: they are ill-educated and trained for a mainstream economy that has 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 2 [2010], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.2.2 little demand for unskilled labour. also, even with some commercialisation of the larger aboriginal settlements like ngukurr and notwithstanding local employment readiness or willingness, there simply will not be enough jobs to ‘solve’ the unemployment problem. we noted above that there are about 60 ‘staff’ jobs in ngukurr. there are usually well over 200 people in the cdep. even if all the staff positions were indigenised (notwithstanding that aboriginal people have difficulty in being supervisors), substantial unemployment would persist. so, fostering a culture of accumulation and deferred consumption within the aboriginal people of ngukurr is an objective that is at odds with their life-views and social behaviour. as cowlishaw (2003:111) stated “rejecting our proffered solutions to their problems could be seen as a way in which indigenous people assert their autonomy from the state’s suffocating solicitude”. a better alternative may be to design forms of work that accord with aboriginal preferences to be on the land and to work when work needs to be done, rather than to set timetables. one option is to develop work on suites of activities, such as eco-system management, art and crafts, and ecotourism (altman 2006; armstrong et al. 2009; gerritsen 2009). such economic activities would accommodate rather than ignore aboriginal world views. conclusions official policy does not acknowledge the contradiction between its objectives and the social concomitants of aboriginal social and work order. the problem is not confined to work and employment policy, it also permeates social policies (gerritsen and straton 2007). other observers have noticed other instances of similar cultural incomprehension, as for instance over the repatriation of indigenous remains from western museums (strathern 2010). official policy assumes that aborigines have to be dragged from welfare dependence to workforce discipline. 17 mcrae-williams and gerritsen: mutual incomprehension published by scholarship@western, 2010 this overlooks that the people of ngukurr have made a bounded accommodation with the dominant western society and have learned to persist despite the dominant capitalist system. as povinelli (1993:5) argues aboriginal economic action is, therefore, neither an enclave of subsistence production nor a capitalist penetration. it is part of an ongoing production of group – its economic, cultural, and political well-being – drawn from the multiplicity of cultural and political-economic discourses and resources that aboriginal people find in their lives. this paper has posited that work is the dominant place of intercultural interaction in ngukurr and that entrenched western work ideology plays a significant role in shaping non-aboriginal experiences in the community. as beder (2000:266) observed of westerners: most people spend almost all of their time working, resting from work, or spending the money they earned working. a life that is not fully taken up with work and consuming seems to offer not only boredom but also purposelessness. the ngukurr aboriginal world view, especially as related to work, is diametrically different. work is primarily managing social relatedness and autonomy. being unemployed or employed on the cdep are not different states but merely different social locales for fortifying relatedness and autonomy. reaffirming ties is equally, if not more, important than attendance at the formal workplace. similarly, referring to northern cheyenne reservation indians, ward (1998:475) stated that: being unemployed does not necessarily mean that a person does not contribute to the household economy, nor does it result in a loss of social status. unemployed adults may contribute to the support of their households through subsistence and informal 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 2 [2010], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.2.2 economic activities or through eligibility for general assistance, a situation which has become the norm for a substantial number of reservation residents. this case study suggests that the lived reality of indigenous individuals, families, communities, and cultures may present a formidable challenge to well-meaning state employment and economic development agendas. increasing levels of employment (and education) for indigenous people may well be a means of achieving more social and economic mobility, community empowerment, and the reduction of poverty. yet, behind such governmental economic and social assimilation agendas is the assumption that colonised (or minority) subjects will simply be able to cast off their (often traumatic) histories, identities, and ways of constructing meaning, in order to subsequently transform into a shape that comfortably fits established standards. we argue that such a supposition portends future strife with a people who, even if they understood the implications, do not find western work habits and priorities appealing and may continue to resist the cultural transformation necessary to profit from the benefits of an employment-centric society. 19 mcrae-williams and gerritsen: mutual incomprehension published by scholarship@western, 2010 notes 1. in this article the word ‘western’ refers to dominant australian society that has a basis in western european culture and institutions. 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 2 [2010], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.2.2 references altman, john c. 1984. 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"the importance of context in explaining human capital formation and labour force participation of american indians in rosebud county, montana". rural sociology 63 (3):451-480. working futures (2009). northern territory government. working futures. http://www.workingfutures.nt.gov.au 27 mcrae-williams and gerritsen: mutual incomprehension published by scholarship@western, 2010 the international indigenous policy journal september 2010 mutual incomprehension: the cross cultural domain of work in a remote australian aboriginal community eva mcrae-williams rolf gerritsen recommended citation mutual incomprehension: the cross cultural domain of work in a remote australian aboriginal community abstract keywords creative commons license mutual incomprehension: the cross cultural domain of work in a remote australian aboriginal community policy (mis)alignment: addressing type 2 diabetes in aboriginal communities in canada the international indigenous policy journal volume 4 | issue 2 article 3 april 2013 policy (mis)alignment: addressing type 2 diabetes in aboriginal communities in canada lauren a. brooks university of ottawa, lbroo049@gmail.com francine e. darroch university of ottawa, francinedarroch@gmail.com audrey r . giles university of ottawa, agiles@uottawa.ca recommended citation brooks, l. a. , darroch, f. e. , giles, a. r. (2013). policy (mis)alignment: addressing type 2 diabetes in aboriginal communities in canada. th e international indigenous policy journal, 4(2) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.3 policy (mis)alignment: addressing type 2 diabetes in aboriginal communities in canada abstract in this article, we employ bacchi’s (1999) what’s the problem approach to policy analysis to examine health canada’s aboriginal diabetes initiative (adi) and the ways in which it articulates with existing federal policies that relate to three aboriginal social determinants of health: colonialism, education, and health care. focusing our analysis on the aboriginal population with the highest prevalence of type 2 diabetes, first nations, we argue that the adi produces type 2 diabetes as a problem related to first nations peoples’ apparently poor health decision making and lifestyle choices. such a framing of the problem ignores the ways in which current federal policies are aligned in a way that undermines attempts, like the adi, to improve first nations peoples’ health. we argue that for rates of type 2 diabetes to decrease in first nations communities, the federal government needs to re-align policies that affect all of the aboriginal social determinants of health so that the startling inequities in health that exist between first nations peoples and non-first nations peoples, particularly those related to type 2 diabetes, can be addressed in a more effective fashion. keywords type 2 diabetes; first nations; aboriginal social determinants of health; policy analysis; aboriginal diabetes initiative creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ policy (mis)alignment: addressing type 2 diabetes in first nations communities in canada aboriginal peoples’ lifestyles have changed drastically in recent decades (earle, 2011). rates of type 2 diabetes are increasing in aboriginal populations in canada. health canada has cited aboriginal peoples’ lifestyle changes, unhealthy habits such as smoking, and poor health decisions as reasons for this increase (cited in assembly of first nations [afn], 2011b). to address this issue, health canada implemented the aboriginal diabetes initiative (adi) in 1999 (health canada, 2011c). the adi focuses on encouraging aboriginal peoples to adopt healthy lifestyles through culturally relevant interventions in order to reduce existing high rates of type 2 diabetes (health canada, 2011c). despite the hundreds of millions of dollars that have been put into the program since its inception, type 2 diabetes is still rampant among aboriginal peoples (health canada, 2011b). the proportion of the canadian population living with type 2 diabetes is highest for first nations individuals living on-reserve, followed by first nations individuals living off-reserve (public health agency of canada [phac], 2011a); as a result, in this article we focus on first nations peoples.1 we argue that the adi’s strategy of encouraging first nations peoples to address their apparently poor individual health decisions and lifestyles that result in type 2 diabetes is an approach that will be met with limited success. a recent united nations (un) general assembly resolution recommended that to effectively address non-communicable diseases, countries need to focus on “multi-sectorial public policies that create equitable health programming environments that empower individuals, families and communities to make healthy choices and lead healthy lives” (un, 2012, p. 6). in addition to this recommendation, the un (2012) strongly advocated for the alignment and analysis of all sectors and their policies to maximize positive health outcomes. using the “what is the problem” (bacchi, 1999) approach to policy analysis in concert with un (2012) recommendations, we argue for the need to re-align federal policies that currently coalesce in ways that are detrimental to first nations peoples’ health. more specifically, we focus on three determinants of aboriginal peoples’ health: colonialism, education, and access to health care services (frohlich, ross, & richmond, 2006). we illustrate the ways in which first nations people’s disproportionately poor health – in this case, rates of type 2 diabetes is largely produced by a constellation of government policies. the purpose of this examination is not to discredit the adi’s important work; rather, our examination of the adi is meant to identify this initiative’s limitations. critical examinations of current government programs is essential in order to improve policies and practices so that there is a stronger chance that they can be used to end health inequalities between first nations and non-first nations peoples in canada. this article is divided into seven sections. first, we provide an overview of type 2 diabetes and describe its prevalence in aboriginal communities. next, we summarize bacchi’s (1999) approach to policy analysis and our reasons for employing this approach in analyzing the adi. we then describe the adi, the social determinants of health, and the aboriginal social determinants of health. after analyzing the adi using the “what’s the problem” approach (bacchi, 1999), we offer recommendations for the ways                                                                                                                 1 in some cases, data are only available for aboriginal peoples in general. in these situations, we use such data, but do so with the understanding that it is not ideal. 1 brooks et al.: policy (mis)alignment published by scholarship@western, 2013 in which federal policies can be aligned, or rather re-aligned, within the government of canada. we believe these measures are crucial to reducing the high rates of type 2 diabetes in first nations populations and, in turn, to reducing overall health disparities between first nations and non-first nations populations in canada. diabetes type 1 diabetes is a disease in which the pancreas is unable to produce sufficient insulin due to failure of the β-cells and affects about 5% to10% of those suffering from diabetes (canadian diabetes association, 2012b). type 2 diabetes, on the other hand, is a result of insulin resistance, where insulin can no longer transport glucose into the cells (canadian diabetes association, 2012b); it accounts for 90% to 95% of those suffering from diabetes and is generally associated with obesity (canadian diabetes association, 2012b). type 2 diabetes is often characterized by frequent urination, excessive thirst, unexplained weight change (loss or gain), extreme hunger, sudden vision changes, tingling or numbness in hands or feet, feeling very tired most of the time, irritability, sores that are slow to heal, and increased occurrence of infections (canadian diabetes association, 2012a). the indirect complications of diabetes make it an extremely challenging disease to address and treat. lower-limb amputations, adult blindness, end stage renal disease, and death from cardiovascular disease are some common complications associated with diabetes (hanley et al., 2003). the disease can have devastating effects on individuals, families, and communities. there is a much greater prevalence of type 2 diabetes in aboriginal populations compared to nonaboriginal populations in canada. in addition, the onset of type 2 diabetes occurs in aboriginal canadians at a much younger age (health canada, 2011b). type 2 diabetes has become a serious public health problem in aboriginal populations in canada. phac (2011b) reported that the prevalence of type 2 diabetes among first nations peoples living on-reserve is 17.2%, among first nations living offreserve is 10.3%, among métis is 7.3%, and for inuit is 4.3%. it is predicted that the inuit rate will rise drastically in coming years. the prevalence of type 2 diabetes in first nations communities in particular is in stark contrast to non-aboriginal canadians’ prevalence rate of 5% (health canada, 2011c), which serves to justify our focus on this population. high birth weight, hyperlipidemia, abdominal obesity, dietary factors such as consuming excess protein and “junk foods,” and lack of physical activity are all examples of genetic, biological, or lifestyle factors that contribute to diabetes (young, reading, elias, & o’neil, 2000). other major contributing factors to the increased prevalence of diabetes among first nations peoples include the rapid environmental and sociocultural changes that first nations have faced, such as dietary acculturation substituting modern for traditional food items and adopting a more sedentary lifestyle (young et al., 2000). to address the serious public health issue of type 2 diabetes in aboriginal populations, health canada, in consultation with aboriginal organizations, developed the adi with the hope of decreasing the prevalence of diabetes in aboriginal populations by reducing the risk factors that contribute to diabetes (health canada, 2011a). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 2 [2013], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.3 policy analysis the purpose of policy analysis is to understand the past failures and successes of policies and to plan for future policy development (walt et al., 2008). policy analysis helps to explain the “interaction between institutions, interests, and ideas” (walt et al., 2008, p. 308) and also addresses disparities that exist between populations (coveney, 2010), such as health disparities between first nations peoples and non-first nations peoples, as is the case for type 2 diabetes. for this article, we adopt bacchi’s (1999) “what’s the problem” approach to policy analysis. the “what’s the problem” framework is a poststructuralist approach to policy analysis that focuses on language and discourse and on identifying and reframing how a problem is represented rather than on problematizing an issue and trying to find a solution to the problem (coveney, 2010). coveney (2010) identified the strength of bacchi’s (1999) framework as its ability to be used to address what is silenced and the assumptions, motivations, and the values expressed in the representation of the problem. the approach can be used in attempts to bring out the underlying nature of the problem under study. below, we summarize the adi and then analyze the ways in which first nations’ high rates of diabetes are framed by applying the “what’s the problem” framework. the adi the adi was established by health canada in 1999 as a part of the canadian diabetes strategy (health canada, 2011a). the adi was a federal response to the drastically increasing prevalence of type 2 diabetes in aboriginal populations (health canada, 2011a). the focus of the initiative is to support first nations people who live in traditional first nations communities and inuit people living in traditional inuit communities (health canada, 2011a).2 there have been three phases of the adi, which is in effect until 2015. phase 1 (1999 2004), with a budget of $58 million over five years, focused on: (a) increasing awareness of type 2 diabetes among aboriginal populations, (b) increasing awareness of the complications that can occur if it goes undiagnosed and untreated, and (c) implementing health promotion and primary prevention strategies (health canada, 2011a). phase 2 (2005 2010) saw the budget increased to $190 million over five years and included four main components: health promotion and primary prevention; screening and treatment; capacity building and training; and research, surveillance, evaluation, and monitoring (health canada, 2011a). currently in phase 3 (2010 2015), the adi uses health promotion and diabetes prevention activities and services as its main method of delivery. the budget for phase 3 was increased again to $275 million over five years (health canada, 2011a). there are four main areas of focus for phase 3: initiatives for children, youth, parents, and families; diabetes in pre-pregnancy and pregnancy; community-led food security planning to improve access to healthy foods, including traditional and market foods; and enhanced training for health professionals on clinical practice guidelines and chronic disease management strategies. (health canada, 2011a, 3.0 adi phase 3 section para. 1)                                                                                                                 2 importantly, there is no mention of how they defined what constitutes a “traditional” community. 3 brooks et al.: policy (mis)alignment published by scholarship@western, 2013 phase 3 also focuses on food security, healthy eating habits, physical activity, and diabetes awareness (health canada, 2011a). the guiding principles of the adi are centred on evidence-based practices, community-based and community-led approaches, culturally appropriate activities, attention to varying levels of communityreadiness, partnerships, the increase of communities’ capacities to deliver the programs and activities, and the use of innovative approaches to prevent diabetes and support healthy lifestyles (health canada, 2011a). some of the activities that are community-based and deemed culturally appropriate by health canada include walking clubs, weight-loss groups, diabetes workshops, fitness classes, community kitchens, community gardens, and healthy school food policies (health canada, 2011a). with the implementation of the adi in 1999 and the initiative’s increased budget since that time, it was expected that the prevalence of diabetes in first nations populations would decrease (health canada, 2011a); however, this has not been the case (health canada, 2011b). by using policy analysis to examine the adi and some of the aboriginal social determinants of health, we believe that we can foster a stronger understanding of why rates of type 2 diabetes have not decreased in first nations populations. what’s the problem? its representation the federally developed adi represents the problem of high rates of diabetes in aboriginal populations – more specifically in this case, first nations, as an issue of personal responsibility and as a community problem (see for example health canada, 2011b). certainly, some personal choices contribute to the prevalence of type 2 diabetes in first nations communities, as they do in any community (canadian diabetes association, 2012b). first nations peoples’ choices, however, are strongly influenced by federal government policies that fail to address their determinants of health. below, we outline the general social determinants of health as well as the aboriginal social determinants of health. we then show the impact that federal policies have had, and continue to have, on the first nations’ social determinants of health and, in turn, on first nations peoples’ health, and particularly on the prevalence of type 2 diabetes. social determinants of health the world health organization (who, 2012) defines the social determinants of health as “the conditions in which people are born, grow, live, work and age, including the health system. these circumstances are shaped by the distribution of money, power and resources at global, national and local levels, which are themselves influenced by policy choice” (para. 1). social determinants of health reveal health inequities between and within countries since they are affected by the distribution of money, power, and resources (who, 2012). the social determinants of health can be considered as distal, intermediate, and proximal. proximal social determinants of health reflect those that directly impact physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual health such as health behaviours, physical environments, employment and income, education, and food insecurity (greenwood & de leeuw, 2012; loppie reading & wein, 2009). intermediate determinants of health are typically the origin of the proximal determinants and include health care systems; educational systems; community infrastructure, resources, and capacities; environmental stewardship; and cultural continuity (greenwood & de leeuw, 2012; loppie reading & wein, 2009). distal determinants of health represent political, economic, and social contexts that construct intermediate and 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 2 [2013], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.3 proximal determinants and include colonialism, racism and social exclusion, and self-determination (greenwood & de leeuw, 2012; loppie reading & wein, 2009). the social determinants of health act in a variety of ways to impact individuals; it is rare for an individual to be influenced by just one determinant. all of these determinants interact on different levels to determine an individual’s health status as well as the health status of communities or entire cultures of peoples. for example, marginalization, stigmatization, loss of language and culture, and lack of access to culturally appropriate health services are all factors that contribute to poorer health for certain cultures (phac, 2003). with regard to specific health issues, such as type 2 diabetes, researchers have investigated the relationship with social determinants of health and have identified that type 2 diabetes is primarily a disease of material and social deprivation (mcdermott, 1998; pilkington et al., 2010). those living in poverty or with lower incomes disproportionately experience much higher rates of type 2 diabetes (ross, gilmour, & dasgupta, 2010). the poor health status of those with lower incomes is affected by variables such as a lack of adequate housing and limited funds to buy healthier foods (phac, 2003), both of which contribute to higher rates of type 2 diabetes. there are also more complex explanations for this trend that suggest that people who have greater control over their life circumstances are likely to have better control over their health statuses (phac, 2003). in response to the major health disparities that exist between aboriginal and non-aboriginal peoples in canada, and the failure of mainstream approaches to the social determinants of health to account for issues pertaining to aboriginal health, researchers have identified the aboriginal social determinants of health. aboriginal social determinants of health specific social determinants of health for aboriginal people include colonialism, dispossession of land, loss of traditional health practices, discrimination, education systems, access to health care, food insecurity, and lack of adequate housing (earle, 2011; loppie reading & wein, 2009). providing an overview of how all of the aboriginal social determinants of health influence first nations peoples’ rates of type 2 diabetes would prove too lengthy for this article; below, we focus on three factors: colonialism, health care access, and education systems. colonialism the impact of colonialism on first nations lands and peoples has involved assimilation and systematic disempowerment through laws and acts created to control this population (royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996). the control that first nations people had over their communities, languages, education, and governance was largely extinguished when the federal government seized control (royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996). through colonial laws and governments, first nations peoples were denied rights to self-determination, had their families displaced, and were treated as objects to be controlled by social welfare agencies and corrective institutions (royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996). children were placed in residential schools and had little, if any, contact with their families and communities, which limited the knowledge the children gained about traditional foods, cultural activities, and life on the land (loppie reading & wein, 2009). forced disconnection from land-based cultural practices that involved natural sources of food and physical activity contributed to disease and to dependency on the state’s health care system (alfred, 2009). this disconnect from 5 brooks et al.: policy (mis)alignment published by scholarship@western, 2013 their families, communities, and cultures is believed to have had a significant impact on the health of first nations peoples, including a disproportionate burden of type 2 diabetes compared to non-first nations peoples (young et al., 2000). the social hierarchy that places first nations peoples below non-first nations peoples has created many gaps and disparities in health between these two populations. giles, haas, & findlay (2005) have argued that among aboriginal peoples, diabetes is viewed as the result of the loss of traditions, community, culture, and spirituality, all of which are tightly tied to colonialism. as a distal social determinant of health, colonialism has had, and continues to have, an impact on the intermediate (resources and accessibility to health care) and proximal (health behaviours or “choices”) social determinants of health for aboriginal peoples, which creates disparities. colonialism has also affected the health of other indigenous populations worldwide, such as those in australia, the united states, and new zealand; these populations also have a high prevalence of type 2 diabetes in comparison to non-indigenous populations. for example, type 2 diabetes is much more prevalent in australian aboriginal populations in comparison to the australian non-aboriginal population (wang, hoy, & si, 2010); american indian and alaska native adults are 2.3 times more likely to be diagnosed with type 2 diabetes in comparison to non-hispanic whites (centers for disease control and prevention, 2011); and maori people of new zealand are 3 times more likely to develop diabetes in comparison to other new zealanders (ministry of health, 2012). as lavallée (2011) argued, colonization defines aboriginal peoples’ health. the who (n.d.) further noted that individuals who experience hardships and stressors are at greater risk of developing illnesses, particularly chronic conditions. colonialism has constructed an inequitable education and health care system and has influenced first nations’ and other global indigenous populations’ abilities to make healthy choices; this, in turn, can impact health outcomes such as type 2 diabetes. education systems education is directly linked to first nations individuals’ health status (national collaborating centre for aboriginal health [nccah], 2009b); thus, it is important to look at the policies surrounding education for first nations and examine how these policies influence health and the incidence of type 2 diabetes. higher levels of education are positively correlated with health status (nccah, 2009b). more education provides an individual with more knowledge of how to stay healthy, including when, how, and where to seek medical attention (phac, 2003). low levels of educational attainment in first nations populations make strong contributions to health disparities, including those related to type 2 diabetes, between non-first nations and first nations in canada. the indian act, enacted in 1876, made it possible for the federal government to have control over education for first nations children and allowed the federal government to establish, operate, and maintain schools (indian act, 1985). specifically, sections 114 and 115 of the indian act articulate the federal government’s responsibility to provide education for first nations students, including adequate buildings, equipment, teaching, and transportation (indian act, 1985). regardless of these guarantees of education, first nations individuals have extremely low levels of educational attainment. for example, in 2001, only 5.1% of the first nations population had earned a university degree, compared to 22% of the non-aboriginal population. in addition, 48.6% of the first nations population had not completed high 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 2 [2013], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.3 school, compared to 22.5% of non-first nations (health canada, 2009). in 2006, approximately 60% of first nations individuals aged 20 to 24 who lived on-reserve had not achieved a high school diploma or certificate (first nations education council [fnec], 2009). fnec (2009) has suggested that disproportionately low levels of educational attainment are due to the federal government’s underfunding of first nations education. the amount of funding allocated to first nations education is inadequate given the dramatic growth of the number of young first nations individuals (afn, 2005); indeed, the first nations education is systemically underfunded. from 1996 until at least 2008, there was a 2% growth cap placed upon education funding for first nations communities (fnec, 2009). the cap did not allow any adaptation to the funding necessitated by a quickly expanding first nations population. for example, between 2001 and 2006 the first nations population grew by almost 15% (human resources and skills development canada [hrsdc], 2012). the 2% growth cap on education funding created a cumulative shortfall of $1.54 billion between 1996 and 2008 (fnec, 2009). resources in first nations schools are not equivalent to those provided to provincial and territorial schools. for example, libraries in first nations schools, which provide students with the opportunity to learn new information, learn basic research skills, and gain lifelong knowledge, do not receive any funding from the federal government (fnec, 2009). also, while information and communication technology (ict) was introduced into provincial schools in the 1980s, lack of funding resulted in about two-thirds of first nations school principals stating that they were unable to use ict in their schools in 2003 (fnec, 2009). another example of unequal resources for first nations schools compared to nonfirst nations schools occurs in sports and recreation. there is no funding provided for sports and recreation programs in first nations schools, whereas all other provincial schools include both sports and health in their education programs (fnec, 2009). policies that make it possible to chronically underfund first nations education make strong contributions to lower levels of educational attainment among first nations, which in turn makes strong contributions to first nations’ heightened vulnerability to poor health, including type 2 diabetes. such inequitable structures of domination persist today and continue to shape the first nations peoples’ health. a lack of access to sport and recreation opportunities is particularly problematic given the important contributions that physical activity make to the reduction in a large number of health problems, including type 2 diabetes (canadian diabetes association, 2012b). access to health care during colonization, specific treaties were signed by first nations peoples and the crown to recognize first nations peoples’ right to health care and the provision of health care (health council of canada, 2005). the signing of these treaties, as well as other agreements, legally binds the federal government, rather than the provincial or territorial governments, to provide health care to first nations peoples to this day (health council of canada, 2005). articles 21 and 24 of the 2008 united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples, which canada, a late signatory, signed on november 12th, 2010 (aboriginal affairs and northern development canada [aandc], 2012), also identify aboriginal peoples’ rights to health care (un, 2008). 7 brooks et al.: policy (mis)alignment published by scholarship@western, 2013 regardless of first nations peoples’ rights to health care, the afn (2011b) remains concerned that residents of first nations communities are not receiving adequate health services, which they argue is having devastating effects on first nations individuals and communities. for example, first nations peoples also have limited access to screening and treatment services, which leads to later diagnosis of diseases in first nations peoples compared to non-aboriginal peoples (nccah, 2009a). this problem that has its roots in numerous policies. first nations peoples have insured hospital care and primary health care through provincial and territorial governments (health canada, 2011d). there are, however, many health services that are not insured by provincial and territorial governments, such as drugs, dental care, vision care, medical supplies, mental health counselling, and medical transportation. these are provided to first nations people through the federal government’s non-insured health benefits program (nihb) (health canada, 2011d). the nihb program is helpful in trying to improve first nations peoples’ health status, but it remains problematic. approximately one in five first nations children have not had any dental care; half of first nations adults have reported having difficulties accessing the nihb; and one in five first nations adults have had difficulties with health care due to treatments not covered by nihb (afn, 2011a). individuals must receive pre-approval for transportation, dental, vision, and other benefits, and there are increasing policy restrictions that make it more difficult for individuals to access the required care (afn, 2011b). in 2011, the afn (2011b) reported that the lack of investment by the government into the nihb program would lead to a $376 million shortfall for 2012. also, the budget for the nihb program will need to be restructured to account for the approximately 45,000 newly registered first nations individuals due to indian act amendments (afn, 2011b). if there is no change to these financial burdens, first nations individuals and communities will continue to face barriers in accessing basic health care and will continue to experience a higher prevalence of health problems, such as type 2 diabetes, when compared to non-first nations populations. in addition to a lack of funding for health services, many first nations communities experience a lack of adequate access to health care services (campbell, 2002). furthermore, the health care and advice that comes from health services is encased in western medicine traditions that do not support traditional, holistic medicine practices of first nations culture, leading to first nations individuals being reluctant to seek advice and treatment regarding medical conditions (oliver & mossialos, 2004). moreover, there is often a lack of willingness from western practitioners to accept and respect first nations knowledge and experience regarding medicine and ways to prevent, diagnose, and treat diseases (smye & browne, 2002). programs that are culturally safe often have greater impact and are more successful than those that are not (brascoupé & waters, 2009). cultural safety provides “a tool or lens for a reflexive process informed by post-colonialism, which alerts us to the importance of historical, social, economic and political structures in the analysis of contemporary health policies” (smye & browne, 2002, p. 43). indeed, if programs are not developed in a culturally safe way, they can further discriminate against first nations peoples and exacerbate their detachment from the current health system (barnett & kendall, 2011). health care programs and practitioners must be aware of and respect first nations peoples’ history and colonialism’s impact on this population. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 2 [2013], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.3 access to health services can also be quite challenging for individuals who live on remote reserves; individuals often have to travel great distances and transportation is not fully covered by nihb. the lack of physical access to care can deter individuals from seeking the required diagnosis and care for their diabetes (campbell, 2002). early detection is very important in the treatment of diabetes. in fact, if treated early and effectively, a person with type 2 diabetes can live a healthy, normal lifestyle; however, in order for type 2 diabetes to be treated, there must be health care services within an acceptable distance. with difficulties in accessing health services, early detection can be impeded, resulting in delayed diagnosis and more challenging treatment requirements (campbell, 2002). together, the chronic underfunding of health care, lack of physical access, and absence of wide-spread access to culturally-safe health practices render it difficult for first nations peoples to seek and receive health care, including the prompt diagnosis and treatment for pre-diabetes and type 2 diabetes, especially for those living on remote reserves. what’s the problem with the adi? the core objectives surrounding the adi focus on changing the lifestyles and habits of first nations individuals and communities (health canada, 2011a); as a result, the initiative makes it seem as if the problem lies in first nations peoples’ apparent unwillingness to change or their lack of knowledge of healthy choices. using bacchi’s (1999) “what’s the problem” approach to analyze the adi, we argue that current approach taken by the adi ignores the policies – such as those related to colonialism, education systems, and access to health care that shape first nations peoples’ health-based decisions and health statuses (graham, 2004). for example, the adi focuses on encouraging first nations communities to build on their strengths and draw on their traditions and cultures to implement health promotion and diabetes prevention programs. as mentioned above, giles et al. (2005) have argued that among aboriginal peoples, diabetes is viewed as the result of the loss of tradition, community, culture, and spirituality; as a result, the approach used in the adi could potentially be very useful and beneficial. there is, however, a large challenge to taking such an approach: in the past – and some might argue in the present first nations communities’ traditions and cultural practices, including those pertaining to physical activity, have been actively suppressed and/or marginalized by eurocentrically-oriented colonial policies (paraschak, 1998; pettipas, 1994). there is a certain irony to the current situation: on the one hand, the federal government is advocating for the use of cultural practices and traditions – particularly forms of physical activity – to incite first nations individuals to change their lifestyle practices to address type 2 diabetes; on the other hand, federal policies continue to play a large role in curtailing traditional physical practices, delegitimizing elders’ knowledge, westernizing education, failing to support culturally-appropriate health care (monture-angus, 2005), and neglecting to provide access to in-school sport and recreation programs. as a result, the very practices for which the adi apparently advocates are undermined. pilkinton et al. (2010) found that health education and lifestyle interventions – the approach that adi takes are not sufficient to curb high rates of type 2 diabetes and call for “comprehensive, populationbased policy changes” (p. 6). effectively addressing type 2 diabetes in first nations communities requires sustained, multi-sectorial, and multi-faceted responses that go beyond the approach employed by the adi. below, we make recommendations for the ways in which type 2 diabetes in first nations 9 brooks et al.: policy (mis)alignment published by scholarship@western, 2013 communities could be addressed in a manner that is more consistent with best practices in health interventions. recommendations policies that pertain to the social determinants of health need to be made based on coordinated, collaborative efforts and evidence-based approaches (kelly, morgan, bonnefoy, butt, & bergman, 2007). a program like the adi, which is intended to improve first nations peoples’ health, is seriously undermined by other federal policies – such as those related to colonialism, education, and access to health care, that contribute to first nations peoples’ disproportionate rates of poor health, in this case type 2 diabetes. marmot, friel, bell, houweling, and taylor (2008) have convincingly argued that health equity should be the aim of all social and economic policies, not just those directly related to health, because even if they do not directly pertain to health such policies indirectly exercise a strong influence on it. policy alignment, as defined by phac (2005), includes a comprehensive look at how a new policy or program fits within the existing policy, regulatory, and program environment; specifically, it necessitates an alignment of the policies of departments with similar or overlapping mandates, geographic locations, or key stakeholders. policy alignment can be achieved by coordinating policymaking and discussions among people who work in the health and non-health sectors and by reaching out to the populations that the policies affect to ensure that appropriate and fair policies are created (marmot et al., 2008). currently, federal policies are aligned in such a way as to create a policy environment that is not conducive to diminishing rates of type 2 diabetes in first nations communities. policies that are intended to promote first nations health, for instance by decreasing the prevalence of type 2 diabetes, should be aligned so that they work together to ameliorate the disparities. part of aligning policies so that they are better able to reduce health care inequities will require fundamental re-examination of policies themselves. for example, current policies related to health care access and to education systems continue to be rooted in colonial belief systems that justify existing health inequalities as being inevitable and/or based on first nations peoples’ inabilities to make good decisions. if the canadian government is in fact serious about addressing health inequities between first nations and non-first nations, changes must be made. in order to benefit from the canadian health care system, individuals must have physical, political, and social access to the services, which many first nations peoples are denied. the factors that contribute to this denial of service are related to the intermediate social determinants of health: education systems, health care systems and access, and infrastructure development (loppie reading & wein, 2009). this neglect extends to a current education curriculum that ignores aboriginal content or learning styles, resulting in lower educational attainment (loppie reading & wein, 2009; nccah, 2010). policies that encourage first nations’ control over first nations education are important in increasing levels of educational attainment (fnec, 2009), which can in turn improve health (canadian council on learning, 2009), especially with respect to rates of type 2 diabetes (loppie reading & wein, 2009). in order for this to occur, however, first nations need adequate funding for educational infrastructure and development. thus, changing existing policies that result in the chronic underfunding of first nations health (afn, 2011b) and education systems (fnec, 2009) could play an important role in decreasing the incidence of type 2 diabetes. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 2 [2013], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.3 it is crucial for the government of canada to work with first nations communities and governments to re-align policies that presently foster the proliferation of diabetes. we recognize that this is a particularly challenging recommendation in light of the current government’s recent cuts to the aboriginal organizations that champion the needs of aboriginal peoples: for instance, health canada removed all funding for the national aboriginal health organization (naho), which was forced to close in june, 2012 (naho, 2012); the native women’s association of canada (nwac) suffered severe cuts to their programming (nwac, 2012); and pauktuutit: inuit women of canada had all of its funding related to health severed (pauktuutit, 2012). such cuts to aboriginal organizations demonstrate the canadian government’s lack of commitment in seriously addressing aboriginal health issues, including type 2 diabetes in first nations communities. as stated above, type 2 diabetes is a significant health issue for indigenous populations worldwide (centers for disease control and prevention, 2011; ministry of health, 2012; wang, hoy, & si, 2010). as such, while the adi is a canadian federal government program, we believe that the aforementioned recommendations could also be applied in international contexts. conclusion while a laudable effort, a program like the adi has limited reach. we propose that in order to address health disparities between first nations and non-first nations peoples, there is need to recognize the systemic factors that contribute to type 2 diabetes in this population. we call for improved collaboration between community members, researchers, and policy makers to reform the disconnected approach that currently exists in type 2 diabetes prevention and treatment. this approach to diabetes prevention is incongruent with existing policies that influence the lives of first nations peoples. furthermore, interventions need to work on multiple levels in order to have the greatest impact. initiatives that exist within an aligned policy environment are more likely to work in synergistic manners to improve the unacceptable health disparities that currently exist for first nations peoples. 11 brooks et al.: policy (mis)alignment published by scholarship@western, 2013 references aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc). 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(2010). a framework for indigenous school health: foundations in cultural principles. retrieved from http://nccah.netedit.info/docs/nccah%20reports/nccah_cash_report.pdf native women’s association of canada (nwac). (2012). the native women’s association of canada denounces aandc funding cuts. retrieved from http://nwac.ca/media/release/06-09-12 oliver, a. & mossialos, e. (2004). equity of access to health care: outlining the foundations for action. journal of epidemiology and community health, 58(8), 655 658. doi:10.1136/jech.2003.017731 paraschak, v. (1998). “reasonable amusements”: connecting the strands of physical culture in native lives. sport history review, 29(1), 121 131. retrieved from http://journals.humankinetics.com/shr-backissues/shrvolume29issue1may/reasonableamusementsconnectingthestrandsofphysicalculturein nativelives pauktuutit. 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(1996). highlights from the report of the royal commission on aboriginal peoples. retrieved from http://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/webarchives/20071115053257/http://www.aincinac.gc.ca/ch/rcap/sg/sgmm_e.html smye, v. & browne, a. (2002). “cultural safety” and the analysis of health policy affective aboriginal people. nurse researcher, 9(3), 42 56. retrieved from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11985147 united nations (un). (2008). united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples. retrieved from http://www.un.org/esa/socdev/unpfii/documents/drips_en.pdf united nations (2012). political declaration of the high-level meeting of the general assembly on the prevention and control of non-communicable diseases, 66 (117). wang, z., hoy, w. e., & si, d. (2010). incidence of type 2 diabetes in aboriginal australians: 11-year prospective cohort study. bmc public health, 10, 1 5. doi: 10.1186/1471-2458-10-487 walt, g., shiffman, j., schneider, h., murray, s. f., brugha, r., & gilson, l. (2008). “doing” health policy analysis: methodological and conceptual reflections and challenges. health policy and planning, 23(5), 308 317. doi:10.1093/heapol/czn024 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 2 [2013], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.3 world health organization (who). (2012). social determinants of health. retrieved from http://www.who.int/social_determinants/en/ world health organization. (n.d.). preventing chronic diseases. a vital investment: public health agency of canada. retrieved from http://who.int/chp/chronic_disease_report/en/ young, t. k., reading, j. elias, b., & o’neil, j. d.(2000). type ii diabetes mellitus in canada’s first nations: status of an epidemic in progress. canadian medical association journal, 163(5), 561 566. retrieved from http://www.cmaj.ca/content/163/5/561.full.pdf 17 brooks et al.: policy (mis)alignment published by scholarship@western, 2013 the international indigenous policy journal april 2013 policy (mis)alignment: addressing type 2 diabetes in aboriginal communities in canada lauren a. brooks francine e. darroch audrey r. giles recommended citation policy (mis)alignment: addressing type 2 diabetes in aboriginal communities in canada abstract keywords creative commons license policy (mis)alignment: addressing type 2 diabetes in aboriginal communities in canada participatory action research with a group of urban first nations grandmothers: decreasing inequities through health promotion the international indigenous policy journal volume 6 | issue 1 article 4 january 2015 participatory action research with a group of urban first nations grandmothers: decreasing inequities through health promotion carla s. ginn university of calgary, cginn@ucalgary.ca judith c. kulig university of lethbridge, kulig@uleth.ca recommended citation ginn, c. s. , kulig, j. c. (2015). participatory action research with a group of urban first nations grandmothers: decreasing inequities through health promotion. the international indigenous policy journal, 6(1). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.4 participatory action research with a group of urban first nations grandmothers: decreasing inequities through health promotion abstract inequities experienced by aboriginal people in canada due to residual effects of colonization and assimilation are evident; research is needed focusing on positive strategies for health and healing in urban settings. participatory action research (par) is identified as an appropriate method of research for engaging collaboratively with aboriginal people. this study involved seven first nations grandmothers in a small urban community in alberta, canada. the grandmothers linked personal health with family and community health, and practiced health promotion through maintaining cycles of support between themselves, their families, and communities. these grandmothers recognized their invaluable roles as leaders in health promotion in families and communities. the collective knowledge of aboriginal grandmothers has potential to affect health inequities on a broader scale. keywords canada, aboriginal health, health promotion, indigenous population, inequities, participatory research, social determinants of health, urban acknowledgments this research was funded by the canadian institutes of health research frederick banting and charles best canada graduate scholarshipsmaster’s award (cgm-89148). we would like to acknowledge the grandmothers without whom this study would not have occurred. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/     p a r t i c i p a t o r y a c t i o n r e s e a r c h w i t h a g r o u p o f u r b a n f i r s t n a t i o n s g r a n d m o t h e r s : d e c r e a s i n g i n e q u i t i e s t h r o u g h h e a l t h p r o m o t i o n this article will briefly review the effects of colonization and assimilation on aboriginal people in canada, identifying them as a vulnerable yet resilient population. participatory action research (par) will be outlined as a fitting method to engage in research because of its emphasis on participants as coresearchers. study design, data collection, and analysis with a group of seven first nations grandmothers in a small urban community in alberta will be described. findings of the study will be discussed in relation to roles of grandmothers in health promotion, the social determinants of health for aboriginal people, and the ultimate potential for contribution to health policy. much has been written with regard to existing inequities for the 1.4 million aboriginal people in canada, 70% of whom live off-reserve (national association of friendship centres, 2013; statistics canada, 2013). aboriginal people have been described as strong and resilient with a holistic world view that has potential to contribute to the overall health and well-being of all canadians (kirmayer, simpson, & cargo, 2003; national collaborating centre for aboriginal health, 2013); however, they have also been identified as the “most distressed group in canadian society” (knopf, 2008, p. 5). residential schools1 have detrimentally affected individual as well as collective health for aboriginal people (mikkonen & raphael, 2010; national collaborating centre for aboriginal health, 2013; waldram, herring, & young, 2006). the residential school era was compounded by the “sixties scoop,” wherein disproportionate numbers of aboriginal children were adopted by non-aboriginal families or entered foster care. this wave of assimilation has been linked to intergenerational disparities and inequities in individual and collective health (royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996; waldram et al., 2006). inequities in health resulting from the trauma of assimilation are systemic and ongoing. four percent of aboriginal children in canada are foster children as compared to 0.3 % of non-aboriginal children, and aboriginal children aged 14 and under currently make up 48.1% of children in foster care (statistics canada, 2013). although the government of canada has issued an apology for the immeasurable damage incurred through efforts to separate and assimilate children into the “dominant culture” (government of canada, 2008), colonizing attitudes continue to pervade the collective consciousness of canadians. colonization and its effects persist throughout canadian society. negative societal views have the potential to affect the well-being of aboriginal people through discriminatory behaviours and attitudes. aboriginal people in canada perceive negative stereotyping by other canadians in areas such as addiction, laziness, lack of intelligence, and poverty (the environics institute, 2012). the collectivist worldview of aboriginal people does not fit the dominant capitalist culture in canada and many misunderstandings have occurred due to this disconnect. aboriginal communities were profoundly                                                                                                                 1residential schools—with goals of assimilation and acculturation—were a government–church (anglican, catholic, methodist, and presbyterian) partnership that opened boarding schools across canada. the removal of aboriginal children from their homes and replacing traditional language and beliefs with european language and beliefs was an attempt at “civilizing” and “re-socializing.” conversely, the results were horrendous, resulting in neglect, mistreatment, and abuse of thousands of children, reaching to future generations through forced removal of traditional values and bonds of parental love. the last residential schools closed in the 1970s in the united states and in 1996 in canada. 1 ginn and kulig: par with urban first nations grandmothers published by scholarship@western, 2015     changed during colonization through treaties, land claims, and the enactment of a complex web of documents such as the indian act2 and bill c-31.3 in terms of health legislation, the white paper policy4 was withdrawn following protest from aboriginal groups, while the indian health policy5 revised the approach to aboriginal health and slowly aboriginal people progressed toward greater involvement in their own health. recommendations for increasing health equity were co-created at a forum held by commissioner roy romanow in co-operation with the national aboriginal health organization (naho). aboriginal health partnerships were proposed as strategies for health promotion. these partnerships were to be community-centred (rather than government-centred), holistic, rooted in cultural traditions and values, and encompass community, regional, or urban partnerships (romanow, 2002). these partnerships have yet to be fully implemented in canada. while remaining cognizant of the ensuing negative effects of colonization, looking forward and strategizing for progress is essential. the urban first nations health research discussion paper (2009) recommended attention to strategies and processes for healing and health in urban settings (browne, mcdonald, & elliott, 2009). much of health literature is focused on deficits such as marginalization and loss, and an emphasis on positive health promotion strategies in urban centres is necessary: “studies are needed that explore the processes that support health and healing—that is, the strategies used by people to stay healthy, mobilize social support, and develop a sense of community in urban settings” (browne et al., 2009, p. 37). the government of alberta (2010) identified aboriginal people as part of a vulnerable population requiring collaborative research to generate solutions for reducing disparities in their health. reducing inequities in accessing the determinants of health for vulnerable populations in alberta “is thought to have the potential to yield health benefits similar in magnitude to those that would accrue from reductions in lifestyle risk factors for the major chronic diseases” (government of alberta, 2010, p. 25). research with aboriginal people in canada must attain a balance between identifying existing inequities and hidden strengths within the aboriginal population. the aims of this study were two-fold: first, to engage with a group of first nations grandmothers in collaborative research; second, to gain understanding about health and ways of promoting it in their families and communities.                                                                                                                 2 the indian act was created by the government of canada in 1876, defining who possessed “indian” status. many amendments were made to it, including aboriginal and treaty rights. women (as opposed to men) lost their indian status (including fishing and hunting rights, property inheritance, education, and health benefits) when marrying a non-indian. their children could not claim indian status. 3 bill c-31 amended the indian act when it passed in 1985 and became law in 1987. women could no longer lose indian status through marriage, but must disclose the identities of their children’s fathers in order to transfer it. 4 the white paper policy was created in 1969 and proposed to transfer health care from federal to provincial governments, phasing out the indian act, reserves, and separate services for indians. 5 the indian health policy was first introduced in 1974, followed by another in 1979, which recognized the need for improvement of health through the participation of indian people. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.4     m e t h o d s p a r t i c i p a t o r y a c t i o n r e s e a r c h ( p a r ) par encompasses a philosophical stance stemming from social constructionism and pragmatism, a theoretical framework interconnecting ways of knowing with ways of living, and a method linking research to social action. social constructionism blends the material and symbolic, or common sense and philosophy (burr, 2003; edley, 2001). pragmatism stems from social constructionism and is the “recognition of an inseparable connection between rational cognition and rational purpose” (peirce, 1905, pp. 162-163)—in other words, thinking followed by doing. par links research with action, and is a theoretical framework as well as a method found throughout the work of noted scholars, such as dewey (1859 1952), collier (1884 1968), lewin (1890 1940), horton (1905 1990), freire (1921 1997), and borda (1925 2008), over the last century. dewey built on pragmatism proposed by peirce, moving from philosophizing to action in helping people solve their problems. dewey wrote extensively about social environments and their effects on people’s lives as individuals and communities. when people with shared values struggle together for community survival, it demonstrates the positive side of human nature; on the other hand, those with a love of power tend to perpetuate oppression and removal of other’s freedoms (dewey, 1989). collier (1945), the commissioner of indian affairs in the united states from 1933 to 1945, described research action as compelled by identified areas of need within society, and emphasized the responsibility of researcher and participant to work together, integrating knowledge that the “indian” provided in order to make positive change. collier (1945) described the damage done to first nations people through processes of colonization as tantamount to the horrors of wwii expansionism and resultant devastation. he wrote about the loss of community and applying integrative action research as a way “to deepen our realization of the potentialities of the democratic way, as well as our realization of our own extreme, pathetic shortcomings” (collier, 1945, p. 276). lewin (1946) coined the term “action research,” and emphasized involvement of communities in facilitating change. lewin stressed the need for a two-way democratic process to bring about social change rather than decisions being made by the most powerful on behalf of the less powerful. he categorized “minority problems” as also being “majority problems,” arguing that those in the majority should work to increase the self-esteem of individuals and groups of people who are in the minority, and decried the harmful historical effects of colonization through the imposition of colonial policies (lewin, 1946). horton founded the highlander folk school in 1932 to enrich the culture of indigenous people living in the appalachian mountains in tennessee. he began by working with people to strengthen unions and increase economic justice through education of the workers, which led to increased involvement in human and civil rights. rosa parks, who sparked the civil rights movement by refusing to give up her seat on a bus to a white man, was an alumna of the school; martin luther king, jr. was a colleague and friend of horton’s (horton & freire, 1990). freire and borda were the founders of par. freire’s work in brazil placed the illiterate and less powerful in the center of knowledge creation, engaging in research as social action to break the power of the oppressive and dominating political structures of society (freire, 1993). borda lived out processes of radical social transformation, assisting grassroots groups in columbia with incorporation of local knowledge into power for change. borda emphasized making a conscious effort to combine our life experiences with how we live in such a way that radical change is possible: “therefore, we must know how to select that which is in harmony with our vision of social responsibility; and, at the same time, that which satisfies our life experience” (borda, 1979, p. 33). he described the importance of exploring the oral traditions and stories of columbian elders who possess wisdom and common sense 3 ginn and kulig: par with urban first nations grandmothers published by scholarship@western, 2015     about their own histories, as differing from the written books by others about them: “thus we recover the popular (unofficial) version of history and strengthen the culture and self-esteem of people at the grassroots” (borda, 2013, p. 160). these early descriptions of action research emphasized the importance of engaging communities throughout the research process in order to bring about understanding and societal change. a par study in three indigenous communities in ontario explored why externally imposed public health programs are often ineffective (smylie, kaplan-myrth, & mcshane, 2009). community representatives and governing bodies identified community research team members who assisted with recruitment, data collection, analysis, synthesis, and approval of study results in collaboration with aboriginal and non-aboriginal researchers. the study findings suggested that without understanding of each local community knowledge translation activities would likely be ineffective. some common themes were discovered and included the value of experiential knowledge, the influence of community, and the dissemination of information through family and community networks (smylie et al., 2009). this model of community and family dissemination has not been fully realized by researchers and policy-makers. the centralized system of the first nations and inuit health branch of health canada has developed and transferred knowledge in a hierarchical manner not congruent with effective knowledge translation in aboriginal communities (smylie et al., 2009). to achieve useful and meaningful policy development, local community expertise is a prerequisite. par is an effective method of research that engages communities in research and knowledge development. due to its inherent principles of cultural sensitivity, inclusion, community decision-making, empowerment, respect, and emancipation, par is particularly fitting for research with aboriginal people (cochran et al., 2008; maar et al., 2011; purden, 2005). s e t t i n g a n d s a m p l e a participatory design and community engagement is essential when engaging in research with first nations people (canadian institutes of health research, natural sciences and engineering research council of canada, & social sciences and humanities research council of canada, 2010). this article presents findings from a par study conducted during graduate studies of the first author under the supervision of the second author. the research occurred in collaboration with a group of urban first nations grandmothers in a small city in alberta, canada. the study builds upon existing literature noting that first nations grandmothers are known to pass on traditional knowledge and create support networks for their families and communities (hungry wolf, 1980; meadows, thurston, & lagendyk, 2004; royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996; tjepkema, 2002; young, 2003). the study also adds to the body of literature noting that first nations women in canada do not routinely experience trust or respect during their encounters with health care professionals (browne & smye, 2001; fiske & browne, 2006). experiences of lack of trust, stemming from colonization, have been identified in the connection between indigenous peoples and research: indigenous communities agreeing to participate in research “tend to be persuaded not by the technical design, however, but by the open and ‘good’ intentions of the researchers. they also expect and appreciate honesty” (smith, 1999, p. 140). engaging in collaborative research should include the researcher and the community, should benefit the community, and produce valued outcomes relevant to the community. par involves knowledge users 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.4     assisting with development of the research questions as well as collecting and analyzing data with researchers learning to work collaboratively with the group being researched (parry, salsburg, & macaulay, 2009). in par, the knowledge users include the community being researched as well as the researcher. the community representative for aboriginal seniors confirmed the importance and appropriateness of a study of this nature, suggested the research questions, and assisted with development of the proposal. the research questions were as follows: research question 1: what does health mean to urban first nations grandmothers? research question 2: how do they promote it in their families and communities? the proposal was submitted for ethical approval to the university of lethbridge, human subject review committee, and then presented to and approved by the first nations community association (fnca). a group of seven grandmothers between 48 and 80 years of age from cree and blackfoot tribes volunteered to participate in the study. this group of grandmothers requested to be described as first nations. d a t a c o l l e c t i o n the grandmothers received opportunities for group and/or individual interviews, resulting in four group interviews and one individual interview over a four-month period. a member of the fnca chose to participate in the study, setting the time and place for the first interview. the grandmothers and the community representative determined subsequent times and locations for interviews. the process not only included interviews but also communal activities that were of significance to the group—cooking in particular. one of the grandmothers made bannock, some of the grandmothers wrote out their recipes, the first author brought ingredients and learned to make each grandmother’s version of traditional stew. while cooking, the grandmothers discussed content from the transcripts that they felt were meaningful and deserving of follow-up. throughout the study, the first author was invited to participate with the grandmothers in a community garden project, cultural awareness days, and a health fair. participating in these community events was enjoyable and educational, adding significantly to understanding of the grandmothers and their families; therefore contributing to increased richness of the data. the first author completed the transcribing and provided copies to the community representative one week following each interview for distribution to the grandmothers. some of the grandmothers requested summaries of key points to avoid the lengthy reading; these were provided following subsequent interviews. another grandmother asked for more questions before each interview; these were developed from additional topics she wished to explore and passed on to the community representative for distribution to the group. the grandmothers’ contributions such as suggesting additional questions and topics from their transcripts for subsequent interviews aligned with principles of ownership, control, access, and possession (ocap), which are essential in research with aboriginal people. ownership encompasses more than simply owning a copy of the transcripts or thesis; it means that the participant is regarded as a co-researcher and feels that his or her perspective and knowledge has been accurately represented in the findings (schnarch, 2004). due to the sensitive nature of what they revealed during their interviews, the grandmothers decided against owning copies of the tapes themselves, lest they “get into the wrong hands.” the grandmothers further requested not to be identified by numbers in the transcripts, as they 5 ginn and kulig: par with urban first nations grandmothers published by scholarship@western, 2015     had been “given enough numbers by the government;”therefore, pseudonyms were developed by the first author with meanings resembling notable personality traits of the grandmothers. these names and meanings were discussed and heartily approved by the group, amidst much laughter. d a t a a n a l y s i s data analysis involved coding and theme development with the grandmothers, using a method documented by bartlett, iwasaki, gottlieb, hall, and mannell (2007). the first author printed 556 paraphrases of key statements from the transcripts on index cards with corresponding statements, page, and interview numbers cross-referenced on the back. these cards were laid out on tables with the grandmothers walking around the room, picking up the cards most meaningful to them. cards containing statements about residential schools were placed in a separate pile as the grandmothers decided the statements on these 106 cards should be woven throughout the data rather than having a separate theme because they described residential schools as affecting every part of their lives. during two consecutive meetings, the grandmothers chose cards most meaningful to them, 129 in total. those who were unable to see or understand the cards due to vision difficulties or language barriers were assisted by other grandmothers who read the cards out loud, at times in their first language. as the grandmothers held their cards, they spoke out ideas for themes regarding health, which the first author wrote on sticky notes and placed on walls around the room. the grandmothers then placed the cards they had chosen under themes they determined fit their statements. while choosing cards and placing them under themes, their consensus regarding the words they had chosen helped to establish rigor, ensuring credibility of the findings. many of the cards they chose were statements made by one of their friends rather than their own, and they marvelled at their combined knowledge. when reviewing transcripts and organizing the findings, the grandmother who had spoken the least throughout the interviews said, “i know a lot.” this recognition of contribution is essential in maintaining credibility, as is engagement and interaction with the participants (ryan-nicholls & will, 2009). consistency was maintained through member checking occurring with the second author and the community representative throughout the research process, ensuring transferability, dependability, and confirmability of the study results (lincoln & guba, 1985). f i n d i n g s the grandmothers co-created 12 themes under an overarching theme of “staying healthy,” which they defined as a balance of physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual health. one of the grandmothers brought up the concept of a medicine wheel to describe this balance, but the group determined not to use it because they did not all feel comfortable with it as a model. therefore, they continued with naming and positioning three themes into each of the four quadrants of health. they described their physical health including role-modeling, educating, and living off-reserve; mental health including knowledge of who to trust and distrust, problem-solving, and enjoying life; emotional health including resiliency and surviving, staying positive, and constructively addressing racism; and spiritual health including spirituality and culture. at the second data analysis meeting, one of the grandmothers identified a missing theme: they discussed a major part of living healthfully as listening to their intuition and following dreams. initially, the group was reluctant to include it in case certain audiences might consider it too mystical, but through their thoughtful discussion they concluded dreams and intuition fit as the final theme under spirituality. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.4     physical health encompassed role-modeling, described by the grandmothers as “changing myself first;” educating or “increasing understanding;” and reserves, resulting in “splitting us up.” strong relationships with grandchildren were seen as catalysts for change. when role-modeling interactions with her physician, joan said: i wouldn’t let myself be intimidated, i would ask the questions that needed to be asked because i always thought, “my kids will have to learn from me how to do this.” formal and informal education was viewed as a way to bridge gaps between cultures. similar to residential schools, reserves assimilated the grandmothers into physical spaces that were not traditional lands and not home. the grandmothers asserted that choosing to live off-reserve resulted in decreased material resources but increased health and opportunities to be physically present and available for their grandchildren. mental health encompassed learning whom to trust and distrust, clarifying that “trust is difficult;” problem-solving or “planning how to stay healthy;” and enjoying life through “using humour.” letting go of negative influences and developing positive relationships helped move them away from difficulties with trusting those in authority following residential school. the grandmothers encouraged each other to try new things, develop self-confidence, let go of anger, and replace it with gratefulness. brigid described humour as: one of the blessings, cause even if we had a really bad day in class, we’d all be in the rec room and there’d be nothing but laughter. prioritizing mental health allowed the grandmothers to build on strengths from past experiences, helped them cope with present daily events, and provided opportunities for sharing these strategies with grandchildren. emotional health involved resiliency, which the grandmothers termed “we’re still here;” keeping a positive outlook through deciding to “turn things from negative to positive;” and encountering racism or “being treated differently,” learning from it, and educating others about cultural differences. brigid described it in this way: it didn’t dawn on me while i was at residential school that i would eventually begin to see myself as less than other people . . . “i’m not as good, i’m not as capable, i’m not as smart” . . . i began to realize, because of the different environments i got into that “hey, you’re an okay human being. you’re not less than, you’re not more than” and i find myself to be in a comfort zone now at this stage of my life, knowing i’ve never been less than and i’ve never been more than any other human being . . . i am of value to whomever i meet because i see the value in other people. realization of personal value and resiliency helped to build strong relationships with grandchildren, as did focusing on “changing things from dark to light.” alice related: trying to turn everything from a negative to a positive. like i could wake up in a real miserable mood but i could turn it around, so i don’t live in that darkness anymore. i want it to be light. even if it’s gloomy like this, i’ll try to make something happier. 7 ginn and kulig: par with urban first nations grandmothers published by scholarship@western, 2015     the grandmothers observed that health care providers lacked understanding and listening skills and that they, generally, were not culturally sensitive or aware. ida explained: they talk so much you can’t get in edge-wise so you just give up; you leave without telling the main thing that’s bothering you . . . you just can’t be healthy, no matter what you do. through the doctors you try to be healthy, but you bump up against the wall with these doctors. positive encounters involved those who took time to listen, took action on what they heard, and took time to follow up. the grandmothers persevered in their determination to “turn it around” as they described their methods of changing things for the better for their communities, families, and themselves. joan described the grandmothers feeling unsure and afraid at times following the experiences of residential schools: sometimes they don’t find that worth in themselves because of residential school, they’ve been so beaten down and they need to have somebody build them back up . . . when their kids are being raised in that kind of attitude where their caregiver feels like they’re nothing, how can their kid feel like anything? the grandmothers’ choices to be emotionally healthy involved a transparency regarding the past, and a recognition of their worth in the present. the grandmothers described spiritual health as a daily occurrence through “everyday experiences;” living within two cultures or “mine and the mainstream;” and in dreams and intuition or as they described “things we can’t explain.” religion imposed by residential schools led to confusion regarding traditional beliefs and a loss of the ability to maintain healthy, loving relationships. alice described it this way: we lost everything, love, everything. you tell me what love is. i don’t know. and somebody’s telling me, “i love you” and i’ll say, “you’re full of it” . . . i love my children and i love my grandchildren. i know that much, just the way i feel about them. though a male, forget it. daily living in a spiritual way involved being part of a bigger plan, having faith, employing prayer, and maintaining gratefulness. practicing traditional knowledge and ceremonies increased abilities to maintain spiritual health while living in two cultures. brigid explained: i’ve lived away from the reserve for so long, that i’ve developed my way. it’s based on knowledge from both cultures that i live within. utilizing knowledge gained from both cultures facilitated health promotion activities with their families while maintaining first nation identities. the grandmothers did not expect their families to engage in healthy activities without role modeling, as described by alice: fixing myself first, because being in this area [i.e., the control imposed by residential school] for so long i have to fix myself before i can walk my talk. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.4     clara described her strategy for staying healthy and positive: for me its faith, and being able to have, to hang on to someone, a higher power, knowing that i’m not walking alone with this problem that i have. the grandmothers revealed many lingering effects and secrets from residential schools; some have been able to move on, others have been unable to forget. feelings of being different than others, or as they described being “the indian,” affected their views of health and health promotion both negatively as well as positively. finding strength through cultural beliefs because of their experiences in life included access to dreams and intuition, belief in cause-and-effect, and causal events. brigid summarized: and i hang onto that like almost in a physical state of my mind, which is coupled by that emotional part of me. it’s every breath i take, every thought i have, it comes from that spiritual point of what i was taught when my dad was alive, my grandmothers. and as i get older, i think it’s called wisdom, to understand and to know these things and to be able to, i pray someday i’ll be, i’ll get to a point where, so unconscientiously [sic], i’ll just live my life in total benevolent, peaceful giving of love, of human being. living daily in a spiritual way strengthened the grandmothers by assuring them of their ability to carry on no matter what they had previously endured and no matter what was to come. d i s c u s s i o n par was a complementary method of research for the grandmothers, providing opportunity to demonstrate respect for their capabilities and knowledge, and a means to engage effectively with them. the first nations grandmothers participating in this study possessed profound understandings of themselves, their families, and their communities. they clearly were experts in health promotion and ways of decreasing inequities within their own social context. their holistic views of health as being a balance of physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual health were in stark contrast to the “health” enforced at residential schools through regulations, work, cleanliness, and avoidance of cultural practices. the grandmothers chose ways of improving their own health through maintaining mobility and strength, managing chronic health conditions through exercising and eating well, maintaining healthy body image, and choosing to live off-reserve. living off-reserve has been outlined in other studies as a healthy strategy for improving well-being because of increased access to housing and clean water, closer proximity to children and grandchildren, increased educational opportunities, and avoidance of individuals on-reserve who have hurt them in some way (balfour, 2008; bharadwaj et al., 2006; browne, smye, & varcoe, 2005). the grandmothers described numerous challenges in encounters with health care providers but utilized them to role-model effective communication techniques. they did not develop a formal strategy for educating health care providers, but encouraged each other to “use your voice” when encountering challenges within the health care system. this collective knowledge-sharing has been identified as facilitating understanding between aboriginal women and health care providers (wild et al., 2013). the grandmothers’ availability to their families and communities counted as a rich resource, which they practiced innovative means of health promotion. they resolved to speak up and out, taking a stand 9 ginn and kulig: par with urban first nations grandmothers published by scholarship@western, 2015     against injustices while changing things for the better to turn it around for their families and communities. this group of urban first nations grandmothers has experienced many inequities throughout their lifetimes. their collective knowledge and resiliency has contributed to the well-being of their families and communities, with potential to contribute to the overall well-being of canadians. many of the social determinants of health are inherently linked to this study and include aboriginal status, early life, education, income and income distribution, social exclusion, and the social safety net. the international symposium on the social determinants of indigenous health (2007) identified colonization as a fundamental underlying health determinant for indigenous people. recommendations included restoring control over their lives through self-determination and involvement in policy development and provision of health services (international symposium on the social determinants of indigenous health, 2007). the grandmothers in this study were unaware of the social determinants of health in a formal manner but vocalized awareness of their importance throughout the interviews. the health inequities that these grandmothers, their families, and communities have experienced are directly related to colonization, and, in order for health reform to occur, family and community involvement is vital as well as respect for the knowledge that first nations people bring to their own health management. inequities in access to the social determinants of health may decrease material resources, but, for this group of grandmothers, with decreased material resources has come increased value of individual, family, and community connections. waldram et al. (2006) wrote about viewing aboriginal people as “indigenous, colonized minorities in their homeland” (p. 295) who are active in “improving their lot” and reacting in response to oppression rather than as “passive victims.” uptake of these positive perceptions in canadian society would go far to reduce inequities. recognition of the human rights of urban aboriginal people and communities is essential in order for them to work together for change because disrespect negatively impacts health in material and psychological ways (senese & wilson, 2013). the grandmothers demonstrated great resiliency by role-modeling strength while progressing in their own healing. living daily in a spiritual way, they gratefully practiced traditional knowledge and prayer. linking personal health with family and community health, they maintained positive cycles of support between themselves, their families, and communities as they educated and passed on knowledge. this interrelated and collective model of health is noted in the literature as one reason that mainstream approaches to prevention and treatment of health do not fully address the complexities of health for aboriginal people (loppie reading & wien, 2009). l i m i t a t i o n s the study was completed in the english language while only one of the grandmothers spoke english as a first language, two spoke both cree and english, and four spoke both blackfoot and english. completing the study in their original languages may have resulted in richer data. the first author wrote out key statements on cards rather than having the grandmothers write out key statements and may have overlooked some themes that the grandmothers would otherwise have chosen. data analysis occurred over two meetings, with one grandmother unable to be at either meeting due to illness. the community representative was a liaison during this process, keeping the grandmother who was ill informed and 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.4     adding her ideas as applicable. the success of the research was linked to the involvement of the community health representative but this involvement may have inadvertently impacted the overall research process. the grandmothers did not want to review the 106 key statements regarding residential schools; they kept them in a separate pile and requested that the first author weave them throughout the final manuscript. the first author may have placed them under different themes than the grandmothers would have. this study involved a small group of urban first nations grandmothers and further research regarding on-reserve grandmothers would provide meaningful context. the grandmothers suggested more research regarding the place of men, both young and old, in their families and communities, as traditional roles were missing and along with those often a sense of purpose. c o n c l u s i o n engaging in par has the potential to contribute significantly to inequity-related research. according to cochran et al. (2008), “the way researchers acquire knowledge in indigenous communities may be as critical for eliminating health disparities as the actual knowledge that is gained about a particular health problem” (p. 22). this concept was expanded by bastien (2004), who described reciprocal relationships as one way in which researchers gain knowledge and in which blackfoot people come to know. the importance of relationships can be traced back to first nations “ways of knowing,” which existed long before western philosophies, theories, and methods. the grandmothers in this study vocalized and confirmed with each other their innovative ways of maintaining and promoting health. their insistence on “turning things around” for themselves, their families, and their communities provides promise for decreasing inequities in overall health for first nations people in canada. brigid wisely stated: the more healthy i am in these four basic concepts, physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual, the more i understand, the more my attitude changes to the healthier individual and it brings out, a lot of times i pray, the best in who i am. that’s how i work with the community and my family and myself to stay healthy . . . there are some days when i walk around with a big deep dark cloud over my head and a “stay out of my road” kind of attitude, but i work with me, i come upstairs from my basement bedroom and i look to the east, look at the day that’s been gifted to me, and i’m grateful for that . . . i keep a very open mind. i keep a real bright sun in my day, whether the sun is actually shining or not. i try to see the light about a lot of things . . . the attitude of many, many people could get a whole lot healthier if they would just open themselves up. canada’s income inequality and poverty rate is among the highest of wealthy countries and community engagement through social movements is a useful method for pressuring policymakers and governments to support health (mikkonen & raphael, 2010). to improve well-being for aboriginal people, effects of colonization on the social determinants of health must be addressed. aboriginal seniors are among canada’s most vulnerable citizens—living with poor physical and mental health due to the trauma of residential schools, low incomes, multiple chronic diseases, in isolated areas (usually on-reserve) and with poor housing (health council of canada, 2013). inequities in health for aboriginal people are extensive and on the surface may appear beyond reparation. colonization has occurred over hundreds of years and health reform for aboriginal people will be a gradual process. in engaging aboriginal communities, families, and individuals to work together to decrease inequities, aboriginal grandmothers are a clear starting point. 11 ginn and kulig: par with urban first nations grandmothers published by scholarship@western, 2015     aboriginal grandmothers are leaders in their communities, having emerged through unimaginable circumstances with strength, resiliency, and wisdom. they possess traditional knowledge, know their communities and families, and are well positioned to work collaboratively to negotiate change. aboriginal grandmothers are untapped resources in their communities and families who ardently engage in health promotion. they build and strengthen communities, provide links with cultural traditions, and are invaluable in promoting health and well-being. collaboration with aboriginal grandmothers in developing innovative strategies for health reform and policy development is a fitting start in reducing inequities in health for aboriginal communities. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.4     r e f e r e n c e s balfour, g. 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(2013). ‘give us the full story’: overcoming the challenges to achieving informed choice about fetal anomaly screening in australian aboriginal communities. social science & medicine, 98, 351-360. doi: 10.1016/j.socscimed.2012.10.031 young, t. k. (2003). review of research on aboriginal populations in canada: relevance to their health needs. british medical journal, 327(7412), 419-422. doi: 10.1136/bmj.327.7412.419 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.4 the international indigenous policy journal january 2015 participatory action research with a group of urban first nations grandmothers: decreasing inequities through health promotion carla s. ginn judith c. kulig recommended citation participatory action research with a group of urban first nations grandmothers: decreasing inequities through health promotion abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license participatory action research with a group of urban first nations grandmothers: decreasing inequities through health promotion oil companies, reindeer-herding communities, and local authorities: rights to land from the perspective of various stakeholders the international indigenous policy journal volume 5 | issue 4 article 2 october 2014 oil companies, reindeer-herding communities, and local authorities: rights to land from the perspective of various stakeholders svetlana tulaeva university of eastern finland, svett07@mail.ru recommended citation tulaeva, s. (2014). oil companies, reindeer-herding communities, and local authorities: rights to land from the perspective of various stakeholders. the international indigenous policy journal, 5(4). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.2 oil companies, reindeer-herding communities, and local authorities: rights to land from the perspective of various stakeholders abstract this article is devoted to the consideration of land disputes between oil companies and reindeer-herding communities. this research analyzes the legal framework within which the participants of conflict act, with particular reference to legal anthropology. most of the focus is not so much on formal laws as on the way in which they are understood and interpreted by the participants in relations. it is shown that various groups are guided by different laws and regulations, determining for themselves their priority over others. emphasis is placed on the role of custom and the way in which it influences the appeal of locals to the state legal system. starting from the specificity of legal environment, this article explains the use by the participants of conflicts of various strategies to settle them. keywords legal anthropology, indigenous peoples of the north, oil companies acknowledgments this article was prepared during the research project, “companies coping with multiple regulatory systems in russia,” supported by university of eastern finland (2012 2014). the author is a doctoral student at the university of eastern finland, faculty of social science and business, department of law, and a lecturer at the russian presidential academy of national economy and public administration, department of comparative political studies. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ oil companies, reindeer-herding communities, and local authorities: rights to land from the perspective of various stakeholders intensive industrial development at the close of the 20th century prompted attention to the issue of preserving and respecting pre-industrial traditions and customs. this was reflected in a burst of interest in two problems: the interrelationship between the state and indigenous peoples attempting to maintain their traditional way of life and also in the revision of the basis for the maintenance of indigenous special status. according to present-day russian legislation, “indigenous peoples are those living within the territories of traditional settlement of their ancestry, preserving traditional way of life, management and crafts, numbering less than 50,000 persons in the russian federation, and being aware of themselves as belonging to independent ethnic communities” (“o garantiyakh prav” [on guarantees of the rights…], 1999, p. 3). membership in an indigenous group provides a number of advantages in the use of natural resources and ensures additional government transfer payments and compensations. over the past few decades, other groups have become involved with issues concerning indigenous rights. the most significant newcomers have been the international expert community and the corporations working on the lands of indigenous peoples. declarations by the un and other international organizations defending the rights of indigenous peoples have influenced (at least on a discursive level) the maintenance of indigenous special rights in russia. at the same time, the swift advance of russian and international extractive corporations (forest-industry, coal, and oil-and-gas) into the territories of indigenous peoples challenge the preservation of their natural habitat. in a number of cases, this has resulted in the development of conflicts between local communities and companies. in accordance with russian legislation, indigenous peoples have no direct control over their traditional territories. the state owns most of all lands and leases them to different groups and organizations. it tends to mediate in conflicts that arise and tries to establish a balance between the various functions of natural resources and the ways in which they are used. on the one hand, the state sees its task to be the maintenance and preservation of the customary way of life and culture of traditional communities; while in the other hand, mining operations are a strategic resource on which the welfare of russian social and economic systems as a whole, and of each specific region, is based. thus, a relatively small proportion of the land has become the center of widely varying economic, ecological, political, and cultural interests, the promotion of which is based on different normative systems: common law, positive law, international law, and various forms of self-regulation such as compliance codes and others (benda-beckmann, 1989). the present investigation focuses on conflicts arising from the distribution of lands between oil companies and reindeer-herding communities in the nenets autonomous okrug (nao). nao is situated in the northwestern region of russia. most of nao is located above the arctic circle, which means that this territory exists under severe climatic conditions. the territory of the district comprises 176,810 square kilometres, mostly covered in tundra and forest tundra with an administrative centre at naryan-mar. the 2013 population of the district was 42,789, primarily made up of russians (63.31%), nenets (17.83%), and komi (8.61%) (dallmann, peskov, & murashko, 2011). there are heavy stocks of mineral resources, especially oil and gas, in the territory of okrug. the development of oil deposits in the okrug began during the soviet period. geological survey expeditions carrying out the evaluation of petroleum reserves actively worked here in the 1970s, while oil extraction began in the okrug in the early 1990s. at present, the largest russian and international extractive companies (lukoil, rosneft, total, conocophillips, and others) are actively working in the territory of okrug (dallmann et al., 2011). the specific issue facing the nao region 1 tulaeva: oil companies, reindeer-herding communities published by scholarship@western, 2014 is connected to the fact that a considerable part of the population consists of indigenous nenets people who practice a traditional way of life and engage in reindeer-herding. in this context, one of the problems of okrug is the necessity to find a balance between the interests of the local communities whose way of life is based on a close connection with nature and the companies dealing with the industrial mining operations. the purpose of this study is to analyze how the settlement of such conflicts is achieved, by what legal (or quasi-legal) reasoning participants are guided, and which are the factors that have an influence on the selection of strategies in conflict settlements. this article describes the features of the interaction between indigenous peoples, companies, and public authorities in russia. at the same time, some of the consequences of the interaction between state laws, informal rules, and customs are typical not only in the russian context, but also in other countries facing similar circumstances. theory and methodology of the investigation property rights are the key issue in economic theories concerned with the scarcity of resources. according to demsetz (1967), the prevailing anglo-saxon tradition implies that the term property means not the material objects but a defined set of rights (bundles of warrants) governing the entitlement to those objects. for example, various people can have different rights to the possession of land: someone is entitled to walk on that land to reach a brook for water, someone has a right to rent it for planting, someone is entitled to plant it, and so forth. thus, in real life, property rights are not a single and indivisible framework, but present individual warrants that can exist in various combinations and belong to a variety of persons (schlager & ostrom, 1992). such an understanding of property rights results in several important consequences. first, any act of exchange is nothing but an exchange of bundles of warrants. second, property rights do not mean relations between persons and objects but relations between persons with respect to using objects. third, the specification of property rights (i.e., the exact distribution of warrants among different proprietors) plays a key part in the settlement of conflicts over possession of one or another object (campbell & lindberg, 1990). moreover, the economic interpretation of property rights is focused mainly on formal rules directing the behavior of various groups but does not take into account the peculiarities of the social interaction of participants and the objects of their claims. an analytical model proposed by anthropologists enables us to fill in those gaps. this includes the consideration of several layers: ideology and culture, legal regulation, property as an aggregate of multifunctional relations, and actions with respect to property combining all the previous layers (benda-beckmann, 1997). particular attention is paid to how the interaction of different rules and regulations with respect to access to resources forms the specific practices of property handling (benda-beckmann, 1989). from the point of view of anthropologists, it is not the availability of formal rules for the possession of objects that is important but their legitimation by all the participants in the relationship. here various groups of participants can have different ideas about the rules concerning the use of the same object. in speaking of the juxtaposition of various rules and regulations, investigators have addressed the concept of a legal pluralism that presupposes the coexistence of different legal systems in a single social space (michaels, 2005). it means that one actor is potentially regulated by a multitude of diverse legal or quasi-legal regulations. such an approach supposes several main lines for the development of the subject. the first direction is the analysis of interaction between the state legal system and the systems of common law in local communities (teubner, 1997). the second direction is connected with the analysis of state law and the plurality of social forms formulating it 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.2 (merry, 1988). the relationship between the law and other social forms results in elements of law becoming elements of other social forms, and vice versa. on the one hand, they support one another; while on the other, they also modify each other. the third subject concerns the interaction between state law and global rules and procedures created by transnational actors (berman, 2007). when applied to the analysis of conflicts arising at the interface between different normative systems, as is considered in this article, the following consequences of the views of anthropologists on law and property are important for us. first, there is the consideration of law from the point of view of the participants in a particular relationship. this suggests that we can speak about a situation as a legal one if it is comprehended as such by the participants themselves. secondly, there is the limitation of the role of the state in the resolution of legal conflicts, including those connected with the rights to use one or another object. thirdly, it is the presence of “built-in pluralism” (internal pluralism) in state law. in other words, state law has absorbed the peculiarities of various forms of social life and reflects the interests of various groups in the population, which may result in contradictions within state law itself. fourthly, the interaction between different rules and regulations results in mutual transformation of the law. therefore, it is less important that the state recognizes the system of common law than whether the system connects with the nature of state law and affects it, as participants build up their behaviour in accordance with customs and traditions. since an anthropological approach is oriented towards an empirical understanding of law, the current investigation used a qualitative methodology as suggested by kvale (1983). use was made of both semi-structured interviews and the analysis of documents. material was collected during an expedition to nenets autonomous okrug in 2012. a total of 40 interviews were completed. interviews were conducted with the representatives of the state (6 interviews), managers of oil companies (7 interviews), representatives of reindeer-herding farms (19 interviews), and experts from non-governmental organizations (ngos, 5 interviews). interviews conducted at various points in time with experts from international ngos were also used in the study (3 interviews). the data were coded and analyzed with the aid of the successive approximation method as described by neuman (1991). the documents used can be divided into several groups: (a) state laws of federal and local significance, (b) international standards and conventions, (c) documents relating to negotiations between companies and reindeer herders, (d) materials in the regional press (the naryana vynder newspaper), and (e) expert documents and recommendations. triangulation was used to ensure validity of interviews, participatory observation, official materials and documents (neuman, 1991). in addition, earlier studies of indigenous peoples in russia and other countries (see for example, cunningham, 2010) were used for corroboration. this combination of methodologies allowed assessment of legal and quasi-legal arrangements from the perspectives of many actors: companies, ngos, international auditors, state representatives, and local people. special attention was paid to ethical issues. this research did not aim to provide specific facts of the activities of companies or state authorities; rather, the purpose of the study was to analyze the structure of interaction between different actors. in order to protect potentially vulnerable local people in the communities, the data were made anonymous and names of interviewees were not 3 tulaeva: oil companies, reindeer-herding communities published by scholarship@western, 2014 used in publication. also, local communities received feedback about the research through a presentation of the report on the project.1 first, a general description of the modern life of reindeer-herding communities are presented, followed by the legal environment within which they exist: the state laws, informal norms and customs, and international standards which describe the opportunities for and restrictions imposed upon the participants in relationships. subsequently, possible strategies for the resolution of land disputes and the reasons of their use (or misuse) are analyzed. nenets reindeer-herding farms: between custom and the present all that could be preserved has already been preserved. now we are trying to grow into present-day society in a modern way. (representative of the association of the nenets nation, 2012) the life of modern nenets reindeer-herders is a mixture of centuries-old traditions, soviet heritage, and up-to-date trends in development. for many decades, nenets reindeer-herders led a nomadic life with their herds in the tundra, using traditional instruments of labour and clothing, and conforming to individual nenets rites. however, during the course of the 20th century, the nenets’ way of life underwent profound changes. policies carried out by the soviet authorities had the strongest impact on the nenets culture and lifestyle. many traditions and rites were destroyed: the nenets language was partly forgotten and local shamans, who were the leaders of nenets communities, were sent to prison camps (novikova 2010; stammler & wilson 2006). reindeerherding communities were reorganized into reindeer-herding collective farms and a work rotation system was introduced: reindeer-herders no longer led a nomadic life with their reindeer but went into the tundra in shifts for a fixed period of time. reindeer-herders started to perceive reindeer herding not as a way of life but simply as a job. children of the reindeer herders studied the whole year round at settlement schools and lived in hostels located in the same settlements. they could go to the tundra to be with their parents only in the summer. children who grew up without personal experience of the tundra did not want to return there after graduation from school; instead, they entered study institutes and left for the cities. on the one hand, this resulted in the appearance of the first nenets intelligentsia; on the other hand, it also resulted in estranging the nenets from the tundra, their language and customs, and also in a reduction in reindeer herding. as a local journalist commented: previously, all the professions we acquired were for us secondary. unfortunately, today everything is the wrong way round; that is we have mastered this society and its space, and reindeer herding has become secondary, although it is our traditional way of life, through which one can preserve language and culture. (local newspaper journalist in the town of naryan-mar, 2012) after the collapse of the soviet regime, the reindeer-herding collective farms broke up. in the period of perestroika (reconstruction), most of the reindeer were lost. additional kinds of production, which existed at the time of the collective farms (fur farms, dairy farms, and others), were closed down. agricultural productive co-operatives (apcs) were organized in most settlements instead of                                                                                                                 1 the materials of this research were published and presented for local ngo and communities in nao (see tysiachniuk, tulaeva, & landonio, 2012). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.2 soviet collective farms, and reindeer herding and fisheries began to develop in some settlements on the basis of family-tribal communities. at present, the life of the nenets in nao is an unusual mixture of traditional ways and modernity. the herders drive not only teams of reindeer but also off-road vehicles, wear both traditional jumpers and modern overalls, live in reindeer skin tents in the tundra, while aiming to equip them with modern acquisitions (washing machines, satellite phones, and tv sets) and have modern houses in the settlements. most nenets, particularly the younger generation, already living in nao are not engaged in reindeer herding but hope to leave for the cities. at the same time, the gradual dying-out of reindeer herding constitutes a threat for the continued existence of nenets culture. for example, the nenets language is connected with the domestic features of reindeer herder life; therefore, its use in modern urban life is inconvenient and results in it gradually dying out: if we want to hide something from the children, we speak in the nenets language. (inhabitant of the krasnoye settlement, 2012) traditional nenets rites and customs have suffered a similar fate. the appearance of oil companies ambitious to move into the lands of the reindeer herders has been met with ambivalence. on the one hand, petroleum production is considered a matter of national importance and an opportunity to obtain serious economic support from companies. schools, gyms, and dwelling houses are built in settlements at the expense of the oilmen. as one individual stated: we are hooked on oil, so we need nothing more. (settlement chief, 2012) on the other hand, the coming of the oilmen is perceived as a threat to the traditional way of life and to the tundra, which reindeer herders consider to be their home. hence, one of the main motifs voiced in all of the interviews was regret for the restriction imposed on reindeer herding and the contamination of nature as a result of industrial development: well, anyway, when reindeer herders lived solely amongst themselves, without what there is now… well, before the oilmen came, everything was good then. now, most pastures are littered, the grass is trampled. (local inhabitant of the nelmin-nos settlement, 2012) thus, the necessity to preserve the conditions for a traditional way of life became one of the main concerns in the interaction between the oil companies and local communities in the okrug. oil, reindeer, and the legal environment the territory is common, but everyone has his own rules of survival. (local inhabitant in the khorei-ver settlement, 2012) one of the purposes of this article is to determine the legal coordinates within which the participants in a relationship act. in the view of a positive approach to the law, the only framework determining the interactions between the reindeer herders and oilmen is provided by state legislation. from the perspective of legal anthropology, the situation seems to be more complex. how the managers of the companies and the reindeer herders themselves perceive and substantiate their rights to the land is important. and here we see the juxtaposition of several normative procedures, including state legislation, informal rules for its use, international law referring to indigenous peoples, common law to which reindeer herders appeal, and corporate standards of company activity oriented in many respects toward economic efficiency. 5 tulaeva: oil companies, reindeer-herding communities published by scholarship@western, 2014 perception of the legal situation by its participants. in accordance with the state legislation, both reindeer herders and oilmen rent the lands from the state to which they belong but local communities themselves perceive the situation otherwise. the representatives of the reindeerherding communities appeal to common law and tradition. as reindeer herders have been pasturing reindeer on the same lands over the ages, they perceive the lands as their own. reindeer herders consider themselves to be native and permanent inhabitants of the lands, which in turn gives them a greater entitlement to the lands. one herder stated: it drives me nuts, if i meet a non-nenets in the tundra. i would not walk in your territories in such a way. they creep where i creep. the tundra is my homeland. (local inhabitant, krasnoye settlement, 2012) the appearance of the oilmen is perceived as an intrusion and as a violation of an unwritten law. in the opinion of the local inhabitants, the oilmen are a “temporary phenomenon” and varangians, who “will pump all the oil and go away;” therefore, they cannot be considered to be the legal owners of the lands. it is interesting that in a number of cases such an impression also meets with approval amongst company managers: anyway, we work on their lands. that is, so to speak, to ignore their requests would be wrong. (oil company manager, 2012) taking lands away from reindeer herders for the sake of petroleum production is connected for the reindeer herders with the loss of an object that has not only an economic value but also is imbued with definite moral connotations. the tundra is the basis of their economic survival and of the maintenance of their cultural identity, in the loosest meaning of the word. nenets songs, legends, language, clothes, and domestic objects all are involved in the tundra. for example, inhabitants commented: if they no longer walk across their land, it is as if they have lost their home. there is a very sensitive attitude to the land here… if the matter concerns an oil company, it means that it has grabbed a plot of land. it is the seizure of pasture. (local inhabitant, krasnoye settlement, 2012) let us suppose that any management company or someone else would come into your flat… and they are going to lay a pipe through your flat, next to the ceiling lamp, but without impeding your activities very much... well, the tundra is just their home... (representative of the association of indigenous peoples, 2012) at the same time, many company representatives consider such an attitude to be unjustified since the lands are not formally the property of reindeer herders, stating: we need two licenses to begin our work: one for production and another for land. the lands were already rented to the reindeer herders. and they say: it is our land. but it is not their land, it is the state land. (oil company manager, 2012) companies aim to act within the framework of formalized laws and do not always have opportunities to gain an understanding of the cultural and domestic features of nenets life. moreover, they are bound by their corporate obligations, the principal one of which is concerned with the economic efficiency of their activity: 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.2 our task is to produce oil rather than spend time on reindeer herders... we are responsible to our owners. they are not interested in how we come to an agreement here: they simply need a profit. the owner will take as much as has been planned. (oil company manager, 2012) thus, we see here the collision of two different normative systems, where one party appeals to informal, historically formed norms, while the other party bases its actions on economic necessity and formal rules. it is significant that both reindeer herders and oilmen, when describing the behaviour of their opponents, used the metaphor “those people seem to have been born yesterday,” which emphasizes the difference between the two worlds. the mediator in this confrontation is the state legal system. formal rules. one can pick out several main laws regulating relations in this sphere. first, there is the law of the russian federation, o nedrakh (underground resources law, 1992), determining the procedure companies use to access natural resources. it regulates the rules for conducting auctions and obtaining licenses, and for regulating the rights and obligations of the users of mineral resources. secondly, there is the land code of the russian federation (2001). it determines the rights and obligations of owners and lessees of land plots, procedure of recovery of damages on seizure of agricultural land no longer in use, and regulates land disputes. thirdly, there is a group of laws regulating the rights of indigenous low-numbered peoples of the north: o garantiyakh prav korennykh malochislennykh narodov (“on the guarantees of the rights of indigenous lownumbered peoples,” 1999); o territoriyakh traditsionnogo prirodopolzovaniya korennykh malochislennykh narodov severa, sibiri i dalnego vostoka rossiiskoi federatzii (“on the territories of the traditional natural resource use of the indigenous low-numbered peoples of the north, siberia and far east of the russian federation,” 2001); ob obshchikh printsipakh organizatsii obshchin korennykh malochislennykh narodov severa, sibiri i dalnego vostoka rossiiskoi federatsii (“on the general principles of the organization of the communities of indigenous low-numbered peoples of the north, siberia and far east of the russian federation,” 2000). these laws establish the legal foundation for the development of indigenous low-numbered peoples and protection of their aboriginal habitat and traditional way of life. on the basis of this group of laws, as well as the land code of the russian federation (2001), the nenets people have rights concerning compensation for the damage inflicted on them as a result of the seizure of land by oil companies. the amount of stated damages is determined by the establishment of an agreement between the parties and is estimated according to the procedure established by the existing legislation. several methods allowing for the evaluation of damage were developed at the federal level, which resulted, for example, in methods of damage assessment and calculation (2000), approved by the goscomecologiya environmental agency of the russian federation and, in 2009, in methods for the calculation of damages caused by the seizure of land for non-agricultural use, proposed by the ministry of economic development and trade of the russian federation. fourthly, there exists the law on ecological expert examination (1995), the essence of which is concerned with the preliminary inspection of correspondence resulting from planned economic activity, on the one hand, and the requirements of state legislation and technical regulations, on the other. before 2007, this was the key law determining the opportunities for the participation of the general public in the evaluation of ecological and social effects of the industrial activity undertaken by organizations. but following a reform in 2007, this law was considerably amended, with the result that the idea of “ecological expert examination” began to be interpreted more narrowly. according to the new version of the law, documentation of the planned activity has to be subject to evaluation, 7 tulaeva: oil companies, reindeer-herding communities published by scholarship@western, 2014 rather than the planned activity itself. the opportunities for ngo expert participation have also been abridged. finally, there are the legislative acts of nenets autonomous okrug: o regulirovanii zemelnykh otnoshenii na territorii nao (“on the regulation of land relations in the territory of nao,” 2005); o nedropolzovanii (“on the use of subsurface resources,” 2003); and o chastnogosudarstvennom partnerstve (“on public-private partnership,” 2011). these acts establish the foundations of interaction between various actors in the okrug and outline the terms of mobilization and use of public and private resources for the development of the economic and social sphere, as well as protect of the rights of the nenets people. all of the above laws create a framework for constructing interaction between the various actors. however, from the point of view of legal anthropology, filling this framework depends on how much the state system coincides with the normative systems of the participants. it will have a direct influence on how laws act in practice. law enforcement in practice. the next step important for our study is to show the peculiarities of the impression of state laws held by various groups of actors. we can note the following points. first, according to the informal norms, the circumvention of any legislative barriers is often considered in order to overcome bureaucratic obstacles rather than violate the law. for example, the formalization of a permit for the allotment of land or the receipt of a license for oil production can take from one to three years. hence, sometimes it is economically more profitable for companies to pay a fine for starting operations early, rather than observing correctly all the details of the law: the oilmen think that it is cheaper for them to pay a fine, to start and even complete their work. and so this is what they do and they pay the fines. in other words, they will pay more taxes during a year than they will if they pay a fine… anyway, they will obtain that plot, of course. because the license plot is, of course, an oil one, and they will in any case formalize it in a year or two. (representative of reindeer-herding farm, khorei-ver, 2012) in some cases, this results in the land turning out to be developed by oilmen earlier than the reindeer herders will have given their permission for them to do so. as one chief told us: they have already built houses and laid an oil pipeline. and we have not yet agreed or signed anything. (chief of reindeer-herding farm, krasnoye settlement, 2012) unofficially, it is accepted that a permit will in any case be obtained. indeed, when studying the materials on nao, we found no single case where petroleum production had been blocked because of the absence of a permit issued by the indigenous nation. secondly, observation of a number of laws can be deceptive. that is, it is important to observe the external formalities of the law rather than its essence. for example, public hearings, which are necessary before the start of petroleum production, are often organized in such a way that practically none of the interested parties can take part in them. for example, the one representative of a local community on whose lands petroleum production will be carried out said: 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.2 it is enough to conduct hearings only in naryan-mar and that is all, and the law will have been observed. (local inhabitant, naryan-mar, 2012)2 it should be noted that the local stakeholders themselves also react passively to the opportunity to realize their rights by participating in the public discussion. thirdly, the participants do not consider the state law to be a unified, monolithic system. the various groups of participants are guided by different legislative documents determining, as far as they are concerned, their priority over other state laws. in other words, each group has its own hierarchy of rules and laws: some of which are primary for their own activity, while all others are considered to be secondary. such an understanding is in conflict with any positive approach to the law but better reflects the true nature of law enforcement in practice. for example, the underground resources law (199) and the requirements that it presents is the basic law regulating the activity of oil companies. other legislative documents, such as the laws on indigenous low-numbered peoples of the north, which are typical only for defined territories, seem to the oil companies to be less significant: we are governed by the underground resources law. it is the main law for us… we produce petroleum and pay taxes on it to the federal budget. that corresponds to the federal interest. other companies also come and confront the local people with this absurdity in respect of land plots… (manager of oil company, 2012) fourthly, in connection with frequent changes of power in the okrug, changes in regional laws, and the absence of clarity in the distribution of authority between various levels of power, local inhabitants do not consider the state legal system to be something reliable, especially when the matter concerns the regulation of relations in the territory of the okrug. one participant stated: when power changes, the laws change with it each time. there are no correct regional laws regulating local relations. (local inhabitant, nelmin-nos settlement, 2012) thus, although all the relations among participants exist formally in the system of russian state law, we are also confronted with a number of legal and quasi-legal regulations in practice. land disputes and their resolution strategies we do not arm-wrestle with the oilmen, we negotiate token prices. (representative of reindeer-herding co-operative, 2012) we fight against the oilmen. (representative of reindeer-herding farm, 2012) conflicts between reindeer herders and oilmen over rights affecting the use of land plots began to appear in the 1990s with the arrival of oil-producing companies in the okrug. the implementation of actual petroleum production resulted in the seizure of a part of the land traditionally used for reindeer herding. this, in turn, placed a restriction on the number of reindeer on the farms. in some cases because of the concomitant shortage of land, the local inhabitants were unable to increase the number of reindeer since part of the land had been handed over to the oilmen. in accordance with legislation, companies should pay compensation to reindeer herders for the lands seized from them. the amount of compensation became one of stumbling blocks in the negotiations. moreover, even if                                                                                                                 2 naryan-mar is a district center. 9 tulaeva: oil companies, reindeer-herding communities published by scholarship@western, 2014 the lands remained in the possession of the reindeer herders, oil pipelines were built across them, partitioning the lands and hindering reindeer herding. reindeer, unaccustomed to such constructions in the tundra, often refused to go further. the construction of convenient crossings for reindeer over the oil pipelines was another important point in the negotiations between the reindeer herders and oilmen. finally, one more cause of conflict was connected to the ecological consequences of the activities of the companies: oil spills, poor restoration of territories after oil production, and rubbish left behind on the tundra. initially, interaction with the oilmen was complicated. on the one hand, high expectations on the part of local communities with respect to the oilmen had a major influence. local populations tended to think that, since oil is one of the key resources for the country, the oil companies would have practically unlimited financial capacity. one of the discourses most commonly used in the okrug can be expressed in the short phrase “milking the oilmen.” according to a story told by an active participant on the side of the reindeer herders in the negotiations with the oil companies: the point is that when we worked with the geologists, they convinced us: "boys, where would we get money from? we can help you with helicopters, but we have no money. but when the oilmen come, they will help you, they have a lot of money." when the oilmen came, i said to them: "boys, that's it, it's time to pay up." well, they did not understand the situation, of course…. (reindeer herder, 2012) at the same time, the oil companies were also unprepared to interact with the communities of reindeer herders and to take into account their special rights to the land. the need to reconcile their activity not only with the state authorities but also with the indigenous people was considered an unjustifiable additional pressure, according to some accounts obtained from the managers of the oil companies. on the basis of the material collected, it is possible to pick out three possible models for land dispute resolution: (a) through official state channels, (b) through non-governmental mediators, and (c) by way of direct negotiations and agreements (i.e., without any intervention of a third party). the first model addresses the regulation of contradictions by the state authorities. according to russian legislation, land problems are to be solved by municipal authorities; however, when the oil companies first arrived in the okrug there was no regional administrative division and so the matter did not come within the constraints of the usual russian practice. this in turn resulted in confusion in the distribution of responsibility for land dispute resolution between the regional, area, and district levels of power. as a result, the oilmen and reindeer herders, without the intervention of state officials, directly resolved the conflicts. later, the polar district was established in the okrug and land disputes came under its jurisdiction. but by virtue of the tradition that had already existed for several years, the settlement of land questions between the oilmen and reindeer herders went on as usual without the intervention of the state authorities. according to one observer: unfortunately, at that moment in time, the state mildly expressed what it had not said directly: let them reach an understanding by themselves. and so it has continued up to the present moment. now the picture looks rather different, since the state is now trying to meddle in the situation. however, the reindeer herders and oilmen say that it is only between themselves. (representative of ngo, 2012) 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.2 the second model represents the resolution of disputes with the help of non-governmental experts. the association of the nenets people, or yasavei, was involved as a mediator in the cases under consideration. yasavei is the largest ngo in the okrug engaging in the rights of the indigenous peoples. all questions connected with economic, social, legal, and cultural aspects of the life of the nenets people fall within its scope. yasavei is the only ngo in the okrug with the right to take a legislative initiative. the vice president of yasavei, who is in charge of natural resources, is a member of the commission drawing up the decisions on the allocation of land plots to the oil companies. in other words, the representative of this organization takes part in the inspection of the land that has been proposed for allocation to the oilmen; subsequently, the commission also oversees the work of the oil companies in those territories. moreover, the commission has close connections with the authorities in the okrug, as some of its members work simultaneously for the okrug government. this creates some of the key factors affecting the situation, but it does not permit the resolution of all of the problems: if any questions arise, we can help them to meet and come to an agreement. we have no authority to establish rules, norms, algorithms, or mechanisms to resolve such problems. we have nothing like that. we can only construct an agreement. (representative of yasavei, 2012) in a number of cases, experts of yasavei were mediators between reindeer herders and companies when the matter concerned the allocation of land or the terms of its use by the oilmen (for example, the construction of crossings over oil pipeline for reindeer herders). however, most common is the third model. in most cases, the oilmen and reindeer herders resolve their questions by means of direct negotiations, without the aid of a third party. direct agreements on social and economic co-operation between oil companies and reindeer-herding farms have resulted in mutually beneficial solutions for problems, such as the reindeer herders giving their consent to the use of land by oil companies in exchange for which the oil companies would assign sums of money for the economic support of reindeer-herding farms. as a rule, interaction between the two sides is formed in the following way. each year the representatives of the apc write appeals in which they state their requirements for the current year. the companies do not, however, transfer money directly to apc, but pay for services rendered (for example, the construction of garages and houses, the rental of helicopters, the purchase of equipment, reindeer, inclusion in a tourist promotion, goods, etc.) the scenario above illustrates the usual model of interaction between oilmen and reindeer herders. there are various ways of reaching such agreements. the quotations set as the epigraph for this section of this article show two different strategies used by reindeer herders in negotiations. in most cases one can speak of the “strategy of peaceful coexistence,” when the reindeer herders agree to the conditions proposed by the oilmen; in other words, agree to accept the amount of compensation that is proposed by the company. the reindeer herders can try to negotiate an increase, but only by a negligible margin. at present, the “price list” agreed in the process of such informal negotiations already exists. according to one team leader: i want to tell you that our wish is their proposal. (team leader of reindeer-herding farm, 2012) the second strategy is based on the tendency of reindeer herders to advance their own requirements; however, the team leaders adopted an active position in only one the case included in 11 tulaeva: oil companies, reindeer-herding communities published by scholarship@western, 2014 the study under discussion. the state legislation (the land code and laws on the rights of indigenous low-numbered peoples) was the major tool with which the reindeer herders tried to defend their interests in their disputes with the oilmen. but in order to make the law work, it was necessary to "operationalize" it (i.e., to use the formalized methods of damage evaluation): they might have twisted arms in a barely legal way; we needed calculations to prove it. (representative of the reindeer-herding farm, 2012) the leader of the reindeer herders approached moscow experts who calculated the approximate amount that would compensate for the damage connected with the seizure of the land. the calculations were not, however, recorded in the case study. having an idea of the amount on which one could count in the disputes with the oilmen, the leader of the reindeer herders discussed the amount of possible compensation with the companies working in their territories. this particular reindeer-herding farm concluded the first formal agreement in 2001. at the same time, the leaders of the farm carried out a geo-botanical examination of the land with the financial support of the okrug administration in order to calculate the cost of the damage caused by petroleum production. at present, interaction between the farm and the oilmen continues with the aid of formalized methods of damage calculation and agreements concluded on the basis stated by a representative of the reindeer farm: today one cannot arm wrestle with the oilmen without any proper methods! we count on those methods; we have counted everything. but now i have those figures, i can substantiate all of them, and it is easier to me to speak to any president or director. (representative of reindeer-herding farm, 2012) at the same time, other nao reindeer-herding farms are unable to use the same kind of methods because they have not commissioned an expensive geo-botanical examination of their lands. consequently, in most cases in the territory, the amount of damages paid to reindeer herders by oil companies is determined arbitrarily during the course of negotiations. conclusions in the course of this investigation, we have analyzed the possibilities for resolving land disputes between oil companies and reindeer herders based on the peculiarities of the existing legal and quasilegal regulations. following the approach of legal anthropologists, we have analyzed the various normative and quasi-legal systems existing in the community, layer by layer. in this light, the legal system does not appear to be a unified, monolithic construction, but is more like an onion, made up of many layers. this is the main challenge for legal science to consider since as a rule only one of the existing layers of the legal system is taken into account. in spite of the fact that the general framework of interaction is constituted by the state legal system, there are other rules, norms, and standards, which overlap with and influence each other, that also act in the process. first of all, the discourse is influenced by a collision between the traditional ideas of reindeer herders with the corporate standards of economic efficiency. with respect to international documents protecting the rights of indigenous peoples, their influence is felt in some cases only through the corporate standards of social responsibility (csr) of international corporations working in russia. as a rule, this is expressed in the social programs of companies focused on indigenous peoples. none of our informants (business, ngos, authorities, communities) appealed to international law, either by discussing or disputing it. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.2 consequently, it is possible to delineate the following effects of the interactions of the various rules and norms. first, custom continues to play an important role in the life of reindeer-herding communities. it constitutes the rights of local communities to the lands in their possession, whereas the state laws are considered to be an instrument to impose pressure on the oil companies. custom also determines to some extent the peculiarities of an appeal to the state legal system. for example, the role of mistrust of external institutions is high in traditional communities such as those of the reindeer-herders. the communities are characterized by their tendency “to wash their dirty linen at home” (i.e., to solve their questions themselves without unnecessary fuss). it is noteworthy that the leader of the only reindeer-herding farm actively asserting its rights and appealing to degrees of jurisdiction is not an ethnic nenets. secondly, the role of state law in the resolution of conflicts is restricted because of confusion in the distribution of authority between the various levels of state power, the complexity of the operationalization of specific laws in practice, and the necessity to use special methods, as well as the excessive bureaucratization of the state legal machine. as we have seen, municipal authorities under whose supervision such questions are raised do not intervene in the process of their resolution. the participants themselves also do not consider the state law as an effective system of resolution of such conflicts; they say that it is more profitable for them to resolve their problems themselves. virtually none of the participants applied to a court for the resolution of a conflict. both companies and reindeer herders tend to avoid bureaucratic acrimony and thus reduce their expenses. the participants in conflicts nevertheless use the threat of legal recourse. thirdly, it must be emphasized that the model of land dispute resolution using direct negotiations between oilmen and reindeer herders took some time to establish before it became the common practice. the participants had to work specifically on the legitimation of their rights, even though they existed formally in state legislation. both parties used various mechanisms to this end: publications in the press, participation at round tables and conferences, interaction with representatives of regional authorities, and actual direct negotiations. fourthly, negotiations between oilmen and reindeer herders taken out of the context of the state bureaucratic machine are characterized by opaqueness and situatedness. they are regulated to a larger extent by informal norms and impressions of justice than by formal rules. in each individual case, the amount of assistance provided by companies to reindeer herders is determined individually in the course of negotiations and the process remains confidential. it is determined by the literacy of the administration of the reindeer-herding farms and by the stance adopted by the company administration. neither the representatives of the state authorities nor the experts from the ngos know the exact amount of assistance provided. moreover, as a rule, those agreements are short-term in character and their conditions are revised every year. in consequence, this brings into question the sustainability of this model of relations. it would be desirable to implement the following measures to resolve the existing problems: • involvement of groups of civil society in decision-making regarding the use of lands and natural resources (for example, recovery of public environmental examination); 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(1992). retrieved from www.consultant.ru     15 tulaeva: oil companies, reindeer-herding communities published by scholarship@western, 2014 the international indigenous policy journal october 2014 oil companies, reindeer-herding communities, and local authorities: rights to land from the perspective of various stakeholders svetlana tulaeva recommended citation oil companies, reindeer-herding communities, and local authorities: rights to land from the perspective of various stakeholders abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license oil companies, reindeer-herding communities, and local authorities: rights to land from the perspective of various stakeholders the international indigenous policy journal volume 3 | issue 4 article 5 october 2012 a critical appraisal of responses to māori offending juan marcellus tauri queensland university of technology, juan.tauri@qut.edu.au robert webb aut university of auckland, robert.webb@auckland.ac.nz recommended citation tauri, j. m. , webb, r. (2012). a critical appraisal of responses to māori offending. the international indigenous policy journal, 3(4) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.4.5 a critical appraisal of responses to māori offending abstract this article critically analyses the role that criminological theory and specific policy formulations of culture play in new zealand's state response to māori crime. we begin by charting policy responses to the "māori problem" during the 1980s to the 2000s, with a particular focus on policies and interventions based on theorising that māori offending is attributable to loss of cultural identity, through to the current preference for risk factor and criminogenic needs approaches. the second part of the article critiques strategies employed by administrative criminologists who, in partnership with the policy sector, attempt to elevate their own epistemological constructions of indigenous reality in the policy development process over that of indigenous knowledge and responses to social harm. keywords critique, interventions, māori, offending, policy, administrative criminology creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ a c r i t i c a l a p p r a i s a l o f r e s p o n s e s t o māo r i o f f e n d i n g this article critically analyses the role that criminological theory and specific policy formulations of culture play in the new zealand state’s response to the over-representation of māori in the criminal justice system. part one provides an overview of the changing criminological explanations of, and responses to, māori offending in new zealand from the 1980s onwards and how these understandings extended colonialist approaches to māori and crime into the neo-colonial context. in particular, we chart the shift in policy development from theorising māori offending as attributable to loss of cultural identity to a focus on socio-economic and institutional antecedents and, finally, through the risk factors, assessment, and criminogenic needs approaches that have gained prominence in the current policy context. in part two, the focus moves to the strategies employed by members of the academy to elevate their own epistemological constructions of māori social reality within the policy development process. in particular, the critique scrutinises recent attempts to portray indigenous responses to social harm as “unscientific” and, in part, responsible for the continuing over-representation of māori in new zealand’s criminal justice system. the purpose of this analysis is to focus the critical, criminological gaze firmly on the activities of policy makers and administrative criminologists1 in order to examine how their policies and approaches impact on māori as an indigenous people. r e s p o n d i n g t o māo r i o f f e n d i n g : a n o v e r v i e w by the early 1980s, the level of māori over-representation in the criminal justice system had reached a level that commentators equated to “considerable and ongoing over-representation” based upon population (mcintosh & radojkovic, 2012; quince, 2007). this “social fact” prompted a small number of dedicated, inter-agency policy projects2 and the implementation of so-called māorispecific interventions (see discussion below). despite all this policy attention, the level and nature of māori over-representation has remained high ever since. it is because māori over-representation became a recognisable statistical issue and received considerable attention from policy makers from the 1980s through to the 2000s that we have chosen this period as the focus of our analysis. it is, after all, the period in new zealand’s criminal justice history that concerted efforts by policy makers to solve the so-called “māori problem” were finally made (tauri, 2011a). e x p l a n a t i o n s a n d r e s p o n s e s t h r o u g h t h e 1 9 8 0 s generally, responses by policy-makers and academics to māori offending in the 1980s reflected the growing popularity of community-centred responses to offending in western jurisdictions grappling 1 the term administrative criminology is used to denote criminological research and theorising that is aimed at enhancing state knowledge of the social context (see galliher, 1999; hirschi, 1993). tauri (forthcoming) argues that administrative criminological musings on indigenous populations can be readily identified through key characteristics, including confining the focus of criminological inquiry to issues the state deems important, using state definitions of what constitutes crime, and demonstrating a preference for using methodologies that restrict contact with marginalised social groups. 2 since the mid-1990s, government agencies have initiated a number of inter-agency policy projects with the issue of māori over-representation as a key focus. these include the roffending by māori (robm) project (1996-1999), effective interventions (2006-2008), and, most recently, drivers of crime (2008-ongoing). 1 tauri and webb: a critical appraisal of responses published by scholarship@western, 2012 with rising levels of crime amongst “lower class”, new migrant, and first nation populations (tauri, 1996). a similar response was followed in the new zealand context, although policy makers quickly came under criticism for excluding māori values, practices, and philosophies (tikanga) during the development of ostensibly māori-focused interventions (see jackson, 1988). the 1980s saw māori increasingly campaign for significant control of crime control interventions targeted at māori offenders and victims. for example, the ministerial advisory committee’s (1986) review of the department of social welfare, puao-te-ata-tu, criticised the state’s delivery of programmes for māori as ineffective and culturally inappropriate. one supposed community-centred initiative was the departments of māori affairs, social welfare, and then justice led mātua whangai initiative, which promoted developing community-led responses to offenders based upon iwi (tribe), hapū (sub-tribe), and whānau (family) practices (department of justice, 1985). however, williams (2001) notes that mātua whangai underwent a number of changes after 1985 and, by the late 1990s, it had moved away from the original intent of developing māori-community centred approaches to a limited service provision model that implemented departmental aims with programme contractors. these types of community crime prevention programmes incorporate features of what might loosely be called māori responses to social harm, but the reality was the design and delivery of state-centred initiatives that “added” māori cultural elements to existing intervention logic (tauri, 1999; see discussion below). while traditional māori approaches to social harm were given some attention after the department of social welfare review, māori dissatisfaction with the state system failed to abate, as evidenced by the release of moana jackson’s report, māori and the criminal justice system: he whaipānga hou, in 1988. jackson’s (1988) report examined māori interaction with the new zealand criminal justice system through a three-year study involving interviews, focus groups, and hui (focus groups or community meetings) with a range of māori, including police, correctional officers, policy workers, inmates, community workers, and academics. in his analysis, jackson argued that māori justice practices had been marginalised through colonial practices that imposed british law. he observed that māori practices and philosophies were denigrated to the point where they no longer operated in many māori communities to a meaningful extent. jackson and his participants’ analyses of crime were directed toward a range of antecedents, including a detailed examination of the marginalisation of māori by government institutions, most notably from the social welfare and justice systems. māori who participated in jackson’s research argued that the criminal justice system reflects a pākehā (european) theoretical and practice bias, and that this bias was evident in research into māori criminal behaviour. it was suggested that policy makers and members of the academy did not consider māori experiences of colonisation to a degree necessary for informing the development of effective policy. policy makers were criticised for their tendency to assume that criminal behaviour by māori could be dealt with in the same way as offending by other population groups. furthermore, participants observed that māori offenders in the criminal justice system had experienced poor education, difficulties within their family during their upbringing, long periods of unemployment, and other factors that increased the likelihood of offending behaviour. however, unlike other groups of offenders, for māori, these issues were impacted by a history of marginalisation from new zealand society through the process of colonisation. participants argued that māori social deprivations were the result of state policies that had negatively impacted on māori social structures, through the active suppression of māori culture, and their economic and political autonomy (see walker, 1990). to understand māori offending, jackson (1988) argued that theoretical explanations and policy responses had to contextualise māori experiences in relation to a history of colonisation: 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 4 [2012], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.4.5 the monocultural basis of pākehā research into māori offending has prevented recognition of these socio-cultural dynamics and the appropriate mechanisms needed to understand them. this has resulted in a raft of “explanations” of māori crime which reflect considerable monocultural and theoretical bias, but little effective explanation. thus the māori offender has merely been defined as an urban misfit, a cultural maladept, an educational retard, or the victim of behavioural labelling, while the socio-cultural forces underlying such descriptions have been largely unrecognised. (p. 26) this emphasises the importance of understanding how colonisation shapes contemporary social relations and contexts, rather than limiting analyses to individual pathology decontextualised from the wider social relations in new zealand society. jackson (1988) believed māori philosophies were relevant to understanding offending, and he argued that tikanga māori would “… provide some insight into the complex questions of why some māori men become criminal offenders and how the criminal justice process responds to them. it approaches the topic from within a māori conceptual framework and seeks to explain māori perception of the causes and consequences of criminal offending” (p. 17). jackson hypothesised that a māori system, based upon māori values and authority to hear and respond, would be able to better address the māori offending problem. overall, government ministers and policy makers have largely ignored jackson and his research participants’ argument for increased māori jurisdictional autonomy. instead, the primary policy response largely revolved around the controlled integration of “acceptable” māori concepts and cultural practices into confined areas of the justice system (see tauri, 2011b). for example, in reviewing he whaipānga hou, the court consultative committee (1991) (comprised of the judiciary, lawyers, and community representatives) recommended to the then minister of justice that culturally appropriate responses to māori offending were achievable through existing state mechanisms. the committee expressly recommended against transferring criminal justice-centred processes into distinctly māori settings. the committee especially argued against marae (meeting houses) being used for court cases (thus ignoring evidence that historically māori utilised marae as a site for dealing with social harm) (see jackson, 1988). it was argued that court trials could not be easily transposed to the marae while ensuring the integrity of the state process remained “intact”. however, officials did express the view that marae could play a minor role in the formal justice system through the delivery of community diversion and rehabilitative programmes designed by the state for the benefit of māori offenders sometime in the future3. in contrast to the position taken by jackson and his research participants, state officials made it clear that the only acceptable response to māori concerns was for offending to be addressed through the purposeful incorporation of māori justice and cultural concepts into the justice system, rather than a separate justice system or any meaningful form of jurisdictional autonomy (tauri, 1999). for example, since the early 1990s government agencies within the justice sector have followed the firm policy of enhancing the responsiveness of state processes to māori. the responsiveness strategy was 3 the government’s perspective changed recently with the introduction of rangatahi (youth) courts in may 2008. the rangatahi court is, in essence, a youth court held on a marae with te reo (māori language) and māori protocols incorporated into the process. the purpose of the hearing is to monitor the young person's completion of his or her family group conference plan (ministry of justice, 2012). while the rangatahi court process signals a willingness on behalf of the new zealand state to involve marae in the formal process, the extent to which it results in meaningful jurisdictional autonomy for māori remains to be seen. 3 tauri and webb: a critical appraisal of responses published by scholarship@western, 2012 based around incorporating more māori values into the justice system. the stated aims of the responsiveness strategy were to: • identify how to reduce māori offending and victimisation; • focus on ways to be more effective in service delivery to māori, and to actively encourage positive participation by māori in such delivery; • explore the scope for greater diversity in dealing with māori offenders (justice sector policy group, 1998. in order to achieve the goals of the strategy, various māori programme and provider developments were funded, and controlled, by policy makers. these initiatives were considered essential to enhancing relationships between the policy sector and māori providers and communities. by the late 1990s, programmes with a specific māori focus that were being supported or considered by the ministry of justice and department of corrections (via the justice sector policy group, 1998) as part of the responsiveness framework included: • iwi-based safer community councils; • community panel pilot diversion projects, such as te whānau āwhina, that focused on offending by urban māori; • māori focus units in prisons; • habilitation centres specifically focusing on māori4; • a cultural perspectives unit within the department focused on developing māori policy; and • a bicultural therapy programme. through the responsiveness strategy developed during the 1990s, government officials drew a clear distinction between the māori justice system advocated by jackson and his participants and the preferred strategy of integrating “acceptable” elements of māori culture into the state-dominated system. the strategy further sought to enhance the goals and status of the formal system through recruitment of more māori into the justice sector. officials also strove to achieve the goals of the strategy through enhancing officials’ awareness of māori culture, while purposefully avoiding significant alterations in either the structure or power dynamics of the formal system (tauri, 1999). the new zealand police, for example, actively recruited more māori officers and developed cultural awareness programmes as part of its responsiveness policy (te puni kōkiri, 2002a). the department of corrections responsiveness policy was dominated throughout the 1990s (and early 2000s) by the introduction of supposed māori therapeutic programmes, the development of a treaty of waitangi strategy, and the signing of a small number of memorandum of understandings (mou’s) with specific iwi, which were designed to enhance relationships with māori communities (see department of corrections, 2001a, 2002; lomax, 1994). t h e 1 9 9 0 s a n d o n w a r d s the 1990s onwards witnessed the development of more sophisticated, supposedly scientific approaches to the māori problem, at least from a eurocentric theoretical and practice-based position. for example, in 1998 the department of corrections psychological services introduced a rehabilitation initiative for māori called the bi-cultural therapy model. this model aimed to deliver 4 the term habilitation centre referred to in-community therapeutic centres that would specialise in delivering “culturally appropriate” drug, alcohol, and violence-related treatment to maori offenders. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 4 [2012], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.4.5 psychological treatments to māori offenders through incorporating elements of tikanga into (or more accurately onto) therapeutic interventions. in describing the initiative, the department of corrections (2001b, p. 10) noted that: māori therapeutic programmes have been developed as “blended” programmes that incorporate tikanga māori concepts alongside western psychological concepts. these programmes provide a more focused analysis of how māori tikanga and concepts relate to specific offending behaviour. (p. 10) this development, however, does not alter the basic premise of attributing offending to individualistic pathologies. in reality, the treatment response has been adapted through the utilisation of māori culture and tikanga within the rehabilitation process (mcfarlane-nathan, 1994, 1999; nathan, wilson & hillman, 2003). the development of māori focus units can be attributed to this blended approach, with the first being in place by 1997 (department of corrections, 2001a). these units offer māori inmates cultural instruction and te reo (māori language) courses. the rationale from the department of corrections (2002) for developing these units was described as “…us[ing] māori language and culture to create a change in the understanding, attitude and behaviour of māori offenders” with a related “... commitment from participants to address the discrepancies between māori tikanga and their current offending and lifestyle” (p. 21). within māori focus units, māori therapeutic programmes have also developed into a cognitive group therapy intervention with added on māori cultural components (webb, 2012). in evaluating the programmes, the department of corrections (2009a) states that: the māori therapeutic programme (mtp) is a group-based offender rehabilitation programme. the main purpose is to both encourage and enable the avoidance of new offending amongst participants. currently, mtps are delivered only within the mfus. led by experienced group facilitators, the mtp group meets several times each week over ten weeks to work through prescribed programme content. this content is similar to that used in existing mainstream rehabilitative programmes, centering on understanding the patterns of behaviour, emotion and interaction that lead up to “relapse” into new offending. participants are taught social, cognitive and practical skills necessary to avoid such relapses. in exploring such issues, the mtp uses māori cultural language, values and narratives to assist participants’ learning and change.5(pp. 6-7) it is observable that, throughout the 1990s, psychological-based therapeutic treatments became ever more entrenched in new zealand’s policy response. the apex of this policy approach came with the development of the integrated offender management (iom) framework by the department of corrections in the second half of the 1990s (newbold, 2007). based on correctional policies imported from canada, the iom process, implemented in the early 2000s, sought to identify the 5 there are new developments for māori offenders in prison; whare oranga ake units or kaupapa māori rehabilitation units are being opened in 2011 and piloted on a limited basis. designed as targeted pre-release rehabilitation initiatives for inmates in the final stages of sentences, it will be interesting in the future to consider the effectiveness of these initiatives for māori inmates. 5 tauri and webb: a critical appraisal of responses published by scholarship@western, 2012 particular criminogenic needs of all offenders, including māori, through applying diagnostic tools like the criminogenic needs index (cni). the importance of the risk and criminogenic needs paradigm to understanding and framing responses to individuals’ offending behaviour is demonstrated in the department’s (2001a) report, about time turning people away from a life of crime and reducing reoffending, where it is argued that māori offenders are more likely to be atrisk of offending from criminogenic needs. despite the fact that corrections’ documentation made it clear that criminogenic needs are observable in a range of offenders regardless of ethnicity (and regardless of social, familial or historical context), officials went about designing features to enhance service delivery specific to māori. the most notable examples forged under iom were the framework for reducing māori offending (fremo) and māori culture related needs (macrns) (mcfarlane-nathan, 1999). in maynard, coebergh, anstiss, bakker, & huriwai’s (1999) discussion of the macrns assessment tool for māori offenders, several cultural-related needs are identified, including cultural tension, whānau, and whakawhānaunga (kinship relations). maynard et al. (1999) suggest that: contemporary new zealand society has developed primarily from western/european based norms, despite the fact that māori are recognised as the tangata whenua [first peoples] of this country. māori culture has been generally compromised and discouraged in the process of colonisation and it is likely that a number of stressors and/or tensions have developed in connection with differences in cultural values and beliefs both between māori and non-māori, and amongst māori. further, the lack of positive coping skills for dealing with such tension is likely to promote maladaptive responses which could include cognitions and behavioural patterns that increase the individual's risk of re-offending. (p. 50) although these officials argue that specific māori needs exist, māori offending is framed within a theoretical focus on individual thinking as explanatory of maladaptive behaviour. thus, in the iom policy context, we see components of māori cultural practice grafted to a process based on individualistic theories of human behaviour, which has already explained offending as generated in negative emotions and anti-social thoughts (webb, 2003). it is clear from the description of the macrns that they were developed primarily to increase māori responsiveness to psychological treatment interventions. this is evident when maynard et al. (1999) wrote that “[t]he responsivity principle states that offenders will be most affected by interventions that are matched to their particular learning style…” (p. 44). a 2005 waitangi tribunal6 report into māori cultural assessments provides insight into the development and limitations of the macrns model. the tribunal report identified that only a limited pilot study occurred prior to macrns assessment being implemented nationally. the assessment tool for māori “needs” was developed from a small sample before implementation, which illustrates the limitations inherent in the policy sector’s strategy of integrating māori knowledge frameworks in an ostensibly individualistic approach like the cni. in this instance, the lack of wider 6 the waitangi tribunal was established by the third labour government (1972 1975) with the passing of the treaty of waitangi act in 1975. the initial purpose of the tribunal was to inquire into and make recommendations to the crown, represented by the government of the day, relating to māori claims against government actions that they believed contravened their rights under the treaty of waitangi from the date of the forum’s inception (catalinac, 2004; gibbs, 2006). later, in the mid-1980s, the tribunal’s jurisdiction was extended to receiving māori claims going back to the signing of the treaty of waitangi in 1840. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 4 [2012], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.4.5 engagement with māori, as stipulated in the treaty contract, and a breach of the “rules” of positivistic social science related to the establishment of validity and reporting of findings are evident. three years after implementation, the department of corrections could “neither verify their soundness nor point to any quantifiable benefits that flow to māori offenders who are assessed with macrns” (waitangi tribunal, 2005, p. 151). morrison (2009) noted that following the release of the tribunal report, the department of corrections carried out an evaluation of the macrns. the evaluation found that corrections staff underused the macrns assessment tool. furthermore, even when used, less than 20% of offenders assessed with macrns then took up a culture-related activity as part of their offender management plan. morrison (2009) observes that soon after this evaluation, the macrns assessment process was discontinued. similarly, in a review of the criminal justice sector’s responsiveness to māori, te puni kōkiri (2002b) officials identified that the much publicised fremo process was rarely used by policy workers in the department of corrections as designed. more often than not, fremo was utilised after policy and interventions had been designed by policy workers. taking both case studies into consideration, it is difficult to comprehend how some commentators have recently argued that these little used risk and needs assessment processes and māori or indigenous theories of, and responses to, criminality have come to dominate criminal justice policy making in the new zealand context. it is to particular this issue that we now turn. c r i t i q u i n g r e s p o n s e s t o t h e ‘ māo r i p r o b l e m ’ so far, this paper has charted the explanations of, and responses to, māori offending from two related phases in the development of crime control policy in new zealand. the distinctly māori perspectives from the 1980s, culminating in the production of jackson’s (1988) report, identified a framework for addressing māori offending through māori centred and controlled responses. the idea of rebuilding and instituting māori social control over offenders goes far beyond the implementation of rehabilitation programmes for māori within the system. the period covered by the 1990s to 2000s, however, demonstrates that the state was much more comfortable with the strategy of incorporating elements of māori cultural belief and practice into the existing system; a process that tauri (1999) describes as the symbolic and physical indigenisation of new zealand’s criminal justice system. the responsiveness policy saw the recruitment of more māori into the criminal justice system and the development of blended (psychology-based) interventions. this response clearly represented a rejection of jackson’s (1988) notion of a parallel māori criminal justice system and the furtherance of the co-ordinated strategy of indigenisation through increasing the integration of māori concepts into existing state processes. despite clear evidence to the contrary, some contemporary authors from the administrative criminological perspective argue that the period from the 1980s to the 2000s marked the transition in the department of corrections, and other crime control agencies, to adopting jackson’s ideas and those of other māori practitioners and academics (for example see marie, 2010 in new zealand; and for similar arguments in australia, weatherburn, 2010; weatherburn & fitzgerald, 2006). given the available literature, these commentators make the surprising assertion that the rehabilitation programmes received by māori offenders are predominantly informed by this supposed new orthodoxy and focus mainly upon the concept of cultural identity deficit. furthermore, it is argued that the dominance of so-called “māori theory and interventions” presents a forceful explanation for the new zealand states’ failure to arrest māori over-representation in the criminal justice system. in this last section, we wish to refute these claims and focus the critical gaze firmly on the dominance of western theories and interventions in state responses to māori over-representation. 7 tauri and webb: a critical appraisal of responses published by scholarship@western, 2012 d o e s t i k a n g a māo r i d o m i n a t e t h e d e v e l o p m e n t o f c r i m e c o n t r o l p o l i c y i n n e w z e a l a n d ? the argument that tikanga dominates the development of crime control policy greatly exaggerates the authority given to māori approaches to offending within the system, whether measured by legislative empowerment or the amount of resource targeted to so-called māori initiatives. the purpose of this mythical construct appears to be to convince us that the development of effective solutions to the indigenous problem has been hampered in neo-colonial jurisdictions by: (a) the rise of indigenous cultural theory, (b) the biculturalisation of state policy, which led to (c) the policy sector in new zealand “turning away from science” and embracing cultural perspectives to develop crime control policies for first nations (see marie, 2010; and also weatherburn, 2010 in relation to the australian context). for some practitioners of administrative criminology, this explains the predominance of policies and interventions geared to conferencing processes, circle sentencing, enhancing the cultural awareness of agents and agencies, and a focus on bias and institutional practice. amongst these, marie (2010) makes the specious claim that māori theory dominates correctional policy development in the new zealand context. to bolster this position, administrative criminologists offer misleading summations of māori theories of social harm by arguing that cultural loss is presented in such theoretical frameworks as the key determinant of māori overrepresentation in the justice system: a major assumption of this theory is that the contemporary overrepresentation of māori in offending, incarceration, and recidivism rates is best understood as the outcome of māori experiencing impairments to cultural identity resulting from colonisation. central to this theory, therefore, is also the assumption that ethnicity is a reliable construct by which distinctions can be made between offenders regarding what factors precipitated their offending, as well as best practices for their rehabilitation. considering a thwarted cultural identity is seen to have given rise to a higher proportion of offenders who are māori, rehabilitation efforts largely pivot on the idea that restoring cultural identity will lead to a subsequent reduction of the number of māori in prison. (marie, 2010, p. 283) to support the argument, newbold’s (2007) summary of the types of programmes currently in vogue in corrections is cited. yet, inexplicably overlooked are the preceding chapters of newbold’s book, which reveal that within the department’s theoretical paradigm, culture, and cultural identity are not given causal power; in other words, culture neither causes crime nor factors significantly in its reduction. in fact, culture (specifically māori culture) is confined to the responsivity tranche of the department’s theoretical and intervention framework. in this tranche, “restoring cultural awareness” is considered helpful for preparing individual māori offenders to receive therapeutic treatment (see coebergh, bakker, anstiss, maynard, & percy, 2001, especially pp. 15-16; webb, 2012). administrative criminological practitioners who take this view appear be to unaware that the socalled māori or indigenous theory they are critiquing is in fact an invention of government officials and contractors (tauri, forthcoming). in other words, the “indigenous theory” that informs policy making is best described as a governmental interpretation of indigenous knowledge and cultural practice employed by institutions to enhance the indigenisation of their strategies and interventions (see tauri, 2011a; webb, 2003, 2012). it is difficult to comprehend how commentators could depict the current policy situation in new zealand this way, given that the available documentation is almost entirely constructed by crime control agencies, including external “experts” who have been contracted to deliver a proscribed 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 4 [2012], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.4.5 project on behalf of government officials. the majority of sources utilised by crime control policy makers are not generated by external, independent māori (or critical, non-māori) commentators (tauri, 2009). we are not, as administrative criminological practitioners argue in relation to the australasian context, experiencing the dominance of indigenous theory in the design of policy and interventions. what are presented as culturally derived items are more accurately described as neocolonial artefacts developed by policy makers and members of the academy “jobbing” on behalf of the state, which are then utilised primarily to satisfy the policy requirements of ministers and their agencies (see tauri, 2011a regarding government institutions purposeful use of māori symbols and tikanga to indigenise policies and interventions). the dominance of positivistic theory in department of corrections policy programme and the subjugation of indigenous perspectives are evident in all relevant departmental documents, as demonstrated in the following text from a department of corrections (2009b) review of the effectiveness of rehabilitation programmes: it is now generally accepted that treatment programmes should be adapted to cater for the cultural needs of offenders who participate. as such, culture represents an important responsivity issue within offender rehabilitation. incorporating culturally-based concepts, imagery and activities into programme content is regarded as a way of both attracting minority-group participants into programmes, and ensuring that the programme engages and retains them [emphasis added]. (p. 42) this imagery is ignored in administrative accounts that accentuate the myth of the dominance of indigenous perspectives and a focus on structure (i.e., bias in policing or the courts) in policy responses. for example, one account from that perspective argues that: ... debate about how to respond to indigenous violence have focussed less on the question of how to reduce it than how to reduce the effect of indigenous violence on indigenous contact with the criminal justice system. the general consensus on this issue seems to be that the best way to reduce indigenous contact with the criminal justice system is to create some tribunal or process that gives indigenous community members a voice in how to respond to crime by indigenous defendants. (weatherburn, 2010, p. 198) in promoting the view that indigenous theories dominate the development of crime control policy, administrative criminological exponents appear to resist engaging with the extensive material indigenous and non-indigenous scholars have produced in examining indigenous peoples and their over-representation in new zealand and other settler societies. if they did, they would find that indigenous and critical scholars in new zealand (jackson, 1988; tauri, 2009; webb, 2003), australia (blagg, 2000; cunneen, 2009; dodson, 1994), and canada (gosse, henderson, & carter, 1994; monture, 1999; turpel, 1994; victor, 2007) provide sophisticated explanations of the causes of indigenous social harm and victimisation. this material also reveals the wide range of interventions, such as habilitation centres, and culturally and socially specific therapeutic approaches to a wide range of risk factors that, to use the preferred terminology of administrative criminology, indigenous scholars and practitioners have designed (see tauri, forthcoming). undoubtedly, issues like colonialism, institutional bias, and militaristic policing strategies are all key foci of indigenous criminological analysis. however, it is duplicitous to argue that they are the only or the most predominant factors that indigenous (and critical, non-indigenous) scholars utilise to theorise the over-representation issue. the key issue that administrative criminology in new 9 tauri and webb: a critical appraisal of responses published by scholarship@western, 2012 zealand and other neo-colonial societies neglect is that the settler state has demonstrated a preference for culturally sensitive processing of indigenous offenders, exemplified by agency designed and controlled programmes such as group conferences, sentencing circles, indigenous sentencing courts, indigenous liaison officers, aboriginal justice strategies and such like (tauri, 2011a). these types of state-centred responses invariably lack jurisdictional autonomy, legislative weight, and receive significantly less funding compared to mainstream policies and interventions. a considerable proportion of settler state responses to the indigenous problem can be described as orientalised artefacts that enable the state to be seen to do something, while attempting to silence independent (indigenous) commentary on the failure of its crime control processes to provide meaningful justice outcomes for indigenes (see palys & victor, 2005; tauri, 2011b). policies to increase māori participation within corrections through communications, community relations, employment, service delivery, and community partnerships should not be confused with control over correctional philosophy and policy development. indeed, there have only been recent developments, in 2011, of two standalone pre-release units for māori prisoners, the whare oranga ake units. with thousands of māori incarcerated on a yearly basis, the size of these 16 beds units confirm that māori-informed correctional programmes are limited within the current system. the dominant orthodoxies that inform penal practice and wider criminal justice processes are ignored by administrative criminologists, who instead present the erroneous assumption that rehabilitation programmes for māori are based solely upon cultural identity deficits and dominate programme delivery to this group7. critical scrutiny of processes should involve an objective and systematic evaluation of the broader iom and the criminogenic suite of programmes, as well as the failure of these to achieve stated aims, namely the significant reduction of recidivism amongst the prison population. this has been thoroughly documented by greg newbold (2009) in his article, another one bites the dust: recent initiatives in correctional reform in new zealand. in summary, contrary to the mythic claims of some administrative criminology accounts in the australasian context, a thorough review of available research and government texts demonstrates that: (a) māori theory does not dominate policy making in any of new zealand’s crime control agencies; (b) the vast majority of policy, legislation, intervention design, and funding decisions are informed by imported “theories” and interventions (for example, see the ministry of justice, 2009a, 2009b material on the recent drivers of crime project in new zealand); and 7 see for example, marie’s (2010) assertion that the greater majority of māori offenders receive tikanga-based treatment, while the extant literature clearly shows this not to be the case. unfortunately, marie presents the macrns process as having a meaningful impact on policy design and the delivery of correctional interventions to māori offenders when, in fact, it was only ever intended to supplement the much broader, psychology-dominated iom approach (webb, 2012). morrison (2009), from the ministry of justice, reviewed the operation of macrns and observed it was under-utilised by staff, and that the depatment of correction’s initiated an evaluation that found less than 20% of offenders who were assessed with macrns then went on to a culture-related activity. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 4 [2012], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.4.5 (c) the vast majority of government spending in new zealand’s criminal justice system goes to fund the orthodox “western” derived crime control programmes8. c o n c l u s i o n s we wish to conclude our critique of the mythological constructs of administrative criminology by acknowledging the lack of evidence for the efficacy of indigenous theories and interventions. however, while making these claims, commentators appear unaware of the politics of māori crime control policy in the new zealand context. it our contention that ignorance of the politics surrounding māori policy construction leads to exaggerated claims regarding the amount of influence māori theory and practices actually have on the development of crime control policy. even a rudimentary awareness of the politics involved, as evidenced by a vast array of policy documents, would undoubtedly curb exaggerated claims about the supposed failure of māori theory and programmes. this is because such knowledge would invariably lead commentators to acknowledge a fundamental truth about the criminal justice sector in new zealand, namely that it has a poor history of undertaking scientific, outcome-focused research and evaluation on its policies and interventions (tauri, 2011a). the lack of empirical analysis of the crime control in new zealand pertains to the entire suite of policies and interventions, whether they are informed by tikanga or crime prevention through environmental design (cpted) or some other theory (see tauri, forthcoming; te puni kōkiri, 2002b). the mythological construction of māori approaches offered by administrative criminologists is further weakened by a sustained, critical analysis of the efficacy of their preferred scientificallyderived interventions. in particular, commentators fail to provide significant evidence that the preferred programmes of the state and administrative criminologists are reducing māori rates of offending and reoffending in any empirically verifiably way. further to this is the fact that offenders are much more likely to experience the individual-focused therapeutic programmes that many administrative criminologists prefer than tikanga-inspired interventions, which are supposedly having such a negative effect on indigenous recidivism rates (see offenders’ comments in department of corrections 2009b; te puni kōkiri, 2007). on this basis, any claim that māori theory and/or culture dominates crime control policy construction in new zealand, or that we are to blame for the contemporary failure of the overall crime control policy response to the māori problem, should be considered little more than a mythological artefact that lacks empirical validity. over the past thirty years, indigenous commentators have produced a significant amount of critical material on the response of crime control agents to the “indigenous problem”. less prominent has been critical analysis of the role played by the academy in supporting the state’s historical and contemporary marginalisation of first nations through crime control policy. evidence for the need for indigenous scholars to turn our critical gaze to the symbiotic relationship between the discipline of criminology and policy-makers is indisputable. as biko agozino (2003) has demonstrated, the social sciences (in particular criminology) born in the 19th century played a significant role in the colonial project, with the first nations of africa and north american serving as guinea pig populations for the development and refinement of western crime-control strategies. in more recent 8 during the now defunct effective interventions initiative (2006-2007), te puni kōkiri officials were informed by crime control agencies that māori initiatives (which are likely to include programmes such as counselling derived from non-māori theoretical sources) received less than 10% of the sector’s spending on therapy and other forms of intervention (tauri, 2011b). 11 tauri and webb: a critical appraisal of responses published by scholarship@western, 2012 times, we have observed the resurrection and re-empowerment of administrative forms of criminology in the policy making process, and with it a governmental preference for individualised, therapeutic interventions and policy development strategies largely devoid of direct engagement with first nation peoples. on these issues alone, the need for a sustained critique is justified. but this critique must serve a greater purpose, namely the empowerment of first nations in the realm of justice, resulting in meaningful reductions in contacts with “the system”. in the area of crime control, this necessitates a multi-dimensional, strategic approach involving (amongst other things) a critical focus on the policy and legislation-making functions of the state, the continued resurrection of first nation responses to social harm as alternatives to the formal system, and the development of an indigenous, counter-colonial criminology dedicated to contesting the hegemony of administrative criminological approaches in the development of crime control policy. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 4 [2012], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.4.5 r e f e r e n c e s agozino, b. 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(2009). the māori social science academy and evidence-based policy. mai review, 1(article 2). retrieved from http://www.review.mai.ac.nz/ tauri, j. (2011a, march). crime control policy and first nations – a critical commentary on current trends and issues in settler societies. keynote paper presented at the aboriginal justice conference, penticton, british columbia. 15 tauri and webb: a critical appraisal of responses published by scholarship@western, 2012 tauri, j. (2011b). indigenous perspectives. in r. walters & t. bradley (eds.), introduction to criminological thought (2nd ed) (pp. 187-210). auckland: pearson longman. tauri, j. (forthcoming). indigenous critique of authoritarian criminology. in k. carrington, m. ball, e. o’brien, & j. tauri (eds.), crime, justice & social democracy: international perspectives. london: palgrave macmillan. te puni kōkiri. (2002a). review of new zealand police service delivery to māori. wellington: te puni kōkiri. te puni kōkiri. (2002b). update briefing on the criminal justice system. wellington: te puni kōkiri. te puni kōkiri. (2007). report on engagement with māori providers, practitioners and offenders (draft). wellington: te puni kōkiri. turpel, m. (1994). reflections on thinking concretely about criminal justice reform. in r. gosse, j.y henderson, & r. carter (eds.), continuing poundmaker and riel’s quest: presentations made at a conference on aboriginal peoples and justice (pp. 206-221). saskatoon: purich publishing. victor, w. (2007). alternative dispute resolution (adr) in aboriginal contexts: a critical review. retrieved from http://www.chrcccdp.ca/research_program_recherche/adr_red/toc_tdm-eng.aspx. waitangi tribunal. (2005). the offender assessment policies report (wai 1024). wellington: legislation direct. walker, r. (1990). struggle without end. auckland: penguin books. weatherburn, d. (2010). guest editorial: indigenous violence. australian and new zealand journal of criminology, 43(2), 197-198. weatherburn, d., & fitzgerald, j. (2006). reducing aboriginal over-representation in prison: a rejoinder to chris cunneen. current issues in criminal justice, 18(2), 366-369. webb, r. (2003, december). risk factors, criminogenic needs and māori. in conference proceedings of the sociological association of new zealand, knowledge, capitalism, critique, auckland. webb, r. (2012). culture and crime control in new zealand. in crime, justice and social democracy conference proceedings (2nd ed) (pp. 73-87). brisbane: school of justice, queensland university of technology. williams, c. (2001). the too-hard basket: māori and criminal justice since 1980. wellington: institute of policy studies victoria university of wellington. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 4 [2012], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.4.5 the international indigenous policy journal october 2012 a critical appraisal of responses to māori offending juan marcellus tauri robert webb recommended citation a critical appraisal of responses to māori offending abstract keywords creative commons license a critical appraisal of responses to mä†ori offending “and then i got pregnant”: early childbearing and the first nations life course the international indigenous policy journal volume 4 issue 1 indigenous early parenthood article 6 march 2013 “and then i got pregnant”: early childbearing and the first nations life course martin cooke university of waterloo, cooke@uwaterloo.ca recommended citation cooke, m. (2013). “and thhen i got pregnant”: early childbearing and the first nations life course. the international indigenous policy journal, 4(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.6 “and then i got pregnant”: early childbearing and the first nations life course abstract one of the characteristics of the life courses of aboriginal youth is a greater likelihood of becoming a parent at young ages, at least relative to other youth. young parenthood is often portrayed negatively, in terms of the implications for later education and employment. however, these effects depend greatly on the context of childbearing, including the sources of available support. in this paper we make use of exploratory qualitative life course interview data with a sample of first nations living in canadian cities to investigate the circumstances around early childbearing, including sources of support and strategies for managing this transition, its meaning from the perspective of parents themselves, and the potential implications for their later lives. french abstract "et puis je suis tombée enceinte " : maternité précoce et parcours de vie des premières nations martin cooke université de waterloo résumé l’une des caractéristiques du parcours de vie des jeunes autochtones est la probabilité élevée de devenir parent à un jeune âge, du moins en comparaison des autres jeunes. la parentalité précoce est souvent présentée de façon négative, notamment en raison des répercussions futures sur l’emploi et les études. cependant, ces répercussions dépendent beaucoup du contexte de la maternité, y compris des sources d’aide offertes. cette étude utilise les données qualitatives d’entretiens exploratoires sur le parcours de vie recueillies auprès d’un échantillon d’individus des premières nations vivant dans des villes canadiennes pour déterminer les circonstances de la maternité précoce ainsi que les sources d’aide et les stratégies permettant de gérer cette transition, le sens de cette transition du point de vue des parents et les répercussions possibles sur leur avenir. motsclés : premières nations, parentalité précoce, parcours de vie spanish abstract “y entonces me quedé embarazada”: embarazo precoz y ciclo de la vida en las primeras naciones martin cooke universidad de waterloo resumen una de las características de las vidas de los jóvenes indígenas es la mayor probabilidad de ser padres a edades jóvenes, al menos con respecto a otros jóvenes. ser padres cuando se es joven suele describirse como algo negativo por las consecuencias para la educación y el empleo. sin embargo, estos efectos dependen en gran medida del contexto en el que se procree, incluyendo en él los apoyos disponibles. en este artículo se emplean datos de entrevistas exploratorias y de carácter cualitativo sobre ciclos de vida entre una muestra de individuos de las primeras naciones que viven en ciudades canadienses, para investigar las circunstancias que rodean la procreación precoz, incluyendo en ello las fuentes de apoyo y las estrategias para gestionar esta transición, el significado de esta transición desde la perspectiva de los propios padres y las repercusiones potenciales para sus vidas posteriores. palabras clave: primeras naciones, padres jóvenes, ciclo de la vida keywords first nations, early parenting, life course, teenage pregnancy acknowledgments this research was funded by the social sciences and humanities council of canada (sshrc) and aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc). an earlier version was presented at the congress of the social sciences and humanities workshop, "on being and becoming: aboriginal youth in the city ", june 2011. sincere thanks are due to marc fonda and the anonymous reviewers for comments on earlier versions. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ “ a n d t h e n i g o t p r e g n a n t ” : e a r l y c h i l d b e a r i n g a n d t h e f i r s t n a t i o n s l i f e c o u r s e the perception of teen childbearing as a social problem has persisted, despite little evidence that it is a widespread or increasing phenomenon (duncan, 2007). in canada, rates of teenage pregnancy are low relative to other countries and have been stable since the mid-1970s (dryburgh, 2002). however, teenaged fertility is high among canadian aboriginal populations, particularly first nations, despite falling overall fertility. between 1996 and 2004, there were about 100 births per 1,000 first nations women under 20 years old, compared to about 14 per 1,000 among all canadian women under 20 (guimond & robitaille, 2008). moreover, the young age structure of the first nations population means that even a lower rate of teen parenting would result in relatively large numbers of young parents. early childbearing has been identified as having negative consequences for young parents, families, and first nations communities (big eagle & guimond, 2009; guimond & robitaille, 2008), and as possibly contributing to the overall disparities between aboriginal and non-aboriginal populations (guimond & cooke, 2008). this is consistent with research from other contexts that finds that early parenting has negative educational and economic consequences for mothers, as well as for their children (see for example furstenberg, 2005). however, understanding early childbearing is complex and some have argued that early parenting is more the result of social disadvantage than the cause. young men and women from low-income families or communities are especially at high risk of becoming parents, and it can be difficult to separate this selection from the effects of early parenthood (furstenberg, 2005). understanding young parenthood and its potential implications requires attention to the context in which childbearing decisions are made and to the resources that are available to support parenting. this is perhaps even more the case for first nations childbearing because there is a danger that the fertility decisions of young first nations adults are judged from the perspective of non-aboriginal norms regarding the timing and order of major family events. different systems of family and social support, expectations regarding family, education and work trajectories, and other cultural differences may lead to different fertility decisions, and to different outcomes of early parenting. despite the large amount of research on young childbearing in other contexts, there has been little focussing on understanding early childbearing among first nations. in this paper, we explore teenaged childbearing among urban first nations parents using qualitative life history interviews from a sample of adults who had their first child before the age of 20. we used a “life course” approach to understanding how these parents talk about their own parenting experiences in the context of previous events and subsequent trajectories. these data also permitted us to explore the factors that preceded first births, the sources of support for early childbearing, and the potential life-long consequences of early childbearing. these exploratory data are used to draw conclusions regarding how research done in other contexts may relate to young first nations childbearing, and to suggest avenues for future research. t h e c o n s e q u e n c e s a n d c a u s e s o f e a r l y c h i l d b e a r i n g there is a clear pattern of earlier and higher fertility among aboriginal families as compared to nonaboriginal canadians, and part of this pattern includes an increased risk of teenaged parenthood (guimond & robitaille, 2008). although there is little direct evidence regarding the consequences of 1 cooke: early childbearing and the first nations life course published by scholarship@western, 2013 early parenthood among first nations or other aboriginal peoples, there has been a considerable amount of research into the well-being implications of early births in other contexts, most notably the u.s. much of this evidence has focussed on the potential consequences for the well-being of young mothers. young women who had births in their teens, in a number of different contexts, have been found to be less likely to complete secondary and post-secondary education, or more likely to complete education later, compared with those who had delayed their first births (mott & marsiglio, 1985; waite & moore, 1978). these delays or disruptions of education trajectories earlier in life have potential knock-on effects for later education, employment, and for lifetime income (kiernan, 2001). these effects of early childbearing have also been found to partially explain racial differences in income in the u.s., particularly between african-american and white women (elman & o'rand, 2004; willson, 2003). early childbearing also has potential consequences for mothers’ health. an australian twin study found that teenaged mothers were more likely to smoke during their lives and be overweight than those who had later births (webbink, martin, & visscher, 2008). women who have early first births may also be at greater risk of stress and depression, especially in the context of lone motherhood (breheny & stephens, 2007; umberson, pudrovska, & reczek, 2010). they may also may be at further risk of higher levels and prolonged periods of substance abuse (de genna, cornelius, & donovan, 2009). young fathers also might be at risk to delinquency and substance abuse (sigle-rushton, 2005; stouthamer-loeber & wei, 1998). despite the evidence that young parents tend to be disadvantaged relative to other parents, there has been a lively and prolonged academic debate about whether this disadvantage is the consequence of young childbearing itself, or a result of the factors that put young people at risk of early parenthood in the first place (breheny & stephens, 2007; furstenberg, 1991). research examining the risks of early parenting has identified a number of family, neighbourhood, school, and behavioural characteristics associated with a higher likelihood of pregnancy and parenthood. this has included low family and neighbourhood incomes (dehlendorf, marchi, vittinghoff, & braveman, 2010; fletcher, harden, brunton, oakley, & bonell, 2008). however, there are other family characteristics, beyond socioeconomic location, that can lead to a higher risk of teen pregnancy and early childbearing. strict parenting styles, for instance, have been identified as reducing the likelihood of teenage pregnancy (east, khoo, & reyes, 2006). there is also evidence that early parenting tends to be intergenerational. women from families with a history of early childbearing are themselves more likely to have early first births (campa & eckenrode, 2006; east, reyes, & horn, 2007; hofferth & goldscheider, 2010; meade, kershaw, & ickovics, 2008), as are men (sipsma, biello, cole-lewis, & kershaw, 2010). there are also a number of individual behavioural characteristics that have been related to early childbearing. a tendency to risky behaviour and substance use (kowaleski-jones & mott, 1998) and delinquent behaviour among men (stouthamer-loeber & wei, 1998) have been identified as risk factors for early parenthood. a history of previous sexual abuse may also put adolescents and young adults at increased risk of early pregnancy and childbearing (butler & burton, 1990). if those who are more likely to be young parents are also those with family, neighbourhood, or behavioural characteristics that also put them at risk to poorer educational and employment outcomes 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 6 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.6 later in life, it becomes difficult to separate these selection mechanisms from the effects of young childbearing itself (duncan, 2007; ribar, 1999). longitudinal studies (see for example woodward, fergusson, & horwood, 2001; yamaguchi & kandel, 1987) have confirmed the importance of family social background and individual behavioural risks as important predictors of early pregnancy, and some longitudinal research suggests that the children of young parents may not, in fact, be at an increased risk of poor educational or behavioural outcomes (levine, emery, & pollack, 2007). however, natural experiments have also confirmed that some effects of early childbearing on education (hotz, mcelroy, & sanders, 2005) and health trajectories (webbink, et al., 2008) may remain, even after the selection effects are well controlled. in addition to the debate regarding the causes and consequences of early parenthood is the question of why teens from disadvantaged social and economic backgrounds are at particularly high risk. one line of argument is that there may be local “fertility cultures” that are associated with particular areas. arai (2007) reports qualitative evidence from a uk context that there may be some effect of peer groups and local culture on teenage fertility. evidence regarding the high rates of fertility among young africanamerican adults has pointed to different family and caregiving norms. burton (1990) has identified teenage childbearing as alternative life course strategy among african-american women. the prevalence of intergenerational families and co-parenting, especially with their own parents, means that having a child at a young age may be a rational and available strategy to deal with the lack of support from fathers. furthermore, for young people for whom educational and employment opportunities are limited, the costs of becoming a parent may not be as great as for middle-class teens, for whom having a child might disrupt education and employment trajectories (phoenix, 1993). for communities in which there is a cultural “script” regarding lone parenthood and parenting roles may hold particular cultural significance, transitions to parenthood that are considered “early” in other contexts may not be problematic and may, in fact, be desirable (diez & mistry, 2010; horn, 1983). even the degree to which young parenthood is a real problem, rather than a “moral panic” partially constructed through research and policy discourse, has been the subject of debate (breheny & stephens, 2007; caragata, 1999). duncan (2007) relates the “problem” discourse to a denial of the rationality of teen mothers in much academic and policy writing. this discourse is further related to the assumption that young pregnancy and childbirth is a result of mothers’ “ignorance, mis-information and low expectations”, and the “fecklessness” of young fathers (duncan, 2007). characterisations of young parents as entering parenthood accidentally or through carelessness tend to discount the agency of these young people. it ignores the possibility that fertility decisions are, at least partly, the result of rational decision-making, which must be understood in the social and cultural context in which these young parents live. the possibility that teen parenting may be a rational decision reminds us that attention should be paid not only to the risk factors and consequences of young parenthood, but also to how young parents see parenthood within the context of their own lives. this may be even more the case among first nations, for whom traditional family patterns and current economic realities may make the experience of parenthood quite different from those of non-aboriginal parents. 3 cooke: early childbearing and the first nations life course published by scholarship@western, 2013 u n d e r s t a n d i n g e a r l y c h i l d b e a r i n g a m o n g f i r s t n a t i o n s despite the large amount of research focussing on investigating the relationships between young parenting and social and economic disadvantage, and the high rates of young childbearing among first nations, there has not been much research specifically focussing on first nations. the framing of early pregnancy as a social problem may be especially problematic in the case of first nations. different first nations family formations and cultural attitudes toward parenthood may lead to fertility decisions that do not appear rational from a non-aboriginal perspective, but may well make sense within the context of first nations communities. interviews with american indian women in the u.s. indicated that they were knowledgeable about contraception and pregnancy is considered an important validation of a woman’s femininity, suggesting that early births had not in fact been unintended (horn, 1983). other research on navajo women in the u.s found that having children was seen as less of an individual choice and more of a community issue (murry & ponzeitti, 1997). childbearing decisions were, therefore, not to be taken only in consideration of one’s own resources and personal goals, but in light of the expectations of the community at large. considered within the appropriate cultural context, young childbearing becomes more easily understood as a rational decision. the assumption that early childbearing necessarily has negative consequences may also be less appropriate when considering the decisions made by first nations adolescents and young adults. certainly, much of the reason for the negative consequences of early childbearing is a lack of resources available to young parents, including money, time, and caregiving support. young parents, in general, have limited financial resources, and are less likely to be in stable partnerships. the high likelihood that teen parenting takes place outside of marriage or stable partnerships puts mothers in particular at high risk to poverty (umberson et al., 2010). however, different family formations may provide different levels of support for young or lone parents. traditional first nations and métis family systems, although disrupted by colonization, may still be seen in the importance of extended family and social childrearing (see quinless, 2013, in this issue). “lone parenthood,” as identified by the census, may, therefore, fail to capture the true extent of social support and co-parenting that may be available to young first nations or métis parents (anderson & ball, 2011). similarly, in the australian aboriginal context, senior and chenhall (2008) found that young, sexually active women were well aware of the risk of pregnancy, but saw pregnancy as an acceptable outcome that would be supported within their communities. it is, therefore, important to understand early parenthood in terms of the experiences of the parents themselves and the resources they have available. the degree to which an “early” pregnancy is seen as a problem for individuals or families may depend not only on the degree to which adolescents or young adults have goals that might be impeded by a pregnancy, but also on whether that pregnancy is likely to be an impediment to reaching those goals. young men and women who do not see childbearing as a threat to their future plans are not likely to postpone it (jumping-eagle, sheeder, kelly, & stevenssimon, 2008). the presence of social or other supports for childbearing may reduce the social and economic costs of early childbearing, and may also make it possible to reconcile early childbearing with other life course goals. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 6 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.6 t h e l i f e c o u r s e a n d e a r l y p a r e n t i n g one framework that we can use to integrate these various ideas, and within which to ask questions about the timing and consequences of childbearing, is the life course (umberson et al., 2010). life course research generally examines individual life transitions and trajectories through interrelated life domains such as education or employment. this longitudinal view of life helps to focus attention on how the timing of events in one domain, such as family, can have implications for later outcomes in work, education, or health (marshall & mueller, 2003). we have described the benefits of a life course framework for aboriginal policy research elsewhere (cooke & mcwhirter, 2011). in general, the perspective helps direct research questions by focussing on the factors that shape the life course and the timing and experience of various life course events. these factors are generally considered to include the effects of social structures, as well as individual agency, historical time and place, the linking of the lives of individuals, and the effects of the timing of previous events (marshall & mueller, 2003). despite its potential utility, the application of a life course framework to understanding the lives of aboriginal peoples requires some special consideration. in addition to identifying the differences in the timing and experience of various life course events, such as childbearing, which may have implications for other outcomes, it also must be recognized that the lives of aboriginal peoples have been shaped by policies and institutions in ways that non-aboriginal lives have not. residential schooling and the indian act are perhaps the most powerful examples of these effects (cooke & mcwhirter, 2011). for our present concern on the timing of childbearing among first nations, the life course helps us address several questions suggested by the previous literature review. in general, we are interested in the place of early childbearing in the life course of first nations parents. this includes three questions. first, what seem to be the antecedents to early childbearing in the life courses of first nations parents? the literature reviewed suggested that young childbearing may be intergenerationally transmitted, and the social and economic status of birth families may affect the likelihood of early childbearing. in addition, individual behaviours, such as alcohol and drug use, may place adolescents and young adults at increased risk. second, what are the sources of support and strategies that young first nations parents draw upon that allow them to provide for their children? as discussed above, different family formations among first nations may help young parents access social supports that allow them to care for their children while meeting other goals. however, there may also be other strategies and resources used by these parents, which should be understood as part of the context of early childbearing. third, what seem to be the outcomes in other life course domains for young first nations parents? although pervious literature suggests that early childbearing tends to have negative implications for later life, what do the later life courses of these parents look like in terms of marital, education, and employment trajectories? 5 cooke: early childbearing and the first nations life course published by scholarship@western, 2013 m e t h o d s this research makes use of exploratory qualitative life history interviews collected by the aboriginal inequality in life course perspective study. the goal of this study was to collect life history information from first nations and métis adults living in urban areas in alberta and ontario, in order to better understand their experiences in various life course domains. the ongoing disparity between aboriginal peoples and non-aboriginal canadians in income, health, education, and other dimensions formed the background to this project, which aimed at using life course principles to understand some of the mechanisms by which these inequalities are reproduced, both within individual lives and across cohorts. the project aimed at examining the roles of life course processes such as the accumulation of risk or disadvantage (o'rand, 1996), the interrelationships between events in different life course domains, and the connections among individuals or “linked lives” (elder, 1994) in the maintenance of inequality, as well as the influence of the presence or absence of various types of social, financial, or other support on life course trajectories (cooke, 2009) in the absence of prospective, longitudinal data, retrospective interviews were used to provide insights into these processes, as well as subjective accounts of various “turning points,” from the perspectives of individuals themselves. the interviews used a semi-structured interview guide and life course “tree” instrument (figure 1) validated by elders and aboriginal researchers as being more culturally appropriate than the usual life history calendar methods. whereas the life history calendars typically collect information on the domains of health, work and education, and family trajectories, the tree instrument was used to focus discussions around events in work and education, family and community, and health and spirituality. it was thought that these themes more appropriately captured the domains that were important to aboriginal peoples. moreover, the “tree” instrument better reflects a non-linear view of life courses that may be more appropriate (castellano, 2008) than does a calendar. furthermore, the tree presented an appealing metaphor for aboriginal life trajectories that enabled interviewers to talk about the life course while avoiding possible negative or stigmatizing aspects of nonstandard trajectories. this included the interrelated notions that we all grow in different directions at different times, sometimes our lives branch in unexpected ways, and our lives are “rooted” in family and community. the interviews were conducted mainly by first nations student interviewers and ranged between one to two hours in length. the interviews focussed on the situations surrounding important “turning points” in the respondents’ lives, and addressed experiences in childhood and adolescence, young adulthood, and later adulthood (when appropriate). the interview subjects ranged in age from 18 to 69 years old and were purposefully sampled to include people from a variety of income and education levels. the purpose of this sampling method was to capture a wide array of experiences and reflect the diversity of the population as much as possible in a small sample. the transcribed interview data were analysed using qualitative, interpretive methods and facilitated by nvivo qualitative analysis software, which allowed the inductive coding of data into “themes.” 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 6 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.6 f i g u r e 1 . l i f e c o u r s e i n t e r v i e w t r e e i n s t r u m e n t . 7 cooke: early childbearing and the first nations life course published by scholarship@western, 2013 these exploratory data are not able to definitively answer the three research questions posed above. in the absence of longitudinal data that could link earlier and later life course events among first nations, these narrative data can provide some evidence about the causes and outcomes of early parenting. as well, our strategy can provide insight into whether early childbearing among young first nations, and the context in which it takes place, are meaningfully different from that described in the extant literature from other contexts, and provide direction for further research. r e s u l t s : e a r l y c h i l d b e a r i n g i n t h e l i f e c o u r s e o f f i r s t n a t i o n s a d u l t s of the 55 interviews that were available at the time of this analysis, 11 respondents indicated having had a child between the ages of 14 and 20. those cases could be grouped into three major types of life course trajectory. first, of those eleven cases, three women were still in their 20s at the time of the interview. these women were still coping with raising young children, all in the absence of the children’s fathers. second, an additional six women, who were in their 30s or 40s when interviewed, had their first births while they were teenagers and had re-started their education and employment careers after a period of childrearing. of these women, two could be identified as having particularly “successful” trajectories, in the sense that they had completed higher education and had well-established working careers. a third group included two men, both in their 30s at the time of interviews, who had children in their teens. several themes emerged from the analyses of these interviews. these include the important impacts of disruptive and high-mobility childhoods, the role of extended family social support for young parents, and the return to education as a post-childbearing life transition. d i s r u p t i v e a n d m o b i l e c h i l d h o o d s one theme that appeared in the analysis was the extent to which the young parents had themselves experienced what appeared to be fairly disruptive childhoods, characterised by frequent moves and unstable households. although currently living in urban areas, most of the respondents were raised in first nations communities for at least part of their childhoods. all also mentioned making several moves between a reserve community and an urban area while children. these moves often corresponded to changes in household. most of the women (n = 6) described being raised by their mothers alone, or by a sibling. two reported being raised primarily by grandparents. one was primarily supported by her father, since her mother was unable to raise her because of alcohol abuse. however, most of these respondents indicated that they had made moves as a result of a parent’s temporary inability to provide care. some of this was associated with substance use or violence in the household or community, and some was associated with parents’ own changing relationships and employment. interviewer: when you moved to (community) at age 11, what happened? respondent: my mom was breaking up with the boyfriend she was with for, like, i think, 6 years. she broke up with him and then we moved to (community) and she worked at 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 6 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.6 (firm) and then we went to school there and then we came back so i didn’t finish school. (female, 24) for several respondents, this resulted in a pattern of repeated moves among different living arrangements, including living with grandparents, extended family, and biological parents in several different communities. one man described how he thought this mobility affected his later life. it was just something that my mom taught me, like. when things weren’t well…this is what i picked up…was when things weren’t going right, then she would move and, uh, hopefully it was better, right? so that’s something that rubbed off on me and i never really realized it: why i moved so much, and, you know, but a lot of the times…when i was younger, like, we’d move somewhere, things would get better for a little bit and then they start to go south. like, “let’s pack up and go somewhere else”, right? (male, 21) perhaps tellingly, only one respondent in the sample had lived consistently with his parents, who had remained married for his entire childhood. that man was also the only young parent in the sample who was living with the other parent of his child at the time of the interview. although it is tempting to relate high mobility in childhood to the increased risk of early parenting, it should be noted that these patterns were also evident in the interviews of many of the other respondents who did not have children at young ages. however, what did appear to be an important precursor to early parenthood for several women was the decision to leave home as a teenager to live with friends or a romantic partner, which most often involved a move from a reserve to a city. one striking thing that arose in the analysis of the women’s interview transcripts was a lack of personal intentionality or agency in the language that they used to describe becoming pregnant. although none of them specifically described their pregnancies as unintentional or “accidental,” they also spoke about pregnancy as something that happened “to” them, rather than describing it as a planned event. well we were both partiers; we had a lot in common, we partied. he’s older than me; he wasn’t educated; [and,] he worked in the mines. kind of like everything that i was against during high school but when you’re drunk, i guess, booze clouds your vision. and then we lived together, we were shacked up and then i got pregnant. (female, 34) well my boyfriend, the father, had a job and my sister lived in toronto so i moved in with my sister and then i moved in with the boyfriend and every year i was getting pregnant. like, there was one year i didn’t get pregnant. (female, 49) c o p i n g w i t h e a r l y p a r e n t h o o d : s t r a t e g i e s a n d r e s o u r c e s one clear theme emerging from the data was the importance of caregiving support provided by others, including family and other community members. this need for extended family or community support was, in large part, due to a lack of support from fathers. for the most part, the women in the sample had raised their children as lone mothers. one of the young men was the only 9 cooke: early childbearing and the first nations life course published by scholarship@western, 2013 respondent in the sample to still be in a relationship with the mother of his first child at the time of the interview. otherwise, one of the women had married the father of her first child. some of the women in the sample described their relationships ending because of abuse or their partners’ substance use. in two cases, the relationships ended because their partners went to jail. having a first birth disrupted the educational or employment trajectories for some of the respondents. two of the older women in the sample had started post-secondary educational programmes at the time of their first births. the different strategies each adopted to meet the challenges of an unanticipated pregnancy illustrate the importance of extended family resources. one was forced to leave her educational programme and her job. she describes her situation immediately afterward: i was on welfare. like i said, her father, just throughout the pregnancy and preparing for the baby, he just was not responsible. so, i had to take care of myself. but i worked until i was, you know, seven months’ [pregnant] and then had to do the welfare thing. after that and i couldn’t do any courses either. (female, 36) eventually, this woman was able to return to complete her education after a delay. however, the second woman had a different experience because her own mother was available to help take care of her children. ...but i never got to take a moment off from school. my mom, thank god, was there for me and it was like the only sobering time of her life. like, i don’t know if it’s just that she had to help me out and she was sober but she had like a five-year stint there where she was sober and she was able to help me out. (female, 31) although these two women had experienced disruptive educational trajectories as a result of their early births, the other women and two men in our sample did not. one of the men had continued to attend university after the birth of his child and intended to go on to medical school. most of the women who had left school before the birth of their first child indicated they had made use of some combination of social assistance and the support of family, either in a first nations community or the city. most of these women were not working at the time of their first births. family support, including living with cousins, siblings, parents, or others, was clearly an important part of a strategy for providing for their children. t r a j e c t o r i e s a f t e r c h i l d b e a r i n g we were able to observe part of the life courses of some of the older women in our sample after their experience as young parents. although some of these women were still in their 30s at the time of the interview, the interview data provided information about their subsequent marital, work, and education trajectories. all of these women had gone on to have other significant relationships or marriages, and three of four of them had subsequent births. these marriages also had ended, however, and none of the women were in a relationship at the time of the interview. it is impossible to relate these 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 6 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.6 subsequent marital trajectories to earlier childbearing in any causal way: several of the respondents who had not been young parents also had discontinuous marital histories. all four of these “older” early mothers returned to education at some point, and the two that had been in post-secondary education at the time of their first births went on to earn advanced degrees. the other two older women also went on to post-secondary programmes, and one was completing a degree at the time of the interview. one of the younger lone mothers also returned to school to receive a postsecondary certificate at age 26. she had since begun work as a personal care worker. it is impossible to know what these young parents’ educational or employment trajectories would have been had they not had early births. the educational trajectories for most of the men and women in this subsample of young parents had been characterised by several disruptions before their parenthood. returning to education might, therefore, be thought of not as a re-establishment of an educational trajectory that was disrupted by childbearing, but rather as a transition that was made in response to parenthood. most of the younger women and the two men in the sample spoke of the birth of their first child as a transformative moment that led them to re-evaluate their lives and prepare to take on adult responsibilities. for many of them, this included a desire to be able to support their children. i felt pity on myself, because i wasn’t providing for my daughter and, at that time, i was just, uh, trying to make something work, right, where i could be proud of myself and say that i was there for my daughter kind of thing. (male, 21) several men and women who had indicated being involved with substance use reported their first births were an impetus to change their behaviours. interviewer: how did you feel when your daughter was born? respondent: when she was born it was, like, a life-changing experience. i said that, “i have to grow up. i can’t keep doing what i’m doing.” [...] i had to clean myself up a bit. spiritually, i haven’t really thought too much about it. [...] spirituality wasn’t my main concern at the time, but it definitely took off after that. (male, 21) one source of support that was clearly important for those making a transition to post-secondary education was the availability of post-secondary funding administered by bands or first nations. with the exception of one of the men, all of the early parents in the sample made use of postsecondary funding to either begin or return to school. although such support was also important among the non-early parents in the sample, the circumstances of these parents may have meant that this funding was even more crucial in allowing them to make a transition to post-secondary education. d i s c u s s i o n a n d c o n c l u s i o n s the qualitative data analysed in this chapter provide some evidence about the role of early childbearing in the life courses of first nations adults. although the data do not allow us to generalise the results, they do give us some insight into possible antecedents of early childbearing, 11 cooke: early childbearing and the first nations life course published by scholarship@western, 2013 supports that are drawn upon, and subsequent life transitions and trajectories after early parenting among young first nations parents. many of the reported findings support research results in other contexts. our sample indicated that many of these young parents experienced disruptive childhoods, often accompanied by conditions of deprivation. in addition, they often had family and personal lives that involved substance use and violence, which are known to be risk factors for early parenting in other contexts. early homeleaving and disrupted educational trajectories tended to precede becoming parents, rather than result from parenthood. we also found, however, that many of the young parents in our sample were able to return to education and find employment after their children had reached school age. resources allowing them to do this included the support of family and community members, social programmes, and educational funding. moreover, for some of these young parents, the transition to early parenthood may, in fact, be a positive one. despite its difficulty at the time, becoming a parent may have been the “turning point” that led some of these young adults to engage in education and work in a more meaningful way. if this is the case, it suggests that it may be even more important than previously thought to provide the right supports for early parents in order to ensure that the transition to parenthood is a positive one, rather than the beginning of a more negative life trajectory. it is important to remember that evidence of positive outcomes does not necessarily indicate that young childbearing is a decision taken intentionally. we have argued that it is important to consider that childbearing decisions by young first nations parents may be rational within particular cultural, economic, and social contexts, and that there may be resources available that reduce the potentially negative life course implications of becoming a parent at a young age. nonetheless, and although the data presented here are exploratory and not broadly generalizable, we find no evidence that the young parents in the sample intended to become parents when they did. similarly, evidence of supports for young parents, such as assistance from grandparents or other family members, is not necessarily an indicator that there is a community or local culture that supports young parenting as normative and desirable. as furstenberg (1991) points out, intergenerational parenting as an adaptation to young and unmarried parenthood may also be problematic for grandparents, families, and communities. similarly, evidence that early parenting may be preceded by disadvantage, combined with evidence of more positive subsequent trajectories, is not enough to conclude that young parenthood is not potentially problematic for individuals or communities. however, generalizable longitudinal data are needed to fully unpack the risk factors and consequences of early births. from the somewhat more general perspective of the life course and social conditions of aboriginal peoples, these data provide insight into some of the mechanisms that are at play in the reproduction of inequality, and the potential importance of early childbearing as one of them. it is important to be critical about the role of research in the discursive construction of young parenthood as a social problem (breheny & stephens, 2007), especially in the case of first nations (see fonda, guimond, & eni, 2013, in this issue). nonetheless, there seems to be reason to believe that young childbearing has some implications for the continued lower average educational attainment and incomes of aboriginal peoples. having a child at a young age might be seen as both 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 6 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.6 a manifestation of disadvantage and a mechanism by which that disadvantage may accumulate or be magnified over the course of individual lives. although the young parents in the sample did continue their education after having their children, an important principle of the life course is that the timing of previous events matters for subsequent outcomes (o'rand, 1996). later educational completion may have implications for the lifetime earnings of individuals and thereby contribute to lower average incomes. moreover, we can see in the lives of several of these young parents, the difficult transitions that they experienced in their youth were often implicated in their own early childbearing. insofar as these disruptive childhood experiences could be related to the social and economic conditions experienced by their parents, we can see early childbearing as one mechanism by which disadvantage is potentially transmitted between generations, expressed by the life course principle of “linked lives” (elder, 1994). nonetheless, the qualitative data 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(2003). race and women's income trajectories: employment, marriage, and income security over the life course. social problems, 50(1), 87-110. woodward, l., fergusson, d. m., & horwood, l. j. (2001). risk factors and life processes associated with teenage pregnancy: results of a prospective study from birth to 20 years. journal of marriage and family, 63(4), 1170-1184. yamaguchi, k., & kandel, d. (1987). drug use and other determinants of premarital pregnancy and its outcome: a dynamic analysis of competing life events. journal of marriage and family, 49(2), 257-270. 17 cooke: early childbearing and the first nations life course published by scholarship@western, 2013 the international indigenous policy journal march 2013 “and then i got pregnant”: early childbearing and the first nations life course martin cooke recommended citation “and then i got pregnant”: early childbearing and the first nations life course abstract french abstract spanish abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license cooke_and_then_i_got_pregnant_final cooke_and_then_i_got_pregnant_final.2 cooke_and_then_i_got_pregnant_final.3 addressing the persistence of tuberculosis among the canadian inuit population: the need for a social determinants of health framework the international indigenous policy journal volume 2 issue 1 health and well-being article 1 may 2011 addressing the persistence of tuberculosis among the canadian inuit population: the need for a social determinants of health framework kassandra c. kulmann ma candidate the university of western ontario, kkulmann@uwo.ca chantelle am richmond professor he university of western ontario, chantelle.richmond@uwo.ca recommended citation kulmann, k. c. , richmond, c. a. (2011). addressing the persistence of tuberculosis among the canadian inuit population: the need for a social determinants of health framework. the international indigenous policy journal, 2(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.1 this research is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. addressing the persistence of tuberculosis among the canadian inuit population: the need for a social determinants of health framework abstract canadian aboriginal people have poorer levels of health than the general population. a serious issue is the high rate of tuberculosis (tb) among the inuit population; rates are much higher than those of the general canadian population. several social determinants of health (sdoh), including household crowding and poverty, are strongly correlated with tb prevalence. in this paper, we describe the medical and social determinants of tb, and critically examine the tb literature specific to the inuit population. the majority of studies recommend biomedical interventions for the treatment of tb. few researchers have employed the social determinants of health theory to steer their research, and even fewer researchers suggest improving living and social conditions in inuit communities as a way of eradicating tb. we conclude with research and policy recommendations. keywords tuberculosis, canada, aboriginal, inuit, social determinants of health, poverty acknowledgments chantelle richmond acknowledges the support of a cihr new investigator award. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ introduction compared with the general population of canada, aboriginal people1 a significant health issue unique to the canadian aboriginal population is the persistence of tuberculosis (tb) infection. while tb has been all but eradicated among the general canadian population, aboriginal canadians continue to experience prevalence rates of tb that are 10-20 times that of the general canadian population (nguyen et al., 2003). a closer examination of patterns of tb among the aboriginal population reveals a highly unequal burden. among the inuit population, prevalence rates are 20-50 times higher than the general population (nguyen et al., 2003). see figure 1 for crude numbers of tb cases in canada from 1985 to 2009 and figure 2 for rates of tb per 100,000 in canada from 1997 to 2007 (health canada, 1996, 2001; public health agency of canada, 2007, 2008, 2009). in a recent interview with the cbc’s the current, dr. isaac sobol, chief medical officer of health in nunavut reported that rates of tb in nunavut were the highest they have been since the creation of the territory in 1999 (sobol, 2010). in 2010, for example, 99 cases of the disease were reported in nunavut, bringing the overall rate to 62 times higher than that for the general canadian population (sobol, 2010). though tb rates among the inuit have decreased since the 1950s, the recent increase of tb cases emphasizes the fact that the disease is a serious and emergent inuit health issue (nguyen et al., 2003). see table 1 for percentage of inuit population reporting diagnosis of tb in 2006 for the four arctic regions (statistics canada, 2006b). experience a significantly higher burden of morbidity and mortality (adelson, 2005; codon, 2005; frohlich, ross, & richmond, 2006; macmillan, macmillan, offord, & dingle, 1996). the roots of this inequality lie in a legacy of colonial relations, dispossession from traditional lands and territories, rapid cultural change and dependency (bartlett, 2003; gracey & king, 2009; waldram, herring, & young, 2006). like other vulnerable populations, factors such as material deprivation and a low social position have strongly influenced patterns of aboriginal health (krieger, 2001; navarro, 1990). as adelson (2005) notes, health disparities are directly and indirectly associated with social, economic, cultural and political inequities; the end result of which is a disproportionate burden of ill health and social suffering upon aboriginal populations of canada (p. s45). the consequences for health and disease in the aboriginal population include higher rates of heart disease, type ii diabetes, and infectious diseases, such as tuberculosis (adelson, 2005; wilson & rosenberg, 2002). in explaining the recent spike in tb prevalence, dr. sobol identified a number of social environmental determinants, including substandard housing, nutrition, and sanitation as factors influencing high tb rates in nunavut (sobol, 2010). the poor living conditions of the inuit are well documented, as is the high prevalence of tb (bjerregaard, young, dewailly, & ebbesson, 2004; grzybowski & allen, 1999; hotez, 2010; kunimoto, chedore, allen, & kasatiya, 2001; loppie reading & wien, 2009; møller, 2010; nguyen et al., 2003; richmond, 2009). indeed, evidence from around the globe suggests that the determinants of tb are not purely biomedical (barr, diez-roux, knirsch, & pablos-méndez, 2001; clark, riben, & nowgesic, 2002; dubos & dubos, 1952, 1987; elender, bentham, & langford, 1998; farmer, 1999; fitzgerald, wang, & elwood, 2000; gibson, cave, doering, ortiz, & harms, 2005; mangtani, jolley, watson, & rodrigues, 1995; møller, 2010; rubel & garro, 1992; spence, hotchkiss, williams, & davies, 1993; wanyeki et al., 2006). rather, there is a growing base of evidence to substantiate the strong pathways between tb incidence and various social and economic determinants (cantwell, mckenna, mccray, & onorato, 1998; clark et al., 2002; elender et al., 1998; farmer, 1996; farmer, 2000; spence et al., 1993). in the canadian literature around aboriginal tb however, only a handful of studies (clark et al., 2002; møller, 2010) have incorporated a social 1 as defined under the canadian constitution, section 35(2), the aboriginal population of canada refers to first nations, métis and inuit. 1 kulmann and richmond: addressing inuit tuberculosis with social determinants of health published by scholarship@western, 2011 determinants of health (sdoh) framework for understanding and describing patterns of tb. because of the strong policy reliance on biologically and genetically based scientific evidence in canada (kiefer, frank, di ruggerio, dobbins & manuel et al., 2005), the lack of evidence detailing the links between social circumstance and tb incidence means that initiatives designed to combat tb in canada’s north have not focused on social, economic, or environmental factors. however, the rise in tb rates in inuit communities within the past 10 years emphasizes the severity of this health issue. biomedically based initiatives have not adequately targeted the socioeconomic factors that influence tb, which suggests that perhaps it is time for more holistic initiatives that can combat the medical and socioeconomic factors that underlie high tb prevalence rates. in the following paper, we describe tb in canadian inuit communities, including historical factors, demographics and initiatives to lower rates of the disease. we also explain sdoh theory and its connection to inuit health. we critically examine the tb literature, including recommendations made by researchers for eradicating the disease. finally, we argue for the use of a sdoh theoretical framework in tb research among the canadian inuit population as a policy response that may help to eradicate the disease. population health and sdoh theory population health is a framework for understanding that economic, social and environmental structures can both support and constrain the health of community members (evans & stoddart, 1994; raphael, 2001), thereby moving conceptual understandings of health and disease beyond the traditional domains of genetics and access to health care. population health was founded in the 1980s by an interdisciplinary group of economists and health policy analysts of the canadian institutes for advanced research (frank, 1995). conceptually, population health emerged as a framework for thinking about why some people, and peoples, are healthier than others – that is, a conceptual framework for the determinants of health at individual and population levels (evans & stoddart, 1994; frank, 1995). the main tenets of the population health framework are three-fold. first, the major determinants of human health status, particularly among advanced, capitalist societies, are not those of medical care inputs and utilization, but cultural, social and economic factors – at both the population and individual levels (evans & stoddart, 1994). the effect of these factors is expressed universally through profound social gradients in health status (wilkinson, 1997). second, at the population level, societies with both a high level and a relatively equitable distribution of wealth enjoy higher levels of health status (kaplan and lynch, 1997). third, at the individual level, one’s immediate social and material environments and the way that these environments interacts with one’s psychological resources and coping skills are important determinants of health (frank, 1995). throughout the world, people who are vulnerable and socially disadvantaged have less access to health resources, get sicker, and die earlier than people in more privileged social positions (evans, whitehead, diderichsen, bhuiya, & wirth, 2001). the greatest share of health problems is attributable to the social conditions in which people live and work, referred to as the sdoh (marmot & wilkinson, 1999). the world health organization (who, 2010) defines sdoh as “the conditions in which people are born, grow, live, work and age”. included in the who’s definition are factors such as social support, food, unemployment, stress, the social gradient, early life, addiction, transport, work and social exclusion (wilkinson & marmot, 2003). within the canadian context, federal and provincial governments draw from a population health framework as a means of creating health and social policy (legowski & mckay, 2000; robertson, 1998). canadian policy includes several social indicators identified by the who list of social determinants, and also includes gender, the physical environment, social environments, income and social status, education, social support networks, personal health practices and coping skills, healthy child 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.1 development, culture, health services, employment and working conditions, and biology and genetic endowment (advisory committee on population health, 1996, as cited in richmond & ross, 2009). understanding the medical and social pathways of tb tb is an infectious disease that primarily affects the lungs (though it can also affect bones, kidneys or lymph nodes) and is passed through coughing; one must breathe in the tb bacteria to contract the infection (health canada, 2009; long, njoo, & hershfield, 1999). the bacteria mycobacterium tuberculosis causes the tb infection (health canada, 2009). the infection does not always advance to the stage of disease, but those with the infection can still pass it on to others (health canada, 2009). though contact with an infected person is necessary, some people are more at risk for developing tb disease than others. for example, those with hiv, diabetes, immunosuppressive illness or renal disease are at a higher risk of advancement of tb from infection to disease (long et al., 1999). skin tests are used to determine if a person has tb infection, and chest x-rays are taken to find out if the infection has advanced to the disease (health canada, 2009). tb can be treated with antibiotics (health canada, 2009). globally, research indicates a positive correlation between incidence of tb and various sdoh including malnutrition, crowded housing and inadequate ventilation, low levels of sanitation, low socioeconomic status and poverty, alcohol and drug abuse, high levels of stress and poor health care access (baker, das, venugopal, & howden-chapman, 2008; clark et al., 2002; clark & cameron, 2009; grzybowski & allen, 1999; long et al., 1999). several researchers have identified a positive relationship between household crowding and prevalence of tb in indigenous (clark et al., 2002) and non-indigenous communities (baker et al., 2008; wanyeki et al., 2006;). clark et al.’s (2002) study statistically examined the connection between household crowding and socioeconomic status and tb infection in first nation communities in canada. wanyeki et al. (2006) also explored the association between tb and household crowding in montreal; aboriginal peoples were not the focus of the study. baker et al. (2008) looked at tb and crowding in new zealand. generally, these studies point to rates of tb infection that are negatively correlated with household income, and positively correlated with higher levels of density. lower socioeconomic households tend to experience higher crowding, with poor circulation of air and more people breathing in this infected air (wanyeki et al., 2006). spence et al. (1993) identified positive correlations between poverty and rates of tb in liverpool, england. the authors were inconclusive regarding how poverty affected rates of the disease, though malnourishment was suggested as a possibility (spence et al., 1993). elender et al. (1998) explored connections between poverty, ethnicity and aids and prevalence of tb in england and wales from 1982-1992. barr et al. (2001) examined poverty as an influence increasing prevalence of tb infection in new york city. in the above two studies (barr et al., 2001; elender et al., 1998;) strong positive correlations with poverty were identified, and in both cases, it was suggested that malnutrition played a significant mediating role between poverty and tb infection. though the sdoh listed above are connected to high rates of tb, many have not been studied extensively in the canadian context, and very rarely among inuit (clark & cameron, 2009; grzybowski & allen, 1999). as outlined above, the strong association between tb and various sdoh, including household crowding, poverty and malnutrition have been documented in studies with diverse populations from around the world. in particular, researchers have discovered a strong correlation between household crowding and elevated rates of tb. both household crowding and malnutrition are connected to poverty, and therefore form important risk factors for tb infection and disease. due to the strong 3 kulmann and richmond: addressing inuit tuberculosis with social determinants of health published by scholarship@western, 2011 correlation between sdoh and tb, initiatives to combat the incidence of the disease should take sdoh into account. overview of inuit health in canada: persistence of tb the inuit population in canada resides in nunaat (“inuktitut expression for inuit homeland”), which spans across the arctic as four distinct areas (tait, 2008, as cited in richmond, 2009, p. 473). inuvialuit includes the northern part of the northwest territories, including banks island and parts of victoria and melville islands; nunavut is the newest territory in canada and includes those arctic islands not included in inuvialuit; nunavik is in quebec’s north; and nunatsiavut includes the northeastern coast of labrador (richmond, 2009; tait, 2008). these 4 regions are the home of the majority of canada’s inuit (77%) (tait, 2008). the inuit population experiences lower levels of health than the non-aboriginal population, including lower life expectancy, higher infant mortality, higher prevalence of both chronic and infectious diseases, higher levels of accidental death, violent death and suicide, and higher levels of substance abuse (bjerregaard et al., 2004; kirmayer, fletcher & boothroyd, 1998; richmond, 2009; tester & mcnicoll, 2004; wilkins et al., 2008). in addition to having lower levels of health, the inuit also experience significantly lower standards of living than other aboriginal populations as well as the nonaboriginal canadian population (adelson, 2005; møller, 2010). see tables 2, 3 and 4 for social indicators including, income, unemployment, and incidence of crowded housing (statistics canada, 2006a, 2006c, 2006d). this poor standard of living negatively affects inuit health and contributes in important ways to the high rates of disease and social problems listed above (adelson, 2005), including tb. the social determinants of inuit health have contributed to the poor levels of health and high prevalence of tb among the inuit population of canada. the inuit have suffered several major lifestyle changes connected to colonization that have negatively impacted their health. for example, during the 1960s many nomadic inuit families were forcibly relocated by the government. according to the government, this relocation was done in order to provide them with a better quality of life, and to provide a physical presence in areas of the arctic that were not occupied (berkes, diduck, fast, huebert, & manseau, 2005; damman, eide, & kuhnlein, 2007). these relocations significantly changed ways of life among the inuit. they were not familiar with the land bases of their new homes and unable to carry on the collection of traditional foods and resources (berkes et al., 2005; indian and northern affairs canada, 1996). this meant that the inuit were unable to continue consuming their traditional diets and began to purchase more innutritious, pre-packaged foods (pretty & samson, 2006; richmond & ross, 2009). in addition to changing the diets of the inuit, the government relocations also altered their daily traditional activities. entrance into the wage economy was necessary, and the low availability of employment left many families struggling on social assistance (indian and northern affairs canada, 1996; pretty & samson, 2006). this created poor living conditions in many inuit communities, which are still prevalent today (møller, 2010). for example, 31% of inuit live in crowded homes (“more than one person per room”), and many homes are in poor condition (28% “in need of major repairs”), without running water (møller, 2010; loppie reading & wien, 2009, p. 9). compared with the general canadian population, inuit experience lower levels of education attainment, higher infant mortality, shorter life expectancy, significantly higher rates of suicide, higher morbidity, and higher levels of unemployment (hicks, 2007; møller, 2010; statscan, 2001 a, b; nunavut department of health and social services, 2002). many communities also suffer from high rates (higher than the average for canada) of sexual, physical, and substance abuse (møller, 2010; statscan, 2001 a, b). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.1 tb prevalence among the inuit remains much higher than levels for the non-aboriginal population. for example, the non-aboriginal population in canada exhibits rates of tb approximately 12/100,000 (grzybowski & allen, 1999). in contrast, the level for the inuit population in nunavut for 2005 was approximately 150/100,000 (møller, 2010). historical conditions including colonialism are responsible for introducing the disease to the inuit, as well as for perpetuating its existence in communities (møller, 2010). for example, european settlers introduced new diseases to inuit communities upon their arrival to the arctic (bjerregaard et al., 2004). the following section provides a historical overview of tb in the inuit population, a summary of medical treatments used to combat tb, and an overview of current inuit living conditions. historical background of tb among the inuit population of canada though tb is a major contemporary health issue in inuit communities, the disease did not originate in canada. tb started as an epidemic in europe in the 1600s, and was transferred from europe to north america with european colonizers (grzybowski & allen, 1999; møller, 2010). inuit in the arctic were exposed to tb in the 19th and early 20th century by european settlers and explorers, which was much later than other aboriginal groups (e.g. aboriginal peoples in western and eastern canada were exposed 200 and 300 years ago respectively) (bjerregaard et al., 2004; grzybowski & allen, 1999; møller, 2010). the inuit did not have any natural immunity to the disease and many died before they could be treated (clark et al., 2002; grzybowski & allen, 1999; møller, 2010). the government did not respond to the tb crisis in inuit communities until after world war ii, once many inuit had already died from the disease (møller, 2010). at this point in time “the inuit population in canada had the highest reported rate of tuberculosis in the world” (kunimoto et al., 2001, p. 642). after world war ii, the canadian government initiated several interventions to combat tb in inuit communities. in the early 1950s, the primary method of treatment for tb was to send affected persons to sanatoria (bjerregaard et al., 2004; grzybowski & allen, 1999; møller, 2010) according to grzybowski and allen (1999), “sanatorium treatment isolated infected patients and provided rest, nutritious food, fresh air, education and rehabilitation” (p. 1026). though this description provides a relatively positive image of sanatoria treatments, many inuit have a different view of these facilities. sanatoria treatment required the infected person to be taken far from their homes, families and communities and placed in isolation, sometimes for years (møller, 2010). though rates of tb did drop among inuit, many suffered social and mental trauma due to the extended periods of time during which they were unable to see their families (bjerregaard et al., 2004; kunimoto et al., 2001; møller, 2010). sanatoria treatment helped prevent the spread of tb but had the undesirable effect of seclusion from one’s family. in addition to sanatoria treatment, a tb vaccine has also been used to help prevent the disease among the inuit. in 1924, dr. camille guérin and dr. albert calmette developed a vaccine called bacille calmette-guérin (bcg vaccine), which was and still is given to babies (grzybowski & allen, 1999; nguyen et al., 2003; bjerregaard et al., 2004). the bcg vaccine is used in regional tb programs spearheaded by health canada (health canada, 2005). aboriginal infants in areas with a high prevalence of tb are provided with the vaccine (public health agency of canada, 2010). pharmaceuticals are used to combat tb disease once it has developed. the first type of anti-tb drug used was streptomycin, though it did not always cure the disease; tb would often become resistant to the drug (grzybowski & allen, 1999). drugs (para-aminosalicylic acid salts and isoniazid) were developed later on that, when taken with streptomycin, were almost always able to cure tb (grzybowski & allen, 1999). currently, two sets of antibiotics are used to treat tb, which depend on the strain of the disease. first-line antibiotics can cure tb that is not drug resistant, while second-line antibiotics are used 5 kulmann and richmond: addressing inuit tuberculosis with social determinants of health published by scholarship@western, 2011 for multi-drug resistant tb (mdr-tb) (health canada, 2009). extensively drug resistant tb (xdr-tb) is even more difficult to treat than mdr-tb, as this strain of tb is resistant to second-line antibiotics (health canada, 2009). current strategies for eliminating tb among the canadian inuit in addition to the tb treatments listed in the previous section, the literature on tb among the inuit identifies a number of other recommendations for the control and eradication of the disease. these recommendations fall into several categories, including prevention, testing and treatment of tb infection and disease following the biomedical model; a holistic approach that includes culturally sensitive prevention, testing and treatment of tb; and finally, an approach that addresses the larger social and economic factors that can lead to tb infection and persistence. though not all of the articles involve the examination of tb in canadian inuit communities, they are still relevant examples of recommendations. the majority of the articles reviewed suggested traditional biomedical methods of preventing, treating and testing tb in the canadian inuit population. a study by nguyen et al. (2003) suggested contact tracing and treating latent tb infections within the inuit population of quebec. kunimoto et al. (2001) recommend similar solutions for canadian inuit, including tracing transmission of the disease through dna fingerprinting and treating latent infections. the importance of treating latent infections was emphasized, as “the transmission of the disease was largely between contacts within communities and not intercommunity, as had previously been suspected” (kunimoto et al., 2001, p. 645). clark and cameron (2009) examined tb among canadian first nations, and suggest that “the degree of transmission and risk of infection in the population will depend upon medical and public health interventions” (p. 225). smeja and brassard (2000) advise for case finding and testing of canadian cree individuals with a higher risk for tb. other authors (grzybowski & allen, 1999; long et al., 1999; menzies et al., 1999) recommend preventative therapy, tb antibiotics, and use of the bcg vaccine. menzies et al. (1999) further recommend that patients be isolated and stay outdoors to prevent passing the infection to others. in a study specifically targeting tb among canadian aboriginal peoples, fitzgerald et al. (2000), suggests standard biomedical treatments, including “directly observed therapy”, which is “the direct observation of the ingestion of medication by a health care worker or surrogate” for patients who do not comply with medications (p. 352). very few articles suggested addressing social and economic factors as a method of decreasing rates of tb, and studies that did recommend this option did not elaborate on the concept. for example, fitzgerald et al.’s (2000) article suggested that substance abuse and housing should be addressed as a method of decreasing tb rates; however, the means by which health policy, or tb programs more specifically, might incorporate these recommendations was not defined. clark et al. (2002) recommend improving “overcrowded housing and other socio-economic determinants of tb to eliminate tb in first nations communities” (p. 944). similarly, baker et al.’s (2008) new zealand study concludes that “reducing or eliminating household crowding could decrease tb incidence in nz and globally” (p. 715). though barr et al. (2001) recognize poverty as a risk factor for tb, they only recommend that treatment be focused on poor areas, and not on addressing the issue of poverty itself. finally, while richmond’s (2009) study does not focus specifically on tb, the research supports the links between canadian inuit health and the sdoh (particularly social support). though the links between sdoh and tb rates have been identified, few researchers advise addressing these determinants as a way to decrease rates of the disease; of those that do, little detail for policymakers is provided. two studies (gibson et al., 2005; møller, 2010) critically evaluate the effectiveness of traditional biomedical recommendations for the eradication of tb in canadian aboriginal communities, and they 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.1 identify the need for more holistic approaches – those that nurture biomedical, social, and economic solutions for tb eradication. gibson et al. (2005) examined issues connected to tb prevention and treatment among aboriginal peoples and immigrants in alberta. the researchers discovered that aboriginal peoples with tb experienced stigmatization by the non-aboriginal population and healthcare workers and had negative memories of tb sanatoria, both of which affected their acceptance of biomedical tb therapies (gibson et al., 2005). the authors of this study recommend culturally sensitive tb information provided in aboriginal languages, and recognize the need for aboriginal health care professionals (gibson et al., 2005). for example, though “directly observed therapy” (fitzgerald et al., 2000, p. 352) may be effective in ensuring patients take their tb medication, this method may not be appropriate in inuit culture. though the researchers recognize social and economic factors affecting rates of tb, they did not recommend addressing these issues as a method of decreasing rates of the disease. in contrast, møller’s (2010) study on tb among inuit in nunavut included interviews with inuit regarding their experiences with tb. the interviewees offered rich insight regarding methods that would be more effective for the prevention and treatment of tb (møller, 2010). for example, interviewees reported that personal, orally transmitted stories about tb experiences would be more effective than written information (møller, 2010). negative relationships with healthcare professionals and culturally inappropriate methods were also named as issues hindering tb treatment (e.g. inuit cultural values include accepting guests into the home, which may be an issue when healthcare professionals recommend isolation for tb patients) (møller, 2010). møller (2010) concludes that key social and economic factors, the primary one being poverty, must be addressed to lower rates of the disease. discussion: employing a sdoh framework for tb research and policy in this paper, we have illustrated that the connection between the sdoh and tb has been recognized in studies from all over the world. tb rates among the inuit of canada continue to be much higher than rates for the non-aboriginal population, and it is well established that the poor quality living and social conditions of the inuit are connected in significant ways to these high rates (cantwell et al., 1998; clark et al., 2002; elender et al., 1998; møller, 2010; nguyen et al., 2003; sobol, 2010). in spite of a global base of evidence that substantiates this connection, few canadian researchers have applied a sdoh theoretical framework to guide their research, and fewer still have recommended addressing the sdoh as a method of lowering tb rates (clark et al., 2002; møller, 2010). rather, within this literature, there has been a continued focus on traditional biomedical methods of prevention, testing and treatment (clark & cameron, 2009; kunimoto et al., 2001; nguyen et al., 2003; smeja & brassard 2000). in addition to lowering rates of tb among the inuit population of canada, there is evidence to suggest that improving living and social conditions can reduce the risk of other diseases as well. for example, it is known that the determinants of health that influence rates of tb (e.g., poverty, overcrowding) are also powerfully shaping other diseases such as shigellosis (clark et al., 2002), hiv and malaria (farmer, 1996). indeed, many diseases prevalent among canadian inuit are directly connected to poverty, including respiratory infections (meningitis, pneumonia, septic arthritis), acute otitis media, trichinellosis, toxoplasmosis and giardiasis (hotez, 2010). clearly, the role between poverty and infectious disease, including tb, cannot be ignored. though the biomedical method of prevention, testing and treating tb solely as a disease outcome has substantially lowered rates of tb among the inuit, this model has not been successful in eradicating the disease altogether. in order that we can begin to combat rates of tb experienced by canada’s inuit population, both through research and policy, serious consideration must be given to the social and economic determinants of the disease. part of the challenge to creating effective health policy requires understanding of existing health needs (kiefer et al., 2005). in the context of inuit tb, this will require a more thorough conceptualization 7 kulmann and richmond: addressing inuit tuberculosis with social determinants of health published by scholarship@western, 2011 of the factors that place people at risk for disease in the first place (marmot and wilkinson, 1999). as we described in an earlier section, the effects of colonialism and shift to market economy are quite apparent in the current health and social status of the inuit population (bartlett, 2003; gracey & king, 2009; pretty & samson, 2006; waldram et al., 2006). because of the rapid change in way of life, various basic needs in relation to the sdoh remain quite marginally met in many arctic communities (e.g., employment, income, food security), and in some cases not at all (tait, 2005). clearly, there is a need to better define and understand the health and social needs of the inuit population. in relation to future research, our results point to the importance of drawing from a sdoh framework, and moreover, to the importance of understanding how environmental, social, economic and historical processes related to tb can exacerbate health inequalities over time. we argue that the current research and policy approaches used to examine and treat tb are incomplete; one only need to look as far as the example of nunavut’s explosion of tb cases in 2010 as a measure of success under the current biomedical model. complex health problems require complex solutions; it is necessary that tb researchers widen their scope of understanding and incorporate more integrated approaches and methods to better understand the underlying risk factors for tb, and to frame their evidence base in a way that promotes policy uptake. the application of the sdoh theory to tb research has the potential for far-reaching consequences. by creating a more complete, in-depth picture of the social and economic risk factors that make the inuit population more susceptible to tb means not only that incidence rates of the disease may be lowered with appropriate medical and socioeconomic interventions, but that rates of other infectious diseases may also drop, thereby leading to improved quality of life among inuit (clark et al., 2002; farmer, 1996; hotez, 2010). health policies, health programs and future health research on the social determinants of tb must recognize the complex historical, political and social context that has shaped current patterns of the disease and seriously contemplate interventions that can holistically encompass these experiences. policy recommendations sdoh have a profound influence on tb rates among the inuit population and need to be considered by policymakers. though biomedical interventions have successfully lowered rates of tb, the disease continues to persist in the canadian population, particularly the inuit population. policymakers need to address sdoh in order to eradicate the disease. this recommendation is echoed by brian graham, from the chronic disease policy group for the canadian lung association: “we need to ensure that our strategy for combating the disease also focuses on such social determinants as poverty and housing. we look forward to partnering with the federal government to ensure that the domestic fight against tb is diverse in scope and aggressive in effort to eradicate this formidable disease” (canadian lung association, 2010). in addition to focusing on sdoh in tb policy, policymakers also need to increase efforts among the inuit population (canadian lung association, 2010). for example, the federal government has developed tb reach, which includes $100 million for global tb prevention and treatment programs (canadian lung association, 2010). though the canadian lung association “commends the federal government’s recent commitment to international tuberculosis (tb) control, it urges the government to continue working with provincial and territorial partners to reduce alarming rates of tb among inuit, first nations and métis” (canadian lung association, 2010). the arguments made both in this paper and by the canadian lung association emphasize the importance of policymakers not only to continue focusing on tb in the inuit population, but also introduce policies to improve the social and living conditions in the north. short term policy initiatives should include increased funding for tb programs, culturally appropriate tb education and awareness, 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.1 and holistic research approaches that encompass both biomedical and socioeconomic frameworks for understanding pathways for addressing tb in the inuit population. long term policy initiatives should include improvements to housing, nutritious food subsidization, the creation of economic opportunities and the development of an inuitcentred elementary and secondary curriculum. the above changes have the potential to lower, and potentially eradicate tb from the canadian inuit population. conclusion though tb rates among the inuit have decreased since the 1950s, the recent increase of tb cases, particularly in the territory of nunavut, emphasizes the fact that the disease is a serious and emergent inuit health issue (nguyen et al., 2003). the sdoh, in particular poverty, strongly influence rates of tb in the canadian inuit population (sobol, 2010; møller, 2010). unfortunately, few researchers have employed the sdoh theory to steer their research, and even fewer researchers suggest improving living and social conditions in inuit communities as a way of eradicating tb. rather, many suggest traditional biomedical prevention, testing and treatment. while tb has been all but eradicated among the general canadian population, it is deeply troubling that patterns of tb among the inuit population continue to grow. this suggests that the current biomedical models of treatment are not sufficient on their own in the inuit context. we conclude that tb needs to be recognized not only as a disease of poverty in the arctic, but as a social issue in its own right. policy makers (e.g. health canada) have framed tb as a medical issue, therefore recommending medical solutions, which have not been entirely effective. by framing tb as a social issue, affected individual and communities, and the organizations that represent their interests, can argue for policy makers to address the social conditions that fundamentally underlie the disease. figure 1. tuberculosis cases in canada 1985-2009, source: health canada, 1996, 2001; public health agency of canada, 2007, 2008, 2009. *data for figure 1 available in appendices tuberculosis cases in canada 1985-2009 0 200 400 600 800 1000 1200 1400 19 85 19 87 19 89 19 91 19 93 19 95 19 97 19 99 20 01 20 03 20 05 20 07 20 09 year n um be r of c as es status indian non-status indian/métis inuit non-aboriginal foreign born 9 kulmann and richmond: addressing inuit tuberculosis with social determinants of health published by scholarship@western, 2011 figure 2. rates per 100,000 of tuberculosis in canada 1997-2007, source: public health agency of canada, 2007. *data for figure 2 available in appendices table 1 percentage of inuit population reporting diagnosis of tuberculosis in 2006 for the four arctic regions of canada inuit region population % diagnosed with tuberculosis inuit nunaat 25,120 5 nunatsiavut 1,540 n/a nunavik 5,850 3e nunavut 15,490 6 inuvialuit 2,240 4e outside nunaat 10,740 4e canada 35,860 5 *e"use with caution" source: statistics canada, 2006b rates per 100,000 of tuberculosis in canada 1997-2007 0 20 40 60 80 100 120 140 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 year r at e status indian inuit non-aboriginal foreign born 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.1 table 2 percentage of population living in crowded housing in canada 2005 (crowdingmore than one person per room) aboriginal status % in crowded housing non aboriginal identity population 2.9 métis 3.4 north american indian 14.7 inuit 31.1 source: statistics canada, 2006a table 3 average income in canada for 2000 and 2005 aboriginal status average income ($) 2000 (2001 census) 2005 (2006 census) non aboriginal ancestry population 33,752 35,934 registered indian status 33,390 35,501 métis 24,914 28,227 inuit 22,295 25,461 source: statistics canada, 2006c table 4 unemployment in canada for 2000 and 2005 aboriginal status unemployment (%) 2000 (2001 census) 2005 (2006 census) non aboriginal identity population 7.1 6.3 métis 14 10 north american indian 22.2 18 inuit 22.2 20.3 source: statistics canada, 2006d 11 kulmann and richmond: addressing inuit tuberculosis with social determinants of health published by scholarship@western, 2011 appendix aboriginal status year 1985 1986 1987 1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 status indian 253 280 283 236 303 295 259 322 260 268 265 218 non-status indian/métis 67 69 89 75 73 72 58 39 55 95 56 51 inuit 22 22 12 21 34 8 22 26 58 35 24 26 nonaboriginal 941 919 720 724 666 682 670 587 576 490 431 364 foreign born 861 855 868 891 959 940 1009 1135 1063 1186 1140 1159 aboriginal status year 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 status indian 212 191 247 167 199 165 204 202 213 223 225 218 223 non-status indian/métis 52 53 39 36 63 43 32 25 41 36 36 36 30 inuit 18 35 28 56 53 33 11 41 63 61 46 87 89 nonaboriginal 403 347 326 314 283 257 233 214 218 201 170 209 237 foreign born 1279 1161 1161 1133 1124 1127 1110 1115 1057 1072 1042 985 1003 figure 1. data: tuberculosis cases in canada 1985-2009 source: health canada, 1996, 2001; public health agency of canada, 2007, 2008, 2009 aboriginal status year 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 status indian 32.8 29 36.6 24.2 28.3 23 27.9 26.4 27.4 28.2 27.9 inuit 30.9 58.7 47 89.9 111.4 67.8 22.1 80.4 120.7 114 84.2 nonaboriginal 1.7 1.4 1.3 1.3 1.2 1.1 1 0.9 0.9 0.8 0.7 foreign born 23.9 21.2 20.8 19.6 18.4 17.8 16.9 16.6 15.4 15.2 14.4 figure 2. data: rates per 100,000 of tuberculosis in canada 1997-2007 source: public health agency of canada, 2007 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.1 references adelson, n. 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(2010, march 17). the lung association. retrieved from http://www.lung.ca/media-medias/newsnouvelles_e.php?id=192 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.1 http://www12.statcan.gc.ca/census-� http://www12.statcan.gc.ca/census-� http://www12.statcan.gc.ca/census-recensement/2006/dp-� http://www12.statcan.gc.ca/census-recensement/2006/dp-� http://www12.statcan.gc.ca/census-recensement/2006/dp-� http://www.who.int/social_determinants/en/� the international indigenous policy journal may 2011 addressing the persistence of tuberculosis among the canadian inuit population: the need for a social determinants of health framework kassandra c. kulmann ma candidate chantelle am richmond professor recommended citation addressing the persistence of tuberculosis among the canadian inuit population: the need for a social determinants of health framework abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license addressing the persistence of tuberculosis among the canadian inuit population: the need for a social determinants of health framework structural racism and indigenous health: what indigenous perspectives of residential school and boarding school tell us? a case study of canada and finland the international indigenous policy journal volume 5 | issue 3 article 3 june 2014 structural racism and indigenous health: w hat indigenous perspectives of residential school and boarding school tell us? a case study of canada and finland sandra a. juutilainen centre for arctic medicine, thule institute, university of oulu, sandra.juutilainen@oulu.fi ruby miller six nations council, ruby@williamsconsulting.ca lydia heikkilä north finland social centre for excellence, sámediggi, sámisoster (ngo) arja rautio centre for arctic medicine, hule institute, university of oulu recommended citation juutilainen, s. a. , miller, r. , heikkilä, l. , rautio, a. (2014). structural racism and indigenous health: what indigenous perspectives of residential school and boarding school tell us? a case study of canada and finland. the international indigenous policy journal, 5(3). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.3 structural racism and indigenous health: w hat indigenous perspectives of residential school and boarding school tell us? a case study of canada and finland abstract the objective of this study was to explore, as an example of structural racism, the effects of residential school and boarding school on the self-perceived health of indigenous peoples’ in canada and finland. structured interviews were conducted at six nations of the grand river and inari municipality. the individual and intergenerational negative effects included themes of vulnerability (language and cultural loss, fractured identity, and negative self-worth), and resilience (indigenous identity, language and cultural renewal). indigenous identity, culture, and language are intertwined and key determinants of health. further studies about structural racism and a strong indigenous identity as a protective factor may provide valuable insight into health disparities. keywords residential school, boarding school, haudenosaunee, sámi, identity, health inequalities acknowledgments we would like to acknowledge six nations council, the six nations ethics committee, and the community members at six nations who participated in the study in canada and sámisoster (ngo), sámediggi, and the participants from inari municipality in finland. and to anne miesperä for conducting and transcribing the finland interviews and matti luonua for translating the finnish data to english. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ s t r u c t u r a l r a c i s m a n d i n d i g e n o u s h e a l t h : w h a t i n d i g e n o u s p e r s p e c t i v e s o f r e s i d e n t i a l s c h o o l a n d b o a r d i n g s c h o o l t e l l u s ? a c a s e s t u d y o f c a n a d a a n d f i n l a n d studies suggest that historical legacies of social oppression are the present day social forces that influence racial inequalities in health, with racism as the link between race and health (chae, nuru-jeter, lincoln, & francis, 2011; williams & mohammed, 2009). therefore, it is important to re-visit the past to better understand what is happening in the present. this type of research is important to give a better understanding of root causes of health inequalities; it has also shown that people who self-report experiences of racism have greater risk for mental and physical ailments (brondolo, brady, beatty, pencille, & contrada, 2009; paradies & cunningham, 2012; williams & mohammed, 2009). racism is a phenomenon that is multi-layered; therefore, it is important to investigate the structural layer because it may provide insight to the fundamental causes of health disparities (gee & ford, 2011). structural racism is defined as the macro-level systems, social forces, institutions, ideologies, and processes that interact with one another to generate and reinforce inequities among racial and ethnic groups (powell, 2008). throughout this article, we investigate structural racism through concepts of racially motivated oppression, discrimination, or inequality experienced by indigenous people in relation to the majority population. a quintessential model of structural racism is the educational experiences of indigenous peoples within the residential school and boarding school systems. the main goal of these institutions, whether it was written into policy or implied by institutional practices, was to assimilate indigenous children into the dominant culture. indigenous children were taught that their own language and cultural practices were inferior to the dominant culture and were instilled with the notion that they were “less than” the majority society. previous research extensively discusses how colonial education frameworks had profoundly negative impacts on indigenous health and well-being in the past and present (bastien, kremer, kuokkanen & vickers, 2003; chrisjohn et al, 2002; royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996; smith, 2009; truth and reconciliation commission [trc], 2012a, 2012b; whitbeck, adams, hoyt, & chen, 2004). colonization has been defined as a determinant of aboriginal health (baskin, 2007; moffit, 2004) and aboriginal status as a social determinant of health (mikkonen & raphael, 2010). colonialism, in the context of residential schools, impacts the health of aboriginal peoples by producing social, political, and economic inequalities that have a ripple effect on determinants of health, such as physical environments, health behaviour, education, food insecurity, employment, income, and cultural continuity (reading & wein, 2009). beliefs around health and well-being from an indigenous perspective embody more than the medical model (i.e., the absence of disease and standard definitions of health). indigenous peoples' concept of health and survival is both a collective and an individual intergenerational continuum encompassing a holistic perspective incorporating four distinct shared dimensions of life. these dimensions are the spiritual, the intellectual or mental, physical, and emotional. in linking these four fundamental dimensions, health and survival manifest themselves on multiple levels where the past, present, and future co-exist simultaneously (world health organization, 1999). this article aims to analyze experiences of residential and boarding schools, both individual and intergenerational, through the lens of racism at the structural level and to examine how structural racism 1 juutilainen et al.: structural racism and indigenous health published by scholarship@western, 2014 has impacted the health and well-being of indigenous people in two communities: six nations of the grand river in canada and the inari municipality in finland. r e s i d e n t i a l s c h o o l i n g i n c a n a d a the first group to be racialized in canada were indigenous people via policies such as the colonial canadian government policy of indian residential schools (sunseri & cannon, 2011). one hundred and thirty-two federally supported schools in canada were located across every province and territory, except newfoundland, new brunswick, and prince edward island. most schools were operated as "joint ventures" with anglican, catholic, presbyterian, or united churches that operated from 1863 to 1996. the government of canada built an educational system in which very young children were often forcibly removed from their homes and often taken far from their communities. many were inadequately fed, clothed, and housed. all were deprived of the care and nurturing of their parents, grandparents, and communities. first nations, inuit, and métis languages and cultural practices were prohibited in these schools. tragically, some of these children died while attending residential schools (aboriginal affairs and northern development canada, 2008), with research confirming at least 3,000 deaths at indian residential schools (the canadian press, 2012). the damage of the indian residential school process has been defined by scholars as “cultural genocide” (macdonald, 2007; macdonald & hudson, 2012) and genocide (akhtar, 2010; chrisjohn et al., 2002; woolford, 2009). the residential school system was not unique to canada. governments and missionary agencies in many countries around the world established boarding schools as part of the colonial process (trc, 2012b). although there are contextual differences in how the schools were operated worldwide, indigenous peoples generally argue that the historic purpose was to assimilate indigenous peoples into the dominant society in which they lived (smith, 2009). b o a r d i n g s c h o o l i n f i n l a n d assimilation tactics were not blatantly written into the education policy in finland; however, sámi language and culture were systematically repressed during this period (lehtola, 2012). finnish boarding schools, which were attended by both finnish and sámi children living in rural communities, played a key role in finnish national identity building between 1866 and 1977 (syväoja, 2004). during this time period, there were increasingly racially inspired discussions surrounding the ideal of an ethnically homogenous people in finland, that is who shared the same culture and language (nyyssönen, 2007). as a result, sámi cultural ways were openly hindered and belittled during this time. sámi identity was excluded in the national identity since the teaching language was finnish, even in the sámi regions with the exception of one school in outakoski, utsjoki. sámi children were forbidden to speak their mother tongue at school and in the dormitories and were severely punished if they did (aikio-launiemi, 1995; rasmus, 2008; valle, 1998; valkonen, 1998). since the finnish government did not consider sámi languages worth preserving, many sámi lost their native language, and this process occurred within a single generation (aikio-puoskari & pentikäinen, 2001). sámi children attending boarding school learned to adopt the finnish language and culture and were directed to the majority culture’s way of thinking and living (lehtola, 2012). their cultural connectedness and family ties were undermined while attending boarding schools, which only allowed a few visits home during the school year. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.3 s t u d y d e s i g n the aim of this case study was to investigate residential school and boarding school experiences of indigenous people from six nations of the grand river, a haudenosaunee1 community in canada, and the inari municipality, a sámi homeland area in finland, to better understand how experiences of racism at the structural level impacts holistic health and well-being on the individual and intergenerational level. the lead author originally collected the data during structured interviews in canada and finland for her master’s thesis entitled, less than: two indigenous communities experiences of discrimination and its impact on self-perceived health. ethical approval was received from the university of oulu, finland and the six nations ethics committee, canada for both the original data collection and use in the master’s thesis and for use of the data in this article. all participants signed informed consent to participate in the study. the original questionnaire contained 73 closed-ended and open-ended questions that solicited responses about socio-economic status, experiences of discrimination while accessing health services, individual level discrimination and racism, and residential school and boarding school experiences. since there was additional information that was not analyzed in detail for the master’s thesis, the questions about residential school and boarding school experiences were further analyzed for this article and will be included in an article based doctoral dissertation entitled, structural racism and its impact on indigenous health: a comparative study of canada, finland, and norway. for data collection, a purposive sampling method was used in order to recruit an equal number of male and female participants aged 18 to 80 years old. the ratio of female to male participants was 60% to 40%, respectively, in both countries. participants had either attended a canadian residential school or a finnish boarding school or had family members who attended. the lead author conducted 25 interviews in canada, which were recorded with permission and later transcribed verbatim. a finnish translator conducted 20 interviews in finland, which were recorded with permission and later transcribed and translated to english. the aim of this paper is to give voice to indigenous peoples in the body of work on structural racism by triangulating the data from the two countries to further investigate how racism at the structural level influences indigenous health and well-being. the idea for this article arose from two of the major themes from the master’s thesis data: the impact of colonization on indigenous health and responses about the various layers of racism (policy level, service level, and individual level racism). the intention was to reflect on the area of racism at the structural level (e.g., education policy) and conduct a deeper analysis of the open-ended responses about residential school and boarding school experiences in order to get explanations and increased understanding of how the interviewees defined the effects of structural racism. this process is described through firsthand and intergenerational experiences of racially                                                                                                                 1 the nations that recognize themselves as haudenosaunee are: mohawk, oneida, onondaga, cayuga, seneca, and tuscarora. for more information on the haudenosaunee confederacy see: https://www.haudenosauneeconfederacy.com/index2.html information about the six nations of the grand river can be found on their website: https://www.sixnations.ca 3 juutilainen et al.: structural racism and indigenous health published by scholarship@western, 2014 motivated oppression and discrimination that occurred within the confines of residential and boarding schools. narrative data were analyzed using nvivo version 9.2 software for qualitative narrative analysis. the themes that emerged were indigenous identity and resilience. for this article, the questions about residential school and boarding school experiences are analyzed in detail. in addition to the narrative material from the open-ended questions, the interviewees’ spontaneous narration in connection with close-ended questions are analyzed. the two cases—one from canada and one from finland—were chosen in order to gain an enlarged scope and insight of the related phenomena internationally and to investigate whether there were essential differences in the indigenous people’s experiences between the two countries with different education policies. solid, long-term working relationships were imperative to the successful collaborations with six nations of the grand river in canada and inari municipality in finland. for the study, it was difficult to recruit people who had attended residential schools in canada because it is a sensitive topic due to abuses (sexual, physical, emotion, spiritual) that occurred within this education system and the stigma attached to this experience. even though the researcher had good long-standing relationships within the community, it was made clear when working with community contacts that recruiting respondents would be challenging. however, it was possible to talk with people who had family members who attended residential schools. in finland, it took a lot of effort to recruit people to participate who had attended a finnish boarding school; however, due to long-standing relationships with the director of sámisostoer, a non-governmental organization (ngo), the process of recruiting interviewees with both firsthand and intergenerational experiences at boarding school was well facilitated. our research design encompasses a de-colonial framework that ensures collaboration, communication, and relationship building between the indigenous community and researcher at all stages of the research project from design and approval of the research tools to dissemination of the results (kovach, 2009a; kovach, 2009b; nicholls, 2009, wilson, 2008). stories and experiences from indigenous perspectives can give us insight into how knowledge and worldviews interrelate, and can open up new perspectives and raise consciousness (balto & østmo, 2012). this type of decolonizing methodology acknowledges that indigenous peoples have been constructed and represented in negative ways and that power and knowledge are interconnected (sunseri, 2007). power dynamics are also apparent in state definitions of indigenous identity. therefore, identifying and defining indigenous peoples internationally is complex. it is best to ask indigenous peoples themselves to determine how they will be defined and how they will be viewed for purposes of research (bartlett, madariaga-vignudo, o’neil & kuhnlein, 2007). for the purposes of this study, all participants were asked to self-identify their indigenous identity. in canada, all participants self-identified as first nations. in finland, all participants self-identified as sámi. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.3 r e s u l t s i n d i v i d u a l a n d i n t e r g e n e r a t i o n a l l e v e l i m p a c t s t o h e a l t h a n d w e l l b e i n g participants were asked if they had attended residential school or boarding school and if they believed it had an overall impact on their health and well-being: negative impact, positive impact, negative and positive impact, no impact, or don’t know. table 1 summarizes the participants’ responses to the questions. table 1 shows that, at the individual level, haudenosaunee respondents stated that their attendance at residential school had a negative impact on their individual health and well-being. for sámi participants, there were more diverse responses: negative impact (5 out of 16), and negative and positive impact (5 out of 16), no impact (4 out of 16), positive impact (1 out of 16), and don’t know (1 out of 16). it appears that more sámi females (4 out of 9) than males (1 out of 7) reported that attendance at boarding school had a negative impact on their health and well-being. more of the sámi participants reported that their experience at boarding school had both a negative and positive impact on their individual health and well-being. the negative impacts to health and well-being were well articulated in the narrative responses: h a u d e n o s a u n e e p e r s p e c t i v e : i think emotionally, yes, it had an impact. if i have to take a view, i was never the same person afterwards: emotionally, mentally. there was something different about me after that. i didn’t feel like the same kid. i wasn’t a kid after that. s á m i p e r s p e c t i v e : the school world of that the self-esteem was flattened altogether...because it was always when being there, you were dirty, you were always a rotten lappish, it was a thing that has affected my self-esteem a terrible amount. it’s in a way mentally affected, surely affects to this day and it affects a lot for sure. nothing positive but i managed to finish that school. additionally, sámi respondents talked about how their experience at boarding school contained both negative and positive elements: the boarding school life did make me neurotic in a certain way. that way i got more shy towards people. positive things as well, that i can be a really balanced person. 5 juutilainen et al.: structural racism and indigenous health published by scholarship@western, 2014 t a b l e 1 : a t t e n d a n c e a t r e s i d e n t i a l s c h o o l o r b o a r d i n g s c h o o l a n d i m p a c t s t o h e a l t h a n d w e l l b e i n g q u e s t i o n s c a n a d a n = 2 5 f i n l a n d n = 2 0 g e n d e r 60% female 40% male 60% female 40% male d i d y o u a t t e n d r e s i d e n t i a l s c h o o l / b o a r d i n g s c h o o l ? yes: 1 no: 14 yes: 1 no: 9 yes: 9 no: 3 yes: 7 no:1 d o y o u b e l i e v e i t h a d a n i m p a c t o n y o u r o v e r a l l h e a l t h a n d w e l l b e i n g ? negative: 1 negative: 1 negative: 4 negative: 1 positive: 0 positive: 1 negative and positive: 4 negative and positive: 1 no impact: 1 don’t know: 0 no impact: 3 don’t know: 1 d i d a m e m b e r o f y o u r f a m i l y a t t e n d r e s i d e n t i a l s c h o o l / b o a r d i n g s c h o o l ? yes: 13 no: 2 yes: 8 no: 2 yes: 11 no:1 yes: 8 no: 0 d o y o u b e l i e v e t h a t t h e i r a t t e n d a n c e a t a r e s i d e n t i a l s c h o o l / b o a r d i n g s c h o o l h a s h a d a n i m p a c t o n y o u r o v e r a l l h e a l t h a n d w e l l b e i n g ? negative: 6 negative: 3 negative: 2 negative: 1 positive: 1 positive: 0 positive: 2 positive: 0 negative and positive: 2 negative and positive: 0 negative and positive: 0 negative and positive: 0 no impact: 3 no impact: 4 no impact: 6 no impact: 4 don’t know: 1 don’t know: 1 don’t know: 1 don’t know: 3 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.3 we also asked about the intergenerational impacts of those participants who had family members attend a residential school or boarding school and if they believed it had an impact on their own health and well-being. almost all of the participants interviewed had a member of their family who had attended residential school and boarding school, respectively: 21 out of 25 haudenosaunee participants, and 19 out of 20 sámi participants. almost half of the haudenosaunee respondents stated they felt their health and well-being was impacted negatively if a member of their family had attended residential school and a few of the sámi respondents stated they felt their health and well-being was negatively impacted if a member of their family had attended boarding school, with more responses of “don’t know”. one third of haudenosaunee responses and half of the sámi reported that it had “no impact” on their health and well-being. equally, haudenosaunee men and women responded that it had a negative impact, and equally sámi men and women reported that it had a negative impact on their health and well-being. the intergenerational impacts were further discussed in the narrative responses of both haudenosaunee and sámi participants: h a u d e n o s a u n e e p e r s p e c t i v e : the people that did attend the residential schools and learned all the dysfunctional behaviours and the abuse, they did come back to our community…and because our community is so intertwined that abuse was spread throughout our community: the sexual abuse, the physical abuse. and the language...they were taught not to speak their language at the residential school and it brought shame to them. s á m i p e r s p e c t i v e : at least it still has a strong impact, even now…now that we talk about the boarding school times and this when the children have been subjected to all kinds of actions there, and the church talks about apologizing, that people dare to think how bad the situation has been. there would be a lot to do, actually there would be concrete things to do, need of support, chances to talk about things. n e g a t i v e i m p a c t s t o i n d i g e n o u s i d e n t i t y more often with the discussions about residential and boarding schools, haudenosaunee and sámi participants talked about its negative impacts to indigenous identity, in the past and present. the main themes that emerged from these discussions included: language and cultural loss, fractured identity, and negative self-worth. l a n g u a g e a n d c u l t u r a l l o s s language, culture, and identity are all intertwined and cannot be separated. participants talked about how the language loss also is equivalent to cultural losses because so much of the culture is embedded in the language. this created a break or disconnect from their indigenous identity. some sámi participants talked about their feelings of not being “as good” as other sámi because they lost their language and, as a result, they developed feelings of negative self-worth. the loss of language was seen as impacting all 7 juutilainen et al.: structural racism and indigenous health published by scholarship@western, 2014 individuals in the community through negative impacts to self-esteem and self-worth. participants describe this experience below: h a u d e n o s a u n e e p e r s p e c t i v e : i always tell people, that in my grandmother’s case, she was 8 years old when she went in, she came out when she was 14. when she went in all she spoke was mohawk, when she came out all she could speak is english, she couldn’t even speak mohawk until she was on her deathbed...that’s how big of an impact it had. so much of the culture is in the language. that important part of us as human beings, as communities, was lost for that time span. another respondent stated that: i think it’s really impacted the language, which has a profound impact on identity, which really has negatively impacted all individuals: self-esteem, motivation and confidence. i think those are some of the ripple effects we are seeing now from a multi-generational standpoint. s á m i p e r s p e c t i v e : what i run into in my work is that when you’ve lost the language you experience that you’re not as good a sámi as others. another respondent stated that: this type of lingual and cultural continuity from one generation to another, we were torn away when we were 6 years old, so we were torn from that growing environment where we had lived our first 6 years. firstly, our sámi language development ceased altogether, even though we of course had others who shared our fate, but everything concerning the livelihood and the life that was lived in the community, for example the vocabulary of the livelihood, that was broken. r i p p l e e f f e c t s o f l e a r n i n g i n a n i n s t i t u t i o n a l i z e d e n v i r o n m e n t within the canadian context, residential schools depended on student labour to survive. until the 1950s, the schools ran on what was called the “half-day system”. under this system, the older students spent half a day in class, while the other half was supposed to be spent in vocational training. in reality, this training often simply amounted to free labour for the school (trc, 2012a, 2012b). in finland, the need for children’s daily labour was less because the boarding schools were subsidized by the national education system. however, within both systems, there were similar consequences of receiving an education in a foreign language and not being allowed to speak one’s mother tongue. indigenous education principles were not included, which also had a negative impact on learning ability. both systems had the outcomes of learning in an institutionalized environment. participants talked about how their learning environment could be compared to a prison or institution. participants discussed the main outcomes of receiving an education in this environment as creating learning difficulties that continued into adult life, which affected their choice of jobs and income earning potential. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.3 h a u d e n o s a u n e e p e r s p e c t i v e : first of all, being in residential school, i never got an education so i took all these high-risk jobs. but up there, it wasn’t a healthy place to be, i didn’t think: mentally, psychologically, physically, because we almost never got enough to eat. just the situation up there, it was like an institution, you could compare it to prison. when i was there everybody had a number, got a number. s á m i p e r s p e c t i v e : i didn’t even learn finnish and i haven’t learned the new writing form of sámi because i haven’t learned grammar in school. i have writing problems, then it’s affected that i’ve had to do more physical work and have to hire support on the side for interpreting. another respondent stated that: in the boarding school, i really had to give up everything, almost like my entire home and related things and had to become the kind (of person) who are directed all the time by someone. in the morning they ring the bell to wake you up and when you go to sleep they tell you, “lights out!” you change entirely: (become) part of that machine. f r a c t u r e d i d e n t i t y discrimination of indigenous language and culture resulted in a fracturing of indigenous identity. this had two main negative outcomes: shame and displacement. it was further described by some participants as feeling ashamed of their indigenous identity; others felt displaced—like they no longer belonged in their home community or in the dominant society. the feeling of being placed somewhere between two worlds was described as an overall feeling of not being whole or broken. whole or holistic is a key definition to health and well-being for indigenous peoples where the definition of health includes a balance of the physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual realms. h a u d e n o s a u n e e p e r s p e c t i v e : now today i’m kind of like torn between church and the longhouse. i’ve got nothing against churches. i go to longhouse or church. but all these things get back to that they planted that little seed, way back when the younger you are, the more they are going to change you. another respondent stated: once my parents ended up taking me out of the schools here (on reserve) because they didn’t want me to learn all the traditional teachings and sent me an hour away to go to another school, it was just chaotic. so i really did grow up with the feeling that to be native was to be very, it was a less-than, an embarrassing, and inferior culture. s á m i p e r s p e c t i v e : another part in life is when you’re separated from your own community and how you can return to be part of the community again? it’s the part i think is even worse, that you’re not accepted 9 juutilainen et al.: structural racism and indigenous health published by scholarship@western, 2014 with your own. you’re not good there, you’re no good here, you’re like between two worlds, not whole, not part of the community, not as good in the community. another participant noted similar negative feelings about one’s self: that i was always considered lower, a rotten lapp, that you were like a rotted person. c o p i n g w i t h n e g a t i v e s e l f w o r t h experiences of social oppression and adverse trauma produce deep feelings of negative self-worth, which resulted in feelings of anger, stress, depression, and low self-esteem. pathways of vulnerability and resilience were explained within the process of coping. the participants talked about the ongoing healing work that was required to overcome traumatic experiences. some of the participants discussed various coping mechanisms at the individual and intergenerational level, such as overeating to “stuff feelings”, an inability to show feelings or love, and using drugs or alcohol as a form of escape. other forms of coping were described as feeling the need to overcompensate or the notion of feeling more work was required to prove you were just as “good” as the majority population. others talked about observations made of former attendees of boarding school or residential school as people who strived to model “perfectly ordered” lives, or keeping a very sterile environment. these forms of coping, including workaholic tendencies, were recognized as unhealthy ways to try to be accepted by the majority society. h a u d e n o s a u n e e p e r s p e c t i v e : when you read up on residential school and stuff like that, they wanted to kind of like civilize us and they denied our language and culture and everything, but yet, they didn’t want us to be really smart either, we just had to be down one notch, it seemed like. so these things cause hurt feelings. even if you did have an education, you had to be “extra” good. you had to be better than someone with the same education, you had to be a little bit better to get them to accept you. s á m i p e r s p e c t i v e : still just like when being sámi, you have to stay sharp to be as good as a finn. somehow this kind of defensive state and apologetic attitude, it’s probably because they always belittled, pushed down, and so that’s how i’ve had to struggle with myself… r e s i l i e n c e resilience was a topic of discussion and also viewed as source of power: a positive outcome of negative experiences. the participants talked about how they were able to overcome abuses experienced during their childhood and how they were able to develop healthy relationships within their own families and work towards ending generational abuses. participants reported a self-awareness of their own issues and noted that the healing process is possible but ongoing. a key focus on the stories of resilience by both haudenosaunee and sámi was the ongoing healing journey and restoration of their culture and languages. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.3 h a u n d e n o s a u n e e p e r s p e c t i v e : as i was growing up, it was confusing; i had to do a lot of learning, teaching and healing so that i can function in a healthy way, so that i don’t continue doing those things that i was taught to do. and that is an ongoing process, there is always something that comes up. another respondent discussed language and culture restoration: i make sure my kids are aware of their languages, one is now fully in the curriculum and her baby is only learning mohawk, she’s now writing the curriculum for the mohawk language. i told her about this program out here and they just loved her, she picked it right up. it can be brought back, if you have people like that. s á m i p e r s p e c t i v e : more negative than positive, living in the boarding school…has caused a lot of things that i’ve had to later sort of go through, caused traumas that i’ve had to work on later. another respondent discussed experience with sámi language in the school system: i think 20 years back when my daughter went to school. the daughter left as a pioneer to study as a sámi speaker in an elementary school. i felt it was pretty exciting that i wanted the child in a sámi speaking school, in a sami speaking class to begin that class…then when the teachers said that you are really demanding for sámi language and they have to organize it. but it was strange when i had the right to get the education for my child in her mother tongue, so why do they come to ask me whether i’m serious? d i s c u s s i o n this case study situates the topic of structural racism and its consequences on holistic health and wellbeing within the context of residential schools in canada and boarding schools in finland. this study serves to give voice to indigenous perspectives on how holistic health and well-being was and is influenced by residential school and boarding school experiences and allows for an expanded consciousness of the phenomenon of racial-oppression. structural racism is a conduit within the colonial framework of the institutionalized educational experiences of indigenous children. the residential schools and boarding schools were representations of racist thought within education policy and provided arenas for racist actions, both at the individual and institutional level. during the past several decades in canada, more research results have emerged documenting indigenous viewpoints on how racial oppression within the education system negatively impacts health and well-being. however, in finland there are only a limited number of studies on the subject and the matter has only recently been addressed in the media. namely, with more attention to the issue following a documentary that was released in 2011, “kun suomi tuli saamenmaahan” (“when finland came to samiland”), which included interviews with and stories from people who went through the process of changing their identities while attending finnish boarding schools (väliahdet & ahola, 2011). 11 juutilainen et al.: structural racism and indigenous health published by scholarship@western, 2014 for this study, it was earlier discussed how it can be difficult to get people to talk about their firsthand experiences within the residential school and boarding school systems. however, the documentary example from finland shows how film has the power to encourage people to discuss their own experiences on sensitive topics. in canada, a research project included digital stories2 of the intergenerational effects on professional first nations women whose mothers are residential school survivors (stout & peters, 2011). the addition of digital stories to research is an impactful tool and can be an accessible way to start and continue conversations and should be a part of future research in which the topic area is sensitive. these conversations are important not only for a greater understanding of the link between structural racism and health but also to allow for healing to occur. other research indicates that having opportunities to discuss historical trauma can order, situate, and provide meaning for troubling experiences (garro, 2003). it can go beyond the individual level to also further expand the concept and connections surrounding the intergenerational transmission of fragmented trauma narratives, or the fragmented “history” within historical trauma, which may benefit individuals or communities suffering from the effects of intergenerational trauma (denham, 2008). our research results show that the overall effects on the self-perceived health and well-being of the two indigenous groups were very similar regardless of the contextual differences in how the education systems operated in canada and finland. this finding gives us reason to believe that these effects are not only individual experiences or situation-specific to certain countries. structural racism seems to operate in similar ways and have similar outcomes regardless of the contextual differences in national policy, legislation, and institutional practices. canada’s government policy “to kill the indian in the child” and finland’s nation building process, whereby sámi identity, language, and culture were systematically repressed, produced similar negative impacts to indigenous identity based on the narratives of haudenosaunee and sámi interviewees. when viewing trauma through a multidimensional lens, both survivors and their offspring have areas of both vulnerability and resilience (danieli, 1998). based on individual and intergenerational responses, interviewees consistently reported that language, culture, and identity are directly connected, and that the canadian residential school and finnish boarding school systems created a disconnect between interviewees and their indigenous identity, which then has ripple effects to holistic health and wellbeing. this supports previous research that has shown that aboriginal identity, sometimes referred to as the concept of “connectedness”, is seen as a key social determinant of health (bourassa, mckaymcnabb, & hampton, 2005; carriere, 2008; johner, gingrich, jeffery, & maslany, 2008). our findings about the shortcomings of receiving an education in a foreign language and in an institutionalized environment that did not respect or tolerate indigenous language, culture, and epistemologies are similar to previous research that used psychological research and theory to explain the increased risk of poor academic performance, reduced capacity to continue education after leaving residential school, limited employment prospects, and reduced income as adults (barnes, josefowitz, & cole, 2006). when coping with historic traumas, there was potential for both vulnerability and resilience. areas of vulnerability included internalizing the attacks to culture, language, and identity,                                                                                                                 2digital stories available at: http://www.pwhce.ca/program_aboriginal_digitalstories.htm 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.3 which produced an inability to show emotions and feelings of shame about one’s indigenous identity. whereas other survivors possessed an awareness of the ongoing effort to heal from negative experiences, strived to end generational abuses, and had a positive outlook about keeping their language and culture alive. these experiences described in our study are similar to braveheart’s (2000) findings. she explored emotional experiences related to historical trauma, including anger, an impaired ability to bond, transposition, guilt, and somatic symptoms. yet, others had positive coping strategies, including having deep emotional attachments to others, holding traditional values, helping others, and focusing on future generations. our research results clearly show similarities between the two indigenous groups with respect to how indigenous identity was fragmented on the individual and intergenerational level and this coincides with other studies on historical trauma and the fragmentation of one’s sense of self or identity (caruth, 1996; crossley, 2000; greenberg 1998). there were similar experiences between the haudenosaunee and sámi in the connection between resilience and indigenous identity. this builds on discussions in other research which shows how strong indigenous identity has a buffering effect to the impacts of discrimination on mental health (hansen & sørlie, 2012; whitbeck et al., 2004). besides many similarities of experiences of haudenosaunee and sámi respondents, there were certain points of differences as well. in general, the haudenosaunee respondents appeared to be more critical to the effects of residence schools. as mentioned earlier, of the majority of those responses represented intergenerational impacts. while the second-generation sámi experiences were clearly not as negative, the firsthand sámi experiences were predominantly negative. this result may reflect differences in the national minority policy and institutional practices between the two countries. second, the result may reflect a difference in cultural communication patterns. the sámi narrative way typically builds on positive aspects, while negative experiences are addressed covertly. it reminds us of the importance of having an understanding of the multiple dimensions to indigenous epistemologies and that a pan-indigenous approach is not suitable for discussing different indigenous groups. more research to investigate the mechanisms between racism at the structural level and indigenous identity, which include a thorough understanding of indigenous epistemologies, may provide valuable insight into the health disparities experienced by indigenous peoples worldwide. participants discussed how repressed indigenous identity, language, and culture manifested in their own life experiences as low levels self-esteem, motivation, and confidence, and as feelings of shame, displacement, anger, and depression. indigenous identity, language, and culture are key determinants of health. the traumatic experiences of racial oppression of indigenous people will continue to challenge their everyday health and well-being as long as these matters are not addressed properly. structural racism encompasses social mechanisms that have made the privileges associated with being white and the disadvantages associated with being a person of colour as relatively permanent characteristics of western societies (harrell et al., 2011). with this in mind, an analysis of 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(2008). structural racism: building upon the insights of john calmore. north carolina law review, 86, 791-816. rasmus, m. (2008). baggu vuolggit, baggu birget. samemanaid ceavzinstrategiijat suoma albmotskuvlla asodagian 1950-1960 – logus. publications of giellagas institute nr 10. gummerus kirjapaino oy, vaajakoski, finland. retrieved from https://oula.linneanet.fi/vwebv/holdingsinfo?searchid=1268&reccount=10&recpointer=1&b ibid=1038214 reading c. & wien, f. (2009). health inequalities and social determinants of aboriginal peoples’ health. national collaborating centre for aboriginal health: prince george, british columbia. royal commission on aboriginal peoples. (1996). residential schools (chapter 10). in looking forward looking back (volume 1). false assumption and a failed relationship (part 2) (pp. 309394). retrieved from http://caid.ca/rrcap1.10.pdf smith, a. (2009, may 18-29). indigenous peoples and boarding schools: a comparative study. prepared for the secretariat of the united nations permanent forum on indigenous issues (8th session), new york. stout, r. & peters, s. (2011). kiskinohamamatotapanask: inter-generational effects on professional first nations women whose mothers are residential school survivors. winnipeg: prairie women’s 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.3 health centre of excellence. digital stories for the project available at http://www.pwhce.ca/program_aboriginal_digitalstories.htm sunseri, l. (2007). indigenous voice matters: claiming our space through decolonizing research. junctures: journal of thematic dialogue, 9(12), 93-106. sunseri, l. & cannon, m. (2011). not disappearing: an introduction to the text. in m. j. cannon & l. sunseri (eds.). racism, colonialism and indigeneity in canada: a reader (pp. xxii-xxvii). don mills: oxford university press. syväoja, h. (2004). kansakoulu – suomalaisten kasvattagja. perussivistystä koko kansalle 1866 – 1977. jyväskylä, finland: ps-kustannus, 304. the canadian press. (2012, february 18). residential school deaths in canada number at least 3,000, according to research. huffington post. retrieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2013/02/18/residential-school-deathscanada_n_2711087.html truth and reconciliation commission of canada (trc). (2012a). they came for the children: canada, aboriginal peoples, and residential schools. retrieved from www.trc.ca truth and reconciliation commission of canada (trc). (2012b). truth and reconciliation of canada interim report. retrieved from www.trc.ca väliahdet, p. (producer), & ahola, a. (director). (2011). kun suomi tuli saamenmaahen. finland: ima filbma – ja sátneduodji. valkonen, s. (1998). että tämönen saamelainen minä olen. saamelainen identiteetti asuntolasukupolven elämäkertojen valossa (pro gradu). university of tampere, tampere, finland. valle, s. (1998). hän ja asuntola. viiden saamelaisen kokemuksia asuntolasta (pro gradu). university of lapland, rovaniemi, finland. whitbeck, l. b., adams, g. w., hoyt, d. r., & chen, x. (2004). conceptualizing and measuring historical trauma among american indian people. american journal of community psychology, 33(3/4), 119-129. williams, d. r. & mohammed, s. a. (2009). discrimination and racial disparities in health: evidence and needed research. journal of behavioral medicine, february, 32(1), 20-47. wilson, s. (2008). research is ceremony – indigenous research methods. winnipeg: fernwood publishing. woolford, a. (2009). ontological destruction: genocide and canadian aboriginal peoples. genocide studies and prevention, 4, 81-97. 17 juutilainen et al.: structural racism and indigenous health published by scholarship@western, 2014 world health organization: committee on indigenous health. (1999). the geneva declaration on the health and survival of indigenous peoples (who/hsd/00.1.). geneva: author. 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.3 the international indigenous policy journal june 2014 structural racism and indigenous health: what indigenous perspectives of residential school and boarding school tell us? a case study of canada and finland sandra a. juutilainen ruby miller lydia heikkilä arja rautio recommended citation structural racism and indigenous health: what indigenous perspectives of residential school and boarding school tell us? a case study of canada and finland abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license structural racism and indigenous health: what indigenous perspectives of residential school and boarding school tell us? a case study of canada and finland collection and governance of data: much to learn the international indigenous policy journal volume 5 issue 2 the governance of indigenous information article 4 april 2014 collection and governance of data: much to learn jerry p. w hite university of western ontario, white@uwo.ca recommended citation white, j. p. (2014). collection and governance of data: much to learn. the international indigenous policy journal, 5(2). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.2.4 collection and governance of data: much to learn abstract there is an extensive history of research projects with indigenous communities around the world where the projects were based on western epistemologies and were neither collaborative, nor communitybased.this editorial introduces the international indigenous policy journal's special issue on the governance of indigenous information. the issue opens a dialog about how data can be collected and governed in a way that empowers indigenous peoples and communities. keywords data collection, data governance, research ethics, indigenous methods creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ c o l l e c t i o n a n d g o v e r n a n c e o f d a t a : m u c h t o l e a r n there is an extensive history of research projects with indigenous communities around the world where the projects were based on western epistemologies and were neither collaborative, nor community based. further, there have been many research projects that have “…been based on disrespectful relationships, misinterpreted cultural ceremonies, and [presented] inaccurate portrayals of first nations peoples…researchers have mined both physical and intellectual property, using practices ranging from disturbance of sacred burial grounds to appropriation of ceremonial practices to theft of knowledge” (assembly of first nations, 2009, p. 5). this past speaks to the need for a new beginning. as i said in an editorial in volume 4, issue 3: beyond simply condemning unethical research with indigenous populations, we need to examine why this happened and understand what the implications and lessons are for "policy research" moving forward. policy research is a powerful tool when conducted in the proper way. we must never lose sight of the reason we are engaged in the activity: to improve well-being through the improvement of understanding that leads to change. the research process must, itself, be part of the positive process (white, 2013). we have to begin to understand that as researchers we actually act as intercessors for information, which means we hold a certain level of power because we construct arguments that can impact real people in real time. we build or tear down legitimacy and as such have a responsibility to protect and enhance the peoples we partner with in research endeavors. there have been some very positive changes in the conduct of research, due in some part to the development of better ethics review and the sincere push by indigenous people’s themselves for improving how work is done. there is a shift in academia towards respectful research where the community or organization members are partners instead of being simply research participants (or worse yet “research subjects”). there is a growing understanding that aboriginal knowledge “is integrated and valued throughout the entire research process” (assembly of first nations, 2005, p. 5). importantly, there has been growth in the use of plain language and memorandums of understandings developed by partners in projects that spell out how data is collected and governed. research is intrinsically neither good nor bad. it can be either depending on who does it, how it is done, and the outcomes it produces. that said, as the articles in this special focused edition of iipj point out, there are a lot of things for us to learn. the lessons that are arising from this change in the conduct of research are many: the need to partner; the need to have clear protocols; the need to ensure the research benefits the communities; the need to incorporate traditional understandings and knowledge, where allowed by indigenous peoples, into all aspects of the research; the need for indigenous peoples to have a direct say in how data gathered is used; and many more important things. on the governance of data, the state of our evolution is comparatively meagre. who decides how to use data? what is the role of the researcher and what is the role of the community partners (or in mass surveys the population partners)?   1 white: collection and governance published by scholarship@western, 2014 we are pleased to open a dialogue on these issues and thank the contributors featured in this issue for their work. we do not see this as definitive, but rather a part of a widespread discussion that is going on in multiple countries and regions. jerry p. white editor-in-chief april 2014 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 2 [2014], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.2.4 r e f e r e n c e s assembly of first nations. (2005). first nations ethics guide on research and aboriginal traditional knowledge. ottawa: author. assembly of first nations. (2009). ethics in first nation research. ottawa: author. white, j. p. (2013). policy research: good or bad (editorial)? the international indigenous policy journal, 4(3), article 2. retrieved from http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/2/ 3 white: collection and governance published by scholarship@western, 2014 the international indigenous policy journal april 2014 collection and governance of data: much to learn jerry p. white recommended citation collection and governance of data: much to learn abstract keywords creative commons license collection and governance of data: much to learn the international indigenous policy journal volume 8 issue 4 reconciling research: perspectives on research involving indigenous peoples—part 2 article 1 october 2017 miýo-pimātisiwin developing indigenous cultural responsiveness theory (icrt): improving indigenous health and well-being jolee sasakamoose university of regina, jolee.sasakamoose@uregina.ca terrina bellegarde federation of sovereign indigenous nations, terrina.bellegarde@fsin.com wilson sutherland federation of sovereign indigenous nations, wilson.sutherland@fsin.com shauneen pete university of regina, shauneen.pete@uregina.ca kim mckay-mcnabb indigenous herapist, private practice, dr.mckay.mcnabb@gmail.com recommended citation sasakamoose, j. , bellegarde, t. , sutherland, w. , pete, s. , mckay-mcnabb, k. (2017). miýo-pimātisiwin developing indigenous cultural responsiveness theory (icrt): improving indigenous health and well-being. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(4). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.1 miýo-pimātisiwin developing indigenous cultural responsiveness theory (icrt): improving indigenous health and well-being abstract the truth and reconciliation commission of canada calls upon those who can effect change within canadian systems to recognize the value of indigenous healing practices and to collaborate with indigenous healers, elders, and knowledge keepers where requested by indigenous peoples. this article presents the indigenous cultural responsiveness theory (icrt) as a decolonized pathway designed to guide research that continuously improves the health, education, governance, and policies of indigenous peoples in saskatchewan. decolonizing practices include privileging and engaging in indigenous philosophies, beliefs, practices, and values that counter colonialism and restore well-being. the icrt supports the development of collaborative relationships between indigenous peoples and non-indigenous allies who seek to improve the status of first nations health and wellness. keywords indigenous health, indigenous methodologies, indigenous theory, health and well-being acknowledgments peter nippi – kinistin first nation murray ironchild – piapot first nation sam isaac – ochapowace first nation lorraine yuzicappi – standing buffalo first nation rose atimoyoo – little pine first nation lambert sylvestre – turner lake first nation dorothy myo – saskatchewan indian cultural centre willie ermine – sturgeon lake first nation ben weenie – sweet grass first nation janice kennedy – battlefords tribal council flora fiddler – meadow lake tribal council angie tanner – cowessess first nation val arnaultpelletier – university of saskatchewan – college of medicine joyce racette – regina qu’appelle regional health authority gabe lafond – saskatoon health regional health authority patricia neufeld – prince albert parkland regional health authority noel starblanket university of regina alma poitras university of regina creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ m iýo pi māt i s i w i n1 d e v e l o p i n g i n d i g e n o u s c u l t u ra l r e s p o n s i v e n e s s t h e o ry ( i c r t ) : i m p ro v i n g i n d i g e n o u s h e a l t h a n d w e l l be i n g s i t u a t i n g o u r w o rk this article describes the theoretical development of the indigenous cultural responsiveness theory (icrt). indigenous peoples and communities are leading the way by melding science with tradition, laying new ground for evaluating culture-as-intervention (fiedeldey-van dijk et al., 2016). in 2016, the muskowekwan first nation (mfn) engaged indigenous scholars jolee sasakamoose (ojibwe) and shauneen pete (cree), as well as indigenous therapist dr. kim mckay-mcnabb (cree), to work with the mfn community to develop a first nations community-based family healing and wellness centre. federation of sovereign indigenous nations (fsin, previously known as the federation of saskatchewan indian nations) partners terrina bellegarde (nakota-cree) and wilson sutherland (cree) joined sasakamoose, pete, and mckay-mcnabb to transform the culturally responsive framework (crf; fsin, 2013) into a theoretical model that continuously improves the well-being of indigenous peoples in saskatchewan. this partnership draws from the collective wisdom of first nations elders, knowledge keepers, and leaders at the community level alongside provincial first nations leadership, scholars, and health practitioners. together we are working to challenge the assumptions and privileging of western researchers’ intellectual practices (blaut, 1993). this community-based partnership answers whitbeck’s (2006) call for new generations of indigenous researchers who can do the work from within. while icrt is a model created and owned by first nations peoples living within saskatchewan’s borders, the fundamental principles can be locally adapted and applied. t e rm i n o l o g y a n d c o n t e x t we use the terminology first nations, aboriginal, indigenous, native, and métis throughout the manuscript as we have adopted the terms used by authors of studies cited. although for the purpose of applying this theoretical model, we address the first nations people of saskatchewan to whom this framework belongs, as expressed by principles of ownership, control, access, and possession (ocap®; first nations information governance centre, 2017).2 first nations people in saskatchewan developed this framework and, for the purposes of this article, first nations refers to: those people in saskatchewan who are . . . reserve or urban-based, rural, remote, or northern dwellers, status or non-status members, treaty and non-treaty nations, traditional or non-traditional peoples. it is inclusive of all kinship patterns and all tribes and linguistic groups, whether they be of the nehiyawak (cree, plains, swampy, and woodland), nakawe (saulteaux/anishnaabe), deesuline, or lakota, dakota, and nakota decent. in other words this is a framework that speaks to and is for all first nations in the province. (fsin, 2013, p. 9) 1 cree for “in a good way.” 2 first nations principles of ocap® are a set of standards that establish how first nations data should be collected, protected, used, or shared. they are the de facto standard for how to conduct research with first nations. 1 sasakamoose et al.: developing indigenous cultural responsiveness theory published by scholarship@western, 2017 this framework was also intended for non-indigenous peoples interested in providing culturally responsive service that continuously improves the health, education, governance, and policies of indigenous peoples in saskatchewan. a s y n o p s i s o f t h e i n d i g e n o u s c u l t u ra l r e s p o n s i v e n e s s t h e o ry ( i c r t ) d e v e l o p m e n t theories are systematic sets of interrelated statements and constructs intended to explain some aspect of social life (gay & weaver, 2011). the development of a theory is a complex and philosophical experience and all research requires a sound theoretical basis and strong methodology (udo-akang, 2012). from a first nations perspective, everything relates to the spiritual realm. as developers of this theory, we understand this to be of key importance. we created this model as an overt act of resistance countering settler narratives that seek to hold power and privilege, justifying and reinforcing aggressive assimilative policies aimed at the destruction of first nation well-being (snowshoe & starblanket, 2016). this decolonizing model validates and supports indigenous histories and inherent rights. such a theory will generate research and the research generated will refine the theory (gelso, 2006). we are using this model to reframe, rename, reclaim, and restore our own methodological approaches. our team carried out an indigenous-centred research process supported by local traditional knowledge keepers. this allowed us to develop a decolonizing theory that prioritizes indigenous methodologies and ways of knowing alongside evidence-based western practices to harmonize with localized indigenous knowledges. in august 2016, a draft of the paper was taken into the sundance lodge. a message from one of the elders indicated that our team “must continue to talk to the old people about the framework and keep asking for guidance” (sundance elder, personal communication, august 2016). by engaging in ceremony, the icrt establishes a middle ground that allows parties to come together, ask for guidance from the ancestors, and move forward together in reconciliation. this article presents the indigenous cultural responsiveness theory (icrt), a decolonizing model that aims to improve first nations well-being in the province of saskatchewan. this framework emerged from ceremonial and community engagement processes that identified three strategic directions: a. restore first nations community-based health and wellness systems; b. establish a “middle ground” for engagement between mainstream and first nations systems and worldviews by instituting a mutually beneficial co-existence as the foundational stage for reconciliation and respectful engagement; and c. transform mainstream service delivery to become culturally responsive by guiding research that continuously improves the health, education, governance, and policies of indigenous peoples in saskatchewan. each of these strategic directions clearly identifies objectives that can be found in more detail in the fsin (2013) cultural responsiveness framework (crf) document. as we further develop the model, we will translate the knowledge back to first nations community members through engagement processes as well as academic channels to allow this theory to be expressed through practical applications. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.1 the key to developing a much-needed culturally adaptable framework for first nations peoples may not lie in decolonizing the approach but utilizing culture as the very tool to engage wellness. snowshoe and starblanket (2016) identify four healing protective factors that are effective when applied as principles decolonized approaches to well-being: a. trauma-informed, b. strengths-based, c. community engaged, and d. spiritually grounded. these principles are appropriate for the icrt because they fit with an indigenous worldview and are already a component of the establishing a middle ground. therefore, according to definitions of theoretical practice, icrt is a working theoretical model that is grounded in the nuances of life that give meaning and significance to the various stakeholders (gay & weaver, 2011). s e t t i n g t h e c o n t e x t : w e a re g ro u n d e d i n t h e t re a t y the historical context when one is working with indigenous peoples of canada is crucial. the legacies of colonialism are ubiquitous and tenacious. the trauma of colonization and the residential school system remains embedded in the lives of indigenous peoples through direct experience and intergenerational transmission. without reparation and healing, such trauma is compounded by racism and inequity in health, education, governance, and policy systems. for indigenous peoples, endemic poverty and attitudes toward health further compound these barriers from the earliest age. however, evidence reveals that recovery from colonization is grounded in cultural healing practices (for example, sweat lodges, traditional teachings; fiedeldey-van dijk et al., 2016; yellow bird, 2012, 2013, 2015). these culturally based healing practices are usually regionally specific and are commonly led by respected community members who are able to facilitate such experiences (rowan et al., 2014). culturally based healing addresses wellness in a holistic manner, unlike western biomedical approaches that focus on the absence of disease (shea et al., 2013). culturally based healing practices have been shown to improve functioning in all areas of wellness for indigenous peoples on the road to recovery from canada’s colonial policies and practices (fiedeldey-van dijk et al., 2016). first nations assert that the treaties are a sacred covenant in which sovereign nations exchanged solemn promises—kihci-asotamatowin, meaning “sacred promises to one another, the treaty sovereigns’ sacred undertakings”—that were formalized by the pipe ceremony. treaty 6 signatories agreed to share land in exchange for relief and medical services; these are most commonly known as the “medicine chest” and “pestilence” clauses of treaty 6. in signing the treaties, first nations did not surrender their traditional healing practices or medicines. instead, they stood to protect their health system and supplement this section with western medical care and medicines (boyer, 2003). according to the office of the treaty commissioner (1998): both the modern western medical practices and traditional first nations healing systems have important contributions to make to the well-being of treaty first nations people. the fsin 3 sasakamoose et al.: developing indigenous cultural responsiveness theory published by scholarship@western, 2017 wishes to explore how treaty first nations governance in the area of health might help treaty first nations optimize the benefits of both the western and traditional medical systems. one possibility suggested by first nations is to establish institutions that integrate both systems. (p. 51) between 1871 and 1921, the crown and first nations across canada signed 11 numbered treaties. saskatchewan is covered by the “sacred blanket” of treaties 2, 4, 5, 6, 8, and 10, and the first nations signatories range from saulteaux, dene, cree, dakota, and lakota to nakota or assiniboine descent. when the crown and first nations entered into a treaty for purposes of mutual respect and benefit, the treaties were to secure a positive future for the children of the signatories and future generations (cardinal & hildebrandt cited in boyer, 2003). treaty rights are constitutionally protected under section 35(1) of the constitution act (1982) and they have also been recognized by the canadian courts. the fact that first nations peoples did not surrender their systems and meant to supplement with western health services should mean that indigenous peoples are among the healthiest in canada. to the contrary, first nations peoples face many health challenges in contemporary canadian society. decades of colonization, oppression, and government assimilation policies have eroded first nations languages and cultures. first nations languages and cultural practices (such as sweat lodge, sun dance, rites of passage, traditional medicines) embedded community specific protective factors to help people deal with individual, family, and community well-being. the loss of cultural and healing practices caused indigenous peoples to experience a variety of social and health challenges. current issues in the canadian context include a high rate of disengagement from education (crooks et al., 2015), ongoing health challenges, high suicide rates, physical inactivity, obesity, substance abuse (sasakamoose, scerbe, wenaus, & scandrett, 2016), and overrepresentation in corrections facilities and poverty (brokenleg, 2012). first nations’ experiences of many historical and current events have exerted a lasting effect on the health of indigenous peoples. these determinants include the creation of the reserve system, forced relocations, forced placement of children in residential schools, inadequate services for those living on reserves, systemic racism, and a lack of comprehension of the effects of these experiences in the mainstream society (association of faculties of medicine of canada, 2017). by imposing western cultural values and laws, canada has profoundly influenced every social determinant of health for indigenous peoples living within colonized lands. this colonization has been described as a “process of encroachment and subsequent subjugation of indigenous peoples since the arrival of the europeans. from the indigenous perspective, it refers to the loss of lands, resources, and self-direction and to the severe disturbance of cultural ways and values” (association of faculties of medicine of canada, 2017, p. 84). although there is no lack of first nations input into the future of first nations health, education, policy, and governance, this perspective has clearly not been honoured or implemented. further, our community engagement processes acknowledged that the type of change needed to make a system culturally responsive will only occur through the people who are trained and practise within those same systems. it will be through attitudinal change and education, and each of these will be dependent upon individual organizations and the policies and regulations through which we can affect change (fsin, 2013). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.1 i n d i g e n o u s e p i s t e m o l o g i e s : a c o m m u n i t y d ri v e n m e t h o d o l o g y in the summer of 2008, the federation of saskatchewan indians (fsin), health canada’s first nations and inuit health branch, and the saskatchewan ministry of health signed the memorandum of understanding on first nations health and well-being in saskatchewan (fsin, government of canada, & government of saskatchewan, 2008). a main aim of the partnership was to improve first nations health status and eliminate the health disparities between first nations and non-first nations people in the province. the truth and reconciliation commission (trc) of canada released 94 calls to action (2015), in order to redress the legacy of residential schools and advance the process of canadian reconciliation. therefore, we have all been charged to take steps to reconcile the historic wrongs to which indigenous peoples were subjected through colonization and the residential school system. practitioners operating within the icrt framework will directly engage many of these trc calls to action. the truth and reconciliation commission of canada (trc, 2015) calls upon those who can effect change within canadian systems to recognize the value of indigenous healing practices and to collaborate with indigenous healers, elders, and knowledge keepers where requested by indigenous peoples. after the signing of the mou in 2008, the fsin engaged in a community-based research strategy to develop a first nations health and wellness plan. the fsin used indigenous methodologies to engage first nations peoples in developing a health and wellness plan that addressed culturally appropriate, responsive, patient-oriented care as a foundational priority. programs that reflect the social and cultural realties of the group for which they are intended are anticipated to be more accessible, congruent, and effective than programs that do not (whitbeck, adams, hoyt, & chen, 2004). because indigenous methodologies are relatively new to academia, it is useful to illustrate the ways in which indigenous theory and worldview influenced aspects of the research design (kovach, carriere, montgomery, barrett, & giles, 2015). the fsin conducted in-depth indigenous qualitative consultations (kovach, 2012; sasakamoose et al., 2016). community participants included men, women, and youth from a broad array of first nations communities. the fsin held community engagement consultations during cultural camps, conferences, ceremonies, and other community events. the fsin team considered it particularly important to seek permission from and involve the cultural “experts”—the mitew or kehteayak (elders),3 otisapahcikewiyiniw (ceremonialists), maskihkiwiyiniw (medicine people or herbalists), and oskapewis (helpers)—from the various tribes and linguistic groups. in accordance with traditional practices and protocols of the hosting communities. the team approached the kehte-ayak with tobacco and invited them to contribute as advisors and leaders of this sensitive process. the kehte-ayak made it clear from the outset of the project that “whenever life is spoken about, ceremony leads the discussion and gathering” (fsin, 2013, p. 11). in keeping with these words, pipe ceremonies and other cultural protocols became essential to the framework development process. the document, the cultural responsiveness framework (crf) emerged as a 31-page living guide designed to address several key principles and objectives to ensure that saskatchewan’s health care system respects the cultures of first nations peoples and assists in the restoration of first nations own health systems. as fsin (2013) stated as part of the crf: 3 we recognize that there are several languages represented in this document. we use cree predominately among the other languages throughout this article. 5 sasakamoose et al.: developing indigenous cultural responsiveness theory published by scholarship@western, 2017 while it is important to make reforms to mainstream health policies, services and programs that recognize and respect first nations cultures, it is equally important to keep in mind nuhec’alanie (dene: our way of life), that it is the fact that distinct first nations systems (e.g., mitewiwin, grand medicine society) still exist, systems which are guided and shaped by their own protocols, e nacinehiket (cree), languages, healing approaches, medicines and practitioners, and which continue to be accessed and utilized by many first nations peoples for their health and wellbeing. (p. 7) c u l t u re a s i n t e rv e n t i o n t o a f f e c t c o l o n i a l r e s i d u e a profound assertion derived from the first nations community members was that culture is “critical to both understanding and remedying the issue, and that culture is key to health and healing” (fsin, 2013, p. 11). first nations peoples in saskatchewan recognized that change is needed in the systems that affect the social determinants of health (for example, income, education, health, research, governance) and that health disparities will not be addressed unless those who practise within these systems embrace an indigenous cultural responsiveness paradigm. this paradigm recognizes that colonial policies and practices will continue to be a detriment to indigenous health and well-being. health, education, research, governance, and policies that practitioners bring to the forefront must engage the land, language, and cultural practices specific to the people for whom they are meant to work. in other words, any attempts to improve first nations mental, emotional, spiritual, or physical well-being must involve co-participation in protocols specific to the community for whom they are being designed (national aboriginal health organization [naho], 2007; snowshoe & starblanket, 2016; whitbeck, 2006). when the duty to consult4 with first nations communities is respected and an indigenous model of cultural responsiveness is implemented, educators, researchers, health and wellness practitioners, and governance leaders may influence change in the social determinants of health that affect indigenous peoples (fsin, 2013; reading & wein, 2009; snowshoe & starblanket, 2016). the fsin team’s community-engaged research findings also indicated that indigenous medical thinking emphasizes healing, which is achieved by restoring balance in the four realms of spiritual, emotional, mental, and physical health, whereas western medicine focuses on treating illness. indigenous healing relationships recognize more routes to healing than biomedical science, and the contrast highlights the dilemma facing modern clinicians who aspire to provide health care when often they only have time to treat disease (hunter, logan, goulet, & barton, 2006). first nations community members agreed that western biomedical frameworks that revolve around diagnoses tend to be limited and do not consider the collective and cumulative intergenerational and historic trauma that indigenous peoples experience (brooks, daschuk, poudrier, & almond, 2015; yellow horse brave heart, 1998, 1999, 2000). those frameworks also tend to focus on negative outcomes rather than on ways in which people can maintain wellness after trauma (smith, 2006). therefore, the icrt embeds a strengths-based approach within the framework as it shifts the perceived deficits away from the individual and places them within the appropriate context (i.e., residential schools, colonization; snowshoe & starblanket, 2016). 4 article 19 of the declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (united nations general assembly, 2007) indicates that first nations have the right to be consulted in good faith before the adoption and implementation of legislative or administrative measures that may affect first nations. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.1 t h e m o d e l : w e a v i n g i n d i g e n o u s s c h o l a rs h i p w i t h c o m m u n i t y n e e d o p e ra t i o n a l d e f i n i t i o n s a n d i n d i g e n o u s w e l l n e s s we acknowledge that indigenous nations have distinct sacred knowledge, beliefs, and traditions and that each individual community will locally develop this framework to their own ways of knowing. however, unified concepts of culture have been identified (dumont, 2014) and we use this as a basis for building the theory. as an indigenous construct, wellness is an inclusive state or position of balance, wherein spirit–heart–mind–body work together through the primary unified concepts of culture, thus rendering culture, in and by itself, as an intervention toward wellness (fiedeldey-van dijk et al., 2016). mcconnery and dumont’s (2010) concept of native wellness is defined as the whole and healthy person expressed through a balance of spirit, heart, mind, and body. researchers theorized and empirically demonstrated that indigenous culture expressed through cultural intervention practices (cip) are an underpinning for wellness with indigenous peoples (fiedeldey-van dijk et al., 2016). the foundation of icrt is that indigenous health, wellness, and education can be improved by utilizing cip. therefore, the mere participation in indigenous cultural healing practices is an intervention for wellness for all people (lavallie & sasakamoose, 2016) and is particularly effective for first nations, métis, and inuit peoples. c o n c e p t 1 . m i d d l e g ro u n d : e rm i n e ’ s e t h i c a l s p a c e the concept of middle ground emerged as a place where the two systems (first nations and western) could come together as “equals to work together in a way that would be to the benefit of all” (fsin, 2013, p. 6), and it was in this conceptual space that the icrt was formed. ermine (2007) described ethical space as being formed when two societies with disparate worldviews are poised to engage each other: the ethical space of engagement proposes a framework as a way of examining the diversity and positioning of indigenous peoples and western society in the pursuit of a relevant discussion on indigenous legal issues and particularly to the fragile intersection of indigenous ways of knowing and canadian legal systems. ethical standards and the emergence of new rules of engagement through recent supreme court rulings call for new approaches to indigenous–western dealings. the new partnership model of the ethical space, in a cooperative spirit between indigenous peoples and western institutions, will create new currents of thought that flow in different directions of legal discourse and overrun the archaic ways of interaction. (pp. 193–194) throughout history, indigenous peoples have refused to surrender to a fear-based worldview that purports to have answers to everything yet has answers to very few problems. we are living in a time when our technological power has so vastly outdistanced our spiritual progress that we are threatened by the prospect of a global catastrophe. the human mind can create medicine to keep us alive, but it cannot create the will to live; it can manufacture an engine of war, but it cannot create deep peace (williamson, 2010). in the ethical space, we atone for our human arrogance. one of the major features of indigenous spiritualty is the belief in the spirit world and the consciousness that resides there. it is recognized that spirit beings are real and that it is possible to develop relationships with them and that they can provide guidance in crucial areas such as health and healing (stonechild, 2016). 7 sasakamoose et al.: developing indigenous cultural responsiveness theory published by scholarship@western, 2017 ceremonies are the way we deal with good health. we do these things to seek “health, happiness, help and understanding.” spiritual growth “comes from the inside out” and spiritual learning and strength “comes from the heart.” long ago our people lived a simple life that encompassed total spirituality. everything that was done was with the traditional teachings. today, our people are facing hardships because they have forgotten the old ways. there is a need to bring this back if one wants to survive and to have a healthy community. (kehte-ayak (elder) cited in federation of saskatchewan indian nations, 2013, p. 11) within the icrt, the ethical space is a sacred space. anyone agreeing to enter it should be committed to working toward the improvement of indigenous well-being and be prepared to follow the metaphysical guidance that emanates from the spiritual interactions. prayer is to take spiritual action. from an indigenous perspective, the spiritual is the gateway to the mental, physical, and emotional planes. it is said that seeking balance between the emotional, spiritual, mental, and physical domains is where the healing process occurs (sasakamoose et al., 2016). on a spiritual level, with every problem we have, our role is to find the place of hurt and transform it. it is in the negative emotions that we need healing; this is the chance to transform the past and move into healing or, for some, reconciliation (personal communication, noel starblanket, july 12, 2016). while there is an assumption that icrt practitioners begin in the ethical space of engagement, we acknowledge that, before entering the middle ground, non-indigenous partners and allies must engage in critical reflection and move beyond the awareness of differences to examine the significance of these differences for themselves and society (peters, 2010). in the ethical space, differences are not only acknowledged, but also negotiated in culturally sensitive ways. seldom do non-indigenous participants have all the values, attitudes, skills, and knowledge they require for genuine dialogue with indigenous peoples (peters, 2010). therefore, it is an assumption of this theory that non-indigenous partners will do their own work and reconciliation within prior to engaging in this model of action. c o n c e p t 2 . t w o e y e d s e e i n g etuaptmumk is the mi’kmaw word for “two-eyed seeing.” this concept originated through the work of mi’kmaq elders murdena and albert marshall from eskasoni first nation. it means to see from one eye with the strengths of indigenous knowledges and ways of knowing and from the other eye with the strengths of western knowledges and ways of knowing and to use both of these eyes together (bartlett, marshall, & marshall, 2012; ermine, sinclair, & jeffery, 2004). it is within this area of ethical space that the strengths of indigenous ways and the strengths of evidence-informed western approaches are considered. the work of grappling with each other’s cognitive universes and learning to see through the minds of others is the work of generations to come (newhouse, 2004). the canadian institutes of health research (cihr) institute of aboriginal peoples’ health has adopted the two-eyed seeing concept with the goal of transforming indigenous health and it figures prominently in its vision for the future (cihr institute of aboriginal peoples’ health, 2011; hall, dell, fornssler, hopkins, & mushquash, 2015). one indigenous practice that takes place in any ceremony is the act of offering gratitude and seeking kindness, humility, and guidance from the ancestors. within the middle ground, the two-eyed seeing approach honours the spirits of place and the knowledge of the participants, and it recognizes the 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.1 colonial power relations and collective power differences. two-eyed seeing allows for making conscious decisions to activate whichever lens is more appropriate to use or a harmonization of both. this recentering debases enshrined modes of colonial power and governance mechanisms and brings into question the fundamental role of the outcomes (hall et al., 2015). c o n c e p t 3 . n e u ro d e c o l o n i z a t i o n neurodecolonization is based on the evidence of brain neuroplasticity, meaning the brain can change neurologically and adapt and/or compensate (adlaf et al., 2017). with neurodecolonization, people are using mindfulness techniques to create new and healthy neuropathways while changing negative harmful pathways associated with colonization. yellow bird (2013) provided a scientific rationale: neurodecolonization is a conceptual framework, which uses mindfulness research to facilitate an examination of ways in which the human brain is affected by the colonial situation and an exploration of mind–brain activities that change neural networks and enable individuals to overcome the myriad effects of trauma and oppression inherent in colonialism. (p. 294) in other words, colonialism changes the brain’s neural pathways and neurodecolonization takes place within the colonized person to generate positive, empowering thoughts. neurodecolonization uses traditional ceremonies (cultural intervention practices) as training to change the mind and brain, allowing healing to occur from the trauma of colonialism (yellow bird, 2012, 2013, 2015). described as a blend of meditation and traditional contemplative practices, mindfulness corrects cognitive biases and current eurocentrically created mindlessness. through the creative strategic approaches of neurodecolonization, indigenous peoples can harness positive thinking and challenge oppression (yellow bird, 2013). using neurodecolonization (ceremonial) approaches within the ethical space, both indigenous peoples and non-indigenous allies are able to work in solidarity to build a collaborative future in the areas of indigenous health, wellness, and education. current research identifies the strong mind–body connection that occurs during neurodecolonizing activities. malchiodi (2003a) noted that neuroscience is beginning to identify the benefits of approaches that support and develop mind–body connections. neuroscience also shows that trauma affects cognition and interferes with an individual’s ability to understand, make sense of, and verbally express what they are thinking and feeling (kuban, 2015). c o n c e p t 4 . s n o w s h o e a n d s t a rb l a n ke t ’ s pro t e c t i v e f a c t o rs o f c u l t u re ba s e d h e a l i n g snowshoe and starblanket (2016) have identified four protective factors of a culturally responsive healing model that are effective when applied to decolonized healing approaches with first nations clients. we liken these four factors to the maskihkiy or medicines that should be picked up and placed in the intervention bundle. the factors are spiritually grounded [seeing]; community-based [teaching]; trauma-informed [storytelling]; and strengths-based nurturing [healing]. the reference to snowshoe and starblanket’s protective factors as maskihkiy (medicine) transforms the evidence and traumainformed, strengths-based approaches into culturally based healing practices (snowshoe, 2016). t h e s p i ri t u a l l y g ro u n d e d s e e i n g m a s ki h ki y . the icrt as a model begins with seeking guidance from indigenous knowledges within ethical space, reflecting snowshoe and starblanket’s (2016) spiritually grounded seeing factor. the seeing factor is protective, as it makes use of indigenous 9 sasakamoose et al.: developing indigenous cultural responsiveness theory published by scholarship@western, 2017 ways of knowing and being. it is the study of knowledge and the justified belief that we seek guidance from the culture through elders and ceremony. we position this within the ethical space of engagement. in this place, one should consider engaging with elders and enacting appropriate community-specific ceremonial protocols (for example, smudge, prayer, pipe, sweat lodge) to guide the efforts of the twoeyed seeing. t h e c o m m u n i t y s p e c i f i c t e a c h i n g m a s ki h ki y . it is expected that in ethical space the community-specific aspect of snowshoe and starblanket’s (2016) protective factors be engaged. it is through the community-specific teaching maskihkiy that one can ensure the needs of the community are met. it is important to support wellness for indigenous peoples through initiatives that reflect the community’s unique lived experiences and that highlight culturally appropriate modes of enhancing wellness (fiedeldey-van dijk et al., 2016). in this ethical space, the two-eyed seeing approach is used to determine the best indigenous and evidence-based western approaches to be engaged. t h e t ra u m a i n f o rm e d s t o ry m a s ki h ki y . a trauma-informed perspective in any programming tailored for first nations is required to take into account the intergenerational impact of colonization and its associated negative health impacts, and this perspective must be integrated into all aspects of programming (snowshoe & starblanket, 2016). the trauma-informed story factor is the recognition that through colonization and residential schools, trauma is entrenched in the lives of indigenous peoples through both the lived experience and intergenerational knowledge. through the story factor, we enliven the human story of indigenous peoples and enact the “truth” telling of truth and reconciliation efforts. trauma-informed practice acknowledges how the mind and body respond to traumatic events rather than seeing symptoms as pathology; it uses a strengths-based approach and sees symptoms as adaptive coping mechanisms (malchiodi, 2003b). trauma-informed practice is also sensitive to culture, values, and perspectives on illness and treatment; it views individuals as “thrivers” and focuses on fostering resilience (garrett et. al, 2014; malchiodi, 2015). t h e s t re n g t h s b a s e d n u rt u ri n g m a s ki h ki y . hammond (2010) stated that traditional western approaches in the helping professions focus on deficits, or “what is wrong,” which leads to reliance on the “experts.” individuals who are dealing with issues are not given the opportunity to take control of their lives, and their ability to conquer life’s challenges is inhibited. a strengths-based approach does not minimize or ignore problems. instead, it attempts to identify what resources an individual has to positively address problems. it is a model that focuses not on pathology, but rather on developing assets (smith, 2006). the strengths-based model focuses on now and the future, and it situates actions in these times as being far more important than those in the past could ever be (smith, 2006). it is a perspective that holds that people have untapped reservoirs of mental, physical, spiritual, social, and emotional abilities that can be mobilized. as people develop greater awareness of their own strengths, they will be able to take control of their lives and make appropriate decisions to empower themselves (smith, 2006). although trauma, illness, and abuse are painful experiences, they can also be used as an opportunity for growth. strengths-based approaches can be particularly relevant for marginalized or oppressed peoples who often have problem-infused narratives about their lives (blodgett et al., 2013). in the past, research with aboriginal peoples tended to emphasize their problems and deficiencies rather than their strengths and capacities (blodgett et al., 2013). 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.1 c o n c l u s i o n the icrt provides a pathway for changing the short-term and long-term outcomes of indigenous health, wellness, and education in saskatchewan. indigenous scholars used groundbreaking research to create a model with culture-as-intervention at the apex and woven through an operationally defined construct of native wellness (dumont, 2014; fiedeldey-van dijk et al., 2016) that incorporates snowshoe and starblanket’s (2016) protective factors of culture-based healing (culture-as-intervention) and adaptations of ermine’s (2007) ethical space of engagement, two-eyed seeing from bartlett et al. (2012), and yellow bird’s (2012) concepts of neurodecolonization. the icrt weaves the concepts from multiple theories of cultural responsiveness, safety, and competency with theories of resiliency grounded within indigenous knowledges (for example, ceremony, protocols, language) and ways of knowing to substantiate each of the concepts and generate this new theory. the icrt is based on the assumption that new theories initiated and developed by indigenous communities and scholars are needed to guide changes in indigenous health, wellness, and education. the icrt asserts that health behaviour and educational experiences can be enhanced by fostering comprehensive, multi-level education; strengthening community-based systems; changing existing health and education services and programs; and creating new avenues by melding together two worldviews (fsin, 2013). with these guiding principles as the cornerstone, we created this theory out of various ceremonies and engagement sessions, with an emphasis on treaty and the treaty relationship. the icrt was designed for flexibility, for use by organizations, institutions, education centres, health and wellness programs, or individuals, and for those implementing strategies to understand the assumptions and expectations that guide the development of programs for the well-being of first nations. the icrt has been an effective way of empowering; communicating; fostering self-awareness, resilience, and identity; addressing trauma; and connecting with culture. the possibilities for making use of the icrt are endless. future direction of the icrt will include engaging an indigenous artist to create a visual representation of the model to be shared. at each phase of the theory development, ceremony is engaged to ensure that the ancestors guide the developers in an appropriate spiritual way. indigenous scholars working alongside first nations communities have generated much excitement in the province regarding this theoretical model. because of the unique community-engaged design, it can be easily adapted locally. we offer this model to all indigenous peoples and our non-indigenous allies to move forward the agenda of recovering first nations health and education systems, establishing a culturally responsive community of care, and fostering a middle ground for reciprocity where two systems can support one another in the common efforts to enhance the health and wellness of first nations peoples. 11 sasakamoose et al.: developing indigenous cultural responsiveness theory published by scholarship@western, 2017 r e f e re n c e s adlaf, e., vaden, r., niver, a., manuel, a., onyilo, v., araujo, m., . . . overstree-wadiche, l. 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(2004). conceptualizing and measuring historical trauma among american indian people. american journal of community psychology, 33(3–4), 119–130. doi: https://doi.org/10.1023/b:ajcp.0000027000.77357.31 williamson, m. (2010). everyday grace: having hope, finding forgiveness, and making miracles. carlsbad, ca: hay house. yellow bird, m. (2012). neurodecolonization: using mindfulness practices to delete the neural networks of colonialism. in waziyatawin & m. yellow bird (eds.), for indigenous minds only: a decolonization handbook (2nd ed., pp. 57–84). santa fe, nm: school for advanced research press. yellow bird, m. (2013). neurodecolonization: applying mindfulness research to decolonizing social work. in m. gray, j. coates, m. yellow bird, & t. hetherington (eds.), decolonizing social work (pp. 293–310). surrey, uk: ashgate. yellow bird, m. (2015, october). concepts of traditional mindfulness and neurodecolonization of the mind and body. presented at creating a new legacy: aboriginal mental health & wellness conference, brandon, mb. retrieved from http://creatinganewlegacy2015.ca/wpcontent/uploads/2015/11/dr-michael-yellow-bird.pdf yellow horse brave heart, m. (1998). the return to the sacred path: healing the historical trauma and historical unresolved grief response among the lakota through a psychoeducational group intervention. smith college studies in social work, 68(3), 287–305. yellow horse brave heart, m. (1999). gender differences in the historical trauma response among the lakota. in p. a. day & h. n. weaver (eds.), health and the american indian (pp. 1–21). new york: haworth press. yellow horse brave heart, m. (2000). wakiksuyapi: carrying the historical trauma of the lakota. tulane studies in social welfare, 21/22, 245–266. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.1 the international indigenous policy journal october 2017 miýo-pimātisiwin developing indigenous cultural responsiveness theory (icrt): improving indigenous health and well-being jolee sasakamoose terrina bellegarde wilson sutherland shauneen pete kim mckay-mcnabb recommended citation miýo-pimātisiwin developing indigenous cultural responsiveness theory (icrt): improving indigenous health and well-being abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license miã½o-pimä†tisiwin developing indigenous cultural responsiveness theory (icrt): improving indigenous health and well-being canadian drug policy and the reproduction of indigenous inequities the international indigenous policy journal volume 6 | issue 1 article 7 january 2015 canadian drug policy and the reproduction of indigenous inequities shelley g. marshall university of manitoba, shelley.marshall@umanitoba.ca recommended citation marshall, s. g. (2015). canadian drug policy and the reproduction of indigenous inequities. the international indigenous policy journal, 6(1). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.7 canadian drug policy and the reproduction of indigenous inequities abstract canada’s federal drug policy under the harper government (2006 to present) is “tough on crime” and dismissive of public health and harm reduction approaches to problematic drug use. drawing on insights from discourse and critical race theories, and bacchi’s (2009) poststructural policy analysis framework, problematic representations in canada’s federal drug policy discourse are examined through proposed and passed legislation, government documents, and parliamentary speaker notes. these problem representations are situated within their social, historical, and colonial context to demonstrate how this policy is poised to intersect with persistent racial inequalities that position indigenous peoples for involvement with illicit substances and markets, and racialized discourses and practices within law and law enforcement that perpetuate indigenous over-representation in the criminal justice system. keywords policy analysis, drug policy, poststructural, indigenous over-incarceration, racialization acknowledgments i am grateful to elizabeth comack for her valuable insights and support with this analysis, and to the anonymous reviewer for the helpful suggestions. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ c a n a d i a n d r u g p o l i c y a n d t h e r e p r o d u c t i o n o f i n d i g e n o u s i n e q u i t i e s since 2006, in line with its “tough on crime” agenda, canada’s conservative federal government under stephen harper has advanced a drug policy that is decidedly dismissive of public health and harm reduction approaches to problematic drug use. one manifestation of this agenda is the safe streets and communities act, which, in addition to implementing restrictions on community-based conditional sentences and changes to conditions of pardons, introduced minimum mandatory prison terms for certain drug offences (bennett & bernstein, 2013; department of justice canada, 2012a). the anti-harm reduction sentiment in harper’s drug policy has been demonstrated by the removal of harm reduction from the national anti-drug strategy of 2007; federal funding cuts to harm reduction programs (webster, 2012); the denial of a renewed exemption to section 56 of the controlled drugs and substances act for vancouver’s safe injection site, insite, in 2011, leading to a supreme court ruling that deemed the denied exemption unconstitutional (small, 2012); and the passing of bill c-2: respect for communities act (2013), which sets out extensive criteria required by an applicant requesting a criminal code exemption for the purpose of establishing a supervised drug consumption facility. first nations, inuit, and métis peoples in canada have experienced distinct histories of colonization and cultural oppression, which have led to substantial burdens of social and health inequalities. these inequalities are connected to a high burden of drug-related harms and drug-related structural violence, including over-representation in the criminal justice system for drug offences (bennett & bernstein, 2013); high rates of blood-borne infections related to injection drug use (public health agency of canada, 2010); high reported rates of illicit substance use and substance use disorders among indigenous youth (currie & wild, 2012; elton-marshall, leatherdale, & burkhalter, 2011); and multiple social damages to first nations communities caused by the illegal drug trade (comack, deane, morrissette, & silver, 2013). this artice aims to explore some of the modalities through which canadian drug policy can intersect with extant indigenous inequities and racialized practices and discourses operating in canadian society. racialization is understood as the process of creating difference based on racial categories, identities, and meanings, and can be used to legitimize the domination of one racial group over another (block & galabuzi, 2011; hall, 1997; wallis & fleras, 2009). discourses act as sites in which symbolic power is exercised to produce a racialized knowledge of the “other,” and are deeply implicated in operations of power and knowledge construction (foucault, 1980, 1982; hall, 1997). for example, a significant artifact of colonial discourse is the notion that indigenous people have a predilection toward addiction, a discourse that can be traced back to the 1869 act for the gradual enfranchisement of indians under which it was illegal to sell intoxicating substances to indigenous peoples (government of canada, 1869; see also de leeuw, greenwood & cameron, 2010). salmon (2007) demonstrated how canadian fetal alcohol prevention policy discourses construct indigenous mothers of children with fetal alcohol effects as unproductive citizens and a risk to first nations people. campbell (2000) argued that policy discourses produce women’s drug use as a greater crime than men’s because the birth of a drug-affected infant can be construed as a crime against humanity. further, according to de leeuw et al. (2010), these discourses perpetuate colonial relations in that they “simultaneously produce non-indigenous peoples as legitimate and necessary agents of care, protection, and improvement” (p. 283) and, thus, have significant outcomes on lived experience and material conditions. exploring the troubling relationship between the harper government’s drug policy and indigenous peoples in canada calls for an interrogation of the “drug problems” the policy seeks to address while 1 marshall: canadian drug policy published by scholarship@western, 2015 locating the policy in its broader social and historical context. to do so, i draw from bacchi’s (2009) poststructural policy analysis framework, which attends to problem representations inferred within a policy and salient contradictions embedded in the policy discourse. in bacchi’s method, social problems are understood to be constructions from interpretations of real and often deeply troubling social issues, and it is through these problem constructions that governing processes take form. the following questions guide the discourse analysis in bacchi’s method (2009): 1. what is the “problem” represented to be? 2. what presuppositions or assumptions underlie this representation of the “problem?” 3. how has the representation of the “problem” come about? 4. what is left unproblematic in the “problem” representation? 5. what effects are produced by this representation of the “problem?” 6. how/where has this representation of the “problem” been produced, disseminated and defended? how could it be questioned, disrupted and replaced? (xii) the first three questions guide my analysis of the “drug problems” implicit or explicit in the discourse of current canadian drug policy, drawing from proposed and passed legislation, government documents, and parliamentary speaker notes from january 2007 to january 2014. questions 4 and 5 are addressed by situating representations of drug-use problems within the canadian context of racialized inequities that position indigenous peoples for involvement with illicit substances and markets, and racialized discourses and practices within law and law enforcement that perpetuate indigenous overrepresentation in the criminal justice system. finally, question 6 is addressed through exploring the state of the drug policy debate, opportunities to destabilize problem representations, and promising practices and policy recommendations. c a n a d i a n d r u g p o l i c y p r o b l e m a t i z a t i o n s the department of justice canada, evaluation division (2012) has outlined three national anti-drug strategy pillars— enforcement, prevention, and treatment—with the largest funding allotment ($205.9 million plus $67.7 million set aside for the components under mandatory minimum penalties) devoted to the enforcement action plan, representing 70% of the overall budget (debeck, wood, montaner, & kerr, 2009). there are no components of the enforcement action plan that specifically target indigenous peoples, while several components of the prevention and treatment action plans target indigenous youth and offenders, particularly treatment and crime prevention initiatives. with enforcement prioritized, the illicit drug use problem is understood as a problem of criminality, resting on the conflation of illegal drug use with crime and social disorder. as stated in one government document: “these substances may pose serious risks to the health of individuals, and their use often affects public safety and may support organized crime” (health canada, 2013, para. 1). even though canada reports the lowest crime rate in 40 years (perreault, 2012) and the greatest burden of health and social drug harms can be attributed to alcohol and tobacco (canadian public health association, 2011), illicit drug use is widely fused with addiction, abuse, danger, and public disorder throughout the policy discourse. for instance, rob nicholson, minister of justice and attorney general of canada, stated in 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.7 support of bill c-10, “the proliferation of drugs and violent crime is, unfortunately, a reality in this day and age and it is our job as parliamentarians to deal with criminals, to protect society and do whatever we can to deter crime” (canada, 2012, hon. rob nicholson section, para. 4). the largest proportion of funding in the enforcement plan is dedicated to clandestine lab and illegal marijuana grow-operations (department of justice canada, evaluation division, 2012). this agenda therefore locates the source of illicit drugs from within canada, and remains silent on the state’s weak ability to intercept illicit substances and precursor chemicals flowing into canada (oscapella, 2012) and the increased availability of cocaine, marijuana, and heroin in recent decades (werb et al. 2013). harsher penalties by way of minimum mandatory sentences come by way of amendments to the criminal code through bill c-9 (2007) and bill c-10 (2012), which have eliminated the availability of judicial discretion for conditional and community-based sentences for a range of drug-related offences, including criminal organization-related offences, and import and export, trafficking, or production of drugs offences. these legislations undermine much of the potential brought in 1996, when bill c-41 (1995) was passed, adding section 718.2(e) to the criminal code. under the principles governing section 718.2(e), judicial discretion in sentencing should consider the unique systemic and background factors that position indigenous offenders before the law (r v gladue, 1999). conversely, within the current drug policy, harsher punishments are expected to act as deterrents to drug-related criminal behaviour, treating all equally before the law regardless of social and historical background factors that impact the offender’s social location. in this way, the enforcement action plan is essentially “colour blind,” consistent with the liberal ideals of egalitarianism and individualism (henry, tator, mattis, & rees, 2009), which runs contrary to the social realities of indigenous peoples’ lives and their overincarceration in canada. three core assumptions are implicit in the treatment action plan: illicit substance use requires treatment, all people who engage in problematic substance use desire or will engage in treatment, and treatment is effective. treatment itself is framed as a means to prevent risk to communities, which is stated explicitly in the strategy as a key issue of concern: “lack of treatment capacity for those who pose risk to community” (government of canada, 2013, para. 2). the largest funding component ($125 million) is dedicated to urban drug treatment, with $35 million to national native alcohol and drug abuse programs on reserve. a number of other components under the treatment agenda fall within the purview of corrections or law enforcement, such as youth justice initiatives, drug treatment courts, and diversional sentencing. those illicit substances users that do not seek treatment or do not see their drug use as problematic are not addressed in this action plan, unless they are mandated into treatment. among the goals of the federal prevention action plan is “to prevent youth from using illicit substances by enhancing their awareness and understanding of the harmful social and health effects of illicit drug use” (government of canada, 2013, para. 1). this demonstrates an assumption that youth drug use is the result of lack of knowledge regarding drug-related harms, leading to poor individual choices. approximately $30 million of this budget has been allocated to federal social marketing campaigns, specifically the drugsnot4me campaign, with videos depicting illicit drug harms in middle-income settings. drug strategy community initiatives receive the greatest funding allotment at $55 million, with a number of regional and national projects targeting indigenous populations, focused on improving capacity to avoid illicit drug use through knowledge and skill development, increasing awareness of the 3 marshall: canadian drug policy published by scholarship@western, 2015 negative consequences of illicit drugs, and promoting healthy lifestyle choices (department of justice canada, evaluation division, 2012). the prevention action plan allocates $32 million to national crime prevention and drugs and organized crime awareness services, with several components targeting indigenous populations. these strategies involve awareness and education programs, primarily delivered under the purview of the royal canadian mounted police (rcmp) or regional police departments. additionally, the drug endangered children initiative of the rcmp culminated in the document, drug endangered children: equating child abuse with drug activity (rcmp, 2010). this initiative follows a series of provincial legislative amendments to child and family services acts permitting child apprehension on the grounds of child exposure to illicit drug activity. for example, the province of alberta’s (2006) drug-endangered children act preamble states: “whereas children exposed to illegal manufacturing of drugs, indoor cannabis grow operations, trafficking and other forms of illegal drug activity are victims of abuse” (p. 2). the conflation of illicit substance activity with child abuse can further the racial inequities in child protection placements, given that indigenous families are much more likely to be under the surveillance of child protection agencies than non-indigenous families (brownell, roos, & fransoo, 2006; de leeuw et al., 2010). consistent with the emergence of neoliberal governance—with its emphasis on freedom of choice, the predominance of the market, a retreat from social welfare, and encouraging responsible individual choices (broad & antony, 2006; larner, 2000; rose, 2000)—canada’s current drug policy holds citizens responsible and accountable for their involvement with illegal drugs and seeks to deter poor choices through education and harsh punishments. according to keane (2002), “the production of human beings as autonomous individuals is central to operations of power in modern societies” (p. 3). wacquant (2009) demonstrated how the expansion of the punitive arm in of the state is a key characteristic of u.s. neoliberalism, with the “right hand” of the government punishing and regulating african american men in the penal system, and the “left hand” of the state regulating and monitoring african american women on welfare or workfare. canada’s anti-drug strategy appears keenly positioned in this punitive policy turn with the potential to produce similar racialized and gendered effects. dividing practices are described by foucault (1982) as those dichotomies that cause the subject to divide within himself or herself, or divide from others, and are integral to the creation of power relations by way of legitimizing categories of good and bad. the dichotomy of the criminal drug dealer versus the vulnerable addict is an important element of the governmental discourse. as stated on a government’s website: “the national anti-drug strategy focuses on prevention and access to treatment for those with drug dependencies, while at the same time getting tough on drug dealers and producers who threaten the safety of our youth and communities” (government of canada, 2013, para 1). for many who lack the funds to support an addiction, options are reduced to trafficking or property crimes (canadian bar association, 2011). involvement in illegal drug markets can similarly be driven by the need to meet basic life requirements. this policy discourse, however, is dislocated from social, structural, and historical contexts in which it operates, especially as these pertain to indigenous peoples. the following sections situate this policy accordingly to demonstrate what has been left unproblematic in the policy discourse, and the effects produced by the problem representations the current policy seeks to address. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.7 i l l i c i t s u b s t a n c e i n v o l v e m e n t a n d s o c i a l l o c a t i o n a complex of intersecting historical, structural, and social pathways have positioned first nations, métis, and inuit peoples in canada at greater risk for illicit substance involvement and greater surveillance of illicit substance use. the surveillance and documentation of indigenous peoples have been a longstanding component of the canadian colonial project (de leeuw et al., 2010). these colonizing practices have involved the appropriation of traditional lands, interrupting the self-determined path of indigenous peoples, and disparaging indigenous ways of life, resulting in social and economic exclusion and generations of cultural oppression and dislocation (king, 2012; monture, 2006; monture-angus, 1995; royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996; york, 1990). the legal roots of colonization can be traced to the indian act of 1876, whereby indigenous people were dispossessed of their land, confined to small reserves, and stripped of rights enabling self-determination (government of canada, 1876; see also hamilton & sinclair, 1991). shortly thereafter, traditional ceremonies, languages, and practices were banned; residential schools were created to systematically remove indigenous children from their families and “civilize” them; and indigenous children were widely adopted out to non-indigenous families in the “sixties scoop,” furthering family and social dislocation (hamilton & sinclair, 1991). this legacy is perpetuated today by the extremely high placement of indigenous children into child welfare (blackstock, cross, george, brown, & formsma, 2006; native women’s association of canada, 2012), which in turn is associated with high rates of homelessness and street-involvement among indigenous youth aging out of the child welfare system with inadequate system supports (baskin, 2007; bounajm, beckman, & thériault, 2014; evenson & barr, 2009; gaetz & scott, 2012). the systematic marginalization and cultural oppression of indigenous peoples has resulted in racialized social inequities in canadian society (reading & halseth, 2013). indigenous people experience poor housing quality in first nations and urban communities, food insecurity, high unemployment, and lower income if included in labour force (loppie reading & wien, 2009; reading & halseth, 2013). fifty percent of indigenous youth will drop out, or be pushed out, of high schools in canada, reproducing conditions for economic and employment exclusion (loppie reading & wien, 2009). self-reported major depressive episodes are nearly double for indigenous versus non-indigenous canadians (loppie reading & wien, 2009), while the canadian centre on substance abuse (2009) reported that more than 50% of people seeking addictions treatment have been diagnosed with a mental illness. substance use has been cited as the most important challenge facing first nations communities (assembly of first nations, native addictions partnership foundation inc., 2011). there is poor access to any addictions services in first nations, métis, and inuit communities, and poor access to culturally appropriate services in general (carter & mcpherson, 2013; loppie reading & wien, 2009). indigenous people are overrepresented as service recipients at harm reduction programs in canada, comprising from 13% to over 50% of the population served (leonard, 2010; saskatchewan ministry of health, 2008; tyndall et al., 2006). according to wilkinson and marmot (2003), “drug use is both a response to social breakdown and an important factor in worsening the resulting inequalities in health” (p. 24). although most substance use is not harmful, social dislocation, trauma, and poverty can create conditions for problematic drug use, defined as “use that has become habitual and compulsive despite negative health and social effects” (carter & macpherson, 2013, p.16). problematic substance use among first nations peoples is linked to cultural oppression and erosion, economic exclusion, and the intergenerational impacts of trauma borne from colonial practices such as the residential school system (assembly of first 5 marshall: canadian drug policy published by scholarship@western, 2015 nations, native addictions partnership foundation inc., 2011; chansonneuve, 2005; chiefs of ontario, 2010). moreover, for many people coping with social dislocation, poverty, homelessness, and mental health issues, substance use can be a solution to pain, loss, and boredom, and provide a means to selfmedicate (nadew, 2012). when substance use is framed as the problem, rather than a response to socially inflicted pain, the social and environmental drivers of inequities and trauma that lead to problematic substance use become obscured. another contemporary manifestation of colonialism is the advent of indigenous street gangs, especially in the prairie provinces. comack et al. (2013) locate the proliferation of street gangs as a form of resistance to colonialism and to the racialized and spatialized poverty that permeates inner city communities. indigenous youth are pushed and pulled toward gang recruitment due to social dislocation, economic exclusion, and the prevalence of street gang involvement among proximal social relations. the street skills of indigenous youth are an asset in the illicit drug trade, and a liability in most legal employment arenas, as demonstrated in other racialized drug markets (bourgois, 1998). further, indigenous street gangs largely restrict drug sales to indigenous people in the inner city and reserve communities where “impoverished and colonized spaces, already deprived of financial resources, are further drained by the activity of the illegal drug market” (comack et al., 2013, p. 133). as such, indigenous street gangs in canada have made illicit drugs more accessible to indigenous communities (department of justice canada, evaluation division, 2012). the safe streets and communities act (bill c-10, 2012) specifically targeted street gangs and the illicit drug trade. street gangs are included in the definition of a “criminal organization” provided in section 467 of the criminal code: a group, however organized, that (a) is composed of three or more persons in or outside canada; and (b) has as one of its main purposes or main activities the facilitation or commission of one or more serious offences that, if committed, would likely result in the direct or indirect receipt of material benefit, including a financial benefit, by the group or by any of the persons who constitute the group. as rob nicholson, minister of justice and attorney general of canada, proclaimed when the targeting serious drug crime component of the act came into force, the production and trafficking of illicit drugs is one of the most significant sources of money for gangs and organized crime in canada. today our message is clear that if you are in the business of producing, trafficking, importing or exporting drugs, you’ll now face jail time. (department of justice canada, 2012b, para. 2) under the safe streets and communities act, the controlled drugs and substance act was amended to provide “mandatory minimum penalties for serious drug offences [production and trafficking; possession for the purpose of trafficking; importing and exporting] when they are carried out for organized crime purposes, or if they involve targeting youth” (legislative summary: bill c-10, 2012, p. 37). the intention of the legislation was to “support the national anti-drug strategy’s efforts to combat illicit drug production and distribution and help disrupt criminal enterprises by targeting drug suppliers” (department of justice canada, 2013, tackling crime section, para. 4). aggravating factors to be considered on sentencing include an offence committed for the benefit of organized crime, involving the 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.7 use or threat of violence or weapons, committed in a prison, and involving youth in the commission of the offence, selling to youth, or near an area normally frequented by youth. the primary business of street gangs is the illegal drug trade, a business that is inherently violent because, unlike “legitimate” profit-building enterprises sanctioned by law, the state does not ensure the conditions for profit accumulation, nor provide regulatory and judicial dispute resolution processes (comack et al., 2013; oscapella, 2012). as such, prohibitive drug policies have relevant implications for shaping the nature of the street drug industry (oscapella, 2012). a systematic review by werb et al. (2011) found a significant association between drug law enforcement and violence in the illicit drug market. the causative mechanisms that explain this link remain theoretical; however, evidence supports the notion that illicit drug-related violence is more structurally mediated (i.e., through drug law enforcement and prohibition) than can be explained by behavioural or psycho-pharmaceutical theories (resignato, 2000; werb et al., 2011). the discourse that promotes harsher punishments as deterrents to drug-related crime has been widely questioned. bennett and bernstein (2013) challenge the notion that people undertake a cost–benefit analysis prior to engaging in illicit drug-related crime, especially for people who are dependent upon drugs, economically marginalized, or struggling with the impacts of prior incarceration. according to oscapella (2012), “there is abundant evidence that minimum mandatory sentences do not deter as predicted or reduce harms associated with drug use” (p. 4). comack et al. (2013) demonstrated how canadian penitentiaries are sites where street gangs are produced and reproduced, as gang involvement becomes beneficial for protection and social inclusion in prison, and a significant amount of the illegal drug business is run from inside the penal system. they argue that incarceration is not a deterrent, but something that street gang members aspire to: “in the street gang business of illegal drug sales, it is a necessary step on a successful career path” (p. 118). bringing drugs into jail can be a lucrative act, reimbursed with large monetary sums and minimal risk. further, prison terms allow time to plot and conduct illegal drug business maneuvers, and shipping gang members to other provinces with the intent of disrupting gang activity has enabled indigenous street gangs to exploit new markets (comack et al., 2013). in this way, incarceration through harsher punishments can foster rather than deter the conditions for street gang activity, the illegal drug trade, and the violence associated with it. the relationship between racialized inequities, illicit substance involvement, and problematic substance use is more complex than structural determinism. without underplaying the agency and selfdetermination of indigenous peoples and the ability to mitigate the outcomes of unjust social conditions, and the multiple life trajectories that may arise from a history of cultural oppression, the research suggests that problematic substance use and involvement in illegal substance markets are highly sociostructurally mediated. gang involvement appears to be a powerful agentic response that reframes criminal justice system involvement as a rational risk among limited employment options, while reproducing damages to indigenous communities. r a c i a l i z e d p o l i c i n g a n d l e g a l d i s c o u r s e s while indigenous peoples comprise approximately 4% of the canadian population, the federal inmate population is approximately 23% indigenous (office of the correctional investigator, 2013). indigenous over-incarceration is even more acute in the prairie provinces. in 2007 to 2008, indigenous people made up 10% of the adult population in saskatchewan but 81% of those admitted to provincial jails. in 7 marshall: canadian drug policy published by scholarship@western, 2015 manitoba, where 15% of the adult population is indigenous, they represented 69% of admissions to provincial jails (perreault, 2009). legal processes must be considered in the context of law enforcement practices, which help determine which subjects come before the law. racialized spaces often become associated with violence and disorder (razack 2002, 2007), and accordingly become heavily policed. in this way, policies that are “tough on crime” become inevitably tough on racialized spaces and the individuals found therein. these associations result in the over-surveillance of the “usual suspects,” whereby indigenous young men are very frequently stopped, questioned, searched, and detained because they “fit the description” (comack, 2012). indigenous peoples are more likely to experience residential instability and homelessness, and homeless people who use drugs have been found more likely to use public spaces for drug use (gaetz, donaldson, richer, & gulliver, 2013; gessler, maes & skelton, 2011; marshall, kerr, montaner, & wood, 2010), producing a vulnerability to police surveillance and arrest. the reproduction of adversarial relationships between indigenous peoples and the police leads to police becoming part of the problem of indigenous overrepresentation in the criminal justice system. comack and balfour (2004) demonstrated how racist ideological representations of indigenous offenders, victims, criminal acts, and the spaces in which they occur make their way into legal casebuilding strategies. these representations resonate with judges, juries, and the wider society to affect sentencing decisions. bail releases for indigenous defendants are seen to provide opportunities to build up social attributes valuable to mainstream society, such as drug treatment or other morally sanctioned conduct. social events attended by indigenous people and involving alcohol become reduced to “drinking parties,” framing indigenous substance use as reckless and chaotic. legal discourses that construct indigenous people as poor witnesses in court persist, without recognition of transportation challenges, language, and cultural differences operating in court proceedings, or the social stresses involved in testifying against someone from one’s own family or community. these representations become understood by legal actors as problems “with” indigenous people—and not as problems stemming from systemic discrimination or colonial oppression (comack & balfour, 2004; hamilton & sinclair, 1991). canadian law has been ineffective at redressing the systemic discrimination of indigenous peoples in the criminal justice system, even when equipped with tools for this purpose. in 1996, bill c-41 (1995) was passed, adding section 718.2(e) to the criminal code to provide judicial discretion in the sentencing of indigenous offenders. in 1999, the case of jamie gladue was brought before the supreme court, providing an opportunity for an analysis of section 718.2(e) (r v gladue, 1999). the court held that judges are to consider the unique background factors that helped position the offender before the court, and consider the indigenous heritage of the offender in sentencing. gladue reports, designed to facilitate judges’ legal analysis for indigenous offenders, have not redressed indigenous over-incarceration, and the resources required to produce gladue reports can be prohibitive (april & orsi, 2013; milward & parkes, 2014; roach, 2009). further, conditional sentences have not been successful in reducing indigenous overrepresentation in the canadian penal system. conversely, these sentencing alternatives appear to have resulted in net widening, whereby more offenders have received intrusive sanctions than before (roach, 2000). the length of conditional sentences can exceed the term of imprisonment for offences, and breach of conditions often results in incarceration (roach, 2000; taillon, 2006). the legacy of racialized discourses, policies, and practices is evident in the inimical burden of legal sanctions placed on 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.7 indigenous people in canada, and attempts to redress systemic discrimination must clearly extend beyond the criminal justice system. r e s i s t i n g t h e c o n s e r v a t i v e d r u g p o l i c y a g e n d a a n d p r o m i s i n g w a y s f o r w a r d canadian drug policy is a highly contested terrain of political and moral agendas. some of the pressures that shape the canadian drug policy are derived from the international drug control system, including the bodies that interpret and enact international treaties (elliott, 2012)—a system that has unintentionally resulted in the marginalization and moral stigmatization of users of illicit substances, record incarceration rates, and the subordination of public health to law enforcement approaches to problematic drug use in many jurisdictions (united nations office on drugs and crime, 2008). the current canadian government drug policy discourse holds individuals responsible for the drug-related harms they experience while “too little attention is paid to the suffering and loss caused by criminalizing those who use drugs” (oscapella, 2012, p. 23). why many canadians support this neoliberal drug policy agenda over human rights and evidence-informed policies is uncertain, but it is possible that because indigenous peoples experience such a high burden of drug-related harms drug use problems have come to be understood to be the problems of the “indigenous other,” resulting in less identification and empathetic social response from the non-indigenous majority. this othering process may be explained in terms of what henry et al. (2009) refer to as “democratic racism,” whereby many canadians hold racist beliefs, recognized as socially unacceptable, and champion democratic values of egalitarianism—and “colour blind” drug policies—while undermining those values through practices of racism that reinforce indigenous inequities. the critical response to canadian drug policy is extensive, suggesting the potential for resistance (bennett & bernstein, 2013; canadian bar association, 2011; carter & mcpherson, 2013; cavalierri & riley, 2012; oscapella, 2012). bennett and bernstein (2013) point to opportunities to disrupt the sanctions brought by the safe streets and communities act (bill c-10, 2012) through challenges under section 7 of the charter, which, whether successful or not, may disrupt the prevailing discourse that exonerates the state from its role in producing drug-related harms. the case of canada (attorney general) v. phs community services society (2011) marks a historic act of canadian drug policy resistance employing a section 7 charter challenge. this resulted in a landmark decision in which the minister of health’s denied exemption of section 56 of the controlled drugs and substances act, required for the operation of vancouver’s insite, was deemed unconstitutional. however, engagement with the law also carries the potential for what smart (1989) refers to as “juridogenesis,” whereby relying upon the law to redress social inequities can compound problems by increasing the level of legal interference into the already highly regulated lives of people who use drugs. charter challenges may produce legal rulings that are misinterpreted and misappropriated into legislation that represents the same neoliberal agenda as, for example, bill c-2 (2013). with ample evidence that the law is not neutral, impartial, and objective, the outcomes of engaging the law are unpredictable. indigenous stakeholders and organizations in canada must be key partners in shaping canada’s drug policy. the native addictions and mental health regional research consultation/forum (2011) called for the development of a culturally relevant evidence base that values indigenous worldviews and ways of being in order to understand and plan policy and programmatic responses to substance use and addictions. they stated that the substance use knowledgebase to date is largely grounded in eurocentric and scientific worldviews, which lack and understanding and acceptance of cultural beliefs and the spiritual influence in everyday life, and tend to oversee the historic and structural production of the 9 marshall: canadian drug policy published by scholarship@western, 2015 conditions for problematic substance use. the national native addictions partnership foundation (n.d.) cites harm reduction as a guiding principle that is at times the most important and realistic course of action to be taken. some first nations in canada under self-government have developed their own local policies to deal with substances, law enforcement, and health care, including legislation banning alcohol, and the provision buprenorphine outside of the non-insured health benefits program (national advisory committee on prescription drug misuse, 2013). however, reading, kmetic, and gideon (2007) stated “. . . policies linked to the political economy of nation-states create strong forces which undermine first nations peoples’ legitimate aspiration for self-determination and impose change necessary to ensure survival” (p. 6). this arose, and continues, through settler colonial interests in appropriating land and resources from indigenous peoples in the interests of economic development (reading et al., 2007). in this way, there is a historically constituted tension between the market fundamentalism of the canadian neoliberal state and indigenous self-determination. worldwide, punitive law enforcement drug policies have resulted in increased violence, larger prison populations, erosion of governance around the world, and exacerbated drug harms. a number of recommendations from the global commission on drug policy (2014) can inform ways forward for canadian drug policy reform: 1. put health and community safety first by reorienting policy and resources away from law enforcement and toward social intervention such as meaningful employment, appropriate education, adequate housing, harm reduction, and access to culturally appropriate substance treatment and mental health services. 2. cease criminalization for illegal drug possession and mandatory drug treatment for possession of drugs, which are not evidenced to reduce drug use levels but promote unsafe drug use practices and divert law enforcement away from serious criminality at great public expense. 3. use alternatives to incarceration for non-violent low-level participants in illegal drug markets—including those involved in production, transportation, and street sales. focus on longer-term socioeconomic development to reduce economic inequality. 4. focus enforcement efforts on reducing the power of criminal organizations and the resultant violence and insecurity. governments should be held accountable for human rights abuses committed in the pursuit of drug law enforcement. 5. encourage and experiment with legal regulation of currently illegal drugs. lessons learned from the regulation of alcohol, tobacco and pharmaceutical drugs can help inform restricted access to substances currently only available in illegal markets. education, harsh punishments, and drug treatment are a grossly inadequate response to illegal substance use. in addition to incarceration reproducing criminal activity and gang involvement, criminal records disable people in the employment arena (oscapella, 2012), single parents are created, and generations of families are disassociated (bennett & bernstein, 2013; comack et al., 2013). while the national antidrug strategy intensifies the government’s legal response to illicit drug use, harm reduction programs that provide supportive services to many indigenous peoples are being actively opposed and constructed 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.7 as threats to community harmony and in need of regulation by citizens (for example, bill c-2). law, policy, and mainstream media are forms of cultural production that structure lived experience and interpretations of drug use. accordingly, these “get tough” discourses, while reinforcing neoliberal governance, have distinct material effects upon the health and wellbeing of indigenous peoples. indigenous peoples in canada have been socially positioned for involvement with illicit substances and markets through racist social, historical, and legal practices, creating the conditions for problematic drug use, high surveillance, and criminal justice system encounters related to illicit drug offences. the current drug policy 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(2009). health inequalities and social determinants of aboriginal people’s health. prince george, bc: national collaborating centre for aboriginal health. retrieved from http://www.nccah-ccnsa.ca/docs/social%20determinates/nccah-loppiewien_report.pdf marshall, b. d. l., kerr, t., qu, j., montaner, j., & wood, e. (2010). public injecting and hiv risk behaviour among street-involved youth. drug and alcohol dependence, 110, 254-258. doi: 10.1016/j.drugalcdep.2010.01.022   milward, d., & parkes, d. (2014). colonialism, systemic discrimination, and the crisis of indigenous overincarceration: the challenges of reforming the sentencing process. in e. comack (ed.), locating law: race, class, gender, sexuality connections (3rd ed., pp. 116-140). halifax and winnipeg: fernwood publishing. monture, p. (2006). standing against canadian law. in e. comack (ed.), locating law: race, class, gender, sexuality connections. (2nd ed., pp. 73-92). halifax, ns: fernwood publishing. monture-angus, p. 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(2002). gendered racial violence and spatialized justice. in s. razack (ed.), race, space and the law: unmapping a white settler society (pp. 121-157). toronto: between the lines. razack, s. (2007). when place becomes race. in t. das gupta, c. e. james, r. maaka, g.-e. galabuzi, & c. andersen (eds.), race and racialization: essential readings (pp. 74-82). toronto: canadian scholars' press. 17 marshall: canadian drug policy published by scholarship@western, 2015 reading, j., & halseth, r. (2013). pathways for improving well-being for indigenous peoples: how living conditions decide health. prince george, bc: national collaborating centre for aboriginal health. retrieved from http://www.nccahccnsa.ca/publications/lists/publications/attachments/102/pathways_en_web.pdf reading, j. l., kmetic, a., & gideon, v. (2007). first nations wholistic policy and planning model: discussion paper for the world health organization commission on social determinants of health. ottawa: assembly of first nations. retrieved from http://ahrnets.ca/files/2011/02/afn_paper_2007.pdf resignato, a. j. (2000). violent crime: a function of drug use or drug enforcement? applied economics, 32(6), 681. roach, k. (2000). criminal sentences, restorative justice, net widening, and aboriginal offenders. in the changing face of conditional sentencing: symposium proceedings. retrieved from http://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/rp-pr/csj-sjc/jsp-sjp/op00_3-po00_3/op00_3.pdf roach, k. (2009). one step forward, two steps back: gladue at ten and in the courts of appeal. criminal law quarterly, 54, 470. retrieved from http://turtletalk.files.wordpress.com/2011/03/3-14-11one-step-forward-two-steps-back-gladue-paper.pdf rose, n. (2000). government and control. british journal of criminology, 40(2), 321-339. royal commission on aboriginal peoples. (1996). report of the royal commission on aboriginal peoples. ottawa: department of indian and northern affairs. retrieved from http://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/webarchives/20071115053257/http://www.aincinac.gc.ca/ch/rcap/sg/sgmm_e.html royal canadian mounted police (rcmp). (2010). drug endangered children: equating child abuse with drug activity (catalogue number ps64-73/2010e, isbn 978-1-100-14640-9). ottawa: author. salmon, a. (2007). dis/abling states, dis/abling citizenship: young aboriginal mothers and the medicalization of fetal alcohol syndrome. journal for critical education policy studies, 5(2). http://www.jceps.com/print.php?articleid=103 saskatchewan ministry of health, population health branch. (2008). a review of needle exchange programs in saskatchewan, final report. retrieved from http://www.health.gov.sk.ca/needleexchange-review-report small, d. (2012). canada’s highest court unchains injection drug users: implications for harm reduction as standard of healthcare. harm reduction journal, 9(34). doi: 1186/1477-7517-9-34 smart, c. (1989). feminism and the power of law. london: routledge. taillon, j. (2006). offences against the administration of justice. juristat, 26, 1. retrieved from http://publications.gc.ca/collection-r/statcan/85-002-xie/0010685-002-xie.pdf 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.7 tyndall, m. y., kerr, t., zhang, r., king, e., montaner, j. g., & wood, e. (2006). attendance, drug use patterns, and referrals made from north america’s first supervised injection facility. drug and alcohol dependence, 83, 193-198. doi: 10.1016/j.drugalcdep.2005.11.011 united nations office on drugs and crime. (2008). world drug report 2008. vienna: united nations office on drugs and crime. retrieved from http://www.unodc.org/documents/wdr/wdr_2008/wdr_2008_eng_web.pdf wallis, m., & fleras, a. (eds.). (2009). the politics of race in canada. toronto: oxford university press. wacquant, l. (2009). punishing the poor: the neoliberal government of social insecurity. durham and london: duke university press. webster, p. c. (2012). the redlining of harm reduction programs. cmaj, 184(1), e21-e22. werb, d., kerr, t., nosyk, b., strathdee, s., montaner, j., & wood, e. (2013). the temporal relationship between drug supply indicators: an audit of international government surveillance systems. bmj open 2013, 3, e003077. doi:10.1136/bmjopen-2013003077 werb, d., rowell, g., guyatt, g., kerr, t., montaner, j., & wood, e. (2011). effect of drug law enforcement on drug market violence. international journal of drug policy, 22, 87-94. doi: 10.1016/j.drugpo.2011.02.002 wilkinson, r., & marmot, m. (2003). social determinants of health: the solid facts. geneva: world health organization [who]. retrieved from http://www.euro.who.int/__data/assets/pdf_file/0005/98438/e81384.pdf york, g. (1990). the dispossessed: life and death in native canada. london: vintage books. 19 marshall: canadian drug policy published by scholarship@western, 2015 the international indigenous policy journal january 2015 canadian drug policy and the reproduction of indigenous inequities shelley g. marshall recommended citation canadian drug policy and the reproduction of indigenous inequities abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license canadian drug policy and the reproduction of indigenous inequities aboriginal knowledge infusion in initial teacher education at the ontario institute for studies in education at the university of toronto the international indigenous policy journal volume 4 issue 4 educational pathways of indigenous learners article 3 october 2013 aboriginal knowledge infusion in initial teacher education at the ontario institute for studies in education at the university of toronto angela mashford-pringle ontario institute for studies in education, angela.mashford.pringle@utoronto.ca angela g. nardozi ontario institute for studies in education of the university of toronto, angela.nardozi@gmail.com recommended citation mashford-pringle, a. , nardozi, a. g. (2013). aboriginal knowledge infusion in initial teacher education at the ontario institute for studies in education at the university of toronto. the international indigenous policy journal, 4(4) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj?utm_source=ir.lib.uwo.ca%2fiipj%2fvol4%2fiss4%2f3&utm_medium=pdf&utm_campaign=pdfcoverpages http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4?utm_source=ir.lib.uwo.ca%2fiipj%2fvol4%2fiss4%2f3&utm_medium=pdf&utm_campaign=pdfcoverpages http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4?utm_source=ir.lib.uwo.ca%2fiipj%2fvol4%2fiss4%2f3&utm_medium=pdf&utm_campaign=pdfcoverpages http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/3?utm_source=ir.lib.uwo.ca%2fiipj%2fvol4%2fiss4%2f3&utm_medium=pdf&utm_campaign=pdfcoverpages aboriginal knowledge infusion in initial teacher education at the ontario institute for studies in education at the university of toronto abstract knowledge of the aboriginal socio-political history in canada has historically been excluded from public education. in ontario, public school children learn about aboriginal people at specific times in the curriculum. however, teachers frequently only teach the bare essentials about aboriginal people in canada because they do not have adequate knowledge or feel that they lack the ability to teach about this subject. the ontario institute of studies in education at the university of toronto has implemented the deepening knowledge project to provide teacher candidates with an increased awareness and knowledge about aboriginal history, culture, and worldview for their future teaching careers. this article will provide insight into the project and the curriculum developed for working with teacher candidates. keywords aboriginal, first nations, indigenous, post-secondary education, teacher education, adult education, education policy, canada, ontario creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ aboriginal knowledge infusion in initial teacher education at the ontario institute for studies in education at the university of toronto in 2008, the ontario institute of studies in education at the university of toronto (oise/ut) implemented the deepening knowledge project to provide teacher candidates with an increased awareness of and knowledge about aboriginal history, culture, and worldview for their future teaching careers. as part of the project team, the two authors were tasked with the delivery of introductory presentations to teacher candidates about these topics while collecting data on teacher candidate responses to this endeavour. the purpose of this article is to outline the work of the deepening knowledge project and to document the results of the first two years of evaluation of the associated presentations. we begin by outlining terminology, situating the ontario context, and reviewing the literature on curriculum that will positively impact aboriginal people. we then discuss the deepening knowledge project, which is situated at oise/ut, details of the presentations, and the results of evaluations and observational data. finally, we suggest further steps to be taken with the project. our observations and results may also inform the work of others designing mainstream teacher training programs in the successful incorporation of aboriginal content. literature review terminology “first nations” is a self-designated term and is used in the official names of communities, and regional and national organizations such as the assembly of first nations. the indian act (1985), first legislated in 1876, defines who is eligible for status or registration among first nations people with all others being considered non-status. this requirement to be recognized by the government means that some first nations people and all métis people who are not registered are not eligible for certain government rights and privileges granted in the treaties and indian act (borrows, 1994). previously, only first nations people with two generations of paternal lineage are eligible to register as a status first nations person. over the years, many methods of enfranchisement1 were amended into the indian act, which resulted in a loss of status. in 1985, bill c-31 amended the indian act to include first nations people who previously lost their status as a result of interracial marriage and enfranchisement (borrows, 1994). the recently concluded mcivor case (mcivor v. the registrar, indian and northern affairs canada, 2007) is challenging current criteria in the indian act around registration and, if successful, has the potential to increase the number of status first nations people in canada by as many as 200,000 people (gibson, 2009). there are over 200,000 people who identify as having aboriginal ancestry in ontario. with an increasing number of aboriginal children who attend non-reserve schools, many teachers will have aboriginal children in their classrooms.                                                                                                                 1 enfranchisement refers to the process by which indian status is taken away from a person and replaced with canadian citizenship. enfranchisement required that status first nations people give up their treaty rights and “assimilate” as a member of canadian society. whether or not a status first nations person became enfranchised was set out by conditions determined by the government of canada as recorded in the indian act. 1 mashford-pringle and nardozi: aboriginal knowledge infusion published by scholarship@western, 2013   education in ontario in ontario, the provincial ministry of education (moe) regulates education beginning in early childhood and continuing through to elementary and secondary school institutions. the ministry mandates that, up until age 16, children living in the province must attend school. in 2003, the moe developed new initiatives in the province to improve student engagement and achievement for aboriginal learners. as part of the aboriginal education strategy, the ministry committed to “developing and implementing curriculum resources for teachers to reach aboriginal students and to teach all students about first nation, métis and inuit cultures, traditions and histories” (ontario ministry of education, 2009, para. 6). even with this initiative and aboriginal input into the aboriginal education strategy, change is slow in coming. it is not yet evident to what extent teacher education programs in the province have taken up the mission to educate teacher candidates about aboriginal issues and history. it is also not yet evident what, if any, concrete and province-wide initiatives will be taken to (re)educate teachers about these issues.2 it has been stated by many scholars that the aboriginal population is the fastest growing and the youngest amongst the canadian population (preston, 2008). mendelson (2006) reported that there were 188,315 self-identified aboriginal people in ontario in 2001. the most recent census data from 2011 showed there were 301,425 self-identified aboriginal people in ontario (statistics canada, 2013). these numbers reflect only those people who responded to the census questionnaires and selfidentified as aboriginal (first nations, métis, or inuit). there are many communities in ontario that do not complete the census; therefore, this number may not accurately represent the current aboriginal population in ontario. aboriginal agencies estimate that 70,000 aboriginal peoples live in the greater toronto area (environics institute, 2010). curriculum that will help aboriginal people there are marked differences between western and aboriginal knowledge and worldviews. western ways of knowing and education can be described as “secular, fragmented, neutral or objective” (kanu, 2011, p. 105), or unfolding in a linear fashion (alfred, 2009; borrows, 2001). traditional aboriginal education has always been flexible, adaptable, and synergic, and can further be described as “intrapersonal, subjective, holistic, spiritual and transformative” (kanu, 2011, p. 105). the entire community has always been responsible for educating aboriginal children and youth (stonechild, 2006). in part, this ensured a high rate of knowledge transfer from one generation to the next. to create a holistic approach within the mainstream school system in ontario, it is necessary for educators and teachers to learn, understand, and incorporate knowledge about aboriginal worldviews into their own vision of education at, not just the level of the classroom, but also the level of curriculum creation and school structure. indigenous scholars have provided a growing number of articles about aboriginal worldviews and the importance of community learning (alfred, 2009; battiste, 2004; cardinal, 1969; stonechild, 2006; tully, 1995). this literature has contributed to the inclusion of aboriginal content in teacher education in ontario.                                                                                                                 2 while one of the authors of this article has attended a professional development day conference on aboriginal culture held by one of the boards, she was not inspired by the reception of the audience. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.3   the “grandfathers” have always said that things that occur now will have impact for seven generations, and aboriginal people in canada are experiencing impacts from the past three hundred years of change in their education due to contact with settler society. to heal from the historic trauma of colonization, residential schools, the sixties scoop3 (and following decades of forced adoption), poor living conditions and racism, aboriginal peoples are decolonizing and healing through higher education. education (including formal western education) will be the “new buffalo” (stonechild, 2006) by nourishing, clothing, sheltering, and healing aboriginal people through helping them to find ways of thriving in the western workforce while maintaining cultural traditions and perspectives if they so choose. traditional education continues in many forms throughout aboriginal communities (on and off reserve). the belief in the interconnectedness of all things, including people, lends itself to the traditional practice in many communities of families and communities learning from one another. if members of these communities have been traumatized by the western education system, they may stay away and seek to keep others from being consumed by western paradigms espoused within these institutions (gone, 2007; jones, 2006). therefore, it is necessary to engage educators, teachers, and learning institutions in developing awareness, appreciation, and understanding of aboriginal peoples and the socio-political history that they have endured to ensure that they (aboriginal peoples) feel included, recognized, and validated by the knowledge used in western education. as aboriginal ways of knowing are incorporated into public schools, it is necessary to acknowledge that traditional education does occur in present-day aboriginal communities. strong emphasis is placed on observation, trial and error, and success cycle, for instance (gone, 2007). “apprenticeship” or experiential learning was intentionally provided to maintain and transmit traditional knowledge to the next generation as well as creating an interdependent relationship between all members of the community (faries, 1996; stonechild, 2006). there is limited research on how traditional educational practices are surviving in the current era, but it is apparent that traditional knowledge is being transmitted and maintained even amongst urban aboriginal populations (mccaskill & fitzmaurice, 2007). aboriginal leaders have advocated that education needs to be addressed within communities to ensure that vital information and the community’s way of life continues on for future generations. the literature reflects the belief that aboriginal communities must have complete control of their education in order to transmit their culture, language, values, and beliefs to another generation and that everyone in the community is responsible for teaching the youth, especially the elders (akan, 1992; battiste & barman, 1995; frideres & gadacz, 2001; preston, 2008; stonechild, 2006). within urban communities like toronto, there is a multi-aboriginal culture developed that is respectful and accepting of all traditional knowledge, languages, and beliefs. in many urban areas in ontario, cultural centres are created to allow aboriginal people to socialize and access their culture (mccaskill & fitzmaurice, 2007). these cultural centres often have other aboriginal and non-aboriginal organizations with which they work closely to                                                                                                                 3 the sixties scoop is a term first coined by patrick johnson and it refers to the time period stretching from the 1960s to the late 1980s when first nations children were apprehended from their families by the canadian government and adopted to non-aboriginal families in canada and internationally. 3 mashford-pringle and nardozi: aboriginal knowledge infusion published by scholarship@western, 2013   ensure that aboriginal people living in urban centres have the ability to obtain education, employment, shelter, and other social supports (mccaskill & fitzmaurice, 2007). traditional learning passed on much more than traditional knowledge for the community to function; it also allowed for culture, language, and worldview to be passed on to the next generation (battiste & barman, 1995; preston, 2008; stonechild, 2006). many aboriginal people who live in urban cities have lost their aboriginal languages but have maintained parts of their culture and worldview through connection to other aboriginal people (mccaskill & fitzmaurice, 2007). language and culture grow from the land base that people inhabit, but when the land is taken or the people (re)moved, the language can be lost (brigham, 2008; grande, 2004). it has become necessary to revitalize aboriginal languages for the majority and also to provide diverse languages in education for those who still maintain their mother tongue (faries, 1996). those individuals who maintain their traditional language are a small portion of the urban aboriginal population in toronto, ontario and canada; however, doing so is recognized as a large part of traditional learning. the mainstream education system that is provided to aboriginal people acts to assimilate them into the mainstream economy (battiste & barman, 1995; faries, 1996; stonechild, 2006). this has led to a negative view of education with few aboriginal advocates for using such a system (stonechild, 2006). that being said, an increasing number of aboriginal people encourage aboriginal children and youth to finish high school and move on to post-secondary education (malatest, 2004; mendelson, 2006). it is felt by many, including the current leader of the assembly of first nations, shawn atleo, that participating in education will build “strong first nations” who help canada to “fulfill its economic potential” (atleo, 2010, para. 3). many scholars and aboriginal communities agree that it is necessary to learn mainstream education, but, at the same time, it is also necessary to use traditional methods of teaching to pass on cultural knowledge to future generations (atleo, 2010; mendelson, 2006; royal commission on aboriginal peoples [rcap], 1996; stonechild, 2006). it is critical that teachers and teacher candidates acknowledge their collective responsibility to both aboriginal and non-aboriginal students. aboriginal students currently face “the choice between assimilating and dropping out of school” (kanu, 2011, p. 21). this situation necessitates an improvement in teaching to address the cultural backgrounds of aboriginal students in order to rectify the polarization of options and create real change in educational attainment. teachers must recognize “the functioning power of the curriculum in shaping identity, representation, and social and economic circumstances [underlying the call from aboriginal people to]…have their perspectives integrated not only into school curricula but also the organization and delivery of formal schooling as a whole” (kanu, 2011, p. 19). other than gaining different perspectives on canadian history, non-aboriginal children in canada will benefit wholeheartedly from knowledge, recognition of, and respect for aboriginal worldviews and knowledge. western knowledge gatekeepers have repeatedly “dismissed traditional aboriginal knowledge as inconsequential and unfounded” (kanu, 2011, p. 15). however, as kanu (2011) argued, the new global environment within which economies compete requires new and creative perspectives, which would benefit immensely from the inclusion of aboriginal knowledge. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.3   initial teacher education programs across canada are in the process of implementing aboriginal content and perspective within their curriculum. various researchers (cherubini, hodson, manley-casimir, & muir, 2010; den heyer, 2009; dion, 2007; finney & orr, 1995; vetter & blimkie, 2011) have documented strategies and interventions that include aboriginal perspectives within mainstream teacher training programs and have noted the reactions elicited from teacher candidates. efforts range from documenting initial conversations among faculty (den heyer, 2009), to instruction within a particular subset or option for teacher candidates (vetter & blimkie, 2011), to the creation of an aboriginal education council and centre for aboriginal research and education (cherubini et al., 2010). there is a substantial difference in the type, quantity, and variety of implementation strategies, depending on the university, the provincial guidelines, and the aboriginal communities working with each institution. for example, in saskatchewan, where there is an aboriginal cohort, there are courses available for all teacher candidates; whereas in british columbia, one full course about aboriginal topics has been mandated for all teacher candidates. literature is also emerging from colonized contexts across the globe as indigenous peoples and settlerallies grapple with the concerns and issues that arise when aboriginal content is incorporated into teacher education programs and is applied in the classroom by non-indigenous teachers. o’dowd (2012), for instance, explores the nature of the resistance displayed by non-indigenous teachers to accept and teach indigenous history in australia and argues that the australian national identity as reflected through literature, art, and historical accounts of early settlement “creates an indigenous history that is not possible” (p. 105) or what she terms an “unhistory” (p. 104). she recommends that teachers and their students take a critical look at these discourses of identity within classrooms, suggesting that doing so “co-sequential with a study of other nationalisms and understanding australian national identity, indigenous history may be less emotional and engagement more likely” (o’dowd, 2012, p. 114). looking at the hawaiian context, indigenous scholar julie kaomea (2005) conducted research in the classrooms of non-indigenous teachers documenting the teaching of hawaiian studies. what she found was that lack of knowledge and confidence in teaching this content on the part of nonindigenous teachers, as well as using out-dated resources has led to the replication of colonial discourses about hawaiian savagery and the random and brutal nature of rules and rulers in hawaiian society (kaomea, 2005). in order to rectify these deeply entrenched misconceptions, she argues that ultimately, native peoples should have authority over native issues. in the case of hawaiian studies instruction, this means that in order for hawaiian/nonhawaiian team-teaching alliances to be effective, non-hawaiian classroom teachers will need to take a back seat to hawaiian elders and cultural experts, and assume a supportive role that allows hawaiian experts to take the lead. (kaomea, 2005, p. 40) bishop (2003), writing from aotearoa (new zealand) also believes that “new images and their constituent metaphors are needed to inform and guide the development of educational principles and pedagogies” (p. 234) in the classroom and that these new forms should be guided by indigenous kaupapa maori educational experiences so that maori children will be able to participate with greater success. this need arises from the current deficient images teachers hold of maori children, which are reflected in teaching practice and continue to “perpetuate the educational crisis for maori children” (bishop, 2003, p. 234). 5 mashford-pringle and nardozi: aboriginal knowledge infusion published by scholarship@western, 2013   the deepening knowledge project initiated by dr. kathy broad, executive director of initial teacher education (ite) at the ontario institute for studies in education at the university of toronto (oise/ut), the deepening knowledge, enhancing instruction project (deepening knowledge project for short) has engaged faculty, staff, and students at oiset/ut in different ventures that work toward increasing knowledge of aboriginal histories, perspectives, and contemporary communities among instructors in the program and teacher candidates since 2008. the executive director has demonstrated ever-increasing involvement and enthusiasm for developing this area of knowledge for teacher candidates. thus the project has had strong leadership from the institution, developing a great team of dedicated and involved faculty and staff who implement a series of strategies to increase awareness and capacity within the program. under the leadership of the executive director, course instructors in the ite program were asked to host at least one workshop in their classrooms to relay information to teacher candidates about aboriginal topics for use in their classroom instruction starting in the spring of 2011. the authors of this report were recruited to design and conduct workshops for teacher candidates in both elementary and secondary streams as part of the deepening knowledge project. angela mashfordpringle is an urban aboriginal scholar with personal experience with the ontario public school system through her own experiences and those of her children. angela nardozi is a qualified teacher, who has taught in and conducted research with, a northern first nations community to complete her m.a., and who herself graduated from the ite program at oise/ut. the authors developed workshops that varied in length from 45 minutes to 3 hours. the workshops addressed: (a) who are aboriginal peoples; (b) the historical and intergenerational trauma experienced by aboriginal peoples through residential schools, the sixties scoop, and legislation (indian act, constitution of canada, etc.); (c) statistics of aboriginal people in canada and specifically ontario; (d) videos about aboriginal peoples and the social injustices they have and continue to face; and (e) potential ways to include aboriginal subjects into the curriculum, including resources that could be used by teachers and/or their students. the topics were chosen primarily by the aboriginal presenter (mashford-pringle) and the list was modified depending on the interest, level of knowledge, and questions of each group. with longer workshops, more opportunities for interactive segments arose, such as question and answer or brainstorming sessions, which allowed teacher candidates to become more involved in their learning. at the end of the workshops, most classes were provided with an evaluation form to complete, the results of which provide the basis for this report. the setting the level of enthusiasm that course instructors used when introducing the presenters set the tone for the workshops. some course instructors seemed uninterested prior to the workshop, but were extremely involved by the end, even asking questions and prompting the class to ask questions. other course instructors were excited and interested prior to the workshops. some provided concrete connections for the teacher candidates between the work that the class had done and the workshop’s themes. at the very least, each instructor made mention of the great importance of the topic, its implications for the audience’s future students, and for social justice in general. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.3   the process of scheduling presentations grew easier as we built relationships with instructors, who then began to speak to their colleagues about the importance of the presentation. when the presentation was first offered in the spring of 2011, take-up occurred quickly in the elementary cohorts, but it was much slower in the secondary classrooms. factors that may have contributed to this were the timing (the presentations were first introduced late in the school year) and the increased focus on subject-based teaching for secondary teachers. however, by the 2011 to 2012 academic year, many instructors were eager to book presentations and after continued outreach to secondary instructors, presentations were booked in all but a small number of cohorts. one phenomenon that contributed greatly to the reputation of the presentations and repeat bookings for the instructors was the reaction of the students. during presentation after presentation, instructors witnessed the surprise, shock, and passionate responses of a large number of teacher candidates when they realized the extent to which they had not been taught about aboriginal peoples, histories, and contemporary cultures in their own education. some openly asked why this material had not been presented earlier in their teacher training program. their responses are reflected in the post-presentation evaluations, which are discussed below. context and methodology oise/ut’s ite program graduates upwards of 1,000 teacher candidates a year. the teacher candidate population consists of mainly of settler and settler-diasporic candidates (cannon, 2011); the majority of the population enrolled in the program continues to consist of female, middle-class candidates (solomona, portelli, daniel & campbell, 2005). teacher candidates who attended workshops were provided with an evaluation form, but as some students may not have been present in class, the total number of teacher candidates who should have been provided with the presentations is not known. the evaluation used in this study (see appendix) was co-created by the authors and the other members of the deepening knowledge project team. comments were only included in this article if the teacher candidate who made them indicated on their evaluation that we could use their words in future publications. observations, questions, and comments from each presentation were recorded afterwards by the authors in independent research journals and were compared as data was being analyzed. qualitative responses were often about the content; for example, what the teacher candidates liked or did not like in the presentation and suggestions for further improvement. the qualitative data was compiled by question. then responses were coded using nvivo 9 software and analyzed for similarities and differences. the data were checked individually by both authors to ensure that all data were entered accurately. the authors conducted member checks with some teacher candidates from each workshop and with the instructors for each of the cohorts. while the authors intended to receive responses from each teacher candidate who attended the workshops, some groups were not provided with the evaluation form due to time constraints. the data are rich in knowledge, but may not reflect all teacher candidates’ reactions from the two academic years because not all teacher candidates received the workshop or had the opportunity to complete the evaluation forms. 7 mashford-pringle and nardozi: aboriginal knowledge infusion published by scholarship@western, 2013   by the numbers to date, the program has run over two academic years. in both years, we asked audience members to fill out a voluntary evaluation after the presentation in order to gain anonymous feedback and insight into reactions to the material and our presentation methods. after analyzing the statistical results and the written feedback sections, we determined that the results from both years were quite similar, and thus we have collapsed the feedback for the purposes of this paper. over the two academic years, 844 evaluations were collected after 25 presentations. in total, 36 presentations were given, but due to a variety of factors (most often lack of time at the end of presentations) 11 groups were not asked to fill out evaluations. course instructors were asked to provide at least 1.5 hours for the workshop, but presentations ranged in time from 45 minutes to 3 hours (with a 15 minute break). we agreed to fill any time slot we were given, convinced of the importance of our message, especially given that our audience consisted of future educators. after the delivering the first round of presentations in a two week span at the end of the 2010 to 2011 academic year, many course instructors acknowledged verbally that the workshops were much needed and would have benefited their students if spaced throughout the year. during the 2011 to 2012 academic year, presentations were delivered throughout the two semesters, with the majority of instructors hosting us prior to the second practicum period for teacher candidates. evaluation results in the evaluations after the workshops, teacher candidates were asked if they had received any instruction at oise/ut on aboriginal peoples, histories, or contemporary cultures prior to the presentations. in the first year, presentations were given during the last month of the academic year, and 70% of teacher candidates responded that they had received some instruction on these topics. however, when broken down, some groups had averaged much lower, with only 26% and 48% of candidates in three particular options responding that they had received previous instruction. the lowest percentage was registered in the one concurrent teacher education program (ctep) option in which we presented; ctep is an option where teacher candidates earn an undergraduate degree concurrent with their bachelor of education degree, taking five years in total to complete the program. the ctep program tends to be less unified, with education courses and practicums scattered throughout the five years, and this may contribute to candidates having never encountered these topics. the two options in which only 48% of candidates had received education on aboriginal peoples consisted solely of teacher candidates training to become secondary teachers, and their program tends to be more subject-specific in its instruction. the curriculum decisions made by the instructors of these three cohorts of teacher candidates would have influenced the instruction received during their program. in the second year of presentations, 33% of respondents replied that they had received instruction on aboriginal topics prior to our presentation, 62% responded that they had not, and 5% responded that they were unsure. it is probable that this significantly lowered average among the groups reflects the earlier placement of presentation within the school year. however, as of 2010 to 2011, the evaluations indicate that, depending on their particular courses and instructors, a number of teacher candidates did graduate from oise/ut having received no instruction on aboriginal topics. based on our findings, it became clear that, for some teacher candidates, the workshops represent the only professional instruction about historical and current aboriginal topics to which teacher candidates 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.3   are exposed before entering their teaching careers. in the written comments on evaluations, teacher candidates noted that having completed elementary, secondary, and even postsecondary education (as is required to obtain a b.ed.) does not guarantee that an individual has received a memorable lesson on aboriginal perspectives. one respondent astutely observed that teacher candidates who immigrated to canada might have missed learning about this subject area as a result of not being educated in this country. given this reality, it becomes even more important for initial teacher education programs, like the one at oise/ut, to include an aboriginal instruction component because for many teacher candidates this may represent the last opportunity to learn about the material in a formal setting before embarking on their teaching careers. one question on the evaluation asked how comfortable teacher candidates were teaching or speaking about aboriginal issues before attending the workshop. grouped over two years, 15.5% of teacher candidates stated they were very comfortable, 24% were comfortable, and 35% were somewhat comfortable, while 15.5% stated they felt not at all comfortable teaching about these topics. teacher candidates were also asked how important they felt aboriginal content was in their classrooms prior to having viewed the presentations. only 4% of all teacher candidates thought aboriginal content was not important in their classrooms. the remaining respondents were divided among somewhat important (23.5%), important (35.5%), and extremely important (28%), while 6.5% answered that they were unsure. to further understand if the presentation had been effective in conveying information to the teacher candidates, the evaluation asked respondents if they had a better understanding of aboriginal issues after the workshop. overwhelmingly, 90% of teacher candidates felt they had a better understanding of aboriginal peoples, with only 6% expressing that they did not. it became apparent that the workshops largely achieved their goal of increasing awareness among teacher candidates. in the future, longer time slots and multiple workshops will allow for more interactive presentations, which could incorporate more learning styles in order to reach more of the audience. incorporating more aboriginal content would effectively increase awareness among future educators and could assist aboriginal students because their classroom teachers would feel more confident in teaching aboriginal content. the most promising response came to the question of whether or not the workshop had inspired the teacher candidates to learn more about aboriginal people. when asked on the evaluations, the vast majority of teacher candidates (93.5%) reported that they were. only 4% of respondents were not inspired or were not planning to learn more about aboriginal peoples after the workshop. some of those who responded that they were not planning to learn more left no indication on their survey about why they responded this way: some indicated that they felt aboriginal content was either not at all important or somewhat important to their future classrooms, and others indicated that they had been previously inspired to learn about aboriginal topics. this overwhelming response indicates that, in most cases, learning will extend beyond the limited time of the presentations. to assist in future learning, key resources for teachers and students were discussed at the end of every presentation and both authors have contributed resources to a website that oise has developed to direct teachers towards appropriate and respectful teaching and learning resources. it is available at: www.oise.utoronto.ca/deepeningknowledge 9 mashford-pringle and nardozi: aboriginal knowledge infusion published by scholarship@western, 2013   the evaluation also asked how confident teacher candidates felt teaching about aboriginal issues after attending the workshop. although over 12% of teacher candidates responded that they did not feel confident, 47.3% of respondents felt somewhat confident, while 29.2% were confident in teaching the material to their future students. unfortunately, only 6.9% of all teacher candidates felt very confident that they could teach this material after the workshop. this lack of confidence in teaching aboriginal material after the workshop indicates that, in addition to information workshops delivered as part of this project, additional time does need to be dedicated to instruction around lesson planning and practicum assignments in order to boost the confidence of the teacher candidates and give them concrete experience in incorporating information about aboriginal cultures into their lessons. it may also be helpful for oise/ut to help facilitate relationships between teacher candidates and various organizations in toronto, which provide educational outreach for classes and schools, such as the native canadian centre of toronto. an open-ended qualitative question was posed to teacher candidates about what they found most interesting about the workshops. the responses to the question varied. almost every part of each presentation was cited in this section in different evaluations. resource suggestions, the video clips highlighting inequities in the cost of living in remote communities, as well as current youth culture were favourites among the candidates. indeed, the reactions on the faces of teacher candidates when the videos, which were at times provocative, alarming and fun, were shown on screen, suggested that candidates had been affected by what they saw. many respondents recorded that they found all of the information included in the presentations to be of interest. the information on residential schools was also frequently mentioned. in response to what they did not find interesting within the workshop, a surprising and overwhelming majority either had no response or indicated that they found the whole presentation interesting. some used this space to suggest the presentation be longer so that information could be covered in more depth, and that there would be additional time for questions. those who did respond mentioned various aspects of the presentation, but no distinct trends emerged. other open-ended questions on the evaluations did yield some trends in opinion. it became apparent that many teacher candidates had a desire to learn much more about the topic during their initial teacher education with comments like: this is a subject one cannot know enough about. i feel like this should be a larger priority at oise. one hour-long presentation is not enough. some expressed frustration that the presentation was their only exposure to topics regarding aboriginal people in the year, as indicated by one candidate who stated: [w]hy is this only a workshop?! why is there no mandatory class? we talk about social justice and multiculturalism…but why is that we don’t hear about first nations? these comments suggest that teacher candidates who were in the workshops may spend time learning more about aboriginal people in order to incorporate the knowledge into their classrooms in the future. however, since there was no follow up with the teacher candidates after the workshops were presented, it is unclear if respondents did continue to learn about aboriginal people and issues or if their only exposure throughout their education was in the workshops. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.3   we also received many comments about the timing of the presentation, especially with regard to the perceived importance of the topics. for instance, teacher candidates stated: the workshops should not be presented at the end of the year. it should be integrated into the year in all our curriculum. all of our curriculum. mandatory & longer/ maybe do this presentation before second practicum so we can use this! we need more! [this] should be at the beginning of the program. have this workshop earlier in the year, i could have used this in my practicum – it would make more confident teaching this. in reviewing teacher education programs across canada, it is apparent there is a wide range of incorporation of aboriginal content into teacher instruction. therefore, further analysis of how much time is provided to teacher candidates in all teacher education programs would be useful in order to ensure that all candidates are provided with at least some instruction about aboriginal people and issues to assist with improving aboriginal student graduation rates. finally, many teacher candidates requested the inclusion of concrete lesson plans and more direct links with various aspects of the curriculum: [include] more time for resources => how we can make positive change. [h]ow to tie it into math/sci? [m]ore specific to schooling, education and teaching. [h]ow aboriginal culture could be integrated into the curriculum…or what actions can be taken to integrate aboriginal students into the curriculum? the presenters received similar questions from teacher candidates at almost all workshops. among these questions were: why wasn’t this workshop provided earlier in the year? or why wasn’t the information provided in smaller segments across the curriculum? how do i get more information about aboriginal children and families? how can i help aboriginal children and their families with the curriculum? what resources should i use in my classroom? is there a place to take a course or workshop to add to the information that you’ve provided? we had some aboriginal information throughout the year, but we don’t all have the canadian history knowledge. will oise work on rectifying that? 11 mashford-pringle and nardozi: aboriginal knowledge infusion published by scholarship@western, 2013   another line of questioning that emerged during both years of the presentations had to do with the cultural makeup of toronto. it is true that toronto is an especially multicultural city; however, as the original inhabitants of this land, aboriginal peoples hold a unique place in the country’s history and contemporary culture. some teacher candidates expressed concerns about the importance of learning aboriginal topics in a city where they felt aboriginal people were not a significant portion of the population. some also expressed disbelief that they would encounter first nations, métis, and inuit families in their schools, instead perceiving aboriginal communities to be “up north,” “out there,” and “not here.” as the presentations continued, effort was made to highlight that toronto has one of the biggest populations of aboriginal peoples in canada, as well as to highlight the number of youth of aboriginal descent thought to be residing in toronto. other toronto-centric statistics and statistics provided by aboriginal community organizations were also offered in an effort to demonstrate how the information being presented would be immediately useful in a career teaching in toronto. it is important to note that teacher candidates do have opportunities to learn about aboriginal topics during their time in initial teacher education. while enrolled in both the elementary and secondary option, teachers are required to choose from a list of electives to be taken during one of their two semesters. one of the courses currently offered focuses on aboriginal worldviews and education. with special permission, teacher candidates may also enrol in graduate level courses to fulfill this requirement and some of those elective courses focus on specific aspects of aboriginal history, health, and culture. however, most teacher candidates either do not chose to enrol in aboriginal-specific courses because they choose to take other electives offered in the ite program or, in the case of the graduate level courses, because they are offered in the evenings, which would create an overwhelming schedule since teacher candidates do attend a full day of classes. while a few may avail themselves of aboriginal learning opportunities, the reality is that most of the teacher candidates who currently pass through the ite program will not receive adequate instruction in aboriginal issues. after two years of delivering the presentations, it is clear that they have become an important component of the ite program at oise/ut. although not enough on their own, the presentations do provide the beginnings of a foundation of knowledge of aboriginal histories, cultures, and contemporary experiences. this can lead to improved aboriginal educational attainment: future educators may be more inclined to discuss and teach about aboriginal people and issues in their classrooms, which may assist aboriginal students in connecting with the curriculum they are being taught. suggested next steps the following recommendations were formed based on evaluation comments and presenter observations. first, the length of presentations should be re-thought. for those groups who participated in workshops that were up to two hours in length, most evaluations included comments about how more time should be allotted to this subject. some commenters echoed the belief of the presenters in recommending that a mandatory course be added to the ite program. for presentations that were three hours in length, teacher candidates repeatedly stated that while they found the information valuable, they felt overwhelmed and would have preferred there be a series of sessions to allow time to absorb and apply the information. however, it was also clear from the evaluations that the mandated one hour is not enough to meet the needs of the teacher candidates. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.3   second, different and more in-depth presentations should be offered for those few teacher candidates who do come from a background in aboriginal studies or who are further along in their journey in learning about these topics. on the other hand, based on feedback during presentations and within the evaluations, it is clear that the majority of teacher candidates who enter into the ite program do not have a solid working knowledge of aboriginal peoples, histories, and cultures. teacher candidates spoke about not learning this in elementary or high school, or in their undergraduate programs. evaluations indicated that candidates wanted more information about a variety of subjects such as contemporary issues, historical perspectives, and especially residential school. course instructors may assume that their teacher candidates have more knowledge about aboriginal peoples and perspectives than they do. on two notable occasions, instructors expressed shock at the lack of knowledge communicated by teacher candidates during the course of a presentation. one commented that knowledge of social justice in general does not necessarily translate into knowledge of aboriginal-specific topics. instructors should not assume that a satisfactory knowledge of social justice issues on the part of their teacher candidates translates into an equal level of knowledge of aboriginalspecific topics. instructors should be prepared to devote a larger proportion of their instructional time to aboriginal-specific topics. third, the diversity of the requests from course instructors regarding length and content of the presentations, as well as the different needs of each cohort, meant that at least 30 minutes to 1 hour of preparation was dedicated to thinking and planning for each presentation. presentations could be even more effective if more time was spent meeting with each instructor to learn more about the students and what material they have been taught up to the point of the presentations. some of the information provided by presenters was met with resistance from teacher candidates. some teacher candidates made comments about the political nature of the presentations and that the delivery was biased. others could not yet see culture beyond the representations of “artefacts” and “spiritual routines.” taken together, these comments suggest a fourth recommendation: more time needs to be spent on identity, privilege, bias and perspective, and critical multiculturalism theory prior to the presentations. the original purpose of the presentations was to give a background of aboriginal peoples, histories, and cultures, with some focus on the integration of material into classroom curriculum. despite efforts to bring the two together, one presentation is not enough to give sufficient time to cover both to a satisfactory degree. this presentation should not be seen by teacher candidates or course instructors as the “one stop shop” for all things aboriginal-specific for the year. instead, course instructors should focus on curriculum integration and understanding how to work with aboriginal children and families throughout the ite program. if multiple sessions with the presenters are not possible, course instructors must see the integration and lesson-planning piece as their responsibility within the ite curriculum. exposure to aboriginal peoples, histories, and cultures should continue to be increased within the ite program. the inclusion of established aboriginal organizations at the university of toronto such as the indigenous education network (ien), the infinite reach network (irn), supporting aboriginal graduate enhancement (sage), and first nations house would be advised in such events as orientation through the use of guest speakers throughout the program. 13 mashford-pringle and nardozi: aboriginal knowledge infusion published by scholarship@western, 2013   in addition, the presenters recommended that oise/ut create a partnership with aboriginal and northern affairs canada (previously known as indian and northern affairs canada) and, most importantly, build strong and trusting relationships with first nations and inuit communities in order to create more practicum opportunities in first nations and inuit schools. these relationships can also assist oise/ut in determining the needs of aboriginal families with children in the education system that may be beyond the curriculum. in this way, oise/ut can assist communities by advocating for their interests. finally, it has become apparent that the lack of knowledge teacher candidates have about aboriginal history and current issues is unacceptable, given their responsibility in educating future generations of canadian, first nations, métis, and inuit children. to begin to rectify this widespread problem, oise/ut must do its part to educate, to undo the years of trauma perpetuated by the school system on many aboriginal people, as well as the widespread ignorance among canadians of these events and other assimilationist practices. to this end, it should be mandatory that candidates entering the b.ed. program have some undergraduate credits in aboriginal issues or that candidates receive a full term, mandatory course on topics related to aboriginal communities while being educated at oise/ut. in british columbia and saskatchewan, b.ed. students are mandated to take at least one full course in aboriginal history before the completion of their degree. while the ministry of education in ontario has not mandated this requirement, oise/ut could become a leader and establish such a practice with assistance from the local aboriginal community and faculty. oise/ut will need to increase the number of aboriginal faculty who provide this knowledge, which will also likely increase the number of aboriginal teacher candidates applying. conclusion the deepening knowledge project was deemed to be a first step toward the incorporation of aboriginal ways of knowing and content for teacher candidates at the university of toronto. the aboriginal awareness and orientation sessions that were discussed in this article are ongoing and will hopefully continue into future years. the inclusion of these workshops and content in the ite program is a positive step toward integrating aboriginal histories, cultures, and contemporary experiences into mainstream education. the inclusion of aboriginal content in the ite program will assist future educators with becoming comfortable in providing such information to their students, some of whom may be aboriginal students. the findings also suggest that more should be done for already practicing teachers and educators because they may not have had any aboriginal content in their ite program or throughout their teaching careers. based on the needs of a growing aboriginal population, it is necessary to have teachers and educators who are comfortable with and aware of aboriginal people and issues so they can further assist their students with identifying themselves in the curriculum. as many respondents suggested, learning about aboriginal people and issues also can be helpful for non-aboriginal students and may help to reduce stereotyping, racism, and discrimination in the future. further inclusion of aboriginal content into initial teacher education will move western education toward assisting aboriginal people in achieving higher levels of education because they will feel connected to the curriculum. historically the ite program at oise/ut has had a very low enrolment of self-identified aboriginal teacher candidates, and so these findings and the next steps we have suggested may not apply directly to programs with 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.3   larger populations of aboriginal students. given the large population of settler-diasporic peoples in the greater toronto area, the social dynamics differ from other urban centres in canada 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(2009). sticky points: teacher educators re-examine their practice in light of a new alberta social studies program and its inclusion of aboriginal perspectives. teaching education, 20(4), 343 355. dion, s. d. (2007). disrupting molded images: identities, responsibilities and relationships— teachers and indigenous subject material. teaching education, 18(4), 329 342. environics institute. (2010). urban aboriginal peoples study: main report. ottawa, on: environics institute. faries, e. (1996). closing the gap for aboriginal students. sudbury: laurentian university. finney, s., & orr, j. (1995). "i've really learned a lot, but...": cross-cultural understanding and teacher education in a racist society. journal of teacher education, 46(5), 327 333. frideres, j. s. & gadacz, r. (2001). aboriginal peoples in canada: contemporary conflicts, 6th edition. toronto: pearson education canada inc. gibson, g. (2009). a new look at canadian indian policy: respect the collective – promote the individual. vancouver, bc: fraser institute. gone, j. (2007). “we never was happy living like a whiteman”: mental health disparities and the postcolonial predicament in american indian communities. american journal community psychology, 40, 290 300. grande, s. (2004). red pedagogy. lanham, maryland: rowman & littlefield publishers inc. indian act. (1985). (r.s.c., 1985, c. i-5). jones, d. s. (2006). american indian health disparities. american journal of public health, 96, 2122 2134. kanu, y. (2011). integrating aboriginal perspectives into the curriculum: purposes, possibilities, and challenges. toronto, ontario: university of toronto press. kaomea, j. (2005). indigenous studies in the elementary curriculum: a cautionary hawaiian example. anthropology and education quarterly, 36(1), 24 42. malatest, r.a. & associates ltd. (2004). aboriginal peoples and post-secondary education: what educators have learned. toronto, on: canadian millennium scholarship foundation. mccaskill, d., & fitzmaurice, k. (2007). urban aboriginal task force: final report. toronto, on: ontario federation of indian friendship centres. mcivor v. the registrar, indian and northern affairs canada. (2007). bcsc 827. 17 mashford-pringle and nardozi: aboriginal knowledge infusion published by scholarship@western, 2013   mendelson, m. (2006). aboriginal peoples and postsecondary education in canada. ottawa, on: caledon institute of social policy. o'dowd, m. (2012). engaging non-indigenous students in indigenous history and "un history". history of education review, 41(2), 104 118. ontario ministry of education. (2009). backgrounder: aboriginal education in ontario. retrieved from http://www.edu.gov.on.ca/eng/aboriginal/supporting.html preston, j. (2008). the urgency of postsecondary education for aboriginal peoples. canadian journal of educational administration and policy, 86. retrieved from http://www.umanitoba.ca/publications/cjeap/pdf_files/preston.pdf royal commission on aboriginal peoples [rcap]. (1996). bridging the cultural divide: a report on aboriginal people and criminal justice in canada. (ottawa): royal commission on aboriginal peoples. solomona, r. p., portelli, j. p., daniel, b., & campbell, a. (2005). the discourse of denial: how white teacher candidates construct race, racism and ‘white privilege’. race, ethnicity and education, 8(2), 147. statistics canada. (2013). aboriginal peoples in canada: first nations people, métis, and inuit. retrieved from http://www12.statcan.gc.ca/nhs-enm/2011/as-sa/99-011-x/99-011-x2011001eng.cfm stonechild, b. (2006). the new buffalo: the struggle for aboriginal post-secondary education in canada. winnipeg, manitoba: university of manitoba press. tully, j. (1995), cultural demands for constitutional recognition. journal of political philosophy, 3, 111 – 132. vetter, d. m., & blimkie, m. (2011). learning to teach in culturally responsive and respectful ways: the first steps in creating a first nation, métis and inuit education infusion in a mainstream teacher education program. the canadian journal of native studies, 31(2), 173 185, 187, 189. 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.3   appendix evaluation date: your option: thank you for attending and being involved in our workshop today. below are a few questions so we can evaluate our workshop and areas that may require improvement. may we use your anonymous comments in future academic publications? ___________________ before viewing this presentation... 1. did you receive any instruction on aboriginal content at oise prior to this workshop? yes no not sure /n/a 2. how comfortable were you with speaking/teaching aboriginal history and in your classroom? please circle the one most applicable to you. not all comfortable somewhat comfortable comfortable very comfortable not sure 3. how important did you think aboriginal content was to your classroom? please circle the one most applicable to you. not at all important somewhat important important extremely important not sure after viewing this presentation... 4. do you feel you now have a better understanding of aboriginal peoples? yes no 5. what part of the workshop was most interesting for you? ____________________________________________________________________ 6. what part of the workshop was not interesting for you? ____________________________________________________________________ 7. are you inspired to learn more about aboriginal peoples and the issues surrounding them? yes no 8. how would you describe your confidence in teaching this material? not confident somewhat confident confident very confident not sure 9. how would you rate the length of the workshop? too long long perfect length could be longer should be longer 19 mashford-pringle and nardozi: aboriginal knowledge infusion published by scholarship@western, 2013 the international indigenous policy journal october 2013 aboriginal knowledge infusion in initial teacher education at the ontario institute for studies in education at the university of toronto angela mashford-pringle angela g. nardozi recommended citation aboriginal knowledge infusion in initial teacher education at the ontario institute for studies in education at the university of toronto abstract keywords creative commons license aboriginal knowledge infusion in initial teacher education at the ontario institute for studies in education at the university of toronto policy research: good or bad? the international indigenous policy journal volume 4 | issue 3 article 2 january 2013 policy research: good or bad? jerry p. w hite university of western ontario, white@uwo.ca recommended citation white, j. p. (2013). policy research: good or bad?. th e international indigenous policy journal, 4(3) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.2 policy research: good or bad? abstract canada went through a tough discussion in july 2013 when it was revealed that between 1942 and 1952 unethical and harmful research was conducted on aboriginal peoples, most of whom were children. beyond simply condemning unethical research with indigenous populations, we need to examine why this happened and understand what the implications and lessons are for "policy research" moving forward. policy research is a powerful tool when conducted in the proper way. we must never lose sight of the reason we are engaged in the activity: to improve well-being through the improvement of understanding that leads to change. the research process must, itself, be part of the positive process. keywords research, ethics, nutritional experiments, aboriginal, canada, residential schools creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ p o l i c y r e s e a r c h : g o o d o r b a d ? canada went through a tough discussion in july 2013. it was revealed that between 1942 and 1952 unethical and harmful research was conducted on the aboriginal population living in a northern town and with children at six residential schools (the canadian press, 2013). researchers, who were well aware that the adults and children were malnourished and living on starvation diets, chose to use them as subjects for testing theories concerning vitamin and mineral substitutes. this research was done without their informed consent and, even more importantly, there were no steps taken to ensure that the diets were improved. particularly awful is the fact that children were shown callous disregard and treated as “experiments.” for example, some students had their milk rations reduced by half for up to two years in order to set the “controls” for the experiment and monitoring (canadian press, 2013). the canadian minister of aboriginal affairs’ office has responded with a statement: “if this is true, this is abhorrent and completely unacceptable” (canadian press, 2013, para. 6). of course this is abhorrent and unacceptable, but we need to examine why this happened and understand what the implications and lessons are for “policy research” going forward. historically, food and food access has been used as a weapon. james daschuk (2012) has made a compelling case that denying access to food was used to force indigenous peoples in canada to move from their traditional territories to “reserves” in the 19th century. the residential school system in canada, which is a variant of the same policies used elsewhere (usa and australia for example), saw children forcefully separated from their families and sent to either day or boarding schools. at these schools, children were subject to an assimilation process, which has been described as “taking the indian out of the child.” we now learn that on top of other reported physical and sexual abuse, children were subject to experimentation around food. specifically divided into groups where they were given different quantities of food and supplements and observed for different outcomes. the international indigenous policy journal (iipj) is dedicated to publishing the best quality, ethically developed policy research. promoting evidence-based policy making, as we do, requires the best evidence be produced. however, this is the proverbial two-edged sword: we are also interested in understanding and explaining how non-ethical research gets started and why. policy research is an important and powerful tool, but it must be conducted in a proper way. i am a strong advocate of research following the “four rs,” first discussed by kirkness and barnhardt (1991). proper policy research must: be respectful of the peoples one is doing research with. this means understanding the diversity of the cultures and knowledge held by the people. be relevant for the peoples who are the subject of the investigation. show reciprocity, which requires there is a value created for the indigenous peoples and they can realize that value. this may be training people in those communities, exchanging 1 white: policy research published by scholarship@western, 2013 knowledge, creating opportunities, or more. it is a bi-lateral or back and forth process of learning and research activity. be responisible, which means leaving the peoples stronger than when you entered into the process. this requires that the interests of those research partners are protected and enhanced and everyone engages in the process to the extent possible. these principles have evolved into dynamic discussions of community-based research, de-colonization of research methods, governance of data dialogues, and new ethical standards in most countries. there can never be research collected unethically that leads to real, long-term, positive policy change. journals, such as the iipj, have a responsibility to be watchdogs and gatekeepers because it is our responsibility to encourage the proper conduct of research. we are currently calling for papers on the governance of data, which will contribute to a world debate on how to treat research data: who owns it and who should control access. as well, we have called for a major policy paper on the current best practices for memorandums of agreements between indigenous peoples and researchers. policy makers, regardless of where you work or who you are, have to scrutinize the evidence that researchers give you to ensure it was developed properly and stands the test of ethical review. the canadian example is sadly not unique. i am reminded of president clinton’s apology for the tuskegee experiments where black men with syphilis went untreated so researchers could follow the progress of the disease (office of the press secretary, 1997). there are examples from every country. the point here is that the pursuit of knowledge must never lose sight of the reason we are engaged in the activity: to improve well-being through the improvement of understanding that leads to change. the research process must, itself, be part of the positive process. jerry p. white editor-in-chief international indigenous policy journal 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.2 r e f e r e n c e s canadian press. (2013, july 16). hungry aboriginal people used in bureaucrats’ experiments: food historian published details of nutritional experiments that began in the 1940s. cbc news. retrieved from http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/story/2013/07/16/mbaboriginal-nutritional-experiments-canada.html dachuk, j. (2012). clearing the plains: disease, politics of starvation, and the loss of aboriginal life. regina: university of regina press. kirkness, v. j., & barnhardt, r. (1991). first nations and higher education: the four r's--respect, relevance, reciprocity, responsibility. journal of american indian education, 30(3), 1 15. office of the press secretary. (1997, may 16). remarks by the president in apology for the study done in tuskegee. retrieved from http://www.cdc.gov/tuskegee/clintonp.htm 3 white: policy research published by scholarship@western, 2013 the international indigenous policy journal january 2013 policy research: good or bad? jerry p. white recommended citation policy research: good or bad? abstract keywords creative commons license microsoft word policy research can be good or bad editorial final.docx comparing tribal research and specimens policies: models, practices, and principles the international indigenous policy journal volume 8 issue 4 reconciling research: perspectives on research involving indigenous peoples—part 2 article 4 october 2017 comparing tribal research and specimens policies: models, practices, and principles jessica bardill east carolina university, usa, jessi.bardill@gmail.com recommended citation bardill, j. (2017). comparing tribal research and specimens policies: models, practices, and principles. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(4). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.4 comparing tribal research and specimens policies: models, practices, and principles abstract this article reviews a range of tribal policies regarding the proper solicitation, collection, disposition, and return or disposal of biological samples, or biospecimens, which include not only the sample itself but also data, such as genetic information, derived from the sample. these policies are not always found within tribal regulation, and many that exist emerge from a discrete set of models, such as from the american indian law center (ailc), the canadian institutes of health (cihr), and the indigenous peoples council on biocolonialism (ipcb). some policies merge language from these national models and conceptual papers with tribally specific foci, including incorporating tribal language for specific principles to guide research with that community and their biospecimens. the article concludes with recommendations for principles that emerge as paramount in the review for directing research involving biospecimens. keywords research protocols, biospecimens, tribal principles acknowledgments thanks for this submission are due to doris cook, leela viswanathan, and the summer internship for indigenous peoples in genomics (sing) consortium for their support, as well as the reviewers of this manuscript for their feedback. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ comparing tribal research and specimens policies: models, practices, and principles this article reviews a range of tribal policies regarding the proper solicitation, collection, disposition, and return or disposal of biological samples or biospecimens. this includes not only the samples and specimens themselves but also data (such as genetic information) that have been derived from them. these policies are not always found within tribal regulations, and many emerged from a discrete set of models. while many tribal communities do not yet have specific policies on biospecimen usage, related policies and scholarship are useful for gauging the overall attitude toward biospecimens in indian country (radin & kowal, 2015). thinking beyond the u.s., additional models and practices are useful for demonstrating not only the present approach but also additional forward-looking approaches to developing relevant policies that center indigenous sovereignty (beaton et al., 2017; cunningham & dunbar, 2007; kowal, greenwood, & mcwhirter, 2015). this article reviews relevant policies, models, and practices from the u.s., canada, and other countries across the world in order to highlight commonalities between different approaches and challenges to developing policy related to biological samples and biospecimens. by situating reviews alongside current scholarship on biological samples and biospecimens, this article seeks to inform potential best practices created from the cutting instead of the lagging edge of research and policy. as research regulations have increased and achieved federal assurance and as specific policies governing biospecimens have been created, many guidelines have adopted the language found in the following codes and guidelines: • the model tribal research code (now in its 3rd edition; the american indian law center, inc., 1999), • the indian health service (ihs) guidelines for implementing and complying with his policy on specimens (freeman, 2001), • the canadian institutes of health research (cihr, 2007) guidelines for health research involving aboriginal people, and • the indigenous people’s council on biocolonialism (ipcb, 2000) indigenous research protection act. this review notes where some tribal policies can be extended regarding principles or return, for example, to provide information about what to do with remaining specimens in labs. moreover, this review notes how research and sampling practices can be revised to address not only the collection and processing of biological samples and data but also issues surrounding consultation, ownership, and reciprocity. for a full comparison of protocols, see the appendix. tribal research regulatory codes emerged prior to the establishment of tribal institutional review boards (irbs) to protect traditional knowledges and guard against archeological research that communities may not invite, want, or find beneficial. in particular, these tribal research regulatory codes help to both guard against researchers taking tribal individuals’ remains and, if remains have been taken, establish channels for their proper return through ceremonies. historically, the bodies of deceased indigenous persons have been disinterred from their resting places and “collected” by ethnologists, archaeologists, and others who saw financial value in them (kowal, 2013). in the present, indigenous peoples’ bodies have become sites of resource extraction insofar as the study of their genetic and biological materials is 1 bardill: tribal specimens policies published by scholarship@western, 2017 touted as “beneficial to humankind.” these studies, however, rarely offer tangible benefits to those from whom specimens are taken (mello & wolf, 2010; tsosie, 2007). protections have emerged because of reactions to the encroachment on indigenous peoples’ bodies and lands; notably, these measures contain many of the same principles (and at least one of the same protocols) that have informed environmental protections as well as protections for human bodies and data derived from them. american indian tribes created these codes both before and after the native american graves protection and repatriation act of 1990 (nagpra) following generations of excavations done in the name of research and profit (salzano & hurtado, 2004). one limitation of these codes, which the nagpra sought to address, has been their enforceability outside of tribal land holdings. broadly, however, these codes help us to consider how tribes have thought of “human subjects” who provide “specimens” as both living and non-living humans; moreover, these codes provide useful inferences regarding indigenous communities’ preferred methods for the treatment, disposal, and/or return of samples in cases where specific research codes or policies are not available. for example, the 1992 cherokee code stated, “the remains of cherokee people shall not be subjected to destructive skeletal analysis” (eastern band of cherokee indians, 1992, section 70-2c). this demonstrates that the technology used to date bone remains and obtain genetic material, which would destroy the remains themselves, is contrary to the explicitly stated preference of the cherokee that remains be neither disturbed nor destroyed. furthermore, it noted that remains should be reburied. the cherokee code also stated that any researcher permitted to perform a study on tribal lands or with tribal peoples should provide the tribe “a copy of all collected data, completed reports or publications, including copies of audio or video tapes or recordings obtained in the course of such study or research” and that “all such data . . . shall be deposited for permanent storage with the museum of the cherokee indian” (eastern band of cherokee indians, 1992, sections 70-3c-70-3d). this last point shows the importance of tribal governance over data created through research, particularly research involving human bodies (both “alive” and “remains”)—this is widely referred to as data sovereignty and has been evident in efforts undertaken by the national congress of american indians (sahota, 2007), the native nations institute (2016), and te mana raraunga (2015). the 1992 cherokee code is both of its time and ahead of it. it highlights, for example, that both samples and the data derived from those samples should be dealt with according to both tribal preferences and reciprocal relationships between researchers and the tribe. the code is also useful for thinking about how tribal communities, either alone or collectively, may create biobanks and other large data repositories similar to the alaska area specimen bank, which will be discussed below (hiratsuka, brown, hoeft, & dillard, 2012; hoeyer, 2008). the cherokee code is also helpful for considering cases wherein samples have been obtained but there are neither living donors available to provide re-consent for the continuing use of the samples, processes for obtaining re-consent from the relations of the person from whom the samples were taken, nor processes or policies regarding the use of samples from a person who cannot be identified. there is relative consensus among graves protection and repatriation policies and legislation that remains should be returned to tribal nations for reburial. similarly, when donors cannot be identified, or when detailed consent regarding how to care for samples (e.g., body parts with cultural significance, such as placenta) can be obtained beforehand, the māori people of aotearoa (new zealand) have set precedent for the respectful disposal of specimens obtained through both research and the health system (cunningham et al., 2007; hoeyer & hogle, 2014). for a sample to be taken, the māori code requires consent, which asks 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.4 the participant, whether māori or pākehā (settlers), if s/he would like the sample returned (with the option of a particular blessing (known as karakia), disposed of, and/or used for future research. these guidelines have been shown to be effective in addressing the needs of this diverse group of indigenous people. they may therefore provide useful methods to work with the diversity of thoughts, cultures, practices, languages, and approaches among american indian and alaska native peoples in the u.s., as well as the diverse indigenous peoples in relationship with other settler colonial nation states around the world (beaton et al 2017; compton 2010). national models and theories american indian law center (1999) model tribal research code, 3rd edition the american indian law center (1999) model tribal research code (mtrc) does not offer a prescriptive policy for tribes who are interested in establishing their own research codes; instead, it has provided historical information that explains why tribal research regulation is necessary. it included sections to guide tribes in creating their own protection codes by using questions and engaging with tribal leaders in ways that allow them to answer as they feel is appropriate, including defining important terms for the code. the research aims and methods should be stated explicitly. in addition, the code prompts the user to define “terms whose meaning might not be obvious to the community, to individual tribal members, or to researchers” (p. 20); this statement, in its attention to language, highlights the importance of transparency for all stakeholders, which emerged as an important principle in the tribespecific protocols. one section of the mtrc explored the question, “who will own specimens—human biological material—from the research” (p. 21)? in response, the code stated the protocol should provide assurances of confidentiality to participants, families, communities, and the tribe itself as necessary and appropriate. the statement also highlights the importance of determining who will own data produced by research. the mtrc do not provide answers to the questions posed, rather the questions are to be answered by tribes and communities. in approaching the issue in this way, the mtrc has invited necessary conversation regarding data and specimen ownership related to research with indigenous communities. another section of the mtrc offered a checklist that indian health boards might use for contexts regarding “ownership and control of human biological material from . . . research” (p. 26). the checklist is noted as being of use to indian health boards, it could be useful for irbs and other regulatory bodies as well. the mtrc checklist queried: “how will the tribe’s interest in its cultural and community heritage for its future generations be protected” (p. 26)? the importance of protection is evident in the mtrc, and it indicates the necessity of considering what protection might look like from diverse, tribally specific perspectives—as opposed to those of researchers. indigenous peoples council on biocolonialism (ipcb, 2000) indigenous research protection act (irpa) following on the third edition of the mtrc, the indigenous peoples council on biocolonialism (ipcb, 2000) issued a model entitled the indigenous research protection act (irpa), which actively engaged with concerns about specimens and samples taken for research. the act provided normative responses outlining what tribes should do to protect themselves, while the mtrc and the national congress of american indians (ncai; in their training for creating tribal regulation discussed below) offer questions to help tribal leaders formulate their own responses. the irpa is one of the first models that has 3 bardill: tribal specimens policies published by scholarship@western, 2017 provided a general response to indigenous research regulation around biospecimens, which it defines in relation to “traditional indigenous intellectual property” (irpa, 2000, section 3.14). it bears a striking, though more legally based, similarity to the question posed by the mtrc regarding ownership and control of human biological material. the irpa (2000) has defined “biogenetic resources that originate (or originated) on indigenous lands and territories,” as well as “tissues, cells, biogenetic molecules including dna, rna, and proteins, and all other substances originating in the bodies of tribal members, in addition to genetic and other information derived therefrom” (sections 3.14j-k), as particular forms of tribal indigenous intellectual property that require explicit protection. the irpa (2000) noted that its guiding principles are: “fully informed consent after full disclosure and consultation,” “immediate risks and benefits to tribal community,” “confidentiality,” “respect,” “communication,” “empowerment,” “equity,” “mutual respect,” “prior rights,” “self-determination,” “inalienability,” and “traditional guardianship” (section 5). these principles are positioned centrally, which indicate that they can be used as a guide in making decisions in the face of new technologies or other changes in the research relationship. respect is listed twice—once with reference to individuals and communities and again with reference to the mutual respect between researchers and indigenous peoples that is central to successful and robust science. in some instances, other principles are stated subtly or can be inferred from other principles. for example, the references to equity and empowerment also remind researchers and research participants that this relationship is reciprocal. in several instances, communication (and transparency) is embedded in codes regarding the return of results and samples to the community. however, the code also places emphasis on the importance of using the “local language” (section 5.1e), which is itself a good research practice (see also akwesasne task force on the environment (atfe, 1996). with respect to biospecimens, irpa (2000) emphasized specific limited consent for projects—i.e., consent that is free, prior, and informed—and the retention of intellectual property rights (pp. 14-15). irpa’s ownership argument owes its language to the atfe (1996; reviewed below). considering the limited success of property arguments regarding biospecimens (see lewis, 2013), this wording allows tribes both to choose “to require the deposit of raw materials and data, working papers or product” into repositories of their choice as well as for “duplicates of data or split samples . . . [to] be stored in such a local archive” (irpa, 2000, section 6.2m) during the course of research projects. another of irpa’s (2000) recommendations concerned the ability of tribes to elect to withdraw from a project and receive a full and complete return of all biological samples at the conclusion of a project. in addition, this recommendation concerned protections against the secondary use of biological samples without the tribe’s consent, expressly disallowing the patenting and commercialization of products based on the biospecimens. canadian institutes of health research (cihr, 2007) guidelines for health research involving aboriginal people and arbour and cook (2006) in the canadian institutes of health research (cihr, 2007) aboriginal research ethics guidelines and an accompanying academic paper by laura arbour and doris cook (2006) have taken a different approach to the question of ownership vis-à-vis biological specimens. arbour and cook (2006) advanced the concept of “dna on loan,” a model whereby dna (both in sample and data derived therefrom) obtained through research is only loaned to researchers by participants. this concept is 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.4 different from u.s. legal approaches to biological specimens, which typically presume that a sample given (or taken) is a gift or donation. the principles of respect and reciprocity are central to arbour and cook’s “dna on loan” premise. as “stewards,” researchers must care for samples and data with respect to ensure the integrity of samples and data. when researchers are not owners but rather custodians of samples and derivative information, certain abuses (such as patenting, reuse or secondary use without consent, improper storage, and/or destruction) are not as likely. furthermore, under the dna on loan model, researchers enter a reciprocal relationship with samples or data, since participants can withdraw from studies at any time and cancel the loan. as a result, researchers must consult with participants and/or return to communities to obtain re-consent if they wish to continue using samples or data. for many participants involved in research, the reciprocity they desire is simply to know what happened with their samples—that is, the results of research—and the dna on loan premise enables and encourages this transparent sharing of information. the cihr (2007) aboriginal research ethics guidelines have noted, “co-ownership of data between researchers and communities is recommended because the aboriginal community and the researcher are both integral to the production of data (pre and post-analysis), subject to the community’s views on traditional or sacred knowledge” (p. 26). the guidelines have suggested that secondary research only happen with community consent (if samples are rendered anonymous), individual re-consent (if samples can be linked to identity), and/or through the use of a research review committee. this precondition not only stymies sample and data misuse, but it also promotes best practices in consent and participation insofar as aboriginal (or american indian) communities must be involved with and consulted about the research process. the cihr guidelines also prohibit the transfer of samples to third parties, even for testing related to consented research, unless such transfer has been explicitly stated in the statement of consent itself. importantly, the cihr guidelines shifted responsibility regarding awareness of community policies and protocols away from research participants and to researchers. in doing this, the cihr guidelines have offered a different way to think about “human subjects protection” as an issue that does not refer to whole bodies alone, but also the disaggregated parts of the human body that become samples and specimens. the cihr (2007) guidelines have emphasized that “for existing tissue banks, a series of consultations with aboriginal stakeholders should be held to determine under what circumstances the samples can be used for future research” (p. 28). this indicates that many peoples may be willing to consent to continued research, but ultimately participation is the communities’ decision, and all research should abide by the best practices concerning consultation and reciprocity. national congress of american indians (ncai) research regulation in american indian/alaska native communities: policy and practice considerations (sahota, 2007) written for the policy research center (prc) of the ncai, sahota (2007) demonstrated that the foundation for all research interactions with american indian and alaska native (ai/an) communities is based on the belmont report principles of respect for autonomy, beneficence, and justice, but emphasized that these principles must be applied to both the individual participants and the communities themselves. the belmont report (department of health, education, and welfare, 1979) highlighted the importance of data sharing considerations and emphasized that existing policy may allow ai/an data to be made publicly available if protections are not in place at the beginning of research 5 bardill: tribal specimens policies published by scholarship@western, 2017 projects. in the related ihs guidelines for implementing and complying with ihs policy on specimens, freeman (2001) clarified that “specimens for which ihs was or is involved in collection or storage are not anonymous for community because they are known to be from ai/an people, with the group of tribes also known” (p. 5). freeman also noted that specimens can only be anonymous for individuals, and anonymous individual samples may still harm the community if it can be identified as the source. this attention to extending the belmont report principles to communities is necessary for tribes, but, arguably, it is useful for other communities as well. sahota (2007) reviewed how tribes or groups thereof may set up or partner with institutions to create irbs, highlighting the importance of communication and tribal oversight. likewise, harding et al. (2012) reviewed the importance of data sharing and other agreements between communities, as a negotiated mutually respectful process that can produce the best outcomes for science and communities. in the creation of research policy and the development of model volunteer consent documents, freeman (2000, 2007) emphasized language and how it helps one to translate and reconsider concepts, even if in non-technical english (or a version of english that is used as the “local language”) as opposed to an indigenous language. sahota (2014), in a later study involving interviews with a small sample of participants from one tribal community, demonstrated the diversity of attitudes regarding biospecimens. the interviews with tribal members and leaders showed that it is important for communities to have guidelines for biospecimen disposal that include a range of options, such as returning samples to individuals, returning samples to community representatives, and/or clinical methods of disposing samples. participants also suggested blessing the laboratory where handling and storage would occur in order to offer a culturally appropriate form of protection over the information and the piece of the participant. in the sample, most participants affirmed that they would want a sample destroyed after the study had finished. many participants also expressed an inalienable connection between themselves and samples or specimens, which directly relates to the irpa’s principle of respecting and upholding inalienability between participants and their specimens. regarding the disposal of specimens following death, participants in sahota’s (2014) study expressed different opinions about what constituted best practices. these opinions were tied to “how they understood traditions around both death and property” (p. 26). most interviewees said “specimens should be used after death” (p. 26); however, the majority of those who said specimens should be used after death described themselves as traditional and felt that specimens should be cared for as other possessions of a deceased person (through burning or burial, for example). this diversity of opinion regarding the disposal of specimens within and between communities is also evident in the māori model (cunningham et al., 2007). one advantage the māori do have is a single language and recognition of their rights within the central governing document of the settler state. in related work in south africa, moodley, sibanda, february, and rossouw (2014) found that participants were concerned with the export of their specimens for secondary uses, the importance of re-consent for additional research, and benefit sharing between participants and researchers. they also reported diverse attitudes about participation in research and preferences for obtaining and using samples. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.4 alaska area specimen bank (aasb) the alaska area specimen bank (aasb) is unique example of how to bridge multiple communities, languages, and ways of thinking. the aasc was created to help address the issue of biospecimens (largely an) amassed from the healthcare system, and it focused on their maintenance, use, disposal, and return. these archival samples highlight the lack of informed consent typically given for secondary use of samples. with this in mind, bathe and mcguire (2009) have proposed a framework for the secondary use of tissues in the aasb. the aasb has set up a formal network, which includes a community representative committee, to review proposals for research involving the samples. proposal approval is required before specimens can be accessed. the network works with the larger governing structure of the bank to manage new deposits, withdrawals, and loans of samples and data. parkinson, hennessey, bulkow, smith, and the alaska area specimen bank working group (2013) have similarly laid out a framework regarding access to specimens. their framework has emphasized that new deposits must include informed consent and offer three options to participants: a. storage of specimens with identifying information; b. participation in current but not future projects (no deposit, only exchange of “currency”); and c. if foreseen, consent for secondary use of deposit, which may contain particular restrictions. central to aasb’s operation is the notion that ownership of specimens remains with participants, and that all resources in the aasb should “be used to benefit the health and well-being of the alaska native people” (p. 3). ongoing discussion is occurring around “the use of specimens from deceased persons” and other collections of human biological materials (parkinson et al., 2013, discussion section, para. 2). hiratsuka et al. (2012) have noted, for example, that an participants considered proper respect for participants to be of paramount importance; respect should be shown through appropriate care of samples; communication about dates of destruction; and respectful, non-cavalier destruction of samples. indigenous nation-specific policies in u.s. context navajo nation human research code (nnhrc; navajo nation, 1994) and genetic moratorium (navajo nation council, 2002) the navajo nation human research code (nnhrc; navajo nation, 1994) and genetic moratorium (navajo nation council, 2002) have demonstrated a different approach towards research regulation and biospecimen use in indian country. the navajo nation (1994) noted in the nnhrc that research involving human subjects should be “beneficial, community-based, and consistent with the navajo nation priority and concerns” (p. 295). importantly, the last part of this clause emphasizes the importance of mutual respect and community consultation for all research involving human subjects. furthermore, the nnhrc expressly noted, “all data and research subject to this code are the property of the navajo nation” (p. 296); the nnhrc also referred to the need to assure protection of data, thus implying that, even when samples are stored at another facility, they remain the property of the navajo nation. the nnhrc also highlighted the importance of both individual and national informed 7 bardill: tribal specimens policies published by scholarship@western, 2017 consent, as well as the importance of the navajo nation reviewing manuscripts resulting from research with their people. the navajo nation has subsequently established the navajo nation data resource center whose research timeline lists the deposit of information derived from studies as its last step. in 2002, the navajo nation (navajo nation council, 2002) issued a moratorium on genetic testing, which has limited but not halted the collection of biological specimens (including by the ihs) for purposes other than research. given this moratorium, no secondary uses of samples would be permitted, and samples would be returned to the navajo nation or disposed of (with respect and possibly ceremony) after their use for research. akwesasne task force on the environment (atfe, 1996) protocol for review of environmental and scientific research proposals (presrp) this atfe’s forward looking protocol for review of environmental and scientific research proposals (presrp) was not driven by the belmont principles, but rather by the community principles of skennen (peace), kariwiio (good word), and kasestensera (strength). these community principles are all intended to support the goals of justice and unity. coming from the mohawk nation community of akwesasne, which has long been a leader in thinking about issues of concern to their community and indian country more broadly, the presrp emphasized respect, equity, and empowerment. while there is some overlap with the belmont principles, the akwesasne principles center the interactions between researchers and participant communities as one characterized by reciprocity instead of simply protection. the presrp defined research as including “biogenetic” studies, a term that is similar to the language used in the mtrc and other codes. in addition, the presrp included important safeguards regarding confidentiality, which permits the release of aggregate data only and allows data sharing only in accordance with community requirements. the presrp used the language of “fair and appropriate return” (atfe, 1996, equity section, para. 1) in combination with a data ownership statement, mirroring the ipcb’s, to affirm that the community maintains rights to all samples and their disposal, intellectual property, and any data derived from samples. the principles guiding the presrp suggest that the proper way to deal with samples from this community is to respectfully return them and, if they are not returnable, to respectfully destroy them. in either case, however, any data or information derived from the samples, as well as any papers or products created as a result of research using the samples, should be shared with the community. ho-chunk nation (2005) ho-chunk nation code (hcnc) the ho-chunk nation (wisconsin) code (hcnc) has offered explicit guidelines about the use and disposal of specimens in research, and it contains a broader definition of “human subject” than many federal irbs. the hcnc defined “human subject” as: [a] living or nonliving individual (including human remains) about whom a researcher (whether professional or student) conducting research obtains information or data through intervention or interaction with the individual, involving physical procedures by which data are 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.4 gathered (for example, blood draws) and/or manipulations of the subject or the subject’s environment. (ho-chunk nation, 2005, p. 4) this definition extends past the typical bounds of human subject safeguards to protect remains (that may be unearthed) and the recently deceased. the hcnc also included a clarification for researchers, which includes students, that explicitly states acceptable or desirable methods for the clinical or biomedical sciences and psychological or educational research. “specimens” in this code includes all “tangible and intangible data” (ho-chunk nation, 2005, p. 4), which means that everything from data from computer codes to biological samples are to be treated similarly by researchers. the hcnc requires the completion of an application for the collection of specimens or data; this application must specify: • how the specimens will be donated; • how researchers plan to dispose of both specimens and derived data at the conclusion of the project; • any contemplated secondary research; and • informed consent procedures regarding the proposed study, saving of specimens, and future uses of specimens. however, the hcnc only requires information to be presented; it does not dictate the answers. the hcnc has explicitly stated that research participants own their specimens, and thus current and future uses of specimens “must be disclosed and agreed to by the researcher and irb prior to a [research] permit being issued” (ho-chunk nation, 2005, p. 6). pascua yaqui tribal council (2008) regulatory code the principles highlighted by the pascua yaqui regulatory code include mutual respect, equity, empowerment, and working towards collaborative relationships (following the atfe model). the principles that guide the review of research include those from the ipcb model. the language of the ipcb is used when the pascua yaqui regulatory code describes the regulation of biological samples (pascua yaqui tribal council, 2008, section 170). the code has defined “biological samples” in a manner that was later mirrored by the tohono o’odham, whereby ownership of samples remains with the tribe; this suggests that the proper disposal of samples would necessarily involve their return to the tribe. colorado river indian tribes (crit, 2009) human and cultural research code the crit (2009) code focused on “protection of the crit property . . . such as blood and tissue samples” (p. 1), and it included provisions for obtaining informed consent from both living and nonliving humans, with informed consent routed through non-living humans’ heirs or relatives. the crit code asserted ownership of intellectual property generated from research and data. although the code offers no specific provision or regulation regarding biological samples, future uses of samples would likely require either subsequent consent through the identification of donors or their heirs, or returning or disposing of the sample. 9 bardill: tribal specimens policies published by scholarship@western, 2017 fort peck tribes (2013) research code of ethics and policy—assiniboine and sioux research and policies the tribes located on the fort peck reservation in montana have created a joint policy, which demonstrates the bridging of two native american cultures in order to reach a consensus (as other models and the ihs guidelines have also done). this code is linked to fort peck community college, thereby bringing researchers into contact with the tribal people of the area. the code has noted, for example, “researchers and learners [must] accept a responsibility to share and practice the knowledge [given to them] in a manner consistent with its original use and teachings” (fort peck tribes, 2013, p. 4). regarding specimens, the code stated, “the data collected . . . will be secured and owned by the people” (fort peck tribes, 2013, p. 4). this provision may not be entirely feasible for a study involving biospecimens, insofar as there may be a need to build such capacity among communities and how such capacity can be tied to larger institutions is a question that the code does not address. the code has noted that “free and informed consent” is necessary for research involving biospecimens, and it emphasizes that “the research project must make available support services for participants, including ceremony and counselling, that may be needed” (fort peck tribes, 2013, p. 6). in line with the māori guidelines, this point also relates to respectful, culturally appropriate storing and disposal of specimens. given the background information contained in the code, the statement of “trust and respect as essential elements of the [research] relationship” (p. 1), and the implicit importance placed on transparency, the inference would be that all samples and their data would be returned to the community. the community would retain ownership over the information and any publications, but the details of research relationship would be negotiated with researchers. tohono o’odham legislative branch (2013) chapter 8—research code the tohono o’odham research code (torc) has defined biological samples inclusively, so that they include not only human subjects (living and nonliving), but also “microorganisms, bacteria, plant, animal, or any human biological materials, genetic samples, any copies of the original genetic samples, any cell lines containing copies of the original genetic samples, and data derived from those samples” (tohono o’odham legislative branch, 2013, section 8101). this is the most inclusive definition of biological samples among those in policies reviewed in this article. the emphasis on benefits to communities mirrors that of the hcnc. it includes requirements for protecting ownership of samples, data, and work products of the research, as well as specimens. importantly, the torc has noted the importance of both transparent communication and the use of the local language of o’odham, and it requires research to be explained in both o’odham and english. per the torc, future uses of biological samples must be disclosed before the initial collection of samples. the torc’s regulation of biological samples section comes from the ipcb’s model, which necessitates appropriate return, prohibits sharing, and prohibits patenting or commercialization of samples. indigenous nation-specific policies in canadian context the canadian protocols reviewed below have been organized by region. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.4 manitoulin first nations guidelines for ethical aboriginal research (aboriginal health research review committee [ahrc] & manitoulin first nations, 2003)—ontario the manitoulin first nations guidelines for ethical aboriginal research has offered an innovative approach that resembles the atfe insofar as both emphasize traditional teachings and the range of possibilities for engagement with research. the “seven grandfather teachings of respect, wisdom, love, honesty, humility, bravery, and truth” (ahrc & manitoulin first nations, 2003, p. 8) inform the guidelines. the guidelines emphasized: • “research should be owned by the local first nations communities and organizations” (p. 7); • research should provide benefits, including capacity building and the production of documents useful to the communities; and • research should center respect for diversity within the community, for community ownership of data, and for aboriginal knowledge and culture (p. 7). the guidelines pull from the tri-council policy statement, the principles of respect for human dignity, respect for free and informed consent, respect for vulnerable persons, respect for privacy and confidentiality, respect for justice and inclusiveness, balancing harms and benefits, minimizing harm, and maximizing benefit. regarding biological specimens, the guidelines have noted that ownership remains with the communities through intellectual property rights and other means. the guidelines also noted that values of the academic community, which include “openness, sharing of ideas, and scholarly activity” with the goals of “increas[ing] and disseminat[ing] knowledge” (p. 21) may or may not be commensurate with the values and goals of participant communities. six nations council of the grand river territory (2014) conducting research at six nations — ontario this code takes “mutual respect, understanding and trust” as its guiding principles (six nations council of the grand river territory, 2014, preamble section, para. 1). the reuse of data (and therefore samples from which that data was derived) is expressly prohibited without authorization from the research ethics committee. communication through local media channels is emphasized as part of the research relationship, but the code’s section on storage and ownership does not expressly address biological samples; instead, it is focused on research products. however, the earlier prohibition on reuse of samples would require the researcher to store the samples until a mutually agreeable project is proposed and approved. tl’azt’en nation chief and council (1998) tl’azt’en nation guidelines for research in tl’azt’en territory—b.c. the tl’azt’en nation guidelines (tng) promoted respect (as opposed to protection) in research interactions, and prominently emphasized the diversity within their nation (tl’azt’en nation chief and council, 1998). this diversity is evident in other codes as well. this approach attends to different viewpoints and perspectives, but also to differing relations to norms, standards, and classifications, which encourages researcher to move beyond the classic categories and instead, in collaboration with the 11 bardill: tribal specimens policies published by scholarship@western, 2017 community, create the best categories answer the questions of the community. communication and the use of dakalh, the tl’azt’en language, are also emphasized by the tng. the tng noted that both individual and group consent are needed for projects. the community must be consulted regarding the design, implementation, and interpretation of the research. in addition, copies of the final report are to be made available to members of the community in cases where there are no conflicts in terms of privacy and confidentiality. moreover, this information is to be made available in both dakalh and english. the tng has noted that commercialization can only benefit the people, and that local capacity building should be a part of research. while there is no explicit mention of biospecimens, the code suggests that traditional heritage is protected through the return of samples and data to the community. nuu-chah-nulth tribal council research ethics committee (2008) protocols & principles for conducting research in a nuu-chah-nulth context—b.c. the nuu-chah-nulth have experienced ethical breaches in their relationships with researchers; as such, their code has called for protection and partnership in research, and includes a unique caveat regarding research participation or refusal (nuu-chah-nulth tribal council research ethics committee (2008). under the nuu-cha-nulth’s code, participants have a 24-hour minimum timeframe to consider the research before deciding to participate. the code emphasized that the community should benefit from the research, risks related to participation should be minimized, research data should be disseminated to participants and communities, and the community retains partial ownership of data. the principles governing this code break down the belmont principles: autonomy and protection as part of respect for persons; non-maleficence and maximum benefit and minimum risk as part of beneficence; and equality, equity, and fairness as part of justice. while this code does not, surprisingly, include reference to biospecimens, its principles and the nuu-chah-nulth’s historical relationship with researchers suggest that the community would require re-consent for future uses of samples, the respectful return of samples to communities, and/or the respectful disposal of samples in cases where future use and return are not possible. mi’kmaw ethics watch (1999) mi’kmaw research principles and protocols—nova scotia the mi’kmaw ethics watch (1999) code highlighted the importance of the mi’kmaw language by using it at the beginning of the document. throughout, the code has addressed how researchers and communities can be beneficial to one another. while this benefit is generally in terms knowledge, it is possible to infer biospecimens are included in the statement, “all research, study, or inquiry . . . belongs to the community and must be returned to that community” (mi’kmaw ethics watch, 1999, p. 2). the code also emphasized the importance of “a negotiated partnership” which places participants as “equals in the research” (p. 3). the code emphasized the return of information, capacity building, and community consultation during the interpretation of data. like the nnhrc, this code has expressly noted, “any research involving collection of human genes, mi’kmaw genetic material, or involving the human genome diversity project shall be rejected or considered only as to its benefits to the mi’kmaq people” (p. 4). this supports the contention that biospecimens should be returned to the community after their use and that very limited uses of those samples would be deemed acceptable. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.4 métis centre at national aboriginal health organization (2010-2011) principles of ethical métis research this report proposed principles for ethical research involving métis peoples, but does not indicate any specific policies for biospecimen usage. indeed, it does not indicate or outline any specific policies at all. the principles highlighted are: • reciprocal relationships; • respect for . . . (a variety of such as individual and collective rights); • safe and inclusive environments; • recognize diversity; • research should . . . (normative statements regarding benefits, relevancy, and standards); and • métis context. these principles, like those in other codes, are centered on diversity within tribal nations, which means that there is no single correct approach to research questions. without clear policies, it is not possible to know how the métis centre at the national aboriginal health organization would regulate the obtainment, use, return, and disposal of biospecimens. what is apparent from this code is that anything done to biospecimens should be respectful, and that communities should be consulted and informed about potential actions regarding biospecimens. the inuit tapiriit kanatami and nunavut research institute (2007) negotiating research relationships with inuit communities: a guide for researchers—nunavut the inuit tapiriit kanatami and nunavut research institute’s (2007) guide for researchers is informed by the principles of honesty, humility, informed perspective, openness (including to new things), patience, willingness to learn, local capacity building (including supporting the local economy), communication, respect, and use of the local language. the guide specifies that control of data has to be addressed in negotiating the research relationship but no set policy is given. the guide implies that a properly negotiated research relationship will result in a reciprocal agreement developed between researchers and participants—as opposed to relying on prescribed policies for each aspect of research. additional indigenous policies in other settler-colonial contexts australian institute of aboriginal and torres strait islander studies (aiatsis, 2012) guidelines for ethical research in australian indigenous studies—australia while the aiatsis (2012) guidelines make little reference to biological specimens, it has presented a number of important principles, related to things such as the transformation of samples into data, that are related to samples and specimens. the 14 principles in this document included “rights, respect and recognition; negotiation, consultation, agreement and mutual understanding; participation, collaboration and partnership; benefits, outcomes and giving back; managing research: uses, storage and access; and reporting and compliance” (p. 1). the guidelines direct researchers and community partners 13 bardill: tribal specimens policies published by scholarship@western, 2017 (who are to be equal partners) to negotiate in order to make decisions regarding the collection of samples, disposition, storage, and return of samples and data. desert knowledge cooperative research centre (2008) desert knowledge crc protocol for aboriginal knowledge and intellectual property—australia the desert knowledge cooperative research centre’s (2008) desert knowledge crc protocol for aboriginal knowledge and intellectual property (pakip) addressed “storage, access, and publication,” (section 5.2) and highlighted the importance of accessibility of information “by aboriginal people with interests or rights in the data” (section 5.2, para. 6) as an expression of continued partnership and benefit sharing. the pakip also noted that samples “must be destroyed on the request of the providers of the information or on the request of those who according to traditional law have the authority to make that decision” (section 5.2, para. 7). this constitutes a novel system that covers various types of withdrawal and/or requests for destruction. this protocol prohibited commercialization and secondary use of samples without re-consent, which may be given by either individuals or the community as a whole. the return of results, as well as equitable benefit sharing, are also required. supreme community council of alto san juan (asocasan), united nations environment programme (unep), environmental research institute of the pacific (iiap), and natural justice (nj) (2012) biocultural community protocol for the territory of the supreme community council of alto san juan—colombia this protocol specifically made reference to traditional knowledges and directly addressed the community concept of zoteas, which are “small, locally maintained gene banks” (asocosan, unep, iian, & nj, 2012, p. 16). the protocol demonstrated a desire to protect and house knowledge of biology and nature within the community as much as possible, which is reiterated in the document’s assertion of “the right of ownership over natural resources” (p. 33). this protocol also referenced the nagoya protocol of the convention on biological diversity, which is focused on human interactions with environments and the rights associated to those interactions, with an emphasis on benefit sharing. federación por la autodeterminación de los pueblos indígenas (2010) propuesta de protocolo para un proceso de consulta y consentimiento con los pueblos indigenas del paraguay—paraguay this protocol, available in spanish, reiterated principles seen in other protocols, emphasizing justice, respect, equality, transparency, and indigenous ownership (and benefit sharing) of research and other activities in their territory and involving their knowledges (federación por la autodeterminación de los pueblos indígenas, 2010). this protocol was not the result of debate and discussion among researchers, but rather emerged from consultation with and consensus between researchers and indigenous people, and among indigenous people. traditional health practitioners of bushbuckridge, kruger to canyons biosphere, and natural justice (2010) biocultural protocol of the traditional health practitioners of bushbuckridge— south africa this protocol focused on cultural and practical knowledge and it also encouraged the use of the local language and the translation of the protocol into the indigenous language. like other protocols that have 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.4 focused on traditional knowledges, this one is directed towards protecting knowledge and benefiting the communities who hold the knowledge. the protocol highlighted reciprocity, informed consent, and transparency as integral to research relationships. with regard to consent, research or other partnerships are to be regulated in part through “a process of community deliberation and ancestral consultation” (traditional health practitioners of bushbuckridge, kruger to canyons biosphere, & natural justice, 2010, p. 5) that is similar to the nuu-chah-nulth’s minimum reflection period for participants. interestingly, this protocol expressed interest in welcoming “commercial bio-prospectors” who must apply “for any access to . . . [i]ndigenous biological resources” (p. 5). this approach further demonstrates the diversity of perspectives among indigenous peoples, and it offers an example of a community’s self-determination in research partnerships. principles that inform actions regarding specimens in research and laboratory settings both standard ethical principles and community-specific principles informed these protocols in establishing their conceptions of research relationships and preferences regarding the obtainment, use, return, disposal, and loaning of specimens. this article has presented community-specific policies, protocols, codes, and principles to allow for a coalitional understanding of ethical issues related to biospecimens. these principles provide guidance for both researchers who wish to partner with indigenous communities (instead of either extracting specimens and conducting culturally-uninformed analyses or utilizing the remains of individuals whose relations do not want them to be analyzed), and for communities to reflect upon as they create their own policies going forward. further, these policies can inform the research policies by drawing attention to the limits of current rules and the possibilities for interaction between the various stakeholders in the research. similar to the belmont principles, respect is central to the protocols and codes that we reviewed in this article, although the protocols and codes reviewed present a wider, more holistic understanding of respect that encompasses individuals, communities, samples, and data. respect is thus necessary at every stage in the development of research relationships, from initial consultation to the presentation of the final research. this last point on presentation leads into the principle of beneficence, whereby attention must be paid through regulation or “common sense” to how the results of research will be interpreted and whether they pose risks for participants. there should also be benefit to participants and communities in terms of capacity building as a result of the research. this, in turn, extends to the need for transparency, including policies to allow access to and review of data, specimens, findings, and publications. fair return of information and benefit to both parties in the relationship are both part of justice, equity, and empowerment of the community. in truth, many of these principles and practices are entangled, and they are often conjointly demonstrated through reciprocity, ownership, negotiation, protection, and communication. when those syncretic aspects are at the center the research, interactions with indigenous peoples, and/or decisions about specimens, the discussion will lead to best practices on how to proceed from within and between communities. 15 bardill: tribal specimens policies published by scholarship@western, 2017 references aboriginal health review committee (ahrc) & manitoulin first nations. 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(2008). title 8: regulatory code—part 7 research protection . retrieved from http://www.pascuayaqui-nsn.gov/_static_pages/tribalcodes/ radin, j., & kowal, e. (2015). indigenous blood and ethical regimes in the united states and australia since the 1960s. american ethnologist, 42(4), 749-65. doi: 10.1111/amet.12168 sahota, p. s. (2007). research regulation in american indian/alaska native communities: policy and practice considerations. retrieved from the national congress of american indians (ncai) policy research center website: http://www.ncai.org/policy-researchcenter/initiatives/research_regulation_in_ai_an_communities__policy_and_practice.pdf sahota, p. s. (2014). body fragmentation: native americans community members’ views on specimen disposition in biomedical/genetics research. ajob empirical bioethics, 5(3), 19-30. doi: 10.1080/23294515.2014.896833 salzano, f. m., & hurtado, a. m. (2004). lost paradises and the ethics of research and publication. new york, n. y.: oxford university press. six nations council of the grand river territory. (2014). conducting research at six nations. retrieved from http://www.sixnations.ca/admethicspolicy.pdf supreme community council of alto san juan (asocasan), united nations environment programme (unep), environmental research institute of the pacific (iiap), and natural justice (nj). (2012). biocultural community protocol for the territory of the supreme 19 bardill: tribal specimens policies published by scholarship@western, 2017 community council of alto san juan. retrieved from https://europa.eu/capacity4dev/file/12655/download?token=ikhinqbg te mana raraunga—māori data sovereignty network. (2015). te mana raraunga—māori data sovereignty network charter. retrieved from http://planetmaori.com/files/content/2016/te_mana_raraunga_charter.pdf tl’azt’en nation chief and council. (1998). tl’azt’en nation guidelines for research in tl’azt’en territory, resolution. retrieved from http://cura.unbc.ca/governance/cemtlazten%20guidelines.pdf tohono o’odham legislative branch. (2013). title 17 – health and safety. chapter 8 – research code. tohono o’odham code. retrieved from http://www.tolc-nsn.org/docs/title17ch8.pdf traditional health practitioners of bushbuckridge, kruger to canyons biosphere, & natural justice. (2010). biocultural protocol of the traditional health practitioners of bushbuckridge, south africa. retrieved from http://community-protocols.org/wpcontent/uploads/documents/south_africa-bushbuckridge_biocultural_protocol.pdf tsosie, r. (2007). cultural challenges to biotechnology: native american genetic resources and the concept of cultural harm. journal of law, medicine, and ethics, 35(3), 396-411. doi: 10.1111/j.1748-720x.2007.00163. 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.4 appendix a table 1. comparison of regulatory models and indigenous nation-specific policies steps in process m t r c (a il c , 1 99 9) ir pa (i pc b , 2 00 0) c ih r (2 00 9) n c a i ( sa ho ta , 2 00 7) a a sb n av aj o n at io n (1 99 4) h r c pr es r p (a t fe , 1 99 6) h oc hu nk n at io n (2 00 5) pa sc ua y aq ui (2 00 8) h c r c (c r it , 2 00 9) r c ep (f or t p ec k t ri be s, 2 01 3) t oh on o o ’o d ha m (2 01 3) t l’a zt ’e n n at io n (1 99 8) m i’k m aw (1 99 9) r pp a h r c & m an ito ul in f n (2 00 3) in ui t t ap ir iit k an at am i (2 00 7) n uu -c ha hnu lth (2 00 8) si x n at io ns (2 01 4) m et is c en tr e (2 01 020 11 ) c on se ns us consultation/ negotiation s y y y y y y y y s y s y y y y y y y y protection for lh b,k lh lh lh lh b,k h b,k h,k lh h,b k k,h lh k lh lh h,k lh, k informed consent p,c p,c p,c p,c p,c p,c p,c p,c p,c p,c, g p,c p,c p,c p,c p,c p,c p,c p,c p,c p,c confidentiality p,c p,c p,c p,c p,c p,c p,c p,c p,c p p p s p,c s p,c s p,c use & storage potential uses defined s s s sd y y y y s yd withdrawal s p,c p,c s p p,c p,c p,c p,c p,c p,c secondary uses consent s p,c p,c s ec p, ec p,c p,c ec p,c ,ec return / on loan/ disposal of results r r r r r r r r r r r y r r r r r r r r 21 bardill: tribal specimens policies published by scholarship@western, 2017 steps in process m t r c (a il c , 1 99 9) ir pa (i pc b , 2 00 0) c ih r (2 00 9) n c a i ( sa ho ta , 2 00 7) a a sb n av aj o n at io n (1 99 4) h r c pr es r p (a t fe , 1 99 6) h oc hu nk n at io n (2 00 5) pa sc ua y aq ui (2 00 8) h c r c (c r it , 2 00 9) r c ep (f or t p ec k t ri be s, 2 01 3) t oh on o o ’o d ha m (2 01 3) t l’a zt ’e n n at io n (1 99 8) m i’k m aw (1 99 9) r pp a h r c & m an ito ul in f n (2 00 3) in ui t t ap ir iit k an at am i (2 00 7) n uu -c ha hnu lth (2 00 8) si x n at io ns (2 01 4) m et is c en tr e (2 01 020 11 ) c on se ns us of data r r sd r ol r r ol r ol ol ol r r r r r r r d of samples sd r ol ol ol dib ol ol, di r, dib ol ol r r r, di r, ol d ol, r benefits commercial possibilities n n n n n n n c n c c n, c local capacity building y y y y y y y s y y y y y y y s y s y analysis review y y y y y y y y s y y s s s s y publication review / author y y sd y y y y y y s s y y s s s s y language / communication y y y y y y y y y s y y s s y access y ol y y y y y y y y y y y y s y note. y – yes; n – no; blank – unaddressed; s – inferred support; d – discussion; lh – living humans only; h – humans and nonliving humans; b – all biologicals; k – knowledge; p – participant; c – community; ec – ethics committee; g – guardian; ol – on loan; r – return; dib – disposal with blessing 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.4 the international indigenous policy journal october 2017 comparing tribal research and specimens policies: models, practices, and principles jessica bardill recommended citation comparing tribal research and specimens policies: models, practices, and principles abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license comparing tribal research and specimens policies: models, practices, and principles the social distribution of distress and well-being in the canadian aboriginal population living off reserve the international indigenous policy journal volume 2 issue 1 health and well-being article 4 may 2011 the social distribution of distress and well-being in the canadian aboriginal population living off reserve susan wingert university of western ontario, swingert@uwo.ca recommended citation wingert, s. (2011). the social distribution of distress and well-being in the canadian aboriginal population living off reserve. the international indigenous policy journal, 2(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.4 his research is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in he international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. the social distribution of distress and well-being in the canadian aboriginal population living off reserve abstract this article examines how the social structure distributes risk and protective factors and mental health outcomes within the off reserve aboriginal population in canada. it uses the stress process model, a prominent model in the sociology of mental health, to explore pathways between social status, stress, coping resources, and mental health outcomes. path analyses are used to decompose total effects on distress and wellbeing into direct and indirect or mediating pathways. the results suggest that stress, mastery, and social support are important mediators between social status and mental health outcomes. stress appears to be a stronger contributor to distress while mastery and social support are of higher relative importance to wellbeing. keywords mental health, distress, well-being, stress process creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ epidemiological data suggest that aboriginal peoples in canada have higher average rates of specific psychiatric disorders including depression (tjepkema, 2002), alcohol and substance abuse, and suicide (clarke, colantonio, rhodes, & escobar, 2008; first nations inuit health branch, 2005). within the field of aboriginal mental health, most studies attribute mental health disparities to historical and contemporary colonialism. there are two avenues through which colonialism is seen as impacting aboriginal peoples. the first is through social and economic disadvantage, while the second is cultural oppression and loss. most research focussing on aboriginal peoples has examined issues related to culture, such as identity, assimilation, cultural loss or retention, cultural discontinuity, and cultural practices in healing (see for example chandler & lalonde, 1998; herman-stahl, spencer, & duncan, 2003; mccormick, 2000; whitbeck, mcmorris, hoyt, stubben, & laframboise, 2002). there has been much less attention paid to how the social structure distributes risk and protective factors and mental health outcomes within the aboriginal population. this lack of attention to structural determinants of health may be due, in part, to the fact that the aboriginal mental health literature has developed largely independently of the sociology of mental health. there is evidence that differences in social status are important determinants of mental health. noh, kaspar, and schimmele (2003) examined the effect of demographic variables on mental health for a wide range of ethnic groups in canada. they reported that when differences in sociodemographic and socioeconomic characteristics, health, social support, area of residence, and immigration status were controlled differences in rates of depression between aboriginals and english ancestry whites were reduced to non-significant levels. however, no other studies have comprehensively measured important demographic characteristics in order to replicate these findings. in addition, no known studies have examined the pathways between social status and mental health among aboriginal people. from a policy and service delivery standpoint, it is valuable to know which groups within the aboriginal population are at greatest risk of negative mental health outcomes and where intervention is possible. this paper contributes to the literature on aboriginal mental health by using the stress process model (pearlin, menaghan, lieberman, & mullan, 1981), a prominent model in the sociology of mental health to examine the social distribution of psychological distress and well-being in the off reserve aboriginal population. it also examines whether these outcomes are mediated or moderated by risk and protective factors, namely stress, mastery, and social support. theoretical perspectives while there are differences in cultural beliefs about mental health, aboriginal peoples share a holistic approach that emphasizes mental, physical, emotional, and spiritual dimensions. in addition, they emphasize the role of the physical and social environment in which the person or community is situated in producing health or illness (alfred, 2005; smye & mussell, 2001). this view is quite compatible with sociological perspectives which, unlike psychiatry and psychology, conceptualize mental health as being influenced by everyday life experiences, social arrangements, and contexts (aneshensel & phelan, 1999). distress and disorder are seen as expectable consequences of normative social arrangements that distribute hardships and resources inequitably (aneshensel, 2005; pearlin, 1999). one of the most prominent models in the sociology of mental health is the stress process model. pearlin and his colleagues theorized that the social structure and mental health outcomes were connected through stressors and social and psychosocial resources (pearlin, 1999). the stress process model was developed to guide explorations of the pathways between the social structure, exposure to 1 wingert: the social distribution of distress published by scholarship@western, 2011 stressors and stress proliferation, mediating and moderating processes, and manifestations of stress (pearlin, 1989; pearlin et al., 1981). pearlin (1995) described the major components of the model as: stressors, of course, refer to the problems, hardships, or threats that challenge the adaptive capacities of people; moderators are the social and personal resources that people can mobilize to contain, regulate, or otherwise ameliorate the effects of stressors; and outcomes refer to the effects of the stressors that are observed after the moderating resources are taken into account. in the background of the three components, and potentially influencing the nature of each of them, are the person’s various social and economic characteristics. (p. 3) research has supported the contention that differences in exposure to stressors accounts for a significant amount of social status variation in mental health outcomes (turner, wheaton, & lloyd, 1995). for example, stress explained 23 to 50 percent of the differences in depression by sex, martial status, and occupation (turner, wheaton et al., 1995). mastery is one of the most widely studied social resources (turner, marino, & rozell, 1995). “the construct of mastery refers to individuals’ understanding of their ability to control the forces that affect their lives” (pearlin, 1999, p. 409). mastery has been shown to be correlated with gender, age, race, marital status, education, income, occupation, employment status (ross & sastry, 1999; thoits, 1995). research suggests that mastery is related to social status because higher status groups experience objective conditions that make desirable outcomes more likely, which creates and reinforces feelings of personal control (ross & sastry, 1999). while social support involves both objective (how much support is actually received) and subjective (how adequate the support received is) elements, most studies examine perceived social support (turner, marino et al., 1995). the literature supports the conclusion that there is an inverse relationship between social support and mental illness with most studies examining depression. interestingly, social support is important regardless of stress level, but effects are stronger under high stress conditions. reliable relationships between gender, martial status, and socioeconomic status and social support have been reported in the literature. it also appears that having a supportive family in childhood lays the foundation for later social relationships (turner & turner, 1999). mental health of aboriginal people the limited epidemiological data available suggest that most aboriginal people are mentally healthy; however, a significant number experience distress or disorder. the majority of respondents in the 2002 to 2003 cycle of the first nations regional longitudinal health survey (fnrhs) reported feeling in balance physically, emotionally, mentally, and spiritually. on the other hand, 30.1% reported feeling sad, blue, or depressed for two or more consecutive weeks, 30.9% had suicidal thoughts in their lifetime, and 15.8% had attempted suicide at least once (rhs national team, 2007). data from the 2001 canadian community health survey (cchs) found that the rate of major depressive episode in the past year was 1.8 times higher in the aboriginal population (13.2%) compared to the non-aboriginal 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.4 population. however, these rates were linked to socioeconomic status with non-significant differences between aboriginal and non-aboriginal people with high household incomes1 there is also evidence that the consequences of mental illness are very serious. measures of potential years of life lost (tjepkema, 2002). 2 one of the few studies examining distress, rather than diagnosable disorder, found that among the cree of james bay distress in the past week was predicted by younger age, female gender, higher levels of education, living in an inland or isolated region, alcohol and drug use, less social support, having experienced significant life events, untimely loss of a close relative, and less time spent in the bush (kirmayer, boothroyd, tanner, adelson, & robinson, 2000). the off reserve aboriginal population has been found to have a prevalence rate of high psychological distress that is 42% higher than white canadians and two to five times the likelihood of having a severe mental disorder or substance dependence; however, the difference was non-significant among non-low-income groups (caron & liu, 2010). this finding suggests that socioeconomic status explains at least some of the disparity. due to mental disorders were much higher among first nations (142 years per 100,000 population) compared to the canadian population (60 years). suicide accounted for 1,315.4 potential years of lost life among first nations, which exceeded the rate for all cancers combined (first nations inuit health branch, 2005). in 1999, mental disorders accounted for 7.7 deaths per 100,000 among first nations males and 5.5 among females. these rates exclude suicides, which had a rate of 12.4 among women and 43.3 among men. suicide and self inflicted injuries are the leading cause of death among first nations aged 10 to 44 (first nations inuit health branch, 2005). in the fnrhs, rates of suicide ideation and suicide attempts were highest among respondents aged 18 to 59 and lowest among those aged 60 and over (rhs national team, 2007). there are no known studies that have attempted to measure the stress universe among aboriginal people. however, the literature suggests that many aboriginal people experience significant levels of stress, particularly related to disadvantaged socioeconomic circumstances, historical and contemporary effects of colonialism, and the intergenerational transmission of trauma. kirmayer et al. (2000) found that having a higher number of significant life events in the past year was associated with elevated rates of distress among cree in james bay. similarly, research involving american indian elders in michigan found that life events were related to increased risk of experiencing depression in the shortterm (chapleski, kaczynski, gerbi, & lichtenberg, 2004). there is also some evidence suggesting greater exposure to traumatic events among indigenous peoples. a study with american indians aged 15 to 57 living on two reservations showed relatively high lifetime rates of exposure to at least one trauma, particularly among women (manson, beals, klein, & croy, 2005). in a non-probability sample, respondents who reported childhood histories of abuse were more likely to use substances, report dysfunctional family relationships, and experience conflict in interpersonal relationships (jacobs & gill, 2002). american indians who experienced childhood sexual abuse were significantly more likely to be diagnosed with multiple psychiatric disorders (robin, chester, rasmussen, jaranson, & goldman, 1997). research involving the australian indigenous population have also found relatively high rates of stress and anxiety that have been linked to historical losses, being “trapped” between cultures, and social and economic disadvantage (brown, 2001). whitbeck, adams, hoyt, and chen (2004) found that american indian adults often thought about historical losses and those thoughts were associated with anxiety and depression or anger and avoidance. among the sources of stress experienced by aboriginal peoples, 1 the threshold for a high household income was set at $30,000 for households with one or two people, $40,000 for those with three or four people, and $60,000 for those with five or more people. 2 potential years of life lost is a measure of premature mortality compared to the population or subgroup average. the measure highlights causes of death that are prevalent among younger persons. 3 wingert: the social distribution of distress published by scholarship@western, 2011 racism is a commonly experienced one. in the fnrhs, two out of five first nations respondents had experienced racism in the past year with those with higher levels of education and who work for pay being more likely to have encountered it (rhs national team, 2007). perceived discrimination was found to be strongly associated with depressive symptoms among american indian adults, while engaging in traditional practices was negatively associated (whitbeck et al., 2002). there is also evidence that social problems are caused by and create stressors. for example, rates of family violence have been reported at 75% among aboriginal women and 40% among children (shah, 2004). few studies have examined the role of mastery in the production of health and well-being. in the fnrhs, suicide ideation was higher among those who received government transfers compared to those who did not (although rates in both groups were relatively high). the authors speculated that dependence on government aid may undermine one’s sense of mastery (rhs national team, 2007). those who reported they had not experienced an episode of depression were more likely to indicate they strongly agreed on questions related to locus of control (rhs national team, 2007). others have suggested that the history of cultural genocide and colonial domination contributed to learned helplessness among aboriginal peoples (wesley-esquimaux & smolewski, 2004). chandler and lalonde’s (2008) research on youth suicides in first nations communities found that community control over governance, land, and services was associated with very low rates of suicide. aboriginal peoples tend to share a collective orientation that places emphasis on relationships with family, friends, and community (first nations inuit health branch, 2009). among various types of social support, about half of respondents in the fnrhs reported having access to tangible, informational, affective, and positive social interaction. however, levels of support were relatively low for the availability of someone to give the respondent a break from daily routines. most people sought support from family and friends with family doctors, traditional healers, psychiatrists or psychologists, and crisis workers being used less frequently respectively (rhs national team, 2007). kirmayer et al. (2000) found that having fewer than five friends or close contacts was significantly associated with distress. research has also found that aboriginal women who reported high levels of positive social interaction, emotional and tangible support were more likely to be classified as thriving, which was defined as having excellent or very good self-rated health. among aboriginal men, only emotional support was significantly related to health status (richmond, ross, & egeland, 2007). however, research also suggests that aboriginal people, particularly those who experience socioeconomic disadvantage, may have reduced access to social support, live in communities where colonialism and poverty have undermined traditional values related to social ties, and have social networks that reinforce negative health behaviours (richmond, 2008). social support may be critical to those experiencing distress and disorder. among respondents in the fnrhs, those who were depressed used the supports available to them more than those who were not depressed (rhs national team, 2007). methods research questions these analyses examine how the stress process model explains the social distribution of distress and well-being in the off reserve aboriginal population. the following research questions will be addressed: 1) are psychological distress and well-being socially distributed by gender, age, family 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.4 structure, household income, and education? 2) are stress, mastery, and social support also socially distributed? 3) do stress, mastery, and social support mediate the relationship between social status and distress or well-being? and 4) do mastery and social support moderate the effect of stress on distress and well-being? data data for these analyses come from the canadian community health survey (cchs) cycle 1.2 mental health and well-being. cycle 1.2 was a smaller-scale follow-up survey focused on mental health that provides provincial level results. the cchs is a cross-sectional survey of individuals aged 15 and over living in private dwellings in the ten provinces. excluded from the sampling frame were residents of the three territories, indian reserves, crown lands, and institutions, as well as full-time members of the armed forces and those in select remote communities. data were collected by statistics canada between may and december of 2002. responses were obtained from 36,984 individuals, which represent a combined household and person response rate of 77.0%. sample in the cchs, 865 respondents (654.2 survey weighted cases) answered “yes” that their cultural or racial background included aboriginal people of north america (north american indian, métis, inuit/eskimo)? (statistics canada, 2004). these cases were selected for the analyses. there were no identifiers for identity group (i.e., first nations, métis, and inuit) that would allow subgroup analyses. measures endogenous. the non-specific measure of distress in the cchs is the kessler psychological distress scale (k10). the scale is a composite index of 10 items. for each item, respondents indicate how often in the past month they have experienced each symptom (statistics canada, n.d.-b). symptoms include feeling tired without a good reason, nervous, so nervous nothing calms the person down, hopeless, restless or fidgety, unable to sit still, sad or depressed, so depressed nothing would cheer the person up, everything is an effort, and worthless (statistics canada, 2004). responses were coded from 0 or none of the time to 4 or all of the time. distress scores range from 0 to 40 with higher scores indicating higher levels of distress (statistics canada, n.d.-b). comparisons of this scale with other mental health measures, including meeting diagnostic criteria for a range of mental disorders, using data from large population surveys, have supported its validity as a measure of psychological distress (andrews & slade, 2001; cairney, veldhuizen, wade, kurdyak, & streiner, 2007; kessler et al., 2003). the measure of well-being is the psychological well-being manifestation scale. the scale ranges from 0 to 100 with higher scores indicating higher levels of well-being (statistics canada, n.d.-b). the 5 wingert: the social distribution of distress published by scholarship@western, 2011 scale is composed of 25 sub-scales that measure the frequency in the past month a person: felt selfconfidence, felt a sense of accomplishment or pride, took on lots of projects (was a “go-getter”), felt loved and appreciated, had goals and ambitions, felt like having fun, felt useful, smiled easily, was true to self, did a good job of listening to friends, was curious and interested, was able to clearly sort out complicated situations, found life exciting, felt life was well-balanced, was calm and level-headed, easily found answers to problems, got along well with others, lived at a normal pace, had the impression of really enjoying life, had a good sense of humour, was at peace with oneself, felt healthy and in good shape, able to face situations in a positive way, and had good morale (statistics canada, 2004). stress was measured using a five-point self-rated scale in response to the question, “thinking about the amount of stress in your life, would you say most days are not at all stressful, not very stressful, a bit stressful, quite a bit stressful, or extremely stressful?” (statistics canada, 2004, p. 16). high scores reflect higher levels of stress. the measure of mastery is a composite scale made up of two variables: self-perceived ability to handle unexpected problems and self-perceived ability to handle day-to-day demands. both scales were recoded so that high scores reflect higher levels of mastery. cronbach’s alpha was 0.7692. the measures of social support in the cchs were developed and tested for validity and reliability as part of the medical outcomes study (mos) social support survey (sherbourne & stewart, 1991). there are four dimensions: tangible, social support, affection, positive social interaction, and emotional or informational based on 19 functional support items (statistics canada, n.d.-b). tangible refers to having someone to provide material aid or assistance. affection involves having someone with whom to give or receive love and affection. positive social interaction measures the availability of others with whom to do fun or enjoyable activities. informational refers to having others to provide advice, information, guidance, or feedback (statistics canada, n.d.-b). for each question, respondents were asked to rate how frequently in the past 12 months each type of support was available, ranging from never to almost always (statistics canada, 2004). the four subscales were standardized so each was given equal weight and summed. cronbach’s alpha was 0.9223. responses were scored so that higher scores reflect higher levels of social support. exogenous. five social status variables were included in the model. gender was coded as male or female. age was provided in years. family structure was coded into four categories based on living or family arrangement, economic family status, marital status, and/or the presence of children in the household: single (not married or common-law with no children), couple (without children), single parent family, and two-parent family. highest level of education completed was coded into three categories: less than high school, high school or equivalent, or post-secondary. the income variable is based on total household income from all sources in dollars. gender, family structure, and education were dummy coded with female, single, and less than high school as the reference category respectively. analyses path analyses were used to test whether the stress process model was a good fit with the data and whether the variables were related as predicted by the model. an advantage of path analysis, 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.4 compared to linear regression, is that it enables researchers to identify direct and indirect, and mediating and moderating, effects that help elucidate explanatory mechanisms (george, 1996). in accordance with statistics canada requirements, bootstrap survey weights (n = 500) were used in all data analyses. these weights allow the complex survey design to be taken into account when calculating variances. the analyses also make use of sample weights, which adjust the sample to reflect the population from which it was drawn (statistics canada, n.d.-a). the “svy” commands in stata 10 (statacorp, 2007) were used. models with transformed variables to correct for non-normality, heteroskedasticity, and outliers showed no significant differences in model fit χ2d (1) = 1.24, p = .265 for both distress and well-being models or interpretation of the parameters compared to untransformed models so the simpler, untransformed model was used (tabachnick & fidell, 2001). of the weighted cases, 515.8 (78.8%) had complete data and 138.4 (21.2%) were missing data on at least one variable. missing case analyses showed that there were differences between those with missing and complete data in terms of age, family structure, education, income, stress, and well-being. data were imputed using the imputation by chained equations (ice) package for stata (royston, 2010), which uses the fully conditional specification (fcs) approach to multiple imputation. five imputed data sets were created and analyzed using the mim package for stata 10 (galati, royston, & carlin, 2010). path analyses were conducted in amos 17 (arbuckle, 2008) using a survey weighted correlation matrix. in order to prevent failure of convergence during iterative estimation processes due to an illscaled covariance matrix (kline, 2005), stress, mastery, social support and distress scores were divided by 10, well-being and age scores were divided by 100, and income was divided by 10,000. this procedure changes the mean and variance of the variable, but not its correlation with other variables (kline, 2005). monte carlo parametric bootstrapping was used to provide additional estimates of parameters and standard errors. differences between bootstrap and maximum likelihood estimates were very small so the maximum likelihood estimates are presented except where noted. amos does not calculate significance tests for individual indirect effects when multiple indirect effects are present. the sobel test was used to determine statistical significance of indirect pathways (sobel, 1986). figure 1 shows the path models used in the analyses. models for distress and well-being were run separately. an additional covariance pathway was added between gender and income in the model using imputed data. in order to test hypotheses about moderating effects between stress and mastery and stress and social support, interaction variables were created and added to the model after centering the variables to reduce collinearity. results table 1 presents sample descriptives. while all respondents reported aboriginal identity, about 60% reported having only aboriginal identity while the remaining respondents indicated they belonged to at least one other ethnic group. there were slightly more females than males, which may reflect the greater representation of first nations women with registered indian status living off reserve (cloutier et al., 2008) and longer life expectancy among aboriginal women (statistics canada, 2010). the younger age of the aboriginal population (cloutier et al., 2008) are reflected in these data; over 2/3 are under the age of 45. two-parent families were the most common family structure, followed by single persons, couples, and single parents in both the unimputed and imputed data sets. the largest proportion of respondents had less than secondary school as their highest level of education, while approximately 30% had completed post-secondary schooling and a quarter had graduated from secondary school, which is similar to the proportions reported based on 2001 census data (mendelson, 2006). based on 7 wingert: the social distribution of distress published by scholarship@western, 2011 imputed data, just under half of respondents had a household income that fell below $30,00, which was the average income for an unattached individual in 2000 (statistics canada, 2003). approximately 30% had incomes between $30,000 and $59,999. while over a quarter had incomes above $60,000 per year with a number of respondents among high earners households with incomes over $100,000. stress shows the expected pattern with most people reporting moderate levels. the vast majority of respondents indicated having moderate or high levels of mastery and social figure 1. path model: distribution of stress, resources, and mental health outcomes by social status. gender age family education income stress mastery distress / well-being social support e 4 e 3 e 1 e 2 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.4 table 1 survey weighted sample descriptives unimputed imputed n % m (se) median n %1 m (se) median identity single 398.2 60.86 multiple 256.1 39.14 gender male 303.5 46.38 female 350.8 53.62 age 37.49 (0.66) 15 24 147.7 22.58 25 34 147.6 22.56 35 44 159.6 24.40 * 45 54 122.0 18.65 55 65 50.4 7.71 65+ 26.8 4.10 family structure single 143.2 21.89 144.8 22.14 couple 115.4 17.64 118.08 18.05 single parent 109.8 16.78 111.8 17.09 two parent 276.9 42.33 279.41 42.71 missing 8.9 1.36 education < high school 272.3 41.62 277.77 42.46 high school 168.0 25.68 * 171.47 26.21 * postsecondary 202.4 30.94 204.90 31.32 missing 11.5 1.76 income 45,002.51 (2,059.93) 42,718.30 (1,865.53) < 10,000 41.9 6.41 61.76 9.44 10, 000 – 19,999 113.3 17.31 142.94 21.85 20,000 – 29,999 71.0 10.85 89.10 13.62 30,000 – 39,999 60.4 9.23 * 75.82 11.59 * 40,000 – 49,999 43.8 6.70 52.60 8.04 50,000 – 59,999 58.8 8.99 64.18 9.81 60,000 – 79,999 64.6 9.87 72.09 11.02 80,000 + 87.2 13.33 95.64 14.62 missing 113.2 17.31 stress 2.87 (0.05) not at all 75.64 11.56 not very 134.3 20.52 a bit 277.9 42.47 * quite a bit 133.1 20.35 extremely 33.35 5.10 mastery 7.28 (0.08) 7.28 (0.08) low 50.21 7.67 50.50 7.72 9 wingert: the social distribution of distress published by scholarship@western, 2011 moderate 267.2 40.84 268.88 41.10 high 334.4 51.12 * 334.82 51.18 * missing 2.36 0.36 social support 15.44 (0.13) 14.94 (0.14) low 16.7 2.55 25.78 3.94 moderate 97.52 14.91 232.50 35.54 high 526.2 80.43 * 395.86 60.51 * missing 13.82 2.11 distress 7.09 (0.31) 7.08 (0.31) low 543.7 83.11 * 545.80 83.43 * moderate 97.37 14.88 97.41 14.89 high 10.98 1.68 11.00 1.68 missing 2.15 0.33 well-being 79.47 (0.74) 79.49 (0.74) low 9.95 1.52 9.94 1.52 moderate 129.0 19.72 129.73 19.83 high 509.1 77.81 * 514.53 78.65 * missing 6.22 0.95 total n 654.2 654.2 1 proportions are averaged across the five imputed data sets. support. similarly, the majority of respondents had low levels of distress and high levels of well-being. distress. path analysis enables the calculation of total effects, which can be decomposed into direct and indirect effects. the total effect of all pathways, both direct and indirect, between each social status variable and distress are presented in table 2. compared to females, males had significantly lower levels of distress, but the difference was only significant using imputed data. the negative coefficient for age suggests that distress decreases with age. among family structure variables, only two-parent families had significantly lower levels of distress compared to single persons. similarly, there was no significant difference in distress levels between those with high school and those without, but those with post-secondary credentials had lower levels of distress compared to those without a high school diploma. finally, higher incomes were associated with lower levels of distress. figures 2 and 3 show the statistically significant direct paths for unimputed and imputed data respectively, which test the hypotheses about the social distribution of mediators and distress, as well as the relationships between mediators and distress. compared to females, males had significantly lower levels of stress, but there were no significant differences in social support and distress. the gender effect on mastery was significant using imputed data only. there was a significant negative relationship between age and distress, but only the effect of social support with imputed data was significant among the mediating variables. when family structures are compared, couples have lower stress and higher social support in relation to single persons. unexpectedly, couples had significantly higher levels of distress with the imputed data. there were no significant differences between single persons and single parents. two-parent families had significantly higher levels of social support compared to single persons. among educational 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.4 table 2 total effect of social status variables on distress unimputed imputed male -0.003 (0.003) -0.105* (0.049) female ref. ref. age -0.692** (0.219) -0.612** (0.196) single ref. ref. couple -0.005 (0.004) -0.096 (0.082) single parent -0.001 (0.005) -0.039 (0.095) two parent -0.009* (0.004) -0.165* (0.073) < high school ref. ref. high school -0.003 (0.003) -0.091 (0.062) post-secondary -0.008* (0.003) -0.169** (0.062) income -0.265** (0.078) -0.028** (0.007) model χ2 (df) 9.620 (5) p = 0.087 5.585 (4) p = 0.232 cfi 0.996 0.999 rmsea 0.042 p = 0.563 0.025 p = 0.794 gfi 0.997 0.999 note. unstandardized regression coefficients with standard errors in parentheses. standard errors generated using bootstrap method. *p < .05; **p < .01; ***p < .001 11 wingert: the social distribution of distress published by scholarship@western, 2011 figure 2. statistically significant unstandardized coefficients for direct paths between social status, mediating variables, and distress based on unimputed model male age couple single parent two-parent income social support mastery stress distress high school post-secondary -.002 (.000) -.631 (.180) -.003 (.001) .013 (.002) .009 (.002) .002 (.001) .003 (.001) .045 (.020) .072 (.034) -.227 (.063) 1.961 (.236) -.999 (.146) -.498 (.083) 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.4 figure 3. statistically significant unstandardized coefficients for direct paths between social status, mediating variables, and distress based on imputed model. groups, those with high school or post-secondary had significantly higher levels of mastery compared to high school non-graduates. income was positively related to stress, mastery, and social support, and negatively related to distress. the paths from the mediating variables, stress, mastery, and social support, were all significant with stress being positively related and mastery and social support being negatively related to distress. table 3 shows the indirect or mediating effects of stress, mastery, and social support. males have significantly lower levels of stress, which has the effect of lowering their distress levels compared to females. in the imputed data, the effect of mastery was also significant, which suggests that males have higher levels of mastery that in turn lowers distress. the total indirect effect of all three mediating variables collectively was also significant, which suggests that men have better access to resources that enable them to maintain lower levels of distress compared to women. with the exception of social support using imputed data, none of the indirect effects of age were significant. among different family structures, couples had significantly lower levels of distress compared to single persons as a result of their lower stress levels and greater social support. there were no significant differences between single persons and single parents. two-parent families had lower distress via their greater access to social support. the indirect effects between those with less than high school and high school were not significantly different with the exception of mastery with imputed data. however, those with post-secondary credentials had lower levels of distress due to higher levels of mastery. using unimputed data, the effect via stress was also positive and significant, but the total mediating effect was negative suggesting comparatively low levels of distress. the effect of income was significantly negatively related to distress via both mastery and social support. there was also a significant positive effect via stress using imputed data. male age couple single parent two-parent income social support mastery stress distress high school post-secondary -.037 (.008) -.731 (.163) -.051 (.013) ..259 (.036) .168 (.032) .061 (.015) .090 (.016) .005 (.002) ..007 (.003) -.024 (.006) 1.975 (.201) -1.001 (.131) -.544 (.074) .038 (.013) -.254 (.089) .156 (.068) .002 (.001) 13 wingert: the social distribution of distress published by scholarship@western, 2011 table 3 indirect effects of social statuses on distress via mediators unimputed imputed stress mastery social support totala indirect effect stress mastery social support totala indirect effect male -0.0039*** (0.0004) -0.0010 (0.0010) 0.0005 (0.0005) -0.004*** (0.002) -0.0731*** (0.0175) -0.0380** (0.0139) 0.0060 (0.0120) -.105*** (0.030) female ref. ref. ref. ref. ref. ref. ref. ref. age -0.0451 (0.0688) -0.0639 (0.0577) 0.0483 (0.0500) -0.061 (0.125) 0.0237 (0.0652) -0.0430 (0.0514) 0.1382** (0.0519) .119 (0.117) single ref. ref. ref. ref. ref. ref. ref. ref. couple -0.0059** (0.0021) -0.0010 (0.0010) -.0.0065*** (0.0015) -0.012** (0.003) -0.1007*** (0.0276) -0.0100 (0.0211) -.1409*** (0.0274) -.252** (0.052) single parent 0.000 (0.0020) 0.000 (0.0010) 0.000 (0.0010) 0.001 (0.003) 0.0178 (0.0317) -0.0110 (0.0251) 0.0071 (0.0240) 0.013 (0.057) two parent -0.0020 (0.0020) 0.000 (0.0010) -.0.0045*** (0.0012) -0.007** (0.002) -0.0356 (0.0240) -0.0060 (0.0180) -0.0914*** (0.0214) -0.133** (0.044) < high school ref. ref. ref. ref. ref. ref. ref. ref. high school 0.000 (0.0020) -0.0020 (0.0010) 0.0005 (0.0005) -0.002 (0.002) 0.0079 (0.0198) -0.0611*** (0.0170) 0.0016 (0.0147) -0.052 (0.035) postsecondary 0.0020*** (0.0002) -0.0030** (0.0011) -0.0010 (0.0005) -0.003* (0.002) 0.0356 (0.0201) -0.0901*** (0.0199) -0.0234 (0.0150 -0.077* (0.039) income 0.0431 (0.02410) -0.0450* (0.0210) -0.03586* (0.0180) -0.039 (0.044) 0.0040* (0.0020) -0.0050* (0.0021) -0.0038* (0.0017) -0.004 (0.004) note. unstandardized regression coefficients with standard errors in parentheses. coefficients calculated as ab = a x b where a is the coefficient for the path from the social status variable to resource and b is the coefficient for the path from the resource to distress. standard errors calculated using the formula seab = sqrt(b2se2a + a2se2b) where sea and seb are the standard errors for paths a and b respectively. a sum of all indirect pathways between social status variable and distress. standard errors generated using bootstrap method. *p < .05; **p < .01; ***p < .001 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.4 well-being. table 4 shows the total effects of all direct and indirect paths from the social status variables to well-being. in this model, males had significantly higher levels of well-being compared to females. there was also a general increase in well-being with age. among different family structures, there were no significant differences between single persons, couples, and single parents; however, two-parent families had higher levels of well-being compared to single persons. there were also no significant differences between those with and without a high school diploma, but those with postsecondary had higher levels of well-being compared to those without high school. well-being also improves with higher household incomes. the statistically significant unstandardized pathways between social status, the mediating variables, and well-being are presented in figures 4 and 5. the direct effect of gender on stress was significant with men having lower average levels. the effects for mastery and well-being were significant using imputed data with men having higher scores on both variables. the direct effect of age on wellbeing was significant and positive. the effect of social support was significant using imputed data and suggested that perceived support decreases with age, which may reflect increase need for social support among older persons. compared to single persons, couples had significantly lower stress levels and higher social support levels, but also had lower levels of well-being. there were no significant differences between single persons and single parents. two-parent families had higher levels of social support but there were no significant differences in well-being. result for educational attainment showed that those with high school or post-secondary had higher levels of mastery compared to those without a diploma. those with higher household incomes had higher levels of mastery, social support, and well-being, but also reported higher levels of stress although the difference was only significant with imputed data. 15 wingert: the social distribution of distress published by scholarship@western, 2011 table 4 total effects of social status variables on well-being unimputed imputed male 0.007* (0.003) 0.040** (0.011) female ref. ref. age 0.790** (0.218) 0.154** (0.048) single ref. ref. couple 0.007 (0.004) 0.031 (0.019) single parent 0.000 (0.004) 0.001 (0.023) two parent 0.008* (0.004) 0.041* (0.017) < high school ref. ref. high school -0.001 (0.003) 0.006 (0.014) post-secondary 0.007* (0.003) 0.037** (0.014) income 0.232** (0.072) 0.005** (0.002) model χ2 (df) 9.620 (5) p = 0.087 5.585 (4) p = 0.232 cfi 0.996 0.999 rmsea 0.042 p = 0.563 0.025 p = 0.794 gfi 0.997 0.999 note. unstandardized regression coefficients with standard errors in parentheses. standard errors generated using bootstrap method. *p < .05; **p < .01; ***p < .001 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.4 figure 4. statistically significant unstandardized coefficients for direct paths between social status, mediating variables, and well-being based on unimputed model. male age couple single parent two-parent income social support mastery stress well-being high school post-secondary -.002 (.000) .744 (.159) -.003 (.001) .013 (.002) .009 (.002) .002 (.001) .003 (.001) .045 (.020) .072 (.034) .142 (.056) -1.373 (.209) 1.408 (.129) .780 (.073) -.007 (.003) 17 wingert: the social distribution of distress published by scholarship@western, 2011 figure 5. statistically significant unstandardized coefficients for direct paths between social status, mediating variables, and well-being based on imputed model. among the mediating variables, the expected relationships were found. stress was negatively related to well-being while mastery and social support were positively related. table 5 presents the mediating effects of stress, mastery, and social support on well-being. while the total indirect effect for gender was significant only in the imputed data, the effect for stress was significant, which suggests that males have higher levels of well-being because they have lower levels of stress. using imputed data, the effect for mastery was also positive and significant. the indirect effect of age was not significant except for a negative effect on well-being via social support in the imputed data. compared to single persons, couples had higher levels of well-being as a result of their lower levels of stress and greater social support. the total indirect effect for couples compared to single persons was also positive and significant. none of the contrasts between single persons and single parents were significant. two-parent families had significantly higher levels of well-being due to their higher levels of social support. the total effect for two-parent families compared to single persons was also significant. compared to those with less than high school, the indirect effect on well-being via mastery was significant for both high school and post-secondary graduates. in addition, there was a negative indirect effect on well-being via stress among post-secondary graduates, but the indirect effects through mastery and social support were positive as was the total indirect effect. the indirect effect of income on well-being through mastery and social support were both positive and significant, but the total indirect effect did not reach statistical significance. to test the moderating effects of mastery and social support on stress, interaction terms were added to the distress and well-being models. there was no significant male age couple single parent two-parent income social support mastery stress distress high school post-secondary -.037 (.008) .191 (.036) -.051 (.013) ..259 (.036) .168 (.032) .061 (.015) .090 (.016) .005 (.002) .007 (.003) .003 (.001) -.287 (.044) .334 (.029) .191 (.016) .038 (.013) -.254 (.089) -.037 (.015) .002 (.001) .019 (.009) 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.4 table 5 indirect effects of social status on well-being via mediators unimputed imputed stress mastery social support totala indirect effect stress mastery social support totala indirect effect male 0.0027*** (0.0004) 0.0014 (0.0014) -0.0008 (0.0008) 0.003 (0.002) 0.0106*** (0.0028) 0.0127** (0.0045) -0.0021 (0.0042) 0.021** (0.008) female ref. ref. ref. ref. ref. ref. ref. ref. age 0.0316 (0.0483) 0.0901 (0.0807) -0.0757 (0.0775) 0.046 (0.146) -0.0034 (0.0095) 0.0144 (0.0171) -0.0485** (0.0175) -0.037 (0.031) single ref. ref. ref. ref. ref. ref. ref. ref. couple 0.0041** (0.0015) 0.0014 (0.0014) 0.0101*** (0.0018) 0.014** (0.003) 0.0146*** (0.0044) 0.0033 (0.0070) 0.0495*** (0.0080) 0.067** (0.014) single parent 0.0000 (0.0014) 0.0000 (0.0014) 0.0000 (0.0016 -0.001 (0.003) -0.0026 (0.0046) 0.0037 (0.0084) -0.0025 (0.0084) -0.001 (0.015) twoparent 0.0014 (0.0014) 0.0000 (0.0014) 0.0070*** (0.0017) 0.009** (0.003) 0.0052 (0.0035) 0.0020 (0.0060) 0.0321*** (0.0067) 0.039** (0.012) < high school ref. ref. ref. ref. ref. ref. ref. ref. high school 0.0000 (0.0014) 0.0028* (0.0014) -0.0008 (0.0008) 0.003 (0.002) -0.0011 (0.0029) 0.0204*** (0.0053) -0.0006 (0.0052) 0.019 (0.009) postsecondary -0.0014*** (0.0002) 0.0042** (0.0015) 0.0016* (0.0008) 0.006** (0.002) -0.0517*** (0.0084) 0.0301*** (0.0059) 0.0082 (0.0052) 0.033** (0.010) income -0.0302 (0.0171) 0.0634* (0.0288) 0.0562* (0.0270) 0.090 (0.052) -0.0006 (0.0003) 0.0017* (0.0007) 0.0013* (0.0006) 0.002 (0.001) note. unstandardized regression coefficients with standard errors in parentheses. coefficients calculated as ab = a x b where a is the coefficient for the path from the social status variable to resource and b is the coefficient for the path from the resource to distress. standard errors calculated using the formula seab = sqrt(b2se2a + a2se2b) where sea and seb are the standard errors for paths a and b respectively. a sum of all indirect pathways between social status variable and distress. standard errors generated using bootstrap method. *p < .05; **p < .01; ***p < .001 improvement in model fit with the addition of interaction terms so the simpler model was retained (χ2d (4) = 3.096, p = .542 for both the distress and well-being models). 19 wingert: the social distribution of distress published by scholarship@western, 2011 discussion and conclusion the results of these analyses enable several important conclusions about the social distribution of distress and well-being in the off reserve aboriginal population to be drawn. first, stress, mastery, and social support are important determinants of both outcomes but their relative importance differs. among the continuous variables in the distress model, the largest standardized coefficients among direct paths were found for stress (ß = 0.312), followed by mastery (ß = -0.260), and social support (ß = 0.236). in the well-being model, social support (ß = 0.371) and mastery (ß = 0.366) had higher relative importance than stress (ß = -0.219). these findings suggest that stress is a stronger contributor to negative mental health outcomes while psychosocial resources are more important for positive outcomes. confirmatory analyses have suggested that distress and well-being are correlated, but distinct, dimensions that make up the higher order construct of mental health (massé et al., 1998). the results also support the contention that stress and resources are related to social status, but certain statuses seem to matter for specific mediators. for example, education increases mastery but does not influence perceived stress or social support. the same conclusion can be drawn about mediating effects – specific statuses provide advantages in particular domains that translate into better outcomes. mediating variables, such as stress and coping resources, appear to play an important role in connecting social status and mental health. with the exception of age and income in both models, and family structure in the well-being model, none of the direct paths between social status and mental health were significant. in the case of age, only the direct effect was significant, which suggests that age is related to distress and well-being but not as a result of its relationship with stress, mastery, or social support. it may be that age is related to other mediating processes not considered in these analyses. the results for family structure suggest that it is marital status, rather than the presence of children in the household, that influences mental health outcomes. the results also imply that higher education and income are indirectly related to distress via their effect on stress. further research is needed to confirm whether there are stressors that are associated with higher socioeconomic status. the literature suggests that highly educated and employed aboriginal people are exposed to more discrimination (whitbeck et al., 2002). the insignificant moderating effects should be interpreted with caution since the measure of stress used in these analyses is self-perceived stress, which may already take into account coping resources. those with fewer resources may perceive the same stressors to be more stressful. overall, the findings suggest that the stress process model has utility in guiding research about the interrelationships between the social structure, stress, resources, and mental health in the aboriginal population. future research part of the appeal of the stress process model is that it is not intended to be a totalizing and universal theory, but rather a general orienting framework that guides research into the social origins of distress and disorder (pearlin, 1999). pearlin (1999) asserted, “in addition to collecting extensive information about people’s social and economic characteristics, and the contexts of their daily lives, research should ideally employ a host of measures appropriate to the particular issues and populations under investigation (p. 412). future research should adapt existing measures and developing new ones specific to the aboriginal population. 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.4 research also needs to consider both social status and culture in the stress process. simon (2000) argued, “…the failure to include structural and cultural factors in current explanations of the differential effects of stress on mental health has serious consequences for theory and research in this area because it results in underestimates of the importance of social conditions for the etiology of mental illness” (p. 68). connecting traditional culture may be an important resource that buffers against stress. researchers may also consider why there are disparities between different social groups within the aboriginal population in terms of stress, mastery, and social support? for example, why do women have higher levels of stress even after controlling for differences in age, family structure, education, and income? there may also be important interrelationships between stress and resources that will provide insight into the processes that shape mental health (avison & cairney, 2003; wheaton, 1985). for example, when do resources buffer the negative effects of stress and when do they act as a stress deterrent? a requirement of path analysis is that equivalent or alternative models be considered (kline, 2005). while the stress process hypothesizes that social stress causes mental health and illness, it is also possible that there are reverse paths as well; that is, poorer mental health makes people more likely to experience certain types of stressors (turner, marino et al., 1995). in the case of equivalent models, adjudication is based on theoretical, rather than statistical, criteria since model fit will be the same (kline, 2005). therefore, sound theorizing about how and why stress and resources are related is required before statistical analyses are carried out. finally, while quantitative approaches enable us to make comparisons among different strata of the social structure, it tells us nothing about the social realities of the people who occupy those positions. qualitative approaches enable researchers to consider the meaning and process, as well as generating new or elaborating on old theoretical insights (pearlin, 1992). limitations while distress is conceptualized as a non-specific outcome measure, the items in the scale tend to reflect symptoms of affective and anxiety disorders. although these are among the most prevalent psychiatric diagnoses, persons with other manifestations of distress or disorder, such as paranoia, anger, violence, or substance abuse, may receive a lower distress score because these dimensions are not directly measured. since women are more likely to express distress in this way, there may be gender bias. future research aim to develop measures that cover the spectrum of distress manifestations (aneshensel, 2005; horwitz, 2002). measures that fit cultural notions of mental health or illness are also needed to provide an accurate picture. for example, inuit in nunavik reported having no word for mental illness in their language, but made reference to two terms, which referred to thinking too much or not thinking at all. in addition, inuit respondents tended to label states rather than people, which has implications for measures of lifetime disorder or disorder in any other time period than the present (kirmayer, fletcher, corin, & boothroyd, 1997). ideally, we should examine the impact of both social disadvantage and cultural loss at the same time. however, existing data does not allow researchers to do so. most surveys designed for the general canadian population do not include 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(2003b). race, ethnicity, and depression in canadian society. journal of health and social behavior, 44(3), 426-441. 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.4 http://www.statcan.gc.ca/pub/89-645-x/2010001/life-expectancy-esperance-vie-eng.htm� http://www.mhsip.org/nimhdoc/socioeconmh_home2.htm� the international indigenous policy journal may 2011 the social distribution of distress and well-being in the canadian aboriginal population living off reserve susan wingert recommended citation the social distribution of distress and well-being in the canadian aboriginal population living off reserve abstract keywords creative commons license theoretical perspectives mental health of aboriginal people methods research questions data sample measures analyses results discussion and conclusion future research limitations references registered indian children's school success and intergenerational effects of residential schooling in canada the international indigenous policy journal volume 1 | issue 1 article 5 may 2010 registered indian children's school success and intergenerational effects of residential schooling in canada evelyne bougie statistics canada, evelyne.bougie@statcan.gc.ca sacha senécal indian and northern affairs canada / university of western ontario, sacha.senecal@chrc-ccdp.gc.ca recommended citation bougie, e. , senécal, s. (2010). registered indian children's school success and intergenerational effects of residential schooling in canada. the international indigenous policy journal, 1(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.5 this research is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. registered indian children's school success and intergenerational effects of residential schooling in canada abstract using the 2006 aboriginal peoples survey, this study investigates factors associated with school success (as perceived by parents) among off-reserve registered indian children aged 6 to 14 in canada. holding other factors constant, registered indian children were more likely to be doing well at school if they were living in households with high income, were living in adequately maintained dwellings, or spoke an aboriginal language at home. boys and older children, on the other hand, were less likely to be doing well at school, as were children who were living in larger households, experienced food insecurity, or had parents who attended residential school. mediation analyses revealed that the negative intergenerational effect of parental residential schooling on children’s school success was partially attributable to household characteristics or economic status. indeed, former residential school attendees were found to be more likely to live in households with a lower income, live in larger households, and report that their family had experienced food insecurity. these characteristics were, in turn, found to be negatively associated with children’s school success. keywords registered indian, residential school, canada, education, school success acknowledgments this paper was funded by the strategic research and analysis directorate at indian and northern affairs canada (inac). the views expressed in this document are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the position of statistics canada or indian and northern affairs canada. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ registered indian children’s school success and intergenerational effects of residential schooling in canada despite improvements in the educational profile of canada’s aboriginal population over the past decades (cesc 2007; statistics canada 2008a), large gaps in high school completion rates still exist between the aboriginal and the total canadian population. for instance, data from the 2006 census for the population aged 25 to 64 indicate that 31% of the off-reserve registered indian population had not completed high school, twice the rate of 15% observed in the canadian population (statistics canada 2008b). this situation is not unique to canada. indigenous students in australia are also more likely to leave school early compared to nonindigenous students (commonwealth of australia 2002). in the united states, a higher percentage of american indian/alaska native young adults drop out of high school compared to their peers in the overall population (devoe and darling-churchill 2008). there is evidence that aboriginal individuals without a high school diploma face a greater disadvantage in the labour market than their non-aboriginal counterparts. in a recent report using 2006 census data, the canadian council on learning (2008) reports that unemployment rates among aboriginal youth aged 20 to 24 were fourteen percentage points higher for high school dropouts than for graduates. in comparison, unemployment rates among non-aboriginal youth were only three percentage points higher for high school dropouts than for graduates. similarly, hull (2005) notes that canadian aboriginal adults with educational credentials had substantially improved employment and income outcomes compared to those without credentials (partial education). moreover, hull found evidence that credentials were of greater importance for employment and earnings to the aboriginal than to the non-aboriginal population. 1 bougie and senécal: registered indian children's school success published by scholarship@western, 2010 given the considerably lower rates of high school completion among the aboriginal population relative to the overall canadian population, there is a need to better understand the factors associated with aboriginal students’ success at school – or lack thereof. understanding the factors underlying both school success and school difficulties may help improve educational attainment at all levels among the aboriginal population in canada and, indeed, elsewhere. as educational success for aboriginal/indigenous children is a common theme in several countries, lessons learned from the canadian context could also provide some directions for research and policies in international contexts. dropping out of high school has been described by many researchers as a multifaceted and cumulative process, which is likely to be established early in a child’s school career (astone and mclanahan 1991; ensminger and slusarcick 1992; alexander, entwistle and horsey 1997; garnier, stein and jacobs 1997). in other words, rather than being seen as a single event, dropping out of high school is seen more as a process occuring over time and an outcome of a complex combination of student, family, and school experiences. moreover, paths leading to school success or school difficulties are likely to begin as early as a child’s very first years in school.1 the present study sought to provide insights into some of the factors likely to influence how well aboriginal students are doing at school, with a focus on the elementary and early high school years. specifically, using the 2006 aboriginal peoples survey on children and youth, the goal of the present study was to investigate the factors associated with perceived school success among registered indian children aged 6 to 14, who were living off reserve across canada. the research question addressed is the following: what are some of the circumstances that lead to lower or higher success at school among off-reserve registered indian children? 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.5 defining the aboriginal population there are various ways to define the canadian aboriginal population. the focus of the present study is (off-reserve) registered indian children, that is, children who were reported in the 2006 aboriginal peoples survey on children and youth as being registered or treaty indians as defined by the indian act of canada. accordingly, throughout the introduction of this article, census-based characteristics of the overall aboriginal population are described using the (off-reserve) registered indian population. other research cited in the introduction may have defined the aboriginal population differently. influences on school achievement research based on the general population shows that educational achievement is influenced by a wide variety of factors associated with students, their families, the schools that they attend, and their communities (see rumberger 1995 for a review). moreover, it is important to keep in mind that the various factors influencing educational achievement are likely to act in concert rather than in isolation (lee and burkham 2003). we briefly review a number of key factors known to be generally associated with school achievement. family and household characteristics. several family and household characteristics are well-known for their impact on school achievement (rumberger 1995). overall, characteristics like parental education, household income, and family structure (single-parent vs. two-parent families) are powerful predictors of school achievement and dropping out. in fact, researchers such as brady (1996) argue that the difficulties faced by many aboriginal students may be better explained by disadvantaged socio-economic background than any other factor. 3 bougie and senécal: registered indian children's school success published by scholarship@western, 2010 generally speaking, the registered indian population living off reserve shows lower educational attainment and income levels compared to the total canadian population. according to 2006 census data for adults aged 25 to 64, registered indians were far less likely to have completed a university degree (9%) as compared to the total population (23%). the median income in 2005 for the population aged 15 and over was also lower for registered indians ($17,173) than for the total population ($25,615). in terms of family structure, data from the 2006 census show that far fewer registered indian children aged 14 and under lived with two parents (46%) as compared to children in the total population (80%) (statistics canada 2008b, 2008c). housing conditions. housing conditions are closely related to a family’s socio-economic status. health experts assert that inadequate housing can be associated with a multitude of potential health problems for the dwelling’s occupants. for example, crowded living conditions can lead to the transmission of infectious diseases and can increase risk for injuries, mental health problems, family tensions, and violence (health canada 1999). the 2006 census found that off-reserve registered indians were twice as likely as the total canadian population (7% versus 3%) to live in crowded conditions (defined as one or more people per room). the state of a family’s living conditions is also partly determined by the need for major repairs to the home a family is occupying. the 2006 census showed that off-reserve registered indians were twice as likely as the total canadian population (17% versus 8%) to live in a home in need of major repairs (statistics canada 2008d). the impact of housing conditions on aboriginal children’s school achievement has not been well-researched; however, one can argue that crowded living conditions may represent a challenge in terms of providing children with a quiet place to study. also, given the relationship 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.5 between health and educational outcomes, one may expect inadequate housing conditions to be negatively associated with children’s school success. nutrition. eating breakfast has many benefits for children, including providing energy for the morning’s activities and helping them to get ready to learn (turcotte and zhao 2004). research has also shown that inadequate nutrition – which may also come from experiencing food insecurity – can have serious impacts, including a decreased ability to concentrate and poor school performance (wachs 1995). a study using data from the 1998/99 national population health survey has shown that there was a higher proportion of aboriginal people2 living in food-insecure households compared to the total canadian population (27% versus 10%) (che and chen 2001). in other words, because of a lack of money at least once in the 12 months preceding the survey, proportionally more aboriginal people worried that there would not be enough to eat, and/or did not eat the variety or quality of food that they wanted, and/or did not have enough to eat. furthermore, this study showed that even after controlling for factors such as household income or marital status, the odds that aboriginal people would live in a food-insecure household were about one and a half times those for non-aboriginal people. mobility. residential moves and transfers to different schools have been argued to be disruptive of family events, which can be related to dropping out of school (alexander, entwistle and horsey 1997), especially for younger children (havemen, wolfe and spaulding 1991). rumberger and larson (1998) found that american students who had changed schools between the 8th and 12th grades – even just one time – were less likely to have completed high school, after controlling for student and family background and educational experiences. 5 bougie and senécal: registered indian children's school success published by scholarship@western, 2010 recent canadian research using administrative data from public schools in british columbia also demonstrates that mobility is an important factor contributing to school failure in the aboriginal student population3 (aman and ungerleider 2008). indeed, findings from this research suggest that school changes resulting from family moves were associated with large decreases in aboriginal students’ school completion rates. registered indians living off reserve tend to be more mobile than other canadians. according to the 2006 census, 27% of the off-reserve registered indian population had moved in the year prior to the census, compared with 14% of the total canadian population. about 62% of registered indians who moved did so within the same community, while 37% of movers changed communities (statistics canada 2008b). aboriginal languages. for many aboriginal people, aboriginal languages are an important part of their identity. these languages reflect distinctive histories, cultures and identities linked to family, community, the land, and traditional knowledge (norris 2007). the 2006 census recorded over 60 different aboriginal languages spoken by first nations people in canada (statistics canada 2008e). in 2006, about 15% of the off-reserve registered indian population said they could speak an aboriginal language well enough to carry on a conversation (statistics canada 2008b). some authors argue that learning, acquiring, and demonstrating fluency in an aboriginal language may contribute to positive self-esteem and community well-being, as well as cultural continuity (canadian heritage 2005; hallett, chandler and lalonde 2007; norris 2007). it is through its impact on self-esteem that fluency in an aboriginal language is, in turn, thought to be associated with school achievement (bougie, wright and taylor 2003; wright and taylor 1995). 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.5 residential schools. the residential school system operated across canada between 1830 and the 1990s. residential schools were largely operated by churches in partnership with the federal government (aboriginal healing foundation 2002). it has been stated that, in order to attend residential schools, aboriginal children were removed from their homes, and often taken far from their families and communities. while at school, children were prevented from speaking their own languages and learning about their culture and heritage. it is not uncommon to hear some former students speak about the positive experiences in these institutions; however, many former students suffered physical and sexual abuse (indian and northern affairs canada 2008). the last residential school for aboriginal children in canada closed in the 1990s but the negative impacts will likely affect many generations of aboriginal peoples, their children and their communities (where are the children 2008; aboriginal healing foundation 2002). little research has systematically explored the indirect intergenerational effects of residential schooling on the education outcomes of children and youth whose parents were former residential school attendees. two recent national studies, however, have started to shed some light on this issue. the first study, using data from the first nations regional longitudinal health survey 2002/034, has found that first nations youth aged 12 to 17 (who lived in first nations communities) were more likely to report having learning problems at school, and to report having had to repeat a grade, if one or both of their parents had attended residential school (assembly of first nations 2007). a related finding has also emerged in another recent study using the 2006 aboriginal peoples survey in a sample of off-reserve first nations children aged 6 to 14. according to these 7 bougie and senécal: registered indian children's school success published by scholarship@western, 2010 data, off-reserve first nations children whose parents (one or both) had attended residential schools were less likely to be doing “very well” or “well” at school compared to children whose parents had not attended residential schools (bougie 2009). parental residential school attendance thus appears to be a contributing factor in aboriginal children’s experiences at school. to the extent that this finding is replicated in the present study, it would be important to attempt to understand the mechanisms likely at play in the relationship between parental residential school attendance and aboriginal children’s school success. specifically, is this negative intergenerational effect attributable to other factors? a more in-depth analysis of the indirect effects of residential schools on today’s aboriginal children and youth would help us better understand their current experiences, as well as the adversities that they may face (assembly of first nations 2007). the present study given that many researchers view the path toward dropping out of school as beginning in the early years, there is a need to look at the school experiences and circumstances of children in order to better understand the lower high school completion rates of aboriginal people in canada. the goal of this study was to investigate the factors associated with perceived school success among registered indian children aged 6 to 14 living off reserve across canada. furthermore, should evidence of a negative effect of parental residential school attendance on children’s success at school be found, this study also sought to investigate this relationship in a more in-depth manner in order to gain a better understanding of some of the mechanisms likely at play. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.5 methodology data source the data source used in this study was the 2006 aboriginal peoples survey, children and youth (6 to 14 years) component. the aboriginal peoples survey (aps) provides an extensive set of data about the lifestyles and living conditions of métis, inuit, and off-reserve first nations adults aged 15 years and over and children aged 6 to 14, living in urban, rural, and northern locations across canada. the aps is a post-censal survey; that is, a sample of about 60,000 people was selected from adults 15 years and over and children aged 6 to 14 living in private households whose response(s) on their 2006 census questionnaire indicated that they had aboriginal origins; and/or identified as north american indian5, métis, and/or inuit; and/or had treaty or registered indian status; and/or had indian band membership. the 2006 aps covers the aboriginal population living off reserve in canada’s ten provinces, and all aboriginal peoples living in the yukon, northwest territories and nunavut. more detailed information about the survey is available in the “aps concepts and methods guide” (statistics canada 2009, catalogue no. 89-637-x — no. 003). the aps on children and youth (6 to 14) – the component that will be the focus of the present study – is a survey which collected data about the child from their parent/guardian. it is therefore important to note that the findings in this study are based on the perceptions and reporting of the parent/guardian responding on behalf of their child. in the majority of cases this person was the parent of the child, either the mother (63%) or the father (16%). to facilitate readability, the term “parent” will be used throughout the article when referring to the person responding on behalf of the child. 9 bougie and senécal: registered indian children's school success published by scholarship@western, 2010 target population the focus of this study was children with reported treaty indian or registered indian status. only registered indian children with reported first nations, métis, or inuit identities (as a single identity or in combination) were included in our target population. the resulting sample size was 4,860 children (2,359 girls and 2,501 boys) between the ages of 6 to 14, representing about 68,475 children with treaty or registered indian status living off reserve6 across canada. in this group of children, about 85% were identified by parents as first nations (single identity), 11% as métis (single identity), and 3% as first nations in combination with métis identity. most were reported to be members of an indian band or a first nation (89%). registered indian status the 2006 aps asked parents, “is <child’s name> a treaty indian or a registered indian as defined by the indian act of canada?” the indian act sets out certain federal government obligations and regulates the management of indian reserve lands, indian moneys and other resources. registered indians or “status indians” are entitled to have their names included on the indian register, an official list maintained by the federal government. certain criteria determine who can be registered as a status indian. only registered indians are recognized as indians under the indian act. status indians are entitled to certain rights and benefits under the law. generally speaking, treaty indians are persons registered under the indian act and can prove descent from a band that signed a treaty. for more information, see the indian and northern affairs canada website at: http://www.ainc-inac.gc.ca/pr/pub/wf/index_e.html. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.5 dependent variable: school success direct or objective measures of school success, such as standardized tests scores or report cards, are not available from the 2006 aps.7 the 2006 aps does, however, contain an indicator of children’s school success based on parental perceptions. parents were asked the following question: “based on your knowledge of (child)’s school work, including report cards, overall, how well is (child) doing at school this year? would that be… very well? well? average? poorly? very poorly?” according to these data, 42% of registered indian children were reported to be doing “very well” and 26% were reported to be doing “well” at school. one quarter (25%) were reported to be doing “average” and 5% “poorly” or “very poorly” at school. a similar school success question based on parents’ perceptions is used in statistics canada’s national longitudinal survey of children and youth (nlscy). according to these data, similar perceptions of how children were doing at school were found for all children aged 6 to 14 in canada.8 in the nlscy, parents were asked to rate how well their child was doing overall at school this year. about 42% of all children in canada were reported by their parents to be doing “very well”, 25% “well”, 24% “average”, and 4% “poorly” or “very poorly” at school.9 independent variables this study sought to investigate the association between off-reserve registered indian children’s school success (as perceived by parents) and a number of family and household, student, and demographic characteristics. the family and household characteristics that were investigated were as follows: parental education, household income, living arrangements, mobility, parental residential school attendance, and two indicators of housing conditions− household size (as a proxy for crowded living conditions10) and whether or not the dwelling was in need of repairs (as a measure of adequacy of housing conditions). the student characteristics 11 bougie and senécal: registered indian children's school success published by scholarship@western, 2010 that were investigated included children’s use of an aboriginal language at home and two nutrition related indicators: whether or not the child ate breakfast everyday and whether or not the child experienced being hungry. table 1 summarizes the descriptive results for all these variables for our sample of off-reserve registered indian children. table 1 summary of descriptive results for all independent variables, off-reserve registered indian children aged 6 to 14 variables parental level of education completed university degree 9% college, trade/vocational, or apprenticeship 27% some postsecondary 13% high school 21% less than high school 29% household income quintile 5 (highest) $80,257 and above quintile 4 $50,760 to $80,256 quintile 3 $34,601 to $50,759 quintile 2 $22,219 to $34,600 quintile 1 (lowest) $22,218 and below living arrangements two parent household 58% one parent household 42% different community 9% mobility in the previous year different address but same community 15% same address 77% yes1 16% parents attended residential school no 84% household size 6 persons or more 26% 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.5 5 persons or less 74% dwelling in need of repair no repair needed 45% minor repairs needed 37% major repairs needed 18% yes ('some' to 'all' the time) 21% aboriginal language use at home no 79% eating breakfast everyday yes 80% no 20% experienced being hungry yes 12% no 88% note: all estimates were calculated using sample survey weights and bootstrap weights to obtain the correct variance estimates. 1 it is important to note that these data are for the parents of off-reserve registered indian children between the ages of 6 to 14. as such, these data may not include older individuals whose generation was more likely to have attended residential school, given that the last residential school stopped operating in the 1990s. source: statistics canada, aboriginal peoples survey 2006, children and youth component. parental education. parents were asked about their highest level of education ever completed. five categories of parental education were created: 1) less than high school; 2) high school; 3) some postsecondary education – that is, some college or university level courses but with no certificate, diploma, or degree; 4) college, trade/vocational or apprenticeship certificate, or university certificate or diploma below a bachelor’s degree; and (5) completed university degree. household income. the total household income figures of the off-reserve registered indian population aged 6 to 14 were ranked from lowest to highest and then divided into quintiles. 13 bougie and senécal: registered indian children's school success published by scholarship@western, 2010 living arrangements. two categories were used based on parents’ response as to whether their household was a one or two parent household (including step parents, adoptive parents, foster parents, legal guardians, etc.). mobility in the previous year. the residential mobility status variable was used. this variable refers to the relationship between a person’s usual place of residence on census day and his/her usual place of residence one year earlier. three categories were created: 1) residing at the same address as the previous year; 2) residing in a different dwelling but in the same community; and (3) residing in a different community. parental residential school attendance. parents were asked if they, and their current partner or spouse, were “ever a student at a federal residential school, or a federal industrial school.” two categories were used: having parents (one or both), who indicated that they were former residential school students, and having parents who were not. household size. parents were asked to indicate how many individuals lived in this household, including themselves and the child. two categories were created: children living in households with five persons or less and those living in households with six or more persons. adequacy of housing conditions. the variable “dwelling in need of repair” was used. this variable refers to whether, in the judgement of the respondent, the dwelling requires any repairs. two categories were created: children living in adequate housing conditions (i.e., no repair needed, only regular maintenance) and those living in dwellings that needed repairs (minor or major). aboriginal language use at home. parents were asked to indicate the frequency with which their child currently used an aboriginal language in his/her household. two categories were created: children who used an aboriginal language “some of the time,” “most of the time,” 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.5 or “all the time” at home and those who did not use or who used an aboriginal language “very seldom” [sic] at home (including children who could not speak nor understand an aboriginal language). eating breakfast. parents were asked to indicate how often their child had eaten breakfast in the last week. two categories were created: children, who were reported to eat breakfast everyday, and those who did not eat breakfast everyday. food insecurity. parents were asked whether their child had “ever experienced being hungry because the family had run out of food or money to buy food.” two categories were used: children who reported to have experienced such food insecurity and those who did not. results modelling perceived school success the research question addressed in this section is the following: what are the factors associated with off-reserve registered indian children’s school success? logistic regression models were applied for predicting the odds that children did “very well or well” at school (as perceived by parents). perceived school success was analyzed as the outcome variable predicted by a number of family and household, student, and demographic characteristics. we first analyzed the effect of each factor on school success individually. odds ratios for parental education, mobility in the previous year, parent’s sex, and urban vs. rural area of residence did not reach statistical significance. these factors were not included in the full model. table 2 shows the odds ratios for the full model. results from this model indicate which factors are significantly associated with doing “very well or well” at school, while holding constant the presence of other factors.11 15 bougie and senécal: registered indian children's school success published by scholarship@western, 2010 table 2 logistic regression results predicting the odds of doing "very well or well" at school, off-reserve registered indian children aged 6 to 14 factors odds ratio household income quintile 5 (highest) 1.39 * quintile 4 1.20 quintile 3 1.14 quintile 2 1.15 quintile 1 (lowest) † 1.00 living arrangements two parent household 1.10 one parent household † 1.00 yes 0.78 * parents attended residential school no † 1.00 household size 6 persons or more 0.71 *** 5 persons or less † 1.00 dwelling in need of repair no repair needed 1.22 ** repairs needed † 1.00 yes ('some' to 'all' the time) 1.28 * aboriginal language use at home no † 1.00 eating breakfast everyday yes 1.16 no † 1.00 experienced being hungry yes 0.73 ** no † 1.00 child's sex boy 0.55 *** girl † child's age 11 to 14 years old 0.70 *** 6 to 10 years old † 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.5 parent's age coded continuous 0.84 ** (1=34 or less; 2=35 to 44; 3=45 or more) geography atlantic † 1.00 quebec 0.74 ontario 0.73 manitoba 0.84 saskatchewan 0.95 alberta 0.69 * british columbia 0.71 territories 0.71 pseudo r2 0.04 number of observations 4,431 notes: the odds ratio indicates the effect of each factor on perceived school success when all other variables in the model are held constant. odds ratios for parental education, mobility in the previous year, parent's sex, and area of residence in the single variable models did not reach statistical significance. these factors were not included in the full model. the full model is based on 4,341 off-reserve registered indian children (representing 60,780 children) for whom there were no missing value on any variables included in the model. all models were calculated using sample survey weights and bootstrap weights to obtain the correct variance estimates. † reference group * statistically significant difference from the reference group (p < .05) ** statistically significant difference from the reference group (p < .01) *** statistically significant difference from the reference group (p < .001) source: statistics canada, aboriginal peoples survey 2006, children and youth component. 17 bougie and senécal: registered indian children's school success published by scholarship@western, 2010 first, in terms of demographic characteristics, boys and older children were found to be less likely to be doing well at school compared to girls and younger children. all other factors being equal, the odds of doing “very well or well” at school for off-reserve registered indian boys were significantly lower than the odds for girls (odds ratio [or] = 0.6). similarly, the odds of doing “very well or well” at school for off-reserve registered indian children aged 11 to 14 were significantly lower than the odds for children aged 6 to 10 (or = 0.7). household income, housing conditions, and household size were found to be significantly associated with off-reserve registered indian children’s school success. the odds of doing “very well or well” at school for children who were living in households at the top income quintile were higher (or = 1.4) than the odds for children who were at the lowest range. similarly, the odds of doing “very well or well” at school for children who were living in adequately maintained dwellings (i.e., no repair needed) were higher (or = 1.2) than the odds for children living in dwellings in need of repairs. the odds of doing “very well or well” at school for children living in larger households (i.e., 6 persons or more) were lower than the odds for children living in smaller households (or = 0.7). experiencing food insecurity was found to be negatively associated with off-reserve registered indian children’s school success. the odds of doing “very well or well” at school for children who experienced being hungry were significantly lower than the odds for children who did not (or = 0.7). using an aboriginal language at home was positively associated with off-reserve registered indian children’s school success. the odds of doing “very well or well” at school for children who spoke an aboriginal language at home were significantly higher than the odds for children who did not or who could not speak an aboriginal language (or = 1.3). 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.5 finally, replicating the findings observed in a recent study by bougie (2009) also using the 2006 aps, parental residential school attendance was found to be negatively associated with how well off-reserve registered indian children were doing at school. all other factors being equal, the odds of doing “very well or well” at school for children whose parents attended residential schools were significantly lower than the odds for children whose parents did not attend residential schools (or = 0.8). toward a better understanding of the impact of residential school attendance there appears to be a negative intergenerational effect of residential schools: off-reserve registered indian children, whose parents attended residential schools, were less likely to be doing well in school. given that this finding has begun to emerge in a number of recent studies (assembly of first nations 2007; bougie 2009), there is a need to better understand the relationship between parental residential school attendance and children’s perceived school success. thus, this section explores the following research question: what are the mechanisms that may underlie this relationship? in other words, is the relationship between parental residential school attendance and children’s school success at least partly attributable to other factors? the 2006 aps on children and youth, because of its focus on the children, does not contain any information on former residential school attendees’ experiences while they were attending these institutions or on the long-term consequences of residential school attendance. the aps did, however, ask parents about their expectations regarding their child’s education. it could be argued that former residential school attendees have developed distrust toward the “mainstream” educational system brought on by negative experiences with residential schools. it 19 bougie and senécal: registered indian children's school success published by scholarship@western, 2010 is thus reasonable to suggest that former residential school attendees may not place high importance on their own children attending formal educational institutions. parents were asked to indicate how important it was to them that their child graduates from high school and that their child goes on to postsecondary education. we cross-examined these parental expectations by considering whether or not parents attended residential schools. findings revealed that parents who attended residential schools were as likely as parents who did not attend these institutions to think it “very important” that their child graduates from high school (98% vs. 97%, respectively). furthermore, parents who attended residential schools were significantly12 more likely to think it “very important” that their child goes on to postsecondary education (91%) than parents who did not attend these institutions (86%). these results suggest that parental expectations regarding their child’s education do not appear to be a mechanism at play in the negative association between parental residential school attendance and children’s school success. to the contrary, results suggest that parents strongly believe in the importance of education for their children, whether or not they were former residential school attendees. while the 2006 aps contains limited information on the psychological pathways which could potentially explain the relationship between parental residential school attendance and children’s school success, this survey allows an examination of a number of demographic and socio-economic characteristics of the households in which children are living. we now turn to exploring some of these characteristics, according to whether or not parents were former residential school attendees. in terms of basic socio-demographic characteristics, parents who had attended residential schools were found to be older than those who did not. for instance, there were significantly more individuals aged 45 and over among parents who had attended (34%) than among those 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.5 who had not attended (19%) residential schools. there were also significantly more parents/guardians who were grandparents to the child among those who had attended (14%) than among those who had not attended (4%) residential schools. parents who had attended residential schools were also more likely to report having other family members who had also attended. for instance, there were significantly more individuals reporting that both their mother and father had been residential school students among parents who had attended (57% for mother and 48% for father) than among those who had not attended (25% for mother and 18% for father) residential schools. significant differences in basic socio-economic indicators were also found between former residential school attendees and those who did not attend these institutions. indeed, the proportion with a completed university degree was significantly lower among parents who had attended (7%) than among those who had not attended (10%) residential schools. similarly, the proportion with no high school diploma was significantly higher among parents who had attended (36%) than among those who had not attended (28%) residential schools. in terms of income, there were significantly less individuals at the top income quintile among parents who had attended residential schools (14%) than among those who had not (21%). these observations lend some support to some authors’ claims that the problems associated with residential schools exposed aboriginal children and adolescents to reduced capacity to continue education after leaving the residential school, as well as reduced income as adults (barnes, josefowitz and cole 2006). parental education and household income, therefore, appear to represent two potential pathways through which the negative intergenerational effect of parental residential school attendance may be passed on to children. 21 bougie and senécal: registered indian children's school success published by scholarship@western, 2010 to further investigate the relationship between parental residential school attendance, socio-economic characteristics, and children’s perceived school success, we conducted a series of mediation analyses. the goal of these analyses was to find out whether other factors – referred to here as mediators – may explain the relationship between parental residential school attendance and children’s school success. mediation analysis a factor may be considered a mediator to the extent to which it carries the influence of a given independent variable to a given dependent variable. the basic chain of associations involved in mediation is illustrated in chart 1. according to baron and kenny (1986), a factor is confirmed as a mediator if: 1) there is a significant relationship between the iv and the dv in the absence of the mediator (path c); 2) there is a significant relationship between the iv and the mediator (path a); 3) the mediator has a significant unique effect on the dv while controlling for the iv (path b); and, independent variable (iv) mediator dependent variable (dv) a c b (c') chart 1. chain of associations in mediation. 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.5 4) the effect of the iv on the dv is reduced upon the addition of the mediator to the model (path c'). each mediation analysis is comprised of three separate regressions: a first regression for testing path c, a second for testing path a, and a third for testing both path b and c'. if the relationship between the iv and the dv goes to zero when the mediator is in the equation, mediation is said to be full or complete. if the relationship is diminished, but not to zero, mediation is said to be partial. these criteria can be used to informally judge whether or not mediation is occurring, but sobel (1982) presented a method by which mediation may be formally assessed. the mediating effect of a factor is tested as the difference between the relationship of iv and dv with and without consideration of the factor (i.e., comparing path c and path c'). the goal of this section was to look for factors that could explain or mediate (even if only partially) the relationship between parental residential school attendance (iv) and children’s perceived school success (dv). the following factors were investigated as potential mediators13: 1) household income, 2) household size, 3) food insecurity, 4) adequacy of housing conditions, 5) mobility, 6) parental education, 7) living arrangements, and 8) eating breakfast everyday. eight separate mediation analyses (one for each mediator) were thus conducted.14 results from these analyses are presented in tables 3.1 to 3.8. table 3.1 mediation analysis with household income (top quintile) as potential mediator coef. regression 1 path c -0.28 * regression 2 path a -0.72 *** 23 bougie and senécal: registered indian children's school success published by scholarship@western, 2010 regression 3 path b 0.29 ** path c' -0.23 * sobel's z = -2.53, p < .01. table 3.2 mediation analysis with household size (6 persons or more) as potential mediator coef. regression 1 path c -0.28 * regression 2 path a 0.56 *** regression 3 path b -0.31 *** path c' -0.24 * sobel's z = -2.78, p < .01. table 3.3 mediation analysis with food insecurity as potential mediator coef. regression 1 path c -0.28 * regression 2 path a 0.61 *** regression 3 path b -0.37 ** path c' -0.28 * sobel's z = -2.44, p < .01. table 3.4 mediation analysis with housing conditions (no repairs needed) as potential mediator coef. regression 1 path c -0.28 * regression 2 path a -0.22 * regression 3 path b 0.21 ** path c' -0.27 * sobel's z = -1.68, p = .09. table 3.5 mediation analysis with mobility (same address) as potential mediator 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.5 coef. regression 1 path c -0.28 * regression 2 path a -0.34 ** regression 3 path b 0.19 * path c' -0.27 * sobel's z = -1.60, p = .11. table 3.6 mediation analysis with parental education (university) as potential mediator coef. regression 1 path c -0.28 * regression 2 path a -0.55 ** regression 3 path b 0.07 path c' -0.26 * sobel's z = -0.5, p = .62. table 3.7 mediation analysis with living arrangements (two parent) as potential mediator coef. regression 1 path c -0.28 * regression 2 path a -0.17 regression 3 path b 0.14 path c' -0.27 * sobel's z = -1.22, p = .22. table 3.8 mediation analysis with eating breakfast everyday as potential mediator coef. regression 1 path c -0.28 * regression 2 path a -0.17 regression 3 path b 0.19 * path c' -0.30 ** sobel's z = -1.09, p = .27. 25 bougie and senécal: registered indian children's school success published by scholarship@western, 2010 notes: a factor is confirmed as a mediator if: 1) there is a significant relationship between the iv and the dv in the absence of the mediator (path c, regression 1); 2) there is a significant relationship between the iv and the mediator (path a, regression 2); 3) the mediator has a significant unique effect on the dv while controlling for the iv (path b, regression 3); and, 4) the effect of the iv on the dv is reduced upon the addition of the mediator to the model (path c', regression 3 and sobel's test). all logistic regressions were calculated using sample survey weights and bootstrap weights to obtain the correct variance estimates. all models included controls for child' sex and age, parent's age, and geography (not shown). * p < .05; ** p < .01; *** p < .001. source: statistics canada, aboriginal peoples survey 2006, children and youth component. three factors acted as significant mediators in the relationship between parental residential school attendance and children’s school success: household income, household size, and food insecurity. parental residential school attendance was negatively associated with living in a household at the top income quintile (path a); and, living in a household at the top income quintile was positively associated with doing “very well or well” at school while controlling for parental residential school attendance (path b). household income partially mediated the relation between parental residential school attendance and children’s school success (path c'; sobel’s z = -2.53, p < .01). similarly, parental residential school attendance was positively associated with living in a relatively large household (path a), and living in a relatively large household was negatively associated with doing “very well or well” at school while controlling for parental residential 26 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.5 school attendance (path b). household size partially mediated the relation between parental residential school attendance and children’s school success (path c'; sobel’s z = -2.78, p < .01). finally, parental residential school attendance was positively associated with experiencing food insecurity (path a), and experiencing food insecurity was negatively associated with doing “very well or well” at school while controlling for parental residential school attendance (path b). experiencing food insecurity partially mediated the relation between parental residential school attendance and children’s school success (path c'; sobel’s z = -2.44, p < .05).15 adequacy of housing conditions and mobility were found to be associated with both parental residential school attendance (path a) and children’s school success (path b); however, these factors did not mediate this relationship (sobel’s tests failed to reach statistical significance). parental education was found to be associated with parental residential school attendance (path a), but not with children’s school success (path b – criterion for mediation not met). living arrangements and eating breakfast everyday were not associated with parental residential school attendance (path a – criterion for mediation not met). discussion this study provided insights into some of the factors associated with how well offreserve registered indian children aged 6 to 14 in canada were doing at school, as perceived by parents. findings highlight a number of associations between perceived school success and children’s family characteristics, housing conditions, nutrition, as well as use of an aboriginal language. future research on these topics could provide additional knowledge regarding potentially important areas for educational programs and policies. additional research should 27 bougie and senécal: registered indian children's school success published by scholarship@western, 2010 also be conducted in other contexts to see if the same patterns can be found in other canadian aboriginal populations or in indigenous populations in other countries. when all other variables in the analysis were held constant, boys and older children were found to be less likely to be doing well at school, as compared to girls and younger children. factors positively associated with off-reserve registered indian children’s school success included living in households at the highest income range, living in adequately maintained dwellings, and using an aboriginal language at home. factors negatively associated with these children’s school success included living in relatively large households and having experienced food insecurity. finally, replicating the findings observed in recent studies, off-reserve registered indian children whose parents had attended residential school were found to be less likely to be doing well at school, as compared to children whose parents had not attended these institutions. these findings reveal that some of the factors that were associated with off-reserve registered indian children’s school success are similar to those observed in research based on the general population. for instance, gender differences in school achievement are not unique to the children in this study. such gender differences are commonly observed in the overall population. recent canadian data from the national longitudinal survey of children and youth (nlscy, 2006/07) for nine year-old children in the overall population showed that parents reported girls to be doing better than boys at school overall (thomas 2009). in addition, several family and household characteristics, like household income, are well-known for their relationship with school achievement (see rumberger 1995 for a review). the study by thomas (2009) also highlighted that nine year-old canadian children from low income households were more likely to have parents who reported that they were not doing well 28 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.5 at school than children from higher income households. inadequate nutrition, which can come from food insecurity, has also been shown to be associated with lower school performance in the general population (wachs 1995). these similarities notwithstanding, descriptive data presented in this study demonstrate that the aboriginal population generally fares more poorly than the overall canadian population with regard to factors such as household income, housing conditions, and food insecurity. it has been noted in other contexts such as australia that the factors that negatively influence indigenous people’s education outcomes, such as poorer health and greater poverty, are not entirely specific to them; in other words, other population groups are also affected by these factors. however, many of these circumstances are more commonly experienced in the indigenous population (australian council for educational research 2004). two factors specific to registered indian children were found to be statistically related to how well they were doing at school: the use of an aboriginal language at home, and whether or not they had parents who had been residential school students. aboriginal language use is an important element of culture and identity, particularly through its positive contribution to selfesteem, community well-being, and cultural continuity (canadian heritage 2005; hallett, chandler and lalonde 2007; norris 2007). this study provided evidence that aboriginal language use in the homes of off-reserve registered indian children also contributed positively to how well they were doing at school, as perceived by parents. mediation analyses revealed that the negative intergenerational effect of parental residential school attendance was, at least in part, attributable to some household and nutrition related characteristics. indeed, parents who were former residential school attendees were found to be more likely to live in households with a lower income; to live in larger households; and to 29 bougie and senécal: registered indian children's school success published by scholarship@western, 2010 report that their family had experienced periods of food insecurity. these characteristics were, in turn, found to be negatively associated with children’s success at school (as perceived by parents). interestingly, parents who were former residential school attendees were found to strongly believe in the importance of education for their children. parental expectations regarding their child’s education were, therefore, not retained as a potential mediator in the negative relationship between parental residential school attendance and children’s school success. taken together, these results suggest that off-reserve registered indian children, whose parents attended residential schools, were less likely to do well at school, and point to three potential pathways, which may partially explain this relationship. little in-depth analyses have been done thus far regarding the indirect effects of residential schools on today’s aboriginal children and youth; this study helps us better understand some of the mechanisms likely at play in the association between parental residential school attendance and children’s success at school. it would be interesting to assess whether such relationship also exists in other aboriginal or indigenous populations both in canada and abroad. other pathways could be involved which could not be analyzed in the present study. indeed, some scholars have discussed a number of emotional and psychological long-term consequences of residential school attendance (brasfield 2001; dion stout and kipling 2003). undoubtedly such factors could also help explain the observed negative intergenerational effect of parental residential school attendance; however, the 2006 aps on children and youth does not allow such analysis to be undertaken. future research on these pathways could add to our understanding of the factors involved in the association between parental residential school attendance and children’s success at school. 30 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.5 future research could also further explore whether more or less recent parental residential schooling experiences have a different relationship to children’s school outcomes. the ages of the parents in this study range to a large extent, some being in their twenties and some in their sixties. this would mean that there could be parents in the sample who attended residential schools in the mid 1960s, as well as some who would have attended in the mid‐1980s, possibly with different residential schooling experiences. limitations limitations to the present study include the subjective nature of the school success measure that was used. objective measures of educational achievement, such as standardized tests scores or actual report cards, are not available from the 2006 aps and, therefore, could not be considered in this analysis. different results than those observed in the present study could be obtained using more objective measures of school achievement. future data collection efforts related to education should try to include more objective assessments of children’s educational achievement. it is also important to emphasize that the direction of the relationship between perceived school success and the factors under investigation in the present study is difficult to determine. results are best interpreted as highlighting correlations between variables. furthermore, school achievement is influenced by students’ experiences over many years, whereas the aps captures these experiences as reported at a single point in time. for this reason, the cumulative effect of specific factors on how well off-reserve registered indian children were doing at school could not be analysed. finally, the 2006 aps on children and youth did not survey the on-reserve population. also, the aps did not collect data on the schools that the children were attending. the lack of 31 bougie and senécal: registered indian children's school success published by scholarship@western, 2010 school-level or institution-based data (such as curriculum, program design, classroom structure and climate, size of the aboriginal student population within the school, etc.), as well as the lack of data for the aboriginal population living on reserve, prevented us to include such contextual factors into the analysis. future research on these topics could provide important additional knowledge on other factors associated with how well aboriginal/indigenous children are doing at school both in the canadian and international contexts. while specific policies and programs aimed at improving success would undoubtedly differ in such different contexts, similarities in relationships resulting from similar experiences with colonization would be interesting to study further. conclusion even though the educational profile of aboriginal people in canada has generally improved over the past decades, their rates of high school completion continue to be lower than that of the total population. this study looked at the school success and circumstances of offreserve registered indian children aged 6 to 14 and provided insights into some factors associated with their educational outcomes. further research on the circumstances leading to higher or lower school success in aboriginal/indigenous populations is necessary to gain a better understanding of their lower educational profile, as well as inform potentially important areas for improved educational programs and policies. 32 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.5 endnotes 1 recent canadian data from the national longitudinal survey of children and youth (nlscy, 2006/07) showed that school readiness indicators at the age of 5 were associated with school achievement four years later (thomas 2009). 2 aboriginal status was based on responses to nphs questions on race (or colour) and the ethnic (or cultural) groups with which respondents identified. those who indicated native or aboriginal peoples of north america, such as north american indian, métis, inuit or eskimo, were considered to be aboriginal persons. the nphs includes only aboriginal people living off reserve. 3 in this research, the term “aboriginal” refers to students who have self-identified as being of aboriginal ancestry on the annual british columbia ministry of education student data collection form. these students may include first nations, status or non-status indians, métis, or inuit. 4 the 2002/03 first nations rlhs sample was designed to represent the first nations population living in first nations communities in all provinces and territories except nunavut. 5 in the census and the aps, people identified as “north american indian”; however, the term “first nations” is used throughout this article. 6 the on-reserve population was not surveyed in the 2006 aps. please consult the “aps concepts and methods guide” (statistics canada 2009, catalogue no. 89-637-x — no. 003) for more detailed information about the survey. 7 this issue is not unique to the aps. because the practices, usages, and capacity regarding the collection of aboriginal education data vary widely across jurisdictions, there is also a dearth of national-level data regarding the school achievement of aboriginal children in canada. 33 bougie and senécal: registered indian children's school success published by scholarship@western, 2010 8 data from the national longitudinal survey of children and youth (nlscy, cycle 4, 2000/01) were used. comparable data for all children in canada aged 6 to 14 are not available for 2006. the target population of the nlscy comprises the non-institutionalized civilian population (aged 0 to 11 at the time of their selection) in canada’s ten provinces, which, unlike the aboriginal peoples survey, does not include children from the territories. the nlscy excludes children living on indian reserves or crown lands, residents of institutions, full-time members of the canadian armed forces, and residents of some remote regions. 9 a recent report (thomas 2009) indicates that this parent report measure is consistent with more objective test results. the report, based on the national longitudinal survey of children and youth (nlscy, 2006/07) for 9-year-old children, looked at parent response to a question about how well their children were doing in school in mathematics, in combination with scores from an objective mathematics test that was administered to these children as well. findings indicate that higher mathematics achievement was associated with parent reports that the child was doing well in mathematics. this pattern appeared for boys and girls and for children from both lower and higher income households. the cultural reliability of these observations remains to be verified in the aboriginal population. 10 ‘crowding’ is defined as more than one person per room. crowding is thus derived by dividing the number of people in the dwelling by the number of rooms in the dwelling. the 2006 aps only asks about the number of people living in the dwelling; it does not ask about the number of rooms. it is therefore not possible to derive an indicator of crowded living conditions strictly with the 2006 aps. 11 also included in the full model were controls for parents’ age and geography. older parents were found to be less likely to report that their child was doing “very well or well” at school. as 34 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.5 compared to the atlantic region, parents in alberta were found to be less likely to report that their child was doing ‘very well or well’ at school. 12 in this study, differences were considered to be statistically significant if the 95% confidence intervals around the bootstrapped estimates did not overlap. 13 even though some of these factors were not found to have a significant unique effect on children’s school success in the regressions presented in the previous section, they could still play a role as mediators in the relationship between parental residential school attendance and children’s school success. 14 all regressions controlled for child’s gender and age, parent’s age, as well as geography. 15 using the informal criteria proposed by baron and kenny (1986), one may conclude that mediation has not occurred because the coefficients associated with path c and path c' appear unchanged. however, the sobel test indicates the presence of a significant mediation effect. see holmbeck (2002) for a discussion of the importance of formally probing mediational effects using the sobel's equation. 35 bougie and senécal: registered indian children's school success published by scholarship@western, 2010 references aboriginal healing foundation. 2002. the healing has 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“well-being of off-reserve aboriginal children.” canadian social trends 75: 22-27. statistics canada catalogue no. 11-008. ottawa: minister of industry. wachs, t.d. 1995. “relation of mild-to-moderate malnutrition to human development: correlational studies.” journal of nutrition 125: s2245-2254. where are the children. 2008. intergenerational impacts. http://www.wherearethechildren.ca/en/impacts.html. 40 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.5 white, j., p. maxim and n.d. spence. 2004. “an examination of educational success.” pp. 129148 in aboriginal policy research: setting the agenda for change, volume i, edited by white, j., p. maxim and d. beavon. toronto: thompson educational publishing. white, j.p., j. peters and d. beavon. 2009. “enhancing educational attainment for first nations children.” pp. 117-174 in aboriginal education: current crisis and future alternatives, edited by white, j.p., j. peters, d. beavon and n.d. spence. toronto: thompson educational publishing. wright, s.c. and d.m. taylor. 1995. “identity and the language in the classroom: investigating the impact of heritage versus second language instruction on personal and collective selfesteem.” journal of educational psychology 87: 241–252. 41 bougie and senécal: registered indian children's school success published by scholarship@western, 2010 the international indigenous policy journal may 2010 registered indian children's school success and intergenerational effects of residential schooling in canada evelyne bougie sacha senécal recommended citation registered indian children's school success and intergenerational effects of residential schooling in canada abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license registered indian children's school success and intergenerational effects of residential schooling in canada teenage pregnancy and parenthood perspectives of first nation women the international indigenous policy journal volume 4 issue 1 indigenous early parenthood article 3 march 2013 teenage pregnancy and parenthood perspectives of first nation women rachel eni university of manitoba, eni@cc.umanitoba.ca wanda phillips-beck recommended citation eni, r. , phillips-beck, w. (2013). teenage pregnancy and parenthood perspectives of first nation women. the international indigenous policy journal, 4(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.3 teenage pregnancy and parenthood perspectives of first nation women abstract this paper summarizes a study that explored perspectives of manitoba first nation women on teenage pregnancy and parenthood. data was derived through a qualitative methodology focusing on a life storytelling approach within a culturally informed framework and setting. the two main objectives of the study were to: (a) elucidate community perspectives on teenage pregnancy and parenting, and (b) understand their psychological, cultural, and socioeconomic causes and implications. the study was designed in consultation with staff and participants of the manitoba first nation strengthening families maternal child health program (sf-mch). through the storytelling technique, the women were able to practice or "work out" the unfolding of their personal relationships, past and present. themes arose from the data that shed light upon women’s personal relationship experiences, meanings they ascribe to them, values, and aspirations for the future. the study included a participant engagement in policy development activity that had the women consider types of policies and programs to better support youth in first nation communities. french abstract les points de vue des femmes des premières nations sur la grossesse a l’adolescence et la maternité rachel eni et wanda phillips beck université du manitoba résumé le présent article résume une étude qui a examiné les points de vue des femmes des premières nations du manitoba sur la grossesse chez à l’adolescentes et la maternité. les données ont été obtenues à l’aide d’une méthodologie qualitative axée sur une approche narrative personnelle au sein d’un cadre et d’un contexte culturels. les deux principaux objectifs de l’étude consistaient à élucider les perspectives communautaires relatives à la grossesse à l’adolescence et à l’éducation des enfants, de même qu’à en comprendre les causes et les répercussions psychologiques, culturelles et socioéconomiques. l’étude a été conçue en collaboration avec le personnel et les participants du manitoba first nation strengthening families maternal child health program (programme de santé maternelle et infantile sur le renforcement des familles des premières nations du manitoba). grâce à notre technique narrative, les femmes étaient en mesure de pratiquer ou d’élaborer le dévoilement de leurs relations personnelles, passées et présentes. des thèmes se sont dégagés des données qui ont permis de jeter de la lumière sur les expériences vécues par les femmes dans leurs relations personnelles, sur le sens qu’elles leur attribuent, ainsi que sur leurs valeurs et leurs aspirations pour l’avenir. l’étude comportait un volet de participation à une activité d’élaboration de politiques qui a amené les femmes à examiner les types de politiques et de programmes qui permettraient de mieux soutenir les jeunes dans les collectivités des premières nations. spanish abstract embarazos de adolescentes y perspectivas parentales de las mujeres de las primeras naciones rachel eni y wanda phillips-beck universidad de manitoba resumen este artículo resume un estudio de las perspectivas de las mujeres de las primeras naciones de manitoba sobre los embarazos y los padres adolescentes. los datos se obtuvieron mediante una metodología cualitativa que se centraba en un enfoque basado en narraciones de vidas en un entorno y en unas condiciones adaptadas culturalmente. los dos principales objetivos del estudio eran aclarar las perspectivas de la comunidad sobre los embarazos y los padres adolescentes y comprender sus causas e implicaciones psicológicas, culturales y socioeconómicas. el estudio se preparó en colaboración con personal y participantes del programa strengthening families maternal child health (sf-mch) de las primeras naciones de manitoba. nuestra técnica narrativa permitió a las mujeres revelar sus relaciones personales pasadas y actuales. los temas surgen de los datos que aclaran las experiencias de las mujeres en el ámbito de las relaciones personales, de los significados que les atribuyen y de los valores y aspiraciones para el futuro. el estudio permitió a las mujeres participar en una actividad de elaboración de políticas en la que pudieron estudiar políticas y programas para apoyar mejor a las comunidades de las primeras naciones. keywords teenage pregnancy, early parenting, qualitative research, life storytelling, community perspectives creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ t e e n a g e p r e g n a n c y a n d p a r e n t h o o d p e r s p e c t i v e s o f f i r s t n a t i o n w o m e n among first nations in manitoba, 1 in 8 teenage girls has had a child (guimond & robitaille, 2008). across the country, rates are consistently higher for first nation teenagers as compared to other canadian populations. research and discussion about teen pregnancy and parenthood in canada is scarce and, understandably, far fewer publications exist that pertain specifically to first nation populations. moreover, there is little understanding about what pregnancy and parenting means to youth and to their families. epidemiological research on teen pregnancy and parenthood expands the knowledge base on issues of cause and effect, prevalence, trend analysis, differences between diverse populations, and socioeconomic risk assessment. insight into how experiences of youth pregnancy and parenthood unfold within personal life histories requires in-depth qualitative analyses (olsen, 2005). teenage pregnancy and parenthood in first nation communities happens within ongoing (post)-colonization, socio-ecological inequalities, marginalization, and poverty. a standpoint and institutional ethnographic approach to research on teen sexuality pregnancy and parenthood can be informative on various person-in-the-world issues, for example: interpretations of pregnancy and parenting among first nation teenagers and their families and the perceived role of fathers. it is an approach that allows insight into questions such as: is pregnancy a reaction to life circumstances? is pregnancy considered a sensible or debilitating solution to personal and socioeconomic predicaments? does youth pregnancy or parenting allow for a deeper sense of meaning, engagement, contribution, and belonging in the world than later parenting or not parenting at all? social scientists have referred to high teen pregnancy rates in first nation communities as “a public health crisis” (rich-edwards, 2002) and “a health matter” that increases the vulnerability of individuals and whole communities already disadvantaged socioeconomically by limited access to education, employment, and formal childcare (anderson, 2002; hull, 2004; luong, 2008; ordolis, 2007; robitaille, kouaouci, & guimond, 2004). it has been demonstrated that factors such as sexual maturity, emotional instability, belief systems, personal values, expectations favorable to premarital sexual activity and teen parenthood, lower educational levels, a dislike of school, and less involvement in religious activities are associated with a greater vulnerability to teenage pregnancy (pedrosa, pires, carvalho, canavarro, & dattilio, 2011). indeed, increased rates of low birth weight, infant mortality, childhood illness, welfare dependence, academic failure, less supportive home environments, juvenile crime, and teen parenthood in successive generations are associated with teen parenthood (brownell et al, 2010; committee on adolescence, american academy of pediatrics, 1999; langille, 2007; maynard, 1996). issues of sexual health are a main concern (hampton, mckay-mcnabb, jeffery, & mcwatters, 2007; ship & norton, 2001); sexual abuse in childhood is also associated (kenney, reinholtz, & angelini, 1997; rainey, stevens-simon, & kaplan, 1995). importantly, however, statistical modeling exercises reveal that the causal factor for the public health discrepancy is income imbalance and not maternal age. these studies implicate “poverty” and not maternal age as the real threat to maternal and infant wellness. moreover, there is the argument that it isn’t disadvantaged teenagers who are getting pregnant, but the “discouraged of the disadvantaged” who become so (rich-edwards, 2002, p. 555). accordingly, richedwards (2002) maintains that it is, “(p)overty (that) causes teen pregnancy.” “simply put,” she writes, “girls with prospects do not have babies” (p. 555). 1 eni and phillips-beck: teenage pregnancy and parenthood published by scholarship@western, 2013   understanding long-term implications of teen pregnancy is central to the problematizing discourse. north american researchers have ruminated quite extensively on the issues involved: but does premature parenthood cause future poverty? remarkably, with appropriate (statistical) control for economic background and educational attainment prior to pregnancy, it appears that the life trajectories of teen mothers are little altered by becoming mothers in their teens. circumstances were not about to improve for these young women, even if they had postponed pregnancy into their twenties. in the words of one boston teen, “why should you wait? who’s coming?” under these circumstances, it would make little, if any, difference to us public health if teen mothers were to wait a few years. indeed, where cumulative exposure to poverty and stress degrades maternal health capital, risks of poor pregnancy outcome may actually rise with maternal age. arline geronimus has argued that in the face of such powerful weathering forces; it makes sense for disadvantaged women to bear their children in their teens. (rich-edwards, 2002, p. 555) negative causes and consequences of teen pregnancy are common themes in the literature (brubaker, 2007), and some researchers have focused on women’s interpretations of the conditions of their lives. for example, ordolis (2007) studied the consequences and interpretations of pregnancy and motherhood among aboriginal adolescents, acknowledging the circumstances within which the young mothers managed to build satisfactory lives for themselves and their children. she also points to relationships between early parenting and stigmatization (or a lack of stigmatization) owing to cultural values that place children at the centre of community and as gifts from the creator, on the one hand, and to colonial interferences with parenting and the removal of children from families and communities, on the other. it is difficult to separate youth pregnancy and parenthood from the social situations within which these occur. miller (1993) questioned the whole authoritative perspective itself, explaining the risk that concern for teen pregnancy in general may be more a matter of professional and personal stance than being a matter in-and-of-itself, stating that, historically, “perceptions have changed, not because overall teen birth rates have risen dramatically, but because these births are occurring, relatively more than before, among those who are younger, white and unmarried” (p. 11). the topic, in other words, is one fraught with moral undertones and the difficulties of establishing a meaningful cultural, and intercultural discourse, within a powerfully imbalanced and, moreover, racist society. with regards to intention to become pregnant, the jury is still out. benson (2004) claimed that most teens do not consciously decide to become pregnant, though others maintain that there are motivating factors behind an adolescent’s choice to become pregnant (ordolis, 2007). such contradiction is a critical outcome of the scarcity of research on the perceptions of teenage pregnancy and parenthood and of the near absent indigenous voice on the topic. brubaker (2007) raised a concern regarding the impact of negative official discourse surrounding teen pregnancies in african american populations, writing that:   2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.3 the social problems discourse of teen pregnancy resonated through teens accounts of every stage and aspect of their experiences, becoming pregnant, to dissolving pregnancy, to seeking prenatal care and giving birth. the discourse clearly limited teens’ access to formal medical knowledge and care when it might have enabled them to prevent pregnancy or seek prenatal care earlier. (p. 547) engagement in the discourse itself has impacts on the wellbeing of teen mothers and their families, a problem that speaks to the necessity of a nonjudgmental and culturally respectful scientific engagement (fuery, smith, rae, burgess, & fuery, 2009; hart, 2007). brubaker (2007) addressed the impacts of context as it pertains to a sample of african american women by designing a methodology that allowed her to connect with the women and their stories directly. similarly, in canada, anderson (2002) provides insight into the personal perspectives on being pregnant and parenting by aboriginal teens. individuals engaging in the process of expounding on their own life experiences are unlikely to depict themselves as social problems, as an objectifying research methodology would do. as such, problematization of individuals and communities is a byproduct of exclusion. it is due to these many aspects of teen pregnancy and parenthood in first nation communities and because of the issues involved in simply discoursing about teen pregnancy and parenthood between cultural, socioeconomic, and political boundaries that meaningful research on the standpoints of first nation women is required. this need for more contextual and conceptual research on the topic was the impetus for the current study. s t u d y d e s i g n there were two main objectives of the study. the first was to elucidate first nation community perspectives of teenage pregnancy and parenting. the second was to understand its psychological, cultural, and socioeconomic causes and implications. this study was developed in consultation and cooperation with staff and participants of the manitoba first nation strengthening families maternal child health program (sf-mch). the manitoba regional nurse program advisor with the sf-mch program (phillips-beck) at the assembly of manitoba chiefs initiated consultations regionally in the summer of 2008. initiation was in response to data derived through program administration and qualitative studies revealing high rates of teen pregnancies in the communities, involvement of young moms and grandmothers in the programs, and a desire to understand individual and community needs surrounding young pregnancies and parenthood. consultation meetings between regional and community-based program staff in each of the 14 sf-mch program communities were held in-person in the communities, via email, and over the telephone to discuss issues of teen pregnancy and parenting, and existing and possible supportive policy and practice. in january 2009, the communities and regional sf-mch office began the design and implementation of an intensive exploratory workshop on the topic of first nation teen pregnancy and parenthood. there was such a great interest from the communities to participate in the workshop (greater than the space and funds could support) that the workshop coordinators decided that the fairest approach would be for each community to select two representatives to attend the workshop. a three-day workshop was held at the windy hill community learning and wellness centre at hillside beach, near brokenhead and sagkeeng first nations. the space was welcoming for both a retreat and 3 eni and phillips-beck: teenage pregnancy and parenthood published by scholarship@western, 2013 for learning. ma mawi wichi itata family support centre owns windy hill. the centre is located on the east shore of lake with a mission to focus on aboriginal cultural teachings and traditions and to provide and accommodate customized learning forums. the space created a distraction-free ambience that promoted a relaxed, freedom of expression and contemplation about the personal issues that affect day-to-day living on the reserve. the serenity and natural surroundings were ideal for productive collaboration, healing, and creative thinking. the intention of the workshop was to create a space for open and non-judgmental discussion about very sensitive issues. it would require personal reflection and possible examination of the long neglected, dark places where secrets are guarded and from which, possibly unconsciously, decisions are made. whether such an environment allows for a presentation of the “true” causes and consequences of teen pregnancy and parenting is unclear. but what is certain is that within such an environment of acceptance of self, and a sense of the “traditional,” “natural,” and “healthy,” women were able to draw connections between aspects of their lives that were previously unrevealed. the workshop was intended mainly, from one perspective, as an opportunity to collect information about the topic under study, as well as being a forum from which teachers could share their knowledge with the participants. participants gained from the sharing by learning about traditional family practices, women’s ceremonies for coming into adulthood, pregnancy, childbirth, the significance of the moon and our natural rhythms. many stories were shared that allowed the women access into deeper and more intimate reflections of themselves. some were also were able to see glimpses into some of their choices, obstacles, temptations, and supports that have influenced them over the duration of their lifetimes (and perhaps through generations). certainly, the teachings influenced the stories shared about pregnancies and parenting, and offered a basis for the women to compare what could have been, or should have been, with what was available to them. the home visitors of each of the fourteen community-based sf-mch program sites recruited the participants. youth from each of the communities were invited to participate, as were men and women of all ages who have experience and interest in teen pregnancy and/or parenting. the recruiters were seeking individuals who have been or currently are pregnant or mothers in their teen years (18 years of age or younger). in total, 26 women from 14 manitoba first nation communities participated in the study. all of the community participants had become pregnant and were mothers in their teenage years. some were now mothers of pregnant teenage daughters or grandmothers with daughters who were also teenage moms. the youngest participant was a 15-year-old mom of two children. an adaptation of the traditional “sharing circle” was implemented as the primary data collection method in the study. a sharing circle is typically a small group discussion process that allows participants and facilitators to share experiences, feelings, thoughts, and beliefs in response to specific topics. sharing circles are semito loosely-structured, and participants are expected to adhere to rules promoting several process goals (i.e., assuring cooperation, effective communication, trust, and confidentiality).1 the sharing circles during this workshop were referred to as “bannock-and-tea meetings.” in total, there were three sharing circles with all of the study participants, the researchers, and sf-mch program staff.                                                                                                                 1 http://www.innerchoicepublishing.com/aboutus.html#ourcopyright         4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.3 essentially, all of the sharing circle participants came to the circle able to share some area of expertise, whether it was a lived experience with the topic, experience and understanding of practical programming, policy issues, and/or knowledge of an effective research methodology for delving meaningfully, respectfully, as well as empirically, into the study. each sharing circle was approximately 2.5 hours in duration. semi-structured questions were developed in order to stimulate a free flowing conversation about various aspects of the topic. question guides for each circle built upon knowledge from the previous discussions. all of the sharing circles were audio-recorded and then transcribed verbatim. the transcripts were then reviewed in working groups, which included many of the study participants and sf-mch program staff. the groups reviewed the information to consider the findings on: experiences and perceptions of teen pregnancy and parenthood in the communities; the influences and impacts of high prevalence rates on community capacities and available resources (including formal and informal supports); and the types of supports required to better support young parents and their families. f i n d i n g s several themes emerged from the participant stories and are discussed below. the themes described factors associated with becoming pregnant in one’s teen years and the struggles and supports of adolescent parenthood. t r a d i t i o n s , r e l i g i o n , v a l u e s a n d n o r m s participants described degrees of association with first nation traditions and christianity. speakers felt, almost unanimously, that in spite of the persistent effects of colonization and cultural and geographic marginalization, a sense of the traditional has endured. in spite of great threats against their families, and perceived attacks against their very identities, a central value for children and family has remained. the most resounding of these values was the sentiment that children were considered a “gift from the creator”; as such, it is not for human beings to question what is given to us and even more unfathomable that we question the details surrounding their births: gisthi muntoo gi-meenigonan awasisek (god gives us children). we always say back home, every time someone becomes a grandmother. i didn’t know what that really meant until i saw my first grandchild. once i got pregnant… it wasn’t even an option, until my own selfishness, my own fear took over and then thought holy heck… all the values my grandparents, my mom instilled in me i am (thinking of) throwing all away because of my own selfishness, and i decided to have my daughter. another common value was the perception of the child’s rightful place is at the centre of the family and community. children were seen to provide the family and community with meaning, purpose, goals, and destiny. the depth of the impact of more than 100 years of child apprehensions was emphasized in their stories. 5 eni and phillips-beck: teenage pregnancy and parenthood published by scholarship@western, 2013   pregnancy, motherhood, and parenthood were seen as honorable and valued in and of themselves. although the traditional ceremonies were not practiced by the majority of women participants, after the teachings included in the current workshop, many expressed their interest in learning more about their traditions and felt that they do adhere to the values behind the teachings, at least in the way they perceive the world to be or how it “ought” to be. and i’m just glad i have my daughter and i hope to have another child someday, and i want to finish school. i’m trying to change. i don’t regret anything. it’s made me who i am and it’s made my life. and life is precious. parenting was also seen as a shared responsibility between members of the family. and a lot of the times the girls will say, well if i really don’t want to raise my baby, i will give it to my auntie – she really wants a baby. traditions were believed to provide order and sensibility to their lives. the stages of life allow for an unfolding of human development, expressions of identity, obligations, and interconnections between individuals and ecologies. connection to tradition was revealed through the personal stories: there’s norms, there’s values, there’s beliefs and that guides me in my relationships. all the love and support and the good stuff that i didn’t have when i was growing up, i wanted to show them… my mom… took over and she taught my son the values and traditions. she taught my son a lot of respect. i am thankful for my son and people tell me he is so kind and respectful. values were often apparent through actions or taught in passing down practical skills: having to watch my younger sisters have babies (first), especially my baby sister. my mom was really hard on her… all the time, because she wanted her to know that (it) is a big responsibility to provide for your own children. she didn’t want my sister to depend on handouts or to not be able to give her child what he needed. so she taught her how to beadwork… and that’s how she got money for milk and diapers. my mom didn’t help her with that, we occasionally… with the beading, mothers prepare (their daughters) to be patient and kind and understanding to… children. and that’s a beautiful story what your mom gave to your sisters, that gift… that’s the kindness you can give to your child, regardless of how she got pregnant, or what decisions were made, or what she did. (in the programs) we reinforce the responsibilities of motherhood through the making of blankets. we make the baby blankets in the program with the mothers for their babies. we provide the fabric and we see mothers and grandmothers coming in, cooperating with each other to make the baby blankets. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.3   m i x e d e m o t i o n s the birth of a child was unanimously observed as a positive and welcoming event, regardless of circumstance. however, the birth of a child to a teenager also brought about sadness. though participants emphasized the sacredness of life, they also shared their turmoil and confusion about things like security or responsibility, and feelings that they, themselves, receive adequate care. older participants thought that teenagers were still too young to care for their children. in summary, the stories about teenagers having babies included a mixture of varying emotions. i was the first to know that my big sister (teenager) was having a baby. i was so happy! i could just imagine if i had a kid of my own. i would be so loving of my baby and for the whole nine months of her pregnancy i couldn’t wait. every morning i would get up and say, “i will be an auntie in x months time.” we couldn’t tell my dad that my little brother was going to be a dad. my mom was the only one who told my dad. and my dad was so mad. (but that was temporary). next thing i know, he’s asking, “where are you going to live? are you going to come stay with us?” but, he was just mad (in the beginning). when my daughter first told me, i was so upset. i couldn’t believe it. what about school? i thought. so, i said, i am going to take a drive. so i (was) crying and i ended up at the graveyard and i was looking around and i saw all these little babies. that’s when it hit me. why am i crying? we’re getting a new life… god has given us life through our daughter. the people who lost their babies, and i (told) my husband about her being pregnant and what a gift it really is. my daughter is pregnant at 15 (said through lots of tears). but i always told her about birth control. i really wanted her to have her education. my husband wasn’t talking to our daughter. anyway, he got mad at her, but after, like he started talking to her again. my daughter is pregnant… she’s due next month… it was really hard on us, even my husband… it hurt you know. (crying), i told him. the first person i called was my auntie because i’m closest with (her). i’m not really close with my mom, because i grew up with my grandparents (this is the third generation of teen moms). so i was raised with my aunties, we were like sisters. i remember this auntie; she phoned me when her 14-year-old daughter was pregnant. she was crying so hard, i couldn’t even understand her. i was so worried thinking, “oh no! who died?” but then she said her daughter is pregnant and i thought, “is that all?” so when i found out about my daughter i phoned her right away. and oh, now i was so upset. i n t e n t i o n : t h e c h o i c e t o b e c o m e p r e g n a n t in speaking about “getting pregnant,” the women used language that revealed either an active choice to become pregnant or a circumstance of pregnancy that just happened to them. participants in the sharing circles repeated the term “got pregnant” more than 30 times in different contexts. discussions about getting pregnant focused on being “pregnant” and momentary feelings for a boyfriend, and sometimes 7 eni and phillips-beck: teenage pregnancy and parenthood published by scholarship@western, 2013 on having a baby, more so than they did on raising a child over the course of a lifespan or on the responsibilities of ongoing parenting. um, the changes, like i liked to party and drink a lot. i was into the drugs, cocaine, and crack and i partied a lot and i met my boyfriend and i guess it was alright i guess and we tried to get pregnant. we were in love and wanting to be together forever. i got pregnant and i found out and i was really excited. and i was scared, i guess. i wanted a baby. b e c o m i n g p r e g n a n t , l o v e , a n d i n t i m a c y perhaps the greatest indication from the stories of a conscious motivation to become pregnant, and to have babies in adolescence, was a desire for love and the normalcy of family. all of the participants agreed that “above all else” this was what they longed for. most of the women present were separated for an extended period of time in childhood from family and/or community. the older women who were present were placed in residential schools, as were many of the parents and grandparents of the younger women. some were raised in foster homes or had parents who were raised in foster homes and, as a consequence, described themselves as being “not very good” at “showing their children love or affection.” being neglected by parents and other adults was a common theme in the stories. though child physical abuse was not a common experience, some of the women said they were often physically punished by their mothers or the men their mothers brought home. others said that, as children, men in the family or community sexually abused them. i never knew love. there was no one around who took the time to notice me when i was a kid. and my life wasn’t wonderful. i’ve been in foster care. i’ve been abused, everything you can imagine happened to me… but that’s the hurt i carry. … i was still angry with (my mom)… i was sexually abused as a child with one of her men and i came forward to her and the reaction i got wasn’t what i expected. so right there i shut myself out of her life. i guess because of the way things happened to me, i wanted to make them better. … my mother was a teenage single mother and brought me and my brother up until we were six and seven. and she met this man and he started getting really mean. he took us to the park once and we were playing and he said, “come,” to my brother, “i’ll push you on the swing,” and he pushed and he swung him so high, he fell. and i went home and i told my mother and she never believed me. and it started to get really bad. and it started getting worse and i started running away from home. i ran off with my boyfriend and we started doing drugs and alcohol, well i thought it was fun back then…and then, i got pregnant…but then (boyfriend) started getting really abusive. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.3   most of the women explained that to them the opportunity to become a parent was “like having a second chance…to become a part of a normal family.” it was said, “it felt so good being loved for the first time” in their lives, “getting pregnant was a way to hold onto that love,” “to keep him forever,” “to hold onto him,” and “i thought maybe then he wouldn’t leave me.” i thought by having his baby he would stay with me. some of the older women reflected on past relationships saying that they later came to realize that their insecurities and feelings of “worthlessness, dependency, and desperation” were magnets to “predators,” men who would take advantage of them. in their own words: i realized all those men who noticed me, i was attracting guys who knew i was desperate and they could take advantage of me and the only way i could stop them was to heal myself. so to think of myself, and my children for once. i n t e r g e n e r a t i o n a l a b u s e s young relationships between teen boys and girls commonly included a lot of “partying,” “drugs, alcohol,” and violence. physical violence typically began or was intensified in pregnancy. in some cases, the young women escaped abusive relationships, and then “got pregnant again” with another man who also became abusive. the women were far more likely to have tumultuous home environments in their teens. with age and maturity, many of the women said they were able to make significant changes for themselves, and in some cases, also for their children. my mom… when we first started out, you would never guess she was the same person as when she passed away. she never hugged us. she never touched us. she only touched us when she was intoxicated. and then, finally, within the last, when i turned about 14, she decided she was going to stop drinking. and she was going to go onto that road and life… i said i was not ready for that. i was only 14 but already i was partying and doing a lot of drugs and drinking. like, it wasn’t an option for me to take that road with her because now my past started me on a path where i would one day need to heal… and i’m…sorry i didn’t take it with her. because, i think how humble she was and how she was with other people. and she never got to see me the one i am… i’m not sure i can ever fill her shoes, be the woman my mother was. my daughter was 4 and he hit me in front of her. she was just standing there and she was crying for him to stop. and i thought she’d forgotten (all that) after i left him. but one time, i was standing in the kitchen and she said, “remember that time dad hit you and he made you bleed when he put that knife on your neck?” but she was only 4 and i didn’t think that she would remember and that shocked me. the very final abuse that he, when my youngest child was two months, he came over and while we weren’t together he just wanted to see the baby, he said. he was trying to get back with me. and we started… an argument… and i saw him running towards me and i turned (to move) my baby (out of the way) when he was running towards me. next thing i remember i was knocked 9 eni and phillips-beck: teenage pregnancy and parenthood published by scholarship@western, 2013 out. i was on the floor and he was standing over me and he was crying really loud and he never cried in his life. then i saw all that blood, i had the baby right next to me and there he was with all that blood everywhere… the women shared many stories expressing ongoing hopes for a secure relationship. perhaps one can say that they were easily impressed, jumping too quickly into relationships and pregnancy. what is evident, however, from the stories is the good feeling that attention from the men gave them, by way of complimenting their beauty or promising small amounts of support. the woman in the following excerpt had four children before the age of 20: after leaving that relationship (severely abusive father of two of her children), i started building myself up after i got off the drugs. then i met someone. we started fooling around and he called me beautiful. i got pregnant and i was on welfare. i didn’t want him to think that i got pregnant because i wanted to be with him and take his money. but he said, “are you going to keep it?” i said, “i don’t know.” but he said, “i’ll help you out if you keep it to buy pampers and milk” and so i said okay and he started coming over often. he came over during the pregnancy, telling me i’m beautiful and rubbing my tummy… i got pregnant again and then he asked me to marry him and i said, “why you gotta ask me when i’m in bed?” the young woman’s excitement, quoted below, was supported with applause from the group: after three of those abusive relationships and after three children, i still dream of being married and in love. and my waiting paid off! my boyfriend asked me to marry him! relationship struggles and the struggle to lead a healthy lifestyle were ongoing challenges for the women. much of the turmoil in their lives was attributed to alcohol abuse. it’s one thing…i’d like to do is just to stop drinking… i don’t enjoy it anymore. i don’t need to drink to enjoy myself and have fun and be with my friends. i can still go out and have fun and… remember everything… i am still trying to change…still trying to forgive because he stopped abusing me…i charged him because he abused me and beat me… he had conditions (put on him) where we’re not to see each other and not be around each other. i left him for 8 weeks and ever since we got back together and ever since he hasn’t beat me or anything like that… before, he always used to beat me and i never used to charge him… he used to say, “don’t charge me, i love you,” and you know that cycle. you know how hard it is? i don’t drink anymore, to find a man who can appreciate that? and i don’t want to fall back into that lifestyle… participants recognized and expressed a desire to escape cycles of abuse. grandmothers, or expectant grandmothers of teen daughters who they had during their own teen years, spoke of the changes they were making to protect their children and grandchildren from the kinds of abuses they suffered in their own lives. beyond protection, the grandmothers wanted to help their daughters to stay in school, keep working on themselves, and develop careers.   10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.3 my oldest daughter, like when we talk about what we went through in the past, we’ve talked about it a lot and like she’s got a lot of confidence in herself. she’s already talking about going to college. she’ll put in an application before she even turns 16. my daughter and her boyfriend, it was their choice (to keep the baby). i gave them the option you know. like my daughter i was 17 when i had my first baby. when she had her first relationship and seeing what i went through, none of my kids wanted to have kids, because they seen what i went through. and now here she is, she’s at home with my first grandchild and i’m the whole support system. i take care of them. and so is (nurse supervisor of sf-mch), she’s a good support system too… i’m not going to let them be me. i am going to change it. just like that cycle of violence, i am going to change that with my grandbaby. r e l a t i o n s h i p s , s e x a n d s e x u a l i t y sex, sexual development, and healthy sexuality topics brought about great interest and discussion among the participants. sex often happened at parties, with other teens present (“partying”) in the house. participants explained that they thought perhaps if they were not “under the influence,” they might not have had sex. many said they felt they were not ready or had sex because it was expected of them. the group said that most teens were beginning to have sex as early as 13 to 14 years of age, and sometimes earlier. i felt like that i was expected to have sex. sexual preparedness, whether in the form of formal or informal education, was often lacking for the young women or influenced by the spiritual beliefs of family members. an excerpt from one of the women’s stories serves as an example: my grandmother… she was more of a christian… she used to say, “oh, the only time i ever laid in bed with your grandpa was to have kids…” you know, i found it strange that my grandpa had his own room and i went to stay with my mom and my mom would have her boyfriend in the room. like with birth control, we weren’t allowed to use birth control. like my grandma said, “if you don’t want to have children you don’t have sex.” that’s just how she used to put it… the only reason why the creator gave you that action was to make life. missed opportunities for an unfolding of healthy relationships was a common theme expressed: relationships weren’t something that came naturally for me because of my upbringing. healthy relationships weren’t modeled. i knew what a healthy relationship didn’t look like and i knew what i was not going to do. so i fought really hard to not be my parents and not be the models that i grew up with and so it took a while to get away from that negative and just to accept what a relationship is and focus on the positive.   11 eni and phillips-beck: teenage pregnancy and parenthood published by scholarship@western, 2013 …i realize(d) there (was) something missing. we need to… figure out what exactly is it that’s missing and my interpretation was it’s the relationship that we have and the relationship that we build from when…an infant, even prenatally and the relationship we carry on from our childhood and early relationships that we bring into the course of our lives, into our becoming mothers early and raising our kids, ready or not ready… but the most fundamental piece to bring health back to our families is in healing the relationships. the biggest impact on the youth is that they are searching for relationships and they get into the adult world too quickly. the biggest loss of residential school was the loss of relationship that was the biggest loss. it wasn’t all the abuse, it wasn’t all the other shit that happened. but it was the loss of healthy, strong relationships. older women in the circle said that the intergenerational relationships between women and their daughters needed to be repaired so that mothers can more effectively prepare their daughters for the responsibilities of adulthood: the idea is that if we can create relationships with these young people in the community then there’s a better chance for us to be able to talk with them. but there’s also that better chance that they’re going to listen. see if we have that relationship with them then we can start to influence them in a good way, because they will listen. …what kind of relationships do we value? what kind do we need to create so that children can live out their young lives and then come to be parents in a healthy way? s o c i a l c i r c u m s t a n c e s a n d e m o t i o n a l u n a v a i l a b i l i t y social and emotional circumstances affecting adolescent parents were described, such as a lack of social supports (including formal and informal), poverty (most notably a lack of housing or poor quality of housing), and emotional unavailability of parents, who were either brought up at residential schools or in foster homes and, therefore, lacked experiences of being parented themselves. i look around my community and there’s overcrowded housing and all these issues and i just don’t know. it’s okay for them to give up, why, cause their parents are drinking. they’re scared, i guess. i know i don’t feel supported. my mom has dreams when someone in our family is pregnant and she had a dream about me, before i told her she knew i was pregnant. i said, “i’m scared and i don’t know if i am ready to have a baby.” and she wants to help, but she can’t. she doesn’t even have a room in the house. there’s overcrowded housing… i put my name in for housing 6 years ago and now, 6 years later, my name is second from the top. you know i never had that support from my parents, if you just need something come and see us. i never did. you know, my dad, he shouldn’t be like that, but…   12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.3 my mom asks, “how come my grandchildren don’t come and see me?” but then they do come and see her, it’s like, “don’t touch that, don’t sit there…” any my dad, he’s got like one little favorite one and the other ones are like, “f*in grandpa always ignores me.” and we were talking the day about residential school. you know, that’s what happened there, the love that he shows when he got his residential (financial compensation). yah, like really shovels it out, only christmas time, once a year! that’s when he shows it, and it shouldn’t be like that. t h e i s o l a t i o n t h a t c o m e s w i t h b e c o m i n g a y o u n g m o m importantly, notwithstanding expressions of great joy that a new little baby is coming and the promises to help care for the baby, teen friends who are not pregnant or parenting themselves eventually pull away from those who are having babies, causing the latter group of women to feel estranged from their peers and from all the things they used to do. participants described feeling isolated at times during their pregnancies and in parenting: there wasn’t anybody there for me besides my mom. i don’t know, i just think when you become a mom, it’s expected that you shut yourself off from the world…it’s scary. for the first four years, it was awful… just felt so alone. one of the participants, a mother of a 15-year-old pregnant daughter, described her daughter’s experience as follows: for the first five months, she wasn’t really showing, so it was okay for her to go to hockey games and be with her friends… she just recently started getting really big and now she’s staying home and she doesn’t go to sports events anymore. but i take her out, we go to the store, go shopping… another grandmother described her daughter’s sadness: … her friends changed and she’s made a lot of good choices since she’s had the baby, better choices than she was making before. the boyfriend has kind of come and gone and that’s been a tough thing too you know. like… he’s seen the baby three times in his life and so she had all these…ideas of now they’re going to be a nice little family and everything and it’s not there… valentine’s day came and she was thinking it was just going to be a wonderful…day…and it never happened…he was with another woman and she was just totally crushed. women talked about the things they had to miss out on now that they had become pregnant or were parenting: …we got pregnant with the second one and then the third and then the fourth one, and i’m a single parent… it made me grow faster than i wanted to. i never had no time to go out and party and things that my sister got to do when she was a teenager and i had my first child. maybe, well, it happened the way it happened. you know, as time went on, i always made sure we had what we needed, food, diapers, clothes.   13 eni and phillips-beck: teenage pregnancy and parenthood published by scholarship@western, 2013 though many of the women described the difficulties that came with being a young mom with few resources, and oftentimes inadequate support, some of the stories emphasized the protective aspects of the reserve, as opposed to trying to make it on one’s own in the city. for example, one mother shared her story about leaving the reserve to find work in the city. though the city provided her with various opportunities for employment, education, childcare, and children’s programming, she said that living in the city in general was not affordable to her. being away from the reserve and her family increased her feelings of isolation. other women said they felt the city was a far more dangerous place to raise children. the trap of living on reserve in order to stay close to whatever support a family could give, but away from the opportunities that the city promises, was a situation with which most of the participants tried to cope. for some women, getting pregnant and becoming a mother was the impetus for positive changes in their lives. i figured, okay, i’m not going to do this anymore. either i have to get an education or i have to sit on welfare for the rest of my life. she doesn’t have a job… she lives on welfare, and she maintains…in a way, you know, she maintains her goals. she reevaluates and puts everything in perspective. and she gave up some things for the baby to come. she’s…doing the best she can. i give her a lot of credit. i think (her baby) saved her. having (him) saved her brain because she was really destructive, so some of the changes were about her lifestyle. many sacrifices were also made. she had to leave school to support him, she works nights and (baby) stays with me on wednesday and thursday nights. the boyfriend quit work when she was pregnant and he hasn’t worked a day since. mixed emotions, sadness for lost opportunities with a deep love for one’s children were main themes in the stories: well your whole life changes, first of all. the way you see things because you’re not only looking at yourself anymore, you’re looking after someone else. i mean, it’s scary. when i had my son, i sat in my room, and i don’t know how many times i just sat there looking at him thinking, this is my son, this is my son… it was in awe to me because i had been anticipating and waiting for him for almost nine months. i think there were some positive and some negatives because there were some doors out there that did close for me because there were opportunities that i could have taken, to finish my schooling, but the thing was i didn’t want to leave him at home.   14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.3 y o u t h o p p o r t u n i t i e s o n r e s e r v e overall, there are few employment, education, and recreation opportunities for youth on reserve. it is often repeated that young people on reserve have “nothing to do.” concern that options are not effectively communicated to the youth was raised: in this community, so many girls had their babies and none of them finished school. i think we don’t talk enough about what the options are. that the young girls don’t hear, maybe they never hear what their options are. and maybe we don’t talk about it enough. i think we need to make young women feel that they can accomplish anything in their life and that there are options other than becoming pregnant. and we just don’t talk enough about what they are. let them know they can make choices, they don’t have to be comfortable with the way things are and that there are alternatives to having babies. …we say to the girls, have the baby, and we will be right behind you. we have that baby, we love that baby, but i don’t think there’s anyone there standing behind them saying, “ok, you want to go to school, this is what we will do.” and that is the piece that is truly missing. opportunities for advancement seemed even slimmer once the young women became moms: i already asked the school for support for young moms, there’s nothing at the school. i wanted to go back to school but i couldn’t, because on the reserve there was no daycare, well we had a daycare but the kids had to be at least 8 months…to get in… e x t e n d e d f a m i l y s u p p o r t many of the participants discussed the pressures that they felt they were putting on family members. some older women end up caring for the children of more than one, and sometimes several, young women. notwithstanding such pressure, familial support had measureable positive impacts over the lifespan of the young mothers and their babies as well. i have a lot of nieces that have children. sometimes that’s kinda hard on me…my sisters sort of depend on me to be there to (raise) my nieces. i have two younger sisters that got pregnant too. my mom wasn’t really happy about the news at first. she had high expectations for us. when i was growing up, in my teens, my mom had a lot of foster children, since i could remember. this one girl my mom had her when she was young, and her brother came to stay at our house too. cause their dad, there was lots of drinking and there was no one to look after them, so they came and stayed with us. i guess she got pregnant when she was 16… i guess she was scared to tell my mom she was pregnant. so this one time, my mom was sitting in the 15 eni and phillips-beck: teenage pregnancy and parenthood published by scholarship@western, 2013 washroom…and the door was closed and she opened the door and said, “jean, i’m pregnant.” and she closed the door and she ran…i guess she was scared…she wanted to have an abortion, but there was no one to do that for her… she had the baby in winnipeg and brought the baby back home. i think she was 19 when she left (the community), the baby was 3 years old. she moved to winnipeg. her son is 21-years-old now and he’s graduated high school and she too went back to school and graduated and now she’s a teacher. so i guess, that’s why she wanted to have an abortion, because she thought no one would help her…but (my family) didn’t let that happen… family support is a finite resource, however, and mothers of teen mothers, though they want to help their children, often found they were limited in either energy, resources, or both. my daughter now is 19 and as many of you know she has a 7-and-a-half-month-old (baby boy). but when she came to us when she was 18 and she said she was pregnant it was really hard because…we had all these hopes and dreams for her to, you know, go to school and get this education and she had her own dreams, and she really does well with music and she was going to go and shock the world with her talent. and all these hopes and dreams and now where is that going to put her…opportunities and that. but we chose to support her, and we talked about adoptions at some point and but that was hard for us to think about and was hard for her. and so she had the baby and they are at home and he’s just an absolute doll and we love him. but for her, just seeing some of the missed opportunities. she’s not in school right now and she’s on social assistance and we help her the best that we can…but…by the end…i’m exhausted… y o u n g w o m e n ’ s p e r c e p t i o n s o f t h e f a t h e r ’ s r o l e traditionally, women assumed a central role within families, as well as within government and spiritual ceremonies. both men and women enjoyed considerable personal autonomy and performed functions vital to family and community wellbeing. men provided food, shelter, and clothing. women were custodians of nurturing and care in the home environment, responsible for the early socialization of children. life unfolded within the balance of responsibilities between men and women (aboriginal justice implementation commission (ajic), 1999). “since the coming of the anglo-europeans beginning in the fifteenth century, the fragile web of identity that long held tribal people secure has gradually been weakened and torn” (paula gunn allen cited in ajic, 1999, women in traditional aboriginal society, para. 8). there was an overwhelming absence of fathers in the lives of the participants that spanned at least two generations. though some of the women shared stories of grandfather involvement in their lives, many were raised away from their fathers and none remained in a relationship with the fathers of their children. non-involvement of fathers in relationships with the mothers and their children was a complicated matter that included premature intimacy and parenting roles. relationship stories of the young women typically included one of two themes with the fathers of their children: either they remained together, “partied” a lot and suffered, sometimes extreme, domestic violence until they left the relationship, or they separated from the fathers prior to having the baby. the stories revealed a lack of attention to longterm co-parenting and typically focused on immediate feelings of love or desire to “be with him forever.” once the feelings faded, women said little about ongoing sharing of child rearing responsibilities. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.3   my son, he didn’t have any relationships at all with his father, nothing at all. and… our relationship was more like attraction, just attraction. but then, i know, i knew what i wanted when i was with a child, i wanted a son… i never told him, never said who his father was. and i guess as he got older, him and his cousins, my nephews, got wondering who was his dad. in the following quotation, it seemed the young father was given little choice about the role he would have in his child’s life: we were together three months and i got pregnant and every time he would pick me up at my mom’s i would cry because it wasn’t fair to him you know i wasn’t in love with him, i was still in love with my other boyfriend and this isn’t fair to him to have to stay with him and just because i got pregnant didn’t mean i had to stay with him. there are lots of single mothers who do it all the time and who was to say i couldn’t do it too? and so i decided to break it off with him. i decided to be a single mother. i decided that he wasn’t for me and it wasn’t fair to the baby, and it wasn’t fair to him. and it didn’t bother me, what bothered me was that he said he would be a part of this child’s life and he hasn’t stepped up to the plate. and it isn’t about money with me, it’s about the relationship with this child and i see her long for her daddy and want her dad and now she’s trying to build her ideas about her dad and who he is and asking who he is to me and about our relationship, and i’m glad i made the decision i did. the older participants considered the fact that many young men are still unsure about what it is they are supposed to be doing as fathers because they are still trying to figure themselves out. one grandmother said of the teen father of her grandchild: maybe his biological dad loves him. but he doesn’t know how to fit him into his life at this time. p a r t i c i p a n t c o n s i d e r a t i o n o f p o l i c y it was overwhelmingly apparent through the discussion and dialogue that the values attached to pregnancy and the sanctity of the child were deeply rooted in both cultural and spiritual beliefs. one hundred years ago, marriage and early pregnancies were not only accepted as the norm, but also often necessary for the perpetuation and survival of the community. this history and the values attached to pregnancy resonate very strongly through the voices of the women to the present day, influencing many to decide to carry through with their pregnancies, regardless of age. this policy discussion does not question this belief system, but will focus on the other factors and behaviours that lie outside of the cultural and value system. pregnancy and childbirth are essentially laden with these beliefs and values, but what we did not hear through the women’s voices was any value attached to becoming pregnant too early. as a matter of fact, we heard quite the opposite. fear, sadness, and uncertainty about the future were many of the sentiments that were discussed, and we heard many reasons why this may have occurred. policy discussion must focus on many of these factors and behaviours that contribute to high rates of teen pregnancy and not on the values attached to these significant life events. this is where the discussion will focus, both from the perspectives of the women, and through the authors interpretations, experience, and knowledge of health and social systems. 17 eni and phillips-beck: teenage pregnancy and parenthood published by scholarship@western, 2013   clearly, there are numerous policy implications, some of which require more discussion and thought due to the sensitive nature of topic areas: healthy sexuality, sexual self image, and self-esteem, for instance, which the participants suggested may be strongly related to, and damaged by, both childhood experiences of sexual abuse, neglect, withholding of affection, and colonization, along with larger societal inequities that are slanted against aboriginal women. these are conversations that are generally avoided, but must be brought to the forefront in every sector, whether health or social programming: that all the young women need a voice…needs healing to get this voice from our own life experiences knowing they are not alone. healing is the key. there is a reason why our young girls are having sex! lost, looking for love. we need lots of support systems for teens having babies. fortunately, part of the workshop discussions engaged the participants thoughtfully in the policy discussion. participants broke into small groups, which included teens, older women, and staff from the sf-mch program, to consider and write down policy directions for their communities. the following are excerpts from their work, with only brief commentary from the authors. p o l i c y m u s t f o c u s o n a n a d e q u a t e s u p p o r t s y s t e m . programs, like sf-mch as an example of a community-based, peer support home visiting program, offers one-to-one family support, including building healthy relationships within families and fostering healthy attachment between parents and children. unfortunately, the sf-mch program is not a universally available program; it is only available in 14 of the 63 first nation communities in manitoba. even within the 14 communities, the support is limited to those who are in greatest need (eni & rowe, 2010). families first, the provincial counterpart to the on reserve sf-mch, is accessible to all targeted families living off reserve. this is one example of inequitable access to formal social supports for on reserve first nation women and families. teen pregnancy is not a problem or a burden as long as the teen has a good support system and is accepted they will be fine. they just need time, understanding, and support in finding resources and guidance with the decisions they make for their new family. i strongly believe we need to educate our people to prevent teen pregnancies: prevent, promote, educate the teenagers. maybe, just maybe if they hear the stories i have heard during the workshop this past week, life stories, just maybe this would have a big impact on young teenagers and think twice and life’s choice…life stories on other teens having babies and listening… the…workshop on teen pregnancy is very important because our communities need to really support…teenagers. they need a strong and committed support system in which teens will feel and be comfortable with their options and goals. we need programs to support our community members so they can accomplish their goals and dreams.   18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.3 we all need to encourage safe sex and family planning goals. policy must also address the issue of teen pregnancy early, prior to the reproductive years, in order to make a difference; as many of the participants indicated, sexual activity was beginning much earlier than anticipated. educational efforts must consider the belief and values of the communities and would gain added value if messages were delivered within a cultural framework that involved elders and youth, including those slightly beyond the teen years sharing their experiences, both positive and negative: those who delayed parenthood and those with different experiences from which the young could learn. on this note, the participants made suggestions to offer several programs, including those focusing on: sex education, parenting, first aid/cpr, better and more inclusive schools, daycare, breastfeeding, babysitting classes and certification, and balanced involvement from men and women in reproductive, parenting, and family matters. we need centers for young men and women to come and learn about the responsibilities of parenthood. i believe that there needs to be more support services provided to teens who are pregnant. there needs to be more opportunities available for young parents. they should have the opportunity to continue their education. there should be more traditional teachings from elders to pass onto the young people. more fathers need to be included in some programs or in their own program on fathering children. there is a definite need for the voice of the community to be heard when it comes to teen pregnancy…there needs to be greater effort made in ensuring that the male perspectives be heard also…this would allow for greater balance and would also be of benefit for both sides, male and female…teen pregnancy is an important issue that needs to be addressed through the development of programs and supports that will address the needs that arise from this area. many of the participants spoke about the use of drugs and alcohol preceding sexual involvement and using at the time of conception. many said that they most likely would not have engaged in sex without alcohol or drugs. healthy discussions with youth about sexuality must include blunt discussions about alcohol and drugs. conversations about youth exploration with alcohol and drugs and youth addictions need to take place both within families and formally within programs. alternative activities for youth must also be available in the communities (e.g., recreation, artistic, and cultural programs that engage youth in positive self and social expression). policy intervention calls for multi-sectoral, multi-level support, and involvement from families, communities, and government to address the issues. preventing teen pregnancy and early parenting requires holistic approaches that consider the social determinants of health, including economic opportunity for youth and their living conditions (kenny, 2004; little bear, 2000). keeping youth busy with recreation, creative educational approaches, and employment will provide them with a sense of purpose and options for meaningful futures. this would address the need, to some degree, of “breaking the cycle” of abuse, unhealthy relationships, both lateral and intergenerational, and the family violence of which the participants spoke. these are not easy tasks, but ones that must clearly begin from the bottom 19 eni and phillips-beck: teenage pregnancy and parenthood published by scholarship@western, 2013 up with communities defining their own approaches and priorities. one solution would be to provide communities with the necessary skills to begin organizing, mobilizing, and connecting themselves to funding opportunities outside of governments, which have often narrowly defined mandates and objectives. communities within sf-mch, with the introduction of the peer support program and regional peer support worker, have worked earnestly to boost intercommunity collaborations. this type of approach to health and social programming is working to decrease isolation, scarce resourcing, and dependence upon the federal government. communities are learning from the experiences of one another and providing their youth with greater opportunities inherent within larger populations. modern communication technologies are also being used and facilitate more engaged networks. engagement of the research participants in policy discussion is typical of the kind of programming offered through the manitoba first nation sf-mch program. this is a program that emphasizes peer support within maternal, infant, and family health matters. though expertise in health or health related matters is not as easy to come by on reserve as it is in the larger cities, the program allows for on-going training and skill attainment as it is being implemented. this on-the-job skill acquisition should be supported because it not only provides a higher caliber of on reserve health programming, but also aids in building a self-esteem and confidence in women to engage in healthy parenting and family processes, and to build up their own opportunities for education and employment. the program focuses on engagement of participants, listening to the voice of the community, open communication, and, most importantly, incorporating cultural beliefs, practices, and traditions while employing a strength-based approach. such an approach to programming is part of the solution to the puzzle of whether or not women come into their pregnancies and parenting prepared and ready to benefit from what life has to offer. 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.3 r e f e r e n c e s aboriginal justice implementation commission (ajic). (1999). aboriginal women. in the report of the aboriginal justice inquiry of manitoba: vol. 1. the justice system and aboriginal people (chapter 13). winnipeg: manitoba government. anderson, k. (2002). tenuous connections: urban aboriginal youth sexual health and pregnancy. toronto: ontario federation of friendship centres. benson m. j. (2004). after the adolescent pregnancy: parents, teens, and families. child and adolescent social work journal, 21(5), 435 455. brownell, m., chartier, m., santos, r., ekuma, o., au, w., sarkar, j., macwilliam, l., burland, e., koseva, i., & guenette, w. (2010). how are manitoba’s children doing? winnipeg: manitoba centre for health policy. retrieved from http://mchpappserv.cpe.umanitoba.ca/reference/mb_kids_report_web.pdf brubaker, s. j. (2007). denied, embracing and resisting medicalization: african american teen mothers’ perceptions of formal pregnancy and childbirth care. gender and society, 21, 528-552. committee on adolescence, american academy of pediatrics (1999). adolescent pregnancy – current trends and issues: 1998. pediatrics, 103(2), 516 520. eni, r., & rowe, g. (2010). manitoba first nation strengthening families maternal child health program 5-year evaluation report. winnipeg: assembly of manitoba chiefs and health canada, first nation inuit health branch. fuery, p., smith, r., rae, k., burgess, r., & fuery, k. (2009). morality, duty and the arts in health: a project on aboriginal underage pregnancy. arts & health, 1(1), 36 47. guimond e., & robitaille, n. (2008). when teenage girls have children: trends and consequences. horizons policy research initiative government of canada, 10(1), 49 51. hampton, m., mckay-mcnabb, k., jeffery, b., & mcwatters, b. (2007). building research partnerships to sexual health of aboriginal youth in canada. the australian community psychologist, 19(1), 28 38. hart. m. a. (2007). cree ways of helping: an indigenist research project (unpublished doctoral dissertation). university of manitoba, winnipeg. hull, j. (2004). aboriginal single mothers in canada, 1996: a statistical profile. in j. p. white, p. s. maxim, & d. beavon (eds.), aboriginal policy research: setting the agenda for change (vol. 2, pp. 183 200). toronto: thompson educational publishing. 21 eni and phillips-beck: teenage pregnancy and parenthood published by scholarship@western, 2013 kenney, j., reinholtz, c., & angelini, p. c. (1997). ethnic differences in childhood and adolescent sexual abuse and teenage pregnancy. journal of adolescent health, 21(1), 3 10. kenny, c. (2004). a holistic framework of aboriginal policy research. ottawa: status of women canada. langille, d. b. (2007). teenage pregnancy: trends, contributing factors and the physician’s role. canadian medical association journal, 176(11), 1601 1602. little bear, l. (2000). jagged worldviews colliding. in m. battiste (ed.), reclaiming indigenous voice and vision (pp. 77 – 85). vancouver, bc: ubc press. luong, m. (2008). life after teenage motherhood. perspectives, may, 5 13. retrieved from http://www.statcan.gc.ca/pub/75-001-x/2008105/pdf/10577-eng.pdf maynard, r. a. (ed.). (1996). kids having kids: a robin hood foundation special report on the costs of adolescent childbearing. new york: the robin hood foundation. miller, b. c., card, j. j., paikoff, r. l., & peterson, j. l. (eds.). (1992). preventing adolescent pregnancy. newbury park, ca: sage. olsen, s. (2005). ask us: a conversation with first nation teenage moms. winlaw, bc: sononis press. ordollis, s. (2007). a story of their own: adolescent pregnancy and child welfare in aboriginal communities. first peoples child & family review, 3(4), 30 41. pedrosa, a., pires, r., carvalho, p., canavarro, m. c., & dattilio, f. (2011). ecological contexts in adolescent pregnancy: the role of individual, sociodemographic, familial and relational variables in understanding risk of occurrence and adjustment patterns. contemporary family therapy, 33(2), 107 127. rainey, d., stevens-simon, c., & kaplan, d. (1995). are adolescents who report prior sexual abuse at risk for pregnancy? child abuse and neglect, 19(10), 1283 1288. rich-edwards, j. (2002). teen pregnancy is not a public health crisis in the united states. it is time we made it one. international journal of epidemiology, 31(3), 555 556. robitaille, n., kouaouci, a., & guimond, e. (2004). la fecondite des indiennes a 15 a 19 ans, 1980 99. in j. p. white, p. s. maxim, & d. beavon (eds.), aboriginal policy research: setting the agenda for change (vol. 2, pp. 201 224). toronto: thompson educational publishing. ship, s. j., & norton, l. (2001). hiv/aids and aboriginal women in canada. canadian women’s studies, 21(2), 25 31. 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.3 the international indigenous policy journal march 2013 teenage pregnancy and parenthood perspectives of first nation women rachel eni wanda phillips-beck recommended citation teenage pregnancy and parenthood perspectives of first nation women abstract french abstract spanish abstract keywords creative commons license teenage pregnancy and parenthood perspectives of first nation women health care as commons: an indigenous approach to universal health coverage the international indigenous policy journal volume 5 | issue 3 article 1 june 2014 health care as commons: an indigenous approach to universal health coverage young soon wong monash university sunway, young.soon6@gmail.com pascale allotey monash university sunway, pascale.allotey@monash.edu daniel d. reidpath monash university sunway, daniel.reidpath@monash.edu recommended citation wong, y. s. , allotey, p. , reidpath, d. d. (2014). health care as commons: an indigenous approach to universal health coverage. the international indigenous policy journal, 5(3). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.1 health care as commons: an indigenous approach to universal health coverage abstract modern health care systems of today are predominantly derived from western models and are either state owned or under private ownership. government, through their health policies, generally aim to facilitate access for the majority of the population through the design of their health systems. however, there are communities, such as indigenous peoples, who do not necessarily fall under the formal protection of state systems. throughout history, these societies have developed different ways to provide health care to its population. these health care systems are held and managed under different property regimes with their attendant advantages and disadvantages. this article investigates the gaps in health coverage among indigenous peoples using the malaysian indigenous peoples as a case study. it conceptually examines a commons approach to health care systems through a study of the traditional health care system of indigenous peoples and suggests how such an approach can help close this gap in the remaining gaps of universal health coverage. keywords universal health coverage, indigenous peoples, commons, malaysia, orang asli acknowledgments the authors would like to acknowledge the valuable input from the reviewers in the preparation of this paper. most of all, we wish to thank all the orang asli, the first and original people of peninsular malaysia, who were involved in this project. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ h e a l t h c a r e a s c o m m o n s : a n i n d i g e n o u s a p p r o a c h t o u n i v e r s a l h e a l t h c o v e r a g e the united nations’ state of the world’s indigenous peoples report clearly documents the stark disparities in health between indigenous peoples and the national population of many countries (united nations, 2009) including within developed countries where health care services are comparatively of a higher standard. for example, infant mortality among indigenous people in australia is 3 times that of the non-indigenous population, while in new zealand it is 1.5 times higher. this same pattern is evident between indigenous and non-indigenous populations in the americas, from north america to latin america. globally, indigenous peoples carry a higher burden of diseases such as malaria, tuberculosis, hiv/aids, cardiovascular diseases, respiratory diseases, and diabetes compared with non-indigenous peoples. modern day diseases like diabetes have become a major health problem for indigenous populations due to externally induced changes to diet, environment, economy, and lifestyle. worldwide, indigenous populations still battle with poor nutrition whether they are in developed, developing, or less developed countries. in australia, 12.4% of aboriginal women give birth to low birth weight children compared to 6.2% of nonaboriginal women (better health channel, 2012); in malaysia, various studies show that between 50 80% of orang asli indigenous children were undernourished (idrus, 2013); in el salvador, 40% of indigenous children under 5 years were malnourished compared with 23% of non-indigenous children (united nations, 2009). one of the reasons for this poor state of health among indigenous peoples is lack of access to adequate health care. causes include inadequate state financing, geographical distance or isolation, high out-of-pocket expenses, lower quality of services, and culturally inappropriate or insensitive methods (united nations, 2009). t h e b a c k g r o u n d t o u n i v e r s a l h e a l t h c o v e r a g e universal health coverage has been proposed as a systems solution to the challenges in access to health care. the core aims of universal health coverage (world health assembly, 2005) are to achieve better access to adequate health care for all and to ensure that available health care is affordable. this is defined by the world health organisation (who) as a health care system that ensures all people obtain the health services they need without suffering financial hardship when paying for them (who, 2012). universal health coverage relies on a strong, efficient, and well-run health system that meets priority needs through people-centred, integrated care: one that is affordable, provides access to essential medicines and technology, and has sufficient capacity of welltrained motivated health workers (who, 2012). the concept of universal health coverage is not new. historical studies of the progression of public health show how the provision of health related and health care services grew both in the extent of coverage as well as in the range of services. whether this growth came about because of the progressive increase in knowledge, science, and technology as implied in george rosen’s (1993) grand narrative or due to changing socio-economic and political structures defining relationships between classes, social structures, and states as articulated by porter (1999), the result has been improvements in the health of populations, particularly since the mid-nineteenth century (mckeown & record, 1962). these narratives portray the progress of health improvement as a coherent whole. however, health care systems across different societies, communities, or states often evolved independently. as interaction and influence between states increased during the renaissance period, shared knowledge gave rise to common approaches that formed the basis for a modern health care system. the rise of modern nation states with the often used case studies of germany, britain, and the united states 1 wong et al.: health care as commons published by scholarship@western, 2014   (bump, 2010; porter, 1999; rosen, 1993) shows the various paths used in the attempt to meet the ideal of providing health care for all citizens. after the second world war, with the formation of international bodies in the united nations and the world health organization, universal health coverage found its ultimate expression in the unanimous consensus achieved by the alma ata declaration (rifkin & walt, 1986). historically, studies on health systems have had a western orientation focusing on sweden, france, germany, britain, and the progressive movement in the united states. less is known about the evolution of health care systems of non-western societies. chinese and indian societies, for instance, have had distinct systems of structuring health care for populations that were under the protection of the state (hillier, jewell, worcester, & kane, 1983; mishra, singh, & dagenais, 2001). virtually undocumented are the histories of health care systems of non-state societies; those societies or communities that for various reasons live and function outside the formal political structures of the state (scott, 2010). these non-state societies are often considered inferior with limited historical records, which may contribute to little more than “exotic” anthropological value. most indigenous communities fall under the definition of non-state societies (benjamin & chou, 2002) and have a history of marginalisation. c h a l l e n g e s t o u n i v e r s a l h e a l t h c o v e r a g e i n i n d i g e n o u s p o p u l a t i o n s recent discourses on the approaches to improving universal health coverage give primacy to the need for optimal financing models1(holst & brandrup-lukanow, 2005; who, 2010). while financing is a critical aspect of ensuring universal health coverage, it is also clear that the absence of appropriate infrastructure, qualified and culturally sensitive personnel, supportive socio-economic and policy environments, and adequate implementing structures combine to undermine universal health coverage. in southeast asia, for example, thailand, which is often cited in international reports (who, 2010) for successfully providing universal health coverage still falls short of providing access to minority tribal groups (hamilton, 2002; sricharoen, buchenrieder, & dufhues, 2008). large numbers of hilltribe households are not even accorded citizenship status by the state, thereby excluding them from government health subsidies (hu, 2009). national policy environments need to synchronize with health policy in order for universal health coverage to work. since the public policy making process is a profoundly political process and not a linear analytical problem-solving one (walt, 1996), national health policies emulate the goals, priorities, and biases of the state, which may not necessarily contribute altruistically to health improvement alone. some examples are colonial britain’s use of health services to draw the orang asli away from communist influence during the malayan emergency from 1948 to 1960 (bedford, 2009), south africa during the apartheid era used health policies as part of its effort to maintain the dominance of its white population (mcintyre & gilson, 2002), and mexico used health services in its counter-insurgency effort to suppress the zapatista rebellion in chiapas (farmer & gastineau, 2005).                                                                                                                 1 optimal financing models refer to methods of raising money to pay for health care services. due to the rising cost of providing health care services as a result of larger and ageing populations, governments are increasingly looking to methods other than general taxation. social health insurance, private health insurance, privatizing services, or increasing user fees are various methods used but each has their advantages and disadvantages. finding an optimal model for each country that balances between equity, efficiency, effectiveness, and sustainability is the challenge. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.1   with such an array of challenges, is universal health coverage in its current form adequate to ensure access to quality health care for indigenous peoples? to this question we will now turn using the orang asli, an indigenous people of malaysia, as a case study. t h e m a l a y s i a n i n d i g e n o u s p e o p l e the orang asli are the indigenous peoples of peninsular malaysia, officially classified by the state into 3 main groups and sub-divided further into 18 ethnic sub-groups. numbering just 178,197 (department of aboriginal development, 2012) or 0.6% of malaysia’s population of 28.3 million (department of statistics, 2010), the orang asli are the oldest population group recorded to inhabit the peninsula (zainuddin, 2012). the orang asli is not a homogenous group. however, they share similarities in factors requisite among indigenous people: that is self-identification as a distinct group, historical experience of vulnerability, dislocation and exploitation, a long connection with the region, close cultural affinity with the land or territory, and non-dominance in the affairs of the state (kingsbury, 1998). archaeological, anthropological, and genetic evidence suggests that the three main orang asli groups—negrito, senoi, and aboriginal malay—have pre-histories that go back as far as 10,000 years (dentan, endicott, gomes, & hooker, 1997). the earliest state systems in the peninsula were indianised kingdoms dating back about 1,800 years ago and orang asli contacts with these populations and traders from further afield were limited to trading forest products (nicholas, 2000). mostly, they lived in the forested upland interiors, isolated from the reach of national politics. with the establishment of malay kingdoms in the second millennium, the orang asli were subjected to intense slavery (andaya, 1984; clifford, 1989; endicott, 1983; gullick, 1987; mikluhomaclay, 1878; swettenham, 1880). passing references by traders, explorers, missionaries, and later anthropological studies dating from mid-nineteenth century, give a glimpse of how orang asli societies were organised. in spite of the heterogeneity of the communities, a number of features were common across the groups. these were: (a) small to medium sized bands of kinship related households (dentan et al., 1997), which enabled them to exploit ecological resources in a sustainable fashion, provided protection from state control, and facilitated flight when there was a perceived threat (scott, 2010). (b) egalitarian social structures, particularly within the negrito and senoi groups (dentan et al., 1997; lye, 2002), but less so with the aboriginal malay groups (nicholas, 2000). the structure supported the sharing of knowledge and skills among band members to ensure group survival. (c) most of their livelihoods and daily needs were derived from their natural environment— the sea for the coastal groups and the forests for those in the hinterland (nicholas, 2000). the forest was a source of nourishment, household, building and trading materials, medicines, and leisure (colfer, 2008;vinceti, eyzaguirre, & johns, 2008). (d) land and natural resources were held communally to allow every member of a community access to vital resources (vinceti et al., 2008). (e) communities maintained some interaction with the state but remained largely outside the control of the state (benjamin & chou, 2002). it has been argued that this particular feature relates to the history of slavery (endicott, 1983). 3 wong et al.: health care as commons published by scholarship@western, 2014   organisation and social structures that ensured the availability and accessibility to basic resources for nourishment, shelter, social, and health needs coupled with limited wants played a key role in enabling bands not only to survive but also to thrive in difficult ecological conditions (mies & bennholdt-thomsen, 1999; sahlins, 1974). the population of the orang asli in the 1947 census report stood at 34,737 from a total population of 4.9 million (del tufo, 1949) or 0.7% of malaya’s population. a year later, the communist insurgency war in malaya triggered a concerted effort by the state to isolate the indigenous people from communist influence. this led to a series of development programs, which included the provision of health services as part of its counterinsurgency strategy (bedford, 2009; nicholas & baer, 2007). there is now a hospital dedicated solely for the health of orang asli, free medical treatment at government health facilities, and dedicated mobile health units that provide mother-and-child health services, malaria screening, vector control, and ambulance services. notwithstanding the economic development of malaysia over the past five decades since its independence in 1957, the orang asli have, to a large extent, remained isolated from the advantages brought through economic development. similar to indigenous peoples worldwide, disparities are evident in almost every sector. compared with the 1947 census, the orang asli share of the population has in fact decreased from 0.7% to 0.6% of the total population. official statistics in 2008 to 2009 indicated that 33% of orang asli were “hard-core” poor compared with the national average of 0.7% ( department of statistics, 2010; idrus, 2013). the proportion categorised as “poor” was 50% in 2009 (economic planning unit, 2010) but the poverty incidence is likely much higher due to the lower poverty line income used with orang asli compared to the national standard (idrus, 2013). in education, school attrition in the first 6 years of formal education for orang asli children attending the malaysian public school system was reported at 43.9% in 2003 while only 6 out of 100 completed up to 11 years of formal education (nicholas, 2010). one of the most contested areas between the orang asli and the state is in land rights and the natural resources that come with it. in a 2013 report published by the human rights commission of malaysia (suhakam, 2013), there were 287 cases of disputes pertaining to land rights that pitted the orang asli against state land development schemes, dams, national parks, logging, commercial plantations, and settlers. for the orang asli, land and its environment is fundamental to the social, cultural, spiritual, and economic systems. from the land, they derive their food, medicines, fuel, and building materials. in addition, it shapes their governance systems, spiritual beliefs (nicholas, yok chopil, & sabak, 2003) and, as this article will show, their health care system. hence, the loss of land and its resources has severe impacts on the life and identity of this community. t h e m a l a y s i a n h e a l t h c a r e s y s t e m a n d o r a n g a s l i h e a l t h malaysia too has made remarkable progress in the standard population health indicators since achieving independence in 1957. life expectancy at birth has risen from 56 years and 58 years for males and females respectively to 71 and 76 years respectively in 2005. the crude death rate (cdr) per 1,000 population declined from 12.4 in 1957 to 4.5 in 2002 and maternal mortality rates per 1,000 live births fell from 3.2 in 1957 to 0.3 in 2004 (sirajoon & hematram, 2008). the progress has been achieved with a relatively low expenditure on health care. between the years 2004 to 2011, health care expenditure averaged 3.95% of gdp of which slightly less than half was public expenditure (world bank, 2013). human resources for health coverage from both public and private sectors are in the ratio of 1:758 for doctors and 1:345 for nurses while, with respect to infrastructure, the state owns and runs 140 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.1   hospitals, 1,025 health clinics and 1,831 community clinics (ministry of health, 2013) under a state property regime. in addition to static health care facilities, the state has mobile clinics to provide primary health care for communities such as indigenous peoples living in remote locations. if complications arise, patients are sent to tertiary level facilities located in major urban centres. all these were achieved with an optimal expenditure on health provision. malaysia’s total health expenditure was 4.75% of gdp, well within the recommended 4% to 5% by who for the asiapacific region (chua & cheah, 2012). these achievements are remarkable compared to countries such as ghana, which also became independent in 1957 (mayhew & adjei, 2004). malaysia’s health care system is a mix of public and private services with the state owned and publicly funded health care system catering to the majority of its citizens. however, since the 1980s, the government has been reducing its role in the provision of services and ceding over initiatives to a forprofit private sector made up chiefly of large publicly-listed companies (chee & barraclough, 2007). in fact beginning in 2004, the private sector has overtaken government spending on health with the former accounting for 53.8% of expenditures (chua & cheah, 2012). another effect of the privatization policy is the draining of public medical personnel to the private sector due to the higher monetary rewards (ramesh, 2007) leaving the public health care sector with reduced quality services. for-profit private sector health care services cater to the affluent rather than the poorer and more inaccessible sections of society given that these have little profit potential. owned and run under a private property regime, private health care services go where the money is; hence, they tend to be located in large urban centres where the wealthy reside. while there are not-for-profit private health care services in malaysia, their number is small and coverage is limited. it is left to the state then to provide these services on reduced budgets and personnel. despite the reduced resources and privatization challenges, malaysia’s public health care system has done commendably well in moving towards universal health coverage with 93% of the population living within 5 kilometres of a health care facility; rural primary health care is provided free of charge while urban public health clinics and hospitals levy only modest charges on the population (ramesh, 2007). however, in common with the global pattern, national level achievements in providing health care mask significant health disparities for indigenous peoples. the orang asli carry a larger burden of diseases like tuberculosis, malaria, and leprosy compared with the national population. the crude death rate, infant mortality, and maternal mortality rates were also higher than the national average (baer, 1999; nicholas & baer, 2007). even basic health needs like nutrition remain unmet as malnutrition and undernourishment continue to plague a large proportion of the community (khor & zalilah, 2008; osman & zaleha, 1995; saibul et al., 2009; shashikala, kandiah, zalilah, & khor, 2005). national health policy and its implementation are a reflection of the state’s goals, priorities, and biases. for indigenous peoples, communities that have historically been non-state societies that state societies tend to view them as uncivilized, barbaric, backward (nicholas, 1996; scott, 2010) that need to be lifted out of their condition and brought under the “civilizing” tutelage of the state. this orientation is reflected in public policy that establishes how the malaysian state relates with its indigenous peoples groups. in the 2009 country report of the un human rights council, this policy is described in the following manner: 5 wong et al.: health care as commons published by scholarship@western, 2014   the most significant challenge which besets malaysia is lifting indigenous groups from backwardness [italics added for emphasis] and assimilating them into mainstream society. in line with this, malaysia has developed comprehensive policies and strategies for the development of indigenous groups which focuses on uplifting the status and quality of life of the indigenous community via socioeconomic programmes. (united nations, 2008, p. 16 para 4.97) socioeconomic programmes here would include health care services, which the state is morally and legally under international conventions obliged2 to provide. the result of such orientation in policy manifests itself in health policy and practices towards the orang asli exemplified in the following documented incidents in health matters: • in 2010, dr. shelvaa pillai, a physician at the gombak hospital, went public with allegations of negligence and mismanagement at the hospital that was setup exclusively for orang asli health treatment since the malayan emergency (alhadjri, 2011; idrus, 2013). • in 2004, tasik chini, a natural fresh water lake, was found to be heavily contaminated with e. coli, causing rashes and diarrhoea among the orang asli living in villages along the lake. the government immediately blamed the contamination on the orang asli and suggested that they be resettled. a study later found that the contamination was due to a local tourist resort and a national service camp sited by the lakeside (nicholas & baer, 2007; “pollution killing tasik chini,” 2004; “scattered orang asli to be resettled in one village,” 2004). • in 1997, two jah hut orang asli children died from an overdose of anti-malarial drugs wrongly administered by health department personal. the government denied it was at fault and instead accused the parents of negligence. subsequently, a coroner’s inquiry found that it was indeed an overdose of anti-malarial drugs but no health official was held accountable. this was the fourth documented incident (aziz, 1997; baer, 1999; nicholas & baer, 2007; ruslaini, 2000). • in 1996, when a study revealed that 60% of mothers who died during home births were orang asli, the government immediately placed expectant mothers in newly set up alternative birthing centres located in public hospitals from up to a month or more before the delivery date and forbade home births (“encouraging women to give births in hospitals,” 1996; nicholas & baer, 2007). the expectant mother was required to wait out her time in these centres—some up to three months. the dominating power of the state over this traditionally non-state society is now expressed in paternalism and authoritarianism. health policy and public health care services owned by the state are delivered to the orang asli without the participation of the community, purportedly for “their own good” and when something goes wrong, it is due to their “backwardness”. considering malaysia’s achievements in reducing poverty and bringing health care services to a high level of                                                                                                                 2 malaysia has ratified the convention to eliminate discrimination against women (cedaw) and the convention on the rights of the child (crc) but not the universal declaration on human rights (udhr) or international convention on economic, social and cultural rights (icescr) (united nations, 1979, 1989, 1948, 1966, respectively). 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.1   coverage since independence in 1957, this failure to address the needs of a group that make up less than 1% of the country’s population indicate that the policy and implementation environment of its one-size-fits-all system of organising universal health coverage has been less than effective in reaching the orang asli. for a non-state society like the orang asli, a third way of holding resources—common property regimes—may be needed to achieve the goals of universal health coverage. t h e c o n c e p t o f “ c o m m o n s ” the term “the commons” provides a generic description of common-pool resources – cultural and natural resources—shared by all members of a community or society. in many traditional societies, a commons approach or “common property regimes” govern shared lands, water sources, public property and social protection systems (platteau, 1991; swallow, 1997) and ensures that resources are accessible to all members of the community. this is in contrast with state property regimes and private property regimes where ownership is limited to the state in the former and to an individual entity in the latter. recent applications of common property regimes also cover knowledge systems such as the internet and open access software (brin, 1995; ostrom & hess, 2007; ostrom & hess, 2011). there remain communities in many low and middle-income countries where the commons approach remains of core relevance to the way the society functions. these communities are often ones that are marginalised due to ethnicity, geography, development, political alignment, or socioeconomic status and commonly suffer persistently poorer health outcomes. they also present the greatest challenges to achieving universal health coverage within state owned health care systems. h e a l t h c a r e a s c o m m o n r i g h t the accepted working definition of health by the who is a “state of complete physical, mental, and social well-being, and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity” (who, 1946). such a definition of health has clear connections with basic human rights and this has resulted in recent years in an increasing momentum towards a rights-based approach to health (gruskin, grodin, marks, & annas, 2005; smith-nonini, 2006) as it is recognised that the right to health cannot be separated from human rights (kirby, 1999; leary, 1994; toebes, 1999; tomasevski, 2012). this was recognised and set out in a number of international legal instruments: the universal declaration on human rights (udhr), article 25:1 in 1948 (united nations, 1948) and the international convention on economic, social and cultural rights (icescr), article 12 in 1966 (united nations, 1966). this was subsequently reinforced for specific segments of the population by the convention to eliminate discrimination against women (cedaw), article 12 in 1979 (united nations, 1979) and the convention on the rights of the child (crc), article 6 in 1989 (united nations, 1989). the right to health is accorded to all people even if it is a de jure right and not always de facto, as not all governments have signed onto these international instruments. the right to health is not limited to the provision of health care services but encompasses other conditions— civil, political, economic, social, and cultural (gruskin & tarantola, 2005)—that make “the right of everyone to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health” possible (united nations, 1996, icescr article 12). it is in a sense a “common-right” accorded for all. for indigenous groups who face significant health disparities, operationalizing this common-right to health is a focus for who as seen in its world health assembly resolutions 54.16, 53.10, 51.24, 50.31, 49.26, 48.24 and 47.27 (world health assembly, 2001). key to delivering this common-right to health is health care systems that are setup in various forms in each country. who defines a health care system as all the activities whose primary purpose is to promote, restore, or maintain 7 wong et al.: health care as commons published by scholarship@western, 2014   health (who, 2000) and it is a country’s health care system that determines the success or failure of universal health coverage. h e a l t h c a r e s y s t e m a s a c o m m o n p o o l r e s o u r c e the idea that health has economic value is certainly recognised and acknowledged in the social determinants of health report (who, 2008) and by the international labour organisation (ilo, 2007): investments in health bring economic returns. good health is good for the economy (sachs, 2001). to an extent, in today’s market economy, what passes as good health has been commoditised and packaged into something that can be bought and sold, as evidenced by the privatised medical services market, the diet and fitness market, and the pharmaceutical market, to generate revenue. in this light, a health care system may be considered as a common-pool resource in so far as it is an economic resource that safeguards a population’s health and where those of the population are accorded certain rights of access. a common-pool resource consists of two components: a resource system or stock facility and a flow of resource units or benefits from the resource system (e. ostrom, 2000). the resource system of a modern health care system is made up of hospital buildings and attendant infrastructure, medical and supporting equipment, medicines, personnel and their skills, medical and health knowledge, all of which are tangible or intangible resources. the flow of resource units from a health care system is made up of the various health care services to the population. two attributes that economists usually associate with common-pool resources are: (1) the difficulty of excluding people from using the resource, and (2) that its use by an individual subtracts from what is available for others (e. ostrom, gardner, & walker, 1994; v. ostrom & ostrom, 1977). health care, particularly a public health care system, certainly displays these attributes. first, it is difficult insofar that it is unacceptable to exclude or discriminate against individuals or segments of the population from using the services by virtue of the “common-right” they have to health as enshrined in the international instruments. states are obliged to ensure that these rights are respected, protected, and fulfilled even if they do not often succeed. second, due to the finite nature of resources and multiple demands on it, competing for a share of resources such as finances allocated to the health sector, trained personnel to provide services, time to attend to patients, availability of equipment or medicines, mean the subtractibility3 of these resources has limits. c o n c e p t u a l i z i n g a c o m m o n s h e a l t h c a r e s y s t e m traditionally, in studies that review property regimes, the function that has been emphasized is the economic function. this is true even in reviewing common property regimes where the foremost studies predominantly emphasize this from the angle of the potential in economic development. and so, the track record of it being successful in that function has been uneven and frequently contested (hardin, 1968), even more so as economic systems have moved from subsistence to capitalist. however, in recognising a common property regime’s specific function in social protection rather than economic growth, then mitigating health risk and maintaining good health as critical components of social protection (hormansdorfer, 2009) suggest that common property regimes are                                                                                                                 3 subtractibility refers to the degree to which the use of a portion of the resource shrinks the supply that remains for others (fao, n.d.). e. ostrom and colleagues (1994) use the example of how a person’s use of a weather forecast does not subtract from its availability to others; hence, it is limitless. however, a person’s use of a fishery subtracts from its availability to others because there are limits to how much fish can be extracted before a fishery is exhausted. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.1   an important aspect of holding and organising a health care system. this approach has not received much attention except in a few scholarly papers (smith-nonini, 2006; smith-nonini & bell, 2011) and is equally contested (lewis, 2004) as with the rest of the commons debate. one possible reason is because there has been even less investigation into actual cases of health care systems organised under a common property regimes but instead re-conceptualizations of health care systems that are under private or state property regimes. it can be compared to trying to fit a square peg into a round hole. to determine efficacy and limitations, a conceptualization based on an actual example of a commons health care system is needed. o r a n g a s l i t r a d i t i o n a l h e a l t h c a r e s y s t e m a s a c o m m o n s h e a l t h c a r e s y s t e m the orang asli traditional health care system is possibly more integrated than the modern health care system: the people’s concept of health linked individual and communal ill health to social, cultural, spiritual, and environmental factors (nicholas & baer, 2007). while these linkages had been evident for some time in public health circles, it was only in the past few decades that the interconnectedness of these factors gained traction in the medical field, particularly with the publishing of the social determinants of health report (who, 2008). that the orang asli did not require busloads of highly qualified personnel or millions of dollars to come to that conclusion and organise their health care system accordingly suggests lessons we need to learn. a number of anthropological studies have documented the orang asli’s health concepts, practices, and factor links (dentan, 1968; endicott, 1979; gianno, 1986; hood, 1978; howell, 1989; roseman, 1993; skeat & blagden, 1906; wazir-jahan, 1981). while these studies are valuable, they will only be explored here from the commons angle. according to e. ostrom (1990), there are eight design principles that contribute toward a successful common property regime. while not all are found in every common property regime, the absence or presence of a design principle poses questions about how it affects the long-term integrity and sustainability of a common property regime. the design principles ostrom postulates are: (a) clearly defined boundaries; (b) rules in use are well matched to local needs and conditions; (c) individuals affected by the operational rules can participate in modifying the rules; (d) a system for self-monitoring members’ behaviour is established; (e) a graduated system of sanctions is available; (f) community members have access to low-cost conflict-resolution mechanisms; (g) the right of community members to devise their own rules is respected by external authorities. and in the case of common property regimes that are parts of a larger system: (h) nested enterprises – appropriation, provision, monitoring, enforcement, conflict resolution, and governance activities are organized in a nested structure with multiple layers of activities. 9 wong et al.: health care as commons published by scholarship@western, 2014   there are three features nested in the orang asli traditional health care system that makes it a common-pool resource held and managed in a common property regime—a commons health care system. f e a t u r e 1 : n a t u r a l r e s o u r c e b a s e . first, is the natural resource base—the tropical rainforest— from which the orang asli obtain their sustenance, medicinal plants, and which is their spiritual and cultural foci. in itself, forest systems are a widely recognised a common-pool resource with various examples of successful management under common property regimes (arnold, 1998; fao, n.d.; e. ostrom, 1990; pagdee, kim, & daugherty, 2006). orang asli view forest resources and the land on which the forest grow as being communally held. land is regarded as a living entity and a band exercises rights to regulate and use it yet no individual has permanent ownership of it but only usufruct rights. resources from the natural forests are accessible to anyone from the band. however, crops that are planted by individuals belong to the specific individual and his or her household (lim, 1997; nicholas et al., 2003). items key to orang asli health that are obtained from the tropical rainforest are medicinal plants, which are accessible to all members of the band in their territory. food sources such as meat and vegetables come from both cultivated and natural sources, the former harvestable only by the owners or with the owner’s consent, while the latter accessible again to all from that band. a study by samuel and colleagues (2010) identified 62 species of plants used for medicinal purposes by one orang asli community while an earlier study by dunn (1975) identified 104 fruit species alone that are harvested in another community from forest and forest swiddens. without this natural resource base, the orang asli traditional health care system could not exist since duplicating this ecosystem is not possible. f e a t u r e 2 : k n o w l e d g e b a s e . the ability to use and manage a natural resource base, whether for medicinal, nutritional, shelter, spiritual, or cultural purposes, comes from a community’s knowledge repository that has been accumulated over generations. this constitutes the second feature of the orang asli traditional health care system: the indigenous or traditional knowledge base that underpins the system. indigenous knowledge, like the natural resource systems held and used by an indigenous people, is central to the maintenance of its identity (posey & dutfield, 1996). it is an identity that is visibly community-oriented, communal, and with roles, reciprocities, and obligations of the individual to the band and vice versa. many indigenous communities like that of the orang asli hold their indigenous knowledge in common (joranson, 2008) enabling it to be open and accessible to anyone in a band interested to learn to acquire the necessary skills needed to survive. it is in the survival in a specific environmental niche that indigenous knowledge becomes a resource that equips the band to obtain food, water, shelter, medicinal products, work and tend the land, maintain social ties and the health of the band, negotiate spiritual and cultural rules, in addition to accumulating and passing on the knowledge on to the next generation so that it too will survive and develop. with a largely egalitarian social structure in small band sizes, surviving in such an environment requires a communal effort and so the knowledge that is needed to do that is shared and managed jointly. the more members who share the necessary information and skills for survival, the more the band is able to thrive. knowledge then is non-subtractive in that one person’s ability to use it does not compromise another’s. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.1   this common access to knowledge, however, does not mean every member will put into practice all available knowledge. factors like gender, age group, or lineage will influence utilization of knowledge in order to fulfil different roles in the social setup of a band; however, it is accessible to all band members if they are interested to learn. a person’s knowledge of health and health treatment is determined more by personal attentiveness rather than say gender, while children gain this knowledge through observation and instruction by following the adults in a band. not only is knowledge held in common, but also it is generated and used in common through the participation of every band member in the acts of learning and decision-making. it is self-organised through collective-action and self-governance by a band. communal decision-making is the norm in orang asli communities with band members’ collectively deciphering and providing information and knowledge in order for decisions and actions to be made that affect the band. some examples of this include decisions about opening up rice swiddens (nicholas et al., 2003), moving the village to another location, marriage, death, and issues dealing with external or state authorities. this method of holding and using knowledge by indigenous peoples like the orang asli is increasingly being understood and recognised through a growing body of studies into the concept of knowledge as a commons (hess & ostrom, 2006; joranson, 2008; kranich, 2004; stiglitz, 2007). in a knowledge commons, knowledge is jointly used and managed by groups, cumulatively building on past knowledge and accessible to all in the group and at times beyond. it is self-organised and is nonsubtractive unlike other common-pool resources (hess & ostrom, 2006). f e a t u r e 3 : s o c i a l p r o t e c t i o n b a s e . the third feature in the orang asli traditional health care system that makes it a commons health care system is its social protection function. the united nations (2000) defined social protection as: a set of public and private policies and programmes undertaken by societies in response to various contingencies to offset the absence or substantial reduction of income from work; to provide assistance to families with children as well as provide people with basic health care and housing. (p. 4) this is underpinned by: fundamental values concerning acceptable levels and security of access to income, livelihood, employment, health and education services, nutrition and shelter. (united nations, 2000, p. 4) in the subsistence context from which traditional orang asli society originated, livelihoods were not income based so income and employment security were not relevant but instead centred on obtaining food, water, and other materials for subsistence needs. traditional social protection then consists of guaranteed sustenance, care, and health treatment for kin who are ill, incapacitated, disabled, too young, or too old to meet his or her own livelihood needs (baer, 1999; colfer, 2008). this is achieved through risks pooling when band members who are healthy or appropriately skilled provide those services embedded within social customs of reciprocity, kinship obligation, and cultural sanctions. these customs are transmitted orally and through practice and are a shared resource, utilized and owned jointly as in a common property regime for the benefit of the band. through habitual usage, they become an un-codified form of rules and precedents not unlike common law (thompson, 11 wong et al.: health care as commons published by scholarship@western, 2014   1993), practiced in common by band members. the communal nature of these social customs helps ensure a band’s survival through mutual guarantee of basic health and survival needs met within the capacity level of a band and a common understanding of what constitutes the rights of band members. traditional social protection as practiced in the orang asli community thus played similar functions as social health insurance, patient care, and after care services in a modern health care system plus welfare assistance in a social welfare system. it is a non-state equivalent of public or private policies and programmes of a state society and its interpretation of who should receive social protection— equity—and how it is best implemented—efficiency. s u m m a r y o f f e a t u r e s from these three features, the first two reveal that the orang asli traditional health care system consists of two common property regime systems in itself—natural resource and knowledge—while the third—social protection—has a clear communal focus. the orang asli traditional health care system appears to reflect the common property regime design principles that e. ostrom (1990) postulated. clearly defined boundaries encompass the right to access medicinal products within a band’s territory, to receive instruction of the knowledge needed to use medicinal products and provide health treatment, and to receive social protection is generally confined to band members and kin. the rules in use are well matched to local needs and conditions; rules for the use of medicinal products from the forest follow the same rules that govern other natural resource use. the indigenous knowledge that informs the rules is unique to this community being historically isolated geographically and specific to the environment while social protection functions are unique to the orang asli community based on local social customs. individuals affected by the operational rules can participate in modifying the rules and community members have access to low-cost conflictresolution mechanisms. the egalitarian structure of bands allows every member to participate in decision-making even when differences of opinion occur over a wide range of issues including health matters. the un-codified nature of social customs allows room for variations in interpretation and negotiation to take place (thompson, 1993) until conflict is resolved and consensus is reached. a system for self-monitoring members’ behaviour is established and a graduated system of sanctions is available; small band sizes and the egalitarian structure of orang asli communities allow ease of monitoring another member’s actions. sanctions come in the form of cultural and spiritual sanctions or taboos that influence health behaviour and health treatment. the right of community members to devise their own rules is respected by external authorities; in the past, the orang asli’s geographical isolation and non-state status allowed them the freedom to devise their own rules for resource usage without interference from the state. however, with the dominance of the state and its policies and practices, orang asli traditional health care is being undermined directly by health authorities who discourage certain traditional health practices, and indirectly through the loss of its natural resource and knowledge base and the erosion of traditional social protection due to the increasing individualization of orang asli society, resulting in a decline of the community’s traditional health care system. c o n c l u s i o n a n d p o l i c y i m p l i c a t i o n s one of the aims of this article has been to show that an alternate way of holding and managing a health care system exist in a common property regime as compared to the dominant models of public, private, or public-private ownership. the case study of the orang asli traditional health care system is of a working example of a commons health care system and because of similarities in socio12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.1   economic organisation with other indigenous peoples groups worldwide suggest that the common property regime path to organising health care may be more widespread than what one would suppose. it is a system that empowers communities with ownership and control, and prioritizes equity and social protection. within the limits of its medical technology, the case study shows it is a workable system that brings health care benefits to the entire community. indigenous peoples groups like the orang asli who were predominantly non-state societies still face critical health issues despite state-led or state-owned efforts at universal health coverage due to conflicting state or private property regime functions, and the politics of policy-making and implementation. if universal health coverage is to fulfil its goals among such groups, alternate pathways that put the community in control and empower members will be needed. one such pathway is the commons health care system expressed in traditional health care systems. by recognising, supporting, and strengthening these systems as part of universal health coverage efforts, we move away from depending solely on a state-centred, one-size-fits-all approach that has fallen short in addressing indigenous people’s health needs. what this means in policy terms for the health care needs of the orang asli community and indeed other indigenous communities is that: (a) the forest and the land that nurtures these ecosystems—the natural resource base— and the rights to it need to be recognised and protected in national laws and enforced justly by the state. the orang asli, as with many indigenous peoples around the world, are denied ownership and in some cases even usufruct rights to their land. the lack of such security in tenure invariably leads to the degradation and eventual loss of the natural resource base through unsustainable usage or appropriation by others. (b) the indigenous knowledge base needs to be preserved and transmitted to the younger generation of indigenous peoples in a more inclusive and creative state education system that currently ignores the needs of this traditionally non-state society. among the orang asli, indigenous knowledge was transmitted from adults to children via the daily activities of the family or band. the modern state schooling system ignores this knowledge and divorces the involvement of parents and community adults from the children’s education. to reverse this requires state education policies that include indigenous knowledge in its curriculum and facilitates the involvement of parents and community adults in teaching. (c) indigenous peoples have to navigate the treacherous waters of social change that are rapidly changing the values and social customs that underpin their traditional social protection system. this is further undermined by widespread poverty that prevents people from having sustainable livelihoods. state policy must first have a genuine focus to tackle the issue of poverty among indigenous peoples and enhance livelihood security. in addition, policy makers need to understand and recognise the role of these non-state traditional social protection systems and support them through appropriate measures that bring new methods into traditional systems, such as local credit and savings groups, mutual aid and insurance groups, or the strengthening of common property management groups. (d) finally, international and national agencies promoting universal health coverage need to move substantially more in their policy directions towards including indigenous 13 wong et al.: health care as commons published by scholarship@western, 2014   people’s community control and participation in health care decision-making. for a long period, health policy decisions have been made without consulting or involving indigenous people who use the services. in contrast, an indigenous peoples’ traditional health care system intricately involves its users in the management of its resources, the learning and transmission of its knowledge and in the care of its patients to attain better health outcomes. these policy recommendations, if applied, can help address the major gaps that still exist with indigenous peoples’ health. the commons health care system presented in this article provides a framework for engagement. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.1   r e f e r e n c e s alhadjri, a. 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(2012). genetic and dental profiles of orang asli of peninsular malaysia. penang: usm press. retrieved from http://bukumalaysia.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cpath=15&products_id= 402 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.1 the international indigenous policy journal june 2014 health care as commons: an indigenous approach to universal health coverage young soon wong pascale allotey daniel d. reidpath recommended citation health care as commons: an indigenous approach to universal health coverage abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license health care as commons: an indigenous approach to universal health coverage indigenous educational attainment in canada the international indigenous policy journal volume 5 | issue 3 article 6 june 2014 indigenous educational attainment in canada catherine e. gordon western university, cgordo28@uwo.ca jerry p. w hite western university, white@uwo.ca recommended citation gordon, c. e. , white, j. p. (2014). indigenous educational attainment in canada. the international indigenous policy journal, 5(3). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.6 indigenous educational attainment in canada abstract in this article, the educational attainment of indigenous peoples of working age (25 to 64 years) in canada is examined. this diverse population has typically had lower educational levels than the general population in canada. results indicate that, while on the positive side there are a greater number of highly educated indigenous peoples, there is also a continuing gap between indigenous and non-indigenous peoples. data also indicate that the proportion with less than high school education declined, which corresponds with a rise of those with a pse; the reverse was true in 1996. despite these gains, however, the large and increasing absolute numbers of those without a high school education is alarming. there are intra-indigenous differences: first nations with indian status and the inuit are not doing as well as non-status and métis peoples. comparisons between the indigenous and non-indigenous populations reveal that the documented gap in post-secondary educational attainment is at best stagnant. out of the data analysis, and based on the history of educational policy, we comment on the current reform proposed by the government of canada, announced in february of 2014, and propose several policy recommendations to move educational attainment forward. keywords indigenous, aboriginal, education, educational attainment, canada acknowledgments this study was originally prepared for presentation at the “indigenous issues in post-secondary education conference” in october 2013. we are grateful to don drummond and the team that organized this conference and invited us to conduct this study and present the results. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ i n d i g e n o u s e d u c a t i o n a l a t t a i n m e n t i n c a n a d a indigenous peoples have typically had lower educational attainment levels compared to the nonindigenous population in canada (spence & white, 2009). research indicates that low levels of education in specific populations are correlated with factors such as socio-economic status (eagle, 1989), ethnicity (gang & zimmermann, 2000), geography (garner & raudenbush, 1991), and parental educational attainment (krein & beller, 1988). several studies have indicated that low educational attainment levels among indigenous peoples in canada are also tied to colonialism (miller, 1996). with an increasing number of indigenous students at post-secondary institutions, some people feel more optimistic about the direction of attainment levels. higher educational attainment will likely enhance individual labour market opportunities and possibly benefit indigenous communities if educated individuals return home. in this article, recent attainment is examined in-depth. the objectives of the study are the following: (a) to examine the most up-to-date data available for indigenous educational attainment in order to determine whether there has been adequate progress since the 1996 census in canada. this assessment involves an examination of intra-indigenous trends in educational attainment and a comparison between indigenous and non-indigenous populations in canada across high school and post-secondary education (pse). (b) to develop some preliminary policy assessments based on the data analysis. cursory comments are made on the current reform proposed by the federal government of canada announced in february of 2014. for international and canadian readers alike, it is important to present a brief history of indigenous educational policy and practice in canada first. a bri e f h i s t o ry o f c o l o n i a l e d u c a t i o n po l i c y i n c a n a d a : f i rs t c o n t a c t t o 1 9 9 6 researchers and indigenous peoples point to the history of colonialism and the approaches taken to education as necessary context in order to understand the present educational attainment of indigenous peoples in canada (see for example miller, 1996). according to peters (2013), the outcome and legacy of this history were: . . . [p]overty, marginalization, and much despair. deprived of an economic base, family relationships disrupted, and indigenous ways of knowing denigrated, colonialism has taken an exacting toll on first nations communities. first nations have relatively high incarceration rates, infant mortality rates, and high school drop-out rates, higher rates of smoking, alcohol, and drug abuse, and have a disproportionate burden of ill-health (first nations information governance centre [fnigc], 2012; national collaborating centre for aboriginal health [nccah], 2012; perrault, 2009). (p. 43) in order to explain and understand the impact of the past on present events, we begin at the earliest period when these processes began, at the beginning of the 17th century. france originally colonized canada. the first schooling systems, dating to the early 17th century, had the goal of “francization” of indigenous peoples to convert them to christianity (jaenen, 1986). as white and peters (2009) pointed out, the récollets (franciscan friars) trained small groups of boys, whom they hoped would lead the transformation in belief systems within communities. in 1632, the jesuits were given control of educating the indigenous population. they decided first to set up community based schooling (magnuson, 1992) but later abandoned this approach for boarding schools (jaenon, 1986). these efforts were very unsuccessful due to “tenacity of the indigenous cultures” (magnuson, 1992, p. 61). by the beginning of the 18th century, the schools were largely abandoned (miller, 1996). in addition to indigenous resistance to converting to christianity and french culture, part of the reason for school closure lay in the on-going politics and military situation in north america. the french began to realize that assimilation did not serve their colonial interests because both fur traders and soldiers found the indigenous peoples valuable as partners in the fur trade and strong military allies (white & peters, 2009). the mindset that indigenous peoples could be allies without being made into “europeans” was also important in british thinking in north america in early periods. prior to the war of 1812, the british were not very concerned with assimilating indigenous peoples per se. they were more interested in the utility of indigenous peoples as military partners against both the french and the americans. however, the policy shifted after the war of 1812 when declining hostilities led to a british focus on rapid settlement of what is now canada. a shift in thinking occurred whereby indigenous peoples were no longer considered allies but impediments. “in the words of a former secretary of state for the colonies, ‘reclaiming the indians from a state of barbarism and introducing amongst them the industrious and peaceful habits of civilized life’ became the order of the day" (cited in wilson, 1986, p. 66). this policy shift ushered in a dark time in canadian history when the industrial boarding school system was launched. the system was designed to enhance the integration of indigenous peoples into british north american society. in the same period, efforts were made to settle indigenous populations on reserve land closer to white settlements. the objectives were to get indigenous peoples who were nomadic to quit moving and to make indigenous peoples who already had fixed communities to adopt western lifestyles. the reserves, however, proved to be a failure after many of the first experiments were unable to retain a sizable indigenous population (miller, 1996) from the 1840s to canadian confederation in 1867 the emphasis was on building “manual labour schools” that promoted christianity, espoused general assimilation, and taught indigenous peoples practical skills that fit the british view of development. by the 1860s, reports concluded that these too were very unsuccessful (miller, 1996). from confederation onward, the constitution of canada ceded control of indigenous affairs to the federal government. in the fifty years from 1871 to 1921, the crown entered into treaties with many indigenous peoples, known as canada’s first nations. these treaties were designed by the state to facilitate settlement, resource development, and agricultural development in ontario, the prairie provinces in the west (manitoba, saskatchewan, and alberta) and the territories of the northern regions. the arrangements and the treaties that came before1 laid a framework for crown relations with indigenous peoples. in these treaties, the crown promised education; however, it is not clear that what the crown meant by this was understood in the same way by the many indigenous peoples who signed the agreement (white, maxim, & beavon, 2003). the first education efforts were day schools, but soon the government began to look south to the united states for a model of forced residential schooling. the davin report of 1879 recommended that residential institutions be established in western canada (haig-brown, 1988). the acceptance of this proposal marked a massive growth in the residential schools that were run by various churches. white and peters (2009) noted, “the indian act was amended in 1894 to make school attendance at a day, boarding, or industrial school compulsory for ten months of the year for all indigenous children over age six” (p. 17). through residential schools, the state aimed to “take the indian out of the child.” the consequence included a long-term negative impact on educational attainment that is still witnessed today. by 1910, reports made it clear that the schools were taking a significant toll on students' health. in many areas, 25% of the student populations were suffering from tuberculosis, and even the deputy superintendent of indian affairs indicated that less than half the students lived long enough to benefit from their education (white & peters, 2009). miller (1996) argued that, at this point in time, the canadian government shifted its policy from education aimed at assimilating the indigenous peoples to one of preparing them to live on their own reserves; in other words, segregation. an examination of the policy and actions from 1910 up to world war ii illustrates several key problems. first, the curriculum was always much less advanced than that of provincial schools2. students received less than one half day in the classroom and the rest was spent in manual labour. teachers often had minimal training and the churches used clergy as principals in the schools (chalmers, 1972). these circumstances led to a situation whereby “few students progressed past the primary grades regardless of how many years were spent in school” (white & peters, 2009, p. 18). this was far worse than the conditions for the settler population (barman, hébert, & mccaskill, 1986, p. 18). secondly, white and peters (2009) noted that: . . . for many first nations students residential schools were places of emotional, physical, and sexual abuse. children were taken, often forcefully, from their homes, had their hair cut, were clothed in european style of dress, and were placed in unsanitary living conditions. students were taught to be ashamed of their culture and to see themselves and their people as inferior and immoral, often facing punishment if they spoke their native language (miller, 1996). physical abuse was also commonplace in residential schools. (p. 19) this history is being investigated by the truth and reconciliation commission of canada.3 these conditions were not isolated events. chrisjohn and belleau (1991) estimated that in some schools 48%                                                                                                                 1 from the 17th century, protocols and treaties were signed in different areas. the most expansive period for treaty making was 1871 to 1921 when the so-called “numbered treaties” were consummated. these were the treaties that enshrined promises of state supported education. 2 in canada, the constitution gives the provinces jurisdiction over education except for registered indians or first nations and inuit living on reserve. 3 for more information on the commission please see http://www.trc.ca/websites/trcinstitution/index.php?p=3 to 70% of residential school students were sexually abused (see also milloy, 1999). many researchers have documented similar conditions (see haig-brown, 1988; knockwood, 1992; miller, 1996). the 1940s and 1950s marked another re-evaluation of government education policy. the whole system was severely under-resourced given the depression of the 1930s and wwii. many indigenous veterans returning from europe were not prepared to accept the poor treatment given to their peoples (miller, 2000). a major government committee study concluded that residential schools were not succeeding and should be shut down and that the students should be integrated into the provincial systems (bear nicholas, 2001). in less than 10 years, 25% of aboriginal students were attending provincial institutions (barman et al., 1986). however, the shift from residential schools was academically unsuccessful. in 1967, the federal government reported that dropout rates from high school were approaching 94%. the dropout rate for non-indigenous was less than 15% (canada indian affairs branch, 1967). despite the “decision” to move away from residential schools, the system was far from shutdown even by the mid-1960s. however, public attitudes were shifting. there were liberation movements in the developing world, civil rights movements in the united states, and major government investigations that all contributed to a change in terms of public acceptance for discrimination (miller, 1996). two reports published in 1967, caldwell’s (1967) indian residential schools and hawthorn’s (1967) a survey of the contemporary indians of canada were critical of the residential school system. according to milloy (1999), the state opted to endorse the reports. most schools shut their doors in the following decade. between 1967 and the 1990s, there was a period of public debate. indigenous national organizations, like the national indian brotherhood, issued sharp rebukes to government proposals and called for indian control of indian education. this position was “inspired partly by events such as the 1970 blue quills residential school sit-in, in which the community successfully resisted the school’s closure, demanding it remain open under community control” (white & peters, 2009, p. 23). the government had already steered away from residential schooling. with no clear policy direction to fall back on, the government accepted the indian brotherhood position of indian control. however, this acceptance did not mean a major shift in how things were done. as white and peters (2009) reported: after accepting indian control of indian education as the national policy statement on aboriginal education, the government began to devolve some administrative control of schools to first nations communities. in most cases, the devolution of responsibility to first nations communities resulted in very little actual control over the content and delivery of education. (p. 23) in different provinces change was developing, albeit slowly. in 1988, the assembly of first nations (afn, 1988) released tradition and education: towards a vision of the future, which reiterated the concepts of indigenous control, arguing that the government should devolve control to the indigenous communities. the afn argued that in practice the communities (first nations) should acquire controls similar to those of the provinces as set out by the canadian constitution. this was a call for aboriginal peoples’ inherent right to self-government to be the basis for control over education (abele, dittubrner & graham, 2000). as white and peters (2009) reported, “it was argued that a constitutional amendment was needed to formally recognize and affirm this inherent right, or, at the very least, federal legislation that would ensure future dealings between first nations and the federal government were on a government-to-government basis” (p. 24). there was a demand for proper funding “to create a new administrative structure, establish national and regional educational institutions, formulate long-term education plans, [and] research first nations learning styles and to develop new curriculum” (white & peters, 2009, p. 24). since 1988, the landscape of change has become complex. new treaties have brought change in some provinces (e.g., the nishga treaty in british columbia). more progressive provincial regimes have developed or are developing new curricula. at the same time, major finances for indigenous educational systems have languished (afn, 2010). the royal commission on aboriginal peoples (rcap, 1996) was a momentous undertaking in the mid-1990s. the rcap had extensive involvement of indigenous peoples themselves in research and leadership positions. the rcap recommended that federal, provincial, and territorial levels of government recognize education as a core to self-government and necessary to build indigenous capacity to run their own affairs. many of the groundbreaking policy suggestions from the rcap have not yet been implemented. the positive changes have led some people to hold hope that educational attainment would improve. that optimism is examined in this article. our data analysis begins where this “history” leaves off, that is after rcap in 1996. in the beginning of this introduction, it was stated that there are many things that are correlated with educational attainment. the history described above has taken a terrible toll and has created conditions where educational attainment has been stifled. that said, it has not destroyed the indigenous peoples in canada nor has it destroyed their drive for improving the educational process in the country. indigenous languages, cultures, and knowledge(s) have not been obliterated although damage has been done. the call for control of indigenous education by indigenous peoples has actually grown (afn, 1988, 2010; castellano, 2000; national indian brotherhood, 1972; rcap, 1996). in the current article, the data on attainment between 1996 and the present are examined. in the concluding sections, the current policy debate on indigenous education will be discussed. m e t h o d s data used in this article come from the 1996, 2001, and 2006 censuses and the 2011 national household survey (nhs) of canada. publicly available data sets were downloaded that included variables relating to non-aboriginal and aboriginal populations, registered indian or treaty status, on or off reserve status, and aboriginal identity (first nations, inuit, métis), as well as educational attainment, geographic location, and age group. highest educational attainment is defined as a person's “most advanced certificate, diploma, or degree” comprised of (a) less than high school, (b) high school, and (c) post-secondary education (pse). pse is further broken down into the following categories: apprenticeship or trades, college or other nonuniversity (herein referred to as college), university below the bachelor level, and university at or above bachelor level (see statistics canada, 2011b). in each data set, there were additional categories that complicate the presumed general hierarchy (high school graduation, trades, college, and university). in order to avoid over-estimating high school or pse attainment, we combined certain categories. in the 1996 census data set, categories of "some apprenticeship," "some college," and "some university" were collapsed into the high school educational attainment category because no diploma, certificate, or degree was obtained at the pse level. similarly, the "some high school" category was grouped with the "less than high school" category. the 2001 to 2006 censuses and 2011 nhs had an option to examine whether a high school diploma was attained in addition to the highest education achieved. those who had pse yet no high school diploma are considered to have less than high school education.4 in the labour market, potential employees typically have to show their resumes or fill in documentation about their educational achievements; employers will presumably consider those without high school completion to have a relatively lower educational attainment compared to high school graduates. l i m i t a t i o n s o f n h s the indigenous population in canada is a very diverse group and aggregate figures can obscure very different attributes. we have attempted to capture some of this diversity by reporting for the on and off reserve populations and by identity group: métis, first nations (status and non-status), and inuit. given the voluntary nature of the nhs, there are inherently more potential groups and geographical areas that may be under enumerated. therefore, the finer the analysis we do using the nhs data, the more likely there will be “under enumeration impacts” on the findings. the most reliable situation is to have a stable methodology over time that has similar response patterns (like the mandatory long form census). statistics canada (2011a) reported that approximately 75.3% of the census subdivisions in canada were included in the releases. this is lower than the previous census in 2006. the non-response bias is likely to impact indigenous estimates generally and in rural centers particularly. saskatchewan was the most under-reported province and has a high proportion of indigenous peoples. in the 2011 nhs, there were a total of 36 indian reserves and indian settlements that were incompletely enumerated. according to statistics canada (2011b), estimates associated with the on/off reserve variable are more affected than other variables because of the incomplete enumeration of these indian reserves and settlements. r e s u l t s the sheer number of post-secondary indigenous graduates has increased tremendously over the past 15 years. from 1996 to 2011, there was a total increase of 183,170 indigenous peoples between the ages 25 to 64 years who attained pse.5 the change for each type of pse by census year during this time period is documented in table 1. between 2006 and 2011, there were 21,120 new college graduates and 23,085 new university graduates (at or above bachelor level). for the most part, steady increases have been made at these educational levels over time. conversely, apprenticeship or trades numbers are in decline.                                                                                                                 4 this is an example of how researchers have to be careful to investigate the specificities of indigenous communities. aboriginal affairs canada (aandc) was in the habit of requiring indigenous persons who were participating in certain transfer programs to enroll in upgrading seminars or short certificate programs. people taking these certificates would often report their engagement as pse, thereby inflating the pse numbers. 5 we utilized the 25to 64-year-old population for two reasons: (a) the 15 and over age population inflates the number of people without high school completion, and (b) the 65 and over age groups are much more likely not to be employed compared to 25 to 64 year olds. the drop in the 2006 to 2011 period reverses gains made in the 2001 to 2006 period. possibly, this decline could indicate that indigenous post-secondary students are choosing other paths at colleges and universities instead of participating in apprenticeship or trades. it is also possible that fewer apprenticeship opportunities were available for interested students following the 2008 recession. t a b l e 1 . i n d i g e n o u s po p u l a t i o n ps e a t t a i n m e n t , 2 5 t o 6 4 y e a rs , 1 9 9 6 t o 2 0 1 1 , a b s o l u t e n u m b e rs 1 9 9 6 2 0 0 1 2 0 0 6 2 0 1 1 c h a n g e 1 9 9 6 –2 0 1 1 apprenticeship or trades 16,000 69,260 80,060 67,045 51,045 college or other non-university 66,935 66,795 103,905 125,025 58,090 university below bachelor level n/a 8,125 20,050 23,605 15,480a university at bachelor or above 15,660 26,340 43,010 66,095 50,435 total post-secondary education 98,595 170,520 247,025 281,765 183,170 total indigenous population 346,485 443,600 555,420 671,380 324,895 note. sources: statistics canada (1996, 2001a, 2006b, 2011a) a the increase for this pse type is for the 2001–2011 time period because data are not available for 1996. the increased pse attainment among the indigenous population is a success. a real roadblock to a greater number of pse graduates is low educational attainment. table 2 shows the rising numbers over time of indigenous peoples with no high school diploma or equivalent; the number increased by 80,165 in the 1996 to 2011 period. the number of high school graduates with no pse completion also rose; however, this group is considerably smaller than its less educated counterpart. the indigenous population in canada is relatively young (statistics canada, 2011a), which means the numbers of those who are not high school or post-secondary graduates will likely rise if trends remain unchanged. a concern, then, is high school completion. mendelson (2006) reported, "the failure to complete high school explains 88% of the variation in pse" (p. 31).6 increasing the number of high school graduates increases the number of pse graduates (mendelson, 2006). accordingly, high school completion is an important key to moving forward with regard to improving indigenous pse attainment.                                                                                                                 6 the variables less than high school and pse completion have a strong negative correlation (r 2 = 0.8782) (mendelson, 2006). t a b l e 2 . i n d i g e n o u s po p u l a t i o n h i g h s c h o o l w i t h n o ps e a n d h i g h s c h o o l n o n c o m p l e t i o n , 2 5 t o 6 4 y e a rs , 1 9 9 6 t o 2 0 1 1 a b s o l u t e n u m b e rs , 2 0 1 6 t o 2 0 2 1 e s t i m a t e d n u m b e rs¹ 1 9 9 6 2 0 0 1 2 0 0 6 2 0 1 1 c h a n g e 1 9 9 6 – 2 0 1 1 pro j e c t e d 2 0 1 6 a pro j e c t e d 2 0 2 1 a less than high school 156,605 171,710 189,395 236,770 80,165 253,165 278,983 high school 91,275 101,355 118,960 152,840 61,565 166,683 186,913 note. sources: statistics canada (1996, 2001a, 2006b, 2011a). in order to make the projections for 2016 and 2021, we assume that fertility and mortality rates for the indigenous population remain at current levels and there are no major shifts in general economic or social conditions. a less than high school trend line: slope a = 25,818, x intercept = 124,075, r2 = 0.9182 high school only trend line: slope a = 20,230, x intercept = 65,533, r2 = 0.9336 in canada's labour market, pse attainment is critical for gainful employment. unemployment rates7 drop with each increasing level of higher education. among the indigenous population, the unemployment rate was a high 23.3% for those who did not complete high school; it fell to 11.4% for those with high school only, and then to 9.3% for those with pse (statistics canada, 2011b). we estimate that 278,983 indigenous peoples (25-64 years) will not have a high school education in 2021. given the economic outcomes associated with higher education, this number is very high. we agree with mendelson (2006) but also note that there are important considerations in terms of improving high school graduation rates. as noted earlier in this article, some are resources, curriculum, social capital and normative issues, some relate to the policy and practice bred by colonialism, and still others relate to the lack of economic opportunity seen by indigenous youth that dissuade them from seeking credentials. the indigenous population is a heterogeneous group. it is not surprising then, that some groups fare better than others. differences within the indigenous population of canada are discussed next. g e o g ra p h i c l o c a t i o n as noted earlier, the federal government in canada has jurisdiction over indigenous education. yet, attainment is disproportionate across provinces and territories, as seen in figure 1. geographic locations are rank ordered according to the proportion of pse attainment. the top seven provinces (nova scotia [ns], newfoundland [nl], ontario [on], quebec [que], new brunswick [nb], prince edward island [pei], and british columbia [bc]) have a higher proportion of pse than “less than high school” level of education. for example, among the indigenous population in nova scotia, 53% possess a pse and 26% have not completed high school. reading down the provinces on the vertical axis of figure 1, this finding stops at yukon where the proportion of non-high school completion and pse attainment is                                                                                                                 7 the unemployment rate is the number of unemployed individuals aged 15 and over as a percentage of the labour force. equivalent at 40%. the pattern for the remaining provinces and territories is a higher proportion of “less than high school” education than pse. this makes a useful benchmark for judging where the problems are most acute and where we might find positive approaches that are working. 73 52 43 39 37 40 32 35 31 37 28 33 26 12 17 23 24 23 20 25 21 24 17 25 17 22 15 31 34 37 40 40 43 43 45 46 48 50 53 0% 20% 40% 60% 80% 100% nunavut nwt mb sk ab yukon bc pei nb que on nl ns <hs hs pse f i g u re 1 . i n d i g e n o u s p o p u l a t i o n h i g h e s t e d u c a t i o n a l a t t a i n m e n t b y p ro v i n c e o r t e rri t o ry , 2 5 – 6 4 y e a rs , 2 0 1 1 , p e rc e n t a g e s note. source: statistics canada (2011a). nova scotia (ns), newfoundland and labrador (nl), ontario (on), quebec (que), new brunswick (nb), prince edward island (pei), british columbia (bc), yukon, alberta (ab), saskatchewan (sk), manitoba (mb), northwest territories (nwt), nunavut. the most alarming difference is nunavut where 73% of the indigenous population has less than a high school education and 15% has a pse. a notable demographic trend in canada is that the northwest territories and the prairie provinces typically have the highest proportions of indigenous peoples in their populations whereas, in terms of absolute numbers, ontario has the largest indigenous population (statistics canada, 2006a). however, the indigenous populations of the territories and prairies have lower educational attainment. in fact, they have the lowest provincial rates of high school completion with higher proportions of non-high school completion than pse attainment. british columbia stands out as a more successful western province; two-thirds of its indigenous population have at least a high school education. this province has 130 first nations community schools, is engaged in defining new treaties and has well integrated the public and indigenous run schools (first nations schools association, 2014). at the other end of canada, we see better educational attainment. another more successful area of the country is nova scotia where the self-governing educational authorities of mi’kmaw communities of the province reported high school completion rates of 88% in the 2012 to 2013 school year (mi’kmawkina’matnewey, 2014). this number is well above the national average for indigenous students and is comparable to the average for the general population of canada. in canada, recent job creation has been higher in alberta and saskatchewan (burleton, gulati, mcdonald, & scarfone, 2013). however, these provinces rank relatively poorly with regard to indigenous educational attainment. if pse attainment is presumed to make individuals labour market ready, there is a geographical mismatch between a lesser trained indigenous population and a very hot job market. possibly, economic development projects are not localized in indigenous communities. i d e n t i t y g ro u p , s t a t u s , o n o r o f f r e s e rv e differences within the indigenous population of canada also emerge by the identity group to which one belongs and whether one lives “on reserve” (in a first nations designated community). highest educational attainment over time for first nations (north american indian), inuit, métis, status indian and non-status indian, and peoples living on or off reserve8 is shown in table 3. one may expect that over the past 15 years, the percentages of high school non-completions would decline and postsecondary attainment would increase. this is not the case for all identity and geographic groups. this trend was observed for métis, off reserve, non-status, and first nations peoples9. these particular indigenous groups have continuously had higher pse attainment compared to indigenous peoples living on reserve, status indians, or inuit peoples; this difference is clear in figure 2. in 1996, all seven of these groups had roughly the same proportion of pse attainment (range 24-31%). fifteen years later, métis and off reserve peoples more than doubled their respective post-secondary proportions. for example, métis pse attainment numbers changed from 30,435 to 117,015 — a growth of 285%. contributing to this growth is the great rise in high school completions. as stated earlier, an increase in high school completions will increase the number of pse graduates. this point in time appears to be a turning point for first nations peoples. although this population follows the higher education trend previously noted, in 2011, the proportions of those without a high school education and those with a pse are about the same (40% and 38%, respectively). likely in the next census period, the first nations population will have more pse graduates than individuals without a high school education.                                                                                                                 8 canada has a rather unique system that is the result of colonialism. first nations (in some documents called indians) are indigenous nations historically constituted prior to colonial first contact. they have, over the last 4 centuries, engaged in forced and voluntary agreements that have limited their traditional territories and created “reserves,” which are defined through legislation and signed treaties. status indians are those who are registered and have status under the indian act and these peoples have reserved land. some status indians live in their reserve communities and some do not (approximately 50%; see white et al., 2003). those who live on reserve are for all intents and purposes status indians. there are also a large population of non-status indians who have lost their recognition for various reasons and live in urban and smaller towns. these peoples very often identify in surveys as “first nation” so any data using “first nation” includes both status and non-status first nations persons. there are also mixed ancestry persons who identify as a separate indigenous group known as métis. these peoples live in more urban centres, and, finally, there are the inuit who live in large part in canada’s north. 9 as noted, first nations persons can be either status or non-status. given that non-status indians have higher educational attainment the mean levels of the first nation category are inflated. t a b l e 3 . h i g h e s t e d u c a t i o n a l a t t a i n m e n t b y i n d i g e n o u s g ro u p , 2 5 t o 6 4 y e a rs , 1 9 9 6 t o 2 0 1 1 , pe rc e n t a g e s note. sources: statistics canada (1996, 2001ab, 2006bc, 2011a) 1996 2001 2006 2011 on reserve less than high school 54 48 50 55 high school 22 19 15 18 post-secondary education 24 32 35 27 off reserve less than high school 42 35 29 30 high school 28 24 23 24 post-secondary education 30 41 47 46 status less than high school 47 42 40 43 high school 26 22 19 21 post-secondary education 27 36 41 36 non-status less than high school 42 35 28 29 high school 27 23 24 24 post-secondary education 31 42 48 47 first nations less than high school 46 41 38 40 high school 26 23 20 22 post-secondary education 27 37 42 38 inuit less than high school 53 48 51 59 high school 20 20 13 16 post-secondary education 27 32 36 25 métis less than high school 41 34 26 26 high school 27 24 24 24 post-secondary education 31 43 50 49 0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 1996 2001 2006 2011 métis non-status off reserve first nations status on reserve inuit f i g u re 2 . ps e a t t a i n m e n t b y i n d i g e n o u s g ro u p , 2 5 – 6 4 y e a rs , 1 9 9 6 – 2 0 1 1 , p e rc e n t a g e s note. sources: statistics canada (1996, 2001ab, 2006bc, 2011a) attainment of higher levels of education over time is not evident among inuit or those living on reserve. for on reserve indigenous, educational attainment levels remained stable. consistently, a greater proportion of this group has not completed high school than attained a pse. inuit educational attainment appears to be worsening; high school non-completions have risen about 11 percentage points over the past 10 years10. among status peoples, non-high school completion is higher compared to post-secondary completion. i n d i g e n o u s a n d n o n i n d i g e n o u s po p u l a t i o n s we see no reason why indigenous peoples in canada could not achieve the same levels of education as non-indigenous peoples if conditions were right. figure 3 compares highest educational attainment between these populations over time. similar trends are apparent for both populations: the proportion of those with less than high school education declined, which corresponds with a rise of those with a pse; high school-only attainment has been relatively stable at about 23% from 2001 to 2011. although both populations made gains in higher education, little change occurred to the gaps between them with regard to pse attainment and high school incompletion. between 1996 and 2011, indigenous peoples had a higher percentage—about 19 percentage points—of those with less than high school education compared to non-indigenous peoples. during the same time, the non-indigenous population had a higher percentage of those with a pse—ranging from 16 percentage points in 1996 to 20 percentage points in 2011—compared to the indigenous population. the disparity between these populations is not narrowing. indigenous pse attainment was 65% of the non-indigenous pse attainment in 1996, 70% in 2001, 72% in 2006, and 68% in 2011. at best, the gap has remained at the                                                                                                                 10 we caution readers that the 2011 nhs data were collected somewhat differently than previous censuses; therefore it will be important to see the next collection periods for comparison (2016 and 2021).   same level. at worst, it is beginning to increase. clearly, improving high school completion for indigenous peoples is critical if we are to narrow the pse gap between these groups. 26% 22% 15% 15% 31% 24% 24% 23% 43% 54% 61% 62% 45% 39% 34% 35% 26% 23% 21% 23% 28% 38% 44% 42% 1996 2001 2006 2011 <hs hs pse f i g u re 3 . i n d i g e n o u s a n d n o n i n d i g e n o u s h i g h e s t e d u c a t i o n a l a t t a i n m e n t , 2 5 – 6 4 y e a rs , 1 9 9 6 – 2 0 1 1 , p e rc e n t a g e s note. sources: statistics canada (1996, 2001a, 2006b, 2011a)   in figures 4 through 6, we compare various types of pse attainment for our populations. there is no gap in trades and apprenticeship attainment between indigenous and non-indigenous populations (figure 4). figure 5 shows that college attainment remained about constant over time for both groups; there is a slight difference between them (a stable 2 percentage points). in figure 6, there is a continuous and growing difference between the two trend lines for university attainment. the number of indigenous degree holders is increasing both absolutely and proportionally, but the increase in non-indigenous university completion is even greater. this gap is slowly widening; from 12 percentage points in 1996 to 16 percentage points in 2011. considering the trends we see in these different types of pse, we can say with certainty that university attainment carries the greatest weight in the pse gap between the two populations. d i s c u s s i o n one objective guiding this article was to determine whether adequate progress has taken place with regard to indigenous peoples' educational attainment in canada. the answer to this question is of national and international importance. the short answer is that while improvements have been achieved, it should have been better. below, this answer is elaborated upon. afterward, we discuss policy attempts since 1996, including the 2014 proposed reforms, and make progressive policy recommendations. non-­‐indigenous  population  indigenous  population   4% 13% 12% 10% 5% 16% 14% 10% 0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30% 1996 2001 2006 2011 non-indigenous indigenous   f i g u re 4 . i n d i g e n o u s a n d n o n i n d i g e n o u s a p p re n t i c e s h i p o r t ra d e s a t t a i n m e n t , 2 5 – 6 4 y e a rs , 1 9 9 6 – 2 0 1 1 , p e rc e n t a g e s note. sources: statistics canada (1996, 2001a, 2006b, 2011a)       21% 18% 20% 21% 19% 15% 19% 19% 0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30% 1996 2001 2006 2011 non-indigenous indigenous   f i g u re 5 . i n d i g e n o u s a n d n o n i n d i g e n o u s c o l l e g e a t t a i n m e n t , 2 5 – 6 4 y e a rs , 1 9 9 6 – 2 0 1 1 , p e rc e n t a g e s note. sources: statistics canada (1996, 2001a, 2006b, 2011a)     17% 20% 23% 26% 5% 6% 8% 10% 0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30% 1996 2001 2006 2011 non-indigenous indigenous   f i g u re 6 . i n d i g e n o u s a n d n o n i n d i g e n o u s u n i v e rs i t y a t t a i n m e n t , 2 5 – 6 4 y e a rs , 1 9 9 6 – 2 0 1 1 note. sources: statistics canada (1996, 2001a, 2006b, 2011a) undoubtedly, strides have been made in indigenous peoples' educational attainment in canada. among indigenous peoples, the current working age group is more educated compared to this age group in earlier censuses: post-secondary attainment increased 186 percentage points between 1996 and 2011. the cumulative increase of pse graduates reveals a source of labour that can make meaningful contributions to the canadian economy and indigenous communities. another sign of moving forward is the trend observed for métis, off reserve, non-status, and first nations peoples. over the past 15 years, high school non-completion declined and pse attainment rose for these groups. also, indigenous success is real in apprenticeships, trades, and colleges—indigenous and non-indigenous populations have about the same proportions of graduates for these pse paths. these gains connect to resources and economic development. job creation is typically higher in urban areas than rural areas (burleton et al. 2013). perhaps métis and off reserve peoples, who tend to live in cities, see the real value and payoff of high school completion and pse through proximity to such economic activity. time away from family and community are important factors among indigenous peoples when determining whether to attend post-secondary institution (restoule et al., 2013) and deciding between employment options (mckenzie et al., 2013). urban centres are home to community colleges and many jobs that require pse. disruptions to familial relationships and responsibilities are minimal if urban indigenous students attend local post-secondary institutions while living at home. notably, apprenticeship, trades, and college programs require fewer resources, both financial and time, compared to university programs. in short, there may be real socio-cultural and economic explanations for the disparity we see between status and on-reserve indigenous persons, and the métis and nonstatus populations, the latter having more improved educational attainment and a declining gap with the non-indigenous population. our conclusion that there has not been adequate improvement in attainment rests on the continuing problems faced by on reserve, status, and inuit peoples with regards to high school completion. as well, there is the problem of a growing gap in university pse attainment. this developing gap bodes poorly for engagement in the 21st century economy. the number of indigenous post-secondary graduates increased, but pse attainment among non-indigenous peoples is increasing much more quickly. in summary, we would point out that the difference in attainment between populations is not narrowing. the disparity is driven by (a) continuing lower attainment of high school among indigenous populations, (b) the increasing difference of university attainment, and (c) socio-cultural and economic disparities related to living on reserve, having indian status, and/or being inuit. po l i c y a t t e m p t s s i n c e 1 9 9 6 we have briefly tracked canadian policy from the 17th century to the 1996 and looked at the data from 1996 census to the 2011 nhs. in our discussion of the data, it was noted that, while there have been improvements in the gross numbers of indigenous persons who have completed high school and in the numbers attending and completing pse, there are serious on-going problems. first, the high school noncompletion rates are far too high. second, there is an increasing gap between non-indigenous canadians and indigenous people in canada. also noted above are intra-indigenous differences whereby first nations holding status and the inuit are not doing as well as non-status and métis peoples. the history of forced assimilation, including residential schooling, abuse in some institutions, suppression of language and culture, and the other violations that were pointed out earlier in this article, have surely contributed to the problems reviewed in educational attainment, implying that there are past policy failures and current policy shortcomings. from 1996 to the present there have been quite a few partial and failed attempts to address policy deficits. the most promising was the education action plan (diand, 2005). the canadian federal government, through aandc (then called department of indian affairs and northern development), partnered with the assembly of first nations to build an action plan that would tackle who does what in indigenous education, funding problems, and accountability.11 the policy was to be delivered in 2007. as peters (2013) noted: the steering committee held regional dialogues with various first nations and education organizations in 2006. however, the projected completion dates for both the policy framework and management framework passed with no documents produced and the afn reported that inac halted the collaborative process in 2007 and had proceeded alone [personal communication, 2008]. (p. 39) while several initiatives were unveiled in the next few years,12 there was a continuing and growing critique of the state’s approach. peters (2013) argued:                                                                                                                 11 this was in response, in part, to a critique by the auditor general of canada regarding the poor educational attainment resulting from public investments (inac, 2005). 12 the education partnerships program (epp) and the first nation student success program (fnssp) are examples. considering the trajectory of federal first nations education policy, this initiative was very much in line with the government’s position since 1993 which has been to formally accept and support indian control of indian education in theory, but to interpret ‘control’ as primarily administrative. (p. 40) so the programs did not receive support. fast forward to 2013: the same debate has now become a public issue. the newly launched “proposal for a bill on first nation education” (see aandc, 2013) has come under intense criticism. the crux of the difference between first nations and aandc is the demand that any change reflect the first nations people’s proposals. atleo (2013) suggested, “these include the central principle of first nation control and the absolute need for a funding guarantee for first nation children to learn in a safe, secure environment nurtured within their languages and cultures” (p. 1). the first nations have indicated, “the current federal proposal for a bill for first nation education is not acceptable to first nations. we must work together on a mutual plan that fully respects and reflects partnership, [and] that is consistent with treaty relationships . . .” (atleo, 2013, p. 1). they call for substantial consultation and the core demands included per capita funding equal to the provinces13 and real control over the content and delivery of education. this group has argued that the scope of consultations is simply unacceptable and there should be a true partnership, and that the proposal is not reflective of partners working together to find solution but is being unilaterally developed from the top down. further, they say that there is no funding proposal included and the legislation could undermine the existing arrangements whereby some first nations have developed self-governing control over education.14 the government argues that, from their perspective, some consultation was done, noting that the first nations saw the draft proposal and that it is still under discussion (valcourt, 2013). in addition, aboriginal affairs minister valcourt indicated that there would be funding with the new legislation, it simply had not been determined how much at this point (valcourt, 2013). the material from both sides and the 2013 act itself indicates that the draft had several difficult sticking points. first, while the government said, “it should be noted that the new legislation would not apply to selfgoverning first nations that have adopted laws related to education” (aandc, 2013, p. 9), it is not clear whether new self-governing agreements could be formulated with features of the existing ones. the government also was not clear what funding is really forthcoming. lastly, the focus of the government seemed to be on accountability, standards, and quality of whatever might be allowed under the new act. this raises the problem of real sovereignty for first nations over their education. the government also raised peoples’ worries when they stated, "the first nation could enter into an agreement with a provincial school board either to operate the first nation school on reserve, or students who live on reserve could attend off-reserve schools operated by the provincial school board”(aandc, 2013, p. 9). the wording led to suspicions that the requirements of the system would push aside real control over the curriculum and lead to a system that continues to undermine indigenous culture, language, and historical content. saying that control “could” be delegated is read as “would not                                                                                                                 13 it should be noted that “equal per capita funding” would in itself be inequitable given the decades of underfunding and the enormity of the problems to tackle (see drummond cited in galloway, 2013). 14 in several areas, such as new brunswick, indigenous control has shown real improvements in the graduation rates from high school (see valcourt, 2013). be delegated”. finally, first nations also saw the proposal as leading to a loss of control on quality, stating, “there must not be and cannot be unilateral federal oversight and authority vested in the canadian bureaucracy” (atleo, 2013, p. 3). generally, the proposals were vague and first nations were determined they would not let this historical opportunity pass without gaining substantial control over their educational system. t he first nations control of the first nations education act 2 0 1 4 in a surprise turn of events, february 2014 saw the joint announcement, from the afn and the canadian federal government, of a new approach and what appeared to be a new agreement. the new revision of first nations control of first nations education act (fncfnea) appeared to mark a real shift in policy. the prime minister, stephen harper, noted, “ [the act] will ensure first nations control of first nations education while establishing minimum education standards, consistent with provincial standards off-reserve” (prime minister, 2014, p.1). he also argued: the bill will also allow for the establishment of first nation education authorities. these authorities will act like school boards in the provincial education system to provide the key secondary support to help ensure that first nation schools are meeting their requirements under the act, and are providing a quality education for first nation students . . . the first nations control of first nations education act will also repeal the provisions in the indian act related to residential schools. this measure is of great symbolic importance and aligns with the purpose of this bill; namely, to turn the page on the dark chapter of the residential school system, and provide the framework for first nations to develop and implement a quality education system under the control of first nations. (prime minister, 2014, p. 1) finally, prime minister harper noted that the announcement has significant differences from the 2013 proposal that was so roundly opposed. he highlighted that the new agreement: [includes] adequate stable, predictable and sustainable funding. this funding will replace the complex structures now in place with three funding streams: a statutory funding stream that will have a reasonable rate of growth; transition funding to support the new legislative framework; and funding for long-term investments in on-reserve school infrastructure . . . [it enables]first nations to incorporate language and culture programming in the education curriculum, and providing funding for language and culture programming within the statutory funding stream. (prime minister, 2014, p. 1) the first response from the afn (2014) appeared to agree on several issues with the government. the afn noted that the agreement “[f]ully respects and confirms first nation jurisdiction, consistent with treaties and inherent rights and title. there is also an agreement to joint development of regulations and supportive structures.” the afn pointed out, “[n]ew funding will be invested and enshrined in statute for first nations education, along with a predictable annual escalator to ensure funding will keep pace with the costs of quality first nations education” (p. 1) and very importantly: stable and adequate funding for school operations and recognition of first nations control will ensure the centrality of culture and language in all first nations schools. this agreement also provides funding to support the development and implementation of first nations systems. this agreement commits to mutual accountability. recognizing the principal of first nations control and supports without federally imposed or unilateral oversight. (afn, 2014, p. 1) the changes appeared to answer the key issues that prevented an agreement between first nations and canadian government (afn, 2014, p. 1). the assembly of first nations reverses its support within days of the positive assessment of a majority of the afn leadership, criticism started from different groups, councils and individuals. candidates like pam palmater, defeated by atleo in the last afn election for national chief, spoke out vehemently against the fncfnea, stating, “[e]ither atleo [grand chief that negotiated the deal] and the regional chiefs have to . . . be accountable [or] . . . they deserve to be removed” (cited in roman, 2014, para. 3). there were responses to these types of criticism. the afn's new brunswick and p.e.i. regional chief, roger augustine, was quoted as saying: the other side, if there's another side, say we have to protect the rights of our children. but do we do that by walking away each and every time? i've seen it so often that people just say “no” and then maybe 10 or 15 years later they come back and say, “ok, let's discuss this again.” (roman, 2014, para. 10) national chief atleo resigned, citing the fact that the debate had shifted to his leadership and away from education, stating: i have fought for this work and to achieve this mandate. this work is too important and i am not prepared to be an obstacle to it or a lightning rod distracting from the kids and their potential. i am therefore, today resigning as national chief. (“shawn atleo resigns,” 2014, para. 6) several leaders from different first nations have made statements about the problems with the bill as it was written. grand chief michael delisle of the mohawk council of kahnawake noted: there are two main points of contention . . . the first one is the lack of formal consultation. even though minister valcourt has been cited saying on numerous occasions that there was extensive consultation, i know for a fact that they never spoke with us . . . the second one is the main point of contention in the bill is if you look through the bill, is that it gives more control to the minister today than the current provisions in the indian act. (gerson, 2014, paras. 21-23) our analysis of the act essentially coincides with the comments of the chiefs quoted above. the federal government negotiated with the executive of the afn and the process did not permit the assembly to build a consensus with the indigenous nations across canada. bill erasmus, national chief of the dene, pointed this out (“chiefs demand withdrawal,” 2014). secondly, the federal government insisted there be a jointly appointed oversight body (prime minister, 2014). while this body was to be jointly appointed between the afn and the federal minister, it still ran against the widely articulated demand for indigenous control. on may 27th, the chiefs of the afn voted to support the following statement: canada must withdraw bill c-33 and engage in an honourable process with first nations that recognizes and supports regional and local diversity leading to true first nation control of education based on our responsibilities and inherent aboriginal and treaty rights. (cited in “chiefs demand withdrawal”, 2014, para. 5) the government, for its part, has removed the bill from the legislative agenda stating: as we have said all along, this legislation will not proceed without the support of afn, and we have been clear that we will not invest new money in an education system that does not serve the best interests of first nations children; funding will only follow real education reforms. (“chiefs demand withdrawal, 2014, para. 21) po l i c y f o r m o v i n g e d u c a t i o n a l a t t a i n m e n t f o rw a rd aside from the debate over the 2013 proposals and the continuing disagreements over the recent 2014 redraft, there are several things that will need to change. for any policy to move forward to make real gains there will need to be several elements in place: (a) successful building of pse attainment requires emphasis on high school completion strategies. this outcome rests on improving the high school curriculum to reflect first nations peoples in a historically proper light. it means in the short run introducing more indigenization of the schools and ultimately will require schools built and operated in the territories of the first nations by indigenous led school authorities. (b) decades of underfunding means large investments are necessary. this is not a form of welfare, but rather an explicit recognition that over the colonial history there has been a deep problem created and, if we are going to make progress, it requires investments. these investments should not be seen as a cost to the non-indigenous population. it is truly an investment. it leads to improved health and social security for indigenous peoples through improvement of the social determinants of health and it creates the possibility for hundreds of thousands of indigenous peoples to engage in the economy. the collective wealth created by such engagement will far outweigh the investments. and lastly, it is simply unacceptable that a segment of the population living in canada faces the gaps in education, as well as gaps in health, labour force participation, and income, that exist today. (c) indigenous control of a properly funded system where voluntary agreements are developed with provincial education systems is a necessary component of any potential solution. (d) building on successes is critical. it was noted earlier that colleges are relatively successful in attracting and retaining indigenous students. it was also noted that current self-governing educational authorities in select areas of the country have vastly improved high school graduation. these models need to be systematically examined and learned from in a practical sense. (e) creating a generation of mentors and role models will be an important step forward. much of the research indicates that success leads to success. parental educational attainment is highly correlated with children’s success (see krein & beller, 1988). improving attainment in each generation will build greater successes in the next. maintaining the status quo is in many ways the worst of all alternatives. educational reform will require that a consensus be built. as former national chief atleo pointed out: this work is simply too important to walk away and abandon our students to the next round of discussions, to tell them they will have to wait . . . we owe it to ourselves, our children and our nations to make our best efforts to achieve our lifelong goal of first nations control of first nations education. (atleo, 2014, paras. 22-23).     r e f e re n c e s abele, f., dittubrner, c., & graham, k.a. 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(2011a). national household survey users guide (catalogue number 99-001x2011001). ottawa: author. statistics canada. (2011b). 2011 national household survey (catalogue number 99-012-x2011044). ottawa: author. statistics canada. (2011c). 2011 national household survey (catalogue number 99-012-x2011046). ottawa: author. valcourt, b. (2013). open letter to assembly of first nations. ottawa: aboriginal affairs and northern development. retrieved from http://www.aadncaandc.gc.ca/eng/1386958638702/1386958691700 white, j. p. & peters, j. (2009). a short history of aboriginal education in canada. in j. p. white, j. peters, d. beavon, & n. spence (eds.), aboriginal education: current crisis and future alternatives (pp. 13–33). toronto: thompson educational publishing. white, j. p., maxim, p., & beavon, d. (eds). (2003). aboriginal conditions: research as a foundation for public policy. vancouver: ubc press. wilson, d. j. (1986).‘no blanket to be worn in school’: the education of indians in nineteenth-century ontario. in j. barman, y. hébert, & d. mccaskill (eds.), indian education in canada. volume 1: the legacy (pp. 64–87). vancouver: university of british columbia press.   the international indigenous policy journal june 2014 indigenous educational attainment in canada catherine e. gordon jerry p. white recommended citation indigenous educational attainment in canada abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license indigenous educational attainment in canada inequities in diabetes outcomes among urban first nation and métis communities: can addressing diversities in preventive services make a difference? the international indigenous policy journal volume 5 | issue 1 article 2 january 2014 inequities in diabetes outcomes among urban first nation and métis communities: can addressing diversities in preventive services make a difference? hasu ghosh institute of population health, university of ottawa, hghos099@uottawa.ca denise spitzer institutes of women studies and population health, university of ottawa, dspitzer@uottawa.ca recommended citation ghosh, h. , spitzer, d. (2014). inequities in diabetes outcomes among urban first nation and métis communities: can addressing diversities in preventive services make a difference?. the international indigenous policy journal, 5(1). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.2 inequities in diabetes outcomes among urban first nation and métis communities: can addressing diversities in preventive services make a difference? abstract this article primarily aims to demonstrate how diversity is reflected among urban aboriginal peoples in canada. secondly, it uncovers if and how preventive health services in the province of ontario, canada are responsive to this diversity. data for this study were gathered from a review of literature on culturally appropriate health service delivery to aboriginal peoples in canada and a qualitative exploratory study conducted with urban first nation and métis people, and health service providers and policy makers. the findings from review of literature and the exploratory study indicated that the nature of aboriginal diversity and its trends are complex. from the document review, we can comprehend that socio-economic disparities among first nations and métis, compared to non-aboriginal people, are reducing slowly; however, evidence from the exploratory study suggested otherwise and indicated that there is also a strong need for first nation and métis families to overcome barriers in order to improve their quality of live in urban ontario, canada. it is evident that health services for urban first nation and métis people cannot address existing health inequities by simplistic application of pan-aboriginal strategies in preventive services. initiatives for urban first nation and métis people require strategies that are targeted at the unique and distinct needs of first nation and métis residents regardless of their legal status, cultural pluralities, socio-economic backgrounds, and place of residence in cities. keywords diversity, inequities, diabetes, urban first nation and métis people, pan-aboriginal approach, preventive health services acknowledgments the authors are immensely indebted to the métis and first nations, and health service providers and decision maker participants of this research for sharing their stories. the authors gratefully acknowledge the members of aboriginal community advisory circle (acac) for providing their guidance and mentorship throughout the tenure of this research project. first author’s doctoral research was funded by cihr-iaph funded akneahr (network environment in aboriginal health research) (former ottawa acadre) and ihrdp (indigenous health research development program) programs, phirn (population health improvement research network) doctoral award and university of ottawa admission and excellence scholarships. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/   i n e q u i t i e s i n d i a b e t e s o u t c o m e a m o n g u r b a n f i r s t n a t i o n a n d m é t i s c o m m u n i t i e s : c a n a d d r e s s i n g d i v e r s i t i e s i n p r e v e n t i v e s e r v i c e s m a k e a d i f f e r e n c e ? increasing numbers of indigenous peoples1 around the world are residing in urban areas. although a majority of the first people of a land are rural (national aboriginal health organization [naho], 2011), there is a trend towards increasing urban migration (united nations, 2008). for example, over half of the indigenous peoples in australia, new zealand, and the usa live in urban areas (new zealand, 2011; un-habitat, 2010). a similar movement of urban migration among aboriginal peoples2 is taking place in canada as well. in most prominent images, aboriginal peoples in canada are located in rural landscapes; however, the association of aboriginal peoples and communities solely with rural life belies the demographic changes that have taken place over the past 60 years. for instance, the 1951 census of canada showed that 6.7 percent of aboriginal peoples lived in urban canada (peters, 2002); however, by 2006, that proportion had increased to 54 percent (statistics canada, 2008). as aboriginal peoples in canada are increasingly becoming urban, they constitute a significant component of the urban landscape (environics institute, 2010). first nations people accounted for 50 percent of the urban aboriginal populations, while 43 percent were métis (statistics canada, 2008). currently, the percentage of aboriginal peoples living in urban areas is higher in the province of ontario (62%) than the national average (54%) (ontario ministry of aboriginal affairs, 2012). the majority of the health and social programs and services are available in cities; however, the programs homogenize the realities of aboriginal peoples and most often define them in terms of their social and economic needs (peters, 2002, 2006). current practices in serving the disparate needs of urban first nation and métis peoples often mask the diversity of their lived realities. urbanization, along with continued colonization and marginalization, has exposed first nation and métis peoples to a broad range of contextual factors over the last several decades that have been significant in making them vulnerable to adverse health events, diminishing their spirit and their capacities (peters, 2006; smylie, 2009; reading, kmetic, & giddion, 2007). understanding these contextual factors is a major, but much needed, undertaking for policymakers and health service providers, and using these understandings to guide policy-making and service delivery is a significant, yet worthy, health policy and service provision challenge. the overarching objective of this article is to highlight the need of addressing aboriginal diversities in preventive service provision and policy development. specifically, this article aims to explore ways to improve health services and policies that are viewed as culturally appropriate and responsive by urban first nation and métis peoples. we will engage this issue by illuminating the urgency of developing                                                                                                                 1 we use the term indigenous peoples to denote the collective identities of the first, or original, peoples of a territory whose land has commonly been occupied by settler societies. 2 indigenous peoples in canada are referred to as aboriginal peoples; this overarching category is further differentiated into first nations, inuit, and métis. first nations refer to the indigenous peoples of canada who were the first occupants of the land (wotherspoon & satzewich, 1993). first nations peoples registered under the indian act can be referred to as either registered or status indian (indian and northern affairs canada [inac], 2010), whereas first nation peoples not registered with the federal government are called non-status indians. métis refers to the mixed ancestry descendants of french fur traders or scottish or english traders and first nation women. inuit are aboriginal peoples of the canadian arctic (aboriginal affairs and northern development canada [aandc], 2010). participants in this study include only individuals who self-identified as first nations or métis.   1 ghosh and spitzer: inequalities in diabetes outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2014   services and policies that address the multiplicity of needs determined by the cultural, legal, and spatial diversities among aboriginal peoples in the urban landscape. furthermore, we assert that the policy process should place aboriginal peoples at the front and centre of policy-making and reject deficit-based approaches that have characterized past policy initiatives designed to address the challenges of urban aboriginal populations (institute on governance, n.d.). secondly, we review select findings from an eastern ontario-based exploratory and community-based study with urban first nation and métis peoples, and health and social policy professionals regarding their understandings of diabetes and its prevention. through participants’ narratives and a review of documents, we uncover the limitations of existing preventive health services in addressing diverse needs among urban aboriginal peoples and call for improved services where diversities among aboriginal communities are recognised. more specifically, findings of this study indicate that policies must also engage with and incorporate indigenous knowledge and understandings as a way to work through existing and future challenges of urban aboriginal lives. s e t t i n g t h e c o n t e x t d i v e r s i t y : l e g i s l a t e d a n d l i v e d the category of aboriginal in canada masks a wide array of nations, cultures, languages, life-ways, and histories. in addition to this myriad of variations, aboriginal peoples have had legal definitions imposed upon them by the federal government for the purposes of administering their responsibilities for “indians” as defined by the indian act (1985). although amended over the years, the indian act (1985) remains a central fact in the lives of aboriginal peoples as it creates distinct categories of “status” versus “non-status” among first nations and produces associated restrictions for other aboriginal groups such as métis and inuit (sawchuk, 2001). these differences in legal status among aboriginal peoples determine, amongst other entitlements, the nature and scope of health services offered to peoples of different origins. in 1982, changes to the constitution act of canada (1982) recognised first nations, métis, and inuit as three distinct aboriginal canadian groups. the present context shaping health provisions for aboriginal peoples in canada can be traced back to the implementation of british north america act (bna) (constitution act, 1867), which created ambiguity over first peoples' health that still exists because it assigned health services to provincial jurisdiction and indian affairs to federal jurisdiction. subsequent implementation of the indian act (constitution act, 1867), however, included health related provisions, but the lack of clarity in this provision failed to provide clear legislative authority to the federal government for first peoples' health provision (national collaborating centre for aboriginal health [nccah], 2011b, 2011c). presently, the first nation and inuit health branch (fnihb) of health canada oversees the federal government’s role in the provision of health services for status (registered) first nations on reserves and for inuit living in their traditional territories (health canada, 2008). fnihb also provides non-insured health benefits (nihb) such as prescription drugs, vision, and dental coverage to all status or registered indians and inuit, regardless of their place of residence in canada. however, métis and non-status indians, despite being considered as aboriginal peoples in canada, are not eligible to receive noninsured health benefits. although physician and hospital care is provided by provincial and territorial governments for all canadians (health canada, 2008; native women’s association of canada, 2007), as a result of historical legislative ambiguities and the multiplicity of authorities involved in health service 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.2   provisions, the aboriginal health policy framework seems limited in its capacity to address the needs of the métis or first nation peoples who are either not registered or not living on reserve or traditional territory (unicef canada, 2009). although there are many commonalities in cultural practices and belief systems amongst aboriginal canadians, there are also significant variations in lifestyles, traditions, languages, and cultures, and as such there is no singular culture or tradition that can represent aboriginal peoples as a homogeneous group. these variations are not only in particular geographic settings, but also reflected in their livelihoods, environments, and worldviews. in the past, aboriginal peoples resided in their traditional territories and were distinctive by knowledge, language, and culture (henderson, 2007). currently, aboriginal peoples are not confined to set spatial contexts, but are dispersed across canada in different urban regions, provinces, and territories. in ontario alone, there are 133 first nation communities, 127 of which are recognized under the indian act with two main language groupings: algonkian and iroquoian (ontario ministry of aboriginal affairs, 2012). besides first nations cultural differences, there are métis people, with two distinct cultural origins, and inuit people. notably, aboriginal peoples in urban canada form complex and heterogeneous communities and cultures that are a mix of different aboriginal sub-cultures and urban livelihoods. in addition to variations in legal definitions or cultural practices, aboriginal peoples are economically and educationally diverse as well; some have opportunities for achieving better education and secured income from employment or other resources, while others have none. geographic diversity also makes aboriginal lifestyles different. some indian reserves are located in the vicinity of the larger cities (for example, six nations on the outskirts of the city of toronto), while other communities are isolated and accessible only by air or water. moreover, there are significant diversities within each community (voyageur & caillou, 2000/ 2001). u r b a n a b o r i g i n a l l a n d s c a p e the growing trend of urbanization among the world’s indigenous populations has been associated with high rates of geographical mobility between rural and urban areas as compared to non-indigenous populations (newbold, 2004). in canada, increased urban migration among aboriginal peoples is often characterised by a hybrid residence pattern wherein people move back and forth between urban and rural areas on a regular basis, thereby maintaining strong ties with rural and/or reserve communities (lawrence, 2004; peters, 2004). notably, the high rates of mobility among aboriginal peoples in canada may affect the continuity in accessing health services and service providers may experience difficulty in maintaining adequate care (clatworthy & norris, 2007). international research indicates that in-country population mobility may impact health service delivery (long & memmott, 2007) and thereby create disparities in health care utilization rates between indigenous and non-indigenous populations (marrone, 2007). 3 ghosh and spitzer: inequalities in diabetes outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2014   moreover, ongoing jurisdictional3 conflict between federal and provincial governments over responsibility for urban aboriginal programming presents distinct challenges for both developing and sustaining health services, and advocating for peoples’ needs. as a result, there is significant variation in meeting the particular health service needs of urban aboriginal peoples even across a single province. given the complex nature of the health care system for aboriginal peoples, access to health services is fragmented (lavoie & gervais, 2011). as noted earlier, the federal government is responsible for providing limited primary health services for registered or status indians living on reserve and inuit living within the traditional territories but not to the first nations, métis, non-status indians, and inuit who are living in urban areas (bent & haworth-brockham, 2007). such complexity of health care for aboriginal peoples results in inequities in accessing health services within and across aboriginal communities. while status and non-status indians and métis living in urban areas have access to provincially funded mainstream health services, little or no attention is paid to their specific cultural or spatial needs (tait, 2009). jurisdictional issues arise frequently and in many forms for aboriginal peoples affected by or at risk of developing chronic diseases such as diabetes. diseases like diabetes, however, do not respect the legal boundaries that divide aboriginal peoples who are subsequently proffered disparate benefits. t y p e 2 d i a b e t e s type 2 diabetes mellitus (also known as adult-onset or non-insulin-dependent; hereafter, called “diabetes”) used to be most commonly diagnosed in persons over forty years of age; however, in recent decades rapid changes in life circumstances have resulted in alterations of proximal risk factors related to diabetes such as obesity, diet, stress, and physical activities (bowser, utz, glick, & harmon, 2010; pan et al., 2011). these factors appear to affect first nation and métis peoples differently from other canadians resulting in a higher incidence of this chronic condition among much younger people. aboriginal peoples in canada, more specifically in ontario, experience diabetes at 3 to 5 times the rate of the general population and face a higher risk of developing the disease and related complications (raphael, 2009). although rarely reported in aboriginal communities prior to the 1950s, current statistics show a higher prevalence of diabetes in this population compared to their non-aboriginal counterparts (public health agency of canada [phac], 2011). much of the dominant discourse attributed these changes in disease prevalence to personal health behaviours, most notably compromised diets and limited opportunities for physical activity. however, attention to social, economic, and political marginalization; the impact of systemic and structural racism; and the on-going legacy of colonization, including the trauma of the residential schools and its impact on survivors and their families, the witnessing of increased environmental degradation, and the loss of traditional life-ways and the resultant anomie, appear to offer                                                                                                                 3 the issue of jurisdiction with respect to aboriginal peoples in canada involves the royal proclamation (1763); the historical relationship between the crown and first nations, treaties and land claims agreements, the indian act (1982), the concept of fiduciary responsibility, judicial decisions, and the transition to self-government. in brief, parliament generally exercises the full weight of its constitutional powers over “indians” while taking a narrow view of its historically based responsibilities to all aboriginal peoples including those on reserve, off reserve, status, non-status, métis, and inuit.   4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.2   even greater explanatory power in our understanding of factors that precipitate or exacerbate type 2 diabetes than the more limited focus on individual behaviour (ghosh & gomes, 2011; lightman, mitchell, & wilson, 2008). research into the relationship between type 2 diabetes and stress enables us to link the context in which people live with disease outcomes both through the stimulation of neuroendocrine pathways (golden et al., 2008), as well as the additional burdens faced in the transition from rural to urban living conditions (wang & hoy, 2004; wilson, gilliland, moore, & acton, 2007). social determinants of health, therefore, are vitally important to the aetiology, exacerbation, and mitigation of type 2 diabetes. significant differential prevalence of type 2 diabetes within and between the aboriginal population groups living across canada has also been observed (macaulay et al., 2003; saksvig et al., 2005). under the rubric of aboriginal peoples, the first nations population living off reserve is most affected by diabetes, followed by the métis population (reading, n.d.). the combination of early onset of diabetes, increased urbanization of this population, and the inequitable progression of this disease process that is still preventable may pose extremely serious challenges to the canadian health system. while this situation is not that different from the case of other populations of low socioeconomic status living in urban areas, the main disparity is in the apparent lack of employment, education, health, and housing services needed to facilitate the transition from on reserve conditions to urban settings (peters, 2002). this difference has been worsened by limited cultural supports in larger cities and a general lack of investigation pertaining to the potential salutary effects of cultural factors on urban aboriginal peoples’ overall wellbeing (peters, 2002; wilson & rosenberg, 2002). in addition, health and social services and practices are informed by historical and political legacies and imbued with dominant euro-canadian values that work to reify social hierarchies and the othering of indigenous peoples in canada (spitzer, 2004). this is a plausible reason for aboriginal peoples’ poor utilization of health services and greater likelihood of being diagnosed at a later stage of the disease than non-aboriginal people (nccah, 2011a). thus, prevention of long-term complications of diabetes becomes more difficult or no longer possible. it is in this shifting context that aboriginal peoples living in urban ontario encounter potential risk factors for the development or exacerbation of diabetes. nevertheless, intersecting contextual factors such as historical legacies and compromised social determinants of health rarely inform health service and policy decisions related to diabetes management and prevention, which is reflected through the conversations we had with research participants that are presented in the findings section of this article. b e y o n d t h e s o c i a l d e t e r m i n a n t s o f h e a l t h this article draws on an exploratory study that is conceptually grounded in population health. the population health approach focuses on understanding the social determinants of health by considering the structures and systems within which people are born, grow, work, and live as opposed to comprehending their health separately from their social-cultural, political, and historical contexts (marmot, friel, bell, houwelling, & taylor, 2008). indeed, the social determinants of health approach has been described as research that moves thinking from “the cell to the social” and as a practice of investigating the “causes of causes” (marmot, 2007; raphael, 2009) by shifting the focus of health and well-being from a biomedical investigation of susceptibility to disease to an understanding of health as being socio-contextually determined (raphael, 2007; wilkinson & marmot, 2003). although the social determinants of health approach may be associated with an overall improvement in population health, it 5 ghosh and spitzer: inequalities in diabetes outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2014   often makes use of static conceptions of “subgroups” and concomitant “risk factors”. as a consequence, there may be gaps between understanding the social context of health and affecting meaningful changes in the health outcomes of those situated at intersecting axes of disadvantage (hankivsky, 2012; paterson, 2010). extending beyond the social determinant of health framework, intersectionality helps to unpack the multi-level interpenetrating social locations, forces, factors, and power structures that shape and influence human health and well-being (hankivsky, 2012; mcgibbon & mcpherson, 2011). an intersectional framework recognizes the plethora of structural and social factors that are simultaneous and mutually different and work at both micro and macro levels to affect health. since social determinants of health may be distributed unequally and affect interand intra-group population diversity differentially, the need to consider intersectionality as a conceptual framework is essential to better understand the complexities surrounding aboriginal diabetes in the urban context. with some exception, the majority of research deploying intersectionality continues to centre primarily on gender, race, and class (black & veenstra, 2011). our investigation of diabetes incorporated the relatively unexplored dimension of aboriginal diversities within and between first nation and métis populations that are created by systemic determinants that include, but are not limited to, poverty, unemployment, stress, food insecurity, education, and access to health services determined by cultural variations, aboriginal status, and jurisdictional squabbles related to place of residence. we considered these pluralities because we anticipated that peoples’ experiences of systemic determinants vary within and between first nation and métis peoples and their respective social locations. for example, the experiences and social interactions of a status indian diabetic person living with secured employment, higher education, and necessary material resources may significantly differ from a homeless non-status first nation diabetic person with little formal education and employment who relies on a drop-in centre or food bank on a regular basis. additionally, interpersonal experiences again may vary between status indian and métis peoples because of their differential access to government funded health services. we also noted that many studies have found that diversity within and between first nation and métis population results in differential exposure to the contextual stressors for chronic health conditions (peters, 2006; reading et al., 2007; smylie, 2009). in this article, we draw from peoples, providers and policy-makers’ narratives to determine how this particular dimension of inequality intersects with other dimensions in diabetes occurrence, its prevention and management, and attempt to ascertain if this set of inequalities is being addressed in health service delivery and policy development. m e t h o d s this study was grounded in the fundamental principles of community-based research (israel, schulz, parker, & becker, 1998). the research respected the ocap™ (ownership, control, access, and possession) principles that offer a first nations approach to research, data, and information management (naho, 2005), and ocas (ownership, control, access, and stewardship) (bartlett, sanguins, carter, hoeppner, & mehta, 2010) principles that include a métis approach to maximize privacy protection for métis citizens and canadian institutes of health research (cihr) guidelines for health research involving aboriginal peoples (cihr, 2007). the governance structure included the student researcher who was a doctoral candidate, the thesis supervisors, the thesis advisory committee, and an aboriginal community advisory circle (acac) comprised of members from aboriginal research organizations, a community elder, and health care providers. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.2   upon receiving approval from the university of ottawa’s research ethics board, multiple strategies were employed to recruit community participants that included: making presentations to aboriginal organizations and aboriginal studies programs; circulating recruitment flyers among aboriginal organizations, their networks, and mainstream health and social service organizations; and making radio broadcasts. the majority of the interviews with primary participants took place at partner aboriginal organizations, although some were conducted at the participants’ homes. professional participants were recruited purposefully by the researcher and were interviewed at their workplaces or locations preferable for them. primary data were collected in the form of narrative interviews with first nation and métis community members, health service providers (hsps), and policy-makers. at the beginning of each interview, the consent forms and demographic questionnaire were explained to each participant and any questions were addressed. thereafter, participants completed a demographic questionnaire. all interviews were recorded after receiving approval from the participant. while interviews were casual in tone, a semi-structured interview guide, developed in consultation with the acac and thesis advisory committee, informed by the literature, and designed to be relevant to respondents, was used (hunt, 1998; kleinman, 1988; loewe & freeman, 2000). each primary research participant received a token of appreciation in cash. primary data were collected in the form of narrative interviews with 27 urban first nation and métis community members, six health service providers, and seven policy-makers, and was further informed by field-notes and secondary document review. the urban community participants included: 11 first nation (six females and five males) and 15 métis persons (nine female and six males), and one female participant who self-identified as both first nation and métis. the details of participant demographic information are presented in tables 1 and 2. all recorded primary data was transcribed word for word by experienced transcriptionists. data were analyzed using riessman’s (2008) narrative thematic analysis. coding, sorting, and the identification of themes were an essential part of the analytical process as they capture the commonalities or experiences across interviews. the goal of the narrative thematic analysis process in this study was to find commonalities as well as variations within and among the narratives of the participants. to that end, a within-case and an across-case narrative thematic analysis approach was used (ayres, kavanaugh, & knafl, 2003; poirier & ayres, 1997). analysis of the narratives gave birth to themes or subthemes that were coded with the help of nvivo software. these themes or typologies were related to the theoretical frameworks of intersecting determinants of health, then situated within broader métis and first nations’ contexts and explored for concordance or discordance with professionals’ narratives. this resulted in a description of individual narratives as they related to the larger social groups of first nations and métis and respective social, cultural, economic, and political contexts. a summary of the key concepts of thematic narrative analysis applied to this study can be found in table 3, which describes the definition and structure of narratives employed, the exemplars of unit of analysis, and the contextual information of the narratives. 7 ghosh and spitzer: inequalities in diabetes outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2014   t a b l e 1 . c o m m u n i t y p a r t i c i p a n t s ’ d e m o g r a p h i c d e t a i l s c o m m u n i t y p a r t i c i p a n t s g e n d e r s t a t e o f d i a b e t e s a g e r a n g e l e n g t h o f u r b a n r e s i d e n c e l e v e l o f e d u c a t i o n e m p l o y m e n t s t a t u s f i r s t n a t i o n s ( 1 1 ) 5 male and 6 female 6 diabetic and 5 non-diabetic 20 54 years 5 39 years less than high school to undergraduate degree 8 employed and 3 unemployed m é t i s ( 1 5 ) 6 male and 9 female 8 diabetic and 7 non-diabetic 20 74 years 2 70 years and all life high school diploma to graduate degree 8 employed, 6 unemployed, 1 status undisclosed m i x e d d e s c e n t s e l f i d e n t i f i e d ( 1 ) 1 female non-diabetic over 50 years 50 years and above graduate degree employed note. number within bracket denotes the number of participants in each category. t a b l e 2 . p r o f e s s i o n a l p a r t i c i p a n t s ’ d e m o g r a p h i c d e t a i l s p r o f e s s i o n a l r o l e y e a r s i n p r e s e n t r o l e y e a r s i n a b o r i g i n a l h e a l t h a n d s o c i a l c a r e y e a r s i n h e a l t h p o l i c y d e c i s i o n m a k i n g a b o r i g i n a l p a t i e n t s w i t h d i a b e t e s / m o n t h g e n d e r a g e r a n g e h e a l t h s e r v i c e p r o v i d e r s ( 6 ) * family physician, dietician educator, nurse diabetes educator, diabetes prevention coordinator less than 5 years to 14 years less than 5 years to 19 years na 1 to 120 patients 5 female and 1 male 20 years to over 50 years p o l i c y m a k e r s ( 7 ) health planner, policy analyst, program manager, policy advisor, research manager, director less than 5 years to 10 years na 5 years to over 10 years na 5 female and 1 male 31 years to over 50 years note. number within bracket denotes the number of participants in each category. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.2   t a b l e 3 . t h e m a t i c n a r r a t i v e a n a l y s i s d e f i n i t i o n o f n a r r a t i v e r e p r e s e n t a t i o n o f n a r r a t i v e s u n i t o f a n a l y s i s : f o c u s analysis to contexts bounded segment of interview text about an incident brief interview excerpt; cleaned up speech § subjective experiences of genesis of illness (diabetes) reported in personal narratives § § acts of initiatives or attempts to prevent or manage his/ her illness (diabetes) as demonstrated in personal narratives societal: considerable note. adapted from riessman (2008). riessman (2002) stated that traditional applications of reliability standards do not and should not apply to narrative analysis. similarly, bradbury and reason (2008) suggested that practitioners of communitybased participatory research should “broaden the bandwidth of validity” by including different “ways of knowing,” including community lay knowledge alongside more traditional scientific sources of knowledge. this study asserts its trustworthiness and rigour by: (a) maintaining factual accuracy of the account or descriptive validity (cleaning up the spoken language to construct unambiguous plot lines but keeping the meanings of participant’s understandings and story lines intact); (b) undertaking rigorous iterative analytic process using within-case (each transcript) and across-case (from one transcript to the other) analyses that inherently prevents any risk of errors in theoretical validity; and (c) focusing on the reflections and perspectives of the participants rather than those of the researcher by remaining true to the interpretive validity. f i n d i n g s the divergence and convergence between first nations and métis community people, and health service providers and policy-makers’ understandings point out the need to develop culturally appropriate health services that respond to the diversity of urban first nations and métis people’s historical, socio-economic, legal, cultural, and spatial realities. p e r c e p t i o n s o f d i a b e t e s the métis and first nation participants’ experiences demonstrate how urban living, poverty, food insecurity, and federal-provincial jurisdictional squabbles intersect and increase susceptibility to develop health problems and vulnerability to type 2 diabetes (ghosh, 2012). participants expressed their experiences with multiple health risks that were worsened by broader inequities related to urban living, poverty, food insecurity, lack of interconnected but structured services, as well as continuous colonial relationship with governments. a young métis woman said: 9 ghosh and spitzer: inequalities in diabetes outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2014   i think …that a lot of the traditional like a lot of the food we eat today are not the things that the ancestors were used to. another young female participant of first nation origin agreed, saying: i think another factor would be like, a lot of aboriginal peoples here are unemployed too … so they are still not able to afford the better kinds of food. more precisely, peoples’ descriptions of vulnerability to type 2 diabetes largely detailed social and economic factors rather than standard physiological risk factors as identified in the western biomedicine. these sentiments are summarized most clearly by a middle-aged female university professor, who self-identified as first nation and métis, and who said: when you’re in poverty, so much time is spent struggling, it’s just not worth it. that kills you … your health. poverty kills your health. b a r r i e r s t o a c c e s s i n g s e r v i c e s several first nation and métis community members said that preventive services tend to overlook the linguistic, cultural, economic, and legal diversities that exist within and between aboriginal peoples in this urban location. in order to understand the elements of health service delivery to diverse minority first nation and métis populations living in this urban ontario setting, it is important to first comprehend the challenges or barriers to access culturally responsive health services. many socioeconomic and political factors including jurisdictional issues, resource allocations and procurement, funding allocation, and decision making process have influenced the characteristics of the diverse aboriginal communities in urban ontario. these political diversities may have implications for the formation of community-institutional partnerships and for collaboration with aboriginal peoples in the program development and service deliveries. c u l t u r a l d i v e r s i t y . demands for, and barriers to, access of culturally appropriate preventive health services hold a different set of implications for first nation and métis women with or at risk of diabetes. in particular, métis people living in urban areas revealed that health services tend to overlook métisspecific needs and more often focus on first nations’ needs and priorities. one elderly métis woman who is also quite engaged with the local métis community at the professional level said: oh, it [health services] has to be métis specific. because... when we walk in there as métis, we always don’t feel aboriginal enough, you know? and we’re treated differently. because we look so much like mainstream…. well as a second class, like. one first nation male participant stated a similar sentiment, saying: it’s like me. i want to learn my culture. i don’t want to learn about mohawk... i don’t want to learn about cree, i’m ojibway... i am native all the same but i am within a cultural group that is ojibway... i think there is need to acknowledge that uniqueness. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.2   one métis mother who was expecting her second child during the time of interview spoke of her experience with health care professionals’ limited knowledge of aboriginal cultural diversities and how that had impacted the nature of her medical care during and after pregnancy. she shared that: … i have [an] amazing family doctor …he’s not ignorant the least bit [of my culture]… my ob on the hand was really ignorant, he had no idea what métis person was… he just looked at me and ... i said ya well i’m métis person and he said well what’s that? … i think if he was more educated he would have contacted me because my family doctor when he saw the results of the gestational diabetes he was like, “oh you’re borderline,” so he was wondering why i wasn’t contacted. in many cases, professionals were either unaware of the cultural diversities within and between aboriginal populations and how they may affect service delivery, or simply found it too complex to consider in their scope of practice. one professional participant, a community diabetes educator, stated: so whoever comes to see us that identifies themselves as having, being first nations or métis they [are the] same… come in to the same population groups as the other clients, so we don’t pinpoint them or identify. s o c i o e c o n o m i c d i v e r s i t y . métis and non-status first nation participants of this research who have no access to non-insured health benefits due to their status face considerable challenges in either preventing diabetes or slowing its progress. particularly, cost of medications and supplies become challenging for non-status first nation or métis peoples. community participants discussed the need for monetary supports for medications, supplies, and healthy foods. one first nation woman described her experiences of dealing with her non-registered first nation mother’s diabetes: before my mom wasn’t able to pay for her pills sometimes ’cause she was lower income and… so sometimes she would just not take them for a month or so…, and then the needles now you have to pay for every month so she can test for. a non-aboriginal physician participant from a mainstream health centre, commented: i don’t think money is a big issue. i really don’t. in most cases, particularly first nations people … they get most of their medications covered by the government. when he was further questioned about the realities of non-status first nation and métis peoples, the physician agreed that situation is much more complex for métis and non-status first nations. he said: … not for métis, yeah. right! that’s true, so they don’t have any of the [government provided] advantages. so there are the expenses of medications definitely that can be very significant... his comments clearly demonstrate that there are disparities in health providers’ understanding about the inequities non-status first nation and métis peoples face in accessing health services due to their legal status. 11 ghosh and spitzer: inequalities in diabetes outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2014   l e g a l d i v e r s i t y . a clear need for equitable access to health services for the aboriginal peoples of diverse socio-economic, linguistic, cultural, and legal orientations have been reflected in both métis and first nations participants’ narratives. participants shared their feelings of marginalization, discrimination, and alienation with the existing pan-aboriginal health strategies and service provision. participants’ narratives clearly present how non-registered aboriginal peoples struggle with diabetes management when they have inadequate income. as the daughter of an elderly non-status first nation woman said: you can’t take care of yourself as well if you’re in lower income… before, my mom wasn’t able to pay for her pills sometime… they [work insurance] pay for half of whatever… she doesn’t have a status card, so she’s just covered under her work insurance. métis participants’ perceptions also revealed how the exclusionary nature of government provided health services limited their capacity to prevent diabetes or its long-term complications. they felt that government-provided services designed for aboriginal peoples could act as a protective measure against occurrence of diabetes and preventing its long-term consequences. a young métis woman said: … [t]hey probably do something for the first nations, aboriginal peoples… but for the métis, i don’t know, i don’t think they do. … but they [métis] should have just as much right as the next culture [first nations and inuit], [and so do we] because we’re descendent of that [métis] culture. s p a t i a l d i v e r s i t y . participants revealed their frustrations with and expectations for policy-makers in developing policies that determine the design and delivery of health services. in contrast to the preconceived notion that aboriginal peoples predominantly reside in downtown areas, aboriginal peoples are dispersed throughout the city. centralizing aboriginal health or social services in the downtown core, therefore, does not make it equitably accessible for all. one métis man with diabetes said: they [ policy-makers] have to make it [health and social services]… accessible for everybody… it doesn’t do anything for anyone who lives off of [downtown street]. it’s a heck of a travel [for me]. you need more, you need some central, or you need satellite areas… a new mother of métis descent told us: we used to go to [name of the aboriginal health centre] for pre-natal [care], and i found just traffic you know, it’s all the way out in [name of a place]… it’s still it’s a half an hour at least to get there and that’s a long drive … but there is nothing in [name of the place where she lives]… sure would like to have something that’s geared to us, ya. r e s p o n s i v e p o l i c i e s first nation and métis participants’ narratives indicate that explanatory models of diabetes and its causal factors were informed by both social and biomedical understandings. as policy responses are determined by how a problem is defined or framed, attending to the social significance of a disease can enrich policy decisions by going beyond the deterministic logic of biomedicine. for example, when 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.2   biomedicine increasingly defines diabetes as a lifestyle-related disease, policies focus on solutions such as healthy eating and physical activity; thereby, ignoring the social and non-medical determinants of health such as the socio-economic status of the population, the affordability of and access to both planned physical activities and healthy food, including the role of media in product promotion. policy-makers who participated in this research articulated both biomedical and intersecting social determinants of health views about diabetes causation; however, they faced challenges in addressing the social determinants of health within their scope of practice. they also acknowledged the policy limitations of addressing and responding to local needs as policies are generally developed higher up in the decisionmaking hierarchy without community input. a senior program manager from a federal government department said: so i could see where the distortion happens where it’s [inter governmental coordination and engagement with urban communities] still very siloed… like we do work with our colleagues and stuff, so we’re connected, but program connectivity happens at our program community level. … but you can tell from here, you gotta look up a loooooong way to see where it gets coordinating. and by the time you’re up here you get a nosebleed (laughs). and you’re not looking up no more (laughs). thus, front-line and senior policy-makers felt disempowered within the scope of their institutional practice despite their willingness to make changes. moreover, lack of demographic information and scientific evidence on urban aboriginal populations were identified as barriers to understanding and acknowledging aboriginal subpopulation-specific issues in policy formulation, particularly with respect to métis peoples. i m p r o v i n g p r e v e n t i v e s e r v i c e s in urban centres, first nation and métis peoples form a diverse subpopulation with varied cultural, linguistic, socio-economic, and educational backgrounds, and aboriginal statuses; thus, highlighting the limitations of pan-aboriginal approaches to health service delivery. the need for culturally appropriate health services must acknowledge population diversities, which are often shaped by the varied legal, economic, and social realities of their urban lives. again, historical legislative ambiguities and jurisdictional disputes due to involvement of multiple authorities result in a great deal of diversity in aboriginal health service provision across the provinces and territories. d i v e r s i t y , i n c l u s i v i t y participants also emphasized the need for greater responsiveness in health service provision, including longer clinical hours, more patient and understanding attitudes from health service providers, flexible hours for physical social activities, support for transportation and childcare services, and programs that accommodate both work schedules as well as stay-home parents’ schedules, as these supports would make existing services and programs more accessible for them. as one first nation female participant suggested: i think the most important thing is transportation. if they have a diabetic van, for instance…and you know that could go around and collect people … and brought them to a centre and teach them how to exercise. 13 ghosh and spitzer: inequalities in diabetes outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2014   community participants discussed the barriers and service needs around educational, nutritional, physical, and psychological aspects of diabetes, as well as the time and monetary limitations faced in trying to prevent or mitigate the condition. they also observed that lack of social support complicates type 2 diabetes prevention and management. a young métis women stated: … like let people know the preventative ways of doing it and then to have actual programming that is targeted… so for example, if alcoholism is a risk factor [of diabetes], you have programs to tackle those risk factors and you can do that through you know culturally safe initiatives and programming offered through different aboriginal organizations... another community participant of métis origin noted the lack of supportive food services: like i’ve been told, “you should come down to the aboriginal community centre for the food bank.” i thought oooh... that’s a long way to travel on a bus, with shopping bags... like that’s crazy… he also added saying that: … if you just have one person, or two people in the satellite office. you [could] open a small food bank, emergency food services. you have these two people, who can direct you to services that are open to métis and native. h e a l t h h u m a n r e s o u r c e s informants emphasized the importance of recognizing the diversity of peoples and subsequently creating diverse approaches to health service provision. in 1996 the royal commission on aboriginal peoples (rcap) stated that lack of access to culturally competent health care is as detrimental as a lack of other determinants of health. a paucity of cultural competence in the health delivery system results in miscommunication between health care providers and stakeholders thus creating a barrier to access services (lemchuk-favel & jock, 2002; pohar & johnson, 2007). one métis female community participant said: every doctor should be educated on the métis, inuit, aboriginal peoples because we are different … our culture is different our food is different, historically… yes, it’s changed over time and we do need to get back to who we are. similarly, a physician who is a professor at a medical school and of aboriginal background talked about need for cultural training for health service providers: it’s one of the things i teach is making sure you are looking at the whole person, not just not just the problem they are there for… you look at them not only themselves, you look at their family, their home, their community... a physician of first nation origin, who is very much aware of the diversities among first nation and métis peoples, stated: 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.2   the fact that these health services, these decisions are made by… people you know who may not be as familiar with the actual needs of the population that they’re trying to serve… once they understand the… social and historical context of those populations, then you can develop those programs with more realistic measures. like the community participants, health service providers and policy-makers felt that health human resources are a priority for the first nation and métis communities in this city. they recommended that more health human resources be of aboriginal descent to improve trust between providers and patients and ultimately improve community health outcomes. a physician of first nation origin shared: as a family physician, i’m very privileged, sometimes, that the people i meet choose to trust in me because they know i am also aboriginal and that they will share with me things that they have never shared before… nevertheless, it is vital to remember that urban first nation and métis communities are as varied as the recognized nation states, and that their experiences cannot be homogenized through a blanket terminology such as “aboriginal.” indeed, the ontario federation of indian friendship centres (2006) has argued that a “pan-aboriginal approach fails to recognize the differences between diverse and distinct aboriginal cultures, and amalgamates all aboriginal cultures into a single melting pot, thereby erasing crucial aspects of identity specific to different aboriginal peoples” (p. 2). the conflation of aboriginal legal and cultural identities and masking of cultural diversities are commonplace for both mainstream and aboriginal health services; however, indigenous participants insisted that recognition of aboriginal diversities in health service provision is greatly needed. they also expressed a need for aboriginal health care professionals to understand and communicate culturally appropriate messages for both métis and first nation peoples. a young métis female university graduate student, who is deeply involved in community activities, particularly with youth, stated: indeed, there are lot of aboriginal cultural groups … that is first nation and then there are métis, inuit...we are mixed now too... i think it is bad when it say that you are aboriginal so you all speak same, eat same... we do not like to be imposed on us that we are all aboriginal. r e c o m m e n d a t i o n s the recommendations generated from this study are not representative, but commonalities do exist across the aboriginal population groups that can serve as a basis for policy and program development. e n g a g i n g t h e c o m m u n i t y • the arbitrary regulations and distinctions that have created unequal health service provision based on one’s legal status (first nation [status indian] or métis) must be removed to improve health outcomes for all aboriginal peoples. for example, métis participants expressed frustrations about being denied equitable access to health services. • restoring health and well-being among aboriginal peoples requires services and programs founded on an integrated, holistic view of human health. both first nation and métis 15 ghosh and spitzer: inequalities in diabetes outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2014   community participants expressed that preventive services are narrowly focused on diabetes as a disease and do not consider health in totality. • health and healing systems for aboriginal peoples must be returned to the control of aboriginal peoples. for example, policy-makers agreed that top-down decision-making approaches devoid of appropriate context are not responsive to local conditions, priorities, resources, and necessities; only local people have such knowledge about their community members, and their knowledge is essential to implementing successful programs and services. • health care services for aboriginal peoples should have enough flexibility to accommodate differences in cultural and community realities, and diversity of local conditions and priorities. for example, métis participants felt marginalized as aboriginal health services reflected solely first nation worldviews. thus, health service providers need to respectfully respond to their clients' need in a way that encompasses the cultural components and beliefs of all aboriginal groups. f l e x i b i l i t y a n d i n c l u s i v i t y • strategies to improve the nutritional and physical status of first nation and métis peoples in urban settings must reflect the realities of their circumstances and the manner in which they access, select and prepare food, and participate in physical activities. policy initiatives to help create and sustain supportive environments are essential to make it easier for first nations people and their families to increase healthy food intake and participate in physical activities. • policies and funding for health services and education programmes, and auxiliary health supplies should be sufficiently flexible to enable programs to respond to the diverse cultural, legal, socio-economic, and spatial needs of urban first nation and métis peoples. • greater integration of resources and services is needed at the local level through interorganizational collaborations to address funding shortages or discontinuities. consulting research evidence and best practice models from different jurisdictions or international organizations could help improve indigenous health. importantly, service implementation requires sustainable programming that continues beyond its pilot project stage. • the health system needs to be more proactive in dealing with the increasing needs of longterm complications of diabetes among aboriginal peoples. while cultural sensitivity training may be useful, responding to aboriginal diversity requires systemic change. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.2   t h e i n t e r s e c t i n g d e t e r m i n a n t s o f h e a l t h • policy-makers need to shift from reactionary policy-making and program spending to more complex, pre-planned, targeted, inter-sectoral action and to reject the stigmatizing portrayal of first nation and métis peoples as “vulnerable populations” in favour of a focus on communal strengths. • change must start from an understanding that there is no “one size fits all” approach in providing preventive services. in this respect, policy-makers need to link the individual-level factors to the institutional systems that shape them, to consider power relationships, and to promote the development of more equitable policy. • meaningful and culturally-appropriate translations of knowledge surrounding diabetes causation and prevention requires that first nation and métis peoples, health service providers, and policy-makers understand and communicate each other’s perspectives and work in partnership. finally, there are some real challenges associated with addressing first nations and métis diversity in canadian cities beginning with the recognition of socio-economic, cultural, and spatial complexities of first nation and métis peoples’ location in terms of accessing preventive services for diabetes. another challenge is to provide a supportive environment for the propagation and continuation of first nation and métis cultures that is the foundation of improving the basic social and structural determinants of health. importantly, we must recognize the histories of first nation and métis peoples, their legacy in cities, and the need for their input into health services and policy development. c o n c l u s i o n differences in historical legacies, legal statuses, socio-economic backgrounds, and cultural identities contribute to significant diversity among urban first nation and métis peoples. hence, the nature and trends of the issues presented here are decidedly complex. while a recent study (environics institute, 2010) indicates that the socio-economic conditions of urban first nations and métis are improving and that the inequities between them and non-aboriginal people are slowly reducing, informants in this study suggest that a considerable portion of first nation and métis peoples are still in extreme poverty and lack the basic material resources to lead healthy lives. evidence also suggests that although there are positive changes in these urban populations, there is also a strong need for first nation and métis families to overcome barriers in order to improve their quality of lives in urban ontario, canada. health services for urban first nation and métis peoples, however, cannot offer a simplistic application of panaboriginal strategies designed to address their health inequities. initiatives for urban first nation and métis peoples must be targeted at the unique and distinct needs of first nation and métis residents regardless of their legal status, cultural diversities, socio-economic backgrounds, and place of residence in the cities. moreover, the initiatives must reflect first nation and métis peoples’ strengths and needs by involving them in health planning and policy making processes. aboriginal-diversity informed preventive health services for first nation and métis peoples is needed; however, we must also address the barriers that first nation and métis peoples face in urban areas in 17 ghosh and spitzer: inequalities in diabetes outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2014   accessing culturally-appropriate health services. vibrant first nation and métis cultures are important elements of the canadian urban landscape and can provide an important foundation for improving health services to reduce inequities in health. policy development requires meaningful relationships and necessitates that policies should be developed from the bottom up: those who are most affected by the policy should be included in its development so that local needs are acknowledged and addressed. urban aboriginal organizations can play a key role in linking with local first nation and métis communities for making programs and policies culturally appropriate and relevant from the start (peters, 2006). besides offering input for providing aboriginal cultural-diversity informed programs and services, the organizations involved play significant roles in connecting clients to determinants of health such as food, shelter, education, and employment. the nature of urban aboriginal communities is somewhat different from rural or reserve communities. in urban centres, aboriginal communities are mostly created and maintained by local aboriginal organizations. first nation and métis peoples, for example, come to friendship centres for social, educational, or spiritual purposes. therefore, these organizations play a crucial role in improving the quality of lives of all aboriginal peoples in a coordinated manner and in helping clients maintain a balance between the physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual aspects of their lives. policy-makers in our study remarked that community strength includes not only personal strength and the commitment to understand themselves as indigenous peoples, but also in locating the connections between common interests in urban centres, workplaces, educational facilities, and places of residence. thus, recognizing themselves as an urban community, coming together and working together is one of the many positive aspects of urban first nation and métis communities. another recognized strength of the community is in its committed providers in health and social service programs. despite various obstacles and challenges, as well as insecurity with their own professional careers, these providers offer their best efforts to accommodate the community members’ needs in overcoming the difficulties of prevention and management. responding to the unique needs of diverse urban ontario first nation and métis populations in a meaningful way means acknowledging and understanding the historical, political, social, cultural, and local or community factors that influencing their well-being. importantly, what is culturally appropriate 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(1993). first nations: race, class and gender relations. ontario: nelson canada. 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.2 the international indigenous policy journal january 2014 inequities in diabetes outcomes among urban first nation and métis communities: can addressing diversities in preventive services make a difference? hasu ghosh denise spitzer recommended citation inequities in diabetes outcomes among urban first nation and métis communities: can addressing diversities in preventive services make a difference? abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license inequities in diabetes outcomes among urban first nation and mã©tis communities: can addressing diversities in preventive services make a difference? introduction: special issue on indigenous early parenthood the international indigenous policy journal volume 4 issue 1 indigenous early parenthood article 1 march 2013 introduction: special issue on indigenous early parenthood marlene brant castellano trent university, castellano@kos.net recommended citation castellano, m. b. (2013). introduction: special issue on indigenous early parenthood. the international indigenous policy journal, 4(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.1 introduction: special issue on indigenous early parenthood abstract this introduction underscores many of the points raised and facts presented in the articles of this special edition of the international indigenous policy journal on indigenous early parenthood. it briefly mentions the interrelationship between economic deprivation and high fertility rates among canada’s first nations populations as well as the challenges and consequences of early parenting. while the authors may not make policy prescriptions, they emphasize the need for young parents and their children to receive the supports needed to help break the cycle of negative outcomes, which can be achieved through education, protection, and actualizing the value of ensuring that every child is a welcome and sacred gift. french abstract préface du numéro spécial de l’international indigenous policy journal sur la parentalité précoce chez les autochtones marlene brant castellano professeure émérite, université trent résumé cette préface souligne bon nombre des points soulevés et des faits présentés dans les articles de ce numéro spécial de l’international indigenous policy journal sur la parentalité précoce chez les autochtones. elle fait brièvement mention de la corrélation entre le dénuement économique et les taux de fécondité élevés au sein des premières nations du canada, ainsi que des défis et des conséquences associés à la parentalité précoce. bien que les auteurs ne puissent pas faire des recommandations de politiques, ils insistent sur le fait que les jeunes parents et leurs enfants ont besoin de mesures de soutien afin de pouvoir briser le cycle des résultats négatifs, ce qui peut être accompli grâce à l’éducation et à la protection ainsi qu’en actualisant l’importance de voir à ce que chaque enfant soit un cadeau bienvenu et sacré. spanish abstract prólogo del número especial de international indigenous policy journal sobre padres indígenas jóvenes marlene brant castellano profesora emérita de la universidad de trent resumen este prólogo pone de relieve muchos de los puntos planteados y hechos presentados en los artículos de este número especial de international indigenous policy journal sobre los padres indígenas jóvenes. en él se menciona brevemente la relación entre las penurias económicas y las altas tasas de fertilidad en las poblaciones de las primeras naciones de canadá así como los retos y las repercusiones para los padres jóvenes. aunque los autores no pueden preconizar políticas a este respecto, insisten en la necesidad de que los padres jóvenes y sus hijos reciban el apoyo necesario para tratar de salir del ciclo de resultados negativos y ello se puede lograr a través de la educación, de la protección y de la valorización de la idea de que cada niño es un regalo sagrado. keywords teenage pregnancy, early parenting, aboriginal creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ i n t r o d u c t i o n : s p e c i a l i s s u e o n i n d i g e n o u s e a r l y p a r e n t h o o d the papers in this special issue on teen parenthood address questions of vital importance to indigenous youth, families, and communities. in the best tradition of research, the authors begin with points of common knowledge and present information that leads readers to look closely at established facts and the context surrounding those facts to extend the boundaries of knowledge. the common knowledge, at least among those who pay attention to such matters, is that the aboriginal population of canada, including first nations, inuit and métis peoples, is young and growing at rate that exceeds that of the general population. the inferences drawn on the basis of those facts can vary. for example, aboriginal traditions place a value on large families. aboriginal people have children at a younger age than their neighbours (garner, guimond, & senécal, 2013). poverty (also a widely known fact) is not a deterrent to childbearing (united nations population fund, 2008). high fertility rates create an opportunity for economic participation or a burden on human services, depending on your point of view. examination of census data, including the more detailed information available from the aboriginal peoples’ surveys, has identified patterns in aboriginal population change. in southern reserve communities and urban centres, the rate of natural population growth among aboriginal people has slowed, although overall numbers have grown through inter-marriage, parenthood with non-aboriginal partners, and self-identification of significant numbers of persons of mixed heritage. in communities in more northerly regions, fertility rates tend to resemble patterns of earlier decades (guimond, 2003). the indian register, which records detail on births, deaths, marriage, and indian status, provides further insight into fertility in one segment of the aboriginal population registered indians who are principally, but not exclusively, resident on reserves. data from the indian register reveals that, while indian women overall are having fewer children, the number of births to teenage mothers has remained at about seven times the rate for all teenagers in canada (guimond & robataille, 2008). those are facts that can be gleaned from statistical records that draw on a variety of sources and use different criteria and population bases. discerning whether the facts should give rise to concern, or to social and policy action, requires a fuller exploration of the context of the numbers and the consequences of such youthful parenthood. questions about context and consequences have gone unasked until the past decade, despite collateral facts about single mothers, poverty, dependence on social assistance, and rates of children in alternative care. are there connections among the facts that speak of youthful maternity, parents under stress and children at risk? authors are careful to avoid assumptions that pregnancy among aboriginal teenagers is a reflection of “cultural difference”. such an explanation reinforces the perception that aboriginal people are essentially “others”, not affected by the same forces and concerns as the general population. if aboriginal youth occupy a separate social-cultural space, then facts that raise public health concerns in the general population can be regarded as normal for aboriginal people. review of research in other countries and comparison with data on teen parenthood among aboriginal women in canada show similar patterns of risk for children and continuing social and economic disadvantage specifically for their mothers (garner et al., 2013; guimond & robataille 2008). a few 1 castellano: introduction published by scholarship@western, 2013 qualitative studies of limited scope reveal that there are cultural differences in the proportion of young mothers who choose to keep their children and reliance on extended families for assistance (see quinless, 2013). significantly, many aboriginal participants in relevant research affirm the view that children are sacred gifts (anderson, 2002; eni & phillips-beck, 2013; newhouse, 1998), regardless of the circumstances into which they are born. despite such evidence of the value assigned to children and childbearing, two consequences of early birthing stand out. teenage maternity is associated with leaving school before high school graduation and extended families, with scarce economic resources, are severely limited in their capacity to provide the supports that are sought (garner et al., 2013). cycles of under-education, under-employment, and poverty are thus in danger of being repeated with new generations of children, specifically those born to teenage mothers. in analyzing the facts, the context, and the consequences of teenage parenthood among aboriginal women in canada, the authors often stop short of prescribing social and policy responses, although they underline the importance of the issues to aboriginal families and communities and to public service providers. research in other countries, particularly the united states, illustrates that public attitudes are often conflicted with respect to sexuality, roles of teenagers, education on contraception, and support for youthful and single parents (fonda, 2013; fonda, eni, & guimond, 2013). the articles clearly convey the inadequacy of moralizing about teen sexual practices, enforcing hardship on vulnerable mothers and children, or, worse, ignoring that threats to community well-being exist. this collection of articles draws on quantitative and qualitative research, often led by aboriginal researchers, to shed light on an aspect of community well-being that has received sparse attention in the past from researchers and policy makers. this beginning discussion gives voice to concerns that have circulated for some time in families and communities on the front line of responding to their members’ needs. this special issue of the international indigenous policy journal on indigenous early parenthood makes an important and timely contribution to broadening our understanding of the education, protection, and support necessary for aboriginal teens to actualize the traditional value of welcoming every child as a sacred gift. marlene brant castellano tyendinaga mohawk territory   2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.1 r e f e r e n c e s anderson, k. (2002). tenuous connections: urban aboriginal youth sexual health and pregnancy. toronto: the ontario federation of indian friendship centres. eni, r., & phillips-beck, w. (2013). teenage pregnancy and parenthood perspectives of first nation women. international indigenous policy journal, 4(1). available from http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/ fonda, m. (2013). the potential impacts of religion and spirituality on first nation teenage fertility. international indigenous policy journal, 4(1). available from http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/ fonda, m., eni, r., & guimond, e. (2013). socially constructed teen motherhood. international indigenous policy journal, 4(1). available from http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/ garner, r., guimond, e., & senécal, s. (2013). the socio-economic characteristics of first nation teen mothers. international indigenous policy journal, 4(1). available from http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/ guimond, e. (2003). changing ethnicity: the concept of ethnic drifters. in j. p. white, p. s. maxim, & d. beavon (eds.), aboriginal conditions: research as a foundation for public policy (pp. 91-107). vancouver: ubc press. guimond, e. & robatille, n. (2008). when teenage girls have children: trends and consequences. horizons, 10(1), 49-51. newhouse, d. (1998). magic and joy: traditional aboriginal views of human sexuality. the canadian journal of human sexuality, 7(2), 183-187. quinless, j. (2013). first nations teenaged female lone parent families in canada: recognizing family diversity and the importance of networks of care. international indigenous policy journal, 4(1). available from http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/ united nations population fund (2008). state of population 2008: poverty, inequality and population. retrieved from http://www.unfpa.org/swp/2008/en/05_poverty_inequality.html 3 castellano: introduction published by scholarship@western, 2013 the international indigenous policy journal march 2013 introduction: special issue on indigenous early parenthood marlene brant castellano recommended citation introduction: special issue on indigenous early parenthood abstract french abstract spanish abstract keywords creative commons license introduction: special issue on indigenous early parenthood along the road: the ngäbe-buglé struggle to protect environmental resources in panama the international indigenous policy journal volume 4 | issue 3 article 5 january 2013 along the road: the ngäbe-buglé struggle to protect environmental resources in panama rogelio cansari copenhagen university, rogelio.cansari.valdespino@anthro.ku.dk quentin gausset copenhagen university, quentin.gausset@anthro.ku.dk recommended citation cansari, r. , gausset, q. (2013). along the road: the ngäbe-buglé struggle to protect environmental resources in panama. the international indigenous policy journal, 4(3) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.5 along the road: the ngäbe-buglé struggle to protect environmental resources in panama abstract indigenous people in panama do not enjoy full autonomy within their comarcas (traditional land reserves): they only control surface resources, while the state retains control of underground resources. this article analyses direct action by the ngäbe-buglé, who successfully defeated the latest attempt by the government to exploit underground resources within their comarcas. it describes government strategies for retaining control over indigenous people’s land and analyses how the ngäbe-buglé counteracted these strategies with support from burgeoning civil society movements. we argue that this is due to an unprecedented alliance between indigenous people and other social movements in panama, as well as to the fact that indigenous people have succeeded in federating all major civil society organizations around their discourses and actions. keywords panama, indigenous movement, ngäbe-buglé, environment, mining, civil society acknowledgments we thank the senacyt of panama for providing financial support to our study. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ a l o n g t h e r o a d : t h e n g ä b e b u g l é s t r u g g l e t o p r o t e c t e n v i r o n m e n t a l r e s o u r c e s i n p a n a m a the ngäbe-buglé number around 285,000 people and constitute 69% of all indigenous people in panama, who in turn make up 12% of the country’s total population (national census, 2010). despite impressive economic growth in panama over the past 10 years and several governmental programs to redress their economic situation, indigenous people remain poor and the ngäbe-buglé are the poorest of the poor (nakoneczny & whysner, 2010). the main struggle of indigenous people in panama has always centered on recognition of their land rights. as a result, comarcas have been created in panama. a comarca is a large indigenous territory protected by law. in all, there are five comarcas, which collectively cover 21% of panama's total landmass (herrera, 2012). historically, the first comarca was created for the guna people in 1938, after the bloody guna rebellion (valiente, 2002). the second comarca was created for the embera in 1983. the ngäbe-buglé received their comarca in 1997, and this was followed by two further guna comarcas. indigenous people participate both in national and in local or indigenous elections. in national elections, the ngäbe-buglé people elect three members of parliament (diputados) as well as seven mayors (alcaldes) and 58 representatives (representantes de corregimiento) in their comarca. all of them belong to a political party and collaborate to administer the comarca in collaboration with a governor, who is also ngäbe-bugle and is appointed by the president of panama. all these political actors are on the government payroll. in local and indigenous elections, the ngäbe-buglé elects traditional authorities such as the caciques and presidents of congresses. the cacique is the head of the indigenous executive body while the congress represents the indigenous legislative body. these individuals are the legal representatives of the people living in the comarca and are not affiliated to any political party; only the caciques are on the government payroll. today, most of the real power lies in the hands of the governor, mayors, representatives, and members of parliament; they receive funds from central government to manage all programs and infrastructural needs within the comarca. the traditional authorities are consulted, but they do not officially receive any budget from the national government. comarcas are inalienable and imprescriptible land-holdings created for the exclusive use of indigenous people. however, the state retains ownership of underground resources along with the right to authorize large-scale development projects such as hydroelectric dams and mining for the benefit of the whole nation (ley 10, 1997; tresierra, 1999; wickstrom, 2003). as a result, it is unclear to what extent the state recognizes the authority of indigenous communities over natural resources within the comarca (ortiga, 2004). this creates much tension between the state, which has plans to exploit mineral resources, and indigenous peoples, who would like to protect their natural resources and their livelihoods. this article is about the latest struggle of the ngäbe-buglé people to ban mining from their comarca. we will argue that this struggle was successful because of an unprecedented alliance between indigenous people and other social movements in panama over the protection of the environment itself instead of just focusing on indigenous peoples' land rights. 1 cansari and gausset: the ngäbe-buglé struggle published by scholarship@western, 2013 m e t h o d s the data on which this article is based come from a number of different sources. at the time of the conflict, we were conducting fieldwork in panama with a neighbouring indigenous group and closely followed national and international media coverage of the conflict. we also observed how the ngäbe-buglé protest was perceived both nationwide and by neighbouring indigenous people and how they expressed their support for the struggle by creating roadblocks along the pan-american highway. we were also in close contact with an informant who was part of the coordinadora por la defensa de los recursos naturales y los derechos del pueblo ngäbe-buglé y campesinos1 and with another informant who participated in the negotiations meetings. the first author, rogelio cansari valdespino, is an indigenous person with more than 15 years experience in the dirección nacional de política indígena, which is the national office for indigenous affairs, and thus has access to key actors and information. this afforded us an insider’s perspective on the way this conflict was managed, as well as on the conflicts within the indigenous movement. we further had access to many documents and working papers produced during negotiations between representatives of indigenous peoples and the government. and finally, we analysed various official documents, such as relevant national laws and mining legislation (código de recursos minerales), the report on the violation of human rights during the repression of the indigenous protest (bill, arce, wing, lum, & deleon, 2012), the report of the united nations’ special rapporteur on the rights of indigenous people (anaya, 2012), and official communications by global indigenous networks in support of the ngäbe-buglé cause (e.g. alianza mesoamericana, 2012). c h r o n o l o g y o f e v e n t s t h e f i r s t c e r r o c o l o r a d o p r o j e c t in the early 1930s, copper was discovered on cerro colorado, a mountain that lies at the heart of what is today the ngäbe-buglé comarca and, in 1955, a preliminary exploration concluded that cerro colorado contained significant copper reserves (gjörding, 1991). when colonel omar torrijos herrera overthrew president arnulfo arias in 1968, his goal was to build a revolutionary panamanian state endowed with full sovereignty, economically independent of the usa, and less dependent on the panama canal, which had dominated the economic and political life of the country since independence in 1903 (gjörding, 1991; pérez, 1998). copper mining in cerro colorado soon became a key component of this vision. in addition, torrijos also developed popular programs to help poor and indigenous people (gjörding, 1991). he frequently stressed that his government was the first in panama’s history to respect indigenous people, to devise and implement projects to improve their subsistence, and to provide them with the same services as those granted to other citizens, such as education and health care. torrijos also promised indigenous people a speedy recognition of land rights (in the form of comarcas). the government sought to convince the ngäbe-buglé and the panamanian population in general that the cerro colorado project would ensure a better future for everyone in panama, including the ngäbe-buglé. the government created the mining development corporation (codemin) in 1975 to exploit the cerro colorado copper deposits and to build hydroelectric dams in order to provide the energy required for copper mining. indigenous people were not consulted but were promised that any loss would be fully compensated.                                                                                                                 1 the coordinadora is a coordinating group for the defense of natural resources and the rights of the ngäbebuglé people and of peasants. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.5 in 1980, when the project had already been approved, codemin was implementing the first phase of the process by opening roads to make the cerro colorado accessible for mining. the ngäbebuglé, who increasingly feared that they would be displaced by the project, organized a general congress to discuss the issue with the support of the catholic church. after debating the project in the general congress, they decided to reject both the mining of the cerro colorado and the hydroelectric projects and they demanded full participation in negotiations concerning the project (gjörding, 1991). above all, they wanted their territory to be recognised as a comarca. torrijos, however, refused to grant their lands comarca status unless they: (a) approved the referendum on the torrijos-carter canal treaties, (b) supported the creation of torrijos’ new political party (prd), and (c) supported the cerro colorado project. the ngäbe-buglé complied with the two first conditions but remained critical of the cerro colorado project and were determined to protect their land, despite the fact that some caciques entertained good relations with torrijos and backed his plans (gjörding, 1991). the government continued to prevaricate regarding land recognition and, ultimately, the cerro colorado project was put on hold for various reasons: the political void left by torrijos’ death in 1981, the complexity of the project, decreasing global copper prices, and the opposition of the ngäbe-buglé people (zea cited in simms & moolji, 2011; wickstrom, 2001). the cerro colorado today lies within the ngäbe-buglé comarca, which was finally created in 1997, and it remains one of the world’s largest proven untapped copper reserves (simms & moolji, 2011). both government interest in copper and the ngäbe-buglé opposition to mining remained high: by the end of the 1990s, 80% of the ngäbe-buglé comarca was covered by mining applications that did not have the consent of the ngäbe-buglé people. by 2011, 13 multinational companies had expressed an interest in exploiting the cerro colorado site (simms & moolji, 2011; young & bort, 1999). as world copper prices began to rise at the turn of the 21st century, reaching a historical high in 2011, pressure to mine the copper increased and the government started revising the law to facilitate mining. in 2003, the government used a technique known as madrugonazos (legislation votes at dawn) to repeal a number of key statutes of the environment general law (ley 41, 1998). the statutes that were repealed were those that recognized indigenous people’s right to use and manage natural resources in their lands and comarcas, that required authorization for the industrial and commercial use of indigenous resources and agreement with indigenous representatives for any project on indigenous land, and that necessitated obtaining prior consent before indigenous people could be relocated. there was no process of consultation with interest groups such as indigenous people and no media coverage of the events (runk, 2012). r e f o r m o f t h e m i n i n g c o d e in june 2010, the president of south korea visited panama and met with ricardo martinelli, a successful businessman elected as president of panama in 2009. on february 10, 2011, the government approved the reform of the 1963 mining code by 44 votes to 15, which subsequently became law 8, signed by president martinelli (ley 8, 2011). this reform provoked wide-scale protest and opposition. first, the population perceived it as violating the panamanian constitution in that it allowed the exploitation of national resources by multinational companies. second, journalists revealed that the president of south korea had been discussing the mining issue in june with president martinelli, expressing his satisfaction about the proposed revision of the mining code and reiterating that south-korean companies were willing to increase their investments in panama. this provoked questions among protesters regarding the extent to which president martinelli had changed the law to satisfy south korean interests (“gobierno confirma,” 2011). third, many indigenous people opposed the new mining code because they had not been consulted and because 3 cansari and gausset: the ngäbe-buglé struggle published by scholarship@western, 2013 of articles 26, 29 and 30, which would allow mining in comarcas. the ngäbe-buglé took the lead in these protests because they feared that the new law would pave the way for copper mining in the cerro colorado. to show their opposition to the reform, union members, students, environmentalists, and indigenous peoples carried out a nationwide protest that ultimately forced the government to repeal the law. the protest started on february 7, 2011 with groups of students, union members, and environmentalists demonstrating in panama city and indigenous people blockading stretches of the pan-american highway (until they were forcibly removed by the police). after law 8 was passed in the face of widespread opposition, road blockades and protests intensified across the country. it took about one week for the ngäbe-buglé to organize, but on february 15, they mobilized on a large scale and blockaded the pan-american highway in san felix. from then on, the ngäbe-buglé took the lead in the protests, supported by students, labour unions and environmentalists, as well as by the catholic church, which called for peaceful dialogue. the strategy of the protesters was fourfold. first, indigenous people, together with students, teachers, labor unions and environmentalists, organized several demonstrations in panama city, targeting the south korean embassy and the national assembly. second, they lodged an appeal in the supreme court on the grounds that the new mining law violated the country’s constitution. third, indigenous people blockaded the pan-american highway and continuously re-established blockades after they were forcibly removed. fourth, indigenous people disavowed any indigenous authorities who called for an end to the protests and organised themselves around an independent and civil coordinadora. the government adopted three main strategies. first, they sent police to clear road blockades (as on february 18 in pacora or on february 25 in san felix and 12 different road blockades). second, because the government believed that foreigners were behind the protest (“arrestos y,” 2011), the minister of the interior gave two weeks notice to all foreigners (including journalists) to leave the ngäbe-buglé comarca. third, the government tried to “divide and rule” in order to take advantage of latent divisions that exist in any movement (colloredo-mansfeld, 2009) by making deals with indigenous representatives who were susceptible to co-optation. for example, on february 21, the government surprised everybody by announcing that it had been negotiating with rogelio moreno, the then cacique of the ngäbe-buglé, and that they had reached an agreement that no mining in indigenous territories would happen during president ricardo martinelli’s term of office. the president signed this decree into law the very next day to show that he was committed to keeping his word and then cacique moreno called for an end to the protests. but this deal outraged protesters, who did not want any agreement made behind their backs and wanted a total and permanent repeal of the law. as a consequence, when the ngäbe-buglé held their general congress in march 2011, cacique moreno was strongly renounced called a traitor to the ngabé-buglé cause and declared persona non grata in the comarca. the ngabé-buglé even detained him for two days, binding his hands. however, the internal division within the ngäbe-buglé did not prevent further action and may even have further radicalized protesters. finally, the government agreed to mediated talks with the coordinadora. the road blockades were suspended and negotiations were started between the government commission and the coordinadora, which were mediated catholic church. they reached an agreement on february 27 and, as a result, law 12 was voted in to repeal law 8 (ley 12, 2011). the trade and economic affairs commission of the national assembly presented a new bill (bill 415) proposing a special 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.5 regime to protect mineral, water, and environmental resources in the ngäbe-buglé comarca. this bill (proyecto de ley 415, 2011) included article 5, stating that: all valid concessions granted to national or foreign corporations for the exploration or exploitation of mineral resources and for the construction of hydroelectric projects within the comarca, appended areas and in ngäbe-buglé communities outside the comarca are hereby cancelled, and all ongoing work by such corporations is hereby suspended forthwith [our translation]. t h e f i g h t f o r a r t i c l e 5 however, when the bill was voted on at the commission level on january 25, 2012 and was proposed as a new law to be discussed in the assembly, article 5 had been removed. the new formal congress representatives, who had been elected in march 2011 (after the provisional agreement with the government), had complained that article 5 had not been discussed within the ngäbe-buglé congress and was therefore illegitimate. this allowed the trade commission to remove article 5 from the bill. the trade commission took advantage of the fact that the ngäbe-buglé people were divided. the presidency of the general congress and the post of general cacique have been the object of constant struggles between different indigenous factions for more than 10 years (ellington, lino, & cansari, 2009; hrev, 2010). in an attempt to put an end to the internal struggle and competing claims to the presidency, the national electoral tribunal organized the elections for the first time in comarca history. but this was contested by a large number of ngäbe-buglé, who felt that the government was trying to influence the outcome of the election and who organized a simultaneous parallel election following traditional procedure. as a result, in 2011, there were two separate heads of congress: edilberto sánchez, who was formally elected according to the law and while under the supervision of the state was officially recognized by the government, and celio guerra, who had been “traditionally” elected but who had no official recognition from central government. while formally elected congress members sided with the government and supported the new bill without article 5, traditionally elected congress members and the coordinadora defended inclusion of the article. upon learning of the intention to remove article 5, the coordinadora addressed a letter to president martinelli on january 22, complaining about the prevaricatory tactics of commission members and collusion with the officially elected president of the ngäbe-buglé congress while warning that they would protest and blockade the pan-american highway if article 5 was removed from the new bill. three days later, the bill was passed in the trade commission of the national assembly without article 5 and, on january 30, the ngäbe-buglé people resumed protests and blockaded several strategically sensitive stretches of the pan-american highway, with san felix as the epicentre of their action. this time, the coordinadora received the support of the new general cacica silvia carrera, who had been elected in september 2011. silvia carrera came to act as the movement’s main spokesperson. the blockade lasted about a week and had a major impact on the national economy because it affected communication and transport from the northern side of the country down to panama city. the whole country was effectively paralyzed, posing an urgent problem for the government, which responded by establishing a puente aéreo (air bridge) to transport people and food from david city, near san felix, to panama city using large aircraft normally flown on international routes. on february 4, the government shut down all telephone and e-mail communications in the entire region of san felix. around 5 a.m. the following morning, the police brutally and without warning 5 cansari and gausset: the ngäbe-buglé struggle published by scholarship@western, 2013 charged the blockade in san felix. the police used tear gas and allegedly fired live ammunition, killing one protester, wounding 32 (one of whom later also died), and arresting 40 people, including women and children (bill et al., 2012). this only served to further radicalize the protesters who overran the police station in el volcán and burnt it to the ground; by late afternoon, traffic on the pan-american highway had been reopened. however, over the following days (and for the entire duration of the conflict), the road was sporadically blockaded at various points, not just by the ngäbe-buglé but also by other indigenous people from all over the country. panamanian environmentalists, teachers, students, and labor unions organized demonstrations nationwide in solidarity with the ngäbe-buglé cause. in addition, the united nations high commissioner for human rights (unhchr) special rapporteur wrote to the president of panama setting out his concerns regarding the removal of article 5 from the new mining bill (anaya, 2012). on february 7, with the mediation of the catholic bishop of chiriquí, government representatives, and ngäbebuglé leaders met and signed the san lorenzo agreement. one of the 10 clauses in the agreement asked the president of the trade commission to re-include article 5 in bill 415. negotiations began the following day. throughout the negotiations, the government was represented by the minister of trade, the minister of the interior, the national environmental authority (anam), the public services authority (asep), and the secretaría de energía de la presidencia (presidential energy office). the ngäbe-buglé were represented by cacica silvia carrera, rogelio montezuma from the coordinadora, and eight other members of the comarca. no congress members (either from the formal or the traditional congress) took part in the negotiations. although the formal president of the ngäbe-buglé general congress, edilberto sánchez, repeatedly tried to join the negotiating panel (“otros líderes,” 2012), the coordinadora refused to include him because he had played a role in the removal of article 5 and was trying to be put on the government payroll (a fact that was confirmed by an official from the department of indigenous affairs). he was therefore identified as siding with government interests. the negotiations lasted for more than 40 days, going through a variety of phases and giving rise to numerous incidents. over the course of the negotiations, the pan-american highway was intermittently blockaded and demonstrations by indigenous and non-indigenous people took place both in panama city and in provincial towns, as well as in front of the national assembly and presidential palace. during the demonstrations, the ngäbe-buglé, dancing to the beat of maracas, chanted “ñankare! la comarca no se vende, la comarca se defiende, este pueblo no se vende” (no way! the comarca cannot be bought, the comarca will resist, this people cannot be bought). the negotiators quickly agreed to close the codemin and to abolish law 41 of 1975 that allowed for the exploitation of the cerro colorado, to cancel two planned hydroelectric dams, caño clarito and chorcha, and to reinsert article 5 in the new mining bill. but when the ngäbe-buglé tried to include other hydroelectric projects (such as the barro blanco project) that had already begun and that will flood part of the ngäbe-bugle customary land, the government refused, arguing that the projects fell outside the remit of the san lorenzo agreement. nevertheless, negotiations centered on the hydroelectric projects and the rewriting of article 5. on march 15 at midnight, the commission finally reached a two-part agreement. first, the group working on article 5 of bill 415 agreed on a new draft: a. cancelling all mining concessions in the comarca; 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.5 b. requesting that all future hydroelectric schemes be approved by the general congress of the comarca; c. requiring that all future hydroelectric projects in the comarca should give a minimum of 5% of annual profit to the comarca, to be administered by the general congress and to be used for agriculture, water, education, health, and the strengthening of traditional institutions, and that at least 25% of personnel should be drawn from the ngäbe-buglé community; d. requesting that any people forced to move as a result of the dam project be given compensation in advance and be relocated to land of comparable quality; e. protecting the traditional and sustainable use of ngäbe-buglé natural resource in collaboration with the national authority for the environment; f. abolishing law 41 of 1975 (and thereby cancelling any mining in cerro colorado). second, the group discussing hydroelectric projects agreed: a. to revise the environmental impact assessment of the barro blanco hydroelectric dam; b. to set up a working group to verify that three hydroelectric dams (chan 75, tabasara ii and chan ii) had complied with the agreement and paid proper compensation to indigenous people; c. to create a special commission including representatives of anati (national land authority), anam (national environmental authority), and the ministry of interior, which handles indigenous affairs, to verify illegal trespassing by colonos on indigenous land; and d. to create a roundtable to discuss national plans for indigenous development. the cacica and the coordinadora, who had always maintained permanent contact with people during the conflict, reported back to “the people” (indigenous people, teacher’s unions, local leaders) to explain the new agreement. their report caused discontent among some radical indigenous people2 who wanted to remove all existing hydroelectric dams, but was generally well received by others, and the remaining road blockades were removed. on march 22, the national assembly approved bill 415 of 2011, establishing a special regime for the protection of the mineral, water, and environmental resources of the ngäbe-buglé comarca, which later became law 11 of 2012 (ley 11, 2012). d i s c u s s i o n indigenous people have long been seen as doomed either to extinction or to assimilation in mainstream society. however, the present demographic growth of indigenous people and their                                                                                                                 2 radical is here understood as unwilling to accept anything less than a total ban on mining and electric dams, including those already well underway, which makes such demands rather unrealistic. we do not mean to say “radical” in the sense of a “racist, culturally intolerant extremist” movement, as it is sometimes used in an andean context (hale, 2002, p. 491). 7 cansari and gausset: the ngäbe-buglé struggle published by scholarship@western, 2013 increasing political organization and influence seems to give the lie to this prediction (cadena & starn, 2007; warren & jackson, 2002). today, we are witnessing a striking reversal in how indigenous people are perceived since “in the early twenty-first century, few would disagree that [indigenous movements] are among the most important social actors in the struggles over the future of latin american democracies” (postero & zamosc, 2004, p. 1). the focus of the present article has been on indigenous mobilization against mining. transformations in the structure of the global mining industry over the past 25 years, coupled with advances in technology and the strong trend toward liberalization and privatization, has opened up enormous new regions for exploration and development by transnational mining companies. this has inevitably brought mining companies into conflict with indigenous communities, both in latin america (ballard & banks, 2003; szablowski, 2002; whiteman & mamen, 2002) and elsewhere (ali, 2009). as the cumulative social and environmental impacts of mining are important, indigenous people resist these projects through a variety of strategies, ranging from lawsuits to community mobilization and protest (barber, 2008, nakoneczny & whysner, 2010; urkidi & walter, 2011; whiteman & mamen 2002). for example, there have been major conflicts between the mining industry and indigenous people in peru (bebbington, bebbington, bury, lingan, & muñoz, 2008; garcía & lucero, 2004), colombia (rathgeber, 2004), chile (postero & zamosc, 2004; tomaselli, 2012; urkidi & walter, 2011), bolivia (nash, 1989), argentina (giarracca, 2006; urkidi & walter, 2011), and ecuador (bebbington, bebbington, et al., 2008). however, there are two characteristics that make the ngäbe-buglé case different from many of the conflicts mentioned above. first, social movements in latin america are atypical, unfolding in different geographical and political contexts. bebbington, bebbington, et al. (2008) distinguish between two types of social movement. on the one hand, some social movements fight against “accumulation by exploitation” in order to expand people’s asset base. this is the case with historically generated labor movements, trade unions, and related political organizations. on the other hand, social movements can also emerge to fight against “accumulation by dispossession” as with the privatization of land and water. these “new” social movements, such as the one described in this article, are usually centered around land and minority rights. in panama, the ngäbe-buglé movement is built on communitarian identities and is therefore more “traditionalist” (see bebbington, abramovay & chiriboga, 2008). unlike indigenous movements in the andes, which are often about social and environmental justice, anti-colonial or social class struggles (lucero, 2008; nash, 1989; thomson, 2002; urkidi & walter, 2011; veltmeyer, 1997), the ngäbe-buglé movement is more about the autonomy of the indigenous territory and the protection of indigenous culture. it is therefore closer to amazonian indigenous movements that also articulate their struggle around some form of land reserve (comarcas and tierras colectivas in panama, resguardo in columbia, terras indígenas in brazil, for example). second, unlike most of the conflicts mentioned above, the ngäbe-buglé conflict is not about an existing mining operation (the mitigation of environmental impacts or the redistribution of benefits), but rather about preventing and outlawing future mining within the comarca. the conflict is therefore not with a specific mining company but rather with the government. van cott (2001, 2004) argued that renewed claims for indigenous autonomy are triggered by: (a) neoliberal economic policies threatening the land of indigenous communities, (b) united nations’ efforts to secure indigenous people’s rights, and (c) an alliance between indigenous organizations and other social movements (see also rodrigues, 2002). the conflict between the ngäbe-buglé and the panamanian government fits well into this analysis. first, the conflict was triggered by neo-liberal 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.5 policies opening up mining to multinational companies, which provoked extra-parliamentary protest activity (see also bellinger & arce, 2011). second, the presence of a special rapporteur from the united nations helped put pressure on the government to negotiate, even though this factor was probably not decisive. the additional fact that the national media provided a full and critical coverage of the ngäbe-buglé movement and its violent repression, which was relatively new in the media history of panama, and that this information was relayed by the international media, probably had more impact in terms of putting pressure on the panamanian government. third, indigenous people have demonstrated previously, have blockaded the pan-american highway and have achieved important results (the creation of the comarcas being the most significant of these). they have been fighting like a community (colloredo-mansfeld, 2009), alone and against others, adopting a “closed form of self-governance” focusing on indigenous rights (bebbington, abramova, et al., 2008, p. 2881). this time, however, indigenous people joined forces with other civil movements to reach common environmental and democratic goals. thus, the coordinadora fought for the defense of the rights of the ngäbe-buglé and peasants (campesinos), and explicitly included non-indigenous people. but the alliance went far beyond these campesinos and also included environmentalists, teachers, workers, and students. moreover, whereas indigenous movements used to fight for their specific land rights, in this case, they were also fighting for environmental goals (a trend that can also be seen in other latin american countries, see assies, 2009; giarraca, 2006; soliz, 2012), as well as for broader democratic ones. the alliance was not only concerned with protecting environmental resources, but also with respect for the constitution, democracy, and human rights. the new mining code was attacked in court on the ground that it was anti-constitutional; cacica silvia carrera threatened to call on the organization of american states to investigate human rights violations in the violent repression of the ngäbe-buglé demonstrations (suarez toro, 2012), and four civil rights organizations joined forces to produce a report on human rights violation during the repression of the demonstrations (bill et al., 2012). opposition to president martinelli’s plan to change the mining code and allow south korean interests to mine the cerro colorado was so widespread in all layers of panamanian society that various civil society movements with diverse foci (self-determination and the right to be consulted for the ngäbe-buglé, preservation of biodiversity for environmentalists, respect for the constitution and preservation of the national interest for unions), ended up joining forces to oppose it. lucero (2008) argued that indigenous movements represent a democratizing force in contemporary latin america. this is certainly the case in panama, but what is striking in the present case is that indigenous people emerged as the most active component of a cluster of interest groups fighting for the protection of the environment and democratic consultation in the country. the ngäbe-buglé came to be seen as the leading actors in the defense of the national interest, which made them immensely popular and garnered very broad support from other civil society organisations and from the media. the indigenous slogan, “ñankare!” or “ñagare!”as it is spelled in the national media, means “no way” in the ngäbe-buglé language and has today become part of the national vocabulary. it can now also be heard in non-indigenous demonstrations about unrelated social or political differences with the government. other non-indigenous groups are now taking the ngäbe-buglé movement as example when organising protests against the government. indigenous people have also become keen to support non-indigenous social movements. for example, in colon province, where black communities are fighting for the abolition of law 72, which allows the government to sell land in the free zone, cacica silvia carrera expressed public support for their cause, threatening 9 cansari and gausset: the ngäbe-buglé struggle published by scholarship@western, 2013 to blockade the pan-american highway if the law was not abolished (“indegenas saldrán,” 2012). during the conflict about the mining code, cacica silvia carrera became an iconic figure for the indigenous movement and she is increasingly recognized as the spokesperson not only of indigenous people, but also of panamanian civil society as a whole. for example, on january 12, 2013, 20 panamanian civil society organizations (associations of black communities, indigenous communities, teachers, ecologists, plantation workers, farmers, labor unions, the coordinadora against mining, etc.), calling themselves “alianza estratégica” and fighting against so-called “megaprojects” (megaproyectos), chose silvia carrera as the coordinator and spokesperson of the alliance. indigenous people in panama have thus acquired a unique position as leaders of a coalition of civil rights and environmental movements, which is a surprising achievement, given their minority and marginal status in panama. c o n c l u s i o n the ngäbe-buglé’s success in their fight against mining in the cerro colorado is quite remarkable and has repercussions that reach far beyond the issue of mining. indigenous people in panama, as elsewhere in latin america, are emerging as permanent players on the political stage (van cott, 2004, 2007; yashar, 1999), and far from losing momentum (as predicted by van cott, 2009), they continue to gain in strength in terms of influencing policy making. but in panama, the ngäbe-buglé have gone further: in that they have shifted from being one player among others to becoming the key or central player, federating all major civil society organisations around their discourses and actions. a broad national alliance with progressive political forces fighting for a common national interest may prove to be the best way to influence indigenous policy. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.5 r e f e r e n c e s ali, s.h. (2009). mining, the environment and indigenous development conflicts. tucson: the university of arizona press. alianza mesoamericana. (2012). condenamos enérgicamente la salvaje represión de presidente en contra el pueblo ngäbe buglé. retrieved from http://alianzamesoamericana.org/site/noticias/2012/02/condenamos-energicamente-lasalvaje-represion-de-presidente-en-contra-el-pueblo-ngabe-bugle/ anaya, j. (2012). mandato del relator especial sobre los derechos de los indígenas (reference: ua indigenous (2001-8) pan 2/2012). new york: office of the united nations high commissioner for human rights. special procedures of the human rights council. assies, w. (2009). pueblos indígenas y sus demandas en los sistemas políticos. revista cidob d’afers internacionals, 85 86, 89 107. arrestos y heridos por la minería. (2011, february 26). la estrella. retrieved from http://www.laestrella.com.pa/online/impreso/2011/02/26/arrestos-y-heridos-por-lamineria.asp ballard, c., & banks, g. (2003). resource wars: the anthropology of mining. annual review of anthropology, 32, 287 313. barber, j. (2008). paradigms and perceptions. a chronology and analysis of the events of the chan75 hydroelectric project and the roles and relationships of participants, bocas del toro, panama (independent study project (isp) collection, paper 5, sit panama). retrieved from http://digitalcollections.sit.edu/isp_collection/5/ bebbington, a., abramovay, r. & chiriboga, m. (2008). social movements and the dynamics of rural territorial development in latin america. world development, 36(12), 2874 2887. bebbington, a., bebbington, d. h., bury, j., lingan, j., & muñoz, j. p. (2008). mining and social movements: struggles over livelihood and rural territorial development in the andes. world development 36 (12), 2888 2905. bellinger, p. t., & arce, m. (2011). protest and democracy in latin america’s market era. political research quarterly 64(3), 688 704. bill, d., arce, m., wing, s. f., lum, s. w. & de leon, d. (2012, february 28). informe de gira de observación de derechos humanos luego de la protestas contra la minería e hidroeléctricas en la comarca ngäbe-buglé y en las provincias de chiriquí y veraguas. panama city: coordinadora nacional de mujeres indígenas de panamá (conamuip), allianza ciudadana pro justicia, centro de estudios y acción social panameño (ceaspa), centro de incidencia ambiental (ciam), comisión de justicia y paz. cadena, m. de la, & starn, o. (2007). introduction. in m. de la cadena & o. starn (eds.), indigenous experience today (pp. 1 30). oxford: berg. 11 cansari and gausset: the ngäbe-buglé struggle published by scholarship@western, 2013 colloredo-mansfeld, r. (2009). fighting like a community. andean civil society in an era of indian uprisings. chicago: university of chicago press. ellington, j., lino, r., & cansari, r. (2009, septiembre 29). caso ngöbe-buglé, problema de gobernabilidad ministerio de gobierno y justicia. dirección nacional de política indígena. panama city: ministerio de gobierno y justicia. garcía, m. e., & lucero, j.a. (2004). un país sin indígenas? rethinking indigenous politics in peru. in n. g. postero & l. zamosc (eds.), the struggle for indigenous rights in latin america (pp. 158 188). brighton: sussex academic press. giarracca, n. (2006). territorios en disputa: los bienes naturales en el centro de la escena. realidad económica, 217, 51 68. gjörding, c. n. (1991). conditions not of their choosing. the guaymí indians and mining multinationals in panama. washington: smithsonian institution press. gobierno confirma interés de corea del sur en minería. (2011, february 15). la estrella. retrieved from http://www.laestrella.com.pa/online/noticias/2011/02/15/gobierno-confirmainteres-de-corea-del-sur-en-mineria.asp hale, c. r. (2002). does multiculturalism menace? governance, cultural rights and the politics of identity in guatemala. journal of latin american studies, 34(3), 485 – 524. herrera, f. (2012). the development of indigenous territorial claims and the response of the state in panama. quaderns-e, 17(1), 44 59. hrev (2010, octubre 24). informe sobre las elecciones a delegados para los congresos general, regionales y locales de la comarca ngäbe-buglé. panama city: human rights everywhere (hrev). indígenas saldrán a las calles mañana; inicia marcha en la ciudad. (2012, october 24). la prensa. retrieved from http://www.prensa.com/uhora/locales/indigenas-saldran-las-callesmanana-inicia-marcha-en-la-ciudad/132846 ley 8. (2011). que reforma el código de recursos minerales y dicta otras disposiciones relacionadas con la actividad minera. gaceta oficial, 26721-d, 11 de febrero de 2011. ley 10. (1997). ley por la cual se crea la comarca ngöbe-buglé y se toman otras medidas. gaceta oficial, 23.242, 11 de marzo de 1997. ley 11. (2012). que establece un régimen especial para la protección de los recursos minerals, hídricos y ambientales en la comarca ngäbe-buglé. gaceta oficial, 27001, 26 de marzo de 2012. ley 12. (2011). que deroga la ley 8 de 2011 que reforma el código de recursos minerales y dicta otras disposiciones relacionadas con la actividad minera. gaceta oficial, 26746-a, 18 de marzo de 2011. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.5 ley 41. (1998). por la cual se dicta la ley general de ambiente de la república de panamá y se crea la autoridad nacional del ambiente. gaceta oficial, 23.578, 1 de julio de 1998. lucero, j. a. (2008). struggles of voice. the politics of indigenous representation in the andes. pittsburgh: the university of pittsburgh press. nakoneczny, l. & whysner, k. (2010). in the “heart” of the comarca: understanding the environmental and social impacts of mining the cerro colorado deposit (envr 451 final report). montreal: mcgill university. nash, j. (1989). cultural resistance and class consciousness in bolivian tin-mining communities. in s. eckstein (ed.), power and popular protest. latin american social movements (pp. 182 202). berkeley: university of california press. national census. (2010). xi censo nacional de población y vii de vivienda 2010. inec. retrieved from http://www.contraloria.gob.pa/inec/publicaciones/subcategoria.aspx?id_categoria= 13&id_subcategoria=59&id_idioma=1 ortiga, r. r. (2004). models for recognizing indigenous land rights in latin america. biodiversity series (paper no. 99). washington: the world bank environment department. otros líderes ngäbe-buglé piden ser incluidos en diálogo minero e hídrico. (2012, february 25). la prensa. retrieved from http://www.prensa.com/uhora/locales/otros-lideres-ngabe-buglépiden-ser-incluidos-en-dialogo-minero-e-hidrico/67450 pérez, b. j. (1998) [1993]. en nuestra propia voces. panamá protesta: 1968-1989. panama: instituto de estudios políticos e internacionales. postero, n. g., & zamosc, l. (2004). indigenous movements and the indian question in latin america. in n. g. postero & l. zamosc (eds.), the struggles for indigenous rights in latin america (pp. 1 31). brighton: sussex academic press. proyecto de ley 415. (2011, julio 19). que establece un régimen especial pára la protección de los recursos minerales, hídricos i ambientales en la comarca ngobe-buglé. asamblea nacional. rathgeber, t. (2004). indigenous struggles in colombia. historical changes and perspectives. in n. g. postero & l. zamosc (eds.), the struggle for indigenous rights in latin america (pp. 105 130). brighton: sussex academic press. rodrigues, m. g. m. (2002). indigenous rights in democratic brazil. human rights quarterly, 24, 487 512. runk, j.v. (2012). indigenous land and environmental conflicts in panama: neoliberal multiculturalism, changing legislation, and human rights. journal of latin american geography, 11(2), 21 – 47. simms, r., & moolji, s. (2011). in the belly of the machine. indigenous mining experiences in panama (envr 451 final report). montreal: mcgill university. 13 cansari and gausset: the ngäbe-buglé struggle published by scholarship@western, 2013 soliz, c. (2012). el otro rostro de américa latina. nueva sociedad, 238, 126 – 137. suarez toro, m. (2012). ngöbe buglé indigenous in panamá: spearheading the struggle against mining and water companies. escribanas. retrieved from http://escribanas.wordpress.com/2012/03/12/ngobe-buglé-indigenous-in-panamaspearheading-the-struggle-against-mining-and-water-companies-2/ szablowski, d. (2002). mining, displacement and the world bank: a case analysis of compania minera antamina's operations in peru. journal of business ethics 39(3), 247 – 273. thomson, s. (2002). we alone will rule. native andean politics in the age of insurgency. madison: the university of wisconsin press. tomaselli, a. (2012). natural resources claims, land conflicts and self-empowerment of indigenous movements in the cono sur – the case of the mapuche people in chile. international journal on minority group rights, 19, 153 174. tresierra, j. c. (1999). rights of indigenous groups over natural resources in tropical forests (idb publications nr 25338). inter-american development bank. urkidi, l. & walter, m. (2011). dimension of environmental justice in anti-gold mining movements in latin america. geoforum, 42, 683 – 695. valiente, a. (2002). derechos de los pueblos indígenas de panamá. serie normativa y jurisprudencia indígena. san josé, c.r.: impresora gossestra intl. van cott, d. l. (2001). explaining ethnic autonomy regimes in latin america. studies in comparative international development, 35 (4), 30 58. van cott, d. l. (2004). broadening democracy: latin america’s indigenous peoples’ movements. current history, february, 80 – 85. van cott, d. l. (2007). latin america’s indigenous peoples. journal of democracy, 18 (4), 127 142. van cott, d. l. (2009). indigenous movements lose momentum. current history, february, 83 89. veltmeyer, h. (1997). new social movements in latin america: the dynamics of class and identity. journal of peasant studies, 25(1), 139 – 169. warren, k. b., & jackson, j. e. (2002). studying indigenous activism in latin america. in k. b. warren & j. e. jackson (eds.), indigenous movements, self-representation, and the state in latin america (pp. 1 46). austin: university of texas press. whiteman, g., & mamen, k. (2002). meaningful consultation and participation in the mining sector? a review of the consultation and participation of indigenous peoples within the international mining sector. ottawa: the north-south institute. wickstrom, s. (2003). the politics of development in indigenous panama. latin american perspectives, 30(4), 43 68. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.5 yashar, d. j. (1999). democracy, indigenous movements, and the postliberal challenge in latin america. world politics, 52, 76 104. young, p. d., & bort, j. (1999). ngóbe adaptive responses to globalization in panama. in w. loker (ed.), globalization and the rural poor in latin america (pp. 111 136). boulder, co: lynne reiner publishers.   15 cansari and gausset: the ngäbe-buglé struggle published by scholarship@western, 2013 the international indigenous policy journal january 2013 along the road: the ngäbe-buglé struggle to protect environmental resources in panama rogelio cansari quentin gausset recommended citation along the road: the ngäbe-buglé struggle to protect environmental resources in panama abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license microsoft word cansari20along_the_roadfinal.doc editor in chief commentary: water recognizing the indigenous perspective the international indigenous policy journal volume 3 issue 3 water and indigenous peoples article 1 september 2012 editor in chief commentary: water recognizing the indigenous perspective jerry p. w hite university of western ontario, white@uwo.ca recommended citation white, j. p. (2012). editor in chief commentary: water recognizing the indigenous perspective. th e international indigenous policy journal, 3(3) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.1 editor in chief commentary: water recognizing the indigenous perspective abstract indigenous peoples have, since time immemorial, understood that water is central to the cycles of life. yet, as many of the articles in this special issue on water in indigenous communities point out, indigenous peoples have real problems accessing safe water. why? indigenous peoples have always cared for the water and followed practices that, depending on their geography, varied by season to protect and conserve fresh safe water. they have celebrated it as witnessed by the ceremony and language used. colonial practices have disrupted the care and knowledge passing in indigenous communities. cost-effective technology exists to deliver safe water to indigenous communities. the issue is that utilization of technology and environmental sustainability rest on the social determinants of safe water. from a policy perspective, this means we have to look outside of western technological solutions and come to listen to the other ‘story’ the one that emanates from indigenous traditional knowledge. keywords water, colonialism, social determinants, traditional knowledge, policy creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ welcome to the international indigenous policy journal. we are very pleased to publish this special edition of the journal on water and indigenous peoples. normally, i would not write a special editorial, but i believe this is a very important issue that goes to the heart of the impact of colonialism on indigenous peoples and their territories. the articles contained here make many important observations and draw our attention to many important policy questions. however, that said, i want to shed light on an aspect of this issue that is only partially covered. the impact of colonialism on indigenous safe water when we talk to elders in many different indigenous communities around the globe, we find a strikingly similar story. indigenous peoples have, since time immemorial, understood that water is central to the cycles of life. we are created and grow in water. it is water that signals birth is about to take place. each day of our lives, we must seek and consume water. our thought processes, bodily functions, and growing of food and more are tied to having water. it truly is, as traditional indigenous knowledge points out, central to our life cycle. yet, as many of the following articles point out, indigenous peoples have real problems accessing safe water. why? we have multiple articles on canada in this issue and, in countries like canada, there is an abundance of fresh water so why the problems for indigenous peoples? i can’t deal adequately here with this question (the articles in this volume contribute to that understanding). but briefly put: indigenous peoples have always cared for the water and followed the practices that, depending on their geography, varied by season to protect and conserve fresh safe water. they have celebrated it, as witnessed by the ceremony and language used. colonial practices have disrupted the care and passing of knowledge in indigenous communities. whether losing lands that were part of the water systems or residential schools breaking the bonds and cycles between grandmothers and granddaughters, elders and youth, water keepers and apprentices, the bonds and practices that allowed transfer of knowledge and the care of water were snapped. if we tried to understand this in western science terms, we can come to a similar conclusion. we might draw on social capital theory to explain it. the bridging and linking forms of social capital get broken when the bonding family-based social capital networks are disrupted (see robinson & williams, 2001; white, 2003; woolcock, 2001). regardless of whose ‘story’ we use to explain it, the impacts of colonial practises remain part of the explanation. recently, i had the pleasure of speaking to an executive of one of the world’s leading water and wastewater treatment companies. she was their scientific director and she said: “we could deliver safe water to every first nation household in canada for less than the cost of a color tv.” what should be clear to any who look is that it is not technology that stands in the way of solutions! the issue is that utilization of technology and environmental sustainability rest on the social determinants of safe water. from a policy perspective, this means we have to look outside of western technological solutions and come to listen to the other ‘story’ the one that emanates from indigenous traditional knowledge. recently, this point was driven home to me at western university in london, canada. at the university’s summer institute on indigenous community-based research methods, one of the indigenous mentors made the point: “if we see water as sacred, how can you expect us to put chemicals in it and shake it to make it pure and safe? that makes no sense.” policy becomes complicated, but it appears that the way forward will be to meaningfully engage indigenous peoples in the process of rectifying the situation. moving to more sovereignty over water supplies, allowing traditional knowledge to flourish, and, where feasible, blend the western and traditional ways to move out of the problems we now face. control must shift, but that shift requires that the resources needed to cope with the system be guaranteed. 1 white: editor in chief commentary published by scholarship@western, 2012 this goal could be accomplished with the creation of indigenous peoples water commissions, for example, or in other ways appropriate to the regions. how problems are approached and the building of lasting and meaningful partnerships will be important in determining how successful we are in solving the problems associated with ensuring safe water. we sincerely hope you enjoy this issue. jerry p. white 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.1 references robinson, d., & williams, t. (2001). social capital and voluntary activity: giving and sharing in maori and non-maori society. social policy journal of new zealand, 17, 51-71. white, j. p. (2003). social capital, social cohesion, and population outcomes in canada’s first nations communities. in j. p. white, p. s. maxim, & d. beavon (eds.), aboriginal conditions: research as a foundation for public policy (pp. 7-34). vancouver: ubc press. woolcock, m. (2001). the place of social capital in understanding social and economic outcomes. in j. f. helliwell (ed.), the contribution of human and social capital to sustained economic growth and well-being: international symposium report (pp. 65-88). hull: human resources development canada and the organization for economic co-operation and development. 3 white: editor in chief commentary published by scholarship@western, 2012 the international indigenous policy journal september 2012 editor in chief commentary: water recognizing the indigenous perspective jerry p. white recommended citation editor in chief commentary: water recognizing the indigenous perspective abstract keywords creative commons license microsoft word 307332-text.native.1344517735.docx are we seeking pimatisiwin or creating pomewin? implications for water policy the international indigenous policy journal volume 3 issue 3 water and indigenous peoples article 10 september 2012 are we seeking pimatisiwin or creating pomewin? implications for water policy patti laboucane-benson bearpaw research, native counselling services of alberta, patti-laboucane@ncsa.ca ginger gibson the firelight group allen benson native counselling services of alberta greg miller bearpaw communications recommended citation laboucane-benson, p. , gibson, g. , benson, a. , miller, g. (2012). are we seeking pimatisiwin or creating pomewin? implications for water policy. he international indigenous policy journal, 3(3) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.10 are we seeking pimatisiwin or creating pomewin? implications for water policy abstract the purpose of this discussion is to describe the worldview and sacred relationship of the cree people in alberta, as well as how colonial policy has created despair (pomewin) in aboriginal communities and a state of disconnectedness from the water. it concludes with the presentation of a framework for the development of policies that seek to repair the relationship between aboriginal people and mainstream society – with the potential to create the good life, broadly defined (pimatisiwin) for all albertans (aboriginal and nonaboriginal). this discussion is based upon the findings of a three-year research project entitled “the sacred relationship”. the goals of the project were three-fold: to describe the aboriginal people of alberta’s sacred relationship with water, to articulate the indigenous science practices of aboriginal people, and to find common ground between western and indigenous science. keywords water, indigenous, aboriginal, first nation, sacred relationship, water policy acknowledgments we wish to express our sincere gratitude to all of the elders and scientists (western and indigenous) who participated in this project. we are also grateful to the alberta water research institute for their support (financial and so much more) of this project. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ are we seeking pimatisiwin or creating pomewin? implications for water policy1 canadian policy is a reflection of society’s worldview and the values that arise from that perspective. the canadian government’s current water policy statement refers to freshwater as an undervalued natural resource that has been historically mismanaged and abused (canada, 1987). the overall objective of the federal water policy is “to encourage the use of freshwater in an efficient and equitable manner consistent with the social, economic, and environmental needs of present and future generations” (p. 3). this will be accomplished primarily through a constellation of strategies that promote scientific leadership, awareness building, legislation, and the increased value of water within canadian society. one such policy statement pertains to first nations peoples and water stating that: water is of special value as a sustaining force for the essentials of life for canada’s native people. in recent years, native people have demonstrated they are prepared to assert their interest in, as well as participate in, managing water resources. in this way, they are taking steps to protect their distinctive way of life and to determine their own destiny. (p. 26) the policy goes further, indicating that the federal government of canada must improve its understanding of the first people’s commitment to the water. this is a departure from the legacy of colonial policy that has been thrust upon the first people of canada. in this paper, we will discuss how settler policies were formulated to shatter the interconnected worldview of aboriginal people, attacking their ability to self-determine family, governance, and economic structure. government policies have undermined the ability of knowledge keepers to pass on their understanding of natural law and the rules that govern all relationships and, hence, interrupted the flow of knowledge between generations. the impact of colonial policies has been devastating; many indigenous people, families, and communities are still mired in social, political, and psychological issues that are complex and difficult to resolve. in addition, the relationship between the people and the environment has been attacked, and the ability to teach the process for building and renewing a sacred relationship with water has been compromised. in 2009, bearpaw research, a division of native counselling services of alberta began a three-year research project investigating the aboriginal people of alberta’s sacred relationship with water, articulating the indigenous science practices of the aboriginal people and seeking common ground between western and indigenous science. we have found many instances where aboriginal elders and knowledge keepers have corroborated the canadian government’s policy statements about the state of our collective relationship with water and how we misuse it. there is also common ground between the goals of the federal water policy pursuit of excellence in scientific leadership and our research endeavours; we have sought to understand the philosophy and corresponding science that the aboriginal people in alberta have used for millennia and how this scientific paradigm can be mobilized to help solve complex water issues that albertans currently face. 1 note: this discussion is written in english, the language of the colonizer in canada. thus, the terms used to refer to the people who were here before european settlers will be in the language of the colonizer. we chose to use the term “indian” when referring to the policies between 1763 and 1982 for consistency, as that was the term used in all of the legislation to which we refer. in addition, many elders use the term indian in their interviews and we have respectfully left those quotes unchanged. in the federal water policy, the government uses the term native, which we have left unchanged in the quotes. we have also included quotes from authors that use the term first nation. in the rest of the paper, we used the terms aboriginal, indigenous, and first peoples interchangeably to promote flow and readability in the paper. all of these terms have colonial connotations and thus can be problematic, but they are the words available in the english language. when we refer to specifically cree worldview, we were finally able to use a term that was specific and contextually appropriate. in addition, we used cree terms to describe important concepts within this worldview. 1 laboucane-benson et al.: are we seeking pimatisiwin or creating pomewin? published by scholarship@western, 2012 in this article, we will use the findings of this research to describe the worldview and sacred relationship of the cree people in alberta. we will look at how colonial policy has created despair (pomewin) in aboriginal communities and a state of disconnectedness from the water. finally, we will discuss how policies can be developed to create resilience instead. indeed, policies that seek to repair the relationship between aboriginal people and mainstream society have the power to create the good life, broadly defined (pimatisiwin) for all albertans. ethics as protocol when seeking knowledge within the indigenous worldview, the first step is to observe protocol. for the cree, protocol is stated as “kihceyihtakosowin,” which means “the act of showing respect.” this first step is critical in an interconnected worldview; it is the acknowledgement that learning occurs in the context of relationship. before learning can be commenced, we must first ensure that we begin or renew the relationship between the learner and the teacher in a good way. respect is shown through the presentation of a “gift” to a teacher when asking for help. the gift is a type of sacrifice the seeker makes, and it demonstrates that (a) the request is important; (b) the seeker understands that something must be given up to receive help; and (c) the seeker holds the knowledge the teacher possesses in high esteem. the presentation of the protocol is also an acknowledgement of the time and effort the teacher has dedicated to the pursuit of knowledge. observing this protocol, therefore, affirms commitment to – and enhances – the learning process. throughout the research project, respect protocol was offered to all research participants who represent cree, blackfoot, dene, and stoney elders, leaders, scientists, and knowledge keepers, as well as western scientists and leaders. the protocol offerings were carefully chosen for each individual. we then smudged the protocol offering before we presented them and were careful to first state our gratitude, humility, and willingness to learn. after our protocol was accepted, we were then able to begin our interviews or teaching circles. during one teaching circle of cree elders (tce) (focus group, 2007)2, the elders responded to the offering of respect protocol, describing what it meant to them to receive it: i am very grateful for the offering that is placed upon me. it is a high honour and respect when you give an offering when you are seeking and asking for – in that way i pray with this offering for guidance to speak about the proper things that are needed here for our people. so that is how i take this offering. i work for the creator. for me i just want to say that part – i respect this and i thank you for that proper protocol. (tce, focus group, 2007) in the indigenous research process, respect protocol also serves as a means of acquiring informed consent. when the protocol offering is accepted, it signifies a profound commitment to the knowledge seeker. when addressing a teaching circle of elders, one of the researchers explained: in the [non-aboriginal] world, people have to sign a paper to give permission to record on camera. in the traditional way when we make an offering and an offering is accepted – people don’t understand that that is our consent – traditionally. i think it’s one of the differences of our laws – when we do research in indian country or when we ask a question of an elder – when they accept an offering, that’s giving consent to give knowledge. (tce, focus group, 2007) the elders responded in affirmation by saying: it’s very important to do that – to make that gesture to give a gift and to receive a gift. in this case, the gift of knowledge and the sharing of that story…. when protocol is done, like in this case, it is opening the door for that relationship – to be open and of giving – sharing. and that’s what is very important in our traditions – more important than me signing a piece of paper. because a paper is a 2 all references to data collected are described in the method section. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 10 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/10 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.10 paper to us – it is something that was brought to us – it was foreign. in our way this is what guides us. i think you have done the proper thing – we are willing to share as much as we can with respect to the questions that you have brought before us. (tce, focus group, 2007) in their response, the elders further clarified the role of the respect protocol in indigenous research; the spiritual dimension of the offering brings a strict requirement of accountability both to the knowledge seeker (who must use the knowledge in the appropriate ways) and to the teacher (who after accepting tobacco must follow through on his or her teaching obligation). in this way, respect is realised by the spiritual connectedness between the seeker and the teacher, as well as between the individuals and the spirit world. the elders described the seriousness of this commitment: i have many times accepted one cigarette and travelled a couple hundred of miles because of that cigarette. not knowing what was on the other end – only i know my commitment was when i took that cigarette. it is an unwritten thing – you have made a commitment to it and you follow up on it. and when you finish that ceremony or whatever is required of your service – only then is the commitment complete. (tce, focus group, 2007) in summary, there were five aspects to the offering of protocol in this research project: (a) protocol acknowledges the essential nature of relationships in the learning process; (b) it allows the researcher entrance into the knowledge seeking process; (c) it is required to ask permission to seek knowledge; (d) it is the process whereby informed consent of the teacher is acquired; and (e) it is the bridge that promotes accountability and unity between the teacher and the seeker in the research process.3 thus, respect protocol provided the strict ethical framework within which research and learning can occur. methods from the outset of this project, even before the research proposal was completed, the research team made a commitment to a research process that was grounded in an indigenous worldview and guided largely by a group of four cree elders. based upon the previous research experience of team members, we understood that this meant employing and deepening our understanding of wahkohtowin, a term referring to kinship in cree, but also to the doctrine or rules that guide our relationships with all living things. elder fred campiou described the interconnected, relational nature of wahkohtowin: our relationship with our mother the earth, the water, with all of the different plants, medicine, the herbs, the animals, the birds, all the four legged being[s]. everything we encounter in our lives there is a relationship that we are always reminded of and are mindful about. we see ourselves belonging to the entire existence of our world; we are not separated from anything. wahkohtowin talks about embodying that entire holistic idea of how we exist. (interview, 2012) we understood that to explore the sacred relationship indigenous people have with water we needed to understand our wahkohtowin with water and the natural environment. the research team had an existing learning relationship with a core group of cree elders, which was renewed and strengthened throughout the current research project; therefore, the first action undertaken by the research team was to ask the elders to reconvene the earlier teaching circle. after observing protocol, we asked for their guidance regarding how to proceed in the project and also to share their knowledge on the nature of the sacred relationship between cree people and water. the elders decided that, as part of the process, we also needed to hold a pipe ceremony on the second day of the teaching circle – to ask the spirit world to provide the team with help and guidance throughout the research process. hence, these elders were 3 this is a modification of the three aspects of protocol put forward by couture, parker, couture, and laboucane (2001). 3 laboucane-benson et al.: are we seeking pimatisiwin or creating pomewin? published by scholarship@western, 2012 our project advisors and they shared information for the team to reflect upon and to consider in the creation of the plan for data collection. all of the methods employed throughout this project, therefore, flowed from our prior understanding of wahkohtowin, as well as the first teaching circle. these methods included the following: • teaching circles. the research team hosted teaching circles with the core group of cree elders: william dreaver, issac chamakees, george brertton, and fred campiou. two circles were held before this project began, one in november 2007, and another in march 2008. they are included here because each circle built upon the teachings of the previous circle. the first circle held for the water research project was held in january 2010. • interviews. thirty-three interviews were conducted between july 2009 and may 2012. the individuals included aboriginal people from across alberta (cree, blackfoot, dene, and stoney elders, leaders, scientists, and knowledge keepers) and non-aboriginal leaders and western scientists. • sharing circles. two sharing circles were hosted. the first circle was held with elders violet poitras, mary poitras, percy potts, and francis alexis at lac st. anne (sharing circle of elders [sce], focus group, july 2009) and the second circle with elders barb faichney, mary powder, roy ahyason, emma faichney, elizabeth stokes, celina harpe, ed harpe, walter orr, zachary powder, harvey rolland, and frances orr in fort mackay, alberta (sce, focus group, july 2010). • reconciliation circles. finally, the research team hosted discussions between several groups of aboriginal and western knowledge holders. they included the following: (a) western water scientist chris le, aboriginal leader allen benson, western water scientist alexander zender, and elder/cree scientist fred campiou (february 2012); (b) elder violet poitras and western water scientist david schindler (august 2011); (c) allen benson and albertan political leader lorne taylor (october 2011); and (d) wetlands scientist susan bailey and cree scientist len benson. the deliverables for this research include two peer reviewed research papers, the production of evidencebased documentaries, and the development of educational resources for grade school and university students. all participants were recorded using professional video equipment operated by experienced technicians. the resulting data, over 100 hours in total, were transcribed as they were collected. interviews, circles, and discussions were semi-structured, free-flowing, and guided by both the researchers and the participants, in that the researchers set the focus of the interview and the participants determined the content (bernard, 1995), without any “a priori categorization” (fontana & frey, 2000, p. 653) that might have limited the information the teachers shared. further, in the videos we are completing, all individuals who speak will be identified by their name and their affiliation as they wished. for this research article, participant quotes will be presented in two manners. first, any quotes from teaching or sharing circles, as advised by the teaching circle of elders, will be attributed to the collective, rather than an individual, because they are products of the group’s discussion. thus, such quotes will be followed by a citation to the circle (i.e. tce, focus group, 2010). second, any quotes from interviews will be cited using the individual’s name and affiliation. thematic data analysis was completed by the co-investigators both individually and as a group. code identification, labelling, and integration were data-driven (boyatzis, 1998) and emerged as a result of working extensively with the raw data. in addition, the researchers moved back and forth between data collection and analysis (glaser & strauss, 1967; morse, barrett, mayan, olson, & spiers, 2002), beginning with the 2010 elder’s teaching circle. finally, the guiding value at the commencement of the project was humility. the research team began by asking the elders for their advice on how to proceed with the research. indeed, it was not until the final year of a three-year project that we were able to come back to the elders with more specific questions; that is to say, we had learned enough to ask the right questions. the research team was also transformed in this process. we have grown individually (personally) and professionally, and our relationships 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 10 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/10 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.10 within the team have been strengthened. the results achieved show a greater depth of learning than if we had not followed this process. pre-contact worldview a worldview is the overall perspective from which one sees, experiences, and interprets the world. a society can hold a common worldview, including a collectively held constellation of philosophy, basic assumptions, values, and ethics (palmer, 1996). this worldview serves as a framework that helps us to understand reality and our place in society, the world, and the universe. cree beliefs about creation teach that the creator (wiyohtawimaw) gave the people sacred gifts as a result of a sacred relationship between the people and the creator. the first gifts were physical in nature and included the people, land, animals, and plants. the second gifts were metaphysical in nature and included the rules and values that guide our many relationships (cardinal & hildebrandt, 2000). the rules referring to the laws of nature that are unchanging and irrefutable (natural laws) are described by fred campiou: the people in our ceremonies express our gratitude to the creator for the water. the rain that comes to replenish life, the sun that helps make life happen, the wind that makes that life happen. all of these are in the natural order of law. the creator, through his creation, put down the law – this is the way it will happen. he gave entities, grandfathers, the power to make life work. as a human being, we are part of that – we are linked into that. you can’t be separate from it, otherwise you won’t exist. we need that connection that relationship with the natural world… there are laws that govern that world that do not belong to us, that we cannot overpower, we cannot manipulate or even attempt to have any say over. they have their own way. so what we try to do as a people is to fit into that, become a part of it. and not to try to control it – if we ever try that, then we will bring demise to ourselves. (interview, 2012) in addition, the people must adhere to the creator’s laws that govern relationships between all things (wahkohtowin) and the laws that direct us to have good relationships between people (miyo-wîcehtowin). living within the boundaries of these laws will ensure that the people will feel safe, secure, and able to live “the good life” (pimatisiwin). these laws are informed by, and based upon, the values that were gifted to the people as well. the most common values include the following (cardinal & hildebrandt, 2000; leclaire & cardinal, 1998): • kisewâtisiwin: compassion; loving kindness. • tapwewin: speaking the truth with precision and accuracy; honesty. • witaskewin: living together in harmony. • manâtisiwin: respect. • miyotehewin: generosity. • tapateyimisôwin: humility; humbleness. • tipeyimisowin: self-determination; freedom; liberty. • wîcihitowin: helping one another; having a partnership or friendship; unity. the spiral in figure 1 is used here as a symbol of the cree interconnected worldview and the nature of the relationship between the people and all beings in their world animate, inanimate, and spiritual (laboucanebenson, 2009). the spiritual dimension, which is common within indigenous societies globally, is acknowledged as being a significant part of the everyday reality of the cree. joe couture (1991) quoted an anonymous elder, “there are two things you have to know about being an indian. one is that everything is alive. two is that we are all related” (p. 206). this simple statement signals that the spiritual dimension of reality exists and we have a continual responsibility to our reciprocal relationship with it, whether we are hunting, working, playing, or learning. 5 laboucane-benson et al.: are we seeking pimatisiwin or creating pomewin? published by scholarship@western, 2012 figure 1. symbolic representation of cree interconnected worldview. the spaces between the rungs of the spiral are equally significant. the spiral is supported, kept beautiful, and kept whole by the strength of the metaphysical gifts from the creator. by observing the rules of wahkohtowin, miyo-wîcehtowin, and living within the irrefutable natural laws, the people keep in place the scaffolding that ensures the spiral moves upward continuously – perfectly – and that we have equality, harmony, and balance in all relationships throughout the spiral. indeed, this spiral is the actualization of the best possible life we can attain. the on-going act of building, strengthening, and renewing our relationships is, thus, the essence of miyo-pimatisiwin – seeking the good life. the nature of the sacred relationship the sacred relationship between the cree and water can only be understood through the relationship between the creator and the people. cardinal and hildebrandt (2000), in working with several elders in treaty 6, describe this relationship: the cree word “iyiniw miyikowisowina” (that which has been given to the peoples) and “iyiniw saweyihtakosiwin” (the people’s sacred gifts) are used to describe those special gifts that originate in the special relationship that first nations peoples have with the creator and the blessings or gifts that devolve to the peoples collectively and individually from that relationship. (p. 100) thus, water is a part of the sacred physical gifts bestowed upon the cree by the creator, and through wahkohtowin (an aspect of the metaphysical gifts) the cree were given the rules regarding how they were to build and renew a respectful relationship with water. during a teaching circle of elders the story of how the creator bestowed the gift4 was shared: 4 the elders were careful to share only what they could, within the rules of cree pedagogy, about this creation story. to transgress the rules would be to bring negativity to themselves, their children, and their grandchildren. to be learned properly and completely, the reader would have to become a seeker of this knowledge, which is learned through ceremony and apprenticeship. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 10 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/10 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.10 it makes a lot of sense what we are told about these origins. in particular with water, it’s in the [creation] story… it talks about these women, the grandmothers, which were selected or asked by the creator, which ones will come here to make this world… this happened in the spirit world before this world was made… the first one the creator asked, he made that one the moon grandmother. second one, he made into mother earth. the third one, he made into water. that’s all the water we see in the world, the oceans, streams, the river. that’s the life; there’s lots of life in that water. it’s a woman, a grandmother. the fourth one he made into the image of woman you see walking around on earth today. that one to carry life into this world for the creator; that’s what we’re born from. (tce, focus group, 2010) from this perspective, water is regarded with reverence because it is connected to the people’s relationship with the creator, and it is perceived as a sacred being – a grandmother in the spirit world, with whom we are to be in relationship. as the elders described, “water is a very, very powerful element, [a] grandmother and i think if we look at her that way, learn to respect her that way, then we will have life for our children” (tce, focus group, 2010). in addition, water is venerated and considered sacred by the people because it is one of the life-giving and life-sustaining gifts that are absolutely necessary for survival. the elders spoke at length about their regard for water: our people had high reverence, still today, high reverence for water respect for the water. [pointing to another elder in the circle] he spoke about the quality of the water and in the old days they used to go and even to have a swim in the pond where they know it was clean. they used to put tobacco in that water and pray for that water and to show respect for that water. that’s how much the people had such high regard for the water. (tce, focus group, 2010) many of the elders also acknowledged the power of water stating, “i talked about the rivers and the streams and the places where the people knew it was safe to cross the river. they didn’t just cross anywhere, and when they did they made a prayer for safe passage on that water” (tce, focus group, 2010). the elders also taught that the name “canada” was derived from the cree word kanatan, which means “pure and clean.5 they stated that, in the past, “the water was pure, the land was pure” (tce, focus group, 2010). further, the elders reflected that, when water is respected, it remains pure, thus, it holds the power to heal the people who are sick and also grow medicines that heal illness: wherever it was used, wherever it was accessed, there was always a moment in time when our people would take the time to make that prayer, giving thanks for this beautiful water we were given and this gift. and the medicines that go in the water as well and those ponds – there is medicine there that we use. when you take that water, even to make some tea with it, that medicine comes with that water…and it heals, becomes part of your healing, your system. (tce, focus group, 2010) as well, the elders shared that “the rain would fall on one’s back and in our indian worldview, it was viewed as sacred medicinal water that was there to cleanse” (tce, focus group, 2010). finally, the elders taught that our bodies are made up of water; therefore, there is no separation between the water and human beings. the sacred water that births our babies is a part of our bodies as well. we are the water, and the water is us; if we respect the water, we are respecting ourselves. to pollute the water is to pollute our bodies, which will eventually put our very survival at risk. the elders also referred to the sacred water at birth. “in our worldview, we are born from our mother and in the process of bath; it is water that 5 for the cree, cleanliness is an important way of being and a part of everyday life. kanacisowin refers to clean living and kanateyimew refers to an individual with a faultless, pure, unblemished character (leclaire & cardinal, 1998). 7 laboucane-benson et al.: are we seeking pimatisiwin or creating pomewin? published by scholarship@western, 2012 comes first in that sacredness of given birth” (tce, focus group, 2010). as well, there are rituals and procedures performed at the birth of a baby. even when a child was born, they used that pure, clean water to bathe the child. and it was a healing for the little one; as well when they used to use that water for specific purpose when preparing that child for life so it depended on water. (tce, focus group, 2010) in the cree way, every child needs to be taught to create respectful relationships with all aspects of creation. this is accomplished by role modelling behaviour to young children and then making ceremonies available that would help young adults garner their own relationship with water. for many cree people, the fasting ceremony, in particular, the depth of sacrifice made in the ceremony, is a powerful teacher about the sacredness of water. one of the elders, in a teaching circle reflected upon his experiences of fasting: you know the one time i fasted i remember, the only thing i thought about was water. i never thought about food, i wasn’t hungry, i was thirsty... i went eight days one time with no water and no food and i was coming down the hill, sort of like this, floating, about half way i had to stop, i was so tired, even just coming down the hill…. and i stopped and i laid down, this was in the summertime, i laid on that hill like this, i was tired, waiting, and i woke up underneath this vine, it looked like a couple of grapes, they were kind of purplish and i’ve never seen that before in my life (and i’ve spent a lot of time in the bush). and i took one of them and i put it in my mouth, as soon as i bite it, it’s just water, nothing in there but water. and so, once i drank that, my thirst just went away completely, i never had to have water [in my fast] after that. that day i was just replenished with that one grapelike thing. i went around looking for some more, i couldn’t find them. to me that was a message, that time it was sacred water that was given to me, to give me back that life. (tce, focus group, 2010) the fasting ceremony is both a personal experience for the person who is participating in the ceremony (the faster) and a communal experience for the ceremonialists. all the helpers are required to put on the ceremony (which includes help for the actual ceremony, as well as maintaining a camp during the ceremony). the participants are put out onto the land by themselves. in isolation, they will learn about themselves and their environment, which will be accomplished through prayer and meditation. in this way, learning is achieved through a connection with the creator and the spirit world. george brertton tells this story: one fast i went to, the first one, this old man made my [fasting] lodge right by a big red ant hill… and i`m looking at this lodge and i`m shaking my head, why this old man put me there, he knows those things are going to eat the flesh right off me in a few minutes, why would he do that, is he playing a joke on me or what... and i looked back and i seen these ants by the thousands all over. anyway i moved away from them, i took my stuff like this and i started praying, meditating…and then the next thing i knew, i was doing a pipe ceremony. and as i was doing that pipe ceremony i started thinking about these ants while i`m doing this so i offered that pipe to the leader of the colony, the spirit of that colony so that they could accept me as a visitor, that i didn’t come out there to harm them, that rather come there to learn from them. so i finished my pipe, got up, took some tobacco, walked around this ant hill and then i offered tobacco to them and i left and went and got my stuff and …i stayed four days and four nights there, they never bothered me, they walk all the way around me like this, never once did they walk through where i was, even though they had little paths in there, that`s how respect they showed me. (interview, 2011) in order to ensure that children understood the sacred relationship with water and would pursue their own understanding of the sacredness of water as adults, the cree had in place a sophisticated, experiential system of pedagogy that included role modelling, ceremonies, living on the land, and personal sacrifice. in this way, knowledge of the natural laws and the understanding of wahkohtowin were passed down from generation to generation, ensuring the survival of the people. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 10 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/10 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.10 colonial policies of domination and assimilation james tully (2000) defined internal colonization as “the historical process by which structures of domination have been set in place on turtle island/north america over the indigenous peoples and their territories without their consent and in response to their resistance against and with these structures” (p. 37). tully suggests that internal colonization can be considered in four dimensions: (a) the arrival and settlement of european people brought war, pestilence, and foreign disease, leaving indigenous populations in ruins. (b) the taking of all power and authority over indigenous territory and forcing indigenous people into small parcels of land that were perceived to be of no use to the colonial government. (c) treaty making and periods of cooperation between indigenous peoples and the canadian government. (d) the establishment of european-based governments on north american soil resulting in the development of legislation (i.e. the indian act), policies of domination (i.e. residential school policies), and the subsequent formation of colonial band councils that are controlled by the canadian federal governments. this section of the discussion will focus on the fourth dimension of internal colonization and how legislation and policies have caused chaos in many aboriginal communities across canada and, for the cree, a disruption of the teaching of wahkohtowin. the result has been devastating, leaving indigenous people feeling hopeless, helpless, and powerless to self-determine their future. the indian act prior to the tabling of the constitution in 1867, many policies and pieces of legislation created between 1763 and 1867 were enacted and amended, then formed the basis of the indian act. the first was the royal proclamation of 1763 that clearly distinguished which lands were designated for indian tribes. it determined that the interest in these lands were held by the collective, rather than by individuals (canada, 2010), thus acknowledging the indian nation as a autonomous political entity and giving rise to the tri-partite relationship between the crown, the colony, and the indian nation. further, the crown established that aboriginal people were under the protection of the crown (canada, 2010), and only the crown could buy or sell aboriginal lands, creating the process whereby indian land could be purchased for settlement or development. between 1763 and 1867, the notion of indian nations as being autonomous political entities began to give way to legislation that focussed on defining who was indian, as well as the “civilization,” control, and assimilation of aboriginal people. these included the following: • in 1828, the first formal inquiry into indian conditions in canada recommended the need for “indians in fixed locations where they could be educated, converted to christianity, and transformed into farmers” (canada, 1996c, p. 244). • the bagot commission of 1844 recommended that indians be encouraged to become farmers and tradesmen. to facilitate this process they would be provided with education and agricultural tools instead of gifts and payments. thus, boarding schools were recommended as a way of providing training for assimilation and fostering christianity. in addition, the bagot commission suggested that government officials maintain control over band membership on reserves and, therefore, define who would or would not receive treaty payments. the commissioners recommended that those who were ineligible would include “all persons of mixed indian and non-indian blood who had not been adopted by the band; all indian women who married nonindian men and their children; and all indian children who had been educated in industrial 9 laboucane-benson et al.: are we seeking pimatisiwin or creating pomewin? published by scholarship@western, 2012 schools” (canada, 1996c, p. 247). the recommendations made by the bagot commission ultimately provided the basis for the development of many aspects of subsequent acts. • two acts were passed in 1850: an act for the better protection of the lands and property of indians in lower canada and an act for the protection of indians in upper canada. in these documents the government first attempted to identify who was an “indian,” thus formally taking away the legal right of indian nations to determine their own membership. the term “indian” was defined with then current notions of race in mind, whereby only a person of indian blood or married to a person of indian blood would be considered an indian (canada, 1996c, p. 248). as this definition evolved, indian status and residency rights became associated with the male line. • in 1857, the gradual civilization act, an act to encourage the gradual civilization of indian tribes in this province and to amend the laws relating to indians, was passed to introduce the process of enfranchisement, deemed a privilege, whereby indian men (not women) could become full british subjects and be free from the protected status of being an indian. while this process was voluntary for a man, his wife and children would be automatically enfranchised with him. the underlying assumptions of this act were that to have indian status was to be deemed inferior and that it is the natural desire of all people to work towards assuming a british identity. an assault on the aboriginal psyche, this act created an environment whereby only indians who renounced their communities, cultures, and languages could gain the respect of colonial (the crown) and later canadian society. the relationship set out by the proclamation of 1763 between the crown, the colonies, and autonomous tribal nations was, thus, transformed by the act into one of current state goals – those of domination, control, and assimilation over aboriginal people. • the 1860 indian lands act centralized control over all aboriginal people and their lands to the office of the chief superintendent of indian affairs. indian nations were no longer recognized in the new tripartite crown/dominion/provincial scheme (canada, 1996b). in 1876, the first version of indian act was passed, bringing together aspects of the past legislation and moving forward an explicit agenda of assimilating aboriginal people into canadian society. the royal commission of aboriginal peoples (canada, 1996c) concluded that: the transition from tribal nation in the tripartite imperial system to legal incompetent in the bilateral federal/provincial system was now complete. while protection remained a policy goal, it was no longer collective indian tribal autonomy that was protected: it was the individual indian recast as a dependent ward – in effect, the child of the state. (p. 255) as such, the canadian government expressed its desire to encourage the enfranchisement, education, and “civilization” of the indian people. in 1869, the first provision for the election of chief and council on indian reserves, with very limited power to set bylaws, was set out in an act for the gradual enfranchisement of indians, the better management of indian affairs, and an extension of the provisions of the act 31st victoria (makarenko, 2008). this enforced system of government led to the destabilization of family and clan by making them no longer the foundation of economic and political activities (tully, 2000). aboriginal women were not allowed to vote in band council elections. the act also included compulsory enfranchisement for first nation men, as opposed to being voluntary. notably, only one first nation man was enfranchised between 1857 and 1876. in addition, the act made it law that if an aboriginal woman married a non-aboriginal man, she and any children born from this marriage would be excluded from indian status, thus moving forward the colonial agenda of assimilation (makarenko, 2008). the indian act was amended in 1884 to protect indians from their own cultures (canada, 1996c, p. 267), prohibiting ceremonies, such as the potlach, the tamanawas dance, and later the sundance. a jail term of two 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 10 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/10 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.10 to six months would be given to anyone engaging in or assisting in these ceremonies. in 1918, indian agents were given the power to prosecute anti-dancing, anti-potlatching provisions (p. 268), acting to suppress the entire ceremony, even though it was only certain aspects of the ceremonies that were criminalized (p. 269). eventually, indian agents were allowed to conduct trials wherever they thought necessary; all forms of political protest were criminalized and the indian agent acted as the final word on justice issues (p. 266). the indian act was in no way a fair or equitable piece of legislation; rather, it was an act to institute internal colonization. aboriginal people living on reserve could not vote in federal elections until the 1951 amendment to the indian act was passed. aboriginal people could not manage their own reserve lands or moneys and were under the constant supervision of the federally appointed indian agent (canada, 1996c, p. 237). when the first indian act was passed it made no reference to the treaties that were in existence or were being currently negotiated (p. 255), and there was no importance attached to the nation-to-nation nature of the treaties (p. 256). almost every year after the act was initially passed, amendments were brought forward to adjust the act to further the ultimate goal of assimilating aboriginal peoples. many of the provisions were enacted solely to increase the power of federal bureaucrats – specifically the indian agent who became a powerful figure and came to dominate all important aspects of band life (p. 259). until the 1982 amendments to the constitution, the indian act was the most prominent reflection of the distinctive place of aboriginal people in canada. when the government attempted to repeal the indian act in 1969 by issuing the “white paper”6 and in 2002 with the first nations governance act, aboriginal people throughout the country protested and, ultimately, caused the withdrawal of both attempts. the reason for these protests can be seen in the following quote from the late dr. harold cardinal (1999): “no just society and no society with even pretensions to being just can tolerate such a piece of legislation, but we would rather continue to live in bondage under the inequitable indian act than surrender our sacred rights” (p. 119). residential school policy the 1828 darling commission and the 1850 baggot commission both made strong recommendations that, in order to assimilate aboriginal people into british society, both education and conversion to christianity were required. after the adoption of the constitution in 1867, the department of indian affairs instituted policies that would aggressively promote the aboriginal people’s assimilation and conversion to christianity. the purpose of the policies was to separate aboriginal people from their identity, culture, traditions, and language, and thus transform them into a labouring class of british subjects. in 1920, while tabling a bill that made it mandatory for all indian children between the ages of 7 and 15 years to attend residential schools, duncan scott, deputy superintendent of indian affairs, stated: i want to get rid of the indian problem. i do not think, as a matter of fact, that the country ought to continuously protect a class of people who are able to stand alone… our objective is to continue until there is not a single indian in canada that has not been absorbed into the body politic and there is no indian question, and no indian department; that is the whole object of this bill. (cited in leslie, 1978) residential schools were funded by the federal government and operated through contracted service with the different church organizations of canada. government policy at the time reflected the assumption that aboriginal children would not succeed if still under the influence of their families and, thus, gave rise to the justification for the removal of children from their communities, the complete disruption of aboriginal families, the re-socializing of children in residential schools, and schemes for integrating graduates into a nonaboriginal world (canada, 1996a, p. 313). the stated goal and wish of the government was to obtain “entire possession” of aboriginal children once they reached the age of seven or eight (p. 314). accordingly, 6 the white paper would have seen the global elimination of all indian special status, the gradual phasing out of federal responsibility for indians and the protection of reserve lands, the repeal of the indian act, and the end of treaties (canada, 1996c, p. 238). 11 laboucane-benson et al.: are we seeking pimatisiwin or creating pomewin? published by scholarship@western, 2012 residential school policies, at this time, supported the passage of moving from the aboriginal to the nonaboriginal world in three phases: separation, socialization, and assimilation through enfranchisement – which entailed a male graduate leaving behind his indian status and becoming a full canadian citizen (p. 317) who would not have protected indian status. clearly, residential schools were the most powerful instrument in the government's enterprise to civilize indians with the goal to eventually be rid of aboriginal identity, aboriginal tribes, and the “indian problem.” although the churches were contracted to provide administrative, operational, and educational services at the residential schools, no provisions were made in the contracts to oversee the quality of care and education that aboriginal children would receive. although agents raised concerns, schools operated without any regulations regarding how discipline and punishment was administered at the schools (with the exception of a regulation passed in 1949 that encouraged the use of strapping). as such, an environment was created where staff acted without consequence (p. 352). indeed, regardless of the numerous reports filed over decades, no action was ever taken by either party to correct the substantive proof of neglect, cruelty, and abuse (emotional, physical, and sexual) being perpetrated on the children attending residential schools (canada, 1996a). much evidence exists describing the mismanaged, underfunded, and overcrowded conditions of residential schools, which resulted in a high death rate in students, mostly due to the quick spread of diseases (p. 329-330) including tuberculosis. poor menu planning, combined with a diet that failed to meet nutritional guidelines, left the children receiving “too little meat and not enough green vegetables, whole grains, fruit, juice, milk, iodized salt, and eggs” (p. 345). as a result, children experienced pervasive hunger and, at times, resorted to stealing fruit and vegetables for survival. it was common school policy that, upon admission to the school, traditional clothing was discarded and replaced with school uniforms, traditional hair braids were cut off (and often boy's heads were completely shaved), the use of aboriginal language was forbidden, and the practice of aboriginal spirituality and culture (deemed morally and ethically wrong) was prohibited (p. 316). if children dared transgress these rules, they received punishments ranging from shaming to physical violence. as a result, if any of the children did go home, they were unable to communicate with their family and were unaware, suspicious, or afraid of customs and rituals that had historically strengthened and reaffirmed relationships between family and community members. the disconnect created between children and their families was described in 1913 when indian agents on reserves noted a cultural gap that was creating people stranded between communities, without an identity (p. 357). further, the european lecture-style teaching model employed by the residential schools had little in common with the oral, experiential pedagogy of aboriginal people. thus, many aboriginal children, having been accustomed to the latter, struggled to learn the european school curriculum (p. 320). consequently, they failed to learn either the teachings of settler society or those of the aboriginal society. by 1956 federal government policy regarding residential schools changed. acknowledging the importance that parents played in the children’s development, a provision for the creation of parent-school committees was established. as residential schools began to close, the child welfare system became responsible for increasing numbers of aboriginal children. by the mid 1960s one third of all aboriginal children were under the government’s care (p. 322). the apprehension of aboriginal children became so widespread and continuous that it is commonly referred to as the 60s scoop. the apprehension of aboriginal children remains common policy today; currently, aboriginal children make up 65 percent of the child welfare caseload in alberta (alberta, 2010). in 2002, there were approximately 22,500 aboriginal children in care in canada (bennet & blackstone cited in lafrance & bastien, 2007). impact of colonization for the cree, colonization has had devastating, pervasive, and multi-dimensional effects. first, colonization has interfered with the creation of a positive cree identity in individuals and as a collective. during a teaching circle, the elders spoke emphatically about how the colonizer has defined who they are and how this colonized identity is inaccurate and ignorant: 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 10 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/10 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.10 in the indian world…you have to realise there is an indian mind…there is an indigenous mind...i don’t like that word indian, i don’t like that word aboriginal, i don’t like that word first nations to me that’s where we are running into problems. because we have always allowed other nations, other people from foreign lands to define who we are. we never had the opportunity to define who we are…[the european settlers] had an opportunity over a hundred years to come tell us who we should be and how we should live. they have never heard our understanding of who we are. they don’t know our relationship that we have with our creator and our grandfathers. they don’t understand the stories and the reason why we are here and we are put on mother earth here at this time and what our responsibilities are in this country, our responsibilities to our families and children. (tce, focus group, 2007) further, residential school policies caused enormous change that became evident in aboriginal communities across canada. prior to the implementation of residential schools, the family was the all-encompassing unit – a mediator between the individual and the social, economic, and political spheres of a larger society (canada, 1996b). government policies that forced children to stay in residential schools, with little or no contact with their families, deprived children of the principal agency that helps them make sense of the world (canada, 1996b). parents were also made to feel inferior because, due to their aboriginal identity and/or the poverty in which they lived, they were deemed incapable of raising their children. they were made to relinquish their responsibility of interpreting the world for their children (canada, 1996b), and they had to withstand the shame of not being able to protect the gifts they were bestowed by the creator. the loss of connection and communication between children and their parents and grandparents severely damaged essential family relationships, blocking the transmission of cultural, ethical, and normative knowledge between generations. the elders in the teaching circle of elders described this history, railing against the inability to teach their children about the rules of wahkohtowin, their sacred responsibilities, and the cree interconnected worldview. they shared: the laws that the governments have established do not correlate with our understanding of our responsibility and our obligations to our creator and our families. so that is where we are running into problems – the creation of alcohol, drugs, the needle – everything that we see in society today that people are using. we see the jails being filled up because of that behaviour. it was brought over and our children are caught in that. because we didn’t have the opportunity to teach our children the values we talk about – these concepts – it was stopped – it was blocked – it was manipulated and turned into something. our people were demonized. by the churches, by the government. by saying our elders were not important, our teachings, our ways were not important. that’s what created the mess today. we have those teachings, we have those understanding. [we have] the stories about the origins how we were created, how we were given this land. [we] can tell stories about before the white man first came here. there is history – [we] know those stories. the truth you can say. what the history really is in this country. the truth from our perspective. (tce, focus group, 2007) the elders focussed on how inadequately first nation participation in history is taught in canadian schools; specifically, the fundamental breach of the sacred relationship between the first peoples and the european lawmakers and canadian government that was evoked by the pipe ceremonies performed at the time of the treaty signings. they assert that the process in which laws and policies have been created in canada has been disrespectful to the first nations and, thus, have resulted in a transgression of laws of wahkohtowin. an elder in a teaching circle stated that: regarding the law – canadian law – as it is – is only made by one side – one party. when the newcomers came to our land – they shook hands – they said they agreed to live with us. they agreed to live in peace and harmony. they had an agreement – they lifted the pipe and made a treaty. then he went his way and indians stayed on the land. he started writing laws and using the paper to make things his way. an indian person should have been there looking over that paper and seeing what it 13 laboucane-benson et al.: are we seeking pimatisiwin or creating pomewin? published by scholarship@western, 2012 said. how that law affected indian people, because we are half of that agreement that was made. it takes two people to make a treaty. those treaties…that relationship is the relationship we are in today. everything that the law is doing is affecting us but we have no say. they are not living up to their agreement – because of that there will always be disagreement and conflict. we have a relationship with the white man – a wahkohtowin. if they were to listen to our side, our law and rules about relationships, behaviours in the community and societies – we would have a stronger, healthier society. their own children are being affected the same ways as we are. because we don’t follow the rules anymore. they are lying to the creator when they do that. there was three parts to that agreement because the creator was part of the treaty. it is all connected. the protection that this country is under [is] based on that agreement by our ceremonies and our people. when we lifted the pipe – there was the creator, the whiteman and the indian. because they are breaking their agreement, the protection of the country itself is becoming more at risk. (tce, focus group, 2007) from this fundamental breach of relationship between peoples, the elders believe that a serious transgression of the laws of wahkohtowin has occurred, which is referred to as pastahowin in the cree language. when asked to speak about this concept, elder fred campiou stated: we use the word pastahowin, really what it means is overstepping the bounds, going outside the boundaries that you are entitled to … in terms of pastahowin, in today’s society – there is a lot of that going on… society is over extending itself into boundaries, and it is creating conflict, division, hardship, animosity and resentment. all of those negative feelings that come up when boundaries have been crossed over. (interview, 2012) according to elder fred campiou, the word pastahowin refers to both the action of transgressing the boundaries of wahkohtowin, as well as the intergenerational consequences that come from that action. many elders translate pastahowin to english (and western thinking) as “sinning against your children.” in other words, it is committing a transgression that has dire consequences that you, as well as your children and grandchildren will have to suffer. fred taught: why these words exist is to remind us of the behaviours the creator expects us to exhibit. expects us to live. and beware of other behaviours that are going to eventually maybe destroy our environment, destroy ourselves or maybe future generation… that’s where ceremony reminds us what the creator expects from us. that is the point that is being missed. (interview, 2012) many first nations people today have not been taught to view the land, water, and air as sacred gifts from the creator. generations of people have lived who do not understand natural laws, nor how to live, innovate, and prosper within these laws. the elders, who want to teach wahkohtowin to cree youth, find themselves competing with television, video games, and gangster culture; thus, many young adults have no understanding of their sacred responsibility. indeed, the elders have now observed that all of creation is suffering as a result of human pastahowin; the behaviour of aboriginal and non-aboriginal people is now destroying the water. elder fred campiou describes the current state of our collective wahkohtowin with water: i am really concerned about [our pastahowin] with water… the water itself is one of the most important grandmothers, elements in our world that we need to take care of, we need to respect. without that water, nothing is going to live. there’s a lot of careless people doing things with the water that’s creating this poison, this environment where it’s not going to be safe. already, we see it back home, we don’t feel safe to drink in our rivers we don’t want to eat the fish… some of our ceremonial people will not eat the ducks anymore that we used to use in ceremony because of where they are landing. how toxic they are, what kind of sickness might be in those animals. same thing with the moose… they were very sick, when they opened them up there was this green stuff, 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 10 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/10 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.10 basically rotting within. it’s sick. it’s everywhere, in every part of our life the water it is there. if we don’t look after it, we are going to be finished. (interview, 2012) earlier, a spiral was presented (figure 1) that illustrated an interconnected worldview that was supported by the cree teachings of wahkohtowin and natural law. when the cree people were prevented from teaching these values, rules, and way of life, the scaffolding that ensured healthy, respectful relationships was severely damaged, and the spiral collapsed upon itself. the critical relational boundaries were transgressed. the spiral, for some families and communities has become a tangled, chaotic knot as illustrated in figure 2. figure 2. symbolic representation of the impacts of colonialism on interconnections in cree worldview. this effect on the cree people, as well as other first nations and metis people that we interviewed in alberta, is a pervasive feeling of sadness and despair (pometasiwin7) connected to the water. pometasiwin, a result of policies and laws that have damaged essential human relationships (including the loss of the sacred relationship between the people and the water) manifests itself as hopelessness, helplessness, powerlessness, and voicelessness. during a sharing circle of elders in fort mckay, the elders shared many stories about the way in which development is undertaken and their lack of participation in this process. one of the elders shared: when i grew up here, that river was high. we lived off that river. i used to go with my father to go get the nets and bring the fish in. and now when you look at it and that, you can't because there is absolutely nothing there. they've caught fish and reported the fish, you know, it had mercury and other items in it and that. we can't drink that water. we can't live off that water anymore…i don't think the government really understand the importance of our culture, of our living and the muskegs and everything and when the oil companies put up there industry, they took a lot of water out and destroyed our water. and the government is letting them do this without consulting and sitting with the native people; how important that the water is, that the lakes are, the rivers is and the muskegs and wetlands. because that was our survival. (sce, focus group, 2010) the elders in fort mckay also described their powerlessness to use the water in their traditional ways, including the ability to pick medicine that grows by the water. in this instance, the area in which the medicines have been harvested by their people for generations is now under the surveillance of the industry that is developing the land. one elder described the current situation: 7 the creation of despair; people are giving up (fred campiou, interview, 2012). 15 laboucane-benson et al.: are we seeking pimatisiwin or creating pomewin? published by scholarship@western, 2012 you’ve got to go to horseshoe lake for the rat root, that's the rat root that we usually pick. now if i go in there, they’re going to bring this security department... to watch me pick that medicine. i wasn't told that way by my mom and dad. if i'm going to make an offering, ask the medicine what i'm going to need it for, to help me; i want to be alone and talk to it. talk to the creator at the same time… but i don't want a whole audience watching me, what i'm saying and what i'm doing. (sce, focus group, 2010) for elder violet poitras, the medicine that she has picked for years is now poisoned and harvesting these medicines is not possible. in an interview, violet described the loss she and her community have sustained: but along over there, where the cattails are… there will be still some medicine there, [in the past] we’d have to dig it out, and some growing like up on top, we’d just uproot it. but because of what happened to our water… that train derailed over there and it spilled some fluid into the water, some poisonous stuff and it killed everything in the water and it killed everything along the shores where our medicines [were]… it’s a very unhealthy lake, unhealthy water, so we just don’t bother anymore coming to the lake or even the kids coming to swim or let alone picking medicines, we don’t do that anymore, so it’s a big loss to the community. it’s a big loss for us and, of course, for the children. (interview, 2010) elder celena harpe, from fort mckay, described her feeling of hopelessness toward the pollution of the streams and creeks in her community and her concern for the people in the future: it really makes me sad...i wish this didn’t have to happen. we'll say for instance, now our future generations...what's going to happen to the younger generations now, later on in life? how are they going to survive? they can't drink this river water...now you know, they can't be buying water... you want to go to the cabin, you have to take bottled water and that's stupid. i mean that's it not right, it’s not natural, it’s not our culture; it’s not the way we lived. we didn't have to take water when we used to go in the bush and travel for days on end to get to my dad's trap line. there used to be creeks and little rivers. we used to just go and dip a little water and make tea and drink it and cook with it and wash with it, whatever but that's not the way it is now. (interview, 2010) feelings of powerlessness were also described the cree elders in the teaching circles. one elder stated: everybody believes they can’t do nothing about it because somebody else is in control, someone else is handling that water, we’re buying it. the government pours millions of dollars to put water treatment plant on reserve, they’re controlling that water, but we are allowing them to. (tce, focus group, 2010) part of the cree belief is that through ceremonies we can heal the water by reclaiming our wahkohtowin with it. one of the elders (tce, focus group, 2010) despaired that, although he has the capacity to perform specific ceremonies for the water, no one comes to him to ask for these ceremonies. he believes that, if the people supported the ceremonies with resources and their participation, the water could be made pure and it could be used to heal the people. by healing the water, the people could simultaneously reclaim their sacred relationship and heal the despair they feel as well. however, people are not going to the ceremonies, and, thus, the elder worries that there are too few young people apprenticing to take the ceremonies over. another elder (tce, focus group, 2010) stated that we should not only think about what kind of world are we leaving our children, but more importantly what kind of children are we leaving the earth? policies that promote pimatisiwin the task that society must now collectively undertake can be visualized as the untangling of the chaotic spiral presented in figure 2. drawing on the indigenous model of building family and community resilience 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 10 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/10 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.10 (laboucane-benson, 2009) the process will include three interconnected dimensions: (a) reconciling our damaged relationships, (b) reclaiming an interconnected worldview, and (c) repatriating the power to respectfully self-determine. for positive change to occur, all three dimensions need to be engaged at many different levels, including the natural environment. in this way, we can begin to seek the good life (pimatisiwin) collectively, in a manner that respects all perspectives. this model suggests actions that can both untangle and support the spiral of healthy relationships, and, thus, inform and transform individual action, family priorities, and government policies. this framework is illustrated in figure 3. figure 3. an indigenous model of building resilience. adapted from laboucane-benson (2009). reclaiming worldviews for many of the elders, knowledge keepers, and ceremonialists, the cornerstone to reclaiming an interconnected worldview is the reclamation of the ceremonies as educational instruments. while a part of parenting is role-modelling wahkohtowin, the ceremonies are the milieu where traditional teachings are imparted in the context of prayer and connectedness to the environment and the cosmos. the elders we spoke with were emphatic: “we all need to support and participate in the ceremonies. we need to bring our children to ceremonies and provide the opportunities for them to become seekers of the sacred and traditional knowledge.” this requires a change in priorities of individuals and families, as ceremonialists require support and the participation of helpers who continue to learn through their involvement in the ceremonies. in addition, the opportunity to be on the land and to learn from adults who know the land is critical. all the knowledge keepers we spoke to had garnered intergenerational, longitudinal information about the local, natural world from adults in their lives. for knowledge keeper len benson, who spent much of his youth with his uncles in the bush, the land and water were important to him. he shared this story: how i am connected to the land is with the trapping, with our own traditional ways which we follow and that’s hunting and gathering which we do every year. right from spring with the geese coming back right until the fall with the moose. i guess the best way to put it is i look forward to every change in the season that’s coming because everything is different; everything is new all the time, right from the plants that start growing to when the water melts. i think most first nations that are raised in this area and have stayed on the reserve are the same way; they look forward to seeing the 17 laboucane-benson et al.: are we seeking pimatisiwin or creating pomewin? published by scholarship@western, 2012 green grass. along with that comes the ducks that come back, and gathering of the eggs and right throughout every season. (interview, 2010) cree people who have lived on the land are able to combine this information with their observations over a lifetime to draw powerful conclusions about the changes they are witnessing in the water and the land. len benson shared another story about the change he has witnessed to the water and how people used that water in the past: as a young lad we would go out fishing, snaring fish, catching them in the springtime, going out shooting ducks, everything at the water and from the water. if you were out playing or you were out doing something you didn’t run all the way back, sometimes you were a mile away from camp or something, you were able to drink right out of a muskeg. all you have to do is go there, move the leaves out of the way, take a cup or take your hand and drink it and you felt safe. it never crossed your mind that you would get sick from water…[now, everything has] changed because there is no way in the world anybody would go and do the same things that we did, like you wouldn’t go and drink out of a muskeg or out of a stream, you just wouldn’t do it. you can’t do it…the shortage of water and the water that is being consumed by industry, it’s phenomenal, and it’s going to get more and more, they are going to take more and more water as time goes on. and then, the pollution of the water, the erosion that is happening out there, of course it breaks my heart. i think if more people were aware of how serious this is they would feel the same way but a lot of people aren’t aware of it, they don’t see it. (interview, 2010) len specifically refers to how these change in the water affected the fish in his area: like this time of day when the creeks are open and the lakes are starting to open, and along the lakeshore, those jackfish, they spawn in the spring, they go up the rivers, pickerel too, and suckers. [we used to] make a snare there and haul them out. my mom used to make dried fish with those jackfish …even around the lakes, and the lakeshore, used to be fish all around the lakes in the spring, just splashing water all over. nowadays i don’t see that anymore. see, where i lived, to go across was about four or five miles from the beaver lake and that beaver lake creek runs upstream about, there’s another lake up there, right in the middle of the reserve, we call it cross lake…fish travel on those creeks too. after they finish spawning they all come back to the lake... now the creeks are no good, they are not running anymore… they’ve dried up. (interview, 2010) len’s story illustrates the experiential, longitudinal quality of knowledge that is acquired through lived experience on the land. the knowledge of water that len holds is within the context of a deep connectedness to the water and to a way of life that the water has provided in the past. we conclude that len’s sacred relationship with the water is simultaneously historical, familial, emotional, and intellectual, revealing data that is grounded in his understanding of natural law and can be used to heal water. thus, the findings from indigenous science can be critical in resolving water issues, and they need to be recognized by policymakers. the reclamation of the sacred relationship is, therefore, an undertaking that requires collective action. the elders were clear: we need to teach our children natural law and wahkohtowin so that they can lead the change required to heal and preserve the water for future generations. reconciliation the essential relationship between cultures, nations, and communities, as well as the relationship between humans and the environment (including water) require renewal and repair, given the history of internal colonization, legislation, and schooling discussed earlier. the elders in the tce (focus group, 2010) taught that the arrival of the european settlers was foretold and the outcomes (good and bad) were predicted. as we move forward to heal our wahkohtowin with the water, we must also repair and renew the relationship 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 10 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/10 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.10 between the settlers (mainstream canada) and the first nations people. in all of our interviews and circles, the elders and knowledge keepers were united in their message: we need to work together. the elders (tce, focus group, 2010) spoke of how willing the first groups of settlers were to listen to the people because they needed the knowledge of first nation peoples to survive on the land. today, however, they feel that mainstream society is not interested in what the elders and knowledge keepers have to say. still, the elders (tce, focus group, 2010) spoke of their willingness to share their sacred teachings with people from other cultures. in an interview, elder george brertton reflected on his fasting ceremony experience and what he learned from the ants: [in] cree they say (mâmawohkamâtowin) what they say is: work all together, let’s work all together. well you know the people who say that should go watch those ants, you’d learn from that, how they worked all together. [work] titles? nothing. work, work as a community. (interview, 2012) we understand this story to be teaching the value of humility; that each of us has an important part in the process of healing the water and a responsibility to participate. to really work together, society has to acknowledge the unique and important perspective of the first peoples and work with the indigenous scientists to resolve water issues. the solution is based upon our collective ability to develop a wahkohtowin between the indigenous leaders and scientists and western scientists and policymakers. to accomplish this, we must undertake a paradigm revolution in our society. the elders taught that our children require both western and traditional education in order to be leaders of change now and in the future. thus, by creating a wahkohtowin between the first peoples and society, we can honour both ways of learning and equip our children with the knowledge they need to transform the way in which we use water. these new leaders will have a wahkohtowin with water, and, as a result, they will be innovators, creating new technology and policies that will heal the water. self determination self determination, in the context of this discussion, is the ability to make decisions for oneself and manage one’s own affairs as an individual, family, and nation. as such, all people (individually and collectively) need to be able to self-determine in ways that are respectful of other’s ability to self-determine. the elders (tce, focus group, 2012) were clear that the voicelessness in public policy and decision-making of the people must change; for example, they referenced the creation story of the four grandmothers (moon, earth, water, and women) and the importance of women’s voice in decisions that pertain to water: that’s how our people lived, strong kinship. if one goes back to that [creation] story and knows where we come from, [then they would know] the woman is strong. but today the woman’s voice is taken out of decision-making processes in this system. that’s why there’s chaos. there’s no more balance in that with respect to how the relationships go. (tce, focus group, 2010) the elders (tce, focus group, 2010) were also adamant that we all must take responsibility for the state of our relationship with water; we all have a sacred responsibility that we must reclaim. within an interconnected worldview, individuals, families, communities, and societies are required to be responsible for their own actions, accountable for the consequences inherent in those actions and respectful of the requirement of others to be responsible and accountable for their actions (laboucane-benson, 2009). the findings of this research project suggest that, in order to engage in this type of interdependent system, we must first repair our relationships, and in this process we must carefully listen to each other. dialogue between aboriginal and non-aboriginal policymakers, scientists, and community members must be pursued in order to build trust and positive relationships (wahkohtowin) within our society and empower all parties in the decision-making process. this message was iterated by many research participants, particularly in the reconciliation discussions that were held. the voicelessness and powerlessness of aboriginal people can only 19 laboucane-benson et al.: are we seeking pimatisiwin or creating pomewin? published by scholarship@western, 2012 be transformed through dialogue and relationship. while there will always be differences in opinions, the findings of this research suggest that common ground in our collective beliefs and goals is achievable and can drive the development of policies that mandate the inclusion of indigenous people in decision-making processes for water, which will result in actions that reflect the collective voice of all albertans. in conclusion, the findings of this research project suggest that the impact of colonization has been a loss of our collective understanding of our sacred relationship with water and with each other. for aboriginal people, this has created a pervasive feeling of despair (pomewin). these relationships, however, can be transformed through respectful dialogue, and in the process policies can be developed that promote pimatisiwin in our society. 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 10 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/10 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.10 references alberta. 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(1991). the role of native elders: emergent issues. in j. w. friesen (ed.), the cultural maze: complex questions on native destiny in western canada (pp. 201-217). calgary, ab: detselig enterprises. couture, j., parker, t., couture, r., & laboucane, p. (2001). a cost-benefit analysis of hollow water's community holistic circle healing process. ottawa, on: aboriginal corrections policy unit: solicitor general of canada. fontana, a., & frey, j. h. (2000). the interview: from structured questions to negotiated text. in n. k. denzin & y. s. lincoln (eds.), handbook of qualitative research, 2nd edition (pp. 851-869). thousand oaks, ca: sage publications inc. glaser, b., & strauss, a. (1967). the discovery of grounded theory: strategies for qualitative research. chicago, il: aldine. laboucane-benson, p. (2009). reconciliation, repatriation and reconnection: a framework for building resilience in canadian indigenous families (doctor of philosophy), edmonton, ab: university of alberta. 21 laboucane-benson et al.: are we seeking pimatisiwin or creating pomewin? published by scholarship@western, 2012 lafrance, j., & bastien, b. (2007). here be the dragons! reconciling indigenous and western knowledge to improve aboriginal child welfare. first peoples child & family review, 3(1), 105-126. leclaire, n., & cardinal, g. (1998). alberta elders' cree dictionary. edmonton, ab: university of alberta press. leslie, j. (1978). the historical development of the indian act. ottawa, on: department of indian affairs and northern development, treaties and historical research branch. makarenko, j. (2008). the indian act: historical overview. retrieved from http://www.mapleleafweb.com/ print/422 morse, j. m., barrett, m., mayan, m., olson, k., & spiers, j. (2002). verification strategies for establishing reliability and validity in qualitative research. retrieved from www.ualberta.ca/~ijqm/ palmer, g. b. (1996). toward a theory of cultural linguistics. austin, tx: university of texas press. tully, j. (2000). the struggles of indigenous peoples for and of freedom. in d. ivison, p. patton, & w. sanders (eds.), political theory and the rights of indigenous peoples (pp. 36-59). cambridge, uk: cambridge university press. 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 10 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/10 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.10 the international indigenous policy journal september 2012 are we seeking pimatisiwin or creating pomewin? implications for water policy patti laboucane-benson ginger gibson allen benson greg miller recommended citation are we seeking pimatisiwin or creating pomewin? implications for water policy abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license microsoft word 317537-text.native.1352856763.doc working with an aboriginal community to understand drinking water perceptions and acceptance in rural new south wales the international indigenous policy journal volume 8 | issue 3 article 4 july 2017 working with an aboriginal community to understand drinking water perceptions and acceptance in rural new south wales fidelis g. jaravani population health, hunter new england local health district, nsw, australia; centre for biodiversity and molecular development of therapeutics, james cook university, queensland, australia, fidelis.jaravani@hnehealth.nsw.gov.au peter d. massey population health, hunter new england local health district, nsw, australia; college of medicine and dentistry, division of tropical health and medicine, james cook university, queensland, australia, peter.massey@hnehealth.nsw.gov.au jenni judd college of medicine and dentistry, division of tropical health and medicine; aton breinl research centre for health systems strengthening ; australian institute of health and tropical medicine, james cook university, queensland, australia; central queensland university, bundaberg qld australia, jenni.judd@jcu.edu.au kylie a. taylor population health, hunter new england local health district, nsw, australia, kylie.a.taylor@hnehealth.nsw.gov.au jason allan walhallow local aboriginal land council, nsw, australia, wlalc08@bigpond.com recommended citation jaravani, f. g. , massey, p. d. , judd, j. , taylor, k. a. , allan, j. , allan, n. , durrheim, d. n. , oelgemoeller, m. (2017). working with an aboriginal community to understand drinking water perceptions and acceptance in rural new south wales. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(3). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.4 see next page for additional authors working with an aboriginal community to understand drinking water perceptions and acceptance in rural new south wales abstract this study explored the walhallow aboriginal community’s experiences with drinking water to gain a shared understanding about community concerns and to develop ways to address these concerns together. there is a strong connection between people and water, as well as a need to appreciate the social factors associated with the unique cultural and socioeconomic factors that the provision of drinking water has for aboriginal communities. we used a mixed method design within a community-based participatory action research (par) framework. water hardness and parental influence were the key factors associated with participants’ decisions to drink rainwater. this study provides important insights for water supply authorities when assessing health risks and when choosing appropriate mitigation measures for water quality improvement programs in aboriginal communities. keywords aboriginal, community perceptions, drinking water, community experiences, mixed method research design acknowledgments we gratefully acknowledge the walhallow community for their support and participation in the project and the contribution of our many participants in the study. we also thank the walhallow local aboriginal land council for leading the study; a/prof michael oelgemöller for funding the transcription of the questionnaire interviews and the new south wales (nsw) forensic and analytical science services for testing water samples; dr paul byleveld, manager, water unit, environmental health branch, nsw health; balaraju thangamany, manager, aboriginal communities water and sewerage program, nsw dpi water. disclaimer this article may contain information obtained from deceased persons. the information could upset some people; however, the authors wish no disrespect or distress to the respective families and the community. the views and positions expressed in this article are those of the authors and are not necessarily representative of nsw health. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. authors fidelis g. jaravani, peter d. massey, jenni judd, kylie a. taylor, jason allan, natalie allan, david n. durrheim, and michael oelgemoeller http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ w o r k i n g w i t h a n a b o r i g i n a l c o m m u n i t y t o u n d e r s t a n d d r i n k i n g w a t e r p e r c e p t i o n s a n d a c c e p t a n c e i n r u r a l n e w s o u t h w a l e s aboriginal australians have a significantly higher incidence of many diseases, which occur with greater severity, compared with other australians (macrae et al., 2012). mortality rates for aboriginal australians are almost twice as high as for non-aboriginal individuals (aboriginal institute of health and welfare [aihw], 2011). there is a growing impetus to identify and address the determining factors of this health disparity, with the overall aim of “closing the gap” and improving the health of aboriginal australians (council of australian governments [coag] 2007). however, the focus thus far has mainly been on lifestyle-based factors such as smoking and alcohol consumption (vos, barker, stanley, & lopez, 2007) at the expense of environmental health factors like drinking water quality. a crucial objective of the australian governments’ closing the gap program is to improve aboriginal health to achieve morbidity and mortality rates similar to those for non-indigenous australians. low perceptions of drinking water safety can lead to other social issues for indigenous people's health such as obesity and diabetes and can contribute to economic impoverishment with high costs of bottled water and soft drinks. reducing public health risks due to the drinking water of unknown quality will help to close the gap. this study aimed to gain a deeper understanding of how aboriginal communities are socially and historically connected to drinking water, their perceptions of drinking water quality, and the degree of satisfaction with drinking water management. a u s t r a l i a n a b o r i g i n a l a n d t o r r e s s t r a i t i s l a n d e r p o p u l a t i o n the indigenous populations of australia are referred to as aboriginal and torres strait islanders. the term aboriginal is used in the state new south wales (nsw) to reflect that the first nations peoples in this state are aboriginal (australian museum, 2015). the population of aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples in 2014 was 713,600 (3% of the australian population), of which 220,902 (31%) lived in nsw (aihw, 2015). twenty-eight percent (60,862) of the aboriginal population in nsw live in the hunter new england region, of which 21% live in remote areas compared to 2% of the non-aboriginal population (primary health network [phn], 2016). the current health status and challenges can be seen in the estimated gaps in life expectancy. currently, life expectancy for aboriginal and torres strait islander people is 69.1 years for males— 10.6 years lower than that of non-aboriginal males (79.7 years)—and 73.7 years for females—9.5 years lower than that of non-aboriginal females (83.1 years; australian bureau of statistics [abs], 2013). p o l i c y c o n t e x t : n s w d r i n k i n g w a t e r p o l i c y a n d r e g u l a t i o n it is recognised that policy frameworks involving aboriginal peoples should recognise aboriginal knowledge, as well as the right to self-determination and participation in decision-making (black & mcbean, 2016). this recognition must also include drinking water. good water management requires an understanding of aboriginal peoples’ values and interests in water, and acting to support and protect those interests (barber, 2013). in australia, research has shown that aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples are keen to contribute their knowledge and to see their values recognised in water allocation decisions (jackson, tan, mooney, hoverman, & white, 2012). 1 jaravani et al.: aboriginal community drinking water perceptions and acceptance published by scholarship@western, 2017 in the state of nsw, government policy directs that the responsibility to provide safe drinking water rests with each water supplier (byleveld et al., 2016; new south wales public health act, 2010). nsw health is the public health regulator of drinking water in nsw. the nsw public health act (2010) and the nsw public health regulation (2012) require water suppliers to develop, implement, and adhere to drinking water quality assurance programs that address the framework for management of drinking water quality in the australian drinking water guidelines (adwg; national health and medical research council [nhmrc] & national resource management ministerial council [nrmmc], 2011). a quality assurance program describes the water supply, identifies risks, critical control points, and details the actions to be taken to protect the quality of water provided to consumers. as part of the nsw health drinking water monitoring program (nsw health, 2005), nsw health works with aboriginal communities and local water utilities to monitor drinking water safety. the program provides free routine testing of drinking water for microbial indicators and physical and inorganic chemical characteristics (byleveld et al., 2016), as well as protocols for responding to contamination incidences or test results that do not comply with the adwg targets (nhmrc & nrmmc, 2011). since 2008, the water supply and sewerage systems in 61 discrete aboriginal communities have been improved by the implementation of the aboriginal communities water and sewage program (acwsp). a discrete aboriginal community in nsw is one parcel of privately owned aboriginal land that is predominantly inhabited and managed by aboriginal people (aihw, n.d.; henderson, byleveld, standen, & leask, 2016). the acwsp is a partnership between aboriginal communities, the nsw government, and the nsw aboriginal land council. the acwsp aims to improve health and well-being by providing services equivalent to the standard expected in the wider community (byleveld et al., 2016). under the acwsp, drinking water quality assurance programs were implemented in many discrete aboriginal communities well before the 2010 nsw public health act requirement. experienced service providers (generally local councils) are contracted under formal service agreements to provide water and sewage support services (henderson et al., 2016). specialist contractors review critical control point performance, risk assessment findings, and improvements. aboriginal community water management plans were integrated into utility drinking water management systems (byleveld et al., 2016). t h e i m p o r t a n c e o f w a t e r t o a b o r i g i n a l c o m m u n i t i e s there is a strong and lasting connection between aboriginal and torres strait islander australians and water. the strength of this connection can be seen in various ways. the gamaraigal people, of what is now known as sydney, resisted european invaders and objected to them clearing the ground around water holes, casting nets without permission, and interfering in cultural and community practices (broome, 2002). this strong connection is also evident in how people’s behaviours and choices are in part shaped by how communities socially and historically connect to drinking water, perceptions of water quality, and the degree of satisfaction with water management (doria, 2010; dupont, adamowicz, & krupnick, 2010). the strong connection and the value given to natural sources of water in aboriginal communities have implications when providing treated drinking water. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.4 supplying town water to aboriginal communities without acknowledging and appreciating the unique socioeconomic, cultural, and historical context and values may be futile (baird et al., 2013; jaravani, massey, judd, allan, & allan, 2016). negative community perceptions and concerns about the safety of supplied drinking water may be a proxy for concerns and experiences of racism and cultural safety (dupont et al., 2010). there are historical reports of aboriginal people being killed by poisoned drinking water supplies in the past (jalata, 2013). these concerns and experiences have reportedly led to higher consumption of substitutes for tap water—such as rainwater, costly bottled water, and soft drinks—in other locations (deschamps & prum, 2007), but this set of circumstances has not yet been tested in australia. for example, in 2006 in the town of armidale, nsw, bottles of water reportedly cost 400 times the price of town water, which if it were to be used all the time would impact on families’ financial resources (pigram, 2006). the experiences and perceptions of aboriginal people today towards drinking water are largely unknown. walhallow is a small aboriginal community in northwest nsw that has for many years been concerned with the quality and safety of drinking water. nsw health has provided bi-weekly monitoring tests of the community water supply (town water) since 2001. the test results indicated that the town water has maintained consistent microbiological quality in accordance with the adwg (nsw health, n.d.). in additional, each house is supplied with a rainwater tank and the rainwater supply is pumped to the kitchen sink. the rainwater is not routinely tested. at walhallow, the acwsp program provided an opportunity to implement a risk-based drinking water quality assurance management system. emergency repair works (such as leak detection and repairs for broken pipe and pumps) and infrastructure works (new bore pump, telemetry, reservoir rehabilitation, and new pressure booster pumps) on the town water supply system have been implemented at a cost of about aud$238,000 (bala thangamany, personal communication). the local public health unit regularly engages with the community and participates with department of primary industries water (dpi water) and local government in inspections every 4 months and reviews of the program. t h e p r o b l e m from december 2007 to february 2008, the nsw department of commerce undertook a survey of the water supply and sewerage services in selected aboriginal communities including walhallow (australian indigenous healthinfonet, n.d.). the survey assessed the existing water and sewage infrastructure, operational procedures, and current levels of servicing and maintenance. the survey found that: • 10 communities had satisfactory water supply and sewerage services, but required assistance with ongoing management and servicing; • 31 communities had adequate infrastructure, but needed maintenance and repairs to equipment; and • 20 communities had inadequate infrastructure and required additional funding (australian indigenous healthinfonet, n.d.). in response, the nsw government and nsw aboriginal land council committed aud$200 million over 25 years, beginning in 2008, to fund the acwsp to improve the health of aboriginal communities and help “close the gap” (nsw department of water and energy, 2008). 3 jaravani et al.: aboriginal community drinking water perceptions and acceptance published by scholarship@western, 2017 observations and informal discussions with the walhallow community indicated that, despite the investment towards town water that is treated and routinely tested, many community members preferred rainwater. although they are part of the housing infrastructure, rainwater tanks are not eligible for funding under the acwsp. the walhallow local aboriginal land council (wlalc) is responsible for maintaining the integrity of the houses. it is not clear, however, who is responsible for maintaining rainwater tanks. we hypothesised that the walhallow community’s drinking water choices were culturally guided by their perceptions of health risk. the study was therefore guided by the following questions: a. what are the drinking water needs that impact the choice of water source among the walhallow aboriginal community? b. what are the drinking water quality characteristics and differences between rainwater and town water that affect the drinking water choices? c. is there a need for change in drinking water policy to include an understanding of community perceptions? water supply authorities may have the technology and capacity to supply safe water; however, the acceptability of the town water may not solely be dependent on safety considerations. there may be other factors that need to be identified and understood. consumers can reveal dominant perceptions and concerns that policy makers need to be informed about to enable effective supply and management decisions (doria, 2010). the objective of this study was to explore the experiences of people in the walhallow aboriginal community with drinking water, to gain a shared understanding with the community about their concerns about using reticulated water supplies, and then to develop together ways to address these concerns. l o c a t i o n a n d h i s t o r y the study was conducted at walhallow, which is located at 31°18ʹs 150°30ʹe near caroona in the north west slopes area of nsw. the community was formally established in the 1870s, although the gomeroi (kamilaroi) people lived in this area for thousands of years (taylor, 1999). walhallow currently has approximately 100 residents, the kamilaroi or gomeroi people, and is estimated to peak at 150 residents during special occasions. walhallow now consists of 42 brick and tile houses, although in the past people lived in mission-built timber and fibrous cement houses. since 1998, the village has been served by maintained roads and upgraded water and sewerage systems. it is generally reported that the walhallow community did not actively choose their current geographical location and issues of water quality emerged when the community was first displaced and resettled at the reserve. similar issues have been reported for indigenous communities in canada (white, murphy, & spence, 2012), usa (smith, 2005), and new zealand (bailie, carson & mcdonald, 2004). rainwater storage was connected to the walhallow community houses when the houses were built in the 1940s (taylor, 1999). each house has a 9,000l rainwater tank without filters to strain pollutants, and there is no programmed maintenance of the tanks. neither the community nor nsw 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.4 health has any record of rainwater tanks being cleaned or the rainwater tank water being tested for microbial contaminants. the quality of the rainwater is unknown and may be unsafe to drink. the provision of reticulated1 town water resulted from a needs assessment survey by the community aboriginal health education officer in 1998 (taylor, 1999). the assessment fulfilled the recommendation of the race discrimination commissioner investigation into the provision of water and sanitation to aboriginal and torres strait islander communities. the commissioner recommended a review of the state of water and sanitation in aboriginal communities (race discrimination commissioner, 1994). town water was eventually sourced from a bore located about 3 km from the village in an intensive crop agricultural area. m e t h o d a mixed method design within a community-based participatory action research (par) framework was used. the methods included interviews, focus groups, rating of water quality, and water testing. a key strength of a par approach is that participants and researchers work collaboratively bringing together their respective knowledge of real world issues and scientific expertise (cargo & mercer, 2008). this research design is recognised as culturally acceptable and has allowed us to build sustainable trust with the community (massey et al., 2012; weiner & mcdonald, 2013). the initial point for engagement with the community was the existing relationships between the community and the local public health practitioners through several programmes: immunisation programmes; housing for health; the acwsp; and the companion animals health programme. the chief executive officer of the local land council and two other members of the community participated as co-researchers. i n d i v i d u a l i n t e r v i e w s we used individual face-to-face semi-structured interviews to explore participants’ lived experiences and perceptions about town and rainwater through criterion sampling (creswell, 2013). some of the participants preferred to gather as a group. group participation was allowed provided that the participants responded individually. only participants who were at least 18 years of age and living within the community on a permanent basis were asked to volunteer to ensure independent consent. the age limit ensured independent consent and permanency ensured lived experiences with drinking water in the community. participants were asked some specific open-ended questions to express perceptions about water and closed-ended questions to give answers about water quality issues (baird et al., 2013). participants were allowed to explain their responses to closed-ended questions. the conversations were voice recorded and professionally transcribed verbatim. the transcripts were then thematically analysed by applying line-by-line coding using a deductive approach to interpret participants’ quoted experience as qualitative evidence (kingston, judd, & gray, 2014). descriptive codes were then entered into a microsoft excel 2010 spreadsheet and grouped. similar codes were consecutively 1 in australia, reticulated town water supply means a disinfected drinking water supply system delivered to a town (or community) through a network of pumps, pipes, and water storages (water grid) designed to store and distribute water (local government & municipal knowledge base, n.d.). 5 jaravani et al.: aboriginal community drinking water perceptions and acceptance published by scholarship@western, 2017 refined into analytical themes (pfadenhauer & rehfuess, 2015). co-researchers participated fully in the analysis and interpretation of the findings. f o c u s g r o u p we selected a purposive sample of three elders who grew up in the community, although they had since relocated to the nearby city of tamworth. these three elders, who had a longstanding experience with the community, were chosen to inform our understanding of the drinking water history in walhallow (creswell, 2013). the aboriginal co-researchers had significant input into the selection of the focus group members, as well as analysing and presenting the findings as part of the par process. the semi-structured interviews guide guided the questions and participants consented to voice recorded dialogue. we thematically analysed the transcripts to merge with the themes from the individual interviews. p a r t i c i p a n t r a t e d w a t e r q u a l i t y the participants were concurrently asked closed-ended questions to rank both town water and rainwater quality, in regards to the following characteristics: taste, smell, hardness, appearance, pressure, reliability, safety, and maintenance (appendix 1). group participants ranked these individually on a 7-point likert scale. the ranks were then collapsed into two categories: ranks 1 to 4 were categorized as good, and ranks 5 to 7 were categorized as bad. the categories were compared between town water and rainwater using microsoft excel. we used the satterthwaite approximation method assuming unequal variances and standard deviations between the two water sources because it was ideal for the small sample size (degrees of freedom; ruxton, 2006). the rating of rainwater to town water was then compared using 95% confidence intervals of the standard deviation and the p-value. when the confidence intervals did not intercept and the p-value was ≤ 0.05 the difference was considered as statistically significant. w a t e r t e s t i n g five rainwater tanks were randomly sampled in the community and tested for e. coli and total coliforms in accordance with the nsw guide for submitting water samples to the division of analytical laboratories for analysis (division of analytical laboratories [dal], 2010). one water sample per tank was collected from the kitchen tap per week for 12 weeks. one house was randomly chosen among the five sample houses for concurrent town water microbiological testing. town water quality would be expected to be of a constant quality because it is disinfected and is tested fortnightly by the local government. one point of testing only was considered acceptable as a quality control measure. in total, 58 rainwater samples and 12 town water samples were tested for e. coli and total coliforms. e t h i c s the walhallow aboriginal corporation as the local aboriginal community controlled health organisation approved the project. ethics approval was also obtained from the hunter new england health research ethics committee (13/10/16/5.06), nsw health research ethics committee (lnr/13/hne/418), nsw aboriginal health and medical research council’s human research ethics committee (984/13), and james cook university human research committee (h5531). 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.4 r e s u l t s a n d f i n d i n g s overall, participants preferred rainwater to town water. reasons provided by the participants included that rainwater “is more consumable, it is better quality water” and town water is “a bloody big pile of calcium.” the main factors that influenced participants’ preferences were parental influence, water hardness, and water maintenance. some participants preferred bottled water to rainwater or town water. five major themes emerged from the questionnaires about participants’ perceptions of drinking water supplies in the community. i n d i v i d u a l i n t e r v i e w s a n d f o c u s g r o u p fourteen community members, six males and eight females, participated in the individual interviews and responded to all questions. all were above 40 years old and had been residents of walhallow for many years. the sample size was based on the homogenous makeup of the community and previous qualitative studies that suggested saturation is often reached after 12 interviews (guest, bunce, & johnson, 2006). it has been found that for harmonised communities, like walhallow, 94% of high frequency codes were identified within the first 6 interviews and 97% within the first 12 interviews (guest et al., 2006). francis et al. (2009) similarly found data saturation using retrospective analysis of 10 and 3 additional interviews. morris (2015) recommends fewer interviews for homogeneous communities and more for studies involving different communities as long as the researchers are satisfied that they have reached saturation. five themes emerged from the thematic analysis: a. always brought up on rainwater; b. rainwater is good . . . but; c. town water is good . . . but; d. if it’s maintained then it would be safe; and e. we buy bottled water. a l w a y s b r o u g h t u p o n r a i n w a t e r participants often described how as children they were “always brought up on rainwater” and how “it’s been the same for generations.” people’s knowledge of the source of drinking water has built trust in the rainwater: “just for drinking, probably rainwater because at least i know where it is coming from.” however, another participant noted, “well i think that the rainwater is unsafe, but i think the town water is more unsafe.” however, this participant also went on to say, “i think the rainwater would be full of bugs and gunk.” the elders focus group explained how “it was just drilled in to me that you don’t touch the hard water” and “you drink rain water, don’t drink that hard water, don’t know why, probably a cultural thing.” participants often explained that “it’s been the same for generations,” but “you never got an explanation why, not to drink it.” they explained, “you would get in trouble from your parents, they use to tell us don’t drink town water, drink the rainwater.” one elder in the group further explained why rainwater was preferred to town water: 7 jaravani et al.: aboriginal community drinking water perceptions and acceptance published by scholarship@western, 2017 as far as the tank water is concerned the people always chose tank water because it was soft water and the result of using tank water as opposed to town water was people could see it in their tea, with the taste of tea and the hardness of the tea and that sort of thing. you could see it straight away, so it was something that was always in front of you every dinnertime, so tank water was always considered the best because it didn’t do that. r a i n w a t e r i s g o o d . . . b u t . . . participants frequently described the taste of rainwater as: “very good . . . will be [ranked] one out of seven for rainwater [one being best]”; “tastes better”; “it is more consumable”; “it is better quality water”; “because it is softer, it is clearer”; “it hasn’t got any smell”; and “tastes fresher.” participants also described how they felt safe with drinking rainwater: “i’ve been drinking it [rainwater], and it hasn’t made me run to the toilet or anything.” however, several participants disliked rainwater because it is: “shocking, very, very poor”; “when you run the tap it is yellow or brown”; and “it is not as good as it used to be, so it is terrible now, it is not as good as it was when we were growing up either.” some participants said, “mine is nice to drink and that, like i still drink it but i really think that it is contaminated, like frogs and whatever else is in there. plants, like i’ve got plants growing out of my tank.” “there has always been e. coli in water out here,” and “it used to give me utis [urinary tract infections] constantly.” t o w n w a t e r i s g o o d . . . b u t . . . participants frequently described town water as “pretty good and clear”; “looks alright”; “it is drinkable”;“ better than my rainwater”; “it doesn’t smell”; “is 100 times better in terms of smell than those [other] places”; and “i don’t mind the taste either.” participants generally liked town water: “because you use it more. like everyone uses it more than their rainwater.” and if there are no “rains you have got no water anyway so you have got to have some sort of supply, so i reckon the town water. and health wise and all that stuff.” however, participants often referred to town water as the “hard water.” participants asserted that town water caused skin problems such as “itchy and scaly skin” and “very harsh on the skin and you can tell with the shower how it builds up with the calcium.” one participant remarked, “you look at the showers and that, what do you think they do to our insides too?” many participants talked at length about “calcium build-up in the water heaters,” and the need to regularly “dig it all out.” participants also complained about the cost of maintaining hot water systems because of the hardness of the town water. for example, as one participant articulated” he [the plumber] is probably out here; probably about, i don’t know, 6 times a year doing it. the elements have got like salt; i have got to get the elements replaced all the time. i have had i think it is two hot water systems . . . in nine years. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.4 i f i t ’ s m a i n t a i n e d t h e n i t w o u l d b e s a f e participants said that if the rainwater were properly maintained “then it would be safe.” several participants were aware that town water was being maintained: “they come out every couple of months because you see them. i know, i see them coming out all the time.” several participants wanted the local government to extend their services to rainwater. for example, one participant said, “it goes in with the general maintenance of it, that program of the councils where they are coming out and checking, that should be extended to the tank system.” another said, “it would be good to have the tanks cleaned out probably get some new water in it.” one participant countered that “whoever has got the houses have a responsibility . . . they have to be kept to it.” lack of information was frequently cited as contributing to residents’ rejection of town water. an elder resident was dismayed: “ahh, yuck! we don’t know what we are drinking.” several participants did not even know “if it is bore water or bloody river water” or “whether it is coming from some unknown source . . . probably from the river.” a participant then wanted to know the effects of chlorine: “chlorine! what will chlorine do to you though? it is a chemical isn’t it?” w e b u y b o t t l e d w a t e r participants who dislike both rainwater and town water often said, “we buy bottled water” because “you can just tell that bottled water has been filtered because it feels more natural . . .” and “it is supposed to be the best or something.” however, one elder participant said he “won’t buy water. it is too dear.” community members who cannot afford the cost often get bottled water from the local pre-school. the pre-school was said to “always have heaps of water, cold in the fridge and especially in summer time they are all like can we have bottles of water.” p a r t i c i p a n t r a t e d w a t e r q u a l i t y the rating of water quality characteristics helped us to identify which water attributes participants believe are most important in determining the drinkability of each type of water. the ordinal data was collapsed into two categories of good or bad to capture the participants' perceptions of the water. if the participant rated the water characteristic favourably (1-4), their perception for that characteristic would be good. otherwise, it would be bad, which may ultimately lead to the rejection of the water. participants generally rated rainwater taste and hardness as most important in deciding their preferred drinking water source (table 1). town water taste was rated very bad (0 rating it as good and 14 rating it as bad) compared to 9 good and 5 bad for rainwater, which is statistically significant (t(17.26) = -3.42, p = 0.003). town water hardness was rated as very bad (0 rating it as good and 14 rating it as bad) compared to rainwater (14 rating it as good and 0 rating it as bad), which is statistically significant (t(16.81) = -6.12, p = 0.0001). secondly, the participant ratings helped us to compare the water attribute rated as most in need of urgent improvement for each type of water (table 2). town water hardness was the higher priority (14 rating it as a high priority and 0 as a low priority) compared to rainwater (0 rating is as a high priority and 14 rating it as a low priority) and statistically significant (t(18.96) = 6.94, p = 0.0001). 9 jaravani et al.: aboriginal community drinking water perceptions and acceptance published by scholarship@western, 2017 t a b l e 1 . p a r t i c i p a n t r a t e d w a t e r q u a l i t y a t t r i b u t e s b y w a t e r s o u r c e , w a l h a l l o w , m a r c h 2 0 1 4 w a t e r c h a r a c t e r i s t i c w a t e r s o u r c e g o o d n b a d n t ( d f ) 9 5 % c i o f s d p taste town 0 14 -3.42 (17.26) [0.68, 5.31] 0.003** rain 9 5 [1.68, 2.24] smell town 10 4 -0.79 (25.57) [1.29, 2.40] 0.437 rain 11 3 [1.48, 1.68] appearance town 12 2 0.75 (22.88) [1.70, 2.15] 0.458 rain 10 4 [1.15, 2.01] pressure town 14 0 0.85 (22.87) [0.90, 1.28] 0.406 rain 11 3 [1.33, 1.44] reliability town 9 5 0.43 (25.94) [1.62, 2.42] 0.668 rain 5 9 [1.54, 2.84] safety town 8 6 0.65 (25.12) [1.34, 2.72] 0.524 rain 6 8 [1.62, 2.99] hardness town 0 14 -6.12 (16.81) [0, 0.62] 0.0001*** rain 14 0 [1.44, 1.59] note. participants rated each characteristic on a 7-point likert scale with 1 being the best and 7 being the worst. the results are displayed as two categories: good (1-4) and bad (5-7). in order to assess whether differences in the ratings of town water and rainwater were statistically significant, the satterthwaite unequal variance t-test was performed on the ordinal level data for each characteristic. ci = confidence interval. sd = standard deviation. n = 14. * p < .05. ** p < .01. *** p < .001. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.4 t a b l e 2 . p a r t i c i p a n t r a t e d w a t e r a t t r i b u t e m o s t i n n e e d o f i m p r o v e m e n t b y w a t e r s o u r c e , w a l h a l l o w , m a r c h 2 0 1 4 w a t e r c h a r a c t e r i s t i c w a t e r s o u r c e h i g h p r i o r i t y n l o w p r i o r i t y n n t ( d f ) 9 5 % c i o f s d p taste town 10 2 12 -1.09 (25.99) [1.37, 2.70] 0.285 rain 8 4 12 [1.39, 1.89] smell town 5 6 11 -1.24 (23.25) [1.32, 3.19] 0.223 rain 9 3 12 [1.09, 2.63] appearance town 1 10 11 -1.97 (24.95) [1.22, 4.28] 0.061 rain 6 6 12 [1.27, 2.99] pressure town 3 8 11 -0.69 (20.00) [1.82, 3.39] 0.113 rain 5 7 12 [1.15, 3.43] reliability town 3 8 11 0.81 (25.82) [1.62, 4.02] 0.423 rain 3 9 12 [1.76, 3.33] safety town 8 3 11 -0.11 (24.67) [1.51, 2.11] 0.913 rain 8 4 12 [1.81, 1.85] hardness town 10 2 12 6.94 (18.96) [0.69, 1.55] 0.0001*** rain 1 12 12 [1.01, 6.4] note. participants rated each characteristic on a 7-point likert scale with 1 being the highest priority and 7 being the lowest priority. the results are displayed as two categories: high priority (1-4) and low priority (5-7). in order to assess whether differences in the ratings of town water and rainwater were statistically significant, the satterthwaite unequal variance t-test was performed on the ordinal level data for each characteristic. ci = confidence interval. sd = standard deviation. * p < .05. ** p < .01. *** p < .001. 11 jaravani et al.: aboriginal community drinking water perceptions and acceptance published by scholarship@western, 2017 w a t e r t e s t i n g rainwater tests at walhallow indicated that half of the rainwater tested had e. coli. of the samples tested, 30/58 (52 %) had e. coli with a mean of 18 colony-forming units per sample (table 3). overall, 3/5 rainwater tanks had more than 50% e. coli detection rate2 over the sampling period. the adwg recommends no e. coli in every 100ml of a drinking water sample. there is no guideline value for total coliforms as they are not recommended for use as an indicator of faecal contamination. total coliforms are an indicator of disinfection efficiency. rainwater at walhallow is not disinfected. d i s c u s s i o n parental influence, town water hardness, and rainwater maintenance were the main factors influencing participants’ choice of drinking water. participants rated town water hardness significantly different from rainwater. the difference between the other water characteristics was not statistically significant. about half of rainwater samples had e. coli while town water samples did not detect any e. coli. participants also suggested that if rainwater were properly maintained then it would be safer. early engagement and social interactions developed trusting relationships, fostered cultural appropriateness, and provided opportunities to learn community protocols, and to use appropriate language and avoid sensitive behaviours. the active participation of community members as coresearchers developed legitimacy and goodwill with the community. p a r e n t a l i n f l u e n c e the significance of interpersonal relationships, parental influence, and community culture was a strong and recurring message from participants although water safety, smell, and taste were also discussed often. consequently, the rejection of treated town water in favour of untreated rainwater at walhallow has been passed on from generation to generation, placing the community, particularly children, at risk of waterborne enteric diseases through consuming possibly unsafe rainwater. influence, or habit, that is passed from generation to generation becomes a tradition and consequently a culture. culture is defined as the shared patterns of behaviours and interactions, cognitive constructs, and affective understanding that are learned through a process of socialization (centre for advanced research on language acquisition [carla], n.d.). aboriginal culture and kinship are strong and act as protective forces for children and families (secretariat of national aboriginal and islander child care [snaicc] & innovative resources, 2009). a participant described how hard it is to get out of a habit instilled by one’s parents: “i was always brought up, like it is hard to get out of your [habit], when you are used to rainwater.” 2 the e. coli detection rate is the number of e. coli detections divided by the number of samples multiplied by 100 to create a percentage (i.e., the proportion of samples with e. coli to the total number of samples tested per house). 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.4 t a b l e 3 . r a i n w a t e r a n d t o w n w a t e r t e s t i n g r e s u l t s , w a l h a l l o w , n o v e m b e r 2 0 1 4 t o j a n u a r y 2 0 1 5 h o u s e n u m b e r w a t e r s o u r c e n u m b e r o f s a m p l e s e . c o l i d e t e c t i o n s t o t a l c o l i f o r m s d e t e c t i o n s 1 rain 12 9 10 2 rain 12 9 11 3 rain 10 4 7 4 rain 12 7 11 5 rain 12 1 8 2 town 12 0 1 cultural influence is not unique to the walhallow community. culture and law are used interchangeably among aboriginal and torres strait islander australians, illustrating that community connections, activities, and knowledge govern people’s behaviour (barber & jackson, 2011). throughout australia, aboriginal peoples have a strong association with country, culture, kinship, and self-determination; these are characteristics that have been reported to safeguard communities against transgenerational trauma (australian indigenous healthinfonet 2016; colquhoun & dockery, 2012). parental influence over drinking water has also been demonstrated in rural kenya (makutsa et al., 2001) and india (firth et al., 2010), where low cost drinking water contamination interventions were hindered by cultural practices that caused low acceptance and sustained the use of untreated water. in camarines sur, philippines, in 2012, it was found that villagers who had access to chlorinated water chose to drink from untreated wells because parents were resistant to change, despite deaths due to a cholera outbreak (de guzman, carr de los reyes, sucaldito, & tayag, 2015). drinking water suppliers should therefore be aware of parental influences on water choices and be prepared to address public health problems associated with drinking water in a social context in addition to scientific knowledge (gorelick et al., 2011). r a i n w a t e r s a f e t y the participants’ perceptions were that the taste and smell of rainwater were good. other studies (see for example wright, yang, rivett, & gundry, 2012) have highlighted the importance of taste and smell in determining people’s choices in drinking water. in the current study, although participants knew that rainwater’s microbiological quality was poorer than town water, they still preferred rainwater. a participant who had her rainwater tested and found it to be contaminated did “a bit of research . . . and stopped drinking it.” instead of switching to town water, she preferred to “go to the old girls [house over the road] and use their [rain] water.” while the drinking of rainwater is not unique to walhallow, nsw health does not endorse this practice when reticulated town water is available (nsw health, 2007; enhealth 2010). according to nsw health (2007), where treated water is provided, rainwater may be used for low risk uses such as hot water services, laundry, toilet flushing, or gardening. in 2013, the australian bureau of statistics (abs) reported that 19.3% of rural nsw households had rainwater as the main source of drinking water compared to 76% for rural south australia and 23% of other rural australian households (abs, 2013). 13 jaravani et al.: aboriginal community drinking water perceptions and acceptance published by scholarship@western, 2017 frequent detection of e. coli in the rainwater test results is not surprising, given that roof catchments and guttering are subject to contamination by bird and small animal droppings, which are known to harbour potential pathogens. a study in south australia found that 59% of rainwater tanks in aboriginal communities had either faecal coliforms or streptococci (plazinska, 2003). other studies of rainwater tanks in southeast queensland detected salmonella, giardia lamblia, legionella pneumophila, campylobacter jejuni, and cryptosporidium parvum (ahmed, hodgers, sidhu, & toze, 2012; ahmed, vieritz, goonetilleke, & gardner, 2010), which were tracked back to possum and bird faecal samples. the presence of faecal coliforms such as e. coli in rainwater does not necessarily mean that the community will get ill from drinking the water. there are no records of waterborne disease outbreaks at walhallow, although sporadic and unreported cases cannot be discounted. continuous contact with a risk often results in the normalisation of the risk, where the individuals become familiar and desensitised to its presence (halpern-fisher et al., 2001). epidemiological investigations undertaken in south australia have failed to identify links between rainwater tanks and gastrointestinal illness despite global underreporting contributing to a lack of evidence (heyworth, 2001; heyworth, glonek, & maynard, 1999; rodrigo, sinclair, forbes, cunliffe, & leder, 2010). a study by heyworth, glonek, maynard, baghurst & finlay-jones (2006) found that there was no difference in the incidence of gastroenteritis in children who drank rainwater and those who drank treated town water. in our study, participants who drank rainwater often said they have not had diarrhoea or other symptoms from the water; hence, they assumed that it was safe for drinking: “i don’t have any issues with it.” “it [e. coli] has always been mainly in the drinking water, they did surveys ages ago, with e. coli in them. i reckon because the insects and frogs get in the rainwater.” t o w n w a t e r h a r d n e s s during the period 2006 to 2015, routine town water monitoring data for walhallow showed that the mean total hardness measured as calcium carbonate (caco3) was 268 mg/l compared to the adwg value of 200 mg/l (nsw health, n.d.). participants often referred to town water as “hard water” that caused “itchy and scaly” skin after bathing. consequently, the community disliked the town water and this may lead to perceived water insecurity. when hard water is heated, the calcium hydrogen carbonate (ca(hco3)2 that causes the hardness is converted into caco3 , which is deposited as a whitish scale. hence “hard water” is the qualitative description that people use for the scaling actions of water, while water hardness is a quantitative measure of metal ions that are dissolved in the water usually measured as caco3 (mcmellon, 2010). hard water scale accumulation causes the elements of hot water systems, kettles, and appliances to overheat and burn out, resulting in higher energy bills that become a burden on low-income indigenous families (browett, pearce, & willis, 2012). hard water also causes malfunctioning of health hardware by clogging internal plumbing and water appliances, increasing the frequency of fixture repair and maintenance costs. for example, replacing a solar hot water system in central australia costs aud$5,000 and the replacement of tapware cost aud$100 per tap (browett et al., 2012; downing, 2000). additionally, households must purchase large volumes of expensive soaps, softeners, and other cleaning materials that are capable of lathering in hard water (pearce, willis, mccarthy, ryan, & wadham, 2008). therefore, water related expenses may be undertaken at the expense of other pressing household issues. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.4 water hardness is not unique to walhallow. even mainstream towns around walhallow such as quirindi, gunnedah, narrabri, and moree that use similar groundwater do not treat for water hardness due to the prohibitive cost. however, larger regional towns and cities can soften their water supply by treating it to remove calcium and magnesium. however, any potential public health risks would depend on the local concentration of minerals, other than those contributing to hardness, in the respective aquifer (nhmrc & nrmmc, 2011). w a t e r q u a l i t y m a i n t e n a n c e participants indicated that if the water sources were properly maintained then the water would be safer. considering the health risks of drinking untreated rainwater instead of treated and routinely tested town water, responsibility for drinking water safety at walhallow requires interagency negotiation for improvements at the service level. the regional public health unit could help with educating the community on the advantages of choosing town water over rainwater to promote the use of safer town water. community members who choose to continue drinking rainwater would need to boil the water before drinking it. bartram (1996) suggested that a drinking water service level is conditioned by continuity and quality (safety), such that service quality = service level × continuity × safety (see also kayser, moriarty, fonseca, & bartram, 2013). although town water continuity and service level are guaranteed at walhallow, safety is diminished because people do not drink it due to its hardness. thus, the service quality is compromised by a diminished perception of safety. reduced service quality undermines the value of the service and associated public health benefits. in canada, for instance, it was found that the degree of concern about the health risk of town water was inversely proportional to town water consumption and to aesthetic concerns raising the consumption of bottled water (dupont et al., 2010). the world health organization (who, 2011) guidelines for drinking-water quality define domestic water as water used for all usual domestic purposes including consumption, bathing, and food preparation. to promote health, an individual needs a basic water supply of 20l per day for of which only 2 litres (10%) is for direct consumption (drinking and food preparation). however, considering that the walhallow community is provided with an optimal service water supply (100l/day; howard & bartram, 2003) direct consumption is only 2%. the bulk of the service (98%) goes to other health or household needs such as food preparation, bathing, and laundry. therefore, treating the safe town water for hardness would be essential for general health promotion in the community. the introduction of the nsw aboriginal communities water and sewerage program has created interdepartmental alignment in the provision of safe drinking water to walhallow and other nsw aboriginal communities. the wlalc, nsw office of water, hunter new england population health unit, and local government all work across disciplines to deliver safe town water to walhallow. the nsw guideline on rainwater tanks where a public water supply is available—use of (nsw health, 2007) spells out the best methods for maintaining rainwater tanks. these include tank design and maintenance, catchment management, tank desludging, and maintenance. rainwater quality can be improved by the use of first flush devices and filters that are properly maintained and meet an appropriate standard such as as/nzs 4348 or ansi/nsf 53 (nsw health, 2007). properly maintained rainwater tanks can “provide good quality drinking water. rainwater tanks are 15 jaravani et al.: aboriginal community drinking water perceptions and acceptance published by scholarship@western, 2017 widely used as a source of drinking water throughout rural australia. occasionally there are cases of illness from contaminated rainwater” (nsw health, 2007, p. i). people who decide to use rainwater for potable uses should be aware of potential risks associated with microbiological and chemical contamination. the wlalc may have to consult again with the community about who is responsible for and how rainwater maintenance occurs. b u y i n g b o t t l e d w a t e r the preference for bottled water among some of the participants was due to perceived safety and aesthetic considerations of the current supplies. one participant said, “[bottled water is] supposed to be the best.” low perceptions of town water have been associated with higher consumption of costly bottled water and sugary beverages, resulting in high incidence of related diseases such as diabetes, gastritis, and obesity in indigenous communities elsewhere (see for example sarkar, hanrahan, & hudson, 2015). water insecurity and poverty also caused a high intake of sugary beverages in canada’s inuit indigenous community resulting in high levels of related diseases such as diabetes and obesity (sarkar et al., 2015). where water supplies are fluoridated, drinking bottled water may also reduce the fluoride intake among children leading to poorer oral health (gorelick et al., 2011). generally, australians choose bottled water because of concerns about microbiological quality of town water, avoidance of chlorine, preferred taste, and the perception that bottled water is healthier (cochrane, saranathan, morgan, & dashper, 2006). studies in the united states (gorelick et al., 2011) and rural canada (mcleod, bharadwaj, & waldner, 2014) found health risks and aesthetic complaints about town water to be the most frequently cited factors influencing the consumption of bottled water. however, studies in england (ward et al., 2009) and portugal (doria, 2006) found that taste was the most important consideration in choosing bottled water. p o l i c y i m p l i c a t i o n s the diseconomies of scale experienced by small aboriginal communities present difficulties for policy makers. the cost of financing water supply treatment, especially to treat water hardness, can be exorbitant on a per service basis. the current policy regime may not be sufficiently flexible to deal with the diversity of consumer preferences and different cost-benefit trade-offs between communities. however, it is difficult to precisely identify and measure the health effects of improved water supply. governments, water suppliers, and consumers would need to make practical decisions on the most rational solutions and compromises. this decision-making requires a balanced consideration of the health risks, the cost of treatment, and community aspirations for enhanced water quality. water hardness, taste, and smell are primary determinants of aesthetic acceptability of drinking water at walhallow, and indeed other communities, but cannot be disassociated from health considerations. community acceptance of a water supply is determined by cultural conditioning, perceptions of safety, and level of consumer education on water safety among other issues (doria, 2010). it is not adequate to conclude, on the basis of technical comparison of physical characteristics of water among communities, that consumers will obtain equal benefits from the introduction of the same level of service (race discrimination commissioner & australia, 1994). it is important to promote equality as a measure of outcomes of actions, instead of the input of similar resources in different situations (race discrimination commissioner, 1994). 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.4 there is no specified rainwater strategy for the walhallow community and there are no technical standards that apply to rainwater because it does not form part of the authorised supply system. rainwater tanks are the property of the housing provider. the role of the housing provider or occupier in maintaining the tanks is not clear. the acwsp only extends to the housing block boundary. should the acwsp be extended to include the houses? would the funds be adequate? what are the policy implications in other communities? furthermore, would the community be able to afford the higher water rates due to water softening? these are some of the policy issues that need further discussion and consideration. the acwsp is currently undergoing a planned review. in response to this study, the feasibility of installing a water softener at walhallow is under consideration. the wlalc is also considering the feasibility of regular rainwater tank maintenance. we contend that if the town water is softened, the community is adequately consulted and educated, and children are allowed to choose with time there may be generational change and the uptake of safer town water will increase. s t r e n g t h s a n d l i m i t a t i o n s a major strength of this study is that a par approach allows a high degree of community involvement and empowerment, which resulted in the findings being context appropriate. par methodology is a culturally appropriate approach for working with aboriginal communities for a joint research outcome and can be applied in and with other aboriginal communities in nsw and australia. the community co-researchers gained valuable skills in research methods and water testing. the researchers and the community are working together to improve rainwater maintenance and to advocate for ways to soften the town water to meet the adwg 2011 value, for the benefit the community. the sample size has made the effects of gender and age on water preferences difficult to interpret. the study was carried out in a particular context and a particular community, we are therefore unable to generalise these results to all aboriginal communities in nsw or australia. however, this study may give some good foundations for further studies in other communities. every aboriginal community has unique physical, cultural, economic, and social environments, which may cause communities to have different attitudes towards their drinking water supplies (anadu & harding, 2000; hu, morton, & mahler, 2011). the timing of the water testing also made it hard to predict the impacts of seasonality and drought. our study was unable to relate health outcomes to water quality data and identified preferences; further research is required to address this data gap. a major research priority is the assessment of the uptake and acceptance of town water supplies in multiple rural nsw aboriginal communities. a cost-benefit study could develop better understandings about whether the resources expended in maintaining the town water supplies are worthwhile and cost effective. this may also contribute to the improvement of the quality of the community-preferred sources. c o n c l u s i o n in this study, we found that the perception of town water hardness and parental influence were key factors associated with participants’ decisions to drink rainwater. perceptions of town water and rainwater quality and safety were also associated with decisions by some to drink bottled water. considering the potential costs of repairing and replacing malfunctioning scaled health hardware, 17 jaravani et al.: aboriginal community drinking water perceptions and acceptance published by scholarship@western, 2017 the cost of soap and detergents, the cost of drinking water substitutes like bottled water and fizzy drinks, and the health impacts of untreated rainwater, the need for softer town water is compelling. this study presents important insights that water supply authorities need to consider when assessing health risks: choosing appropriate mitigation measures and building business cases for water quality improvement programs at walhallow. the findings can inform potential interventions to improve drinking water quality in aboriginal communities by involving communities in the process and by addressing community social concerns about town water supplies. tangible improvements in the quality of town water will not be fully recognised if the community is distrustful about the supply. understanding this paradigm can improve future programs and policies for the supply of adequate and acceptable drinking water to aboriginal communities. programmed interventions are unlikely to fully achieve the intended benefits without a good understanding of the social factors influencing drinking water choices by incorporating appropriate and adequate responses in partnership with communities to mitigate such factors. 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.4 r e f e r e n c e s ahmed, w., hodgers, l., sidhu, j. p., & toze, s. (2012). fecal indicators and zoonotic pathogens in household drinking water taps fed from rainwater tanks in southeast queensland, australia. applied and environmental microbiology, 78(1), 219-226. ahmed, w., vieritz, a., goonetilleke, a., & gardner, t. (2010). health risk from the use of roofharvested rainwater in southeast queensland, australia, as potable or non-potable water, determined using qualitative microbial risk assessment. applied and environmental microbiology, 76(22), 7382-7391. anadu, e. c., & harding, a. k. (2000). risk perception and bottled water use. journal of the american water works association, 92, 82–92. australian bureau of statistics (abs). (2013, march). sources of water and its uses. environmental issues: water use and conservation. retrieved from http://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/abs@.nsf/lookup/4602.0.55.003main+features3mar%20 2013 australian indigenous healthinfonet. 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(2008). a response to the national water initiative from nepabunna, yarilena, scotdesco and davenport aboriginal settlements (dkcrc research report number 36). alice springs: desert knowledge cooperative research centre, uk. 23 jaravani et al.: aboriginal community drinking water perceptions and acceptance published by scholarship@western, 2017 pfadenhauer, l. m., & rehfuess, e. (2015). towards effective and socio-culturally appropriate sanitation and hygiene interventions in the philippines: a mixed method approach. international journal of environmental research and public health, 12(2), 1902-1927. pigram, j. j. (2006). australia’s water resources: from use to management. collingwood, victoria, australia: csiro publishing. plazinska, a. j. (2003). microbiological quality of rainwater in several communities in the anangu pitjantjatjara lands, south australia. canberra: bureau of rural sciences. primary health network (phn). 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(2009). health beliefs about bottled water: a qualitative study. biomed central public health, 9(196). doi: https://doi.org/10.1186/1471-2458-9-19 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.4 weiner, j., & mcdonald, j. a. (2013). three models of community-based participatory research: are researchers prepared? issue brief, 18(5), 1-7. white, j. p., murphy, l., & spence, n. (2012). water and indigenous peoples: canada’s paradox. international indigenous policy journal 3(3). doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.3 world heath organization (who). (2011). guidelines for drinking-water quality (4th ed.). geneva, switzerland: author. retrieved from http://www.who.int wright, j. a., yang, h., rivett, u., & gundry, s. w. (2012). public perception of drinking water safety in south africa 2002–2009: a repeated cross-sectional study. biomed central public health 12(556). doi: https://doi.org/10.1186/1471-2458-12-556 25 jaravani et al.: aboriginal community drinking water perceptions and acceptance published by scholarship@western, 2017 a p p e n d i x 1 i n t e r v i e w q u e s t i o n n a i r e my name is . . . from hunter new england population health. i hope you have heard about the community project on drinking water from the previous consultation meetings or from the local aboriginal land council. the walhallow aboriginal land council, on behalf of the community, and the hunter new england population health unit are currently working together to conduct an assessment of the community’s drinking water needs. the results of the assessment will help the community to map the required activities to improve the health of the walhallow community through drinking water of known quality. the assessment will also provide hunter new england population health with opportunities to learn about what issues about drinking water are most important to walhallow community and what can be done to address those issues. as a member of the walhallow community over the age of 18 years and living in the community, we would like to know what you think about the quality of drinking water in the community. we are therefore inviting you to participate in this assessment. it is important that you should know that your participation in this assessment is voluntary. should you agree to participate, you are free to withdraw at any time. your name or address will not be recorded. the answers will be recorded in a voice recorder and on the printed questionnaire. all information collected will be owned by the walhallow aboriginal land council. do you agree to participate? a . p a r t i c i p a n t i n f o r m a t i o n participant = any community member over 18 years old gendermale/ female age group 16-18 19-24 25-40 41-50 51-65 65-75 76-85 >85 b . w a t e r p r e f e r e n c e s 1. can you describe what you use rainwater for? 2. can you explain what you use town water for? 3. how would you describe the rainwater quality? 4. how would you describe the town water? 26 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.4 5. how would you rank the water quality between 1 and 7 with 1 being the best and 7 the worst? water source water characteristic taste smell appearance pressure reliability safety hardness rainwater town water 6. which water characteristic do you consider the most important? rank between 1 and 7 with 1 being the best and 7 the least. water source water characteristic taste smell appearance pressure reliability safety hardness rainwater town water 7. which water source do you trust most? why? 8. which supply do you recommend to your children? why? 9. which supply do you recommend to your visitors? why? 10. if rainwater were to run dry, would you drink town water? yes/no 11. if your answer is “no,” can you explain why? 12. if town water were to run dry, would you drink rainwater? yes/no 13. if your answer is “no,” can you explain why? 14. when you visit town do you drink town water? yes always/yes sometimes/never 15. if never, what do you drink if you become thirsty? 16. can you explain why you do this? 17. can you tell me about a time when you went away from walhallow and what you did about drinking water? 18. when your children go to school, do they carry drinking water with them? yes/no 19. if your answer is “yes,” which water? 20. can you explain why the children carry the water to school? 27 jaravani et al.: aboriginal community drinking water perceptions and acceptance published by scholarship@western, 2017 c . w a t e r m a n a g e m e n t 1. how would you describe drinking water maintenance in walhallow? 1 = very good; 2 = good; 3 = bad; 4 = very bad rainwater town water 2. if any improvements were to be made which issues would you prefer to be addressed first? rank them 1-7 (1 for the highest priority and 7 for lowest priority). water source water characteristic taste smell appearance pressure reliability safety hardness rainwater town water 3. if only one water source were to be improved, which water would you prefer? why? 4. who do you think should best be responsible for the water maintenance? why? d . c u l t u r e 1. do you use the water for any cultural purposes? yes/no 2. if yes, which water supply? town/rainwater 3. can you describe what type of cultural purposes? 4. does the source of the water have any influence on your choice of water? yes/no 5. can you describe what the influence is? 6. does the quality of the water have any influence on the choice of water? yes/no 7. can you describe what the influence is? 8. which water quality criteria do you consider most when using the water for cultural purposes? 9. can you explain why? 28 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.4 e . h i s t o r y in relation to the history of walhallow, from a long time ago to more recently, what are some of the issues that relate to the safety of drinking water? do you have any other issues pertaining to drinking water in walhallow that you would want to be addressed? 29 jaravani et al.: aboriginal community drinking water perceptions and acceptance published by scholarship@western, 2017 the international indigenous policy journal july 2017 working with an aboriginal community to understand drinking water perceptions and acceptance in rural new south wales fidelis g. jaravani peter d. massey jenni judd kylie a. taylor jason allan recommended citation see next page for additional authors working with an aboriginal community to understand drinking water perceptions and acceptance in rural new south wales abstract keywords acknowledgments disclaimer creative commons license authors working with an aboriginal community to understand drinking water perceptions and acceptance in rural new south wales book review: trickster chases the tale of education the international indigenous policy journal volume 8 issue 4 reconciling research: perspectives on research involving indigenous peoples—part 2 article 2 october 2017 book review: trickster chases the tale of education kaitlyn watson western university, kwatso63@uwo.ca recommended citation watson, k. (2017). book review: trickster chases the tale of education. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(4). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.2 book review: trickster chases the tale of education abstract this article provides a review of the book trickster chases the tale of education by sylvia moore. keywords stories, indigenous, mi'kmaw, mi'kmaq, education, trickster, indigenous methodologies creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ book review sylvia moore. (2017). trickster chases the tale of education. montréal, qc: mcgill-queen’s university press. 184 pp. $27.95 (paperback). isbn: 978-0-7735-4907-4. with the help of the trickster, crow, sylvia moore’s trickster chases the tale of education weaves tales across time and place to both share stories from her doctoral research and offer new ones related to her retelling. moore’s doctoral work, based on a salmon release project with wildcat first nation and north queens school in nova scotia, canada, explored “the dynamics of school educators and mi’kmaw community members working together to centre and legitimate mi’kmaw knowledge in education” (p. 10). trickster chases the tale of education discusses this salmon project, offers stories related to moore’s experiences teaching a native studies course at north queens school, and meaningfully incorporates moore’s reflections about what she learned during the research process. moore effectively describes the challenging task of bringing indigenous methodologies into colonial universities, which is reflected in her doctoral dissertation’s research question: how can mi’kmaq knowledge be centered and legitimated in education? the book opens with crow’s story about the “big mess” (p. xv) of education, which is reminiscent of thomas king’s 1993 novel green grass, running water. chapter 1, “the story begins,” provides context for the rest of the monograph; moore describes the “who” and “where” central to the stories in her book, and states her positionality as a mi’kmaw mother and grandmother. chapter 2, “introducing the research,” returns to crow’s opening story, which moore uses to describe both the rootedness of her doctoral research in the indigenous storytelling tradition as well as how the salmon release project she studied began and developed. chapter 3, “a tale: the learning circle,” discusses the salmon release project as an example of how mi’kmaq knowledge and traditions might be brought into and legitimized in school settings. integrating teachings from crow with those from people involved with the salmon release project, moore addresses the project’s work to raise and release salmon and offers a series of realizations related to the salmon and her reflections on the research. moore explains, for example, that “through the stories that were told we were not only learning about salmon but also about one another. we were reconnecting ourselves to one another and to the nation through our words” (p. 37). chapter 4, “a tale: the inside out circle,” engages moore’s work advocating for and teaching a mi’kmaq studies course at north queens school. moore explains that the course had to be re-thought following her realization that indigenous knowledge cannot be substituted for another type of knowledge. moore notes that shifting the course’s priorities—for example, the when, where, how, who, and why central to the course— “turned this class—in an otherwise typical public school—inside out” (p. 75). one significant change that moore mentions is the involvement of elders and traditional teachers. chapter 4 also addresses the difficulties that were associated with bringing mi’kmaq knowledge and experiences into the classroom (e.g., resistance from students). in chapters 5 and 6, titled “a tale: the outer circle” and “a new tale,” respectively, moore synthesizes what she has learned through the research process. moore answers her initial question 1 watson: book review published by scholarship@western, 2017 regarding how to center and legitimate mi’kmaq knowledge in eurocentric education by affirming that there is no answer. moore states: i was looking, as if it were a recipe that i could find. but there are no recipes, no rules, no step-bystep directions . . . it is about doing what is ethical in our lives as we share this land . . . the work is relationship work. (p. 121) from this, moore concludes that “the answers are in the threads of interconnectivity which, when woven together, create the story of our lives” (p. 124); this statement further reflects her realizations about the importance of storytelling and relationship building to indigenous education. trickster chases the tale of education is, overall, a strong piece of storytelling literature; however, there are moments at which the book’s writing style affects its clarity. at times, moore’s writing style comes off as forced, particularly in terms of how she integrates academic literature into her reflections. for example, moore introduces a conversation with her daughter by writing: “‘i relate to what canadian author and educator, lorri neilson glenn, wrote,’ i say to chupan . . .” (p. 123). moore then follows this introduction with a long quotation from neilson glenn. in instances like this, it is difficult to follow moore’s writing as an example of story, given its blending of academic literature and personal conversations. that noted, the book has its stylistic strengths, too. trickster chases the tale of education is a very interesting and informative read. moore’s work to guide readers through her own learning journey makes the monograph read like a prolonged story, which withholds its final lesson until the end. it is thus a book one must read from cover-to-cover—crow’s jokes and all. moore’s creative uses of space, specifically the use of blank pages to represent her pauses—“why the silence?’” [crow] asks . . . i do not know what to say or how to say it” (p. 80)—enhances the storytelling format. moore’s explains that her doctoral dissertation aimed to “meaningfully analyze and present a narrative so that it was respectful of traditional cultural factors and had the strength to influence change in policy and pedagogical practice” (p. 91). through her storytelling approach in trickster chases the tale of education, she effectively personalizes education policy. furthermore, moore’s work cleverly calls out and challenges the expectations of colonial research. for example, when speaking to crow she says, “i can’t put spirits in a study. my research will not be taken seriously” (p. 20). however, moore continuously incorporates teachings, dreams, and stories as relevant sources of knowledge. moore’s honesty about her knowing and unknowing makes her work relatable and valuable: “i was frustrated by my lack of knowledge, which was magnified as i became painfully more aware of how colonized my own consciousness was” (p. 83). in addition to offering important implications for education pedagogies and policy, moore’s book offers a powerful embrace of indigenous methodologies. moore explains that her “first obligation as a researcher was to the mi’kmaw nation and to the voices of mi’kmaw people,” though she also worked to privilege “other indigenous scholars and theories both in framing the research and in analyzing it” (p. 11). using narrative and storytelling methodologies, moore uses her journals and “scholarly quotes that were insightful” (p. 13) to share the stories of her research. in doing so, she weaves together her experience with those of indigenous scholars like jo-anne archibald, marie battiste, willie ermine, and shawn wilson. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.2 while trickster chases the tale of education is centered on mi’kmaw education in nova scotia, it is relevant to other indigenous communities both in canada and around the globe. following canada’s recent truth and reconciliation commission, moore offers her insights about how to bring together indigenous and non-indigenous knowledges. though moore does not expressly use the term “reconciliation” in her book, the text seems to be doing work that is fundamentally similar to that of reconciliation by respectfully bringing together two knowledge systems. her conclusion, that the work of bringing together these knowledges is that of building and sustaining relationships, might provide a lesson for those interested in reconciliation work more broadly. despite some stylistic limitations, trickster chases the tale of education offers valuable insights about the importance of indigenous methodologies, relationship building, and storytelling. its creative format allows readers to glean multiple lessons from its various stories and from the text as a whole. for those interested in indigenous methodologies, moore’s book provides a valuable framework for how to approach narrative work and how to balance responsibility to indigenous epistemologies with the expectations of the academy. moore explains that her book is for “all people (indigenous and nonindigenous) who struggle with colonized minds” (p. 4). together with crow, moore offers critical and clever insights regarding the importance of relationship building as the basis for aligning indigenous and eurocentric education. 3 watson: book review published by scholarship@western, 2017 the international indigenous policy journal october 2017 book review: trickster chases the tale of education kaitlyn watson recommended citation book review: trickster chases the tale of education abstract keywords creative commons license book review: trickster chases the tale of education the cross-fertilization of human rights norms and indigenous peoples in africa: from endorois and beyond the international indigenous policy journal volume 5 | issue 4 article 5 october 2014 the cross-fertilization of human rights norms and indigenous peoples in africa: from endorois and beyond derek m k inman vrije universiteit brussel, derek.inman@vub.ac.be recommended citation inman, d. m. (2014). he cross-fertilization of human rights norms and indigenous peoples in africa: from endorois and beyond. the international indigenous policy journal, 5(4). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.5 the cross-fertilization of human rights norms and indigenous peoples in africa: from endorois and beyond abstract beginning in the 20th century, international law expanded beyond law between nations to eventually embrace the concept of human rights. however, until recently, human rights efforts were focused mostly on individuals, their rights and the obligations of the state in question. indigenous peoples, on the other hand, have always articulated their collective rights and, to their credit, achieved notable success. while there is no doubt that these achievements should be applauded, what is also of interest, and deserves further study, are the ways in which human rights jurisprudence concerning indigenous peoples’ collective rights intermingle, cross-fertilize, and integrate. this dynamic relationship between the various sources of indigenous rights law has had a tremendous impact locally, changing how states interact with the indigenous peoples living within its borders. the first aim of this article will be to explore the above-mentioned topics in detail with a particular eye on the african human rights systems. secondly, it will examine how they relate to the endorois case that was recently decided by the african commission on human and peoples’ rights. i conclude with an investigation into what this could mean for indigenous peoples’ rights in the african context. keywords indigenous peoples, africa, endorois, african commission on human and peoples’ rights, african charter on human and peoples’ rights, localizing human rights acknowledgments derek inman is a phd researcher with the faculty of law and criminology at the vrije universiteit brussel. a version of this paper was presented at the fourth multidisciplinary meeting on indigenous peoples in madrid (spain), 9 may 2013. this research has been funded by the interuniversity attraction poles programme initiated by the belgian science policy office, more specifically the iap “the global challenge of human rights integration: towards a users’ perspective” (www.hrintegration.be). creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ t h e c r o s s f e r t i l i z a t i o n o f h u m a n r i g h t s n o r m s a n d i n d i g e n o u s p e o p l e s i n a f r i c a : f r o m e n d o r o i s a n d b e y o n d after more than 25 years of negotiations, the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip, 2007) was adopted by the united nations general assembly in september 2007. this was a landmark event for the indigenous rights movement and produced noticeable change in the traditional international legal order because indigenous peoples, as a group, were finally recognized as holders of a catalogue of rights. one must ask: how did international human rights law evolve in order to recognize the collective rights of indigenous peoples? consider if you will, emerich de vattel, who in the 18th century defined international law as the “science of rights which exist between nations or states and of the obligations corresponding to these rights” (cited in anaya, 2004, p. 6). with sovereignty of utmost importance, the rights of individuals remained solely the responsibility of the state. after the emergence of human rights, international law surpassed the above-mentioned confines, and individuals were considered the subjects of international law. indigenous peoples, however, wanted to move even further beyond the narrowness of the individual–state dichotomy (anaya, 2004). to unlock the potential beyond the formal human rights system and to expand global human rights norms to include collective rights, indigenous peoples would have to take advantage of the fact that human rights discourse permits plurality (viljoen, 2007). the first point of entry for indigenous peoples into the international legal arena was through labour, when the international labour organization (ilo) addressed the exploitation of indigenous peoples and their lands by colonial industries (oguamanam, 2004). the 1957 ilo convention no. 107 concerning the protection and integration of indigenous and other tribal and semi-tribal populations in independent countries (ilo, 1957) became the first instrument to address the question of indigenous rights in a comprehensive manner. however, convention no. 107 was critiqued (swepston, 1990; yupsanis, 2010) for its state-centric leanings and resulted in the drafting of a more up-to-date legal instrument, ilo (1989)convention 169 concerning indigenous and tribal peoples in independent countries, which revised and improved the previous convention. convention 169 recognized the right of indigenous and tribal peoples to live and develop as distinct communities (venne, 1990), elaborated on the provisions for land rights, and elevated participation rights as a key principle. through participation rights, indigenous peoples received additional means to exercise control over their own economic, social, and cultural development. the entry point for indigenous peoples to raise their concerns at the united nations came through investigations into racial discrimination, when the un sub-commission on prevention of discrimination and protection of minorities recommended that a separate study on indigenous populations be conducted under the auspices of the special rapporteur jose martinez cobo (oguamanam, 2004). the landmark report (cobo, 1983), as chidi oguamanam (2004) explained, “set the stage for entrenchment of the indigenous question on the international agenda” (p. 355). at the united nations, “a number of the issues affecting indigenous peoples” began to be “addressed in the context of individual human rights regimes” (wiessner, 2007, historical context and legal context section, para. 2). the human rights committee (hrc) in its interpretation of article 27 of the international covenant on civil and political rights (international covenant on civil and political rights [iccpr], 1976), which recognizes the rights of ethnic, religious, or linguistic 1 inman: cross-fertilization of human rights norms and indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2014 minorities “to enjoy their own culture, to profess and practice their own religion, or to use their own language” and that “culture manifests itself in many forms, including a particular way of life associated with the use of land resources, especially in the case of indigenous peoples” (hrc, 1994, para. 2). similar to the hrc, the supervisory body of the international covenant on economic, social and cultural rights (icescr, 1976) understood that, in order to fulfill the right to enjoy and maintain one’s culture, indigenous peoples must be able to participate in any decisions that would affect their collective right to lands and resources (matiation & boudreau, 2006; ward, 2011). moreover, the goal of the state should be to acquire consent prior to using lands, territories, and resources traditionally used and enjoyed by indigenous communities (committee on economic, social, and cultural rights [cescr], 2001; cescr, 2004). as stated in the committee on economic, social and cultural committee’s general comment no. 21 (1997): indigenous peoples’ cultural values and rights associated with their ancestral lands and their relationship with nature should be regarded with respect and protected, in order to prevent the degradation of their particular way of life, including their means of subsistence, the loss of their natural resources and, ultimately, their cultural identity. states parties must therefore take measures to recognize and protect the rights of indigenous peoples to own, develop, control and use their communal lands, territories and resources, and, where they have been otherwise inhabited or used without their free and informed consent, take steps to return these lands and territories. (para. 36) in general recommendation no. 23, the committee on the elimination of racial discrimination (cerd, 1997) called upon all states to “ensure that members of indigenous peoples have equal rights in respect of effective participation in public life and that no decisions directly relating to their rights and interests are taken without their informed consent” (para. 3(d)). cerd then referred to informed consent again in the context of the rights of indigenous peoples to own, develop, control, and use their communal lands, territories, and resources (cerd, 1997). at the regional level, the inter-american court of human rights (inter-american court) and the inter-american commission on human rights (inter-american commission) have interpreted the american declaration of the rights and duties of man (american declaration, 1948) and the american convention on human rights (organization of american states, 1969) in ways that have been very beneficial for indigenous peoples. similar to the steps taken to get to the undrip, the jurisprudence emanating from the inter-american human rights system did not occur in a vacuum. the inter-american court and commission engaged in evolutive interpretation, employing decisions from other courts, utilizing authoritative interpretations of human rights norms, while simultaneously understanding that “greater cultural and ideological homogeneity of a region permits agreement on a fuller list of human rights” (neuman, 2008, p. 106). the above was in no way an authoritative overview of the evolution of indigenous peoples’ rights. what it was trying to demonstrate is the variety of ways in which human rights norms concerning indigenous peoples’ rights intermingle, cross-fertilize, and integrate. this dynamic relationship between the various sources of law has had a tremendous impact regionally and locally, changing how states interact with the indigenous peoples living within their borders. one of the aims of this article will be to explore this dynamic relationship, paying particular attention to the african human rights system. the main reason for the focus on africa is that its human rights 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.5 regime has been reluctant at times to utilize external sources relating to indigenous peoples, and also hesitant to even acknowledge indigenous peoples’ rights, whether philosophically, politically or legally. recently however, the african commission on human and peoples’ rights appears to be receptive to integrating the concerns of indigenous peoples, and in the example of the endorois decision one could notice the cross-fertilization of human rights norms. this deserves further study along with an investigation into what this could mean for indigenous peoples’ rights in the african context in the future. i n d i g e n o u s n e s s i n a f r i c a : a c o n t e s t e d c o n c e p t the concept of indigenous peoples, and the catalogue of indigenous peoples’ rights that followed, stemmed from numerous grassroots movements that were mainly focused on the americas and australasia. in these regions, there was a morally compelling claim made by “first peoples” who were dislocated from their traditional way of life through colonial conquest, mass murder, dispossession, and displacement (viljoen, 2007). the earlier human rights instruments dealing with indigenous and tribal peoples, such as the ilo conventions, reflected the focus on historic continuity with preinvasion and pre-colonialism. when it came to africa, however, the acceptance of indigenous peoples or indigenous communities became a contentious issue, with the main argument being that all africans are indigenous to africa and no particular group can claim indigenous status (bojosi & wachira, 2006). another reason why african governments have resisted recognizing indigenous peoples is the uneasiness about the rights associated with such recognition, namely the right to self-determination. after achieving independence, african states pursued a policy of national unity, where the hegemony of the post-colonial state depended on silencing counter-hegemonic voices and drowning out distinctive cultures and identities (viljoen, 2007). questions arose over the strategic and conceptual applicability of the concept in africa, privileging certain sections of the population and resulting in the undermining of the already fragile nation building that was underway (viljoen, 2007). many saw indigenousness as a global interpretation of a western-originated concept that needed to be refocused if it was to be relevant for the african continent (viljoen, 2007). the full extent of africa’s concerns and resistance to indigenous peoples’ rights became even clearer when the text of the undrip reached the general assembly, where namibia, with the support of many african states, asked for the vote on the undrip to be deferred in order to allow for more consideration of african concerns (barume, 2009). as a group, african states and governments (the african group) published seven of their concerns in a draft aide memoire dated november 9, 2006 (african group, 2006). as stated in this communication, the african group (2006): • wanted a definition of “indigenous” in order to determine who would be the rights holders; • objected to the right to self-determination because they were fearful it would cause threats to political stability and territorial integrity; • recognized that, by allowing for the right to political, social, and cultural institutions, the undrip contradicted several constitutions that promote unified states; • feared that accepting the right to belong to an indigenous community meant that people could change their nationalities freely, resulting in political instability; 3 inman: cross-fertilization of human rights norms and indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2014 • believed that the concept of free, prior, and informed consent meant that indigenous communities could veto national legislation; • felt that recognizing the rights of indigenous peoples to the lands, territories, and natural resources they traditionally owned, occupied, or acquired was unworkable and in breach of states’ rights over land and natural resources; • and, in relation to respecting treaties that have historically been made between indigenous peoples and states, claimed that only treaties were exclusively a state matter. while it is beyond the scope of this article to fully elaborate on the lobbying and discussions that took place with the african group prior to the adoption of undrip in 2007 (barume, 2009), it is important to note that the concept of indigenous peoples’ rights would only finally find its home in the african human rights system with the establishment of the african commission on human and peoples’ rights working group of experts on indigenous populations/communities (bojosi & wachira, 2006). prior to this working group, the concept of indigenous peoples was not embraced by the african commission, as is reflected in the earlier jurisprudence, an issue which will be addressed in more detail in the following section. by asking the experts to examine the concept of indigenous peoples in africa, the african commission, whether knowingly or not, allowed for an african perspective on indigenousness, and one that would be used during human rights litigation at the regional level. although keenly aware of the controversy surrounding the concept of indigenous peoples in africa, in the report of the african commission’s working group of experts on indigenous populations/communities (report of the african commission’s working group, 2005), the working group of experts adopted a more flexible approach to the term indigenous, distancing it from aboriginality and instead focusing on the following characteristics: marginalization, discrimination, and exclusion from developmental processes; occupation and use of a specific territory; voluntary perpetuation of cultural distinctiveness; and, survival of their particular way of life dependent on access and rights to their traditional land and the natural resources thereon (bojosi & wachira, 2006). following the release of the above-mentioned report, the african commission, which has a promotional and protective mandate with regards to the human rights enshrined in the african charter for human and peoples’ rights (1982), reaffirmed that indigenous peoples’ rights do exist, are compatible with, and are relevant for, africa and hence released their advisory opinion on the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (“advisory opinion,” 2007). the “advisory opinion” (2007) concluded by saying: …the african commission on human and peoples’ rights recommends that african states should promote an african common position that will inform the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples with the african perspective so as to consolidate the overall consensus achieved by the international community on the issue. (para. 44) 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.5 t h e a f r i c a n c o m m i s s i o n o n h u m a n a n d p e o p l e s ’ r i g h t s a n d i n d i g e n o u s p e o p l e s , p r e e n d o r o i s b r i e f o v e r v i e w o f t h e a f r i c a n c o m m i s s i o n o n h u m a n a n d p e o p l e s ’ r i g h t s lying at the core of the african human rights regime is the african charter on human and peoples’ rights (african charter, 1982), which was adopted in 1982 and entered into force in 1986 following ratification by a majority of member states of the organisation of african unity (pentassuglia, 2010). included in the african charter is the classic catalogue of civil, political, social, economic, and cultural rights found in other human rights treaties, but the african charter also enshrines a number of “peoples’ rights.”1 at the time of drafting, the concept of peoples’ rights was not seen as something new, as the iccpr and the icescr also referred to peoples’ rights. however, the inclusion of this concept was meant to reflect african values and traditions and to address the real needs of africans in their pursuit of development (viljoen, 2007). of course, there are numerous ways2 to understand the concept of “peoples” in the context of the african charter, particularly in relation to indigenous communities. this idea will be explored later on in this section. as set out in the african charter, the african commission on human and peoples’ rights (the african commission) was established with a specific mandate to promote all rights contained within the african charter and to ensure their protection. the promotional and protective functions of the commission were achieved through examining states’ reports;3 receiving communications from individuals, ngos, or state parties on alleged violations;4 and interpreting the charter5 more generally (pentassuglia, 2010). the african commission continues to be the central institution enhancing human rights protection across africa (pentassuglia, 2010). u n i q u e n e s s o f t h e a f r i c a n c h a r t e r , r e l u c t a n c e o f t h e a f r i c a n c o m m i s s i o n apart from the inclusion of the concept of peoples’ rights, one of the more unique attributes of the african human rights system is the explicit reference to external sources. the charter effectively implores the african commission to use international human rights instruments in order to assist in the interpretation of the norms enumerated therein (shepherd & sing’oei, 2010). as article 60 of the african charter (1982) stated: the commission shall draw inspiration from international law on human and peoples’ rights, particularly from the provisions of various african instruments on human and peoples’ rights, the charter of the united nations, the charter of the organisation of african unity, the universal declaration of human rights, other instruments adopted by the united nations and by african countries in the field of human and peoples’ rights, as well as from the provisions of various instruments adopted within the specialised agencies of the united nations of which the parties to the present charter are members. 1 see african charter, 1982, articles 19-24. 2 frans viljoen (2007), for example, enumerates three ways to understanding this term: 1. essentially encompassing everyone. 2. denoting a distinct minority group. 3. denoting the inhabitants of a group under alien domination. (pp. 243-244) 3 see african charter, 1982, article 62. 4 see african charter, 1982, article 47, article 55. 5 see african charter, 1982, article 45(3). 5 inman: cross-fertilization of human rights norms and indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2014 likewise, article 61 stated: the commission shall also take into consideration, as subsidiary measures to determine the principles of law, other general or special international conventions, laying down rules expressly recognised by member states of the organisation of african unity, african practices consistent with international norms on human and peoples’ rights, customs generally accepted as law, general principles of law recognised by african states as well as legal precedents and doctrine. although superfluous at first glance, in the sense that other regional and international human rights systems do not have similar provisions yet still use other sources as interpretive guides, the commission has at its disposal, by including these provisions, a wide array of possible sources that could provide guidance (viljoen, 2007). in practice, the commission appears to view articles 60 and 61 as working together to include relevant international law principles that relate to the charter and the issue under consideration (shepherd & sing’oei, 2010). as the commission itself stated in democratic republic of congo v burundi, rwanda and uganda (2003): the combined effect of articles 60 and 61 of the african charter enables the commission to draw inspiration from international law on human and peoples’ rights, the charter of the united nations, the charter of the organisation of african unity and also to take into consideration, as subsidiary measures to determine the principles of law, other general or special international conventions, laying down rules recognized by member states of the organization of african unity, general principles recognized by african states as well as legal precedents and doctrine. (“the merits,” para. 5; see also shepherd & sing’oei, 2010, p. 91) unfortunately, the african commission seemed to avoid reference to external sources in its first years, using them only to distinguish the african system from other human rights systems (neuman, 2011; viljoen, 2007). according to frans viljoen (2007), “this initial neglect may in part have been a deliberate attempt not to alienate states and to establish the commission as an african institution, but in part also reflected the initial absence of reasoned and well-researched findings” (p. 345). however, this reluctance to use external sources has changed markedly. since 2001, the african commission often refers to united nations treaties, general comments, human rights committee jurisprudence, regional human rights instruments and decisions, and even references “soft” law (viljoen, 2007). as will be explored in the sections below, articles 60 and 61 have been used for the benefit of indigenous peoples in africa and will hopefully be used to develop even more progressive jurisprudence that will further indigenous rights. “ p e o p l e s ’ r i g h t s ” a n d t h e a f r i c a n c o m m i s s i o n as mentioned above, the concept of peoples in the charter is uncertain, and the relationship of this term to indigenous peoples was mired in even more controversy because of the contested nature of indigenousness in africa. however, prior to the endorois decision, the african commission had the opportunity to develop a deeper understanding of the term peoples in two cases: katangese peoples' congress v zaire (katangese peoples' congress v zaire [katangese secession], 1995) and the social and economic rights action center and the center for economic and social rights v. nigeria (the social and economic rights action center and the center for economic and social rights v. nigeria [ogoni], 2001). 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.5 the katangese secession (1995) case concerned a claim that katanga was entitled to independence under article 20(1) of the charter and, therefore, the right to secede from zaire. in deciding whether or not to recognize the right of katanga to self-determination, the african commission was asked, albeit implicitly, to present a definition of peoples (viljoen, 2007). however, the african commission refrained from elaborating on whether or not the katangese “consist[ed] of one or more ethnic groups” (katangese secession, 1995, para. 3) and they did not feel obliged to do so as the african commission believed that the katangese should have exercised a “variant of selfdetermination that is compatible with the sovereignty and territorial integrity of zaire” (katangese secession, 1995, para. 6). importantly though, the african commission appeared to accept that the right of peoples to self-determination could exist if there was concrete evidence of human rights violations or if groups were excluded from participating in government (viljoen, 2007). the ogoni case was concerned with the impact of oil development activities on the ogoni people who live in the areas surrounding the niger delta, where most of the oil production was taking place (pentassuglia, 2011). the african commission found that the nigerian government, through the nigerian military and the state oil company, the nigerian national petroleum company, violated, inter alia, the ogoni peoples’ rights found in article 21 of the charter, namely the right of the ogoni people to freely dispose of their wealth and natural resources (ogoni, 2001; pentassuglia, 2011). interestingly, on a number of occasions, the african commission construed violations of various rights as a combination of individual and collective rights. for example, the african commission stated that the levels of pollution and environmental degradation have made…living in the ogoniland a nightmare. the survival of the ogonis depended on their land and farms that were destroyed by the direct involvement of the government. these and similar brutalities not only persecuted individuals in ogoniland but also the whole of the ogoni community as a whole. they affected the life of the ogoni society as a whole. (ogoni, 2001, para. 67) similarly, the african commission concluded that the right to adequate housing as implicitly protected in the african charter, also encompasses the right to protection against forced evictions, which is a right to be enjoyed by the ogonis as a collective right (ogoni, 2001; pentassuglia, 2011). using this line of reasoning the african commission concluded that the nigerian government also violated the ogonis individual and collective right to health, to property, to family health, and to a satisfactory environment favourable to development. although the approach of the african commission in the ogoni case was progressive in relation to its previous decision in the katangese secession case, it was still cautious, particularly with regards to using external sources in determining the rights of indigenous peoples (pentassuglia, 2011). however, the african commission would utilize a more expansive approach in the endorois decision (the centre for minority rights development and minority rights group international (on behalf of the endorois welfare council) v kenya [endorois], 2010). 7 inman: cross-fertilization of human rights norms and indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2014 t h e e n d o r o i s d e c i s i o n b a c k g r o u n d after a 40 year struggle, the african commission made a historical and landmark ruling that the eviction of the endorois peoples, in order to create a wildlife reserve, violated their rights as indigenous peoples to their customary lands to free, prior, and informed consent, to development, to culture, to religion, to health, and to natural resources (adam, 2011). the endorois are a distinct kalenjin-speaking community and for centuries have been the traditional inhabitants of the lake bogoria area within the rift valley province in kenya (endorois, 2010; morel, 2004). the community consists of approximately 400 families, or 60,000 people, practicing pastoralism from early days (endorois, 2010; morel, 2004). the endorois’ traditional way of life has always consisted of allowing their animals to graze in the lowlands surrounding lake bogoria during the rainy season and retreating to the mochongoi forest for the dry season (endorois, 2010; morel, 2004). the green pastures around lake bogoria have been vital for the health of their livestock and the lake also remains important for religious and traditional practices of the endorois community (endorois, 2010; morel, 2004). the endorois community continued to hold, use, and enjoy this land until 1973 when, without prior consultation or consent, the land was declared a protected area (endorois, 2010; morel, 2004). in 1986, the endorois community was evicted from the fertile lowlands surrounding lake bogoria and displaced to semi-arid land, resulting in the death of a number of their animals and their falling into economic hardships previously unknown to them (endorois, 2010; morel, 2004). moreover, access to lake bogoria for religious and cultural purposes was restricted and even met with intimidation (endorois, 2010; morel, 2004). in an effort to regain access to their lands, the endorois community pursued various avenues of recourse through the domestic legal system but ultimately failed (endorois, 2010; morel, 2004). the endorois community first launched their campaign by challenging the land and natural resource regime that was adopted, unchanged, from the british colonial powers (shepherd & sing’oei, 2010). under the colonial system, land that was occupied by recognized ethnic groups was considered “native land areas” and, although controlled by the native lands trust board in london, was effectively governed under customary tenure (shepherd & sing’oei, 2010). after independence, the title to the native land areas was transferred to the local authorities where the county councils were “obliged to hold the land in trust for the use and benefit of the local communities” (shepherd & sing’oei, 2010, p. 61). unfortunately, this form of land tenure system, in many instances, resulted in collusion between the central government and the local authorities to privatize or nationalize native land areas with complete disregard for the local communities (shepherd & sing’oei, 2010). as this was the case for the endorois community, they submitted a complaint to the kenyan high court, challenging the legality of the forced evictions and the constitutionality of the denial of access to their grazing lands, and to their cultural and religious sites (shepherd & sing’oei, 2010). the kenya high court dismissed the endorois’ claim and stated very clearly that it “could not address the issue of a community’s collective right to property” nor did they believe that kenyan law should afford “any special protection to a peoples’ land based on historical occupation and cultural rights” (endorois, 2010, para. 12). 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.5 after exhausting all domestic remedies, the endorois community, with the assistance of two ngos, centre for minority rights development and minority rights group international, filed an individual communication with the african commission on human and peoples’ rights in 2003 claiming that the republic of kenya violated their right to practice religion, their right to property, their right to culture, their right to free disposition of natural resources, and their right to development. k e y l e g a l a r g u m e n t s a n d t h e i m p o r t a t i o n o f i n t e r n a t i o n a l j u r i s p r u d e n c e as mentioned above, endorois has been hailed as a landmark decision for indigenous peoples’ rights in africa and adds to the catalogue of progressive jurisprudence dealing with indigenous peoples’ rights to traditional lands, territories, resources, and culture. since the endorois decision is integral to developing an understanding of the integration, cross-fertilization, and dynamic relationship of human rights law, the following section will be dedicated to an in-depth study of the numerous instances of the “borrowing” from other regional and domestic sources that can be seen in the african commission’s decision. d e t e r m i n i n g i n d i g e n o u s n e s s . prior to discussing the merits of the alleged violations put forward by the complainants, the first substantive aspect the african commission had to analyze was the endorois’ claim to indigenous identity (murphy, 2012). from the outset, the african commission noted that “the terms ‘peoples’ and ‘indigenous community’ arouse emotive debates” (endorois, 2010, para. 148) and that “there is no universal and unambiguous definition of the concept[s]” (para. 147). however, in their first attempt to determine “indigenousness” in the african context, the african commission took a very unique approach. first, the african commission stressed the uniqueness of the charter, which departs from the narrow formulation of existing human rights instruments and instead includes the three generations of rights: civil and political; economic, social and cultural; and group rights (endorois, 2010). using the term indigenous is not meant to create a special class of citizens but is linked to the notion of peoples. this, in turn, is closely related to collective rights, a concept that, because of the generous provisions in the charter, can be used to address the historical and present day injustices and inequalities felt by sections of populations with nation-states (endorois, 2010). by allowing for a section of a population to claim protection when their rights as a collective are being violated, as was done in the ogoni case, the african commission opened the door for indigenous peoples to claim similar protection (report of the african commission’s working group, 2005). second, since the charter includes provisions for peoples to retain rights as peoples and peoples are analogous to collectives, and indigenous communities fall within this parameter, the african commission set out to provide criteria that could be used for identifying indigenous peoples. for this task, the african commission referred to its working group of experts on indigenous populations/communities, which highlighted the following criteria and shared characteristics: occupation and use of a specific territory; the voluntary perpetuation of cultural distinctiveness; selfidentification as a distinct collectivity; recognition by other groups; an experience of subjugation, marginalization, exclusion, or discrimination; and survival of their particular way of life, which was dependent on access and rights to their traditional land and the natural resources thereon (endorois, 2010). moreover, in applying articles 60 and 61 of the charter, the african commission also took note of the internationally recognized working definition proffered by united nations special rapporteur 9 inman: cross-fertilization of human rights norms and indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2014 jose martinez cobo (cobo report, 1986)6 and the definition contained within the ilo convention no. 169 (1991).7 third, in attempting to dispel kenya’s argument that endorois are not a distinct community but a mere kalejin-speaking sub-group of the tugen tribe, the african commission turned to the concept of self-identification included in the above-mentioned definitions (endorois, 2010). to do this, the african commission relied heavily on a case from the inter-american court of human rights, saramaka people v suriname (2007). the saramaka case dealt with one of six distinct maroon groups living in suriname, an afro-descendent community whose ancestors were african slaves forcibly taken to suriname during european colonization in the 17th century (endorois, 2010). although not fitting the narrow aboriginal, pre-colombian concept of an indigenous community, the saramaka still claimed violations to their collective rights, most notably to property because, over time, the saramaka developed an ancestral link to their land and their way of life depended heavily on the traditional use of their land (endorois, 2010). in view of the evidence presented, the interamerican court considered that the saramaka people made up a tribal community because they were distinct from other sections of the population and they had a special relationship with their 6 cobo report, 1986, defines “indigenous peoples” as follows: indigenous communities, peoples and nations are those which, having a historical continuity with pre-invasion and pre-colonial societies that developed on their territories, consider themselves distinct from other sectors of the societies now prevailing in those territories or parts of them. they form at present non-dominant sectors of society and are determined to preserve, develop and transmit to future generations their ancestral territories, and their ethnic identity, as the basis of their continued existence as peoples, in accordance with their own cultural patterns, social institutions and legal systems. (article 2) this historical continuity may consist of the continuation, for an extended period reaching into the present of one or more of the following factors: • occupation of ancestral lands, or at least of part of them; • common ancestry with the original occupants of these lands; • culture in general, or in specific manifestations (such as religion, living under a tribal system, membership of an indigenous community, dress, means of livelihood, lifestyle, etc.); • language (whether used as the only language, as mother-tongue, as the habitual means of communication at home or in the family, or as the main, preferred, habitual, general, or normal language); • residence in certain parts of the country, or in certain regions of the world; and • other relevant factors. 7 ilo convention no. 169 (1989) offers the following definition in article 1: 1. this convention applies to: (a) tribal peoples in independent countries whose social, cultural and economic conditions distinguish them from other sections of the national community, and whose status is regulated wholly or partially by their own customs or traditions or by special laws or regulations; (b) peoples in independent countries who are regarded as indigenous on account of their descent from the populations which inhabited the country, or a geographical region to which the country belongs, at the time of conquest or colonisation or the establishment of present state boundaries and who, irrespective of their legal status, retain some or all of their own social, economic, cultural and political institutions. 2. self-identification as indigenous or tribal shall be regarded as a fundamental criterion for determining the groups to which the provisions of this convention apply. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.5 ancestral land (endorois, 2010). the inter-american court decided this despite some of the members of the saramaka community not “occupy[ing] the same precise history, territory, or customs of the larger super-class of which they were a part” (murphy, 2012, p. 177). noting the similarities to the claims of the saramaka people and the endorois, along with the endorois' strong linkages between history, traditions, land, and culture, fulfilling much of the criteria of the above-mentioned definitions, the african commission determined that the endorois community was an indigenous community and thus able to benefit from the provisions of the charter that protect collective rights (endorois, 2010). in supplementing previous african commission jurisprudence concerning collective rights, and the african commission’s working group of experts on indigenous populations/communities interpretations, with international soft law sources and comparative jurisprudence from the inter-american court, the african commission adopted an expansive definition of indigeneity, and one that will hopefully have lasting positive consequences (murphy, 2012). a r t i c l e 8 : r i g h t t o r e l i g i o n . the endorois community claimed that by expelling them from their land, kenya violated article 8 of the charter, the right to the free practice of religion. in determining if the endorois’ cultural practices constituted a religion under international law, the african commission looked to its own case law (free legal assistance group and others v. zaire, 1993) on the matter but also to the human rights committee. in general comment 22, where the hrc provides an authoritative interpretation of article 188 of the iccpr, the hrc stated: “the terms ‘belief’ and ‘religion’ are to be broadly construed. article 18 is not limited in its application to traditional religions or to religions and beliefs with institutional characteristics or practices analogous to those of traditional religions” (hrc, 1993, para. 2). consequently, the african commission determined that there was a violation of article 8 of the african charter. a r t i c l e 1 4 : r i g h t t o p r o p e r t y . following this, the african commission examined the endorois claim that kenya violated their property rights as stated in article 14 of the charter. in determining this claim, the african commission relied heavily on its own jurisprudence, most notably the ogoni case, but also jurisprudence from the inter-american court and the european court of human rights (european court). however, prior to delving into the more substantive questions of the alleged violation, the african commission first attempted to determine what was a property right in accordance with african and international law and whether special measures were required to protect such rights (endorois, 2010). the endorois claimed that property rights had an autonomous meaning under international human rights law, which superseded national legal definitions (endorois, 2010). the complainants 8 iccpr (1976) article 18: 1. everyone shall have the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion. this right shall include freedom to have or to adopt a religion or belief of his choice, and freedom, either individually or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in worship, observance, practice and teaching. […] 3. freedom to manifest one's religion or beliefs may be subject only to such limitations as are prescribed by law and are necessary to protect public safety, order, health, or morals or the fundamental rights and freedoms of others. 11 inman: cross-fertilization of human rights norms and indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2014 explained that indigenous groups had a specific form of land tenure and that domestic legal systems had failed in acknowledging communal property rights, instead relying upon “formal” title (endorois, 2010). the african commission appeared to be in agreement as they stated: “…the first step in the protection of traditional african communities is the acknowledgement that the rights, interests and benefits of such communities in their traditional lands constitute ‘property’ under the charter…” (endorois, 2010, para. 187) to support their conclusion, the african commission referred to dogan and others v turkey (2004). this case involved villagers who were forcibly evicted after being unable to produce registered titles to the land where they were living. however, the european court ruled that the villagers, although unable to fulfill formal domestic requirements to prove land ownership, did have rights to property because such rights were born out of possession alone (murphy, 2012). in dogan and others v turkey, the possession mentioned previously included houses the villagers constructed themselves on the lands of their ascendants; land of their fathers which they cultivated; and the money earned from stockbreeding and tree-felling, which was used for subsistence (endorois, 2010). following the reference to dogan and others v turkey (2004), the african commission also made reference to the landmark case from the inter-american court, mayagna (sumo) awastingni v nicaragua (awastingni, 2001). this judgment adopted an evolutionary interpretation of the right to property as defined in article 21 of the american convention,9 in its meaning autonomous of domestic law, recognizing indigenous rights to communal property (awastingni, 2001). in its decision, the inter-american court acknowledged that indigenous rights to property derived from their traditional use and occupancy patterns and did not depend on state recognition (awastingni, 2001). the african commission echoed these sentiments by citing articles 2610 and 2711 of the undrip (2007) and two other inter-american court decisions: case of the moiwana community 9 american convention (organization of american states, 1969), article 21 states: 1. everyone has the right to the use and enjoyment of his property. the law may subordinate such use and enjoyment to the interest of society. 2. no one shall be deprived of his property except upon payment of just compensation, for reasons of public utility or social interest, and in the cases and according to the forms established by law. 3. usury and any other form of exploitation of man by man shall be prohibited by law. 10 undrip (2007) article 26: 1. indigenous peoples have the right to the lands, territories, and resources, which they have traditionally owned, occupied, or otherwise used or acquired. 2. indigenous peoples have the right to own, use, develop, and control the lands, territories, and resources that they possess by reason of traditional ownership or other traditional occupation or use, as well as those which they have otherwise acquired. 3. states shall give legal recognition and protection to these lands, territories, and resources. such recognition shall be conducted with due respect to the customs, traditions, and land tenure systems of the indigenous peoples concerned. 11 undrip (2007) article 27: states shall establish and implement, in conjunction with indigenous peoples concerned, a fair, independent, impartial, open and transparent process, giving due recognition to indigenous peoples’ laws, traditions, customs and land tenure systems, to recognize and adjudicate the rights of indigenous peoples pertaining to their lands, territories and resources, including those which were traditionally owned or otherwise occupied or used. indigenous peoples shall have the right to participate in this process. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.5 v suriname (moiwana community, 2005) and yakyeaxa indigenous community v paraguay (yakyaxa, 2002). the african commission referred again to the saramaka case, where suriname failed to recognize that the saramaka people could enjoy and exercise property rights as a community (endorois, 2010). this failure resulted from the saramaka people not qualifying as a juridical personality and thus being unable to seek judicial protections against violations of their property rights (endorois, 2010). without appropriate land titles, suriname believed that its duty was to simply grant members of the saramaka community the privilege to use the land but effective control of the territory was left to the state. kenya argued along similar lines stating that de facto ownership belonged to them in the absence of a land title and thus it was legally permitted to restrict access. the inter-american court rejected the argument in saramaka. similarly, the african commission believed that the lack of a domestic legal framework designed to recognize communal property rights for the saramaka in suriname was analogous to that of the endorois people in kenya and kenya had the duty to establish mechanisms to give effect to such property rights recognized in the charter and international law (endorois, 2010). by denying ownership of land to the endorois, by expropriating their land and by restricting their access, the african commission decided that the property rights of the endorois people had been encroached upon. although encroachment itself is not a violation of article 14 of the african charter, there is a two-pronged test to determine when encroachment can be conducted: in the interest of public need and in accordance with appropriate laws (endorois, 2010). in determining public interest, the african commission stated that this test had a high threshold because it concerned the encroachment of indigenous peoples’ ancestral lands (endorois, 2010). to elaborate on this point the african commission referred to the special rapporteur of the united nations subcommission for the promotion and protection of human rights, who drafted a report on indigenous peoples in 2004. limitations, if any, on this right of indigenous peoples to their natural resources must flow only from the most urgent and compelling interest of the state […] few if any limitations on indigenous resource rights are appropriate, because the indigenous ownership of the resources is associated with the most important and fundamental of human rights: the rights to life, food, and shelter, the right to self-determination, and the right to exist as a people. (daes, 2004, para. 48) limitations on rights, the african commission explained by referencing handyside v united kingdom (1976), must be proportionate to the legitimate aim pursued. for this, the african commission did not believe that unlawfully evicting the endorois from their ancestral land, destroying their possessions, and denying their property rights, were proportionate to a public need served by the game reserve that was set up by kenya (endorois, 2010). moreover, the african commission noted that the right to property became illusory when they lost access to lake bogoria, with kenya violating the very essence of the right itself (endorois, 2010). in relation to the “in accordance with appropriate laws” test, the african commission regarded consultation to be an important and related requirement. in attempting to expand upon consultation duties, the african commission turned once again to saramaka, which was a seminal case that helped to qualify the meaning of participatory rights while defining the right to consultation and where applicable the duty to obtain consent (saramaka, 2007). saramaka was the first time the inter13 inman: cross-fertilization of human rights norms and indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2014 american court held that “indigenous communities had the right to own the natural resources they traditionally used within their territory” (saramaka, 2007, para. 121). the saramaka decision was also significant because it clarified whether and to what extent the state could interfere with indigenous property rights in the exploration and extraction of natural resources located on their territory. beyond conventional factors, the inter-american court was specifically required to take into consideration whether any restriction “amounted to a denial of the concerned communities traditions and customs, in a way that endangered their very survival” (saramaka, 2007, para. 128). for this, the court established three safeguards to identify whether any restriction would violate an indigenous populations’ survival. first, the state must ensure the right of indigenous communities to effective participation in conformity with their customs and tradition regarding development plans. then, it must guarantee that the indigenous community shares in the benefits of the development plan. finally, an environmental assessment must be performed (saramaka, 2007). only when those factors are respected can the state legitimately curtail indigenous peoples’ rights to property. the african commission concluded that no elements of the three safeguards proposed in saramaka were met and this was tantamount to a violation of article 14 of the african charter (endorois, 2010). a r t i c l e 1 7 : r i g h t t o c u l t u r e . following the discussion on property, the african commission looked into alleged violations of article 17, where the endorois claimed that their group’s cultural rights were denied as a result of their limited access to lake bogoria and by the damage caused by kenya to their pastoralist way of life (endorois, 2010). in this instance, the african commission determined that: article 17 of the charter is of a dual dimension in both its individual and collective nature, protecting, on the one hand, individuals’ participation in the cultural life of their community and, on the other hand, obliging the state to promote and protect traditional values recognised by a community. it thus understands culture to mean that complex whole which includes a spiritual and physical association with one’s ancestral land, knowledge, belief, art, law, morals, customs, and any other capabilities and habits acquired by humankind as a member of society the sum total of the material and spiritual activities and products of a given social group that distinguish it from other similar groups. (endorois, 2010, para. 241) in reaching this conclusion, the african commission drew inspiration from the hrc, as is reflected in their interpretation of article 2712 of the iccpr, which stated: with regard to the exercise of the cultural rights protected under article 27, the committee observes that culture manifests itself in many forms, including a particular way of life associated with the use of land resources, especially in the case of indigenous peoples. that right may include such traditional activities as fishing or hunting and the right to live in reserves protected by law. the enjoyment of those rights may require positive legal measures of protection and measures to ensure the effective participation of members of minority communities in decisions which affect them. (hrc, 1994, para. 7) 12 iccpr (1976) article 27: in those states in which ethnic, religious or linguistic minorities exist, persons belonging to such minorities shall not be denied the right, in community with the other members of their group, to enjoy their own culture, to profess and practise their own religion, or to use their own language. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.5 in reading these together, the african commission noted that not only did kenya have a high duty to protect the cultural rights of the endorois people but that a burden is also placed on african states to preserve the cultural heritage essential to group identity (endorois, 2010). due to the nonderogable nature of kenya’s responsibility to protect endorois culture, in planning the game reserve kenya had the obligation to ensure community access, particularly since access posed no harm to the reserve itself or to kenya’s economic incentive to develop it (endorois, 2010; murphy, 2012). a r t i c l e 2 1 : r i g h t t o r e s o u r c e s . in determining if kenya had violated the endorois’ right to freely dispose of their wealth and natural resources, the african commission first made reference to earlier jurisprudence, namely ogoni, where they decided that indigenous communities have a general right to the natural resources contained within their traditional lands (endorois, 2010). the african commission again sought the views from the inter-american court through the saramaka decision. in saramaka, the inter-american court interpreted the property rights contained within the american convention to mean that the state is precluded from interfering with the natural resources located on indigenous land without first consulting with the indigenous peoples and permitting them to benefit from the results of natural resource development (murphy, 2012). the african commission concurred with this interpretation and, as in saramaka, concluded that kenya could not institute resource development projects within endorois territory if it affected the natural resources traditionally used by the indigenous community and which were necessary for the survival of the members of that community (endorois, 2010). a r t i c l e 2 2 : r i g h t t o d e v e l o p m e n t . in determining if there was a violation of article 22, the african commission stressed the connectedness of development with participation. to do this, the african commission took note of the united nations declaration on the right to development (undrd, 1986), which stated that the right to development includes active, free, and meaningful participation in the development process (endorois, 2010). in saramaka, the inter-american court noted that effective participation required the state to consult with said indigenous community ensuring that development plans within their territory were according to their traditions and customs (endorois, 2010). for the african commission, participation also refers to benefit sharing. again reference was made to the saramaka decision, where the inter-american court stated that benefit sharing is not only vital to the right to development but, by extension, serves as an indicator that states are complying with the communal property of indigenous peoples (endorois, 2010). in addition, in determining the merits of the alleged violation of article 22 of the charter, the african commission also made reference to the concept of “free, prior and informed consent.” in exploring this concept, the african commission took note of the mary and carrie dann v. united states (2002) decision at the inter-american commission for human rights, where the western shoshone community was not accurately informed, nor did they give consent, prior to the us pursuing agricultural developments on their land. the african commission also made note of the observations of the un special rapporteur on the situations of human rights and fundamental freedoms of indigenous peoples that free, prior, and informed consent is essential for the protection of human rights of indigenous peoples with regards to major development projects (endorois, 2010). moreover, the african commission referred to the committee of the elimination of racial discrimination, which observed that: 15 inman: cross-fertilization of human rights norms and indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2014 as to the exploitation of the subsoil resources of the traditional lands of indigenous communities, the committee observes that merely consulting these communities falls short of meeting the requirements set out in the committee’s general recommendation 2313 on the rights of indigenous peoples. the committee therefore recommends that the prior informed consent of these communities be sought. (cerd concluding observations: ecuador, 2003, para. 16) finally, the african commission noted that the goal of development should be empowerment and this was not the case for the endorois community. similarly, the african commission highlighted the case of the yakyaaxa community, which was displaced for the purposes of development projects leading to extremely destitute conditions for members of this community (endorois, 2010). c o n c l u d i n g r e m a r k s : g o i n g b e y o n d e n d o r o i s the endorois decision was a landmark ruling for indigenous peoples in africa and worldwide. as cynthia morel, the co-counsel for the endorois stated: 13 committee on the elimination of racial discrimination (cerd, 1997) general recommendation no. 23 stated: 1. in the practice of the committee on the elimination of racial discrimination, in particular in the examination of reports of states parties under article 9 of the international convention on the elimination of all forms of racial discrimination, the situation of indigenous peoples has always been a matter of close attention and concern. in this respect, the committee has consistently affirmed that discrimination against indigenous peoples falls under the scope of the convention and that all appropriate means must be taken to combat and eliminate such discrimination. […] 3. the committee is conscious of the fact that in many regions of the world indigenous peoples have been, and are still being, discriminated against and deprived of their human rights and fundamental freedoms and in particular that they have lost their land and resources to colonists, commercial companies and state enterprises. consequently, the preservation of their culture and their historical identity has been and still is jeopardized. 4. the committee calls in particular upon states parties to: (a) recognize and respect indigenous distinct culture, history, language and way of life as an enrichment of the state's cultural identity and to promote its preservation; (b) ensure that members of indigenous peoples are free and equal in dignity and rights and free from any discrimination, in particular that based on indigenous origin or identity; (c) provide indigenous peoples with conditions allowing for a sustainable economic and social development compatible with their cultural characteristics; (d) ensure that members of indigenous peoples have equal rights in respect of effective participation in public life and that no decisions directly relating to their rights and interests are taken without their informed consent; (e) ensure that indigenous communities can exercise their rights to practise and revitalize their cultural traditions and customs and to preserve and to practise their languages. 5. the committee especially calls upon states parties to recognize and protect the rights of indigenous peoples to own, develop, control and use their communal lands, territories and resources and, where they have been deprived of their lands and territories traditionally owned or otherwise inhabited or used without their free and informed consent, to take steps to return those lands and territories […] 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.5 the african commission's ruling makes clear to governments that they must treat indigenous peoples as active stakeholders rather than passive beneficiaries […] that recognition is a victory for all indigenous peoples across africa whose existence was largely ignored both in law and in fact until today. the ruling spells the beginning of a brighter future. (human rights watch, 2010) with the endorois decision, the african commission has also removed all doubts concerning the possibility of indigenous peoples claiming, collectively, the right to property, natural resources, and development as protected under the african charter. although it is too early to draw conclusions on the impact of its jurisprudence, this decision is a major step forward for indigenous peoples’ rights in africa. its focus on the collective rights of indigenous peoples to consultation and participation, and its emphasis on the requirement of free, prior, and informed consent, strengthen the distinctive interests of indigenous peoples in the development process of their countries. given the increasing pressures on indigenous lands and the threat development projects cause to their livelihoods, the recognition of those rights is paramount to the survival of indigenous peoples. together with the inter-american court, the african commission has taken a favourable move to defend the interests of indigenous peoples and to remediate their longstanding exclusion and marginalization from the development process of their states. locally, however, it remains to be seen whether the work of the african commission will lead to significant changes but a few positive outcomes can already be noted, while failings from the endorois decision can be highlighted in order to provide recommendations for the future. l o c a l i z i n g h u m a n r i g h t s traditionally, international human rights lawyers have focused on the universality of human rights, promoting a catalogue of rights that represents a shared understanding of all peoples, the prerequisites for a life of dignity. however, for human rights to be truly relevant for all, they need to be situation specific and to be localized (de feyter, 2006). localizing human rights requires that the human rights needs must first be formulated at the local level before global human rights norms can be interpreted and elaborated upon, thus creating human rights actions at the global, regional, and local level (de feyter, 2006). the international human rights regime remains a work in progress that must be contextualized (de feyter, 2006). in other words, what we are searching for is an inclusive universality, which takes place on two fronts: within societies, steps must be taken to make societies more receptive to human rights; and within the international human rights system, flexibility and transformation must be understood as the way in which global human rights norms accommodate specific human rights claims (brems, 2001). post-endorois we have firsthand evidence of this concept of localizing human rights, and how it worked to address local needs. pre-endorois, the idea of property rights in kenya was narrowly defined, influenced by the classic english common law, inherited through a colonialism definition. the endorois community challenged this at the local level but was unsuccessful because there were no precedents in domestic law for the recognition of collective or communal property rights, nor were there any precedents in domestic law for the recognition of peoples’ land based on historical occupation and cultural rights. in taking into consideration recent developments on indigenous rights at the global and regional levels, and then providing an interpretation based on an african perspective, the african commission on human and peoples’ rights challenged kenya’s arguments and decided in favour of the endorois community. 17 inman: cross-fertilization of human rights norms and indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2014 at the local level, this decision not only benefitted the endorois community, but will also have a long lasting impact in future cases. in the lengthy kenyan constitutional review process, the perspectives of the african commission, along with recent comparative and international decisions on indigenous land rights, were integral in influencing negotiations (mennen & morel, 2012). these efforts culminated in the adoption of a new constitution in 2010, which included provisions expressly recognizing community land as equal to public and private land (mennen & morel, 2012). the antiquated land trust regime was eliminated and community land is now “vested directly in the communities for the protection of ancestral lands and lands traditionally occupied by huntergatherer communities” (mennen & morel, 2012, p. 82). in keeping with the concept of localizing human rights, the ensuing question is: what can be done with the endorois decision? wilmien wicomb and henk smith (2011) have noted that with the award of title in endorois, the door is now open for customary communities to be seen as peoples and for customary land tenure to be seen as culture. with respect to customary communities as peoples, wicomb and smith (2011) explain that, based on the african commission’s own analysis, many customary communities would be able to identify themselves as tribal peoples or indigenous peoples. for example, the african commission determined the endorois’ indigeneity through their seasonal semi-nomadic occupation of areas surrounding lake bogoria. however, transhumant nomadism is just one of the characteristics of indigenous and local customary communities which occupy communal land (wicomb & smith, 2011). furthermore, the african commission noted that the term indigenous is used to address historical and present-day injustices and the term peoples is closely related to collective rights (endorois, 2010). by marginalizing customary law systems, and because domestic african courts have been unable to protect customary forms of tenure, the protection afforded to the endorois community could be extended to all customary communities (wicomb& smith, 2011). with respect to customary land tenure as a cultural right, wicomb and smith (2011) explained that when communities exercise their tenure rights within a communal system, this is an articulation of their culture or an expression of the culture of the people. in other words, land is central to the culture and cultural survival of customary communities, similar to the argument put forward by the endorois community before the african commission. protecting customary forms of tenure of communities is of utmost importance, especially now in africa, where the issue of land grabbing is of grave concern (smis, cambou & ngende, 2013). in recognizing communal ownership, one hopes that the bargaining position of customary communities will be strengthened, invoking the state’s duty to consult and the requirement of free, prior, and informed consent (wicomb & smith, 2011). i n c o r p o r a t i n g t h e u n d r i p while endorois has been hailed as a landmark decision for indigenous peoples in africa, we must also recognize its failings in order to highlight areas for further progress. the decision appears to refrain from elaborating upon instruments that were specifically designed to promote the rights of indigenous peoples (pentassuglia, 2011). instead, the african commission opted for jurisprudential dialogue (pentassuglia, 2011). the undrip and ilo convention no. 169 are both notably absent from the discussion concerning the merits of the endorois’ claims. when references to the undrip are used, they appear to reiterate general principles, or perhaps expectations, and remain unused as an interpretive tool (pentassuglia, 2011). 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.5 the idea of using the undrip for the purpose of interpreting the african charter on human and peoples’ rights stems from the unique provision, notably article 60, that is contained within the charter (shepherd & sing’oei, 2010). furthermore, to the general extent that many of the principles contained with the undrip represent nothing more than the codification of norms that have already been accepted by the domestics courts throughout africa, article 61 of the charter could have easily been used to incorporate the undrip into the endorois decision (shepherd & sing’oei, 2010). the african commission has been willing to use the procedural mechanisms contained within the charter to reference international instruments, stating: the african commission is, therefore, more than willing to accept legal arguments with the support of appropriate and relevant international and regional human rights instruments, principles, norms, and standards taking into account the well recognized principle of universality which was established by the vienna declaration of action of 1993 and which declares that “all human rights are universal, indivisible, interdependent, and interrelated” (purohit and moore v the gambia, 2003, article 48; see also shepherd & sing’oei, 2010, p. 93). moreover, consider the above alongside the african commission’s stated position on the undrip: the african commission on human and peoples’ rights welcomes the adoption of the un declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples by the un general assembly on the 13th september 2007. this declaration is a very important document for the promotion and protection of indigenous peoples’ rights all over the world, including on the african continent. the un declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples is in line with the position and work of the african commission on indigenous peoples’ rights as expressed in the various reports, resolutions and legal opinion on the subject matter. the african commission is confident that the declaration will become a very valuable tool and a point of reference for the african commission’s efforts to ensure the promotion and protection of indigenous peoples’ rights on the african continent. (advisory opinion of the african commission communiqué on undrip, 2007, communique on the un declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples section, paras. 1-2) the undrip provides the minimum standards for the survival, dignity, and well-being for indigenous peoples worldwide and using this framework for understanding how the rights in the charter are to be applied to the indigenous communities in africa would have been monumental, not only for the african continent but also for the jurisprudential development of the norms embodied in the undrip (shepherd & sing’oei, 2010). an opportunity was missed in the endorois case but hopefully the african commission will think of ways to incorporate the undrip in the future, particularly since “the usefulness of article 60 and 61 of the charter depends on the creative imagination of the [african] commission” (nmehielle, 2001, p. 161). l e s s o n s l e a r n e d until recently, many african governments have been reluctant to recognize indigenous peoples as beneficiaries of the numerous rights contained within the african charter of human and peoples’ rights. government officials gave numerous justifications for their position, most notably expressing concerns that the fulfillment of the abovementioned rights for indigenous peoples as a group could 19 inman: cross-fertilization of human rights norms and indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2014 have a negative impact on the stability and territorial integrity of african states. furthermore, and perhaps even more troubling, many african officials even questioned the existence of indigenous peoples within african borders, claiming that all africans are indigenous peoples. fortunately, the engagement of the african commission on human and peoples’ rights, and its working group of experts on indigenous populations/communities, in the development of indigenous peoples’ rights as a specific issue in african human rights law, contributed greatly in detangling the contested concept of indigenous peoples on the african continent and helped to respond to the objections raised by the african group of states prior to the adoption of the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (2007). with its report of the african commission’s working group of experts on indigenous populations/communities (2005) and its advisory opinion on the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (2007), the african commission managed to provide an african perspective on the concept of indigenous peoples and, perhaps even more significantly, developed more relevant criteria for determining indigenousness. by focusing on elements such as marginalization, exclusion, and self-identification, as opposed to the more controversial criterion to define who are considered indigenous peoples in africa, the african commission and its working group of experts bypassed the controversy of whether or not indigenous peoples as a group is applicable in the african context. this position has also broadened the scope of application of indigenous peoples’ rights beyond the colonial framework and is likely to have repercussion in other parts of the world where the existence of indigenous peoples is not fully accepted. the contribution of the african commission is not solely limited to offering an african perspective on indigenous peoples or to convincingly arguing that the manner in which the rights of indigenous peoples were framed in the undrip did not represent a threat to african states. by developing a novel interpretation of the african charter in recognizing that indigenous groups are the rights holders of peoples’ rights protected by the african charter, the african commission breaks with earlier suggestions that precluded indigenous peoples from enjoying the same human rights as other peoples. at the heart of the controversy was the denial of the right of indigenous self-determination. even though an explicit decision has not yet been pronounced, the african commission has set aside most uncertainties concerning the application of self-determination to the situation of indigenous peoples in the ogoni case. while endorsing an interpretation of self-determination that no longer defines the right in term of secession and independent statehood, the african commission has confirmed that the right can be exercised within state borders, thereby dismissing arguments that would limit indigenous self-determination on the basis that its exercise represents a threat to the territorial integrity of states. in its landmark endorois decision, the african commission has also eliminated any doubts concerning the possibility of indigenous peoples claiming the collective right to property, natural resources, and development as protected under the african charter. although it is too early to draw conclusions on the impact of its jurisprudence, this decision is a major step forward in favour of indigenous peoples’ rights in africa. by focusing on the collective rights of indigenous peoples to consultation and participation, and its emphasis on the requirement of free, prior, and informed consent, the endorois decision contributes to highlighting the distinctive interests indigenous peoples have in the development process of their countries. given the increasing pressures on indigenous lands, and the threat development projects causes to their livelihoods, the recognition of those rights is paramount to the survival of indigenous peoples. together with the jurisprudence of the inter-american court, the african commission has taken a favourable move to defend the 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.5 interests of indigenous peoples and to remediate their longstanding exclusion and marginalization from the development process of their states. locally, however, it remains to be seen whether the work of the african commission will lead to significant changes. the general purpose of this article was to examine the various ways in which human rights norms cross-fertilize, intermingle, and integrate in an attempt to address local needs. with regards to indigenous peoples, the struggle for their recognition and rights has occurred on a variety of stages, while changing the traditional discourse in the international legal arena and forcing the human rights regime to step away from the individual-state dichotomy. the endorois decision represents the pinnacle of the human rights cross-fertilization process and a call for human rights localization. hopefully, in going beyond endorois, even with its faults, one hopes to see a continuing evolution in the advancements of indigenous peoples’ rights across africa. 21 inman: cross-fertilization of human rights norms and indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2014 r e f e r e n c e s adam, a. h. 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(2007). international human rights law in africa. oxford: oxford university press. 25 inman: cross-fertilization of human rights norms and indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2014 ward, t. (2011). the right to free, prior, and informed consent: indigenous peoples’ participation rights within international law. northwestern journal of international human rights, 10(2), 54-84. wicomb, w., & smith, h. (2011). customary communities as ‘peoples’ and their customary tenure as ‘culture’: what can we do with the endorois decision. african human rights law journal, 11, 422-446. wiessner, s. (2007). united declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples. retrieved from http://untreaty.un.org/cod/avl/ha/ga_61-295/ga_61-295.html yakyeaxa indigenous community v paraguay, case 12.313, report no. 2/02, inter-american court of human rights, doc. 5 rev. 1 at 387 (2002). yupsanis, a. (2010). ilo convention no. 169 concerning indigenous and tribal peoples in independent countries 1989-2009: an overview. nordic journal of international law, 79(3), 433-456. 26 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.5 the international indigenous policy journal october 2014 the cross-fertilization of human rights norms and indigenous peoples in africa: from endorois and beyond derek m k inman recommended citation the cross-fertilization of human rights norms and indigenous peoples in africa: from endorois and beyond abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license the cross-fertilization of human rights norms and indigenous peoples in africa: from endorois and beyond redistribution and recognition: assessing alternative frameworks for aboriginal policy in canada the international indigenous policy journal volume 3 | issue 4 article 3 october 2012 redistribution and recognition: assessing alternative frameworks for aboriginal policy in canada robert maciel the university of western ontario, rmaciel@uwo.ca timothy e.m. vine th e university of western ontario, tvine@uwo.ca recommended citation maciel, r. , vine, t. e. (2012). redistribution and recognition: assessing alternative frameworks for aboriginal policy in canada. th e international indigenous policy journal, 3(4) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.4.3 redistribution and recognition: assessing alternative frameworks for aboriginal policy in canada abstract in this paper, we argue that government approaches to addressing the claims of aboriginal peoples in canada are insufficient. historically, these approaches have focused on redistribution. at the same time, these approaches have all but ignored recognition. we argue that a more holistic approach that addresses both redistribution and recognition is necessary. further, we attempt to show that our approach is consistent with the tenets of liberalism. by conceiving of aboriginal politics as such, the state may be better able to address claims. we begin by providing a theoretical overview of redistribution and recognition, respectively. then, we proceed to show how redistribution and recognition must work together in an adequate account of justice with respect to aboriginal peoples in canada. finally, we offer a conception of aboriginal politics that fulfills this desideratum, and integrates the principle of recognition and redistribution in a way that is within the bounds of liberalism. keywords recognition, redistribution, aboriginal policy, canada, rawls, honneth, fraser acknowledgments we would like to acknowledge the helpful comments and support of angela white, charles jones, discussants who provided feedback on an earlier draft at the annual meeting of the canadian political science association, and the helpful feedback of the anonymous reviewers. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ redistribution and recognition: assessing alternative frameworks for aboriginal policy in canada state policy in canada has historically tended towards making the aboriginal population “legible” to the state through a process of “civilisation” and assimilation (manzano-munguía, 2011). indeed, manzano-munguía argues (2011) that the state has historically created policy that is used to control and subdue aboriginal populations. this colonial-based policy is best exampled by the infamous white paper of 1969 where the canadian government effectively tried to close any space for aboriginal identity or ways of life in the public sphere (canada, 1969). given the historical relationship between aboriginal peoples and the state, it can be seen that we need to restructure the relationship. although relations between the two have improved since the 1970s, there is still great room for improvement. the relationship between the aboriginal peoples in canada and the government of canada continues to be typified by an imbalance of power. much aboriginal policy in the latter half of the twentieth century has been focused on the distribution of rights and resources (richards, 2006). for example, since 1973, canada has entered into 22 land treaty agreements with aboriginal peoples (alcantara, 2008). these treaty agreements are in response to the claims of aboriginal peoples against the state. as alcantara (2008) has argued, although land treaties are important, they do not necessarily provide an adequate response to the power imbalances and structural inequalities that exist in aboriginal and state relations. following others (see, for example, bouchard & vézina, 2003), we argue that alternative policy paths ought to be pursued in order to help foster better relations between aboriginal peoples and the state. while land treaties have been used to help restructure aboriginal and state relations in canada and other settler societies, such as the united states and australia (alcantara, 2008; scholtz, 2006), we argue that, by moving away from a solely distributivist focus and incorporating recognition-based approaches into aboriginal policy, the state may be better able to respond to the claims of indigenous peoples. we further contend that altering a theoretical framework for policy can be applicable in other settler societies where relations between aboriginal populations and the state government are characterized by power imbalances. although we do not make specific policy prescriptions, we argue that a theoretically-informed approach for policy can serve as a foundation for restructuring unequal relations. we argue that a more holistic approach that addresses both redistribution and recognition is necessary. further, we attempt to show that our approach is consistent with the tenets of liberalism1; thus both the redistributive and recognition perspectives are satisfied. we begin by providing a theoretical overview of redistribution and recognition, respectively. then, we proceed to show how redistribution and recognition must work together in an adequate account of justice with respect to aboriginal peoples in canada. finally, we offer a conception of aboriginal politics that fulfills this desideratum and integrates the principles of recognition and redistribution in a way that is within the bounds of liberalism. overview of redistribution and recognition in this section, we provide a theoretical overview of distributive ends, which have been so influential in determining canadian federal policy pertaining to aboriginal peoples. we will then address the potential role for recognition in coming to terms with claims by aboriginal peoples. we begin with an overview of distributive justice by briefly analyzing the philosophies of john rawls and will kymlicka. distributive justice concerns the proper distribution of social goods (e.g. rights and resources), and it is of central concern to many liberals, including rawls and kymlicka. we argue that the distributivist approach typified by these theorists is useful for understanding the majority of responses put forward by the canadian 1 liberalism here is taken to be the dominant approach to government policy. liberal approaches are typified by a concern for individual rights and the distribution of socio-economic goods. 1 maciel and vine: recognition and redistribution published by scholarship@western, 2012 government, which have focused on distribution, be it distribution of property (assessing land claims) or distribution of rights (differentiated citizenship). further, their work may be useful for thinking about possible future responses by the canadian government to claims of aboriginal peoples. we argue that rawls (1971, 2002) defends a welfare egalitarian theory of distributive justice, which kymlicka (1991) then extends in order to accommodate national minorities’ claims for justice. the focus of their theories is understandable considering that liberalism represents a set of theories centering on liberty and equality. redistribution beginning his work in the mid 20th century, american political philosopher john rawls has contributed extensively to political philosophy, developing a theory of justice that has been enormously influential in contemporary political theory and practice. there are several aspects of his philosophy that can be applied to aboriginal policy, some of which we will briefly outline here. first, rawls developed a comprehensive theory of distributive justice for liberal societies (rawls, 2005). according to rawls (2001), justice may be understood in terms of the fairness of distribution of social goods. he states, “the most fundamental idea in this conception of justice is the idea of society as a fair system of social cooperation over time from one generation to the next” (p. 5). rawls’ theory highlights that one of the conditions for the possibility of justice in a democracy is that the people must be committed to fair terms of social cooperation with one another. to the extent that they are not, one can expect injustices to occur within that society and its institutions. furthermore, rawls explicates two principles of justice that may be used to determine the political and economic institutions in a modern liberal democracy. the two principles require that every person have access to the basic liberties and that inequalities are justified in so far as they benefit all in society (rawls, 1971). the basic liberties are described as, ...roughly speaking, political liberty (the right to vote and to be eligible for public office) together with freedom of speech and assembly; liberty of conscience and freedom of thought; freedom of the person along with the right to hold (personal) property; and freedom from arbitrary arrest and seizure as defined by the concept of the rule of law. (rawls, 1971, p. 11) rawls’ theory is not meant to advance novel principles of justice to govern modern liberal democracies. it is meant to explicate the principles that, in actuality, support modern liberal democracies (i. e. canada) and are enshrined (in different language) in the canadian charter of rights and freedoms. thus, in his theory of justice as fairness, rawls’ (1971) primary concern is with providing principles that capture the proper (i.e. fair) distribution of access to resources. individuals ought to have equal opportunity to pursue their concept of a good life and exercise their basic liberties. the institutions of the state, then, need to be arranged in order to fulfill the requirements of this distributive framework. kymlicka (1991) shares a similar commitment to the basic tenets of liberalism, but he is also concerned with the claims of justice for national minorities. kymlicka’s work can be understood as taking rawls’ theory of distributive justice and extending it to national minorities. kymlicka (1991) specifically applies his theory to aboriginal peoples in canada. in his work, liberalism, community, and culture, kymlicka (1991) argues for a specific definition of culture and for the protection of vulnerable minorities through group-based rights. kymlicka’s (1991) primary concern is to reconcile the legitimacy of minority rights, which are typically grounded in the moral status of groups, with the ontological foundation of liberalism, which only recognizes individuals as the proper bearers of rights. in order to achieve this, kymlicka (1991) identifies two criteria: “(1) that cultural membership has a more important status in liberal thought than is explicitly recognized… and (2) that members of minority cultural communities may face particular kinds of disadvantage with respect to the good of cultural membership, disadvantages whose rectification requires and justifies the provision of minority rights” (p. 162). fulfilling these desiderata form the basis of a substantial amount of his work. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 4 [2012], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.4.3 kymlicka is a devoted liberal fundamentally committed to the view that institutions ought to be structured so that we can pursue our conception of the good,2 as far as it is possible within liberal society. further, he is committed to the rawlsian understanding of self-respect3 and extends the rawlsian ideal of promoting selfrespect by acknowledging the value in our pursuits (within our personal formulation of the good) (kymlicka, 1991). according to kymlicka (1991), as individuals our essential interest is to be able to freely pursue life projects that we perceive as valuable. if we come to see our current life projects (i.e. current ends) as lacking value, we have to revise them and follow the new set of ends. kymlicka argues that this is an essential feature of liberalism. kymlicka’s view is similar to other major contemporary liberal theories in some ways; however, it diverges when considering the central role that culture plays in determining how we come to understand ourselves and the potential value in our conception of the good compared with others. essentially, for kymlicka (1991), liberals should be concerned with maintaining cultural structure for individuals, since that is where individuals derive much of their own self-worth, and this, in turn, is what allows them to formulate their conceptions of the good. without a conception of the good, i.e., ends, they would have no reason to act and will not exercise their basic liberties. key to understanding kymlicka’s argument (1991) is that he sees cultural membership as a primary good in the rawlsian sense (i.e. it is vital to maintaining or ensuring self-respect and exercising one’s basic liberties). kymlicka, however, relies on a specific definition of culture. for kymlicka, culture is a structure or framework that allows individuals to make decisions. in his words: “‘culture’ is defined, as i think it should be defined for these purposes, in terms of the existence of a viable community of individuals with a shared heritage (language, history, etc.)” (kymlicka, 1991, p. 168). he advances this definition in opposition to one that defines culture in terms of the norms that currently characterize it. his point is that individuals need to have reference to a cultural structure in order to enjoy a fulfilling life (i.e. in pursuit of the good). in essence, living within a cultural structure provides individuals with the proper tools to make decisions on whether or not a certain conception of the good is valuable. without this cultural structure, kymlicka (1991) argues that an individual’s growth is stunted. kymlicka (1991) contends that we must have reference to a cultural structure in order to make informed decisions about the good life. without the ability to participate in one’s own culture (that they were born into), an individual cannot properly make the decision as to whether or not their current ends are valuable and worth pursuing. moreover, it becomes increasingly difficult to make the comparative judgments between ends in order for people to confirm their value. national minorities require government protections to ensure cultural viability. having access to the overarching cultural structure that kymlicka (1991) suggests is necessary for cultivating the good life requires that aboriginal peoples are not made vulnerable to certain practices by the state. put more clearly, protections are put in place that ensures aboriginal peoples have access to the resources necessary to cultivate aboriginality in canada (e.g. access to land, access to resources for ensuring survival the language, etc.). importantly, however, kymlicka is not making the claim that we should protect cultural ways of life because of the value of that culture, per se. rather, cultural protections are put in place as a way to ensure individual autonomy (i.e. that one has the ability to choose a meaningful life). thus, while his theory makes headway towards recognition-based policy, we are left with an explicitly liberal individualist approach. after establishing the importance of culture in people’s moral development, kymlicka moves to justifying minority rights for groups who have been institutionally disadvantaged. one of the most salient cases for 2 that is, the ends which we desire and base our life projects around. kymlicka’s use of the good here refers to the pursuit of “the good life”. 3 rawls considers self-respect to be the most important social good. self-respect refers to citizens’ understanding of themselves as being free and equal with others, or as having a similar set of rights and access to public institutions. 3 maciel and vine: recognition and redistribution published by scholarship@western, 2012 kymlicka is that of aboriginal peoples in canada. in his analysis, kymlicka (1991) finds that, because of institutional disadvantages, state protections are needed in order to make “aboriginal culture”, or “aboriginality”, a viable pursuit for individuals within the community. the special rights claim is bound to circumstance and not political choice. aboriginal peoples did not, with free agency, choose the current situation that continues to disadvantage them and undermine their ability to pursue their conceptions of the good, which are largely based on their cultural values. kymlicka (1991) succinctly states his argument as such: “so i believe that certain collective rights can be defended as appropriate measures for the rectification of an inequality in circumstances which affects aboriginal people collectively” (p. 194). kymlicka’s approach moves in the right direction, but that it does not go far enough to respond to the demands of aboriginal peoples. we argue that kymlicka’s distributive response via group-based rights offers a one-sided approach to the claims of aboriginal peoples. although the differentiated protections from the state are helpful, and quite useful, they fail to recognize aboriginal culture, justice, forms of governance, etc., which we argue are required to adequately address aboriginal demands. kymlicka’s approach, nonetheless, offers a valuable starting point for conceptualizing a holistic approach to aboriginal demands within a liberal framework. as we will argue further, however, incorporating recognition into a redistributivist approach is required as well. moreover, as turner (2000) points out, kymlicka’s argument regarding group-based rights operates ahistorically and fails to recognize the serious power imbalances between the state and aboriginal peoples. as such, an alternative approach is necessary. recognition in this section, we present an alternative conception of justice as recognition, which is advanced by many communitarian scholars. the fundamental difference between “justice as fair distribution of basic resources” (including opportunities and liberties) and “justice as recognition” is the importance of the individual and society and the interrelation between them. communitarianism is a branch of philosophy that tends to argue against liberal individualism and the notion of individual freedom and rights (mulhall & swift, 1996). unlike liberals, communitarians see social relations as co-existing with the individual identity. the individual cannot be understood outside the social context. that is, contemporary liberal theories fail to recognize that the social environment – including communities to which people belong – contributes to identity as much as any other aspect of the physical environment. to understand what is meant by recognition and how it is relevant to our discussion here, it will be helpful to start with charles taylor's discussion of recognition, highlight aspects of tully's constitutionalism, and discuss honneth's view of recognition in social injustice more broadly. for taylor, comprehending the rise of originality and authenticity, which began with jean-jacques rousseau and was continued by johann herder, is of great importance for understanding the demands of recognition. there is a tension between our need to belong and a need to live an authentic life. by authentic, taylor (1991) means to live a life that is true to ourselves, one that we internally approve of, and one that we arrive at through engagement with our community. this need for authenticity, then, is coupled with the need for recognition that our way of life is worthwhile. we need our way of life to be recognised as valuable and one worth living by those around us. according to taylor (1995), initially in hierarchical society, recognition was “built into the socially derived identity by virtue of the very fact that it was based on social categories that everyone took for granted” (p. 231). however, the rise of authenticity coincides with a democratization of hierarchical societies. this change in social structures, thus, degrades the degree to which recognition is possible in the socially derived identity. this new, inwardly-generated identity that the “age of authenticity” brings highlights the importance of dialogical (negotiated) identity. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 4 [2012], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.4.3 for taylor, achieving authenticity (which will be an ongoing process) or self-fulfillment cannot be monological (as mainstream modern philosophy supposes, according to taylor), but must be dialogical. “we become full human agents, capable of understanding ourselves, and hence defining our identity, through our acquisition of rich human languages of expression ... not only the words we speak, but also other modes of expression whereby we define ourselves, including the ‘languages’ of art, of gesture, of love, and the like” (taylor, 1995, p. 231). an essential aspect of developing personhood is expanding the ability to communicate with others, which we do through language, but also through art and non-verbal modes of communication. it is not simply the acquisition of this language, however, that is relational. it is also its use. language (in any form) is, quite literally, without meaning if it is not used in relation to another person; that is to say, language itself must imply a relationship among people. we do not, once this language is acquired, retreat to some solitary place, where we then use what we have learned to determine “who am i?.” for taylor (1995), “discovering my own identity doesn't mean that i work it out in isolation, but that i negotiate it through dialogue, partly overt, partly internal with others” (p. 231). further, engaging in dialogue with others is necessary not only because this may provide one with epistemic checkpoints in self-discovery. recalling the point made earlier, our part in social relationships constitutes us as persons. thus, for taylor (1995), one cannot be a person without being in social relationships with others. in taylor’s account, it is also important to note, for our purposes, that a person need not be a single individual. taylor (1995) discusses the dialogical relationship of identity formation and authenticity for a person and a people – that is, for an individual as a person and as a member of a culture-bearing group. thus, the dialogue that leads to self-identity is mirrored by a dialogue among cultures themselves at the macro level. to understand taylor (1991) we must understand his meaning of identity – “it is ‘who’ we are, ‘where we come from’” (p. 34). our subjectivity, then, consists of exterior factors that are informed by others and our context. try as we might we cannot escape the dialogue that informs who we are. it is not only the dialogical process that is important for one's own identity formation, but also the reflection that one is given by “significant others.” identity is something we form in dialogue with others who matter to us, so it is crucial how others see us; we often struggle against the image reflected by the significant others with whom we dialogue. because of the crucial significance of others in realizing and affirming identity, recognition becomes important. taylor’s contentions are congruent with michael sandel’s argument that some aims are constitutive of the self and some allegiances and loyalties go beyond choice and revision (on the liberal view). living by these allegiances and loyalties has a moral force that is inseparable from “understanding ourselves as the particular person we are” (sandel, 1982, p. 179). these allegiances go beyond temporal values and inform our very identity as members of a family, community, nation, etc. however, it cannot be the case that my identity is constituted by all the attachments or loyalties i might have as “any change in my situation, however slight, would change the person i am” (sandel, 1982, p. 20). if this was the case, given that situations necessarily change from moment to moment, my identity would be in constant flux. thus, we would say that the attachments we find with the significant others that taylor discusses are important. the problem of misrecognition is central here, as “the projection of an inferior or demeaning image on another can actually distort and oppress, to the extent that the image is internalized” (taylor, 1995, p. 232). because recognition is vitally important, misrecognition can inflict harm, either on the individual person or on the culture-bearing people by representing their culture in a distorted and demeaning way. this is especially evident in an economy of unequal cultural, economic, and political power within a single state. a good example of this is the lasting effects of the imagery of aboriginality in north america perpetuated by the state. an express purpose of the residential schools created in canada in the 19th century was to contrast the degenerate and despised view of the “indian” with the civility and dignity of the dominant culture. at 5 maciel and vine: recognition and redistribution published by scholarship@western, 2012 least part of the process of destroying aboriginal culture that took place in these residential schools involved the presentation of a misrecognised figure of aboriginality and a denigration of aboriginal language and custom. in the united states the process of anthropological cataloguing that occurred during the american romantic period toward the end of the 19th century similarly (consciously or unconsciously) sought to reflect a unilaterally conceived image of the american “indian”. photographers, such as edward sheriff curtis, set out to capture on film the last of the “noble savages”, going as far as to carry with him a wagon of “indian” props, such as headdresses and spears. he would force aboriginal peoples to conform to his image when he found that they did not (king, 2003). thus, an identity is forced upon a group thereby degrading them and inflicting harm upon their sense of worth (taylor, 1995). the demand for recognition is the demand for acknowledgment of legitimate collective ends and people’s worth. with this understanding of recognition we can make some sense of the constitutional imperative that james tully (1995) articulates in is work, strange multiplicity, namely mutual recognition (among continuity and consent). tully is important for us here, as this work is directed at constitutionalism in canada between settler and aboriginal peoples. this idea of recognition consists in the reciprocal nature of the treaty system first established between the british crown and aboriginal peoples (nations) in north america (tully, 1995); that is, it implies recognition of each by the other as autonomous nations. in fact, the workability of a modern constitution between these nations requires that each nation recognize the other. this gives constitutional content to the basic idea of recognition expressed above, namely the acknowledgment of legitimacy and worth of cultures. clearly, tully sees recognition as being central to providing a just accommodation of both aboriginal and non-aboriginal peoples in canada. what is important here is the consistency with taylor above. tully's view of mutual recognition expressly supports the legitimacy of collective ends and starts from the position of equal worth of these cultures. axel honneth (2003) discusses recognition in the broader context of social injustice. he sees recognition as being the central problem of justice, and other problems of injustice (i.e. distributional ones) as being derivatives of recognition (fraser & honneth, 2003). material inequality here is considered a species of misrecognition. although honneth (2003) argues that “the opposition of ‘distribution conflicts’ and ‘struggles for recognition’ is not very helpful, since it creates the impression that demands for economic redistribution can be understood independently of any experience of social disrespect”, it is clear that he considers “distribution conflicts as a specific kind of struggle for recognition” (pp. 170-171). while distributional problems present themselves, it is only as a form of misrecognition, not systemic distributional problems. this point, as we will see later, is criticized by fraser (2003) and ultimately seen as insufficient, on its own, to articulate solutions for injustice. honneth, as fraser points out, cannot account for systemic distributional inequalities in capitalist economies, leaving an important form of injustice outside his focus on recognition. the redistribution and recognition perspective above, we have seen the liberal emphasis on distributional mechanisms (rights and resources) as a mechanism for correcting injustice eschews consideration of recognition. within this distributive framework, injustice can be overcome simply by providing state protections or resources; there is no need to recognize the constitutive effects of group membership or the degrading effects of misrecognition per se. as well, we have seen above how honneth (2003) contends that distribution is a subset of misrecognition. we cannot understand the demand for economic redistribution independent of the experience of social disrespect. so here, recognition eschews distribution and concentrates on the subordination of distribution to recognition. in essence, each of these perspectives on addressing injustice is constructed as either/or mechanisms. here we will present the both/and perspective best articulated by nancy fraser. fraser (2003) argues that both recognition and distribution are required to deal with injustice. against views that posit recognition and redistribution as antitheses as either/or fraser contends that recognition and redistribution are better conceived as both/and. the problem with a distributional approach alone is that it 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 4 [2012], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.4.3 cannot adequately deal with difference. the distinction of class for the materialist debate of distribution prioritizes differences in material resources only; other differences, such as ethnicity and culture, are subsumed under the primary dichotomy of material resources. consequently, the response to injustice is to destroy difference by eliminating the material conditions that produce this inequality (fraser, 2003). thus, if a group’s experience of injustice is more than material – if, for example, they also experience social disadvantage – redistribution alone is not adequate. fraser (2003) terms these groups “two-dimensionally subordinated groups” for whom both recognition and redistribution are needed (p. 19). in the case of aboriginal peoples, we can easily see that marginalization takes on aspects of economic inequality, social disadvantage, and lack of social respect. in order to correct injustice on this account, fraser argues for “participatory parity” that allows members of society to interact on an equal footing. for participatory parity, she argues that two conditions are necessary: the objective and inter-subjective conditions. excesses of material inequality degrade the ability to participate on an equal footing, which is a primary concern for liberals as we have seen above. the second aspect of participatory parity focuses on the degree to which institutionalized patterns of cultural value allow equal opportunity for social esteem (fraser, 2003). this brings the importance of material and social equality together. fraser, in contrast to honneth, is committed to a view of justice that does not reduce the role of either recognition or redistribution. fraser (2003) proposes “perspectival dualism” where we must “assume both the standpoint of recognition and the standpoint of distribution, without reducing either one of these perspectives to the other” (p. 63). rather than constituting separate domains, we can see recognition and distribution as applicable. this “perspectival dualism” gives us a place to start that does not foreclose the possibility of either distributive or recognition approaches to injustice. in the case of aboriginal peoples in canada, it is manifestly clear that it is not simply a matter of distributional inequality, but also a lack of secure access to culture that needs addressing. some studies have indicated how the recognition of aboriginal life choices (supported by resource distribution) can pay social dividends. hallett, chandler, and lalonde (2007), for example, report that increased aboriginal language knowledge in aboriginal communities is associated with lower youth suicide rates at the band or reserve level in some communities. while this is a preliminary investigation, we can see some parallels to what kymlicka (1991) claims in regards to having access to cultural resources and an ability to cultivate the good. this requires that both the local community and government recognize the importance and viability of aboriginal life choices and commit resources to programs that require support, such as aboriginal language literacy. in another study, chandler and lalonde (1998) find that efforts taken by some aboriginal communities to preserve cultural continuity (broader than just language here) are strongly associated with variability in youth suicide rates. as cultural continuity increases, youth suicide rates in these groups decrease. factors that contribute to cultural continuity and are associated with reduced rates of youth suicide include measures of self-government, engagement in land claims, as well as band control over health and education. thus, at stake in some of these cases is clearly not only the preservation of cultural diversity for its own sake, but also support for the preservation of culture to address real social and material issues within a particular community. clearly this is a narrow, but important, example of the effect of recognizing the viability of aboriginal life choices on one disturbing aspect of social pathology disproportionately present in aboriginal communities. it is also an example of the link between distribution and recognition in addressing social disadvantage. presumably, it is not only the community control over these mechanisms of cultural continuity that foster better social outcomes, but also resources needed to run them (often distributed by a level of canadian government). in a limited way this empirical and psychological example illustrates the perspectival dualism that fraser argues is most effective in redressing injustice. 7 maciel and vine: recognition and redistribution published by scholarship@western, 2012 bridging the gap in this final section of the paper we offer one potential solution to incorporating the claims of recognition, while still maintaining a commitment to distribution. to do this, we advocate theory driven policy that is based, in part, on rawls’ ideas expressed above, as well as those from his law of peoples. we argue that one of the main reasons that traditional multicultural approaches have failed is that they have mainly focused on distribution, while all but forgoing recognition. thus, we argue that policy should be refocused to incorporate recognition into redistribution. ultimately, we argue that current policy debates need to shift focus to establish a discursive space for genuine recognition. we contend that rawls’ later work in law of peoples can be used to provide the basis for refocusing policy debates for aboriginal politics in canada. by conceiving of aboriginal communities as peoples, based on rawls’ work, the state may be able to more fully address the concerns of aboriginal peoples. the term ‘peoples’ in rawls’ (2002) work describes independent groups demarcated by a common social structure and/or governing structure. we do not speak directly on the policies that will come out of this or make specific recommendations; we are simply trying to show that a conceptual overhaul of aboriginal politics in canada is required. in law of peoples, rawls’ argues that his principles of justice, outlined above, can only properly operate within a liberal society. he points to the fact that there are nonliberal societies that we must tolerate and allow sovereignty, as long as they maintain individuals’ basic rights. according to rawls, a main task in extending the law of peoples to nonliberal peoples is to specify how far liberal peoples are to tolerate nonliberal peoples. here, to tolerate means not only to refrain from exercising political sanctions – military, economic, or diplomatic – to make a people change its ways. to tolerate also means to recognize these nonliberal societies as equal participating members in good standing of the society of peoples, with certain rights and obligations... (rawls, 2002, p. 59) rawls is arguing that particular peoples (as differentiated from states) who are well-ordered, but nonliberal in nature, require basic autonomy and recognition as a viable and well-ordered community. it should be noted at this point that the law of peoples is referring to a theory of international relations not domestic policy. rawls is arguing that these groups deserve respect for several reasons. primarily, respect can foster solidarity and lack of it can “wound the self-respect of decent nonliberal peoples” (rawls, 2002, p. 61). rawls is not using the term “decent” pejoratively; rather, decent merely signifies that the people may not be liberal, but they still have a well-ordered set of principles and members’ basic rights are being met. nonetheless, the use of the term decent illustrates that much still needs to be done to recognize nonliberal people’s ways of life, as opposed to simply tolerating them. thus, in international relations, liberal states must respect and recognize nonliberal peoples as pursuing an equally viable way of living. what we are arguing is that, for the purpose of policy prescriptions, some aboriginal peoples could be seen as constituting a nonliberal society, through their alternative approaches to governance and justice, and should be afforded the respect and recognition as required by the law of peoples within canada. at the same time, there is great diversity amongst aboriginal ways of life in canada. given this diversity, conceiving of aboriginal and state relations by way of the law of peoples could help frame policy that recognises the value of nonliberal aboriginal ways, while at the same time respects liberal aboriginal ways. in this way, we contend, incorporation of a theoretical framework such as the law of peoples may provide the state with the ability to better respond to the diversity of claims presented by aboriginal peoples, be they liberal or nonliberal in nature. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 4 [2012], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.4.3 for rawls, principles of justice “... are a conception of social justice; they regulate the relations among people living in the same society, specifying their duties to one another and society’s duties to them” (cited in freeman, 2007, p. 416). a main impetus behind the notion of a law of peoples is that principles of justice are inherently social. these principles are determined by a people, a nation, or a state. for various reasons, rawls argues that we should not attempt to extend the principles of justice, as determined in a liberal society, to nonliberal societies. one justification for this idea is the different valuation of the good. for thinkers like michael walzer (1994, 2006), for example, notions of the good – those that help form a substantive morality in society – are social ideas that are discovered within a particular society. already we can begin to see the relevance of this aspect of rawls’ work to aboriginal policy in canada. if we can conceive of aboriginal peoples as peoples distinct from canadians, then rawls’ law of peoples can potentially be applied domestically. again, by doing so, policy prescriptions could better fulfill the redistributive and recognition sides of policy to both liberal and nonliberal groups. we argue that rawls’ international theory can be applied domestically to canada for several reasons. first, canada is a multi-national federal state, and, as such, the state is comprised of several peoples (as defined by rawls. to describe a group as a “people” requires that they have a shared set of institutions that allows for social cooperation (rawls, 2002). secondly, in our view, aboriginal peoples in canada have a legitimate claim to pursue aboriginality based on history and past injustices. further, the canadian state has recognized these claims, but has not been able to fully address them due to a focus on redistribution inherent in liberal politics. finally, the aboriginal peoples of canada constitute groups of peoples, as per rawls’ definition: first, the society does not have aggressive aims, and it recognizes that it must gain its legitimate ends through diplomacy and trade and other ways of peace ... the second criterion has two parts. (a) the first part is that a decent hierarchical people’s system of law, in accordance with its common good idea of justice ... secures for all members of the people what have come to be called human rights .... (b) the second part is that a decent people’s system of law must be such as to impose bona fide moral duties and obligations...on all persons within the people’s territory. (rawls, 2002, p. 64-66) having a unified culture is not necessarily required; there only needs to be a sense of social cooperation and a shared basic structure of society for a group to constitute a people (freeman, 2007). we feel that the aboriginal peoples of canada represent a “people” in the rawlsian sense. this alters the way we can theorize about and conceive of aboriginal policy in canada. we must recognize the value of aboriginality in canada as something beyond a contribution to the diversity of the state. that is, we must actually recognize that aboriginal ways of life (although they may not necessarily be liberal) are reasonable ways of living, due the proper recognition and respect as outlined by rawls. by doing so, we may be able to carve out a space for the recognition of aboriginality in canada. the recognition that aboriginal peoples in canada constitute a people must inform our policy. policies must be formulated so as to respect and recognize the value of aboriginal forms of governance. additionally, aboriginal people must be given the autonomy required for them to properly govern traditionally. as long as they constitute a “decent people”, aboriginal peoples should be given a substantial autonomy in governance. aboriginal policy in canada should be guided by theory. we argue that the law of peoples can help inform aboriginal policy in canada as it maintains the necessary redistributive side, while justifying the recognition aspect to liberal politics. in order to show why this is a possible solution we turn to the work of taiaiake alfred. alfred (2009) calls for complete reform of the conceptualizations of multicultural policy towards aboriginal peoples in canada. one of the main problems hampering the resolution of aboriginal governance in canada is history. despite several well-intentioned approaches so far, the problem of establishing real aboriginal governance in canada persists. according to alfred, 9 maciel and vine: recognition and redistribution published by scholarship@western, 2012 the imposition of western governance structures and the denial of indigenous ones continue to have profoundly harmful effects on indigenous people. land, culture, and government are inseparable in traditional philosophies; each depends on the others, and this means that the denial of one aspect precludes the recovery for the whole. without a value system that takes traditional teachings as the basis for government and politics, the recovery will never be complete. (alfred, 2009, pp. 25-26) although we do not discuss the recovery process specifically, approaching policy with alfred’s comments in mind may help lead to harmony between the canadian state and aboriginal peoples. additionally, as alfred (2009) argues, true recognition of the history and contemporary situation is required before any policy initiatives will be successful. it is important to note that policy initiatives must be aimed towards imposing a balance of power between the state and aboriginal peoples in canada. according to alfred, we need to realize that ways of thinking that perpetuate european values can do nothing to ease the pain of colonization and return us to the harmony, balance, and peaceful coexistence that were – and are – the ideals envisioned in all traditional indigenous philosophies. in fact, it is not possible to reach these goals in the context of western institutions at all, because those institutions were designed within the framework of a very different belief system, to achieve different objectives. (alfred, 2009, p. 65) we do not necessarily suggest that aboriginal governance must be mutually exclusive from western institutions of governance; we feel that alfred (2009) offers some insights into the issue that traditional approaches to multiculturalism have missed. however, aboriginal self-governance is not necessarily the only response. henderson (2009) argues that aboriginal peoples can find redress through traditional institutions in canada, while ladhner (2006) argues that aboriginal forms of governance are sufficiently different from traditional western forms. despite the fact that we do not begin to delve into the complexities of aboriginal governance in canada, we are arguing that policy needs to be aimed more at balancing a respect for and recognition of true autonomy, while still providing redistributive justice. although some (notably coulthard, 2007) contend that incorporating recognition-based approaches to aboriginal claims will only further exacerbate the imbalances between aboriginal populations and the state, we contend that this is not necessarily the case. coulthard (2007) is likely correct when he suggests that, if recognition-based policies are framed within a notion of “liberal pluralism”, they will fail. however, we argue that, by reframing our theoretical understanding of the relationship between aboriginal peoples and the state as one typified by rawls), we may be able to avoid coulthard's criticism. recognition-based policy framed within a society of peoples will be characterised by an understanding of autonomy and genuine value in governing and ways of life. by restructuring policy initiatives to fit within a “society of peoples” type model, policy need not be translated into liberal language or made “legible” by the state (following the language of manzano-munguía, 2011). the response from kymlicka (1991) to establish protections over aboriginal culture as a way to foster individual autonomy, for example, remains problematic as it fails to engage with the deep history between aboriginal peoples and the state. recognition-based policy, on the other hand, can work to foster a more equal balance of power between the groups – one that genuinely recognises aboriginal peoples and the value of their ways of life and modes of governing. we argue that, as opposed to furthering colonial policy, recognition-based policy has the potential to receive aboriginal peoples as they really are and not simply as subordinate groups subsumed within the canadian state. this is not to suggest that recognitionbased policies alone can restructure relations between aboriginal peoples and the state – they likely won't (bhandar, 2011). it is impossible to undo the historical legacy of colonialism, especially considering that colonialism is what characterised policy in canada; however, we maintain that we need to reconceptualize the relationship between aboriginal peoples and the state. incorporating recognition-based policy is a step in the right direction in the theoretical overhaul of aboriginal policy in canada. indeed, following turner (2006), 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 4 [2012], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.4.3 reshaping the future of aboriginal and state relations needs to be done dialogically; aboriginal peoples and the state need to work together. aboriginal policy should be marked by both redistribution and recognition. conclusion we need to rethink our conceptualization of aboriginal policy in canada if we are to consider alfred’s view seriously. we must be aware of the language we use and its implications; for example, the concept of “justice” may have various meanings for the state and different aboriginal peoples, even though the contexts may overlap. additionally, we need to work more closely with aboriginal communities in an attempt to: (a) cultivate strong aboriginal leadership with knowledge of traditional ways of life, and (b) establish an equal power relationship. we argue for the need for recognition, but we must also consider how redistribution fits. kymlicka’s (1991) formulation of group-based rights is beneficial in that it can help guarantee the basic resources needed to sustain aboriginality as a viable culture in canada. redistribution is necessary and cannot be ignored; however, it is only part of the solution. similarly, recognition, despite its importance, cannot be conceived without redistribution. without a redistribution of resources, individuals will not be able to alter their situations. minow (1998), while speaking of state apologies argues, “perhaps most troubling are apologies that are purely symbolic and carry no concrete shifts in resources or practices to alter the current and future lives of survivors of atrocities” (p. 112). a state-offered apology fulfills the need for recognition, as the state recognizes committing a wrongdoing; however, the apology is essentially empty without a transfer of resources to actually change the situation. consequently, recognition and redistribution must be taken together when attempting to address the demands of aboriginal peoples. although we do not offer any specific recommendations for policy, we argue, nonetheless, that policy shaped by both recognition and redistribution can help better respond to the claims of aboriginal peoples. by maintaining a focus on distribution of rights and resources, policy will continue to foster better economic outcomes and reduce structural inequalities. incorporating recognition into policy can help ensure that the self-worth of aboriginal peoples is not devalued or undermined by the state. additionally, recognition-based policy can help alleviate some of the social pathologies explored earlier. by creating policy that properly allocates resources to aboriginal peoples and also comes from a place of genuine recognition of the value of aboriginal ways of life and governance, we argue that the state can better respond to the claims of aboriginal peoples and help relations between the two groups going forward. we resist providing explicit examples of what this policy will look like, as it will necessarily be varied and ever-changing. we can say, however, that it will be characterised by mutual engagement and dialogue (this is also noted by castellano & reading, 2010). we already have seen some examples of a willingness to engage in this type of policy (bouchard & vézina, 2003). in the international context we have seen policy that tends towards either recognition or redistribution as well. for example, the australian government has implemented policies similar to those in canada (i.e. typified by concerns for the proper allocation of resources) and acknowledged past injustices through the “sorry day” apologies (duhs & davidoff, 2010). recognition of historic injustice from the state is necessary if we are going to foster better relations, but it does not end there. again, our central point is that policy needs to strike a balance between the two if we are hoping to provide better responses to the claims of aboriginal peoples. this type of policy, we argue, will be characterised by mutual engagement between groups, community involvement, and a balance between the state’s typically liberal policy and governance and the aboriginal groups’ potentially nonliberal stance (johns, 2007). with this in mind, we recognize that a plethora of implications and potential policy routes could be undertaken. one of the major implications is that the needs and requirements of the aboriginal community must be identified. who should act as the representatives of the community? are all aboriginal communities representative of the same values? is there even a single aboriginal community that we can speak of? these are serious questions that deserve close scrutiny, but they are beyond the scope of this paper. nonetheless, we 11 maciel and vine: recognition and redistribution published by scholarship@western, 2012 maintain that policy must be aimed at fulfilling both the redistributive and recognition aspects as outlined here. further, we argue that, by conceiving aboriginal peoples as a people in the rawlsian sense, we can justify recognition to both liberal politics and aboriginal groups. the goal of this paper is merely to demonstrate a way in which we can shift conceptions of aboriginal-state relations in canada to help guide policy initiatives. finally, we argue that this is well within the bounds of liberalism. by conceiving canada in the way we have, we are arguing that aboriginal peoples constitute a rawlsian people and are due a certain level of respect and autonomy. further, if aboriginal peoples fulfill the criteria of a decent hierarchical nonliberal people, which we believe they do, there is no reason to suggest that this is illiberal. by incorporating a theoretical background from both liberal and traditional communitarian theories, we argue that the state can better respond to the claims of aboriginal peoples. the impetus for the reconceptualisation of aboriginal policy is largely the fault of canadian state policy, but this failure is one that goes beyond the canadian context. in australia, for example, policy that focuses on the distribution of rights and resources has largely failed to significantly improve the lives of aboriginal peoples (westwood & westwood, 2010). thus, the notion of reconceptualising aboriginal policy is one that is applicable to other settler societies (e.g. australia and new zealand). the overall goal of policy should be to respond to the claims of aboriginal peoples in a way that corresponds to the particular community. our belief that policy should be aimed at fulfilling both the redistribution as well as recognition is not something that should be seen as distinctly canadian. rather, canada is used here to: (a) show why states ought to recognize aboriginal ways of life as valuable ways of living alongside non-aboriginals, (b) explore why liberal states’ responses to the claims of aboriginal peoples tend towards redistribution, and (c) investigate why that focus has failed. in this paper, we have attempted to provide an analysis of why traditional approaches to aboriginal policy in canada have failed. additionally, we have attempted to show that, by refocusing policy to incorporate more genuine recognition, we may be able to provide a better response to the claims of aboriginal peoples. theoretically driven policy that enhances an understanding of aboriginal peoples’ claims would allow for the autonomy over governance that scholars like alfred and turner argue is required, while still maintaining the primacy of liberal values in the state. this is just one way to approach the issue and may not necessarily be the best. we feel that, by incorporating the rawlsian understanding of a people, aboriginal policy may come closer to addressing the claims for recognition and redistribution. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 4 [2012], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.4.3 references alcantara, c. (2008). to treaty or not to treaty? aboriginal peoples and comprehensive land claims negotiations in canada. publius, 38(2), 343-369. alfred, t. (2009). peace, power, righteousness: an indigenous manifesto. don mills, on: oxford university press. bhandar, b. (2011). plasticity and post-colonial recognition: owning, knowing and being. law and critique, 22(3), 227-249. bouchard, p. & vézina, s. (2003). cengagement des citoyens: une alternative pour le renouvelle-ment des relations entre les autochtones et lest non-autochtones. canadian public administration, 46(1), 76-102. castellano, m. b. & reading, j. (2010). policy writing as dialogue: drafting an aboriginal chapter for canada’s tri-council policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans. international indigenous policy journal, 1(2), 1-18. chandler, m. & lalonde, c. (1998). cultural continuity as a hedge against youth suicide in canada’s first nations. transcultural psychiatry, 35(2), 678-696. coulthard, g. s. (2007). subjects of empire: indigenous peoples and the ‘politics of recognition’ in canada. contemporary political theory, 6(4), 427-460. duhs, a. & davidoff, l. (2010). capabilities, rights and justice in the context of australian aboriginal welfare policy. forum for social economics, 39(1), 23-31. fraser, n. (2003). social justice in the age of identity politics: redistribution, recognition, and participation. in n. fraser & a. honneth (eds.), redistribution or recognition? a political philosophic exchange (pp. 7-109). london, uk & new york, ny: verso press. fraser, n. & honneth, a. (2003). introduction. in n. fraser & a. honneth (eds.), redistribution or recognition? a political philosophic exchange (pp. 1-7). london, uk & new york, ny: verso press. freeman, s. (2007). rawls. london, uk: routledge. canada. parliament. (1969). statement of the government of canada on indian policy, 1969. ottawa: minister of indian affairs and northern development. hallett, d., chandler, m., & lalonde, c. (2007). aboriginal language knowledge and youth suicide. cognitive development, 22, 392-399. henderson, j. y. (2009). dialogical governance: a mechanism of constitutional governance. saskatchewan law review, 29, 27-44. honneth, a. (2003). redistribution as recognition. in n. fraser & a. honneth (eds.), redistribution or recognition? a political philosophic exchange (pp. 110-160). london, uk & new york, ny: verso press. johns, g. (2005). strife amid plenty: aboriginal policy after land rights. institute of public affairs, 57(3), 17-19. king, t. (2003). the truth about stories. toronto, on: house of anansi press. 13 maciel and vine: recognition and redistribution published by scholarship@western, 2012 kymlicka, w. (1991). liberalism, community, and culture. new york, ny: oxford university press usa. ladhner, k. l. (2006). indigenous governance: questioning the status and the possibilities for reconciliation with canada’s commitment to aboriginal treaty rights. retrieved from http://fingovernance.org/ncfng_research/ kiera_ladner.pdf manzano-munguía, m. c. (2011). indian policy and legislation: aboriginal identity survival in canada. studies in ethnicity and nationalism, 11(3), 404-426. minow, m. (1998). between vengeance and forgiveness. boston, ma: beacon press. mullhall, s. & swift, a. (1996). liberals and communitarians, second edition. cambridge, ma: blackwell publishing. rawls, j. (1971). a theory of justice. cambridge, ma: harvard university press. rawls, j. (2001). justice as fairness: a restatement. cambridge, ma: harvard university press. rawls, j. (2002). law of peoples. cambridge, ma: harvard university press. rawls, j. (2005). political liberalism. new york, ny: columbia university press. richards, j. (2006). aboriginal policy: two priorities. inroads, 19, 4-6. sandel, m. (1982). liberalism and the limits of justice. cambridge, ma & new york, ny: cambridge university press. scholtz, c. (2006). negotiating claims: the emergence of indigenous land claim negotiation policies in australia, canada, new zealand, and the united states. new york, ny: routledge. taylor, c. (1991). malaise of modernity. concord, on: house of anansi press. taylor, c. (1995). the politics of recognition. in c. taylor (ed.) philosophical arguments (pp. 225-267). cambridge ma: harvard university press. tully, j. (1995). strange multiplicity: constitutionalism in an age of diversity. cambridge, ma & new york: cambridge university. turner, d. (2000). liberalism’s last stand. in c. cook & j. d. lindau (eds.), aboriginal rights and self-government (pp. 135-147). montreal, qc & kingston, on: mcgill-queen’s university press. turner, d. (2006). this is not a peace pipe. toronto, on: university of toronto press. walzer, m. (1994). spheres of justice: a defense of pluralism and equality. new york, ny: basic books. walzer, m. (2006). thick and thin: moral argument at home and abroad. notre dame: university of notre dame press. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 4 [2012], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.4.3 westwood, b. & westwood, g. (2010). aboriginal cultural awareness training: policy v. accountability – failure in reality. australian health review, 34(4), 423-429. 15 maciel and vine: recognition and redistribution published by scholarship@western, 2012 the international indigenous policy journal october 2012 redistribution and recognition: assessing alternative frameworks for aboriginal policy in canada robert maciel timothy e.m. vine recommended citation redistribution and recognition: assessing alternative frameworks for aboriginal policy in canada abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license microsoft word 319663-text.native.1354296579.doc water and indigenous peoples: canada’s paradox the international indigenous policy journal volume 3 issue 3 water and indigenous peoples article 3 september 2012 water and indigenous peoples: canada’s paradox jerry p. w hite western university, white@uwo.ca laura murphy western university, lmurph33@uwo.ca nicholas spence western university, nspence@uwo.ca recommended citation white, j. p. , murphy, l. , spence, n. (2012). water and indigenous peoples: canada’s paradox. th e international indigenous policy journal, 3(3) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.3 water and indigenous peoples: canada’s paradox abstract the condition of water safety and quality on reserve has been a growing concern in canada. despite a substantial amount of funding allocated toward improving water infrastructure on reserve, an alarming proportion of communities face boil and drinking water advisories. to understand why this paradox and problem persists, this article will work through the issues and nuances that have created unsafe drinking water on reserve, proposed remedies, and policy implications. to do so, the role of the government of canada is reviewed first because reserve land is under federal jurisdiction. following this, the article will discuss the standpoints of the assembly of first nations and other indigenous groups on the water crisis, and will draw upon focus groups within first nations that we conducted. to contextualize the water issue on reserve in canada, a comparison with the united states is then drawn. one of the main themes of this paper with regard to the issue of safe drinking water on reserve is how the legacy of colonization has limited community capacity. this theme is then discussed in depth by comparing indigenous to non-indigenous communities, looking to the social determinants of water quality, and possibilities and limitations of building sustainable development allowing for safe drinking water on reserve. to understand what processes consistently intervene in the way of sustainability of safe water in indigenous communities, regulatory frameworks are examined, funding mechanisms are reviewed, and aboriginal governance is discussed along with the direction that policy should take. keywords water, indigenous, community capacity, capital, sustainable development acknowledgments the research that supported this paper was funded by a strategic grant from the social science and humanities research council: may 2009 –“the social determinants of safe water and community wellbeing in aboriginal communities.” creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ water and indigenous peoples: canada’s paradox canada is in a very fortunate position given it has approximately 9% of the world's renewable water supply and less than 0.5 percent of the world’s population (biro, 2007; natural resources canada 2007). however, not all canadians have regular, protected access to safe drinking water. specifically, we find that true for the indigenous peoples of canada, particularly for first nations and inuit1. if this issue were simply a matter of funding shortfalls, the problem would be more easily solved. however, it is not simply about dollars. since 1996, canada has spent over 2.5 billion dollars in indigenous communities building new or improving existing infrastructure. more than 50% of that funding has been spent since 2006. in june 2011, the auditor general of canada reported that, “…first nations’ reserves may still be years away from having drinking water protection comparable to what exists off-reserve in canada” (auditor general, 2011, section 4.34). the most recent data indicates that, “…more than half of water systems on reserves still posed a medium or high risk to the community members they served” (auditor general, 2011, section 4.34). demonstrating this, several severe situations have come to the public’s attention over the last few years. in october 2005, the community of kasheshewan in northern ontario had to be evacuated because of bacteria in the water system. in late 2011, the community of attawapiskat came into public view for poor housing as well as water problems. as of august 2012, 119 communities, out of over 600 first nations communities in canada, were under water advisories requiring residents to either boil their water or to heed ‘do not drink warnings’ (health canada, 2012). technology is also not the issue. we have the capacity to deliver clean water and treat wastewater anywhere in this country2. canada is an advanced industrial country with one of the highest standards of living and united nations development index ratings (white, beavon, & spence, 2008) and an enviable level of technological development. given this, we should not see a significant section of the population facing problems accessing safe drinking water. this paper examines the current understanding of why this problem exists, the current proposals on the table to deal with this problem, and our analysis of which policy directions should be explored. stakeholders views of the water problem and its solution recently, global movements have emerged to advocate the right to safe water (knight, hartl, & world health organization, 2003; united nations, 2010). one of the most influential statements driving these movements is the united nations’ (2000) millennium declaration. this declaration addresses the safe drinking water issue by calling for environmental protection, sustainable development, and the maintenance of sufficient and safe resources for all peoples. in the ten years since the declaration, availability of safe drinking water worldwide has improved in rural areas (united nations, 2010). overall, the gap between rural and urban access to water has been closing, but the “safety of water supplies remains a challenge and urgently needs to be addressed” (united nations, 2010, p. 58). however, while the issues regarding the availably of safe drinking water are global, the primary focus of the un’s call has been in developing nations (united nations, 2010). safe drinking water is assumed to be universally accessible within countries in the global north, such as canada. nonetheless, public media accounts, research, and government reports have recently been released reporting 1 in canada, there are three main groups of indigenous peoples who are collectively called aboriginal peoples. the largest group is first nations; some of whom have legal status as ‘indians’ under the indian act and constitution, which gives them rights to reserve lands. the inuit are indigenous peoples who traditionally lived in the arctic regions. the métis peoples are those with mixed north american indian and european ancestry. 2 we recently talked with the vice president research of one of the world’s leading water treatment corporations and she said that we have the capacity to deliver safe water to every indigenous household for cost of an hd color tv (personal communication, may 10, 2012). 1 white et al.: water and indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2012 on real problems regarding drinking water for indigenous people’s communities in canada (auditor general, 2011; simeone, 2010).3 the processes that maintain the current crises, critiques of these processes, and recommendations for moving forward have been discussed by indigenous people’s organizations, responsible government agencies, auditors and commissions, academics, as well as non-governmental organizations. all have all put forward their interpretation of the issues, along with proposals on how to proceed. in this section of our paper, we will present a brief overview of these views. in the section following, we will outline our conclusions on the issue and our policy proposals. government of canada in canada, there is a complex system of water regulation. dating from 1763, the crown (now federal government of canada) has assumed responsibility for “indians and lands reserved for indians4.” for all others in the country, water and wastewater are normally the responsibility of provincial and territorial governments. three federal departments are responsible for delivering safe drinking water to aboriginal communities: aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc), health canada, and environment canada. aandc (2010) “...provides advice and funding assistance for the design, construction, operation, and maintenance of water and wastewater systems. it also provides funding for the training and certification of water system operators” (p. 5). next, “health canada works with first nation communities south of 60° latitude to identify potential drinking water quality problems, including: verification monitoring of the overall quality of drinking water, and reviewing, interpreting and disseminating results to first nations; providing advice, guidance and recommendations about drinking water safety and safe disposal of onsite domestic sewage; and reviewing water and wastewater infrastructure project proposals from a public health perspective” (aandc, 2010, p. 5). finally, “environment canada provides advice and guidance material in the areas of source water protection and sustainable water use” (aandc, 2010, p. 6). the government’s position is that they provide funding, while the first nations is responsible for delivery. chiefs and band councils are responsible for designing, building, and operating their water systems. they receive full capital funding for projects that aandc approves and 80% of “…of operating and maintenance costs” (simeone, 2010, p. 2). the community is responsible for the remaining 20% of costs. in addition, communities are “...responsible for ensuring that water systems are operated by trained operators as well as for monitoring drinking water quality through effective sampling and testing programs” (simeone, 2010, p. 2). health canada verifies that they are monitoring the water supply, but first nations' themselves issue ‘drinking water advisories’ (dwas) in their communities, as advised by health canada (aandc, 2010). the federal initiatives 2003 2012: aandc and health canada. in response to a growing number of complaints and emergencies regarding threats to safe drinking water, the federal government of canada developed the first nations water management strategy (fnwms) (aandc, 2003). the strategy was a five year, 600 million-dollar program aimed at dealing with issues from source of water to consumption at home. it was targeted at both drinking water and wastewater treatment. in march 2006, a plan of action for drinking water in first nations communities was put forward that would guide spending of the remaining fnwms funding and commit a further $60 million for the post-2008 period. the action plan was aimed at 3 in the balance of this paper, we will use the term ‘first nation’ when describing indigenous peoples in canada. this is the term these communities use to describe themselves and government documents utilize this term. 4 first nations and inuit have been historically been referred to as ‘indians’ in both the united states and canada. the term ‘indian’ is in the constitution, but current best practice has been to talk about ‘aboriginal,’ ‘indigenous,’ or first nation, métis, or inuit peoples. federal responsibility is outlined in section 35 of the constitution act (department of justice, 1982). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.3 reducing risk in aboriginal communities and targeted 193 high-risk water systems (aandc, 2008b). this plan included: • “the protocol for safe drinking water for first nations communities... standards for the design, construction, operation, maintenance, and monitoring of drinking water systems in first nations communities and is intended for use by first nations staff responsible for water systems” (aandc, 2006, p. 1); • mandatory training for all treatment-plant operators and a regime to ensure that all water systems are overseen by certified operators. various initiatives such as remote monitoring of water systems and the contracting of independent certified operators to provide necessary oversight will be put in place; • complete specific remedial plans for first nations communities with serious water issues, starting with the 21 communities most at risk; • a panel of experts to advise on the appropriate regulatory framework, including new legislation, developed with all partners; and • a clear commitment to report on progress on a regular basis (aandc, 2006). furthering this plan of action, an expert panel was put in place to focus on the issue of legislative and regulatory frameworks (aandc, 2008a). this was the result of a 2005 report by the auditor general that pinpointed regulation as a key problem (auditor general, 2005; 2011). in addition, the federal government made three substantial financial commitments to increase funding for safe water on reserve. in the 2008 budget, $330 million dollars were promised over two years; in 200, $165 million was earmarked for specific treatment projects; and in 2011, a further $330 million was guaranteed. over this period, changes were also made to the plan of action, which included: • a national engineering assessment to determine the state of existing water and wastewater facilities. the assessment, to be completed in 2009, was to propose solutions for every first nations community in canada; • consultations on a new federal legislative framework for safe drinking water; • doubling the funding for the circuit rider training program in an effort to increase the number of circuit rider trainers from the current level of about 44 to over 70; • aandc (formerly called indian and northern affairs canada or inac) would modify existing policies and develop a protocol to facilitate investments in small water systems, such as individual and community wells, trucked water, septic systems, or agreements with neighboring municipalities to buy or provide water or wastewater services; • investments in a national wastewater program; and • waterborne illness procedures (aandc, 2008a). each year of the action plan, the government has reported on what it sees as achievements. by the 2010 report, the government identified some of the following updates: • out of the initial 21 communities with high risk drinking water systems, only 3 remain high risk; • compared to 193 communities identified in 2006, 49 community drinking water systems have been identified as having high risk water systems, which is an increase of one from the 2009 report; • since 2006, there has been a decrease from 224 to 132 communities with high-risk drinking water systems and/or advisories; • the protocol has been further developed to include health canada's (2007) procedures for addressing drinking water advisories in first nations communities south of 60 ° and environment canada's guidance on source water protection; • a 24-hour hotline and emergency support has been available to all first nations since december 2006; 3 white et al.: water and indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2012 • the expansion of the circuit rider training program5 is underway, and includes plans for hiring additional trainers; • decentralized systems protocols for water and wastewater; • engagement sessions held with first nations, regional first nations organizations, and provincial and territorial governments, regarding proposed development of a legislative framework for water. • a national engineering assessment of water and wastewater systems for first nation communities • (aandc, 2010). in 2010, the federal government introduced bill s-11 aimed at creating the federal regulations that would cover the safety of drinking water on first nation lands (assembly of first nations (afn), 2010). that legislation sparked a lot of opposition. it died on the order paper and in february of 2012 new legislation was introduced in an attempt to address the critics (canadian press, 2012). we discuss these two initiatives further in a later section. the expert panel. as part of the plan to address the serious problem of water quality, the government organized the expert panel for safe drinking water for first nations (swain, louttit, & hrudey, 2006b). their primary mandate was to examine options for regulatory frameworks. as mentioned above, in canada, water quality and safety is largely in the provincial jurisdiction (or delegated to municipalities). the panel did some consultations with aboriginal communities,6 organizations, and individuals, and conducted their own research on these issues. concerning their primary focus of legislative framework, they indicated that success required: • the existing multi-layer, multi-organizational, multi-level responsibility structure be clarified because the responsibilities of each stakeholder were unclear and the roles of the different players were not well understood, which created accountability gaps and problems on the ground; • proper in-depth consultations with first nations were essential in the creation of chosen frameworks; • the resource gap had to be closed, including the 20% that communities had to ‘find’ in order to build, operate, and maintain systems (simeone, 2010; swain et al., 2006b). communities being forced to meet new high standards, without the human capital, expertise, and resources needed to do so, was only exasperating existing problems; and • particular attention needed to be paid to the high-risk communities. the panel then pursued five legislative options for ensuring safe drinking water on reserve. they are: • applying provincial laws on reserve; • federal regulations in line with statutes, including federal laws empowering first nations to pass water legislation; • “... a new federal act”; • adopting provincial water laws in federal legislation; • “ first nations jurisdiction and customary laws” (simeone, 2010, p. 6). the first two options listed, despite the potential to be incorporated easily and quickly, were rejected by the panel (simeone, 2010). “ the remaining three options – creating a new federal act, incorporating provincial water laws, and applying first nations jurisdiction – were deemed most workable” (simeone, 2010, p. 7). of these three, the panel preferred a new federal statute establishing 5 the circuit rider training program makes available experienced water system operators, called circuit riders, to communities for on site support. 6 it should be noted that the panel made it very clear that they were not set up to do extensive consultation; rather, they were to identify legislative options, roadblocks to their implementation, and issues that impacted water quality (swain et al., 2006a). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.3 one water standards body. the panel felt that applying customary law could create “uncertainty, both in terms of how to get a comprehensive modern water regime and how long the process might take” (swain et al., 2006b, p. 59). the issue of the role of indigenous peoples in this framework received some attention. one very important issue raised was the idea of an aboriginal water commission that would provide indigenous oversight. they noted that, “the commission and an associated appeals tribunal, would be responsible for inspections and holding particular parties, including federal agencies, to account. the view of the panel is that this would help to bind the current multi-party system and shift the enforcement of rules away from the funding providers…” (simeone, 2010, p. 8). in the end, canada appears to have adopted the creation of new federal legislation. we will return to this issue in the discussion of our policy directions. the auditor general of canada. the auditor general of canada (auditor general) provides one form of periodic overview for government departments and the auditor general has been monitoring safe water for aboriginal peoples over the last decade. in 2005, the auditor general’s office7 investigated drinking water on reserves and reported that, “…first nations communities did not benefit from a level of drinking water protection comparable to that available to people living off reserves because provincial legislation and regulations are not applied on reserves. consequently, first nations communities did not have a regulatory regime to govern drinking water” (auditor general, 2011, section 4.24). the mechanism used by aandc and health canada is ‘contribution agreements’, which are contracts for every service provided that outline the funding to be given and responsibility of the community in the program. communities were required to make many reports on the use of the funds. this form of control on quality was deemed by the auditor general to be inadequate for protecting quality. the 2005 report notes that, “there were no statutes or regulations to require monitoring of the quality and safety of drinking water on reserves” (auditor general, 2011, section 4.24). further, the report called for the development of such regulations and legislated standards. they also found that the accepted guidelines for canadian drinking water quality were not enforced for activities like testing (auditor general, 2005). even aandc, in their own reports, noted that in 2005 there was “…a significant risk to the quality or safety of drinking water in three quarters of the drinking water systems on reserves” (cited in auditor general, 2011, section 4.24). the auditor general requested that the federal government take two major steps: • inac (now called aandc) and health canada implement a regulatory regime for drinking water in first nations communities; and • health canada, in consultation with inac, ensure that all drinking water tests be carried out, that test results be properly recorded and shared, that situations where drinking water was not safe be identified and the necessary measures for each situation be defined, and action be taken by responsible parties as required (auditor general, 2011). in june 2011, the auditor general (2011) released a report where they outlined their evaluation of the progress to date by responsible government bodies. according to their report, two key issues for the auditor general remain: (a) the creation of a legislated, regulatory framework that will force the proper funding for water systems through aandc; and (b) the implementation of a workable, accountable water testing program by health canada. the auditor general wants the regulatory framework to be developed through a consultative process that involves aboriginal communities. the auditor general’s (2011) report assesses the progress made on recommendations from 2005 and notes that, “first nations reserves may still be years away from having drinking water protection comparable to what exists off-reserve in canada. as of march 2010, more than half 7 to be precise, it was the commissioner of the environment and sustainable development in the auditor’s office, but for simplicity we shall use auditor general. 5 white et al.: water and indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2012 of water systems on reserves still posed a medium or high risk to the community members they served” (auditor general, 2011, section 4.34). further, “there are still no legislative or regulatory regimes applicable to first nations reserves, and putting these in place will take time and collaborative efforts” (auditor general, 2011, section 4.34). the report does note that due to the complexity of the issues involved that aandc had made satisfactory progress toward this goal. however, the report also noted that the progress of health canada on improving water monitoring and testing was ‘unsatisfactory.’ monitoring drinking water quality and safety in first nations communities is unevenly required and it is mandated only through individual agreements between health canada and the first nations (auditor general, 2011; morales, 2006). the senate standing committee on aboriginal peoples. the senate committee issued a report in 2007 that examined the situation on reserve with regards to safe drinking water. the committee found many of the same issues to which the auditor general had pointed; but, in addition, they questioned the authenticity of the aandc progress reports. in particular, they “expressed strong concern that parliament is not receiving full and accurate information about the quality and safety of drinking water on reserves” (cited in simeone, 2010, p. 10). they called for “…an independent needs assessment of both the physical assets and human resources of individual first nations communities in relation to the delivery of safe drinking water, and the tabling of that assessment in parliament” (cited in simeone, 2010, p. 10). the senate committee also saw a regulatory regime as important, but not a means of solving the problem if the first nations had no financial or managerial capacity to operate within the regulations (simeone, 2010). aboriginal organizations and communities assembly of first nations (afn). in canada, the afn is the largest and most influential of the organizations representing first nations. it is a national organization that has delegates8 from the vast majority of first nations across canada. at its national meetings, resolutions have directed the afn to advocate for the protection of water rights and push for consultation and accommodation of aboriginal viewpoints. when we review the last ten years of afn position papers, we find a striking pattern that follows the mandate they have been given by their member nations. that mandate is to “…advocate for the protection of water rights and the right to be consulted and accommodated” (afn, 2012, p. 1). the problems that reoccur are simply stated: the lack of adequate capital resources, need for training and development of management capacity to run the increasingly complex first nations infrastructure, the shortfall in operating funding, and the lack of adequate on-going consultation at the local, regional, and national level. the problem is not simply fresh, clean drinking water, which involves issues of turbidity and contamination, as well as accessibility. it also involves wastewater and sewage. in a 2005 report, the afn pointed out that, “…wastewater management, particularly sewage, is especially problematic for first nations. this problem is not just about how others dispose of their sewage and how this affects our lands and waters, but how inadequate our own wastewater systems are on our reserves. … 75% of the 740 water treatment systems on reserves and 70% of the 462 wastewater treatment systems on reserves posed a medium-to-high risk to drinking water and wastewater quality” (afn, 2005, pp. 4-5). in response to issues concerning regulation, the afn has endorsed a different path. essentially, their position is that water should be under the control and jurisdiction of the first nations themselves. in their view, this comes from constitutional rights and signed treaties. therefore, they have opposed the wholesale move for provincial regulatory regimes to be implemented on first nations lands. alternatively, they have suggested that, through consultation, a federal safe water regime be developed and this be implemented as an interim measure. they see this as temporary until first nations are given governance of their water systems (afn, 2007). 8 under the indian act, first nations must elect their leaders, including a chief and band council, every two years. the delegate to assembly of first nations congresses is the chief, or his or her stand-in. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.3 they have also responded negatively to the first version of legislation bill s-11, put in front of parliament in 2011. their opposition centered on three main issues (afn, 2011): • the bill was introduced as a health and safety issue, which ignores the various commissions and inquiries that have recommended the federal government close the resource gap; • the bill impacts aboriginal rights; and • there was inadequate consultation carried out before introducing the legislation. the rights issue is very complex. the first draft bill indicated that the federal cabinet has authority to determine the extent to which the crown may abrogate and derogate treaty rights in pursuing the safety of water. essentially, if it was a safe water issue, and the first nations did not agree to government intervention proposals, canada could set aside first nations rights and do as they felt necessary. it also says that the government can force first nations into agreements with third party providers (at whatever cost canada sets), and enables the federal government to apply any or all provincial regulations to first nation communities as needed to protect water. the afn (2011) sees these powers in direct contradiction to section 35 of the constitution of canada, which guarantees aboriginal rights.9 as we noted above, on february 29th, 2012, the government of canada introduced new water legislation in response to criticisms of bill s-11. government spokespersons argued that the new legislation would differ from s-11 in the following ways: • addition of language in the preamble on the government's commitment to work with first nations on the development of future federal regulations stemming from the legislation; • clarification that any regulation on source water on first nation lands would be to protect it from contamination; • clarification that regulations would not include the power to allocate water supplies or license users of water for any purpose other than the purpose of drinking water; • clarification that only the powers necessary to effectively regulate drinking water and wastewater systems would be conferred on any person or body; • removal of language that could be interpreted as powers to compel first nations into an agreement with third parties to manage water and wastewater on first nation lands; • clarification that third parties that own systems on first nations lands, not first nations, will be held liable in case of problems; • clarification that the legislation could apply to first nations that are signatories to self-government agreements at their request; and • inclusion of a non-derogation clause addressing the relationship between the legislation and aboriginal and treaty rights under section 35 of the constitution act, 1982 (aandc, 2012). this proposed framework addresses the three main criticisms from aboriginal peoples including direct rights infringement, transfer of responsibility from third party providers to first nations communities when they are not in charge, and the right to impose third party providers. however, the issue of consultation remains vague, as does the particular role of each provincial government. other aboriginal organizations and communities. it is hard to determine what the general sentiment is in first nation communities concerning water systems.10 however, there are some indications. submissions to the expert panel were relatively consistent. commentaries indicated that individuals felt their systems should be improved to produce water of similar quality to non-aboriginal communities. few non-anecdotal studies 9 for a discussion of constitutional and treaty rights for aboriginals, as well as regulations in force in canada, see white, maxim, & beavon (2004). 10 see spence (2012) in this special edition for further information on this issue. 7 white et al.: water and indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2012 exist, but the press has been full of commentaries that indicate first nations people feel they have been denied the right to safe water. helen fallding (2010) did a long series in the winnipeg free press where she attempted to chronicle some of the realities and attitudes of first nations regarding water issues. she reported that people have little control in their communities, safe water is really a treaty right that has not yet been delivered (although that remains to be tested in court), and people do not trust the water they receive. survey studies tend to substantiate the views expressed in media reports. in late july 2009, ekos research associates (2009) were commissioned by aandc to do a survey to gain “...insight into the views of first nation on reserve populations with regards to the safety of their drinking water” (p. iii). their findings were clear: • first nations peoples have much lower confidence in their drinking water quality than non-first nations. • “fewer than half of the first nations residents rated the quality of their water as ‘good’ and …one quarter consider their drinking water quality to be poor” (ekos research associates, 2009, p. iii). • in terms of safety, 3 of 10 thought their water was safe, 4 out of 10 thought it somewhat safe, and 3 out of 10 feel their water is unsafe. • people’s lack of security led to less use of tap water for cooking and, particularly, for drinking; • only 55% of the homes surveyed had water delivered to their home; 19% used a cistern and 17% used wells. others had no sources listed. the overarching message from the survey and anecdotal reporting is that individual first nations, and their citizens, have concerns about their water and have a different experience with drinking water compared to other canadians, including those in rural settings. ekos research associates (2009) reported 98% of canadians believe they get enough water delivered to their homes and over 60% are very pleased with the quality.11 as part of our study, we conducted several focus groups that included residents of northern first nation communities. these groups helped to give our team a clearer understanding of how first nations individuals view water issues around them. we identified several key sentiments. first nations individuals do not feel they play any role in the decisions about investments in water infrastructure. ‘t’s views were typical of what we heard: “well we don’t have any say in it. indian affairs dictates to us. no matter if we said don’t spend the money on that, we want a treatment plant. we ain’t got no say.” ‘g’ echoed the same sentiment: “this is not going to change as long as we are under the indian act. look what they are doing in attawapiskat; the people don’t want what they are doing, but they are doing it. the people up there know where the community should be, but indian affairs doesn’t care.” when investigations are done, citizens are not privy to the reports. ‘c’s comments reflect this: “when they did the survey, i don’t know what they did with it. in regards to the water wells and other sources of drinking water, i don’t know what they did with the survey. what they found out. …[all i was told] it was not going to be enough to continue; we will eventually have to take water from the river.” there are disconnects between chief and band council, on one hand, and community members, on the other. sometimes, this is simply a problem related to information flows and, other times, it relates to the faith citizens have in their leaders. “one of my concerns is that we only have one water source in place, the water plant. if something were to happen to that supply, we would have no backup supply. one thing i would like to do, when 11 the over 30% of those not pleased cited taste issues not safety. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.3 these reports are done, is to present them to band council and get them to start concentrating on our water, it is very important. because if we do not have the resources to back it up, enough with expanding on buildings. i think water is the number one concern.” (focus group 2, participant 1) “but the chief should know, if ___ takes pride in [this] community, ____ should know what the water system is about. i mean our chief and council need to know what is going on, and that they are on top of things like that. sure you have your directors and managers, but you need to have chief and council to be accountable to the people and to work with the community to ensure there is water quality in the community, and get a secondary system in place. you see what i am saying though?” (focus group 1, participant 1) people have some awareness of the crises and high-risk communities, particularly those in close proximity. there were some graphic commentaries such as from ‘r’: “it is so polluted that the children that play in the water come out with sores on their legs. but you have to remember where they are located, in the middle of chemical valley. we have rama and georgina island are suffering from nutrient loading in the lake. and now they have to come up with the simcoe river action plan...” (focus group1, participant 2) the work on water systems that is done is not always top quality. focus group participants pointed out examples of decisions and work that simply was substandard: “i am surprised that water continues to run in the winter. we complained about how the pipes were installed. boulders the size of these tables were put against the pipes, with fill. that should be all redone.” (focus group 1, participant 2) very brief comment on the united states current situation. while most tribes have some forms of self-governance, the federal government is in charge of creating and enforcing water legislation in tribal communities (swain et al., 2006b).12 overall, water regulation in indigenous communities in the united states shows some similarity with canada,13 in that there are multiple governing bodies responsible for water quality: the federal government, the u.s. environmental protection agency (epa), and the public water system supervision (pwss). specifically, “drinking water quality is regulated by the federal safe drinking water act (sdwa), which was first enacted in 1974 and amended most recently in 1996” (swain et al., 2006b, p. 44). the u.s. epa is responsible for establishing and implementing drinking water regulations and standards. the u.s. epa may grant tribes ‘primacy’14 through the pwss program (swain et al., 2006b). similar to canada, regional or state laws regulating drinking water typically do not apply to indigenous lands (epa, n.d.b; swain et al., 2006b). also, american indians and alaska natives face real challenges in terms of safe water. the u.s. epa (n.d.a) notes: the lack of access to safe drinking water and basic sanitation in indian country continues to threaten the public health of american indian and alaska native (ai/an) communities. approximately 12% of ai/an homes do not have safe water and/or basic sanitation facilities. this is high compared with the 0.6% of non-native homes in the united states that lack such infrastructure. a multi-agency infrastructure task force (itf) has been formed to improve access to safe drinking water and basic sanitation in indian country. (para. 3) 12 however, in special cases, the federal government may also transfer that authority over water quality “to tribes that qualify as states” (swain et al., 2006b, p. 44). 13 primarily because there is more than one governing body that oversees water quality. 14 primacy means self-governance, as well as total control over water quality and resources. 9 white et al.: water and indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2012 the itf has issued a major goals paper where they indicate there are several barriers to improving the accessibility and quality of water. at the top of the list is a lack of investment funding. they also point to maintenance and management of facilities both new and aging because there are: … two primary factors that interfere with infrastructure maintenance: 1) the infrastructure design does not meet the tribal needs and/or is not appropriate, and 2) the management entity responsible for the water and waste disposal infrastructure assets is itself not sustainable and lacks appropriate authority, structure, and/or technical, managerial, or financial capacity. (inter-agency infrastructure task force, 2011, p. 1) our analysis: assessing the source of current problems and seeking solutions it is not surprising that those involved in trying to improve the current situation for indigenous communities, which includes people from all stakeholder groups, are frustrated with the current process. to really determine why canada faces the problems it does in terms of safe water, we assess that there are two things to recognize: (a) this problem has its roots in the early history of the region as a settler colony; and (b) there are many inter-related variables at work that act to create a difficult and complex problem. colonial history: creating foundations for current problems as noted above, non-aboriginal canadians have a lot of faith in their water supplies, and aside from some with ‘taste’ issues, they rate the quality and availability as near perfect. what is it about the locations of first nation communities that impacts water quality? further, why would there be a difference from similar sized non-aboriginal communities, including those that are remote? first nations did not actively choose where their communities are located. as well, if they were part of the decision process, it was based on totally different assumptions (miller, 2010a; white, anderson, morin, & beavon, 2010). elders of the haudenosaunee peoples in many regions speak of the ‘gus-wen-tah’ or tworow wampum belt when talking about agreements and treaties. the two rows symbolized two sovereign nations side by side going down the river each controlling their own canoe but progressing together, as brothers rather than father and son. however, this was not how canada was to be developed. looking back to 1763 when the royal proclamation declared that indians and indian lands would be ‘protected’ and be the responsibility of the british crown through to today, we have seen a sometimes slow and sometimes fast shift of indigenous sovereignty over to european control. there has been a progressively more damaging dependency created that has, through many mechanisms, made self-sufficiency and sustainability more and more difficult (white, maxim, & spence, 2004; white, maxim, & beavon, 2003). further, environmental discrimination in indigenous communities in canada is well documented (mascarenhas, 2007; page, 2007; westra, 2007). this phenomenon has also occurred in other countries such as new zealand and australia (bailie, carson, & mcdonald, 2004; barcham, 2009; pritchard, 2000) and the united states (smith, 2005). it has been argued that it was when indigenous people were first displaced and moved onto reserved lands, issues with the quality of water first emerged (murdocca, 2010). first nations reserved lands, or ‘reserves’ as they commonly known in canada, were created over an extended period of canadian history. some were created through treaty processes, which defined set numbers of acres for certain family sizes (white, peters, beavon, & dinsdale, 2010). some were set up by local peoples or institutions (like churches) seeking to isolate aboriginal peoples, while governments set others up. sometimes, they were set up near waterways and included fertile lands, but often this was not the case. aboriginal peoples found themselves in poor land areas that were widely unsustainable (royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996). the aboriginal signatories of these treaties understood that the lands would be shared and their practices respected, not that they would be confined within a small allotment indefinitely (hanson, 2010; royal commission of aboriginal peoples, 1996). in part, these selected locales make the attainment of safe drinking water difficult to this day. the creation of blocks of land where peoples are tied down remains a key 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.3 issue in the paradox around safe water in canada. that defines one basis for the problem, the spatial dimension, but that is not the only colonial impact. but why are the communities more vulnerable than non-aboriginal communities? overall, the water resources that are most readily available on reserve are groundwater sources (52% of communities) or surface water (29% of communities) (neegan burnside ltd., 2011). as well, both groundwater and surface water can be quite vulnerable to pollutants (swain et al., 2006a). without protection of these surface water sources, politically and economically vulnerable communities nearby are often subjected to pollutants that accumulate from nearby agricultural, industrial, or waste industries (mcgurty, 1997). the question is why are communities so vulnerable? why are things so bad at this point in history? helen fallding (2010), an editor at the winnipeg free press, did a series for that paper on first nation water issues. in an interview with researcher, jerry white, she reported: …indigenous people used to learn about water when they were out hunting. they kept track of water flow patterns, made sure drinking water wasn't contaminated by sewage and learned to be careful at certain times of year when runoff water was likely to make them sick. we broke the educational chain when we brought in the residential schools, he said. the inherited lifelong role of water-keeper has been replaced by barely trained water plant workers who could lose their jobs with a change of band council jerry white points out. many reserves have also ended up on land with a poor water supply after settlers grabbed better spots that were once [i]ndigenous people's camps…. white said it's hard to solve drinking water problems when they're leaning up against other issues such as education and poverty…there's a lot of people in the first nations communities who are bright, interested and want to work. we have to create mechanisms for them to be able to take control of some of these issues. (fallding, 2010, paras. 22-26) the creation of this dependency relationship from 1763 forward establishes much of the practices and nonpractices we see today (miller, 2009). this has combined with the attempted forced assimilation of first nations through the residential school system15 to produce the situation today where many communities have reduced levels of human capital and expertise to deal with the complex technological and environmental issues around safe water. there is also lack of depth in capacity to handle, finance, and manage the issues that are involved in making the systems work (maxim & white, 2003; white et al., 2003). on top of this, there are many other community level problems that are legacies of this history of created dependency and attempted forced assimilation (miller, 2009). white and maxim (2003) argue that the lack of physical capital, given the often marginal land locations and lack of control over resources on indigenous territories, is making any sustainable development difficult to impossible for many first nation communities. this is compounded by low levels of human16 and social 15 the canadian government has made a public apology for the residential schools system where indigenous children were forced into schools, separate from their parents, and taught to be ‘european.’ the schools forced children to abandon their own cultures and languages. widespread physical, emotional, and sexual abuse in this system has been documented (miller, 2010b). considerable research is being done currently to determine the mechanisms by which the trauma of this system has created inter-generational problems for individuals and their communities (see the aboriginal healing foundation’s website at www.ahf.ca). 16 currently, the high-school graduation rate for indigenous peoples in canada is approximately 50%. scholars have argued this is the outcome of several contributors, including the failed residential schools program that operated for over 100 years and the lack of opportunity to utilize skills gained in school because reserves have so little economic development. interviews we conducted with youth who dropped out of school before grade 12 indicated they saw no reason to get more education because there were no opportunities to use the education, in a sense, the reserves’ poverty of development discourages students from staying in school (peters & white, 2009; white, peters, & beavon, 2009). this is the cycle that maintains low levels of human capital. 11 white et al.: water and indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2012 capital17 (white & maxim, 2003), which is also a product of the colonial historical legacy noted above and the subsequent dependency relationships. these outcomes are reflected in lower community capacity as measured by the community capacity index18 (maxim & white, 2003) and later by the widely accepted community well-being index19 (white et al., 2008). studies are clear that the educational attainment of first nations peoples is substantially lower than the average in canada (white, peters, beavon, & spence, 2009). the lack of economic development20 in many first nation territories means that these communities have little potential to accumulate physical capital for development, operations, and maintenance of community run projects. this sets in motion yet another cycle of increasing dependency because communities must seek physical capital, funding in particularly, from external sources in order to maintain or improve conditions. given reserve locations and the lack of human and physical capital, problems of all kinds can reinforce each other and become self-perpetuating. communities face difficulties raising the funds to support the operation and maintenance of their water systems. they are also much more likely to find little depth of expertise in terms of managing water safety systems. this is the first of a complex array of issues that impact safe drinking water. another aspect of this complex set of factors is the fact that most first nations’ communities have little or no economic or political power in our modern capitalist economy. this exasperates a reliance on federal funding, and makes it difficult for communities to generate the resources, confidence, and perceived ability to self-govern. this, combined with the regulatory gap discussed above, creates greater vulnerability for communities encroached upon by environmentally harmful development activities. to recap, the dependency relationship, spatial locations, and lack of physical capital, human capital, and political power combine to make it difficult for first nations to control and develop safe water systems. we would further argue that the problems faced today are grounded in two more inter-related factors: (a) the social determinants of water quality, and (b) governance of water systems. both are the products of the historical processes we have discussed above. we will take each of these in turn and look at them in-depth, concluding with proposals for policy development. social determinants of water quality water is deeply sacred and honored by first nations communities (afn, 2011; von der porten & de loë, 2010). it is an entity requiring respect and protection and is held in common, not owned. it should be shared not marketed (afn, 2011; phare, 2009). as such, unclean water is not only a health hazard, but is also 17 white and maxim (2003) argued that community cohesion in many canadian indigenous communities was being undermined by a lack of human, physical, and social capital. the social capital networks that enhance the living conditions in non-aboriginal communities through the creation bonding, linking and bridging social capital (putnam, 2000; portes & landolt, 1995) has been damaged which is witnessed by the health and community issues that plague many communities (suicide, substance abuse, and child welfare issues for example). the interaction between social capital and educational attainment (human capital) was explored by white, spence, and maxim (2009) where they argue, in a three country comparison, that social capital can be critical in the educational attainment process in aboriginal communities. 18 this tool was developed to give an indication of the capacity of a community to run the programs that were being downloaded to them. 19 based on the community capacity index concept, which was built using the united nations development programme human development index framework. this tool is widely applied in canada to measure relative community well-being. 20 actually, it is more complex than simple non-development. canada has an array of regulations, laws, and practices that govern how resource development takes place on and near indigenous territories. these factors influence what capital accumulation is possible for first nations and inuit, as well as what income and labour force participation can come out of development. this is the subject of a special feature in the international indigenous policy journal (see volume 3, issue 2). strictly speaking, it is not just lack of development, but also lack of rewards for developments, that are taking place. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.3 threatening to traditional indigenous philosophies and way of life (mcgregor, 2008). water is also a plural resource that not only directly sustains life and is necessary for survival, but is also an economic resource for non-indigenous communities (knight, hartl, & world health organization, 2003). to make water accessible and maintain safe drinking water in environments often rampant with contaminants, infrastructure, which is costly, has been put in place. over the past two hundred years or so, around and within indigenous communities traditional ways of life have been slowly eroded. traditionally, food could and would be procured from the surrounding lands. however, due to declining access to sufficient traditional food sources, communities have become more reliant on imported foodstuffs. thus, life has typically become more reflective of a capitalist, market driven, existence. this trend has been particularly extreme in the arctic (richmond, 2009; wenzel, 1991). comparatively, when non-aboriginal communities find their traditional livelihoods have deteriorated, such as some of the fishing villages of the east coast, they are pressured to slowly shut down, and members are expected to migrate to other opportunities. this is simply impossible for indigenous peoples given the barriers to inter-community migration possibilities, lack of opportunities in either aboriginal or nonaboriginal centres (dinsdale, white, & hanselmann, 2011), and the cultures and traditions of the peoples. as white and maxim (2003) argued, the communities are often small and/or remote. typically, a lack of the physical, social, and human capital undermines community cohesion and leads to sustainability problems. all of which adds up to the discussed conundrum of created dependency and trauma, which leads to destruction of community capacity. yet, the way forward really demands first nations to increasingly take control of their own affairs. first nations need to develop sustainability compatible with the evolving culture and traditions of global market relationships. when this is accomplished, there will greater stability in canada as well as a flourishing of indigenous life across this vast country. the paradox facing canada, in the way forward, is to increase the capacity of first nation communities and their peoples, which can only happen as the dependency relationships dissolve and self-sufficiency evolves. the key will be the indigenous communities developing their own adaptive sustainability. adaptive21 sustainability is a state where the peoples themselves control their affairs, have sustainable development based on their evolved cultures, and reap the rewards of canada’s advanced development through economic development that serves them. in the united states, projects at harvard and the university of arizona have argued that greater self-government is key to improvements in u.s. ‘indian country’ (begay, cornell, jorgensen, & kalt, 2007; cornell & kalt, 1998; harvard project on american indian economic development, 2008). the conundrum has always been how to shift to ‘self-government’ with few resources to do so? or, put another way, how to develop adaptive sustainability in a system that breeds dependency and denies the accumulation of the forms of capital necessary to make progress? if we were to model the process in order to make it simpler to see, it would look like this: 21 we use the term ‘adaptive’ to make it clear that the content of development and forms of capital are not determined out of a uniquely western model. human capital is multifaceted and inclusive of all forms of knowledge. protecting, enhancing, and utilizing traditional knowledge will be central in building human capital and, subsequently, community development and adaptive sustainability, which are core components of sustainable development. social capital is made up of relationships and networks, further complicated by mutual and reciprocal obligations (portes, 1998). social capital will be determined by the individuals themselves and how they are influenced by cultures and norms. that said, development in the global economy requires adapting to other cultural ways to one’s self. indigenous peoples in canada and around the world are well aware of this process of adaptation and inclusion; however, they can decide how this is done. 13 white et al.: water and indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2012 figure 1. model for creating sustainable development in this conceptual model, the three forms of capital (human, social, and physical) interact with each other, influence the development of the intervening variable, community capacity development, which in turn leads to changes in the dependent viable, sustainable development. the interaction of the three forms of capital, social,22 physical, and human capital, has been thoroughly researched in other investigations (coleman, 1988; teachman, paasch, & carver, 1996; white & maxim, 2003). by example, increasing levels of social capital can enhance educational attainment through production of human capital (coleman, 1988). as well, high levels of human capital in a community can enhance existent networks and the ability to reciprocate when community or family members in need make requests (coleman, 1988; enright, 2000; narayan, 1999). additionally, increased physical capital in communities can facilitate the development of schools and other infrastructure that may enhance human capital production and lead to capital investments (narayan, 1997). we have argued in this paper that first nation communities have varying deficits in the three forms of capital, which has been well documented in the literature (maxim & white, 2003; white & maxim, 2003; white et al. 2008; white, anderson et al. 2010; white, peters et al. 2010). as the three forms of capital increase, they spur the intervening variable, community capacity. there are a variety of ways to observe these phenomena, such as an increase in trained people available to take on management that produces an increase in employee income, which in turn increases the amount of funds available to improve infrastructure. in the case of increasing community capacity to maintain and manage water systems, we would see more trained people, increased comprehensive planning, and capital fund accumulation, which would lead to increased employment. one would also expect language preservation or maintenance, and the vitality of social organizations in the community. 22 we have not discussed social capital to this point. social capital is a resource that is created in the relationships among persons and groups that engender trust and mutual obligations that can be drawn upon (callahan, 1996). it is inherent in the structure of relations between and among actors, and is made up of obligations, expectations, information channels, norms of reciprocity, and effective sanctions that constrain or encourage certain types of behaviour (callahan, 1996; wall, ferrazzi, & schryer, 1998). social capital can be easily understood as a resource that is created as community members interact in networks such as families, organizations, ceremonies, or workplaces (portes & landolt, 1995; putnam, 2000). this resource can be undermined by a lack of cohesion in a community, child welfare issues, infighting over scarce resources, drug and alcohol abuse, and so on. sustainable development human capital physical capital social capital community capacity 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.3 the changes in capacity lead to the development of sustainable development. we would see enhanced integration of traditional and western approaches, economic stability through development, and decreases in negative social outcomes (such as suicide, substance abuse, et cetera). at this stage, first nation communities may very well run their own water systems and report to regional water authorities that are also controlled by aboriginal organizations. looking to the future, the continued development of sustainable development may lead to the development of an indigenous water authority. in many ways, water is just one of many similar issues that all require the same changes. of course, as we see in the model, the increases in capacity and sustainable development feedback and perpetuate the expansion of the forms of capital. in the simplest terms, the model above posits communities that draw on civic involvement and positive norms, such as education and training-based skills along with the requisite financial and physical resources, will be better functioning communities. further, these communities will build their capacity and achieve sustainable development. however, only communities reaching a level of capacity development that triggers movement toward sustainable development may operate and maintain water systems. building sustainable development: the paradox of safe water as we look at the policy issues before us, we propose directions consistent with developing community capacity while reducing potential harm to first nation residents. we will break our analysis into three sections: (a) legislative and regulatory frameworks; (b) capital and operating funding, and (c) aboriginal governance and self-sustainability. legislative and regulatory frameworks. as we noted above, the various proposals from stakeholders cover a wide spectrum. they range from non-legislated, practical arrangements, such as contracts, through to a new national set of guidelines legislated at the federal level. early in these discussions, there was a lot of interest in utilizing provincial guidelines. however, the proposal to implement provincial standards and controls seemed unfeasible given the structure of the indian act, past court rulings, differences across provinces, and opposition from first nations (swain et al., 2006a). another option was to incorporate the provincial standards into a new federal legislation, which resolved some court ruling issues, but left other problems in place. ultimately, the expert panel looked briefly at giving first nations control. they then produced a regulatory standards framework, which was later rejected. the expert panel cautiously produced three options: the creation of a new federal act with its own standards, new federal legislation that is based upon provincial water standards, or using customary law (swain et al., 2006a). the outcome of these three recommendations would be the creation of a new federal law (swain et al., 2006a). there has always been a focus on legislated regulation as the means of resolving water issues on reserve. however, legislative solutions are limited in their ability to address low levels of compliance. in addition, even when policy changes are put in place, chronic funding and community capacity issues limit their effectiveness. the government has been fixated on legislation with regulation as the best ‘fix’. this happened because the auditor general’s (2005) review noted, “indian and northern affairs canada and health canada, in consultation with first nations, should develop and implement a regulatory regime for drinking water in first nations communities” (p. 12). the auditor general’s office reiterated that position in their 2011 update: “in 2005, we audited drinking water on reserves and found that first nations communities did not benefit from a level of drinking water protection comparable to that available to people living off reserves because provincial legislation and regulations are not applied on reserves [emphasis added]” (auditor general, 2011, section 4.24). the problem is that standards are only as good as their implementation. clearly, problems remain after practices are set in place, namely the shortcomings in capacity building. the auditor general mentions this in the report by saying that it may be some time before standards can be attained given community resources (auditor general, 2011). however, our position is that the approach taken to this issue has to be based on 15 white et al.: water and indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2012 capacity development. serious consultations with first nations about what should be in the regulatory framework should be undertaken. currently, there are important questions about the capacity of first nations to comply with the proposed regulations. as the afn notes, among first nations communities, • “some may already be in compliance. • some are under-designed and over-capacity right now. • some have good information about their systems; others do not” (afn, 2008, p. 13). imposing federal legislation, as the former bill s-11 was seen to do, does not build capacity nor make the first nations the partners they need to be in this water crisis. the most recent proposed legislation, bill s-8, introduced in february of this year, made several improvements over bill s-11, particularly around indigenous rights and third party involvement responsibilities (simeone & troniak, 2012). however, it is unclear whether this legislation included first nation involvement in formulating the standards and regulations. the auditor general felt legislation at the federal level was the most viable, given the treaty23 and constitutional issues. however, this framework should be temporary, developed with consultation, and aim to move toward first nations control of water systems, as capacity permits, with the creation of an aboriginal water commission. legislation, if developed properly, offers the opportunity to ensure two things: (a) communities buy in, and can provide feedback on, how to actually achieve the implementation of regulated high standards; and (b) canada can understand what resources are going to be necessary to make it work. these would be the immediate goals, but we argue that the key is movement toward an indigenous controlled water commission where first nations and experts, who may or may not be aboriginal, work together to monitor compliance in communities. this would build capacity through fostering responsibility and allow the bridging of traditional and western knowledge. we realize this type of system will require a certain level of trust because large, external investments will be required to develop and maintain the systems for some time until capacity grows in the communities themselves. capital and operating funding. in 2011, it was estimated that the national construction cost required to upgrade waste and water systems to acceptable standards would approach $1.0 billion and that the long-term and sustainable costs were $80 million (neegan burnside ltd., 2011). as well, it was estimated that, nationally, future-servicing costs, including upgrades, could add billions more (neegan burnside ltd., 2011). aandc has reported that they have already invested more than $2.5 billion between 1995 and 2011 (cited in neegan burnside ltd., 2011). still, as we noted above, a large proportion of community water systems are at serious or moderate risk and hundreds of boil water advisories are issued annually. while upgrades to and maintenance of water systems on reserve is possible, finding the money required to do so is difficult. the problem from a policy perspective is two-fold: (a) how should the capital, operating, and maintenance budgets be delivered; (b) what is really necessary and feasible for the amount of funding; and (c) how should the capital, operating, and maintenance budgets be delivered? according to the assembly of first nations, only 50% of the allocated operations and maintenance dollars ever reach the communities themselves (phare, 2009). water treatment systems are difficult to maintain, especially when federal dollars received by indigenous communities (per capita) are less than half of what non-aboriginal communities receive (phare, 2009)24. additionally, funding from aandc is not always granted or available to all indigenous communities (phare, 2009). the high priority communities, which are identified in earlier audits, get funding first, but this system can leave new problems unattended. 23 the treaty implications are complex. treaties are often seen as the only protection against even further disenfranchisement while many recognize that they are very flawed and prevent capacity building at the same time. 24 the data indicates that first nations communities do get less per capita than is spent in non-aboriginal communities, but the exact ratios are difficult to determine. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.3 it is easy to see that for most communities even 20% of operating costs may be out of reach. the issue is that the communities have to take money out of other programs, education or child welfare for example, in order to make up the 20% (morales 2006). user fees may be attempted, but may not be affordable for community members—depending on local unemployment levels and income levels. a rule of thumb in economics is that ‘pay as you use systems’ are effective only where people have discretionary capacity and are above the poverty line. this approach to paying for personal water use in poor income areas does not work well because people cannot reduce use to save money so they have to spend money they need for other necessities. overall, shortfalls in funding have been a primary concern for those running reserve water systems. not only does the funding system make it difficult to operate water systems, but anxiety rises while communities wait on a long list for capital funding (swain et al., 2006a). in addition, these communities have little diversity in economic development, which means that shortfalls in operating funds for all programs are intensified by the need to invest in maintenance and operation water systems (swain et al., 2006a). in addition, the way money is transferred further complicates the water issue. we look at the problem of annual contribution agreements next. there are many concerns that stakeholders and regulators have with annual contribution agreements. first nations and aandc enter into agreements that stipulate what finances are going to the community, and the community is responsible for reporting on spending. however, the auditor general (2011) has critiqued this process for failing to ensure quality. in addition, due to the annual nature of these agreements, communities are prevented from engaging in long-term planning. communities must reapply for funding each year without guarantee as to the amount that will actually be secured. concluding these agreements can take time; meaning that funding is often not in place by the beginning of the new fiscal year. consequently, other programs are often cannibalized to find water system dollars. the expert panel noted the need to “develop a more objective and efficient process for allocating funds” (swain et al., 2006a, p. 30). longer funding periods, such as three or five-year plans, would be an improvement. the u.s. government has demonstrated that stable funding permits sustainable management structures to be built by indian communities, which, in turn, creates stability in the system (inter-agency infrastructure task force, 2011). the very act of developing plans and implementing them is a capacity building exercise. the processes currently in place do not encourage capacity building through planning and may damage human, social, and physical capital development. how much money is enough? this is a crucial, but impossible question. as noted above, estimates vary on the extent of the problem out there. the current approach is to allocate funds to systems deemed to be in the greatest risk. this makes a great deal of sense at first glance, but is it the most effective and rational approach? risk assessments are not perfect, but they do have a solid scientific foundation. here again we are faced with the problem of how to plan investments over longer periods of time. taxpayers in canada do want a return on investments, which implies that we need to have a way of determining where scarce resources will be invested. the two issues that could be approached in a more systematic way are: (a) the development of a wider source water protection plan, which integrates the community in the planning process and ensures that the first nation is not simply dealing with water issues in their own small territory. water comes from other places and leaves the community to go to other locales so planning has to be on a wider territorial basis; and (b) the 80/20 split on costs for maintenance and operating may be a false economy if the first nation is unable to consistently raise the 20% to ensure operations and maintenance. careful partnerships, based consultations, are necessary to ensure that systems that cost a great deal to establish or renovate do not simply fall into disrepair or become under-managed. the more cooperative and consultative this process is, the more community level capacity will develop and the more buy-in from the first nation will develop. communities taking charge of their own situations, because they 17 white et al.: water and indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2012 are part of the planning and, therefore, engaged as leaders in the on-going operations, is crucial in the process of reducing expenditures in the long run. aboriginal governance and self-sustainability. choosing policy based on whether it will enhance first nation capacity in managing community affairs is important. however, governance is complicated and is not as simple as demanding ‘high standards’ while downloading responsibility for maintaining those standards onto communities or groups that have limited capacity to do so. research on community capacity was triggered by what appeared to be a shift in governmental thinking from ‘the crown takes care of first nations programming’ to a more devolutionary approach. it appeared to researchers that responsibilities were being downloaded “…as fast as communities could fail” at managing the new responsibilities (white & maxim, 2003, p. 248-249; see also whitehead & hayes, 1999). ensuring the best quality water systems now, while moving toward independent, aboriginal control, integrated into wider territorial protection, should be the aim. one controversial option that may serve some communities is the introduction of third party (private) providers. we see this as workable under certain circumstances. the argument that you can never have any private involvement is inconsistent with the evidence. within this position exists the simplified public-private binary (fisher, 2008), which forecloses opportunities to holistically understand the many facets and possibilities within water provision. while the literature typically follows a divisive rhetoric, some researchers advise not to dismiss privatization outright because it may be an alternative to the risks faced by certain communities (carter & danert, 2003). “it is less important to fixate on private versus public provision as both are capable of providing poor services that are inequitable and unsustainable in the absence of adequate regulation and institutions” (fisher, 2008, p. 35). we would add that any private provision of water (or pay-as-you-go supplied from a neighboring public municipality) must be accompanied by the third party retaining responsibility for standards, as well as the training of local first nations in the management of the system. in this way, the first nation can eventually, where possible, assume full control. further, ‘collective privatization’ of water sources by first nations groups may offer opportunities for economic development. by example, the tk'emlups te secwepemc (kamloops indian band) developed and provided source water to the nearby sun rivers golf course. this arrangement provided commercial opportunities for the community, as well as quality drinking water (swain et al., 2006a). this approach is controversial and we are neither advocating nor opposing. first nations can decide how they feel about such development opportunities. importantly, the anti-privatization position does point out that water is a life sustaining resource, which is held by many indigenous peoples to be sacred and not for possession. it should, therefore, not be treated as a commodity to be sold. however, our position is that water itself can be seen quite separately from the ‘private delivery to those who need it’. one can have private delivery systems without having private ownership of the resource. direct ownership of the resource in several areas of the world has created real hardships for local peoples, particularly where there are dramatic economic and social inequalities (jaglin, 2002). other governance approaches include various forms of co-management, information sharing, and best practices development. these can involve non-governmental organizations (ngos) or other parties working with first nations. this may even lead to two-tiered systems of regional and local individuals working together (morales, 2006). as we have noted above, consultation leading to incorporation of best ideas and, eventually self-sufficiency, is the end goal. past practices have been critiqued as lacking or completely excluding indigenous consultation. this lack of collaboration between federal bodies and local indigenous communities has been an issue in many domains, not just safe drinking water (afn, 2011; christensen, goucher, & phare, 2010; indigenous bar association in canada, 2011; neegan burnside ltd., 2011; swain et al., 2006a). often, even where a community was asked for input, it seemed like the counsel provided was largely ignored (safe drinking water 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.3 foundation, 2009). it is interesting to note that the new legislation, introduced february 29, 2012, indicates in the preamble that there is a commitment to consult (canadian press, 2012; simeone & troniak, 2012). conclusion the issue of safe water for indigenous peoples in canada will not be solved quickly. as we have discussed above, the problem is rooted in the historically developed dependency relationship that developed as part of canada’s colonial history and became entrenched over time. the legacy of colonial relations, attempted forced assimilation, and ongoing paternalistic relations, codified through the indian act, have created a situation where simple investments in water infrastructure and/or better regulations will not solve the problem. that said, we have to move forward rather than simply lament the past. our argument is that there needs to be a combination of actions that are primarily aimed at building community capacity. this means developing three forms of capital (physical, social, and human), which will increase community capacity and lead to sustainable development. economic development brings along jobs and training that strengthen the fabric of communities. not only does economic development provide sustainability for communities, it offers future generations powerful motivators for staying in school. the chain of interaction between these forms of capital will pull communities forward. the process is critical which means there must be real partnerships built through real consultations that are aimed at increasing the first nations’ capacity to run their own affairs. we say this not because it is ‘politically correct’ but because this is how you actually build self-sufficiency and capacity. this will be a long process, which means there will have to be ongoing investments, not only in hardware, but also in the building of the communities themselves. let us set rules and regulations, but not from the top down. we need to use the process of regulation development to increase the capacity to self-govern and solve problems within the communities. let us use problems to engage and build a new generation of indigenous leaders who can work within and between nations to achieve what is now only a dream. 19 white et al.: water and indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2012 references aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc). 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(1999). the insanity of alcohol: social problems in canada’s first nations communities. toronto, on: canadian scholars’ press. 25 white et al.: water and indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2012 the international indigenous policy journal september 2012 water and indigenous peoples: canada’s paradox jerry p. white laura murphy nicholas spence recommended citation water and indigenous peoples: canada’s paradox abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license water and indigenous peoples: canadaâ•žs paradox h1n1 in retrospect: a review of risk factors and policy recommendations the international indigenous policy journal volume 4 | issue 2 article 4 april 2013 h1n1 in retrospect: a review of risk factors and policy recommendations mark mousseau university of toronto, mark.mousseau@mail.utoronto.ca recommended citation mousseau, m. (2013). h1n1 in retrospect: a review of risk factors and policy recommendations. the international indigenous policy journal, 4(2) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.4 h1n1 in retrospect: a review of risk factors and policy recommendations abstract the h1n1 pandemic of 2009 devastated indigenous communities worldwide. in order to explain infection patterns and prevent repeating history in future pandemics, associations with infection were investigated. this revealed that the vulnerability of indigenous communities to infection was associated with poor performance on measurements of social determinants of health. several policy recommendations pertaining to nonpharmaceutical interventions, prioritization of scarce health care resources, and pandemic planning are made to improve this situation. the best approach would be to empower indigenous communities to take control over and improve local conditions. success of such strategies in the battle against other indigenous health issues suggests that these interventions would be invaluable against emerging infectious disease. keywords h1n1, influenza, infectious disease, pandemic, indigenous populations creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ h 1 n 1 i n r e t r o s p e c t : a r e v i e w o f r i s k f a c t o r s a n d p o l i c y r e c o m m e n d a t i o n s in twenty first century society, infectious disease is coalesced throughout the world by the rapid movement of people and cargo. this creates a sense of global interconnectedness, with people worldwide being affected by the same infectious diseases. the h1n1 influenza pandemic of 2009 is a recent example of such global infiltration. as the infection spread worldwide, a common trend appeared: indigenous communities in nations separated by thousands of kilometers were being devastated by the virus with higher infection rates and the manifestation of more severe symptoms than the general population. in the northern territory of australia, pandemic influenza rates in indigenous populations were almost five times the rate seen in non-indigenous populations (markey, su, & krause, 2010). in new zealand, pacific islanders were seven times more likely to be hospitalized due to h1n1 than those of european descent (verrall et al., 2010). in canada, aboriginals, who make up 4.6 percent of the population, contributed to 10 percent of h1n1 cases (helferty et al., 2010). furthermore, these rates potentially underestimate the impact in certain communities because subgroups may have experienced even higher rates of infection. for instance, inuit in canada faced a hospitalization rate sevenfold higher than the already staggering rate among first nations (la ruche et al., 2009). the h1n1 influenza pandemic was an international crisis that required immediate action. however, acting effectively required an understanding of this phenomenon: why were indigenous populations bearing the brunt of the pandemic? r e s e a r c h d u r i n g t h e p a n d e m i c to explain this worldwide trend and reduce the impact of the virus, characteristics that make populations vulnerable to infection needed to be identified. however, during the peak of the pandemic, information on infection patterns was extremely limited, which made this task difficult, if not impossible. seasonal influenza data, however, was widely available and could be used to identify pertinent factors, since the transmissibility of the h1n1 pandemic influenza virus was found to be comparable to seasonal influenza with respect to direct contact and respiratory droplet transmission (maines et al., 2009; spence & white, 2010). using this approach, high rates of infection and/or severe clinical presentation were found to be associated with factors that ranged from broader social determinants of health, including substandard housing and low levels of education, to more proximal clinical risk factors, such as smoking and obesity (spence & white, 2010). the state of these distal and proximate determinants of health among indigenous populations worldwide provide a foundation for understanding the devastation observed (spence & white, 2010). although the use of seasonal influenza data was useful during the pandemic, current h1n1 pandemic influenza data should be investigated more directly to identify community factors that are associated with severe pandemic influenza infection. the direct use of h1n1 data is warranted because influenza activity varies from season to season, as does the public’s degree of awareness and patient care-seeking behaviour, making it a less than ideal source of information on which to base conclusions (carcione et al., 2010). i n d i g e n o u s p o p u l a t i o n s a t r i s k ? using information regarding individuals with laboratory-confirmed h1n1 in ontario, canada, lowcock, rosella, foisy, mcgeer, and crowcroft (2012) investigated the effects of social determinants 1 mousseau: h1n1 in retrospect published by scholarship@western, 2013 of health and mediating clinical risk factors on pandemic influenza severity by employing a case-control design. they found that hospitalized individuals were significantly more likely to live in neighbourhoods with a high material deprivation index, a score reflecting a low employment to population ratio, lower average income, and a higher proportion of people without a high school diploma. although smoking, obesity, chronic morbidity, family doctor use, and antiviral treatment did explain some of the associations, large gaps in understanding remain. this suggests that social determinants of health affect infection in ways that extend beyond the recognized risk factors (lowcock et al., 2012). the results found by lowcock et al. (2012) are in line with those found in studies using data on seasonal influenza and acute respiratory infections (glezen, greenberg, atmar, piedra, & couch, 2000; hawker et al., 2003; spence & white, 2010). as seen in seasonal influenza comparisons, the results paint an unfavourable picture for many indigenous communities, putting them at a particularly high risk of infection rates with more severe complications (spence & white, 2010). another factor that may contribute to the disproportionate impact on indigenous communities is a possible link between prior receipt of trivalent inactivated influenza vaccine and h1n1 infection. several canadian investigations reported findings that consistently showed an increased risk of h1n1 infection with prior receipt of the seasonal influenza vaccine (janjua et al., 2010; national advisory committee on immunization, 2009; skowronski et al., 2010). this may help to explain elevated infection rates seen in areas where indigenous communities have higher vaccination rates than in the general population, such as those in british columbia, canada (environics research group, 2006). however, laboratory studies will be needed to elucidate the effect of seasonal influenza vaccine on h1n1 infection since international investigations have reported negligible, or even protective, effects of prior vaccination (janjua et al., 2010). a theory that emerged in discussions surrounding pandemic influenza and its associated severity in indigenous populations worldwide is that of proposed genetic susceptibility of this group (zarychanski et al., 2010). genetics have been known to influence host susceptibility to viral infection, as in the case of hiv (gonzalez et al., 2005; hardie et al., 2008). zarychanski et al. (2010) propose that it is tempting to apply this logic to the influenza pandemic: that is, a predisposition to severe h1n1 infection is shared among indigenous people, perhaps due to a certain immunodeficiency and could explain higher infection rates. however, zarychanski et al. (2010) are quick to point out that canadian aboriginals and australian aboriginals, for example, do not share a common ancestry but, what is shared by the two groups, is a similar experience of social marginalization and inequality that has led to significant health disparities (gracey & king, 2009; king, smith, & gracey, 2009; zarychanski et al., 2010). therefore, it is much more likely that elevated infection rates are the result of the poor socioeconomic conditions aboriginals experience rather than a genetic predisposition that evolved separately among unrelated tribes. p o l i c y r e c o m m e n d a t i o n s the risk factors for h1n1 infection and their disproportionate prevalence among indigenous people makes this group particularly vulnerable or “high risk.” h1n1 was generally found to have only mild symptoms but it can be seen as a “test run” of current pandemic plans (zarychanski et al., 2010). key interventions enacted should be analyzed with respect to indigenous populations to identify any lessons 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 2 [2013], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.4 that may be learned and applied to future pandemics, including non-pharmaceutical interventions, prioritization of scarce health care resources, and pandemic planning. non-pharmaceutical interventions will likely be the first strategies implemented to curtail the spread of infection before a vaccine is available (halder, kelso, & milne, 2010). an example of a nonpharmaceutical strategy would be social distancing – the closure of schools or businesses and the cancellation of other public gatherings (baum, jacobson, & goold, 2009). on the surface, this course of action seems like a straightforward way to limit exposure; however, it illustrates an important drawback. measures like this have not taken into account indigenous culture and localized social norms. social distancing methods may prove ineffective in indigenous communities as there are important ceremonial gatherings that community members, even if sick, are still very likely to attend (massey et al., 2009). policy development must, therefore, be carried out in a culturally appropriate manner. with increasing severity and rates of infection, pressures are put on health care systems as hospitals and health units are pushed to capacity. it becomes necessary to prioritize the allocation of scarce health care resources in order to maximize their benefits. an example of this principle is seen in the allocation of ventilators. the progression of h1n1 in certain patients results in acute respiratory distress that may require ventilation. in some hospitals, allocation of ventilators was based on utility and efficiency, promoting actions that maximized the greatest good for the greatest number of people (silva et al., 2010). however, this policy potentially disadvantages populations that are at increased risk of infection. for example, the risk factors for infection that are disproportionately present in indigenous communities are also linked to extended duration of required ventilation (centers for disease control and prevention, 2009). while it is deemed undesirable to place patients on ventilators for extended periods because it reduces availability for other patients, applying the principles of utility and efficiency in this situation would exclude some indigenous people (silva et al., 2010). therefore, this policy may magnify existing social and health inequalities. a more socially responsible policy would be to recognize the fact that indigenous populations account for a disproportionately higher percentage of hospitalized persons, justifying the higher use of ventilators even if doing so is inefficient. in addition to specific non-pharmaceutical interventions and the allocation of resources, it is important that the general policies stemming from pandemic planning be culturally sensitive and relevant. how can this be accomplished? indigenous communities must be directly included in pandemic planning. consultations in australia have identified key issues that should be included in pandemic plans, such as training local “go to” persons and communicating information in a direct format while demonstrating respect for the local culture (massey et al., 2009). it is important to remember that consultation need not be limited to issues of cultural sensitivity. for example, traditional native medicine was used during the 1918 spanish flu pandemic and many lessons can be carried over to today. in one documented case, a native american family from south dakota was struck with the virus while in the midst of a five-day journey back to their home after picking potatoes. the use of traditional native medicine helped to spare the lives of the entire family (centers for disease control and prevention, 2012). particularly interesting about this story is that the native medicine and its underlying principles very closely mirrors modern methods of infection control, such as quarantine, hydration, and pharmacology. this suggests that traditional medicine can be helpful in combating infection and it is also very compatible with current pandemic plans. 3 mousseau: h1n1 in retrospect published by scholarship@western, 2013 building on the success of consultation, policy should go further by developing equal partnerships with indigenous communities that focus on enabling them to improve their own health status. community self-determination results in culturally sensitive and effective services that lead to improvements in individual health (chandler & lalonde, 1998; kirby & lebreton, 2002). although i am not aware of comprehensive influenza prevention programs encompassing these principles, success stories in battling other health issues make it likely that increased self-determination in indigenous communities could be a major force in future pandemic planning. an example is illustrated by the kahnawake schools diabetes prevention project. kahnawake is a mohawk community of 7,000 people near montreal, canada that reflects a trend seen in aboriginal communities worldwide: rising rates of type ii diabetes combined with an earlier average age of onset (naqshbandi, harris, esler, & antwi-nsiah, 2008). however, the closely-held mohawk value of taking care of future generations prompted a call to action and the subsequent formation of the kahnawake schools diabetes prevention project. through the promotion of community capacity building, program ownership, and respect for mohawk tradition and culture, programs have been put in place to increase physical activity and healthy eating habits (macauley et al., 1997). fundamental to the above project is the idea of equal partnerships between community members, community-based researchers, and academic researchers (potvin, cargo, mccomber, delormier, & macauley, 2003). community members from health, social, political, spiritual, and recreational sectors had major influences throughout the project (cargo et al., 2003). they decided to focus the project on their children through school and community interventions. furthermore, community members were involved in each stage of the project, including development, implementation, and evaluation (potvin et al., 2003). as potvin (2003) described, the community members “were not considered as passive agents of someone else’s vision” (p. 1,301). it was truly a project by the people, for the people. although focused on diabetes, the principles in the kahnawake schools diabetes prevention project could be applied to pandemic intervention. diabetes shares a similar global trend to an influenza pandemic and these principles of self-determination and community building would no doubt also be of use in pandemic influenza prevention. as such, universities and other organizations should engage in reciprocal relationships with indigenous communities, whereby community members are empowered to take action and be actively involved in the development and implementation of prevention strategies that are respectful of local values and culture. to make the most potent impact, policies need to go one step further and integrate the idea of community empowerment with programs designed to reverse the poor conditions present in many indigenous communities. that is, programs also need to address the social determinants of health affecting h1n1 infection, such as those investigated by lowcock et al. (2012). as seen in the kahnawake schools diabetes prevention project, indigenous people in canada and throughout the world value a concept of health that encompasses physical, spiritual, emotional, and mental dimensions (maher, 1999; turton, 1997). programs that take a holistic approach in addressing these determinants are, therefore, quite compatible with traditional culture and do not interfere with the idea of selfdetermination. furthermore, improving education and employment rates would give policies a greater ability to reduce the impact of future pandemics as well as other infectious and chronic disease (farmer, 1996; michelozzi et al., 1999; mao, hu, ugnat, semenciw, & finchman, 2001; van rossum, shipely, van 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 2 [2013], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.4 de mheen, grobbee, & marmot, 2000). however, despite the powerful potential of such projects, it may be difficult to set these programs in motion. the mechanisms by which community variables improve health are poorly understood and policymakers often associate health policy with acute care (brown, 2006; lowcock et al., 2012). for these reasons, programs that bear more immediate and direct results are likely to receive funding over programs addressing more distal factors. it is, therefore, crucial that programs focusing on improving the social determinants of health be advocated for and funded in indigenous communities to not only reduce the impact of future pandemics, but to improve general health overall. c o n c l u s i o n with the world’s indigenous people being affected by higher infection rates and more severe outcomes during the 2009 h1n1 pandemic, it is imperative to ensure that this disproportionate suffering not be in vain. without any changes, indigenous populations remain vulnerable to devastation if and when another pandemic occurs. actions need to be taken now. policy needs to be developed with indigenous communities in mind, through direct consultation, partnerships, and community engagement. also, communities must be empowered to develop and implement their own policies. policies would best address pandemic infection rates by focusing on improving social conditions, including housing, income, employment, and education rates. by building healthy communities, indigenous people would become more resilient to future infection, and they would also experience a general improvement in their quality of life. 5 mousseau: h1n1 in retrospect published by scholarship@western, 2013 r e f e r e n c e s baum, n. m., jacobson, p. d., & goold, s. d. 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(2009). indigenous health part 2: the underlying causes of the health gap. lancet, 374, 76 85. kirby, m. j. l., & lebreton, m. (2002). the health of canadians – the federal role. final report of the standing senate committee on social affairs, science and technology. ottawa, on: parliament of canada. la ruche, g., tarantola, a., barboza, p., vaillant, l., guegen, j., gastellu-etchegorry, m. for the epidemic intelligence team at invs. (2009). the 2009 pandemic h1n1 influenza and indigenous populations of the americas and the pacific. eurosurveillance, 14(42), pii19366. lowcock, e. c., rosella, l. c., foisy, j., mcgeer, a., & crowcoft, n. (2012). the social determinants of health and pandemic h1n1 2009 influenza severity. american journal of public health, 102(8), e51 58. macaulay, a. c., paradis, g., potvin, l., cross, e. j., saad-haddad, c., mccomber, a.,...rivard, m. (1997). the kahnawake schools diabetes prevention project: a diabetes primary prevention program in a native community in canada. intervention and baseline results. preventative medicine, 26, 779 790. maines, t. r., jayaraman, a., belser, j. a., wadford, d. a., pappas, c., zeng, h.,...tumpey, t. m. (2009). transmission and pathogenesis of swine-origin 2009 a (h1n1) influenza viruses in ferrets and mice. science, 325(5939), 484 487. maher, p. (1999). a review of “traditional” aboriginal health beliefs. the australian journal of rural health, 7(4), 229 236. 7 mousseau: h1n1 in retrospect published by scholarship@western, 2013 mao, y., hu, j., ugnat, a-m., semenciw, r., & fincham, s. (2001). socioeconomic status and lung cancer risk in canada. international journal of epidemiology, 30(4), 809 817. markey, p., su, j. y., & krause, v. (2010). summary of influenza in 2009 in the northern territory. the northern territory disease control bulletin, 17(1), 1 10. massey, p. d., pearce, g., taylor, k. a., orcher, l., saggers, s., & durrheim, d. n. (2009). reducing the risk of pandemic influenza in aboriginal communities. rural remote health, 9(3), 1290. michelozzi, p., perucci, c., forastiere, f., fusco, d., ancona, c., & dell'orco, v. (1999). inequality in health: socioeconomic differentials in mortality in rome, 1990-95. journal of epidemiology and community health, 53(11), 687 693. naqshbandi, m., harris, s. b., esler, j. g., & antwi-nsiah, f. (2008). global complication rates of type 2 diabetes in indigenous peoples: a comprehensive review. diabetes research and clinical practice, 82, 1 17. national advisory committee on immunization. (2009). statement on seasonal trivalent inactivated influenza vaccine (tiv) for the 2009–2010 season. canada communicable disease report, 35 (acs-6), 1 – 41. potvin, l., cargo, m., mccomber, a. m., delormier, t., & macauley, a. c. (2003). implementing participatory intervention and research in communities: lessons from the kahnawake schools diabetes prevention project in canada. social science and medicine, 56(6), 1295 1305. silva, d. s., nie, j. x., rossiter, k., sahni, s., upshur , r. e., & canadian program of research on ethics in a pandemic. (2010). contextualizing ethics: ventilators, h1n1 and marginalized populations. healthcare quarterly, 13(1), 32 36. skowronski, d. m., de serres, g., crowcroft, n. s., janjua, n. z., boulianne, n., hottes, t. s.,... canadian savior team. (2010). association between the 2008–09 seasonal influenza vaccine and pandemic h1n1 illness during spring-summer 2009: four observational studies from canada. plos medicine, 7(4), e1000258. spence, n., & white, j. p. (2010). scientific certainty in a time of uncertainty: predicting vulnerability of canada's first nations to pandemic h1n1/09. the international indigenous policy journal, 1(1). retrieved from: http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/1 turton, c. l. (1997). ways of knowing about health: an aboriginal perspective. advances in nursing science, 19(3), 23 36. van rossum, c. t. m., shipley, m. j., van de mheen, h., grobbee, d. e., & marmot, m. g. (2000). employment grade differences in cause specific mortality. a 25 year follow up of civil servants from the first whitehall study. journal of epidemiology and community health, 54(3), 178 184. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 2 [2013], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.4 verrall, a., norton, k., rooker, s., dee, s., olsen, l., tan,...blackmore, t. k. (2010). hospitalizations for pandemic (h1n1) 2009 among maori and pacific islanders, new zealand. emerging infectious diseases, 16(1). retrieved from http://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/16/1/090994.htm zarychanski, r., stuart, t. l., kumar, a., doucette, s., elliot, l., kettner, j., & plummer, f. (2010). correlates of severe diseases in patients with 2009 pandemic influenza (h1n1) virus infection. canadian medical association journal, 182 (3), 257 264. 9 mousseau: h1n1 in retrospect published by scholarship@western, 2013 the international indigenous policy journal april 2013 h1n1 in retrospect: a review of risk factors and policy recommendations mark mousseau recommended citation h1n1 in retrospect: a review of risk factors and policy recommendations abstract keywords creative commons license h1n1 in retrospect: a review of risk factors and policy recommendations missing pathways to self-governance: aboriginal health policy in british columbia the international indigenous policy journal volume 6 | issue 1 article 2 january 2015 missing pathways to self-governance: aboriginal health policy in british columbia josée g. lavoie university of manitoba faculty of medicine, josee.lavoie@med.umanitoba.ca annette j. browne university of british columbia, annette.browne@nursing.ubc.ca colleen varcoe university of british columbia, colleen.varcoe@nursing.ubc.ca sabrina wong the university of british columbia, sabrina.wong@nursing.ubc.ca alycia fridkin university of british columbia, alycia.fridkin@alumni.ubc.ca see next page for additional authors recommended citation lavoie, j. g. , browne, a. j. , varcoe, c. , wong, s. , fridkin, a. , littlejohn, d. , tu, d. (2015). missing pathways to selfgovernance: aboriginal health policy in british columbia. the international indigenous policy journal, 6(1). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.2 missing pathways to self-governance: aboriginal health policy in british columbia abstract this article explores how current policy shifts in british columbia, canada highlight an important gap in canadian self-government discussions to date. the analysis presented draws on insights gained from a larger study that explored the policy contexts influencing the evolving roles of two long-standing urban aboriginal health centres in british columbia. we apply a policy framework to analyze current discussions occurring in british columbia and contrast these with ontario, canada and the new zealand māori health policy context. our findings show that new zealand and ontario have mechanisms to engage both nationor tribal-based and urban indigenous communities in self-government discussions. these mechanisms contrast with the policies influencing discussions in the british columbian context. we discuss policy implications relevant to other indigenous policy contexts, jurisdictions, and groups. keywords aboriginal people, first nations, canada, new zealand, jurisdiction, self-government, urban, health, health policy, non-governmental organizations acknowledgments funding for this study was provided by the canadian institutes of health research (cihr). we thank our research team members, our clinic partners, and the research participants who generously shared their perspectives. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. authors josée g. lavoie, annette j. browne, colleen varcoe, sabrina wong, alycia fridkin, doreen littlejohn, and david tu http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/     m i s s i n g p a t h w a y s t o s e l f g o v e r n a n c e : a b o r i g i n a l h e a l t h p o l i c y i n b r i t i s h c o l u m b i a   despite canada’s constitutional commitment to aboriginal1 self-government, scholars studying aboriginal-state relations agree that the implementation of self-government in canada remains unfinished business (abele & prince, 2009, p. 568). although jurisprudence has affirmed the legitimacy of urban aboriginal communities as political communities entitled to the provision of services, and models of self-government that include aboriginal peoples living in urban environments have been proposed (abele & prince, 2009; peters, 2005; walker, 2013), meaningful progress toward the actualization of such models has yet to be achieved. in the province of british columbia, a landmark agreement was struck that was unprecedented in canada and elsewhere (havemann, 1999). in november of 2005, the province of british columbia (bc), the bc first nations leadership council, and the federal government of canada signed the landmark tripartite transformative change accord (tca hereafter) (canada, 2005). the focus of discussions prior to and emanating from the tca has been on the development of a new relationship with first nations and possibly, although this is less clear, with other aboriginal peoples in bc. a number of milestones have been achieved since to realize this policy objective, including the adoption of a first nations health plan in 2006 (british columbia assembly of first nations, first nations summit, union of british columbia indian chiefs, & government of british columbia, 2007), the creation of a first nations health council (fnhc) in 2007, and a first nations health authority (fnha) in 2010. the process of implementation has developed in an iterative manner, with expectations of meaningful engagement between the fnha and either (a) all first nation peoples living in bc (first nations health council, british columbia ministry of health, & health canada, 2012), (b) bc first nation communities (the first nations leadership council, government of canada, & government of british columbia, 2007), or (c) all aboriginal peoples living in bc (british columbia assembly of first nations, first nations summit, union of british columbia indian chiefs, & government of british columbia, 2007), depending on documents. these differences in foci and terminology likely reflect • the iterative process these developments have followed, and the development of a clearer vision over time; • the complexities and context of discussions; and • the ever present transfer of federal functions to the fnha, which includes the funding and delivery of health services exclusively to first nations living on-reserve, and the delivery of a limited number of other health benefits (dental care and prescription drug coverage, for example), to all first nations living onand off-reserve.                                                                                                                 1in canada, the term “aboriginal peoples” refers to first nations, inuit, and métis peoples. the federal government continues to use the colonial term indian in its policy documents, and distinguishes between registered and non-registered indians. a registered indian is a first nations person registered under the terms of canada’s federal indian act. registration ensures the right to live on-reserve and have access to policy-defined benefits (subsidized medication, eye care, etc.). non-registered indians are a provincial jurisdiction. métis are not eligible for registration. 1 lavoie et al.: missing pathways to self-governance published by scholarship@western, 2015     these differences in foci also reflect the impact of missing mechanisms and pathways for engaging first nations living in urban centres, as well as other aboriginal peoples, in priority setting and decisionmaking over services delivered to them. it is not the first time bc has recognized an obligation to actively engage aboriginal peoples to redress persisting health inequities. in 1991, bc released the report closer to home: the report of the british columbia royal commission on health care and costs (british columbia royal commission on health care and costs, 1991). interestingly, recommendations from this policy initiative focused almost exclusively on aboriginal peoples living off-reserve in urban centres. the tca, with its focus on a transfer of substantial responsibilities previously assumed by the federal government to first nation peoples, signals a new era of engagement. however, given the historical lack of self-government pathways for métis, inuit, and aboriginal peoples living in urban environments, the developments in bc are ostensibly fulfilling aspirations of first nations, while possibly side-stepping the broader discussion of how to engage first nations and other aboriginal peoples living off-reserve. the purpose of this article is to critically explore how the lack of pathways for implementing selfgovernment in urban environments is linked to how canadian and provincial policies have conceptualized and operationalized the concept of self-government as guaranteed by section 35 of the canadian constitution act, 1982 (canada, 1982). specifically, it explores how aboriginal health policy, as it applies to the organization of health care, has shifted in bc policy over time; the reasons why this shift is significant; and possible alternate policy options. we suggest that meaningfully engaging all bc aboriginal peoples may be unrealistic, given the lack of self-government pathways. in forming our analysis, we contrast the bc policy framework with two other frameworks that are used heuristically as examples of alternative approaches to policy. the first draws on ontario’s aboriginal health policy framework because it is recognized as one of the most comprehensive in canada (lavoie, gervais, toner, bergeron, & thomas, 2013). we explore the strength of this policy framework and compare it to features of the 2005 bc tca. secondly, we draw on new zealand’s māori health policy context. māori– state relations are characterized by a unique socio-political context that has set the stage for an entirely different approach to recognizing the crown’s obligation to engage with māori people. it includes both those who are still connected to their own traditional territory and nation and those living in urban environments regardless of whether or not they retain linkages with their traditional territory and identify with a specific iwi (tribal political organisations). our aim in this article is to contribute to an evolving national dialogue on the implications of missing pathways for self-government in urban contexts. the analysis we present is informed by insights gained from a larger study that explored the policy contexts influencing the evolving roles of two long-standing urban aboriginal health centres (uahcs) in british columbia, canada. the research participants, who included provincial health policy and uahc decision makers, discussed the shifting policy contexts that have shaped the evolution of the uahcs; however, they were not asked to comment on any aspect of self-government in particular, nor was this issue an explicit focus of the uahc study. rather, the points related to self-government discussed here reflect the views of the authors’ own analysis. the authors, in partnership with the uahcs, realized that the current policy debates in canada could be informed by insights gained from the uahc study. further, the analysis of self-government pathways discussed here are equally informed by the authors’ synthesis of theoretical and international literature; these pathways are explored as possible avenues to consider in light of the policy and funding contexts 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.2     shaping the two uahcs. finally, although we draw on bc as a case in point, the issues we discuss are of national and international significance. the next section describes this study and the dataset that informs this article. this section is followed by an overview of aboriginal health policy in bc, to orient the reader to important contextual features. there, we provide an analysis of the closer to home report and the tca, including opportunities and on-going challenges. we then contrast the current bc policy framework with alternative options implemented in ontario and new zealand. we conclude with a discussion of the role of aboriginal organizations in the implementation of a form of self-government in urban contexts. o v e r v i e w o f t h e r e s e a r c h this article is informed by a larger study that aimed to (a) explore how health care services at two uahcs are organized to explicitly address the needs of aboriginal and non-aboriginal peoples experiencing systemic marginalization and racialization, and (b) develop primary health care “performance” indicators that adequately reflect the impact of such services on peoples’ health and wellbeing (browne et al., 2012; wong et al., 2011). both health centres have an explicit mandate to provide increased access to primary health care (phc) services in two urban centres, and to make their services as accessible as possible to both aboriginal and non-aboriginal clients living with multiple health and social challenges. many of the patients who self-identify as aboriginal have been affected by the legacy of colonialism (in particular, economic marginalization, systemic discrimination and racism, intergenerational traumas associated with residential schools and more recent forms of colonialism such as child apprehension by the state (benoit, carroll, & chaudhry, 2003; browne et al., 2011). the dataset that we draw on is based on: (a) a document-based in-depth analysis of the bc health authorities and bc provincial government’s policy initiatives (for example, british columbia ministry of health, 2004; british columbia ministry of health planning, 2003) that led to the emergence of the two uahcs, and how those policies frame and constrain opportunities for aboriginal engagement in policy discussions and health service delivery; and (b) in-depth interviews with provincial health policy and uahc decision makers (n = 8). interviews focused on the shifting policy contexts shaping uahcs, the historical and current contractual relationships between the uahc and funders, and how these policy and funding contexts influenced phc service delivery in the two urban settings. all data were audio recorded, transcribed verbatim, and anonymized. a thematic content analysis of policy documents was conducted. interview data were analyzed using approaches for qualitatively derived data (denzin & lincoln, 2011; thorne, 2008). the process included repeatedly reading interview transcripts to identify recurring and contradictory patterns in the data. qualitative data analysis software (nvivo, qsr international, 2010) was used to assist with organizing and coding the interview data. as analysis proceeded, coding categories were refined, and the analysis shifted from a textual level to a deeper conceptual analysis of themes related to the policy contexts influencing the uahcs. credibility of the thematic analysis was continually evaluated by the members of our research team, which included experts in qualitative research and policy analysis, and executive directors and senior staff from the uahcs. triangulation of policy analysis and interview data also contributed to the rigor and trustworthiness of the analysis (thorne, 2008). 3 lavoie et al.: missing pathways to self-governance published by scholarship@western, 2015     b a c k g r o u n d a n d c o n t e x t : t h e j u r i s d i c t i o n a l d i v i d e i n a b o r i g i n a l h e a l t h p o l i c y i n c a n a d a when it comes to aboriginal health care, the canadian jurisdictional policy map is best described as a patchwork (lavoie et al., 2013). for reasons described as historical and humanitarian (waldram, herring, & young, 2006), the federal government has assumed primary responsibility for a complement of phc services provided to first nations registered under the federal indian act and living on-reserve, and to inuit living in their traditional territories in québec and labrador. in contrast, provincial and territorial governments are responsible for the delivery of a number of health services, as defined by the canada health act 1984 (canada health act, 1985). as discussed in more depth below, ontario is the only province to have adopted a fairly comprehensive policy framework to address the health care needs of all aboriginal peoples (ontario ministry of community and social services, 1994). although other provinces have included provisions addressing aboriginal health in legislation, policies, or strategies, most of these focus on jurisdiction for legal, financial, or other reasons (lavoie et al., 2013) that nevertheless fail to clarify areas of jurisdiction for service delivery (lavoie & forget, 2006). most provinces have developed regional health boards or health authorities to improve citizen participation, set priorities regionally, coordinate provision, and integrate service health care delivery (kouri, 2002). regionalization has added yet another level of complexity and variation in the complement of services accessible to aboriginal peoples. the relationship between diverse and numerous aboriginal nations in canada and provincial health authorities varies across the country. with the exception of ontario, regionalized systems do not require aboriginal representation and, where they engage with aboriginal communities, such engagement is based on relationships rather than policies (lavoie et al., 2013; lavoie et al., 2005; smith & lavoie, 2008). section 35 of the 1982 canadian constitution recognizes aboriginal peoples’ inherent right to selfgovernment. trends in self-government have improved opportunities for aboriginal participation in service delivery. agreements between federal and/or provincial health ministries, departments, or health authorities and aboriginal communities have multiplied (lavoie et al., 2013). these opportunities however have been largely limited to first nations, inuit, and some métis groups still living in their traditional territories. self-government agreements have their own geographical boundaries that may or may not coincide with provincial health authorities’ own boundaries. in bc in particular, first nations’ self-government discussions were limited until the 1997 landmark delgamuukw decision (culhane, 1998). as a result of this decision, self-government discussions centred on issues of land and natural resources in traditional territories are proceeding, albeit with prudence. bc is thus an anomaly in canada because, unlike other canadian jurisdictions, self-government discussions are relatively recent (mckee, 2009). as in other jurisdictions, discussions of self-government in urban environments are lacking. across canada, aboriginal-controlled organizations have emerged in urban settings to fill service gaps and advocacy needs. friendship centres (over 100 across canada) emerged in the 1950s to help aboriginal peoples adjust to urban life and to provide bridging of social and health services (graham & kinmond, 2008). walker has noted that friendship centres, and arguably other urban aboriginal organizations such as the two uahcs discussed in this article, have contributed to the emergence and nurturing of “associational aboriginal communities” (in contrast to nation-based communities), whose 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.2     cultural heterogeneity neither undermines the coherence of this community nor its legitimacy as an aboriginal community engaged in some level of self-governance (peters, 2011a). urban citizenship results in “the articulation of local-right claims and their substantiation through engagement with the state and other sectors of society” (walker, 2006, p. 2349). as others have (peters, 2011a), we argue that in urban centres associational aboriginal communities provide an opportunity for a form of urban self-government that neither competes with nor undermines other forms of self-governments (e.g., on-reserve governance structures), but rather complements these by providing opportunities for aboriginal peoples living in urban environments to have their interests represented. walker (2013) argued for increased engagement through the co-production of “future seeking and place making” (ie planning and policy making, walker, 2013, p. 151). we notice important discussions in the literature on how associational aboriginal communities might be engaged as a mechanism to enact urban self-government. to date, these discussions have remained theoretical (peters, 2011b; peters & andersen, 2013). further, there remain considerable differences in the understanding of urban aboriginal governance within aboriginal and first nation communities. tensions exist as to who has governing authority over urban aboriginal communities (e.g., the provincial health authorities, local first nations, provincial first nations governance structures, etc.). many urban aboriginal organizations have publicly stated that their mandate is limited to services delivery. interestingly, the fnha has adopted the same stance, leaving the fnhc to shoulder political responsibilities. in canada, these issues remain under discussion and no salient solution has emerged. as will be discussed below, new zealand has acknowledged the role of urban māori organizations as an expression of self-government (tino rangatiratanga), without competing with or undermining iwi. in contrast, canadian associational aboriginal communities have yet to be recognized as a legitimate platform to represent aboriginal peoples in ways that complement on-reserve governance structures, despite earlier federal commitments (abele & graham, 2011). the next sections explore aboriginal health policy developments in bc and how these developments have narrowly defined the role urban aboriginal health organizations play in the context of self-government. p a s t p o l i c y a p p r o a c h e s a n d i m p a c t o n t h e p r e s e n t : t h e c a s e o f u r b a n a b o r i g i n a l h e a l t h c e n t r e s i n b c in bc, the overall aboriginal population is estimated at slightly under 200,000 (4.8% of the total bc population). just slightly more than half (56.3%) of aboriginal peoples in bc are first nations registered as “indians” under the indian act (statistics canada, 2006b). further, the majority of aboriginal peoples in bc live in urban areas (59.7%); 26% live on reserve and 14.3% live in rural areas (statistics canada, 2006a). e a r l y 1 9 9 0 s : p o l i c y d i r e c t i o n s although the above figures provide an important backdrop to the policy analysis that follows, it fails to explain the shift in focus between the 1991 closer to home report and more recent discussions. the closer to home (1991) report was a comprehensive review of the health status of british columbians and of health services in bc. the report included a series of recommendations, two of which are relevant to this article. first, the report recommended the decentralization of the bc health care system, to “shift a portion of the decision-making power away from victoria [the provincial capital city], [by] 5 lavoie et al.: missing pathways to self-governance published by scholarship@western, 2015     substituting several regional authorities for one centralized authority” (british columbia royal commission on health care and costs, 1991, p. b37). as noted earlier, a whole section of the closer to home report was also devoted to the health of “native” (now aboriginal) peoples, stating, currently, the health needs of native communities are determined by outside agencies, usually without native input or control. if british columbians are to address these serious health issues, governments must relinquish much of the control over how and what services are delivered, and real partnerships must be forged between health care providers and native communities. culturally appropriate programs which meet the needs of the community and are controlled by the community must be funded, designed and implemented. (british columbia royal commission on health care and costs, 1991, pp. c-27) the commissioners were cognizant of the onand off-reserve divide and the associated jurisdictional challenges, and recommended that provincial authorities • work with aboriginal communities and federal authorities to develop community mental health programs; • negotiate agreements to fund physician services on-reserve; and • ensure that “full health services” are available to all communities. (british columbia royal commission on health care and costs, 1991, pp. c-31-32) the bulk of the recommendations were however clearly focused on addressing the lack of aboriginal health programs off-reserve: “half of the province’s native population lives off reserves, but services to meet this population’s needs are only beginning to develop” (british columbia royal commission on health care and costs, 1991, p. c-29). recommendations included the development of an information system to measure health determinants and health status; the development of alcohol and drug programs for youth, women, and people who use iv drugs; greater aboriginal involvement in policy and program planning as well as implementation; the creation of an aboriginal health division within the ministry of health, with its own assistant deputy minister; and the development of aboriginal-controlled health services, including services to aboriginal people living in urban areas (british columbia royal commission on health care and costs, 1991, pp. c-28). one tangible outcome of these recommendations was the establishment of four urban aboriginal health centres, two of which remain in existence today as established phc centres. the 1991 report did not address how these phc centres would relate to (a) the emerging regional health authorities, whose governance structures reflect dominant societal conceptualizations of health care priorities and strategies for operationalization, or (b) the growing urban aboriginal population. neither did it define the health service gaps these uahcs were intended to address, nor how these uahcs might articulate their services with other health service providers. section 35 of the constitution (canada, 1982), the section that guarantees the right to self-government for aboriginal peoples, was not mentioned. these initiatives were thus positioned outside section 35, and therefore not framed as expression of self6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.2     government but rather as aboriginal non-government organizations tasked to deliver contractually defined health services. p o l i c y d i r e c t i o n s i n t h e n e w m i l l e n n i u m the responsibility for aboriginal health services delivered off-reserve was transferred from provincial coffers to bc’s health authorities (has) in 2001 along with two directives: that existing contracts with uahcs be maintained for a period of three years, and that the aboriginal health budget transferred from the provincial government remain dedicated to aboriginal health, rather than absorbed into provincial revenues (government decision-maker interview 35). has have since been given considerable autonomy in identifying strategies to address aboriginal-specific health care needs, including ways of addressing urban population health priorities. since 2001, government policy documents (for examples, british columbia ministry of health services & ministry of children and family development, 2010; woermke, 2011) have mentioned that there is a role for non-government organizations (ngos) in addressing the health care needs of urban aboriginal peoples. these same documents however fail to define or provide direction about the role of ngos, articulate how the ngo sector should be supported, or identify the gaps in the health care system that the ngo sector is expected to address. individual ngos have carved their own mandate, based on community input, needs, available funding, and activism. our research clearly shows that the two uahcs in bc play multiple roles: first, they are service delivery organizations that play an advocacy role in relation to the health needs of aboriginal peoples in urban areas who are most impacted by social and systemic inequities (browne et al., 2012; wong et al., 2011). uahcs advocate for better services both at the individual patient and at the system level. as this decision-maker describes: certainly the people who came together to form this society understood . . . why people might not be accessing the health care system so they wrote a constitution which i think was very visionary . . . because i really think that they, they understood what might need to happen to do something really proactive around aboriginal health. one was the opening of the health centre where aboriginal people could come and feel safe and respected and honoured and it was really friendly to them and secondly was what needs to happen in our community to really make a difference so it was about not just looking at what happens within these four walls but how can the society engage with the rest of the community in really making a difference. (uahc decision-maker interview 33) second, the uahcs also provide community leadership that is politicized, yet whose political agenda is not linked to institutional development, or to formal political processes. for example, the two uahcs are routinely engaged in consultations over the implementation of new initiatives such as the offreserve aboriginal action plan, which is focused on improving socio-economic outcomes for aboriginal peoples living off-reserve (british columbia association of friendship centres, 2013). as noted before and in contrast to the reserve system, urban aboriginal communities tend to lack a policyor legislationdefined system of governance. this can pose challenges to creating organizational cohesion. urban aboriginal ngos such as the uahcs thus often provide a leadership role that may help achieving 7 lavoie et al.: missing pathways to self-governance published by scholarship@western, 2015     community cohesion and advance an agenda addressing urban aboriginal peoples’ health in the absence of a common urban aboriginal system of governance. let’s not think of who owns what within the community, let’s think along the lines that this belongs to every community member . . . it belongs to the god damn community, you know. and you know, it’s been really really hard getting that across to people because of the way people have been, sort of conditioned to think, you know. (uahc decision-maker interview 25) findings from our study demonstrate that the uahcs provide one model of what walker (2006) calls “associational aboriginal communities”: we have a totally different set-up in that we don’t have any kind of boundaries, no definable boundaries . . . i don’t think we’ve sat there and say kind of begun to talk amongst ourselves about, “given that we’re not like a reserve,” and yet we have all of the conditions of reserves in many cases. how are we going to make some decisions in a unified way, to bring about better conditions now? so that more of our kids go to school and graduate and become productive and so on and so forth. how are we going to house people in such a way that they can have those children go to school? and just so, it’s not about self-government as much as it’s about, how do we all cooperate amongst ourselves? and that’s what i see, the whole thing about selfdetermination, i think if we can reach certain kinds of understandings amongst ourselves, we won’t need to say, “well we’re self-governing,” you know. (uahc decision-maker interview 25) and i think we’ve made decisions about whether or not we’re trying to be conscious about is this a community enterprise where we’re going to be present and contribute or do we need to be present and be a leader? so it’s about stepping up to the plate too often and saying, we should chair that. we have the ability, it’s central enough to our concerns and what we should be doing in the community, that we should be playing a leadership role. and because we can. (uahc decision-maker interview 33b) solidifying uahcs’ role in representing urban aboriginal peoples’ interests to governments requires building relationships with governmental and non-governmental agencies, including funding agencies. over time, and depending on shifting policy priorities, leadership style and context, funders’ relationship with the uahc may shift back and forth on a continuum characterized at one end as a flexible and responsive, partnership-based relationship, to the more limited role of an organization competing for contracts and delivering contractually-defined services at the other end. opportunities for the uahcs to engage with high-level decision-makers, or to have input into important debates, depends on and is defined by their relationship with the ha. i think most of the time it’s a comfortable relationship. i probably wouldn’t be honest to say there’s never any . . . tension or conflict there, that wouldn’t be true. but i think for the most part, again as i say, we do have contracts, we do have schedule a’s that spell out what we’re providing money for and what our expectations are. if a contractor can’t live with that, then we won’t be giving them a contract or we’ll be withdrawing that contract. and of course, all of our contracts have clauses for either party to get out of the contract if it’s not working for either party. so i mean it’s a business relationship. (government decision-maker interview 34) 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.2     having ngo’s being advocates is a challenge for them in terms of, should we fund it, what level of advocacy should we accept from an ngo that we’re funding, when does it become a conflict of interest? (government decision-maker interview 35) we’re caring for the same people at one end of the spectrum or the other right? and if people aren’t receiving good primary care they’re ending up in acute care or ambulatory care with all the wrong reasons, for all the wrong reasons. and so in our primary care model of integrative accessible health services and strengthening those services at the community level it makes sense for us to work with not just [the ha] but ngos as well and different, finding different ways to do that. and i don’t think we draw enough on those supportive partnerships. (government decision-maker interview 36) to date, as is the case for the fnha, urban aboriginal organizations (including the uahcs discussed in this article) have framed their role as service delivery organizations that can advocate for the population they served, without representing them politically (interviews 25, 33, 37). r e f o c u s i n g o f p r i o r i t i e s : t h e n e w t r a n s f o r m a t i v e c h a n g e a c c o r d in november of 2005, the province of british columbia, the first nations leadership council, and the government of canada signed the landmark transformative change accord. the tca marks a major shift in health policy and politics in canada, and is guided by three broad objectives: (a) close the gaps between first nations and other british columbians in the areas of education, health, housing and economic opportunities over the next 10 years; (b) reconcile aboriginal rights and title with those of the crown; and (c) establish a new relationship based on mutual respect and recognition (canada, 2005; kelly, 2011). this last objective echoes the constitutional commitment to respect aboriginal peoples’ right to self-government. to close the gap in health inequities that exist between aboriginal populations and their bc counterparts, the tca proposes to prioritize investments in mental health and youth suicide prevention programs, chronic disease prevention, pilot projects integrating acute care and community health services for first nations, the training of first nations health care professionals, and telehealth. the tca also commits to improving cross-jurisdictional coordination and to improving participation in planning and decision-making. by focusing on education, housing, workforce development and other areas, in addition to health care, the tca offers concrete steps to address and redress a number of important inequities, including the creation of a fnha mandated to manage and deliver services previously under the authority of the federal government (first nations health council, government of canada, & government of british columbia, 2010). the tripartite framework agreement in-principle (her majesty the queen in right of canada, 2010), which operationalizes the tripartite agreement in regards to health services, focuses on the transfer of services previously provided by the first nations and inuit health branch of health canada (fnihb)2 to “first nations and their mandated health organizations [mhos]” (the first nations leadership council et al., 2007, p. 3). a mho is defined as                                                                                                                 2 first nations and inuit health branch (fnihb) of health canada supports the delivery of public health and health promotion services on-reserve and in inuit communities, and the provision of primary care services in remote and isolated areas, where there are no provincial services readily available (health canada, 2013). 9 lavoie et al.: missing pathways to self-governance published by scholarship@western, 2015     a health organization or agency with a defined mandate that is created and ratified through band council resolutions or a motion passed at a duly convened meeting of representatives of the chiefs and councils and authorized for that purpose. usually, but not always, such a mandated organization or agency will be legally incorporated. (the first nations leadership council et al., 2007) this transfer occurred on october 1, 2013. the language used in the first nations health plan suggests that, at this point, only first nations recognized by the federal government through the registry and those nations who have mhos are included in the new policy framework. mhos refer specifically to health organizations that operate on-reserve, or in a few cases off-reserve, under the leadership of a first nation community, a consortium of communities, or a tribal council. although some may access funding from their health authority, the main source of funding for these organizations was fnihb and is now the fnha. by definition, métis, inuit, first nations peoples who are not registered under the indian act and those who are not formally affiliated with a specific first nation, however, cannot be represented by mhos (90,000 aboriginal peoples in bc). the implicit features of these policy documents position first nations and their mhos as selfgovernment mechanisms within a federal-provincial-first nations decision-making process. for example, first nations are provided the opportunity to sign agreements with canada and bc “as nations.” other aboriginal groups (e.g., non-registered first nations, métis), including the diverse groups residing in urban centres, do not have access to a similar mechanism or pathway to participate in decision-making. unmet needs and missing alternative pathways can put pressure on urban aboriginal organizations to speak on behalf of the population they serve, without having an explicit mandate to do so. we argue that this issue reflects the broader context of self-government discussions in canada. e x t e n d i n g o p p o r t u n i t i e s f o r e x p r e s s i o n o f s e l f g o v e r n m e n t canada, and therefore bc, has yet to adopt a policy framework that gives shape to section 35 of the constitution, which promises the right to self-government to all aboriginal peoples. while mechanisms for self-government have been extended to first nations, and some métis and inuit who remain connected to their traditional territories, pathways for aboriginal peoples who do not have a specific nation affiliation remain undefined. operationalizing section 35 for those who no longer are affiliated to a specific first nation, or living outside of their traditional territory (primarily in urban areas), is complex. ontario and new zealand have both attempted to tackle this issue in different ways. examples from ontario and new zealand provide interesting counterpoints to the bc context. ontario was the first province to have developed an aboriginal healing and wellness strategy (ahws) in 1990, and to have developed an overarching aboriginal health policy in 1994 (ontario aboriginal health advocacy health initiative, 1999). the strategy led to the creation of 10 aboriginal health access centres, six healing lodges, seven family shelters, two family violence healing programs, two outpatient hostels, and crisis intervention teams in 47 northern communities (ontario ministry of community and social services, 2011). the ahws is the most comprehensive policy framework currently in place in canada (lavoie et al., 2013), and may serve as a model for other provinces including bc. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.2     until recently, the implementation of the ahws was directed by a joint management committee (jmc) with representation from key aboriginal political bodies, including métis, first nations, and provincial non-aboriginal ministries and departments. collectively, these organizations represented the interests of urban, rural, and remote first nations, métis, and inuit. this high-level oversight committee may have resulted in too much standardization: the [ahws] has standardized and streamlined its processes to effectively manage a diverse group of programs province-wide. but in doing so, it may have curtailed some of the local autonomy that is the fundamental strength of the community-based programs it supports. (minore & katt, 2007) in 2010, ontario renewed its commitment to the ahws, but noted that the jmc was expected to wind down its operations (meilleur, 2010). this shift may be associated with the creations of local health integration networks (lhin) in 2007, tasked with regional health priority setting and resource allocation. each lhin is expected to be advised by an aboriginal health council, thereby increasing flexibility and responsiveness to regional priorities (ontario public appointment secretariat, 2007). this level of urban aboriginal engagement, which is entrenched in policy, is unprecedented in canada (lavoie et al., 2013) and offers some guarantees of representation for all aboriginal peoples living in ontario. new zealand has tackled the issue of representation in the context of the implementation of their 2001 health policy, he korowai oranga (new zealand ministry of health, 2002). the policy reiterated the 1988 commitment that all policies in new zealand should reflect the principles of the 1840 treaty of waitangi: • partnership: working together with iwi (tribe), hapū (sub-tribe), whānau (family), and māori communities to develop strategies for māori health gain and appropriate health and disability services. • participation: involving māori at all levels of the sector in planning, development, and delivery of health and disability services. • protection: ensuring māori enjoy at least the same level of health as non-māori and safeguarding māori cultural concepts, values and practices (new zealand national health committee on health and disability, 2002). the principle of partnership has led the district health boards (dhbs) to enter into formal agreements with two very distinct māori populations: manawhenua and mataawaka. manawhenua includes local iwi (nations) whose traditional territory coincides with the territory covered by the dhb. mataawaka groups are predominantly found in large urban settings. manawhenua and mataawaka are not necessarily mutually exclusive since some mataawaka are cognizant of their whakapapa (lineage) and of their tribal affiliation(s). implementation efforts have resulted in a multiplicity of governance arrangements between dhbs and local manawhenua and mataawaka māori groups. in some cases, the policy led to the creation of new mataawaka groups to fulfill the need for a consultative or advisory body for the dhb board (pere, 11 lavoie et al.: missing pathways to self-governance published by scholarship@western, 2015     boulton, smiler, walker, & kingi, 2007). the establishment and composition of these groups is as varied as the dhbs in which they reside, however, all have the function of representing the māori population in decisions affecting health and health services to that population. c o n c l u s i o n s new zealand and ontario have developed mechanisms to engage both nation or tribal and associational aboriginal communities in self-government discussions. in ontario, policy options have formalized the relationship between aboriginal peoples and regional planning processes. in new zealand, policies have gone further and created obligations to ensure representation. this is not the case in bc, where the focus of aboriginal health policy shifted: by first focusing on the health of aboriginal peoples living offreserve, and then shifting focus to the development of a tripartite discussion which to date has been focused on the transfer of fnihb to the fnha and the engagement of first nation communities. the reasons for this shift are pragmatic: addressing pressing inequalities the early 1990s, and in 2005, creating a more coherent health care system in bc by creating partnerships between the federal government, has and first nations. but this shift is also highlighting a policy weakness in the conceptualization of self-government which limits the political space some first nations, métis, and inuit have in the bc and the canadian political landscapes. bc is the last jurisdiction in canada to enter into self-government discussions with first nations living on-reserve, and is now doing so as the result of a supreme court ruling that impacts title to land and resources for first nations only. this exclusionary shift is unlikely purposeful, but rather reflects the canadian national conceptualization of selfgovernment. the current federal jurisdictional structure necessitates that the current focus on transferring fnihb obligations to the fnha requires the engagement of first nations communities. future plans related to closing the health equity gap will however require the engagement of all aboriginal peoples and clear pathways are missing. we note that canada and the provinces have yet to explore, define, and act on obligations entrenched in the canadian constitution for those aboriginal peoples no longer affiliated with a first nation or other aboriginal nation, and/or living outside of their traditional territory such as urban environments. new zealand has tackled this obligation to manawhenua and mataawaka with pragmatic solutions. canadian policy debates have yet to extend the same opportunities. as a result, those affiliated to their nations are being extended self-government or self-determination opportunities. in contrast, those who do not connect with a specific nation or with their traditional territory depend on the ngo sector to extend services and advocacy. as described by this research participant: that to me is what self-determination really is all about, you know. it’s not about us proclaiming ourselves as some sort of sovereign group of people, it’s saying, “we have in place agreements that we ourselves have reached amongst ourselves.” (uahc decision-maker interview 25) in bc, uahcs are located at the heart of associational aboriginal communities and might become mechanisms of urban citizenship, which centres on an active civil society that develops a capacity to engage the state as a partner in its locally driven citizenship agenda. the organizations with which we engaged did not see this as part of their role. we suggest that associational aboriginal communities could offer an opportunity to engage aboriginal peoples in a form of self-governance that complements other forms such as the role of first nations governments. realizing this potential, or generating options 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.2     more suitable to urban aboriginal organizations, requires national discussions supported by resources and an adequate timeframe. in bc, expecting these discussions to take place as a “side project” of the fnha is unlikely to yield to the outcome sought and could possibly undermine the work of the fnha. 13 lavoie et al.: missing pathways to self-governance published by scholarship@western, 2015     r e f e r e n c e s abele, f., & graham, k. 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(2006). searching for aborignal/indigenous self-determination: urban citizenship in the wuinnipeg low-cost-housing sector, canada. environment and planning a, 38, 2345-2363. walker, r. c. (2013). increasing the depth of out civic identity: future seeking and place making with aboriginal communities. in e. peters & c. anderson (eds.), indigenous in the city: contemporary identities and cultural innovation (pp. 151-166). vancouver: ubc press. woermke, m. (2011). towards reducing health inequities (pp. 1-94). victoria. 17 lavoie et al.: missing pathways to self-governance published by scholarship@western, 2015     wong, s., browne, a. j., varcoe, c., smye, v., godwin, o., littlejohn, d., & tu, d. (2011). enhancing measurement of phc indicators using an equity lens: where are we missing the mark? international journal for equity in health, 10(38). 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.2 the international indigenous policy journal january 2015 missing pathways to self-governance: aboriginal health policy in british columbia josée g. lavoie annette j. browne colleen varcoe sabrina wong alycia fridkin see next page for additional authors recommended citation missing pathways to self-governance: aboriginal health policy in british columbia abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license authors missing pathways to self-governance: aboriginal health policy in british columbia the international indigenous policy journal volume 4 issue 4 educational pathways of indigenous learners article 7 october 2013 he manu hou: the transition of māori students into māori studies meegan hall victoria university of wellington, meegan.hall@vuw.ac.nz arama rata victoria university of wellington, arama.rata@vuw.ac.nz peter adds victoria university of wellington, peter.adds@vuw.ac.nz recommended citation hall, m. , rata, a. , adds, p. (2013). he manu hou: the transition of māori students into māori studies. the international indigenous policy journal, 4(4) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.7 he manu hou: the transition of māori students into māori studies abstract there are many known factors that can help or hinder indigenous students undertaking tertiary study, but little is known about how māori students experience māori studies courses specifically. against the backdrop of low māori student retention in universities and the short history of māori studies as a field of study, this article shares findings from a thematic analysis of interviews with māori students in māori studies. it proposes a framework, te ara mātauranga, which organises new findings about māori cultural enclaves, aspirations, engagement, learning opportunities, and support. ultimately, this article distinguishes the experiences of māori students in māori studies from previous generic research about māori students in tertiary education and identifies a set of consequential challenges and opportunities. keywords māori students, māori studies, university transition, indigenous student retention acknowledgments he mihi nui ki ngā kaimahi katoa o tēnei kaupapa. we are grateful to everyone who contributed to this project. in particular, special thanks to principal researcher, dr ewan pohe, and research assistant, richard bradley. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ h e m a n u h o u : t h e t r a n s i t i o n o f māo r i s t u d e n t s i n t o māo r i s t u d i e s he manu hou ahau he pī ka rere. in 1983, professor of māori studies at victoria university of wellington (vuw), hirini moko mead, cited this whakatauki (māori1 proverb) to liken the development of māori studies in new zealand universities to a fledgling bird that has just learnt to fly (mead, 1983, p. 349). thirty years later, this article reports on the behaviours and beliefs of māori students as they transition into the māori studies programme at one new zealand university and identifies the factors that help or hinder their success. firstly, though, it considers the broader contexts of māori student participation in higher education in new zealand and the history and focus of māori studies as a field of academic study. māo r i p a r t i c i p a t i o n i n h i g h e r e d u c a t i o n the new zealand tertiary education strategy 2010 2015 called for providers to “improve progression to, and achievement at, higher levels” (tertiary education commission, 2010, p. 12) for māori students. māori people make up 15.4% of the total new zealand population of 4.4 million and 414,000 are of working age (statistics new zealand, 2012). despite a steady increase in māori participation in tertiary studies in recent years, by 2011 only 14% of the tertiary qualifications completed by māori were at the degree level or above, compared to 39% for europeans2 (ministry of education, 2012). while the tertiary education commission (tec) sets national goals, each university is required to devise its own māori-related objectives (see for example aut university, 2011; massey university, 2003; university of auckland, 2005; university of waikato, 2010). in 2011, the 1,940 students who identified themselves as māori made up 9.7% of victoria university of wellington's total enrolments (victoria university of wellington, 2012). victoria university of wellington’s strategic plan declared a commitment to “māori student recruitment, retention, and achievement” to “the contribution of mātauranga māori (māori knowledge) to scholarship across disciplines” and to “the contribution of te reo māori [māori language] and tikanga māori [māori culture] to the culture of victoria” (victoria university of wellington, 2009, pp. 3 4). thus, within the broader university environment a connection has been drawn between the goal to increase māori student degree completions and the provision of a culturally responsive university environment and experience. t h e e v o l u t i o n o f māo r i s t u d i e s the field of māori studies emerged in new zealand universities with the intention to provide space, both physical and intellectual, to study, practice, and protect māori cultural ideas and values (reilly, 2011). mead (1983) explained that māori studies is “more than a university subject area” (p. 348) and goes beyond the transmission of knowledge to include the survival of the māori people. since their inception, māori studies programmes have generally offered two strands of courses: māori                                                                                                                 1māori are the indigenous people of new zealand. 2the ministry of education used the term “european" in this report to denote students who were not of māori, pacific, or asian origin, or classed as “other.” 1 hall et al.: he manu hou published by scholarship@western, 2013 language and māori culture, with some relatively minor variation3 (mead, 1983; reilly, 2011). c. w. smith (2000) noted that māori studies is also embedded with philosophy but that “it tends to be interwoven into the curriculum rather than seen as a separate subject”( p. 43). in addition, over time, most māori studies curricula have evolved to include comparative indigenous perspectives and histories. the challenge that remains for those working in māori studies, however, is how best to impart māori knowledge, “discover new and more effective ways of teaching maori” (mead, 1983, p. 341) and produce quality māori graduates. l i t e r a t u r e r e v i e w   to date, there is no comprehensive published account of the experience of māori students enrolled in a māori studies degree program in a new zealand university. the last 20 years, however, have seen an increase in the number of publications about the transition of māori students into university study and the factors that may impact on their success (e.g., gorinski & abernethy, 2007; jefferies, 1997; mckenzie, 2005). in addition, limited research has been completed about the experiences of māori university students in other disciplines, such as accounting and psychology (bennett, 2003; gallhofer, haslam, nam kim, & mariu, 1999). collectively, they suggest a multitude of factors that can impact on māori student transition, particularly relating to student characteristics, the university environment, relationships, and teaching pedagogy and practice. many of these factors have been echoed in international research about other indigenous students in higher education (champagne & stauss, 2002). c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s o f māo r i s t u d e n t s   while researchers have decried the deficit approach that labels māori cultural norms and values as hindrances (bishop & glynn, 1999; gorinski & abernethy, 2007; hunt, morgan, & teddy, 2001), it has been suggested in some research literature that māori university students may have distinctive characteristics that act as barriers to their academic success. jefferies (1997) reported that these characteristics may include low self-esteem, low expectations, a propensity to become distracted by political activities, and a sensitivity to criticism. hunt et al. (2001) noted how the māori cultural concept of whakamā (shame) can keep māori psychology students from seeking help and actively participating in their studies. alongside these factors, some authors have suggested māori cultural obligations act as barriers to māori academic success. for example, a high degree of whānau (family) connectedness and responsibility has been found to increase the likelihood of māori tertiary attrition (hunt et al., 2001; jefferies, 1997; t. smith, 2012). also, māori are often first-generation university students, which is believed to place even more significance on, and present additional challenges to, their leaving home to pursue academic qualifications (gallhofer et al., 1999; jefferies, 1997; nikora, levy, henry, & whangapirita, 2002).                                                                                                                 3māori studies were first offered as an undergraduate subject at the university of auckland in 1952. it was later established at victoria university of wellington in 1965, the university of waikato in 1970, massey university in 1971, the university of canterbury in 1974, and the university of otago in 1981. more recently, lincoln university has offered māori studies as a minor and aut university teaches it under the subject heading “māori development” (reilly, 2011). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.7 some māori students believed that they needed to assimilate in order to achieve at university (jefferies, 1997; nikora et al., 2002) or try to adopt a “bicultural” approach (t. smith, 2012). similar to the “racelessness” phenomenon that was also found among black students in the united states (fordham, 1988) and pressures on indigenous australian students to assimilate to australian universities (bourke & bourke, 2002), the negative stereotyping of perceived cultural traits can lead to a reluctance to be identified as māori for fear of marginalisation and a reluctance to use targeted māori support programmes (gorinski & abernethy, 2007). some māori students have expressed a reluctance to forgo their cultural beliefs in order to “fit in” to the university environment (egege & kutieleh, 2004). similarly, researchers have looked for ways in which māori cultural identity can benefit university study (bishop, berryman, cavanagh, & teddy, 2007; gavala & flett, 2005; mcmurchy-pilkington, 2009). bennett (2003) found a significant correlation between having a strong māori cultural identity and the likelihood of success at university. he concluded that “cultural identity moderates the effect of student problems on academic achievement”(p. 57), possibly because of a higher level of “resilience to the difficulties that academic life presents”(p. 62). jefferies (1997) also noted that māori students are often drawn to university study by a motivation to learn te reo (the māori language) and kaupapa māori (māori ways of knowing and doing). c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s o f t h e u n i v e r s i t y e n v i r o n m e n t   some studies have shifted away from a deficit approach to māori students and instead have focused on the shortcomings of educational institutions (see for example bishop & glynn, 1999; gorinski & abernethy, 2007). researchers advocate the adoption of culturally specific spaces and learning support programmes to help māori students to transition into the university environment (adds, hall, higgins, & higgins, 2011; coxhead, 2006; trafford, 2003). gallhofer et al. (1999) found a lack of māori-focused support services and low numbers of māori academic role models. t. smith (2012) and jefferies (1997) found a lack of quality course and enrolment information. mckenzie (2005) recommended centralised māori support units and increased pastoral care. furthermore, jefferies (1997) highlighted the instrumental role that affirmative action policies had played in increasing the disciplinary range and number of māori tertiary students. a common environmental barrier for māori university students cited in the literature was lack of finances (gallhofer et al., 1999; t. smith, 2012). tumen, shulruf, and hattie (2008) found that the characteristics of māori firstand second-year drop-outs were unlike any other ethnic group and concluded that “financial obstacles or other commitments unrelated to their educational experiences might explain why māori students leave”( p. 238). one study identified fear of financial pressure as a deterrent to university enrolment for māori secondary school students (jefferies, 1997), while others indicated that high student debt levels were linked to māori non-completion rates (nikora et al., 2002). a number of studies also linked financial stress with family responsibilities and suggested that these combined external obstacles often led to reticence to enrol and/or academic failure (hunt et al., 2001; jefferies, 1997; tumen et al., 2008). a further theme that featured strongly across the literature was the barrier caused by racism and marginalisation. hunt et al. (2001) reported that māori students in their study had found the “monocultural environment” to be alienating (p. 25). similarly, students in another study reported feeling “very lonely” due to their uncertainty and isolation (gallhofer et al., 1999, p. 786). gorinski and abernethy (2007) also found that the university environment projected low expectations on to 3 hall et al.: he manu hou published by scholarship@western, 2013 māori students, which were often self-fulfilling. in jefferies’ (1997) study, the māori students were asked to identify a range of environment-related barriers: racism and intimidation featured prominently, a finding reinforced in canadian, american, and australian research with other indigenous and minority student cohorts (augoustinos, tuffin, & sale, 1999; simpson, 2002; sonna, bishop, & humphries, 2000; tierney, 1999). c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s o f r e l a t i o n s h i p s w i t h s t u d e n t s   once at university, a key success factor mentioned in almost all of the literature was the importance for māori students of whanaungatanga or relationships (bishop et al., 2007; chinlund & hall, 2010; earle, 2008; hawk, cowley, hill, & sutherland, 2002; mcmurchy-pilkington, 2009; white, oxenham, tahana, williams, & matthews, 2009). the challenge for universities was recognising this aspect and building the requisite organisational capacity (gorinski & abernethy, 2007; syron & mclaughlin, 2010). some have suggested that the students need to form relationships has a cultural basis, which is linked to “a very powerful tendency and preference for mixing with other māori” (jefferies, 1997, p. 78). others emphasise that university study puts pressure on traditional whānau support relationships, so the development of new connections with others becomes critical for māori success (nikora et al., 2002). the most critical relationships for māori students, according to the literature, were with staff. in many instances, māori staff were described as important role models whom māori students were more comfortable in approaching (gallhofer et al., 1999; jefferies, 1997). this was found to ease the transition of māori students into the unfamiliar university environment (t. smith, 2012), lead to higher levels of māori student motivation and participation (hawk et al., 2002) and, ultimately, greater retention (gorinski & abernethy, 2007). also deemed very important were the relationships that māori students formed with each other (clark, 2006; gorinski & abernethy, 2007), with varying outcomes. some positive peer relationships were found to form during academic activities, such as targeted māori student tutorials (hunt et al., 2001). in contrast, if they “hang with the wrong crowd”, peer pressure was found to have a negative impact on māori student success (jefferies, 1997, p. 76). c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s o f t e a c h i n g p e d a g o g y a n d p r a c t i c e   the student transition literature about māori and other indigenous students also suggested that culturally responsive teaching practice is likely to engage and retain more students in tertiary study (hall, 2011; nakata, nakata, & chin, 2008; norman, 2004; page & asmar, 2008; simpson, 2002; zepke & leach, 2005). the literature recommended that teaching staff should engage in inclusive practice and that non-māori teachers in particular needed to achieve “cultural congruence” (jefferies, 1997, p. 82). one study reported how western approaches to learning and disciplinary knowledge were often inconsistent with māori values (gallhofer et al., 1999). researchers also found that māori students “need to see themselves reflected in the curriculum” in order to engage with a course of study and suggested that staff undertake professional development about learning styles and discursive pedagogical practice (gorinski & abernethy, 2007). effective teachers of māori students were found to have “incorporated relevant experiences into educational activities, encouraged students to talk in their first language and enjoyed learning from their students about their culture” (hawk et al., 2002, p. 6). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.7 a number of studies found a lack of māori material in tertiary courses (gallhofer et al., 1999; hunt et al., 2001; jefferies, 1997). when māori content was taught, researchers found that it was often in isolation, delivered by the few māori academics on staff, and not offered cohesively across the academic programme (gallhofer et al., 1999). in contrast, when the māori content in courses increased and māori-specific learning opportunities (such as targeted tutorials) were offered, they contributed to māori student success (hunt et al., 2001). the demeanour of teachers also impacted on māori tertiary student engagement. in one study, māori students reported how there are “too many teachers who do not understand the needs of māori students”, “ are racist”, and “have low expectations of māori” (jefferies, 1997, pp. 135 136). positive reinforcement of māori students from teaching staff and the setting of high expectations were found to be critical elements of effective teaching pedagogy (gorinski & abernethy, 2007; jefferies, 1997). p r o j e c t o v e r v i e w against this backdrop, a project was developed at te kawa a māui (tkam), the school of māori studies at vuw, to identify the factors that help or hinder māori students undertaking māori studies courses. it was prompted by a tec edict for new zealand universities to ensure that māori student completion rates were on par with overall student completion rates by 2018. at vuw in 2011, the overall student course completion rate was 84%, whereas it was 77% for māori students. in comparison, completion rates for māori students in tkam courses were varied and ranged from 25% to 88%, with only two courses achieving completion rates above the 84% threshold (victoria university of wellington, 2011). as the programme with the largest cohort of māori students within vuw, it was important to investigate why there was such a disparity in māori student performance. ultimately, this project was about identifying any elements that distinguished the experience of māori students in māori studies from māori students in other tertiary programmes, with a view to utilising that information to increase māori student completion rates in tkam. m e t h o d an advisory panel of tkam staff was established to direct the project and māori research assistants were recruited to conduct interviews and assist with the research. ethical approval was also obtained from vuw’s human ethics committee. interviews were held with 10 māori students (7 female) from tkam who were identified by staff to represent differing levels of academic performance and engagement. the participants consisted of seven undergraduate students, two graduate students, and one postgraduate (master’s) student. a semi-structured interview schedule was followed. students were asked about their experiences of tkam and vuw more broadly. they were also asked about the factors that facilitated and inhibited their academic achievement. the interviews were digitally recorded and later transcribed and coded using nvivo software. the interview data was subjected to an inductive thematic analysis, as outlined by braun and clarke (2006), in which data were coded into basic elements of meaning and then organised into higher-level themes. major themes were assessed to ensure that (a) they were indicated by multiple extracts, (b) there was consistency between extracts within overarching themes, and (c) there was distinctiveness between extracts across major themes. the major themes were then arranged into an overarching framework for promoting māori academic achievement within māori studies. 5 hall et al.: he manu hou published by scholarship@western, 2013 r e s u l t s – t e a r a māt a u r a n g a four major themes emerged from the interview data in relation to the way that māori students experienced studying within māori studies: (a) their aspirations, (b) their ways of engaging, (c) the learning opportunities that they encounter, and (d) the support they receive. māori cultural enclaves were found to assuage each of these elements. a distinct feature of the māori studies interviewees was that they drew clear distinctions between “mainstream” or “western” cultural spaces and māori cultural spaces that exist in pockets within the university environment, such as tkam, vuw’s māori meeting house complex called te herenga waka marae (the marae), a māori student mentoring programme called te pūtahi atawhai, and the whānau house (māori student accommodation). the interviewees described engaging most strongly with the māori cultural enclaves, where māori worldviews were dominant. the four major themes were organised into a framework entitled te ara mātauranga (māori knowledge pathway). the framework describes māori student academic progression within a māori studies department, and shows student progression through ”aspirations”, “engagement”, ”learning opportunities”, and “support”. a discussion of the major themes, supported by extracts from the interview data, is presented below. a s p i r a t i o n s the first major theme, aspirations, relates to how the expectations and aspirations held by māori students in māori studies, and those around them, influence their decision to pursue and succeed in tertiary education. in line with previous literature, their expectations were influenced by whānau and secondary school experiences (jefferies, 1997). however, their aspirations to succeed in māori studies were found to centre on cultural and iwi (tribal) goals. a number of participants described being the first in their family to attend university, which is similar to earlier research findings (gorinski & abernethy, 2007; jefferies, 1997), and having to overcome negativity and family expectations, as the following quotes attest: although i knew i wanted to go to university, my immediate family, my parents and siblings, wanted me to leave school and go working. (p3) i am the first in my family to come to university. my parents are proud. you get pressure, you know. it all builds up, and you don’t want to tell them about bad things and marks. (p8) however, in addition to overcoming expectations about university study in general, participants described having to overcome negativity around their enrolment in māori studies in particular. one participant with limited prior māori cultural engagement described her grandmother’s response to her choice of studies: i think she was a bit surprised that i was getting into the māori stuff. (p7) despite the renaissance in māori culture that has been in effect for the past four to five decades (moon, 2009), it seems from the quote above that māori who swim against the broader tide of assimilation into mainstream culture might still be met with “surprise”. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.7 participants also described negative perceptions surrounding the value of a māori studies degree, as follows: i know there aren’t many jobs out there right now. and people still think, “why are you doing māori studies? what will that give you?”(p8) the negative attitudes towards māori studies suggested within the excerpt above conform to colonial discourses locating indigenous languages and cultures as static remnants of the past of little relevance today (l. t. smith, 1999) and deny current demand in the labour market for graduates with an understanding of māori language and culture, which is driven, in no small part, by the burgeoning māori economy. many participants were motivated to pursue māori studies due to cultural aspirations. in the following excerpts, a participant described her desire to promote te reo māori and cultural connectedness within her whānau: my main reason for learning it and speaking it is for my babies…i just want to know my reo all over again. i want to remember being be able to kōrero [speak māori] to my parents. (p1) participants also noted that their decision to choose māori studies was motivated by their aspirations to contribute to their iwi, as the following two participants described when asked about their poststudy plans: make the iwi and whānau more involved together and help the rangatahi [youth] into tertiary education, even if it’s training to get a job. i have to work out a proposal for the iwi, though i've never really been a part of my iwi, even though granny was. (p4) the topics i’m studying are topical right now for post treaty settlements. what i have wanted is to go to work with my iwi. (p6) thus, while previous research has suggested that whānau responsibilities increase the likelihood of māori university student attrition (hunt et al., 2001; jefferies, 1997; t. smith, 2012), the preceding quotes suggest that whānau responsibilities might also motivate māori studies students to complete their studies. e n g a g e m e n t the second major theme, engagement, relates to the places that the participants found people who encouraged them to stay connected and focussed on māori studies. the marae was popular with most participants. participants described a deep sense of connectedness with the facility and marae community, as the following quote expressed: i love the marae here. it’s the only thing that makes me feel good about being here in wellington in the concrete jungle…because there’s this marae here i don’t feel like i’m in some alien place. i feel relaxed. not in a strange environment. (p6) 7 hall et al.: he manu hou published by scholarship@western, 2013 notably, for some participants, their connectedness with the marae pre-dated their university enrolment and encouraged their interest in māori studies, as the following excerpts described: i was a little girl here when they were building the marae. my father was a student here and i was a little girl running around. and i did a little mahi [work] here. i helped with some of the work on the panelling. so yeah i do feel that connection. (p6) i already had a small connection with the marae. it’s the reason i chose to come through māori studies. (p1) in addition to the marae, participants described feeling connected to the māori studies programme, as explained in the following quote: you feel you’re with people who have similar lives, values, experiences. (p6) a source of engagement within the māori studies programme for some participants was the tohu māoritanga (diploma in māori studies), as this participant explained: that first trimester we all met and all moved together, and we had [the coordinator] who is amazing. and he was always there for us, helping us. (p2) the importance of having access to māori cultural enclaves within and around the māori studies programme that affirm māori identity and enable māori cultural expression was also asserted: the environment matters as well. being allowed to be māori, in a māori environment. it matters a lot. (p1) this finding was consistent with previous research results that suggest students who are members of cultural minorities are reluctant to forgo their cultural beliefs to conform to the mainstream university cultural setting (egege & kutieleh, 2004). l e a r n i n g o p p o r t u n i t i e s the third major theme was learning opportunities. many participants described going to university as an opportunity to acquire māori knowledge without the curricula limitations of other programmes noted in earlier research (gallhofer et al., 1999; hunt et al., 2001; jefferies, 1997). tkam and its surrounding cultural enclaves were seen by interviewees as the place to gain māori knowledge. however, a notable distinction for the māori studies students was the diversity of their prior knowledge and experiences. some māori students entered māori studies with very limited prior exposure to māori knowledge and culture, while others entered with a wealth of knowledge and experience on which to draw. this presented additional challenges, which were met through the careful pitching of māori studies courses. many participants noted their limited exposure to māori knowledge at secondary school or in their families: i went to mainstream [schooling] and didn’t start learning ‘til here. mum and dad don’t speak the reo. (p4) 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.7 limited prior exposure to māori knowledge and culture meant that learning in māori studies could be intimidating, as the following quote demonstrates: my brother and sister attended for one semester. then they felt intimidated by the others in their classes… they were worried that people knew more than them. they thought they knew a lot when they first started. but as soon as they started learning stuff, they knew less than what they thought. (p1) another participant described how she was initially intimidated but had eventually developed māori cultural competence through her experiences in māori cultural enclaves at university and developed a strong sense of māori identity over time: in my first year, i remember coming for the pōwhiri [māori ceremonial welcome]. it was my first pōwhiri… i was never brought up with it. we lost our reo, and our ties to our marae. i remember being a little intimidated… i remember thinking wow, a sense of belonging. you kinda get to see all those faces and as the years progress you get to know them… i now feel confident on a marae. i feel at home. i know what goes on, the protocol and why… i’m glad i chose māori studies. i’ve met some great people and i’m now proud to say i’m part māori. it’s been instrumental in who i am today and i’m proud to be both māori and pākehā [new zealander of european descent]. (p8) while previous research has shown that strong māori cultural identity predicts university academic success (bennett, 2003), in the case of māori studies, it appears that the strong māori cultural identity of the students may need time to develop and that the learning opportunities afforded by the program may facilitate that development. for one participant, her extensive prior māori knowledge meant she felt that courses were not pitched at the right level for her: i don’t know if it’s just me, but i think some of them are easy. but that’s cos i’ve been brought up a bit more māori than others. i see things differently than other people. (p9) however, the same participant acknowledged divergence between how she was taught the māori language in the past and how it was taught at university: i wasn’t used to uni reo. that’s why i think i failed. and i don’t know what the different grammatical terms are. i learnt māori when i was young. (p9) many of the learning opportunities described by participants took place outside of formal class settings, in māori cultural enclaves other than tkam. in the following quote, a participant described learning opportunities at the whānau house: just having conversations. that was it really. it wasn’t like we were sitting down and studying together, those particular behaviours. it was just more the kōrero [talk] that you have with your peers because we were all māori so it was just more of a natural sort of thing. (p7) 9 hall et al.: he manu hou published by scholarship@western, 2013 the marae was also noted for providing abundant learning opportunities, as one participant described learning: …just by sitting at the pae [orator’s bench] and listening to discussions and joining in on discussions. (p5) in managing student diversity, participants noted that it was important to respect individuals’ opinions and affirm their mana (esteem). in the following quote, the māori studies programme is described as offering an environment where students’ diverse opinions are respected: here there’s always debate, its open, no one’s wrong everyone’s entitled to their own opinions and everyone walks away with their mana intact. (p8) this finding confirms previous research, which indicated the negative impact of te whiunga kupu (the thrown word, i.e. verbal criticism) on the mana and, in turn, the academic success of māori students (jefferies, 1997). t h e i n f l u e n c e o f l e a r n i n g o p p o r t u n i t i e s o n a s p i r a t i o n s . some participants noted how the learning opportunities with which they had been presented at māori studies contributed to reshaping their aspirations: the seven years i’ve been here or it’s taken me to get this far [to master’s level]…it’s become like some sort of foundation for something else you know. to go on learning... i’m thinking about doing my phd. (p7) another participant described how the learning opportunities in māori studies had enabled her to rekindle aspirations she had formerly held, and that those renewed aspirations enabled her to overcome challenges and persevere in her studies: when i went to high school i tried to join the te reo māori class but i was told i was “white.” so when i came to university i decided to pick up a reo paper for me, and now it’s my major. now māori studies is my major… i failed 111 and 112 over summer, and that set me back a year, but i still pursued it. i remember saying back to myself, “i’m not going to let that 13 year old forget her dream.” (p8) another participant described the pathway leading from engagement, to learning, to new aspirations as follows: i picked it up in 101 [a māori language course] and was hooked, it clicked with me and i felt it was something i wanted to do, especially after finding out about the decline of the language, i just wanted to get involved in the revitalisation. (p4) while involvement in political activities has been found to distract māori students from tertiary studies (jefferies, 1997), the quote above highlights how students’ awareness of māori political issues, such as māori language revitalisation, can also act as a powerful motivator to continue their studies. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.7 s u p p o r t the fourth major theme that was extracted through thematic analysis was support. participants identified a number of challenges that they faced while studying and noted the importance of being able to access support in order to deal with these challenges. similar to what was suggested in the research literature (gallhofer et al., 1999; jefferies, 1997; nikora et al., 2002), challenges identified by participants included finances, dealing with psychological stress, and being away from home and family, as the following quotes outline: when your rent costs the same as the allowance, something’s wrong! (p8) this year i’ve been angry and sad and stressed. it’s more of a personal journey. its just life and everything has affected my studies. (p2) staying away from family. we live twenty metres away from each other, all the whānau on the farm… people think it’s weird but i’m used to being around everyone. we’re like a village. we’re like a pā [traditional māori communal living]. (p9) participants also noted the challenges faced by students who lacked academic skills. in the following quotes, participants explained how even though students may have knowledge of the māori course content, they may lack an understanding of how to approach university study, be unaware of university processes, and may not be used to working independently: i was used to the reo. just not the work. (p9) i still didn’t know much about the process of dropping courses, adding courses, all that sort of stuff. so i mean, that affected me… it wasn’t ‘til third year that i sort of had a better idea of how things worked. (p3) …you’re pretty much told, “you’re an adult. go off and do it.” they don’t know how to go off and do it. they’re told how to do it, but some of them need more encouragement. (p1) faced with these challenges, participants highlighted the importance of having a thorough understanding of the available support services: initially when i started, i was lost. i didn’t have any support… i didn’t know where to go to seek advice. (p3) in order to receive support, participants explained that students also needed to be comfortable accessing support services. as found in earlier research literature (jefferies, 1997), the following two quotes demonstrate how māori students can be reluctant to ask for help from student services: it was like a very last resort for me. it’s a pride thing. (p4) i found a lot of students at that time were very whakamā, very shy in coming forward and putting their hand up and saying, “hey, i need help.” they’d rather just fail. you know the 11 hall et al.: he manu hou published by scholarship@western, 2013 number of people i saw walk away from university…just because they didn’t ask the right question of the right person. (p3) in line with previous research (gallhofer et al., 1999; hunt et al., 2001; jefferies, 1997; nikora et al., 2002; t. smith, 2012; tumen et al., 2008), participants agreed that a significant source of support during their studies was their peers. many described establishing study groups with their peers. for example: the older students were really good at living their experiences so you could learn through them… we had regular meeting times and it was all for a common cause. (p3) as was also outlined by jefferies (1997), the potential negative implications of group study were also noted. in the following excerpt, a participant noted that group study could at times be disruptive, as she compares the voices of those attempting quiet study with the voices of those wishing to socialise as though they were at a “guitar party” (a common form of social gathering involving boisterous singing with guitar accompaniment): but you get too many of them in the one room, and you’ve got your guitar voices, and your study voices and they tend to clash. (p1) despite the potential for distractions, many participants enjoyed taking a collective approach to study. this preference for collectivism resonates with nikora and colleagues’ (2002) suggestion that māori students place importance on creating family-like relationships within the university environment. participants suggested a collective approach to study was a distinguishing feature of their experience of māori studies, compared with other programmes: having experienced both this school [māori studies] and [another programme], i am so glad i’m done with that major. i didn’t enjoy it. their systems are very hands-off… here it’s about being together, helping each other and being more of a whānau. (p8) i found those papers outside te kawa a māui… they were actually just really tough places to be…. the reo papers that i have done and the māori papers in general that i have done have always been much warmer and much more collective and much more, kind of, collectively based. (p10) the positive impact of staff who are accessible and have good relationships with students is well documented (gallhofer et al., 1999; gorinski & abernethy, 2007; hawk et al., 2002; jefferies, 1997; t. smith, 2012). in addition to the peer support noted above, participants noted the assistance received from māori studies staff. for example: after [child’s name] was born, i was doing my last language paper and she ended up being in hospital for a month and māori studies was really accommodating…tutors and lecturers this time around have been very supportive, very approachable. (p3) other participants noted support from other māori cultural enclaves on campus, rather than mainstream student services, as the following quote asserts: 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.7 the support comes from tpa [mentoring program] and the marae, who have always been supportive of me. i haven’t used the rest of the services like health or careers. (p4) t h e i n f l u e n c e o f s u p p o r t o n a s p i r a t i o n s . some participants described how the support they received at university influenced their self-belief and aspirations. the influence of staff expectations on māori students has been described elsewhere (gorinski & abernethy, 2007; hawk et al., 2002; jefferies, 1997; t. smith, 2012). in the following excerpt, a participant described how a māori studies lecturer influenced her self-belief: [lecturer] is amazing, how she taught us and encouraged me to believe in myself. (p5) finally, the following quote outlines how engagement, learning opportunities, and support could lead to academic success: i like learning and exploring ideas, and te kawa a māui is a comfortable place to be. i think it’s crucial, a support network. all the māori support networks have helped me complete and succeed. (p6) d i s c u s s i o n this project enabled the construction of te ara mātauranga as a framework for understanding and encouraging māori student achievement in māori studies. overall, the positive experiences of māori students within māori studies were clear and numerous. many found the various māori cultural enclaves provided them with a secure, comfortable learning environment that offered opportunities to not only learn about māori but to also “be māori.” the te ara mātauranga framework illustrates the influence of māori cultural enclaves within the university throughout each stage of the academic progression of māori students in māori studies and explains the relationships between aspirations, engagement, learning opportunities, and support. many of the findings from this study support previous research into māori and other indigenous student experiences of tertiary education. however, several findings from this study were inconsistent with previous research and may suggest that māori students within māori studies have a unique experience of tertiary education. the interviewees entered into māori studies for reasons far beyond just academic success or better career prospects – they also held deep cultural aspirations and wanted to connect with their personal heritage, become more connected with whānau, give back to iwi, and advance māori political causes such as the revitalisation of the māori language. as some of these aspirations spread into realms outside of academia, they hold the potential to either motivate students to pursue their studies or distract their efforts away from their studies. as well as having diverse aspirations, interviewees described diverse māori cultural backgrounds. their diverse prior educational experiences reportedly created difficulties for māori studies students courses could be too easy or too difficult and cause students to disengage from the material. however, many participants described being more engaged in courses offered in the māori studies programmes than in courses outside of it. participants also reported experiencing connectedness to a number of related māori cultural enclaves throughout the university. it was through these cultural enclaves that participants tended to 13 hall et al.: he manu hou published by scholarship@western, 2013 seek and receive support for their studies, with some participants reporting reluctance to access mainstream student support services. the māori cultural enclaves supported students in a number of ways. for those students with strong māori cultural backgrounds, enclaves provided spaces where they would not have to assimilate to the dominant culture to fit in. for those students with limited prior māori cultural exposure, the cultural enclaves provided opportunities to connect with other māori, develop māori cultural understanding and competencies, and give expression to their māori identities. i m p l i c a t i o n s a n d a p p l i c a t i o n s the results of this study suggest that the experiences of māori students within māori studies differ from those of students outside of māori studies. therefore, strategies to improve māori student outcomes based on research with māori students outside of māori studies may not be appropriate for māori students within māori studies departments. also, somewhat ironically, while it appears that the combination of positive factors influencing the experiences of māori students in māori studies had the effect of retaining students within the tkam academic programme, it did not necessarily ensure that those students were academically successful. thus, new strategies are required in areas that present continuing challenges, such as the diversity of the māori students’ prior knowledge, the need to demonstrate māori cultural knowledge, language proficiency and mainstream academic skills in order to be successful in the māori studies programme, in addition to the negative perceptions around the value of māori studies as a subject of study. the results of this research may be limited due to participant characteristics. while efforts were made to invite māori students who differed in their levels of academic performance and engagement with tkam, it is possible that those students who chose to take part in the study were more engaged and had more positive experiences of tkam than those who did not. it is also possible that participants in this study were influenced to give a favourable account of their experiences at tkam, given that senior students of the school conducted the interviews on school premises. future research could address this issue by contracting independent researchers to conduct the research. this study has focused squarely on the experiences of māori students in māori studies; however, it has international implications for tertiary education institutions and educators involved in recruiting and retaining indigenous students. while the specific strategies and factors identified in this study may not be entirely transferable, the overall finding that the experiences and barriers for māori students in māori studies were often quite discipline-specific raises the possibility that a similar differentiation could exist for indigenous students in other indigenous studies programmes elsewhere in the world. r e c o m m e n d a t i o n s based on the findings of this research a number of recommendations for māori studies departments can be put forward: • design student service packages, tailored to the unique needs of māori studies students (e.g., career advice, health and counselling, and academic support). 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.7 • promote student services through the māori cultural enclaves in which māori studies students are engaged. • structure māori studies courses to accommodate diverse learning needs and/or design specific courses targeted at specific populations within māori studies departments (e.g., students who have been through māori medium primary and secondary education). • promote collective learning opportunities (e.g., māori student study spaces). • structure course content to prepare students to fulfil their cultural, whānau connectedness, and political ambitions. c o n c l u s i o n thirty years after mead (1983) first described māori studies as a fledgling bird, it is still too soon to judge whether māori studies, as an academic field of study, has soared to its academic heights or delved into the great depths of māori knowledge. it is, however, long enough to be able to examine the experiences of its māori students and provide a greater understanding of their challenges and opportunities, and particularly their engagement with the māori cultural enclaves that have developed around māori studies. nevertheless, there is a need for further empirical research, particularly quantitative and comparative, to elaborate on these findings and to determine the extent to which they are transferable, both within new zealand and internationally. in addition, there is also a need for māori studies academics to publish more on curriculum design and pedagogy within māori studies and to engage in “the critical and liberating dialogue which is necessary for us to understand our social reality” (mead, 1983, p. 32). 15 hall et al.: he manu hou published by scholarship@western, 2013 r e f e r e n c e s adds, p., hall, m., higgins, r., & higgins, t. 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(2011). māori studies completion data. unpublished raw data. victoria university of wellington. (2012). victoria university of wellington investment plan 2013 2015. wellington: author. white, h., oxenham, t., tahana, m., williams, k., & matthews, k. (2009). ma te huruhuru, ka rere te manu/how can language and literacy be optimised for māori learner success? wellington: ministry of education. zepke, n., & leach, l. (2005). integration and adaptation: approaches to the student retention and achievement puzzle. active learning in higher education, 6(1), 46 59. 19 hall et al.: he manu hou published by scholarship@western, 2013 the international indigenous policy journal october 2013 he manu hou: the transition of māori students into māori studies meegan hall arama rata peter adds recommended citation he manu hou: the transition of māori students into māori studies abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license he manu hou: the transition of mä†ori students into mä†ori studies guest editors' introduction the international indigenous policy journal volume 3 issue 3 water and indigenous peoples article 2 september 2012 guest editors' introduction daniel shrubsole western university, dashrubs@uwo.ca laura murphy western university, lmurph33@uwo.ca recommended citation shrubsole, d. , murphy, l. (2012). guest editors' introduction. th e international indigenous policy journal, 3(3) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.2 guest editors' introduction abstract we are very pleased to present the international indigenous policy journal’s special edition on water and indigenous peoples. the idea behind the special edition was to address the complications and nuances of the relationship between indigenous peoples and water. while not exhaustive of all the issues regarding indigenous peoples and water, we have been mindful to include in this edition papers that address many of the key indicators of unsafe drinking water on indigenous reserve communities. we feel that this edition successfully interrogates why many reserves are still out of reach of safe drinking water, and we hope that the insights offered open up further dialogue and possibilities for meaningful and useful policy in the future. keywords water, indigenous communities, reserve, legislation, policy, canada creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ we are very pleased to present the international indigenous policy journal’s special edition on water and indigenous peoples. the idea behind the special edition was to address the complications and nuances of the relationship between indigenous peoples and water. while not exhaustive of all the issues regarding indigenous peoples and water, we have been mindful to include in this edition papers that address many of the key indicators of unsafe drinking water on indigenous reserve communities. access to safe drinking water is a basic human need; we know that we need water to survive. as many in canada do not even have to think of, or worry about, accessing safe drinking water, why is it that indigenous communities experience such disproportionate water safety issues? if the majority of canada’s population enjoys safe drinking water, why is it that access to this basic human need is not extended to those on reserve? as well, why is it that canada is not unique in indigenous communities having limited access to safe drinking water? while these questions on the surface seem very simple, the process of addressing them, as this special issue demonstrates, is highly complex. further, while there are common threads of water inequality across many indigenous communities, each has its own unique challenges and barriers to safe drinking water. as well, each community holds their own connection to the nearby waters. to begin to address and scratch away at this seemingly larger than life issue, the papers that we have included in this special edition highlight and work through various themes relevant to the lack of access to safe drinking water by indigenous peoples, both across canada, as well as worldwide. some of the themes within, as well as between, papers that begin to unravel the above questions posed include: how biological factors impact drinking supplies, the role of traditional knowledge in safe drinking water, how governance limits access to water, and how competing legislations impede safe access? looking to policy implications, the commonalities across canada, the united states, australia, timor-leste, and in andean countries are insightful and offer opportunities for interventions. the strength of this edition is that while water issues differ contextually, there is utility in the shared experiences across borders of colonized indigenous peoples. what makes an edition like this so important is that this issue, lack of access to safe sustainable drinking water on reserve, seems to be highly misunderstood by key players who have the capacity and ability to ensure that safe drinking water is available on reserve. it seems like each camp understands their own small piece of the puzzle, but is unable to access a more holistic understanding of the issue. part of the challenge in canada lies in the narrow manner in which the rights of first nations have been interpreted by the courts, and federal and provincial governments. these decisions have been made in the context of the longstanding and ongoing arguments made by first nations in canada that they have had rights to land, water, and other natural resources ‘from time immemorial,’ even in the context of signed treaties. these political and legal problems continue to exist despite the repatriation of the canadian constitution in 1982 and the creation of the canada act, which recognized the existence of aboriginal and treaty rights. in addition to the above, there has been little if any recognition and application of indigenous knowledge in water management plans within first nations communities in canada and very limited consultation has taken place in developing these plans. for instance, the federal government has long been wrestling with bill s-11, a bill created to legislate safe drinking water on reserve. in february of this year, the federal government announced that water standards on reserve needed to be improved, and with bill s-8 (bill s-11’s successor), reserves were now to be under provincial standards and laws but without articulating how the capacity to create the upgrades and capital required by downloading provincial water standards onto reserves. while it is true that many of the conditions surrounding safe drinking water on reserve do need to be improved, the larger picture of how and why communities are currently unable to do so has to be examined. with the abundance of drinking water and sewage treatment available in canada and throughout the world, the 1 shrubsole and murphy: guest editors' published by scholarship@western, 2012 problem of achieving sustainable water management in first nations communities is clearly not a ‘technical problem.’ we feel that this edition successfully interrogates why many reserves are still out of reach of safe drinking water, and we hope that the insights offered open up further dialogue and possibilities for meaningful and useful policy in the future. dan shrubsole laura murphy 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.2 the international indigenous policy journal september 2012 guest editors' introduction daniel shrubsole laura murphy recommended citation guest editors' introduction abstract keywords creative commons license microsoft word 314234-text.native.1350053618.doc supporting successful transitions to post-secondary education for indigenous students: lessons from an institutional ethnography in ontario, canada the international indigenous policy journal volume 4 issue 4 educational pathways of indigenous learners article 4 october 2013 supporting successful transitions to postsecondary education for indigenous students: lessons from an institutional ethnography in ontario, canada jean-paul restoule university of toronto, jeanpaul.restoule@utoronto.ca angela mashford-pringle university of toronto maya chacaby ontario federation of indian friendship centres christine smillie university of toronto candace brunette university of western ontario see next page for additional authors recommended citation restoule, j. , mashford-pringle, a. , chacaby, m. , smillie, c. , brunette, c. , russel, g. (2013). supporting successful transitions to post-secondary education for indigenous students: lessons from an institutional ethnography in ontario, canada. the international indigenous policy journal, 4(4) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.4 supporting successful transitions to post-secondary education for indigenous students: lessons from an institutional ethnography in ontario, canada abstract this study examines some of the ways institutional policies and practices can support or hinder the successful transition to post-secondary education for indigenous people. tracing the path from indigenous high school student to post-secondary education applicant and utilizing knowledge gained from interviews, focus groups, and online surveys as part of an institutional ethnography approach, we offer recommendations for institutions and applicants to help increase enrollment and enhance the success of indigenous post-secondary students. we share implications for institutions and post-secondary education applicants utilizing selfidentification or cultural identity tracking. keywords access, post-secondary education, indigenous, aboriginal, transition acknowledgments we acknowledge the support of the ministry of training, colleges and universities. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. authors jean-paul restoule, angela mashford-pringle, maya chacaby, christine smillie, candace brunette, and gail russel http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ s u p p o r t i n g s u c c e s s f u l t r a n s i t i o n s t o p o s t s e c o n d a r y e d u c a t i o n f o r i n d i g e n o u s s t u d e n t s : l e s s o n s f r o m a n i n s t i t u t i o n a l e t h n o g r a p h y i n o n t a r i o , c a n a d a although there has been an increase in the number of aboriginal students enrolled in and completing post-secondary programs in the last two decades, aboriginal people are still significantly underrepresented at colleges, universities, and other post-secondary institutions in canada. only 39% of those between the ages of 25 and 64 have graduated from some form of post-secondary education. this is far below the aspirations that aboriginal youth and their families have for higher education, and also well below the overall canadian post-secondary attainment level of 54% (canada millennium scholarship foundation, 2005). a survey of first nations people living on-reserve showed that 70% of those between the ages of 16 and 24 hoped to complete some form of post-secondary education, and almost 80% of parents hoped their children would do so (canada millennium scholarship foundation, 2005). formal education is critically important for its ability to provide the kinds of experiences, knowledge, skills, and credentials required for success in contemporary aboriginal communities and canadian society in general (holmes, 2006; malatest, 2004). indeed, the more education individuals have, the more likely they are to be happily employed and experience better health (edgerton, roberts, & von below, 2012; mashford-pringle, 2008). aboriginal students face numerous barriers in accessing post-secondary education, including inadequate financial resources, poor academic preparation, lack of self-confidence and motivation, absence of role models who have post-secondary education experience, lack of understanding of aboriginal culture on campus, and racism on campus (canada millennium scholarship foundation, 2008; holmes, 2006; hudson, 2009; malatest, 2004; rae, 2005; restoule & smillie, 2008; st. denis & hampton, 2002). these factors, coupled with a history of forced assimilation through non-aboriginal educational institutions (miller, 1996; milloy, 1999), ensure a challenging path for aboriginal people wanting to pursue post-secondary education (malatest, 2004). aboriginal students considering post-secondary studies also face the legacy of distrust towards the canadian educational system due to historically ethnocentric practices and residential schools (dickason, 2004; malatest, 2004; office of the auditorgeneral, 2005). in an attempt to better understand the barriers and supports for aboriginal peoples transitioning to post-secondary education, our indigenous-led research team worked with ontario ministry of training colleges and universities funding to ascertain how aboriginal people engage with post-secondary institutions (psi’s). the ultimate goals of this research were to increase enrolment of aboriginal students in post-secondary institutions (psis), increase completion of their chosen programs, and identify strategies to achieve these goals. r e s e a r c h d e s i g n we grounded our work in anishinaabe (ojibwe) methodology, and complemented this approach with institutional ethnography (smith, 2005, 2006; wilson & pence, 2006). our method of inquiry was motivated by elders’ teachings: we must honour our ways of knowing and doing, while also creating bridges and connections with “western” practices (armstrong, 1997; cajete, 1994; simpson, 2000). a first principle of working from an anishinaabe methodology is that the work must represent and serve 1 restoule et al.: supporting successful transitions published by scholarship@western, 2013   the people. we took as a starting principle that this project must change conditions for aboriginal people seeking post-secondary education. early on in the conception of this study, we wanted to turn our attention to how the institutions can change to make the transition to post-secondary education more successful for indigenous students. as such, we sought a method of inquiry where the focus would be on understanding where in the institution revised policy and practice could result in a change for the experiences of aboriginal students and potential applicants. as anishinaabe scholars (of the research team, three hailed from anishinaabe communities, one had mushkegowuk heritage, and one was from a non-aboriginal canadian background), we were attracted to the institutional ethnography approach for its emphasis on narrative and for its ability to engage with ruling relationships in ways that have the potential to make concrete differences in how aboriginal people experience post-secondary education. what institutional ethnography offers anishinaabe methodologies is a way of inquiring into institutional practices that normalize colonialism into “work” and finding where these practices intersect with indigenous people. unlike many other approaches that result in problematizing aboriginal peoples or that blame abstract structures with little or no hope for change, institutional ethnography gets at the “everyday” experiences of organizational practices. in institutional ethnography, it is the institution that is the focus; it is the institution’s story that is being told through its textual practices and processes. in the same ways that our languages are deeply connected to the land and spirituality, institutional ethnography teaches us that institutional language is inherently tied to texts and textual practices. thus, it is the life of the text its multiple readings and appraisals that becomes the focus through the use of narratives. initially, our work on aboriginal people’s access to post-secondary education centered on the experiences of current students and experiences with the application process. we started with an online survey that reached over 250 aboriginal students ontario-wide over several months in 2008. we asked about the level of support they received from their family, schools, and communities. we asked about the importance of emotional, spiritual, physical, and mental supports in their schools from elementary to secondary to post-secondary. we followed up with phone interviews with those students who consented to being called. the purpose of the initial information was to get a sense of where, in the vast sequences of texts and practices in post-secondary institutions, would be a good place to start. we were aware that many aboriginal people did not follow the typical application sequence (high school, application-assessment, post-secondary education entry), which many respondents termed the “regular” way. it was important for us to get a general feeling for issues and trends in aboriginal people’s access to post-secondary education before we focused on specific work-text sequences of action. immediately, we noticed that the majority of aboriginal post-secondary education students who responded were over the age of 25 (79%). more than 60% had accessed post-secondary studies through a bridging program or as mature students. when they were younger, these students were not able to access or chose not to access post-secondary education through the so-called “regular” way. following the path of the mainstream application form helped us to see how systemic barriers to aboriginal access to education become hidden. however, the relatively lower numbers of aboriginal respondents seeking higher education through this route suggested a need to look at youth who were not applying in this way. following the "text" of the application form submitted to the ontario universities application centre (ouac) illuminated the barriers to aboriginal youth applying through this route. the ouac is a notfor-profit, centralized application service for applicants to ontario universities. following the 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.4   experiences of youth who do not apply at all or who have not applied demonstrated just how early the barriers to access begin. t h e “ r e g u l a r ” w a y i n our survey asked respondents to indicate whether they had entered post-secondary education through a special access program. some survey respondents said they got in “the regular way.” in ontario, the “regular” way to university studies is a general application to undergraduate studies that is processed by a central bureau serving the province’s universities. “these services were developed to facilitate the process of applying to the ontario universities. they reduce duplication in application processing, and save time and resources for applicants and the universities” (ontario univerities’ application centre, n.d., para. 1). there are two forms, 101 and 105. form 101 is for current secondary school students and form 105 is for all other applicants. we were advised by the ouac that most aboriginal students apply using form 105 so we focused our attention to the work done in filling out that form. form 105 includes a question asking aboriginal people to self-identify as such. the question was developed with aboriginal student support services in mind – to reach applicants and provide them with information about programs and services. significantly, one of the pieces of information aboriginal services at university of toronto wants to provide is financial assistance options and scholarships. given that inadequate funding for aboriginal students is a key theme in the literature on aboriginal access to post-secondary education (canadian millennium scholarship foundation, 2004), having access to information about funding would be an important support for incoming students (restoule & smillie, 2008). in our survey, less than half of the first nations student respondents reported receiving band funding for their post-secondary education. other avenues of support are clearly needed. however, the question on form 105 causes confusion and depending on how it is interpreted, can hinder rather than help aboriginal student access. more than a dozen aboriginal people were informally asked to read the form and discuss with our research team how they would respond to the question about self-identification. several of the consultants said they would identify as aboriginal while close to half said they would choose not to identify as aboriginal. when probed, the consultants choosing not to identify talked about their distrust of government, their concerns about being assessed on their individual merit instead of their cultural heritage, and a need for privacy. a couple of the respondents who would declare their aboriginal identity said that they would do so because it might give them an advantage. there was clearly a sense among our small group of aboriginal people that the form had some bearing on their academic admissibility. staff at ouac, however, say that they do not use this information for that purpose at all. indeed, they do not even look at it. staff shared with the research team how the documents are processed. the ouac acts solely as a coordinating body, collecting the applications and sending them out to the respective institutions. no decisions are made at ouac about academic matters. the one and only barrier to the forwarding of the applications is non-payment of fees to the ouac. when admissions bodies were asked how they read these forms, particularly the question on aboriginal identity, the answer was universally that they forwarded copies of the files to aboriginal student services when students self-declared. the answers had no bearing on decisions of admissibility. aboriginal students hoping to get in on a quota system could not do so via form 105. aboriginal students who did 3 restoule et al.: supporting successful transitions published by scholarship@western, 2013   not tick the box out of fear of being reviewed unfavourably due to prejudice were in fact doing themselves a disservice. their files would not be forwarded to aboriginal student services, meaning that they would not receive information about the supports available to them as aboriginal students in the way that students who did self-declare would. furthermore, by not ticking the box, they essentially provide the university with an inaccurate, namely undercounted, number of aboriginal students in attendance. this could have implications for the amount of program funding provided to student services to assist aboriginal students on campus. not only is the validity of the count possibly inaccurate because a segment of the population of aboriginal students holds suspicions regarding identity reporting, but the perceived benefit is likely affecting the way international students complete similar forms. at least one aboriginal student support officer reported that the list they received from their institution of students reporting aboriginal heritage included numerous names of individuals who misinterpreted the question and whose aboriginality is traced to regions outside of canada. they may indeed identify as an indigenous person in the lands they call home but the institution is seeking to identify those who are indigenous to lands settled by canada. to avoid this misinterpretation and increase the validity of the information gathered, institutions are advised to clarify whom they mean by “aboriginal people” and why they are collecting this information in the first place: how is the information to be used and who will use it. while this information may already be communicated in fine print, it could be made clearer to applicants so that the information gathered is better serving its purpose. clarity about the uses of the information provided on this part of the form could go a long way to reducing inaccurate declarations of aboriginal identity. it could also allay misperceptions and fears among the intended aboriginal applicant groups that the question is somehow related to malicious research practices or prejudicial academic assessments. the form itself could include a statement about how the information will be used, including clarity that academic admissions decisions do not take into account whether individuals declare they are aboriginal on this form. it is important to note that there are programs seeking aboriginal applicants, but they obtain this information by other means, such as in a statement of intent or as part of the application process specific to the program. these programs usually clearly specify that they are seeking aboriginal applicants to fill spots exclusively reserved for them and often have dedicated recruitment strategies indicating that this is the case. this may be why some students believe that self-declaring on ouac’s form 105 will be used to make decisions on admissions. there are several implications for the policy around self-declaration. one of these is aimed at the institutions gathering data on the number of aboriginal people they serve or requesting declarations on the part of the applicant. if they want reliable and valid data, it is imperative that the motivation for requesting this information is transparent and explicit on the form itself and clearly communicated to potential applicants. there may be some lingering distrust among applicants. another implication is for the applicant. applicants need to be better informed about how self-reporting is used. how can they be reached? for applicants who may be seeking post-secondary education assistance from their band education counselor, the counselors might be the most appropriate part of the chain for raising awareness. when they provide or collect the applications, they can offer advice to their band members about the uses of self-declaration in the application process. in urban settings with status-blind education counsellors or in friendship centres or similar bodies, this information could be provided by the relevant staff to the clients they serve. this step is important because even if the institutions improve the way they communicate their intentions in collecting such data, the aboriginal applicants may continue to carry skepticism and mistrust of academic institutions, even of ones to which they are 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.4   applying. in our surveys, about 57% reported that they “do not trust the education system,” and these were current or graduated post-secondary education students! imagine the lack of faith held by those without any experience in post-secondary education. from all accounts, it seemed that there were a series of interactions that occurred between postsecondary institutions and aboriginal youth that had an impact on access to post-secondary education long before the applications process. the applications collected by institutions for admissions generally centred around the transcript, which is a record that tells of a student’s achievement in the past, but is often uncontextualised. transcripts serve as a form of currency, where identities are circulated in the form of grades that presumably communicate a student’s worth in academia. when the transcript is taken as reality, the result is fewer aboriginal students are admitted. as one university assistant registrar said in an interview: we are being fair because we don’t look at whether someone is aboriginal or not, we look only at the transcript. if you meet the target and have the prerequisites, you are admitted. this process in reality can be unwittingly unfair. as one member of our research team, having spent several weeks in northern ontario as a former university recruiter, noted there were some districts where the high school could not offer courses that were prerequisites for entry into some university programs. as a result, some students graduating from these regions could not directly enter their chosen university programs because they lacked the prerequisites. in our survey, 72% of the respondents did not feel that their high school had adequate resources to help prepare them for post-secondary school. digging for this kind of context about educational transitions yielded insight into why so many of our survey respondents accessed their programs as mature students. our survey also elicited numerous other potential barriers to successful transitions experienced during the high school years. a little less than a third of respondents reported that their high school staff did not expect them to do well in high school and 29% felt that their high school staff did not expect them to do well in post-secondary education. while 1 in 3 aboriginal students did not feel supported by their high schools, their families were an important source of support. only 7% of respondents reported that their families expected them to do poorly in high school, while 53% said their families had expectations of success in high school. this support during high school translated into a majority of respondents (79%) reporting their families encouraged post-secondary attendance and had expectations of success. according to our data, one of the best predictors of success was knowing other aboriginal people who have gone to post-secondary education or completed degrees. of the respondents, 60% reported they had a role model with post-secondary experience and 90% knew five or more aboriginal people who have post-secondary education experience (respondents may have been counting fellow students when answering this question) and 84% knew five or more aboriginal people who had completed their program. respondents were most likely to have a cousin who attended (90%) or a sister (50%). still, the majority (63%) were the first generation in their family to go to university or college. moving away from a supportive community was reported as a struggle with just over 50% saying they had difficulty managing community ties and responsibilities. this is significant to post-secondary transitions because most respondents said family and community responsibilities take precedence over schooling (> 70%). in the early period of starting a university program, 80% of respondents experienced 5 restoule et al.: supporting successful transitions published by scholarship@western, 2013   stress starting the new program, often because of the physical relocation; 71% reported difficulty moving away from family or community members. the good news is that most reported that their university provided support in ways that their high schools did not. while 90% of respondents reported experiencing racism in their school experiences, approximately two-thirds of respondents reported feeling welcome at their campus and 63% had guidance and support from their college or university counseling or advice services. furthermore, the supports available in university were often remarked upon in the narrative open-ended questions on the survey. in response to the question, "have you been assessed for, or feel you have a learning disability?", respondents shared numerous stories about accessibility accommodations they received in post-secondary education for learning disabilities that were ignored, dismissed, or undiagnosed while in high school. one respondent noted having supports in elementary school that were discontinued while in high school due to cost, but were recommended again in university after an assessment by accessibility services. p o s t s e c o n d a r y i n s t i t u t i o n s a n d a b o r i g i n a l y o u t h in phase two of our study, we shifted our focus to looking at how post-secondary education is experienced prior to entry to gain ideas about the ways in which aboriginal people were viewed within the applications process and the kinds of organizational practices that alternately supported or posed barriers prior to and during the applications process. approximately 75 aboriginal youth from across ontario were asked to talk about what they thought of post-secondary education. we held focus groups or sharing circles with students from thunder bay and scarborough, ontario. most of the youth attended high school programs and ranged from grades 9 to 12 (although some did not currently attend high school); some were in special programs geared toward at-risk aboriginal youth. the youth were invited to participate as consultants rather than “subjects of study” and were compensated accordingly. the youth were also given a citation for the study and a description of how they could add this consultation to their résumé’s or post-secondary education applications. since this study was focused on textual processes and representations, it was important to highlight the ways that their “work” on this project could be used textually to their advantage. many of the youth agreed that this incentive was worth more than the monetary compensation. y o u t h r e c o m m e n d a t i o n s f o r p o s t s e c o n d a r y e d u c a t i o n p r a c t i c e s , p r o c e s s e s a n d r e p r e s e n t a t i o n s first, the youths’ stories suggested that the information provided by universities is vague and did not represent their needs they could not see themselves in these representations. the following points were suggested by the youth themselves as ways to address this issue: • provide more information about “everyday issues” that relate to aboriginal youth: funding (band funding, scholarships, ontario student assistant program), housing (single parent, on and off campus), food banks, childcare, and part-time jobs or job training opportunities. • have posters of successful post-secondary education graduates from their communities (e.g., show a doctor from eabametong first nations). 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.4   • provide detailed information about what cultural supports, housing, academic help, etc. there are in post-secondary institutions. are there elders with whom to talk? are there cultural events, tutors, and community centres? • have information about supports presented in packages with details and pictures (of aboriginal youth). • have more speakers (that are aboriginal youth) who can talk about more than just how important it is to go into post-secondary education. • have post-secondary education information made specifically for aboriginal youth that includes a “what to expect” section, which takes applicants step-by-step through the first year process. this would include information about preparing to apply to post-secondary education. • have all the information circulating earlier in secondary school (i.e., grade 9). • have time, starting in grade 9, devoted to discussing post-secondary education. altogether, aboriginal youth spoke about having little agency over the ways that the “work” they have done in high school is taken up by post-secondary education textual practices. they have no say about what kind of information post-secondary institutions provide and, with the exception of a few outstanding aboriginal support staff in the high schools, they have very little support interacting with and navigating through these texts. all of the youth narratives honed in on the desire for more access and control over post-secondary education textual representations and processes and the need for colleges and universities to develop long-term relationships in and with aboriginal communities. as one youth said, [t]hey [universities] only speak to us in our last year when they want us to apply and they say you need to go and this is not helpful. another youth said, [i]f they really wanted us, they would come to our powwows, our community events, not just court us a day and leave. the youths’ perceptions of universities become their reality of university, just as the records read in bureaucracies become the reality they are meant to represent. as hubner (2000) observed, writers such as foucault have shown that communications do not just passively document an objective world, they construct and shape it and thus they help shape what later archivists and researchers can know about the pastthis construction is done in many ways. among the most important are the choices records creators make when they decide what to record, how to record it, how it is filed, and what to transmit to superiors. as these records are used in dally operations and they accumulate in massive filing (and later archival) systems, these records act as 7 restoule et al.: supporting successful transitions published by scholarship@western, 2013   surrogates for reality, which means they become reality, or what is taken to be real about the world. (p. 30) this process worked in both directions: in how the university read applicants via their transcripts and in how the youth rejecting university as an option took the institutions’ recruitment literature as reality. as a way of honouring the youth circles, a member of our research team took the above recommendations from youth about their recruitment materials to a university assistant registrar. the registrar worked at a college that had just recently developed multiple recruitment videos that were being posted on youtube and links were sent to various feeder schools. when we viewed the videos we didn’t see any examples of aboriginal students or elders in the footage. when asked why this population was not visible, the registrar replied that the college had chosen to represent its current student population and there were few aboriginal students whom they knew about or could invite to participate. one can see how continuing to recruit in the same way is not likely to change the make-up of the attending population. the pamphlets and videos university recruiters used in high schools became the reality of the institutions for the youth, who were often critical of the lack of indigenous community seen in these texts. yet, the representation of the reality of university presented in the recruitment materials— one that is absent of aboriginal participation—may actually be contributing to the ongoing reality of underrepresentation in these college spaces. one of the youth consultants said to us that he knew he would be rejected if he applied so he was going to reject the institution first by not applying. how could he know he would be rejected? c o n c l u s i o n s much work remains to be done to support successful transitions for aboriginal students accessing postsecondary education in ontario. aboriginal students across canada aspire to more education (hudson, 2009) but are suspicious of education as an institution. the transition issues begin much earlier than the point of access. establishing relationships with aboriginal students in high school or earlier is clearly important as is developing these relationships in the context of community, not just to the individual. many students did not feel supported in high school or that they belonged in post-secondary institutions. one of the key issues identified by aboriginal youth is communication on the part of the institution that more readily speaks to their target population. while these findings are based on research conducted in ontario, canada, there certainly are implications for other regions of canada and internationally. wherever self-identification data on indigenous populations is collected, clear and transparent language explaining self-declaration strategies is vital to enable students to access important cultural supports and financial opportunities targeting this population. the flow of counsel on self-identification should come not just from government and education institutions but from indigenous support organizations and counsellors who are in a role to advise clients, band members, and indigenous applicants of the meaning and benefits of selfidentification questions and data collecting. finally, aboriginal students for the most part did find their campuses welcoming of their identities and found supports for disabilities. building on these successes will undeniably assist in supporting successful transitions for aboriginal students accessing postsecondary education. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.4   r e f e r e n c e s armstrong, j. (1997). sharing one skin: okanagan community. in j. mander & e. goldsmith (eds.), the case against the global economy: and for a turn toward the local (pp. 460 470). san francisco: sierra club. cajete, g. (1994). look to the mountain: an ecology of indigenous education. asheville, nc: kivaki press. canada millennium scholarship foundation. (2005). changing course: improving aboriginal access to post-secondary education in canada (millennium research note #2). montreal, qc: author. canada millennium scholarship foundation. (2008). ten things you need to know…about financial support for post-secondary students in canada (millennium research note #7). montreal, qc: author. castellano, m. b. (2004). ethics of aboriginal research. journal of aboriginal health, 1(1), 98 114. dickason, o. p. (2004). canada’s first nations: a history of the founding peoples from earliest times. toronto: oxford university press. edgerton, j. d., roberts, l. w., & von below, s. (2012). education and quality of life. in k. c. land, a. c. michalos, & m. joseph sirgy (eds.), handbook of social indicators and quality of life research, (pp. 265 296). dordrecht, netherlands: springer publishers. holmes, d. (2006). redressing the balance: canadian university programs in support of aboriginal students. ottawa, on: association of universities and colleges of canada. hubner, b. (2000). an administered people: a contextual approach to the study of bureaucracy, records-keeping and records in the canadian department of indian affairs, 1755-1950 (unpublished master’s thesis). university of manitoba, winnipeg. hudson, n. (2009). contextualizing outcomes of public schooling: disparate post-secondary aspirations among aboriginal and non-aboriginal secondary students (unpublished master’s thesis). retrieved from https://tspace.library.utoronto.ca/bitstream/1807/18119/5/hudson_natasha_200911_ma_t hesis.pdf malatest, r. a., (2004). aboriginal peoples and post-secondary education: what educators have learned. montreal, qc: canada millennium scholarship foundation. mashford-pringle, a. (2008). the impacts of health and education for children and families enrolled in aboriginal head start urban and northern communities in ontario (unpublished master’s thesis). university of toronto: toronto. 9 restoule et al.: supporting successful transitions published by scholarship@western, 2013   miller, j. r. (1996). shingwauk’s vision: a history of native residential schools. toronto: university of toronto press. milloy, j. (1999). a national crime: canadian government and the residential school system, 1879 1986. winnipeg: university of manitoba press. office of the auditor general (2005). report to the house of commons – education program and post-secondary student support. retrieved from http://www.oagbvg.gc.ca/domino/media.nsf/html/20041105pr_e.html ontario universities’ application centre. about ouac. retrieved from www.ouac.on.ca/about/ rae, b. (2005). ontario: a leader in learning. toronto: the queen’s printer. restoule, j. p., & smillie, c. (2008). aboriginal access to post-secondary education in ontario (unpublished literature review). simpson, l. (2000). anishinaabe ways of knowing. in j. oakes, r. riewe, s. koolage, l. simpson, n. shuster (eds.), aboriginal health, identity and resources. (pp. 165 185). winnipeg: university of manitoba press. smith, d. e. (2005). institutional ethnography: a sociology for people. toronto: altamira press. smith, d. e. (2006). institutional ethnography as practice. lanham, md: rowman and littlefield. st. denis, v., & hampton, e. (2002). literature review on racism and the effects on aboriginal education (report prepared for minister’s national working group on education). ottawa: indian and northern affairs canada. wilson, a., & pence, e. (2006). u.s. legal interventions in the lives of battered women: an indigenous assessment. in d. e. smith (ed), institutional ethnography as practice (pp. 199-226). lanham, md: rowman and littlefield. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.4 the international indigenous policy journal october 2013 supporting successful transitions to post-secondary education for indigenous students: lessons from an institutional ethnography in ontario, canada jean-paul restoule angela mashford-pringle maya chacaby christine smillie candace brunette see next page for additional authors recommended citation supporting successful transitions to post-secondary education for indigenous students: lessons from an institutional ethnography in ontario, canada abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license authors supporting successful transitions to post-secondary education for indigenous students: lessons from an institutional ethnography in ontario, canada preventing obesity in canadaâ•žs aboriginal children: not just a matter of eating right and getting active the international indigenous policy journal volume 2 issue 1 health and well-being article 2 may 2011 preventing obesity in canada’s aboriginal children: not just a matter of eating right and getting active melanie a. ferris huntinghawk communications, melanie@huntinghawkcommunications.com recommended citation ferris, m. a. (2011). preventing obesity in canada’s aboriginal children: not just a matter of eating right and getting active. the international indigenous policy journal, 2(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.2 this policy is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. preventing obesity in canada’s aboriginal children: not just a matter of eating right and getting active abstract obesity is a growing issue for all children. many experts say that preventing obesity is largely a matter of eating the right foods and getting enough physical activity. this advice doesn’t recognize the fact that first nations, inuit, and métis children face unique barriers to growing up healthy and strong simply because of their identity. this paper discusses how the social determinants of health impact the ability of aboriginal children to grow up free of obesity. the paper highlights results from a community-based research project conducted amongst aboriginal parents and service providers in ontario who wish to prevent obesity amongst their own young children and clients. research was carried out over two years to help develop a “toolkit” and training program to help service provides increase efforts to prevent obesity amongst first nations, inuit, and métis children from the ages of 2 to 6 in ontario. keywords childhood obesity; prevention; aboriginal children; first nations; inuit; métis; wholistic; nutrition; physical activity; medicine wheel; education; control; residential schools; aboriginal research acknowledgments the author acknowledges the first nations, inuit, and metis key informants and advisors who helped to make the "let's be healthy together" toolkit and training program a reality. she says chi miigwetch to her strong ancestors who survived residential school and the foster care system. she also acknowledgers her son bright star, her biggest teacher in helping her understand how to promote ways of raising healthy indigenous children. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ i went in there and looked at prices, a bag of apples, fresh apples and they were like the size of marbles was $7. three bags of milk was $12 and like a brick of cheese that we would pay $7.99 for, you know the large... we would pay $7.99 for it here, it would be on sale maybe $4.99, but they pay $14.29 for that. when you look at access to food it is deplorable. you look at the salary levels of the indigenous people, they are the same as in the south yet their cost of living is not the same. ~traditional mohawk teacher diane longboat speaking about her trip to moosonee in northern ontario (best start, 2010d, p. 27) across canada and in many western nations, childhood obesity is on the rise. this is a growing concern across all populations but poses a particular threat to indigenous peoples who already suffer poor health outcomes. first nations children in canada are increasingly developing type 2 diabetes at a young age, and this is linked to their bodyweight (i.e., rate of overweight and obese) (ho l. et al, 2008). imagine yourself as an aboriginal parent trying to find information on how to help your children be healthy. you might call a toll-free number to talk to a dietician or a registered nurse, or perhaps you would order the free little booklet often referred to as “canada’s food guide.” if you speak and understand the dominant languages of english or french, then the key messages you’ll hear begin to sound like a broken record: feed your children the right foods and make sure your child gets enough daily activity. although these messages surely intend to make a positive difference in children’s lives, the truth is that they do not recognize the barriers that aboriginal parents face in simply getting food for their children—many first nations reserves do not even have a grocery store or a food bank. also these messages do not recognize that physical activity for children on a reserve is often dependent on a host of issues, for example, wild dogs running around the back yard or the affordability of appropriate gear such as a snow suit or helmet. this work explores how the social determinants of health impact the ability of aboriginal children to grow up free of obesity. the paper is largely based upon the results from a community-based research project conducted amongst aboriginal parents and service providers in ontario, aiming to prevent obesity amongst their children and clients respectively. the research was carried out over two years to inform the development of a “toolkit” and training program to help service provides increase and improve efforts to prevent obesity amongst first nations, inuit, and métis children from the ages of 2 to 6 in ontario. obesity among first nations, inuit, and métis children in canada first nations, inuit, and métis in canada are spread far and wide across the country. more and more of us are moving to urban environments to access education and health services, but many of us also still live in our traditional territories—often remote, hard-to-access locations with little or poor access to health care services. with growing media coverage, there’s no doubt that most canadians are concerned about rates of obesity across the country. the potential financial impact of obesity and related chronic conditions among aboriginals is a major policy issue, with rates rising among younger cohorts. aboriginal people in canada have both the youngest population and the fastest growing birth rate in canada. health services are often a treaty right for many aboriginal people, yet in remote locations these services can be difficult to coordinate and very expensive. “if aboriginal children continue to be affected by obesity and its complications, we are going to see a major financial burden on 1 ferris: preventing obesity in canada’s aboriginal children published by scholarship@western, 2011 canada’s health care system” (ferris, 2010). this major burden will be the result of the federal government being obliged to pay for the transportation and out-of-home health care for status indians and registered inuit who will need health services to deal with their obesity-related health issues. addressing obesity from an aboriginal perspective recognizing the looming crisis, the ontario trillium foundation provided two years of funding to a non-profit organization in ontario called health nexus, to develop health promotion resources. health nexus works in the area of maternal-child health and developed several resources in partnership with first nations people on topics such as early childhood development and environmental health. health nexus received funding to develop a toolkit and training session(s) on preventing childhood obesity from an aboriginal perspective. first nations, inuit, and métis people in ontario worked with health nexus to develop let’s be healthy together: preventing childhood obesity in ontario’s aboriginal communities. this set of health promotion resources and training sessions is now available for free at www.letsbehealthy.ca. the resources include a set of four books, posters, mp3s, videos, handouts, and powerpoints. these resources aim to empower service providers to work in culturally appropriate ways with aboriginal parents and communities. the goal is to help prevent childhood obesity in aboriginal children in ontario. as mentioned earlier, many key messages in health promotion materials might include tips on eating the right foods and being active. these tips do not seem to consider the multitude of social determinants that impact that the health of indigenous peoples. health canada recognizes these determinants: “income and social status; social support network; education; employment/working conditions; social environments; physical environments; personal health practices and coping skills; healthy child development; biology and genetic endowment; health services; gender; and culture” (naho, 2001, p. 12). the national aboriginal health organization considers other determinants as well: “colonization, globalization, migration, cultural continuity, territory, access, poverty, and selfdetermination” (naho, 2001, p. 13). what is an aboriginal perspective? aboriginal people in canada include first nations, inuit, and métis. these are three distinct groups of people. ontario is thought to have a quarter of a million (about 240,000) aboriginal people (best start, 2010d), but those numbers are likely lower than the actual population since many aboriginal people would not identify for a variety of reasons, including lack of knowledge about their identity, homelessness during the census, internalized racism, etc. although first nations, inuit, and métis are three distinct populations, we are often lumped together because we do share one commonality—we are the first peoples of canada and we have been systematically oppressed simply because of our identity. developing health resources that address all aboriginal people is no easy task; in fact, some aboriginal people might even say that it is disrespectful to attempt to do so. in developing the let’s be healthy together toolkit and training session, a first nations writer and researcher worked full-time to recruit and coordinate a body of twelve aboriginal advisors who were equipped to give advice and direction on the best ways of developing these types of resources. advisors were recruited through a wide variety of methods. a simple two-page application form was developed and put online and distributed via a press release to major media outlets, friendship centres, a mass-distributed email to a variety of aboriginal people working in health, and social media sites such as facebook. the aboriginal 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.2 http://www.letsbehealthy.ca/� peoples’ television network (aptn) did a feature on both the project and recruitment of the advisory on one edition of its 6 o’clock news. aboriginal people in ontario were invited to apply and explain their interest in becoming advisors. there were a variety of criteria to follow in establishing an advisory team that would be able to represent the diverse needs and interests of aboriginal people across ontario; indeed, the advisory team would need to include representation from all three identity groups (first nations, inuit, and métis), major political-territorial organizations, various geographic regions, elders and youth, and aboriginal professionals with expertise in areas of childhood development, nutrition, physical activity, and indigenous approaches to health. in the end it was difficult to fulfill all criteria. for example, finding inuit in ontario able to take part on an advisory team was difficult since there is a small inuit population in the province. some experts, including a paediatrician who works with aboriginal children in northern ontario, initially joined the advisory team and took part in the first meeting; however, they eventually had to leave the advisory team due to high workload. as mohawk elder sakoieta’ widrick (2011) states, “anyone that’s involved in any type of this work, there’s a lot of this work for us to do.” once the advisory was established, the members came together for an all-day meeting in toronto. all travel costs were covered but the work was being done on a volunteer basis. during the first meeting, a framework for the development of both the research and the format of the toolkit was developed. the main piece of advice that aboriginal advisors provided was to develop all materials and training from a strength-based perspective—after all, aboriginal people are a positive and resilient group of people. this is why the toolkit is called let’s be healthy together instead of something negative that focuses on the problem rather than the solution. doing research that respects and honours indigenous peoples advisors were mainly service providers and parents. their names and locations are listed in the book called prevent childhood obesity in your aboriginal community: a guide for service providers. after their first in-person meeting in toronto, they regularly received email updates and took part in teleconference meetings every few months. they helped to develop the research questions for the qualitative interviews for the project. each advisor reviewed and provided input to all resources before they were published. advisors worked to identify a list of 16 “key informants” for the project, that is, people who could answer questions and give informed ideas about how aboriginal people can raise healthy children. all of the key informants were aboriginal, and most were parents or grandparents with a background or keen interest in health. all names of key informants are also listed in the prevent childhood obesity book. key informants identified as first nation (8), inuit (2), and métis (6). all key informants and advisors received small honorariums of money for taking part in the project. the research was conducted using culturally appropriate aboriginal methods. this included offering a gift of sacred tobacco to those who did the interviews in person. everyone involved in the research had the opportunity to review transcripts of their interviews, which they had to approve before their information was published. key informants received final copies of their transcripts to keep for future reference. some advisors and key informants also volunteered to “model” for photographs produced for the toolkit. both the advisors and key informants noted that it is important to include photos of aboriginal people in health promotion resources. in fact, many people involved in producing the toolkit noted that it upsets them that many aboriginal health resources often use photos of non-aboriginal people. the toolkit attempted to capture a wide variety of aboriginal people, including mixed-race aboriginal people who do not fit the stereotypical look of an aboriginal person. in keeping with these 3 ferris: preventing obesity in canada’s aboriginal children published by scholarship@western, 2011 ideas, the final products for the toolkit were produced by several indigenous graphic designers/illustrators based in canada. using the medicine wheel advisors and key informants all agreed that most indigenous people see health in a “wholistic” sense. this means that we think about health as more than just the absence of disease. we think about balance, and we consider how the wide range of determinants affects our health in contemporary times. using a medicine wheel helps us consider how we treat our mind, body, emotions, and spirit. key discussions amongst advisors and key informants touched on issues such as colonization, displacement from traditional territories, and the inter-generational effects of the residential school system. many advisors and key informants suggested that we use the medicine wheel as a teaching and guiding tool when developing our training sessions and resources. as ojibwe social work student michael auksi explained in an interview about how to promote healthy living to aboriginal children: use a medicine wheel framework and explain it using the four aspects of self from the perspective of a child. for example, you would have the spirit in the east and show the child that when they smudge and go to ceremonies that they’re taking care of their spirit. for the emotional aspect teach them to be mindful of their feelings and the feelings of others. for the physical aspect you can teach them the importance of eating well and staying active, and for the mind teach them the importance of going to school and doing their homework. (best start, 2010d, p. 17) while funding was initially meant to address obesity prevention amongst aboriginal children ages 2 to 6, “we decided to take a wholistic approach, developing tools to help encourage entire families and communities to change their lives and become healthier” (ferris, 2010). preventing obesity using traditional teachings everyone working on the project agreed that in addressing childhood obesity, we would need to highlight the fact that obesity prevention begins before a child is born. most researchers argue that prevention needs to start with parents, even before conception. women who are overweight and smoke are more likely to deliver babies who might eventually become overweight or obese (vanvrancken-tompkins c.l., sothern m.s., 2006). this section of this paper outlines some ways that the toolkit promotes traditional teachings. breastfeeding is the traditional way of feeding our babies much of the research on preventing childhood obesity shows that health care providers should promote exclusive breastfeeding and delay the introduction of solid foods to babies (ventura, a.k., savage, j.s., may, a.l., birch, l.l., 2005 and chaput, j.p., tremblay, a., 2006). although evidence-based research supports the approach of exclusive breastfeeding, this is something that aboriginal women have always done for their babies without “scientific knowledge”. indeed, researchers and health promoters believe it is likely that aboriginal women would respond positively to breastfeeding children given its long tradition in their culture. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.2 in an article about a mohawk community and its breastfeeding program, a nurse writes, “the grandmother of the baby plays an important role in child rearing… the close relationships that exist between mother and daughter have had a significant impact on the choice of infant nutrition, and the success or failure of breastfeeding” (banks j.w., 2003, p. 342). recognizing the importance of traditional teachings and close-knit family units within aboriginal communities, the team working to develop the let’s be healthy together project wanted it to be “one of the first holistic toolkit and training initiatives that aims to use culture as one way to help children be healthy” (ferris, 2010, p. 2). starting to reclaim and promote traditional knowledge while the project incorporates evidence-based research and statistics focusing on aboriginal children in ontario, it also supports the lived experience that aboriginal people have gathered through the acts of raising their own children, taking part in spiritual healing ceremonies, and having teachings passed down through generations. teachings from various nations as well as inuit and métis people are included throughout the toolkit. the toolkit is somewhat limited in terms of its reach because teachings were gathered from elders and other traditional people solely in ontario. while many of the teachings can apply to indigenous people around the globe, canada is still falling short when it comes to promoting healthy living for aboriginal children—there are still no concrete statistics on rates of obesity for aboriginal children across ontario. for example, we were only able to find rates of obesity and overweight for first nations children but nothing for métis or inuit in ontario. this reflects the idea expressed by the public health agency of canada (2008) that “better quality information on first nations, inuit and métis and other vulnerable subpopulations is necessary in order to identify and target disparities.” another example of a lack of good information is being able to find a good resource about raising healthy children. as an aboriginal parent, one might go to a library or book store searching for a good source that would provide all the information needed to raise a healthy child, covering topics such as nutrition, physical activity, stages of development, and safety tips. to date, there are no such books that cover these topics and include teachings and lessons from a first nations, inuit, and/or métis perspective. since “promoting native or inuit pride is an essential part of preventing obesity in aboriginal children” (best start, 2010d), it is essential that these populations are able to access culturally appropriate information developed for and by them. aboriginal people need aboriginal solutions “our people have the answers,” says mohawk teacher diane longboat (best start, 2010a). this statement reflects the common sentiment amongst many indigenous people, that is, the idea that indigenous people have always been healthy and have known how to keep themselves healthy. hence, programs need to include and promote traditional knowledge that has helped us survive in our respective territories from time immemorial. it is interesting to note that at the beginning of the research project, a survey was administered via email and survey monkey in which health nexus asked service providers about the most important aspect of receiving training on preventing childhood obesity. the majority of respondents noted that training needed to be provided and delivered by traditional aboriginal people. 5 ferris: preventing obesity in canada’s aboriginal children published by scholarship@western, 2011 an article on preventing childhood obesity from an aboriginal perspective states, “solutions to obesity in aboriginal children need to be designed, controlled, and led by aboriginal people themselves. government policy makers often come into our communities to implement a quick fix. they try to design programs or provide funding to programs in a way that they see as fitting their (sometimes narrow) view of health” (ferris, 2010, p. 4). in discussing how to prevent obesity amongst aboriginal children, aboriginal midwife ellen blais raises some important issues: how do you get them [our women] out of their level of poverty? giving them money doesn’t help—it doesn’t make them change the way they buy food. it’s really the depression and the trying to make ends meet and the stress from the constant worry about money that causes obesity. maybe really easy access to nutritional foods, like fresh seasonal fruits and vegetables at their door or delivered to their buildings... there needs to be way more of that going on. it’s a way deeper issue. it’s a way deeper issue than following canada’s food guide (best start, 2010d, p. 28). many people believe that parents are the most important factor in preventing childhood obesity—yet as ellen blais says, it is impossible to change the behaviour of parents without looking at the bigger picture and addressing systemic factors such as poverty and the inter-generational effects of residential schools. research shows that all levels of society must work together (reilly, j.j., 2006; vanvrancken-tompkins, c.l., sothern, m.s., 2006)—governments, charities, schools, and communities need to support strategies and programs for preventing obesity (fisher, j.o., hodges, e.a., 2006; wabistch, m., 2006). this perspective is in line with the idea and inter-connectedness of the circle. yet in many aboriginal communities, the circle has been broken because of systemic factors that kept us from growing up in our traditional ways. these factors often influence us to be depressed, angry, live in fear, and use addictions as a way of escaping these feelings (best start, 2010a, p. 9). what causes obesity: examining the evidence “nobody is born obese” writes wabitsch (2006). this statement helps us understand why it is so important to start preventing obesity from the very beginning of life. childhood obesity is not usually a matter of genetics. an imbalance between the energy that comes in and the energy that goes out is often the cause of obesity (wabitsch, m., 2006; chaput, j.p., tremblay, a., 2006). obese children may be eating too many high-calorie foods or large portions along with spending too little time engaging in physical activity. for everyone across the globe, rising rates of obesity reflect changing lifestyles over the past 20 years—this includes a move away from labour to produce and find our own food to a sedentary lifestyle where we spend more time in cars and in front of television and computer screens, and buying innutritious food at grocery stores and restaurants. a métis father of three, jeffry cyr, explains things have changed even in the time from when he was a child growing up in the 1980s: my grandfather was pretty.... he’s a pretty funny guy. he was constantly kicking us out of the house to be active and i mean, this was st. francis (in southern manitoba), this is -32 celcius and he’d still kick you out and we would go. we would go into the forest and we build... we would build forts and stuff. you feel exhilarated, ‘cause you got out there and kinda challenged the weather. if you let them inside, they’re going to immediately gravitate, especially in this day and age, to a video game, a tv, or a computer, one of those three things (best start, 2010c, p. 24). 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.2 aboriginal people working on the let’s be healthy project all assert that indigenous people are not facing obesity as a crisis because of our genes. all indigenous people are land-based people. the obesity crisis within our communities is a result of the forced move away from our traditional, active lifestyle. “as a people, we now face deep-rooted and complex issues of poverty, geographical isolation, food insecurity, unequal access to education, and others that place our health at risk” (ferris, 2010). mohawk teacher diane longboat says: one of the things about talking about traditional healing and high-risk families is the overriding social issue of poverty. that more than anything else, i feel, is the most critical deterrent to health and just the lack of infrastructure. for example, at six nations, which has a huge population of 17,000 people in one area, we don’t have our own grocery store. you know? and as much as there’s a lot of traditional healing and medicine societies that are very active we don’t have a place where we can actually trade medicines, share medicine, share teachings, and that sort of thing. there’s no real healing centre for us... (best start, 2010d, p. 29) the majority of aboriginal people interviewed for the toolkit and training project lament the move away from traditional lifestyles. this move was often forced upon us by the government sending our children to residential schools where they sat at a desk and learned from books rather than through lived experience (e.g., growing a garden or hunting for game). people coming out of the schools lacked parenting skills since they had been separated from their own families for so long. the result was aboriginal people having children and being unable to raise them properly; subsequently, those children were put into foster care homes, often raised by non-aboriginal families. now, “the number of children in care outside their own homes today is three times the number of children in residential schools at the height of their operation” (blackstock, c., 2008, p. 165). aboriginal people want to raise their own children in a healthy way. they want to return to their cultural ways and values, and they want the chance to use their ancestral languages. many of the aboriginal people interviewed for the project want better support from the government, but they also want to create their own solutions. policy approaches the government must adopt to help aboriginal children be healthy métis professor dr. lynn lavallée states: we have to become less dependent on government and come up with our own economic solution and only then will we be able to deliver the programs we want to deliver in the way we want to deliver them (best start, 2010a, p. 20). the toolkit encourages aboriginal parents to create and deliver their own programs as much as possible; it includes ideas such as starting community kitchens and community gardens where families can work together to increase food security and increase levels of physical activity in the communities. the idea is that aboriginal people need to empower themselves and move away from dependency on government that is not always responsive or respectful of the needs of aboriginal people in canada. métis mom of three, jaime koebel helps highlight ways in which the community can help to empower aboriginal parents in raising healthy, active children. although many moms with a career and three children might say, “i’m too tired to exercise,” koebel demonstrates how a wholistic approach to 7 ferris: preventing obesity in canada’s aboriginal children published by scholarship@western, 2011 delivering a community program can help get parents and children active together. in this particular instance, the program also helped to empower the mother by giving her a space in which she could pass on teachings about her métis identity to her own children as well as others: the community was a big help, especially when i was a single parent. it was a big help because... when i was teaching jigging the program consisted of having a meal. they... provided child care for those whose kids were really small or whose kids lost interest, you know, half way through the session. so that was something i could fit my life around and include my kids if i wanted to” (best start, 2010b, p. 50). the book prevent childhood obesity in your community: a guide for service providers (best start, 2010d) is authored by a first nations woman who gathered advice and feedback from other first nations, inuit, and métis key informants and advisors. after interviews were transcribed, there were reviewed for recurring themes. recommendations to government were developed when topics were mentioned by at least two key informants. moreover, recommendations were shared with advisors and feedback was welcomed before publishing them in the toolkit. the prevent childhood obesity book gives the following recommendations to government staff from pages 70 to 75: • support infrastructure: community buildings need repairs and need rebuilding; government funders will not often give out “capital” money. • provide core funding for programs: staff at non-profit organizations do not know whether their funding will continue from one year to the next, despite the great work they are doing. • support and encourage partnerships: governments should see first nations and other aboriginal communities as partners when developing new programs and funding opportunities—a part of being a good partner means engaging with these folks from the planning stages onwards and giving equal decision-making roles. • support self-empowerment and education: aboriginal people think government should have a hands-off approach when it comes to health and healing. in fact, aboriginal people should have autonomy over health care decisions and delivery; however, key informants did express the need for government to support education measures around nutrition and physical activity, but they also said they did not want governments to dictate what aboriginals should or should not do. • support measures to increase food security: support more food co-ops or community-run stores in northern and remote communities. many communities only have one store that is run by outsiders—this does not make economic sense for communities needing more jobs. as inuk mother and service provider heidi langille says about her work at the ottawa inuit children’s centre, perhaps the only centre where inuit families in ottawa can depend on getting services in inuk from inuit: we don’t receive any core funding, not a single dollar is core funding. so everything needs to happen at a core level including the executive director, the administrative assistant, the annual general meetings, all of that sort of thing has to come out of programming dollars. which means less programming for the kids. i don’t know of anybody right now that’s funding transportation, like to get a van to pick up some of the kids. nobody’s doing that right now so it’s difficult (best start, 2010d, p. 73). 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.2 moving forward: lessons from the research as with many projects, the let’s be healthy together toolkit was delivered and published with little money or resources left for evaluation. a series of two-day training sessions were delivered across five regions of ontario in the summer and fall of 2010. between 100 to 150 people attended the five regional sessions. the public health agency of canada requested one extra session to be organized in toronto for about 15 head start staff. condensed training sessions also took place through one-hour webinars organized by invest in kids, reaching about 40 first nations staff in ontario. training sessions were facilitated by a first nations woman who brought in local drummers, dancers, elders, and other traditional people to share teachings and wisdom from their indigenous perspective. the training was done in a circle using the medicine wheel as a guide. the facilitator explained the idea that knowledge needs to come from the local aboriginal communities, which was supported by the fact that local elders and other people were brought in to help provide teachings from the local nations. in unsolicited emails to the author, participants’ comments show that delivering training from the indigenous perspective is a successful strategy: the training you and michael presented was extremely well done—the best! you are such a natural and made everyone feel so welcome. i learned a great deal re empowering our communities and most certainly utilizing cultural and traditional stories as well as addressing aboriginal history. i also learned much from the participants. ~registered nurse, dilico ojibway child and family services, thunder bay *** thank you for your workshop. it was a very moving experience. you were able to support participants to take chances with food. your presentation was based in an indigenous worldview and this made it a safe place for people to take chances. food is such a personal issue and often relates to issues in our childhood and past. you were nurturing and supportive and delivered a workshop that is based on strengths, not inabilities. ~teacher, mothercraft college, toronto **** i was at the workshop in sudbury… it was a very great workshop. i enjoyed the interaction, and the cultural aspects that were presented. i left there feeling totally elated. registered nurse, weeneebayko general hospital, moose factory these comments are just a few of the many positive ones received via email. they are important to consider because they reinforce the idea that programs and services need to be designed by aboriginal people. in closing, it is important for all levels of government, including band councils, and other funding organizations to understand two main points: 1) indigenous people have strong feelings of empowerment and self efficacy when delivering and passing on traditional knowledge; 2) efforts to increase food security for communities goes hand-in-hand with local economic development strategies, such as support for stores run by community members, which will enable families to afford healthier food and appropriate gear for children’s outdoor activity. the product of these processes is empowered parents who are able to raise healthier children, and in turn, build healthier communities. 9 ferris: preventing obesity in canada’s aboriginal children published by scholarship@western, 2011 references banks, j. w. (2003). ka’nisténhsera teiakotíhsnie’s: a native community rekindles the tradition of breastfeeding. awhonn lifelines, 7(4), 340-347. best start resource centre. (2010a). let’s be healthy together: creating healthier communities. toronto: health nexus. best start resource centre. (2010b). let’s be healthy together: eating the right stuff. toronto: health nexus. best start resource centre. (2010c). let’s be healthy together: getting active. toronto: health nexus. best start resource centre. (2010d). prevent childhood obesity in your aboriginal community: a guide for service providers. toronto: health nexus. blackstock, c. (2008). reconcilitation means not saying sorry twice: lessons from child welfare in canada. in m. castellano, l. archibald, & m. degangné (eds.), from truth to reconciliation: transforming the legacy of residential schools (pp. 163-178). ottawa: aboriginal healing foundation. chaput, j. p., & tremblay, a. (2006). obesity at an early age and its impact on child development. in r. e. tremblay, r. g. barr, & r. dev. peters (eds.), encyclopedia on early childhood development online. retrived from http://www.child-encyclopedia.com/documents/chaput-tremblayangxp.pdf ferris, m. (2010). voices from the field – aboriginal children and obesity. in r. e. tremblay, r. g. barr, & r. dev. peters (eds.), encyclopedia on early childhood development online. retrived from http://www.childencyclopedia.com/documents/ferrisangps.pdf fisher, j. o., hodges, e. a. (2006). determinants and consequences of pediatric obesity: comments on chaput and tremblay, and ventura, savage, may and birch. in r. e. tremblay, r. g. barr, & r. dev. peters (eds.), encyclopedia on early childhood development online. retrived from http://www.childencyclopedia.com/documents/fisher-hodgesangxp.pdf ho, l., gittelsohn, j., sharma, s., cao, x., treuth, m., rimal, r., . . . harris, s.(2008). food-related behavior, physical activity, and dietary intake in first nations a population at high risk for diabetes. ethnicity and health, 13(4), 335-349. national aboriginal health organization. (2001). strategic directions for an evidence-based decision making framework at naho. ottawa: naho. reilly, j. j. (2006). early prevention of obesity. in r. e. tremblay, r. g. barr, & r. dev. peters (eds.), encyclopedia on early childhood development online. retrived from http://www.childencyclopedia.com/documents/reillyangxp.pdf vanvrancken-tompkins, c. l., sothern, m. s. (2006). preventing obesity in children from birth to five years. in r. e. tremblay, r. g. barr, & r. dev. peters (eds.), encyclopedia on early childhood development online. retrived from http://www.child-encyclopedia.com/documents/vanvrancken-tompkinssothernangxp.pdf ventura, a. k., savage, j. s., may, a. l., birch, l. l. (2005). early behavioural, familial and psychosocial predictors of overweight and obesity. in r. e. tremblay, r. g. barr, & r. dev. peters (eds.), encyclopedia on early childhood development online. retrived from http://www.child-encyclopedia.com/documents/venturasavage-may-birchangxp.pdf wabitsch, m. (2006). preventing obesity in young children. in r. e. tremblay, r. g. barr, & r. dev. peters (eds.), encyclopedia on early childhood development online. retrived from http://www.childencyclopedia.com/documents/wabitschangxp.pdf 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.2 http://www.child-encyclopedia.com/documents/chaput-tremblayangxp.pdf� http://www.child-encyclopedia.com/documents/ferrisangps.pdf� http://www.child-encyclopedia.com/documents/ferrisangps.pdf� http://www.child-encyclopedia.com/documents/fisher-hodgesangxp.pdf� http://www.child-encyclopedia.com/documents/fisher-hodgesangxp.pdf� http://www.child-encyclopedia.com/documents/vanvrancken-tompkins-sothernangxp.pdf� http://www.child-encyclopedia.com/documents/vanvrancken-tompkins-sothernangxp.pdf� http://www.child-encyclopedia.com/documents/ventura-savage-may-birchangxp.pdf� http://www.child-encyclopedia.com/documents/ventura-savage-may-birchangxp.pdf� http://www.child-encyclopedia.com/documents/wabitschangxp.pdf� http://www.child-encyclopedia.com/documents/wabitschangxp.pdf� the international indigenous policy journal may 2011 preventing obesity in canada’s aboriginal children: not just a matter of eating right and getting active melanie a. ferris recommended citation preventing obesity in canada’s aboriginal children: not just a matter of eating right and getting active abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license preventing obesity in canadaâ•žs aboriginal children: not just a matter of eating right and getting active policy and practice options for equitable access to primary healthcare for indigenous peoples in british columbia and norway the international indigenous policy journal volume 5 | issue 1 article 6 january 2014 policy and practice options for equitable access to primary healthcare for indigenous peoples in british columbia and norway josée g. lavoie university of northern british columbia, josee.lavoie@med.umanitoba.ca recommended citation lavoie, j. g. (2014). policy and practice options for equitable access to primary healthcare for indigenous peoples in british columbia and norway. the international indigenous policy journal, 5(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.6 policy and practice options for equitable access to primary healthcare for indigenous peoples in british columbia and norway abstract over the past three decades, policy reforms have been geared towards improving quality of care, responsiveness, and equitable access to healthcare services for all social groups in general, and individuals living in marginalizing circumstances in particular. the purpose of this study was to document how primary healthcare services (phc) services are provided in norway and british columbia to meet the needs of indigenous peoples and use this knowledge to critically explore policy alternatives that inform the delivery of phc for vulnerable populations. findings show that in british columbia, indigenous-specific phc services have been the preferred mechanism to ensure better care. this is not the case in norway, where sámi-centric services exist only in mental health and only in finnmark. keywords primary healthcare, indigenous, first nations, sámi, policy, international, comparison acknowledgments this study was funded by the research council of norway. the author would like to thank the university of tromsø, and colleagues inger dagsvold and mette bech-risør for their guidance and support through this project. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ p o l i c y a n d p r a c t i c e o p t i o n s f o r e q u i t a b l e a c c e s s t o p r i m a r y h e a l t h c a r e f o r i n d i g e n o u s p e o p l e s i n b r i t i s h c o l u m b i a a n d n o r w a y internationally, primary healthcare (phc)1 renewal continues to be identified as a key pathway to achieving health equity, meeting the needs of underserved and poorly served populations, and for improving the efficiency of healthcare systems (world health organisation, 2008; world health organisation commission on social determinants of health, 2008). evidence shows that when phc services are not accessible (geographically, economically, or culturally), responsive or effective, people delay seeking help, rely on emergency care, and lose the benefits of continuity of care (browne et al., 2012; world health organisation, 2008). in many countries, histories of colonialism have resulted in power differentials that negatively impact phc access and responsiveness to indigenous peoples’ needs. many countries have implemented equity-oriented phc reforms, balancing universal schemes with targeted interventions (clinics specializing in hiv care or peer-led outreach programs; for example see benach, malmusi, yasui, & martinez, 2013; graham, 2004; lavoie, boulton, & dwyer, 2010). still, finding the right balance between these options is complex and linked to national priorities, history, values, and sensitivities. the purpose of this study was to document how british columbia (bc, canada) and norway have configured phc services to meet the needs of: (a) asylum seekers and refugees; (b) drug users; and (c) indigenous peoples. the specific objectives of the study were: (a) to examine the policy contexts that informs the organization of phc services for vulnerable and marginalized populations; (b) to identify the approaches used in delivering phc services to address these needs; and (c) to document the robustness and vulnerabilities of approaches in place for these different populations. although this article draws examples from services for vulnerable and marginalized populations, the main focus is on services provided to indigenous peoples. this article is organized in six broad sections. the next section explores the structure of the phc system in norway and bc, which serves as a backdrop to the findings. section three provides an overview of the theoretical framework informing this study. it begins with a discussion of social constructionist theory in relation to concepts such as marginality and vulnerability. it then explores the link that has been made in the literature between health equity, marginality, and vulnerability. section four explains how the study was conducted and how the findings were generated. section five summarizes and discusses the significance of the findings from this study, and a last section explores key lessons and proposes some policy recommendations. b a c k g r o u n d : c o m p a r i n g n o r w a y a n d b r i t i s h c o l u m b i a although canada and norway share some characteristics, the two countries are undoubtedly different enough to make comparisons of limited utility. the focus of this study was thus with one of canada’s multiple healthcare systems: the system that exists in bc. table 1 shows selected comparative indicators.                                                                                                                 1 primary healthcare (phc) services generally include primary care services provided on an out-patient basis, tertiary prevention interventions designed to assist in the management of complications once they manifest themselves, secondary prevention interventions focused on assisting in the management of chronic illness to avoid or delay the development of complications, and primary prevention activities designed to prevent the onset of chronic conditions (starfield, shi, & macinko, 2005). in norway, these services are often referred to as “basic services.” 1 lavoie: indigenous access to healthcare in bc and norway published by scholarship@western, 2014 t a b l e 1 . s e l e c t e d c o m p a r a t i v e i n d i c a t o r s c a n a d a b c n o r w a y p o p u l a t i o n 2 0 0 7 total population (1,000,000) 33a 4.3a 4.7b population over 65 13.4%a 14.3%a 14.6%b p o p u l a t i o n 2 0 0 6 population who are indigenous 3.7%a 4.8%a 1.2%d p u b l i c s p e n d i n g gdp spent on healthcare 10.1%b 10.6%c 8.9%b healthcare spending per capita (cnd$) $3,895b $3,604c $4,763b average annual growth rate of real healthcare spending per capita, 1997 2007 3.8%b 5.3%c 2.4%b out-of-pocket healthcare spending per capita $580b n/a $720b hospital spending per capita $1,070b n/a $1,615b note. sources: a statistics canada, 2008 b the commonwealth fund, 2010 c canadian institute of health information, 2012 d statistisk sentralbyra, 20142 bc’s healthcare system abides by the five principles of the canada health act 1984 (canada, 2004), which include public administration, comprehensiveness, universality, portability, and accessibility. in practice, the canada health act guarantees access to medically necessary care (general practitioners, specialists, and hospitals) at no out-of-pocket cost for the patient. as shown in table 2, bc’s five regional health authorities (rhas) manage and deliver phc and hospital services for a regionally defined population. budgets, policies, and priorities are set at the provincial level. municipalities have no responsibility over health services, except for 169 bc first nation reserves, which operate like municipalities and deliver a limited complement of phc services funded by the federal government. canada’s commitment to a multinational state has fuelled discourses on the need for services to be responsive to all and culturally appropriate to minorities (romanow, 2002). as a result, many provinces, including bc, have adopted targeted strategies to ensure responsive care for all cultural minorities, including indigenous peoples. the norwegian healthcare system is built on the principle of equal access to services: all inhabitants should have the same opportunities to access health services, regardless of social or economic status and geographic location (johnsen, 2006). although national policies may acknowledge the need for targeted strategies in the pursuit of equity, norway has favoured general welfare policies aimed at the entire population and focused on inequalities existing along a socio-economic gradient (dahl & lie, 2009; norwegian directorate for health and social affairs, 2005; povlsen, borup, & fosse, 2011).                                                                                                                 2 statistics on the sámi population were obtained from the statistiks sentralbyrå website (http://www.ssb.no/). because there is no overall registration of the sámi population, no one knows exactly how many sámi there are today. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.6 t a b l e 2 . o r g a n i z a t i o n o f h e a l t h s e r v i c e s b c n o r w a y r e g i o n a l h e a l t h a u t h o r i t i e s • manage primary, secondary, and tertiary care off-reserve • manage secondary and tertiary care m u n i c i p a l i t y • manage primary healthcare on-reserve (first nations) • manage primary healthcare and, lately, some specialist care g e n e r a l p r a c t i t i o n e r s • paid centrally (provincial), 76% fee-forservice • paid centrally, 81% on fee-forservice/capitation/co-payment d r u g s • 100% out of pocket • private insurance • catastrophic expenditures covered through pharmacare (means adjusted deductible) • out of pocket, reimbursed by the national insurance scheme (100% white prescription list; % for blue prescription list) d e n t a l c a r e • out of pocket • out of pocket for those over 20 note. sources: johnsen, 2006; marchildon, 2005 the healthcare system mirrors the political structure of the country, with responsibilities being shared between the national level, the five health regions, and the municipalities. policies and budgets are set at the national level. the main responsibility for the provision of healthcare services lies with the five health regions for specialist healthcare and the 431 municipalities for phc (johnsen, 2006). norwegian municipalities have shouldered some responsibility for health services since 1860 (hubbard, 2006). since 1982, the municipalities have been responsible for health promotion, phc, care of the elderly, and care of people with disabilities. although national directives provide broad guidance, each municipality can decide on local priorities and design strategies to meet them. the non-governmental organization (ngo) sector plays a limited role in the delivery of phc services. in some ways, the municipalities’ role in the planning and delivery of phc may fill a role usually shouldered by the ngo sector in other countries, since municipalities operate with an elected governance structure and must respond to community needs. the norwegian and bc healthcare systems have important similarities. both provide universal access to hospital, general practitioners, and specialists. both serve populations that are geographically dispersed and with a sizable rural population. i n d i g e n o u s p e o p l e s a n d t h e n a t i o n s t a t e canada and norway share a long history of recognizing that indigenous peoples living within national boundaries have rights that go beyond those of other citizens. the interpretation of these rights in contemporary terms is, however, different. in norway, the sámi were first recognized as indigenous peoples in the stromstad treaty of 1751, which defined the norwegian-swedish border. an addendum to the treaty, the lapp codicil, recognized, in a legal international treaty, the right of the sámi to freely cross the border as part of their seasonal migration of reindeer herding (forrest, 1997). in canada, indigenous rights are entrenched in the royal proclamation of 1763 (king george, 1763). this document, which was issued to clarify the rights of the french and indigenous 3 lavoie: indigenous access to healthcare in bc and norway published by scholarship@western, 2014 minorities following the conquest of new france by britain, states that the indigenous population is not conquered, that they retain title over their ancestral territory, and that encroachment must be negotiated and settled by treaty. the stromstad treaty and the royal proclamation remain foundational documents. international covenants, particularly the international labour organisation convention 169 in the case of norway (canada never ratified this convention), support a concept of indigenous rights stemming from the continuous occupation of the land. indigenous peoples’ right to the practice of their culture are guaranteed in the canadian and norwegian constitutions (canada, 1982; norge stortingsforhandl, 1986). canada and norway once undertook vigorous programs (fornorskning [norwegianization] in norway, assimilation in canada) aiming to assimilate indigenous peoples into mainstream society. in norway, the norwegianization policy resulted in sámi being forced to forego their own family name and adopt norwegian names instead, as well as the suppression of language, cultural, and religious practices. this policy was discontinued in 1980 (jernsletten, 1986; minde, 2005). although similar practices were reported in canada, the negative impact of residential schools has received the most attention. the last of these schools closed in the late 1990s (robertson, 2006). while overt initiatives have subsided, reports of racism and discrimination remain in both countries (browne, fiske, & thomas, 2000; hansen, melhus, & lund, 2010; hansen, melhus, hogmo, & lund, 2008; smye & browne, 2002). in canada, and in other countries, the concept of indigenous rights has been invoked in relation to indigenous control over phc services serving their communities (lavoie et al., 2010). this option has not been pursued in norway (baer, 2000; nyntti, 2000). in canada, arguments in favour of indigenous control over health services have found justification in documented health inequities (lavoie et al., 2010) and an associated health services’ failure to meet the needs of indigenous peoples. health inequities have been documented for indigenous canadians, whether they are first nations, métis, or inuit (adelson, 2005; british columbia provincial health officer, 2009; martens et al., 2010). canadian researchers, in partnership with indigenous groups, have developed methodologies to identify indigenous peoples (first nations, métis) in health administrative data in order to ensure that health inequalities are documented and that evidence-based solutions are in place (lavoie et al., 2010; martens et al., 2002; 2010; martens, sanderson, & jebamani, 2005). in contrast, norway is not collecting ethnicity information in relation to service provision. this is illegal. researchers have explored alternative methodologies to document health inequalities among sámi with mixed results. the methods used for sámi identification have been based on geography (gaski, melhus, deraas, & forde, 2011; norum et al., 2007; norum, bjerke, nybrodahl, & olsen, 2012; norum, hofvind, nieder, schnell, & broderstad, 2012; norum & nieder, 2012a; 2012b; norum, olsen, smastuen, nieder, & broderstad, 2011). the communities these studies used as proxies for sámi (including the statistics presented in table 3) include from 20.3 to 68.4 percent of their population registered as sámi in the 2005 census (gaski, 2011). in contrast, the sáminor survey used a mix of geography (the same communities) and self-identification (broderstad, melhus, brustad, & lund, 2011; hansen et al., 2008; lund et al., 2007). this method likely yields more rigorous results, although it has been suggested that self-identification may be hindered by past experiences and distrust. further, these results cannot be said to reflect the experience of all norwegian sámi since the sample includes communities located in finnmark only (norway’s most northern county). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.6 t a b l e 3 . s e l e c t e d i n d i c a t o r s o f h e a l t h i n e q u a l i t y   c a n a d a a n o r w a y b   n a t i o n a l b c i n d i g e n o u s n a t i o n a l s á m i l i f e e x p e c t a n c y , m a l e 78.5 79.2 73 79 77 l i f e e x p e c t a n c y , f e m a l e 83.1 83.6 78 83.5 81.6 note. life expectancy in years. a british columbia provincial health officer, 2009 b because sámi identification in health service utilization is illegal, the numbers presented are for stn geographical areas, which are the area of activity of the sámi parliament subsidy schemes for business development. these areas also include large non-sámi populations. caution should be used in interpretation. sámi have reported ethnic discrimination. inequalities in self-reported health have also been documented, compared to the norwegian majority population (hansen et al., 2008; hansen et al., 2010). a dominant discourse is that sámi’s assertion of indigenous rights is perceived as a demand for special treatment and unfair advantages: this is portrayed as “unequal” and fuels national resentment. this argument can, however, be flipped since the policy of norwegianization was also fuelled by anti-sámi sentiments. in canada, indigenous groups have developed determinants of health frameworks to help explain cultural perspectives. medicine wheel-inspired frameworks (assembly of first nations, 2006) have been developed by indigenous communities and used to articulate differences in social determinants of health reflecting indigenous values. the use of the medicine wheel, which is a spiritual symbol originating from cree and ojibway cultures, has been problematized when applied to all canadian indigenous cultures. further, some traditional elders have expressed distress at the secular use of a spiritual symbol. despite these reservations, medicine wheel-inspired theoretical, analytical, and programmatic frameworks are widely used in canada, and justified as being more culturally appropriate (clarke & holtslander, 2010; warne, 2005; similar frameworks have been used in other disciplines). the equivalent does not exist for sámi. t h e o r e t i c a l f r a m e w o r k d e f i n i n g v u l n e r a b i l i t y , m a r g i n a l i t y , a n d u n d e r s e r v e d p o p u l a t i o n s i n p o l i c y this study focuses on populations identified (and not identified) in policy as underserved as a result of vulnerability and marginality. in this study, the terms vulnerable and marginalized are understood as being socially constructed (schneider & sidney, 2009), and nation, culture, and context-specific. populations and individuals defined as underserved, vulnerable, or marginalized in policies are legitimized and elevated to a status of deserving of additional social support, as defined in policy. in contrast, policy silences construct other groups and individuals as not deserving of additional social support (schneider & sidney, 2009). legitimacy is fluid and changing over time. policy silences are problematic since they effectively transfer the responsibility of providing responsive care to the providers without guidance. the language of policies speaks of target populations as if these exist with verifiable (although often contested) objective boundaries. schneider and ingram (1993) stated that social construction requires that target populations be understood as having have shared characteristics that are socially meaningful and that distinguish them from other populations and of the attribution of specific 5 lavoie: indigenous access to healthcare in bc and norway published by scholarship@western, 2014 valence-oriented values (statistics) and symbols (represented in graphs) that reify the construct (schneider & sidney, 2009). the construction, they argue, can be positive or negative. o p t i o n s f o r e q u i t a b l e p h c d e l i v e r y in their landmark book accessing healthcare, responding to diversity, healy and mckee (2003) propose the following summary of options implemented in higher income countries (table 4) to ensure responsiveness. there is an obvious gradient in table 4 in that services identified as alternative or parallel are generally phc services delivered by non-government organizations that may be entirely funded by governmental authorities and tasked to deliver specific programs (lavoie et al., 2010). these options emerge generally as a result of failure of mainstream and integrationist strategies to meet the needs of specific populations, and in indigenous contexts, as an expression of self-determination (lavoie et al., 2010). research has documented contractual agreements that narrowly define the population to be served, while providing limited funding to meet stated contractual obligations (dwyer, o'donnell, lavoie, marlina, & sullivan, 2009; lavoie, forget, & o'neil, 2007). t a b l e 4 . s e r v i c e d e l i v e r y m o d e l s a n d p o p u l a t i o n g r o u p e x a m p l e s s e r v i c e d e l i v e r y m o d e l s d e f i n i t i o n u n iv er sa l m a i n s t r e a m ( c o l l e c t i v e ) health services are made collectively available to everyone, with minority groups expected to use the same health services as everyone else and, arguably, to conform to the dominant conventions. i n t e g r a t i o n i s t includes a range of activities designed to encourage disadvantaged groups to use collective health services, such as referral services, interpreters, and liaison workers, as well as broader policies to direct resources to those who are disadvantaged. t ar ge te d a l t e r n a t i v e services that exist in addition to mainstream services, with individuals able to choose between the two. such services are usually limited in scope and scale (e.g., primary care only) and can be of good quality and designed to meet the needs of particular groups. p a r a l l e l s e r v i c e s good quality health care system that exists to cater for certain groups and that substitutes for, rather than complements, mainstream services. note. adapted from healy and mckee (2003). while mainstream and integrationist strategies are universal strategies that may be better positioned to ensure that services are not delivered on the cheap (ahmad & bradby, 2007; titmuss, 1968), interventions established for the majority and untailored to the needs of specific populations may result in lack of responsiveness and worse outcomes. all options above have advantages and challenges to be managed. generally, universal schemes supplemented with alternative and/or parallel interventions are likely to produce the best outcomes (healy & mckee, 2003; world health organisation, 2008). no matter what option is preferred, legislation, regulations, and monitoring are required to ensure that services are provided in the manner intended, adequately resourced, responsive, and that they result in improving health outcomes. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.6 m e t h o d s the norwegian component of this mix method study included policy and document analysis; discussions with scholars; and interviews with policy-makers, service providers, and representatives from populations considered vulnerable, indigenous, and those with documented inequalities. it was funded by the research council of norway and hosted by the university of tromsø’s department of clinical medicine. the bc component was based on published literatures. in norway, potential ethical issues were discussed with the regionale komiteer for medisinsk og helsefaglig forskningsetikk (rek), the regional committees for medical and health research ethics (n.d.). the study protocol was submitted to rek for review. the rek’s response stated that because this project did not require access to personal health information (i.e., medical charts), the collection of biological samples, or a clinical trial, it did not require ethical review by rek. the university of northern british columbia’s research ethics board approved the project’s protocol. d a t a g a t h e r i n g a n d a n a l y s i s the norwegian data for this study was collected from policy documents and interviews with researchers, health service providers, and healthcare administrators of the healthcare system. a combination of snowball and theoretical sampling was utilized to identify individuals to be interviewed. potential interviewees (n = 47) were contacted using a standard email written in english and in norwegian. a bilingual information sheet about the study was included in the email. overall, 15 interviews were conducted with 19 individuals: 13 were with service providers, 4 with decision-makers, and 2 with representatives of community organizations. of these, 5 identified as sámi (identified as [s], as opposed to [n] for other norwegians). in addition, conversations were conducted with 5 researchers involved in the fields of health inequalities, non-government organizations, and phc. interviews were conducted between september and november 2012. all interviews were conducted in english. in two cases, a colleague trusted by the interviewee, inger dadsvold, attended to provide support and occasional sámi-english translation. interviews were digitally recorded. interviewing continued until saturation was achieved (glaser & strauss, 2009). recordings were selectively transcribed. full transcription was considered redundant, as all interviews were conducted by lavoie and analyzed right after the interview. recordings were listened to twice and key themes identified, collated, and synthesized. third and fourth listening occurred to verify the analysis. validation was ensured through periodical presentations (n = 5) of key findings to norwegian peer-researchers and health providers, and cross-referencing with existing literature where available. the documents reviewed were selected based on a published and grey literature search, complemented by recommendations by those interviewed. two broad limitations must be acknowledged in relation to this study. first, the author is not fluent in norwegian or sámi. although all interviews were conducted in english, it is clear that all interviewed were working in their second (or third) language and that word choice was sometimes an issue. consequently, direct quotes are not used. second, although norwegian scholars publish widely in english, many key publications exist only in norwegian. some policy documents are translated, but generally, they are abridged versions of the original document. google translate was used to translate key documents. while the translation provided was at best approximate, this provided sufficient information to be further explored in 7 lavoie: indigenous access to healthcare in bc and norway published by scholarship@western, 2014 discussions. still, the literature reviewed is likely incomplete since some key references may have been overlooked. r e s u l t s d e f i n i n g m a r g i n a l i t y a n d v u l n e r a b i l i t y i n b c a n d n o r w e g i a n p o l i c i e s despite canada’s commitment to phc and principles of social justice, health inequity remains a pressing national concern. in bc, the provincial health services authority recently released a discussion paper entitled, towards reducing health inequities (woermke, 2011), identifying five priority populations: (i) children and families living poverty, (ii) people with mental health and substance use issues, (iii) aboriginal peoples, (iv) immigrants, and (v) refugees. the discussion paper proposes a number of strategies including the development of health equity target plans, improving health literacy, increasing equitable access to care and expanding population-focused health services, developing intersectoral collaboration, and increasing the capacity of the healthcare system to better serve a culturally and linguistically diverse population. ensuring the existence of culturally competent policies, programs, and services is recommended. the language adopted in bc is somewhat different than the policy language used in the norwegian context. in 2007, norway released the storting national strategy to reduce social inequalities in health, identifying four priorities: (a) reducing social inequalities that contribute to inequalities in health (income and childhood conditions including education, employment, and working conditions); (b) reducing social inequalities in health-related behaviour and use of the health services; (c) targeted (non-healthcare specific) initiatives to promote social inclusion; and (d) the development of cross-sectorial tools (torgensen, giaever, & stigen, 2007). the strategy includes a provision targeting vulnerable groups: many disadvantaged people need more targeted services. universal schemes must therefore be supplemented with specially adapted services and measures tailored to the individual. user oriented and specially adapted public services are necessary to ensure that everyone, regardless of their background and circumstances, has access to equitable services. the government will take steps to promote inclusion in the workplace, inclusion at school and adapted health and social services. (torgensen et al., 2007, p. 10, emphasis added) unlike bc, vulnerable groups are not identified. both norway and bc identify the need for targeted strategies to ensure responsiveness to groups identified as marginalized or vulnerable. norway has experimented with fine-tuning services for those living with hiv infection, mental health, or addictions issues. harm reduction-focused services exist (safer injection clinics, for example). low threshold clinics (drop-in clinics where copayments are waived) and after hours points of services provide alternatives [n008, n015, n018], with good results (johansen, morken, & hunskaar, 2012). specialized services exist to support pregnant women at risk of substance use [n014]. refugee and asylum seekers receive services from mainstream services. the norsk organisasjon for asylsøkere (norwegian organisation for asylum seekers) provides support to these mainstream health service providers to ensure that services are meeting the specific needs of asylum seekers. interviewees reported mixed results, noting that mainstream providers are often reluctant to provide services or ill equipped to meet needs, especially for those who experienced torture [n015, n016, n017]. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.6 similar strategies exist in bc. in addition, population-focused health services are part of an official bc strategy, in relation to specific cultural groups such as indigenous peoples (woermke, 2011). this is not the case in norway where national strategies have been favoured [n001, s003, n004, s005, s009], and where the idea of separate services for sámi has not been pursued by the sámi parliament (which provides recommendations to the norwegian partliament; see semb, 2012 for a detailed discussion) [s002, s007]. some interviewees suggested that norway’s discomfort with population-focused strategies, when defined in relation to ethnicity, is based on the belief that separate services are inherently discriminatory and potentially stigmatizing [s002]. others dismissed the importance of ethnicity, suggesting that all inequalities can be linked to education and employment [n013, n019]. according to interviewees [s003, s005, n013, n019], an assumption imbedded in policies is that equal provision of services, guaranteed in policy, results in equal access. despite documented discrimination, services are thus believed to be sufficiently responsive. the leading discourse is that since all have access to the same services, inequalities that persist must be related to personal choice in lifestyle. health inequalities have been documented mostly in relation to the socio-economic gradient and in relation to employment (hoffmann et al., 2013; holland et al., 2011; huijts, eikemo, & skalicka, 2010; van der wel, dahl, & thielen, 2012). as noted earlier, ethnicity data is not collected in connection to health service utilization so documenting health inequalities on the basis of ethnicity is not possible. consequently, strategies have focused on ensuring access to continuous work because, the argument goes, inequalities are related to social exclusion and employment is the antidote (dahl & lie, 2009). critics of this approach have noted that little is said about the type of work created [n14]. further, since work can be an antidote, few options are available for those who may not be able to work as result of social exclusion, marginalization, or for health reasons (dahl, 2002). i n d i g e n o u s h e a l t h s e r v i c e s norway identifies five cultural minorities: sámi, roma, romani, kvens, and travelers. in the context of this project, these groups were mentioned as belonging to marginalized groups. of these, only the sámi have their own policy citing an obligation for health services to meet the needs of sámi: equivalent provision of health and social services must be available to the whole population. the government will achieve this for the sámi population by means of an improved knowledge base for employees of municipal services and through owner control of specialist health services. the ministry of health and care services will make it clear in the annual letter of instructions to the re-gional (sic) health authorities that the rights and needs of sámi patients for adapted services must be investigated and clarified in planning and studies and in the decision-making phase. the ministry will also strengthen the guidance provided to municipal and county services. (norwegian ministry of labour and social inclusion, 2008, p. 9, emphasis added) the sámi policy guarantees equivalent access to services, which is a right guaranteed to all cultural minorities. it appears that “adapted services” has been interpreted to mean that sámi have the right to services in the sámi language. 9 lavoie: indigenous access to healthcare in bc and norway published by scholarship@western, 2014 when asked about the space given to sámi culture in phc services, interviewees first highlighted the issue of language, suggesting that for sámi whose fluency in norwegian is limited, services should be available in sámi [s002, n006]. while there is literature on sámi cultural beliefs that suggests that traditional modalities (access to traditional food, laying on of hands, distance healing, and “reading” or prayers) could be integrated into health services (sexton & stabbursvik, 2010), there is limited evidence that this has been institutionalized [s002]. one interviewee suggested that this was actively discouraged by policies [s007]. still, two interviewees suggested that some providers quietly facilitate the use of traditional modalities in hospitals [s003, s007]. another suggested that the inclusion of healers in mainstream services was imprudent, as it could result in increased regulation and distortion of sámi healing practices [s003]. as noted earlier, sámi respondents stated that the sámi parliament has not advocated for sámicentric health services, it instead continues to advocate for all services to be responsive to sámi [s002]. an exception is sámisk nasjonalt kompetansesenter (sanks, alternative services), which provides low threshold mental health services for sámi. sanks is located in karasjok and lakselv (finnmark). it is funded by helse nord (the health authority) to provide psychological and psychiatric services to sámi children, individuals and families from finnmark, and to conduct research. sanks emerged as a result of sámi advocacy [s005], as a mechanism to address underutilization of mental health services by sámi. sanks has made an effort to hire sámi service providers (mainly psychologists) to increase cultural safety in service provisions. although sanks staff have provided sámi-centred programs in other regions (sámi-centred services exist nowhere else), it appears that this is no longer being supported [n006]. and while sanks was at one time recognized as a national centre of excellence, it appears that this designation is being reassessed. interviewees reported that the organization’s broader role and mandate is being implicitly reframed in a more narrow way by decision-makers [s003, n004, s005, n006, s007]. these findings are summarized in table 5. in bc, services for indigenous peoples who still live in their traditional territory are funded by the federal government (parallel services). in certain urban centres, despite a policy of universal access, health authorities are funding ngos to provide services to indigenous peoples (alternative services). both types of services have been challenged with underfunding and policy shifts (lavoie et al., 2005). despite these challenges, studies have demonstrated these services’ ability to be more responsive to indigenous peoples’ needs and to deliver on outcomes (such as improved health status and decresed number of avoidable hospitalization) (browne et al., 2012; chongo, lavoie, hoffman, & shubair, 2011; lavoie et al., 2010). c o n c l u s i o n s a n d i m p l i c a t i o n s f o r p o l i c y finding the right balance between universal measures and targeted strategies may be more of an art than a science. alternative and parallel services can play an important role in meeting unmet needs. although they run the risk of being welfare on the cheap (titmuss, 1968), regulation and monitoring can mitigate this risk. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.6 t a b l e 5 . p r i m a r y h e a l t h c a r e s e r v i c e s s t r a t e g i e s f o r i n d i g e n o u s p e o p l e s c o u n t r y e x a m p l e s e r v i c e d e l i v e r y t y p e d o c u m e n t e d r e s p o n s i v e n e s s v u l n e r a b i l i t y p a r a l l e l a l t e r n a t i v e c a n a d a phc services onreserve (ngos funded by the federal government). ngos in larger cities provide phc or bridge services. √ yes (browne et al., 2012; lavoie et al., 2010). some vulnerability related to funding (lavoie & forget, 2008; lavoie et al., 2007). n o r w a y sansk, mental health in karasjok and lakselv. √ interviews suggested that responsiveness was mixed, depending on the provider. some vulnerability especially related to the integration of sámi values. norway and bc have opted for different strategies in order to meet the needs of vulnerable, marginalized, and underserved populations. in bc, parallel services have in some cases been preferred: for example, first nations living on-reserve. underfunding and vulnerability to policy shifts remain an issue (lavoie et al., 2005). this is also the case for alternative services, which are vulnerable to underfunding and shifts in policy. still, studies have demonstrated that indigenous health services are more responsive and able to produce better outcomes (lavoie et al., 2010). in norway, universal schemes have been promoted; yet, some integrationists and alternative strategies have also been implemented. interviewees suggested that sanks’ role (alternative) has been questioned because its focus is sámi-specific, suggesting political sustainability issues. assessing effectiveness in producing better outcomes is constrained by a policy that forbids the collection of ethnicity data in relation to health service utilization. titmuss’ (1968) statement that “services for the poor will result in poor services” (p. 21), which was used by some interviewees as a rationale for defending norwegian practices, appears erroneous. while targeted services may be underfunded and challenged by policy, some parallel and alternative services have been shown to produce better outcomes than mainstream services. the saying should be revised to state that in the absence of policy commitments and regulations, services for the poor may be impoverished services (welfare on the cheap) that might nevertheless produce better outcomes for marginalized populations. the distinction is important. the dilemma between universal versus targeted strategies is well documented: either option can result in the perpetuation of inequities. regulation and monitoring are key. bc is more actively engaged in monitoring the performance of its healthcare system in relation to underserved population. monitoring is however underdeveloped in norway, and is linked to discomfort related to documenting inequalities for sámi. thus, norwegian claims of more equalitarian outcomes must be treated with suspicion and challenged. 11 lavoie: indigenous access to healthcare in bc and norway published by scholarship@western, 2014 r e f e r e n c e s adelson, n. 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(2005). contribution of primary care to health systems and health. the milbank quarterly, 83, 457 502. statistics canada. (2008, january 15). aboriginal peoples in canada in 2006: inuit, métis and first nations, 2006 census. the daily. statistisk sentralbyra. (2014). sámi in norway, 2014. from http://www.ssb.no/en/forside;jsessionid=125ddbde98ea9c92dd842fe384b1b5b3.k pld-as-prod10 the commonwealth fund. (2010). international profiles of health care systems: australia, canada, denmark, england, france, germany, italy, the netherlands, new zealand, norway, sweden, switzerland, and the united states (rep. no. 1417). washington: author. titmuss, r. (1968). commitment to w\welfare. new york: pantheon. torgensen, t. p., giaever, o., & stigen, o. t. (2007). developing an intersectoral national strategy to reduce social inequalities in health. the norwegian case. unpublished document. van der wel, k. a., dahl, e., & thielen, k. (2012). social inequalities in "sickness": does welfare state regime type make a difference? a multilevel analysis of men and women in 26 european countries. international journal of health services, 42, 235 255. warne, d. (2005). traditional perspectives on child and family health. paediatrics & child health, 10, 542 544. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.6 woermke, m. (2011). towards reducing health inequities. victoria: population & public health,provincial health services authorities. world health organisation. (2008). primary health care: now more than ever. retrieved from http://www.who.int/topics/primary_health_care/en/ world health organisation commission on social determinants of health. (2008). closing the gap in a generation: health equity through action on the social determinants of health. final report of the commission on social determinants of health. geneva: world health organisation. 17 lavoie: indigenous access to healthcare in bc and norway published by scholarship@western, 2014 the international indigenous policy journal january 2014 policy and practice options for equitable access to primary healthcare for indigenous peoples in british columbia and norway josée g. lavoie recommended citation policy and practice options for equitable access to primary healthcare for indigenous peoples in british columbia and norway abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license policy and practice options for equitable access to primary healthcare for indigenous peoples in british columbia and norway gender gaps in indigenous socioeconomic outcomes: australian regional comparisons and international possibilities the international indigenous policy journal volume 1 | issue 2 article 3 september 2010 gender gaps in indigenous socioeconomic outcomes: australian regional comparisons and international possibilities mandy yap the australian national university, mandy.yap@anu.edu.au nicholas biddle th e australian national university recommended citation yap, m. , biddle, n. (2010). gender gaps in indigenous socioeconomic outcomes: australian regional comparisons and international possibilities. th e international indigenous policy journal, 1(2) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.2.3 this research is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. gender gaps in indigenous socioeconomic outcomes: australian regional comparisons and international possibilities abstract international literature clearly demonstrates the potential for gender-based inequalities to constrain development processes. in the united nations development programme gender-related development index, australia ranks in the top five across 177 countries, suggesting that the loss of human development due to gender inequality is minor. however, such analysis has not been systematically applied to the indigenous australian population, at least in a quantitative sense. using the 2006 australian census, this paper provides an analysis across three dimensions of socioeconomic disparity: indigeneity, gender, and geography. this paper also explores the development of a similar gender-related index as a tool to enable a relative ranking of the performance of indigenous males and females at the regional level across a set of socioeconomic outcomes. the initial findings suggest that although there is a substantial development gap between indigenous and non-indigenous australians, the development loss from gender-related inequality for indigenous australians is relatively small. higher life expectancy and education attainment for indigenous females balances out their slightly lower earnings to a large extent. at the regional level, indigenous females tend to fare better than indigenous males for the set of indicators chosen; and, this is particularly true in capital cities. keywords gender-based analysis, indigenous, australia, socioeconomic, life expectancy, educational attainment, income, human development index acknowledgments an earlier version of this paper was presented at the aboriginal policy research conference in ottawa. we thank participants at the conference for their useful feedback and the conference organisers for the opportunity to present our work. the authors are especially indebted to anne daly, janet hunt, boyd hunter, and john taylor for helpful insights and comments on an earlier draft. a number of organisations and individuals provided helpful feedback on an early draft of this work including officers of the standing committee for aboriginal and torres strait islander affairs (scatsia) and the productivity commission. the authors are especially grateful to gillian cosgrove for her detailed proofing and layout. last but not least, the authors would like to thank the two iipj referees for their time in providing constructive feedback. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ gender gaps in indigenous socioeconomic outcomes: australian regional comparisons introduction and background in many developing countries, gender disparity in the achievement of education and employment outcomes tends to hinder economic growth and improvements in the socioeconomic outcomes of the population (world bank 2001, 2003). the recognition of the role that gender can play is evident through the third millennium development goal, which is explicitly focused on promoting gender equality and empowering women, in terms of educational attainment (united nations secretariat 2008). the importance of considering gender has also led the united nations development programme (undp) to extend its human development index (hdi) to better capture the gender dimension of development through its gender-related development index (gdi) (undp 1995). the undp produces the hdi and gdi for 177 countries in their annual reporting of human development to rank countries based on achievements in life expectancy, adult literacy, school enrolments and earnings, with the latter noting differences in gender achievements across the aforementioned components. in 2008, an hdi score of 0.962 placed australia third amongst the 177 countries considered. australia also ranked second based on the gdi score (undp 2008). this suggests that, relative to other countries and at the national level, there is relatively little development loss in australia due to gender-based inequality, at least in the three components that are used to construct the index. however, the hdi and gdi scores mask large disparities within countries that go beyond gender-related disparities. similar to new zealand, canada and the united states, australia has a high ranking on the hdi, yet an indigenous population with a substantially lower life expectancy, lower literacy and education enrolment rates and lower employment. cooke et al. (2007) calculated an hdi score for indigenous australians for 2000–01 that would give the 1 yap and biddle: gender gaps in indigenous socioeconomic outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2010 population a rank of 103, analogous to a medium human development country (and a gap of 0.184 in favour of the non-indigenous population). the evidence concerning the disadvantaged circumstances faced by the indigenous population is well documented in australia (altman 2000; altman, biddle & hunter 2008; daly & hawke 1994; scrgsp 2005, 2007). however, the gender differences within the indigenous community have received far less attention, despite the fact that in many parts of the world indigenous women are among the most marginalised groups, suffering discrimination on the basis of both their sex and ethnicity (banda & chinkin 2004). in canada, on the other hand, the hdi and gdi has been adapted for the registered indian population with the results suggesting that women are outperforming men in knowledge acquisition, but still falling behind in the income component. this finding is true across all age groups with relative improvements in the outcomes of women over time due to rising educational attainment (guimond & cooke 2008; cooke 2007). the gdi has also been replicated at the regional level for the total population in australia (basu & basu 2005), with the authors finding that, with the exception of new south wales, men outperformed women in the relevant indicators across the remaining seven states and territories. the differences were not, however, consistently large. gender-based research for the indigenous population in australia tends to be anthropological or historical in its focus (white 1974; bell 1983; merlan 1988). in general, what the literature shows is a complex evolution of gender roles and relationships over time. in particular, the traditional role of men as providers has been affected as power relations change following contact with settler australia (hamilton, 1975). the main debate has revolved around 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 2 [2010], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.2.3 the shift from men to women as key economic providers as dependence on transfer payments from the state has supplemented customary economic activity. mccormack (2006) observes indigenous men in one particular remote community have been displaced, losing their role as the provider and surrendering their hunter-gather lifestyle, while women have taken over the role of provider with the introduction of the welfare economy. however, merlan (1988) citing altman (1982) observed that women’s gathering roles in remote areas have declined greatly since the introduction of staple carbohydrates, while men’s hunting productivity has been vastly enhanced by the introduction of appropriate technology. notwithstanding whether the evolution of gender roles have benefitted one gender or the other, it is clear that the gender roles and relationships have evolved. one factor that underpins or at least is related to the changing roles of indigenous men and women is the much greater level of education participation and attainment amongst the latter. in the mid-1990s, a greater proportion of indigenous males than females had either completed high school or had a post-school qualification (abs 1995). as shown later in this paper, by the time of the 2006 australian census this situation had been reversed with indigenous females having an educational advantage over their male counterparts. this has had the effect of substantially altering the relative development options available to the two groups. the results presented in basu & basu (2005) point to a third dimension of socioeconomic difference within a country, namely geography. while the authors focused on state-by-state comparisons for the total population only, there is consistent evidence within australia of substantial variation of socioeconomic outcomes of the indigenous population not only by region, but also by city, town, suburb, and even community. using a ‘location type’ classification and analysing data from the 2006 census, biddle (2009) found that indigenous 3 yap and biddle: gender gaps in indigenous socioeconomic outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2010 socioeconomic disadvantage was highest in remote parts of australia including remote towns, but especially town camps1 and remote dispersed settlements. indigenous australians in city areas, in contrast, had the most advantaged outcomes, with those in regional towns falling somewhere in-between. the main aim of this paper is to provide an analysis across all three dimensions of socioeconomic disparity within australia: indigeneity, gender and geography. international literature clearly demonstrates the potential for gender-based inequalities to constrain development processes. it has been shown that male and female children who grow up in unequal societies have worse health outcomes and are less likely to undertake schooling, than those where males and females have a similar status (unicef 2006). such insights have not been systematically applied to the indigenous australian population, at least in a quantitative sense. however, much policy is designed (or at least implemented) at the local or regional level, so it is important to identify the types of areas where indigenous males are doing relatively well compared to their female counterparts and, importantly, the types of areas where the reverse is true. a further aim of the paper is to outline a set of methodologies that will enable crossnational comparisons, especially between countries with similar institutions and, importantly, data collection strategies (for example australia, canada, new zealand, and the united states). we begin the analysis by calculating an hdi and gdi score for indigenous and non-indigenous australians. due to data limitations around life expectancy, this analysis is restricted to the australian indigenous and non-indigenous populations in aggregate, as well as the four jurisdictions with the largest indigenous populations (new south wales, queensland, western australia, and the northern territory). because it is not possible to calculate a gdi for lower 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 2 [2010], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.2.3 levels of geography, in the section that follows we propose a gender-related index for indigenous australians (grifia), which we estimate for 37 indigenous regions in australia.2 the final section of the paper provides some concluding comments and suggestions for future research. for all the analysis presented in this paper the main data source is the 2006 australian census of population and housing3. in addition, we use life expectancy estimates from the australian bureau of statistics (abs 2009) based on data for the 2005 to 2007 period. we focus on those respondents who identify as being indigenous (aboriginal, torres strait islander or both) and make comparisons with those respondents identifying as non-indigenous. those who do not state their indigenous status are excluded from the analysis.4 human development and gender-related development indices for indigenous australians due to its relative simplicity, the hdi and related gdi have been very useful in making cross-country and within-country comparisons of various populations. both indices summarise levels of development across three dimensions: life expectancy at birth; knowledge and education; and, standard of living. while the hdi was developed first, the two indices are linked through an inequality aversion parameter. as a number of the indicators used by the undp are not available for population sub-groups (for example gross domestic product per capita) or on the 2006 australian census, the first step in calculating the hdi and gdi is to identify proxies. we do so as follows: • life expectancy index – life expectancy at birth (le) from abs (2009). • education index – comprised of adult literacy (al) proxied by the per cent of the population aged 15 years and over who have completed year 10 or higher and gross enrolment (ge) proxied by the per cent of the population aged 15 to 24 years old 5 yap and biddle: gender gaps in indigenous socioeconomic outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2010 attending education. to create the education index (ei), al is weighted by 2/3 and ge by 1/3. • standard of living – median income (minc) for those employed. the next step in calculating the gdi and hdi is to establish a set of unit-free indices for each of the dimensions that range from zero to one. this is done by subtracting the minimum value for the variable from the observed value, and then dividing by the maximum value minus the minimum value. this is done separately for males and females as follows: 22.5 _ 82.5 22.5 27.5 _ 87.5 27.5 2 0 1 0 _ 3 100 0 3 100 0 0 _ 1000 0 male male female female le uf le le uf le al ge uf ei minc uf minc − = − − = − − − = + − − − = − the third step in calculating the hdi and gdi is to calculate an equally distributed index (edi) for each of the dimensions. using life expectancy as an example, and letting the male, female and total population for the particular subgroup be malepop , femalepop and totalpop respectively, the formula edi for both the hdi and gdi can be expressed using the following formula: ( ) ( ) ( ) 1 111 _ _ _femalemale male female total total poppop edi le uf le uf le pop pop εεε ε −−−⎛ ⎞ = +⎜ ⎟ ⎝ ⎠ 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 2 [2010], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.2.3 with no aversion to inequality( )0ε = , the edi is simply the arithmetic mean of the male and female values and equates to the hdi. with a mild aversion to inequality by gender ( )2ε = , the edi equates to the harmonic mean of the male and female values and equates to the gdi. the fourth step in calculating the hdi and gdi is to take an unweighted average of each of the edis. to put the results into context, the final step for this paper is to scale all the hdis and gdis such that the hdi for the australian non-indigenous population is equal to the value calculated by the undp for australia (0.965 in 2006). using the above methodology, the following table summarises the estimated hdi and gdi scores for australia and the four jurisdictions separately for the indigenous and nonindigenous population. that is, he larger the gap between the gdi and hdi, the greater the development loss due to inequality between genders. table 1. human development indices and gender development indices for indigenous and non-indigenous australians, 2006 indigenous non-indigenous jurisdiction hdi gdi gap hdi gdi gap australia 0.737 0.735 0.002 0.965 0.956 0.009 new south wales 0.773 0.771 0.002 0.974 0.966 0.008 queensland 0.761 0.759 0.002 0.95 0.941 0.01 western australia 0.712 0.71 0.002 0.987 0.97 0.017 northern territory 0.53 0.527 0.003 0.998 0.991 0.006 source: customised calculations from the 2006 census and abs (2009). 7 yap and biddle: gender gaps in indigenous socioeconomic outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2010 at the national level, the indigenous population had an hdi score of 0.737, a remarkably similar gap against the non-indigenous population to that found by cooke et al. (2007) using previous data. while the results are not strictly comparable due to the necessary use of proxy variable, it is interesting that in 2006 an hdi value of 0.737 would equate to a country rank of 105th, slightly higher than the syrian arab republic and the occupied palestinian territories, but slightly lower than fiji and sri lanka. the non-indigenous population living in western australia and the northern territory had the highest hdi scores across the four states, reflecting in part the mining sector in those two jurisdictions and the advantageous terms of trade at the time of the 2006 census. on the other hand, the indigenous population living in new south wales and queensland had the highest hdi scores, with the greatest disparity between the two populations in the northern territory. looking at the northern territory indigenous population, an hdi score of 0.530 equates to a ranking of 145th, equivalent to nepal and slightly above sudan and bangladesh. the gap between the non-indigenous gdi and hdi for australia was quite small (0.009), replicating the findings in undp (2008) and indicating a relatively high level of gender equality for the non-indigenous population. however, the gap between the gdi and hdi for the indigenous population was only 0.002, suggesting even lower gender-based inequality across the three dimensions considered in the index. traditionally, a gap between the gdi and hdi has been taken to demonstrate poor outcomes of females relative to males. this reflects the particular social and economic structure of the medium and least developed countries that the undp focuses much of its analysis on. however, as shown in table 2 below, the gap between the indigenous hdi and gdi is an indication of the relatively disadvantaged position of indigenous males compared to indigenous 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 2 [2010], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.2.3 females in the dimensions covered. in this table, the components of the gdi and hdi are presented separately for indigenous males and females and by jurisdiction. table 2. development indicators for indigenous males and females, 2006 life expectancya literacy proxyb enrolment proxyb gdp proxyb (yrs) (%) (%) ($) jurisdiction male female male female male female male femal e australia 67.2 72.9 64.4 68.2 29.1 32.4 565.3 477.8 new south wales 69.9 75 64 67.3 33 36.7 616.5 506.5 queensland 68.3 73.6 70.9 75.3 29.2 33.5 565.2 472.8 western australia 65 70.4 68.5 73.1 24.4 25.2 529.1 448.6 northern territory 61.5 69.2 38.8 41.4 15.9 17.3 268.1 352.8 source: a. abs (2009). b. customised calculations from the 2006 census. as can be seen from table 2, for all jurisdictions, males have lower life expectancy, lower literacy (proxied by year 10 completion) and lower levels of education participation. at the national level, employed females have slightly lower median income than employed males, 9 yap and biddle: gender gaps in indigenous socioeconomic outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2010 partly reflecting their greater incidence of part-time employment. in the northern territory, however, employed females had a higher median income than employed males. a gender-related index for indigenous australians one of the key findings from table 1 was the apparently small development loss from gender-related inequality for the indigenous australian population relative to both the nonindigenous population and other countries internationally (undp 2008). furthermore, the gender disparity that does exist is mainly due to lower life expectancy and education attendance/attainment for males relative to females. however, two of the criticisms of the gdi are that the conclusions hold true only for the three dimensions included in the index and that it masks substantial variation within countries. the true level of gender-related inequality may be much greater than that suggested by the gdi. over the remainder of this paper an alternative gender-related index for indigenous australians (grifia) is constructed with a greater range of input variables and at a more disaggregated level of geography. the variables considered for inclusion in the index5 are listed in table 3 alongside the average values for indigenous males and females across australia in 2006 with the indigenous region boundaries and labels given in figure 1. variables used to construct the table 3. grifia variable males (%)a females (%)a ratiob year 12 as highest year of schooling 17.99 20.56 0.88 did not go to school 3.71 3.37 1.1 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 2 [2010], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.2.3 degree as non-school qualifications 2.54 4.5 0.56 children engaged in preschool 51.19 48.8 1.05 managerial or professional occupation 13.7 20.01 0.68 employment to population percentage 51.18 40.41 1.27 core activity restriction 2.16 2.17 1 individual income less than $250 per week 52.77 49.19 1.07 individual income more than $1000 per week 9.59 4.89 1.96 notes: a. standard deviations in parentheses. b. a ratio greater than 1 = males are more likely to report that characteristic; a ratio less than 1 = females are more likely to report that characteristic. source: authors’ calculations using the abs census of population and housing 2006. 11 yap and biddle: gender gaps in indigenous socioeconomic outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2010 fig. 1. indigenous region structure, 2006 applying a similar methodology to that used by the abs (2006) in the construction of socio-economic indexes for areas (seifa) indices and by biddle (2009) for the indigenous population as a whole, this study summarises the variables of interest using principal component 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 2 [2010], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.2.3 analysis (pca). the analysis presented in this paper uses indigenous regions as the unit of analysis, with the per cent of the population reporting each of the characteristics used to construct a correlation matrix. pca is then applied to summarise the set of variables into a single index. two versions of the grifia were created. the first involves creating two separate indices, one for males and one for females. this first index, grifia(i), shows how the distribution of indigenous males and females differs across indigenous regions. the second index, grifia(ii), involves pooling both indigenous males and females together to create a single ranking that allows the outcomes of indigenous males in a particular region to be compared to their female counterparts. for both indices, the first component of the pca is used to rank the indigenous region.6 the loading that is used to construct this rank is the correlation between the component and the variable for each region. the sign of the loading indicates whether the variable contributes positively or negatively to regional outcomes, with the size of the loading (absolute value) indicating the strength of the correlation. if that strength is low it means the component is not highly correlated with the variable, suggesting the removal of the variable will not affect the overall explanatory power of the model. variables which had a loading in absolute value of less than 0.3 were removed. it should be kept in mind that this is an area-based analysis and not an individual-based analysis. there is likely to be substantial diversity across individuals within regions. table 4 outlines the loadings on the first component from each of the pcas. the final line of the table gives the percentage of the total variation across all the retained variables explained by this component. 13 yap and biddle: gender gaps in indigenous socioeconomic outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2010 table 4. loadings and eigenvalues for the grifia grifia(i) grifia(ii) variable males females males and females employment to population 0.23 0.35 0.22 year 12 completion 0.43 0.41 0.45 degree or equivalent qualifications 0.4 0.42 0.42 managers and professionals 0.36 0.3 0.31 did not attend schooling -0.36 -0.33 -0.38 individual income less than $250 per week -0.43 -0.41 -0.45 individual income more than $1000 per week 0.44 0.39 0.33 variance explained 0.62 0.68 0.57 note: preschool enrolment, core activity restriction and private sector employment were excluded from the pca as their loadings were less than 0.30. the employment to population percentages were maintained for the male index as well as the index for males and females together to maintain consistency with the female index, where it had a value greater than 0.3. source: authors’ calculations using the abs census of population and housing 2006. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 2 [2010], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.2.3 the first component explains about 62 per cent of the variation in indigenous males and 68 per cent of the variation in indigenous females (table 4). of the variables in the model, for both indigenous males and females separately, and in the pooled dataset, education as denoted by completing year 12 and possessing a degree qualification had the highest positive correlation with the grifia, whereas individual income of less than $1,000 per month had highest negative correlation. for indigenous females, possessing a degree qualification was also the most dominant factor contributing to the rank of the indigenous regions. after undertaking the pca, indigenous regions are ranked from 1–37 for the relative ranking (grifia(i)) and 1–74 for the absolute ranking (grifia(ii) – combining males and females). for both indices, a ranking of 1 refers to the region with the most favourable outcomes. the difference between the rankings for indigenous males and females is also calculated. for the relative rankings, a negative difference means that indigenous males in that region are at a more favourable part of the distribution than indigenous females. a positive difference of course means the opposite. for the absolute ranking, the difference indicates the extent to which males rank worse when compared directly to indigenous females in the area (rather than just by distribution). table 5. relative and absolute ranking for indigenous outcomes across indigenous regions (grifia), 2006 relative ranka absolute ranka difference indigenous region males females males females relative absolute queanbeyan 12 9 29 15 3 14 15 yap and biddle: gender gaps in indigenous socioeconomic outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2010 bourke 27 26 52 46 1 6 coffs harbour 14 13 31 20 1 11 sydney 3 3 7 5 0 2 tamworth 23 24 49 41 -1 8 wagga wagga 20 20 43 36 0 7 dubbo 21 22 47 37 -1 10 melbourne 2 2 3 4 0 -1 non-met. victoria 13 16 28 27 -3 1 brisbane 4 4 6 8 0 -2 cairns 15 11 30 17 4 13 mt isa 19 23 39 42 -4 -3 cape york 28 28 56 53 0 3 rockhampton 11 15 25 26 -4 -1 roma 16 17 33 32 -1 1 torres strait 6 7 14 10 -1 4 townsville 10 14 22 21 -4 1 adelaide 9 8 23 12 1 11 ceduna 26 18 54 34 8 20 port augusta 30 31 61 59 -1 2 perth 5 5 11 9 0 2 broome 24 12 50 24 12 26 kununurra 31 32 64 62 -1 2 narrogin 18 21 38 40 -3 -2 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 2 [2010], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.2.3 south hedland 17 27 35 55 -10 -20 derby 32 29 65 60 3 5 kalgoorlie 25 30 51 57 -5 -6 geraldton 22 25 48 45 -3 3 tasmania 8 10 18 19 -2 -1 alice springs 29 19 58 44 10 14 jabiru 33 35 68 66 -2 2 katherine 34 33 69 63 1 6 apatula 37 37 74 71 0 3 nhulunbuy 36 36 73 70 0 3 tennant creek 35 34 72 67 1 5 darwin 7 6 16 13 1 3 act 1 1 2 1 0 1 note: a. indigenous regions are ranked from 1–37 for the relative ranking and 1–74 for the absolute ranking (combining males and females), with 1 having on average the most favourable outcomes. source: authors’ calculations using the abs census of population and housing 2006. reading across the first line of results in table 5, we can see, for example, that relative to indigenous males in other indigenous regions, those in queanbeyan rank 12th out of 37. relative to others, however, those indigenous females located in queanbeyan ranked 9th. when outcomes for indigenous males and indigenous females in queanbeyan are aggregated together, however, indigenous males rank 29th out of the 74 observations and indigenous females 15th. 17 yap and biddle: gender gaps in indigenous socioeconomic outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2010 in terms of the relative ranking, the results suggest that indigenous males and females in the capital cities have the most favourable outcomes, with indigenous males and indigenous females ranked at the top of the distribution of their respective group. the main variables driving this are the high year 12 completions and the high proportion of the population with degree qualifications in these cities. in the capital cities, there is very little difference in the relative ranking of males compared to females. however, the regions where indigenous males rank relatively poorly compared to the distribution of indigenous females are broome, alice springs, and ceduna. in these areas, indigenous males tend neither to have completed year 12, nor have a degree qualification – two components that are dominant factors in explaining the index for both males and females. at the other end of the spectrum, indigenous males are faring relatively well in south hedland, kalgoorlie, mount isa, rockhampton, and townsville. in these places, there is higher male employment to population percentages, compared to indigenous males in other regions. for the pooled ranking, indigenous males and females living in capital cities also have the most favourable outcomes, with the exception of indigenous males in adelaide. indigenous males appear to be faring better than indigenous females in kalgoorlie and south hedland. this is largely driven by more indigenous males than females being employed in these areas. there is also a higher proportion of indigenous males earning more than $1000 per week and a lower proportion of indigenous males compared to indigenous females earning less than $250 per week. the pooled ranking also suggests that indigenous females are better off than indigenous males in cairns, dubbo, and wagga wagga. this is a consequence of much fewer indigenous 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 2 [2010], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.2.3 males having degree qualifications (or higher), especially in dubbo and cairns, as well as fewer indigenous males completing year 12 compared to indigenous females in these regions. it is also evident that indigenous males and females living in the central and northern part of australia tend to fall into the fourth quartile (including katherine, apatula, kunnunurra, and tennant creek). this is mainly a result of lower educational attainment and a higher proportion of indigenous males and females earning less than $250 per week. those indigenous males and females in capital cities, in contrast, both tend to rank in the top quartile. ultimately, what this shows is that, while gender differences are important, the outcomes of the indigenous population as a whole cannot be ignored. summary and implications socioeconomic disparities across three dimensions in australia (indigeneity, gender, and geography) are clearly evident in this paper. firstly, the lower hdi scores for the indigenous population reflect a large gap at the national level in education attainment, life expectancy, and income level. while the non-indigenous population was ranked in the top few countries worldwide, a score of 0.737 would indicate indigenous australians have similar human development levels to fiji and sri lanka. there are, however, variations across the different jurisdictions. while the hdi scores vary only marginally between the four jurisdictions for the non-indigenous population, the hdi score for the indigenous population living in new south wales are 0.207 higher than that of those living in the northern territory. the gap in socioeconomic outcomes between the indigenous and non-indigenous population is also widest in the northern territory. the gender differences within the two populations are also highlighted across the range of demographic and socioeconomic variables. the gap between the gdi and hdi reflects the 19 yap and biddle: gender gaps in indigenous socioeconomic outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2010 loss of human development from gender-related inequality. the smaller gap between the hdi and gdi for the indigenous population suggests that there was small development loss from gender-related inequality relative to the non-indigenous population using these indicators. yet, the lived reality of the population and the diversity of individual experiences may suggest otherwise. the gdi and hdi only consider three aspects of the gender differences between the two populations. one of the beauties of the hdi and the gdi is their simplicity and, while a more encompassing index with a greater range of input variables may tell a different story, it is important to first establish the results using these two widely used and understood indices. one of the major limitations of the analysis in this paper is that the ranking holds true only for the set of variables used to create the indices. if a different set of variables were included, a different picture might emerge. for example, in this paper, the education component of the index was the dominant factor. as a result, the better performance of indigenous females as measured by education indicators placed indigenous women higher in the rankings compared to indigenous males. future work will consider the distribution of indigenous male and female outcomes across a much wider range of indicators. notwithstanding such limitations, the methodology employed in this paper, while relatively simple, provides a useful starting point for the development of international, crosscountry comparisons of indigenous males and females. furthermore, the results highlight the importance of looking at, within country variation, a finding that should be considered in other settings. the most obvious set of analyses would be across the four large, english-speaking settler countries – australia, canada, new zealand, and the united states. while the indigenous populations of these countries have very different characteristics and histories of colonisation, 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 2 [2010], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.2.3 the institutional alignment across the countries opens up a number of interesting questions. furthermore, a similar data collection strategy (especially with regards to their respective censuses) means that any differences identified are likely to be real, rather than driven by methodological variation. the development loss from indigenous disadvantage in these countries has been shown to be consistently large. the extent to which this is being driven by gender inequality is a research question of ongoing policy relevance. 21 yap and biddle: gender gaps in indigenous socioeconomic outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2010 notes 1. town camps are generally special purpose lease areas within remote urban centres that are designated as aboriginal community living areas. they have a very large indigenous population (in proportionate terms) alongside little or no infrastructure or amenities. 2. the indigenous region classification is the least disaggregated level of geography in the australian indigenous geographic classification (aigc) system created by the australian bureau of statistics (abs). 3. while the census remains the key source of data for comparisons between the indigenous and non-indigenous populations of australia, the substantial undercount discussed by taylor and biddle (2008) should be kept in mind when interpreting results. in particular, morphy (2008) shows that the individuals most likely to be missed by the census are highly mobile, young indigenous males. this means that the observed educational advantage of indigenous females may be even larger than suggested by standard census outputs. 4. there are a number of differences between the australian census and other collections internationally that should be kept in mind when interpreting the results. first, there is no shortform and long-form questionnaire with all respondents essentially being asked the same set of questions. while this boosts the available sample size, the drawback is a more limited set of questions available for analysis. second, indigenous status on the australian census is completely self-identified. 5. while life expectancy is an important indicator, at present the best available information on life expectancy from the abs is experimental and is only available at the national or state level. instead, the percentage of the population with a core activity restriction is used as a proxy for poor health. core activity restriction refers to those people needing assistance in one or more of 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 2 [2010], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.2.3 the three core activity areas of self care, mobility, and communication (because of a long-term health condition, disability, or old age). 6. the first component of the pca explained the largest amount of variation in the original variables (68%) and therefore is used as the index. while the eigenvalue for the second component was greater than 1, the common cut-off used in pca (darlington 1997), the difference was substantial enough between the first and second components to justify the use of only one component. 23 yap and biddle: gender gaps in indigenous socioeconomic outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2010 references altman, j.c. 1982 “hunter-gatherers and the state: the economic anthropology of the gunwinggu of northern australia”. phd thesis, australian national university. ________. 2000. “the economic status of indigenous australians.” caepr discussion paper no. 193. canberra: centre for aboriginal economic policy research, the australian national university. ______, n. biddle and b.h. hunter. 2008. “how realistic are the prospects for ‘closing the gaps’ in socioeconomic outcomes for indigenous australians?” caepr discussion paper no. 287. canberra: centre for aboriginal economic policy research, the australian national university. indian and northern affairs canada. 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(2013). evaluation of aboriginal programs: what place is given to participation and cultural sensitivity?. th e international indigenous policy journal, 4(2) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.1 evaluation of aboriginal programs: w hat place is given to participation and cultural sensitivity? abstract aboriginal populations in northern canada have, for many years, been confronted with socio-economic problems affecting their development. in the early 1990s, the royal commission on aboriginal peoples (1996) report concluded that it was important to integrate aboriginal people into the management of public policies that concern them and to encourage their autonomy. in order to produce a quality evaluation that is useful in particular cultural contexts, measures have been developed to assure that the evaluation highly regards cultural sensitivity while integrating local participants in the evaluation process. this study, based on the systematic analysis of a non-probability sample of 27 program evaluation reports, presents an inventory of evaluation practice in aboriginal contexts and estimates in what measure a culturally sensitive and participatory approach was applied. it was apparent that cultural sensitivity is gradually being integrated into aboriginal program evaluation and that certain indicators show that there has been a positive evolution in this direction. finally, the study shows an occasional recourse to participatory approaches, but this is not a strong tendency as systematically technocratic approaches are more broadly employed. keywords program evaluation, cultural sensitivity, culturally-competent evaluation, participatory evaluation, aboriginal governance, aboriginal program evaluation in canada acknowledgments the authors would like to thank the social sciences and humanities research council of canada (sshrc), which sponsored our research. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ e v a l u a t i o n o f a b o r i g i n a l p r o g r a m s : w h a t p l a c e i s g i v e n t o p a r t i c i p a t i o n a n d c u l t u r a l s e n s i t i v i t y ? c o n t e x t a n d r e s e a r c h p r o b l e m aboriginal people of canada have, for a long time, been confronted with major socioeconomic problems that constitute a hindrance to their development and the blossoming of their communities. on this subject, numerous statistics indicate that aboriginal people are disproportionally affected by school drop-out, problems related to drug and alcohol use, delinquency, and domestic violence in comparison with the rest of the canadian population (health canada, 1998). in the north, these persistent difficulties, which can be explained by specific environmental, economic, politico-historical, and cultural conditions, make the governance of northern canada a major issue for the federal government (institute on governance, 2011). meanwhile, as banting and kymlicka (2010) explained, canada’s multicultural diversity necessarily implies flexibility, prudence, and openness in governance on the part of the federal government. diversity policies in canada today typically operate within three distinct “silos,” with separate laws, constitutional provisions, and government departments dealing with multiculturalism in response to ethnic diversity arising from immigration; federalism and bilingualism in response to the french fact; and aboriginal rights for first nations. (p. 63) the royal commission on aboriginal peoples (rcap), held at the beginning of the 1990s in the wake of the oka crisis and rejection of the meech lake accord, permitted canadians to truly take into consideration the challenges and weaknesses concerning their relationship with aboriginal people. conducted by members of first nations communities and renowned jurists, the basic approach of the rcap (1996) was based on canadian historical data and calibration measures developed in other countries to help better understand relationships with aboriginal peoples. the study demonstrated that the government of canada needs to become more aware of the knowledge of aboriginal peoples and underlined the relevance of changing the existing power relationship in order to permit aboriginal peoples to participate in both reflection and the decision-making process regarding issues that concern them. moreover, in january 1998, in response to the conclusions of the rcap, the canadian government produced a document entitled, gathering strength, which consisted of a strategic plan of action to address the new priorities established for aboriginal peoples. notably, the plan suggests that: the development of stronger relationships with aboriginal organizations is critical to improving the design, development, and delivery of programs and policies; programs designed to strengthen aboriginal governance are dedicated to enabling aboriginal communities to make the transition to stable and accountable self-government. (indian affairs and northern development [iand], 2000, p. 5) following the conclusion of the rcap, the virtues of a consultative process that favours greater autonomy for aboriginal peoples has gained more and more recognition in research on aboriginal governance. as underlined by abele in reference to policies in matters of aboriginal health, on the one hand, it helps aboriginal people to familiarize themselves with the workings of the canadian political system and to formulate an opinion; on the other hand, this collaboration 1 jacob and desautels: evaluation of aboriginal programs published by scholarship@western, 2013 helps managers to familiarize themselves with the culture, the beliefs and the specific needs of aboriginal peoples in matters of health, which opens a new era of collaboration. (cited in the institute for governance, 2011, p. 6) other work, including a study focusing specifically on the development of aboriginal communities in the northwest territories, also insists on the advantages of aboriginal autonomy. our rich cultural diversity, combined with our history, has led to a unique and fairly complex system of governance. while the implementation of self-government agreements will add to the complexity of the system, it is important to the achievement of aboriginal peoples’ aspirations. it is also a critical step toward building a solid foundation for the territories’ political, social, cultural, and economic development. (northwest territories government, 2004, p. 5) in this way, whether in gathering strength or in the literature on aboriginal governance, we observe awareness and a change in attitudes relating to the relationship between aboriginal peoples and the government of canada. notably, the new “paradigm” prioritizes local participation and cultural sensitivity; two governance issues that are no stranger to the domain of program evaluation. in this regard, jacob and daigneault (2011) confirm that in order to act on the will for participatory governance, it will be necessary to review the evaluative process in order to integrate the maximum number of stakeholders, which will require use of a more systematic, participatory evaluation. indeed, apart from an aboriginal context, participatory evaluation has developed based on three distinct but complementary aims, including: (a) improving evaluation use; (b) favouring social justice and democratic representation; and (c) strengthening the validity of an evaluation’s conclusions. first, participatory evaluation is presented as an answer to the recurring problem of under-used evaluation. for example, elected and public managers ignore reports produced by evaluators when the time comes to make program decisions (patton, 2008). in response to this weakness, many authors have claimed that the integration of participants (either somewhat or greatly affected by the program and its evaluation) favours the use of results (briedenhann & butts, 2005; cousins & earl, 1992, 1995; cousins & whitmore, 1998; jacob, bélanger, & ouvrard, 2011; patton, 2008; wholey, 1994). this collaboration contributes to the orientation of evaluation, selection of an adequate methodology, and, ultimately, to the production of results matching the expectations of involved parties and, therefore, greater use of the results (burke, 1998; cousins & shulha, 2006; patton, 2008). second, participatory evaluation can present a fundamentally political orientation by giving a voice to participants traditionally left outside the process. the motivation behind participatory evaluation, which notably finds its incarnation through “empowerment evaluation,” involves a redefinition of the role of the evaluator who then becomes a facilitator. this favours the success of the evaluation project (eliadis, furubo, & jacob, 2011; fetterman, 2000), the idea being to permit participants to develop their skills relating to evaluation, emancipate themselves in relation to the program, and, eventually, reach self-determination (fetterman et al., 1995; macaulay et al., 1997). the third motivation of participatory evaluation is epistemological. participation is considered a medium by which to mobilize the knowledge of the involved parties, which translates into an evaluation strongly guided by the true needs of the program and leads to more valid, trustworthy, and representative conclusions (brandon, 1998; cousins & earl, 1992, 1995; cousins & whitmore, 1998). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 2 [2013], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.1 participatory evaluation is not the only evaluative approach that focuses on public interest and integrating different stakeholders (alkin & christie, 2008), but it differs from other approaches, notably due to its attention to empowerment. thus, in the context of aboriginal governance, where the ties between the central government and the local authorities are particularly fragile, participatory evaluation sets itself apart from other evaluative processes in that it promotes the sharing of knowledge and development of evaluative skills to the benefit of the program’s decision-makers (rossman, 2000). in fact, participatory evaluation helps to give a voice to actors whose views are not traditionally echoed in aboriginal governance. specifically, in participatory evaluation, “participants determine the evaluation’s focus, design and outcomes within their own socioeconomic, cultural and political environments” (zukoski & luluquisen, 2002). it is from this perspective that this type of assessment differs from traditional approaches. it is in line with the document, gathering strength, in that it encourages citizen empowerment and, ultimately, contributes to the development of aboriginal autonomy. as stated by putnam, measures of participation in civic associations and political life point to similar conclusions. engagement in civic associations has been celebrated as a means of building trust and enhancing the capacity for collective action in contemporary democracies. (cited in banting & kymlicka, 2010, p. 56) culturally sensitive evaluation (culturally competent evaluation), which has much in common with participatory evaluation, was developed as a way to favour the quality and precision of evaluation in different cultural milieus (chouinard & cousins, 2007). this recent interest in culture flows, based on several observations, underlines the difficulties relating to the development of unique and universal research frameworks (barbier & hawkins, 2012; chouinard & cousins, 2007; guba & lincoln, 2005). this approach accentuates the fact that evaluators need to show evidence of a very particular sensitivity regarding local culture so as to maximize their understanding of the context (ebbutt, 1998; smith, 1990). as stated by sengupta, hopson, and thompson-robinson (2004), “more broadly, because values are so integral to culture they are also integral to cultural dimensions of program design” (p. 8). recognizing the importance of the cultural context in evaluation, the american evaluation association (aea) has published a formal declaration on the cultural competence in the context of the evaluation. now, the cultural competence of the evaluator or the evaluation team is no longer a suggestion, but rather a professional and ethical obligation in order to produce evaluation: “to ensure recognition, accurate interpretation, and respect for diversity, evaluators should ensure that the members of the evaluation team collectively demonstrate cultural competence” (aea, 2011). more precisely, the aea puts an emphasis on the skills of the evaluator or the team: the culturally competent evaluator (or evaluation team) must have specific knowledge of the people and place in which the evaluation is being conducted – including local history and culturally determined mores, values, and ways of knowing. the culturally competent evaluator draws upon a wide range of evaluation theories and methods to design and carry out an evaluation that is optimally matched to the context. in constructing a model or theory of how the evaluand operates, the evaluator reflects the diverse values and perspectives of key stakeholder groups. (aea, 2011, what is cultural competence?, para. 3) 3 jacob and desautels: evaluation of aboriginal programs published by scholarship@western, 2013 finally, the aea statement highlights the importance of cultural contextualization based on ethical principles, validity, and theory, criteria similar to the pragmatic, political, and epistemological dimensions of participatory evaluation. consequently, whether through training or involvement with key partners in the evaluation, an evaluator sensitive to the context helps to produce an evaluation that provides concrete results that are adapted to the expectations and interests of the parties concerned (friersen, hood, & hughes, 2002; mertens, 2008). sengupta et al. (2004), quoting madison, also observed the sensitivity to the cultural context by involving stakeholders at key moments in the evaluation, which can significantly modify the spectrum of analysis and effectiveness of the research: […] the most important role program participants can play is in the program design and planning, and preferably also in problem definition. she convincingly argues that problem definition, a core activity that drives ameliorative program development, is often a dominant culture’s interpretation of reality that perpetuates the myth of the deficit model. (p. 8) also, consideration of the context helps to avoid factual errors and, in this way, leads to even more valid conclusions (nelson-barber, lafrance, & trumbull, & aburto, 2005). as underlined by chouinard and cousins (2007), the unique cultural context of aboriginal evaluation has largely contributed to the development of this evaluative approach. in fact, any research grounded in solid contextual relevance will make for better or stronger conclusions. however, the specific canadian context, where aboriginal and non-aboriginal relationships have always been motivated by the will of members of the dominant culture to colonize aboriginal people in a paternalistic way, justifies the recourse to this evaluative approach (mckenzie, 1997; potvin, cargo, mccomber, delormier, & macaulay, 2003). this conclusion is consistent with the aea declaration in respect to the motivation to produce an evaluation that takes into account the cultural context: “in many minority and indigenous communities there is a history of inappropriate use of research or evaluation in ways that violated basic human rights. vigilance to securing the well-being of individuals and their communities is essential” (aea, 2011, cultural competence is an ethical imperative, para. 2). in this sense, using a culturally sensitive evaluation approach goes a long way to repairing the lack of trust that flows from this paternalistic approach. for their part, thomas and bellefeuille (2006), during the formative evaluation of the cross-cultural mental health program for aboriginal people, also remarked that canadian evaluation is not sufficiently inclusive of first nations peoples in spite of the fact that the will to involve them is there. the authors assume that traditional approaches are undergoing a mutation and that, gradually, aboriginal people are passing from the role of the evaluated to that of the evaluators: once understood more as the object of research, aboriginal peoples are increasingly being seen as researchers conducting research within aboriginal knowledge traditions, using aboriginal methodologies as well as methodologies drawn from interaction with non-aboriginal intellectual traditions. (thomas & bellefeuille, 2006, p. 10) it is possible to observe more and more examples of evaluations of aboriginal programs using participatory or culturally sensitive methods. the rarity of empirical studies on the subject demonstrates an opening for potential research: “we need greater methodological and philosophical clarity surrounding the use of participatory and collaborative approaches to cross-cultural evaluation” (chouinard & cousins, 2007, p. 54). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 2 [2013], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.1 r e s e a r c h o b j e c t i v e s the objective of this article is to determine the consequences that arose from the conclusions of the rcap (1996), in the context of the evaluation of aboriginal programs. more precisely, it aims to verify how the principles of new aboriginal governance, notably those proposed in the document gathering strength, apply to aboriginal program evaluation in canada. the study examines how evaluation reports integrate participatory principles and those of cultural sensitivity. do we observe a true willingness to have aboriginal peoples participate in evaluations and, if so, how does this translate concretely? finally, do the evaluation reports present diverse elements attesting to an approach sensitive to aboriginal people’s cultural reality? t h e o r e t i c a l f r a m e w o r k a n a l y t i c a l g r i d f o r p a r t i c i p a t o r y e v a l u a t i o n daigneault and jacob (2009) have developed, following from the work of cousins and whitmore (1998), an analytical framework helping to conceptualize and measure the participatory nature of a given evaluation: the participatory evaluation measurement instrument (pemi). the pemi will help us to better understand aboriginal program evaluations: “the potential contribution of the framework for research is also important. a promising area of research relates to predicting and explaining the consequences of participatory approaches” (daigneault & jacob, 2009, p. 346). this instrument of conceptualization is a valuable tool to better understand the different dimensions of participatory evaluation and measurement. the measure of participatory evaluation is founded on three dimensions, including the diversity of participants, the scope of their involvement, and the real control that they exercise on the evaluation process. in this way, at the diversity level, we can denote four groups of actors potentially involved in the framework of a participatory evaluation: a. decision-makers and policy designers, b. those responsible for implementation and program delivery, c. direct and indirect beneficiaries, and others affected, and d. civil society and citizens. the diversity of actors is calculated on a scale from 0 to 1, where each group involved in the evaluation process is worth 0.25. if no group is represented, the evaluation receives a score of 0 for diversity. if a single group is represented, a score of 0.25 is given, and so on. the scope of involvement is related to the steps of the process in which the evaluation participants are potentially involved: a. the definition of issues and the development of evaluation questions, b. results collection and data analysis, c. judgement formulation and recommendations, and 5 jacob and desautels: evaluation of aboriginal programs published by scholarship@western, 2013 d. the report and the dissemination of results. to be considered participatory, an evaluation must integrate the participants in at least one of these four phases. in the fashion of participant diversity, the scope of the involvement is calculated on a scale from 0 to 1 where each step is valued at 0.25. the third and final dimension of participatory evaluation is control. this represents the real hand that participants may have in the framework of conducting an evaluation. this dimension, which is more difficult to operationalize than the two preliminary dimensions of participatory evaluation, is accessible in the following ways: a. exclusive control of the evaluator; b. limited control by the participants; c. control shared equally between, on the one hand, the evaluation participants and, on the other, the evaluator; d. substantial participant control; and e. exclusive control of the participants. the measure of this dimension only takes into consideration the steps where participation is involved. it is then logically possible to obtain a control score of 1, even if participation is limited to a single step. finally, in the case where the level of control varies from one step to another, it becomes necessary to determine a representative score for the control for evaluation as a whole, for example, by calculating the average of the different levels of control in order to arrive at a single value. therefore, it is in combining the results obtained in the three previously defined categories that we obtain the overall score and can determine if the evaluation is participatory or not and to what degree. the overall participation score represents the most trustworthy value obtained for one of the three measured dimensions. in this way, if one of the dimensions obtains 0.25, the overall participation score could not be superior to 0.25, regardless of the scores in the other dimensions1. c u l t u r a l s e n s i t i v i t y the second dimension of the study focuses on cultural sensitivity. it is a facet of evaluation relatively difficult to observe with a single reading of a report because there is no consensus on the definition of a culturally sensitive evaluation (guba & lincoln, 2005). that being said, the operationalization of the concept of culturally sensitive evaluation proposed by frierson et al. (2005) is no doubt the most complete. these authors have established a list of criteria to observe in order to guide the handling of this type of evaluation. these criteria are expressed in the various phases of the evaluative process: 1 the present study relies on the original version of the pemi (daigneault & jacob, 2009). the procedure to 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 2 [2013], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.1 a. preparing for the evaluation: given the important role of the evaluation team, care should be taken in selecting its members. those members, whenever possible, should be individuals who understand or who at least are clearly committed to being responsive to the cultural context in which the project is based. b. identifying the purpose(s) and intent of the evaluation: careful documentation of the implementation of program activities is critical to making sense of the subsequent summative evaluation results. c. framing the right questions: for an evaluation to be culturally responsive, it is critical that the questions of significant stakeholders have been heard and, where appropriate, addressed. d. collecting the data: consequently, when collecting qualitative data directly from individuals, e.g., via interviews or observations, if those who are collecting and recording the data are not attuned to the cultural context in which the program is situated, the collected data could be invalid. e. analyzing the data: having adequate understanding of cultural context when conducting an evaluation is important, but the involvement of evaluators who share a lived experience may be even more essential. the analyst of data gathered in a culturally diverse context may serve as an interpreter for evaluators who do not share a lived experience with the group being evaluated. to this end, a good strategy is the creation of review panels principally comprising representatives from stakeholder groups to examine evaluative findings gathered by the principal evaluator and/or an evaluation team. f. disseminating and utilizing the results: further, communications pertaining to the evaluation process and results should be presented clearly so that they can be understood by all of the intended audiences. (frierson et al., 2005, pp. 65 72) there are other ways to operationalize the principle of cultural sensitivity. for example, the rcap ensured that it conducted its research using an ethical code in matters of aboriginal research where the accent is placed on the importance of proving cultural sensitivity. this document explains that researchers must listen to aboriginal people, assuring that they get their say, that their points of view are heard, and that they have the right to see the conclusions of the research that concerns them (see rcap, 1996, appendix e). we can also return to the criteria proposed by the interagency advisory panel on research ethics (pre) of the research of the government of canada, which explains research that is sensitive to aboriginal culture needs to, notably, respect the culture, the traditions, and the knowledge of the aboriginal group; consult the members of the group with the appropriate expertise; and have the group participate in the conception of the project (canadian institutes of health research, natural sciences and engineering research council of canada, social sciences and humanities research council of canada, 1998). these are the criteria set out by frierson et al. (2005), as well as the rcap and the pre, which provided the theoretical framework that helped to develop a coding grid for the evaluation of aboriginal programs. the “instrument” section presents, in detail, the criteria retained for the ends of the report analysis. 7 jacob and desautels: evaluation of aboriginal programs published by scholarship@western, 2013 m e t h o d o l o g y d a t a s o u r c e s a n d s a m p l i n g examination of the levels of participation and cultural sensitivity was founded on a non-probability sample of evaluation reports that best represented the evaluation of aboriginal programs in canada. a report was considered to be “aboriginal” if it was produced in the public program evaluation framework in an aboriginal collective as defined by indian and northern affairs canada (inac) (2011)2. aboriginal collectives include: inuit collectives in nunavut, the northwest territories, the yukon, northern quebec (nunavik), and labrador; métis collectives; towns or municipalities that are not part of reserves or other traditional territory (for example, the aboriginal collective of winnipeg) (inac, 2011). in addition to the inac website, we consulted the websites of provincial and territorial governments and various private evaluation firms3 in canada to determine the outlines of the “population” of aboriginal evaluation reports. although the initial objective was to assemble diverse reports relating to the various levels of government represented (national, provincial, and territorial), it became obvious that inac was the most important player in these matters in canada, with more than 60 published reports since 2003. at first glance, given the exploratory nature of this study and the goal to draw an overall portrait of the practices used in aboriginal evaluation, it appeared a sample of 20 reports would be sufficient. however, in light of preliminary results, a supplementary sample round was conducted to improve the representativeness of the final sample. figure 1 illustrates the approach that led to the selection of the initial sample, while figure 2 illustrates complementary research. initially, the objective was to assemble a number of diverse reports according to the level of government concerned, year of publication, and type of evaluation (internal or external and summative or formative). because of the rarity of the reports issued from provincial and territorial governments, these selection criteria were applied uniquely in the case of the reports from inac. unlike the criteria applied in a qualitative manner, the selection process is similar to a stratified sample. on the surface, the sample seems to provide an adequate representation of program evaluations conducted in canada in an aboriginal context (table 1). the sample is composed of 27 evaluation reports on aboriginal programs (table 2). the majority of the reports retained were produced for the federal ministry, inac. for inac’s part, they frequently participated in the evaluation of programs in collaboration with external resources; this is why nearly a third of the reports are evaluations using both internal and external resources. another note about the sample is that the vast majority of reports retained present summative evaluations (74%). finally, a very large majority of reports were produced after 2005 (85%)4. 2 of note, the ministry of indian and northern affairs canada (inac) changed their name at the end of 2011 to the ministry of aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc). 3 we consulted the websites of eight evaluation firms suggested by the canadian evaluation society: goss gilroy, science-metrix, raymond chabot grant-thornton, capra international, universalia, johnson research, cathexis consulting inc., and harry cummings & associates inc. 4 the oldest retained evaluation report dates back to 2001. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 2 [2013], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.1 f i g u r e 1 . s a m p l e s e l e c t i o n p r o c e s s p h a s e 1 december 2010: research in the evaluation report section of the inac website (n = 66). december 2010: google search using the keywords “aboriginal evaluation,” “canadian aboriginal evaluation,” and “aboriginal evaluation”. read the 50 first entries for each of the keywords (n = 200). rejected reports on the inac website after having read the abstract (for reasons of being repetitive in terms of year and/or type of evaluation) (n = 40). entries rejected after analyzing the description on google because they were not evaluation reports (n = 190). reports from the inac website retained for a complete reading (n = 26). google entries retained from a detailed reading (n = 10). retained evaluations from the inac website (n = 16). retained evaluations from google (n = 4). reports rejected on the inac website because they were not relevant (program covered by another evaluation already selected or program similar to an already retained evaluation) (n = 10). reports rejected from google because they were not aboriginal program evaluations (the description was not sufficiently exhaustive to reject them at an earlier step) (n = 6). 9 jacob and desautels: evaluation of aboriginal programs published by scholarship@western, 2013 f i g u r e 2 . s a m p l e s e l e c t i o n p r o c e s s p h a s e 2 evaluations retained from the yukon, nunavut, and northwest territories websites (n = 5). evaluations retained from google (n = 2). reports retained from the yukon, nunavut, and northwest territories websites for a complete reading (n = 10). reports retained from google search for a detailed reading (n = 5). entries rejected following analysis of the research description from the websites for the yukon, nunavut, and the northwest territories since they were not evaluation reports (n = 90). entries rejected following the analysis of the research description in google because they were not evaluation reports (n = 145). february 2012: search using the keyword “evaluation” on the websites for the yukon (n = 3,050), northwest territories (n = 2,490), and nunavut (n = 0) territorial governments. read the first 50 results (n = 100). february 2012: new google search for different key words, such as “yukon evaluation” (n = 7,700,000), “northwest territories evaluation” (n = 1,253,000), “nunavut evaluation” (n = 2,620,000). read the first 50 results (n = 150). reports rejected from the websites of the yukon, nunavut, and northwest territories websites because they were not relevant (n = 5). reports rejected from google because they were either not aboriginal program evaluations or nonrelevant (n = 3). 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 2 [2013], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.1 t a b l e 1 . c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s o f t h e s a m p l e o f r e p o r t s l e v e l o f g o v e r n m e n t n u m b e r o f r e p o r t s % federal 18 67 nunavut 1 4 northwest territories 5 19 yukon 3 11 total 27 100 t y p e o f e v a l u a t i o n n u m b e r o f r e p o r t s % internal 4 15 external 15 55 mixed 8 30 total 27 100 t y p e o f e v a l u a t i o n n u m b e r o f r e p o r t s % summative 20 74 formative 7 26 total 27 100 p u b l i c a t i o n d a t e n u m b e r o f r e p o r t s % before 2005 4 15 from 2005 to 2009 11 41 since 2010 12 44 total 27 100 11 jacob and desautels: evaluation of aboriginal programs published by scholarship@western, 2013 t a b l e 2 . l i s t o f d o c u m e n t s i n s a m p l e evaluation number report 1 evaluation, performance measurement and review branch & cona, d. (2010). impact evaluation of treaty commissions. ottawa: indian and northern affairs canada. 2 evaluation, performance measurement and review branch of inac’s audit and evaluation sector. (2010). formative evaluation of the elementary/secondary education program on reserve. ottawa: indian and northern affairs canada. 3 evaluation, performance measurement and review committee. (2010). summative evaluation of the contribution for inuit counselling in the south. ottawa: indian and northern affairs canada. 4 hicks j., & akeeagok, d., wilson, c., & lovely, k. (2002). building nunavut through decentralization: evaluation report. iqaluit: nunavut executive and intergovernmental affairs. 5 departmental audit and evaluation branch assisted by rosemary trehearne and associates. (2005). evaluation of the family violence prevention program for first nations. ottawa: indian and northern affairs canada. 6 hanson g., lloyd, r., & lorimier, b. evaluation of the social housing program. (2004). whitehorse: yukon housing corporation and canada mortgage housing corporation. 7 engage strategies. (2010). program evaluation of temporary assignment activity between yukon first nations and the government of yukon 2006 2009. whitehorse: workplace diversity employment office government du yukon. 8 kpmg. (2001). evaluation of the p3 pilot initiative: final report. yellowknife: government of the northwest territories. 9 dpra canada in collaboration with t. k. gussman associates. (2009). evaluation of community-based healing initiatives supported through the aboriginal healing foundation. ottawa: indian and northern affairs canada. 10 tns canada facts, & harvey mccue consulting. (2010). formative evaluation of the postsecondary education program. ottawa: indian and northern affairs canada. 11 evaluation, performance measurement and review branch, & external consultants. (2008). evaluation of the implementation of inac's gender-based analysis (gba) policy. ottawa: indian and northern affairs canada. 12 evaluation, performance measurement and review branch. (2009). evaluation of the advocacy and public information program. ottawa: indian and northern affairs canada. 13 centre for public management inc., & evaluation, performance measurement and review branch. the report was written by t. k. gussman associates inc. (2010). summative evaluation of the capital facilities and maintenance program. ottawa: indian and northern affairs canada. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 2 [2013], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.1 evaluation number report 14 evaluation, performance measurement and review branch audit and evaluation sector. (2010). evaluation of grants for the promotion of fire protection awareness in band and federally operated schools. ottawa: indian and northern affairs canada. 15 pra inc. (2010). summative evaluation of the contributions made to indian bands for the registration administration. ottawa: indian and northern affairs canada. 16 centre for public management. (2010). implementation evaluation of the first nation infrastructure fund. ottawa: indian and northern affairs canada. 17 consortium of goss gilroy inc., & hollett and sons. (2011). evaluation of the miawpukek first nation grant agreement. ottawa: indian and northern affairs canada. 18 evaluation, performance measurement and review branch. (2008). evaluation of inac's contaminated sites management policy and programming. ottawa: indian and northern affairs canada. 19 human resources and social development canada. (2007). evaluation of the national child benefit reinvestments initiative. ottawa: indian and northern affairs canada. 20 unidentified consulting firm. (2009). evaluation of the first nations schoolnet program. ottawa: indian and northern affairs canada. 21 wildeor wildlife research & consulting. (2008). evaluation of the klondike soft gold program. whitehorse: yukon department of environment. 22 zapf, m. k. (2004). an evaluation of the whole child project. whitehorse: rcmp national youth strategy. 23 departmental audit and evaluation branch, & goss gilroy. (2005). evaluation of the cultural/education centres program. ottawa: indian and northern affairs canada. 24 terriplan consultants. (2009). territorial medical travel program northwest territories evaluation. yellowknife: steering committee pan evaluation northern medical travel programs. 25 j. carey consulting evaluation plus ltd. (2010). nwmog project summative evaluation. yellowknife: status of women council of the northwest territories. 26 r. a. malatest & associates ltd. (2011). evaluation of the protection against family violence act. yellowknife: department of justice, nwt. 27 evaluation directorate strategic policy and research branch human resources and skills development canada. (2009). summative evaluation of the employment benefits and support measures delivered under the canada-nwt labour market development agreement. retrieved from http://www.ece.gov.nt.ca/files/tab%205_nwt%20lmda%20%20sum%20evaluation%20report_eng%20w%20mr.pdf 13 jacob and desautels: evaluation of aboriginal programs published by scholarship@western, 2013 i n s t r u m e n t the analysis of the reports follows a coding system with the help of a grid that is divided into three distinct sections. the first section of the grid makes reference to more general aspects of the evaluation reports: a. report’s year of publication, b. internal or external evaluation, c. summative or formative evaluation, d. the ministry that implemented the evaluated program, and e. the level of government (federal, provincial, or territorial). this first section of the grid presents the descriptive characteristics of the evaluation reports that were retained for the sample. the second section of the coding grid helped us to judge the integration of the principles of culturally sensitive evaluation into the evaluations. these principles included, notably, if the evaluators were from the aboriginal community, familiar with the evaluated program, had received any particular training to better understand aboriginal culture, and whether members of the aboriginal community were involved when the objective was defined. the research questions were then drafted and the results analyzed. also, this grid permitted us to determine whether the evaluated program was well documented and if there were recommendations specific to the evaluated program’s beneficiaries and aboriginal authorities. finally, the third coding section measures the participatory nature of the evaluations with the help of a tool developed by daigneault and jacob (2009). the tool was used in the manner outlined in the theoretical section. thus, for each report, we identified the different participants, identified in which evaluative phases they were involved, and established the overall control they exerted on the evaluative process. assigning a score (from 0 to 1) for each dimension, we were able to establish an overall participation score for all reports in the sample. c o l l e c t i o n a n d a n a l y s i s p r o c e d u r e s the second author, in consultation with the first author when necessary, performed the coding. to assure the reliability and the validity of the results, we followed a three-step coding process. a first reading allowed the author to become familiar with the style and content of the reports in the sample. during this stage, no notes were taken; the only objective was to understand the context of the evaluation. the coding grid was then rigorously applied to each of the evaluation reports during second reading. the objective was to identify all the information necessary to complete the grid. after reading and re-reading a report, if the necessary information proved to be missing, we reported it as not available. finally, a few weeks after the first coding was done, each report was the object of a second round of coding, which was compared to the first. this “test-retest” validation procedure aimed to assure the stability of the coding over time. coding took an average of 6.5 hours for each of the reports (4.5 hours for the first round of coding and 2 hours for the second). it is important to point out that certain elements, such as the members of the evaluation team, justification of the methodological choices, and progress of the evaluation, were not always presented in the evaluation reports. this observation also 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 2 [2013], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.1 reflects findings of the treasury board secretariat in its examination of the quality of federal evaluations (cited in daigneault, 2010). r e s u l t s s e n s i t i v i t y t o a b o r i g i n a l c u l t u r e does aboriginal program evaluation in canada accord particular attention to the cultural realities of aboriginal people? table 3 presents the principal indicators of cultural sensitivity and their application to the reports in the sample. t a b l e 3 . p o r t r a i t o f a n a l y z e d r e p o r t s – s e n s i t i v i t y t o a b o r i g i n a l c u l t u r e c r i t e r i a o f s e n s i t i v i t y t o a b o r i g i n a l c u l t u r e n u m b e r o f r e p o r t s w h e r e t h e c r i t e r i a i s m e n t i o n e d % 1. presence of an evaluator from the aboriginal community 5 19 2. presence of an evaluator familiar with the evaluated program 13 48 3. presence of an evaluator having taken specific training to better understand aboriginal culture 11 41 4. consultation of participants familiar with the program at the point of defining objectives or evaluation questions 12 44 5. well documented set-up of the program 25 93 6. consultation with participants familiar with the program at the point of analyzing the results 8 30 7. recommendations destined to aboriginal authorities 16 59 8. recommendations destined to evaluated program’s beneficiaries 9 33 9. number of evaluations meeting criteria 1, 2, 3, or 4 (criteria demonstrating preliminary knowledge of the environment or if approaches were taken with local participants so as to better understand the environment) 15 56 10. number of evaluations meeting criteria 1, 2, 3, or 4 a n d criteria 5, 6, 7, and 8 (this conjunction of criteria illustrates the number of evaluations where there was preliminary knowledge of the context and where the approach was done while respecting the totality of the pre-defined criteria of a culturally sensitive evaluation) 5 19 15 jacob and desautels: evaluation of aboriginal programs published by scholarship@western, 2013 we immediately noticed that a weak majority of evaluation reports (56%) respect criteria 1, 2, 3, or 4. this suggests that, when all is said and done, evaluation frequently happens without the evaluators having any of the resources that foster their understanding of the aboriginal context. in nearly half of all cases, the evaluator’s experience with the aboriginal context is summed up in the initial meeting with the evaluation sponsors to discuss the project’s terms of reference. in return, the explanation of the activities of the evaluated program is well illustrated in the vast majority of the evaluation reports (93%). in this regard, the principal steps of program implementation are clearly described in practically all of the evaluation reports. also, key participants are rarely consulted when the collected data are being analyzed. finally, it must be noted that rarely do the evaluation reports provide recommendations focusing on the evaluated program’s beneficiaries (33% of the cases) and the recommendations aimed at the aboriginal authorities are not systematic (59% of cases). this phenomenon can be explained by the fact that evaluation reports are more often aimed at providing accounts to the evaluation sponsors, such as the federal government. the preceding indicators sketch an overall picture of the more or less culturally sensitive nature of aboriginal program evaluation, a portrait that may be completed with the help of report extracts. further, certain evaluations are conducted by aboriginal evaluators or evaluators who are particularly knowledgeable of the aboriginal cultural context. this is notably the case for the evaluation of the whole child project in the yukon. in the report, the expertise of the principal evaluator is presented unequivocally: principal investigator for this study was dr. michael kim zapf (crilf board member and professor of social work at the university of calgary) who has published extensively on issues of social service delivery in remote northern regions. having previously lived and worked in whitehorse, he had direct experience in the relevant context. (table 2, evaluation 22, 2004, p. 4) this seasoned evaluator, perfectly conversant with the context in which the evaluation process would evolve, represents the evaluator-type for more than half of the analyzed evaluations. in other cases, evaluators have recourse to local resources that allow them to better understand the cultural context. in this way, evaluators frequently surround themselves with key actors at the heart of aboriginal programs and communities, notably taking the form of a supervisory committee composed of the principal decision-makers and local personnel: the project was guided by a steering committee of territorial and health canada representatives, who met with the evaluation team and the project manager as required to clarify goals, provide direction, approve the methodology, and monitor evaluation activity. (table 2, evaluation 24, 2009, p. 2) otherwise, when evaluators were not familiar with the program or the cultural context, and if they had not received training to aid their comprehension of the milieu, particular attention was given to the evaluation methodology so as to “hear” the aboriginal cultural sensitivities. often, this methodological sensitivity was expressed in the form of concern over providing easily understandable documentation for the population involved in the evaluation framework. as is the case, for example, in the evaluation on the initiatives of community healing offered by the aboriginal healing foundation: 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 2 [2013], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.1 the evaluation methodology was adapted for this project to ensure cultural appropriateness of methods and the safety and wellbeing of participants. there were three primary ways of doing this: one was to provide for translation where needed to enable interviewees to participate in their aboriginal language if desired. (table 2, evaluation 9, 2009, p. 12) moreover, considering the language barrier is a recurring difficulty in the evaluation of aboriginal programs, evaluators do not hesitate to seek out local resources to narrow this gap. for example, in the framework of a study on the decentralization of nunavut, the evaluator explains his recourse to local experts: “the researcher was supported by local research assistants familiar with the issues and fluent in inuktitut. as a result, all those who wished to be heard were able to share their views” (table 2, evaluation 4, 2002, p. 5). it must be understood that, in the aboriginal context, the role of local expertise and sensitivity to local issues goes beyond simply finding an interpreter. it also encourages evaluators to adapt their speech, which contributes to greater trust on the part of the stakeholders involved at various stages of the evaluation process. though not all evaluators use resources to help understand the cultural context, a very large majority of the evaluation reports analyzed demonstrated that the evaluator had a good understanding of the evaluated program. moreover, most evaluations were founded on the reading and analysis of principal program documents: “the document review was used to familiarize the project team with the program and its context” (table 2, evaluation 23, 2005, p. 5). nelson-barber et al. (2005) confirm that it is important for the evaluator to have recourse to local experience and not to hesitate to immerse themselves in local culture: “if possible, evaluators should engage in community activities, such as graduation ceremonies and dinners for the elders in the tribe, or funerals for honoured tribal members” (p. 74). the idea behind this is that each evaluated environment possesses local particularities and that, for an evaluator unfamiliar with the context, it can be difficult to arrive at even-handed and appropriate conclusions. moreover, the analyzed reports demonstrate that, very often, the availability of local skills is written into the terms of reference of the evaluation contract. consequently, the work of the evaluator is facilitated and the evaluated organization is assured the work will be conducted in a context where there is a constant awareness of the local cultural realities. i n w h a t m e a s u r e i s a b o r i g i n a l e v a l u a t i o n p a r t i c i p a t o r y ? at first glance, we notice that a little more than half (52%) of the evaluations of aboriginal programs integrate elements of the participatory approach that is operationalized in different ways at the practice level (table 4). we note, however, that no evaluation is considered to be “very” or “totally” participatory. the dimensions of participant diversity and control over the evaluative process have indeed pulled down the overall participation scores. in a large majority of cases (86%), just one or two groups of actors were represented out of a possible four (table 5). among the groups represented, the decision-makers and policy designers (86% of cases), or even those responsible for implementation or program delivery (79% of cases), are those who are habitually associated with the evaluative process. 17 jacob and desautels: evaluation of aboriginal programs published by scholarship@western, 2013 t a b l e 4 . d i s t r i b u t i o n o f t h e e v a l u a t i o n s a c c o r d i n g t o t h e l e v e l o f p a r t i c i p a t i o n l e v e l o f p a r t i c i p a t i o n n u m b e r o f r e p o r t s % non-participatory 13 48 somewhat participatory 9 33 average participation 5 19 very participatory 0 0 totally participatory 0 0 total 27 100 t a b l e 5 . p a r t i c i p a t i o n d i v e r s i t y i n a b o r i g i n a l e v a l u a t i o n s number of different groups represented in the evaluation number of occurrences among participatory evaluations % of participatory evaluations 1 group 4 29 2 groups 8 57 3 groups 1 7 4 groups 1 7 total 14 100 type of participants represented in the evaluation number of occurrences among participatory evaluations % of participatory evaluations decision-makers and policy designers 12 86 manager for program implementation and delivery 11 79 direct and indirect beneficiaries, others affected 1 7 civil society and citizens 3 21 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 2 [2013], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.1 table 6 illustrates that, when evaluations are participatory, the involved parties generally participate during the two first phases. more often than not, the formulation of recommendations and the dissemination of results are the responsibility of the evaluators. finally, the control for the evaluative process is either limited for the involved parties (64% of cases) or shared equally between the evaluator and these participants (36% of cases). in the evaluations examined, not once did we observe a greater level of control for participants (table 7). indeed, the integration of participatory approaches is relatively common in aboriginal program evaluation; half of the evaluation reports in the sample had only limited or moderate participatory approaches. as a general rule, it is the pragmatic and epistemological aspects – more than the political aspects – which seem to motivate the systematic recourse to participatory evaluation. indeed, the perspective of favouring community development does not seem to be the principal motivation in the framework of aboriginal program evaluation. for example, we noted a few passages from different reports illustrating the common relationship between evaluators and local participants: “… the evaluation team, in consultation with the client identifying key inac staff along with the contact information of each identified participant,” (table 2, evaluation 16, 2010, p. 8) or even: “the key informers participating in this study were chosen on the basis of the recommendations of the consultative committee regarding the people that know the most on the programs and inac educational policies and first nations’ problems in this domain” (table 2, evaluation 2, 2010, p. 11). these two examples demonstrate the integration-type of the involved parties in the evaluation of an aboriginal program. the objective is then to integrate them so as to favour the understanding of the program, bring together the key actors, and, ultimately, produce conclusions compatible with their efforts in relation to the evaluated program. in return, the perspective of giving a voice to participating actors, notably during the steps of defining objectives and developing evaluation questions, does not seem to be a priority for aboriginal program evaluation. beyond the observed levels of participation, we have brought to light two participatory types or modes: (a) the communication channel, and (b) the management and supervisory committee. in the first type, the participant acts as a facilitator serving the primary role as the transmission cog between the program’s actors and the evaluators. for example, a report on the infrastructure funds of first nations summarizes well how this type of participation operates, explaining the role assumed by the participant: identify key informants; identify key documents, literature, and data sources; determine the adequacy of data collection; identify possible case study communities; identify local/community contact to facilitate with application of lines of inquiry; obtain appropriate insight into fnif’s successes and limitations. (table2, evaluation 16, 2010, p. 8) 19 jacob and desautels: evaluation of aboriginal programs published by scholarship@western, 2013 t a b l e 6 . e x t e n t o f i n v o l v e m e n t i n a b o r i g i n a l e v a l u a t i o n s s t e p s w h e r e i n v o l v e d p a r t i e s a r e r e p r e s e n t e d i n p a r t i c i p a t o r y e v a l u a t i o n s n u m b e r o f o c c u r r e n c e s % o f r e p r e s e n t a t i o n definition of the issues and the development of evaluation questions 12 86 results collection and data analysis 12 86 formulation of judgments and recommendations 8 57 report and results dissemination 7 50 t a b l e 7 . d i s t r i b u t i o n o f c o n t r o l i n t h e f r a m e w o r k o f p a r t i c i p a t o r y e v a l u a t i o n s level of control number of occurrences % among participatory evaluations exclusive control given to the evaluator n/a n/a limited control given to evaluation participants 9 64 control shared equally between evaluation participants (on the one hand) and the evaluator (on the other) 5 36 substantial control given to evaluation participants 0 0 exclusive control given to evaluation participants 0 0 in this case, the role is one of orienting, but especially supporting, the evaluation team in the framework of their approach. this participation has also been observed in the evaluation of the klondike soft gold program: “we particularly thank the yta’s manager, mara spricenieks, who cheerfully responded to our requests, and made extra efforts to track down documents and information that helped us in this work” (table 2, evaluation 21, 2008, p. vii). it is also evident in the framework of the whole child project: “ms. crystal pearl-hodgins, wcp community coordinator, found time in her busy schedule to gather written materials, share her perspective and experiences with wcp, and direct the researcher toward those community people whose stories were vital to the report” (table 2, evaluation 22, 2004, p. ix). it is the integration of the participants that is most commonly observed in the evaluation of aboriginal programs. when the participants are considered more as facilitators for evaluators, their participation tends to be limited to the first two steps of the evaluative process. indeed, in this type of evaluation, cases where the actors participated in the entire process were rare. when this was the case, participant control was relatively moderate. for example, the consultative committee for the evaluation framework on community healing initiatives, played a limited role that hinged more on revising the process than on 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 2 [2013], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.1 decision-making: “the evaluation team consulted a consulting group from the fadg, government experts and independent specialists who revised a detailed report on the methodology and all the data collection tools as well as the preliminary findings of the evaluation” (table 2, evaluation 9, 2009, p. 12). as a general rule, it is during these first two steps – either the preparation of the draft and research questions or data collection and analysis – where parties were most involved. the other type of participation observed is more oriented towards the needs of the program decisionmakers. in these circumstances, the spread of participation is more complete, notably concerning steps 3 and 4 of the evaluation process. in these cases, the reports justify collaboration with involved parties, not with a view to develop the skills of the actors involved in the program, but more to answer to the epistemological and pragmatic perspectives of evaluation. to this effect, the evaluation report of the postsecondary education program is unequivocal: “the purpose of the advisory committee was to work collaboratively to produce evaluation products, which are reliable, useful and defendable to both internal and external stakeholders” (table 2, evaluation 10, 2010, p. 10). the same holds true for the evaluation of the protection against family violence act where a committee guarantees that the evaluation follows the right objectives: “the evaluation approach taken for the current project relied on multiple lines of evidence and followed the recommendation of the advisory committee to focus on the influence of social responses on the achievement of the goals and objectives of the pafva and the epo process” (table 2, evaluation 26, 2011, p. 10). this involvement was also observed in the framework of the evaluation on the effect of the commission of treaties: “the broad mandate of the advisory group was to provide advice and guidance on the conduct of the study for epmrb’s consideration at key stages of the evaluation process” (table 2, evaluation 1, 2010, p. 6). while such participation is relatively surprising, considering the efforts necessary to integrate involved parties possessing little or no experience in matters of evaluation, it is largely explained by the fact that it is most often program managers or personnel who are included. consequently, these consultative committees do not attract many participants familiar with the implementation of the evaluated program. in other cases, however, the participatory aspect can be summed up in a simple final approval of the work of the evaluator, a sort of seal of quality, as in the framework of the evaluation concerning the infrastructure funds: in line with epmrb’s quality control process and standards and its engagement policy, a working group established for the purposes of this evaluation assisted by facilitating access to information, reviewing and validating the draft final report. the working group comprised of managers and program officers (headquarter and regional) from fnif and from the afn. a validation session of the preliminary findings and the final report occurred with program representatives. (table 2, evaluation 16, 2010, p. 13) finally, on very rare occasions, the reports presented a participatory approach integrating the key participants throughout the process. this was notably the case in the evaluation of the contribution for inuit counselling in the south: in line with epmrb’s engagement policy, ti was actively engaged in the evaluation. ti provided information on, and access to, key informants and documentation. the organization also reviewed the evaluation issues and questions, methodology report and final report. officials from both nao and the irs provided input on the terms of reference, as well as comments on 21 jacob and desautels: evaluation of aboriginal programs published by scholarship@western, 2013 the methodology report, preliminary findings and the final report, in line with epmrb’s quality assurance strategy. (table 2, evaluation 3, 2010, p. 4) it is here, in one of these rare cases, where it became possible to observe a real integration of the parties involved in the evaluation process. the most common recourse to aboriginal participants was more pragmatic in nature or was intended to confirm the validity of the process. d i s c u s s i o n the objective of this study was to examine to what extent, in canada, the evaluation of aboriginal programs integrates the elements of cultural sensitivity and is a participatory process. at first glance, the results suggest evaluations are of varying sensitivity to the local (aboriginal) culture. moreover, a minority of the criteria for cultural sensitivity is respected. for example, few aboriginal evaluators or evaluators familiar with the program take part in program evaluation. this absence might be compensated for, in part, if the evaluators had undergone training to improve their understanding of the context or, even, if they had systematic recourse to local participants, but this is far from reality in most cases. indeed, the approach of understanding the context essentially seems to operate in the framework of readings presenting the broad themes of the evaluated program. this documentary research contributes to a better understanding of evaluation issues, but does not suffice to guarantee a sensitive evaluation in the cultural context. certainly, the evaluators adequately present the program they are charged to evaluate and demonstrate their understanding of said program (93%), but in conducting their analysis from a strictly external perspective, without recourse to informed participants, they increase their chances of producing an evaluation with erroneous conclusions. on this subject, nelsonbarber et al. (2005) believe that a heightened cultural sensitivity helps to draw more valid conclusions and avoid the factual errors related to an evaluator in an unfamiliar environment: “without specific understandings of the context in which a program is being implemented, for example, evaluators are likely to miss important information that can shed light on why a program has particular outcomes or impact on a community” (p. 62). in a parallel manner, we note the recommendations are essentially addressed to the governmental authorities, which generally sponsor the evaluation. in the view that the government of canada seeks to favour autonomy and collaboration with aboriginal communities, it is surprising that a weak majority of evaluations present recommendations for the aboriginal authorities (59%) and a minority of the evaluations make recommendations for the beneficiaries of evaluated programs (33%). it is all the more surprising considering it is an explicit criterion of the code of ethics in matters of aboriginal research: “whenever possible, research should support the transfer of skills to individuals and increase the capacity of the community to manage its own research” (rcap, 1996, appendix e, community benefit, para. 3). consequently, it is paramount that the evaluations present results and, therefore, recommendations that address local communities; otherwise, it seems difficult to anticipate the adoption of the results by the communities and, in this way, favour the autonomy of these people in view of potential research. at the moment, when we look at the recommendations, there still seem to be cleavages between program administrations that are sometimes centralized in the federal government and the local administration of aboriginal communities. there is one essential condition in order to produce a culturally sensitive evaluation: “in addition to the need to recognize a paradigm shift in aboriginal research, it is important that aboriginal communities be given the opportunity to decide that the research priorities should be for their communities” (thomas & bellefeuille, 2006, p. 10). in the end, despite certain gaps, such as few recommendations to the aboriginal administrators and limited 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 2 [2013], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.1 involvement of local participants, it is possible to observe an emerging cultural sensitivity in aboriginal program evaluation. though the use of culturally sensitive evaluation is not systematic, considering the importance given to a rigorous program’s documentation and the fact that we see, more often than not, the necessity to have recourse to local skills written in the form of an obligation in the terms of reference of the evaluation contract, we can conclude that some efforts seem to be undertaken in order to favour the autonomy and the integration of aboriginal people. following the example of cultural sensitivity, the integration of participatory approaches in the evaluation of aboriginal programs is, in sum, relatively limited. local populations hold little or no decision-making power over the evaluation process. it is true that the integration of the whole list of involved parties concerned with the evaluation process is sometimes difficult, whether for financial or logistical reasons (bradley, mayfield, mehta, & rukonge, 2002). however, it is nevertheless possible to observe the recourse to different participatory methodologies in aboriginal programs. indeed, aboriginal participatory evaluation seems to favour the emergence of two participatory types or modes. first, the facilitating participant, who is essentially an interpreter at the service of the evaluator, is often represented by decision-makers or first-line program personnel, matching the theories stipulating that participatory evaluation aims to promote the use and the quality of the evaluation. interestingly, these participants were frequently involved in the two first phases of the evaluation, which is surprising considering that many authors (cousins & earl, 1995; cousins & whitmore, 1998) say the involved parties have a tendency not to involve themselves in data collection, preferring instead to leave the more technical tasks to the evaluators. however, it is possible to assume that there is a particular reality in the context of evaluation of aboriginal programs that can be largely explained by the numerous barriers, notably those of language and distance, which can exist between the evaluator and the respondents in the evaluated sphere. furthermore, brandon (1998) summarizes well how involving participating parties can contribute to the achievement of practical and epistemological objectives of participatory evaluation: by tapping the expertise of all appropriate stakeholder groups, […] evaluators can take steps calculated to enhance evaluation validity. evaluators’ confidence in the credibility of their studies should be improved, and, most likely, they will find that their studies will receive greater use. (brandon, 1998, p. 334) otherwise, the second type of evaluator involved acts in a similar fashion to the decisional power. this active participant has, more often than not, the right to observe each step of the process. in this case, this is an actor interested principally in the results of the evaluation. the integration of this type of actor is a sufficient criteria to consider the evaluation to be participatory, although it is important to underline here that, in these circumstances, the interests represented are more those of program decision-makers and managers. it is, therefore, difficult to speak of a complete autonomy of aboriginal communities during the evaluation process. in fact, even if there is a history of promoting initiatives to develop participatory approaches favouring the empowerment of aboriginal peoples, it is only recently that this inclination has been officially listed as an objective for aboriginal governance (canadian institutes of health research, natural sciences and engineering research council of canada, social sciences and humanities research council of canada, 1998; iand, 2000). at this stage, it is, therefore, normal to observe that the great majority of evaluations are still managed by an evaluator. this might not be, except given the goal of the former is a collective aimed at self-determination. 23 jacob and desautels: evaluation of aboriginal programs published by scholarship@western, 2013 in the end, the epistemological and pragmatic dimensions of participatory evaluation seem to occupy a place of choice in the aboriginal context, although, at first glance, there seems to be little emphasis on the political dimension of participatory evaluation. emancipation, self-determination, and autonomy do not emerge as priorities in aboriginal program evaluation, in spite of the fact they are the priorities of aboriginal governance and were, thereby, justifying the use of a participatory approach rather than traditional approaches. in the context where the political dimension of participatory evaluation does not appear at the heart of aboriginal program evaluation, it must be concluded that the objectives of the rcap and gathering strength have not yet been achieved. however, recourse to certain methods benefitting the understanding of the environment by the evaluator contributes, in an important way, to the production of a just and clarified evaluation that will ultimately serve the cause of local populations, assuring the provision of rigorously evaluated public programs. f u t u r e o r i e n t a t i o n s a n d l i m i t s the results observed through this research allow for a better understanding of how to articulate and develop evaluation in an aboriginal context, where evaluation is traditionally carried out by the dominant culture seeking to better understand a minority culture. this inherent reality in any multicultural society means that our findings may apply to other societies with similar conditions. as mentioned by kirkhart (1995), today’s evaluators must be aware of the cultural context in which they operate: “we as evaluators need to have a clearer understanding of the ways in which multicultural influences shape and are shaped by our work” (p. 1). we found that in canada there appears to be a moderate, but growing, willingness to integrate the principles of culturally responsible evaluation, and, in parallel, we observed that participatory evaluation is mainly pragmatic and epistemological. despite this, our results allow us to see the challenges that remain to be lifted for these different approaches to establish themselves in the context of the evaluation of aboriginal programs. the challenges of multiculturalism are not limited to canada; in the united states, the aea deemed it necessary to publish an official declaration calling for cultural sensitivity on the part of evaluators and greater awareness of the virtues of involving local stakeholders. in multicultural contexts, where culturally responsible and participative approaches are increasingly encouraged and recognized as approaches that produce more ethical and valid results, it would be interesting to compare how they are integrated in comparison with the results of our study. are there situations in which the political aspect of participatory evaluation and the ethical challenges of culturally responsible evaluation are favourable? finally, it is important to underline the limits of this research. indeed, despite the results that we were able to obtain and the qualitative observations that we conducted, this analysis is not supported by a large-scale sample, nor is it a statistically representative one. this research should be taken for what it is; that is to say, an exploratory step aimed at verifying how participatory and culturally sensitive approaches are integrated into the evaluation of an aboriginal program. moreover, even when the reports were available, they did not always reveal everything concerning the actors involved and the events that happened as a result of the evaluation. in many cases, the reports did not present the profiles of the evaluators, the details of the methodology used, or the contributors consulted. the results that we presented rely on the elements reported in the evaluation report. on certain occasions, the evaluation process happened in other circumstances and involved other actors who were not mentioned in the reports that we consulted. for future research, it would be useful to take into consideration the 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 2 [2013], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.1 recommendation of daigneault (2010) who suggested, “contacting the evaluation services of the involved organizations, submitting to them, for example, the detailed evaluation of the reports so as to complete the missing information and validate the judgments made on the main people concerned” (p. 208, translated). in this way, a more thorough research integrating the interviews with the involved participants at the heart of these evaluations or even the authors of these reports could furnish us with the details that we were not able to obtain by relying solely on documentary sources. it would be interesting to know the extent of stakeholder involvement and the extent to which they benefitted from their involvement. a methodology based on interviews would promote this type of understanding, an option that is not possible using the current research design. additionally, while the study sketches a portrait of the evaluation of aboriginal programs, this is not compared to other evaluations of canadian programs. in these circumstances, it seems relevant to pursue this work on a larger scale, notably proceeding to the analysis of reports at different levels of aboriginal governments, but also in comparing the results with analyses on evaluation in other specific communities. what can be said of participatory aboriginal evaluation in the united states and australia? 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(2008). utilization focused evaluation (4th ed.). california, ca: sage. potvin, l., cargo, m., mccomber, a. m., delormier, t., & macaulay, a.c. (2003). implementing participatory intervention and research in communities: lessons from the kahnawake schools diabetes prevention project in canada, social science & medicine, 56, 1295 1305. 28 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 2 [2013], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.1 rossman, g. (2000). participatory monitoring and evaluation. the center for international education. retrieved from http://www.umass.edu/cie/themes/participatory_evaluation.htm royal commission on aboriginal peoples. (1996). report of the royal commission on aboriginal peoples. retrieved from http://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/webarchives/20071115053257/http://www.aincinac.gc.ca/ch/rcap/sg/sgmm_e.html sengupta, s., hopson, r., & thompson-robinson, m. (2004). cultural competence in evaluation: an overview. new directions for evaluation, 102, 5 19. smith, t. (1990). policy evaluation in third world countries: some issues and problems. the asian journal of public administration, 12, 55 68. thomas, w., & bellefeuille, g. (2006). an evidence-based formative evaluation of a cross-cultural aboriginal mental health program in canada. australian e-journal for the advancement of mental health, 5(3), 1 14. wholey, j. s. (1994). assessing the feasibility and likely usefulness of evaluation. in j. s. wholey, h. p. hatry, & k. e. newcomer (eds.), handbook of practical program evaluation (pp. 15 39). san francisco: jossey-bass. zukoski, a., & luluquisen, m. (2002). participatory evaluation. what is it? why do it? what are the challenges? community-based public health policy & practice partnership for the public’s health, 5. retrieved from http://depts.washington.edu/ccph/pdf_files/evaluation.pdf 29 jacob and desautels: evaluation of aboriginal programs published by scholarship@western, 2013 the international indigenous policy journal april 2013 evaluation of aboriginal programs: what place is given to participation and cultural sensitivity? steve jacob geoffroy desautels recommended citation evaluation of aboriginal programs: what place is given to participation and cultural sensitivity? abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license evaluation of aboriginal programs: what place is given to participation and cultural sensitivity? voices from the land: reflections on teenaged pregnancy in aboriginal communities today the voices of traditional healers the international indigenous policy journal volume 4 issue 1 indigenous early parenthood article 7 march 2013 voices from the land: reflections on teenaged pregnancy in aboriginal communities today the voices of traditional healers delores cardinal university of alberta clifford cardinal university of alberta earle waugh university of alberta, earle.waugh@ualberta.ca darryn baddour recommended citation cardinal, d. , cardinal, c. , waugh, e. , baddour, d. (2013). voices from the land: reflections on teenaged pregnancy in aboriginal communities today the voices of traditional healers. the international indigenous policy journal, 4(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.7 voices from the land: reflections on teenaged pregnancy in aboriginal communities today the voices of traditional healers abstract while the precarious state of aboriginal health is often noted, and several studies have detailed the issues raised by teenage pregnancy, the voices from traditional healers, many of whom have to deal with the youth are scarcely recorded. these reflections are in response to the conversation of select traditional practitioners at the gathering, held in the faculty of medicine and dentistry, the university of alberta, in october, 2010. they spent about one-and-a-half hours discussing the issue with health care professionals and physicians. this article reprises high points of that discussion along with additional material offered to support their contentions. french abstract les voix de la terre : réflexions sur les grossesses des adolescentes des communautés autochtones contemporaines – les voix des guérisseurs traditionnels delores cardinal, clifford cardinal, earle waugh, & darryn baddour université de l’alberta, edmonton (alberta) canada résumé lors d’une rencontre internationale des intervenants en médecine traditionnelle tenue à l’université de l’alberta, on a demandé à des guérisseuses de donner leur opinion au sujet de la hausse spectaculaire du nombre d’adolescentes enceintes, laquelle constitue une situation grave pour les services sociaux et de santé. au total, 25 femmes et 2 hommes se sont réunis pour résumer les opinions présentées dans cet article. ils ont formulé des recommandations stratégiques précises sur la façon de remédier à cette crise, notamment la création d’un centre de service unique inspiré du modèle australien, où les adolescentes enceintes pourraient étudier et trouver un emploi. spanish abstract voces de la tierra: reflexiones sobre los embarazos adolescentes en las comunidades indígenas en la actualidad – voces de los curanderos tradicionales delores cardinal, clifford cardinal, earle waugh, darryn baddour universidad de alberta, edmonton, alberta, canadá resumen en la reunión de curanderos tradicionales celebrada en la universidad de alberta se pidió a las curanderas que hablaran sobre las reservas indígenas en las que se habían multiplicado los embarazos de adolescentes hasta el punto de constituir una situación grave para los servicios sociales y de salud. participaron en el debate —que se resume en este artículo— veinticinco mujeres y dos hombres. se hicieron propuestas concretas de políticas sobre la forma de enfrentar la crisis, entre ellas desarrollar el concepto australiano de un solo centro (onestop centre) para todas las cuestiones de aprendizaje y trabajo de las adolescentes embarazadas. keywords teenage pregnancy, traditional aboriginal healers, the gathering, one-stop centre creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/7?utm_source=ir.lib.uwo.ca%2fiipj%2fvol4%2fiss1%2f7&utm_medium=pdf&utm_campaign=pdfcoverpages v o i c e s f r o m t h e l a n d : r e f l e c t i o n s o n t e e n a g e d p r e g n a n c y i n a b o r i g i n a l c o m m u n i t i e s t o d a y – t h e v o i c e s o f t r a d i t i o n a l h e a l e r s the precarious state of health among canada’s aboriginal people is so well known that it has become an accepted part of aboriginal reality. both canadian statisticians and government officials are aware of the situation and its application to children (see for example health canada, 2005; health canada, 2012; roterman, 2007). of the many pressing demands from this crisis, it is evident that the birthrate among teenaged aboriginal women (9% under 18 years of age) will lead to severe consequences for both reserve and off-reserve communities (canadian institute of child health [cich], 1994).1 some issues include: insufficient pregnancy care, higher infant mortality, lower birth weight, children raising children without the usual family support system, increased demand for childcare facilities, unbalanced resource demands on health care facilities, unplanned demands on community social services, social or familial discord in a small community. as health canada (2005) has documented, it also has major consequences for canada’s health care and social programs. students of health care have had much to say about this issue2, and government concerns have been articulated both here and in other venues. yet, little in the literature reflects the views of those who encounter this reality on the ground in indigenous communities, where they must deal with the day-today hope and tragedy involved. of particular importance are the voices of the traditional healers, whose work among their peoples goes on behind the scenes where they try to deal with the conflicted outcomes in the lives of youth who have nowhere to turn for support. in this article, we wish to give recognized place to the views of this unheard voice of traditional authority, since they remain part of not only the heritage of their respective peoples but also are intimately acquainted with the health dimensions of this issue. the occasion for these views was a national “gathering of traditional medical practitioners”. the meeting was held at the university of alberta’s faculty of medicine and dentistry from october 24 to 26, 2010 with the support of blue quills native college in st. paul, alberta. the gathering was one element of a number of initiatives whose strategy is to engage traditional practices and knowledge for inclusion into the teaching and research processes of a major medical faculty in canada and to further their impact in the larger community. in order for you to gauge the significance of these voices, a little background needs to be provided. this was expressed by chief clifford cardinal (2010), co-host for the gathering and resident cree healer in the department of family medicine at the university of alberta. his statement underlines the importance of these voices: 1 no attempt will be made here to address the deeper philosophical and political issues that theorist have 2 a survey of the academy’s response to this issue has been included in the original report conveyed to indian and northern afairs canada (inac, now called aboriginal affairs and northern development canada [aandc]) in december 2010; most sources for that document have been listed in the references, but we do not have the space to include that analysis here. 1 cardinal et al.: reflections on teenaged pregnancy published by scholarship@western, 2013 the last gathering of healers in alberta was in 1933… in a place called heart lake. because of the word mitiyo meaning heart and metiyo meaning the institutions of medicine; metiyo, that word has lost some of its meaning over time and through semantics. i know that the healers here probably know what a metiyo is because it is the career as a healer usually given before a person is even born. the people who are here are gifted long before they are born, through gifts, through signs… about two years ago, earle and i went to calgary to approach fred eagletail, who is the keeper of the beaver bundle. we were fortunate enough for him to allow us to be blessed with the bundle itself…in september 2007, the previous dean of medicine, tom marrie, participated along with some prominent members of the campus to allow the bundle to bless all the initiatives of this campus, all the aboriginal initiatives, so we are indeed living under the umbrella, under the protectorate of this particular umbrella. we have five people that were seated at the front at that time when fred came out and endorsed this campus to go ahead, to never mind what people say, there will always be people that are putting you down…your faith in the creator rests on the protection of the bundle that will be keeping you. i thank my friend here for going with me at that time to make representation to the beaver bundle and bring its philosophy here, bring its essence to the university of alberta. the list of invitees is too long to discuss here. all those who came were personally presented with tobacco and the special request that they come and share their knowledge with us. not all could come, but those who came reflect the following geographical areas: alberta, north west territories, nova scotia, saskatchewan, south dakota, ontario, quebec, arizona, and british columbia. the healers selfidentified as dene, woodland cree, plains cree, northern cree, metis, mi’kmaw, akwasane (iroquois), mohawk, and dakota. one other note needs to be made here: no photos, videos, or taped recordings were made. the elders did not, however, have any objection to court reporters writing down the discussion. with respect to oral tradition, we wish to make everyone aware that certain stories are told at certain times because they may be very private, but they are shared under the tobacco. there are ethical considerations that researchers need to be aware of in documenting knowledge that is shared in an oral fashion. we hope to maintain integrity to the personal quality of the knowledge shared by attempting to present our reflections without specific, identifying details.3 since we had agreed that no names or elements of identity would be used when tobacco was presented, no identification will be used here. still the voices arose out of this important gathering. with regard to the concerns that were expressed, it is critical that readers understand the significance of the beaver bundle’s authority when considering the strength of the remarks discussed. 3 the importance of applying distinct ethics in documenting oral knowledge follows cruikshank (2000). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.7 t h e c o n t e x t o f t h e v o i c e s : t r a d i t i o n a l p r a c t i t i o n e r s p e r s p e c t i v e s o n t h e h e a l t h c o n d i t i o n o f a b o r i g i n a l p e o p l e s the practitioners of traditional medical knowledge are very aware of the health issues their people face and the difficult social and medical conditions on many of the reserves they serve. we agreed that a special deliberation could be held for the women practitioners at the gathering. the result was a session held for one-and-a-half hours during the afternoon of the general meeting. the session involved women healers, medical personnel from the faculty of medicine and dentistry, scholars from diverse areas of study, students in medicine, arts, and social sciences, and community knowledge-keepers. over 25 women and 2 men sat together with the healers as they specifically addressed teenage pregnancy and related maternal issues on reserves across canada. additional healers’ views were incorporated after the session to form the basis of these reflections. the healers pointed out that their people resist being evaluated by assessments devised for immigrants; they are rightly concerned that many specialty services, including health services, are arrayed for a “minority” population, which, of course, places them with the 200 odd ethnic groups in canada today. traditional healers were united in insisting on programs being designed for indigenous communities, based on proper research techniques with their communities. some writers, such as devries and free (2010) have already noted that the available health promotion programs have been adapted from programs designed to suit other populations; there is little research in canada pertaining to the actual experiences of aboriginal people (in relation to culturally-appropriate health promotion strategies). we also have to make clear that there was limited opportunity with the healers to address all the issues in traditional culture that are often taken for granted. those who are familiar with indigenous cultures are aware that there are underlying factors about their cultures and these are crucial in shaping discussion. a few relevant to this issue are: a. the meaning of kinship in traditional societies (relatively enlarged when compared to western cultures, as reflected in indigenous languages); b. the practical issues required in traditional family-building (i.e., division of roles between husband and wife, roles of the female in gathering food provisions, home comforts, providing status for her husband, and a host of negotiated requirements depending upon locale and size of the community); c. status issues relative to the public role of men; and, d. the amount of assimilation with other cultures and/or reactions to western culture that have taken place. furthermore, the wide variety of social forms, such as moieties, which also guide some indigenous societies, was not part of our discourse. finally, it is important to bear in mind that the healers had already participated in the larger gathering sessions, where many cultural issues had already been raised. they were aware, then, that the context out of which they spoke had been set by the priorities of the gathering’s themes. they did not believe that they would have to re-state some of those conceptions. however, a quick survey might be helpful to the reader: traditional medicine’s holistic viewpoint; the four elements in an indigenous person’s well-being 3 cardinal et al.: reflections on teenaged pregnancy published by scholarship@western, 2013 – physical, social, mental, and spiritual; the giftedness of traditional medical leadership and its variety and diversity in caring for the community; the role of nature and land in identity and medical understanding; and the spheres of influence of both genders in traditional societies. these elements had already been part of the discussion. t r a d i t i o n a l t e a c h i n g s o n w o m a n h o o d the framework for understanding the traditional viewpoint rests upon what western scholars have called worldviews. in addition, there are critical values arising out of these worldviews. traditional healers believe that speaking about these values is a matter for the knowledge keepers, elders, medicine people, and community wisdom holders. such knowledge was originally conveyed during ceremonial and properly sanctified occasions. these rites were essential because it put receivers of the information in the proper state of mind. unfortunately, print media is neither able to provide that kind of context, nor to put readers in the proper attitude towards the teachings. distortion may occur. despite that, the healers are determined to convey, as best they can, across the gulf that modern technology has fixed between the oral and written traditions. they are also aware of the distance between generations, but believe that their message is so important for their people that they are willing to speak with awareness that their words may not be comprehended by all. no traditional voice would be considered truthful without someone who is party to the deeper knowledge speaking about these matters. the following rests upon that of knowledge keeper, p. quinn, and medicine practitioner, clifford cardinal: specific issues related to womanhood among canada’s indigenous people have surfaced since a joint meeting on the topic took place at slave lake, ab in 2006; for example, the name of these teachings differs within different tribes and linguistic groups. nevertheless, the teachings themselves remain at the center of the original peoples’ identity. both tribal politics and the expression of “holiness” or “sacredness” are expressed in these teachings. the original teachings were expressed primarily during rituals for that purpose. in fact, the nature of womanhood was revealed through oral tradition at that time and in that place. because the ritual was recited by the woman leaders, men were not privy to this information. it is only through the words of five practicing woman of this ritual that i am sharing what i know and what my mother (who saw the need to revive this in the 70s) told me that this is now being shared. the name given to these rites by each tribe is not of great importance, rather it is the concept of teaching young girls how to become women in the tribe and still be themselves as individuals that is the key and is of great importance today. in 2006, i referred to these teachings as turtle teachings for lack of better terminology. since then i have learned that other ceremonial people have given other names to this ritual. unfortunately, the diversity of names may have confused practitioners. but we know that these rites have been continuously practiced since time immemorial. the origin of this ritual has been retold many times but this is what has been told to me when i received my first pipe over 40 years ago by woman healers. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.7 central to the ceremony is the ritual use of a sacred woman’s pipe. any woman can offer to have their pipe used in this gathering; however, it is customary for the senior member to lead the ceremony. these rites take place 13 times each year due to the 13 full moons that women experience. in the cree language the full moon is called kohkomaw, meaning our grandmother (i.e. the grandmother teachings). it is also referred to as the turtle teachings owing to the 13 “plates” a turtle has on its back plate – these 13 plates coincided with the thirteen teachings or virtues as they are designated today. the ritual is also referred to as the tepee teachings because the 13 poles of the traditional living abode of the plains people are recognized as the pillars of womanhood. hence, the 13 months composed of 28 days indicating the cycle of time in a woman’s cycle, makeup one year. the original people believed one year consisted of 364 days and the one day, june 21st, was counted as a void, owing to its designated sacredness. hence, 13 moons times 28 days from cycle to cycle produced one year. traditionally, this experience by mature women was a period of time considered holy, since all things with life have an element of holiness. the power a woman has during this moon time is immense and therefore she is exempt from community ceremony and any duties she might serve. the teachings begin with the sharing of origin stories of one’s given tribes, their unique tribal puberty rites, and their ability to give life and of prayer. then follows a reciting of the thirteen teachings and virtues. these can be summarized as follows: 1. b e h o l y as the creator has given you the great gift of giving birth. 2. b e h u m b l e to your grandmother (menstrual cycle) as she allows you time to prepare yourself for her each month before her arrival. 3. give g r e a t c a r e t o a l w a y s b e c l e a n during your own private moments. 4. be r e s p e c t f u l t o y o u r s i s t e r s in the circle as they will also be respectful towards you. 5. be m i n d f u l o f y o u r s e n s e s a n d f e e l i n g s as they will guide you closer to grandmother’s thoughts. 6. b e m i n d f u l o f y o u r m e n t o r s the turtle and the old women who have that sacred connection, this connection can be helpful to you. 7. always r e m e m b e r y o u r s a c r e d n e s s i n t h e p r e s e n c e o f m e n ’ s c e r e m o n i e s a n d r i t u a l s as it can alter the direction of the pipe’s calling; some ceremonial leaders may not understand your holiness at this time so always be humble whatever is said of grandmother’s (menstrual cycle) presence. 8. your presence may be needed when p i c k i n g s a c r e d p l a n t m e d i c i n e ( s ) , do not feel you are being singled out during this time. 5 cardinal et al.: reflections on teenaged pregnancy published by scholarship@western, 2013 9. in the presence of great healers, you will be noticed as holy and may b e c a l l e d u p o n t o p e r f o r m c e r t a i n d u t i e s you do not know. remember it is not your knowledge they seek but your sanctity. 10. b e p r o u d o f y o u r w o m a n h o o d and the power to give life so you can teach this to your children. 11. n e v e r s e e k a p a r t n e r o v e r t l y , such a person will be revealed to you in a most sacred manner. 12. k n o w t h e d i f f e r e n c e b e t w e e n d u t y a n d w o r k , it can mean the difference between respect and disrespect. 13. p a r t i c i p a t e i n s o c i a l , s p i r i t u a l , p e r s o n a l , a n d p h y s i c a l r i t u a l s as they are preparing you for your role of being a woman. know the cycles of life especially your womanhood and h o w t h i s l i f e f i t s a r o u n d t h e e q u i n o x ( e s ) a n d s o l s t i c e ( s ) and of each full moon. there are patterns there only you will have insight into. in teepee teachings, the perception is that you should share your knowledge without prejudice as there are many who cannot ask, or even talk in public; so make this your mission in life, to teach what little you know. however, remember to always be humble as there will be always someone who knows more than you. it is a big life challenge today on how this view of womanhood should be presented. often this is presented to original people as social issues – with many seeing this view as a problem – because we have thrown away our culture and language and henceforth the essence. it is up to us, the knowledge keepers of the original people, to provide that knowledge link for our woman (p. quinn, personal communication reported to c. cardinal, jan 2, 2011; emphasis in original). v o i c e s c o n c e r n i n g “ t h e c u l t u r a l ” as is to be expected, cultural differences in attitude will play a significant role in defining issues such as teenage pregnancy and maternal health. indeed, culture continues to be a primary filter through which much of the healers’ discussion took place at the gathering. we are reminded of the importance of this feature since canada had just signed the united nations (un, 2008) declaration on indigenous rights, a declaration it had hitherto refused to validate4. a key element of the document is that each group of aboriginal peoples embraces a cultural viewpoint that may differ significantly from other indigenous notions. this is not regarded as problematic by traditional people since community awareness of boundaries is part of that group’s identity. traditional communities do not need uniformity of cultural descriptors in order to affirm their respective identities. traditional healers insisted that there are many voices in their communities concerned with the notion of “traditional.” whatever scholars may say, as far as the healers were concerned, there is almost uniform 4 the signing was dated november 12, 2010 (see aandc, 2010). canada’s view is that this is an “aspiration” document, which will not change its laws or modify its current relationship. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.7 acceptance of “tradition” as a concrete basis for meaning within their communities today. this suggests that “traditional ways,” however they are conceived, have a larger role in providing acceptable norms for young people than is generally acknowledged. healers spoke of the great need to return to tradition in their communities because there is just no other accepted value system in place. interestingly, even where this tradition has been impacted by euro-christian values or a current form of relationship (i.e., “living together” as opposed to marriage), traditional healers continue to believe that it still has an authority among youth today who value their aboriginal identity. it will surprise no one that the legacy of the residential school issue was also part of today’s healers’ voices. traditional people’s perceptions are that canada’s current social policies, despite recent apologies and other attempts at healing the past, are somehow stacked against the legitimate aspirations of traditionally-oriented attempts to rebuild their communities. they will tell you personally that they want to engage canada’s culture; however, to do this they need the willing assistance and support of canada’s institutions, and especially the professionals in health care and social services. they do not find much willingness there. one cultural issue that healers pointed to was the social welfare system. this is a good example of how canadian social policies impinge on proper maternal care. as reported by valerie taliman (2010) in canada’s native newspaper indian country, cherry smiley of the aboriginal women’s action network indicated at a recent conference why so many aboriginal women have disappeared: a single native mother on welfare with one child receives about $580 per month to live on. but if social services takes her child and gives it to a non-native family, they get $1,000 per month to care for the child. instead of policies designed to keep families together, we’re dealing with rules and regulations that break our families apart. (para. 13) the social welfare system weighed heavily in healers’ voices. they asked why it is easier for a young woman who has a child to go on welfare than receive funded-training that would provide a livelihood for her so she could have the dignity of working for her family. healers related many stories illustrating how the system, originally designed to help the struggling family, has moved to become an encouragement for young women to get pregnant: rather than foster indigenous communities, these policies are not helping people care for their own children or develop their own communities. they really push young women to have children just for the financial assistance. traditional people indicated they are normally reluctant to speak candidly in a canadian forum for fear of unknown impacts, especially when they are not sure their position in their communities is known to the wider public. in private conversation, their voices were strong and clear: social policies should foster good community life, not motivate people to have children for financial purposes, or provide these children for adoption agencies that force the children out of the community. t r a d i t i o n a l d i s c o u r s e s f r o m t h e h e a l e r s as far as traditional healers were concerned, canadians should be aware that teenaged pregnancy in and of itself is not an issue within traditional native culture. aboriginal girls were known for marrying on the onset of puberty. however, as we know, oftentimes girls began menstruating much later than they do now, probably because of traditional food sources. furthermore, when european culture came to dominate, society changed and the rules changed. girls could not marry at the onset of puberty given 7 cardinal et al.: reflections on teenaged pregnancy published by scholarship@western, 2013 that the colonizing culture deemed it as an inappropriate practice. therefore, they were, and are not, allowed to get married at the onset of puberty because they are considered too young and still developing – both in mind and body. and this is likely the case because they have not been taken through the rituals that traditionally helped to instill mature values in a young person’s life. in contemporary canadian society, social services’ rules do not comply with traditional aboriginal values. the system looks down upon native culture with respect to how it views pregnancy, life, and childcare. whereas aboriginal culture values life and views a pregnancy as a gift, very often in today’s communities the issues surrounding the causes and consequences of young people’s choice to have sex, particularly unprotected sex, are not directly addressed. it is not part of the traditional viewpoint because tradition trained young people for community participation and contributions before they engaged in sexual activity. furthermore, the value system deriving from europe and america, which is supposed to support young mothers and their babies, largely fails them because it does not provide the sanctioned teachings: where coming of age meant the choosing of a mate and start of a family between a young man and woman. for example, by tying welfare to the young woman and her child alone, the structure of the traditional family is broken. in other words, the system is a failure to the native mothers and their children because the young man is not part of the picture. the healers’ voices were quite clear: their communities are not blind to what is happening. they know that young women are menstruating earlier and choosing to have sex at an earlier age than ever before. these liaisons do not fit the traditional pattern and so are outside their value system. there are major questions related to the spread of disease, hiv and aids, and sexually transmitted infections (stis). they believed these issues are cross-cultural and affect everyone regardless of race, class, religion, and culture. their children cannot escape the larger culture. still, because teenage pregnancy is on the rise specifically in native communities, aboriginal families and communities are stressed by the results. their voices were unified in crying out against the coming of so many babies into communities already plagued with poor health services. the babies do not have even a fighting chance at a good life in such circumstances, and mortality numbers verify that there is a problem. the psychological and social impact of teenage pregnancy on the young women, many of whom are children themselves, is regarded as quite phenomenal within contemporary aboriginal society and, therefore, a partnership between traditional people and canadian social services is crucial. the girls need community support in terms of family and friends, and traditional health care providers. moreover, the reinforcement of traditional culture is necessary to foster community support and build a foundation for healthy mothers and children in the community. the healers spoke honestly that, regardless to which aboriginal peoples one points, a debate is underway on how to deal with the problems that arise from this issue. condemning the young women will not fix the problem. it is larger than the choices that young women can immediately see. both contemporary aboriginal communities and community healthcare providers are faced with considerable stress because some of the children born from these relationships have major health issues and most communities have to find a way to deal with them. why this occurs was the subject of various discussions within the gathering session. sometimes, traditional people believed it was the loss of traditional ceremony and the structure offered by a traditional marriage; some emphasized that we do not have the resources to meet the needs of these children that is the primary problem. some hold that 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.7 the personal wish to get pregnant by a teen really arises because she has not learned who she is in the traditional way and she has very low self-esteem – she gives up on herself because she is young and does not have the inner motivation or knowhow for going to school or seeking higher life achievements for herself; she takes the easy way out and gets pregnant. for the traditional healers, it was primarily a matter of legitimate choices. young women lose sight of what they can achieve and abandon hope for their futures. having a child is the best choice among poor options. the girls need community support in terms of family and friends, and concerned health care providers. they need the support of traditional values under and around them, since they hear so much that does not promote these values. moreover, the reinforcement of traditional culture is necessary to foster a sense of community support and through that to build a foundation for healthy families for mothers, fathers, and children. the healers noted a number of elements that bear on teenage pregnancy. thus, while the healers praised the role of mothers and grandmothers in helping these young women, they feared the pressure on these women from grandchildren with so many needs. this stress will negatively impact their own health and likely reduce their own life potential. they voiced concern because several key ailments, like hiv and aids, and stis, that are part of modern life pose risks that never really existed when they were young women and so they have not developed the ability to deal with them; for traditional healers, these diseases were a greater problem than the birth of a child. the healers noted: no traditional society allowed the kind of attitude prevalent today – widespread promiscuity and disposable sex – and the healers stood unified against this practice. they insisted this was largely an influence from the larger canadian culture on aboriginal children, and they urgently require assistance to handle its negative impacts. traditional healers had real concerns about the lack of community support offered to these young women. even canadian health care workers are judgmental of these pregnant, young women without realizing that many of these young people are quite lost when it comes to family values. many are from dysfunctional families. they have little education when they become pregnant and the majority of them have not been trained in the traditional way so they have no solid identity. the level of drug, alcohol, and other addictions among these young mothers distressed healers and they worried that resources are not available within communities to offset some of the outside influences that have undermined the aboriginal way of life. nor do their concerns stop there—they spoke of being alarmed at the rate of rape, sexual assault, and abuse that comes about because these young people have an alarming low sense of personal worth. traditional women were strong and resourceful. for traditional healers, this issue needed immediate, major attention. as an example of a response, some attention is being given through a support group at the alberta hospital, which was started to deal with contemporary mental health concerns such as teenage pregnancy, addictions, family violence, depression, and loss of identity. another matter, which is growing throughout the treaty regions, is what are referred to as “receiving homes;” these homes are privately owned by citizens of first nation communities and offer a residence for children from the newly born to adolescent aged children. currently, up to 15 children are kept in these homes by people other than their immediate family members. the first of these homes was opened in the late 1990s with the notion that they would be temporary living settings for children that the young mothers were not able to support. the children would stay until such time as the mothers were capable 9 cardinal et al.: reflections on teenaged pregnancy published by scholarship@western, 2013 of supporting their own offspring. since then, up to four or five such homes, where the children are reared and prepared for the life outside this receiving home, have been set up in reserves. clifford cardinal has spoken about this matter and other health related issues on the media and received both praise and angst from the public. his point in speaking about this matter in a public forum was to share with aboriginal people what he thought was another element of colonization rearing its head within the social culture of the people: as, for example, how similar the concept appears to be with the residential schools of the past and how these children are going to be impacted in their formative years of learning and adopting behaviours that are learned in a non-familial setting. however, at issue is the cultural environment of these homes. traditional voices speak with authority about the traditional values system. they indicated that when they to have the opportunity to lead young women into traditional ways, they address sexual mores quietly and calmly within the ceremonial environment. this sanctifies the discussion. ordinarily in aboriginal cultures, speaking about sexual matters in mixed publics is taboo; it is just in bad taste. in fact, the issue divided traditional voices because some wondered whether sex education is placed in a serious enough environment. in the ceremonial environment, the discussion carries the weight of tobacco gifts; it authorizes it in a way that teachers in class cannot do. healers uniformly held that, for their communities, something as important as life and bearing children requires significant community commitment to traditional ways of teaching. this was seen as essential for moving from one stage of life into another. they pointed out that traditional knowledge keepers should be valued for some aspects of young people’s education in schools, and teaching about life is one of them. healers suggested that the elders’ abilities in the community have not been valued enough by school authorities, and they believe that policies should be changed in aboriginal education to recognize this fact. o u t c o m e r e c o m m e n d a t i o n s as a response to the healers’ positions on the issue of teenaged pregnancy, the authors have formulated some suggestions that might be addressed by social and cultural policy agents. our recommendations certainly require testing within the wider environment of traditional communities, but we think they are good starting points for further discussion, both within and outside of the aboriginal community. we have summarized these into four areas of recommendation: 1 . a f f i r m a c u l t u r a l l y a p p r o p r i a t e m o d e l . a. the traditional belief is that children are a blessing from the spirit world, with connections to spirit sources of one’s family and totem identity; therefore, there is a cultural tendency to view the coming of children as a natural extension of a young woman’s being when she reaches puberty. this view should be affirmed and respected. b. teach a worldview in which children are part of the growth of a young woman’s potential, not a burden, since traditional ways never considered children a burden. they were a natural outcome of family life. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.7 c. all institutions and health care facilities, teachers, and social workers should be committed to the model if they are to work with young women. 2 . a p p l y a c o m m u n i t y c o n s t r u c t i o n 5 r o l e i n a l l w o r k w i t h t e e n a g e w o m e n . this can be constituted this way: a. from a traditional point of view, it is not teenaged pregnancy that should be the concern, but the offering of community enhancing options for teenage women. b. layout a ladder of achievement for both the mother and her child. provide a one-stop centre6– a daycare, training school, health clinic, counselling unit, integrated traditional medicine and biomedicine environment. make sure there is adequate transportation to get her and her baby to the centre from wherever she is living. this should apply to both rural and urban settings. c. portray a visible, remunerated ladder of development: a paid job as a daycare assistant or bakery helper while the young mother is going to school or receiving specialized training, then a move up to a teacher’s helper or waitress, then a kindergarten teamteacher or hospitality management trainee, then an assistant teacher or food hospitality supervisor, then a teacher or supervisor. not only can she learn while she works and gets paid, but she learns how to support herself and her child in a manner that leads to progressive development. she can see how she can progress, and her child is well cared for while she continues on her personal journey. this model can also work for young women who are not parents. d. a parallel, “young warriors,” program for young fathers should also be developed through the one-stop centre, which affirms the male role as the child’s guide and support as the child grows. this will undergird the common family life envisaged in traditional culture with parallel roles and responsibilities, while preserving the notion of different roles with common purpose in relationships. given indigenous ideological commitments to a traditional family model, this component must be present or the institution will not be legitimate in the community’s eyes. 3 . u n d e r g i r d t h i s m o d e l w i t h a t r a d i t i o n a l e d u c a t i o n a l s t r u c t u r e : a. use grandmothers and female elders as trainers and role models; employ traditional women ceremonialists to teach the young women about their ceremonies, their long 5 the community construction model depends upon empowering women from grandmothers down to the smallest girl, as the key bricks in aboriginal life. it should affirm the positive role women played in traditional culture and re-affirm that role today. it should embrace the desire for children as part of the traditional balance of nature, but provide a way forward for both mother and child together in a world that does not recognize these traditional values. 6 a notion developed in australia for children and brought to my attention by sherry thompson of alberta’s ministry of health (see department for education and child development, 2010). 11 cardinal et al.: reflections on teenaged pregnancy published by scholarship@western, 2013 identity in canada, and the importance of their way of well-being as a viable way to live in the world; and incorporate this into school educational projects. b. apply the same model for the young men, with elders and healers involved in their counselling and training in the centre. c. make this structure central to the girls’ education from kindergarten, and certainly as a part of the general training philosophy as soon as they come to the centre. d. since sexuality and moral fibre are regarded as mainstays of women’s lives, build upon traditional cultural values: in that way, education is cloaked in traditionalist teachings, not imposed from a system foreign to the natural balance sought in traditional worldviews. this also means offering gender segregated teachings headed by women healers and traditional women and featuring their skills at conveying sexual information in a culturally-appropriate manner. this education should be available to girls from school age on. e. make every effort to integrate traditional lifestyles into learning, including “book learning.” that is, while she is learning at school, keep the young mother and her child safe and comfortable within easy reach of each other in the centre so there is no significant physical space separating them. f. ensure that women work and interconnect with the young women so that the young mother can see the values of women who work within a system and how it pays off. she should be able to see what the right kind of skill development can provide for her and her child. g. employ a traditional woman healer and provide her with current information about problem areas in girls’ lives, including fetal alcohol syndrome (fas), drug abuse, family violence, etc., and have her act as counsellor and surrogate grandmother for both the child and the young mother. use the power of ceremony to teach community values. allow her to reinforce the responsibility of both the young woman and the young man as parents and community builders. 4 . a p a r t n e r s h i p b e t w e e n r e s e r v e f u n d i n g a n d p u b l i c a s s i s t a n c e f u n d i n g i n t h i s m o d e l . a. in rural environments, this model will require reserve administration backing and support, both for the reconstruction of physical space around the one-stop centre idea and the centralizing of services. it is particularly important to provide the transportation infrastructure because the model will not work if transportation is not completely integrated into the system. otherwise, the young mother will feel a barrier right from the beginning. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.7 b. participation in the program should bring with it adequate funding. this will remove the incentive to become pregnant just to gain livelihood and will positively tie the young woman into an advancement system based on traditional values. c. funding should rest jointly with the reserve and social services system so that the administration can respond if the young woman decides to move to another reserve or into the city. d. in the urban environment, a surrogate model of the reserve should be built with the one-stop centre idea replicated. in that locale, housing should be negotiated so that public transportation can be used, but the concept of free and available transportation should still predominate. a pick-up van would be best, but subsidizing bus tickets might work. e. maintain the notion of payment for work while going to school and use role models of aboriginal women in urban centres as the backbone of the organization. f. create partnerships between social work and municipal governments to underwrite the cost of this model of care. these traditional healers’ voices, then, represent a cross-section of those participants in the gathering. the recommendations arise from their vision of tackling the more difficult aspects of teenage pregnancy. these would now need to be evaluated by traditional people in each community to see what is relevant to their situation and to adapt them to their cultural traditions. two further notes: when interpreting this material, it is crucial that the context be kept in mind. in an environment stressing traditional values and traditional lifestyles, the voices we heard remained fairly close to what some will argue is a conventional narrative. we think this view is crucial because it appears to be the only option for addressing some very tough issues in canada today. furthermore, hovering in the background is the major resentment around colonization and residential schools (see brascoupé & waters, 2009). these issues cast a long shadow. we have made no attempt to unpack the relationships with the voices we have expressed here. because of space, little attempt has been made to articulate differences between groups in various parts of the country. by not doing so, the implication is that all indigenous people have the same experience, all the time, and everywhere. we know that is not the case, as the healers carefully expressed. clearly, the healers could not say much about the negative results of abuse, addiction, and family violence that mar so many communities and modify the family contexts within which many of the teenaged pregnant young women are embedded. the healers have tried, nevertheless, to address issues that have broad representation throughout the land. 13 cardinal et al.: reflections on teenaged pregnancy published by scholarship@western, 2013 r e f e r e n c e s aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc). (2010). canada’s statement of support on the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples. retrieved from http://www.ainc-inac.gc.ca/ap/ia/dcl/stmt-eng.asp alfred, t. (2005). wasase: indigenous pathways of action and freedom. peterborough: broadview press. brascoupé, s., & waters, c. (2009). cultural safety: exploring the applicability of the concept of cultural safety to aboriginal health and community wellness. journal of aboriginal health, 5(2), 6 – 41. retrieved from www.naho.ca/jah/english/jah05_02/v5_i2_cultural_01.pdf cardinal, c. (2010, october 24). opening remarks. presented at the gathering, edmonton. canadian institute of child health (cich). (1994). the health of canada's children: a cich profile (2nd ed.). ottawa: the institute. coulthard, g. s. (2007). subjects of empire: indigenous peoples and the “politics of recognition” in canada. contemporary political theory, 6, 437 460. doi:10.1057/ palgrave.cpt.9331037 cruikshank, j. (2000). the social life of stories: narrative and knowledge in the yukon territory. university of nebraska press. department for education and child development. (2010). children’s centres for early childhood development and parenting. retrieved from government of south australia website http://www.decd.sa.gov.au/childrensservices/pages/earlychildhood/childrenscentres/?reflag =1 devries, k. m., & free, c. (2010). “i told him not to use condoms”: masculinities, femininities and sexual health of aboriginal canadian young people. sociology of health & illness, 32(6), 827– 842. health canada, first nations and inuit health branch. (2005). a statistical profile on the health of first nations in canada. ottawa: minister of health canada. health canada, first nations and inuit health branch strategic policy, planning, and analysis. (2012). fnih research. bulletin, april, 1 – 5. retrieved from http://www.hcsc.gc.ca/fniah-spnia/alt_formats/pdf/pubs/aborig-autoch/_bulletin-2012/bulletin1-eng.pdf rotermann, m. (2007). second or subsequent births to teenagers. health reports, 18(1), 39 – 42. (statistics canada catalogue no. 82-003). taliman, v. (2010, august 23). canada’s racist policies to blame for national tragedy. indian country. retrieved from indiancountrytodaymedianetwork.com/ictarchives/2010/08/23/canada%25e2%2580%2599sracist-policies-to-blame-for-national-tragedy-2-81939 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.7 united nations (un). (2008). united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples. retrieved from http://www.un.org/esa/socdev/unpfii/documents/drips_en.pdf 15 cardinal et al.: reflections on teenaged pregnancy published by scholarship@western, 2013 the international indigenous policy journal march 2013 voices from the land: reflections on teenaged pregnancy in aboriginal communities today the voices of traditional healers delores cardinal clifford cardinal earle waugh darryn baddour recommended citation voices from the land: reflections on teenaged pregnancy in aboriginal communities today the voices of traditional healers abstract french abstract spanish abstract keywords creative commons license voices from the land: reflections on teenaged pregnancy in aboriginal communities today the voices of traditional healers long time overdue: an examination of the destructive impacts of policy and legislation on pregnant and parenting aboriginal women and their children the international indigenous policy journal volume 6 | issue 1 article 5 january 2015 long time overdue: an examination of the destructive impacts of policy and legislation on pregnant and parenting aboriginal women and their children cyndy baskin school of social work, ryerson university, cbaskin@ryerson.ca carol strike dalla lana school of public health, university of toronto, carol.strike@utoronto.ca bela mcpherson bmcpherson2172@yahoo.ca recommended citation baskin, c. , strike, c. , mcpherson, b. (2015). long time overdue: an examination of the destructive impacts of policy and legislation on pregnant and parenting aboriginal women and their children. the international indigenous policy journal, 6(1). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.5 long time overdue: an examination of the destructive impacts of policy and legislation on pregnant and parenting aboriginal women and their children abstract today, in canada, aboriginal peoples continue to experience marginalization, over representation in the child welfare system, and a higher prevalence of poverty and substance misuse challenges. these experiences affect for aboriginal women in particular because of the oppressive experiences of systemic racism and discrimination they face, including legislation such as the indian act and the child and family services act, which directly targets them. this article is based on a research project conducted in toronto, ontario that implemented aboriginal research methodologies to explore ways to increase collaboration between aboriginal families, treatment counsellors, and child welfare workers. one significant theme that emerged out of this project was the concept of time as related to policy and legislation that negatively impact aboriginal pregnant and/or parenting women. in this analysis, we focus on the concept of time as connected to four policy areas that emerged from the findings: historical trauma caused by discriminatory legislation, the family court system, the bureaucracy of child welfare, and the need for further research and long-term solutions. keywords aboriginal mothers, substance misuse treatment, child protection acknowledgments funding for this research project came from the canadian institute of health research. this article is dedicated to our elder, the late joann kakekaish. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/   l o n g t i m e o v e r d u e : a n e x a m i n a t i o n o f t h e d e s t r u c t i v e i m p a c t s o f p o l i c y a n d l e g i s l a t i o n o n p r e g n a n t a n d p a r e n t i n g a b o r i g i n a l w o m e n a n d t h e i r c h i l d r e n according to the 2006 census, there are now over one million aboriginal1 peoples (1,172,785) living in canada, with aboriginal women representing 51% of that population (statistics canada, 2008). although aboriginal women only represent 3% of the total female population in canada, the population growth of girls is greater than that of the general female population (elizabeth fry, 2010a). this may be due in part to aboriginal peoples having a younger population, as evident in the median age of 27 years old compared to 40 years old for the general canadian population (statistics canada, 2008). aboriginal women’s health status is far below that of aboriginal men, demonstrating disadvantage created by the intersection of race and gender in their lives (native women’s association of canada [nwac], 2007). the statistics for aboriginal women are worrisome with respect to experiences of violence, abuse, and death. aboriginal women between the ages of 25 and 44 years old are 5 times more likely to die as a result of violence than non-aboriginal women in canada and are more likely than nonaboriginal women to have experienced abuse (chansonneuve, 2008; nwac, 2007). a human rights report commissioned by amnesty international (2004), titled the stolen sisters report, discussed the extensive discrimination and violence experienced by aboriginal women. following this report, the native women’s association of canada (nwac) documented over 600 missing or murdered aboriginal women since the 1980s through their role in advocacy, research, education, and awareness initiatives (amnesty international, 2004; nwac, 2007). furthermore, from a social determinants of health perspective, aboriginal women experience inequities, such as lower quality of housing, fewer employment opportunities, lower educational attainment, inadequate physical environments, lower socioeconomic status, and weaker social supports within communities (nwac, 2007). in turn, these factors contribute to increased rates of substance misuse, mental health challenges, suicide, poverty, lack of safe and affordable housing, and barriers to opportunities that could increase socioeconomic standing. the oppressive experiences of systemic racism and sexism that aboriginal women face, including in legislation such as the indian act and the child and family services act, is of significance to aboriginal women who are pregnant and/or parenting while using substances (elizabeth fry, 2010b; horejsi, heavy runner craig, & pablo 1992; nwac, 2007; salmon, 2010; smith, edwards, varcoe, martens, & davies, 2006) because such legislation means that they lack self-determination and influence in policies that directly relate to them. according to chandler and lalonde (1998), community wellbeing appears to be related to selfgovernment (particularly the involvement of women), control of education, and control of the policies and practices of health and social programs. other research links wellbeing to people and communities who believe they are in control of their lives (reading & wien, 2013). unfortunately, colonial                                                                                                                 1 the term aboriginal in this article reflects a diversity of indigenous expression that is grounded in the north american context, otherwise known as turtle island. in canada, the term aboriginal most often refers to any person, group, or community who identifies as having ancestry to first nations, either registered (or status) indians as defined by the indian act of canada or non-status first nations; metis; or inuit. other terms commonly employed in the literature that may be reflected in this writing include native, native american, american indian, first peoples, original peoples, and indigenous. 1 baskin et al.: long time overdue published by scholarship@western, 2015   governments and institutions are not acting upon such evidence, resulting in unequal participation of aboriginal people in political institutions that govern their fate (reading & wien, 2013). this article is based on a research project entitled developing collaborative relationships between aboriginal mothers, substance misuse treatment counsellors, and child welfare workers conducted in toronto, ontario from 2007 to 2010. the overall goal of the project was to explore and better understand the relationship dynamics between aboriginal women and the various systems of care in which they become engaged along their journeys of substance misuse, mothering, and wellness. we explore an emergent theme of how time shapes and can undermine these relationships. within this project, we incorporated two important frameworks: anti-colonial theory and communitybased research. we chose anti-colonial theory because it examines how colonization has affected indigenous peoples, as well as the relationships that exist between colonized and colonizing peoples, from the worldview of indigenous peoples (baskin, 2011). post-colonial theory also discusses resistance and decolonization. it “indicates a new way of thinking in which cultural, intellectual, economic, or political processes are seen to work together in the . . . dismantling of colonialism . . . by examining the intersection of ideas and institutions, knowledge and power” (loomba, 1998, p. 45). we chose community-based research because it fits well with aboriginal values of community control throughout the research process. community-based research centres on areas of interest and concern to local peoples and ensures that multiplicities of voices are represented (porsanger, 2004). the project received institutional ethical review from ryerson university and the centre for addictions and mental health (camh). group techniques, including storytelling circles and focus group discussions, were used to collect information. l i t e r a t u r e r e v i e w in understanding what contributes to the negative statistics and poor socially determined health outcomes for aboriginal women, it is imperative to acknowledge the historical and intergenerational impacts of colonialism on their lives. colonization can be understood as the forced takeover of turtle island (north america) by french and british settlers in the 1500s, which signalled the beginning of troubling times for the original peoples of this part of the world (miller, 2000). colonialism brought disease, death, displacement through forced reserve settlement, legislated assimilation policies, residential schooling, damaging child welfare practices, and the ongoing marginalization of aboriginal peoples, especially women (miller, 2000). it is this enduring colonial legacy that is widely understood as being a major contributor to the contemporary social ills that plague aboriginal peoples (bombay, matheson, & anisman, 2009; chansonneuve, 2008; de leeuw, greenwood, & cameron, 2010; ordolis, 2007; shepard, o’neill & guenette, 2006). intergenerational trauma, also referred to as historical trauma, is commonly understood, in the aboriginal context, as the process by which stressful traumatic experiences from colonialism have been carried over from one generation of aboriginal peoples to the next (bombay et al., 2009), resulting in the breakdown of traditional aboriginal kinship and family structures, impacting parenting across generations, and disrupting traditional systems of social support (horejsi et al., 1992; niccols, dell, & clarke, 2010; rutman, field, jackson, lundquist, & callahan, 2005; shepard et al., 2006; thibodeau & peigan, 2007). this is the current reality for many aboriginal women, indicating the need for an 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.5   understanding of and sensitivity to the intergenerational legacy and ongoing impacts of colonialism on aboriginal women’s lives (benoit,carroll & chaudhry, 2003; chansonneuve, 2008; de leeuw et al., 2010; horejsi et al., 1992; ordolis, 2007; rutman et al., 2005; shepard et al., 2006; thibodeau & peigan, 2007). women who use substances while pregnant or parenting not only have to face the day-to-day challenges of social stigma in our society, but their experiences are compounded by the prevalence of a shaming discourse within health care and judicial systems creating further barriers to accessing treatment. substance use during pregnancy has become equated to child abuse—often resulting in the apprehension of children at birth or soon thereafter (carter, 2002; crowe-salazar, 2009; niccols et al., 2010; rutman et al., 2005). in our project, one mother spoke for many when she stated, “because i had a record with them, my other children were in cas, they came and apprehended my youngest one from the moment [of birth].” one research project by carter (2002) explained how women’s substance use and their fear of punishment created uncomfortable relationships with healthcare provides, which resulted in the women being 4 times more likely to receive inadequate healthcare, increasing the risk of adverse events for both mother and child. carter (2002) further noted how the pejorative attitudes of healthcare providers create overwhelming barriers for low-income, substance using pregnant women. for some time in the aboriginal context, prevalence rates of fetal alcohol syndrome effects (fase) were believed to be at a state of crisis compared to the general population; however, recent research has revealed that, in fact, no clear evidence exists that differentiates the rates of fase between aboriginal and non-aboriginal children in canada (pacey, 2009; salmon, 2010). for mothers who use substances while pregnant and/or parenting, prevailing discourses present a dichotomous view of the wellbeing of children versus the wellbeing of mothers (carter, 2002; crowesalazar, 2009; greaves & poole, 2007; rutman et al., 2005). this leads to social responses that prioritize the wellbeing of fetuses and children over mothers’ wellbeing, thereby failing to address the root causes that perpetuate women’s disadvantaged social locations that correlate with their substance misuse (greaves & poole, 2007). for instance, the work of niccols, dell, and clarke (2010) points to how research has indicated serious social and economic challenges such as homelessness, lack of affordable housing, and the struggle to provide “stable and nurturing” environments for children as barriers to women’s ability to parent. along these same lines, boyd (2007) pointed out, “poverty, rather than illegal drugs, has the most negative impact on fetal health and birth outcomes” (p. 17). furthermore, punitive laws that persecute racialized women for essentially being poor, pregnant or mothering, and dependent on substances have been criticized for punishing women rather than protecting unborn children (rutman et al., 2005). another theme discussed in the literature pertaining to substance-using women who are pregnant or parenting is the racialization of mothers (crowe-salazar, 2009). women are often characterized by a “racialized” existence, which positions them as marginalized “others” and “bad mothers” (gustafson, 2005). surveillance data shows that the use of illegal drugs is similar across racial and class lines for women; however, it is poor and racialized women who are most likely to be criminalized for their use (carter, 2002). the amount of attention that gets paid to targeting specific racialized populations of women through public health campaigns and prevention initiatives like fase have been noted (rutman 3 baskin et al.: long time overdue published by scholarship@western, 2015   et al., 2005; salmon, 2007; salmon, 2010; smith et al., 2006). interestingly, salmon (2007) points to a national canadian survey that showed how problem drinking was more prevalent among white, wealthy and middle-class women with high levels of education; however, these surveillance data are not used to construct this population as a “social problem” or a threat to their children. salmon (2007) goes on to note that, nevertheless, it is aboriginal communities that have often been earmarked for great public surveillance of “risky” behaviors such as substance misuse. aboriginal peoples’ experiences with the child welfare system often tell of troubling, inappropriate, discriminatory, and harmful interactions that have left deep scars on the memory, and contemporary reality, of aboriginal peoples. in canada, there are currently 3 times more aboriginal children in the child welfare system today than the number of children in attendance at the height of the residential schools in the 1940s (blackstock & trocmé, 2005; de leeuw et al., 2010; salmon, 2010). this phenomenon, referred to as the "millennium scoop," relies on the same policies as child welfare in the decades proceeding the turn of the 21st century, despite small changes to the child and family services act (sinclair, 2007). the child welfare system has also been criticized for relying heavily on risk assessments that decontextualize women’s lived experiences and behaviors from their parenting abilities (boyd, 2007). weaver (2007) similarly noted this with regard to the questionnaire child welfare workers use to assess substance misuse: the questions appear to build a case against women rather than help them. assessments of substance misuse do not distinguish between patterns of use that may result in children being in harm’s way or neglected, and patterns of use where safe arrangements for children are set up. as a result, substance use itself becomes proof of child abuse and/or maltreatment (rutman et al., 2005). the practice of assessment by child welfare workers could be improved if the type of substance(s) used and the severity of use figured more prominently in determining risks and case planning (grella, hser, & huang, 2006). assessments have been said to be “out of sync” with the realities of substance using mothers (rutman, callahan & swift, 2007). rutman et al. (2007) have drawn distinct conclusions based on four qualitative studies that highlight concerns associated with risk assessments such as a focus on weaknesses instead of strengths, a demand for a fast and linear process of healing, identification of issues a woman must deal with thereby constructing these as being personal faults of the woman, and a lack of needed self-reflection processes that are beneficial to women with substance misuse challenges in moving towards health and wellbeing. according to a 2004 united nations report cited by niccols, dell, and clarke (2010), “engaging and retaining pregnant and parenting women in treatment requires collaboration between substance use treatment sectors, prenatal care, and child welfare . . . ideally, services should be accessed through a single site” (p. 325). an integrated treatment program approach would include pregnancy, parenting, and child-related services and care in addition to a woman-centred treatment approach (niccols, dell, et al., 2010). evaluations of integrated programs suggest positive outcomes for women and children, such as the reduction of substance misuse, improved parenting capacity, better child development outcomes, and improved mental health (niccols, dell, et al., 2010; niccols, dobbins, et al., 2010). one quantitative study by grella et al. (2006) exploring the situations of mothers who were in substance misuse treatment and were involved with child welfare services found that those who were able to attend 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.5   treatment programs with their children and/or retained custody of their children during treatment had higher rates of program retention than those who did not have their children. m e t h o d s the project arose from an earlier capacity building project where aboriginal mothers experiencing substance misuse and child welfare involvement identified the need to better understand the nature and potential to improve their relationships with child welfare and substance misuse treatment agencies. based on their recommendations, we designed this study to capture data in toronto, canada during 2009 and 2010 using two methods: focus group discussions for substance misuse treatment counsellors and child welfare workers; and story-telling circles to collect data from mothers experiencing substance misuse and child welfare involvement. these qualitative methods are appropriate when trying to understand social interactions and processes. from inception to analyses and dissemination, the community was represented in this project by aboriginal women from the following agencies: jean tweed centre, centre for addiction and mental health (camh), noojimawin health authority, toronto public health, aboriginal legal services, council fire, native child and family services of toronto, native women’s resource centre, métis nation of ontario, and ryerson university. we looked to our elder, joann kakekayash, to ensure that our practices and outcomes were consistent with ontario coalition of aboriginal people (ocap) principles. to recruit substance misuse treatment counsellors and child welfare workers, baskin, strike, and/or mcpherson attended staff meetings at camh, jean tweed, native child and family services of toronto, and metro toronto children’s aid society. in these meetings they described the research project, answered questions, and handed out a study flyer with information regarding how to contact the team and volunteer to participate. a total of 11 drug and alcohol and 12 child welfare workers who had worked with an aboriginal pregnant or parenting woman in toronto in the last five years volunteered to participate and attended one of four focus group discussions. we recruited workers and conducted the focus groups before we recruited mothers as a way to demonstrate to mothers our commitment to their confidentiality. to recruit mothers experiencing drug and alcohol problems and with child welfare involvement to participate in a storytelling circles, nine agencies (i.e., camh (aboriginal services), jean tweed, toronto council fire, anishnawbe health toronto, south riverdale community health centre, new heights community centre, aboriginal head start, the meeting place, and the scarborough storefront) assisted by posting flyers on notice boards, sending email messages to their listserv recipients, and handing out the flyers directly to clients. for the storytelling circles, 38 mothers who selfidentified as aboriginal (i.e., first nations, inuit, or métis) and had been involved with a child protection agency and an addiction treatment facility in toronto in the past five years attended one of five circles. before obtaining consent from participants, we followed a cultural protocol that represents the value of reciprocity by the offering of a traditional tobacco tie to those from whom we seek their experience and knowledge. traditional aboriginal teachings “reveal the cultural significance of tobacco as a spiritual and sacred entity that helps us to remember the importance of our reciprocal and interdependent relationship in the web of creation” (michell, 1999, p. 3). tobacco is a sacred medicine and is used in 5 baskin et al.: long time overdue published by scholarship@western, 2015   ceremonial practices. it is used to seal an oath in almost all important functions, friendships, and agreements (michell, 1999). when researchers extract stories and knowledge, they are taking something sacred from people and communities. since the research process disrupts balance for these people and communities, we offered each participant a tobacco tie to restore balance. following this ceremony, each participant was asked to read and sign a consent form. a research team member discussed issues related to mandatory reporting requirements related to any disclosure during the session about abuse and/or intentions to harm one’s self or others. also, we reminded participants that other than those reporting requirements, we would not disclose what was said in the groups to child welfare and/or drug treatment workers and/or mothers. we asked each participant to respect the confidentiality of other participants and not to disclose anything said during the discussions. after answering any questions, we asked the participants to sign the consent form. we believe our use of ceremony, method of obtaining consent, and clarity regarding reporting requirements provided an environment where participants could judge what and how they wished to disclose their thoughts, feelings, and experiences. each of the focus group discussions with substance misuse treatment counsellors and child welfare workers was opened by our elder, joann kakekayash, who offered a prayer and traditional teaching. after these ceremonies, strike and/or baskin asked the counsellors or workers who participated to discuss their experiences, attitudes, opinions, and recommendations regarding (a) providing services to and any collaborative practice with women, children, and families experiencing drug and alcohol problems; and (b) collaboration between the treatment and child welfare systems. for the story-telling circles with mothers experiencing substance misuse and child welfare involvement, our elder, joann kakekayash, opened with a prayer and a teaching about the anishnawbe medicine wheel. following these ceremonies, women were asked by baskin and/or mcpherson to discuss their experiences, attitudes, opinions, and recommendations regarding involvement with child welfare and substance misuse treatment. for the story telling circles, we placed a 4 x 4 foot artistic rendition of the anishnawbe medicine wheel teachings in the centre of the circle and women were asked to structure their remarks, if appropriate, in relation to the four directions. an eagle feather was passed from participant to participant along the circle and used to designate a turn to speak, thereby ensuring all had the opportunities to speak. at the end of each circle, a traditional closing was facilitated by our elder. the women were provided with a feast, an honorarium, and compensation for childcare. with the consent of the participants, all of the storytelling circles and focus group discussions were recorded and later transcribed verbatim. to ensure the confidentiality of the participants, only members of our team with no direct clinical roles had access to the transcripts. other team members, including those working for child welfare agencies and substance use treatment programs only had access to excerpts and never knew who participated or what particular people had said. we read, discussed, and condensed the transcripts to understand the key ideas that participants spoke about using thematic coding techniques. for this project overall, and also during the analyses, we were challenged to represent the cultural complexity of the aboriginal population in toronto. in light of these challenges, we decided to focus on the teachings from our elder and the anishawbe land on which we conducted our project. to understand the stories we were told, we were guided by the seven grandfather teachings of wisdom, respect, humility, love, honesty, bravery, and truth to examine and explain factors (e.g., personal, interpersonal, and institutional) that influence how mothers, counsellors, and 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.5   workers understand and interact with each other. we read, discussed, and coded the transcripts based on these teachings and also identified emergent themes. following the coding procedures, we condensed the content of the codes into analytic summaries with supporting data excerpts. to ensure rigor, we presented our coding structure and analytic summaries to the full team for comment, discussion, and suggestions for clarification and modification. in this sub-analysis, we focused on one of these emergent themes: time. time was examined as it connected to six policy areas that emerged from the findings: historical trauma caused by discriminatory legislation, the criminalization of mothers who misuse substances, the targeting of mothers through public health campaigns, the family court system, the bureaucracy of child welfare, and the need for further research and long-term solutions. r e s u l t s h i s t o r i c a l t r a u m a : t i m e d o e s n o t h e a l a l l w o u n d s according to the literature, research that has examined aboriginal family experiences of the child welfare system describes the need for workers to develop a better understanding of the historical relationship of aboriginal peoples with child welfare authorities (horejsi et al., 1992) and the lack of trust that can occur on numerous levels for many aboriginal peoples such as loss of trust in self, family, community, government, and in those seen as “outsiders” (thibodeau & peigan, 2007). a substance misuse treatment counsellor in our research project suggested that multi-generational apprehension of children contributes to mistrust: what does it mean for [a mother] to have her children taken away as she was taken away from her mother and her mother was taken away? in our project, mothers spoke to the catastrophic impacts that historical trauma with child protection authorities have had on them and their families. as one mother said, so me and the children’s aid, we don’t get along because even to this day, my children were taken from me because of my past being rooted in that system. this mother was referring to the fact that her children were involved with the children's aids society (cas) because, as a baby, she was apprehended by cas from her parents. another mother, who did not lose her children, but did have the unrelenting involvement of cas in her life, shared, because we have a family history, as soon as i have my child, they’re at the hospital trying to take my kid or they want to know what i’m doing. my kids never got taken away from me, but it’s just like they’re constantly there. they never leave you alone and just because something happens in a family, it doesn’t mean the next generation is going to continue on the same pattern. as one drug treatment counsellor in this research project shared, if a woman has come from a life of oppression and has internalized oppression, to get to a place where she can say she likes herself, that could be a life-long journey. 7 baskin et al.: long time overdue published by scholarship@western, 2015   f a m i l y c o u r t s y s t e m : t i m e r e p e a t i n g i t s e l f branding mothers who misuse substances as uncaring or abusive is not helpful. one mother captured this when speaking about reaching out to cas for help: they acted like i was an abusive parent. they took my [child] from me. she went on to say that her child later informed her, they’re [cas] telling me i have fetal alcohol spectrum . . . you drank when you were pregnant with me because you didn’t care and ruined my life. another mother in our project discussed her view of the focus of cas on apprehension and adoption over helping the family: i thought they were there to help people, not to grab their children and run, and the more i hear of them, the more i feel that they want to take as many kids as they can. they don’t even want to wait a year or two to have them in their care before they want to adopt them out. they (cas) were talking to [removed name] about adopting [removed child’s name] out as soon as possible. you know that’s not right. it’s not right at all. one mother, who was in cas as a child, remarked on the long-term effects she endured and the length of time it is taking her to learn about who she is: i’ve not been clinically diagnosed with depression, but i have through periods of my life been dealing with abandonment issues and things like that . . . i struggle with native spirituality because i was raised in a different family, a christian family, the typical adoption. i'm slowly learning about my native background and my history now. i’m struggling to have my own beliefs i guess. i also want to teach my [child] these beliefs too. the child welfare system continues to be criticized for placing more emphasis on the removal of aboriginal children, than towards addressing the root causes that impact aboriginal mothers’ ability to parent (ordolis, 2007). as one mother candidly shared, i have four children who have been in the children’s aid off and on most of their lives. the first time they went into cas, i asked for their (cas) help. having four children, it’s hard to get a babysitter when you want to go to rehab to get clean and i couldn’t get any of my family to help me that way. sadly, this mother spent years involved with the courts, post apprehension, and she eventually lost her children to crown wardship. another mom also spoke about the risk she took in order to get help: i had to put them (my children) in children’s aid to get treatment because i didn’t have any family or anybody able to take them . . . that could have really backfired on me. i jumped through every hoop they told me to; i even said “how high?” . . . i was honest and genuine from 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.5   the beginning because they wouldn’t have known i had a drug problem if i hadn’t told them . . . but i know other people that were honest and it didn’t work, they just got slammed. child welfare's narrow focus on protection, rather than prevention, creates policies that conflict with aboriginal practices that aim to keep children in their families and communities. a euro-canadian worldview continues to be imposed upon aboriginal people through governmental legislation, policies, and laws, which violates their right to self-determination and the fact that they have never relinquished their right to care for their children. as one mother explained, they (cas) come in and they just snatch up their (the parent’s) kids and think they can teach them a better way than their own parents. when they return them home, they’re screwed up because there was nothing wrong with them in the first place. just somebody decided that they didn’t like the way they parented. there’s many ways of parenting. not everybody parents the same, but just because one worker decides that they don’t like the way the client is raising their children, they have the right to come and snatch them. h i g h b u r e a u c r a t i c d e m a n d s : n a r r o w w i n d o w s o f t i m e the demands of child protection work has been observed as drawing attention away from building relationships with mothers as part of the child welfare process. time is short for the latter due to the high demand of bureaucratic documentation and investigative procedures (maiter, palmer, & manji, 2006). in this project, cas workers lamented that the bureaucracy of their work does not usually fit with the realities of the mothers and families that they service. as one worker explained, we’re at the hospital. the mom has just given birth. they will be released the next day. this means we have six hours of working time to figure out a safe plan for the child. it’s never smooth. things can change very quickly like something might’ve been one way an hour ago, but suddenly changes, so you have to make very quick decisions on the spot. you have such a little bit of time to find everyone you need to find and talk to everyone that could possibly help you or help the mom out. another worker echoed this, stating, you can’t get everything done that you want to do. there is so much external pressure on us from the society and the hospital. thus, even when workers try to assess situations and allow for bonding time between the mother and newborn, they are faced with unrealistic demands from the child welfare and health care bureaucracies. the narrow parameters of time also influence the time allocated for women to recover and reunite with their children. not having enough time also strains the resources of substance misuse treatment counsellors. as explained by one, for the women that we work with if they’re using and the children get apprehended . . . we’re like, “okay you got to be in court in five days,” and you have to be able to pick up and get in a program and complete a program and then you can come out and see your kids. it’s astronomical in terms of the human resources and time put into this. it's like that for us, so how 9 baskin et al.: long time overdue published by scholarship@western, 2015   can we expect the moms to complete these challenges in such a short amount of time? the whole thing is unrealistic. this is certainly tied into the excessive focus on compliance regarding case management and child protection standards, which lead to huge administrative requirements and unreasonable demands upon aboriginal child welfare agencies. according to the commission to promote sustainable child welfare (cpscw, 2011), “compliance measures tell us relatively little about the outcomes for children and families or of cas services” (p. 40) and yet, according to a former child welfare worker, this is what takes up so much of their time: when i worked in child welfare, i had 35 children on my case load . . . i mean there’s only so many hours in a day and all the requirements of the notes are really very stringent . . . so it was a six day a week job. time and compliance demands also influence the treatment approach for mothers engaged with the child welfare system. substance misuse treatment counsellors reflected that, for mothers, the demands for compliance fail to reflect the process of recovery as they are only allotted short periods to time to begin this rehabilitation. as one stated, a three-week program to me is like putting your toe in the water. i don't know how these women are supposed to do this. clearly, the mothers are not given the same amount of time as the child welfare bureaucracy and yet it is the former who are expected to change. such power imbalances and disempowering practices must be closely examined in terms of the relationships between service providers and aboriginal families and communities. there is already evidence in british columbia that communities that have some self-governance, meaning control over services such as child and family services, health, and education, experience lower rates of youth suicide than those that do not (lalonde, 2006). does it not make sense, then, to put time and resources into what seems to be helping, rather than repeating the same interventions over and over again? l o n g t e r m s o l u t i o n s : r e e v a l u a t i n g t i m e viewing motherhood over the life course, substance misuse treatment counsellors in this research project acknowledged how identities begin to transform during the prenatal period: during the time of pregnancy, it’s a transitional stage and you start to think about family and where you come from and who you are as a person and a mother, and i think a lot of the women i work with, are estranged from their culture so pregnancy can be a time for them to find out where they belong. mothers involved in this project also spoke to the need of an integrative treatment approach: i think that what the city of toronto needs really is a family treatment centre. i had the opportunity to go into a treatment centre in the [united] states a number of years ago that 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.5   addressed the whole person, but also the whole family because the disease of addiction affects everyone in our family. it touches the lives of everyone that we love and i think that we really need to have a place where our children can come in with us so that we don’t have to worry about where they are . . . that whole stress of your child being away from you would not be there, so we would be able to heal while there. one mother, who agreed with the others, emphasized that when the topic of family treatment centres is discussed the talk typically focuses on the lack of funding and it has been discussed for a very long time with no results: i know that there have been talks about something like that for years, like almost 20 years, and here we go again. i’ve sat in circles over and over again and it’s always the same people and it’s always about money. this concern was also raised by both substance misuse counsellors and child welfare workers who referred to the importance of beginning to “examine rules that are not working” and the need for “longterm policies that engage all parties” who are involved with women and their children. c o n c l u s i o n this article is based on a research project that explored the relationships between aboriginal mothers who misuse substances and the various systems of care with which they become engaged. through group techniques, including storytelling circles and focus group discussions, the concept of time emerged as a significant theme. time was then connected to the four policy areas that emerged from the findings: historical trauma caused by discriminatory legislation, the family court system, the bureaucracy of child welfare, and the need for long-term solutions embedded in policies. as is evident in this article, only a handful of sources from the literature spoke about the issues of aboriginal women’s substance misuse and mothering (see niccols, dell, et al., 2010; niccols, dobbins et al., 2010; rutman et al., 2005, 2007; salmon, 2007, 2010). in the literature, authors who wrote from an aboriginal context did not always have a gender specific analysis: some content pertained to aboriginal families and aboriginal peoples more broadly. aboriginal specific sources also tended to focus more on child welfare issues over substance misuse among pregnant and/or parenting aboriginal women. social determinants of health and colonialism were generally noted across a broad spectrum of aboriginal peoples, rather than a specific focus on aboriginal women who misuse substances, let alone those who do so and are pregnant and/or parenting. when piecing the literature together, the need is great for supportive care and treatment for aboriginal women’s health and wellbeing when dealing with substance misuse while pregnant and/or parenting. what is missing is a contextual analysis and research that is specific to the relationship dynamics between aboriginal women and the various systems of care with which they become engaged along their journeys of substance misuse, mothering, and wellness. colloquial sayings such as "time is precious," "it's about time," and "there's no time like the present" resonate within both the literature and the findings from our research project. legislation, policies, and laws that aim to protect children are, at the same time, hurting aboriginal mothers, families, and 11 baskin et al.: long time overdue published by scholarship@western, 2015   communities. they also often create stress for child welfare workers and substance misuse treatment counsellors in that they confine them to unrealistic time constraints and create situations where workers enact the very barriers they identify as impeding their ability to assist aboriginal mothers and their families. the authors acknowledge that, based on a qualitative design, the findings reported may not necessarily be transferable to other mothers, workers, counsellors, or contexts. given the group nature of data collection, some participants may have been reluctant to disclose all experiences. however, our discussions and storytelling sessions were passionate. participants discussed emotional and painful topics, suggesting that our data reflects important issues and experiences. this is one of the few studies to recruit all these groups and provides insight to guide further exploration. several recommendations came from the project participants to assist policy makers and those who are designated to carry out those policies to make positive changes in the lives of aboriginal women and their families. of interest is the fact that the majority of the suggestions that came from all three of the populations involved in the project were in agreement about what needs to be done in terms of policy change. these recommendations include: • ensure that policies reflect the overall situation of families, including the environmental factors affecting them; • address the whole family as the recipient of services without pitting the needs of children against those of mothers; • provide space for mothers to learn healthy parenting according to aboriginal worldviews and values in order to minimize the risk for apprehension; • acknowledge historic trauma and the intergenerational impacts caused by colonization upon women and families; • educate about and implement anti-oppressive, anti-racist, and anti-colonial ways of assisting families; • respect the complexity of the healing journey and the time it takes to travel along this path; • involve aboriginal mothers in the development and evaluation of programs and services within child welfare and substance misuse treatment; • create treatment centres that address the whole family; and • develop an aboriginal family and child services act that reflects aboriginal worldviews and values. perhaps enough time has gone into research that highlights that legislation, such as the indian act and the child and family services act, are detrimental to aboriginal mothers and their families. perhaps it is time to stop repeating what is not working and put our time and resources into exploring what is, and 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.5   what might be, of help. the participants in this research project have offered several beginning points to do so. 13 baskin et al.: long time overdue 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(2007). pregnancy, mothering and substance use: toward a balanced response. in n. poole & l. greaves (eds.), highs & lows: canadian perspectives on women and substance use (pp. 219 225). toronto, on: centre for addiction and mental health. grella, c. e., hser, y., & huang, y. (2006). mothers in substance abuse treatment: differences in characteristics based on involvement with child welfare services. child abuse & neglect, 30(1), 55 73. doi: 10.1016/j.chiabu.2005.07.005 gustafson, d. l. (2005). unbecoming mothers: the social construction of maternal absence. ny: routledge press. horejsi, c., heavy runner craig, b., & pablo, j. (1992). reactions by native american parents to child protection agencies: cultural and community factors. child welfare, 71(4), 329 340. lalonde, c. e. (2006). identity formation and cultural resilience in aboriginal communities. in r. j. flynn, p. dudding, & j. barber (eds.), promoting resilience in child welfare (pp. 52 71). ottawa: university of ottawa press. loomba, a. (1998). colonialism/postcolonialism: the new critical idiom. new york: routledge. maiter, s., palmer, s., & manji, s. (2006). strengthening social worker-client relationships in child protective service: addressing power imbalances and ‘ruptured’ relationships. qualitative social work, 5(2), 167 186. doi:10.1177/1473325006064255 michell, h. (1999). pakitinasowin: tobacco offerings in exchange for stories and the ethic of reciprocity in first nations research. retrieved from http://www.sifc.edu/indian%20studies/indigenousthought/fall99/tobacco.htm miller, j. r. (2000). skyscrapers hide the heavens. a history of indian–white relations in canada. toronto, canada: university of toronto press. native women’s association of canada (nwac). (2007). social determinants of health and canada’s aboriginal women – submission by the native women’s association of canada to the world health organization’s commission on the social determinants of health. retrieved from http://www.nwac.ca/research/xxx-nwac-reports 15 baskin et al.: long time overdue published by scholarship@western, 2015   niccols, a., dell, c. a., & clarke, s. (2010). treatment issues for aboriginal mothers with substance use problems and their children. international journal of mental health and addiction, 8(2), 320 335. doi:10.1007/s11469-009-9255-8 niccols, a., dobbins, m., sword, w., smith, a., henderson, j., & milligan, k. (2010). a national survey of services for women with substance use issues and their children in canada: challenges for knowledge translation. international journal of mental health and addiction, 8(2), 310 319. doi: 10.1007/s11469-009-9267-4 ordolis, e. (2007). a story of their own: adolescent pregnancy and child welfare in aboriginal communities. first peoples child & family review, 3(4), 30 41. retrieved from http://www.fncfcs.com/publications/online-journal pacey, m. (2009). fetal alcohol syndrome & fetal alcohol spectrum disorder among aboriginal peoples. a review of prevalence. prepared for the national collaborating centre for aboriginal health. retrieved from http://www.nccah-ccnsa.ca/docs porsanger. j. (2004). an essay about indigenous methodology. retrieved from http://www.ub.uit.no reading, c. & wien, f. (2013). health inequalities and social determinants of aboriginal peoples’ health. prince george, bc: national collaborating centre for aboriginal health. retrieved from http://www.nccahccnsa.ca/publications/lists/publications/attachments/46/health_inequalities_en_web.pdf rutman, d., callahan, m., & swift, k. (2007). risk assessment and mothers who use substances: contradictions in child welfare practice & policy. in n. poole & l. greaves (eds.), highs & lows: canadian perspectives on women and substance use (pp. 269 282). toronto, on: centre for addiction and mental health. rutman, d., field, b., jackson, s., lundquist, a., & callahan, m. (2005). perspectives of substance-using women and human service practitioners: reflections from the margins. in d. l. gustafson (ed.), unbecoming mothers – the social production of maternal absence. (pp. 227 249). new york: haworth clinical practice press. salmon, a. (2007). beyond shame and blame: aboriginal mothers and barriers to care. in n. poole & l. greaves (eds.), highs & lows: canadian perspectives on women and substance use (pp. 227 235). toronto, on: centre for addiction and mental health. salmon, a. (2010). aboriginal mothering, fasd prevention and the contestations of neoliberal citizenship. critical public health. 1 14. doi: 10.1080/09581596.2010.530643 shepard, b., o-neill, l., & guenette, f. (2006). counselling with first nations women: considerations of oppression and renewal. international journal for the advancement of counselling, 28(3), 227 240. doi: 10.1007/s10447-005-9008-8 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.5   sinclair, r. (2007). identity lost and found: lessons from the sixties scoop. first peoples child and family review, 3(1), 65 82. smith, d., edwards, n., varcoe, c., martens, p. j., & davies, b. (2006). bringing safety and responsiveness into the forefront of care for pregnant and parenting aboriginal people. advances in nursing science, 29(2), e27 e44. retrieved from http://journals.lww.com statistics canada. (2008). 2006 census: aboriginal peoples in canada in 2006: inuit, métis and first nations (catalogue number 97-558-xie2006001). retrieved from http://www12.statcan.ca/census-recensement/2006/as-sa/97-558/p2-eng.cfm thibodeau, s., & peigan, f. n. (2007). loss of trust among first nation people: implications when implementing child protection treatment initiatives. first peoples child & family review, 3(4), 50 58. retrieved from http://www.fncfcs.com/publications/online-journal weaver, s. (2007). “make it more welcome:” best-practice child welfare work with substance-using mothers – diminishing risks by promoting strengths. in s. c. boyd, & l. marcellus (eds.), with child substance use during pregnancy: a woman-centred approach. (pp. 76 90). halifax: fernwood publishing.   17 baskin et al.: long time overdue published by scholarship@western, 2015 the international indigenous policy journal january 2015 long time overdue: an examination of the destructive impacts of policy and legislation on pregnant and parenting aboriginal women and their children cyndy baskin carol strike bela mcpherson recommended citation long time overdue: an examination of the destructive impacts of policy and legislation on pregnant and parenting aboriginal women and their children abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license long time overdue: an examination of the destructive impacts of policy and legislation on pregnant and parenting aboriginal women and their children empowering indigenous youth: perspectives from a national service learning program in taiwan the international indigenous policy journal volume 5 | issue 3 article 4 june 2014 empowering indigenous youth: perspectives from a national service learning program in taiwan leemen lee fu jen catholic university, 200089m@gmail.com peiying chen national taiwan normal university, peiyingntnu@gmail.com recommended citation lee, l. , chen, p. (2014). empowering indigenous youth: perspectives from a national service learning program in taiwan. the international indigenous policy journal, 5(3) . retrieved from: http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.4 empowering indigenous youth: perspectives from a national service learning program in taiwan abstract issues related to indigenous higher education have received more attention in recent years. an important aspect has been the adjustment and development of more inclusive regulatory policies. this study explores the policy-enhancing role of non-profit organizations (npos) in empowering indigenous college students through an analysis of a nationwide service learning program initiated by a npo based in taiwan. the findings revealed the important role of npos in enhancing government policies by leveraging their knowledge base and resource networking in order to develop a service learning program for indigenous youth, which aimed to develop their self-confidence and strengthen their ethnic identity. the article identified four themes that are essential for non-profit organizations in designing and implementing empowerment-based programs for indigenous participants: developing resource networking partnerships, emphasizing responsibility, building effective mutual trust, and sustaining endeavors. keywords service learning, indigenous, college student, empowerment, non-profit organization creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/     e m p o w e r i n g i n d i g e n o u s y o u t h : p e r s p e c t i v e s f r o m a n a t i o n a l s e r v i c e l e a r n i n g p r o g r a m i n t a i w a n indigenous people’s social problems have gained broad attention with respect to issues like social justice, affirmative action, and multicultural education since the 1970s (banks & banks, 2001; freire, 1970; ogbu, 1978; torres, 1998). in the area of education, the exploration of empowerment and equality for indigenous students has become a critical issue (cheng & jacob, 2008; giroux, 1988; hooks, 1994; sleeter, 1991). during the 1990s, the taiwan government began to address the problem of equal access to education for ethnic minorities, passing the education act for aboriginal peoples (1998) and approving the indigenous peoples basic law (2005). although this legislation guaranteed various basic rights, indigenous students were still encountering many challenges within the school system. through a case analysis of a nationwide service learning program designed and implemented by a non-profit organization, this article investigates how non-profit organizations can, by using a “service learning pedagogy” and resources-networking strategy, support indigenous college students’ efforts to address identity issues and reflect on ways to integrate identity awareness along with professional career development. h i s t o r i c a l b a c k g r o u n d o f t h e a b o r i g i n e s i n t a i w a n taiwan’s population is about 23 million and consists of two distinct ethnic groups: the han majority (97.8 percent), who settled on the island some 400 years ago, and the original aborigine inhabitants (2.2 percent), who are currently classified into 14 tribes and have a total population of about 513,000 (ministry of interior, 2012). recent research suggests that the first aborigine ancestors may have occupied the island about 8,000 years before the han majority arrived on the island (blust, 1999). the spanish and the dutch ruled over taiwan for a short period during the 17th century; however, taiwan was later colonized by japan following the first sino-japanese war in 1895. in 1948, taiwan was taken over by the republic of china, who, under the kuomintang (kmt), declared martial law and became the governing polity in 1949 (ito, 1996). during the various colonization periods, aborigines were labeled with racist and discriminatory names like “wild aborigines,” “civilized aborigines,” or “mountain tribes.” successive governments employed political and military power to inhibit or suppress the culture and language of the aborigines (hsieh, 2006). when the martial law was finally lifted in 1987, political democratization in taiwan staged a new era for the aborigines. various rehabilitation movements were initiated, such as encouraging the emergence of new forms of appellations, awareness-raising, and cultural reconstruction (xu, 1990). however, as early as december 1984, the taiwan aboriginal people's movement (tapm) was created under the alliance of taiwan aborigines (ata, or yuan chuan hui) (hsieh, 2006; stainton, 1999). the sending of an ata representative to the 1988 united nations working group on 1 lee and chen: empowering indigenous youth in taiwan published by scholarship@western, 2014     indigenous populations staged a new era of pressuring government to revise policies to address the problems of the aborigines (united nations, 2008). in 1994, the taiwanese government officially recognized the legal status of its indigenous groups. the aborigines were renamed as the “earliest inhabitants.” the appellations hsien chu min ("first people") or tsao chu min ("early people") were also accepted to evoke a sense of this group’s historical immigration to taiwan (stainton, 1999). in 1996, the council of indigenous peoples was established with the purpose of managing the affairs of the indigenous people. a b o r i g i n a l e d u c a t i o n i n t a i w a n in 1998, the education act for aboriginal peoples (1998) was enacted to endorse multicultural values and to promote indigenous education; shortly thereafter, structural reforms in aboriginal education ensued. mother-tongue language learning, ethnic curricula, and pedagogies were emphasized to encourage cultural practices. nevertheless, in rural areas where most of the indigenous people live, the lack of qualified teachers and job opportunities made it difficult for indigenous youth to remain in their rural communities. hence, more and more indigenous young people migrated into cities (chou, 2005; li & ou, 1992) until approximately 47% of indigenous population resided in urban areas (ministry of interior, 2012). the rural indigenous communities suffered from manpower drain and were faced with serious problems of sustainability. the urbanization of indigenous groups also created new challenges for the younger generation. indigenous students in cities experienced cultural shock and marginalization at schools where they felt alien or even victimized (s. chen, hwang, & chiu, 2003). to ameliorate existing conditions, the government provided subsidies for tuition and living expenses for aboriginal students enrolled in secondary or post-secondary education. the law also protected opportunities in higher education for aboriginal people and mandated that aboriginal students receive a mark up of 25 percent on original scores for college entrance exams. the problem of underrepresentation of aboriginal students in higher education gradually improved after the law was passed and recent statistics showed that the ratio of aboriginal to total college students rose from 0.64% in 1998 to 1.64% in 2011 (council of indigenous peoples, 2013). however, the current ratio of 1.64% is still significantly disproportionate, given the fact that the student ratio for the aborigines in relation to the total student population in taiwan at the high school level is above 2.5%. moreover, at the post-secondary education level, aboriginals have a much higher dropout rate (council of indigenous peoples, 2013). the present study aimed to address the concern of indigenous youth empowerment. more specifically, we analyzed an empowerment-based service learning program for aboriginal college students. through a case analysis, we discussed the role of non-profit organizations in organizing a 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.4     nationwide service learning program that offers a unique opportunity for indigenous youth to effectively assume their ethnic identity and to develop self-confidence and self-esteem. l i t e r a t u r e r e v i e w i n d i g e n o u s e d u c a t i o n i n t a i w a n indigenous students were often left behind while studying together with non-indigenous students. factors associated with low academic performance of indigenous students include low socio-economic status (j. lin, 2000), problems of learning adjustment (chiu, 2000; fu, 2001; y. lin, 2001), ethnic stereotyping by teachers (p. chen, 1998; chou, 2005), and cultural differences in educational expectations (lu, 1986; tan, 2002; tang, 2002). research emphasizing the adoption of an indigenous standpoint in order to develop a meaningful connection between indigenous identity and issues of indigenous education has ranged from a critique of the chinese-centric curriculum (jian, 1991; c. lin, 1998; m. lin, 1997), the promotion of mother-tongue instruction (m. huang, 1998), to advocacy for multicultural education (kao, 2000; sun, 2000). indigenous education at the college level has received increased academic attention. some research has explored the socio-psychological aspects of learning adjustment for indigenous college students. the aspects include learning motivation (liu et. al, 2000), successful learning styles (liu, 2007), and a comparison of campus experiences and development for aborigine and chinese students. factors like self-concept and esteem, adjustment strategies, academic engagement, faculty-student relationships, and peer relationships are most often mentioned (liu & huang, 2005). two studies have suggested that group identity and cultural recovery affect individuals’ career achievement (i. huang, 1999; wu, 1999). i. huang’s (1999) research on career development of indigenous college graduates found that the internalization of ethnic identity was the primary reason for the individuals’ higher academic achievement. wu (1999) showed that the success of indigenous elites was positively associated with family support and developing awareness of ethnic identity and culture. in short, most research on indigenous education in taiwan has focused on formal education and has taken a “medicalized” view to identify factors associated with learning problems of indigenous students in coping with mainstream goals set up by the formal educational system (p. chen, 2012). as brickman et al. (1982) emphasized, the “medical” view implicitly accepts mainstream goals without raising the concern of what values and norms are needed to empower indigenous youth to have the freedom to be whoever they want. 3 lee and chen: empowering indigenous youth in taiwan published by scholarship@western, 2014     a b o r i g i n a l i d e n t i t y , s e l f c o n f i d e n c e , s e l f e s t e e m aboriginal students’ self-confidence and self-esteem are hindered by negative experiences at school, especially those associated with their aboriginal identity (p. chen, 1998; chou, 2005; liu & huang, 2005; richmond & smith, 2012). urban schools often suffered from colonial imperatives and ethnic prejudice that originated in the colonial past so that schools became hostile to aboriginal identity development (battiste, 2000; richmond & smith, 2012). consequently, many aboriginal students have experienced bullying by non-aboriginal students and have had negative interactions with teachers (richmond & smith, 2012), which in turn have a long-term impact on aboriginal students’ self-esteem and self-confidence. phinney (1990) theorized that ethnic identity development is a process of identity construction that combines the experiences and knowledge of the individual with a sense of belongingness to an ethnic group. the process of identity construction, as suggested by phinney (1990), includes three stages: unexamined identity, identity search, and identity achievement. at the stage of unexamined identity, the individual takes his or her ethnic identity for granted without personal examination. at the stage of identity search, the individual embarks on a questioning of ethnicity, often initiated by significant experiences such as humiliation or discrimination, which results in a heightened awareness of ethnicity. a confident and secure sense of self, as well as a good understanding of where one’s in-group is located within the broader social context, characterizes the stage of identity achievement. the individual successfully overcomes the negative impact of earlier experiences of humiliation or discrimination. at the identity achievement stage, the ethnic identity has been internalized by the individual and become a source of career inspiration and meaning. this study addressed the issue of indigenous youth empowerment. phinney’s (1990) theory suggested that empowerment may occur if aboriginal students can ultimately reach the achievement stage of ethnic identity development. in this sense, an empowerment-based service learning program should be designed so as to create opportunities for participants to reflect, discuss, and share experiences with aboriginal identity, as well as to facilitate the effective internalization of aboriginal identity in order to develop self-confidence and self-esteem. s e r v i c e l e a r n i n g , a b a s i s f o r e m p o w e r m e n t most indigenous students have encountered negative identity-related experiences at schools and they need to reflect on those experiences and redirect their energy to obtain self-confidence and connect ethnic identity with career development in a constructive way. in this respect, service learning has proved to be an effective pedagogy. in a broad sense, service learning is the integration of academic study with volunteer service, requiring that students participate in organized services for identified community needs and reflect on the service experiences to enhance academic learning and civic responsibility (jacoby, 1996; steinberg, bringle & williams, 2010). service learning programs 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.4     encourage student-teacher interaction, teamwork, and active learning (jacoby, 1996). most research confirms that service learning enhances student learning overall (eyler & giles, 1999). specifically, “engaged learning practices” is one of the most important practices to achieve the goals of critical thinking and transformative learning (hart research associates, 2009). p. chen (2004) pointed out the importance of consciousness-raising in empowering marginalized groups. sleeter (1991) emphasized the point that minority students have to develop a keen awareness of power relations and must learn to employ critical thinking so that they can empower themselves to cope with frustrating situations. while formal education tends to emphasize professional training without the questioning of underlying mainstream values, non-formal education often aims to raise students’ awareness of social injustice and the value of commitment in social change. hence, service learning, which lies between formal and non-formal education, can be understood as both conformative and transformative with respect to empowerment. the conformative view suggests that students develop professional skills and career motivation through service to communities. the educational goal is oriented toward personal self-efficacy and career development in a highly competitive world. in contrast, the transformative view highlights the critical thinking aspect of service learning: the goal is to empower students to develop an awareness of ethnic identity and to become agents of change in an unjust society. m e t h o d o l o g y a nationwide government-sponsored service learning program (slp) called “return to village to serve” (rvs) program was chosen as the primary data collection source for the study. from 2000 to 2010, the formosa corps (a non-profit organization in taiwan that has been serving tribal people for more than forty years) operated the rvs program to empower indigenous college students in taiwan. given the achievement of the rvs program in taiwan, this program was chosen for case analysis. b a c k g r o u n d o f t h e “ r e t u r n t o v i l l a g e t o s e r v e ” ( r v s ) p r o g r a m the rvs program originated from disaster relief and recovery efforts in taiwan after a massive earthquake on september 21, 1999. many villages where indigenous people lived were devastated. because the formosa corps (hereafter, the corps) had served indigenous villages since the 1960s, the council of aboriginal affairs sponsored the corps to initiate a new program to encourage indigenous college students to serve in indigenous villages destroyed by the earthquake. the corps developed the rvs program with two main goals: (a) to empower indigenous youth, especially those in colleges; and (b) to improve the quality of life in tribal communities. initially, the rvs program targeted seven villages damaged by the earthquake; however, after 2001 the program extended its services to other tribal villages. the rvs program recruited 100 indigenous college students per year. participants were required to attend a one-week training program to acquire the 5 lee and chen: empowering indigenous youth in taiwan published by scholarship@western, 2014     knowledge and skills of teamwork, community service-related subjects, and tribal context. during the summer break, participants were sent to villages in groups to serve for three weeks. the corps carefully organized the personnel of the rvs program. participants were grouped into 12 service groups, one for each of 12 selected villages. each group had a facilitator, selected from the program alumni pool. participants were paid a small stipend for their services, an important incentive because indigenous college students usually need to take summer jobs to earn their tuition. a program manager was hired to facilitate program activities and to handle bookkeeping and government reporting. drawing from the group facilitators of previous years, the corps recruited four persons to form a leading team (lt) responsible for program implementation. lt members had at least two years of prior experience with the program and were therefore very familiar with the operation and main characteristics of the program. the rvs program inherited a spirit of caring and commitment from the corps. the corps was the first private non-profit organization in taiwan to address the needs of the aborigines on the island. each summer, the corps recruits chinese college students to travel to remote areas of the mountainside to establish contact with aborigine families. with an attitude of earnest respect and willingness to learn, students develop a relationship based on mutual understanding with the aborigines and practice caring and respect for others. the corps’ caring and long-term commitment to the aborigines is crucial for fostering trust and cooperation between indigenous and chinese youth. not only has the corps implemented summer service learning programs in selected aboriginal communities for years, but also it has encouraged young leaders to initiate new programs of their own. several key chinese members from the corps who have a special compassion for aborigines initiated the rvs program. the rvs program equipped aboriginal participants with effective leadership skills. its success was demonstrated by the fact that, after three years of operation, the leadership role in the rvs program was exclusively fulfilled by indigenous youth. the corps is committed to providing quality training for participants and delivering quality services to the tribal communities. to ensure that rvs services would adequately address villages’ needs, the lt would carefully choose 20 villages and first conduct an on-site needs assessment during april and may. based on the needs assessment, the lt then selected 12 villages with clearly identified, feasible goals for the service program. feasibility is emphasized so that goals beyond their reach would not frustrate participants. the needs for daycare for the elderly, summer teaching programs for pupils, life education programs, and information literacy programs are common to many villages. the rvs training program was designed according to the varying objectives and action plans for services every year to ensure that all the participants acquired adequate skills to deliver quality services. the training program entailed two parts: general training and special training. the general 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.4     training covered subjects such as interpersonal skills, group dynamics, teaching activity design, interviewing skills, and orientation on indigenous history and current status, and governmental welfare programs for the aborigines. the special training addressed the special service needs of that particular year. typically, special training would include library usage, media for teaching, documentary production, field research methods, ecology, and community development skills. d a t a c o l l e c t i o n this study aimed to explore the role of the corps in designing and implementing the nationwide service learning program for aboriginal college students and used open-ended interviewing as the primary qualitative research device (seidman, 1998). the researchers interviewed the executive director, program manager, and a board member of the corps to learn about the background, purposes, and processes that the program entailed, as well as the mission, background history, and operations of the corps with regard to the concept of empowerment of aboriginal youth. to explore whether the program had achieved its empowerment goal, the researchers interviewed 13 indigenous college students who had participated in the rvs program. the program manager helped to invite five team leaders for interviews and through them the researchers were able to reach five group facilitators and three first-time participants. the interview schedule covered the following topics: (a) educational experiences prior to college, (b) college learning experiences, (c) motives for participating in the program, and (d) rvs service learning experiences and impact. the length of the interviews ranged from 1 to 1.5 hours. all interviews were recorded and transcribed for analysis. in addition to the interviews, documents such as program proposals, contracts, meeting minutes, and the evaluation reports were collected from the corps and examined. d a t a a n a l y s i s the purpose of the study was to understand the role of the corps in designing the nationwide service learning program for aboriginal college students and to identity significant themes underlying the empowerment of aboriginal youth. the study used a general inductive approach (silverman, 2000). in this approach, researchers begin with extensive readings of the interview transcripts. in the second step, each researcher identifies main categories or themes and through discussions and re-examination of the transcripts, researchers reach consensus about the main themes. a next step is the coding the data and grouping concepts and text sections according to the main categories. this inductive process gradually produces the basis of the main thematic findings. the main categories and associated concepts found by the study include: 1. platform for resource networking (i.e., role of the corps as non-profit organization): partnership (with government agencies, universities, and local communities); resource networking abilities; designing training programs; self-organization and 7 lee and chen: empowering indigenous youth in taiwan published by scholarship@western, 2014     self-management principles; program sustainability; care for aboriginal students and communities; and organizational mission and commitment. 2. empowerment: developing a sense of duty (responsibility); facing frustrating school experiences; developing leadership; learning about own culture and mother tongue language; experiencing community, team, sharing, self-confidence and self-esteem. 3. mutual trust: building mutual trust and collaboration (between han and aboriginals). 4. sustained endeavors: networking; engaging in indigenous affairs; volunteering; participating in follow-up learning opportunities; developing career aspirations and appreciation for the corps. f i n d i n g s the rvs program was designed to empower aboriginal youth. the program provided indigenous youth with opportunities to reconnect with their villages. most of the youth lived in cities and many of them were no longer able to speak their traditional languages. based on data collected from interviews, four themes stand out strongly and are considered to be essential for indigenous youth empowerment: the development of a platform for resource networking, the design of a program based on empowerment and responsibility, the building of effective mutual trust, and the opportunity for sustained endeavors. p l a t f o r m f o r r e s o u r c e n e t w o r k i n g a n d e m p o w e r m e n t the executive director emphasized that the corps played an important role in creating a partnership platform with universities, communities, and governmental agencies. while many universities offer service learning programs of various types, they mainly focus on their own students. in contrast, the rvs was designed to attract aboriginal college students from all universities. the corps allied with universities and local communities to develop the service learning program. the government has the resources, but it lacks the ability to design and implement an effective service learning program. the corps was effective serving as an organizer that made best use of the government funding to design and implement a nationwide service learning program that links indigenous students with rural indigenous communities. one interviewee commented on the program: this is an important platform through which young indigenous college students began to know their tribal cultures, to be close to their origins. . . . also through this platform, we learned to care and show concern about indigenous issues and affairs. . . . we got the chance to learn what could not be attained at college classrooms. . . . the experiences in the community will touch you, and those who were touched will then embrace the mission of the revival of indigenous communities and engage in. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.4     e m p h a s i s o f r e s p o n s i b i l i t y the corps structured the rvs program on the basis of a self-management principle to encourage participants to manage themselves and to cultivate their problem-solving abilities and sense of responsibility. the corps’ role was mainly facilitative in developing service learning, giving participants sufficient opportunities to learn from their firsthand experiences and to practice leadership skills. the executive director delegated the responsibility to the lt to make all decisions and take full responsibility, except in the case of life-threatening decisions such as those involving typhoon warnings. participants greatly appreciated the fact that the rvs program empowered them to value their own language and culture and respect their people. youth are empowered when children in the villages see them as role models or when the elderly see them as hope for the future. in addition, youths empower one another as they are achieving the goals and dealing successfully with challenges. a student group in the village met a senior woman, who was almost one hundred years old: the grandmother could not speak chinese. only ancient atayal! i kept trying to talk to her. she told us that she was abandoned by her children. they’ve never taken care of her. . . . even so, she had to raise one grand-grandson. . . . although my group members couldn’t understand even a single sound, we were so touched by her story that we wept. the leadership role designed for team leaders and group facilitators gave indigenous students not only the opportunity to learn leadership skills but also a space within which they could internalize their collective identity by leading and serving new participants. for example, one participant was recruited into the leadership team after two consecutive years of participation. he greatly appreciated the leadership training that he had received and which made him capable of leading the rvs program. he described his experiences of empowerment: my first experience was chaotic. i didn’t know how to work with my group. . . . my facilitator was dissatisfied with my sloppiness. . . . then i became the facilitator [the next year]. i learned to be responsible for my group’s performance. . . . then i joined the lead team to learn how to plan and make things work. . . . we kept asking questions, searching for better ways to solve problems, and evaluating what we had done. . . . i couldn’t believe i turned out to be a demanding supervisor, setting high standards for my team to achieve the mission of the program. b u i l d i n g e f f e c t i v e m u t u a l t r u s t identity conflict is a main factor that hinders the development of trust (p. chen, 2012). many indigenous college students attended high school in cities and almost all of them had negative identity-related experiences with their chinese classmates. this expereince made indigenous youth 9 lee and chen: empowering indigenous youth in taiwan published by scholarship@western, 2014     hesitant to develop mutual trust with their chinese counterparts. they preferred to join indigenous student clubs. the corps’ executive director shared his insights: indigenous youth tend to live in closed circles or groups. generally speaking, this is good for them. but the close-knit mentality also became a great limit to their development. the world is moving toward integration, inter-disciplinarity, and inter-culture. therefore the indigenous youth might needs to be more open-minded, cooperative, and innovative. the program manager, whose ethnic identity is chinese, emphasized the challenges in nurturing trust and collaboration between chinese and indigenous youth. a team leader shared a confrontational experience: during the intensive training camp, a participant left the training site after dinner for a couple of hours to meet his friend without informing us. by the rules he should be disqualified from the service learning program, for the rules said that participants shall not leave the camp site except for important reasons, with permission. but we thought he might deserve a second chance. but the program manager was firm that the rules should be followed. she told us that trust is about responsibility and the participants need to be responsible for their behavior. the chinese youth in the corps made substantial contributions to the initiation of the program. the leading team was initially filled with both chinese and indigenous youth. the corps continued to work closely with the lt and the indigenous rvs participants throughout the year-long cycle of the program. all these efforts have contributed to building mutual trust. s u s t a i n e d e n d e a v o r s the corps played a pivotal role in resource networking, which impacted both the participants and the indigenous communities. active rvs participants found various opportunities to network with the community and to benefit from the experience. for example, nine interviewees were engaged in indigenous cultural forums. through active engagement in dialogue on indigenous affairs, they developed networks with other indigenous young leaders and gradually familiarized themselves with cultural and political issues, thus unveiling opportunities for action. the corps actively sought follow-up learning opportunities for rvs participants. the rvs participants are invited to various programs in volunteering, cultural exposure, or career development. the corps also devotedly facilitated cross-sectoral collaboration, bridging tribal communities with non-tribal and developing various projects to engage businesses and other non-profit organizations in expanding community development for the aborigines. the program manager mentioned that some rvs participants wanted to help indigenous elementary school students in taipei and the corps deployed its network to get support from the government and 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.4     chinese youth to initiate an after-school program for an elementary school where many indigenous kids are in crucial need of after-school tutoring. another telling example is that two rvs participants became key coordinators for disaster relief in their home villages after typhoon morakot created catastrophic damage in taiwan on august 8, 2009. the executive director also pointed out that a few rvs participants even returned to their villages to become village leaders, bringing new hope and talent to the indigenous communities. most interviewees highly appreciated what they gained from the program: the opportunity to create and implement the service learning program, the development of new friendships, the exhilaration of enhanced self-efficacy and pride, and the accomplishments they had collectively reached. many felt a sense of solidarity—“we become one!” the rvs program had a strong impact on career aspirations. two participants responded that they purposefully took ethnography and sociology classes because those courses are most relevant to indigenous issues. two others decided to pursue graduate education in ethnic studies. one interviewee mentioned that she became so clear about the purpose of her undergraduate learning that she switched her major to education. she is genuinely passionate about education and her career goal is to nurture leaders in the rebuilding of indigenous communities. she said: from the indigenous standpoint, it is important to foster diverse professional talents and capabilities among the indigenous people so that we can sustain and enrich our developmental spaces. . . . i’m convinced that my vocation is in education. . . . i can fulfill an empowering pedagogy, using indigenous perspective to develop a curriculum and teaching methods for our people. there are several parallels between our own findings and the results of a study conducted by hall, rata, and adds (2013) with māori students in new zealand. hall et al. (2013) found that aspirations, learning opportunities, engagement, and support were the most important thematic factors that contributed positively to māori students’ engagement with māori studies. interestingly, the four themes put forward by our study in capturing the uniqueness of the rvs program include: networking for cross-sectoral partnerships, fostering a sense of responsibility, nurturing mutual trust, and sustaining participants’ career inspirations. hall et al. (2013) discovered the importance of aspirations for māori student engagement with studies; the current study emphasized how the rvs program actively sought ways to sustain students’ career aspirations. they suggested that surrounding people influence student engagement with māori studies. along the same vein, the present study indicated that the corps fostered mutual trust between indigenous and non-indigenous participants and that such trust is critical for student engagement in the rvs program. in addition, hall et al. (2013) reported that māori studies served as a learning opportunity for māori students to acquire māori knowledge. the current study reached a similar conclusion: the rvs program was designed to offer indigenous students empowerment-based learning 11 lee and chen: empowering indigenous youth in taiwan published by scholarship@western, 2014     opportunities to gain first-hand experiences and knowledge about their own cultures. specifically, the rvs program adopted the self-management principle so that students would have better opportunities to become active and responsible participants. hall et al. (2013) also emphasized that māori students faced many challenges and needed support to overcome the challenges. the current study found that the corps actively developed resource networks and partnerships to deepen support for the students. c o n c l u s i o n s this research analyzed the rvs program from the perspective of empowerment. the findings supported the fact that participants’ mindsets (i.e., how they perceive themselves) are crucial in envisioning their future career paths. the rvs program invited indigenous college students to serve in indigenous villages. although the mindset of most indigenous students had been adversely impacted by negative experiences at city schools, the rvs program effectively offered an experiential educational opportunity for participants to develop self-confidence and a better grasp of their ethnic identity. contrasting with discipline-oriented, formal education, the rvs program was designed to be action-oriented and to facilitate an empowering learning process. indigenous students not only interacted among themselves but also with village people and chinese youth. they critically reflected on identity issues and developed more meaningful and stronger connections between their college education, career goals, and the collective future of indigenous peoples. the rvs program showed that non-profit organizations and formal educational institutions are to some extent complementary, but also interdependent in offering holistic education for minority students. more interestingly, the rvs program highlighted the important role of non-profit organizations (npo) in enhancing the quality of government policies. npos can play the role of a cross-sectoral partnership catalyst for the design and implementation of nationwide programs to empower indigenous youth. while it is common to see indigenous organizations dealing with indigenous issues and mobilizing for collective action, this study suggested that the cooperation between indigenous and non-indigenous students helps youth move beyond negative stereotyping in order to build trust through empowering synergy. the rvs program vividly demonstrated the role that an npo may play in fostering collaboration between the aboriginal and chinese youth. the success of the rvs program depended on the development of trust among various stakeholders. the corps is committed to the aborigines’ betterment and has a long history in serving the aborigines. it takes time to develop trust, accumulate tacit knowledge and cultivate people’s attitudes. the rvs program bloomed in the soil of the caring spirit and sustained commitment of the npo to indigenous peoples and their cultures. this finding echoed and extended the knowledge 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.4     that trust is the most essential factor in developing cooperation among non-profit organizations (yankey, willen, mcclellan, & jacobus, 2005). the self-management principle was embedded in the structure of the rvs program, giving participants more opportunities to develop a sense of responsibility and to practice leadership skills. participants could deal with conflict, which become a source for empowerment. the endeavors do not end as participants complete their services in the summer because the corps continues to encourage them to engage in other experiences that will sustain learning and career development. some rvs alumni even return villages to become leaders and managers of local organizations. hence, the rvs program achieved its long-term goal in nurturing leaders for aboriginal communities. r e c o m m e n d a t i o n s based on the findings of the study, a few recommendations for non-profit practitioners in designing programs to empower indigenous youth are proposed: • apply self-management principles to enhance students’ active participation and sense of responsibility. • actively seek out and establish partnerships with government agencies, universities, and indigenous communities. • design programs that are experience-based (such as service learning programs). • expose students to indigenous cultures for ethnic identity awareness, and invite students to reflect on their professional education and career development. • design programs that facilitate cooperation between indigenous students and non-indigenous counterparts. this mixture may enhance mutual trust and benefit both groups. s t u d y l i m i t a t i o n s there are several noteworthy limitations of this study. first, the study is based mainly on interviews with the managers and participants of the corps and thus may not represent the full spectrum of views. given the interviewees’ strong affective and working ties with the corps, the findings may be biased toward the positive side of the program. second, the participants interviewed were mainly referred by team leaders, rather than a random sampling of all participants. this may have created a bias toward positive responses as well. third, the study did not interview influential actors in local communities or from government agencies. interviews with those people would significantly 13 lee and chen: empowering indigenous youth in taiwan published by scholarship@western, 2014     improve the quality of the study and enable a better understanding of the role of the corps in operating the program. fourth, the findings of the study are limited to the context of the specific organization and program; therefore generalization of results should be done with caution. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.4     r e f e r e n c e s banks, j., & banks, c. a. 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(2005). nonprofit strategic alliances case studies: the role of trust. cleveland, oh: mandel center for nonprofit organizations. 19 lee and chen: empowering indigenous youth in taiwan published by scholarship@western, 2014 the international indigenous policy journal june 2014 empowering indigenous youth: perspectives from a national service learning program in taiwan leemen lee peiying chen recommended citation empowering indigenous youth: perspectives from a national service learning program in taiwan abstract keywords creative commons license empowering indigenous youth: perspectives from a national service learning program in taiwan restoring the balance: first nations women, community, and culture the international indigenous policy journal volume 1 | issue 2 article 4 september 2010 restoring the balance: first nations women, community, and culture maría del carmen rodríguez de france university of victoria, faculty of education, indigenous education, mdcr@uvic.ca recommended citation rodríguez de france, m. (2010). restoring the balance: first nations women, community, and culture. th e international indigenous policy journal, 1(2) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.2.4 this book review is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. restoring the balance: first nations women, community, and culture abstract with empowering stories and histories from twelve aboriginal women who are leaders in different contexts and communities, the book acknowledges and celebrates the contributions of aboriginal women to diverse fields of work and disciplines such as art, culture, politics, language, law, community, education, and social activism. about the authors eric guimond is an assistant director at the strategic research and analysis directorate at indian and northern affairs canada. gail guthrie valaskakis was a distinguished professor emeritus of concordia university and was a leading authority on aboriginal media and communication. she passed away in 2007. madeleine dion stout is a former nurse and founding director of the centre of aboriginal education, research, and culture at carleton university. keywords first nations traditions, feminism, aboriginal women, gender imbalances creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ with empowering stories and histories from twelve aboriginal women who are leaders in different contexts and communities, the book acknowledges and celebrates the contributions of aboriginal women to diverse fields of work and disciplines such as art, culture, politics, language, law, community, education, and social activism. the book, dedicated to gail guthrie valaskakis who passed away in 2007, is organized into four thematic units: 1) historic trauma; 2) intellectual and social movements; 3) health and healing; and, 4) arts, culture, and language. the editors offer a succinct explanation of each theme in their introduction suggesting the need to consider aboriginal women’s participation individually and collectively for the advancement of cultural continuity and community development both of which are forces of self-determination. as a prelude to each chapter, artwork by aboriginal women serves as the ‘door’ through which the reader is invited to enter a world of words that through diverse writing styles illustrate the times and lives of women who have “successfully navigated beyond gender and racial discrimination, and are moving toward the reforms that will bring lasting changes” (p. 3). in order to better understand such reforms, the authors affirm it is necessary to understand the historical aspects that have shaped the present. consequently, the first theme explores several views of historical trauma from the perspective of four writers who take on different lenses to analyze the social and moral implications of colonization in the welfare system, in education, in the psychological and emotional dependency on individuals and in communities, as well as in the misrepresentations of aboriginal women in demographic dynamics and issues of equality, all of which are issues ‘never properly voiced out and represented’ (p. 20). although these accounts are written from an aboriginal perspective, the authors do not present an often encountered ‘us/them’ position (aboriginal vs. non-aboriginal) 1 rodríguez de france: restoring the balance published by scholarship@western, 2010 within scholarly work but, rather, offer a balanced view of the issues. this unit ends describing the case of sandra lovelace as an example of the legal changes that aboriginal women have led, which serves as an introduction to the second theme of intellectual and social movements. this thematic unit highlights the lives of women who have counteracted established norms and organizations by serving their communities as chiefs, academics, intellectuals, and in other roles, which have required capacity building, accountability, and compromised team work. in the chapter written by dr. jo-ann archibald, the reader is invited to learn more about the lives of five women, who were the first to occupy faculty positions at mainstream canadian universities. the last chapter of this theme describes the sisters in spirit campaign, which has gained support as a result of the persistence and engagement of women within various sectors of society across canada. the chapter contains accounts and testimonials of women, who have lost mothers, daughters, nieces and other female relations as a result of violent crimes. marlene brant-castellano’s chapter introduces the third theme of which health and healing are the focus. brant-castellano describes traditional roles within communities and societies using her own upbringing as an example before moving to a community based approach to understanding healing and wellness. the description of several health initiatives assists the reader to appreciate not only the need for established programs but also to recognize that healing takes different forms throughout life and that spiritual healing is fundamental to regaining a strong sense of identity and communal growth. in this regard, the next chapter by gaye hanson describes cultural competence as an ethical space developed within family, community, and within research and policy. the last three chapters of the book are dedicated to the theme of arts, culture, and language. the merging of historical accounts and the description of ongoing efforts from 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 2 [2010], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.2.4 individuals and organizations offer the reader a clear sense of the need to revitalize and restore these expressive ways of life within communities. the first chapter in this unit examines the lives of seven artists in an attempt to describe the complexities of what the arts are, how they represent a people, and how they infuse spiritual and emotional connections among individuals and nations. through the lens of a curator, the second chapter looks at the value and relevance of cultural artefacts as representations of cultural dynamics, and community development and cohesion. the author offers a useful historical account of the emergence of some such artefacts that began as “curiosities” or souvenirs and later found a place in the economic system of many communities. the last chapter of the book addresses the challenges and triumphs around issues related to language: strength, loss, recovery, revitalization, and preservation bringing to a full circle the recognition of women as central contributors to community development and cultural continuity. in holding with its title, the book “restores the balance” through the ideas that are presented and while it is not formulaic, the historical accounts provide the reader with a clearer understanding of the issues and offer an ample and, at times, detailed discussion of the topics at hand. those interested in learning about history from diverse perspectives (i.e., social, pedagogical, spiritual) would benefit from reading this book, which is presented in a ‘reader friendly’ approach and, thus, accessible to general audiences. further, the book offers opportunities to consider the implications for pedagogical practices and for policy development from socio-cultural and socio-economic perspectives. additionally, those who are less familiar with some of the challenges and victories that aboriginal nations have faced and achieved would find this book insightful not only because it is written from an authentic aboriginal perspective but also because it is specific to the 3 rodríguez de france: restoring the balance published by scholarship@western, 2010 challenges and victories of aboriginal women who have been the moral, social, economic, educational, and spiritual fibre that has woven communities in this place called canada. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 2 [2010], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.2.4 the international indigenous policy journal september 2010 restoring the balance: first nations women, community, and culture maría del carmen rodríguez de france recommended citation restoring the balance: first nations women, community, and culture abstract keywords creative commons license restoring the balance: first nations women, community, and culture socially constructed teen motherhood: a review the international indigenous policy journal volume 4 issue 1 indigenous early parenthood article 8 march 2013 socially constructed teen motherhood: a review marc fonda aboriginal affairs and northern development canada, and western university, marc.fonda@aandc.gc.ca rachel eni university of manitoba, rachel.eni@ad.umanitoba.ca eric guimond aboriginal affairs and northern development canada, and western university, eric.guimond@aadnc-aandc.gc.ca recommended citation fonda, m. , eni, r. , guimond, e. (2013). socially constructed teen motherhood: a review. the international indigenous policy journal, 4(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.8 socially constructed teen motherhood: a review abstract this article reviews literature on the gradual construction of teenage pregnancy as a social issue in north america. it shows how teen motherhood emerged not as an issue unto itself, but as a microcosm of numerous, closely intertwined phenomena including: the evolution of western views on human sexuality and gender roles; the place of religious values in society; and the emergence of various modern technologies, the social and medical sciences, and how such disciplines view childhood, motherhood, and women in society. in particular, it shows that even as teen pregnancy is today viewed primarily through public health and/or socioeconomic lenses, it has never been completely divorced from its original construction – as an indicator of failure to adhere to social, religious, and moral values. the article closes with an informal content analysis of several first nations-related documents that highlight both similarities and differences to the non-aboriginal perspective. french abstract construction sociale de la maternité à l’adolescence : un examen marc fonda affaires autochtones et développement du nord canada et université western rachel eni université du manitoba eric guimond affaires autochtones et développement du nord canada et université western résumé cet article examine la documentation sur la construction graduelle de la grossesse à l’adolescence en tant que « problème » social en amérique du nord. il montre la façon dont la grossesse à l’adolescence est devenue non pas une question en soi, mais un microcosme de nombreux phénomènes étroitement liés, dont : l’évolution des points de vue occidentaux sur la sexualité humaine et les rôles des sexes; la place des valeurs religieuses dans la société; l’émergence de diverses technologies modernes ainsi que des sciences sociales et médicales, et le regard que ces disciplines portent sur l’enfance et la maternité. plus particulièrement, nous constatons à quel point, même si la grossesse à l’adolescence est surtout abordée aujourd’hui d’un point de vue socioéconomique et de santé publique, elle n’a jamais complètement été séparée de sa construction initiale, c’est à dire comme indicateur de non respect des valeurs sociales, religieuses et morales. spanish abstract examen de la maternidad adolescente definida por la sociedad marc fonda ministerio de asuntos indígenas y del norte de canadá y universidad western rachel eni universidad de manitoba eric guimond ministerio de asuntos indígenas y del norte de canadá y universidad western resumen en este artículo se examina la documentación sobre la interpretación gradual de los embarazos de las adolescentes como un ‘problema’ social en américa del norte. en él se muestra cómo los embarazos de las adolescentes surgieron no como una cuestión en sí, sino como un microcosmos de numerosos fenómenos estrechamente ligados entre sí, como: la evolución en occidente de los puntos de vista sobre la sexualidad humana y los roles establecidos en función del sexo; el lugar de los valores religiosos en la sociedad; y la aparición de diversas tecnologías y de las ciencias sociales y médicas modernas y la manera en la que estas disciplinas ven la infancia y la maternidad. de manera concreta, nos damos cuenta de que, aunque los embarazos de adolescentes se ven principalmente en la actualidad desde una perspectiva socioeconómica y de salud, nunca se han distanciado de su interpretación original, esto es, como un indicador de no conformidad con los valores sociales, religiosos o morales. keywords social construction, teenage pregnancy, gender roles, sexuality, religion, morality, aboriginal disclaimer the views expressed in this article are solely those of the author(s) and do not necessarily represent those of any other person, agency, organization, or institution. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ socially constructed teen motherhood: a review is teenage motherhood an issue? the answer to this question is “it depends.” it depends on whom you speak to, where you are coming from, and where you are located in history and the world. for example, teen motherhood is an issue in the usa1. in 1976, the alan guttmacher institute (1976) declared it an epidemic in the report “eleven million teenagers: what can be done about the epidemic of adolescent pregnancies in the united states?” suddenly, there was a growing moral alarm in the usa, where there was no previous problem. this sense of alarm spread to only a few english-speaking countries, excluding canada (patterson, 2004). unlike extreme poverty, famine, or protection against infectious disease, teen motherhood is not viewed uniformly around the world as an issue worth debating in the public sphere (united nations population fund [unfpa], 1999). while it is not clearly established in the existing literature that teenage motherhood in first nations communities is an issue, there are indications that it may be perceived as an issue. to be sure, there have always been instances of teenage girls becoming mothers, but until the alan guttmacher (1976) report, teenage motherhood was not considered a problem. rather, the focus was on children born out of wedlock (linders & bogard, 2004), resulting in a child not receiving the support of both the mother and father. what happened to make the historically common event of young women having children a moral concern? the short answer is that it was a socially constructed. statements such as those made by the alan guttmacher (1976) report helped bring about a dramatic change to social understandings regarding the fact that young women often got pregnant before they were 20 years of age. people started to see this fact differently. this led to a cycle of research, reporting, and institutional and social claims that further supported this new view. for this reason, this article briefly reviews the history of issue making of teen motherhood. it first focuses on the gradual construction of teen motherhood as a social “problem” in north america. it traces how teen motherhood was never completely divorced from its original construction as an indicator of a failure to adhere to social, religious, and moral values. after reviewing the history of claims made in regard to teen motherhood, we then look at the notion of social construction and how it relates to teen motherhood. we then deconstruct the modern ideal of the child-parent-expert nexus and provide a brief critique of the european-based developmentalist model. what follows is an informal content analysis of technical papers and program descriptions from national first nations organizations and government programs, respectively, to draw a very preliminary picture of how some first nations individuals and groups view teen motherhood. this approach is used because there is a relative dearth of available literature on first nations teen motherhood, making it difficult to document what precisely it is that first nations persons and organizations think about teen motherhood within their communities. any examination of the issues of fertility and sexual behaviour in first nations communities should be undertaken with respect, humility, and deep awareness of how teen motherhood has come to be an issue 1 there is no intention to conflate the “approach to” and “instance of” teen motherhood in the usa as compared to canada in this report. rather, although there is some canadian literature on this topic, we acknowledge the information limitations in canada when compared to the usa, where data is much more abundant and can be taken to reflect the situation in canada to some degree. more importantly, however, the relative paucity of literature on teenage motherhood in the first nations context makes it very difficult at this time to develop a parallel argument that investigates the development of first nations views regarding teen motherhood. 1 fonda et al.: socially constructed published by scholarship@western, 2013 of concern in mainstream society and whether its current formulation in the public discourse is free from prejudice and misinformation when viewing first nations teen motherhood. this article is not tied to a negative moral perspective about teen motherhood. rather, the main focus is on examining the relationship between teen motherhood and the well-being of young mothers, their children, families, and communities. reviewing the modern european history of early parenting before urbanization and industrialization, the fact that young women under 20 years of age had children was not an issue in north america. it was the social norm (linders & bogard, 2004). what was an issue was when children were born “illegitimately;” that is, out of wedlock and without the support of both mother and father. with religion playing a central role in terms of setting norms, values, and controls, sexual activity outside of marriage and illegitimate births were considered sinful. at that time, pregnant teens had two choices: marriage or ostracization. the vast majority chose to marry (addleson, 1999; harari & vinovskis, 1993). by the second half of the 1700s, premarital conception, in what would become the usa, increased. this increase paralleled a steady and visible erosion of church and civil opposition to premarital sexual activity (harari & vinovskis, 1993; see also rhode, 1993). this changed again in the early 1800s when there was a substantial decrease in premarital births. by the civil war, there was an extension of adolescence as a lengthy period of financial dependence. the education of youth became a primary goal as american society became more urbanized (harari & vinovskis, 1993). however, at that time, a double standard was introduced in white, middle class north american society: education and labour force participation was reserved for men. this resulted in a situation where young, unwed, and pregnant women had limited means to support a family alone, given the difficulties in obtaining an education and the lack of employment opportunities (addleson, 1999; patterson, 2004; rhode, 1993). by the early 1900s, premarital sex re-emerged as a part of courtship patterns as the previous century’s moral standards and religiosity diminished and legal doctrine followed suit. in the 1920s, premarital intercourse rates jumped significantly. however, the depression era of the 1930s showed the lowest rate of teen pregnancies during the twentieth century with fertility rates declining for all age groups (harari & vinovskis, 1993). kinsey, pomeroy, and martin’s (1948) study found that 50 percent of american women and 90 percent of men had engaged in premarital sex. but the teenage pregnancy rate remained low. the twentieth century, in general, can be characterized as an era of a declining rate of births for teenage mothers, smaller families, and later marriages. there is the exception: the baby boom period in the 1950s where the usa temporarily changed course and fertility went up dramatically, including the rate of teen pregnancies, which peaked at 97.3 per 1000 for women aged 15 to19 in 1957 (harari & vinovskis, 1993). regardless, the dominant culture retained strong sanctions against out of wedlock births. polls in the 1950s and 1960s show that only 25 percent of americans approved of premarital intercourse (rhode, 1993). in 1957, teenage motherhood was not seen as much of a problem because marriage was still considered an adequate solution. however, in the 1960s, this began to change due to alterations to women’s familial roles and labour force participation, as well as amendments to programs 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 8 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.8 providing support to families with dependent children. consequently, at that time, many unwed mothers made the decision to keep their children (harari & vinovskis, 1993). the 1970s are widely known as a period of significant social change in the western world. during this decade, the rate of american non-marital childbearing increased steadily, while rates of marital childbearing among adolescents declined (by some 74% between 1970 and 1984). education became even more important as high school diplomas became essential for meaningful employment (harari & vinovskis, 1993). starting in 1976, the role of public interest groups in exacerbating the situation cannot be overstated. the alan guttmacher institute’s “epidemic of teen pregnancy” was one starting point. other interest groups soon joined. they did so in the context of a deep cultural ambivalence regarding teen sexuality. sex is often presented as a goal unto itself in popular culture, on the one hand; while on the other, there is little evidence of wide-spread parent-child discussions of its risks or responsible contraceptive behaviour in religious american family life (regenrus, 2007; regnerus, smith, & fritsch, 2003). religious families are known to use such opportunities to reinforce moral values, as opposed to providing information about healthy sex and birth control (regnerus et al., 2003). at the same time, there has been increasing information made available in public educational programs and through health messaging, which has been contentious for many religious americans (moore, 1987). before moving on to the next section, it is important to take a brief look at how american people viewed teen pregnancy among its ethnic and cultural populations. this is important because it illustrates a further double-standard in the american teen motherhood debate: the perception of sexual permissiveness as a cultural preference in ethnic populations persists and has a significant bearing on how teen motherhood is perceived by mainstream society with respect to such populations. sexual norms for american women of colour evolved out of different cultural traditions and different sociological constraints (rhode, 1993). these sorts of perspectives persist today and tend to result in viewing teen motherhood among black peoples as a cultural preference. in contrast, pregnant middle and upper class white teens tend to be pathologized as psychologically and socially deviant (patterson, 2004; phoenix, 1993). social construction as a form of critique social constructionism is a sociological theory of knowledge that examines how cultural and social responses develop in social contexts. a social construct can be said to be a concept or practice that is a creation of a particular group or subgroup (patterson, 2004). one of the major methods of social constructionism is to “deconstruct” how people and groups participate in the creation of their perceived reality (hacking, 1999a; macleod, 2001). this includes asking questions about the very assumptions a society holds about the way the world is organized, examining how such assumptions are created, institutionalized, and made “traditional.” deconstruction could be said to be a critique of a social construction designed to point out its ideational roots with the goal of demonstrating that its view on a topic is rarely a reflection of naturally occurring phenomena, but rather a cultural interpretation thereof. an examination of the contemporary western social construction of teen motherhood is considered here because there is not much official documentation on teen motherhood produced by first nations voices. because there is so little written about teen motherhood in first nations, there is little choice but 3 fonda et al.: socially constructed published by scholarship@western, 2013 to view the debate in the larger north american social context in which first nations are located and with which they interact. this exercise provides a glimpse into the ideational environment on teenage motherhood that surrounds first nations in canada. one of the first critiques of teenage pregnancy as a socially constructed category appeared four years after the alan guttmacher institute’s report (see murcott, 1980). since then, there have been several other critiques of the social construction of teenage motherhood, including wong and checkland’s (1999) teen pregnancy and parenting: social and ethical issues, which initiated a canadian debate on this topic to accompany that in the usa. among other interesting chapters, wong and checkland’s volume includes what might be considered an important overview of social construction as a method written by ian hacking. hacking (1999b) is skeptical of such critiques because he thinks everything is socially constructed. despite his scepticism, hacking (1999a) proceeds to characterize the method in light of teenage motherhood. in the following section, hacking’s (1999a, 1999b) elaboration on the methods and approaches employed by social constructionists is briefly outlined. this is followed by some responses to hacking’s dismissal of critically viewing teen motherhood as socially constructed. hacking (1999b) finds the roots of social constructionism in a doctrine called linguistic idealism, which is descended from berkley’s idealism. hacking (1999a) noted that there are two halves to social constructionism. the first looks at the historical and material conditions that took place making an idea appear as it does. the second follows upon the first and also states that the idea in question is not inevitable. the case of “teenage pregnancy,” hacking concludes, is as “natural” a category as there possibly could be. in his analysis, saying that teen pregnancy is socially constructed makes sense but is not very useful: what it means is that the very idea of teenage pregnancy is one that comes into being, in certain historical circumstances, and the practices, institutions, and experiences are the product of those circumstances. it means that the idea of teenage pregnancy is not an inevitable one, a mere description of the state of certain young women, but rather a label used both to identify, advise, and control… (hacking, 1999a, p. 80) for hacking (1999b), social construction claims are not always clear about precisely what is inevitable or what should be removed. what he is trying to get at is the subtle distinction that there need not always be a conflict between saying a thing is “socially constructed” and saying it is “real”. rather, it is our culturally conditioned ideas of things that are not contingent on the nature of the things in question. such ideas exist within a matrix of social meanings, which act to change the way persons see themselves and others see them. thus, in the context of teenage motherhood, it is not the fact that teenage women become mothers that is socially constructed but rather it is about the invention of a new “class” of young women that are ascribed a series of challenges accompanying early parenting. in response to hacking, wong and checkland (1999), note that the phrase “teenage pregnancy” seems like an objective description of pregnancies for women 13 to 19 years of age and has a “natural ring” to it. however, as seen above, the phrase emerged in the 1970s. before then, people used categories of illegitimacy and unwed mothers. this is not a question of interchangeable labels for the “same” thing: “the categories of ‘unwed mothers’ and ‘teenaged mothers’ are very different ways of describing and gaining knowledge of the events” (p. 273; see also patterson, 2004). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 8 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.8 for wong and checkland (1999), it is a question of transferring the concept out of the realm of morality, where it originated, and turning it into technical problems with new categories for study and “resolution” by the medical sciences, the social sciences and the public health enterprise. it is not that the moral claims are eliminated in the process, but they are displaced and transformed. it is possible to see this differently than wong and checkland. this may be a case in which one set of objections is overlaid by a second set. that is, the issue of illegitimacy, the moral threats to “traditional” family structures, and the fear of subversion of religious and patriarchal authority have not gone away. rather, they have been supplemented and made secondary (for some) by issues of socio-economic, health, and psychological burdens put on the teen mother, her parents, and child. wong and checkland’s (1999) next point looks at the fundamental practice of “kind-making” in the sciences. the making of kinds and the identification of people as belonging to certain kinds has the effect of changing how people see themselves. such “kinds” influence the persons it defines and those doing the defining, resulting in a feedback loop that changes how researchers see their subjects. wong and checkland (1999) argued that kind-making is more complex in the case of teenage pregnancy than hacking allows and is in need of socio-political analysis. the characteristics and categories of teenage pregnancy reflect the expectations of dominant culture and are determined by specific modes of questioning that emerged at a specific historical and social juncture. they are not imaginary findings, but they do set up expectations of what it means to be a “normal” adolescent (macleod, 2001; murcott, 1980). once the nomenclature turns to issues of normality, we find accompanying connotations of deviance, sickness, or abnormality – all of which can be seen as an extension of the christian moral discourse regarding out of wedlock, or “illegitimate,” child-bearing. this pathologization of the unmarried teen mother de-emphasized, but did not eliminate, the “illegitimate” act of premarital sex. it transformed pregnant teenagers into a public health and social problem, where sexual permissiveness is seen more as a symptom of socio-psychological problems and less as a sign of immoral character. in the end, the present way of talking about teen motherhood subjects contemporary young women to entirely different sets of practices and solutions than before. now, they are seen as having deviated from the “natural” order of human development and that such deviation may lead to economic, social, and psychological problems (macleod, 2001; murcott, 1980). teen motherhood is now more of a technical issue: an error in timing and interruption of psychological development and social position rather than a moral transgression. this pathologized discourse on teen pregnancy in general includes a wider target population than that of the “fallen woman.” it now includes all adolescent girls, who are not pregnant but are seen as “at risk” of becoming so. the plethora of north american psychological and sociological studies on teen motherhood expanded its conceptual framework to include behaviours that are also classified as normal or deviant. in this context, patterson (2004) concluded that motherhood is a social, rather than a natural category. and social constructionist critiques, contra hacking (1999a, 1999b), illustrate that dominant views on motherhood and types of mothers are neither fixed nor inevitable. a further consideration alluded to earlier is that social science explanations for teenage motherhood were not applied to all unwed mothers in the same way. rather, it is fractured along racial and class lines. it is only the white, middle and upper class teen mothers who were thought to be emotionally troubled. 5 fonda et al.: socially constructed published by scholarship@western, 2013 unwed pregnancy for teenaged black women is still often seen as a sign of deep cultural or racial pathology in the usa (adler & tschann, 1999; macleod, 2001; patterson, 2004; phoenix, 1999). this is an important consideration for our purposes given that canadian mainstream society often shares similar “myths” of aboriginal canadians. a third consideration addresses the american political culture’s view on welfare programs. when speaking about the belief that teen motherhood is at the heart of the problem of welfare dependency, pearce (1993) stated, “the real issue behind the relation between teenage pregnancy and welfare dependency is single parenting – in other words, mothers living and surviving economically without men” (p. 52; see also kelly, 1999). additionally, patterson (2004) points out that the moral alarm in the late 1970s and 1980s served a historically specific set of conservative political interests in the usa. during this period, family values were co-opted by conservative politicians who argued that social life, in general, was endangered by changing patterns of family formation. consequently, conservative american politicians cut welfare entitlements and limited access to contraceptives in the name of the family (see also lawson & rhode, 1993). this last point suggests that the (social) science discourse may not be as immune from moral discourse as supposed. it is possible that a new kind of person has emerged from the hybridization of these two sets of discourses, but most people are not trained in the social or natural sciences and have more exposure to theological and moral views on social issues. what can be seen here then is the interaction of a number of views and ideologies resulting in the over-determination of teen motherhood as a social problem. the next section will address this further by looking at how discourses, or social scripts, such as ideals of childhood, adolescence, and adulthood, and the power relations represented by categories like “experts” vs. “children” have further complicated the situation for teenage mothers. deconstructing the ideals of the child, parent, and expert the dynamics leading to social ideals of good and bad motherhood are also found in european developmentalist views on adolescence. anne murcott (1980) was one of the first sociologists to examine teenage pregnancy as a social construction by addressing legitimacy. legitimacy, in this context, has to do with the acceptability of conception. it is a question of age and control. for instance, patterson (2004) noted that the idea of teen mothers being trapped in a culture of dependency mirrors the situation of traditional nuclear families, where the mother is economically dependent on the husband (see also kelly, 1999; pearce, 1993). dependency is one of several characteristics invoked by the modern view on adolescence. because adolescents are in transition between childhood and adulthood, they are seen as dependent due to their immaturity and inability to support themselves (macleod, 2001; murcott, 1980). this developmentalist framework on adolescence has been more or less accepted throughout the world, insofar as it has adopted western psychological and social paradigms. but things change: there is a growing body of literature that problematises this notion of childhood and, by implication, adolescence. childhood is not a timeless, transcultural phenomenon. it is best seen as the product of a number of cultural processes and modernist ideals that have come to define a specific life stage as different from others (macleod, 2001). in modern times, being a child or adolescent is not so much being a potential adult as it is belonging to very separate category (mucrott, 1980). in this view, teen motherhood is a 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 8 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.8 problem because it is a contradiction in terms: child and adult are exclusive categories and a child, thus, cannot beget a child (macleod, 2001; murcott, 1980; phoenix, 1993). when a teenager becomes pregnant she becomes a “deviant” adult (macleod, 2001) or, for that matter, a “deviant” child. teen pregnancy, thus, brings to attention not only the transgression of the child/adult boundaries, but also her sexuality, which further emphasizes the teen mother’s existence on the margins of society. if these observations hold, then teen motherhood constitutes an affront to both moral and developmental categories (cf., caragata, 1999; lawson, 1993). in cases where social structures rest on grave paradoxes, exaggerated avoidances develop. one might see the american moral outcry surrounding teen motherhood as an expression of this phenomenon. certainly, what we have learned to this point supports this view that there is an over-determination of teenage motherhood as a problem (macintyre & cunningham-burley, 1993). this paradox has left the field open for the professionalization of the construct of childhood, where experts define the characteristics of youth and explain their behaviour using developmental language. thus, the teen mother is placed in a paradoxical situation. she is subjected to a developmental blueprint, where she supposedly progresses through invariable stages of moral and cognitive development, but it is this very process that renders her vulnerable. it puts her at risk for the “unnatural” event of teen motherhood. once having conceived, her developmental stage is used to pathologize her ability to mother (macleod, 2001). considering the influence that the developmentalist model has had on teen motherhood, it is important to offer a critique of developmentalism. a critique of the european developmentalist model by way of a conclusion to the previous section, what follows is a critique of the developmentalist model. developmentalist approaches to psychology and social work are influenced by the medical sciences, which can be problematic. from a medical science perspective, anything deemed abnormal is seen to be pathological and in need of cure (hillman, 1964, 1972, 1975a). in addition, in the medical sciences, the body is seen to be a mechanical wonder (hillman, 1972). this perspective encourages a view of the body as one that functions like a machine, meaning that when one of its parts breaks down, it should be removed and replaced (i.e., be cured in one way or another) (hillman, 1964). in psychology, this medical influence historically resulted in various types of reactions to abnormal behavior, which have differed over time. from the viewpoint of developmental psychology, the image of the child is set up as an ideal and it is believed that what happens to it will affect the person for the rest of his or her life. developmentalism may put too much emphasis on the child and adolescent as precious, delicate, and vulnerable. while it is true that children have these aspects, it is not all that characterizes them. what about their stubbornness or resilience to suggest two other possibilities? the result could be that a lot of adult memories and experiences that do not fit within the developmentalist picture of childhood are repressed, transformed, or otherwise altered and made inconsequential (hillman & ventura, 1992). presumably, the developmentalist approach is one that sees the child as being closer to a natural state, in need of growth and civilizing. and this growth takes place under the tutelage of the expert (hillman, 1975b). such a model of growth is a western cultural preference that often butts heads with other cultures and their views on childhood and adolescence. but one cannot fully understand adolescents without first 7 fonda et al.: socially constructed published by scholarship@western, 2013 studying the culture(s) in which they are embedded. different cultures afford different levels of autonomy, as well as different types of social roles and responsibilities. for instance, in certain cultures adolescents are expected to contribute significantly to household and economic responsibilities (lerner, rosenberg, & lerner, 2001). additionally, different cultures tolerate different degrees of adolescent intimacy. some expect adolescence sexual expression and allow it, while others attempt to suppress it. finally, the notion of a transition from childhood to adulthood varies drastically by culture. in western countries, for instance, it can take nearly a decade or two; in other cultures, the transition – often in the form of an initiation ceremony, which are maintained in or being revived by many first nations cultures – may be over in a few days. additionally, such transitions can vary by gender. all this underscores the point that adolescence, like motherhood (early or not), is a social construct: it is shaped differently depending on the cultural and social context and may be enforced more by social and cultural practices than by biological change. is first nations teen motherhood an issue? this section attempts to see if there is a difference in how first nations view teenage motherhood as compared to mainstream canada. this is a difficult goal to achieve because there is little research literature on teenage motherhood in the first nations context. additionally, there are a variety of histories, cultures, geographies, and other considerations that make it difficult to capture all the different views on teen pregnancy within first nations. with these challenges in mind, we applied an informal content analysis to a small group of documents to get a glimpse of how first nations perceive teenage pregnancy, the role of experts, and other related themes discussed above. content analyses is an accepted methodology in the human sciences that quantifies the presence of certain words, phrases, concepts, themes, or characters within texts or a set of texts in order to make inferences about messages within the text and how they affect the reader’s understanding of the subject at hand and, indeed, within the general culture and time in which they originate (busha & harter, 1980). in the following analysis, the goal was not to count reports on the topic but, rather, to see if and to what extent: (a) the texts reviewed include discussions of the themes identified above, and (b) if they might demonstrate a difference in approach to teen motherhood. in other words, the goal is to reveal similarities and differences in how mainstream canadian society and first nations view early motherhood and the associated risks. this exercise might also encourage those concerned to ask whether teen motherhood in first nations has not received much attention to date because it is a women’s issue in general and not necessarily a first nations’ community issue in specific. the sample of documents discussed below was derived from a process by which the authors identified technical articles or program statements from selected organizations, some aboriginal, some canadian government, and one international. this resulted in nine technical papers (anderson, 2002; archibald, 2004; bannnister & begoray, 2006; brown, et al., 2007; hill, 2003; national aboriginal health organization [naho], 2008; ordolis, 2007; redding, kmetic, & gideon, 2007; robbins, 2008), one masters’ thesis (davis, 2005), descriptions of two federal government programs (health canada, 2007; public health agency of canada, 2008) designed to encourage and support to first nations’ participation on issues related to youth and maternal health. the authors identified relevant sections in each document related to a limited number of themes, such as developmentalism, experts (social 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 8 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.8 scientific, parental, and elders), disparities such as risks of poor socio-economic and health outcomes for teen parents, statements of cultural differences or supports for the transmission of traditional culture, and deviance (including the outcomes of various aspects of the colonial legacy). a brief analysis of the findings follows. with respect to the developmentalist view, statements were found that reflected the following familiar themes: due to early menstruation, children are ready biologically but not yet emotionally; adolescents are immature, their identities are in formation; a medicalized view of health and development; youth are excluded from decision making; there is a need to strengthen personal attributes of adolescents; use of phrases like “fixing,” “making better,” and ensuring “correct behaviour” among adolescents; and the idea that adolescents are in need of the guidance of experts, such as elders. in virtually all of the documents reviewed strong statements about “cultural differences” and calls for “programming and policies that are culturally sensitive” or assist in “transmitting cultural knowledge” were found. moreover, the analysis identified different developmental models that are derived from first nations’ cultures that are, to some extent, close to the social scientific model discussed above. with respect to the category “expert,” we found references to parents and elders as role models and important figures in the development of children. there was no discussion of the social scientist or medical practitioner and other professions as experts in these documents. however, these documents were often authored by “experts,” who decided which risks to report and how to do so. there is also the theme of adolescent deviance, which included the effects of colonialism (e.g., intergenerational trauma, cultural loss, racism, loss of traditional life styles). such themes appear in almost all the documents reviewed. from these findings, it is possible to conclude that first nations’ social understandings of teen motherhood share several of the scripts outlined in the above discussion on the social construction of teen motherhood. however, they also show a distinct and strong cultural foundation not found in european-based constructions. this is to say that the approach to teen motherhood seems to be both similar and different at the same time. what needs to be mentioned here is that within aboriginal discourses the child is seen as being independent of the factors associated with his or her birth. in other words, while the mother may have a history of unacceptable behaviour, it is not automatically assumed that her child will be the same. in western discourses, in contrast, the child is seen as a product of the young mother’s shortcomings and thus shares with the mother these “developmental problems.” this conflation – this inability to see the child as his or her own spirit, being, as a gift from the creator – is very different in aboriginal texts. here, no moral stigma is necessarily attributed to the children of young mothers. although in such texts pregnancy can be discussed in terms of “more ready” or “less ready” with respect to timing, there is an emphasis on the child being always welcome in the world and community. conclusion when a teen’s community, culture, and nation are said to be dysfunctional (as a result of colonization and historical trauma) and in deficit (as per poor social economic and health outcomes), there is a risk that mainstream views on first nations teenage mothers are made that much more negative through conflation. consequently, the challenges and difficulties faced by first nations teen mothers risk being disregarded by many persons because they may see teen motherhood as a fact of first nations’ cultures, 9 fonda et al.: socially constructed published by scholarship@western, 2013 despite the recognition that children are the future of canada’s first nations and an important pillar to building the future of canada. the purpose of this paper was to critically review the development of teen motherhood as a social issue in north america. in doing so, it discussed how teen motherhood has been socially constructed as an issue that is viewed significantly differently than it was previous the late 1970s. the paper outlined the changes in north american acceptance or disapproval of adolescent sexuality, the historical change of focus from illegitimate births to unmarried mothers to one of lone teenage mothers understood to be pathologically incapable of tending to themselves and their children. what we found is an overdetermination of the issue resulting in social avoidance. also critiqued is how the contemporary view on teenage mothers reflects modern western beliefs regarding childhood, adolescence, and adulthood, and how this is deeply gendered. social and cultural structures define what is considered “normal” adolescent behaviour. it recognized that the transition from moral sanctions to sanctions belonging to the health and social sciences were not mutually exclusive, but that the former set of concerns (moral transgression) where overlaid with the latter, newer set of concerns (economic, health, and psychosocial). the paper closed with a reporting on a brief and informal content analysis of a small set of documents reflecting first nations perspectives on childhood, early parenting, and social scientific views. the content analysis helped to show that, while many first nations hold similar views as western cultures on women, adolescents, childhood, and motherhood, they also demonstrate significant differences with regard to supporting culturally appropriate ways to express and support teenage motherhood. in closing, the authors wish to reiterate and emphasize that this article emerged from the context in which, until very recently, there has been little discussion in first nations research on the understanding of teenage motherhood. rather than attempting to establish that teenage motherhood in first nations communities is or could be an issue, this article seeks to help initiate discussions about conditions facing first nations teenage mothers without presenting a negative moral perspective. the main focus of any ensuing discussions should be on the well-being of first nation teenage mothers, their children, families, and communities. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 8 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.8 references addleson, k. p. 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(1999). teen pregnancy and parenting: social and ethical issues. toronto: university of toronto press. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 8 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.8 the international indigenous policy journal march 2013 socially constructed teen motherhood: a review marc fonda rachel eni eric guimond recommended citation socially constructed teen motherhood: a review abstract french abstract spanish abstract keywords disclaimer creative commons license socially constructed teen motherhood: a review implementation of indigenous rights in russia: shortcomings and recent developments the international indigenous policy journal volume 5 | issue 4 article 3 october 2014 implementation of indigenous rights in russia: shortcomings and recent developments alexandra tomaselli european academy of bolzano (eurac), italy, alexandra.tomaselli@eurac.edu anna koch world economic forum, geneva (switzerland) and european academy of bolzano (eurac), italy, annakochi@mac.com recommended citation tomaselli, a. , koch, a. (2014). implementation of indigenous rights in russia: shortcomings and recent developments. the international indigenous policy journal, 5(4). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.3 implementation of indigenous rights in russia: shortcomings and recent developments abstract after more than 20 years of active engagement in indigenous issues, raipon, the umbrella organization of the indigenous peoples of the north, siberia, and the far east, was ordered to suspend its activities by the russian ministry of justice in november 2012. eventually, this order was withdrawn provided that raipon changed its statute, which subsequently took place in early 2013. why such sudden and definitive decisions? apparently, the measures taken against raipon were due to its active engagement to defend indigenous peoples' rights especially vis-à-vis the russian extractive industry. a starting point for all possible explanations is thus the existing gap between the legal protection of indigenous peoples' and its enforcement. the aims of this article are thus to gain a deeper understanding of the legal protection of indigenous peoples’ rights in the russian federation, and to explore the interests and the politics lying behind the government attitude vis-à-vis indigenous peoples. keywords indigenous peoples, russian federation, north, siberia, the far east, raipon, oil and gas industry, fishing rights acknowledgments bearing in mind the current difficult situation of the russian indigenous peoples, we wish to express our gratitude to all the interviewees who agreed to participate to participate in the preparation of this article. we are particularly grateful also to the anonymous reviewers, whose suggestions and comments have certainly enriched our article. finally, we would like to thank also ms. sadaf raja and mr. samuel baird for their kind language editing. disclaimer an earlier version of this paper was presented at the fourth conference multidisciplinary meeting on indigenous peoples (empi iv), complutense university of madrid (spain), may 9 10, 2013. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ i m p l e m e n t a t i o n o f i n d i g e n o u s r i g h t s i n r u s s i a : s h o rt c o m i n g s a n d r e c e n t d e v e l o p m e n t s 1 after more than twenty years of active engagement in indigenous issues, the russian association of indigenous peoples of the north (raipon), the umbrella organization of the indigenous peoples of the north, siberia, and the far east, was ordered to suspend its activities by the russian ministry of justice in november 2012. after a global campaign with a wide international echo,2 this order was eventually withdrawn, provided that raipon changed few formalities in its statute, which subsequently occurred in early 2013 (survival international, 2013). why such a sudden and definitive decision? apparently, the measures taken against raipon were due to its active engagement to defend indigenous peoples’ rights especially vis-à-vis the russian extractive industry (novaya gazeta, 2012). one possible explanation for these events can be understood to lie in the existing gap between the legal protection of indigenous peoples and the enforcement of relevant legislation. in fact, despite a promising formal legal framework protecting indigenous peoples, the lack of law enforcement de facto deprives indigenous peoples of their rights and, in particular, of their safeguards vis-à-vis the massive extractive industry in russia. therefore, this article aims to gain a deeper understanding of the legal protection of indigenous peoples’ rights in the russian federation and to explore the interests and the politics underlying the government’s attitude with regard to indigenous peoples and the exploitation of natural resources. understanding is achieved, first, through the analysis of the legal framework and its failed implementation in the period from 1999 to 2012 by looking at the three federal laws specifically addressing indigenous peoples that were adopted between 1999 and 2001 (“on guarantees,” 1999; “on obshchina,” 2000; and “on territories,” 2001). in addition, other provisions directly or indirectly affecting indigenous peoples are analysed. secondly, thanks to the information provided by six interviewees, the implementation of overall legal protection of indigenous peoples in russia is subsequently critically assessed. w h o a re t h e i n d i g e n o u s s m a l l n u m b e re d pe o p l e s o f t h e n o rt h , s i b e ri a , a n d t h e f a r e a s t ? to date, 46 peoples have been legally recognized as “indigenous small-numbered peoples of the north, siberia, and the far east” in the russian federation.3 four specific conditions have to be met by the peoples in order to obtain such a status. first, the number of members must not exceed 50,000. second, they have to maintain a traditional way of life. third, they have to live in areas that have traditionally                                                                                                                 1 in the course of the common elaboration of the present article, the first three sections were written by anna koch, and the following three, including subsections, by alexandra tomaselli. in addition, the questionnaire on which the interviews were based was prepared by ms. tomaselli, while the interviews were conducted, transcribed, and translated into english by ms. koch. ms. tomaselli is particularly grateful to ms. koch for her 2 inter alia, a global campaign against raipon’s closure, was realized by cultural survival to which many organizations across the world adhered (cultural survival, 2012b). 3 in the decree no.536-r issued in 2006 the government of the russian federation recognized 40 peoples as “indigenous small peoples of the north, siberia and the far east.” two acts, no.255 (“on the common list of numerically small indigenous peoples of russia,” 2000), which was subsequently amended by act no.1145 (“on the common list of numerically small indigenous peoples of russia,” 2011) states that in total 46 numerically small indigenous peoples are living in the russian federation. 1 tomaselli and koch: implementation of indigenous rights in russia published by scholarship@western, 2014 been inhabited by their ancestors. finally, they have to self-identify as a distinct ethnic community (“on guarantees,” 1999, art.1, para.1, section 6). comparable to anaya (2010), we also address small-numbered indigenous groups as defined by russian legislation. in particular, the numerical threshold is rather unique worldwide and creates asymmetrical legislative protection among groups who share similar challenges and characteristics, but are not ultimately recognized as indigenous peoples. this is exactly what happened with the following groups: the altai kezhi, the nogay, the komi-izhemts, and izvatas. all of these groups are excluded because their numbers exceed 50,000 (anaya, 2010). although these groups are not directly addressed in this article, the general considerations discussed here may also be applicable to them. the total number of indigenous peoples is estimated to be around 250,000, with the nenet peoples representing the largest group with 41,000 individuals. this number represents approximately 2% of the total russian population and is dispersed across 28 regions of russia (anaya, 2010; international working group for indigenous affairs [iwgia], 2012; for a map of the russian federation see figure 1). however, it is difficult to determine the exact number of indigenous peoples in russia. for instance, during the census of 2010, around 5.6 million people, or 4% of the entire russian population, did not indicate their nationality. among these, there may be indigenous peoples unwilling to self-identity for various reasons. another factor that further complicates the situation is what ethnographers call the “change of ethnic identification,” which mainly occurs in mixed indigenous and russian families (iwgia, 2012). a large number of indigenous peoples live in obshchinas, or community owned land holdings. most indigenous peoples worked together in community-based groupings, but without formal recognition, until it was granted and regulated by the law (“on obshchinas,” 2000). many of the indigenous peoples pursue their traditional work such as reindeer breeding, fishery, hunting, and gathering. since there are almost no current statistics that could help to clarify the present-day living conditions of indigenous peoples, one can only derive a trend using available datasets from 2002. according to 2002 data, the living standards of the indigenous peoples have deteriorated significantly over the years. for example, the life expectancy of indigenous peoples dropped; there is a high rate of mortality caused by infections, mainly tuberculosis; and the birth rate has decreased rapidly over the last 40 years. furthermore, alcohol abuse, inadequate medical treatment, and unemployment have also become more prevalent over the last few years. the unemployment rate has reached a startling 50% in certain communities (anaya, 2010). i n d i g e n o u s pe o p l e s a n d t h e o i l a n d g a s i n d u s t ry i n r u s s i a russia is one of the biggest oil and gas producers in the world with one-quarter (25.2%) of discovered global gas reserves, 6.5% of world oil reserves, and the second largest coal deposit in the world (19%). the country executes 20% of global total gas production and 12% of the overall oil production (auswärtiges amt, 2012). the russian federation is planning to increase its production capacity by 2015 through the construction of more oil and gas pipelines (heinrich, 2011). in 2012, the state’s budget revenue consisted mainly of oil and gas sales (assenova, 2013). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.3                   figure 1. map of the russian federation.               3 tomaselli and koch: implementation of indigenous rights in russia published by scholarship@western, 2014 oil and gas extraction in the soviet north began in the 1930s when the soviet authorities started to perceive the traditional activities of the northern peoples (herding, hunting, and fishing) as an industry that could be used for producing meat and fish. they envisaged it becoming a supporting branch of oil and gas extraction companies (i.e., supplying the workers with fish and meat). the main tool for enforcing this policy was collectivization. thus, in this period, the indigenous peoples grew accustomed to trading with workers from the extraction companies (stammler & forbes, 2006). according to stammler and forbes (2006), the economic development of the north was accompanied by a mass migration of workers and the marginalization of the indigenous peoples in the areas where they had previously been the majority. furthermore, pollution of rivers and lakes also occurred due to pipeline leakages and waste left behind by the companies. an additional problem was that after the collapse of the soviet union repairs to facilities such as oil pipelines were delayed, causing even greater environmental damage. in 1999, it was estimated that more than 45,000 km of the pipeline system needed replacement. this number dropped to 3,257 in the beginning of the 21st century. the flaring of waste gas has also led to an increase in forest fires. all of these factors have brought about a decline in fish and wild game in the territories inhabited by indigenous peoples, thereby aggravating the ability to pursue a traditional way of life. in addition, the lack of ecological consciousness and the drive of companies to maximize profit have led to the pollution of the living environment of the indigenous population. over time, oil and gas extraction has posed a threat to the living conditions of indigenous communities. the regions that have the highest number of oil and gas extraction sites are: khantiamansia, sakha republic, sakhalin oblast, yamalo-nenets autonomous okrug and nenets autonomous okrug. the empowerment of indigenous peoples is closely linked to protests against the oil and gas extraction companies. it seems that in most cases, as in the case of the east siberian-pacific ocean pipeline,4 the northern peoples do not entirely reject the projects; rather, they want to ensure that ecological standards are met and that they profit from the construction works either through the compensation payments or employment opportunities (fadhal & sirina, 2006). even though provisions regarding compensation and benefits sharing are contained in the three above-mentioned laws, they have remained ineffective due to lack of implementation. as a result, in most cases northern peoples are insufficiently compensated if their homelands are polluted or taken away by companies. t h e l e g i s l a t i v e f ra m e w o rk v i s à v i s i n d i g e n o u s r i g h t s i n r u s s i a in this section, the three federal laws that formally protect indigenous peoples are analysed in detail along with other provisions that directly or indirectly affect indigenous peoples in russia. in addition, russia has ratified the main united nations human rights treaties, which, according to art.15(4) of the constitution of the russian federation (1993), may prevail over national law. in particular, the 1995 council of europe’s framework convention for the protection of national minorities (fcnm) was                                                                                                                 4 this oil pipeline project should bring oil from oil fields in eastern siberia to the pacific ocean and thereby connect russia to its markets in asia (fadhal & sirina, 2006). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.3 ratified by the russian federation in 1998.5 however, russia did not sign the international labour organization (1989) convention no. 169 concerning indigenous and tribal peoples in independent countries, which is the sole binding and effective international treaty concerning indigenous rights. finally, russia abstained from voting for the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip, 2008) adopted in 2007. c o n s t i t u t i o n a l r e c o g n i t i o n a n d t h e t h re e f e d e ra l l a w s a d d re s s i n g i n d i g e n o u s pe o p l e s ’ r i g h t s indigenous peoples are constitutionally recognized in art.69 of the constitution of the russian federation (1993), which states that “[t]he russian federation shall guarantee the rights of indigenous small peoples in accordance with the universally recognized principles and norms of international law and international treaties of the russian federation.”6 this article was legally implemented by the adoption of three federal laws, which specifically address indigenous peoples recognized between 1999 and 2001, namely: “on guarantees” (1999), “on obshchina” (2000), and “on territories” (2001). formally, these laws provide indigenous peoples with a number of individual and collective rights and guarantees, inter alia, the right: • to freely use land and renewable natural resources in their traditionally occupied territories and areas where they engage in traditional economic activities (“on guarantees”, art.8, para.1); • to establish self-government bodies where densely populated settlements are in place, and to form communities and other organizations (“on guarantees,”1999, arts.11 and 12); • to revise their educational institutions in line with their traditional way of life (“on guarantees,” 1999, art.8, para.9); • to obtain compensation in the event that their traditional environment is damaged by industrial activities (“on guarantees,” 1999, art.8, para.8); • to consider customary law in court proceedings as long as it does not contradict federal or regional legislation (“on guarantees,” 1999, art.14). however, problems seem to lie in the effective execution of the laws (anaya, 2010). the same problems were acknowledged and underlined by our interviewees as well.                                                                                                                 5 the advisory committee (ac) of the fcnm also provides a system for monitoring a state party’s application of the convention’s provisions. this system also allows for the observation of indigenous issues. see the state and ac reports, as well as the resolution by the committee of ministers of the council of europe, available at http://www.coe.int/t/dghl/monitoring/minorities/3_fcnmdocs/table_en.asp 6 the articles of the constitution cited throughout this article are reported in the official translation provided by the russian government available at http://www.government.ru/eng/gov/base/54.html 5 tomaselli and koch: implementation of indigenous rights in russia published by scholarship@western, 2014 in particular, the law “on guarantees” (1999) was amended by the federal law, “on changes in federal acts of the russian federation” (2004), which entered into force in 2005. the amendment removed the following articles and clauses from the original law: (a) art.4 on socio-economic and cultural development; (b) clauses nos.1, 6, 9, 11, 12 of art.6, which dealt with the establishment of forms of selfgovernment in areas inhabited by ips, administrative liability in case of violation of legislation regarding ips, and the issuing of licenses and setting of quota of employment in traditional crafts of ips; (c) clauses nos.1, 4, 5 of art.7 on the protection of the original habitats, traditional ways of life, economic systems, and crafts of indigenous peoples; and (d) art.13 on the rights of indigenous peoples to representation in the legislative organs of power. “on changes in federal acts of the russian federation” (2004) also amended the law “on obshchina” (2000) removing economic support for obshchinas and benefits for their individual members while limiting decision-making power at the local level (the previous clauses nos.2, 3, 8 of arts.7 and para.2 of art.18). o t h e r l a w s i n v o l v i n g i n d i g e n o u s pe o p l e s ’ r i g h t s in addition, other laws affect indigenous rights and ways of life, including the following federal laws: “on hunting” (2009), “water code” (2006), “on the animal world” (1995), “on fishery” (2004), “forest code” (2006), “land code” (2001), “on general principles of local self-government in russia” (2003), and “on education” (1992). to illustrate, a partially new system of auctioning both hunting and fishing licenses has recently been enforced. the federal law “on hunting” (2009) affirmed that all hunting grounds without any exemption are to be distributed for long-term lease, based upon the results of tenders (arts.27, 28, and 42). consequently, this law will hinder access to fishing for various indigenous peoples and serve as another impediment to their traditional way of life. despite an exception clause included in art.25 of the federal law “on fishery” (2004), indigenous peoples are often prevented from routine daily fishing. this clause allows indigenous peoples to be exempt from the requirement of holding a fishing permit if fishing is done for subsistence needs and follows traditional practices at a community-level while avoiding fishing as obshchinas or at other forms of company or industrial levels. however, this clause is not well-known among the indigenous peoples’ communities and is applied neither by federal subjects nor the central government,7 but rather solely litigated in courts. furthermore, in 2010, the federal law “on the animal world” (1995) was amended. in particular, in art.48, the word “fishing” was eliminated and substituted with the general concept of “objects of the animal world.” this amendment created confusion and uncertainty about indigenous peoples’ rights to the prioritized use of fishing resources. although some fishing and hunting quotas have been established for indigenous peoples, they barely meet the nutritional needs of the communities concerned. in other cases, the fishing or hunting grounds were located far away from the settlements of the indigenous peoples. thus, indigenous peoples are essentially forced to participate in further auctions in which they                                                                                                                 7 the russian federation is a federal, semi-presidential republic composed by 83 constituent subjects or political administrative units, which are commonly called federal subjects. in the 1993 constitution, 89 subjects were listed (the constitution of the russian federation, 1993, art.65). on the basis of the federal constitutional law passed in 2001 ‘on the procedure of the acceptance into and the creation of new federal subjects in the russian federation’ no. 6-fks the number of federal subjects was reduced to 83. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.3 are faced with the difficulty of competing with more powerful enterprises due to both required documentation and budgetary availabilities (anaya, 2010). in addition, according to the federal “land code” (2001, arts.1, para.1) and “forest code” (2006, art.1, para.11), the use of land and forest is allowed solely upon payment of licenses. the provisions were in contrast with the original text of the law “on territories” (2001) since its art. 11 stated that the use of the “territory of traditional natural use” (hereinafter in its russian acronym ttp)8 should be free of charge. hence, the article was amended by the federal law “on the introduction of amendments in lawmaking acts” (2007) and now affirms that the use of the ttps should comply with other laws of the russian federation (i.e., the land and forest codes). thus, ttps are also subject to auctions to assign the rights of use. finally, the federal policy of russian “optimization,” that is the grouping of specific municipal services such as schooling according to the local self-government reform under the federal law “on general principles of local self-government in russia” (2003), also affects indigenous peoples. in fact, this policy has resulted in the closure of local schools in baklaniha village in krasnoyarsk krai, and a shor village in the kemerovo oblast (anaya, 2010). in addition, on the basis of the federal law, “on education” (1992) and following yearly amendments (the last entered into force in december 2012), many regions have eliminated positions for teaching extracurricular activities (anaya, 2010). thus, indigenous arts, handicraft, and other performances previously included in school activities were abolished de facto. r e c e n t d e v e l o p m e n t s in 2009, the federal government adopted a “concept paper on the sustainable development of indigenous peoples of the north, siberia and the far east of the russian federation” (2009; hereafter, “concept paper”). this is the basis for fostering the socio-economic development and improving the living conditions of indigenous peoples over the following 15 years (until 2025). despite this important step at the formal level, an overarching criticism of the concept paper is that its many initiatives appear far too general to be applied in a timely and consistent manner, as has been seen in the last two years (anaya, 2010). in fact, the government’s plans for russia’s indigenous peoples were not fulfilled and the expected legislative reform regulating indigenous peoples’ rights was never adopted. in addition, the very same annual funds already allocated elsewhere were now to serve to meet the seven objectives of the concept paper mentioned above (iwgia, 2012). this casts another shadow over the real implementation of this instrument, since—as already discussed—the available funds are insufficient. finally, the sole remaining state body at the federal level dealing with indigenous peoples, namely the committee on problems of the north and indigenous peoples of the federation council of the federal assembly of the russian federation, was shut down in 2011 (berezhkov, 2012). i m p l e m e n t a t i o n o f i n d i g e n o u s r i g h t s : a q u a l i t a t i v e a n a l y s i s this section presents a qualitative analysis and presents the main outcomes of six interviews, conducted between august and october of 2011, assessing the failed implementation of the indigenous peoples’                                                                                                                 8 in russian: territorii tradicionnogo prirodopol' zovanija. 7 tomaselli and koch: implementation of indigenous rights in russia published by scholarship@western, 2014 rights at a grass-roots level. the interviewees are well-known experts and practitioners in the field and are referred to by numbers for their privacy and personal security reasons. the interviews were conducted in russian via the software skype® and were recorded. the authors of this article take the sole responsibility for any eventual english translation errors from the interviews. the interviews were based on a questionnaire prepared by the authors, although the interviewees spontaneously added additional information. first, given the formally extensive protection of indigenous peoples guaranteed by the three federal laws specifically addressing it, we were keen to verify the implementation of the laws at national and regional levels and to acknowledge the problems lying behind their application. second, we decided to focus on the competing economic interests over natural resources and the rush to their exploitation that, in russia as well as elsewhere, may heavily affect access to land for many indigenous communities and/or cause irreversible river and land contamination. thus, the second part of this section aims to assess whether and how the extraction of oil and gas or other non-renewable energy resources fuelled social tensions or otherwise affected indigenous ways of life and the surrounding environment. the authors are aware of the limited number of interviews that were conducted. nevertheless, we consider that these six detailed interviews gave sufficient grounds and information to form the core of this article.9 i m p l e m e n t a t i o n o f r u s s i a n l e g i s l a t i o n pro t e c t i n g o r i n v o l v i n g i n d i g e n o u s i s s u e s as seen above, the three laws provide indigenous peoples with extensive formal protection. indigenous peoples are increasingly aware of their rights (interview 1),10 although generally the urbanized indigenous peoples are better informed than those living in rural areas (2, 3, 4, 5). nevertheless, indigenous peoples are often unfamiliar with the details of their legal protection. this is also due to the low educational attainment that prevents indigenous peoples from understanding the content and the meaning of their rights (1). efforts to disseminate legal information are made by ngos and other organizations (e.g., by raipon) (1, 4, 6); however, the legal technical terms used to explain these rights in magazines and leaflets, as well as the remoteness and budgetary restraints of indigenous peoples’ communities put a strain on the dissemination of such information (1, 4, 6) (see also anaya, 2010). more specifically on the application of the three laws, there is general agreement over the lack of implementation by public institutions at both the central and regional levels (1, 3, 4, 5, 6)11. for instance,                                                                                                                 9 this is for the following reasons: first, all the interviewees have a high profile and a sound expertise in the field, and they boast collaborations and recognitions both at national and international levels. second, although some of them know each other, they were contacted and interviewed individually and in different timeframes. third, there were no monetary incentives for the interviews (i.e., the interviewees were not paid a fee since we wanted unbiased and voluntary information). the experts that requested an honorarium were not interviewed. fourth, the responses of the six interviewees are homogenous and it was found that they did not contradict each other. this is particularly relevant in the case of those interviewees coming from a different background. last, but not least, the statements reported here are in line with other literature cited in this article or otherwise used to integrate this overview. 10 from here on just the number of the interviewer will be written. 11 to refer to the russian “subject of the federation” or “federal subject” or “constituent entities” or their governments, the terms federal subject, region and regional will be used in this text similarly to anaya (2010). 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.3 in 10 years, no fully-fledged territory of traditional natural use (ttp) has yet been established under federal law (1, 3) (see also anaya, 2010). in fact, according to art.95, para.5 of the “land code” (2001), the boundaries of a ttp have to be determined by an act of the russian federal government.12 the federal subjects of khabarovsk krai, yamalo-nenets autonomous okrug, sakha republic, and khanty-mansi autonomous okrug started the procedure to create ttps within public lands (i.e., lands managed by the region or the municipality) (1). indeed, anaya (2010) reported the creation of ttps in 28 federal subjects13 and, in particular, of 523 ttps in the khanty-mansi autonomous okrug. the latter have regional status and are the former patrimonial lands, which had been created in 1992 through the regional directive, “on the statutes of primordial lands” (1992).14 later, the lands were transformed into ttps by the federal law “on territories” (2001) (4). despite these attempts, there are many controversies since the lands are considered public lands (1). in fact, when ttps are established by federal subjects or by municipalities, they also include land owned by the state. in some cases, if a governor supports indigenous peoples, the ttp will be created regardless of whether it includes stateowned land. there was an attempt to create a ttp in kamchatka krai, which failed due to the lack of support from the appointed governor (1). moreover, if oil or gas is found on ttps, then the state is free to reclaim the area in question. thus, the status of such ttps is not yet well defined (1), and, as anaya (2010) reports, the majority of indigenous communities do not benefit from such designated territories. a lack of centralized coordination and motivation by the state vis-à-vis the overall protection of indigenous peoples is perceived (3, 5, 6). in fact, the level of enforcement of the three laws seems to vary from region to region (3) (see also anaya, 2010). some federal subjects adopted regional legislation,15 especially on indigenous culture and education (6), whereas others (e.g., khabarovsk) carried out small development projects for indigenous peoples (1). despite the adoption of these acts, it remains unclear whether some regions provide better protection than others. the goodwill or availability of each governor is another factor that comes into play in both positive and negative terms (1, 6). for instance, in yamalo-nenets autonomous okrug, the governor organizes a monthly meeting with nenet indigenous leaders to discuss any problems in their communities, while in kamchatka krai a council was                                                                                                                 12 according to art.9 of the constitution of the russian federation (1993), private parties, the state, and the municipalities may own land and other natural resources (see also art.1, para.9 of the land code (2001) that states that such divisions shall be determined by federal laws). moreover, issues concerning possession, utilization, and management of land and of subsurface, water, and other natural resources are one of the shared competences between the state and the federal subjects (art.72 russian constitution, letter c and j). basically, the state mainly owns land and natural resources such as forest, tundra, etc. the federal subjects and municipalities mostly own streets, infrastructures, etc. 13 these are documented in an official federal listing act no.631-p of 2009 called “list of places of traditional lifestyles and traditional livelihood of numerically small indigenous peoples of the russian federation” (cited in anaya, 2010). 14 in russian: položenie o statuse rodovych ugodij. 15 the federal subjects that have adopted regional legislations are the following: republic of buryatia, republic of karelia, sakha republic, republic of khakassia, tyva republic, primorskiy krai, krasnoyarsk krai, khabarovsk krai, amur oblast, arkhangelsk oblast, irkutsk oblast, kamtchatka krai, kemerovo oblast, magadan oblast, murmansk oblast, sakhalin oblast, sverdlovsk oblast, tomsk oblast, tymen oblast, nenets autonomous okrug, and khanty-mansi autonomous okrug. 9 tomaselli and koch: implementation of indigenous rights in russia published by scholarship@western, 2014 created to deal with regional indigenous issues (6).16 finally, civil servants at both the central and/or regional levels are not fully informed about indigenous issues, programs, and legislation (3, 5, 6). another influential element is the frequent amendment of the three laws, as well as of other laws directly affecting indigenous issues (4, 5). for instance, the ministry of the regional development in charge of indigenous affairs at the state level recently proposed the redefinition of the status of ttps to no longer consider them subject to special protection and restricted use by indigenous peoples (3). another example is illustrated by the laws “on hunting” (2009) and “on the animal world” (1995) according to which hunting licenses are assigned by open tenders on a basis of long-term leases of specific territories (3) (see also anaya, 2010). this generates significant competition, which then goes beyond the financial means of many indigenous communities. indeed, a case was brought before the supreme court in which it was ruled that a fishery ground’s auction carried out in kamchatka krai violated indigenous peoples rights (1, 3). l a n d , n a t u ra l r e s o u rc e s , a n d r i s i n g c o n f l i c t s interviewees reported actual and recent oil extractions in murmansk oblast, nenets autonomous okrug, yamalo-nenets autonomous okrug, sakha republic, chukotka autonomous okrug (3), and kamchatka krai (1). furthermore, they reported gas and oil extractions in khanty-mansi autonomous okrug (4) and yamalo-nenets autonomous okrug (5) (see also anaya, 2010) and a planned gas pipeline to be built in the altai republic (2). as far as hydroelectric plants are concerned, there were plans to build two dams in sakha republic and krasnoyarsk krai, but in the end these plans were abandoned (4). the former project kankunskaya ges in sakha republic was frozen in 2012 because it was found to not be profitable (russian gazette, 2012). the latter dam was to be built by the roshydro company in evenkia (evenk autonomous okrug, which is nowadays part of the krasnoyarsk krai), and it would have flooded an area consisting of 1.200 square meters. this case concerned a large number of indigenous peoples villages that were at risk to be submerged in the city of krasnoyarsk krai. the russian public or civic chamber, which is a sort of ombudsman,17 organized several public meetings and events during which the consequences of the dam’s construction were explained. finally, a referendum was carried out among the population, and the 85% opposed the project (3). anaya (2010) also mentioned this project and reported that the national and international concern and debate on this project contributed to stopping, or at least postponing, construction on the dam. however, one interviewee reported that there were many actors involved in this dispute and the main reason for the shelving of this project are most likely technical and economic ones (4).                                                                                                                 16 the main indigenous peoples in the region are even and italmen. 17 the public or civic chamber was created by the federal law “on the russian chamber” (2005). the chamber is formed by 126 members. the first group of members consisted of 42 persons appointed by presidential decree among “russian citizens who had performed special services to the state and society”. this first group selected further 42 members among nominees proposed by russian ngos and other organizations. finally, other 42 members were chosen among representatives from regional and inter-regional organizations. according to the aforementioned law no.32, the chamber acts as a sort of ombudsman having the following tasks: facilitating coordination between the state or local authorities and civil society organizations; protecting human rights and fundamental freedoms of russian citizens; protecting the interests of the russian citizens vis-à-vis the government and the politics pursued by it; ensure “national security” in respect of democratic principles and of the russian constitutional values (civic chamber of the russian federation, 2012). 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.3 apart from this case in krasnoyarsk krai, another dam (boguchanskay ges) is under construction in the same federal subject. building of this dam started in 1974. the main companies involved in the construction of the dam are roshydro and rusal. in the course of this project, 29 towns and villages are at risk of flooding (24 in krasnoyarsk krai and 4 in irkutsk oblast). the resettlement of people started initially in the 1980s and continued into the 1990s. it is estimated that approximately 12,000 indigenous and non-indigenous people will have been resettled by the end of the construction (boguchanskay ges, n.d.). gas and oil exploitation often cause irreparable damage to the surrounding flora and fauna, thus affecting indigenous peoples’ means of livelihood linked to the natural habitat (1, 3, 4, 5). for instance, oil spills and waste disposal in watercourses or lakes inevitably cause water pollution, environmental harm, and kill fish (1). another example can be seen with regard to the tundra, which is a habitat that tends to absorb liquids and thus absorbs leakages of oil and other toxic substances (3). furthermore, many indigenous communities who employ reindeer herding and grazing are affected by the construction of oil pipelines that intersect reindeer pastures and interrupt migratory patterns (5). in some cases, reindeer have also been injured by abandoned remnants of the oil-plants (5). in other cases, pipelines run over territories usually crossed by nomadic peoples and their cattle (2), thus affecting their traditional way of life. coal and gold mining activities also have adversely affected the living conditions of indigenous peoples because many companies improperly treat the mines’ waste and leave open-air dumps close to indigenous peoples’ settlements (5). in addition, in the altai republic, one of the interviewees (2) reported that a number of rocket pieces had fallen onto the indigenous peoples’ lands, apparently releasing toxic substances that contaminated the surrounding flora and fauna, resulting in the indigenous peoples losing the ability to hunt in the affected areas. indigenous peoples’ sacred sites may have also been damaged, since there is no register of indigenous sacred sites or places of worship (2). although the sites may be recreated (2), they still lack basic (legal) protection. for instance, in the altai republic, a new gas pipeline to be built by the russian company gazprom will cross the entire republic and will include lands considered holy by the indigenous telengit people, with no regard for indigenous peoples’ beliefs and sentiments (2). this is the equivalent of building a pipeline through the walls of a church. to find a solution for this problem, a unesco delegation travelled to the altai republic to study and propose alternative routes for the pipeline (2); however, despite crossing sacred sites, the project has been recently approved (cultural survival, 2012a) and the planned pipeline will run over the ukok plain in the altai republic. in the same region in 1993, archaeologists found a well-preserved mummy, claimed by indigenous peoples as one of their ancestors. later, the media gave the mummy the name “the altai princess,” the age of whom was dated to circa 500 bce. shortly after the discovery of the mummy, archaeologists concluded that she must have belonged to the pazyryk culture instead and she was taken to novosibirsk to conduct further research. the discovery of the mummy was not a novel occurrence as several mummies belonging to that culture had been found there previously. however, in the following weeks, an unidentified spokesman, most likely one of the archaeologists, commented on the discovery of the mummy as “the greatest archaeological discovery of the end of the 20th century” (konyaev, 2010, contested princess, para 2). this statement had a significant impact on the altai republic’s citizenry, who became 11 tomaselli and koch: implementation of indigenous rights in russia published by scholarship@western, 2014 increasingly aware of the mummy’s discovery and its alleged value. in addition, it became common opinion that the mummy did not belong to the pazyryk culture, but rather that the mummy was the famous “kydym,” a powerful enchantress and the oldest ancestor of the whole altai people. however, this assertion remained unclear and very highly contested; researchers reiterated that the mummy was of the pazyryk culture, which apparently has european features and not indigenous ones. this fuelled the indigenous peoples’ discontent. in 1998, a regional law was passed prohibiting further archaeological excavations in the ukok plains in order to decrease the social tension around the contested discovery and the mummy’s transfer to novosibirsk. the regional law was reversed in 2010 due to an agreement signed between the research centre in novosibirsk in charge of the studies and the museum in altai. the princess mummy was returned to the altai republic in 2012 after being kept in novosibirsk for 19 years. currently, the mummy is the most famous and popular exhibit in the museum, which is allowed to temporarily store the “biological object” according to the above agreement. the agreement also stipulates that further research will be conducted on the mummy (konyaev, 2010). according to one interviewee (2 in august, 2011), gazprom stepped into the dispute between the indigenous peoples and the altai government. in exchange for completion of its pipeline, gazprom promised to facilitate the return of the “princess” to altai and to modernize the museum in which the mummy could be displayed (2). in fact, prior to the return of the mummy, the national museum of the altai republic was renovated and enlarged. the total cost of the project amounted to nearly 750 million russian roubles, covered by gazprom. the inaugural ceremony of the new museum was held on september 26, 2012 (“princessu ukoka,” 2012). prior to any approval and construction, the elaboration of an environmental impact assessment (hereinafter, eia)18 is required by art.3 of the eia federal law (1995).19 in addition, according to the federal law “on guarantees” (1999, art.8, para.6), indigenous peoples have a general right to participate in an eia study whenever construction is likely to directly affect them. according to the abovementioned federal law (eia: federal law no.174-fs, 1995), an eia is a particular requirement for projects in territories under special protection and where there has already been significant damage due to previous activities (see art.11, para.6).20 interestingly, an eia governmental study has to be financed by the company responsible for pursuing and completing the project (art.14, para.2). in other words, the government appoints experts but receive their honorariums from the company eventually responsible for any damage caused to the land, suggesting that companies could exercise pressure on the experts. hence, the system in place for the eia reports is not a transparent one and has an increased likelihood of bias. in particular, the eia requires two open public presentations and hearings to illustrate the main aspects and consequences of the planned work. notwithstanding this requirement, such                                                                                                                 18 in russian: ob èkologičeskoj èkspertize. 19 see also federal law, “on the protection of the environment” (2001), art.1 on the definition of the eia and the decree, “on the acknowledgment of the direction on the environmental impact assessment caused by economic and other activity in the russian federation” (2000), which provides the list of documents required when preparing an eia and the procedure to be followed, included the abovementioned public presentations and hearings. 20 see also art.14, para.5 of the eia (1995) federal law on the composition of the governmental commission elaborating the eia. for further details on the procedure see the decree, on the acknowledgment of the direction on the environmental impact assessment caused by economic and other activity in the russian federation (2000). 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.3 presentations and hearings are often held in remote and unknown places, which are physically far away from the work site or publicized very late (1, 3, 4, 5). one of the interviewees (5) reported that in southern yakutia the announcement to participate in an eia public presentation scheduled for the following day was placed on a marginal notice board in the concerned village. the presentation took place with extremely low community participation since the majority of community members did not read the notice and were not aware of the presentation. such practices by companies seeking to execute controversial projects suggest an intention to bypass the legal requirement and prevent criticism or protests. on other occasions, indigenous participants concerned by the planned projects do not intervene during the public hearings because they are afraid to openly criticize the companies (4). in addition, there is high risk that the eias are biased since, as mentioned earlier, the companies remunerate the experts in charge of the study (2). although the studies are expected to be run independently, they often lack this independence due to their ties to the companies in question. nevertheless, in some cases, the results of the eia generated a public debate on planned energy projects and thanks to such debates, these projects were withdrawn (1). however, it seems likely that they were stopped due to decreased estimated revenues rather than because of environmental concerns (1). another peculiarity regards a so-called “ethnological impact assessment,” which examines the effects on the culture of an indigenous community close to which an energy project is to be built although this type of assessment is not required by any federal law. sakha (yakutia) is the exception to this trend: a similar regional law was adopted in 2010 that prescribes such an assessment (regional law of sakha, 2010). however, many companies do not consider it binding due to the fact that it is a regional law and, therefore, not applicable to projects carried out on a federal or supra-regional level (i.e., when involving more than one federal subject) (3). in practice, an ethnological impact assessment has been recognized by some civil society organizations (3, 4) and by some oil and gas companies (1). in particular, the company oao ternejles conducted one and reached a compensation agreement with the community concerned (6). oao ternejles, located in primorskiy krai, operates in wood processing, forest clearing, forest plantations, and the production of wholesale wood products and electric saws. in 2004, the company and the indigenous peoples’ organization of primorskiy krai signed an agreement according to which the company recognized the necessity to carry out an environmental and ethnological impact assessment in accordance with russian law, existing international standards, and the international convention on biological diversity. furthermore, the company agreed to financially support the indigenous organization and the krai’s northern peoples, who reside in the territories in which the company carries out its projects. ternejles also underlined its willingness to minimize any negative impacts of projects and to inform the indigenous population about all planned projects. in addition, a body was set up to improve the negotiation process. in 2010, ternejles compensated the obshchina agsu with 1,575,000 russian roubles and the indigenous organization of primorskiy krai with 300,000 russian roubles (“blagotvoritel’ nost,” 2012). however, the instances of compensation to indigenous peoples in case of forced relocation or other damages, such as the abovementioned ones, are generally infrequent (6). in some cases, buyers profit at the expense of the indigenous peoples by paying them less than the market price (4); while in other situations, especially where communities are well organized, indigenous peoples succeed in benefitting from revenues of oil and gas production (e.g., in yamalo-nenets autonomous okrug) (5). 13 tomaselli and koch: implementation of indigenous rights in russia published by scholarship@western, 2014 the interviewees reported other examples of cooperation and negotiation between indigenous communities and the oil and gas companies. for example, the case of the sakhalin energy investment company ltd. (an international consortium; hereinafter, sakhalin energy) involved the indigenous peoples of the sakhalin island and can be defined as a “best practice” (6) (see also anaya, 2010). an interviewee confirmed that agreement was reached in a rather coherent and transparent way (5), especially when compared with other cases. nevertheless, interviewees still expressed their criticism (4, 5). in 2005, the sakhalin ii project, which aimed to extract oil and gas both on and offshore of sakhalin island, raised widespread concern. environmental and indigenous organizations had mobilized since early 2005. because the company hoped to receive funding from the european bank for reconstruction and development, it had to follow the bank’s operational policy on indigenous peoples. a council of indigenous representatives was formed to negotiate with sakhalin energy. the immediate result was a tripartite agreement amongst the indigenous peoples, sakhalin energy, and regional authorities. as part of the agreement, the “sakhalin indigenous minorities development plan” would finance development programs to a total amount of usd 300,000 (iwgia, 2007). on the one hand, the fund offered the indigenous movement some new equipment (computers, etc.) and reinforced its network. on the other hand, other planned actions and concrete needs of indigenous peoples (e.g., the economic empowerment of obshchinas according to the law “on obshchina,” 2000) were not met. thus, the plan partially failed in realizing its intent. for instance, according to the indigenous leaders, the criteria for submitting a project proposal were too demanding (iwgia, 2007) and indigenous peoples’ original claims were not respected. consequently, an overall ethnological impact assessment was not completed and the determined pipeline routes were not diverted (4). apparently, foreign oil and gas companies are generally more willing to cooperate with indigenous peoples (1, 6); however, there are some exceptions to this, such as the sakhalin energy example discussed above. russian companies are slowly becoming more concerned about their corporate image (1). contentious situations have also involved the company gazprom, which, according to the interviewees, collaborated with indigenous peoples in yamalo-nenets autonomous okrug (6), but failed to do so in kamchatka krai or sakha republic. in the former region, the indigenous movement is well organized and has a stronger input at the regional level, enabling it to enter into negotiations with gazprom. in the latter case, the company simply stated that it has no responsibility to deal with indigenous issues because these matters are to be addressed by the state (6). this is a common understanding among other russian companies as well (3). other tensions were observed in the northern part of the altai republic: the regional government tried to expand the tourism, against the will of the local indigenous peoples, into areas traditionally inhabited and used them (2). the logging exploitation in the taiga forest in primorskiy krai, which the udege people have fiercely opposed for many years, is also provoking hostilities (6). another factor that aggravates tension is the flow of russian migrants towards indigenous territories in search of job opportunities. such territories are rich in natural resources and are likely to be exploited by extraction companies (4, 5). however, the majority of the russian population is concentrated in urban areas and the conflicts are perceived as being too far away both in terms of physical distance and culture. there is also a predominant belief amongst both indigenous peoples and a majority of the population that oil and gas extraction is a positive factor for the country’s economy (2, 4, 5, 6). the energy mega-projects are often 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.3 located in remote areas and therefore people remain unaware of the immediate environmental damage (4). in some cases, regional governors have tried to influence public opinion by emphasizing the positive consequences of such exploitation plans (1) without stating the disadvantages that these projects may involve (5). moreover, economic interests often prevail over indigenous claims and issues resulting from these projects (1) (see also advisory committee on the framework convention for the protection of national minorities [acfc], 2002). another issue concerns the perception of indigenous peoples by mainstream russian society, which still views them as an “exotic” people (3, 4, 5, 6) (see also anaya, 2010). even public officials are rather oblivious to the harsh living conditions and the other issues indigenous peoples face (3, 4, 5, 6). thus, there is widespread misunderstanding of claims (3, 4, 5, 6). this is also due to the stereotypically negative image of indigenous peoples that is frequently portrayed by the media (4, 6). rarely has a positive collaboration with the media been reported (5). another relevant aspect regards confrontation between indigenous peoples and other poor sectors of the society, especially in the rural areas, which may see the former as more privileged than themselves in terms of the programs or policies addressed toward improving their living conditions (4, 5). however, one interviewee reported a case of solidarity in tomsk oblast, where there is a mutual support between the indigenous and non-indigenous communities, both of whom live in equally difficult conditions (5). c o n c l u d i n g r e m a rks & r e c o m m e n d a t i o n s as shown in this article, indigenous rights in the russian federation are poorly implemented. moreover, there is a lack of political will to support indigenous peoples’ rights and cultures that has created confusion and legal uncertainty created by numerous amendments to the three laws (“on guarantees,” 1999; “on obshchina,” 2000; “on territories,” 2001), as well as other relevant laws discussed above. additionally, the russian indigenous protection system lacks clear policies and there is a deficiency of transparent, central, and coordinated administration. the most glaring examples are the improper use of funds by the federal subjects and the missed implementation of the concept paper on the sustainable development of indigenous peoples of the north, siberia and the far east of the russian federation (2009), which was adopted in 2009, but essentially still remains unexecuted. therefore, despite a promising formal legal framework protecting indigenous peoples, the lack of law enforcement deprives indigenous peoples of their rights, and particularly of their safeguards vis-à-vis the massive extractive industry in russia. in general, as in many other parts of the world, economic interests tend to prevail over indigenous needs. consequently, indigenous peoples are directly and indirectly affected and become victims of prioritized industrial interests. at times, indigenous peoples are forcibly relocated or their sacred sites are destroyed or placed under serious threat. the compensation for damages of such relocations is rare. furthermore, pollution deriving from oil spills or mining activities affects the natural habitat, thus adversely affecting living conditions and means of subsistence. in addition, environmental legislation may also fail to safeguard indigenous peoples since the environmental impact assessment provided by law is essentially circumvented in practice. finally, mainstream russian society perceives indigenous peoples as an exotic people and considers oil and gas extraction a priority for the country’s economy and development. thus, indigenous peoples seem to stand alone against both the extractive industry and the state. in fact, as affirmed at the beginning of this article, the umbrella association defending and dealing with indigenous rights, raipon, after an order 15 tomaselli and koch: implementation of indigenous rights in russia published by scholarship@western, 2014 of closure was finally reopened in early 2013 following a global campaign and an amendment of its statute. in sum, the necessary dialectics when balancing national economic interests and potentially affected human rights seem unilaterally driven by the regions and the central government in a clear breach of law and thus essentially sacrifice indigenous peoples and their rights. the following recommendations, inter alia, may serve as a basis for improving the protection for indigenous peoples in russia: • put pressure on the russian government to fully execute indigenous peoples’ protection as foreseen by the domestic legislation in force. the russian case represents a clear paradox since it counts on a well-developed legislation vis-à-vis indigenous peoples, but neither this is implemented, nor it is known by stakeholders and public officials. • promptly create and demarcate indigenous territories of traditional use (ttp). land rights are vital to indigenous peoples as widely recognized both in academia (gilbert, 2006; xanthaki, 2007) and in the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (2008; see for example art.26). land rights imply land’s possession and usufruct, thus means of subsistence. additionally, traditional lands are also part of indigenous peoples world vision and, as seen above, of their religion. • carry out viable environmental impact assessments (eia); also in this case, the russian legislation on the subject is potentially a good instrument, but it is circumvented de facto. pressure may be exerted onto both national and international companies to properly follow the eia’s procedure. • fairly inform indigenous peoples on upcoming projects of natural resources’ exploitation onto or close to their territories; this is required by the russian eia’s legislation. however, the right to the free, prior and informed consent is becoming a widely respected standard (e.g., at un and world bank level) (doyle & cariño, 2013). • whenever a planned project is unavoidable, fairly compensate indigenous peoples whenever they would suffer a damage in terms both of land’s loss and pollution over their territories; some experiences have been successful also in russia as seen in this article. • run educational activities not only to indigenous peoples vis-à-vis their rights, but particularly to the wider russian population and the civil servants in order to make them aware of the richness of indigenous peoples’ cultures as well as of the set of problems they face in their daily life. • litigate indigenous peoples’ rights before domestic courts and, in particular, to claim the application of art.25 of the law “on fishery” (2004). this norm provides for an exception clause that allows indigenous peoples to be exempt from the requirement of holding a fishing license. indigenous peoples have to meet two requirements in order to make use of such exemption, as follows: to fish for subsistence needs by following traditional practices at a community-level, and to fish at community and not at obshchinas or at other forms of 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.3 company or industrial levels. this has shown to be particularly successful in some recent cases before russian courts (see “russian general court of second instance,” 2011; see koch & tomaselli, in press). 17 tomaselli and koch: implementation of indigenous rights in russia published by scholarship@western, 2014 r e f e re n c e s advisory committee on the framework convention for the protection of national minorities [acfc]. 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(2007). indigenous rights and united nations standards: self-determination, culture, land. cambridge: cambridge university press. 21 tomaselli and koch: implementation of indigenous rights in russia published by scholarship@western, 2014 the international indigenous policy journal october 2014 implementation of indigenous rights in russia: shortcomings and recent developments alexandra tomaselli anna koch recommended citation implementation of indigenous rights in russia: shortcomings and recent developments abstract keywords acknowledgments disclaimer creative commons license implementation of indigenous rights in russia: shortcomings and recent developments the potential impacts of religion and spirituality on first nation teenage fertility the international indigenous policy journal volume 4 issue 1 indigenous early parenthood article 4 march 2013 the potential impacts of religion and spirituality on first nation teenage fertility marc fonda aboriginal affairs and northern development canada and western university, marc.fonda@aandc.gc.ca recommended citation fonda, m. (2013). the potential impacts of religion and spirituality on first nation teenage fertility. the international indigenous policy journal, 4(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.4 the potential impacts of religion and spirituality on first nation teenage fertility abstract after reviewing some american research on the impacts religion has on adolescent sexual decision making and teenage pregnancy, this article considered the few instances of canadian research addressing this topic. with this contextual information in place, it then moves on to report on analysis comparing the 2001 census figures on religions declared by canadian first nation communities to teen fertility rates and the community well-being index (cwb). it finds that first nations teen fertility rates are related to relative socio-economic deprivation, but also that religion has impacts on sexual decision making at the individual level and those first nations communities showing no major religious adherence have teenage fertility rates of up to 140 per 1000, as compared to those communities showing one major tradition whose fertility rates are closer to 109 per 1000 adolescent first nation women. french abstract les répercussions potentielles de la religion et de la spiritualité sur la fécondité a l’adolescence des premières nations marc fonda affaires autochtones et développement du nord canada et université western résumé après avoir examiné certaines recherches américaines sur les répercussions de la religion sur les décisions prises par les adolescents relativement à leur sexualité et sur la grossesse à l’adolescence, le présent article étudie les recherches canadiennes peu nombreuses portant sur ce sujet. une fois le contexte fourni, l’article présente par la suite une analyse comparant les données du recensement de 2001 sur les religions recueillies auprès des collectivités des premières nations canadiennes aux taux de fécondité chez les adolescentes et à l’indice du bien-être des collectivités. l’article révèle que les taux de fécondité chez les adolescentes des premières nations sont liés à la privation socioéconomique relative, mais également que la religion a des répercussions sur la prise de décisions individuelles touchant la sexualité et que les collectivités des premières nations n’adhérant à aucune religion en particulier ont des taux de fécondité à l’adolescence allant jusqu’à 140 p. 1000 comparativement aux collectivités des premières nations respectant une grande tradition, dont les taux de fécondité à l’adolescence sont plus près de 109 p. 1000. spanish abstract repercusiones potenciales de la religión y de la espiritualidad en la fertilidad de las adolescentes de las primeras naciones marc fonda ministerio de asuntos indígenas y del norte de canadá y universidad western resumen tras examinar algunas investigaciones estadounidenses sobre las repercusiones de la religión en las decisiones de carácter sexual de los adolescentes y en los embarazos de adolescentes, este artículo analiza algunos ejemplos de estudios canadienses sobre esta cuestión. teniendo en cuenta esta información contextual, el artículo informa sobre el análisis comparativo de las cifras del censo de 2001en materia de religión declaradas por las comunidades de las primeras naciones con las tasas de fertilidad de las adolescentes y el índice de bienestar de la comunidad. en el artículo se considera que las tasas de fertilidad de las adolescentes de las primeras naciones están relacionadas con las penurias socioeconómicas relativas y también que la religión tiene consecuencias en las decisiones de carácter sexual de los individuos y que las comunidades de las primeras naciones que no muestran una adhesión importante a las creencias religiosas tienen tasas de fertilidad de las adolescentes de hasta el 140 por 1000 en comparación con las comunidades que han mantenido una tradición importante y en las que las tasas de fertilidad se acercan a 109 por 1000 adolescentes de las primeras naciones. keywords religion and spirituality, adolescent pregnancy, sexual decision-making, community well-being index disclaimer the views expressed in this article are solely those of the author(s) and do not necessarily represent those of any other person, agency, organization, or institution. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ potential impacts of religion and spirituality on first nation teenage fertility why should one care about teen fertility? many people will be able to tell you why from a normative viewpoint. that is, their arguments will focus on moral issues – birth out of wedlock is a sin. while one cannot ignore the power of moral arguments, they often do little to illuminate the outcomes of human behaviour. the typical moral argument regarding teen sex says little about the potential negative health, cultural, and socioeconomic outcomes. with this in mind, we can begin to look at the religion question: does religion influence teenage sexual decision making and decisions regarding fertility and, if so, how? because this debate is just beginning in canada when compared to the usa, this discussion will start with a look at american research to see to what degree it can be mapped to the canadian aboriginal situation. it will then fill the picture with what little relevant canadian data and research is available. what then follows is a discussion of new research findings that compare census data on religious or spiritual affiliations in on-reserve communities to teen fertility rates and the well-being of these communities as measured by the community well-being index (cwb). how religion can influence sexual decision making: the case made in the usa one of the driving questions behind mark regnerus’ (2007) book, forbidden fruit, is to examine how religion can shape adolescent decision making related to sex. religion can shape attitudes and beliefs regarding sexuality in terms of friendships, dating patterns, and how teenagers use their time. it also provides a cultural background of normative ideas that orient consciousness and actions; it provides social and organizational ties; and, it helps to develop extra-community skills. parents in a religious community tend to enjoy a wider network of people to care for their children, which can result in better outcomes for youth (regnerus, 2007; regnerus, smith, & fritsch, 2003). regnerus’ (2007) primary data sources are the national survey of youth and religion and the national longitudinal study of adolescent health (add health). both suffer from the same methodological weakness: they only surveyed adolescents in school – the voices of those who have prematurely left school are left unheard. one of the factors measured in these surveys is the degree of a person’s religiosity. regnerus (2007) points out that adolescent sexual behaviour often follows from: (a) quick decisions made in transient moments, and (b) planned but unstructured time spent together. private religiosity is thought to affect (a), and public religiosity is known to affect (b). thus researchers often find that multiple sources of religiosity affect adolescent behaviour and decision making in multiple ways. (p. 46) regnerus (2007) contends that devoutly religious american parents make decisions about sex based not only on their own sexual attitudes and morality, but also as a response to their perceptions of their children. hence, the influence of parental religiosity is not only direct (determining in part what they ought to say), but also indirect (influencing their judgement on whether an adolescent is ready for such information). when testing what american adolescents know about sex and contraception, it was found that they displayed an inability to accurately define most terms and their mothers fared no better. 1 fonda: potential impacts of religion and spirituality published by scholarship@western, 2013 boys were less able than girls to recognize pregnancy risks and understand contraceptive practices. in this case, regnerus (2007) continues, religion matters: “youth who report weekly church attendance and who say that religion is ‘very important’ to them score lower than less religious adolescents…” (p. 73). adolescent boys, african americans, children of less educated parents, and sexually inexperienced youth also scored lower. open discussions about sex, it seems, is not the norm among religiously devout families (regnerus, 2007; regnerus et al., 2003). regnerus (2007) also looks at such things as religious influences on actual sexual experiences; the frequency of having sex, timing, and context of the first experience; the likelihood of having sex only once and then shunning it until later; and attitudes towards and uses of contraception. he found that american youth are not as over-sexed as some fear. he also found that the loss of virginity tends to start a pattern of paired sexual activity, most commonly with more than one partner (81% repeated intercourse within 12 months of the first experience). regnerus (2007) learned that religion is not a predictor with respect to contraceptive use, but it is a predictor with regard to attitudes on the morality of contraception. still, youth for whom religion is important are less likely to use contraceptives at first intercourse. regnerus (2007) concluded that religious influence on sexual decision making is most consistently the result of high religiosity rather than a specific religious affiliation. the degree to which individuals are immersed in religious worldviews and how connected they feel toward family and friends who are helping them navigate adolescent sexual pressures are the main predictors. however, he also found that the most compelling sexual messages for american youth are not religious ones, but those that are secular and permissive, which are more pervasive. another important finding from regnerus’ (2007) study is that there is evidence of a “new” sexual ethic emerging in the middle-class among mainline denominations. it is neither about religion nor abstinence, but rather about risk reduction, safeguarding one’s future, and sexual substitution. it trades the pleasures of vaginal intercourse for a set of low risk substitutes where the chance of pregnancy is zero and the threat of transmitting sexually transmitted diseases (stds) reduced. this new perspective appears mostly among those youth who are among the wealthiest of religious americans. regnerus (2007) concluded, “religious teens do not often make sexual decisions for religious reasons” (p. 184). in fact, in many cases, religious faith has a confused role with respect to colouring sexual attitudes and actions. for a small minority, religion is a vital part of day-to-day decision making; for others, religious claims on their behaviour are unknown or merely ignored. teen fertility in canada as part of a large, internationally comparative research project on teen fertility sponsored by the allan guttmacher institute, maticka-tyndale, mckay, and barrett (2001) produced the “country report” for canada. it reviews canada’s teen pregnancy rates as a whole and only makes the simplest of disaggregation based on race or ethnicity. while it does not disaggregate aboriginal youth from the sample, matika-tyndale et al. (2001) does acknowledge that aboriginal people “are among the most disadvantaged of canada’s population” (p. 7). what immediately follows is a summary of this report. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.4 canada is neither at the top nor the bottom of the list for teen fertility rates among the five comparison countries. the lowest rates were found to be in sweden and france, and the highest rates in the usa. canada and britain sit in between the usa and sweden and france, but is closer to the latter two countries than the former (allan guttmacher institute, 2001). all of the study countries are democratic and highly developed. however, they differ in terms of population size and density, as well as political, economic, and social perspectives and structures. for example, european countries have placed greater political and social emphasis in providing a social safety net. the usa, in contrast, has long emphasized strong individualism with respect to one’s well-being. the result of this approach is an individualistic society that tends to foster more fluid social structures than can be found in much of europe. a secondary result is greater disparity in terms of the gap between rich and poor. based on data from the 1996 national population health survey and 1995 general social survey, it was found that the overall canadian teenage fertility rate declined between 1980 and 1997. the abortion rate (22/1000) was higher in 1997 than the birth rate (20/1000) for women aged 15 to 19. teen fertility and stds are concentrated in census tracts with the lowest mean socioeconomic indicators and “the primary differences between these regions is in the proportion of aboriginal [sic] people concentrated in each, with proportions highest in the territories [sic], followed by the prairie provinces [sic] and the lowest in the maritime [sic] regions of canada” (maticka-tyndale et al., 2001, p. 7). most canadian men and women are initiated into intercourse before leaving their teens (over 73%). there continues to be a downward trend in age of the first instance of intercourse, with around 51% of both men and women initiating sexual intercourse before 18 year of age. with respect to the number of partners in a year, it was found that instances of engaging in intercourse with more than one partner in a year generally decreases with age. in addition, those teens not in school were more likely to have multiple partners and the proportion of multiple partners generally decreases as income levels increase (maticka-tyndale et al., 2001). the 1995 general social survey, as well as the canadian contraceptive survey conducted in 1993, 1995, and 1998, provide insights into adolescent contraceptive use. both show a consistent pattern of awareness and use of contraceptives among canadian adolescents: 99% of 15to 17year-olds were aware of various birth control methods. however, patterns of contraceptive use change with age, with more grade 12 students (45%) using oral contraception than at grade 7 (4%), and fewer grade 12 students employing condoms (36%) as compared to those in grade 7 (55%) (maticka-tyndale et al., 2001). maticka-tyndale et al. (2001) provide their readers a caveat: the methodology used to collect the data excludes those at the greatest risk of stds and teen pregnancy aboriginal and streetinvolved youth. while these two groups may represent a minority of canadians, “the risks to their health and well-being surpass those represented in this report. risks for aboriginal [sic] youth are seen in teen pregnancy and std rates that are four times higher in aboriginal [sic] than non-aboriginal [sic] populations” (p. 9). what we know about the relationship of religion and spirituality to sex and early parenting in the canadian aboriginal context 3 fonda: potential impacts of religion and spirituality published by scholarship@western, 2013 compared to the usa, there is a relative dearth of canadian research on teenage fertility. even rarer is canadian research addressing the relationship between religion and teenage pregnancy. mainly, this is due to the fact that among the general canadian population teenage fertility is sufficiently low as to not induce panic. yet, things are different in the teenage aboriginal context. and, there is a nascent debate on this topic found in two previous canadian studies. in 2001, around 50% of canada’s aboriginal population was under 25 years of age (matickatyndale et al., 2001). twice as many aboriginal children under 15 years of age, as compared to the rest of the canadian population, were living in single-parent families on income assistance (maticka-tyndale et al., 2001), both of which are associated with elevated rates of teen fertility. an outcome of such conditions is that teen fertility rates for aboriginal women under 20 were between 4 and 7 times higher than the general teenaged population; for girls under 15, the rate was up to18 times higher than their non-aboriginal peers (anderson, 2002; senate standing committee on aboriginal peoples cited in guimond & robitaille, 2008; first nations regional longitudinal health survey [rhs], 2005). canadian first nation teen fertility rates are highest in the prairie provinces, where one finds one of the greatest concentrations of first nations persons in canada. in manitoba, for example, 1 teenaged first nations woman in 8 had a child in 2004 (i.e., 128 per 1000 for women aged 15 to 19). moreover, guimond and robitaille (2008) point out that fertility rates among first nations teens are twice as high as that of american teens, who have the highest fertility rate among industrialized nations. canadian first nations teenage girls have fertility rates similar to those of nepal, ethiopia, and honduras (cf., united nations population fund [unpf], 2008), which are all among the least developed countries in the world. aboriginal youth are in the same category as are street-involved youth in terms of poor sexual and reproductive health outcomes. they are younger at first intercourse, have a larger number of sexual partners, and have higher teen pregnancy and std rates. according to the first nations regional longitudinal health survey (rhs, 2005), an estimated 50% of canadian adolescents were sexually active. among aboriginal adolescents, 66% of males and 57% of females 17years-old were sexually active; for those 13to14-years-old, it was 3% and 19% were sexually active, respectively, which is approximately 8% to 9% more than non-aboriginal youth. aboriginal adolescent males are reported to have twice as many partners as their female counterparts. aggregated together, we find that 67% of aboriginal adolescents had 1 to 2 partners, 19% reported 3 to 4 partners, 6% reported 5 to 6 partners, and 4% claimed 7 to10 partners. based on this, the rhs (2005) concluded that first nation youth are more sexually active than their mainstream counterparts and show higher levels of sexual activity at younger ages. contraceptive use among first nations youth is akin to that of their mainstream counterparts. first nations males are more likely than first nations females to have used a condom at their last intercourse (89% vs. 72%). however, while aboriginal male teenagers are more likely than their mainstream counterparts to report condom use, at least 50% of urban aboriginals do not use condoms every time or are using them incorrectly (rhs, 2005). while it appears that trends in adolescent sexual behaviour are changing (a decrease in those sexually active and an increase in contraceptive use), the greatest declines are reported in the 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.4 lowest risk groups. that is, the changes affecting the sexual behaviour of adolescents from the lowest risk groups are of limited significance for aboriginal youth, who remain the highest risk group in terms of early pregnancy, stds, sexual abuse, sexual exploitation, as well as depression and suicide (rhs, 2005). rhs also reports a higher prevalence of substance use (drugs and alcohol) among aboriginal than mainstream youth (rhs, 2005), which has impacts on sexual decision making and “may result in incidences of unprotected sexual activity, often leading to teen pregnancy, unwanted pregnancy, stis [sexually transmitted infections] and hiv” (rhs, 2005, p. 210). in a smaller study of the 2003 british columbia adolescent health survey conducted by devries, free, morison, and saewyc (2008), we find similar but varying results. data from first nation adolescent respondents shows that only 34% of males had intercourse, 63% with more than one partner, but 21% did not use a condom at last intercourse. among first nation adolescent females, 35% had intercourse, 56% with more than one partner, and 41% did not use a condom the last time. the mean age for both aboriginal males and females for their first sexual intercourse was 14.8 years (devries et al., 2008). among the relevant canadian research on aboriginal early parenting, only anderson (2002) and bibby and penner (2009) ask questions related to the impacts that religion and spirituality may have on aboriginal teen sexual practices and attitudes. over the next several pages, i consider findings from both studies. anderson (2002) investigated the following question: “are the youth influenced by native traditional knowledge and ethics, or are there other spiritual ethics that influence their approach to sex and parenting?” (p. 13). her goal was to explore the impact that cultural or spiritual practices and beliefs may have on attitudes toward sex and about family among contemporary urban aboriginal youth in ontario. however, her sample size was small (350 participants, 255 of which were adolescents). interestingly, it was found that those adolescent participants identifying with native spirituality were less likely to have been pregnant (66% vs. 52% of those claiming christianity and 48% of those following no tradition). when asked if they thought that spiritual practices influenced their sexual activity or attitudes regarding family, only a few respondents discussed pregnancy as a “gift of the creator” and 6% (n = 3) of the 53 youth parents spoke about the use of traditional knowledge in their own lives. additionally, some interviewees suggested that traditional families were more reserved about sex. in the end, “over half of the interviewees surmised that aboriginal youth are not greatly influenced by native culture and tradition, and certainly not in the areas of sex and sexuality” (anderson, 2002, p. 48). while a few of the youth workers discussed how hard it is to get youth interested in the cultural parts of their programs, 35% of the interviewees suggested using elders and cultural teaching as a method to encourage healthy sexual practices and prevent unwanted pregnancies (anderson, 2002). with respect to the influence of christian teachings on sexuality and pregnancy, four of the youth interviewees reported having received messages to delay first sex until older and married. others noted that, while they have christian backgrounds, their families rarely attend church. this finding led anderson (2002) to conclude that “overall, christianity did not appear to have a big influence on the youth interviewees or their peers” (p. 49). anderson (2002) suggested that 5 fonda: potential impacts of religion and spirituality published by scholarship@western, 2013 youth identifying with “native spiritual knowledge” had significantly lower teenage pregnancy rates. however, she did not find that the influence of native culture and tradition affected sexuality. the relationship between spiritual affiliation and first nations teen fertility will be explored below. before moving on, it is necessary to acknowledge some limitations to this study. anderson (2002) does not provide details on what is referred to by “native traditional knowledge”. for instance, we are unable to determine if term to refers to: (a) local traditional knowledge, (b) what has been called “pan-indian” spirituality, (c) knowledge flowing from a syncretic aboriginalchristian context, (d) some combination of the above, or (e) something completely different. this question is relevant given anecdotal evidence of generational divides in spiritual or religious identification among at least some first nations (adelson, 2008; hayes, 1998; tanner, 2008). a second limitation to anderson's (2002) study is that it does not distinguish the degree of religiosity. most surveys examining the impact of spirituality or religion on decision making and behaviour generally account for degree of “religiosity”. while there is no guarantee that adding this variable would have yielded interesting results, it is clear that by not doing so it is not possible to determine what portion of the sample was highly religious and whether degree of religiosity has any bearing on sexual decision making in the urban ontario first nations context. during 2008 and 2009, reginald bibby and james penner (2009) conducted a survey of aboriginal youth attitudes. their survey asked a number of questions on a variety of issues, including religious preferences and sexual attitudes or practices. it also asked about the degree to which spirituality is considered important in the lives of the respondents. they found that 38% reported that aboriginal spirituality is “very important” and an additional 43% said it is “somewhat important” (for 81% in total). the remaining 20% view it as “not very important” or “not important at all”. it was also found that 50% highly valued both aboriginal spirituality and christianity; 25% highly valued aboriginal spirituality, but not christianity; and 5% highly valued christianity but not aboriginal spirituality. thus, we find a 30% overlap, where 80% value aboriginal spirituality and 50% value christianity. this finding is corroborated by 75% of respondents who said that spiritual teachings are very important to them and they have a high level of confidence in the people in charge of traditional ceremonies (bibby & penner, 2009). based on these results, we can agree with bibby and penner (2009) who write in contrast to anderson: “clearly, aboriginal spirituality is both valued and practiced by significant numbers of young people” (p. 30). with respect to sexual attitudes and behaviour, it was found that the canadian teen attitude towards premarital sex when love is involved receives high levels of acceptance and approval (72%). when it is merely a case of liking the partner, premarital sex is still fairly highly accepted but approval drops dramatically (38%). in contrast, only 5% of teens both accept and approve of extramarital sex, with some 80% neither approving nor accepting it. first nation teenagers attending off-reserve schools show higher levels of acceptance and approval of premarital sex and same sex relations (bibby & penner, 2009). however, both “are uniform in rejecting extramarital sex” (bibby & penner, 2009, p. 18). with the exception of approval of premarital sex where love is involved, the degree to which one finds aboriginal spirituality important does not results in significant differences in attitudes. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.4 what some of these findings suggest is contrary to anderson’s (2002) conclusion that first nation spirituality and religion have little impact on sexual decision making and behaviour. in fact, bibby and penner (2009) demonstrated several differences by spiritual and religious affiliation in attitudes towards co-habitation, premarital, contraception use, and extramarital sex. given the nature of the data available in canada, it is fair to say that more research will be necessary to confirm what is suggested above: that there may be some potentially significant different cultural attitudes towards sexuality and related issues among aboriginal teens as compared to the rest of canadian youth and some of this may be impacted by the nature and degree of first nation adolescents’ religiosity. like anderson's (2002) report, bibby and penner's (2009) suffers from the limitation of not defining what is meant by native spirituality. additionally, it does not include aboriginal teens who have left school prematurely. however, it does address the second limitation of anderson's (2002) study: the degree to which spirituality was valued. while bibby and penner's (2009) approach to this question does not meet regnerus’ (2007) standard, it provides some indication of the impact degree of religiosity has among on-reserve first nations teenagers. what a community-based statistical approach shows the goal of this section is to report on research examining whether or not religious or spiritual affiliation impacts adolescent fertility rates within first nations communities, as suggested by anderson (2002) above. in order to do this, first nation adolescent fertility rates are crossreferenced to both the broad general spiritual affiliation claims made in the 2001 canadian census of the population and to each community’s score on the cwb index for 2006. the assumption is that communities with different spiritual affiliations may have different adolescent fertility rates and those fertility rates may be reflected by those communities’ cwb scores. because of canadian data limitations, and in keeping with the collectivist cultural preference among many first nations persons, we conducted research on active religious and spiritual traditions at the community level. it is convenient to do so because we can compare national data on religious affiliation from the 2001 census (the last time the question was asked) to that community’s adolescent fertility rate (as of 2006), and cross-reference this to the 2006 cwb index, developed and maintained at aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc). this approach was applied because canada has no available national-level datasets on individual persons comparable to those used by regnerus (2007) in the usa. the first nations fertility rate used here was derived from aandc’s indian register 1 . while the cwb has been described elsewhere (beavon, white, & spence, 2007), it deserves description here. the cwb is a way to examine the well-being of individual canadian communities. several indicators of socioeconomic well-being, including education, labour force activity, income, and housing, are derived from statistics canada's census of population and combined to provide each community a well-being “score”. these scores are used to compare well-being in first nations and inuit communities to non-aboriginal canadian communities over time. 1 for more details on the data source and methodology see robitaille, kouaouci, and guimond (2004). 7 fonda: potential impacts of religion and spirituality published by scholarship@western, 2013 the cwb is used for a variety of tasks, not the least of which is to monitor changes in the wellbeing of canadian first nations. thus, the cwb is a way of determining the relative well-being of first nations communities as compared to: (a) their last score from a previous census date, (b) other first nations communities, and (c) the “average” canadian community. currently, the cwb shows that of the top 100 canadian communities only one is first nation and, conversely, of the bottom 100 canadian communities 96 are first nation. when conducting the research for this chapter, we examined all first nation reserve communities that, according to 2001 census religion responses, had either over 50% (called “mainly”) or over 80% (called “super”) of their membership following one of the five following “religious” categories: (a) catholic, (b) mainline protestant, (c) all protestants (i.e., all protestant traditions claimed by aboriginal persons in 2001), (d) aboriginal spirituality, and (e) no tradition. 2 these findings were then compared to that first nation’s community fertility rate, derived as per guimond and robitaille (2008), and its 2006 cwb score. the justification for using a community level approach is: (a) the cwb is aggregated to the community level, which means that we need something reasonably comparable, and (b) we assume a certain threshold of religious or spiritual identification or affiliation would be necessary to be able to say, if at all possible, that a community's spiritual or religious character may have some bearing on its wellbeing and teenaged fertility rates. the 2001 census religion numbers are limited in terms of examining the impact of traditional aboriginal spirituality – it simply did not capture the same numbers emerging elsewhere, such as the rhs (2005), bibby and penner (2009), and anderson (2002), all of which indicate that around 80% of first nations respondents claim an affiliation to aboriginal spirituality. this difference is possibly due to a monotheistic bias in the census of population that only allows a single response to the religion question. allowing for a single response is questionable when considering the changing face of the canadian population, many of whom come from south east asia, for instance, where participating in a number of different religious traditions has historical and cultural precedent. with respect to methodological limitations, by setting the cut-off line at 50% and 80% of a community membership following one of the four aforementioned categories, we limited the number of communities that can be considered. that is, not many aboriginal communities are as religiously exclusive as 80% and, more importantly, only seven of the communities enumerated in the 2001 census showed more than 50% of its members claiming aboriginal spirituality. 2 the categories of religions used herein are as follows: catholic (roman catholic, ukrainian catholic, greek or byzantine catholic, and christian orthodox); mainline protestant (protestant, anglican, lutheran, mennonite, presbyterian, salvation army, unitarian, united church, protestant not otherwise specified [nos], swedenborgians [new church], interdenominational, methodist bodies, and reformed bodies); all protestants (includes those denominations in the mainline protestant category above, plus the following other groups – adventist, baptist, christian and missionary alliance, evangelical nos, jehovah’s witnesses, pentecostal, non-denominational, born again christian nos, evangelical missionary church, latter day saints [mormons], brethren in christ, church of christ, disciples, church of god nos, church of the nazarene, christian vineyard fellowship, world wide church of god, christian assembly, and other christian); aboriginal spirituality; and no religion (no religion, agnostic, and atheist). 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.4 hence, what is reported below (figure 1) should be understood as provisional. the conclusions are suggestive and need further confirmation with more robust data with respect to aboriginal spirituality. figure 1: first nation teen fertility rates by religion and cwb score, 2001 2006 source: census of the population 2001, 2006 it was found that, in 2006, the first nations teenage fertility rate of the mainly (50% plus) catholic communities was 102 per 1000 teenaged women (15 19) and the average cwb score of the 186 communities was just over 56 out of 100. in the same year, the teenaged fertility rate for the super (over 80%) catholic communities was marginally higher at 107 per 1000 teenaged women and the average cwb score was 55 for the 96 communities considered. for the mainline protestant communities, the teenaged fertility rate was 109 per 1000 women with an average cwb score of 57 for these 119 communities. the super mainline protestant communities showed 118 births per 1000 teenaged women, with an average cwb score of 55 for the 37 communities. for the grouping of communities categorized as all protestants, the teenaged 9 fonda: potential impacts of religion and spirituality published by scholarship@western, 2013 fertility rate was 109 per 1000 women the average cwb score was 58 for the 145 communities. at the super level for the all protestant category, the teen fertility rate was 115 per 1000 and the average cwb score was 56 for the 64 communities. for those seven communities with greater than 50% of its members reporting aboriginal spirituality, the teen fertility rate was 108 per 1000 per teenaged women and the average cwb score was 55. of those 17 communities with more than 50% of its members claiming no tradition, the average teenaged fertility rate was 140 per 1000 women and their average cwb score was 53. of the 94 communities that could be said to have an even mix (no tradition able to claim more than 50% of a community's members), the average teenaged fertility rate was 126 per 1000 women, and the average cwb score was 58. taken as an unweighted whole, of the 482 communities included above, the average teenage fertility rate is 107 per 1000 teenaged women and the average cwb score is 56. to put this into context, we need to consider that the general canadian teen fertility rate in 2006 was around 14 per 1000 adolescent women. in contrast, the total first nations teen fertility rate has remained around an average of 100 per 1000 teenaged first nation women since 1986. the fertility of first nations teenage girls is seven times higher than that of other young canadian women. “for first nations teenage girls under 15 years of age, the rates are estimated to be as much as 18 times higher than that of other canadians” (guimond & robitaille, 2008, p. 49). finally, the average 2006 cwb score for all first nations communities was 56. in this light, it appears that those 18 communities that include 50% or more of its members following no tradition have the highest teenaged fertility rates among first nations communities. however, the approximately 40% difference between 140 per 1000 and 102 per 1000 teenaged women is not nearly as significant as the difference to the rest of teenaged canada's 14 births per 1000 teenaged women. it may also seem to be good news to catholic communities that their average teenaged fertility rate is the lowest among all first nations communities, but again 102 per 1000 is considerably higher than 14 per 1000 teenaged women. the very small sample of communities with over 50% of their members claiming aboriginal spirituality showed a teenaged fertility rate that is neither high nor low among first nations communities. yet, the average cwb score for these seven communities is the second lowest; it is just under two points higher than the 17 communities where over 50% of the membership claimed no religious tradition. in this case, while there is heightened socioeconomic deprivation in these communities, it did not translate into the same teenage pregnancy rates as found in those communities claiming to follow no spiritual path (140/1000) or showing a mix of traditions (126/1000). moreover, those communities that are constituted by a majority (both 80% thresholds) of mainline protestant or all protestant denominations tend to show the next highest teen fertility rates (118 and 114, respectively) and below average cwb scores. the mainly catholic and super catholic communities showed the lowest teen fertility rates among all first nations communities, but have cwb scores of 55 to 56. conclusion based on the available data, it is not possible to conclusively demonstrate specific communitylevel impacts of religious affiliation on first nation teenage pregnancy. however, with the cwb, one is able to demonstrate a relationship between social and economic deprivation and 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.4 first nation teenage pregnancy. this is to say that, generally, the lower a community's cwb score, the higher its rate of teenage pregnancy. it is interesting to also observe that the teen fertility rates in the small number of communities claiming no spiritual path or a mix of traditions is considerably higher than other first nations communities. in addition, it was found that those communities following mainly one spiritual path showed lower teenaged fertility at the community level. the degree to which this may or may not translate into better potential well-being outcomes at the individual level is hard to say given data limitations. while the relatively low teenaged fertility rate (compared to other first nation communities) found among those few communities with greater than 50% of its population following aboriginal spirituality (there were only four in this category) may be encouraging – especially in face of their lower average cwb score. the population of these four communities represent less than 0.3% of the total canadian on-reserve first nation population. also interesting is that those individuals following two traditions, aboriginal spirituality and christianity, benefit the most (bibby & penner, 2009), while individuals and communities claiming to follow no spiritual path demonstrate the least beneficial well-being outcomes at the individual level and the highest teenage pregnancy rates of all communities considered. furthermore, while data at the community level is not able to demonstrate that religious affiliation has an impact on fertility and sexual decision making among entire communities, let alone among their adolescent populations, we can say that the impact that religion and spirituality was found to have on sexual decision making in united states (regenerus, 2007) seems to be validated in canadian first nations context. bibby and penner (2009) show that the degree to which spirituality is valued makes a difference in the sexual decision making and in the practices and attitudes of first nations teens attending band-managed schools. however, there remain data limitations at the individual level in canada; notwithstanding the findings in the rhs (2005) and bibby and penner (2009), we simply do not have the wealth of individual data to which regenerus (2007) had access. still both the rhs (2005) and bibby and penner (2009) suggest that the degree of individual religiosity impacts sexual decisions and, quite possibly, adolescent fertility rates. one next step for further research might be to re-evaluate the rhs data regarding sexuality (among other items) by age and degree of religiosity to bring to light more detail on the impact religious affiliation may have on adolescent decision making. doing so will increase our knowledge of the individual level effects of degree of religiosity, similar to regenerus’ (2007) work. it might also further contribute to the nascent debate between bibby and penner (2009) and anderson (2002) regarding the degree to which first nations adolescents are religious or spiritual and the impacts this may have on sexual behaviour and decision making. finally, if the trends of increasing affiliation to aboriginal spirituality observed in anderson (2002), the rhs (2005), and bibby and penner (2009) continue, then it is quite possible that the religious landscape among reserve communities will change significantly (see for example, fonda, 2011) and so will attitudes towards morally loaded issues like teenaged sexuality and fertility. 11 fonda: potential impacts of religion and spirituality published by scholarship@western, 2013 references adelson, n. (2008). towards a recuperation of souls and bodies: community healing and the complex interplay of faith and history. in v. kirmayer, & g. valaskakis (eds.), healing traditions: the mental health of aboriginal peoples in canada (pp. 272 288). vancouver: ubc press. allan guttmacher institute. (2001). can more progress be made? teenage sexual and reproductive behaviour in developed countries: executive summary. retrieved from http://www.guttmacher.org/pubs/euroteens_summ.pdf anderson, k. (2002). tenuous connections: urban aboriginal youth sexual health and pregnancy. toronto: the ontario federation of indian friendship centres. beavon, d., white, j., & spence, n. (2007). aboriginal well-being: canada’s continuing challenge. toronto: thompson educational press. bibby, r. w., & penner, j. (2009). aboriginal millennials in national perspective. lethbridge, ab: project canada books. (an abridged report of the same title submitted to the department of indian and northern affairs canada is available from project canada books.) devries, k. m., free, c. j., morison, l., & saewyc, e. (2008). factors associated with the sexual behaviour of canadian aboriginal young people and their implications for health promotion. american journal of public health, 98(10), 855 862. fonda, m. (2011). canadian census figures on aboriginal spiritual preferences: a revitalization movement? theology and religious studies, 30(2), 171 187. available from http://www.equinoxjournals.com/rst guimond, e., & robitaille, n. (2008). when teenage girls have children: trends and consequences. horizons, 10(1), 49 51. hayes, m. (1998). global and transnational flows and local cree youth culture. (unpublished master’s thesis). department of sociology and anthropology, concordia university, montreal. maticka-tyndale, e., mckay, a., & barrett, m. (2001). teenage sexual reproductive behavior in developed countries: country report for canada (occasional report no. 4). new york and washington: the allan guttmacher institute. retrieved from http://www.guttmacher.org/pubs/summaries/canada_teen.pdf first nations regional longitudinal health survey (rhs). (2005). results for adults, youth and children living in first nations communities. retrieved from http://www.rhsers.ca/sites/default/files/enpdf/rhs_2002/rhs2002-03-technical_report.pdf regnerus, m. d. (2007). forbidden fruit: sex and religion in the lives of american teenagers. oxford: oxford university press. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.4 regnerus, m. d., smith, c., & fritsch, m. (2003). religion in the lives of american adolescents: a review of the literature. a research report for the national study of youth and religion (number 3). retrieved from http://www.youthandreligion.org/publications/docs/litreview.pdf robitaille, n., kouaouci, a., & guimond, e. (2004). la fécondité des indiennes à 15 19 ans, de 1986 à 1997. in j. p. white, p. maxim, & d. beavon (eds.), aboriginal policy research – setting the agenda for change (pp. 201 224). toronto: thompson education publishing. tanner, a. (2008). the origins of northern aboriginal social pathologies and the quebec cree healing movement. in v. kirmayer, & g. valaskakis (eds.), healing traditions: the mental health of aboriginal peoples in canada (pp. 249 269). vancouver: ubc press. united nations population fund [unpf]. (2008). state of population 2008. retrieved from http://www.unfpa.org/swp/2008/en/ index.html 13 fonda: potential impacts of religion and spirituality published by scholarship@western, 2013 the international indigenous policy journal march 2013 the potential impacts of religion and spirituality on first nation teenage fertility marc fonda recommended citation the potential impacts of religion and spirituality on first nation teenage fertility abstract french abstract spanish abstract keywords disclaimer creative commons license microsoft word 326303-text.native.1360080173.doc approaching educational empowerment: guidelines from a collaborative study with the innu of labrador the international indigenous policy journal volume 1 | issue 1 article 6 may 2010 approaching educational empowerment: guidelines from a collaborative study with the innu of labrador david philpott memorial university of newfoundland, philpott@mun.ca w. c. nesbit recommended citation philpott, d. , nesbit, w. c. (2010). approaching educational empowerment: guidelines from a collaborative study with the innu of labrador. th e international indigenous policy journal, 1(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.6 this research is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. approaching educational empowerment: guidelines from a collaborative study with the innu of labrador abstract this paper discusses the journey toward self-managed education for the innu people of coastal labrador who, after an arduous struggle, have finally attained autonomy from the canadian government. while the paper briefly explores the broader context within which innu education has evolved, particular attention will be given to the role served by a recent research project in both documenting the specific educational needs of the people and presenting a process to guide change. what emerged from that study was a wealth of data including community attitudes to education, as well as indicators of attendance, ability and achievement of the entire population of school-aged children. the study documented significant learning needs among the school-aged population despite average cognitive ability and a desire to achieve well in school. a plethora of policy recommendations was presented to guide the creation of innu-managed education as well as to establish a template for the creation of a bicultural model of education, one in which traditional culture and native language were prioritized. this paper explores the five-year impact of that study on both policy and practice for aboriginal education in coastal labrador. as such, it informs the establishment of policy and pedagogical approaches for educators attempting to balance contemporary educational opportunity with retention of core cultural values. keywords aboriginal education, self-management, culturally appropriate assessment, innu of labrador, bicultural education, policy formation, indigenous education creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ introduction the 2009-2010 school year will be a significant one for the innu of labrador, canada, a year that marks the official beginning of self-managed education. following a long and often difficult process, the innu are among the last aboriginal people in canada to attain land-claim settlement from the federal government and, with it, the right to self-determination. these people, indigenous to northeastern canada, live predominantly in two coastal communities, sheshatshiu and natuashish, both of which are located on the north east coast of labrador. the innu, now numbering approximately 2,500 people, have survived for over 6,000 years in a traditional nomadic lifestyle that relied on migrating caribou herds (burnaby & philpott 2007). over the years they have endured the harsh climate, fluctuations in animal herds, and encroachments of other tribes including, more recently, european settlers (press, 1995). in the latter half of the 19th century the arrival of the hudson’s bay company precipitated a process of momentous change for the innu. company posts along coastal labrador encouraged the settling of the nomadic innu into communities and introduction to formal schooling, thereby radically altering their lifestyle. these changes triggered challenges and hardships that have plagued the innu people ever since. financial difficulties, social problems unequaled in north america, loss of cultural identity, and the collapse of self-reliance in these communities have resulted in the epithet of "canada’s tibet" (samson 2000/2001). at the start of the new millennium, the innu were actively engaged in land-claim settlement with both federal and provincial governments, which would include self-management of their schools. the innu were well aware of the fractured and ineffective system of education for which they were about to assume responsibility; and, they were understandably skeptical of the effects of formal schooling on their language, culture and social well-being. likewise, 1 philpott and nesbit: approaching educational empowerment published by scholarship@western, 2010 government negotiators were equally aware of the history of band-managed education in other parts of canada and apprehensive about the capacity within innu communities to tackle such challenges effectively. all stakeholders did agree that a new system of education would have to be anchored in the actual needs of innu youth. to that end, a team of researchers from memorial university of newfoundland was invited by the innu to conduct a wide-scale assessment of the educational needs of their children so as to provide objective information that would predicate change. beginning in 2003, the project was conducted in two phases that would inform and guide the process toward educational autonomy for these people. the initial phase entailed the largest assessment endeavor of the learning needs of aboriginal youth ever conducted in canada, in that an entire culture of children (908 in all) was assessed for ability, achievement, risk factors, and attendance profiles. the second phase, stemming from the findings of the first, resulted in a series of program and policy recommendations that would respond to the needs of these children and establish a bicultural model of education. it mapped for the innu a process by which to build capacity for selfmanagement of education, one that was realized in september, 2009. this paper discusses this process. as such, both the assessment methodology and the resultant policy and program recommendations hold particular ‘lessons learned’ relevance to aboriginal peoples in other regions/countries engaged in similar processes for autonomy. we begin with a discussion of the broader context within which aboriginal education has evolved as well as a brief history of the innu experience with schooling. it presents a précis of the project’s methodology and findings. finally, the paper concludes with a discussion of the recommendations which helped the innu realize educational autonomy and policy change. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.6 aboriginal education in the canadian context within the context of contemporary canadian society, characterized as multi-cultural and diverse, is wide recognition of the failure of education for the growing aboriginal population. recent census data (statistics canada 2007) places this growth rate at 45% in the last 10 years and predicts continued growth of 34% in the next twenty years. of greater relevance to educators is the young age of these people, given that 48% of the aboriginal population is school-aged youth. coupled with rising immigration rates, predictions are that by 2017, 23% of canada’s population will be from a visible minority. while this will redefine canadian educational services (philpott 2009) it underscores a need for redress of the long-standing concerns for aboriginal education. in canada, the british north america act of 1867 assigned to the provinces/territories responsibility for public education, creating separate, albeit parallel, histories. however, responsibility for educating the aboriginal population rests with the federal department of indian and northern affairs (inac). by 2007-2008, with a budget of 1.2 billion dollars, inac operated 515 schools for 109,000 students, 60% of whom were enrolled in reserve-based, band-run schools (inac, personal communication, october 2008). questions about the quality of education in these schools began as early as the 1960’s, when aboriginal people themselves were voicing concern for inequities in educational services for their children (hawthorne 1967). as a result, a federal government policy paper titled the white paper (government of canada 1969) presented a response plan that would assign to the individual provinces sole responsibility for the education of aboriginal children. philpott et al., (2004a) argued that while the “intention [of the plan] may have been the development of equity in educational opportunities for all children, many aboriginal leaders interpreted it as an attempt to facilitate assimilation” (52). 3 philpott and nesbit: approaching educational empowerment published by scholarship@western, 2010 goulet (2001) supports this observation, and views the history of aboriginal education as reflective of the struggle for self-determination against the effects of colonization: "aboriginal education has a legacy of assimilationist policies that were guided by the ideology of cultural deprivation and deficit" (69). in discussing the inappropriateness of this approach and the resulting oppression, goulet writes: social struggles are enacted in classroom practice where aboriginal students can encounter an ethnocentric curriculum, authoritative relationships, racist attitudes, and prejudicial beliefs about inferiority or deficits. conditions such as these are intolerable for aboriginal children, who are made to feel stupid when they cannot learn under these circumstances and fail in school. some resist the oppression and so do not participate and drop out of school (68). following the white paper, the national indian brotherhood (1972), in a report titled indian control of indian education, outlined its own plan to reform education by assuming selfmanagement of its schools. that report heralded the establishment of self-managed education, where individual bands were federally funded to assume responsibility for the operation of their community schools via culturally appropriate and language-sensitive educational models. however noble this goal, the ensuing years did not result in significant change in educational outcomes and, by 2004 the effects of this separate model of education led the council of ministers of education to conclude: there is recognition in all educational jurisdictions that the achievement rates of aboriginal children, including the completion of secondary school, must be improved. studies have shown that some of the factors contributing to this low level of academic achievement are that aboriginals in canada have the lowest income and thus the highest 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.6 rates of poverty, the highest rate of drop-outs from formal education, and the lowest health indicators of any group (22). that same year, the office of the auditor general of canada (2004) echoed this distress: “we remain concerned that a significant education gap exists between first nations people living on reserves and the canadian population as a whole and that the time estimated to close this gap has increased slightly, from about 27 to 28 years” (section 5.2). this struggle for self-determination and effective education was not only occurring in the broader canadian context, but among aboriginal people as a whole. pewewardy (2002) argues that globally, aboriginal history holds continuous failed attempts to impose "…white man’s education and educational processes on aboriginal children despite overwhelming evidence that these peoples have definite cultural values and traits that affect learning and academic achievement” (25). so pronounced is this “achievement gap” for aboriginal youth that sleeter and grant (2009) write: the fact that schools do a better job with students who are white, middle class, and native english speaking than with students of color, students from poverty communities, and second-language learners is not new. but the achievement gap has sparked discussion of this problem among many educators and community leaders, who in previous years had taken gaps for granted (47). while poor educational outcomes are recognized, miller-cleary and peacock (1998) discuss the added effects of failed practice on culture and identity. they argue that the effects of colonizing approaches have been extremely destructive to aboriginal identity and have fuelled the systemic problems that have become associated with many first nation communities such as substance abuse, violence, and self-destructive behavior. 5 philpott and nesbit: approaching educational empowerment published by scholarship@western, 2010 aboriginal education: the innu context in the province of newfoundland and labrador, one such aboriginal group are the innu, an algonquian language-speaking group of amerindians, who lived and hunted inland in the north eastern region of canada, in both quebec and labrador, along the north shore of the st. lawrence river. shifting patterns of animal migration, coupled with an exceptionally harsh climate and rugged terrain, eventually led to a group of innu becoming more isolated from their quebec cousins. these labrador innu lived largely through harvesting from the land within their community rules of governance and traditional knowledge resources (mailhot 1997). the first documented contact between these labrador innu and europeans occurred in the early 1700’s when the innu, who were engaged in caribou hunting inland, began trading along the labrador coast. as these european trading posts became more established, missionaries started arriving to serve employees of the posts, as well as to convert the aboriginal people. by the 1860’s, most innu had been converted to christianity at these missions, which involved religious observances and some efforts towards the teaching of literacy. while records indicate that these missions were successful in teaching some innu to read english by 1851, by 1893 the missionary endeavours had diminished with the innu then being served by catholic priests from newfoundland (mailhot 1997). prior to joining canada in 1949, newfoundland and labrador was a colony of england and “…much of its early educational system was reflective of british standards and religious pedagogy” philpott (2002, 1). following confederation with canada in 1949, the newfoundland government followed its canadian counterparts and assumed responsibility for education of its citizens, including aboriginal people. it would not be until 2002 before innu leaders would successfully negotiate “indian status” with the federal government as a pre-requisite step toward 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.6 official land settlement and reservation status, which would lead to their eventual autonomy. in the years following confederation with canada and official recognition by the federal government, provincial government services for the innu, including education, reflected a philosophy of assimilation that exacerbated the erosion of traditional hunting and lifestyle practices for aboriginal people. however, early promises of improved government services such as employment, education, and health care quickly evaporated as the economic marginalization of aboriginal people left them in a dependent state, compounded further by the loss of their traditional lifestyle. physical isolation from their hunting land, limited supplies of fresh water, substandard housing, and inadequate sewer services quickly produced deplorable living conditions for the innu, which eventually garnered international attention (armitage 1997; mailhot 1997; samson 2000/2001). despite these extreme social conditions, one fact about the innu of labrador is envied by the vast majority of aboriginal people in canada: virtually all of them are speakers of their traditional language, innu-aimun. the 2001 canadian census data indicate the almost complete fluency in innu-aimun of the populations of sheshatshiu and natuashish (statistics canada 2003). however, despite the fact that almost all innu children are raised in households and communities where innu-aimun is spoken as the first language, they were still being educated in english-only schools. this language conflict typified the long-standing clash between the reality of innu children and the provincial model of education offered in these communities. under provincial jurisdiction, english-medium schools were operated in both innu communities by the labrador roman catholic school board, staffed by english-speaking teachers. thus, innu students would enter school fluent in their native language and meet teachers fluent only in english. instruction in the provincially prescribed curriculum was in english, with scant and 7 philpott and nesbit: approaching educational empowerment published by scholarship@western, 2010 inconsistent attempts at mediation in the first language. so blatant were the resultant concerns that education, particularly issues relating to school attendance and success, would eventually become a dominant item in self-management negotiations. attendance at the schools had been reported to be near 40% for at least a decade, and fewer than 20 students had graduated from high school. more alarming than low school attendance, however, was wide-spread substance abuse by children, including gas sniffing so rampant that it also made international headlines. even more traumatizing was the staggering fact that 40% of the youth reported having attempted suicide (philpott et al., 2004b). innu leaders were painfully aware of these statistics and the growing negative perceptions many of their people held toward formal education. the cultural mismatch between the community and the school was widely recognized, though unaddressed. these concerns were also recognized by both provincial and federal governments since numerous studies had laid blame on governments for critical neglect of the innu (e.g., backhouse & mcrae 2002; tanner, kennedy, mccorquodale and inglis 1994). as negotiations for self-government continued, the innu wanted these issues identified and addressed, since self-management would require enhanced educational opportunities for their youth. not surprising, given their history with formal schooling, innu parents, like many aboriginal people, display varying degrees of skepticism for education and its non-aboriginal curriculum. in gathering voices, a publication by the innu nation (1995), a strong denouncement of past educational provisions for innu children is difficult to miss. the introductory words are dramatic and clear: there are many problems with the school. the school has done a lot of damage to our culture and our children. it has really changed our lives. the school is not working as it is supposed to. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.6 the biggest problem is that our children are not learning their culture in school. they are learning the white culture. this is a foreign culture. the school has prevented us from learning our own history. too many of our children are dropping out (65). deep resentment toward school experience is stored in the memory of many traditional innu. some described their first days of schooling in terms of "cultural shock", a time when innu children "were placed in a strange environment, their freedoms were curtailed, they were removed from their parents and they were addressed in a foreign language" (samson 2000/2001, 92). while skepticism is understandable, it is clear that the view of education as a negative force contributing to cultural destruction is not universally shared by aboriginal parents. some parents, having seen the demise of the traditional lifestyle, resignedly concede that new educational directions might enhance their children’s chance for life in a broader cultural context. while neither rejecting the traditional culture, nor favoring a reduction in cultural links in curricular content and planning, many parents perceive themselves as people in transition and are willing to consider at least some elements of nontraditional curriculum. despite concern for cultural erosion, it must be said that aboriginal people have always valued education by ensuring provisions for schools were outlined in all of the treaties signed with the federal government (macpherson 1991). such a consistent focus on negotiating educational provisions for their children implies more than a passing interest in schooling on the part of the aboriginal signatories as well as the non-aboriginals. likewise, countless documents reiterated the importance of establishing schools that would respect and preserve aboriginal languages and cultures, while preparing children to be independent in the broader canadian society (e.g., hawthorne 1967; assembly of first nations 1988 & 1990; hughes 1990; royal 9 philpott and nesbit: approaching educational empowerment published by scholarship@western, 2010 commission on aboriginal peoples 1996; task force on aboriginal languages and cultures 2005). subsequently, it comes as no surprise that innu negotiations for self-government would include self-management of their schools. it was during this process of negotiating for self-management (which would include an enhanced educational system for their youth) that the innu requested the federal government conduct a wide-scale assessment of the learning needs of their children. they wanted to ensure that the resources needed to address the dramatic problems with education would be provided and that policies and programs would be anchored in the actual needs of their children. the research project which ensued was conducted over a three-year period and the final reports were released in 2004 and 2005. the initial assessment phase of the project proved to be the most comprehensive study on education in innu communities to date and the largest assessment project of aboriginal youth in canada’s history. the project documented not only achievement outcomes and cognitive ability of students but also community attitudes, perceptions of and aspirations for education. it identified significant learning needs among the school-aged population of innu youth, including low school attendance and limited academic achievement. it also raised significant concern for an exceptionally high rate of fetal alcohol spectrum disorder (fasd). despite these concerns, the majority of innu children were identified as demonstrating average cognitive ability, appropriate patterns of behavior, and a desire to achieve well in school. the children displayed diverse strengths that were not being exploited in current pedagogical approaches. methodology the goal of the research team was to gather input from all stakeholders, while striving to remain objective. sensitivity was accorded to the political wishes of innu leadership, 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.6 government policies, and the economic realities within canada. the project included extensive surveys of parents, students, and teachers on their perceptions of and aspirations for education. it included individual interviews and focus groups, specifically aimed at optimizing input from innu families, leaders, and service providers, as well as observations of the researchers themselves. finally, a careful blend of qualitative and quantitative indices of cognitive ability, academic achievement, social/behavioral concerns, and developmental risk factors were collected for all 908 innu children. the report of the first phase, an educational profile of the learning needs of innu youth, (philpott et al., 2004b) immediately received national media attention. it documented the profound failure of traditional educational institutions to connect with this culture and pinpointed where concentrated interventions were needed. the report of the second phase, enhancing innu education, (philpott et al., 2005) reflected exhaustive reviews of research and proven programs. it presented recommendations for policy and programs that would respond to the needs of these students and begin to build the capacity for self-managed education. collectively, the reports documented need, directed interventions, guided policy change, and initiated service while prioritizing the unique culture and language of the innu people. five years later, the innu would assume responsibility for the education of their youth and, with it, inherent stewardship of their language and culture. findings: effecting policy change both phases created a baseline of the individual needs of these students and suggested the creation of a bicultural model of education that would balance culture with broader educational opportunity. it called for the creation of an innu school system that was empowered with the 11 philpott and nesbit: approaching educational empowerment published by scholarship@western, 2010 ability and the knowledge to begin this process, while accepting the many challenges and issues it faced. in beginning this process, the report cautioned: when aboriginal people try to sustain and maintain their culture while surrounded by another, the challenges are prodigious. schools, like many other institutions, promote policies, practices, programs and ethos of the dominant culture. to counter this, aboriginal people must be valued for who they are and their curriculum must nurture inclusiveness. success rates are increased when the curriculum reflects the understanding, uniqueness and culture of aboriginal people (philpott et al., 2005, 30). subsequently, the report listed a number of dominant challenges in moving toward this goal including: responding to the needs of current students; planning for the needs of future students; creating an effective and sustainable bicultural model; embracing the strengths and complexities of language; accepting the implications of current literacy levels; attempting to limit the negative impact of social instability; and, recognizing the correlation between attendance and achievement. what follows is a discussion of each of these cautions. responding to the needs of current students the magnitude of the change recommended by the reports would necessitate long-term planning and capacity building, while responding to the immediate needs of existing students. the report presented a disturbing picture of the standing of the existing school system. a pattern emerged from the research data indicating that most children began falling behind as early as the first grade and continued a clear pattern of falling further behind grade/age expectations as they continued through school... in the area of reading for example, 80% of seven year olds are one to two years behind grade level and the grade level discrepancy continues to increase to a point where 85% of 15 year olds were at least five years behind. a 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.6 similar pattern is evident in mathematics, namely approximately 56% of seven year olds are one to two years behind and 100% of 15 year olds are at least five years behind (philpott et al., 2004b, 14-15). likewise, attendance was equally alarming: the vast majority of those who attend school do so sporadically. while a third of the full population do not attend school at all, another 17% do so less than 20% of the time. the remaining students attend 54% of the time in natuashish….and 45% in sheshatshiu. ….school drop out begins at the primary level and continues into adolescence with the result that only 30% of innu youth enter high school where they then attend 20% of the time (12). such patterns appealed for an immediate response designed to increase attendance, remediate performance, and optimize instructional opportunities. recommendations were made for interventions which began immediately. planning for the needs of future students while an immediate response to the needs of current students was noted as a priority in the study, the implementation of a long-term planning process was critical. as indicated earlier, concern for the academic achievement and attendance patterns of aboriginal students is not unique to innu communities but appears systemic to the canadian context as a whole. nonetheless, the report called for discussion, reflection, and careful consideration of alternatives which will take time and warrant review so as to create long term and sustainable educational change. it suggested that such a process must be collaborative in nature, with all stakeholders sharing responsibility to support innu leadership in acquiring the skills necessary to manage their own education system effectively. 13 philpott and nesbit: approaching educational empowerment published by scholarship@western, 2010 creating an effective and sustainable bicultural model the data articulated a need for a bicultural model of education in which innu youth would be taught in their native language, yet acquire proficiency skills in english as a second language, affording them greater career opportunities. defining and endorsing a bicultural model affords a tangible goal by which to facilitate self-management within a reasonable and expeditious time frame. cahill et al., (2004) build on the work of peavy (1995) in articulating this approach within the aboriginal context: aboriginal cultures should not be considered static. just as european and north american cultures have evolved over the centuries, those of aboriginal populations have responded to changing circumstances, events and technologies. there is also diversity within aboriginal communities. some aboriginal people may adhere to traditional way of life while others choose to embrace the values and practices of the dominant society. some may be committed to neither culture and others may feel comfortable in both cultures, i.e., they are bicultural (131-132). an appreciation of the values, aspirations, traditions, issues, and diversity within aboriginal societies is essential to non-aboriginal people who work with these populations. educators in labrador’s innu communities must help to prepare the innu to live both as innu and as citizens of the world. undoubtedly, such a process will take time and careful planning. rushing to impose change runs the risk of disempowering stakeholders, overwhelming the current system, and squandering resources on well-intended though unproven practices. central to this would be an articulation by the innu themselves of what “bicultural” means to them. careful consideration needs to be given to how they view both languages and both cultures co14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.6 existing, where they see the associated boundaries, and how they plan to establish and maintain a balance in this process. the study, consequently, called for prioritizing the well-being of innu youth through the establishment of an educational system that balances improved learning opportunities with the retention of innu culture and language. the report suggested that an innu model of education should be one that: • is managed effectively by the innu, under federal jurisdiction; • is led and celebrated by the innu communities through a council of elders; • is inclusive of all students; • is staffed by qualified innu teachers; • results in a sense of cultural pride for innu youth; • fosters healthy and safe environments; • has a culturally relevant curriculum within a bicultural model of education; • uses innu-aimun as the language of instruction from preschool through elementary; • provides junior high students a fluid transition into late english immersion program; • offers innu youth enriched career opportunities; • produces high school graduates who are fluent in both innu-aimun and english; • embraces prevention programs to reduce rates of fasd significantly. (philpott et al., 2005, 8-9). 15 philpott and nesbit: approaching educational empowerment published by scholarship@western, 2010 embracing the strengths and complexities of language a review of current educational practices utilized with aboriginal learners in other parts of canada, makes it apparent that the goal in most (if not all) of these schools was to revitalize native languages threatened with extinction. most aboriginal students in canada enter school fluent in english and specific programs are set in place to reintroduce their native language. the innu have the opposite concern – entering school fluent only in innu-aimun, necessitating an instructional model that follows the approach of late immersion into english. although the innu are among the most successful of canadian first nations groups with regard to retention of their language, there is great fear that this will change with the encroachment of english (statistics canada 2003). in gathering voices (innu nation and mushuau innu band council 1995) members of the innu nation made numerous references to the negative impact of english on retaining innu-aimun. "if our culture and our language is lost, there is nowhere in the world where it will be found" (69); and again, “if the school doesn’t teach our children our culture, in twenty to thirty years’ time, our children will speak only english like in other places in canada” (71). innu children are greatly challenged, when they are exposed to english as a language of instruction at school. their language, innu-aimun, remains in the oral tradition and continues to lack orthography. like many indigenous languages which have evolved from their nomadic, rural origins, there exist tensions in the community about standardization (burnaby 1985; francis & reyhner 2002). burnaby and philpott (2007) write: critically, the labrador innu have virtually no experience of literacy in their own language and therefore literacy in innu-aimun has no practical role in communications in their communities. there has been virtually no accommodation to this linguistic reality 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.6 on the part of non-innu who live and work in the community or provide services in the region. while publicly funded schooling was available to them in english, it was the same as that for other children in the province despite the clear language and cultural differences (280). a significant focus of language-acquisition research is the vulnerability of threatened cultures in eroding their identity, when the second and more dominant language is introduced (gegeo & watson-gegeo, 1999). this literature is of particular relevance to the innu, as they attempt to create a new system of education that will prepare their children to become fluent enough in english to make the transition to post-secondary schools, while retaining their own language and identity. a bicultural model of education will require a curriculum written in innuaimun (particularly during the initial years of schooling) taught by teachers fluent in that language. language is the heart around which a culture survives, defines itself, and secures its roots to the past. clearly, the failure of english-based education has played a role in the survival of innu-aimun. however, once education becomes a more dominant influence in the lives of innu youth, their native language will become even more threatened under the pressure of the dominant canadian culture. accepting the implications of current literacy levels the assessment project identified the fact that school achievement levels lagged so dramatically that "the researchers [had] grave concern for the readiness of current students to meet prescribed graduation criteria within the next five years" (philpott et al., 2004b, 15). it was critical for the communities to recognize that basic literacy does not imply university/college readiness. the few innu candidates who had completed high school and who were interested in pursuing careers in education would need additional academic support to ensure university 17 philpott and nesbit: approaching educational empowerment published by scholarship@western, 2010 readiness. other innu candidates would require literacy/numeracy training to reach high school equivalency levels and to prepare for university entrance. current models and programs needed to be adapted and tailored to address the unique and substantive needs of innu students. attempting to limit the negative impact of social instability the systemic social concerns that have plagued the innu are well-documented. given the demographics of the communities, however (half the population are school-aged and there is an exceptionally high rate of fasd) impact of these issues on future generations was profound. community leadership, parenting skills, social stability and employment viability could be compromised for the next generation. future generations would benefit by long-term supports given to the current generation. breaking a cycle of social instability is a long-term process. school attendance patterns are a strong indicator of the effect of social instability on the educational opportunities for innu youth. analysis of school attendance indicated a consistent pattern of dramatic drops in attendance, when social issues arise in the communities. it was important that the band councils recognize the link between social stability and educational opportunities for their children. given that innu schools exist within innu communities and, as such, are subjected to social factors, efforts should be taken to ensure continuity of programming for these children during times of stress. a pressing concern is the widely recognized problem of alcohol consumption in both communities. it would be naive to think that education could be effectively improved without addressing this issue. alcohol consumption among innu families was a dominant deterrent to school attendance, school readiness, and educational outcomes. community leadership, in confronting this issue, is of critical importance to the education of innu youth. 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.6 recognizing the correlation between attendance and achievement while the attendance and achievement patterns of innu students in schools within their communities were stark, patterns for a small population of innu who were enrolled in school outside the community were revealing. those students who, on a daily basis, commuted to neighboring communities (goose bay and northwest river), had attendance and achievement records remarkably higher than innu youth, who were educated in their community school. in fact, these commuting students performed on par with provincial peers. those students were taught the provincial curriculum via the same instructional approaches as other children in the province, by teachers who spoke only english, and who had no appreciation of traditional innu culture. while the researchers had significant concern for the ability of these students to retain their traditional language and lifestyle, the pattern, nonetheless, clearly identified low attendance as the single biggest factor limiting the education of innu youth. limited school attendance is not unique to the innu. in a related study (mackay & myles 1989) on school attendance rates for aboriginal youth in ontario, the authors identified attendance/drop-out patterns almost identical to those documented by the authors of the innu study. lehr et al., (2004) in an extensive review of school drop-out prevention programs concluded that effective programs are those that engage all stakeholders, especially the students, in diverse approaches to meet diverse needs. they outlined five areas that require specific programming: personal/affective, academic, family outreach, school structure, and career planning. given the magnitude of the issues facing education and innu communities, expecting immediate and dramatic improvements in school attendance for the innu was unrealistic. instead, beginning a process to identify a number of solutions to address the diverse issues 19 philpott and nesbit: approaching educational empowerment published by scholarship@western, 2010 contributing to low attendance was more realistic and, in the long-term, a more effective strategy. policy formation and recommendations the reports presented 61 recommendations to address the cautions annotated above. the thrust of the subsequent recommendations was a focus on empowering the innu not only to address the immediate needs of their children but also to establish a bicultural model of education, anchored within their own culture. three tiers of recommendations were presented: 1. level one recommendations were designed for immediate consideration and implementation. they were responsive in nature and were designed to be set in motion with existing resources. 2. level two recommendations were designed to build capacity for future approaches. they build on the level one recommendations by calling for immediate discussion, planning and a more careful consideration to ensure success in the short and long-term. they afford the innu the opportunity to learn from the experiences of other first nations educators and build towards an effective, culturally-appropriate model of education. 3. level three recommendations were designed for long-term implementation, following review of the impact of those initiated in levels one and two. they articulate what an effective model of innu education might look like. specific recommendations ranged from providing early childhood literacy in exclusive innu-aimun environments, to establishing adult education opportunities. they outlined curriculum development, attendance enhancement programs, teacher training programs, and infusion of traditional culture into existing curriculum. they suggested a defined place for innu 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.6 elders, effective communication with families, community social programs and career development opportunities. they guided the creation of capacity within existing innu communities not only to assume control of education, but also to become responsible stewards of their culture. the recommendations also marked the beginning of the planning for actual transition of management of education from provincial/federal jurisdiction to the innu themselves. this devolution would prove to be a five year project, culminating in september, 2009. the findings of the research project and the recommendations forthcoming consolidated the shared sincerity among all stakeholders in naming and addressing the problems. there are many logistical challenges in the delivery of education to children in a unique geographic, social and cultural environment. meeting the needs of innu students will demand the same sincerity, openness, commitment and collaboration demonstrated by educators and the community throughout this assessment process. their keen interest in truly understanding innu educational needs and their willingness to accept and share responsibility for past educational limitations, without assuming a blaming stance, has set the tone for improving educational opportunities for innu youth (philpott et al., 2005, 23). summary the years following the release of the research findings have ushered in rapid change for the innu. economic promise in labrador, new leadership, and the completion of negotiations for self-management have given these people a new sense of hope. the people of natuashish are well established in their new community, their children enjoy a new school (first opened in 2003), and the community decided to become alcohol-free in 2008. sheshatshiu attained reserve status in november, 2006 and a 21.5 million dollar school opens in september, 2009. both 21 philpott and nesbit: approaching educational empowerment published by scholarship@western, 2010 communities are now funded by the federal department of indian and northern affairs and are led by elected and autonomous band councils, who are responsible for the provision of services to their own people. september 2009 witnesses approximately 630 innu children attending schools (whose annual budget is 6 million dollars), which are completely managed by innu people, who continue to strive toward establishing their articulation of a bicultural model of education. today, the innu of labrador speak of a brighter future, one that includes appropriate education for their children, health for their people, and a returning sense of pride in their culture. the recommendations that emerged from the study reflect shared ownership and acknowledgement of the existing problems. respectfully, the intention was to present these recommendations in a responsible way that would not overwhelm an already-stressed system. the goal of the researchers in writing these recommendations was to suggest a realistic map for the stakeholders to guide the innu in implementing change. they recognized that the learning needs of innu youth are both profound and urgent, and could only be addressed by fundamental change. tinkering with the existing system would have had little, if any, effect, and by the time the futility of half-measures was realized, another generation of youth would be lost. the impact of these recommendations and the plan that they suggested were explored in a 2006 follow-up study on the needs of students in one of these two innu communities, that of natuashish. at that time transitionally managed by the labrador school board, under federal contract, the school in natuashish had actively pursued many of the programming recommendations contained in the initial report. educators were interested in ascertaining whether attendance and achievement had improved and research was conducted to answer that question. the subsequent data identified dramatic improvements in reading, writing, attendance 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.6 and school participation in natuashish. this was especially clear for the primary-aged children who had started school after the initial study had begun. that report concluded that “…students who only know school as it exists now in natuashish, have attendance and achievement levels remarkably close to provincial averages” (philpott 2006, 22). the end of the 2008-2009 school year brought closure to a long and arduous process of struggle, growth, and change for innu students and leaders. it brought an end to an external management of education that contributed to an erosion of cultural identity and community wellness. with closure comes opportunity and hope, not only for the innu of labrador, but for other aboriginal people still engaged in a similar struggle. closure, however, also brings a new set of challenges and a continued need for diligence. in the canadian context, self-managed education provided by existing band-run schools has not resulted in dramatically increased achievement for aboriginal youth. while educational and cultural autonomy for the innu has arrived, so too has accountability. in accepting these responsibilities, the innu of labrador are guided by the dream of their aboriginal counterparts, who also imagined a bicultural education system for their children: an [aboriginal] education system grounded in the wisdom of indigenous knowledge, that respects the vision of parents and elders and reinforces the teaching of language and culture will measure its success through the development of caring and respectful people who are valued contributors to their communities and live in harmony with their environment (department of 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(2000/2001). “teaching lies: the innu experience of schooling.” london journal of canadian studies, 16:84-102. sleeter, c.e. & c.a. grant. 2009. making choices for multicultural education. toronto: john wiley and sons inc. tanner, a., j.c. kennedy, s. mccorquodale, and g. inglis. 1994. aboriginal peoples and governance in newfoundland and labrador: a report for the governance project, royal commission on aboriginal peoples. st. john’s, newfoundland. 28 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.6 the international indigenous policy journal may 2010 approaching educational empowerment: guidelines from a collaborative study with the innu of labrador david philpott w. c. nesbit recommended citation approaching educational empowerment: guidelines from a collaborative study with the innu of labrador abstract keywords creative commons license approaching educational empowerment: guidelines from a collaborative study with the innu of labrador colonialism as a broader social determinant of health the international indigenous policy journal volume 2 issue 1 health and well-being article 5 may 2011 colonialism as a broader social determinant of health karina czyzewski university of toronto, karina.czyzewski@utoronto.ca recommended citation czyzewski, k. (2011). colonialism as a broader social determinant of health. the international indigenous policy journal, 2(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.5 his research is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in he international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. colonialism as a broader social determinant of health abstract a proposed broader or indigenized social determinants of health framework includes "colonialism" along with other global processes. what does it mean to understand canadian colonialism as a distal determinant of indigenous health? this paper reviews pertinent discourses surrounding indigenous mental health in canada. with an emphasis on the notion of intergenerational trauma, there are real health effects of social, political, and economic marginalization embodied within individuals, which can collectively affect entire communities. colonialism can also be enacted and reinforced within indigenous mental health discourse, thus influencing scholarly and popular perceptions. addressing this distal determinant through policy work necessitates that improving indigenous health is inherently related to improving these relationships, i.e. eliminating colonial relations, and increasing self-determination. keywords indigenous health, health policy, colonialism, mental health, trauma, social determinants of health acknowledgments the author wishes to acknowledge the edits, suggestions and comments made by nicholas and patricia czyzewski, emily anson, garret c. smith, dr. martin cannon, dr. krystyna sieciechowicz, helen leeds and emma yasui. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ introduction the social determinants of health are the environmental causes of ill health that affect populations. they point to evidence that highlights higher susceptibility to illness and disease as a product of particular socio-economic and physical environments. considering these environments are socially constructed, it seems reasonable to conceptualize addressing these determinants through the generation of social welfare policy and infrastructural adjustments. however, the causes of ill health can stem from deeper social structures and processes that operate at the national and global levels, as identified in the commission on the social determinants of health (sdoh) most recent report (2008). "the inequity [in daily living conditions] is systematic, produced by social norms, policies and practices that tolerate or actually promote unfair distribution of and access to power, wealth and other necessary social resources" (ibid). this statement acknowledges that there are larger causes of causes, or distal determinants, of unhealthy life conditions. the commission's report (2008) provides a greater breadth for appreciating how some groups are more likely to suffer from poor health, but it is limited in failing to accurately define the structures and processes that produce vulnerabilities. this omission highlights one of the mechanisms by which this unfair distribution of power, wealth and resources goes unabated: by refusing to expose the guiding ideologies that result in the disproportionate social burden for some. labelling these mechanisms underlines a component missing from the mainstream sdoh analysis that would involve tracing the birth and pervasiveness of these mechanisms: stressing the effects of history and the notion that history is still in the making. when the health gap between indigenous populations and settler populations persists globally, their shared history becomes all the more significant with regards to the aforementioned “unfair distribution”. at the international symposium on the social determinants of indigenous health (2007), it was demonstrated that the determinants of indigenous health differ from those of the mainstream population. this is in part due to how health is conceptualized amongst indigenous populations compared to western, biomedical definitions, but also that some of these previously cited mechanisms are actually identified as distal determinants. that an indigenous sdoh framework would be different from the conventional framework stresses that the latter's indicators are limited and not reliable for all (intl symp., 2007). "research and dialogue at the international level has demonstrated a common element that exists for all indigenous peoples and affects every issue confronting them as a collective: the history of colonization and the associated subjugation of indigenous peoples" (ibid, p. 24). since the sdoh themselves point to the very fact that the mechanisms that "influence health are humanly factored, socially influenced and unequal" (lang, 2001, p. 162) and that the commission (2008) acknowledges the unique "social exclusion" circumstances of indigenous peoples, colonialism should really be allowed into the debate (loppie-reading & wien, 2009; naho, 2006; lang, 2001). with an emphasis on discourse analysis and indigenous mental health research in canada, this piece explores what it means to understand colonialism as a distal determinant of indigenous health. colonialism: a finished project? why the use of the term colonialism instead of post-colonialism? colonialism is defined as: i) the control or governing influence of a nation over a dependent country, territory, or people; ii) the system or policy by which a nation maintains or advocates such control or influence (random house, 2010). several authors and organizations speak to the notion that colonialism has never ceased; that our history of colonialism is interconnected with continuing colonial policies and historical events "spilling 1 czyzewski: colonialism as a broader social determinant of health published by scholarship@western, 2011 over into the present" (warry, 1998, p. 84). whole communities are still trying to recover from the impacts of colonial legislation, the structural influences, such as the residential school system and "continuing, although more general, assimilationist tactics perpetuated by the canadian government" (wesley-esquimaux 2007, p. 69). spatially or symbolically, one such tactic is the urban daily practice that reifies essentialist notions of the indigenous person as antithetical to urban space, such as the policing responses toward disadvantaged urban aboriginals. sherene razack describes such responses as "cleansing rituals that enable settlers to know city space as theirs, and individual settlers to know themselves as the managers and rightful inhabitants of public” (2008) or "civilized" space. on a symbolic level, and in contrast to material tactics or legislation, this last example speaks to the politics of erasure of the history of relations between indigenous peoples and the colonial state. this erasure reflects a public consciousness that is ignorant of the goings-on in residential schools and the laws that were put in place to prohibit most forms of possible recourse for indigenous families. this erasure also appears in the refusal to understand and accept aboriginal title and respect indigenous rights (as seen with the current government’s shelving of the 2005 kelowna agreement1) or that up until very recently, canada had not even signed the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples2 on a similar note, the national aboriginal health organization (2001) draws a critical link between racism and colonialism: "racism is one of the characteristics of colonization and as such it has a negative influence on how indigenous peoples are positioned in canadian society. because they have endured rather invisible and long-term oppression and discrimination, they have fared worse in economic, political, cultural and social terms," (p. 13). racism fuelled the disenfranchising, assimilationist and genocidal tactics; as well as the amnesia of this detailed history and how it has produced intergenerational impacts, compels us to question if racism as a motivator has ever dissipated. thus, it is through the mentalities that perpetuate and reproduce these incidents and the continuation of certain policies that we see how settlers have gained illusionary freedom assuming colonialism is a finished project. . this erasure also appears as the ignorance in everyday interactions such as in "banal liturgies" (thobani, 2007, p. 79), or in racially discriminatory comments, such as the ethnocentrism and paternalism inherent in the referral to indigenous peoples as "our" aboriginals. indeed, borrowing from anne mcclintock’s the angel of progress (1990), this "premature celebration of the pastness of colonialism, runs the risk of obscuring the continuities and discontinuities of colonial and imperial power" (p. 88). the term "post-colonial" also encourages a settler description of time and interpretation of history. this perception prioritizes european historiography and a perhaps hasty desire to put uncomfortable stories behind us (sch.“n”; st. denis, 2009). this dichotomy of "colonial" and "post-colonial" "[then] may be in danger of neutralizing historical inequalities" (miyawaki, 2004) and emphasizes a sometimes inappropriate vocalization of relations that does not necessarily reflect the lived realities of contemporary indigenous peoples and the state. from historical inequalities to observable disparities 1first ministers met with the federal government to discuss aboriginal issues and to develop culturally appropriate first nations governments over the long term (warry 2008, p. 179). 2 adopted internationally in 2007 except for the us, canada, australia and new zealand. canada signed the declaration on november 12, 2010. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.5 many of the reviewed statistics reiterate the aforementioned point of first nations peoples faring worse overall when compared to the life situations of many non-indigenous peoples3 . when looking at a statistical profile on the health of first nations in canada: determinants of health, 1999 to 2003 (hc, 2010), one observes that 48.6% of those aged 25-64 years have less than a high school graduation certificate, compared to 22.5% of non-indigenous; 27.7% of on-reserve households have at least one standard below core housing standards, compared to 13.5% of the general population; and 27.7% of the on-reserve population is unemployed, compared to 7.3% of the general population. furthermore, there are numerous communities with inadequate infrastructure for proper sanitation or access to potable water (ibid). these and other disparities reflect a certain level of consent to inaction from the canadian government and also contribute to the health disparities that exist between the indigenous and the non-indigenous populations. for instance, indigenous peoples in canada represent only 3.8% of the population, but they are disproportionately afflicted with aids (7.2% of cases) (ibid). twenty percent of the indigenous population has diabetes mellitus, which indicates rates three to five times greater than the overall canadian rate (cda, 2010). the potential years of life loss to suicide is about three times greater amongst first nations on-reserve (hc, 2010). life expectancy can be contrasted as well to that of non-indigenous, the latter enjoying a 5 to 8 year longer life expectancy than indigenous peoples (ibid). this list of health statistics is not exhaustive, and several more significant health statistics are also pertinent, but for the purpose of this discussion, we will now focus on how these disparities relate to the socially-manufactured environment. "colonialism" as a broader social determinant of health there are and have been direct effects of colonialism or colonial policies on indigenous health, for example, the introduction of contagious diseases like smallpox; the extinction of the beothuk4 the world health organization ; or the gamut of negative experiences within the residential schooling system, to name a few. however, the above disparities also reflect the protracted effects of land dispossession and sedentarization on cultural continuity, access to traditional economies, as well as physical separation from mainstream monetary economies, to name a few. in other words, these health gaps hint at the distal effects of colonial legislation. 5 3 the surveys reviewed mainly speak only of the experiences of on-reserve first nations peoples as compared to non-aboriginals. non-aboriginal then includes the first waves of white euro-canadian settlers and extends to the subsequent and current newcomers to canada (thobani, 2007, p.16). it is certainly problematic to imply relative homogeneity within these groupings and it somewhat disregards the discrepancies between the experiences of white settlers and racialized settlers, or between the affluent and the poor. the statistics generated by health canada, statistics canada and others, despite this often generalizing methodology, still point to noteworthy disparities in many regards. therefore, i will use them on these dualistic terms to help explain my point on colonialism as a distal determinant of health. refers to the social determinants of health as the "remarkable sensitivity of health to the social environment[;…]the common causes of the ill health that affects populations are environmental” (who 2003, p. 7). the who lists proximal determinants of health or 4 indigenous peoples from newfoundland. the population decreased due to infectious disease, tuberculosis, loss of access to important food sources, and violent encounters with settlers and other indigenous peoples because of colonial pressures. the last known member died in the 1820s. 5 who. 3 czyzewski: colonialism as a broader social determinant of health published by scholarship@western, 2011 what we see on the surface as follows: health behaviours, the physical and social environments; what diminishes capacity, limits control of material resources and exacerbates health problems. intermediate or core determinants are what create these proximal ones. the former include such things as community infrastructure, resources, systems (labour and education) and capacities (public health agency of canada, 2003; reading). the national collaborating centre for aboriginal health (nccah) defines distal determinants of health as "the political, economic, and social contexts within which all other determinants[–proximal and intermediate–]are constructed" (2009, p. 20). colonialism is the guiding force that manipulated the historic, political, social, and economic contexts shaping indigenous/state/non-indigenous relations and account for the public erasure of political and economic marginalization, and racism today. these combined components shape the health of indigenous peoples. at the intermediate level, this occurs via the funding and organization of the health care, education and labour systems; as well as the extent to which indigenous peoples can operate their environmental stewardship and maintain cultural continuity. along with these intermediate determinants, proximal determinants are also subsumed under this larger structural reality: that at the root of these determinants is colonial relations; relations that have produced and reproduce unfavourable conditions and environments. these conditions and environments determine healthy behaviours, or lack thereof, physical environments, employment and income, education, and food security (loppie-reading & wien, 2009). these are not coincidentally some of the areas mentioned earlier where disparities can be seen between indigenous and non-indigenous populations. the structural and systemic contexts make for colonialism to be distal. distal determinants are generally beyond the individual or community's control and are the causes of causes for unjust life situations for certain groups or people over others. exploring colonialism as a distal determinant of health is linked to examining how current ideologies and historic events influence the health of contemporary indigenous peoples. a focus on mental health although there is certainly a huge variance of mental health factors from one community to the next, overall, suicide rates are five to six times greater among first nations on-reserve youth than the general canadian population (trumper 2004). and "the 1997 first nations and inuit regional health surveys, conducted across canada, found elevated rates of depression (18%) and problems with alcohol (27%)" (kirmayer et al., 2009, p. 17). can the production of these mental health disparities be attributable to how mental health is conceptualized? albeit the presence of specific indigenous vocabularies (see kirmayer, fletcher & watt, 2009) that describe afflictions of the mind that are comparable to biomedical mental ill-health categories, for many, indigenous health is still often spoken about and represented more broadly than the physical being. for instance, the medicine wheel reflects good health as a balance between four realms: the mental, the spiritual, the emotional, and the physical. this conceptualization of health speaks to the interconnectedness of these spheres of being and emphasizes the notion of holism when attempting to understand what it means to be well. these dimensions, which also represent the four directions, can provide a way to conceptualize our belonging in the world and they also relate our health to the social environment around us. although there are points of convergence and divergence in comparing a biomedical definition of mental health to that of indigenous conceptualizations of mental health, a most important element of variance is the complexity of factors that determine health as seen through the different relationships implicated. in healing traditions (2009) joseph gone speaks of his community of the gros ventre tribe in montana as one that configures "wellness much differently than the 'mental health' of professional 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.5 psychology, emphasizing respectful relationships instead of egoistic individualism and the ritual circulation of sacred power instead of the liberating enlightenment of secular humanism" (p. 427). naomi adelson's work with the james bay cree also provides us with an understanding of health that connects land and identity to social and political well-being (2000). the cree concept of "being alive well" or miyupimaatisiun is informed by historical, contemporary events and cultural practices (ibid). this definition extends beyond the usual biomedical parameters of physiological well-being and highlights the importance that various relationships have on health. these relationships, in particular those to the land, are explored in kirmayer et al. (2009, p. 22) and are articulated through the concept of the "ecocentric self", which envisions the ego as one piece in a web of relationships that includes extended family, kin, clan, ancestors, for some also animals, elements of the natural world and spirits. the idea of these relationships is key to a healthy social environment, and is a concept we will return to. deconstructing indigenous mental illness colonial policies have produced their own collective mental dis-ease6 why the focus on mental health? in revenge of the windigo (2004), a comprehensive review of mental health literature on indigenous peoples in north america, medical anthropologist james b. waldram states that mental health is the most written about sector of indigenous health. from his research, it becomes apparent that the concept of the "disordered aboriginal" stems from anthropologists’, psychologists’ and psychiatrists' interpretations and projections of a contemporary inability of indigenous peoples to "deal with their problems". waldram highlights that there is a lack of an anthropologically sophisticated view of culture in mental health research; researchers often reduce the concept to a set of arbitrary characteristics, or worse, blame culture for health outcomes. he also points to the utilization of problematic methodologies and, to a lesser extent, the underlying assumptions of race and biology–such as attributing substance abuse to a genetic predisposition–in much of the existent indigenous mental health work. he criticizes the fact that much of this work often points to what makes people sick instead of what makes people healthy; hence, although he critiques the inconclusive indicators of cultural continuity described by chandler and lalonde (1998), he applauds their seminal piece as significant in addressing what makes suicide a non-issue in some first nations communities. that affects indigenous peoples today; however, the impacts of these policies are compounded by colonial mentalities that produce and reproduce detrimental discursive environments. the examples to follow allude to how indigenous mental health discourse can be both demonstrative and influential. the discourse is demonstrative in that how mental health is conceptualized by various authors, how the very act of explaining, i.e., producing discourse on indigenous mental health, reflects how mainstream authors construct the "other" (in this case the "aboriginal"); as well, the discourse elicits the power differentials involved in generating these constructions. the discourse is then influential in that there are potential outcomes of the unquestioned acceptance of these constructions. on a similar vein, waldram cautions that the notion of the "depressed aboriginal” is informed by a “tendency to embrace panoptic explanations which uncritically attribute psychopathology to broad historical and cultural phenomena while ignoring local cultural heterogeneity, continuity, and adaptation" (2004, p. 198). another category, "the traumatized aboriginal", is a concept we will unpack more thoroughly–and is also spoken about reflexively in consideration of the aforementioned concern. with the latter in mind, utilizing the statistics cited earlier additionally run the risk of essentializing indigenous peoples as “victims” or inherently “sick”. on the other hand, acknowledging a degree of 6deliberate spelling based on adelson's (2000) and other scholars' work. 5 czyzewski: colonialism as a broader social determinant of health published by scholarship@western, 2011 trauma can create “assets that could be used to leverage the state for compensation” (petryna 2002, p. 31). either way, it is a category that should not be entirely discarded because although indigenous peoples may not embrace trauma as the pathological condition that some scholars have proposed, trauma can still be seen as a particular disposition that attests to the seriousness of history as memory and "as a metaphor for [indigenous peoples'] historical relationship with the european settler society" (waldram 2004, p. 236). this last point reinforces the aforementioned centrality of relationships in conceptualizations of health and healthy outcomes. from his extensive analysis of relevant research, waldram (2004) concludes that the assumptions underlying these “disordered” categories are often a product of racial stereotypes, racial “othering”, essentialism (ibid), and continued colonial mentality. therefore, the uncritical placement of individuals into these categories and related discourses affect how we understand mental health, how indigenous mental health is constructed, but also how mental ill health is managed; thus, these discourses affect mental health outcomes. this last point is articulated well in de leeuw, greenwood and cameron's work (2009): [i]n order for the social determinants literature to effectively address the health of racialized and colonized groups, it must incorporate an understanding of colonial discourse as an imaginative and material practice within which particular ideas, people, institutions, and actions intersect and (re)produce inequalities.[…]discourses are firmly connected to ideological struggles and to the exercise of power. (p. 5). the authors emphasize the necessity to understand unhealthy indigenous families and communities as socially and historically constructed and argue that the ideas and impulses that informed the residential school project continue to find saliency today within canadian child welfare practices (ibid, p. 10). these works highlight the significance of "colonial discourse" as a circumstance that determines indigenous mental health, in addition to the importance of contextualizing the health status of indigenous peoples in canada–grounding collective health status in historical and structural processes. "survivors of survivors" at his university of toronto lecture in december 2009, justice murray sinclair, chair for the truth and reconciliation commission of canada, stated that every indigenous person has been affected directly or indirectly by the residential schools. in other words, this poignant fact points to the injuries inflicted within the residential schooling system that have produced "survivors"7; it also recognizes the biopolitical8 many former students, as patricia monture-angus put it, learned to "look the other way" (1999, p. 25) and retained the negative behaviours acquired during their time at the residential school, and the lack of positive, healthy relationships influenced their own interactions with others. these behaviours and the lack of exposure to healthy parenting skills (bombay et al., 2009, p. 17) were passed down from production of intergenerational impacts on a population as culpable for the production of "survivors of survivors". 7 there has been some discussion on this term being problematic in terms of subjectivity; however, it is a term that past residential school students coined and use themselves. thus, this term is used knowing that it can imply certain restrictions. 8 often associated with michel foucault's work (1997). 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.5 one family to the next creating a series of transmitted impacts of the residential schools in first nations communities. these impacts–in collaboration with the effects of other colonial legislation and attempted cultural engineering (niezen 2009, p. 187) such as displacement, the prohibition of cultural practices, the "60's scoop" (or the disproportionate amount of indigenous children placed in white settler homes), birthing relocation, etc., within a continued oppressive social, political, and economic environment–are often encapsulated under the umbrella term of "intergenerational trauma". anthropologist and indigenous scholar wesley-esquimaux (2007) defines intergenerational trauma as: the historical experiences of first nation people(s), which disrupted the process of indigenous cultural identity formation, [that] continue to loudly resonate in the present, and ...the harm done in the past [that]continue[s] to manifest inter-generationally into the present.[…t]he psychological “affect” generated by centuries of cultural dislocation, forced assimilation and the indian residential schools (p. 7, 62). the following paragraphs outline one such impact of the aforementioned psychological "affect" by choosing to highlight the discourse on indigenous "trauma". bombay, matheson and anisman (2009) demonstrate evidence of a high incidence of posttraumatic stress disorder: 64% amongst residential school survivors, with 50% of those showing comorbid mental illnesses (p. 9-10). moreover, protracted and severe stressors, including on-going discrimination, contribute to disease and may precipitate mental illness. the authors (ibid) emphasize a particularly strong relationship between such stressors and substance abuse, in addition to depression and other anxiety disorders that "often occur in conjunction with...traumatic experiences, and are frequently co-morbid with ptsd" (ibid, p. 26). they also found "that cumulative trauma was a significant predictor of parental abuse potential" (ibid, p. 21). their work suggests that groups vary in terms of culturally-based responses to stressors, as well as with their specific "histories, cultural norms and relationship to the mainstream culture, which in turn leads to variations in the nature, exposure, assessment and reactions," including resilience, "to stressful and traumatic events" (ibid, p. 13). in addition to the concept of "cultural continuity", these items, along with the cultural diversity between first nations, may help explain the variety in community experiences to stressors, not to mention individual-specific responses and the variance of the individual performance of cultural norms. even measures and medical definitions of mental health are based on western conceptualizations and "normalized against white middle class samples" (ibid, p. 27) facilitating cultural inappropriateness and class-related misdiagnoses. in this regard, there is still a significant need for the employment of culturally-specific and -appropriate indicators of health and wellness for studies on indigenous health (ibid, p. 28). as outlined above, researchers are attempting to demonstrate the links between the traumatic events experienced in the residential schools or the impacts of the placement of children in white settler homes, and place them under the umbrella term of historical trauma. it is a cumulative emotional and psychological wounding over the lifespan and across generations, emanating from massive group trauma experiences (wesley-esquimaux & smolewski, 2004); the collective “consequences of multiple stressors experienced by whole communities over generations (castellano, 2008, p. 390). it has been proposed that the cumulative effect and sometimes violent nature of these colonial policies on indigenous peoples can be appropriately termed an ethnic or cultural genocide (smith, 2005). another concept, that of "social suffering"–put forth by anthropologists kleinman, das and locke (1997) as the pain and marginalization of a group–has also been used. indeed, it has been proposed that the normalization of such pain contributes to its persistence (niezen, 2009, p. 190). 7 czyzewski: colonialism as a broader social determinant of health published by scholarship@western, 2011 there is an urgent need for empirical evaluations of indigenous trauma and stressors, although the work of ing shows the transmission of up to 46 impacts over 3 generations9 whatever term is used to label these stressors and their subsequent induced distress, speaking of trauma provides a language that enables people to express the relationship between the past and its structurally oppressive forces, and the link to contemporary realities. it is important to keep in mind that speaking of trauma in such a broad way can obscure the multitude of individual experiences that exist and the specific contexts in which they were created. moreover, people are not passive recipients of the epithet "traumatized"; neither does the dominant society divvy out equal value to "traumatized" subjects (fassin & rechtman 2007, p. 10). it can however be used as a "resource to support a right" or "to testify to the reality of persecution", thereby giving this mental health category social and political power (ibid). however we approach collective memory and trauma, bombay et al., through the limited studies available on first nations peoples (and other studies that focus on childhood traumas) do indicate that adverse childhood experiences (if we restrict our analysis to say, the residential school system) affect appraisals, lead to altered coping strategies that can perpetuate into adulthood, and encourage poor mental health outcomes (2009, p. 18). this discussion on intergenerational and historical trauma presents certain effects of colonial policies on individuals and possibly whole communities. (2006, p. 161). spittal et al. (2002) draw links between injection drug use, hiv+ status and residential school lived experiences; and menzies (2008) draws a link between residential school experiences and indigenous homelessness. by stressing the connection between lived experiences and its impacts on daily living conditions, kirmayer et al. (2009, p. 455) state that a focus on historical trauma deflects individual blame as outcomes may be out of the person's control; this focus valorizes suffering and directs people to righting the structural violence present in our society. the authors go on to say that the family and community are the locus for this kind of trauma and must be understood as the source of restoration and renewal in health promotion endeavours (2009, p. 463). this work suggests that the trauma embodied in parents or previous generations negatively impacts people’s lives and mental health today, indicative of colonialism's interpretation as a generator of certain types of disadvantages and unjust environments, thus capable of determining health. it is for these reasons that it is important to contextualize and speak of colonial policies and the legacies they left behind when speaking about indigenous mental health, and the health disparities we see when compared to the mainstream population. in regards to these items, leeuw et al. (2009) summarize the work of other scholars and state that: indeed, research has increasingly established that poor health outcomes in indigenous peoples, and the health disparities realized by indigenous peoples in almost all sectors of life as compared with their nonindigenous counterparts, stem from or are related to colonial disruptions and ongoing erosion of human rights (adelson, 2005; d’souza, 1994; tarantola, 2007) (p. 4). policy implications of colonialism as a health determinant if we are to conceive colonialism as a force or set of practices that determines health as outlined above and we wanted to address this determinant, one could suggest policy implications like those described in the who social determinants of health (2003) document. this could look something like: ▪ all citizens should be protected by minimum income guarantees, minimum wages legislation and access to services. 9impacts include: denial of fn identity, belief in myths about fn people, poor self esteem, etc. (ing, 2006, p. 162). 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.5 ▪ legislative interventions to discrimination and social exclusion are needed at both the individual, the scholastic, and neighbourhood levels. ▪ public health policies should remove barriers to health care, social services and affordable housing. ▪ labour market, education and family welfare policies should aim to eliminate inequitable funding or lack of services. ▪ measures should be taken provincially and federally to educate more mental health professionals and offer funds for mental well-being services. these are loosely based on the policies suggested in the who document (ibid) and are certainly all important, especially considering the lack of mental well-being services to meet community needs (kirmayer et al., 2009). however, a sdoh approach to healing that strictly looks at the population as a whole could contribute to an “incorporation” (intl symp., 2007) agenda or to the normalized invisibility of the experiences of marginalized groups compared to the advantages enjoyed by the mainstream population. integration is a common theme in colonial discourse and action, where the distinct history of indigenous-settler relations and unique status with the state often go unacknowledged. furthermore, the imposition of the conventional sdoh framework and what is recommended as necessary actions elicits questions about if these documents are truly addressing the determinants or perpetuating inequality (krieger & birn, 1998) by not allowing indigenous peoples, for instance, to dictate what determines their health and what actions are needed to address health disparities. certainly the commission (2008) breaches from the "conceptual conservatism" that facilitates inaction in settler societies with regards to the unethical and ineffective distribution of power (venkatapuram, 2010); this break is exemplified by item 14.2: "national governments need to acknowledge, legitimize and support" indigenous peoples (2008), which would in turn allow for the improvement of socio-economic conditions. nevertheless, without truly acknowledging the legacy of colonialism, including its concurrent forms (policies and discourse) and its intergenerational impacts (trauma), these documents do not question the basis and functioning of the state, and thus perhaps contribute to the unspoken agreement that we have reached the end of history "with the triumph of the west" (lang, 2001). it is the danger in this belief that makes taking seriously colonialism as a distal determinant, whether or not the sdoh framework is embraced, absolutely pivotal. if the "problems of social health are ultimately linked to colonial oppression" (warry, 1998, p. 84), then we are not simply discussing issues of individual social exclusion, as outlined in the who document, but more so the marginalization of cultural groups, which is at least acknowledged in the commission's report (2008). therefore, if we return to the definition of colonialism that was provided earlier–"the control or governing influence of a nation over a dependent country, territory, or people; the system or policy by which a nation maintains or advocates such control or influence"–then ideally addressing this distal determinant of health is inherently connected to restoring respectful relationships, nation-to-nation relations (turner, 2010), the return of lands and allowing for self-determination. . in terms of decision-making over health services, many communities have embarked on or have completed health services transfers, but even these policies are problematic because services are not funded equitably compared to provincial services; the funding often does not account for a growing population; and there is cost shifting and administrative fragmentation by federal and provincial bodies, which provides for an overall limiting structure from which to offer the necessary holistic, responsive services that communities need and want (lavoie, 2003, p. 345). indigenous scholars like montureangus insist that indigenous peoples' health is essential to self-determination, and vice versa, which involves personal and community power and control over decision-making (as cited in naho, 2001, p. 18). this is especially important where indigenous peoples and communities "have historically lacked control over their social health" (warry, 1998, p. 65). redressing the impacts of colonialism on a 9 czyzewski: colonialism as a broader social determinant of health published by scholarship@western, 2011 population and ending paternal relations will take commitment, however, from all parties, and in addition to indigenous solutions at the community-level, commitment is also needed from the government to contribute to developing economic sustainability and greater political inclusion. ultimately, if an indigenous sdoh framework demonstrates that settler ideologies, interactions and imposed systems are a significant cause of the causes of indigenous ill-health, then settlers need to confront the persistence of racist attitudes and with this, society's role, along with the state and its institutions, at contributing to poor health outcomes. it is difficult to estimate how changes in "empowerment" and a more prevalent allowance of "decision-making" (commission, 2008) will happen under the nation-state that had refused to sign the un declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples and who sanctions colonial tactics of ongoing land degradation and expansionism. with these items in mind, the aspirations of self-determination and land rights (intl symp., 2007) become more obvious as generators of "social, cultural and economic conditions" that improve health (ibid), as well as issues of social justice and human rights (larsen, 2006). these aspirations are especially significant considering they point to what indigenous peoples identify would improve their well-being, when the conventional sdoh have been criticized for focusing on what keeps people healthy instead of what measures would help the ill (intl symp., 2007). the societal and structural reform (ibid) at the state and institutional levels necessary for the paradigm shift that would allow these measures needs to be grounded in public interest and support, as well as through monitoring at the international level. concluding thoughts recognizing colonialism as a determinant of health involves questioning if colonialism is a finished project, one of ongoing unequal relationships, but equally, that these relationships have real negative effects on health. as a result, interpreting colonialism as a determinant of health is related to recognizing its influence on indigenous lives as multi-faceted. from a mental health perspective, colonialism can be produced and reinforced within indigenous mental health discourses, but its effects can also be embodied as a reaction to contemporary political, social, economic situations and historically through trauma. addressing the ongoing effects of colonialism, decolonizing indigenous mental health discourse and allowing for just and adequate control over key dimensions, such as health services, is inherently related to self-determination and thus improving health. therefore, reducing and possibly eliminating health disparities would require policy that addresses the structural causes of causes perpetuated by the general population and the government via transfers of power, and a sustained commitment to change from settlers, the various levels of government, and the indigenous community. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.5 references adelson, n. 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(2004). revenge of the windigo: the construction of the mind and mental health of north american aboriginal peoples. toronto: university of toronto press. 13 czyzewski: colonialism as a broader social determinant of health published by scholarship@western, 2011 warry, w. (2008). ending denial: understanding aboriginal issues. toronto: university of toronto press. (1998).unfinished dreams: community healing and the reality of aboriginal selfgovernment. toronto: university of toronto press. wesley-esquimaux, c. c.& smolewski, m. (2004). historic trauma and aboriginal healing. ottawa: aboriginal healing foundation. whitbeck, l. b., adams, g. w., hoyt, d. r. & chen, x. (2004). conceptualizing and measuring historical trauma among american indian people. american journal of community psychology 33(3/4), 199-130. world health organization. (2003). social determinants of health:tthe solid facts ( 2nd ed.). retrieved from www.who.int on february 16th, 2010 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.5 the international indigenous policy journal may 2011 colonialism as a broader social determinant of health karina czyzewski recommended citation colonialism as a broader social determinant of health abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license colonialism as a broader social determinant of health a community-based leadership development program for first nations women: revaluing and honoring women’s strengths the international indigenous policy journal volume 4 | issue 2 article 5 april 2013 a community-based leadership development program for first nations women: revaluing and honoring women’s strengths k . amanda maranzan lakehead university, kamaranz@lakeheadu.ca alice sabourin beedaubin resources christine simard-chicago nishnawbe aski nation recommended citation maranzan, k. , sabourin, a. , simard-chicago, c. (2013). a community-based leadership development program for first nations women: revaluing and honoring women’s strengths. the international indigenous policy journal, 4(2) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.5 a community-based leadership development program for first nations women: revaluing and honoring women’s strengths abstract over 400 first nation women participated in leadership development workshops developed by first nation women for first nation women. we collected survey data and conducted focus groups and interviews with workshop participants to identify outcomes and determine barriers and resources to women in leadership. outcomes of the workshop included increased perception of women as leaders, increased personal capacity, and encouragement to seek opportunities for formal and informal leadership positions. family and home responsibility, community pressure, and lack of support were identified as barriers faced by women in leadership or considering leadership positions. this program represents an effort to empower women to participate in social, cultural, and political life within their communities and obtain equitable political representation. keywords first nations, leadership, women acknowledgments funding for the nishnawbe aski nation major women’s development project and evaluation was provided by indian and northern affairs canada, nishnawbe aski nation, ontario trillium foundation, province of ontario (ontario women’s directorate), and status of women canada. the authors wish to thank amie cryderman, breann gilbart, rachel mamekwa, and christine waugh for their assistance with transcription and data entry. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ a c o m m u n i t y ba s e d l e a d e rs h i p d e v e l o p m e n t pro g ra m f o r f i rs t n a t i o n s w o m e n : r e v a l u i n g a n d h o n o ri n g w o m e n ’ s s t re n g t h s indigenous leadership and self-governance are important topics in canadian public policy, particularly at a time when seminal decisions on the health, economy, politics, and social conditions of indigenous peoples (first nations, métis, and inuit) and their communities are being made (stout & kipling, 1998). the legacy of colonialism, patriarchy, and marginalization continues to impact indigenous peoples’ right to self-determination in the form of poverty, poor physical and mental health, socially inflicted trauma, and abuse (adelson, 2005; frideres & gadacz, 2001; stout & kipling, 1998). while some indigenous groups and communities are successfully re-establishing their right to selfdetermination, for others the struggle is ongoing. indigenous women are an underrepresented group in leadership and policy relating to indigenous peoples (stout & kipling, 1998); therefore, this article focuses specifically on first nations women. we believe that first nations women must be able to meaningfully participate in decisions about policies and programs that affect women, their families, and their communities. the social and economic status of first nations women has received increased attention over the last several years. statistical information provides a general overview of their age distribution, family status, income, and educational attainment. although these data do not capture the heterogeneity of social, economic, and cultural characteristics present, they provide some context for the life situations of first nations women (stout & kipling, 1998). in 2006, there were approximately 360,000 first nations women and girls in canada, representing 51.6% of the first nations population and 1.14% of the entire canadian population (o’donnell & wallace, 2011). between 1996 and 2006, the first nations female population grew by approximately 30%, compared to a 9% growth rate in the non-indigenous female population. slightly more first nations females lived off reserve (58.8%) compared to on reserve (41.2%). in terms of age distribution, the first nations female population was younger than its nonindigenous counterpart with a median age of 26.4 years, a difference of approximately 14 years. in 2001, life expectancy for a first nations woman was 76.7 years and approximately 5 years shorter than her non-indigenous counterpart (o’donell & wallace, 2011). a large proportion of first nations women lived with their immediate or extended families (87.3%) and were more likely to be lone parents compared to non-indigenous females (o’donnell & wallace, 2011). according to the 2006 canadian census, 14% of first nations females lived in crowded conditions, increasing to 26% among on-reserve females. approximately one quarter of first nations females lived in dwellings that were in need of major repair and this number increased to almost one half for females living on reserve. these numbers are 4 and 6 times higher, respectively, than for non-indigenous females in canada. education significantly influences future employment opportunities, income potential, and access to health information and resources (adler & newman, 2002) and thus is an important contributor to social and economic status. overall, census data indicated that the educational attainment of first nations women was lower than that of non-indigenous women, although the gap is slowly closing (o’donnell & wallace, 2001). between 2001 and 2006, education levels increased among first nations women: in 2001, 48% of first nations women had less than a high school education compared to 39% in 2006. by 2006, 8% had a university education, compared to 20% of non-indigenous females. first 1 maranzan et al.: leadership development for first nations women published by scholarship@western, 2013 nations females were more likely than males to have a university degree, and as likely as non-indigenous females to have a community college degree or certificate. post-secondary qualifications were more common among women dwelling off reserve (o’donnell & wallace, 2011). finally, the 2006 canadian census indicated that a significant number of first nations women experienced financial hardship. only 46.1% of first nations women aged 15 and older were employed, compared to 50.7% of first nations males and 62.7% of the non-indigenous population (o’donnell & wallace, 2011). first nations women also earned less; in 2006, the median income for first nations females was $14,490 compared $20,640 for non-indigenous females. for women living on reserve, the median income dropped to $12,466. more than two times the number of first nations females off reserve were living below the low income cut-off compared to non-indigenous females (37% versus 16%, respectively) (o’donnell & wallace, 2011). considering that first nations women are often caring for a number of dependents, financial hardship becomes an even greater concern. although statistical information risks oversimplifying and homogenizing the experiences of first nations women and girls (and census data can provide an inaccurate picture due to poor compliance rates), the preceding data provide some context for their lives. what emerges is a social and economic picture that is quite different from that of non-indigenous females and first nations men. given their unique experiences and central role in family and community life, first nations women must be included in the leadership and decision-making processes affecting indigenous peoples. yet, historically opportunities for first nations women to access, participate, or engage in policy development have been restricted. the 1869 enfranchisement act (“an act for the gradual enfranchisement of indians,” 1867) and 1876 indian act (enacted as part of the constitution act, 1867, section 91(24) are examples of racist and sexist policies encountered by first nations women; these policies limited women’s sexual and reproductive freedoms by defining who could and could not hold “status” (fiske, 1995). prior to the 1985 amendments to the indian act (1985) (bill c-31), band membership (for women and their children), the right to live on reserve and share in band resources, and the right to inherit property were only available to those with “status”; women were also excluded from public meetings and the band electorate (fiske, 1995). efforts by individuals and advocacy groups to further amend sexist policies have met with varying degrees of success (c.f. mcivor v. canada, 2009). systems governing communities have typically been patriarchal and the lack of women in leadership positions has systemically limited the voice and contribution of women in policy-related decisions (fiske, 1995; stout & kipling, 1998). participation of each member is vital for the health of a community and half of the community’s available potential is missed if women do not participate in leadership, policy, and program development (findlay & wuttunee, 2007). m a j o r w o m e n ’ s d e v e l o p m e n t pro j e c t nishnawbeaski nation (nan) is a political representation of 49 first nation communities in northern ontario, representing approximately 45,000 individuals (nishnawbeaski nation, 2011). the nan major women’s development project was formed to examine how women could be included in nan’s leadership processes, facilitate the on-going involvement of women in leadership, and promote women’s development initiatives in the communities. the overall goal of the project was to increase women’s knowledge and competencies, thereby empowering women to participate in social, cultural, and political life within their communities. the project materialized under the guidance of the director of women’s 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 2 [2013], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.5 development (co-author simard-chicago) with input from women in nan communities, the nan women’s council, and other stakeholders (maranzan, sabourin, & simard, 2011). the major women’s development project consisted of four-day workshops delivered to women residing in nan communities, discussion during women’s circles, and collection of baseline social and economic data. curriculum materials were developed for the workshops to focus on personal capacity (e.g., stress management, communication skills, boundary setting) and leadership development (e.g., community planning, leadership skills). workshop materials included facilitator and participant manuals, icebreaker games, and group discussion questions. the chief of each community was first contacted to explain the nature and purpose of the workshops and to ask if there was interest within the community. with the chief’s permission, the workshops were advertised by posters and word-of-mouth. trained facilitators, all of whom were first nations women, went in groups of 2 or 3 to deliver the workshops in the communities (maranzan et al., 2011). the final element of the major women’s development project was the creation of a data collection tool to gather statistical information about nan women’s needs and experiences (results described in maranzan et al., 2011). the major women’s development project was implemented from 2008 to 2010, with the goal of holding workshops in each of the 49 first nations communities affiliated with nan. workshops were delivered in a total of 44 communities (one community declined participation, and four communities did not respond to initial inquiries and invitations). participation records showed that 428 women and 15 men attended the workshops. o b j e c t i v e s the objective of the present study was to determine the impact of the major women’s development project on participants and determine the barriers and resources for women in leadership. we used quantitative and qualitative methods to identify the program’s immediate outcomes such as changes in participants’ knowledge and skills and impact on participants’ lives. the information gathered was used to identify themes about women in leadership, barriers to leadership, and recommendations for future leadership development for first nations women. m e t h o d s maranzan and sabourin partnered with the nan director of women’s development (co-author simard-chicago) to develop the methodology. several meetings took place with advisors from the nan women’s council and workshop facilitators to identify key questions. a mixed methodology was chosen, resulting in a questionnaire about leadership and personal capacity to be distributed at the workshops with follow-up focus groups and interviews with women who attended the workshops. support and approval for the major women’s development project and evaluation was provided by the nan executive committee. permission to offer the workshops and data collection was obtained from each community’s chief and/or band council. ethical approval for data collection was obtained from the lakehead university research ethics board. 3 maranzan et al.: leadership development for first nations women published by scholarship@western, 2013 q u e s t i o n n a i re s questionnaires were distributed to women attending the workshops and contained items about their leadership involvement, interest in running for chief or council, barriers to running for a formal leadership position, and women’s involvement in their communities. data are reported as frequency distributions below. f o c u s g ro u p s a n d i n t e rv i e w s we conducted five focus groups and five individual interviews with women who participated in the leadership and personal capacity-building workshops. two focus groups were held in thunder bay with women from several communities (n = 20), and three focus groups were held in nan communities (n = 19). these communities were chosen on the basis of geographic factors: one community was located in an urban setting, and the other communities were accessible only by air and ice road (one each in northeastern and northwestern ontario). snacks and participant incentives were provided at each focus group and all women gave informed consent to participate and to have the session audiotaped. all focus groups were facilitated by co-authors maranzan and sabourin and began with group introductions and a discussion of the purpose of the meeting. the major women’s development project director and staff were not present and participants’ anonymity was ensured in order to encourage women to speak honestly about the program. one facilitator asked specific questions of the group and ensured that each participant had the opportunity to speak. the second facilitator ran the audiotape and kept notes on procedure and participants’ responses. questions asked by the facilitator were: 1. “what part or parts of the workshop impacted you the most?” the facilitator prompted each woman to consider all aspects of the workshop by asking, “what stands out the most?” “was there a specific topic that really caught your attention?” 2. “are there skills that you became more aware of and decided to pursue?” the facilitator followed up with “have you made any small or big life changes as a result of the workshop?” 3. “did this workshop impact your family or community?” “if so, how?” 4. “do you see changes in opportunities for women to be leaders in the nan communities?” “if so, what changes have you seen?” 5. “what is needed for women take a more active role in leadership in your community?” the facilitator inquired as to what factors are obstacles or barriers and what is needed for women to overcome these barriers. the facilitator followed up with “how can women’s leadership be supported and nurtured in your community?” at the end of each focus group, the facilitator asked if there were other issues about the workshop or women in leadership that participants wanted to share. the summary notes on procedure and responses were reviewed with the participants, who agreed that the summary notes captured the content of the discussion. individual interviews were conducted with five women who were not able to attend the focus 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 2 [2013], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.5 groups but requested to participate. the same focus group questions and procedure were followed for the interview process. each audiotape was transcribed verbatim by a research assistant. all transcripts were first read to obtain an overall sense of the data. thematic content analysis as outlined by cresswell (1998) was used to identify themes in relation to the questions asked. a list of non-repetitive, non-overlapping themes including verbatim examples was generated separately by two of the researchers, and consensually validated by obtaining agreement between the researchers. member checking was then used to solicit participants’ views of the research findings’ credibility. r e s u l t s r e s u l t s f ro m q u e s t i o n n a i re s a total of 234 women completed the questionnaire while attending the community workshops. fifty percent of the women were under the age of 40 years, with 26.2% between the ages of 31 and 40. the majority of the women were married or in a common-law relationship (55.9%) and spoke english as a first language (53.1%). other first languages included ojibway, cree, and oji-cree. half of the women had completed high school (49.6%) and 19% had completed post-secondary education. at the time of the workshops, 17.9% of participants had run for chief and/or council in their community, while another 27.8% had thought about it. the women were also active in other aspects of community life, with 75.2% volunteering in their communities. most commonly, the women volunteered at community events (48.3%), followed by fundraising (44.4%), cooking (40.6%), cleaning (29.5%), crisis response (28.6%), and visiting families in need (22.2%). participants were asked about barriers and alternate responsibilities encountered by women who run for leadership positions. the most frequent response was family responsibility, endorsed by 48.5% of the women. other concerns expressed by participants were: community pressure (44.9%), home responsibility (43.7%), lack of support (37.9%), self-esteem issues (26.1%), and financial concerns (17.5%). f o c u s g ro u p s a n d i n t e rv i e w s all focus group and interview participants indicated they had attended the workshops in their communities. themes were identified for each question and are presented in table 1. 5 maranzan et al.: leadership development for first nations women published by scholarship@western, 2013 t a b l e 1 . t h e m e s f ro m f o c u s g ro u p s a n d i n t e rv i e w s re g a rd i n g l e a d e rs h i p a n d p e rs o n a l c a p a c i t y b u i l d i n g question theme what part or parts of the workshop impacted you the most? • increased perception of women as leaders • recognition of natural leaders • motivation to change through positive role modeling • intergenerational relationship building are there skills that you became more aware of and decided to pursue? • formal education • stress management skills • self-esteem • advocacy did this workshop impact your family or community? • perception of increased female leadership and employment • community among women do you see changes in opportunities for women to be leaders in nan communities? • encouragement for women to get involved what is needed for women to take a more active role in leadership in your community? • improved access to training opportunities • women’s recognition of their skills and abilities • opportunities to interact with chief and council • more community support for women leaders 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 2 [2013], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.5 for question 1, the participants reflected on the part(s) of the workshop with the most impact, and many women spoke about their increased sense of women’s ability to be leaders, the recognition of natural leadership ability, and of learning leadership skills through positive role modeling. one woman stated, my mom and my aunties are a big influence because they were strong women. another said, i’ve learned a lot from the women in our first nation, especially the [women] chief and council. many participants identified the accessibility of the workshops as an important feature. education and training activities are usually offered outside of first nations communities and many women stated that holding the workshops within each community made it easy for women to attend. the women were also impacted by the facilitators, all of whom were first nations women, and discussed the significance of the workshops being developed by first nations women for first nations women. question 2 identified skills that participants developed or became aware of and had decided to pursue. many women talked about the value of education and how important it is for youth and adults. one participant said, …speakers and women’s conferences and training were talking about education and kids. i could relate, learning and going to school. i said i can do it too. another woman described how a youth who attended the workshops went from not being in high school to now attending university. the focus group participants also talked about personal capacity skills such as improved stress management and self esteem skills. similar experiences were repeated throughout the focus groups. for example, i speak up for myself now. i’ve learned how to handle my stress level. i manage my life more. [the workshop] taught me to be proud of myself. one woman explained, i came from residential school, where the spirit got squelched, i’m getting it back slowly, these workshops really help. the women also spoke about the opportunity for intergenerational relationship building and knowledge exchange provided by the workshops. since the workshops were open to all females it was common for 7 maranzan et al.: leadership development for first nations women published by scholarship@western, 2013 youth, adults, and elders to attend together. another woman summed up her experience of the workshop by saying, for myself i see a lot of growth from the training, i learned my language and work with elders. the third focus group question asked about the impact of the workshop on participants’ families and/or communities. women spoke about themselves and others who were seeking job opportunities, securing employment, and participating in political aspects of their communities since attending the workshops. an example was given of a participant who watched one of the workshop videos on the regional first nations police service and went on to become a police officer. participants also believed the increased knowledge and skills would impact their communities: women are more confident to do whatever they want, after these workshops they want to start their own activities. another participant said, women can organize events that they want to see happen. finally, participants also spoke about increased community among women, summarized best by one woman’s statement: we can empower each other. another woman stated, i want to do something for my community, to raise women’s voices. women need to stand together, [it has] always been men but [we] need more women to speak up for women’s issues. the sub-theme of community among women was best summarized by the statement, we had nothing, but then we realized we had everything, we had each other. the final two questions focused on changes in opportunities for women to be leaders, and what would be needed for women to take a more active leadership role. participants gave examples of how women were being encouraged to get involved, a change from their earlier experiences. as one woman stated, patterns of thinking are changing, chiefs are starting to encourage women to get involved. many women commented that improved access to training opportunities would help support more women leaders. participants also described how women need to have increased recognition of their skills and abilities. one participant described the impact that a single person can have by saying, …simply start by knowing how much power each person has. others believed that opportunities to interact with chief and council and greater community support would benefit women and encourage them to take on leadership roles. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 2 [2013], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.5   d i s c u s s i o n the major women’s development project was developed by first nations women, for first nations women, and was delivered by first nations women in the communities. delivering the workshops in women’s home communities improved access to the workshop for women who were otherwise limited by geographic and financial restraints. more than 400 women attended the workshops, with a subsample of women completing questionnaires and participating in focus groups to identify training outcomes and describe barriers and resources to women in leadership. key outcomes were an increased perception of women as leaders, enhanced personal well-being, and encouragement to seek out opportunities for greater community and leadership involvement. the spirit of the workshop was to inspire women to recognize, utilize, and build upon their strengths. a key theme expressed throughout our data was the value of drawing on first nations women’s preexisting strengths. our data show the majority of women attending the workshops were already involved in their communities, an example of a pre-existing strength. examples of community involvement included volunteering at community events, fundraising, cooking, cleaning, crisis response, and visiting families in need. the women also spoke about other female role models within nishnabeaski nation and their communities. furthermore, workshop participants were committed to mentoring other women. although leadership can be thought of in terms of formal political or job-related roles, leadership can also be informally exercised through volunteerism and role modeling. the workshops helped participants recognize the important leadership roles already held by women within the community. informal roles may not be as visible as formal leadership roles but they contribute significantly to the well-being of families and communities. focus group participants also described changes in their skills and personal capacity resulting from the workshops. improved stress management and enhanced self-esteem are examples of personal capacity building that occurred. we heard about women who made changes in unhealthy relationships by setting and maintaining boundaries. these findings fit with some participants’ belief that balance in one’s personal life can support balance in one’s public life. we also heard examples of how the workshop inspired women to go back to school, seek employment, and look into options for starting their own businesses. as described by stout and kipling (1998), indigenous women’s influence can come from their education as they work in various roles throughout the health, education, and government sectors. census data has indicated that first nations women are more likely than their male counterparts have at least some university education, although they are still behind non-indigenous women in this area (o’donnell & wallace, 2011). as far as education influences social, economic, and leadership status, obstacles to first nations women’s educational success must be addressed. at the time of the workshops, approximately 18% of participants had run for chief and/or council in their community, while another 28% had thought about it. these numbers are encouraging because, as in recent history indicates, opportunities for women to participate in leadership were restricted through exclusion from public meetings and the band electorate, and women were discouraged from contributing in governance (fiske, 1995; stout & kipling, 1998). these numbers also suggest that women who attended the workshops likely had a pre-existing interest in or experience with leadership and so self-selected into the workshops. 9 maranzan et al.: leadership development for first nations women published by scholarship@western, 2013 workshop participants also identified barriers to women in leadership. almost half of survey respondents indicated that family responsibility was a concern for women in leadership; home responsibility was another commonly endorsed concern. indeed, first nations women are often faced with balancing the competing demands of their family and community roles (stout & kipling, 1998) and our findings suggest that difficulty balancing these responsibilities presents a barrier to women’s participation in political life. self-esteem issues and financial concerns were also identified as barriers to leadership by survey respondents. our data do not allow for more in-depth analysis of these factors; however, miller (1992) found that coast salish women had greater electoral success in communities where males did not have disproportionate incomes compared to females. interestingly, women’s electoral success was negatively associated with median household income; women held more council seats in poorer communities perhaps due to new economic and educational resources available to them (miller, 1992). our survey respondents indicated that community pressure and lack of support were barriers to leadership participation. a similar theme emerged from our qualitative data: women described how women were discouraged from organizing and were not being encouraged to step forward for leadership positions. very little has been written about the role communities play in supporting or oppressing women’s political activities (stout & kipling, 1998). our findings show that the community does play a role; however our data do not provide more specific information about community influence. the role that communities play in supporting or discouraging women’s leadership is an important area for further research. the results of this study should be considered in light of the following limitations. throughout delivery of the community workshops, the facilitators were able to tailor the workshop materials to the needs identified by participants, which naturally varied from workshop to workshop and community to community; this variability in content may have impacted our findings. we cannot account for changes resulting from forces acting outside of the major women’s development project (e.g., other programs and policies which may have affected our outcomes) because we did not have a comparison group. finally, we collected data from a sample of women who participated in the workshops and this sample may not be representative of the larger group of women who attended or of first nations women in the general population. as previously stated, it is possible that workshop participants self-selected due to a pre-existing interest and/or participation in leadership. c o n c l u s i o n s although this article has focused on women and leadership, it is important to note that it does not only relate to women. women are concerned about the health, economics, and culture of their families, communities, and first nations society, which is inclusive of females and males. furthermore, “revaluing aboriginal women does not mean devaluing aboriginal men” (findlay & wuttunee, 2007, p. 5). the major women’s development project succeeded in increasing women’s perception of themselves as leaders in various capacities, impacted personal development, and encouraged women to seek opportunities to take on leadership roles. the project also identified barriers faced by women in leadership, barriers that must be addressed before women can obtain equitable representation and inclusion in leadership and decision-making processes. we believe the full potential of first nations 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 2 [2013], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.5 women will be realized when they are able to meaningfully participate in decisions about policies and programs that affect women, their families, and their communities. 11 maranzan et al.: leadership development for first nations women published by scholarship@western, 2013 r e f e re n c e s adelson, n. (2005). the embodiment of inequity: health disparities in aboriginal canada. canadian journal of public health, 96, s45 s61. adler, n. e. & newman, k. (2002). socioeconomic disparities in health: pathways and policies. health affairs, 21, 60 70. an act for the gradual enfranchisement of indians, the better management of indian affairs, and to extend the provisions of the act 31st victoria, chapter 42. (1867, june 22). retrieved from www.aadnc-aandc.gc.ca/dam/dam.../a69c6_1100100010205_eng.pdf the constitution act. (1867). 30 & 31 vict, c 3. creswell, j. w. (1998). qualitative inquiry and research design: choosing among five traditions. california: sage publications. findlay, i. m. & wuttunee, w. (2007). aboriginal women’s community economic development: measuring and promoting success. irpp choices, 13(4), 1 26. fiske, j. (1995). political status of native indian women: contradictory implications of canadian state policy. american indian culture and research journal, 19(2), 1 30. frideres, j. s. & gadacz, r. r. (2001). aboriginal peoples in canada: contemporary conflicts (6th ed. ). toronto: prentice hall. indian act. (1985). rsc, c i – 5. maranzan, k. a., sabourin, a. & simard, c. (2011). first nations women in northern ontario: health, social, and community priorities. the international indigenous policy journal, 2(1). retrieved from http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/9/ mcivor v. canada (registrar of indian and northern affairs). (2009). bcca 153. miller, b. (1992). women and politics: comparative evidence from the northwest coast. ethnology, 31(4), 367 383. nishnawbeaski nation (2011). land, culture, community. retrieved from http://www.nan.on.ca/article/land-culture-community-120.asp o’donnell, v. & wallace, s. (2011). first nations, metis, and inuit women. in women in canada: a gender-based statistical report (6th ed.). ottawa: statistics canada. stout, m. d. & kipling, g. d. (1998). aboriginal women in canada: strategic research directions for policy development (cat. no. sw21-20/1998). retrieved from http://publications.gc.ca/collections/collection/sw21-20-1998e.pdf 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 2 [2013], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.5 the international indigenous policy journal april 2013 a community-based leadership development program for first nations women: revaluing and honoring women’s strengths k. amanda maranzan alice sabourin christine simard-chicago recommended citation a community-based leadership development program for first nations women: revaluing and honoring women’s strengths abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license a community-based leadership development program for first nations women: revaluing and honoring womenâ•žs strengths “what is the spirit of this gathering?” indigenous sport policy-makers and self-determination in canada the international indigenous policy journal volume 5 | issue 4 article 6 october 2014 “ w hat is the spirit of this gathering?” indigenous sport policy-makers and self-determination in canada braden p. te hiwi the university of western ontario, btehiwi@uwo.ca recommended citation te hiwi, b. p. (2014). “what is the spirit of this gathering?” indigenous sport policy-makers and self-determination in canada. the international indigenous policy journal, 5(4). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.6 “ w hat is the spirit of this gathering?” indigenous sport policy-makers and self-determination in canada abstract in this article, i examine how the process of indigenous participation in policy-making pertaining to the development of federal sport policy in canada is connected to indigenous forms of self-determination. by conducting semi-structured interviews with six indigenous sport policy-makers, i investigate how their respective thoughts, experiences, and actions shape their perspective on self-determination. my analysis shows that a focus on relationships was at the center of the interviewed indigenous sport policy-makers’ approaches to the promotion of indigenous self-determination. furthermore, the relational nature of indigenous policy-makers’ identities was also central to their pursuit of self-determination. the promotion of family and community type relationships with government representatives could be used as an outcome of policy-making, in addition to traditional policy directives. keywords self-determination, sport policy, relationships creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ “ w h a t i s t h e s p i r i t o f t h i s g a t h e r i n g ? ” i n d i g e n o u s s p o r t p o l i c y m a k e r s a n d s e l f d e t e r m i n a t i o n i n c a n a d a from the early 1990s through to 2005, indigenous peoples have become increasingly important to the policy agenda of sport canada, the branch of the department of canadian heritage that guides and administers the delivery of sport in canada. indigenous participation in policy-making culminated in 2005 when the first comprehensive policy document was created. the document, entitled sport canada’s policy on aboriginal peoples participation in sport (hereafter referred to as the aboriginal participation policy), focused specifically on indigenous peoples (canadian heritage, 2005). in this article, i examine how the process of indigenous participation in policy-making pertaining to the development of federal sport policy is connected to indigenous forms of self-determination. given the prominence and importance of promoting indigenous self-determination to indigenous peoples, it may be easy to assume the obvious and positive benefits of enhanced indigenous self-determination. yet the complexity of connections between indigenous self-determination and indigenous sport policy is only obscured when such an assumption is made. just as connections between self-determination and policy can be considered obvious, so too can the inherent “benefits” of sport and physical activity to participants and the community (murphy & waddington, 1998). it is known that sport can play a role in the prevention of chronic disease (warburton, nicol, & bredin, 2006), enhance participants’ self-esteem (bowker, 2006; koivula, 1999; taylor, 1995), and be used in the promotion of global peace and development (kidd, 2008). but even a brief examination of the history of canadian government involvement in indigenous sport complicates any tendency to make these assumptions. the history of indigenous sport policy in canada has been part of the government’s colonialist and assimilationist agenda (paraschak, 2002). yet the posited benefits of sport and physical activity within this context are still powerful in both popular discourse as well as in sport policy-making rationales. rather than assuming the benefits of self-determination, i take the position that the way in which self-determination takes form is fundamental to how it may promote and facilitate indigenous people’s needs, desires, and interests. although the potential for investigating the connections between self-determination and sport policy are vast, this study seeks to make a focused contribution to how self-determination has been relevant to indigenous sport policy-makers specifically, as well as in relation to indigenous policy generally. i begin this article by providing a sketch of the indigenous sport policy context since the 1970s. next, i provide a brief outline of what i mean by self-determination and introduce the double helix model, which describes the interconnectedness between an indigenous and euro-canadian sport system as the model used in the indigenous sport community. i then outline the methodology for the study wherein i focus on the personal knowledge and experiences of indigenous policy-makers through semi-structured interviews. the interviews investigate how the participants understand self-determination in policymaking and also how they acted in the pursuit of self-determination through sport policy development. the remainder of the article covers an analysis and discussion of the participants’ thoughts and experiences. i argue that an important element of the meaning and practice of self-determination in indigenous sport policy-making is expressed in relationships, especially family type relations, which focus on fostering and building relationships between indigenous peoples and sport canada. the relationship focus shows that self-determination is not just about autonomy that leads to indigenous people’s independence; rather, it also involves examining ways in which indigenous people can actively 1 te hiwi: “what is the spirit of this gathering?” published by scholarship@western, 2014 and strategically work with and relate to others in order to best meet important needs and address relevant issues. i also suggest that identity is a foundational component of pursuing self-determination and that the relational nature of the indigenous policy-makers’ identity is fundamental to their approach to policy development. indigenous policy-makers bring ideas that are informed by their experiences working in indigenous policy contexts to their public policy-making experiences and negotiate differences as part of the relationship-building approach, which is, in itself, an expression of selfdetermination. i conclude that the focus of sport policy should be beyond the parameters of the policy document itself (as the only outcome of policy-making) and that sport policy should include better practical relations between the federal government and indigenous peoples. such an outcome would be, in and of itself, worthy of recognition and prioritization since it could facilitate a better policy-making process because it would reflect the aspirations and lived experiences of indigenous peoples. i n d i g e n o u s s p o r t p o l i c y i n c a n a d a since the 1970s, sport policy in canada has primarily been focused on developing elite-level sport athletes for national and international competition (green & houlihan, 2005; macintosh & whitson, 1990). indigenous peoples had very little input into the official purpose of sport policy in the 1970s and 1980s (parashcak, 1995). consequently, sport canada’s involvement with indigenous peoples has been designed to strengthen canadian national athletes. the government has also pursued a strong assimilationist agenda with regard to sport policy and indigenous peoples (paraschak, 1995, 1998, 2002). for example, in 1978, the minister of state for fitness and amateur sport, iona campagnolo, was very clear on the role of assimilation of indigenous sport when she said: …if you think that what i am trying to do is assimilate you, you are right, because with sport there is no other way…except to compete with other people. it does not mean cultural assimilation of the indian people. it simply means that you get into the mainstream and compete like everyone else. (cited in paraschak, 1995, p. 7) the call for indigenous peoples to “get into the mainstream” is a dominant theme of the canadian government’s involvement in indigenous sport and recreation (paraschak, 2002). indigenous rejection of this call to the mainstream in the late 1970s led to a decade where indigenous sport programming was eliminated and no new policy directives were created. the values that sport promotes, and the ways in which it is understood, can only be fully appreciated within the cultural context within which it is created. government imposed understandings and directives for sport limits indigenous leadership and control of indigenous sport (forsyth, 2007, 2013; forsyth & heine, 2008; paraschak, 1995, 1998). yet indigenous canadians have attempted to become involved in developing sport on their own terms (paraschak, 2002), and part of this process manifested itself in indigenous participation in federal sport policy-making in the early 1990s. an investigation into the nature and basis of the canadian sport system, prompted by the ben johnson drug scandal of the 1988 seoul olympics, lead to a major shift in sport policy discussion (green & houlihan, 2005). the debate shifted the discussion of sport policy away from high performance sport in order to strengthen a participatory sport focus and to promote a system more inclusive of marginalized groups. by leveraging their position as a marginalized group, indigenous peoples were, for the first time in the history of federal sport policy, able to successfully assert their position in an ongoing working 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.6 relationship with the federal government in policy-making. as a result, the major sport policies of the 1990s, sport the way ahead (government of canada, 1992) and sport: everybody’s business (government of canada, 1998) included policy specifically attending to indigenous peoples. a number of important developments were the direct results of these policies, including the development of the aboriginal sport circle (the national level administrative body) as well as a number of provincial and territorial sport administration bodies. the north american indigenous games were also developed during the 1990s, connected to federal financial support through the policy of this time period. while the aboriginal sport circle provided indigenous people with a representative, national administrative body, further developments, including the aboriginal participation policy, came in the 2000s. beginning in 2000, sport canada initiated a process to create a broad and all-encompassing policy statement for the future of the canadian sport system, titled the canadian sport policy (government of canada, 2002). the canadian sport policy formalized the two overarching goals for sport canada: developing elite sport and fostering participatory sport. connected to this strategy were additional but connected policies for marginalized groups, like the aboriginal participation policy, as well as others that focused on women in sport and sport for disabled persons. the aboriginal participation policy represents the culmination of indigenous participation and prioritization in sport policy and included the recognition of indigenous cultures in the successful development of sport for indigenous peoples, the importance of health promotion to indigenous peoples, and a participatory focus that targeted the community level (canadian heritage, 2005). the aboriginal participation policy represented a watershed in indigenous sport policy as the first ever comprehensive policy statement for indigenous peoples; yet, no action plan was created or implemented after the aboriginal participation policy and currently some of the administrative bodies, including the aboriginal sport circle, are not in operation. the rise in prominence and participation of indigenous peoples in sport policy-making and the benefits that this brought provides us with an opportunity to explore the ways in which selfdetermination was part of this process. was self-determination relevant to indigenous sport policymakers during this era? and what did self-determination look like in policy-making in this era of increased administrative power and policy participation? s e l f d e t e r m i n a t i o n the term self-determination has come to encapsulate the many and varied political aspirations of indigenous peoples. it implies a general sense of authority in indigenous decision-making and the control of indigenous affairs by indigenous peoples. self-determination, for my purposes, refers generally to the degree of autonomy, freedom, and authority people have to organize themselves politically, culturally, socially, and economically in ways that they feel meet their needs and desires (alfred, 1999; fleras, 1999; maaka & fleras, 2005; ponting, 1997). for indigenous peoples in canada, self-determination is grounded in the historical nation-to-nation relationship with the federal government, which includes partnerships, alliances, treaties, and wars (alfred, 1999). this perspective suggests that indigenous self-determination is inherent to indigenous peoples and is exhibited through partnerships and treaties and is therefore not delegated by the government but reflects original occupancy and a form of national independence (maaka & fleras, 2005). self-determination is a contested idea that can mean different things to different indigenous peoples across varied contexts (maaka & fleras, 2005; primeau & corntassel, 1995). the complexity of 3 te hiwi: “what is the spirit of this gathering?” published by scholarship@western, 2014 indigenous self-determination is evidenced by discussions that raise an awareness of the limits of selfdetermination, including calls to stop using the term self-determination (primeau & corntassel, 1995), the particularities of indigenous self-determination in different national contexts (maaka & fleras, 2005), the realization that a primary focus on official political recognition of indigenous selfdetermination is not sustainable (corntassel, 2008), and suggestions that state government recognition of indigenous self-determination should be avoided in order to focus on the promotion of locallycontrolled indigenous practices of self-determination (coulthard, 2007). in this study, i seek to explore the nuances of the discussion around self-determination by building upon the perspectives of indigenous peoples to understand what self-determination can look like in the practice of policy-making through the participants’ thoughts, experiences, and actions. self-determination can also be understood in a collaborative way. maaka and fleras (2005) suggested that "indigenous claims to self determining sovereignty are not synonymous with independence or closure but embrace references to relationships that need to be nurtured in partnership rather than borders that must be defended" (p. 59, original emphasis). more specifically, framing self-determination in this way has been identified as relevant to an indigenous approach to policy development, which could further a context of power sharing, partnership, and meaningful indigenous participation (fleras & maaka, 2010). one particular way to frame indigenous sport in canada is by using the double helix model that makes visible the differentiation between indigenous and euro-canadian sport systems, where connections and partnerships between them are of central significance. the double helix model is an idea that is based on the double helix structure of dna, and provides a conceptual framework for thinking about the position of the indigenous sport system. the double helix model has two individual intertwining strands that represent the indigenous sport system and the eurocanadian sport system, linked by multiple bridges where the two systems connect and together form the entire sport system of the country (forsyth, 2001). the model recognizes both indigenous and nonindigenous systems of sport and shows how the indigenous system is both distinct from, and connected to, the euro-canadian sport system (forsyth, 2001). the double helix model asserts the existence of an indigenous sport system that is partly comprised of indigenous sport leagues, the north american indigenous games, and national, provincial, and local indigenous administrative bodies. m e t h o d o l o g y examination of official public policy is central to understanding indigenous policy. yet, fleras (1999) reminds us that although “indigenous-state relations are constructed and conducted through official policy and administration…[they] are secured at the level of tacit assumptions and patterns of engagement” (p.199). the use of interview analysis provides an in-depth look at an indigenous perspective of the tacit assumptions and patterns of engagement in public policy-making. this enables a look behind the “neutral” and “clean” presentation of policies to see what thoughts and actions exist informally and behind the scenes (green & houlihan, 2004). to understand the thoughts, perspectives, experiences, and actions of indigenous policy-makers, i conducted one-on-one interviews with each of the study’s participants. the interviews were semi-structured to enable some flexibility in the collection of data in the unpredictable context of research interviews (kirby & mckenna, 1989). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.6 the interview schedule was based around the research question and a set of sub-questions, which specifically asked about what the participants understood self-determination to mean. my questions during the interview also sought to draw thoughts from the interviewees that would speak to whether self-determination is important to policy development. i also asked questions that would help me discern if self-determination, according to the indigenous peoples’ experiences with sport policy, relates to the double helix model. through this line of questioning, i sought to better understand the opportunities and challenges self-determination presented in policy-making. a total of six indigenous sport leaders participated in the study. i contacted them via my colleagues’ networks using a snowball sampling method. the selected participants met the criteria for inclusion in the study by identifying as an indigenous canadian and by having prior experience with sport policymaking with the federal government. in particular, the participants were very well placed to provide information on, and experiences about, policy development at the highest levels, which included the aboriginal participation policy. the small sample size limits the generalizability of the results to other indigenous sport policy-makers’ perspectives and, furthermore, it may not comprehensively cover themes relevant to indigenous sport policy-makers and self-determination. however, my sampling strategy and sample size were not intended to be representative; rather, it was to use our conversations as a basis to discuss and examine the dominant themes that emerged from the interviews. all of the interviews took place in 2009 in various cities across the country. the participants had fulfilled a variety of roles in sport leadership and administration, both past and present. they were involved in various levels of leadership and administration, including provincial or territorial experiences, first nations band-level experiences, as well as federal level experiences. all of the participants had worked within indigenous sport organizations; some also had experience working within non-indigenous sport organizations. prior to the interviews, all of the participants were informed about and consented to the undertaking. i will refer to each participant through a pseudonym that i have chosen in order to protect his or her identity. the interview recordings were transcribed and then coded into common themes that were categorized under the subject of self-determination. through a back and forth process of refining sections of the transcripts into themes and analyzing the relationship between codes and themes, it was found that the themes that were identified were fully represented in the interviews. all participants were offered the opportunity to review my draft analysis and to make changes to my analysis if deemed necessary. however, none of the participants felt i had unfairly represented their perspectives and did not request any alterations to the content or to their pseudonym. my analysis identified the themes of identity, working within two systems of governance, and relationships; all three topics form the body of this article and are discussed in turn. i d e n t i t y a n d s e l f d e t e r m i n a t i o n a strong sense of identity allowed the participants to refine their approaches to public policy-making. the identity was described as relational in nature; it is through relationships that the indigenous policymakers understood who they were, providing a basis for engaging with others. much discussion took place around the identification of aspirations and values at a personal level. for example, amanda noted that for her self-determination: 5 te hiwi: “what is the spirit of this gathering?” published by scholarship@western, 2014 is more of a self-realization about who you are and who you want to be in this world—you first need to understand what it is that you want, who you are in the world. you need to identify those first. this point becomes particularly important for the approach to policy-making, as suggested by kelly: before we can get to a point where we can govern our communities . . . [we need to] find those rules or those values in ourselves that we bring to any style of aboriginal governance. the role of identity, as a foundational element in the pursuit of self-determination, also extended beyond the personal level for the people i interviewed. the relational elements of identity were central for all the people i interviewed. for example, mason conceptualized multiple relationships as he saw as: four circles. i see the inner circle as the inner self. the second one as family, the third one community, and the fourth one the rest of the world. in order to be that family, you need to know inner-self. and in order to know your community you need to know your family and yourself. a holistic understanding of the self as part of a broader set of relationships illuminates the relational nature of mason’s identity. a focus on the interconnectedness of life, relationships, and kinship relations is often central to an indigenous perspective (battiste & henderson, 2000; little bear, 2000). the connection to community and the drive to give back to the community are also central to the participants’ understanding of being self-determining. amanda believed that self-determination is: this notion, i said earlier, of giving back to the community. it’s being someone who can move forward in this world, and make decisions not only for yourself, but for the people who you care about. the challenge of being community-driven in public policy development is acknowledged by morgan, who spoke about reconnecting with his home community: you get to touch and feel the people. and that’s what feeds; i think that’s what feeds us when we do our work. if we don’t get back to who it’s all about, we sort of, we forget, we forget what we are supposed to be doing. or why we are doing what we are doing. i’ve been fortunate to be reminded, and hang out with elders, who say, this is what it’s all about. the approaches that the indigenous policy-makers brought to their policy-making experiences are grounded in a strong sense of identity, an identity embedded in interpersonal, familial, and community relations. the greater purpose of community needs drives both the participants’ purpose and identity, which forms the crux of how they pursued self-determination when working alongside government policy-makers. w o r k i n g a c r o s s d i f f e r e n t s y s t e m s o f g o v e r n a n c e an important aspect of collaborative policy endeavours for the participants was understanding how working within public policy is different from their experiences of governance in indigenous 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.6 communities, organizations, and contexts. this difference is important to consider in order to understand how the participants attempted to create relationships with public policy-makers through their pursuit of indigenous self-determination. all participants identified a need to understand each system of governance because every group has a different set of boundaries through which they work, as recognized by morgan: the aboriginal people have to recognize the government has to work in their system, and that the [government] people trying to move the policy were guided by certain parameters . . . [as the government officials] were restricted by mechanisms and policies in sport canada. a prominent example of these differences that participants discussed was the difference between a topdown approach in public policy development and the bottom-up approach that can be an element of governance in indigenous contexts. the participants (melanie, dylan, amanda, and kelly) noted that the top-down approach in public policy-making contributed to a perspective in which decisions were not always open to debate because, in this dynamic, indigenous sport leaders felt that the legitimacy of their perspectives and authority on sport issues were not always fully embraced and recognized. many of the participants (morgan, melanie, amanda, mason, and kelly) spoke about the importance of getting involved and connected at the community level, and then basing governance decisions upon the information gained in local contexts. this perspective enables formation of an open space for dialogue, which was identified as being different from public policy development: policy review committee [was] held behind closed doors . . . decisions [were] made behind closed doors . . . [and] lobbying . . . wasn’t open [for] discussion. so it’s a totally different approach for getting something implemented within the . . . government system than it was within our own. i still see that every day . . . you don’t get to have open and frank discussion amongst all constituents. (kelly) the top-down orientation affects the nature of the participants’ contributions to policy and, in the historical and contemporary context of indigenous mistrust towards government policy, creating a more open, honest, and collaborative environment is still an issue affecting sport policy-making. the top-down approach to governance may be limiting in fostering community needs, which were identified as central to the participants’ agendas. for example, melanie spoke about the challenges the aboriginal sport circle (the federally funded national sport administrative body) faced when dealing with the top down approach: [indigenous] organizations are influenced by the government. there is a delicate balance between something being grassroots-driven and creating the agenda and mandate, versus, “you will get funding if you address these issues.” the movement of the aboriginal sport circle is very high performance focused, and it had to be in order to meet [its] financial commitments. did that meet the needs of the community? are we really serving our community, or are we really just serving what sport canada [wants]? participants said the top-down approach was a barrier to creating an open and collaborative environment. this is not to suggest that dialogue did not take place between indigenous sport leaders and government officials or that the government did not come in good faith to the policy table to hear 7 te hiwi: “what is the spirit of this gathering?” published by scholarship@western, 2014 the perspectives of the participants (dylan). rather, the top-down approach facilitated a context in which the government directed policy development and this arrangement may have impacted the potential collaborative energies that sport canada’s relationship with indigenous peoples could produce. given that the participants understood the importance of differences between indigenous and public policy contexts, they all identified the need to work in and between them. dylan made this point when discussing indigenous priorities in developing policy with government officials: he said that he and his colleagues were attempting to “find a way to articulate [indigenous priorities] in a way that [the] government could accept.” building bridges and connections with the government represents a crucial step in the participants’ approach to promoting indigenous self-determination through policy. the ability to work with government bureaucrats and institutions while also providing a perspective about indigenous sporting needs is best accomplished by being effective in, and also across, indigenous and public policy governance contexts. r e l a t i o n s h i p s an essential element identified by all of the participants was that of building bridges with the government in order to educate and communicate about what indigenous peoples are looking for and how they intend to work towards their goals. the participants came with a desire to build relationships and bridges but this hope was different from their experiences. the strategy of aligning indigenous interests with interest groups is important to empowering the pursuit of indigenous self-determination. dylan spoke about times when the indigenous community built relationships with other policy communities that represented disabled people and women—who are also marginalized groups within the canadian sport system—and they worked together: we knew we were outsiders pushing for new organizations, new funding, new focus and with that [a new] policy. these groups were identified by government officials as being a disadvantaged group: the canadian sport system needed a policy to hang its hat on and how it would best address the issues specific to those target groups. (dylan) the leveraging of sport canada’s desire to be more inclusive by strategically aligning indigenous peoples interests with other interests enabled indigenous needs to become a priority in canadian sport policy. it is these connections and relationships that indigenous people are able to develop to better pursue their needs and interests in canadian sport. a striking feature of the focus on relationships for indigenous sport policy-makers was that it was informed by both the prominence and value of the double helix model. even though the model speaks more directly to how canadian sport systems can be envisioned, it also served as a highly valued tool in the policy-making process for the participants. building bridges and connections with the government and sport communities is a part of how the participants interpreted the double helix model, which captures much of what they considered indigenous self-determination in public policy-making to be about. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.6 the double helix model was identified (by mason, amanda, morgan, melanie, and dylan) as being a highly relevant framework in the promotion of self-determination through relationships. kelly preferred the “two row wampum belt” as a better model for how she preferred to envision indigenous sport in canada because it suggests two separate and autonomous entities working alongside each other. amanda suggested that: the concept of self-determination is wrapped up quite nicely into that model of the double helix [because] that’s what we were trying to do [at policy meetings]; we were trying to find ways to build those linkages. in addressing self-determination and the importance of relationships, dylan spoke of the importance of the bridges being built between the indigenous and canadian sport system, arguing that: we know what our needs are, we know how to best meet our needs. but we can’t do that in the absence of partnerships, we need the resources, we need the support, we need the expertise. the[re is] a body of knowledge in mainstream sport, and we are going to take that and shape it so that it fits the unique needs of our community. to these indigenous sport leaders, a thriving indigenous sport system is not only predicated on the importance of the difference between the canadian and indigenous sport system, but also on the idea that the links between them are fundamental to a healthy indigenous sport system. the model in this way works as a very general outline for the functioning of an indigenous sport system. the double helix model can also be used as a tool for fostering relations and communicating their aspirations when working with the government. mason, amanda, and dylan all believed that the double helix model was seen as one particular approach that was effective when attempting to foster relationships in collaborative policy-making developments. as amanda noted: people tend to get that model quite quickly, it’s easy to conceptualize, it’s really easy to explain. i don’t think it truly offends people’s sensitivities about what aboriginal people want. because i think sometimes people get hung up on aboriginal people taking over. it’s a good model because it’s so clear-cut. for the content itself, and a really good entry point for bringing people to the table, and talking about what can be done. and then you can build those relationships. the double helix model thus provides elements of an outcome, that is, a very general framework for different but highly connected sport systems; it also provides elements of process, such that working on the bridges between the sport systems is important to their success. it was felt by the participants, however, that government bureaucrats did not share the same relationships approach. amanda spoke of a policy development experience in which: the policy framework that they [the government entity] were establishing wasn’t really set up to build relationships . . . i understood . . . [the government representatives] probably wouldn’t let us build a relationship that we were really looking for . . . i don’t think . . . [the government] got . . . [the relationship focus] too much. the other side of the table . . . was looking at us like deer in the headlights. 9 te hiwi: “what is the spirit of this gathering?” published by scholarship@western, 2014 to read the participants’ statements as saying that the government did not want any relationship with indigenous policy-makers is not the point. indigenous peoples were an important element throughout the development of a number of sport policies and contributed in a variety of roles, such as participating at policy meetings, conducting roundtables of their own, providing input on the drafting of policy, and so on. the process was set up to develop a policy document rather than develop a relationship with indigenous sport leaders. a second indicator that the approach brought by indigenous sport leaders was different from the framework of public policy development was that sport canada did not consider the double helix model an appropriate framework for relations with the government. for example, dylan discussed government apprehension in accepting a separate and parallel indigenous sport system, despite efforts by indigenous sport leaders to validate that approach within sport policy development. he said, with regard to the aboriginal participation policy that: we tried to get that [acceptance of a parallel system] into the policy, we tried to put that explanation into the policy. they [the government representatives] appreciated the values of those models in understanding why we are different; [but] they absolutely refused to include that in the document. it was actually in the initial draft but as it worked its way up through the food chain people became very uncomfortable about that. (dylan) the reluctance to embrace a parallel indigenous sport system moved policy in the preferred direction of sport canada’s assimilationist goals rather than in the direction envisioned by the involved indigenous sport leaders. menno bodlt (2000) has identified this general process as institutional assimilation, which points to the ways that indigenous peoples are guided into public institutions. in this case, this is driven by the fact that sport canada believes it is the best place for indigenous peoples to take part in sport. minister campagnolo’s quote from 1978, noted above, points to the historical consistency in sport canada’s approach in which indigenous peoples are called to “get into the mainstream like everyone else” (cited in paraschak, 1995, p. 7). the needs and desires of indigenous policy-makers became untenable when they were viewed as being outside of the bounds of what sport canada was looking for. the double helix model captured much of the participants’ ideas about what self-determination through public policy development should be, including the desire to build bridges with the canadian sport system. the need to convey indigenous aspirations about indigenous sport to public policy-makers is understood as foundational to their approach and objectives. yet, at times the relationship approach was not part of the indigenous policy-making experiences in public policy-making. as a result, one important way that indigenous sport leaders attempted to promote self-determination was by moving beyond policy documents as the only outcome for indigenous policy. m o v i n g b e y o n d p o l i c y d o c u m e n t s a s t h e s o l e o u t c o m e o f t h e p u b l i c p o l i c y m a k i n g p r o c e s s the importance of developing effective sport policy documents is clear; however, a focus on people and their relationships enables a perspective that moves beyond the policy document as the only outcome of public policy-making. morgan spoke about the idea of family and community-type relationships. he went on to say that he would deliberately and routinely attempt to humanize the relationship with 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.6 government bureaucrats by emphasizing family values and family relations, which he characterized as having openness and trust. what was important about humanizing indigenous peoples was that: even if the programs or whatever gets developed because of these policy things, those relationships would still be there, and people will find a way to make things work—even after those other tools [e.g., policies] are gone. because if you don’t build relationships then there is no concern for the other. (amanda) thus, relationships are not only important for the creation of a specific policy document but also future policy development, policy implementation, evaluation, and so on. it is the more holistic framework of family and community relationships, rather than individuals representing special interests, which the participants understood as being part of the promotion of self-determination in policy-making. grounding the pursuit of self-determination in identity reveals its fundamental importance to indigenous policy-makers. attempts by the participants to build relationships can at once be understood as being a strategic direction for indigenous sport policy, but at the same time is also embedded in, and an expression of, the participants’ identity. in other words, building relationships is not just a reflection of how they identify themselves, but furthermore the very process of building relationships in policymaking enables the participants to express their identity in policy development. this identity is expressed in relationship building in routine policy-making activities, like policy table discussions. public policy-making with indigenous peoples could be better developed if it could be framed more closely to indigenous policy-makers’ perspectives in this way. the participants suggested that the focus of the policy-making process of the aboriginal participation policy was mainly around a discrete process of developing a policy document. this is consistent with the rational model of policy development, which presents an issue focused approach to policy development and breaks the policy process into a series of discrete stages (e.g., from agenda setting, to issue definition, setting objectives and priorities, and so on) that is created by rational agents (john, 1998). when a specific policy document is considered to be a discrete entity, indigenous participation in its creation can be thought of as more instrumental—that is, its function is to inform indigenous peoples’ perspectives to enable the government to create public policy that includes the very important perspectives and knowledge that indigenous peoples have to offer. yet, public policy, as a particular course of public action on an issue, can be understood as always being in process (john, 1998). from this perspective, building relationships can also be understood as an outcome of policy development: one that enhances not only any particular document but also policydevelopment in the future as well. the formation of the first ever indigenous sport policy created by sport canada was possible in large part because of the strength of its relationship with the indigenous sport community that had steadily grown since the early 1990s (paraschak, 2002). thus, a focus on relationships is not only important to the process of indigenous self-determination and creating better policy, but also can be seen as an outcome too. from this perspective, it may be better for policy development if indigenous peoples’ input into indigenous policy is not simply instrumental, but also involves proactively developing relations with indigenous peoples. this approach may include, for example, bureaucrats becoming familiar with indigenous sports and culture in order to encourage greater socio-political awareness of how building relationships with people is particularly fruitful when 11 te hiwi: “what is the spirit of this gathering?” published by scholarship@western, 2014 developing indigenous policy. further, this approach could better enable indigenous directives in policy or enhance the incorporation of community-level engagement in policy-making. for indigenous peoples, indigenous policy is not an abstracted set of instrumental directives created to solve policy issues but an important governmental expression of an underlying relationship. the participants identified some instances in which the level of openness and trust in their relationship with the government in policymaking was questionable. mason summed up this point poignantly: when speaking about the very nature of their relationship in public policy meetings, he asked, “what is the spirit of this gathering?” this question strikes at the heart of the relationship as it questions the basis for the relationship, the purpose of this relationship, and the intentions that are brought to this relationship. being open in defining the nature and basis for indigenous–government relationships could be a very valuable approach to better position indigenous policy-makers and government policy-makers. participant responses make it clear that this is not an empty statement but an important declaration of values and structure that guide policy-making; it makes all parties accountable through an explicit statement about the basis and purpose of working with indigenous peoples. j. r. miller (1991) argued that, throughout the history of indigenous–government relations in canada, the most significant trend from settler contact to the present is that the outcome of the relationship will likely be the result of the intentions at the outset. whether indigenous peoples and the government see each other as equals working together or see each other as impediments to their own objectives, the outcome will likely be the result of which perspective is taken. an open and honest basis for indigenous involvement in policy as a type of family-based relation may foster better relationships, better policy, and rebuild the mistrust that many indigenous peoples have when developing public policy with the federal government. c o n c l u s i o n the premise of this article is to explore self-determination in recent sport policy development and, more specifically, to better understand the nuances of how self-determination is relevant to the promotion of indigenous policy from the perspective of indigenous policy-makers. the relational nature of the participants’ identity is a fundamental basis for policy leadership and a driving force in motivations for contributing to policy development. furthermore, the relational basis of indigenous policy-makers’ identities can be understood as being practical expressions of self-determination in the policy-making process. working within the public policy system does not always fit with the approach that the participants bring to the policy table. yet, the ability of the participants to work within government and indigenous contexts is important for meeting the needs of their communities while also working well with government representatives and institutions. the participants understood that effectively communicating with the government on policy issues is central to their role and that a good relationship with public policy-makers is crucial to their success. however, the focus on relationships was not always part of their experiences in public policy development, but rather their participation can be described as being somewhat instrumental in nature. future indigenous policy development could be aided by emphasizing relationship-building as an important part of policy-making, rather than simply using a task-oriented perspective for policy development. this does not suggest overlooking the contested nature of collaborative policy development but rather points to a strategy to help foster engagement on critical issues. by building upon an approach that reflects indigenous peoples’ relational identity, which is characterized by 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.6 openness and trust, and engenders respect and concern for the other, is a both a long term and short term strategy that could facilitate better policy-making for indigenous peoples and begins to answer mason’s question about the nature and spirit of indigenous policy-making. indigenous self-determination, in theory and practice, is complex and fraught with contradictions. on the one hand, maaka and fleras (2005) noted the importance of relationships and engagement with the government. on the other hand, there are not only limits to requiring state governments to recognize and promote indigenous self-determination, but this can reproduce the colonial relations of dominance that indigenous self-determination has sought to overcome (coulthard, 2007; primeau & corntassel, 1995). the history of indigenous sport policy in canada bears out both the reproduction of and resistance to colonial relations of power (paraschak, 1995). the promotion of indigenous selfdetermination will need to be multifaceted, complex, and contradictory, as seen by the need for distance from, as well as connections to, government ideas, institutions, and resources. the focus on relationships must be understood within a context of these opportunities and limits, as one potential avenue for the promotion of self-determination. the double helix model was noted as being useful to provide a good starting place to negotiate this type of complexity. an area of potentiality in the central ideas i have proposed is that they are well suited for consideration across multiple indigenous policy fields in canada and abroad. i have suggested that culturally informed ideas about indigenous identity could be better leveraged as a strength that could be used as a relevant dimension of enhanced public policy development. this approach could also be used to heed primeau and corntassel’s (1995) call to move away from government apprehension and resistance associated with the term of self-determination in order to focus on more politically astute terms and ideas that focus on cultural integrity. furthermore, my central argument articulates the need for cultural relevance to be taken seriously if public policy-making is to meet the demands and aspirations of indigenous policymakers. the focus on relationships, as an expression of indigenous peoples’ approach to policy and as an underused basis in the development of indigenous sport policy-making in canada, could be used to contribute to local, domestic, and international indigenous policy-making across various public policy fields. 13 te hiwi: “what is the spirit of this gathering?” published by scholarship@western, 2014 r e f e r e n c e s alfred, g. 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(1991). skyscrapers hide the heavens: a history of indian-white relations in canada. toronto, on: university of toronto press. murphy, p., & waddington, i. (1998) sport for all: some public health policy issues and problems. critical public health. 8(3), 193–205. paraschak, v. (1995). the native sport and recreation program 1972-1981: patterns of resistance, patterns of reproduction. canadian journal of history of sport, 26(2), 1-18. paraschak, v. (1998). reasonable amusements: connecting the strands of physical culture in native lives. sport history review, 29, 121-131. 15 te hiwi: “what is the spirit of this gathering?” published by scholarship@western, 2014 paraschak, v. (2002). get into the mainstream: aboriginal sport in canada, 1967-2002. in v. paraschak & j. forsyth (eds.), north american indigenous games research symposium (pp. 23-29). winnipeg, mb: university of manitoba. primeau, t. h., & corntassel, j. (1995). indigenous “sovereignty” and international law: revised strategies for pursuing “self-determination.” human rights quarterly, 17(2), 343-365. ponting, r. j. (ed.). (1997). first nations in canada: perspectives on opportunity, empowerment, and self-determination. toronto, on: mcgraw-hill. taylor, d. (1995). a comparison of college athletic participants and nonparticipants on self-esteem. journal of student development, 36, 444-451. warburton, d. e., nicol, c. w., & bredin, s. s. (2006). health benefits of physical activity: the evidence. canadian medical association journal, 174(6), 801-809. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.6 the international indigenous policy journal october 2014 “what is the spirit of this gathering?” indigenous sport policy-makers and self-determination in canada braden p. te hiwi recommended citation “what is the spirit of this gathering?” indigenous sport policy-makers and self-determination in canada abstract keywords creative commons license â•œwhat is the spirit of this gathering?â•š indigenous sport policy-makers and self-determination in canada modernising water: articulating custom in water governance in australia and east timor the international indigenous policy journal volume 3 issue 3 water and indigenous peoples article 7 september 2012 modernising water: articulating custom in water governance in australia and east timor sue e. jackson csiro, division of ecosystem sciences, sue.jackson@csiro.au lisa r . palmer melbourne university, lrpalmer@unimelb.edu.au recommended citation jackson, s. e. , palmer, l. r. (2012). modernising water: articulating custom in water governance in australia and east timor. th e international indigenous policy journal, 3(3) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.7 modernising water: articulating custom in water governance in australia and east timor abstract the modernisation of water governance, which can entail resource commoditisation and privatisation, requires the reformation of water allocation institutions. in many parts of the world, such transformations have empowered statutory systems to dominate or marginalise parallel, extant customary systems of water governance. the water policy and management frameworks of australia and east timor (timor-leste) are at different stages of a modernisation trajectory; yet, both have extant systems of customary governance and so lend themselves to a comparative analysis. this paper describes the institutions and negotiating arenas through which indigenous peoples of these two countries seek to define, increase or influence their access to water, and the legitimacy of their water related values, ethics, and practices. institutional transformations are compared alongside local efforts to create space for the co-existence of custom while improving the economic standing of indigenous and local populations and the environmental quality of their territories. keywords customary water governance, indigenous water rights, water reform, east timor, australia, water resource management acknowledgments the research and fieldwork carried out by lisa palmer in east timor was supported by australian research council grants lp0561857 and dp1095131. the authors would like to thank the two anonymous reviewers for their constructive comments. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ modernising water: articulating custom in water governance in australia and east timor water has always been fundamental to the existence of human societies: to settlement patterns, economic development trajectories, environmental philosophies, and governance arrangements (vorosmarty et al., 2010). throughout the course of history, the critical need to secure human water supplies has generated a variety of social institutions that control and influence access to water (bruns & meinzen-dick, 2005). foremost amongst these institutions are property rights regimes. common property theorists, institutional analysts, and ethnographers have documented examples of institutional arrangements that achieved sustainable water management over hundreds of years. exemplary among these is the aboriginal occupation of the australian continent, which depended on knowledge of water distribution and use of technology to harvest water and aquatic resources for tens of thousands of years (lloyd, 1988). another example can be found in the famed balinese subak and temple network system, which co-ordinates wet rice agriculture across the island (lansing, 2007). competition for water between users extending beyond small, face-to-face communities poses collective action challenges of great complexity (bruns & meinzen-dick, 2005; scholz & stiftel, 2005). recent pressures from global population growth, increased demand for irrigation, the expanding urban footprint, and climate change have strained institutional water resource arrangements worldwide (boelens, chiba & nakashima, 2006; poff et al., 2003). it is estimated that nearly 80 percent (4.8 billion) of the world’s population (in 2000) lives in areas facing a very high threat to human water security or aquatic biodiversity (vorosmarty et al., 2010). of these 4.8 billion, 3.4 billion are particularly vulnerable because they reside in developing countries that have a reduced capacity to invest in water security technologies (vorosmarty et al., 2010). as well as investing in water supply systems, many countries are reforming their water management arrangements, particularly their water allocation institutions, to address growing water scarcity, conflicts between categories of users, and over-allocation, often incurred at the expense of the environment (bruns & meinzen dick, 2005; saleth & dinar, 2005). the mounting pressure on water resources is prompting the call for new approaches to water governance and management. in countries such as australia and south africa, wide ranging water law reforms have resulted in a “radical shift in the manner in which water is conceived in legal terms and the regulatory frameworks that control its allocation and distribution” (godden, 2005, p. 181). according to bruns, ringler, and mainzen-dick (2005), the transfer of water rights has been the major driver in global governance transformations. in an effort to increase the international competitiveness of their respective agricultural industries, countries such as australia, spain, and the western united states have promoted relatively secure tenure for irrigators and australia, mexico, south africa, chile, and china have advanced pro-market national water policies since the 1980s (bruns et al., 2005; madeleno, 2007). not all reforms involve changes to property rights. for example, to counter the negative effects of burgeoning urban growth and other competing land and water uses on the traditional balinese irrigation practices and associated social institutions, the government of indonesia has recently nominated the balinese subak system as a world heritage cultural landscape (ministry of culture and tourism of the republic of indonesia & the government of bali province, 2010). we argue here that reformist governments and multi-lateral institutions will need to take careful and holistic account of the socio-economic impacts on indigenous peoples who, in many parts of the world, maintain customary forms of governance and management and rely on aquatic environments for their livelihoods and well-being. for instance, reforms that create property in water to establish tradeable rights may privilege private property over communal or jointly-held property rights characteristic of most indigenous societies (prasad, 2007). as growth and development impose increasing pressure on natural systems (vorosmarty et al., 2010), it is critical that indigenous communities be able to effectively engage in natural resource development processes and institutional transformations to protect their customary use of water. in addition, customary systems are of interest in their own right as alternative modes of resource governance. attention to the study and promotion of community-based governance is, in some significant part, warranted because of the 1 jackson and palmer: modernising water published by scholarship@western, 2012 “perceived failure and recognised limitations of state-centred and market-based approaches” (schlager, 2005, p. 38). this paper describes the customary water governance systems of two neighbouring countries, australia and east timor, each at a different stage in modernising and reforming their water sectors. australia has been a global leader in reforming its sector, while east timor has yet to institute its first national water resource law or policy. the paper examines the difficulties facing indigenous and local communities that are attempting to have their rights to assert control of their waterscapes recognized in the face of rapidly changing water governance institutions. over the last few decades australia has experienced momentous changes in water policy and law. from this period of historic reform, we reveal valuable lessons for east timor, one of the world’s newest nations, and for other countries facing water reform. the case studies develop and illustrate two themes relating to empowerment in the face of changing resource governance systems: (a) recognition and prioritisation of co-existing systems of customary governance; and (b) inclusion of ethical concerns and complex inter-relationships between people and water in governance reforms. this paper is structured as follows. the next section defines customary water governance systems; then case studies describe these systems in australia and east timor. an overview of the recent sectoral reforms in the two countries is then provided, with a description of some indigenous and local responses to these changes and policy interventions in each country. in the discussion, we compare the cases and draw out similarities and differences and, in doing so, conclude that there is an urgent need for policymakers and practitioners pursuing integrated water resource management to (re)consider the importance of foundational indigenous and local peoples’ water related values, ethics, and practices. customary systems of water governance at local levels in some countries, community allocation and management systems that have endured the colonial period continue to play a significant role in managing water systems. the term “customary governance” is defined here as law and rules based on long-standing practice and hereditary principles of social organisation, which are not usually codified in written form. it is important to note the point made by analysts of legal pluralism, such as bruns and meinzen-dick (2005), that, rather than there being a dualistic state and customary relationship, there is often a complex interaction between state law and local law, one that “might include local norms and practices, village and district governments, and religious values and leaders, as well as other ideas and principles at the community level” (p. 12). the existence of diverse customary institutions that govern the sharing, distribution, and consumption of water has been analysed in many countries, such as chile (madaleno, 2007), indonesia (lansing, 2007), east timor (palmer, 2010, 2011), australia (jackson & altman, 2009; langton, 2006), and kenya (gachenko, 2012). analysts have paid particular attention to: (a) the creation of local rights and allocation systems in regions reliant on irrigated agriculture (very often these systems predate colonial rule); (b) the religious foundation of ritual practices that sustain the sanctity and productivity of cultural landscapes; and (c) the hydrological knowledge held by water users. for example, in most parts of rural africa customary institutions continue to exercise an important role in governance of water resources (gachenko, 2012). in that region, as in many others, customary institutions are founded on social and cultural norms, along with sanctions and dispute resolution mechanisms in the event of a breach of the accepted norms or rules. the interface between statutory and customary water rights has also been the subject of anthropological, legal, and policy analysis (jackson, 2011; ramazotti, 2008; roth, boelens, & zwarteveen, 2005; schlager, 2005; weir 2009), although it is argued by bruns and meinzen-dick (2005) that changes affecting water tenure have received less attention than changes to land tenure institutions. burchi (2011), for example, refers to a number of water laws that give consideration to customary water rights and practices, such as the regulatory systems for water abstraction and wastewater disposal permitting in namibia, and similar 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.7 regulatory arrangements in mozambique, chile, and paraguay. interactions between state and indigenous systems have been closely studied in the usa, where schlager (2005), for example, argues, american courts have been suspicious of customary law and practices, refusing to allow longstanding practices to “create legal rights that would govern communities.” customary rights were viewed as antidemocratic and courts argued that communities should be governed by open, constitutional practices. (p. 34) burchi’s (2011) overview of international trends in recognising customary water governance concludes that laws will more likely treat customary rights and interests superficially (e.g. in russia, indonesia, nicaragua, and tanzania) than treat them equally. noting that many laws include an explicit acknowledgement and safeguard of customary rights for water in general, he argues that the effect is inconsequential as customary rights are relegated to “a legal limbo” (p. 3). customary rights are dealt with by “basically separating them out of the mainstream ‘modern’ water rights regulated by statute, and by creating a separate legal space for them” (burchi, 2011, p. 3). northern chile is an exemplar, according to a study by madaleno (2007) who found that the privatisation of water and allocation of water rights to mining companies has had a profoundly adverse impact on the region’s indigenous communities, resulting in some cases where communities have migrated away from ancestral estates. madeleno (2007) stated: the 1981 water code, which separated water from land ownership, ascribed separately superficial and groundwater resources, and permitted faster return activities, such as mining, to appropriate all available water rights. ancestral group loyalties were broken and the water cycle and the ecosystem approach, for so long respected, abandoned by the new water management models. (p. 204) in the following section, we describe the indigenous customary water governance systems of australia and east timor before turning to an analysis of sectoral reforms and their impact on the indigenous people of these countries. australia australia has a stable liberal democratic political system, which functions as a federal parliamentary democracy and constitutional monarchy. the federation comprises six states and several territories. within australian society, indigenous australians are a culturally distinct group representing approximately 2 percent of the total population of approximately 22 million, which is heavily concentrated in conurbations of the country’s southeast. while indigenous people own approximately 23 percent of the australian landmass (altman, buchanan, & larson, 2007), these lands are mostly in the remote northern and central regions where there has been limited water resource development. regarded as a highly developed country, australia’s economy is the world’s thirteenth largest and its per capita income is the world’s fifth highest. water, like energy and clean air, makes an essential contribution to australia’s social well-being, lifestyles, and the maintenance of the natural systems that underpin economic activity (foran & poldy, 2002). australia is the driest inhabited continent on earth with the least runoff per unit area, the lowest percentage of rainfall as runoff, and the least amount of water in its rivers. australia’s water resources are highly variable and reflect a continental range of climatic conditions and terrain (chartres & williams, 2006). the level of development of australia’s water resources in the north and south also shows a marked contrast. the majority of southern australia’s water systems, which are also the country’s most agriculturally productive, are fully allocated or over-allocated; and the most productive region, the murray-darling basin, is facing a water crisis brought about by overuse, degradation of wetlands, and severe drought (grafton & connell, 2011). as noted above, indigenous land ownership is very high in the region’s remote north and central areas where commercial and 3 jackson and palmer: modernising water published by scholarship@western, 2012 industrial water use is negligible1; it became a significant factor shaping the level of political influence indigenous people wield in these very different parts of the country. before becoming a british colony, indigenous people exercised group or joint property rights over water for many thousands of years. access to territory and natural resources was regulated through social convention and rules differed across the continent in response to the abundance and reliability of resources (hiscock, 2008). availability of water shaped the movement of territorial groups, and rich, complex cultural landscapes were constructed around spiritually powerful water bodies, such as rock-holes and billabongs, created by ancestral beings. successful hunting and foraging strategies relied on oral instruction and stylised mapping of traditional knowledge regarding the type and location of water supplies (bayly, 1999). in most parts of australia, the pre-colonial hunter-gatherer economy did not rely upon agriculture and, therefore, had little need for irrigation systems. however, in some parts of southern australia, aquaculture was practiced and surface water systems were controlled to maintain the productivity of fisheries (bandler, 1993; richards, 2011). in those parts of the country where indigenous people have maintained customary systems of governance (see jackson & altman, 2009; langton, 2006; toussaint, sullivan, & yu, 2005), they must now co-exist alongside the relatively recently introduced, and still evolving, state systems that encompass a mix of regulatory and market-based allocation mechanisms (to be discussed below), scientific methods of resource assessment and management, and efforts to achieve transparency in water planning procedures, including opportunities for public participation in water management decisions. under provincial (state) law, water is vested in the crown; therefore, statutory water management systems empower water authorities to regulate water resources and licence water users, and, in doing so, privilege mainstream management approaches, values, and concepts over those practiced or held by indigenous people (jackson, 2006; jackson, tan, mooney, hoverman, & white, 2012; weir, 2009). water, however, continues to play a central role in indigenous societies and distinct cultural perspectives on water are manifest in many regions of the country (barber & jackson, 2011; langton, 2006; toussaint et al., 2005; weir, 2009). these perspectives relate to identity and attachment to place, environmental knowledge, resource security, and the exercise of custodial responsibilities to manage inter-related parts of customary estates. in indigenous belief systems, water is a sacred, elemental source and symbol of life (langton, 2006) and aquatic resources constitute a vital part of the indigenous customary economy (jackson & altman, 2009). in this paper, we focus on water, noting, however, that an exclusive focus on water values is antithetical to the holistic quality of indigenous environmental perceptions and discourse that consistently emphasise connectivity and relationships between features and components of the socio-ecological system. indigenous hydrological knowledge and cultural relationships to water are understood within the context of an overarching belief system or cosmology relating to the origin and ongoing maintenance of the physical environment and the distinct cultures and social groups that reside within it. this is commonly referred to in english as “the dreaming,” derived from translations of its equivalents in indigenous languages, usually derivations of the words for “dream” (cooper & jackson, 2008). water features strongly in indigenous cosmology, according to which water sources and rivers were derived from the powerful actions of mythic beings during the dreaming, when the world attained its present shape, and the socio-cultural institutions governing present water use were formed (barber & rumley, 2003; toussaint et al., 2005).                                                                                                                           1in the tropical north, where population density is below one person per square kilometre, indigenous people represent one quarter of the population and control close to 30 percent of the land mass; whereas, in the murray darling basin, only 3.5 percent of the population is indigenous and in control of only 2 percent of the land base. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.7 in contrast to the dominant western notion of water as a resource owned and/or managed by the state, with competing commercial, environmental, recreational, and cultural values, there is an overarching indigenous view that water, which has multiple inseparable values, is created by ancestral forces. cooper and jackson (2008) illustrate this perspective in wardaman creation stories from the katherine region of the northern territory, where local narratives: envisage a primeval epoch when there was only the ocean (saltwater) and a landscape of sand. from the actions of the rainbow serpent that lived in the saltwater, and other creation beings, the present landscape took shape in a series of events – a flood that covered the world and from which only a few survived in the highest places; the actions of the black-headed python, walujapi, and water python, kunitjarri, in creating the rivers and creeks which drained the land and established the division between land and ocean; and in actions which established the hydrological cycle of clouds and rain and, ultimately, the present physical forms of landscape, rocks, trees, animals and people. (p. 26) these world-creating events have detailed local-level expression, manifested in a vast system of land-based cultural sites, connections, and networks underpinned by the cultural knowledge encoded in the song lines, some of which run for thousands of kilometres through the countries of many different cultural groups. the corporate organisation that was required to maintain such expansive, shared cultural traditions was itself both extensive and highly sophisticated, necessitating the bringing together of large regional gatherings of many different cultural groups on an annual basis to perform the major ceremonies (song cycles) and at the same time to mediate shared cultural, social, and economic interests in land and water. spiritual life and ritualised practices in many australian regions continue to draw on water bodies and water symbols for inspiration (see for example barber & jackson, 2011; weir, 2009). water sources are powerful places in the cultural landscape, acting as points of concentration for the ancestral forces, and conception sites of immense importance to individual and group identity and social relations (langton, 2002). strang (2005) describes water’s role in cape york aboriginal cosmologies: aboriginal groups in cape york share with other australian indigenous communities a cosmology in which the landscape and its waterway are the products of ancestral creativity, in what is locally known as the story time. having formed all the water sources, as well as other features of the land, the ancestral beings “sat down”, remaining in the land and water as sentient forces with the power to provide (or withhold) resources for the human inhabitants of the area. in doing so, they defined the spatial and social organisation of aboriginal clans, providing each with totemic links to particular places and tracts of country, and to each other. (p. 369) east timor east timor constitutes the eastern half of the timor island in the indonesian archipelago. following 24 years of indonesian rule and centuries of portuguese colonial rule, it (re)gained its independence in may 2002. while the national languages are tetum and portuguese, at least 16 distinct local languages are spoken across different parts of the 13 administrative districts. the country has a population of approximately one million. although subject to centuries of uneven portuguese colonial rule, the occupation of the country by indonesia from 1975 resulted in an intensified disruption of timorese land and resource uses through forced population movements and relocation, ongoing military surveillance, and conflict with timorese resistance forces (cavr, 2006). throughout the occupation, the timorese suffered severe abuses of human rights and the loss of approximately a quarter of its population (cavr, 2006). the eventual withdrawal of indonesian troops in 1999 resulted in the widespread destruction of property and infrastructure (tanter, ball, & van klinken, 2006). hence, independent east timor faces a suite of complex social and economic challenges as it rebuilds itself from bureaucratic and infrastructural ashes into a modern nation state (hill & saldanha, 2001; philpott, 2006). since 1999, two united nations peacekeeping and state building missions (1999 – 2002; 2006 – 5 jackson and palmer: modernising water published by scholarship@western, 2012 present) and the independent government of east timor (2002 – present) have continued to struggle with enormous development and reconstruction challenges. the country is the poorest in asia. poverty estimates indicate that 49.9 percent of east timorese live on less than us$1 a day (directorate of national statistics, 2007). resource management and conservation form a significant national priority in east timor (fitzpatrick & mcwilliam, 2005), and the government has recognized in its national development planning the need to involve local communities in environmental governance (east timor national planning commission, 2002). however, in relation to the detail of developing land tenure and resource management regimes, it is unclear at this stage what legal and administrative measures will be adopted to support and provide protection for the myriad of culturally distinct local communities – entities with their own governance structures and local knowledge systems (fitzpatrick, 2002; mcwilliam 2002, 2003; ospina & hohe, 2002). this process raises key issues for the ways in which local peoples are or are not being allowed to be active decision makers and participants in the development process at various stages (howitt, 2001). similar to indigenous customs and traditions elsewhere in the eastern archipelagic region (fox, 1997), in east timor, the indigenous worldview is based in an understanding of place as enlivened by an ancestral and nature spirit world (hicks, 1976). in this world, families of (usually) patrilineal lineages are organised around origin groups linked to particular sacred houses (uma lulik), and, in many cases, sacred springs or other water bodies, which embed these families in intimate, intergenerational social, political, and economic relationships with their extended kin from other areas. links between these houses and with the surrounding environment are embedded in a world of obligation and reciprocity built around dualisms, such as male or female, wife givers or wife takers, younger sibling or older sibling, indigene or newcomer, political authority or ritual authority, visible or invisible, and a suite of environmental metaphors, such as trunk or tips, wet or dry, water or fire, raw or cooked—the harmonious (or conflictual) relations between which ensure the “flow of life” (fox, 1980; kehi & palmer, forthcoming). during the 500 years of portuguese colonialism, timor experienced only an indirect and often tenuous foreign rule. this indigenous worldview remained both strong and the paradigm around which daily political and economic life continued to revolve (gunn, 1999). the violence and control of the indonesian era (1975 2002) saw a widespread suppression of autonomous local rule. however, in the independence era there is currently a revitalisation of indigenous custom and tradition relating to resource use, and local people in the districts are revelling in their freedom to re-instigate many practices which were repressed during two and a half decades of violent indonesian rule (barnes, 2011; carvalho & coreia, 2011; mcwilliam, 2003; meitzner yoder, 2005; oxfam & gtz, 2003; palmer, 2007a). one of these increasingly revitalized traditions is the practice of tara bandu, which involves imposing ritual prohibitions on an area and protecting significant water sources (bemalae lagoon in the country’s west is a famed example). the annual mechi or seaworm harvest in the far east is another example of customary resource management practices with elders sanctioning the harvest (see palmer & carvalho, 2008). while not technically banned during the indonesian occupation, such practices were effectively suppressed due the restrictive movement and congregation rules enforced by the indonesian military and the consequences, potentially fatal, of gathering in large numbers to conduct ceremonies. since independence, however, tara bandu and other such practices have reappeared in many communities across the country. across the wider region, water is understood as a communicator, a cleanser, and the purveyor of life and health; as well, in some cases, it is an ultimate destination in death (jennaway, 2008; cf. kehi & palmer, forthcoming; lansing, 2006, 2007; palmer, n.d.). in this way water is viewed through the prism of relationship (for example, relations between the visible and invisible, life and death, water custodians and water users), not as a possessory form of individuated property. such understandings create social, cultural, and ecological categories and forms of organization grounded in inter-dependent relationships; a ritual and political ecology 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.7 of water guides people in their ethical obligations to, and aesthetic interactions with, the environment and each other (see palmer, n.d.). for example, in baucau, in the eastern part of the island, the karst spring systems that feed the traditionally irrigated rice fields on the northern edge of the baucau plateau are the focus of complicated local annual and seven year regional cycles of ritual sacrifice and ceremony. these rituals function to spiritually and literally open water sources by sending, receiving, dividing, and sharing water between springs and water channels, and consecrating and sharing the fruits of production between regional communities. in light of such practices, it is evident that baucau’s owners or custodians of the rice fields are holders of complicated socioecological knowledge, which functions to organize both irrigation co-operatives and rice growing practices. indeed, these practices are not dissimilar to the “integrated system of ritualized ecological management” famously described by lansing (2007, p. 14), in bali with the local baucau irrigation co-operatives and regional spring networks being reminiscent (at a smaller scale and without the direct hindu influence) of balinese subak (irrigation cooperatives) and associated water temple networks. from a local perspective, the regional karstic landscape creates a web of interconnected seepages and underground channels stretching from the central mountains to the plateau and marine terrace coastal zone, and complicated ritual and socioecological relationships between dry in-land and wet coastal-land farming communities (palmer, n.d.). here, at the intersection of local traditions and resource governance, complicated processes create webbed networks of people, named water sources, rice fields, and other places drawing people together into collectivities to communicate and negotiate exchange with each other as well as deities, spirit beings, and ancestors (hicks, 2007; jennaway, 2008; kehi & palmer, forthcoming; palmer, 2010, n.d.; traube, 1986). at the intersection of cosmology, politics, and resource management (named water sources and water pathways) are origin narratives, social identity, and political authority for particular communities. conversely, they also provide a meta-narrative for a more sinuous cosmopolitics comprised of spiritually-linked human and nonhuman agents, as well as a pragmatic need for fluidity in a region where water pathways are understood enigmatically and population movements have led to numerous contests over the control of land and resources (palmer, n.d.). illuminating the above broadly similar “customary” understandings and management of water as both foundational to, and integrated within, holistic local and regional systems of inter-relationship and exchange (whether this be in australia or east timor), we now turn to a discussion of state sanctioned water governance and institutional reforms in these two jurisdictions, as well as the responses of indigenous and local communities in these contexts. water governance and institutional reform statutory systems in australia australia derived its legal systems from english models, including tenets relating to water. the common law systems for regulating water use reflected non-indigenous environmental contexts and, as a result, these water laws imported regulatory forms, which were based on inappropriate assumptions (godden, 2005; taylor & stokes, 2005). the british occupation of australia entailed the dispossession of aboriginal people who were deprived of much of their lands and mostly restricted to reserves set aside for their use. over the course of two hundred years, the colonial system of common law water administration was gradually adapted to suit the continent’s predominantly arid conditions. throughout the nineteenth century, statutory frameworks for the public management of water were introduced and, in most jurisdictions, water was vested in government instrumentalities through specific legislation (godden, 2005). godden (2005) notes that the nexus linking water use to land as a basis for agricultural development remained during this period. throughout the twentieth century, a complex institutional structure of multi-level water instrumentalities developed to meet the growing demand for consumptive water in the agricultural regions. under that system of public control of water resources, private persons could exercise rights to access water resources on the basis of land access 7 jackson and palmer: modernising water published by scholarship@western, 2012 rights (often limited to domestic and stock use), access rights under personal licences that were usually attached to the title of the land, or rights to receive a supply of water from a public water utility (gardner, bartlett, gray, & carney, 2009). legislative regimes and water managers did not address either the environmental or social consequences of water resource development for indigenous people during the first two hundred years of settlement. in facilitating agriculture, pastoralism, and urban development, the settler society greatly modified land systems and changed the quality, quantity, and flow patterns of rivers in all but a small number of australia’s remote drainage basins to the extent that, by the end of the twentieth century, sustainable water management was acknowledged as a major national goal. problems intimately connected to water use, particularly for irrigated agriculture (drought, salinity, water scarcity), have since been more influential in bringing about institutional change (hillman & howitt, 2008; national water commission, 2011). awareness of the physical limits to expanding demand for water from increasing numbers of interconnected users, coupled with greater scientific knowledge of hydrological variability, focussed public policy and research attention on water resource allocation institutions and integrated catchment management. economic arguments relating to the cost of supplying water and maintaining a large irrigation infrastructure could be heard more frequently around this time, and an ideological shift in favour of market-based allocation emerged as the preferred mechanism for transferring water rights and achieving greater efficiency in the use of water. consistent with global neoliberal shifts in environmental governance (bakker, 2007), private property rights were privileged over orthodox regulatory regimes, and market institutions were deployed as a means of improving the water sector. economic doctrine predicted that trading water rights would redistribute water from low-value activities (e.g. water inefficient industries) to higher-valued uses (e.g., municipal domestic uses, more water efficient agriculture, and industrial uses) (donohew, 2009). australia thus turned away from decades of administrative water allocation with the 1994 water reform framework, which encompassed market-based allocation based on limited supplies and principles of sustainability and resource management. competition reforms in other utility sectors (e.g. electricity) provided an impetus to change. a cap on diversions in the murray–darling basin and the provision of water for the environment were accompanied by the separation of water access entitlements from land titles, consumptionbased water pricing, more precise specification of rights, and the establishment of a market for water trade (heaney, dwyer, beare, peterson, & pechey, 2006). conversion of most of the former landholder, licence, supply, and public utility rights to access that have the legal character of private property (a water access entitlement) was a central feature of the reform (gardner et al., 2009). market-based and regulatory measures were to support environmental requirements (godden, 2005). the public was to be widely consulted in developing water plans; however, at the policy level, the specific impact of these early reforms on indigenous communities was overlooked (jackson, 2011). a turning point for australian water governance came with the high court’s mabo decision and native title act 1993. in the mabo decision, the high court recognised for the first time the entitlements of indigenous people to their traditional lands under their customary laws. when the native title act was passed, the scope was defined to include rights over waters located within traditional estate boundaries. the native title act confirms governmental ownership of water and minerals, while guaranteeing rights to customary use of resources for sustenance (hunting, gathering, and fishing). the right to protect sites or areas of significance that include waters has been recognised as a native title right (bartlett, 2004). such rights will be subject to existing laws and grants and are more limited in nature than rights attached to land. legal specialists, such as mcfarlane (2004) and bartlett (2004), expect that native title rights to water will continue to be interpreted as non-exclusive and non-commercial in nature, i.e. for domestic and subsistence purposes only. but uncertainty about the extent and nature of native title rights remains high and there have been few achievements in the process (strelein, 2004; tehan, 2003). 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.7 customary uses protected by the native title act are often dependent on the quality and quantity of freshwater (finn & jackson, 2011); nevertheless, there is negligible formal consideration of water use activities on native title rights. some commentators argue that australian water managers are taking a narrow view of their obligation to protect native title from impairment by over-allocation upstream (behrendt & thompson, 2004; mcavoy 2006; tan & jackson, in press). this and other factors, such as the lack of procedural rights and questions about compensation, compound the uncertainty in native title. an important phase of institutional evolution commenced in 2004 when australia embarked on a national response to further adapt water governance regimes with an intergovernmental agreement, the national water initiative (nwi). this policy, developed to address environmental degradation of water resources due to inefficient uses and over-allocation of water, expanded the market-based agenda formulated in the 1990s. the emphasis given to market-based incentives has distorted the latest reforms, according to godden (2005) who states that the “mechanism of the market that was promoted as the tool to resolve these problems appears to have assumed a life of its own” (p. 190). the development of water trading regimes and questions of security of entitlement for water users are to be given “first emphasis,” and environmental protection is perceived to be an outcome of these processes “rather than a first imperative to be addressed” (p. 191). among many economic and environmental reform objectives (connell, dovers, & grafton, 2005), the nwi negotiators intended to address the previous neglect of indigenous rights and interests. the nwi explicitly recognises the special character of indigenous interests in water, particularly native title rights (paras. 52-54). indigenous access to water is to be achieved through planning processes that: • include indigenous representation in water planning, wherever possible; • incorporate indigenous social, spiritual, and customary objectives and strategies for achieving these objectives, wherever they can be developed; • take account of the possible existence of native title rights to water in the catchment or aquifer area; • potentially allocate water to native title holders; and • account for any water allocated to native titleholders for “traditional cultural purposes.” federal and state governments reformed their water statutes to implement the nwi; however, there is no easily identifiable australian model of water resource legislation. australia’s approaches to indigenous access to water, as a result, are inconsistent, ad hoc, and underdeveloped (tan & jackson, in press). mcfarlane (2004), jackson & morrison (2007), and jackson et al. (2012) note certain challenges and impediments specific to the treatment of indigenous interests in water management, including the neglect of commercial interests in policy definitions of water property, lack of mandatory measures, and insufficient attention to genuine community partnerships with indigenous communities in water planning. these analyses all conclude that indigenous australians face a high degree of competition and contestation over water in the absence of a policy or legal framework that prioritises their rights or interests. further, they unanimously conclude that indigenous expectations to directly participate in water management institutions are not being met (jackson et al., 2012; national water commission, 2011). of particular note is that the policy has had a negligible effect on the distribution of water to indigenous people. according to estimates by jackson and langton (2012), indigenous-specific water entitlements represent less than 0.01 percent of australian water diversions.2                                                                                                                           2  this estimate of “indigenous-specific” water entitlements does not include provision of water under licence for irrigation, pastoral activities, or industrial use, which, although not well documented, is acknowledged as small in the agricultural heartland of australia, the murray darling basin. provision of water for these licensed purposes is available to any australian person or entity – whether indigenous or otherwise – to buy at market prices or inherit with land titles granted prior to the separation of land and water titles.   9 jackson and palmer: modernising water published by scholarship@western, 2012 community strategies to maintain control of waterscapes indigenous people have responded in a variety of ways to the limited statutory recognition of customary water rights and underpinning systems of management in australia, ranging from policy advocacy to engaging in conservation management activities. a number of indigenous ngos can be seen participating in water policy debates in order to have a determining say in the definition and distribution of benefits that flow from access to water and asserting their rights to commercially valuable resources, while others have placed greater emphasis on community-based efforts to manage threats to aquatic ecosystems and the lifeways they sustain, using their skills and knowledge to restore the health of aquatic ecosystems to standards set by local communities. in 2009, for the first time in australia, the federal water minister established an indigenous advisory group (first people’s water engagement council), to provide space for indigenous perspectives and policy positions to be voiced. notwithstanding the existence of this national group, geographic differences are apparent in the focus and influence of these efforts with remote indigenous communities in the north of the country being more able to exercise control over natural resources than their counterparts in the settled agricultural regions of southern australia (jackson & langton, 2012). a group particularly effective in their role as “water policy entrepreneurs” (meijerink & huitema, 2010) is the indigenous water policy group formed and supported by the north australian indigenous land and sea management alliance (nailsma). this non-government organisation is attempting to build the capacity of indigenous land-owning groups in northern australia to respond to the rapidly transforming legal and economic landscape as water law in the county’s north is brought into line with national policy and water trading is promoted as the most efficient mechanism for allocating water (see jackson & altman, 2009; nikolakis, 2011). leading up to the world water forum of 2008, the group convened an international meeting of indigenous advocates in australia, which resulted in the garma international indigenous water declaration (www.nailsma.org.au). nailsma has also released domestic policy statements (see the mary river declaration, 2009) and is advocating the declaration of strategic indigenous reserves in a number of northern territory water allocation plans. one of these plans, the mataranka tindal aquifer plan, currently in draft, contemplates an allocation of as much as 25 percent of the consumptive pool to indigenous land-owners (department of natural resources, environment, the arts and sport [dnretas], 2011). the water would be available for commercial use in horticultural activities and temporarily traded when water markets are established (nikolakis, 2011). in response to the environmental and social impacts of land and water degradation, a number of indigenous organisations and communities are pursuing biodiversity conservation activities on their lands under their own initiative or in concert with state water or land management agencies (altman et al., 2007; putnis, josif, & woodward, 2007). local systems of customary law dictate that traditional landowners have a substantive role in land and water management; hence, indigenous people expect to participate fully in environmental management decisions. as a result, there has been a tremendous growth in community-based indigenous natural and cultural resource management, much of it funded by the commonwealth government’s environment agency; for example, there are currently approximately 500 indigenous people working in land and sea management groups in the northern territory (putnis et al., 2007). local responses to land and water management pressures, such as weeds, pollution, and land clearing, have been diverse, ranging from leaseback of protected areas to government conservation agencies and selfdeclaration of inalienable freehold land to be included in the conservation estate as indigenous protected areas, to the small-scale community activities undertaken by indigenous “ranger” groups. during the last decade, many community-based organisations have expanded their focus on co-management of protected areas to include more strategic and comprehensive catchment-scale approaches to tackling threats to the waterscapes of their customary estates (jackson, storrs, & morrison, 2005). many of these organisations are now evolving into social enterprise organisations capable of generating income and employment for people in 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.7 remote regions (putnis et al., 2007). the expectation is that if indigenous groups can attract payment for the environmental services they provide on an equitable basis, then this funding could ameliorate indigenous poverty while simultaneously addressing the investment deficit in environmental management on the indigenous estate (altman et al., 2007; muller, 2008). however, the sector faces a number of significant constraints: the funding base is inadequate and insecure; time frames are short and approaches ad hoc; eligibility criteria are constantly shifting; reporting requirements are burdensome; and the lack of recurrent core funding constrains the indigenous sector in its efforts to respond to environmental problems and meet the social and cultural responsibilities of indigenous community members. statutory systems in east timor east timor’s water governance systems are rapidly transforming as a result of international interventions (ngos, multilateral banks, international treaties, and conventions), the growth of the private sector, and the reconstruction and development agenda of the government of east timor. since its independence, with heightened awareness of the need to conserve variable and limited water supplies and with water and sanitation services either non-existent or in critical disrepair across much of the country, timor has been in the process of developing a national water supply policy and instituting statutory water resource management (see “east timor national water supply policy,” 2010). according to the timorese constitution, all water resources are owned by the state, and recent policies attribute responsibility to the state directorate of water resources management for ensuring that water resources are regulated, allocated between competing demands, and protected from contamination (ministry of infrastructure, 2010). donor banks have supported resource assessments to better understand the characteristics and limits of water resources, especially the country’s substantial groundwater resources (furness, 2004). the increase in the number of stakeholders in the water sector, including international donors3 and the private sector, has highlighted the need for an umbrella water policy to integrate across sectors, clarify roles and responsibilities, and prioritise competing objectives (ministry of infrastructure, 2010). a water services decree was promulgated in 2004 to guide the water sector in its strategic planning and dayto-day activities, and relevant water directorates are now in the process of revising that law and fashioning a national water policy using the global water tool kit (integrated water resources management) (ministry of infrastructure, 2010). it is significant to note here that, in the drafting of relevant laws and policies, international advisors have been careful to pay attention to the need to transform the water sector according to international “best practice” treaties and conventions. at the same time, it is also acknowledged that all aspects of water sector development must proceed from a very low base and that there is a desperate need to facilitate, as quickly as possible, the provision of basic services to alleviate the considerable burden and health risk faced by families and communities with difficult, little, or no access to a domestic water supply. yet, it must also be noted that, despite the fact that international donors have directed significant resources at the sector, water programs and projects have struggled to achieve sustainable results. for example, outside urban areas the model of water supply management adopted by the development industry in east timor (and indeed elsewhere as discussed above) has been based on community participation (mcgregor, 2007; schoffel, 2006). this was due, partly, to the structural limitations of developing much needed state-operated water and sanitation services (including lack of technical capacity and operating funds) (schoffel, 2006). in 2006, the asian development bank published a consultant’s report titled “east timor: community-managed water supply and sanitation” (schoffel, 2006), and, interestingly, the report was scathing in its analysis of the effectiveness of what is considered internationally to be a model of “best practice” community participation in water supply management (schoffel, 2006). in contradistinction to most critics of the failure of                                                                                                                           3 the government has pledged to meet its millennium development goal target to provide 75 percent of the rural population and 86 percent of the urban population with access to safe water by 2015 (ministry of infrastructure, 2010). 11 jackson and palmer: modernising water published by scholarship@western, 2012 community-based development in east timor, the report concludes that the issue is not one of a lack of community education, which most proponents of the model argue can be addressed with the investment of more time and follow-up resources (schoffel, 2006). the report does not discuss the existence of customary water use groups, their governance processes, or, indeed, locally enforced practices such as sanctions (see above and costin & powell, 2006; palmer n.d.). rather, schoffel (2006) concludes that the model of community participation, planning, and management was itself the problem. in all community water projects surveyed in east timor, schoffel (2006) found that, despite the assumptions embedded in the model, there was no evidence that people in these communities will “voluntarily obey collectively agreed rules to equitably share, pay for, and take care of common property without sanctions to enforce the rules” (p. 11). hence, the report concludes that “piped water supply systems are unlikely to be sustainable in any circumstances in east timor without an established and qualified institution that is empowered by the state to manage them, carry out repairs and maintenance, collect user fees, and impose regulations on use and sanctions on abuse” (p.15). in contrast to the above report, another report funded by the asia development bank does mention the significance of traditional beliefs, customs, and practices to the management of timor’s water resources (costin & powell, 2006). at one point, it reports on concerns about the high rate of project failures, associated problems with water users groups, and the need to better understand the influence of “tradition” at this interface (costin & powell, 2006). it also states, however, that “the influence of ‘traditional’ beliefs and practices associated with water use and allocation in urban environments is largely invisible to most residents, if they exist at all” (costin & powell, 2006, p. 72). yet, research conducted by palmer (2010, 2011) in the country’s second largest centre of baucau indicates that, in this urban centre at least, concerns about the customary use and allocation of water remain a foundational aspect of local social and political life. recognition of the importance of water-related custom and tradition is also present in a draft version of the state’s water resources law recently viewed by the authors (ministry of infrastructure, 2012). in relation to customary law the draft states that: 1. prevailing customary law within the scope of this law is recognised and shall still apply unless it conflicts with the enforcement of this law in accordance with the purpose stated in article 2.4 2. access, distribution, use, and charges or contributions for such use of water regulated by customary law shall be fair and equitable both within and between communities. 3. disputes related to sub-article 2 shall be resolved in accordance with prevailing principles and procedures of customary law. 4. where dispute resolution in accordance with prevailing principles and procedures of customary law fails, communities or directly affected parties may bring the dispute to the responsible member of the government for a resolution. 5. dispute resolution by the responsible member of the government shall be based on the purpose and provisions of this law. 6. resolutions made by the responsible member of the government may be brought to the courts of law. the draft further proposes to recognise and incorporate into regulatory law the above mentioned traditional resource governance system known in tetum as tara bandu. yet, in order for this to be more than a superficial reckoning, we will argue below that the state will need to give more consideration to the interaction between customary and statutory principles and be prepared to compromise power and share                                                                                                                           4 for example, article 2 (a) refers to the purpose of the law being the need “[t]o ensure that the water resources of east timor are managed in an efficient, equitable, and sustainable manner to meet the social and economic needs of present and future generations while protecting the environment and cultural values of east timor.” 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.7 resources to a much greater extent than the draft law currently envisages. for example, at the same time as it recognises a role for tara bandu, the law also proposes designating legal “owners” for all elements of the water supply system and imposing a state cost recovery tariff on water use (ministry of infrastructure, 2010). it is unclear what the implications of these measures will be for extant customary systems of water resource use and sharing. community strategies to maintain control of waterscapes it is obvious that, in the realm of water governance in east timor, there is an urgent need for a greater understanding of the ways in which alternate practices and claims to resources can lead to more integrated, sustainable environmental management practices (altman & jackson, 2008; lansing, 2007; strang & toussaint, 2008). with ritual at its core, the customary economy is embedded in reciprocal social relations where local resources (land, water, trees, fields) are understood as relational fields “whose offerings to humans must be compensated through sacrifice” (yang, 2000, p. 482). it is an understanding of power and of the world, which enlivens and connects both place and people. as such, a framework is needed for working through critical environmental governance challenges in the region and enabling effective decision making over resources and their allocation. such a framework must take into account a broader socio-cultural understanding of interdependence at the social, economic, and environmental level. as discussed above, with the support of elements of timorese civil society, many communities have begun to make use of the “power of spectacle,” staging events, such as tara bandu, as public performances to be captured on film and radio by a burgeoning media interest in timorese cultural traditions. many such events are also significant as the self-conscious expansion of the local political and ritual spheres into the national body politic (see barnes, 2011, palmer, 2007a; palmer & carvalho, 2008). in these circumstances, local communities are seeking an active role in the designation and management of their community lands and waters, and demonstrations of extant resource management capacities through practices, such as tara bandu, are highly important political interventions. whilst these interventions seem to be gaining traction in east timor’s developing formal resource management sector, it is also clear that such instances of customary governance are valued by the state as local mechanisms “to conserve and promote the environment and the preservation and sustainable use of natural resources” (ministry of infrastructure, 2012, article 10 (2) of the draft water resources law). however, from a local standpoint, tara bandu is not just about conserving and promoting the environment and the preservation and sustainable use of natural resources, rather it is more broadly interpreted as a practice which regulates a range of place-based social and environmental relationships. while local communities are able to attract support for, and are encouraged to carry out, tara bandu activities perceived as environmentally beneficial by the government and civil society, tara bandu is for local communities as much about the management of people’s behaviours and local governance systems as it is about environmental management (barnes, 2011; comissao justica e paz paroquia viqueque, 2005; palmer, 2007a). in this sense, there is no separation between a community’s natural, cultural, and economic resources. representing practices drawn from the customary realm as one-dimensional tools for nature or water conversation, elides the social and political complexities, which constitute both their “traditional” and modern day character. elsewhere in the region, zerner (1994) has written about the risks of customary systems becoming beholden to external regulatory control whereby “the complicated ritual nexus in which these practices are embedded has been reduced to a sparse, functional system” (p. 107). it is at this stage unclear whether the conversation in timor between customary practice and the “outside” world will allow for maintenance of local direction and control or whether customary practice will succumb to external manipulation. while in some parts of east timor, such as the oecusse enclave, the process of collaboration between state and customary authorities over natural resource management has worked largely to the benefit of local peoples and the nation state (see meitzner yoder, 2005); in other areas, particularly around the nation’s capital, there has been a problem of selective use of the process by government authorities (cf. meitzner yoder, 2005). in these 13 jackson and palmer: modernising water published by scholarship@western, 2012 cases, the government has become involved with tara bandu ceremonies and provided money and animals for the rituals, but has not followed through the process beyond the staging of a ceremony. in the independence era it is expected by local peoples that, if the state and local communities are to achieve their aims – mutually harmonious relations – such financial support would be ongoing rather than event-based, and the government would recognise that such processes need to be fully engaged with, and led by, those properly appointed and supported at the local level (palmer, 2010). as a result of the aforementioned momentary engagements, in some cases, local peoples have not taken the process seriously and prohibitions have been breached or set aside shortly after (d. de carvalho do amaral, personal communication, 2008). in other cases, collaborations have selectively focused on particular environmental elements of the tara bandu process, and this failure to engage with the full spectrum of what are usually social and environmental prohibitions has weakened the bandu implementation. in some areas, hostility toward such practices by representatives of local churches continues to actively undermine their implementation. discussion a comparative analysis of the multiple water governance systems of australia and east timor reveals many lessons to be shared between those two countries, as well as lessons for other nations facing water resource pressures and transformations in their management institutions. in both countries extant “modern” customary systems are struggling for visibility amidst the formal embrace of a globalising water sector drawing its legitimacy from integrated water resources management toolkits and neo-liberal economic doctrine. this struggle for recognition is consistent with reports in the literature which suggest that, at best, indigenous rights and water management practices are paid lip service by governments and, at worst, they are deliberately obstructed by national legislation and intervention policies (boelens & solanes, 2002). in evaluating the direction of water governance reform, there is a need to place changes and developments in their specific political, cultural, and economic contexts. at an international level, australia is often seen to have an effective “model” for water law, policy, and management (godden, 2005), and australia considers itself at the forefront of the reform paradigm, having over-allocated its resources and brought about environmental crisis by developing its advanced agricultural sector. in many of its responses, such as integrated basin planning (garrick & bark, 2011), australia has been regarded as a leader; whereas, east timor is in the early days of developing the state institutions to address its acute water supply deficiencies and basic development needs. australia has far greater resources to devote to the management and reform of its water sector than does east timor, which confronts fundamental need amongst its population. the basic water needs of subsistence and small-scale farm communities, in addition to meeting the needs of urban society (especially sanitation systems), have preoccupied policymakers more so than their australian counterparts. perhaps as a consequence of the manifest development need, social equity concerns are more explicit in the policy documents of east timor, compared to those in australia where institutions show “little formal recognition” of the issues of social equity “beyond a rather vague exhortation to ensure sustainability” (godden, 2005, p. 203). just as australian state institutions are relatively more well resourced than those of east timor, so too are its indigenous communities and their representative organisations. this is reflected in the nature of their strategies to respond to, and advocate for, change, although, perhaps, not in the effect they have on final outcomes. common to recent governance reforms in both countries is the apparent influence of sustainability principles, such as user fees and the need to meet the water requirements of the environment. australian reforms reflect a far stronger trend towards market-based regulation of natural resources than do those in east timor. efficiency concerns have provided a strong impetus for australia’s reforms, and this is reflected in the attention given to expanding trade in water and the need for security of access to the water resource for the water consumer. policy developments in east timor suggest that the state does not wish to relinquish its controlling role in water allocation to private interests operating in a market to the extent seen in the evolution of property rights in australia. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.7 the east timor experience shows that, in attempts made to date to formally engage local customary systems, the tendency has been for a superficial engagement – one that often does little more than abuse the access to extant social capital, using local ceremonies as an occasion to pursue national political and resource management agendas. yet, coming to nationhood later than most, east timor is in a unique position to learn from the mistakes of other postcolonial and post conflict states, as well from progressive developments. one such progressive example can be seen in the recent actions of australia’s indigenous ngo sector, which is beginning to have an influence on water policy and planning, particularly the allocation of commercial water rights in northern australia, and is rapidly developing its capacity to address environmental problems on estates owned by indigenous peoples in accordance with local decision-making and cultural prerogatives. indigenous organisations in these areas are building negotiating power at a catchment scale to defend the systems, which form their livelihoods and part of their identity. australian governments too have only superficially engaged with indigenous water resource governance systems. the history of over-allocation and exclusion of indigenous rights and interests in australia’s case serves as a warning to other regions developing and reforming their water management institutions. such experience tells us that water reformers must attend to ethical concerns and complex inter-relationships between people and water, as well as efficiency and sustainability goals. in response, they must put in place measures to address indigenous and local needs, understandings of water, and relationships with water prior to the establishment of a property-based entitlement, or they risk excluding indigenous or local groups with insecure tenure to land and water and undermining extant or resurgent customary governance ideals and processes. the explicit attention given to the role of social tenure in east timor’s draft laws and foundational policies might enable its institutions to structurally recognise local and indigenous water management rules and rights before control over resource rights is granted to other parties. in the agricultural regions of southern australia, the water entitlement framework has entrenched inequitable patterns of water distribution established during the first two hundred years of settlement, thereby significantly limiting indigenous access to water. in the murray-darling basin, australia’s largest agricultural zone and one where indigenous people are politically marginalised by the dominant population (see jackson, 2011; jackson & langton, 2012; weir, 2009), water supplies are fully allocated, almost exclusively to nonindigenous landowners and water users. to address indigenous customary rights and needs only recently recognised by australia’s high court and its current national water policy, australian states would need to prioritise indigenous water requirements and reallocate water entitlements – a strategy which is highly politically contentious (grafton & connell, 2011). in east timor, common understandings of water form an integrated complex, fused together by the interconnected spiritual, political, social, and ecological domains and syncretic realities associated with water (see kehi & palmer, forthcoming; palmer n.d.). the case, therefore, invites a reframing of concerns about the distribution of water that are particularly prominent in australia in order to foreground an ontology of reciprocal ethical relations grounded in an intimate attention to the symbolic and spiritual, as well as the political, social, and environmental realms. insights from studies of east timor’s water cultures are, therefore, highly relevant to international water policy, which needs to acknowledge widespread human attachments to, and needs for, water (see boelens et al., 2006; strang, 2004), and extend well beyond the strictures of narrow economic reformist agendas and technocratic global resource management toolkits so popular in many parts of the world. a further observation emerges from the comparison between australia and east timor. in both countries, even if recognised, local customary water uses are not granted a priority in state systems of allocation. although indigenous rights to water are recognised by australian common law and federal statute, indigenous people have, for some time, confronted a narrow legal interpretation of their rights and interests in resources, such that most current definitions of customary rights preclude a commercial interest in natural resources (langton, mazel, & palmer, 2006). indigenous water rights, for example, are currently limited to subsistence use (jackson & langton, 2012) and, in a manner, consistent with international trends in water law 15 jackson and palmer: modernising water published by scholarship@western, 2012 (burchi, 2005). australian judicial interpretations circumscribe and demarcate subsistence or customary use as uses that are outside, even irrelevant to, the formal economy. likewise, as the east timor experience shows, subsistence water use, even when it is clearly for “productive” agricultural purposes, is not granted a high priority in state systems of natural resource governance. yet, we argue that, in these two cases, indigenous and local modes of interacting with resources and each other are at once customary and modern, subsistence and market-based. indeed, from an indigenous or local perspective the boundaries between the state, market, and customary realm are porous and fuzzy, as with its supposed nemesis subsistence use, all are firmly grounded in principles of exchange (see altman, 2010; curry, 2003; langton et al., 2006; palmer, 2010). the critical point here is the necessity for broader recognition of deeply embedded local and indigenous socio-ecological exchange relationships. as curry (2003) has written in another context, “without exchange, the quality of life declines, social relationships are suspended, and opportunities to resolve conflicts decline. in short, exchange makes community, and, without exchange, there can be no community” (p. 417). given the well documented resilience of many such socially embedded economies (curry, 2003; langton et al., 2006; mcwilliam, 2011; palmer, 2010; yang, 2000), it is also very possible that the same intricate political and ritual ecologies which have long fashioned and maintained space and place in these localities could be potential agents for the transformation of market and state configurations of water resource management in east timor and australia. conclusion we argue here that the state needs to recognize and make visible complex processes of change, interdependence, exchange, and ethical decision making, which have long been relevant to creating viable indigenous and local livelihoods and socio-ecological modes of water governance. in such cases, as in east timor, resurgent customary resource management practices, like tara bandu, are important for communities continuing to exercise de facto governance and ownership rights over areas of “social tenure” (wallace, 2007). as such, we concur that a fruitful approach to recognizing a “legal space” for custom is to acknowledge in resource management regulations the role of broadly interpreted customary governance mechanisms in the regulation and sharing of land and resources. indeed, the australian experience, particularly in northern australia, and the new draft water resources law in east timor goes towards recognising the role of social tenure in the management and regulation of water resources. such policy and legislative processes give recognition to locally relevant institutions of resource governance, whilst refraining from the specific definition and “capture” of such practices or the alienation of community from communal lands and resources. in this way, extant land and resource management institutions can become tools for land and resource regulation, also enabling formal recognition of the fact that “community” is a notion that extends well beyond simply defining a customary land-owning group or a community bounded by place (as is usually the case, for instance, in indigenous land rights legislation). in these arrangements, context-specific agreement making will be an important mechanism to carry forward relations with a range of non-community water “users.” the implementation of resurgent tara bandu practices in east timor and the recognition and support of indigenous water governance initiatives in australia face, of course, a myriad of challenges. as well as the challenge of collaboration among diverse stakeholders due to colonial and postcolonial abuses of ritual activities for the short term gain of the state and other “outsiders,” communities also face a suite of issues relating to the absence or loss of knowledgeable ritual leaders, livelihood and financial constraints, illegal commercial resource extraction activities, and failures of mainstream resource managers to fully link resource management into the realm of social and political, rather than regulatory and scientific, relationships (jackson, 2006; palmer, 2007b; palmer, 2010; palmer & carvalho, 2008). the state and community level embrace of tradition must also be tempered by the fact that there was never a “golden age” of harmonious local cooperation and environmental protection; rather, there were, and always are, varying degrees of resource protection and exploitation, as well as “uncertainties, disharmony, and disruption” (mosse, 2003, p. 4) and cooperation. this reality was, and remains, a part of the ongoing processes of social and political negotiation, 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.7 which address the changing economic circumstances of resource use. the important point is not that conflict or unsustainable resource exploitation was absent, but that the “customary” repertoire had and still has complicated and nuanced mechanisms to address such issues. a repertoire which, in addition, has always involved some degree of engagement beyond the local and which is embedded in a long history of regional and more recently nation-state level influences and dialogues (see langton et al., 2006; palmer & carvalho, 2008; cf. tsing, 1993; zerner, 1994). consideration of the issue of the maintenance of customary authority, potential state payment to customary managers for provision of environmental services, and the recognition of the economic value of sustainable management of water resources for subsistence, commercial, and cultural values is likewise critically important and complex. the suitability and trajectory of such pathways will need to be carefully considered and implemented in the context of local and regional environmental and cultural specificity and historical and present day circumstances. careful attention must also be paid to the broader implications of bringing the complex ethical interrelationships, which characterise the arrangements of social tenures squarely into the market and administrative sphere. while we support the formal state recognition of customary governance practices, we suggest that the multiple players involved in such water conversations must embrace the risk and uncertainty in resource management collaborations, as well as accept the messiness of the diverse representational practices that characterize the “intercultural” resource management domain. critically, we suggest that, rather than focusing on a need for state-led governance and control of local level water management activities, successful outcomes from such collaborations depend on the decentralization of management and decision-making responsibility and adequate resourcing of the very livelihood and cultural practices which underpin relevant local instances of water resource governance. dynamic and adaptive local traditions can only be truly effective when there is a long-term commitment by those from outside the immediate community, who also stand to benefit from the outcomes of such practices (environmental protection, social cohesion), to support and resource the process. as unruh (2008) writes, an acknowledgement of the benefits of “working with the grain” and of building on existing practices is critical to the task of creating successful long-term governance systems (p. 113). proactive governance arrangements instigated by local peoples themselves need to be acknowledged as legitimate, and governments need to begin trusting in the capacity of local communities to manage themselves and their territories. this includes assisting, to some extent at least, with the financial and other resources needed for successful environmental governance. 17 jackson and palmer: modernising water published by scholarship@western, 2012 references altman, j. c. 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(2008). towards sustainable livelihoods after war: reconstituting rural land tenure systems. natural resources forum, 32, 103-115. 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.7 vorosmarty, c.j., mcintyre, p.b., gessner, m.o., dudgeon, d., prusevich, a., green, p., glidden, s., bunn, s.e., sullivan, c.a., reidy liermann, c., & davies, p.m. (2010). global threats to human water security and river biodiversity. nature, 267, 555-561. wallace j. (2007) building social tenures in east timor. in l.r. palmer, s. niner, & l. kent (eds.), exploring the tensions of nation building in east timor: proceedings from the forum (pp. 25-33), 15 september 2006, ssee research paper no 1, the university of melbourne, melbourne. weir j, (2009). murray river country: an ecological dialogue with traditional owners. canberra: aboriginal studies press. yang, m. 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(1994). through a green lens: the construction of customary environmental law and community in indonesia’s maluku islands. law & society review, 28(5), 1079–122. 25 jackson and palmer: modernising water published by scholarship@western, 2012 the international indigenous policy journal september 2012 modernising water: articulating custom in water governance in australia and east timor sue e. jackson lisa r. palmer recommended citation modernising water: articulating custom in water governance in australia and east timor abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license modernising water: articulating custom in water governance in australia and east timor intergenerational patterns of fertility among registered indian teenage girls in canada the international indigenous policy journal volume 5 | issue 3 article 7 june 2014 intergenerational patterns of fertility among registered indian teenage girls in canada marilyn amorevieta-gentil university of montreal david daignault aboriginal affairs & northern developement canada, david.daignault@aadnc-aandc.gc.ca norbert robitaille university of montreal eric guimond aboriginal affairs & northern development canada sacha senecal university of western ontario recommended citation amorevieta-gentil, m. , daignault, d. , robitaille, n. , guimond, e. , senecal, s. (2014). intergenerational patterns of fertility among registered indian teenage girls in canada. the international indigenous policy journal, 5(3). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.7 intergenerational patterns of fertility among registered indian teenage girls in canada abstract in 2004, registered indian teenage girls aged 15 to 19 had a 94‰ fertility rate, 7 times the average canadian rate for the same age group. despite various general studies on the subject, there has been little interest in the past on the intergenerational character of teenage fertility. analysis of data from the indian register of the ministry of aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc) reveals that, among registered indian teenage girls, the fertility of daughters of teenage mothers is systematically higher than for daughters of mothers aged 20 or older. while it is impossible to establish a direct link of causality, the results of this study demonstrate for the first time the intergenerational nature of teenage motherhood among registered indian girls. keywords canada, fertility, intergenerational, registered indian, adolescent females disclaimer the views expressed in this report are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of neither aboriginal affairs and northern development canada nor the université de montréal. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ ! ! ! i n t e r g e n e r a t i o n a l p a t t e r n s o f f e r t i l i t y o f r e g i s t e r e d i n d i a n t e e n a g e g i r l s i n c a n a d a early motherhood is a subject that continues to be topical and one that is prompting substantial scientific interest and international effort to understand and prevent. it is generally associated with compromised schooling, low socio-economic status, and a more fragile state of health for mother and child. these factors are detrimental to the environment within which children develop their physical, intellectual, emotional, and spiritual faculties (anderson, 2002; first nations information governance centre, 2012; ordolis, 2007). hence, teenage maternity can take on an intergenerational character. in canada, it is a concern of primary importance because it has significant long-term consequences on the living conditions of the mother and her children. it gives rise to numerous information, awareness, and support programs for teenagers in health and social services centers and in schools. teenage fertility rates1 are highest in the most disadvantaged socio-economic groups. since 2004, the fertility rate of canadian girls aged 15 to 19 has remained around 14‰2 (statistique canada, 2013). the magnitude of this demographic phenomenon is generally a good indicator of a population’s development. yet, the fertility rate of registered indian women in canada has drawn limited interest among social sciences and health researchers. the fertility rate of indian teenage girls receives even less attention. in 2004, registered indian teenage girls aged 15 to 19 had a fertility rate of 94‰. this is seven times higher than the rate observed for all canadian girls in the same age group (guimond & robitaille, 2008, 2009; robitaille, kouaouci, & guimond, 2004). regionally, significant variations have been observed from one province to another. the fertility rate for registered indian girls aged 15 to 19 was twice as high in manitoba (128‰) as in the three territories (61‰) or the atlantic provinces (62‰). in saskatchewan (105‰), alberta (98‰), quebec (94‰), and british columbia (86‰), the fertility rates of registered indian girls were closer to the national average of 94‰ for registered indian women (guimond & robitaille, 2009). the intergenerational character of adolescent fertility has been addressed by a number of research projects. none of these, however, has been exclusively dedicated to the registered indian population. our knowledge on the intergenerational aspect of fertility is limited to non-aboriginal subgroups of the population, mainly from the united states. so, it cannot be applied to the registered indian population of canada. however, certain projects have examined the topic of pregnancy and motherhood for aboriginal people of canada, which includes the registered indian population. the cultural value of having a child at a young age, sense of belonging, health, education, employment, and crime are some of the themes explored in connection with early maternity (comité sénatorial permanent des peuples autochtones, 2003; desgagné, 2006; downey & stout, 2001; murdock, 2009; sokoloski, 1995). these sources make it possible for us to better contextualize teenage fertility among aboriginal people. some studies have shown that women born to a teenage mother were more likely to become mothers in adolescence than young women born to an older mother (campa & eckenrode, 2006; card, 1981; furstenberg jr., levine, & brooks-gunn, 1990; jaffee, caspi, moffitt, belsky, & silva, 2001; kahn & anderson, 1992; manlove, 1997; meade, kershaw, & ickovics, 2008). however, not all daughters of !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 1 fertility rates are calculated by dividing the number of births by the number of women of reproducing age, generally by quinquennial age groups. 2 per mil (per 1000). 1 amorevieta-gentil et al.: intergenerational patterns of fertility among registered indian girls published by scholarship@western, 2014 ! ! ! adolescent women will become teenage mothers. a number of different factors are cited to explain the intergenerational patterns of fertility: the characteristics of the adolescent girl and of her mother (age at time of first childbirth, marital status, level of schooling, cognitive skills); the family environment offered by the mother (socio-economic resources, stability of the family, residential stability, presence of the biological father, parental involvement); and lastly, social behaviours and values transmitted (tolerance, the mother as model, ideal age and value of motherhood, and perception of medical care). maternal characteristics are factors receiving the most attention in the literature. the link between the mother’s and the daughter’s age at motherhood is not, however, directly causal. the mother’s age at first childbirth contributes to the effect of the family environment she offers her children (furstenberg et al., 1990; hardy, astone, brooks-gunn, shapiro, & miller, 1998; manlove, 1997; meade et al., 2008). the reverse is also valid, since the family environment that produced the mothers also has an effect on the probability of becoming a mother at a young age (anderson, 2002). adolescent mothers are exposed to the repercussions of their childbirth over the long term. they are at greater risk of academic underachievement (cooke, 2013; garner, guimond, & senécal, 2013; manlove, 1997; robitaille et al., 2004) and consequently of having less time to develop their cognitive skills and to be effectively involved as parents. according to the final report of the standing senate committee on aboriginal peoples (comité sénatorial permanent des peuples autochtones, 2003), aboriginal young people are faced with a major problem of absenteeism from and dropping out of school before the completion of secondary education. deviant behaviour, such as delinquency, drug or alcohol use, or early pregnancy, is sometimes involved. racism, non-participation, difference in educational attainment between aboriginals and non-aboriginals, lack of parental supervision or support, and the value that parents ascribe to education are reasons cited to explain the drop-out phenomenon (comité sénatorial permanent des peuples autochtones, 2003). conversely, dropping out of school is an alternative often contemplated by adolescent girls in order to deal better with their maternity (horwitz, klerman, kuo, & jekel, 1991; murdock, 2009). teenage mothers are more likely to be socio-economically disadvantaged and dependent during their lives (guimond & robitaille, 2008; murdock, 2009). they make greater use of government assistance to meet their own and their children’s needs (garner et al., 2013). the absence or limited parental involvement of a child’s biological father also adds to the difficulties and the responsibilities faced by the teenage mother (eni & phillips-beck, 2013; murdock, 2009). between 1985 and 1999, nearly 30% of childbirths to registered indian women under the age of 20 were cases of unstated paternity (clatworthy, 2003). however, results indicate that some women who become mothers in adolescence and live in a single-parent situation improve their socio-economic status through education and financial assistance (cooke, 2013). according to the 1996 census, the percentage of registered indian women between the ages of 25 and 29 who became mothers in adolescence and had a non-university or university education was 4% higher for lone-parent women (34% for non-university and 15% for university) than for registered indian women in a union (30% for non-university and 11% for university). similarly, lone mothers generally had a higher personal income than women in a union (hull, 2001; robitaille et al., 2004). nevertheless, for the majority of aboriginal adolescent girls, already suffering discrimination due to their age and their cultural identity, motherhood maintains intergenerational poverty (ordolis, 2007). this is exacerbated in urban areas where the cost of living is higher (comité sénatorial permanent des peuples autochtones, 2003). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.7 ! ! ! studies demonstrate a link between the quality of the family environment and the child’s cognitive and emotional development (cooke, 2013; first nations information governance centre, 2012). this link is reflected, for example, in effects on self-esteem, personal aspirations, and success in school (campa & eckenrode, 2006; card, 1981; meade et al., 2008). a family context that offers little parental involvement and passes on permissive values exposes the child to greater risk of adopting and reproducing behaviours that lead to early motherhood. additionally, there have been, historically, more aboriginal children placed in the custody of child protection agencies, in terms of both numbers and percentages. the result is multiple placements in homes, inadequate personalized supervision, and removal from the community of origin. this significantly disrupts development of the children’s cultural identity, particularly during adolescence (assemblée des premières nations, 2006; breton, 2011; ordolis, 2007). being a teenaged parent is a difficult experience. it involves meeting numerous challenges and shouldering many responsibilities, including that of being a good role model for the child. the search for suitable and affordable housing to meet the needs of the young mother and child often results in multiple changes of residence, which can affect the children’s emotional stability (comité sénatorial permanent des peuples autochtones, 2003). in aboriginal populations, when support from the mother, the extended family, or the community is deficient, young people often look to fill that gap by joining a gang, which provides a false sense of belonging, security, and social cohesion. aboriginal girls joining such groups are more vulnerable. they can become sexually active early and neglect contraception. furthermore, they are sometimes victims of sexual abuse, causing early pregnancy and are at greater risk of contracting sexually transmissible infections. the consequences for mother and child can thus be harmful (anderson, 2002; comité sénatorial permanent des peuples autochtones, 2003; murdock, 2009). however, other young women want to start a family early in their reproductive lives as a remedy for solitude or out of a need for attention and love (anderson, 2002; eni & phillips-beck, 2013; murdock, 2009; ordolis, 2007). the teenage girls whose mothers report a preference for motherhood before the age of 20 are, in fact, more likely to be teenage mothers than the teenage girls whose mothers favour the delay of the age of the first childbirth (kahn & anderson, 1992; manlove, 1997; meade et al., 2008). this helps perpetuate the intergenerational effect of fertility at a young age. abuse of alcohol, tobacco, or drugs at a young age is more common among aboriginal people than the non-aboriginal population (first nations information governance centre, 2012). it was identified as a major factor in the high frequency of teenage pregnancy (anderson, 2002; comité sénatorial permanent des peuples autochtones, 2003; first nations information governance centre, 2012). the combined effect of the use of these substances and age is doubly felt through all the stages of the child’s development (meade et al., 2008). medical complications, already substantial in an early pregnancy, are more so when the adolescent’s general health is impaired. additionally, fetal alcohol syndrome (fas) is also more prevalent in the aboriginal population (comité sénatorial permanent des peuples autochtones, 2003; desgagné, 2006; ordolis, 2007). children of teenage girls often suffer the long-term consequences of their mother’s behaviour and socio-economic vulnerability. they are at higher risk of premature birth, low birth weight, delayed growth, neglect, abuse, irreversible injury, and mortality (assemblée des premières nations, 2006; ordolis, 2007). aboriginal peoples have different cultural values associated with having a child at a young age from the majority of non-aboriginal canadians. indeed, many aboriginal women start their family in their 3 amorevieta-gentil et al.: intergenerational patterns of fertility among registered indian girls published by scholarship@western, 2014 ! ! ! adolescent years, following the example of some women in their family or in their community. the motherhood experience is an integral part of the life cycle for aboriginal people in which the immediate and extended family, friends, and the community provide vital socioeconomic support and care. these networks are more common and extensive on reserve, better meeting the needs of young mothers, especially in situations of single parenthood (quinless, 2013). motherhood also ensures the intergenerational transmission of cultural values and beliefs. children are a gift from the creator; their lives are sacred starting at conception and pregnancy is a blessing. pregnant women are treated with great respect and are held in high esteem. motherhood gives the woman higher social status in the family and in the community (anderson, 2002; comité sénatorial permanent des peuples autochtones, 2003; desgagné, 2006; eni & phillips-beck, 2013; murdock, 2009; sokoloski, 1995). consequently, early motherhood can reflect a community’s social standards or life choices if there are no other options (anderson, 2002; guimond & robitaille, 2008). aboriginal women have been identified as being most at risk for health problems, difficult pregnancies, and effects of poor nutrition, while also receiving the least medical care. the geographic remoteness of certain aboriginal communities does not always allow for access to appropriate prenatal care or prolonged medical follow-up for young mothers and their children. information about the benefits of maternal health care is not always thoroughly or properly distributed to all aboriginal populations. this situation has created fear and mistrust among some aboriginal women with respect to the use of health care and the feelings are reinforced by personal experiences with discriminatory attitudes or expressed by some of them (comité sénatorial permanent des peuples autochtones, 2003; downey & stout, 2001; ordolis, 2007). mutual ignorance of the other’s maternal know-how probably explains the lack of reconciliation between aboriginal and non-aboriginal people. for aboriginal people, pregnancy and birth are natural events. for health practitioners, they are medical events that require monitoring (sokoloski, 1995); however, modern medicine can make its contribution to the maternity process without conflicting with aboriginal customs and without interfering in what is considered a family affair. expectant aboriginal mothers sometimes harbor suspicions that medical interventions (medication, consultations, contact with medical personnel, and assistance during delivery) are harmful to the health of their unborn child. as a result, they may voluntarily choose to reduce the frequency of such interventions. by acting in this way, they arrive at a compromise between the offer of medical assistance and their own needs. other women, on the contrary, find benefit in more frequent use of prenatal care (desgagné, 2006; downey & stout, 2001; sokoloski, 1995). the factors we have just cited for understanding the intergenerational character of adolescent fertility are not independent of one another. they make up a complex web that is structured at the individual, family, and community levels. the factors cannot be analyzed separately from communities’ historical, geographic, economic, socio-cultural, and health contexts without making the phenomenon more difficult to understand (anderson, 2002; meade et al., 2008). it is not easy to estimate what each of these mechanisms contributes to explaining intergenerational fertility, since longitudinal survey data are needed. consequently, the literature on this subject as it applies to registered indian girls is sporadic. the frequency of pregnancies among registered indian teenage girls obliges us to survey this very important subject. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.7 ! ! ! in this research project, we estimate the fertility rates of registered indian girls from 1999 to 2011. this study looks at girls born between 1986 and 1991 when they were between 13 and 19 years old. all childbirths by these women before they reached the age of 20 are used in the indicator. next, we estimated the probability of these women becoming teenage mothers by their order of childbirth: if they were the first, second, or third child born to their mother. the fertility rates and probabilities obtained are then compared according to the mother’s age at the birth of her daughters: either “under 20” or “20 and over”. in this way, we are able to ascertain the intensity of the phenomenon and verify the existence of an intergenerational link of adolescent fertility. s t u d y p o p u l a t i o n a registered indian is a person legally recognized by canada’s federal government under the indian act and whose name appears in the indian register, an administrative record maintained by aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc). in 1985, the right to be entered in the indian register, as cited in section 6 of the indian act, was modified by passage of bill c-31.3 an individual acquires registered indian status according to two rules based on the registration or entitlement to registration of his/her parents (figure 1). two registered indian parents who have status under subsections 6(1) or 6(2) pass on 6(1) status to their children. a mixed union between a 6(1) status indian parent and a non-indian parent (n) gives rise to children with 6(2) registrations. the children of two successive generations of mixed unions are not entitled to registration (clatworthy, 2009; guimond & robitaille, 2009). in january 31, 2011, the discrimination experienced by descendants of two generations of women married to non-indians was eliminated by the implementation of bill c-3. the first generation of descendants, who held 6(2) status before the passage of bill c-3, can now have it changed to 6(1) status (hurley & simeone, 2010). furthermore, the band of the mi’kmaq qalipu first nation in the province of newfoundland was officially recognized on september 22, 2011. the members of this band are recognized as indians under subsection 6(1) in accordance with the indian act (aandc, 2014). the substitution of female descendants’ status category in the first case and the inclusion of new indians in the second case are now under way. the women concerned in either situation are not part of our analysis because the information relating to their situation is still incomplete. in this study, only second-generation women registered under subsection 6(1) are analyzed. these women were born between 1986 and 1991 and were 13 to 19 years old between 1999 and 2011 (appendix a). all the children of these adolescents were entered in the register, whether or not they were born of a union with a non-indian. girls with 6(2) status are excluded from the analyses because their children are entitled to be entered in the register only if they were born of a union with a registered indian (figure 1). women and children who live outside canada have also been excluded from our study group. !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 3 until 1985, an indian man marrying a non-indian woman retained his status and his wife acquired the status of registered indian. the descendants obtained the legal status of registered indian. however, an indian woman marrying a non-indian man lost her status under the indian act and her descendants were not eligible for registration as indians in the register. after 1985, indian women married to non-indian men regained or maintained their 6(1) status and their descendants were entitled to registration in the indian register under subsection 6(2). 5 amorevieta-gentil et al.: intergenerational patterns of fertility among registered indian girls published by scholarship@western, 2014 ! ! ! f i g u r e 1 . c u m u l a t i v e p r o p o r t i o n o f b i r t h s b y d e l a y i n r e p o r t i n g , r e g i s t e r e d i n d i a n m o t h e r s o f c a n a d a * , 1 9 8 6 1 9 9 0 , 1 9 9 1 1 9 9 5 , 1 9 9 6 2 0 0 0 , a n d 2 0 0 1 2 0 0 5 note: * registered under subsection 6(1) of the indian act, 1985. source: aandc (2013). d a t a s o u r c e a n d m e t h o d o l o g y the indian register is the data source upon which the analyses are based. this continuously updated administrative record contains a good deal of information on every registered individual, including date of birth, date of registration, date of death, gender, province of residence, band of membership, and section of registration [6(1) or 6(2)]. this study uses an anonymized version of the register, which covers the compilation of demographic events until december 31, 2011. the indian register is the most appropriate source for examining the demographic patterns of the registered indian population since it includes all persons with legal indian status. however, the indian register distorts analysis of fertility as a result of two flaws: under-declaration and late declaration of births. the first concerns mostly children who died before their birth was recorded. this flaw will not be corrected because it requires a good deal of hypothesizing, in particular about the 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.7 ! ! ! infant mortality rate. in any case, this statistical problem would likely cause only a bias of less than 2% (robitaille et al., 2004). the second may be the result of administrative delays, lack of legal incentive to report events, or even a change in the rules of eligibility for indian status. for example, delays of 20 years have been noted between a birth and its registration. consequently, annual birth numbers have to be adjusted based on the timing of birth declarations drawn up for different years. using a standard timeline based on years of observation instead of cohorts may seem curious. this methodological choice is explained by a characteristic peculiar to the registered indian population: the time that an event is reported is more dependent on registration formalities adopted by the federal government at a given time than an effect of the mother’s or a cohorts’ age. because of the biases inherent to the indian register, the results presented in this study are conservative. analysis of four standard birth declaration timing practices or strategies among women of all ages4 showed a visible improvement in time of declaration over the periods 1986-1990, 1991-1995, and 19962000. between 2001 and 2005, however, it is more modest5 (amorevieta-gentil, daignault, norbert, guimond, & senécal, 2013) as shown in figure 2. the period of observation is different for each curve. the effect of the 1985 amendments to the indian act led us to eliminate the two oldest standard timelines. using them would increase the significance of the birth correction. similarly, the period of observation of birth declarations in the most recent timeline (6 years) is too short to get a good assessment of the number of births occurring during 2001 to 2005. there remains the standard timeline for 1996 to 2000, for which it is assumed that all births were declared within 11 years of observation. it is also assumed that the pace of declaration remained stable over time. use of this standard timeline implies somewhat higher degree of correction of births occurring in 2011 by women between 19 and 20 years of age exactly (appendix b). the effect of this overestimation, however, is minor. the double classification of births by calendar year and by age of the mother, together with the number of registered indian women by age (appendix a), allows us to calculate, first of all, the fertility rates of these women6. fertility rates are estimated by the classic method, relating birth events, n(x;x+1), to years lived by mothers between each age a(x;x+1). the rates are then calculated for registered indian girls between the ages of 13 and 19 according to their mother’s age when they were born, i.e. under 20 or 20 and over. !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 4the age of the mother is not a variable that explains the time taken to declare a birth. in the study by guimond and robitaille (2009), some standard timelines were constructed according to the mother’s age. times taken to declare births by women under 40 years of age were similar, regardless of the mother’s age. births by mothers aged over 40, however, posted longer times. a thorough analysis revealed that these were mainly women who regained their registered indian status following the passage of bill c-31 in 1985. the children of these women could not be registered until after their mothers’ status was restored. this explains the length of the time taken. 5 we compared changes in the time of declaration of births for a six-year period of observation for each of the four five-year periods. we have ignored all births reported after a period of six years, and have assumed that all events were declared within that period. the time to declare births curve for the 1986 to 1990 period is clearly distinguished from the other three because it reflects a longer declaration time. the evolution of the other curves is similar. the one for the 1996 to 2000 period posts a slightly faster declaration time. 6 according to the indian register, 169 registered indian girls out of 23,704 born between 1986 and 1991 died between the ages of 13 and 19. consequently, the mortality of registered indian girls aged 13 to 19 is low and has virtually no effect on the rates or probabilities obtained. deaths of registered indian teenage girls are thus not taken into account in the calculation of our indicators. 7 amorevieta-gentil et al.: intergenerational patterns of fertility among registered indian girls published by scholarship@western, 2014 ! ! ! f i g u r e 2 . a d j u s t e d f e r t i l i t y r a t e s b y e x a c t a g e o f r e g i s t e r e d * i n d i a n g i r l s b o r n b e t w e e n 1 9 8 6 a n d 1 9 9 1 , a n d b y a g e o f t h e i r m o t h e r w h e n t h e y w e r e b o r n , c a n a d a note: * registered under subsection 6(1) of the indian act, 1985. source: aandc (2013). second, the probability of registered indian women born between 1986 and 1991 becoming mothers in adolescence, fy(x,x+1), was obtained using a crude fertility table. in this case, births7 ny(x,x+1) attributed to registered indian women born between 1986 and 1991 were classified by time elapsed, x, in years, by order, y, and by age of the grandmother (under 20 or 20 and over). for order 1, time refers to the years elapsed between the mother’s 13th birthday, which marks her entry into fertile life, and her age at first childbirth. for orders 2 and 3, time refers to the period elapsed between the birth being analyzed and the previous birth8. for any individual mother, one obtains two indicators estimated for two types of time. !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 7 in cases of multiple births, only one birth was considered. sixty multiple births (twins) were observed for 10,508 deliveries, which represent a proportion of 0.57% of the total. 8 let us take the fictitious example of a teenage girl who gave birth to three children before she was 20 years old, the first at 16, the second at 18, and the third at 19. the time elapsed used for these births will be, in order, 3 years (16 – 13 years old), 2 years (18 – 16 years old), and 1 year (19 – 18 years old). 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.7 ! ! ! age attained and maximum year of observation (2011) constitute two limitations to this research. the first is the result of our decision to analyze fertility during adolescence, i.e. before attaining 20 years of age. the second is the result of the non-availability of all data beyond the year 2011. the adjusted numbers of births by age of the grandmother (two categories) and by childbirth order (1 to 3) were obtained by applying a proportionality rule (appendix c). by order and by time elapsed, this rule utilizes the adjusted and unadjusted numbers of all births and the unadjusted numbers of births by age of the grandmother. lastly, the fertility tables obtained made it possible to estimate parity-progression ratios, an,x, by time elapsed, by childbirth order, and by grandmother’s age. r e s u l t s the adjusted fertility rates of registered indian girls born between 1986 and 1991 are as predicted9 and presented in figure 3. rates increase with age for all registered indian girls. from 13 to 15 years of age, they increase from 1‰ to 26.9‰. afterward, the rates post an average increase of 32‰ to 40‰ at each age, with the result that 19-year-old girls show a fertility rate of 166.2‰. when the group of registered indian girls is divided by age of their mothers at their birth, we see that these girls’ birth rates are systematically higher if their mother was herself an adolescent when she gave birth to them. the difference between the curve of indian girls whose mother was under 20 and those whose mother was 20 or more when they were born widens until age 17 (difference of 29.1‰). afterward, the curves remain almost parallel (difference of 25.5‰ and 27.8‰ at ages 18 and 19). these results demonstrate an intergenerational link of adolescent fertility in the female registered indian population. is the phenomenon also visible when the fertility of registered indian girls under 20 years of age is analyzed by childbirth order? the graphic illustration of the adjusted fertility tables (appendix d) provides some interesting answers to this question (figure 3). the adjusted birth probabilities for all order 1 registered indian girls increase with time elapsed since the 13th birthday, while those for orders 2 and 3 peak at time 1. the different trajectory of the order 1 curve compared with the other reflects difference of methodology10. one year after the first childbirth, the order 2 birth probability attains the level of the order 1 probability observed after a time period of 7 years (145‰). order 2 and 3 childbirths are relatively close together for registered indian girls. adolescent girls have 7 years to bear their first child, explaining the timeline difference for the different orders. in order to bear two or three children before their 20th birthday, adolescent women necessarily experience short intervals between births. the maximum elapsed time observed between order 2 and 3 births before the age of 20 is only four years. again, the order-specific birth probabilities are always higher when the adolescent’s mother was under 20 years of age. while the intergenerational link for adolescent fertility persists, whatever the childbirth order, that link becomes less significant with each successive birth. the cumulative parity-progression ratios (figure 4) estimated from the fertility tables reveals another intergenerational dimension of fertility in adolescence. !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 9 the results were calculated from the adjusted figure of 11,667 births by 23,704 women aged 13 to 19 between 1999 and 2011. 10 this difference of methodology is explained in the data source and methodology section. ! 9 amorevieta-gentil et al.: intergenerational patterns of fertility among registered indian girls published by scholarship@western, 2014 ! ! ! f i g u r e 3 . a d j u s t e d b i r t h p r o b a b i l i t i e s o f r e g i s t e r e d * i n d i a n g i r l s b o r n b e t w e e n 1 9 8 6 a n d 1 9 9 1 , b y a g e o f t h e i r m o t h e r w h e n t h e y w e r e b o r n a n d c h i l d b i r t h o r d e r , c a n a d a note: * registered under subsection 6(1) of the indian act, 1985. source: aandc (2013). 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.7 ! ! ! !!! ! f i g u r e 4 . c u m u l a t i v e p a r i t y p r o g r e s s i o n r a t i o s o f r e g i s t e r e d * i n d i a n g i r l s b o r n b e t w e e n 1 9 8 6 a n d 1 9 9 1 , b y a g e o f t h e i r m o t h e r w h e n t h e y w e r e b o r n a n d c h i l d b i r t h o r d e r , c a n a d a note: * registered under subsection 6(1) of the indian act, 1985. source: aandc (2013). the cumulative probabilities demonstrate that 40% of all registered indian girls had at least one child before reaching 20 years of age. also, 25% of women who have one child will have a second before 20 years old, and 13% of women who have two children will have a third. the growth of the order 2 and 3 parity-progression ratios is more pronounced between the first and second year following the previous childbirth order. the order 2 and 3 cumulative parity-progression ratios, which are lower than the order 1 ratio, reach a ceiling beyond a period of 4 years between each birth. the maximum value attained is explained by the method of analysis described earlier. for each of the birth orders, the cumulative parityprogression ratios of registered indian girls are once again higher when the latter arise from teenage 11 amorevieta-gentil et al.: intergenerational patterns of fertility among registered indian girls published by scholarship@western, 2014 ! ! ! mothers. for a period of 7 years, the order 1 cumulative ratio is 5.5 points higher than that obtained for all the girls (43.4% versus 37.9%). for order 2, it is 2.9 points higher (28.3% versus 25.4%). c o n c l u s i o n this study sheds new light on the fertility of registered indian girls during adolescence by examining the intergenerational dimension of this phenomenon for the first time. the age-specific fertility rates of registered indian girls under 20 years of age present the generally observed profile. fertility rates increase between the ages of 13 and 19 and their pace of growth is relatively high. at 19 years old, the fertility rate of registered indian girls reaches 160‰. by comparison, the fertility rate of canadian women born in 1985 and aged 19 in 2004 was 27.6‰ (milan, 2011). the results show a difference in the fertility of registered indian teenage girls when analyzed according to the ages of their mothers. the daughters of teenage girls tend to have higher fertility rates than daughters whose mother was older at the time they were born. when all births are structured according to childbirth order, the birth probabilities and parity-progression ratios of registered indian women are always significantly different, depending on the age of their mother. nonetheless, the impact of having been born to a teenage mother is progressively diminished with each additional birth. this indicates a connection between the age of the mother and the age of her daughter in becoming a mother, which is not to imply a direct causal relationship, since, in fact, only some of the daughters of teenage mothers become mothers themselves while adolescents. the indian register, the data source used for this study, enabled us to learn a little more about this phenomenon and uncover a little-known facet of the fertility of registered indian girls. the fertility of indian adolescents differs from that of other populations by virtue of its intensity. the early motherhood being experienced by these girls is deserving of particular attention, given the socio-economic, cultural, or health-related issues involved over the short and long terms of their lives and those of their children. to improve our comprehension of this topic, we could try to compute the same information presented in this study on non-aboriginal women in order to compare their patterns with those of registered indian women. also, we might explore the fertility rates of women over 20 years of age for these two groups. this would enable us to see how teen fertility affects the total fertility rates of these two groups and also to compare those women who gave birth during their adolescence with those who waited until later in life. lastly, we could look at the birth parity of the mothers to discover the effect of starting to have children at an early age on the total number of live births. the above analysis calls for continued research into the intergenerational character of adolescent fertility among registered indian women. it also raises many questions about the factors directly or indirectly involved. the answers would help us understand the phenomenon, and set up new prevention and education programs. they will inform young people and indian families in canada of early motherhood impacts (sex education, mother, and child health, etc.) and will provide social support for young parents. similar challenges face aboriginal teenage girls in latin america (brazil), south africa, and australia. in these regions, as in canada, aboriginal teenage fertility is also higher than non-aboriginal fertility. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.7 ! ! ! r e f e r e n c e s aboriginal affairs and northern development canada [aandc]. (2013, february). special tabulations from the indian register [data file]. ottawa” author. aboriginal affairs and northern development canada [aandc]. (2014). qalipu mi'kmaq first nation enrolment process. retrieved from http://www.aadncaandc.gc.ca/eng/1319805325971/1319805372507 amorevieta-gentil, m., daignault, d., norbert, r., guimond, é., & senécal, s. (2013). la fécondité des indiennes inscrites du canada entre 1986 et 2010. document non publié. anderson, k. (2002). tenuous connections: urban aboriginal youth sexual health & pregnancy. toronto: ontario federation of indian friendship centres. assemblée des premières nations. (2006). plan d'action des dirigeants des premières nations en matière de protection de l'enfance. ottawa: auteur. breton, a. (2011). les enfants autochtones en protection de la jeunesse au québec: leur réalité comparée à celle des autres enfants. (mémoire de maîtrise inédit). montréal: université de montréal. campa, m. i., & eckenrode, j. j. (2006). pathways to intergenerational adolescent childbearing in a high-risk sample. journal of marriage and family, 68, 558-572. card, j. j. (1981). long-term consequences for children of teenage parents. demography, 18(2), 137156. clatworthy, s. (2003). facteurs contribuant à la non-reconnaissance de la paternité. ottawa: direction de la recherche et de l'analyse, ministère des affaires indiennes et du nord canada. clatworthy, s. (2009). modifications apportées en 1985 à la loi sur les indiens: répercussions sur les premières nations du québec. cahiers québécois de démographie, 38(2), 253-286. comité sénatorial permanent des peuples autochtones. (2003). les jeunes autochtones vivant en milieu urbain. plan d’action pour le changement. rapport final. ottawa: travaux des comités du sénat, 37e législature, 2e session. cooke, m. (2013). “and then i got pregnant”: early childbearing and the first nations life course. the international indigenous policy journal,, 4(1), 1-17. desgagné, m. (2006). femmes autochtones et maternité. le médecin du québec, 41(10), 101-103. downey, b., & stout, r. (2001). young and aboriginal: labour and birth experiences of teen mothers in winnipeg. winnipeg: prairie women’s health centre of excellence. 13 amorevieta-gentil et al.: intergenerational patterns of fertility among registered indian girls published by scholarship@western, 2014 ! ! ! eni, r., & phillips-beck, w. (2013). teenage pregnancy and parenthood perspectives of first nation women. the international indigenous policy journal,, 4(1), 1-22. first nations information governance centre. (2012). first nations regional health survey (rhs) 2008/10: national report on the adult, youth and children living in first nations communities. ottawa: author. furstenberg jr., f. f., levine, j. a., & brooks-gunn, j. (1990). the children of teenage mothers: patterns of early childbearing in two generations. family planning perspectives, 22(2), 54-61. garner, r., guimond, é., & senécal, s. (2013). the socio-economic characteristics of first nation teen mothers. the international indigenous policy journal, 4(1), 1-25. guimond, é., & robitaille, n. (2008). quand les adolescentes ont des enfants: tendance et conséquences. horizons – entre espoir et adversité: la jeunesse autochtone et l’avenir du canada, 10(1), 49-51. guimond, é., & robitaille, n. (2009). mères à l’adolescence: analyse de la fécondité des indiennes inscrites âgées de 15 à 19 ans, 1986 à 2004 cahiers québécois de démographie, 38(2), 287-310. hardy, j. b., astone, n. m., brooks-gunn, j., shapiro, s., & miller, t. l. (1998). like mother, like child: intergenerational patterns of age at first birth and associations with childhood and adolescent characteristics and adult outcomes in the second generation. developmental psychology, 34(6), 1220-1232. horwitz, s. m., klerman, l. v., kuo, h. s., & jekel, j. f. (1991). intergenerational transmission of school-age parenthood. intergenerational transmission of school-age parenthood, 23(4), 168172. hull, j. (2001). les mères seules autochtones au canada, 1996: un profil statistique. ottawa: direction de la recherche et de l'analyse, ministère des affaires indiennes et du nord canada. hurley, m. c., & simeone, t. (2010). projet de loi c-3 loi sur l'équité entre les sexes relativement à l'inscription au registre des indiens. ottawa, canada: bibliothèque du parlement. jaffee, s., caspi, a., moffitt, t. e., belsky, j., & silva, p. (2001). why are children born to teen mothers at risk for adverse outcomes in young adulthood? results from a 20-year longitudinal study. development and psychopathology, 13, 377-397. kahn, j. r., & anderson, k. e. (1992). intergenerational patterns of teenage fertility. demography, 29(1), 39-57. manlove, j. (1997). early motherhood in an intergenerational perspective: the experiences of a british cohort. journal of marriage and family, 59(2), 263-279. meade, c. s., kershaw, t. s., & ickovics, j. r. (2008). the intergenerational cycle of teenage motherhood:an ecological approach. health psychology, 27, 419-429. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.7 ! ! ! milan, a. (2011). fécondité: aperçu, 2008 rapport sur l’état de la population du canada. ottawa: statistique canada. murdock, l. (2009). young aboriginal mothers in winnipeg. winnipeg: prairie women’s health centre of excellence. ordolis, e. (2007). a story of their own: adolescent pregnancy and child welfare in aborignial communities. first people child & family review, 3(4), 30-41. quinless, j. (2013). first nations teenaged female lone parent families in canada: recognizing family diversity and the importance of networks of care. the international indigenous policy journal, 4(1). retrieved from http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/12 robitaille, n., kouaouci, a., & guimond, é. (2004). la fécondité des indiennes à 15-19 ans, de 1986 à 1997. in j. p. white, p. maxim & d. beavon (eds.), aboriginal policy research — setting the agenda for change (pp. 201-224). toronto: thompson educational publishing inc. sokoloski, e. (1995). canadian first nations women's beliefs about pregnancy and prenatal care. canadian journal of nursing research, 27(1), 89-100. statistique canada. (2013). tableau 102-4505. naissances vivantes, taux brut de natalité, taux de fécondité par groupe d'âge et indice synthétique de fécondité, canada, provinces et territoires, annuel. retrieved from http://www.statcan.gc.ca/tables-tableaux/sumsom/l01/cst01/hlth85b-eng.htm ! !!! 15 amorevieta-gentil et al.: intergenerational patterns of fertility among registered indian girls published by scholarship@western, 2014 ! ! a p p e n d i x a l e x i s d i a g r a m : a l l o r d e r s o f b i r t h s o b s e r v e d a n d a d j u s t e d , n u m b e r s a n d d e a t h s o f 6 ( 1 ) r e g i s t e r e d i n d i a n w o m e n b o r n b e t w e e n 1 9 8 6 a n d 1 9 9 1 , c a n a d a standard birth correction timeline, all orders, 1996-2000 exact age x 1.000 1.000 0.996 0.991 0.985 0.979 0.970 0.959 0.942 0.915 0.869 0.754 0.327 n ( x ; x + 1 ) 23,535 women 20 3914 (3266)* 32 19 3119 (2862) 38 18 2374 (2249) 28 17 1439 (1387) d ( x ; x + 1 ) 19 16 636 (621) 16 15 161 (159) 22 14 24 (24) 14 13 t o t a l 1 1 , 6 6 7 ( 1 0 , 5 6 8 ) 23,704 women born 1986 to 1991 12 n o . p e r c a l e n d a r y e a r 1 (1)* 16 (16) 79 (79) 235 (234) 505 (498) 964 (945) 1558 (1511) 1957 (1877) 1926 (1815) 1717 (1571) 1415 (1229) 863 (651) 431 (141) t o t a l 1 9 9 9 t o 2 0 1 1 1 1 , 6 6 7 ( 1 0 , 5 6 8 ) 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 calendar year note: * the numbers in brackets are the observed numbers of births (all orders) or the observed numbers of 6(1) registered indian women. source: aandc (2013). 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.7 ! ! ! a p p e n d i x b a d j u s t m e n t o f a l l o r d e r s o f b i r t h s , r e g i s t e r e d * i n d i a n m o t h e r s b o r n f r o m 1 9 8 6 t o 1 9 9 1 * * a n d a g e d 1 3 t o 1 9 , c a n a d a y e a r g i r l ’ s a g e t o t a l 13 years 14 years 15 years 16 years 17 years 18 years 19 years bi rt hs o bs er ve d 1999 1 1 2000 2 2 12 1 6 2001 1 2 13 17 46 7 9 2002 1 4 10 9 51 55 104 2 3 4 2003 1 2 8 13 46 58 88 129 153 4 9 7 2004 3 4 10 17 37 51 110 122 154 209 228 9 4 5 2005 1 10 17 43 62 100 144 190 212 211 247 274 1 , 5 1 1 2006 23 35 71 106 143 182 195 224 265 308 325 1 , 8 7 7 2007 66 97 115 186 225 235 273 324 294 1 , 8 1 5 2008 129 171 178 229 283 290 291 1 , 5 7 1 2009 194 218 236 282 299 1 , 2 2 9 2010 213 212 226 6 5 1 2011 141 1 4 1 t o t a l 9 15 63 96 258 363 605 782 1,036 1,213 1,345 1,517 1,690 1,576 1 0 , 5 6 7 2 4 1 5 9 6 2 1 1 , 3 8 7 2 , 2 4 9 2 , 8 6 2 3 , 2 6 6 y e a r s t a n d a r d t i m e l i n e o f t i m e t o d e c l a r e , 1 9 9 6 2 0 0 0 , a l l o r d e r s 13 years 14 years 15 years 16 years 17 years 18 years 19 years 1999 1.000 2000 1.000 1.000 1,000 2001 0.996 0.996 0.996 0.996 0.996 2002 0.991 0.991 0.991 0.991 0.991 0.991 0.991 2003 0.985 0.985 0.985 0.985 0.985 0.985 0.985 0.985 0.985 2004 0.979 0.979 0.979 0.979 0.979 0.979 0.979 0.979 0.979 0.979 0.979 2005 0.970 0.970 0.970 0.970 0.970 0.970 0.970 0.970 0.970 0.970 0.970 0.970 2006 0.959 0.959 0.959 0.959 0.959 0.959 0.959 0.959 0.959 0.959 0.959 2007 0.942 0.942 0.942 0.942 0.942 0.942 0.942 0.942 0.942 2008 0.915 0.915 0.915 0.915 0.915 0.915 0.915 2009 0,869 0,869 0.869 0.869 0.869 2010 0.754 0.754 0.754 2011 0.327 y e a r g i r l ’ s a g e t o t a l 13 years 14 years 15 years 16 years 17 years 18 years 19 years a dj us te d bi rt hs 1999 1 1 2000 2 2 12 1 6 2001 1 2 13 17 46 7 9 2002 1 4 10 9 51 55 105 2 3 5 2003 1 2 8 13 47 59 89 131 155 5 0 4 2004 3 4 10 17 38 52 112 125 157 213 233 9 6 4 2005 1 10 18 44 64 103 148 196 219 218 255 282 1 , 5 5 8 2006 24 36 74 111 149 190 203 234 276 321 339 1 , 9 5 7 2007 70 103 122 197 239 249 290 344 312 1 , 9 2 6 2008 141 187 195 250 309 317 318 1 , 7 1 7 2009 223 251 272 325 344 1 , 4 1 5 2010 282 281 300 8 6 3 2011 431 4 3 1 t o t a l 9 15 63 98 262 374 623 816 1,082 1,292 1,435 1,684 1,870 2,044 1 1 , 6 6 6 2 4 1 6 1 6 3 6 1 , 4 3 9 2 , 3 7 4 3 , 1 1 9 3 , 9 1 4 note: * registered under subsection 6(1) of the indian act, 1985. ** the grey and white areas track birth numbers according to mother’s year of birth (1986 to 1991), mother’s age, and daughter’s year of birth. source: aandc (2013). 17 amorevieta-gentil et al.: intergenerational patterns of fertility among registered indian girls published by scholarship@western, 2014 ! ! ! a p p e n d i x c c o r r e c t i o n o f c h i l d b i r t h s b y r e g i s t e r e d * i n d i a n g i r l s b o r n f r o m 1 9 8 6 t o 1 9 9 1 , b y c h i l d b i r t h o r d e r a n d a g e o f t h e m o t h e r a t c h i l d b i r t h , c a n a d a c h i l d b i r t h o r d e r 1 c o m p l e t e d y e a r s e l a p s e d totals mother under age 20 mother aged 20 or over unadjusted adjusted unadjusted adjusted unadjusted adjusted 0 24 24 8 8 16 16 1 156 159 45 46 111 113 2 603 619 184 189 419 430 3 1,287 1,336 343 356 944 980 4 1,897 2,002 506 534 1,391 1,468 5 2,120 2,312 523 570 1,597 1,742 6 2,109 2,522 489 585 1,620 1,937 total 8,196 8,974 2,098 2,288 6,098 6,686 c h i l d b i r t h o r d e r 2 c o m p l e t e d y e a r s e l a p s e d totals mother under age 20 mother aged 20 or over unadjusted adjusted unadjusted adjusted unadjusted adjusted 0 185 205 71 79 114 126 1 1,122 1,267 295 333 827 934 2 493 555 136 153 357 402 3 162 192 51 60 111 132 4 48 54 17 19 31 35 5 4 5 3 4 1 1 6 1 1 0 0 1 1 total 2,015 2,279 573 648 1,442 1,631 c h i l d b i r t h o r d e r 3 c o m p l e t e d y e a r s e l a p s e d totals mother under age 20 mother aged 20 or over unadjusted adjusted unadjusted adjusted unadjusted adjusted 0 33 42 14 18 19 24 1 171 193 49 55 122 138 2 54 61 16 18 38 43 3 6 6 0 0 6 6 total 264 302 79 91 185 211 note: * registered under subsection 6(1) of the indian act, 1985. source: aandc (2013). 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.7 ! ! a p p e n d i x d a d j u s t e d f e r t i l i t y t a b l e s f o r r e g i s t e r e d * i n d i a n g i r l s b o r n f r o m 1 9 8 6 t o 1 9 9 1 , b y c h i l d b i r t h o r d e r a n d a g e o f t h e m o t h e r a t c h i l d b i r t h , c a n a d a all registered indian girls c o m p l e t e d y e a r s e l a p s e d x f0,x n1(x, x+1) f1,x a0,x f1,x n2(x, x+1) f2,x a1,x f2,x n3(x, x+1) f3,x a2,x 0 23,704 24 1.0 0.0 8,974 205 22.8 0.0 2,279 42 18.4 0.0 1 23,680 159 6.7 0.1 8,769 1,267 144.5 2.3 2,237 193 86.3 1.8 2 23,521 619 26.3 0.8 7,502 555 74.0 16.4 2,044 61 29.8 10.3 3 22,902 1,336 58.3 3.4 6,947 192 27.6 22.6 1,983 6 3.0 13.0 4 21,566 2,002 92.8 9.0 6,755 54 8.0 24.7 1,977 13.3 5 19,564 2,312 118.2 17.5 6,701 5 0.7 25.3 6 17,252 2,522 146.2 27.2 6,696 1 0.1 25.4 7 14,730 37.9 6,695 25.4 registered indian girls – mother under age 20 c o m p l e t e d y e a r s e l a p s e d x f0,x n1(x, x+1) f1,x a0,x f1,x n2(x, x+1) f2,x a1,x f2,x n3(x, x+1) f3,x a2,x 0 5,272 8 1.5 0.0 2,288 79 34.5 0.0 648 18 27.8 0.0 1 5,264 46 8.7 0.2 2,209 333 150.7 3.5 630 55 87.3 2.8 2 5,218 189 36.2 1.0 1,876 153 81.6 18.0 575 18 31.3 11.3 3 5,029 356 70.8 4.6 1,723 60 34.8 24.7 557 0 0.0 14.0 4 4,673 534 114.3 11.4 1,663 19 11.4 27.3 557 14.0 5 4,139 570 137.7 21.5 1,644 4 2.4 28.1 6 3,569 585 163.9 32.3 1,640 0 0.0 28.3 7 2,984 43.4 1,640 28.3 registered indian girls – mother aged 20 or over c o m p l e t e d y e a r s e l a p s e d x f0,x n1(x, x+1) f1,x a0,x f1,x n2(x, x+1) f2,x a1,x f2,x n3(x, x+1) f3,x a2,x 0 18,432 16 0.9 0.0 6,686 126 18.8 0.0 1,631 24 14.7 0.0 1 18,416 113 6.1 0.1 6,560 934 142.4 1.9 1,607 138 85.9 1.5 2 18,303 430 23.5 0.7 5,626 402 71.5 15.9 1,469 43 29.3 9.9 3 17,873 980 54.8 3.0 5,224 132 25.3 21.9 1,426 6 4.2 12.6 4 16,893 1,468 86.9 8.3 5,092 35 6.9 23.8 1,420 12.9 5 15,425 1,742 112.9 16.3 5,057 1 0.2 24.4 6 13,683 1,937 141.6 25.8 5,056 1 0.2 24.4 7 11,746 36.3 5,055 24.4 note: * registered under subsection 6(1) of the indian act, 1985. source: aandc (2013). 19 amorevieta-gentil et al.: intergenerational patterns of fertility among registered indian girls published by scholarship@western, 2014 the international indigenous policy journal june 2014 intergenerational patterns of fertility among registered indian teenage girls in canada marilyn amorevieta-gentil david daignault norbert robitaille eric guimond sacha senecal recommended citation intergenerational patterns of fertility among registered indian teenage girls in canada abstract keywords disclaimer creative commons license intergenerational patterns of fertility among registered indian teenage girls in canada recommended mitigation measures for an influenza pandemic in remote and isolated first nations communities of ontario, canada: a community-based participatory research approach the international indigenous policy journal volume 5 | issue 3 article 2 june 2014 recommended mitigation measures for an influenza pandemic in remote and isolated first nations communities of ontario, canada: a community-based participatory research approach nadia a. charania university of waterloo, ncharani@uwaterloo.ca leonard js tsuji university of waterloo, ljtsuji@uwaterloo.ca recommended citation charania, n. a. , tsuji, l. j. (2014). recommended mitigation measures for an influenza pandemic in remote and isolated first nations communities of ontario, canada: a community-based participatory research approach. the international indigenous policy journal, 5(3). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.2 recommended mitigation measures for an influenza pandemic in remote and isolated first nations communities of ontario, canada: a community-based participatory research approach abstract influenza pandemics disproportionately impact remote and/or isolated indigenous communities worldwide. the differential risk experienced by such communities warrants the recommendation of specific mitigation measures. interviewer-administered questionnaires were conducted with adult key health care informants from three remote and isolated canadian first nations communities of sub-arctic ontario. forty-eight mitigation measures (including the setting, pandemic period, trigger, and duration) were questioned. participants’ responses were summarized and collected data were deductively and inductively coded. the participants recommended 41 of the questioned mitigation measures, and often differed from previous literature and national recommendations. results revealed that barriers, such as overcrowded housing, limited supplies, and health care infrastructure, impacted the feasibility of implementing mitigation measures. these findings suggest that pandemic plans should recommend control strategies for remote and isolated canadian first nations communities that may not be supported in other communities. these findings highlight the importance of engaging locally impacted populations using participatory approaches in policy decisionmaking processes. other countries with remote and/or isolated indigenous communities are encouraged to include recommendations for mitigation measures that specifically address the unique needs of such communities in an effort to improve their health outcomes during the next influenza pandemic. keywords community mitigation measures, pandemic planning, influenza pandemic, remote and isolated first nations, qualitative analyses, community-based participatory research acknowledgments the authors would like to thank the participants who were involved in the study for their invaluable contributions. this study was funded by the canadian institutes of health research (institute of aboriginal peoples’ health), aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (northern scientific training program), the government of ontario, and the vanier canada graduate scholarship program. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/     r e c o m m e n d e d m i t i g a t i o n m e a s u r e s f o r a n i n f l u e n z a p a n d e m i c i n r e m o t e a n d i s o l a t e d f i r s t n a t i o n s c o m m u n i t i e s o f o n t a r i o , c a n a d a : a c o m m u n i t y b a s e d p a r t i c i p a t o r y r e s e a r c h a p p r o a c h since another global influenza pandemic is inevitable (osterholm, 2005), the world health organization (who) recommends that nations have effective pandemic plans in place to minimize the associated social and economic consequences (world health organization, 2009). in canada, the canadian pandemic influenza plan for the health sector (cpip) provides guidance for a consistent and comprehensive pandemic response and recommends various mitigation measures, both pharmaceutical and non-pharmaceutical, to reduce the impact of an influenza pandemic (public health agency of canada, 2006). as the cpip is national in scope and regional diversities regarding healthcare delivery exist, it recommends that jurisdictional plans address specific operational details associated with implementing an influenza pandemic response (public health agency of canada, 2006). having specific details regarding the implementation of effective mitigation measures is particularly important for marginalized populations, such as aboriginal (first nations, inuit, and métis) populations in canada living in geographically remote and isolated areas. although the 2009 h1n1 pandemic (a(h1n1)pdm09) was mild compared to previous pandemics (gatherer, 2009; reed et al., 2009; shen, ma, & wang, 2009), indigenous populations residing in remote and/or isolated areas suffered disproportionately, particularly in canada, the united states, and australia (barker, 2010; flint et al., 2010; kermode-scott, 2009; kumar et al., 2009; la ruche et al., 2009; spence & white, 2010; trauer, laurie, mcdonnell, kelso, & markey, 2011; zarychanski et al., 2010). the differential health outcomes experienced in such communities during a pandemic may be attributed to a variety of complex challenges that arise from social, economic, environmental, and cultural inequalities (groom et al., 2009; richardson, driedger, pizzi, wu, & moghadas, 2012; tsuji, 1998). previous research suggests that differences in the presence of pre-existing co-morbidities, population profiles, access to healthcare services, transmission dynamics, and malnutrition in remote and/or isolated indigenous communities may result in more severe influenza-related outcomes (la ruche et al., 2009; morrison, buckeridge, xiao, & moghadas, 2014; mostaço-guidolin, towers, buckeridge, & moghadas, 2013; spence & white, 2010). thus, the differential risk experienced by remote and/or isolated indigenous communities warrants the recommendation of mitigation measures that are context-specific and communityinformed to better prepare them for the next public health emergency (lee, rogers, & braunack-mayer, 2008; richardson et al., 2012; uscher-pines, duggan, garoon, karron, & faden, 2007). scientific evidence regarding effective community measures to mitigate the ensuing effects of an influenza pandemic is limited (aledort, lurie, wasserman, & bozzette, 2007; oshitani, 2006). although important evidence and lessons learnt pertaining to the use of various mitigation measures emerged after the a(h1n1)pmd09 experience, gaps in knowledge remain (cowling et al., 2010; aburto et al., 2010; halder, kelso, & milne, 2010). for instance, there remains a lack of data regarding the knowledge, attitudes, and practices of mitigation measures for pandemic influenza across diverse populations, especially those that are marginalized (aiello et al., 2010). recommendations for implementing mitigation measures are inherently complex as it varies according to the pandemic period, setting, availability of resources, severity of the pandemic, and requires reflection on societal values (aledort et al., 2007; thompson, faith, gibson, & upshur, 2006). since marginalized populations best understand how their community perspectives and values impact their ability to comply and implement public 1 charania and tsuji: pandemic mitigation measures for remote indigenous communities published by scholarship@western, 2014     health recommendations, directly engaging locally impacted populations can provide valuable insights to guide recommendations for specific mitigation measures (braunack-mayer et al., 2010; groom et al., 2009; uscher-pines et al., 2007). prior to the next pandemic, governments and relevant institutions are recommended to identify populations that have been historically marginalized and engage these populations in the planning process to facilitate the inclusion of ways to address their specific needs during a pandemic outbreak (uscher-pines et al., 2007). given this, the purpose of the presented study is to elicit a list of recommended mitigation measures (including the setting, pandemic period, trigger, and duration) specific for remote and isolated first nations communities in canada, using a community-based participatory research approach. these specific recommendations will subsequently be compared and contrasted to current national recommendations and relevant literature. this study also aims to highlight the importance and value of using participatory methods to engage locally impacted populations in health policy decision-making processes. m e t h o d s c o m m u n i t y b a s e d p a r t i c i p a t o r y r e s e a r c h a p p r o a c h the present study employed a community-based participatory research (cbpr) approach, as participatory research approaches have been successful in influencing policy and practice (horowitz, robinson, & seifer, 2009; o’brien & whitaker, 2011; themba-nixon, minkler, & freudenberg, 2008). the hallmark principles of cbpr, such as equitable partnerships, valuing different ways of knowing, and addressing issues of local importance, can foster the engagement of indigenous populations in influencing health policy (fletcher, 2003; laveaux & christopher, 2009). as such, this project arose from a longstanding partnership between the co-author’s (ljst) research team and the involved communities, and addressed a locally relevant issue (horowitz et al., 2009; o’brien & whitaker, 2011). the study stemmed from previous research that involved modifying the community-level pandemic plans of the study communities by engaging various community stakeholders (e.g., band councils [locally-elected first nations government], health care staff, clergy, education boards, etc.) (charania & tsuji, 2012). since cbpr endeavours also emphasize shared control of decision-making, a communitybased advisory group was formed of three community representatives (one from each study community) to aid in various aspects of this study including designing the study, piloting the questions, informing the data analysis process, and disseminating the results (charania & tsuji, 2011; kirby, lévesque, wabano, & robertson-wilson, 2007). achieving action-oriented outcomes that benefit the involved communities is an important aspect of cbpr (israel, eng, schulz, & parker, 2005; israel et al., 2008) so the communities requested that the results of this study be used to further update the community infection control measures section in each of the community’s influenza pandemic plan (charania & tsuji, 2012). ethics approval to conduct this study was granted by the office of research ethics at the university of waterloo, and was supported by the band councils of the involved communities. s t u d y a r e a a n d p o p u l a t i o n three communities (names omitted for anonymity purposes) were included in the present study and are located in northern ontario, canada. all are characterized as being remote (i.e., the nearest service 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.2     center with year-round road access is located over 350 kilometers away) and isolated (i.e., the communities are only accessible by airplanes year-round) first nations communities (public health agency of canada, 2006). nine adult-key health-care informants were purposively selected (three from each community) based on the inclusion criteria of having experience as a practicing health care professional (e.g., health director, nurse-in-charge, clinical coordinator, etc.) in a remote and isolated first nations community and being directly involved in their respective community’s health sector response to a(h1n1)pdm09; thus, they had the required experience and authority to comment. furthermore, as multiple government organizations are responsible for aboriginal health in canada (e.g., federal, provincial, and first nations) (public health agency of canada, 2006), participants were chosen within each of the three communities to ensure that each applicable government body was represented. all of the participants invited subsequently agreed and consented to participate in the study. d a t a c o l l e c t i o n an extensive review was conducted of relevant literature and existing (international, national, provincial, regional, and community level) pandemic plans to create a comprehensive list of currently discussed mitigation measures. forty-eight mitigation measures (accounting for variations of 41 mitigation measures) were included in the interview questionnaire. the questionnaires were administered by the lead author (nac) from july 2010 to october 2011 at a place and time chosen by the participants after obtaining informed verbal consent, which is culturally appropriate for the region (kirby et al., 2007; skinner, hanning, & tsuji, 2006). to gain additional insights regarding the data analysis and dissemination process, the community-based advisory group was consulted in person by the lead author (nac) in june 2013. the interview questionnaire employed a combination of closedand open-ended questions; thereby allowing for comparability amongst participants’ answers in addition to providing the opportunity for participants to expand on their opinions (bryman, 2001). for each mitigation measure, the key informants were asked if they would recommend the measure in their community during a future influenza pandemic. if a mitigation measure was recommended, the participant was subsequently asked to elaborate on the setting, pandemic period, trigger (to begin implementation), and duration (of implementation) of the mitigation measure. definitions of the mitigation measures and aforementioned terms were provided to the participant. the interviews ranged in duration from 2 to 4 hours long, were conducted in english (as requested by the participant) and audio recorded (with the participant’s permission). d a t a a n a l y s e s the collected data were manually transcribed verbatim into electronic format to allow for deductive coding and inductive coding (to reveal any additional insights) using qsr nvivo® computer software (version 9.0). the data were deductively analyzed using a template organizing approach in which the interview questionnaire was used as a coding template (bryman, 2001; crabtree & miller, 1999). the closed-ended questions regarding setting and pandemic period were coded according to preestablished options, based on previous literature. the participants chose any option that applied for the setting (i.e., hospital, ambulatory/community-based healthcare facility, community, and home) 3 charania and tsuji: pandemic mitigation measures for remote indigenous communities published by scholarship@western, 2014     (aledort et al., 2007) and pandemic period (i.e., interpandemic, pandemic alert, and pandemic) (public health agency of canada, 2006). the cpip outlines the who pandemic alert system, which consisted of six pandemic phases categorized into three pandemic periods. the interpandemic period (phases 1 and 2) was characterized by outbreaks in animals caused by a novel influenza subtype that has not yet been detected in humans. the pandemic alert period (phases 3, 4, and 5) was characterized by a novel influenza subtype causing outbreaks in humans. and the pandemic period (phase 6) was characterized by increased and sustained human-to-human transmission of the novel influenza subtype in the general population. the open-ended questions regarding the trigger and duration of the mitigation measure were categorized and coded to allow for comparability amongst participants’ responses. the categories for the implementation trigger were outbreak in the zone, outbreak in the community, all the time, and other. herein, zone will refer to the geographic zones in ontario within which health services are provided by the first nations and inuit health branch of health canada (health canada, 2011). implementation duration categories were post-outbreak in the zone, post-outbreak in the community, two weeks postvaccination of community members (the time required to induce protective antibody titres) (cox, brokstad, & ogra, 2004), post-pandemic, all the time, and other. participants’ responses were summarized and the answer most commonly chosen is reported. when there was disagreement amongst participants’ responses, the community-based advisory group was consulted to decide whether the measure would or would not be recommended. r e s u l t s the participants stated that they would recommend 41 of the questioned mitigation measures to be implemented in their communities during the next influenza pandemic. the collected data are summarized as a list of mitigation measures recommended for use (including the most commonly answered setting, pandemic period, trigger, and duration of implementation) (see table 1) and not recommended for use (including participants’ rationale for not supporting the measure) (see table 2). as the level of agreement regarding the recommendation of measures sometimes varied, the most pertinent results (as suggested by the community-based advisory group) are highlighted below and supplemented by participants’ quotes (knafl & howard, 1984). the majority of participants deemed one measure, animal-human interchange as not applicable in their communities because domestic animal farming does not occur. however, a participant was concerned that avian influenza could be transmitted to humans while hunting and harvesting potentially infected wild geese. one participant suggested traditional medicine as an additional mitigation measure that would be beneficial and culturally-appropriate. the participant recommended that traditional medicine practices should be implemented in the community and community members’ homes all of the time, but particularly during the alert period. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.2     t a b l e 1 . l i s t o f r e c o m m e n d e d m e a s u r e s t o m i t i g a t e a n i n f l u e n z a p a n d e m i c i n r e m o t e a n d i s o l a t e d f i r s t n a t i o n s c o m m u n i t i e s s u g g e s t e d b y p a r t i c i p a n t s ( n = 9 ) m i t i g a t i o n m e a s u r e s e t t i n g p e r i o d t r i g g e r d u r a t i o n t ra ve l m ea su re s entry screening of travelers (8a,1b) community (8a,0b) alert (7a,1b) other (5a,3b) post-zone outbreak (4a,4b); post vaccine (4a,4b) exit screening of travelers (5a,4b) community (5a,0b) alert (5a,0b) zone outbreak (2a,3b); other (2a,3b) post vaccine (4a,1b) travel restrictions on all arriving passengers (6a,3b) community (5a,0b,1e) alert (5a,0b,1e) other (5a,1b) post vaccine (3a,2b,1e) travel advisories on all arriving passengers (8a,1b) community (8a,0b) alert (7a,1b) other (5a,3b) post-community outbreak (3a,5b) travel advisories on all departing passengers (9a,0b) community (8a,0b,1e) alert (6a,1b,2e) zone outbreak (4a,4b,1e) other (3a,5b,1e) closing down all borders (7a,2b) community (7a,0b) alert (6a,1b) zone outbreak (4a,3b) post vaccine (4a,2b,1e) quarantine of a geographic area (cordon sanitaire) (7a,2b) community (7a,0b) alert (5a,2b) other (4a,3b) post-zone outbreak (3a,3b,1e) c o m m u n it y s o ci al d is ta n ci n g m ea su re s avoid visiting (9a,0b) community (9a,0b); home (9a,0b) alert (7a,2b) zone outbreak (7a,2b) post-community outbreak (4a,5b); post vaccine (4a,5b) avoid crowding (8a,1b) hospital (8a,0b); ambulatory (8a,0b); community(8a,0b); home (8a,0b) alert (8a,0b) zone outbreak (7a,1b) post vaccine (5a,3b) social distancing measures (9a,0b) community(9a,0b) alert (7a,2b) zone outbreak (5a,4b) post-community outbreak (4a,5b); post vaccine (4a,5b) voluntary sheltering (9a,0b) home (7a,2b) alert (6a,3b) zone outbreak (4a,5b) post vaccine (5a,4b) school closures (9a,0b) community (9a,0b) alert (5a,4b) community outbreak(8a,1b) post vaccine (8a,1b) (continued) 5 charania and tsuji: pandemic mitigation measures for remote indigenous communities published by scholarship@western, 2014     m i t i g a t i o n m e a s u r e s e t t i n g p e r i o d t r i g g e r d u r a t i o n c o m m u n it y s o ci al d is ta n ci n g m ea su re s (c o n ti n u ed ) childcare center closures (6a,0b,3d) community (6a,0b) alert (4a,2b) community outbreak (5a,1b) post vaccine (6a,0b) workplace closures (4a,4b,1c) community(4a,0b) pandemic (3a,1b) community outbreak (4a,0b) post-community outbreak (3a,1b) mandatory isolation of ill individuals (7a,2b) home (6a,1b) alert (5a,2b) community outbreak (3a,4b) post-zone outbreak (2a,5b); other (2a,5b) voluntary isolation of ill individuals (6a,3b) home (6a,0b) alert (4a,2b) zone outbreak (3a,3b) post-zone outbreak (2a,4b); postcommunity outbreak (2a,4b) mandatory quarantine of case contacts (5a,4b) home (5a,0b) alert (4a,1b) community outbreak (3a,2b) other (3a,2b) voluntary quarantine of case contacts (6a,3b) home (6a,0b) alert (5a,1b) community outbreak (5a,1b) other (5a,1b) restricting attendance at public gatherings (6a,2b,1e) community(6a,0b) alert (3a,3b); pandemic (3a,3b) zone outbreak (3a,3b); community outbreak (3a,3b) post-community outbreak (3a,3b) cancelling public gatherings (9a,0b) community(9a,0b) alert (5a,4b) zone outbreak (5a,4b) post vaccine (4a,5b) s u rv ei ll an ce m ea su re s monitoring trends of influenza-like illness (9a,0b) ambulatory (9a,0b) alert (7a,2b) all the time (3a,6b); other (3a,6b) all the time (3a,5b,1e); post pandemic (3a,5b,1e) human surveillance and case reporting (9a,0b) hospital (8a,1b) alert (8a,1b) all the time (4a,5b); other (4a,5b) post-community outbreak (3a,6b); all the time (3a,6b) contact tracing (6a,3b) ambulatory (5a,1b) pandemic (4a,2b) community outbreak (6a,0b) other (4a,2b) home support program (7a,1b,1c) ambulatory (7a,0b) alert (5a,2b) community outbreak (6a,1b) post-community outbreak (3a,4b) urge entire population in an affected area to check for fever at least once daily (5a,3b,1c) home (5a,0b) alert (3a,2b); pandemic (3a,2b) community outbreak (3a,2b) post pandemic (2a,3b) (continued) 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.2     m i t i g a t i o n m e a s u r e s e t t i n g p e r i o d t r i g g e r d u r a t i o n s u rv ei ll an ce (c o n t. ) rapid influenza diagnostic tests (8a,1b) hospital (8a,0b) alert (7a,1b) all the time (5a,3b) all the time (4a,4b) screening for influenza-like illness at public places (8a,1b) hospital (8a,0b); ambulatory (8a,0b); community (8a,0b) alert (7a,1b) zone outbreak (4a,4b) post vaccine (4a,4b) in fe ct io n c o n tr o l m ea su re s modifying cultural practices at church and funerals (9a,0b) community(9a,0b) alert (8a,1b) zone outbreak (4a,5b); community outbreak (4a,5b) post-zone outbreak (4a,5b); postcommunity outbreak (4a,5b) hand hygiene (9a,0b) hospital (9a,0b); ambulatory (9a,0b); community(9a,0b); home (9a,0b) interpandemic (9a,0b); alert (9a,0b); pandemic (9a,0b) all the time (9a,0b) all the time (9a,0b) respiratory etiquette (9a,0b) hospital (9a,0b); ambulatory (9a,0b); community(9a,0b); home (9a,0b) interpandemic (9a,0b); alert (9a,0b); pandemic (9a,0b) all the time (9a,0b) all the time (9a,0b) surface disinfection (beyond usual practice) (9a,0b) hospital (9a,0b); ambulatory (9a,0b); community(9a,0b); home (9a,0b) alert (8a,1b) zone outbreak (4a,5b); community outbreak(4a,5b) post-zone outbreak (4a,5b) ventilation (i.e., open windows) (8a,1b) home (8a,0b) alert (7a,1b) zone outbreak (5a,3b) post vaccine (3a,5b) air disinfection (7a,2b) hospital (6a,1b) alert (7a,0b) all the time (4a,3b) all the time (4a,3b) visitor restrictions (in health facilities) (7a,1b,1d) hospital (7a,0b) alert (6a,1b) zone outbreak (6a,1b) post vaccine (5a,2b) isolation precautions (in health facilities) (8a,1b) hospital (8a,0b) alert (8a,0b) zone outbreak (4a,4b) post vaccine (5a,3b) minimize aerosolgenerating procedures (in health facilities) (8a,0b,1d) hospital (7a,1b) alert (7a,1b) zone outbreak (4a,4b) post-community outbreak (4a,4b) (continued) 7 charania and tsuji: pandemic mitigation measures for remote indigenous communities published by scholarship@western, 2014     m i t i g a t i o n m e a s u r e s e t t i n g p e r i o d t r i g g e r d u r a t i o n in fe ct io n c o n tr o l m ea su re s (c o n t. ) wearing surgical masks and n95 respirators – provider and patient use (9a,0b) hospital (9a,0b); ambulatory (9a,0b); community(9a,0b) alert (5a,4b); pandemic (5a,4b) community outbreak (3a,6b); other (3a,6b) post-community outbreak (5a,4b) wearing personal protective equipment – provider and patient use (9a,0b) ambulatory (9a,0b) alert (7a,2b) community outbreak (5a,4b) post-community outbreak (4a,5b) public education (9a,0b) community(9a,0b); home (9a,0b) interpandemic (9a,0b); alert (9a,0b); pandemic (9a,0b) all the time (9a,0b) all the time (9a,0b) p h ar m ac eu ti ca l m ea su re s vaccines (9a,0b) ambulatory (8a,1b) alert (8a,1b) other (8a,1b) other (9a,0b) antivirals (9a,0b) hospital (8a,1b) alert (8a,1b) community outbreak (8a,1b) post-community outbreak (6a,3b) a participant recommended measure b participant did not recommend measure c participant suggested a modification to the measure d participant deemed measure not applicable e missing data   8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.2     t a b l e 2 . l i s t o f m e a s u r e s n o t r e c o m m e n d e d t o m i t i g a t e a n i n f l u e n z a p a n d e m i c i n r e m o t e a n d i s o l a t e d f i r s t n a t i o n s c o m m u n i t i e s s u g g e s t e d b y p a r t i c i p a n t s ( n = 9 ) m i t i g a t i o n m e a s u r e r a t i o n a l e f o r n o t r e c o m m e n d i n g disinfection of clothing, shoes, or other objects of persons exiting affected areas (4a,5b) measure would not be feasible to implement in a remote and isolated community due to required monies, supplies, and human resources. sanitary measures at frontiers or on conveyances (2a,7b) measure would not be feasible, practical, or cost-effective to implement. travel restrictions on all departing passengers (2a,7b) community members would not adhere to the measure and measure would be difficult to enforce. self-health monitoring and reporting if ill but no restrictions on movement (0a,9b) self-health monitoring and reporting would be beneficial, but difficult for community members to conduct. measure would also contradict the purpose of other mitigation measures directed at limiting virus transmission. wearing surgical masks and n95 respirators – public use (4a,5b) limited resource availability, proficiency regarding proper use and adherence to the measure would render the measure ineffective for the general public. wearing personal protective equipment – public use (1a,8b) limited resource availability, proficiency regarding proper use and adherence to the measure would render the measure ineffective for the general public. a participant recommended measure b participant did not recommend measure t r a v e l m e a s u r e s the majority of travel mitigation measures were recommended for a future influenza pandemic. all of the recommended measures were to be implemented in the community, primarily at the airport, during the alert period. most participants agreed that these measures should be implemented when positive cases are detected in canada or at the latest when positive cases are detected in the zone. these measures were recommended to be implemented until the outbreak has ceased in the zone or two weeks post-vaccination of community members. participants almost unanimously agreed that entry screening of travelers would be a beneficial measure if executed properly because the airport is typically the only entry point into their remote and isolated communities during the ice-free season. screening measures could include health questionnaires and declarations, temperature screening, thermal scanning, medical examinations, and stop lists (bell, nicoll, fukuda, horby, & monto, 2006a; bell, nicoll, fukuda, horby, & monto, 2006b; gostin, 2006). although participants felt that exit screening of travelers is an important measure and would help contain an outbreak, participants were more mixed about recommending the measure as it was expected that the receiving community would conduct screening. participants generally agreed with implementing voluntary travel advisories instead of mandatory travel restrictions, although the recommendation would depend on the severity of the community outbreak. participants reported that voluntary measures encourage people to be more self-conscious and responsible for their health, while mandatory measures were not perceived to be as practical or feasible. 9 charania and tsuji: pandemic mitigation measures for remote indigenous communities published by scholarship@western, 2014     also, participants reported that voluntary travel advisories would effectively deter the majority of people from traveling: with voluntary advisories, you would weed out a lot of people…there would probably only be a select few that would probably still want to travel anyways and if you could implement the precautions and if they would follow them, then i think that would be enough. (participant #7) the majority of participants recommended travel measures that would block the main entry point into their communities. participants reported that closing down all borders and quarantine of a geographic area (cordon sanitaire) would help protect their at-risk population if a community outbreak has not yet occurred. however, the decision to implement these measures would depend on the severity of the pandemic because participants considered these measures to be difficult to implement, enforce, and maintain. c o m m u n i t y s o c i a l d i s t a n c i n g m e a s u r e s participants recommended that all of the proposed community social distancing measures be implemented in their communities. measures that decrease the frequency and duration of social contact, such as avoid visiting, avoid crowding, and general social distancing measures (e.g., spacing people, staggering work schedules, allowing employees to work from home, etc.) were highly recommended by participants during the alert period. although participants noted the difficulties associated with avoiding crowding in overcrowded homes in the communities: overcrowding in the home, it’s hard to try to stay your distance from someone that is sick because you’re close to each other walking by and stuff. (participant #3) participants reported that voluntary sheltering of healthy persons to avoid exposure would be a beneficial mitigation measure during the alert period, although it would be the community members’ prerogative to implement. most participants recommended this measure to be implemented in the community members’ homes; however, some mentioned that members could camp in the bush as long as they had sufficient resources. participants recommended that these measures should be implemented when an outbreak occurs in the zone until the community outbreak has ceased or two weeks postvaccination of community members. in the community, participants unanimously recommended that schools and childcare centers close during the alert period to aid in controlling influenza transmission in the younger age groups, especially given the prior experience of infections among first nations populations. it stops the spread of the flu because there are so many children and they are close together and it’s a lot more difficult telling a child to close their mouth, wash their hands. (participant #8) it helps a lot to control the spreading…i think the community here took it [a(h1n1)pdm09] very seriously…there’s fear because of the history, so the fear is so high here, it’s not like anything else down south … they’ve been decimated by infection [in the past]… (participant #1) 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.2     conversely, participants’ responses were divided regarding the closure of workplaces during the pandemic period. some participants reported that closing workplaces would be impractical as the limited amount of workplaces is essential for the daily functioning of the community; however, others were willing to recommend this measure if the severity of the pandemic warranted it. all of these measures were recommended to be implemented when a community outbreak occurred and workplaces should re-open as soon as the community outbreak ceases, but schools and childcare centers should stay closed until two weeks post-vaccination of community members. although all of the participants recommended these measures during the alert period to reduce virus transmission, participants were also divided regarding whether recommendations for isolation of patients and quarantine of contacts should be mandatory or voluntary. in general, participants recommended voluntary isolation when there is an outbreak in the zone, escalating to mandatory isolation when a community outbreak occurs. participants agreed that mandatory or voluntary quarantine should only be implemented when there is a community outbreak. some participants stated that community members should isolate until the outbreak has ceased in the community and the zone; however, others recommended only isolating until the symptomatic period is over. participants recommended that community members should quarantine for the incubation period post-exposure, and then isolate for the symptomatic period if the person falls ill. s u r v e i l l a n c e m e a s u r e s participants recommended the implementation of all of the surveillance measures, except for one. participants did not recommend the mitigation measure of self-health monitoring and reporting if ill without restrictions on movement. participants unanimously agreed that monitoring and reporting about one’s health would be a beneficial surveillance measure, but not limiting the movement of ill individuals would provide opportunities for virus transmission within the community. of the recommended measures, participants reported that monitoring trends of influenza-like illness and human surveillance and case reporting during the alert period would produce helpful statistics to indicate how effective the response was and how they could better target future response efforts. participants generally suggested that these measures should be implemented on an ongoing basis; however, in the context of a pandemic, these measures would be implemented when treating a symptomatic person and continue until the outbreak has ceased in the community or post-pandemic. the majority of participants also recommended that contact tracing be implemented in the ambulatory setting during the pandemic period in order to identify contacts of an index case that may be at risk of becoming infected and, in turn, help contain a community outbreak. participants reported that contact tracing should ideally occur until all of the contacts have been reached, but would realistically occur until available resources and manpower became overwhelmed. support for conducting contact tracing was qualified by concerns regarding human resources, as a significant number of household and casual contacts would have to be contacted due to the overcrowding in homes and extensive social networking. overcrowding is a problem, so even if you call them but you have a family [and] they have 15 people around them, or 20, if they’ve made contact … and those contact[s] have to be contact[ed], so at the end you have to call the whole community for contact tracing … because everybody’s related with someone. (participant #6) 11 charania and tsuji: pandemic mitigation measures for remote indigenous communities published by scholarship@western, 2014     if enough resources and manpower were available, participants recommended the implementation of a home support program, which involves the provision of infection control supplies and education to families in need, during a community outbreak. moreover, participants considered recommending that community members check for fever on a daily basis in their homes during a community outbreak, as this measure is a valuable diagnostic tool that would raise awareness about self-health. however, participants noted that many families do not own thermometers because they are not available for purchase in community stores. i n f e c t i o n c o n t r o l m e a s u r e s participants recommended most of the proposed infection control measures. participants recommended modifying the cultural practices of kissing and handshaking at church and funeral services during the alert period. hand hygiene and respiratory etiquette were unanimously recommended to be implemented all of the time in all of the settings to decrease virus transmission. participants also recommended other general infection control measures during the alert period, including disinfecting surfaces (beyond usual practice) and ventilation (i.e., opening windows); although, some drawbacks were noted. moneywise…because of the cost of the things we have in here, i don’t think every…[person] can buy that [cleaning supplies] to clean the house … [and] most of the houses in here have a mold problem… (participant #6) all depends on how well their windows are in the community, but some have broken windows, some are boarded up… (participant #2) in the hospital setting, participants recommended that visitor restrictions, isolation precautions, and minimizing aerosol-generating procedures be implemented when an outbreak in the zone occurs; these measures would be in effect until after the community outbreak ceases or two weeks after community members have been vaccinated. participants unanimously recommended that health care providers and patients wear surgical masks to reduce virus transmission during a community outbreak, although it was suggested that providers wear n95 respirators if the situation warrants it. furthermore, participants recommended that providers wear personal protective equipment (ppe) during a community outbreak. symptomatic patients were not recommended to wear ppe as the person will ultimately contaminate any items that he or she wears, thereby rendering the measure ineffective. moreover, participants did not recommend that the general public wear masks and ppe due to concerns of supply, proficiency regarding proper use, and adherence to the measures. lastly, all of the participants reported that pertinent health teachings about influenza and the importance of infection control measures should be occurring in cree and english on an ongoing basis to raise awareness. participants reported that community members received lots of misinformation during a(h1n1)pdm09 from various media sources. thus, participants suggested using multiple community-based measures, such as announcements on the local radio station and door-to-door visits with cree translators, to rectify the received misinformation. also, participants suggested that educational materials should be visual, simple, and targeted to their community members in order to be most effective. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.2     be more specific and simple, too much information is not better than not enough, and i think we have too much information on that case [a(h1n1)pdm09] coming from…too [many sources] at the same time, confusing the people, confusing the health care provider, confusing almost everyone. (participant #6) p h a r m a c e u t i c a l m e a s u r e s the participants unanimously recommended implementing pandemic-sensitive vaccines and antivirals during a community outbreak. the mass vaccination campaigns should commence as soon as the vaccines are delivered to the community and ideally continue until herd immunity is achieved. the community-based healthcare facility would be responsible for distributing the vaccines to community members in a variety of settings, including the hospital, school, and homes of people who are not mobile. the antivirals would be dispensed by the hospital to symptomatic people meeting the required criteria. d i s c u s s i o n given the unique challenges experienced in remote and isolated canadian first nations communities during an influenza pandemic that in turn impact their pandemic response capacity and may result in more severe health outcomes, the participants recommended that the majority of questioned mitigation measures be implemented in their communities. not surprisingly, similar to national recommendations, the participants unanimously recommended the use of vaccines and antivirals, since pharmaceutical measures are the best measures to mitigate the impact of a pandemic outbreak (oshitani, 2006; public health agency of canada, 2006). although much uncertainty still remains regarding optimal vaccine allocation (tuite, fisman, kwong, & greer, 2010), previous modelling studies have reported that rapidly immunizing the population, even with a poorly matched vaccine, could significantly reduce the outbreak and number of ill people (ferguson et al., 2006; germann, kadau, longini jr., & macken, 2006; wu & cowling, 2011). furthermore, the implementation of antiviral drugs for treatment and/or prophylaxis purposes during a pandemic could reduce influenza-related attack, hospitalization, and death rates (gani et al., 2005; longini jr., halloran, nizam, & yang, 2004; wu & cowling, 2011). previous modelling research has suggested that aggressive antiviral therapy significantly reduced the impact of a(h1n1)pdm09 in an isolated canadian first nations community (xiao et al., 2013). as limitations of supply and cost restrict the use of vaccines and antivirals, especially in remote and isolated settings (finnie, hall, & leach, 2012; low, 2008; oshitani, 2006), the participants noted the importance of recommending a wide variety of non-pharmaceutical mitigation measures to supplement the use of pharmaceutical measures. non-pharmaceutical mitigation measures may aid in delaying, reducing, and containing a pandemic outbreak (bell et al., 2006a; low, 2008; markel et al., 2007). pandemic response strategies that appropriately combine pharmaceutical and non-pharmaceutical interventions have been shown to be more effective than individual strategies in terms of delaying the outbreak, reducing the number of ill cases, and delaying and reducing the peak attack rate (lee, lye, & wilder-smith, 2009). at the national level, of relevance to the presented paper, annex b of the cpip discusses planning considerations for on-reserve first nations communities, while annex m outlines public health recommendations including public education, case and contact management, travel and border related measures, and community-based interventions (public health agency of canada, 2006). three 13 charania and tsuji: pandemic mitigation measures for remote indigenous communities published by scholarship@western, 2014     community-based interventions are recommended to control a community outbreak, including selfisolating if symptomatic, closing schools and daycare centres, and restricting “high-risk” indoor public gatherings (other than schools) (see table 3) (public health agency of canada, 2006). all of the aforementioned recommendations were also supported by the participants. the participants recommended that isolation and quarantine measures begin as voluntary and escalate to mandatory as needed. previous research states that isolation and quarantine are generally effective and acceptable measures (crabtree & henry, 2011); however, mandatory isolation and quarantine are considered ineffective and impractical since viral shedding occurs prior to the onset of symptoms and healthcare facilities would rapidly become overwhelmed (aledort et al., 2007; bell et al., 2006b). furthermore, although participants recommended the closure of schools and daycare centres, along with cancelling and/or restricting public gatherings, due to increased influenza transmission in these settings, there are limited data to support the effectiveness of these measures (roth & henry, 2011). interestingly, the participants recommended 8 of the 10 community-based interventions that are not nationally recommended (see table 3) (public health agency of canada, 2006). contrary to national recommendations, the majority of participants placed much value in recommending various travel measures to protect their communities. previous research has reported that screening travelers, travel restrictions, and closing down airports are generally ineffective and result in substantial economic and societal costs (bell et al., 2006b; inglesby et al., 2006). however, the cpip does note that travel measures may be more feasible to implement in geographically remote and isolated communities due to small population sizes and limited ports of entry (public health agency of canada, 2006). as disease transmission is typically amplified due to the characteristics of the study communities (finnie, et al., 2012; groom et al., 2009; kermode-scott, 2009; massey et al., 2009; massey et al., 2011), travel measures directed at preventing the importation of the pandemic virus, especially during a severe pandemic, may be particularly important. the cpip notes that recommendations will vary according to local conditions, especially with regards to the timing of their implementation (public health agency of canada, 2006). the participants also highlighted the importance of specifying the timing of implemented mitigation measures, especially since these specifications may vary for geographically remote and isolated communities. three mitigation measures—hand hygiene, respiratory etiquette, and public education—were recommended by participants to be implemented all of the time. similar to the cpip recommendations, the participants recommended that the trigger to implement mitigation measures would be dependent on the location of confirmed cases (public health agency of canada, 2006). participants generally recommended that measures should be employed until the outbreak ceases in their community and/or the zone, or until herd immunity is achieved two weeks post-vaccination of their community members. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.2     t a b l e 3 . l i s t o f r e c o m m e n d e d a n d n o t r e c o m m e n d e d m i t i g a t i o n m e a s u r e s f r o m a n n e x m o f t h e c a n a d i a n i n f l u e n z a p a n d e m i c p l a n f o r t h e h e a l t h s e c t o r a s e v a l u a t e d b y s t u d y p a r t i c i p a n t s r e c o m m e n d e d c o m m u n i t y b a s e d i n t e r v e n t i o n s n o t r e c o m m e n d e d c o m m u n i t y b a s e d i n t e r v e n t i o n s • close schools and daycares* o trigger: declaration of one or more confirmed cases in the local community, depending on the epidemiological context. • self-isolate if symptomatic* o trigger: arrival of one or more confirmed cases in the province/territory. reinforce recommendation when cases occur in the local jurisdiction. • restrict indoor public gatherings in ‘high-risk’ settings (other than schools)* o trigger: when transmission occurs within the community. • thermal scanning in public places* • restricting travel to and from affected areas* • cordon sanitaire* • broadly restricting indoor public gatherings (other than schools) * • urge entire population in an affected area to check for fever at least once daily* • hand-sanitizing stations in public settings* • surface disinfection beyond usual practice in public settings* • air disinfection* • disinfection of clothing, shoes, or other objects of persons existing affected areas** • use of masks by the general public (well individuals)** note. source: public health agency of canada, 2006 *participants in the study recommended the measure **participants in the study did not recommend the measure interestingly, although typical responses for the implementation trigger were outbreak in the zone or community, the participants recommended that most of the mitigation measures be implemented in the alert period (before the official declaration of a pandemic). in contrast, during the alert period, the cpip recommends measures to aggressively contain an outbreak and prevent a pandemic, such as isolation and quarantine, contact tracing, exit screening, and antiviral therapy; while population-based measures are recommended during the pandemic period to reduce and delay the pandemic outbreak (public health agency of canada, 2006). this finding may infer the desire of participants residing in remote and isolated first nations communities to be prepared to rapidly implement mitigation measures to prevent the introduction and subsequent spread of a pandemic virus in their communities. since community-level measures will likely be more effective at mitigating a pandemic than internationaland national-level measures (bell et al., 2006b), it is vital that remote and isolated first nations communities have appropriate recommendations included in pandemic plans. in light of these findings, pandemic planners, especially those that are dedicated to community-based pandemic planning, should consider the following policy implications. given the different challenges and health outcomes experienced in remote and isolated first nations communities, it may be appropriate that future pandemic plans recommend pandemic control strategies in such communities that may not be supported in other canadian communities. these findings highlight the importance of developing 15 charania and tsuji: pandemic mitigation measures for remote indigenous communities published by scholarship@western, 2014     mitigation measures that address the population’s values, beliefs, perceptions, and cultural differences in order to be appropriate and effective (massey et al., 2011). for instance, culture influenced some of the recommended mitigation measures since participants were open to modifying the cultural practices of kissing and handshaking at church and funeral services, and traditional medicine was suggested as an additional beneficial mitigation measure. it is also important that future policies address community differences. participants raised concerns that overcrowded impoverished housing and limited supplies impacted the ability of community members to comply with the recommended mitigation measures. participants also noted that the implementation of some mitigation measures might overwhelm their limited health care infrastructure. as these communities have a high proportion of people with pre-existing co-morbidities who are at risk of more severe influenza-related outcomes, the capacity of their health care infrastructure may be further strained by patients visiting with influenza symptoms and by the effects of non-pharmaceutical mitigation measures. to help overcome these barriers, policies and action aimed at improving living conditions, providing money for stockpiling supplies, and improving health care infrastructure in these communities is imperative prior to the next influenza pandemic. furthermore, the implementation of certain measures, such as the distribution of scarce resources (e.g., antivirals), may raise many legal, political, and ethical issues, especially when there is limited scientific evidence to support the measure (aledort et al., 2007; thompson et al., 2006). for instance, although mandatory isolation and quarantine may infringe upon the ethical value of individual liberty and are not commonly recommended (thompson et al., 2006), the majority of participants reported that they would recommend these measures to help minimize virus transmission if a community outbreak occurred. engaging and partnering with community members using participatory approaches are vital to create pandemic plans that are communityand culturallyappropriate (massey et al., 2011). the optimal community-level approach to mitigate the effects of an influenza pandemic in remote and/or isolated indigenous communities is still unknown. there remains a paucity of scientific evidence regarding the assumptions that currently guide pandemic planning and the effectiveness of mitigation measures; thus, most planners resort to historical accounts, mathematical modelling studies, and expert opinion (aledort et al., 2007; bell et al., 2006b; markel et al., 2007). to aid planners in making more informed recommendations, future research regarding influenza transmission characteristics should be encouraged in remote and/or isolated indigenous communities because vast heterogeneities exist. future studies should also explore what mitigation measures are most cost-effective and what combination of mitigation measures would be most effective in these communities c o n c l u s i o n influenza pandemics continue to disproportionately impact indigenous populations worldwide, especially those residing in geographically remote and/or isolated areas. the differential risk experienced by such communities warrants the need for recommendations for mitigation measures that are context-specific and community-informed. the present study elicited a list of recommended pharmaceutical and non-pharmaceutical measures to mitigate the effects of an influenza pandemic in three remote and isolated canadian first nations communities. the results indicated that participants recommended a wide variety of mitigation measures that often differed from national recommendations 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.2     and existing literature. participants also revealed that a number of barriers impacted their ability to feasibly implement recommended measures. these findings suggest that it may be appropriate to recommend pandemic control strategies in remote and isolated canadian first nations communities that may not be supported in other communities. these findings also highlight the importance of engaging locally impacted populations using participatory approaches in policy decision-making processes. other countries with remote and/or isolated indigenous communities are encouraged to include recommendations for mitigation measures that specifically address the unique needs of such communities in an effort to improve their health outcomes during the next influenza pandemic. future research should be directed towards better understanding the current assumptions that guide pandemic planning and the effectiveness of mitigation measures in remote and/or isolated indigenous communities, as vast heterogeneities exist. 17 charania and tsuji: pandemic mitigation measures for remote indigenous communities published by scholarship@western, 2014     r e f e r e n c e s aburto, n.j., pevzner, e., lopez-ridaura, r., rojas, r., lopez-gatell, h., lazcano, e., & et al. 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(2010). correlates of severe disease in patients with 2009 pandemic influenza (h1n1) virus infection. canadian medical association journal, 182(3), 257-264. 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.2 the international indigenous policy journal june 2014 recommended mitigation measures for an influenza pandemic in remote and isolated first nations communities of ontario, canada: a community-based participatory research approach nadia a. charania leonard js tsuji recommended citation recommended mitigation measures for an influenza pandemic in remote and isolated first nations communities of ontario, canada: a community-based participatory research approach abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license recommended mitigation measures for an influenza pandemic in remote and isolated first nations communities of ontario, canada: a community-based participatory research approach international teen reproductive health and development: the canadian first nations context the international indigenous policy journal volume 4 issue 1 indigenous early parenthood article 11 march 2013 international teen reproductive health and development: the canadian first nations context michelle m. mann michelle@michellemann.ca recommended citation mann, m. m. (2013). international teen reproductive health and development: the canadian first nations context. the international indigenous policy journal, 4(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.11 international teen reproductive health and development: the canadian first nations context abstract women’s well-being is dependent on access to reproductive health care. around the world, however, many women do not have adequate access to this essential health service. barriers to accessing reproductive health services are especially problematic for canadian first nations youth, especially those living in rural and remote communities. this article explores the unique challenges of and approaches to teen reproductive health and sustainable development internationally. the international context of reproductive health and sustainable development can inform and set the context for a discussion of canadian first nations teens’ reproductive health. of special interest is how the united nations and the international community approached sensitive issues and generated consensus among many different countries, cultures, religions, and customs. french abstract développement et santé reproductive des adolescentes à l’échelle internationale : la situation des premières nations du canada michelle mann, b.a., ll.b., ll.m. chercheuse indépendante résumé le bien-être des femmes repose sur l’accès aux soins de santé reproductive. cependant, de nombreuses femmes de partout dans le monde n’ont pas un accès adéquat à ce service de santé essentiel. les obstacles à l’accès aux services de santé reproductive sont particulièrement problématiques pour les jeunes des premières nations du canada et les adolescentes qui vivent dans des collectivités rurales et éloignées. cet article explore les défis uniques que représentent le développement durable et la santé reproductive des adolescentes à l’échelle internationale ainsi que les diverses approches à cet égard. la situation internationale du développement durable et de la santé reproductive peut éclairer et définir le contexte de la discussion sur la santé reproductive des adolescentes des premières nations du canada. il est particulièrement intéressant de relever la façon dont les nations unis et la communauté internationale ont abordé les questions de nature délicate et sont parvenus à un consensus malgré les différents pays, cultures, religions et coutumes. spanish abstract salud reproductiva y desarrollo de las adolescentes en el ámbito internacional: contexto de las primeras naciones canadienses michelle mann, b.a., ll.b., ll.m. investigadora independiente resumen el bienestar de las mujeres depende de su acceso a la atención en el campo de la salud reproductiva. sin embargo, son muchas las mujeres en todo el mundo que no disponen de un acceso adecuado a estos servicios esenciales de salud. los factores que dificultan el acceso a los servicios de salud reproductiva son especialmente problemáticos para las jóvenes de las primeras naciones canadienses y para las adolescentes que viven en localidades rurales y alejadas. en este artículo se analizan los retos y enfoques exclusivos de la salud reproductiva de las adolescentes y el desarrollo sostenible a escala internacional. el contexto internacional de la salud reproductiva y del desarrollo sostenible puede aportar información y establecer el contexto para un debate sobre la salud reproductiva de las adolescentes de las primeras naciones canadienses. resulta especialmente interesante la forma en que las naciones unidas y la comunidad internacional plantean las cuestiones sensibles y generan un consenso entre los distintos países, culturas, religiones y costumbres. keywords indigenous health, reproductive health, first nations health, teen health, international health creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ i n t e r n a t i o n a l t e e n r e p r o d u c t i v e h e a l t h a n d d e v e l o p m e n t : t h e c a n a d i a n f i r s t n a t i o n s c o n t e x t women’s well-being is dependent on access to reproductive health care. this includes sexual education, family planning, preand postnatal care, and other community and social supports. reproductive health is not only essential to the well-being of women; it is also important to the health of their children, community, and country. around the world, however, many women do not have adequate, or even any, access to this essential health service. this is also true for canadian teenagers, who may face a variety of significant barriers to accessing such services. these barriers are especially problematic for first nations youth and those teens living in rural and remote communities. barriers to reproductive health experienced by women around the world are related to several factors. obviously, as other articles in this journal have shown, this includes economic status and available health care systems. it is also related to culture, custom, and gender equality. moreover, the barriers to accessing reproductive health and gender equality are magnified for teenagers, who may also experience additional obstacles that are specifically age-related. the profound interconnection between reproductive health, gender equality, poverty, and well-being is on the international agenda. its presence there has resulted in efforts focused on teenaged girls. in fact, the international context of reproductive health and sustainable development can inform and set the context for a discussion of canadian first nations teens’ reproductive health and access to related services. of special interest is how the united nations (un) and the international community approached sensitive issues and generated consensus among many different countries, cultures, religions, and customs. this article explores the unique challenges of, and approaches to, teen reproductive health and sustainable development internationally. first, i discuss the international and national context of reproductive health services. next, i present case studies of successful reproductive health programs in countries with colonized indigenous populations. finally, i ask what parts of the international reproductive health and sustainable development enterprise can be applied in the context of canadian first nations teenagers. i n t e r n a t i o n a l c o n t e x t in mid-2008, the world population stood at 6.7 billion, nearly a 9 percent increase from the 6.0 billion in 1999. the next milestone, 7 billion, will likely be surpassed in 2011 or 2012. during the 20th century, nearly 90 percent of human population growth took place in countries classified by the united nations (2005) as less developed (i.e., all countries in africa, asia except japan, latin america and the caribbean, and oceania except australia and new zealand). overall, women gave birth to an average of about 2.6 children in 2008. however, this figure varies substantially from region to region and country to country. in more developed countries, for instance, women average 1.6 live births over their lifetimes; whereas, in the least developed countries, excluding china, women average 3.2 births, twice that of the wealthier countries. in the 50 least developed countries (as defined by the united nations), the number is even higher at 4.7 births per woman (population reference bureau, 2008). 1 mann: international teen reproductive health published by scholarship@western, 2013 according to the united nations population fund (unfpa, n.d.b), reproductive health problems remain the leading cause of ill health and death for women of childbearing age worldwide. impoverished women, especially those living in developing countries, suffer disproportionately from unintended pregnancies, maternal death and related disability, sexually transmitted infections including hiv, gender-based violence, and other problems related to reproductive health and sexual behaviour. for example, maternal mortality is the leading cause of death among all women and girls of reproductive age. worldwide, 1 in 92 women are estimated to die from pregnancy-related causes. still, the gap between most developed countries and least developed countries is vast. in the most developed countries, the risk of maternal mortality is 1 in 6,000 and in the least developed countries it is 1 in 75 (population reference bureau, 2008). ninety-nine percent of maternal deaths occur in the developing world; most of them – a staggering 74 percent – are preventable (unfpa, 2007a). put differently, over 1,500 women and girls die every day from complications related to pregnancy and childbirth. this translates to around 550,000 annual worldwide deaths related to pregnancy and childbirth (united nations human rights council [unhrc], 2009). maternal mortality is linked to such factors as the frequency and type of prenatal care and the type of care at birth (population reference bureau, 2008). according to unfpa (n.d.f), at least 200 million women want to use safe and effective family planning methods, but they are unable to do so because they lack access to information and services or they lack of support of their husbands and communities. moreover, over 50 million of the 190 million women who become pregnant each year have abortions. many of these abortions are clandestine and performed under unsafe conditions. evidently, the need for voluntary family planning is growing fast. it is estimated that this “unmet need” will grow by 40 percent during the next 15 years. universal access to services allowing couples to exercise their full reproductive rights remains elusive: one study found that family planning services are routinely made available to women at a reasonable cost in only 14 of 88 developing countries. however, the level of unintended pregnancy is lowest in countries with the most access to effective methods of contraception and where women play a major role in family decision-making. moreover, differing patterns of contraceptive use may not reflect women’s personal preferences as much as political and economic decisions made by governments in order to emphasize certain ideological preferences. patterns of contraceptive use also reflect the attitudes of medical professionals, cost, and the limited range of methods offered in some countries, or an uneven availability of contraceptive supplies (unfpa, n.d.f). additionally, in many countries, poverty and profound gender inequalities limit women’s ability to plan their pregnancies and exercise reproductive rights. gender-based violence encompasses a wide range of human rights violations, including sexual abuse of children, rape, domestic violence, sexual assault and harassment, trafficking of women and girls, and harmful traditional practices. violence against women reflects and reinforces inequities between men and women. it also compromises the health and security of its victims. violence may have profound effects – direct and indirect – on a woman's reproductive health. such effects include unwanted pregnancies, restricted access to family planning information and contraceptives, sexually transmitted infections (stis), and unsafe abortion (unfpa, n.d.a). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 11 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/11 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.11 w h a t t e e n a g e r s a n d y o u n g a d u l t s f a c e reproductive health barriers experienced by women around the world are magnified for teenagers and young adults because young people often face greater barriers in trying to get the information or care they need. their reproductive health is an important element of international reproductive health and sustainable development. each year, an estimated 14 million teenagers between the ages of 15 and 19 years give birth. uncounted others are even younger when they have babies. while teenaged pregnancy is declining worldwide, high rates in many countries persist, mostly where poverty and poor health are endemic. on average, onethird of women in developing countries give birth before age 20. the average fertility rate (number of births per 1,000 young women) among 15to 19-year-olds in the least developed countries is more than 5 times greater than that of the most developed countries (unfpa, 2007a). the future is compromised for most teenaged mothers. many will face poverty; ill health; abuse; unprotected sex, which carries the risk of contracting a sti or hiv; frequent pregnancies; and an end to education. there are comparatively few positive life options for teenaged mothers. their children are more likely than those of older mothers to be malnourished and have developmental problems. the united nations population fund (unfpa, 2007a) estimates that one million babies born to teenaged mothers will not survive their first year. internationally, more than 1.5 billion people are between the ages of 10 and 25; more than half of them live in poverty, on less than $2 per day. they often lack access to the technology and information that can make a difference in their lives. many also face social inequality, poor schools, gender discrimination, unemployment, and inadequate health systems (unfpa, n.d.g). becoming a mother carries risks for all women, regardless of age. however, there are many factors that make teenaged childbearing especially hazardous. the majority of deaths among 15to19-year-old girls worldwide result from problems related to pregnancy and childbirth. each year, nearly 70,000 teenaged girls die for such reasons and at least 2 million more are left with chronic illness or disabilities that may bring them life-long suffering. each year 2.2 to 4 million teenage girls resort to unsafe abortions. pregnancy and childbirth are most dangerous for younger girls who are not yet physiologically mature. girls between the ages of 15 and 19 are twice as likely to die during pregnancy or childbirth as compared to women in their 20s. physically immature and often with few resources, the youngest first-time mothers are most at risk. for those under 15, the risk of death during pregnancy or childbirth is five times higher than for those 15to 19-years-old (unfpa, 2007a). most teenage girls are giving birth for the first time with sparse knowledge and limited or non-existent health care and support. very few teens are empowered enough to access such critical sexual and reproductive health services. they have the least exposure to sexual and reproductive health information and are less able to prevent or cope with unwanted pregnancy. compared to older women, teenaged girls are more likely to give birth without a skilled attendant, which further compounds their risks. many receive no prenatal care, especially those in developing countries (unfpa, 2007a). poor girls are far more likely to give birth early. rural teenaged girls are more likely to be poor, have less education, less access to reproductive health services, and to marry young; consequently, they are much more likely to become pregnant at a young age. within urban areas, poor girls living in slums have higher 3 mann: international teen reproductive health published by scholarship@western, 2013 fertility rates than those living outside of these areas. for many girls living in poverty and social deprivation, becoming pregnant and having a child may not seem to make much of a difference to longterm success (unfpa, 2007a). worldwide, only 17 percent of sexually active teenagers use contraceptives. many are unaware that condoms offer dual protection from unwanted pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections, despite the fact that they are especially vulnerable to stis including hiv. even if they want to use condoms, they may not have ready access to them or are unable to negotiate their use (unfpa, n.d.e). i n d i g e n o u s p e o p l e s f a c e a d d i t i o n a l c h a l l e n g e s in addition to the global challenges facing women and particularly teenaged girls, indigenous peoples are also unique with respect to their reproductive health. globally, indigenous people number an estimated 300 to 370 million in more than 70 countries (united nations permanent forum on indigenous issues [unpfii], 2003). they maintain social, cultural, economic, and political characteristics distinct from those of the dominant societies in which they live. worldwide, centuries of systematic marginalization have rendered them one of the poorest and most vulnerable groups today, despite their resiliency. many are victims of racial discrimination and social exclusion. moreover, indigenous peoples are often deprived access to basic services, such as education and healthcare (united nations development fund for women [unifem], n.d.). most indigenous groups share the demographic profile of developing countries, where youth aged 10 to 24 years comprise the largest segment of the population. in addition, these groups tend to be poor, rural, and excluded from meaningful economic development (farrell, rosen, & terborgh, 1999). while they constitute approximately 5 percent of the world’s population, indigenous people make up 15 percent of the world’s poor. furthermore, they make up about one-third of the world’s 900 million extremely poor rural people (unpfii, 2003). indigenous peoples experience less access to economic opportunities and employment. sometimes these circumstances lead to an increased vulnerability to prostitution and substance abuse (farrell et al., 1999). indigenous teens and youth experience the same barriers to reproductive health services that other youth face. however, they encounter additional obstacles by virtue of being indigenous. for instance, globally many indigenous youth, especially girls, speak only their native language and experience difficulties functioning in mainstream culture (farrell et al., 1999). low levels of literacy and schooling compound this problem, especially for girls. in guatemala, for example, 53.5 percent of indigenous teens aged15 to19 have not completed primary education, as compared to 32.2 percent of nonindigenous youth (unpfii, 2003). furthermore, indigenous youth are more likely to experience marginal political and legal status, which serves to fuel racism and discrimination as well as exacerbate poverty and lack of access to health services. regularly encountering social and institutional discrimination, many indigenous teenagers may be reluctant to use available reproductive health services, often for fear of persecution or human rights abuses. moreover, they may be more comfortable with their own health systems and traditional providers than with western medicine. in addition, indigenous peoples often live in less geographically accessible places. if they are poor and live in a rural area, access to services may be limited. if they are urban, they may face cultural exclusion and discrimination. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 11 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/11 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.11 these and other conditions translate into indigenous youth being a group with a large unmet need for reproductive health services. cultural and geographic isolation make indigenous youth even less knowledgeable about reproduction and pregnancy than other youth. indigenous youth are more vulnerable to stis, hiv, and maternal complications resulting from poverty and discrimination, their young age, and lack of knowledge (farrell et al., 1999). in bolivia, for example, the infant mortality rate among the indigenous population is close to 75 per 1,000, as compared to 50 per 1,000 for the nonindigenous population (unpfii, 2003). yet, traditional culture and low educational attainment make indigenous youth more likely to marry and give birth at an early age. fertility is usually highly regarded in traditional cultures and girls often feel great pressure to become pregnant early (farrell et al., 1999). t h e c a s e o f c a n a d i a n f i r s t n a t i o n s t e e n a g e r s a n d y o u n g a d u l t s over the last thirty years, fertility rates among all 15to19-year-olds in canada declined. in 1980, canadian teenagers between the ages of 15 and19 gave birth at a rate of 27.6 per 1,000 and in 1985 it was at 23.7 per 1,000 (matick-tyndale, mckay, & barrett, 2001). in 1996, the teenaged birth rate was 22.1 per 1,000, and, by 2006, it fell significantly to 13.7 per 1,000, representing a 38 percent decline from 1996 (mckay & barrett, 2010). the fertility rate of first nations women of all ages, though still almost double that of other canadian women, has also been declining since the 1960s. across the country, the fertility rate among first nations women fell from 6.1 in the 1960s to 2.7 children per woman by 2006 (guimond & robatille, 2008). however, birth data contained in the indian register, maintained by the department of aboriginal affairs and northern development canada [aandc], tells a different story. indeed, the fertility rate of first nations teenage girls under the age of 20 has remained high since 1986 at about 100 births per 1,000 women. the fertility rate of first nations teenage girls is 7 times higher than that of other canadian teenagers. registered indian girls aged 15 to19 years have a 1 in 10 fertility rate with the highest rates in the prairies, including 1 in 8 in manitoba, which is high even by international standards. according to international demographic statistics collected by the united nations in 2006, first nations teenage girls in canada have a fertility level comparable to that of teenage girls in the least developed countries, such as nepal, ethiopia, and somalia. for first nations teenage girls under 15 years of age, the rate is estimated to be as much as 18 times higher than that of other canadians (guimond & robatille, 2008). we also need to consider the infant mortality rate to get a picture of the overall population growth. for over a century, the infant mortality rate among canada’s aboriginal populations was twice that of the non-aboriginal population. however, in 2000, health canada stated that the infant mortality rate among all first nations peoples in canada dropped to 6.4 per 1,000 live births, almost on par with the infant mortality rate of 5.3 per 1,000 live births for canada (cited in public health agency of canada [phac], 2008). focusing only on first nations teenagers living on-reserve in the year 2000, the infant mortality rate, which has been steadily decreasing among first nations people since 1979 (when it peaked at 27.6 deaths per 1,000 live births), was reported as 6.2 per 1,000 live births (social union, 2003). another source found that, in 1999, the first nations infant mortality rate for that year was 8.0 per 1,000 live births (compared to 5.5/1,000 live births for canada as a whole) (stout & harp, 2009). as one might expect, these numbers have been called into question based on issues related to data collection. the phac’s (2008) perinatal health report points out that: 5 mann: international teen reproductive health published by scholarship@western, 2013 the argument that first nations, inuit and métis populations have a sub-optimal perinatal health status requiring serious public health attention is difficult to make partly because of inadequate and poor quality surveillance information… note the high rates of stillbirth in the north american indian population ([which is] approximately two-to-three-fold higher than among the french and english)… nevertheless, there is evidence to suggest that even these mortality statistics for first nations, inuit and métis populations are underestimates of true rates because of an under-registration of births at the borderline of viability. (p. 20) moreover, aboriginal health indicators and health data in general are widely regarded as inadequate and incomplete in canada. most of the aboriginal maternal health data available exists in the form of circumstantial health indicators, for example, age, income level, or family or marital status (stout & harp, 2009). yet, it is generally agreed that, despite the steady decline, the infant mortality rate for first nations people remains higher than that found in the general population. for example, one recent study in british columbia concluded that infant mortality rates were more than double the rate for first nations people than for non-first nations people. post-neonatal mortality rates were found to be 3.6 times higher. first nations infants were also more likely to be born pre-term than non-first nations infants in both rural and urban areas of that province (luo et al., 2004). finally, the mortality rate for first nations infants is consistent with that found among the lowest income groups in urban canada, where there is a 1.6 times greater risk of infant death compared to high income groups (social union, 2003). it has been argued that the high rate of teenaged pregnancy in many first nations communities may be one explanatory factor for elevated levels of infant mortality among these communities (dion stout, kipling & stout, 2001). as noted by the authors of the aforementioned british columbia study, excess infant mortality among first nations people is due to higher post-neonatal mortality and, in particular, deaths due to preventable causes. what this suggests is a need for improved socio-economic and living conditions (luo et al., 2004) and improved access to reproductive health services. teenage pregnancy in canada is highest among disadvantaged socio-economic groups and is a particular health concern for first nations. owing to the economic situation of their guardians, children of teenaged mothers are more likely to live in poverty. in 2001, 80 percent of first nations teenaged mothers lived in a household with a total income of less than $15,000 per year, compared to 27 percent of first nations mothers aged 20 years or older (guimond & robataille, 2008). this situation is compounded by high rates of lone parenting in first nations communities. in 2001, 15.5 percent of registered indian women 15 to 24 years of age were lone mothers (hull, 2004; see also quinless, 2013, in this issue). many of these lone mothers also had children with unstated paternity, often resulting in incorrect or no status indian registration for their children and the loss of accompanying benefits (see clatworthy, 2004). by way of elucidation, registration as a status indian under the indian act is based on the status registration of both parents; numerous benefits are attached to registered indian status, including health and education programs. teen pregnancy can lead to a life of poverty that perpetuates an ongoing cycle of social problems, which were discussed in detail in earlier articles in this journal. by the way of a summary, such social problems include substance abuse, child neglect, family violence, and a greater risk of child removal by social 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 11 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/11 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.11 services. the outcomes can be cyclical, with children of teen parents more likely to be victims of abuse and neglect and three times more likely to be incarcerated in their late teens and early twenties than children of mothers who delay childbearing. most children of teenaged parents will have children when they become teenagers themselves (anderson, 2002). under these circumstances, better access to reproductive health care would seem to constitute one important step towards ensuring better outcomes for affected aboriginal teenagers. many first nations persons living on-reserve point to barriers when accessing the general health care system, not to mention reproductive health services. reported barriers include extensive wait-times, services not covered by benefits, a shortage of doctors or nurses in the area, transportation costs, inadequate services, or lack of cultural sensitivity. the situation is more difficult for those persons living in rural and remote areas, where teenaged first nations girls are among the most vulnerable with respect to accessing reproductive health services. often lacking information concerning their sexual and reproductive health, they may not know where to turn. they face unexpected costs, significant travel time, and other expenses in order to access reproductive health services that are sometimes located hundreds of kilometers from their home communities. small and isolated communities may lack services and birth control supplies. in particular, first nations youth may experience difficulty obtaining contraception in the north (aboriginal nurses association of canada [anac], 2002). many additional factors have been noted as to why reproductive health service delivery to aboriginal women requires improvement, including overt and covert racism, cultural insensitivity, and residence in areas with few services or in small communities with little privacy (anac, 2002). aboriginal women have also indicated that health care providers frequently do not ensure the fully informed consent of aboriginal women achieved by providing full information in plain language and allowing a person to consider this information and make an informed decision about care (native women’s association of canada [nwac], 2007). certainly, some mothers who give birth to children in their teens have made successful lives for themselves and their children. however, teen pregnancy has consequences for the teenaged parent, the teen’s child, the community, and canadian society. statistically, teen parents are less likely to complete their education, more likely to experience isolation and homelessness, less likely to develop good parenting skills, and more likely to transfer their own history of childhood abuse and neglect to their children (phac, 2000). these are issues of concern for all communities regardless of race or ethnicity, political orientation, income, or education level. these are concerns on the international stage as well as the national. learning from international responses regarding youths’ access to reproductive health services is the basis of the next section. i n t e r n a t i o n a l d e v e l o p m e n t s the genesis of international agreements on reproductive health and sustainable development can be traced back to 1968. in that year, the united nations human rights conference recognized that parents have a right to determine family size and timing, as well as adequate to the education and information needed to exercise this right. these rights were later codified in the un’s (1979) convention on the elimination of discrimination against women and the “plans of action” produced by the 1974 (united 7 mann: international teen reproductive health published by scholarship@western, 2013 nations world population conference, 1974) and 1984 (united nations international conference on population, 1984) world population conferences. during the 1980s and 1990s, the women’s health movement increasingly challenged various population programs’ continuing emphasis on reducing fertility rates rather than improving reproductive health. during the 1990s, a series of important united nations conferences emphasized that the well-being of individuals, and respect for their human rights, should be central to all sustainable development strategies. particular emphasis was given to reproductive rights as a cornerstone of sustainable development (unfpa, n.d.f). as a result, the previous population control approach gave way to a new perspective that placed reproductive rights and health at the center of population plans at the 1994 international conference on population and development (icpd) at cairo (unfpa, 1995). the importance of reproductive health and rights for meeting development goals has been increasingly recognized by the international community. high fertility augments poverty by slowing economic growth and skewing the distribution of consumption against the poor. reducing fertility – by reducing infant mortality, increasing education, and improving access to services, especially reproductive health and family planning – counters these effects (unfpa, 2008). in short, the international community has agreed that reproductive health is a basic human right and a fundamental precursor to sustainable development. but, without access to relevant information and high quality services, that right cannot be exercised. the international commitments discussed below recognize that attaining the goal of sustainable, equitable development requires that individuals are able to exercise control over their sexual and reproductive lives. t h e c a i r o p r o g r a m m e o f a c t i o n the icpd at cairo, convened under the auspices of the united nations in 1994, was the largest intergovernmental conference on population and sustainable development ever held. more than 180 states took part in negotiating a programme of action in the area of population and sustainable development for the next 20 years. it was the first international conference that did not specifically address women’s issues, but they were, nonetheless, the main focus. the icpd programme of action (unfpa, 1995) forms the basis for achieving population and development objectives within a framework of human rights and gender equality. the icpd programme of action endorsed a new strategy that emphasized the integral link between population and sustainable development. it also focuses on meeting the reproductive health needs of individuals, rather than achieving demographic targets. the key aspect of this new approach is empowering women and providing them with more choices through expanded access to education and health services, skills development and employment, and involvement in governance processes at all levels (unfpa, 1995). the icpd programme of action defines reproductive health as implying: …that people are able to have a satisfying and safe sex life and that they have the capability to reproduce and the freedom to decide if, when and how often to do so. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 11 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/11 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.11 implicit in this last condition are the rights of men and women to be informed and to have access to safe, effective, affordable and acceptable methods of family planning of their choice, as well as other methods of their choice for regulation of fertility which are not against the law, and the right of access to appropriate health care services that will enable women to go safely through pregnancy and childbirth and provide couples with the best chance of having a healthy infant. (unfpa, 1995, p. 40) the icpd programme of action also defines international reproductive health and rights objectives: a. to ensure that comprehensive and factual information and a full range of reproductive health care services, including family planning, are accessible, affordable, acceptable and convenient to all users; b. to enable and support responsible voluntary decisions about child-bearing and methods of family planning of their choice, as well as other methods of their choice for regulation of fertility which are not against the law and to have the information, education and means to do so; c. to meet changing reproductive health needs over the life cycle and to do so in ways sensitive to the diversity of circumstances of local communities. (unfpad, 1995, p. 41) with respect to teens and youth, the objectives of the icdp programme of action are as follows: a. to address adolescent [teen and youth] sexual and reproductive health issues, including unwanted pregnancy, unsafe abortion and sexually transmitted diseases, including hiv/aids, through the promotion of responsible and healthy reproductive and sexual behaviour, including voluntary abstinence, and the provision of appropriate services and counselling specifically suitable for that age group; b. to substantially reduce all adolescent [teen and youth] pregnancies. (unfpa, 1995, p. 50) it also includes goals regarding improving education, particularly for girls, as well as further reducing levels of infant, child, and maternal mortality. one of the primary goals of the icpd programme of action is to make family planning universally available by 2015 as part of a broadened approach to reproductive health and rights (unfpa, 1995). the icpd programme of action recognizes that violence against women is inextricably linked to gender-based inequalities. when women and girls are expected to be generally subservient, their behaviour in relation to their health, including reproductive health, is negatively affected. principle 4 of the icpd programme of action recognizes that advancing gender equality, equity, the empowerment of women, eliminating all kinds of violence against women, and ensuring women’s ability to control their own fertility are cornerstones of population and sustainable development programs. the human rights of women and girls are an inalienable, integral, and indivisible part of universal human rights (unfpa, 1995). 9 mann: international teen reproductive health published by scholarship@western, 2013 t e e n a g e r s a n d y o u t h in its advocacy and programming, the unfpa focuses on key messages that can empower both women and men at different stages of their lives. girls are empowered to delay pregnancy until they are physically and emotionally mature; boys are motivated to be sexually responsible partners. the unfpa seeks to reorient the health education and services of signatory countries to meet diverse needs. the unfpa’s objectives include encouraging development of programs that meet the special needs of teenagers and youth, especially young women, in accessing high-quality reproductive health services. countries are directed to provide teenagers and youth with reproductive health information that helps them attain a level of maturity required to make responsible decisions. in particular, information and services should be made available to teenagers and youth in order to help them understand their sexuality and protect them from unwanted pregnancies, stis, and the subsequent risk of infertility. this should be combined with the education of young men to respect women’s self-determination and share responsibility with women in matters of sexuality and reproduction (unfpa, 1995). countries must, while recognizing the role of parents and guardians, ensure that programs and attitudes of health care providers do not restrict teenagers and youth from accessing the appropriate reproductive health services and information they need. these services must safeguard their rights to privacy, confidentiality, personal respect, and informed consent, but also respect cultural values and religious beliefs. in this context, countries should, where appropriate, remove legal, regulatory, and social barriers to reproductive health information and care for teenagers and youth (unfpa, 1995). programs should integrate education and counselling in the areas of gender relations and equality, violence against teens, responsible sexual behaviour and family-planning practice, family life, reproductive health, and stis, including hiv and aids prevention. sexually active teenagers and youth require family-planning information, counselling, and services. those who become pregnant require special support from their families and community during pregnancy and early parenthood. programs for teenagers and youth are most effective when they are fully involved in identifying their reproductive and sexual health needs and in designing the programs (unfpa, 1995). among the reasons for high rates of teenaged childbearing, the unfpa (1995) programme indicates poor educational and economic opportunities, sexual exploitation, and pressures to engage in sexual activity as important factors. in both developed and developing countries, teenagers with few apparent life choices have little incentive to avoid pregnancy and childbearing; low-income teenagers are especially vulnerable. the unfpa explains the connection between adolescent reproductive health, gender equality, and sustainable development: strategically investing in adolescent [teen] girls produces a double dividend. enabling the adolescent girls of this and the next several generations to have greater control over their reproductive rights and to delay childbearing and family formation will contribute to greater fertility decline. investing in their education, livelihoods, and health is critical to this end, but also has other effects: when girls stay in school, develop productive skills, protect their health, and have smaller families, young women will be stronger economic actors, individual children 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 11 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/11 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.11 will benefit from increased investment, families will enjoy greater economic prospects, and future generations will be less likely to live in poverty. the “dividend” is thus maximized. with even a few years to develop their potential, adolescent girls can change their lives, their communities, and their countries. (unfpa, 2007a, p. 12) as noted by the unfpa, for young, poor parents, each additional child creates further strain on an already small budget for nourishing, educating, and keeping their children healthy. failing to help teenaged girls delay pregnancy until they are physically, emotionally, and financially ready leads to higher health care and social welfare costs, a less educated and skilled workforce, limited socio-economic development, dependency of young mothers on male providers, gender inequality, fewer opportunities to rely on a growing youth population to help accelerate economic development, and reduced prospects for eradicating poverty (unfpa, 2007a). in sharp contrast, preventing unwanted teenaged pregnancy and investing in girls’ education, health, and livelihoods, means: • promoting young women’s human rights and rectifying pervasive gender inequalities; • supporting adolescent girls to grow up happy, healthy, and empowered; • saving lives – decreasing unnecessary maternal, infant, and child mortality and illness; • ensuring more babies will be born to mothers who are better prepared to care and provide for them; • improving the economic potential of families – breaking the cycle of intergenerational poverty; and • producing positive ripple effects for communities and societies, including improved productivity, reduced expenditures, and economic growth. (unfpa, 2007a, p. 12) i n d i g e n o u s p e o p l e s the unfpa conference and the subsequent icpd programme of action brought together many diverse countries, cultures, and religions (unfpa, 1995). accordingly, the implementation of the icpd programme of action is to be consistent with participating countries’ national laws and developmental priorities, with full respect for the various religious beliefs, ethical values, and cultural backgrounds of its peoples. the icpd programme of action is widely considered a breakthrough that reached at least partial consensus on population and sustainable development, where agreement had not previously been achieved. despite reservations registered by many participating countries, particularly in relation to domestic religious and cultural values and concerning abortion, the icpd programme of action has facilitated numerous population and reproductive health development successes among participants (cook, dickens, & fathalla, 2003). the icpd programme of action’s cross-cultural approach, emphasis on respect, and facilitation of local initiatives are key contributing factors to these successes. 11 mann: international teen reproductive health published by scholarship@western, 2013 in that vein, since the 1990s, increasing emphasis was given to securing the rights of historically marginalized groups, including indigenous communities around the world. as noted earlier, compared to the general population of their countries, indigenous peoples have higher rates of infant and maternal mortality, less access to education and health services, and limited participation in government and social systems. accordingly, the unfpa (1995) objectives respecting indigenous peoples are as follows: a. to incorporate the perspectives and needs of indigenous communities into the design, implementation, monitoring, and evaluation of the population, development, and environment programmes that affect them; b. to ensure that indigenous people receive populationand developmentrelated services that they deem socially, culturally, and ecologically appropriate; and c. to address social and economic factors that act to disadvantage indigenous people. (p. 37) in considering the population and development needs of indigenous people, states are mandated to recognize and support their identity, culture, and interests and to enable them to participate fully in the economic, political, and social life of the country, particularly where their health, education, and wellbeing are affected. in particular, governments and societal institutions should recognize the distinct perspective of indigenous people on aspects of population and development and, in consultation with indigenous people and collaboration with other concerned organizations, should address their specific needs for reproductive health services. all human rights violations and discrimination, particularly all forms of coercion, must be eliminated (unfpa, 1995). the icdp programme of action appeals for greater respect for religious and cultural beliefs of persons and communities, while simultaneously facilitating reproductive health and rights as key components of gender equality and development. o t h e r i n t e r n a t i o n a l d e v e l o p m e n t s numerous other international agreements both preand post-icpd contain principles that reinforce its programme of action. the constellation of rights recognized at cairo was reaffirmed at 1995’s world summit on social development (wssd) (un, 1995) and the fourth world conference on women (un, 1995). at both events, participating countries were urged to include population factors in all sustainable development strategies and to act to eliminate gender-based violence and harmful traditional practices. when combined with the cairo programme, the beijing conference (un, 1995) is considered to have established sexual and reproductive health and rights as being fundamental to human rights and sustainable development. the following key concepts are said to have emerged from these two world events: a. sexual and reproductive health and rights, especially a woman’s fundamental right to control and make decisions about her body and sexuality, are an integral part of development and human rights. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 11 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/11 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.11 b. good sexual and reproductive health, beyond the focus on demographics and family planning, are a prerequisite for socio-economic progress and sustainable development. ensuring universal access to comprehensive sexual and reproductive health information and services, especially for women and adolescents, must be a priority goal for national programs. c. population policies and family planning programs must uphold the principles of voluntary and informed choice and not impose coercive measures that violate fundamental human rights, especially of women. d. mainstreaming a gender perspective in all policies, programs, and activities is essential to improving outreach and impact and making better use of existing resources. partnership with civil society, in particular with non-governmental organizations specialized in sexual and reproductive health, and with women’s groups should become an integral element of government policy and programme planning, implementation, and monitoring (alcala, 1995). the beijing platform (un, 1995, 106(e, i)), the wssd programme (un, 1995, 36 (h)), and convention on the elimination of discrimination against women (cedaw) (united nations, 1979, 12.1)) confirmed the need for universal access to a full range of safe and reliable family planning methods, which are not illegal, as part of comprehensive sexual and reproductive health care to be put in place by all participating counties by the year 2015. the beijing platform (un, 1995, 107 c) also confirmed the protection and promotion of the rights of teenagers to sexual and reproductive health information and services, as well as the goal of reducing the number of teenaged pregnancies. cedaw (un, 1979), the international covenant on economic, social and cultural rights (un general assembly, 1966), and the convention on the rights of the child (un, 1989) all recognize the rights of female and male adolescents to sexual and reproductive health education and services. both wssd (un, 1995, 5(g)) and the beijing platform (un, 1995, 106(f), 108(1)) also called for the promotion of male responsibility in sexual and reproductive behaviour. at the beijing conference, indigenous women collectively issued a declaration of indigenous women (beijing declaration of indigenous women, 1995) to call world attention to their particular realities. these realities include the cumulative impacts on human rights or gender discrimination combined with other forms of discrimination, such as those based on race or ethnicity. they noted that indigenous women are all too often targets of forced pregnancy, sexual assault, forced sterilization, domestic abuse, and denied legal rights and protection. poverty and limited access to economic resources, education, and health services have further contributed to the erosion of their economic and social rights (unifem, n.d.). derived from numerous conventions and programmes, the following general principles guiding state conduct emerged: in collaboration with non-governmental organisations, women’s groups and other institutions of civil society develop a comprehensive national strategy for providing universal and equitable 13 mann: international teen reproductive health published by scholarship@western, 2013 access for all to primary health care, including sexual and reproductive health, with special attention to girls and women, without distinction as to race, national origin, sex, age, language, ethnicity, culture, religion, disability, socio-economic class, indigenous identity, marital, family or other status. (alcala, 1995, p. 3) and, [to] develop integrated service, information and educational programmes for adolescents that address adolescent sexual and reproductive health issues, including unwanted pregnancy, unsafe abortion, sexually transmitted diseases and hiv/aids. (alcala, 1995, p. 40) appendix a offers a chart generated by the unfpa that highlights key international reproductive health human rights principles and their sources. m i l l e n n i u m d e v e l o p m e n t g o a l s . in adopting the united nations (2000) millennium declaration, the international community committed itself to an ambitious goal: cutting in half the number of people living in absolute poverty by 2015. the millennium development goals (mdgs), which are based on the declaration, set out specific targets for life expectancy, education, housing, reproductive health, and gender equality, among others (united nations development program [undp], n.d.). the mdgs are interrelated, requiring an integrated push for progress on all targets simultaneously. they are considered the starting point for eradicating poverty, safeguarding human rights and security, and achieving sustainable development. they recognize that reproductive health is a particularly powerful driver for improving lives. the unfpa’s work in the fields of reproductive health and rights, women’s empowerment, and population issues are considered to be at the core of the achievement of the mdgs and poverty eradication. the mdgs recognize that universal access to education and reproductive health care are crucial steps that can help individuals break cycles of poverty. reproductive rights are central to women’s empowerment, and empowered women are a key for opening the door to healthier and more productive families, communities, and countries (unfpa, 2008). the mdgs, the cairo programme of action, and the beijing platform converge in their affirmation of women’s human rights, including their reproductive rights, and the recognition that solving the world’s most pressing problems demands the full participation and empowerment of women. the first seven mdgs are mutually reinforcing and are directed at reducing poverty in all its forms. the last goal – global partnership for development – is about the means to achieve the first seven. the list of goals presented below is the new official mdg framework that incorporates four additional targets and other indicator improvements adopted at the 62nd general assembly of the united nations in 2007 (un, 2007). mdg 1: eradicate extreme poverty and hunger mdg 2: achieve universal primary education mdg 3: promote gender equality and empower women 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 11 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/11 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.11 mdg 4: reduce child mortality mdg 5: improve maternal health mdg 6: combat hiv/aids, malaria, and other diseases mdg 7: ensure environmental sustainability. mdg 8: develop a global partnership for development. (undp, n.d.) the mdgs recognize that universal access to reproductive health is imperative to reducing poverty because it increases the possibility of higher investment in human development, sustainable livelihoods, and food security. investment in teenagers’ reproductive health is critical for reducing poverty and achieving the mdgs. women’s ability to decide freely the number and timing of children is critical to their empowerment and expanded opportunities for work, education, and social participation. enabling girls to delay pregnancy, ending discrimination against pregnant girls, and providing support to teenaged mothers can help ensure that they complete their education. it can also improve prospects for the family, helping to break the cycle of intergenerational poverty. at the september 2005 world summit, the goal of universal access to reproductive health was endorsed at the highest level and recognized as crucial to the attainment of the mdgs. reproductive rights were recognized as valuable ends in themselves and essential to the enjoyment of other fundamental rights. special emphasis was given to the reproductive rights of women and teenaged girls, as well as to the importance of sex education and reproductive health programmes. world leaders resolved to achieve universal access to reproductive health by 2015, promote gender equality, and end discrimination against women by adopting the summit outcome recommended by the general assembly. leaders agreed to integrate the goal of access to reproductive health into national strategies in order to attain the mdgs goals of ending poverty, reducing maternal death, promoting gender equality, and combating hiv/aids (unfpa, n.d.h). more recently, on the 17th of june 2009, the un’s human rights council adopted a landmark resolution on “preventable maternal mortality and morbidity and human rights” (united nations general assembly, 2009). in this resolution, governments expressed grave concern for the unacceptably high rates of maternal mortality and morbidity, acknowledged it as a human rights issue, and committed to enhancing their efforts to protect the lives of women and girls worldwide. through the human rights council resolution, governments recognise that the elimination of maternal mortality and morbidity requires the effective promotion and protection of women and girls’ human rights, including their rights to enjoy the highest attainable standard of sexual and reproductive health. i n d i g e n o u s t e e n a g e d r e p r o d u c t i v e h e a l t h a p p r o a c h e s . efforts to reach international indigenous groups with reproductive health programs, especially young indigenous people, encountered a number of obstacles. such impediments included language barriers, geographic accessibility, and social and cultural differences between indigenous groups and the mainstream population (farrell et al., 1999). the unfpa is concerned that indigenous communities often do not have access to reproductive health services, screening for hiv/aids and other sexually transmitted 15 mann: international teen reproductive health published by scholarship@western, 2013 diseases, or protection from gender-based violence. it would have such considerations included in broader investment programmes (unfpa, 2007b). in a 2007 speech at the united nations permanent forum on indigenous issues, the director of the asia and the pacific region at the unfpa outlined some of the challenges faced during the encounter between unfpa’s mandate and indigenous peoples. in addressing the challenge of restoring human dignity, maintaining their identity, and participating in the promise of a better political and economic life, it was observed that indigenous peoples and ethnic minorities often bear the greatest burden of poverty. this implies that indigenous populations, particularly women, are isolated not just economically, but politically and culturally. at the cultural level, the challenge is in striking a balance between respect for indigenous cultures and mainstream reproductive health and gender equality. thus, it is critical that high quality reproductive health information and services are provided in a culturally sensitive, accessible, and equitable manner (unfpa, 2007b). the permanent forum on indigenous issues has recommended that all relevant united nations entities, as well as regional health organizations and governments, “fully incorporate a cultural perspective into health policies, programmes and reproductive health services aimed at providing indigenous women with quality health care, including emergency obstetric care, voluntary family planning and skilled attendance at birth” (unpfii, 2006, p. 2). certainly, the issue of reproductive health services in indigenous communities is a sensitive one, given their marginalization in many countries. what follows are case studies of a few successful, culturally-relevant reproductive health initiatives involving international indigenous populations. a l u k u r a , c e n t r a l a u s t r a l i a . alukura is an arrernte word meaning “a woman’s camp.” alukura was established following extensive consultation with indigenous women throughout central australia. it is a women’s health and birthing centre designed by the central australian aboriginal congress (an independent, community-controlled health service) in the 1980s to address the concerns of aboriginal women in central australia. these women had a vision for a broad “one-stop” women’s health service, including pregnancy and birthing, screening, and children’s services. in central australia, women’s health and issues and the grandmothers’ law are intricately connected. so, a “women’s only,” separately located health service, is essential to ensure adequate access to health care (bell, 2001). alukura provides a comprehensive woman’s screening service and a program for prenatal and postnatal care to optimize the health of mother and child in-utero and for the first 6 weeks of life. the goal of this program is to reduce infant mortality and improve birth weights. this program includes a visiting obstetrician and gynaecologist for a weekly clinic and alukura midwives attending client births in nearby hospital facilities. alukura also runs the young women’s community health education program with two educators offering sexual health education to young women aged 12 to 20 years in schools, youth organisations, and town camps in remote communities and at alukura (alukura, n.d.b). alukura services include the provision of culturally appropriate care – prenatal, intrapartum, postnatal, and women’s health. a full-time medical officer, midwives, women’s health nurse, liaison officer, educators, traditional grandmothers, and support staff are employed. a women’s health clinic offers treatment and advice on contraception, family planning, stis/hiv, etc., while the midwifery-led maternity service offers prenatal education and prenatal, birthing, and postnatal care at alukura and 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 11 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/11 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.11 alice springs hospital. it also provides policy and advocacy in relation to indigenous women’s health in central australia (alukura, n.d.a). m o o d i t j p r o g r a m , w e s t e r n a u s t r a l i a . mooditj – the local aborigine word for “solid” – is a community-based sexual health and life skills program for aboriginal youth aged 11 to 14 years. it is the winner of the 2006 healthway excellence in health promotion award. developed by the family planning association of western australia (fpwa), the program makes learning about sexual health an engaging experience for aboriginal children entering puberty (may, n.d.). the mooditj program is an integrated approach to sexual health, connecting sexual health, physical, mental, and emotional well-being with the impact of environmental and social influences. it aims to increase knowledge, enhance personal skills, and offer a platform permitting youth to feel comfortable talking about sexual health with trained community mooditj leaders. mooditj is underpinned by an extensive consultation and sustainable development process with indigenous australians and those working with indigenous youth from over 200 western australia regional and rural communities. consultation results identified a need for a culturally-specific sexual health program for this age group. this finding was supported by the 2003 indigenous health statistics report on increasing rates of the prevalence of stis, abuse and relationship violence, teenage pregnancy, and high risk-behaviour among aboriginal children and youth. the program was piloted in 10 rural and metropolitan communities around western australia, as well as with an after-school program and a camp, involving over 150 young people. fwpa runs four-day mooditj “leader training workshops” in communities across western australia. participants have included social workers, police officers, teachers, indigenous elders, health workers, and community members. mooditj leader training programs focus on building confidence in delivering the program to young people. the program is supported by an easy-to-follow manual. mooditj is reported to have met with a great deal of enthusiasm from all over western australia, the northern territory, south australia, and new south wales. it has generated much interest from aboriginal workers, government departments, regional service providers, and organisations working with indigenous populations. to date, fpwa has trained over 300 mooditj leaders, with many running ongoing mooditj groups in their local communities (may, n.d.). delivered over ten sessions, mooditj employs art, puppets, role-plays, and informal discussions to explore a wide range of “sensitive” topics, ranging from self-identity, emotions, and positive relationships to sexual issues and rights. the main findings from the mooditj impact evaluation for february to august 2008 involved positive lifestyle outcomes, healthy sexual behaviour outcomes, and community impacts. these include the following: • interactive participation in mooditj young people groups; • increased school attendance during and shortly after mooditj; • improved hygiene; 17 mann: international teen reproductive health published by scholarship@western, 2013 • increased respect for self and others; • increased self-esteem; • increased discussion of sexual health issues; • increased knowledge of pregnancy issues; • reported increased contraception use, mainly condoms and implanon; • increased knowledge of stis; and • increased attendance at clinics for sti testing and sexual health needs (powell, 2008). t h e l i l a c t e n t , b o l i v i a . bolivia is home to some 35 different indigenous groups, many of whom live in remote mountainous areas. bolivia’s lilac tent is an innovative rural health and family planning campaign in a place where family planning was previously a taboo subject. messages on reproductive health became a normal part of public discussion due to numerous campaigns undertaken across bolivia, which had a high rate of maternal mortality and an estimated 38 percent of maternal deaths caused by unsafe abortions (center for communications programs, n.d.a). the lilac tent is the fourth component of a widespread communication and advocacy campaign designed specifically to service bolivia’s indigenous population. political support for the initiative intensified when victor hugo cardenas, then vice president, and his wife, lidia catari, active representatives of the indigenous populations of bolivia, advocated reproductive health on television, in radio spots, and during personal appearances. the lilac tent ran from october 1998 through may 1999 and expanded the reach of the three previous campaigns to rural areas of bolivia as part of the national rural reproductive health communication strategy. in six months, three lilac-coloured tents, with reproductive health materials designed for teenagers and adults, reached about 40,000 people in 15 communities. at every stop, 2,000 to 4,000 spectators participated. community leaders vied to support lilac tent activities; dynamic community involvement helped inspire a sense of ownership and empowerment among participants. the tents housed videos, live music, theater, dance groups, mimes, games, puppet shows, print materials, and interactive learning devices. each tent operated in coordination with local political leaders, health providers, schoolteachers, students, and performers in the communities. the unfpa and other agencies also provided support. designed and implemented by consensus with public, private, and community groups, these communication campaigns had a major impact. whereas in 1978 family planning was condemned, health centers were closed, and leaders sent to jail, today bolivia embraces a nationwide reproductive health program. the country’s contraceptive prevalence rate for modern methods more than doubled from 12.2 percent in 1989 to 25.2 percent in 1998 (center for communications programs, n.d.a). the purpose of the lilac tent was to generate community mobilization efforts and strengthen local capacity for reproductive health activities. each tent was designed for a specific region of the country: 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 11 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/11 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.11 highlands, valleys, and plains. messages and materials were adapted to reflect the local language, culture, and customs. for example, safe motherhood materials used in the highland region depicted women giving birth in the traditional squatting position and were translated into the indigenous aymara language. adaptations of materials were based on extensive ethnographic studies and field-testing carried out by bolivian non-governmental organizations (ngos). the tent was intended primarily for rural teenagers and young couples, although market days and local holidays provided broader exposure of reproductive health messages to adults. the messages disseminated during the lilac tent’s tour dealt specifically with reproductive health, including sti prevention, safe motherhood, and informed decision-making. there were also messages on environmental conservation, children’s rights, and women’s rights. before the arrival of the lilac tent in each town, ngos in charge of each tent worked with local authorities to advocate continued support for reproductive health activities in their communities. artistic resources from the community were invited to join the activities during the tent’s three-day stop in each town. concurrently, community radio operators were trained to disseminate reproductive health information. as part of the training, the radio operators received prototype scripts and a reproductive health message toolkit for local production. the arrival of the tent in each town was marked by a carnival-style atmosphere. balloons, posters, and flyers were distributed before and during the tent’s visit. community radio operators advertised the tent on air, and vehicles with megaphones announcing the event made their way through town. local schools participated in reproductive health mural painting contests sponsored by the lilac tent. after participating in lilac tent activities, more than 90 percent of the audience was able to define sexual and reproductive health. ninety percent were also able to identify health centers as points of information and reproductive health services. nearly 70 percent of participants were able to identify risk factors for obstetrical emergencies, and 73 percent said reproductive health decisions should be made with their partner. seventy percent mentioned contraceptive methods as a way to plan their families. finally, the number of people who wanted information on family planning and prenatal care increased by 21 percent and 33 percent, respectively (center for communications programs, n.d.b). more than 200,000 people were touched in 21 municipalities, with 34,710 men and women actively engaged in formal learning. it was reported also that the infant mortality rate in participating areas improved and use of contraceptives increased (strug, 2005). all municipal governments, local authorities, and ngo representatives made available human, financial, or logistical resources to carry out tent activities. furthermore, local governments pledged to carry out projects to improve reproductive health in their regions. forty-two national organizations collaborated with the lilac tent through the national reproductive and sexual health forum. approximately 80 institutions at the departmental level and 315 local organizations were involved in planning and implementing the lilac tent (center for communications programs, n.d.b). g u a t e m a l a n a s s o c i a t i o n f o r s e x e d u c a t i o n , g u a t e m a l a . with support from the population council, the guatemalan association for sex education (ages) trained bilingual primary school teachers to conduct reproductive health classes in mayan languages in rural indigenous communities. teachers were trained to conduct three 10-hour courses on topics such as birth spacing, reproductive 19 mann: international teen reproductive health published by scholarship@western, 2013 physiology and contraception, pregnancy, birth, gender, and violence. fifty-six certified teachers (predominantly indigenous) taught a total of 496 courses to 11,171 indigenous persons. although this intervention was not specifically targeted at indigenous youth, many young people participated. following the training, contraceptive use in the participating communities increased by 3 percent, representing an 18 percent increase in the use of all family planning methods (farrell et al., 1999). p r o j e c t c o n c e r n i n t e r n a t i o n a l , g u a t e m a l a . since 1974, project concern international (pci) has worked with mayan communities also in rural guatemala. pci’s focus is on providing integrated women and children’s health care, with an emphasis on reproductive health and family planning. integral to pci’s programming in guatemala is the importance of strengthening the capacity of local organizations to provide improved health care in rural communities. this strategy was successful in santiago atitlan, where pci developed the local leaders’ capacity to provide health care services, community and clinic-based family planning counselling, and provision of family planning methods in a village of nearly 40,000. pci successfully integrated birth spacing activities with infant health interventions and was successful in promoting the concept of child spacing to guatemala’s rural, indigenous population (pci, 2004). the ngo that was established out of this program, rxiin t’namet (meaning “clinic of the people”), continues to provide much-needed health care services in the area. the lessons learned in santiago atitlan contributed to pci´s successful expansion of this project to improve service delivery for a total target population of 250,000 in six departments (or regions) of guatemala (pci, 2004). in august 2000, pci inaugurated the first casa materna in guatemala. casa materna is located in huehuetenango, with 80 percent indigenous mayan inhabitants. it has one of the highest maternal death rates to be found in central america. a local ngo, the association of midwives (acomasmi), was consulted and integrated into the project. this was instrumental in achieving behaviour change related to family planning and reproductive health, which was attributed to the fact that acomasmi recruits and trains indigenous mayan community health workers and midwives for outreach and educational activities. casa materna, which originally offered monitoring services to women with high obstetric risks, has since become a strategy and a program in itself designed to reduce maternal death in huehuetenango and neighbouring areas. casa materna is now a center for women’s integrated health with a variety of interventions all directed to improve women’s health. these interventions include the following: • offering curative, as well as preventive health services, to a target population of over 200,000 mainly rural women of reproductive age; • providing attention, food, and lodging to women in high obstetric risk; • training institutional, as well as community workers (mainly midwives and health promoters), on women’s health issues; • contributing to research on sexual and reproductive health topics; • creating an institutional space for women’s health advocacy; 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 11 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/11 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.11 • supporting local ngos implementing sexual and reproductive health projects in rural communities; • providing a pharmacy that offers essential medicines, as well as contraception; and • providing free contraceptive methods, including voluntary surgical contraception (pci, 2004). pci has also been able to expand its sexual and reproductive health portfolio to include working with adolescents on sexual and reproductive health in order to increase knowledge and choices in this group for the reduction of teenage pregnancy and stis. pci in guatemala has been recognized for its active promotion of women’s health as a human right, particularly within indigenous women’s groups who otherwise would have no access to information and services (pci, 2004). i n t e r n a t i o n a l s y n o p s i s the importance of reproductive health and rights, with respect to meeting international development goals, has been increasingly recognized by the international community and endorsed at the highest levels. reproductive rights have been recognized as valuable ends in themselves. they are essential to the enjoyment of other fundamental rights. special emphasis has been placed on the reproductive health and rights of teenaged girls. reproductive rights include the basic right of all couples and individuals to decide freely and responsibly the number and spacing of their children and to have the information, education, and means to do so. it also includes the right to attain the highest standard of sexual and reproductive health, as well as the right to make decisions concerning reproduction free of discrimination, coercion, and violence. a rights-based approach to reproductive health and development means that: • individuals have the right to control their sexual and reproductive lives and make reproductive decisions without interference or coercion, which includes family planning; • governments must ensure equal access to health care for everyone and address the unique health needs of women, men, and teenagers. reproductive health services should be accessible to all groups, including teenagers and indigenous people; and • governments are obliged to make comprehensive reproductive health services available and remove barriers to care. states are to address the rights of the most vulnerable people to reproductive health. there is international consensus that advancing women’s rights, in general, and reproductive health and rights, in particular, is a necessary precondition for halving the number of people living in poverty. it is seen as being fundamental to successfully achieving all other mdgs. the unfpa focuses on ensuring that adolescent reproductive health and rights are included in national agendas. the priority is reaching the most vulnerable. although teenaged reproductive health is a sensitive subject in many countries, unfpa endorses the use of culturally sensitive approaches to gain support for providing young people with the resources they need to protect their reproductive health. culture helps to mould the ways 21 mann: international teen reproductive health published by scholarship@western, 2013 people live with each other and influences their understandings of, and approaches to, development. culturally sensitive programming is essential for achieving the icpd and mdg goals for development in conformity with human rights. furthermore, culturally sensitive approaches are tools to help build ownership within communities (unfpa, 2008). in particular, governments and civil society are mandated to recognize the distinct perspective of indigenous people on aspects of population and sustainable development and, in consultation with indigenous people, to address their specific needs for reproductive health services. certainly, the issue of reproductive health services in indigenous communities is a sensitive one, given their marginalization in many countries. in this context, the unfpa programme is notable for its rejection of all forms of coercion in population policies. the success of culturally relevant approaches to reproductive health is illustrated by the examples of indigenous reproductive health programming discussed above. underpinned by extensive consultation and development with the indigenous people they serve and usually involving myriad governments, local authorities, and ngo representatives, in addition to the communities, programme messages and materials were adapted to reflect the local language, culture, and customs. these examples are illustrative of the idea that, by taking into account different worldviews, religions, and cultures, culturally sensitive and human rights approaches to reproductive health encourage local solutions, which, in turn, ensure ownership and sustainability of development efforts. c a n a d a ’ s f i r s t n a t i o n s given the reproductive health status and accompanying poor socio-economic indicators for many among canada’s first nations population, particularly teenaged mothers, much of the international experience on reproductive health and development could be applied domestically. certainly, this journal issue helps to demonstrate the strong interconnection among reproductive health, gender equality, and the fight against poverty in the context of teenaged and young first nations mothers. further, a good deal of holistic thinking on these issues has taken place internationally. while first nations teenage pregnancy is associated with numerous challenges and consequences, it is equally important to recognize the greater context in which this discussion takes place. given a legacy of colonialism, oppression, and attempts at assimilation of first nations peoples, including residential schools, forced sterilization, and the sixties scoop, first nations reproductive health is an understandably sensitive topic. as noted by the national aboriginal health organization (naho, 2008), colonialism is also cited as a determinant of health for pregnant first nations women (moffitt, 2004, p. 323), including the residential school system; the imposition of western medicine; government legislation; epidemics; and various other processes that undermined aboriginal cultures and societies (national aboriginal health organization, 2004, p. 7-8). because of this, the discourse around birth and pregnancy often becomes part of the greater dialogue of selfdetermination and rights for first nations people and communities. (p. 8) 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 11 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/11 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.11 in addition, community and cultural attitudes may also play a role in adolescent and teen fertility rates. they may act as a disincentive to accessing reproductive health services: traditionally, all children are considered a gift from the creator, and thus any critical response to pregnancy can be seen as disrespectful. many aboriginal adults also had children young, and so youth pregnancy is a norm that community members may be reluctant to address. (anderson, 2002, p. 16) clearly, the discussion is fraught with pitfalls. yet, as aboriginal nurses association of canada (anac, 2002) observes: children are gifts from the creator and deserve to grow in families and communities that show them unconditional love, teach them respect and prepare them for life. for many aboriginal people, this is a challenge. parents struggle to make ends meet or to deal with unemployment and the loss of traditional livelihoods. family support may be lacking, and many adults today do not feel that they had a positive experience as children that would prepare them to be good parents. (p. 45) and, as pointed out by guimond and robitaille (2008), there is a strong temptation to use culture as an explanation, not to say justification, for early motherhood among first nations teenage girls: they have children early because that’s the way it is in traditional first nations culture. given the consequences of early motherhood, however, the very idea of a teenage mother not being able to provide her child with a healthy environment conducive to physical, emotional, intellectual and spiritual development is diametrically opposed to the spirit of traditional culture, which places the child at the centre of family and community life. (p. 51) it is clear that, in both developed and developing countries, youth and teenagers with few apparent life choices and those with low-incomes are most vulnerable. often they are also the ones who may have little motivation to avoid pregnancy and childbearing. as noted by the unfpa (2007a), teenaged pregnancy is costly, in myriad ways. it brings lost potential. not only are there health risks, pregnancy places a heavy toll on a girl’s chances in life. becoming a mother before developing the personal resources for effective parenthood – being educated, gaining comprehensive health knowledge, starting work and participating in the community – constrains a girl’s life options and endangers her children. she will develop less social capital and is more likely to be poor, to be a single parent or to get divorced, or to have more children than she wants. the outcome will be worse if she does not have a strong support system, as she will struggle to secure her family’s safety, health, and livelihood. (unfpa, 2007a, p. 11) some first nations communities appear to be increasingly concerned about teen reproductive health, whether because of the number of unwed mothers, lack of paternal responsibility, breakdown in community supports (bobet, 2005), or increased personal mobility and changing family structures (assembly of first nations [afn], 2006). this increased concern over teenaged pregnancy among first 23 mann: international teen reproductive health published by scholarship@western, 2013 nations communities is not about not valuing parenting or not wanting babies, rather, as anac (2002) points out, …because in the current world having children early is hard on the parents, especially the mothers and the children. most of us young parents are not prepared for the responsibility of raising children, and we often don’t have family support close by – parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles – that we once had to help in this taxing job. many, many young parents today are single mothers with little money. having children usually ends our education early, so our families stay poor. family problems like alcohol and drug abuse, violence and neglect can result. (p. 105) as noted previously, some first nations teenaged mothers made successful lives for themselves and for their children. this is not to say, however, that teenage pregnancy has no individual or social consequences. it often can negatively impact the teenaged parent, her child, her extended family, her nation, and society. statistically, we know that teenaged parents are less likely to complete their education, more likely to experience isolation and homelessness, less likely to develop good parenting skills, and more likely to transfer their histories of childhood abuse and neglect to their child. the social cost of teenaged pregnancy also includes higher rates of lone parenting, incarceration, poverty, and children taken into state care. all of these factors have lifelong impacts. first nations teenage girls face particular challenges because the traditional supports that were formerly part of their culture are no longer consistently there (phac, 2000). first nations communities, as a whole, face circumstances that are disenfranchising. as we have seen both internationally and domestically, poor girls are far more likely to give birth during their teen years than girls who are better off. we also know that rural and indigenous teenaged girls are more likely to be poor, have less education, have less access to reproductive health services, and, thus, are much more likely to become pregnant at a young age. internationally, most indigenous groups share the demographic profile of developing countries, where youth aged 10 to 24 years make up the largest portion of the population. such groups tend to be poor, rural, and left out of the process of economic development, and, as guimond and robatille (2008) point out, first nations adolescent fertility rates are more similar to those of developing countries than to other canadian teenagers. despite the steady decline, the infant mortality rate for first nations people remains higher than that found in the general population. as noted earlier, the death rate for first nations infants is consistent with that found among the lowest income groups in urban canada, at 1.6 times a greater risk as compared to high income groups. if we accept these statistics as accurately revealing that the reproductive health of canada’s first nations appears to have more in common with developing countries than with non-aboriginal canadians, we might choose to ask ourselves: why do aboriginal canadian, maori new zealander, aboriginal australian and native american babies born today share a pattern of premature morbidity and mortality rather than the expected healthy life-course of the non-indigenous baby in the next crib? [and then reflect that] despite marked improvements in the average indicators of health in western nations, good health is not enjoyed by all. our indigenous citizens suffer substantial and systematic 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 11 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/11 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.11 inequalities that cannot be accounted for by individual make-up or behaviour. (cass, 2004, p. 597) one response to this state of affairs might be the general economic situation of teenage mothers, meaning that their children grow up in conditions of poverty more often. this is true of most teenaged mothers, but the situation is exaggerated for first nations teenaged mothers. as discussed earlier, not only are first nations teenaged mothers more likely to live in a family with a total income of less than $15,000 per year, compared to first nations mothers 20 years or older, first nation’s teenaged girls are significantly more likely to have grown up in the household of a teenaged mother, live in poverty, be subjected to state custody of children than are other non-aboriginal canadian teenaged mothers. it is in this context that international principles offer a more holistic understanding of the interconnections between reproductive health, sustainable development, socio-economic progress, and the well-being of nations. investments in teenagers and youth, including education, training, and reproductive health, are critical for reducing poverty. yet, despite the commitment to develop a comprehensive national strategy for providing universal and equitable access to sexual and reproductive health, with special attention to girls, without distinction as to indigenous identity, and in collaboration with civil society, first nations adolescents and teenagers are still among the most vulnerable canadians when trying to access reproductive health services: although in canada advancements are being made in health services delivery specific for aboriginal women, significant inequities remain in relation to the general population (health canada, 1999). there are few intervention programs for aboriginal girls, and many of those that exist are delivered in culturally inappropriate ways (steenbeek, 2004). (banister & begoray, 2006, p. 76) clearly, approaches to first nations teen reproductive health should involve the youth themselves. elders and the communities must be involved in developing the approach. programs must respect aboriginal culture and be presented to teenagers in their preferred language (phac, 2000). the inclusion of both male and female experience is vital. by taking into account different worldviews, religions, and cultures, culturally sensitive approaches to reproductive health encourage local solutions that, in turn, ensure ownership and sustainability of development efforts. as a society, canadians have a common responsibility of creating conditions in which all teenagers have opportunities for healthy personal development. as noted in a recent unfpa (2007a) publication: adolescent girls hold the key to a world without poverty. with the right skills and opportunities, they can invest in themselves now and, later, in their families. if they are able to stay in school, postpone marriage, delay family formation, and build their capacity, they will have more time to prepare for adulthood and participate in the labour force before taking on the responsibilities of motherhood. they and their future children can be educated and healthy. one family at a time, they can help fuel the economic growth of their countries. (p. 1) 25 mann: international teen reproductive health published by scholarship@western, 2013 canada is experiencing a demographic slowdown in general population replacement (the current fertility rate of about 1.54 children per woman, but the rate needs to be at 2.1 to ensure more than mere replacement), while a youthful aboriginal population is growing at a rapid rate. improving the reproductive health and well-being of first nations teens and youth will facilitate increased access to education and greater labour market success for first nations people. it will improve canada’s ability to meet its labour market needs as the mainstream workforce continues to age (mann, 2007). this is addressed by the unfpa (2007a): as youth populations reach their peak in developing countries, a historic opportunity to accelerate human development and economic growth is created: the demographic dividend. as higher proportions of young people enter their productive years with lower fertility rates, they have relatively fewer dependents to support. with the right policies and investments to develop young people’s human capital and create jobs, they will earn more income. under-investment, however, will exacerbate current problems, including unand under-employment, crime and violence, and will miss the unique opportunity afforded by the demographic dividend. (p.12) the ultimate goal is to maximize the number of children in canada who are thriving, as well as the number of teenagers that enjoy reproductive well-being and futures full of possibilities. as proclaimed by the beijing platform, “the girl child is the woman of tomorrow.” given current canadian demographics, now, more than ever, is the time to realize that first nations girls are canada’s women of tomorrow. the toolbox for linking reproductive health and sustainable development in a culturally sensitive manner has already been filled by the international community. it falls to us to use those tools in building a better future. 26 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 11 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/11 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.11 a p p e n d i x a h u m a n r i g h t s e s t a b l i s h i n g a g r e e m e n t r i g h t s b a s e d a c t i o n s right to life and survival udhr, article 3 iccpr, article 6 crc, article 6 prevent avoidable maternal deaths end pre-natal sex selection and female infanticide screen for cancers that can be detected early and treated. ensure access to dual-protection contraceptive methods right to liberty and security of the person udhr, article 25 icescr, article 12 cedaw. articles 11, 12 and 14 eliminate female genital cutting encourage clients to make independent reproductive health decisions right to marry and establish a family cedaw. articles 11, 12 and 14 prevent early or coerced marriages right to decide the number and spacing of one’s children udhr, article 12 iccpr, article 17 icescr, article 10 cedaw, article 16 crc, article 16 provide access to a range of modern contraceptive methods help people choose and use a family planning method right to the highest attainable standard of health icescr, article 12 cedaw, articles 12 and 14 crc, article 24 provide access to affordable, acceptable, and comprehensive reproductive health services rights to the benefits of scientific progress udhr, article 27 icescr, article 15 fund research on women’s as well as men’s health needs provide access to obstetric care that can prevent maternal deaths right to receive and impart information udhr, article 19 iccpr, article 19 cedaw, articles 10, 14, 16 crc, articles 12, 13 and 17 make family planning information freely available offer sufficient information for people to make informed reproductive health decisions. source: unfpa (n.d.c). key: udhr: universal declaration of human rights iccpr: international covenant on civil and political rights crc: convention on the rights of the child icescr: international covenant on economic, social and cultural rights cedaw: convention on the elimination of discrimination against women 27 mann: international teen reproductive health published by scholarship@western, 2013 r e f e r e n c e s aboriginal nurses association of canada (anac) and planned parenthood federation of canada. 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(1974). world population plan of action. bucharest: author. 32 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 11 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/11 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.11 the international indigenous policy journal march 2013 international teen reproductive health and development: the canadian first nations context michelle m. mann recommended citation international teen reproductive health and development: the canadian first nations context abstract french abstract spanish abstract keywords creative commons license international teen reproductive health and development: the canadian first nations context traditional knowledge: considerations for protecting water in ontario the international indigenous policy journal volume 3 issue 3 water and indigenous peoples article 11 september 2012 traditional knowledge: considerations for protecting water in ontario deborah mcgregor university of toronto, d.mcgregor@utoronto.ca recommended citation mcgregor, d. (2012). traditional knowledge: considerations for protecting water in ontario. the international indigenous policy journal, 3(3) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.11 traditional knowledge: considerations for protecting water in ontario abstract in canada, the water crisis increasingly felt around the world is being experienced primarily in small, usually indigenous, communities. at the heart of this issue lies an ongoing struggle to have indigenous voices heard in the decision-making processes that affect their lives, lands, and waters. as part of ancient systems of traditional knowledge (tk), indigenous people bear the knowledge and the responsibility to care for the waters upon which they depend for survival. a series of internationally developed documents has supported indigenous peoples’ calls for increased recognition of the importance of tk in resolving environmental crises, including those involving water. ontario provincial and canadian federal governments have been developing legislative and regulatory documents to help fend off further water-related catastrophes within their jurisdictions. despite such efforts, a number of barriers to the successful and appropriate involvement of tk in water management remain. based on years of community-based and policy-related research with first nations people involved in water-related undertakings, this article highlights progress made to date, and provides indigenous viewpoints on what further steps need to be taken. key among these steps are the need to restore and maintain indigenous access to traditional territories and ways of life, and the requirement for mutually respectful collaboration between tk and western science. keywords traditional knowledge, water, indigenous peoples, water crisis, indigenous rights acknowledgments i would like to thank the elders, traditional knowledge holders and practitioners, traditional teachers, hunters, trappers, grandmothers and grandfathers who shared their time and knowledge with me on this important topic. miigwetch. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ t r a d i t i o n a l k n o w l e d g e : c o n s i d e r a t i o n s f o r p r o t e c t i n g w a t e r i n o n t a r i o this article provides a summary of work completed over the past decade on the topic of water. i first began to work on water-related issues in 2000 when the chiefs of ontario1 responded to a request to provide a first nations submission to the walkerton inquiry. the report was submitted to the commission in 2001. the submission from the chiefs of ontario made it clear that traditional knowledge (tk) must be included in decision-making around water protection. since 2001, a number of initiatives have come to the forefront to address water-related issues in first nation communities. based on the tk work completed from 2000 to 2011, this paper provides an overview of what water means to anishinabe peoples in ontario. emphasis is placed on the fact that such meaning has application in both historical and contemporary times. anishinabe knowledge, like any other, is dynamic, continuously adapting to contemporary situations and incorporating aspects of knowledge learned from others. many elders, grandmothers, grandfathers, and other knowledge holders (spiritual leaders and healers, hunters, trappers, fishermen, gatherers, etc.) retain a great deal of this knowledge. this knowledge is based on ancient philosophies, the principles of which are used to determine which new information might appropriately be incorporated to address contemporary challenges. i hope that by sharing my experiences working on environmental issues, especially those concerning water, i am fulfilling an important responsibility as an anishinabe woman. as a mother, clan member, member of a first nation, and teacher i have a responsibility to share knowledge. this reflection paper is based on my work with elders, traditional knowledge holders, and practitioners in ontario in relation to the role of traditional knowledge (tk) in protecting water. the ideas and insights that i will share in this paper are essentially lessons and teachings from elders, knowledge holders, practitioners, anishinabe thinkers, scholars, and others over the years. nothing i will say here is, therefore, particularly original, as these teachings generally have been passed on for generations within our nation. i will share my own reflections on the teachings and my current understandings of tk in relation to water. i hope to convey at least some of the tk that i have learned over my lifetime in a way that makes sense. my goal is simply to share what i have learned from those far more knowledgeable than i. it is part of my role as an anishinabe-kwe to share such knowledge. f r o m t h e i n t e r n a t i o n a l t o t h e l o c a l c o n t e x t ensuring an adequate water supply for human populations is rapidly emerging as one of the major global environmental concerns of the twenty-first century (corpuz, 2006; goldtooth, 2006; united nations educational, scientific, and cultural organization [unesco], 2003). the indigenous peoples’ kyoto water declaration (2003), prepared by indigenous participants at the 3rd world water forum in japan, describes indigenous interests in water and water protection issues. the declaration specifically affirms aboriginal peoples’ “…relationship to mother earth and responsibilities to future generations….” and states that, “we recognize, honour and respect water as sacred and sustaining of all life. our traditional 1 chiefs of ontario is a coordinating body for 133 first nation communities located within the boundaries of the province of ontario. the purpose of the chiefs of ontario office is to enable the political leadership to discuss regional, provincial and national priorities affecting first nation people in ontario and to provide a unified voice on these issues (see www.coo.org). 1 mcgregor: traditional knowledge published by scholarship@western, 2012   knowledge, laws and way of life teach us to be responsible in caring for this sacred gift that connects all life” (boelens, chiba, & nakashima, 2006, p. 176). section 15 of the declaration outlines the role of tk in water management and the strengths it can bring to addressing global water issues: our traditional practices are dynamically regulated systems. they are based on natural and spiritual laws, ensuring sustainable use through traditional resource conservation. long-tenured and place-based traditional knowledge of the environment is extremely valuable, and has been proven to be valid and effective. our traditional knowledge developed over the millennia should not be compromised by an over-reliance on relatively recent and narrowly defined western reductionist scientific methods and standards. we support the implementation of strong measures to allow the full and equal participation of indigenous peoples to share our experiences, knowledge and concerns. the indiscriminate and narrow application of modern scientific tools and technologies has contributed to the loss and degradation of water. (boelens et al., 2006, p. 177) the 4th world water forum, held in mexico city yielded the tlatokan atlahuak declaration (2006). again prepared by indigenous participants, this new document reaffirmed the kyoto declaration and emphasized that, “for all indigenous peoples of the world, water is the source of material, cultural and spiritual life” (p. 1)2 indigenous peoples have sought for decades to have a voice in environmental and resource management at the international level. the recently ratified united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (united nations general assembly [unga], 2007) is a prime example of how this voice is now being expressed. article 25 in the declaration states that: indigenous peoples have the right to maintain and strengthen their distinctive spiritual relationship with their traditionally owned or otherwise occupied and used lands, territories, waters and coastal seas and other resources and to uphold their responsibilities to future generations in this regard. (unga, 2007) the discussion of issues around water quality and conservation is thus not new to aboriginal peoples. as in many countries, these issues are only becoming more serious in canada as time progresses. in this paper, water governance in ontario will be explored in relation to first nations people, their potential roles and contributions, and the importance of anishinabe knowledge. this article links international, national, regional, and local efforts to protect water and further shares insights gained over the past decade from elders, traditional teachers, grandmothers, grandfathers, and environmental professionals i have encountered as part of the various water-related projects i have worked on during that time. s t a r t i n g w i t h c r e a t i o n origin stories say a great deal about how people understand their place in the universe and their relationship to other living things. creation stories are the means by which cultural communities ground their identity in particular narratives and particular landscapes (johnston, 2006). the anishinabe 2 see http://www.worldwaterforum.org/files/declarations/indigenous.pdf for the full declaration. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 11 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/11 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.11 creation and re-creation stories inform us of our beginnings and provide the conceptual frameworks for an indigenous understanding of our relationship to creation and its many beings. the creation stories of first nations people vary from nation to nation, although there are remarkable similarities among the concepts and messages contained in these stories. teachings that emerge from creation stories uphold ideas of holism and the importance of inter-relationships among all elements of creation. the earth is described as a living entity, bearing special responsibilities towards supporting the continuation of life. as a fundamental component of the earth, water plays a central role in creation stories. an anishinabe view on the importance of water and its relationship to the people is expressed by benton-banai (1988), who states that, “the earth is said to be a woman. in this way it is understood that woman preceded man on the earth. she is called mother earth because from her come all living things. water is her lifeblood. it flows through her, nourishes her, and purifies her” (p. 2). in the anishinabe tradition, water is also a powerful purifying force in the re-creation stories. as many of the teachings contained in these stories warn, if we do not take care of creation as instructed by the creator and if we do not fulfil the duties and responsibilities as we are taught, then we will suffer along with the earth. in the re-creation story, the people do not perform their duties as instructed – they have not followed the instructions for living appropriately with creation. balance and harmony are, therefore, not maintained. the people begin to bicker and quarrel. peace among peoples suffers, and creation is not respected. the creator becomes very sad with this situation and decides to purify the earth. water is chosen as the means to do this, and the creator sends a flood to cleanse the earth. afterwards, water is again used to re-create the earth. “water beings” play an integral role in this re-creation; they help the first woman and, thus, have a special place in the lives of first nations people. for more complete versions of these stories, see benton-banai (1988) and johnston (1976). in the creation and re-creation stories, instructions are given by the creator on how to relate appropriately with all beings of creation. in the anishinabe worldview, these instructions are often related to people in the form of stories, although there are other forms. people obtained such instruction or knowledge from many sources, including creation itself (johnston, 2003; mcgregor, 2004). many stories and teachings are obtained from animals, plants, the moon, the stars, water, wind, and the spirit world. knowledge is also gained through visions, ceremonies, prayers, intuitions, dreams, and personal experience. taking care of water has been part of our knowledge for most of our history as anishinabe people. it is only recently that we have not been able to exercise these responsibilities. our relationship with water is not only historical or in the past; it continues to the present day. we recognize that water continues to play a role in our daily lives not just for drinking, but also for numerous other important activities, including providing a source of food. our relationship to water also plays a vital role in passing on knowledge to younger generations. they too must learn about the importance of water. in the anishinabe tradition, women have a special relationship with water, since, like mother earth, they have life-giving powers. women have a special place in the order of existence. they provide us, as unborn children, with our very first environment – water. when we are born, water precedes us. with this special place in the order of things come responsibilities. no one is exempt from caring for, and paying respect to, the water, but for women there is a special responsibility. in some ceremonies, women speak for the water. for example, grandmother josephine mandamin, through the “mother earth water 3 mcgregor: traditional knowledge published by scholarship@western, 2012   walk” 3 she founded, has inspired many others to “walk the talk” in order to heal the waters. many have decided to follow her example of raising awareness of the responsibility to care for water. grandmother josephine and the water walkers demonstrate the spiritual role that women have with respect to water. w a t e r , f i r s t n a t i o n s p e o p l e s , a n d t h e c a n a d i a n c o n t e x t although the most publically known water issue facing first nations is the lack of access to safe drinking water, the complexity of first nations legal, financial, social, economic, and cultural systems indicates that water management by and for fist nations is a multi-layered problem (phare, 2011). in 2000, seven people died from e. coli contamination of the drinking water supply in the rural town of walkerton, ontario. an inquiry into the tragedy was held, and two years later justice o’connor released his report on part 2 of the walkerton inquiry, outlining 121 recommendations. key among these was the recognition that first nations face serious problems in relation to water quality, and the difficulty in resolving these issues is compounded by jurisdictional issues among federal, provincial, and first nations governments (o’connor, 2002; phare, 2011; swain, louttit, & hrudey, 2006). the problems with water quality in first nations communities are long standing and related to broader historical and unjust relationships between aboriginal peoples and the crown (assembly of first nations [afn], 1993; national aboriginal health organization [naho], 2002). this situation, fundamentally rooted in a colonial history, creates a context where many first nations on a daily basis face a multitude of environmental health challenges that affect community well-being. the historical injustices that aboriginal peoples have faced, chronicled in great detail in the royal commission on aboriginal peoples (rcap) report, have had a devastating impact on people, as well as the environment (rcap, 1996). the focus of this paper is on one area of such impact – water. in some first nations communities, akwesasne being one, severing ties with the water source (in this case the st. lawrence river) has represented the single most harmful event in the history of the community (ransom, 1999). in the fall of 2005, a drinking water crisis in the northern ontario first nation community of kashechewan drew national attention (christensen, gourcher, & phare, 2010; naho, 2005; st. germain & sibbeston, 2007; swain et al., 2006). the community, which had already been under a boil-water advisory for two years due to e. coli contamination, was declared by the ontario government to be in a state of emergency. hundreds of people were evacuated from the community with many requiring medical attention (bakker, 2007; st. germain & sibbeston, 2007). the government of canada responded with a plan to assure the health of residents of kashechewan and the long term well-being and sustainability of their community (ontario ministry of the environment [omoe[, 2005). a memorandum of understanding was later signed between the community of kashechewan and the minister of indian and northern affairs canada4 to address the community’s challenges (aboriginal affairs and northern development canada [aandc], 2007). the ontario ministry of environment’s contribution to the plan included a technical on-site assessment of 3 see http://www.motherearthwaterwalk.com/. 4 effective june 2011, the prime minister announced the former minister of indian and northern affairs canada's title and the department's name would change from indian affairs and northern development (inac) to aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc). this change would have no impact on the mandate of the department or the minister's statutory responsibilities. depending on when a particular document was published and website last updated, both indian and northern affairs canada (inac) and aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc) are indicated in the bibliography. see http://www.aadnc-aandc.gc.ca/eng/ 1314808945787 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 11 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/11 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.11 kashechewan first nation’s drinking water, water treatment system, and sewage collection system (omoe, 2005). the expert technical team offered a number of recommendations to safeguard kashechewan’s drinking water. the situation in kashechewan was sadly not an isolated event. drinking water advisories are frequent, and water quality continues to be recognized as a serious health concern in many first nations communities (harden & levalliant, 2008; st. germain & sibbeston, 2007; willsie, pastershank, lyndon-hassen, wu, & travis, 2009). a recent study by the ontario first nations technical services corporation found that over 80 percent of water treatment plants in ontario first nations were at medium to high risk of not being able to meet existing regulations (morriseau, 2011). as johanne gelinas (2005), commissioner of the environment and sustainable development, points out, “when it comes to the safety of drinking water, residents of first nation communities do not benefit from a level of protection comparable to that of people who live off reserves” (p. 3). water governance, generally referred to as “decision-making processes through which water is managed” (de loe & kreutzwiser, 2007, p. 87), is a complex issue in canada because both federal and provincial governments have responsibilities towards water. jurisdictional conflicts frequently arise. hence, aboriginal rights with respect to water represent a multifaceted issue (swain et al., 2006; walkem, 2007). aboriginal peoples’ involvement in water-related concerns throughout north america has often, though not exclusively, been couched in the aboriginal and treaty rights discourse (afn, 1993; getches, 2002; matsui, 2005; walkem, 2007), as well as in discussions of social, environmental, and social justice issues (lavalley, 2006; walkem, 2007). the idea that aboriginal peoples face unique challenges has been clearly recognized (afn, 2007; boelens et al., 2006; groenfeldt, 2006; phare, 2011; ransom & ettenger, 2001; swain et al., 2006; walkem, 2007). however, aboriginal peoples regard western water management approaches as limited, and science and technology, alone, as being unable to address the challenges faced by global, regional, and local communities in relation to water. from an aboriginal point of view, alternative perspectives are required in an effort to address such challenges (blackstock, 2001). many scholars, activists, scientists, and aboriginal peoples in canada have observed, “… water governance in canada is in a state of crisis (in the true sense of the word)” (bakker, 2007, p. xv). achieving resolution of water-related issues in canada is proving to be difficult; in this country, jurisdictional division of responsibilities in relation to water management is particularly complex, crossing “provincial, federal and international management regimes” (saunders & wenig, 2007, p. 119). simeone and troniak (2012) describe such complexity as follows: in canada, water and wastewater operations and systems are generally the responsibility of provincial and territorial governments. over the years, the different jurisdictions have developed comprehensive regulatory regimes for the protection of source water, water quality standards, and the oversight of water treatment plants and water delivery services. however, because section 91(24) of the constitution act, 1867 grants to the federal government exclusive jurisdiction over “indians and lands reserved for the indians,” provincial regulatory water standards do not apply to on-reserve first nations communities. to date, there has been no federal legislative framework governing drinking water and wastewater in first nations communities beyond what is set out in federal policies, administrative guidelines, and funding 5 mcgregor: traditional knowledge published by scholarship@western, 2012   arrangements. (p. 2) in summary, jurisdictional fragmentation is far more troublesome for aboriginal peoples (o’connor 2002; walkem, 2007), as aboriginal and treaty rights cross jurisdictions as well. simply put, “current canadian water policy is not working” (walkem, 2007, p. 309), and this is perhaps most true for aboriginal peoples. t h e s t a t e ’ s r e s p o n s e s in 2003, indian and northern affairs canada released the national assessment of water and wastewater systems in first nation communities: summary report (inac, 2003). the purpose of the report was to document a comprehensive assessment of on-reserve water and wastewater systems conducted to determine their present status. the results were startling: “of the 740 community water systems assessed, about 29 percent (218) posed a potentially high risk that could negatively impact water quality … another 46 percent (337) were classified as medium risk, and the remaining 24 percent were in the low or no risk category” (inac, 2003, p. ii). these results are remarkably similar to the statistics found for ontario in 2011, as noted above. clearly, there is a water crisis in first nations communities in canada, and it is a public health, as well as a social equity, issue. in response to this assessment and the findings of the walkerton inquiry, the federal government in 2003 announced the creation of the first nations water management strategy (fnwms) aimed at improving the safety of water supplies in first nation communities (indian and northern affairs canada [inac], 2003). this strategy focused on seven key areas: developing comprehensive guidelines, policies, and standards; educating on-reserve residents about drinking water issues; clarifying roles and responsibilities; building and upgrading water systems to standards; improving operations and maintenance; providing operator training; and expanding water testing (gelinas, 2005). the strategy began with a budget of $600 million for five years. despite such an investment and improvements made since the inception of this strategy (inac, 2007; inac, 2008a), water issues remain critical and urgent in many aboriginal communities (phare, 2011). in march, 2006, the minister for inac announced an action plan for drinking water in first nation communities (inac, 2006a) that included two noteworthy aspects: (1) a “protocol for safe drinking water in first nations communities” (inac, 2006b) and (2) the commitment to appoint an “expert panel to advise on a regulatory framework to ensure safe drinking water in first nation communities” (inac, 2006c) to advise on the appropriate regulatory framework required to ensure clean water in first nation communities (afn, 2007). the protocol requires first nations authorities responsible for drinking water systems, in collaboration with other stakeholders, to develop and implement a watershed or aquifer protection plan, as well as a source water protection (swp) plan, to prevent contamination of community water sources. the mandate of the fnwms drew to a close in march 2008. in april of that year, however, the government of canada announced a two year first nations water and wastewater action plan (fnwwap) in its continued efforts to address drinking water quality issues in first nation communities. a key component of this plan is to conduct an updated assessment of water and 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 11 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/11 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.11 wastewater systems in all first nations communities, but also to consult with first nation communities on the creation of a federal legislative framework for drinking water and wastewater on-reserve (inac, 2008b, 2008c). in 2009, inac organized a series of one-day sessions throughout canada to provide first nations with an opportunity to discuss and provide comments on the federal government's proposals for developing legislation and regulations for first nations drinking water. in preparation for these sessions the government of canada released the drinking water and wastewater in first nation communities discussion paper: engagement sessions on the development of a proposed legislative framework for drinking water and wastewater in first nation communities (aandc, 2010). these engagement sessions also provided opportunities for dialogue addressing the regulatory gap in first nations communities in relation to water (graham, mitchell, & edgar, 2009). over the course of the fall and winter of 2009 to 2010, federal officials met with first nation organizations to discuss specific issues relating to the federal legislative proposal (inac, 2010). in may 2010, the federal government introduced legislation for the development of federal regulations governing the provision of safe drinking water on reserves. known as bill s-11, an act respecting the safety of drinking water on first nation lands (simeone, 2010), it has not garnered positive reaction from first nations (christensen et al., 2010). in ontario, for example, the chiefs of ontario passed a resolution rejecting the legislation even as it was being proposed (chiefs of ontario, 2009). in a later document, the chief of ontario (2011) describes ontario first nations’ opposition to the bill in some detail, which includes the following: • the bill was created without due consultation of first nations. rather than being a joint effort between the federal government and first nations, it is being imposed on first nations. • the bill gives the federal government the authority to hand over significant powers to third parties such that those third parties then assume power over first nations in terms of water management and regulation. this ignores the existing nation-to-nation and fiduciary relationships between first nations and the federal government and likely contravenes the constitution act of 1982 in various ways. • not only would the bill put first nations under the regulatory power of third party managers in terms of water systems, it would do so without providing any of the resources required for necessary infrastructure upgrades. the government of canada’s aboriginal consultation and accommodation guidelines for federal officials to fulfil the duty to consult (aandc, 2011, referred to here as “the guidelines”) outlines the crown’s legal duty to consult with aboriginal peoples. the guidelines define the duty to consult as follows: the duty to consult is an obligation of the government as a whole. in haida, taku river and mikisew cree, the supreme court of canada held that provincial and federal governments have a legal obligation to consult when the crown contemplates conduct that might adversely impact potential or established aboriginal or treaty rights. (aandc, 2011, p. 61) 7 mcgregor: traditional knowledge published by scholarship@western, 2012   first nations in canada, as noted above, consistently stated that the government of canada did not fulfill their legal duty to consult on these matters. more specifically, the assembly of first nations and chiefs of ontario argued that aboriginal and treaty rights would be adversely impacted by the proposed legislation (afn, 2012; chiefs of ontario, 2011). also, as noted above, “engagement” sessions, not consultations as the expert panel called for, were held with various first nations. engagement is explained in the guidelines as including “discussion groups and formal dialogue, sharing knowledge and seeking input on activities such as policy, legislation, program development, or renewal” (aandc, 2011, p. 61). engagement often precedes formal consultation if the engagement reveals adverse impacts, not previously known, on the exercise of aboriginal and treaty rights. the centre for indigenous environmental resources states, in consulting with the crown: a guide for first nations, that, at the most basic level, consultation must be meaningful, fair, and conducted in good faith. the discussions must be substantive (guirguis-awadalla, allen, & phare, 2007). clearly, as first nations have articulated, the impacts of s-11 are far reaching and require more than one-day engagement sessions. in response to criticisms from first nations across the country, the federal government, in february 2012, released a revised version of the bill, now referred to as bill s-8. while containing a new clause stating that the act is not to, “… abrogate or derogate from any existing aboriginal or treaty rights of the aboriginal peoples of canada under section 35 of the constitution act, 1982,”, it also states that this is the case, “… except to the extent necessary to ensure the safety of drinking water on first nation lands” (simeone & troniak, 2012, p. 6). this seemingly contradictory clause appears to be the most significant change in what ontario regional chief angus toulouse has referred to as, “… almost an exact replica of … bill s-11” (cited in morriseau, 2012). needless to say, the chiefs of ontario rejected bill s-8 just as strongly as the earlier version, despite the government’s claimed improvements. as noted above, although the federal government has begun taking legislative steps to resolve water concerns in first nations communities, they have not begun to appropriately address such problems from an aboriginal perspective. first nations continue to call for the crown to work in partnership with first nations and respect the guidance provided in the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (unga, 2007) on such matters. first nations have called for a government-togovernment process that recognizes first nations authority and jurisdiction over their lives and territories (afn, 2012). aboriginal people are not only concerned about water in their communities, but on their traditional territories as well. in ontario, first nations territories outside the federal reserve system fall under the jurisdiction of the province. in response to the walkerton inquiry, the province of ontario embarked on a process of water reform, which included the passage of the clean water act (2006). the act focused on source water protection as the first barrier to overcome in a multi-barrier conceptualization of protecting drinking water. the clean water act is primarily concerned with source water protection planning. the act helps protect drinking water at the source as part of an overall commitment to safeguard human health and the environment. this legislation sets prevention as its fundamental principle. keeping the sources of drinking water free of contamination is smarter, safer, and more effective than cleaning up problems after the fact (omoe, 2010). justice o’connor stated, “the best way to achieve a healthy public water supply is to put in place multiple barriers that keep water contaminants from reaching people” (omoe, 2010, p. 72). the idea is to keep the source water as clean 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 11 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/11 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.11 as possible to lower the risk of contamination. thus, a multi barrier approach formed a major recommendation in the walkerton inquiry that has since been implemented in the province of ontario. o’connor explains, “a multiple-barrier system for providing safe drinking water, the selection and protection of reliable, high-quality drinking water sources is the first barrier (omoe, 2010, p. 89). source water is understood in the multi-barrier approach to be “untreated water from streams, lakes or underground aquifers that people use to supply private wells and public drinking water systems. source water protection is about protecting both the quality and quantity of these water sources, now and into the future” (pollution probe, 2004, p.1). a primary role in the implementation of the act and the regimes it created to protect source water has been assigned to the province’s conservation authorities (ca) who manage water resources on a watershed basis (de loe & kreutzwiser, 2007). conservation authorities are local watershed management agencies that deliver services and programs, which protect and manage water and other natural resources in partnership with governments, landowners, and other organizations. ontario has also directed cas to engage first nations in establishing working relationships. in general, however, neither federal nor provincial initiatives in relation to first nations water concerns address core issues such as aboriginal and treaty rights, governance or decision-making structures and processes, jurisdiction and authority, or recognition of the responsibilities held by first nations people to care for water (phare, 2009). i n d i g e n o u s r e s p o n s e s despite tremendous obstacles, first nations people continue in many instances to fulfill their responsibilities towards water. the women's water walk, inspired by josephine mandamin, is a prime example. as described in the introductory paragraphs of this article, indigenous peoples around the world have asserted their views and knowledge through various declarations. in ontario, the chiefs of ontario, through a regional policy forum on water, drafted the “water declaration of the anshinabek, mushkegowuk and onkwehonwe” (chiefs of ontario, 2008), which was subsequently adopted through resolution by the chiefs in assembly. this declaration emphasizes the importance of exercising the caretaking role of indigenous people with regard to water and the environment. the declaration recognizes the special role of women and traditional knowledge in decision-making regarding water. it denounces the lack of state recognition and respect for the authority and responsibility of indigenous peoples to care for water. it also calls into question the authority and jurisdiction of governments in making decisions about water. in summary, indigenous peoples recognize that government-led solutions for addressing water-related challenges have thus far failed. i n d i g e n o u s r e a l i t i e s water is a sacred thing. this is reflected in many traditional beliefs, values and practices. (elder ann wilson in mcgregor & whitaker, 2001) according to elder ann wilson, “water is a sacred thing. this is reflected in many traditional beliefs, values, and practices” (cited in mcgregor & whitaker, 2001). first nations across canada are diverse in terms of culture, language, identity, governance, and traditions, and it is often a challenge to convey 9 mcgregor: traditional knowledge published by scholarship@western, 2012   key concepts and ideas regarding water. the expert panel on first nations drinking water observed that, it is risky to treat first nations as a homogeneous group. if there was one area, however, in which attitudes were widely shared, it was traditional beliefs and attitudes toward water. in addition to sustaining life itself, water was traditionally a means of transportation, or a source of food, or both, for every first nation and remains central to the lives of many communities today. the pervasiveness of this traditional view of water and the related stewardship role for first nations gave us a strong sense of how the goal of achieving safe drinking water on reserve should be pursued. (swain et al., 2006, p. 32) from a first nation perspective, water quality is not just an “environmental” or ecological issue (afn, 1993; phare, 2011). in the anishinabe tradition, one of the main features of knowledge, based on thousands of years of living sustainably with creation, is its holism: the recognition that all aspects of creation are inter-related. thus, degradation of water quality directly impacts the people, permeating every aspect of their lives. it threatens their very survival. first nations maintain unique perspectives on (and relationships with) water and feel these perspectives should form an integral part of water governance (mandamin, 2012; mcgregor, 2009). this section focuses on work undertaken by the chiefs of ontario on traditional knowledge and water in preparation for their submission to the walkerton inquiry in 2000, along with workshops and presentations since then (see for example, kamanga, kahn, mcgregor, sherry, & thorton, 2001; lavalley, 2006; mcgregor, 2009; mcgregor & whitaker, 2001; noojimawin health authority [nha], 2006). the teachings and understandings expressed were shared by approximately 80 first nations elders, traditional knowledge holders and practitioners, grandmothers and grandfathers, and leaders from across ontario. these individuals participated in various water-related workshops and other initiatives hosted by the chiefs of ontario over the past decade. the perspectives shared here summarize key messages that participants wished to share within the context of a dialogue around traditional knowledge and relationships to water. as noted above, such findings are similar to observations made by others throughout canada (anderson, 2010; anderson, clow, & haworthbrockman, 2011; blackstock, 2001; phare, 2011; swain et al., 2006). w a t e r i s a l i v e . i t i s a b e i n g w i t h i t s o w n s p i r i t . workshop participants continually stress that water must be respected as a living being. water bodies are thought to have various personalities and responsibilities that require different demonstrations of respect. water is understood to have feelings and can be sad and/or angry if not respected or treated properly. water must be free to fulfill its responsibilities; it is not appropriate for people to interfere with water’s life-giving duties. w a t e r i s s a c r e d . water is regarded as sacred and is often used in ceremonies. it is a powerful medicine and must be respected as such. it has life-giving properties. we need water to live. “water is life” is a common sentiment expressed among elders and traditional teachings. w a t e r i s a r e l a t i v e . not only is water alive and infused with spirit; it is a relative. in one workshop, an elder referred to water as my “little brother” and scolded participants for speaking about water as if it 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 11 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/11 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.11 was a thing. one speaks to water as one would a relative, with caring and compassion. water is not a commodity to be bought and sold. it is to be revered and treated with respect and dignity. w a t e r i s p a r t o f a h o l i s t i c s y s t e m , a p a r t o f c r e a t i o n . water is not a single, discrete aspect of the environment; it is part of a greater, interconnected whole. when one considers water, therefore, one must consider all that to which water is connected and related. elders felt current government initiatives around water to be limited and short-sighted. when one considers water, one must consider all that water supports and all that supports water. therefore, a focus on just drinking water is misguided. it is not in keeping with traditional principles of holism and the interdependence of all living things. one must also consider, for example, the plants that water nourishes, the fish that live in water, the medicines that grow in or around water, and the animals that drink water. w a t e r i s k e y t o s u r v i v a l . water is critical for the spiritual, emotional, physical, and intellectual life of aboriginal people. water fulfills many functions for continued life on earth. the role of water in life must be recognized. therefore, it is not appropriate to deprive others (including other beings of creation, such as fish, plants, and land animals) of water, by hoarding water for oneself. a p p r o p r i a t e w a t e r u s e i s a b o u t p r o p e r r e l a t i o n s h i p s . from a traditional perspective, one does not really use water. one speaks to, and seeks permission from, water to utilize its life-giving properties. one does not seek to treat water as a commodity, but should find an appropriate relationship with water based on respect and the recognition that water is a living spiritual force. water is regarded as a gift. in traditional teachings and values, there are protocols to ensure that proper relationships with water are maintained so that water, in turn, is able to fulfill its responsibilities. w a t e r m u s t b e t r e a t e d w i t h a n e t h i c o f t h a n k s g i v i n g . water is critical to the survival of all life on earth, and aboriginal peoples are most thankful for water’s existence. there are protocols and ceremonies for giving thanks to water and for establishing and maintaining a spiritual connection to water. a central component of the haudenosaunee thanksgiving address involves giving thanks to the waters. in aboriginal cultures, water is not taken for granted and its life-giving qualities are routinely recognized and honored. p e o p l e h a v e s p e c i f i c r e s p o n s i b i l i t i e s t o p r o t e c t w a t e r . people are taught that they have an obligation, a responsibility, to care for water. this responsibility has recently been proclaimed in international declarations involving water (see for example boelens et al., 2006) and was frequently addressed by participants at the aforementioned workshops. work with elders over the years has also revealed that women, in particular, are considered to have specific responsibilities in relation to water (anderson et al., 2011; lavalley, 2006; mcgregor, 2005). this means that consideration must be given to the gender of decision-makers, especially with respect to aboriginal women, who have the responsibility of speaking for water in aboriginal communities. p l a n n i n g f o r w a t e r g o v e r n a n c e m u s t t a k e a l o n g t e r m a p p r o a c h . decision-makers must plan at least seven generations ahead. any decisions about water should be based on recognition of the impact such decisions will have on subsequent generations. k n o w l e d g e r e g a r d i n g w a t e r m u s t b e s h a r e d . there was a strong sentiment among workshop 11 mcgregor: traditional knowledge published by scholarship@western, 2012   participants that aboriginal peoples’ unique views and values in relation to water must be shared with non-aboriginal society. it is felt that current mainstream processes for protecting water are misguided, limited, and too dependent on the compartmentalized approach of science and technology. elders feel that traditional teachings around water would benefit the broader community, so non-aboriginal people can also learn to develop proper relationships with water. w o m e n h a v e a c e n t r a l r o l e . everyone has a responsibility to care for the water. women, however, carry the responsibility to talk for the water. (elder ann wilson in mcgregor & whitaker, 2001) everyone has a responsibility to care for the water. women, however, carry the responsibility to talk for the water. the recognition of women’s role in creating life along with water means that women and water have a special bond (mandamin, 2012). this bond is often expressed in ceremonies, where the role of anishinabe women is to speak for the water: in the water ceremony we make an offering to water, to acknowledge its life-giving forces and to pay respect. we have a responsibility to take care of the water, and this ceremony reminds us to do it. women bring forth life, the life of the people. water brings forth life also, and we have a special role to play in this responsibility that we share with water. (akii kwe in mcgregor & whitaker, 2001) l a n g u a g e r e t e n t i o n i s c r i t i c a l . another common theme that emerged from the water workshops over time is the importance of language. reclaiming language and re-naming the waters with their proper names, rather than the newcomers’ names, is important in helping the waters heal. grandmother josephine mandamin (2010), in a great lakes water workshop in the summer of 2010, said that, “learning the proper names and stories for particular places relating to water will also help anishinabe people heal as people”. t r a d i t i o n a l k n o w l e d g e i n a c t i o n we are the voice for water. (akii kwe in mcgregor & whitaker, 2001) for many years, indigenous women have noticed changes in water quality, particularly because they have a close and special relationship with the water. in the process of rediscovery, revitalization, and healing, the women of bkejwanong territory (walpole island, ontario) have organized themselves to speak for the water. akii kwe is an informally organized grassroots group of women speaking only from what they know. they began by protesting what was happening to the water, especially pollution contaminating the waters flowing around bkejwanong territory. the women decided to speak for the water and to try to stop such actions (mcgregor & whitaker, 2001). in a 1998 submission on water quality issues, akii kwe members stated that in bkejwanong nature provides the foundation of anishinabe culture and the ways in which the people conduct themselves (systems of governance). as 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 11 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/11 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.11 part of this, the people have a responsibility to act on behalf of the water (akii kwe, 1998). josephine mandamin, introduced above, is a grandmother fulfilling a prophecy by walking around the great lakes to remind people of their responsibility to water. the water walks take place in the spring and are led by a grandmother (www.motherearthwaterwalk.com). they begin with a water ceremony, feast, and celebration. routinely covering distances of over 1,000 kilometres, the goal of each walk is to raise awareness about water and to change the perception of water from that of a resource to that of a sacred entity, which must be treated as such. on these journeys the grandmothers carry with them a vessel of water and an eagle staff. the beauty of this effort is that it is led by women who are fulfilling their role in raising awareness of the spiritual and cultural significance of water and trying to engage as many people as possible (mandamin, 2012). the walks have inspired anishinabe women in other communities to organize their own water walks. grandmother josephine mandamin's incredible journey is now featured in water life, a national film board documentary (nfb, 2009). water-related traditional and spiritual knowledge that is driving the mother earth water walks and the activism of groups, such as akii kwe, is slowly finding its way into current decision-making processes. in march 2007, the anishinabek nation5 announced the creation of a women’s water commission aimed, in part, at providing input to the ontario government on great lakes water issues (union of ontario indians [uoi], 2008). the foundation of the anishinabek women’s water commission, “… is the traditional role of the women in caring for water” (uoi, 2008, p.1). it was established in recognition of this traditional role along with the need to include women as part of the decision-making processes in formal environmental and resource management. this commission, led by none other than josephine mandamin, gained momentum with the appointment of political representative chief isadora bedamash in march 2008. chief bedamash’s appointment is seen as being vital in the effort to, “…strengthen our leadership role in the area of water policy in ontario, and enhance the leadership of the women’s water commission itself.” (uoi, 2008, p. 1) through its work not only with member first nations but also with government agencies, it is hoped that this commission will provide valuable insights into the approaches required for the ongoing protection of the great lakes and other waters. c o n c l u s i o n as an anishinabe-kwe, i have a responsibility to speak for water and address equity issues in relation to water. sharing my work over the years and advocating for the inclusion of anishinabe perspective in various capacities has been, and continues to be, part of my responsibility to all my relations and to creation as a whole. in this chapter, i have offered insights shared by elders, traditional knowledge holders, practitioners, leaders, grandmothers, and grandfathers from the various initiatives in which i have had the privilege of participating. within the context of the anishinabek people, key concepts of anishinabe traditional knowledge are critically important to sustaining appropriate relationships with water. anishinabe elders 5 the anishinabek nation, through its secretariat, the union of ontario indians (the oldest political organization in ontario), is the political advocate for 42 member first nations in ontario. 13 mcgregor: traditional knowledge published by scholarship@western, 2012   have stated that water is a living spiritual being with its own responsibilities to fulfil. as anishinabe people strive to address the challenges we face in relation to the water in our communities, we must go beyond the “techno-fix” advocated by governments and others. there is too much of a reliance on science and technology to solve issues. these solutions tend to be shortsighted and do not deal with the root of the problem. there is no quick and ready answer for the challenges that we face. water must be considered in a holistic fashion. other aspects of creation, along with people’s role in creating the current water crisis, must be included. while the tools of science, applied appropriately, can aid us, we must turn to the traditions and knowledge that did not fail us for thousands of years to find a real solution. while we face new challenges, the traditions are still as viable as they have always been. miigwetch... 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 11 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/11 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.11 r e f e r e n c e s aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc). 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(2009). drinking water advisories in first nations communities in canada: a national overview. ottawa, on: health canada. 21 mcgregor: traditional knowledge published by scholarship@western, 2012 the international indigenous policy journal september 2012 traditional knowledge: considerations for protecting water in ontario deborah mcgregor recommended citation traditional knowledge: considerations for protecting water in ontario abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license traditional knowledge: considerations for protecting water in ontario reconceptualizing indigenous parent involvement in early educational settings: lessons from native hawaiian preschool families the international indigenous policy journal volume 3 | issue 4 article 4 october 2012 reconceptualizing indigenous parent involvement in early educational settings: lessons from native hawaiian preschool families julie kaomea university of hawaii at manoa, julie.kaomea@hawaii.edu recommended citation kaomea, j. (2012). reconceptualizing indigenous parent involvement in early educational settings: lessons from native hawaiian preschool families. th e international indigenous policy journal, 3(4) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.4.4 reconceptualizing indigenous parent involvement in early educational settings: lessons from native hawaiian preschool families abstract indigenous families are often perceived by teachers and school administrators as disinterested and uninvolved in their children’s education. this article aims to complicate that longstanding stereotype. a detailed, qualitative case study of two native hawaiian preschool families reveals compelling counterstories of indigenous parents who are deeply concerned about their children’s education, but are limited in their familyschool involvement by a range of (post)colonial, social, psychological, and economic challenges that make it difficult for them to engage with schools in conventional ways. the study raises awareness of the skillful resolve with which indigenous families employ their limited resources to support their children’s education. it challenges educators and policy makers to imagine creative possibilities for drawing indigenous families into collaborative activity with contemporary schools. keywords indigenous, education, parent involvement, native hawaiian acknowledgments this research was supported in part by a grant from the spencer foundation. julie kaomea is a native hawaiian and associate professor in the college of education at the university of hawai‘i. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ r e c o n c e p t u a l i z i n g i n d i g e n o u s p a r e n t i n v o l v e m e n t i n e a r l y e d u c a t i o n a l s e t t i n g s : l e s s o n s f r o m n a t i v e h a w a i i a n p r e s c h o o l f a m i l i e s increasing parents’ involvement in their children’s education is viewed as a cornerstone of contemporary united states school-reform efforts (u.s. department of education, 2010). educational researchers and policy makers alike contend that children learn more and schools improve when parents are involved in their children’s schooling (barnard, 2004; demmert, 2001; henderson & mapp, 2002; hill & tyson, 2009; national parent teacher association, 2009). this finding has significant implications for native hawaiian students, who have historically demonstrated low-levels of academic achievement in conventional u.s. schools (benham, 2006; hammond, wilson, & barros, 2011; kana‘iaupuni, malone, & ishibashi, 2005) and whose parents have long been perceived as uninvolved in their children’s education (maielua, 2011; yamauchi, lau-smith, & luning, 2008). in an era when parent involvement (or lack thereof) is considered a predictor of indigenous students’ school success or failure (friedel, 1999b; goulet, 2001; smith, 1999), educators who work in native hawaiian and other indigenous school communities are challenged with the question of: how can we most effectively collaborate with the indigenous families whom we serve? this article is based on the premise that too often schools’ efforts toward increasing indigenous parental involvement are guided by longstanding stereotypes that oversimplify the complex challenges and motivations of contemporary indigenous families (friedel, 1999a; maielua, 2011). for instance, according to koki and lee (1998), many pacific educators contend that the indigenous pacific parents with whom they work do not “carry their share of the load.” the educators perceive these indigenous pacific parents as simply “dumping” their children at school and relinquishing their responsibility for their children’s educational development. similarly, mackay and myles’ (1995) study of aboriginal student dropouts in ontario, canada revealed that the non-native educators of these students largely attributed the high aboriginal student dropout rate to their parents’ lack of interest and failure to engender in their children an appreciation of the value of education. in each of these cases, indigenous families are ahistorically depicted as failing at parenting and blamed for their children’s school failure with virtually no recognition of the deep, colonial history that undergirds many of the ongoing challenges that indigenous families and students have faced, and continue to face, in the contemporary (post)colonial society and educational system. in hawai‘i, as in other indigenous nations across the globe, colonial domination took our once healthy, thriving, and self-sufficient indigenous society and horribly distorted it (stannard, 1989; trask, 1999). the journals and travelogues of captain cook and other early colonists in hawai‘i reveal numerous accounts of a thriving indigenous community of strong, happy, and healthy hawaiians, coexisting in selfsufficient harmony in a land of natural abundance (cook, 1967; edgar, n.d.). now, a little more than 200 years later, statistics tell us that many native hawaiian families are poor, unhealthy, unstable, and uneducated, and that our children are consequently at risk physically, cognitively, socially, and emotionally (kamehameha schools, 2009; office of hawaiian affairs, 2011). what these statistics neglect to explain is that, sandwiched between these contrasting social portraits, is a history of invasion and colonialism: a story of theft, exploitation, and oppression that, when coupled with the forced imposition of devastating colonial educational policies, has enduring implications for contemporary native hawaiian home-school relations. 1 kaomea: reconceptualizing indigenous parent-school involvement published by scholarship@western, 2012 by shedding light on this often-forgotten colonial history and its contemporary ramifications, this paper sets out to complicate the longstanding stereotype of native hawaiian families as disinterested and uninvolved in their children’s education. it is premised on the understanding that if teachers and educational researchers are committed to sensitively listening and responding to the unique perspectives and concerns of native hawaiian families, they are likely to find that these families are deeply concerned about their children’s education and are committed to doing whatever they can to support their children’s schooling, but are often limited in their family-school involvement by a range of (post)colonial, social, psychological, and economic challenges that make it difficult for these families to engage with schools in conventional ways. e x i s t i n g r e s e a r c h o n “ m i n o r i t y ” p a r e n t i n v o l v e m e n t although an extensive body of research documents the importance of parent involvement for student achievement (epstein, 2001; henderson & mapp, 2002; jordan, orozco, & averett, 2002), parental participation in minority and disadvantaged communities is reported to be persistently low (davies, 2002; floyd, 1998; moles, 1993). the prevailing interpretation is that less-educated, socioeconomically disadvantaged, and minority parents either cannot or do not want to become involved in their children’s education (chavkin, 1993; lareau, 1996; valdés, 1996). however, while educators and educational researchers frequently (mis)interpret minority parent non-involvement as evidence of deficiency or disinterest (delgado-gaitan, 2001; scribner, young, & pedroza, 1999), or demonstrative of a lack of caring (carger, 1997), studies examining parents’ perceptions of their role in their children’s schooling have found that minority parents care very much about their children’s education (trumbull, rothsteinfisch, greenfield, & quiroz, 2001). they have high goals and aspirations for their children (goldenberg, gallimore, reese & garnier, 2001; shannon, 1996), and they want to be involved (lópez, 2001). furthermore, while there is a persisting view that minority family values may conflict with the values necessary for school success, research on home-school “complementarities” (goldenberg & gallimore, 1995) suggests that the adherence to traditional cultural values in minority homes does not necessarily put children at a disadvantage in american schools. instead, many of these values may actually serve to support or complement educational achievement (garcía, 2004; reese, balzano, gallimore, & goldenberg, 1995). e x i s t i n g r e s e a r c h o n i n d i g e n o u s p a r e n t i n v o l v e m e n t in addition to the existing research on minority parent-school involvement, which is largely focused on immigrant communities, there is a growing body of research on family-school participation in various indigenous communities where the historical imposition of colonial educational policies has had profound and lasting effects upon contemporary home-school relations. for instance, a number of american indian studies suggest that, in spite of legislation mandating that federally funded schools actively promote parent involvement, the on-site involvement of american indian parents in public schools is dramatically low (deloria, 1991; noley, armstrong, downing, & figueroa, 1995; robinsonzañartu & majel-dixon, 1996). while the national education association (1983) has cautioned against equating the lack of american indian parent-school involvement with lack of interest, research suggests that educators and school personnel continue to “explain” american indian parents’ lack of involvement 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 4 [2012], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.4.4 with stereotypical and unsubstantiated hypotheses; often assuming, for instance, that “these parents don’t care about education” (robinson-zañartu & majel-dixon, 1996, para. 3; see also dixon, murphy, estrella, howe, whitehorse, & robinson-zañartu, 1991). more recent studies highlight historical explanations for the lack of on-site, native parent-school involvement. linking the colonial legacy of residential boarding schools with intergenerational cycles of dysfunctional relationships, deep mistrust of educational institutions, and the disruption of parenting skills within native communities, these studies provide recommendations for culturally grounded school-community networks that foster healing and empowerment among native families while rebuilding the social, cultural, and familial ties that have been severed by decades of residential schooling (hirshberg & sharp, 2005; jamie & russell, 2010; lawrenchuk, harvey, & berkowitz, 2000). t h e c u r r e n t s t u d y this study builds upon the existing body of indigenous parent-involvement research and extends it to the case of native hawaiian communities, where a combination of colonial, english-language day and residential schools nearly eradicated our native language and culture and effectively undermined the role of native hawaiian parents in the education of their young children (benham & heck, 1998). now, over 100 years after the illegal overthrow of the native hawaiian monarchy and hawai‘i’s forced annexation to the united states, the (post)colonial state of hawai‘i remains economically and politically dominated by a colonial settler population that is predominately white and asian american, while large numbers of native hawaiians remain politically, economically, socially, and culturally disenfranchised in our island home (fujikane, 2008; warner, 1999). beginning with the understanding that, prior to colonization, traditional native hawaiian families had a long history of supporting their children’s education (chun, 2006; pukui, haertig, & lee, 1972), this study aims to acknowledge the myriad ways in which native hawaiian families continue to support or complement their children’s schooling in the face of enduring, (post)colonial challenges. instead of focusing on how educators can teach indigenous families to become involved in their children’s education (dauber & epstein, 1993; epstein, 1986), this study considers what educators can learn from listening closely to these families. it seeks to legitimize what indigenous families are already doing to support their children’s education and focuses on how educators can recognize, foster, and sustain these existing efforts. m e t h o d this paper reports on a small section of an extensive, two-year case study aimed at helping educators to better appreciate the unique and diverse strengths, needs, and challenges of native hawaiian families with young, preschool-aged children. while the larger study included participant-observation sessions, surveys, and follow-up interviews with 16 native hawaiian preschool families, for the purposes of this article, i focus on just two of these families whose stories i found to be particularly compelling. i report the results through two narrative counterstories (delgado, 1993) that detail these native hawaiian families’ experiences in accessing and participating in preschool education for their young children. 3 kaomea: reconceptualizing indigenous parent-school involvement published by scholarship@western, 2012 c o u n t e r s t o r y t e l l i n g , c r i t i c a l r a c e t h e o r y , a n d t r i b a l c r i t in contrast to recent u.s. education policies that espouse a narrow definition of “scientifically-based” educational research (education sciences reform act, 2002; no child left behind act, 2001), critical race theory and tribalcrit honor stories and oral knowledge as “real and legitimate forms of data and ways of being” (brayboy, 2005, p. 439). tribalcrit acknowledges that stories are the foundations on which indigenous communities are built and are vehicles for the transmission of our culture and knowledge. stories serve as guideposts for elders and policymakers in indigenous communities, and can serve as powerful data in indigenous educational research (brayboy, 2005). critical race theorists distinguish between two types of stories: majoritarian stories, or stories of those in power, which are a natural part of the dominant discourse, and counterstories, or stories of those experiences that are not often told (i.e., those on the margins of society), which can serve as a tool for analyzing and challenging the majoritarian story (delgado, 1993). while a narrative may support the majoritarian story, a counter-narrative or counterstory, by its very nature, challenges the majoritarian story and the “bundle of presuppositions” (delgado & stefancic, 1993, p. 462) that are embedded within it to “displace, jar, or reconstruct the dominant tale or narrative” (delgado, 1995, p. xviii). counterstories challenge the perceived wisdom of those at society’s center, and provide a context to understand and transform established belief systems (solorzano & delgado bernal, 2001). in the following counterstories, i aim to challenge the dominant narrative of “disinterested” and “uninvolved” native hawaiian parents and posit a counter-narrative of dedicated and hardworking hawaiian families who are steadfast in their commitment to successfully raising their young children amidst a complex combination of (post)colonial hardships and tribulations. finally, i conclude by offering what i believe are important lessons that we can learn from these families, including specific policy recommendations for schools that wish to improve their indigenous family-school collaboration. c a s e s t u d i e s n o e : “ m a c g y v e r i n g i t ” a n d p r a y i n g f o r r a i n i begin with the story of noe1. noe has two kids and two jobs. she works as an educational assistant at a public elementary school and an after-school program coordinator. a few months prior to my interview with noe, her husband, ikaika, had been laid off from his construction job; noe’s grandmother, who raised noe, had just passed away; noe’s mother was battling leukemia; and her family was forced to move homes twice. life isn’t easy for noe. as my research assistant, who transcribed noe’s interview, noted: you read about all those negative statistics regarding hawaiians, and it sometimes seems like an exaggeration, or it doesn’t seem that real. but when you listen to noe’s interview, you see all those statistics bearing true—in one family! 1 all names presented in these accounts are pseudonyms. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 4 [2012], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.4.4 noe and her family have had some difficult times, but she’s not complaining. instead, her interview (and her life) is an inspiring treatise on the art of “making do” (de certeau, 1984) or in noe’s words, “macgyvering it.” macgyver is the hero in a 1980s tv series who has the cunning ingenuity to make use of mundane materials around him to escape dire situations, and is able to cobble together unorthodox solutions to any problem he faces. unlike secret agents in other films, macgyver has no high-tech weapons or tools, but relies only on his swiss army knife and duct tape. he can fix a broken fuel line with a ballpoint pen, repair a blown fuse using the aluminum wrapper from a stick of chewing gum, or build an ultra-light airplane with bamboo poles, heavy-duty garbage bags, and a cement-mixer engine. a self-proclaimed hawaiian, female macgyver, noe has similarly mastered the art of making do with little and demonstrates the creative ability to adapt in the face of challenging situations by drawing upon her only consistently available resource—her extended family network. noe, her husband, and their two kids have always lived with extended family out of necessity. not in the kauhale, traditional style with many houses on a compound, but in the postcolonial, struggling-to-survive style, with various families and generations crammed under one roof. noe, her husband, and two kids used to live with her husband’s family with a total of seven adults and two children, spanning four generations, including her husband’s mother and grandmother, as well as his adult siblings, and 18 year-old cousin. however, they recently moved out when her husband’s 21 yearold sister, who used to babysit their 2½-year-old son, began using drugs and was behaving erratically. wanting to remove their children from that influence, they moved in with noe’s sister’s family, where they now live as an extended family of four adults and four children. no longer able to rely on her sister-in-law as a babysitter, noe enrolled their 2½-year-old son, keoni, in preschool. however, the preschool that noe had chosen for her son required students be potty trained and keoni was still having trouble staying dry. thus, keoni was put on a modified school schedule that would allow him to go to school for shorter periods of time for the first couple of months while he continued to work on his potty training. for those first few months, noe, who worked at a public elementary school (where her daughter also attended) that was a 15-minute drive away from her son’s preschool, was challenged daily to come up with creative solutions for dealing with keoni’s modified schedule. as noe explains, it was a delicate balance of utilizing various family members while trying not to overburden any one family or person. she says: when keoni was on that modified schedule, it was horrible. i felt like i was macgyver. my daughter, malia, is in kindergarten at the same school where i work. but she has to be in school by 7:30 and i can’t drop keoni off until 7:45. so, i’d drop malia off at 7:30, take keoni to preschool at 7:45, then race back to my school where i’m supposed to start work at 8:00. then when he was on that modified schedule keoni would be pau [finished] with school at 10 o’clock. so he’d be in school from 7:45 to 10, and 10 o’clock was my recess. so at recess, i gotta tell my teacher, “’kay wait. i gotta go pick up keoni and come back.” 5 kaomea: reconceptualizing indigenous parent-school involvement published by scholarship@western, 2012 so i would have to pick him up during my recess and drop him off with one of my relatives. but mostly everyone is working, so it was hard to find someone who could take him. at one point, i had asked my cousin, who has a younger son and probably didn’t want to watch my son. i was like, “just watch him until i can get to lunch—for 2 hours. just watch him for 2 hours. i’ll pick him up at lunch, then i’ll keep him with me at work ‘til 4:00.” i know that i probably wasn’t supposed to bring him to my class, so i had to “hush hush” him, you know. like just hide him in the corner, because i gotta do my own work. but i didn’t want to leave him with my cousin ‘til 2:00, you know. i just felt that was unfair. so i said to my cousin, “pleeease, just help me. you know it’s just till noon. i’ll do whatever for you—but i just gotta get past this.” she was like “o-o-okay.” so, like i said, recess was like picking him up, dropping him with my cousin or one of my relatives for a couple of hours. at lunch i’d pick him up and bring him back to my class. you know it was this big ordeal i had to do. at that point, ikaika [noe’s husband] was working construction, so i couldn’t rely on him at all. the only time i could rely on him was if it rained, you know. and at that point, i would pray for rain. noe continued macgyverying it day after day and “praying for rain” when things got too hectic. as she explains: you know, it was really difficult. i had like all these macgyvers. i had to macgyver my whole life! at one point, i tell you, i was gonna give up. i was gonna say it wasn’t for me. i need to pull him from the preschool and put him in [a daycare] where they’d take him in diapers because i couldn’t do it already. i just couldn’t do it. but his teacher kept telling me she saw potential in him. she was like, “if you can just stick it out with the modified schedule until he’s potty trained, i think he could do really well in this school.” and i knew that she was probably right, ‘cause i think he’s really smart, and i knew it was a really good preschool, so i stuck it out. noe describes that, as keoni slowly but surely got the hang of potty training and progressed to a regular schedule, her husband got laid off from his construction job, which noe saw as a blessing. she explained: luckily at that point, you know—god forbid, i hate to say this—but at that point, november, ikaika got laid off. so it was like, “yes!” it was blessing. at the same time, it was like, “oh my god, what am i going to do?” you know, like we needed that money, but at the same time it worked out perfectly. as noe explains, after her husband lost his construction job, he took on a newspaper route. this gave him more time to spend with his son, which noe believes is important because her husband’s dad committed suicide when he was young and her dad left her mother before she was born, so they both grew up without a father. noe also explains that, since keoni has settled in on a regular schedule, they have been able to get assistance from her husband’s mother, grandmother, and cousin, who also help with dropping off and picking up keoni on their days off. now between ikaika, his mother, grandmother, and cousin, keoni 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 4 [2012], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.4.4 always has one family member or another to be there for him when his class has parent-and-child activities or to accompany him as a chaperone on field trips. while the adversity that this family has faced, and continues to face, is striking, perhaps more remarkable is their resilience, and the stubborn resolve on the part of this mother and the entire extended family to pull together and do whatever they need for their children’s education. in spite of the challenges dealt to her, noe holds fast to her conviction that education can lead to success for her children. her expectations for her children in school are in her words, “high—very high.” as noe explains, she is constantly comparing her kids with other kids the same age to make sure that they are “average or above average” and don’t fall behind. if it seems that they are falling behind, she works with them at home. noe also regularly checks in with her children’s teachers to see how they are doing. she explains: every so often, i call the teachers up because i need to know. i need to know how my kids are doing. i’m constantly on it. when asked to reflect on her values and her long-term goals for her children, they all revolved around the intertwined themes of education and family. first, she discussed the value of family: in our family, we always say love one another. it came from my grandpa who used to preach. one of the verses he used to preach was love one another. and right before my grandpa died that was what he said, “tell my family, love one another.” and then he went. from that, we always say, “eh, love one another.” ‘cause, you know, my grandparents had six kids, so my mom’s generation had six brothers and sisters, so we have like billions of grandkids. then we have like these loads of great-grandkids. so with all of us, of course when the family’s that big, we all get pilikia [disagreements], you know. someone’s always huhū [angry] with somebody. it’s ridiculous. so we always say, “eh, love one another,” because that’s what we was always taught. you know, eventually get over it, move on. so that’s what i always say. especially with our kids, we always say, “love one another.” you know, “love your brother. love your sister.” to me, that’s my biggest issue because that was instilled in me so i instill it in my kids, you know. to love one another, value them. so that, i would say, is my value, love one another. i value that. i value my family. secondly, noe discussed the value of education: i also value my kids’ education ‘cause i want better for them. we always want better for them than what we had. you know, that’s why i think our standards for our kids are so high, because we don’t want them to go through what we went though, especially with my husband, ikaika. ikaika was on a bad road because he hardly had any guidance, you know. their family had a lot of problems with drugs, so he had a lot of drama in his life, and he dropped out of school in ninth grade, you know. so i’m like, “you know, ikaika, we want them to get what we didn’t have. we want them to go farther than us.” 7 kaomea: reconceptualizing indigenous parent-school involvement published by scholarship@western, 2012 so to me, my value is, we value family, education, and get them farther than what we have, because i want them to be able to—eh, when we’re fifty can they take care of us? you know, i said that maybe they’ll be able to take care of us. like for me and ikaika, we’re not going to be able to take care of his mom. we’re not in a place where we’re doing well enough that we can take care of her, you know. not that i’m complaining, because i’m not at all. you know, we’re comfortable, but i would like my kids to be plus, you know? so that’s where i’m at. family and education is my main thing. r e n e e : “ i t ’ s l i k e h a v i n g a s e c o n d f a m i l y ” the theme of family also runs through renee’s story, but in a slightly different way. renee had her first child when she was 17, and her mother played a big role in helping to raise him. now, 15 years later, renee has five children ages 2 to 14. however, renee and her husband now live an hour away from her mother, so her mother’s help is less frequent and less readily available than it had been previously. renee’s mother comes over every couple of weeks to help out and spend time with her grandchildren. for the rest of the time, renee is on her own because her husband works as an elevator repairman on some of the more remote islands during the week and returns home on weekends. when asked to describe her typical day, renee recounts how she wakes up at 5:30 each morning to have a cup of coffee and a few minutes of silence before waking up her children. she then launches into the daily madness of getting five kids ready with one bathroom, and dropping them off at three different schools and a babysitter before driving to the neighboring town, where she parks her car at a municipal parking lot and rides her bicycle to the pediatrician’s office where she works as a part-time medical assistant. she works for five hours before jumping back on her bike and repeating the same process on reverse. upon arriving home, renee oversees all of the children’s homework and chores, while simultaneously making dinner and keeping the young ones entertained, and then makes sure that everyone is fed and bathed before they are sent off to bed. when i commended renee on single-handedly orchestrating this daily feat of getting her five children to and from school each day while also working herself, renee declined the compliment, lamenting that in the craziness some things slip through the cracks. she explains: like, you know, i have hardest time remembering to bring in kawena’s library books. i feel so stupid when i have to explain it to her teacher because it’s such a simple thing to remember to put the book in the bag and back in the car. but, you know, in the mix of all of the craziness sometimes it’s a little hard to remember. it’s difficult sometimes. renee also confides that she feels guilty when she has to miss the morning parent-and-child activities at her daughter’s preschool because she has to rush off to work. however, she appreciates that the teachers fill in for her and do the activities with kawena when she can’t. renee says: it’s frustrating for me when there’s a morning parent-and-child activity and i have to rush off to work. i feel so guilty leaving and i really wish that i could stay and do the activity with kawena, but when you work in a pediatrician’s office, you can’t just go in late. that would really mess up your doctor. but the good thing is that when they have those parent-and-child activities and i 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 4 [2012], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.4.4 have to leave, i can always take kawena to aunty sheri or aunty lei and they’ll take over for me and finish the activity with her. without the daily support of an extended family renee looks for that support in the preschool community, which she considers a second family, with the classroom teachers assuming the role of surrogate aunties. she explains: one thing that i really like about the preschool is how the children call the teachers aunty sheri and aunty lei. it makes the place feel more like a family. and i think that really made a difference with kawena in helping her adjust to preschool. a lot of hawaiian children, i’ve noticed, have this hesitancy, this shyness towards their teachers so to speak like, “hmm. i don’t know if i trust you.” i don’t know why it is. i believe it’s a cultural thing. but i do see that, in the beginning of the school year, there might be a couple of kids that are really out there, ready to volunteer, and they want to help and they want the teacher’s approval. but then most of them are more reserved and go along kind of cautiously until they’ve really learned the way that the teacher is and get to know and trust them better. so at the preschool, you know, it’s really nice to be able to tell kawena, “okay. i have to go to work, but i’m going to leave you with auntie sheri or auntie lei.” because that immediately makes her think, “oh, this is a family member.” the cultural respect that we give to our aunties is there immediately; the trust is there immediately, which is important you know? at this stage of learning, it’s so important. and the kids can move past whatever that barrier is and feel comfortable being at school. renee contrasts the family feel of her daughter’s preschool with her boys’ elementary school: at my boys’ elementary school, home and school are separate. it’s like this is home, this is school. i just drive through and drop off my boys in the morning and drive through and pick them up in the afternoon. so i don’t even really know their classmates, let alone their classmates’ parents. but at kawena’s preschool, not only do we call the teachers “auntie,” but everybody’s parents are like aunties and uncles. i feel like at the preschool there’s that feeling of ‘ohana [extended family] where home and school are all connected, and i like that. i also think it really helps that we have to walk our children into the preschool classroom and help them get situated each morning, and there’s a lot of activities in the mornings for the parents to do with their kids. even if we can’t stay for them all, i think it makes the children more comfortable to see their parents talking and laughing with the other parents in the morning. you know, when kawena comes to school each day she’s greeted by a lot of aunties and uncles, in a sense, who are there in the class with their own children. they say hello to her and talk to her, and that makes her feel comfortable. it’s like having a second family. renee wishes she had more opportunities to interact with this extended, second family. for instance, she wishes that she was able to attend some of the preschool’s parent workshops—not so much to learn from the featured speakers or “parenting experts,” but mostly to informally share concerns and exchange 9 kaomea: reconceptualizing indigenous parent-school involvement published by scholarship@western, 2012 parenting advice with other parents and perhaps develop an informal parent support network. renee explains: i didn’t get to go to any of the parent workshops because i was working. but i would have loved to have gone. i would have really liked to hear what the other parents had to say about the problems that they’re facing. like maybe some of the other parents there might have some of the same challenges with their kids that i have. i think it would have been really good to be able to share the problems that we’re having and exchange advice. i also think that those workshops could be a good opportunity to meet other parents in the preschool, outside of our class, and maybe arrange carpools or take turns with childcare for afterschool. but i could never make the timing of the workshops, so i never had a chance to do that. when asked to reflect on her goals for her daughter and what she sees as the role of the parents and other aunties and uncles in the extended preschool family in helping their children meet these goals, renee’s response echoed on a larger scale noe’s earlier reply that her success in raising her children would ultimately be measured by her children’s ability, and their inclination, to one day take care of their parents. commenting on her goals for her daughter, renee says: i hope that kawena does well in school and chooses a profession that helps her and helps others. doing well in school does not necessarily mean that she is, you know, top of her class genius. doing well in school to me means that her peer relationships are good. she is not only absorbing good things from her environment that will carry her through life, but also influencing others with the good things that she has to offer. it’s a give and take. i really believe that. i believe that you get good, true happiness from giving back to the community that you’re in. so when you ask what our role is as parents and aunties and uncles at the preschool, that’s an overwhelming thought. we are shaping our future in a sense. these are the people that are going to run our country and care for us when we’re old and make decisions about where we live. we need to be good to these people and teach them well. c o n c l u s i o n s a n d p o l i c y r e c o m m e n d a t i o n s so what can we learn from these counterstories? i conclude with what i see as specific policy recommendations for schools that wish to improve their capacity to support and collaborate with indigenous families in hawai‘i and internationally: a . a p p r e c i a t e w i t h i n g r o u p v a r i a t i o n a n d v a r i o u s m e a s u r e s o f s u c c e s s first of all, i believe that these stories help us to move beyond stereotypical views of indigenous parents by reminding us, as cornell (2006) has, that indigenous families come from a variety of socio-economic backgrounds and living situations and, accordingly, vary in the strengths, challenges, and aspirations that they bring to their role as parents. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 4 [2012], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.4.4 all of the parents whom i interviewed want their children to grow up to be successful. at the same time, however, as suggested by the canadian council on learning (2007), there are distinct differences in how various families measure “success.” while for some, a successful child is one who graduates from a prestigious college and gets a high paying job, for others, like noe or renee, a successful child is one who stays close to home to take care of their aging parents or applies their education to give back to the community that raised them. regardless of their definition of success, nearly all of the families that i interviewed view education as a means to achieving this success, and demonstrate a tremendous commitment to do whatever they can to support their children’s schooling. b . r e p l a c e p i t y w i t h a d m i r a t i o n the story of noe’s family serves as a powerful reminder of the enduring effects of the historical legacy of colonialism and the social, economic, and personal challenges that continue to plague many indigenous families hundreds of years after the initial colonization of our people. at the same time that it gives us this solemn reminder, noe’s story, like the writing of xavier albó (1999), also urges us as educators to view families like noe’s with neither pity nor contempt, but with admiration for the skillful resolve with which these extended indigenous families make creative use of their limited resources and work together to successfully macgyver from day to day to support their children’s education and help their children succeed in the face of these challenges. c . b r o a d e n t h e n o t i o n o f p a r e n t i n v o l v e m e n t t o i n c l u d e e x t e n d e d f a m i l y the counterstories that families have shared with me in these and other interview sessions provide an alternate perspective to stereotypical perceptions of apathetic indigenous families for whom planning for the welfare of their children is a mere afterthought. i have collected many inspiring stories of large, extended families like noe’s who have creatively pooled their resources and organized themselves into complex supportive networks for the primary purpose of providing and caring for their young children. these are families who resourcefully deal with difficult financial, work, and childcare situations by living in cramped quarters, under a single roof; families in which the financial reality is that many of the adult members need to hold multiple jobs, but who, nonetheless, are ever-mindful of carefully coordinating their work schedules to make certain that someone is always available to take the children to and from school and attend important school events. this practice of extended family parenting, which is traditional in many indigenous communities (glover, 2001; kolar & soriano, 2000; lafrance & collins, 2003), may at first seem discontinuous with american-school models of parent involvement, which assume relations with a nuclear family. however, this study suggests that this seeming discontinuity can actually serve to support a school’s efforts if, rather than focusing exclusively on “parent” involvement, teachers are willing to acknowledge, invite and support the broader and more inclusive phenomenon of “family” involvement; thereby encouraging, embracing, and accepting school participation by not only mothers and fathers, but also grandparents, aunties, uncles, older siblings, or cousins, and all who share responsibility for childcare in many traditional indigenous extended families. 11 kaomea: reconceptualizing indigenous parent-school involvement published by scholarship@western, 2012 d . b e p r e p a r e d t o f i l l i n f o r m i s s i n g e x t e n d e d f a m i l y m e m b e r s at the same time, consistent with the work of castellano (2002), renee’s story reminds us that, in this (post)colonial, postindustrial society, our jobs often dictate where we live—frequently causing nuclear families to move far away from their extended family base and, sometimes, sending one parent to live and work in a remote location for weeks at a time. thus, many indigenous families who could really use extended family support no longer have it. we are reminded that these overworked, overextended, and often isolated families may sometimes look to classroom teachers and administrators for additional support when, for instance, they are unable to stay at school for a morning parent-and-child activity. furthermore, we are reminded that parents who are struggling with familial dislocation may look to the school community as a surrogate family network to fill gaps in their existing support networks and provide the support that one might traditionally receive from one’s extended family. e . p r o v i d e o p p o r t u n i t i e s f o r p a r e n t s t o r e c o n n e c t w i t h t r a d i t i o n a l p a r e n t i n g p r a c t i c e s a n d a l s o c o n n e c t w i t h o n e a n o t h e r while parent-involvement programs typically focus on increasing opportunities for effective parentchild and parent-teacher interactions (jamie & russell, 2010), renee’s story urges us to also consider the growing need on the part of increasingly isolated indigenous families for more opportunities for parent-to-parent interactions. to this end, i see great potential in renee’s vision of parenting workshops that acknowledge the wisdom already inherent our parent communities by coupling lectures by “parenting experts” with parent talk-story sessions that provide families with an informal and supportive network for exchanging parenting advice and concerns. for, while there may be wisdom to be gained from lectures on white, middle-class ways of parenting, there is also a wealth of parenting wisdom in indigenous communities, and this indigenous wisdom should be acknowledged and respected in parent education programs and parenting workshops as well. one hawaiian example that comes to mind is ‘anakala kawa‘a’s mele inoa (hawaiian name chant) class (groves, 2008). the primary aim of the course was to reconnect contemporary, hawaiian families with traditional hawaiian parenting practices and encourage these families to revive the traditional practice of composing chants or songs in honor of their children. however, ‘anakala kawa‘a found that in the process of composing their children’s name chants, and tapping into and then sharing the very personal emotions that they feel toward their children, the parents enrolled in the course developed strengthened relationships both within their families and between families as well, thereby strengthening both the individual families and the community as whole (groves, 2008). perhaps schools could consider facilitating similar types of indigenous parenting workshops that reconnect indigenous people to our traditional parenting practices and simultaneously reconnect us with one another, so that we can once again trust and depend upon one another for support. f . a i m t o s u p p o r t a n d s t r e n g t h e n i n d i g e n o u s f a m i l i e s , n o t t o r e p l a c e t h e m finally, while the painful legacy of colonial schooling in indigenous communities across the globe should justifiably make us wary of teachers assuming the role of mother substitutes (kaomea, 2005), renee’s story makes a case for the important function that could be played by a preschool teacher who is 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 4 [2012], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.4.4 willing to take on the role of a surrogate auntie—warm and loving, yet strict and demanding, and deserving of respect. for, ultimately, our goal as educators working in indigenous communities is not to replace indigenous families. colonial schools sought to replace indigenous families 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(2008). family involvement in a hawaiian language immersion program. school community journal, 18(1), 39–60. 19 kaomea: reconceptualizing indigenous parent-school involvement published by scholarship@western, 2012 the international indigenous policy journal october 2012 reconceptualizing indigenous parent involvement in early educational settings: lessons from native hawaiian preschool families julie kaomea recommended citation reconceptualizing indigenous parent involvement in early educational settings: lessons from native hawaiian preschool families abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license reconceptualizing indigenous parent involvement in early educational settings: lessons from native hawaiian preschool families do factors other than ses explain differences in child outcomes between children of teenage and older mothers for off-reserve first nations children? the international indigenous policy journal volume 4 | issue 3 article 6 january 2013 do factors other than ses explain differences in child outcomes between children of teenage and older mothers for off-reserve first nations children? anne guèvremont health analysis division, statistics canada, anne.guevremont@statcan.gc.ca dafna kohen statistics canada; university of ottawa, dafnakohen@hotmail.com recommended citation guèvremont, a. , kohen, d. (2013). do factors other than ses explain differences in child outcomes between children of teenage and older mothers for off-reserve first nations children?. the international indigenous policy journal, 4(3) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.6 do factors other than ses explain differences in child outcomes between children of teenage and older mothers for off-reserve first nations children? abstract this study used data from the aboriginal children’s survey (acs) to explore differences in behavioural outcomes for first nations children born to teen and older mothers living off-reserve in canada. of particular interest was an examination of socio-economic and contextual influences, and their contributions to differences in child outcomes. findings from this study demonstrate that off-reserve first nations children born to teen mothers (aged 12 19 years when they started childbearing) had poorer behavioural outcomes compared to off-reserve first nations children born to older mothers (aged 25 and over when they started childbearing). these differences were found for emotional symptoms, inattention and hyperactivity, and conduct disorder scores, but not for prosocial behaviours. contextual factors differed for children born to teen mothers as compared to older mothers, but parenting behaviors and the number of people involved in raising the child was similar for both groups. while differences in the behaviour of children born to teen mothers are often attributed to poorer socio-economic conditions, this study demonstrates that other contextual factors (e.g., breastfeeding, social support, screen time, residential mobility) may be as important as socio-economic factors in their contribution to the behavioural outcomes of children of teen mothers. keywords mental health, behaviour, teen mother, socioeconomic status, first nations, off-reserve acknowledgments this study was funded by aboriginal affairs and northern development canada. the authors thank sacha senécal, eric guimond, chris penney, and leanne findlay for their helpful comments on drafts of this manuscript and amanda thompson and adam sunderland for assistance in manuscript preparation. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/   d o f a c t o r s o t h e r t h a n s o c i o e c o n o m i c s t a t u s e x p l a i n d i f f e r e n c e s i n o u t c o m e s b e t w e e n c h i l d r e n o f t e e n a g e a n d o l d e r m o t h e r s f o r o f f r e s e r v e f i r s t n a t i o n s c h i l d r e n ? differences in physical and mental health outcomes between children of teen and older mothers are well documented. for example, children of teen mothers have been shown to be in poorer health, are more likely to be born prematurely or born small for gestational age, and are more likely to experience injuries (chen et al., 2007; ekéus, christensson, & hjern, 2004; fraser, brockert, & ward, 1995). furthermore, children of teen mothers are at greater risk for behavioural problems compared to children of older mothers (howard, burke lefever, borkowski, & whitman, 2006; wolfe & perozek, 1997). socioeconomic status (ses) factors that may be associated with teen motherhood such as lower levels of education, income, and single marital status (corcoran, 1998; hofferth, reid, & mott, 2001; hoffman, 2006; turley, 2003) have been studied as possible explanations for differences in child outcomes. for instance, teen mothers have a greater likelihood of not completing or delaying high school, resulting in a low level of education and consequently are more likely to have children who experience behaviour problems (brooks-gunn & duncan, 1997). however, several other factors such as parenting practices, social support, and father involvement have also been considered to be influential factors for both child and adolescent outcomes (black et al., 2002; dahinten, shapka, & willms, 2007; luster, bates, fitzgerald, vandenbelt, & key, 2000; nagin, pogarsky, & farrington, 1997; pogarsky, thornberry, & lizotte, 2006). little is known, however, with regard to the physical and mental health outcomes of aboriginal children born to teen mothers in comparison with those born to older mothers. the inclusion of aboriginal mothers in the study of teen motherhood is particularly relevant given a higher birth rate among aboriginal mothers. for example, among registered first nations women, the teen birth rate is significantly higher (1 in 10) than the teen birth rate (1 in 50) for all canadian women (guimond & robitaille, 2008; robitaille, kouaouci, & guimond, 2004). based on canadian data from the 2006 aboriginal children’s survey, guèvremont and kohen (2013) found few differences in physical health for first nations children born to teenage mothers not living on reserve. no differences were found between children of teen and older mothers in parent-rated health status, presence and number of chronic conditions, presence of asthma, or prevalence of ear infections. however, off-reserve first nations children who had teen mothers were more likely to have dental problems compared to offreserve first nations children who had older mothers. additional differences were found when mental health outcomes were examined. compared to children of older mothers, first nations children of teen mothers living off-reserve had lower scores on maternal-reported behavioural outcomes, including lower prosocial scores (e.g., shares, gets along with other children), higher emotional symptoms (e.g., worries, fears), higher inattention-hyperactivity (e.g., fidgeting, restless), and higher conduct problem scores (e.g., fights, bullies). although some differences in mental health outcomes between children of teen and older mothers were explained by ses factors, which differed by maternal age (garner, guimond, & senécal, 2013), other differences persisted even when ses was considered (guèvremont & kohen, 2013). for example, while children of teen mothers showed lower prosocial scores than did children of older mothers, this association was not maintained once maternal income and education were controlled, suggesting that lower levels of maternal income and education were important contributors to the difference in 1 guèvremont and kohen: explaining differences in outcomes for children of teen mothers published by scholarship@western, 2013   outcomes rather than maternal age per se. by comparison, children of teen mothers were rated by mothers as more hyperactive, even after controlling for maternal income and education, suggesting that children of teen mothers had greater hyperactivity scores regardless of maternal ses conditions. although ses is an important contributor, this study considers the role of other contextual factors in explaining the differences in behaviour problems between first nations children of teen and older mothers not living on reserve. c o n t e x t u a l i n f l u e n c e s o n c h i l d o u t c o m e s b r e a s t f e e d i n g . children’s development is largely influenced by their environment, which includes the prenatal environment, parental behaviours, stimulation in and outside the home, interactions with extended family, and influences from the broader community. notably, early health behaviours such as breastfeeding may influence later child outcomes, including behaviour problems (oddy et al., 2009). both the canadian paediatric society and the world health organization recommend exclusive breastfeeding for the first six months after birth (canadian paediatric society, dietitians of canada, & health canada, 1998; world health organization, 2003). although the majority of aboriginal mothers do report breastfeeding, fewer aboriginal mothers (first nations not living on reserve, inuit, and métis) have reported initiating breastfeeding (78%) compared to non-aboriginal mothers (88%) (health canada, 2012). furthermore, reports suggest that canadian teen mothers aged 15 to 19 are less likely to breastfeed their child (public health agency of canada, 2009). p a r e n t i n g . parenting practices, including parenting behaviour styles and parents’ interactions with children, have long been associated with children’s outcomes (chao & willms, 2002; spera, 2005;thomas, 2004), with positive and consistent parenting behaviours associated with reducing the odds of behaviour problems in children, and hostile and punitive parenting increasing the odds of behaviour problems (bornstein, 2012). research has suggested that teen mothers display less supportive behaviours and more negative behaviours toward their children than do older mothers (berlin, bradysmith, & brooks-gunn, 2002) and parenting practices have been found to be important in reducing the differences in behaviour problems of children of teen mothers as compared to older mothers (dahinten et al., 2007; pogarsky et al., 2006). for example, in a study of third grade children born to teen mothers, rhule, mcmahon, spieker and munson (2006) found positive parenting to be associated with children’s positive adjustment in the behavioural, social, and academic domains. c o g n i t i v e s t i m u l a t i o n . similarly, the provision of cognitively stimulating experiences in the home has repeatedly been linked to children’s development (bradley et al., 1989; bradley, whiteside, & mundfrom, 1994). however, adolescent mothers have been shown to score significantly lower than older mothers in terms of overall and less varied opportunities in daily stimulation (schilmoeller & baranowski, 1985). luster and colleagues (2000) found that low-income adolescent mothers who demonstrated more cognitively stimulating behaviours when children were between 24 and 36 months of age had children who scored higher on a measure of receptive language at 54 months of age. although earlier work with the aboriginal children’s survey suggested that, in general, young first nations children are regularly exposed to cognitively stimulating early learning activities (statistics canada, 2008a), differences between first nations children of teen mothers as compared to older mothers have not been examined. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.6   s c r e e n t i m e . it is generally accepted that increased screen time (time spent watching television, playing video games, or using a computer) is associated with negative effects for children (iannotti, kogan, janssen, & boyce, 2009), including increased aggressive behaviour (manganello & taylor, 2009). children of teen mothers may watch more hours of television per day than do children of older mothers (burgess, 2005); yet, to our knowledge no study has specifically examined the impact of television viewing and screen time for aboriginal children of teen mothers. s u p p o r t n e t w o r k . having a support network may be influential for both child outcomes and parental well-being. such a support network may include the child’s father, grandparents, extended family, or other people involved in raising the child. past research has shown a connection between parental social support and child mental health (armstrong, birnie-lefcovitch, & ungar, 2005; sommer et al., 2000). furthermore, the benefits of a support network, and father involvement in particular, may be advantageous for children at risk for poor outcomes (howard et al., 2006). wakschlag and colleagues (2000) found that father absence was associated with conduct disorder in boys aged 7 to 18, although father absence did not mediate the relationship between maternal age at first birth and conduct disorder. fewer studies have investigated the role of support from other household members, although one study (garcia coll, vohr, hoffman, & oh, 1986) found that child care support (or the number of people available to help) mediated the relationship between maternal age and child development at 8 months of age. child development was assessed by a multifaceted assessment of neurological, cognitive, and motor assessments, and the relation persisted even after controlling for family ses. this line of inquiry is particularly important from an aboriginal perspective as a high percentage of off-reserve first nations children live in large households (bougie, tait, & cloutier, 2010), or have four or more people involved in raising the child (guèvremont, 2010). however, while some research has indicated that the adolescent’s mother is an important source of social support (musick, 1994), others have reported that when the mother (and child) and grandmother lived together, both were found to be less supportive and displayed more negative parenting attitudes and behaviours compared to mothers and grandmothers who lived apart (chase-lansdale, brooks-gunn, & zamsky, 1994). thus, the evidence for the role of support from parents (e.g., the child’s grandparent) is mixed. c h i l d c a r e . high quality child care has also been shown to be associated with positive outcomes for children (nichd early child care research network, 2002; nichd early child care research network, 2003), including benefits for children of teen mothers (sadler et al., 2007). sadler and colleagues (2007) found that children of teen mothers who were attending a formal child care program had better behavioural outcome scores than did children in non-formal care arrangements; formal child care arrangements are generally of higher quality than non-formal arrangements (romano, kohen, & findlay, 2010). given that more than half of all aboriginal children are in some form of child care (findlay & kohen, 2012), its impact is an important area of study, particularly for children of teen mothers. c o m m u n i t i e s . finally, community-level features have been associated with child outcomes. for example, family mobility, or frequent moves, have been shown to have negative impacts on healthy child development (rumbold et al., 2012; wood, haflon, scarlata, newacheck & nessim, 1993). aboriginal people in general have been shown to have increased mobility, experiencing more frequent moves than the general canadian population (statistics canada, 2008b). 3 guèvremont and kohen: explaining differences in outcomes for children of teen mothers published by scholarship@western, 2013   in addition, even in the early years, neighbourhood factors have been shown to be influential for young children’s outcomes (carpiano, lloyd, & hertzman, 2009; kohen, leventhal, dahinten, & mcintosh, 2008; leventhal & brooks-gunn, 2000), including both neighbourhood structural features (e.g., ses conditions) and organizational features (e.g., safety, cohesion). specific to first nations children living off-reserve, neighbourhood features have been shown to be associated with child mental health, including prosocial behaviour, inattention and hyperactivity, and emotional symptoms (kohen & oliver, 2010), as well as language outcomes (findlay & kohen, 2012). features such as the ses conditions of the neighbourhood as well as the safety and supports available have been shown to impact young children’s outcomes via family processes such as maternal mental health, parenting behaviours, and activities in the home (kohen et al., 2008) and may play an important role for teen mothers in particular. however, the specific effects of neighbourhood features on outcomes of first nations children of teen mothers remain largely unexplored. m e t h o d s r e s e a r c h q u e s t i o n s thus, there are a multitude of factors that can play an important role for young children’s outcomes and many of these factors can differ for teen versus older mothers. in addition, many of the factors described have been shown to be differentially associated with child outcomes for the first nations population. to our knowledge, however, no large-scale population-based canadian studies have examined differences in these factors and their associations with child outcomes specifically for off-reserve first nations children of teen as compared to older mothers. in this study, we examine the possible impact of contextual factors and their contribution to the outcomes of children of first nations teen mothers living off-reserve in canada, over and above the contribution of ses factors. we consider the following questions: 1. do contextual factors differ for off-reserve first nations children of teen mothers as compared to off-reserve first nations children of older mothers? 2. is having a teen mother associated with behavioural outcomes for off-reserve first nations children if we control for contextual factors in the child’s environment? 3. is having a teen mother associated with behavioural outcome differences for off-reserve first nations children if both ses and contextual factors are controlled? does the indirect effect of non-ses factors explain variation in behavioural outcomes over and above the effects explained by ses? d a t a s o u r c e this study is based on data from the 2006 aboriginal children’s survey (statistics canada, 2008b). the aboriginal children’s survey (acs) provides information on the early development of aboriginal children and the social and living conditions in which they are growing and learning. the acs provides extensive data about aboriginal (métis, inuit, and off-reserve first nations) children less than six years of age in urban, rural, and northern locations across canada. the present study focuses on first nations 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.6   children aged 2 to 5 years not living on reserve (n = 2,697). mental health outcomes are only available in the acs for children aged 2 and older, and data is not available for first nations children living onreserve. therefore, this study is representative of first nations children aged 2 to 5 living off-reserve in canada. a g e o f m o t h e r a t f i r s t b i r t h children were included in the study if the person who responded to the survey was their birth mother (statistics canada, 2008b). the age of the child’s mother at her first birth was determined by looking at the difference between the mother’s current age and the age of the oldest sibling living in the household. if the difference between the mother’s age on the day of the survey and the age of the oldest child was less than 20 years, she was classified as a teenage mother. if the difference was greater than or equal to 25 years that mother was categorized as an older mother. if the difference was less than 12 years, the child was excluded. results for children of mothers aged 20 to 24 at first child’s birth were also included in the tables for informational purposes, but are not discussed in the text due to space constraints. the age of the mother at first child’s birth (regardless of her age when she had the survey child) was used in this study as opposed to age of mother when the survey child was born. the age of mother at first birth was selected on the assumption that the factors that led the mother to begin childbearing during adolescence would likely influence not only the child or children born when the mother was a teen but children born later as well (turley, 2003). in addition, circumstances in the mother’s life caused by having a child during adolescence may also have long-term effects (pogarsky et al., 2006). other research has found that age of mother at first birth is more predictive of children’s outcomes than the age of mother at the birth of the target child (turley, 2003). c h i l d m e n t a l h e a l t h child mental health was assessed with the goodman strengths and difficulties questionnaire (sdq) (r. goodman, 1997). the sdq is a parent-reported instrument designed to provide information on children’s behaviours and relationships. the sdq consists of 25 items grouped into 5 subscales. in the acs, mothers responded about their child’s behaviour. in a study by oliver, findlay, mcintosh, and kohen (2009), validity of the questionnaire and its subscales was demonstrated on 4 of the 5 original subscales for first nations children living off-reserve surveyed in the acs; however, results suggested that the peer problems subscale had poor validity. all questions included the following possible responses: not true, somewhat true, or certainly true. exact wording of all items is in appendix a. in the present study, we used the four sub-scales suggested by oliver et al. (2009): a. prosocial behaviour (ten items) (e.g., “is he/she…considerate of other peoples’ feelings?”), b. emotional symptoms (five items) (e.g., “is he/she … often unhappy, depressed or tearful?”), c. conduct problems (four items) (e.g., “he/she… often fights with other children or bullies them?”), and 5 guèvremont and kohen: explaining differences in outcomes for children of teen mothers published by scholarship@western, 2013   d. inattention/hyperactivity (three items) (e.g., “is he/she … constantly fidgeting or squirming?”). p o t e n t i a l s e s a n d c o n t e x t u a l m e d i a t o r s we examined ses factors as well as other contextual factors to determine their role in explaining differences in outcomes between children of teen and older mothers. child level factors included mother-reported age, sex, and whether the child was a registered or non-registered indian. s e s v a r i a b l e s . maternal education was categorized into two variables: (a) currently in school versus not in school, and (b) not a high school graduate versus high school graduate or currently in school. family structure was indicated by whether the child lived in a lone parent or two-parent family (mother either married or in a common-law relationship) at the time of the survey. low-income family (i.e., below the low-income cut-off [lico]) was based on information on household income from the 2006 census. the lico is a statistical measure of the income threshold below which families are likely devote a larger-than-average share of their income to the necessities of food, shelter, and clothing (statistics canada, 2009). household size was based on the number of people living in the household, which was obtained from information from the 2006 census. finally, urban areas were defined as areas with a population of at least 1,000 or more people and a minimum of 400 people per square kilometer. c o n t e x t u a l f a c t o r s . mothers who breastfed their child were asked how long they had breastfed. children were categorized as being breastfed for more than 6 months or not (breastfed 6 or fewer months or not breastfed at all). a parenting practices score was based on 12 items about how mothers interact with their children (e.g., “how often is he/she praised with words?”). six response options were: more than once a day, once a day, more than once a week, once a week, less than once a week, and never. based on factor analysis, one item from the original scale was excluded (“how often does he/she receive physical punishment?”) since it did not load on the same factor as the other items. cronbach’s alpha for the remaining items was 0.63. children were considered as participating in a high number of learning activities if they participated in six or more of the following ten activities: heard stories daily, read or looked at books daily, counted daily, did arts and crafts daily, played outside daily, role played (e.g., superhero) daily, participated or attended traditional first nations activities monthly (such as singing or drum dancing), participated in seasonal activities monthly (such as gathering goose eggs or wild plants), and had gone hunting, fishing or camping monthly. furthermore, children were considered as having a low amount of screen time if they spent less than three hours per day watching television, videos, dvds, or playing computer or video games. mothers were also asked whether anyone else was involved in raising the child, including a birth, step, adoptive, or foster father. a child was categorized as living with grandparents if they lived with their grandparents either alone or with his or her parents. the total number of people raising the child was summed and dichotomized into less than four versus four or more people. in terms of social support, mothers were asked how satisfied they were with their support network, support from family, friends, and others (satisfied or very satisfied). 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.6   mothers reported whether or not the child was currently receiving regular child care, and how many times the child had moved during his or her life. this was categorized as less than three moves versus more than three moves. finally, mothers were asked a number of questions about how they felt about their community on a scale of 1 (poor) to 5 (excellent) on the following items: (a) as a place with good schools, nursery schools, and early childhood education programs; (b) as a place with adequate facilities for children (e.g., community centers, rinks, gyms, parks); (c) as a safe community; (d) as a place with health facilities; (e) as a place with actively involved members of the community; and (f) as a place with first nations, métis, and inuit cultural activities. the five items all loaded on to a single factor in a factor analysis. cronbach’s alpha for the five items was 0.82. a n a l y s i s descriptive analyses (chi-square or t-tests) were conducted to explore differences in both socioeconomic and contextual features of children born to teen and older mothers. we then proceeded to try to further explain differences in outcomes beyond ses factors by including the contextual factors. mediation occurs when the relationship between two variables is explained by another variable or by a set of variables (baron & kenny, 1986). to determine whether ses and/or contextual factors mediated the relationship between having a teenage mother and children’s behaviour, a first step was to examine whether the factors of interest differed between off-reserve first nations children of teen (aged 12 to19 at their first birth) and older mothers (aged 25 and older at their first birth). next, to select the contextual factors to include in the multivariate regression models, we examined whether the variables were associated with having a teenage mother. variables that were significantly associated with having a teenage mother were included in the models. regression models were conducted to examine the role of the various possible mediators (ses and contextual) in reducing the differences in behavioural outcomes between children of teen mothers compared to children born to older mothers. four sets of models predicting each of the four child behavioural outcomes were conducted. in the first set of models, each of the outcome variables (prosocial behaviour, emotional symptoms, conduct problems, inattention and hyperactivity) was predicted by the following control variables that are not easily modifiable: age of mother at first birth, child age, gender, and status (registered or non-registered indian). the second set of models included the control variables as well as ses characteristics (mother’s education, family structure, low-income family, household size, and urban dwelling). the third set of models included the control variables along with contextual characteristics of the child’s environment (with no socio-economic conditions). the fourth and final sets of models included all of the variables. the correlation between the ses and contextual factors was examined to ensure that collinearity was not a problem in our regression models. of the ses factors, living in a low-income family was negatively correlated with both being a high school graduate (r = -0.30, p < .05) and living in a lone parent family (r = -0.43, p < .05). as well, having a father involved in raising the child was negatively correlated with living in a lone parent family (r = -0.53, p < .05). however, all other pearson correlations were less than r = 0.30. excluding father involvement did not change any model results. to test whether the size of the association between having a teenage mother and behavioural outcomes was significantly different in the above models (e.g., between model 2 and model 4), we used the sobel 7 guèvremont and kohen: explaining differences in outcomes for children of teen mothers published by scholarship@western, 2013   test, adjusted for use with dichotomous outcomes using methods described by mackinnon and dwyer (1993) and for use with multiple mediators as described by preacher and hayes (2008). we assessed the difference between models 1 and 2 to test the significance of the indirect effect of socio-economic conditions, models 1 and 3 to test the significance of the indirect effect of contextual factors, and models 2 and 4 to test the significance of the indirect effect of contextual factors over and above socio-economic conditions. therefore, a significant sobel test (i.e., significant differences between the models) allowed for the interpretation of any significant mediation effects. r e s u l t s d e s c r i p t i v e a n a l y s e s c o m p a r i n g a l l c o v a r i a t e s b y a g e o f m o t h e r a t f i r s t b i r t h two of the examined factors did not differ for off-reserve first nations children born to teen mothers (aged 12 to 19 at their first birth) as compared to first nations children living off-reserve born to older mothers (aged 25+ at their first birth): the parenting behaviour score and having four or more people involved in raising the child. since these did not differ, they were not considered as possible mediators in further model testing. all of the other contextual factors were associated with age of mother at first birth (see table 1). that is, off-reserve first nations children born to teen mothers (aged 12 to 19 at their first birth) were less likely to have been breastfed for more than 6 months compared to off-reserve first nations children born to older mothers (aged 25 or older at their first birth). children of teen mothers were also less likely to have participated in learning activities such as reading and counting, and more likely to have spent more than 3 hours per day in front of a computer or television. they also differed in social support as demonstrated by the following: compared to off-reserve first nations children of older mothers, offreserve first nations children of teen mothers were less likely to have father involvement, were more likely to live with grandparents, and were less likely to have mothers who were satisfied with their social support. children of teen mothers were less likely to participate in non-parental childcare, but if they were they were equally likely to be in centre-based care arrangements as in non-centre-based care. in terms of community factors, children of teen mothers were more likely to have experienced more than three moves since birth and also had mothers who rated their communities more poorly. m o d e l s e x a m i n i n g v a r i o u s m e d i a t i n g f a c t o r s p r o s o c i a l b e h a v i o u r s . prosocial behaviours included behaviours such as sharing and being kind to younger children. no significant differences were apparent in the prosocial behaviours of off-reserve first nations children of teen mothers (aged 12 to 19 at their first birth) compared to off-reserve first nations children of older mothers (aged 25 and older at their first birth) once registered status, child gender, and child age were controlled.1 factors that accounted for the difference included gender (boys were less prosocial) and age (older children were more prosocial). since there was no difference in prosocial behaviour for first nations children of teen mothers as compared to first nations children of older mothers, no further models were examined.                                                                                                                 1 these results differ from guèvremont & kohen (2013) because of variations in the study sample. in the current study, only children who had valid scores for all of the contextual factors were included in the analyses. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.6   t a b l e 1 . d e s c r i p t i v e c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s b y a g e o f m o t h e r a t f i r s t b i r t h v a r i a b l e a g e o f m o t h e r a t f i r s t b i r t h t o t a l 12 19 (n = 807) 20 24 (n = 974) 25+ (n = 916) (n = 2,697) s o c i o e c o n o m i c s t a t u s f a c t o r s maternal education currently in school % 25.43*** 17.44*** 9.74 17.11 not currently in school and has not completed high school % 38.73*** 24.53*** 11.97 24.33 not currently in school and completed high school % 35.83*** 58.03*** 78.29 58.56 lone parent family % 59.99*** 50.55*** 33.30 47.32 low-income family % 70.73*** 49.52*** 27.69 48.08 living in rural area % 16.80*** 20.89 25.03 21.13 c o n t e x t u a l f a c t o r s breastfed 7+ months % 27.10*** 31.48*** 43.55 34.38 parenting behaviours mean score (standard deviation) 1.97 (0.02) 1.97 (0.02) 1.94 (0.02) 1.96 (0.01) high learning activities score (6 10) % 83.17*** 87.00** 91.39 87.44 3+ hours screen time daily % 41.76*** 33.33*** 24.75 32.82 father (birth, step, or adoptive) involved in raising child % 70.20*** 73.70*** 85.36 76.77 lives with grandparents (with or without parent) % 11.48*** 8.14*** 3.91e 7.65 4+ people involved in raising child % 33.70 33.45 30.56 32.52 satisfied with social support % 39.05*** 48.02 50.09 46.13 in child care % 44.41*** 50.70* 56.51 50.90 3+ moves since birth % 34.76*** 30.33*** 17.37 27.14 community perception mean score (standard deviation) 3.18*** (0.04) 3.42 (0.03) 3.49 (0.04) 3.38 (0.02) note. source: aboriginal children’s survey 2006 e indicates unreliable estimate, use with caution. *p < 0.05, **p < 0.01, ***p < 0.001 9 guèvremont and kohen: explaining differences in outcomes for children of teen mothers published by scholarship@western, 2013   e m o t i o n a l s y m p t o m s . emotional symptoms included behaviours such as having many worries or fears and easily losing confidence. children of teen mothers (12 to 19 years at their first birth) had poorer emotional symptoms than children of mothers aged 25 and over at their first birth. neither the difference in emotional symptoms after including ses factors in the model nor the sobel test for the difference between models 1 and 2 were significant, indicating that the mediating effect of the ses variables was not significant (see table 2). however, the sobel test of the difference between models 1 and 3 was significant, indicating that the contextual factors mediated the relationship between age of mother at first birth and emotional symptoms. in particular, less than 3 hours of screen time, satisfaction with social support, less than 3 moves since birth, and more positive perceptions of the community were found to be important factors. in the final model that considered the complete list of factors (i.e., both the ses and the contextual factors), none of the ses factors remained significant. this is further evidence suggesting that the contextual factors played a crucial role in reducing the differences in emotional symptoms between children born to teen as compared to older mothers. c o n d u c t p r o b l e m s . conduct problems included behaviours such as fighting and losing one’s temper. children of mothers aged 12 to 19 had poorer conduct scores than children of older mothers. when controlling for ses factors, the sobel test was significant, indicating that ses variables (in particular, maternal education greater than high school) partially mediated the relationship between mother’s age at first birth and the child’s conduct problem scores (see table 3). when contextual factors were considered, differences in conduct problem outcome scores between children of younger mothers were also reduced but still remained significant. the sobel test between models 1 and 3 was not significant, indicating that the contextual factors did not explain the differences in conduct problems between off-reserve first nations children of teen and older mothers. although they did not mediate the differences, less than 3 hours of screen time, and a more positive community perception score were both associated with lower conduct problems scores. in the final model, all of these factors remained significant; however, children of younger mothers maintained higher conduct problem scores as compared to children of older mothers. again, the sobel test was not significant for the difference between models 2 and 4, indicating that the contextual factors did not explain the difference in scores for children of teen and older mothers, over and above ses. i n a t t e n t i o n a n d h y p e r a c t i v i t y . inattention and hyperactivity included behaviours such as being overactive and restless. children born to mothers aged 12 to19 at first birth had higher inattention and hyperactivity scores compared to children born to mothers aged 25 and over at first birth. when controlling for ses factors, these differences were reduced slightly but remained statistically significant (see table 4). the sobel test was significant, indicating that ses factors partially mediated the relationship between mother’s age at first birth and inattention-hyperactivity. maternal education greater than high school, mother currently in school, and larger household size were associated with lower inattention and hyperactivity scores for children. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.6   t a b l e 2 . r e g r e s s i o n p r e d i c t i n g e m o t i o n a l s y m p t o m s   v a r i a b l e m o d e l 1 m o d e l 2 m o d e l 3 m o d e l 4 d e m o g r a p h i c f a c t o r s age of mother at first birth 12 19 0.04 ( 0.02)* 0.01 ( 0.02) 0.00 ( 0.02) -0.01 ( 0.02) 20 24 0.02 ( 0.02) 0.00 ( 0.02) -0.00 ( 0.02) -0.01 ( 0.02) 25+ ref. ref. ref. ref. non-registered indian (vs. registered indian) -0.04 ( 0.02)** -0.04 ( 0.02)* -0.03 ( 0.02) -0.03 ( 0.02) male (vs. female) -0.02 ( 0.02) -0.02 ( 0.02) -0.03 ( 0.02) -0.03 ( 0.02) child age at interview (in years) 0.02 ( 0.01)* 0.02 ( 0.01)* 0.01 ( 0.01)* 0.02 ( 0.01)* s o c i o e c o n o m i c s t a t u s f a c t o r s mother’s education currently in school -0.07 ( 0.03)* -0.04 ( 0.03) completed high school -0.06 ( 0.02)* -0.03 ( 0.02) did not complete high school ref. ref. not lone parent -0.01 ( 0.02) 0.02 ( 0.02) not low-income -0.05 ( 0.02)* -0.03 ( 0.02) number of people in household -0.01 ( 0.01) -0.01 ( 0.01) urban (vs. rural) -0.00 ( 0.02) 0.01 ( 0.02) c o n t e x t u a l f a c t o r s breastfed 7+ months -0.01 ( 0.02) -0.01 ( 0.02) high number of learning activities -0.04 ( 0.03) -0.04 ( 0.03) less than 3 hours screen time -0.05 ( 0.02)** -0.05 ( 0.02)** father involved with child -0.03 ( 0.02) -0.03 ( 0.02) does not live with grandparent(s) -0.00 ( 0.03) -0.02 ( 0.03) satisfied with social support -0.04 ( 0.02)** -0.04 ( 0.02)* in child care -0.00 ( 0.02) 0.00 ( 0.02) less than 3 moves since birth -0.04 ( 0.02)* -0.04 ( 0.02)* community perception mean score -0.03 ( 0.01)** -0.03 ( 0.01)** 11 guèvremont and kohen: explaining differences in outcomes for children of teen mothers published by scholarship@western, 2013   v a r i a b l e m o d e l 1 m o d e l 2 m o d e l 3 m o d e l 4 r-squared 0.01 0.02 0.04 0.05 n 1,834 1,834 1,834 1,834 d i f f e r e n c e b e t w e e n m o d e l 1 a n d m o d e l 2 d i f f e r e n c e b e t w e e n m o d e l 1 a n d m o d e l 3 d i f f e r e n c e b e t w e e n m o d e l 2 a n d m o d e l 4 sobel test 1.42 2.22* 2.20* note. source: aboriginal children’s survey 2006. regression coefficients with standard errors in brackets. *p < 0.05, **p < 0.01, ***p < 0.001 t a b l e 3 . r e g r e s s i o n p r e d i c t i n g c o n d u c t p r o b l e m s v a r i a b l e m o d e l 1 m o d e l 2 m o d e l 3 m o d e l 4 d e m o g r a p h i c f a c t o r s age of mother at first birth 12 19 1.69 ( 0.05)*** 1.85 ( 0.07)*** 2.01 ( 0.09)*** 2.07 ( 0.10)*** 20 24 0.16 ( 0.03)*** 0.10 ( 0.03)** 0.11 ( 0.03)*** 0.08 ( 0.03)* 25+ ref. ref. ref. ref. non-registered indian (vs. registered indian) -0.02 ( 0.02) -0.01 ( 0.02) -0.01 ( 0.02) -0.01 ( 0.02) male (vs. female) 0.01 ( 0.02) 0.01 ( 0.02) 0.00 ( 0.02) 0.01 ( 0.02) child age at interview (in years) -0.05 ( 0.01)*** -0.05 ( 0.01)*** -0.05 ( 0.01)*** -0.05 ( 0.01)*** s o c i o e c o n o m i c s t a t u s f a c t o r s mother’s education currently in school -0.13 ( 0.04)*** -0.11 ( 0.04)** completed high school -0.14 ( 0.03)*** -0.11 ( 0.03)*** did not complete high school ref. ref. not lone parent 0.01 ( 0.03) 0.02 ( 0.03) not low-income -0.05 ( 0.03) -0.04 ( 0.03) number of people in household 0.00 ( 0.01) 0.00 ( 0.01) urban (vs. rural) -0.02 ( 0.03) -0.01 ( 0.03) 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.6   v a r i a b l e m o d e l 1 m o d e l 2 m o d e l 3 m o d e l 4 c o n t e x t u a l f a c t o r s breastfed 7+ months -0.01 ( 0.02) -0.01 ( 0.02) high number of learning activities 0.01 ( 0.04) 0.02 ( 0.04) less than 3 hours screen time -0.13 ( 0.03)*** -0.12 ( 0.03)*** father involved with child 0.02 ( 0.03) 0.01 ( 0.03) does not live with grandparent(s) -0.04 ( 0.04) -0.05 ( 0.04) satisfied with social support -0.01 ( 0.02) 0.00 ( 0.02) in child care 0.02 ( 0.02) 0.04 ( 0.02) less than 3 moves since birth -0.05 ( 0.03) -0.04 ( 0.03) community perception mean score -0.04 ( 0.01)** -0.03 ( 0.01)* r-squared 0.04 0.06 0.07 0.08 n 1,814 1,814 1,814 1,814 d i f f e r e n c e b e t w e e n m o d e l 1 a n d m o d e l 2 d i f f e r e n c e b e t w e e n m o d e l 1 a n d m o d e l 3 d i f f e r e n c e b e t w e e n m o d e l 2 a n d m o d e l 4 sobel test 3.25** 1.06 1.30 note. source: aboriginal children’s survey 2006. regression coefficients with standard errors in brackets. *p < 0.05, **p < 0.01, ***p < 0.001 13 guèvremont and kohen: explaining differences in outcomes for children of teen mothers published by scholarship@western, 2013   t a b l e 4 . r e g r e s s i o n p r e d i c t i n g i n a t t e n t i o n a n d h y p e r a c t i v i t y v a r i a b l e m o d e l 1 m o d e l 2 m o d e l 3 m o d e l 4 d e m o g r a p h i c f a c t o r s age of mother at first birth 12 19 0.17 ( 0.04)*** 0.13 ( 0.04)** 0.08 ( 0.04)* 0.09 ( 0.04)* 20 24 0.10 ( 0.04)** 0.08 ( 0.04)* 0.05 ( 0.04) 0.06 ( 0.04) 25+ ref. ref. ref. ref. non-registered indian(vs. registered indian) 0.03 ( 0.03) 0.04 ( 0.03) 0.06 ( 0.03) 0.05 ( 0.03) male (vs. female) 0.13 ( 0.03)*** 0.14 ( 0.03)*** 0.12 ( 0.03)*** 0.13 ( 0.03)*** child age at interview (in years) -0.02 ( 0.01) -0.02 ( 0.01) -0.02 ( 0.01) -0.02 ( 0.01) s o c i o e c o n o m i c s t a t u s f a c t o r s mother’s education currently in school -0.13 ( 0.05)** -0.08 ( 0.05) completed high school -0.13 ( 0.04)** -0.07 ( 0.04) did not complete high school ref. ref. not lone parent -0.01 ( 0.04) 0.04 ( 0.04) not low-income -0.04 ( 0.04) -0.02 ( 0.04) number of people in household -0.02 ( 0.01)* -0.03 ( 0.01)** urban (vs. rural) 0.03 ( 0.04) 0.05 ( 0.04) c o n t e x t u a l f a c t o r s breastfed 7+ months -0.07 ( 0.03)* -0.07 ( 0.03)* high number of learning activities -0.04 ( 0.05) -0.04 ( 0.05) less than 3 hours screen time -0.13 ( 0.03)*** -0.12 ( 0.04)*** father involved with child -0.04 ( 0.04) -0.04 ( 0.04) does not live with grandparent(s) -0.07 ( 0.06) -0.13 ( 0.06)* 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.6   v a r i a b l e m o d e l 1 m o d e l 2 m o d e l 3 m o d e l 4 satisfied with social support -0.07 ( 0.03)* -0.06 ( 0.03)* in child care -0.03 ( 0.03) -0.03 ( 0.03) less than 3 moves since birth -0.08 ( 0.03)* -0.07 ( 0.03)* community perception mean score -0.03 ( 0.02)* -0.03 ( 0.02)* r-squared 0.03 0.04 0.06 0.07 n 1,816 1,816 1,816 1,816 difference between model 1 and model 2 difference between model 1 and model 3 difference between model 2 and model 4 sobel test 1.96* 2.36* 2.29* note. source: aboriginal children’s survey 2006. regression coefficients with standard errors in brackets. *p < 0.05, **p < 0.01, ***p < 0.001 when contextual factors were considered, associations between the inattention and hyperactivity scores of children born to teen mothers compared to children born to older mothers were reduced. the sobel test was significant, indicating that the contextual factors partially mediated the relationship between age at first birth and inattention and hyperactivity. of the contextual determinants, having been breastfed for more than 6 months, less than 3 hours of screen time daily, satisfaction with social support, fewer than 3 moves since birth, and more positive perceptions of the community were particularly important in reducing differences in inattention/ and hyperactivity scores between children born to teen and children born to older mothers. the final model considered both the ses and contextual factors. of the ses factors, only household size maintained significance; yet, all the contextual factors maintained their significance. the sobel test between models 2 and 4 was significant, indicating that the contextual variables partially explained the difference between mother’s age at first birth and hyperactivity and inattention (over and above the socio-economic variables). however, even after considering ses and contextual factors, children of the youngest mothers still had significantly poorer inattention and hyperactivity scores as compared to children of older mothers. d i s c u s s i o n findings from the current study demonstrate that off-reserve first nations children born to teen mothers had poorer behavioural outcomes compared to those born to older mothers. these differences were found for emotional symptoms, conduct disorder scores, and inattention and hyperactivity but not for prosocial behaviours, which were similar for both groups of children. differences in children born to 15 guèvremont and kohen: explaining differences in outcomes for children of teen mothers published by scholarship@western, 2013   teen mothers are often attributed to poorer ses conditions (corcoran, 1998; guèvremont & kohen, 2013; hoffman, 2006; turley, 2003), conditions which often persist over time and continue to have a significant impact on children’s outcomes (jaffee, caspi, moffitt, belsky, & silva, 2001). this study also demonstrates that other contextual factors may be as important as ses factors in their contribution to the behavioural outcomes of children of teen mothers. two of the contextual factors, parenting behaviours and having four or more people involved in raising the child, did not differ for offreserve first nations children of teen and older mothers, suggesting that these did not differ by maternal age group at childbirth. however, for the other contextual factors examined, differences were apparent, including being less likely to be breastfed for more than 6 months, more likely to have 3 or more hours of screen time daily, less likely to have a father involved in raising the child, less likely to have a mother satisfied with her level of social support, and more likely to have experienced 3 or more moves since birth. for inattention and hyperactivity, controlling for contextual factors had a similar mediating effect as controlling for ses differences (indicated by the sobel test) suggesting that contextual factors such as breastfeeding, decreased screen time, satisfaction with social support, less than three moves, and positive community perceptions can have a comparable impact as ses characteristics such as maternal education and household size for this outcome. however, for emotional symptoms, the sobel test indicated that contextual factors had a significant mediating effect, whereas ses factors did not. that is, lower screen time, satisfaction with social support, less than three moves, and positive community perception scores were important in explaining differences in emotional symptoms scores for children of teen mothers compared to older mothers. conversely, for conduct problems, ses factors such as being in school or a high school graduate had a significant mediating effect, whereas contextual factors did not. the ses and contextual factors were not highly correlated, suggesting that poor ses conditions do not necessitate poorer environments as assessed by the contextual factors included here. an exception to this was living in a lone parent family and having father involvement, which were correlated but neither of which were significantly associated with the behavioural outcomes. even after controlling for ses as well as a host of contextual factors, differences in inattention/hyperactivity and conduct scores for children of teen and older mothers remained. however, the total percentage of variance explained (r-squared values) was relatively low for all outcomes ranging from 5% to 13% for the complete model. this suggests that there are many other factors contributing to behaviour problems of 2 to 5 year old off-reserve first nations children of teen mothers not accounted for in the present study. although a comprehensive set of ses and contextual factors were included, other important factors may have been missing: for example: an indicator of maternal mental health, detailed information about social and other types of supports available to the mothers, and a measure of longer-term household income. these factors have also been shown to be important in explaining the differences between children of teen and older mothers (turley, 2003). the present study has several limitations. the measure of age at first birth is based on the age of the oldest sibling in the household derived from the acs household roster. it is possible that this child was a step, foster, or adoptive child, and not a birth child, which could lead to inaccuracy in determining mother’s age at first birth. as well, it is possible that the oldest sibling might not be living in the household (e.g., if they have been adopted, are in custody of social services, or living with another 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.6   relative), which could also lead to inaccuracy in the mother’s age at first birth. this problem is easily remediated by the inclusion of a single survey item asking about mother’s age at first birth. secondly, all the behavioural outcomes and contextual factors are based on maternal-reported information. mothers’ responses could be influenced by the way they think they should respond, by their own experiences, or by their subjective views of their child and his or her behaviour. however, mothers are experts about their children and one of the strengths of the current is study was having the mothers themselves report about their first nations children. another limitation is that this study was restricted to what was asked in the survey. other variables like maternal depression (s. h. goodman et al., 2011) are likely associated with both maternal age at first birth and children’s behavioural problems, but could not be examined. finally, although the particular behaviour problems included in the current study have been shown to be associated with school readiness, later school achievement, and mental health (a. goodman & goodman, 2009), and have been used in other studies of aboriginal children (kohen & oliver, 2010; zubrick, lawrence, de maio, & biddle, 2006), these behaviours may not be the most relevant or important behaviours for first nations children living off-reserve. the strengths of this study include a population-based sample of 2to 5-year-old off-reserve first nations children, information on mother’s age at first childbirth, and the inclusion of a large number of ses and contextual factors. as well, children’s behaviour problems were based on maternal reports from a standardized measure, which has been validated for off-reserve first nations, métis, and inuit children using the 2006 acs (oliver et al., 2009). in addition, this study used a comparison group of off-reserve first nations children of older mothers, which is a more relevant comparison group than, for example, older mothers in the general population. despite these limitations, this study demonstrated differences not only in children’s behaviours, but also in a variety of contextual factors for off-reserve first nations children of teen and older mothers. differences in the behavioural outcomes of off-reserve first nations children of teen and older mothers were based on both the ses and contextual factors. indeed, when ses and contextual factors were included in the models, emotional problem scores of children of teen and older mothers did not differ. in particular, the effects of maternal education, hours of screen time, three or more moves, satisfaction with social support, and community perception scores were important. however, hyperactivity and conduct problems were not completely mediated by ses or contextual factors suggesting that differences for children of teen and older mothers are likely attributable to other factors not considered in the present study. some additional characteristics that should be considered in future studies include maternal mental health and more details about the types of social support provided. finally, replication of these findings using other data sources, qualitative research studies about the experiences of teen mothers and their children’s behaviours, as well as longitudinal data for first nations children would enhance our understanding of child outcomes among offreserve first nations children of teen mothers. 17 guèvremont and kohen: explaining differences in outcomes for children 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(2010). associations among child care, family, and behavior outcomes in a nation-wide sample of preschool-aged children. international journal of behavioral development, 34(5), 427 440. rumbold, a. r., giles, l. c., withrow, m. j., steele, e. j., davies, c. e., davies, m. j. et al. (2012). the effects of house moves during early childhood on child mental health at age 9 years. bmc public health, 12(583). retrieved from http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2458/12/583 sadler, l. s., swartz, m. k., ryan‐krause, p., seitz, v., meadows‐oliver, m., grey, m., & clemmens, d. a. (2007). promising outcomes in teen mothers enrolled in a school‐based parent support program and child care center. journal of school health, 77(3), 121 130. schilmoeller, g. l., & baranowski, m. d. (1985). childrearing of firstborns by adolescent and older mothers. adolescence, 20(80), 805 822. sommer, k. s., whitman, t. l., borkowski, j. g., gondoli, d. m., burke, j., maxwell, s. e. et al. (2000). prenatal maternal predictors of cognitive and emotional delays in children of adolescent mothers. adolescence, 35(137), 87 112. spera, c. (2005). a review of the relationship among parenting practices, parenting styles, and adolescent school achievement. educational psychology review, 17(2), 125 146. doi:10.1007/s10648-005-3950-1 statistics canada. (2008a). first nations children under six years old living off reserve (catalogue no. 89-634-x 2008003). ottawa, on: minister of industry. statistics canada. (2008b). aboriginal peoples survey 2006: concepts and methods guide. ottawa, on: minister of industry. statistics canada. (2009). low income cut-offs for 2008 and low income measures for 2007. ottawa, on: minister of industry. thomas, e. (2004). aggressive behaviour outcomes for young children: change in parenting environment predicts change in behaviour. ottawa, on: statistics canada. retrieved from http://www5.statcan.gc.ca/bsolc/olc-cel/olc-cel?catno=89-599-mie2004001&lang=eng turley, r. n. l. (2003). are children of young mothers disadvantaged because of their mother's age or family background? child development, 74(2), 465 474. wakschlag, l. s., gordon, r. a., lahey, b. b., loeber, r., green, s. m., & leventhal, b. l. (2000). maternal age at first birth and boys' risk for conduct disorder. journal of research on adolescence, 10(4), 417 441. 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.6   wolfe, b., & perozek, m. (1997). teen children's health and health care use. in r. maynard (ed.), kids having kids (pp. 181-203). washington, dc: the urban institute press. wood, d., halfon, n., scarlata, d., newacheck, p., & nessim, s. (1993). impact of family relocation on children's growth, development, school function, and behavior. jama, 270(11), 1334 1338. world health organization. (2003). global strategy for infant and young child feeding. geneva: who/unicef. zubrick, s. r., lawrence, d., de maio, j., & biddle, n. (2006). testing the reliability of a measure of aboriginal children's mental health: an analysis based on the western aboriginal child health survey. canberra: australian bureau of statistics.   23 guèvremont and kohen: explaining differences in outcomes for children of teen mothers published by scholarship@western, 2013   a p p e n d i x a w o r d i n g o f m e n t a l h e a l t h i t e m s f r o m t h e s t r e n g t h a n d d i f f i c u l t i e s q u e s t i o n n a i r e p r o s o c i a l b e h a v i o u r considerate of other peoples’ feelings shares readily with other children, for example, toys, treats, pencils helpful if someone is hurt, upset or feeling ill kind to younger children often offers to help others including parents, teachers, other children generally well-behaved, usually does what adults request has at least one good friend generally liked by other children can stop and think things out before acting good attention span, sees work through to the end e m o t i o n a l s y m p t o m s often complains of headaches, stomach-aches, or sickness many worries or often seems worried often unhappy, depressed, or tearful nervous or clingy in new situations, easily loses confidence many fears, easily scared   c o n d u c t p r o b l e m s often loses temper often fights with other children or bullies them often argumentative with adults can be spiteful to others   i n a t t e n t i o n / h y p e r a c t i v i t y restless, overactive, cannot stay still for long constantly fidgeting or squirming easily distracted, concentration wanders   24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.6 the international indigenous policy journal january 2013 do factors other than ses explain differences in child outcomes between children of teenage and older mothers for off-reserve first nations children? anne guèvremont dafna kohen recommended citation do factors other than ses explain differences in child outcomes between children of teenage and older mothers for off-reserve first nations children? abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license do factors other than ses explain differences in child outcomes between children of teenage and older mothers for off-reserve first nations children? the physical and mental health of off-reserve first nations children of teen mothers the international indigenous policy journal volume 4 issue 1 indigenous early parenthood article 2 march 2013 the physical and mental health of off-reserve first nations children of teen mothers anne guèvremont health analysis division, statistics canada, anne.guevremont@statcan.gc.ca dafna kohen health analysis division, statistics canada, dafnakohen@hotmail.com recommended citation guèvremont, a. , kohen, d. (2013). the physical and mental health of off-reserve first nations children of teen mothers. the international indigenous policy journal, 4(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.2 the physical and mental health of off-reserve first nations children of teen mothers abstract the teen birth rate for first nations women is higher than the teen birth rate for non-aboriginal women. while associations between physical and behavioural outcomes have been examined in non-aboriginal children with teen mothers, fewer studies have focused on first nations children of teen mothers. this study uses data from the 2006 aboriginal children’s survey to compare physical and mental health outcomes of 2to 5-year-old off-reserve first nations children of teenage and older mothers. there were few differences in physical health outcomes between off-reserve first nations children of teen mothers and older mothers with the exception of dental health. however, for all of the mental health outcomes examined, child prosocial behaviours, emotional symptoms, inattention-hyperactivity, and conduct problems, scores were poorer for off-reserve first nations children of teen mothers. although the differences in prosocial and emotional problems were attributable to socio-economic factors, differences in child inattention-hyperactivity and conduct problems were not. future research would help our understanding of the differences in outcomes between off-reserve first nations children of teen and older mothers. french abstract la santé physique et mentale des enfants des premières nations vivant hors des réserves et nés de mères adolescentes anne guèvremont et dafna kohen statistique canada résumé le taux de natalité à l’adolescentes femmes des premières nations est plus élevé que celui des feemmes non autochtones. bien que les associations entre les résultats physiques et comportementaux aient été examinées chez les enfants non autochtones nés de mères adolescentes, un moins grand nombre d’études ont mis l’accent sur les enfants des premières nations nés de mères adolescentes. cette étude utilise les données recueillies dans le cadre de l’enquête sur les enfants autochtones de 2006 afin de comparer les résultats en matière de santé physique et mentale des enfants des premières nations vivant hors des réserves nés de mères adolescentes et de mères plus âgées, qui sont âgés de deux à cinq ans. les résultats sur le plan de la santé physique diffèrent peu entre les enfants des premières nations vivant hors des réserves nés de mères adolescentes et de mères plus âgées, à l’exception de la santé dentaire. toutefois, pour ce qui est de tous les résultats en matière de santé mentale examinés – comportements prosociaux chez les enfants, symptômes affectifs, inattention et hyperactivité et problèmes de comportement – ceux obtenus par les enfants des premières nations vivant hors des réserves nés de mères adolescentes étaient plus faibles. les différences en matière de problèmes prosociaux et affectifs étaient attribuables à des facteurs socioéconomiques, ce qui n’était pas le cas des différences sur les plans de l’inattention et de l’hyperactivité ainsi que des problèmes de comportement. des recherches futures pourraient améliorer notre compréhension des différences touchant les résultats entre les enfants des premières nations vivant hors des réserves nés de mères adolescentes et de mères plus âgées. remerciements: cette étude a été financée par affaires autochtones et développement du nord canada. les auteures tiennent à remercier sacha senécal, eric guimond, chris penney et marc fonda pour leurs commentaires utiles concernant les versions provisoires de ce manuscrit. spanish abstract salud física y mental de los hijos de madres adolescentes de las primeras naciones que viven fuera de las reservas anne guèvremont y dafna kohen dirección general de estadísticas de canadá resumen la tasa de natalidad de las adolescentes de las primeras naciones es mayor que la de las adolescentes no indígenas. aunque se han estudiado las relaciones entre los resultados físicos y los del comportamiento en los hijos no indígenas de adolescentes, pocos estudios se han centrado en los hijos de adolescentes de las primeras naciones. en este estudio se emplean datos de la encuesta sobre los niños indígenas de 2006 para comparar los resultados en materia de salud física y mental de hijos de 2 a 5 años de adolescentes de las primeras naciones que viven fuera de las reservas y de madres de mayor edad. existen pocas diferencias en los resultados relativos a la salud física entre los hijos de adolescentes de las primeras naciones que viven fuera de las reservas y los de madres de mayor edad, con excepción de la salud dental. sin embargo, en todos los resultados sobre salud mental examinados —comportamientos prosociales de los niños, síntomas emocionales, inatención-hiperactividad y problemas de conducta—, el puntaje fue peor para los hijos de adolescentes de las primeras naciones que viven fuera de las reservas. aunque las diferencias en los problemas prosociales y emocionales pueden atribuirse a factores socioeconómicos, las diferencias en el ámbito de la inatención-hiperactividad y en los problemas de conducta no se justifican de la misma manera. las investigaciones futuras nos podrían ayudar a comprender las diferencias de resultados entre los hijos de adolescentes de las primeras naciones que viven fuera de las reservas y los de madres de mayor edad. agradecimiento: este estudio fue financiado por el ministerio de asuntos aborígenes y de desarrollo del norte de canadá. las autoras agradecen a sacha senécal, eric guimond, chris penney y marc fonda sus valiosos comentarios de la versión preliminar de este documento. keywords aboriginal, child behaviour, child health, maternal age, parenting, socio-economic factors acknowledgments this study was funded by aboriginal affairs and northern development canada. the authors thank sacha senécal, eric guimond, chris penney and marc fonda for their helpful comments on earlier drafts of this manuscript. disclaimer the views expressed in this article are solely those of the author(s) and do not necessarily represent those of any other person, agency, organization, or institution. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ t h e p h y s i c a l a n d m e n t a l h e a l t h o f o f f r e s e r v e f i r s t n a t i o n s c h i l d r e n o f t e e n m o t h e r s aboriginal children represent a large and growing proportion of the canadian population. whereas 31% of the off-reserve first nations population is under 15 years of age, only 18% of all canadians are under 15 years (statistics canada, 2009). furthermore, aboriginal women are more likely to be teen mothers than other canadian women. the teen birth rate for first nations women is higher than the teen birth rate for non-aboriginal women –1 out of 10 teenage first nations woman had a child in 2004, compared to 1 in 50 for all canadian teenage women (guimond & robitaille, 2008; robitaille, kouaouci, & guimond, 2004). higher rates of teen motherhood for first nations as compared to nonaboriginal women are supported by the 2006 aboriginal children’s survey (zukewich & o'donnell, 2008), which demonstrates that 27% of off-reserve first nations children under the age of 6 had mothers between the ages of 15 and 24, compared to 8% of non-aboriginal children. b a c k g r o u n d children of teen mothers face certain challenges, both in terms of physical and mental health. although a large amount of research has examined the outcomes of non-aboriginal children of teenage mothers, little research has looked at the outcomes for aboriginal children of teen mothers. research conducted with the non-aboriginal population has shown that children of teen mothers have worse health (including higher rates of low birth weight, small for gestational age, and unintentional injuries) and poorer behaviour compared to the children of older mothers (wolfe & perozek, 1997). however, in some studies the differences in outcomes between children of teen and older mothers are explained by differences in socio-economic factors (pittard, laditka, & laditka, 2008). children of younger mothers often live in more difficult circumstances: they are more likely to live in low-income families, have a lone parent, and have mothers who did not graduate from high school (dahinten, shapka, & willms, 2007). some research shows that once these differences are accounted for, there are no longer differences in the outcomes between children of teen and older mothers. several studies of non-aboriginal mothers examined the associations between teen motherhood, birth outcomes, and socio-demographic factors. in terms of birth outcomes, children of teen mothers are more likely to be premature, be small for gestational age, and have low birth weight (fraser, brockert, & ward, 1995). these birth outcomes are often associated with later health problems (hack et al., 2002; hack, klein, & taylor, 1995). in their study of births to women under 25 years of age in the united states, chen et al. (2007) found that even after adjustment for confounding factors (state of birth, maternal race, marital status, tobacco smoking and alcohol use during pregnancy, and prenatal care status), teenage pregnancy (mothers aged 10 to19 years) was independently associated with the increased risks of pre-term delivery, low birth weight, being small for gestational age, and neonatal mortality (infant death in the first 28 days of life). similarly, amini, catalano, dierker, and mann (1996) found higher rates of pre-term delivery and small size relative to gestational age in infants of mothers aged 12 to 15 years compared to mothers aged 20 or higher. these results controlled for ethnicity, socio-economic status, parity (whether it was the mother’s first or later birth), and marital status. in another study based in utah, united states, fraser et al. (1995) found that infants of mothers aged 19 and younger were more likely to be premature, have low birth weight, and be small for gestational age compared to infants of mothers aged 20 to 24, even after adjusting for the mother’s 1 guèvremont and kohen: physical and mental health published by scholarship@western, 2013 education and marital status. thus, differences in the health of children of teenage mothers emerge early and are sustained even when socio-demographic factors are controlled. several studies have examined the health status of preschool and school-aged children of teenage mothers. wolfe and perozek (1997) found that 4 to11-year-old children of teen mothers (17 or under at the birth of the child) were more likely to be rated as being in fair or poor health compared to children of non-teen mothers who were more likely to be rated in good, very good, or excellent health. although the study controlled for child’s age and sex, it did not control for socio-economic status. shaw, lawlor, and najman (2006) found that children of young mothers (less than 18 years at the time of first birth) were no more likely to report being in poor health than children of older mothers (over the age of 18 at first birth). however, children of young mothers were more likely to report a large number of dental fillings at age 14, even when adjusted for family income, maternal education, maternal depression, and family structure. in a study of children born in sweden from 1987 to 1993, ekéus, christensson, and hjern (2004) found that children of teenage mothers (19 years and younger) had a higher risk of hospital admission for violent as well as unintentional injuries compared to children of mothers at least 32 years of age at the time of the child’s birth. when the models were adjusted for socio-economic variables, indicators of parental substance misuse, and psychiatric illness, the risk for children of younger mothers decreased slightly but remained well above that of children with older mothers. several studies have also examined the behavioural outcomes of non-aboriginal children of teenage mothers. some of these studies have found higher rates of behaviour problems among children born to teen mothers compared to those born to older mothers (dahinten & willms, 2002; moffitt & study team, 2002), whereas others did not (moore, morrison, & green, 1997). in a nationally representative study of canadian children, dahinten et al. (2002) found that the nearly double the percentage of preschool children in the group with mothers who had their first child at age 18 or 19 had behaviour problems compared to those whose mothers who had delayed childbearing until their twenties. this increased prevalence was reduced, but still significantly higher, when adjusted for family background (family income, parent’s education, lone parent status). moffitt et al. (2002) found that the 5-year-old children of young mothers (aged 15 to 20) in britain were rated by both parents and teachers as having more emotional and behavioural problems. however, moffitt et al. (2002) did not adjust for any socio-economic factors. turley (2003) found that at age 5, children of younger mothers had worse scores on math, reading, and vocabulary tests compared to children of older mothers, but that there were no significant differences in behaviour problems after controlling for the background characteristics of the mothers. similarly, terry-humen, manlove, and moore (2005) found that kindergarten children born to mothers aged 17 and younger had higher levels of externalizing and internalizing problem behaviours compared to children of mothers aged 22 to 30, but that the differences were no longer significant when adjusted for family structure, socioeconomic status, and the educational attainment of the child’s grandmother. shaw et al. (2006) found that 14-year-old children of young mothers (less than 18 years at the time of first birth) had higher rates of behaviour problems (defined as any trouble with police or suspension from school) compared to children of mothers who were over 18 years when pregnant, even when adjusting for family income, maternal education, maternal depression, and family structure. moore et al. (1997) found fewer behaviour problems among 4 to 14-year-old children of mothers aged 19 and younger at age of birth, compared to those with mothers aged 20 to 21 at birth. findings from these studies are mixed possibly due to 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.2 inconsistent controls for socio-economic factors and different methods of defining teen mothers and differences assessing behavior problems. while associations between physical and behavioural or mental health outcomes have been examined in children of non-aboriginal teen mothers, less research has been conducted with children of aboriginal teen mothers. qualitative research has reported on the circumstances surrounding adolescent pregnancy, as well as the needs of aboriginal teenage mothers. the ontario federation of indian friendship centres (2002) collected data from 340 female and male youth (parents and nonparents), front-line workers, and grandmothers (elders and teachers) with the goal of seeking ways to prevent unwanted pregnancies among aboriginal youth. they found that, “although pregnancy is something of a social norm, teens who become pregnant can still feel stigmatized and isolated” (ontario federation of indian friendship centres, 2002, p. 11). they also found that many of the pregnant and parenting youth are not supported by their families and/or their parenting partner, and are in need of trusting relationships with adults. murdock (2009) conducted interviews with 28 young aboriginal mothers living in winnipeg. the mothers identified many challenges including financial hardship, lack of parenting and life skills, limited access to adequate housing and childcare, and difficulties with transportation. the women expressed a strong desire to further their education, find employment, and have more free time for self-care. although these studies provide information on the environments in which the children of teen mothers are growing up, to our knowledge associations with health and behavioural outcomes have not been documented for children of aboriginal teen mothers. both aboriginal and non-aboriginal teenage mothers experience different socio-economic circumstances compared to older mothers. numerous studies have found that teenage mothers are more likely to be single parents and have lower levels of income and education (dahinten et al., 2002; moffitt et al., 2002; terry-humen et al., 2005). in canada, dahinten and willms (2002) found that, for the mothers of 2 to 11-year-olds, 51% of mothers who were 14 to 17-years-old at their first birth were single parents compared to only 12% of first-time mothers who were aged 26 to 30 years. in addition, the mean income of mothers who were 14 to 17-years-old at the time of their first birth was approximately $25,000 compared to $53,000 for those who became mothers between the ages of 26 and 30. garner, guimond, and senécal (2013, in this issue) found that aboriginal women who became mothers in their teens had significantly worse socio-economic outcomes when compared to women who postponed motherhood until their 20s. these included lower incomes and a higher likelihood of living in poor housing conditions. while aboriginal teenage mothers were less likely to graduate high school than older mothers, teenage mothers who had also graduated high school had better socioeconomic outcomes (i.e., higher personal and household income, and less likely to be living in overcrowded housing or in housing in need of major repair) than aboriginal mothers who had children in their 20s. this suggests that education and high school completion, in particular, play an important role in the lives of aboriginal teen mothers. in what follows, we use the 2006 aboriginal children’s survey (statistics canada, 2008) to examine the physical and mental health of 2 to 5-year-old children of aboriginal teen mothers. the preschool period is an important time in a child’s development for a number of reasons. during the early years, 3 guèvremont and kohen: physical and mental health published by scholarship@western, 2013 the foundations for many skills are laid including emotional regulation, behavioral skills, and the regulation of attention ( duncan et al., 2007; tremblay et al., 2004). moreover, children, who during their early years show a disadvantage in behavioral outcomes, may not only be at risk for future behavior problems and poor mental health – particularly if extreme (côté, vaillamcourt, leblanc, nagin, & tremblay, 2006; crick, 1996; romano, tremblay, farhat, & côté, 2006) – but they may also have poor social skills, poor peer relations, difficulties in school adjustment, and lower academic achievement (alexander, farhat, & dauber, 1993; mcclelland, morrison, & holmes, 2010; o'neil, welsh, parke, wang, & strand, 1997). this study had two goals. the first was to examine whether or not there are differences in the physical health and/or mental health (as assessed by behavioral outcomes) of first nations off-reserve children born to mothers who started childbearing in their teens compared to first nations off-reserve aboriginal children born to mothers who started childbearing when they were older. the second goal was to examine the role of socio-economic factors in these associations. since teen mothers (and their children) are more likely to live in disadvantaged socio-economic circumstances (garner et al., 2013), it is possible that these conditions contribute to poor outcomes for children, rather than teen childbearing, per se.1 this article addresses the following research questions: 1. are there differences in the physical and behavioural outcomes of off-reserve first nations children of teenage mothers compared to off-reserve first nations children of older mothers? 2. do socio-economic differences explain the differences in physical and behavioural outcomes between off-reserve first nations children of teen mothers and off-reserve first nations children of older mothers? d a t a s o u r c e , v a r i a b l e s , a n d m e t h o d o l o g y d a t a s o u r c e as noted above, this study is based on data from the 2006 aboriginal children’s survey (statistics canada, 2008). the aboriginal children’s survey (acs) provides information on the early development of aboriginal children and the social and living conditions in which they are growing and learning. the acs provides an extensive data set about aboriginal (métis, inuit, and off-reserve first 1 “mediation” occurs when the relationship between two variables is explained by another variable or by a set of variables. to examine whether the relationship between having a teenaged mother and children’s outcomes (physical health and behavioural outcomes) was mediated by socio-economic factors, we addressed four questions: (a) is having a teenaged mother associated with different outcomes than having a non-teen mothers? (b) do children of teen mothers live in lower socio-economic conditions? (c) do children living in lower socioeconomic conditions have different outcomes? and (d) if we assume that all children live in similar socioeconomic conditions (also known as controlling for socio-economic conditions), is having a teenaged mother still associated with poorer outcomes? if there is an association between having a teen mother and child outcomes prior to controlling for socio-economic conditions and then no statistically significant association between having a teen mother and child outcomes after controlling for socio-economic conditions in the analytic models, it would suggest that the difference in outcomes for children of teenaged mothers are mediated by differences in socio-economic conditions rather than teenaged parenthood per se. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.2 nations) children under 6 years of age in urban, rural, and northern locations across canada. the study we are reporting on in this chapter focused on first nations children aged 2 to 5 years living offreserve. behavioural outcomes are only available on the acs for children aged 2 and older, and data is not available on the acs for first nations children living on-reserve; thus, limiting the generalizability of the results to first nations children living off-reserve. we classified children in our data sample in the following manner: children whose parents identified them as a treaty or registered indian were classified as registered indian; children whose parents identified them as north american indian, but not as a treaty or registered indian, were classified as non-registered indian; and, children who were identified with more than one of the aboriginal groups (non-registered indian, métis, inuit) were excluded. registered indians or "status indians" are people who are entitled to have their names included on the indian register, an official list maintained by the federal government. certain criteria determine who can be registered as a status indian. only registered indians are recognized as indians under the indian act (1985), which defines an indian as “a person who pursuant to this act is registered as an indian or is entitled to be registered as an indian” (section 2(1) “indian”). status indians are entitled to certain rights and benefits under the law (for example, registered indians are eligible to receive services such as vision and dental benefits under the non-insured health benefits program (health canada, 2009), which may lead to different outcomes for registered and non-registered indians). v a r i a b l e s a g e o f m o t h e r a t f i r s t b i r t h . children were included in the study if the person who responded to the survey was their birth mother. the age of the child’s mother at first birth2 was determined by looking at the difference between the mother’s current age and the age of the oldest sibling living in the household. if the difference between the mother’s age on the day of the survey and the age of the oldest child was less than 20 years, she was classified as a teenage mother. 3 if the difference was greater than or equal to 25 years, the mother was categorized as an older mother. if the difference was less than 12 years, the child was excluded. p h y s i c a l h e a l t h . mothers were asked a number of questions about their child’s health: health status: “in general, would you say his or her health is…” response categories included: excellent, very 2 the age of the mother when she started having children (regardless of her age when she had the survey child) was used in this study as opposed to age of mother when the survey child was born. we selected age of mother at first birth based on the assumption that the factors that led the mother to begin childbearing during adolescence 3 in our analyses, we categorized teenaged mothers as mothers aged 12 to 19 when they started having children. some research has examined whether children of mothers who start having children in their late teens (age 18 or 19) differ from children whose mothers started having children in their early teens. this research has generally shown that older teen mothers have certain (socio-economic) advantages and fewer differences compared to older mothers. we examined whether or not socio-economic differences were apparent for older as compared to younger teen mothers by dividing the group into two categories: 12 to 17 and 18 to 19-year-olds. children of young teen mothers, compared to children of older teen mothers, had mothers with similar levels of education and were as likely to be in low-income or lone parent families. logistic regression analyses showed similar results for older and younger teen mothers so these two groups are combined in the analyses presented (results are available upon request). 5 guèvremont and kohen: physical and mental health published by scholarship@western, 2013 good, good, fair, and poor. these categories were dichotomized with responses of “excellent” and “very good” compared to “good,” “fair,” and “poor.” previous research has used this dichotomy for selfor parent-rated health ( shields & shooshtari, 2001; tremblay, dahinten, & kohen, 2003). chronic conditions: “does [child] have any of the following long term conditions that have lasted or are expected to last 6 months or more?” a child was considered as having a chronic condition if their mother reported they had one of a list of health conditions.4 several specific chronic conditions were also examined separately based on their prevalence and their importance for aboriginal children (smylie, 2009). these conditions included: allergies, asthma, two or more ear infections in the last year, and dental problems. m e n t a l h e a l t h . mental health was assessed with the goodman strengths and difficulties questionnaire (sdq) (goodman, 1997). the sdq is a parent-reported instrument designed to provide information on children’s behaviors and relationships. the sdq consists of 25 items grouped into 5 subscales. in the acs, mothers answered several questions regarding their child’s behaviour. this questionnaire and its subscales have been validated for use with aboriginal children, demonstrating that four of the five original subscales are valid for first nations children (the peer problems subscale was omitted) (oliver, findlay, mcintosh, & kohen, 2009). all questions included the following possible responses: not true, somewhat true, or certainly true. exact wording of all items is in appendix a. we used the four sub-scales suggested by oliver et al. (2009), which are as follows: • prosocial behaviour: this sub-scale is composed of ten items including questions such as “is he/she…considerate of other peoples’ feelings?” and “is he/she… helpful if someone is hurt, upset, or feeling ill?” • emotional symptoms: this subscale is composed of five items including questions such as “is he/she … often unhappy, depressed, or tearful?” and “is he/she nervous or clingy in new situations, easily loses confidence?” • hyperactivity/inattention: this subscale is composed of three items including questions such as “is he/she … constantly fidgeting or squirming?” and “is he/she… restless, overactive, cannot stay still for long?” • conduct problems: this final subscale is composed of four items including questions such as, “is he/she… often fights with other children or bullies them?” and “is he/she… often argumentative with adults?” o t h e r v a r i a b l e s . we examined several socio-economic variables to determine their role in explaining differences in outcomes between children of aboriginal teen mothers and older mothers. these included: mother’s education (currently in school, not in school and not a high school graduate, not in school and a high school graduate), family structure (lone parent or two parent family), low 4 conditions included asthma, chronic bronchitis, tuberculosis, diabetes, hypoglycemia, heart disease, kidney disease, epilepsy, cerebral palsy, down’s syndrome, spina bifida, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, anxiety or depression, fetal alcohol spectrum disorder, autism, hearing impairment, visual impairment, speech or language difficulties, iron deficiency anaemia, or any other long term condition or disease. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.2 income family (family income below low income cut-off [lico]),5 and number of people living in the household. m e t h o d o l o g y descriptive analyses (percentages and means) were used to describe the socio-economic characteristics and physical and mental health of off-reserve first nations children according to the age of their mother when she began childbearing. differences between the characteristics of off-reserve first nations children of teenage and older mothers were assessed with t-tests. multiple regression was used to examine the association between the age of the mother when she first gave birth and each mental health outcome, while controlling for socio-economic characteristics. analyses were based on survey data weighted to be representative of the 2006 census counts of children younger than age 6 in canada according to different age groups (statistics canada, 2008). the bootstrap method was used to account for the complex sampling design used by the survey (rao, wu, & yue, 1992; rust & rao, 1996). r e s e a r c h f i n d i n g s the remainder of this article is a discussion of the findings of our research. in general, there were few differences in the physical health outcomes for aboriginal children born to teen mothers compared to aboriginal children born to older mothers. differences in behavioural outcomes were demonstrated, although some of these differences were found to be attributed to socio-economic factors, rather than differences in childbearing age; other outcomes were not explained by differences in socio-economic factors between teen and older mothers. o n e t h i r d o f r e g i s t e r e d i n d i a n c h i l d r e n a n d o n e f i f t h o f n o n r e g i s t e r e d i n d i a n c h i l d r e n l i v i n g o f f r e s e r v e h a d m o t h e r s w h o s t a r t e d h a v i n g c h i l d r e n a s t e e n s . about one-third (33%) of registered indian children and one-fifth (23%) of non-registered indian children had mothers who had their first child as a teen (figure 1). another 38% of registered indian children and 34% of non-registered indian children had mothers who started having children when aged 20 to 24. the remaining 29% of registered indian children and 44% of non-registered indian children had mothers who starting having children when aged 25 or older.6 5 the low-income cut-off (lico) is a statistical measure of the income thresholds below which families likely devote a larger-than-average share of their income to the necessities of food, shelter, and clothing (statistics canada, 2009). 6 although a high percentage of first nations children had mothers who started having children in their teen years, the mothers’ current age at the time of the survey was over age 25 for half of children whose mothers started having children as teens and four out of five children whose mother started having children when aged 20 to 24. 7 guèvremont and kohen: physical and mental health published by scholarship@western, 2013 f i g u r e 1 : p e r c e n t a g e o f o f f r e s e r v e f i r s t n a t i o n s c h i l d r e n a g e d 2 t o 5 w i t h m o t h e r s w h o f i r s t g a v e b i r t h a t a g e 1 2 1 9 , 2 0 2 4 , a n d 2 5 + . source: aboriginal children’s survey, 2006 these numbers demonstrate that a relatively high percentage of aboriginal children, registered or not, have mothers that began giving birth as teenagers. moreover, 71% of registered indian children have mothers who gave birth before they turned 24-years-old and this is also true for 57% of their nonregistered counterparts. o f f r e s e r v e f i r s t n a t i o n s c h i l d r e n o f t e e n m o t h e r s l i v e d i n m o r e d i s a d v a n t a g e d s o c i o e c o n o m i c c i r c u m s t a n c e s . off-reserve first nations children whose mothers started childbearing during adolescence were more likely to have mothers who were still in school or had not completed high school (table 1). about 28% of registered indian children with teen mothers had mothers who were still in school compared to 13% of registered indian children with mothers who had their first birth when aged 25 or more. about 2 out of 5 (38%) registered indian children with teen mothers had mothers who had not completed high school compared to 15% of registered indian children with mothers who started having children when aged 25 or more. fewer registered indian children with teen mothers (17%) had mothers with more than a high school education compared to children with older mothers (55%). 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.2 t a b l e 1 : d e s c r i p t i v e c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s o f f i r s t n a t i o n s c h i l d r e n a g e d 2 t o 5 y e a r s b y a g e o f m o t h e r a t f i r s t b i r t h ( % ) r e g i s t e r e d i n d i a n n o n r e g i s t e r e d i n d i a n 1 2 1 9 (n = 8 4 8 ) 2 0 2 4 (n = 9 8 8 ) 2 5 + (n = 7 2 4 ) 1 2 1 9 (n = 3 0 5 ) 2 0 2 4 (n = 4 4 6 ) 2 5 + (n = 5 2 8 ) m a t e r n a l e d u c a t i o n currently in school 28 * 19 * 13 20 * 14 * e 6 e less than high school 38 * 28 * 15 40 * 18 * 9 e high school 17 22 18 20 e 29 23 more than high school 17 * 31 * 55 20 * 39 * 61 f a m i l y s t r u c t u r e married 13 * 21 * 39 21 * 34 * 56 common-law 27 25 22 20 e 23 17 lone parent 60 * 55 * 38 59 * 43 * 28 l o w i n c o m e f a m i l y not low income 26 * 45 * 66 37 * 41 * 79 low income 74 * 56 * 34 63 * 39 * 21 * numbers with stars mean that the number is significantly different from the number for children of mothers aged 25+ at their first birth (p < 0.05). e use with caution – number may be unreliable. source: statistics canada, 2006 aboriginal children’s survey 9 guèvremont and kohen: physical and mental health published by scholarship@western, 2013 trends in education by age of mother at first birth were similar for non-registered indian children. in addition, children with teen mothers were more likely to be in lone parent families (60% vs. 38% for registered indian children; 59% vs. 28% for non-registered indian children), less likely to have married mothers (13% vs. 39% for registered indian children; 21% vs. 56% for non-registered indian children), and also more likely to be in low-income families (74% vs. 34% for registered indian children; 63% vs. 21% for non-registered indian children) compared to children with older mothers. these findings were similar to those of garner, guimond, and senecal (2013), although the sources of data were different: they used data from the canadian census to examine the socio-economic characteristics of teenage mothers and we used data from the aboriginal children’s survey. both studies found that mothers who were teens at their first birth were less likely to have completed high school, more likely to be single parents, and more likely to have lower personal and household incomes than mothers who were older at their first birth. t h e r e w e r e f e w d i f f e r e n c e s i n t h e p h y s i c a l h e a l t h o f f i r s t n a t i o n s c h i l d r e n o f t e e n m o t h e r s c o m p a r e d t o f i r s t n a t i o n s c h i l d r e n o f o l d e r m o t h e r s . our research found that registered indian children of teen mothers were as likely to be in very good or excellent health as compared to registered indian children of older mothers. however, non-registered indian children of teen mothers were less likely to be in very good or excellent health compared to non-registered children of mothers aged 25 and older at their first birth (see table 2). first nations children of teen mothers (both registered and non-registered) did not differ from first nations children of older mothers in the presence of a chronic health condition or in the number of chronic conditions. for specific health conditions, first nations children of teen mothers (both registered and non-registered) did not differ from first nations children of older mothers in reports of asthma or the occurrence of two or more ear infections in the last year. however, children of registered indian teen mothers were less likely to have allergies compared to children of older mothers. they were also more likely to have dental problems compared to children of older mothers. there were no differences in dental problems for non-registered indian children (see table 2). d i f f e r e n c e s i n t h e b e h a v i o u r s o f o f f r e s e r v e f i r s t n a t i o n s c h i l d r e n o f t e e n m o t h e r s c o m p a r e d t o o l d e r m o t h e r s w e r e e x p l a i n e d b y s o c i o e c o n o m i c c i r c u m s t a n c e s f o r s o m e o u t c o m e s b u t n o t o t h e r s . our research showed that first nations children of teen mothers (both registered and non-registered indians) had lower prosocial behaviour scores (how readily the child shares with other children, whether the child is kind to younger children), higher scores on emotional symptoms (includes having many worries and fears and being depressed or tearful), higher inattention-hyperactivity scores (being easily distracted and unable to stay still for long), and higher scores for conduct problems (such as child having fights with other children and often losing his or her temper) as reported by their mothers. these results are shown in figure 2 (model results are shown in model 1 in tables 3 and 4). 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.2 t a b l e 2 : p h y s i c a l h e a l t h o u t c o m e s b y a g e o f m o t h e r a t f i r s t b i r t h ( % ) r e g i s t e r e d i n d i a n n o n r e g i s t e r e d i n d i a n 1 2 1 9 ( n = 8 4 8 ) 2 0 2 4 ( n = 9 8 8 ) 2 5 + ( n = 7 2 4 ) 1 2 1 9 ( n = 3 0 5 ) 2 0 2 4 ( n = 4 4 6 ) 2 5 + ( n = 5 2 8 ) in very good or excellent health (vs. good, fair, or poor) 81 83 84 82 * 89 90 presence of chronic condition 33 34 31 38 31 31.1 number of chronic conditions none 67 66 69 63 69 68.9 one 24 24 24 30 21 22.7 two or more 10 10 8 e 8 e 9 e 8.4 e presence of specific condition asthma 11 13 14 13 e 10 e 10.2 e 2+ ear infections in last 12 months 11 14 13 16 e 14 e 13.3 allergy 8 * 11 12 10 e 8 * e 14.4 dental problem 35 * 29 26 18 18 18.8 * numbers with stars mean that the number is significantly different from the number for children of mothers aged 25+ at their first birth (p < 0.05). e use with caution – number may be unreliable. source: statistics canada, 2006 aboriginal children’s survey 11 guèvremont and kohen: physical and mental health published by scholarship@western, 2013 figure 2: predicted scores of behavioural outcomes with and without controlling for socio-economic characteristics (ses). * numbers with stars mean that the number is significantly different from the number for children of mothers aged 25+ at their first birth (p < 0.05). models that controlled for ses included mother’s highest level of education, household size, and whether the child lived in a lone parent family or a low income family. source: statistics canada, 2006 aboriginal children’s survey age of mother 12-19 age of mother 20-24 age of mother 25+ age of mother 12-19 age of mother 20-24 age of mother 25+ 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.2 t a b l e 3 : r e g r e s s i o n c o e f f i c i e n t s a n d s t a n d a r d e r r o r s p r e d i c t i n g p r o s o c i a l b e h a v i o u r a n d e m o t i o n a l s y m p t o m s p r o s o c i a l b e h a v i o u r e m o t i o n a l s y m p t o m s m o d e l 1 m o d e l 2 m o d e l 1 m o d e l 2 age of mother at first birth 12 – 19 0.04 (0.02)* 0.02 (0.02) 0.04 (0.02)* 0.02 (0.02) 20 – 24 0.01 (0.02) 0.01 (0.02) 0.02 (0.02) 0.00 (0.02) 25+ ref. ref. ref. ref. age of child in years 0.06 (0.01)*** 0.06 (0.01)*** 0.01 (0.01)* 0.01 (0.01)* male child 0.08 (0.01)*** 0.08 (0.01)*** 0.02 (0.01) 0.02 (0.01) identity registered indian ref. ref. ref. ref. non-registered indian 0.04 (0.01)** 0.03 (0.01)* 0.03 (0.01)* 0.03 (0.02)* mother's education currently in school 0.02 (0.02) 0.00 (0.02) less than high school 0.03 (0.02) 0.03 (0.02) high school graduate ref. ref. lone parent 0.01 (0.02) 0.00 (0.02) low income family (income below lico) 0.03 (0.02)* 0.04 (0.02)* number of people in the household 0.00 (0.00) 0.01 (0.01) age by registered interaction ns ns age by education interaction ns ns n 2,541 2,216 2,545 2,217 r2 0.07 0.08 0.01 0.02 *p < 0.05 **p < 0.01 ***p < 0.001 source: statistics canada, 2006 aboriginal children’s survey 13 guèvremont and kohen: physical and mental health published by scholarship@western, 2013 t a b l e 4 : r e g r e s s i o n c o e f f i c i e n t s a n d s t a n d a r d e r r o r s p r e d i c t i n g i n a t t e n t i o n h y p e r a c t i v i t y a n d c o n d u c t p r o b l e m s i n a t t e n t i o n h y p e r a c t i v i t y c o n d u c t p r o b l e m s m o d e l 1 m o d e l 2 m o d e l 1 m o d e l 2 age of mother at first birth 12 19 0.16 (0.03)*** 0.13 (0.04)*** 0.16 (0.02)*** 0.10 (0.03)*** 20 24 0.08 (0.03)** 0.06 (0.03) 0.11 (0.02)*** 0.09 (0.02)*** 25+ ref. ref. ref. ref. age of child in years -0.03 (0.01)* -0.02 (0.01)* -0.05 (0.01)*** -0.05 (0.01)*** male child 0.13 (0.02)*** 0.14 (0.03)*** 0.02 (0.02) 0.02 (0.02) identity registered indian ref. ref. ref. ref. non-registered indian 0.02 (0.03) 0.04 (0.03) -0.03 (0.02) -0.02 (0.02) mother's education currently in school 0.01 (0.04) 0.00 (0.03) less than high school 0.12 (0.04)*** 0.11 (0.03)*** high school graduate ref. ref. lone parent -0.01 (0.03) 0.00 (0.03) low income family (income below lico) 0.07 (0.03)* 0.05 (0.03) number of people in the household -0.02 (0.01) 0.00 (0.01) age by registered interaction ns ns age by education interaction ns ns n 2,517 2,195 2,508 2,189 r2 0.03 0.04 0.04 0.05 *p < 0.05 **p < 0.01 ***p < 0.001 source: statistics canada, 2006 aboriginal children’s survey 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.2 as stated previously, because socio-economic disadvantage is associated with both teen parenthood and poor behavioural outcomes, analyses were conducted to examine if socio-economic factors contribute to (mediate) the association between having a mother who started childbearing as a teen and preschool-aged children’s behaviour scores. while differences in all behavioral outcomes examined were found for children of teen mothers compared to children of older mothers, after accounting for differences in socio-economic characteristics, including maternal education, income, lone parent family, and household size, children of teen mothers did not differ from children of older mothers on scores of prosocial behaviours and emotional symptoms. however, even after considering socio-economic factors, children of teen mothers still had higher scores of inattention-hyperactivity and higher scores of conduct problems compared to children of older mothers (results shown in figure 2 and model 2 of tables 3 and 4.) c h i l d r e n o f m o t h e r s c u r r e n t l y i n s c h o o l h a d t h e s a m e b e h a v i o u r s c o r e s a s c h i l d r e n o f m o t h e r s w h o h a d a h i g h s c h o o l l e v e l o f e d u c a t i o n ; c h i l d r e n o f m o t h e r s w i t h l e s s t h a n a h i g h s c h o o l l e v e l o f e d u c a t i o n h a d p o o r e r s c o r e s o n r e p o r t e d i n a t t e n t i o n h y p e r a c t i v i t y a n d c o n d u c t p r o b l e m s t h a n c h i l d r e n o f m o t h e r s w i t h a h i g h s c h o o l e d u c a t i o n . children of mothers currently in school had similar scores on all four mental health measures (prosocial behaviour, emotional symptoms, inattention-hyperactivity, and conduct problems) as compared to children of mothers who were high school graduates. children of mothers with less than a high school level of education had worse scores on two of the outcomes – higher scores on both inattention-hyperactivity and conduct problems. schooling had the same association with child behavior outcomes regardless of whether the child had a teen mother or not – children of both teen and non-teen mothers had fewer behaviour problems if their mother was currently in school or had graduated high school.7 d i s c u s s i o n to our knowledge, this study is the first to use population-based data to report on the outcomes of offreserve first nations children born to teen mothers compared to off-reserve first nations children born to older mothers. findings from the 2006 aboriginal children’s survey (based on maternal reporting) suggest that there are few differences in physical health outcomes between the children of teen mothers and older mothers with the exception of dental health. however, the picture is different for maternal-reported behavioural problems and mental health. all the mental health outcomes examined – child prosocial behaviors, emotional symptoms, inattention-hyperactivity, and conduct problems –were worse for children of teen mothers. 7 there was no interaction between having a teenage mother and mother’s education for any of the behavioural outcomes. the relationship between age of mother at first birth and mental health outcomes was the same for children of mothers still in school, high school graduates, and non-graduates. 15 guèvremont and kohen: physical and mental health published by scholarship@western, 2013 there are several reasons why children of teen mothers may be at risk of negative outcomes. one reason may be that living in lower socio-economic conditions can impact living conditions, daily stress levels, as well as interactions between mother and child (mcloyd, 1998). in this study, similar to others, we found that off-reserve first nations children of teenage mothers lived in more difficult socio-economic circumstances compared to off-reserve first nations children of older mothers. moreover, the lower scores of prosocial behaviours and higher scores of emotional problems for children of teen mothers, as compared to older mothers, were found to be attributed to socioeconomic factors rather than differences in age of childbearing. of the socio-economic factors considered, household income and maternal education were shown to be important. yet, differences in child inattention-hyperactivity and conduct problems persisted and were not explained by differences in socio-economic factors between teen and older mothers. several studies of non-aboriginal children show that children growing up in disadvantaged socioeconomic circumstances demonstrate worse school, behavioural, and health outcomes compared to children growing up in better socio-economic circumstances (willms, 2002). socioeconomic differences can have an influence in many ways. these have included living in neighborhoods that are less safe, poorer housing conditions, and more limited access to resources in terms of health, education, recreation, and employment opportunities (kohen, brooks-gunn, leventhal, & hertzman, 2002; sampson, morenoff, & gannon-rowley, 2002), family stress and poor mental health (hill & herman-stahl, 2002; kohen, leventhal, dahinten, & mcintosh, 2008; mcloyd, 1998; xue, leventhal, brooks-gunn, & earls, 2005) , as well as differences in parenting styles, behaviours, and the types of activities in and outside of the home (edwards & bromfield, 2009; hill & herman-stahl, 2002; mcloyd, 1998; vaden-kiernan et al., 2010). lower levels of education, in particular, may be associated with different parenting behaviors, including less language use and fewer literacy activities (reading books, teaching, counting, storytelling) (burgess, 2005). this suggests that living in conditions of socio-economic disadvantage may have far-reaching consequences for mothers and their children. the present study demonstrated differences in the socio-economic circumstances of preschool children of both registered and non-registered first nations teen mothers living off-reserve. in terms of child outcomes, there were few differences in the physical health of off-reserve first nations children of teen mothers compared to off-reserve first nations children of older mothers, other than a higher rate of dental problems for registered indian children of teen mothers. these findings are similar to those of others. for example, based on samples of non-aboriginal children of young mothers in australia, shaw et al. (2006) found that young maternal age was not associated with self-rated health or with maternal reports of asthma, number of hospital admissions, or emergency visits. similar to our study, shaw et al., (2006) found that the younger age of mothers was associated with worse dental health of children. in terms of mental health, we found that off-reserve first nations children of teenage mothers had lower prosocial behaviour scores, more emotional symptoms, higher inattention-hyperactivity scores, and more conduct problems compared to children born to older mothers. although some of these differences (i.e. for emotional symptoms and prosocial behaviours) were explained by socio-economic differences, others remained (e.g. inattention-hyperactivity and conduct problems) even after accounting for the differences in income, education, marital status, and household size between teen 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.2 and older mothers. while these findings are consistent with research on non-aboriginal children in canada (dahinten et al., 2002), they are noteworthy for aboriginal children. inattention-hyperactivity and conduct problems are likely to be associated with poorer school readiness and problems with academic achievement. it was beyond the scope of the present study to explore other factors that may have contributed to differences in hyperactivity-inattention and conduct problems of children of teen mothers compared to older mothers. for example, parenting behaviours, learning activities, and the availability of social and other supports, including father involvement, can all be important for children’s behavioural outcomes during the preschool period (howard, burke lefever, borkowski, & whitman, 2006; rhule, mcmahon, spieker, & munson, 2006). moreover, the implications of educational attainment for the behavioural outcomes of children of teen mothers suggest that factors enabling teen mothers to attend school and/or complete high school may be particularly important as benefits accrue to both mother and child. the area of educational attainment of teen mothers warrants further investigation because the completion of high school education has been associated with direct effects to the mother, such as socio-economic benefits (see garner et al., 2013, in this issue), as well as indirect benefits to children. s t r e n g t h s a n d l i m i t a t i o n s o f t h i s s t u d y to our knowledge, this is the first large-scale empirical study examining the physical and mental health of off-reserve first nations children of teenage mothers. strengths of this study include a populationbased sample that was nationally representative of first nations children living off-reserve in canada, the examination of both physical and mental health outcomes, and information on mother’s age when she started having children, as well as a variety of socio-economic characteristics. despite these strengths, this study has several limitations. our measure of maternal age at first birth is based on the age of the oldest sibling in the household. it is possible that this sibling was a step, foster, or adoptive sibling, and not a birth sibling, which could lead to inaccuracy in determining the mother’s age at first birth. in addition, the physical and mental health outcomes examined in this study were based on parent-reporting. mothers’ responses could be influenced by the way they think they should respond, their experiences, or subjective views of their own child. however, the cultural relevance of standardized measures is often uncertain (greenfield, 1997), which points to the importance of parent-reported measures for this population. in addition, both groups of teen and older mothers reported on the same measure. these limitations highlight to the need for further qualitative and quantitative research to replicate these findings. future research could use a direct measure of age at first childbirth and could also examine physical and mental health outcomes from other reporters (such as teachers or child care providers) or ones based on observational measures. finally, this study focused on socio-economic factors to explain differences in the association of being a teen mother with preschoolers’ outcomes; however, other factors are likely involved and warrant future study. c o n c l u s i o n s findings from our research using the 2006 aboriginal children’s survey show that there are few differences in the physical health of off-reserve first nations children of teen mothers compared to offreserve first nations children of older mothers. in terms of mental health, differences were apparent in 17 guèvremont and kohen: physical and mental health published by scholarship@western, 2013 all outcomes with children of teen mothers faring worse compared to children of older mothers. although some differences in mental health are explained by socio-economic factors, such as household income and maternal education (for prosocial behaviour and emotional symptoms), other differences (inattention-hyperactivity and conduct problems) were not; differences between children of teen and older mothers persisted even when socio-economic differences were considered. these findings suggest that differences in the mental health outcomes of off-reserve first nations children of teen mothers start as early as the preschool period. further qualitative and quantitative research would help our understanding of the differences in outcomes between the children of teenage and older mothers. 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.2 references alexander, k. l., farhat, a., & dauber, s. l. 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(2005). neighborhood residence and mental health problems of 5to 11-year-olds. archives of general psychiatry, 62, 563. 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.2 zukewich, n. & o'donnell, v. (2008). aboriginal children's survey, 2006: family, community and child care. ottawa, on: minister of industry. 23 guèvremont and kohen: physical and mental health published by scholarship@western, 2013 a p p e n d i x a : w o r d i n g o f m e n t a l h e a l t h i t e m s p r o s o c i a l b e h a v i o u r considerate of other peoples’ feelings shares readily with other children, for example, toys, treats, pencils helpful if someone is hurt, upset, or feeling ill kind to younger children often offers to help others including parents, teachers, other children generally well-behaved, usually does what adults request has at least one good friend generally liked by other children can stop and think things out before acting good attention span, sees work through to the end h y p e r a c t i v i t y i n a t t e n t i o n restless, overactive, cannot stay still for long constantly fidgeting or squirming easily distracted, concentration wanders 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.2 e m o t i o n a l s y m p t o m s often complains of headaches, stomach-aches, or sickness many worries or often seems worried often unhappy, depressed, or tearful nervous or clingy in new situations, easily loses confidence many fears, easily scared c o n d u c t p r o b l e m s often loses temper often fights with other children or bullies them often argumentative with adults can be spiteful to others 25 guèvremont and kohen: physical and mental health published by scholarship@western, 2013 the international indigenous policy journal march 2013 the physical and mental health of off-reserve first nations children of teen mothers anne guèvremont dafna kohen recommended citation the physical and mental health of off-reserve first nations children of teen mothers abstract french abstract spanish abstract keywords acknowledgments disclaimer creative commons license guevremont_kohen final guevremont_kohen final.2 guevremont_kohen final.3 guevremont_kohen final.4 guevremont_kohen final.5 guevremont_kohen final.6 identifying useful approaches to the governance of indigenous data the international indigenous policy journal volume 5 issue 2 the governance of indigenous information article 5 april 2014 identif ying useful approaches to the governance of indigenous data jodi bruhn stratéjuste consulting, jbruhn@stratejuste.ca recommended citation bruhn, j. (2014). identifying useful approaches to the governance of indigenous data. th e international indigenous policy journal, 5(2) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.2.5 identif ying useful approaches to the governance of indigenous data abstract questions of data governance occur in all contexts. arguably, they become especially pressing for data concerning indigenous people. long-standing colonial relationships, experiences of vulnerability to decisionmakers, claims of jurisdiction, and concerns about collective privacy become significant in considering how and by whom data concerning indigenous people should be governed. also significant is the on going need on the part of governments to access and use such data to plan, monitor, and account for programs involving indigenous people. this exploratory policy article seeks to inform efforts to improve the governance of data between governments and indigenous organizations and communities – especially the federal government and first nations in canada. it describes a spectrum of models arising from the growing literature on data governance in the corporate and public sectors as well as overarching approaches articulated by indigenous organizations. after outlining certain practical considerations in negotiating data sharing agreements, the article presents a selection of promising initiatives in indigenous data governance undertaken in canada, the united states, and australia. keywords data governance, information governance, indigenous data, first nation data, ocap, data governance models acknowledgments this article had many contributors. special thanks are due to staff members at the bc first nations health authority, the tui’kn partnership, the first nations technology council, ktunaxa first nation, keewaytinook okimakanak, first nations of quebec and labrador health and social services commission, british columbia ministry of aboriginal affairs and reconciliation, health canada, and aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc). the first nation information governance centre also provided helpful orientations on the first nations governance of first nation data at workshops and a 2011 conference. the author gratefully acknowledges staff of the strategic research directorate, aandc for their financial support and their long-standing interest in the governance of indigenous data. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/   i d e n t i f y i n g u s e f u l a p p r o a c h e s t o t h e g o v e r n a n c e o f i n d i g e n o u s d a t a data are a resource, a descriptive asset. data can inform planning and decision-making; they can establish track records and measure results; they can enhance accountability and ease compliance. if relevant, of high quality, and used in their proper context, data can serve as a cornerstone of effective governance. at the same time, governance matters to data. effective data governance can establish checks to ensure that data collected support an organization’s priorities. it can provide for quality control mechanisms and ensure that the required data are available in a timely way. if more than one organization collects, manages, or uses the data, effective data governance can promote mutually beneficial and respectful relationships between the partners. speaking of data governance, questions of roles and responsibilities, and processes and protocols come to the fore in any context. arguably though, these questions become more pressing for government-held data concerning indigenous people and organizations. long-standing colonial relationships, experiences of vulnerability to decision-makers, claims of jurisdiction, and concerns about collective privacy become significant in considering how and by whom data on indigenous people should be governed. also significant is the on going need on the part of governments to access and use such data to plan, monitor, and account for funds they invest in programs for métis, first nation, and inuit people. this exploratory policy research article seeks to inform efforts to improve the governance of data between governments and indigenous organizations and communities, especially the federal government and first nations in canada. to this end, the article will first explore basic understandings of data governance, describing a spectrum of models arising from the emerging literature. it will then turn to governance of data involving indigenous people specifically, considering the central concerns and resulting approaches articulated by indigenous organizations. after outlining some practical considerations in negotiating a data governance model, it will present a handful of promising initiatives undertaken in canada, the united states, and australia. throughout, it will demonstrate that effective data governance is an important tool, both in rebuilding indigenous governing institutions and improving indigenous–government relationships. further, it will show that mutually useful governance models for sharing indigenous data are achievable—and some have been established already. this article draws on diverse academic and grey literature on data, information, and information technology (it) governance as well as on indigenous perspectives on data and information. it further draws on descriptions – usually on websites – of data governance initiatives in canada, the united states, and australia. for canadian examples, where possible, the article supplements publicly available information with interviews with staff members of the organizations involved. officials with first nation communities and organizations interviewed in british columbia, ontario, and quebec appear in appendix a. also listed are officials from the government of british columbia, health canada, and aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc), who agreed to speak about initiatives in which they were involved. before proceeding, a few words on limitations. where this article seeks to gain a broad strokes view of data governance, it does not delve into any particular approach or treat particular legislative and regulatory contexts involving privacy, access to information, and intellectual property. second, the 1 bruhn: useful approaches to the governance of indigenous data published by scholarship@western, 2014   promising precedents outlined in the final section should be seen as a sampling – selected to indicate the variety of indigenous data governance principles to specific circumstances. the indigenous data governance initiatives now occurring are growing in size and number. they merit more sustained investigation on their own. d a t a g o v e r n a n c e : t h e b a s i c s “data” is a term we use so often we often forget our associations with it. at their most basic, data are simply attributes, properties, or characteristics that describe (mitra, 2012). data must be distinguished from information, which seeks to render data useful and worthy of notice or concern by interpreting them. compared to information, data involve a more immediate relationship to what is described. notably, a subjective intention lies behind their creation and use – most importantly, behind the decision on which data to create and use, not to mention which categories those data describe. this aspect of data creation has long been emphasized by critiques – among them, indigenous ones – of political rationalities behind government uses of census data, to take one example (andersen, 2008; espey, 2002). governance entails the activity of directing or steering (bevir, 2009; robichau, 2011). key sources emphasize governance as an ongoing activity or process. it can occur in multiple spheres: within or between governments, corporations, or non-government organizations, for example. since the early 1980s, the use of the term in the public context has usually entailed an assumption that authority is (or ought to be) dispersed among actors beyond governments. in this paradigm, governments increasingly depend on other organizations to realize their goals and intentions (steger & roy, 2010; stoker, 1998). d a t a g o v e r n a n c e much of the literature on data governance draws from the fields of corporate and it governance. wende (2007) defined data governance as “the framework for decision rights and accountabilities to encourage desirable behaviour in the use of data” (p. 419). panian (2010) describes it more broadly, as the “processes, policies, standards, organization, and technologies required to manage and ensure the availability, accessibility, quality, consistency, auditability, and security of data in an organization” (p. 939). in the for-profit context, data governance serves profitability and survival. its purposes here are: • to increase sales and retain customers by developing a deeper understanding of customers; • to lower costs by increasing operational efficiency in business processes and eliminating redundancy; and • to ensure compliance with external regulations and internal policies by streamlining the collection of reporting data and increasing ease of audits. of course, these purposes are not fully translatable from the corporate to the public sphere. to the extent that they can be translated, however, one could derive the public goals of policy and service improvement by developing a deeper understanding of citizen needs; cost reduction by increasing efficiencies and eliminating redundancies; and ensuring and easing compliance by streamlining reporting and increasing ease of audits. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 2 [2014], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.2.5   t h e a g e n t s o f d a t a g o v e r n a n c e speaking of information governance, kooper, maes, and lindgreen (2011) indicated that there are three central agents: the producer or creator of the information, the user or receiver, and the “governing actor,” or the agent shaping and overseeing the transaction space between the producer and user. depending on the context, the governing actor could be the board of a company or not-for-profit, or a legislator, policy-maker, or regulator. though distinct in key ways from information governance, data governance also involves a relationship among these parties, whether they are located in a single organization or different ones.1 i n t e r o r g a n i z a t i o n a l d a t a g o v e r n a n c e in the case of multiple organizations, questions of control and ownership move to the fore. inter-organizational data governance occurs in a context where one or more agents in the data relationship represent different organizations. one common situation is outsourcing, whereby an organization engages a third party to perform a key function in its data creation or management. another situation is data sharing. data sharing opens up an individual organization to a range of possible relationships—from a partnership between two or more organizations, to a larger network or data commons. importantly, data sharing gives rise to questions of ownership and control that do not arise in an outsourcing scenario. data sharing arrangements could range from full ownership by one party to partial ownership, to an interest in the data by a preferred user party (fisher & fortmann, 2010). c o m p o n e n t s o f d a t a g o v e r n a n c e beyond the question of ownership in inter-organizational data governance, what areas must a data governance framework address? data are said to require accessibility, availability, quality, consistency, auditability, and security. data governance develops these attributes, enhancing the data’s overall value to the organization. specifically, a data governance framework will: • set and enforce standards including definitions and classification systems, development and technical standards, and organizational data models. • develop and enforce policies and processes around creation, development, access and delivery, monitoring and measurement, management and auditing of data. • set out a data governance structure, including the roles, responsibilities and accountabilities of actors. this extends from planning by executive committees to day-to-day use by data analysts. • put in place a suitable technological infrastructure, or a client-focused data integration technology platform that provides built-in capabilities to access, cleanse, transform, deliver, and monitor data (panian, 2010).                                                                                                                 1 the authors note an important difference between information and data governance: “where data governance focuses on data assets, information governance is related to interactions” (p. 198). 3 bruhn: useful approaches to the governance of indigenous data published by scholarship@western, 2014   a s p e c t r u m o f d a t a g o v e r n a n c e m o d e l s drawing on the broader data and information governance literature, the current section describes three basic models of how, in broad terms, a data governance framework could be organized. the intent later on will be to ask how these models might correspond with both indigenous and government approaches to data governance and sharing. s i n g l e o r g a n i z a t i o n d a t a h i e r a r c h y the previous section addressed data governance primarily in terms of the central case described in the literature: a single organization, often a corporation, that creates and uses data to promote its strategic purposes. that organization must exist within and comply with a legal and regulatory environment largely beyond its control. but within its own sphere, its executive can create the policies, procedures, standards, and structures and acquire the technological infrastructure it sees as required to promote effective data governance in a top-down way. data governance occurs within a self-contained unit: a single-organization data hierarchy. in this model, effective data governance exists as a sub-set of the broader corporate governance structure. an executive data governance council or steering committee might be struck, with members representing both it and business units of the organizations. the executive committee would set topdown data governance goals, ensuring that the data collected and analyzed support the organization’s mission and objectives. the executive committee might have a technical data quality management committee reporting to it, chaired by a data steward. this technical committee would be tasked to develop the required standards, policies, processes, and it recommendations and would directly oversee implementation of the data governance initiative. o u t s o u r c i n g within the single-organization data hierarchy model, outsourcing allows an organization to transfer delivery of services to third parties, which perform them on its behalf. the decision to outsource might be made when the required talent, capacity, or security exist outside the organization, or the costs of having a third-party perform functions are lower, or the central organization wishes to enhance confidence in the data’s integrity by having it created or stored by a third-party (clark, zmud, & mccray, 1995). the defining feature of the outsourcing relationship is the client’s retention of full control: “while service delivery is transferred, accountability remains firmly with the remit of the client organization” (it governance institute, 2005, p. 7). or, as panian (2010) stated, “although they have moved to a third party, these data remain a core asset of the organization. even though they sit outside the firewall, the organization cannot relinquish visibility into and control over that data” (p. 942). as is clear from the above, the outsourcing of data services – even if were to include the entire data creation, management, and storing process – should not be mistaken for a data partnership. on the contrary, this relationship continues and extends the single-organization data hierarchy with the support of a third party hired for that purpose. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 2 [2014], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.2.5   d a t a p a r t n e r s h i p s the single-organization data hierarchy model possesses certain advantages. chief among them are its straightforward accountabilities and ability to tailor data creation, management, and storage very closely to the needs of the institution. yet the model also poses disadvantages, especially in cases where the data pertains not only to the clients, employees, and transactions of the organization, but to the world “out there.” data are costly to generate and require technical expertise to analyse and administer. data on broader societal or environmental trends may already exist – in many cases, collected, managed, and stored by government agencies. access to a data set held by one organization may be necessary for another to fulfill its core functions. of the many examples, a prominent one has emerged on the international stage: the need to share data among countries for reasons of national or global security. if the central case for the data hierarchy model is the self-enclosed corporation, the one for data partnerships might be the public service organization. speaking of information governance, yang and maxwell (2011) submit that public service organizations have shifted focus in the past fifteen years from a model emphasizing protection to one of cross-organization sharing. the authors trace this shift to events like 9/11, which laid bare the potentially catastrophic results of information-sharing failures among government agencies. in addition, policy changes since the early 1980s emphasize inter-agency coordination as a means to improve efficiency and client service while reducing waste. finally, technological changes facilitate organizational exchange of information based on standard transmission and exchange protocols. arising from such factors, the second major governance model is the data partnership. in its simplest theoretical form, it involves parties with reciprocal data needs, equal means to meet them, similar capacity and legal position, and so on. things are rarely so tidy in practice. and yet parties in a data partnership, by contrast to a self-enclosed hierarchy, interact on a horizontal plane. one party may be more powerful, but the other is not a direct subordinate to it. neither are the parties involved in an outsourcing relationship. what makes data governance work in a partnership scenario? as basic motivators, there needs to be a perception of mutual benefit of both producer and user and at least a minimally compatible technology. a further major factor is trust. the producing or sharing party must have confidence that the data shared is secure, confidential, and will not be misused (yang & maxwell, 2011). the recipient party must have assurance of the data’s quality and credibility. trust can begin with individuals but should deepen to exist between institutional structures and cultures. a helping factor is leadership. senior management can provide the vision, guidance, and resources required to initiate and sustain data sharing initiatives. clarity of roles and responsibilities, respect for autonomy, and appropriate exercise of authority contribute to fruitful sharing. the required staff time and resources required to negotiate and implement sharing relationships is another motivator. a final factor that can either inhibit or promote data partnerships in a public service context is legislation. on the one hand, a “lack of legislative support to assure the privacy and confidentiality of shared information can impede cross-boundary information sharing in the public sector” (yang & maxwell, 2011, p. 170). on the other, explicit support from legislatures and policy-makers is required, or sharing among organizations can “lose its priority status and lack necessary funding and resources to make 5 bruhn: useful approaches to the governance of indigenous data published by scholarship@western, 2014   projects sustainable” (yang & maxwell, 2011, p. 170). notably, the same legislative supports that can assure sharing between government agencies can also impede sharing of data or information between governments and non-government organizations. this has been the experience of indigenous organizations in canada. as the foregoing makes clear, establishing and maintaining information-sharing partnerships—much less data-sharing partnerships—may make good sense for a host of reasons. but it is not easy. in absence of active, ongoing efforts to tend communication and to open policy and legislative channels, the default position appears to be closure. as such, it is crucially important to build up formal sharing arrangements and joint data governance structures. progress should be expected to build slowly at first, as informal trust and communication channels take time and effort to develop. these points also emerged clearly from the reported experiences of staff of the first nation and federal or provincial government organizations interviewed for this project. in terms of organizational structure, data partnerships entail co-governance of the data asset. jointly established executive and technical committees oversee development and implementation of the data governance framework. the partners collect, manage, and share data as determined by protocols and processes they have jointly created. a d v i s o r y b o d i e s the above description outlines a full partnership, where decisions surrounding data collection, management, sharing, and other associated procedures are made in a co-governance arrangement. short of a partnership, organizations could also develop engagement or advisory mechanisms with no decision-making power. public organizations such as statistics canada, for example, seek advice not only to improve their data products and their relevance but also to educate clients, stakeholders, and the public about them. advice-seeking forums can take many forms. these can range from virtual engagement techniques, to information and engagement workshops, to working groups or task forces, to permanent advisory committees. more lasting forums approach the partnership model. however, the defining feature of a collaborative governance partnership is that “participants engage directly in decision-making and are not merely ‘consulted’ by public agencies” (ansell & gash, 2007). as such, the use of advisory bodies, while they represent a step toward a data partnership model, should not be mistaken for one. d a t a c o m m o n s the third basic model appears at the opposite end of the spectrum from the single-organization data hierarchy. it is the data commons and its central case may be the research community. within the confines of a given community, the rationale behind the commons model is to facilitate data sharing as far as possible. the data commons also cultivates a community of mutual discussion, exchange, and group-sourcing to ensure quality and usefulness. its centerpiece may be a shared infrastructure or platform that allows members to upload data, which are then compiled, archived, and distributed. the size of a community or network can vary widely, from a few dozen organizations or individuals to thousands. in the limit, the data commons is the global public—where it is very costly, if not impossible, to control the use of a data set once released into cyberspace. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 2 [2014], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.2.5   fisher and fortmann (2010) noted the increasingly common practice of sharing data in digitally distributed collections and virtual communities. applying the theory of common property rights to sixteen case studies of data sharing in a commons situation, the authors found that successful sharing tended to feature clearly defined boundaries, appropriation rules, and collective choice arrangements to ensure that both producer and user benefit.   for even data sets shared in the commons retain a formal owner and do not come without their rules of use. fair use policies might require “payment” by users in the form of acknowledgement of the source or co-authorship by the producer. data sites might be password-protected and accessible only to registered users. producers might have immediate use rights, or an ability to analyze and publish results from the data before sharing with the community. a c o n t i n u u m o f d a t a g o v e r n a n c e m o d e l s in concluding this review, we might place the three major models—along with the steps between them—on a spectrum. at the one end is the single hierarchical organization, governing its data with a close focus on its own institutional needs. at the other is the theoretically limitless data commons, which promotes accessibility of data in a given community, subject to limited constraints. in the middle is the data partnership, where governance by a single-organization gives way to genuine co-governance— shared decision-making—of the data asset. at the black line and left of it, but at no point to the right of it, ownership becomes an issue for negotiation. to this point, the article has drawn on the broader western-based literature on data governance. it has identified some basic definitions, key actors, and required components of a data governance program. it has addressed the central purposes of a data governance regime, with its overarching goal of maximizing the value derived from the data resource. finally, it has described a spectrum of data governance models, presenting three basic arrangements and intermediate stages. turning now to indigenous approaches to data governance, the article explores themes that were notably absent from the literature examined to this point. why is a given data set created? what stories is it used to tell? what stories should it tell? who should be doing the telling and how? beyond the secondary goal of maximizing value, indigenous approaches to data governance address questions of the spirit and intent that inform any specific data governance model. data  hierarchy  data  partnership     data  commons   networks   outsourcing  advisory  bodies   engagement  virtual     communities   f i g u r e 1 : a s p e c t r u m o f m o d e l s o f d a t a g o v e r n a n c e a n d s h a r i n g   7 bruhn: useful approaches to the governance of indigenous data published by scholarship@western, 2014   i n d i g e n o u s a p p r o a c h e s t o d a t a g o v e r n a n c e it might be fitting to begin this section with a story. in his book, the inconvenient indian, cherokee author thomas king (2012) described his memories of the occupation of the washington headquarters of the bureau of indian affairs in 1972. during the seven-day occupation, some members of the american indian movement ransacked the building and destroyed bia files. king (2012) recalled: at first none of us wanted to believe the reports of vandalism... destroying bia files might have had some symbolic power, but the loss of those records also had the potential to hurt tribes, to set them back in their negotiations with the government, to allow washington to drag its feet. the damage didn’t make much sense... many years later, at a conference in phoenix, i ran into a guy who had been in the bia building during the occupation. i made the mistake of sharing my opinion about the destruction, and we almost wound up in a fight. “you weren’t there,” he told me, “so you don’t get it. you didn’t see the files. our lives were in those files. the bastards had us locked up in folders”. (pp. 148 149) king’s story reminds us of a feature of data that appears nowhere in the broader data literature, namely: data can be, and have been, used to fulfill all manner of purposes, among them to categorize and administer peoples in an imposed colonial relationship. the story further conveys, in stark terms, the ambivalent relationship many indigenous people continue to have toward the data that federal and other governments create about them. on the one hand, such data are necessary, at very least, to provide archival evidence of prior injustices or to establish ongoing needs and priorities. on the other hand, they are artefacts of a fraught historical relationship—one that was undeniably oppressive in the past and remains marred by colonialism to this day. t h e l i n g e r i n g e f f e c t s o f c o l o n i a l i s m recalling the connection noted earlier of information and the data that support it to the intentions of its creators and users, we consider the oft-cited statement in the report of the royal commission on aboriginal peoples (rcap, 1996a): the gathering of information and its subsequent use are inherently political. in the past, aboriginal people have not been consulted about what information should be collected, who should gather that information, who should maintain it, and who should have access to it. the information gathered may or may not have been relevant to the questions, priorities and concerns of aboriginal peoples. because data gathering has frequently been imposed by outside authorities, it has met with resistance in many quarters. (p. 4) the data gathering refers relates to a variety of areas, among them administration of the canada census, federal or provincial programs and services, or, for first nations people on reserve, the federal indian registry and other administrative requirements of the indian act. beyond being not useful, the data collected to support these activities may in fact undermine the ability of aboriginal governments to define and meet their own data needs by supplanting them with the data needs and demands of external governments. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 2 [2014], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.2.5   speaking of programs delivered on reserves, the auditor general of canada has long noted the questionable value and relevance of the data and information that the federal government—in particular, aandc—collects from first nations as a condition of their funding arrangements. successive reports have made at least three criticisms: • the department collects far too much information focussed on outputs. this results in an excessive reporting burden, increased costs, and inefficiencies. • the information collected, in the form of reports required as a condition of program funding, is of limited use either to first nations or to government administrators and does not provide adequate information on outcomes. • collection requirements are dictated to first nations rather than based on discussion with them. the information collected does not reflect community priorities and there is little feedback on its basis (auditor general of canada 2002, 2004, 2008). despite modest improvements, the auditor general’s (2011) status report remarks that the situation now remains largely unchanged. the same impression was reflected in interviews with first nation administrators for this project. t h e d a t a n e e d s o f n a t i o n r e b u i l d i n g the observations noted above should not leave the impression that indigenous leaders and administrators do not perceive a need for high quality, relevant data. on the contrary, as the interviews conducted for this project indicate, such data are crucial to rebuilding indigenous nations and communities. speaking of the movement toward self-government, the rcap report affirmed a need for aboriginal people to collect and use quality data in order to plan and implement their governments: for aboriginal people, knowing how political, demographic, social and economic changes will affect their nations and having in place data collection vehicles that provide a community and nation level aggregate picture will be essential to aboriginal government implementation and planning processes. (rcap, 1996b, p. 349) the rcap further stressed that aboriginal people need the required skills and technologies within their own governments to design, plan, and manage government functions and operations. for their part, the first nation and tribal council officials interviewed for this project stressed their need for relevant, high quality, and integrated data as part of nation rebuilding in areas ranging from health to social development to governance and land management. 9 bruhn: useful approaches to the governance of indigenous data published by scholarship@western, 2014   within the broader purpose of self-determination and nation rebuilding, many themes that emerged from discussions with first nation representatives bore a striking similarity to themes from the broader literature on data governance presented earlier.2 specifically, interviewees noted: • a need to integrate disparate data sources – now dispersed in siloed programs and jurisdictions – around the individual first nation citizen to optimize investment. • a need to cast indicators and performance measures in terms of the strategic objectives, visions, and cultural or historical self-understandings of communities, rather than in those of government programs. • where possible, a need to consolidate information from multiple existing sources to introduce efficiencies, reduce reporting burdens, and improve compliance. ideally, the data would be brought together from all levels of government and either owned or easily accessed by the first nation partner. • a need to provide the it infrastructure and technical personnel required to ensure the coordination of data around nations and citizens. a final key point that emerged from the interviews was the need to shift the focus of indicators from eliminating problems to identifying desired end states, then measuring progress toward the end goals rather than addressing gaps and deficits. o w n e r s h i p , c o n t r o l , a c c e s s , a n d p o s s e s s i o n it was noted earlier in this article that questions of ownership arise as soon as data is shared. as the observations of the rcap and auditor general make clear, first nations and other aboriginal organizations indeed share data with other governments. much of these data are administrative and dispersed across programs and jurisdictions. some are from censuses or surveys, collected and owned by statistics canada or other agencies or private organizations. some of the data arise from university or independent researchers engaging in research projects. the most explicit assertion of ownership and control of data concerning indigenous people arose around survey and research data, although it holds deep implications for administrative data as well. that assertion involves the first nation principles of “ownership, control, access and possession,”                                                                                                                 2 of particular importance to the observations presented on this page were personal communications with gwen phillips, ktunaxa nation, january 11, 2013; nancy gros-louis mchugh and richard gray, first nations of quebec and labrador health and social services commission in quebec, january 23, 2013; and michelle degroot, miranda kelly, and joseph mendez of the first nations health authority in british columbia, february 2013.   10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 2 [2014], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.2.5   recently trademarked by the first nations information governance centre (fnigc) as ocap™.3 an assembly of first nations (afn, 2009) publication describes the principles as follows: • o w n e r s h i p refers to the relationship of a first nations community to its cultural knowledge, data, and information. the principal states that a community or group owns information collectively in the same way that an individual owns his or her personal information. • c o n t r o l asserts that first nation communities and representative bodies are within their rights to control research and information management processes which affect them, including all stages of research projects, research policies, resources, processes, frameworks, data management, etc. • a c c e s s refers to the right of first nations people to access information and data about themselves and their communities regardless of where these are held, and to make decisions regarding access to their collective information. • p o s s e s s i o n refers to the actual custody and holding of the data. it is distinguished from ownership for being more literal in its understanding. first articulated in 1998, the ocap™ principles are specific to first nations – although their creators acknowledge possible parallel principles elsewhere. a seminal 2002 article describes them as “a political response to colonialism and the role of knowledge production in reproducing colonial relations” (espey, 2002, p. 6). the principles arose through the development and administration of the first nations regional health survey (rhs), a national health survey conducted on and by first nations people on reserves. the fnigc, whose core staff members have overseen administration of the rhs over the past sixteen years, describes the motivation behind their emergence as follows: in the 1990s, first nations were increasingly dissatisfied with canadian privacy and access to information laws that did not meet their needs and aspirations. first nations believed they had been “researched to death” with little or nothing to do with the information that was collected from them and taken out of their communities. the first nations principles of ocap (ownership, control, access and possession) were initially coined as “oca” in 1998 as a framework for asserting self-governance over information related to research…the “p” for                                                                                                                 3 at a workshop delivered in january 2013 to aandc staff, staff of the first nation information governance centre indicated that the trademark was acquired to protect the acronym ocap (ownership, control, access and possession) from improper and unauthorized use. the presenters indicated that the acronym should be referenced in documents as ocap™. this will be the approach taken here. however, at least one first nation official interviewed questioned the decision to trademark the principles – with the justification that it is individual first nation communities, not a national first nation organization, that own the principles and determine their meaning in practice.   11 bruhn: useful approaches to the governance of indigenous data published by scholarship@western, 2014   possession was later added as a mechanism to support the previous three principles. (first nations regional health survey, 2011, p. 14) a major concern animating ocap™ has been to ensure the collective ownership and privacy of information about first nation communities. existing federal and provincial laws protect individual privacy but do not acknowledge, let alone protect, communal or collective privacy. as communities that are comparatively small and easily identifiable, first nations can be and have been stigmatized by publications based on information about them. the ocap™ principles seek to address by asserting ownership, by the first nation community, of data concerning its members. a second motivation relates to ensuring that research conducted by external researchers benefits communities. historically, first nations people have been treated as objects in ways that have disempowered, misrepresented, and even brought physical harm to them. as a means to reverse such practices, the principles seek to ensure community control of the research processes. they provide a framework requiring researchers to gain permission from the community’s political leadership before commencing work, and to work in close partnership with members at all stages, including sharing and publishing results. control of the process is thought ultimately to improve the accuracy and relevance of the final products and also to build research capacity where it is required, within first nations themselves. the access principle of the broader ocap™ framework becomes critical for first nations and regional organizations seeking to access and use the administrative data and records held by other governments. interviews with first nation officials, including those in organizations with formal data sharing agreements with other governments, indicated that access to government data on their citizens remains a chronic concern. noted with particular frequency was difficulty in accessing data from the indian registry, as well as provincial and federal government health data, due to privacy and health data-specific laws and policies. a further concern cited concerns cases where information held by another government is shared with external parties without consent or knowledge of the first nation partner. the possession principle reflects a commitment physically to hold the data assets on a first nationcontrolled server. some first nation officials interviewed emphasized the need to hold and use data at the community level. one reason cited was economic. adherence to ocap™ principles at the community level provides first nation members with opportunities for skilled jobs and professional development, rare in many remote communities. a second reason is nation rebuilding. data owned, held, and accessed by communities are more readily available for use in strategic planning, monitoring, and reporting to the membership at that level. third, where first nation communities are the rightsholders, including of the inherent right of self-government, they are the primary rightful owners of their data. an interviewee from a northern ontario tribal council serving nine remote communities stressed this point on the example of education data. schools in each community hold and interpret key program data themselves, with remote backup. in this case, the issue is to ensure that capacity to manage and analyze the data exists, and remains, at the community level. in a related community-centred vein, an assembly of first nations (afn, 2007) publication stated: “quite simply it is the first nation community whose data or information is at stake that decides what these principles really mean” (p. 5). 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 2 [2014], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.2.5   of central importance to understanding the ocap™ principles is that they arose as part of a broader assertion of jurisdiction by first nations to govern their own affairs. self-governance of data both supports and reflects the purpose of self-determination more broadly. consistent with this intent is the expanding application of the principles from research-related information to program and administrative data and even to it infrastructure. o t h e r j u r i s d i c t i o n s this review of indigenous approaches to indigenous data governance focused mainly on first nations in canada, but also examined some approaches in the united states and australia. it revealed similar issues and related objectives among indigenous peoples in the other two jurisdictions as well. in the united states, for example, the indigenous first archivists circle (fac, 2007), protocols for native american archival materials, recognized the “sovereign governments and associated rights of native american communities” (p. 4). similar to the ocap™ principles, the protocols challenge the ideal of unfettered access to archival resources: archivists and librarians taught to champion intellectual freedom and unfettered access to resources may be troubled by the notion that in native american and other indigenous communities knowledge can be collectively owned and that access to some knowledge may be restricted as a privilege rather than a right. these views of information are not irreconcilable, given that archives and libraries often contain restricted materials, classified materials, secret materials, or materials that may not be accessed until some future date. (fac, 2007, p. 3) also in the united states, fisher and ball (2003) described a “tribal participatory research model” that facilitates active involvement of american indian and alaska native communities in health research. collaborations between researchers and tribal governments engage community participants in all aspects of the research, from conceptualizing the issues to be investigated to developing a research design, and from collecting, analyzing, and interpreting the data to disseminating the results. a recent project initiated by the crow and montana state university used the same method to gain water quality data to address health issues in the community. crow tribal members describe their research in a way that resonates strongly with first nation experience in canada: crow tribal members, like members of other tribes, are sensitive about participating in research as we have been researched repeatedly with little or no benefit to the tribe. this experience was different because tribal members initiated the work, the data are useful to us and we are solving the problems we have identified. the fact that the impetus for this research originated with the community continues to be the single most important factor in the overall success of our crow water project (cummins et. al, 2010, p. 167). in australia, the australian library and information association (2012) published the aboriginal and torres strait islander protocols for libraries, archives, and information services. first developed in 1995, the protocols were endorsed by the aboriginal and torres strait islander library, information and resource network. recently updated, the protocols have been called “ground-breaking” by native indian archivists in the united states. also asserting indigenous ownership of their archival information, the protocols uphold restricted access to knowledge of a secret or sacred nature. 13 bruhn: useful approaches to the governance of indigenous data published by scholarship@western, 2014   p r a c t i c a l c o n s i d e r a t i o n s the indigenous approaches to data governance described in the last section are highly consistent. they all cite concerns about collective privacy concerning community information, as well as about misuse and potential harm caused by data created in a context of ongoing power imbalances. as an antidote, the approaches propose a governance framework ensuring that any data created and the resulting analysis benefit indigenous communities. the ocap™ principles entail an additional claim of political jurisdiction of first nation governments over data and information concerning their citizens. at this point, it is useful to ask: how might indigenous approaches fit with the continuum of data governance models outlined in earlier sections? which data governance models fit within the overarching framework provided by ocap™ and related principles? i n d i g e n o u s a n d f i r s t n a t i o n c o n s i d e r a t i o n s taken at their face, first nation ownership and control of data might be seen to entail a single organization data hierarchy, only located in a first nation organization rather than in other governments. given the assertion of political jurisdiction, this initial perception would be understandable. and, yet, the ocap™ principles themselves emerged through a survey whose nationallevel results the fnigc intended to—and did in fact—share with health canada via a licence-to-use agreement. data partnerships reflecting the ocap™ principles also exist, as will be see in the next section. finally, it is at least imaginable to have a data commons with a well-defined virtual community agreeing to be guided by ocap™ principles and protocols developed within them. the adoption of a commons model would depend on how widely the indigenous party would like to see data concerning its members accessed and used. recalling that the data governance models outlined earlier did not speak to ultimate ends, the reverse would also apply: indigenous approaches to data governance likely do not appear on the spectrum of models at all. rather, they provide a political and ethical orientation upholding indigenous selfdetermination and respect, which should animate any model pursued. in this case, the overriding consideration on the indigenous side might ask the following: does a given data governance arrangement—whether a data hierarchy, partnership or commons—satisfy the spirit and intent of the indigenous code, protocol or principle? beyond this, does it meet the specific data needs that motivated the agreement? g o v e r n m e n t c o n s i d e r a t i o n s but what of the government party in the data relationship? before turning to promising precedents, we briefly consider priorities, issues, and challenges on the government side. one commentator observed that federal and provincial communities already have ocap™ – although “ocap for the dominant culture goes unnoticed” (espey, 2002, p. 27). the government of canada owns all data produced by statistics canada and that agency controls the data creation and analysis process. apart from this, the crown (whether federal or provincial) has historically owned, controlled, and possessed all data assets of their individual departments and ministries as a matter of course. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 2 [2014], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.2.5   through laws and policies governing privacy, confidentiality, and access, both federal and provincial governments control access to the information and data they hold. within this broader framework, assuming government ownership on behalf of canadians or provincial residents, government departments and ministries are no strangers to the data hierarchy model. indeed, even internally, they often find it difficult to overcome barriers to data partnerships. factors that inhibit a more collaborative approach to data governance include: • a long-standing view of ministerial accountability as vertical control in a given government department or agency, existing to serve and protect the interests of the (publicly accountable) political leadership. this understanding of accountability works against horizontal sharing arrangements. • a resulting administrative culture that has evolved to favour risk aversion and top-down coordination of initiatives, rather than horizontal coordination in a partnership relationship. • a limited scope of fiscal instruments through which to promote partnerships. both procurement contracts and annual contribution agreements emphasize cost containment as well as a high degree of control, rather than partnership, as a function of public accountability (allen, juillet, paquet, & roy, 2001). the pronounced hierarchical structures of government departments and ministries have historically favoured a top-down control model in most decision areas, including in data governance. to the three factors noted above could be added privacy legislation, which allows sharing of data containing personal information on a “need-to-know” basis within and across governments, but inhibits the ability to share with organizations considered non-governmental, such as first nations and their regional organizations. and yet equally weighty factors promote co-governance arrangements. in some ways, these factors may be ascendant. ansell and gash (2007) remind us that collaborative governance, involving shared decision-making between governments and external parties, came about as a response to the failures in implementation of top-down initiatives and as a positive response to the growing knowledge and institutional capacity outside government. allen et al. (2001) observed, “nearly everything about the connected (or digital) state requires horizontal governance” (p. 94). they argue that governments have been forced to adapt to horizontal models or risk becoming both irrelevant and inefficient. added to this is a heightened need for relevant, high quality data as part of a concerted push toward evidence-based policy-making and results-based management of programs. in this sense, the question that has evolved in the past fifteen years is not whether, but how public organizations—which were not designed for horizontal governance—can nonetheless achieve it. d a t a r e l a t i o n s h i p s w i t h a b o r i g i n a l g o v e r n m e n t s a n d o r g a n i z a t i o n s certain features of the relationship between the federal government and aboriginal governments and organizations add further impetus to the argument for data partnerships. beyond the general factors noted in the section on partnerships, there is also the unique relationship between the federal crown and indigenous governments and organizations. program and service 15 bruhn: useful approaches to the governance of indigenous data published by scholarship@western, 2014   delivery for indigenous people depends on productive partnerships with communities (aandc, 2012). in a practical sense, therefore, responsibility for the outcomes of programs and services delivered is shared. both aboriginal organizations and the federal government require relevant data to demonstrate their progress in improving outcomes. added to this are recognitions of self-government and the policy goal of increased autonomy for indigenous communities. taking the program reality and the policy impetus together, the government of canada would appear to be aiming at a partnership with first nations and aboriginal organizations, with a momentum favouring increased autonomy on the aboriginal side. it would be strange indeed if the federal government were to continue pursuing a self-enclosed data hierarchy model in the governance of data on aboriginal people; such a model supports neither its program delivery structure nor its long-term policy goals. but a partnership, to be a partnership, would need to acknowledge the major concerns and protocols of the indigenous partners—just as it would the legal constraints of the government ones. s u m m a r y the literature on data and information governance consulted in the first half of this article suggested that there is no one correct model of data governance. whatever approach is adopted, the data created and used should support the strategic goals pursued. this principle could apply to a single organization or to a group of organizations seeking to realize shared goals. the indigenous approaches reviewed underscore the overarching political and ethical intentions of the actors, along with the processes that realize and reinforce them. government considerations revealed an ongoing struggle of factors. strong historical, institutional, and legal factors still favour a single-organization data hierarchy. however, this model has faced repeated challenges in past decades. specific to data governance involving aboriginal people, both the program delivery model and policy goals of the federal government suggest the suitability of a partnership model over a hierarchic one. what data approaches would facilitate creation, use, and analysis of data in a way that supports indigenous governance of indigenous information, yet provides partners with the data access and privacy assurances they require? such questions can be answered only in the concrete. to that end, the next section provides examples of recent data governance initiatives involving governments and indigenous communities that have answered such questions—provisionally, at least—with the sense of benefiting both parties. p r o m i s i n g p r e c e d e n t s within the past 10 to 15 years, a host of initiatives in indigenous data governance have arisen. they feature diverse, often creative, uses of indigenous approaches in ways that also accommodate the needs government partners. drawing from the canadian, american, and australian contexts, the projects profiled below integrate increased attention to indigenous approaches in relationships between governments and indigenous groups. they also indicate some of the challenges that remain. the projects profiled are a mere sampling of the wide variety of new data governance initiatives that now exist. they were selected for featuring either strategic use of data to promote the autonomy, capacity, and governance of indigenous communities, or for evincing a shift from hierarchic data governance by governments to a more collaborative partnership model. where possible, the author interviewed staff 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 2 [2014], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.2.5   members in the initiatives undertaken in canada and received commentary on draft profiles. it should be noted that, with some exceptions, formal evaluations had not yet been conducted for the initiatives profiled. as such, it is not yet clear whether the results the parties anticipate will be achieved in practice. the initiatives profiled below feature three survey and research data relationships, four health data sharing initiatives, and two it and data infrastructure initiatives. s u r v e y a n d r e s e a r c h d a t a u s e a r r a n g e m e n t s 1 . f i r s t n a t i o n s r e g i o n a l h e a l t h s u r v e y ( c a n a d a ) the longest-standing example of a new orientation toward aboriginal data is the first nations regional health survey (rhs), developed in the mid-1990s. funded by health canada. the rhs was designed, implemented, and disseminated by participating first nations in 1997, 2002 to 2003, and 2008 to 2010. its delivery agent, the first nations information governance centre (fnigc), has a licence-to-use agreement with health canada to guide its access and use of the national level rhs data. ownership, control, access, and possession of the rhs data remain with the first nations. the initiative, in other words, is “ocap™ compliant.” the current organization of the rhs reflects ongoing capacity building led by first nation organizations at national, regional, and community levels. formerly a committee of the assembly of first nations, the national-level fnigc was federally incorporated in april 2010. ten regional partners provide oversight, implement the survey, and hold the data collected in their regions. local community members, who are recruited and trained by regional coordinators, carry out fieldwork. local political leaders must also be on board: no recruitment of fieldworkers or survey participants can occur without the consent of the community leadership via a band council resolution. the regional data centres report to regional political leadership. the rhs data is now housed at the fnigc and regional data centres. the organization has developed a number of protocols, codes, and guides to protect the quality, integrity, and community accessibility of the data. the rhs has undergone reviews assessing the quality of its design, collection, and dissemination and has gained consistently high marks from external reviewers. perhaps most notable is a review of the phase i 2002 to 2003 survey by the harvard project on american indian economic development, which concluded: compared to other national surveys of indigenous people from around the world, the 2002/2003 rhs was unique in first nations ownership of the research process, its explicit incorporation of first nations values into the research design and in the intensive collaborative engagement of first nations people and their representatives at each stage of the research process. all of this was accomplished under considerable resource constraints. (harvard project on american indian economic development, 2006, p. iv) according to staff members at the fnigc, a strong partnership with health canada has emerged over the survey cycles. in the experience of the health canada project manager interviewed, the licence-touse agreement has been effective in accommodating requests for a range of health information needs, including official requests for statistics to more programmatic analyses designed to target improved 17 bruhn: useful approaches to the governance of indigenous data published by scholarship@western, 2014   health promotion activities (fnigc, 2011; rene dion, health canada, personal communication, february 7, 2013). for the phase iii data, health canada will work with the fnigc to explore the possibility of establishing regional-level agreements to access results to inform region-specific program management and decision-making. 2 . t h e s u r v e y o n a b o r i g i n a l p e o p l e s ( c a n a d a ) as the fourth generation of a survey conducted since 1991, the aboriginal peoples survey (aps) was developed to collect information that is not covered in the canada census (statistics canada, 2012). its evolution reflects movement toward more targeted, useful, and complete information for policy-makers on the one hand and greater respect for the principles underlying first nation governance of information on the other. the first three generations of the aboriginal peoples survey were developed and implemented by statistics canada, informed by an advisory committee comprised of the national aboriginal organizations. in 2006, the assembly of first nations withdrew its support from the survey, citing concerns about the collection and ownership of the data. the survey was not delivered on first nation communities that year, resulting in a loss of valuable data on the on reserve population. in the lead-up to the fourth generation survey, the funding departments (aandc, employment and social development canada, and health canada) established a more limited, thematic focus on priority areas of employment and education. at the same time, the funders deepened their relationship with the fnigc, an organization with a now long-established relationship with health canada and proven capacity to deliver a major national survey. the result has been two delivery partners for the surveys on aboriginal peoples, two related but distinct surveys that focus on education and employment. in 2011, statistics canada delivered the fourth generation aboriginal peoples survey off reserve while the fnigc is preparing to deliver the first nations regional early childhood, education and employment survey (fnreees) in first nation communities. the surveys’ governance structure features a steering committee of funding partners, a tripartite technical advisory committee, and a secretariat provided by aandc. two key features of the data relationship reflect the first nation governance of first nation information. first, within certain broad parameters established by the funding parties, the fnigc, together with participating regions and communities, has determined the content of the fnreees survey. second, aandc will never own this survey data. informed by the prior work of health canada, the department is now seeking to negotiate national and regional data access and use agreements for both rhs and fnreees data tables. 3 . a b o r i g i n a l a n d t o r r e s s t r a i t i s l a n d e r d a t a a r c h i v e ( a u s t r a l i a ) created in 2008, the aboriginal and torres strait islander data archive (atsida) is a research data management facility designed to ensure storage and preservation of data relating to aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples. atsida seeks to collect scattered research data on aboriginal people, to manage it according to appropriate protocols, and to make it available for secondary analysis. a node of the australian data archive, the datasets are stored at the australian national university and managed 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 2 [2014], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.2.5   by the university of technology of sydney library according to protocols created with the jumbunna indigenous house of learning (atsida, 2014a). of the initiatives examined here, this one comes closest to a data commons. the archive obtains datasets through direct deposits by individuals and organizations. depositors set access conditions to protect the interests of their indigenous research associates and their own academic interests. restrictions imposed by a depositor might be due to the pending publication of research papers based on the dataset or may be imposed in accordance with indigenous cultural protocols specified by the community the dataset concerns. requests for access to a restricted dataset can be submitted for the depositor’s consideration. unrestricted datasets permit use without specific authorisation. along with principles of respect, trust and engagement, the protocols state an explicit intention to stimulate research: “atsida encourages and promotes use of its data archive to stimulate new research ventures and insights that benefit aboriginal and torres strait islander communities” (atsida, 2014b, engagement, para. 3). according to its website, atsida (2014c) works closely with aboriginal and torres strait islander communities to repatriate their materials “through a recognized cultural centre or community organisation (such as a language or knowledge centre) that has a computer terminal available for approved users. responsibility to monitor access to the materials by individuals will devolve to the community organisation” (para. 6). atsida also works with university researchers to provide information relating to their research, with higher education institutions to identify datasets and research projects of national interest, and with governments to influence policy concerning indigenous data, research, intellectual property, and moral rights. the author was unable to find material presenting aboriginal or torres strait islanders perspectives on the atsida archive. further research examining whether this model meets requirements on the indigenous side would have to seek out and incorporate those perspectives. i n d i g e n o u s h e a l t h d a t a g o v e r n a n c e i n i t i a t i v e s 4 . f i r s t n a t i o n s h e a l t h a u t h o r i t y , t r i p a r t i t e d a t a q u a l i t y a n d s h a r i n g a g r e e m e n t : b r i t i s h c o l u m b i a ( b c , c a n a d a ) the first nations health society was created in 2009, evolving into the first nations health authority (fnha). together with the first nations health council, the fnha evolved out of a series of agreements with provincial and federal governments preparing for the assumption by a first nations organization of federal health programming for first nations in bc. the province-wide organization gained its mandate from 203 chiefs in british columbia, making the fnha the first organization of its kind in canada. among other things, the fnha is mandated to collect and maintain clinical information and patient records and develop protocols with the bc ministry of health and the bc health authorities for sharing patient information; to plan, design, manage, deliver, and fund the delivery of first nations health programs; and to enhance collaboration among first nations health providers to address service delivery issues and improve efficiencies and access to health care (canada, british columbia, first nations health society , 2011). in october 1, 2013, all programs and associated data for health 19 bruhn: useful approaches to the governance of indigenous data published by scholarship@western, 2014   canada’s first nations and inuit health branch (fnihb) british columbia region were transferred to the fnha, which now interacts directly with fnihb headquarters in ottawa. on april 16, 2010, the first nations health society (2010) signed the first nations in bc tripartite data quality and sharing agreement (tdqsa) with the government of british columbia and the federal government. a central purpose of this agreement is to improve the quality of first nations health data, to facilitate data sharing, and to ensure that these data are “appropriately compiled, used and shared by the parties in accordance with the principles set out by this agreement and in relevant legislation” (first nations health society, 2010, section 3.1). the agreement allowed for the creation of a first nations client file using an annual extraction of indian registry data held by aandc and transferred to the bc ministry of health, which would act as the data custodian. terms of the data transfer and custodianship are set out in a memorandum of understanding between the bc ministry of health and aandc. both the tripartite data sharing agreement webpage (first nations health council, n.d.) and interviews with staff members at the fnha and health canada indicated that access to first nation client data remains of paramount concern on the part of first nations, along with the understanding and support of both governments to build the capacity of first nations to implement the principles of ocap™ (michelle degroot, joseph mendez, miranda kelly, personal communications, february 18 & 19, 2013; shannon waters, health canada (bc region), personal communication, february 4, 2013). a second motivation has been to enhance governance in the health area in first nations: “because research drives policy development, first nations need to be armed with accurate information to effectively plan and implement programs and services at a community level” (first nations health council, n.d., para. 4). the tripartite data and information planning committee, which is tasked to improve the quality and sharing of first nations health data, facilitate data sharing (including data linkages), and ensure proper use of first nations data held by federal and provincial partners, oversees the implementation of the tdqsa. staff members at the fnha provide secretariat support to this committee, whose three voting members represent fnha, health canada, and the bc ministry of health. the committee works mainly by consensus. in the views of the first nations health authority personnel interviewed, relationships with their government counterparts are strong and improving, although some issues still arise. the issues are due in part to frequent staff turnover in partner organizations, as well as to the limits on the number of individuals with the access and expertise required to perform data linkages. awareness building of the first nations priorities and concerns require ongoing orientation efforts with provincial partners. one staff member interviewed stressed the importance of the high level political agreements to ensure that momentum is maintained when progress begins to stall on technical issues. others emphasized a need for fairly frequent, in-person meetings to build trust and communication and ensure that the partners hold each other to account. specific to the ocap™ principles, fnha staff members stressed a need to engage in a sustained discussion at the community level: what ocap™ means; what province-wide standards should be in place; what data should be owned, held, or controlled by communities or by their mandated health 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 2 [2014], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.2.5   organization, the fnha; and what data should remain with its partner institutions (regarding the first nations client file, for example: the fnha does not yet have the capacity to house the file). in addressing such questions, the organization wishes to honour the spirit and intent of ocap™ in their own context. that context requires them to work in close coordination with provincial authorities, consider their own capacity and strategic priorities, and bring community voices to the fore in governing first nations health data and information. due to concerns of their federal government partners, the tdqsa does not reference the ocap™ principles. however, it does include the following definition of first nations health information governance: “first nations health information governance” is a component of first nations health governance and refers to a structure, process and protocols by which first nations in b.c. have access to first nations data and are influentially involved in decision-making regarding the culturally appropriate and respectful collection, use, disclosure and stewardship of that information in recognition of the principle that such information is integral to first nations policy, funding and health outcomes. (first nations in bc tripartite data quality and sharing agreement, 2010, p. 3) in the view of the officials interviewed, this definition protects the spirit and intent of the principles in health information governance discussions with their partners. 5 . t u i ’ k n p a r t n e r s h i p ( n o v a s c o t i a , c a n a d a ) the tui’kn partnership includes the eskasoni, membertou, potlotek, wagmatcook, and waycobah first nations of cape breton, nova scotia. the partnership emerged from a primary health care transition fund project called the tui’kn initiative (2004 2006), which had the goal of creating a platform for joint planning and collaboration on issues of mutual interest and concern to the five first nation communities on cape breton island. working together and in partnership with the district health authorities, the nova scotia department of health, first nations and inuit health of health canada, and dalhousie university, tui’kn leveraged the size, talent, scope, and resources to better shape the philosophy, planning, funding, and delivery of primary health care services. since that initial project, the communities have collaborated on more than 30 initiatives since 2006. these all build on tui’kn’s shared vision of achieving health status and outcomes that are equal to, or better than, the overall canadian population (tui’kn partnership, 2012). the bands take turns hosting and administering health projects on behalf of the partnership. to support their health monitoring, planning, and evaluation needs, tui’kn has partnered with the nova scotia department of health and wellness (nsdhw), health canada, and academic partners to develop an unama’ki client registry. completed in 2010, the unama’ki client registry is a unique longitudinal population registry of five cape breton first nations. it allows extraction of populationlevel data from provincial administrative and clinical registry systems for use by the bands in their own health planning and in their planning efforts with other health organizations. 21 bruhn: useful approaches to the governance of indigenous data published by scholarship@western, 2014   according to the project manager interviewed for this report, it was a lengthy process to complete the privacy impact assessment on the registry and to negotiate a data sharing agreement between the five bands and the nova scotia department of health (stacey lewis, tui’kn partnership, personal communication, march 1, 2013). not only the newness of the process, but the number of parties and complexity of the data required prolonged the negotiations. on the questions of control and possession, the project manager indicated that each party controls the data that is contributed to the registry. although the registry data is stored off-site by a trusted third party on behalf of all partners, ocap™ principles are reflected in the policies, procedures, and access structures governing the registry data. access to the client registry for purposes beyond those outlined in the data-sharing agreement must go to the unama’ki client registry data access committee. the committee’s six members include the first nation health directors and one member from the nova scotia department of health and wellness. the committee reviews all requests in a process that is said to be respectful of both ocap™ principles surrounding first nations data and the department of health’s legal and policy requirements surrounding the nova scotia health card registry. the registry is now used by cancer care nova scotia, reproductive care program of nova scotia, and cardiovascular health nova scotia to produce reports on indicators that were identified as important by the communities. each first nation receives a report from each provincial program, and the partnership as a whole receives a regional report with data aggregated across the five communities. the reports belong to the first nations and are not to be used for other purposes without their permission. the first nations have also received chronic disease and health care utilization reports developed on contract by the population health research unit at dalhousie university. with information extending from 2000 to 2010, the first nation partners have just produced a series of health bulletins developed to communicate some of the key findings from the health indicator reports to a broad audience including health care providers on and off reserve, chiefs and councils, community members, planners, and policy-makers. communities are using information from the health indicator reports to establish their future priorities and to inform community health plans. the provincial parties, for their part, have also learned more about the health status of first nations people and developed relationships with their first nation community counterparts. according to the project manager interviewed, the tui’kn partnership’s efforts have advanced to date through the persistence of its partners and their shared intention to remove roadblocks as they arise. one inhibitor to achieving a level playing field in negotiating data sharing agreements and pursuing data linkages is the lack of access to legal, privacy, and technical expertise on the first nation side. by contrast, government partners are able to draw on significant in-house legal, technical, and privacy expertise. 6 . c o m m o n s u r v e i l l a n c e p l a n i n i t i a t i v e : f i r s t n a t i o n s o f q u e b e c a n d l a b r a d o r h e a l t h a n d s o c i a l s e r v i c e s c o m m i s s i o n ( f n q l h s s c , q u e b e c , c a n a d a ) due to the relatively small size, dispersion, and health characteristics of first nation communities, the surveillance of first nations health and health determinants is a major challenge. the role of the 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 2 [2014], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.2.5   fnqlhssc is to “assist quebec first nations and inuit communities and organizations in defending, maintaining and exercising their inherent rights in ... health and social services, support them in developing and implementing these programs, and help them gain greater control over the data and information pertaining to first nations people and services” (first nations of quebec and labrador health and social services commission [fnqlhssc], 2009, p. 7). to this end, the fnqlhssc began in 2009 to develop and implement a health surveillance plan specific to quebec first nations. the health surveillance framework is based in part on the common plan developed by the ministère de la santé et des services sociaux du québec (msss). although it lacks the specific indicators to develop it, the plan also draws on the health measurement framework of the eagle (effects on aboriginals from the great lakes environment) project, which identified health indicators specific to first nation communities and focused on holistic quality of life measures rather than health determinants. the inventory developed by the fnqlhssc focuses on selected indicators that can be compared with other jurisdictions, but are also consistent with the cultural and historical background as well as data and reporting needs of quebec first nations. it combines indicators where possible, using such sources as the canada census, first nations identifier, health surveys, vital statistics registries, health services utilization data, specific surveillance systems, and other information systems. most of the data required to make the surveillance plan operational is stored in statutory databases owned by the government of quebec. the initiative was designed, among other things, to assist individual first nations in developing their community health plans. member first nation health directors will be able to access their communities’ results through a web surveillance portal. yet, the project also has a number of additional potential users. health canada, as a partner, will have access to regional-level results of the surveillance. other organizations interested in improving quebec first nations health might consult the project to obtain information on health trends. all external users will be subject to application of the ocap™ principles. in this, as in other data-related initiatives, staff members at the fnqlhscc cited challenges similar to those experienced by the other first nation regional organizations canvassed here (nancy gros-louis mchugh and richard gray, fnqlhscc, personal communication, january 24, 2013). a specific difficulty was accessing provincially held health data due to stated conflicts with provincial privacy, health, and access to information legislation. because the fnqlhssc is not a public agency under the quebec health system, it is not permitted to access the provincial health database. a further difficulty has been a lack of stable funding for the surveillance project to date, as well as absence of shared vision in speaking with federal partners. staff members remain hopeful for a shift in mindset that will allow their counterparts see first nation band councils as more than administrators of federal programs. for its part, the quebec first nations leadership is said to be aware of their need for more complete health data for their planning; many have put into place the required protocols and privacy protections for information at the community and nation levels. 7 . n o r t h w e s t p o r t l a n d a r e a i n d i a n h e a l t h b o a r d ( a n d e p i c e n t e r ) ( u s a ) in 1972, a group of tribal leaders from idaho, oregon, and washington came together to discuss their nations' health issues and to determine how they might work together to address them. the leaders noted that it was often an enormous challenge to obtain health data at tribal level and that tribe-specific 23 bruhn: useful approaches to the governance of indigenous data published by scholarship@western, 2014   data was frequently incomplete, inaccurate, and insufficient. the lack of accurate data hindered tribes' ability to manage health services and implement appropriate public health measures. they created the northwest portland area indian health board (npaihb), an intertribal organization serving 43 federally recognized tribes in the tri-state region with each member tribe appointing a delegate (harvard project on american indian economic development, 2004). the npaihb addresses the need to generate tribe-specific data and provide accurate data on health services and facilitate knowledge sharing between tribes. it provides expertise in health-related services but also facilitates advocacy, health promotion and disease prevention, data collection and management, and empowers its tribes to create and manage effective health care systems specific to individual community needs. the website indicates that the organization is now involved in at least two record linkage projects: the northwest tribal registry project, designed to increase the quality of disease surveillance health data on american indians and alaskan natives; and the improving data & enhancing access – northwest (idea-nw) project (northwest portland area indian health board, 2013). the organization is recognized throughout the united states and was granted a harvard project on american indian economic development honoring nations award in 2003 for having played a crucial role in improving the health status of its member tribes. one of npaihb’s main successes was the development of the northwest tribal epidemiology center (epi-center) in 1997 to facilitate healthrelated research, surveillance, and training to improve the quality of life of american indians and alaskan natives. as the first and largest tribal epidemiology center in the united states, the npaihb epi-center trains member tribes in data collection, relevant statistical analysis software, and data management. it regularly implements innovative programs to enable tribes to work increasingly independently and to customize their own programs. in turn, npaihb relies on the center’s work with tribes in the design and implementation of effective health promotion and disease prevention programs. f i r s t n a t i o n i t a n d d a t a i n f r a s t r u c t u r e i n i t i a t i v e s the following two examples address the it infrastructure component of any effective data governance program. they apply, in an innovative way, first nation approaches to information and data governance to it infrastructure. 8 . t h e f i r s t n a t i o n t e c h n o l o g y c o u n c i l ( b c , c a n a d a ) the first nation technology council (fntc) serves 203 first nation communities in british colombia. developed in 2002 as a committee of the first nations summit, the fntc aims to partner in every region of the province to continue its mandate of providing technical capacity development, highspeed connectivity, information management systems and practices, and technical services and support. its goal is to facilitate the development and use of technology in the broadest sense to support nation rebuilding of first nations in bc. where most first nations in bc are very small, the fntc seeks to develop tools and competencies that are first nation owned and developed and come at a reasonable cost (fntc, 2013a). in conjunction with the fntc, the sto:lo nation developed unification, a citizen-focused it system to assist in managing first nations’ social information concerning education, housing, and 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 2 [2014], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.2.5   employment statistics, among other areas. the application was also designed to make reporting and planning activities required by aandc more efficient and less time consuming. thus far in bc, several communities are implementing unification for information management, data integration, and community planning. through this initiative, first nations can integrate their data in a way that focuses on individual citizens and at the same time ensure more accurate and reliable reporting (fntc, 2013b; sue hanley, former coordinator of the first nations technology council, personal communication, january 23, 2013; gwen phillips, ktunaxa nation, personal communication, january 11, 2013). 9 . t h e f i r s t m i l e p r o j e c t ( c a n a d a ) the first mile project applies the ocap™ principles to it infrastructure and technology development through telling stories of first nation self-determination in technology development (first mile, 2013). it builds on a 2010 study of broadband networks in first nation communities. that study stressed the importance of local ownership and management of first nation information and communication technologies, which are usually provided at higher cost by external service providers. consistent with an ocap™ approach to research, the first mile approach supports the community leadership to make decisions about the development and deployment of broadband networks in their communities (o’donnell, kakekaspan, beaton, walmark, & gibson, 2011). a main component of the first mile project is an online meeting space where first nations can share stories about how their communities have taken ownership and control of technologies. the first mile project is now part of a new social sciences and humanities research council of canada (sshrcc) funded study, formally launched in february 2013. the first nation innovation project features keewaytinook okimakanak (ko), a tribal council providing it support to nine remote first nations in ontario, atlantic canada’s first nation helpdesk, the first nations education council in quebec and the university of new brunswick. the goal of this partnered research project is to focus on how remote and rural first nation communities are using broadband networks and ict to improve their communities, social and economic development and services (first nations innovation project, 2013; brian beaton, former ko-knet coordinator, personal communication, february 5, 2013). c o m m o n t h e m e s although very diverse, the examples cited above present some common themes. among them: • regardless of the model pursued, in negotiating data sharing arrangements between governments and first nations organizations, trust-building as well as frequent contact among the parties appears to be key to addressing the legal, policy, and capacity challenges that will certainly arise. • at the operational level, both commitment and the technical capacity required to begin to implement data linkages is required; such capacity is often in short supply on both government and first nation sides. • there was a distinction among the sharing initiatives to approaches on the question of political support: some started small and built up slowly, seeking support from senior levels 25 bruhn: useful approaches to the governance of indigenous data published by scholarship@western, 2014   as they progressed; others were initiated through high-level political accords that were then progressively implemented. • the first nation data sharing arrangements varied in their interpretation and embodiment of the ocap™ principles. the first nation partners appeared to support approaches that allowed for compromise, as long as they were assured that the spirit and intent of the principles were preserved. • some examples feature local, regional, and even (in the case of the rhs and fnrees) national level stewardship of first nation data. other initiatives are tightly focused on the community level. that said, staff at all organizations interviewed noted their priority to ensure that communities gain access to and have a voice in the governance of the data concerning them. c o n c l u s i o n the profiles presented above represent only a small number of initiatives addressing indigenous data governance. to keep the task manageable, the article has addressed some higher profile examples, which has meant that many local, lesser-known community-based initiatives went unaddressed. many worthy examples—taken in particular from the health area—could not be included here. very little research exists examining these and other initiatives. this gap merits further research attention, given the centrality of data both to the nation-rebuilding efforts of aboriginal peoples and the broader relationship between indigenous peoples and the crown. the potential policy implications of the governance of indigenous data are at once deep and far ranging. how, for example, might a partnership model promote the long announced goal of reducing the reporting burden of aboriginal communities and organizations in canada? how might it guide the sharing of documents and archives surrounding residential schools? how might it interact with current government-wide initiatives, at both provincial and federal levels, supporting open data and open government? these are all topics for a future day. this one – which brings together models of data governance described in academic and corporate literatures on data and information governance with indigenous approaches – concludes an open invitation for readers to offer comments and critiques. as an early, exploratory policy research piece in a complex intercultural area, this article will certainly have provoked as many questions as it has provided answers. 26 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 2 [2014], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.2.5   a p p e n d i x a : l i s t o f i n t e r v i e w e e s n a m e t i t l e o r g a n i z a t i o n brian beaton ko-knet coordinator keewaytinook okimakanak peter cunningham mariana diacu carroll dena chris bechard denise sandison michael ross assistant deputy minister, partnerships & community renewal division ministry of advanced education, innovation and technology ministry of children and family development ministry of jobs, tourism and skills training ministry of social development government of british columbia michelle degroot joseph mendez miranda kelly executive director, health actions vice-president, innovation and information management services health planner, health knowledge and information first nations health authority rene dion manager, health information and policy coordination health canada richard gray nancy gros-louis mchugh manager, social services manager, research sector first nations of quebec and labrador health and social services commission sue hanley former coordinator first nations technology council 27 bruhn: useful approaches to the governance of indigenous data published by scholarship@western, 2014   n a m e t i t l e o r g a n i z a t i o n stacey lewis project manager tui’kn partnership gwen phillips director, governance transition ktunaxa nation diana proesser policy analyst, performance measurement aboriginal affairs and northern development canada shannon waters director of health surveillance, first nations & inuit health branch health canada, bc region 28 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 2 [2014], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.2.5 r e f e r e n c e s aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc) and canadian polar commission. 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(2011). information sharing in public organizations: a literature review of interpersonal, intra-organizational and inter-organization success factors. government information quarterly, 28, 164 175. 32 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 2 [2014], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.2.5 the international indigenous policy journal april 2014 identifying useful approaches to the governance of indigenous data jodi bruhn recommended citation identifying useful approaches to the governance of indigenous data abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license identifying useful approaches to the governance of indigenous data the international indigenous policy journal volume 5 | issue 1 article 1 january 2014 w hānau ora; he w hakaaro ā w hānau: māori family views of family wellbeing amohia f. boulton whakauae research for maori health and development, amohia@whakauae.co.nz heather h. gifford whakauae research for māori health and development recommended citation boulton, a. f. , gifford, h. h. (2014). whānau ora; he whakaaro ā whānau: māori family views of family wellbeing. the international indigenous policy journal, 5(1). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.1 w hānau ora; he w hakaaro ā w hānau: māori family views of family wellbeing abstract this article presents the findings from two studies that investigated the concept of whānau ora (family wellbeing): one examined the nature of resilience for māori whānau and how resilience relates to whānau ora; while the second investigated the impact of the working for families policy on māori families’ perceptions of whānau ora. in each study, māori were asked to define whānau ora for their family. the responses to the “whānau ora” definition question in each of the studies were separated out to derive a unique dataset of 46 whānau definitions of whānau ora. a secondary analysis of responses was undertaken specifically for this article and these were compared to the whānau ora outcome definition outlined in the report of the taskforce on whānau-centred initiatives (taskforce on whānau-centred initiatives, 2010). the degree of concordance between the definitions of whānau ora expressed by māori families and those espoused by the government’s taskforce is outlined. the article discusses the variability in understandings around whānau ora and the implications of our analysis for social service delivery and social policy development. keywords māori, family wellbeing, whānau ora, wellbeing outcomes, social services, social policy acknowledgments our appreciation is extended to the families who shared their thoughts with us and to the two anonymous reviewers who reviewed the article. this work was supported by the health research council of new zealand [hrc 09/035 and hrc 09/627]. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ w hān a u o r a ; h e w h a k a a r o ā w hān a u : māo r i f a m i l y v i e w s o f f a m i l y w e l l b e i n g māori, the indigenous population in new zealand, experience poorer health and wellbeing outcomes across a range of indicators when compared with the wider new zealand population (blakely, tobias, & atkinson, 2008; robson & harris, 2007). in response to these persistent inequalities and their multiple causes, successive governments have developed a range of policies and strategies aimed at improving the economic, cultural, and social wellbeing of the māori population. the latest in a long line of social policy approaches to reduce the so-called disparity gap is an initiative with a unique “political genesis” (ryan, 2011, p. 105). the “whānau ora approach to social service delivery” (taskforce on whānau-centred initiatives, 2010) is an initiative aimed at caring for, and meeting needs of, māori families, fundamentally based on māori cultural values as well as a distinctly māori concept: that of whānau ora1. this article seeks to achieve two things. firstly, it posits the argument that while the term whānau ora is well understood at a policy and service delivery level, the term is less well articulated by māori families; indeed, understandings of whānau ora are variable and diverse amongst the general māori population. this conclusion is derived from the combined analysis of two qualitative studies undertaken in māori communities where participants were asked to define the term whānau ora. secondly, and importantly from a social policy perspective, the article considers this combined analysis in light of how the whānau ora approach to social service delivery was conceptualised and articulated as a policy initiative. the initiative emerged as a consequence of perceived need on the part of māori politicians to effect lasting change for māori whānau; after extensive consultation with māori communities, the initiative was developed by māori public sector policymakers, in conjunction with māori leaders in the fields of health and social service provision. yet, the research presented here indicates that, for māori whānau, the elements that constitute whānau ora do not necessarily match those of the policymakers: understandings of whānau ora prove to be as diverse as the māori population itself. the implications of this diversity of view, particularly in terms of measuring the success of the whānau ora approach, for service delivery and for on-going policy development are discussed. b a c k g r o u n d the term whānau ora is commonly used in health settings, amongst māori health providers, and at the central government level (boulton, tamehana, & brannelly, 2013; chant, 2011); however multiple understandings or definitions of the concept abound. the emergence of whānau ora from a term commonly used by māori providers in the 1990s to describe a model of practice to its use now as a flagship health and social policy is outlined in a separate paper (boulton et al., 2013). suffice to say that, in addition to a range of definitions, the term is used in a number of ways in the new zealand health and social services sector, creating layers of complexity and the potential for misunderstanding. to explain further, whānau ora is at once a philosophy (which focuses on the health of the whole whānau or family, not just the health of the individual), a distinct model of practice (embracing the health and social service sectors), and an outcome in its own right (taskforce on whānau-centred initiatives, 2010). at a philosophical and conceptual level, māori understand whānau ora to mean the wellbeing of the extended family, where wellbeing is measured or considered in its broadest and most holistic sense. in keeping with the worldviews of other indigenous peoples globally (king, smith, & gracey, 2009;                                                                                                                           1whānau ora is defined as meaning “wellbeing of the extended family” unless otherwise stated in this article. 1 boulton and gifford: m?ori family views of family wellbeing published by scholarship@western, 2014 lutschini, 2005; waldram, herring, & young, 2008), optimum health and wellbeing can only be achieved when all facets of a human’s lived experience cultural, spiritual, physical, emotional, environmental and economic are in balance. optimal wellbeing for māori necessarily includes the wellbeing of not only of the individual, but also of the individual’s immediate and extended family (whānau), sub-tribe, and tribe. proponents contend that whānau ora, or the wellbeing of the extended family, can only be determined by ascertaining the health of a person across a number of indicators, many of which lie outside of the health sector (durie, 2006; kiro, von randow, & sporle, 2010; panelli & tipa, 2007). in recent policy discourse, such indicators have necessarily considered social gains such as health; education and societal inclusion; economic gains, as in an expanding asset base; cultural gains including participation in maori cultural life; and collective gains like intergenerational and broader kinship network gains through collective action and reciprocity (māori economic development panel, 2012; ministry of social development, 2008a; taskforce on whānau-centred initiatives, 2010). as a distinct model of practice, the origins of whānau ora lie in a body of work championed by māori health providers, community leaders, policy makers, and māori academics. clearly articulated models of whānau ora practice began emerging in the late 1990s and described the practice of whānau ora as family-based services, where the emphasis was not on the nuclear family but on wider kinship networks (crengle, 1997; gifford, 1999). whānau ora as a model of practice is grounded in māori understandings of health and wellbeing, operates according to the principles and processes of tikanga (cultural values and norms) and is driven by a commitment to tino rangatiratanga or māori self-determination (boulton, 1999). these early models and ways of working with māori families have been further consolidated over the last fifteen years by māori health and social service providers across the country (abel, gibson, ehau, & tipene leach, 2005; kidd, gibbons, lawrenson, & johnstone, 2010). as a consequence of the models having emerged organically from localised practice, a great diversity of whānau ora approaches are apparent and may be found within the range of māori health promotion, community development, and primary health services available today; in other words, each individual māori health service will have its own unique interpretation and application of the concept. unfortunately, these localised understandings of whānau ora serve to add to the complexity of developing a shared understanding of the term. the idea of whānau ora as an ultimate outcome or state of being for a family, one which can be quantified, measured, and ultimately achieved, has emerged in the last two years with the introduction in 2010 of a new national policy: the whānau ora approach to social service delivery (taskforce on whānau-centred initiatives, 2010). it can be argued that the creation of this policy provides a much-needed impetus and opportunity to articulate the various components of the approach in a consistent manner. the whānau ora approach, as espoused by the taskforce on whānau centred initiatives (the taskforce) and outlined in their 2010 report, provides a conceptual framework to guide health and social service agencies’ work in a more cooperative and coordinated manner (taskforce on whānaucentred initiatives, 2010). furthermore, the report clarifies the myriad of domains in which whānau ora activity can occur, defines a series of whānau ora outcomes, and outlines the groups within society and institutions of state responsible for the achievement of these outcomes. the significant addition of a dedicated budget appropriation (from general taxation through vote: health, the means by which new zealand’s health and disability system is primarily funded) and a focus on improved cross-sector integration has resulted in the whānau ora approach becoming a key strategy of new zealand health and social policy for māori. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.1 h o w f a m i l i e s u n d e r s t a n d t h e t e r m w hān a u o r a whilst the existence of a national policy framework may assist to clarify the various understandings and meanings of whānau ora for politicians, policy makers, and health and social service providers, among the recipients of the policy themselves (that is, māori families in the community), a common understanding or definition of whānau ora remains elusive. the term whānau ora is often broadly interpreted, usually being translated to mean “family wellbeing.” the exact nature of family wellbeing, its components and characteristics is not necessarily elaborated upon. therefore, while service providers, practitioners, and health and social service professionals may assume an agreed appreciation and understanding of the term, evidence from two qualitative research projects conducted with māori community members suggests that, for māori families, understandings of whānau ora are diverse and generally context-specific. there is a dearth of empirical material on māori families’ views of whānau ora and the elements that constitute whānau ora. consequently, little is known about how māori families perceive whānau ora and whether these perceptions align in any way with those of the health and social service providers charged with delivering whānau ora services or with those of central agency officials responsible for developing policy and allocating the requisite funding. this article goes some way toward rectifying the lack of empirical data regarding understandings of whānau ora from the perspective of whānau themselves and offers an analysis of the degree of alignment or concordance between the views of maori families regarding whānau ora and the whānau ora outcome goals as outlined in the taskforce report (taskforce on whānau-centred initiatives, 2010). the following section outlines the methods by which whānau understandings of whānau ora were gathered and analysed. c o m b i n i n g t h e r e s u l t s f r o m t w o s e p a r a t e q u a l i t a t i v e s t u d i e s this article presents two sets of analyses. the first was derived by combining the results of qualitative interviews drawn from two separate, but related, studies. the second, arguably deeper analysis, reviews themes from the combined set of qualitative whānau interviews and compares these against the government’s goals for whānau as outlined by the taskforce in their 2010 report (taskforce on whānau-centred initiatives, 2010). the process by which this secondary analysis was done is described later in the article. m e t h o d s the first set of analyses combines the results of two different studies each of which asked māori whānau to provide a definition of whānau ora, for their family. the first study examined the nature of resilience for māori whānau and how resilience relates to whānau ora; the second investigated the impact of new zealand’s working for families policy on māori families’ perceptions of whānau ora. the methods used to collect the qualitative data presented in this article are described briefly below. a more detailed description of the full range of methods used in the two studies may be found in other publications (boulton & gifford, 2010, 2011a, 2011b; boulton, gifford, & tamehana, 2010). t h e w o r k i n g f o r f a m i l i e s ( w f f ) s t u d y . the “working for families” policy comprises a package of social welfare benefits targeting low-to-middle income families with dependent children (perry, 2004) with the aim of providing incentives to those families to participate in the paid workforce and, by extension, contribute to a reduction in child poverty (true, 2005). components 3 boulton and gifford: m?ori family views of family wellbeing published by scholarship@western, 2014 of the policy include increasing family incomes, “making work pay,” assisting with childcare costs, and providing more affordable housing for families (ministry of social development, 2008b). the working for families (wff) study involved four discrete phases of data collection activity: (a) interviews with key informants regarding the intent and expected target audience for the policy; (b) identifying all households in a longitudinal survey (te hoe nuku roa2) who qualify for working for families assistance; (c) analysis of these households over time to assess how their whānau wellbeing has changed since the introduction of the policy; and (d) interviews with a subset of these households to gather in-depth data on their understanding of the policy and its perceived effects on their whānau wellbeing (boulton & gifford, 2010, 2011a). the findings presented here derive from this fourth phase of data collection: qualitative interviews with 30 households from the te hoe nuku roa study who were in receipt of working for families assistance. the interviews used a semi-structured interview schedule developed by the research team and explored, among other things, the meaning of whānau ora for participants. questions included: “what does whānau ora mean to you and your whānau?” and “if all aspects of life were going really well what would that look like for your whānau?” interviews could include as many family members as the whānau thought necessary, although the majority of interviews were only conducted with the mother of the family. interviews averaged thirty minutes in length. each interview was recorded and transcribed and an inductive thematic analysis was completed by the members of the research team (cresswell, 2009). t h e r e s i l i e n c e s t u d y . while there is a growing international literature relating to the concept of cultural resilience (fleming & ledogar, 2008; ungar, 2008), there is little published material available which explores and critiques the concept of resilience from an indigenous perspective (andersson, 2008; boulton & gifford, 2011b; lavallee & clearsky, 2006; walters & simoni, 2002). in the resilience study, we explored the concept of resilience; its usefulness and applicability to māori, whānau, and communities; and the extent to which the concept of resilience contributes towards the goal of whānau ora. specifically, the project explored: (a) the relationship between whānau resilience, māori primary health concepts, and interventions such as whānau ora; (b) how primary health approaches may mitigate risks to the individual through enhancing their personal capacities and abilities; and (c) how engagement in māori primary health services can strengthen whānau resilience through improved access to a range of culturally relevant resources. using exploratory qualitative research methods in a single case study site (where the case study was a māori primary healthcare provider), two phases of enquiry were conducted. phase 1 comprised a comprehensive literature review: a review of case study documents and key informant interviews with case study employees and board members to identify how concepts of resilience are incorporated into a primary health care providers’ whānau ora approach. in phase 2, a series of sequential focus group (sfg) interviews with case study consumers were conducted to gather evidence of implementation of these concepts and in particular, how participation in māori primary health services had impacted whānau resilience. the sequential focus group method is a novel approach to qualitative data collection with indigenous populations that has been developed by the                                                                                                                           2 te hoe nuku roa (thnr) is the longest running longitudinal survey of māori households, comprising a survey using a random sample of 850 māori households (2500 individuals) (durie 1995; te hoe nuku roa research team 1997, 1999).   4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.1 authors in collaboration with indigenous researchers from canada3. it relies on the same group of participants meeting over the course of a number of weeks (in this instance, four) to explore issues in depth. in the fourth week of the sequential focus group, participants were asked to define whānau ora. initial definitions provided were then workshopped in the focus group under direction from the research team, analysed, and discussed until the participants arrived at an agreed definition of the elements that constituted whānau ora. it is the data collected in the course of the sfgs that are drawn upon for this article. r e s u l t s while the two studies had different overall objectives and engaged with different groups of people, participants in each study were asked to provide their views on whānau ora, what whānau ora meant to them, and what the attainment of whānau ora would look like for their family. the qualitative data from each project pertaining directly to understandings of whānau ora were extracted, then reviewed and analysed thematically by a team of senior researchers, each of whom had been involved in the original studies. originally, only intended to inform our ongoing work investigating the implementation of the “whānau ora approach to social service delivery” as commissioned evaluators, it soon became evident that the diversity of views regarding whānau ora that we discovered would be of use to policymakers and practitioners alike; hence, our desire to publish this combined analysis. the resulting analysis was grouped according to a series of high-level themes and it is this material from the unique combined dataset (representing the views of 46 individuals) that we present here. in providing a definition of whānau ora for their family, responses can be considered according to six themes: wellbeing; happiness; sense of belonging, identity, and active participation; support; financial security; looking forward and supporting potential. w e l l b e i n g for many whānau, the wellbeing of their children and future generations was a prime motivator behind their striving to achieve a state of whānau ora. participants talked about wanting their children to experience a better life than theirs, of the importance of establishing a “foundation” for their children, providing children with stability and security, and providing them with a “decent” environment in which to grow up. many spoke about the need for parents to instil values, including cultural values, such as “holding true to ... our tikanga4”, and of holding people accountable for their actions. parents spoke about needing good role models, having healthy attitudes, and demonstrating healthy attitudes through their actions and lifestyles. maintaining personal good health was also regarded by parents as facilitating whānau ora. parents noted that if they were not well, then they would be of little use to their family. most participants regarded whānau ora as a set of attributes that were in balance with each other. having a balance between mental, physical, and spiritual wellbeing were all observed as contributors towards a state of whānau ora.                                                                                                                           3 a paper outlining the sfg method is currently being developed by the authors. 4 tikanga refers to customs, cultural values and norms. when referring specifically to māori customs, the term “tikanga māori” is used. 5 boulton and gifford: m?ori family views of family wellbeing published by scholarship@western, 2014 h a p p i n e s s participants spoke about whānau ora being synonymous with health and happiness. whānau ora was achieved when “everyone’s healthy, everyone’s happy … everything’s happy”. those who demonstrated whānau ora had the capacity simply to live an everyday life and to participate in “normal activities”. these normal everyday activities included keeping the “kids happy, kids clothed, fed, sheltered, warm”. having “enough”, being well and together as a family, having sufficient money, a job, “good” housing, and healthy kids were all seen to contribute towards happiness and, therefore, to whānau ora. unsurprisingly, overcoming potential barriers to happiness was regarded as an important step towards achieving whānau ora. s e n s e o f b e l o n g i n g o r i d e n t i t y a n d a c t i v e p a r t i c i p a t i o n participants spoke about the importance of participation as members of society, whether as a family that is active in the community through to family participation in sports groups and at the local school or marae5. some participants regarded having a sense of “place” and of “purpose” as crucial in achieving whānau ora. one participant spoke about the “strong hold to home” and how identity was forged through the ability to participate fully as a member of their community. another participant viewed participation as broader than just family-based activity, stressing family participation “in a lot of society stuff, with the community”. a sense of achievement or having contributed something tangible in some area of life was also considered by participants to be important to whānau ora: with one participant noting that a family that exhibited or had achieved a state of whānau ora was one which was “peopled by those who make contributions”. s u p p o r t many spoke about whānau ora as families who enjoy being together: for example, “a family that can talk, laugh, play together”. family unity, inter-generational connectedness, and a duty of care were all mentioned as critical to whānau ora. according to some respondents when a state of whānau ora is achieved, all family members look after one another, share responsibility for each other, and in turn expect to be supported themselves. one participant spoke about how, in that individual’s own family, “everyone frets for one another when we all separate” and that separation from the whānau is regarded as far from ideal. support networks were considered essential to whānau ora. family connections aside, having a wider network of friends and community members to call upon when required was also regarded by participants as an important component of whānau ora. f i n a n c i a l s e c u r i t y financial independence or security was mentioned by many whānau as being a key aspect in the pursuit of whānau ora. participants agreed that having money “just takes that big load off your shoulders”. being financially well off or secure meant there were fewer stresses or strains on the household. other participants noted that being financially organised in your whānau, taking personal responsibility, having sorted your finances, and ensuring that a regular income was coming in to the family gave great “peace of mind”. conversely, other participants were quick to maintain that financial security alone was not the key to whānau ora. one participant noted that while financial security may have been the crux of whānau ora for a lot of people, “it’s not the absolute be all and end all; it’s not all about money, you know; it’s a spiritual thing, not a money thing”.                                                                                                                           5 marae are the traditional meeting places of māori, usually part of a larger village complex. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.1 l o o k i n g f o r w a r d a n d s u p p o r t i n g p o t e n t i a l for some participants, whānau ora encompassed a sense of future success and of unrealised potential. for these participants, the achievement of whānau ora required a forward-looking attitude and approach. one person, for example, spoke of whānau ora as being an aspirational goal: that whānau ora also embraced the ability “to meet whānau potential”. whānau ora for these participants might not be achieved by this current generation, but could be a goal that future generations strive to meet. to that end, these participants noted that opportunities must be seized when they appear. s u m m a r y o f f i n d i n g s according to the 46 participants who offered their views, whānau ora is inclusive of nuclear and extended whānau perspectives. the wellbeing of children and wider whānau members is a key driver for the achievement and maintenance of whānau ora. being healthy, happy, and living by christian and/or culturally-based values were necessary to achieve whānau ora. a sense of connectedness as whānau and a sense of duty to care for and support whānau members were also regarded as essential. for many of our informants, whānau ora was seen to have been achieved when families were able to participate in everyday whānau maintenance tasks; in other words, what we have come to expect in a developed country as routine entitlements: healthy food, adequate housing, warmth, access to health care and education, and an ability to meet whānau obligations (jensen, krishnan, spittal, & sathiyandra, 2003; perry, 2002). while financial security was seen as being integral to the achievement of whānau ora, it was not seen in isolation of other attributes of whānau ora such as spiritual wellbeing. it is also important to note that the existence of potential, whether at a whānau ora or community level, should not be underestimated. s e c o n d a r y a n a l y s i s : a l i g n m e n t o f r e s e a r c h f i n d i n g s w i t h t h e p o l i c y d o c u m e n t s e c o n d a r y a n a l y s i s m e t h o d s the remainder of this article presents a comparative analysis of the taskforce on whānau-centred initiatives’ (2010) whānau outcome goals (i.e., the government’s goals for whānau as outlined in the taskforce report) and whānau views regarding whānau ora, derived from the interviews described above. a discussion outlining the implications of this analysis is then offered. recent approaches to policy-related research, and in particular policy analysis, suggest that policy is “the result of complex negotiations and contestations that take place to a significant extent within language and discourse/s” (goodwin, 2011, p. 167). increasingly then, researchers are exploring how policy problems are constructed: whose language is being used, to what end (i.e., the ideological positioning of policy and its intent), and by extension, how identities are constructed in policy documents (colley & hodkinson, 2001; marston, 2000). the secondary analysis presented in this paper seeks to explore the link between policy intent and the lived reality of māori whānau. in this analysis, we ascertain the alignment, or degree of congruence, between intent of the policy (as evidenced by the language and goals used in the taskforce report) and the views of a discrete set of māori families (i.e., those who had participated in the two studies described above). the whānau ora taskforce report represents the culmination of the work of the taskforce on whānau-centred initiatives (2010), a ministerially appointed panel charged with the task of constructing an evidence-based framework that would lead to: 7 boulton and gifford: m?ori family views of family wellbeing published by scholarship@western, 2014 strengthened whānau capabilities; an integrated approach to whānau wellbeing; collaborative relationships between state agencies in relation to whānau services; relationships between government and community agencies that are broader than contractual; and improved cost-effectiveness and value for money. (taskforce on whānaucentred initiatives, 2010, p. 6) it is the taskforce report that outlines the government’s principles, expectations, and goals for its new “whānau ora approach to social service delivery” initiative. while the initiative has one overarching aim (i.e., the best outcomes for whānau), three sets of goals underpin this aim, namely: whānau goals; goals for effective service delivery; and goals for efficient governance and management (taskforce on whānau-centred initiatives, 2010, p. 42). the whānau goals represent the highest level of goals insofar as they embody the overall purposes of whānau ora (taskforce on whānau-centred initiatives, 2010, see p. 42). according to the report, whānau goals will be met, and therefore whānau will be regarded as having achieved a state of whānau ora, when māori are able to demonstrate that they are self-managing, living healthy lifestyles, participating fully in society, confidently participating in te ao māori (the māori world), economically secure and successfully involved in wealth creation, and cohesive, resilient and nurturing. the achievement of these goals by whānau at an individual, community, and population level forms the basis for determining the overall effectiveness of whānau-centred initiatives using the whānau ora approach. given the complexity inherent in this policy initiative and the degree of variability we had already identified amongst māori whānau regarding the use of the term whānau ora, our research team was interested in assessing the extent to which whānau understandings of whānau ora matched those outlined by the government in the taskforce report. we were particularly interested in understanding the alignment between the official policy position and the views of māori whānau, for whom the policy was ostensibly targeted, at a point in time when the policy was new and only recently being implemented across the country. to determine how closely (or not) māori views complemented the government’s stated whānau ora goals, we undertook a further analysis of the themes that emerged from the 46 transcripts discussed above by grouping and sorting those themes according to the six whānau goals described in the taskforce report. we then recorded frequency counts for each of the themes based on how many interviews mentioned each of the six whānau outcome goals and made a determination as to whether there was strong, moderate, or limited concordance between whānau views and the government’s view, according to the frequency counts. table 1 summarises how many interviews were required to mention a whānau outcome goal for each of our three categories of concordance. t a b l e 1 : f r e q u e n c y o f w hān a u o u t c o m e g o a l f r e q u e n c y w e a k c o n c o r d a n c e m o d e r a t e c o n c o r d a n c e s t r o n g c o n c o r d a n c e w hān a u o u t c o m e g o a l s < 15 interviews 16 31 interviews > 32 interviews 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.1 table 2 provides a summary of the degree of concordance between whānau perceptions of whānau ora (as identified in our studies) and the whānau outcome goals from the taskforce report. our analysis indicates a strong degree of concordance in four of the six goals, namely healthy whānau lifestyles, full participation in society, economic security, and whānau cohesion. only moderate concordance was noted in participation in te ao māori6 goal and weak concordance in the whānau self-management goal. t a b l e 2 : d e g r e e o f c o n c o r d a n c e b e t w e e n w hān a u o r a o u t c o m e g o a l s a n d w hān a u v i e w s w hān a u o u t c o m e g o a l s s u m m a r i s e d d e s c r i p t o r o f g o a l d e g r e e o f c o n c o r d a n c e w hān a u s e l f m a n a g e m e n t capacity of whānau to determine their own pathways and manage their own affairs. knowledgeable about and participating in their own communities. can access a range of goods and services. able to draw on the skills of their own members, including leadership, in order to advance their collective interests. activity is value-based defined by culture and traditions. w e a k c o n c o r d a n c e whānau described being able to manage, without stress, everyday whānau responsibilities. whānau responsibilities were emphasised and carried out from a set of defined values. h e a l t h y w hān a u l i f e s t y l e s whānau as agents of change promote lifestyles that can lead to optimal health and wellbeing. whānau shape lifestyles by establishing codes of conduct that will endorse healthy behaviours. setting examples, applying a consistent set of values, disseminating information to whānau members, and observing safe practices in homes contribute to positive lifestyle choices. s t r o n g c o n c o r d a n c e parents seeing themselves as significant role models for their children and wider whānau. f u l l w hān a u p a r t i c i p a t i o n i n s o c i e t y whānau able to readily access community facilities and benefit from community goods and services. access to health services, quality schooling, recreational facilities, housing, commercial ventures, meaningful employment, and levels of income adequate for whānau needs are necessary for whānau wellbeing. successful participation in education is a critical determinant of wider participation and is positively associated with better health, higher incomes, adequate housing, and healthier lifestyles. s t r o n g c o n c o r d a n c e whānau described being able to access the full range of goods and services as essential elements of whānau ora. they clearly described the importance of meaningful employment and levels of income adequate to meet whānau needs. 9 boulton and gifford: m?ori family views of family wellbeing published by scholarship@western, 2014 w hān a u o u t c o m e g o a l s s u m m a r i s e d d e s c r i p t o r o f g o a l d e g r e e o f c o n c o r d a n c e c o n f i d e n t w hān a u p a r t i c i p a t i o n i n t e a o māo r i te ao māori (the māori world) has several dimensions that span tribal, community, and cultural endeavours. includes, but not limited to, māori cultural events, iwi6 affairs, marae hui7, waka ama8, and kapahaka9, and ongoing transmission of māori knowledge, culture, and language. whānau will be able to enjoy active participation in māori society. māori society will be sufficiently aligned to the needs of whānau to be able to meet their needs. m o d e r a t e c o n c o r d a n c e some whānau indicated that participation in the marae and kōhanga reo10 was important and māori values such as wairua11 were important, however overall, participation in the maori world was not identified strongly with whānau ora. e c o n o m i c s e c u r i t y a n d s u c c e s s f u l i n v o l v e m e n t i n w e a l t h c r e a t i o n whānau can aspire to levels of economic certainty that do not depend on minimal household incomes or beneficiary payments. innovative approaches to business, enterprise, and asset management will assist with wealth creation. s t r o n g c o n c o r d a n c e all whānau agreed that economic security was a critical element of whānau ora. many also noted wealth creation was not the paramount goal for whānau; rather, having enough to cover basic needs without financial stress often sufficient. w hān a u c o h e s i o n able to communicate regularly and have on-going participation in whānau affairs. households able to participate with the wider whānau, derive benefits from consistent patterns of caring, and experience safe and nurturing environments. s t r o n g c o n c o r d a n c e all whānau discussed the importance of participation in whānau affairs, in particular the responsibilities for guiding, caring, and support. note. source: taskforce on whānau-centred initiatives (2010), p. 7. l i m i t a t i o n s it should also be noted that, as this is secondary analysis, few whānau used exactly the same wording as that of a whānau outcome goal to describe elements of whānau ora for their family. consequently, it is our research team’s interpretation of the thematic analysis of the scripts, and our grouping and coding of interview schedules that has resulted in the analysis presented below. we note that all members of the team who undertook the secondary analysis are themselves māori.                                                                                                                           6 iwi means tribe. 7 hui means a meeting or gathering. 8 waka ama refers to the traditional sport of outrigging. 9 kapahaka refers to traditional performing arts. 10 kohanga reo literally means “language nest” and refers to preschool education centres that operate according to a māori philosophy and in the māori language. 11 wairua means spirit and refers to the concepts of spirituality.   10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.1 the moderate degree of concordance evident in the “confident whānau participation in te ao māori” (the maori world) goal may be partly due to the sources of data that were used in the analysis. whānau ora, while an important, embedded aspect of both of our studies, was not the sole focus of the interviews. for example, the interview schedule for participants in the wff study was largely focused around the impact of economic wellbeing on whānau wellbeing. the question relating to the meaning of whānau ora was part of the wider interview guide; therefore, participants may not have been focused on thinking around te ao māori. secondly, those who participated in the resilience study’s sequential focus groups were concentrating on defining resilience and its meaning within māori health services. participants talked specifically about why they identified closely with a māori health service, their sense of belonging to the tribal collective, and their commitment to the driving purpose of the service. however, this same perception of the importance of cultural identity and belonging was not evident when they were asked the question: “what is whānau ora?” finally, it is possible that those who are already immersed in te ao māori already regard “being māori” as an integral part of their identity; therefore, they may not consider “confident participation in te ao māori” as a whānau ora outcome in the same way that someone who is less confident in their māoritanga12, and who is making a conscious effort to become more self-assured in the māori world, would. similarly, the weak alignment of whānau views and taskforce views on the “whānau selfmanagement” goal may be attributable to the fact that our participants, particularly in the wff study, were preoccupied with day-to-day existence and may not yet have been in a position either socially or economically to be the masters of their own destiny. while participants in the two studies described attributes or behaviours that could be aligned with this outcome, we found only limited reference to the concepts of self-determination, self-management, self-efficacy, or leadership amongst our study participants. d i s c u s s i o n the analysis presented here highlights that for māori whānau there is not, as yet, a globally understood definition of whānau ora. many of the families we interviewed were able to discuss elements that contributed to a sense of whānau ora for their family. however, it was equally clear that achieving a state of whānau ora was both time and context dependent and differed from family to family depending on where along a continuum of financial, social and cultural security, and confidence they placed themselves at any one time. the analysis shows too that the concept of whānau ora is complex; the direct translation of the word into the phrase “family wellbeing” is inadequate to describe a largely multi-dimensional concept that is underpinned by māori cultural values. specifically, the achievement of whānau ora requires a recognition that māori must be able to live, act, and associate as māori, and have the opportunity to participate in cultural institutions and traditions of significance. while we found only limited acknowledgement of participation in te ao māori as an indicator of whānau ora for our participants, for those who did identify, this as an important contributor to whānau ora: active participation in the decision-making, governance, and support roles associated with their iwi (tribe), hapū (sub-tribe), and marae (traditional gathering place) was regarded as crucial to their and their family’s wellbeing.                                                                                                                           12 māoritanga in this sense refers to one’s personal skills, knowledge, and ability to understand and operate in the māori world and in māori settings. 11 boulton and gifford: m?ori family views of family wellbeing published by scholarship@western, 2014 these findings that there is no one understanding of whānau ora; that whānau ora is a multidimensional concept; and that, even for whānau with only limited understanding of the cultural institutions of te ao māori, access to these institutions remains important – have implications for those providing social services to māori families. the range of responses provided by māori whānau as to what constitutes whānau ora means that a “one-size fits all” or single-sector approach to working with māori families is now, more than ever, neither appropriate or relevant; nor is it likely to effect substantive and meaningful change for those families. social service providers and their staff will necessarily have to be flexible when working with families and have to be able to work across sectors. providers must appreciate that the achievement of whānau ora for each family may require different whānau outcome goals taking precedence at any one time and must manage and mitigate any tensions that arise as a consequence of multiple funding streams, performance measures, and service contracts. finally, providers should recognise that the ultimate achievement of whānau ora for a family may require long-term investment of time and resources by many agencies and staff. the findings of the whānau ora action research programme initiated soon after the approach was announced and currently being undertaken by a network of evaluation and action research practitioners around the country (te puni kōkiri, 2013) will shed interesting insights into how well the sector has managed some of these important issues. at a policy level, it is equally important to recognise that the achievement of whānau ora for many families is not a goal that will be realised in the short-term. many of the families this policy targets have experienced inter-generational poverty, unemployment, violence, abuse, and even neglect. while māori service providers may be able to develop and operationalise a whānau ora approach, working in a seamless fashion to support whānau to achieve personally-mediated goals, in terms of public administration, it is crucial that funding, contracting, and performance monitoring frameworks, the mechanisms that support this approach, are working equally seamlessly and are implemented in an environment of greater collaboration. furthermore, whilst māori health and social service providers may find it relatively straightforward to operationalize a whānau ora approach to health and wellbeing, mainstream health and social service providers negotiate such implementation with less ease and oftentimes with a great deal of anxiety. given that the bulk of the health and social service budget in any one year is managed by mainstream policy ministries and departments, a crucial challenge to the success of improving māori health and wellbeing outcomes will be the degree to which these mainstream state sector agencies can come to grips with the concept and adjust their service delivery approach to one that better meets the needs of whānau. it is also important to recognise the challenges for policy makers in getting policy to fit as closely as possible to policy recipients’ realities. the whānau ora policy emerged after considerable consultation with māori families and was developed by māori policy makers. notwithstanding this, our analysis indicates the fit between policy intent and reality is not necessarily exact and the achievement of such alignment may well be an impossible goal. a key lesson for policy-makers from the example provided by the whānau ora approach to social service delivery is a that indigenousspecific policies must be well-informed, grounded in indigenous realities, and lead by indigenous policy makers wherever possible. the whānau ora approach to social service delivery represents an innovative and unique way of working with some of new zealand’s most vulnerable citizens. the challenge in translating this national policy initiative into a changed approach in social service provision will require action at a range of levels. at a national level, it requires the immediate implementation of recommendations from the government’s own report into the improvement of public services (state services 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.1 commission, 2011) that align well with whānau ora: specifically, the call for better integrated, crosssector practices to manage complex problems at whānau level. at a provider level, it will be necessary to increase the range of institutions that currently work according to a whānau ora model; indeed, whānau ora needs to be imbedded into social service best practice. finally, whānau themselves need to embrace the opportunity to determine their own whānau goals, to work collectively as a whānau to achieve those goals, and move towards their own, self-determined whānau ora. 13 boulton and gifford: m?ori family views of family wellbeing published by scholarship@western, 2014 r e f e r e n c e s abel, s., gibson, d., ehau, t., & tipene leach, d. (2005). implementing the primary health care strategy: a maori health provider perspective. social policy journal of new zealand, 25(july), 70 87. andersson, n. (2008). affirmative challenges in indigenous resilience research. pimatisiwin: a journal of aboriginal and indigenous community health, 6(2), 3 6. blakely, t., tobias, m., & atkinson, j. (2008). inequalities in mortality during and after restructuring of the new zealand economy: repeated cohort studies. bmj: british medical journal, 336(7640), 371. boulton, a. (1999). tangata ora tangata toa: an evaluation of a māori men's wellbeing programme (unpublished master's thesis). victoria university of wellington, wellington, new zealand. boulton, a., & gifford, h. (2010, december). making work pay: policymakers perspectives on ‘working for families'. paper presented at the māori association of social science conference, auckland. boulton, a., & gifford, h. (2011a). implementing working for families: the impact of the policy on selected māori whānau. kotuitui new zealand journal of social sciences online, 6(1-2), 144 154. boulton, a., & gifford, h. (2011b). resilience as a conceptual framework for understanding the māori experience: positions, challenges and risks. in t. mcintosh & m. mulholland (eds.), māori and social issues (vol. 1, pp. 283 300). wellington: huia publishers. boulton, a., gifford, h., & tamehana, j. (2010, june). resilience and whānau ora: seeking understanding beyond our first impression. paper presented at the 4th international traditional knowledge conference, auckland. boulton, a., tamehana, j., & brannelly, p. (2013). whānau-centred health and social service delivery in nz: the challenges to, and opportunities for, innovation. mai journal: a new zealand journal of indigenous scholarship, 2(1), 18 32. chant, l. (2011). whānau ora: hauora māori models for kotahitanga/cooperative coexistence with non-māori. alternative, 7(2), 111 122. colley, h., & hodkinson, p. (2001). problems with bridging the gap: the reversal of structure and agency in addressing social exclusion. critical social policy, 21(3), 335 359. doi: 10.1177/026101830102100304 crengle, s. (1997). ma papatuanuku, ka tipu nga rakau: a case study of the well child health programme provided by te whanau o waipareira trust (unpublished master's thesis). university of auckland, auckland. cresswell, j. w. (2009). research design: qualitative, quantitative and mixed methods approaches. thousand oaks: sage publications. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.1 durie, m. h. (1995). te hoe nuku roa framework: a māori identity measure. journal of the polynesian society, 104(4), 461 470. durie, m. 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(2012). he kai kei aku ringa: the crown-māori economic growth partnership strategy to 2040. wellington: author. marston, g. (2000). metaphor, morality and myth: a critical discourse analysis of public housing policy in queensland. critical social policy, 20(3), 349 373. doi: 10.1177/026101830002000305 ministry of social development. (2008a). children and young people: indicators of wellbeing 2008. wellington: author. ministry of social development. (2008b). working for families . retrieved from http://www.msd.govt.nz/about-msdand-our-work/work-programmes/policydevelopment/working-for-families/index.html 15 boulton and gifford: m?ori family views of family wellbeing published by scholarship@western, 2014 panelli, r., & tipa, g. (2007). placing well-being: a maori case study of cultural and environmental specificity. ecohealth, 4(4), 445 460. doi: 10.1007/s10393-007-0133-1 perry, b. 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(2010). whānau ora: report of the taskforce on whānau-centred initiatives. report produced for hon tariana turia, minister for the community and voluntary sector. retrieved from www.tpk.govt.nz/_documents/whanauora-taskforce-report.pdf te hoe nuku roa research team. (1997). reports of the manawatu-whanganui and gisborne baseline studies. palmerston north: department of māori studies, massey university. te hoe nuku roa research team. (1999). te hoe nuku roa source document: baseline history. palmerston north: school of māori studies, massey university. te puni kōkiri. (2013). whānau ora fact sheet. retrieved from http://www.tpk.govt.nz/_documents/whanau-ora-fact-sheet-august-2013.pdf true, j. (2005). methodologies for analysing the impact of public policy on families: a conceptual review. wellington: the families commission. ungar, m. (2008). resilience across cultures. british journal of social work, 38, 218 235. waldram, j. b., herring, a., & young, t. k. (2008). aboriginal health in canada (2nd ed.). toronto: university of toronto press. walters, k. l., & simoni, j. m. (2002). reconceptualizing native women's health: an "indigenist" stress-coping model. american journal of public health, 92(4), 520 524. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.1 the international indigenous policy journal january 2014 whānau ora; he whakaaro ā whānau: māori family views of family wellbeing amohia f. boulton heather h. gifford recommended citation whānau ora; he whakaaro ā whānau: māori family views of family wellbeing abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license whä†nau ora; he whakaaro ä• whä†nau: mä†ori family views of family wellbeing realist review of programs, policies, and interventions to enhance the social, emotional, and spiritual well-being of aboriginal and torres strait islander young people living in out-of-home care the international indigenous policy journal volume 8 | issue 3 article 5 july 2017 realist review of programs, policies, and interventions to enhance the social, emotional, and spiritual well-being of aboriginal and torres strait islander young people living in out-ofhome care sophie lindstedt university of melbourne, sophie.lindstedt@gmail.com kristen moeller-saxone university of melbourne, kristen.moeller@orygen.org.au carly black victorian aboriginal child care agency, carlinab@vacca.org helen herrman university of melbourne, h.herrman@unimelb.edu.au josef szwarc recommended citation lindstedt, s. , moeller-saxone, k. , black, c. , herrman, h. , szwarc, j. (2017). realist review of programs, policies, and interventions to enhance the social, emotional, and spiritual well-being of aboriginal and torres strait islander young people living in out-ofhome care. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(3). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.5 realist review of programs, policies, and interventions to enhance the social, emotional, and spiritual well-being of aboriginal and torres strait islander young people living in out-of-home care abstract the child protection system in australia includes out-of-home care (oohc) for children and young people at risk of harm and neglect. in australia, aboriginal and torres strait islander children and young people are 9 times more likely to be placed in care than non-aboriginal young people (australian institute of health and welfare, 2015). australia’s history of colonization and subsequent policies have caused trauma to individuals, families, and communities and resulted in poor physical and mental health and mistrust of services. this review was undertaken to identify programs and policies currently in place that aim to improve the mental health and well-being of this vulnerable population. it provides an analysis of both the strengths of the current system as well as what has been inadequately addressed based on literature in the area.by incorporating an aboriginal perspective, this review focuses on social, emotional, and spiritual well-being (seswb) and the aspects of a child’s life and community that promote this. a realist review of the academic and grey literature was conducted in 2014. it included an extensive search of government and non-government (ngo) publications. the review identified nine programs or policies that are designed to improve the seswb of aboriginal young people in oohc in local and international settings. these are the aboriginal and torres strait islander child placement principle, cultural support plans, aboriginal community controlled organisations (accos), family group decision-making, therapeutic care, and panyappi mentoring program. given that culturally competent service provision is important to seswb, the review concludes that an increase in monitoring and evaluation is necessary to determine the effectiveness of programs and ensure their implementation and sustainability when warranted. policy and research work is needed to adapt and devise programs promoting the seswb of aboriginal young people (at both the individual and system levels), determine their effectiveness, and ensure they are sustained when warranted. keywords aboriginal, mental health, well-being, policy, programs acknowledgments mr peter lewis and ms connie salomone at the victorian aboriginal child care agency, and the aboriginal reference group for the ripple study provided support for the research creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ realist review of programs, policies, and interventions to enhance the social, emotional, and spiritual well-being of aboriginal young people living in out-of-home care (oohc) the child protection system in australia includes out-of-home care (oohc) for children and young people who are considered at-risk for harm or neglect. when children are placed in care, they can be at high risk of both mental and physical health problems as well as poor social and educational outcomes (cummins, 2012). in australia, the aboriginal and torres strait islander population is disproportionately represented in oohc (australian institute of health and welfare, 2016). the mental health and well-being of this group is of paramount importance and support may be necessary for aboriginal australians and torres strait islanders to either achieve or regain mental health following removal from their families. this article reviews and examines published evidence about a variety of programs that are designed to enhance the mental health and well-being of aboriginal young people (aged 12-18) living in oohc services. this age group is the focus of this review because adolescence is an important developmental stage when mental health needs can be high. issues such as low levels of school participation, involvement with the criminal justice system, and problems with substance use during this period can be linked to mental health problems and subsequent adjustment problems as young adults (walker, robinson, adermann, & campbell, 2014). if not addressed, the impacts of trauma can be carried through into adulthood causing significant lifetime distress. beyond the consequences felt by individuals, untreated trauma may also have negative effects on the health and wellbeing of families across multiple generations. as such, it is critical to understand what kinds of programs and support services are available to young aboriginal australians and torres strait islanders and which have been shown to be effective. background what is out-of-home care? oohc is the system that australia has developed to care for and protect young people (i.e., up to the age of 18) who cannot live with their parents. oohc is used in cases in which a young person is (a) considered to be at risk of harm within his or her family, or (b) his or her parents can no longer safely care for or protect him or her. the oohc system in australia is broadly divided into two categories: home-based care and residential care. home-based care refers to placements with carers who are reimbursed (or who have been offered but declined reimbursement) for expenses relating to the care of a child. there are three subcategories of home-base care: relative or kinship care, foster care, and other home-based oohc (australian institute of health and welfare, 2015). residential care, by contrast, refers to placements in residential facilities with paid workers who are employed as either rostered staff or live-in carers (australian institute of health and welfare, 2015). large numbers of children are in oohc both in australia and internationally. in australia, the rate of children in oohc has increased by 20% between 2010 and 2015; the 2015 figure notes that 8.1 out of every 1,000 children in australia are in oohc (australian institute of health and welfare, 2016). this is higher than the rates in both the united kingdom (uk) and the united states (us). in the uk, for example, the rate of children in oohc was 6 per 1,000 as of march 31, 2016 (u.k. department for 1 lindstedt et al.: review of programs to support young people in out-of-home care published by scholarship@western, 2017 education, 2016). in the united states, the number of children and young people in care on september 30, 2015 was 428,000 or 5.8 per 1,000 (u.s. department of health and human services, 2016). aboriginal and torres strait islanders in out-of-home care in australia, aboriginal and torres strait islander children and young people are greatly overrepresented in oohc. although aboriginal and torres strait islander children make up only 4.7% of the total population of children aged 0 to 17 years in australia (secretariat of national aboriginal and islander child care [snaicc], 2013a), they make up approximately 35% of all children and young people in oohc (australian institute of health and welfare, 2015). data from 2014 to 2015 show that aboriginal and torres strait islander children are living in oohc at a rate 52.5 per 1,000 children, compared to 8.1 per 1,000 children for the total population (australian institute of health and welfare, 2016). this data also shows that they are 9 times more likely than their non-aboriginal or non-torres strait islander counterparts to be placed in care. these higher odds of being placed in care range from 2.6 in tasmania to 15.5 in western australia (australian institute of health and welfare, 2015). internationally, in other colonized countries such as canada, the us, and new zealand, indigenous children are overrepresented in oohc. there are multiple and complex reasons for the overrepresentation of aboriginal children in the child welfare system. aboriginal communities experience higher levels of poverty, homelessness, poor health, unemployment, imprisonment, and other socio-economic disadvantages, along with lower levels of education, than their non-aboriginal counterparts. parental issues with drug and alcohol misuse and abuse, family violence, poor mental health, and cognitive impairment can all lead to children entering oohc —often, more than one of these are determining factors. additionally, child protection workers’ lack of understanding of aboriginal childcare practices can influence their assessments of parental care (snaicc, 2013a). the differential rate of these risk factors in aboriginal and torres straight islander families is the legacy of over two centuries of devastating, violent, and intrusive legislation, policies, and practices by governments in australia. this has been articulated by the aboriginal and torres strait islander healing foundation development team (2009), which noted: many of the problems prevalent in aboriginal and torres strait islander communities today— alcohol abuse, mental illness and family violence . . . have their roots in the failure of australian governments and society to acknowledge and address the legacy of unresolved trauma still inherent in aboriginal and torres strait islander communities. history of forced removal when discussing aboriginal young people in oohc, it is important to consider australia’s history and the legacy of the stolen generations—the forced, systematic, and widespread permanent removal of children from their parents and communities—as well as the lifelong and intergenerational impacts of colonial policies (human rights and equal opportunity commission, 1997). indeed, it has been noted that colonisation and past policies continue to directly impact aboriginal and torres strait islander children and families in australia (cummins, 2012; human rights and equal opportunity commission, 1997). these policies have inflicted trauma upon individuals, families, and communities, and they have often resulted in the loss of family structures and family connections, of language, of culture, and of land. as emphasised in our children, our dreaming, this multi-layered loss of 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.5 connection continues to affect the social and emotional well-being of aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples (snaicc, 2013a). specifically, the history of forced removal in australia is at the core of many difficulties faced by aboriginal and torres strait islander people, particularly insofar as it continues to create barriers in terms of trust and successful cultural care (human rights and equal opportunity commission, 1997). the intergenerational trauma resulting from forced removal has been linked to substance use, mental health difficulties, family violence, imprisonment, homelessness, and poverty among aboriginal and torres strait islander people (atkinson, nelson, brooks, atkinson, & ryan, 2014). the programs and policies discussed in this review demonstrate the resilience of aboriginal and torres strait islander people—especially considering the broader context of colonial loss, violence, and dislocation with which they must contend. aboriginal and torres strait islander definitions of the family unit, attachment, and parenting considering the effect of the oohc system on australia’s aboriginal and torres strait islander population requires an understanding of childrearing and attachment in australian aboriginal and torres strait islander cultures. in general, aboriginal and torres strait islander cultures are collectivist, and thus their approaches to childrearing have often been described as collectivist, too (yeo, 2003). traditionally, aboriginal and torres strait islander children are raised with close connections to their extended family members and to their communities; as such, they can be cared for by multiple people and might occasionally be apart from their biological parents for lengthy periods of time (yeo, 2003). these children therefore often form multiple close attachments and have larger “secure bases,” which form an “attachment network” (mcclung, 2007; yeo, 2003). ethnocentric approaches to understanding childrearing can lead to inappropriate decisions to place aboriginal and torres strait islander children in care because child welfare workers misunderstand how attachment networks, which include kin, actually function. mental health and well-being for children in out-of-home care upon entering care, children and young people across racial and ethnic backgrounds have already experienced a number of adversities including neglect, trauma, abuse, and social disadvantage. many of these children have poorer mental and physical health, poorer educational and social outcomes, as well as a higher likelihood of truancy and delinquency, drug and alcohol problems, and self-harm and suicide (cummins, 2012; fleming, bamford, & mccaughley, 2005; mcauley & davis, 2009; pecora, roller white, jackson, & wiggins, 2009; sawyer, carbone, searle, & robinson, 2007; state government of victoria, 2011). turney and wildeman (2016) have suggested that these problems may also relate to a poorer quality of life for children during their time in care. furthermore, these problems often extend into adulthood, with care-leavers at a much higher risk of experiencing adverse outcomes. these outcomes include financial hardship, housing instability or homelessness, involvement in the criminal justice system, suicidal behaviours, and early pregnancies (dworsky & courtney, 2009). unstable care placement during childhood is a major factor contributing to adverse mental health outcomes for children in oohc (commission for children and young people and child guardian, 2013; tarrensweeney, 2008). these issues are comparable globally, with children in care in the uk and the us facing similar concerns in terms of mental health and social outcomes (mcauley & davis, 2009; pecora et al., 2009). 3 lindstedt et al.: review of programs to support young people in out-of-home care published by scholarship@western, 2017 mental health and well-being among australian aboriginal and torres strait islander people health from an aboriginal perspective is holistic. the most widely accepted definition of health, endorsed by the national aboriginal community controlled health organisation (naccho, 2016), includes: not just the physical well-being of an individual but refers to the social, emotional and cultural well-being of the whole community in which each individual is able to achieve their full potential as a human being thereby bringing about the total well-being of their community. this is a whole of life view and includes the cyclical concept of life-death-life. (aboriginal health section, paras. 1-2; see also national aboriginal health strategy, 1989) the world health organization, in its definition of mental health, has noted the connection between individual and community well-being: mental health is a state of well-being in which an individual realizes his or her own abilities, can cope with the normal stresses of life, can work productively and is able to make a contribution to his or her community. (world health organization, 2016, para. 2) episodes of mental illness in the general population are initially treated in the primary health system or referred to mental health services for specialist treatment. aboriginal and torres strait islander experts stress the importance of a shared, cooperative approach to defining mental health for aboriginal and torres strait islander people (ypinazar, margolis, haswell-elkins, & tsey, 2007). from an aboriginal perspective, services should not just aim for an absence of the signs and symptoms of mental illness in an individual, but should “strive to achieve the state where every individual is able to achieve their full potential as a human being of their community” (naccho cited in aboriginal health and medical research council of new south wales, n.d., para. 4). a meta-synthesis of studies conducted with aboriginal and torres strait islander people found that attempts at defining mental health included elements of cultural, spiritual, social, and emotional well-being (ypinazar et al., 2007). ypinazar et al. (2007) also noted that there is no single aboriginal and torres strait islander culture, and thus a definitive consensus regarding the definition of mental health has not yet been reached. well-being in an aboriginal and torres strait islander context is affected by many factors, including housing, education, financial security, cultural connection, and support, as well as australia’s history of colonization and the grief, trauma, and loss that this caused (bamblett, frederico, harrison, jackson, & lewis, 2012; commission for children and young people and child guardian, 2013; haswell, blingnault, fitzpatrick, & jackson pulver, 2013; mcclung, 2007). when the harmony among these factors is disrupted, ill-health will arise (bamblett et al., 2012; commission for children and young people and child guardian, 2013). in australia, mental health funding has been directed to support the mental health of aboriginal and torres strait islander people and targeted strategies for aboriginal people are included in the current roadmap for national mental health reform 2012-2022 (council of australian governments, 2012). the government also funds specialist child and adolescent mental health services up to the age of 18 years for those living with serious mental illness. these mental health services are aimed at young people with diagnosable psychiatric disorders that seriously affect their growth and development and/or lead to 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.5 major problems in their social or family environments. treatments range from community support to hospital-based services, and include prescription medication. one innovative initiative in victoria, australia sought to address the mental health needs of young people in oohc by ensuring they would receive priority access to mental health support without needing to be diagnosed with a mental disorder (victorian department of health, 2011). to our knowledge, there has been no evaluation of the utilization of the priority access initiative by aboriginal young people in oohc. broadly, some of the barriers preventing aboriginal and torres strait islander people from accessing mainstream health services that are provided or funded by the government include a lack of culturally safe services, a lack of awareness of the services that are available to them, racism, shame and fear, complex administrative processes, and the costs associated with care (victorian auditor general's office, 2014). bamblett (2008) found that aboriginal and torres strait islander people are reluctant to access mainstream health services because of both racism and the history of forced removal of children from their parents’ care. in order to conceptualise what programs addressing the social and emotional well-being of aboriginal and torres strait islander youth need to include, it is important to understand and respect the worldview of aboriginal and torres strait islander people. the mental health system, designed from a western perspective, fails to consider this worldview and the lasting impact of australia’s colonial history on indigenous peoples. aboriginal society is collective, and there is not one approach to or one model of aboriginal healing and well-being. indigenous australia is, in fact, multicultural and consists of multiple complex and diverse societies. yet, it is possible to simultaneously understand and acknowledge these differences, while also recognizing common elements, approaches, and perspectives that are shared by many aboriginal and torres strait islander communities. in general, these worldviews value kinship as the foundation of social life, and aboriginal children develop their identities in relation to everyone in their community. methods given the acknowledged challenges regarding the mental health and well-being of aboriginal young people in oohc, this review was undertaken to (a) identify programs and policies currently in place that aim to improve the mental health and well-being of this vulnerable population, and (b) provide an analysis of both the strengths of the current system as well as what has been inadequately addressed based on relevant literature. this review is not limited to a standard, western definition of a “mental health program”; instead, this review incorporates a broader aboriginal and torres strait islander perspective to mental health, focusing on social, emotional, and spiritual well-being (seswb) and the aspects of a child’s life that promote these things. programs that have been included in the review focus on maintaining and supporting connections to culture and community for young aboriginal people in care. the scope of this review included programs for indigenous children in other countries, and it excluded programs targeted to the wider oohc population. this review utilized a systematic review methodology. according to guidelines for systematic reviewing, the picos framework was used for selecting articles (liberati et al., 2009). this framework allows for the identification of the main components of a study design: population, intervention, comparator, outcome and study design. within this framework, the components of interest for this review were: 5 lindstedt et al.: review of programs to support young people in out-of-home care published by scholarship@western, 2017 • population: aboriginal young people between 12 and 18 years of age who have experienced the oohc system. • intervention: any program that aims to improve the mental health or social, emotional, and spiritual well-being of the above population; this may include programs at a family, community, system, or individual level. • comparator: a comparator was optional for this review, as the aim was to investigate all studies published that focus on programs like the ones described above. • outcome: there were two aspects of interest relating to outcome: the first concerns the efficacy of a program’s implementation and the second concerns the improvement of social and emotional well-being. improvement in well-being can be measured in a variety of ways, including self-rated happiness, school attendance, connectedness to community, connectedness to family, positive behavioural change, a decrease in offending behaviour, and a decrease in substance use. • study design: all study designs were included, including grey literature. all publications meeting these criteria were included in the review. as the review of existing and relevant literature progressed, we altered our outcomes to include enhanced cultural connection, as this was discovered to be a crucial intervention for well-being. this broadened the focus of the review from only addressing programs to also include policies that impact cultural connection. at this point, we adopted the realist review methodology because it aims to address broader research questions regarding the impact of context on outcomes (pawson, greenhalgh, harvey, & walshe, 2005). we theorized legislative and policy developments as complex social interventions, and so the realist synthesis method was used to systematically review the evidence. whereas systematic reviews seek to minimize bias, realist reviews address issues of context with the aim of providing answers that are appropriate to policymakers and other stakeholders. this review is reported in accordance with rameses publication guidelines (geoff, greenhalgh, westhorp, buckingham, & pawson, 2013) exclusion criteria studies and reports were excluded if they did not involve young people between the ages of 12 and18, if the participants were not aboriginal or torres strait islander, and/or if they did not include young people who had experienced oohc. studies were also excluded if they did not include a program or were written in language other than english. search terms a combination of pico terms was searched. terms relating to the “population” were: • aboriginal, aborig* • “torres strait island*” 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.5 • “first nation” • “indigenous” • “out-of-home care” • “out of home care” • “foster care” • “foster home care” • “foster-care” • “foster-home-care” • “residential care” • “kinship care” • “kinship-care” • “looked after children” • “child welfare” • “child protection” ‘intervention’ terms were: • “program” • “intervention” • “policy” ‘outcome’ terms were: • “mental health” • “wellbeing” • “well-being” • “well being” information sources the following electronic databases were searched: cochrane controlled trials register (central); medline (1950 to may 2014); informit, aboriginal and torres strait islander combined informit indexes, including 26 different online databases (up to may 2014); discovery search (up to may 2014). the search was conducted between january and may 2014 and results apply to publications and policies up to this date. 7 lindstedt et al.: review of programs to support young people in out-of-home care published by scholarship@western, 2017 sample initial database searches yielded 771 articles (see figure 1; moher, liberati, tetzlaff, altman, & the prisma group, 2009). after the removal of duplicates, we reviewed of abstracts and full text articles based on pico criteria and excluded 767 articles. the remaining 14 articles are included in this review. due to the limited number of articles obtained through standard database searches, a grey literature search was necessary, as was handsearching through relevant articles and reference lists, and contacting experts in the field (n = 4). grey literature was sourced through the informit database as outlined above, google scholar, and relevant government and non-government websites. book chapters that were not discoverable using the electronic databases were not included in this review. this review seeks to identify studies wherever they were undertaken. however, the australian-based authors had greater capacity to locate grey literature relating to australia because of both their access to local experts and their familiarity with the context. results policies and programs to improve the well-being of aboriginal and torres strait islander young people in oohc nine policies and programs were found that are designed to improve the seswb of aboriginal young people in oohc. they are: • the aboriginal and torres strait islander child placement principle (atsicpp), • cultural support plans (csp), • aboriginal self-determination through aboriginal community controlled organizations (accos), • family group decision-making (fgdm), • four programs within a therapeutic care model, and • mentoring through the panyappi program. eight of these policies and programs are specific to australia (fgdm is implemented in australia and in other countries). while policies such as the accos are not solely designed for young people in oohc, they explicitly mention their impact on the seswb of this group and are therefore included in this review. table 1 describes the theories underpinning each policy or program and their links to mental health promotion. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.5 f i g u r e 1 . f l o w c h a r t o f l i t e r a t u r e s e l e c t i o n p r o c e d u r e s . records identified through database searching (n = 771) sc re en in g in cl ud ed e li gi bi li ty id en ti fi ca ti on additional records identified through grey literature and handsearch (n = 4) records after duplicates removed and records screened (n = 767) records excluded (n = 753) full-text articles assessed for eligibility (n = 14) full-text articles excluded, with reasons (n = 0) publications included in qualitative synthesis (n = 14) programs included in review (n = 9) 9 lindstedt et al.: review of programs to support young people in out-of-home care published by scholarship@western, 2017 table 1. review of programs and policies to improve well-being of aboriginal young people in oohc program or policy theory for improving seswb indicators of positive mental health for childrena implementation: distribution implementation: barriers evaluation atsicpp child placement principle (tilbury, burton, sydenham, boss, & louw, 2013) atsi people are in best position to make decisions regarding their children. it is a preference system to promote aboriginal empowerment, recognize child, family, and community decision-making. atsicpp promotes positive mental health at the societal level by valuing and protecting children. placement in community and empowerment promote mental health at the individual level. different implementation across different australian states and territories. lacks efficacy in distribution—increasing numbers of children in care, low socioeconomic status of carers, compounding effect of past removal leads to insufficient suitable carers. lack of implementation of decision-making component of atsicpp leads to ineffective implementation. strong compliance with policy and program, but minimal compliance in practice (commission for children and young people, 2016). cultural support plans (csps) (aboriginal and torres strait islander legal services (qld) ltd., 2012; libesman, 2011) maintain young person’s connections with family and community, and engagement in culture. this leads to positive well-being and successful transition through life stages. csps promote positive mental health at the organizational and community levels, and individual mental health by improving social connections and selfworth. child protection practitioner is responsible for completion. not implemented— many aboriginal children are not on guardianship orders, which means no are csps completed for them. none. a indicators of positive mental health for children were developed by maher and waters (cited in world health organization, 2005). 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.5 table 1. review of programs and policies to improve well-being of aboriginal young people in oohc (continued) program or policy theory for improving seswb indicators of positive mental health for children implementation: distribution implementation: barriers evaluation aboriginal community controlled organisation (accos) (bamblett & lewis, 2007; burton & libesman, 2013; rae, 2011) self-determination increases self-image and confidence, improves well-being, connections and relationships, empowers aboriginal communities, and provides adequate cultural care. accos promote positive mental health at the organizational and community levels. however, final decisionmaking remains with government agencies. good uptake in canada. many australian states do not implement in oohc. victoria first to move towards selfdetermination. no mandatory requirement. concerns that traditional quantitative research methods are inappropriate for evaluating accos (see therapeutic care section for one acco program evaluation). culturally appropriate evaluation methods needed to compare outcomes for young people within accos versus in nonaccos. fgdm – family group decisionmaking (ban, 2005; harris, 2008; marcynyszyn et al., 2012; snaicc, 2013b) empower community and family as decision makers. fgdm promotes positive mental health at the community level. trialled internationally and in all australian jurisdictions except the northern territory. removed from new south wales and western australia. in victoria it is rarely used but recent legislative changes encourage its use. inconsistent involvement of aboriginal families in decision making, lack of support for fgdm, and decisions made by aboriginal families lack of authority, which can make the process tokenistic. us evaluation found that diversity of tribal communities made standardised evaluation unsuitable. 11 lindstedt et al.: review of programs to support young people in out-of-home care published by scholarship@western, 2017 table 1. review of programs and policies to improve well-being of aboriginal young people in oohc (continued) program or policy theory for improving seswb indicators of positive mental health for children implementation: distribution implementation: barriers evaluation therapeutic care (tc) (healing foundation, 2013; victorian aboriginal child care agency, 2009) reparative experiences promote healing and recovery. tc promotes positive mental health at the individual level. implemented widely throughout oohc. must be adapted to include culture for aboriginal young people. victorian aboriginal child care agency (vacca) programs—culture is healing—narrative evaluation appropriate for aboriginal context. found “improved sense of identity and belonging; importance of culture as a protective and healing factor, the role of storytelling, relationships, consistency of support and opportunities; csps and education in the intergenerational healing of young people in oohc” (vacca, 2015, p. 37). panyappi program (j. r. higgins & butler, 2007) mentoring for young people at risk of entering or re-entering justice system that aims to reduce offending and risk-taking behaviours in aboriginal young people. not specifically for oohc but a high proportion have oohc histories. panyappi promotes positive mental health at the individual level. one program in south australia. funding reduced since evaluation. demonstrated significant reductions in 12/14 offending behaviours and increased school attendance. also developed stronger sense of self-belief, personal and cultural identity, led to the development of other interests and strengthened relationships with family and friends. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.5 the aboriginal and torres strait islander child placement principle (atsicpp) the atsicpp is considered an important policy to ensure the well-being of aboriginal and torres strait islander children. the atsicpp ensures both that aboriginal and torres strait islander children are removed from their parents’ care only when they cannot safely remain at home and, when they are placed in care, that they remain connected to family, culture, and community. this is important because connection to culture helps build resilience, a sense of self-worth, and self-confidence (dockery, 2011). aboriginal people have connections to culture, country, and community that nurture and support their well-being, spirituality, and identity development. it is important to child and family well-being that these connections are maintained and strengthened (tilbury et al., 2013). in addition, atsicpp acknowledges that aboriginal and torres strait islander people are in the best position to make decisions regarding their children (tilbury et al., 2013). since the 1980s, the atsicpp has been adopted into legislation and policy across australia to varying degrees in each state and territory (see table 2). the principle itself prioritizes placing aboriginal and/or torres strait islander children with a family member or relative (although relatives may not be aboriginal or torres strait islander). if this is not possible, then the principle notes that the child shall be placed with a member of the same community, with a third option of being placed with an aboriginal or torres strait islander family from a different community. as per the atsicpp, aboriginal and torres strait islander children should only be placed with non-aboriginal and torres strait islander carers as a last resort. across australia, 69% of aboriginal and torres strait islander children in care are currently placed according to one of the first three options outlined above (australian institute of health and welfare, 2016). there are multiple reasons why such a large proportion of children are placed with nonaboriginal and torres strait islander carers. first, the principle is neither well understood nor consistently implemented and monitored. similarly, child protection workers often do not have the resources or expertise to find and engage aboriginal families with which to place children (d. higgins, bromfield, & richardson, 2005). second, the already large number of aboriginal and torres strait islander children in care is increasing, which poses another set of challenges to finding appropriate carers for them. as such, although aboriginal and torres strait islander people and communities are often likely to become carers, the system has become overloaded (d. higgins et al., 2005). this trend is amplified by the demographics of the aboriginal and torres strait islander population: the majority of the population is younger than 26 years, with 36% below 15 years old (australian bureau of statistics, 2012-2013). third, aboriginal and torres strait islander families are more likely to be in a disadvantaged socioeconomic situation and hence may not be able to support children. these factors, in tandem with the compounding effect of past removal, results in too few suitable carers for the increasing number of children who need carers (libesman, 2011). in addition to child placement, the atsicpp also prioritizes the involvement of children, family, and community members in both decision-making and support so as to maintain connections with family, culture, and community. these elements of the principle are often not prioritized and are therefore not effectively implemented, even though they are considered as crucial for child well-being (libesman, 2011) 13 lindstedt et al.: review of programs to support young people in out-of-home care published by scholarship@western, 2017 table 2. the aboriginal and torres strait islander child placement principle across australian states and territories year of current policy child placement principle aboriginal decisionmaking recognition of selfdetermination additional principles new south wales 1998 yes atsi families and organisations participate in decision-making regarding placement by means approved by the minister. yes when deciding placement, take into account: child selfidentifies as atsi, child’s wishes, parents from different communities, non-atsi parent, children with nonatsi carer. reunification is a fundamental objective. western australia 2004 yes atsi officer to be involved in placement decision and consult with atsi agency. no none. australian capital territory 2008 yes decision maker must take into account atsi organisation submission. yes placed on first available principle, whether child objects, or whether it is consistent with cultural plan. victoria 2005 yes decisions about an atsi child must have consultation with a community member and acco. yes when deciding placement consider: child self-identifies as atsi, child’s wishes, parents from different communities, one non-atsi parent, if child placed with non-atsi person child must have continuing contact with family, community and culture. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.5 table 2. the aboriginal and torres strait islander child placement principle across australian states and territories (continued) year of current policy child placement principle aboriginal decisionmaking recognition of selfdetermination additional principles queensland 1999 yes participation in significant decisions and consultation about other decisions, which can be done after if urgent. no maintenance of cultural connection. south australia 1993 recommended placement preference system. consultation must be sought on placement decisions. no take into account: child’s objection to placement. tasmania 1997 nothing in legislation. consultation must be sought on placement decisions. no none. northern territory 2007 recommended placement preference system. recognition of role of aboriginal organisation, decision making when nominated. yes none. note. atsi stands for aboriginal and torres straight islander. the abbreviation is used in the table for brevity reasons only. the aboriginal child placement principle is a system of preference when placing an atsi child in care, as well as for promoting atsi empowerment. the details vary across states and territories, but most outline preference systems in the following order: (1) extended family or relatives, (2) an atsi person from the same community, (3) another atsi person from a different community, and (4) a non-atsi person. the principle also recognises the child, family, and community in decisionmaking, as well as the importance of maintaining a connection to the community. 15 lindstedt et al.: review of programs to support young people in out-of-home care published by scholarship@western, 2017 the atsicpp has been acknowledged as a key policy to support and improve the well-being of aboriginal and torres strait islander children in care; unfortunately, however, there are now many reviews demonstrating that there is often poor implementation, compliance, and monitoring of the principle (arney, iannos, chong, mcdougall, & parkinson, 2015). a recent review of the atsicpp in victoria, australia, for example, found that there is strong compliance with the policy at a program level, but not at the practice level. program level responses typically meet the requirements of related legislation, but overall practice minimally complies—particularly, practice is not often consistent with mandatory policy and program requirements. a lack of meaningful decision-making by aboriginal stakeholders, insofar as not all aboriginal young people have had access to atsicpp, together with the complex documentation required by the principle, makes it difficult for child protection staff to comply (commission for children and young people, 2016). cultural support plans (csps) the importance of culture for aboriginal children in oohc has been recognised through the legislative and policy requirements outlined by csps. a csp should be completed in conjunction with the young person when he or she enters oohc, and the document should then be kept as part of the young person’s care records. these plans include sections on the young person’s identity, including siblings and extended family background, supporting cultural links, plans for contact with country and kin, and connecting to community. csps focus on maintaining young people’s connections with their family groups and communities, and engagement with relevant cultural events and activities. it has been noted that maintaining these connections can lead to cultural strength, which can assist young people navigating the care environment—including any related “unintended detrimental experiences” related to being in care. through encouraging cultural connectedness and positive relationships, these plans aim to promote resilience for young aboriginal and torres strait islander people and encourage their successful transition through different life stages (aboriginal and torres strait islander legal services (qld) ltd., 2012). csps are implemented to varying degrees across australia (see table 3), with all states and territories except tasmania having some form of csp. each state and territory differs in its legislative or policy requirements, involved parties, and funding. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.5 table 3. cultural support plans (csps) across australian states and territories csp which children? how effective? who is responsible? how is it funded? when was it developed? new south wales yes—policy not legislation. every atsi child. no data—but it is known to not be implemented for all children yet because it is still a new program. department of community services none, however costs are tracked as part of the system. 2009 western australia yes every atsi child. no data. department for child protection none 2004 australian capital territory yes may be required for atsi child on a care protection order. known to not always be filled out promptly (due to resourcing), but no data on numbers. care and protection services office in consultation with atsis unit, foster carers, and others. none—cultural needs costs are resourced by contingency funding. 2008 victoria yes only legally obliged for atsi on guardianship orders (many children in long-term care are not on a guardianship order). 2009-2010 only 34 children on guardianship orders had a ccp, which is a very small percentage of the overall number of atsi children in care in victoria. child protection has statutory responsibility, in consultation with accos and victorian aboriginal child care agency. current shift to aboriginal family decision-making workers gaining responsibility. none 2005 17 lindstedt et al.: review of programs to support young people in out-of-home care published by scholarship@western, 2017 table 3. cultural support plans (csps) across australian states and territories (continued) note. csps provide cultural support to aboriginal and torres strait islander (atsi) children and young people in oohc. they are designed to maintain connections with family groups and engagement in cultural events and activities. csp which children? how effective? who is responsible? how is it funded? when was it developed? queensland yes— legislation encourages participation of an atsi agency and contact with the community. no official csp policy. every atsi child. no accurate data. department of community services in conjunction with recognised entities (atsi organisations). none 1999 south australia yes—policy not legislation: cultural maintenance plans. every atsi child involved with families south australia for ≥ 6 months. no data. department for families and communities $500/year 1993 tasmania none—no policy or legislation. n/a n/a n/a n/a 1997 northern territory yes—policy not legislation. all atsi children. no data. northern territory families and children none 2007 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.5 in victoria, australia, these documents are the statutory responsibility of child protection practitioners, in conjunction with an aboriginal community controlled organisation (acco); however, increasing responsibility is being transferred to family group decision-making (discussed below). although it has been recognised that these plans are in the best interest of all aboriginal and torres strait islander young people in care (libesman, 2011), the policy was not implemented for all aboriginal children until 2016. this delayed implementation is a major failing of the victorian child protection system, as many children in long-term care are not on guardianship orders and thus would not have been allocated a child protection practitioner.1 a report on cultural care for aboriginal and torres strait islander children, published by the snaicc, showed that in 2009 to 2010 only 34 children who were on guardianship orders—a very small number of those in care— had an active cultural care plan (libesman, 2011). this lack of implementation of cultural care plans is a national trend, with many states and territories self-reporting both low rates of adherence and no method of quantifying these rates (libesman, 2011). government figures, reported in a 2012 review of the program in queensland, suggested that 92.7% of aboriginal and torres strait islander children in oohc had a current cultural support plan; however, further investigation found that non-government child protection agencies described these plans as incomplete and failing to meet children’s cultural needs (libesman, 2011). in addition, an internal review was conducted within the acco, which showed a large proportion of cultural support plans were incomplete (aboriginal and torres strait islander legal services (qld) ltd., 2012). figures relating to the implementation of csps across other states could not be reported in the snaicc report because government agencies did not hold this data. the lack of effective implementation of csps suggests that many aboriginal and torres strait islander young people in oohc are at risk of losing their connections to their cultures and thereby are at an increased risk of experiencing poor well-being outcomes. research is necessary to assess both why csps have not been implemented consistently as well as their effectiveness as tools for improving the quality of care and well-being among young people. aboriginal self-determination aboriginal community controlled organisation (acco) policies and legislation. both nationally and internationally, there is increasing recognition that decisions surrounding indigenous young people are best made by indigenous organisations, resulting in legislative and policy reforms to empower aboriginal communities (burton & libesman, 2013; rae, 2011). in canada, for example, a number of aboriginal childcare agencies have the legal ability to provide the full range of child protection services using federal funding, thereby empowering indigenous communities and ensuring that children receive adequate cultural care (sinha & kozlowski, 2013). similarly, in australia, the importance of accos in decision making, particularly in relation to the oohc population, has been recognised (bamblett & lewis, 2007). as noted in the national framework for protecting australia’s children, we must recognise the importance of aboriginal led and managed solutions in order for aboriginal children to be supported and safe in their families and communities (council of australian governments, 2009). 1 guardianship orders in relation to child welfare refer to the transferral of legal parental responsibility to the state. 19 lindstedt et al.: review of programs to support young people in out-of-home care published by scholarship@western, 2017 despite this and other similar declarations, many states do not incorporate this principle into their child protection systems. although the national standards for out-of-home care made it a goal for aboriginal and torres strait islander communities to participate in decisions concerning the care and placement of their children and young people (council of australian governments, 2009), it has not been made a mandatory requirement to include aboriginal and torres strait islander input throughout australia (burton & libesman, 2013). victoria was the first australian jurisdiction to introduce legislation in an attempt to create a culturally competent service system (the children, youth and families act, 2005) that actively promoted self-determination for communities (see also burton & libesman, 2013; long & sephton, 2011). however, despite this legislation, government agencies have retained final decision-making power. accos are important for overseeing the appropriate placement and care of aboriginal children in oohc and are crucial advocates for the well-being of these children, often offering a range of programs designed to re-connect young people with their cultures. these programs are noted to be effective in terms of increasing self-image and confidence and improving well-being, connections, and relationships for aboriginal and torres strait islander young people in oohc (libesman, 2011; victorian aboriginal child care agency, 2012/13). these organisations vary significantly across australia. in victoria, the largest acco is the victorian aboriginal child care agency (vacca, 2012/2013). vacca runs programs designed to enhance well-being for aboriginal and torres strait islander children and families in victoria. vacca also aims to improve the well-being of aboriginal young people in victoria through a program known as the aboriginal children’s healing team. this team provides culturally attuned and therapeutic services to young people in vacca’s care. there are currently no reviews of this program (victorian aboriginal child care agency, 2012/2013). family group decision-making (fgdm). the fgdm model arose from family group conferences that were developed in new zealand to determine the best interests of māori children placed in care. the aims of the program were to empower the community and the family as decision makers, reduce the overrepresentation of māori children in the child welfare system, and ensure the maintenance of family group and cultural connections. since its inclusion in the children, young persons and their families act (nz) in 1989, fgdm has been adopted internationally (ban, 2005). this program has been implemented in varying degrees in the us, canada, australia, and in some european countries. an evaluation report of this program among tribal families in south dakota concluded that the vast diversity of tribal communities in the us made a standard program and evaluation tool unsuitable (marcynyszyn et al., 2012). instead, the evaluation report stressed that each tribal group should develop their own internally driven programs and assessment tools. furthermore, the report emphasised the importance of community empowerment and internal program development for producing the best outcomes for children in care (marcynyszyn et al., 2012). however, it is important to note that the benefits and the disadvantages of fgdm are contested. the fgdm has been trialled in all jurisdictions of australia except the northern territory. fgdm was implemented in new south wales and western australia but has since been removed from legislation; currently, both states no longer practice fgdm in regards to oohc placement. in victoria, aboriginal family led decision-making (afldm) was implemented in 1992, but was used in very few cases. however, the child, youth, and families act (2005) includes the use of afldm as a decision-making principle, which should increase the implementation of this program and help integrate it into mainstream decision-making for aboriginal and torres strait islander children in oohc (harris, 2008). 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.5 therapeutic care. therapeutic care refers to a type of oohc that is designed and implemented with an acknowledgement of the background of abuse and neglect and the problems related to emotions, behaviour, and functioning that are common among young people in the system. therapeutic care aims to provide reparative experiences that promote healing and recovery for children in oohc (mclean, price-robertson, & robinson, 2011). the standard in australia consists of a therapeutic model based on trauma-informed care (jackson, frederico, tanti, & black, 2009; mcclung, 2007; victorian aboriginal child care agency, 2009). when implementing these programs with the aboriginal and torres strait islander population, experts have commented that the standard model should be revised in order to place emphasis on the importance of culture (healing foundation, 2013). otherwise, commentators agree therapeutic care is unlikely to be effective (victorian aboriginal child care agency, 2009). therefore, according to vacca, culturally appropriate therapeutic residential care should be built on a scaffolding of cultural relationships and should incorporate aboriginal cultural practices (victorian aboriginal child care agency, 2009). in addition, care should have a strong focus on rights, deliver knowledge of cultural responsibilities, and help children maintain their connection to family and kinship structures. trauma-informed practice also varies in the aboriginal context. not only have aboriginal children in oohc faced abuse and neglect, which contribute to feelings of fear, terror, and/or helplessness, but they have also experienced the effects of intergenerational and pervasive trauma caused by european colonization. this trauma permeates entire families and communities as well as causing cultural trauma (victorian aboriginal child care agency, 2009). therefore, a healing and therapeutic approach must be holistic and take in to account the multiple aspects that impact on aboriginal health for both individuals and communities. we found one narrative evaluation of cultural programs for young aboriginal and torres strait islander people in oohc. culture is healing: documenting journeys to identity and belonging (victorian aboriginal child care agency, 2015) uses narrative evaluation action research (near) methods to document four programs and their outcomes. near methods were chosen because they are congruent with vacca’s goal of communicating evaluation findings and passing on cultural knowledge using storytelling. the cultural programs evaluated in the article were: • return to country, which supports children and young people in oohc to visit and connect with their traditional countries, and their families, communities, and culture; • the koorie tiddas youth choir, in conjunction with vacca extended care program and leaving care program, which provide an opportunity for young people in oohc to connect with culture and language through music; • the connecting to sea country, which uses day trips to help children learn about the port phillip bay and its aboriginal heritage from both an aboriginal elder and a marine scientist; • the wrapped in culture: possum skin cloak project, which worked with 40 children and young people to learn how to make a possum skin cloak, which were exhibited at the melbourne museum. the evaluation demonstrated that the participants in the programs had an improved sense of identity and belonging. key elements of the programs were the inclusion of culture as a protective and healing factor, the role of storytelling, the importance of relationships, consistency of support 21 lindstedt et al.: review of programs to support young people in out-of-home care published by scholarship@western, 2017 and opportunities, the use of cultural support plans, and education as part of the intergenerational healing of young people in oohc (victorian aboriginal child care agency, 2015). panyappi mentoring program. the panyappi mentoring program, developed in south australia, was developed for aboriginal youth aged 10 to 18 years who are at risk of entering or re-entering the justice system with the aim of reducing their offending and risk-taking behaviours. the program does not specifically target the oohc population, but many of its clients have experience with the oohc system. the program was evaluated after one year of operation. the evaluation found that 12 out of 14 participants had significantly reduced their offending behaviours and had increased their school attendance. interview data also found many participants had developed a stronger sense of self-belief, and personal and cultural identity; had developed other interests, and had strengthened relationships with their family members and friends (j. r. higgins & butler, 2007). through mentorship, supporting connections with family and community, and building resilience and empowerment, the program effectively enabled positive behavioural change and increased the wellbeing of its participants. although the review of this program involved a small sample, its potential is noteworthy. however, the program’s funding has recently been limited and panyappi now supports fewer participants. discussion main findings three elements are vital when reviewing the literature on programs and policies that aim to improve the mental health of young aboriginal people in oohc. first, it is of primary importance to use aboriginal and torres strait islander definitions and words for mental health. these definitions emphasize social, emotional, cultural, and spiritual well-being. second, it is necessary to understand aboriginal and torres strait islander family structures, attachment networks, and parenting methods that emphasize collectivist approaches to childrearing. third, it is crucial to recognize and respect how australia’s history of colonization and forced removal has broken down trust between aboriginal people and the government, and damaged some aboriginal and torres strait islander kinship groups and communities. other communities have survived and thrive and are sources of traditional knowledge. these elements reoriented this review to search for all policies and programs that promote any aspect of an aboriginal young person’s life that influences his or her social, emotional, and spiritual well-being. this review linked the theory for improving seswb to indicators of positive mental health for children (world health organization, 2005), and nine programs and/or policies that sought to do this were found. despite the disproportionately high number of young aboriginal and torres strait islander people in oohc and their need for support, the most striking aspect of this review was the absence of studies evaluating programs designed to improve the well-being of indigenous young people, and particularly those in oohc. the panyappi mentoring program and the vacca programs demonstrated that connecting young people to their cultures and communities has positive outcomes for aboriginal young people in oohc. the current system, designed from a western perspective, does not adequately address the need to feel a sense of belonging among young people in oohc (corrales et al., 2016). the lessons from these programs could lead to improved mental health for both indigenous and western young people in oohc. international programs, such as the fgdm, support the principle of community empowerment, which in turn supports the seswb of young people in oohc. 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.5 what this study adds this study recognizes that the importance of cultural care and support for aboriginal and torres strait islander young people in oohc needs to be acknowledged and documented. it describes the inconsistent implementation of policies and programs that are intended to assist aboriginal and torres strait islander young people in oohc, and the findings suggest that this inconsistency risks not providing effective support to promote the seswb of young people in oohc. this review describes the pathways from policy and program theory to the improvement of mental health outcomes for young aboriginal and torres straight islander people. although most of the programs and policies evaluated in this review emphasize the cultural and social components of seswb, it is still necessary to assist individual young people who are struggling with problems related to their seswb. the panyappi mentoring program and vacca program are the only programs aimed at individuals that have documented preliminary success. while the policies and programs discussed in this review are seen to be important for aboriginal well-being, it is important that each individual child’s needs are also met. further culturally appropriate evaluation of programs meant for individuals is necessary. available research supports the empowerment of communities as a culturally appropriate method for improving seswb among aboriginal and torres strait islander young people in oohc; fittingly, the promising practices highlighted in this review are those that are driven by communities and cultural knowledge. limitations despite our efforts to identify a comprehensive range of programs and policies, it is possible that other programs have either not been documented or program reports have not been published in a locatable form—at least in terms of the search methods of this review. while the focus of this review was evaluating published accounts of relevant programs and policies, key informants in the fields of oohc and aboriginal childcare were contacted to gather information on any programs that exist but have not been written about. the review covers the period up until may of 2014; as such, policies and programs that originated or were written about after this date may alter some of this review’s conclusions. for example, in 2016, changes to permanency laws passed in victoria, australia, which made the reunification of children and their families dependent on families meeting court and government-set goals. if permanency laws are not properly enacted, then aboriginal and torres strait islander young people are at risk of being placed in circumstances that disconnect them from their identities, exacerbate existing trauma, and damage health (snaicc, 2016). some aboriginal and torres straight islander people and groups are reluctant to participate in research, as described in the report, we don’t like research, but in koori hands it could make a difference (vichealth koori health research and community development unit, 2000). this reticence to participate in research may have contributed to the lack of published evaluation of and research about successful programs for young people. conclusions and recommendations there is a pressing need for early intervention, prevention, and intensive family support to reduce the numbers of aboriginal and torres strait islander young people entering care. for young people 23 lindstedt et al.: review of programs to support young people in out-of-home care published by scholarship@western, 2017 who cannot be properly cared for by their own families, this review notes the need for improved programs and policies promoting the seswb of aboriginal and torres strait islander young people in oohc. importantly, this improvement needs to occur at both an individual and system-wide levels. specifically, there is a need for culturally competent service provision and attention to the monitoring and evaluation of all relevant policies and programs. international examples provide guidance and may be suitable for adaptation to local contexts, although this review focuses on several australian programs and policies that appear promising. programs and policies that enhance cultural and community connection and empower communities could potentially provide necessary support to a small and overburdened group of carers. information from implementation research is needed to evaluate their effectiveness and to support the case for continuing to fund programs that are working demonstrably well. the personal, communal, and social costs of ineffective programs are profound, and scarce social welfare funds are being expended so there is strong interest in ensuring they are used well. there are clearly compelling grounds for governments and others to commission and sponsor policy and research work to adapt and devise programs promoting the seswb of aboriginal and torres straight islander young people (at both the individual and system levels), determine their effectiveness, and ensure they are sustained when warranted. the increasing numbers of young people in oohc drives a need for evaluations that specifically report seswb outcomes for young people in oohc. finally, programs that support reunification as well as early intervention and prevention and intensive family support need to be funded, so as to reduce the numbers of indigenous young people entering care. 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.5 references aboriginal and torres strait islander healing foundation development team. 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(2007). indigenous australians’ understandings regarding mental health and disorders. australian and new zealand journal of psychiatry, 41, 467-478. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/00048670701332953 30 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.5 the international indigenous policy journal july 2017 realist review of programs, policies, and interventions to enhance the social, emotional, and spiritual well-being of aboriginal and torres strait islander young people living in out-of-home care sophie lindstedt kristen moeller-saxone carly black helen herrman josef szwarc recommended citation realist review of programs, policies, and interventions to enhance the social, emotional, and spiritual well-being of aboriginal and torres strait islander young people living in out-of-home care abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license realist review of programs, policies, and interventions to enhance the social, emotional, and spiritual well-being of aboriginal and torres strait islander young people living in out-of-home care career dilemmas among diné (navajo) college graduates: an exploration of the dinétah (navajo nation) brain drain the international indigenous policy journal volume 4 issue 4 educational pathways of indigenous learners article 5 october 2013 career dilemmas among diné (navajo) college graduates: an exploration of the dinétah (navajo nation) brain drain james mckenzie dine' policy institute aaron p. jackson brigham young university utah, aaron_jackson@byu.edu robert yazzie dine' policy institute steven a. smith brigham young university amber k . crotty dine' policy institute see next page for additional authors recommended citation mckenzie, j. , jackson, a. p. , yazzie, r. , smith, s. a. , crotty, a. k. , baum, d. , denny, a. , bah'lgai eldridge, d. (2013). career dilemmas among diné (navajo) college graduates: an exploration of the dinétah (navajo nation) brain drain. the international indigenous policy journal, 4(4) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.5 career dilemmas among diné (navajo) college graduates: an exploration of the dinétah (navajo nation) brain drain abstract like many indigenous nations, the navajo nation has worked to develop its human and economic potential. it has provided scholarships and other supports to enable its members to pursue post-secondary education. however, relatively few of these college-educated members return to the reservation to contribute directly to its development. this phenomenon has been termed a brain drain. this study explored the experiences of 28 college-educated navajos who, while raised on the reservation, were living off the reservation after completing their post-secondary education. participants indicated a number of factors that went into their decision to live off the reservation. these included: 1. ké’: relationships/connections to family, culture, homeland, people; 2. iiná: lifestyle/lifeway, desirable setting, learned work ethic, social atmosphere, togetherness (diné) vs. individualism (mainstream); 3. bee ach’į’ na’hwii’ná: resources and roadblocks to making a life, infrastructure, services, the “system”; 4. bee ajit’9: opportunity, prosperity and personal improvement, education, extracurricular, job availability, work experience. keywords brain drain, navajo, post-secondary education, indigenous, native american, american indian acknowledgments funding for this research was provided by the mckay school of education at brigham young university. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. authors james mckenzie, aaron p. jackson, robert yazzie, steven a. smith, amber k. crotty, donny baum, avery denny, and dana bah'lgai eldridge http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ c a r e e r d i l e m m a s a m o n g d i n é ( n a v a j o ) c o l l e g e g r a d u a t e s : a n e x p l o r a t i o n o f t h e d i n é t a h ( n a v a j o n a t i o n ) b r a i n d r a i n the navajo nation makes significant investments in educating its people, but returns from these investments are not always realized. scholarship funds and other resources are often provided to students pursuing higher education outside the reservation. however, many of these students do not return to the reservation to work once they have completed their education. education is an important means of overcoming poverty and related social challenges, but when college graduates do not return to their sponsoring nation, little benefit is realized. making educational investments that bring a greater return would help the navajo nation develop systemic solutions to poverty rather than simply mitigating problems (ruffing, 1979). the purpose of this study was to better understand the experience of college-educated members of the navajo nation in deciding whether to live on the nation after they complete their education. o v e r v i e w o f t h e n a v a j o n a t i o n the navajo nation covers areas of the states of arizona, new mexico, and utah in the u.s. with an area of over 27,000 square miles (over 70,000 square kilometers), it is roughly the size of ireland or sierra leone. the population is approximately 176,000, of which about 96% identify as native americans or american indians. the median income on the navajo nations is about $27,000 per year. this is about half the median income of the state of arizona, the state within which most of the nation is contained (arizona rural policy institute, n.d.) e d u c a t i o n a n d t h e n a v a j o n a t i o n levels of education are much lower on the navajo nation than for other regions or ethnic groups in the united states (see table 1). choudhary (2002) states, “according to census 2000, only 55.93% of the total population living on the navajo nation over the age of 25 have high school degree or higher and only 7.29% have a bachelor’s degree or higher. these numbers are consistent with most american indians who have a high school graduation rate of 54.22% and a college graduation rate of 4.85%” (p. 48). these numbers are far below both the national and regional averages, which show a high school graduation rate of 80.4% and a college graduate rate of 24.4% for the united states (choudhary, 2002). in spite of this discrepancy, legislation and policy are constantly being targeted to african americans, hispanics, and under-achieving minority groups, while very little, if anything, is said regarding the state of native american education and how it can be improved. 1 mckenzie et al.: navajo brain drain published by scholarship@western, 2013 t a b l e 1 . c o m p a r i s o n o f h i g h s c h o o l a n d c o l l e g e g r a d u a t i o n r a t e s p e r c e n t g r a d u a t i n g f r o m h i g h s c h o o l p e r c e n t g r a d u a t i n g w i t h b a c h e l o r s d e g r e e u.s. population 80.40 24.40 european american 83.58 26.08 african american 72.26 14.26 american indians 54.22 4.85 navajo nation 55.93 7.29 there appears to be a correlation between education levels and income, as well as employment: these are factors that greatly influence development within any particular region. harbison and hanushek (1992) supported this idea by showing a correlation between a nation’s inability to develop its level of intellectual capital and effectively utilize its educated people with its inability to instigate any type of development. woo (1991) explained, “in educational planning, the limited resources of a country should be allocated to develop its human resources. the framework of carefully and deliberately matching educational output with social and economic needs results in the most effective human resources development” (p. 1). in the case of the navajo nation, it is not so much a matter of failure to develop human resources; rather, funds are being allocated and human resources are being developed, only to be lost as individuals gain post-secondary education but do not come back to the reservation, which is a “brain drain.” this experience resonates with the understanding of brain drain as a zero-sum gain, where “one party’s gain is presumed to be another’s drain” (baldacchino, 2006, p. 143), thus benefitting the winner-take-all society (frank & cook, 1996). the nation needs to find ways to enhance human resources, as well as ways to keep them on the reservation to contribute to development. the development literature consistently names education as the most salient indicator of any nation’s ability to reduce poverty and spark development. for example, education has moved from being the floor on which a country builds its competitive success to being its competitive success… the single most important question for economic success is now: how smart are your people? knowledge does not respect geography or old economies. ideas have wings, and in the information technology age they fly at the speed of light. (unesco, 2000, p. 15) thus, a nation’s ability to produce sustainable development rests heavily upon its ability to create effective learning experiences and develop professional skills matched with societal needs. the needs expressed by the department of education and skills (2003) in the united kingdom could be applicable to any nation or region in the world today: “our future success depends upon mobilizing even more 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.5 effectively the imagination, creativity, skills and talents of all our people. and it depends on using that knowledge and understanding to build economic strength and social harmony” (p. 2). while generally left unstated, it is also crucial that developing regions be able to retain the professional skills acquired through investment because losing these skills could be considered even worse than not developing them in the first place. b r a i n d r a i n the problem of losing professional skills, which were gained through public investment in students’ education, is a problem facing the navajo nation. this problem is often referred to as brain drain. the literature explains brain drain to be a phenomenon in which educated or skilled professionals depart from one country, generally their native country, to another in order to obtain better wages or working conditions or other more promising opportunities, presumably unavailable at home (bagdanavicius & jodkoniene, 2008; kwok & leland, 1982). as a corollary term—brain gain—can also be used in reference to a nation or region that obtains experienced professionals whose skills were developed outside and brought within (salt, 1997). the term is generally reserved for those with a higher education, generally termed “highly skilled professionals,” or those who have expertise in their field (iredale, 1999). the world bank (2006) defines highly skilled professionals as those with professional or post-secondary education. in general, the nature of our current global economy is such that the developing areas of the world are often subject to brain drain, to their detriment, while the more established, strong economies entice professionals with higher wages, better opportunities, and higher living standards—producing brain gain (ward, 1967). baldacchino (2006) refers to this in terms of “proximity to large centres of population” (p. 144). this idea seems to be closely related to the idea of geographic hegemony and the “development of underdevelopment,” suggested by frank (1989), in which the powerful, developed metropolis exploits its relationship with the satellite regions, using its power to control, manipulate, and perpetuate poverty of the peripheries for its own development. the current global economy perpetuates a system in which: …locations unable to muster a knowledge critical mass will find themselves exporting people, brains, investment and other forms of capital to attractive metropolitan zones or their immediate suburbs. local employment opportunities will stagnate or fall; actual entrepreneurs will move away; potential ones will look askance. the young and educated people will relocate first, often never to return but to visit relatives and friends on short trips and vacations. (baldacchino, 2006, p. 143) with such a system of free capital movement (brain circulation), it can be extremely difficult for developing regions to maintain levels of education and expertise substantial enough to catalyze development and reverse poverty. brain drain is a salient issue, especially given that “many countries explicitly replace their personnel loss with highly skilled foreigners attracted from less developed countries” (vinokur, 2006, p. 8). brain drain can also have severe economic impacts on any state or governing body. the issue of brain drain has relevance for any group’s investment in educating workers or citizens, and seeking to “secure the returns from their investment” (vinokur, 2006, p. 8). millions of dollars are spent every year to provide scholarships for navajo students to receive higher education and training, in hopes of increasing the intellectual capital of its citizens. choudhary (2002) 3 mckenzie et al.: navajo brain drain published by scholarship@western, 2013 stated, “in 2002, a total of 13,172 requests were made for financial assistance. of this number a total of 4,659 students were awarded one or another type of financial assistance totaling an amount of $11,159,080” (p. 47). when these students choose not to return to the reservation, not only does this constitute inefficiency in terms of educational and indirect social investment, but also such activities fail to contribute to any type of development or increased quality of life for the rest of the navajo nation. kwok and leland (1982) stated specifically “indigenous college graduates frequently leave their countries for advanced studies in the western world, but only a handful return after completing their work” (p. 91). although some scholars argue that the development of individuals needs to be considered (baldacchino, 2006), the primary concern here seems to be whether the priority of a nation be to develop the skills of individuals or the capacities of the nation. when individuals leave the reservation to develop their skills and knowledge, a much greater potential exists for migration, in which case investments are lost. if action is taken for national development, the group can be developed together as one whole and, as the nation progresses, so can the skills and knowledge of the individual to fit the level of progression and the nation’s stage of development (woo, 1991). when we consider that a nation is concerned first and foremost with the development of the group rather than the individual and that it invests in individuals with the hope of future benefit to the whole, it can be suggested that nations have a primary responsibility to concern themselves with the group’s development. the literature also identifies the notion of “brain waste” being one of the reasons that some college graduates are reluctant to return to the navajo nation. brain waste refers to the waste of professional skills and qualifications that occurs as a result of migration into a job that requires lower levels of skills and training than those attained by the graduate (bagdanavicius & jodkoniene, 2008). the navajo nation is highly invested in educating its young people in order to increase development and improve standards of living for all of its people. better understanding of the brain drain and how it may be impacting the nation’s long-term planning for nation building will lead to more efficient use of education funds, as well as facilitate the process of development for all. in order to facilitate understanding of brain drain, this study explored the experiences of college-educated members of the navajo nation in deciding whether to return to the nation after completing their post-secondary education. m e t h o d the method for this project was based upon several philosophical assumptions. first, we assumed a relational ontology. in other words, we assumed that knowledge is produced, gained, and maintained through relationships (gergen, 2009; levinas, 2002; oliver, 2001). we rejected the notion that knowledge is an independent commodity to be had by individuals. second, we subscribed to the ideal of collaboration as informed by the notion of “working the indigene-colonizer hyphen” (jones & jenkins, 2008, p. 471). that is, we acknowledged at the outset the implicit challenges, ambiguities, and advantages of working as a team of reservation-based policy researchers (indigene) and university-based academics (colonizers). third, because the study was initiated by, focused on, and intended for members of diné, we agreed that the study would be grounded in diné philosophy and values (grande, 2008). rather than adopt the dominant western positivistic tradition, we opted for a more postmodern philosophical foundation that we deemed more consistent with diné values. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.5 p a r t i c i p a n t s the participants were 28 self-identified members of the navajo nation consisting of 12 men and 16 women. their average age was 37. all indicated that they met the following criteria: • grew up on the navajo nation. this was defined as having spent at least one-half of their school years (k 12) attending reservation schools. • left the navajo nation to pursue post-secondary education. • had lived and worked off of the navajo nation for at least two years. • were still living off of the reservation. in order to identify efficiently a sufficient number of individuals meeting the study’s criteria, we recruited individuals attending the gathering of nations—an annual gathering of indigenous people in albuquerque, new mexico (see gathering of nations, n.d.). participants were recruited from a booth sponsored by diné college and the diné policy institute. potential participants were engaged in conversation to determine if they might meet the criteria. if they did, they were asked if they would be willing to participate in the study and were given informed consent information. p r o c e d u r e interviews were conducted by one of the research team in or near the diné college and policy institute booth. the interviews ranged from 20 to 60 minutes. the typical interview was about 40 minutes. interviews were transcribed by members of the research team and distributed to the entire team for review. identifying information, such as references to specific places and people, were removed from the transcripts. the transcripts were analyzed using what we called collaborative hermeneutic interpretation (chi). this method of analysis was predicated on the assumptions outlined at the beginning of this section and on principles of qualitative interviewing and interpretation as outlined by kvale and brinkmann (2009). the analysis proceeded as follows: 1. all members of the research team read all the transcripts. the purpose of this was to get a general sense of the interviews. 2. each member of the research team proceeded in subsequent readings of the transcripts to identify meaningful passages. the purpose of this was to identify sections of dialogue that seemed to have meaning relevant to the research questions. 3. team members shared the meaningful passages that they had identified. 4. each member of the research team generated some preliminary interpretations or themes. 5 mckenzie et al.: navajo brain drain published by scholarship@western, 2013 5. team members met to share their preliminary themes and begin to construct a final collaborative interpretation. 6. the team’s collaborative interpretations were vetted by diné elders who are cultural experts able to critically evaluate the interpretations in terms of diné philosophy and values. c o l l a b o r a t i v e r e s e a r c h in our observation, qualitative research has struggled with two problems when applied to indigenous issues. first, the predominance of qualitative research paradigms are somewhat individualistic. that is, they depend primarily on the interpretation of a primary expert researcher. this is obviously problematic when the primary researcher is not a member of the indigenous community being studied (e.g., a white academic studying problems on the navajo nation), but may also be problematic even if the researcher is a member of the community (e.g., a navajo researcher studying problems on the navajo nation). an obvious solution to the problem seems to be to collaborate. however, the means of such collaboration raises the second problem: a drift away from qualitative methods back toward the positivistic traditions that qualitative research has tried to overcome in the first place. for example, collaborations often follow the postpositivistic paradigm of methods such as collaborative qualitative research or cqr (hill, 2011). such methods revert to the inherently colonizing practices of positivism. these include subscription to the notion of a universal, objective reality based in the physical world and the related idea that validity is established by consensus about those realities. the idea is that the reality is in the data and that that data are independent of human construction. therefore, the purpose of such research is to mitigate or manage any human construction that would interfere with the inherent reality of the data. in this study, we worked to avoid both individualism and positivism and their inherent negative implications for indigenous research. our purpose from the beginning was to collaborate in such a way that we could make collaborative interpretations of the data without relying on either individual interpretations or simple inter-rater reliability, in the positivistic sense. as a result, our process required a lot of conversation as the analysis began. our initial interpretations were made in the interviews themselves and in subsequent conversations among the researchers. these initial interpretations were written by the members of the research team and then discussed as a team. as the discussion progressed, these initial interpretations were revised as team members learned from each other’s interpretations and refined their own. this process, sometimes called the hermeneutic circle, required the researchers to continually return to the data and consider the interviews from both micro and macro perspectives. each interpretation was considered in the light of the inherent difference that each team member brought to the team—in particular, the difference between the predominantly white members from the university and the indigenous members of the team from the diné policy institute. in effect, there was a parallel process. there was a hermeneutic circle that the team used to reflect on the particulars of the data, as well as the more global aspects of the data, and the ongoing evaluating of the fit of each with the other. at the same time, the team was conducting a similar process as it returned repeatedly to the interpretations and considered them as constructions of team members, as well as constructions of the broader group, and considered their reciprocal “fit” with each. that is, each thematic construction had to stand up as a legitimate indigenous construction, as well as a white academic construction. these constructions, in turn, had to stand up as collective interpretations of the entire group. the validity of 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.5 the study rests in this dual application of the hermeneutic circle to both the data and the interpretive process. we termed this method collaborative hermeneutic interpretation or chi. as with any method, this approach had its limitations. our focus on interpretation did not allow for the focus on problem solving that might be a part of an action research approach. in addition, our attention to inclusion and “working the indigene-colonizer hyphen” (jones & jenkins, 2008, p. 471) may have limited the analysis or diluted it to some degree. nonetheless, we trust that we and other like-minded researchers will be able to refine this approach and improve our efforts to better understand indigenous issues. r e s u l t s four complex themes were identified after: (a) successive readings by all members of the research team, and (b) two meetings in which the research team discussed possible themes. to best represent meanings within navajo culture, theme labels were discussed by native navajo speakers and subsequently translated into english. the navajo speaking members of the research team and the navajo elder consultants to the diné policy institute reported some frustration in trying to translate the navajo constructs into english. in keeping with the recommendations of several scholars of indigenous methodology (see for example denzin, lincoln, & smith, 2008), we decided to retain the navajo terms to reflect the imperfection of the translations and to signify ownership of the interpretations by the navajo members of the research team. the four themes that emerged were: 1. ké’: relationships/connections to family, culture, homeland, people; 2. iiná: lifestyle/lifeway, desirable setting, learned work ethic, social atmosphere, togetherness (diné) vs. individualism (mainstream); 3. bee ach’į’ na’hwii’ná: resources and roadblocks to making a life, infrastructure, services, the “system;” 4. bee ajit’9: opportunity, prosperity and personal improvement, education, extracurricular, job availability, work experience. k ’ é ( r e l a t i o n s h i p s / c o n n e c t i o n s t o f a m i l y , c u l t u r e , h o m e l a n d , p e o p l e ) the navajo word of k’é, in one application, can be used to describe relationships and connections. this complex theme showed that many navajos feel a deep desire to return to their family, culture, homeland, and people. many participants, while living away from the reservation, maintained a strong attachment to their homeland although their circumstances sometimes made it difficult or impossible to return. subthemes were desire to return and help one’s people; family; culture, language, and traditions; sense of belonging; and spouse non-navajo. d e s i r e t o r e t u r n a n d h e l p o n e ’ s p e o p l e . most participants maintained a strong connection with the tribe and their reservation homeland. several participants expressed a desire to return to the reservation as soon as they were able to do so. 7 mckenzie et al.: navajo brain drain published by scholarship@western, 2013 i really wanted to go back to the reservation and become some sort of a liaison. or you know, i wanted to deal with students. i wanted to help people. i wanted to help the navajo people get their kids to go to school and to get an education. i was willing to do outreach and talk to people and tell them what i had gone through and tell them, if i could do it they could do it. and just spread the word, education is very important. that is what i had planned to do. another participant expressed similar sentiments: i did a speech and i said if any of you know any jobs that are available i want to come home and help my community. i want to be back home and see if there is anything i can do to help students. and they said they would, but nothing came through. a third participant captured a feeling expressed by several other participants: for some reason, the older i get, i feel like somebody is pulling me to the reservation—to go back there to make a difference. so i am looking at that. f a m i l y . participants worked off the reservation, but felt connections to family members who stayed on the reservation. several participants discussed sacrificing to get back to the reservation as often as they could to be with family: i am driving five hours at least twice a month to visit my parents—visit my family. there are always functions, birthday parties and stuff like that going on. i am really close to my family. another participant expressed something similar: i [could] easily say, “do you know what? i’m tired. if we stay here…we save all this money.” i [could] easily say, “hey, you know what… this is a hundred and twenty dollars in my pocket… times four.” that’s what? five hundred dollars extra in my pocket? but, i don’t look at it that way. that’s not the issue… family is. yet, another participant expressed it this way: the people who are going to the big corporation or schools or colleges, they always will come back home because i think we are all attached to the reservation. we are all attached to families... i believe our grandparents are always our teachers, like grandma and grandfather are our teachers. i learned from them and they raised me pretty good, that is the only reason i go back. c u l t u r e , l a n g u a g e , a n d t r a d i t i o n s . this was a complex theme-within-a-theme. many participants expressed continuing connections to navajo culture, language, and traditions, while a few expressed disdain for traditional navajo values. many who lived away from the reservation continued to have strong grounding in their tribal language and customs. one participant expressed how important it as to keep her children grounded in the culture: 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.5 i don’t want my kids to lose that love for their culture that i have. and i want to instill it in them while they are young—to love who they are because i feel like i see a lot of urban indians who don’t love who they are and they don’t love their culture and they are kind of embarrassed about it. and then they come to [college] and they want to be part of it and find out who they are and so they start researching about their culture. but i want my kids to have it instilled within them. another participant said it this way: i think for so long we were told that being white is better, but it is not. when you discover— when you move away from the reservation--it’s really awakening. you realize it’s not like that. we have a strong culture, we have a rich language and history and we have to be proud of it. and it is really about learning about the outside world. it is still important to maintain who you are…. remember where you came from your language your culture, your land, your family—it is really important. some participants expressed their desire to stay away from navajo tradition. this is captured in the following quote: one thing i didn’t approve of is how they pushed the…traditional…practices on the kids. you know…they make them learn traditional things. and i think that should be an option. if i want my kids to learn, i’ll teach them. it just…a lot of it is superstition and i just don’t agree with a lot of it. that’s why to me it should be optional. s e n s e o f b e l o n g i n g . b e i n g r o o t e d i n h o m e l a n d . a significant number of participants noted a sense of belonging or being rooted in their navajo homeland as influencing their interest to return to the reservation. while participants found it difficult or impossible to return to live on the reservation, they maintained strong connections to their home. one participant expressed the following: it’s just the fact that it is home, there’s no other place in the world, you know. like the reservation was the best place in the world to me because…you can always go back to where you feel safe…it will always be home. similarly, another participant said: always come back because whatever you do in a dominant society it is temporary—you always know you have a place to come back. another participant expressed his dilemma at being drawn to the reservation but being unable to find work: i think we’ll always have a strong spot in our heart for it, for the reservation. but at the same time, i’m a little turned off because there’s no place to work, really. s p o u s e n o n n a v a j o . some participants believed that they were unable to return to the reservation due to their spouse’s lack of affiliation with the tribe and reservation. these perspectives are illustrated by the following quotes: 9 mckenzie et al.: navajo brain drain published by scholarship@western, 2013 my partner lives here in [off-reservation city], so and i decided to move out here... probably down the road as i get older. cause i think that [the reservation] is where i would rather be unless my partner was to live off the reservation, which…she’s a white person… yeah and my husband is also not native. he is hispanic. so, you know, i am sure it would probably be different if he was native. i i n á ( l i f e s t y l e / l i f e w a y ) the second main theme identified by the research team is iiná, or lifestyle or lifeway, which for many participants represented reasons they would not return. this was another complex theme and includes the subthemes of preferring city life, finding fewer activities on the reservation, finding a native community off the reservation, and moving from a traditional lifestyle toward a more mainstream, westernized lifestyle. p r e f e r r i n g c i t y l i f e . several participants expressed a preference for life away from the rural confines of the reservation. they expressed a preference for the convenience of city life as captured in the following quote: i never went home. i like the city and i like the city life—like the mall, so i stay here…reservation life—you are home and [always have] something you have to worry about: using the water, you have to haul the water. we had to worry about the electricity because we did solar panels. and the electric, water, and sewage lines don’t go as far [on] the reservation. and the roads aren’t paved, so they are not suitable. so there is a big difference, you have to travel one hour to go to town, so its kind of hard…in the city everything is convenient, everything is right there. that’s what i like. another participant expressed it this way: it gives you more independence. you can make your own money you can be proud of. and you can experience something other than where your family is right now—just to be free and open, meet new people, go new places. you know, try new things rather than being at home and just going to the flea market every now and then. it is a huge difference and it’s a good opportunity. it gives you great independence. f i n d i n g f e w e r a c t i v i t i e s o n t h e r e s e r v a t i o n . some participants enjoyed what they could do away from the reservation. they expressed their belief that there was more to do away from the navajo nation: i wouldn’t want to raise my kids in that area because i want them to experience the new things in the city and meet new people with different background and have the opportunity to experience restaurants and new technology. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.5 another participant suggested the following: here in the city you have different types of museums, you have different backgrounds, you have different artist, musicians and you have the military branch here so you can learn something about them—or just being friends with someone rather than the same race as them. and they can learn a lot, that is the difference. f i n d i n g a n a t i v e c o m m u n i t y o f f t h e r e s e r v a t i o n . some participants expressed the belief that they could maintain their connection to navajo culture off the reservation because they found other indigenous people with whom they could associate. one participant stated the belief as follows: like i said i found a native community there that’s kind of accepted me. so yeah, i am kind of fortunate to find that especially in this city you know somewhere so far away from where i grew up—and be able to establish that connection. so it’s good. i feel very grateful for that. m o v i n g f r o m t r a d i t i o n a l l i f e s t y l e t o w a r d m a i n s t r e a m , w e s t e r n i z e d l i f e s t y l e . many participants said that living off the reservation they were moving away from navajo traditions and adopting more mainstream, westernized traditions. one participant suggested that her grandfather believed it was important to try to blend the traditions: my grandpa…he kind of saw in a way…how the future is going to be. he understood that we really can’t rely on our culture. because this new way is coming in…we have to adapt to it. the trick is… not to fully get assimilated into it… but instead of [it] crashing into us… what if we gained their knowledge and…weave it with ours? but our ways stay on top. another participant suggested that she could find a better way away from the reservation: yeah, it depends on how people raise their kids. they might raise them traditionally or they may raise them in a christian home, a catholic home, but it depends on how the child will take it in. me, i have seen people on the reserve suffer. i wanted more. i wanted a house you know. i wanted nice things and i want be able to go here and there. so…my mentality was to get out and get a life and get a good life. that’s where i am right now. one participant appeared resigned to adopting a different lifestyle and culture: understanding that more and more the american way of life is taking over people—that they’re their own individuals and that they are not accountable to anybody else. i think that’s the information that our youth are getting thinking that they are their own individuals and not a part of our community. b e e a c h ’į’ n a ’ h w i i ’ n á ( r e s o u r c e s a n d r o a d b l o c k s t o m a k i n g a l i f e ) this was another complex theme. many participants indicated that there was a lack of resources on the reservation that made living there more difficult, which was a primary reason why many participants would not or could not return. the sub-themes were identified as infrastructure, services, and “the system.” 11 mckenzie et al.: navajo brain drain published by scholarship@western, 2013 i n f r a s t r u c t u r e . some participants identified the lack of infrastructure on the reservation as a roadblock to them returning. one participant expressed frustration with not being able to start a business due to the lack of infrastructure and the difficulties with red tape: speaking of the process, if you want to start a business on the reservation you are just a business owner. so if i wanted to put up a, let’s take for example, a café. i want a piece of land. here i’ve got to go to the tribe, go to the [tribal office], to make sure there are no artifacts on it. and then you have to lay in the water line, electricity line, and then you’ve got to go to the department. you have to go through the chapter house, and then through the navajo nation to give them your proposal. and then they got to take it to the government, and [it] just goes on and on. and then people just quit. s e r v i c e s . several participants expressed concern about getting housing on the reservation. one participant discussed the struggle finding housing on the reservation as a reason she could not return: [i] could come back as an art teacher. i don’t know, but there is no place to live. i have a home here in [off-reservation city] but i want to move back to [reservation town]. and i am thinking “where am i going to live?” i used to live right across from [navajo politician], but i am not married anymore. teacher housing? but everybody fights for those. so i don’t know. another participant said: they need to establish homes. they need to know that we have a home site that we can move back. there’s nothing…you know, you have to buy a trailer and live in a little trailer park. they don’t establish home site leases for everybody. i’m just lucky. i’ve lived in [town] for so long. i do have friends that…all my friends that have graduated… a lot of them have gone for that reason. “ t h e s y s t e m . ” several participants discussed how the bureaucracy on the reservation created problems for them. one participant expressed frustration with the tribal government: one of the reasons why people stay away is maybe because they don’t feel like they can trust the tribal government. why do you think folks stay away from the rez—like yourself—who’s got a lot of education now? what would keep you away from the rez? another discussed the red tape in the government: unfortunately there’s a lot of bureaucracy with the rez. i mean just to move back. you’ve got to apply at windowrock (navajo nation capital) with [agency]. as soon as you get that on your way, you still have the grades and permits that you have to do with the land…you know there’s a lot of set up that you have to do…so i think to expedite that process would help people come back to the reservation. and it wouldn’t discourage the people from coming back to help the reservation. you know…i think there’s too much red tape. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.5 several participants suggested that there were frequent abuses of power on the reservation. one participant stated that the tribal government wasted money: but the only thing [that] matters to me a lot now is—i used to work with the navajo tribe and i know there is a lot of misused funds there. and now working with the [agency] the government job, looking back, it’s a lot of waste of money. our students should be the ones that we should be using all the money [for]. another participant decried perceived corruption: corrupt, as far as, you know, politicians everywhere. but i think it’s really bad because there aren’t qualified people there in powerful jobs on the reservation. and when that happens everybody suffers. b e e a j i t ’ 9 ( o p p o r t u n i t y , p r o s p e r i t y , a n d p e r s o n a l i m p r o v e m e n t ) the final complex theme is bee ajit’9, which translates as opportunity, prosperity, and personal involvement. this theme showed the dilemma many navajo citizens feel with regard to their desire for personal growth and opportunity. participants identified a number of reasons that prevented them from returning to the reservation. subthemes included education, job availability, and work experience. e d u c a t i o n . many participants expressed concern with educational opportunities available on the reservation. one participant suggested that schooling on the reservation created problems for her: the schools aren’t very good. i don’t really want to put my own kids through a lot of things i went through as a kid. a second participant related her discussion with her husband regarding schooling for their children: the other thing too is that i told him, you know when…if we ever have kids… i don’t want them going to school on the reservation because i’ve seen what happens, and what can happen. i just…i didn’t approve of their…system. a third participant expressed similar sentiments: and the education for kids, the education needs to be bumped up a little bit higher for students. if i was young and had children now, i would not go back. j o b a v a i l a b i l i t y . many participants suggested that they would like to come back to the reservation but found that the job opportunities were limited. one participant expressed this as follows: i think we’ll always have a strong spot in our heart for it…for the reservation. but at the same time, i’m a little turned off because there…there’s no place to work, really. 13 mckenzie et al.: navajo brain drain published by scholarship@western, 2013 another participant discussed his inability to find equivalent employment on the reservation: you know looking at a job market [on the reservation] there is really nothing where i am at where i want to be…but i need to find something that is going to be equivalent to what i am doing right now and it’s going to keep me, you know, wanting to perform and succeed. a third participant discussed his experience coming out of military service: when i came out of the navy and got a job on the reservation, the job opportunities on the reservation were nil…. i am more of a craftsman, there is nothing like that on the reservation— just more service oriented jobs. there was nothing there for me that i could be satisfied with, so i had to get off the reservation. w o r k e x p e r i e n c e . several participants discussed their belief that they get better work experience off the reservation. these individuals suggested that they have greater and more varied opportunities off the reservation. one participant expressed this sentiment as follows: i am staying [off the reservation] because i like the job. it is really good experience. i do have plans to eventually return home. but like i said, the main reason why i am staying is to get as much experience as i can. and school is providing that to me, and i do like the people i work with, so it’s kind of really hard to leave. other participants suggested that work experience off the reservation was essentially different from what one receives on the reservation. it is good to get some experience off the reservation for several years so you have an idea of what it is like to work for a corporation. and where you’re working for a for-profit organization— withthat experience you can bring a lot to the navajo nation and kind of reorganize their organizations the way they are—and really emphasize performance and quality services. d i s c u s s i o n in this study, we endeavored to explore an important aspect of navajo experience and provide a model for collaboration between university scholars and tribal policy researchers. the implications of the study are discussed below. we anticipate that this study will have implications for other indigenous nations and communities that experience the loss of members who receive formal post-secondary education. r e c o m m e n d a t i o n s the results of the study provide several implications for both post-secondary educators and tribal policymakers. first, post-secondary educators need to be aware of the experience indigenous students have as they prepare for graduation and explore their various career options. for example, it would be helpful for advisors and placement personnel to be aware of the k’é (relationships/connections to family, culture, homeland, people) dimension of indigenous students’ experience. awareness of this dimension would encourage discussions of how students might incorporate these connections into academic and career planning. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.5 likewise, awareness of the importance of iiná (lifestyle/lifeway) will help counselors and advisors to encourage indigenous students to consciously and purposefully consider the trade-offs that might be a part of either returning to live on their reservation or continuing to live away from their reservation. for example, for students who find it necessary to live away from their reservation after graduating, exploring ways to maintain a traditional iiná might include: (a) making connections with other indigenous groups in their community, (b) planning regular visits to the reservation for ceremonies and family gatherings, or (c) finding ways to learn or maintain one’s tribal language. tribal policymakers might also consider the implications of this study. a primary finding of this study was that many tribal members feel a strong desire to contribute to their reservation and its communities. we found that the challenges in doing so were related to bee ach’į’ na’hwii’ná (resources and roadblocks to making a life) and bee ajit’9 (opportunity, prosperity, and personal improvement). policymakers need to focus on resource and opportunity issues in order to take advantage of the desire of many graduating members to return to their reservation and contribute. for example, housing was a primary challenge for many considering returning to the reservation. for the diné, it might be helpful to reconsider the tribe’s home site lease policy and its related procedures. employers might adopt the strategy that schools have taken, in making housing available as a benefit of one’s employment. if tribal administrators provided incentives for employers to facilitate housing for their employees, a significant barrier to returning to the reservation might be reduced. another way for policymakers to take advantage of the existing passion for reservation service would be to restructure more of the financial aid for post-secondary education to encourage such service. rather than providing just scholarships, tribes might consider providing low interest student loans. these loans could have contingencies that would reduce or remove the loan if the student returns to the reservation to work for a time after graduation. such policies have already proven effective in the indian health service (n.d.) and more broadly in the national health service corp (n.d.). a more radical strategy involving both tribal policymakers and higher education administrators would be to consider how to minimize the need for students on reservations to leave the reservation in the first place. if students could get more of the education they desire while living on the reservation, they might be more likely to remain on the reservations and use that education to better the community. one way to do so would be to have tribal colleges partner with off-reservation colleges in providing pathways to degrees. many state and private universities are already involved in this practice. for example, utah state university has satellite campuses in price, utah and blanding, utah. the satellite campuses are approximately 200 and 400 miles away from the primary utah state university campus in logan, utah. this means that students in these primarily rural areas can live and work at or near their homes while completing all or most of their bachelor’s degree at utah state university. a similar strategy could be employed on rural reservations. many tribes, including the navajo nation have tribal college campuses across their land. if these campuses could become affiliated with offreservation colleges and universities and provide the education students have been seeking off the reservation, it could significantly reduce the brain drain phenomenon. of course, the logistics of such mergers would be challenging. there would be a host of political, legal, and practical issues to resolve. however, doing so could be a primary means of addressing the brain drain phenomenon and the overall economic development of indigenous reservation communities. 15 mckenzie et al.: navajo brain drain published by scholarship@western, 2013 r e f e r e n c e s arizona rural policy institute. (n.d.). demographic analysis of the navajo nation using 2010 census and 2010 american community survey estimates. retrieved from azcia.gov/documents/links/demoprofiles/navajo%20nation.pdf bagdanavicius, j., & jodkoniene, z. (2008). brain drain from lithuania: the attitude of civil servants. engineering economics, 2(57), 55 60. baldacchino, g. (2006). the brain rotation and brain diffusion strategies of small islanders: considering ‘movement’ in lieu of ‘place.’ globalisation, societies and education, 4(1), 143 154. choudhary, t. (2002). 2003 comprehensive economic development strategy of the navajo nation. window rock, az: support service department, division of economic development. denzin, n. k., lincoln, y. s., & smith, l. t. (eds.). (2008). handbook of critical and indigenous methodologies. thousand oaks, ca: sage. department for education and skills. (2003). the future of higher education (white paper). london: her majesty’s stationery office. frank, a. g. (1989). the development of underdevelopment. monthly review, 41(2), 37 51. frank, r. h., & cook, p. j. (1996). the winner-take-all society. new york: penguin. gathering of nations. (n.d.). retrieved from http://www.gatheringofnations.com/ gergen, k. j. (2009). relational being: beyond self and community. new york: oxford university press. grande, s. (2008). red pedagogy: the un-methodology. in n. k. denzin, y. s. lincoln, & l. t. smith (eds.), handbook of critical and indigenous methodologies (pp. 233 254). thousand oaks, ca: sage. harbison, r. w., & hanushek, e. a. (1992). educational performance of the poor: lessons from rural northeast brazil. washington, dc: world bank. hill, c. r. (ed.). (2011). consensual qualitative research: a practical resource for investigating social science phenomena. washington, dc: american psychological association. indian health service. (n.d.). ihs scholarship program. retrieved from http://www.ihs.gov/scholarship/index.cfm? iredale, r. (1999). the need to import skilled personnel: factors favouring and hindering its international mobility. international migration (geneva, switzerland), 37(1), 89 123. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.5 jones, a., & jenkins, k. (2008). rethinking collaboration: working the indigene-colonizer hyphen. in n. k. denzin, y. s. lincoln, & l. t. smith (eds.), handbook of critical and indigenous methodologies (pp. 471 486). thousand oaks, ca: sage. kvale, s., & brinkmann, s. (2009). interviews: learning the craft of qualitative research interviewing (2nd ed.). thousand oaks, ca: sage. kwok, v., & leland, h. (1982). an economic model of the brain drain. the american economic review, 72(1), 91 100. levinas, i. (2002). otherwise than being: or beyond essence (a. lingis, trans.). pittsburgh, pa: duquesne university press. national health service corps. (n.d.). retrieved from http://nhsc.hrsa.gov/ oliver, k. (2001). witnessing: beyond recognition. minneapolis, mn: university of minnesota press. ruffing, t. (1979). the navajo nation: a history of dependence and underdevelopment. review of radical political economics, 11(2), 25. salt, j. (1997). international movements of the highly skilled (oecd occasional papers no 3). paris: oecd. unesco (2000). world education forum: final report (dakar, senegal, april 26 28). paris: author. vinokur, a. (2006). brain migration revisited. globalisation, societies, and education, 4(1), 7 24. ward, r. g. (1967). the consequences of smallness in polynesia. in b. benedict (ed.), problems of smaller territories (pp. 81 – 96). london: athlone press for the institute of commonwealth studies. woo, j. h. (1991). education and economic growth in taiwan: a case of successful planning. world development, 19(8), 1029 1044. 17 mckenzie et al.: navajo brain drain published by scholarship@western, 2013 the international indigenous policy journal october 2013 career dilemmas among diné (navajo) college graduates: an exploration of the dinétah (navajo nation) brain drain james mckenzie aaron p. jackson robert yazzie steven a. smith amber k. crotty see next page for additional authors recommended citation career dilemmas among diné (navajo) college graduates: an exploration of the dinétah (navajo nation) brain drain abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license authors career dilemmas among dinã© (navajo) college graduates: an exploration of the dinã©tah (navajo nation) brain drain the international indigenous policy journal volume 5 issue 2 the governance of indigenous information article 1 april 2014 enacting kaitiakitanga: challenges and complexities in the governance and ownership of rongoā research information amohia boulton whakauae research for maori health and development, amohia@whakauae.co.nz maui hudson te kotahi research institute, the university of waikato, maui@waikato.ac.nz annabel ahuriri-driscoll the university of canterbury, annabel.ahuriri-driscoll@canterbury.ac.nz albert stewart kaye.albie@xtra.co.nz recommended citation boulton, a. , hudson, m. , ahuriri-driscoll, a. , stewart, a. (2014). enacting kaitiakitanga: challenges and complexities in the governance and ownership of rongoā research information. the international indigenous policy journal, 5(2). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.2.1 enacting kaitiakitanga: challenges and complexities in the governance and ownership of rongoā research information abstract this article explores the tensions one research team has faced in securing appropriate governance or stewardship (which we refer to as kaitiakitanga) of research data. whilst ethical and regulatory frameworks exist which provide a minimum standard for researchers to meet when working with māori, what our experience has highlighted is there is currently a “governance” gap in terms of who should hold stewardship of research data collected from māori individuals or collectives. in the case of a project undertaken in the traditional healing space, the organisation best placed to fulfil this governance role receives no funding or support to take on such a responsibility; consequently by default, this role is being borne by the research team until such time as capacity can be built and adequate resourcing secured. in addition, we have realised that the tensions played out in this research project have implications for the broader issue of how we protect traditional knowledge in a modern intellectual property law context, and once again how we adequately support those, often community-based organisations, who work at the interface between indigenous knowledge and the western world. keywords indigenous, māori, health services, traditional healing, kaitiakitanga acknowledgments the full title of the study is supporting traditional rongoā practice in contemporary health care settings and it is funded by a project grant from the health research council of new zealand (hrc 11/439). we gratefully acknowledge te kahui rongoā's support of the project and the contribution made to the study by our many participants. we would also like to thank the anonymous reviewer for reviewing the article. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/   enacting kaitiakitanga: challenges and complexities in the governance and ownership of rongoā research information for the most part, the roots of academic scholarship may be found firmly in the cultures, histories, and philosophies of euro-western civilisations (chilisa, 2012). indigenous knowledge, however, is beginning to make a significant contribution to the academy and gaining greater currency in knowledge creation at local (sillitoe & mariella, 2009) and global levels (bhawuk, 2008). as new indigenous knowledge comes to light (in part through increased participation by indigenous scholars in the field of research), so must this new knowledge be ordered, categorised, analysed, and disseminated if it is to be of any use to the very academy who demands it. in aotearoa, also called new zealand, research with māori individuals, whānau (families), hapū (sub-tribes), iwi (tribes)1, and communities is guided by a number of institutional (i.e., university) ethical and regulatory guidelines (māori research development komiti, 2007; university of otago, 2013), as well as national frameworks (health research council of new zealand, 1998, 2008; hudson, milne, reynolds, russell, & smith, 2010). such frameworks not only provide a minimum standard for researchers to meet when working with māori, but they also afford māori a degree of comfort in knowing that, by following these standards, researchers will adhere to a set of key ethical principles in the execution of research. less evident, or available consistently across the country, are guidelines for researchers and research teams regarding the governance and ownership of research data collected from māori individuals or collectives. unlike the ethical guidelines for health and disability research promulgated nationally and monitored and upheld by the national ethical advisory committee, in the case of aotearoa, frameworks to guide governance and ownership of data tend to be negotiated on a project by project basis or, in some more enduring situations, at the tribal level. furthermore, protocols around the collection, storage, and use of, and ongoing access to mātauranga māori (māori knowledge) that is associated with particular communities or activities also tends to be negotiated as need arises. this article discusses the challenges our research team faced as it negotiated data ownership and governance in a highly politicised area of health research: that of rongoā māori (traditional māori healing). we identified that we were, in fact, working with a “governance gap”. specifically, the article addresses two issues: (a) at a project level, our actions to develop and support the rongoā sector to take appropriate governance or stewardship roles for research activity and subsequent data; and then more broadly, (b) the challenges we face of protecting traditional knowledge in a modern intellectual property law context. each issue serves to illustrate the ever-present tension that exists whereby indigenous communities constantly have to justify and substantiate their custodial “rights” over their own knowledge and culture. we explore the māori concepts of tiaki (meaning to guard, protect, or foster) and kaitiakitanga (guardianship or stewardship), a term commonly employed to refer to the guardianship of the natural environment and natural resources (roberts, norman, minhinnick, wihongi, & kirkwoods, 1995). specifically, we discuss how the notion of kaitiakitanga in its more general sense may have relevance in a contemporary research setting.                                                                                                                 1māori are the indigenous people of aotearoa, also known as new zealand. the language we use is also called māori. throughout the article māori words and phrases are defined when they are first used. thereafter, readers are advised to refer to the glossary provided at the end of the article. 1 boulton et al.: the governance and ownership of rongo? research information published by scholarship@western, 2014   background the research context in aotearoa (new zealand) the emergence of kaupapa māori research (cram, pihama, & barbara, 2000; glover, 1997; smith, 1999) in aotearoa (new zealand [nz]) over the past 25 years has encouraged the development of communityand tribally-based research approaches, which focus on issues of direct importance to māori communities. kaupapa māori research (i.e., research guided by maori philosophies, traditions, and protocols) consists of two inter-related strands, arising from the origins of kaupapa māori research in critical theory and social constructivism (eketone, 2008). the first of these is to critique and question existing systems of research, whilst the second supports the development of new māori-led approaches. the emphasis on research that is “by māori, for māori” has led to an increase in the number of māori researchers, the growth of māori research approaches, the development of māori ethical frameworks, the advent of māori responsiveness requirements within research funding criteria, and the establishment of funding mechanisms that prioritise communityinitiated research questions (ahuriri-driscoll, hudson et al., 2007). these changes have seen the mobilisation of research resources in areas of interest to māori communities: a reclaiming of the right to ask questions of relevance to māori, and māori alone. as a consequence, many māori community members who were once sceptical of the value of research are beginning to recognise the worth of research inquiry that is designed, led, and conducted by māori according to appropriate tikanga or cultural protocols. the area of traditional medicine, or rongoā māori, is one such site of reclamation. rongoā māori rongoā māori is a holistic system of healing derived from māori philosophy and customs (ahuriridriscoll, baker et al., 2008a; mark & lyons, 2010). despite a post-colonisation period whereby the use of te reo māori (the māori language) waned and rongoā māori was effectively outlawed (through, for example, the tohunga (healer) suppression act), traditional healing, as a practice, has endured. the last decade in particular has seen increased interest regarding traditional māori healing and its place in new zealand’s wider health system. offering a culturally consistent and appropriate model of care, proponents argue that the inclusion of rongoā māori in the publicly funded health system has the potential to increase acceptability and service responsiveness (ahuriri-driscoll, baker et al., 2008a; durie, 1998, 2003a; jones, 2000b; o’connor, 2008). while the history of research in the area of traditional medicine could be characterised as having been the domain primarily of anthropologists and scientists, more recently māori communities have begun to work with māori researchers to explore ceremonial practices (moon, 2003), the experience and practices of healers (ahuriri-driscoll, baker et al., 2008a; ahuriri-driscoll, hudson et al., 2012; jones, 2000b; mark & lyons, 2010), the relationship between healthcare seeking behaviours and cultural beliefs (kinloch, 1984; nicholson, 2006; progressive consultancy, 1998) and the potential for relationships between healers and primary healthcare providers (jones, 2000a, 2000b; o’connor, 2008), as well as to test the efficacy and toxicity of indigenous pharmacopeia (leach, 2003; mcgowan, 2000; melbourne, 2003). reclaiming the right to ask questions of relevance to māori and opening a space for engagement with māori communities in research will not necessarily only involve local participant communities. rather, researchers must be mindful of the many regional and national māori stakeholder organisations that will have an interest in both the actions and outcomes of research. providing the space for engagement can result in more meaningful māori participation in the on-going governance 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 2 [2014], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.2.1   of indigenous knowledge to inform research activity and in the new knowledge that emerges as a consequence of that activity. in the field of traditional māori healing, a key stakeholder group representing a broad college of māori interests is te kāhui rongoā trust (heareafter referred to as te kāhui rongoā or tkr), the national body for rongoā māori practitioners. the establishment of te kāhui rongoā te kāhui rongoā was established in 2011 through the amalgamation of two “peak bodies”; ngā ringa whakahaere ō te iwi māori (nrw) and te paepae matua mō te rongoā (tpm). each organisation had slightly different aims, objectives, and constituencies; yet, both were motivated by a desire to ensure the survival of rongoā māori as a viable and sustainable healing practice. nrw was established in 1992 in a deliberate move to create a body that represented māori traditional healers in order to facilitate the recognition of traditional healers/healing as an integral part of the new zealand health service (the waitangi tribunal, 2011). whilst nrw did not represent all healers, it advocated on behalf of affiliated members for more formal recognition of traditional healing practices (ahuriri-driscoll, baker et al., 2008a). nrw was involved in formulating accreditation procedures for healers and contributed to the development of national traditional healing service standards (durie, 1996; ministry of health, 1999). the goals of nrw were threefold: to have māori traditional health and healing recognised and accepted as a legitimate healing practice both nationally and internationally and governed by māori; to develop and support a credible network of effective providers of māori traditional health and healing services; and to establish and maintain a respected national organisation to govern māori traditional health and healing. te paepae matua mo te rongoā meanwhile was a national rongoā taumata (advisory board for rongoā) whose purpose was to protect, nurture, and extend rongoā. the paepae matua was made up of representatives of contracted clinics (including healers, iwi representatives, and administrators) and was supported by the paepae whenua (a regional representative structure) and the paepae mahi (the organisation’s secretariat). supported initially by the ministry of health through establishment funding and some operational funds (the waitangi tribunal, 2011), the tpm sought to distance itself, and assert a degree of independence from, the crown. at the time it was established, it was envisaged that the kaumātua (elders) as “keepers of the knowledge” would provide advice, help maintain the integrity of rongoā, protect rongoā (in the present and for future generations), and also protect the mana (power and authority) of the body itself (ahuriri-driscoll, baker et al., 2008a). te kāhui rongoā (tkr) came into being following a ministerial directive in march 2010 for the two existing organisations to merge (nrw, tpm & ministry of health, 2010). until that time, nrw and tpm had each received some funding from the ministry of health to support their existence. citing reasons of economic rationalisation and the avoidance of duplication, the two were directed to form one overarching body with the mandate to represent the rongoā sector. although pressured by the crown to merge, members from both entities viewed these changes as an opportunity to unite rongoā under one voice to determine one joint direction or vision for rongoā māori and to strategically position rongoā as a relevant and viable mode of healthcare service delivery for māori. the transition to unity, however, was not without its challenges. te kāhui rongoā comprises two trustees from each of ten regions around the country. to establish this structure, rohe (regions) had 3 boulton et al.: the governance and ownership of rongo? research information published by scholarship@western, 2014   to be identified, membership of rohe called for and a registration database in each region established, and elections to select trustees from amongst the regional members held. the constituency tkr represent are a diverse group: from individual healers through to nominated organisations and clinics, as well as whānau, patients, and those simply with an interest in rongoā māori. te kāhui rongoā’s role, according to its trust deed, is to “ensure the proper governance of rongoā” (te kāhui rongoā, 2010, p. 2). this governance function includes, amongst other things, a kaitiaki or guardianship role over information or research data that helps to “nurture, protect and grow rongoā me ōna tikanga (māori traditional healing and māori traditions)” (te kāhui rongoā, 2010, p. 6). the term kaitiaki is more commonly heard in the fields of natural resource management and conservation where, according to whangapirita, awatere, and nikora (2003), the term refers to: the responsibility that certain entities, not exclusively people, have to protect and guard the mauri (intrinsic life essence) of particular groups, objects, resources, traditions, practices and places. a practical philosophy, the kaitiaki role is a process that is locally defined and owned. the kaitiaki role is not a process of ownership but an individual and collective role to safeguard ngā taonga tuku iho (treasures that have been passed down) for the present and future generations. (p. 6) however, in the context of guarding, protecting, and nurturing rongoā māori, traditional māori healing practices and the knowledge that underpins and informs those practices, the twins concepts of kaitiaki and kaitiakitanga, are equally as valid. whilst te kahui rongoā are mandated to act in the role of guardians of traditional healing knowledge and the activities that surround traditional healing, they currently receive very little funding to do so and certainly not to a standard that might be expected of māori whānau and communities, of healers, or indeed of those of us that produce “new” research knowledge. once again the ministry of health have provided this new entity with establishment funding; however, not all activities that tkr have needed to engage in to position themselves as the governance group for the sector have been resourced. for example, whilst tkr has been funded to undertake practitioner meetings, scope out the requirements for a knowledge repository database, develop governance guidelines, and undertake business planning, other more strategic activities, essential to establishing a sustainable and enduring governance body, have not been funded. in its first year of existence, te kāhui rongoā has developed a strategic vision for rongoā māori (te kāhui rongoā, 2013a) and an associated work plan to help guide the 20 trustees towards the achievement of the organisation’s strategic goals in a methodical way and within realistic timeframes (te kāhui rongoā, 2013b). given the heterogeneity of te kāhui rongoā members and a lack of funding from the government to support the development of either document, to have developed both in such a short timeframe is testament to the passion of the members. in operating, tkr must strike a balance between regional interests (often constituting different aims and objectives for rongoā), its national mandate and focus, the needs of its members, and the needs of the crown. this “balancing act” is underpinned by the stewardship role that tkr holds in relation to rongoā māori. as kaitiaki, the tkr is guided by its member regions, which in turn, represent individual members across aotearoa. it has been in the course of negotiating tkr’s role with regard to ownership and governance of the data emerging from our study that we, as the 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 2 [2014], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.2.1   research team, have identified a number of challenges. we turn now, then, to outline the research project itself. the “supporting rongoā practice” research project origins of the study the supporting rongoā practice project2 is a three-year health research council of new zealand funded study. it builds on the earlier work of two research team members (ahuriri-driscoll and hudson), who together have undertaken extensive research with and for healers investigating issues of sustainability and undertaking preliminary work on developing an outcome framework for the sector (ahuriri-driscoll, baker et al., 2008a; ahuriri-driscoll, hudson et al., 2012). the project is “hosted” by whakauae research for māori health and development, a small, iwi-owned and governed research centre with a mission to successfully lead and deliver iwi-based research founded on academic excellence, mātauranga māori, and strong relationships with iwi in a manner that effectively amplifies the potential of all māori (whakauae research services ltd., 2013). owned by the iwi of ngāti hauiti, whakauae undertakes research and evaluation in the fields of māori public health (particularly tobacco research), health promotion, community development, health services, and health policy. as a research centre, we strive to produce high quality research that contributes to both the academy and to māori, while at all times being mindful that the work that we do must in some way shape or form be of direct benefit to the people of ngāti hauiti. all the researchers brought together for the supporting rongoā practice project are māori: two are university-based academics (ahuriri-driscoll and hudson), three are based at whakauae (boulton [project lead], gifford, and potaka-osborne), and the final member of the team is a contract researcher and current chair of te kahui rongoā (stewart). the idea for the project emerged from the recommendations outlined in the 2008 report entitled the future of rongoā māori: wellbeing and sustainability (ahuriri-driscoll, baker et al., 2008). two considerations were key to the project being hosted by whakauae. first, due to the nature of the research question with its focus on the policy environment, contracting, and health service delivery, ahuriri-driscoll and hudson deliberately sought researchers with expertise in these areas. second, the project benefits by being hosted by an iwi-owned research centre, in that the directors of the centre understand the importance of māori-controlled, māori-led research undertaken for and on behalf of māori, and the deliberate framing of research to benefit māori. the project rationale accessible and effective health services are a key determinant of good health (king, 2000). in considering how to improve health services for māori, emphasis is often given to providing choice and relevance through culturally appropriate service delivery (durie et al., 1995), increasing the responsiveness of conventional services, and establishing dedicated māori programmes (durie, 2003b). rongoā māori services, as part of the publicly funded and delivered healthcare system, have emerged in the midst of these developments, offering culturally meaningful options for care (jones, 2000b).                                                                                                                 2 the full title of the study is supporting traditional rongoā practice in contemporary health care settings (hrc 11/439). 5 boulton et al.: the governance and ownership of rongo? research information published by scholarship@western, 2014   the research project is premised on the belief that the provision of rongoā māori within aotearoa’s health system supports māori wellbeing at two levels: providing holistic, culturally consistent assessment, and treatment of individual symptoms or conditions (jones, 2000b; mark & lyons, 2010) whilst maintaining and revitalising mātauranga, tikanga and te reo māori (ahuriri-driscoll, baker et al., 2008a). rongoā māori is more than simply an approach to health; rather, it has intrinsic value as a cultural healing tradition in its own right. as robbins and dewar (2011) have argued, indigenous knowledge systems, which include our understanding of healing and medicine, are living entities and not relics of the past. in this study, we sought to elucidate the differences between the role of traditional medicine as a practice within a “cultural ecosystem” and the role of traditional medicine as a service within “the health ecosystem” (ahuriri-driscoll, hudson et al., 2008), with a view to understanding the service arrangements that can best support traditional rongoā māori today. originating from a māori value system and base, rongoā māori has traditionally been embedded in whānau and hapū communities: practiced by those identified as having a gift for healing, nurtured by senior healers through apprenticeship. this practice-focused approach entails a more organic model of development that is locality-specific, funded by koha (gifts), and based on oral transmission of knowledge (ahuriri-driscoll, baker et al., 2008a; reinfeld & pihama, 2010). conversely, publicly funded health services place emphasis on standardized practice, delivered by formally trained health professionals within contracted organizations. beyond the administrative and compliance requirements which must be met by those who hold service contracts (lavoie, boulton, & dwyer, 2010), a service-focused approach may see increased professionalization of healers, the development and implementation of practice standards, and funding more explicitly linked to outcomes of rongoā care. figure 1. practice-focused and service-focused approaches to rongoā. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 2 [2014], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.2.1   the delivery, funding, management, regulation, and monitoring of rongoā is complex and multifaceted. the exact number of rongoā practitioners and healers is unknown, although what is apparent is that there is great diversity of practice in the sector. rongoā providers range from single individual healers, through to formal, contracted, and funded clinics operating as businesses alongside other health providers (e.g., general practitioners). widespread interest in the integration of traditional māori healing more formally within the publicly-funded health system exists; however, there are a number of concerns relating to any such developments. the first of these is the potential for rongoā to be subjected to inappropriate scrutiny and regulation and, therefore, be compromised or undermined (jones, 2000b). a second concern is centred on the difficulties associated with crown funding (ahuriri-driscoll, baker et al., 2008a) and the apprehension that the reporting frameworks employed to monitor the performance of māori health providers may impact negatively on healers and the rongoā clinics themselves (boulton, 2007). a third concern is the possibility that healing in exchange for money will subtly alter the therapeutic relationship between the healer and the patient and, indeed, between the healer and wider community, which, in turn, could give rise to expectations on either side being misunderstood or unmet (te aho-lawson, 1998). these fears for rongoā practice as a result of further service development are not unfounded. analysis of the public funding of rongoā services undertaken by o’connor (2008) revealed that a focus on biomedical complementarity has led to the support of particular rongoā concepts and modalities over others, thereby marginalising certain practices and sectors of the healing community. while service-focused development is a key strategy for extending the reach and impact of rongoā, it is our contention that this must not occur at the expense of the practice or “art” of rongoā. indeed, quality rongoā service provision relies on robust practice applied effectively by practitioners working from a strong cultural base. identifying the optimal contractual environments and service delivery elements that support the practice of rongoā will, we would argue, contribute to the long-term sustainability of rongoā, to improvements in māori health gain, and to māori development more broadly. data governance issues two issues regarding data governance emerged in the course of this study. the first is that tkr, the entity that should be taking on the data governance role for this project, currently lacks the capacity or the resourcing to do so. the second is a wider concern regarding the legal and ethical dimensions of cultural and intellectual property in terms of the traditional medicinal knowledge, indigenous medicine plants and products, and access and use of data from research. these two issues are discussed in more detail below. the role of tkr as noted above, te kāhui rongoā has been established to, amongst other things, protect, grow, nurture, and develop traditional māori medicines. as the peak body in the sector with a representative mandate from healers and practitioners across the country, tkr is, in our view, the most appropriate organisation to hold research data gathered from constituency members. the supporting rongoā practice project was initially conceived in 2009, prior to the creation of tkr by the ministry of health. at that time, a project application to the main funder of health research in aotearoa was developed on the basis of pre-existing relationships and in consultation 7 boulton et al.: the governance and ownership of rongo? research information published by scholarship@western, 2014   with members of the two existing stakeholder organisations (ngā ringa whakahaere ō te iwi māori and te paepae matua mō te rongoā) and submitted for consideration late that same year. by the time the project was assessed and the funding approved, the new entity, te kāhui rongoā, had been formed. while our research team has developed a working relationship with the tkr in the months since the project began, our vision of te kāhui rongoā acting as the oversight body for the research has never fully come to fruition. in part, this is due to demands being placed upon tkr by the ministry of health, who has directed a programme of work for the organisation to complete in its first three years. however, in part, we also believe this was due to a lack of understanding, at least at the outset of the project, of how research could be used to support the work of tkr and advance the organisation’s strategic objectives. in the 18 months that the project has been underway, our research team has endeavoured to work closely with tkr to demystify “research” and research processes, to demonstrate how research might be used for advocacy, and, more recently, to assist tkr in the development of their own knowledge strategy. te kāhui rongoā’s knowledge strategy supports the organisation’s overall vision and development aspirations. it recognises the value of traditional cultural knowledge, as well as information derived from research. tkr appreciate that a significant amount of information about traditional māori medicine already widely and publicly accessible and that the subject continues to attract the attention of researchers. as the national body charged with protecting rongoā māori, te kāhui rongoā is uniquely positioned to establish a moral and ethical mandate to act as a national steward for rongoā research and information. such a claim would not undermine the authority of local healers and communities to govern their own knowledge but, rather, would provide a powerful collective voice for indigenous rights at the interface with researcher and commercial interests. in our study alone, three distinct types of data collection activity are being conducted, namely: indepth interviews with a range of key informants in the sector (healers, policy-makers, funders of rongoā māori); a survey of healers, clinicians, and rongoā practitioners; and in-depth case study research with three health services currently providing rongoā services. consequently, a vast amount of data, much of which has never been systematically collected, categorised, or analysed, will be amassed through the course of the study. in circumstances where there is an absence of a national advocate or a local community partner, the responsibility to act as a steward of indigenous knowledge and research information often defaults to the researcher team and then becomes subject to institutional policies. whereas in our situation we have a national body in tkr, which could hypothetically provide an enduring stewardship role in relation to research data collected from the sector, this same organisation is in the unenviable position of receiving no additional resource allocation to allow them to take on this important governance duty. as a research team, we are conscious that to request that tkr take on the role of kaitiaki or guardian of the data places an additional responsibility and burden on an organisation that is already under-resourced for the work they do. what then would be required were the tkr to take on a kaitiaki role? four elements are immediately apparent as being critical success: (a) recognition by the sector, by researchers, and by the crown that this is an crucial task for the tkr; (b) a willingness on the part of tkr to add this duty to an already long list of roles and responsibilities; (c) capacity, on behalf of the tkr, to discharge its role; and, of course, (d) resourcing to enable it to do so. setting aside the issue of whether the tkr are willing to take on this role (which of course must be debated and discussed by that organisation), we believe that our experience in conducting the supporting rongoā practice project highlights the importance of, and the need for, an entity such as the tkr to take on the role 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 2 [2014], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.2.1   of kaitiaki for rongoā-related research data. the question then arises as to whether these activities should be funded by the sector itself, by the researchers and funders of research activity, or by the crown. a recent report by the waitangi tribunal (2011) into the issues of cultural and intellectual property rights made specific mention of government responsibilities to support the traditional knowledge and indigenous species used in traditional medicines. this finding on the part of the tribunal echoes statements made in both the mataatua declaration (commission on human rights, 1993) and the united nations (2008) declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples asserting indigenous peoples’ rights to their knowledges. clearly then, based on this collective body of work, an argument can be made for crown resourcing to support a kaitiaki role in the management and governance of rongoā-related research data. the responsibility of the part of government to support traditional knowledge translates into the right, at an indigenous ethical level, for māori to have the ability to access and use information about traditional healers, traditional healing, and medicinal plants irrespective of where, how, and by whom this data may have been collected. extending the idea of kaitiakitanga further, such a role could allow for the development of a knowledge repository encompassing traditional knowledge and contemporary research. tkr would then be in a strong position to develop partnerships with other organisations and agencies to store information and take on the institutional responsibilities for data management. while technically feasible, the challenge of realising this kind of model relates to tkr developing a coherent vision for indigenous information management, the political recognition of indigenous cultural and intellectual property rights, and the resourcing of capacity within tkr to develop or create in partnership with an indigenous institution with the necessary infrastructure. currently, there are no policy impediments that we can identify that could prevent the tkr carrying out the role of kaitiaki; however, notwithstanding this, emergent international trade agreements and joint trans-tasman regulatory schemes (such as the recently mooted therapeutic products & medicines bill) could at best threaten the ability of a nationally-mandated entity to discharge a kaitiaki duty appropriately and, at worst, override its decisions. the implications of the commodification of knowledge beyond national borders are especially apparent when considering issues of cultural and intellectual property, an issue to which we now turn. the legal and ethical dimensions of cultural and intellectual property linked to more global concerns, the research has highlighted issues regarding the legal and ethical dimensions of cultural and intellectual property, in terms of the traditional medicinal knowledge, indigenous medicine plants and products, as well as in terms of access and use of data from research. understanding the complexities of the interface between western legal and ethical institutions and traditional knowledge is crucial if rongoā māori is to have a sustainable future. navigating towards such a future is likely to require the integration of rongoā information, in some way, within the evidence-based, public health system. there is both a political context and a long history to the access and use of traditional knowledge. intellectual property (ip) law to date has not effectively considered the rights of indigenous peoples as holders of indigenous knowledge or as victims of exploitation (mead, 1996; posey, 2002). consequently, any attempts to reconcile indigenous knowledge with conventional intellectual property rights (ipr) must take cognisance of “the growing value of indigenous knowledge in different areas of scientific, cultural, economic, and commercial endeavour” (oguamanam, 2004, p. 139). nowhere is this more apt than in the area of traditional medicine, where the commercialisation 9 boulton et al.: the governance and ownership of rongo? research information published by scholarship@western, 2014   of the “active” ingredient in a traditional medicine can result in huge profits for a pharmaceutical company, little of which is ever enjoyed by the traditional landowners or knowledge holders. examples exist whereby indigenous peoples have attempted to redress the balance and reassert their rights to their indigenous knowledge. successive instruments have advocated for, and advanced the protection of, biological resources and the recognition of indigenous iprs, including the convention of biological diversity (united nations, 1992) and the un declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (united nations, 2008). in aotearoa, the issue of indigenous rights and ip has been advanced through the mataatua declaration (commission on human rights, 1993) and the wai262 claim (the waitangi tribunal, 2011). amongst other propositions, the mataatua declaration recommended that states, national and international agencies recognise indigenous peoples as guardians of their customary knowledge with the right to protect and control dissemination of that knowledge and that indigenous peoples also have the right to create new knowledge based on cultural traditions. this position was reiterated in the waitangi tribunal report into the wai262 claim, ko aotearoa tēnei (the waitangi tribunal, 2011), which recommended that the crown amend new zealand ip law to ensure, to the greatest extent practicable, the authority of iwi and hapū in relation to their taonga (treasures), works, and related knowledge so that they may fulfil their obligations as guardians of that property. this theme of self-determination, currently being advocated on the world stage through organisations such as the un, underpins indigenous ethical frameworks and decisions to engage with research. canada’s ocap™ principles, for example, provide a useful starting point for discussions regarding indigenous involvement in knowledge production, data ownership, and data sharing (schnarch, 2004). ocap™ refers to ownership, control, access, and possession and synthesizes key aspirations for indigenous sovereignty in relation to indigenous knowledge resources including cultural knowledge, data, and information. in the context of ocap™, ownership signifies the collective responsibility and stewardship of a community’s knowledge. control relates to the aspiration to control all aspects of research and knowledge management. access refers to the right to manage and make decisions about data and information that concerns indigenous communities regardless of where that information is held. possession is a mechanism to strengthen stewardship of data when ownership may reside with other groups. ocap™, therefore, provides a framework for considering the political dimensions of knowledge production; in short, who is in control, what gets done, and how is it done? in aotearoa, the idea that mātauranga māori can be “owned” at all is incongruous with māori values and conceptions of kaitiakitanga. the notion of ownership as described in the ocap™ principles resonates with māori concepts of custodianship of knowledge, understandings which stand in stark contrast to western understandings of ownership as a private “property right”. kaitiakitanga or guardianship is concerned with caring for taonga and maintaining the mauri of that taonga. kaitiaki are therefore responsible for imposing protective measures around taonga, which might include restricting or limiting access to it and, in extreme cases, knowledge-withholding (lemon, 2002). central to the concept of kaitiakitanga is a function of collective control in contrast to individual control. whereas western views of knowledge would see it as an individual’s right to choose whether to share information, māori believe that information about one individual belongs to the whole whānau, hapū, or iwi. similarly, traditional knowledge and cultural and intellectual property, which has been accumulated over generations by hundreds or thousands of individuals, does not belong exclusively to specific individuals, although it may be managed by responsible stewards (commission on human rights, 1993; united nations, 2008). 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 2 [2014], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.2.1   indigenous research and ethics guidelines reinforce notions of indigenous control over both the inputs (cultural knowledge and data) and outputs (analysis and results) of the research process (canadian institutes of health research, natural sciences and engineering research council of canada, & social sciences and humanities research council of canada, 2010; hudson et al., 2010; national health and medical research council, 2003). however, the reality of the situation is that communities and researchers still have to negotiate the terms of a research relationship and the protocols that will inform the management of knowledge related to the project. a key challenge for researchers and communities alike is the lack of consistency in legal and ethical policies and documents regarding definitions of terms such as “ownership” and “control” when referring to data, knowledge, products, and other aspects of research. developing a level of consistency, whilst potentially time-consuming and resource intensive, will go some way to addressing what bannister (2005) describes as the “real world complexities of working in an intercultural and political environment” (p. 128). the real world complexity our team faces is that we find ourselves in a vacuum between our aspirations for indigenous (community or stakeholder) governance of research and the capacity and ability of indigenous community or stakeholder entities to enact that form of kaitiakitanga. the role of kaitiaki or “responsible steward” currently rests uneasily, albeit we would hope temporarily, with the research team. for us as an indigenous research team, this additional cultural responsibility requires that we be accountable to the rongoā community outside of the research domain and highlights the need for researchers to be proactive in supporting capacity-building initiatives with indigenous communities and stakeholders. these initiatives need to extend beyond a focus on research skills to the governance of research projects and the careful and considered stewardship of research data, and cultural and intellectual property. conclusion the māori cultural renaissance has gained momentum in aotearoa over the past 30 years. its initial focus was the revitalisation of māori language but has since spread to a range of cultural practices, art forms, and areas of expertise, including traditional māori medicine. this renaissance has had at its heart, the rejuvenation of traditional knowledge bases (royal, 2009) including efforts to preserve and maintain traditional resources and taonga, as well as the unalienable right to advance and develop these resources further (gibbs, 2005; the waitangi tribunal, 2011). knowledge management is a key activity at the interface of indigenous knowledge and indigenous development; it is a system of actions allowing the effective use of knowledge for problem solving and decision-making (lai, 2005). the establishment of te kahui rongoā as a peak body to protect, grow, nurture, and develop traditional māori medicines places it at the forefront of advocacy and development initiatives. this also positions it as the most appropriate entity to take responsibility for governing research interests in the rongoā sector and managing the data and knowledge that emerges from these activities. indeed, it is the most logical entity to fill the “governance gap”. however, what has become apparent in the development of this article, and what we are once again reminded of, are the myriad and often competing obligations, responsibilities, and accountabilities (boulton, 2005) that our māori communities and representative bodies manage in order to advance the goals of māori development. our research project is exploring the dynamic tension that is created when rongoā māori as a cultural practice is funded as a contemporary mode of health service delivery. this “dynamic duality”, and the complex and often difficult issues that arise at the interface between indigenous knowledges and systems and western knowledges and systems, is mirrored in 11 boulton et al.: the governance and ownership of rongo? research information published by scholarship@western, 2014   other aspects of society – from research through to practice, from governance through to management, from the caring professions through to business and economics. tkr are trying to maintain the balance between their role as cultural custodians and kaitiaki, (charged with safeguarding the knowledge and cultural and intellectual property of rongoā) and the responsibilities placed on it by virtue of their peak body status to have a degree of formal oversight of research data. as researchers active in the traditional healing space, we have an obligation and commitment to support te kahui rongoā in these dual roles. as māori, we have a duty to safeguard and ensure that the benefits that arise as consequence of this research are directed at those for whom the project was originally conceived: the rongoā sector and māori communities more widely. and as māori researchers, it is our responsibility to challenge the status quo and ensure that the crown and the government of the day acknowledge the additional roles organisations such as tkr are expected to take on for the benefit of māori and that they provide appropriate compensation for these roles. by appropriately remunerating such organisations for the additional kaitiaki roles they shoulder, we, as the research community, will benefit from more appropriately located data governance. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 2 [2014], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.2.1   glossary aotearoa literally “land of the long, white cloud”, the indigenous term for new zealand hapū sub-tribe iwi tribe kāhui cluster, company kaitiaki to guard or protect when used as a verb or a guardian or steward when used as a noun kaitiakitanga guardianship or stewardship kaumātua elders kaupapa vision, direction, topic or purpose kaupapa māori a “for, by and with maori” approach, used to refer to practice guided by maori philosophies, traditions, protocols koha gift(s) mana power, authority, influence māori the indigenous people of new zealand mātauranga knowledge mātauranga maori maori knowledge mauri intrinsic essence or life-supporting capacity ngā taonga tuku iho literally “those treasures that have been passed down”, hence a phrase referring to valuable things that have been passed down to other generations over time rohe region(s) rongoā māori traditional māori healing taonga treasures te reo māori the māori language tiaki to guard, preserve, foster, protect, and shelter tikanga maori cultural protocols, customs, and traditions tohunga expert, specialist (including spiritual leaders or artists), and in case of 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(1998). māori traditional healing: survey review (a report prepared for te kete hauora). wellington: ministry of health. reinfeld, m., & pihama, l. (2010). matarakau: ngā kōrero mō ngā rongoā o taranaki. new plymouth: karangaora inc/māori and indigenous analysis ltd. roberts, m., norman, w., minhinnick, n., wihongi, d., & kirkwoods, c. (1995). kaitiakitanga: māori perspectives on conservation. pacific conservation biology, 2, 7 20. robbins, j. a., & dewar, j. (2011). traditional indigenous approaches to healing and the modern welfare of traditional knowledge, spirituality and lands: a critical reflection on practices and policies taken from the canadian indigenous example. the international indigenous policy journal, 2(4). retrieved from http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/2 royal, c. (2009). te kaimanga: towards a new vision for mātauranga māori. lecture 1 of the macmillan brown lecture series, macmillan brown centre for pacific studies, university of canterbury. schnarch, b. 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(1992). convention on biological diversity. retrieved from http://www.cbd.int/convention/text/ united nations. (2008). united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples. retrieved from http://www.un.org/esa/socdev/unpfii/documents/drips_en.pdf university of otago. (2013). research consultation with māori. dunedin: university of otago. 17 boulton et al.: the governance and ownership of rongo? research information published by scholarship@western, 2014   waitangi tribunal, the. (2011). ko aotearoa tēnei: a report into claims concerning new zealand law and policy affecting māori culture and identity. te taumata tuatahi. (waitangi tribunal report). wellington: author. whakauae research services ltd. (2013). strategic plan for 1st january 2014 – 31st december 2018. whanganui: author whangapirita, l., awatere, s., & nikora, l. w. (2003). a review of environment: waikato iwi environment management plans (environment waikato internal series 2004/01, vol. technical report 2). hamilton, new zealand: environment waikato regional council. 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 2 [2014], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.2.1 the international indigenous policy journal april 2014 enacting kaitiakitanga: challenges and complexities in the governance and ownership of rongoā research information amohia boulton maui hudson annabel ahuriri-driscoll albert stewart recommended citation enacting kaitiakitanga: challenges and complexities in the governance and ownership of rongoā research information abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license enacting kaitiakitanga: challenges and complexities in the governance and ownership of rongoä† research information consulting whom? lessons from the toronto urban aboriginal strategy the international indigenous policy journal volume 5 | issue 1 article 3 january 2014 consulting w hom? lessons from the toronto urban aboriginal strategy mai t. nguyen york university, mnguyen6@yorku.ca recommended citation nguyen, m. t. (2014). consulting whom? lessons from the toronto urban aboriginal strategy. the international indigenous policy journal, 5(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.3 consulting w hom? lessons from the toronto urban aboriginal strategy abstract the research conducted here looks at the current urban aboriginal strategy (uas) in toronto. the purpose of this strategy is to provide long-term investments to support aboriginal communities in urban settings by focusing on three priority areas: improving life skills; promoting job training, skills, and entrepreneurship; and supporting aboriginal women, children, and families. this article seeks to answer the following question: does the uas provide aboriginal participants with the ability to effectively participant in the consultation process? it argues that the uas process of consulting with the urban aboriginal community does not allow for the effective participation of aboriginal peoples because of problematics related to consulting in an urban setting and despite the language of partnership, the federal government still reserves the right to make final decisions. these problems diminish the ability to build renewed aboriginal-state relations based on mutual respect and trust, which has been absent within the aboriginal-state apparatus and resulted in the political exclusion of aboriginals in canada. though consultation can be a vehicle for empowering participants with decision-making authority, this is not the case in toronto. the lack of a common vision, political buy-in, and the aura of secrecy leads to a political relationship built on mistrust. mistrust between members and government renders the consultation process ineffective. this article combines the literature on public consultations with official government documents to identify critical components that must be evident for consultations to be fruitful and participation effective. these criteria are the benchmarks upon which to measure effectiveness. based on interviews with the steering committee, this article finds that the uas process of consulting with the toronto aboriginal community does not enable aboriginal participants to effectively participate in the democratic process. keywords aboriginal-state public consultations, community engagement, community capacity building creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ c o n s u l t i n g w h o m ? l e s s o n s f r o m t h e t o r o n t o u r b a n a b o r i g i n a l s t r a t e g y public consultation exercises in advanced industrialized countries are becoming the norm with governments consulting and engaging with citizens in many fields of policy. this is especially the case for aboriginal-state relations in canada and abroad. in canada, aboriginal peoples have made great efforts to participate in the democratic process in order to change the course of colonialism. aboriginal participation signifies that, similar to other citizen groups, aboriginal peoples will no longer allow governments to make decisions on their behalf. on the other hand, aboriginal peoples are different from other citizens in that their colonial history has, at times, resulted in socio-economic marginalization and political exclusion, which creates barriers to democratic participation. to overcome these barriers, governments in canada have actively sought the opinion and knowledge of aboriginal peoples in policymaking. an example of this activity is the urban aboriginal strategy (uas). in 1997, the federal government launched the uas designed to provide long-term investments to support aboriginal communities in urban settings by focusing on three priority areas: improving life skills; promoting job training, skills, and entrepreneurship; and supporting aboriginal women, children, and families. the strategy was first implemented in 1998 in winnipeg and half a decade later arrived on the toronto scene. the strategy itself employs a community engagement model for consulting and a consensusbuilding model for decision-making, making the model an example of an aboriginal-state consultation exercise. to this end, the focus of this article is the public consultation process with respect to one segment of the canadian population, urban aboriginal peoples. the public consultation literature argues that consultations can only be meaningful when mechanisms for effective participation are in place; if not, the process is rendered futile and frustrating for participants (arnstein, 1969). effective participation occurs when governments can equip aboriginal participants with the necessary resources to make wellinformed decisions about their communities. thus, if effective, the consultation process will aid in building relationships based on trust and mutual respect amongst parties. the question this article asks is: does the uas process provide aboriginal participants with the ability to effectively participate in the consultation process? that is, will participation in consultation help restore aboriginal trust and confidence in the political system, thus removing barriers to participation? if yes, what elements and criteria must be evident for this to be the case? if no, what renders the process ineffective? if consultations are a mechanism for relationship building, what should be the government’s role in facilitating this mechanism, given the barriers to democratic participation as experienced by some groups of aboriginal peoples? some of the barriers are related to aboriginal mistrust in the political process: aboriginal peoples do not trust the state and have good reasons for their lack of trust. more critical barriers are intrinsically linked to socio-economic factors such as employment and income since the lack of both hinders the ability to meaningfully participate. in relation to the former point, aboriginal communities experience a lack of government recognition, which can make community development difficult at times because the federal and provincial governments have been unwilling to consult with aboriginal communities and organizations, as this research found in the toronto case. this hinders the building of political relationships because governments have been reluctant to sit at the consultation table unless the governments themselves initiated the consultation. with regard to the latter aspect, the demographic 1 nguyen: consulting whom? published by scholarship@western, 2014 profile of the toronto aboriginal population plays a critical part in the ability of aboriginal residents to participate in any consultation process. according to the 2006 aboriginal peoples survey (aps), toronto’s aboriginal population stood at 26,575 and accounted for less than 1% of the total population (0.5%) (statistics canada, 2006) compared to other cities, such as winnipeg, where the aboriginal population accounts for 10% of the overall population. on the other hand, the greater toronto area (gta), made up of the city of toronto, and the peel, york, durham, and halton regions, has the largest aboriginal population of any city in ontario, accounting for approximately 13% of the overall aboriginal population in the province (aps, 2006). ontario itself has the largest and most diverse aboriginal population in canada. in toronto, the majority of aboriginal peoples identify themselves as north american indian or métis (statistics canada census, 2006). the toronto aboriginal population is younger than the nonaboriginal population across all categories and has a lower proportion of seniors (mccaskill, fitzmaurice, & cidro, 2012). the majority of aboriginal residents tend to reside in the city of toronto. however, a large number of these residents tend to reside in lower-income areas and in neighbourhoods with a high incidence of air pollution (mccaskill et al., 2012). residential patterns correlate closely with income. according to statistics canada (2010), in 2005, 27% of toronto aboriginal people were living below the low-income cut-off point (lico) compared to only 18% of the non-aboriginal population. furthermore, the findings from the toronto aboriginal research project (tarp) community survey indicate that approximately 63% of respondents earned less than $40 000 per year (mccaskill, et al., 2012). the findings also point to a significant proportion (37%) of respondents who earn $40,000 or more per year thus, representing the urban aboriginal middle-class (mccaskill, et al., 2012). however, respondents of the survey noted that, although there is a growing urban aboriginal middle-class, they are not as politically active and engaged with the community overall (mccaskill, et al., 2012). in other words, those most likely to participate in the community and be politically active are not likely to be members of the aboriginal middle-class. this may suggest that some of the most politically active community members may not possess the adequate resources, information, knowledge, and time to effectively participate. therefore, in some cases, empowerment requires governments to equip aboriginal participants with the necessary resources to become fully engaged and meaningful participants. how can governments go about achieving this end? this article aims to answer these questions by developing a framework for analysis, which is derived from the literature on public consultation and applies the framework to the toronto case through interviews with steering committee members. toronto has been home to the uas for over a decade and, in march of 2012, the federal government announced it would renew the uas for an additional two years, adding new funding of $27 million. at this point, the uas in toronto transitioned from a steering committee composed of community members to the toronto aboriginal social services council (tassc), which acts as an advisory body. this version of the uas no longer employs the consultation model of decision-making based on the consensus of a nominated body of community representatives and, therefore, the research ends at this point. the toronto urban aboriginal management committee (tumc) managed the original incarnation of the steering committee, which was responsible for overseeing the implementation of the uas. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.3 tumc was mandated to “identify, promote and advance opportunities to close the gap in life chances (opportunities for social advancement and economic development) for urban aboriginal people in toronto” (toronto uas handout, 2012, p. 1). in the fiscal years of 2010 to 2011 and 2011 to 2012, the local priority, as set by tumc, was to support programs that focused on “serving children and youth, providing educational & cultural opportunities” (toronto uas handout, 2012, p. 1). priorities were determined through community feedback obtained during community engagement activities. engagement occurred in the form of community forums. a community based on consensus building then decided on priorities. m e t h o d s from the public consultation literature, a series of interview questions were constructed and given to respondents during the interview process (see appendix a). the questions sought to deconstruct participants’ statements articulating their sentiments and experiences with the process. interviewees comprised of members from tumc. the committee is made up of 14 members: one project officer (the only salaried position); two co-chairs (one from the aboriginal community and one representing the federal government); one national caucus representative, also from the aboriginal community; three youth representatives from the community; three government representatives from each level of government; and four aboriginal community members. all aboriginal community members (except for the project officer) sit on the committee on a volunteer basis. government representatives sit on the committee as an extension of their paid position. in toronto, eight interviews were conducted in total at the start of 2012 (see table 1). those interviewed were members of the third cycle of the steering committee. the original two committees were dismantled because of differing priorities. all interviews were done in-person, lasting approximately one to one and a half hours. six other aboriginal committee members were inaccessible via email. community representatives who were interviewed all worked for aboriginal organizations located throughout the city, such as aboriginal legal services of toronto. all respondents worked in a professional or managerial capacity, but did not hold any executive positions within the organizations. government representatives were more readily available to be interviewed and to answer questions, except for the federal government representative for the office of the federal interlocutor (ofi) who is the director and co-chair of the toronto chapter and asked to be interviewed off the record. t a b l e 1 . n u m b e r o f i n t e r v i e w s b y p a r t i c i p a n t c a t e g o r y c o m m u n i t y # o f f e d e r a l g o v e r n m e n t i n t e r v i e w s # o f p r o v i n c i a l a n d m u n i c i p a l g o v e r n m e n t i n t e r v i e w s # o f i n t e r v i e w s w i t h a b o r i g i n a l c o m m u n i t y m e m b e r s t o t a l # o f i n t e r v i e w s t o r o n t o 2 1 5 8   3 nguyen: consulting whom? published by scholarship@western, 2014 c o n s u l t a t i o n f r a m e w o r k urban aboriginal peoples pose an interesting case study because of the gap in the aboriginal-state public consultation literature where the focus tends to be on the legal duty to consult, resource development, construction-related proposals, and self-government arrangements for nationand land-based groups (walker, 2005). this focus has been a by-product of the privileged state of aboriginal rights within the eyes of the federal government. little has been written in the way of aboriginal-state consultations that take place in an urban setting. this may be attributed to the fact that section 35 of the constitution act (1982), which legally recognized aboriginal and treaty rights, conflicts with the legal duty to consult as it relates to urban aboriginal peoples for which no specific body, organization, or leader can rightfully claim to represent any specific urban aboriginal community. with regard to section 35, many of the benefits that flow from the recognition of aboriginal and treaty rights, such as the right to selfgovernment, to land, to culture, and the right to hunt and fish, are land and group specific. this makes it increasingly difficult for urban aboriginal populations to access their aboriginal and treaty rights in urban centres. with respect to the legal duty to consult, whether or not cities have this duty has been a contentious issue that has been brought before the provincial courts. for example, on september 24, 2012, the british columbia court of appeal decided in the case of neskonlith indian band v. the city of salmon arm (2012) that local governments do not have a duty to consult with first nations nor do they have the practical resources to do so. this decision can make policy coordination that much more difficult and strengthening aboriginal-state relations that much more daunting. given the colonial history of aboriginal-state relations, it is important to evaluate whether the process of public consultations will assist in repairing aboriginal-state trust dynamics. this article attempts to evaluate the uas consultation process through the development of a framework that is aboriginal specific. it does so by employing sherry arnstein’s (1969) a ladder of citizen participation (see figure 1) as a benchmark, as well as extracting various criteria evident in the public consultation literature. generally, this framework is designed to determine whether the uas allows for the effective participation of aboriginal participants by asking questions related to the process. the framework is divided into three components, development, empowerment, and relationship building (see table 2), which represent different crucial features of the consultation process. from here, each component devises a set of criteria that measure effectiveness in terms of redistributing power from, and building trust between, the parties. d e v e l o p m e n t a l c o m p o n e n t component one, the developmental component, ultimately sets the agenda. at this stage in the framework, the question that needs to be asked is: which party gets to decide the purpose and form of consultation, aboriginal participants or the state? in other words, do aboriginal people have a voice in determining the subject matter of the consultation and what form is to be employed? as arnstein (1969) stated, “participation without redistribution of power is an empty and frustrating process for the powerless. it allows the power-holders to claim that all sides were considered, but makes it possible for only some of those sides to benefit. it maintains the status quo” (p. 216). the typology developed by arnstein (1969) classifies eight rungs on “a ladder of citizen participation”. the first two rungs, manipulation and therapy are labeled as “nonparticipation” in which the objective of public participation is not to enable participation, but to allow power holders to “educate” or “cure” the participants (p. 217). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.3 f i g u r e 1 . a r n s t e i n ’ s ( 1 9 6 9 ) e i g h t r u n g s o n a l a d d e r o f c i t i z e n p a r t i c i p a t i o n . t a b l e 2 . e v a l u a t i o n f r a m e w o r k s u b c o m p o n e n t s c o m p o n e n t c r i t e r i a 1. developmental (a) deciding subject matter (b) deciding consultation mechanism 2. empowerment (a) deciding representatives (b) availability of resources and training provided (c) communication process 3. relationship-building (a) political will (b) use of input     5 nguyen: consulting whom? published by scholarship@western, 2014 rungs three to five, informing, consulting and placation, progress to levels of “tokenism” in which participants hear and are heard, but lack the power to affect outcomes (p. 217). the highest three rungs, partnership, delegated power, and citizen control, progress to varying degrees of citizen power. partnership allows participants to negotiate and engage in trade-offs with policy-makers, while delegated power and citizen control allow participants a large share of the decision-making authority or full managerial power (p. 217). similarly, king, feltey, and susel (1998) define authentic (effective and authentic will be used interchangeably) participation “as the ability and the opportunity to have an impact on the decisionmaking process” (p. 320). however, in the authors’ view, many efforts at public consultation are ineffective and unauthentic because of what the authors call the “practitioner-client hierarchy” in which decision-making, agenda-setting, and gate-keeping authority remains in the hands of the administrator (king et al., 1998). therefore, authentic participation requires participants to be part of the deliberation process from issue framing to decision-making (king et al., 1998). if this occurs it demonstrates willingness by power holders (governments) to negotiate the terms and conditions of the process and thus reallocate some degree of decision-making authority to stakeholders who now possess the ability to make decisions regarding this stage of the process. the second question asked pertains to the form of consultation employed and, more importantly, which party decides the consultation mechanism that will be adopted. this is important given that the form chosen, specifically how decisions will be decided upon, will determine the degree of influence participants will have on the outcomes. for example, at the bottom of the ladder the rungs of arnstein’s (1969) typology (see figure 1), therapy and manipulation are considered to invoke “nonparticipation” for which “their real objective is not to enable people to participate in planning or conducting programs, but to enable power holders to “educate” or “cure” participants” (p. 217). on the other hand, the top rungs of delegated power and citizen-control empower participants with the majority of decisionmaking authority or full managerial control (arnstein, 1969). thus, the ability to choose which form of consultation will be adopted can allow participants a greater role in determining the final policy outcomes. in addition, allowing all parties a say in the selection process removes the ability for one party, usually the government, to retain a hegemonic position over the process. this is crucial in the aboriginal context as governments and aboriginal peoples have commonly encountered roadblocks during the negotiations process (turcotte & zhao, 2004). as van den burg (2009) stated: a substantial part of the problem with consultation is that the government has failed to devise an appropriate mechanism for consultations. a method of joint decision-making between aboriginal people and non-aboriginal people must be conducted. few policy-makers ... possess the field experience to understand their target population, making it difficult to design programs that properly address aboriginal peoples’ needs. (p. 20) in other words, evading consultation a-priori policy design undermines the objectives of the consultation process because it demonstrates the government’s unwillingness to share decision-making power from the start. for public consultations to be fruitful, governments must negotiate the process with aboriginal stakeholders prior to actual consultation. doing so demonstrates the government’s 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.3 readiness to consult in good faith, a minimum requirement for regaining aboriginal trust and redistributing power. e m p o w e r m e n t c o m p o n e n t the empowerment component focuses on the twin issues of political inclusivity and mechanisms for enabling participation. at this point, evaluators need to determine: (a) who was called for participation and how were representatives of the group in question chosen; and (b) were the necessary tools for empowerment (participation) made available to participants? in regards to the first set of questions, turnball and aucoin (2006) stated that one of the limitations of public consultation is that it offers “a role only to those citizens who volunteer to participate. governments do not always actively recruit a diverse set of opinions” (p. 1). furthermore, catt and murphy (2003) state that the failure of governments to seek input from members of ethnic, national, and religious minorities will result in major obstacles in the domain of both legitimacy and efficacy (p. 411). in the canadian case, this would apply to aboriginal peoples; thus, legitimacy in policy-making requires in-depth aboriginal representation. in regards to the question of group representation, catt and murphy (2003) stated that the question to be asked here is: who speaks for or represents the group and how are these representatives chosen? governments have several ways to go about this task, such as random sampling. however, though this mechanism has its merits (it best approximates the principle of individual equality), it provides aboriginal peoples with no choice in the matter. catt and murphy (2003) argued that allowing parties to pick their own representatives is most effective and is especially important for historically disadvantaged or marginalized groups who may not trust the government to choose representatives who will honestly and effectively represent their interests. therefore, a better mechanism put forth by the authors is to have governments provide for a process of group selection, “wherein particular government-designed groups or associations would choose their own representatives to speak on their behalf” (catt & murphy, 2003, p. 412). in this case, the group may choose to elect their representatives or to choose them through informal methods. catt and murphy (2003) argued that the importance and benefits of this mechanism of group selection is that it allows representatives to be directly accountable to the members it represents and ensures that those representatives provide an accurate account of the perspectives and priorities they represent. this is vital to the group whose interests are at stake and to the government who requires as accurate an account as possible in order to achieve efficacy and legitimacy in the policy-making process. to this end, given the cultural sensitivity of aboriginal policies, aboriginal communities must be assigned this responsibility. the second set of questions in this section is concerned with determining the availability of avenues and resources needed to allow for meaningful participation to occur. participation cannot be meaningful if the appropriate resources (e.g., internet, transportation, access to information, sufficient time), information (e.g., supporting rationales, technical or scientific information, analyses performed, costs and benefits, and potential impacts and consequences), and skills training (e.g., administrative, community engagement training) are not made available to participants. as turnball and aucoin (2006) stated, “the effort to make participants as informed as possible enhances the civic education aspect of the deliberation exercise. it also helps to ‘level the playing field’ between those participants who 7 nguyen: consulting whom? published by scholarship@western, 2014 initially are knowledgeable about the issue and those who are not” (p. 9). without these resources, wellinformed decisions will not occur, which will result in government officials pushing their agenda on participants (van den burg, 2009). therefore, access to information will allow for political inclusion and equality in the process. as catt (1999) argued, “the ability to take part in the democratic process is an important step in attaining equality... even if all have the same access to the democratic procedures there are other conditions that need to be met, such as availability of information” (p. 9). furthermore, king et al. (1998) argued that citizens needed to be educated, with a focus on teaching specific organizing and research skills and leadership training, for effective participation to take place. that is, though information and resources may be made available to participants, without training specific to the requirements of the process, participants may not possess the capacity to participate. for many aboriginal participants, this is the case. because of their damaged trust towards the state and the institutions that are part of the democratic process, aboriginal peoples at time have found themselves politically isolated and excluded. to this end, given the democratic roadblocks aboriginal peoples experience, governments must provide the necessary resources (transportation costs, computer and internet access, communication devices, professional staff, access to expert consultants, etc.) and training needed for effective participation to take place. by creating an environment conducive to effective participation, citizens and administrators can work together from the beginning when issues are being defined and framed. such an environment demonstrates willingness on the part of governments to invest in aboriginal participation in the consultation process. this indicates, to some degree, the readiness by governments to equalize the power base and consult in good faith. r e l a t i o n s h i p b u i l d i n g c o m p o n e n t component three, the relationship-building component, is two-fold. it examines the extent of political will for the process and how final decisions are agreed upon. more specifically, how the findings, participants’ input, and comments are incorporated into the final decision. returning to arnstein’s (1969) ladder, the first three rungs offer participants no assurance that their input will be taken into account or used. participation at these levels is tokenistic in nature with governments having final say. turnball and aucoin further (2006) highlight that governments do not always commit to using public input in decision-making and, more importantly, consultation often occurs late in the process and citizens are left to respond in a context where commitments have been made and ideas hardened. as the authors stated: it must be clear to participants in the deliberation process that their efforts are not simply for consultative purposes or to validate decisions that have already been taken ... if citizens are to be expected to sacrifice the considerable time and energy required by meaningful public deliberations, they must be assured that the result of their deliberations “matter”. a deliberative procedure that fails in this regard will be interpreted as a shallow commitment to public involvement and may even undermine, rather than enhance public trust in government. (p. 7) in other words, in order to move away from tokenistic forms of consultation towards more meaningful and genuine consultation, aboriginal people must have an equal opportunity to affect the final outcomes. as indicated on arnstein’s (1969) typology, the top rungs provide participants with the 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.3 opportunity to make real decisions. this is most important for aboriginal people as they endeavour to remove the reigns of colonialism and work towards political inclusion for self-determination. catt (1999) stated that: democratic decision making as a means of obtaining self-governance to fulfill the ideal that no person should be decided for another is an important strand of argument in justifications for democracy... the other strand to the argument of self-government is that all decisions should be made only after each person has had an opportunity to express their view. only if the decision is made by all is it legitimate. (p. 8) to this end, decision-making power through the consultation process is a step towards political inclusion and the development of trust between governments and aboriginal peoples. that is, by equalizing power relations, governments are entrusting aboriginal communities with the ability to chart their own destinies. therefore, when the criteria set here are fulfilled, governments are removing roadblocks to participation and, consequently, are building relationships with trust and respect being at the crux. in this article, the framework of analysis is applied to the toronto uas. the findings are summarized in the chart below. f i n d i n g s a n d o b s e r v a t i o n s this section analyzes the three components of the evaluation framework as it applies to the toronto uas case study. table 3 summarizes the presence or absence of each of the criteria in the toronto case. measuring the existence of each component was derived from interviewees’ responses to questions assessing criteria derived from arnstein’s (1969) standards for effective citizen participation and the public consultation literature. the findings show that the decision-making process for the toronto uas does not in fact meet arnstein’s standards and the criticisms within the literature hold true in the toronto case. d e v e l o p m e n t a l c o m p o n e n t d e c i d i n g c o n s u l t a t i o n m e c h a n i s m . in toronto, the sentiments towards this aspect of the developmental component are very critical of the actions of the federal government. these criticisms are rooted in the fact that the uas arrived on the scene without any community consultation as to its purpose and subject matter. consultation and a priori implementation had taken place in winnipeg well before the strategy arrived in toronto. however, this sparked anger from the toronto aboriginal community who felt as though the strategy was imposed on the community rather than being developed in partnership with the community. as one member stated: there was a lot of controversy with the federal government and the aboriginal community because some community members felt the federal government just dropped the uas on the community without consultation. not looking at who the community is and what they would want from the strategy. (personal interview with uas member, toronto, february 23, 2012; for a complete list of interviews, see appendix b) 9 nguyen: consulting whom? published by scholarship@western, 2014 t a b l e 3 . a s s e s s m e n t o f t o r o n t o ’ s u r b a n a b o r i g i n a l s t r a t e g y o n e v a l u a t i o n f r a m e w o r k s u b c o m p o n e n t s c o m p o n e n t c r i t e r i a t o r o n t o developmental a) deciding consultation mechanism b) deciding subject matter no yes empowerment a) deciding representatives b) availability of resources and training c) communication process yes no absent relationship building a) political will b) use of input no no   another member noted that: for the uas there is not a lot of information on what it is and people still don’t know what it does and there’s confusion about that so the community is not sure if we’re seen as competition. one of the original purposes was to help bring all the partners to the table. you really need to have all the players to come up with a strategic plan. (personal interview with uas member, toronto, december 2, 2011) these statements reflect the frustration felt by participants due to the lack of consultation with the community, which made some of the aboriginal community organizations sceptical of the strategy’s intent. more specifically, the organizations feared a loss of funding since the uas would be funded by the same, shared pot of federal money since, at the time, it was a reallocation of funding rather than new federal funding. in the toronto case, inter-organizational conflicts are not unfamiliar to the aboriginal landscape. many studies (carter & mcgregor, 2006; jim ward associates, 2008; richardson, dimaline, blondin, macleod, & lazore, 2002) have highlighted the lack of cooperation and coordination of services between the city’s aboriginal organizations. for example, the study commissioned by the native canadian centre of toronto, in the spirit of unity: a synopsis of programs and services available to 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.3 the urban aboriginal population in the greater toronto area, corroborate some of the earlier findings such as: • because of the high levels of poverty in the toronto aboriginal community fundraising activities are not feasible. • there is fragmentation in the aboriginal community in toronto at the agency and individual level. • urban aboriginal agencies have often emerged as the representatives of the community by default sometimes resulting in fragmentation of the community. a larger more representative body is therefore needed to be more representative of the aboriginal community. (as cited in mccaskill, et al., 2012, p. 53)   the study by clatworthy, hall, and loughren (1994) supported these findings and highlighted that “toronto’s organizations reported higher levels of dependency on government resources and minimal levels of self-generated resources. nearly 88 percent of the resources managed by these organizations were derived from government sources” (p. 62). in other words, obtaining and securing government funding is a continuous struggle for aboriginal organizations in the city. to this end, without consultation before implementation, in order to educate and garner community support, governments will find it increasingly difficult to gain the trust of the aboriginal community to ensure participation. this was clearly highlighted in the interviews. as one member stated: if there is going to be a policy on how to make life better for urban aboriginal people it needs to come from grassroots. it can’t be government saying this is our structure, policy, and funding model and we want your input but we’re still going to run the show. (personal interview with uas member, toronto, december 22, 2011) this statement is indicative of arnstein’s (1969) category of “degrees of tokenism” in which participants are heard but lack the power to affect the outcomes. without knowing what and how the strategy can work in partnership with aboriginal community organizations both governments and the community will find participation in the strategy difficult from the initial stages of consultation. d e c i d i n g s u b j e c t m a t t e r . though the original subject matter of the strategy was decided half a decade ago in manitoba, the main areas of focus (improving life skills; promoting job training, skills, and entrepreneurship; and supporting aboriginal women, children, and families) are important and critical to the livelihoods of all urban aboriginal communities across the country. how these policy areas are addressed and implemented become part and parcel of the consultation process. therefore, it is important to examine which party was given the authority to decide the subject matter postimplementation. in toronto, the steering committee is given the authority to decide the subject matter to be consulted or in this case, the uas strategic plan. each year tumc will attend different events and launch its own annual events, such as a recruitment drive, to determine the needs of the community. community feedback is then presented at the committee’s annual “planning session,” which involves a third-party facilitator to help discuss and decide the committee’s priorities and final strategic plan. as the national caucus representative stated: 11 nguyen: consulting whom? published by scholarship@western, 2014 we sit down and discuss what the community needs are and then we send out the call for proposals based on those needs each year. there are certain criteria that have to be met. criteria is based on what community needs are. (personal interview with national caucus representative, toronto, january 27, 2012) the criteria must fit within the three pillars of the strategy, which are broad enough to allow tumc the freedom and authority to design the strategic plan. however, despite this consultation process, several members noted that, at the end of the day, the toronto aboriginal community remained unaware of the strategy’s importance. this suggests that community consultation before implementation is not only important to ensure the cooperation of those involved but also to gain the community’s trust in the process. ultimately, the absence of these key factors in the developmental component renders the process ineffective. at a minimum, it raises difficulties for the government because relationships need to be forged from the ground up and cannot be piggy-backed onto existing relationships, even though tumc had the freedom to decide the direction of the strategic plan. this demonstrates a degree of willingness on the part of government to redistribute some aspects of the policy-design to the community, an essential component for ensuring effective participation and gaining the trust of members. on the other hand, because the strategy was imposed on the community there is a sense of distrust surrounding the strategy and towards those government representatives involved. starting off on the wrong footing will require more work by governments in order to gain the trust of the community and thus to ensure effective participation can take place. e m p o w e r m e n t c o m p o n e n t r e p r e s e n t a t i o n . in toronto, recruitment of members is done through a “call for nominations”. the call is widely advertised throughout the toronto aboriginal and non-aboriginal communities (bus ads, newspapers, email lists, etc.). members are selected based on criteria developed by tumc, which generally coincides with the committee’s plans and activities. for instance, criteria may take into account geographic location within the city, skills, and experience (tumc, 2008). in this instance, the committee is given the power to develop the selection criteria and to appoint committee representation. in 2008, the membership recruitment drive ran from august 25th to october 17th. the broad approach used for membership development included, a. peer recruitment campaign, including word of mouth; b. advertising in the native canadian news; c. new member brochure distribution; d. broadcast email nominations forms to aboriginal organizations; e. posters advertising our new membership drive at aboriginal organizations, community centres, pools, libraries, and health clinics in 22 of toronto’s communities with the greatest population of aboriginal people. (therrien, 2008) 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.3 overall, the committee is given the opportunity to choose the method of recruitment, selection criteria, as well as appointing members. the “selections sub-committee,” who assembles a shortlist of nominees and presents the final list to tumc, who then decides the successful candidates as a whole, handles this process. although the selection process is handled independent of the government, low attendance by community members is a problem. at any given time, seven to eight members will be absent. only five to six representatives attend consistently and at times the government co-chair will be absent from the meetings. the terms of reference (tumc, 2008) stated that two consecutively missed meetings require the resignation of the member; however, this is currently not enforced. low attendance creates barriers to effective participation and becomes problematic for several reasons. first, the absence of almost half of the committee results in a loss of full community representation. second, it slows the process of consensus building. lastly, it reduces members’ morale. the combination of these setbacks makes the ability to effectively participate difficult even when the intent is there and provided by government. for example, steering committee membership is based on community representation. members are chosen based on their personal and professional experience within the community; however, low attendance means community representation and knowledge is not at the consultation table. this triggers the second concern, which is two-fold. first, when members are not in attendance, the absentees need to be briefed at the next monthly meeting. this utilizes some of the already limited time members have dedicated to the strategy. in addition, since the process is based on consensus building, when an item has been rolled over to the next meeting, any previously absent members will need to be briefed on the discussion and consensus must be obtained again. this becomes a daunting task if and when members do not agree with the final decision, such as the design of the uas logo. as one government representative stated: there are frustrations in those things we discuss and need to make decisions on. i don’t know how to stop that. the collective people need to decide to stop discussing. an example of that is our logo that we had. we had a member on our committee who does graphic design. we offered to use her company to make the logo for us. those of us at the meeting picked which one we wanted to use. next meeting there was a debate about which logo to use based on the people at this new meeting because they were not at the previous meeting when we decided. (personal interview with government representative, february 23, 2012) this is a simplistic example of the difficulties that arise from low attendance. nonetheless, it does highlight the ways in which the committee is faced with roadblocks attempting to put the strategy into action. this can make consensus building an onerous, tedious, and slow process, especially since the committee only meets once a month. however, low participation is symptomatic of a deeper democratic concern, which is, according to many members, the absence of ofi at the table. members stated that the absence of government at the meetings makes the members feel as though their participation is futile, especially since the federal government initiated the consultation but is not there to listen. this lowers morale and results in low attendance. as one member stated: 13 nguyen: consulting whom? published by scholarship@western, 2014 it’s disheartening cause we need representation… some say it’s frustrating because of the way government act but they are not giving up on the government but are giving up on us by not showing up. (personal interview with uas member, toronto, march 1, 2012) that is, the physical absence of government at the table is more detrimental to the strategy than the absence of members from time to time. this creates a barrier to effective participation in which members lose faith in the process and distrust those who called them to the table. as one member stated: i think it would be helpful if the federal government would come to meetings. when he or she doesn’t come to the meetings or explain his/her decision it adds to the distrust. (personal interview with committee member, toronto, april 4, 2012) in this instance, the issue of member selection and community representation is not up for debate. both in theory and in practice, the government has delegated this power to the committee. although the government has a seat on the selections sub-committee, they do not make final appointments. the process used to select committee members demonstrates the willingness of the government to entrust the community with the opportunity to choose its representatives. however, the main concern for the toronto uas is the lack of attendance by committee members, which affects the ability of all members to effectively participate and represent the community as it prolongs implementation. more importantly, the lack of representation at the table from both members and the federal government lowers morale amongst the committee resulting in a vicious cycle of absence breeding absence. thus, the ability to develop trust between governments and aboriginal participants must begin with the presence of government at the table. that is, although the intent to empower the community is there, it cannot be fully realized when the figures that represent the power dynamic is not present. r e s o u r c e s a n d t r a i n i n g . resources and training include those tools needed to ensure participants can adequately participate. this includes time (deadlines, personal time), resources (funding), access to information (for incoming members, for referencing projects), and training. the availability of time includes dedicated time from individual members and time allocated to run the programme and implement the strategy. a major problem with the uas is that such a large programme is run on volunteer power. the only paid positions were those within the government and the project officer; as aboriginal community representatives noted, they were not paid by their employers to attend meetings. most members noted that it is unrealistic to run such a programme on volunteerism. as one member commented: to run an engine like this on volunteer power, of course you’re not going to get anywhere. but all government officials are paid to work on this. if they want to make it effective they need to have full-time staffing to work on this. even getting the website running is a huge job. (personal interview with committee member, december 22, 2012, toronto). in addition, the limited time frame for which the strategy is renewed increases pressure on the steering committee and the aboriginal community organizations receiving funding to ensure all funding is allocated and all activities are concluded prior to the end of the government fiscal year (march 31st). this poses a barrier to effective participation because it can result in the funding of projects without appropriate knowledge or implementing projects that may not be an appropriate fit for the uas and that 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.3 do not fulfill funding requirements. furthermore, such limited terms make it difficult to benchmark actual outcomes and successes, especially if the organizations are not given sufficient time to properly launch projects. for example, the final report for the parkdale recreation centre (2009), engaging the aboriginal community in recreation centre 2007/08, stated that the project was affected by a late february 2008 approval to achieve project completion by the end of march 2008. this limited project performance in three main areas: restricted depth of community promotion, reduced outreach to stakeholders, and reduced level of stakeholder involvement in project development phase. this is a significant roadblock to the strategy’s success given that the project was able to develop partnerships with the miziwe biik development corporation and the toronto public health’s peer nutrition program as a direct result of this project. more time may have allowed the project greater visibility in the community, which may have produced additional collaborations. furthermore, the uncertainty of continued funding makes it difficult to design and implement a strategic plan, which will focus on long-term goals since the committee is in constant fear the federal government will terminate the programme when the funding period is concluded. as one member noted: come end of the fiscal year march 31st you don’t know if that program will still be available, it leaves people on edge. (personal interview with committee member, toronto, december 22, 2012) this poses barriers to participation in two ways. first, as mentioned above, early tumc must ensure all funding is allocated prior to the end of the fiscal year. second, during the early months in the calendar year, members do not have much to do or discuss at the meetings as they await renewal decisions. this is not a good use of volunteers’ time and so will affect effectiveness even though other resources maybe readily available. for example, resources such as transportation, accommodations, internet access, and documentation were made available to participants; however, one item of contention was the unavailability of internal government information pertaining to the strategy. members noted that information such as minutes from meetings, previous tor, final reports, communications and correspondence were not available to members upon request. only government officials and the project officer had access to the minutes. in addition, the national and regional websites for the uas were limited and out dated, making the ability to access information on the project and progress difficult in two respects. those members new to the uas had difficulty obtaining information about the strategy and its past accomplishments without access to minutes and/or information from the official website. furthermore, what seems to be a common concern throughout the interviews is the lack of any relevant documents pertaining to the strategy in toronto. one member noted that record keeping was a serious issue for the chapter especially since the group has high turnover. as the member stated, archiving is really important for new members so we can see progress, best practices, projects, etc. but there is no archiving because there is not enough staff, manpower, or resources. like we are trying to keep ourselves afloat and not sink. (personal interview with committee member, december 22, 2012, toronto) 15 nguyen: consulting whom? published by scholarship@western, 2014 to summarize, the lack of internal information is an obstacle to effective participation because it prevents incoming members from becoming knowledgeable on the administrative and policy side of the strategy. this may be especially crucial for members that will take on the position of co-chair or national caucus representative. inadequate information or lack of training for these positions impedes the decisionmaking process because of inefficiencies in the learning process. as one government official stated: we do not provide any training for those who chair our meetings. there is a proper way to run a meeting but there is no reason that we sit there and sit there and nothing gets completed. if you chair the meetings you need to be able to wrap it up at the end of the meeting and make sure things get accomplished. (personal interview with government representative, february 23, 2012, toronto) without adequate access to information and appropriate training of members, which may include mechanisms for communicating and engaging with the community, the process makes it difficult for members to effectively participate as they lack the expertise to be successfully part of the process. without such resources, members cannot make informed decisions, hence limiting participation. ultimately, this places the uas process in the middle rungs of arnstein’s (1969) ladder in which participation is a form of tokenism rather than empowerment. furthermore, in toronto, community cohesion becomes that much more difficult because of the organizational differences and “turf wars” already evident in the city. as one member stated: the uas is not an effective way to work with aboriginal governments in toronto because of all the saturation we have from all the different non-profit organizations and agencies. for the uas there is not a lot of information about what it is and people still don’t know what it does. there is confusion about that so they’re not sure if we’re seen as competition. (personal interview with community member, december 22, 2011, toronto) the view that the uas may be competition for other aboriginal community organizations makes the small pot of federal funding appear that much smaller. for example, in 2007, the chapter received $700,000, but funding was later reduced to $400,000 for the fiscal year on the behest of ofi in ottawa. a budget of $400,000 per year for the strategy is an ambitious endeavour, which becomes increasingly unrealistic when uas projects cannot be appropriately streamlined with existing services, resulting in the duplication of services. one of the major criticisms expressed by committee members is the fact that government withdraws funding when something is not done in accordance with government expectations. as one member stated, regarding a uas campaign ad: honesty and communication prevent participation and so you almost get disciplined if you do something bad. for example, the uas forgot to put the aboriginal affairs ontario logo on the campaign ad and because we forgot to put the provincial government’s logo on the campaign we lost $100,000. we just got a letter saying there is no money left and the funding will be cut. (personal interview with community member, march 1, 2012) 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.3 the issues surrounding funding are numerous and problematic in that the lack of funding and the lack of a common understanding as to what the uas represents places a burden on the shoulders of the aboriginal committee members. that is, their participation and ability to implement the strategy is hindered because they need to find ways to successfully bridge the broken relationship between governments and the aboriginal community, rather than addressing community policy concerns. a large part of this burden is symptomatic of the poor communication process. c o m m u n i c a t i o n p r o c e s s . the toronto uas suffers from a lack of open communication and thus a lack of trust between members and government. this is not exclusive to the uas; rather, it is the norm with aboriginal-state relations and the toronto uas and is not an exception to the rule. all community members stated that the government has never been transparent and accountable to the committee. members have mentioned on several occasions that the government has not been forthcoming when it comes to funding. as one member stated: the renewal process is very frustrating because you are dealing with the federal government who is very quiet and doesn’t want to say anything. there is no transparency. (personal interview with community member, january 27, 2012, toronto) some members noted that “back door deals” have been made without members’ knowledge. for example, there have been occasions when the three levels of government met with each other to discuss funding without community representation at the table. as the community co-chair noted: i should have been at the table when the director met with the city but the director told me to take care of my end and the director would take care of his or her end. we still don’t know what happened at that meeting but we know we lost some funding. (personal interview with community member, march 1, 2012) these communication concerns appear to be the major obstacle to building trust with the community. again, this is not a new phenomenon in aboriginal-state relations but it signifies that a change needs to be made when governments are asking aboriginal leaders to sit at the consultation table. one of the ways this can be best achieved is by thoroughly laying out expectations and delineating roles of all members including government and committee members. the lessons that appear to come from the literature (hess & adams, 2007) and from past experiences is that government and aboriginal groups cannot properly navigate tensions that arise from a lack of understanding of roles and responsibilities. that is, all participants must understand where the power shifting will take place but more importantly, if power shifting will take place at all. as one member stated: the members did not feel they had the agency to push forth ideas. to ask us to be innovative but not let us run with it is a consistent barrier” (personal interview with community member, december 22, 2011, toronto) in other words, without a clear understanding of where and when the power will shift, trust, and mutual respect will not develop, which is largely a by-product of the communication process. for example, one government official noted that in the beginning of the strategy, members were looking at the uas to become another aboriginal agency to allocate money for projects as opposed to the 17 nguyen: consulting whom? published by scholarship@western, 2014 federal government who looked at it as providing funding and helping with the capacity building of a number of agencies (personal interview with government official, february 23, 2012). according to this official, the tension arose because all members were unclear about each other’s roles and, therefore, mistrust developed from both the community and government side. as the member stated: i think the change (more stable committee) came because people were a bit more understanding of what was expected of them and more of a willingness from government part to actually listen and talk with members on the committee. there have been some members on the government side who didn’t know what their role was and had the mentality of “i’m in charge and that’s it. (personal interview with government official, february 23, 2012) this statement reflects the ongoing paternalistic attitude of government in their dealings with the aboriginal community. a process based on consensus building cannot effectively occur if governments are not open, transparent, and accountable to the community with which they claim to be partnering. this suggests that for public consultations to be fruitful a change in attitudes must occur. governments cannot ask aboriginal community members to voluntarily devote resources, both personally and professionally, to a government strategy without levelling the playing field. public consultations and community engagement projects cannot be hierarchical in nature. to ask the public to go above and beyond their civic duty without setting realistic expectations of partnerships and consultation, and without being accountable and transparent, makes the process a futile exercise. this became the case in the summer of 2010, when due to internal conflicts ofi halted the strategy. posted on the turtle island native network’s forum by a former uas co-chair was the following: it is with much regret that i must advise you of the impending closure of the toronto urban aboriginal strategy office located at the native canadian centre of toronto; including the termination of the staff and services at that location. the office of the federal interlocutor (ontario region), within indian and northern affairs canada, arbitrarily made this decision without proper consultation. they shut their ears to our counsel. this decision by governmental officials is not one that any member of our community had any voice to. tumc is composed of community members as well as governmental representatives. the toronto aboriginal community reps, or tac, which is composed of members with vested interest in the community, have passionately rejected the closure of the uas office, for it serves as a hub – a place to meet, discuss and most importantly, a beacon to be drawn to. the members of the toronto urban management committee (tumc) are on summer hiatus and did not participate nor consent with this action. in effect, this has silenced the voice of the community and ended your participation in this project. the largest challenge in inter-government relations with aboriginal peoples has been communication whether it is nation to nation or individual to representative. the failure to communicate and consult and to respond and respect is yet another failed attempt to sustain cohesion in a complicated relationship. (bolton, 2010) this is one of several occasions where the uas has threatened to close its doors due to intra-committee conflict. much of the conflict arises from the lack of communication: specifically, the lack of transparency and accountability from government to members. the weakness of the communication process results in an inefficiency in relationship building based on mutual respect and trust. for 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.3 participation to be effective and consultations to be fruitful, trust as a by-product of open communication must become a priority for success. without trust, aboriginal participants will continue to experience political barriers to participation even when mechanisms for encouraging participation and resources are provided. r e l a t i o n s h i p b u i l d i n g c o m p o n e n t relationship building is one of the crucial elements to building trust that is at the heart of aboriginalstate relations. the uas attempts to bridge this gap by engaging with the urban aboriginal community in order to deliver services that benefit the community. however, this cannot be achieved without the political support of those that make the urban aboriginal community unique. this includes aboriginal community organizations, employers, and government at all three levels. in an urban setting, there is no one body or institution that speaks for the aboriginal community as there is on reserves and so the governance of the urban aboriginal community involves many stakeholders. it is the cooperation of these stakeholders that ensure the success and failures, if any, of urban aboriginal life. similarly, the ability of community members to effectively participate on the uas relies on this cooperation as well. the absence of such cooperation hinders the capacity of the committee to engage with the community and successfully deliver the uas. in toronto, the committee lacks the political support to achieve this goal. a b o r i g i n a l c o m m u n i t y o r g a n i z a t i o n s . support from the aboriginal community and community organizations is central to the success of the uas. the uas is designed to improve the urban lives of aboriginal peoples by making individuals self-sufficient through the coordination of intergovernmental and community efforts. this is to be achieved at the organizational level where gaps in service delivery and programs can be filled. additionally, aboriginal community organizations in urban settings are one of the best sources of knowledge concerning the needs of the community. therefore, without the political support of aboriginal organizations the steering committee will experience difficulties participating on the uas (i.e., unable to identify community needs and closing service-delivery gaps) and this will affect the success of the strategy. all members interviewed commented on the lack of support they felt they received from the aboriginal community organizations. as one government official noted: the aboriginal community is not keen on the term consultation. now the problem when governments come here (toronto) to talk is we do not have any designed leaders like in first nations community where you know who the elected and traditional leaders are. everyone comes from different backgrounds. there is not one body that speaks to the community. the original group of uas people attempted to become that body but the community was like “no, you don’t speak for me and i don’t speak for you.” so the consultation process can be a bit onerous in toronto because there is not one voice that speaks for the community. (personal interview with government official, february 23, 2012, toronto) this statement sheds light on the diversity of the aboriginal community in toronto. the reality that toronto aboriginal community organizations are largely dependent on government funding (clatworthy et al., 1994) and given the reaction to the arrival of the uas suggests that organizations felt 19 nguyen: consulting whom? published by scholarship@western, 2014 its government funding was threatened and, therefore, the community could not collaborate on efforts in support of the uas. as one member pointed out: some of the agencies felt their agency was being threatened by the new funding of the uas. so that’s why there was a bit of a problem first establishing this. (personal interview with government official, toronto, february 23, 2012) although the original intent of the uas was to work in partnership with the aboriginal community, without clearly consulting and informing the community at large a-priori the uas, the strategy did not receive the community support it needed to ensure the success of the strategy. e m p l o y e r s . another element of external support that is generally ignored in the literature is that of the employers. the role of employers plays a significant part in providing political support to the uas because the majority of tumc positions are volunteer-based. they are not paid positions and volunteers agree to devote at least one day a month to attend meetings in addition to any other community activity required (community forums, planning sessions, sub-committees, etc.). given this, support for the strategy must also stem from the members’ employers. in the toronto case, such support is scarce. unlike other chapters (that meet for a full work day), members here meet after work for four hours in the evening to discuss the strategy. only the government representatives reported being given adequate time to participate because some it was part of their job description. for one government member, it was not part of the job description, but the interviewee’s employer provided the respondent with lieu days in exchange for the member’s participation on the committee. the reality is, when community members do not receive flexibility from their respective employers, the ability for members to effectively participate is hampered. this is not a component generally recognized by the public consultation or urban aboriginal literature. much of the literatures’ focus is on processes and organizational capacity. it neglects to recognize the part of employers in understanding and advocating aboriginal issues and particularly, in this case, supporting the uas mandate. though many of the members are employed by specific aboriginal organizations, due to conflicts of interests (government funding, mandate issues, etc.), there may be a lack of support from employers to members. as one member pointed out: toronto right from the start has been shaky because toronto already has all these organizations working for these (uas) causes. (personal interview with government official, toronto, february 23, 2012) to some degree, support for employers is just as important as support from the very organizations the uas is attempting to work with. g o v e r n m e n t . the role of government is the most vital piece of the puzzle. it is largely the attitudes of government representatives that will determine the success of the relationship. since the federal government is calling upon aboriginal representatives to participate at the table, governments must consult in good faith. that is, if the government is agreeing to a consensus-building model of decisionmaking then government representatives must be willing to give up some of their power to the stakeholders. for toronto, the major conflicts have been between governments and committee members and the power struggles that occur intra-committee. 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.3 the lack of trust in toronto stems from a long history of colonialism and is further impaired by the fact that community members did not feel there was political support from government officials in the ways of attendance, transparency, and accountability. for example, on several occasions the community has asked the mayor to attend the meetings but he declined. this is demoralizing especially when toronto was aware that other chapters (ottawa, thunder bay, winnipeg) receive strong support from its municipal governments, which are very proactive with the uas. one member noted that: we don’t have the mayor saying this is a good thing, we are going to work with you. one time i had ford articulate to me, “why am i going to put special emphasis on aboriginal issues?” (personal interview with uas member, toronto, december 22, 2011) another member mentioned that: thunder bay has a lot of members of government sitting with them, mayors and councillors. we’ve invited ours but they don’t come. (personal interview with uas member, toronto, october 13, 2011) a lack of political support regardless of the level of government signifies to aboriginal members that their participation is not valued and the strategy is irrelevant to the political agenda even though government initiated the consultation. another source of contention pertains to the lack of transparency by government. during the interview process, numerous respondents expressed their frustration with the way government, particularly the government co-chair, interacted with the committee. the general consensus was that government continues to act in a position of authority rather than as an equal stakeholder in the partnership. despite the rhetoric of partnership, the members felt governments continued to have final say. according to some of the members, on several occasions one or more levels of government have removed funding from the strategy without consulting with the committee or providing justification for the decision. for example, in 2011 the government decided to reallocate $60,000 from the toronto chapter to another chapter without explanation (personal interviews with uas members, toronto, october 13, 2011 and january 27, 2012). on another occasion, the city of toronto withdrew $20,000 of funding without providing a rationale. as one member observed: we wrote a letter (to the city of toronto) but are still waiting on a response as to why they withdrew funding. at this municipal meeting no steering committee was present, only the governments were present. (personal interview with uas member, toronto, october 13, 2011) it is this veil of secrecy that makes members feel there is no political support for their efforts and dedication to the strategy. the lack of transparency from government to committee also spills into the community. for instance, when the government cannot communicate their funding decisions to the committee, the committee cannot account for the loss of funding to the community. as one member stated in regards to the loss of $60,000: the money was given away without our knowledge. we need to be accountable to our community but we are not given a reason why funding was withdrawn from us. (personal interview with uas member, toronto, october 13, 2011) 21 nguyen: consulting whom? published by scholarship@western, 2014 this creates a vicious cycle in which the absence of political support from the government breeds mistrust from the committee and, thus, mistrust from the community they represent. therefore, effective participation requires relationship building, which must begin from the top down, and this includes equalizing power dynamics through greater transparency. however, this is not occurring in the toronto case. on numerous occasions during the interview process members had alluded to the fact that, ultimately when push comes to shove, the federal government still has final say as representatives at the table. as one member stated: this steering committee is an advisory committee. it is up to the federal government. they can say yay or nay to something, they have final say. it is problematic because you don’t want members to feel tokenized. in other places it works better. for example, in ottawa there are no government chairs. all are aboriginal members so in that steering committee there is no government say. in ottawa their voices are louder. (personal interview with project officer, toronto, november 17, 2011) this sentiment was also in a remarked by another toronto member who argued that having government as a co-chair made him or her less objective. the national caucus representative stated that allowing the aboriginal affairs and northern development director to vote as co-chair was not in the best interest of the steering committee. since the director is the federal government representative, allowing the director a seat at the table makes the director less objective when the committee essentially reports to the director (personal interview with national caucus representative, toronto, january 27, 2012). as the member stated: it’s a conflict of interest because we report to him and essentially he reports to himself. (personal interview with national caucus representative, toronto, january 27, 2012) these comments underline a deeper sentiment in which members do not feel the process is a partnership with the government. rather, members feel that government is an obstacle to the success of the strategy and a roadblock to the members’ ability to effectively participate. in other words, having government sit as co-chair undermines the redistribution of power that the strategy is designed to represent. d e c i s i o n m a k i n g . decision-making within tumc operates under the principle of consensus building. according to the 2008 tor, consensus means: the committee will make decisions wherever possible by consensus. decisions will go to a vote only when consensus cannot be reached. consensus for the purposes of the committee does not mean total agreement but that everyone can accept the final decision. (tor, 2008, p. 8) 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.3 the definition of consensus set out by tumc (2008) is as follows: consensus is a mutual agreement among committee members that legitimate concerns of members have been addressed by the committee such that all members can support the decision. it is important to remember that a consensus decision does not mean that everyone agrees. it does mean that all members have had an opportunity to express their opinion and feel that they have been heard by the group. (annex d) this creates problems in and of itself. first, the need to gain consensus can hinder and slow down the process of both decision-making and implementation of the strategic plan especially when attendance is low. more importantly though, the most crucial obstacle to the decision-making process is the fact that most members felt government officials still controlled the process. that is, at the end of the day the government can decide whether or not the strategic plan and/or projects will be funded. one of the major issues that caused tension within the uas was the fact that $350,000 was withdrawn from the chapter because some projects did not meet the criteria set out in the mandate (personal interview with uas member, toronto, january 27, 2012). this lends itself to the reality that some members felt the director could not be objective and ultimately, at the end of the day the government still makes the final decision. in theory, consensus building is the best way to achieve equality and empower members; in practice, it is the process of getting to a consensus that appears to be most frustrating for members because of the lack of support, transparency, and accountability the government displays for the strategy. c o n c l u s i o n this case study is about hope and the future of aboriginal-state relations: hope that aboriginal political participation will not go to the wayside and that governments can and should enable participation that counts. it is also about the future of aboriginal-state relations. when participation is effective, trust and respect in government and the political process will ensue. this is part of rebuilding strong aboriginalstate relations, which can, and must, be remedied. the goal for this research is to highlight the difficulties of aboriginal-state consultations in an urban setting. more importantly, it hopes to begin a dialogue with aboriginal communities, governments, and urban communities dealing with the policy problems aboriginal peoples encounter in urban settings. in general, public consultations are about giving citizens a “voice”; however, the historical-political relationship between the state and aboriginal peoples need to be renewed. renewal needs to be vested in giving aboriginals “choice” when it comes to matters affecting the group. that is, consultation needs to move away from being general in nature and move up the ladder towards more effective mechanisms for participation and ultimately partnerships. this must also involve a-priori policy-making. governments can no longer claim to consult without providing aboriginal participants mechanisms for enabling meaningful participation. the uas is an attempt by the federal government to do just that and, more specifically, to ensure the success of aboriginal peoples in urban life. it does so by emphasizing the importance of forging political relationships between governments and the urban aboriginal community through community consultation. the question this paper asked is: does the uas process provide aboriginal participants with the ability to effectively participant in the consultation process? based on the framework used for 23 nguyen: consulting whom? published by scholarship@western, 2014 evaluation, the answer to this question is conditional in that only when the criteria are met will public consultations ensure effective participation and forge relationships based on mutual respect and trust. when this occurs, the effects of political marginalization as experienced by aboriginal peoples will be lessened. however, in practice this is not always the case, as illustrated by the toronto uas. the research conducted here demonstrates that even when the intent and design of the process is geared towards ensuring the effective participation of members, many obstacles internal and external to the process will render the process ineffective. internally, the lack of government presence, government resources, government transparency, and political support is detrimental to the success of the strategy since it denotes the unwillingness of governments to enable effective participation and to engage in a real partnership with the community, although by design the uas is meant to achieve just that. specifically, the government representatives came to the table not as partners in the enterprise but as supervisors of the strategy and, therefore, undermined the ability of the aboriginal members to effectively participate. this suggests that for aboriginal-state public consultations to be successful governments must take the lead and enter the community as community members to create relationships that demonstrate faith and trust in the aboriginal community. furthermore, according to the members, the lack of time and funding to fully deliver the strategy placed a strain on the steering committee’s ability to participate. infinite resources are not something governments or the community can readily provide, which can make implementation a daunting task. however, resources such as access to information, technical support, and leadership training are tangible resources governments can provide. providing resources to ensure that effective participation is possible is the role and responsibility of government in relation to the consultation process. the purpose of this study is not to pinpoint the exact and necessary resources each urban aboriginal community requires in order to participate; rather it is to highlight the difficulties involved in aboriginal-state public consultations in an urban setting when the appropriate resources for effective participation are not available. externally, the lack of community support and cohesion was particularly difficult for the committee. specifically, the issue of community representation in urban settings will continue to be a roadblock experienced by urban aboriginal communities as it pertains to aboriginal-state consultations. without an appointed or elected political body that can represent the diverse interests of the toronto urban aboriginal community, ensuring that effective participation will occur will not be an easy task for both government and aboriginal community representatives. however, resolving this issue will not occur overnight. on the other hand, the case study of the uas does illustrate the difficulties that can occur with policy implementation when community representation is not adequate. specifically, without agreed upon representation, there was a lack of community support and a common vision for the aboriginal community. this created roadblocks at the consultation table because consensus amongst the members was hard to achieve. although the intent to ensure effective participation was evident in the policy design, many factors were outside the control of the uas committee and, thus, speak to larger political issues and problems of aboriginal-state consultations in urban settings. for far too long, aboriginal communities in canada have let governments make important decisions on their behalf without, and at times with, their consent. public consultations have become one of the avenues upon which the latter has been achieved. but participating in public consultations does not 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.3 guarantee aboriginal participation will be effective and meaningful. a promise by government to consult is no longer sufficient to build a relationship based on mutual respect and trust. governments in canada must go beyond their duty to consult toward understanding the aboriginal political landscape involved in consultation. as “citizens plus,” it is the responsibility of government to equip aboriginal communities with at least the minimum resources and tools to effectively participate. climbing the ladder of citizen participation requires a foundation that cannot be built without canadian governments as partners in the enterprise. 25 nguyen: consulting whom? 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(2005). social cohesion? a critical review of the urban aboriginal strategy and its application to address homelessness in winnipeg. the canadian journal of native studies, 25 (2), 395 – 416. 27 nguyen: consulting whom? published by scholarship@western, 2014 a p p e n d i x a q u e s t i o n s t o p a r t i c i p a n t s q u e s t i o n s r e l a t e d t o p a r t i c i p a t i o n : 1. how were you chosen or approached to be part of the steering committee (sc)? 2. what is your involvement in the sc? 3. do you know how members were contacted and chosen to join the sc? 4. to your knowledge were members of the steering committee given the opportunity to decide the purpose or form of the consultation? or, was this decided a-priori your involvement? 5. what about consultation mechanisms, who gets to decide this? 6. were the tools/resources (internet, transportation cost, access to info, sufficient time, funding, etc.) needed for participation made available to you? 7. what obstacles (trust issues, bureaucratic control, etc.), if any, do you think hindered your ability to fully participate? 8. finally, in your opinion what is needed to make the participation of members more effective?   q u e s t i o n s r e l a t e d t o t h e p r o c e s s : 1. how was agenda/policy direction decided? in other words, what policy projects get pushed through and how/why? 2. how does the sc reach final decisions? 3. is the process democratic? 4. how is your input used in the final decisions 5. how does the sc overcome conflict? 6. is there any suggests on how to make the process work better for aboriginal people?   q u e s t i o n s r e l a t e d t o t h e s t r a t e g y : 1. how is the uas addressing urban aboriginal poverty? 2. is it working? 3. is the uas trying to be the face of the urban aboriginal population in winnipeg? 4. how does it attempt to forge relationships with the community and how does it build capacity? 5. why do urban aboriginal organizations seem to cooperate so well with each other? 6. is the uas an effective way for governments to work collaboratively with the aboriginal community? 7. would you be able to comment on why winnipeg is one of the more successful uas communities? 8. what elements were present that allowed winnipeg to be a success? 9. finally, what could make this strategy more effective for aboriginal people in terms of the achieving the main goals of the uas?   28 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.3 a p p e n d i x b l i s t o f i n t e r v i e w s community member. (november 07, 2011). personal interview conducted in toronto. community member. (december 22, 2011). personal interview conducted in toronto. community member. (january 27, 2012). personal interview conducted in toronto. community member. (march 01, 2012). personal interview conducted in toronto. community member. (april 04, 2012). personal interview conducted in toronto. government representative. (february 02, 2012). personal interview conducted in toronto. government representative. (february 10, 2012). personal interview conducted in toronto. government representative. (february 23, 2012). personal interview conducted in toronto. 29 nguyen: consulting whom? published by scholarship@western, 2014 the international indigenous policy journal january 2014 consulting whom? lessons from the toronto urban aboriginal strategy mai t. nguyen recommended citation consulting whom? lessons from the toronto urban aboriginal strategy abstract keywords creative commons license consulting whom? lessons from the toronto urban aboriginal strategy the strategic power of data: a key aspect of sovereignty the international indigenous policy journal volume 5 | issue 4 article 1 october 2014 the strategic power of data: a key aspect of sovereignty jennifer lee schultz university of arizona, jschult1@email.arizona.edu stephanie carroll rainie university of arizona, scrainie@email.arizona.edu recommended citation schultz, j. l. , rainie, s. c. (2014). he strategic power of data: a key aspect of sovereignty. the international indigenous policy journal, 5(4). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.1 the strategic power of data: a key aspect of sovereignty abstract the lack of good data about u.s. american indian and alaska native populations hinders tribes’ development activities, but it also highlights a space for sovereign action. in coming years, tribes will no doubt continue to advocate for better national data and at the same time increasingly implement their own “data agendas” by gathering high quality, culturally relevant information about their communities. with more meaningful data, tribal policymakers can make informed decisions about which policies and programs are right for the task at hand. strategic data planning empowers tribes to tell their communities’ stories through their own data, and not that of others. keywords american indian, alaska native, data, sovereignty, self-determination acknowledgments this article originally appeared in the june 3, 2014 issue of indian country today media network under the title, " good data leads to good sovereignty." reprinted with permission. it is part of iipj's ongoing discussion stemming from the special issue on the governance of indigenous information (see http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss2). creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ t h e s t ra t e g i c po w e r o f d a t a : a k e y a s p e c t o f s o v e re i g n t y the lack of good data about u.s. american indian and alaska native populations hinders tribes’ development activities, but it also highlights a space for sovereign action. in coming years, tribes will no doubt continue to advocate for better national data and at the same time increasingly implement their own “data agendas” by gathering high quality, culturally relevant information about their communities. with more meaningful data, tribal policymakers can make informed decisions about which policies and programs are right for the task at hand. strategic data planning empowers tribes to tell their communities’ stories through their own data, and not that of others. it’s no coincidence that the root word of “statistics” is “state.” data is intimately linked to the sovereignty and self-determination of all nations. tribes successfully collect quantitative information—or data—on land, the environment, and physical structures. unfortunately, tribes have been less likely to tell a numeric story about their citizens’ and community members’ health, education, and welfare. data about citizens and community members is a strategic resource. reliable data, carefully gathered and analyzed, can strengthen the ability of tribes to pursue their own goals. armed with dependable and relevant information, tribes can be strategic, envisioning a role for data as part and parcel of sovereignty and governance. they can be responsive, initiating projects to address emerging needs. they can be culturally authoritative, asserting control over which topics are measured, and how. as tribes meaningfully engage with data, quantitative information about native populations will enhance—rather than detract from—the vibrancy and resiliency of tribal communities. it’s no secret that the current data environment for tribes needs improvement. because of the small size of native populations, statistics rarely are reported in the findings of national surveys. when native peoples and populations are reported, the data are not dependable, even on a matter as fundamental as who should be counted as a native person. must a respondent be a tribal citizen? live on reservation lands? have a particular blood quantum? be closely connected to native culture? adding to the confusion, the answer to this question can change from survey to survey and year to year. nearly every tribal program and enrollment office holds a substantial amount of undigested data. most of this information has been collected to comply with funders’ reporting requirements. afterward, it is stashed away in separate offices, stored in increasingly outdated formats. some tribal councils and program managers may not have a comprehensive view of available data that could help them make decisions. the challenge for tribes is to convert program data into a strategic resource. this means making better use of what they already have and shifting to more proactive and strategic collection of new data. tribes are more than capable of developing the technical expertise necessary to improve their data management capacities. but collecting and analyzing data about tribal citizens makes many tribal leaders nervous. and with good reason! such information brings with it serious responsibility. data about native peoples is sensitive and tribal governments must be sure that they can protect citizen information. but the reality is that if tribes don’t actively tell their citizens’ numeric stories, someone else—usually the federal government—will. 1 schultz and rainie: the strategic power of data published by scholarship@western, 2014 a number of positive developments are underway. organizations like the national congress of american indians policy research center and the national indian child welfare association have developed recommendations for improvements to nationally collected data about native peoples and populations. equally important, some tribes have begun to invest in the development of demographic data, in the process creating greater capacity to respond to community needs. for example, in the wake of devastating tornadoes, the citizen potawatomi nation had concerns about its ability to contact citizens for well-being checks and assistance. the nation has since begun a census of tribal members, collecting basic household data and contact details in order to improve future emergency response efforts. in another tribe, widespread public opinion attested to a large and growing juvenile crime problem. even law enforcement, justice system, and social services personnel subscribed to this view. while the police department had incident reports going back several years that could shed light on the problem—stored in boxes in the basement of police headquarters—the data had never been compiled. when an outside justice systems evaluator (who was collaborating with the tribe on several other programs) offered to collate and analyze the data, tribal officials seized the opportunity. results showed that in the nation’s recent history, juveniles had committed relatively few serious crimes, low-level juvenile crime was the norm, and a dozen or so individuals were responsible for most of it. uncontrolled repeat offenders were the real problem, not pervasive, serious juvenile crime. faced with this finding, law enforcement, juvenile justice, detention, and human services staff developed programming aimed at these young offenders’ treatment and rehabilitation. but it was only with the data—and the ability to analyze it—that tribal policymakers could really know what kind of crime problem the tribe had and how to best address it. the insights generated by these investments in data collection and analysis will inform tribal policy for years to come. such information is also a powerful tool for communicating tribes’ concerns and triumphs outside the community, in ways that non-native people and institutions can understand. strategic data collection can be accomplished at a reasonable cost and without major changes in staff duties. one way to begin is with a small project that has widespread support. another is to use an existing process (a revenue distribution mailing, voter registration, etc.) to collect additional data. another is to commit to a data project that will directly inform a current community concern (for example, consolidation of children-in-need-of-care data and juvenile justice data). another is to work with other agencies and organizations to pool resources for data collection, storage, analysis, and use while maintaining authority and control over the data. there is no wrong place to begin to collect and use data. tribes, native advocacy groups, federal staff, researchers, and others must continue to work together to improve the state of national data. meanwhile, at the local level, tribes are increasingly investing in the development of their own data collection and analysis capacities: identifying needed information, strategically developing data infrastructure, setting down policies for internal/external data-sharing, and encouraging partnerships with other entities. as tribes work to regain sovereignty over their statistics, there is no telling the scope of the long-term effects that will be realized.     2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.1 j e n n i f e r l e e s c h u l t z is a senior researcher with the native nations institute for leadership, management, and policy at the university of arizona. she is a social network analyst by training, and holds a phd in sociology from the university of arizona.   s t e p h a n i e c a rro l l r a i n i e is the manager, tribal health program and a senior researcher with the native nations institute for leadership, management, and policy at the university of arizona. she is a doctoral candidate at the university of arizona’s mel and enid zuckerman college of public health. 3 schultz and rainie: the strategic power of data published by scholarship@western, 2014 the international indigenous policy journal october 2014 the strategic power of data: a key aspect of sovereignty jennifer lee schultz stephanie carroll rainie recommended citation the strategic power of data: a key aspect of sovereignty abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license the strategic power of data: a key aspect of sovereignty validation of a culturally appropriate social capital framework to explore health conditions in canadian first nations communities the international indigenous policy journal volume 2 issue 1 health and well-being article 3 may 2011 validation of a culturally appropriate social capital framework to explore health conditions in canadian first nations communities javier mignone the university of manitoba, mignonej@cc.umanitoba.ca brenda elias the university of manitoba, elias@cc.umanitoba.ca madelyn hall the university of manitoba, mkhall@cc.umanitoba.ca recommended citation mignone, j. , elias, b. , hall, m. (2011). validation of a culturally appropriate social capital framework to explore health conditions in canadian first nations communities. the international indigenous policy journal, 2(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.3 his research is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in he international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. validation of a culturally appropriate social capital framework to explore health conditions in canadian first nations communities abstract an earlier study of our research group formulated a conceptual framework of social capital for first nation communities and developed a culturally appropriate instrument for its measurement. we tested this instrument further with the manitoba (canada) first nations regional health survey, 2003. using data from this survey, we investigated the bonding dimension of the social capital conceptual framework, with a total sample of 2,765 first nations individuals living in 24 manitoba first nations communities. twenty seven likert-scale survey questions measured aspects of bonding social capital, socially-invested resources, ethos, and networks. validation analyses included an evaluation of internal consistency, factor analyses to explore how well the items clustered together into the components of the social capital framework, and the ability of the items to discriminate across the communities represented in the sample. cronbach’s alpha was computed on the 27 scale items, producing an alpha of 0.84 indicating high internal consistency. the factor analyses produced five distinct factors with a total explained variance of 54.3%. lastly, a one-way analysis of variance run by community produced highly significant f-ratios between the groups on all twenty-seven bonding items. the culturally-sensitive items included in the social capital framework were found to be an appropriate tool to measure bonding aspects among manitoba first nations communities. research and policy implications are discussed. keywords social capital, first nations, social determinants of health acknowledgments the authors wish to acknowledge ms. lyna hart and mr. garry munro for their feedback to the manuscript. the study was funded in part by the canadian institutes of health research. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ introduction despite a rise in life expectancy among aboriginal people in canada over the last few decades, the health of aboriginal people is worse than that of the overall canadian population on virtually every health status measure and for every health condition (young, 1994; health canada, 2004; canadian population health initiative, 2004). nonetheless, there are significant differences in health status across aboriginal communities. for instance, a province-specific study (british columbia) has highlighted a notable variability in youth suicide rates across different first nations communities (chandler & lalonde, 1998). in manitoba this variability across communities was apparent among several health indicators when observed by tribal councils (martens, et al., 2002). this evidence raises a significant question from a social epidemiological point of view: what are the factors at play that explain this variability? more specifically, are there community-level factors that may be playing a role in these differential health outcomes? the answer to these questions has potentially important policy implications. as richmond (2009) explains, “population health refers to a conceptual framework for thinking about why some people are healthier than others and urges health research agendas to consider dimensions beyond healthcare such as education, employment and social support.” this means recognizing that “socio-economic and environmental structures can support or constrain community health”, what is referred broadly as social determinants of health. along these lines, albeit critically, first nations health planners had indicated that “analytical frameworks that attempt to associate factors such as poverty with health outcomes are insensitive to the complex socio-economic conditions that exist in first nations communities.” (o’neil, et al., 1999). in other words, there may be features of the communities that, above and beyond individual level characteristics, are impacting health and wellbeing. it was in this context that the health information and research governance committee (hirc) 1 of the assembly of manitoba chiefs (amc) together with the manitoba first nations centre for aboriginal health research (mfn-cahr) at the university of manitoba developed a program of research to identify community-level determinants of health that are consistent with indigenous health models. social capital was deemed promising to explore for further development, specific to first nations communities. furthering this approach, an assembly of first nations document on holistic health policy (reading, et al., 2007) has incorporated the notion of social capital as a potential determinant of health. from a policy and programmatic point of view, having tools that may better identify less tangible aspects of community that may lead to well-being and health is invaluable. the validation of a social capital framework for first nations communities is an important step in this direction. it has been argued that social capital adds to the understanding of community-level factors that impact health, and numerous empirical inquiries have provided some support for considering social capital as a health determinant (mignone, 2009). there have been a number of tentative formulations seeking to explain plausible pathways through which social capital may affect health. for instance kawachi and berkman (2000) suggest three ways: by influencing health-related behaviours; by influencing access to services and amenities; and by affecting psychosocial processes. social capital may operate as a community-level determinant of health in that the social fabric (for instance the quality of the interactions among community members) may play a significant role in the above mentioned pathways. 1 the hir committee is mandated by the chiefs of manitoba to represent the health research and information interests of all 62 first nations communities in manitoba. the members of the hir committee are all health directors (or designates) representing all tribal councils, independent first nations and other first nations’ political organizations in manitoba. 1 mignone et al.: validation of a social capital framework canadian first nations published by scholarship@western, 2011 an earlier study of our research group formulated a conceptual framework of social capital for first nations communities and developed a culturally appropriate instrument for its measurement (mignone, 2003; mignone et al., 2004). subsequently, the manitoba first nations regional health survey (mfn-rhs) of 2003 incorporated the bonding portion of this instrument in the questionnaire that collected data from 32 first nations communities in manitoba. using data from the mfn-rhs the paper reports on findings related to empirical validations and refinements of the bonding dimension of the social capital conceptual framework. it then discusses the implications of the findings in relation to the theoretical basis of our research program studying the social determinants of first nations health, identifies future steps in this program 2 , and outlines potential policy implications. social capital social capital, to the extent that it is a property of the social environment, takes the form of a relational resource. a common understanding amongst most authors is that social capital is a resource composed of a variety of elements, most notably social networks, social norms and values, trust, and shared resources (bourdieu & wacquant, 1992; bourdieu, 1983; loury, 1992; putnam, et al., 1993; putnam, 2000; woolcock, 1998a; woolcock, 1998b; woolcock & narayan, 2000; narayan, 1999; schuller, et al., 2000; lin, 2001). its function appears to be related to the enabling of some societal good within the boundary of that specific societal level (coleman, 1988; coleman, 1990). it is mostly considered an aggregate feature that can aid in the characterization of a social system. for bourdieu (1983), social capital relates to actual or potential resources within a social structure that collectively supports each of its members, and is linked to the possession of a durable network of relationships of mutual acquaintance and recognition. social capital has been studied in relation to education, labour markets (department of economics, 1999), local economic development (midgley & livermore, 1998), microfinance (rankin, 2002), sustainable community development (dale, 2005), economic performance (casey & christ, 2005), health (kawachi, et al., 1997; gooden, 1998; veenstra, 2000; rose, 2000; campbell, et al., 2002; bolin, et al., 2003), identity, transition to work (fevre, 2000), communicative competence and human resources (szreter, 2000), information and communication technology (huysman & wulf, 2004) among numerous other outcomes. it was not until the year 2000 that research concerning social capital and aboriginal peoples picked up pace. the first nations social cohesion project of the population studies centre at the university of western ontario was one of the first attempts to examine social capital in first nations communities in canada. this group contributed several papers and pursued a research agenda to address the ways in which variations among forms of capital and cohesiveness within first nations communities generate different outcomes at a population level (white, et al., 2000; maxim, et al., 2003). as well, levitte (2004) researched social capital in the context of aboriginal economic development in canada. social capital has been used to analyze traditional forms of indigenous governance (hunter, 2000; schwab & sutherland, 2001), sustainable development (altman, 2001), and 2 this paper is the first of three papers that empirically explore first nations social capital as a potential determinant of health using the mfn regional health survey data. the authors considered that it was necessary to initiate the presentation of findings with an initial paper that explained in detail the conceptual formulations, presented the empirical evidence validating the concept and tools, and formulated plausible linkages between social capital and health, including its policy implications. two papers currently being developed will provide empirical evidence for the association between social capital and health in first nations communities and will explore in more detail the different pathways that may explain this relationship. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.3 indigenous learning communities (schwab & sutherland, 2001). social capital has also been used as a means to better understand the disconnect between the management of waste in nine first nations communities in northwest british columbia and their traditional relationship with the land (moody & cordua-von specht, 2005). memmott and meltzer (2005) suggested that “indigenous people actually invest significant time and energy into building social capital, but that it often manifests in ways that are not registered in terms of ‘economic development’ or that do not match the mainstream criteria of ‘good governance’.” nonetheless, the fact that social capital is a concept heavily embedded in cultural understandings (brough, et al., 2006) must be addressed “if it is be of value in understanding, and most importantly taking action to improve, indigenous health status.” (baum, 2007, p. 121) in a previous study our research group formulated a conceptual framework of social capital for first nations communities and developed a culturally appropriate instrument for its measurement (mignone, 2003; mignone et al., 2004). the study was conducted in three first nations communities in manitoba. the following conceptual framework of social capital for first nations communities emerged from an iterative analysis between existing literature and the ethnographic evidence from the fieldwork. the operational definition of social capital derived from the study was the following: social capital characterizes a community based on the degree that its resources are socially invested, that it presents an ethos of trust, norms of reciprocity, collective action, and participation, and that it possesses inclusive, flexible and diverse networks. social capital of a community is assessed through a combination of its bonding (within group relations), bridging (inter-community ties), and linking (relations with formal institutions) dimensions. 3 the relevance of the distinction between bonding, bridging and linking social capital that was initially developed by other authors (woolcock & narayan, 2000) was corroborated by the ethnographic evidence of our previous study, resulting in three central dimensions of the conceptual framework. bonding social capital refers to internal community relations. it addresses the networks, ethos, and socially invested resources within a particular society, community or group in question (intra-community ties). bridging social capital is essentially a horizontal notion, implying connections between societies, communities or groups (inter-community ties). linking social capital refers to a vertical dimension (relations with formal institutions beyond the community) (mignone, 2009). specifically to our study, bonding social capital refers to relations within each aboriginal community. bridging refers to horizontal links with other communities, be they other aboriginal communities, or other communities of place (e.g., urban centres). linking refers to connections between particular aboriginal communities and institutions like federal/provincial government departments and public/private corporations (e.g., indian and northern affairs canada, industry canada, manitoba hydro, banks). table 1 summarizes the bonding social capital framework, showing each dimension as consisting of the three components and their descriptors. for socially invested resources (sir) the descriptors are physical, symbolic, financial, human or natural. the central notion is that these resources be socially invested, meaning that they be potentially accessible or of future benefit to any member of the community. each descriptor captures the resource investment at a particular stage of its development. physical refers to tangible resources produced by human beings (e.g., roads). symbolic refers to 3 although this definition was derived from an analysis that tested broad theoretical ideas against the specific ethnographic realities of first nations communities, we believe it is arguably relevant beyond the specific communities from which it arose. this current definition includes minor revisions post publication of papers reporting on the above mentioned study. 3 mignone et al.: validation of a social capital framework canadian first nations published by scholarship@western, 2011 resources that pertain to the identity of the community as such, and for the most part are intangible (e.g., traditional language). financial refers to monetary resources under the control of the community. human resources mean human capacity as a product of formal and informal education. natural resources are those provided by nature shaped with or without human intervention. resources are essentially mutable. for example a financial resource becomes a physical resource when money is used to build houses. similarly, a human resource becomes a financial resource when income potential increases due to the attainment of an education degree. consequently, these five descriptors seek to capture the different facets of socially invested resources at a given point in time. these descriptors are distinct from other forms of capital (e.g., human capital, financial capital) because they refer to the degree of social investment of resources at the community level. ethos 4 as a component of social capital expresses the notions of trust, norms of reciprocity, collective action, and participation. trust means that community members have confidence in one another as well as in community leaders. norms of reciprocity, although also potentially negative, are considered in this framework as a positive value. collective action represents the notion that community members may pursue actions that seek to benefit the collective. finally, an ethos of participation implies the willingness of community members to be involved with others in common activities. networks are understood as “structures of recurrent transactions” (aldrich, 1982) and are described according to their inclusiveness, diversity, and flexibility. more inclusiveness, diversity, and flexibility would imply higher levels of social capital. inclusiveness of networks refers to the notion that these structures of interactions are relatively open to the possibility of newcomers and to the exchange of information with newcomers. diversity implies the co-existence of networks that differ from one another, composed of distinct elements or qualities, but that are capable of interacting in a meaningful way. flexibility of networks implies a ready capability to adapt to new, different, or changing requirements. inclusiveness, diversity and flexibility are actually interrelated qualities. they are different aspects of the same phenomenon. in general, a correlation among these three descriptors of networks should be expected. table 1 bonding social capital framework sir* ethos networks physical trust inclusive symbolic norms of reciprocity flexibility financial collective action diverse human participation natural *sir = socially invested resources the study reported here focused on empirically testing and refining the bonding dimension of the framework. our previous study testing the reliability and validity of the questionnaire and the conceptual framework was conducted with a total sample of 462 respondents from three first nations communities from manitoba (mignone, 2003). the bonding scale had good internal consistency (alpha 4 in earlier published versions of the framework this component was called “culture.” the term “ethos” better reflects the meaning of this component (in the sense of character or disposition of a community), whereas “culture” was somewhat misleading in that it could be interpreted as related to distinct aboriginal cultural aspects which it does not address. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.3 0.84), and factor analyses identified seven factors explaining 56% of the variance. with a larger sample size (2,765) and more first nations communities (24) the paper reports on the psychometric (ecometric 5 to be exact) properties of the scale and on the empirical evidence related to the hypothesized dimensionality of the bonding social capital framework (socially invested resources, ethos, and networks). methods survey and sample in partnership with the assembly of manitoba chiefs, the manitoba first nations centre for aboriginal health research (mfn-cahr) initiated in 2002 the second wave of the manitoba regional component of the national first nations regional health survey (mfn-rhs) (completed in 2003). the national-regional survey is comprised of three independent surveys. each survey includes a national core set of questions asked in 10 provincial and territorial regions in canada, and for manitoba, a regional set of theoretically-informed questions were developed to address critical social determinants and health areas not collected in the national sample (e.g., social capital, cultural continuity, spirituality, economic insecurity, discrimination, mental health, health behaviours, protective factors, and health status). the survey provides cross-sectional estimates of health determinants, health status and health system utilization for children, youth and adults. a multi-stage stratified random sampling approach (tribal community affiliation and community size) was used to select a representative sample of manitoba onreserve first nations communities. small (pop. < 500), medium (pop. 500 999), and large communities (pop. > 1000) were randomly selected from seven tribal council regions. the sample in each community was stratified by age and sex (child survey: 0-11 years; youth survey: 12 17 yrs; adult survey: 18 54 yrs and 55 yrs and over). the survey was implemented in 27 communities for the adult survey, and 28 communities for the youth and child surveys. in each community, interviewers randomly selected households and interviewed, where possible, two adults living in the household (one male and one female) and all adults age 55 years and older. in each household, one child or youth under 18 years of age were selected. all respondents aged 14 and over provided written consent and a legal guardian consented for youth and children under the age of 14. interviewers administered the survey to adults and youth, and a primary caregiver answered on behalf of the child (proxy interview). the questionnaire consisted of 175 items and took on average between 1 ½ to 2 hours to administer face to face. the adult survey achieved a response rate of 77% (n = 3,301 sample; 4,330 target sample; n = 27 communities), with 60% of the communities achieving a response rate of over 80%. slightly more adult females (55%; nf = 1,815), as opposed to males (45%; nm = 1,485), participated in the survey. the sample size of the adult survey is sufficiently large to provide community level data. all databases were adjusted to reflect regional sampling differences and age and sex distributions. the source of population data used to weight the data was the department of indian affairs public use band membership database. this database provided age and sex counts, by age categories for males and females, within each population-sampling unit to weight the survey data to reflect the age and gender distribution within each region according to the sample design used. each survey database represents an individual level dataset nested within communities. for this validation study, three communities were eliminated due to sampling differences, leaving a total of 2,765 individuals surveyed in 24 communities who responded to the majority of the bonding items (described below). fifty five percent of respondents were female and 45% were male. 5 (raudenbush, 2003) 5 mignone et al.: validation of a social capital framework canadian first nations published by scholarship@western, 2011 forty percent were between 18 and 34 years of age, 38% between 35 and 49, and 22% were aged 50 or older. social capital items and analyses the mfn-rlhs adult survey included 27 bonding social capital items that had been developed in our previous study (mignone, 2003). (see appendix i for details). table 2 shows the 27 bonding social capital items matched with the components of the original social capital framework they sought to tap into. the first seven items refer to socially invested resources (sir), the 11 items that follow to ethos, and the last 10 to networks. table 2 social capital: bonding items in the mfhrhs components label sir ethos networks 1) equal access to housing physical 2) equal business funding financial 3) recreation/sports equally available human 4) daycare equally available human 5) support for job training human 6) i will protect land/water natural 7) chief/council protect land natural 8) chief/council do best for community trust 9) most people try to be helpful trust 10) most people can be trusted trust 11) most people are friendly norm of reciprocity 12) people respect elders norm of reciprocity 13) i am proud of community norm of reciprocity 14) no crime in the community norm of reciprocity 15) i am willing to make community better collective action 16) i have influence in making community better collective action 17) i talk about problems in community collective action 18) people should vote participation 19) easy to have different groups of friends inclusiveness 20) concerns of some heard more than others inclusiveness 21) mostly visit with others my own age inclusiveness 22) different groups don't mix inclusiveness 23) people associate with same groups flexibility 24) some people in the community i don't talk to flexibility 25) once part of group, don't associate with others flexibility 26) only visit people known for a long time flexibility 27) do not feel comfortable with others with different means diversity 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.3 for the present study, validation analyses included an evaluation of the internal consistency of the overall scale and of the subscales. analyses of variance were conducted to assess the ability of the items to discriminate across the communities represented in the sample and a principal component factor analysis (direct oblimin rotation) to explore how well the items clustered together into the components of the social capital framework. results cronbach’s alpha for the 27-item social capital scale was 0.84, more than sufficient measure of internal consistency of a scale for group comparisons. for each of the original sub-scales, cronbach’s alpha was as follows: sir 0.79; ethos 0.71, and networks 0.81. another test of the acceptability of items was whether or not they could discriminate differences across communities. mean values for each item would be expected to be significantly different across communities. a one-way analysis of variance by community was performed (df, 23). the results were highly significant (less than 0.001, with f-ratios ranging from 17.86 to 3.26) between the communities on all 27 items. the factor analysis produced five distinct factors, with a total explained variance of 54.3%. table 3 shows the five factors and their loadings, highlighting a minimum loading of 0.4. the intent of these analyses was to examine whether there was empirical support for the hypothesized multi-component conceptualization of bonding social capital. nunnally and bernstein (1994) explain that the distinction between exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis “is a continuum rather than a sharp dichotomy.” our factor analyses were more confirmatory in nature than exploratory, given that a hypothesized structure had been developed, and it sought to observe how well it fits the data. however, to use more specific confirmatory factor analytic methods, a much more developed theoretical framework (including path analysis specifications) would have been necessary. as kline (2000) suggests, a valid approach to confirmatory analysis is to perform a simple structure rotation seeking to find if there is congruence between simple structure analysis and the hypothesized structure. a comparison between table 2 and table 3 is instructive in this regard. with the exception of item 6, all items within socially invested resources loaded together as factor one. one item from ethos (item eight) also loaded as factor one. high loadings on factor two correspond well with the inclusiveness aspect of the networks component, and factor three with the flexible aspect of the networks component. factor four high loadings match almost perfectly with the trust and norms of reciprocity aspects of the ethos component, whereas factor five corresponds exactly with the collective action and participation aspects of this component. these results are suggestive of a number of issues. the fact that item six does not load on socially invested resources but does so with trust and norms of reciprocity aspects of ethos makes sense in that the item seems to be tapping into generic trust towards chief and council rather than into their specific management of natural resources. consequently, one option could be to consider item six as an ethos factor. what is clear is that it does not address socially invested resources issues. however, it is somewhat contradictory that item eight loads with socially invested resources when it supposedly taps into trust towards chief and council. this is difficult to interpret, and one might consider eliminating this item altogether. aside from these two irregularities, factor one can clearly be considered the socially invested resources factor. factor analysis results divide the networks component in two distinct aspects. factor two relates to items tapping into how inclusive community networks are, and factor three to how flexible they are. this suggests that networks as a component of bonding social capital is somewhat more 7 mignone et al.: validation of a social capital framework canadian first nations published by scholarship@western, 2011 nuanced and that inclusiveness does not necessarily imply flexibility. as such, the factors could be renamed inclusive networks and flexible networks. a similar finding was evidenced with the ethos component, where two distinct aspects emerged. factor four relates to trust and norms of reciprocity, whereas factor five relates to collective action and participation. the former mostly reflects how other community members are perceived, whereas the latter seems to address personal and community involvement (thus more action oriented). this may explain the emergence of these two distinct aspects of ethos. table 3 factor analysis results pattern matrix a component factor loadings socially invested resources inclusive networks flexible networks trust & norms ethos collective action ethos 1) equal access to housing .665 .132 -.052 -.044 -.064 2) equal business fund .723 -.005 .037 .004 -.051 3) recreation/sport available .709 -.035 .007 -.027 -.012 4) daycare available to all .742 -.162 .079 .101 -.030 5) support for job training .744 -.029 .025 -.045 -.003 6) will protect land/water .108 .052 -.038 .041 .672 7) chief/council protect land for future .553 .240 -.173 -.153 .240 8) chief/council try do best for community .535 .223 -.112 -.173 .251 9) most people try to be helpful .101 -.107 .069 -.724 .078 10) most people here can be trusted .037 .019 -.047 -.803 -.004 11) most people are friendly .042 -.119 .123 -.803 .025 12) people/adult respect elders .143 -.092 .101 -.570 .112 13) proud of community .196 -.184 .169 -.400 .227 14) no crime problem in community .040 .270 -.322 -.427 .012 15) willing to make community better -.084 -.017 .032 -.050 .808 16) have influence making community better .020 .137 .003 -.157 .688 17) talk about problems in community -.074 -.087 .047 .011 .704 18) people should vote .010 -.305 .050 .053 .550 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.3 19) easy to have different groups of friends .055 -.732 .041 -.184 .034 20) concerns of certain groups heard more than other groups .099 .730 .067 .012 -.122 21) mostly visit people of my age -.009 .448 .369 .251 .092 22) different groups don't mix .045 .568 .272 -.081 -.126 23) people tend to associate with same groups -.068 .447 .339 -.261 -.159 24) some people in the community i won't talk to .006 .099 .670 -.209 -.060 25) once part of group, don't associate with others .035 .277 .584 -.232 -.102 26) only visit people known for a long time .009 .076 .752 -.059 .021 27) do not feel comfortable with people with different means .034 -.060 .737 .143 .179 extraction method: principal component analysis. rotation method: oblimin with kaiser normalization. a. rotation converged in 16 iterations. the results of the factor analyses are revealing in that they partially confirm the component structure of the conceptual framework formulated by our previous study. simultaneously it also suggests a more nuanced reality behind what community networks may reflect and behind what we can consider as ethos of a community. the factors identified in table 3 suggest a new way that the bonding dimension of social capital could be formulated as component structure. in the section that follows we discuss possible meanings and implications of these findings from a conceptual point of view and how they may play a role as health determinants. the assessment of the internal consistency of each of the five new factors as a scale resulted in the following. sir (alpha = 0.834); inclusive networks (alpha = 0.364); flexible networks (alpha = 0.752); trust & norms ethos (alpha = 0.798); collective action ethos (alpha = 0.747). the low alpha level of inclusive networks puts some caution in our interpretation of the networks component that is discussed in the next section. to test how well these factors could discriminate differences across communities, mean values for each component would be expected to be significantly different across communities. a one-way analysis of variance by community was performed (df, 4). the results were significant (0.001, with fratios ranging from 5.35 to 15.29) between the communities on all five factors. discussion the understanding of community-level factors that may play a role in the health and well-being of aboriginal communities is of crucial importance. there is sufficient evidence of the poorer health status among many of these communities as compared to the general population of canada. at the 9 mignone et al.: validation of a social capital framework canadian first nations published by scholarship@western, 2011 same time, the variability across aboriginal communities suggests that a simple generalization is misleading and does little to inform policy to improve the conditions of aboriginal communities. the importance of understanding the various social determinants of health above and beyond the individual level cannot be over stated. the notion of social capital has been explored as a tool to better grasp how social dynamics may be playing a positive or negative role in health and well-being. our previous study provided a grounded formulation of a conceptual framework of social capital for first nations communities using ethnographic methodology in three first nations communities. it also developed and conducted a first round of validation of a culturally appropriate measurement tool. building on this initial work, the study reported here further tested the bonding social capital aspect of the tool as well as the conceptual framework itself with data from 24 first nations communities. the reliability of the scales and its discriminant validity were confirmed. the factor analytical results provided interesting evidence partially confirming the conceptual structure of our initial study, while simultaneously providing compelling information that may enable a more nuanced understanding of what we are capturing under the notion of bonding social capital. five distinct factors emerged that merit a conceptual discussion about their plausible meaning as features of community and as potential determinants of health and well being. socially invested resources was confirmed as a single factor. the central notion is that these resources be socially invested, meaning that they be potentially accessed by, or of potential future benefit to, any member of the community. socially invested resources refer to the degree of social investment of resources at the community level, and these may be of different albeit mutable types (physical, financial, symbolic, natural, and human). despite the limitation of tapping into this aspect of community only through a survey, it does provide a sense from the community members’ perspective of how this is operating based on their experience. it seems to address the experience of fairness and the assessment that there are resources that may provide benefits in the future for the community as a whole. the initial formulation of networks as a component with various descriptors (inclusive, flexible and diverse) was only partially confirmed. an interesting split emerged, where inclusiveness of networks became distinct from flexibility and diversity. inclusiveness refers to the notion that these structures of interactions are relatively open to the possibility of newcomers and to the exchange of information with newcomers. flexibility on the other hand implies a ready capability to adapt to new, different, or changing circumstances. it incorporates the aspects of time and change. diversity implies the coexistence of networks that differ from one another, composed of distinct elements or qualities, but that are capable of interacting in a meaningful way. the implications of the distinction that emerged from the factor analysis are still not clear. the initial idea of the framework was that higher degrees of these three characteristics would imply higher levels of social capital. although this has not changed, what is evident is that we are measuring somewhat different features. inclusiveness might refer to more immediate experiences, whereas diversity and flexibility may be viewed as somewhat more removed. in relation to the ethos component, the experience of trust and norms of reciprocity emerged as a distinct factor vis-à-vis that of collective action and participation. part of the reason may be that the latter may be tapping into more subjective aspects of the experience of community, whereas the former is a somewhat more arm’s length perspective. the initial model expected a degree of correlation among these aspects of the ethos component. although the distinction that emerged does not rule this out, it does make it clear that trust and norms of reciprocity as character of a community need not be strictly connected to the collective action and participation that occurs among the members of the community. the evidence of our study offers a number of interesting windows from where to continue to theoretically formulate how community features may operate as determinants of health and well-being, 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.3 as well as the possibility to empirically test these assumptions, and hopefully better guide policy and programmatic interventions at the community level. there have been a number of tentative formulations seeking to explain plausible pathways through which social capital may affect health. for instance kawachi and berkman (2000) suggest three ways: by influencing health-related behaviours; by influencing access to services and amenities; and by affecting psychosocial processes. in relation to mental health in particular, kirmayer and colleagues (1999), following ideas formulated by the royal commission on aboriginal people’s special report on suicide among aboriginal people (rcap, 1995), categorized risk factors associated with suicidal behaviour in aboriginal communities: psychobiological factors; life history factors; situational factors; socioeconomic factors; culture stress. additionally, they listed protective factors that can act to decrease the risk of suicide: a strong sense of the value and meaning of life; individual and collective self-esteem; belief in survival and coping; fear of suicide and moral objections to suicide; skills in stress management, communication and problem solving; support from peers and family; family responsibilities; community support networks; and a sense of belonging. a frequently quoted study by chandler and lalonde (1998) has shown that local control and the preservation and continuation of culture among native bands of british columbia are associated with substantially lower youth suicide rates. cultural continuity may be contributing to a sense of self-continuity that may be vital for adolescents. socioeconomic risk factors refer to poverty at the individual and family level, community instability or lack of prosperity, limited opportunities for employment, lack of proper housing and inadequate sanitation and water quality (rcap, 1995). the more the resources are socially invested, even in situations of scarce resources, the more the possibility of mitigating the effects of poverty and increasing the social infrastructure that will reduce these types of risk factors. in terms of protective factors, socially invested resources can have an impact in the sense of value and meaning of life, and skills in stress management, communication, and problem solving, particularly when there has been a high investment in human and symbolic resources, like culture, language, education, parenting, relationship, and conflict resolutions programs. communities that have invested heavily in these types of initiatives among youth have reported positive results in reducing feelings of anomie among youth, as well as violent or self-destructive behaviours (mignone, 2003). our study of social capital in first nations communities allows us to continue this path of research with more precise characterizations of community features as potential pathways to health and well-being that will be able to be empirically tested in future analyses. for instance, culture stress factors are defined as “the loss of confidence by individuals or groups in the ways of understanding life and living (norms, values and beliefs) that were taught to them within their original culture(s), and the personal or collective distress that may result.” (rcap, 1995, p. 21). this includes loss of control over land and living conditions, breakdown of cultural values and belief systems, loss of identity and selfesteem, and discrimination. the decision of a community to invest in cultural camps and aboriginal language programs for their children has the potential of increasing the cultural identity of its youth, thus strengthening the community (socially invested resources). one of the central effects of colonization was to disrupt the cultural continuity of first nations and destroy their sense of pride as people. this resulted in serious effects on the well-being of generations. the resurgence of aboriginal ceremonies, practices and values has already shown powerful healing qualities, all of which requires community investment. a community with higher levels of social capital would be expected to have an ethos of trust, and positive norms of reciprocity. there has been increasing evidence in population health studies that communities where people tend to trust each other live under less stressful conditions. stress has been recognized as an important pathway to health or illness (mcewen, 1998). a community where families can help each other due to strong norms of reciprocity, where different community sectors and 11 mignone et al.: validation of a social capital framework canadian first nations published by scholarship@western, 2011 leadership offer support to families in need, where youth sense that they can trust adults before or during moments crisis, can have an important effect in diminishing suicide ideations and attempts. a community with significant collective action and participation is expected to reduce the sense of instability or hopelessness that particularly may affect youth leading to self-destructive behaviours (mignone & o’neil, 2005). additionally, higher levels of an ethos of participation and collective action would be expected to increase support from peers and family, individual and collective self-esteem and sense of belonging. the quality of social networks has been studied as having impacts on health in general and in mental health in particular. for instance inclusive networks increase the opportunities of information and employment, and thus may play a mitigating role among socioeconomic risk factors. rigid social networks that exclude others from information or from meaningful social contact are deleterious to emotional well-being. the feeling of exclusion or social isolation has a powerful impact on self-esteem, and the lack of access to information about resources or opportunities will limit the access to basic resources and thus to well-being. studies have related social isolation to an array of adverse health outcomes (house, et al., 1999). communities with flexible, inclusive and diverse networks tend to develop a social environment that is more conducive to health because fewer community members will be left out of opportunities, dialogue, information, and resources. finally, more inclusive, flexible and diverse networks would be positively related to increased support from peers and family, stronger community support networks, and good sense of belonging. although the notion of social capital has been increasingly used to examine community-level factors as determinants of health, the studies that have empirically tested the association appeared to be mostly data driven rather than properly developing a theoretical and empirical base from where to interpret this association. further, there are numerous scholars who have argued that social capital can have potentially negative effects (kay & bernard, 2006; portes & landolt, 1996). there are two different issues at play. one, that high social capital within a certain group does not imply high social capital for the entire community (it may well be the opposite) (paxton, 1999). two, that high social capital may not have a positive impact on certain outcomes, for instance health. in relation to the former, our framework specifies that the estimation of the degree of social capital should be anchored in the appropriate societal level of which it is a feature. referring to the entire community, communities with more social capital would be those characterized by having more potential or actual resources collectively backing all its members, more extended networks of mutual acquaintance and recognition, higher levels of trust and possibilities of association. in relation to the potential negative effects of social capital on health status, our research program will precisely seek to empirically assess if the association between social capital and health is positive or negative. our initial study is the only one to our knowledge that has formulated a conceptual framework of social capital in first nations communities using ethnographic evidence, and then developed and validated a tool for its measurement and conceptual refinement. this paper reported on a new round in the process of validation, with promising results. our research program will proceed by testing the association between the five social capital factors identified in this study (together with other factors) and health and well-being of 24 first nations communities in manitoba. using multilevel models we will assess the role of individual, family and community-level factors on health. the findings from this program of research may provide better guidance to understand how policies and programs at different levels of government, corporations, and aboriginal leadership impact community social capital and as such the health and well-being of community members. this framework may lead to a more explicit consideration of how policies and programs impact the social fabric of communities. furthermore, it is expected that the knowledge generated through this program of research within manitoba first nations may well provide some applicability that may be extrapolated to indigenous communities in other countries. for instance our research group currently collaborates with 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.3 indigenous health organizations in colombia that face a number of similar experiences as that of manitoban first nations. the collaboration with these indigenous organizations has shown that their holistic notion of health and well-being fits well with some of the findings from our research. the strength of these organizations (mignone et al., in press) appears to be a clear expression of high stocks of social capital. finally, the social capital framework may provide guidance for policy initiatives of different types. for instance, assessing the situation of the communities from a community social capital perspective can help identify and develop policy strategies related to particular aspects of social development, and can assist in assessing the impact of these policies and program. policy and program initiatives may range from fostering the creation of cooperatives or self-help collectives related to business or household matters, to the enhancement of cultural, recreational, artistic and sports activities, increased voluntarism and broader community infrastructures. 13 mignone et al.: validation of a social capital framework canadian first nations published by scholarship@western, 2011 appendix i – questionnaire items the items appeared on the survey in likert scale format and response categories were 1=‘strongly disagree’, 2=‘disagree’, 3=‘neither disagree or agree’, 4=‘agree’, and 5=‘strongly agree’. a blank was considered a non-response (non-responses ranged from 2.4% to 8.2%). the questions were: 1. everyone has equal access to housing in this community. 2. if i wanted to start a small business and need to borrow money, i know that there are funding opportunities available in this community 3. recreation and sports activities are available to everyone in this community 4. day care is available in this community to all children who need it. 5. if myself, or someone in my family, wanted to receive job training, we could receive support within this community. 6. i am willing to make some effort to protect the land and water. 7. chief and council work to protect our land and its resources for future generations. 8. chief and council try to do the best of my community. 9. generally speaking, most people here try to be helpful to each other. 10. generally speaking, most people living here can be trusted. 11. people in this community are friendly to each other. 12. people in this community respect elders. 13. i am proud of the community i live in. 14. there are no crime problems in our community. 15. i am willing to help make my community better. 16. overall, i have some influence in making my community a better place to live 17. i often talk with friends and/or family about problems in my community. 18. people should make every effort to vote when there is a band election for chief and council. 19. it is easy for people in this community to have different groups of friends. 20. *the concerns of certain groups of people in this community are heard more than those of other groups. 21. *outside of my family, i visit mostly with people of my age. 22. *i find that different groups in this community don’t mingle much with each other. 23. *people in this community tend to always associate with the same group of people. 24. *there are people in this community who i won’t talk with, even if i need information or help. 25. *once people are part of a group in this community, they don’t associate much with others outside of the group. 26. *i only visit with people in this community that i have known for a long time. 27. *outside of my family, i don’t feel comfortable dealing with people from this community who have much more or much less money than me. * reversed scoring for analyses 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.3 references aldrich, h. 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(2000). social capital: implications for development theory, research, and policy. the world bank research observer, 15, 225-249. young, tk. (1994). the health of native americans: toward a biocultural epidemiology. new york: oxford university press. 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.3 the international indigenous policy journal may 2011 validation of a culturally appropriate social capital framework to explore health conditions in canadian first nations communities javier mignone brenda elias madelyn hall recommended citation validation of a culturally appropriate social capital framework to explore health conditions in canadian first nations communities abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license validation of a culturally appropriate social capital framework to explore health conditions in canadian first nations communities policy writing as dialogue: drafting an aboriginal chapter for canada's tri-council policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans the international indigenous policy journal volume 1 | issue 2 article 1 september 2010 policy writing as dialogue: drafting an aboriginal chapter for canada's tri-council policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans marlene brant castellano professor emeritus, trent university jeff reading centre for aboriginal health research, university of victoria, jreading@uvic.ca recommended citation brant castellano, m. , reading, j. (2010). policy writing as dialogue: drafting an aboriginal chapter for canada's tri-council policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans. the international indigenous policy journal, 1(2) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.2.1 this editorial is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. policy writing as dialogue: drafting an aboriginal chapter for canada's tri-council policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans abstract writing policy that applies to first nations, inuit and métis peoples in canada has become more interactive as communities and their representative organizations press for practical recognition of an aboriginal right of self-determination. when the policy in development is aimed at supporting “respect for human dignity” as it is in the case of ethics of research involving humans, the necessity of engaging the affected population becomes central to the undertaking. keywords first nations, inuit, métis, research involving humans, tri-council policy, health research, ethical research, policy acknowledgments views expressed in this article are those of the authors and do not represent positions of the interagency advisory panel and secretariat on research ethics, the institute of aboriginal peoples’ health or cihr , nserc or sshrc. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ introduction writing policy that applies to first nations, inuit and métis peoples in canada has become more interactive as communities and their representative organizations press for practical recognition of an aboriginal right of self-determination. when the policy in development is aimed at supporting “respect for human dignity” as it is in the case of ethics of research involving humans, the necessity of engaging the affected population becomes central to the undertaking. the authors of this article have carried leadership responsibilities over the past several years in parallel processes leading to revision of canada’s tri-council policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans (tcps). the tcps, issued in 1998, is the common policy of canadian institutes of health research (cihr), social sciences and humanities research council (sshrc) and natural sciences and engineering research council (nserc), the agencies responsible for distributing research funding allocated by the government of canada. to be eligible to receive research funds, institutions or organizations and the researchers affiliated with them are required to adhere to any of the agencies’ policies, including the tcps. marlene castellano chairs the aboriginal research ethics initiative of the inter-agency advisory panel on research ethics (pre). pre was established in 2001 by the presidents of the three federally-supported research councils to recommend revisions to the tcps in response to evolving ethics issues. jeff reading is the former scientific director of the institute of aboriginal peoples’ health (iaph), one of thirteen cihr institutes. iaph, established in 2000, set an early priority on developing ethical guidelines for researchers engaged in health research involving first nations, inuit, and métis people and communities. 1 brant castellano and reading: policy writing as dialogue published by scholarship@western, 2010 the parallel initiatives of pre and cihr-iaph have come to fruition. cihr adopted guidelines for health research involving aboriginal people in 2007 (canadian institutes of health research, 2007). pre released a first draft of revisions to the tcps in 2008, including a new chapter on aboriginal research, which is currently undergoing revision (interagency panel on research ethics, 2008). this article reflects on the process of developing policy on research ethics from the perspective of authors of first nation origin who are committed to enhancing the agency of aboriginal peoples in processes that affect them. ethical relations and ethics policy elders in aboriginal societies across canada speak of the responsibility of humans to maintain a balanced relationship with all the beings, human and non-human, with whom they share life on mother earth. languages of ancient origin convey the importance of principles such as “miyowicehtowin”, having good relations in western cree culture, and “skennen kowa”, great peace in iroquois culture, valuing relationships that go beyond resolving conflicts to actively care for one another’s welfare. an anishnabe elder speaking to the royal commission on aboriginal peoples spoke of the ethical imperatives in his traditional culture: at the beginning of time the creator gave [indians] law to follow. he gave the four directions. he gave them sweetgrass, the tree, the animal and the rock. the sweetgrass represents kindness; the tree represents honesty; the animal, sharing; and the rock is strength. (rcap. 1996a: 654) the introduction of colonial policies imposed rules that frequently violated the traditional value of maintaining respectful, mutually beneficial relations. policy, to aboriginal people has come to mean constraints of foreign origin. research has taken on similar negative associations, as inquiry conducted by outsiders, harvesting information that is translated into distorted 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 2 [2010], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.2.1 representations of the people’s experience, and policies that limit the arena for self-determined action. the first task of ethics policy development was to bridge conceptual worlds, not repeating errors of the past by assuming that aboriginal peoples needed instruction in ethics but, rather, connecting with those deep currents of ethical sensibility that live on in contemporary community life. the approach taken was to foster dialogue among first nation, inuit, and métis communities interested or engaged in research, organizations representing key sectors of the aboriginal community, the broader research community in canada, cihr-iaph, and pre in an iterative process of policy formation. converging streams of development scientific breakthroughs often demonstrate that convergent insights can appear independently in different places. innovators declare: “there is nothing so powerful as an idea whose time has come.” initiatives to develop ethics policy had the benefit of a movement that was gathering momentum in the aboriginal community, in the research councils, and in international venues. in 1992, canada’s royal commission on aboriginal peoples (rcap) launched consultations on a comprehensive program of research. the response at a workshop convened to engage aboriginal researchers was the cry: “we’ve been researched to death!” an elder in the workshop intervened with the proposition: “if it’s true that we have been researched to death, maybe it’s time we started researching ourselves back to life” (oral communication, 1992). in the years since that meeting, the words “researching ourselves to life” have become a familiar affirmation of the value of research and the possibility of aboriginal ownership of the processes and outcomes of research. numerous studies sponsored by rcap were conducted by 3 brant castellano and reading: policy writing as dialogue published by scholarship@western, 2010 aboriginal and non-aboriginal scholars and community researchers, often in collaboration with communities. researchers were bound by rcap’s “ethical guidelines for research” (rcap, 1996b:325-328), which were articulated by a subcommittee made up of aboriginal persons with extensive research experience. rcap research gave substance to the expectation that knowledge creation could be owned once again by aboriginal people. in 1998 the first nations and inuit regional health survey (http://www.rhsers.ca/english/) was launched in partnership between regional first nations and inuit organizations and health canada. despite the tensions that arose in executing the first rhs, the results were sufficiently positive that the first nations component has been repeated in further cycles, 2002 and 2007. the first nations oversight committee for the rhs developed a statement on the conduct of research which was later encapsulated in a position paper “ownership, control, access and possession (ocap) or self-determination applied to research” published on-line by the first nations centre of the national aboriginal health organization (naho, 2007) (http://www.naho.ca/english/pub_research.php). inuit tapiriit kanatami, representing five regional inuit organizations, has partnered with the nunavut research institute to produce “negotiating research relationships with inuit communities: a guide for researchers” (itk and nri, 2007) and a series of pamphlets on research ethics in collaboration with the ajunnginiq centre of naho. the native women’s association of canada (nwac) established a research presence with the mounting of sisters in spirit research and community action initiative to bring to public awareness the tragedy of missing and murdered aboriginal women in canada. nwac’s publications include a statement of the research methods and ethics that guide their work with the families of vulnerable women (nwac, 2005). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 2 [2010], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.2.1 sshrc in 2003 announced a strategic grants program in aboriginal research that set as a priority shifting from research “on and about aboriginal people” to research “with and by aboriginal people.” nserc for some years has adapted program guidelines for northern research to engage collaboratively with inuit and other northern communities in research that includes a focus on environment and nutrition. unesco’s “universal declaration on bioethics and human rights” (2005) gave specific attention to interests of indigenous peoples in research affecting them and the role of communities in providing consent for such activities. the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples gave further specificity to the right of indigenous peoples to selfdetermination and their collective right to exercise control over expressions of their cultural heritage and intellectual property. (united nations, 2007) the content and research approaches detailed in these documents were informative in designing ethical guidelines adapted to current realities. by far the most intensive activities to engage first nations, inuit, and métis communities directly were undertaken by cihr-iaph in drafting and reviewing their emerging guidelines. cihr guidelines for health research involving aboriginal people the special ethical challenges presented in research involving aboriginal people were identified in section 6 of the tcps (1998), which set out some best practices based on guidelines developed by other agencies including rcap and the inuit circumpolar conference. with the creation of the institute of aboriginal peoples’ health (iaph) as one of the thirteen cihr institutes, dedicated to research that would enhance aboriginal health, the need to address those challenges and provide clear guidance to researchers became an urgent priority. cihr-iaph, collaborating with the cihr ethics office and with extensive involvement by the aboriginal and 5 brant castellano and reading: policy writing as dialogue published by scholarship@western, 2010 research communities, proceeded to develop guidelines for health research, broadly defined, over a five-year period (2002-2007). the experience with health research for aboriginal communities has not always been positive. in fact, many aboriginal people regard research as a process that does not serve their needs either individually or collectively. moratoria on health research have been initiated by some communities despite pressing needs for better knowledge to contribute to improving health and health care. communities are simply demanding greater control of factors affecting their lives including having a say on research priorities, a role in the creation and application of new knowledge, and building capacities in an advanced knowledge environment. in 2002, the iaph scientific director presented a motion to a senior management committee for planning and priorities, chaired by the cihr president and ceo and including membership by the thirteen scientific directors of institutes. the motion called for approval of the development of guidelines for research ethics involving aboriginal peoples to be applied to all aboriginal health research funded by cihr. the motion was approved by consensus. in 2002, the cihr standing committee on ethics approved the detailed plan and subsequently recommended that the cihr governing council adopt the guidelines as policy. the guidelines were approved by consensus on march 21, 2007. an aboriginal ethics working group was struck and conferred over a two-year period to produce the first draft guidelines, drawing on their experience in the field and background papers and studies commissioned by cihr. draft guidelines were revised during extensive preliminary consultations undertaken with aboriginal communities and individuals. comprehensive national consultations on draft guidelines took place as follows: round 1 introduced the idea in a national workshop with aboriginal and research communities (2005); followed by round 2 (2005-06), a 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 2 [2010], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.2.1 web-based consultation that was targeted to the broader research community and general public. concurrently, cihr conducted on-site meetings involving research-intensive institutions and aboriginal communities. the scope of consultations and vetting of guidelines included outreach to northern aboriginal communities, with meetings in the northwest territories, yukon, and nunavut. the eight cihr-iaph funded aboriginal capacity and developmental research environment (acadre) networks helped engage the regional views of aboriginal individuals, communities and elders and further ensured widespread consultation across canada. federal government consultations included health canada, indian and northern affairs canada and justice canada. partners in the endeavour included the national council on ethics in human research and the interagency advisory panel on research ethics. the aim of developing guidelines was to connect aboriginal community interests to researchers and research-intensive institutions. research is multi-disciplinary as envisioned by the cihr act (2000), including the four pillars or domains of biomedical, clinical, population health, and health services research. nested within research domains, health research disciplines employ an astounding array of methods and tools, which can be connected together in multidisciplinary, cross-disciplinary, and inter-disciplinary investigations of aboriginal health. engaging at the interface between the exceedingly complex and sensitive landscape of aboriginal community world-views and the equally complex scientific discourse of cihr funded researchers required clear guidance. in addition, knowledge translation (kt) to inform policy development is critical for evidence-based programs and services. guidelines attempt to create a space for community level involvement in research, which seeks to improve population health through integration of ‘real7 brant castellano and reading: policy writing as dialogue published by scholarship@western, 2010 time’ knowledge translation. kt is imbedded in the process of doing research in partnership with aboriginal communities and policy makers, thereby promoting rapid application of evidence. this initiative in public policy was ground-breaking in canada, introducing research ethics policy of nation-wide application, specific to health research involving aboriginal people. the policy focused on providing an ethical framework that incorporates aboriginal world views to address key issues such as: research partnerships; methodology; collective and individual consent; protection of cultural knowledge; benefit sharing; and, collection, use, storage, and secondary use of data and biological samples. the development of research agreements was emphasized as a vehicle for enabling communities to engage in research and, over time, build a foundation of trust with researchers. in addition to the specific protections articulated in the guidelines, two core processes for peer evaluation of research are built into review procedures within cihr: first, to meet (or exceed) community standards for engagement and knowledge creation and, second, to meet (or exceed) international standards for scientific excellence. the anticipated outcome is research that is responsive, rigorous, and linked to improvements in health for communities. from the outset cihr guidelines were strategically developed to inform revision of the tcps (1998) and specifically to feed into a robust, current policy statement building on section 6. this is not to say that the cihr guidelines were intended to be the revision but a starting point to be fully articulated during the tcps revision process. while the tri-council policy process was proceeding, a clear set of guidelines would be enabling for researchers not familiar with research issues in communities. the development of chir guidelines would encourage health research and clarify the ethical conditions on which it could proceed. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 2 [2010], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.2.1 the cihr guidelines recognize unique cultural, linguistic, historic, and economic differences that exist in relationships between aboriginal communities and scientific researchers. they create space for co-existence and mutual respect in health research. publication of the guidelines stimulated communication and collaboration between cihr and health research agencies in australia, new zealand, and united states. the world health organization has recognized the need for a research agreement template, such as the one referenced in the cihr guidelines, to guide partnerships between researchers and aboriginal communities. circumpolar countries and low and middle income nations have expressed interest in cihr’s guidelines to inform and update their own guidelines. pre’s aboriginal research ethics initiative (arei) the interagency advisory panel on research ethics (pre) is a voluntary group of twelve members drawn from diverse disciplines, universities and research organizations across canada. the panel’s mandate includes education and interpretation as well as evolution of the tcps to address emerging ethics issues. work is carried out with the assistance of a small secretariat on research ethics and working groups that provide access to the expertise of a broader representation of the research and ethics communities. the panel has commissioned papers to support analysis of specific topics. in the case of aboriginal research ethics, background research has been shared with cihr-iaph and supplemented by papers and workshop reports produced during the development of the cihr guidelines. with the endorsement of the presidents of cihr, sshrc, and nserc, pre set a priority on developing a chapter devoted to aboriginal research integrated in the prospective update of the tcps. guidance on ethics of research involving aboriginal peoples would thus apply to all domains of research conducted by institutions and researchers eligible to receive 9 brant castellano and reading: policy writing as dialogue published by scholarship@western, 2010 funding from the three federally-mandated research agencies. the aboriginal research ethics initiative (arei) was launched in 2003 with the appointment of an aboriginal member (castellano) to the panel and the convening of a strategy meeting involving the three research agencies and representatives of aboriginal organizations. the approach adopted was to create a guiding consortium which would engage the agencies and five canadian national aboriginal organizations (naos) with pre in ongoing dialogue to shape the new policy on ethics of aboriginal research. the assembly of first nations (afn), inuit tapiriit kanatami (itk), the métis national council (mnc), the congress of aboriginal peoples (cap), and the native women’s association of canada (nwac) participated in drafting terms of reference for the consortium. the organizations agreed to involve their constituents and pre made a commitment to incorporate the consortium’s consensus recommendations on policy or, if consensus was not possible, to represent divergent views in pre’s report to the agency presidents. on the advice of the aboriginal representatives, federal ministries were invited to participate in discussions as non-voting members. health canada, indian and northern affairs canada, and statistics canada took up the invitation. the canadian naos through their regional networks were knowledgeable about research needs and activities in their communities and were taking an increasing interest in governance of research. the first nations information governance committee, which oversees the first nations regional health survey, articulated the principles of ownership, control, access and possession (http://www.naho.ca/english/pub_research.php), which have been endorsed and adapted in numerous first nations communities across canada. itk, in collaboration with regional representatives and the inuit centre of naho, undertook to develop an inuit-specific platform for ethics of research in the arctic. nwac makes available, on its website, their 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 2 [2010], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.2.1 commitment to participatory research methods and ethical practice in sisters in spirit research. mnc, in collaboration with the métis centre at naho, is working on métis -specific practice guidelines. between 2004 and 2008 the secretariat on research ethics made available modest grants to the naos to assist with engaging their regional constituents. to complement the policy advice sought from the consortium, pre also convened a technical advisory committee on aboriginal research (pre-tacar), made up of aboriginal and non-aboriginal practitioners in academic and community research settings. pre-tacar helped to identify issues and review working papers drafted by the secretariat on research ethics and the chair of arei. in engaging the broader research community, the chair of arei made numerous presentations at conferences and seminars, involving aboriginal and nonaboriginal researchers, to invite commentary on the perspectives and priorities for an aboriginal chapter that were crystallizing. to test and refine policy options in the thirteen (current) chapters of the revised tcps pre publishes issue and area-specific working papers on its website (http://www.pre.gc.ca). an issues discussion paper, including illustrative case studies on aboriginal research ethics, was released in electronic form in the spring of 2008. a complete draft of a revised tcps text was published electronically and in hard copy to solicit public comment in december 2008 (pre: 2008). the secretariat and panel members participated in over 50 consultation meetings and focus groups, some targeted to aboriginal researchers, at universities and research institutes across the country in subsequent months. more than 220 written submissions were received, with chapter 9 on research involving aboriginal peoples receiving the highest volume of comments. at the time of writing, review and analysis of comments are being incorporated in a second draft of a revised tcps slated for public release in december 2009. the national aboriginal 11 brant castellano and reading: policy writing as dialogue published by scholarship@western, 2010 organizations participating in the consortium are engaging their constituents in review of policy drafts. the guidance provided in chapter 9 is based on the premise that engagement with community is integral to ethical research involving aboriginal peoples. community is defined as a collectivity with shared interests or identity that has the capacity to act or express itself as a group. communities may be territorial, organizational, or a community of interest with more fluid boundaries. engagement can take many forms, including consent from formal leadership to conduct research in the community; joint planning with a responsible agency; commitment to a partnership formalized in a research agreement; or, dialogue with an advisory group expert in the customs governing the knowledge being sought. the level of engagement may range from information sharing to active participation and collaboration, to empowerment and shared leadership of the research project. a key aspect of ethical practice is respect for community customs and codes of research practice relevant to the research project. articles in the chapter provide explicit guidance for putting these basic ethical practices into effect. chapter 9 of the draft tcps and the cihr guidelines share the same goal – to create an ethical space where canadian aboriginal communities and researchers can come together with mutual respect and a degree of trust that has often been lacking in research encounters. the two documents embody many of the same practice guidelines but they are not identical. the tcps is the platform on which institutional policies adapted to particular circumstances stand. as an over-arching policy it must be applicable to the research domains of the agencies that endorse it – cihr, sshrc and nserc – and therefore sets out principles as well as prescriptions that must be complemented by ethical reflection and judgment in diverse venues. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 2 [2010], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.2.1 researchers and the nao representatives commenting on the 2008 draft of the tcps perceived significant differences from the cihr guidelines and asked for clarification of how the two policies would work together. pre and the secretariat are working with cihr ethics office, iaph, sshrc, and nserc to make revisions that show the correspondence between the documents more clearly and to narrow or resolve points of divergence. the second draft of the revised tcps is scheduled for release in december 2009 with opportunity for comment extending to march 1, 2010. the revised draft of chapter 9 will be available earlier, at the end of october 2009, in response to requests for additional time for circulation in the aboriginal community. pre’s goal is to have a revised tcps, which has broad support, ready for submission to the agency presidents in the spring of 2010. policy writing as dialogue policy to guide ethical research involving aboriginal peoples is evolving in the unique social and political environment of canada. reflecting on the process may, nevertheless, prove of value to other nation states and indigenous peoples setting out on a similar course. the canadian constitution act of 1982 recognizes and affirms the aboriginal and treaty rights of aboriginal peoples, including indian (first nations), inuit, and métis peoples in canada. while the nature and extent of such rights are still being defined, constitutional protection creates an obligation on public institutions to acknowledge and support the desire of aboriginal peoples to maintain their collective identities and the continuity of their cultures. ethics policy for aboriginal research in canada, whether specific to health or applying more broadly to all research domains, should therefore be responsive to both individual wellbeing and collective welfare as conceived by the people involved. research that engages the community and that addresses concerns relevant to the people, that builds on traditional 13 brant castellano and reading: policy writing as dialogue published by scholarship@western, 2010 knowledge, and that enhances local capacity holds the greatest promise of contributing to that goal. writing policy carries some inherent contradictions, when attempting to incorporate first nations, inuit, and métis ethics of “good relations” and institutional requirements for enforceable rules. translating predominantly oral custom into a written code, or vice versa, introduces the potential for distorting meaning and furthering misunderstanding. the development process followed by cihr and pre has been to consider carefully the guidance available in emerging codes of community practice in canada and the approaches taken in other countries including australia, new zealand, and united states. drafts of ethics policy were discussed in numerous face-to-face meetings conducted by cihr-iaph with community participants and in on-line consultations connecting with aboriginal and non-aboriginal researchers. national aboriginal organizations with regional networks have been involved in reviewing and advising on revisions to drafts the cihr guidelines and the proposed revision of the tcps carry with them two important provisions: first, they are represented to the aboriginal community as living documents, which will be subject to interpretation and updating through the continued participation of aboriginal researchers and community representatives. the dialogue on policy, undertaken between 2002 and 2009, will continue. second, both documents seek to create “ethical space” at the place where communities and researchers meet. different worldviews, needs, and expectations between the parties can be expected to present challenges. dialogue undertaken with an ethical commitment to mutual benefit and good relations can be a powerful instrument to prevent violations of human dignity. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 2 [2010], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.2.1 the experience of cihr-iaph in the two-and-a-half years since the cihr guidelines were approved indicates that policy adoption is only the first step in effecting change. a major educational effort is required to equip research ethics boards to interpret and apply innovative guidelines. at the same time, aboriginal communities struggle to secure the resources that will enable them to become full partners in initiating, guiding, and making use of research to reach self-determined goals. whereas research institutions receive earmarked funding to offset the costs of administration and ethical oversight of research, aboriginal communities have no access to these resources. the expectation that aboriginal communities will co-venture and engage in complex partnership arrangements, as stipulated by the cihr guidelines and potentially the revised tcps, can only be met if a parallel commitment is made to support the development of community research capacity for ethical oversight and administration. indirect costs must be integrated into the funding formulas of national granting councils so that aboriginal communities receive equitable treatment, with earmarked funding comparable to support received by institutional partners for administrative costs and workforce development. ethical guidelines alone do not tackle important issues related to the governance of research ethics. with increased involvement at the community level questions of local conflict of interest are inevitable. some canadian first nations communities have created regional ethics review processes, for example the manitoulin island ethics board in ontario and the mi’kmaq ethics watch in nova scotia. these bodies provide a critical mass of expertise not available in a single community. they are close enough to the culture of the community to reflect local concerns but a step removed from the dynamics of community relationships and obligations. 15 brant castellano and reading: policy writing as dialogue published by scholarship@western, 2010 discussions regarding creation of a national ethics review body have stalled due to reluctance to hand over control of important community decisions to a faceless, distant agency. linking communities with extensive experience in ethics review with newer participants in research through a networked, aboriginal ethics governance body has yet to be tried, to the knowledge of the present authors. testing this or another model will require that the canadian federal government invest in building aboriginal capacity to engage in the dynamic evolution of research practice and research ethics. the knowledge society of the 21st century requires nothing less than the fullest development and creative contribution of all its citizens. indigenous scholars in canada and around the world are articulating the contours of indigenous knowledge and asserting its relevance to contemporary life. the engagement of first nations, inuit and métis peoples, in dialogue to devise policy on ethics of research involving humans in canada, clearly demonstrates that they are eager to take up the challenges of knowledge creation, knowledge translation and knowledge application for the benefit of their communities and society at large. it is hoped that this description of the canadian experience of revising national research ethics policies to include guidelines for research with aboriginal peoples may provide insight to other national jurisdictions interested in developing their own research ethics protocols for engagement with indigenous populations. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 2 [2010], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.2.1 references canadian institutes of health research. 2007. “cihr guidelines for health research involving aboriginal people.” http://www.cihr-irsc.gc.ca/e/29134.html. first nations regional longitudinal health survey (rhs). 1998 [2002]. accessed october 9, 2007 at: http://www.rhs-ers.ca/english/. itk and nri. 2007. negotiating research relationships with inuit communities: a guide for researchers. scot nickels, jamal shirley, and gita laidler (eds). inuit tapiriit kanatami and nunavut research institute: ottawa and iqaluit. 38 pp. national aboriginal health organization (naho). 2007. ownership, control, access and possession (ocap) or self-determination applied to research. sanctioned by the first nations information governance committee. ottawa, first nations centre, national aboriginal health organization (naho). accessed october 8, 2009 at: http://www.naho.ca/english/pub_research.php. naho ajunnginiq centre. “research and research ethics fact sheets.” accessed october 9, 2009 at: http://www.naho.ca/inuit/e/ethics/. oral communication. 1992. royal commission on aboriginal peoples, aboriginal researchers workshop. nakoda lodge, alberta, september 24-5. interagency advisory panel on research ethics (pre). interagency advisory panel on research ethics. http://www.pre.gc.ca pre. 2008. draft 2nd edition of the tri-council policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans. accessed october 8, 2009 at: http://www.pre.ethics.gc.ca/eng/policypolitique/initiatives/draft-preliminaire/ 17 brant castellano and reading: policy writing as dialogue published by scholarship@western, 2010 report of the royal commission on aboriginal peoples. 1996a. volume 1, looking forward, looking back. ottawa. canada communications group. accessed 8 october, 2009 at: http://www.ainc-inac.gc.ca/ap/rrc-eng.asp report of the royal commission on aboriginal peoples. 1996b. “ethical guidelines for research,” in volume 5, renewal: a twenty-year commitment. canada communications group, pp. 325-8. accessed 8 october, 2009 at: http://www.ainc-inac.gc.ca/ap/rrceng.asp. native women’s association of canada. 2005. sisters in spirit initiative. accessed october 15, 2009 at: http://www.nwac-hq.org/en/background.html. united nations educational, scientific, and cultural organization. 2005. universal declaration on bioethics and human rights. adopted 19 october 2005 by the 334rd session of the general conference of unesco. http://portal.unesco.org/shs/en/ev.phpurl_id=1883&url_do=do_topic&url_section=201.html. united nations. 2007. declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples. articles 13 and 31 ff. accessed october 15, 2009 at: http://www.un.org/esa/socdev/unpfii/documents/drips_en.pdf 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 2 [2010], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.2.1 the international indigenous policy journal september 2010 policy writing as dialogue: drafting an aboriginal chapter for canada's tri-council policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans marlene brant castellano jeff reading recommended citation policy writing as dialogue: drafting an aboriginal chapter for canada's tri-council policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license policy writing as dialogue: drafting an aboriginal chapter for canada's tri-council policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans the structure of aboriginal child welfare in canada the international indigenous policy journal volume 4 | issue 2 article 2 april 2013 the structure of aboriginal child welfare in canada vandna sinha centre for research on children and families, mcgill university, vandna.sinha@mcgill.ca anna kozlowski school of social work, mcgill university recommended citation sinha, v. , kozlowski, a. (2013). the structure of aboriginal child welfare in canada. the international indigenous policy journal, 4(2) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.2 the structure of aboriginal child welfare in canada abstract aboriginal children are currently overrepresented in out-of-home care in canada; this extends a historical pattern of child removal that began with the residential school system. the overrepresentation of aboriginal children persists despite legislative and structural changes intended to reduce the number of aboriginal children in care. several recent developments suggest potential for improvement in services for aboriginal children and families in the near future. however, greater information about the structure of aboriginal child welfare in canada is needed to support program and policy development. we present a broad overview of the variation in aboriginal child welfare legislation and standards, service delivery models, and funding formulas across canadian provinces and territories. we draw on this review to suggest specific priorities for future research. keywords aboriginal, canada, child welfare, child protection creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/   t h e s t ru c t u re o f a b o ri g i n a l c h i l d w e l f a re i n c a n a d a aboriginal children comprised 6% of the canadian child population in 2006 (statistics canada, 2009). according to the constitution act (1982), the aboriginal population consists of three distinct groups: first nations, métis, and inuit peoples. within these groups, 65% of aboriginal children are first nations (statistics canada, 2009). the child welfare system is canada’s primary state-sponsored mechanism for responding to reports that a caregiver’s actions (or failures of action) pose a significant risk of harm to a child’s physical or emotional development. placement of a child in out-of-home care is one of the system’s most serious protective measures (gough, shlonsky, & dudding, 2009). aboriginal children are currently greatly overrepresented in out-of-home care in canada, perpetuating a historical pattern of removing aboriginal children from their homes that started with the residential school system of the past (sinha et al., 2011). the recent emergence of a system of child welfare agencies that are managed by aboriginal communities, together with legislative changes across the provinces and territories, are among measures intended to reduce the overrepresentation of aboriginal children in out-of-home care. however, child welfare agencies face the challenging task of serving aboriginal children and families with complex needs (sinha et al., 2011), and of doing so in contexts complicated by the intergenerational effects of past colonial, federal, and provincial or territorial policies (evans-campbell, 2008; miller, 1989). efforts to address the needs of aboriginal families are also complicated by a legislative framework in which the federal government has responsibility for funding on-reserve health and social services for status first nations people while the provinces and territories fund these services for all others. multiple evaluations point to persistent federal underfunding of on-reserve child welfare services, especially those provided by aboriginal child welfare agencies (auditor general of canada, 2011; first nations child and family caring society of canada, 2005). several recent developments in canada point to a growing public awareness of the issues involved and to increasing government attention on the challenges in aboriginal child welfare. a 2006 class action settlement allocated federal funding for the establishment of a “truth and reconciliation” commission mandated to promote knowledge about the long-term impact of residential schooling (indian and northern affairs canada, 2010b). in 2007, the canadian parliament formally supported jordan’s principle ("private members' business," 2007), which was an initiative intended to ensure that first nations children receive needed services without experiencing delays or disruptions caused by disputes between federal and provincial or territorial governments or departments about payment for services (macdonald & craddock, 2005). the same year, the assembly of first nations (afn) and the first nations child and family caring society of canada (fncfcs) filed a human rights complaint charging the canadian government with systematically providing less funding for child welfare services to on-reserve first nations children than is provided for children who are off-reserve (blackstock, 2011). also in 2007, aboriginal affairs and northern development canada1 (aandc) initiated the introduction of a new first nations child welfare funding strategy (aandc, 2010a). in 2008, the prime minister of canada, stephen harper, made a formal statement of apology to residential school survivors on behalf of the government; his apology acknowledged the persistent and serious negative                                                                                                                 1 in may 2011, indian and northern affairs canada (inac) changed its name to aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc). 1 sinha and kozlowski: the structure of aboriginal child welfare in canada published by scholarship@western, 2013   repercussions of residential school policies (aandc, 2010b). finally, in 2012 the federal court for judicial review ruled that failure to ensure comparable funding for onand off-reserve services can be considered racial or ethnic discrimination, ending a lengthy appeals process that had blocked hearing of the afn and fncfcs human rights complaint filed in 2007 ("first nations child and family caring society of canada et al. v attorney general of canada," 2012). collectively, the above developments point to the potential for the expansion and improvement of services for aboriginal children and their families in the near future. however, greater knowledge about the policies that shape aboriginal child welfare is needed to support development of these services. currently, significant barriers exist to the compilation of even basic information about aboriginal child welfare policy and structure. barriers include the challenge of collecting information about multiple jurisdictions in a decentralized child welfare system, limited academic literature on aboriginal child welfare, and an aandc culture in which even complex and essential information such as the terms and conditions of federal funding for aboriginal child welfare agencies – has sometimes been verbally or informally communicated rather than being published in formal documents (o. johnston, 2009). this article presents an overview of the current structure of aboriginal child welfare in canada. we review legislation, service delivery models, and funding, while placing this information in its historical context. the information presented here builds on previous work on aboriginal children presented in the canadian incidence study of reported child abuse and neglect (fncis-2008) (see sinha et al., 2011; trocmé et al., 2010). fncis-2008 researchers, in conjunction with representatives of the aboriginal child welfare organizations analyzed, contextualized, and disseminated information about child welfare investigations involving first nations children (sinha et al., 2011) by having advisory committee members complete a two-page questionnaire about the historical trajectories, umbrella or support organizations, legislative or policy frameworks, funding models, and scope of first nations child welfare agencies in each individual’s jurisdiction. research team members collected and reviewed legislation, government and court documents, and research reports in order to refine and provide formal references for the information provided by committee members. advisory committee and research team members then worked collaboratively to draft and review information sheets that summarized the findings. the current paper offers a synthesis of the first nations child welfare information collected through that process and adds information about child welfare for other aboriginal children whenever available. t h e c u rre n t o v e rre p re s e n t a t i o n o f a b o ri g i n a l c h i l d re n i n t h e c h i l d w e l f a re s y s t e m i n c a n a d a table 1 shows that aboriginal children are greatly overrepresented in out-of-home care across provinces for which data is publicly available. although provincial statistics separating first nations children from other aboriginal children are rare, available data suggests that first nations children are overrepresented compared to other aboriginal children (manitoba ministry of family services and housing, 2009). findings from the fncis-2008 report suggest that the overrepresentation of first nations children begins at the point of first contact with child welfare agencies. in the areas served by sampled agencies, the investigation rate for first nations children was 4.2 times that for non-aboriginal children (140.6 investigations per 1,000 first nations children vs. 33.5 investigations for every 1,000 non-aboriginal children in 2008.) this overrepresentation is driven primarily by cases involving child neglect, which is 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 2 [2013], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.2   linked to factors including poverty, poor housing, domestic violence, and substance abuse (sinha et al., 2011). t a b l e 1 . pro v i n c i a l s t a t i s t i c s o n a b o ri g i n a l c h i l d re n i n o u t o f h o m e c a re province aboriginal children as a % of the total child population aboriginal children as a % of children in care age of children covered in child welfare legislation ontario 3 21 0 16 manitoba 23 85 0 18 saskatchewan 25 80 0 16 alberta 9 59 0 18 british columbia 8 52 0 19 note. adapted from sinha et al., 2011, p. 5; trocmé et al., 2005, p.10. t h e h i s t o ri c a l c o n t e x t o f a b o ri g i n a l c h i l d w e l f a re i n c a n a d a prior to colonization, aboriginal families and communities cared for their children in accordance with their cultural practices, laws, and traditions. culturally based systems of care shared basic tenets, including viewing children as prized gifts from the creator and valuing extended family interdependence (royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996). the existence and continuity of customary care traditions in canada have been documented in a number of court cases (zlotkin, 2009), as well as in research which, for example, demonstrates that first nations communities rely on grandparents as primary caregivers of children more than any other cultural group in canada (fuller-thomson, 2005). the arrival of european settlers and the subsequent imposition of colonial policies disrupted traditional systems of care by imposing state practices that resulted in the removal of tens of thousands of aboriginal children from their homes. starting in 1879, the canadian government systematically separated aboriginal children from their families, placing them in residential schools in order to assimilate them into colonial culture. residential schools also provided state care for first nations children who were found to be abused or neglected in their homes. these practices served as the initial mechanisms for state-sponsored aboriginal child welfare (milloy, 1999). a 1920 amendment to the indian act of 1876 made attendance at state-sponsored schools mandatory for all school age children physically able to attend and allowed truant officers to enforce attendance by pursuing, arresting, and conveying to school truant children ("an act to amend the indian act," 1920, a10). inside the schools, overcrowding and underfunding resulted in poor living conditions that facilitated the spread of disease, contributing to many preventable deaths (bryce, 1922; milloy, 1999). one estimate suggests that 50% of children attending residential school in the early 20th century died as a result of poor conditions (duncan campbell scott as cited in miller, 1996). accounts from the time show that children in many schools were subject to severe physical abuse and, once the residential system began to close, there were revelations of widespread sexual abuse (milloy, 1999; royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996). the residential school system was slowly phased out during the second half of the 20th century and responsibility for aboriginal child welfare shifted from the school system to the child welfare system. the introduction of section 88 to the indian act in 1951 made “all laws of general application from time to time in force in any province applicable to and in respect of indians in the province” ("indian act,” 3 sinha and kozlowski: the structure of aboriginal child welfare in canada published by scholarship@western, 2013   1985, section 88). this was interpreted as meaning that, for the first time, provincial or territorial child welfare legislation applied on-reserve. provinces and territories initially provided on-reserve services only in extreme emergencies, but expanded their efforts upon allocation of federal funds to support provincial and territorial delivery of on-reserve services in the mid-1950s (indian and northern affairs canada, 2007). as a result, the number of aboriginal children placed in care increased sharply in the following years (p. johnston, 1983). many children were permanently removed from their homes; over 11,000 aboriginal children, including up to one third of the child population in some first nations communities, were adopted between 1960 and 1990 (royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996). in some jurisdictions, special programs facilitated the adoption of aboriginal children. for example, the adopt indian and métis (aim) program in saskatchewan allowed for adoptions of aboriginal children to take place outside of the provincially regulated adoption system (sinclair, 2009). concern over the scale of child removal and the treatment of aboriginal children by provincial and territorial child welfare authorities laid the groundwork for first nations groups to develop federally funded child welfare agencies which provided services on-reserve (auditor general of canada, 2008). some first nations groups pioneered efforts in the 1960s and 1970s; the number of first nations agencies grew from 4 in 1981 to 30 in 1986 (armitage, 1995) before a federal moratorium on the recognition of new agencies was imposed. the moratorium was lifted in 1991 when a national funding formula (directive 20-1) and a program manual for first nations child welfare agencies were introduced. both placed greater constraints on first nations child welfare agencies, requiring them to comply with provincial standards and introducing strict controls on funding (auditor general of canada, 2008). despite these restrictions, the number of first nations child welfare agencies and the scope of their responsibilities have continued to expand. while first nations agencies initially served only on-reserve populations, they now increasingly serve off-reserve populations as well. in addition to first nations agencies, there are now multiple agencies serving métis children and families and panaboriginal populations in urban areas (urban aboriginal agencies). t h e c u rre n t s t ru c t u re o f a b o ri g i n a l c h i l d w e l f a re i n c a n a d a canada has a decentralized child welfare system in which over 300 provincial and territorial child welfare agencies operate under the jurisdictions of 13 canadian provinces and territories (trocmé et al., 2010). in addition, as summarized in table 2, there were 121 métis, first nations, and urban aboriginal child and family services agencies either in operation or proceeding with provincially or federally recognized planning processes as of 2011. of these, 84 agencies have signed agreements with provincial governments affirming their rights to apply provincial child welfare legislation and to provide the full range of child protection services, including child welfare investigations (but excluding adoption services for most agencies). the remaining agencies assumed a more limited range of responsibilities under provincial or territorial child welfare legislation. there are currently no comprehensive estimates of the proportion of the aboriginal population served by aboriginally governed agencies. however, the auditor general (2008) estimated that first nations agencies provide at least partial services to about 442 of 606 first nations groups. in addition, sinha and leduc (2011) recently estimated that 30% of first nations children live in areas where first nations or urban aboriginal agencies are responsible for conducting child welfare investigations. finally, it is estimated that 50% of the aboriginal population lives in urban areas (statistics canada, 2009), and aboriginally governed agencies now serve the large 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 2 [2013], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.2   aboriginal populations of toronto, vancouver, and winnipeg, as well as several smaller urban communities. t a b l e 2 . n u m b e r o f f i rs t n a t i o n s , u rb a n a b o ri g i n a l , a n d m é t i s c h i l d w e l f a re a g e n c i e s b y pro v i n c e o r t e rri t o ry a n d r a n g e o f s e rv i c e s o f f e re d , 2 0 1 1 agencies offering full range of servicesb province totala all first nations urban aboriginal métis nova scotia 1 1 1 0 0 new brunswick 10 10 10 0 0 quebec 16 8 8 0 0 ontario 11 6 5c 1 0 manitoba 16 15 13c 1 1 saskatchewan 17 17 17 0 0 alberta 18 18 18c 0 0 british columbia 31 9 8c 1 0 pei 1 0 0 0 0 northwest territories 0 0 0 0 0 newfoundland and labrador 0 0 0 0 0 yukon 0 0 0 0 0 nunavut because inuit represent the majority ethno-racial group, the distinction between territorial and aboriginally governed child welfare agencies is unclear total 121 84 80 3 1 a includes british columbia agencies in planning or pre-planning stages. b includes initial investigations and intake, but not adoption services. c includes first nations agencies serving off-reserve populations. s e rv i c e d e l i v e ry m o d e l s all provincial and territorial child welfare systems share certain basic goals and characteristics; nonetheless, they vary considerably in terms of their organization of service delivery systems, child welfare statutes, assessment tools, competency-based training programs, and other factors. variation in services for aboriginal children is even more pronounced. table 3 describes existing service delivery models in terms of governance and lawmaking authority, service providers, and funding control. the first row depicts service delivery for non-aboriginal children and families; in this unified model, the province or territory has responsibility for all aspects of child welfare services. in contrast, models of service delivery for aboriginal children are both more diverse and more complicated. 5 sinha and kozlowski: the structure of aboriginal child welfare in canada published by scholarship@western, 2013   table 3: child welfare agency service delivery models service provider governance management authority lawmaker funding control services for nonaboriginal children provincial or territorial child welfare agencies provincial or territorial government provincial or territorial government provincial or territorial government services for aboriginal children on-reserve off-reserve provincial or territorial model provincial or territorial child welfare agencies provincial or territorial government provincial or territorial government federal government provincial or territorial government delegated or mandated model1 aboriginal child welfare agencies aboriginal community provincial or territorial government federal government provincial or territorial government integrated model aboriginal child welfare agencies aboriginal community & provincial government provincial or territorial government federal government provincial or territorial government tripartite agreement2 first nations child welfare agency first nations first nation (federally and provincially approved) federal government band by law3 first nations child welfare agency first nations first nation (federally approved) federal government 1 note alternate interpretation under saskatchewan first nations legislation. 2 nisga’ lisms first nation band. 3 spallumcheen first nation band 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 2 [2013], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.2   pro v i n c i a l o r t e rri t o ri a l m o d e l . this model is very similar to that for non-aboriginal children and families; the province or territory is responsible for service provision, lawmaking, governance, and funding for off-reserve families. however, funding for on-reserve services is provided by the federal government; the reasons for and implications of this difference are discussed below. d e l e g a t e d o r m a n d a t e d m o d e l . the second most common service delivery model for aboriginal children involves the transfer of responsibilities described under provincial or territorial child welfare legislation from a province or territory to an aboriginal child welfare agency. the first nations band or aboriginal community assumes governance responsibility, but remains bound to provincial or territorial legislation, and receives federal (on-reserve) or provincial or territorial (off-reserve) funding. responsibilities can be transferred incrementally to aboriginal agencies. the most formal system for incremental transfer is in british columbia where agencies acquire increased responsibilities as they progress through the six “gradual delegation” stages described in table 4. t a b l e 4 . s i x s t a g e s o f g ra d u a l d e l e g a t i o n i n bri t i s h c o l u m b i a level of delegation child welfare activities pre-planning agency has completed an application to offer child welfare services and is engaged in preliminary discussions of service development. planning agency is operationalizing service delivery plan. start-up agency engages in activities that actualize development plans. voluntary-service delivery agency offers support services to families, handles voluntary care agreements, and handles special needs agreements. guardianship service delivery agency offers the same services in voluntary service delivery stage, as well as guardianship services for children in care. these include services such as handling plans of care for children in care, permanency planning, transition to independence services, and quality care reviews. fully delegated service delivery agency offers the same services as agencies in guardianship service delivery stage, as well as child protection services. these include investigation of reports of child abuse or neglect, development of protection plans, placement of children in care when necessary, and obtaining court orders or taking other measures to ensure a child's ongoing safety and well-being. note: adapted from british columbia ministry of children and family development (n.d.) 7 sinha and kozlowski: the structure of aboriginal child welfare in canada published by scholarship@western, 2013   i n t e g ra t e d m o d e l . some agencies operate under a model in which governance responsibilities are formally shared by the aboriginal community and the provincial or territorial government. manitoba child welfare agencies, for example, operate under the auspices of four regional authorities (the general authority, métis authority, the first nations of northern manitoba authority, and the first nations of southern manitoba authority) that have mandates received from the cultural communities they serve and the provincial government (manitoba child and family services act, 2009). the regional authorities have the right to direct child and family service agencies. the minister is responsible for determining the policies, standards, and objectives of child and family services, and for monitoring and funding child welfare authorities (manitoba child and family services act, 2009). in addition to the manitoba agencies, there appear to be aboriginal child welfare agencies in other jurisdictions that are at least partially integrated into provincial or territorial systems; additional research is still needed to specify the nature and extent of the differences between the service delivery models in these agencies and those in delegated or mandated agencies. ba n d b y l a w m o d e l . in 1981, the spallumcheen first nation, the british columbia, and the federal governments signed an agreement legally acknowledging the right of the spallumcheen indian band to jurisdictional control over child welfare services to members of the spallumcheen nation (j. a. macdonald, 1985). as a result, it became the only first nation in canada to operate under a band-bylaw model that frees it from provincial laws and standards (union of british columbia chiefs, 2002). t ri p a rt i t e m o d e l . the british columbia, the federal, and the nisga’a lisims first nation governments signed a treaty in 1999 agreeing that the nisga’a lisims nation may “make laws with respect to children and family service on nisga’a lands” (foster, 2007, p. 55) as long as they are comparable to provincial standards. the nisga’a lisims nation agency is funded by the federal government and is the only first nations agency in canada to operate under this type of tripartite model. l e g i s l a t i o n a n d s t a n d a rd s pro v i n c i a l o r t e rri t o ri a l l e g i s l a t i o n . child welfare legislation in most provinces and territories now includes special considerations for service provision to aboriginal children, families, and communities. table 5 summarizes statements included in primary provincial or territorial child welfare legislation that specifically include the keywords “aboriginal,” “first nations,” or “native.” it does not reflect alternate legislation, standards, or protocols, and it excludes provisions that do not specifically refer to these keywords, but which may have important implications for aboriginal child welfare. the most common aboriginal-specific provision included in legislation for all provinces and territories, except new brunswick and quebec, is a requirement to notify aboriginal bands of court hearings involving aboriginal children. legislation in some jurisdictions also includes provisions for aboriginal involvement in provincial or territorial child welfare services for aboriginal children; suggested forms of involvement range from engagement in individual child protection cases to participation in service design and delivery. for example, ontario legislation states that aboriginal people are entitled to provide culturally appropriate services to aboriginal children and their families and that aboriginal representatives should be involved in decision-making related to protection services for aboriginal children. similarly, british columbia 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 2 [2013], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.2   legislation states, “aboriginal people should be involved in the planning and delivery of services to aboriginal families and their children” ("british columbia child, family and community service act," 1996, part 1, service delivery priniples, 3b). in addition, prince edward island, manitoba, saskatchewan, and alberta legislation suggests consultation with aboriginal representatives in cases involving aboriginal children. in some jurisdictions, legislation contains special provisions for aboriginal children placed in out-of home care. legislation in british columbia, ontario, and the yukon prioritizes kinship care, a living arrangement in which a child is placed under the supervision of a family member (gough, 2006) for aboriginal children being placed in out-ofhome care. legislation in alberta and british columbia requires that when an aboriginal child is placed out of the home, the aspiring guardian must present a plan describing ways that the child’s aboriginal culture, heritage, spirituality, and traditions will be fostered. in prince edward island, ontario, and the northwest territories, aboriginal bands have the right to be involved in the development of or to propose their own care plans for aboriginal children being placed out-of-home or adopted. finally, some jurisdictions have legislative provisions that allow for exemption or adaptation of specific legislative requirements in order to support the development of culturally appropriate services. for example, quebec legislation allows agreements for the establishment of special youth protection programs, which are designed to better adapt the act to the realities of life in first nations communities (quebec youth protection act, 2007). similarly, ontario legislation allows the lieutenant governor in council to exempt first nations child welfare authorities from any provision in the child and family service act (1990). pro v i n c i a l a n d t e rri t o ri a l s t a n d a rd s . some jurisdictions also have aboriginal-specific practice standards. for instance, the aboriginal operational and practice standards in british columbia were developed by representatives of the caring for first nations children society (cfncs), aboriginal child welfare agencies, aandc, and the british columbia ministry of children and family development. the standards manual outlines expectations that child placement within aboriginal communities will be prioritized, families and communities will be involved in intervention plans, children’s access to information on their heritage will be promoted, and a child’s access to cultural ceremonies will be ensured (british columbia ministry of children and family development, 2005). similarly, the micmac and maliseet first nations services standard manual details culturally based standards introduced in new brunswick in 1993. the new brunswick office of the ombudsman and child and youth advocate recently reviewed these standards and, while endorsing the importance of culturally based standards, their report also noted that due to the “complex approval process” (p. 41) the first nations standards were last updated in 2004 and may not reflect current best child welfare practices (office of the ombudsman and child and youth advocate, 2010). 9 sinha and kozlowski: the structure of aboriginal child welfare in canada published by scholarship@western, 2013   table 5. considerations for aboriginal children, families, and communities in primary provincial or territorial legislation province or territory legislation band notification of court or placement aboriginal involvement in case management aboriginal involvement in service planning or delivery prioritization of kinship care band submission of cultural connection plan invited connection to aboriginal culture -best interest of child british columbia child, family and community service act √ √ √ √ √ alberta child, youth and family enhancement act √ √ √ √ √ saskatchewan child and family services act √ √ manitoba child and family services act; child and family services authorities act √ √ √ √ ontario child and family services act √ √ √ √ √ √ quebec youth protection act √ √ nova scotia child and family services act √ a new brunswick family services act prince edward island child protection act √ √ √ √ yukon child and family services act √ √ √ √ northwest territories child and family services act √ √ newfoundland and labrador child youth and family services act the labrador inuit land claim act takes precidents over the child youth and family services act (no other special considerations). nunavut because inuit represent the majrity ethno-racial group, the aboriginal-specific provisions assessed here are not necessarily directly applicable to nunavut legislation. note. based on 2010 legislation and specific statements about aboriginal children, families, and communities. a in nova scotia, the first nations child welfare agency, which serves all first nations (reserve) communities, is notified, as opposed to the child’s band. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 2 [2013], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.2   a b o ri g i n a l l a w s a n d c u s t o m s . in addition to the legislation and standards developed by or in connection with the provinces and territories, child welfare practices may be shaped by aboriginal laws and customs. while we know of no formal review of the role of aboriginal laws and customs in child welfare, their influence is reflected in the descriptions that aboriginal child welfare agencies offer of their own work. for example, nisga’a child and family services state on their website that they provide services “consistent with both the ayuukhl nisga’a (the laws and customs of the nisga’a people) and british columbia statutes and policies” (nisga’a child and family services, n.d., para. 1). there is also at least one example of aboriginal legislation that applies to multiple aboriginally governed child welfare agencies. the federation of saskatchewan indian nations (fsin) developed the indian child welfare and family support act (icwfsa, 1990); the icwfsa exists alongside provincial legislation and includes standards that have been formally recognized by the ministry of social services as being "equivalent to ministerial policies, practices and standards" (saskatchewan minister of social services, 1993, p. 1; see also saskatchewan child and family services act, 1989-90;). the icwfsa (1990) is grounded in an understanding that first nations have pre-existing rights over the well-being of first nations people in saskatchewan and ultimate authority over first nations affairs. it asserts that first nations “have the authority to make, adopt and enact laws” with respect to first nations child welfare and that these laws “honour and take precedence over” provincial laws (article iii.2, p. 8). through these and other provisions, icwfsa sets out a clear alternative interpretation of the political relationships reflected in the child and family services act (1990) of saskatchewan. for example, while saskatchewan legislation contains a provision allowing the minister to delegate provincial child welfare responsibilities to first nations bands, the icwfsa framework would portray these same agreements as the resumption of pre-existing authorities by first nations after a period of temporary delegation of responsibility to the province. a b o ri g i n a l c h i l d w e l f a re f u n d i n g the constitution act (1982) describes those responsibilities that are “the exclusive legislative authority of the parliament of canada,” including “indians and lands reserved for the indians” (section 91.24). accordingly, the federal government provides funding for health and social services to status first nations people living on-reserve, while provincial and territorial governments fund these services for all other people (see table 6). one consequence of this framework is that governments and departments, sometimes disagree about who bears responsibility for funding specific health and social services for onreserve children and families. these “jurisdictional disputes” can result in disruptions or delays in service delivery for vulnerable first nations children. jordan’s principle, a child-first principle intended to reduce these delays, has received support from numerous organizations, including the canadian parliament, but it has not been fully implemented in any canadian jurisdiction (canadian paediatric society, 2009). another important consequence of the exisiting funding framework is a lack of parity in funding for onreserve and off-reserve child welfare servcies. as described above, most child welfare agencies providing services on-reserve are bound by provincial or territorial legislation and standards. nonetheless, the auditor general of canada (2011) recently concluded that there is no mechanism to ensure comparability of federal funding for on-reserve services to provincial or territorial funding off-reserve. assessing comparability of child welfare funding is complicated by gaps in complementary health and social services on-reserve (allec, 2005; lemchuk-favel, 2007; stout & harp, 2009); these gaps translate 11 sinha and kozlowski: the structure of aboriginal child welfare in canada published by scholarship@western, 2013   into unmet family needs which pose added burdens for child welfare agencies and must be considered in any comparison of funding levels (auditor general of canada, 2011). finally, as described below, models for funding on-reserve services vary markedly across provinces and territories, and this variation also complicates systematic assessment of funding comparability. table 6. funding for aboriginal child welfare by agency and community type on-reserve services and child maintenance costs off-reserve services and child maintenance costs provincial or territorial agencies, urban aboriginal and métis agencies aandc provides funds in accordance with agreements with provinces, territories, or individual agencies provinces and territories provide funds, in accordance with provincial or territorial budgeting processes first nations agencies aandc provides funds in accordance with directive 20-1, enhanced prevention focused funding model, or the ontario child welfare act of 1965 provinces and territories provide funds, in accordance with agreements with first nations agencies funding for provincial and territorial services. the auditor general of canada (2008) reviewed aandc’s arrangements for funding provincially administered, on-reserve services in five provinces and found that they varied greatly. funding levels in some provinces were tied directly to expenditures. for example, ontario is reimbursued 93 cents for every dollar spent for on-reserve services and maintenance costs (indian welfare services act, 1990, c.i.4). in other provinces, like quebec, funding was based on directive 20-1 (described below) and in british columbia, the province was reimbursed for estimated (rather than actual) maintenance costs.2 in addition, federal funds in some provinces were transferred to the province, while in others funds flowed directly to agencies. d i re c t i v e 2 0 1 . until 2007, first nations child welfare agencies in every province, other than ontario, received funding under the terms of aandc’s national formula, directive 20-1. british columbia and new brunswick first nations agencies continue to receive directive 20-1 funding, which consists of two components: operations funds based child population size, and funds for maintenance of children placed in out of home care (mcdonald & ladd, 2000). directive 20-1 has been criticized for underfunding services for first nations children, failing to fund preventative or support services for families of children who are not in care, and, as a result, for contributing to the overrepresentation of children in care (blackstock, prakash, loxley, & wien, 2005; indian and northern affairs canada, 2007). the auditor general of canada (2008) found that it does not accurately represent the work done or actual costs incurred by first nations agencies.                                                                                                                 2 aandc announced a shift to funding actual, rather than estimated costs, for out-of-home care services in british columbia starting in april 2011 (aandc, 2010a).     12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 2 [2013], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.2   e n h a n c e d pre v e n t i o n f o c u s e d f u n d i n g . aandc has begun shifting to a new funding model that provides increased funds (see table 7) by specifically targeting funds for prevention services, and allowing increased flexibility in the use of funds. this “enhanced prevention focused” formula consists of three funding streams, which are intended to cover maintenance costs for children in care, administrative expenses, and child maltreatment prevention programs (government of canada, 2009). thus, the new model addresses some key criticisms of directive 20-1. however, it also reproduces some of the flaws identified in directive 20-1: operations costs continue to be partially based on child populations rather than actual agency expenses, and there is still no formal mechanism for linking aandc funding levels to the shifting responsibilities mandated by provinces and territories (auditor general of canada, 2008, 2011). an evaluation of the enhanced prevention focused funding approach in alberta (indian and northern affairs canada, 2010a) determined that, because of unavailable and unreliable data, no conclusions could be drawn about the effects of the alberta funding shift. the impact of this funding model has not yet been evaluated in other jurisdictions. t a b l e 7 . f e d e ra l pro j e c t i o n s f o r e n h a n c e d pre v e n t i o n f o c u s e d f u n d i n g f o r f i rs t n a t i o n s c h i l d w e l f a re a g e n c i e s province additional funds, over 5-years, associated with shift to enhanced prevention focused funding model 5-year period commences nova scotia $10 million 2008 2009 new brunswick directive 20-1 directive 20-1 quebec $59.8 million 2009 2010 manitoba $177 million 2010 2011 saskatchewan $105 million 2008 2009 alberta $ 98.1 million 2007 2008 british columbia directive 20-1 directive 20-1 pei $1.7 million 2009 – 2010 note. based on aandc, 2010a; o. johnston, 2009 13 sinha and kozlowski: the structure of aboriginal child welfare in canada published by scholarship@western, 2013   o n t a ri o f u n d i n g . the 1965 indian welfare agreement made aandc responsible for reimbursing the ontario government 93 cents for every dollar spent on aboriginal child welfare services on-reserve (indian welfare services act, 1990, c.i.4). the ontario commission to promote sustainable child welfare (2011) recently reviewed the ontario child welfare funding structure and made several recommendations for improving the allocation of funds to ontario agencies. however, they found that their model did not adequately capture the unique circumstances and differing cost structures of aboriginal agencies and recommended development of a separate funding approach for aboriginal agencies. d i s c u s s i o n a n d i m p l i c a t i o n s f o r f u t u re r e s e a rc h aboriginal child welfare is currently in a period of great transition. aboriginal communities are increasingly responsible for provision of child welfare services to aboriginal people living both onreserve and off-reserve. federal funding for on-reserve child welfare has recently increased in most provinces and territories. finally, there is an ongoing human rights case charging the federal government with systematically underfunding on-reserve child welfare services. the cumulative result is the potential for the expansion, development, and adaptation of services in order to address the persistent overrepresentation of aboriginal children in the child welfare system and to better serve aboriginal children and families. existing variation in the structural factors that shape aboriginal child welfare represents a valuable source of potential information about the impacts of policy and program changes; however, little systematic information about this variation is currently available. this review has presented a broad overview of some of the structural factors that currently shape aboriginal child welfare such as child welfare legislation, service delivery models, and funding formulas. our review highlights the pronounced variability in all three of these factors. all provincial and territorial and most aboriginally governed agencies are tied to provincial or territorial legislation; however, some are fully exempt by virtue of treaty or tripartite agreements, whereas other jurisdictions allow aboriginally governed agencies to seek exemption from specific legislative provisions. finally, agency practice may also be influenced by aboriginal laws and customs. in terms of funding, the underlying framework, which makes the federal government responsible for funding child welfare services for status first nations people living on-reserve while the provinces and territories are responsible for funding services to all others, gives rise to funding disparities that are compounded by variation in federal funding agreements across and within jurisdictions. the range and variation in service delivery models means that the distinction between aboriginally governed and provincial or territorial agencies becomes increasingly blurry. while initial efforts to establish aboriginally governed agencies came in the form of federally funded first nations agencies serving on-reserve populations, aboriginally governed agencies now employ increasingly diverse service delivery models and a number of agencies currently reflect an integrated model in which responsibilities are formally shared by provinces or territories and aboriginal communities. our review points to a general need for enhanced knowledge about the structure of aboriginal child welfare. we have documented the existence of variation in the structural factors shaping aboriginal child welfare, but the finer details of this variation are still elusive: funding agreements are not publicly accessible, details of the legislative exemptions granted have not been compiled, and information about the specific differences between service delivery models is difficult to access. accordingly, the rich variation that could potentially support comparison of policy and structural alternatives, and 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 2 [2013], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.2.2   development of new aboriginal child welfare programs and policies, remains largely unexamined. our review also suggests specific areas of research that may help support development of new programs and policies. in terms of funding, a clear research priority was identified by auditor general of canada (2011), who called for the development of a mechanism for assessing comparability of federal and provincial and territorial child welfare funding and noted that any mechanism must take into account complex factors such as gaps in complementary services. given the multiple layers of funding and service variations that need to be accounted for, the development of such a mechanism on the national, or even provincial or territorial level, is a daunting task. our review indicates that there are aboriginally governed child welfare agencies that serve both on-reserve and off-reserve aboriginal populations and, accordingly, receive both provincial and federal funding in four provinces. analysis of provincial and federal funding disparities, and any existing mechanisms for ensuring equitable treatment of families and children living on-reserve and off-reserve, within such agencies would limit the variation in contextual factors that need to be considered. this type research could provide a stronger foundation on which to build broader, more complicated funding comparisons. a second issue has been less explicitly specified as a priority for research, but permeates our analysis of legislation and governance models: the existence of dual mandates – one derived from provinces and territories and enshrined in legislation, and another derived from aboriginal communities and shaped by customary laws and practices. these dual mandates are reflected in aboriginally governed agency descriptions, the existence of aboriginal-specific practice standards, the passage of child welfare legislation by the federation of saskatchewan indian nations, and the creation of legislative provisions allowing aboriginal agencies to seek exemption from specific statutes and standards. the approval or acceptance of aboriginal standards, as well as the existence of agencies with an integrated service delivery model, suggests that there are areas of significant overlap between the two mandates. however, the existence of contrasting frameworks of provincial and first nations child welfare legislation in saskatchewan, the conclusions drawn in province-specific reviews of aboriginal child welfare (e.g. ontario commission to promote sustainable child welfare, 2011), and our informal conversations with aboriginal child welfare organizations suggest that negotiating the tensions between these dual mandates is the central challenge of aboriginal child welfare. yet, we could find no systematic documentation or analysis of the specific challenges that child welfare agencies face in negotiating dual mandates. questions that might inform policy or program development include general questions such as: what are the common areas of overlap and tension between aboriginal and provincial or territorial mandates? how do child welfare agencies manage any tensions that do exist? they also include more specific questions linking the task of negotiating dual mandates to specific structures and legislative provisions: does the ability of an agency to manage tensions differ based on service delivery model? how have aboriginally governed child welfare agencies made use of provisions allowing them to seek exemptions from specific legislative provisions? pursuit of research questions such as these has the potential to facilitate both the identification of key challenges to be addressed in future development of aboriginal child welfare policies, and the determination of which existing policies should be maintained or enhanced in order to support the creation and delivery of effective child welfare services for aboriginal children and families. while the review presented here has focused on aboriginal child welfare in canada, it also has implications for aboriginal child welfare in australia and the u.s., where the historical patterns of aboriginal child removal, the persistent overrepresentation of 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(2009). aboriginal peoples in canada in 2006: inuit, métis and first nations, 2006 census: highlights. retrieved from http://www12.statcan.ca/census-recensement/2006/assa/97-558/p1-eng.cfm stout, r., & harp, r. (2009). aboriginal maternal and infant health in canada: review of on-reserve programming. retrieved from http://www.afn.ca/uploads/files/education2/aboriginal_maternal_and_infant_health_in_can ada.pdf trocmé, n., fallon, b., maclaurin, b., sinha, v., black, t. l., fast, e., . . . holroyd, j. (2010). methodology. in public health agency of canada (ed.), canadian incidence study of reported child abuse and neglect 2008 (chapter 2). ottawa: public health agency of canada. union of british columbia chiefs. (2002). calling forth our future: options for the exercise of indigenous peoples’ authority in child welfare. retrieved from http://www.ubcic.bc.ca/files/pdf/ubcic_ourfuture.pdf zlotkin, n. (2009). from time imemorial: recognition of aboriginal customary law in canada. in c. e. bell, & r. k. paterson (eds.), protection of first nations cultural heritage: laws, policy, and reform. vancouver: ubc press. 21 sinha and kozlowski: the structure of aboriginal child welfare in canada published by scholarship@western, 2013 the international indigenous policy journal april 2013 the structure of aboriginal child welfare in canada vandna sinha anna kozlowski recommended citation the structure of aboriginal child welfare in canada abstract keywords creative commons license sinha the_structure_of_aboriginal_child_welfare_in_canada reviewed sinha the_structure_of_aboriginal_child_welfare_in_canada reviewed.2 sinha the_structure_of_aboriginal_child_welfare_in_canada reviewed.3 sinha the_structure_of_aboriginal_child_welfare_in_canada reviewed.4 sinha the_structure_of_aboriginal_child_welfare_in_canada reviewed.5 finding common ground: a critical review of land use and resource management policies in ontario, canada and their intersection with first nations the international indigenous policy journal volume 6 | issue 1 article 3 january 2015 finding common ground: a critical review of land use and resource management policies in ontario, canada and their intersection with first nations fraser mcleod queen's university, 8fam@queensu.ca leela viswanathan queen's university, leela.viswanathan@queensu.ca graham s. w hitelaw queen's university, graham.whitelaw@gmail.com jared macbeth walpole island first nation, jared.macbeth@wifn.org carolyn king mississaugas of the new credit first nation, carolyn.king@newcreditfirstnation.com recommended citation mcleod, f. , viswanathan, l. , whitelaw, g. s. , macbeth, j. , king, c. , mccarthy, d. d. , alexiuk, e. (2015). finding common ground: a critical review of land use and resource management policies in ontario, canada and their intersection with first nations. the international indigenous policy journal, 6(1). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.3 finding common ground: a critical review of land use and resource management policies in ontario, canada and their intersection with first nations abstract this article provides an in-depth analysis of selective land use and resource management policies in the province of ontario, canada. it examines their relative capacity to recognize the rights of first nations and aboriginal peoples and their treaty rights, as well as their embodiment of past crown–first nations relationships. an analytical framework was developed to evaluate the manifest and latent content of 337 provincial texts, including 32 provincial acts, 269 regulatory documents, 16 policy statements, and 5 provincial plans. this comprehensive document analysis classified and assessed how current provincial policies address first nation issues and identified common trends and areas of improvement. the authors conclude that there is an immediate need for guidance on how provincial authorities can improve policy to make relationship-building a priority to enhance and sustain relationships between first nations and other jurisdictions. keywords first nations, aboriginal and treaty rights, duty to consult, accommodation and consent, ontario, land use planning and policy acknowledgments we would like to thank the editors and two anonymous reviewers for their valuable comments on this paper. this research was supported by the social sciences and humanities research council. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. authors fraser mcleod, leela viswanathan, graham s. whitelaw, jared macbeth, carolyn king, daniel d. mccarthy, and erin alexiuk http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ f i n d i n g c o m m o n g ro u n d : a c ri t i c a l r e v i e w o f l a n d u s e a n d r e s o u rc e m a n a g e m e n t po l i c i e s i n o n t a ri o , c a n a d a a n d t h e i r i n t e rs e c t i o n w i t h f i rs t n a t i o n s this article examines and critically evaluates both the degree of formal recognition of first nations’ rights and of honouring past crown-first nations relationships in contemporary provincial land use and resource management legislation that guide planning and development in ontario. due to jurisdictional boundaries and an overall lack of meaningful understanding of first nations’ concerns and knowledge towards land and natural resources, the dominant historical view is that first nations are a “federal responsibility and thus not accounted for in provincial planning” (borrows, 1997a, p. 444). changes in the province of ontario have established several mechanisms for connecting indigenous peoples to processes of government policy development and for establishing lines of accountability between the provincial government and indigenous peoples. in particular, as a direct result of the ipperwash inquiry (johnston , 2007) following the death of dudley george in 1995 at the ipperwash provincial park occupation, the ministry of aboriginal affairs was created. more recently, the government of ontario established the new relationship fund, in part to assist with “core consultation capacity funding” and to enable first nations and métis communities to work with different types of stakeholders, including governments and private sector partners, on land use and resource issues (province of ontario, 2014). however, in light of these changes, relatively little research has been done with regard to comprehensively analyzing policies and plans at the provincial-scale for their recognition of first nations (dorries, 2014). our research team consists of leaders among the mississaugas of the new credit first nation and the walpole island first nation, and planning researchers from queen’s university and the university of waterloo whose backgrounds can be traced to immigrant settlers from western europe and india. we work as research partners and as co-authors of this article. our partnership stems from ongoing conversations about the need to influence provincial policy both to improve municipal–first nations relations and to enhance dialogue and improve planning within a culture that has historically situated first nations’ issues, claims, and knowledge only peripherally. with consultation mainly occurring today on a project-by-project basis, first nations often do not have the capacity to influence decision-making (viswanathan et al., 2013). new funding opportunities in the province for communities, including ontario’s new relationship fund (see province of ontario, 2014), are changing that reality incrementally, but there remains concern amongst our emerging partnership that meaningful change will not be able to sustain itself without amendments to higher guiding policies. improvements to policy at the strategic level are required to enable improved on-the-ground planning relations. the main goal of this article is to develop a baseline on provincial land use and resource management policies to understand their relative capacity at recognizing and supporting first nations, aboriginal and treaty rights, and embodying past crown–first nations relationships. through text-based content analysis, this article identifies structural barriers within crown policies that “shape (both constrain and enable) the kinds of conversations that planners and land managers are able to have with indigenous peoples, and the kind of decisions and processes in which indigenous people are involved with” (porter & barry, 2013, p. 12). this development of a baseline has the potential to raise further awareness of the limits of provincial policies and ensure that when policies do come up for review, first nations-led amendments result in more equitable planning processes. 1 mcleod et al.: finding common ground published by scholarship@western, 2015 this article contributes to first nations policy analysis and development in a number of meaningful ways. first, for first nations across ontario, it highlights policies that limit agency and the ability to take part in equitable planning processes that affect communities and traditional territories. it also acts as an educational guide and catalyst for first nations to negotiate amendments and to challenge their perceived role as “stakeholders,” and instead be viewed as planning partners. our article points to areas of improvement and establishes a necessary space for new discussions about alternative ways to proceed. for planners at the municipal-scale with limited knowledge of crown–first nations relations, this article is meant to enhance their understanding of the policies that shape their relations with first nations. it also is meant to assist practitioners in becoming more self-reflective about how higher policies “shape, constrain, authorize and regulate” planning relations (barry & porter, 2011, p.183). this will not only assist planners in redefining municipal-first nation interaction, but also help to enhance on-the-ground relations, including first nations’ capacity to participate in planning review processes. most importantly, our article and the baseline developed as a result of the analytical framework holds significance to partnering community members involved. for example, this baseline has led to the development of materials to assist both first nations and municipalities in the review of provincial policies and plans. there are also broader effects, including substantial changes to the latest provincial policy statement (2014), a set of minimum standards relating to land use planning matters of provincial interest that all planning authorities and decision-makers must be consistent with. by having a baseline already developed on the draft policy statement, our partnership was able to attend consultations, meet with provincial representatives and provide recommendations that were included into the final provincial policy statement on enabling stronger positive municipal-first nations relationships. while pointing to opportunities for indigenous peoples and governments to work with one another, our article emphasises the perspectives of first nations partners who are involved in this research and also points to overarching practices of consultation (namely the crown’s duty to consult) in its investigation of current land use policies affecting planning with first nations peoples in ontario. the article draws key insights from documents developed during the royal commission on aboriginal peoples (rcap) (rcap, 1996a, 1996b, & 1996c) where relevant, as they provide a foundation for relating federal and provincial governments to building policy that directly affects indigenous–non-indigenous relations in land use policy and planning. the article is structured as follows: the introduction is followed by a description and justification of methods used to conduct the research. next is a literature review which provides insights into the key themes that are foundational to the analytical framework guiding the content analysis. the content analysis broadly discusses common trends in the documents and then the three overarching classifications of the framework—significant, moderate, and minimal—in the analysis of the policies. a discussion follows and highlights the post-2005 northern focus of ontario policy, the issues of consent, and the need to fundamentally create spaces of common ground. the discussion reveals both the current limits and future opportunities rooted in ontario’s land use and resource management policies. the article concludes by sharing changes to policy already occurring in ontario and proposes further policy and planning changes that also need to take place in order to make equitable and constructive relations between municipalities and first nations the standard and not the exception. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.3 m e t h o d s this research was conducted by means of a content analysis of policy documents as well as a literature review. the literature review covered two related themes: aboriginal and treaty rights, and the honour of the crown. the literature review facilitated the development of a framework for the content analysis in order to deconstruct, analyze, and evaluate the relative capacity of identified provincial policy documents to recognize and incorporate first nations’ rights and honouring past relationships. conducted over a five-month period, the content analysis covered material from a total of eight provincial ministries, 32 provincial legislations, 269 regulation documents, 16 policy statements, five provincial plans, six technical documents, two guideline documents, three draft documents and four other reports. the content analysis identified and charted the legislative and policy landscapes that interact with first nations on issues of land use and resource management in ontario. three interviews, two with first nations community representatives associated with the first nations partners in this project and one with a planning expert in southern ontario, were conducted to validate initial findings. these interviews are therefore integrated into the discussion section of this article rather than as standalone findings. the first level of content analysis focused on what cope (2010) refers to as manifest content analysis; this approach identifies key terms, phrases, and sections of policies in order to understand the broader intersection of ontario’s land use and resource management policies with first nations. the surface content of each text was systematically searched and examined for indicator terms, including “aboriginal,” “first nation,” “indigenous,” and “indian” within each policy. next, a latent (sub-surface) content analysis was completed, where the flagged sections within each text and the text as a whole were assessed for certain themes and concepts in order to understand their recognition of first nations and capacity to embody past crown–first nations relationships (dunn, 2010). flagged sections containing key indicator terms, and each text as a whole were analyzed to see if there was any evidence of aboriginal rights. flagged sections and texts as a whole then underwent a second-tier latent analysis to see if there was any recognition of honouring past crown–first nations relations by means of incorporating several key concepts in relation to first nations including: (1) the duty to consult; (2) consultation; (3) accommodation; and (4) consent. these four concepts were selected because they provided an indication of the willingness of crown policy-makers and officials to break with the status quo of a regulatory regime that has traditionally limited participation of first nations, and recognize and support first nations through reconciliation and visibly honouring past agreements made by the crown. both consultation and the duty to consult were selected as separate indicators because consultation is often broadly discussed in relation to all stakeholders, whereas the duty to consult is relatively a new concept that focuses solely on first nations. based on these analyses, each text as a whole was coded and assigned an individual category of “significant,” “moderate,” or “minimal.” these assigned categories helped in data reduction and organization as they identified areas for further improvements and exploration. to be coded as significant, the policy had to have recognized first nations directly, acknowledged aboriginal and treaty rights within the text, and encompassed two or more concepts of honouring past relations. to be coded moderate, the policy had to have recognized first nations directly, and acknowledged aboriginal and treaty rights within the text or incorporated one of the four concepts of honouring past relations. finally, 3 mcleod et al.: finding common ground published by scholarship@western, 2015 to be coded minimal, the policy had to have no direct recognition of first nations, no acknowledgment of aboriginal and treaty rights, and no apparent integration of any of the four concepts of honouring past relations. to mitigate biases, if a text was coded minimal, it was re-examined and all associated regulations were analyzed to identify if there was any direct recognition of first nations, aboriginal and treaty rights, or any of the four concepts in relation to first nations. this classification of documents was relative and primarily meant to assist in organizing and evaluating an individual policy’s capacity in relation to other policies. finally, three interviews provided verification of the content analysis of policy documents and of the analytic framework that was used. interviews were conducted either face-to-face or over the telephone. general research ethics board approval for research with human participants was obtained through queen’s university and the university of waterloo such that our research approach followed chapter 9 of the tri-council policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans addressing ethical practices for research involving first nations, inuit and métis peoples of canada (canadian institutes of health research [cihr], natural sciences and engineering research council of canada [nserc], & social sciences and humanities research council of canada [sshrc], 2010). l i t e ra t u re r e v i e w a b o ri g i n a l a n d t re a t y r i g h t s a b o ri g i n a l ri g h t s . aboriginal rights can be understood as collective or communal rights that manifest from the occupation and intrinsic use of land by aboriginal peoples prior to the arrival of european settlers (passelac-ross, 2010). according to slattery (2007), aboriginal peoples have two different kinds of rights: generic rights and specific rights. generic rights are collectively held by all aboriginal peoples of canada, and they include the right to land, the right to resource-specific activities, the right to pass treaties, the right to practice one’s culture and spirituality, and the right to self-government (slattery, 2007; teillet, 2005). specific rights are unique to an individual community, and are completely dependent on the context and situation. for example, in some cases they may be defined by treaties or a court ruling (slattery, 2007). aboriginal rights are constitutionally protected under section 35 of the constitution act (1982), and can evolve in a modern form, but in certain instances may not be fully accounted for by the crown (lambrecht, 2013). beyond section 35, general understandings of aboriginal rights are also influenced by external factors, including ongoing treaty relationships, land claim agreements, and the indian act (turner, 2006). yet, there are limits to how aboriginal rights are currently understood by the public at large because they are predominantly defined by non-aboriginal individuals within state legal and political systems that do not fully grasp indigenous philosophies and worldviews (borrows, 1997b; turner, 2006). moreover, by not taking the spirit and intent of nation-tonation relations seriously, the crown has and continues to understand itself as the superior party in the treaty relations with unquestioned sovereignty (borrows, 2001). for many aboriginal peoples, rights do not flow from a canadian state or legal system, but rather flow from nationhood and, as a result, prior occupation and jurisdiction over lands and communities (rcap, 1996b; turner, 2006). a b o ri g i n a l t i t l e . aboriginal title is the inherent and collective right to land or a territory that flows from the relationship between the crown and aboriginal peoples, and gives aboriginal peoples “the right to control how the land is used” (tsilhqot’in nation v. british columbia (2014), supra note vi at 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.3 para. 75). while aboriginal title was first acknowledged as the intrinsic right to territory by the crown in royal proclamation of 1763, it was not until the landmark case of calder et al. v. british columbia [attorney-general] (1973) that the supreme court of canada recognized that aboriginal title to land pre-dated the arrival of european settlers and that such title existed outside of and not as a result of colonial law (rcap, 1996b; slattery, 2006). in delgamuukw v. british columbia (1997), aboriginal title was further recognized as a burden on the crown’s claim to land and placed responsibility on the crown to negotiate through consulting and accommodating aboriginal peoples in good faith in order reconcile issues of aboriginal title in addition to other rights (borrows, 2001; devries, 2011). until recently, delgamuukw was a leading case on aboriginal title, but on june 26, 2014 the supreme court of canada ruled in tsilhqot’in nation v. british columbia (2014) that aboriginal title exists as a fact and that it is territorial in nature, rather than just specific sites, such as reserves, by recognizing the unextinguished title of the tsilhqot’in first nation to over 1,700 square kilometres of land (hildebrandt, 2014). this unanimous ruling by canada’s highest court provided a three-point test to determine title, including sufficient occupation, continuity of occupation, and exclusive historic occupation (tsilhqot’in nation v. british columbia (2014), supra note v at para. 50). it also summarized that communities holding title have a right to benefit from the land, including the right to profit from it and the right to decide how the land will be used by future generations. according to the ruling, title is not absolute and provincial laws still apply, but if a government is to infringe on title lands it requires consent or the infringement “must be undertaken in accordance with the crown’s procedural duty to consult and must also be justified on the basis of a compelling and substantial public interest” (tsilhqot’in nation v. british columbia (2014), supra note vi at para. 88). while specific to the context of areas of unceded territories, particularly british columbia, this recent landmark case is highly noteworthy as it moves aboriginal title from theoretical to fact and puts pressure on provincial and federal governments to act in good faith and to ensure first nations are valued partners in land use and resource management processes that affect their traditional territories. furthermore, this recent connection within the canadian legal system between aboriginal title and consent as a result of the case can be interpreted as a long overdue return to the spirit and intent of royal proclamation of 1763 and the subsequent treaty of niagara in 1764 (niagara treaty, 1781). these foundational agreements of peace, friendship, and respect first indicated that no territories could be taken or infringed upon without a first nation’s consent (borrows, 1997b). t re a t y ri g h t s . treaty rights are context-specific rights stemming from negotiated nation-to-nation agreements between specific indigenous communities and the crown following the arrival of european settlers (newman, 2009; porter, 2010; slattery, 2000). they are separate from aboriginal rights and, in certain cases, treaty rights may recognize, reinforce, or even reshape certain aboriginal rights (slattery, 2000). although it is widely assumed in canadian society that past treaties with the british crown predating confederation were written agreements, the majority were oral agreements and based on spoken exchange between equal parties (borrows, 1997b; slattery, 2000). the written accounts of treaty rights that do exist are narratives of british crown officials and may differ in spirit and intent from those of aboriginal peoples who initially agreed to them (slattery, 2000). as a result, the supreme court of canada has recognized more recently that if both oral and written accounts do exist they, along with any discrepancies, should be interpreted in an open manner that gives more weight to an oral history (slattery, 2000). each treaty agreement, whether pre-confederation or post-confederation such as recent land claim agreements, may differ in content and intent and should be interpreted, in theory, “in a 5 mcleod et al.: finding common ground published by scholarship@western, 2015 flexible and evolutionary manner that is sensitive to changing conditions and practices” (slattery, 2000, p. 209). yet, treaty rights as a constitutionally protected right under section 35 of the constitution act (1982) remain a source of conflict between first nations and federal and provincial governments due to misinterpretations, a general lack of consensus, and infringing legislation (lambrecht, 2013). aboriginal peoples saw and continue to see treaties as a sacred means to share land and authority (borrows, 2001; rcap, 1996a). treaties embody a “continuous relationship rather than a simple and final commercial transaction” entered with a strong belief that they would remain honoured and intact (maaka & fleras, 2005, p. 216). when treaty rights and claims to land off reserve are not honoured, first nations are forced to use “blunt instruments to make their point” (borrows, 1997a, p. 445). thus, the blockades and occupations that emerged in ontario, particularly the ongoing events in caledonia over the douglas creek estates that began in 2006, can be interpreted in this light not as isolated incidents, but as consequences of a historical failure to understand first nation land rights and respect for founding relations set out by treaties (devries, 2011; ipperwash inquiry, 2007). with a proportion of canadians convinced that treaties are outdated and their obligations meaningless, the rcap (1996b) declared that society as a whole needs to rethink treaties and see them as an essential and relevant means to ensure justice for aboriginal nations and reconcile differences. the ipperwash inquiry (2007) reaffirmed this stance by advocating that ontarians should understand that everyone shares the benefit of treaty obligations as the province and the majority of canada was founded as a result of treaties with first nations. t h e h o n o u r o f t h e c ro w n the doctrine of the honour of the crown recognizes that when the british crown “claimed” what is now canada, “it did so in the face of pre-existing aboriginal sovereignty and territorial rights” (slattery, 2005, p. 436). the crown by asserting sovereignty in light of existing aboriginal rights to land and resources has a unique relationship and set of responsibilities, including the need to act with the “virtue of honour” and refrain from dishonest practices when interacting with aboriginal peoples in canada (ipperwash inquiry, 2007; lambrecht, 2013; newman, 2009; slattery, 2005). as stated by c. j. mclachlin in haida nation v. british columbia [minister of forests] (2004), the honour of the crown is an exclusive and symbolic obligation of the crown and requires aboriginal and treaty rights to “be determined, recognized and respected” by the crown in order to promote meaningful reconciliation (slattery, 2005, p. 437). the honour of the crown is significant to this discussion because it promotes a break with static understandings of aboriginal rights and title and binds the federal and provincial governments when exercising crown powers to respect past relationships and obligations with first nations and act with integrity in order to find “balance and compromise” between competing rights and discourses (newman, 2009, p. 59). d u t y t o c o n s u l t . recently, amid the legal establishment of the crown’s duty to consult, crown–first nations relations are gradually being reconfigured to embody something substantially different (newman, 2009). as described by lambrecht (2013), “the duty to consult is, at its simplest, intended to ensure that crown decision making regarding development of natural resources ‘respects aboriginal interests in accordance with the honour of the crown’” (p. 54). although earlier cases first identified the crown’s duty to consult and the need to act with integrity, it was not until the recent trilogy of cases in 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.3 2004 and 2005 that the procedural obligation of both federal and provincial governments to consult with first nations prior to making various land and resource decisions became legally recognized (newman, 2009; slattery, 2005). the supreme court of canada’s trilogy, which includes haida nation v. british columbia [minister of forests] (2004), taku river tlingit first nation v. british columbia [project assessment director] (2004), and mikisew cree first nation v. canada [minister of canadian heritage] (2005), all played a significant role in the evolution of the establishment of a new legal doctrine into how the crown mediates and understands the intersection of aboriginal and treaty rights legally outlined in section 35 of the constitution act (1982) with on-the-ground decisions and developments (newman, 2009). while the duty to consult is the responsibility of the provincial and federal crown, parts of the process may be delegated to proponents or third parties (lambrecht, 2013). newman (2009) has identified five distinct and fundamental components of the duty to the consult that have developed because of this recent trilogy of cases. first, the duty to consult can emerge before proof of an aboriginal right or title claim or with uncertainty regarding an infringement on a treaty right (newman, 2009). second, the duty to consult can be triggered with the slightest of knowledge of a potential adverse effect on a right by the crown (newman, 2009). third, degree and scope of consultation required of the crown varies and is dependent on two factors—the strength of the aboriginal claim and the scale of the potential impact on the aboriginal or treaty right (newman, 2009). fourth, the duty to consult does not give first nations the ability to veto a crown decision or development, but it may lead to accommodation of a community’s interests in certain cases if negative impacts cannot be mitigated (newman, 2009). finally, if the crown fails to meet their legal duty to consult, it can result in a spectrum of consequences, ranging from litigation to further consultations (newman, 2009). beyond the legal and theoretical of the duty to consult, the actual practice is evolving and taking shape due to a diverse set of policy frameworks. at the federal-scale, the government has developed a recent set of guidelines, aboriginal consultation and accommodation: updated guidelines for federal officials to fulfill the duty to consult (aboriginal affairs and northern development canada [aandc], 2011), to help guide federal officials in matters affecting aboriginal peoples, rights, and title. whereas at the provincial-scale, the ministry of aboriginal affairs (maa) in ontario has a draft set of guidelines, draft guidelines for ministries on consultation with aboriginal peoples related to aboriginal rights and treaty rights (maa, 2006), to provide general guidance, citing that provincial staff should always consult the ministry’s legal services branch for direction. in addition, individual provincial ministries and administrative bodies have also developed their own individual guidelines and standards on the duty to consult, while the term itself is beginning to materialize within individual provincial legislation (newman, 2009). aboriginal communities and organizations at the national, provincial, and community-scale are also developing their own consultation policies and protocols to ensure communities are active in defining how the duty to consult will transpire (newman, 2009). finally, industry proponents have developed their own consultation policies and programs specific to aboriginal communities (newman, 2009). a c c o m m o d a t i o n . consultation in certain cases may not be enough. as clarified in the haida nation case, “where a strong prima facie case exists for the claim, and consequences of the government’s proposed decision may adversely affect it in a significant way, addressing the aboriginal concerns may require taking steps to avoid irreparable harm or to minimize the effects of infringement” (haida nation 7 mcleod et al.: finding common ground published by scholarship@western, 2015 v. british columbia (2004), supra note i at para. 47). from here, accommodation may be required and the crown must reconcile aboriginal interests with “other societal interests” (newman, 2009, p. 59). depending on the context and situation of the case and the stakeholders involved, the process of accommodation may differ (newman, 2009). for instance, one type of accommodation heavily utilized by industry proponents when they have to carry out aspects of the consultation process as a third party is economic accommodation through impact benefit agreements (caine & krogerman, 2010). yet, in cases involving aboriginal title and unceded territories, as the recent tsilhqot’in nation case emphasized, consultation and accommodation may not be enough. c o n s e n t . fulfilling the duty to consult does not require the crown to receive the consent of an affected first nations to proceed as the crown is only required to consult in good faith (newman, 2009). however, if aboriginal title is involved consent of the aboriginal titleholder is required (tsilhqot’in nation v. british columbia (2014), supra note vi at para. 76). the duty to consult and accommodation reflect progressive steps forward, but these approaches do not represent a complete paradigm shift towards honouring past relationships. with limited changes towards making free, prior, and informed consent of first nations a legal obligation on crown-related land and resource management decisions, these attempts at reconciliation remain inadequate at honouring past relationships and agreements (morellato, 2008). honouring past relationships on the part of the crown means becoming comfortable with notions of consent and integrating specific clauses in crown legislation and policies that recognize the significance and pressing need for consent. the latest tsilhqot’in nation ruling as previously mentioned has the potential to change how we as first nations and non-first nations understand consent with respect to areas where there are outstanding land claims and unextinguished title. despite the polarizing views and tensions that will likely result, such a critical ruling may assist individuals in understanding reconciliation and recognizing that consent may not be a barrier, but a long-awaited opportunity to “smash the status quo” of crown–first nations relationships and move towards policies of mutual respect and co-existence (assembly of first nations [afn], 2012, p. 3). c o n t e n t a n a l y s i s o f po l i c y d o c u m e n t s c o m m o n t re n d s r e f e re n c e t o f i rs t n a t i o n s . recognition of first nations was inconsistent in terms of choice, frequency, and location of words across all policies and text. at one end of the spectrum, provincial crown texts utilized terms of reference such as “first nations” along with approximately 12 variations of the term “aboriginal” paired with a complementary term, including “communities,” “partners,” “organizations,” “interests,” “peoples of canada,” and “entrepreneurs.” the location and frequency of these terms differs within each text. for example, the far north act (2010), which is primarily focused on increasing participation of first nation communities in land use planning in northern ontario, had direct mention of first nations from the onset of the text in the purpose section and throughout the document at high frequency. the growth plan for northern ontario (2011), the endangered species act (2007), the green energy act (2009), and the mining act (1990) utilized similar terms of reference in their immediate preamble or purpose sections as well as throughout the text in a clear and meaningful manner. whereas other statutes and policies, such as the municipal act (2001) referred to the indicator term “first nations” at a minimal frequency and only within specific clauses in the main body of the policy. regardless of where terms of reference were located or their individual frequency, a high 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.3 incidence of these texts that recognized first nations made an effort to distinguish first nations from other groups that were viewed as stakeholders. however, not all documents were as progressive in their choice of words and recognition. in contrast, other statutes position first nations alongside a long list of other political actors under the all-encompassing umbrella term, “public bodies.” in particular, within the planning act (1990), the greenbelt act (2005), the places to grow act (2005), the niagara escarpment planning and development act (1990), and the oak ridges moraine conservation act (2001), the use of “public bodies” as a term of reference for first nations failed to recognize and identify the distinct spaces and relationships that diverse first nations occupy within the canadian landscape because it “fails to appreciate their unique status as original land owners of country that was wrestled from them by the modern colonial state” (porter, 2006, p. 389). for instance, the planning act (1990) listed first nations amongst municipalities, departments, ministries, boards, commissions, and officials of a provincial or federal government, and in doing so intentionally or unintentionally fails to recognize the distinct relations and responsibilities first nations have within planning in ontario both with neighbouring municipalities and the province. by addressing first nations as just another “public body,” the planning act (1990) seemingly justifies the allocation of power to the minister to determine if a first nations community is a valid affected public body depending on the issue. relying on the judgment of one provincial official in practice may prove problematic depending on the dispute as certain first nations may be overlooked as a public body, unless conflicts gain media attention. additionally, if guiding provincial policies are incapable of identifying and recognizing first nations as significant and distinct communities, there may be minimal incentive for municipalities and other non-first nation organizations, beyond a moral impetus or a legal challenge, to engage with first nations and understand treaty relations and obligations (participant two, personal communication, november 2, 2012). r e f e re n c e t o a b o ri g i n a l a n d t re a t y ri g h t s . another pattern of inconsistencies emerged in analyzed documents in how each text recognized and affirmed aboriginal and treaty rights. among the 32 statutes examined, eight statutes respectively cited section 35 of the constitution act (1982), a pivotal legal clause that to a certain degree “gives constitutional protection to aboriginal and treaty rights” (teillet, 2005, p. 35). these eight provincial land use and resource management legislations that cited section 35 as a primary means of acknowledging that the policies as a whole must be implemented in a manner that does not infringe or abolish existing aboriginal and treaty rights included the mining act (1990), the crown forest sustainability act (1994), the clean water act (2006), the provincial parks and conservation reserves act (2007), the endangered species act (2007), the lake simcoe protection act (2008), the green energy act (2009), and the far north act (2010). furthermore, inclusion of section 35 was not exclusive to pieces of legislation, as the code of practice (2009) for the environmental assessment act (1990) also cited section 35 in referring to the need to consult and accommodate during environmental assessment processes that may infringe on aboriginal and treaty rights. additionally, the recognition of aboriginal and treaty rights were evident in non-binding draft and technical documents as well through the explicit mention of rights, as was the case with was the draft guidelines for ministries on consultation with aboriginal peoples related to aboriginal rights and treaty rights (maa, 2006) and ontario’s mineral development strategy (mndm, 2006). the greenbelt plan (2005) and the oak ridges moraine conservation plan (2006) also mention aboriginal and treaty rights in passing: they outlined the policies in the plan would not infringe on issues of rights 9 mcleod et al.: finding common ground published by scholarship@western, 2015 and that the province intended to consult first nations on decisions relating to the plan that may affect crown lands and resources that are subject to treaty rights. while the integration of section 35 of the constitution act (1982) to these provincial crown texts reflects a step forward in crown–first nations relationships, its episodic and gradual inclusion should be taken cautiously. the bulk of the eight legislative documents with direct mention of section 35 did not elaborate more in depth about aboriginal and treaty rights beyond the initial reference. within the crown forest sustainability act (1994), the direct reference to section 35 is the sole reference to first nations in the entire document. still, it must be acknowledged that the incorporation and recognition of aboriginal and treaty rights within 8 of the 32 land use and resource management statutes, as well as other non-binding texts, represents a progressive policy trend forward. a trend that through awareness and advocacy may be consistently implemented within all ontario land use and resource management statutes, ideally reconfiguring how first nations are understood and engaged with on decisions and processes that affect their rights, their communities, and their traditional territories. c a t e g o ri z i n g po l i c i e s pro v i n c i a l p o l i c i e s c a t e g o ri z e d a s s i g n i f i c a n t . of the 337 texts analyzed, 13 provincial land use and resource management policies ranging from binding provincial legislation to draft guidelines for discussion purposes only were categorized as significant. indeed, no two texts designated as significant were precisely the same in their recognition and support of first nations, but they did have three commonalities—each directly recognized first nations, acknowledged aboriginal and treaty rights in their wording, and encompassed two or more concepts of honouring past crown–first nations relations in their latent content. an additional pattern emerged in terms of latent content as there was indication of consultation, the duty to consult, and, to a certain extent, accommodation through reference of section 35 of the constitution act (1982), but no indication of consent. the mining act (1990) and the far north act (2010) (see table 1) were the only two legislations that mentioned the duty to consult and accommodation while speaking directly of first nations and aboriginal and treaty rights. other texts categorized as significant included the provincial policy statement (2014), growth plan for northern ontario (2011), the environmental assessment act’s code of practice (2009), and the draft guidelines for ministries on consultation with aboriginal peoples related to aboriginal rights and treaty rights (maa, 2006). additionally, several secondary texts, including the discussion paper towards developing an aboriginal consultation approach for mineral sector activities (2007), and the technical paper ontario’s mineral development strategy (mndm, 2006) were relatively progressive in their approach and discussion of how the provincial crown and third parties can engage with first nations. these results do not indicate significant documents are ideal and without weakness in relation to recognition and support of first nations and relationship building. without further first nations-led amendments, as will be discussed later, these policies cannot truly reflect a fundamental shift in crown–first nations relationships. by giving the minister of northern developments and mines and his or her counterparts “broad discretionary authority” to manage mineral-based initiatives and dictate the terms by which to proceed, the mining act (1990) minimizes the ability of first nations communities to assess and influence provincial decisions (pardy & stoehr, 2011, p. 13). 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.3 table 1. examples of select provincial land use and resource management legislation with classification legislation ministry [classification] purpose of the legislation how are first nations referenced and addressed? far north act (2007) ministry of natural resources and forestry [significant] the purpose of the far north act is to provide direction for community based land use planning in the far north region of the province, an area previous regulated as public lands, in a joint planning process between first nations and ontario that is consistent with existing aboriginal and treaty rights protected under section 35 of the constitution act (1982). there is recognition of first nations; acknowledgment of aboriginal treaty rights within the opening purpose section; and discussions of to the duty to consult, consultation, and accommodation in the latent content of the text. the outcomes of the act are still emerging, but it aims to ensure a significant role for first nations in planning in the region, protecting areas of cultural and natural value, maintaining biodiversity, and enabling sustainable economic development, which will benefit surrounding first nations. however, the act has received ongoing criticisms since its development (see gardner et al. 2010). planning act (1990) ministry of municipal affairs and housing [moderate] the purpose of the planning act is to provide an overall policy framework for land use planning in the province and identify how land uses may be managed and who has the authority to do so. it is also meant to encourage public participation and recognize different stakeholders’ interests in land use decision making. this overarching act covers everything from how provincial policy statements are to be interpreted by municipalities to zoning by-law implementation. while first nations are cited exclusively and separately as a term in the opening interpretation section, the actual wording only appears twice throughout the entire text. conversely, first nations are predominantly referenced using the term “public bodies,” which makes no clear distinct between first nations and other stakeholders, particularly with respect to discussions of consultation. public lands act (1990) ministry of natural resources and forestry [minimal] the purpose of the public lands act is to manage the use of crown lands by providing the ministry of natural resources and forestry the authority to control how public lands and forests in ontario are managed, sold, and disposed. it applies to all crown lands south of the far north region in the province. within the actual legislation, there is no mention of first nations. however, within associated policy statements, including strategic direction for the management of ontario crown land (ministry of natural resources, 2014) & application review and land disposition process (2008), and the guide for crown land use planning (ontario ministry of natural resources, 2011), there are clear examples of recognition of first nations under the umbrella term aboriginal peoples; acknowledgement of aboriginal and treaty rights, and the continued ability to exercise these rights on crown lands; and discussions of the fiduciary obligations to consult and accommodate aboriginal peoples. 11 mcleod et al.: finding common ground published by scholarship@western, 2015 pro v i n c i a l p o l i c i e s c a t e g o ri z e d a s m o d e ra t e . texts were designated moderate if their intersection with first nations was apparent, but limited and relatively fragmented in their approach in comparison to other crown texts. for example, the only indication of a discussion of first nations and rights in the crown forest sustainability act (1994) occupied a single sentence in reference to section 35 of the constitution act (1982) and how the act does not infringe on any recognized and affirmed aboriginal or treaty rights. nonetheless, two common features emerged amongst these policies—they referenced first nations through use of key indicator terms, and incorporated one of the four concepts of honouring past relations or recognized aboriginal and treaty rights. in terms of honouring past relations, the majority spoke of consultation or accommodation, but often in reference to consulting and accommodating all stakeholders that the minister deems appropriate. additionally, reference to first nations and key indicator terms in many instances, particularly amongst major pieces of legislation, was done so under the broad title of public bodies. legislation that took a fragmented approach in their intersection with first nations included the planning act (1990) (see table 1), the municipal act (2001), the places to grow act (2005), the niagara escarpment planning and development act (1990), the oak ridges moraine conservation act (2001), the crown forest sustainability act (1994), and several others. overall, moderate texts further illustrated the clear inconsistencies of provincial crown policies in ontario as policies attached to legislation discussed first nations in an apparent, but limited manner, while the legislation, such as the public lands act (1990), the environmental assessment act (2009), and the environmental protection act (1990), made no such clear effort. what the moderate classification provides both first nations and non-first nation officials alike is a clear indication that, while there are often strong discussions of consultation, accommodation, and support of first nations and other aboriginal organizations in political circles, the policies that guide how exactly land and resource management unfolds on-theground are inadequate and unclear (participant one, personal communication, november 7, 2013). pro v i n c i a l p o l i c i e s c a t e g o ri z e d a s m i n i m a l . a third set of land use and resource management policies materialized following the two-tiered analysis process, with no recognition of first nations, no acknowledgement of aboriginal and treaty rights, and no reference to any form of honouring past crown–first nations relations. these provincial crown policies were designated minimal because their intersection with first nations was non-existent within each text, even under liberal interpretation. in certain cases, higher legislation did have accompanying policy statements, guides, and other texts that contained an apparent recognition of first nations, aboriginal and treaty rights, and consultation and accommodation. thus, this final classification is not to suggest that all policies designated as minimal were identical and unreceptive to first nations, but it is to suggest that there are many policies developed by the province of ontario that intentionally or unintentionally do not directly prioritize first nations and their inherent and distinct rights. these texts include the public lands act (1990) (see table 1), the lakes and rivers improvement act (1990), the aggregate resources act (1990), the fish and wildlife conservation act (1997), the wilderness areas act (1990), the forestry act (1990), the ontario water resources act (1990), and the environmental bill of rights (1993). the growth plan for the greater golden horseshoe (ministry of infrastructure, 2006) and the niagara escarpment plan (2005) were likewise classified minimal with no clear recognition of first nations within each provincial plan. furthermore, the majority of the 269 regulations examined did not mention first nations with the exception of eleven. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.3 d i s c u s s i o n with first nations’ engagement in planning matters being highly circumscribed and often predetermined by government through provincial land use and resource management policies, it was crucial that a comprehensive baseline be developed to understand how engagement is evolving. the results broadly reaffirm the reality that first nations are not treated fairly in land use and resource management processes (borrows, 1997a; porter & barry, 2013) and illustrate several key concerns and contradictions. t h e po s t 2 0 0 5 n o rt h e rn f o c u s a high proportion of texts categorized as significant and (the most progressive) were developed or amended post-2005. the draft guidelines for ministries on consultation (maa, 2006) and ontario’s mineral development strategy (mndm, 2006), two texts which recognize the importance of the fiduciary duty to consult and accommodate and the need for aboriginal involvement, emerged one year after the end of the mikisew cree ruling, which extended the duty to consult to treaty rights (newman, 2009). the mining act (1990), one of two pieces of legislation recognized as relatively progressive, was noticeably amended in 2009. its purpose clause was expanded to include the words “[…] to encourage prospecting, staking and exploration for the development of mineral resources, in a manner consistent with the recognition and affirmation of existing aboriginal and treaty rights in section 35 of the constitution act, 1982, including the duty to consult” (mining amendment act, 2009, s. 2.). additionally, since november 2012, the mining act (1990) has been further amended to give first nations the ability to apply to have sites of aboriginal cultural significance under 25 hectares recognized by the provincial crown and withdrawn from province’s database to prevent mining claims from being staked (mndm, 2013). these two specific amendments illustrate the gradual changes occurring post2005, but they also link to a much larger trend worth mentioning. the larger trend is that policies that have emerged or have been amended recently to better reflect the interests of first nations in ontario largely relate to northern ontario and resource development (participant three, personal communication, november 15, 2012) with the exception of the 2014 provincial policy statement (viswanathan et al., 2013). those provincial policies relating to southern ontario and urban growth have not prioritized first nations to the same extent. in particular, the growth plan for the greater golden horseshoe (2006) does not recognize first nations’ history in the region, and their role and influence on the future successes of the region. as devries (2011) observed in her account of the conflicts surrounding the contested territory of the six nations in caledonia, within the provincial growth plan’s primary map, the six nations’ reserve is “literally blanked out,” appearing as a white and unlabelled territory surrounded by land designated as beige and well-suited for priority and continued growth (p. 41). this type of normative planning diagram is shaped by a dominant non-first nation assumption that reserves are a federal jurisdiction and that lands outside of a reserve’s boundaries, including traditional territories, were honourably acquired and no longer of interest to first nations (devries, 2011; participant two, personal communication, november 2, 2012). additionally, major guiding acts and policy statements, including the planning act (1990), the places to grow act (2005), the greenbelt act (2005), the niagara escarpment planning and development act (1990), and the oak ridges moraine conservation act (2001), predominantly refer to first nations at a minimum as just another “public body,” which in itself is highly inadequate because it frames first nations’ 13 mcleod et al.: finding common ground published by scholarship@western, 2015 concerns as one of many stakeholder concerns to consider (barry & porter, 2011; porter, 2006; sandercock, 2004). with first nations and traditional territories adjacent to and overlapping with major urban areas in southern ontario, provincial policies outside of the realm of northern ontario and resource development need to come to terms with how land use and resource management policies that shape planning and development in urban areas can recognize and support first nations, as well as rights and claims. recent changes to the provincial policy statement (2014) have, for the first time, included policies that recognize first nations under the constitutional term of aboriginal peoples as outlined in section 35 of the constitution act (1982) and reinforce the importance of consultation and coordination with first nations, particularly on matters regarding archaeological and heritage resources, which may be an indication of an emerging shift. nonetheless, if northern resource-based policies such as the mining act (1990) and the far north act (2011) are relatively the most progressive legislation that exist in the province, with the latter having received strong first nations opposition (gardner et al., 2010; participant three, personal communication, november 15, 2012), the province of ontario will need to further improve both the way it understands aboriginal and treaty rights and the way it accounts for first nation communities in its crown policies both in northern and southern ontario. i s s u e s o f c o n s e n t although consultation, the duty to consult, and accommodation were discussed in certain policies and guidelines, there was no apparent discussion of consent in relation to first nations in any text. consent was mentioned in the planning act (1990) 107 times, but it was largely in relation to the minister’s authority and consent between lower-tier and upper-tier municipalities when subdividing land. without meaningful mention of consent in relation to first nations, no policy examined can truly embody past crown–first nations relations in a meaningful manner because, short of consent, these types of highlevel crown policies fail to acknowledge and embody the nation-to-nation foundations of past agreements, particularly treaties grounded in mutual respect and recognition. in turn, an inability to understand and integrate consent offers no real fundamental change in approach and places first nations vis-à-vis the provincial crown in a subordinate and passive role. with the recent united nations declaration on rights of indigenous peoples (united nations [un], 2007) identifying the eminent need for states to obtain “[…] free, prior and informed consent before adopting and implementing legislative or administrative measures that may affect them,” consent should not be viewed as archaic or irreconcilable in contested territories (un, 2007, article 19). its application in higher-policies at the provincial crown-scale could greatly improve the way first nations and nonfirst nation communities understand and interact with each other, particularly with respect to planning at the municipal-scale. the recent tsilhqot’in nation case may catalyze greater change as it has elevated consent to the forefront of public discourse surrounding unceded territories and now requires the crown to obtain consent from an affected first nation community where aboriginal title is involved. still, the term “consent” has become a polarizing topic. instead of using it as a best practice to base consultation with the intention of coming to an agreement, it has become a discussion on whether or not a first nation has the right to unilaterally stop projects. the spirit of consent should be incorporated into policy while recognizing that the term itself may serve as a barrier to improved relations as fear of the unknown or opposition may undermine any chance to redress historical misconducts and injustices 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.3 on the part of the crown. thus consultation, particularly in instances outside of cases involving aboriginal title where consent is already a requirement, needs to evolve into a process that seeks to obtain the blessing of first nation communities and encourages relationships based on mutual trust and respect. c re a t i n g s p a c e s o f c o m m o n g ro u n d while this research does point to areas of improvement within individual texts and policies, from a theoretical standpoint, it links to a much larger discussion about how ontario, as a province, similar to other contested territories developed through unchecked settlement and colonial expansion, has deviated far from past crown–first nations relations first outlined in spirit and intent of the royal proclamation of 1763 and the subsequent treaty of niagara in 1764 (borrows, 1997b). while the province and its guiding policies for land use and resource management are progressing towards greater recognition and understanding of first nations, aboriginal and treaty rights, and the need to honour past crown–first nations relations, they are doing so slowly. this slow pace coupled with an inability on the part of provincial and federal governments and other institutions to acknowledge or address in a meaningful and honourable manner “decades, if not centuries, of broken promises, dispossession, and frustration” has resulted in ongoing first nations disputes and protests (ipperwash inquiry, 2007, p. 2). the well-documented confrontations of ipperwash in 1995 and ongoing struggles in caledonia are clear indications of a policy gridlock or “paradigm muddle,” where state governments remain caught between a set of contradicting mindsets that play out in policies, plans, perspectives, and decisions—one characterized by the remnants of an entrenched colonial mindset bent on assimilating first nations and the other newly emerging paradigm focused on empowering and engaging first nations as distinct selfdetermining nations and partners with valid claims and concerns (maaka & fleras, 2005, p. 299). in turn, “the new seeks to dismantle the old, but the old guard is digging in its heels in one last-ditch effort to preserve the status quo,” thus resulting in minimal change to policy frameworks and general gridlock (maaka & fleras, 2005, p. 300). amending provincial crown texts to include recognition of first nations, aboriginal and treaty rights, the duty to consult, accommodate, and consent is one means to break this gridlock. beyond altering these texts that influence on-the-ground planning relationships, there is an immediate need to change course, and return to the types of relationships and understandings first embodied and symbolised by the two row wampum (rcap, 1996a). as reflected on by indigenous legal scholar john borrows (1997a), “the two-row wampum belt reflects a diplomatic convention that recognizes interaction and separation of settler and first nation societies” (p. 164). proposing that first nations and non-first nation communities can exist in a shared space of mutual trust and respect is influential and inspirational when thinking about how provincial crown policies can evolve: it is no longer about first nations as a stakeholders; it is about first nations as equal partners with equal footing. in turn, recognizing equality and committing to long-term and sustained relationships has the potential to shift outcomes away from current win–lose situations and more towards developing meaningful solutions that reflect the needs, intentions, and beliefs of neighbouring first nations and non-first nation communities. planning can provide an opportunity to create spaces of common ground, but to do so requires, among other steps, reworking higher policies, including restrictive federal policies, through first nations’ 15 mcleod et al.: finding common ground published by scholarship@western, 2015 participation and voices to give clarity and direction on how to build and sustain relations between first nations and neighbouring non-first nation communities. it has the potential to facilitate cultural changes through bridging understandings and strengthening individual relations across communities that a continued dependence on ridged legal approaches may struggle to achieve. these spaces of common ground may not bring us to consensus on all issues, but they will enable us to co-exist and learn from each other on equal footing through sustained relations and interaction in an unprecedented manner. yet, for planning to be fundamentally transformative, it requires recognition of both political and territorial rights to ensure first nations are actively pursuing and shaping what is best for individual communities and traditional territories (porter & barry, 2013). this type of recognition, which parallels the recommendations of the rcap (1996c), would ensure first nations’ right to self-determination and an equitable planning practice more reflective of the shared foundations of the province. c o n c l u s i o n this research is vital to discussions of crown–first nations relations because there is an immediate need for both a conceptual framework to analyze provincial land use and resource management policies and an overall baseline to be developed in ontario. this comprehensive document analysis is a first step, among a series, that together have the potential to inform better crown–first nations relations along with numerous policies, processes, and practices. this critical reflection is by no means a concluded process—we hope that the ideas present here and the analytical framework will continue to evolve through dialogue and reflection. they will advance discussions about the need for further amendments to clarify provincial policies about both the protection of rights and interests of first nations, and the need to build and sustain relationships between first nations and neighbouring municipal jurisdictions. additionally, within the context of southern ontario and its rapid growth, it is critical that our understanding of recognition expand to include traditional territories in provincial land use and resource management policies, plans, and decisions. not only to build mutual understanding between first nations and the public at large, but most importantly to give the land “a chair at the table,” as noted by carolyn king, former chief of the mississaugas of the new credit first nation (personal communication, june 12, 2014), and ensure its proper stewardship for future generations. in light of the united nations’ recent adoption of the declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (un, 2007) and the release of the report of the ipperwash inquiry (ipperwash inquiry, 2007), ontario is at a critical junction. the recommendations of the latter have certainly changed ontario’s policy approach as the report highlighted “the vacuum of policy in ontario addressing consultation and accommodation” (devries, 2011, p. 133). for example, justice linden’s recommendations have led to the ministry of aboriginal affairs encouraging municipalities to develop and use archaeological master plans to better recognize aboriginal burial and heritage sites, and to establish a new relationship fund (province of ontario, 2014) to build capacity and lines of communication and engagement amongst aboriginal communities, including first nations and métis, with governments and third parties (fraser & viswanathan, 2013; ipperwash inquiry, 2007). whether or not the province and the public have fully changed or unsettled their mindsets remains unclear. specifically, with recommendation 36 of the ipperwash inquiry (2007) outlining the immediate need for the provincial government and ministry of aboriginal affairs to create “mechanisms for obtaining input from aboriginal communities on planning, policy, legislation, and programs affecting aboriginal interests” (p.104), ontario can set a precedent nationally and internationally by reworking certain guiding provincial policies to reflect meaningful and 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.3 valued partnerships with first nations. good relations between municipalities and first nations are occurring in different contexts and to different degrees across ontario, but they are often as a result of the cooperative efforts of individuals across communities (participant one, personal communication, november 7, 2013). to ensure that equitable and constructive relationships become the standard and not just isolated examples, there is an immediate need to begin to rework policies and plans to reflect mutual understanding and mutual learning in shared territory through first nations-negotiated amendments. other efforts and resources will be necessary to catalyze this change within governments and public perspectives as outlined in by the rcap (1996c) and the ipperwash inquiry (2007). for now, however, there is a clearly defined hope that this fundamental shift will occur (viswanathan et al. 2013; walker, jojola & natcher, 2013). recognizing that first nations are foundational partners in ontario’s past, present, and future, and acknowledging that new opportunities exist in rebuilding lost relationships and sustaining new relationships grounded in co-existence will greatly assist in how we, as non-first nations, and first nations peoples recognize our pasts, understand ourselves, mutually respect and trust each other, and plan differently in a shared territory. ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! 17 mcleod et al.: finding common ground published by 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(2013). are we there yet? making inroads to decolonize planning knowledge and practice in southern ontario. plan canada, 53(3), 20 23. walker, r., jojola, t., & natcher, d. (2013). reclaiming indigenous planning. montreal and kingston: mcgill-queen’s university press. wilderness areas act. r.s.o. 1990, c. w.8 ! ! ! 23 mcleod et al.: finding common ground published by scholarship@western, 2015 the international indigenous policy journal january 2015 finding common ground: a critical review of land use and resource management policies in ontario, canada and their intersection with first nations fraser mcleod leela viswanathan graham s. whitelaw jared macbeth carolyn king see next page for additional authors recommended citation finding common ground: a critical review of land use and resource management policies in ontario, canada and their intersection with first nations abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license authors finding common ground: a critical review of land use and resource management policies in ontario, canada and their intersection with first nations awakening: 'spontaneous recovery’ from substance abuse among aboriginal peoples in canada the international indigenous policy journal volume 2 issue 1 health and well-being article 7 may 2011 awakening: 'spontaneous recovery’ from substance abuse among aboriginal peoples in canada adrien tempier colleen a. dell university of saskatchewan, colleen.dell@usask.ca elder campbell papequash randy duncan raymond tempier recommended citation tempier, a. , dell, c. a. , papequash, e. , duncan, r. , tempier, r. (2011). awakening: 'spontaneous recovery’ from substance abuse among aboriginal peoples in canada. the international indigenous policy journal, 2(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.7 this research is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. awakening: 'spontaneous recovery’ from substance abuse among aboriginal peoples in canada abstract there is a paucity of research on spontaneous recovery (sr) from substance abuse in general, and specific to aboriginal peoples. there is also limited understanding of the healing process associated with sr . in this study, sr was examined among a group of aboriginal peoples in canada. employing a decolonizing methodology, thematic analysis of traditional talking circle narratives identified an association between a traumatic life event and an ‘awakening.’ this ‘awakening’ was embedded in primary (i.e., consider impact on personal well-being) and secondary (i.e., implement alternative coping mechanism) cognitive appraisal processes and intrinsic and extrinsic motivation rooted in increased traditional aboriginal cultural awareness and understanding. this contributed to both abstinence (i.e., recovery) and sustained well-being (i.e., continued abstinence). three key interrelated ‘themes’ specific to the role of culture in sr and recovery maintenance were identified: aboriginal identity, cultural practices, and traditional values. these findings, combined with the limited literature, were developed into a prospective model of sr from substance abuse in aboriginal peoples. this model highlights the potential need for substance abuse treatment and intervention policy to consider culture as a determinant of health and well-being. keywords spontaneous recovery, awakening, substance abuse, aboriginal, culture, well-being acknowledgments the authors wish to thank all of the individuals who shared their experiences for others to learn from in this study, the ancient spirals retreat centre for making available a suitable meeting space, and the saskatchewan health research foundation for financially supporting this research. appreciation is also offered to charlotte fillmore-handlon for her editorial assistance. particular appreciation and gratitude is expressed to our study’s elder who guided the gathering; without his cultural guidance this study would not have been undertaken. we would also like to thank the external reviewers from the international indigenous policy journal for their helpful comments, and members of the saskatchewan team for research and evaluation of addictions treatment and mental health services (stream) and their associates, who likewise provided insightful guidance and comments—elder billy ermine, sharon acoose, russell bone, peter butt, joe custer, michelle kushniruk, larry laliberte, glen mccallum, lewis mehl-madrona, david mykota, ron ratte, and cynthia shorting. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ introduction spontaneous recovery (sr) is generally understood as the ability to overcome problematic substance use through the experience of a major life event and in absence of formal treatment (barker & hunt, 2007; mohatt et al., 2008). although many people recover from problematic substance use on their own, there is limited research on non-intervention models of recovery. the majority of empirical attention is placed on the effectiveness of structured inor out-patient treatment programs as well as support groups, such as alcoholics anonymous. the limited research that exists on sr, however, identifies higher rates of continued well-being in comparison to remittance when professional help is sought (armor & meshkoff, 1983; blomqvist, 1999; cunningham et al., 1996). sr is also referred to in the extant literature as spontaneous remission, natural recovery, and natural resolution (barker & hunt, 2007; mohatt et al., 2008; smart, 2007). the etymology of the term spontaneous, in the context of recovering from problematic substance use, is to “aris[e] from inherent qualities without external cause; self-generated” (funk & wagnalls, 1986, p. 1295). in everyday life the term is commonly understood as a singular episode in time with no causal explanation. the influence of past and future experiences is not well recognized. sr from substance abuse then is very much a process of discovery, growth, and transformation within an individual. mainstream models of recovery have been criticized for not addressing cultural diversity, in particular, with and among aboriginal peoples (blue & darou, 2005; mccabe, 2007; mohatt et al., 2008; spicer, 2001). this is true in canada, where the development of the national native alcohol and drug abuse program treatment system was developed in the 1970s. in 2011, the program released its renewed culture-based framework (first nations addictions advisory panel, 2010). there has been some attention to sr among aboriginal peoples internationally, with studies reporting a high frequency of sr (brady, 1993; quintero, 2000; spicer, 2001). for example, kunitz and levy (1994) found in their prospective study that 87% of navajo natives living in traditional rural areas of the united states experienced higher rates of recovery in comparison to 33% of natives using formal treatment in an urban community. leung et al. (1993) found a high rate of recovery in the american northwest coast tribe natives in their research, with 83% self-reporting to have spontaneously stopped their problematic alcohol use. the aim of this study is to examine a prospective model of aboriginal peoples’ spontaneous recovery from substance abuse—that is, an ‘awakening’ triggered by a traumatic life event leads to abstinence (i.e., recovery). in the model, the embracing of aboriginal traditional culture contributes to sr and sustained well-being (i.e., continued abstinence). the model was examined with a group of aboriginal peoples in canada who self-identified as having experienced sr. it is important to note that while the term substance abuse is used, it is not intended to imply a negative judgment on the user (jenkins, 1999). the participants in this study were all diagnosed at some point in their lives as dependent on alcohol, drugs, and/or other substances. overview of relevant literature experiencing a major life event in itself does not provide a sufficient account of individuals’ impending life changes (diclemente, 2003; klingemann, 1991; sobell et al., 1993; tucker et al., 1994). mainstream scholars have suggested that sr involves a life-triggering event that leads to cognitive appraisal (klingemann, 1991; sobell et al., 2000). cognitive appraisal is understood as how a person interprets a situation or event; in primary appraisal attention is given to how an event affects personal well-being, while in secondary appraisal a coping response is considered (folkman et al., 1986). in the context of sr, a major life event prompts an individual to consider the effects of their substance abuse 1 tempier et al.: spontaneous recovery in aboriginal in canada published by scholarship@western, 2011 and commit to change as their coping response. some initial research (hazel & mohatt, 2001; sobell et al., 1996) and the recent people awakening study with alaskan natives (mohatt et al., 2008) suggest that cognitive appraisal is critical to the self-change process in sr. further, meta-analyses on survey studies suggest that cognitive appraisal is central to the change process for many people who recovered ‘on their own’ from problematic substance use (klingemann & sobell, 2007; sobell et al., 2000). in addition to cognitive appraisal ensuing from a major life event in sr, scholars have also suggested that an individual’s initiation toward motivation to change is central (klingemann, 1991; sobell, et al., 2000). self-change theories likewise propose that individual motivation to change can be prompted by a series of negative or positive life experiences (connors et al., 2001; klingemann, 1991), often resulting in an awareness of the personal and social impacts of substance abuse and their anticipated consequences (e.g., ill health, relationship problems). in the past decade, motivation has emerged as an important consideration in the provision of substance abuse services, with studies showing better long term outcomes when an individual is motivated, including sustained abstinence and better social adjustment (miller, 1999). until recently, factors associating major life events to sr in aboriginal peoples were not studied. based on the narratives of alaskan natives in 2007, the people awakening study (mohatt et al., 2008) developed an aboriginal-specific model of recovery; a developmental process of five interrelated sequences in which the sequence termed ‘turning point’ is the final decision to stop using and is often accompanied with a traumatic life event. participants in the study linked their near death experiences, loss of a loved one, and profound suffering with their sr. such traumatic events were in conjunction with an ‘awakening’ that participants perceived to be empowering and life changing. this involved culture specific elements. there was also a propensity for participants to undertake a cognitive appraisal process in which the consequences of substance abuse on their own well-being, and that of their families and communities, were considered and responded to (mohatt et al., 2008). studies have also demonstrated that aboriginal traditional cultural connection is important for maintaining sobriety for aboriginal peoples. for instance, bezdek and spicer’s (2006) study underscored the importance of adopting new social support systems within one’s community, culture-based coping strategies, and renewed spiritual practices to support recovery. mohatt et al.’s (2008) life histories study identified the valuable role of social support, most often through spouses as well as adult children, aa sponsors, and/or the creator/higher spirit. related, scholars have reported that indigenous people’s cultural identity is important to their well-being (berry 1999; kirmayer et al., 2003; mohatt et al., 2008; smillie-adjarkwa, 2009). this was highlighted most recently in a canadian study of the healing journeys of first nations, inuit, and métis women recovering from illicit drug abuse (niccols et al., 2010). these findings support the literature that has identified culture as a key determinant of health and well-being for aboriginal peoples (newbold, 1998; reading, n.d.). method design with so few studies having focused on sr in general, and with aboriginal peoples in particular, more empirical investigation is needed. the aim of this study was to examine the sr process among a group of aboriginal peoples in canada who self-identified as having experienced sr. although there is vast diversity among aboriginal peoples, there is commonality in historical and geographic experiences, cultural traditions, and spiritual beliefs (morrison & wilson, 2004). this study examines sr through an 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.7 in-depth review of major life event(s) precipitating sr from substance abuse and the role of culture in sr and recovery maintenance. this study was designed as a phenomenological, qualitative exploration of multiple participants’ perspectives. qualitative methods were chosen because they are appropriate for research questions concerned with subjective experiences, meanings, and processes (berg, 1998; kirby & mckenna, 1989). data was collected through an open-ended interview in a culturally significant talking-circle format (kovach, 2010). this method allowed for prioritizing the participants’ creation of meaning based on the stories of their lived experiences (denzin & lincoln, 2008; patton, 2002). this is important given the limited research in the field. this study was a collaborative effort of the participants, university researchers, community members, and an aboriginal elder. the intent of the study design was to facilitate a decolonizing method in which the research was undertaken “by, for and in balance with” the research population and not “on” it; the study did not adhere to a western paradigm in which the indigenous ‘subject’ is situated as the ‘other’ (kirby & mckenna, 1989, p. 28; kovach, 2009; smith, 1999). the participants’ knowledge took precedence over perceived academic status in the study. the team’s ethical practices were in adherence to cihr guidelines for health research involving aboriginal people (2008) and ocap principles (ownership, control, access, possession) (schnarch, 2004). ethics approval was granted by the university of saskatchewan behavioural research ethics board. participants a convenience sample was used to recruit five aboriginal peoples in the prairie provinces of canada. one of the principle investigators was aware of their sr experiences based on previous clinical work and prior research studies. the participants ranged in age from 43 to 68, four were male, and all were in continued recovery for over 5 years. two individuals were from manitoba and of cree descent, and three were from saskatchewan and of ojibway and dene descent. two lived on reserve, and three lived in an urban centre. all identified alcohol, drugs, or solvents as their primary drug of choice, with an average of 18 years of abuse. the participants shared vastly similar life histories. during their childhoods, they reported hostility, abuse, discrimination, and neglect. three were sent to residential school, one to foster care, and one ran away from home. in early adolescence, all experienced alienation from their aboriginal traditional culture, contributing to a diminished sense of self-identity. in response to these experiences, alcohol, drug, or solvent use was initiated at a young age and soon after became a means to cope. this resulted in a false sense of high self-esteem and importance that offered a sense of belonging with other users. simultaneously, dependence progressed with the participants’ deterioration through selfidentified selfishness, stubbornness, avoidance, anger, impulsivity, and aggression towards themselves and their surroundings. parallel to their childhood experiences of institutionalization, as young adults all participants were incarcerated or hospitalized for mental health issues or criminal behaviours. procedure all five participants attended a gathering from august 23rd to 25th, 2009 at the ancient spirals retreat centre in rural saskatchewan, canada. the gathering was organized according to aboriginal traditional cultural protocols (e.g., offering of tobacco), and an elder, who himself had experienced sr, guided the participants’, community members’, and researchers’ time together. the gathering opened with traditional ceremonial practices and a talking circle format was adhered to. the gathering also 3 tempier et al.: spontaneous recovery in aboriginal in canada published by scholarship@western, 2011 included shared meals, a feast, creation of a craft (i.e., dream catcher) led by two of the participants, and traditional teachings (e.g., buffalo sage collecting and tying). the gathering was centred on the grandfather teaching of respect among all in attendance (benton banai, 1979). prior to attending the gathering, the participants were provided with a letter of invitation, a draft of the interview questions, and a consent form. the principal investigator reviewed the consent form orally with all participants at the gathering and all provided written consent. in recognition of their participation, each participant received an honorarium and a blanket. travel and full accommodations were provided to all who attended. this included the five participants with sr experience, three researchers, two research assistants, and two community members. the talking circle format allowed for each participant to tell their story, uninterrupted. the average story sharing length was 25 minutes, ranging from 17 to 54 minutes. this did not include discussion that took place following each story, which averaged 1 hour and 22 minutes. questions were asked in the same order for each participant and probing was applied in three main areas: life story, the significant life event(s) that initiated stopping problematic substance use, and reasons, including aboriginal traditional culture, for continuing to not abuse substances. the talking circle is a traditional form of storytelling among first nations in canada (vannini & gladue, 2008, p. 142). vannini and gladue (2008) identify the common similarities between a “reflexive dyadic” form of interviewing, which our team applied, and talking circles: “the sharing of experiences, reciprocity, heartfelt speaking, respect, support, honouring, listening, mutual empowerment, compassion, and interconnectedness generated by open sharing” (p. 142). the data corpus from the sharing circle was recorded using a digital video-microcassette recording system and was transcribed verbatim. transcripts were not provided to participants for verification, given their opportunities for reflection, addition or deletion over the two and a half-day gathering. the transcripts were coded and analyzed by one author, who led the analysis process. to ensure trustworthiness and to improve transferability of the data corpus, investigator triangulation was applied (decrop, 1999; denzin, 1970) with additional independent coding and interpretation undertaken by two members of the research team. this process helped to illuminate discrepancies and allowed for efficiency in achieving consensus for coding. in adherence with a decolonizing methodological approach, the first draft of the findings was provided to the participants at a meeting in april 2010. opportunities for reflection, discussion, and validation were provided for the first and subsequent drafts of this paper, including the final version. analysis thematic analysis was used to identify meaningful patterns within the categories of the data corpus on each participant’s narration or data item regarding sr and recovery maintenance. the flexibility of thematic coding (braun & clarke, 2006) facilitated a combined inductive-deductive approach (elo & kyngas, 2008). drawing on phenomenology, an inductive approach was used to formulate a framework of the life experiences reported by participants. this focus on individuals’ interpretations of events or situations allowed for “silenced voices or perspectives inherent in the information [to] be brought forward and recognized” (boyatzis, 1998, p. 3). deductively, the sr literature, augmented with the self-change literature, and knowledge of aboriginal traditional culture all informed the pre-constructed interview questions. the data coding method was guided by the research questions. first, to enhance familiarity with the data corpus, each transcript was carefully read, in turn, allowing for identification of meaningful segments of each data item relevant to the research questions. identification of meaningful segments for potential themes occurred on a semantic level in order for interpretation of the data to be based 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.7 solely on patterns of direct data extracts. following this, a matrix of frequent and similar explicit segments within and across data items was developed. each data item was coded individually in the matrix using psychosocial categories and provisional definitions. these were likewise informed from the data, literature and knowledge of aboriginal traditional culture. as the interview questions were specifically discussed by each participant, the data items received equal, comprehensive attention. this permitted the recording of ideas and the identification and coding of relevant categories until the data extracts relevant to the research questions were exhausted. next, codes were grouped into potential themes within and across each data item. exhaustion was achieved by independent parallel coding in which the initial coder developed the relevant segments of data extracts and labels for preliminary themes and sub-themes as well as theme titles (babbie, 2010). thereafter, members of the research team reviewed and refined the codes, definitions, and themes to ensure they were intelligible and concise. some segments of the extracted data were included in more than one category. the final stage of the coding process resulted in 96 categories for potential themes, with six principle themes established in two fields. results qualitative analysis generated two main categories under which six common themes captured the process of sr among the participants in this study. the categories and themes are understood within the context of the research questions guiding the study, that is, major life event(s) precipitating sr from substance abuse and the role of aboriginal traditional culture in sr and recovery maintenance. the first category of themes is broadly identified as self-change process and is comprised of (1) cognitive appraisal, (2) coping, and (3) motivation. these are consequential to the major traumatic events experienced in the participants’ lives. the second category of themes is identified as cultural understanding and consists of the interrelated concepts of (1) aboriginal identity, (2) cultural practices, and (3) traditional values. these are specific to the life event as well as recovery maintenance and together comprise ‘one existence.’ each is reviewed in turn. self-change process 1. cognitive appraisal a key theme to emerge is cognitive appraisal, specifically, primary appraisal, which is recognized in the literature as an individual’s consideration of the direct impact of experiencing a traumatic life event on their personal well-being. the participants each reported an abrupt realization of their problematic substance use as a consequence of a traumatic life event. these events were very serious in nature; most were life-threatening. three participants described the event as an imminent threat to loss of life, their own or their children’s. the other two participants’ descriptions were less explicitly traumatic, but still implied that their well-being was seriously threatened. the latter two events were also associated with a spiritual experience. further, there was a common theme among the participants of not wanting to cause further harm to others. this was evident in two of the participants’ narratives. 5 tempier et al.: spontaneous recovery in aboriginal in canada published by scholarship@western, 2011 the following excerpt from the first participant illustrates how a life event led her to stop abusing solvents—her son’s physical illness as a consequence of the distress she caused him, and a related desire to stop harming her family: the reason he (younger son) was in the hospital was because i put him through so much depression. like just, like i was saying i was selfish... he got an ulcer in the bust of the stomach, terrible… the first time i went to go and see him (younger son)… he pull off his blanket to show me where it was, like i started crying i… like it was really coming fast to me, like i started thinking, i went three times a day. and then again i left the hospital, and then i tried to use the solvent [but] i couldn’t. i just about lost a loved one… it was my own flesh… it was my younger son, i just about lost… like i saw him laying in the hospital bed. that day i just said that’s it. really i can’t put him through… my family through anymore hurt, that they never asked for... to tell you the truth, i was really getting sick and tired of being a selfish person, because that’s what i was doing. and i wasn’t thinking. and i should’ve thought… more before seeing my son. he was in the hospital bed, but that’s the reason i made up my mind right there… and that’s when i made the decision to come back to my dad’s reserve and to be with my partner. the second participant described his major life-threatening event as a home fire in which half of his body was burned, causing his legs to be amputated: this really changed my life. one day went to the lake, and i went for a swim and i got drunk over there… and for some reason i don’t know how i got in (home), but i guess i started drinking and sniffing again, i never took my brother’s advice. and, that stuff is flammable… i guess i was trying to light a cigarette… and i caught on fire… i burnt my legs… so now i have no, no legs (crying). that sort of sparked the change in my life… i believe in this he (god)… gave me another chance in life and i lost big… like it scared the hell out of me, like i almost lost my life… i got to quit you know or my life won’t go on anymore… you learn from your mistakes badly, so i don’t know but i’d never go back to it. i lost my legs, just about lost my life. relapse from alcohol abuse developed into a major life experience for the third participant. after returning to alcohol, despite being hospitalized for over a month, he was struck with a sudden sense of gratification, what he described as a spiritual experience: in vowing when i get out of the mental institution i was never going to drink again… i’m dry for forty-five days… i walk to this restaurant… all of a sudden i see this big beautiful liquor cabinet! boy i was back on the merry-go-round right again… [and then] all of a sudden i feel you know this overwhelming joy, this overwhelming peace, this overwhelming happiness, you know and i could feel it. and i knew it wasn’t the drugs, and i knew it wasn’t the alcohol that was going to me. and then all of a sudden, you know my whole life flashes before me. you know for the first time in my whole life i could see my sickness, you know that i was addicted to alcohol and i was addicted to you know alcohol chronically… then you know i had this spiritual awakening… god 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.7 was entering me in my alcoholism… you know i saw the goodness deep within me. and i could also see you know the life that i’ve been living for the last… thirty years. and it was very destructive. and so that’s when you know… there then i was never going to drink again... and i knew that i was going to reach out for help. the fourth participant experienced a profound internal sense of sadness due to the dire circumstances of his life (e.g., criminal involvement, illness, poverty) as his major life event: one day i was walking… i don’t know what came over me, just i cried… and i just couldn’t hold it... and i walked out on the steaming road, and went to that park and i sat there for a while and i cried and i just felt empty inside… my feeling told me… it was time for me to leave that life… you know i was saying, you know god it’s ugly here, no i was thinking that and i was thinking about back home how clear the water is, how beautiful the trees are, how clean the air is, you know that’s what i was thinking about… you know i always think about that day when i started crying. it was just to tell me that it’s time for me to head home. the fifth participant described a particular event in which he was drinking with friends and celebrating his birthday. this resulted in a near death experience for him and his children: we went on the lake the night before… i woke up that morning, hung-over… there’s some bottles they’re home brew… and i took half and i drank it. as i finished one, i started throwing up… and i lay down, half in the water, i fell asleep… i woke up, and i sat in the water and i look towards the tent. for the first time in my life i looked at myself. first of all it was that selfish way where “i could have drowned here!”... i looked over at the tent, and there’s my little girl with my boy… in the tent because i didn’t zip up the tent, and her little hands sticking out with her feet… and as i was thinking about my kids… i said you know what from here today i will not drink anymore. for me that awakening was the day that i recognized my own faults and put myself in my children’s shoes, to feel what i felt as a young child… 2 . c opi ng a second key theme to emerge from the participants’ narratives in relation to sr is coping. this mirrors secondary cognitive appraisal, which is defined in the literature as consideration of a coping response. the participants reflected on how they applied two key and alternative coping responses: seeking social support, with attention paid to aboriginal-specific support, and aboriginal traditional cultural understanding. the participants in this study actively sought alternative environments, broke off unhealthy social ties, and developed new supportive relationships. seeking cultural understanding was a newfound coping mechanism for all of the participants and is explained fully in the next section, as it is endemic to both the process of sr and recovery maintenance. the third participant coped by introducing social support in his life with other aboriginal peoples through alcoholics anonymous: i did not know then… there was native people that were sober i didn’t know that were, that was going to alcoholics anonymous. and so when i found out, you know i, i went to these native 7 tempier et al.: spontaneous recovery in aboriginal in canada published by scholarship@western, 2011 people alcoholics anonymous… and there you know i felt a sense of belonging. and then i began to really work hard on myself. after being released from prison, the fourth participant developed a close relationship with another aboriginal person and learned about his aboriginal culture through this relationship: and me and my mentor started talking and you know we got into the medicine wheel. and that’s where i feel comfortable ‘cause of that medicine wheel because of what i learnt and the way my friend taught me… i need people around me, i need support. and other times i hang on to my buddy (aboriginal friend and mentor). the fifth participant shared how he received support from an aboriginal community organization: i’ve never been to a treatment center. my wife and i did it at the same time… and [an aboriginal community organization] has helped me a lot in understanding where i come from or to my perspective to my life, and understand what my role and responsibility is to my wife, and my family… sometimes we gather, we can pray, and we walk. the second participant coped by sharing his stories at survivor meetings and benefitted from hearing others’ stories. although these meetings were not aboriginal-specific, he closely identified with the other participants as burn victims: i listen to other peoples’ stories… go out and meet people, i think i'm strong enough to talk to other people… especially when it comes from the heart… the more i talk about my story, the more better i feel about it during the day eh... for sure instead of holding it in... 3. motivation the third key theme providing insight into sr that emerged from the participants’ narratives is motivation, both intrinsic and extrinsic. intrinsic motivation was linked to the participants’ acknowledgement of potential death or serious harm as a result of their traumatic life events. this resulted in a wish to live, be free from restraints (e.g., institutionalization), improve health and wellness, and attain spiritual well-being. for example, the second participant expressed motivation to “live his life” and accept the opportunity, or second chance, he had been given: i have to be strong, i said i’m going to walk in i’m going to beat this thing i said “you (partner) can get walking good, want to get married?”… those were my plans walk good, marry my lady and i understood getting a new life was, that sniffing was no… extrinsic motivation focused on the participants’ renewed responsibility to their families and friends, respect for individuals they had harmed, and desire to stop cycles of abuse within their families and communities. this too directly resulted from their traumatic life event. there was also clear overlap between the two forms of motivation. to illustrate, the first participant was motivated by the near death experience of losing her son to illness and by not harming further her social network: 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.7 i wouldn’t to go back to it ‘cause now i have too much to lose, and when i was doing solvent, i just about lost my son and… i think if i ever went back to using solvent i don’t think i’ll be around much longer if i ever went back. and you know i don’t want to start turning around and hurting, you know hurting my good friends… and my relations… because really in life it’s not worth it. cultural understanding 1. aboriginal identity a key theme to emerge from the participants’ narratives related to aboriginal cultural understanding is aboriginal identity. seeking one’s cultural identity was initiated as a direct result of experiencing a traumatic life event and was sustained within the context of maintaining individuals’ sobriety. all participants expressed that they sought increased cultural understanding following the event about who they were as aboriginal people, and that this aided in their sense of identity. as aboriginal peoples, the participants learned about sacred relations with their spirit, family, community, nation, and the land. they also drew upon aboriginal cultural practices to strengthen their understanding about themselves, which helped to maintain their sobriety. the same was true of learning their cultural values. both are described below. the third participant reflected on how understanding the origins and cultural heritage of aboriginal peoples helped him to strengthen his identity: for me to really learn about my identity you know i had to go back, i had to go back into the history of the aboriginal people… when i hear our elders say you know: i am the fire, i am the rock, i am the water, i am the wind, i am the sun, i am the earth, i am the moon, i am the stars, i am the flower, i am the grass, i am the fruit, and i am the trees, i am, i am the crawling being, i am the flying creature, i am the swimming being, i am the four legged being, because we are all of those things. you know that is where the support for life comes from. without those things that i just named, you and i wouldn’t be here today… and we have a ceremony, that is called the naming ceremony and we are always naming after one of those spiritual elements or spiritual substances… so my identity, goes with that, with that name, it goes with that clan, and it goes with that place of birth… i cannot forget where i come from… because i could be back there (alcoholism) tomorrow… given me back my identity as an aboriginal person. the second participant suggested that finding his identity was, and continued to be, an empowering experience in his life: you know the most important thing and i get out of this is that i find my own in-dwelling power. and what is your in-dwelling power? what is it? you know what it is?... it is your subconscious mind! that is your in-dwelling power. that’s the spiritual powers. that is the spiritual powers that is connected directly with our creator or with god… since the aboriginal people’s teachings promote racial harmony and non-violence it empowers and it offers the people a harmonious way of life. 9 tempier et al.: spontaneous recovery in aboriginal in canada published by scholarship@western, 2011 2. cultural practices a second key theme to emerge from the participants’ narratives is aboriginal traditional cultural practices. this too transpired as a consequence of a traumatic life event as well as within the context of maintaining individuals’ sobriety. participants emphasized the importance of how learning to practice their culture was fundamental to their well-being, including language, songs, legends, prayers, ceremonies, and art. they also shared that cultural practices assisted them with (re)building their identity and (re)claiming a sacred relationship to, for example, their kin, tribe, homeland, and the creator. to illustrate, the first participant explored her aboriginal traditional culture by learning about traditional medicines, attending sundances, and doing arts and crafts: getting back into, like back into our culture, when i’m back on the reserve i go pick indian medicine. i go to a lot of sundances. i do a lot of arts and crafts. like i do a lot of stuff. so i just left it that and then i started you know like going out picking medicine and picking medicine and doing art work like i need like medicine wheels. after his initiation to ceremony, the third participant shared his memories of his desire to become a medicine man and continue his pathway to recovery by leading aboriginal ceremonies: you know i made that commitment right there in that mountain. i says, “i’m going back to learn about our heritage”… healing means to heal your culture first... we have to heal our culture because that is where you’re going to find all the foundation for your well-being… and they say there's no better way of gaining that understanding, by participating in aboriginal ceremonies, dances, prayers, and songs… our language… medicine wheel is a great tool… not only recovery for your own well-being. the fourth participant developed a renewed interest in aboriginal traditional cultural practices after his ‘awakening,’ when he returned to his reserve. he promised himself that he was leaving the life that had replaced his cultural traditions. this transformative experience involved his decision to embrace his traditions to help his recovery: using the medicine wheel, i go to sweats, and listen to the elders, and pray ‘cause only man, only person that could ever change anything in you or within yourself is that man up there… you know i see the place where my, our people used to, there was a cave into a rock there, where they used to go and fast for days in that cave. i see that some places where they hung ribbon. but i didn’t know nothing about the culture until i moved… i look at the medicine wheel, and i look at the animals. i danced the traditional grass dance. and i shut that down for fourteen years, i never touched my dancing outfit i never touched it for fourteen years i left ‘alone ‘cause i said i can’t live this life… and these are things that the medicine wheel has helped me out so much… i'm very proud of who i am… once a year i do a sweat, every season i do a sweat, that's it, that's good enough for me. the fifth participant shared feelings about his aboriginal language and emphasized the importance of practicing language to understand aboriginal traditional culture: it’s a good thing that someone… refreshed my thoughts in my memory in regards to where i come from, what i used to see my grandfather do when he used to pray on his own, when my 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.7 mother’s dad used to go to stretch on the lake, (location) and refresh my memory, because i remember my grandfather sitting in that tipi singing the songs that our elder sang this morning. but i didn’t get it, i didn’t get it. he used to be playing on speakers (singing in cree)… when my grandfather used to do ceremonies in sweat lodges… speaking cree… i learned how to speak my language. 3. traditional values the third key theme to emerge from the participants’ narratives in relation to gaining increased aboriginal traditional cultural understanding is learning traditional cultural values. as with the themes of aboriginal identity and cultural practices, this was part of the participants’ sr following a traumatic life event as well as maintaining their recovery. learning traditional values, such as cultural practices, involved exploring the meaning and experience of spirit and spirituality. the third participant shared how he was reacquainted with the traditional cultural values he had become dissociated from in his life: you know you’re going to find all your moral and all your spiritual values in the culture… harmony and the peaceful coexistence of all living beings and nature… i had forgotten the basics of health, giving and holiness. those three elements are the foundation of developing our sacred relationship with our creator and all of creation… we are talking about the physical world the stranger, the star, the plant beings, the flowers, the grasses, the fruits in the trees, the animal beings... because that is where we get our values from. the fifth participant advised that learning about values was crucial to his recovery: i think there has to be value based and i take that person that realizes that something happen has to… have values and re-trigger those values… always have it… the third participant underscored the spiritual foundation of his peoples’ beliefs and values: aboriginal spirituality is necessary for the aboriginal people to develop a positive identity and enables aboriginal people to plan ahead and improve their quality of life. your relationship with god is your spiritual foundation, and you can only achieve contentment through your spiritual foundation. discussion in this study, we examined self-reports of sr among aboriginal peoples in canada. adhering to a decolonizing methodology, we employed participant engaged thematic analysis from a non-western paradigm (kovach, 2009) to develop a prospective model of sr to help inform the extant literature and treatment and intervention policy. prior to the study, there had been limited empirical documentation of sr among aboriginal peoples. the results of this study, acknowledging its limitations, support that sr from substance abuse is initiated through an ‘awakening’ that is triggered by a traumatic life event. this, in turn, leads to an individual’s abstinence. at the same time, the embracing of aboriginal traditional culture contributes to sr and sustained well-being. this model highlights the need for substance abuse treatment and intervention policy to consider culture as a determinant of health. just as it is important 11 tempier et al.: spontaneous recovery in aboriginal in canada published by scholarship@western, 2011 to understand how recovery is maintained in aboriginal peoples, it is equally important to understand how various individuals come to recovery in the first place (bezdek & spicer, 2006). the finding that major life events leading to sr were ‘traumatic’ in nature for the participants in this study, as well as participants in mohatt et al.’s (2008) study, should be considered alongside the historical impact of colonization upon indigenous peoples globally. this includes the interplay between colonization (i.e., intergenerational trauma) and its etiology in individuals’ sr from substance abuse. additionally, for some participants in mohatt et al.’s (2008) study, their experiences centred on life, through birth (e.g., grandchild), and this should be explored as well. further insight into sr should also be gained from the distinct spiritual experiences expressed by two of the participants in this study and others in mohatt et al.’s (2008) study. they recognize that spirituality cannot be separated from other aspects of the self and cultural being, as it is in western understanding. further inquiry should examine the experience and construction of spirituality and/or a ‘spiritual awakening’ in relation to sr and recovery maintenance in indigenous and other spiritual and religion traditions. the findings build upon earlier research that suggests cognitive appraisal is integral to the sr process (hazel & mohatt, 2001; sobell et al., 1996). primary cognitive appraisal, that is, consideration of the impact on personal well-being, was a direct outcome for the participants by living through a traumatic life event. a unique contribution of this study is that cognitive appraisal extended beyond the self to others and not wanting to cause further harm. this supports an aboriginal understanding of self, which is understood in relation to others (mccormick, 2000). this connection to others was also evident in secondary cognitive appraisal, in which seeking social support and participants’ motivation were key; both are discussed below. this understanding, alongside the two participants’ spiritual experiences, supports a holistic view of recovery that transcends the individual, which is non-characteristic of western bio-medical models of health and wellness (dell et al, 2011). like mohatt et al. (2008), the findings of this study revealed that coping strategies, or secondary cognitive appraisal, were central to the participants’ sr process. secondary cognitive appraisal is understood in the mainstream literature as considering an alternative coping response to substance abuse in reaction to a major life event. all participants in this study chose to seek social support, to varying degrees, as an alternative coping mechanism. the literature identifies the seeking of social support, such as with close family and friends, in a healthy environment as an effective coping strategy from substance abuse (carey et al., 1989; klingemann, 1991; sobell et al., 2000; tuchfeld, 1981; waldorf et al., 1991). interestingly, the participants’ support networks included family and community members, which for some were unresolved sources of pain in their lives. it was also crucial to the participants that their support networks involved aboriginal peoples. likewise, this is identified as important in healing among aboriginal peoples in the work of mccormick (2000) and dell et al. (2010). the participants’ coping strategies provide additional insight into the role of aboriginal traditional culture as a determinant of well-being. the substance abuse literature also highlights the role of motivation in recovery (klingemann, 1991; miller, 1999; sobell et al., 2000). motivation was linked in this study to participants’ consideration of their own well-being and that of others after experiencing a traumatic life event. in support, the work of osher and kofoed (1989) with high complex need patients maintains “a model that combine[s] pragmatically internal and external methods of engagement, persuasion and relapse prevention” (cited in sellman, 2009, p. 9). such an interpretation of motivation in recovery is consistent with the western (connors et al., 2001; klingemann, 1991;) and aboriginal (leung et al., 1993) literature. a new or renewed interest in aboriginal traditional culture was evident in the participants’ experiences of sr and recovery maintenance. as relayed, it is critical to understand these three ‘themes’ from a lateral rather than linear western perspective; within the whole of traditional culture, together they represent ‘one existence.’ this is particularly important in consideration of the extent of available supports and services to aboriginal peoples healing from substance abuse in canada. this finding is also 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.7 congruent with the existing literature, where it is well sourced that cultural understanding is foundational to the well-being of aboriginal peoples and communities (first nations and inuit health branch, 2010; mccormick, 2000). this was evident in historical examples of communal healing, such as in alkali lake, british columbia, hollow water, manitoba, and lac la ronge indian band health services, saskatchewan, where aboriginal traditional culture was the mainstay of their accomplishments. although treatment-specific, as mentioned, the renewal of the national native alcohol and drug abuse treatment system has identified the centrality of culture to service provision. in concert with existing research on recovery from substance abuse, the findings of this study suggest that understanding and recognizing one’s own aboriginal identity is fundamental to sr (gone, 2006; spicer, 2001; westermeyer & neider, 1985). among the participants, redefining their identity was essential to reconciliation with their aboriginal heritage. all claimed to have sought increased aboriginal traditional cultural understanding following their traumatic life event and that it increased their sense of identity. introduction to their aboriginal traditional culture helped participants to regain what was lost through colonization (e.g., residential schooling, child welfare practices, criminalization) and what had directly or indirectly (e.g., intergenerational impacts of trauma) initiated their abuse of substance. smillie-adjarkwa (2009) recognizes the loss of identity as a direct consequence of being unable to practice culture and learn traditional values, among other atrocities imposed upon aboriginal peoples in canada. practicing culture in this study included language, songs, legends, ceremonies, traditions, and art. learning traditional values included exploring the meaning and experience of spirit and spirituality, and incorporating them into one’s life. acknowledging the central place of aboriginal traditional cultural practices and traditional values, together rendering an aboriginal identity, in the experience of sr among a group of aboriginal peoples in canada is an important contribution to the sr literature. limitations of the study this study was limited in four ways, and one additional issue requires specific consideration. firstly, the participants represented their personal experiences and views. the aboriginal community is diverse in canada and among aboriginals in the prairie provinces; different subcultures may report different pathways to sr than those in the current study (baruth & manning, 1991; blue & darou, 2005). implications for future qualitative research include using a stratified sampling selection in which various aboriginal cultures provide a more representative sample. the second related limitation of this study is its limited sample size and convenience sampling method. these constraints curtail the applicability of the findings and their translation into policy. it does, however, provide insight and direction for future research and policy considerations. third, based on the sample, this study was not able to consider sr and maintenance for the different genders; this is a necessary consideration in any future study with a larger sample size. the process of healing, and in particular the role of trauma, is well identified in the literature to be distinct for females and males (covington, 2008). fourth, the retrospective self-reports in this study may be confounded by age and latency of recall, resulting in recall bias. to help reduce this limitation, this study employed well-trained interviewers and experts in the field of addiction and mental health, including aboriginal clinicians involved in the participants’ recovery. central was that the gathering was led by an aboriginal elder. of interest in this study is the finding that all participants experienced sr at a later stage in their lives. this suggests that developmental trends may be a unique moderating condition between critical life events and an ‘awakening.’ in quintero’s (2000) study on the navajo population in the us, he identified an “aging out” phenomenon in which participants were more likely to experience remission with the advancing of age, typically in their late thirties. interestingly, all participants in this study reported experiencing sr during their late thirties and early forties. in addition, it must also be 13 tempier et al.: spontaneous recovery in aboriginal in canada published by scholarship@western, 2011 considered that as age advances, individuals may develop new social and family networks (moos & moos, 2007) that can play a role in their recovery. these points require further attention in future studies. conclusion through the findings of this study, a prospective model of sr was developed that suggests an ‘awakening’ through a traumatic life event leads to abstinence, and that the embracing of aboriginal traditional culture contributes to sr and sustained well-being. this model is a contribution to the limited sr literature and the substance abuse literature generally, which emphasizes that cultural understanding is foundational to the well-being of aboriginal peoples. it can also potentially assist with informing treatment and intervention policy on the interaction between culture, sr, and maintenance. such an understanding contributes to the growing literature that recognizes culture as a key determinant of health and well-being (newbold, 1998; 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(n.d.). the crisis of chronic disease among aboriginal peoples: a challenge for public health, population health and social policy. victoria, bc: university of victoria centre for aboriginal health research. 17 tempier et al.: spontaneous recovery in aboriginal in canada published by scholarship@western, 2011 schnarch, b. (2004). ownership, control, access, and possession (ocap) or self-determination applied to research: a critical analysis of contemporaryfirst nations research and some options for first nations communities. ottawa, on: first nations centre, national aboriginal health organization. sellman, d. (2009). the 10 most important things known about addiction. addiction, 105(1), 6-13. smart, r. (2007). natural recovery or recovery without treatment from alcohol and drug problems as seen from survey data. in h. klingemann & l. c. sobell (eds.), promoting self-change from addictive behaviours (pp. 59-71). new york, ny: springer. smillie-adjarkwa, c. (2009). aboriginal alcohol addiction in ontario canada: a look at the history and current healing methods that are working in breaking the cycle of abuse. indigenous policy journal, 20(3), 1-16. smith, l. h. (1999). decolonizing methodologies: research and indigenous peoples. new york, ny: st. martin’s press. sobell, l. c., cunningham, j. a., & sobell, m. b. (1996). recovery from alcohol problems with and without treatment: prevalence in two population surveys. american journal of public health, 86(7), 966-972. sobell, l. c., ellingstad, t. p., & sobell, m. b. (2000). natural recovery from alcohol and drug problems: methodological review of the research with suggestions for future directions. addiction, 95(5), 749-764. sobell, l. c., sobell, m. b., toneatto, t., & leo, g. i. (1993). what triggers the resolution of alcohol problems without treatment? alcoholism: clinical and experimental research, 17(2), 217-224. spicer, p. (2001). culture and the restoration of self among former american indian drinkers. social science and medicine, 53(2), 227-240. tuchfeld, b. s. (1981). spontaneous remission in alcoholics: empirical observations and theoretical implications. journal of studies on alcohol, 42(7), 626-641. tucker, j. a., vuchinich, r. e., & gladsjo, j. a. (1994). environmental events surrounding natural recovery from alcohol-related problems. journal of studies on alcohol, 55(4), 401-411. vannini, a., & gladue, c. (2008). decolonized methodologies in cross cultural research. in p. liamputtong (ed.), doing cross cultural research: ethical and methodological perspectives. social indicators research series (vol. 34, pp. 137-159). new york, ny: springer. waldorf, d., reinarman, c., & murphy, s. (1991). cocaine changes: the experience of using and quitting. philadelphia, pa: temple university press. westermeyer, j., & neider, j. (1985). cultural affiliation among american indian alcoholics: correlations and change over a ten year period. journal of operational psychiatry, 16(2), 17-23. 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.7 the international indigenous policy journal may 2011 awakening: 'spontaneous recovery’ from substance abuse among aboriginal peoples in canada adrien tempier colleen a. dell elder campbell papequash randy duncan raymond tempier recommended citation awakening: 'spontaneous recovery’ from substance abuse among aboriginal peoples in canada abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license self-change process discussion limitations of the study conclusion references armor, d. j., & meshkoff, j. e. (1983). remission among treated and untreated alcoholics. advances in substance abuse, 3, 239-269. baruth, l. g., & manning, m. l. (1991). multicultural counseling and psychotherapy: a lifespan perspective. new york, ny: merrill. berry, j. w. (1999). aboriginal cultural identity. the canadian journal of native studies, 19(1), 1-36. bezdek, m., & spicer, p. (2006). maintaining abstinence in a northern plains tribe. medical anthropology quarterly, 20(2), 160-181. blue, a., & darou, w. (2005). counselling first nations peoples. in n. arthur & s. collins (eds.), culture-infused counselling: celebrating the canadian mosaic (pp. 303-330). calgary, ab: counselling concepts. brady, m. (1993). giving away the grog: an ethnography of aboriginal drinkers who quit without help. drug and alcohol review, 12, 401-411. canadian institutes of health research. (2008). cihr guidelines for health research involving aboriginal people. retrieved from www.cihr-irsc.gc.ca/e/documents/ethics_aboriginal_guidelines_e.pdf carey, m. p., snel, d. l., carey, k. b., & richards, c. s. (1989). self-initiated smoking cessation: a review of the empirical literature from a stress and coping perspective. cognitive therapy and research, 13(4), 323-341. connors, g., donovan, d., & diclemente, c. (2001). substance abuse treatment and the stages of change. new york, ny: guilford press. cunningham, j. a., sobell, l. s., & sobell, m. b. (1996). are disease and other conceptions of alcohol abuse related to beliefs about outcome and recovery? journal of applied social psychology, 26(9), 773-780. decrop, a. (1999). triangulation in qualitative tourism research. tourism management, 20(1), 157-161. dell, c., kilty, j., fillmore, c., grantham, s., lyons, t., clarke, s., & hopkins, c. (2010). turtle finding fact sheet: the role of the treatment provider in aboriginal women’s healing from illicit drug abuse. retrieved from http://ces4health.info denzin, n. k. (1970). the research act: a theoretical introduction to sociological methods. chicago, il: aldine publishing company. denzin, n. k., & lincoln, y. s. (2008). introduction: the discipline and practice of qualitative research. in n. k. denzin & y. s. lincoln (eds.), the landscape of qualitative research (3rd ed., pp. 1-43). thousand oaks, ca: sage publications. diclemente, c. c. (2003). addiction and change: how addictions develop and addicted people recover. new york, ny: guilford press. elo, s., & kyngas, h. (2008). the qualitative content analysis process. journal of advanced nursing, 62(1), 107-115. first nations addictions advisory panel. (2010). honouring our strengths: a renewed framework to address substance use issues among first nations people in canada. manuscript in preparation. first nations and inuit health branch (fnihb). (2010). evidence-base/mental wellness research forum (ottawa, february 23). retrieved from http://www.nnadaprenewal.ca/sites/www.nnadaprenewal.ca/files/10_03_ 8/en/key%20findings%20nnadap%20renewal%20rese... funk & wagnalls. (1986). standard college dictionary. new york: funk & wagnalls. gone, j. p. (2006). mental health, wellness, and the quest for an authentic american indian identity. in t. m. witko (ed.), mental health care for urban indians: clinical insights from native practitioners (pp. 55-80). klingemann, h. k. h. (1991). the motivation for change from problem alcohol and heroin use. british journal of addiction, 86(6), 727-744. kovach, m. (2009). indigenous methodologies: characteristics, conversations and contexts. toronto, on: university of toronto press. kunitz, s. j., & levy, j. e. (1994). drinking careers: a twenty-five-year study of three navajo populations. new haven, ct: yale university press. miller, w. r. (1999). enhancing motivation for change in substance abuse treatment (treatment improvement protocol (tip) series). rockville, md: u.s. department of health and human services. moos, r. h., & moos, b. s. (2007). protective resources and long-term recovery from alcohol use disorders. drug and alcohol dependence, 86(1), 46-54. newbold, k. b. (1998). problems in search of solutions: health and canadian aboriginals. journal of community health, 23(1), 59-73. niccols, a., dell, c., & clarke, s. (2010). treatment for aboriginal mothers with substance use problems and their children. international journal of mental health and addiction, 8(2), 320-335. osher, f. c., & kofoed (1989). treatment of patients with psychiatric and psychoactive substance abuse disorders. hospital and community psychiatry, 40, 1025-30. quintero, g. (2000). “the lizard in the green bottle:” “aging out” of problem drinking among navajo men. social science & medicine, 51(7), 1031-1045. reading, j. (n.d.). the crisis of chronic disease among aboriginal peoples: a challenge for public health, population health and social policy. victoria, bc: university of victoria centre for aboriginal health research. sellman, d. (2009). the 10 most important things known about addiction. addiction, 105(1), 6-13. smart, r. (2007). natural recovery or recovery without treatment from alcohol and drug problems as seen from survey data. in h. klingemann & l. c. sobell (eds.), promoting self-change from addictive behaviours (pp. 59-71). new york, ny: springer. smillie-adjarkwa, c. (2009). aboriginal alcohol addiction in ontario canada: a look at the history and current healing methods that are working in breaking the cycle of abuse. indigenous policy journal, 20(3), 1-16. smith, l. h. (1999). decolonizing methodologies: research and indigenous peoples. new york, ny: st. martin’s press. sobell, l. c., cunningham, j. a., & sobell, m. b. (1996). recovery from alcohol problems with and without treatment: prevalence in two population surveys. american journal of public health, 86(7), 966-972. sobell, l. c., ellingstad, t. p., & sobell, m. b. (2000). natural recovery from alcohol and drug problems: methodological review of the research with suggestions for future directions. addiction, 95(5), 749-764. sobell, l. c., sobell, m. b., toneatto, t., & leo, g. i. (1993). what triggers the resolution of alcohol problems without treatment? alcoholism: clinical and experimental research, 17(2), 217-224. tuchfeld, b. s. (1981). spontaneous remission in alcoholics: empirical observations and theoretical implications. journal of studies on alcohol, 42(7), 626-641. tucker, j. a., vuchinich, r. e., & gladsjo, j. a. (1994). environmental events surrounding natural recovery from alcohol-related problems. journal of studies on alcohol, 55(4), 401-411. vannini, a., & gladue, c. (2008). decolonized methodologies in cross cultural research. in p. liamputtong (ed.), doing cross cultural research: ethical and methodological perspectives. social indicators research series (vol. 34, pp. 137-159). new york... waldorf, d., reinarman, c., & murphy, s. (1991). cocaine changes: the experience of using and quitting. philadelphia, pa: temple university press. westermeyer, j., & neider, j. (1985). cultural affiliation among american indian alcoholics: correlations and change over a ten year period. journal of operational psychiatry, 16(2), 17-23. introductory essay: canadaâ•žs own brand of truth and reconciliation? the international indigenous policy journal volume 2 issue 3 truth and reconciliation article 1 august 2011 introductory essay: canada’s own brand of truth and reconciliation? joanna r . quinn the university of western ontario, jquinn2@uwo.ca recommended citation quinn, j. r. (2011). introductory essay: canada’s own brand of truth and reconciliation?. the international indigenous policy journal, 2(3) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.3.1 this letter from the editor is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. introductory essay: canada’s own brand of truth and reconciliation? abstract the question of how societies might reach some kind of truth or reconciliation is complicated in post-conflict societies, where physical and social devastation is obvious. yet in so-called “settler” societies, evidence of that kind of devastation, including the gross violation of human rights and blatant abuse, along with the lasting impact of that abuse, remains invisible to many, as outlined by the authors who have contributed to this special edition. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ letter from the guest editor joanna r. quinn introductory essay canada’s own brand of truth and reconciliation? the question of how societies might reach some kind of truth or reconciliation is complicated in post-conflict societies, where physical and social devastation is obvious. yet in socalled “settler” societies, evidence of that kind of devastation, including the gross violation of human rights and blatant abuse, along with the lasting impact of that abuse, remains invisible to many, as outlined by the authors who have contributed to this special edition. the latter is, unfortunately, the case in canada, where the indian residential schools (irs) operated from the 19th century until the last school closed in 1996. under that system, aboriginal children were required to attend schools that would “take the indian out of the child,”1 a form of “aggressive assimilation.”2 nearly 150,000 children of aboriginal, inuit and métis origin were separated from their families and communities and forced to attend the schools.3 there, they suffered unimaginable physical, sexual, and emotional abuse.4 in early 1998, in reporting on the royal commission on aboriginal peoples, then-minister of indian affairs and northern development jane stewart offered “a solemn offer of reconciliation,” which acknowledged the role of the government of canada in the indian residential schools.5 although there had been significant negotiation between aboriginal groups and the churches that had, in many cases, run the schools, the government of canada did very little until it finally signed the indian residential schools settlement agreement in 2006.6 1 ward churchill, kill the indian, save the man (san francisco: city lights books, 2004). among other things, the settlement agreement included the establishment of a truth and reconciliation commission (trc). and in 2008, then-prime minister stephen harper made a “statement of apology,” which stated: “therefore, on behalf of the government of canada and all canadians, i stand before you, in this chamber so central to our life as a country, to apologize to aboriginal 2 cbc news, “a history of residential schools in canada,” [faq on-line]; available from http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/story/2008/05/16/f-faqs-residential-schools.html; accessed 21 april 2011. 3 cbc news, “a history of residential schools in canada.” 4 indian residential school survivors’ society, “history,” [article on-line]; available from http://www.irsss.ca/history/; accessed 21 april 2011. 5 “notes for an address by the honourable jane stewart, minister of indian affairs and northern development, on the occasion of the unveiling of gathering strength — canada’s aboriginal action plan,” ottawa, ontario, january 7 1998, [speech on-line]; available from http://www.aincinac.gc.ca/ai/rqpi/apo/js_spea-eng.asp; accessed 21 april 2011. 6 “a condensed timeline of events,” in from truth to reconciliation: transforming the legacy of residential schools, eds. marlene brant castellano, linda archibald, and mike degagné (ottawa: aboriginal healing foundation, 2008), 64-65. 1 quinn: introductory essay: canada’s own brand of truth and reconciliation? published by scholarship@western, 2011 peoples for canada's role in the indian residential schools system.”7 stanton’s essay in this collection clearly traces the events that led to the creation of the settlement agreement and, eventually, the trc, as well as the lasting damage that was ultimately done by the indian residential schools. the trc of canada was finally appointed on june 1, 2008, with a five-year mandate.8 to acknowledge residential school experiences, impacts, and consequences; that mandate is very clear about the seven goals of the trc: to provide a holistic, culturally appropriate and safe setting for people to come forward; to witness, support, promote and facilitate truth and reconciliation; to promote awareness and public education of canadians about the indian residential schools; to create an historical record of the irs system and its legacy; to produce a report including recommendations; and to support the commemoration of former irs students and their families.9 the trc secretariat has been working to carry out these activities, through a series of national and community events, and through the gathering of statements, as well as through a rigorous research and documentation effort. as the paper by bonner and james in this collection demonstrates, however, the canadian trc is seen by many as a marked departure from truth commissions held in many other places across the globe. for example, it will not hold public hearings where witnesses are compelled to come forward, at least not in the manner that is traditionally understood within the transitional justice scholarship. optimists view this as opening up space for a dialogue without fear of sanction on the part of those who will testify and otherwise provide information. likewise, the trc will not name the names of those who are responsible for the abuses that were carried out. the trc’s mandate prohibits this. even without the naming of names, however, the commission will still be engaged in the gathering of evidence that can help to build a narrative of truth, and that can fill in the many gaps that exist in the historical record. the research that is conducted and received, and the testimony that is gathered, will bring the abuses suffered in the indian residential schools into sharper focus. this information can be of real benefit to the community. the main difficulty is that while the aboriginal community knows all too well what took place in the indian residential schools, the dominant, “settler” community knows precious little—as 7 “prime minister harper offers full apology on behalf of canadians for the indian residential schools system,” 11 june 2008 [speech on-line]; available from http://www.ainc-inac.gc.ca/ai/rqpi/apo/indexeng.asp; accessed 21 april 2011. 8 justice harry laforme was appointed the first commission chair, but resigned in october 2008. claudette dumont-smith and jane brewin morley were appointed as commissioners, and stepped down june 1, 2009. the new chair is justice murray sinclair, and the new commissioners are marie wilson and chief wilton littlechild. 9 “schedule ‘n’: mandate for the truth and reconciliation commission,” indian residential schools agreement; available from http://www.trc.ca/websites/trcinstitution/file/pdfs/schedule_n_en.pdf; accessed 31 may 2011. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 3 [2011], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.3.1 stanton points out in her essay, the dominant community was never consulted in the settlement agreement process. the stories that are emerging from the work of the trc are simply not reaching the dominant community. for all the speeches, the remarks, and the agreements signed, the sum total does not seem to have impacted the wider canadian society in any way. it is confounding that a developed society such as canada has had no real uptake of these important issues, the recognition of which might spark the beginnings of a real transition within the broader society. czyzewski points out in her essay in this collection that the trc’s educative function does not yet seem to have had any broad impact—nor has it lead to what bonner and james call “reframing”. as czyzewski notes, “if indigenous peoples are opening up and sharing painful stories to inactive ears, or not being heard at all, who is doing the transforming?” canadians still seem wilfully unaware of these events. the lasting impact of the trc on the aboriginal community as a whole in canada is astonishingly small. the government of canada seems not to be prepared to alleviate the problems that the indian residential schools system created, including unfulfilled treaty obligations, the nonrecognition of rights, re-writing the indian act, re-working the department of indian and northern affairs, and other development-related issues. the government is reluctant, even, to engage with aboriginal peoples in a meaningful dialogue about what the issues are that are most important.10 the real benefit of the trc process can and should be the acknowledgement and recognition of what happened in the indian residential schools system—by the community from which the abuses were perpetrated. czyzewski’s argument about knowing the other’s experience, demonstrates exactly that. my own work in the area of acknowledgement11 and recognition has demonstrated the acute need for this kind of acknowledgement, and how it can contribute to the social well-being of communities and the broader society. it is important for people in all parts of the broader society to begin to support the work of the trc, by promoting a deeper understanding of what it can do, how it might begin to do that, and by engaging in its activities. 10 christian aboriginal infrastructure developments, “meaningful consultation in canada: the alternative to forced aboriginal assimilation,” [submission to government of canada on-line]; available from http://caid.ca/meacon092409.pdf; accessed 21 april 2011. 11 joanna r. quinn, the politics of acknowledgement: truth commissions in uganda and haiti. vancouver: ubc press, 2010. 3 quinn: introductory essay: canada’s own brand of truth and reconciliation? published by scholarship@western, 2011 the international indigenous policy journal august 2011 introductory essay: canada’s own brand of truth and reconciliation? joanna r. quinn recommended citation introductory essay: canada’s own brand of truth and reconciliation? abstract creative commons license introductory essay: canadaâ•žs own brand of truth and reconciliation? pathways to higher education for native hawaiian individual development account participants the international indigenous policy journal volume 4 issue 4 educational pathways of indigenous learners article 1 october 2013 pathways to higher education for native hawaiian individual development account participants david w. rothwell mcgill university, david.rothwell@mcgill.ca recommended citation rothwell, d. w. (2013). pathways to higher education for native hawaiian individual development account participants. the international indigenous policy journal, 4(4) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj?utm_source=ir.lib.uwo.ca%2fiipj%2fvol4%2fiss4%2f1&utm_medium=pdf&utm_campaign=pdfcoverpages http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4?utm_source=ir.lib.uwo.ca%2fiipj%2fvol4%2fiss4%2f1&utm_medium=pdf&utm_campaign=pdfcoverpages http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4?utm_source=ir.lib.uwo.ca%2fiipj%2fvol4%2fiss4%2f1&utm_medium=pdf&utm_campaign=pdfcoverpages http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/1?utm_source=ir.lib.uwo.ca%2fiipj%2fvol4%2fiss4%2f1&utm_medium=pdf&utm_campaign=pdfcoverpages pathways to higher education for native hawaiian individual development account participants abstract as the cost of higher education rises, a growing body of theory and research suggests that asset holding in the form of savings and net worth positively influence education expectations and outcomes. native hawaiians, like other indigenous peoples, have disproportionately low college enrollment and graduation rates tied to a history of colonization. using data from an individual development account (ida) program for native hawaiians, i examine the trajectories through the program and find: (a) welfare receipt and unemployment reduces the chances of ida enrollment; (b) net worth increases the probability of ida graduation; and (c) ida graduates were more likely to gain a college degree over time compared to non-graduates. the study provides empirical evidence to the debate on asset-based interventions for indigenous peoples. keywords native hawaiian, assets, individual development account, post-secondary education, social development acknowledgments i extend thanks to jennifer loiacono for excellent research assistance. thanks to jamie omori and alu like, bank of hawaii, and the hawaii community foundation for providing funding for the wave 2 survey and to bob agres and hacbed for the opportunity to learn about and work in asset-based community development. finally, mahalo to ida participants. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ pathways to higher education for native hawaiian individual development account participants native hawaiians face numerous contemporary social problems that are deeply rooted in the history and process of colonization. one of the key issues facing the fast-growing native hawaiian population is the disproportionately lower rate of higher educational attainment. matched savings programs have been implemented in several contexts to promote long-term asset accumulation. presently, there is rather limited knowledge about how asset-based programs affect indigenous participants who aspire to higher education. this study examines enrollment, graduation, and college degree attainment outcomes for a large matched savings program that served native hawaiians in the early 2000s. background and context native hawaiians are defined here as individuals with ancestry traceable to the hawaiian islands prior to the arrival of captain james cook in 1778. the colonization process that ensued introduced a foreign political system that eventually overturned the hawaiian monarchy. subsequent policy changes effectively restructured hawaiian land rights, as well as the hawaiian school system. this rapid shift left many native hawaiians stripped of land, language, and culture (benham, 1996; boutilier, 1992). presently, native hawaiian and other pacific islanders (nhpi) experience disproportionately high poverty rates in the united states. nationally, census data showed that 21.5% of nhpis experienced poverty in the previous 12 months (united states census bureau, 2011a). in hawai’i, where most of the nhpi population resides, nhpis have the highest poverty rate, at 21.1%, among the ethnic categories measured. this poverty rate is nearly double the rate for whites (11.4%) and even higher compared to asians (7.0%) (united states census bureau, 2011b). this reality is intricately linked with low-wage employment, large family size, and low educational attainment (pobutsky, bradbury, & tomiyasu, 2011). education and native hawaiians native hawaiians have a long tradition of valuing formal learning and education. prior to colonization, parents strongly supported children’s education, largely through oral comprehension and transmission of knowledge (chun, 2005). the education systems, like other aspects of society, changed radically with colonization. the education policy of colonization was heavily influenced by christian values whereby schools were the instrument for assimilation (benham, 1996, 2004; boutilier, 1992). educators and policy makers rationalized that native hawaiian children deserved universal education that would prepare them for the labor market. education in english was seen as key part of the education process. in june of 1896, act 57 of the constitution of the republic of hawai’i established english as the official language of the public school system. this change systematically eroded hawaiian sovereignty (benham, 1996, 2006; ofahengaue vakalahi, 2011). since the 1960s, a native hawaiian cultural renaissance has occurred with strong efforts to shift the education system to be more culturally responsive and rooted in native hawaiian context and values. the importance placed on education continues today: more than 4 in 5 households expect their children to continue studies beyond high school (thomas, kana‘iaupuni, balutski, & freitas, 2012). this value in education starts early in the life cycle with parents highly committed to early learning. kaomea (2012) documented the nature of native hawaiian parental involvement in early childhood education. 1 rothwell: idas and higher education for native hawaiians published by scholarship@western, 2013 nevertheless, there are serious challenges to educational achievement for native hawaiians. for example, the native hawaiian functional illiteracy rate was 30%, much higher than the overall state average of 19% (tibbetts, 1999). more recently, a 2005 assessment showed a gap of 10 percentile points in reading and math for native hawaiian students compared to state averages on achievement test scores (kana‘iaupuni, malone, & ishibashi, 2005). according to recent data from the state of hawai’i department of education, native hawaiians have the lowest timely high school graduation rates of the major ethnic groups in the state: 70% of native hawaiians graduate in four years compared to 78% for all others in the state (kamehameha schools, 2009). further, native hawaiians lag behind state averages in math by 6 to 10 percentile points and in reading by 6 to 9 percentile points (kamehameha schools, 2009). the 2010 census data reveal that 20% of who identify as nhpi, either alone or in combination with other races, have a bachelor’s degree or higher compared to 31% of whites (u.s. department of health and human services, 2011). these disparities suggest difficult challenges in the trajectories to higher education for native hawaiians. higher education in hawai’i studies across ethnic groups reveal gaps in higher education for native hawaiians. asian american and native hawaiian youth are overrepresented (18%) in the community college system and underrepresented (8%) in the four-year university system (orsuwan, 2011). additionally, higher education retention rates are low among native hawaiians. in 2003, the university of hawai’i reported that approximately 65% of native hawaiian youth attending community college dropout within three years. among those who do not dropout within three years, only 15% go on to earn a degree (hagedorn, lester, moon, & tibbetts, 2006). in hawai’i, the ratio of four-year degree enrollment among native hawaiians compared to chinese was .66:1 and was .50:1 compared to japanese (kana‘iaupuni et al., 2005). nationally, 10.6% of adult native hawaiians have a bachelor’s degree, compared to 17.7% of the total u.s. population (united states census bureau, 2011a). in 2010, the percentage of native hawaiians with a graduate degree was less than half that of the whites (11.7%) (u.s. department of health and human services, 2011). since hawai’i became a state in 1959, the federal government has engaged in a number of initiatives to address the education gap among native hawaiians. among other efforts, the native hawaiian education act (nhea) of 1988, which was reauthorized in 2002, established a council to coordinate, assess, and make recommendations for improving education among native hawaiians (thomas et al., 2012). in addition to the native hawaiian education council, the nhea has aimed to link native hawaiians to federal, state, and local supports, enhance and develop innovative educational programs, and encourage native hawaiian people to get involved in the development and implementation of education (native hawaiian education council, 2013). few studies have sought to understand the mechanisms explaining relatively low post-secondary retention and graduation rates among native hawaiians. a number of potential factors are worthy of consideration. many attribute the observed education gaps to systemic factors, both historical and contemporary, such as economic, political, and educational policies that marginalize native hawaiians (benham, 2006; castagno & brayboy, 2008; kawakami, 1999; warikoo & carter, 2009). life events, such as family caregiving, parenthood, unexpected medical problems, play a role in disrupting the educational trajectory through higher education for native hawaiians as they do for other indigenous 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.1 groups (ives et al., 2012). a 1988 study by the university of hawai’i found “a lack of self-identification with the college, a non-supportive campus environment, and inadequate childcare” as barriers to vocational academic success (cited in hagedorn et al., 2006, p. 25). in addition to these factors, financing higher education is a great concern. according to thomas and colleagues (2012), a majority of university students cited paying for college as “the most challenging and stressful aspect of college enrollment” (p. 358). one respondent explained, “pretty much i had to work and had a job all through college to pay for it… when the tuition started getting up to three, four, and five grand, then i had to work full-time” (thomas et al., 2012, p. 358). the cost of attending college has increased much faster than inflation. for example, in the first decade of the twenty first century, the cost of undergraduate tuition, room, and board at u.s. public institutions rose 42 percent (national center for education statistics, 2013). to cover these costs, many students take on student loans. federally, legislation such as the 2010 health care and education reconciliation act has reformed student loan repayment requirements. despite these actions, up-front costs of higher education are expected to rise. interventions to promote higher education for native hawaiians must address the financial aspects of university enrollment. assets and education starting in the late 1980s, social welfare researchers began focusing on the importance of economic resources beyond household income such as assets and net worth. assets are typically described as financial or non-financial. non-financial assets are real assets such as land, buildings, homes, and education. financial assets include liquid money in savings and checking accounts, retirement funds, investment bonds, and equities. assets have been shown to be important for educational trajectories in numerous ways. first, asset holding appears to have positive psychological impacts, such as expectations that children would attend college (kim, sherraden, & clancy, 2013). others explained that asset accumulation might provide the conditions necessary to shape a college-bound identity (oyserman, 2013). the identity-based motivation (ibm) theory asserts that assets increase one’s personal expectations, either for their own future or for their children’s future. for instance, if a youth knows that they will have the resources to attend post-secondary education then they are more likely to develop a self-image or personal identity that includes a school-focused orientation. thus, in some scenarios, assets can make higher education more feasible and change how people, including children, plan for their future (elliott & sherraden, 2013; sherraden, 1991). the empirical evidence has shown that holding financial assets seems to be associated with increased chances of college enrollment: 55% of adolescents without savings failed to attend college after high school graduation compared to only 26% of similar adolescents who had savings (elliott & beverly, 2011). similarly, for college graduation, loke (2013) reported that having a net worth greater than zero had a positive significant relationship with college graduation. individual development accounts the individual development account (idas) is an intervention that promotes short-term savings and long-term asset development (sherraden, 1991). funds accrued in idas can be used to purchase a home, pay for post-secondary education, or invest in small businesses. idas were introduced in legislation passed under the assets for independence act (afia) in 1998, which included over $150 3 rothwell: idas and higher education for native hawaiians published by scholarship@western, 2013 million dollars annually to support ida-type programs. ida programs are usually administered by community-based non-profits with accounts owned at local financial institutions. ida-style matched saving mechanisms have been implemented in several countries, including canada (learn$ave), south korea, the united kingdom, singapore, and uganda, among others (loke & sherraden, 2009). in the u.s., ida participants usually work with case managers to choose a target savings goal, make monthly deposits, and attend financial education classes. as in other matched-savings programs, such as retirement plans, accumulated ida savings are matched with government and philanthropic funds, usually with ratios anywhere from 1:1 to 7:1. when participants reach their target saving goal, their savings are withdrawn with the additional matched ida subsidy and used to purchase the identified asset goal (schreiner & sherraden, 2007). idas offer several attractive features. the institutional structure of idas encourages incremental saving (schreiner & sherraden, 2007). this feature is guided by the theory that institutional structures, like rules, incentives, and subsidies, help individuals save beyond their usual savings thresholds (beverly & sherraden, 1999; han, grinstein-weiss, & sherraden, 2009). the matched subsidy increases returns and makes asset-based goals more attainable by helping funds accrue faster (schreiner & sherraden, 2007). for education savers, the logic is that idas build a pool of financial assets that can ease the financial burdens of post-secondary education (e.g., tuition costs, computer and software, fees, etc.). effectively, the education savings distribute the financial responsibility between the student, their family, and federal and state governments (elliott & sherraden, 2013). in comparison to home and business ida savings, scholars have noted that the potential for idas to promote higher education has not been realized because post-secondary institutions have sometimes been reluctant to cooperate with community organizations that administer idas (kezar, lester, & yang, 2010). who applies and enrolls in idas? ida programs are selective in that only those who are aware, interested, and motivated apply to and enroll in the program. there are no known studies of how ida participants compare to the low-income population. some have examined how enrollees compare to the general low-income population. for example, grinstein-weiss, yeo, despard, casalotti, and zhan (2010) found that, compared to a representative population of the low-income population, ida participants were more likely to be female, black, single, and urban residents with higher levels of education and were more likely to be employed full-time. rothwell and han (2010) examined the differences of native hawaiian ida applicants who applied, but did not enroll for the entire program. they reported that children in the household and saving for education increased the risk of having “second thoughts” about participation. vehicle ownership and positive net worth was associated with a reduced probability of second thoughts. matched withdrawals from idas. previous research has examined the process of dropping out of the ida program. one study defined “dropout” as having total saving of less than $100 throughout the duration of the program (schreiner & sherraden, 2005). using data from the 14 sites of the american dream demonstration project, schreiner and sherraden (2005) reported that income and welfare receipt was not related to dropout. compared to not owning assets, owning several types of assets reduced the risk of dropping out (e.g., checking and savings accounts, home with mortgage, free and clear car ownership, and financial investments) (schreiner & sherraden, 2005). additionally, program design features such as match rate and direct deposit reduced the likelihood of dropping out in that 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.1 study. using the same data from the 14 add sites, others have defined dropout as not making a matched withdrawal from the program and examined the role of bank account ownership (yeo, despard, casalotti, zhan, & grinstein-weiss, 2010). the findings show a clear connection between participants who enrolled with a bank account compared to those without: bank account owners had higher average deposits ($22.24 compared to $19.49), more frequent deposits (.52 compared to .38), and less frequency of dropout (25% compared to 50%). in multivariate models, bank account ownership and education (college graduate vs. no high school) were negatively associated with dropout (or = .58 and .41, respectively). employment status was not statistically significantly related to dropout. a recent study on the $ave nyc program also examined a similar form of dropout, referred to in the article as account closure (manturuk, dorrance, & riley, 2012). the key finding was that a one-point increase in financial hardship (measured by difficulty paying for food, housing, utilities, or medical care) was associated with a 24% increase in the hazard function for account closure. long-term educational outcomes. the best evidence of the long-term impact on post-secondary education comes from the longitudinal evaluation of a randomized ida experiment. after 10 years, there was a statistically significant impact on education enrollment for ida participants compared to non-participants and a strong positive effect on increased educational attainment for men but not women (grinstein-weiss et al., 2013). very little is known about long-term outcomes among indigenous ida participants. rothwell (2011) examined the long-term influence of ida participation on native hawaiian ida participants. using a longitudinal quasi-experimental design comparing participants to non-participants, he reported a strong ida effect on attaining a college degree and net worth, but no influence on business ownership. there are no known studies of the long-term influence of idas on indigenous education savers. method research questions this study examines the chronological trajectories through a large ida program for native hawaiian participants who were saving for post-secondary education. three critical steps are examined: enrollment, graduation, and long-term education. as such, the study is guided by three research questions: a. among education savers within a large ida program, what are the demographic factors associated with program enrollment (participation)? b. of those who enrolled, some graduated and some didn’t. what are the demographic and institutional factors associated with graduation among education savers? c. what are the factors associated with post-secondary education graduation over the longterm? the findings presented are important for indigenous policymakers and other stakeholders so they will understand which types of individuals may be best suited to participate in ida programs designed to promote post-secondary education. further and equally important, the findings fill gaps in knowledge about which types of participants are at-risk of either not enrolling or not graduating within the program. 5 rothwell: idas and higher education for native hawaiians published by scholarship@western, 2013 the ida program the study used data collected from an ida program that ran from 1999 to 2005. the program was administered by a statewide non-profit community-based social services program operating in five hawaiian islands and funded by numerous private sector, government, and community partners. the agency, established in 1975, is well-known in the native hawaiian community and provides a host of services such as community economic development, business assistance, employment preparation, training, and library services. this particular ida program was among a number of first generation idas funded by the assets for independence act (afia). today, afia continues to be the main source of funding for national ida programs. at the time, the ida program under study was considerably larger than the national average with 550 opened ida accounts compared to the afia average of 90 accounts per program (department of health and human services, 2006). the new ida program was marketed via the agency’s professional networks. recruitment took place by word of mouth and professional referral both within the agency and from other social service agencies. interested persons then applied to the program. in the application phase, participants met with case managers and completed background information forms. applicants identified their asset goals as firsttime home purchase, post-secondary education fees, business, or home repair. of the 780 individuals who applied to the program, 550 eventually enrolled by opening an ida savings account. participants were offered individualized case management and financial literacy classes targeted to their specific savings goal. participants were eligible for the matched withdrawal if they made at least a minimum monthly deposit of $10 and fulfilled other obligations. participants could miss up to three minimum monthly deposits per year. education savers in the program were eligible to receive a 2:1 matched rate. matched rates were capped at $500 per year for two years. upon opening an account, participants established a monthly savings goal based on the maximum match cap over the course of the program. for example, the match cap was set at $1,000 for post-secondary education. therefore, a typical monthly savings goal would be the match cap divided by the total number of months in program (i.e., total months in program = 24 and, therefore, a typical monthly savings goal would be $42). based on this, and upon meeting program requirements, savings of up to $1,000 would be matched with a subsidy of $2,000, for a total matched withdrawal of $3,000 paid directly to the vendor. for the education savers, the most common payee was a university to cover some of the costs associated with tuition and fees. participants participants were recruited via advertisement and referral from local social service providers on each hawaiian island: hawai’i, kaua’i, moloka’i, maui, and o’ahu. in the application stage, participants provided proof of hawaiian ancestry, verified by birth certificate. eligibility was based on reported household incomes at 200% or below the federal poverty line and assets worth approximately $10,000 or less, excluding the value of the primary residence and one vehicle. households that received temporary aid for needy families (tanf) or who were eligible for the earned income tax credit (eitc) automatically met the income eligibility criteria for the program. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.1 data collection data was collected at the application and enrollment stages on a rolling basis between 1999 and 2003. applicants were asked to complete a 49-item participant background information form that assessed demographic characteristics, income, assets, and liabilities. at the time of application, participants signed a consent form for their information to be used in subsequent program evaluations. in 2008, a multimodal follow-up survey of ida participants was conducted, referred to here as wave 2. the 2008 study was given exempt status from the university of hawai’i committee on human studies. measures i examined three outcome variables. first, enrollment was the process of officially joining the program by opening an account, which was measured dichotomously (1/0). of the 225 education savers who applied to the program, 87 did not enroll for reasons unknown to the program staff. the second outcome variable was matched withdrawal for post-secondary education purposes, which was measured dichotomously (1/0). of the 138 participants who saved in the program, 45 made matched withdrawals. matched withdrawal is referred to here as graduation. the third outcome variable was measured over time as a gain in post-secondary degree and was measured dichotomously (1/0). participants who gained a college degree between the time of enrollment and the wave 2 survey were represented as 1 and compared to those who did not gain a post-secondary degree over the same time interval (coded as 0). several independent variables were included. these variables were measured at the time of application to the program. continuous variables included age at the time of enrollment, household size, and years of education. an income-to-needs ratio was calculated as total household income adjusted by the poverty threshold. therefore, a household living at the poverty threshold was scored 1. when income surpassed the poverty threshold, the income-to-needs ratio was positive and vice-versa. the benefit of the ratio is that it includes income and poverty status in one measure while adjusting for household size. categorical variables included female (1/0), married (1/0), and receipt of temporary aid for needy families (tanf). full-time employment status was dummy coded for full-time or more. to examine the influence of assets, a net worth variable was created. net worth was calculated as total financial and non-financial assets minus total debts. an inverse hyperbolic sine (ihs) transformation was applied to the net worth variable to address heavy skewness. the ihs is calculated via the following: 𝑖ℎ𝑠   𝑥 = log 𝑥! + 1 + x   where x is reported net worth. compared to the standard natural log transformation, the ihs transformation maintains negative and zero values while addressing the non-normality of the distribution (friedline, masa, & chowa, 2012). the origins and applications of the ihs are fully outlined by pence (2006). analysis a series of four multivariate logistic regression models were produced to address the first two research questions on enrollment and graduation. a linear spline was introduced for the net worth variables in 7 rothwell: idas and higher education for native hawaiians published by scholarship@western, 2013 models 2 and 4. the purpose of using spline regression is to analyze the non-linear relationship between net worth and the dependent variables. several knots were established and compared using procedures outlined by royston and sauerbrei (2007). ultimately, two knots were chosen that divided the distribution into three segments: the lower category from lowest net worth to -$2,210 (ihs value -8.39), the middle category from -$2,209 to $2,000 (ihs value 8.29), and the upper category at $2,001 and higher. bivariate descriptive statistics are reported to address the third research question. nullhypothesis significance testing was not appropriate for these bivariate relationships due to low statistical power. results table 1 presents descriptive information on the sample at enrollment. bivariate analyses (chi-square test for categorical variables; one-way analysis of variance for continuous variables) indicated statistically significant differences (p < .05) between enrollees and non-enrollees. welfare receipt in the past was more prevalent among non-enrollees (n = 60; 72%) compared to enrollees (n = 61; 48%). the difference between enrollees and non-enrollees was apparent along employment: whereas 31% (n = 39) of enrollees worked full-time, only 11% (n = 9) of the non-enrollees worked full-time. the distribution of net worth was considerably higher among enrollees (median = $160) compared to non-enrollees ($0; p = .05). table 2 shows results from multivariate logistic regression model predicting enrollment in the ida program. the sample size was reduced from 218 to 184 after accounting for missing variables. the first model was significantly different from zero (χ2, [df = 9, n = 184] = 30.83, p < .01). i found that full-time employment and receipt of tanf (welfare) were significantly associated with program enrollment after application. those who were employed full-time compared to unemployed were nearly 4 times (or = 3.97) more likely to enroll. similarly, those who had a history of tanf receipt were less likely than those without a history to enroll (or = .31). net worth was added in model 2 (χ2, [df = 12, n = 184] = 34.74, p < .01). with the addition of the net worth variables, the relationships between employment status and welfare receipt remained unchanged. a one-unit change in net worth was not statistically significantly related to enrollment for any of the three groups created via the regression splines. a loglikelihood ratio test of the two models revealed no significant increase in the model’s ability to predict enrollment. additional models were run to assess the influence of categorical asset ownership such as home ownership, stocks and investments, checking account, and savings account. these variables had no meaningful relationship to the enrollment process and did not add significantly to the model (results available upon request). 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.1 table 1. descriptive statistics by enrollment variable not enrolled n = 84 enrolled n = 134 test statistic age m sd 29.5 (9.97) 27 (11.68) n.s. female n % 71 (85) 99 (74) n.s. married n % 27 (33) 35 (26) n.s. household size m sd 4 (1.97) 4 (1.98) n.s. years of education m sd 12.69 (1.26) 12.51 (1.22) n.s. employed full-time n % 9 (11) 39 (31) χ2 = 11*** tanf history n % 60 (72) 61 (48) χ2 = 12.5*** income-to-needs ratio m sd .98 (.48) 1.13 (.61) f = 3.27* net worth mdn $ 0 (14,488) 160 (60,493) f = 5.81* note. * p < 0.05, ** p < 0.01, *** p < 0.001, n.s. = not significant 9 rothwell: idas and higher education for native hawaiians published by scholarship@western, 2013 table 2. multivariate logistic regression model predicting ida enrollment model 1 2 age 1.015 1.012 [0.984, 1.048] [0.979, 1.045] female 0.666 0.631 [0.266, 1.670] [0.248, 1.606] married (ref. non-married) 0.499 0.483 [0.225, 1.105] [0.215, 1.087] household size 1.162 1.139 [0.966, 1.398] [0.945, 1.372] years of education 0.944 0.962 [0.729, 1.223] [0.737, 1.255] employed full-time (ref. other employment) 3.967** 3.964** [1.636, 9.620] [1.621, 9.696] tanf history 0.307** 0.361* [0.145, 0.647] [0.166, 0.784] income-to-needs ratio 1.267 1.047 [0.674, 2.382] [0.526, 2.082] net worth 1: < $2,210 1.016 [0.599, 1.725] net worth 2: $2,211 > and ≤ $2,000 0.993 [0.567, 1.740] net worth 3: > $2,000 1.515 [0.829, 2.768] aic 234.3 236.4 n 184 184 note. exponentiated coefficients; 95% confidence intervals in brackets. * p < 0.05, ** p < 0.01, *** p < 0.001 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.1 a third model was run to predict graduation once enrolled in the program among the 138 education savers (table 3). the final model was reduced to 111 observations after listwise deletion of missing data. the model was significantly different from a null model at predicting ida graduation (χ2, [df = 9, n = 111] = 17.78, p < .05). again, being employed full-time was strongly related to graduation. whereas fulltime employment increased the probability of enrollment, i found that, compared to the “other” employment category, those who were employed full-time were less likely to graduate (or = .27). a fourth model was produced that was significantly different than a null model (χ2, [df = 12, n = 111] = 25.21, p < .01). the use of the spline regression indicated a non-linear relationship between net worth and ida graduation. the coefficients represent the change in the slope from the preceding interval (statacorp., 2009); therefore, net worth accumulation through the low net worth section of the distribution was associated with a lower likelihood of graduation (or = .38). a percent increase in net worth through the next segment of the distribution was associated with increased odds of matched withdrawal (or = 2.72). above the upper spline knot threshold, a percent increase in net worth was not statistically significantly associated with a matched withdrawal. a log-likelihood ratio test of the difference between models revealed that model 4 was a modest improvement over model 3 (p = .06). additional models assessing the influence of categorical asset variables on matched withdrawal were tested but did not yield statistically significant results (results not shown but available by request). next, i examined data for the 53 program participants who saved for education in the ida program and completed the wave 2 survey. in total, 15 participants (28%) gained a college degree over time. descriptive analysis comparing participants who had gained college degrees to those who did not showed that college degree gainers were younger on average (28.15 compared to 31.55) and had higher income to needs ratios (1.38 compared to 1.09). further, 46.67 percent (n = 7) of the college degree gainers had received tanf in the past compared to 54.05 percent (n = 20) in the group who did not gain a degree. among the 53 survey responders, 22 were ida program graduates. importantly, among the 22 ida graduates, 40% (n = 9) earned a college degree. this is much higher than the 19% (n = 6) of program non-graduates who also gained a college degree. discussion like indigenous populations worldwide, native hawaiians face large gaps in educational attainment. similar to other indigenous groups, native hawaiians actively struggle to maintain historical connections to land, language, and culture (thomas et al., 2012). in this study, i examine factors associated with enrollment and graduation from a matched saving program serving native hawaiians who saved for higher education. this is the first known study specifically on ida-related educational outcomes for native participants. further, the study is unique because it follows participants on average five years after enrollment to explore factors associated with college degree attainment. results from this study have a number of implications for indigenous policymaking in other contexts. 11 rothwell: idas and higher education for native hawaiians published by scholarship@western, 2013 table 3. multivariate logistic model predicting ida graduation model 3 4 age 0.981 0.971 [0.942, 1.020] [0.929, 1.014] female 0.890 0.892 [0.312, 2.542] [0.300, 2.654] married (ref. non-married) 1.449 1.641 [0.484, 4.341] [0.499, 5.391] household size 0.858 0.847 [0.673, 1.093] [0.654, 1.097] years of education 1.158 1.117 [0.820, 1.636] [0.767, 1.627] employed full-time (ref. other employment) 0.268* 0.218** [0.0961, 0.749] [0.0721, 0.657] tanf history 0.610 0.605 [0.246, 1.508] [0.229, 1.597] income-to-needs ratio 2.552* 1.923 [1.123, 5.796] [0.755, 4.898] net worth 1: < $2210 0.378* [0.158, 0.901] net worth 2: $2211 > and ≤ $2000 2.725* [1.079, 6.881] net worth 3: > $2000 1.397 [0.795, 2.453] aic 140.1 138.7 n 111 111 note. exponentiated coefficients; 95% confidence intervals in brackets * p < 0.05, ** p < 0.01, *** p < 0.001 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.1 findings raise questions about access to interventions that promote higher education. specifically, interventions need to reach the more socio-economic challenged segments of the population. after controlling for other variables, the full-time employed and those who had never received tanf were more likely to actually enroll in the ida program compared to applicants who did not work full-time and who had received tanf. it is possible that many people heard of the program and completed the initial paperwork, but, after the application, they likely had second thoughts about participating. these findings largely align with the only other study of the full-program enrollment data (rothwell & han, 2010). surprisingly, the net worth variables were not related to program enrollment. in this article, we gain a better understanding of the characteristics associated with program success. while employment was negatively associated with graduation, the income-to-needs ratio was positively related to matched withdrawal: the higher the income-to-needs ratio the more likely individuals were to graduate from the program. this counters some previous research on ida savings performance that found income to not be related to average monthly saving deposits or drop-out (schreiner & sherraden, 2005, 2007). those involved in planning education interventions for indigenous populations are encouraged to consider income and employment status. the examination of net worth on educational trajectories in this study is a contribution to the literature. persons with negative net worth (in this study below -$2,000) may face difficulties to save. it is possible that participants prioritized paying down urgent debts before setting aside money into the savings account, which is a rational behavior in many scenarios. further, the results for the middle of the net worth distribution indicate that households with zero net-worth plus or minus a few thousand dollars are perhaps best positioned to take advantage of the opportunities provided in matched savings programs. the study uses longitudinal data to examine the percentage of participants who gained college degrees over time. in this small sample, those who graduated from the program were much more likely to gain a college degree compared to non-graduates. the large differences, while not definitive, are suggestive that saving in an ida program may play a positive influence on post-secondary education gain among some indigenous groups. limitations this study is limited by many of the methodological challenges facing applied research. the study was retrospective; as such, the administrative data used contained only basic demographic and economic variables. as a result, there is considerable variance in the models predicting enrollment and graduation that goes unexplained. better information on psychological, social, and environmental factors is needed. because of selection bias (participants self-selected into the program), we cannot conclude the ida caused the college degree gain (findings are suggestive). it is plausible that characteristics associated with program enrollment are highly correlated with college degree obtainment. this could be overcome in the future with the implementation of random assignment to a treatment and control group. further, it would be valuable to know how the matched withdrawal was actually used (e.g., for university tuition, computer, textbooks, etc.). unfortunately, these records were not comprehensively collected and recorded by program staff. 13 rothwell: idas and higher education for native hawaiians published by scholarship@western, 2013 implications this study shows that certain segments of the target population are benefitting from this education intervention while others are not. this problem is not exclusive to native hawaiians. to be more effective, matched savings programs targeting higher education need to reach persons with complex socioeconomic histories of unemployment and welfare receipt. for interventions that are selective with eligibility criteria, the recruitment process plays an essential role in reaching the most disadvantaged. in some scenarios, it may be possible to provide universal access to a population. however, universal access requires considerable administrative start-up effort and may not be financially and politically feasible (see for example, the uk’s abandoned attempt to provide a universal child trust fund). further, it seems programs might focus on net worth as a particularly important barrier to program graduation. based on over 15 years of ida implementation and research in the us, it has been established that, given the right institutional supports, the poor can and do save (schreiner & sherraden, 2007). such interventions, implemented in culturally relevant ways, have the potential to promote social development among indigenous populations (rothwell, 2011). however, additional prospective research is needed to better understand the extent to which idas promote asset accumulation and goal attainment over the long-term (richards & thyer, 2011). given the unique histories and socioeconomic exclusion, research is critically needed to examine the unique trajectories experienced by indigenous participants. this study provides suggestive longitudinal evidence that the ida program benefitted native hawaiian education savers. moving forward, there is a great need to understand the “black box” of this and similar interventions. qualitative perspectives may provide great insight into this process. one recent paper explores the perceived impacts of ida participation among native hawaiians with some commenting favorably on the hawaiian-specific cultural adaptations that were made within the program (rothwell, bhaiji, & blumenthal, 2013). there is a great need to better understand what may be unique about the indigenous aspects of such asset-based programs. which institutional features work for which populations under specific settings? better empirical research on matched savings can inform the active debate on aboriginal post-secondary savings accounts proposed in canada (helin, 2006). the affordability of higher education is a major barrier for many populations. economic resources such as financial assets influence how people finance college. matched savings programs—while not a panacea—represent one of many promising interventions to promote higher education and reduce educational disparities. to be more effective, matched savings programs for indigenous participants must better 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(2010). does prior banking experience matter? differences of the banked and unbanked in individual development accounts. journal of family and economic issues, 31(2), 212 – 227. 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.1 the international indigenous policy journal october 2013 pathways to higher education for native hawaiian individual development account participants david w. rothwell recommended citation pathways to higher education for native hawaiian individual development account participants abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license pathways to higher education for native hawaiian individual development account participants health care and aboriginal seniors in urban canada: helping a neglected class the international indigenous policy journal volume 2 issue 1 health and well-being article 10 may 2011 health care and aboriginal seniors in urban canada: helping a neglected class bonita beulah beatty university of saskatchewan department of native studies, bonita.beatty@usask.ca loleen berdahl university of saskatchewan, loleen.berdahl@usask.ca recommended citation beatty, b. b. , berdahl, l. (2011). health care and aboriginal seniors in urban canada: helping a neglected class. the international indigenous policy journal, 2(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.10 this research is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. health care and aboriginal seniors in urban canada: helping a neglected class abstract canadian researchers and policymakers have paid limited attention to the health care needs of aboriginal seniors. this lack of attention is problematic, as the situation of aboriginal seniors – including both status and non-status first nations, métis and inuit – is particularly bleak. using winnipeg, regina and saskatoon as examples, this paper analyses the health care challenges facing aboriginal seniors in urban canada. we ask, what policy approaches are needed to improve the health and wellbeing of urban aboriginal seniors so that they can have good quality living reflective of their needs and culture? we suggest that, in thinking through present and future health services for urban aboriginal seniors, policymakers should consider four key factors: socioeconomic conditions; underutilization of urban health services; jurisdiction; and elder abuse. keywords aboriginal seniors, urban, canada creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ introduction canadian population aging means that the demands for seniors’ health care services will increase over time. although today’s seniors live longer and enjoy more active lives than those of generations past, canadians aged 65 and over remain more susceptible to progressive chronic health problems leading to disabilities, and have higher levels of dependence on both formal and informal caregivers and health systems. population aging and its health implications is an important issue for canada’s aboriginal peoples, and particularly for canada’s urban aboriginal seniors. demographic analyses typically focus on the relative youth of canada’s aboriginal population: compared to the total population, aboriginal people have a lower median age, and individuals aged 65 and over make up a smaller proportion of the total aboriginal population. aboriginal seniors are also younger, on average, with aboriginal seniors being more likely than non-aboriginal seniors to be aged 65-74, as opposed to 75 and over (turcotte and schellenberg 2007, 221). due to the fact that the aboriginal population is, on average, considerably younger than the non-aboriginal population, canadian researchers and policymakers have paid limited attention to the health care needs of aboriginal seniors (see rosenberg et al. 2009). this lack of attention is problematic, as the situation of aboriginal seniors – including both status and non-status first nations, métis and inuit – is particularly bleak. aboriginal seniors are among the most neglected societal class because their increasing multiple physical and mental health problems and increasingly poor socio-economic supports have forced them into even more challenging and dependent situations at an age when they should expect to be well treated and taken care of properly by both their families and governments. also, the number of aboriginal seniors is growing more rapidly than the non-aboriginal senior population. by 2017, statistics canada projects that seniors will make up 6.5% of the total aboriginal population, and 8% of the métis population; 6% of the first nation population; and 4% of the inuit population (turcotte and schellenberg 2007, 223). while aboriginal seniors in all locations deserve their own distinct focus, for brevity’s sake, this paper analyses the health care challenges facing aboriginal seniors in urban canada, as aboriginal seniors are increasingly being forced into the cities due to the lack of healthcare services and facilities in their rural and northern communities. social determinants of health generally refer to living conditions, which for the elderly are often compromised and beyond their control. we ask, what policy approaches are needed to improve the health and wellbeing of urban aboriginal seniors so that they can have good quality living reflective of their needs and culture? three prairie cities – regina, saskatoon and winnipeg – are discussed as examples throughout the paper due to their relatively high proportion of aboriginal residents and due to the presence of some aboriginal-specific programming in these cities. after outlining the specific health care challenges, we make recommendations to improve health care services for aboriginal seniors in canada’s urban centers. some 1 beatty and berdahl: aboriginal seniors in urban canada published by scholarship@western, 2011 ideas are drawn from a recent study on elderly care services in northern saskatchewan where initial findings observed that gaps in local healthcare services and lack of longterm facilities in the communities were increasingly forcing the elderly into the cities, and into culturally foreign and institutionalized settings where they were essentially divorced from familiar contacts with family and community health systems. readers should note that we have chosen to use the word “seniors” and “elderly” interchangeably in order to avoid potential confusion with the word “elders,” which may have different usages. furthermore, we are referring to aboriginal persons aged 65 and over, although some agencies may, as noted by health canada (1998, 32), define aboriginal seniors as those aged 55 and over. health challenges facing aboriginal seniors national analyses suggest a number of specific health concerns for aboriginal seniors: o self-reported health status. a number of studies indicate that aboriginal seniors report a poorer health status than the general senior population. in 2001, aboriginal seniors living off reserve (24%) were less likely than seniors in the total canadian population (36%) to report very good or excellent health, and more likely to report fair or poor health (30% and 4%, respectively) (o’donnell and tait 2003, 13-14; see also wilson et al. 2010), and métis seniors were more likely than first nations seniors to report fair or poor health (wilson et al. 2011, 361). in 2006, métis seniors (32%) were less likely than seniors in the total canadian population (39%) to report very good or excellent health (janz et al. 2009, 10). o chronic conditions and disabilities. in 2001, almost nine in ten aboriginal seniors reported living with a chronic condition, such as arthritis or heart problems, and seven in ten reported having disabilities (turcotte and schellenberg 2007, 248-9). in 2001, aboriginal seniors living off reserve (22%) were more likely than seniors in the total canadian population (13%) to report being diabetic (o’connell and tait 2003, 14), and in a 2003 report on the health of canadians, it was noted that the major chronic diseases, including diabetes, heart problems, cancer hypertension and arthritis/rheumatism, was significantly higher and growing in aboriginal communities (public health agency of canada, june 2003). however, janz et. al (2009, 13) found that in 2005/6, métis and total population seniors reported a similar prevalence of arthritis and/or rheumatism (52% and 46% respectively), high blood pressure (48% and 44%, respectively) and asthma (12% and 7%, respectively). o tobacco and alcohol use. in 2001, aboriginal seniors were more likely than non-aboriginal seniors to report daily smoking and heavy drinking; however, it is important to note that one in two aboriginal seniors report not drinking at all, 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 10 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/10 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.10 and the vast majority reports either never smoking or having quit smoking (turcotte and schellenberg 2007, 253-4). in light of the health differences between aboriginal and non-aboriginal seniors, policymakers should be aware of, and making adjustments for, the relatively rapid growth in aboriginal senior populations. these trends are seen in the three prairie cities. although aboriginal peoples comprise a rather small percentage of the total senior population, with roughly 3% of winnipeg and roughly 2% of regina and saskatoon seniors reporting an aboriginal identity, the aboriginal senior populations in these cities are growing at a much faster rate than the non-aboriginal senior populations (see table 1). in regina, home to 430 aboriginal seniors in 2006, the aboriginal senior population grew by 16.4% between 2001 and 2006, while the non-aboriginal population grew by 7.5% over the same period. in saskatoon, home to over 500 aboriginal seniors in 2006, the aboriginal senior population grew by 34.2%, while the non-aboriginal senior population grew by 9.6%. finally, in winnipeg, home to over 2,500 aboriginal seniors in 2006, the aboriginal senior population grew by almost 40% between 2001 and 2006; in contrast, the non-aboriginal senior population grew by less than four percent over the same time period. given the growth in the aboriginal senior population, it is imperative that policymakers take steps to ensure that health care services in the urban centers meet the needs of aboriginal (irrespective of status) and non-aboriginal seniors alike. 3 beatty and berdahl: aboriginal seniors in urban canada published by scholarship@western, 2011 table 1 aboriginal and non-aboriginal age demographics by city, 2006 regina saskatoon winnipeg population aged 65+ (count, % of total population) aboriginal identity population 430 (2.5%) 530 (2.5%) 2,525 (3.7%) non-aboriginal identity population 23,555 (13.4%) 26,715 (12.8%) 87,370 (14.1%) percentage of senior (65+) population aboriginal identity population 1.8% 1.9% 2.8% non-aboriginal identity population 98.2% 98.0% 97.2% percentage change aged 65 and over, 2001 to 2006 aboriginal identity population 16.4% 34.2% 39.5% non-aboriginal identity population 7.5% 9.6% 3.8% sources: statistics canada 2008a, 2008b, 2008c. health services for urban aboriginal seniors: issues policymakers today rightly acknowledge that health research has to examine the broad scope of factors that affect a person’s health (determinants of health) and that it should motivate appropriate interventions. the public health agency of canada (2010) advocates the need to focus on the root causes of a problem and illustrate evidence for supporting appropriate interventions. in thinking through present and future health services for urban aboriginal seniors, policymakers should consider four key factors, among others: socioeconomic conditions; underutilization of urban health services; jurisdiction; and elder abuse. socioeconomic conditions. there is growing evidence that the two most important determinants of health are social and economic status (public health agency of canada 2003). aboriginal seniors often lack socioeconomic supports, placing greater pressure on their health and wellbeing. the poorer economic conditions of aboriginal canadians are well documented, and this pattern is evident in aboriginal seniors in the prairie census metropolitan areas (cmas). despite similar labour force participation rates, aboriginal seniors had lower median incomes than non-aboriginal seniors in 2006, and received a higher proportion of their income from government transfers. additionally, the prevalence of low income is higher among aboriginal seniors (in and not in economic families) than non-aboriginal seniors (see table 2). (statistics canada defines an economic family as two or more persons living in the same dwelling and related by blood, legal or common law marriage, or adoption.) 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 10 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/10 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.10 table 2 socio-economic demographics, seniors (65+), 2006 manitoba cmas (winnipeg) saskatchewan cmas (saskatoon and regina) aboriginal non aboriginal aboriginal non aboriginal labour force participation rate 8.2 9.6 12.9 11.7 percentage 2005 income government transfer payments* 60.5% 39.9% 55.3% 35.2% median income $17,100 $22,872 $16,311 $27,885 prevalence of low income before tax in 2005 for economic family members 17.8% 6.3% 15.0% 1.6% prevalence of low income before tax in 2005 for persons not in economic families 70.7% 43.8% 57.5% 29.8% * government transfer payments include old age security pensions and guaranteed income support, canada/québec canada pension plan benefits, child benefits, employment insurance benefits, and other income from government sources. source: derived by authors from statistics canada census 2006, aboriginal peoples of canada (92-593-xcb) these economic differences are of particular note when it comes to the issue of publicly versus privately funded eldercare services, as aboriginal seniors are often less able to pay for private or co-funded services. issues like residency requirements and waiting times are particularly onerous for first nations who come from reserves and cannot fulfill the residency requirements and get bumped to the back of long waiting lists. home care, nursing home care and pharmaceutical services are funded under provincial health insurance plans. whatever the province does not pay must be covered by the patient/client or family (stadnyk 2002). furthermore, cost variations across the country has created healthcare inequities in nursing homecare for many seniors (stadnyk, 2009). this is especially true for first nation seniors who do not have alternative income savings to supplement higher nursing home costs besides their senior’s allowance. studies suggest that the number of people receiving homecare has risen and will continue to do so, with subsidized care generally for higher levels of care, but health budgets still emphasize post-acute care rather than long-term care that is focused on maintenance of skills and preventative care. underfunding has raised many concerns with increasingly higher costs of private and public care being unaffordable and inaccessible to aboriginal seniors. 5 beatty and berdahl: aboriginal seniors in urban canada published by scholarship@western, 2011 housing conditions should also be considered. studies on urban homelessness in the prairie cities suggest that poor housing conditions and high housing needs are pervasive among aboriginal people (saskatchewan indian institute of technologies 2002; distasio et al. 2005; hanselmann 2001). compared to non-aboriginal seniors, in 2001 aboriginal seniors were more likely to be residing in a home in need of significant repairs (22% versus 6%) and/or an overcrowded home (9% versus 2%) (turcotte and schellenberg 2007, 238, 242-3). such housing conditions may contribute to lower health statuses and/or place strains on the ability of aboriginal seniors to use homecare services. homelessness is also a concern: homelessness is increasing in urban centers due to poverty, racism, and federal-provincial jurisdiction issues among others (saskatchewan indian institute of technologies 2002; hanselmann 2001), with elders and increasingly families being listed as among the vulnerable ‘hidden homeless,” or those without permanent shelters (distasio et al., 2005). there are limited aboriginal senior care nursing homes both on and off reserve. saskatchewan has no aboriginal nursing homes in either saskatoon or regina, but winnipeg has a $21 million, 80-bed personal care home (winnipeg free press 2009). on reserve housing is among the poorest in canada, and for the frail or disabled elderly, living on reserve generally means living in overcrowded and multiple-deficient homes (kuran 2002; health canada 2009). federal funding policies have not allowed for the building of long-term care homes on reserves. any initiatives undertaken by first nation bands are privately funded by first nations, and because they do not have operational subsidies like the off-reserve long-term care facilities, they face many challenges. this was the case of a 30-bed, long-term care home on the muskeg lake cree nation, closed in august 2010 after four years of operation due to insufficient funding, among other reasons. an additional challenge is the fact that aboriginal seniors face important education and literacy barriers. in winnipeg in 2006, 65% of aboriginal seniors reported less than a high school diploma – considerably higher than the 38% of non-aboriginal seniors with less than a high school diploma. a similar pattern is found in the saskatchewan cmas, where 62% of aboriginal and 39% of non-aboriginal seniors have less than a high school diploma. nationally, the majority of aboriginal seniors had less than a grade nine education in 2001 (turcotte and schellenberg 2007, 233), and 17% of aboriginal seniors living off-reserve reported attendance at a residential school (o’connell and tait 2003, 23). further, the 2003 international adult literacy and skills survey (statistics canada) found that, in urban saskatchewan and manitoba, aboriginal seniors have, on average, lower literacy levels than non-aboriginal seniors, with the majority being below a “level 3 prose literacy” rating, which is considered by many to be “the minimum level of literacy proficiency that is needed for an individual to successfully cope in a complex knowledgeand information-based society” (bougie 2008). in urban saskatchewan, 61% of non-aboriginal persons aged 55 and over had a level 1 or 2 prose literacy rating, compared to 76% of métis persons and 87% of first nations persons. in urban manitoba, 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 10 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/10 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.10 66% of non-aboriginal persons aged 55 and over had a level 1 or 2 prose literacy ratings, compared to 79% of métis persons and 85% of first nations persons (bougie 2008). together, the lower educational and literacy levels of aboriginal seniors have policy implications. older people who have low literacy skills in english have problems with reading and writing and tend to rely on trying to comprehend what they see or hear. this is important as they must be able to understand medicine prescriptions and other health-related instructions (kuran 2002). issues such as communication problems, cultural disconnect, lower living standards, poor quality of life, and avoidance of the existing services result in undue stress and isolation for the elderly, placing them in atrisk situations. as significant social supports for their families and communities, governments need to acknowledge that the elderly are an important part of our society and need to put more efforts into ensuring a better quality of life for them in the cities. underutilization of services. studies suggest that, even in cities, aboriginal seniors are underutilizing elderly care services and facilities. this phenomenon has been observed among seniors in other minority groups, and the issue is not unique to canada (damron-rodriguez et al. 1994). why are minority seniors, including aboriginals, underutilizing elderly care services? a number of barriers must be considered, including culture (hampton 2007), language, affordability, jurisdiction and problems navigating the health services system. limited policymaker and caregiver knowledge of the needs of minority seniors, including aboriginal seniors, exacerbate these barriers. addressing issues of underutilization will require identification of the barriers faced by urban aboriginal seniors and then taking specific actions to address these barriers. while much policy work has been done on improving competency skills and communications between the professional caregivers and minority seniors, there has been limited work done on the larger issues surrounding institutional structures, addressing issues of racism in gerontological settings (brotman 2003), and building aboriginal elderly care facilities. jurisdiction. one of the greatest challenges facing urban aboriginal seniors in the health care system is the issue of jurisdiction. these jurisdictional challenges are specific to inuit and status indian peoples. although provinces and territories provide health care services, the federal government is responsible to pay for status indian and inuit health care. despite being declared aboriginal under the constitution act, 1982, to date métis and non-status peoples are not recognized as a federal responsibility. thus métis and non-status indian peoples receive the same provincial benefits as all other canadians. political jurisdiction and administrative or procedural blocks between federal, provincial and regional authorities are at the root of ongoing jurisdictional disputes in health regarding the provision of health services to aboriginal people (cameron 2003). the issue of whether or not the federal government is responsible for providing health services to status indian and inuit peoples, wherever they reside, is clouded; usually the 7 beatty and berdahl: aboriginal seniors in urban canada published by scholarship@western, 2011 lines drawn in the sand involve the on and off reserve scenarios. notwithstanding the treaty promises of comprehensive healthcare (o’neil et al. 1999), the federal policy position is that they are not responsible for providing health services off reserve using the justification of being “last resort payer” (romanow 2002). consequently, health services off reserve and in the cities are largely the jurisdiction of the provinces delivering health services through the regional health authorities. furthermore, residency requirements attached to long-term care facilities prevent access and cause problems for those elderly with high level care needs from northern communities. at present, the federal government carries out its health responsibilities by providing limited non-insured health benefit (nihb) coverage for inuit and status indian peoples. coverage by the nihb includes prescription drugs, over the counter medication, medical supplies and equipment, crisis counseling care, dental and vision care, and medical transportation (health canada 2009). status indian and inuit persons do not qualify for coverage under provincial seniors drug plans. it is possible that the provincial programs may provide greater coverage. for example, health canada coverage for prescription drugs is limited to formulary drugs, whereas under the saskatchewan seniors drug plan (for which status indian and inuit persons are ineligible) formulary and exception prescription costs above $15.00 are covered for seniors. there are also programs for seniors who are low income or have high drug costs in relation to their annual income (government of saskatchewan 2011). in general, the problems and benefits are faced by people trying to access the various seniors programs remain unclear although for first nations, problems have been identified with access, lack of coordination, and fragmented funding for aboriginal health between federal and provincial health providers (romanow 2002). the issues extend into the broader care of seniors. federal departments, including first nations inuit health branch (fnih) and indian and northern affairs canada (inac), argue that senior care services are a provincial responsibility, but provincial authorities maintain there is no additional funding or special care bed designation policies for aboriginal peoples that would allow them to get funded. the effect of these unresolved issues places seniors, especially those without proper family supports, in stressful and at-risk health situations. not all rural or remote communities have continuing care or homecare services and institutional housing for seniors wanting to remain in their home communities or close to family (health canada 2008). to access publicly funded eldercare services requires many aboriginal seniors to leave their homes and communities and be placed in institutions where they may have their medical needs cared for but at the expense of their mental and cultural well being, which in itself is a stressor that places them in an at-risk health situations (assembly of first nations 2005). as well, payers for service (government, insurance, the individual) are dependent on the province or territory of the senior and whether the person qualifies for a subsidy or can be covered by other organizations (indian and northern affairs canada 2003). although the february 2009 federal stimulus package, canada's economic action plan, targeted $475 million across the country to support the construction of new 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 10 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/10 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.10 housing units for new on-reserve housing, it is uncertain to what extent this addressed the housing shortfalls for aboriginal seniors in the prairie region (inac 2009). currently, aboriginal people are still struggling with housing problems, and elderly care facilities, which could alleviate some of the pressures, are still not being built in numbers sufficient to accommodate the needs of the elderly. elder abuse. elder abuse is another troubling problem affecting aboriginal people. it is not something that just happens in remote areas or with people who have limited access to services; it can happen to anyone who is in a vulnerable position. aboriginal seniors are a population that is often a target of abuse. studies suggest that the medically compromised and dependent elderly are especially vulnerable to potential physical-emotional-financial abuse and neglect (cyr, 2005; government of canada, 2009), whether they are cared for at home or in semi-private and public institutions. aboriginal elder abuse takes various forms. three principle categories of abuse are domestic elder abuse, institutional abuse, and self-neglect or self-abuse (dumont smith, 2002). the three most cited types of elder abuse are physical, psychological and financial, which includes neglect (dumont-smith 2002). another power and control issue that is often disregarded when it comes to eldercare in canada as well as in other locations is the elderly and families’ preference for self-determination of care. selfdetermination of services involves the desire to be included in medical decisions and to have a say in the care they receive, but this is often marginalized due to administrative pressures between rising needs, different expectations between health providers and elderly clients, and under resourced health facilities. there are many contributing factors often associated with elder abuse including intergenerational violence, degree of dependency, frustration by caregiver, stress and ageism (dumont-smith 2002). while the level to which these occur in the aboriginal community and the extent to which the elderly may be at risk at home or in institutional care is uncertain, risks are likely higher for aboriginal seniors due to their generally poor socio-economic conditions. moving forward: short-term considerations the challenges faced by urban aboriginal seniors with respect to socioeconomic conditions, underutilization of health services, jurisdictional problems and elder abuse indicate that policy changes are required to address the growing healthcare problems with the aboriginal elderly and more needs to be done with what is currently available. steps have been taken to improve services in canada, with some success. with the first nations and inuit home and community care program that was developed and implemented by health canada across first nation communities in the late 1990s, services were improved with more focus on case management, nursing care at home, some respite care and personal care services. the current gaps in this program include 9 beatty and berdahl: aboriginal seniors in urban canada published by scholarship@western, 2011 the lack of palliative care, rehabilitative services, respite and mental health services, along with the services being limited to working hours (afn 2005). indian and northern affairs plays a limited role in elderly care besides the assisted living/adult care program that includes assistance with homemaking services, foster care, and reimbursing for institutional care for minimum care clients. in both cases, the greatest gap is the exclusion of specialized care needs for the elderly, and the lack of policies to address the issues around the building of first nation personal care homes. improving these onreserve elderly care issues will go far in alleviating the increasing forced migration of vulnerable elderly into the cities. a recent study highlights a number of innovative elderly care services programming efforts on the peter ballantyne cree nation (pbcn) communities in northern saskatchewan.1 overall, health providers and the elderly themselves experience undue frustration with jurisdictional funding policies that prevent innovation and force people into program and information silos. the isolated policy and program developments by governments and health agencies without aboriginal community engagement are not effective. there is a need to work through the primary healthcare model values that support a more integrated, better coordinated and holistic healthcare system, one that recognizes the social and economic value of informal (families, friends) and formal caregivers (health professionals, governments) and one that strives to reconcile the existing fragmentation of services to aboriginal people. the pbcn health agency augmented the first nations and inuit home and community care nursing program by enhancing support services to the elderly. this included the assistance of trained, cree-speaking local homecare health aides and elder coordinators, as well as opportunities for seniors to engage in social activities. however, both the healthcare providers and the elderly receiving these services identified gaps in services caused by fragmented and insufficient funding, the lack of needed palliative, respite and after hour care services, and lack of coordinated access to city services. the major overwhelming need identified was the need to build long-term care facilities in the communities so that the elderly would not have to move out to the cities and be isolated. some elderly who had to move to the city found themselves lonely, fearful and not treated very well. while there are many issues requiring innovation, a number of key recommendations stand out. these include the need to: 1. establish aboriginal long-term care facilities in the major prairie cities; 2. establish first nation long-term care facilities on-reserve; 3. ensure coordinated elderly care funding initiatives for aboriginal caregivers; 4. ensure aboriginal elderly access to all health benefits; and 5. establish culturally responsive programming and employment in healthcare systems. 1 for information on this research, please contact bonita beatty at bonita.beatty@usask.ca. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 10 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/10 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.10 mailto:bonita.beatty@usask.ca� these broad recommendations would greatly help to reduce the challenges faced by aboriginal seniors living in the prairie cities. publicly funded elderly care and caregiving: options for consideration given the concerns about canada’s current policy frameworks, it is useful to consider how other countries have used policy tools to address the needs of seniors. of particular interest are the publicly funded elderly care programs in the scandinavian countries of sweden, denmark, and iceland; while these models may not fit entirely with canadian needs and political preferences, they do offer alternative ways of thinking through the options for elderly care in canada. the swedish elderly care policy focuses on ensuring the elderly economic security, comfortable housing, and good services and care. legislative measures emphasize the right to receive public health and medical services for help at all stages of life, with all elderly having equal access to health services, regardless of age, sex, ethnicity, place or purchasing power. there is a broad spectrum of welfare supports in sweden that are paid for through taxes levied at national and municipal levels, and the social security offered to seniors is available to everyone. most services are subsidized in sweden, and high-cost-limit caps ensure that fees remain low in the private services that are available (national alliance for caregiving 2002; ciocirlan et al. 2009). services within this system involve informal caregivers who are paid by the government through a paid caregiver program, and the salary is determined according to the needs of the senior and the proportion of hours worked. the paid caregiver is subsidized through a social insurance program including pension credits potentially lost in regular employment and employees are allowed up to 60 days paid time off to care for family members (thorslund and parker 1994; curry 2003). some concerns with the swedish model of elderly care is the growing trend in europe to push public responsibilities to the private sector, due to the worsening economic situation, which could lead to service inequities and increased costs (thorslund and parker 1994). the iceland model is a mixture of family and state involvement. iceland’s health service responsibility is decentralized to local governments (municipalities), and most services are publicly provided, but private companies and organizations are on the rise, creating a mixed system, although services by the public sector still dominate healthcare. sheltered housing in iceland comprises of various types and home help services. this includes respite care, day care help, local health providers and cash support for family caregivers (daatland 2007). demographics suggest that 13% of the elderly in iceland live in nursing homes classified according to skilled and unskilled or residential care. admissions to nursing homes are regulated through preadmission evaluations issuing certificates of need as determinants to admission into nursing homes (riebbe 1997). denmark elderly care is largely state funded. there has been a slight shift towards privatization of home healthcare, but only in selected areas, such as meals and 11 beatty and berdahl: aboriginal seniors in urban canada published by scholarship@western, 2011 cleaning services. specialty units were set up within county hospitals for the elderly to deal with illnesses like dementia, stroke, and general internal medicine among other programs (jarden and jarden 2002). the publicly funded services emphasize independence and self-determination supporting the elderly to remain in the homes as long as possible (riebbe 1997) to accommodate this, municipalities have developed a range of services to help the elderly help themselves. assistance includes cleaning, shopping, washing, preparation of meals and personal hygiene and care. there are two types of home care available to the elderly, one being long-term and the other, temporary help. when an elderly person can no longer live in their own home, another living arrangement is offered, based on the individual’s needs. options include: senior citizen residences, gated communities, assisted living units, and nursing homes. day care is also offered for those who do not wish to move permanently. meals are available for delivery at subsidized rates (jarden and jarden 2002). health reforms in 1993 called for better planning and coordination of social and health-care system services with emphasis on the elderly achieving the highest levels of independence (jarden and jarden 2002). these models suggest a public push for governments to take on more responsibility for long-term care with increased support for families as a means of empowering personal control among the elderly and their families. the stresses facing all countries are to balance family, private and public responsibility within a global economic downturn. it is likely that elderly support needs will increase in the future because of longer life expectancy, and seniors will be less able to rely on their workingage families (reibbe 1997). this is worrisome for many, but in particular for aboriginal people who fall into the lower income brackets. they will simply have difficulty affording the increasing costs for caring for their elderly without help, even though culturally they may wish to do so. research findings suggest that canadians taking care of their elderly are having troubles balancing work and family responsibilities, with many caregivers experiencing mental, physical and financial problems (ciocirlan and mckay 2009). given the potentially high health, income and social impacts of not addressing elderly care in general, a better blend of intergovernmental cooperation will need to be developed to support the elderly and their caregivers; these may include targeted subsidies for primary caregivers, paid leaves or flexible scheduling, among other initiatives. the three scandinavian policy models presented here have some useful ideas towards the development of more positive and holistic aboriginal eldercare models in canada. they advocate the need to acknowledge the significance of culture, community, and mixed systems. furthermore, the models treat community involvement as integral to proper health care. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 10 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/10 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.10 conclusion aboriginal seniors are among the most vulnerable and politically voiceless in canada. the health care of aboriginal seniors – be they onor off-reserve, northern, rural or urban – is a matter of increasing concern due to the poor socio-economic conditions in aboriginal communities and among aboriginal peoples (assembly of first nations 2007). chronic health conditions take over a large part of the lives of the elderly as they interact with the various health care systems in their communities and in the cities. in the communities, they interact with the health clinics when they see a nurse or doctor. from there, they are referred to medical specialists in the major city centers. this is where concerns for long-term care, homecare and community health care take on a more visible profile as the seniors and their families struggle to navigate the health system (public health agency of canada 2007). given the growing aboriginal senior populations in canada, and particularly in prairie cities like winnipeg, saskatoon and regina, policymakers should give consideration to how elderly care services can be best adapted to meet the needs of aboriginal seniors. winnipeg now has its first aboriginal personal care home. this sets a hopeful precedent for other cities like saskatoon and regina to work with aboriginal people in addressing the healthcare and housing needs of their elderly. about the authors bonita beatty, ph.d., is an assistant professor in the department of native studies at the university of saskatchewan. loleen berdahl, ph.d., is an associate professor in the department of political studies at the university of saskatchewan. 13 beatty and berdahl: aboriginal seniors in urban canada published by scholarship@western, 2011 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citation health care and aboriginal seniors in urban canada: helping a neglected class abstract keywords creative commons license introduction national analyses suggest a number of specific health concerns for aboriginal seniors: table 1 aboriginal and non-aboriginal age demographics by city, 2006 health services for urban aboriginal seniors: issues socioeconomic conditions. there is growing evidence that the two most important determinants of health are social and economic status (public health agency of canada 2003). aboriginal seniors often lack socioeconomic supports, placing greater pressure... table 2 socio-economic demographics, seniors (65+), 2006 jurisdiction. one of the greatest challenges facing urban aboriginal seniors in the health care system is the issue of jurisdiction. these jurisdictional challenges are specific to inuit and status indian peoples. although provinces and territories ... elder abuse. elder abuse is another troubling problem affecting aboriginal people. it is not something that just happens in remote areas or with people who have limited access to services; it can happen to anyone who is in a vulnerable position. abori... conclusion water ethics for first nations and biodiversity in western canada the international indigenous policy journal volume 3 issue 3 water and indigenous peoples article 4 september 2012 water ethics for first nations and biodiversity in western canada kenichi matsui university of tsukuba, kenichim@envr.tsukuba.ac.jp recommended citation matsui, k. (2012). water ethics for first nations and biodiversity in western canada. the international indigenous policy journal, 3(3) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.4 water ethics for first nations and biodiversity in western canada abstract the increasing division of academic disciplines and bureaucracy has led to the compartmentalization of knowledge on water security, biodiversity, indigenous rights, and traditional ecological knowledge policy. the attempt to re-establish links among these issues in academic studies can shed light on integrated water governance and the establishment of water ethics. in order to facilitate this effort, this paper discusses three propositions: (1) the establishment of strong legal and ethical frameworks is needed; (2) policymakers and scientists alike need to recognize links between biodiversity and water security; and (3) they need to improve cross-cultural understanding and communication in using the traditional knowledge of indigenous peoples and local people. this article examines these issues in western canada (british columbia, alberta, saskatchewan, and manitoba) because this region has invited cross-cultural and inter-jurisdictional conflicts since the twentieth century. keywords water ethics, first nations, biodiversity, traditional knowledge acknowledgments the research for this article was funded by the japan society for the promotion of scientific research (grantin-aid for scientific research b). i also would like to express my gratitude to the anonymous readers who gave me productive comments regarding the manuscript. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ water ethics for first nations and biodiversity in western canada although canada holds about 20 percent of the world’s fresh water (boyd, 2003) with 755,180 square kilometers of fresh water surface area (enough to swallow both california and nevada), it still faces a number of challenges in securing safe and accessible water (johns, 2008). much of its fresh water is nonrenewable and remains in the glaciers and aquifers (dwivedi, kyba, stoett, & tiessen, 2001). more than 60 percent of renewable fresh water in canada flows into arctic-bound rivers, whereas, about 80 to 90 percent of canada’s population is concentrated in the u.s. border regions (boyd, 2003). as the competition for water has intensified since the mid-twentieth century, largely because of industrial development, urbanization, and wasteful lifestyles, the eutrophication, acidity, and chemical contamination of water has intensified (postel & richter, 2003).1 water contamination has placed considerable strain on ecosystems and biodiversity (inquiry on federal water policy, 1984). in 2006, the reported release of pollutants from industrial facilities amounted to more than 2.1 billion kilograms, of which the release into canada’s surface waters amounted to more than 200 million kilograms (commission for environmental cooperation, 2011). household wastewater, another source of water contamination, contains flame-retardants such as pbdes (pynn, 2007; stockholm convention on persistent organic pollutants, 2001), pharmaceuticals and personal care products (ppcps), and other synthetic chemicals (boyd, 2003; de villiers, 2003; wan, 2011).2 in british columbia, up until january 2007, untreated sewage discharged into the ocean had led to the closure of about 105,000 hectares of its coastline. it was no longer safe to harvest shellfish in this area, which includes the harbours in nanaimo, vancouver, and victoria. wetlands, an important ecological service provider for water quality and biodiversity, have rapidly become depleted largely because of intensified agricultural activities (johns, sproule-jones, & heinmiller, 2005). by one economist’s calculation, the disappearance of one-hectare of wetland means the loss of us$20,000 per year (postel & richter, 2003). this calculation does not include the cultural and economic values of native and local peoples’ harvesting activities, including hunting, trapping, fishing, and collecting plants (marles, 2000; moodie, 1991; turner, 1998).3 in the fraser river delta of british columbia alone, 80 percent of wetlands have disappeared (boyd, 2003). environmental engineering technologies and legal frameworks have substantially improved our capacity to deal with environmental problems, but science and technology alone do not provide the ultimate solution to debilitating water problems (heathcote, 1998). in this paper, i will examine three key propositions that help us better understand these water problems: (a) a strong legal and ethical framework needs to be established; (b) policymakers and scientists alike need to recognize links between biodiversity and water security (e.g., eco-centric approach); and (c) informed and participatory decision-making processes should incorporate better cross-cultural understanding, including the use of traditional knowledge of indigenous and local peoples. since the early twentieth century, the increasing division of academic disciplines and bureaucracy has led to the compartmentalization of knowledge on water quality, biodiversity, traditional knowledge, and native rights, although these areas overlap and are considerably interconnected. under these divided conditions, how can canada restore the health of cultural diversity and ecology? this paper explores this question by focusing on western canada– british columbia and the three prairie provinces (alberta, saskatchewan, manitoba). the examination of issues in these provinces is important, perhaps more than in the arctic region, partly because most studies on native traditional knowledge and biodiversity have not yet provided detailed studies on western canada. more importantly, the focus on 1 according to sandra postel and brian richter (2003), worldwide human impacts on the hydrologic environment had increased by nine fold from 1950 to 2000, while the world population had tripled in that 50-year period. 2 as canadian wastewater facilities do not treat most of these chemicals, they run into lakes, rivers, and oceans. as a result, some unknown mix of these chemicals occurs. according to the international joint commission, the independent canada-u.s. organization that monitors trans-boundary waterways, scientists can identify only 30 percent of chemical pollutants that are found in fish in the great lakes (de villiers, 2003). 3 for example, in western canada much of materials needed for weaving, wild rice, and other household materials come from wetlands. 1 matsui: water ethics for first nations published by scholarship@western, 2012 this region can clarify canada’s entangled institutional problems with the implementation of interprovincial collaboration and inter-cultural partnerships that are designed to sustain water quality, biodiversity, and cultural diversity. in the following discussion, i introduce some representative ideas and practices in legal and political frameworks that are important to understanding issues related to native traditional knowledge, biodiversity, and water. then, i examine why existing legal and political frameworks cannot properly empower native peoples in their efforts to fully participate in local environmental governance as not only stakeholders, but also as rights holders (barsh & henderson, 2003). i argue that the full participation of native and local peoples in environmental governance is key to effectively sustaining local biodiversity and cultural diversity. if one seeks comprehensive approaches to water catchment or some ecosystem, existing legal and political frameworks need to be enhanced by not only science and technology, but also by ethical codes and long-term education efforts. in the last section, therefore, i explore the possible outlook for locally viable ethical principles for water and biodiversity. history and concept of water law and policy in western canada in western canada, more so than in canada’s northern region, the question of jurisdiction has considerably affected the outlook of law and policy related to natural resources, including those of water (matsui, 2009). under the british north america act of 1867, provincial governments have jurisdiction over natural resources, although alberta, saskatchewan, and manitoba have administered the resources since signing the natural resources transfer agreements of 1930. even after 1930, water resources administration was never without jurisdictional conflicts. within provincial boundaries there are areas, such as native reserves and national parks, which are under the federal jurisdiction (although provincial authorities handle many aspects of administrative detail). all provinces in western canada have interprovincial waterways, which require the involvement of neighbouring provinces and the federal authorities. to make the jurisdiction question more complicated, the agreement of 1909 between canada and the united states established the international joint commission (ijc) to collaboratively manage the use and navigation of trans-boundary waters (chacko, 1932).4 within these historical contexts, the basic legal framework for the allocation and dispute resolution of water rights took shape in the period between the mid-nineteenth century and the early twentieth century in western canada with the mixed origin of civil law, common law, and american water law (rueggeberg & thompson, 1984). river lots, typical of the french seigneurial system in french colonies, extended in a limited way to some parts of the prairie provinces through métis settlements in the nineteenth century, although much of métis water management practices remain unknown (harris, 1987). the establishment of the british colonies introduced common law, but the gold rush in the fraser valley in mid-nineteenth century british columbia and growing interest in irrigation agriculture in late-nineteenth-century prairie provinces led to the introduction of the water doctrine of “prior appropriation” from the american west (matsui, 2009; for detailed descriptions of water principles, see kinney, 1912). the american doctrine of prior appropriation soon became dominant in allocating water in british columbia and the prairie provinces, partly because many political leaders and water law experts believed, at the time, that the doctrine would most effectively induce the development of mining and large-scale irrigation agriculture in arid and semi-arid lands. the recognition of water rights to non-riparian landowners by way of giving priority to early claimants provided a substantial economic incentive in the early twentieth century for developers to construct an irrigation system that would not only increase farmlands, but also raise the monetary value of land (matsui, 2009). this legal arrangement was important for homestead promoters like railway companies and immigration promoters. in 1911, for example, the canadian pacific railway, the major landowner in western canada at the time, sold 80-acre homesteads that were connected to the irrigation system in southern alberta. the price of one acre for the ready-made homesteads was about $33; whereas, an acre of land without an irrigation system in neighbouring areas cost an average of $14.11 at the time (kinney, 1912). 4 in western canada, the ijc oversaw eleven trans-boundary waterways, including the columbia river, the milk river, and the lake of the woods. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.4 since world war ii, however, the concept of water rights as economic incentive has increasingly become plagued with water shortage and contamination problems. for example, with the population increase along the fraser, saskatchewan, and bow rivers, the demand for domestic water began to compete with demand in the agricultural and industrial sectors. industrial development (including mining and hydroelectric generation) and agriculture consumed water, but also began to release synthetic chemicals – by-products of a new scientific form of agricultural management – into waterways. also, the industrialization of paper mills with the heavy use of methyl mercury poisoned fish and birds, along with some ojibwa people in ontario where the infamous canadian minamata incident (where people were affected by a neurological disorder caused by excessive consumption of methyl mercury) occurred in 1970 (kinney, 1912). these alarming conditions, in part, drove the federal government to pass the canada water act in 1970 in order to articulate national interests in improving canada’s water quality. whereas previous water law for both federal and provincial waters predominantly focused on the use and allocation of water rights along with some dispute settlements, this act emphasized the importance of conservation as the way to optimize the public good. in its preamble, the act acknowledges that the “pollution of the water resources of canada is a significant and rapidly increasing threat to the health, well-being and prosperity of the people of canada and to the quality of the canadian environment at large” (canada water act, 1970, preamble, para. 2). it then proposes that the federal and provincial governments cooperate to undertake comprehensive programs for the conservation, development, and utilization of water resources. this proposal appeared to be a turning point in the history of water law in canada as previous jurisdictional strife between federal and provincial governments had largely led to the over-allocation and pollution of water resources. the act was also a significant legal document as it connected the health of the environment to the welfare and prosperity of people in canada. it authorized the federal government to enter into agreements with provincial or other regional policymaking bodies to establish intergovernmental committees. the committees were to advise on water policies, research, planning, conservation, development, and utilization; they may also facilitate the coordination and implementation of water policies in respected regions. the idea behind the intergovernmental committees resembled the concept of the international joint commission, but the committees under the water act, unfortunately, have remained largely as ideals without a strong implementation mechanism (canada water act, 1970). a number of other federal laws and regulations followed the water act to deal with water quality issues, but the power of the federal government over terrestrial waters remained limited because, under the british north america act, provincial authorities possess jurisdiction over water resources, including the management of fresh water quality, safe drinking water, and other water utility services. canada does not provide nationwide legal and political frameworks for safeguarding the quality of water that are equivalent to the u.s. clean water act and the environmental protection agency (boyd, 2011; getches, 1990). the only exceptions may be the areas related to fisheries, navigation, shipping, and transboundary waterways. the fisheries act (1985) and its associated regulations provide control over water pollution, including effluents from meat and poultry processing, pulp and paper mills, metal mining, and petroleum refineries.5 other federal water laws mostly focus on marine waters or territorial water resources. some representative laws focus on the less populated north, including the mackenzie valley resource management act (1997), the nunavut waters and nunavut surface rights tribunal act (2002), the northwest territories waters act (1992), and the yukon water act (1992). the federal agencies also administer other federal waters under the international boundary waters treaty act (1985), the fisheries act (1985), the canadian environmental protection act (1999), and the canada national parks act (2000). 5 for example, chlor-alkali mercury liquid effluent regulations, c.r.c., c. 811 (2011), fish health protection regulations, c.r.c., c. 812 (2011), fish toxicant regulations, sor/ 88-258 (2011), the management of contaminated fisheries regulations, sor/ 90-351 (2011), meat and poultry products plant liquid effluent regulations, c.r.c., c. 818 (2011), metal mining effluent regulations, sor/ 2002-222 (2011), petroleum refinery liquid effluent regulations, c.r.c., c. 828 (2011), potato processing plant liquid effluent regulations, c.r.c., c. 829 (2011), and pulp and paper effluent regulations, sor/ 92-269 (2011). 3 matsui: water ethics for first nations published by scholarship@western, 2012 as the federal government realized that coordinated efforts with provinces regarding environmental problems were needed, in 1971 it established the canadian council of resource and environment ministers (ccrem) (later to become the canadian council of ministers of the environment in 1988) to bring ministers from both provincial and federal governments together. in 1987, the council issued the canadian water quality guidelines (ccrem, 1987) for provinces and territories to follow. it also developed a national freshwater quality index tool to help provincial and territorial governments establish standards for water quality administration. according to some political scientists, the council has played a more visible role than the water act itself in coordinating cooperation among provinces (johns & rasmussen, 2008). in western canada, the prairie provinces water board, which was originally established in 1948, took over responsibility for managing water quality in the interprovincial rivers of alberta, saskatchewan, and manitoba after 1969. in that year the three provinces and the federal government signed the master agreement on apportionment, which strengthened the interprovincial cooperation for water quality management. however, it took these governments more than twenty years to enter into a specific agreement on water quality management. this agreement of 1992 clarified the role of the board to “foster and facilitate interprovincial water quality management that encourages the protection and restoration of the aquatic environment” (saunders & wenig, 2007, pp. 129-130). the term aquatic environment was meant to include all living things within water and the environment, and the agreement clearly indicated the interests of the parties to deal with biodiversity.6 thus, before ratifying the convention on biological diversity in 1992, governments in canada showed interest in conserving biodiversity and also engaging in integrated water resources management through cooperation, participation, and partnership. problems in canada’s water law one disturbing question we face is why industry can still discharge large amounts of hazardous chemicals into water even though canada has established a number of important legal frameworks. according to boyd (2003), these problems had been partly attributable to some problematic administrative procedures whereby provincial or federal governments provide pollution permits to industry.7 the negotiation that determines the total allowable amount of hazardous wastes to be discharged into water is individually held without public review and, therefore, “susceptible to lobbying pressure, job blackmail, and threats of leaving the jurisdiction” (boyd, 2003, p. 30). also, the notion of “delusion is solution” appears to encourage industry to understand pollution control as the matter of market externality or administrative liability rather than corporate social responsibility (boyd, 2003). others argue that many corporations, if not all, find that meeting environmental requirements is an important part of their social responsibility (levy & kaplan, 2008). however, corporations face the challenge of capital costs, along with other costs for planning, building, and maintaining pollution control equipment. although the total cost for pollution control differs by type of equipment and governments often provide support by building their own facilities, pollution control projects still require a considerable amount of money from corporations. it also generally takes from six months to two years for completion. in addition, corporations must consider the risk of running into unpredictable problems with their equipment (council of industrial boiler owners, 2012). in the united states, the federal government alone spent about $17 billion on water pollution controls in 2002 (crandall, 2012). building and maintaining water treatment facilities for a municipality also places a huge financial burden on taxpayers. the cost of building a water treatment plant in winnipeg, manitoba that would draw water from shoal lake, located on the manitoba-ontario border, was estimated to cost $204 million for construction and $12 million per year for operation (city of winnipeg, water and waste department, 1999). partly because of the huge cost of capital and maintenance, the city of vancouver is only recently undertaking the nation’s largest water filtration project, which is estimated to cost $820 million for capital 6 see the website of the prairie provinces water board (http://www.ppwb.ca.), which include the text of the 1992 agreement on water quality. 7 i learned from one scholar that problems are also related to a traditional scientific focus on relative environmental loads rather than total loads, as well as the reliance on the projection of additive and synergistic effects. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.4 alone (metro vancouver, 2010). therefore, both corporations and municipalities tend to avoid building pollution control facilities (wilson, 2002).8 different sets of values about water use also affect the management behaviours of industry, science, and government; for example, an industry may continue to discharge chemicals into water to maintain its production and workforces and place other uses of water secondary. likewise, government officials are not immune from particular social values when they interpret a certain quality standard of water to determine the amount of allowable hazardous discharge for industry. legal frameworks for pollution control also carry different sets of values. the u.s. clean water act includes recreational and cultural values when it emphasizes “clean” water that is fishable and swimmable (perry & vanderklein, 1996). on the other hand, laws and administrations in western canada that regulate and manage the consumption of “safe drinking” water tend to focus on so-called “water welfare,” in which concerns for maintaining public health and alleviating poverty are predominant. similarly, the united nations (un) committee on economic, social, and cultural rights has promoted the idea of water welfare in connection with human rights since the late 1980s (salman & mcinerney-lankford, 2004).9 this emphasis on safety and access to water services does not include the needs of ecosystems that are stipulated in the united nations programme of action for sustainable development (united nations, 1992), the convention on biological diversity (1992), and the canada water act (1970). different sets of values that are prescribed in legal documents pose the question of priority: what needs are more important than others? the problem also lies in a gap between the environmental law and the property-driven natural resources law. some american natural resources law experts point out that much of modern environmental law is “parasitic” in western legal traditions because it developed around 1970, relatively recently, without a solid constitutional footing. western legal traditions that are exemplified in the constitutions of canada and the united states evolved within a market-oriented paradigm. as market values have dominated politics and legal development, which, in principle, have limited government intervention, environmental law and government conservation initiatives are vulnerable to other initiatives that are based on marketoriented reasoning. tarlock (1993) believes that this market value supremacy will continue to influence the development of natural resources law in the future. he writes that “the fundamental problems environmental law will face in the future stem from the fact that the subject has become more and more divorced from the actual protection of the biosphere from serious degradation” (p. 164) (see also saunders & wenig, 2007). another related problem stems from the lack of effective long-term inter-jurisdictional collaboration between governments, ministries, agencies, local communities, and indigenous communities. interjurisdictional cooperation is often essential in controlling fresh water quality as water pollution problems occur in, and affect, more than one state or province. this point is particularly true in managing wetlands in the gulf of georgia, the watershed ecosystem in the columbia river basin, and the north and south saskatchewan rivers. also, an effective mechanism is necessary to facilitate community-based participation, from planning through management, so that the federal or provincial government can financially aid and administratively empower in-situ, bottom-up efforts for biodiversity conservation, water quality management, native rights, and other related issues. the canada water act (1970) and the canadian environmental protection act (1999) can provide templates for these efforts, although, up to this point, most intergovernmental institutions tend to be top-down without sufficiently reflecting local or indigenous people’s needs. in addition, intergovernmental efforts have focused heavily on research and the promotion of ideas. in the 1980s, a federal inquiry on water issues pointed out this problem and initially stressed the importance of action plans rather than the past research-oriented collaboration. nonetheless, the inquiry ended up producing a report that mostly stressed a need for further research and additional wastewater infrastructures (inquiry on federal water policy, 1984; johns & rasmussen, 2008). 8 in the 1990s, new york city planned to build a filtration plant as its drinking water sources from the catskill mountains had deteriorated below environmental protection agency standards. it estimated that the capital cost of the plant (from planning to installation) would cost $6 billion to $8 billion dollars and the cost of maintenance $300 million per year. the city abandoned the plan and instead decided to spend about $1 billion to restore the catskill watershed. 9 in particular, see the committee’s “general comment no. 15.” 5 matsui: water ethics for first nations published by scholarship@western, 2012 a challenge for community-based efforts to be properly incorporated into environmental policies is the fact that, from time to time, governments need to respond to new international agendas that require additional political strategies and institutional frameworks. these agendas do not always reflect what the communities want; for example, since the early 1990s, the canadian government has ratified conventions related to biodiversity conservation, climate change mitigation and adaptation, and the prohibition of persistent organic pollutants. as federal or provincial funding is specific to each politicized environmental agenda, indigenous communities and other local communities have very limited control over planning and directing project implementation. for example, for monitoring some endangered fish species, scientists or fisheries officials may collect indigenous ecological knowledge to produce a progress report. they need cooperation from indigenous knowledge holders; yet, native peoples may not see any benefit to helping the canadian government that does not settle matters related to the power of native traditional governance over natural resources. in western canada, native peoples have not gained clear legal definition of the extent to which they are entitled to the governance of natural resources. much of the legal discussion has been devoted to specific harvesting activities or health issues (e.g., water treatment). courts also have mainly dealt with the definition of certain harvesting activities within the meaning of constitutional provisions or treaty rights. as discussed in this paper, the legal concept and policies of native rights to water, for example, developed in the twentieth century largely to safeguard specific beneficial uses of water such as irrigation (matsui, 2009). more recently, some legal scholars have proposed to regard native water rights as human rights and constitutional rights (boyd, 2011; collins, 2010; salman & mcinerney-lankford, 2004), with the emphasis on safety for domestic water consumption. this movement convincingly responds to urgent social problems in many native communities, but it does not seem to connect to indigenous sovereignty or self-government. the focus should include the recognition that native peoples are capable of governing to conserve or manage the watershed environment for not only harvesting or specific economic interests, but also for more comprehensive approaches that include, for example, cultural needs.10 biodiversity and traditional knowledge policies without defining the extent to which native peoples have self-governing powers over natural resources, canada ratified the united nations convention on biological diversity in 1992. in the following year, it created a federal-provincial-territorial biodiversity working group by bridging agencies for parks, environment, wildlife, and forestry, but not including the department of indian affairs, the assembly of first nations, or the métis national council. after two years of discussion, the working group produced the “canadian biodiversity strategy” (biodiversity convention office, 1995). this strategy basically meant to provide guidelines for sustainable use, education, and the extension of international conservation networks for biodiversity. in the beginning of its executive summary, it declares that biodiversity “supports human societies ecologically, economically, culturally and spiritually” (biodiversity convention office, 1995, p. 2). the latter two terms were meant to include both native and non-native cultural and spiritual values that are associated with the distinctive natural environment in canada. one of the guiding principles of the strategy specifically mentions the traditional knowledge of indigenous and local communities. it states, “the knowledge, innovations and practices of indigenous and local communities should be respected, and their use and maintenance carried out with the support and involvement of these communities” (biodiversity convention office, 1995, p. 15). this ethical 10 the gwich’in tribal council (2004) adopted the traditional knowledge policy within the gwich’in settlement region in 2004. it authorizes the gwich’in social and cultural institute to improve general understanding of gwich’in traditional knowledge about environmental assessment, heritage management and land, water and resource management and planning. however, detailed information about water management and planning is not yet available. see gwich’in tribal council, “traditional knowledge policy,” approved by gwich’in tribal council board of directors on june 22, 2004. retrieved from http://reviewboard.ca/upload/ref_library/gtc%20 final%20tk%20 policy%202004.pdf. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.4 principle is buttressed by another guiding principle that emphasizes the importance of local cooperation, including local, regional, provincial, territorial, national, and global levels, in sharing knowledge, costs, and benefits (biodiversity convention office, 1995). the first principle was intended largely to respond to article 8(j) of the convention on biological diversity, in which ratified parties are bound to: respect, preserve and maintain knowledge, innovations and practices of indigenous and local communities embodying traditional lifestyles relevant for the conservation and sustainable use of biological diversity and promote their wider application with the approval and involvement of the holders of such knowledge, innovations and practices and encourage the equitable sharing of the benefits arising from the utilization of such knowledge, innovations and practices. (convention on biological diversity, 2010, p. 6) in comparison to this lengthy quote from the convention, the canadian strategy does not seem to reflect regional realities, such as inter-provincial and inter-cultural cooperation, although each ratified party should provide a specific institutional mechanism that is suitable to the political and cultural characteristics of each party in protecting native knowledge, innovations, and practices. governments in canada, however, did begin incorporating traditional knowledge within the framework of its environmental laws, especially in the north. in 1993, the northwest territories government introduced the traditional knowledge policy, in which the government acknowledged that native peoples’ traditional knowledge is “a valid and essential source of information about the natural environment and its resources, the use of natural resources, and the relationship of people to the land...” (usher, 2000, p. 184) and the government will “incorporate traditional knowledge into government decisions and actions where appropriate” (usher, 2000, p. 184). the canadian environmental assessment act (1992) also included a provision that environmental assessments consider the traditional knowledge of indigenous and local peoples (section 16). the canadian environmental protection act (1999) enhanced the assessment policy with more substantial acknowledgement of the importance of traditional knowledge. in section 2, it stipulates that canada will “apply knowledge, including traditional aboriginal knowledge, science and technology, to identify and resolve environmental problems” (p. 3). this legislation is also significant as it adopted the precautionary principle (section 2), which largely corresponded with the spirit of the rio declaration on environment and development (united nations, 1992) and the preamble of the convention on biological diversity. the canadian environmental protection act (1999) authorizes the minister of environment to issue orders for environmental regulations, and the validity of these orders can be reviewed by designated officers, who have qualification in the fields of environmental conservation and protection in canada, environmental and human health, administrative law on environmental matters, or “traditional aboriginal ecological knowledge” (section 247). another significant legal establishment germane to native traditional knowledge and biodiversity is the species at risk act of 2002. it empowered the committee on the status of endangered wildlife in canada (cosewic), which had existed since 1977, as the policy advisory body. cosewic then created subcommittees of specialists to assist with status reports or advise policy performance on wildlife species and “aboriginal traditional knowledge” (section 18). these members are to be appointed by the minister of environment, and the qualification for appointment includes expertise in native traditional knowledge. this expertise can be examined by a native organization although the qualification for this organization is not clear. section 15 also requires cosewic to take into account relevant treaty and land claim agreements (species at risk act, 2002). along with the canadian biodiversity strategy (biodiversity convention office, 1995) and the environmental protection act (1999), the species at risk act (2002) emphasizes partnerships and community participation by introducing the idea of stewardship. in this act, stewardship means the establishment of partnerships between environment canada and various local organizations or any persons for the purposes of education, endangered species protection and monitoring, and research. the partnership efforts are to be registered as stewardship action plans. these plans can include a commitment to establish “methods for sharing information about species at risk, including community 7 matsui: water ethics for first nations published by scholarship@western, 2012 and aboriginal traditional knowledge” (section 10.2, p. 9). in doing so, parties involved must “respect, preserve and maintain knowledge and promote their wider application with the approval of the holders of such knowledge, with other governments and persons” (p. 9). the traditional knowledge policy for biodiversity conservation, however, has remained almost silent about the location of intellectual property rights, cultural rights, and proper political and legal mechanisms that safeguard native knowledge, innovation, and practices from misappropriation by those who are involved in the collection and use of traditional knowledge. an intriguing exception to this observation is the first nations oil and gas environmental assessment regulations (2007), which provide detailed provision for the disclosure of information. types of information that are exempted from recording and public view in authorizing oil or gas extraction projects include trade secrets, confidential information (e.g., financial, commercial, scientific, or technical), and “information whose disclosure could reasonably be expected to result in the public becoming aware of aboriginal traditional knowledge that a first nation has always treated in a confidential manner” (section 52). when a project is reviewed with the submission of information to a project review panel, including traditional knowledge, the submitted information cannot be disclosed to the public without the authorization of the relevant person, body, or organization (first nations oil and gas environmental assessment regulations, 2007). to date, no equivalent provision exists in the environmental protection act (1999) or the species at risk act (2002). international communities, however, have created some legal frameworks for safeguarding the intellectual property rights and cultural rights of indigenous peoples around the world. as early as the mid-1980s, canada actively participated in the discussion about the un draft declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (2007). however, during prime minister stephen harper’s administration, canada changed its position and initially objected to the united nations general assembly’s decision to adopt the declaration in 2007 (although canada did adopt it in 2010). the declaration resolves to protect the rights of indigenous peoples to “cultural, intellectual, religious, and spiritual property” (article 11). to be more specific, it provides that the indigenous peoples have rights to “maintain, control, protect, and develop their sciences, technologies, and cultures, including human and genetic resources, seeds, medicines, knowledge of the properties of fauna and flora, oral traditions, literatures, designs, sports and traditional games, and visual and performing arts” (article 31). governments are also expected to provide “effective measures” to protect their rights (article 13). the implication of this declaration and other international “soft” laws in canada is not yet clear as cultural appropriation of some indigenous designs, sports, and medicinal knowledge are still ubiquitous, and quite often these cultural appropriation practices are protected under the legal grounds of free speech, patents, trademarks, and other intellectual property rights. canadian courts have not yet clearly defined the extent to which property rights can favour native control over the use of their cultural heritage in canada, although, in the united states, some scholars argue that existing property laws have the potential to protect the cultural and collective rights of indigenous peoples (carpenter, katyal, & riley, 2008). challenges and dilemmas in the traditional knowledge policy in incorporating traditional knowledge into water and biodiversity conservation, canada has faced a number of challenges and dilemmas. when cosewic established a subcommittee on traditional knowledge under the authority of the species at risk act (2002), for example, it was partially yielding to some political pressure from the native majority, especially in the territory of nunavut. since the establishment of cosewic in 1977, experts have focused on species-specific natural science management and lacked the capacity to embrace native cultural perspectives within its management regime (boardman, clark, & beazley, 2001). environment canada also lacked enough expertise on native traditional knowledge as it heavily emphasized its roles in management categories that were closely associated with economic activities, such as forestry, fishing (the ministry of fisheries and ocean took over this role in 1977), water, and wildlife (nadasdy, 2011).11 11 wildlife management is not very different from agricultural concepts. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.4 more relevant to western canada, the mackenzie river basin transboundary waters master agreement (1997), which came into effect in july 1997, established the mackenzie river basin board (mrbb) partly to implement traditional knowledge policy for sustainably managing water quantity and quality within the basin.12 this agreement clearly recognizes the importance of indigenous people’s participation in sharing their ecological knowledge with the scientific community and policymaking bodies. the board has 13 members who represent the federal government, three provinces, and two territories. each province and territory sends one of its board members to represent native perspectives. however, the board has not yet established a mutually beneficial relationship with native peoples in sharing ecological knowledge. the board’s 2006 to 2007 annual report shows that native members “did not feel that the board has demonstrated, through its actions, a real commitment to the inclusion of tk as a valued component of board business” (mackenzie river basin board, 2012, p. 8). the annual report also includes six recommendations from its workshop on traditional knowledge, in which the board renewed its interests in promoting the value of traditional knowledge to a greater extent at the policy level by educating personnel and establishing an internal traditional knowledge committee. as of 2012, however, this committee does not exist. one native representative from alberta is missing from the board. the course of action for establishing a mutually beneficial relationship with native bands, traditional knowledge holders, youths, women, and elders is not yet clear. under these uncertain conditions that surround the traditional knowledge policy in western canada, the scientific opinion in legal and political frameworks has remained the dominant force in decision making for watershed and biodiversity concerns (gratani et al., 2011). in addition, a number of consultants and scientists have become increasingly skeptical about the government’s political experiment on traditional knowledge policy (brook & mclachlan, 2008); for example, widdowson and (2008), after observing traditional knowledge initiatives in the northwest territories as non-native consultants, confess their culturally embedded beliefs in disrobing the aboriginal industry. they contend that indigenous peoples’ ecological observation is “junk science” or a commodity for the politicized “aboriginal industry.” the validity of such observation or expression requires scientific testing before being considered even as knowledge.13 widdowson and howard also dismiss the credibility of academic works that emphasize the importance of traditional knowledge in environmental management because most of these studies “simply provide random recollections from elders” (widdowson & howard, 2008, p. 237).14 although traditional knowledge should be scientifically validated, they continue, this task will pose some fundamental difficulties, as traditional knowledge and scientific knowledge are profoundly different (widdowson & howard, 2008). their descriptions of science, in contrast, appear to uphold neutrality, preciseness, and reliability – the quality only possessed by non-native people. here, widdowson and howard do not seem to be aware of rich literature on political ecology and other academic studies, which examine the culturally-biased process of scientific knowledge making, as well as policymaking (nadasdy, 2003).15 peter usher, veteran consultant on native culture and history, also thinks that the traditional knowledge policy is not working well in canada, partly because governments remain vague about road maps for policy implementation (see northwest territories department of environment and natural resources, 2009).16 however, usher distances himself from the position taken by widdowson and howard (2008) and acknowledges the importance of studying traditional knowledge. he does not define it as junk 12 the full “mackenzie river basin transboundary waters master agreement” (1997) document was downloaded from www.mrbb.ca/uploads/files/general/19/mackenzie-river-basin-transboundary-waters-agreement-pdf. 13 arun agrawal (1995) discusses the fallacy of polarizing indigenous and western knowledge. 14 their statement here seems to differ from the opinion of the supreme court of canada, especially in its delgamuukw decision. the decision acknowledged the importance and validity of elders’ testimonies in courts. 15 some prominent cultural anthropologists like bronislaw malinowski have long advocated that all cultures possess science as well as religion and magic. 16 the government of the northwest territories has improved its traditional knowledge policy considerably since the late 1990s. its “traditional knowledge implementation plan” (2009) provides the policy roadmap by focusing on seven major implementation activities; (1) coordination; (2) awareness and training; (3) collaboration; (4) promotion; (5) support and guidance; (6) resource allocation; and (7) accountability. these activities are to be coordinated by a traditional knowledge coordinator in the department of environment and natural resources. 9 matsui: water ethics for first nations published by scholarship@western, 2012 science, but rather as different types of in-situ knowledge for effective environmental management that can be acquired through years of experience and observation. unlike widdowson and howard, usher’s definition of traditional ecological knowledge includes the one possessed by not only native peoples but also local non-native people. a difference between traditional and scientific knowledge in usher’s theorem does not appear to be as fundamental as widdowson and howard postulate. usher (2000) argues that traditional knowledge is distinguished from the scientific when knowledge holders do not have formal science education. unlike some other scholars who have studied traditional knowledge (see for example berkes, 2012), usher (2000) believes that traditional knowledge can be acquired within one generation as traditional ecological knowledge has adapted to environmental changes. as many more studies on traditional knowledge have appeared and provided their own definitions since the 1990s (brook & mclachlan, 2008)17, this question of its applicability beyond a specific region and discipline has begun to afflict both policymakers and scholars. unlike scientific knowledge, which has been internationally shared through periodicals, conferences, and databases, traditional knowledge studies have not sufficiently encouraged international, cross-regional, and cross-cultural exchanges. as most nonnative policymakers and scholars do not have enough experience among traditional communities, they have difficulty understanding the extent to which some successful collaborative environmental management in a particular area between native people and government can provide a useful model to other regions or countries (anderson & barbour, 2003).18 because biodiversity and water conservation require inter-disciplinary (dewulf, françois, pahl-wostl, & taillieu, 2007) and cross-regional approaches within one entire basin or ecosystem, this question of model application does not sound far-fetched to ask, especially if one aims to effectively incorporate traditional knowledge into participatory environmental governance. anthropologist paul nadasdy (1999) asks if traditional knowledge is culturally contingent or if knowledge in general can be cross-culturally integrated, given a widely-held impression that the traditional knowledge policy has achieved so little success in building inter-cultural partnerships. a related question may be whether a non-native person or outsider can understand native traditional knowledge. in nadasdy’s case study on the kluane people in the southwestern yukon, anthropological studies often appear to overemphasize men’s roles in hunting partly because those studies do not take into account how women were part of important hunting ritual practices. he then continues to illustrate profoundly different ways that the kluane people and government biologists perceive game management. the kluane people focus on hands-on experience, while the biologists rely on number counts. in his conclusion, nadasdy (2003) contends that cross-cultural communication is not impossible, but, since the process of acquiring both indigenous and bureaucratic knowledge are socially embedded, “any attempt at knowledge-integration is at least as much a political process as an epistemological one” (p. 113). if one places this process within a context of colonial history and power imbalance, the politicization of knowledge means the marginalization of indigenous governance over their own natural resources (butler, 2006; nadasdy, 2006). in western canada, the problem is more complicated than the issues in nadasdy’s (1999) study, largely because there is a wide variety of cultural practices and economic interests even among native peoples. any effort to bridge these differences will pose a huge challenge for cross-regional environmental governance. for example, in the northern saskatchewan river valley that encompasses areas in alberta, manitoba, and saskatchewan, the assiniboine, cree, ojibwa, blackfoot confederacy, stoney-nokoda, and métis historically shared or competed for control over harvesting areas. the blackfoot confederacy and assiniboine do not have a reserve in the valley today, but they may have traditional knowledge related to the use of the watershed environment in the valley. in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, newcomers from europe began to occupy these native territories. those newcomers included ukrainian farmers and other european immigrants who now have more than one hundred years of history in coping with that environment. how do these people share their traditional knowledge in cooperatively governing the environment of their neighbourhood? 17 between 1980 and 2004, more than 421 articles discuss traditional knowledge, indigenous knowledge, or local knowledge, most of which were published after the mid-1990s. 18 some researchers are confident that their model can be applied to different regions or cultural groups. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.4 the idea of using traditional knowledge for conserving biodiversity has raised another important question. usher’s study divides traditional knowledge into four categories (cited in usher, 2000)19 and places them within a context of a scientific paradigm. the first category of knowledge includes the rational one based on long-term or short-term observation of changes in the natural environment. here, scientists want to know how indigenous peoples have observed weather patterns, ice, sea levels, currents, and animal behaviour. the second category comprises the “facts” on environmental uses. the third one is defined by the expressions of moral or ethical values. the last category consists of worldviews based on cultural norms. usher argues that the first two categories of knowledge, in particular, require descriptions of scientific methods and validation by scientists (usher, 2000). in sum, usher’s compartmentalization of knowledge does not help explain the way traditional knowledge holders see the interactions between them and the natural environment. usher’s categorization may also misappropriate or assimilate cultural knowledge that mainly accommodates some government scientists (nadasdy, 2006). today, native band governments in western canada are involved in their own ways of environmental management, and, in many cases, they disagree with usher’s scientific paradigm. as their ancestors frequently adopted new western technology and knowledge, such as guns and metals, to enhance their traditional activities, native bands today take advantage of scientific methods and modern technology (e.g., gis mapping of traditional land use) to enrich their governance of natural resources. many secwepemc individuals i know in the interior of british columbia went to public schools and studied science. leaders generally welcome such educated members or other non-native individuals with training in science to work for their band as long as they follow native protocols. this open policy for nontraditional elements does not mean that native communities are getting less traditional, if one defines the term as dynamic and fluid in nature. in the case of traditional fishing, for example, some individuals are designated as fishery chiefs. they still control traditional protocols for their fishing activities, even though much of nineteenth-century fishing technology is no longer in common use. usher’s contention that traditional knowledge holders do not have formal science education does not apply to the native peoples i know, for many traditional knowledge holders can handle both traditional and scientific knowledge. a clear-cut differentiation between traditional knowledge and scientific knowledge can limit the roles native peoples can play in environmental governance. canada’s policy on biodiversity conservation has posed another challenge to implementing collaborative or co-management policies for biodiversity conservation and traditional knowledge among indigenous peoples, local people, government officials, and academics. as already stated, the canadian environmental protection act (1999) has promoted the precautionary principle and the concept of stewardship. the precautionary principle guides policymakers to take a preventive approach or action when necessary, without waiting for the daunting process of obtaining clear scientific evidence. to date, this principle has gained strong support from many european and american scientists and policymakers in dealing with the elimination of persistent organic pollutants (de wit, alaee, & muir, 2009). policies for biodiversity conservation and traditional knowledge, on the contrary, have mainly required top-down scientific validation, as the opinions of usher and others above demonstrate. when indigenous and local communities are asked to participate in government-led initiatives that are already planned by government and dominantly operated by scientists and technocrats, the idea of stewardship in the canadian environmental protection act (1999) cannot fully facilitate community participation among local and indigenous peoples. even though cosewic’s subcommittee invites experts on traditional knowledge or the mackenzie river basin board invites native representatives, as long as its management mechanism does not appreciate indigenous governance or empowerment for specific management projects, native elders and technocrats continue to see the goal of biodiversity conservation and water quality matters with the use of traditional knowledge from very different standpoints. a similar case was reported in the yukon (nadasdy, 2006). 19 houde (2007), who has worked for a first nation tribal council in quebec, divides traditional ecological knowledge into five categories: factual observations, management systems, past and current uses, ethics and values, and culture and identity. he sees this categorization and the building of databases of traditional ecological knowledge as “a bargaining chip that can be used in negotiations with the state government or private companies” (p. 35). 11 matsui: water ethics for first nations published by scholarship@western, 2012 another challenge to traditional knowledge policy is that, as i have mentioned, above, canada does not have a strong legal framework or institutions to safeguard the cultural and intellectual rights of indigenous peoples from misappropriation. various commercial activities have appropriated indigenous peoples’ traditional culture, knowledge, innovation, and practices (tsosie, 2002). under the current legal framework, traditional knowledge, which is communally shared and non-commercially maintained, can be regarded as public domain without federal protection (howell & ripley, 2009; mcmanis, 2009). as a result, government agencies, corporations, and researchers who are interested in traditional knowledge, biodiversity conservation, or water safety, can use ideas that are “inspired” from native peoples and cultures without paying proper royalties or compensation (oguamanam, 2006; taubman & leismer, 2008). the convention on biological diversity (1992) and the canadian biodiversity strategy (biodiversity convention office, 1995) do call for “respect” and “prior informed consent,” but these terms have not driven policymakers to establish a legal framework that prevents businesses and researchers from culturally appropriating indigenous knowledge. the convention also emphasizes equitable access and benefit sharing (abs) if economic developments benefit from native peoples, but, again, this abs principle does not apply to those properties that only gained inspiration from native peoples. indigenous peoples in canada, therefore, depend largely on individual agreements or non-legal frameworks with companies, government agencies, and academic organizations in order to deal with intellectual property rights and benefit sharing (de carvalho, 2009). ethnics for water and biodiversity recognizing the limit of legal and political frameworks for protecting traditional knowledge, biodiversity, and water issues, united nations agencies and some native representatives have advocated establishing ethical frameworks (schmidt, 2010). in general, ethical approaches provide more inclusive and participatory scope than legal and scientific approaches in dealing with traditional knowledge use and protection, biodiversity conservation, and water quality and quantity issues. therefore, in this section, we will examine the potential outlook of ethical principles that enable us to deal with these three topics as interconnected matters. although ethical principles cannot legally bind nations or individuals, one cannot underestimate their long-term influence. since the early twentieth century, international ethical principles have considerably influenced the development of legal and political frameworks as well as research activities in canada and other countries. for example, the nuremberg code (1947) and the world medical association’s declaration of helsinki (1964) have become the backbone of biomedical ethics for safeguarding the rights of human subjects in experiments. these principles include “free prior informed consent,” which later influenced the convention on biological diversity, especially its article 8(j). the new development of ethical codes or principles for traditional knowledge, biodiversity, and water, therefore, is potentially influential for the future (drinan, 1992). in canada, the canadian institutes of health research (cihr), the natural sciences and engineering research council of canada (nserc), and the social sciences and humanities research council of canada (sshrc) adopted the tri-council policy statement on ethical conduct for research involving humans in 1998 and revised it in 2010 (bannister, 2009). its fundamental ethical principles include respect for participants’ autonomy, meaning that researchers must obtain “free, informed, and ongoing consent” (canadian institutes of health research, natural sciences and engineering research council of canada, and social sciences and humanities research council of canada, 2010). other principles include equity or justice, for example, in benefit sharing. as these councils provide canada’s major research grants and require researchers to agree to their terms and conditions, the tri-council’s ethical principles carry a considerable weight in canadian research activities. these principles may also help researchers and even government scientists to establish co-management protocols or research collaboration with native peoples for water conservation, traditional knowledge collection, and biodiversity surveys. the recent development of international ethical codes has also influenced the policies on biodiversity and native traditional knowledge. in october 2010, the tenth meeting of the conference of parties to the convention on biological diversity, which met in nagoya, japan, resolved to adopt an ethical code of 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.4 conduct in order to “ensure respect for the cultural and intellectual heritage of indigenous and local communities” (united nations, 2010, p. 277). this code was mainly designed to provide ethical principles for parties to implement article 8(j) of the convention. these principles include prior informed consent, inter-cultural respect, collective or individual ownership, fair and equitable benefit sharing, and a precautionary approach. the principle for inter-cultural respect recognizes the intrinsic value of traditional knowledge and proposes to “avoid the imposition of external concepts, standards, and value judgments” (p. 282). this principle implicitly suggests that scientific validation of traditional knowledge may impose “external concepts” on native traditional environmental governance, and, therefore, the validation should be done in a culturally appropriate way (convention on biological diversity, 2010). the nagoya code also recognizes that indigenous and local communities are often inextricably bound to traditional lands, waters, and sacred sites both individually and collectively; therefore, their individual and collective rights to having access to these areas should be safeguarded by national and international laws, as well as ethical principles. the recognition of the cultural connection to land also suggests that cultural diversity may play a key role in sustainably using natural resources. when it is so, indigenous and local communities should “be actively involved in the management of lands and waters traditionally occupied or used by them” (convention on biological diversity, 2010, p. 6). this point, however, needs careful examination because the active involvement of indigenous peoples in canada has been marred by legal constraints and scientific compartmentalization of knowledge. in canada’s constitution act of 1982, for example, section 35 recognizes “existing aboriginal and treaty rights,” but the extent to which each native band, tribe, or nation has control over natural resources on the off-reserve traditional territory has not been clear. native hunters and fishers have too often been confronted by game wardens and fisheries officers, occasionally leading to arrests and court disputes. thus, native peoples and local communities remain limited to the role of passive participants in government-planned initiatives, rather than being co-planners and managers. many native bands in british columbia are in the process of clarifying their title to traditional territories, as their reserves are much too small to have a band-based autonomous management of a river basin or ecosystem. also, unlike the navajo tribal council or other large tribal organizations in the american west, which have their own constitutions, courts, and natural resource management systems (ambler, 1990), many band governments in western canada do not have an appropriate administrative mechanism to be able to deal on a par with the large mining, logging, or agricultural companies that encroach on their traditional territories. to fully implement article 8(j), canada needs to substantially empower native bands with regard to environmental governance. another notable principle in the nagoya code is the issue related to fair and equitable benefit sharing. the 2010 conference of parties to the convention on biological diversity and the world intellectual property organization (wipo) paid special attention to it (wipo, 2011). the issue of benefit sharing has increasingly perturbed legal scholars, ngos, and indigenous peoples, among others, largely because, up until recently, businesses and intellectual property lawyers had treated native cultural heritage mainly as public domain or economic externalities (bell & paterson, 2009; brown, 2003; young, 2010). also, the protection of cultural heritage has not gained much attention in connection with the sovereignty and selfgovernment of native peoples (tsosie, 2002). nevertheless, a substantial discussion about benefit sharing at the tenth meeting of the conference of parties to the convention on biological diversity has clarified that the collectively-held properties are also the subject of legal protection from misappropriation and theft. when someone benefits from legally using some aspect of indigenous peoples’ knowledge, the benefits should be returned to the original owners not only as royalties or monetary compensation, but also in the form of information and technology sharing that may enhance the capacity of native polities in governing natural resources. these principles took shape as a result of years of discussion among experts in united nations agencies and indigenous delegates. most notably, the akwé:kon guidelines (meaning “everything in creation” in the mohawk language), which the secretariat of the convention on biological diversity issued in 2004, contributed considerably to the 2010 nagoya code. in fact, the guidelines go beyond the code in terms of cultural insight, depth, and detail. although the focus of the guidelines is on cultural, social, and environmental impact assessment and the contents may not be fully agreed upon by all native and local 13 matsui: water ethics for first nations published by scholarship@western, 2012 communities, the guidelines provide clear step-by-step instructions regarding how non-community members may approach and establish better cross-cultural understanding and collaboration. akwé:kon also proposes that the full and effective participation of indigenous and local communities should be observed from the preparation stage to decision making and monitoring. here, not only government officials, but also all participants, are expected to engage in establishing “effective mechanism for indigenous and local community participation” (secretariat of the convention on biological diversity, 2004, pp. 8-9). the participants should include women (mcgregor, 2008), youths, elders, and other vulnerable groups. the effective mechanism can provide an agreed process and place for screening, reviewing, monitoring, and auditing, in which both native and non-native participants freely express their concerns and views in leading to some agreement or action plan on a proposed development (convention on biological diversity secretariat, 2004).20 many native organizations in canada have also adopted ethical principles for traditional ecological knowledge and other environmental issues. the métis national council (mnc) established the national environment committee in 2011 to buttress the effort of members to sustain traditional environmental knowledge (métis national council, 2011). this committee is represented by five provincial métis organizations in western canada (métis nation of ontario, manitoba metis federation, métis nationsaskatchewan, métis nation of alberta, and the métis nation british columbia). the mnc also has worked with the women of the métis nation to issue the “traditional knowledge policy paper,” in which the traditional roles of women in transmitting and protecting traditional knowledge are emphasized (women of the métis council, n.d.). these métis organizations are still refining their guidelines for traditional knowledge research that require partnerships with academic researchers. however, clément chartier, president of the mnc and minister of environment, has actively pursued establishing partnerships with academic researchers who are experts in historical economic and environmental issues. this partnership, in turn, has partly helped achieve a number of successful defenses of métis harvesting rights in court, including r. v. powley (2003) (cited in ray, 2011). there are, however, some shortcomings of ethical principles. the akwé:kon guidelines and other similar works21 do not guarantee the effective participation of many native and local communities. partnership or co-management requires a deeper cultural understanding of traditional protocols. the participation of youth, women, and elders does not always provide culturally engrained perspectives. one needs to know people in the community in order to identify traditional knowledge holders who are respected within their own communities. in the southern coastal communities of british columbia, for example, the longhouse has functioned as an authentic venue to legitimize knowledge and expression,22 but not all members of the community are entitled to speak, dance, or sing traditional matters. as reported by johnston (1976), an intensive and rigorous process of training is required to become traditional medicine men, and, without knowing the cultural protocol, scientists, government officials, and consultants may easily fall prey to the sweeping claims made by widdowson and howard in their book. in a similar vein, fieldwork on traditional ecological knowledge may not appear to render positive insights for environmentalists or consultants in writing reports on environmental management, but this uncertainty does not mean that traditional knowledge does not exist there (guidotti, 2007). it often requires trained eyes to understand different cultural expressions and practices; therefore, ethical guidelines require long-term support from educational institutions or cross-cultural collaborative programs to promote in-depth, cross-cultural understanding of these documents among potential consultants and scholars. ethical guidelines can also be used to deal with dispute resolution if some co-management or partnership runs into disagreement without relying on the court system. academic researchers and native leaders in canada have collaboratively sought the possible shape of inter-cultural alternative dispute resolution 20 this document was also published in the international journal of cultural property, 24(4), 409-429 in 2007. 21 preceding the akwé:kon, for example, indigenous peoples from thirteen countries met and adopted the mataatua declaration on cultural and intellectual property rights of indigenous peoples (commission on human rights, 1993). it recommended that indigenous peoples establish their own ethical code of conduct for external users. 22 the university of victoria and royal roads university have hired those who are well versed in traditional protocols as cultural liaison persons. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.4 methods, which incorporate traditional models. the traditional models vary by band, tribe, or nation, but many indigenous models apply certain fundamental ethical notions, such as trust, reconciliation, healing, and forgiveness. the tsuu t’ina nation near calgary, for example, has a court, where native judges and prosecutors work with peacemakers to resolve conflicts by relying on the traditional concept of healthy human relationships (dewhurst, 2004). these new attempts mainly focus on inter-personal disputes, but they can be applied to other types of disputes, including water shortage or contamination, biodiversity or conservation or loss, and the validation of traditional knowledge that we have examined above. another challenge to these ethical guidelines can be related to the question of how they can be linked to watershed management. proponents of biodiversity conservation have long noted that a healthy watershed environment has provided the basis for both cultural and biological diversity, and vice versa. postel and richter (2010) elaborate on this question by drawing on the teachings of environmental ethicist and ecologist leopold (1949), who proposed an examination of the health of the environment within a context of ecological whole. they introduce the idea of water ethics, in which ecological needs are fairly represented in water management systems, and contend that the precautionary principle can function as a safety valve to deal with the uncertainties of scientific management. as the scientific projection models of river flow patterns and the quantity of available water may go wrong, often because of the unpredictable nature of weather conditions, the precautionary principle gives good reasons for decision makers to save “a large enough share of natural river flows [in rivers] to ecosystem support” (p. 119). for postel and richter, the principle of public trust, rather than public dependency on sciences and technologies, should guide water ethics for action. in water for life, wescoat and white (2003) emphasize the importance of changing social values in our attitude towards environmental conservation. for example, wetlands were once regarded as the source of disease vectors and pests, but today ecologists and others have come to realize their important ecological functions. in a similar vein, traditional knowledge on water use and conservation can be elevated from the notion of archaic or outdated practices to that of a potential asset to sustainable development. here wescoat and white (2003) do not mean that traditional knowledge and practice can directly apply to rapidly changing contemporary conditions. traditional practices need further adjustment with the supplement of scientific environmental knowledge. the ethical principle of cross-cultural respect and autonomy, along with others, can facilitate further works that bridge scientific and indigenous or local communities in canada (sandford & phare, 2011). conclusion these contemporary attempts to establish ethical principles similarly stress the empowerment of people, cross-cultural respect, ecological needs, equity, precautionary principle, and self-government. ethical principles and education have nourished changing social values and are expected to continue doing so in the future. keeping this point in mind, let us revisit the question i raised in the introduction: how can canada achieve comprehensive water governance and improve water quality for both humans and biodiversity? the first step toward this goal is to identify challenges to achieving comprehensive governance. we have observed some challenges in legal and political frameworks. we also looked at the gap between science and traditional knowledge. here i use governance rather than management, for management tends to operate in a linear way and cannot be comprehensive. wescoat and white (2003) point out that a basic challenge to water management in the twenty-first century is “to identify which combinations of research and administrative policy offer promising opportunities to exercise genuine positive methods of achieving a sustainable world” (p. 25). in this predominantly technocratic scenario of environmental management, the voice and insights of indigenous and local communities continue to be marginalized. governance, on the other hand, has the potential to embrace different cultural and political views without relying solely on experts to make decisions for local people. then the ideas of self-government (self-determination), the precautionary principle, equity, and cross-cultural respect can work better to empower people. another important step is to acquire a deeper level of cultural understanding about traditional knowledge. through learning about traditional knowledge, local community members can gain not only 15 matsui: water ethics for first nations published by scholarship@western, 2012 ecological knowledge, but also a sense of belonging that is distinctively attached to the local environment. here i do not mean that in western canada local knowledge can be isolated from the influence of the mass communication systems. many native and local communities have increasingly experienced the disorientation of their sense of belonging to the local environment, but the rediscovery of locally engendered knowledge can re-orient community members to maintain or develop intimate relationships to their local environment and people. my proposal for water ethics, therefore, is to add to the ideas of postel and others who suggest that the sense of belonging and stewardship for the local environment can come from traditional knowledge education. this also aligns with what leopold (1949), naess (2003), and shiva (2003) have proposed – to place one’s daily activities within a context of biotic community and rediscover one’s “ecological self.” the ideas and actions for comprehensive governance cannot be complete without 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(1992). s.c., ch. 40. 23 matsui: water ethics for first nations published by scholarship@western, 2012 the international indigenous policy journal september 2012 water ethics for first nations and biodiversity in western canada kenichi matsui recommended citation water ethics for first nations and biodiversity in western canada abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license microsoft word 316267-text.native.1351799581.doc developing ethical research practices between institutional and community partners: a look at the current base of literature surrounding memorandums of understanding in canada the international indigenous policy journal volume 8 issue 4 reconciling research: perspectives on research involving indigenous peoples—part 2 article 3 october 2017 developing ethical research practices between institutional and community partners: a look at the current base of literature surrounding memorandums of understanding in canada danielle alcock western university, london, dalcock2@uwo.ca jennifer elgie western university, london, jelgie3@uwo.ca chantelle richmond western university, londoni, chantelle.richmond@uwo.ca jerry w hite western university, london, white@uwo.ca recommended citation alcock, d. , elgie, j. , richmond, c. , white, j. (2017). developing ethical research practices between institutional and community partners: a look at the current base of literature surrounding memorandums of understanding in canada. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(4). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.3 developing ethical research practices between institutional and community partners: a look at the current base of literature surrounding memorandums of understanding in canada abstract few institutionalized examples exist wherein indigenous communities have participated in the codevelopment of ethics initiatives. this article explores one such process—the memorandum of understanding (mou). a mou is a document created between institutional and community research partners to outline project guidelines. based on canadian mous developed between 1980 and 2016, this research has four objectives; (a) to describe current trends of mou use and recognition in research; (b) to describe the challenges of collaborative research and how mous might mitigate them; (c) to understand if a standard mou is feasible; and (d) to offer policy suggesting for implementing mous. local mous mark a way for engaging in good research practices that actually benefit the involved community. keywords memorandum of understanding, research ethics, community-based research, research partnerships, collaborative research practices, indigenous research creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ developing ethical research practices between institutional and community partners: a look at the current base of literature surrounding memorandums of understanding in canada we need not dig too deeply into the history of research to see how indigenous communities have been exploited, subjected, and harmed by their involvement in research (adams et al., 2014; brant castellano, 2004; deloria, 1995; smith 1999). today, however, we are witnessing an incredible and hopeful transformation in the way research is being done in the indigenous community context. particularly positive is the growth in indigenous self-determination practices applied to research (kovach, 2009; louis, 2007; smith, 1999). now, more than ever before, we are witnessing a considerable growth in the number of indigenous communities and organizations not only participating in research but leading and executing research with the goal of making positive changes (richmond, 2016). in addition, canadian research ethics boards (rebs) that govern and grant research projects using the tri-council policy statement (tcps)1 continue to rethink and redevelop their institutional policies to better protect indigenous communities and support researchers involved in indigenous-based research (tobias, richmond, & luginaah, 2013). for example, the tcps contains key concepts, definitions, and methods for interpreting and applying the ethics framework in an indigenous context. researchers are expected to read the tcps and reflect these principles in their ethics proposal prior to approval. however, amidst the inclusion of these promising protocols, collaborative indigenous-based research is not without concerns. in particular, there are few institutionalized examples of indigenous communities having participated in the co-development of research ethics initiatives and protocols for governing research. this article explores one such process, the memorandum of understanding (mou) between indigenous partners or communities and institutional research partners.2 in the most general sense, an mou is both a process and a tool for collaborative research. it is an active, living document used between research partners to develop, discuss, and physically outline the ethical, moral, and practical guidelines and protocols that will be used throughout the research project. despite some recognition within the research community of the value of mous, how they come to exist, and the actual adoption by researchers have not been systematically examined in the academic literature. what 1 the interagency advisory panel on research ethics—known as the panel—was jointly created in 2001 by canada’s three federal research agencies, canadian institutes of health research (cihr), natural sciences and engineering research council of canada (nserc), and social sciences and humanities research council of canada (sshrc), to promote the ethical conduct of research involving human participants using the tricouncil policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans (tcps). the panel is responsible for developing, interpreting, and implementing the tcps. under the tcps, any institution conducting research involving humans “shall establish or appoint reb(s) to review the ethical acceptability of all research involving humans conducted within their jurisdiction or under their auspices, that is, by their faculty, staff or students, regardless of where the research is conducted, in accordance with this policy [the tcps]” (cihr, nserc, sshrc, 2010, article 6.1). 2 for our purposes, indigenous partners are considered any indigenous group or organization. please see link for further clarification of terms http://www.naho.ca/publications/topics/terminology/. institutional partners refer to any canadian research institution that receives and administers funding from the agencies (cihr, nserc, sshrc) to conduct research involving humans. 1 alcock et al.: developing ethical research practices published by scholarship@western, 2017 does the current research base surrounding the use of mous in research look like, and what indications does it give us? why are mous created and how? what factors lead to successful collaborative research, what factors challenge it, and do mous offer a way to bridge these challenges? given indigenous differences across canada, can or should mous be standardized? in this article, we seek to answer these questions as we explore the base of mous developed for research in canada in the past 35 years, as well as the base of literature surrounding mou development and implementation in research. it is our goal to collate this information so that it may inspire and encourage others to engage with mous in their research practice and work towards implementing the mou process as a research standard. this article follows in six sections: literature review, methodology and analysis, key findings, discussion, policy implications, and conclusion. literature review in canada, the term "indigenous" refers to first nations, métis, and inuit peoples (government of canada, 2017). this culturally diverse population share a historically negative relationship with research (ten fingers, 2005). past research practices illustrate two common trends (stiegman & castleden, 2015): the dismissal of indigenous knowledge as "unscientific" and ultimately of limited value (castleden, morgan, & lamb, 2012; kovach, 2009), and a lack of transparency about research intent (assembly of first nations environmental stewardship unit, 2009). perhaps the most prolific example comes from the nuu-chah-nulth people where investigators took 885 blood samples under the auspices of carrying out research to explore the high rate of arthritis in their nation (hawkins & o'doherty, 2011). once the original study was complete, the blood samples were retained and analyzed in a secondary analysis in genetic anthropology, without the nuu-chah-nulth's consent (hawkins & o'doherty, 2011). indeed, neglect toward collaborative, community-based research principles has inarguably been an underlying tone of past colonial research (assembly of first nations environmental stewardship unit, 2009; wallerstein & duran, 2006). yet, increasingly, the use of community-based principles in collaborative research is becoming recognized as a best practice approach and goal for working with indigenous peoples and communities (koster, baccar, & lemelin, 2012; mulrennan, mark, & scott, 2012; o'neil, elias, & wastesicoot, 2015; reading & nowgesic, 2002). according to mulrennan et al., (2012), the collaborative process connects indigenous and western paradigms in order to transition away from traditional (colonial) research methods—from something done on indigenous peoples to something done with or for indigenous peoples (koster et al., 2012). institutional researchers and indigenous partners recognize the value of working together to develop new research practices that foster relationship building for mutually (or community exclusive) desired outcomes (kirkness & barnhardt, 2001; mulrennan et al., 2012). many academics agree that community partners should have greater control over the research process, and that participation in research should lead to tangible benefits at the community level (bull, 2010; mulrennan et al., 2012; parry, salsberg, & macaulay, 2009; restoule, hopkins, robinson, & wiebe, 2015; thom, 2006; wenzel, 1999). however, a lack of official research procedures makes the practical implementation of this goal challenging. additionally, while the core principles of the tcps (cihr, nserc, & sshrc, 2014) make it clear that old institutional research practices that considered indigenous communities to be passive data subjects are no longer acceptable, they still occur (koster et al., 2012). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.3 a memorandum of understanding (mou) is one method of formally and practically engaging with collaborative research concerns (espey, 2002; elias, o'neil, & sanderson, 2004; o'neil, elias, & wastesicoot, 2005). although its initial use is difficult to pinpoint, mou development relates to movements of self-determination, recovery from colonialism, and restoration of cultural values (ball & janyst, 2008) that continue to spark indigenous interest in research. the mou represents an applied practice to doing indigenous research that can significantly enhance both opportunities and outcomes. overarching goals of creating an mou are (a) to ensure increased community control, (b) to set meaningful controls on the research, and (c) to improve the outcomes for the indigenous partner (czaykowska-higgins, 2009). unfortunately, the adoption of mous by institutional researchers has been inconsistent. despite the value of mous, their development can be complicated and time consuming, and there is no one best way to construct mous. within the academic literature, there has been no systematic review that examines what this process of collaboration means in a more practical way. it is here that our study hopes to contribute. methodology and analysis several questions were presented in the introduction related to mou use in research within indigenous and institutional partners. from these questions, we developed four research objectives: a. to understand how or if mous are currently used in research, and if they are understood as a "best practice" for collaborative research with indigenous partners; b. to understand the challenges associated with doing collaborative research between indigenous and institutional partners, and the role mous might play in bridging these challenges; c. if developing a standard mou that can be used as an obligatory step in the overall research process with enforceable protocols is desirable and feasible; and d. to offer policy suggestions for implementing mous as a standardized research practice. a content-based literature review was conducted in june 2016 with the goal of collecting, as comprehensively as possible, all mous developed in canada for research purposes, and all published literature that looked at mou development and use in research. we collected copies of mous, published articles where researchers had created and used an mou in their research,3 as well as published sources where researchers referenced mou development or use but did not necessarily use one in their research. a keyword search was done in the following databases: google scholar, ebsco host, western university shared library catalogue, and proquest. we used multiple combinations of words referring to: a. memorandums of understanding, including memorandum of understanding, mou, mou, memorandum, and 3 we emailed authors who described using an mou to request copies. we were unsuccessful in gaining access to the physical mous; however, their published articles are included as the 40 articles in this research. 3 alcock et al.: developing ethical research practices published by scholarship@western, 2017 b. indigenous peoples in canada, including indigenous, native, aboriginal, first nations, métis, and inuit. we restricted our search to include only mous and literature created and published in canada, and only sources by research institutions and indigenous partners for research purposes. sources were included if they were an mou developed between an indigenous and institutional research partner, or if they addressed one of the following: a. the importance of an mou, b. types of protocols in an mou, c. general or community specific aspects of an mou, d. additional context on mous with indigenous communities, e. best practices for research with indigenous peoples, with reference to mous somewhere, and f. researchers' responsibilities to community members or partners, with reference to mous somewhere. we limited our search to english and included a time frame of 1980 to 2016 (current) to increase relevance. we classified institutional partners as a research institution—university, government organization, or health organization—or as an individual researcher or group of researchers affiliated with one of those institutions. institutional partner and institutional researcher are used interchangeably. we classified indigenous partners based on the terminology "community" developed by the national aboriginal health organization (naho) in canada, which includes peoples living on a reserve, off a reserve in urban areas, and inuit communities. we also reached out via email to researchers we knew had used an mou and to authors identified during our literature review who had used an mou for research to request copies of their mou. the executive director of southwest ontario aboriginal health access centre (soahac), who had an mou with london health sciences centre (lhsc), and two other indigenous communities, who had an mou with institutional partners, kindly shared their mous; however, we were unsuccessful with the literature review authors. all other mous and sources were found via our keyword search. our research yielded a total of 19 mous and 40 additional sources relating to mous in research. to respond to our objectives, we undertook a descriptive and thematic analysis of the 19 mous and 40 articles. we explored the geographic region of the mous, research areas explored, and key elements of mous. the mous also provided context to our thematic findings. mous were coded based on research themes or type of partnerships and analyzed using a thematic content review of key components, which accounted for variations in terms or concepts that addressed the same overall components of the mou. although we tried to be comprehensive in our search, our analysis was limited to mous we could physically get a copy of. each of the 40 sources were organized and coded based on 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.3 area of research and research theme. we also conducted a thematic analysis of the 40 sources, drawing out several interesting themes. findings the findings of this article have been split into descriptive and thematic. the descriptive findings give some indication as to how and if mous are being used in research, and if they are understood by research partners, particularly institutional partners, as a best practice for collaborative research. the thematic findings focus on the content of the articles, particularly context surrounding mou development and implementation, and research between institutional and indigenous partners more generally. descriptive findings although not necessarily generalizable, descriptive findings provide a basic understanding of mou adoption in research and their recognition within the research community. each mou was organized by geographic location, time frame, and type of research (see appendix 1). by geographic location, two of the mous were on a national scale, 14 were provincial, and 3 were community specific with 2 located in london, ontario, and 1 in vancouver, british columbia. see figure 1 for breakdown by province and territory. it is interesting to note that two of the “province-based” mous were with métis communities.4 comparing geographic location to mou adoption, we found that british columbia and manitoba had the highest number of existing (or accessible) mous with five (four provincial and one community specific) and four (provincial), respectively. it appears that british columbia and manitoba may be leading the way for mou use; yet, the small sample of mous makes it difficult to conclude. the low number of community-specific mous led us to believe that mous are generally not shared publicly, nor do they seem to be commonplace for university researchers. the two local mous based in london, ontario were shared with us only because of personal phone calls we made to communities we knew had an mou in place. therefore, as a note of caution, we offer a qualifying statement that our list is by no means an exhaustive analysis of community-specific mous. interestingly, most of the mous were reserve or community-based with provincial institutions as partners, with only two of the community-specific mous—soahac and city of edmonton with the métis nation of alberta—found between urban partners. recall that in conducting our review we limited our search to those written from 1980 to 2016 (current). interestingly, all the mous found were developed and implemented after the year 2000, illustrating that mous are a relatively recent research practice. most of the mous (n = 13) were developed between 2010 and 2016. categorizing by type of research, we found that 5 of the 19 mous were created for health-based research, 4 for education research, 2 each for environment, culture and heritage preservation, as well as reconciliation and recognition research. one mou fell under each of the following categories of research: duty to consult, research partnership, litigation, and child welfare (figure 2). while not conclusive due to the limitations stated, the prevalence of mou development in 4 métis nation of alberta and the city of edmonton, and the government of canada and the manitoba métis federation (mmf) are provincial mous with métis partners. 5 alcock et al.: developing ethical research practices published by scholarship@western, 2017 these areas of research might be indicative of current research trends with education and health-based research with first nations taking the lead in mou development and implementation. figure 1. number of mous by province and territory our search also yielded 40 sources relating to mous in research. we found discussion papers (n = 24), research codes of conduct or guides (n = 4), conference presentations (n = 2), mou newsletter updates (n = 2), case study (n = 2), editorial (n = 1), commentary (n = 1), project report (n = 1), newspaper article (n = 1), review article (n = 1), and a generic mou template (n = 1). see appendix 2 for an alphabetical list of articles by author. each article was organized and coded by overarching area of research including health, environmental, or sociocultural. we found 12 health-based sources, 6 environmental, and 22 sociocultural. after reading each article, we categorized them further based on research theme of source including education, policy, knowledge and cultural preservation, research partnership, governance, ethics, and cultural safety (figure 3). across all areas of research (health, environmental, and sociocultural), we found research partnership and ethics to be the most explored research themes with 10 and 9 sources, respectively. regarding the content of the 40 articles, 25 articles discuss or mention an mou, whereas the other 15 focused more on community-based research and best practices with indigenous communities in canada. of those 25 articles, 7 discussed the development of an mou as a part of their research partnership with indigenous communities.5 5 aboriginal affairs and northern development canada, 2011, 2012; ball & janyst 2008; leatherland & miller 2012; rowley, 2013; styres, zinga, bennett, & bomberry, 2010; thom, 2006. 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.3 figure 2. number of mous by research theme figure 3. number of articles by area of research and research theme 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 duty to consult education heath environmental knowledge/culture preservation research partnerships litigation child welfare reconciliation & recognition 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 education policy knowledge/culture preservation research partnerships governance ethics cultural safety sociocultural environmental health 7 alcock et al.: developing ethical research practices published by scholarship@western, 2017 thematic findings in addition to the descriptive categorizations, after reading the 19 mous and 40 articles, we also found a several interesting themes: a. challenges associated with collaborative research generally, b. research guideline restrictions, c. how mous might bridge these challenges and other benefits of creating an mou, and d. community-specific aspects and key features of an mou. most of the 40 articles focused on collaborative research practices more generally with an mou used as an example. therefore, a number of our findings are based on collaborative research practices with indigenous partners more broadly with commentary offered on how mous might fit into these findings. challenges restricting successful collaboration. a common theme throughout the literature was that successful (indigenous-focused) collaboration is challenging. in fact, challenges associated with collaborative research are often heightened in an indigenous context (association of canadian universities for northern studies, 2003). in general, partnership development between indigenous and institutional organizations is not a streamlined or straightforward process (brascoupé & waters, 2009; kahnawake schools diabetes prevention project [ksdpp], 2007), resulting in several indigenous and institutional partner challenges that may restrict or hinder mou development. institutional partner challenges for collaboration often relate to their role as researchers and the institutional expectations that exist in that role that limit the desirability of mous. some common challenges for institutional partners found in the literature include: a. balancing responsibilities. researchers often have multiple responsibilities to the indigenous partner, academic institution, and funding agency6 that can be difficult to balance (styres et al., 2010, restoule et al., 2015). b. multi-site and community context. challenges associated with negotiating multiple partner and protocol responsibilities can be heightened when research is conducted in a multi-site and/or multi-community context. for instance, the kahnawake schools diabetes prevention project (kdspp) partners with three academic institutions. c. data control and access. institutional researchers have historically claimed ownership over data and analysis with researchers expected to build their careers off publishing research (bull, 2010). however, institutional ownership is contrary to best practices that suggest indigenous partners determine ownership within an mou (the first peoples' heritage, 6 while many researchers may not actually receive funding from external sources like sshrc, most researchers and institutional partners do or are expected to apply to funding organizations in hopes of receiving funding, and thereby they must follow their application protocols. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.3 language, and culture council, 2004; walpole island first nations & the university of western ontario, 2009). d. time, money, and energy requirements. collaborative research (and mou development) is predicated on relationship building (styres et al., 2010). developing relationships takes time, and institutional researchers interested in working with indigenous partners can expect increased time, money, and energy requirements that are not always conducive to institutional or career-based expectations (cargo & mercer, 2008: rowley, 2013). many of the challenges faced by institutional researchers also generate indigenous-specific concerns regarding collaborative research. we found that challenges restricting indigenous partners in collaborative research are often a result of their historical “lack of role” within the research process that continues to undermine their full collaborative participation in research today. some common challenges found in the literature include: a. lack of formal regulating body. indigenous partners have historically been awarded considerably less power in the research process (castleden et al., 2012). without a formal regulating body, institutional researchers are not required to consult with indigenous partner in the early stages of development such as applying for ethics (although many do), positioning institutional partners as primary researchers and experts in the field (castleden et al., 2012). b. data control and access. community members often do not have access to the raw data, manuscripts published in an academic journal, or the opportunity or capacity to analyze and interpret data (koster et al., 2012). c. cultural values and protocols. indigenous partners are also often forced to work within institutional protocols and restrictions due to their institutional partners (kaufert, 2007), which may neglect existing community protocols and the incorporation of cultural practices. d. access to funding. related to cultural values and protocols, not having access to funding was a common critique of traditional collaborative research practices (martin, macaulay, mccomber, moore, & wien, 2006). while some institutional researchers may allocate time and money to include some traditional practices (ball & janyst, 2008), it is not necessarily required. research guideline restrictions. related to the previous finding, many of the challenges restricting research partners in collaborative research stem from institutional research standards and guidelines that clash with indigenous principles or protocols (bull, 2010; parry et al., 2009; schnarch, 2004). research standards and guidelines, such as those mandated by rebs, govern the research process. these, in turn, shape the expectations placed on institutional researchers and the role indigenous partners tend to be allocated in the research process. the challenges for successful collaboration discussed above, are not new. nor are they specific to the mou process. rather, they are an outcome of research guideline restrictions that impede institutional partners' desire and ability to take up collaborative research practices like an mou and restrict indigenous partner's role in the research process as partners. research institution and funding agency guidelines limit both institutional and indigenous partners by 9 alcock et al.: developing ethical research practices published by scholarship@western, 2017 placing restrictions on how research can be conducted (meijer drees, 2001). for instance, it is part of reb protocols that the researcher develops interview guides and other research tools prior to the project gaining ethics approval, which inhibits collaborative principles. additionally, the historical devaluing of indigenous community protocols or practices in favour of generic institutional guidelines creates a mismatch between institutional and indigenous partner expectations. for instance, the continued privileging of the tcps (cihr, nserc, & sshrc, 2014) over first nations ocap™ principles (first nations centre, 2005; walmark, 2010) remains a barrier to creating and implementing mous between institutional and indigenous partners and sets standards for how control over the research process is negotiated.7 using an mou to bridge challenges and other benefits. despite the negative history, many indigenous leaders and community members recognize the value of research (kovach, 2009). developing research practices that mediate partner concerns while increasing the role of indigenous partners from being “researched” to “researchers” is an important goal shared by many collaborative researchers (ashawasegai, 2009). recall that access to funding, control over data, the incorporation of cultural values and protocols, and a lack of formal regulating bodies were all challenges restricting the full participation of indigenous partners in collaborative research. creating a standardized mou practice is one method of equalizing the research process between partners by setting parameters for addressing these challenges, increasing indigenous partner participation and control over the research process (castleden et al., 2012; espey, 2002; restoule et al., 2015; ten fingers, 2005), while still appreciating institutional partner concerns. many communities are unable to obtain monetary support external to their community funds. thus, partnering with research institutions and using an mou presents an opportunity to access funding and other resources (rowley, 2013; styres et al., 2010). some examples of mou protocols found for addressing spending responsibilities and funding allocation included hiring and training community members as researchers (castleden et al., 2012; czaykowska-higgins, 2009), reciprocity such as gifts and sharing of meals to thank participants (ball & janyst, 2008; castleden et al., 2012), and other protocols related to financial security and responsibility of cost (parry et al., 2009; restoule et al., 2015). although not always possible, contract employment for community members as research assistants is a valuable direct benefit (ball & janyst, 2008; meijer drees, 2001; parry et al., 2009; rowley, 2013). it can lead to increased accountability for the indigenous partner (schnarch, 2004), the development of community capacity through direct monetary and skills-based benefits (cargo & mercer, 2008; castleden, et al., 2012; meijer drees, 2001), and strengthen community interest and participation (martin et al., 2006). control over data can also be addressed through mou protocols. some examples of mou protocols that increase community control over data include discussion of data analysis, interpretation, and results throughout the research process (ksdpp, 2007), releasing or sharing data only after adequate time has passed for the indigenous partner to complete and disseminate their interpretation (walpole island first nations & the university of western ontario, 2009), and releasing and sharing data for agreed upon purposes only (czaykowska-higgins, 2009). 7 we are using tcps and ocap™ principles as a canadian example. we propose that mous can be used to reconcile institutional and indigenous research principles internationally. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.3 mous can also be used to promote community values and address concerns regarding the lack of formal regulating bodies. protocols surrounding methodology were found to be critical areas for promoting community values and culturally based practices thereby increasing indigenous partner control. the ksddpp code of ethics (2007) includes several protocols for ensuring the incorporation of indigenous methodologies and the haudenosaunee philosophy into the research methodology. additionally, developing an active mou is one way of mitigating the lack of indigenous regulating body concern as it functions as a document of responsibility and accountability negotiated by the indigenous partner for seeing the project through, step by step. other ways the use of mous were found to benefit indigenous partners is through the inclusion of protocols regarding increased community capacity as an outcome of the research process (e.g., through research infrastructure; ball & janyst, 2008), protection of community knowledge and culture8 (liboiron, 2014; thom, 2006), control over knowledge including sharing (ashawasegai, 2009), documentation of a community issue (o'neil et al., 2005), and enhancing opportunities for communities to practice self-governance (espey, 2002; ladner, 2009). although the benefits for indigenous partners seem to be more obvious (styres et al., 2010), institutional researchers should recognize the intrinsic benefit of prioritizing their partnership with indigenous partners through an mou. additionally, we believe that institutional partners benefit from the increased external awareness an mou brings towards the researcher's role in collaborative research. notably, the obligatory function of an mou would standardize practices that are unique to this type of research, such as increased time requirements and relationship building, and therefore would normalize them and minimize researcher impact. community-specific aspects of an mou and key elements. the previous three findings illustrate several existing challenges in collaborative research that impact the adoption and development of mous, especially by institutional researchers. they also highlight how mous can begin to address these concerns. our fourth finding considers the question, “where do we go from here?” indigenous and institutional partnerships are unique and varied; therefore, mous must reflect that. however, we found most mous include the same or similar key elements, which constitute the “best practice” protocols that contribute to rhetoric on a standardized mou process. first, looking at community specific aspects, prioritizing and respecting indigenous partners as distinct peoples was a common theme throughout the literature. the literature supported a direct relationship between community-driven and community-centered research and the overall worth of the study, predicated on how useful and beneficial the research would be to the indigenous partner (ball & janyst, 2008; castleden, et al., 2012; o'neil et al., 2005; pearce et al., 2009; schnarch, 2004). recognizing the particularities of local communities and needs may require that specific protocols be included in the mou agreement, in addition to or to replace the key elements. see figure 4 for an example of a community-specific mou that has local requirements. 8 thom (2006) discussed the protection of intangible property within the mou created between communities and the university of victoria. intangible property refers to “the traditional, indigenous knowledge held within aboriginal communities as their intellectual property” (p. 1). 11 alcock et al.: developing ethical research practices published by scholarship@western, 2017 figure 4. example of community-specific mou (walpole island first nation & the university of western ontario, 2009). our analysis also showed that most mous contain similar key elements (protocols). we have included a description of the most consistently used elements in table 1. we found that most mous include all or a variety of these elements depending on their fit with the project. we suggest that the development of any mou reflect the specificities of the community partners through a process of tailoring these elements. for example, if a research partnership includes an opportunity for employment of indigenous community members, a protocol should be negotiated and included. see appendix 3 for our suggestions on steps for negotiating an mou as an institutional researcher. summary of findings and discussion our review resulted in several significant findings useful for understanding where mous currently stand as a research practice with indigenous partners and the role of mous for future research. recall our four main objectives were: • to understand if and how mous are being used in research and if they are understood as a best practice for collaboration; • to understand the challenges of collaborative research with indigenous and institutional partners and how mous might mitigate those challenges; • to understand how or if developing a standardized protocol is desirable and feasible; and • to offer policy suggestions for mous as a standard research practice. beginning with our first objective, striving for ethical community-based research that is indigenous centered is an important goal for indigenous research. however, our descriptive findings indicate that mous are not standard practice nor are they necessarily accessible. first, we had a difficult time finding copies of existing (including expired) mous, leading us to believe that mous are both underutilized by the research community as well as inaccessible. second, even though some of the authors from the 40 sources described their experience of using an mou, they declined our request to share their mou. thus, examples of mous that researchers can use to shape their own mou are difficult to find, which in some ways undermines the goal of creating ethics agreement with and for the indigenous partner as a standard research practice. walpole island first nation (wifn) and the university of western ontario(uwo) mou. this mou applies to all collaborative endeavours between wifn and uwo, which is different from other types of mou that are organization specific or based on the research project. yet, it is still community specific as it details only research relationships with walpole island first nation. this mou has several built in protocols that are specific to the needs of the community and can be viewed at https://www.uwo.ca/research/_docs/resources/walpole_island_mou.pdf 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.3 table 1. key elements of an mou element content and purpose title • reflect the content and subject of research and may include signing partners. • usually titled “memorandum of understanding” about health, education, etc. preamble • provides a general description of the reasoning for the mou and some background information about the reasoning why an mou is needed. • outline “the partners” involved in the mou. • include recognition of pre-existing relationships or agreements (e.g., treaties). outline the definitions of the partners signing the mou • outline the signing partners and any additional partners (e.g., funders) and include their shared agreement to achieve the specific objectives. • acknowledge partner roles such as “the parties acknowledge that first nations shall be responsible for the delivery of the full range of services under the child and family services act, as well as adoption services as under the adoption act to first nation members residing onand off-reserve in manitoba” (the assembly of manitoba chiefs and her majesty the queen in right of the province of manitoba, 2012, objective 1.1). statement of purpose • succinctly outline the purposes of creating an mou and set goals and missions of the parties involved in signing. • most statements of purpose are community or organization specific. • community or organization specific comments (i.e., mission statements or standards) may be included here. • examples: “research should provide clear benefits to first nations peoples and communities . . . research should help develop capacity in meaningful ways” (schnarch, 2004, p. 91). defines roles and responsibilities and/or priorities • define how the signing parties of the mou will achieve the objective outlined in the statement of purpose. • define what each partner is responsible for in the research and how that responsibility will be carried out. framework for discussion • outline the general commitment and agreement of the mou and what the mou represents as a formal agreement between the signing parties. timeframe(s) • most mous include a timeframe for the duration of the mou. • they may also include time required to amend or change the mou and the process for doing so including an end date, dates for review of the project or partnership, potential for extensions, and procedure for terminating agreement. • examples: termination period required in advance through written notice (60 days, 90 days). the mou becomes effective the date that the mou is signed between the involved parties. duty to consult • outline requirements to report on progress of research project and procedures for doing so. • may include protocols for scheduling meetings upon finishing different phases, components, etc. via community or board meetings, or other. relationship or partnership development • this section is similar to the duty to consult section and may be used interchangeably. • state the process of continuing relationship development between partners and other community participants and how a relationship of trust and knowledge about the community will be built into the project. • the focus on developing relationships of trust between participants is what differs this section from duty to consult. relationship development might include more democratic or participatory research methods in an effort to increase participation rates, but in general has fewer formal guidelines for consulting community partners such as meetings. 13 alcock et al.: developing ethical research practices published by scholarship@western, 2017 table 1. key elements of an mou (continued) element content and purpose informed consent and confidentiality statement • usually outlined in two sections. • should outline the purpose of the project including individual participant and community risks. although communities may consent to participate, informed consent must be obtained from individual participants as well. • both informed consent and confidentiality adhere to similar principles of project transparency. participants should understand the project, their roles, their responsibilities, and the risks of the project as it applies to themselves and the community. • as it applies, this section should also specify how one partner may gain consent to use data owned by the other partner. • outline confidentiality protocols for collected material and information during the project and following the expiration of the mou. data ownership and dissemination • outline mechanisms of protection and protocols surrounding the ownership of materials, scholarship, and publication rights, including who physically holds the data, how the data can be shared or accessed, and with what permission and in what form data can be shared, who data can be shared with, and for how long a partner has access to data. • having a clear and concise data section is important as it can improve participation and the quality and accuracy of data because the community partners regard the information as valuable. • it may include a general statement about the research process such as “research should increase first nations control of information and research processes” (schnarch, 2004, p. 91), as well as specifics surrounding the process of sharing such as: • releasing or sharing data only after there has been adequate time for the indigenous group to complete and disseminate its own interpretation. • releasing or sharing data for specific and agreed upon purposes only. • releasing only tabular or statistical data for quantifiable information, not record level information. • this section can also outline the “review and approve” process between partners prior to release of publications and presentation (schnarch, 2004). • agree to a right to dissent, each party can include their interpretation of the data. funding and cost sharing • in the absence of external funding, this section should outline which partner is responsible for what costs and how responsibility of cost is determined. • it may also outline how non-monetary resources such as community knowledge or social networking (akwesasne good mind research protocol; the research advisory committee, 1994) are valued and will be incorporated and exchanged. • soahac (2012) includes an insurance liability section in their mou in regards to coverage for general, comprehensive, and professional liability because their mou is focused on health care services for aboriginal seniors. activities • once the mou is signed, some include provisions for a steering committee to provide leadership over the research process and oversee the development. this section should outline the roles and responsibilities of the steering community (e.g., the first nations leadership council representing the bc assembly of first nations, the first nations summit, & the union of bc indian chiefs, & the government of canada, 2008) • this section may also detail the decision-making process. for instance, if a method of voting or delegation is used. • if a steering committee does not exist, this section may detail the process of creating one in the future. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.3 table 1. key elements of an mou (continued) element content and purpose general provisions • outline that the creation of the mou between the first nation community or organization and the academic or government institution does not affect other agreements or relationships. • for example, the federation of saskatchewan indian nations, government of canada, & government of saskatchewan (2008) agreement includes a final section that states the mou does not affect the jurisdiction of first nations health in saskatchewan, does not affect existing treaties, or will not impact existing relationships between regional or national health agencies. dispute resolution • include parameters for disagreements and how they should be dealt with if they arise during or after the research process. • the heritage conservation mou (2010) outlines their dispute resolution process that begins with an in person meeting. if it cannot be resolved, then written resolutions are provided on behalf of each party and finally representatives for each party will meet if the dispute cannot be resolved. definitions • provide definitions of the parties signing the mou. • define terms used within the mou such as first nations groups or organizations, the academic institution, and/or the government agency. point of contact • provide the main contacts for the institutional and indigenous partner who have signed the mou. signing parties • the mou is signed on behalf of the researcher (academic, organization, governmental) and the first nation community (e.g., chief) or organization (executive director). note. the mou for first nations education in alberta does not follow the key features of most mous and outlines specific objectives and roles in their mou. the mou also explicitly states that it is not a treaty and does not affect existing treaties or treaties made in the future (confederacy of treaty 6 first nations, treaty 7 management corporation, treaty 8 first nations of alberta, her majesty the queen in right of canada, & her majesty the queen in right of alberta, 2010). therefore, researchers must rely on templates, legal counsel from universities, and community band councils, which presents some concerns. on the one hand, mous should be indigenous partner specific; therefore, having counsel from community organizations is highly valuable. however, band councils may not know all the right questions to ask or the types of protocols to include. similarly, relying on legal counsel from universities or using government standard formulas can impede the overall goal of local mou development, which is to create a beneficial project that is community centered. for instance, in developing their mou with brock university, styres et al. (2010) found that brock's legal representative was out of her element, with the draft being “very linear and hierarchical” (p. 634). still, striving for ethical research remains an important goal for community researchers. increasing community control to develop useful and meaningful research relationships remains an important aspect of this ethical undertaking (bull, 2010). yet despite progress, indigenous partners still lack the same participation and control over the research process that institutional partners have, and institutional researchers still face external expectations from the research community that are unrealistic in an indigenous context, which can limit the voluntary use of an mou. therefore, a disconnect exists between the theoretical acceptance of the ethical principles underlying mou use in research and the actual adoption of mous as a research standard. 15 alcock et al.: developing ethical research practices published by scholarship@western, 2017 this brings us to our next objective, understanding the challenges of collaborative research and the role of mous for mitigating them. interestingly, we believe that many of the challenges impeding mou use can be addressed by a standardized mou practice (standardized as an expected part of research, like that of a reb). at the most basic level, many of the challenges researchers face deal with expectations placed on the researcher by the research community and the consequences of sacrificing some of the reins on the research process, while the concerns of indigenous partners relate to the historical lack of control over research and the desire to gain more control. however, continued pressure to promote mou development as a research standard may be instrumental for mediating these challenges. currently, institutional researchers tend to be heavily penalized in academia for not publishing. however, data control and dissemination protocols included in an mou may result in fewer publications for the institutional partner as indigenous partners publish their findings. therefore, finding a way to systematically bridge institutional and indigenous partner interests is of utmost importance. developing a standardized protocol, such as the mou, may be one effective way of doing so. mous can bring external awareness to outside partners, such as rebs and funding agencies, to the responsibilities of institutional partners to indigenous partners and the different ethics process, expectations, and outcomes this type of research has—in effect normalizing this process. in doing so, the rhetoric would shift from a “sacrifice” to a standard expectation, strengthening the relationship between institutional and indigenous partners, while still maintaining institutional partner status within the research community or, at the very least, not negatively impacting it. additionally, mous provide a platform for institutional partners to be upfront with the indigenous partner about their institutional responsibilities. indigenous partners may need to understand some of these problems, which are inherent in research with institutional partners, and think innovatively to ensure increased involvement and incorporation of indigenous partner research practices and values. any researcher interested in doing meaningful collaborative research will do the same. indigenous partners may insist on being active within the research process, even if this means revising the reb ethics application. by shifting institutional expectations for the research process, mous provide a baseline or foundation for research, making it both desirable and feasible—our fourth objective. it is evident across canada that mous remain underused, given they are under discussed in the literature and their overall lack of use in research. some indigenous organizations or communities will not engage in research without protocols such as an mou in place; others may not know what an mou is or want one. we believe that indigenous partners who initiate a formal protocol may have more active governing bodies while communities in lower social and political positions may be less likely to request a formal mou from researchers. therefore, the desirability of a standard mou practice stems from its ability to mediate discussed challenges and provide a baseline for how institutional researchers should expect to engage with potential indigenous partners. indigenous partners who are less “research savvy” should be treated the same as communities who are more aware or have more experience. while researchers should be taking the initiative to promote this, a standardized protocol would ensure that the decision to ultimately develop and implement an mou is with the indigenous partner. initially, mou development and implementation as a research standard may seem complicated. we do not suggest that this process will be straightforward without any bumps or lessons, nor do we suggest researchers take a “one size fits all” approach to mou development. yet, we believe that a functional and standard mou is the logical direction for future research. in our analysis, we found that most of the 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.3 mous contained the same or similar elements that were then tailored to reflect project or community specifics, which speaks to the feasibility of a mou research standard. despite the limitations of our review, we believe this finding highlights the fact that many indigenous partners have similar expectations, desires, and/or needs when it comes to research: a project that is beneficial and useful for the indigenous partner. like other protocols (for example, rebs), the mou would become a part of the research process by providing a foundation for addressing challenges, mediating existing research guidelines, and normalizing the collaborative indigenous-centered process, including all the researcher expectations that go along with it. in general, mous identify new and innovative research practices and strengthen research relationships, which is highly beneficial for researchers interested in working with indigenous peoples long term. therefore, an active mou negotiated between partners should be considered a necessary next step in research policy to continue developing better research practices. knowing their position of power in the research process, institutional researchers are key players in encouraging mou development and should support this shift towards more ethical research standards. research implications and policy suggestions the lack of formal ethical protocols surrounding collaborative research that have been negotiated and developed with indigenous peoples is a major policy concern. implementation of a formal mou on par with other rebs regarding accountability and strict researcher adherence is the logical next step in developing indigenous community and research relationships. challenge: the different partners that are often active within a research project (rebs, funding agencies, researchers, indigenous partners, etc.,) are considered distinct entities that tend to have disjointed or disconnected and even contradictory protocols, procedures, expectations, and roles for research that makes true collaboration difficult. implication: where existing community protocols or expectations are not reflected in reb protocols and funding application requirements, logistical challenges may be exacerbated due to a lack of institutionalized recognition of an mou. although becoming more common, community ethics protocols remain a principle of best practice, lacking in enforceable protocols. result: the disconnected relationship between research partners as well as the unofficial nature of mous means there is the potential for external partners and researchers to neglect their responsibilities towards the indigenous partner and forego some of the more complicated aspects of collaboration. for instance, the requirement that researchers submit fully developed proposals for reb ethics approval before conducting any research leaves little opportunity for community consultation let alone meaningful collaboration in the early development stages of the project. at the same time, sanctions do not exist for disciplining researchers who violate existing ethical guidelines except for the community or organization to lodge a complaint to the affiliated university or research institution (brant castellano, 2004). policy suggestions: to work towards greater institutional partner accountability and collaboration, it is suggested that mous become obligatory as a standard practice of gaining reb ethics approval and access to funding and be enforceable by the institutional ethics board that the researcher(s) belongs to 17 alcock et al.: developing ethical research practices published by scholarship@western, 2017 and funding agencies. it is suggested that a standard template for mous be developed under active consultation and negotiation with indigenous leaders and organizations, with indigenous participants making up no less than 50% of the mou developers. in translating this template to a specific project, it is suggested that the indigenous partner make the determination as to whether the mou is acceptable or in need of further negotiation, with the inclusion of any and all template protocols determined by the indigenous partner. further, indigenous partners must be given all appropriate information, necessary documentation, and additional resources to ensure that they are adequately informed about what mous are, their purpose, and how they can be negotiated and enforced. the option to forgo the mou process should be formal and up to the indigenous partner. mous as an obligatory stage in research would be enacted in a two-part policy change that maintains: a. mous need to be obligatory with the negotiated protocols enforceable to ensure institutional partner accountability to indigenous partner.9 b. funding institutions and rebs need to change their procedures and protocols to reflect this principle. as a first step, mous should be regarded as just or more important than reb ethics protocols. in practice, reb ethics approval should be contingent upon ethics approval from the indigenous community or organization in the form of an mou or a similar community-specific agreement. although the indigenous partner may request to not develop an mou, institutional researchers should make it clear that mous can be adjusted and tailored to meet indigenous partner needs, values, and expectations. making reb ethics approval contingent upon community approval offers the indigenous partner a level of protection and increases community control over the research process. to do so, ethics boards and research funding agencies must shift their application processes to accommodate the development of relationships, the opportunity for indigenous partners and researchers to discuss the proposed research, and to gain community ethics approval prior to institutional approval. as a result, canadian granting agencies and institutional rebs would be well served to adopt new application and funding structures that budget money and time for joint planning and support the negotiation of research parameters on a project-by-project basis (meijer drees, 2001). integrating this approach into the research framework will allow the research process to truly be collaborative as research partners would work as units within a unified whole rather than distinct governing bodies. a policy concern that we did not explore in depth is the impact an mou could have on pre-existing agreements such as treaties or future treaty rights. recognizing the concern of treaty interference, care must be taken to build the protection of treaty rights into the mou. 9 given the colonial nature of past research from which mous are trying to move away, indigenous partner responsibility outlined in the various protocols should not be considered “enforceable” in the same way that institutional partner responsibility is. the same is true of accountability. while indigenous partners should respect institutional partners and the negotiated mou, mous should exist to protect indigenous partners and their interests. how best to determine consequences of not adhering to the mou can be outlined in the mou. 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.3 conclusion the two row wampum belt, one of the oldest symbols of agreement between europeans and haudenosaunee communities, can be used as a modern metaphor for the relations sought after through an mou. the agreement represented by the wampum belt is one of commitment to living together as two vessels—the european and haudenosaunee ship—traveling parallel down the river in peaceful coexistence, where neither vessel tries to control the other (oneida nation, 2017). by creating an mou, indigenous and institutional partners commit to working together as equal partners in a mutually beneficial endeavour. standard mous with local relevance mark a way forward for good research practices that actually benefit the indigenous partner. engaging in an mou signifies mutual respect and active community and researcher involvement. community-based learning and project development ensure a culturally inclusive and respectful project with valuable outcomes. using an mou indicates two things: it shows permission to do research has been given by the indigenous partner, and it clarifies and legitimizes the arrangement between partners. gaining community approval indicates mutual respect, a cornerstone of collaboration. in the community context, “permission” is an active process. once ethics approval is granted from the research institution, researchers are often left to implement the projects accordingly, without regular follow up or check ins from the granting body. in contrast, indigenous governing bodies are often more accountable to the project and in turn to the community. permission may require input from various councils, as well as follow up, check ins, and opportunities for redress throughout the project, as outlined in the mou. this level of involvement is necessary to uphold community interests throughout the project and maintain equal control as a community partner. ultimately, mous promote strong working relationships by presenting clear partner expectations and assurance to indigenous communities that their research goals and participation will be maintained throughout the entire research process. mous also indicate that the institutional partner(s) are “willing to be educated on the issues, social phenomena, and traditional values relating to the particular culture” (styres et al., 2010, p. 635), as well as indigenous partner interest in gaining research skills and learning about the research process. through a process of discussion, negotiation, and agreement between research partners, mous provide a workable solution to the institutional, indigenous, and guideline issues discussed above. by using an mou, researchers and indigenous community members can come to an agreement about how to deal with issues. since an mou is an active document that outlines the entire research process, the collaboration between the researcher and the community is founded on transparency of actions and intentions. a formal mou or ethics protocol that can be adjusted based on community needs and specifications is the necessary next step for research with indigenous peoples in canada. at the beginning of this discussion, we noted that this was in no way a conclusive discussion. further work and community consultation would benefit the practical application of this policy endeavour. many indigenous community members and leaders are wary of the implementation of a seemingly western approach to documenting community ethics—formal documents that are signed by involved parties—which makes community consultation and leadership very important. 19 alcock et al.: developing ethical research practices published by scholarship@western, 2017 the commitment to creating meaningful, relevant, and ultimately collaborative research can be a long process; yet, the extra time and effort is worth it. it should not be the responsibility of the indigenous partner(s) to demand change in the traditionally colonial research process. researchers have a responsibility to acknowledge past and current colonial structures by formally and methodologically addressing these concerns. change needs to happen at the institutional level to foster collaborative research with first nations communities and indigenous peoples across canada. 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 3 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(1999). traditional ecological knowledge and inuit: reflections on tek research and ethics. arctic, 52(2), 113-124. retrieved from https://doi.org/10.14430/arctic916 26 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.3 appendix 1 mous by theme, location, and timeframe national mous type of research location/signing parties timeframe health the canadian aboriginal aids network inc. and the national native addictions partnership foundation implemented: march 17, 2011 deadline: no deadline environmental canadian northern economic development agency, natural resources canada, environment canada, fisheries and oceans canada, aboriginal affairs and northern development canada, transport canada, the canadian environmental assessment agency, the canadian nuclear safety commission and the national energy board commission and the national energy board implemented: june 14, 2012 deadline: march 31, 2017 provincial mous theme location/signing parties timeframe nova scotia duty to consult her majesty the queen in right of canada as represented by the minister of aboriginal affairs and northern development and her majesty the queen in right of nova scotia as represented by the minister of the nova scotia office of aboriginal affairs implemented: october 12, 2012 deadline: no deadline alberta education confederacy of treaty 6 first nations as represented by its duly elected grand chief treaty 7 management corporation as represented by its duly elected grand chief treaty 8 first nations of alberta as represented by its duly elected grand chief (assembly of treaty chiefs in alberta) and her majesty the queen in right of canada as represented by the minister of indian affairs and northern development (canada) and her majesty the queen in right of alberta as represented by the minister of education and the minister of aboriginal relations (alberta) implemented: february 24, 2010 deadline: february, 2020 or earlier with 150 day notice can be renewed by written agreement cultural recognition métis nation of alberta (a registered association pursuant to the societies act of alberta) and city of edmonton (a corporation registered pursuant with the municipal government act) implemented: september 30, 2013 deadline: no deadline 27 alcock et al.: developing ethical research practices published by scholarship@western, 2017 mous by theme, location, and timeframe (continued) provincial mous theme location/signing parties timeframe british columbia health the first nations leadership council representing the bc assembly of first nations, the first nations summit and the union of bc indian chiefs and government of canada and government of british columbia implemented: november 27, 2006 deadline: no deadline heritage protection and conservation her majesty the queen in the right of the province of british columbia as represented by the minister of tourism, culture and the arts (british columbia) and doig river first nation, as represented by its chief, prophet river first nation, as represented by its chief and west moverly first nations, as represented by its chief (collectively “the treaty 8 first nations” and individually “a treaty 8 first nation”) implemented: may 20, 2010 deadline: march 31, 2022, or earlier with 30 days written notice a treaty 8 first nation may withdraw from mou with 30 days written notice education the british columbia ministry of education and the british columbia school trustees association implemented: 2014 deadline: 2018, reviewed annually or as required environmental the union of british columbia indian chiefs and the first nations summit and the british columbia assembly of first nations (collectively referred to as the "first nations leadership council") and her majesty the queen in right of canada as represented by the minister of fisheries and oceans (collectively referred to as the “parties”) implemented: september 24, 2013 deadline: september 24, 2016, or earlier with 90 days written notice can be renewed by written agreement saskatchewan health the federation of saskatchewan indian nations (fsin) and government of canada as represented by the minister of health and government of saskatchewan as represented by the minister of health implemented: 2008 deadline: no deadline to be reviewed every two years can be replaced, amended, reviewed with 2 months written notice any party may withdraw with 30 days written notice health the federation of saskatchewan indian nations (fsin) and government of canada as represented by the minister of health and government of saskatchewan as represented by the minister of health implemented: 2010 deadline: 2020 28 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.3 mous by theme, location, and timeframe (continued) provincial mous theme location/signing parties timeframe manitoba education manitoba first nations education resource centre and brandon university including chiefs’ from the from the southern chiefs’ organization (southern chiefs’ organization, waywayseecappo first nation, rolling river first nation, canupawakpa first nation, and dakota tipi first nation) implemented: june 24, 2010 deadline: no deadline litigation her majesty the queen, as represented by the minister of indian affairs and northern development, and the sayisi dene first nation and the northlands dene first nation implemented: 2010 deadline: no deadline reconciliation the government of canada and the manitoba métis federation (mmf) implemented: 2016 deadline: no deadline child welfare the assembly of manitoba chief ("amc") representing the southern first nations as represented by the grand chief, and her majesty the queen in right of the province of manitoba as represented by the minister of family services and housing and the minister of aboriginal and northern affairs ("manitoba") implemented: 2001 deadline: 2005, to be reviewed annually new brunswick education buctouche band, eel ground band, eel river bar first nation, elsipogtog first nation, esgenoôpetitj first nation (burnt church band), fort folly band, indian island band, kingsclear band, madawaska maliseet first nation, metepenagiag mi’kmaq nation, oromocto band, pabineau band, saint mary’s band, tobique band and woodstock band (collectively the “first nations”) and her majesty the queen in right of new brunswick, as represented by the minister of education and the minister responsible for aboriginal affairs (“nb education”) and her majesty the queen in right of canada, as represented by the minister of indian affairs and northern development implemented: april 22, 2008 deadline: no deadline provided community-specific mous theme location/signing parties timeframe health london, ontario southwest ontario aboriginal health access centre (soahac) and london health science centre (lhsc) implemented: january 31, 2012 deadline: no deadline, pending on legislative and partner allowances cultural and language preservation brentwood bay, british columbia the first peoples’ heritage, language and cultural council prepared for the language revitalization in vancouver island salish communities project implemented: 2004 deadline: no deadline research partnership london, ontario walpole island first nation and the university of western ontario (uwo) implemented: june 1, 2009 deadline: january 31, 2014 29 alcock et al.: developing ethical research practices published by scholarship@western, 2017 appendix 2 articles in alphabetical order by author title year author article type key focus the memorandum of understanding for first nations education in alberta newsletter 2011 aboriginal affairs and northern development canada mou newsletter updates provides information and updates on the national panel on first nation elementary and secondary education, mou working groups, and treaty organizations. the memorandum of understanding for first nations education in alberta newsletter 2012 aboriginal affairs and northern development canada mou newsletter updates provides information and updates on mou. editorial: indigenous knowledges and education (ece-12) 2009 jo-ann archibald, mark aquash, vicki kelly, & laura cranmer editorial provides context on the role of “indigenous knowledge” in education. acuns ethical principles for the conduct of research in the north 2003 association of canadian universities for northern studies (acuns) research codes of conduct/guide presents 20 principles for conducting meaningful research between researchers and northerners. years of collaboration blossom into mou 2009 jennifer ashawasegai newspaper article provides social and historical context for the mou between walpole island first nations and the university of western ontario. enacting research ethics in partnerships with indigenous communities in canada: “do it in a good way” 2008 jessica ball and pauline janyst discussion paper examines two indigenous research projects that demonstrate emerging ethical frameworks for indigenous research and utilize community–campus mous. ethics of aboriginal research 2004 marlene brant castellano discussion paper “proposes a set of principles to assist in developing ethical codes for the conduct of research within the aboriginal community or with external partners” (p. 98) by placing discussion within cultural context. exploring the applicability of the concept of cultural safety to aboriginal health and community wellness 2009 simon brascoupé, and catherine waters discussion paper explores “cultural safety” as an outcome at the institutional and policy levels, and its practical implications for improving the health of aboriginal people and the wellness of aboriginal communities. 30 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.3 articles in alphabetical order by author (continued) title year author article type key focus research with aboriginal peoples: authentic relationships as a precursor to ethical research 2010 julie r. bull discussion paper discusses the importance of “authentic research relationships” and offers ways to achieve “authenticity” in research with aboriginal peoples. cihr guidelines for health research involving aboriginal people 2011 canadian institutes of health research research codes of conduct/guides provides guidelines “to assist researchers and institutions in carrying out ethical and culturally competent research involving aboriginal people” (purpose and application section, para. 1). the value and challenges of participatory research: strengthening its practice 2008 margaret cargo & shawna merc discussion paper provides a critical review of literature surrounding participatory research, culminating “in the development of an integrative practice framework . . . to distill the key challenges and added value of pr” (p. 325). “i spent the first year drinking tea”: exploring canadian university researchers’ perspectives on communitybased participatory research involving indigenous peoples 2012 heather castleden, vanessa morgan, & christopher lamb discussion paper explores community-based participatory (cbpr) research in the field of geography, particularly the tension between conceptual understanding and applied research practices. research models, community engagement, and linguistic fieldwork: reflections on working within canadian indigenous communities 2009 eva czaykowskahiggins discussion paper “reflects on different research models in linguistic fieldwork and on different levels of engagement in and with language-speaking communities” (p. 15). environmental racism and first nations: a call for socially just public policy development 2010 christina dhillon & michael g. young review article discusses the relationships between environmental racism and first nations communities in canada and uses examples to identify the need for changes in environmental policies. “just do it!”: carving out a space for the métis in canadian federalism 2013 janique dubois & kelly saunders case study presents the métis as challenging the current view of federalism by “establishing themselves as legitimate partners in the federation and . . . reviving the pre-confederation view of federalism in which power is shared by sovereign peoples” (p. 187). 31 alcock et al.: developing ethical research practices published by scholarship@western, 2017 articles in alphabetical order by author (continued) title year author article type key focus the politics of trust and participation: a case study in developing first nations and university capacity to build health information systems in a first nations context 2004 brenda elias, john o’neil, & doreen sanderson case study explores the recent success of first nations involvement in health information management, “illustrated through a number of initiatives jointly developed and managed by manitoba first nations centre for aboriginal health research and the assembly of manitoba chiefs health information and research committee” (abstract, para. 1). ocap™ and stewardship: a discussion paper for the first nations statistical institute 2002 jennifer espey discussion paper explores “the concepts of stewardship as exemplified by statistics canada and ocap™ as defined by the first nation” (p. 5). municipal-aboriginal advisory committees in four canadian cities: 1999–2014 2016 joanne heritz discussion paper examines municipal aboriginal relations offices and/or advisory committees in vancouver, edmonton, winnipeg, and toronto. kahnawake schools diabetes prevention project: code of research ethics 2007 kahnawake schools diabetes prevention project research codes of conduct/guides provides guidelines on the kahnawá:ke schools diabetes prevention project (ksdpp) center for research and training in diabetes prevention community-based participatory research project. developments in canada: research ethics policy guidelines for research involving aboriginal peoples 2007 dr. joseph kaufert conference presentation examines ethical principles for conducting research with first nations communities and distinguishes key features of research when working with an individual compared to a community. understanding the impact of self-determination on communities in crisis 2009 kiera ladner discussion paper recognizes the need for structural change to transform from colonial subjects to selfdetermining peoples. explores aboriginal selfgovernment and self-determination for healing. policy silences: why canada needs a national first nations, inuit, and métis health policy 2013 josée lavoie discussion paper seeks to answer the question, if what we have in canada is an aboriginal health policy patchwork that fails to address inequities, then what would a healthy aboriginal health policy framework look like? best practice in the making memorandum of understanding: hnhb ccac & six nations 2012 kathryn leatherland & ruby miller conference presentation looks at the challenges of collaborative research and creating the health mou between the six nations of the grand river band council and hamilton niagara haldimand norfolk community care access centre. template of memorandum of understanding for mutual aid research in disasters superstorm research lab & disaster collaboratory 2014 max liboiron generic mou template offers a template starting point for researcher– community or academic–activist partnerships of things to consider when crafting an mou. 32 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.3 articles in alphabetical order by author (continued) title year author article type key focus knowledge translation: a quest for understanding: report prepared by the atlantic aboriginal health research program and the kahnawake schools diabetes prevention program 2006 debbie martin, ann macaulay, alex mccomber, carla moore, & fred wien project report seeks to enhance understanding surrounding knowledge translation (kt) within an aboriginal context, recognizing aboriginal communities and organizations as important partners in the knowledge translation process. native studies and ethical guidelines for research: dilemmas and solutions 2001 laurie meijer drees discussion paper seeks “to illustrate significant research ethics problems, and to stimulate discussion among students, scholars and research participants in native studies research about how to deal with such issues” (p. 84). first nations values in protected area governance: tla-o-qui-aht tribal parks and pacific rim national park reserve 2012 grant murray & leslie king discussion paper “reports on an in-depth case study of the tla-oqui-aht tribal parks and the pacific rim national park reserve, comparing how these areas each attempt to meaningfully engage the tla-o-qui-aht first nation in pa governance.” (p. 385). strengthening the ties that bind? an analysis of aboriginal–municipal intergovernmental agreements in british columbia jen nelles & christopher alcantara discussion paper examines 93 inter-governmental agreements “to construct a typology of aboriginal–municipal inter-governmental partnerships in british columbia” (p. 315). partnering with communitybased organizations: an academic institution’s evolving perspective 2007 keith norris, rebecca brusuelas, loretta jones, jeanne miranda, o. kenrik duru, & carol m. mangione discussion paper reviews “the processes, strategies, and activities around the interface of community–academic partnerships using a cbpr model focused on addressing healthcare issues for minority elders” (p. s1). building a health research relationship between first nations and the university in manitoba 2005 john o’neil, brenda elias, & jennie wastesicoot discussion paper describes “the emergence of a formal partnership between manitoba first nations and researchers in the department of community health sciences at the university of manitoba” (p. s9). guide to researcher and knowledge-user collaboration in health research 2006 david parry, jon salsberg, & ann c. macaulay research codes of conduct/guides provides guidance on “key issues that should be considered when taking an integrated approach to creating knowledge and translating it to action” (p. 2). 33 alcock et al.: developing ethical research practices published by scholarship@western, 2017 articles in alphabetical order by author (continued) title year author article type key focus improving the health of future generations: the canadian institutes of health research institute of aboriginal peoples’ health 2002 jeff reading & earl nowgesic commentary explores the canadian institutes of health research institute of aboriginal peoples’ health strategic research initiative led by both the aboriginal and research communities. first nations mental wellness: mobilizing change through partnership and collaboration 2015 brenda restoule, carol hopkins, jennifer robinson, & patricia k. wiebe discussion paper “describes developments critical to informing the strategy and helping to create foundations for systems change at all levels with positive impacts being created in first nations communities across canada” (p. 89). the reciprocal research network: the development process 2013 susan rowley discussion paper explore “challenges, opportunities, and transformations that occurred during the development of the reciprocal research network (rrn)” (p. 22). ownership, control, access, and possession (ocap™) or self-determination applied to research a critical analysis of contemporary first nations research and some options for first nations communities 2004 brian schnarch discussion paper relating to principles of ocap™ and collective ownership of information, “this paper highlights policies and strategies adopted by first nations organizations” in efforts to “improve ethics in aboriginal research” (p. 80). walking in two worlds: engaging the space between indigenous community and academia 2010 sandra styres, dawn zinga, sheila bennett & michelle bomberry discussion paper focuses on a project between six nations of the grand river territory and brock university to demonstrate that in collaborative research, collaborators should “walk in two worlds to balance the needs of communities with the systemic realities of academia” (p. 617). rejecting, revitalizing, and reclaiming: first nations work to set the direction of research and policy development 2005 keely ten fingers discussion paper explores discussion “on how first nations are working to shape the direction of research and policy development” to address the history and legacy of colonial research practices (abstract, methods section, para. 1). akwesasne good mind research protocol 1994 the research advisory committee discussion paper outlines the application process for researchers who want to work in the akwesasne community. 34 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.3 articles in alphabetical order by author (continued) title year author article type key focus respecting and protecting aboriginal intangible property: copyright and contracts in research relationships with aboriginal communities 2006 brian thom discussion paper “this report is a case study of how a group of coast salish first nations in british columbia entered into a formal arrangement with a university to document their endangered language and publish resources to encourage the revitalization of language and culture” (p. 2). aboriginal intangible property in canada: an ethnographic review 2004 brian thom & don bai discussion paper describes “examples of customary protocols respecting intangible property in four major aboriginal cultural regions of canada” (p. i). traditional ecological knowledge and inuit: reflections on tek research and ethics 1999 george wenzel discussion paper reflects on past appropriation of inuit traditional ecological knowledge (tek) and frames tek as a political, scientific, and cultural concern. educators' perspectives about a public school district's aboriginal education enhancement agreement in british columbia 2012 kevin white, jozsef budai, daniel mathew, mary rickson deighan, & hartej gill discussion paper investigates “the experiences of educators as they implement aboriginal education enhancement agreements (aeeas) in the burnaby school district” in an effort “to forge new partnerships [that] meet the education needs of aboriginal youth” (p. 42). 35 alcock et al.: developing ethical research practices published by scholarship@western, 2017 appendix 3 suggestions for institutional researchers for negotiating an mou protocol step one: understand your position. research groups that are attached to institutions and have access to funding are inherently in a more powerful position then community partners. institutional researchers must recognize this power in order to avoid dominating the process of research development. as a researcher or community outsider, it is important to know who you really are, recognizing your position as a researcher and as part of a research group. it should be noted that aboriginal researchers are also outsiders, although their experience of outsider may be different than their non-indigenous colleagues. this is true in canada and around the world given the diversity of indigenous peoples. even if a researcher is a member of the community, their position as a researcher may put them in a unique position compared to other non-researcher members. researchers are people who can construct arguments and give contextual understandings to indigenous interests and issues that can promote practices or oppose them, legitimate interests or undermine them. researchers trade in knowledge and literally produce meaning, thereby holding power, making it essential researchers help not hurt the indigenous interests, knowingly or unknowingly in effort to build strong allied relations. step two: seeking partners. it goes without saying that research projects arise in different ways. communities or indigenous organizations can approach researchers seeking partnerships, or researchers can be aware of issues of importance and approach indigenous partners seeking to work together. regardless of how things are initiated, take the time to really investigate the understanding each party has of the nature of the research and what is desired. beforehand, researchers need to do their homework on what the community needs and who to approach. our team at western university has worked in several different ways including taking proposals to band councils, tribal councils, community committees, or key individuals such as traditional leaders or elders. we have also been approached to help with many issues by the same groups or persons. however, things are first initiated, the building of a shared vision is the first responsibility for research partners and starts from the first discussion. step three: build relationships. the process of negotiating a working relationship can be challenging as well as time consuming, requiring self-reflection and constant learning. through our time as researchers and allies to indigenous interests, we have learned a simple lesson: the time it takes is the time it takes. relationship building with indigenous peoples or communities is an important “first step” and should not be rushed. rather, we have found that more time put in at the beginning of a research process yields positive results at the end. where practical, a written agreement (a “protocol,” or “memorandum of understanding,” or “contract”) should be the end result of the consultation and negotiation to protect the community and the researcher and to clarify the understandings that have been reached. such agreements may have legal implications and consideration should be given to whether independent legal advice is required. (the australian institute of aboriginal and torres strait islander studies [aiatsis], 2011, p. 16) the initial relationship-building meetings (however many it takes) between the community partner and research team should take place prior to project development. as mentioned previously, relationship building should be considered part of the research methodology, with relationships built first. 36 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.3 step four: understand community needs. assuming the community is interested in the project after the initial relationship building meeting(s), “how do you wish to move forward” should be the first issue of discussion. at this point, researchers should have some understanding of community needs, interests, and goals as outlined by the community. each indigenous organization or community will have its protocols and practices that they adhere to and expect from outside parties. determining best practice and the direction of the research may not be exactly clear for everyone as the process begins, making patience and an open mind important throughout the entire research process. if outsiders are bringing a proposal to the community partner, it is also important that, before the meeting, the researcher has done investigations to determine to whom to present the proposal. doing so is a sign of basic respect and community understanding. understanding and being intuitive to what indigenous partners may want as an outcome from this research project is important to “selling” the project. we would also advise that outsiders be sensitive to the information that indigenous partners may want and/or need. being sensitive to community needs also means prompting people to ask additional questions by soliciting needs from them. answering people's “asked questions” is only one part of the process. it also means bringing unasked questions to the table. the mou is useful in this regard as the many protocols in an mou prompt questions. 37 alcock et al.: developing ethical research practices published by scholarship@western, 2017 the international indigenous policy journal october 2017 developing ethical research practices between institutional and community partners: a look at the current base of literature surrounding memorandums of understanding in canada danielle alcock jennifer elgie chantelle richmond jerry white recommended citation developing ethical research practices between institutional and community partners: a look at the current base of literature surrounding memorandums of understanding in canada abstract keywords creative commons license developing ethical research practices between institutional and community partners: a look at the current base of literature surrounding memorandums of understanding in canada framing indigenous–settler relations within british columbia's modern treaty context: a discourse analysis of the maa-nulth treaty in mainstream media the international indigenous policy journal volume 5 | issue 3 article 5 june 2014 framing indigenous–settler relations within british columbia's modern treaty context: a discourse analysis of the maa-nulth treaty in mainstream media vanessa sloan morgan queen's university, vanessa.sloan.morgan@queensu.ca heather castleden queen's university, heather.castleden@queensu.ca recommended citation sloan morgan, v. , castleden, h. (2014). framing indigenous–settler relations within british columbia's modern treaty context: a discourse analysis of the maa-nulth treaty in mainstream media. the international indigenous policy journal, 5(3). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.5 framing indigenous–settler relations within british columbia's modern treaty context: a discourse analysis of the maa-nulth treaty in mainstream media abstract media plays an integral role in (re)producing our social construction of reality. when viewed in light of canada’s colonial legacy, media’s power has undoubtedly been implicated in circumscribing indigenous peoples and indigenous–settler relations. employing a discourse analysis of mainstream media covering the recent (2011) implementation of a comprehensive land claims agreement in british columbia, this study investigates how media has framed contemporary indigenous–settler relations within the canadian state. findings indicate that mainstream media predominantly relies on stereotypes of indigenous peoples and tends to neglect historical and current political complexities, thereby perpetuating stagnant indigenous–settler relations. concluding with empirically derived recommendations, this article points to education reform to create more robust mainstream media able to address stagnated (re)constructions of indigenous–settler relations. keywords indigenous–settler relations, maa-nulth treaty, first nations, british columbia, canada, comprehensive land claims, media, settler colonialism, discourse analysis acknowledgments the authors gratefully acknowledge huu-ay-aht first nations for their contributions to the design of this article. we also thank ella bennett and paul sylvestre at the hec lab and julia russell at the university of northern british columbia for their tireless comments to earlier editions. to anne godlewska, jane mcmillan, and one anonymous reviewer, thank you for your thoughtful reviews. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/     f r a m i n g i n d i g e n o u s – s e t t l e r r e l a t i o n s w i t h i n b r i t i s h c o l u m b i a ' s m o d e r n t r e a t y c o n t e x t : a d i s c o u r s e a n a l y s i s o f t h e m a a n u l t h t r e a t y i n m a i n s t r e a m m e d i a settler colonial states are historically predicated upon settler immigration and implantation, consequentially displacing indigenous peoples (wolfe, 2006). imperial explorers who began arriving in indigenous territories in the 16th through 19th centuries to what was deemed the “new world,” introduced new diseases (e.g., influenza, tuberculosis, small pox) that would decimate many indigenous nations (waldram, herring, & young, 2006). during this period of turbulence, settlers capitalized on the original inhabitants’ weakened ability to resist settler imposition by colonizing and permanently occupying indigenous territories (miller, 2009). the rapid shift in demographics combined with the ethnocentric and oppressive settler worldviews of the 19th century resulted in the “white man’s burden” mentality, which essentially purported that it was the duty of settlers and their governments to christianize, colonize, control, and civilize indigenous peoples (cardinal, 2011). with territoriality being asserted on a statewide scale, legal–cultural mentalities derived from state possession of land transcended to settler society (kedar, 2003). through this assertion and adjoining legal apparatuses, settler society positioned itself as superior to indigenous peoples and as owners of the new world’s lands and resources (wolfe, 2006). specific means through which territoriality was asserted, however, varied within different settler colonial contexts. the settler colonial states of new zealand, australia, and canada, for example, all have distinct histories predicated upon indigenous dispossession (see for example armitage, 1995). what remains common across these colonial contexts is the institutional entrenchment and normalization of settler legal–cultural rights (armitage, 1995; kedar, 2003). due to the dynamic nature of indigenous-settler relations, and the heterogeneous histories that have created these relationships, every settler colonial situation is unique thus needing to be viewed in light of specific historical, legal, and social conditions. the canadian state is a particularly precarious example of tumultuous settler colonial histories. canada’s colonial roots are demonstrated on the political landscape, which resembles a patchwork of legal tapestry. in canada, settler colonial legal–cultural frameworks hold together treaties as part of a larger project of state sovereignty, an initiative dependent upon the dispossession of indigenous peoples. although many territories in canada have been decided through historic treaties, the province of british columbia (bc) is largely left out of this tapestry because much of it remains unceded to this day1. a recent result of the canadian state’s historical dismissal of indigenous territorial possession and title is that many first nations are now seeking compensation, predominantly through the legal system byway of the negotiation of modern treaties or court bound litigation. in the bc landscape, which is incredibly diverse and with each locale shaped by a distinct colonial history, local relations have to be considered in place and over time. the intent of this article is to explore indigenous–settler relations in a modern settler colonial context. mainstream print media (newspaper) coverage of the genesis of the maa-nulth treaty (maa-nulth nations, 2008), a modern treaty implemented in british columbia, canada in 2011, as represented in                                                                                                                 1 treaty 8 (1899) encompassing some dene territories in the northeastern region of bc and the 14 douglas purchase treaties (1850-1854) covering some coast salish and kwakwaka’wakw territories on vancouver island were the only historic treaties signed in bc (miller, 2009). 1 sloan morgan and castleden: framing indigenous–settler relations within bc's modern treaty context published by scholarship@western, 2014     two media sources provided the empirical data for this study. mainstream print media was specifically chosen due to its prominent role in informing dominant society about relevant current events (warry, 2007), its ability to accessibly provide coverage over the decade long negotiation of the treaty, in addition to its portrayal as an objective source of information (wakefield & elliott, 2003). the maanulth treaty was specifically chosen due to the second author’s longstanding research relationship with one of the maa-nulth signatories, huu-ay-aht first nations (see castleden, garvin & huu-ay-aht first nations, 2009). the first author was invited into huu-ay-aht and castleden’s research partnership to aid in a research project concerning community re-envisioning in a post-treaty era (see sloan morgan, castleden & huu-ay-aht first nations, in press). the need for the research reported in this article, which assesses how indigenous–settler relations, and by extension modern treaties, were portrayed in the media, emerged from conversations amongst the research partners that involved questioning the impact that media has on the general public’s understanding of modern treaties in canada. before these questions can be addressed, however, it is necessary to situate the modern treaty process in bc. b c ’ s e v o l v i n g l a n d s c a p e : m o d e r n t r e a t i e s a n d i n d i g e n o u s – s e t t l e r r e l a t i o n s home to over 30 distinct indigenous cultures (or 203 colonially recognized first nations), bc was initially colonized in the mid-19th century under the common law notion of terra nullius, or empty land. to make way for immigrating settler populations and ensure access to resources, first nations were displaced without compensation (harris, 2002). to regain ownership over a portion of their traditional territories and a relative level of self-determination, many first nations in bc have entered into modern treaty negotiations with the provincial and federal government. to date, three modern treaties have been implemented in bc. each of these treaties, the nisga’a treaty2 (2000), the tsawwassen treaty (2009), and the maa-nulth treaty (2009), took well over a decade to negotiate. an independent tripartite body—the british columbia treaty commission (bctc, 2012)—was developed in 1992 to oversee treaty talks. in 1993, the bctc presented a six-stage framework for negotiations (see table 1). despite the bctc taking active measures to aid in the process of negotiations, the implementation of treaties (abele & prince, 2003) and measures to educate people about their nuances (sloan morgan & castleden, 2014) are lacking. although modern treaty negotiations are moving forward, tensions between indigenous and settler populations still exist in many areas of bc (sloan morgan & castleden, 2014). these tensions risk being compounded since each modern treaty implemented in bc covers indigenous and settler territory alike and encompasses resource-rich areas that settlers and indigenous peoples depend upon for their livelihoods. treaties are thus contested terrain with many settlers being unaware of the conditions for, reasons behind, or outcomes of treaties.                                                                                                                 2 in 1887, nisga’a first nation first attempted to negotiate a treaty with the crown. revisions to the indian act in 1927 prevented them from doing so by blocking their ability to raise funds to access legal council. formal treaty negotiation resumed in 1976; the nisga’a treaty was the first modern treaty to be implemented in bc. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.5     t a b l e 1 . b c t c s i x s t a g e t r e a t y n e g o t i a t i o n p r o c e s s s t a g e d e s c r i p t i o n a c t i o n i t e m s i g n a l e d c o m p l e t i o n 1 statement of intent (soi) first nations signal intent to negotiate bctc, provincial, and federal governments acknowledge soi 2 readiness to negotiate all parties agree to negotiate once all parties indicate readiness to enter negotiations 3 negotiation of a framework agreement parties determine an outlined agreement parties reach a consensus on outline 4 agreement in principle (aip) public consultations and first nations vote on aip aip is voted in favour and all parties agree 5 negotiation to finalize treaty final negotiations all parties agree on treaty conditions and sign off 6 implementation treaty is implemented implementation note. adapted from mckee, 2009; bctc, 2012 t h e m a a n u l t h t r e a t y the maa-nulth treaty, involving five nuu-chah-nulth first nations on the west coast of vancouver island3, the provincial government, and the federal government, is the second treaty to be implemented under the bctc framework. the maa-nulth nations began negotiations in 1994 under the umbrella of the nuu-chah-nulth tribal council (ntc), an organization representing 14 nuu-chah-nulth first nations on the island. modern treaties are often seen as a way of answering “the indian land question”—a historically evolving query concerning who owns indigenous territories and how these territories, and subsequently indigenous inhabitants, should be governed (tennant, 1990). when negotiations for the ntc stalled at stage four of the bctc treaty negotiation process in 2001, five of the nuu-chah-nulth first nations formed a collective, known as maa-nulth, and moved ahead at their own treaty table with the provincial and federal governments. when active negotiations resumed and on april 1, 2011, they successfully reached stage six: treaty implementation. the treaty provided signatory first nations with a level of self-determination not available to them under the long-standing federal indian act. each signatory first nation replaced the indian act with its own constitution, which defined issues such as membership, taxation, the inclusion of hereditary governance in elected government, and decision-making power within fee simple, or owned, territories (maa-nulth, 2003). despite maa-nulth first nations negotiating under the banner of a single entity, the five first nation signatories each has a geographically specific history and territory, which were addressed individually in the final agreement.                                                                                                                 3 the five nuu-chah-nulth nations comprising the maa-nulth nations are: huu-ay-aht first nations, ka:’yu:’k’t’h’/chek’tles7et’h’ first nations, toquaht nation, uchucklesaht tribe, and ucluelet first nation. 3 sloan morgan and castleden: framing indigenous–settler relations within bc's modern treaty context published by scholarship@western, 2014     m e d i a a n d t h e ( r e ) c r e a t i o n o f i n d i g e n o u s s t e r e o t y p e s media outlets largely act as providers of information and events impacting broader society (herman & chomsky, 2002; said, 1981; saul, 2008). given that the federal, provincial, and indigenous governments negotiate modern treaties on behalf of all of their citizens, these treaties impact everyone, thus begging the need for in depth media attention. however, many settler-canadians are unaware of the structural and historical oppressions that have led to current tensions in indigenous-settler relations (godlewska, moore, & badnasek, 2010; sloan morgan & castleden, 2014). it is argued that this “unknowing” results in settlers’ ignorance, which limits the ability of indigenous and settler people to adequately redress racist and colonial attitudes that continue to exist in canadian society (castleden, daley, sloan morgan, & sylvestre, 2013; regan, 2010). journalists responsible for reporting the news are often members of the dominant society and they are privy to the same unknowing as the majority of the population (belanger, 2002). when journalists’ lack of knowing is viewed in light of societal ignorance surrounding indigenous issues, mainstream media is positioned to fall short in its attempt to adequately represent the complexity of modern treaties, thus losing its potential to comprehensively inform readers about current issues (herman & chomsky, 2002). in short, the general public continues to rely on media to guide them (belanger, 2002; said, 1981). the problem, though, is that these “facts” are commonly construed through the lens of dominant society (castleden et al., 2013). moreover, mainstream media’s tendency to simplify events is deeply problematic given that the general public is largely unfamiliar with the social and historical contexts associated with the negotiation and implementation of modern treaties in canada (miller, 2009; sloan morgan & castleden, 2014). the convention of excluding indigenous voices from media further limits the ability to convey comprehensive news coverage (anderson & robertson, 2011). what media reports is arguably as important as what it omits (harding, 2006) and, with this in mind, scholars have sought to explore media’s representation of indigenous peoples, the reproduction of events impacting indigenous peoples, and, in turn, indigenous-settler relations to shed light on social sentiment and related policy implications (see anderson & robertson, 2011; belanger, 2002; furniss, 2001; harding, 2005a, 2005b, 2006). for example, a study on the use of imagery and the representation of indigenous cultures within canadian newspapers found that “non-[indigenous] cultures cling to historical notions of the ‘indian’ as savage, childlike, noble, warlike, and unable to modernize,” concluding that “print-media, as an entity, is preset to defining [indigenous cultures] in less than a favourable light” (belanger, 2002, p. 396). exploring media’s representations of indigenous peoples, harding (2005b) suggested that due to the complexity of indigenous rights, issues are presented in ways that “effectively deny or denigrate the inherent [and treaty] rights of [indigenous] people. [in doing so] the media exert a powerful and direct influence on public policy [emphasis added] towards [indigenous peoples] and indirectly on their lives” (p. 314). in short, news reports have often polarized indigenous and non-indigenous interests, framing indigenous-settler relations as antagonistic (berkhofer, 1978; harding, 2006). as a result, the general public may approach the subject of media reports with pre-conceived negativity (lambertus, 2004). although mainstream media are intended to inform people, albeit in limited textual terms, we can anticipate that the media will continue to rely on stereotypes and make short mention of the complexity 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.5     of indigenous–settler issues (belanger, 2002). this has been demonstrated in instances where indigenous peoples are dualistically represented in the media: if not “noble,” they have lost their “indian-ness” (nadasdy, 2004); if not productive, they are “lazy” and a burden to the state (anderson & robertson, 2011). adding to these representations are over-simplified reports of interand intra-tribal conflicts, for example, first nations’ disputes over territorial overlaps. throwing into question indigenous nations’ ability to self-govern (begay, cornell, jorgensen, & kalt, 2007), these reports frame self-governance as a threat to canada’s social fabric. within this light, media reports concerning modern treaties that do not provide historical context (i.e., relative self-determination and ownership of traditional territories) may create an ideological gridlock to uninformed readers as to the intent of the agreements and may portray treaties as antithetical to canadian nationalism (paine, 1999). d i s c o u r s e a n a l y s i s discourse is the interface through which knowledge and power operate and are (re)constructed within society (foucault, 1978); analyzing discourse can untangle these facets of power and knowledge as they operate within a societal context, thereby extrapolating their potential implications for society (van dijk, 1983). the intent of discourse analyses is to unravel “the social practice of language behaviour, with the dialectics between society, power, values, ideologies, and opinions expressed and constituted in and about language” (wodak, 1989, p. xiv). deconstructing these acts through discourse analysis is unabashedly and inherently political (szuchewycz, 2000). it is intended to provide a small window into how language constructs relations (porter, 2006) by employing linguistic and qualitative analysis, and discussing findings within critical social theories (jiwani, 2006). for its ability to deconstruct relationships of power embedded in society, discourse analysis was selected as an appropriate tool to analyze media representations of the maa-nulth treaty. m e t h o d s print-media stories pertaining to the maa-nulth treaty from 2003 to 2011 in two canadian newspapers, the globe and mail (gm) and the times colonist (tc), were subjected to a discourse analysis. gm is national in scope and its offices are located in ottawa, canada’s capital. it releases a national and provincial edition daily. tc is the mainstream newspaper serving victoria, bc, the provincial capital of bc, and is the largest newspaper produced on vancouver island—where the five maa-nulth nations’ traditional territories are located. the involvement of the provincial and federal governments in negotiating the maa-nulth treaty informed the selection of these two newspapers to reflect the geographical and political spaces in which each level of government operates. a keyword search across two databases—proquest and factiva—for “maa-nulth" anywhere in either newspaper from september 21, 2003 to april 8, 2011 was employed to coincide with the six-stage bctc treaty process associated with the maa-nulth treaty 4. the factiva database revealed 46 news articles: 32 from gm and 14 from tc. using the same criteria, a second search using the proquest database revealed 69 news articles: 32 from gm and 37 from tc. duplicate articles were removed. the                                                                                                                 4 on september 21, 2003, the maa-nulth nations submitted their statement of intent (stage one of the bctc process) to the provincial government. april 8, 2011, was huu-ay-aht first nations day of celebration and a week following implementation (stage six of the bctc process). 5 sloan morgan and castleden: framing indigenous–settler relations within bc's modern treaty context published by scholarship@western, 2014     scope was narrowed further, limited to “news”5 only (removing editorials and letters to the editor), which resulted in 31 articles from gm and 34 articles from tc, for a total of 65 articles over the 7½ year span (see table 2). t a b l e 2 . d i s t r i b u t i o n o f n e w s a r t i c l e s a n d s o u r c e s 2 0 0 3 2 0 0 4 2 0 0 5 2 0 0 6 2 0 0 7 2 0 0 8 2 0 0 9 2 0 1 0 2 0 1 1 n e w s p a p e r gm tc gm tc gm tc gm tc gm tc gm tc gm tc gm tc gm tc # o f a r t i c l e s ( 6 5 t o t a l ) 0 2 0 1 1 1 4 7 17 11 2 3 3 3 4 1 0 5 note. gm = globe and mail; tc = times colonist following preliminary manifest and latent coding (cope, 2005), five broad categories were identified: (a) criticism of the treaty process vis-à-vis a structural dichotomy of indigenous-settler interests; (b) quantification of the treaty process (economic dichotomy of indigenous-settler interests); (c) “us” versus “them” (individual or social dichotomy of indigenous-settler interests); (d) inter or internal tribal conflict (media stereotyping); and (e) indigenous voices representing indigenous issues (i.e., voices previously silenced; indigenous-settler relations). these categories were then subjected to a second round of coding using analytical linguistic and structural tools gleaned from others’ use of discourse analysis: (a) fronting or relevance structuring; (b) framing or frame analysis; (c) rhetorical strategies; and (d) semantic strategies and lexical style (harding, 2006; szuchewycz, 2000; van dijk, 1983). the first three analytical strategies are concerned with the structure and context of media representation. fronting concerns headlines and proposes that the most important aspects of a story are placed at the front of a news article (harding, 2006; voyageur, 2000). framing is the elucidation of underlying assumptions within an article and includes the power of omission. here, what is not reported can be critically interpreted in the same way as what is included in the text (van dijk, 1983). rhetorical strategies are the examination of dichotomies (such as “us” versus “them”), selection of sources, and repetition (harding, 2005b). the fourth strategy, semantic strategies and lexical style, is concerned with the use of words through word choice, exaggerations, quotes, and syntax (van dijk, 1983). these strategies have been employed in a number of studies that explore indigenous-settler relations (e.g., furniss, 2001; harding, 2005a, 2005b; voyageur, 2000) and the construction of racism in canadian media (e.g., belanger, 2002; szuchewycz, 2000). f i n d i n g s through article headlines, the five key themes from the discourse analysis that will structure this section are below (see table 3). highlighting the complexities and subtleties of media reporting on the maanulth treaty, the analysis performed here—by applying the four discourse analysis tools—exposed social practices and inherently political interests concerning the negotiation and implementation of a modern treaty between indigenous and settler peoples in canada.                                                                                                                 5 the media’s intent is to uphold an objective interpretation of current events (van dijk, 1992; wakefield & elliott, 2003). the omission of editorials and reader submissions was intended to ensure neutrality by excluding overtly ideological biases from the dataset and avoiding skewed analyses. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.5     t a b l e 3 . d i s c o u r s e a n a l y s i s t h e m e s a n d m e d i a h e a d l i n e s t h e m e h e a d l i n e (a) criticism of the treaty process panel warns problems for bc treaty processa (b) quantification of the treaty process price tag rises as treaty talks drag onb (c) “us” vs. “them” critics assail tsawwassen treaty signing; pact goes against ‘basic tenets,’ mp saysc (d) inter/internal tribal conflict maa-nulth deal ‘last straw,’ ditidaht file suitd (e) indigenous voices representing indigenous issues island’s first modern-day treaty a ‘vision of future’; deal lets maa-nulth leave painful past behind, chief saye note. a times colonist, december 5, 2007 b times colonist, october 1, 2003 c globe and mail, december 8, 2006 d times colonist, january 22, 2008 e times colonist, november 22, 2007   t h e t r e a t y p r o c e s s : “ t o o c o s t l y , [ t o o ] s l o w ” 6 in 2005, the bc liberal government proposed a “new relationship” with first nations (province of british columbia, 2009; wood & rossiter, 2011). treaty negotiations were poised to become the liberal “legacy”7 in this regard. a failure, however, to define this new relationship beyond one that was to be founded on “respect, recognition, and reconciliation of aboriginal title and rights” (province of british columbia, 2009), induced general uncertainty amongst public servants, first nations leaders, and the citizens they represented. in particular, ambiguity existed regarding how indigenous–state relations would change and how the treaty negotiation process, seen as a milestone of this new relationship, would proceed efficiently. following the influential ruling in delgamuukw v. bc 8(1997), and with the provincial government seeking economic reforms as part of their new relationship, first nations were given greater decision-making abilities over establishing private contracts concerning resources within their territories. this ability for first nations to make more self-determined decisions with industries came under scrutiny in the media. communities able to “strike better deals”9 outside of the treaty process were blamed by policy-makers and government officials in the media for complicating                                                                                                                 6 times colonist, november 29, 2006 7 globe and mail, july 27, 2007 8 the supreme court ruling in calder v. bc [1973] first legally recognized indigenous title in bc. delgamuukw [1997] a precedent setting litigation case in canada between wet’suwet’en first nation and the province of bc, expanded upon this recognition and upon the determination of indigenous title. 9 times colonist, november 29, 2006 7 sloan morgan and castleden: framing indigenous–settler relations within bc's modern treaty context published by scholarship@western, 2014     an already “fragile”10 treaty framework. subsequently, as treaty negotiations “dragg[ed] on,”11 procedures were “becoming more volatile as a large number of [a]boriginal groups push[ed] back against recent progress”12. through this media construction, various impediments to progress were placed upon seemingly uncooperative first nations. accusing first nations of not conforming to treaty conditions (by establishing deals outside of the treaty process) portrays a sweeping condemnation against all bc first nations as being the primary impediment to their own prosperity. discourses that focused on economics and inefficient processes of negotiation thus lend to perpetuating a colonial mentality that first nations depend upon settler governments, a stereotype frequently cited as an argument against first nations’ ability to self-govern (warry, 2007). moreover, this mentality serves to legitimate settler governments’ paternalistic control over indigenous affairs (begay et al., 2007). despite the bc government’s move towards addressing the unresolved “indian land question,” negotiations were limited to provincial attempts to publically uphold their ill-defined new relationship (wood & rossiter, 2011). while simultaneously condemning the glacial pace of treaty negotiations, the media also criticized the provincial government for their haste with respect to reaching an agreement. eager to achieve “a long over-due success on the treaty front,” the bc government is framed as having stopped “just short of rolling out the red carpet.”13 without discussing how, exactly, the province’s new relationship with first nations would come to fruition following implementation, the opportunity for media and the provincial government to draw a “link between the new relationship and treaty negotiation policies,”14 was never explicitly covered by media. additionally, the tendency for the provincial and federal governments’ failure to uphold historic treaty promises or respect the nation-tonation relationships they have with first nations is placed at the fore of media coverage of negotiations (albeit not in context). the “take it or leave it policies of government negotiators” and “the legislation that set it up”15 is identified by the chief of the first nations summit task force as the primary impediment to treaty progression. focusing on placing blame diminished the importance of, and motivation behind, answering the “indian land question.” instead, media tended to focus on quarrels surrounding the negotiation process, which diminished the sui generis16 nature of land claims and reduces issues of legality to finger pointing and party politics. of the 65 articles, only one presented an argument for the long-term (financial) benefits involved in answering the indian land question. in direct relation to the maa-nulth treaty, a chief commissioner for the bctc emphasized that the cost of not negotiating will be “nothing compared to economic                                                                                                                 10 times colonist, october 18, 2009 11 times colonist, october 1, 2003 12 globe and mail, november 5, 2007 13 globe and mail, december 9, 2006 14 times colonist, november 29, 2006 15 globe and mail, june 26, 2007 16 recognizing that indigenous peoples were the original inhabitants of canada prior to the imposition of colonial law, sui generis is a legal designation indicating that indigenous rights and title are distinct from common law notions of land ownership and state citizenship (borrows, 1996). it is intended to acknowledge indigenous peoples as the original inhabitants of the assertively sovereign canadian state (henderson, 2002). 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.5     uncertainty created by unsettled [maa-nulth] claims”17. the huu-ay-aht first nations chief councilor agreed: “i’ve calculated that $12 billion worth of forestry has been removed from the territory since white settlers arrived to the region . . . the cost of the [treaty] is small pittance compared to that, and ultimately all of canada will benefit”18. calculating that $12 billion in forest revenues had been extracted from huu-ay-aht territories couched the indian land question within economic terms, while highlighting the importance of amicable indigenous-state relations for canada’s economic security at the same time. furthermore, it challenged settler perceptions of canadians as the rightful or legal inheritors of unceded first nations territories (anderson & robertson, 2011; simpson, 2008). q u a n t i f i c a t i o n o f t h e t r e a t y p r o c e s s : “ a g r e e m e n t g i v e s m i l l i o n s , 2 1 , 0 0 0 h e c t a r e s t o s i x b a n d s ” 1 9 , 2 0 coverage of the maa-nulth treaty was predominantly structured around quantifying land claims with 50 of the 65 articles citing exact figures. articles often referred directly to monetary value within headlines, for example: “a cash-and-land deal worth roughly 500 million”21. articles that reported large capital transfers often placed these monetary numbers opposite to relatively small population sizes. prioritizing financial figures in this manner and without a discussion surrounding the complexities involved with first nations self-provision of services, an incomplete picture was presented that dichotomized indigenous-settler interests. this was done through perceived unequal distribution of funds and no accompanying coverage of historical transgressions. land transfers within treaty packages were commonly framed as “given” rather than returned to first nations, as demonstrated in a headline from an october 1, 2003 times colonists article: “agreement gives [emphasis added] millions, 21,000 hectares to six bands.” but another article from the times colonist states, with more neutrality, that: “the land package [of the maa-nulth treaty] represents about eight percent of the maa-nulth traditional territories.”22 at the same time, this article highlighted that lands transferred under the treaty would be “almost twelve times as much as the reserve lands they now hold.”23 rhetorical structuring, as shown here, downplays first nations reduced access to their traditional territories, which occurred alongside the establishment of reserves and extinguishment of indigenous title, instead emphasizing gifting land in addition to preexisting reserves. “given” treatied lands overshadow initial dispossession with repossessed lands being exponentially larger than current conditions. a focus upon monetary and land-based transfers provided a fragmented interpretation of the meaning and the intent of negotiations. colonial histories concerning the dispossession and the displacement of first nations are reduced to quantifiable price tags that diminish the legal, political, economic, and social reasons behind establishing treaties. for those unaware of the histories of first                                                                                                                 17 times colonist, december 10, 2006 18 times colonist, december 10, 2006 19 the article headline refers to six bands; for the purposes of treaty negotiations, the ka:’yu:’k’t’h’ and chek’tles7et’h’ first nations merged politically to be recognized as one of the five maa-nulth nations (maanulth, 2008). 20 times colonist, october 1, 2003 21 globe and mail, december 22, 2007 22 times colonist, december 9, 2006 23 times colonist, july 28, 2007 9 sloan morgan and castleden: framing indigenous–settler relations within bc's modern treaty context published by scholarship@western, 2014     nations dispossession, simplistic framing may contribute to ill-informed stereotypes that first nations receive favouritism from settler governments (warry, 2007). “ u s ” v e r s u s “ t h e m ” : “ b r i t i s h c o l u m b i a n a t i v e g r o u p s . . . h a v e l a i d c l a i m t o n e a r l y e v e r y i n c h ” 2 4 the federal aboriginal affairs minister25 quoted in the above news article stated that modern treaties are intended to provide “‘certainty of peaceful co-existence’ between settlers and first nations.”26 a lead negotiator for maa-nulth first nations highlighted the effect that the negotiation of treaties had on the entire population: “in a single stroke, it transforms the relationship between communities and non[indigenous] societies and governments,” thereby, “creating an opportunity to construct an entirely different future [by terminating] a relationship that has been markedly detrimental to these [first nation] communities.”27 reinforcing treaties as multi-lateral agreements intended to settle state claims of sovereignty to first nations territories, the maa-nulth nations’ negotiator’s quote highlighted that all canadians are treaty peoples (miller, 2009). with the exception of this news article, however, the media favoured framing the maa-nulth treaty as compromising, even threatening, settler rights, a trend demonstrated by an article covering the negotiation of the maa-nulth treaty in which it also mentioned the 2009 implementation of the tsawwassen treaty’s land package; this article explicitly assured that the treaty would not see the “removal of… protected agricultural land.”28 extending from the antithetical position of indigenous–settler interests, the data set of media articles also referred to future treaties, discussed in a manner that threatens the physical security of settler communities. one article stated that issues of compensation are “tough . . . [as] british columbia native groups . . . have laid claim to nearly every inch of the greater vancouver area, which is already heavily populated and blanketed by urban sprawl.”29 first nations with traditional territories located in privately held lands are reported to have called upon federal and provincial governments to bring these areas into negotiation, “despite private land . . . long been considered non-negotiable,” because they “feel [it] was unfairly taken from them”30. placing indigenous-settler interests in binary opposition, the media frames treaty negotiations as imposing on settler territoriality with claimed, “‘traditional’ territory … cover[ing] virtually the entire province.”31 within this light, first nations are infringing upon the assumed rightful sale of indigenous lands to settlers (anderson & robertson, 2011). additional use of devaluing terms, such as “they feel [emphasis added]” and the use of quotations surrounding “traditional,” belittles first nation perspectives of territorial boundaries, thereby affirming settler authority.                                                                                                                 24 globe and mail, december 8, 2006 25 the aboriginal and northern affairs minister of canada is responsible for overseeing aboriginal relations with the federal government, including the administering of the indian act and other legislations involving “indians and lands reserved for indians.” 26 times colonist, april 10, 2009 27 times colonist, december 9, 2006 28 globe and mail, november 8, 2007 29 globe and mail, december 8, 2006 30 globe and mail, september 28, 2005 31 globe and mail, december 7, 2006 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.5     settler sovereignty is taken one step further, framed as explicitly threatening in another article discussing the maa-nulth and tsawwassen treaty together. a federal conservative party of canada member of parliament is quoted as calling the tsawwassen treaty “seriously flawed” and “quite dangerous,” with its implementation being “entrenched forever in the constitution.” he ends by warning that, after implementation, “constituents living on treaty lands will face ‘taxation without representation.’”32 insecurities about democratic representation are mongered by threats, not only to constituents living on treaty territories, but also to the political system operating in canada. media framing of treaties often challenged this system by constructing first nations as apathetic towards dominant society. treaties are thus framed to unsettle the democratic process contesting citizenship allocated by the canadian state; as a result, indigenous peoples are socially and politically “othered” (coté, 2010), while treaties are largely perceived to undermine the security provided by the state and the rights subsequently extended to its citizenry (paine, 1999). i n t e r t r i b a l c o n f l i c t : “ d i t i d a h t c h a l l e n g e m a a n u l t h t r e a t y ” 3 3 territorial conflicts between first nations dominated the dataset of media articles in 2007. while maanulth nations were poised to vote on their final agreement, neighbouring ditidaht and tseshaht first nations34 took legal action against the maa-nulth because of overlapping land claims. media coverage of these events brought into question the capability of first nations leadership to address intertribal issues amongst themselves and the treaty framework’s inability to accommodate increasingly complex legal rulings. for example, a july 2007 times colonist article covering the legal conflict between the tseshaht and maa-nulth nations illuminated these issues: “the court battle rooted in intertribal conflict regarding overlapping land claims could set off a chain of events that would undermine the province’s already precarious treaty negotiation process.” extending his conditional support of maa-nulth nations, the elected chief of tseshaht first nation notes the fragility of this backing contingent upon “[tseshaht’s] toes not [being] stepped on in the process.”35 efforts to settle out of court were “rebuffed” with ratification of the treaty, resulting in “an anticipatory breach [emphasis added] of the boundary agreement.”36 the word choice here—breaching—implies that maa-nulth nations were simply ignoring the boundaries of their neighbouring first nation’s and does not highlight the hereditary and familial complexity of historically shared territories. neglecting to shine a light on this aspect of negotiations curtails indigenous relations to each other and their overlying uses of the land, while focus upon intertribal altercations paints first nations as incapable of governing their own affairs (begay et al., 2007).                                                                                                                 32 times colonist, december 8, 2006 33 globe and mail, january 23, 2008 34 ditidaht and tseshaht first nations are both members of the nuu-chah-nulth tribal council and are actively negotiating their treaty at the ntc table. both nations were also part of the ntc when maa-nulth first nations broke away from that table in 2001. 35 times colonist, july 28, 2007 36 times colonist, july 28, 2007 11 sloan morgan and castleden: framing indigenous–settler relations within bc's modern treaty context published by scholarship@western, 2014     i n d i g e n o u s v o i c e s : “ a f t e r a 1 3 5 y e a r g r a s p o n t h e i r d a i l y a f f a i r s t h e i n d i a n a c t n o l o n g e r r u l e s t h e i r l i f e ” 3 7 eighteen (27 percent) of the 65 articles favourably presented first nations voices and gave them dominance in terms of content. of these 18, 5 articles (less than 10 percent) appropriately examined the complexities inherent within issues such as self-governance, the allocation of band membership, and historical implications of the indian act. mainstream media’s (limited) provision of first nations’ voices speaking on their own behalf marks a shift in popular representation; these 5 articles provided significant and complex representation of the treaty in an accessible and relevant manner. citing his motivation for why his first nation entering the highly criticized and costly treaty process, one maa-nulth chief councilor was quoted as saying: “my thinking is, with negotiations you get to help shape where you would be, rather than let a judge decide. there’s a roll of the dice that happens when you go to court.”38 the same chief councilor was cited in a separate article discussing the need for economic diversity so that cash allocations could be invested to ensure the long-term prosperity of the community: “[the maa-nulth treaty brought] a great influx of cash and land, but we need an economy to make it work.”39 throughout this interview, he addressed misconceptions of the treaty as providing unilateral economic transfers. he offered an indigenous perspective of the treaty package: “we only see this treaty as a set of tools not a silver platter. the cash and the resources will provide opportunities, but also pose challenges.”40 another (hereditary) chief expanded upon this notion: “after a 135-year grasp on [our] daily affairs, the indian act no longer rules [our] life.”41 highlighting his perception of the maanulth treaty’s ability to cut paternalistic ties with the federal government, this quote emphasizes the importance of self-determination for first nations while presenting the treaty as a means for maa-nulth nations’ to achieve greater autonomy. during the week the maa-nulth treaty went into effect (april 2011), the provincial premier of bc reiterated the importance of first nations determining their own path towards self-determination stating: “[the treaty is] great because [the maa-nulth signatories] decided it’s what they want. i think that’s what’s critical.”42 one of the maa-nulth chief councilors further highlighted the importance of his nation choosing their own journey forward, especially in relation to the complex task of treaty implementation. centering the discussion around economic diversity, his first nation’s vote in favour of the agreement in principle (step four) was seen not only as approval for the treaty, but as a signal that huu-ay-aht members “understood the possibilities of economic development.”43 according to another media article, the importance of self-governance was articulated as: “the agreement will free [their] people from a historic burden and reclaim their right to govern themselves.”44 the article goes on to quote another maa-nulth chief councilor saying the treaty was an “exciting journey to reintroducing and exercising our inherent right to own our way of government for our people and accountability to our                                                                                                                 37 times colonist, march 20, 2011 38 globe and mail, november 21, 2007 39 times colonist, march 7, 2009 40 times colonist, april 10, 2009 41 times colonist, march 20, 2011 42 globe and mail, july 30, 2007 43 times colonist, october 12, 2007 44 globe and mail, november 22, 2007 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.5     people is a refreshing and welcoming reality that we have strived for.”45 discussing the treaty as a measure of protecting cultural and economic welfare, he referred to the treaty as “an expression of our vision of the future . . . it is a vision that permits us to see a future filled with opportunities. it is a vision that removes the crippling institutions of our colonial era. . . . it is a vision that permits us to move forward and leave the pain of the past behind.”46 breaking over-simplified, economic typecasts of treaties, testimonials from first nations leaders were used in these articles to transcend “impoverished community” stereotypes and to paint a more complex picture of the treaty. although less than 10 percent of the articles represented the maa-nulth treaty as a complex legal and socio-political agreement—while the vast majority framed it simply as an economic contract—these reports highlighted the importance of signatories “gaining control of …[their] economic future.”47 a quote from one of the hereditary chiefs demonstrates this point: “on april 1 my children will be huu-ay-aht citizens, as will many other people who were denied aboriginal rights, despite being connected to our nation,” said happynook, a hereditary chief. happynook's parents and grandparents gave up their indian status [in the early 20th century] because they did not want their children dragged off to alberni indian residential school, happynook said. “they wanted to vote in federal elections, they wanted to buy a house in victoria, they wanted to be able to go up on the passenger deck on the b.c. ferries. under the old system, none of those things would have been possible if they had kept their status.”48 here, the media contextualized his quote, placing the treaty within a long-standing colonial relationship and structures representing the creation of positive relations between maa-nulth nations and the settler society. the hereditary chief furthers this sentiment, exclaiming: “as of today, i am no longer 6630029501 . . . as of today, i am proud to be a huu-ay-aht. i am proud to be a maa-nulth. i am proud to be a british columbian and i'm proud to be a canadian… the [federal] system [under the indian act] was structured to deny indian status to many people with native ancestry.”49 providing historical and structural background in media on injustices experienced by first nations, including the excerpts presented here, challenges simplistic stereotypes that label all first nations as taking advantage of social systems (belanger, 2002) and confronts framing first nations rights as contrary to equality (cairns, 2000). reporting indigenous’ perspectives in this manner defies often unilaterally represented stereotypes in mainstream media. the hereditary chief who, by recognizing his provincial, national, and distinctive huu-ay-aht and maa-nulth identities, presented the treaty as a measure for unifying indigenous and settler people, demonstrating the importance of multiple identities. similarities between indigenous and settler populations are presented; however, they were done in a manner that does not ruffle settlers’ sense of place at local, regional, or national scales.                                                                                                                 45 times colonist, april 3, 2011 46 times colonist, november 22, 2007 47 globe and mail, december 8, 2006 48 times colonist, march 20, 2011 49 times colonist, march 20, 2011 13 sloan morgan and castleden: framing indigenous–settler relations within bc's modern treaty context published by scholarship@western, 2014     i m p l i c a t i o n s a discourse analysis of regional and national mainstream media covering the maa-nulth treaty over an eight-year period demonstrated that media relies on stereotypes and oversimplifications to communicate events leading to, and surrounding, treaty negotiations and implementation. framing events in this manner risks perpetuating settlers’ often ill-informed perceptions of treaties and, by extension, ill-informed perceptions of indigenous peoples. relying upon the (re)production of uninformed stereotypes, media coverage commonly exhorts an underlying assumption about territoriality that places settlers as legally sanctioned inheritors of indigenous territories and, relying upon histories void of colonialism, locates indigenous peoples as subordinate in this regard (smith, 2010). neglecting to discuss ideological complexities and differences in indigenous and settler philosophies (e.g., individual vs. collective/shared land ownership) in media invisibilizes oppression inherent in colonial processes, thus diminishing these histories and their settler colonial implications today (warry, 2007). within this vein, the media serves as a conduit for a shared colonial ideology normalizing inequities with respect to indigenous-settler relations and (re)producing these relationships by framing them as social norms (anderson & robertson, 2011). unlike other studies that have examined the media’s representations of indigenous peoples and have found only that they perpetuate stereotypes (e.g., anderson & robertson, 2011; harding, 2005a, 2005b, 2006; szuchewycz, 2000), a fraction of the articles analyzed in this study included indigenous voices, suggesting that there may be a cultural turn in media representations. overall, however, our dataset revealed a neglect to meaningfully discuss or revisit reasons behind modern treaties. failing to locate the maa-nulth treaty within the broader settler colonial spaces of canada limits settlers comprehension of the complexity and intent of modern treaty negotiations. attempts to form new relationships between federal, provincial, and indigenous governments will remain a challenge unless the media moves beyond its narrow focus concerning the economic implications of modern treaties. indigenous–settler relations will remain in a perpetual state of negativity, unless adequate information—not only on what a new relationship would look like, but why one is even necessary—is shared through the communicative medium used in today’ society to convey socially relevant events, the media. for those working in policy realms seeking to improve indigenous-settler relations, the question becomes: how can we intercept the (re)production of this enduring negative and ill-informed perspective on indigenous–settler relations in canada? understanding indigenous–settler relations beyond what the media currently (re)produces will require settler-canadians to become critically versed in indigenous-settler ontological and structural relations; overcoming bi-directional racism requires both populations to understand the socio-political, historical, and legal-cultural realities that have led the current climate in canada. a task of admitted enormity, place-based educational initiatives have the potential to intercept settler ignorance about indigenoussettler histories and current relations (see for example castleden et al., 2013; tupper, 2011). education that intercepts the substantive (re)production of stagnated indigenous-settler relations would transcend to media through journalists’ ability to conceive of the context in which contemporary issues impacting indigenous and settler peoples, such as the negotiation of modern treaties, exist. of further relevance would be training young people, some of whom may consider journalism, to critically engage with media to extract not only the media story, but the nuanced context in which it exists—a skill that would go well beyond the classroom. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 3 [2014], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.5     educational tools for school districts across canada, developed in partnership with local first nations, could achieve this goal. this could include, for example, highlighting the fact that canadian history did not start when europeans arrived; then including, for instance, early indigenous-settler alliances, the indian act, the creation of reserve systems, and residential schools, and moving through the seminal political and legal events beginning in the late 1960s to present day events, such as the negotiation of modern land claims, the royal commission on aboriginal peoples, the federal apology and truth and reconciliation commission regarding the abuses suffered in the residential schools, and the idle no more movement.50 such coverage would undoubtedly enrich the next generation’s understanding of canadian history and demonstrate the relevance of history to present day society, while challenging it to think critically about contemporary inequities. using examples from the media specifically would also encourage students to explore how social movements and indigenous–settler relations are presented in the media and thus to dominant society. vital to this approach is that indigenous nations themselves communicate what should be taught and how it should be facilitated. doing so will promote respectful re-storying of canadian history and the use of culturally appropriate educational protocols. through education specifically targeting indigenous-settler unknowing and its permeation through the powerful medium of media, an allegedly objective form of communication that exists to inform readers of relevant events, the next generation of students in canada could be better suited to think through and act upon social inequities geared towards visibilizing colonial consequences with the hope of moving towards true reconciliation.                                                                                                                   50 idle no more is a social initiative rooted in canada that calls upon the federal government to respect treaty and constitutional rights of indigenous nations. for more information on idle no more, see http://www.idlenomore.ca/ 15 sloan morgan and castleden: framing indigenous–settler relations within bc's modern treaty context published by scholarship@western, 2014     r e f e r e n c e s abele, f., & prince, m. j. 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(2011). unstable properties: british columbia, aboriginal title, and the “new relationship”. the canadian geographer, 55(4), 407-425. 19 sloan morgan and castleden: framing indigenous–settler relations within bc's modern treaty context published by scholarship@western, 2014 the international indigenous policy journal june 2014 framing indigenous–settler relations within british columbia's modern treaty context: a discourse analysis of the maa-nulth treaty in mainstream media vanessa sloan morgan heather castleden recommended citation framing indigenous–settler relations within british columbia's modern treaty context: a discourse analysis of the maa-nulth treaty in mainstream media abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license framing indigenousâ•fisettler relations within british columbia's modern treaty context: a discourse analysis of the maa-nulth treaty in mainstream media indigenous mobilisation and the law of consultation in peru: a boomerang pattern? the international indigenous policy journal volume 5 | issue 4 article 4 october 2014 indigenous mobilisation and the law of consultation in peru: a boomerang pattern? claire wright universidad autónoma de nuevo león, elizabeth.wrightcl@uanl.edu.mx recommended citation wright, c. (2014). indigenous mobilisation and the law of consultation in peru: a boomerang pattern?. the international indigenous policy journal, 5(4). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.4 indigenous mobilisation and the law of consultation in peru: a boomerang pattern? abstract prior to 2009, it was difficult to speak of a national level indigenous movement in peru with an impact on national politics. however, the situation changed after the tragic events known as the baguazo. little by little, diverse organisations representing different ethnic groups came together to push for a law of consultation, which was promulgated in 2011. nevertheless, the process has been highly complex and is still ongoing. the aim of this article is to offer some interpretative clues in order to understand how the national level movement came about, as well as how it made an impact on national political processes. referring to social movement theory and constructivist international relations theory, i analyse several important episodes between 2009 and 2013. i find that both the convergence and the impact of a national level indigenous movement in peru are embedded in complex bargaining processes in which issues of ethnicity and political opportunities at the national level have been affected by the leverage of global norms (specifically the international labour organisation’s covenant no. 169) by both international and national actors. keywords ilo convention no.169, indigenous peoples, ethnicity, social movements, peru, boomerang effect, transnational advocacy networks, globalisation of law, political opportunity structures acknowledgments the research for this article was undertaken in the framework of the following project: "11-cap2-1516, desarrollo y recursos en territorios indígenas. un trabajo comparado desde los derechos y la participación de las comunidades y los impactos de las intervenciones de los agentes públicos y privados," financed by la agencia española de cooperación internacional para el desarrollo (aecid). creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ i n d i g e n o u s m o b i l i s a t i o n a n d t h e l a w o f c o n s u l t a t i o n i n p e r u : a b o o m e r a n g p a t t e r n ? historically, indigenous peoples have been excluded from political decision-making processes in latin american nation states. however, over the last few decades, indigenous actors have made a considerable entrance onto the political stages of many latin american countries, particularly in ecuador and bolivia (van cott, 2005). the processes have been of great interest to observers in terms of how they have come about and what impact they have had in diverse national arenas (brysk, 2009; keck & sikkink, 1998; martí i puig, 2007; radcliffe, 2007). in the abundant literature on the topic, peru has generally been considered to be an outlier, given that it lacks a powerful indigenous movement at the national level despite having a considerable indigenous population (greene, 2006; pajuelo, 2006; yashar, 2005).1 for this reason, academic attention on indigenous politics in peru has pointed to various factors that could explain the lack of a powerful indigenous movement at the national level. the reasons given include the negative impact of racism and domination throughout peruvian history (rénique, 2004), the effects of agrarian reform in the 1970s (degregori, 1993; yashar, 2005), the increasing prevalence of a more heterogeneous “cholo” identity due to accelerated migration processes (cvr, 2003), the effect of the violence during the sendero luminoso years of the 1980s and 1990s (martí i puig, 2010; yashar, 2005), and the lack of trans-community networks and political association spaces (martí i puig, 2010; yashar, 2005). however, as of 2014, the situation has changed. today, it is possible to speak of the experience of a united indigenous movement in peru, which mobilised in the aftermath of the baguazo, a tragic event that occurred in june 2009 and led to the deaths of 34 people (both indigenous and nonindigenous) in the context of conflict over indigenous land rights. andean indigenous organisations were quick to join their amazonian counterparts in the defence of their territory and in the condemnation of the massacre (“perú: andinos y amazónicos,” 2009). mobilisation occurred with an alignment of frames, grievances, and support; it caught the attention of peruvian intellectuals who noticed the convergence of different groups in defence of the right to “consultation.”2 in 2011, following the events in bagua, five of the main indigenous organisations of peru came together to form an organisation called the pacto de unidad (unity pact) and, in the same year, the ley de consulta (law of consultation; see “ley del derecho,” 2011) was signed. it was the first law of its kind in latin america. a prominent indigenous leader—alberto pizango—noted that the baguazo was a watershed, marking the beginning of a visible indigenous movement in peru (“peru: el movimiento,” 2010). given these events, it is necessary to ask new and important questions regarding the emergence of indigenous actors at the national level in peru, including (a) how did different organisations come together to form a national indigenous movement in peru? and (b) how has the movement achieved an (albeit debatable) impact in terms of the consultation law? the aim of this article is to offer a tentative reply to both questions, given that the process is ongoing. our argument is that both the convergence and the impact of a national-level indigenous movement in peru are embedded in complex bargaining processes in which issues of ethnicity and political opportunities at the national                                                                                                                 1 other authors have argued that there has been an ethnic dimension in peruvian politics, although it has not been visible (degregori, 1993; manrique, 2006). 2 on the importance of consultation, see “peru: el movimiento” (2010). 1 wright: indigenous mobilisation and the law of consultation in peru published by scholarship@western, 2014 level have been affected by the leverage of global norms (specifically the international labour organisation’s covenant no. 169) by both international and national actors. the article is structured as follows: in the first section, relevant perspectives from social movement and constructivist international relations theory are examined; in the second section, an empirical analysis of the convergence of different organisations into a national-level indigenous movement is offered together with an evaluation of its relationship to the law of consultation; and, in the third and final section, the main conclusions of the study are offered, together with pointers on policy implications and lessons learned. the research carried out is based on secondary documentation (including press releases, government and civil society reports, and newspaper articles), as well as ethnographic fieldwork carried out by the author in peru in 2009. this is primarily a case study; however, it is hoped that the conclusions may well be valid in those countries where—despite a considerable indigenous population—there has been a noticeable absence of a strong indigenous movement at the national level. t h e o r e t i c a l f r a m e w o r k : s o c i a l m o v e m e n t a n d c o n s t r u c t i v i s t i n t e r n a t i o n a l r e l a t i o n s t h e o r y in this section, i refer to two bodies of literature that have been used to understand indigenous movements in other contexts: social movement theory, on the one hand, and constructivist international relations theory, on the other. specifically, in the sections below, we revise how perspectives relating to ethnicity and political opportunity from social movement theory and transnational advocacy networks and the leverage of global norms from constructivist international relations theory have been applied to the understanding of indigenous movements elsewhere. s o c i a l m o v e m e n t t h e o r y social movements have been studied from a variety of perspectives, including their emergence, the activities involved, and their impact on politics (tarrow, 2004). in the case of indigenous movements, the literature has focused on two inter-related aspects: the political opportunity structure (martí i puig, 2007; van cott, 2005) and the important issue of the mobilisation of an ethnic identity (brysk, 2009; wright & martí i puig, 2012). a conceptualisation of both aspects is offered together with a reconsideration of their application to the study of indigenous movements in latin america. p o l i t i c a l o p p o r t u n i t y s t r u c t u r e . social movements have been studied from a variety of perspectives (tarrow, 2004). in recent times, a more contextual reading has prevailed in the sociotheoretical analysis of the different processes of mobilisation. this perspective is known as the political opportunity structure (pos), which focuses on how changes in factors that are external to a movement can reduce the costs of collective action and improve the possibility of success by suggesting possible allies while showing weaknesses among the political elite (martí i puig, 2010). the changes are related to three spheres: (a) the political system, in the sense of norms that make mobilisation less costly; (b) the time or place, by finding a favourable position in the cycles of protest at the national or international level; (c) the relationships, in terms of the political elite and other potential allies. the perspective of pos has been applied successfully to the study of indigenous movements and their recent emergence on national political arenas in latin america. in her seminal study, van cott (2005) analysed several institutional factors which—in combination with organisational aspects— 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.4 can explain the formation and success of indigenous parties in latin america, resulting in openness of electoral and party systems, decentralisation, and reserved seats for indigenous candidates. from a relational perspective, martí i puig (2010) argued that the political elite of latin american polyarchies have become increasingly reticent to offer representation for indigenous peoples in terms of governance; thus, a “window of opportunity” that was open in the 1990s in the region is now closing. undoubtedly, pos can both facilitate and hinder indigenous movements, something that will be taken into account in the empirical analysis below. e t h n i c i d e n t i t y . another increasingly important issue in social movement theory is related to identity (tarrow, 2004). identity is defined as the shared elements that distinguish individuals as belonging to a particular social group. it is difficult to capture due to its dynamic and changing nature. social movement theory has offered three clear perspectives on the issue of identity in relation to collective action: first, identity as a cause of collective action when a group feels that its identity is at risk (chihu amparán, 2007; marx ferree, 1994; thompson, 1991) or feels the need to articulate a new identity (hunt, benford & snow, 1994; klandermans, 1994; zubero, n.d.); second, identity as a resource for social movements when political identities are chosen as a result of preexisting cultural elements and the decision is made to activate certain features rather than others in relation to potential allies and common concerns (della porta & diani, 2006; tarrow, 2004); and finally, identity as an unexpected and secondary consequence of collective action, in that, once social movements expand, groups develop their own culture and become elements of cultural innovation (mcadam,1994). it is important to note that identity and ethnicity are not synonymous: while identity refers to a distinctive characteristic of a group, ethnicity refers more specifically to distinctive characteristics based on ancestral, social, cultural, and linguistic features. in this sense, ethnicity is the central identity issue in indigenous social movements and undoubtedly lies at the heart of a collective struggle. the movements arise to protect elements of a collective identity that are under risk— specifically, the recognition of territories and territorial rights, the denouncement of historical treatment, and respect for culture, cosmovisions, and lifestyles (martí i puig, wright, aylwin & yáñez, 2013). however, as brysk (2009) noted, ethnically diverse groups in latin america have claimed the “indigenous” label, with a focus on shared traits rather than group differences. in this sense, several authors have offered a strategic understanding of mobilising with an indigenous rather than local or even peasant ethnicity throughout latin america (gómez suárez, 2005; máiz, 2004; trejo, 2000; wright & martí i puig, 2012). finally, authors incorporating an identity perspective on indigenous movements in latin america have also found that, when the movements are successful, they can lead to a re-evaluation and re-appreciation of ethnicity amongst indigenous communities as a result of the reconceptualisation of their position as “ethnic citizens” (bengoa, 2009). c o n s t r u c t i v i s t i n t e r n a t i o n a l r e l a t i o n s t h e o r y as mentioned above, the pos approach in social movement theory contemplates the possibility of the international context—including media attention, potential allies, and normative frameworks— opening up opportunities and reducing the costs of collective action (tarrow, 2004). for its part, constructivist international relations theory has focused on two interrelated aspects of the impact of international level politics on national indigenous movement processes: the “boomerang effect” of transnational advocacy networks (brysk, 2009; keck & sikkink, 1998) and the globalisation of law (brysk & jimenez-bacardi, 2013). these perspectives are considered in the sections that follow. 3 wright: indigenous mobilisation and the law of consultation in peru published by scholarship@western, 2014 t h e b o o m e r a n g p a t t e r n . the relational aspect of pos at the international level has been developed more fully by constructivist international relations theory and specifically by keck and sikkink (1998) with the identification of a “boomerang pattern.” according to this approach, when national governments are deaf or impenetrable to demands made by ngos or social movements, the latter will reach out to international allies in order to exert pressure at the national level within the framework of a transnational advocacy network. according to this model, actors in developing countries will look to partners in more developed countries to use their resources and influence to exert leverage from the international level to the national level. what is particularly interesting about this process is the need to align cognitive frames and identity discourses with international standards in order to find suitable allies, as was the case with the human rights, environmental, and women’s movements. keck and sikkink (2009) further identify indigenous movements as one of the main examples of this pattern. according to alison brysk (2009), it was thanks to international intervention that indigenous movements in countries like brazil, bolivia, and ecuador had greater influence in the domestic sphere. particularly important was the element of international cooperation through the help of church organisations, ngos, and professional networks, including anthropologists. the networks offered help in various ways with contact, consciousness, courage, and cash. salvador martí i puig (2010) argued that transnational advocacy networks created an international focus on indigenous problems, leading to the creation of the working group on indigenous peoples (wgip), the permanent forum on indigenous issues, and the un special rapporteur. t h e g l o b a l i s a t i o n o f l a w . another equally important element of constructivist international relations theory relates to the normative aspect of pos at the international level in the globalization of law. in the words of brysk and jimenez-bacardi (2013), this process relates to “the growth of legal norms, mechanisms, and jurisprudence across borders” (p.1). however, the degree to which international law can be used to successfully defend human rights will depend on political processes at the national level, namely the autonomy of legal institutions, concepts of sovereignty, and the degree to which civil society is empowered in order to make claims based on legal norms. the globalisation of law has been of tremendous importance for indigenous movements in general. after heated and difficult debates amongst international and national actors, the international labour organisation’s convention 169 (ilo, 1989) was signed in 1989 as a legally binding instrument for ratifying states.3 while it does not develop the idea of political autonomy, it does establish the right to “free, prior, and informed consent” of indigenous peoples in relation to the decisions that will affect them, in essence offering basic (albeit vague) protection against potential violations by the state and by non-state actors. according to martí i puig (2010), c169 has also been crucial in underlining the importance of self-identification as a criterion for determining the groups to which its principles apply (p. 81). undoubtedly, this norm has become an important reference point at the national level in ratifying countries, with courts applying the text when dealing with cases involving indigenous peoples (ilo, 2008). nevertheless, there is still a great deal of work to do in moving from the symbolic sphere of the convention to the implementation of specific, directed policies and actions (stavenhagen, 2012), something that undoubtedly depends on the pos at the national level.                                                                                                                 3 it is important to note that, in 2007, another important global norm was signed: the united nations’ declaration of the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip) (united nations, 2008). although it is a nonbinding document, it develops more fully the ideas of autonomy and participation, as well as stressing the importance of free, prior and informed consent established in c169 (fernández carrillo, 2012). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.4 c a s e s t u d y : t h e n a t i o n a l l e v e l i n d i g e n o u s m o v e m e n t a n d t h e l a w o f c o n s u l t a t i o n at the beginning of this article, two questions were formulated: (a) how did different organisations come together to form a national indigenous movement in peru? and (b) how has the movement been able to achieve an (albeit debatable) impact in terms of the consultation law? the aim of this section is to offer a tentative reply to both questions, considering several important episodes between 2009 and 2013. our argument is that both the convergence and the impact of a nationallevel indigenous movement in peru are embedded in complex bargaining process in which issues of ethnicity and political opportunities at the national level have been affected by the leverage of global norms (specifically, the international labour organisation’s, 1989, covenant no. 169) by transnational advocacy networks. i n d i g e n o u s p o l i t i c s i n p e r u p r i o r t o t h e b a g u a z o as highlighted in the introduction, previous studies have generally argued that there is no nationallevel indigenous movement in peru (greene, 2006; pajuelo, 2006; yashar, 2005), with reasons ranging from the violence of the 1980s and 1990s, to organisational differences, and to pos (comisión de la verdad y reconciliación (cvr), 2003; martí i puig, 2010; rénique, 2004; yashar, 2005). it is important to note that there have been several organisations active in the defense of indigenous rights at the national and international level since the 1970s4 and, therefore, it is not accurate to talk of an absence of indigenous movements; rather, what is new is the convergence of diverse organisations as a national-level social movement capable of having an impact on national politics. historically, ethnic schemas at the national level have led to an unfavourable pos for the emergence of a national-level indigenous movement. on the one hand, as greene (2009) pointed out, amazonian communities have a long history of organisation and self-identification as native peoples (“nativos”). on the other hand, in the andean region, communities have generally been identified as peasants (“campesinos”) as a result of the agrarian reform carried out by the government of velasco in the 1970s (pajuelo, 2006).5 this differentiation was incorporated into the national normative framework of the ley de comunidades nativas y promoción agraria de las regiones de la selva alta y selva baja (1974; law on native communities and the agrarian promotion of the regions of the selva alta and the selva baja; see also eguren, 2006), which was signed in 1974, creating a dichotomous situation in which amazonian groups were considered to be “indigenous” and andean groups were considered to be “non-indigenous,” despite many common ethnic features. in turn, this important social difference between indigenous and non-indigenous communities has had an impact on the way in which the different groups organised politically. on one hand, the asociación interétnica de desarrollo de la selva peruana (aidesep or in english the inter-ethnic association for the development of the peruvian forest) and la confederación de nacionalidades amazónicas del perú (conap or in english the confederation of the amazonian nationalities of                                                                                                                 4 including asociación interétnica de desarrollo de la selva peruana (aidesep or in english the inter-ethnic association for the development of the peruvian forest) and confederación de nacionalidades amazónicas del perú (conap or in english the confederation of the amazonian nationalities of peru). 5 this process does not imply an acculturation of these communities, but rather it constitutes an identity strategy in a context that is not particularly favourable to indigenous ethnicity (de la cadena, 2000; greene, 2009). 5 wright: indigenous mobilisation and the law of consultation in peru published by scholarship@western, 2014 peru) have represented the interests of amazonian peoples as indigenous or native people both at the national level as well as at the international level since the 1980s (van cott, 2005). on the other hand, popular organisations in the andes have generally been identified in terms of class rather than ethnic terms (greene, 2009). in this context, it is clear that national understandings and structures of ethnicity in peru have generally been unfavourable to the emergence of a national-level movement based on shared aspects of an indigenous ethnicity. however, for several years, there have been signs that the ethnicity labels in the andean region are converging with those of the amazon region. in a study on the confederación nacional de comunidades del perú afectadas por la minería (national confederation of communities of peru affected by mining conacami), maritza paredes (2006) found that communities involved in mining conflicts have been opting to identify according to an indigenous identity. in addition, ramón pajuelo (2006) found a considerable emergence of participation in the andean region, with discourses based on indigenous demands by new leaders and organisations. more recently, claire wright and salvador martí i puig (2012) carried out an analysis of environmental conflicts in cusco, peru in 2008; they found embryonic indigenous discourses among highland peasant organisations, alongside more consolidated indigenous discourses among amazonian communities. this process has undoubtedly constituted an important first step towards a more united indigenous movement at the national level in peru; yet, something very important would have to happen in order for the different organisations to converge. f r o m t h e t r a g e d y o f t h e b a g u a z o t o a w i n d o w o f p o l i t i c a l o p p o r t u n i t y the event that would bring about a rapid change in this situation was the baguazo, the tragic result of strikes carried out by indigenous communities in the amazon region in may and june of 2009. throughout the protest period, a transnational advocacy network became activated with a great deal of support among other indigenous organisations and ngos both in peru (“perú: contundente respaldo,” 2009) and abroad (“colombia. indígenas protestan,” 2009). following the deaths of 34 people in clashes on june 5, 2009, both national and international attention became focused on the tragedy, and the transnational advocacy network broadened. the bloody outcome of the events brought about important criticisms at both the national level from amazonian, andean, and civil society organisations, and at the international level from european and north american ngos working to defend human rights and the environment (amnesty international, 2009; “perú: instan a indígenas,” 2009; piltz, 2009). several foreign government agencies also offered criticism (“perúalemania: exigen,” 2009). in brussels, citizen protests took place in front of the peruvian embassy; protesters demanded that the free trade talks between the european union and peru be brought to a halt (“piden en bruselas,” 2009). in spain, 40 ngos protested in front of the ministry of foreign relations, insisting on a full investigation into the events (“españa: 40 ong,” 2009). the indigenous organisations themselves attached great and immediate importance to communicating with the un’s special rapporteur on indigenous affairs and with the international conference of the international labour organisation, both of which criticised the peruvian government’s actions in bagua (“fidh hace graves,” 2009; “onu: estado peruano,” 2009; “perú: invocan presencia,” 2009). furthermore, the leader of aidesep, alberto pizango, was exiled to nicaragua, eliciting high profile media attention (“embajador de nicaragua,” 2009). it was in this context of intense mobilisation at the international and national levels that the different indigenous organisations started to come together with several common demands: an investigation into the events of bagua (“perú: primer ratifica,” 2009), the derogation of the legislative decrees that had given rise to the protests (“perú: masiva e histórica,” 2009), and—eventually—a demand for 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.4 respecting the right to free prior informed consultation, which was perceived to be the source of the conflicts (“perú: invocan,” 2009). this last demand constitutes the core issue that brought different organisations together to push for a "law of consultation," a process analysed in the following section. t h e l a w o f c o n s u l t a t i o n , c 1 6 9 , a n d t r a n s n a t i o n a l a d v o c a c y n e t w o r k s the central idea behind the proposed law of consultation (“ley del derecho,” 2011) was to implement one of the key precepts of c169: the right to free, prior, informed consent. indeed, references to c169 and its clauses on indigenous participation and identity permeate the discourse created in the aftermath of bagua6. in their condemnation of the events in bagua, a group of international ngos based in lima released a statement calling for respect for c169 in peru (“perú: instan,” 2009), as did german-peruvian cooperation agencies (“perú-alemania: exigen,” 2009), and the world council of churches (“internacional: consejo mundial de iglesias,” 2009). also, the peruvian press, in its discussions about the rights of indigenous peoples during this period, invariably refers to the ilo convention (“oit: ‘la ley’”, 2011; selva santisteban, 2013). most importantly, the indigenous organisations at the national level—such as aidesep and conacami—referred explicitly to the ilo convention no. 169 during this period to add weight to their demands for participation based on their identity as indigenous peoples (“perú: el movimiento,” 2010; “perú: jornadas de evaluación,” 2012). the global norm, ratified by peru in 1994, acknowledges the special relationship between indigenous peoples and their territories, which is stressed throughout the text. importantly, c169 offers an important element of legitimacy to the ethnicity claims of both amazon and andean groups in the post-bagua context, within the framework of the globalisation of law as understood by brysk and jimenez-bacardi (2013). c169 establishes that indigenous peoples are those who descend “from populations that inhabited the country or geographical region to which the country belonged in the time of conquest or colonization . . . whatever their juridical situation may be, conserve all or part of their social, economic, cultural and political institutions” (ilo, 2008, article 1.1.b). moreover, it establishes that self-adscription or self-identification is equally important (article 1.2). this concept of indigenous ethnicity is much broader than the peruvian state’s traditional schema of andean-peasant or amazonian-native. consequently, c169 had two legitimising effects on the convergence of demands around the right to consultation: firstly, on the idea of protecting indigenous lands; and secondly, on considering andean as well as amazonian communities as subject to this right. after an extensive period of discussions and mobilisation (“onu: exigen que estado,” 2010), the peruvian congress passed the law of consultation in 2010, which the different indigenous organisations considered to be an important achievement (“ley del derecho,” 2011). tellingly, the name of the law refers explicitly to c169, reflecting once again its importance: “ley 29785 o ley del derecho a la consulta previa a los pueblos indígenas u originarios reconocido en el convenio 169 de la organización internacional del trabajo” (law 29785 or the law of the right to previous consultation of indigenous or native peoples acknowledged in the ilo convention no. 169). consequently, upon the president’s hesitance to promulgate the law, the indigenous organisations joined together and reached out to powerful actors at the international level in a clear attempt at creating a boomerang pattern. in may 2010, five different organisations released two manifestos in                                                                                                                 6 interestingly, there are very few references to the undrip (2008), signed in 2007. 7 wright: indigenous mobilisation and the law of consultation in peru published by scholarship@western, 2014 support of the law, demanding that the president promulgate it immediately,7 which marked a series of joint actions between amazonian and andean organisations. for his part, bartolomé clavero, vice president of the permanent forum on indigenous issues, called on the peruvian president to promulgate the law of consultation after its approval by congress, in line with the demands of national indigenous organisations (“perú: por la promulgación,” 2010). interestingly, the world bank likewise exhorted the president to promulgate the law (“perú: banco mundial,” 2010). finally, it is important to note that there was also continuing support from international ngos, including amnesty international, during this period (“perú: crece presión nacional,” 2010). l i m i t a t i o n s t o t h e b o o m e r a n g p a t t e r n despite the initial momentum gained by the transnational advocacy network and the globalization of c169, there would be further setbacks at the national level. in july 2010, president alan garcía rejected several elements of the law, including the possibility of giving indigenous communities the right to veto, respecting the binding nature of their decision and giving priority to indigenous rights over economic progress. importantly, one of the most serious criticisms was of peasant communities becoming subject to the right to consultation given that—according to the precedent established by the agrarian reform of the 1970s—they were not considered to be indigenous (comisión andina de juristas, 2010). consequently, many major amendments were made to the law and it was sent back to congress for further review. in reply, the indigenous organisations reached out once again to the transnational advocacy network and voiced their concerns to the united nations and amnesty international (“onu: atropellos a derechos,” 2010), followed by several protests throughout peru (“perú: organizaciones protestarán,” 2010). in this context, the leader of aidesep claimed in october 2010 that the indigenous movement in peru had the “solidarity and support of the whole world” (“perú: el movimiento,” 2010). during this process of difficulties followed by intense mobilisation, the different indigenous organisations, who had been working towards the same problem of defending their territory separately, decided to join together. four of the five organisations that had publicly signed two manifestos in 2010 calling for president alan garcía to promulgate the law of consultation— aidesep, conacami, ccp, and cna—joined together with the organización nacional de mujeres indígenas andinas y amazónicas del perú (national organisation of indigenous andean and amazon women in peru onamiap) in the so-called pacto de unidad de organizaciones indígenas de perú (unity pact of indigenous organisations in peru) in may 2011. this step was crucial because it represented the coming together of a national level indigenous movement in peru, not just in symbolic terms (as had been the case since the baguazo and up until this point), but in organisational terms as well. at that time, alberto pizango claimed that there was “a political perspective of unity between andeans and amazonians” (“perú: el movimiento,” 2010), something that became consolidated into a national movement with the signing of the pact. importantly, at that point, the pacto de unidad became the main representative for the different indigenous organisations in the debates surrounding the law of consultation at both the national and international levels. despite these developments, in august 2011, the peruvian congress approved the law with the revisions that had been made by president garcía and, in september of the same year, the recently                                                                                                                 7 among these organisations were aidesep and conacami, as well as the confederación campesina del perú (peasant confederation of peru -ccp), confederación nacional agraria (national agrarian federation –cna), and conap. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.4 elected president ollanta humala implemented the law in bagua, undoubtedly looking for symbolic capital amongst indigenous communities. for the most part, international organisations such as amnesty international and the inter-american commission received the news as a positive step forward for the protection of indigenous territorial rights in peru and as a landmark for latin america (amnesty international, 2011; organization of american states [oas], 2011). for their part, the pacto de unidad and other indigenous organisations appeared to be disappointed by the law, given that, despite a new political context with a different president and majority in congress, the alternations made by president garcía in 2010 were maintained in the law promulgated in 2011 (la rosa, 2013). in november 2011, the executive rapidly distributed its proposed regulations of the law of consultation and the pacto de unidad began to work on debating the contents of the regulations (“perú: jornadas de evaluación,” 2012). during the process, there were claims that the government had begun to coopt certain indigenous leaders (“perú: estado y pueblos,” 2012). in any case, the pacto publicly criticised the regulations for several reasons—for the very narrow understanding of indigenous communities, as well as for the lack of indigenous participation in the process (pacto de unidad, 2012). in protest, the pacto de unidad was absent from the final sessions in february and march 2012, when the regulations were signed (“perú: reglamento de consulta,” 2012). the fact that the regulations were drawn up and passed so quickly (in four months) may explain why, during this period, the pacto did not initially resort to the transnational advocacy network in order to exert additional pressure. during 2013, the pacto de unidad, supported by national human rights’ ngos (chavarri, 2013), once again reached out to the transnational advocacy network, including the ilo and the un’s special rapporteur (“perú: pacto de unidad comunicó,” 2013) to restate its original criticisms of the law and to reiterate the difficulties in the proposed database of indigenous communities and the absence of consultations in practice (pacto de unidad, 2013; “minem desconoce derecho,” 2013). a t e n t a t i v e a n a l y s i s at the beginning of this article, two questions were asked: (a) how did different organisations come together to form a national indigenous movement in peru? and (b) how has the movement achieved an impact in terms of the consultation law? as a result of an empirical analysis, it is clear that both processes are embedded in complex debates between the national and international levels surrounding the nature of indigenous rights. the convergence of a national–indigenous movement in peru can only be interpreted in the context of the baguazo, a tragedy which highlighted the common grievances between ethnically diverse groups in the amazonian and andean region. as a result of the activation of a transnational advocacy network and the normative power of c169, a more favourable pos opened up for the articulation of demands for recognition as indigenous peoples by different groups at the national level in peru. conversely, a convergence of groups was institutionalised in 2011 with the formation of the pacto de unidad when it became clear that the national level pos was more restrictive than expected, particularly due to different understandings of indigenous ethnicity. although the pacto has suffered several organisational changes since then, as of 2014, it is still active in the denouncement of abuses of indigenous rights and in the ongoing conversations of the law of consultation. undoubtedly, this national norm, firmly rooted in a global norm (c169), is what has kept the different organisations united with a common aim. there were two main strategies employed in the period studied here (from 2009 to 2013): the activation of a transnational network and periods of 9 wright: indigenous mobilisation and the law of consultation in peru published by scholarship@western, 2014 intense mobilisation at both the national and international levels. nevertheless, we consider that the strategies up until now were only partially successful given that, although peru now counts on a law of consultation, many of the clauses have been rejected by the national-level indigenous movement. in this sense, the impact of the movement in peru exemplifies how the globalisation of law and the boomerang pattern depend on national level processes—in this case a limited pos due in large part to more restrictive schemas of indigeneity. c o n c l u s i o n s a n d l e s s o n s l e a r n e d it is important to note that the processes analysed in this brief article are ongoing, but, given that the events between 2009 and 2013 have occurred at a considerable pace, the next few years will surely be very interesting in terms of the development and impact of a newly converged, institutionalised and—most importantly—visible national-level indigenous movement in peru. in any case, the tentative analysis carried out in these pages offers several important lessons in terms of indigenous mobilisation and the interplay between international and national processes. one of the most important lessons is that the boomerang pattern is still a key part of the repertoire of indigenous movements in latin america. indeed, in recent times, it has been the main strategy for the national-level indigenous movement in peru, which has reached out beyond its borders to international organisations for support. likewise, the globalisation of legal norms is a key part of this boomerang pattern, given that c169 is still the main reference and leverage point for protecting indigenous rights at the national level. nevertheless, the vagueness of this norm on certain key aspects, such as the very nature of indigenous ethnicity itself, may be one of the causes of the difficult debates at the national level, with states and indigenous organisations embroiled in different understandings of who has the right to consultation. finally, the coming together of a national-level indigenous movement after the tragic events of the baguazo in 2009 demonstrates the importance of using a window of opportunity to focus on a common grievance—conflict over the exploitation of natural resources. likewise, the construction of a common, indigenous identity to unite organisations representing different ethnicities can be seen as a cause of, a resource for, and a result of this intense period of mobilisation and organisation. nonetheless, as of 2012, it seems as if the national-level movement has started to suffer from internal divisions. the pacto de unidad has lost two of its most important organisations: aidesep and conacami. if the national-level indigenous movement in peru is to continue to influence politics and make common demands with any degree of success, it must overcome organisational and leadership conflicts, something that is undeniably one of the key challenges for any social movement. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.4 r e f e r e n c e s amnesty international. 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(2005). contesting citizenship in latin america. the rise of indigenous movements and the postliberal challenge. cambridge: cambridge university press. zubero, i. (n.d.). movimientos sociales y alternativas de sociedad: el componente cultural de los movimientos sociales. el foro ignacio ellacuría. retrieved from http://www.foroellacuria.org/publicaciones/zubero_movimientos.htm 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.4 the international indigenous policy journal october 2014 indigenous mobilisation and the law of consultation in peru: a boomerang pattern? claire wright recommended citation indigenous mobilisation and the law of consultation in peru: a boomerang pattern? abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license indigenous mobilisation and the law of consultation in peru: a boomerang pattern? serious complications for patients, care providers and policy makers: tackling the structural violence of first nations people living with diabetes in canada the international indigenous policy journal volume 2 issue 1 health and well-being article 6 may 2011 serious complications for patients, care providers and policy makers: tackling the structural violence of first nations people living with diabetes in canada marion a. maar dr. northern ontario school of medicine, marion.maar@nosm.ca darrel manitowabi university of sudbury, dmanitowabi@usudbury.ca danusia gzik northern ontario school of medicine, dgzik@hotmail.com lorrilee mcgregor laurentian university, communitybasedresearch@hotmail.com cheri corbiere cheri.corbiere@sympatico.ca recommended citation maar, m. a. , manitowabi, d. , gzik, d. , mcgregor, l. , corbiere, c. (2011). serious complications for patients, care providers and policy makers: tackling the structural violence of first nations people living with diabetes in canada. the international indigenous policy journal, 2(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.6 this research is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. serious complications for patients, care providers and policy makers: tackling the structural violence of first nations people living with diabetes in canada abstract type 2 diabetes mellitus is a progressive metabolic disorder that affects aboriginal people disproportionately around the world. evidence shows that diabetes treatment strategies can effectively reduce complications related to the disease; in contrast many aboriginal people develop these rapidly and at a young age. we conducted qualitative research on the barriers to evidence-based self-management behaviours and education from the perspectives of aboriginal people living with type 2 diabetes and their health care providers on manitoulin island in ontario, canada. applying the concept of structural violence, we analyzed the social and political arrangements that can put aboriginal people with diabetes “in harm’s way” by interfering with diabetes management. lastly, we provide recommendations for structural interventions. keywords diabetes, aboriginal people, social determinants, structural violence acknowledgments we gratefully acknowledge the contributions of the first nations communities of the united chiefs and councils of mnidoo mnissing, m’chigeeng health services, mnaamodzawin health services inc., noojmowin teg health access centre, the physicians in the manitoulin medical clinics, the research participants and the manitoulin diabetes consultation steering committee. we thank mariette sutherland for co-facilitating many of the focus groups. this research received financial supported from the indigenous health research development (ihrdp) and cihr . creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ the lived experience of diabetes i had just heard about sugar diabetes. … next thing i knew, i had it. i had it bad! my numbers were 23 – 28 (high levels of blood sugar). now i’m borderline – so they say. my doctors check my numbers every week. now i eat like a rabbit. (zoozep, elder) nine years ago i was told i had diabetes. my diabetes nearly took me away a couple of times. i had convulsions. my sugar was way out of whack. i didn’t know anything about it. now, today, i keep track of my sugar levels, and i had to do away with a lot of miijim (food) that i used to eat. (biienh, elder) introduction type 2 diabetes affects many indigenous populations worldwide at disproportionately high rates compared with their mainstream counterparts (carrasco et al., 2004; daniel, rowley, mcdermott, mylvaganam, & o'dea, 1999; davis, mcaullay, davis, & bruce, 2007; roberts, jiles, mokdad, beckles, & rios-burrows, 2009; yu & zinman, 2007). in canada, aboriginal populations have diabetes rates 3 to 5 times higher than the general population, develop diabetes earlier in life, experience more rapid onset of diabetes-related complications, and suffer poorer treatment outcomes (dannenbaum, kuzmina, lejeune, torrie, & gangbe, 2008; dyck & tan, 1994; hanley et al., 2005; young tk, reading j, elias b, & o'neill jd, 2000). according to evidence based clinical practice guidelines, optimal diabetes management can help to “control” the disease and significantly reduce the onset and severity of complications. the chronic disease management model underlying the canadian clinical guidelines necessitates substantial health literacy and daily self-management by the patient in order to effectively prevent or delay complications (canadian diabetes association clinical practice guidelines expert committee [cdacpgec], 2008). in this paper we explore the underlying sociopolitical factors that may interfere with effective diabetes care in aboriginal communities. drawing on the concept of structural violence, we analyzed the social and political arrangements that can put aboriginal people with diabetes “in harm’s way” (farmer et al. 2006, pg. 1686), by interfering with the key components of healthy diabetes self-management behaviors and self-management education. to accomplish this, we conducted qualitative research on the perceived social determinants that create barriers to evidence-based self-management behaviours from the perspective of aboriginal people living with type 2 diabetes and their health care providers on manitoulin island, in north central ontario, canada. our intent is to initiate a discussion of sociopolitical forces, which are largely beyond the control of individual patients but impact management of diabetes. furthermore, we recommend immediate structural interventions that may ameliorate the current health inequity of premature disability and death resulting from type 2 diabetes in aboriginal people. 1 maar et al.: structural violence of diabetes self-management and education published by scholarship@western, 2011 diabetes and aboriginal people type 2 diabetes is a serious progressive metabolic disorder characterized by elevated levels of blood glucose. rates of type 2 diabetes are increasing globally, despite the fact that it is a largely preventable disease. for many people, type 2 diabetes leads to serious complications, such as blindness, heart disease, kidney problems, nerve damage and erectile dysfunction, and the risk of complications increases with disease duration. however, research shows that evidence-based diabetes management can be highly effective: people can live healthy and productive lives if they are able to control glycemic levels, blood pressure, and lipid and stress levels, through careful selfmanagement strategies combined with optimal clinical care (cdacpgec, 2008; gaede, lundandersen, parving, & pedersen, 2008; holman, paul, bethel, matthews, & neil, 2008; patel et al., 2007; stratton et al., 2000; uk prospective diabetes study (ukpds) group, 1998). however, diabetes care is complex. it is comprised of a combination of clinical monitoring, using tests and prescriptions, with self-management of medications, diet, physical activity, smoking cessation and self-monitoring of blood glucose (see table 2). often, patients struggle to adhere to their management plan, and this is pronounced for those with depression (approximately 25%) (cdacpgec, 2008). although aboriginals have high rates of type 2 diabetes and poor treatment outcomes relative to non aboriginals across the globe, much research has focused on elusive, racially-based, genetic models to explain this inequality (for a review see (fee, 2006; poudrier, 2007)) as well as culture and modifiable behavioral risk factors (for example: (aluli et al., 2009; harjo, perez, lopez, & wong, 2011; ley et al., 2009; ley et al., 2011; nsiah-kumi et al., 2010; oster & toth, 2009; wang, hoy, & si, 2010). the predominant individual-focused approaches have not led to significant improvements in diabetes management; instead, they tend to emphasize the role of patients and blame them for their health outcomes. for example, although not a commonly shared belief in our study population, one care provider stated: “nowadays everyone needs a personal trainer and a dietetic cook [to engage in a healthy lifestyle]. people should just take responsibility for their own health!” structural violence using a social determinants of health lens, the lack of improved outcomes is not surprising since “inequities in health … arise because of the circumstances in which people grow, live, work, and age, and the systems put in place to deal with illness” (commission on social determinants of health [csdh], 2008). genetic and behavioural risk factor approaches are limited because they ignore the significant impact of external conditions and circumstances on the progression of the illness. more critically oriented research explores the circumstances in which many aboriginal people grow, live and survive. these circumstances include the legacy of canadian colonial practices such as enforced dietary and lifestyle changes on reserves and in residential schools, socio-economic disparities, exposure to racism, and marginalization of aboriginal issues. these issues are all important determinants of chronic diseases, such as diabetes. (manitowabi & maar, 2011; reading, 2009; richmond & ross, 2009; royal commission on aboriginal peoples[rcap], 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.6 1996; waldram, herring, & young, 2006). however, little research has focused on how sociopolitical processes influence the progression of chronic diseases by affecting conditions under which aboriginal patients must self-manage the disease. farmer and colleagues (2006; cf. farmer 2004, 2005) have examined the connection between health care and socio-political factors such as poverty and inequality. they observe an increasing “desocialization” of health issues in contemporary health discourse and boldly ask, “does our clinical practice acknowledge what we already know—namely, that social and environmental forces limit the effectiveness of our treatments (1686)?” farmer et al. use the concept of structural violence to pinpoint the political and economic configuration of our social world that “put people in harm’s way”, leading to disproportionately negative health outcomes for marginalized populations (ibid.). farmer, a physician and anthropologist, acknowledges that medical professionals are not normally trained to understand or confront structural violence, although it interferes with access and adherence to treatment. in order to overcome structural violence in clinical care, it is necessary to work on multiple interventions, including proximal (preventing illness) and distal (when people are already ill) components (ibid). in what follows, we identify the structural barriers that can affect access and adherence to self-management and conclude with recommendations for structural interventions to address these barriers. methodology this research is part of a larger study, the manitoulin first nations diabetes care and prevention research project, initiated in 2005 through a partnership developed between university based researchers, six first nations communities, and the three health boards affiliated with the local first nations political organization, the united chiefs and councils of mnidoo mnissing (uccmm). the long-term goal of this project is to improve the effectiveness of first nations diabetes prevention programs and diabetes care through participatory action research (maar, gzik, & larose, 2010; manitowabi & maar, 2011). this qualitative research incorporated 13 focus groups with 76 participants consisting of sessions with health care providers, elders, and community members with diabetes (see table 1). using grounded theory methodology, we asked participants’ perceptions of factors that affect diabetes care. focus group questions included perceptions of local diabetes care, opportunities/barriers for healthy lifestyles, and lived experiences of diabetes. questions were adjusted for each session to correspond to the following: a) the experience and expertise of each group; b) our growing understanding of barriers; and c) to triangulate or disconfirm evidence. sessions were audio-recorded and aliases were assigned; in several cases audio-recording was seen as inappropriate and two researchers took notes that were compared and consolidated. a translator was present for the sessions with elders to allow them to speak in either english or ojibwe. consistent with the spirit of participatory research, all parts of this study were based on interdisciplinary collaboration. sessions were transcribed and university and community-based researchers thematically analyzed the data independently. divergent results were consolidated through discussions. rigor was further enhanced through peer review and member checks with a community-based steering committee. finally, themes were mapped on recent evidence-based self-management behaviours (table 2) and diabetes self-management education. 3 maar et al.: structural violence of diabetes self-management and education published by scholarship@western, 2011 results and discussion participants discussed determinants they perceived to interfere with many aboriginal peoples’ ability to implement diabetes self-management. thematically, the determinants fell into categories of barriers to self-management education, healthy diet, physical activity, and selfefficacy to become proficient at self-care in general. these barriers are illustrated through the voices of participants and situated within the context of existing research in the next section. barriers to self-management education diabetes education must support self-management through approaches that promote informed, independent decisions relating to the individual’s diabetes management (cdacpgec, 2008 p. s20). language. participants explained that language and cultural barriers were significant for some elders as well as some others, who, although they may be able to communicate in english, have great difficulties understanding or asking questions about their treatment plan. elders explained that diabetes education in their language (ojibwe), tailored to their individual and cultural backgrounds, provided by lay educators in first nations health centres, is very important for their learning about diabetes management: the family has to learn what diabetes is. you have to explain why you can’t eat certain foods. [diabetes lay educator, who teaches in the local language] used to come around… he had actual things that show how diabetes works – he had a [model of a] foot to show amputations. actually seeing stuff helps. and it’s amazing how much salt you’re actually taking in. he showed me that too. [learning from him] it strengthened my conviction that i was diabetic. i have to do the work – no one can make me. today, i live with it. i watch what i eat. i see people stacking up their plate. that’s not how i eat. years ago we had a good breakfast, lunch was the main meal, and supper was a bowl of soup. nowadays we have a big meal late in the evening. it just sits in your stomach then you go to bed…it is hard, you have to be dedicated...i pray to get through the day without eating [too much]. health literacy. the ability to obtain and use health information and services to make appropriate healthy decisions is influenced by language and requires a culturally appropriate approach to health education. elder maanii told the story of being diagnosed with symptoms of prediabetes in the doctor’s office. prediabetes screening is important since the onset of diabetes can be prevented at this stage if health education and lifestyle changes can be implemented. lacking appropriate health knowledge about prediabetes, she took a health-threatening course of action: when i was told that i was “borderline” diabetic i ate all the bad foods like ice cream that i could. because i thought that once i have diabetes i won’t be able to eat any of this food. another elder, jenyep, had a similar story: 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.6 i didn’t know anything about diabetes or high blood pressure until recently. i don’t know much now. i’m sorry that i didn’t learn it. these are not isolated examples. care providers spoke of many patients with harmful misconceptions or inexperience with the disease. elder pillup was said to have made an appointment to treat a serious diabetic foot ulcer but was surprised to learn that the ulcer was related to diabetes. he remembered once being diagnosed with diabetes but he thought that his illness “had gone away by now”. furthermore, patients commonly resist insulin treatment because they believe it causes serious complications like amputations or even death, although from the biomedical perspective it may actually prevent these complications by stabilizing blood glucose levels. a common sentiment health providers encounter is: “i don’t want to go on insulin – my aunt went on insulin and two years later she died”. cultural safety. several participants explained that some aboriginal patients face cultural barriers communicating with some of the non-aboriginal health care providers. besah, an elder, told the following story of being diagnosed with diabetes. the disconnect with his provider resulted in non-adherence to a treatment plan and subsequent need to initiate antihyperglycemic medications: i’ve been a diabetic for 30 years. i found out when i was in the hospital from a blood test. my bed was opposite the nurse’s station. i heard the doctor talking about me. he said with proper diet and exercise that i wouldn’t get diabetes [related complications]. i didn’t experience the list of symptoms [of diabetes]. i was too busy. i didn’t do what [the doctor] said. next thing what happened i had to take pills. then he showed me how to do insulin needles… i had to do something – i couldn’t go on the way i’d been going. a holistic culturally based approach was seen as an effective way of teaching by all: i attended a workshop on diabetes – and the teachings were presented by [a first nations health provider and respected elder]. she shared a holistic view of eating, based on the medicine wheel. there are many teachings in that medicine wheel. (maaniiyan, elder) on the flipside, lack of a holistic approach was seen as harmful to diabetes self-management: lack of the medicine wheel and spirituality affect people [living with diabetes]. a lot of people left the church and the traditional ways… but it was not replaced by anything. and what about stress? there is a lot of that today. there is no time to take time out for yourself. there used to be a lot of camps, like maple sugar… that was time out with yourself and nature. that kind of meditation is missing [today]. we have to start from the anishnaabe way, we have to thank the creator, and everything flows from there. we need to teach our young people. the sacredness is how we should begin. (esta, elder) many participants emphasized the relationship between spirituality and holistic approaches to health in diabetes self-management. their sentiment is in line with previous research: first nations in the manitoulin area have identified service provider acceptance of religions, spirituality, traditional beliefs, knowledge of aboriginal history, understanding of life on 5 maar et al.: structural violence of diabetes self-management and education published by scholarship@western, 2011 reserve, and building on the existing strengths of aboriginal people and their communities as key components of culturally safe services (maar et al., 2009; maar & shawande, 2010). clearly, many aboriginal people with diabetes require ongoing culturally congruent education to acquire the tools, skills and supports they need to effectively self-manage diabetes. improvements to the cultural aspects of health care are definitely necessary, with cultural safety an important concept to advance within the health care system in order to enhance effectiveness of services and health literacy among aboriginal patients with diabetes. barriers to a healthy diet and nutrition nutrition therapy can reduce glycated hemoglobin by 1.0 to 2.0%. replacing highglycemic index carbohydrates with low glycemic index carbohydrates in mixed meals has a clinically significant effect on glycemic control in people with type 1 or type 2 diabetes. (cdacpgec, 2008, p. s40) food insecurity is one area that participants believed impacted diabetic patients’ ability to engage in healthy “choices” such as eating lean meats, fruits, vegetables and whole grain products. many of the healthier food options are expensive and inaccessible to some people living on reserve in poverty. we also heard from care providers that some diabetic patients run out of food completely between cheques: people on social assistance don’t have money to buy fruits and vegetables in the last week or two [before they receive their monthly assistance]. for them, it’s a feast and famine way of life. they eat really good [sic] during the first two weeks. then they have very little. one of my clients always has high blood sugars after he gets his cheque but later in the month it gets lower. the period of time spent with little food is just as much of a health risk as the period characterized as “feasting”. fasting can lead to dangerously low blood glucose levels and result in seizures and diabetic coma for patients on antihyperglycemic medications (cdacpgec, 2008). the distance to large grocery stores is considerable for many aboriginal people living on reserve, and the cost for transportation can take up a significant portion of their food budget. for some, travel to grocery stores is not an affordable option; therefore, food has to be purchased from local variety stores, which are heavily stocked with high-calorie, high-glycemic, nutrient-poor foods that are not good choices for the optimal nutrition therapy aspect of self-management. barriers to physical activity moderate to high levels of physical activity and cardiorespiratory fitness are associated with substantial reductions in morbidity and mortality in both men and women and in both type 1 and type 2 diabetes (cdacpgec, 2008, p. s37). poverty at the individual and community level impedes many people’s ability to engage in medically required physical activity. exercise equipment, gym membership or participation in organized sports is simply not affordable to many first nations patients. while arguably one of 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.6 the cheapest yet effective forms of activity is brisk walking, this form of exercise is often hindered by the poor state of the reserve roads and infrastructure. walking on roads can be dangerous in the winter months as ice and snow make walking treacherous for people with mobility difficulties related to the progression of diabetes. additional safety concerns included poor visibility due to lack of street lighting, insufficient policing and lack of animal control services to address semi feral dogs or bears that threaten walkers on some reserves. evidence shows that in the early stages of diabetes, glycemic levels can be controlled by self-managing nutrition and exercise; however, on manitoulin island, first nations patients are significantly less likely than euro-canadians to succeed in managing diabetes through lifestyle alone (maar, et al., 2010). given the many influences of poverty induced interference with selfmanagement outlined above, this is not surprising. poverty and diabetes have also been shown to be connected empirically. using epidemiologic data from the canadian community health survey, researchers have demonstrated that diabetes is 4.14 times more common among low income canadians. income remains independently associated with the risk of developing type 2 diabetes even when individual risk factors were accounted for, including obesity (dinca-panaitescu et al., 2010). the systematic underinvestment in first nations infrastructure and the economic disparities at the community level are clearly impeding diabetes self-management in numerous ways, including nutrition and exercise. systemic multi-generational barriers to all aspects of self-management participants identified the existence of systemic barriers manifested as mental health and addictions issues, but rooted in multigenerational trauma of past and present socio-political processes. these barriers interfere with people’s ability to acquire the self-efficacy to master selfmanagement. mental, emotional and spiritual “un-wellness”. mental health issues related to diabetes occur in all populations; however, care providers revealed an urgent need for mental, emotional and spiritual support for first nations people with diabetes for various reasons. rampant uncontrolled diabetes exists in many aboriginal communities and results in the rapid deterioration of the health of some people. consequently, many patients believe the diagnosis is a death sentence as they have lost family members or know others who have experienced amputations. a mental health worker explained: “they think ‘that could be me!’ their focus becomes directed at that and that results in a lot of depression, anxiety and resurfacing of old trauma”. this sentiment was confirmed by a distraught patient: my family did not have diabetes, now i have it! why? i wasn’t a heavy drinker, i eat fairly well. i am not overweight. i have not smoked for 30 years. why do i have it? ....i hope they find a cure for diabetes someday! soon before we die from it. losing your body parts, your limbs…that is scary! (maganiit, elder) another mental health worker explained the relationship between addictions, mental health and diabetes: 7 maar et al.: structural violence of diabetes self-management and education published by scholarship@western, 2011 if clients are dealing with substance abuse then we know it is impacting heavily on their ability to deal with diabetes. addictions are a pretty obvious factor that impacts [on diabetes management]; having a mental health problem of any sort interferes with taking care of diabetes; it interferes with people’s motivation to pursue a healthy lifestyle. if they are depressed they don’t have the energy or motivation to go change their lifestyle, to start walking or interact socially. they will experience some degree of difficulty in taking care of themselves. a fourth worker put it this way: “having diabetes – it is not curable – you have it for the rest of your life – that depresses you – managing all of that is the challenge”. pichi, an elder with diabetes shared her perspective: “it is hard to accept this diabetes, it makes me feel depressed to have it; i never wanted to have this!” medical research strongly agrees with the views expressed in focus groups: depression, and diabetes are closely linked to each other, and depression may even accelerate the onset of diabetes-related complications in diabetic patients (musselman, betan, larsen, & phillips, 2003). despite the fact that research, care providers and patients agree that there is a need for mental and emotional support services, few of these services are accessible on reserve: the approach has been to address the physical side of diabetes – the focus has always been to manage your diet and your physical activity – the emotional side never gets identified or prioritized – that in itself is a barrier. the first response in a client to diagnosis is usually the trauma – but in general, the overall approach is just to manage as if the physical is the only side of it (fourth mental health worker). first nation mental health services are scarce despite the documented high need for these services (health canada, 2006; kirmayer et al., 2007; kirmayer, brass, & tait, 2000; kirmayer & guthrie valaskakis, 2009; wesley-esquimaux & smolewski, 2004; wieman, 2006). health canada’s first nations and inuit health branch (fnihb) provides modest alcohol and addictions programs consisting mainly of paraprofessional workers and short-term crisis intervention therapy. these services are utterly inadequate to deal with the complexity of mental health issues in first nations, creating serious gaps in services for those people who need them. consequently, crises related to mental health, addictions and suicide are relatively common. even in communities that have successfully managed to leverage alternative funding for mental health services, the mental health staff typically carry a high case load of urgent or crisis care clients, taking priority over diabetes management supportive services. therefore, the mental and emotional needs of diabetic patients are rarely addressed. traditional aboriginal wellness approaches to diabetes were often discussed as being beneficial to the overall well-being of patients, including their mental and emotional health: spirituality is to each their own, but we need gchimnidoo (the great spirit) in our lives. you should give thanks every morning and at night give thanks for the day. it helps me and i feel really good about it. (maaniiyan, elder) the holistic approach of traditional medicine seeks a balanced physical, mental, emotional and spiritual lifestyle with an emphasis on self-care. it is, at face value, congruent with evidence-based approaches to diabetes. however, due to historic assimilation policies, some 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.6 aboriginal people are ambivalent toward traditional medicine. participants described a wide range of divergent experiences. elder maatii explained: “we didn’t grow up that way”. but many participants recalled that traditional medicine was part of their grandparents lives (translated from ojibwe): my grandfather made a medicine [for diabetes] – like a blood purifier – and you couldn’t eat sugar, salt, alcohol, and coffee. he taught it [to a local traditional healer]. if you don’t pick those medicines, they don’t grow anymore. you have to thank the spirit of the plant. you have to keep picking strawberries – otherwise the plant will give up (become less plentiful). my grandfather used to say to put tobacco down for the plants otherwise they get angry. (aanzhenii, elder) another elder, aanzhen, confirmed that traditional ways have been resilient and irrepressible in the manitoulin region: my grandparents were devout catholics – they were the caretakers of the church and they also fed the priest. but they also practiced traditional medicine without the priest’s knowledge. elders explained further that holistic traditional aboriginal approaches were the norm within their lifetime in local communities, before residential schools and other influences discouraged their use. today, however, some patients are not comfortable with traditional approaches. health care providers explained that some aboriginal patients do not seek traditional medicine “until it is too late”, for example, at the onset of severe complications such as renal failure. a greater emphasis on de-colonizing these traditional approaches is necessary to encourage a holistic approach to healthy living. colonialism and multigenerational trauma. many health care providers recognized that they had a significant number of aboriginal patients who are dealing with consuming issues in their lives and, despite the serious nature of the disease, diabetes self-management was not a priority. they discussed that some patients have good management knowledge but still experience overwhelming barriers, such as current or past, unresolved physical or sexual abuse issues, or, violence or addictions within their families: [these patients] know what they need to do – but they cannot identify what stops them from acting – they know they must exercise, watch their diet, and take their medications but sometimes perhaps due to their busy lifestyles, or problems in the extended family or preexisting social issues are blocking them so they cannot make [self-management] a priority. (physician) some of these patients may have internalized a self-destructive attitude towards their care and are unable to make chronic illness management a priority. in addition social and family issues can take precedence over a focus on personal self-care, as some patients embody the belief that “everybody else is higher on my priorities” or even believe that they are undeserving of a good life. some aboriginal participants clearly linked this perspective with their attendance at residential schools: 9 maar et al.: structural violence of diabetes self-management and education published by scholarship@western, 2011 the residential school brainwashed you into thinking your culture was not good and not to practice your beliefs. the residential school apologized for what they did. the bishop finally confessed to all the residential school delegates. we were there 8 days [meeting at the site of the school]. some couldn’t go to the podium – they got too emotional… they had been punished and now some can’t speak their native language. it took me 15 years to get my language back. (miigwans, elder) the multigenerational causes of high rates of mental health issues, such as mood disorders and addictions, and violence and abuse histories, observed in many aboriginal communities, as well as the effects of colonial disempowerment, racism, marginalization and the residential school system, have been well documented in the literature (brave heart & de bruyn, 1998). these issues, combined with everyday stresses experienced by people on reserve, coupled with the stress of living with a chronic disease, was believed to impact heavily on aboriginal people with diabetes: life is stressful. i was talking to someone about diabetes. he was told to take his blood test every morning but he just did it once per month. it was too stressful to do every day. (zhaabadiis, elder) zhaabadiis, further explained that by itself poor blood glucose values cause stress for people. similarly, negative stressors for aboriginal people with diabetes have been shown to include difficulty of managing diabetes; marginal economic conditions; trauma and violence; and “cultural, historical, and political aspects linked to the identity of being aboriginal” (iwasaki, bartlett, & o'neil, 2004, p.189). related themes emerged in our focus groups. medical research shows that psychological stress has direct and indirect negative influences on diabetes: first, it has a physiological response that raises blood glucose levels; second, it makes it more difficult for patients to adhere to a treatment plan. together, these influence the risk of complications significantly (cdacpgec, 2008). a further expression of multigenerational trauma is arguably the internalization and acceptance of the racially-oriented research that problematizes aboriginal biology. for example, one youth participant exclaimed: “if diabetes is genetic, i am screwed!” this fatalism towards diabetes is linked to a hypothesized genetic predisposition in aboriginal people popularized by the media and in some health literature. ironically, while largely discredited in academic circles (fee, 2006) and recently even in the media (abraham 2011), it is commonly accepted among participating community members as well as care providers, negatively impacting on the selfefficacy required for self-management. in summary we found that colonialism, multigenerational trauma and the related high levels of mental and emotional “un-wellness” in aboriginal communities interferes with many patients’ self-efficacy to manage a complex disease such as diabetes. these significant challenges, combined with a lack of healing services to address these issues, restricts patients’ psychosocial ability to regain the necessary balance in their lives to self-manage their disease. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.6 conclusions while they readily acknowledged that some of their aboriginal patients are doing very well managing their illness, health care providers in this study were in agreement that they see, on average, poorer outcomes for aboriginal patients with diabetes compared to non-aboriginal patients. this sentiment has since been empirically confirmed with a medical chart review (maar, et al., 2010). complications are closely linked to the inability to achieve self-management. one primary care provider with a biomedical perspective comments: compliance [to a treatment plan] is the big issue, there seems to be a big contrast between the non –aboriginal population and aboriginal populations regarding how they gain control of diabetes; among the aboriginal populations there seems to be more of a lack of control [of diabetes] due to compliance issues. it is important to look beyond the surface and identify the root causes of non-adherence, to prevent the unjustifiable blaming of socio-politically disadvantaged and vulnerable patients for their deteriorating health. given the significant barriers to evidence-based self-management experienced by many aboriginal patients, adherence to a treatment plan is indeed difficult to achieve. the social violence of diabetes related complications we set out to examine “the social and political arrangements that can put aboriginal people with diabetes ‘in harm’s way’ by interfering with the key components of healthy diabetes self-management behaviors, and its prerequisite of self-management education.” the connections with the tenets of structural violence and our research are compelling. we have shown that first nations economic, social and political marginalization can create barriers for aboriginal patients with diabetes with respect to the following: a) culturally safe self-management education; b) dietary self-management ; c) physical activities self-management; and (d) selfefficacy required for chronic illness self-management in general. these barriers put people with diabetes in harm’s way by interfering with evidence-based diabetes care, ultimately increasing the risk of rapid onset of complications. our research supports the world health organization’s assertion that the “persistent inequity in the health conditions of indigenous populations goes to the heart of the relationship between health and power, social participation, and empowerment “ (csdh, 2008). the determinants of poor diabetic management uncovered in this research are inseparable from the structural violence exhibited in colonial history resulting in persistent disempowerment, poverty, stress and marginalization of first nations communities and their health. structural intervention strategies for diabetes related complications health outcomes depend on managing the disease effectively, and without access to the necessary tools and strategies, canadians living with diabetes will not be able to achieve optimal results. (cdacpgec, 2008, p. s3) 11 maar et al.: structural violence of diabetes self-management and education published by scholarship@western, 2011 systematic underfunding of first nations health and social services, necessary to address the consequences of colonization (waldram, herring and young 2006) and pervasive poverty are major contributors to the inequities of diabetes related complications in first nations communities. as discussed in the report on the royal commission on aboriginal peoples (rcap, 1996), tackling these roots causes is necessary to improve many social determinants, including education, housing, economic development, water and health services. yet in 2006, the kelowna accord, a five year plan developed by the canadian government and aboriginal leaders to address these social determinants was not funded. it is unclear if the canadian government will implement this plan in the future. if implemented, it may take decades to significantly reduce diabetes related complications. farmer and colleagues (2006, p.1690) argue that health care workers can help to address health inequities by “resocializing” illness, and practitioners “must make common cause with others who are trained to intervene more proximally”, even when there is little political will to improve social determinants. while they are not a substitute for strategic, long-term, proximal improvements in the quality of social determinants of health, structural interventions informed by an understanding of structural violence can ameliorate some health inequalities immediately. we recommend that health care providers advocate for structural interventions to reduce the development of diabetes related complications among aboriginal people as follows: education 1. promote the knowledge of the barriers to diabetes self-management and education aboriginal people might experience among care providers and community members. 2. promote the sharing of success stories of aboriginal people living with diabetes in order to counteract fatalism. 3. educate health care providers about traditional aboriginal approaches to health so they can confidently support patients’ personal choices. 4. educate health care providers about aboriginal concepts of wellness such as the medicine wheel and the aboriginal concept of health as a balance of physical, mental, emotional and spiritual wellbeing. 5. increase awareness of community-specific barriers to healthy eating and physical activity, and support community action. services 6. develop culturally safe diabetes care using a community-based approach, including selfmanagement education and mental health support services, with optional services incorporating aspects of traditional aboriginal holistic wellness. 7. provide access and referrals to appropriate holistic mental/emotional/spiritual health services for aboriginal people with diabetes. 8. develop safe, community-appropriate physical fitness activities and formally prescribe these to patients during clinic visits. 9. move beyond a physical focus of diabetes health and connect patient with culturally safe addictions, mental health and smoking cessation services as necessary. 10. encourage interdisciplinary diabetic health care so that traditional aboriginal practitioners, mental health workers and primary care practitioners work synergistically to support patients with diabetes. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.6 table 1 focus group details category participant details number of participants health care providers community health and nutrition 4 diabetes network workers, includes on and off reserve 5 physicians 4 long-term care staff 8 mental health workers 7 elders from participating communities 10 recreation staff communities combined 4 community members with diabetes community 1 community 2 community 3 community 4 community 5 community 6 6 2 6 6 8 6 total 13 focus groups 76 participants table 2 clinical guidelines for healthy self-management behaviours healthy self-management behaviours diet self-monitoring of blood glucose medications physical activity smoking cessation 13 maar et al.: structural violence of diabetes self-management and education published by scholarship@western, 2011 references aluli, n. e., jones, k. l., reyes, p. w., brady, s. k., tsark, j. u., & howard, b. v. 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(2009). the crisis of chronic disease among aboriginal peoples: a challenge for public health, population health and social policy. victoria: university of victoria. richmond, c. a., & ross, n. a. (2009). the determinants of first nation and inuit health: a critical population health approach. health place, 15(2), 403-411. roberts, h., jiles, r., mokdad, a., beckles, g., & rios-burrows, n. (2009). trend analysis of diagnosed diabetes prevalence among american indian/alaska native young adults--united states, 19942007. ethnicity and disease journal, 19(3), 276-279. royal commission on aboriginal peoples[rcap]. (1996). volume 3: gathering strength. ottawa: royal commission on aboriginal peoples. stratton, i. m., adler, a. i., neil, h. a., matthews, d. r., manley, s. e., cull, c. a., . . . holman, r. r. (2000). association of glycaemia with macrovascular and microvascular complications of type 2 diabetes (ukpds 35): prospective observational study. british medical journal, 321(7258), 405-412. uk prospective diabetes study (ukpds) group. (1998). tight blood pressure control and risk of macrovascular and microvascular complications in type 2 diabetes: ukpds 38. uk prospective diabetes study group. british medical journal, 317(7160), 703-713. waldram, j. b., herring, d. a., & young, t. k. (2006). aboriginal health in canada: historical, cultural and epidemiological perspectives (2nd ed.). toronto: university of toronto press. wang, z., hoy, w. e., & si, d. (2010). incidence of type 2 diabetes in aboriginal australians: an 11-year prospective cohort study. bmc public health, 10, 487. wesley-esquimaux, c. c., & smolewski, m. (2004). historic trauma and aboriginal healing. ottawa: aboriginal healing foundation. wieman, c. (2006). improving the mental health status of canada's aboriginal youth. journal of the canadian academy child and adolescent psychiatry, 15(4), 157-158. young, t. k., reading, j., elias, b., & o'neill, j. d. (2000). type 2 diabetes mellitus in canada's first nations: status of an epidemic in progress. canadian medical association journal 163(5), 561. yu, c. h., & zinman, b. (2007). type 2 diabetes and impaired glucose tolerance in aboriginal populations: a global perspective. diabetes research clinical practice, 78(2), 159-170. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.6 the international indigenous policy journal may 2011 serious complications for patients, care providers and policy makers: tackling the structural violence of first nations people living with diabetes in canada marion a. maar dr. darrel manitowabi danusia gzik lorrilee mcgregor cheri corbiere recommended citation serious complications for patients, care providers and policy makers: tackling the structural violence of first nations people living with diabetes in canada abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license the lived experience of diabetes introduction diabetes and aboriginal people structural violence methodology results and discussion barriers to self-management education barriers to a healthy diet and nutrition barriers to physical activity systemic multi-generational barriers to all aspects of self-management conclusions the social violence of diabetes related complications structural intervention strategies for diabetes related complications education services table 2 clinical guidelines for healthy self-management behaviours references potential barriers to aboriginal teenaged mothers' access to maternal and parental benefits the international indigenous policy journal volume 4 issue 1 indigenous early parenthood article 5 march 2013 potential barriers to aboriginal teenaged mothers' access to maternal and parental benefits jeremy hull prologica research, prolog@mts.net recommended citation hull, j. (2013). potential barriers to aboriginal teenaged mothers' access to maternal and parental benefits. the international indigenous policy journal, 4(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.5 potential barriers to aboriginal teenaged mothers' access to maternal and parental benefits abstract this chapter uses available data to examine the ways in which federal and provincial maternity, maternal, or parental benefits are likely to receive less income than others because of their lower income and parental leave programs may have a differential impact on aboriginal teen mothers as compared to other canadian parents. this is done through analysis of the employment and income characteristics of aboriginal teen mothers in relation to the benefits and eligibility criteria for maternity and parental leave programs. it is concluded that aboriginal teen mothers are less able to receive these benefits because they are less likely than others to meet the minimum requirements for hours of insured employment. in addition, those aboriginal teens who meet the qualifying employment levels may be unable to take advantage of parental benefit options open to couples because they are more likely to be lone parents. it is also found that the quebec parental income plan is more generous and flexible than those in other provinces and its provisions would be especially beneficial to aboriginal teen mothers. recommendations for further research are provided. french abstract obstacles possibles à l’accès des mères adolescentes autochtones aux prestations de maternité et parentales jeremy hull prologica research, winnipeg résumé la présente étude se fonde sur les données disponibles pour examiner dans quelles mesure les programmes de congés parentaux et de maternité fédéraux et provinciaux peuvent avoir des répercussions différentes sur les mères adolescentes autochtones par rapport aux autres parents canadiens. cette comparaison est le fruit d’une analyse des caractéristiques de l’emploi et du revenu des mères adolescentes autochtones réalisée d’après les prestations et les critères d’admissibilité aux programmes de congé parental et de maternité. les résultats ont permis de conclure que les mères adolescentes autochtones sont moins à même de recevoir ces prestations, car elles sont moins susceptibles que les autres de satisfaire aux exigences minimales relatives au nombre d’heures d’emploi assurable. l’étude a également révélé que les adolescentes autochtones admissibles à des prestations parentales ou de maternité reçoivent un revenu inférieur à la moyenne en raison de leurs niveaux d’emploi et de revenu inférieurs et parce qu’elles sont plus susceptibles d’être des mères monoparentales et qu’elles ne peuvent donc pas bénéficier des prestations parentales offertes aux couples. l’étude a aussi établi que le régime québécois d’assurance parentale est plus généreux et plus souple que les programmes similaires offerts par les autres provinces et que ses dispositions sont particulièrement avantageuses pour les mères adolescentes autochtones. l’étude comprend des recommandations pour de futures recherches. spanish abstract dificultades potenciales en el acceso de las madres indígenas adolescentes a las prestaciones por maternidad y parentales jeremy hull prologica research, winnipeg resumen en este artículo se emplean los datos disponibles para examinar las formas en que los programas de licencia por maternidad y parentales federales y provinciales pueden tener repercusiones diferentes en las madres indígenas adolescentes en comparación con los otros padres canadienses. para ello, se analizan las características de empleo e ingresos de las madres indígenas adolescentes en relación con las prestaciones y los criterios de admisibilidad a los programas de licencia por maternidad y parentales. en el artículo se llega a la conclusión de que las madres indígenas adolescentes tienen más dificultades para recibir estas prestaciones porque tienen menos posibilidades que las otras mujeres de reunir las exigencias mínimas de horas de empleo asegurable. además, se afirma también en el artículo, es más probables que las adolescentes indígenas que cumplen las condiciones para las prestaciones por maternidad y parentales reciban prestaciones menores que las otras debido a sus menores niveles de ingresos y de empleo y a que, con mayor frecuencia, son monoparentales y no pueden sacar partido de las opciones de las prestaciones parentales que se ofrecen a las parejas. también se constata en el artículo que el plan de ingresos parentales de quebec es más generoso y flexible que los de las otras provincias y que sus disposiciones serían especialmente beneficiosas para las madres indígenas adolescentes. el artículo también sugiere que se realicen otras investigaciones. keywords maternal and parental benefits, aboriginal teenage mothers, early parenting, employment, lone parent creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/   p o t e n t i a l b a r r i e r s t o a b o r i g i n a l t e e n a g e d m o t h e r s ' a c c e s s t o m a t e r n a l a n d p a r e n t a l b e n e f i t s over the last few decades canadians have received increasing support for new parents in the form of maternal, paternal, and parental leave and related benefits. canadians as a whole recognize that healthy pregnancies, births, and child development over the first few years are crucial to the long-term health of individuals as well as their full social productivity. with this goal in mind, canadian governments have established a suite of programs to support childcare, such as child tax benefits, universal child benefits, public health care services, nutritional support, and programs providing maternal and parental leave. this chapter concerns itself with the latter. this paper was written as a direct result of the background research by fonda, eni, and guimond (2013, in this issue). as part of their inquiry, it was learned that in the united kingdom teen mothers are not eligible to receive maternal benefits until the age of 16, which dovetails with a legal requirement that all children must attend school until that age (lawson, 1993). this finding raised questions about whether aboriginal teen mothers have the same access to maternal and parental leave and benefits as other canadians. of course, the access issues in canada will be different from those in the uk. as will be seen, in canada, we found that limited access to maternal and parental benefits is a consequence of employment and income circumstances, as well as place of residence. the purpose of this brief paper, then, is to examine this question using available data to determine whether or not there is reason to believe that aboriginal teen mothers and fathers may, in fact, experience problems accessing maternal and parental benefits. maternal and parental leave and other benefit support appear in two forms: financial support and employment standards legislation. financial support is provided through the employment insurance (ei) program for all provinces in canada with the exception of québec, where the québec parental insurance program (qpip) operates. canada’s federal employment insurance program provides partial income replacement for mothers leading up to the time of birth. it also provides support to both mothers and fathers following the birth of their child. in québec, a parallel program was developed with the intention of providing similar benefits, but at a different level and using different eligibility criteria. in addition, provincial governments have jurisdiction over employment standards for most employees within their provinces. however, the federal government has jurisdiction concerning employment standards for federal employees. each of these levels of government passes employment standards legislation concerning when and how employers are required to provide maternal and parental leave to their employees within their jurisdiction. while collective agreements may also provide for maternal and parental benefits, a review of even a small sampling of collective agreements is well beyond the scope of this paper. r e s e a r c h q u e s t i o n s a number of research questions were generated to help direct the investigation into the relationship between being a teenaged aboriginal woman and having access to maternal and parental benefits in canada. they are as follows: a. based on the program criteria, provisions, and logic, what factors are generally likely to affect participation and extent of benefits received by parents in the federal and québec maternal and parental leave programs? 1 hull: potential barriers published by scholarship@western, 2013     b. how do the different employment standards within selected jurisdictions affect access to maternal and parental benefits? c. do aboriginal teen mothers differ from other mothers in ways that would affect their access to, or participation in, federal and québec maternal and parental leave programs? d. do aboriginal teen mothers differ from other mothers in ways that would affect the benefits received under the federal and québec maternal and parental leave programs? e. how are aboriginal teen mothers who live in different provinces affected as a result of their place of residence? e m p l o y m e n t i n s u r a n c e a n d q u é b e c p a r e n t a l i n s u r a n c e p r o g r a m s in most of canada, income replacement benefits are provided through the federal ei program under the heading of “special benefits,” which also includes provisions for adoption leave and sickness leave. in québec, income replacement benefits are provided through the qpip. these programs are summarized below. note that these programs are the same in all provinces other than québec. e m p l o y m e n t i n s u r a n c e : m a t e r n a l b e n e f i t s the purpose of the ei maternal benefits program (service canada, 2012) is to provide partial income replacement to working mothers before and after the birth of a child. eligibility is limited to expecting or new mothers who meet the following criteria: a. have accumulated 600 or more insurable hours over the past 52 weeks or from the time at which they last made an employment insurance claim, and b. have experienced or will experience a reduction in income of at least 40 percent during the maternal leave period. the benefits mothers can receive include salary replacement at 55 percent of average insured earnings, up to a maximum of $485 per week. new and expecting mothers must undergo a two-week waiting period before they can receive their salary replacement. however, during the benefit period, any earned income is deducted from the benefit payments on a one-to-one or dollar-to-dollar basis. the payments can begin at any time during the eight weeks prior to the expected birth of the child, up to the actual week in which the child is born. in all cases, however, the mother must apply within four weeks of stopping work. importantly, any delay in the application may result in reduced benefits. the maximum time period for these benefits is 17 weeks. one can apply for ei maternal benefits at canada service centres, by phone, or email. when applying for ei maternal benefits, one needs to provide the following information: • social insurance number; • record of employment (roe) from all employers who issued roes in paper format during the 52 weeks prior to application; • personal identification, if applying in person; 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.5     • complete bank information, if direct deposit is requested; • expected or actual date of child’s birth; • detailed description of the facts related to any jobs the applicant quit or was dismissed from in the previous 52 weeks; and • details regarding the applicant’s most recent employment. e m p l o y m e n t i n s u r a n c e : p a r e n t a l b e n e f i t s the purpose of ei parental benefits (service canada, 2012) is also to provide partial income replacement to parents, but it only applies following the birth of a child. eligibility is open to either parent, the mother or father, who meet the following criteria: a. has accumulated 600 insurable hours over the past 52 weeks or since he or she last made an employment insurance claim, and b. stands to experience a reduction in income of at least 40 percent during the parental leave period. the benefits one can receive are much the same as offered through the maternal benefit program, described above. that is, successful claimants can expect to receive 55 percent of their average insured earnings, up to a maximum of $485 per week. when parental leave benefits are combined with maternal leave benefits, no waiting period exists because parental benefits begin immediately after the period in which the maternal benefits were disbursed. claimants for parental benefits can earn up to $50 per week or 40 percent of their weekly salary, whichever is higher. any monies earned above that amount will be deducted dollar-for-dollar from ei parental leave benefits. ei parental benefits last up to a maximum of 35 weeks and can be used by one parent or shared by both. the information required for successful application is the same as that required for ei maternal leave benefits. generally, one is expected to apply at the same time as one makes the application for maternal leave benefits. q u é b e c p a r e n t a l i n s u r a n c e p l a n ( q p i p ) for various reasons, the province of québec developed its own parental insurance plan to replace the federal ei maternal/parental leave provisions. under qpip parents have two options: the basic plan or the special plan. the first of the two parents who receives the benefits determines the choice and it binds the other parent, even in cases of shared custody following divorce or separation. this choice cannot be changed later; it is irrevocable and applies to all benefits for the same birth or adoption. table 1 describes the benefits available under each plan. 3 hull: potential barriers published by scholarship@western, 2013     t a b l e 1 . q p i p p a r e n t a l b e n e f i t s p l a n s t y p e o f b e n e f i t s b a s i c p l a n s p e c i a l p l a n m a x i m u m n u m b e r o f b e n e f i t w e e k s p e r c e n t a g e o f a v e r a g e w e e k l y i n c o m e m a x i m u m n u m b e r o f b e n e f i t w e e k s p e r c e n t a g e o f a v e r a g e w e e k l y i n c o m e maternity (exclusively for the mother) 18 70% 15 75% paternity (exclusively for the father) 5 70% 3 75% parental (shared between parents) 7 25 (7+25=32) 70% 55% 25 75% source: government of quebec. (2009). parental benefits. retrieved from www.rqap.gouv.qc.ca/travailleur_salarie/types/parentales_en.asp the purpose of the qpip program is to provide partial income replacement to working parents around the time a child is born. eligibility is restricted to either employed or self-employed individuals expecting a child or new parents who meet the following criteria: a. have accumulated $2,000 of insurable earnings over the past 52 weeks, and b. have experienced a reduction in income of at least 40 percent during the maternal leave period. the benefits that parents can receive include 55 to 75 percent of average insured earnings, up to a maximum of $952 per week in 2012, adjusted annually, with the amount depending on the time period for payments and type of plan that is chosen. there is a two-week waiting period before benefits begin, but benefits may start any time from six weeks prior to the expected birth to the birth week itself. benefits last for up to a maximum of 50 weeks for the mother and 37 weeks for the father (i.e., the mother is able to combine maternal and paternal benefits; however, the father is offered a paternal leave of five weeks that cannot be transferred to the mother). one should apply within four weeks of stopping work and delays in application may result in reduced benefits. all applicants are required to provide the following information, some of which is only available following birth (i.e., the child’s identification): • social insurance number of the parent applicant, the other parent, and the spouse, if applicable; • a user-specific id to access the online application process; 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.5     • date of birth of the parent applicant, the other parent, and the spouse, if applicable; • expected date of birth of child (as a written confirmation from a doctor); • child’s identification; • banking information of the applicant(s); and • record of employment of the applicant(s). under the basic plan, a mother may benefit from a maximum of 50 weeks of benefits, namely 18 weeks of maternal benefits and 32 weeks of parental benefits if, with the father’s agreement, she alone accesses all parental benefits. under the special plan, a mother may benefit from a maximum of 40 weeks of benefits, namely 15 weeks of maternal benefits and 25 weeks of parental benefits if, with the father’s agreement, she alone will receive all parental benefits. therefore, the choice for parents is whether they wish to receive higher incomes for a shorter time period or lower incomes for a longer time period. both plans, however, provide a higher level of income than the ei program does. unlike the federal plan, the qpip applies to self-employed workers, as well as wage earners, because in québec self-employed workers pay into the employment insurance program, unlike in the rest of canada. in order to qualify for qpip, a wage earner’s income must have declined by at least 40 percent or, in the case of a self-employed worker, the work hours must have declined by 40 percent. in addition, the parent(s) must have received $2,000 in insurable earnings over the previous 52 weeks. it is worth noting, however, that the qualifying period may be extended to 104 weeks in some circumstances (i.e., if the applicant was unable to work and earn insurable income for the following reasons: receipt of employment insurance benefits, receipt of benefits under qpip for a previous child, or receipt of compensation from the commission de la santé et de la sécurité du travail or from société de l’assurance automobile du québec). no minimum amount of insurable earnings is specified for self-employed workers, but benefits are based on actual or estimated income as identified on the québec income tax form. p o p u l a t i o n n o t c o v e r e d there are several reasons for unemployed people to not receive ei benefits. these reasons were identified in a 1998 study for what was then the canadian federal government department of human resources and social development. below we have listed the reasons identified in the study, along with the number of people who did not receive benefits in 1998 based on each reason (government of canada, 1998). a. not having worked in the previous twelve months (400,000 individuals or about 50% of the total unemployed population was not covered). b. not having accumulated enough hours to qualify (132,000 individuals or about 16% of the total unemployed population was not covered). c. voluntarily leaving a job without just cause (74,000 unemployed persons or about 9% quit their last job without just cause). d. being self-employed (71,000 unemployed persons or just under 9% were self-employed prior to unemployment). 5 hull: potential barriers published by scholarship@western, 2013     e. quitting a job to return to school (57,000 unemployed persons or 7% of individuals had quit a job to return to school). f. not claiming ei benefits (30,000 or 4% of unemployed persons were eligible to receive benefits but did not claim them). g. having exhausted benefits or not receiving ei benefits for unknown reasons (39,000 individuals or over 4% exhausted their benefits and a further 9,000 or just over 1% did not receive benefits for unknown reasons). once more, however, coverage is different in québec. in particular, québec has no requirement that an applicant must amass at least 600 insurable hours of work. in québec, instead, a wage earner is required to have earned at least $2,000 over the previous 52 weeks from which deductions for employment insurance were taken. obviously, this is a less stringent requirement that requires fewer hours of work. for example, at a wage of $10 per hour this represents 200 hours of work or approximately 5 weeks of work at 40 hours a week. at higher wage levels, a shorter period of employment is required to meet the minimum amount of insurable earnings. moreover, and unlike the rest of the country, self-employed persons are also eligible to receive parental benefits from qpip. in the study described above (government of canada, 1998), up to 200,000 individuals, or 25 percent of the population that was not covered, would have been covered if the qpip eligibility criteria were adopted by the federal employment insurance parental benefits program. e m p l o y m e n t s t a n d a r d s l e g i s l a t i o n in addition to the provision of maternal and parental benefits through employment insurance, each federal and provincial jurisdiction has its own employment standards legislation. such legislation governs when and for how long employers are required to provide maternal and parental leave to their employees. this legislation does not affect the amount or the terms of the payments described in the previous section. instead, it governs the rights of employees to receive maternal or parental leave from their employers. it is designed to dovetail with provision of the financial support described above. however, employment standards legislation varies among jurisdictions, mainly in regard to the amount of time an employee must have worked for a given employer before requesting leave. the following table (table 2), compiled by labour canada, summarizes this information. i m p l i c a t i o n s f o r a b o r i g i n a l t e e n a g e d m o t h e r s given the above information regarding the ei and qpip parental leave programs, as well as employment standards legislation, there are several critical factors that could affect aboriginal teen mothers differently than other mothers. these factors include the following: insurable hours of employment, job tenure (or time in the job), average weekly income, and the income of the spouse or income splitting. each factor will be addressed separately. i n s u r a b l e h o u r s o f e m p l o y m e n t younger people and women tend to have fewer hours of employment than older people and men. this is probably the main reason for lower usage rates of regular ei benefits by young canadians, as shown in figure 1. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.5     t a b l e 2 . s u m m a r y o f e m p l o y m e n t s t a n d a r d s l e g i s l a t i o n r e g a r d i n g m a t e r n a l a n d p a r e n t a l l e a v e j u r i s d i c t i o n m a x . l e a v e ( w e e k s ) e l i g i b i l i t y r e q u i r e m e n t s m a i n t e n a n c e o f b e n e f i t s m a t e r n a l p a r e n t a l t o t a l l e n g t h o f s e r v i c e m i n i m u m n o t i c e canada 17 37 52 6 months 4 weeks yes ab 15 37 52 52 weeks 6 weeks not specified bc 17 37 52 n/a 4 weeks yes mb 17 37 54 7 months 4 weeks yes nb 17 37 52 n/a 2 weeks (maternal) 4 weeks (parental) not specified nl 17 35 52 20 weeks 2 weeks no nt 17 37 52 12 months 4 weeks not specified ns 17 35 52 12 months 4 weeks employee pays on 17 37 52 13 weeks 2 weeks yes pei 17 35 52 20 continuous weeks 4 weeks no qc 18 52 70 n/a 3 weeks yes sk 18 37 52 20 of past 52 weeks 4 weeks yes yk 17 37 54 12 continuous months 4 weeks not specified sources: human resources development canada. (2011). information on labour standards: maternity-related reassignment and leave, maternity leave, and parental leave. retrieved from http://www.hrsdc.gc.ca/eng/labour/employment_standards/publications/pdf/maternity.pdf alberta government. (n.d.). employment standards guide. retrieved from http://humanservices.alberta.ca/documents/wrr-espub_esguide.pdf ministry of jobs, tourism, and skills training and ministry responsible for tourism (british columbia) (2012). a guide to the employment standards act. retrieved from http://www.labour.gov.bc.ca/esb/esaguide/#14 new brunswick. (n.d.). maternity leave and childcare leave. retrieved from http://www2.gnb.ca/content/dam/gnb/departments/petlepft/pdf/es/maternityleave.pdf labour relations agency (newfoundland & labrador). (2012). parental leave. retrieved from http://www.gov.nl.ca/lra/faq/ls_parental.html#quest04 employment standards act (northwest territories). (2008). retrieved from http://www.ece.gov.nt.ca/divisions/labour/laour_pdf/regulations/employment_standards_act_3-2011.pdf employment standards (manitoba). (2012). maternity leave. retrieved from http://www.gov.mb.ca/labour/standards/doc,maternityleave,factsheet.html nova scotia labour and advanced education. (2012). guide to the labour standards code of nova scotia. retrieved from http://www.gov.ns.ca/lae/employmentrights/docs/labourstandardscodeguide.pdf ontario ministry of labour. (2009). pregnancy and parental leave. retrieved from http://www.labour.gov.on.ca/english/es/pubs/guide/pregnancy.php department of environment, labour, and justice (prince edward island). (2010). maternity/ parental/ adoption leave. retrieved from http://www.gov.pe.ca/labour/index.php3?number=1022361&lang=e commission des normes du travail (québec). (2012). labour standards in québec. retrieved from http://www.cnt.gouv.qc.ca/fileadmin/pdf/publications/c_0149a.pdf the labour standards act (saskatchewan). (2012). retrieved from http://www.qp.gov.sk.ca/documents/english/statutes/statutes/l1.pdf department of community services (yukon). (2012). maternity and parental leave. retrieved from http://www.community.gov.yk.ca/es/matpat.html#howmuch 7 hull: potential barriers published by scholarship@western, 2013     f i g u r e 1 . r e g u l a r e i b e n e f i c i a r i e s a s a p e r c e n t a g e o f t h e u n e m p l o y e d p o p u l a t i o n , b y a g e a n d s e x , c a n a d a , a u g u s t 2 0 0 8 . sources: statistics canada. (2013). employment insurance beneficiaries receiving regular benefits by age, sex and province and territory. retrieved from http://www.statcan.gc.ca/tables-tableaux/sumsom/l01/cst01/labor02a-eng.htm?sdi=employment%20insurance%20regular%20benefits%20age%20sex statistics canada. (2013). labour force characteristics by age and sex, 2008 (cansim table 282-0002). retrieved from www5.statcan.gc.ca/cansim/pick-choisir?lang=eng&p2=33&id=2820002 adding to this difficulty is the fact that aboriginal people often have lower rates of employment than the general canadian population. as shown in figure 2, teenagers are less likely than others to have paid employment. aboriginal teenagers are especially unlikely to have paid employment, whether they are male or female. according to the 2001 census, 59 percent of aboriginal teenage girls had no paid employment in 2000 compared to 36 percent of aboriginal women aged 20 to 24 years and 44 percent of non-aboriginal girls aged 15 to 19 years. this is to say that aboriginal teenaged girls are less likely to have employment income compared to either older aboriginal women or non-aboriginal teenaged girls. this finding suggests that the percentage of aboriginal teen mothers eligible for maternal and parental income replacement programs is smaller than it is among other mothers, aboriginal or not. j o b t e n u r e as noted above, in most jurisdictions, employers are not required to provide maternal or parental leave to those employees who have been in their jobs for shorter time periods than stipulated by ei or qpip parental benefits programs. for instance, the minimum required employment period in ontario is 3 months, while it is 7 months in manitoba and a full year in alberta. in saskatchewan, the employee must have worked for at least 20 continuous weeks with the same employer over the preceding year. however, in québec there is no such requirement. 12% 45% 10% 73% 0% 20% 40% 60% 80% 15 24 25 54 15 24 25 54 men women 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.5     figure 2. p e r c e n t a g e w h o d i d n o t w o r k f o r p a y i n 2 0 0 0 , b y i d e n t i t y , s e x , a n d s e l e c t e d a g e g r o u p s , c a n a d a . source: census of canada. (2001). custom tables produced for aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (formerly indian and northern affairs canada) labour force research project. job tenure and job turnover are related to age; that is, younger workers are likely to have been in their jobs for shorter time periods, thus reducing their possibilities of even qualifying for parental benefits. this is illustrated in figure 3, where it can be seen that younger workers were more likely to have worked for fewer weeks in 2000 when compared to older workers, regardless of whether or not they were working fullor parttime. more important, however, within any given age group, aboriginal workers were likely to have worked fewer weeks than non-aboriginal workers. it should also be noted that, outside québec, full-time employees working less than 15 weeks in a year do not quality for maternal or parental benefits. moreover, part-time workers working 25 or fewer hours per week also do not qualify if they worked less than 24 weeks during a year. although data are not available to provide precise numbers, it can be inferred that a substantial proportion of young aboriginal workers are not in a position to qualify for these benefits. the proportion not qualifying is higher among young aboriginal workers than among non-aboriginal workers of the same age. it is also higher among older aboriginal workers as compared to non-aboriginal workers in the same age groups. complicating the situation is the fact that a relatively high proportion of young aboriginal workers are working part-time rather than full-time. again, the available data are not precise as to the actual number of hours worked, but it is known that, compared to older aboriginal people, a higher percentage of aboriginal teenagers work part-time (see figure 4). in fact, only 14 percent of aboriginal teenage girls worked full-time in 2000, while 27 percent worked part-time and the remaining 59 percent did not work at all (see table 3). 57% 25% 22% 43% 13% 12% 59% 36% 34% 44% 16% 24% 0% 20% 40% 60% 80% 15 19 20 24 25 29 15 19 20 24 25 29 aboriginal non-aboriginal men women 9 hull: potential barriers published by scholarship@western, 2013       f i g u r e 3 . a v e r a g e w e e k s w o r k e d i n 2 0 0 0 b y a g e , i d e n t i t y , a n d f u l l t i m e o r p a r t t i m e s t a t u s , c a n a d a . source: census of canada. (2001). custom tables produced for aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (formerly indian and northern affairs canada) labour force research project. f i g u r e 4 . p e r c e n t a g e o f t h e a b o r i g i n a l p o p u l a t i o n w o r k i n g p a r t t i m e b y a g e a n d s e x , c a n a d a , 2 0 0 0 . source: census of canada. (2001). custom tables produced for aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (formerly indian and northern affairs canada) labour force research project. 19 34 39 23 27 28 26 38 45 27 34 35 0 10 20 30 40 50 15 19 20 24 25 29 15 19 20 24 25 29 full time part time aboriginal non-aboriginal 25% 17% 12% 27% 23% 18% 0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30% 15 19 20 24 25 29 men women 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.5     t a b l e 3 . p e r c e n t a g e o f w o m e n w h o w o r k e d b y f u l l t i m e o r p a r t t i m e w o r k , i d e n t i t y , a n d a g e g r o u p , c a n a d a , 2 0 0 0 i d e n t i t y a n d a g e g r o u p w o r k i n g f u l l t i m e ( % ) w o r k i n g p a r t t i m e ( % ) n o t w o r k i n g ( % ) t o t a l ( % ) a b o r i g i n a l 15 19 14.2 26.9 58.9 100 20 24 40.2 23.4 36.5 100 25 29 49.5 17.7 32.7 100 n o n a b o r i g i n a l 15 19 10.5 45.5 44.0 100 20 24 47.9 36.2 15.9 100 25 29 65.9 18.2 15.9 100 source: census of canada. (2001). custom tables produced for aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (formerly indian and northern affairs canada) labour force research project. a v e r a g e w e e k l y i n c o m e the relatively low employment rates of aboriginal teenage girls means that only a small proportion of them have employment income. family status and the presence of children also have an impact on the employment and employment income of aboriginal teenaged mothers. as shown in figure 5, there is a decline in the percentage of the population with employment income as we move from non-aboriginal to aboriginal, from men to women, from older age groups to younger, and from mothers in two-parent families to mothers in lone parent families. therefore, while a small proportion of aboriginal teen mothers have employment income, the proportion is lowest among aboriginal teenaged lone parents. f i g u r e 5 . p e r c e n t a g e o f p o p u l a t i o n w i t h i n c o m e f r o m w a g e s o r s a l a r i e s b y s e l e c t e d i d e n t i t y , a g e , s e x , a n d f a m i l y c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s . source: census of canada. (2001). custom tables produced for aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (formerly indian and northern affairs canada) labour force research project.   76.0% 64.5% 52.3% 40.9% 35.0% 19.7% 0% 20% 40% 60% 80% non-aboriginal men 25 64 non-aboriginal women 25 64 aboriginal women 25 64 aboriginal women 15 24 aboriginal mothers two-parent family 15 24 aboriginal mothers lone parents 15 24 11 hull: potential barriers published by scholarship@western, 2013     we know that the proportion of teen mothers is much higher among aboriginals than among canada’s nonaboriginal population. using 2006 census data, this proportion has been calculated to be between 16 and 38 percent of young aboriginal women, depending on aboriginal identity group. however, the proportion is only 6 percent among non-aboriginal women (see garner, guimond, & senecal, 2013, in this issue). as stated above, the ei maternal and parental leave programs provide for a maximum benefit of $485 per week. if the average weekly income is less than $880 per week, the employee stands to receive less than the maximum. for full-time workers, this cut-off point is more or less equivalent to an average wage of $22 per hour; however, we know that the income of young workers tends to be much lower than that of older workers, with most receiving wages of less than $22 per hour. additionally, on average, canadian women’s incomes are lower than men’s incomes and the incomes of aboriginal workers are lower than those of nonaboriginal workers (see figure 6). with average incomes below $10,000 per year in 2005 and an average of roughly 20 to 30 weeks worked per year (as seen in figure 3), young aboriginal women could well be earning in the range of $300 to $400 per week. given that the parental benefit is 55 percent of the average weekly wage in canada, with the exception of québec, young aboriginal women who can actually qualify for maternal or parental leave under the ei program might receive only $165 to $220 per week. in québec, where parents receive between 55 and 75 percent of their income, the range of benefits would be higher and more variable – between $165 and $300 per week. of course, these estimates are based on rough averages and some people would receive more, while others would receive less. mothers, and especially lone mothers, have lower incomes than men or childless women, as was documented by xuelin zhang (2009). this increases the likelihood that young aboriginal mothers will not qualify for maternal and parental benefits, and, if they do qualify, they are considerably more likely than others to receive lower payments. w o r k i n g s p o u s e a n d i n c o m e s p l i t t i n g if there are two working spouses in a family, the couple can maximize their benefits under either ei or qpip by choosing which parent will stay home and receive the benefits. normally, one might expect that it would be the person with less income who stays home, but, if only one person in the couple qualifies for parental benefits, it might be advantageous for that person to stay home with the child while the other parent continues to work. katherine marshall (2008) found that, in québec where families stood to lose as much income by either the mother or father staying home, parents were more likely to split the parental leave benefit. outside québec, marshall found that 18 percent of fathers filed for parental leave benefits when their spouse did not make a claim, compared to only 8 percent of fathers who filed when their spouse did. such options are only available to two parent families, and, as shown in figure 7, a much higher proportion of young aboriginal mothers are lone parents when compared to young non-aboriginal mothers. consequently, young aboriginal mothers have less flexibility in accessing the program’s benefits.   12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.5     f i g u r e 6 . a v e r a g e e m p l o y m e n t i n c o m e b y i d e n t i t y , s e x , a n d a g e , c a n a d a , 2 0 0 5 source: census of canada. (2001). custom tables produced for aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (formerly indian and northern affairs canada) labour force research project. f i g u r e 7 . l o n e p a r e n t s a s a p e r c e n t o f p a r e n t s w i t h c h i l d r e n u n d e r t h e a g e o f 1 5 w h o s e m a j o r s o u r c e o f i n c o m e i s w a g e s o r s a l a r i e s b y i d e n t i t y , a g e , a n d s e x , c a n a d a , 2 0 0 1 . source: census of canada. (2001). custom tables produced for aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (formerly indian and northern affairs canada) labour force research project. 11,673 37,965 8,814 26,644 12,943 53,618 9,944 33,130 0 20,000 40,000 60,000 15 24 25 64 15 24 25 64 male female aboriginal 6.1% 5.8% 14.2% 16.6% 0% 20% 15 24 25 64 15 24 25 64 men women aboriginal non-aboriginal 13 hull: potential barriers published by scholarship@western, 2013     o t h e r i s s u e s there are some aspects of the maternal and parental leave programs and their application processes that might also affect aboriginal teen mothers differently, although there may not be data available to confirm these suppositions. first, it may be that aboriginal teen mothers change jobs more frequently than others. if this is the case, it would affect their eligibility for maternal and parental support in the ei and qpip programs. typically, young people with incomplete educations find themselves in less secure, part-time employment. this has already been reflected in the data presented above. this fact means that many younger, less educated workers go through a greater number of short-term jobs than do others. this situation results in a greater administrative burden associated with their applications since more record of employment forms are required to support the application process. moreover, the nature and number of these jobs potentially increase the likelihood of the employee having been dismissed for cause rather than having been laid off. another factor that needs consideration is the movement of young aboriginal workers between school and employment. generally, aboriginal teenagers are likely both to leave school early and to return to school, resulting in an extended time period required to complete high school and other levels of education. this back-and-forth process is likely to interrupt their employment and increase the number of jobs they have held in a given year (hull, 2005). an increased number of jobs again lead to an increased need for records of employment and other documentation, adding to the applicant’s administrative burden. third, the location of a substantial portion of the aboriginal population in rural and remote communities may make the program application process more difficult (hull, 2005). while both the ei and qpip programs have provisions for application via the internet or telephone, it is usually easier to make applications directly to a government office or service centre. however, it is not clear whether proximity is actually a barrier to aboriginal teenagers, given that most of them seem to be quite comfortable using the internet (theissen & looker, 2008). lastly, it should be noted that aboriginal teenagers generally have lower educational levels than others, and this may indirectly affect their ability to apply or qualify for maternal and parental leave programs (hull, 2005). relatively low educational levels certainly have an impact on employment and income. this factor is probably one of the main causes for the relatively low employment and income levels documented above. in addition, some individuals may lack the level of literacy required to complete application forms or to provide clear, written descriptions of their reasons for leaving various jobs. c o m p a r i s o n o f e m p l o y m e n t s t a n d a r d s b e t w e e n j u r i s d i c t i o n s as noted above, there are some differences in employment standards legislation between jurisdictions, mainly in the area of job tenure; that is, the length of time a person must have worked for their current employer before the employer is required to provide maternal or parental leave. focusing on five jurisdictions, the job tenure requirements are given in table 4.   14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.5     t a b l e 4 . j o b t e n u r e r e q u i r e d t o o b t a i n m a t e r n a l o r p a r e n t a l l e a v e f r o m e m p l o y e r j u r i s d i c t i o n j o b t e n u r e r e q u i r e m e n t québec none saskatchewan 20 weeks during past year canada 6 months manitoba 7 months alberta 52 weeks note: canadian labour standards apply to employers in certain sectors including: inter-provincial and international pipeline and transport, air transport, radio and television, banking, protection of fisheries, most grain elevators, flour and seed mills, uranium mining and processing, first nations governments and social services, as well as to the federal civil service. sources: human resources development canada. (2011). information on labour standards: maternity-related reassignment and leave, maternity leave, and parental leave. retrieved from http://www.hrsdc.gc.ca/eng/labour/employment_standards/publications/pdf/maternity.pdf alberta government. (n.d.). employment standards guide. retrieved from http://humanservices.alberta.ca/documents/wrr-espub_esguide.pdf ministry of jobs, tourism, and skills training and ministry responsible for tourism (british columbia) (2012). a guide to the employment standards act. retrieved from http://www.labour.gov.bc.ca/esb/esaguide/#14 new brunswick. (n.d.). maternity leave and childcare leave. retrieved from http://www2.gnb.ca/content/dam/gnb/departments/petlepft/pdf/es/maternityleave.pdf labour relations agency (newfoundland & labrador). (2012). parental leave. retrieved from http://www.gov.nl.ca/lra/faq/ls_parental.html#quest04 employment standards act (northwest territories). (2008). retrieved from http://www.ece.gov.nt.ca/divisions/labour/laour_pdf/regulations/employment_standards_act_3-2011.pdf employment standards (manitoba). (2012). maternity leave. retrieved from http://www.gov.mb.ca/labour/standards/doc,maternityleave,factsheet.html nova scotia labour and advanced education. (2012). guide to the labour standards code of nova scotia. retrieved from http://www.gov.ns.ca/lae/employmentrights/docs/labourstandardscodeguide.pdf ontario ministry of labour. (2009). pregnancy and parental leave. retrieved from http://www.labour.gov.on.ca/english/es/pubs/guide/pregnancy.php department of environment, labour, and justice (prince edward island). (2010). maternity/ parental/ adoption leave. retrieved from http://www.gov.pe.ca/labour/index.php3?number=1022361&lang=e commission des normes du travail (québec). (2012). labour standards in québec. retrieved from http://www.cnt.gouv.qc.ca/fileadmin/pdf/publications/c_0149a.pdf the labour standards act (saskatchewan). (2012). retrieved from http://www.qp.gov.sk.ca/documents/english/statutes/statutes/l1.pdf department of community services (yukon). (2012). maternity and parental leave. retrieved from http://www.community.gov.yk.ca/es/matpat.html#howmuch this table demonstrates the wide variety of job tenure requirements in different jurisdictions. québec has no tenure requirement (other than being a current employee); saskatchewan’s job tenure requirement is relatively short and flexible; canada requires 6 months at a particular job; manitoba requires 7 months; and alberta is the most stringent, requiring a year’s employment before an employee can be assured of maternity or parental leave. in other respects, the employment standards laws in different jurisdictions are generally similar, at least for older workers, with the exception of alberta where the legislation does not require the employer to maintain leave benefits during the period of maternal or parental leave. finally, it should be kept in mind that all of the 15 hull: potential barriers published by scholarship@western, 2013     above descriptions may be enhanced through collective bargaining contracts. these contracts often provide better or additional benefits than are required by law. c o n c l u s i o n s this paper provides evidence that, when trying to access ei and qpip maternal and parental benefits, aboriginal teen mothers face the following barriers: • they are less likely to be employed; • they are less likely to have accumulated enough insured hours of work; • they are less likely to have worked for their current employer long enough to qualify for leave under employment standards legislation; • they are more likely to receive lower benefits because of lower income levels; • they are less likely to be able to take advantage of splitting parental benefits with a spouse because of higher rates of lone parenthood; and • they are less likely to apply for benefits for which they are entitled because of their geographic location and educational levels. there are also some differences between jurisdictions, most notably the differences between québec and other provinces. under québec’s qpip, maternal and parental benefits are more easily available to everyone because of lower requirements regarding the amount of insured employment. in addition, qpip benefits themselves are more generous and flexible with regard to how the mother and father can divide them up. this means that there will likely be a larger difference for those parents with lower levels of employment and income than others. therefore, provisions of the québec program would be especially beneficial to teenaged aboriginal mothers. in addition, québec’s employment standards legislation eliminates the potential barrier of requiring a minimum length of employment with the current employer found in other jurisdictions. with this said, it is now time to acknowledge that there are other programs, such as the child tax benefit and the universal child care benefits programs among others, that impact teenaged parents. these two programs and other relevant supports offered in various federal and provincial jurisdictions should become part of a broader conversation regarding the kinds and levels of support canadian society could offer to young and teenaged parents, aboriginal or not. such a conversation would very quickly become complex given the variety of benefits, issues, challenges, and opportunities. r e s e a r c h n e e d e d the discussion in this article is a preliminary attempt to assess the type and degree of possible barriers to aboriginal teenaged mothers, who might want to receive maternal and parental benefits. it is based on data that were not originally created for this purpose. accordingly, any discussion based on fact is limited and somewhat speculative. in order to better examine the research questions raised at the beginning of this paper, it would be useful to have more focused data, particularly administrative data from human resources and skill development canada (hrsdc) identifying the extent to which aboriginal teenaged mothers, or at least teenaged women, have received benefits. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.5     the following types of data would be useful: h r s d c a d m i n i s t r a t i v e d a t a • number of teenaged women who have obtained maternal and parental benefits by geography, family status, and aboriginal identity. • insured hours of work of teenaged women by geography, family status, and aboriginal identity. • benefits received by teenaged women by aboriginal identity. • trends in numbers of teenage female beneficiaries by aboriginal identity. note: geographies could be designed to compare onand off-reserve and across provinces. c e n s u s d a t a • employment income of aboriginal teen mothers by geography, family status, age of oldest child, and income categories, such as <$2,000, $2,000 $5,000, $5,000 $10,000, etc. • weeks worked (in categories, such as < 10 weeks, 10 14 weeks, 15 19 weeks, etc.) by aboriginal teen mothers by geography, family status, and age of oldest child. a b o r i g i n a l p e o p l e s s u r v e y d a t a • number of jobs held over a one-year period by aboriginal teen mothers by geography, family status, and age of oldest child. • hours of paid employment over a one-year period by aboriginal teen mothers by geography, family status, and age of oldest child. 17 hull: potential barriers published by scholarship@western, 2013     r e f e r e n c e s fonda, m., eni, r., & guimond, e. (2013). socially constructed teen motherhood: a review. international indigenous policy journal, 4(1). retrieved from http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/i ss1/ garner, r., guimond, e., & senecal, s. (2013). the socio-economic characteristics of first nations teen mothers. international indigenous policy journal, 4(1). retrieved from http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/i ss1/ government of canada. (1998). who receives employment insurance, who does not and why? applied research bulletin, 5(1). ottawa: human resources development canada. hull, j. (2005). post-secondary education and labour market outcomes, canada 2001. ottawa: indian and northern affairs and strategic research & analysis directorate. lawson, a. (1993). multiple fractures: the cultural construction of teenage sexuality and pregnancy. in a. lawson & d. l. rhode (eds.), the politics of pregnancy: adolescent sexuality and public policy (pp. 101-125). new haven, ct & london, uk: yale university press. marshall, k. (2008, june). fathers’ use of paid parental leave. perspectives, 5 14. service canada. (2012). employment insurance maternity and parental benefits. retrieved from:   http://www.servicecanada.gc.ca/eng/ei/types/maternity_parental.shtml#much theissen, v., & looker, d. e. (2008). cultural centrality and information and communication technology among canadian youth. canadian journal of sociology, 33(2), 311-336. zhang, x. (2009, march). earnings of women with and without children. perspectives, 5 13. 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.5 the international indigenous policy journal march 2013 potential barriers to aboriginal teenaged mothers' access to maternal and parental benefits jeremy hull recommended citation potential barriers to aboriginal teenaged mothers' access to maternal and parental benefits abstract french abstract spanish abstract keywords creative commons license potential barriers to aboriginal teenaged mothers' access to maternal and parental benefits book review: greenwood, m. et al. (eds.). (2015). determinants of indigenous peoples' health in canada: beyond the social the international indigenous policy journal volume 8 | issue 1 article 4 january 2017 book review: greenwood, m. et al. (eds.). (2015). determinants of indigenous peoples' health in canada: beyond the social javier mignone university of manitoba, javier.mignone@umanitoba.ca recommended citation mignone, j. (2017). book review: greenwood, m. et al. (eds.). (2015). determinants of indigenous peoples' health in canada: beyond the social. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(1). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.4 book review: greenwood, m. et al. (eds.). (2015). determinants of indigenous peoples' health in canada: beyond the social abstract this article provides a review of the book determinants of indigenous peoples’ health in canada: beyond the social edited by margo greenwood, sarah de leeuw, nicole marie lindsay, and charlotte reading. keywords indigenous peoples, aboriginal, first nations, métis, inuit, canada, health, well-being, social determinants creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ bo o k r e v i e w m a rg o g re e n w o o d , s a ra h d e l e e u w , n i c o l e m a ri e l i n d s a y , & c h a rl o t t e r e a d i n g ( e d s . ) . ( 2 0 1 5 ) . d e t e rm i n a n t s o f i n d i g e n o u s pe o p l e s ’ h e a l t h i n c a n a d a : be y o n d t h e s o c i a l . t o ro n t o : c a n a d i a n s c h o l a rs ’ pre s s . 2 9 1 p p . $ 5 9 . 9 5 ( p a p e rb a c k) . i s bn : 9 7 8 1 5 5 1 3 0 7 3 2 9 . the central premise of determinants of indigenous people’s health in canada: beyond the social is, as stated in the introduction, “colonialism has yet to be fully and consistently accounted for as a significant determinant of health” (p. xi). this is the basis of the book and the ground it seeks to cover. no doubt this gap in the literature about social determinants of health is real and determinants pulls out all the stops in trying to address it with a rich range of vantage points. despite some shortcomings, it mostly achieves its purpose in its 23 chapters, which are written by 34 authors. the “beyond the social” of the book’s title is the key to understanding the common logic behind the varied chapters. while acknowledging the value of past and current social determinants of health frameworks, the editors argue that they are not “nuanced enough to fully conceptualize the disparities and inequities lived by indigenous peoples” (p. xvi). i agree with their argument that these frameworks do not account for the fact that “colonialism is an active and ongoing force impacting the well-being of indigenous peoples in canada” (p. xii). the first of the book’s four sections sets the context by presenting several of the major themes that permeate the entire book. these are: • structural determinants of indigenous people’s health; • two-eyed seeing in medicine; • traditional knowledge systems; and • spiritual dimensions of health. part 2 explores determinants of indigenous health that drive beyond the social, such as the relatedness of people, land, and health; cultural continuity and early childhood; cultural medicines; geography as a determinant; and transcending the gender binary. the section that follows contains chapters that delve into wellness as culture, language, and identity; indigenous knowledges and traditions in education and health; reflections on the interconnections between the cultural, political, and historical drivers of health; early childhood development policies and program; and the relevance of stories and narrative genealogy. chapters in the final section encourage readers to rethink the medical system through indigenous eyes, in particular by “revisioning” medicine toward indigenization and the understanding of medicine as a relationship. this section also addresses specific issues such as type 2 diabetes (chapter 21) and hiv/aids (chapter 22) in indigenous populations. of note is the fact that each section includes several chapters that enrich determinants in a way not common within the academic literature. these are chapters that are consistent with the book’s intention to offer indigenous perspectives and ways of knowing. they include two poems by a métis poet 1 mignone: determinants of indigenous peoples' health in canada published by scholarship@western, 2017 (chapter 5); mi’kmaw elders explaining two-eyed seeing (chapter 2); an interview with a tribal chief talking about indigenous relationships with the land (chapter 11); a narrative about becoming a teller of traditional haida stories (chapter 12); a personal perspective on the politics of health—an amusing story about grandparents’ set of false teeth (chapter 17); the sharing of the story of a cree mother in need of medical procedures and of her son in his journey to become a western-trained medical physician (chapter 19); and stories of the experience of being one of very few indigenous medical doctors (chapter 20). a critique we can make of social determinants of health frameworks is that often the variety of determinants are presented as a list of factors with a relatively weak articulation of hierarchy and interplay. not infrequently these frameworks bring to mind jorge luis borges’ fictional encyclopedia where animals are classified as “those that belong to the emperor; embalmed ones, those that are trained, suckling pigs, mermaids, fabulous ones, stray dogs, those included in the present classification,” and so on (borges, 1975)—that is, a lack of clear inner logic. this brings us to the strengths and limitations of determinants. a particular strength is the explicit articulation of how colonialism is a structural determinant of indigenous peoples’ health in chapter 1: structural determinants of aboriginal peoples’ health. within an indigenous paradigm, the chapter presents the tree as an appropriate metaphor to explore social determinants of health, turning upside down the more conventional view of “structural determinants as upstream forces, creating conditions that flow down to affect population health” (p. 10). what would be considered distal determinants, “resources from the surrounding environment are taken up by the roots of the tree . . . trunk system (intermediate determinants) and into the crown (proximal determinants)” (p. 10). this makes for a potentially more relevant framework to capture how colonial structures operate as root causes that flow upward in the shaping of determinants of indigenous health. although the book’s sections do not follow this framework in an articulated manner, there are indirect connections. as a response to colonialism in health, there is an exploration of inuit knowledge systems and the role of holistic thinking (chapter 3), as well as a reflection on the spiritual dimension of holistic health (chapter 4). the role of culture and identity are also explored—for instance focusing on early childhood development of indigenous children and their role in cultural continuity (chapter 7), as well as how cultural wounds demand cultural medicines (chapter 8). the role of land is strongly present in chapters that discuss geography as a determinant of indigenous people’s health, the importance of taking care of land, and stories from anishinabe elders on the relatedness of people, land, and health (see for example chapters 6, 9, & 11). again, as a counter to colonialism, several chapters provide particular examples of processes of indigenization of medicine (see for example chapters 19-23). in terms of style, despite some discrepancies in writing quality, most chapters are well written and clear. as tends to occur with edited books, there is a degree of repetition in content across several chapters. furthermore, some of the research-based chapters could have provided more consistent empirical evidence to substantiate their claims. more importantly, it would have been helpful if the editors had included a concluding chapter that weaved together the main threads of the chapters in a coherent picture by returning to address the idea of “beyond the social” and integrating the rich material offered by the different authors. a major difficulty with edited books is that the main thrust is often lost due to writing that comes from distinct 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.4 angles and authors. while this in itself is not negative (in fact it tends to enrich), the book must offer places of synthesis that incorporate these varied perspectives to make explicit how they support its central arguments. while the introduction does a good job of presenting each chapter, determinants seems to lack proper conceptual closure. a more specific and integrated conceptual framework of “colonialism [as] an active and ongoing force impacting the well-being of indigenous peoples in canada” (p. xii) would have been useful as a final chapter. determinants of indigenous people’s health in canada: beyond the social, despite some limitations, is a valuable book. it offers new light in questioning the social determinants of health framework from a variety of indigenous perspectives. it is a creative text that provides different vantage points not frequently found in books in this subject area. for anyone in the social determinants of health field, it is a must read. as well, it is a unique resource for post-secondary courses that teach community health, population and public health, health promotion, indigenous studies, and indigenous policy. 3 mignone: determinants of indigenous peoples' health in canada published by scholarship@western, 2017 r e f e re n c e s borges, j. l. (1975). other inquisitions, 1937-1952. austin: university of texas press. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.4 the international indigenous policy journal january 2017 book review: greenwood, m. et al. (eds.). (2015). determinants of indigenous peoples' health in canada: beyond the social javier mignone recommended citation book review: greenwood, m. et al. (eds.). (2015). determinants of indigenous peoples' health in canada: beyond the social abstract keywords creative commons license book review: greenwood, m. et al. (eds.). (2015). determinants of indigenous peoples' health in canada: beyond the social beyond territory: revisiting the normative justification of self-government in theory and practice the international indigenous policy journal volume 2 | issue 2 article 1 june 2011 beyond territory: revisiting the normative justification of self-government in theory and practice janique dubois university of toronto, janique.dubois@utoronto.ca recommended citation dubois, j. (2011). beyond territory: revisiting the normative justification of self-government in theory and practice. t e international indigenous policy journal, 2(2) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.2.1 this research is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. beyond territory: revisiting the normative justification of selfgovernment in theory and practice abstract the association of sovereignty with control over territory is being challenged both internally and externally in modern societies. demands for political autonomy from sub-state minorities undermine the natural link between nation, state and territory from within, while the movement of capital, goods and information across borders contests the relationship between these concepts from without. scholars of international relations, law, philosophy and political science have already suggested that the sovereignty of nation-states is under attack; however, scant attention has been paid to the way in which changes in the relation between nation, state, and territory affect the normative weight associated with each of these concepts in discussions about sovereignty and self-government. the objectives of this article is to examine the way in which nation, state, sovereignty, and territory are addressed in normative justifications of indigenous self-government and to better understand how these notions are being treated in its implementation. keywords indigenous self-government, territoriality, globalization, urban reserves acknowledgments an earlier version of this article was presented at the 21st world congress of political science in santiago, chile. the author would like to thank the anonymous reviewers as well as joe garcea for their thoughtful and encouraging comments. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ instead of being divided between two orders of government, government powers  will have to be divided among three orders. this is a major change, and one that  will require goodwill, flexibility, co‐operation, imagination and courage on the  part of all concerned.  royal commission on indigenous peoples (1996)  control over a territory has been the organizing principle par excellence of the global order since  the signing of the treaty of westphalia in 1648. the westphalian vision of sovereignty postulates that  political power, and by extension self‐government, is exercised by territorially defined nation‐states. the  association of sovereignty with the exclusive control over a territory is being challenged both internally and  externally in contemporary societies. demands for political autonomy from sub‐state minorities undermine  the relationship between nation, state and territory from within, while the movement of capital, goods and  information across borders contests the association of these concepts from without. scholars of  international relations, law, philosophy, geography, indigenous studies and political science have already  suggested that the sovereignty of nation‐states is under attack; however, scant attention has been paid to  the way in which changes in the relation between nation, state, and territory affect the normative weight  associated with each of these concepts in discussions about sovereignty and self‐government. this article  emphasizes the importance of distinguishing between these concepts to uncover their normative content  as well as their applied meaning.   this article contends that, although the control over a given territory can enhance a group’s ability  to achieve political autonomy, it should not be viewed as a normative precondition for self‐government,  self‐determination or nationhood. to support this argument, this article is divided into three parts. the first  section challenges the perceived ‘natural’ link between nation, state, sovereignty and territory. the second  section re‐articulates a normative justification of self‐government that is non‐territorial and thus relevant  for territorially dispersed indigenous peoples. through an examination of the creation of urban reserves in  the canadian province of saskatchewan, the third section illustrates the limits of territorially‐based  justifications of self‐government and thereby challenges the idea that sovereignty is contingent on the  exercise of control over a territory. the underlying objectives of this article is to examine the way in which  the concepts of nation, state, sovereignty, and territory relate to one another in normative justifications of  indigenous self‐government and to better understand how these concepts are being treated in its  implementation.  conceptual clarity  in theoretical and well as political discussions, territory is often portrayed as a necessary condition  for self‐government, which is often used interchangeably with self‐determination and sovereignty. one of  canada’s foremost scholars on minority rights, will kymlicka, describes self‐government as “devolving  political power to a political unit substantially controlled by the members of the national minority, and  substantially corresponding to their historical homeland or territory” (1995, p. 30, my emphasis).1 although  self‐government is often associated with a “historical homeland” or “territory,” j. edward chamberlin  argues that the emphasis on territories as spaces over which to exercise authority is a “stubborn delusion,  part of the mistaken notion that sovereignty is absolute and always territorially defined” (1988, p. 15).2   most indigenous peoples in present‐day canada are not territorially bound. more than half of this  population lives outside the boundaries of traditional reserves in urban and rural areas interspersed with  1 critics of dominant accounts take issue with the notion that self‐government is devolved. scholars such as taiaiake alfred (1999),  joyce green (2005), john borrows (2002) argue that indigenous peoples’ right to self‐government cannot be devolved since it is  inherent and thus existed prior to the establishment of the canadian state.  2 i return to the idea that territory, construed as a bounded place, is privileged in discussions of self‐government in part three.   1 dubois: beyond territory published by scholarship@western, 2011 non‐indigenous persons. there are over 600 indigenous communities in canada, most of which occupy only  fragments of their original land base alongside an ever‐growing body of urban individuals (royal  commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996). given the changes in the territorial organization of indigenous  peoples, it is increasingly evident that the realization of indigenous self‐government will depend on the  development of governance models able to accommodate the changing reality of these groups. in light of  the modern reality where indigenous peoples are territorially dispersed in urban, rural and reserve areas  intermixed with the non‐indigenous population, it is imperative to closely examine the way in which  territory is used in the normative justification as well as the practical implementation of indigenous  sovereignty, self‐determination and self‐government. below, i present a brief overview of the way in which  scholars of globalization and political geography provide the conceptual space in which to rethink the link  between concepts such as self‐government, state, sovereignty, and territory.  globalization’s challenge to self‐government as territorially defined by nation‐states  in a general way, globalization challenges the hobbesian idea that sovereignty is indivisible: it  undermines the assumption that political autonomy is achieved through, and dependent upon, the exercise  of control over a bounded territory. as saskia sassen argues, globalization has affected “two distinct  features of the modern state: sovereignty and exclusive territoriality” (1996, p. xii). the international  relations literature has traditionally linked state sovereignty in various ways with the notion of territory.  hobsbawm writes that “the equation nation=state=people, and especially sovereign people, undoubtedly  linked nation to territory, since the structure and definition of states were … essentially territorial” (1990, p.  19). both in its ideal theoretical and real political form, the westphalian model vested decision‐making  power, authority, and sovereignty in the bounded territory of states. as agnew writes,   [t]he dominant westphalian model of state sovereignty in political geography and international relations theory, deficient as it has long been for understanding the realities of world politics, is even more inadequate today, not only for its ignoring the hierarchy of states and sources of authority other than states, but also because of its mistaken emphasis on the geographical expression of authority (particularly under the ambiguous sign of ‘sovereignty’) as invariably and inevitably territorial. (2005, p. 437) while much of international relations scholarship views the state as what giddens (1985, p. 172) calls a  “bordered power container,” such a view has been supplanted by more nuanced arguments that  acknowledge the complex relationship between state, sovereignty and territory. for instance, nordlinger  (1981) distinguishes between state autonomy – the power to achieve goals – and state sovereignty – the  entitlement to rule over a bounded territory. despite the fact that sovereignty and autonomy are “assumed  to be embedded within, and congruent with, the territorially organized framework of liberal democratic  government” (held, 1999, p. 29), globalization makes the incongruence of these concepts more evident.  david held writes that, “sovereignty itself has to be conceived today as already divided…and limited by the  very nature of this plurality” (1991, p. 222).  although globalization makes apparent that state and territory are not synonymous, stuart hall  remarks that “territory matters for the definition of sovereignty, partly because the sense of ‘belonging’ –  sentiments of loyalty – are important constituents of being members of a state; but mainly because of the  need to establish the boundaries to power and legal rule” (1984, p. 18). as such, it is important to  acknowledge the role territory plays in securing sovereignty without taking these concepts to mean  something identical. in what he calls the “territorial conundrum,” michael keating distinguishes between  territory’s symbolic importance as the actual location of a group and its functional importance as the space  over which the practical exercise of self‐determination takes place (2003, pp. 15‐16). territory’s role as  2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 2 [2011], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.2.1 representative of a symbolic piece of a larger narrative about the collective identity of a group should be  distinguished from its functional roles, which may involve enhancing economic self‐sufficiency.3 given its  various uses and applications, it is important to articulate the way in which territory matters for  sovereignty, self‐government and self‐determination. i therefore turn to scholars of political geography to  clarify how territory relates to sovereignty and to better understand the relationship between territory and  self‐government.  geography’s challenge to self‐government as territorial sovereignty  territory is often associated or confounded with the colonial ideas of property, boundary and  jurisdiction (buchanan, 2003, p. 239). david delaney leads the charge of political geographers in arguing  that territory does not simply refer to national borders or lines on a map. rather, it expresses a relationship  between land, people and identity: a relationship best described as territoriality (2005, p. 4). territoriality is  characterized as a process through which places are created to “satisfy both the material requirements of  life and the emotional requirements of belonging – of placing oneself both in time and space” (penrose,  2002, p. 282). a relational understanding of territory takes into account the symbolic as well as the  functional roles geographical areas encompass. the practices and processes of territoriality thus give life to  territory and meaning to its boundaries (delaney, 2005, p. 27).   given that many indigenous peoples consider land and the resources it holds to be part of “a  complex web of interrelated spiritual and natural relationships” (hendrix, 2005, p. 769), it is appropriate to  consider delaney’s argument that territoriality entails looking beyond the physical manifestation of place  and uncovering the questions of “power and meaning, ideology and legitimacy, authority and obligation,  and how worlds of experience are continually made and remade” (2005, p. 18). territoriality takes into  account the meanings embodied in the contradictions and relationships continually being constructed  between people, place and identity, whereas territory, used to designate jurisdiction over a specific  geographical area, obscures the significance of these interactions. to more adequately account for the  relationship between a geographical space and political autonomy, a relational understanding of territory is  required in discussions about self‐government.   focusing on the functional role of territory and ignoring its symbolic meanings raises particular  problems in discussions about self‐government in canada where indigenous groups do not necessarily  reside on an exclusive territory and do not all identify with a given physical place. more than half of  canada’s self‐identified indigenous population resides in urban areas whereas approximately thirty percent  live on territorially concentrated reserves. indigenous peoples are aware that their claim to self‐ determination is incompatible with the concept of state sovereignty. taiaiake alfred contends that, rather  than conceiving of sovereignty in terms of interests and boundaries, indigenous peoples consider it in terms  of land relationships and spirituality (1995, p. 250). although it is often easier to premise the argument for  self‐determination on a claim to control a specific territory, indigenous peoples’ claim to self‐government  should not be mistaken as necessarily being a claim for exclusive sovereignty or statehood. the following  section examines more closely the way in which these concepts come together in normative justifications of  indigenous self‐government.  rearticulating the normative justification for indigenous autonomy  by challenging the assumption that sovereignty is exclusively exercised by nation‐states over a  given territory and by undermining the idea that self‐government is territorially bound, the literature on  3 for a discussion of territory’s functional roles, see section three of this article.  3 dubois: beyond territory published by scholarship@western, 2011 globalization and political geography provide the conceptual space in which to re‐think the connection  between state, nation, sovereignty, and territory. relying on indigenous nationalist discourse in canada,  this section sketches an outline for a justification of indigenous self‐determination that does not rely on a  claim to the exclusive control of a territory. by taking into consideration the normative content associated  with concepts like territory, this discussion sets the stage for a re‐articulation of the justification of self‐ government that has relevance for indigenous minorities who do not reside on a well‐defined or contiguous  territory.  de‐territorialized indigenous nationhood in canada  indigenous nationalist discourse resurged in the 1970’s as a response to assimilative state policies  such as the 1969 white paper. in reaction to decades of public neglect and political exclusion in canada,  indigenous peoples formulated a claim to self‐determination that was consistent with the dominant  narrative of nationhood that characterized the canadian political scene at the time (for a discussion, see  andersen and denis, 2003, p. 376). adopting the discourse of nationhood not only allowed indigenous  peoples to shape a common political project, but it also enabled them to come together “beyond” the  traditional boundaries of their communities by having small and alienated groups participate in a shared  political endeavour.   in a sense, indigenous nationalism was evoked to evade marginalization as well as to overcome the  divisive realities of secluded indigenous communities with limited governing capacities. at its core, the  discourse of nationhood brought indigenous peoples together “above” and “beyond” dispersed and  isolated territorial communities. the trend to abandon confining characterizations of nationhood by  challenging definitions that privilege territory as a physical place is taken up by benedict anderson who  presents nations as “imagined communities.” nations are imagined in that members conceive of a  comradeship and develop a sense of communal self‐awareness even though they will never know most of  their fellow members (2003, p. 6). following anderson, ross poole contends that when people envision  themselves as belonging to a particular community that influences their lifestyle and choices, they  consequently form a nation (1999, p. 6). many contemporary theorists of nationhood argue that, regardless  of their ethnic make‐up or their territorial and spatial organization, indigenous peoples constitute nations  insofar as they represent a community with an aspiration to be politically self‐determining (guibernau,  1999, p. 16; miller, 1995, p. 19). hence, the aspiration for some form of political sovereignty embodied in  the shared political self‐consciousness of a group is key to a claim to nationhood through which indigenous  peoples articulate their claim to self‐determination.   the argument thus far suggests that although territory can contribute to the sense of community  individuals feel and imagine as part of a nation, nationhood does not depend on any physical place since  the attachment people have to a community is constructed. hence, territory’s symbolic element constitutes  the core of a justification to national self‐determination. to clarify what this argument entails in practice,  we can consider the reality of first nations bands in the canadian province of saskatchewan where  membership is not necessarily determined by residence or presence on a given territory. among cowessess  first nation’s 3526 members, only 712 live on reserve; carry the kettle first nation has 2387 members of  which 850 live on reserve; and only 1100 of the 3106 george gordon first nation members live on reserve  (star phoenix, 2009). even though some members of these communities live on reserve while others are  dispersed in urban areas or in non‐reserve rural regions, their claim to self‐determination and thus to  nationhood is not diminished by the fact that they do not all live on the same territory.   likewise, the emerging trend in a number of canadian cities to expand the territory occupied by  indigenous peoples through the creation urban reserves does not necessarily affect their claim to self‐ determination. it is not the reserve, as a place, that characterizes the nation, but rather their sense of  belonging towards the land as well as towards the members of a group who are both on and off the  reserve, that characterizes them as a nation and that legitimizes their claim to self‐determination. thus,  4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 2 [2011], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.2.1 belonging to a community which is located in a specific place is important to nationhood only insofar as that  specific place may contribute to individuals’ sense of belonging to a shared community: whether indigenous  peoples reside on their traditional homeland or in urban areas does not take away their capacity to be part  of a nation insofar as the nation relies on a political self‐consciousness and is – in a sense –  imagined.  although territory may also play a functional role in relation to self‐determination as will be discussed in  section three, it is imperative to acknowledge that its symbolic qualities can form the basis of a normative  justification to self‐determination and hence to nationhood.  non‐territorial self‐government  recognizing that nationhood and indigeneity transcend territorial boundaries requires that  contemporary politics distinguish self‐government, self‐determination, and sovereignty from the control  over a territory and acknowledge the relational character of identity, place and people. indigenous  sovereignty is not contingent on the control of a territory nor is the control over a territory the sole  expression of indigenous self‐government. sovereignty, for indigenous peoples, refers to their ability to  determine their futures according to their cultural values (alfred, 1999, p. 47). similarly, the primary  justification for self‐government is not to exercise sovereignty over a territory, but to give indigenous  peoples the capacity to define and redefine their goals and projects in such a way that their cultural and  political vocabulary align with their aspiration as an “imagined” community. rather than referring to a  specific territory, a single group or a homogenous cultural identity, indigenous sovereignty refers to the  relationships that exist between persons, identities and places; through self‐determination and self‐ government, indigenous peoples give meaning to these relationships.  in view of the existence of indigenous nations in canada, the canadian state cannot accurately  describe itself as a nation‐state but, as philip resnick argues, should instead refer to itself as a multi‐nation  state. likewise, indigenous groups consequently form what has been called “nations within” (fleras and  elliott, 1992). despite the fact that indigenous peoples do not possess, nor do they necessarily seek to  possess, a state of their own, they nevertheless constitute nations that aim to be self‐governing. in the  same sense that indigenous groups are not required to govern a state to constitute nations, they are not  required to occupy a specific territory to have a claim to self‐determination, nationhood or self‐ government. although the small size of indigenous communities and their territorial isolation raise  legitimate concerns with regard to the feasibility and practicality of self‐government, they do not, however,  diminish the value of indigenous peoples’ normative claim to nationhood, self‐determination and hence, to  self‐government.  non‐territorial self‐government in practice  an important question is nonetheless raised regarding how indigenous peoples can be self‐ governing without the exclusive control over a territory. as peters argues, “space, place, and territory have  a number of important implications for the lives, lands, and cultures of aboriginal peoples that have not  been carefully considered” (1994, p. 163). given the dominance of geography in the political organization of  governance structures, how can indigenous peoples overcome this pragmatic obstacle and become  sovereign, self‐governing nations? part of the answer to this challenge requires the creation of institutional  designs that can accommodate indigenous peoples who are territorially dispersed. 4 as michael murphy  writes,   [r]elational self‐determination encompasses a sphere of autonomy for self‐determining groups, 4 it is important to note that self‐government can take different forms and entails various types of structures and powers for each  community. various models of self‐government have been proposed by weinstein (1986), tizya (1992), dunn (1985), groves (1991),  and contributors in peters (1995) and garcea and barron, (1999).  5 dubois: beyond territory published by scholarship@western, 2011 but also recognizes that relations of complex interdependence place both practical and ethical  limitations to autonomy, creating the need for shared or co‐operative forms of governance to  manage this interdependence in a manner which is both effective and democratic. (2005, p. 10)  looking at current canadian initiatives in urban settings, this section illustrates the limits of territorially‐ based understandings of self‐government and highlights the possibilities for non‐territorial self‐ government.   urban reserves  although the canadian parliament holds exclusive legislative authority over “indians and lands  reserved for indians” according to subsection 91(24) of the constitution act, 1867, negotiations for the  expansion and addition of reserve lands are putting in question the sovereignty of parliament over  indigenous lands and ways of life. the canadian government adopted an additions to reserves (atr) policy  to allow for the expansion of existing reserves as well as the establishment of new reserves. the adoption  of this policy is largely a result of the acknowledgement that many indigenous bands have not received the  acreage to which they are entitled according to the treaties signed between 1874 and 1906 (sully and  emmons, 2004, p. 4). the addition or expansion of reserves is negotiated through treaty land entitlement  framework agreements (tlefa) which are provincial protocols developed by federal, provincial and  indigenous governments through which land debts owed to indigenous peoples are settled (see martin‐ mcguire, 1999).   in 1992, the saskatchewan tlefa was reached through negotiations between federal and  provincial governments and 25 bands, with 4 additional bands signing later (sully and emmons 2004, p. 4).  saskatchewan is one of the rare places where the development of first nations reserves has happened in  an urban setting (scc, 2008). as garcea and barron write, “urban reserves in saskatchewan are not mere  imitations of what can be found elsewhere, but rather are unique inventions, peculiar to the province”  (1999, p. 10). urban reserves elsewhere generally result from urban sprawl or the municipal annexation of  lands surrounding already existing reserves. however, saskatchewan has witnessed the creation of new  urban reserves as part of a conscious strategy by indigenous groups to purchase lands in urban areas to  convert them into new reserves. garcea writes that,   [u]nlike reserves of earlier times, which were created largely at the behest of federal government officials to segregate, isolate, marginalize, and subordinate aboriginal communities and to circumscribe the land holdings and mobility of their members, the new satellite reserves are being created at the request of first nations leaders who see them as a means to advance their economic, social, cultural, and political development objectives. (2008, p. 287) of the 33 new urban reserves created in the province, 9 are in cities. in 1988, saskatoon became the first  city in canada to establish an urban reserve, muskeg lake cree nation.   the city of saskatoon, affirms that “[i]n addition to fulfilling original treaty commitments, tle  agreements have already led to greater economic and social independence and self‐sufficiency for  saskatchewan first nations. it is also providing economic development opportunities for all people of the  city and province” (scc, 2008). economic self‐sufficiency is a large component of the rationale behind  establishing urban reserves though the idea that urban reserves are the best way to achieve economic self‐ sufficiency is contested (see garcea and barron, 1999, pp. 22‐31 and peters, 2007).5 the success of the  muskeg lake cree nation urban reserve lies in its ability to find new strategies for economic development  5 a report entitled “the urban reserves in saskatchewan,” (2005) prepared for the western economic diversification canada, states  that “the major question of whether urban reserves are the best tool for assisting first nations in achieving economic independence  still remains to be answered. although there are arguments to support the notion that the establishment of urban reserves help to  achieve this goal, further research is still required to determine a conclusive response to all of these questions.” retrieved on  november 29, 2010 from http://www.wd.gc.ca/eng/10948.asp.  6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 2 [2011], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.2.1 outside the confines of the traditional reserve.   the creation of urban reserves, though undertheorized and subject of few scholarly investigations,  are a potential site for working through the relationship between nation, sovereignty and territory. insofar  as sovereignty is exercised beyond the set traditional boundaries of indigenous communities, urban  reserves provide a way of re‐imagining nationhood beyond the traditional confines of territorial reserves.  of course, territory remains present in the development of urban governance. however, in contrast to the  most common examples of self‐government, territory in this case is seen as an extension of, rather than a  precondition to, self‐government insofar as already governing indigenous groups are making a claim for  territories in urban settings. in other words, urban territories are seen as an extension of the sovereignty of  indigenous peoples in saskatchewan, not a precondition to their sovereignty.   urban reserves enhance the viability of self‐government by providing economic revenues for  indigenous groups (peters, 2007). hence, territory plays an important role in that it acts as the space where  indigenous communities develop economic strategies for greater self‐determination. while economic self‐ sufficiency is integral to self‐government, it is important to signal that self‐government extends beyond  economics. garcea and barron capture the potential difficulty of urban reserves as tools for economic  sufficiency when they write that,  [i]n theory, urban reserves can be created for any purpose bands deem appropriate, subject to federal approval. but for the most part, the urban reserves created in major urban centres in the central and southern parts of saskatchewan have been designed for commercial and institutional purposes. (1999, p. 5) as indigenous peoples pursue their self‐government goals in urban areas, it is important to take into  consideration the potential danger of reducing self‐government to economic self‐sufficiency.  another danger is what keating refers to as “reterritorialization.” at the same time that indigenous  nations are redefining the relationship between nationhood and territory, keating argues that control over  a territory has become more rather than less important (2001:26‐28). he attributes the tendency towards  reterritorialization to territory’s functional, political, and normative roles. as the primary unit of economic  development, territory remains the political basis for governance and counter‐governance institutions in  the absence of non‐territorial governance bodies. it is precisely because of this tendency to reterritorialize  self‐government that it is important to distinguish the role territory plays in the justification of self‐ government from the role it occupies in its realization. paying excessive and disproportionate attention to  territory’s functional attributes leads to the neglect of its symbolic role thereby marginalizing many  indigenous groups who are not territorially concentrated from making claims to self‐determination or self‐ government. although territory takes on a key role in self‐government in practice – particularly by providing  commercial and institutional opportunities for communities – it is crucial that territory does not become a  precondition for self‐government. such a condition would render it difficult, if not impossible, to honour the  right to self‐government for many urbanized indigenous peoples who may propose new and creative  models of non‐territorial governance. the importance of properly identifying the normative role of territory  in the justification and the implementation of self‐government thus becomes evident.  in addition to offering a unique model of governance that extends beyond the boundaries of  traditional reserves, the creation of urban reserves also constitutes an example of shared governance. the  success of urban reserves depends on shared rule. stakeholders in the establishment of urban reserves  include members of indigenous bands, band councils, tribal councils, municipal, provincial and federal  governments, local governance bodies, as well as the general public. all of these groups play a role in the  successful negotiation of tlefas. in its very formulation, the saskatchewan tlefa outlines the various  actors that may be involved in the process. for instance, section 9 speaks of reconciling the different legal  environments governing reserve and non‐reserve property. this entails that school divisions must be  consulted if they are affected by the establishment of urban reserves (saskatchewan tlefa, 9.01).6  6 to avoid a party exercising veto power over the creation of an urban reserve, there are protections to ensure that if no agreement is  reached between the band and a party within five months, and this disagreement is due to the party’s unwillingness to negotiate in  7 dubois: beyond territory published by scholarship@western, 2011 furthermore, all concerned parties must re‐enter negotiations in good faith upon the 14th year after the  execution date to ensure the continuance of agreements, either in their existing or modified form, between  parties.7   insofar as urban reserves depend on the successful negotiation with various representatives,  governments and individuals, they denote an interesting example of the way in which self‐government is  achieved not through negotiations with the traditional sovereign governments – the usual provincial and  federal governments – but through discussion and collaboration with all affected parties whether they be  municipal governments, school boards or individual citizens. as decision‐making power is divided among  various actors in a globalized world, the collaboration of all stakeholders is crucial. in acknowledging the  interdependent relationship between various actors, the creation of urban reserves in saskatchewan  confirm the need to further reflect on non‐territorial models of self‐government.   conclusion  this article has argued that territory, although important to enhance the self‐sufficiency of  indigenous groups, is not and should not be conceived of as a precondition for self‐government, self‐ determination or nationhood. as demonstrated through the saskatchewan experience, distinguishing  between these various concepts and uncovering the relationship between them is of crucial importance.  such conceptual precision is of great consequence in articulating a claim for indigenous self‐government  insofar as models of self‐government are a product of their normative justifications. in arguing that territory  is not a precondition for self‐determination and for self‐government, the intention of this article is to  generate interest in the role territory plays in practice. as indigenous peoples become increasingly  urbanized and territorially dispersed, it is imperative to develop new models of self‐government relevant to  the realities of these groups. re‐imagining the shape of indigenous self‐government requires thinking about  how concepts are treated, what normative force they bring and how their applied meaning concords with  their normative intent.   good faith, the government of canada can set aside land, and any outstanding claims can be addressed by the arbitration board of  canada, saskatchewan or the band in question.  7 the same provisions as outlined in the previous footnote apply here.   8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 2 [2011], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.2.1 references  alfred, taiaiake. (1995). heeding the voices of our ancestors: kahnawake mohawk politics and the rise of native  nationalism. don mills: oxford university press.  ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐. (1999). peace, power and righteousness: an indigenous manifesto. oxford: oxford university press.  agnew, john. (2005). “sovereignty regimes.” annals of the association of american geographers 95(2), pp. 437–461.  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http://tvontario01.snjsca01.jolokianet.net  sassen, saskia. (1996). losing control? sovereignty in an age of globalization. new york: columbia university press.   star phoenix, saskatoon. (february 2009). special insert.  sully, lorne a. and mark d. emmons, 2004. “urban reserves: the city of saskatoon’s partnership with first nations.”  paper presented at a conference in calgary by the pacific business & law institute, april 22, 2004.  western economic diversification canada. “the urban reserves in saskatchewan.” retrieved from  http://www.wd.gc.ca/eng/10948.asp  10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 2 [2011], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.2.1 the international indigenous policy journal june 2011 beyond territory: revisiting the normative justification of self-government in theory and practice janique dubois recommended citation beyond territory: revisiting the normative justification of self-government in theory and practice abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license beyond territory: revisiting the normative justification of self-government in theory and practice the socio-economic characteristics of first nation teen mothers the international indigenous policy journal volume 4 issue 1 indigenous early parenthood article 9 march 2013 the socio-economic characteristics of first nation teen mothers rochelle garner statistics canada, rochelle.garner@statcan.gc.ca eric guimond aboriginal affairs and northern development canada and western university, eric.guimond@aadnc-aandc.gc.ca sacha senécal aboriginal affairs and northern development canada and western university, sacha.senecal@chrc-ccdp.gc.ca recommended citation garner, r. , guimond, e. , senécal, s. (2013). the socio-economic characteristics of first nation teen mothers. the international indigenous policy journal, 4(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.9 the socio-economic characteristics of first nation teen mothers abstract using data from the 2006 census, this study examines the socio-economic characteristics of first nations and non-aboriginal teenage mothers, and compares these to those of non-teenage mothers in a cohort of women aged 25 to 29 years old. results indicated that first nations women were more likely than non-aboriginal women to be teenage mothers. in general, teenage mothers were less likely to have graduated high school, more likely to live in overcrowded housing, and in a home in need of major repair. furthermore, teenage mothers had lower household incomes after adjusting for the composition the household. characteristics also differed significantly between first nations and non-aboriginal women, as well as between registered indian women living onand off-reserve. french abstract les caractéristiques socioéconomiques des mères adolescentes des premieres nations rochelle garner statistique canada eric guimond et sacha senécal affaires autochtones et développement du nord canada et université western résumé en utilisant les données du recensement de 2006, cette étude se penche sur les caractéristiques socioéconomiques des mères adolescentes des premières nations et non autochtones, et les compare à celles des mères plus âgées dans une cohorte de femmes de 25 à 29 ans. les résultats indiquent que les femmes des premières nations sont plus susceptibles que les femmes non autochtones de devenir des mères à l’adolescence. en règle générale, les mères adolescentes sont moins susceptibles d’avoir terminé leurs études secondaires et plus susceptibles de vivre dans un logement surpeuplé et dans une maison nécessitant des réparations importantes. de plus, les mères adolescentes comptent sur un revenu de ménage inférieur après l’ajustement effectué pour tenir compte de la composition de ce dernier. les caractéristiques sont également très différentes entre les femmes des premières nations et les femmes non autochtones, ainsi qu’entre les indiennes inscrites vivant dans les réserves et celles vivant hors réserve. spanish abstract características socioeconómicas de las madres adolescentes de las primeras naciones rochelle garner dirección general de estadísticas de canadá eric guimond y sacha senécal ministerio de asuntos indígenas y del norte de canadá y universidad western resumen en este estudio se emplean los datos del censo de 2006 para examinar las características socioeconómicas de las madres adolescentes de las primeras naciones y de las no indígenas, comparándolas con las de las madres no adolescentes de la cohorte de mujeres entre 25 y 29 años. los resultados muestran que las mujeres de las primeras naciones tienen mayores probabilidades de ser madres adolescentes que las mujeres no indígenas. en general, es menos probable que las madres adolescentes tengan un diploma de estudios secundarios, es más probable que vivan en viviendas hacinadas o en viviendas que requieren reparaciones importantes. además, las madres adolescentes tienen menores ingresos en su hogar una vez ajustada la composición de dicho hogar. también hay diferencias considerables entre las mujeres de las primeras naciones y las mujeres no indígenas, así como entre las mujeres registradas como indias que viven en reservas o fuera de ellas. keywords teenage motherhood, socio-economic characteristics, first nations, census acknowledgments this paper was supported by the strategic research directorate at aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc). disclaimer the views expressed in this article are solely those of the author(s) and do not necessarily represent those of any other person, agency, organization, or institution. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ t h e s o c i o e c o n o m i c c h a ra c t e ri s t i c s o f f i rs t n a t i o n t e e n m o t h e rs in 2006, there were approximately 355,000 live births in canada, of which 4.1% were to women under the age of 20 (statistics canada, 2008c). there are reports that the teenage birth rate is substantially higher among first nations women than it is among non-aboriginal women (guimond & robitaille, 2008; robitaille, kouaouci, & guimond, 2004). for example, in 2006, 8% of non-aboriginal children under the age of 6 had mothers between the ages of 15 and 24. this compares to 27% of off-reserve first nations children under the age of 6 (zukewich & o'donnell, 2008). in a study commissioned by the ontario federation of indian friendship centres in 2001, 44% of interviewed youth had conceived a child. of those who had conceived a child, nearly 53% of young females indicated that they conceived their first child before the age of 18 (anderson, 2002). teenage pregnancy is an issue of importance to first nations youth. in 2005, the national aboriginal health organization conducted a survey through educational institutions serving first nations students. teenage pregnancy was the most commonly cited health issue among respondents, followed by the effects of alcohol, and suicide prevention (first nations centre, 2006). while western culture generally posits that pregnancy and parenthood among teenagers is a problem, this view may not necessarily be shared by members of first nations communities. when examining the rates of teenage pregnancy among first nations women, many point to historical cultural trends whereby the early onset of pregnancy was the norm in many communities (dion-stout & kipling, 1999; regional health survey national team, 2007). within this context, the aboriginal roundtable on sexual and reproductive health report suggested that the breakdown and loss of traditional social support structures and values may have contributed to the difficulties faced by young first nations parents (dion-stout & kipling, 1999). c o n s e q u e n c e s o f t e e n a g e c h i l d b e a ri n g there are a number of risk factors associated with teenage pregnancy in the general population. these include a lack or inadequate use of prenatal care (chen, wen, fleming, demissie, rhoads, & walker, 2007; gortzak-uzan, hallak, press, katz, & shoham-vardi, 2001), a greater risk of the child being born prematurely or at low birth weight (chen et al., 2007; da silva et al., 2003; fraser, brockert, & ward, 1995; gortzak-uzan et al., 2001; lao & ho, 1997; miller, lesser, & reed, 1996), a greater risk of birth defects (reefhuis & honein, 2004) and higher rates of infant mortality (markovitz, cook, flick, & leet, 2005). in many cases, these risks are minimized after controlling for the relative socio-economic disadvantage of teenage mothers (chen et al., 2007; cunnington, 2001; fraser et al., 1995; markovitz et al., 2005). there is little information specific to the consequences of teenage pregnancy among aboriginal women. this is primarily due to the lack of an aboriginal identifier on most administrative data files, such as birth and death records. furthermore, most general population surveys do not recruit aboriginal people in sufficient numbers to examine their responses as a separate group. as a result, it is often assumed that what occurs in the general population also holds true for aboriginal people. alternately, conclusions are based on findings from small surveys of aboriginal people that may not be generalizable to others. 1 garner et al.: the socio-economic characteristics published by scholarship@western, 2013 pre s e n t s t u d y the objective of the current study was to examine the socio-economic characteristics of first nations teenage mothers. these characteristics were compared with those of women who delayed childbearing until their twenties. the purpose of this study was not to determine the optimal time from a socioeconomic standpoint for a woman to bear children. rather, it was to understand the impact of early childbearing on women’s socio-economic and living conditions. m e t h o d s data were drawn from the 2006 canadian census. for the majority of the canadian population, one in five households receive a long census questionnaire (form 2b)1, which elicits significantly more information than the short-form received by most other canadians. conversely, all individuals living in the three territories and on aboriginal settlements and communities receive a long census questionnaire (form 2d)1. some first nations communities (n = 22) were incompletely enumerated in the 2006 census and their information has been censored, and, as a result, no data is available for these communities. census forms were made available in 62 languages other than english or french, including 18 aboriginal languages. data derived from the long census questionnaires forms the basis of this study. based on previous work conducted by robitaille et al. (2004), the target population was women aged 25 to 29 living with children. figure 1 depicts the sample selection flow for both women and children. of the 208,7752 women aged 25 to 29 in the census, 35,610 were themselves listed as adult children living in a census family with their parent(s) and were therefore excluded. a further 43,475 women were excluded from the sample because they were not listed as being part of a census family, which is defined as “a married couple (with or without children of either or both spouses), a couple living common-law (with or without children of either or both partners), or a lone parent of any marital status, with at least one child living in the same dwelling” (statistics canada, 2008a, p. 125). married couples, including common-law partnerships, may be opposite or same sex. children in a census family include grandchildren living with a grandparent where no parent is present. this left a sample of 129,690 women aged 25 to 29 who were members of a census family but were not themselves a child in that census family. m e a s u re s f i rs t n a t i o n s i d e n t i t y g ro u p s . three questions were used in a sequential fashion to classify women on the basis of their first nations identity. first, women who indicated that they were a treaty or registered indian were classified as a registered indian. using the second question to classify remaining women, those who indicated that they self-identified with as a north american indian (but not as métis or inuit) and did not have registered or treaty status were classified as non-registered indian. women who self-identified with more than one aboriginal identity group were excluded from the current analysis. using the third question, the remaining women were classified as non-aboriginal if they did not: (a) report being a treaty indian or a registered indian; (b) self-identify as either north 1 electronic versions of the 2006 census long form questionnaires (form 2b and form 2d) are available online at 2 due to random rounding requirements from the census, not all numbers may sum to the total. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 9 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.9 women aged 25 to 29 who became mothers in their twenties n = 61,070 people aged 0 to17 n = 1,486,970 exclude persons not in census family n = 26,080 excluded persons who are husband, wife, or partner in census family n = 3,915 child of married or common-law couple n = 1,136,490 child of lone parent n = 299,950 child in other situation n = 20,535 women aged 25 to 29 n = 208,775 exclude women who are not in census family n = 43,475 exclude women who are listed as children in census family n = 35,610 exclude “duplicate” women aged 25 to 29 who are samesex partner of another women aged 25 to 29 n = 125 women aged 25 to 29 in census family without children n = 52,090 women aged 25 to 29 in census family with children n = 77,475 women aged 25 to 29 who became mothers in their teens n = 16,400 women aged 25 to 29 in a census family n = 129,690 match women and children on basis of census family identifier f i g u re 1 . s e l e c t i o n a n d m a t c h i n g o f w o m e n a g e d 2 5 t o 2 9 t o c h i l d re n a g e d 0 t o 1 7 , 2 0 0 6 c e n s u s ( u n w e i g h t e d ) . 3 garner et al.: the socio-economic characteristics published by scholarship@western, 2013 american indian, métis, or inuit; or (c) report being a member of an indian band or first nations community. it should be noted that registered indian women were further subdivided into those living on-reserve and those living off-reserve, based on the type of census subdivision in which a person resided and using criteria established by indian and northern affairs canada (statistics canada, 2008a). t e e n a g e m o t h e rs . women living in census families where children were present were classified as teenage or non-teenage mothers based on their current age and the age of the oldest child (up to age 17) in the household. if the difference between the woman’s age on the day of census and the age of the oldest child was less than 20, she was classified as a teenage mother. other mothers were defined as nonteenage mothers. non-mothers, that is women living in census families where no children were present, were excluded from the sample. e d u c a t i o n a l a t t a i n m e n t . this characteristic is based on the woman’s highest educational certificate, degree, or diploma received. women’s educational attainment was categorized into three groups: (a) less than a high school education (no certificate, diploma, or degree); (b) high school graduate (high school certificate or equivalent); and (c) at least some post-secondary education (anything higher than a high school certificate or equivalent). although census response options allowed for further specificity of this variable, small sample size precluded further sub-dividing the above categories. l a b o u r f o rc e p a rt i c i p a t i o n . women’s participation in the labour force was categorized as employed, unemployed, or not in the labour force. those not in the labour force included students, homemakers, retired workers, seasonal workers in an “off” season who were not looking for work, and persons who could not work because of a long-term illness or disability. employed persons included women who worked for pay or in self-employment in the week prior to the census. this group also included those who were absent from a job in the week prior to the census due to illness, vacation, labour dispute, maternity leave, bad weather, fire, and personal or family responsibilities. other individuals were considered to be unemployed. i n c o m e . income was examined at the individual and household level in this study. total individual income is defined as the total income received from all sources during the 2005 calendar year by individuals 15 years of age and over. household income was defined as the sum of all individual incomes of each person aged 15 and over living in the household. however, total income at the household level did not take into account the number of individuals being supported by that income. therefore, household income was adjusted using a correction factor based on the number and age of individuals in the household, following criteria set out by statistics canada (income statistics division, 2006). total household income was divided by the adjustment factor for household to yield an adjusted per capita household income. m u l t i p l e f a m i l y h o u s e h o l d . households that included more than one census family were said to be multiple family households. d w e l l i n g i n n e e d o f m a j o r re p a i r. individuals indicated in the census long form if their dwelling was in need of any repairs. major repairs were described as things such as defective plumbing or electrical wiring, structural repairs to walls, floors or ceilings, etc. it should be noted that individuals responded to this question regardless of whether they rented or owned the dwelling. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 9 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.9 o v e rc ro w d e d h o u s i n g . households in which there was more than one person per room were considered to be overcrowded. bathrooms, hallways, vestibules, and rooms used solely for business purposes were not included in the count of number of rooms. a n a l y s e s descriptive statistics were examined separately for registered indian, non-registered indian, and nonaboriginal women, and were also analyzed separately for teenage and non-teenage mothers. differences between groups were examined using chi-square or t-tests, as appropriate. no adjustments for multiple comparisons were applied. linear regression models were derived for the following income-related characteristics: (a) total personal income; (b) proportion of personal income derived from government transfers; and (c) household income adjusted for household size. for income measures, only those census respondents reporting any income were included in the analyses, in keeping with census standards (statistics canada, 2008a). however, negative income values indicating income loss in the previous tax year were retained. logistic regression models were derived for the following dwelling-related characteristics: (a) likelihood of living in overcrowded housing; and (b) likelihood of living in a dwelling in need of major repair. covariates in the regression models included: (a) first nations identity group (with non-aboriginal women as reference); (b) whether the woman had been a teenage mother; (c) whether the woman had graduated from high school; (d) whether the woman was a single parent; (e) the region of the country in which the woman resided (atlantic region, québec, ontario, prairies, british columbia, territories); and (f) for non-aboriginal women, whether the woman was a first generation immigrant. this last adjustment was made because immigrant women tend to have higher fertility rates but lower income levels than non-immigrant women (bélanger & gilbert, 2006; palameta, 2004). the presence of interactions between aboriginal identity, teenage motherhood, and educational attainment were also examined in the models. all analyses were weighted using normalized sampling weights and were conducted in sas version 9.1. r e s u l t s d e s c ri p t i v e r e s u l t s among women aged 25 to 29 responding to the 2006 census, including single women without children, 6.5% gave birth to children when they were in their teens (table 1). among women aged 25 to 29 with a partner and/or children (i.e., excluding women without a partner or children), 10.4% had become mothers in their teens. the proportion of women who were teenage mothers was significantly higher for registered indian and non-registered indian women than was the proportion among non-aboriginal women (table 1). among registered indian women in our sample, the proportion of teenage mothers was significantly higher among those living on-reserve as compared to those living off-reserve (48.1% vs. 5 garner et al.: the socio-economic characteristics published by scholarship@western, 2013 t a b l e 1 . pro p o rt i o n o f w o m e n a g e d 2 5 t o 2 9 w h o w e re t e e n a g e a n d n o n t e e n a g e m o t h e rs , 2 0 0 6 c e n s u s as % of all women aged 25 to 29 as % of all women aged 25 to 29 with a partner or children in their census family not a mother teenage mother nonteenage mother not a mother teenage mother nonteenage mother non-aboriginal 65.2 5.7 29.2 43.4 9.2 47.4 registered indian 34.0* 31.1* 34.9* 13.4* 40.8* 45.8* off-reserve 38.3* 26.2* 35.6* 17.3* 35.1* 47.6* on-reserve 28.3*§ 37.7*§ 34.1* 8.5*§ 48.1*§ 43.4*§ non-registered indian 51.3* 17.1* 31.6 30.4* 24.5* 45.2 *estimate is significantly different (p<.05) from that among non-aboriginal women §estimates are significantly different (p<.05) between registered indian women living off-reserve and on-reserve. 35.1%, respectively). all subsequent analyses were limited to include only women aged 25 to 29 with children in their census families. e d u c a t i o n a l a t t a i n m e n t a n d l a b o u r f o rc e p a rt i c i p a t i o n . in general, teenage mothers were more likely to have less than a high school education as compared to non-teenage mothers (table 2). in addition, among non-aboriginal women, teenage mothers were significantly more likely to be unemployed than non-teenage mothers. however, employment and unemployment rates among registered and non-registered indian women were similar between teenage and non-teenage mothers. among all teenage mothers, registered indian women differed significantly from non-aboriginal women on all socio-demographic measures. similar patterns were found for non-registered indian women, although some of the differences were not statistically significant. it was found that, among registered indian teenage mothers, those living on-reserve were significantly more likely to have not graduated from high school as compared to women living off-reserve (54.9% vs. 45.1%). this difference also occurred among the group of registered indian women who were non-teenage mothers (table 2). c e n s u s f a m i l y a n d p a rt n e r c h a ra c t e ri s t i c s . among non-aboriginal women, teenage mothers were significantly more likely to be single parents than non-teenage mothers (34.2% vs. 17.5%; table 3). however, the proportion of single mothers was similar between teenage and non-teenage mothers among registered indian and non-registered indian women in the sample. furthermore, nonaboriginal and first nations teenage mothers had significantly more children and significantly older partners as compared to non-teenage mothers. it should be noted, however, it was not possible from the 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 9 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.9 table 2. educational attainment and labour force participation of women aged 25 to 29 with children, by aboriginal and teenage motherhood groups, 2006 census educational attainment labour force participation less than high school (%) high school graduate (%) any postsecondary (%) not in the labour force (%) unemployed (%) employed (%) teenage mothers non-aboriginal (n = 11,292) 29.2‡ 30.4‡ 40.4‡ 31.6 8.2‡ 60.1‡ registered indian (n = 1491) 50.2*‡ 24.6*‡ 25.2*‡ 46.6* 13.8* 39.5* off-reserve (n = 716) 45.1*‡ 28.0 26.9*‡ 45.2* 13.4* 41.4* on-reserve (n = 775) 54.9*§‡ 21.4*§‡ 23.7* 48.0* 14.2* 37.8* non-registered indian (n = 161) 44.9*‡ 29.7 25.4*‡ 35.8 13.6* 50.7* non-teenage mothers non-aboriginal (n = 58,292) 11.8 27.9 60.4 30.7 7.6 61.7 registered indian (n = 1672) 34.5* 29.7 35.8* 44.6* 12.6* 42.9* off-reserve (n = 971) 25.8* 31.9* 42.3* 43.1* 11.3* 45.6* on-reserve (n = 701) 46.5*§ 26.7§ 26.8*§ 46.7* 14.3* 39.0*§ non-registered indian (n = 298) 24.9* 37.0* 38.1* 36.6* 15.3* 48.0* *estimate is significantly different (p<.05) from that for non-aboriginal women within a given category of mother. §estimate among registered indian women living on-reserve is significantly different (p<.05) from that for registered indian women living off-reserve within a given category of mother. ‡estimate for teenage mothers is significantly different (p<.05) from that among non-teenage mothers within a given indian/non-aboriginal group. 7 garner et al.: the socio-economic characteristics published by scholarship@western, 2013 t a b l e 3 . c e n s u s f a m i l y a n d p a rt n e r c h a ra c t e ri s t i c s o f w o m e n a g e d 2 5 t o 2 9 w i t h c h i l d re n , b y a b o ri g i n a l a n d t e e n a g e m o t h e rh o o d g ro u p s , 2 0 0 6 c e n s u s single parent # children in census family partner’s agea % mean (sd) mean (sd) teenage mothers non-aboriginal (n = 11,292) 34.2‡ 2.20‡ (1.04) 32.63‡ (6.33) registered indian (n = 1491) 42.3* 2.89*‡ (0.77) 31.52*‡ (3.44) off-reserve (n = 716) 50.7*‡ 2.69*‡ (1.15) 31.87*‡ (5.98) on-reserve (n = 775) 34.5§ 3.07*§‡ (0.64) 31.27*§‡ (2.76) non-registered indian (n = 161) 42.9* 2.39*‡ (1.08) 32.41‡ (6.23) non-teenage mothers non-aboriginal (n = 58,292) 17.5 1.51 (0.72) 31.34 (5.33) registered indian (n = 1672) 41.6* 1.77* (0.56) 30.68* (3.86) off-reserve (n = 971) 44.1* 1.65* (0.77) 31.01 (6.31) on-reserve (n = 701) 38.1*§ 1.93*§ (0.46) 30.26*§ (2.70) non-registered indian (n = 298) 37.0* 1.61* (0.72) 30.79 (5.99) ameasured only for those with a partner in the household *estimate is significantly different (p<.05) from that among non-aboriginal women within a given category of mother. §estimate among registered indian women living on-reserve is significantly different (p<.05) from that among registered indian women living off-reserve within a given category of mother. ‡estimate among teenage mothers is significantly different (p<.05) from that among non-teenage mothers within a given indian/non-aboriginal group. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 9 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.9 data collected to determine whether women’s current partners were the biological fathers of the children in their census family. among teenage mothers, registered indian women living on-reserve were as likely as non-aboriginal women to be single mothers. moreover, registered indian women living off-reserve and non-registered indian women were more likely to be single mothers than non-aboriginal women (table 3). first nations teenage mothers also had more children on average than non-aboriginal teenage mothers. h o u s e h o l d a n d d w e l l i n g c h a ra c t e ri s t i c s . overall, teenage mothers were significantly more likely to live in overcrowded housing (9.3% vs. 5.4%) and in homes in need of major repair (15.7% vs. 9.1%) than non-teenage mothers (table 4). yet, there was no difference between teenage and non-teenage mothers regarding the proportion of women living in multiple-family households. comparing teenage and non-teenage mothers by aboriginal identity group, the proportion of women living in multiple census family households was higher among non-teenage mothers than teenage mothers for non-aboriginal and non-registered indian women; rates of multiple census family households were similar for teenage and non-teenage mothers among registered indian women, both living onand off-reserve. in addition, the proportion of women living in overcrowded housing was significantly higher among teenage mothers than non-teenage mothers in most groups. and, the proportion living in a dwelling in need of major repair was higher only for non-aboriginal teenage mothers. that is, the proportion of aboriginal teenage mothers living in a dwelling in need of major repair was not statistically different from that of non-teenage aboriginal mothers (table 4). among all teenage mothers, first nations women were generally more likely to live in multiple census family households. they were also more likely to live in dwellings that were overcrowded or in need of major repair as compared to non-aboriginal women. specifically, registered indian women on-reserve were most likely to live in overcrowded housing (34.6%) and to live in housing in need of major repair (44.0%). to help add context to these numbers, according to the 2006 census 26% of first nations people on-reserve lived in overcrowded housing compared to 3% of the non-aboriginal population. furthermore, 44% of first nations people on-reserve lived in dwellings in need of major repairs compared to 7% of the non-aboriginal population (statistics canada, 2008b). i n c o m e c h a ra c t e ri s t i c s . total personal income levels were similar for teenage and non-teenage mothers among non-aboriginal and non-registered indian women. however, the personal income levels of registered indian women, whether living onor off-reserve, were significantly higher among teenage mothers than non-teenage mothers (table 5). furthermore, while non-aboriginal and registered indian teenage mothers derived a greater proportion of their income from government transfers than did their non-teenage mother counterparts, the proportion of income from government transfers remained similar between teenage and non-teenage mothers for non-registered indian women. however, after adjusting household income for the age and number of people being supported by this income, the households of non-aboriginal and first nations teenage mothers had less income per person at their disposal than did the families and households of non-teenage mothers. among all teenage mothers, registered indian women, whether living onor off-reserve, had lower income levels and 9 garner et al.: the socio-economic characteristics published by scholarship@western, 2013 t a b l e 4 . h o u s e h o l d a n d d w e l l i n g c h a ra c t e ri s t i c s o f w o m e n a g e d 2 5 t o 2 9 w i t h c h i l d re n , b y a b o ri g i n a l a n d t e e n a g e m o t h e rh o o d g ro u p s , 2 0 0 6 c e n s u s household & dwelling multiple family household (%) overcrowded housing (%) dwelling in need of major repair (%) teenage mothers non-aboriginal (n = 11,292) 8.0‡ 7.0‡ 13.5‡ registered indian (n = 1491) 13.8* 24.4*‡ 30.9*‡ off-reserve (n = 716) 7.5 13.2*‡ 16.7* on-reserve (n = 775) 19.7*§ 34.6*§‡ 44.0*§ non-registered indian (n = 161) 4.4‡ 9.9‡ 19.5* non-teenage mothers non-aboriginal (n = 58,292) 8.8 5.2 8.3 registered indian (n = 1672) 13.0* 11.6* 27.6* off-reserve (n = 971) 6.4* 6.9* 16.6* on-reserve (n = 701) 22.1*§ 18.1*§ 42.8*§ non-registered indian (n = 298) 9.6 2.7 20.6* *estimate is significantly different (p<.05) from that for non-aboriginal women within a given category of mother. §estimate for registered indian women living on-reserve is significantly different (p<.05) from that for registered indian women living off-reserve within a given category of mother. ‡estimate for teenage mothers is significantly different (p<.05) from that for non-teenage mothers within a given indian/non-aboriginal group. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 9 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.9 table 5. personal and household income characteristics of women aged 25 to 29 with children, by aboriginal and teenage motherhood groups, 2006 census total personal income (mean) % personal income from government transfers (mean) household income total (mean) adjusted for family size (mean) teenage mothers non-aboriginal (n = 11,292) $21,277 51.89‡ $54,720‡ $25,931‡ registered indian (n = 1491) $18,743*‡ 70.07*‡ $39,293* $16,383*‡ off-reserve (n = 716) $19,751*‡ 70.19*‡ $40,181* $18,022*‡ on-reserve (n = 775) $17,815*§‡ 69.96*‡ $38,472* $14,869*§‡ non-registered indian (n = 161) $20,761 57.11 $45,047* $22,026*‡ non-teenage mothers non-aboriginal (n = 58,292) $21,457 45.71 $63,132 $32,609 registered indian (n = 1672) $16,492* 61.20* $40,357* $19,651* off-reserve (n = 971) $17,532* 58.57* $42,543* $22,060* on-reserve (n = 701) $15,053*§ 64.84*§ $37,331*§ $16,316*§ non-registered indian (n = 298) $19,158* 51.86 $49,096* $25,539* *estimate is significantly different (p<.05) from that for non-aboriginal women within a given category of mother. §estimate for registered indian women living on-reserve is significantly different (p<.05) from that for registered indian women living off-reserve within a given category of mother. ‡estimate for teenage mothers is significantly different (p<.05) from that for non-teenage mothers within a given indian/non-aboriginal group. 11 garner et al.: the socio-economic characteristics published by scholarship@western, 2013 obtained a greater proportion of their personal income from government transfers as compared to nonaboriginal women. r e g re s s i o n m o d e l r e s u l t s pe rs o n a l i n c o m e c h a ra c t e ri s t i c s . two measures related to personal income were examined using multiple linear regression models: (a) total personal income; and, (b) the proportion of income derived from government transfers. beta coefficients from the models are given in table 6. the characteristic that was found to have the largest impact on personal income was whether or not a woman had graduated from high school. teenage motherhood had no independent effect on personal income level, although it was associated with a significant increase in the proportion of personal income derived from government transfers (table 6). the presence of interactions in the model for personal income indicates that the impacts of teenage motherhood and not graduating high school differed for first nations and non-aboriginal women. for example, while there was no main effect of teenage parenthood for non-aboriginal and non-registered indian women, registered indian women who were teenage mothers saw an increase in their personal income compared to registered indian women who were non-teenage mothers (table 6). furthermore, while there was a significant decline in personal income for non-aboriginals who had not graduated high school, this decline was less steep among registered and non-registered indian women. lastly, there was a significant interaction between teenage motherhood and high school graduation, indicating that the combined effect of these factors was more than the sum of the two main effects. there were no interactions with aboriginal identity found in the model examining the proportion of personal income from government transfers. the impact of interactions and main effects on personal income are shown in figure 2. women are classified into one of four groups: (a) those who are neither a teenage mother nor a non-graduate from high school (neither); (b) those who were a teenage mother but who graduated from high school (teenage mother); (c) those who did not graduate from high school but were not a teenage mother (not high school graduate); and (d) those who were both teenage mothers and who did not graduate from high school (both). it is worth pointing out that, while there was no discernable change in personal income between neither and teenage mothers for non-aboriginal and non-registered indian women, registered indian teenage mothers had a significant increase in their personal income compared to women in the neither group. furthermore, the personal incomes of non-aboriginal and non-registered indian women in the not high school graduate and both categories were similar to one another. a d j u s t e d p e r c a p i t a h o u s e h o l d i n c o m e . the results shown in table 6 indicate that both teenage childbearing and not graduating high school were associated with significant decreases in adjusted per capita household income. additionally, being a lone parent also significantly decreased adjusted per capita household income. the model also included significant interaction terms. there was a significant interaction between teenage motherhood and high school graduation, as was the case in the models of personal income. furthermore, interactions with first nations identity indicate that the impact of high school graduation did not have the same effect for non-aboriginal as compared to first nations women. these interactions 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 9 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.9 table 6. regression estimates (b) and standard errors (se) from linear regression models predicting personal and household income characteristics of mothers aged 25 to 29, 2006 census total personal income (nearest $) % total income from government transfers household income adjusted for family size b (se) b (se) b (se) intercept 22,403* (129) 36.89 (0.45) 39,654 (181) aboriginal group non-aboriginal ref. ref. ref. registered indian, off-reserve -4,782* (501) 14.46* (1.25) -9,661* (607) registered indian, on-reserve -6,123* (644) 15.52* (1.34) -14,043* (748) non-registered indian -2,836* (801) 4.98* (2.32) -5,015* (929) teenage mother 126 (169) 2.10* (0.58) -4,456* (233) not high school graduate -6,787* (180) 17.74* (0.62) -9,181* (250) lone parent 2,082* (131) 8.60* (0.46) -11,567* (183) region of residence atlantic region -2,505* (223) 9.36* (0.78) -7,414 (312) québec 1,994* (158) 6.88* (0.55) -4,447* (221) ontario 1,201* (151) 0.83 (0.53) -609* (210) prairies ref. ref. ref. 13 garner et al.: the socio-economic characteristics published by scholarship@western, 2013 total personal income (nearest $) % total income from government transfers household income adjusted for family size b (se) b (se) b (se) british columbia -1,320* (201) -0.04 (0.70) -2,600* (281) territories 7,791* (971) -11.08* (3.39) 8,588* (1357) first generation immigrant -5,275* (136) 9.83* (0.47) -7,196* (188) interact not high school graduate with: …registered indian, off-reserve 2,047* (761) … 3,662* (1044) …registered indian, on-reserve 1,540* (758) … 3,051* (1059) …non-registered indian 3,058* (1420) … … interact teenage mother with: …registered indian, off-reserve 2,471* (727) … … …registered indian, on-reserve 2,635* (758) … … …non-registered indian … … … interact teenage mother with: …not high school graduate 1,079* (326) 2.62* (1.12) 2,494* (452) *estimate significant at p<.05 … interaction term was non-significant and was removed from model 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 9 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.9 indicate that the decline in per capita household income was not as severe among registered indian women, whether living onor off-reserve, as it was for non-aboriginal women. the impact of interactions and main effects on adjusted per capita household income are shown in figure 3. notice that registered indian women living on-reserve consistently had the lowest adjusted per capita household income levels among all groups. d w e l l i n g c h a ra c t e ri s t i c s . two dwelling characteristics were examined using regression models: (a) living in a dwelling in need of major repair; and, (b) living in overcrowded housing. logistic models were fit to both outcomes; odds ratios and 95% confidence intervals are given in table 7. teenage motherhood and not graduating from high school each independently increased the likelihood of living in overcrowded housing or in a dwelling in need of major repair. interestingly, these effects were often dwarfed by the impact of first nations identity: the odds of living in overcrowded housing were more than 10 times greater among registered indian women living on-reserve than among non-aboriginal women; and, the odds of living in a dwelling in need of major repair were more than 6 times greater among the former than the latter. significant interaction terms in both models indicate that teenage motherhood and/or educational attainment had different impacts on these dwelling characteristics among first nations women than among non-aboriginal women. f i g u re 2 . c o m b i n e d i m p a c t o f f i rs t n a t i o n s g ro u p , t e e n a g e m o t h e rh o o d , a n d n o t g ra d u a t i n g f ro m h i g h s c h o o l o n w o m e n ’ s p e rs o n a l i n c o m e , f ro m re g re s s i o n m o d e l s . values in figure assume a constant demographic profile; that is individuals living in prairie provinces, not lone parents, and non-aboriginal women are not first generation immigrants. 15 garner et al.: the socio-economic characteristics published by scholarship@western, 2013 f i g u re 3 . c o m b i n e d i m p a c t o f f i rs t n a t i o n s g ro u p , t e e n a g e m o t h e rh o o d , a n d n o t g ra d u a t i n g h i g h s c h o o l o n a w o m a n ’ s a d j u s t e d p e r c a p i t a h o u s e h o l d i n c o m e , f ro m re g re s s i o n m o d e l s . values in figure assume a constant demographic profile; that is individuals living in the prairie provinces, not lone parents, and non-aboriginal women are not first generation immigrants. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 9 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.9 t a b l e 7 . o d d s ra t i o s ( o r ) a n d 9 5 % c o n f i d e n c e i n t e rv a l s ( c i ) f ro m l o g i s t i c re g re s s i o n m o d e l s p re d i c t i n g d w e l l i n g c h a ra c t e ri s t i c s o f m o t h e rs a g e d 2 5 t o 2 9 , 2 0 0 6 c e n s u s living in overcrowded housing dwelling in need of major repair or (95% ci) or (95% ci) aboriginal group non-aboriginal ref. ref. registered indian, off-reserve 3.34* (2.60, 4.28) 1.82* (1.53, 2.16) registered indian, on-reserve 10.49* (8.53, 12.90) 6.52* (5.58, 7.62) non-registered indian 1.11 (0.52, 2.37) 2.42* (1.83, 3.21) teenage mother 1.80* (1.66, 1.96) 1.47* (1.38, 1.57) not high school graduate 1.75* (1.61, 1.89) 1.49* (1.41, 1.59) lone parent 0.66* (0.60, 0.72) 1.50* (1.42, 1.58) region of residence atlantic region 0.56* (0.45, 0.70) 1.09 (0.99, 1.21) québec 0.91 (0.82, 1.01) 1.18* (1.10, 1.27) ontario 1.13* (1.03, 1.24) 1.01 (0.94, 1.08) prairies ref. ref. british columbia 1.32* (1.18, 1.47) 1.04 (0.95, 1.14) territories 1.07 (0.67, 1.73) 0.93 (0.64, 1.36) first generation immigrant 9.87* (9.15, 10.64) 0.77* (0.72, 0.83) interact not high school graduate with: …registered indian, off-reserve 1.48* (1.06, 2.06) … …registered indian, on-reserve … … …non-registered indian 3.05* (1.24, 7.55) … 17 garner et al.: the socio-economic characteristics published by scholarship@western, 2013 living in overcrowded housing dwelling in need of major repair or (95% ci) or (95% ci) interact teenage mother with: …registered indian, off-reserve … 0.62* (0.48, 0.81) …registered indian, on-reserve 1.30* (1.01, 1.68) 0.70* (0.57, 0.87) …non-registered indian … 0.57* (0.35, 0.92) interact teenage mother with: …not high school graduate … … *estimate significant at p<.05 … interaction term was non-significant and was removed from model the impact of interactions and main effects on living in overcrowded housing or a dwelling in need of major repair are shown in figure 4. regardless of differences between aboriginal identity groups, in every case the probability of living in overcrowded housing was highest among women who were both teenage mothers and had not graduated high school. in addition to examining the impact of teenage motherhood and high school dropout, it is important to keep in mind the size of the population represented by the intersection of these two characteristics (table 8). nearly three-quarters of non-aboriginal women aged 25 to 29 were neither a teenage mother nor a high school dropout (73.9%), compared to only 25.4% of registered indian women living onreserve. conversely, nearly one in three registered indian women living on-reserve (28.8%) were both teenage mothers and had not graduated high school, compared to only 4.7% of non-aboriginal women. d i s c u s s i o n this study demonstrates that the proportion of young women who become mothers in their teens is significantly higher among aboriginal than non-aboriginal women. while less than 6% of nonaboriginal women aged 25 to 29 became mothers in their teens, more than three times as many first nations women became mothers before the age of twenty. the highest rates of teenage motherhood were found among registered indian women living on-reserve (38%). these findings confirm what others have found (anderson, 2002; first nations centre, 2006; guimond & robitaille, 2008; regional health survey national team, 2007; robitaille et al., 2004). births to teenaged women have been declining in canada over the past decades. while 5.9% of live births in 1986 were to women under the age of 20 (statistics canada, 1997), this dropped to 4.1% of live births in 2006 (statistics canada, 2008c). however, there does not seem to have been a similar trend among first nations women. work by robitaille et al. (2004) showed that fertility rates among registered indian teenaged women increased between 1986 and 1999. in the general population, a growing number of women are postponing marriage, cohabitation, and childbearing until later ages (beaupré, turcotte, & milan, 2006; clark, 2007; terry-humen, manlove, & moore, 2005). in most 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 9 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.9 0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% neither teenage mother not high school graduate both non-aboriginal re gis te re d indian, off-re s e rve re gis te re d indian, on-re s e rve non-re gis te re d indian pr ob ab ili ty o f l iv in g in ov er cr ow de d ho us in g 0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% neither teenage mother not high school graduate both non-aboriginal re gis te re d indian, off-re s e rve re gis te re d indian, on-re s e rve non-re gis te re d indian pr ob ab ili ty o f l iv in g in h ou sin g in in n ee d of m aj or re pa ir f i g u re 4 . c o m b i n e d i m p a c t o f f i rs t n a t i o n s g ro u p , t e e n a g e m o t h e rh o o d , a n d n o t g ra d u a t i n g f ro m h i g h s c h o o l o n w o m e n ’ s p ro b a b i l i t y o f l i v i n g i n o v e rc ro w d e d h o u s i n g ( u p p e r f i g u re ) o r l i v i n g i n a h o m e i n n e e d o f m a j o r re p a i r ( l o w e r f i g u re ) , f ro m re g re s s i o n m o d e l s . values in figure assume a constant demographic profile; that is, individuals living in prairie provinces, not lone parents, and non-aboriginal women are not first generation immigrants. 19 garner et al.: the socio-economic characteristics published by scholarship@western, 2013 t a b l e 8 . pro p o rt i o n o f w o m e n w h o a re t e e n a g e m o t h e rs , h i g h s c h o o l d ro p o u t s , n e i t h e r o r b o t h , b y a b o ri g i n a l i d e n t i t y g ro u p , 2 0 0 6 c e n s u s neither a teenage mother nor high school dropout (%) teenage mother only (%) high school dropout only (%) both teenage mother and high school dropout (%) non-aboriginal (n = 69,584) 73.9 11.5 9.9 4.7 registered indian (n = 3,163) 34.6 23.5 18.2 23.7 off-reserve (n=1,687) 42.7 23.3 14.9 19.2 on-reserve (n = 1,476) 25.4 23.7 22.1 28.8 non-registered indian (n = 459) 48.7 19.4 16.2 15.8 cases, these delays are the result of young women’s pursuit of higher education. it is not clear, however, whether this trend applies equally to first nations and non-aboriginal women. this is an area that requires further research. the present study also demonstrated that there are large differences in educational attainment. while 85% of non-aboriginal women aged 25 to 29 completed high school, two-thirds (67%) of whom had at least some post-secondary education, the proportions were significantly lower among first nations women. although there is evidence that high school graduation rates are higher for aboriginal women than for aboriginal men (richards, 2008), the present study found that women who became mothers in their teens, which is more prevalent among first nations women, were significantly less likely to graduate from high school than women who postponed childbearing until their twenties. despite lower rates of high school graduation among first nations women in this study’s sample, the proportion of aboriginal adults obtaining high school and post-secondary education has increased over time. for instance, between 1981 and 2001, the proportion of aboriginal youth without a high school education dropped, while the proportion of 25 to 34 year-olds completing post-secondary education increased (mcmullen, 2005). there are also indications that aboriginal adults who drop out of high school often return to school to obtain their diploma or equivalent at older ages. data from the 2006 census shows that the aboriginal/non-aboriginal gap in obtaining a high school degree or greater gets smaller among increasingly older groups, suggesting that there may be some “catch-up” occurring (richards, 2008). 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 9 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.9 this study highlights the importance of high school graduation in determining a woman’s socioeconomic profile, whether related to income or housing characteristics. other studies also point to maternal education level as an important predictor of children’s long-term health and development, as well as children’s own academic achievement (terry-humen et al., 2005). furthermore, failure to complete a high school education not only exerts costs on the individual and her children, but there are larger societal costs as well. for example, a 2008 report by the canadian council on learning reported that high school non-completion resulted in an annual loss of $969 million in social assistance spending, $350 million in crime-related costs, and $23.8 billion in health care spending (hankivsky, 2008). although both non-aboriginal and first nations teenage mothers were significantly less likely to have graduated high school than non-teenage mothers, it was not possible to determine whether pregnancy preceded or followed dropping out of high school. however, using data from the 2001 aboriginal peoples survey, we find that 34% of north american indian women ages 15 to 34 living off-reserve, who had not graduated high school, indicated that pregnancy or taking care of children was the main reason for not completing their secondary education (statistics canada, 2003). this study does have certain limitations. first, the choice of data source means that the scope of characteristics that can be examined is limited. other variables that may be of interest, such as the child’s health and development, cannot be examined in this study. however, by using the census, our study benefits from a large sample, particularly among the first nations on-reserve population. second, due to incomplete enumeration and refusal rates, the estimates for registered indian women living on-reserve may not be fully generalizable. although there were 22 incompletely enumerated indian reserves in the 2006 census, this number is lower than previous years (30 in 2001 and 77 in 1996), which may indicate that current figures are more comprehensive than they were for previous censuses. third, women may be misclassified across our groups of mothers. the definition of teenage motherhood, and motherhood in general, requires that a woman be living in a household with her children at the time of the census. children may be absent from the household on the day of census for various reasons, including shared custody arrangements, children given up for adoption, or children who were placed in foster care. in may 2008, the auditor general of canada reported that nearly 5% of first nations children on-reserve were living in foster care, which is thought to be nearly 8 times the rate among children living off-reserve (fraser, 2008). as such, it is possible that the misclassification of motherhood and age at first birth may be greater among first nations women in the sample. fourth, the census does not allow one to verify a biological relationship between a woman and the children in her census family. therefore, the children may be the biological, adoptive, or step-children of the 25 to 29-year-old women. however, all nonmother-child census families were omitted from the present sample (e.g., children living with their aunt). finally, the comparison group, that is women aged 25 to 29 who had their first child in their twenties, still represents a relatively young group of mothers. the mean age of women who gave birth in canada in 2006 was 29.3 and many women delay childbearing into their thirties (fraser, 2008; statistics canada, 2008c). however, it was not possible to use an older cohort of women as a comparison group because older children may have already left home to live on their own, which makes identification of teenage mothers in a group of women in their thirties significantly more difficult. nevertheless, significant differences found in the present study may well be even more exaggerated had an older comparison group been used. 21 garner et al.: the socio-economic characteristics published by scholarship@western, 2013 teenage mothers face certain socio-economic challenges. these difficulties are greater if the young woman has not completed her secondary school education. future research may wish to examine the familial and community-level factors that influence a young mother’s ability to complete her high school education, with the goal of increasing graduation rates for teenage mothers. however, it was also found that many young mothers are able to thrive despite the difficulties they face. the nature of the factors leading to this situation could also be examined in further research. 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 9 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.9 r e f e re n c e s anderson, k. 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(2001). what's so bad about teenage pregnancy? the journal of family planning and reproductive health care, 27, 36-41. da silva, a. a. m., simões, v. m. f., barbieri, m. a., bettiol, h., lamy-filho, f., coimbra, l. c., & alves, m. t. (2003). young maternal age and preterm birth. paediatric and perinatal epidemiology, 17, 332-339. dion-stout, m., & kipling, g. d. (1999). aboriginal roundtable on sexual and reproductive health. ottawa: aboriginal nurses association. first nations centre. (2006). youth knowledge needs assessment project report, 2006. ottawa: national aboriginal health organization. fraser, a. m., brockert, j. e., & ward, r. h. (1995). association of young maternal age with adverse reproductive outcomes. the new england journal of medicine, 332, 1113-1117. fraser, s. (2008). report of the auditor general of canada to the house of commons: chapter 4. first nations child and family services program -indian and northern affairs canada. ottawa: office of the auditor general of canada. gortzak-uzan, l., hallak, m., press, f., katz, m., & shoham-vardi, i. (2001). teenage pregnancy: risk factors for adverse perinatal outcome. the journal of maternal-fetal medicine, 10, 393-397. guimond, e. & robitaille, n. (2008). when teenage girls have children: trends and consequences. horizons, 10, 49-51. hankivsky, o. (2008). cost estimates of dropping out of high school in canada. ottawa: canadian council on learning. 23 garner et al.: the socio-economic characteristics published by scholarship@western, 2013 income statistics division. (2006). low income cut-offs for 2005 and low income measures for 2004 (rep. no. catalogue no. 75f0002mie — no. 004). ottawa: statistics canada. lao, t. t., & ho, l. f. 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(2004). maternal age and non-chromosomal birth defects, atlanta 19682000: teenager or thirty-something, who is at risk? birth defects research (part a), 70, 572579. regional health survey national team (2007). chapter 23: sexual health practices. in first nations regional longitudinal health survey (rhs) 2002/03: results for adults, youth and children living in first nations communities (pp. 207-214). ottawa: assembly of first nations/first nations information governance committee. richards, j. (2008). closing the aboriginal/non-aboriginal education gaps (rep. no. 116). toronto: c.d. howe institute. robitaille, n., kouaouci, a., & guimond, e. (2004). la fécondité des indiennes à 15 à 19 ans, de 1986 à 1997. in j.p. white, p. maxim, & d. beavon (eds.), aboriginal policy research: setting the agenda for change (vol ii ) (pp. 201-224). toronto: thompson educational publishing inc. statistics canada. (1997). births and deaths, 1995 (rep. no. catalogue no. 84-210-xpb). ottawa: minister of industry. statistics canada. (2003). aboriginal peoples survey 2001 initial release supporting tables 2 (rep. no. catalogue no. 97-558-xie). ottawa: statistics canada. statistics canada. (2008a). 2006 census dictionary (catalogue no. 92-566-x). ottawa: minister of industry. statistics canada. (2008b). aboriginal peoples in canada in 2006: inuit, métis and first nations, 2006 census (rep. no. catalogue no. 97-558-xie). ottawa: minister of industry. 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 9 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.9 statistics canada. (2008c). births, 2006 (rep. no. catalogue no. 84f0210x). ottawa: minister of industry. terry-humen, e., manlove, j., & moore, k. a. (2005). playing catch-up: how children born to teen mothers fare. washington: national campaign to prevent teen pregnancy. zukewich, n. & o'donnell, v. (2008). aboriginal children's survey, 2006: family, community and child care. ottawa: minister of industry. 25 garner et al.: the socio-economic characteristics published by scholarship@western, 2013 the international indigenous policy journal march 2013 the socio-economic characteristics of first nation teen mothers rochelle garner eric guimond sacha senécal recommended citation the socio-economic characteristics of first nation teen mothers abstract french abstract spanish abstract keywords acknowledgments disclaimer creative commons license garner_socio_economic final garner_socio_economic final.2 garner_socio_economic final.3 garner_socio_economic final.4 garner_socio_economic final.5 garner_socio_economic final.6 garner_socio_economic final.7 garner_socio_economic final.8 apologies to indigenous peoples in comparative perspective the international indigenous policy journal volume 5 | issue 4 article 7 october 2014 apologies to indigenous peoples in comparative perspective michael tager marietta college, tagerm@marietta.edu recommended citation tager, m. (2014). apologies to indigenous peoples in comparative perspective. the international indigenous policy journal, 5(4) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.7 apologies to indigenous peoples in comparative perspective abstract australia, canada, and the united states formally apologized to their indigenous peoples in february 2008, june 2008, and december 2009, respectively. the indigenous peoples in these countries are relatively small in size and indigenous issues usually lack salience in national elections, so these near simultaneous apologies appear somewhat surprising. all three came after years of pressure and incompletely realized apologies. the presence of a focusing event and the level of indigenous mobilization help explain the variation among the apologies, with canada and australia’s apologies stronger than the u.s. one. however, the impact of the apologies on the three governments’ efforts to reconcile with their indigenous populations remains unclear. keywords apology, indigenous peoples, australia, canada, united states, truth and reconcilliation creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ a p o l o g i e s t o i n d i g e n o u s pe o p l e s i n c o m p a ra t i v e pe rs p e c t i v e the official apologies to indigenous peoples in australia, canada, and the united states occurred within two years of one another between 2008 and 2009, but varied considerably, ranging from canada’s high profile apology accompanied by a truth and reconciliation commission and a comprehensive financial settlement to a low profile apology without any aid or promise of further investigation from the u.s. australia’s high profile apology with limited financial aid occupied a middle ground between the two north american apologies. this article compares the apology process in each country and tries to account for the different outcomes, with some concluding reflections about the effectiveness of using apologies to reconcile indigenous peoples and national governments. as government apologies for human rights violations became more common in recent decades, a substantial body of literature about them developed. torpey (2006) situated apologies within “reparation politics,” which includes criminal trials or truth commissions at its core, material compensation at the next level, followed by apologies, and then efforts to reshape collective memory. similarly, verdeja (2009) considered apologies as part of a multi-dimensional reconciliation process. he noted that, as speech acts, apologies cannot fully repair historically violent and exploitative relationships and may enable elites to mitigate their guilt; thus, they benefit those giving the apology more than those receiving it. however, they can facilitate better relations and refusing to apologize may inflict further damage by implying victims or their descendants do not merit the state’s moral respect. in distinguishing interpersonal from collective apologies, tavuchis (1991) argued, “the major structural requirement and ultimate task of collective apologetic speech is to put things on record, to document as a prelude to reconciliation” (p. 109). so in political apologies, a recitation of wrongs done becomes as important as the expression of remorse: people want public acknowledgment of what happened to them or their ancestors. apologies can highlight the subterranean history that countries ignore or downplay in their national narratives (torpey, 2006). even if sorrow or forgiveness does not fully occur, agreeing on what has happened helps address past grievances and creates space for future dialogue. celermajer (2006) argued that in political apologies remorse and compensation matter less than revisiting tenets of a country’s political culture. she considered an apology to be “a means whereby the group recognizes how its collective norms formed the necessary conditions for particular wrongs to occur, and expresses shame for those ethical flaws” (p. 155). also taking a broad view, nobles (2008) argued that apologies reflect an ongoing negotiation about the terms of national membership in states and that groups use them to advance their political goals. many scholars have noted the difficulty of effectively apologizing. thompson (2008) claimed that because an official apology separates a past of injustice from a future of respect it requires a memorable public display. she explained, “this is why a political act of apology requires preparation, ceremony, and subsequent actions; saying the words is a small part of the proceedings” (p. 42). in establishing a public record of past events, apologies also require “some measure” of publicity (dodds, 2003). in addition, the person delivering them should have high stature. tavuchis (1991) noted, “an apology proffered without the proper credentials, that is, lacking the moral imprimatur of the group, amounts to no apology” (p. 101). an apology’s timing matters too because coming too soon can make it seem insincere or ill conceived and coming too late may cause it to lose its relevance (tavuchis, 1991). long-delayed apologies raise questions of responsibility, or to what extent people can or should apologize for things that occurred before their time (dodds, 2003). the importance of context leads some scholars to stress 1 tager: apologies to indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2014 the “performative” (cushman, 2009) aspects of an apology. marrus (2007) argued that one of the most successful modern apologies—willy brandt’s kniefall in 1970—contained no words. the widely disseminated image of the german chancellor in warsaw kneeling before the memorialized victims of the nazis communicated germany’s remorse. the record of failed apologies preceding the official apologies to indigenous peoples in 2008 and 2009 in australia, canada, and the u.s. confirms the scholarly literature’s claims about the challenges of apologizing.1 official government reports in australia and canada help explain the greater effectiveness of their apologies compared to the u.s., and, even though scholars like nobles (2008) convincingly argued that political elites largely control apology politics, the higher level of indigenous mobilization for an apology in australia and canada also strengthened those apologies. without discounting the symbolic importance of these national apologies, they have not seemed to determine the success or failure of subsequent government relations with indigenous peoples in the three countries, which raises questions about their long-term impact. t h e d i f f i c u l t y o f s a y i n g s o rry the evolution of the four canadian apologies illustrates the importance of both content and context to their success. in 1991, the cariboo tribal council of british columbia organized the first conference to examine the impact of residential school abuse.2 at the conference’s close, william van iterson, assistant deputy minister of indian affairs, apologized. he used vague and cautious language, with phrases like “some . . . and perhaps many” to describe the group of abused students, “negative impacts that have been identified” to refer to what happened to them, and “deep and sincere regret” instead of “sorry” or “apologize” (“official apologizes,” 1991, paras. 6 & 2). besides the inadequate content, the apology also failed for contextual reasons. a low ranking official gave it far from the capital at a relatively obscure event. it came as one among several apologies delivered by church representatives. little publicity preceded or followed it so it hardly registered nationally, receiving no mention by officials or the media at the later apologies—almost like the proverbial tree falling in a forest: with no one there to hear it, it made no sound. the government enhanced its 1998 apology with language about the “attitudes of racial and cultural superiority [that] led to a suppression of aboriginal culture and values,” acknowledgment of the fracturing of aboriginal families and the loss of culture and language, mentioned that “some children were the victims of physical and sexual abuse,” and used the word “sorry” (tibbetts, 1998). the apology’s context was improved by jane stewart, minister of indian affairs and northern development canada, who delivered it at an ottawa ceremony to leaders of the largest indigenous organizations. it also received extensive news coverage. yet, it still failed, partly because prime minister jean chrétien did                                                                                                                 1 new zealand, a fourth anglo settler state, is not included in this article because its apologies to the maori started earlier (e.g., queen elizabeth to the tainui in 1995 and prime minister jenny shipley to the ngai tahu in 1998), and constitute part of a distinctive treaty settlement process that includes reparations (see gibbs, 2008). 2 from the late nineteenth century until the 1980s when most of them closed, a network of church-run, government-funded residential schools isolated native children from their families and communities to assimilate them. abuse and neglect at the schools damaged many of the students (see miller, 1996; milloy, 1999).   2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.7 not sign the document or attend the ceremony; therefore, stewart had to clarify afterwards that she had officially apologized for the government (aubry, 1998). however, many native leaders considered its content inadequate (depalma, 1998; o’neil, 1998). even children not abused found themselves in an alien, sometimes hostile environment: families had their children removed for long periods of time, and tribes had their cultures and languages undermined, all of which merited distinct apologies. in addition, the apology’s wording left it unclear how much responsibility the government took for the abuse that occurred in the residential school system. liberal member of parliament (mp) gary merasty initiated the third apology in the house of commons in 2007. indian affairs minister jim prentice supported it because a parliamentary apology, backed by all parties, appropriately shared the responsibility for residential school abuses, instead of a government apology by the current prime minister (ivison, 2007). he considered an executive apology a separate issue and preferred to wait until the truth and reconciliation commission (trc) had finished its work in 2005 (“canada house,” 2007). the apology passed unanimously; however, it failed for contextual reasons: the prime minister did not speak to it, it received little media coverage, and it seemed incongruous for an aboriginal mp with family members who attended residential schools to initiate an apology instead of the euro-canadian head of government. the final 2008 apology achieved greater prominence than previous ones. it was the only parliamentary business for that day and the leaders of the three opposition parties each issued their own apologies after prime minister stephen harper delivered the official one (mcilroy & curry, 2008). the apology received national television coverage, and more than 30 government sponsored events throughout the country enabled people to view it communally (bailey, 2008). the text named the wrongs done in more detail than previously. prime minister harper further apologized for forcibly removing children from their homes, which separated children from their cultures and traditions and undermined indigenous family structures, and for the abuse children suffered, as well as for the sense of powerlessness instilled in natives unable to protect their children. he condemned the attitudes of cultural superiority underlying the residential schools, concluding with the statement, “the government of canada sincerely apologizes and asks the forgiveness of the aboriginal peoples of this country for failing them so profoundly. we are sorry” (“canada house,” 2008, p. 6850). native leaders accepted this apology, with assembly of first nations (afn) chief phil fontaine claiming it created an opportunity to end canada’s “racial nightmare” (“canada house,” 2008, p. 6855). unlike canada, the united states never attained the proper content and context necessary to apologize successfully. the first u.s. apology in 2000 came at a ceremony marking the 175th anniversary of the bureau of indian affairs (bia), delivered by bia head kevin gover to tribal leaders, bia employees, and federal officials (tsosie, 2006). despite its powerful text, it “suffered a death by silence” (buck, 2006, p. 97). president bill clinton neither signed the apology nor attended the ceremony and no white house official commented on it (manning, 2000). like the first canadian apology, a sub-cabinet official delivered it and, like the third canadian apology, a native initiated it. it was not televised and got 3 tager: apologies to indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2014 relatively little news coverage. it hardly registered in the american national consciousness.3 senator sam brownback subsequently led efforts to apologize. he introduced his apology resolution four times (in 2004, 2005, 2007, and 2009) before succeeding. its initial text included 21 perambulatory clauses listing wrongs done to natives by the government, and the seven succeeding operative clauses contained a resolution that “the united states, acting through congress . . . apologizes on behalf of the people of the united states to all native peoples for the many instances of violence, maltreatment, and neglect inflicted on native peoples by citizens of the united states” (joint resolution, 2005, p. 5). it also urged the president to recite the apology. while less eloquent than gover’s apology, the text was adequate but its context was not. the resolution was passed unanimously by the senate indian affairs committee, whose members tend to represent states with significant native populations, but struggled to progress further. in 2008, brownback attached it to the indian health care improvement act, which also passed in the senate but did not receive a house vote (hananel, 2008). in 2009, shorn of its perambulatory clauses, brownback added the resolution as an amendment to the 2010 defense appropriations act (capriccioso, 2009). titled “apology to native peoples of the united states” and labeled as section 8113, it occupied parts of pages 45 and 46 of the 67 page defense spending bill. in this form, it passed congress and president barack obama signed it into law in late 2009 (beech, 2010). however, by removing the perambulatory clauses, the apology failed to detail the harms done, like the prior u.s. apology. unlike the canadian apologies that grew increasingly prominent, in gaining passage, it became steadily more obscure: from a stand-alone resolution, to an amendment to an indian health care bill, and finally to a non-germane amendment to a military spending bill. obama did not refer to it in his remarks after signing the bill and never read it aloud.4 one native analyst complained “there were no public announcements, there were no press conferences, there was no national attention… what kind of an apology is it when they don’t tell the people they are apologizing to? . . . i have had my doubts whether this is a true or meaningful apology . . .” (capriccioso, 2010a, paras. 20, 22, & 23). it hardly helped that, in 2010, brownback, joined by three other members of congress and five tribal leaders, recited it at a little known location to thin media coverage (evans, 2010). at the 2010 tribal summit, obama referred obliquely to the apology by stating that, “i signed a resolution . . . finally recognizing the sad and painful chapters in our shared history—a history too often marred by broken promises and grave injustices against the first americans. it’s a resolution i fully supported—recognizing that no statement can undo the damage that was done . . .” (“president obama,” 2010, para. 2). with no public presidential ceremony, this apology seems likely to vanish from national consciousness. more than in canada or the u.s., australia’s apology became enmeshed in partisan politics and, in kingdon’s (2011) language, the election of a john howard-led liberal government in 1996 closed the                                                                                                                 3as director of the national museum of the american indian, gover appeared on a national public radio (npr) talk show in 2008 to discuss apology politics after the canadian and australian national apologies, and the program’s host showed no awareness of gover’s 2000 apology, nor did gover mention it (see martin, 2008). 4 it is not clear why obama never publicly delivered the apology. in 2009, karl rove derided obama’s foreign travel and addresses as an “apology tour,” a theme appropriated by mitt romney in his 2010 book, no apology: the case for american greatness, and in his 2012 presidential campaign, so perhaps partisan politics played a role (capriccioso, 2010b). alternatively, obama may have preferred other ways to reconcile with indigenous peoples. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.7 “policy window,” which did not reopen until the liberals lost the election of 2007. prime minister paul keating made the initial statement of regrets in redfern park at the end of 1992 (boreham, 1992). he used strong and direct language to describe the wrongs committed against the aboriginal and torres strait island people (the torres strait islanders are melanesians, and in this article the term “aborigines” refers to both of these distinct sets of indigenous peoples) and acknowledged their damaging legacy, but did not use the word “apologize.” he called guilt an unconstructive emotion and instead advocated “practical” measures to improve conditions for aborigines (keating, 1992). in 1997, prime minister john howard spoke at a council for aboriginal reconciliation (car) convention where he personally apologized without issuing a government apology (“transcript of the prime minister,” 1997). he stated his regrets for past injustices, but argued an official apology would reflect what he termed elsewhere a “black armband” view of australian history that ignored the country’s positive accomplishments and that contemporary australians, decades distant from the removal of aboriginal children, should not be held accountable (“transcript of the prime minister,” 1997).5 the audience, committed to a government apology, reacted hostilely (sanders, 2006). as state and local governments, churches, and occupational groups associated with the child removals apologized in succeeding years, the national government continued to balk. the government rejected the car’s proposed reconciliation statement for australia’s centennial because it contained an apology (“stuck again,” 1999). a third expression of regret occurred in 1999 when the government negotiated with newly elected democratic party senator aden ridgeway, the only aboriginal member of parliament (grattan & kingston, 1999). the parliamentary resolution acknowledged the “mistreatment” of indigenous peoples, stating that this represented “the most blemished chapter in our history” (“commonwealth of australia,” 1999, p. 9205). the choice of the word “blemish” reflected howard’s view of australian history, because a blemish implies an exception to an otherwise healthy or attractive whole (adams, 1999). the apology did not name the wrongs committed, specifically the removal of aboriginal children, and avoided the word “sorry” in favor of “deep and sincere regret” (“commonwealth of australia,” 1999, p. 9205). it remained unacceptable to many aboriginal leaders (farr, 1999). in 2000, when car was disbanded and replaced by a private foundation, aborigines lost a test case for damages for their removal from their families (“roundup: aborigines lose,” 2000), and gradually momentum for an apology waned in the face of continuing government opposition. during the 2007 election campaign, labor party leader kevin rudd promised a formal apology to australia’s aborigines (sullivan, 2007). after taking office, he sought unanimous parliamentary support for an apology. partly to win liberal approval, the new government rejected compensating the “stolen generations,” and indigenous affairs minister jennifer macklin asserted, “the apology will be made on behalf of the australian government and does not attribute guilt to the current generation of australian                                                                                                                 5 a 1997 report published prior to howard’s car speech by the human rights and equal opportunity commission examined the removal of aboriginal children from their families and placement in foster families or orphanages from 1910 to 1970. as in the canadian residential school system, many of these children, often referred to in australia as the “stolen generations,” experienced physical and sexual abuse, labor exploitation, and as adults some suffered from feelings of shame and disorientation about their identities.   5 tager: apologies to indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2014 people” (johnston, 2008). the new liberal party leadership endorsed the apology and it passed unanimously in parliament. this process resembled what happened to brownback’s apology resolution, which gradually lost force to gain support for passage. rudd delivered the apology in the house of representatives on parliament’s first session of 2008 and it received live national television coverage. the government paid for about a hundred aborigines from the stolen generations to attend the speech (mcguirk, 2008). rudd read his relatively brief apology resolution, explaining further its rationale and significance. the new liberal party leader brandon nelson also apologized, after which rudd, nelson, and macklin went to embrace the aborigine attendees. rudd quoted from some of the architects of the child removal policy, with their explicit intent to solve the aboriginal “problem” by eradicating its distinct culture (“commonwealth of australia,” 2008). he explained that the laws passed by former national and state parliaments created the stolen generations and, therefore, those institutions appropriately should apologize (“commonwealth of australia,” 2008). this phrasing avoided blaming the people carrying out the policies and their descendants, but also implied that australians must bear the burdens of their history. he received generally positive responses to his apology. pat dodson, the original car chair, called it “a seminal moment in the nation’s history” and another aboriginal leader claimed it would go “a long way to end the distrust of the white man by generations of my people” (rintoul, 2008). after prior attempts fizzled, australia’s fourth apology finally appeared to succeed. e x p l a i n i n g t h e v a ri a t i o n a m o n g a p o l o g i e s two factors help account for the higher profile of the final canadian and australian apologies compared to the u.s. first, canada and australia established government inquiries, whereas the united states did not. the royal commission on aboriginal peoples (rcap), created after the violent confrontation at oka in 1990 to assess the status of indigenous peoples and make recommendations for reform, issued its final report in 1996. it contained a chapter that detailed poor conditions and widespread abuse in residential schools, advocating a further inquiry with remedial actions taken as deemed appropriate, including apologies and compensation (royal commission on aboriginal people, 1996, see pp. 364 367). in australia, the human rights and equal opportunity commission (hreoc) report concluded that, despite the good intentions of some involved, the aboriginal child removal policy amounted to genocide, or the concerted attempt to destroy a people and a culture, under international law (hreoc, 1997, see pp. 270 275). it recommended apologies and compensation by national and state parliaments, as well as the establishment of a national “sorry day” to commemorate the child removals. the car, which pressed for that apology, itself arose from a recommendation in an earlier government report by the royal commission into aboriginal deaths in custody (martin, 2001). neither canadian nor australian political elites embraced the results of these inquiries. the chrétien government tried to ignore the rcap report and did not endorse any of its 440 recommendations (switzer, 1997). the report called for increased government spending to improve housing, education, and job training for natives in a time of fiscal austerity, and proposed enhancing the sovereign status of the first nations when a referendum on quebec separating from canada had just narrowly lost the year before, creating fears about the disintegration of canada (nichols, 1998). chrétien also doubted the utility of an apology for the use of residential schools (smith, 1995). in australia, the howard government went further than just ignoring the hreoc report by attacking its validity in a detailed 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.7 critique of its methodology introduced into parliament and claiming it overestimated the number of aboriginal children removed from their homes, making the phrase “stolen generations” a misnomer (“the ‘stolen generation,’” 2000). despite these negative reactions, the canadian and australian governments could not completely repudiate the findings of their own expert panels. the reports tended to validate indigenous demands for an apology by providing evidence of mistreatment and linking it to a national effort to destroy native cultures. the reports also received considerable media coverage and became “focusing events” (kingdon, 2011) that pushed an apology onto the government agenda. howard issued a personal statement of regrets at the car conference held after the publication of the hreoc report; two years after the rcap report, one of chrétien’s cabinet ministers apologized. a 2007 canadian government report revealing egregious government neglect in addressing tuberculosis at the residential schools in the first half of the twentieth century weakened the harper government’s resistance to an apology (“native leader,” 2007). by contrast, the lack of a government inquiry or damning report contributed to the relative weakness of the u.s. apology. in 2005, senator john mccain held an indian affairs committee hearing on brownback’s apology resolution to build support for the proposal but the hearing failed to attract media coverage (acknowledgement and apology, 2005). a committee report accusing the government of genocide or exposing new evidence of gross negligence would have had more impact. a second factor explaining canada and australia’s relative success is the greater indigenous mobilization for an apology than in the u.s. in canada, native leaders like phil fontaine had experienced abuse while attending residential schools and, as afn chief, he lobbied hard for a response to the rcap report when the chrétien government appeared ready to shelve it, obtaining weekly meetings with the ministry of indian affairs in 1997 to discuss the report’s findings (kennedy, 1997). afn pressure helped persuade a reluctant government to make its 1998 apology and fund counseling and language instruction (anderssen, 1997). more confrontational leaders, like matthew coon come who succeeded fontaine as afn chief in 2000, believed the 1998 apology was inadequate (johnson, 2000). he advocated a south african-style trc to hold public hearings and a comprehensive settlement for all the former students—whether abused or not—for the trauma of removal from their families and loss of their culture and language (mofina, 2000). these became afn official positions, but coon come’s radicalism made it hard for the government to negotiate with the afn (thompson, 2001), and fontaine’s election as afn chief in 2003 facilitated renewed dialogue. proliferating native lawsuits also applied growing pressure on the canadian government. in the fall of 1996, 100 former residential school students had filed abuse lawsuits, which grew to 600 by the end of 1997, 1,000 by the summer 1998, 1,600 by november of 1998, and ultimately over 13,000 by 2005 (sillars, 1998; simpson, 2005). in 1998, a court first held the churches and government legally liable for abuse at residential schools (cox, 1998). after that, natives began to file class action lawsuits. the government established an alternative dispute resolution system, paying 70% of the settlements and the churches paying 30%, but this system did not work well; when, in 2005, a court approved class action lawsuits for the first time, the government faced potentially extensive liability (jacobs, 2005). this led to the settlement of 2005 in which the government allocated nearly $2 billion to compensate all former residential school students, with additional capped settlements for those actually abused (jacobs, 2005). 7 tager: apologies to indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2014 aboriginal leaders clashed with the harper government when it appeared it would not issue an apology even as it implemented the 2005 agreement reached by the previous government. the afn turned to direct action, holding a national day of protest in june of 2007 against aboriginal poverty and a variety of issues besides the apology. it involved mostly peaceful rallies, but there were also some blockades of national highways (“day of action,” 2007). natives held another national day of protest in may of 2008, with talk of disrupting the 2010 winter olympics in vancouver if their demands were not addressed (lavoie, 2008). the potential return to the strife of the early 1990s probably contributed to the government’s change of position and decision to apologize in june of 2008. in australia, an apology for the stolen generations galvanized not only aboriginals but also other groups. facing a government refusing to apologize, a grassroots movement that distributed blank books for citizens to sign and write their apologies to aborigines arose, which the organizers presented to aboriginal representatives on national sorry day, may 26, 1998, the first anniversary of the hreoc report. estimates varied, but the hundreds of sorry books probably contained as many as a million signatures (mcallister, 2012). many different religious and secular observances took place on sorry day while the government officially stood aside (sullivan, 1998). at corroboree 2000, a car organized event, an estimated 250,000 people marched across the sydney harbor bridge, while a plane skywrote the word “sorry,” and much of the city was closed to traffic for eight hours (“australians march,” 2000). howard continued to oppose an apology and avoided the event, instead sending his ministers of reconciliation and aboriginal affairs to participate in the largest civil rights march in australian history (fyfe & taylor, 2000). the issue became highly partisan. once howard became prime minister in 1996 and refused to apologize after the hreoc report’s publication, the opposition labor party began demanding an official apology. the apology became one of several social issues that divided the two parties, with some critics noting that its role in australia’s “culture war” eclipsed its original purpose (muldoon & schaap, 2012). while popular with some of labor’s core constituencies, opinion polls showed support for howard’s position (gratton, 2000). in the late 1990s, howard faced opposition on his right from the conservative populist pauline hanson and her one nation party, a movement that polarized australians on racial issues (robbins, 2007), probably stiffening his reluctance to officially apologize. the impasse with the government eventually divided aboriginal activists. pat dodson advocated abandoning the quest for an apology because howard would never apologize and important issues on the reconciliation agenda remained (nason & green, 1999). others continued to insist on a national apology (nason & jackson, 1999). despite aboriginal efforts and the mobilization of large numbers of supporters, it would take a change of government in 2007 before an official apology became possible. public opinion followed political elites in that by rudd’s win in the 2007 election a majority favored an apology, and after which he apologized in 2008; 69% of the public approved of it (“australian pm’s,” 2008). in the united states, an apology did not become a priority for indian activists as it did in canada, nor did it succeed in activating the public as in australia. the first bia apology by gover and the second one by brownback were derived from their own moral imperatives, not a response to organized pressure. in 2008, tex hall, then president of the national congress of american indians (ncai), recalled that several years earlier brownback called him “out of the blue” to discuss an apology (curry, 2008, para. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.7 16). some analysts suspected politics drove the apology, in that casino revenues had enabled some tribes to lobby more vigorously and contribute more money to campaigns and because, in a nearly evenly divided senate, indians could provide the margin of victory in close senate races in some western states (mollison, 2004; “the long trail,” 2004). brownback disclaimed political motives and instead pointed to the anger he sensed beneath the formally courteous reception he received when he first visited kansas indian reservations (mollison, 2004). he participated in christian-sponsored reconciliation efforts between whites and indians where he encountered a book by baptist missionary john dawson entitled healing america’s wounds (mollison, 2004). dawson (1994) advocated a four-step process of confession, repentance (including apology), reconciliation, and restitution to promote racial and ethnic harmony. brownback discussed apologizing with dawson and spoke of it in religious terms drawn from dawson’s book (carson, 2004; “sen. brownback,” 2005). the official u.s. apology received mixed reactions from natives. some appreciated it and agreed it constituted an important step toward reconciliation, but others sought more tangible government actions (“u.s. says,” 2010). apology critics believed it wrongly implied that treaty violations no longer occurred. at the 2004 midyear ncai meeting, native leaders debated brownback’s apology resolution and concluded that an apology without addressing “intrusions on tribal sovereignty, under-funding of treaty-mandated indian programs and the evasion of responsibility for fixing the trust management system” (adams, 2004, para. 11) was not adequate. they ultimately neither endorsed nor rejected it. at the 2005 senate indian affairs committee hearings, two of the three natives testifying expressed their ambivalence about an apology. one of them told mccain that gover’s 2000 apology “did not change even his own behavior toward native americans” (acknowledgement and apology, 2005, p. 17). this probably referred to gover, along with interior secretary bruce babbitt, being cited for contempt by a federal judge in 1999 for not complying with discovery orders to release documents in the cobell lawsuit, and for bia employees deliberately destroying records of individual indian money trust accounts (buck, 2006). c o n c l u s i o n the years it took to apologize reflect partly the collective action problems facing any controversial bill. kingdon (2011) pointed to the sometimes long period of “softening up” that precedes the enactment of many policy proposals. with a symbolic policy like an apology, it requires not only passing a bill with the right content, but also its recitation within the proper context. the iterative nature of apologies to indigenous peoples also may embody the difficulty that governments have addressing their pasts. tavuchis (1991) explained that apologies “are difficult and potentially humiliating; there is a tendency to resist apologizing that must be overcome; apologies call attention to what we may be as well as what we have done. . .” (p. 9). it may take governments time to accept the dark side not just to what they have done, but in tavuchis’ formulation to who they are. governments may fear a backlash from those resentful of having their country’s image tarnished by an apology or somehow encouraging lawsuits for compensation. the ambiguous status of indigenous peoples in settler states creates added complications: they may view apologies and reconciliation differently than other wronged minorities because “the general thrust of most racial and ethnic groups and their members [in the u.s.] has been to seek inclusion . . . by contrast, the general thrust of most indigenous nations and their citizens… has been to retain their political and cultural exclusion from absorption or incorporation in the american polity…” (wilkins, 2007, p. 211). the desire for recognition and reconciliation but not necessarily 9 tager: apologies to indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2014 inclusion makes apologies to indigenous peoples especially hard to get right. the above cases suggest that apologies are more likely succeed when they involve a discrete set of wrongs. the u.s. apologies were diffuse; whereas government reports in canada and australia had focused attention on specific policies that had continued until fairly recently. aboriginal adults remained alive who had either attended canadian residential schools or were taken from their families as young children in australia. in the u.s. apologies, broad references to broken treaties and land thefts and to nineteenth century events, while deserving of an apology, had somewhat less immediate impact on people’s lives and perhaps gained less traction as a result. the canadian and australian apologies were thus timelier than the u.s. apologies. based on these cases, indigenous groups seeking an official apology should focus on a specific policy that inflicted harm until relatively recently; demand an inquiry by an expert panel, preferably convened by some government agency; and then be prepared to press the government for years until it produces an adequate apology. the impact of apologies on reconciliation remains uncertain. the apologies to indigenous peoples acknowledging past wrongs signal a repudiation of past attempts to assimilate indigenous peoples and extinguish their cultures. press reports of native reactions to the apologies, especially in canada and australia, indicate that they resonated emotionally for many. this cannot help but improve relations, although how much is unclear. as galanter (2002) observed, “as flawed as these efforts [to remedy old wrongs] are, unreflecting acquiescence in past injustice is worse. a patched and leaky vase may be less desirable than an unbroken vase, but is better than a pile of shards” (pp. 123 124). much depends on whether the apology boosts further reconciliation efforts or becomes only a means to placate native discontent. as one aboriginal leader observed on the australian apology’s first anniversary, it “provided the rudd government with a political shield against criticism of its failures in aboriginal affairs” (coates, 2009). paradoxically, howard’s refusal to apologize highlighted the problems facing aborigines over many years, whereas, after rudd’s apology, aboriginal issues became less salient, no longer subject to sharp partisan conflict. events since the apologies suggest that they do not necessarily guarantee or prevent reconciliation. in the united states, with its weak apology, the obama administration improved relations with indian tribes by finally settling the cobell lawsuit for $3.4 billion (savage, 2009). congress permanently reauthorized the indian health care improvement act as part of the affordable care act, which exempted indians from the individual mandate (landry, 2010). the 2013 reauthorization of the violence against women act enhanced tribal sovereignty by allowing tribes to prosecute non-indians living in indian country for crimes of domestic violence they commit there (ross-petherick, 2013). obama received a positive reception at the tribal summits he sponsored. despite their stronger apologies, a mixed picture characterizes native relations in australia and canada. rudd continued, to the resentment of many aboriginal peoples, the federal intervention in the northern territory that his predecessor, john howard, began in 2007 and ignored demands for native sovereignty and land rights (macfarlane, 2010). his successor, julia gillard, continued his aboriginal policies. in canada, tribal relations have recently grown more contentious as the native grassroots protest movement idle no more has spread, and the afn attacked a recent government budget bill that unilaterally changed the indian act when decisions impinging on treaty obligations are supposed to be made in consultation with the first nations (“time we stopped,” 2013). as canada tries to develop oil 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.7 and gas and mineral resources on northern lands, the first nations located there have the potential to present legal obstacles to that activity. of course, without the strong canadian apology, the government’s relations with indigenous peoples might have deteriorated more quickly. post-apology events in the three countries suggest a national apology opens a window for reconciliation, but cannot determine whether political elites then take advantage of the opening to make further progress and that a weak apology does not foreclose improving relations with indigenous peoples. 11 tager: apologies to indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2014 r e f e re n c e s acknowledgment and apology. united states senate committee on indian affairs 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(1996). shingwauk’s vision: a history of native residential schools. toronto: university of toronto press. milloy, j. (1999). a national crime: the canadian government and the residential school system, 1870 1996. winnipeg:university of manitoba press. mofina, r. (2000, december 26). chief wants school abuses aired in public hearings. ottawa citizen. retrieved from lexisnexis.com mollison, a. (2004, may 24). senator seeks official apology to american indians. cox news. retrieved from lexisnexis.com muldoon, p., & schaap, a. (2012). confounded by recognition: the apology, the high court and the aboriginal embassy in australia. in a. hirsch (ed.), theorizing post-conflict reconciliation (pp. 182 199). london: routledge. nason, d., & green, p. (1999, july 12). apology? don’t hold your breath. australian. retrieved from lexisnexis.com 15 tager: apologies to indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2014 nason, d., & jackson, s. (1999, july 14). aborigines split over apology. australian. retrieved from lexisnexis.com native leader demands residential schools apology. (2007, april 25). national post. retrieved from lexisnexis.com nichols, r. l. (1998). indians in the united states and canada: a comparative history. lincoln: university of nebraska. nobles, m. (2008). the politics of official apologies. cambridge: cambridge university press. official apologizes to indians. (june 22, 1991). globe and mail. retrieved from lexisnexis.com o’neil, p. (1998, january 8). natives say ottawa’s apology may sway judges in civil suits. vancouver sun. retrieved from lexisnexis.com president obama acknowledges need for native american apology. (2010, december 20). business wire. retrieved from lexisnexis.com rintoul, s. (2008, february 13). praise for rudd on choice of wording. the australian. retrieved from lexisnexis.com robbins, j. (2007). the howard government and indigenous rights: an imposed national unity? australian journal of political science, 42(2), 315 328. ross-petherick, c. (2013, march 27). attorney: tribal sovereignty strengthened by violence against women act. oklahoman. retrieved from lexisnexis.com roundup: aborigines lose ‘stolen generation’ court case. (2000, august 11). deutsche presse-agentur. retrieved from lexisnexis.com royal commission on aboriginal peoples. (1996). report of the royal commission on aboriginal peoples. ottawa: government of canada. sanders, w. (2006). “never even adequate: reconciliation and indigenous affairs.” in c. aulich & r. wettenhall, (eds.), howard’s second and third governments (pp. 152 172). sydney: university of new south wales press. savage, c. (2009, december 8). u.s. will settle indian lawsuit for $3.4 billion. new york times. retrieved from lexisnexis.com sen. brownback reintroduces native american apology. (2005, april 20). u.s. fed news. retrieved from lexisnexis.com sillars, l. (1998, november 16). agree with thine adversary quickly. british columbia report. retrieved from lexisnexis.com 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.7 simpson, j. (2005, june 3). pay, pay, pay: will the residential schools mess go away? globe and mail. retrieved at lexisnexis.com smith, d. (1995, october 1). $58 million study questioned. toronto star. retrieved from lexisnexis.com the ‘stolen generation’. (2000, april 4). sydney morning herald. retrieved from lexisnexis.com stuck again on an apology. (1999, june 7). sydney morning herald. retrieved from lexisnexis.com sullivan, r. (1998, may 27). australians atone for policies forcing aborigines from home. st. louis postdispatch. retrieved from lexisnexis.com sullivan, r. (2007, november 27). australia’s newly elected leader says he will apologize to aborigines. associated press. retrieved from lexisnexis.com switzer, m. (1997, march 28). pm should be doing better on native rights. toronto star. retrieved from lexisnexis.com tavuchis, n. (1991). mea culpa: a sociology of apology and reconciliation. stanford: stanford university press. thompson, a. (2001, september 7). summit ‘not very useful,’ chretien says. toronto star. retrieved from lexisnexis.com thompson, j. (2008). apology, justice, and respect: a critical defense of political apology. in m. gibney, r. howard-hassmann, j. m. coicaud, & n. steiner (eds.), the age of apology (pp. 154 167). philadelphia: university of pennsylvania press. tibbetts, j. (1998, january 7). ottawa apologizes for treatment of aboriginals; includes text of government statement. canadian press newswire. retrieved from lexisnexis.com time we stopped meeting like this. (2013). economist, 406(8819), 37 38. torpey, j. (2006). making whole what has been smashed: on reparations politics. cambridge: harvard university press. transcript of the prime minister the hon. john howard mp opening address to the australian reconciliation convention—melbourne (1997). pm transcripts, australian government, may 26. retrieved from www.pmtranscripts.dpmc.gov.au tsosie, r. (2006). the bia’s apology to native americans: an essay on collective memory and collective conscience. in e. barkan, & a. karn (eds.), taking wrongs seriously: apologies and reconciliation (pp. 185 212). stanford: stanford university press. u.s. says sorry to native americans. (2010, may 21). the advertiser. retrieved from lexisnexis.com 17 tager: apologies to indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2014 verdeja, e. (2009). unchopping a tree: reconciliation in the aftermath of political violence. philadelphia: temple university press. wilkins, d. (2007). american indian politics and the american political system. lanham, md: rowman & littlefield. 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 4 [2014], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.4.7 the international indigenous policy journal october 2014 apologies to indigenous peoples in comparative perspective michael tager recommended citation apologies to indigenous peoples in comparative perspective abstract keywords creative commons license apologies to indigenous peoples in comparative perspective effects of labour mobility: an analysis of recent international development literature the international indigenous policy journal volume 4 | issue 3 article 3 january 2013 effects of labour mobility: an analysis of recent international development literature manolo abella manolo.abella@me.com recommended citation abella, m. (2013). effects of labour mobility: an analysis of recent international development literature. th e international indigenous policy journal, 4(3) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.3 effects of labour mobility: an analysis of recent international development literature abstract successive censuses have shown that the aboriginal populations of canada are very mobile with strong tendencies to move to urban areas, but little is known about the consequences of these circular movements on the development of first nations, the welfare of individual members and their families, and the costs and benefits to their larger communities. this article reviews the large body of literature on the nexus between mobility and development of countries in the developing world with a view to developing insights that may be relevant to the development of first nation communities. while there are clear differences, the two contexts may be similar enough – in terms of socio-economic well-being, service levels, and institutional barriers to socio-economic development – for such analysis to contribute to understanding the effects of migration on the migrants themselves, their households, and their communities and countries of origin. the experience of developing countries suggest that there are positive gains not only in earnings but also in education and health for those who move internally and more so for those able to move internationally, even if there remain some concerns about negative effects on migrants’ families left behind, especially on the children. what seems clear is that migration plays an important role in family survival strategies. money migrants send home finance the education of children, enable better health care, and improve housing. they shield migrants’ families against all kinds of “shocks”. however, emigration may reduce the human capital stock (brain drain), thus adversely affecting productivity. the loss of health professionals can set back critical medical services in remote communities, and disrupt formal and informal systems for transferring know-how. these “spill-over effects” or externalities on origin communities can be significant, imposing burdens on those left behind. finally, the article looks at how diaspora communities have served as sources of information, linkages, or networks with businesses, markets for sovereign bonds, mediums for the transfer of technology and know-how, and a market for tourism. keywords aboriginal, labour, work, mobility, churn migration, urbanization creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ e f f e c t s o f l a b o u r m o b i l i t y : a n a n a l y s i s o f r e c e n t i n t e r n a t i o n a l d e v e l o p m e n t l i t e r a t u r e the aboriginal population, including the registered indian population, is very mobile. one aspect of this mobility is increasing urbanization. in the past few decades, the movement of registered indians between reserves and urban areas has been an important dimension of the migration patterns of registered indians. notably, this movement does not mark a mass exodus from reserves to cities. on the contrary, successive censuses from 1986 to 2006 have registered the net migration to first nation communities as positive (aboriginal affairs and northern development canada [aandc], n.d.). borrowing from analyses of mobility in the developing world, demographers in canada refer to “churn” or “turbulence” in describing the movement of first nations people between reserve and urban destinations (norris & clatworthy, 2003). various reasons for this movement have been offered. for example, the 1991 aboriginal people’s survey identified education as a major reason for leaving reserves. analysis of the aps also identified family and housing needs as reasons cited for both leaving and returning to reserves (peters & robillard, 2007). as a “pull” back to reserves, the rights and benefits associated with reserve residence (for example tax exemption, housing, use of aboriginal and/or treaty rights) are cited, as well as the notion that the reserve is a “cultural hearth” providing family, community, and cultural supports (norris, cooke, beavon, guimond, & clatworthy, 2004). less mention has been made of the search for work as a factor in the movement from reserves to cities, just as little research exists on the movement of registered indians as workers between reserves and cities. we know from the canadian census, the labour force survey, and studies such as the urban aboriginal people’s study that first nations people are also moving for this reason. what are some of the costs and benefits of the movement of labour between cities and reserves – for individuals and for their home communities? a fruitful initial approach to these questions may be to examine the large body of international development literature analyzing the experience of migrant workers in the developing world. there are of course clear differences between the developing world and the first nation context: registered indians, for example, are obviously not “guests” in cities that are in many cases located in their traditional territories. yet, past research indicates that the two contexts may be similar enough – in terms of socioeconomic well-being, service levels, and institutional barriers to development – for such analysis to contribute to future research. with these similarities in mind, the objective of this article is to craft a high quality, summary analysis of international literature that centres on trends and effects of labour mobility in developing countries. the focus is on movement from rural communities to larger urban centres, including migration across national borders with the intent of developing a better appreciation of the potential costs and benefits of migration between cities and first nation reserves in canada. the organization of the article proceeds as follows. first, we focus on trends in labour mobility, highlighting significant facts established by research about the mobility of workers within countries and neighbouring regions, as well as to more distant destinations, and the economic and non-economic 1 abella: effects of labour mobility published by scholarship@western, 2013 factors identified as possible explanations. the next section reviews research findings on the more direct and identifiable effects of migration on the migrants themselves, their households, their communities and countries of origin, and how national policies make a difference to outcomes. third, we turn our attention to the macro impacts of migration including a summary of the research on the effects of remittances on the origin country. fourth, we present an assessment of migration costs and benefits including the difficult challenge of determining the positive and negative externalities of migration. the following section summarizes a fast growing literature on the role of diaspora in the development of home countries. finally, we identify issues for future policy-oriented research of relevance to first nation communities including, wherever applicable, theoretical frameworks and analytical models that have proven helpful in testing various hypotheses about economic and social consequences of mobility. t r e n d s i n l a b o u r m o b i l i t y historical comparisons of mobility are difficult to make because of dearth of data, but the rural to urban movements in early 19th century europe are now well documented, as well as the massive movements of people across the atlantic from europe and africa to settle the americas. in great britain, the mid1800s saw more than one out of every three rural residents leave for an urban area (long & ferrie, 2003). today, there is a general perception that mobility of workers is again on the rise everywhere. the massive movement of workers from the rural hinterlands to the cities has recently been seen in china during its dramatic transformation from an underdeveloped agricultural economy to a modern industrial giant, and in the middle east where foreign workers have been imported from asian and african countries by the hundreds of thousands every year since the mid-1970s to convert petro-dollars into modern infrastructures (castles & miller, 1993). the 1980s have also seen a spike in migration to north america and in the 1990s to western europe after the collapse of the former soviet union and the expansion of the european union (eu) to more member states (martin, abella, & kuptsch, 2006). contributing further to this perception of growing mobility is the rapid rise of mega-cities in the developing world like mumbai, mexico city, and shanghai where the economies of agglomeration are playing themselves out with important consequences for global movements of capital and trade (shlomo, sheppard, & civco, 2005). in spite of strong attachment to their traditional homelands, indigenous populations in some countries are also observed to be highly mobile. many, especially among the youth, are migrating or commuting from their “reserves” to cities in pursuit of higher education, employment, or simply to experience a different lifestyle. in canada, two-thirds of métis households are already in urban centers with most of future growth in their numbers already projected to occur in urban areas (indian and northern affairs, 2007). greater exposure of the indigenous groups to mainstream society is seen by some observers as a positive trend (graham & levesque, 2010). it enables many to escape from a culture of dependency and to acquire skills and aptitudes likely to contribute to the development of their origin communities. a r e p e o p l e b e c o m i n g m o r e m o b i l e ? for the preparation of its 2009 human development report, the united nations development programme (undp) commissioned a number of experts to look at the evidence of growing intensity of 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.3 population mobility, its consequences and implications for development policy (undp, 2009).1 these studies revealed the enormous complexities involved in making cross-national comparisons of mobility and the limits to analysis of historical trends due to dearth of information about its past dimensions. countries differ in their sources of information, the reference period they used, and the periodicity of their censuses. however, the most problematic for purposes of comparison, particularly in measuring the intensity of internal migration, is the absence of a common spatial scale. for example, an interprovincial movement in vietnam may involve only a few kilometers, but it may entail over a thousand kilometers in canada. migration intensity may look high for two countries of the same size if one is divided into many more zones than the other. data on previous residence and current duration, according to bell and muhidin (2009), can only be used effectively to measure comparable migration if both questions refer to the same spatial scale. the undp took a sample of 24 countries with a combined population equal to 57% of the world’s population. adopting a conservative definition of internal migration (counting movement across only the largest zone demarcations in a country), it estimated that the number of people who move internally is six times greater than those who emigrate (undp, 2009). from these estimates, the undp (2009) arrived at a global estimate of 740 million for internal migrants people living within their home country but outside their region of birth. these internal migrants represent 12.5% of the global population. estimates of international migrants are much smaller, placed at around 200 million, or just about 3% of the global population. one major conclusion of the undp studies is that “contrary to conventional wisdom, and widespread assertion, there is no evidence that the incidence of mobility in the world is undergoing an inexorable rise, at least not so far as it is captured in measures of permanent migration at the inter-regional level . . .” (bell & muhidin, 2009, p. 49). w h o a r e m o r e m o b i l e ? some countries, like china, did experience more intense movements than others. from 1990 to 2005 about 80 million chinese workers and their families were estimated to have migrated to another province (chan, 2009). taking into account all types of internal movements, the economist (“the impact of chinese migration,” 2012) reported: “... all told, some 230 million chinese spend most of the year away from home town or village. this is almost a third of all people globally estimated by the un to be migrating within the borders of their own country” (para. 2). by contrast, canada has one of the lowest rates of internal mobility. inter-provincial migration has been on a seminal decline from about 1.8% of the population moving across provinces in 1973 to less than 1% in 2011 (basher & fachin, 2008; td economics, 2011). in its 1999 world population monitoring report, the united nations (2000) examined population statistics from a sample of countries in various regions. it concluded that the propensity to migrate was higher in latin america and the caribbean (lac) than in asia, and that women were more prominent in lac migration streams than in other developing area. according to bell and muhidin (2009), this was arrived at after comparing internal migration propensities and trends across 15 countries in asia, africa, and latin america. comparability was a serious weakness since the assembled data included both lifetime and fixed interval measures and the data for individual countries differed widely in level of spatial 1 the reports based on these studies are available from the undp website at http://hdr.undp.org/en/reports/global/hdr2009/ 3 abella: effects of labour mobility published by scholarship@western, 2013 resolution. the report also compared available evidence on the intensity of rural-urban migration and found that the rate of rural outmigration rose strongly in asia from the 1960s to the 1980s, accounting for two-thirds of urban growth in the region. rural-urban migration was estimated to have fallen in africa and in latin america and the caribbean it rose and then fell during the same period. h o w f a r d o m o s t p e o p l e m o v e a n d w h y ? seasonal migration is an aspect of mobility that is not well captured by periodic censuses but is known to have a long history in some regions and said to be on the rise by others (ellis, 1998). it is considered integral to the coping, survival, and livelihood strategies of families in the tribal areas of western india (gadgil & guha, 1995), among the subsistence farmers in burkina faso (konsiega, 2007), and in the sahel region of west africa. while it is often the consequence of environmental crises, some researchers argue that seasonal migration has much to do with relations of dependency and indebtedness, which subsistence failure entails (mosse et al., 2002). seasonal migration offers opportunities for meeting contingencies not so much due to declining production but to systems of usurious money lending, labour contracting, and exploitation. movement of people across national borders is constrained by state policies and are understandably smaller than internal movements. the un estimate of 214 million stock of international migrants in 2010 is widely assumed to be conservative and represents an average rate of growth of only 1.1% a year over almost a half century (1960 to 2005) (undp, 2009). its share of the world population has remained the same (2.7% in both 1960 and 2005), excluding the former soviet union and czechoslovakia.2 “most migration occurs within countries in the same category of development: about 60% of migrants move either between developing or between developed countries...” (undp, 2009, p. 2).3 nearly half of all international migrants move within their region of origin and nearly 40% move to a neighbouring country. about 6 out of 10 move to a country with same religion and 4 out of 10 move to a country with same language. over the period from 1960 to 2005, there has been a slight rise in the proportion of females among migrants in africa (from 43.1 to 47.8%), and in latin america and caribbean (from 44.6 to 48.4%) (undp, 2009). while the search for a better life is one of the main motive forces for migration, poverty has remained its main constraint. migration is a costly enterprise; hence, most can only afford to move to nearby cities within their countries or to a neighbouring state. academic observers of migration use the term “migration hump” to refer to the phenomenon whereby propensities to migrate are smaller at low levels of per capita income, but rise progressively as per capita income rises until it reaches a plateau and then subsequently declines (martin & taylor, 1994). the undp’s (2009) examination of migration by region and level of development between 2000 and 2002 showed that emigration rates were low for some of the richest countries, such as canada and the us (north america), but the pattern is not clear for other regions and levels of development, suggesting the factors behind propensities to migrate are many and income may not always be decisive. in europe, the existence of many national borders and a policy of free movement among eu states and among commonwealth of independent states (cis) 2 adding them would mean including as international migrants nationals of former member states who were not earlier considered as such; hence, the percentage rises from 2.6 to 3.0 of the world population. 3 in 2010, about half of all international migrants were residing in one of the rich (oecd) countries with about 50 million in us and canada, and 69 million in europe. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.3 explain the high-recorded rates of emigration. emigration rates from small countries (e.g., 45.3% for antigua and barbados) are notably higher than from big countries (e.g., 0.5% for china). finally, security and human rights differences add to migration pressures. martin et al. (2006) noted that, after the global conflict between capitalism and communism ended in the early 1990s, local conflicts erupted in many areas, leading to separatist movements, new nations, and more migrants as in the former yugoslavia and the former soviet union. in their words “...the emergence of new nations is almost always accompanied by migration, as populations are reshuffled so that the ‘right’ people are inside the ‘right’ borders” (p. 11). s u m m a r y the conceptual and practical difficulties in comparing measures of population mobility across countries preclude sweeping generalisations, but it is safe to say that current rates of mobility in some countries and regions are by no means historically unique. available evidence points to the heterogeneity of situations among countries belonging to different levels of development and many factors contribute to the intensity of mobility. research confirms that mobility within countries is much more intense than across countries for easily understandable reasons: it is costly to migrate and nation states control their borders. finally, even at low levels of income, imbalances in the geography of economic growth (as witnessed in china), as well as political changes (like the fragmentation of the soviet union), can induce intense mobility. d i r e c t c o n s e q u e n c e s o f m i g r a t i o n there is an a priori expectation that people, unless forced by violence or victimised by criminal syndicates, would only move if they can improve their well-being or welfare. it is, thus, widely taken for granted that migration, internal and especially international, leads to positive changes for the migrants, even taking into account the fact that there are instances of exploitation and discrimination. most empirical research indicates that migrants generally “gain” from moving (clemens, 2010). country-level studies based on comparing incomes of migrants before and after migration invariably show significant improvements in migrants’ conditions, whether this is in terms of earnings, consumption, housing, or children’s education.4 there may be contradictory effects on household income, where departure of a member reduces labour and leads to a decline in farm output, but this is counterbalanced by remittances received.5 the gains in earning power of emigrants to other countries, especially to the more developed ones, are well documented. these gains were captured by studies of migrant assimilation in the receiving countries, as well as by more recent investigations in origin countries on the impact of migrants’ remittances on the welfare of families left behind. 4 most empirical studies rely on general-purpose surveys like household income and expenditure surveys, which may provide information on remittances and incomes, and expenditures for consumption, housing, education, and health, but they do not contain leads to other consequences that are harder to quantify. 5 taylor and rozelle (2003) found that farm output declined in rural china, but remittances increased per capita household income by between 14% and 63%. 5 abella: effects of labour mobility published by scholarship@western, 2013 m e a s u r i n g t h e g a i n s f r o m m o v i n g i n t e r n a l l y we first look at the evidence on the direct impact of internal migration on the migrants and their families. one recent study in bolivia found that workers, even with only 5 years of schooling, who moved from the countryside to the cities, experienced more than a 4 fold increase in income (molina & yanez, 2009). in spite of the rich literature on rural-urban migration, there are relatively few studies making cross-country comparisons of impacts on migrants. with a view to filling this gap, the undp commissioned studies seeking to establish a link, if any, between internal mobility and level of human development.6 one of these studies took a sample of 16 developing countries and calculated the human development index (hdi) for internal migrants and non-migrants.7 harttgen and klasen (2009), who undertook the study, computed the three basic dimensions of hdi – life expectancy, education, and per capita gdp – and the overall hdi rating for different population sub-groups. they found that differences in human development between internal migrants and non-migrants within countries could be substantial, although generally much smaller than differences in human development by income groups. internal migrants generally show a higher human development than non-migrants. of the 16 countries, 14 showed a higher value of the hdi for internal migrants than for non-migrants. the largest effect on the overall hdi index comes from the gdp index and the lowest effect comes from the life expectancy index. disaggregating the analysis by urban and rural areas they found that urban internal migrants are better off than urban non-migrants and rural migrants are better off than rural nonmigrants. guatemala and zambia were the only countries that had higher indices for non-migrants compared to migrants. in both countries, per capita incomes and adult literacy rates for non-migrants are higher than for migrants, but these may have to be viewed in context very specific to the two countries.8 based on the general findings of the study, the authors are careful to point out that the method they used is susceptible to selection bias, since the internal migrants constitute a non-random sample of the population. the people who migrate may have characteristics which, had they stayed in their usual residence, also performed well in the index. empirical investigations into the impact of migration pose special challenges for a number of reasons. migration is a dynamic process involving actors who are very likely self-selected: movers are more ambitious, more willing to take risks, and have better skills and abilities than non-movers. these are referred to as “unobserved variables” that are impossible to control for if one has to work with crosssectional data to compare certain observed parameters on migrants with those on non-migrants at one point in time. ideally, one should be able to isolate the impact of the act of “moving” from other variables by looking at changes in the situation of the same individual before and after migrating, and comparing them with “stayers” with the same observable characteristics. researchers rarely have the option of using experimental or longitudinal data, which would allow one to follow the same sample units over a long enough period to assess changes. the closest one gets is to work with panel data in general-purpose 6 for a complete list of commissioned studies go to http://hdr.undp.org/en/reports/global/hdr2009/papers/ 7 the hdi index was developed by the undp in order to take into account, in addition to gdp per capita, other parameters of development including health and life expectancy, literacy and education, standard of living (e.g. access to potable water), employment, gender equality, political participation, and power over resources. 8 in these cases, migration was forced on people due to violent civil wars. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.3 surveys specially constructed to show changes over time.9 in canada, studies on the impact of internal migration have benefited from the availability of panel data extracted from the longitudinal administrative data (lad) based on individual tax returns over many years (bernard, finnie, and st. jean, 2008; see also statistics canada, n.d.). the findings on the positive impact of internal migration on the migrants are consistent with those found in canada using lad. several studies show that many, especially youth, move to richer provinces where wages and salaries are much higher than in their places of birth (see coulombe, 2006; finnie, 2001). according to bernard et al. (2008), migration is driven largely by economic opportunities, as evidenced by the fact that the two richest provinces, ontario and alberta, are preferred destinations. they found that male migrants, on average, experienced an earnings growth of 15% from the year prior to migration to the year following migration, compared with 8% for non-migrants. the growth in earnings among younger migrants was significantly higher than for older groups, suggesting that age matters in integrating successfully in the labour market. finnie (2001) also cites the work of osberg, gordon, and lin (1994), who based their investigation on labour market activity surveys (lmas) data for the 1986 to 1987 period and found that males who moved from one region (not province) to another had significantly greater 1 year increases in earnings than did non-migrants (22.8% versus 9.0%), while female movers had only slightly greater increases compared to female non-migrants (15.0% versus 13.2%). their results point to sizable returns to migration for men, but only marginal gains for women. no cross-country comparisons of the impact of remittances from internal migrants was found, but in china, a cross-sectional study of rural households by zhu, wu, du, and cai (2012) found that the marginal propensity to save out of remittances is well below half of that out of other sources of incomes. the authors claim that other recent studies in china also found no link between migration and productive investment. b e t t e r h e a l t h o u t c o m e s i n m o v i n g t o t h e c i t i e s in most of the developing world, the phenomenon of increasing urbanisation is widely associated with improvements in children’s health, because rural areas lag behind urban areas with respect to the availability of child health care services, both preventive and curative (harpham et al., 2004). migration can become an important determinant of child mortality. in india, keshri and bhagat (2011) analyzed the differentials of mortality rates and child health care utilization among different migrant and nonmigrant groups (natives) using india’s third round of the national family health survey (nfhs-3, 2005 2006). they found large differences among groups: urban natives, rural-to-urban migrants, and rural natives, with the latter being the most disadvantaged as shown by infant mortality rates and access to curative care. this is probably one important reason for the growth of rural-urban migration in some developing countries, despite the fact that most migrants end up living in squalid slum areas. only a few studies explored questions related to the impact of internal migration on such matters as health and emotional well-being of the migrants and their families. finding panel data from family life 9 some countries do conduct family life surveys, which are multi-purpose surveys to track socio-economic, demographic, and health transitions in households over time. for an illustration see deb and papa (2009). 7 abella: effects of labour mobility published by scholarship@western, 2013 surveys in indonesia and mexico, deb and seck (2009)10 sought to measure such effects and found that in both countries migrant households are much more likely to report a higher prevalence of morbidity than non-migrants. they speculate that this may be due to the need to acclimatize to the place of destination and the greater stress that migration usually imposes on all household members. w o r k e r s m o v i n g t o w h e r e t h e y c a n b e m o r e p r o d u c t i v e because of differences in labour productivity among sectors, transfers of labour from less to more productive sectors should lead to higher overall growth of the economy. there are economy-wide gains when markets are not segregated and labour is not restrained from moving to where it can earn higher wages. mobility of labour allows producers to respond to the market for new products and services or to adopt and apply new technologies. a 2005 world bank study in china found that moving 5% of labour out of agriculture is associated with a 3.3% increase in gdp, and moving 5% of rural labour to urban areas is associated with an average 2.5% increase in gdp. gains are much higher if the reallocation of labour is to western and central regions compared to the eastern and northeastern regions. paci, tiongson, walewski, liwinski, and stoilkova (2007) illustrate how transfers of capital and of labour both serve as adjustment mechanisms when growth is concentrated in certain regions, and where governments intervene by redistributing tax revenues through its expenditure programs. adjustments take the form of changes in the flow and wages of workers and flow of capital. how much of the adjustments will take the form of migration decisions of workers or location decisions of firms will depend on government policies (public services, the availability of land, cost of housing and transport) and, for the firms, on the technology they use, the source of raw materials, proximity to markets, and other economies of agglomeration. governments seek to achieve balanced development throughout their territories but this is seldom attained because of the unbalanced distribution of natural resources like minerals and fertile soil, geographical characteristics that favour certain areas for harbours, as well as mistaken economic and social policies. through the way it designs its tax policies and the priorities it sets for spending tax revenues, governments are increasingly playing the lead role in influencing decisions of workers and enterprises. a world bank study of internal migration in central europe and baltic countries identified a number of areas where policy may be needed in order to enhance labour mobility (paci et al., 2007). these are: • encouraging commuting (rather than migration) by reducing the transport costs of commuting in terms of money and time. this includes improvements in infrastructure (e.g., roads, railways), as well as enhanced efficiency of the market for transport services via a combination of private provision and public regulation. • improving availability of housing, especially rental housing, for workers on temporary contracts and their families. • investing in education and lifelong learning, which may facilitate the adjustment process because workers acquire the necessary skills to find jobs in more dynamic regions and move away from lagging parts of the country. 10 see also harttgen and klasen (2009). 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.3 • enhancing the flexibility in labor markets by facilitating the flow of labor from lagging regions to booming regions by: (a) ensuring that workers have the skills required for the newly created jobs, and (b) lowering the monetary and time costs of commuting. for those left behind in lagging regions, a policy package designed to support job creation, encourage capital to move into the area, and enhance productivity is critical. within the eu8 countries, policy measures designed to promote wage flexibility in local labor markets such as through minimum wages differentiated by age or region, and decentralized wage bargaining systems are a critical component of this package. • ensuring that social protection does not inhibit mobility. for example, generous unemployment and welfare benefits may serve to dampen labor mobility by reducing unemployed workers’ incentives to look for employment and raising their reservation wages. the long-term impact of migration on origin communities, especially when those who move out are usually younger, better educated, more skilled, and more enterprising members, has received scant attention in the literature. emigration may starve origin communities of the very people needed to improve the local economy. remittances from migrants will finance increased consumption levels, but would not necessarily lead to increasing productive capacity since this depends on human resources. if migration is to improve economic conditions in origin areas, remittances must do more than make up for the loss in productivity resulting from the departure of workers. some must also go into investments in productive assets. g r e a t e r g a i n s f r o m m o v i n g a c r o s s b o r d e r s in this section, we draw insights from the results of studies on the direct impact of external or international migration on the main participants, namely the migrants themselves and their immediate families or households. we look at changes in earning capacities, apparent motivations for remitting money home, impact on consumption, investment in education, housing and health services, and how increased incomes affect the incentive to work for the other household members. most of the evidence on migrants’ earnings is based on studies undertaken in host countries on the performance of immigrants and their assimilation in the labour market. with respect to the impact on families left behind, most studies tend to lean heavily on measuring the impact of migrants’ remittances, rather than simply of the act of migrating, because the relationship between the former and its outcomes are quantitatively easier to establish. a few studies addressed the more general issue of how migration played a role in the survival of populations constantly challenged by a harsh environment. ellis (1998) and konseiga (2007) both studied migration’s role in survival strategies of rural households in sub-saharan africa. observing how sub-saharan families developed a diverse portfolio of activities and social support capabilities to survive, ellis (1998) used his study to argue for removing constraints to and expanding opportunities for diversification of livelihood means for the poor, including cross-border migration. konseiga (2007) found from studying migration from burkina faso to cote d’ivoire that households benefited from opportunities created by regional integration and free movement arrangements. one study in bangladesh found evidence that migration provides the resources needed to raise farm productivity. 9 abella: effects of labour mobility published by scholarship@western, 2013 mendola (2008) found that wealthier rural households that were able to engage in international migration were more likely than others to employ modern farming technology and raise output. poorer households that were only able to engage in internal migration were unable to do the same and were stuck with low-productivity technology. how much do people gain by moving across borders? ortega (cited in undp, 2009) estimated that migrants who came from countries rated as having low hdi gained the most by moving to an oecd country (as much as us $13,736 in annual income). as to be expected, those who moved from countries already rated high in hdi did not gain very much by moving (difference in annual income of only us $2,480). the gain, on average, for those moving from a medium hdi country to an oecd country is about 4 times such as the migrant workers in the us. these comparisons will have to be interpreted with caution due to the fact that unobservable factors may be positively correlated with migration. ortega used an estimation procedure that sought to make the subject populations more comparable. the degree to which migrants are assimilated in host countries is usually based on how their incomes approximate the national average. there are already many surveys of the literature on the assimilation of migrants in most oecd countries (borjas, 1993; chiswick & miller, 1992; dustmann, 1997; dustmann & fabbri, 2005; dustmann & von soest, 2002). studies on how permanent immigrants in the us and canada fared in the labour market all tended to show that over time, after acquiring language skills and local knowledge, most become assimilated (see aydemir & sweetman, 2007; card, dinardo, & estes, 1998; walters, phythian, & anisef, 2007). as expected, education is a key aspect of integration and occupational mobility in the host country. for example, those who are highly skilled, such as indian software engineers, immediately benefited from relocating, even with temporary visas to the us, where wages are more than 3 times what they received at home (commander, chanda, kangasniemi, & winters, 2008). what has received less attention is identifying which types of assimilation policies bring about faster convergence and how. few assessments have been done, for instance, on the effectiveness of language training in improving job searches and earnings. in their study of immigrants in sweden, aslund and rooth (2007) suggested that earnings assimilation depends on the economic conditions that immigrants face when entering the country. for the us and canada, the evidence on this is still ambiguous (chiswick & miller, 1992). h o w o n e m i g r a t e s m a t t e r s t o g a i n s in the us, niimi and ozden (2008) found significant under-placement of central american migrants who had college educations in their home countries. for example, only 33% of college-educated migrants from mexico ended up in high-skilled jobs in the us and 23% were in medium-skill jobs. this means that 44% of college-educated mexicans work in unskilled jobs. those from the caribbean and south america were noticeably better placed. matoo, neagu, and ozden (2005) found similar evidence of “under-utilisation” of migrants in other parts of the world and cited two possible reasons. one is the lower quality of tertiary education in some origin countries and the other is the way the migration becomes self-selective, depending on how it is organized. those from mexico and central america were very likely selected by family members already in the us and migrated clandestinely; while those from the caribbean and south america were very likely recruited by us employers or applied for immigration through regular channels. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.3 most contemporary labour migration in asia and the middle east is organized by private recruitment brokers or intermediaries. while many female domestic workers, especially from the philippines, may be over-qualified for their jobs, a large majority of migrant workers are placed in jobs for which they have been trained (e.g., construction workers, seafarers, it professionals, hotel and tourism workers, etc.). workers are typically recruited for jobs abroad offering 3 to as much as 10 times higher wages than what they received at home, but most have to pay such huge fees to job-brokers and “sponsors” to get their jobs that it often takes anywhere from 3 to 10 months wages abroad to recover (abella, 2004; shah, 1996). research in origin countries nevertheless shows that migrants’ households have done much better than non-migrants in economic terms. in the philippines, ducanes (2011) showed that households that were able to send a member abroad as a migrant worker climbed up from 6.9 to 8.8 percentage points in the per capita income ranking and from 4.5 to 5.9 percentage points in the per capita expenditure ranking. migrating for employment evidently plays an important role in social mobility. the international labour office (ilo) has been monitoring the treatment and conditions of employment of migrant workers around the world, especially those most vulnerable to exploitation and abusive treatment like female domestic helpers, construction labour, and plantation workers. a report prepared for the 2004 international labour conference concluded that migrant workers, especially those admitted as temporary workers, faced multiple disadvantages (ilo, 2004). temporary workers have limited legal rights to equal treatment (e.g., wages, social security, right to organize). some, like domestic service workers, are excluded from the protective cover of labour laws. most can find employment only in sectors where wages are squeezed because producers are at the highly competitive end of global production chains. h o w a r e f a m i l i e s a f f e c t e d b y m i g r a t i o n ? while the psychosocial effects of migration on migrants and the families they leave behind are just as real as the financial rewards, there has been much less research on the subject (hugo, 2002; yeoh & lam, 2006). the few studies that have been undertaken focused on the possible negative impacts on the education of children and their performance in school. the assumption is that there are two countervailing effects of migration: one is positive, since increased income means relaxing any budget constraints on spending for schooling; the other is negative because the absence of a parent means less supervision and pressure to keep up with school work and more responsibility for housework. the evidence is mixed and suggests that effects are context specific. examining the issue in rural pakistan, mansuri (2006) found that children in migrant households were not only more likely to attend school, but they were also more likely to stay in school and accumulate more years of schooling in comparison to their counterparts in non-migrant households in the same village. they were also less likely to be involved in economic work. moreover, the educational gain from migration was also larger for girls than for boys. similar positive effects of remittances on educational spending, and thus schooling, was found by deshingkar and akter (2009) in india, kuhn (2006) in bangladesh, cox-edwards and ureta (2003) in el salvador, calero, bedi and sparrow (2008) in ecuador, hanson and woodruff (2003) and lopezcordova (2005) in mexico, and lu and treiman (2007) in south africa. 11 abella: effects of labour mobility published by scholarship@western, 2013 however, mckenzie and rapoport (2006) found a negative effect of migration on school attendance and attainment among 16 to 18-year-old girls in rural mexico due to increased housework. living in a migrant household also lowered the probability of younger boys completing junior middle school and of older boys completing high school. they attributed the latter to the prospect of migration to the us. since the returns to an illegal immigrant are very low, few are motivated to pursue further studies. this confirmed the findings of an earlier study by kandel and kap (2001) in mexico. in albania, a study by giannelli and mangiavacchi (2010) evaluated the effect of parental migration and found that it has a disruptive effect on school attendance and is correlated with higher risk of becoming a school drops-out. increasing poverty has forced many men to emigrate for work such that between 1990 and 2005 more than 1 out of every 5 children under 18 years of age have been left behind. a similar negative effect was noted in rural china by xuefei wang (2011), which was especially strong among boys. some societies appear to adjust better to the contingencies imposed by emigration. the philippines has experienced very large outflows of contract workers over the past three decades and, in recent years, more than half of departing migrants are women. in spite of the feared disruptive effects of parental absence on children, studies have found no evidence of negative impact, at least on their education. children in migrant households had higher levels of enrolment and lower dropout rates and girls were able to improve their school performance (parreñas, 2005). battistella and gastardo-conaco (1998) found a positive relationship between being in a migrant household and academic performance. yang (2006) found that migration and remittances led to an increased probability of school attendance and reduced child labour. bryant (2005) found that remittances enabled migrant children to attend private schools, which were better than public schools. the existence of extended families (i.e., grandmothers or aunts who are usually filling in for the absent parent) was credited with this more positive experience. i m p a c t o f r e m i t t a n c e s o n f a m i l y w e l f a r e the earliest literature on migration assumed that mutual caring is the prime motivation for remittances sent home. money is sent home to improve the family’s welfare in its various dimensions more and better food, longer schooling of children and other family members, housing improvements, more leisure time, and so on. money is also sent home as a way to protect the family against natural (drought or typhoons) or financial (drop in price crops, loss of employment, illness) shocks. hence, migration has always been seen as an essential part of family survival strategies and remittances are its principal manifestation. more recently attention has also focused on other possible motivations behind remittances, including paying back previous investment of the family in the migrant’s education, compensating for the services of family members who take care of migrant’s children left behind, or selfserving ones, such as insuring that one maintains entitlement to inheriting family assets. other studies have looked at how remittances may be aimed at investments to provide income or self-employment upon return. much of academic interest in remittances, especially among economists, has been in testing one or more hypotheses about the strength of these possible motivations. the assumption usually made is that from patterns of remitting (levels, regularity, etc.) one can discern the motivation of the remitter. do households with lower domestically sourced incomes receive more remittances than those with higher incomes? are remittances countercyclical, rising when domestic incomes drop and declining when incomes rise? do remittances decrease where there are other remitting members from the same 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.3 household? in the face of volatility in agricultural incomes and idiosyncratic risks, are migration and remittances a means to stabilise levels of family consumption? does the timing of remittance depend on the migrant’s time-discount factor and earnings profile abroad?11 there are also various hypotheses on how remittance behaviour suggests the intention and timing of a migrant’s return. apart from what they reveal about the motivations behind remittances, these studies have been instructive in assembling considerable factual evidence on what happens to the conditions of migrants’ families or households compared to those of non-migrants. the general approach to testing these hypotheses is to estimate remittance functions and from there look for explanations for differences in remittance behaviour, the probability of remitting, and the level of remittances. for example, in his study of remittances sent to nicaragua and el salvador, funkhouser (1995) noted that, while the number of migrants and the general economic conditions in the two countries were very similar, twice as many households received remittances from relatives abroad in san salvador than in managua. moreover, for those who received remittances, the average transfer received in san salvador was twice as high as in managua. he found that these differences could not be accounted for by differences in households or migrants’ observed characteristics (age, education, gender, years since migration). it was only after he estimated remittance functions that he could find explanations for the differences in remittance behaviour. his theoretical model treated as separate the decision to migrate and the decision to remit. unobserved variables in the decision to remit (i.e., educated salvadorians were more likely to return compared to nicaraguans) may explain the difference. empirical studies of remittances are, however, dogged by many methodological and data problems that undermine their contribution to building our knowledge. for example, remittances combine several components altruism, repayment-of-loans, insurance, inheritance, and exchange of a variety of services – but, according to rapoport and docquier (2006), it is extremely difficult to empirically discriminate between them. most studies regress remittances on a set of variables, but any sign of these relations may be interpreted in a number of ways and the additional information needed to implement more discriminate tests is rarely available in sufficient detail. r e m i t t a n c e s a f f e c t s a v i n g s b e h a v i o u r nevertheless, some arguments and findings from studies of remittance behaviour provide useful insights into how savings behaviour of migrants may be affected. one study by djajic and milbourne (1988) found that the savings behaviour of temporary migrants would differ from that of permanent migrants and natives because their marginal utility of consumption is likely to be higher in their home country than in the host country or because economic conditions in the two countries are likely to differ in the future (galor & stark, 1990). decisions of migrants about how much to save and when to return depend crucially on expectations about future income streams assuming one returns or opts to stay (dustmann, 1997). savings behaviour may also be influenced by the fact that interest rates are likely to differ between the origin and the host country (karayalcin, 1994). 11 some researchers reason that frequent and regular remittances reflect altruistic motives (to smoothen the family’s consumption), whereas less regularity means other motives such as for insurance (e.g., entitlement to inheritance) are stronger. viewing migration as a contractual arrangement, erfe (2007) hypothesized that wealthier families have greater bargaining power than poorer ones in pressuring the migrant member to remit more; hence, remittances may actually rise with the receiving household’s wealth but may taper off over time. 13 abella: effects of labour mobility published by scholarship@western, 2013 the savings behaviour of remittance-receiving households is expected to differ depending on whether the higher income is considered to be transitory or permanent. in countries where households face substantial risks from climate variability or macroeconomic instability, one may hypothesise that households will use remittances to smooth out consumption. ersado, alwang, and alderman (2000) studied at how households adapted to such risks in zimbabwe, where poverty increased during the 1990s and vulnerability has grown, by looking at savings and consumption behaviour before and after shocks. they found that before droughts and structural adjustments, households treated remittances as transitory income and displayed a high propensity to save out of it. however, they consumed the majority of both permanent and transitory income in the period following these shocks. the authors concluded that prolonged periods of drought and instability have led to limiting the ability of households to mitigate risks. d o h i g h e r i n c o m e s r e d u c e p a r t i c i p a t i o n i n t h e w o r k f o r c e ? do remittances have a disincentive effect on labour force participation? in other words, do they take members of recipient households out of the labour market? we have already seen that studies in pakistan and elsewhere revealed that school-age children in migrant households were less likely to be involved in economic activity compared to those of non-migrant households. however, they do not seem to affect the labour force participation of working age members except the old. a study in moldova by görlich, mahmoud, and trebesch (2007) found weak evidence of disincentive effects: young and middle-aged members of migrant households are not more likely than those of non-migrant households to be unemployed and not looking for work. however, they noted a labour-substitution effect through which previously inactive members were more likely to be engaged in home production, and an education effect where more members are likely to be in university. the study did find that there was a small disincentive effect for older (51 to 64-years-old) household members of migrant households, an understandable consequence of migration. in the philippines some researchers argued that remittances had the effect of raising reservation wages and lowering participation (tullao, cortez, & see, 2004), but participation was shown to, in fact, be higher if members still in school were excluded and the employment of the migrant was taken into account (ducanes & abella, 2008). because of the migrant’s departure, there may be a temporary disruption of the household’s economic activity. hence, migration and remittances may have multiple and contradictory effects on household income. from a small, non-representative sample of rural households in china, taylor and rozelle (2003) examined the impact of internal migration and remittances on crop and household income. controlling for endogeneity and selection, the authors found that when a migrant leaves a household, crop yields fall and crop income declines by about 33%, but the remittances sent home by the migrant have a positive, countervailing effect. finding that each yuan in remittances is associated with 1.36 yuan of additional crop income, the authors concluded that farm households purchase additional inputs from remittances received and to substitute capital for labor. s u m m a r y there is evidence from research that gains, not only in earnings but also in education and health, are positive for those who move internally and more so for those with the resources to move internationally. in the case of the latter, accompanying risks, which depend on to which countries they go and how they 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.3 enter, lessens the gains. there is suspicion that migration has negative effects on migrants’ families left behind, especially on children, but the few studies undertaken on the subject fail to confirm the suspicion. the children of rural to urban migrants who accompany their parents gain access to better health services. children left behind by parents who go to work abroad appear to stay longer in school and obtain more education because remittances ease budget constraints. studies show that migration plays an important role in family survival strategies because remittances shield them against all kinds of “shocks.” research findings on the savings behaviour of remittance receiving households are, however, less definitive. it appears to depend on whether remittances are seen as transitory or permanent parts of income. m a c r o i m p a c t s o f m i g r a t i o n for many developing countries, migrants’ remittances are the main source of foreign exchange and represent a substantial proportion of their gnp. the world bank (2011) estimates that global remittances received by developing countries have already reached a total of us $351 billion in 2011. aside from offsetting balance of payments deficits, remittances may help reduce poverty directly by lifting many recipient households above the poverty line and indirectly through the effect of increased consumption or investments in the whole economy. other indirect effects, such as easing capital constraints and reducing some investment risks associated with exchange rate instability, are cited in the literature. moreover, remittances are now recognised as a more stable source of foreign exchange than private capital flows and have been noted to display an anti-cyclical character (chami, fullenkamp, & jahjah, 2005; gupta, 2005). one of the early studies on remittances and growth was carried out in greece during the 1970s by glytsos (1993), who estimated that a $1 million increase in inflows raised the greek gdp by us $1.7 million. d o r e m i t t a n c e s h a v e a s i g n i f i c a n t i m p a c t o n e c o n o m i c g r o w t h ? the relationship between remittances and economic growth has been extremely difficult to prove and has spawned a lively debate among economists. one of the issues is the likelihood of two-way causality between remittances and growth. while remittances may stimulate growth, it is also often the case that low economic growth leads more people to emigrate. this leads to more inflows of remittances. according to an international monetary fund (imf) team that recently investigated the issue and reviewed the methods and findings of previous studies, there is still no agreement on how to resolve the problem of endogeneity (see barajas, chami, fullenkamp, gapen, & montiel, 2009). the complexities involved are many, ranging from the fact that growth of the remittance receiving country is affected by factors such as trade with the migration destination country, to problems with specifying appropriate instrumental variables and control variables, to questions about the reliability of remittance data. earlier studies, some by the world bank and others by independent scholars, arrived at different conclusions: some research finding a positive but small impact of remittances on growth, others finding a negative but small impact, and still others finding the link ambiguous. ziesemer (2006) found, for example, that remittances have a higher impact in countries with per capita incomes below $1,200. some studies did attempt to identify the conditions that may contribute to a positive impact, such as high levels of educational attainment, existence of high-quality institutions, depth of the financial market, and price stability. the level of financial development appears to matter according to several recent studies (ramirez & sharma, n.d.; giuliano & ruiz-arranz, 2009; rioja & valev, 2004). remittances have a 15 abella: effects of labour mobility published by scholarship@western, 2013 positive impact on growth in financially less developed economies but not in others possibly because, as one study hypothesised, they act as substitutes for the financial sector in the former (see barajas et al., 2009). remittance inflows can enhance capital accumulation in a number of ways. an obvious one is by helping create domestic macroeconomic stability. chami, hakura, and montiel (2009) showed that large remittances are associated with lower output volatility. as a result stability firms would demand lower risk premium in undertaking investments. another way is the direct effect of remittances on easing liquidity constraints to greater investments in human or physical capital. and a third way is by enabling a remittance receiving country to leverage future inflows effectively serving as collateral. the guarantee of adequate future flows to service debts will reduce the cost of borrowing, quite apart from the direct impact on easing liquidity. s t r o n g e r e v i d e n c e t h a t r e m i t t a n c e s r a i s e o v e r a l l s a v i n g s r a t e s if remittances mainly increased the incomes of poorer households in the origin country, the expectation is that the impact on national savings rates would be minimal since the poor consume most additional income. this would be all the more true if remittance income was not seen as transitory but permanent. studies, however, have shown that significant proportions of remittance income were saved. in pakistan during the 1980s and early 1990s, adams (2002)12 suspected that recipients viewed remittances as uncertain in nature, and thus saved more of them for future contingencies. he found that the marginal propensity to save out of international remittances was about 0.71 compared to a much lower 0.085 propensity to save out of rental income. however, in his study in ghana, he found that recipients treated remittances as fungible, or the same as income from any other source. in moldova, perhaps the poorest country in europe, where about 1.4 million people out of a total population of 3.4 million belong to households that receive remittances, the marginal propensity to save rises with the significance or share of remittances in the total household budget (mîsliţcaia, 2009).13 in nepal, another low-income country, giri (2008) also found a high propensity to save among remittance receiving households. she worked with cross-sectional data from the living standards survey and adjusted her data on remittances for informal transfers. she estimated that for every rupee transferred by nepali migrants in india to their families at home, the household saved between 0.18 to 0.29 rupees. the income elasticity of savings is large for every 1% rise in remittances there is a 0.36% rise in savings. r e m i t t a n c e s r a i s e m a n y o u t o f p o v e r t y , b u t d o e s i t r e d u c e i n e q u a l i t y ? what about the impact on inequality and poverty? page and adams (2003) undertook one of the first significant investigations of the subject by looking at the experience of 74 developing countries. they concluded that remittances reduced the level, depth, and severity of poverty in developing countries. on average, a 10% increase in the share of international remittances in a country's gdp led to a 1.6% decline in the share of people living in poverty. some studies reached more nuanced conclusions that there can be very big differences in the impact of remittances on poverty depending on the country’s initial 12 evidence that the propensity to save remittance income differs from other income sources is also offered by davies, easaw, and ghoshray (2007). 13 this rather surprising finding is probably due to the fact that the households receiving remittances are the richer ones. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.3 conditions. acosta, calderón, fajnzylber, & lópez (2008) investigated the question of whether remittances reduced poverty in latin america. they found that remittances reduced poverty head counts in 6 of the 11 countries for which data were available. no such effect was found for the dominican republic, mexico, nicaragua, paraguay, and peru. they did reduce poverty gaps in ecuador, guatemala, and haiti. the study quantified the average impact of remittances on poverty: a 1percentage point increase in remittances to gdp ratio reduces moderate poverty by 0.37% and extreme poverty by 0.29%. the study also examined the impact on inequality through a counterfactual by estimating what the gini coefficients would have been had no migration taken place. acosta et al. (2008) concluded that migration reduced inequality. in the absence of migration, the coefficients would have been much higher; for example in haiti (7.7% difference), guatemala (2.9% difference), and el salvador (2.1% difference). surprisingly, the study found that remittances added to inequality in mexico and the dominican republic. equally surprising is that the largest inequality and poverty-reducing effects are not necessarily where the lowest income groups receive remittances. where remittances are likely to have a big impact on poverty and inequality is in the philippines, one of the highest remittance receiving countries in the world with an estimated us $20 billion in 2011. a recent study by ducanes (2011) used a fixed effects regression model with varying specifications and a sample panel of some 8,000 households constructed from three linked sources annual income and expenditure surveys, annual poverty surveys, and labour force surveys from 2006 to 2008 to test for the impact of remittances on poverty, inequality, and labour supply. he found that households that were able to send a member overseas for work had 2 to 3-fold greater odds of climbing out of poverty (based on per capita income) compared to other households. the odds get close to 6-fold greater when using logit analysis on pooled data. with respect to reducing inequality, ducanes (2011) found that had it not been for overseas migration in the period between 2007 and 2008 inequality would have risen in 2008. e m i g r a t i o n c a u s e s c o m p l e x a d j u s t m e n t s i n t h e l a b o u r m a r k e t emigration reduces the domestic labour force while, as we have noted in the previous section, remittances may have the added effect of reducing the migrant household’s supply of labour. the latter can happen because the younger household members may now be freed from income-earning activities to pursue further studies, may substitute work in home-production, or may prefer to stay out of the workforce because higher incomes tend to push up their “reservation wages.” whether or not the size of overall drop in the labour force is large enough to affect macroeconomic growth is a relevant question. since, in most origin countries, it is high unemployment that drives people to emigrate in the first place, it may be safe to assume that the overall supply of labour will be unlikely to constrain growth. in honduras, a developing country with high unemployment, gagnon (2011) used cross sectional data to estimate the impact of a 10% increase in emigration on wages. it was found that wages also increased by 10%, but the effect diminished over time. in his study of the impact on lithuania, a small country that experienced a large outflow of workers after joining the european union, elsner (2010) found that emigration led to a change in the wage distribution between young and old workers. the wages of young workers increased by 6%, whereas the wages of old workers decreased by around 1%. unmarried men saw their real wages increase on average by 1.4% for every percentage point increase in the emigration rate; while for married men, this effect was close to zero. 17 abella: effects of labour mobility published by scholarship@western, 2013 the impact of migration on the labour market is seldom straightforward and can only be assessed over a period long enough for other adjustments to take place. where the emigrating workers are unskilled, or leave only for temporary contract employment abroad, the adverse impact is likely to be slight. the skills involved are, however, likely to be heterogeneous, often involving the two ends of the skills spectrum many at the bottom and many at the top. some of the skills are hard to replace because possibilities for substitution are limited. the existence of labour surplus is, therefore, not a guarantee that emigration will not create shortages. at the same time, a rise in wages for occupations in demand abroad may trigger a supply-response that rebounds to the benefit of the origin society. the philippines, for example, has lost a very large number of medical professionals to emigration, but the ratio of remaining doctors and nurses to the population remains equal to those in developed countries because many more young people invested in acquiring medical education (katselli, lucas, & xenogiani, 2006). from a number of studies commissioned by the development centre of oecd, o’connor and farsakh (1996) concluded that the effects of emigration on real wages at the national level were small in most countries. the impact may be concentrated in certain sectors, such as in construction. in pakistan, wages in the construction sector rose by 41% between 1978 and 1983, a period of booming migration to the gulf states, while real wages nationwide increased by only 25% (knerr, 1996). emigration may however have a “knock-on” effect by stimulating internal migration. in kerala, the outflow of migrants to the gulf stimulated in-migration from neighboring regions to replace those who left. finally, wage structures reflected in differentials between skilled and low-skilled occupations may not escape the influence of emigration. rodriguez and horton (1996) suggested that this might have happened in the philippines, while the opposite may have happened in sri lanka because of the migration of domestic service workers. b r a i n d r a i n a n d d e v e l o p m e n t a very early topic in the literature on international migration is the impact of the so-called brain drain on developing countries. the subject has gained greater cogency because of technological and demographic developments, which put a premium on higher education and intensified the global competition for talents and skills.14 over the 1990s, annual admissions of skilled immigrants to the us grew 14.6 times, while to the uk by 10 times. the international organization for migration reported that every year about 20,000 professionals leave africa to take up employment in industrialized countries (la bonte et al., 2006). in theory, the loss of highly-skilled workers, especially scientists and engineers, through emigration can undermine the capacity of a developing country to increase productivity and competitiveness; thus, discouraging investments, frustrate improvements in education and health services for the population, and impose higher costs for goods and services on those left behind. some economists consider this loss in potential growth effects of externalities from education as one of the reasons for the slow rise in total factor productivity (tfp) in poor countries. recent research has, however, opened up a lively debate on the actual impact of high skilled emigration on development. some have pointed to a “brain overflow” in some countries, as evidenced by high levels of unemployment among college graduates. the so-called “new economics of labour migration” has raised 14 the structural transformation from manufacturing to knowledge industries is a major factor driving the competition. see collection of articles in kuptsch and pang (2006). 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.3 the possibility that opportunities to emigrate induce greater investments in education at home to such an extent that the stock of highly educated left behind may be larger than before (mountford, 1997; stark & wang, 2002). the search for empirical evidence has led to research in many countries but the findings have remained inconclusive. beine, docquier, and rapaport (2001) found that the stock of human capital across countries is positively correlated with the overall rate of migration to the rich countries, but faini (2006) and lucas (2005) found that tertiary enrollment levels and increments to these levels are negatively correlated with rates of brain drain. the oecd development centre report (o’connor & farsakh, 1996) concluded that the true situation probably varies from country to country. where there are well-developed educational institutions, such as in india, the emigration of many professionals like information and technology (it) specialists has not constrained growth. in fact, migration and return migration has helped in the development of new industries and with exports. s u m m a r y this section brought together the key findings of research on the consequences of migration and remittances on the development of origin countries. many economists have grappled with the complexities involved in designing models that can show how remittances affect growth given the number of possible variables that can affect it, and because the causation can go both ways. while there is less disagreement among policy makers on migration’s positive and significant contribution to growth and development, the stylized facts coming out of studies only show a weak positive impact on growth and one contingent on various conditions. much depends on whether remittances raise rates of savings. here, some studies offer micro-level evidence of increasing propensities to save among migrant households. there is much more agreement that remittances help reduce poverty, although the impact on income distribution is more ambiguous. since migration to other countries usually requires considerable resources, many migrants originate from better-off households and thus more remittances go to richer rather than poorer households. the consequences on the labour market are equally complex since migration involves a large variety of skills and occupations, and elasticity of labour supplies are not everywhere the same. where migration reduces the human capital stock (brain drain), there can be serious adverse consequences for development. however, some studies already provide evidence that the labour market in developing countries adjust to such losses in unexpected ways. changes in relative wages due to emigration of highly skilled workers tend to motivate greater investments in acquiring skills that are in demand abroad; but since only a few manage to leave their origin countries, the country ends up in a more favourable position. a s s e s s m e n t o f m i g r a t i o n c o s t s a n d b e n e f i t s migration is a form of labour market adjustment in response to a constantly changing economic environment that helps to re-allocate labour to sectors and regions where it can be more productive and earn higher wages and, in the process, enable capital to earn higher rates of return. except where labour is involuntarily moved or “forced,” it is likely that the migrant has weighed the personal costs and benefits and decided that, on balance, he or she gains from moving. indeed, the literature on migration provides ample evidence that the principal gainers from migration are the migrants themselves. the question whether or not the origin or destination community or country gains from migration is much more controversial and remains the subject of continuing debate. 19 abella: effects of labour mobility published by scholarship@western, 2013 m i g r a t i o n h a s p o s i t i v e a n d n e g a t i v e “ e x t e r n a l i t i e s ” what complicates the analysis is the fact that there are externalities involved. education, for example, benefits not only the student, but also the community where she lives. what communities pay for education already takes these externalities into account.15 in contrast, what the individual pays for education usually greatly understates the full social cost of education. when the student emigrates, she carries the benefits with her. however, if she stays and works, say as a medical doctor, there are social benefits not sufficiently reflected in her salary. her working at home may have “positive externalities” on her colleagues (i.e., sharing knowledge) and the whole community is better off (i.e., improved public health). all of these raise a number of questions. what would be the value of benefits foregone if she moves to another community or another country, either temporarily or permanently? since much of this will be future benefit, what would be the appropriate rate of interest to use in assessing its present value? on the other side of the equation are the possible “positive externalities” of migration. if she earns more outside and remits money home, others in the community may benefit more from her absence (i.e., house builders) and if she returns with more skills or enterprising ideas, there will be positive “spillovers” to the whole community. we need an analytical framework for addressing these complex questions. in his 2007 survey of the literature, robinson (2007) makes a useful distinction between the “universalist” and the “nationalist” frameworks for analyzing the costs and benefits of migration. the “universalist” framework is the neoclassical competitive model, developed in chicago by the famous canadian economist, prof. harry johnson (1965), which assumed that the free movement of human capital is welfare improving since it reflects efficient allocation of labour. it is possible that some may lose, but the gains will be enough to compensate them, say for example through foreign aid. grubel and scott (1966) recognized possible negative externalities affecting the welfare of those left behind, but assumed that under competitive conditions, and with possibilities for technology transfers, migration may still benefit all. bhagwati and hamada (1974) articulated more forcefully the nationalist framework by using a general equilibrium model to show that the emigration of the highly skilled, especially those who benefited from publicly subsidized education, amounts to transfers of real resources from poor to rich countries. this was the basis for his proposal for compensating origin countries for brain drain through a head tax. m e a s u r i n g t h e c o s t s o f l o s i n g t h e h i g h l y e d u c a t e d although the issue has generated a lot of debate, there has been a disappointing lack of empirical work showing quantitative estimates of the costs and benefits of the migration of the highly skilled. much of the discussion remained at the highly theoretical level, such as those of stark, helmenstein, and prskawetz (1997) and mountford (1997), but empirical investigations were later pursued by the world bank (ozden & schiff, 2006). beine et al. (2001) used a database developed by docquier and marfouk (2004) with data on 190 countries from the year 2000 and 170 countries from1990 to quantify some of the positive externalities of migration by estimating emigration rates among the highly educated and relating these to how much more was invested in education. their study showed that emigration of 15 if people can easily move from one community to another, public spending for education may become suboptimal from a national standpoint since each community will decide to spend less. see theories on “public goods” and “club goods” for implications on fiscal policy. 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.3 people with high levels of education induced greater investment in human capital in the origin countries. a 10% increase in the migration of the highly skilled was estimated to cause a 5% increase in the proportion of the highly skilled within the non-migrant population. robinson (2007) cited two studies in africa that illustrate the difficulties in doing a social accounting of investments in education when people migrate. kirigia, gbary, muthuri, nyoni, and seddoh (2006) estimated that the total cost of educating and training a physician (or a nurse) in kenya from primary school to university (or nursing college) and how much society loses in “returns” on these training investments. muula, panulo, and maseko (2006) made similar estimates on what malawi would lose from the emigration of a nurse-midwife with a degree, including interest on the investment for 30 years. the estimates raise difficult questions. what educational investments should be included? should it be from primary school? is the actual budget for education a proper measure of the cost or should one take into account other possible uses of the funds (i.e., some measure of opportunity cost)? how should the returns on training be valued? should it be based on the present salaries of medical practitioners in the country? how does one put a value to the remittances sent home? robinson (2007) adds another externality, namely the intensity of the pressures migration puts on those workers remaining at home. absolute numbers of emigration do not take such pressures into account, which are important to a comparative analysis of brain drain internationally, regionally, and sub-regionally. notwithstanding these conceptual issues, there is general agreement that the emigration of educated professionals imposes a heavy cost on poor countries. in africa, there is a special concern about brain drain because of an already small supply of educated professionals, especially medical personnel. the united nations commission for trade and development has estimated that each professional leaving africa costs the continent us $84,000, or us $4 billion a year – one-third of official development funds to (united nations conference on trade and development [unctad], 2012). the assumed benefit from migration as a motivation for more investment in medical education does not seem to have been reaped so far. against the who minimum standard ratio of 2.28 health personnel for every 100,000 population, robinson (2007) reported that none of the 16 east and southern african (esa) countries met the standard in the case of physicians, and only five (botswana, mauritius, namibia, south africa, and swaziland) appear to meet the who standard in the case of nurses. the cause is not migration alone since in some countries (e.g., malawi) the main cause of health worker shortages is not migration but deaths, mainly from hiv and aids. e s t i m a t i n g t h e f i s c a l i m p a c t o f b r a i n d r a i n desai, kapur, and mchale (2001) evaluated the fiscal impact of the brain drain caused by the dramatic rise in emigration of indian professionals to the us during the 1990s. in order to approximate the lost taxes, they estimated how much the emigrants would have earned in india had they stayed and then estimated the fiscal impacts this represented. in order to arrive at estimates of the counterfactual earnings, they adopted two methods: one is a translation of actual us incomes into purchasing power parity terms; and the other is an income simulation based on a jointly estimated model of indian earnings and participation in the workforce. they found that indians in the us had a median income 16% higher than the median income of the native born. indians in the us represented only 0.1% of the population of india, but had an aggregate income that is 10% of the indian national income. given their characteristics, these indians would have been substantial net contributors to the indian tax base had 21 abella: effects of labour mobility published by scholarship@western, 2013 they not emigrated. their absence thus imposes a fiscal burden of higher taxes and lower spending on those left behind. foregone income tax revenues were estimated to be as much as one-third of current individual income tax receipts in india. the estimated net fiscal loss ranges from 0.24 to 0.58% of india’s gdp in 2001, depending on the method for estimating expenditures saved by the absence of the emigrants. in one of the most ambitious attempts to determine the costs and benefits of highly skilled migration, gibson and mckenzie (2010) chose five countries that were experiencing very high rates of high-skilled emigration (tonga, the federated states of micronesia, papua new guinea, ghana, and new zealand). they obtained information through a survey of individuals who were top academic performers in the country at the time of their high school graduation and tracked them. this involved collecting data on individuals living in 45 different countries and asking them detailed questions about their migration and educational histories. the authors then used data obtained through another survey of academically similar non-migrants and return migrants to form counterfactuals for what the migrants would be doing at home had they not left. they were able to measure and quantify a number of the key economic effects of high-skilled emigration. the largest impact was on gains in income ($40,000 to $75,000 per year). they sent annual remittances ranging from $2,000 to $7,000. however, their impact on trade and foreign direct investment were insignificant (with most of similar gross value to remittances). assuming no one avoids paying taxes, the authors estimated annual fiscal impacts, which varied by country: a net loss of at most $1,000 for tonga and micronesia, $6,000 for ghana, $10,000 for new zealand, and $17,000 for papua new guinea.16 they also found migration led to large increases in human capital among migrants, but there was little evidence of net knowledge transfers to home governments or businesses. possible negative externalities from the absence of these individuals were considered small, relative to the magnitude of the benefits from emigration. d o i n v e s t m e n t s f o l l o w f r o m m i g r a t i o n ? there are many claims about benefits of increased flows of foreign direct investments (fdi) to origin countries, but most are anecdotal. migrants living in rich countries are supposed to serve as bridges for investors since they understand their countries of origin and can negotiate the often difficult bureaucratic processes better than others. among the limited empirical work is a study by gheasi, nijkamp, and rietveld (2010), who investigated the relationship between the stock of foreign population by nationality living in the uk and the bilateral volume of fdi, both into the uk (from 22 countries) and out of the uk (to 27 countries) between 2001 to 2007. they found a significant and positive relationship between fdi flows from the uk to a particular country and the presence of migrants from that country. using an instrumental variable approach, they tested if the education level of migrants living in the uk made any difference. they found that the more educated migrants from a certain country are, the stronger positive effect they have on fdi in both directions (inward and outward). 16 in papua new guinea, per capita government expenditure is extremely low and income tax rates on high incomes are quite high – so the fiscal cost greatly exceeds the fiscal benefits. because of new zealand’s highly progressive government spending patterns, each household in the top three deciles was estimated to have received approximately $6,700. health and education spending was $11,302 per household. 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.3 r e m i t t a n c e s a n d t h e “ d u t c h d i s e a s e ” there are also many claims that migration helps in increasing trade between origin and destination countries, but these have largely been associated with the exports of so-called “nostalgia” goods (orozco, 2008). much more significant is the suspected impact of remittances on overvaluation of the origin country’s currency: the so-called “dutch disease” effect. overvaluation of currency causes its commodities and services to become more expensive in export markets. in their study of 13 latin american and caribbean countries, amuedo -dorantes and pozo (2004) found that a 100% rise in remittances caused the real exchange rate to appreciate by 22%. similarly, bourdet and falck (2006) found evidence of adverse effects of remittances and official development assistance on cape verde's competitiveness. makhlouf and mughal (2011) looked for symptoms of dutch disease arising from international remittances in the pakistani economy. they argued that remittances caused an appreciation of the real exchange rate and loss of competitiveness of the exports sector. surprisingly, they also noted that, while aggregate remittances and remittances from persian gulf and europe contribute to the dutch disease in pakistan, those from north america do not. s u m m a r y this section examined the possible spill over effects or externalities of migration and remittances and their effects on development in origin communities. there is wide agreement among researchers that these externalities are substantial but quantifying them brings up all sorts of conceptual and methodological issues. how much do origin communities lose in terms of better health when a medical doctor leaves? what is the added fiscal burden on those who stay if those who leave no longer have to pay taxes? although there is consensus that “brain drain” is a relevant development issue, especially among some of the world’s poorest countries, there is less agreement that restricting migration, even if it is feasible to do, is the solution. moreover, migration may have positive spill over effects on stimulating reverse flows of investments and increased trade, although these issues still need more attention from researchers. r o l e o f d i a s p o r a i n d e v e l o p m e n t o f h o m e c o u n t r i e s although migration has a very long history of serving as a channel for transferring knowledge, beliefs, and new technologies, it was only recently that the role of migrant or diaspora communities abroad received much attention in the discourse on development. in this section, we review the literature on this emerging role of organized communities abroad as sources of capital, aid, and know-how. in a study for the united states agency for international development (usaid), johnson and sedaca (2004) surveyed how émigré and diaspora communities serve as an important source of foreign direct investment, trade linkages, knowledge, and technology transfer. they found that, aside from philanthropic activities, diasporas have also been prominent in a variety of activities, with important developmental impacts on their countries of origin. examples include: • channeling investment and outsourcing opportunities toward their country of origin, which helped to incubate the development of high-tech sectors. 23 abella: effects of labour mobility published by scholarship@western, 2013 • diaspora entrepreneurs acting as “first movers,” who moved early into a promising or struggling sector in their country of origin, creating momentum that catalyzed growth in industries that may otherwise be unable to attract sufficient conventional foreign direct investment. • diaspora portfolio investors in private investment vehicles and sovereign bonds who inject vital capital and budgetary resources for private sector expansion and development of economic infrastructures. • web-based diaspora of intellectual networks facilitating the transfer of knowledge from professionals abroad back to the homeland. c r e a t i n g b u s i n e s s n e t w o r k s the report mentions several examples of how networking among business diasporas played an important part in promoting investments in some countries. for example, the lebanese business network (lbn, 2013) operates an online marketplace; business matching and industry information database; identifies opportunities; and creates links between lebanese entrepreneurs, business diaspora, and international businesses. armentech, established in 2000 by a group armenian-american high-tech entrepreneurs and executives, is helping to transform yerevan into a high tech hub in the same way the indian diaspora has brought it business to bangalore. it launched siliconarmenia.com, an online medium designed to promote armenia’s technology sector through increased exposure to international markets and prospective customers, partners, and investors. the south african diaspora network (sadn), launched in 2001, focuses on two main groups of business contacts – high potential south african based businesses that wish to expand into international markets and well placed and highly connected south african expatriates living in the greater london area expressing a willingness to assist south african based businesses (world bank, 2013). the silicon valley indian professional association (sipa) served, since its founding in 1987, as a bridge to india where it promotes networking with visiting business professionals (newland & tanaka, 2010). currently, sipa consists of over 2,300 members who are highly qualified engineers, corporate managers, legal and financial experts, business people, and other professionals. most of them are actively involved in the high-technology industry and hail from almost every major company in silicon valley. b r i n g i n g n e w i d e a s a n d b u s i n e s s m o d e l the role played by indian and chinese diaspora in developing new industries in their origin countries has been well documented in the literature. a major study by saxenian, motoyama, and quan (2002)17 found that immigrant entrepreneurs in silicon valley are transferring elements of the silicon valley business model to their native countries and in the process “.... are seeding new centers of entrepreneurship and technology growth in formerly peripheral regions of the world economy” (p. 38). half of silicon valley’s foreign-born entrepreneurs who responded to their survey have set up subsidiaries, joint ventures, subcontracting, or other business operations in their native countries—and 17 the study is based on responses of over 2,700 individuals to a survey of members from 17 immigrant professional associations in silicon valley. 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.3 most of the other half indicated they are considering establishing such operations in the future. the indian software industry grew 40% a year in the 1990s (kuznetsov & sabel, 2006), with the number of software firms more than quadrupling from 700 to more than 2,800. this growth was credited to government policy with regard to higher education and to indian executives of us-based industry, which gave their companies the confidence to outsource in india. even more impressive was the role played by overseas chinese in the economic transformation of taiwan and in china. taiwan has emerged as a major global player in the development of computer hardware and software thanks to the know-how and capital brought back by taiwan-born professionals in the us. in the case of china, it was estimated that about 70% of foreign direct investments that flowed to the country after the reforms came from overseas chinese. in tandem with these investments, numerous overseas chinese professionals associations all over the us and other parts of the world were actively engaged by the chinese government in knowledge exchange (biao, 2006; kapur, 2001; saxenian et al., 2002). d i a s p o r a s a s l e n d e r s diaspora communities have likewise become an important market for borrowing from their origin governments, especially in the form of sovereign bonds. an example is the resurgent india bond (rib), which the government has sponsored in the late 1980s through indian banks acting in fiduciary capacity to non-resident indians (nris). some $4.2 billion of these bonds were sold to nris and used for infrastructure development. in 2000, another sovereign bond, the india millennium deposits (imd), was floated and raised $5.4 billion from the diaspora (johnson & sedaca, 2004). non-market factors evidently played a role in the emergence of the diaspora as the major investors in these bonds.1 8 large countries are more likely to benefit from the diaspora, but as lodigiania (2008) points out, size is just one factor. the education and skills in diaspora communities are clearly important and these are associated with higher incomes. it also matters if they are concentrated in certain economic sectors and whether they are in new industries or mature industries. the income and more importantly, the technological gap between the host and the destination country are crucial. as kapur (2001) points out, an immigrant from ghana to the us is likely to have different effects, than an immigrant from the same country to nigeria. the overall conditions in the home country, especially the level of democracy and governance, are key factors determining the propensity of the migrant to contribute to development. “ h o m e t o w n a s s o c i a t i o n s ” f u n d i n g c o m m u n i t y p r o j e c t s another way that diaspora communities have contributed to the development of their origin countries is through the activities of “hometown associations.” there are many examples of such hometown associations, especially among latin americans in the us, moroccans in france, ghanaians in the uk, and many others. mexican hometown associations have received a lot of attention from sociologists and other scholars. originally organized to facilitate remittances among senders from the same places or towns of origin in mexico, these hometown associations (htas) developed spontaneously over time to 18 there are an estimated 20 million people of indian origin living in 70 countries. their combined earnings were once estimated to equal about two-thirds of the gdp of india. in the uk alone, it is reported that there are at least 60,000 doctors of indian origin (see pandey aggarwal, devane, & kuznetsov, 2006). 25 abella: effects of labour mobility published by scholarship@western, 2013 fulfill other functions, from social exchange to philanthropy to political influence. in 2003, there were 2,000 such hometown associations organized by mexican migrants in the us. orozco and lapointe (2004) evaluated their organizational nature, long-term durability, and impact on development in rural mexico, especially their partnership schemes with three levels of government known popularly as tres por uno. many of these htas have raised funds to embark on modest projects (on average under $10,000 a year for projects such as building and paving roads, extending services such as electricity, sewage treatment, and health care to the entire community). htas are increasingly linking with mayors and other local government officials in planning and executing these projects, which are significant for many small communities. the mexican federal government inserted itself into the partnerships through a range of formal and informal relationships that culminated with the citizen initiative program, a matching-grant program also known as iniciativa ciudadana 3x1. in 2002, orozco and lapointe (2004) estimated that mexican htas had donated $30 million for projects they judged to be of great value to isolated, vulnerable communities with under-served populations. moreover, construction of basic infrastructure employs local labor. t r a n s f e r r i n g t e c h n o l o g y a n d c r e a t i n g k n o w l e d g e n e t w o r k s aside from playing a role in establishing new industries in their countries of origin, some diasporas have also organized networks to promote the transfer of skills acquired abroad. one of the best known diaspora knowledge networks, south african network of skills abroad ( sansa), connects skilled people living abroad in contributing to south africa’s economic and social development. the network has over 2,000 members in more than 57 countries, with expertise in hundreds of specializations active in a number of professional sectors, predominantly business and academia (johnson & sedaca, 2004). the individual profiles, including members’ fields of interest and areas of specialization, are available through a database system that also includes information on research projects in natural sciences, engineering, technology, and health sciences, as well as information on research and professional associations and conferences. sansa members assist south african graduate students get acceptance for training in laboratories, connect foreign researchers with south african counterparts, transfer technology to south african institutions, transmit information and results of research, facilitate business contacts, and initiate research and commercial projects. a very similar effort was organized in 1999 by moroccans living in southwestern france. the “savoir et développement (sd)” facilitates the transfer of scientific and technical know-how to morocco. the organization built a database on moroccan competencies abroad that focuses on very practical and concrete projects linking moroccan scientists abroad with those working in morocco (bouoiyour, 2006). the aim is to assist moroccan enterprises (especially small and medium-scale business) become more profitable through innovation. to accomplish this task, it creates networks of competencies in different fields or sectors, links small and big business, and establishes collaborative work with national research organizations. sd’s approach is to develop synergies through the creation of multidisciplinary and multi-sectoral working groups, including business, research bodies, and universities to address common problems. 26 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.3 p o l i t i c a l a n d s o c i a l d i m e n s i o n s o f d i a s p o r a i n f l u e n c e the moroccan state compromised the support given to organizing activities of the moroccan diaspora in europe by opposing moroccan descendants in europe relinquishing moroccan citizenship. the government sought to reinforce its links with moroccan emigrants by establishing a ministry for moroccans residing abroad, the fondation hassan ii pour les marocains résidant à l’étranger (fhii) (de haas, 2006). fhii funded the establishment of moroccan cultural centres in a few european cities and organized annual conferences in morocco for diaspora leaders. at the same time, the government lifted earlier restrictions on foreign currency transactions and adopted tax policies favorable to emigrants. in recent years, “diaspora tourism” has taken on significant dimensions, with notable impact on the growth of travel, banking, construction, and related sectors. the contribution of diasporas to the development of their origin countries has dimensions that go beyond the economic. levitt (2001), for example, argued that migrants not only send money, but they also bring ideas, practices, identities, and social capital back to the communities from which they came, creating important catalysts for change. she calls these “social remittances,” which she is quick to add may have both positive and negative consequences for development. the more positive social remittances include democratic values and respect for the rule of law, work ethics, know-how for building better organizations and more responsible governance, respect for gender equality, taste for new foods and art forms, and greater consciousness about health. negative consequences include materialist values and consumerism, sexual permissiveness, links with criminal syndicates abroad, and so on. the impact of these “social remittances” on development is probably greatly underestimated because they are inherently difficult to assess. s u m m a r y in this section, we reviewed the literature on the role of organized communities abroad as sources of capital, aid, and know-how. this is an area that is starting to receive attention from policy-makers, but the information is still largely anecdotal. there is little doubt that migrants continue to maintain bonds with their origin communities long after they have settled in foreign countries, and there are many interesting examples of the role some played in creating new industries in origin countries when conditions improved. cited are several examples of more organized efforts by diaspora communities to link with origin countries through the establishment of business and knowledge networks, especially using the internet, and how “hometown associations” have emerged as important supporters of improvements in poor origin communities that are often underserved by their governments. also cited are examples of efforts by origin governments to reach out to and maintain links with the diaspora, and to rely on them as sources of credit. finally, this section drew attention to the role played by “social remittances,” which may have positive as well as negative consequences for development. r e c o m m e n d a t i o n s f o r f u r t h e r r e s e a r c h our review of the contemporary literature on migration and development confirmed our initial assumption that there are many common issues with those faced in addressing the development of first nations. in this final section, we bring out a number of these common issues and offer some suggestions on questions that could be the subject of future research. wherever appropriate, we also draw attention to previous research that illustrates what may be helpful methodologies. 27 abella: effects of labour mobility published by scholarship@western, 2013 p a t t e r n s o f m i g r a t i o n a n d m o b i l i t y b e h a v i o u r are patterns of migration totally predictable by looking at the usual instrumental variables like education and employment, or are there other exogenous variables that have so far escaped attention? is it likely that unobserved variables like quality of health care in reserves or perceptions of “relative deprivation” have more power to explain migration behaviour? can these variables be influenced by changes in policy or in governance? research on such issues in canada can benefit from longitudinal data offered by lad, which finnie (2001) and others profitably mined in developing their panel data. taylor and rozelle (2003) used relevant paradigms for examining the variables influencing migration (see also deb and papa, 2009). r e m i t t a n c e m o t i v a t i o n s a n d b e h a v i o u r the decision to migrate is now widely recognised as a family decision; one usually taken as part of a family survival strategy to cope with environmental risks and financial shocks, as well as other contingencies. these are probably equally true of the migration patterns among first nations, but there may also be other idiosyncratic variables that would be helpful to uncover. is there wide variation in the degree to which families left behind depend on remittances from family members working outside? what characteristics or situation of families explain the differences? are remittances flowing regularly or are they only sent when triggered by family contingencies? are they meant for support of elders? how much of remittances go to finance certain lumpy investments19 (i.e., housing)? how much of remittances take the form of goods rather than cash and why? the articles in the handbook edited by kolm and ythier (2006) offer examples of how these issues may be investigated empirically. s o c i a l c o s t s a n d b e n e f i t s o f m i g r a t i o n t o c o m m u n i t i e s l e f t b e h i n d the inability of small communities to benefit from economies of agglomeration probably explains some of the developmental problems faced by first nations. emigration, especially of the better educated, can only worsen the situation. it will be instructive to clearly identify the negative externalities of temporary (even seasonal) and permanent emigration on origin communities and attempt to quantify them. how many professionals have been lost to the big cities? how has this migration affected the quality of local governance? what fiscal burden did their leaving impose on those left behind? in contrast, there are also benefits that need to be reckoned with, including the positive externalities from acquiring experience and know-how in cities. studies, especially by gibson and mckenzie (2010) and desai et al. (2001), may be helpful in designing approaches and research methods. d i a s p o r a n e t w o r k s there are parallels to diaspora communities among first nation migrants in large cities. how have the latter organized themselves for mutual help? are there data bases already developed on various competencies among their members? what networks can be further developed to facilitate the transfer of ideas or models (business, social organisation, etc.)? are there good examples of successful diaspora investments that can be used as models? documenting these experiences and examples may be an important contribution to policy making. 19 investments are lumpy when the investment project cannot be spread over time with small infusions of capital. 28 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.3 t h e i m p o r t a n c e o f “ s o c i a l ” r e m i t t a n c e s t o f i r s t n a t i o n s finally, we suggest looking at the wider impacts of migration that were put under the category of social remittances. what improvements in education, social organisation, health care, and governance can be traced to the influence of former migrants? have there been clearly negative influences (such as loss of traditional values) with long-term adverse consequences on welfare and development. 29 abella: effects of labour mobility published by scholarship@western, 2013 r e f e r e n c e s abella, m. 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(2006). worker remittances and growth: the physical and human capital channels. journal of economics and statistics, 229(6), 743 773. 40 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 3 [2013], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.3.3 the international indigenous policy journal january 2013 effects of labour mobility: an analysis of recent international development literature manolo abella recommended citation effects of labour mobility: an analysis of recent international development literature abstract keywords creative commons license microsoft word abella final.doc revisiting the debate on intellectual property rights and traditional knowledge of biodiversity: accommodating local realities and perspectives the international indigenous policy journal volume 3 | issue 4 article 1 october 2012 revisiting the debate on intellectual property rights and traditional knowledge of biodiversity: accommodating local realities and perspectives ujjal kumar sarma indian institute of forest management, uks_wildlife@yahoo.co.in indrani barpujari th e energy and resources institute, indrani.barpujari@teri.res.in recommended citation sarma, u. k. , barpujari, i. (2012). revisiting the debate on intellectual property rights and traditional knowledge of biodiversity: accommodating local realities and perspectives. th e international indigenous policy journal, 3(4) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.4.1 revisiting the debate on intellectual property rights and traditional knowledge of biodiversity: accommodating local realities and perspectives abstract the international and national debates and developments on the applicability of an intellectual property rights regime for protecting traditional knowledge associated with biodiversity is over a decade old. nevertheless, this continues to be an area fraught with difficulties for many reasons, such as inherent mismatch between the nature of intellectual property rights regimes and that of traditional knowledge, lack of an effective international framework, and alleged lack of will on the part of developed countries. the paper argues that the possible non-inclusion of traditional knowledge holders in the process and the lack of their practical capacity is another key reason for non-effectiveness of existing or envisaged legal instruments. it takes the position that a major lacuna of this discourse is that it is not strongly positioned in the local economic, political, and social contexts in which local and indigenous communities find themselves today. using a field-based case study of an indigenous scheduled tribe, the karbis in the northeastern state of assam, the paper makes the case for discarding commonly held, often non-realistic ‘assumptions’ about local and indigenous communities and accommodation of their realities and perspectives in enacting ‘rights based’ law and policy on these issues. keywords traditional knowledge (tk), intellectual property rights (ipr), biodiversity, indigenous communities, sui generis, karbis creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ revisiting the debate on intellectual property rights and traditional knowledge of biodiversity: accommodating local realities and perspectives the international and national debate on extending legal protection, mainly intellectual property rights (ipr) to traditional knowledge (tk) of biodiversity was triggered over a decade ago. some famous instances of biopiracy, related to basmati, neem, and ayahuasca1 brought to the world’s attention, particularly the developing world, that it was imperative to secure ipr protection over tk, in order to pre-empt misappropriation. developing countries played an active role in bringing this issue to the forefront in international forums, like the trade-related aspects of intellectual property rights (trips) council, the convention on biological diversity, the world intellectual property organisation (wipo), the food and agriculture organisation, and others. apart from urging for international action, many of them took the lead in amending existing laws and developing sui generis regimes, specifically designed to recognize and protect the ipr of local and indigenous communities over their tk of biodiversity. despite these developments, extending ipr protection to tk of biodiversity continues to be fraught with difficulties even today. one main obstacle is the gap in the existing legal mechanisms (wipo, 2008) that has been circumvented through specially designed sui generis regimes. two other key reasons for the noneffectiveness of existing or envisaged legal instruments are the lack of concerted international action and the non-inclusion of tk holders in the process. objective and methodology this paper revisits the debate on extending ipr protection to tk of biodiversity and examines the participation of local and indigenous communities in the process. while the objective of the research is primarily academic, it attempts to affect policy change with regard to the role of these communities in framing policy both at the national and international levels. it presents the argument that the realities of local and indigenous communities, which could actually differ substantially from commonly held assumptions about them, must be taken into account. the paper relies on a field-based case study of an indigenous scheduled tribe2 – the karbi of assam (a state situated in the northeastern region of india) with rich tk of biodiversity, particularly traditional healing through the use of medicinal plants. it examines the traditional context of their knowledge, their perceptions about sharing knowledge, and ipr over it. it also investigates the agents of change operating in the community and the traditional context in which tk has flourished. the methodology of the study includes a desk-based review and fieldwork in two karbi villages of assam, using the standard tools of interviewing and focus group discussions. here, it may be mentioned that most karbis speak both the karbi dialect and the assamese language with equal fluency. the different tribes and caste groups of the state of assam mainly communicate in assamese. the interviews and focus group discussions with respondents were conducted in assamese because it is the mother tongue of both the authors. 1 in these cases, patents were being taken out in the developed countries on genetic resources and associated traditional knowledge from developing countries, without the consent of their original holders and without much actual innovation or novelty being added to the existing knowledge or resource. 2 a scheduled tribe is defined in article 366 (25) of the constitution of india as “such tribes or tribal communities or parts of or groups within such tribes or tribal communities as are deemed under article 342 to be scheduled tribes for the purposes of this constitution”. the criteria followed for specification of a community as a scheduled tribe are indications of primitive traits, distinctive culture, geographical isolation, shyness of contact with the community at large, and backwardness (ministry of tribal affairs, n.d.). according to the international work group for indigenous affairs (n.d.), in india, these scheduled tribes are considered to be the indigenous peoples, also referred to as adivasis, literally meaning indigenous people. 1 sarma and barpujari: revisiting the debate on intellectual property rights published by scholarship@western, 2012 extending ipr protection to traditional knowledge of biodiversity: issues and challenges a number of arguments have been offered for the imperative of extending ipr protection to tk of biodiversity. the main advantages of protection would be preventing the misappropriation of knowledge by unauthorised parties without prior informed consent and ensuring that the holders of tk benefit. it is also assumed that this would help promote the use of tk in development, help preserve traditional practices and culture, and lead to the conservation of biodiversity. also, considerations of justice and equity demand that the knowledge created by local and indigenous communities in fields and forests must be recognized as the property of its creators just as the knowledge created in the laboratories is acknowledged as the property of the innovators (sahai & barpujari, 2006). article 8(j) of the convention on biological diversity (cbd, 1992) provides the primary legal basis internationally for ensuring protection of this knowledge by explicitly stating that, each contracting party shall, as far as possible and as appropriate: subject to national legislation, respect, preserve and maintain knowledge, innovations and practices of indigenous and local communities embodying traditional lifestyles relevant for the conservation and sustainable use of biological diversity and promote their wider application with the approval and involvement of the holders of such knowledge, innovations and practices and encourage the equitable sharing of the benefits arising from the utilization of such knowledge innovations and practices. (p. 6) a number of issues and challenges, however, get in the way of extending effective protection to tk of biodiversity and the tk holders themselves. one main problem is believed to be the inherent mismatch between the nature of intellectual property (ip) and that of tk. as observed by the working group on article 8(j) and related provisions of the convention on biological diversity (working group, 2007) tk at the community level works under customary rules and this context is lost when the knowledge escapes into foreign systems. it observes that, while ipr aim to commodify or commercialize certain pieces of knowledge, this is generally not the purpose behind customary rights in tk. further, the idea of ‘exclusivity’ of rights under the ip system may conflict with customary law concepts of how knowledge and resources should be treated (working group, 2007). however, as discussed later in the paper, it would be presumptuous to assume that indigenous communities do not have the concept of individual ownership of knowledge. many countries have sought to address this gap by enacting sui generis ip regimes. the term sui generis is used in ip law to describe a regime designed to protect rights that fall outside the traditional patent, trademark, copyright, and trade secret doctrines (black, 1968). it is, thus, a special system adapted to a particular subject matter, as opposed to protection offered by one of the main systems of ip protection. sui generis regimes, like the indian biological diversity act (2002), recognize the need for equitable sharing of benefits arising out of the commercialisation of biological diversity and associated knowledge, and try to provide an institutional framework for regulating access and according ip protection. the act is, however, largely silent on the issue of ipr of the tk holders over their knowledge. sui generis regimes, like peru’s law no. 27,811, 2002, philippines’ indigenous peoples rights act, 1997, thailand’s act on protection and promotion of traditional thai medicinal intelligence, b.e. 2542, 1999 have opted to go a step further by recognizing the ip of the tk holders over their knowledge and right to withhold access. some regimes, like the case in the philippines, have sought to accord recognition to the pre-eminence of customary law in these matters. in fact, the working group on article 8(j) and related provisions of the convention on biological diversity (2007) recommend the use of the principles of customary law as the basis for developing a range of sui generis mechanisms, which could provide a means to strengthen and maintain core traditional values, while allowing communities the flexibility of responding and adapting to changing circumstances, opportunities, and threats. this, is, however, not easily reflected in most legislation of this kind. despite countries taking measures domestically to provide protection to tk of biodiversity, the weak international framework is a major hurdle towards effective protection. the convention on biological diversity (1992) is the major international instrument that recognizes the crucial role of local and indigenous 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 4 [2012], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.4.1 communities in biodiversity conservation; it has incorporated specific provisions mandating that contracting parties take measures for the protection of their knowledge, innovations, and practices associated with biodiversity (article 8(j)). negotiated within the convention, the nagoya protocol on access to genetic resources and the fair and equitable sharing of benefits arising from their utilization aims to ensure that tk associated with genetic resources is accessed with prior and informed consent or approval, along with the involvement of local and indigenous communities. mutually agreed terms have been established; however, numerous criticisms of both the cbd and the protocol prevail, owing to the use of ‘soft language’, the primacy accorded to the state vis-à-vis the rights of knowledge holders over their tk, and their silence on the question of ipr of local and indigenous communities (koutouki, 2011). further, the agreement on trade related aspects of intellectual property rights (trips, 1994), which lays down minimum standards of ipr protection in world trade organization (wto) member countries, does not deal with tk; however, a number of its provisions could have a bearing on tk, namely provisions on patents, geographical indications, and standards for the protection of undisclosed confidential information. the trips provisions on patents are the most controversial as there is no legal obligation on wto members to offer protection to tk in their national legislation. in most cases, tk does not meet the patentability criteria of novelty because most tk has been in existence since antiquity and handed down intergenerationally. since the agreement fails to recognize any ipr over tk, the laws of many developed countries that allow inventions based on tk amount to misappropriation. while the trips agreement does not obligate wto members to protect tk, at the same time, there is nothing in trips that prevents them from providing ipr protection to tk. developing countries have tried to use this space in the agreement to lobby for the inclusion of tk within the ambit of ipr protection. there have been arguments in the trips council about the need to amend trips to prohibit the patenting of inventions based on tk or those violating article 15 of the cbd, which mandates that access to genetic resources shall be with prior informed consent and ensure fair and equitable sharing of benefits (submission by brazil, india, china, and others at the trips council, 2002). suggestions have also been mooted regarding the role of disclosure requirements in preventing patents based on genetic material and tk that is misappropriated – a harmonisation of trips and cbd is being sought. while many countries have amended patent and biodiversity laws to incorporate a disclosure requirement, such provisions fail to have the expected deterrent effect in the absence of international laws. it is also unlikely that such provisions would be enacted in the near future considering the strong opposition offered by the developed world to this proposal. from the above discussion, as well as from an overview of available literature, it may be broadly surmised that ipr measures (including sui generis measures) advocated for protecting tk broadly assume two forms: defensive and positive protection. defensive mechanisms mainly seek to prevent ipr claims to tk being granted to unauthorised entities and may take the form of a disclosure requirement, prior informed consent, documentation to establish prior art, etc. positive protection, on the other hand, refers to a situation where the tk holders themselves acquire ipr, such as patents or alternative rights provided in a sui generis system. this implies that exclusive ownership rights over tk have been granted and the ip of the community that holds such knowledge has been protected (sahai & barpujari, 2006). it also involves active exploitation of the tk by the originating community itself through its own commercial enterprise or through license to others and the right to structure and define the financial or other benefits from this authorized use (wipo, 2003a). the wipo recommends the use of both defensive and protective measures, in conjunction, to achieve the goal of comprehensive legal protection of tk (wipo, 2003b). role of local and indigenous communities: hurdles to meaningful participation the wipo intergovernmental committee on intellectual property and genetic resources, traditional knowledge, and folklore explicitly recognizes that the protection of tk should be guided by the aspirations and expectations expressed directly by tk holders. the rights of tk holders and custodians of tk should be respected, and the protection provided should directly reflect the actual aspirations, expectations, and needs of tk holders (wipo, 2006). this is easier said than done considering the fact that local and indigenous 3 sarma and barpujari: revisiting the debate on intellectual property rights published by scholarship@western, 2012 communities have seldom had an active voice in international and national exercises that frame the laws impacting them. highlighting the lack of participation of indigenous communities in the tk debate, professor coombe opines that “although indigenous peoples are now recognized as key actors in this global dialogue, it will need to be expanded to encompass a wider range of principles and priorities … only when indigenous peoples are full partners in this dialogue, with full juridical standing, and only when their cultural worldviews, customary laws, and ecological practices are recognized as fundamental contributions to resolving local social justice concerns will we be engaged in anything we can genuinely call a dialogue” (cited in yu, 2003, p. 242 ). while participation of indigenous actors in the global dialogue needs to be ensured, yu (2003) cautions that many members of the traditional community remain reluctant to participate in the negotiation process, partly due to their concern about further abuse, misappropriation, and exploitation of their arts and crafts and partly due to the secretive nature of some of the indigenous creations and practices, in particular sacred symbols and religious rituals. he also stresses that policymakers have to be vigilant and constantly evaluate whether the negotiation process contains any systematic bias or barriers that make participation difficult. also, as pointed out by some authors, ensuring participation of local and indigenous communities in the global dialogue is not enough if these communities lack expertise. they point out that fairness demands that, when poor and excluded people are confronted with the very complicated issues involving ip, they should have access to expert advice and representation (overwalle, 2005). to fill this need, the public interest intellectual property advisors was set up as an independent international service and referral organisation. despite this, such efforts remain few and far between. local realities may also impede attempts to protect tk of biodiversity through legalistic proposals framed on the western model. solutions like disclosure of origin, prior art databases, geographical indications, and even sui generis approaches all rely on a democratic process and assume that indigenous peoples have equal rights, are empowered, and are involved in the decision-making process; however, the daily reality may be very different. in the case of the san in southern africa, for example, their voice remains unheard and politically they continue to be excluded from the mainstream (vermeylen, 2005). in such a case, meaningful participation of the community cannot be achieved by redesigning ipr legislation, even if the government was to show an interest in granting more power and ownership rights to them. scholars have also expressed the view that the discourse on tk and ipr should, first of all, be placed in the local social and economic context in which communities are living (strathern, 2000). they caution against oversimplifying and romanticising indigenous realities and suggest that probing beneath the ‘false’ generalisations made in the context of these communities is required (strathern, 2000). it is also argued that novel mechanisms to protect tk of biodiversity must be built from the bottom up and not the top down. vermeylen’s (2005) study of the san in southern africa is a case in point, which challenges some of the ‘myths’ regarding indigenous communities that the mainstream debate has propagated to a large extent. her study indicates that, contrary to popular beliefs, property rights exist in all societies. individual property rights over knowledge are not necessarily absent from many traditional societies; they are often accompanied by duties (vermeylen, 2005). according to posey (1990), rather than debating the suitability of ipr to tk, each group, whether indigenous or not, should have the right to determine to what extent and under what circumstances they want to enter market economies and the ipr regime. posey further states that this process is certain to open a ‘pandora’s box’, but to not open this box is to accept the ethical and moral responsibility of a paternalism – the assumption that those from ‘advanced societies’ know what is good for the ‘native’. again, a basic premise of the argument for conferring enhanced ipr protection to the local and indigenous communities in their tk of biodiversity is the recognition of their stewardship of the resource, the associated tk, and the intimate relationship between the two. it is often taken as a given that the worldview and religious beliefs of many indigenous communities living in close communion with nature are often rooted in nature and speak of affinity with the plant and animal world, which, in turn, leads to sustainable use and conservation of nature (western & wright, 1994). the assumption is also that this symbiotic relationship translates into a rich knowledge base on many aspects of human life. the term ‘ecological ethnicity’ has been used to denote such cultures and communities that maintain the rhythm of circularly appropriate 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 4 [2012], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.4.1 cosmovisions by observing related rituals and practicing prudence in the ways that they care about nature, harvest from nature, nurture nature, and are nurtured in turn (parajuli, 2001). one must, however, be aware of the pitfalls involved in romanticizing the issues or beliefs in an ideal ‘indigenous ecological ethos.’ the only constant in the world is ‘change’ and, as indigenous communities the world over are exposed to the various forces of the modern world, levels of ecological consciousness will vary significantly with the material conditions, nature of livelihoods, level of technological development in which different tribal communities live, and market forces (sarma & barpujari, 2011). vermeylen’s (2005) study indicates that the idea of the san as ‘pristine hunter-gatherers’ is a myth and finds that, over time, their cultural identity has become multilayered and complex and they have become increasingly drawn into the local, if not world, economy. local realities and perspectives: the case of the karbi of assam, india the karbi, a scheduled tribe, constitute an important ethnic group in assam, the northeastern region of india. they belong to the indo-mongoloid stock and tibeto-burman linguistic group. they are mainly concentrated in the karbi anglong district and are also scattered in the north cachar hills district, nagaon, sonitpur, and lakhimpur districts of assam. the district of karbi anglong is particularly rich in biodiversity and tk based on it. jain and borthakur (1980) found that the karbi used plants to treat ailments as varied as leprosy, malaria, ulcers, dysentery, fever, and gynecological problems. a more recent study documents that almost 434 species of medicinal and aromatic plants found in karbi anglong are used to treat many ailments (sarma, 2007). fieldwork was conducted in the karbi villages of inglepathar and chandra singh rongpigaon, situated close to the kaziranga national park in karbi anglong district. inglepathar, the oldest karbi village on the fringes of the park, has a population of 247 who are adherents of the traditional karbi religion based on animism or worship of nature. the village of chandra singh rongpigaon with a population of 232 has converted to christianity. the findings from the field on tk of biodiversity, particularly medicinal plants, and the local perceptions and realities about the possibilities of extending ipr protection are now discussed. tk of biodiversity among the karbi: traditional context in the particular context of tk of medicinal plants and healing, the karbi generally possess two kinds of knowledge: common and specialist. most men and women, particularly the elderly, possess common knowledge about the available herbs and plants that are used to treat minor ailments. interviews and focus group discussions with the villagers indicate that such knowledge is transmitted from one generation to the next through the oral tradition. also, the practices are learned through observation or knowledge is shared with others. a karbi elder in inglepathar observed that such knowledge might not be very specific to the karbi community because much of it could be common to the other tribes and caste groups of assam, who live close by. such common knowledge could also have become enriched by borrowing and learning between the different tribes and caste groups. specialist knowledge is, however, confined to a few; there is an intimate connection between specialist and ritualistic knowledge. in most karbi villages that practise animism, such as inglepathar, the religious officiates such as the kurusar (head priest) and deuri (priest) perform the role of healers, combining ritual healing with intimate knowledge of medicinal plants. in the karbi traditional healing system, disease is attributed to both natural and supernatural causes. an ailment is diagnosed by performing a sang-lang or divination (to find out the deity or spirit whose displeasure is responsible for it); then, herbal concoctions, aatams (sacred incantations), rites, and rituals are administered to appease the deity or spirit concerned. as the positions of head priest and priest are usually confined to the members of the priestly kur or clan, the implication is that specialist knowledge is generally confined to the ‘higher’ social group in the community and is transmitted from one generation to the next within the same family or clan. certain specialists, known as bez, are exceptions. they acquire the skill of using magic and divination to cure ailments and an intimate 5 sarma and barpujari: revisiting the debate on intellectual property rights published by scholarship@western, 2012 knowledge of medicinal plants through the teacher-disciple tradition. this training is given to a very few individuals. specialist knowledge is also gendered, with socially defined masculine and feminine works. an elderly male in inglepathar stated that the reason behind this restriction is that karbi women are generally of a timid nature and would not be able to deal with the malevolent spirits residing deep in the forests where medicinal plants have to be collected. interviews with female members of the society revealed two versions. the conformists see this gender division as part of the karbi tradition that has always designated a line of demarcation between the work done by men and women. the alternate view is that such reasoning often serves as a means of excluding women from positions of power, which is evident in other aspects of the karbi community. among the karbi, a woman can never be the village head or aspire to be a priest. women are excluded from participating in many religious rites and rituals, menstruating women cannot brew the local rice beer harlang, and women have been customarily forbidden from entering the bachelor’s dormitory or jirkedam (although this particular tradition is now dying). most karbi traditional healers collect plants from the wild, with the exception of a few species that they cultivate within the village and generally use for treating common ailments. many villagers know how the concoctions are prepared; however, numerous customary prohibitions govern the collection and use of medicinal plants and other forest produce. these restrictions are more stringent for the forests, which are believed to be the home to malevolent spirits. interestingly, most of the medicines prepared for serious/chronic illnesses come from these sacred spaces; for instance, according to the karbi elders in chandrasing rongpigaon, the forests in the singhason hills area in karbi anglong district are home to the dreaded khenglong-po who is imagined to be a huge, hairy wild-man who likes human flesh. villagers pointed out that some of the very precious medicinal plants can be found only in remote inaccessible parts of the forests, which are inhabited by malevolent spirits; hence, only those who know the incantations or aatams to counter their effects can venture into these places. perceptions on knowledge, knowledge sharing, and intellectual property rights while the karbi generally have no reticence regarding the sharing of the common knowledge, the specialist knowledge is, however, closely guarded and remains confined to a very small group in the community. when interviewed, the specialists observed that such knowledge can only be transmitted to a worthy recipient as such knowledge could be dangerous in the hands of someone who cannot ‘handle’ it. a specialist has to adhere to a number of restrictions in his personal life, and it is only in his hands that the knowledge is able to affect a good cure. according to one specialist, he would not mind sharing the knowledge about the medicinal properties of different plants; however, in his opinion, such knowledge would fail to have the desired efficacy without the aatams or sacred incantations. these incantations cannot be shared with people from the same village, let alone outsiders. one bez reported that he was reluctant to talk about his knowledge to outsiders until he got permission from his dead guru. accordingly, permission was sought through a small ritual ceremony. the specialists, on being questioned about their perceptions regarding ownership and commercialization of knowledge, expressed the general opinion that they are its owners and custodians and it is their sacred duty to use it for the welfare of humanity. commercialization, in their view, would result in handing over the knowledge to outsiders, in whose hands it would fail to have the desired efficacy. one specialist also observed that outsiders would put a price on the knowledge, which would clash with their ‘ethics.’ such knowledge is only meant to be used for the welfare of humankind, not for profit. it may be mentioned here that, in the traditional context, specialists do not charge for their services; they have to eke out a livelihood through other activities just like other villagers. their services are, however, acknowledged by the community through an enhanced status and respect that is symbolically expressed, such as being offered a designated sitting place at a community feast. also, the recipient of the services might offer a token remuneration in the form of betel nut and leaf, the locally brewed rice beer (harlang), or something from the first harvest. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 4 [2012], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.4.1 a marked difference is, however, observed between the perceptions of the older and younger generations. the youth, particularly those who are educated, are of the view that the tribe should have proprietary rights over its knowledge and if this knowledge is commercialized (which is acceptable to most of them), then the community, in general, and the specialists, in particular, should be entitled to a share of the profits. many young people feel that, if any gain comes out of this knowledge, the community should be acknowledged and that some portion of the proceeds could be used for the welfare of the villagers directly, like building a community hall, a library, school, etc. there is an apparent vagueness in the other ideas coming from the young people; for example, they suggest raising funds for the local self-help groups and youth clubs. many of them clearly failed to imagine any extra benefit that could be earned from the knowledge of older folks. an educated young member of the priestly clan who is training to be a priest believes that it is important for the knowledge to be documented, protected through legal means (including ipr), and utilized in a ‘modern’ context to benefit the wider society, with benefits accruing to the karbi. he further feels that, if the knowledge is to survive and continue to be relevant in the modern world, it cannot be kept isolated from the rest of the world. he expressed the view that the ‘superstitions’ of the older generation will have to be overcome and the government, particularly the karbi anglong autonomous district council authorities, should create awareness and build the capacity of the local youths to safeguard, as well as facilitate, the use of the knowledge of their forefathers. interestingly, this perspective on the need to derive commercial benefits from tk is generally shared by the younger educated generation who do not possess much tk, while the specialist knowledge holders believe in the need to guard this knowledge against outsiders. specialists indicate that their reluctance is mainly because tk is deeply embedded in the religious beliefs of the group and also because the traditional karbi ethos permits the use of this knowledge only for the welfare of society and not for profit. forces of change as already discussed above, change is evident in the karbi society in how issues regarding the ownership and commercialization of knowledge are perceived by the younger generation. at the same time, as village elders lament, there is considerable erosion of this knowledge with the younger generation who are not keen to preserve it or undergo the rigorous training and regimen associated with being a specialist. one main reason for this, according to informants in the field, is the non-remunerative nature of traditional healing, which cannot fulfill the aspirations of the younger generation. many educated youths exhibit less reverence for the tk of the tribe and tend to dismiss many indigenous healing practices as superstitions. however, ironically, they display considerable enthusiasm for the potential commercialization of this knowledge and the idea of ipr over the knowledge and benefit sharing. also, at the moment, the youths are keen for the expansion of cooperatives for ginger growers as the market linkage is already established, especially due to the push given by the district council. they are not very enthusiastic about the potential of other medicinal plant species, mainly because the market linkage is not evident to them. also, tk is lost to a large extent with change in the traditional context. as observed in the case of chandrasing rongpigaon village, where the people have converted to christianity, there are no specialist knowledge holders though the elders possess some basic common knowledge regarding the medicinal properties of commonly available plants. with conversion to a different religion, many of the customary prohibitions that have helped sustainable collection and conservation have been lost. the demands of a market economy also compel changes in the traditional conservation ethos. the youths of both the villages studied here are increasingly being drawn into the lucrative trade of forest produce, such as supplying bamboo to the paper mills. the issue is not extraction of bamboo per se, but rather the way it is extracted that makes it unsustainable. specialists complain that, in recent times, it is becoming increasingly difficult to procure medicinal plants, and they have to venture deeper into inaccessible areas of the forests to collect certain species. in the opinion of one specialist, this is due to outsiders collecting plants in huge sack 7 sarma and barpujari: revisiting the debate on intellectual property rights published by scholarship@western, 2012 loads and taking them to the market outside, which is not done as stealthily as one would expect. he alleges that local youths, for the sake of easy money, are involved in this. many of these youths have already garnered considerable political say. the way ahead the discussion above indicates that local and indigenous communities, like the karbi, continue to be the custodians of rich tk with continued relevance. at the same time, like most societies, they are subject to constant change through their participation in a wider world that could, in the long run, lead to an erosion of tk, as well as loss of biodiversity, which has been nurtured over time immemorial. in such a context, a multipronged, holistic approach is necessary to protect their tk. the need for recognising ipr over their knowledge persists; at the same time, creating awareness and capacity building to ensure their meaningful participation is a must. capacity building may also involve disseminating knowledge about the economic value of various endemic plant species and possible market linkages. all these efforts would more likely succeed if the customary institutional structures, such as the village councils and the karbi anglong autonomous district council, were involved. in addition to ip or legal protection, conditions must also be created for the community to reap the benefits of their rich tk. mainstreaming tk as an alternative medical system, providing incentives to traditional healers, adding value to medicinal plants by setting up cooperatives, self-help groups, health-tourism, eco-tourism, etc. could offer some encouragement. here, it may also be worthwhile to consider the use of a participatory tool, the bio-cultural community protocol (bcp) developed by natural justice, an international ngo of lawyers for communities and the environment, as a means of defending the community’s bio-cultural heritage against these pressures and threats and asserting their rights over resources and tk. a bcp is “a protocol that is developed after a community undertakes a consultative process to outline their core ecological, cultural, and spiritual values and customary laws relating to their tk and resources, based on which they provide clear terms and conditions to regulate access to their knowledge and resources” (bavikatte & jonas, 2009, p. 9). interconnecting the various aspects of an indigenous community’s way of life also involves ensuring that community members better understand the international and national legal regimes in which their lives are being increasingly played out. such a protocol can, thus, reconcile a number of challenges confronting a group like the karbi. it could serve as a platform for asserting rights and affirming responsibilities under customary, national, and international law, particularly in response to opportunities and challenges posed by external actors (shrumm & jonas, 2012). at the same time, it could contribute towards the revitalization of the karbi worldview, conservation ethos, and practices that are under threat owing to a number of external and internal forces. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 4 [2012], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.4.1 references agreement on trade related aspects of intellectual property rights (trips). (1994). retrieved from www.wto.org/english/tratop_e/trips_e/t_agm0_e.htm bavikatte, k., & jonas, h. (eds.). (2009). bio-cultural community protocols: a community approach to ensuring the integrity of environmental law and policy. nairobi: unep. black, h.c. (1968). black’s law dictionary. st. paul, mn: west publications. convention on biological diversity. (1992). retrieved from the united nations website http://www.cbd.int/doc/legal/cbd-en.pdf indian biological diversity act . (2002). retrieved from the national biodiversity authority website http://nbaindia.org/content/25/19//act.html international work group for indigenous affairs. (n.d.). the indigenous world: update 2011 – india. retrieved from http://www.iwgia.org/regions/ asia/india/870-update-2011-india jain, s. k., & borthakur, s. k. (1980). ethnobotany of the mikirs of india, economic botany, 34(3), 264-272. koutouki, k. (2011). the nagoya protocol: status of indigenous and local communities. in legal aspects of sustainable natural resources legal working paper series. montreal: centre for international sustainable development law. ministry of tribal affairs. (n.d.). definition. retrieved from government of india website: http://www.tribal.nic.in/index3.asp?subsublinkid=303&langid=1 overwalle, g. v. (2005). protecting and sharing biodiversity and traditional knowledge: holder and user tools. ecological economics, 53, 585-607. parajuli, p. (2001). learning from ecological ethnicities: towards a plural political ecology of knowledge. in j. grim (ed.), indigenous traditions and ecology: the interbeing of cosmology and community (pp. 559-590). harvard: harvard university press. peru’s law no. 27, 811 (2002). introducing a protection regime for the collective knowledge of indigenous peoples derived from biological resources. retrieved from http://www.wipo.int/wipolex/en/text.jsp?file_id=179597 philippines’ indigenous peoples rights act (republic act no. 8371). (1997). an act to recognize, protect and promote the rights of indigenous cultural communities/ indigenous peoples, creating a national commission on indigenous peoples, establishing implementing mechanisms, appropriating funds therefor, and for other purposes. retrieved from http://www.wipo.int/wipolex/en/text.jsp?file_id=179605 posey, d. (1990). intellectual property rights and just compensation for indigenous knowledge. anthropology today, 6(4), 13-16. sahai, s., & barpujari, i. (2006). protection of indigenous knowledge of biodiversity. new delhi: gene campaign. sarma, j. (2007). medicinal and aromatic plants of assam with special reference to karbi anglong. diphu: divisional forest officer, silvicultural division. 9 sarma and barpujari: revisiting the debate on intellectual property rights published by scholarship@western, 2012 sarma, u. k., & barpujari, i. (2011). eco-cosmologies and biodiversity conservation: continuity and change among the karbis of assam, the international indigenous policy journal, 2(4), 1-10. shrumm, h., & jonas, h. (eds.). (2012). biocultural community protocols: a toolkit for community facilitators. cape town: natural justice. strathern, m. (2000). multiple perspectives on intellectual property. in k. whimp and m. busse (eds.) protection of intellectual, biological and cultural property in papua new guinea. canberra: asia pacific press. submission by brazil, india, china and others at the trips council. (2002). the relationship between trips agreement and the cbd and the protection of tk. (ip/c/w/356). thailand’s act on protection and promotion of traditional thai medicinal intelligence, b.e. 2542 (1999). yu, p. k. (2003). traditional knowledge, intellectual property, and indigenous culture: an introduction. cardozo journal of international and comparative law, 11, 239243. vermeylen, s. (2005). intellectual property rights and indigenous peoples: a case study of the san in southern africa. centre for environmental strategy, university of surrey working paper 07/05. western, d., & wright, r. m. (1994). the background to community-based conservation. in d. western & r. m. wright (eds.), natural connections: perspectives in community-based conservation (pp. 1-12). washington dc: island press. working group on article 8 (j) and related provisions of the convention on biological diversity (2007). development of elements of sui generis systems for the protection of traditional knowledge, innovations and practices to identify priority elements. (unep/cbd/wg8j/5/6). world intellectual property organization (wipo). (2003a). overview of activities and outcomes of the intergovernmental committee. (wipo/grtkf/ic/5/12). world intellectual property organization (wipo). (2003b). practical mechanisms for the defensive protection of traditional knowledge and genetic resources within the patent system. (wipo/grtkf/ic/5/6). world intellectual property organization (wipo). (2006). the protection of traditional knowledge: revised outline of policy options and legal mechanisms. (wipo/grtkf/ic/9/inf/5). world intellectual property organization (wip0). 2008. the protection of traditional knowledge: draft gap analysis. wipo/grtkf/ic/13/5(b). revision. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 4 [2012], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.4.1 the international indigenous policy journal october 2012 revisiting the debate on intellectual property rights and traditional knowledge of biodiversity: accommodating local realities and perspectives ujjal kumar sarma indrani barpujari recommended citation revisiting the debate on intellectual property rights and traditional knowledge of biodiversity: accommodating local realities and perspectives abstract keywords creative commons license microsoft word 314937-text.native.1350665866.doc first nations teenaged female lone parent families in canada: recognizing family diversity and the importance of networks of care the international indigenous policy journal volume 4 issue 1 indigenous early parenthood article 12 march 2013 first nations teenaged female lone parent families in canada: recognizing family diversity and the importance of networks of care jacqueline m. quinless university of victoria, quinless@theqrgroup.com recommended citation quinless, j. m. (2013). first nations teenaged female lone parent families in canada: recognizing family diversity and the importance of networks of care. the international indigenous policy journal, 4(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.12 first nations teenaged female lone parent families in canada: recognizing family diversity and the importance of networks of care abstract using semi-custom data tabulations from the 2006 census of population, this article provides a brief statistical description of the socio-economic conditions of female first nations teenaged lone parents aged 15 to 19 years in canada. it examines existing formal and informal social and economic support systems available to first nations lone mother families in multiple family households. these support systems where compared to first nations lone mothers in single family households as a way to shed light on the varying degrees that informal networks of care may be available to first nations lone mothers living on reserve, as compared to those living off reserve, who access varying degrees of support from extended family members for the care and nurturing of their children. despite the dominant westernized view of the negative impacts that teenaged lone parenting can have on women and their children, this article illustrates that there seems to be a culturally interrelated system, or “networks of care,” available to these women. such networks of care often have been overlooked in research on lone parenting. there remains much diversity among aboriginal lone parent families when one accounts for factors such as age of the parent, number of children, living on or off reserve, education, employment, and income. therefore, the assumption that the social and economic disadvantage of becoming a teenaged lone parent will result in the same circumstances and place all teenaged lone parents at the same “disadvantage” is not necessarily accurate, at least in the first nation context. french abstract monoparentalité chez les adolescents des premières nations du canada : reconnaître la diversité familiale et l’importance des réseaux de soins jacqueline m. quinless quintessential research group, inc. et camosun college résumé cette étude, fondée sur les données du recensement du canada de 2006, examine le nombre d’adolescents des premières nations chefs de famille monoparentale vivant dans les réserves et à l’extérieur de celles-ci. elle examine ensuite les diverses caractéristiques socioéconomiques uniques à ces deux groupes d’adolescents chefs de famille monoparentale. les résultats révèlent que la monoparentalité chez les jeunes des premières nations est une tendance à la hausse et que de nombreux adolescents des premières nations chefs de famille monoparentale vivent dans des ménages multifamiliaux. l’étude donne également à penser que les adolescents des premières nations chefs de famille monoparentale ont régulièrement accès à des « réseaux d’aide » officieux, même si ce phénomène est plus fréquemment observé dans les réserves qu’à l’extérieur de celles-ci. spanish abstract familias monoparentales adolescentes de las primeras naciones en canadá: reconocimiento de la diversidad de familias e importancia de las redes de atenció jacqueline m. quinless quintessential research group inc & camosun college resumen en este artículo se emplean datos del censo canadiense de 2006 para examinar el número de familias indígenas monoparentales adolescentes que viven en reservas y fuera de ellas. también se analizan las diversas características sociales y económicas exclusivas de estos dos grupos de familias monoparentales adolescentes. se observa que las familias indígenas monoparentales adolescentes constituyen una tendencia creciente, que muchas familias indígenas monoparentales adolescentes viven en hogares con otras familias y se sugiere que tienen acceso regularmente a “redes de atención” informales, aunque este fenómeno es más frecuente entre las familias en las reservas que fuera de las reservas. keywords aboriginal girls, early parenting, teen pregnancy, lone parenting, networks of care acknowledgments thanks to marc fonda, senior research manager at aboriginal affairs and northern development canada’s strategic research directorate, for his valuable insights and editorial expertise. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ f i r s t n a t i o n s t e e n a g e d f e m a l e l o n e p a r e n t f a m i l i e s i n c a n a d a : r e c o g n i z i n g f a m i l y d i v e r s i t y a n d t h e i m p o r t a n c e o f n e t w o r k s o f c a r e there are many different ways to define the aboriginal population in canada and selecting a definition can be somewhat problematic because there will be considerable variation in estimates of its population size. while there is no single or “correct” way to define the aboriginal population, the choice of definition is ultimately based on the discretion of the researcher and should depend on the purpose for which it is to be used. that being said, it is generally contended that the aboriginal population in canada is comprised of three main identity groups, which include first nations, inuit, and métis people. however, even when these definitions are used, it is still important to recognize that much diversity exists between and within these groups, and even more so when we consider the importance and role of family. research has consistently shown that aboriginal families in canada are different than non-aboriginal families in terms of marriage patterns, living arrangements, number of people living within the household, and overall family structure (ambert, 2006; castellano, 2002; hull, 2006). however, these differences can be further extended to first nations, métis, and inuit families, and it is, therefore, imperative that researchers are able to contextualize this important aspect of family diversity that exists between various aboriginal identity groups. while much of the literature aggregates aboriginal families into a single homogenous group in order to make comparisons with the non-aboriginal population, it is the intent of this paper to focus exclusively on first nations teenaged lone parent families. in first nations communities, there is more emphasis on the importance of extended family, comprised of a larger community, including both relatives and friends (ambert, 2006; bianchi, 1995; burns & scot, 1994). nonetheless, it is important to recognize that there is great diversity in terms of the prevalence and socio-economic circumstances of aboriginal families, and lone parent families in particular, across canada. this is especially so when we consider factors such as age, gender, number of children in the household, place of residence, and aboriginal identity group. lone parent families have more obstacles to overcome in terms of childcare, increased poverty, and father involvement (ambert, 2006). understanding first nations family structure and organization is important for researchers and social policy makers when considering the development of programs, policies, and services intended to benefit lone parent families. for example, determining where a family resides and how many children live in the household has an impact on employment, educational opportunities, cost of housing, and also a lone parent’s ability to access and utilize various available systems of social support or “networks of care”, such as sisters, brothers, uncles, aunties, grandparents, and even various community services (ambert, 2006). it is generally thought that the canadian census framework reflects a western, industrialized notion of “family”. more often than not, it is difficult for researchers to apply such census concepts in a meaningful way to depict the socio-economic realities of culturally diverse groups of families. this becomes apparent when we attempt to impose census concepts of families onto the first nations population. the real issue here is that the census framework does not adequately reflect the diversity among first nations lone parent families, but rather creates a particular view by assigning first nations lone parent families to fixed concepts, which are conceptualized as sharing a common collective identity, irrespective of diversity (bauman, 1997). 1 quinless: first nations teenaged female lone parent families published by scholarship@western, 2013 the census questionnaire dichotomizes lone parent families as belonging to either an economic1 or census2 family unit. this classification system imposes a standard definition of family onto first nations communities, which excludes extended family members by grouping these people into a unique category referred to as a multiple family household (statistics canada, 2006). in doing so, we provide a onedimensional description of first nations families as belonging either to some variation of a census or economic family unit. while important, this way of categorizing families does not consider the diversity of types of families that exist within the context of “lone parenting,” such as the extended family, based on culturally significant systems or “networks of care,” to aid in the support and care of children. this has important policy implications when we consider the extent to which these data shape our knowledge and understanding of first nations lone parent families. l o n e p a r e n t f a m i l i e s i n c a n a d a : a g r o w i n g t r e n d since 1996, the incidence of lone parent families has increased in both the aboriginal and nonaboriginal populations in canada. in fact, this increase has been larger among the female registered indian (first nations) population living on-reserve (statistics canada, 2008). the 2006 census shows that 25 percent of aboriginal identity families were lone parent families, compared to 16 percent of nonaboriginal families. the 2006 census also demonstrates that about one-third of aboriginal families living on-reserve were lone parent families, with over 80 percent headed by women (statistics canada, 2008). this increasing trend in lone parent family rates among all aboriginal identity groups suggests a need for social policy researchers to gain an understanding not only of the pathways to becoming a lone parent, but also the existing social and economic support systems that benefit lone parents and their families. this paper focuses on first nations teenaged female lone parent families between the ages of 15 to 19 years, exclusively. there are several pathways to lone parenthood in general. these include a complex system of interrelated factors, such as widowhood, separation, divorce, childbirth outside marriage, and the changing dynamic of an individual’s family status over time (hull, 2001; lindsay, 1992; quinless, 2011). research into aboriginal lone parent families shows that the number of families living in poverty is high when compared to non-aboriginal lone parent families. more importantly, the degree of poverty and associated substandard living conditions tend to differ when we consider other socio-economic factors, 1 economic family refers to “a group of two or more persons who live in the same dwelling and are related to each other by blood, marriage, common-law or adoption. a couple may be of opposite or same sex. foster children are included. by definition, all persons who are members of a census family are also members of an economic family. examples of the broader concept of economic family include the following: two co-resident census families who are related to one another are considered one economic family; co-resident siblings who are not members of a census family are considered as one economic family; and, nieces or nephews living with aunts or uncles are considered one economic family” (statistics canada, n.d.b, definition, paras. 1 – 2). 2 census family is defined as “a married couple and the children, if any, of either or both spouses; a couple living common law and the children, if any, of either or both partners; or, a lone parent of any marital status with at least one child living in the same dwelling and that child or those children. all members of a particular census family live in the same dwelling. a couple may be of opposite or same sex. children may be children by birth, marriage or adoption regardless of their age or marital status as long as they live in the dwelling and do not have their own spouse or child living in the dwelling. grandchildren living with their grandparent(s) but with no parents present also constitute a census family” (statistics canada, n.d.a, definition, para. 1). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 12 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/12 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.12 including age and gender of the parent, number of children living in the household, educational attainment, employment, and place of residence. with this in mind, one can begin to appreciate that first nations lone parent families with pre-school and school age children will have different needs, economic difficulties, and social pressures, when compared to families with older children. this is even more the case when compared to coupled families and families without children. the cost of housing, reduced wages, and the support required to care for young children often results in lone parents, especially lone mothers, living on low-incomes and in poverty. such living conditions can also lead to severe social and health related problems, such as allostatic load3, and a range of stress-related health issues (quinless, 2011). therefore, it is imperative for policy makers to recognize that the social and economic circumstances of first nations lone parent families vary considerably within the aboriginal lone parent family population. f i r s t n a t i o n s t e e n a g e d f e m a l e l o n e p a r e n t f a m i l i e s since 1986, fertility rates among first nations teenage girls under 20-years-old have been high, as compared to other canadian teenagers. guimond and robitaille (2008) demonstrated that the fertility rate for first nations girls under the age of 15 is approximately 18 times higher than that of other canadians. this is of concern because early motherhood can increase the vulnerability of first nations women, who are already at a socio-economic disadvantage based on a variety of factors, such as age, place of residence (living onor off-reserve), educational attainment, income, and employment. thus, having children while in their teens can increase the social and economic challenges facing young first nations women, including dependence on income assistance, lower earnings, poverty, academic underachievement, reduced employability, and lone parenthood (guimond & robitaille, 2008; luong, 2008). consequently, early parenting is an important social policy issue that directly impacts first nations and other aboriginal communities. n e t w o r k s o f c a r e it is important to point out that viewing early parenting as a social concern is problematic because it is a value judgement that reflects a dominant westernized view of first nations lone motherhood. arguably, this way of thinking is not necessarily supported by many first nations communities because it fails to recognize the extent to which teenaged lone mothers rely on culturally significant “networks of care” to support and care for their children. the concept of “networks of care,” as described here, refers to the interrelated cultural and social system provided by extended families members and friends to support female-led first nations teenaged lone parent families. for the purpose of analysis, this system of support is characterized by factors, such as income support, care and nurturing of children, and participation in unpaid housework, provided to multiple family households by extended family members. these components are essential in the successful day-to-day functioning of these lone parent families. 3 the term “allostatic load” was coined by bruce mcewen (2000) and refers to the physiological costs of chronic exposure to the neural or neuroendocrine stress response. 3 quinless: first nations teenaged female lone parent families published by scholarship@western, 2013 o b j e c t i v e s o f t h e s t u d y the overall purpose of this research is to analyze data from the 2006 census of population in order to generate a brief description of an important aspect of the socio-economic conditions of first nations teenaged lone parents in canada. the goal is to produce more culturally sensitive findings. this statistical description of first nations teenaged female lone parent families will shed light on the existing diversity within multiple family census households and show the presence of “networks of care”. specifically, this paper examines differences between first nations teenaged mothers between the ages of 15 to 19 years living on-reserve to those living off-reserve, with respect to their relative access to varying degrees of support from extended family members that assist in the caring and nurturing of their children. m e t h o d s d a t a s o u r c e s , t e r m s , a n d c o n c e p t s data presented are based on semi-customized tabulations prepared by aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc) using the 2006 census of population. according to statistics canada, in 2006 about 98 percent of households were enumerated using the self-enumeration method. the 2006 census provides data that are based on the definitions of ethnic origin (ancestry), aboriginal identity, registered indian status, and band membership. the aboriginal identity population includes all those who identified themselves in the 2006 census as aboriginal and/or identified themselves as registered indians or members of an indian band or first nation. this chapter uses the concept of registered indian (that is women who indicated that they were a treaty or registered indian and are, therefore, registered under the indian act). these women were classified as first nations to provide a statistical description of select socio-economic characteristics of this population of teenage lone mothers. women who selfidentified with more than one aboriginal identity group or who reported being métis, inuit, or nonstatus indian were excluded from the current analysis. registered indian women were further subdivided into those living onand off-reserve, based on the variable “place of residence”. t e e n a g e l o n e m o t h e r s this analysis focuses on those first nations teenage mothers, between the ages of 15 and 19, living in lone parent census families with one or more children (0 to 14 years of age) residing in the household. s o c i o e c o n o m i c c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s i n c o m e . income was measured at the household level for both one census family and multiple family households. household income was the sum of individual incomes of each person aged 15 and over living in the household. m u l t i p l e f a m i l y h o u s e h o l d . a multiple-family household refers to a household in which two or more census families occupy the same private dwelling. h o u r s s p e n t d o i n g u n p a i d h o u s e w o r k . hours spent includes the number of hours that the person spent doing housework, maintaining the house, or doing yard work without getting paid. for 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 12 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/12 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.12 example, this includes time spent preparing meals, mowing the lawn, or cleaning the house for oneself, relatives, friends, or neighbours.4 h o u r s s p e n t l o o k i n g a f t e r c h i l d r e n w i t h o u t p a y . the number of unpaid hours that the person spent looking after children includes time spent taking care of one's own children or looking after the children of relatives, friends, or neighbours.5 s e l e c t e d c e n s u s f a m i l y c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s . this variable refers to the actual number of people residing in the multiple census family household. f i n d i n g s f i r s t n a t i o n s l o n e p a r e n t f a m i l i e s : a s n a p s h o t while examining the results of this study, there will be comparisons made to non-aboriginal teenaged lone parents to provide context. in setting the stage, a more general description of the distribution of female first nations lone parent families in canada in 2006 will be presented by age group and place of residence. lone parenthood varies according to age and place of residence. approximately 47,950 female first nations lone parent families reside in canada, of which slightly more (56% or 26,825) lived off-reserve (urban and rural settings) than lived on-reserve (44% or 21,125). in addition, 5.4 percent of the total female first nations lone parent families living on-reserve were led by women under the age of 24 years, compared to 2.8 percent living off-reserve. when considering the proportion of first nations lone parent families that were headed by males or females and lived on-reserve or off-reserve in 2006, it was not surprising to find that females headed the majority of first nations lone parent families, regardless of place of residence. more specifically, when compared to coupled families and other census family types, female-headed lone parent families accounted for just over 24 percent of all first nations census families. male-headed lone parent families accounted for roughly 6 percent. while we know that there is a higher proportion of first nations lone mothers in canada, it is equally important to recognize that their social and economic circumstances are different. when we consider differences in employment income, we see that in 2006 the proportion of registered indian lone parents living on-reserve whose major source of income came from employment income was lower compared to lone parents living off-reserve. for example, in 2005, 58 percent of first nations lone parent families headed by women had family incomes of less than $20,000, compared to 57 percent of lone parent families headed by men, and 20 percent of two-parent families. in addition, in 2006, roughly 30 percent of first nations lone mother families living on-reserve had three or more children living at home, compared to 20 percent of first nations lone father families (quinless, 2011). 4 the time spent on this activity is divided into blocks of hours (none, less than 5 hours, 5 to 14 hours, 15 to 29 hours, 30 to 59 hours, and 60 hours or more). only the hours spent on the activity during the week before census day (may 7 to 13, 2006) were counted. 5 the time spent on this activity is divided into blocks of hours (none, less than 5 hours, 5 to 14 hours, 15 to 29 hours, 30 to 59 hours, and 60 hours or more). only the hours spent on the activity during the week before census day (may 7 to 13, 2006) are counted. 5 quinless: first nations teenaged female lone parent families published by scholarship@western, 2013 r e c o g n i z i n g f a m i l y d i v e r s i t y : f i r s t n a t i o n s t e e n a g e d f e m a l e l o n e p a r e n t f a m i l i e s the way the data was presented for this analysis allows for comparisons of female first nations lone parent families by both one family households (referring to a single census family occupying a private dwelling) and multiple family household (referring to situations where two or more census families occupy the same private dwelling). this information is particularly useful in determining the extent to which teenaged first nations lone mothers live with other family members, as compared to first nations lone mothers of other age groups. these findings are discussed next in considering the number of female first nations lone parent families by age, household type, and place of residence. in 2006, there were 21,125 on-reserve households headed by female first nations lone parents. approximately two-thirds of them (n = 14,215) were single family households, and just under one-third (n = 6,915) were multiple family households. approximately 5 percent (n = 1,145) of these female lone parent households were headed by a teenager. of these families, 135 (just under 12% of the total teenage-led households) resided in one family households, while 1,010 (88%) were multiple family households. comparatively, in 2006, around 25 percent of female-headed first nations lone parent households lived (n = 26,825) off-reserve, of which 88 percent were one family households (n = 25,590) and 12 percent were multiple family households (n = 3,235). just under 3 percent of these off-reserve households were headed by a teenager (n = 770), and there was an even split in the numbers of one family and multiple family households (n = 385). table 1 offers more details related to female-headed first nations lone parent families by age category and place of residence. the above description of teenaged first nations lone mothers living both onand off-reserve is interesting for several reasons. for instance, lone mothers between the ages of 15 and 19 years who live on-reserve are more likely to live in multiple households, compared to those who live off-reserve. this finding suggests that a significant percentage of teenaged first nations lone mothers on-reserve are not living in independent census families. rather, they rely on some system of support, whether social or financial, of extended family members, as defined above, to assist them in their experience of teenaged lone motherhood. however, we find a different pattern with regard to first nations lone mothers between the ages of 15 and 19 years who resided off-reserve in 2006. a high proportion of first nations teenaged lone mother households contained multiple families, but an equal proportion (50% or 385 for both types) were single-family households. while the pattern may be different off-reserve, it suggests the possibility that a significant number of teenage-led lone parent households off-reserve may rely on informal support systems to complement more formal supports, ranging from salaries to social programming to childcare assistance. what these findings may further suggest is that at least one in two first nations teenage lone mothers, living offreserve in either rural or urban settings, live with extended family members, as defined above, and, in some capacity, may rely on some informal network as a system of support for the care and nurturing of their children. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 12 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/12 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.12 t a b l e 1 : n u m b e r o f f e m a l e f i r s t n a t i o n s l o n e p a r e n t f a m i l i e s b y a g e c a t e g o r i e s , h o u s e h o l d t y p e , a n d p l a c e o f r e s i d e n c e , c a n a d a 2 0 0 6 h o u s e h o l d t y p e t o t a l a g e 1 5 1 9 y r s 2 0 2 4 y r s 2 5 2 9 y r s 3 0 3 4 y r s 3 5 3 9 y r s 4 0 4 4 y r s 4 5 + y r s o n r e s e r v e all households by age1 21,125 100% 1,145 5.4% 2,455 11.6% 2,580 12.2% 2,605 12.3% 2,780 13.1% 2,590 12.2% 6,970 33.0% one family households2 14,215 67.3% 135 11.8% 925 37.7% 1,610 62.4% 1,995 76.6% 2,265 81.5% 2,015 77.8% 5,260 75.4% multiple family households2 6,915 32.7% 1,010 88.2% 1,525 62.1% 975 37.8% 610 23.4% 510 18.3% 570 22.0% 1,710 24.5% o f f r e s e r v e all households by age1 26,825 100% 770 2.9% 2,970 11.1% 3,825 14.3% 4,355 16.2% 4,010 14.9% 3,835 14.3% 7,055 26.3% one family households2 23,590 87.9% 385 50% 2,365 79.6% 3,405 89.0% 4,075 93.6% 3,620 90.3% 3,505 91.4% 6,225 88.2% multiple family households2 3,235 12.1% 385 50% 600 20.2% 420 11.0% 280 6.4% 390 9.7% 325 8.5% 830 11.8% 1 percentages calculated using total age for all households as denominator to show distribution of first nations female lone parent families across age groups. 2 percentages calculated using all households within each age group as denominator to show distribution of household type within age group. interestingly, there also appeared an inverse relationship between age and whether a lone mother lived in a multiple familial arrangement. this implies that first nations lone mothers 30 years and over were more likely to live in one family households and, therefore, less likely to rely on the immediate support of extended family in the care and nurturing of their children. this might be a result of higher education and income levels, enabling these lone mothers to financially and socially provide for their children somewhat more independently, when compared to the teenaged group of lone mothers. when considering the proportion of time spent by first nations teenaged (15 19 years) lone mothers doing unpaid housework, the type of family household, and place of residence in 2006, it was found that teenaged first nations women living in multiple family households off-reserve were much less likely to have spent time preparing meals, mowing the lawn, or cleaning the house for oneself or for relatives, friends, or neighbours when compared to their on-reserve counterparts. that is, teenaged lone mothers living on-reserve spend significantly more time participating in household activities than those living offreserve. this difference might be due to competing factors that are more “available” in off-reserve settings, such as time spent working for pay outside of the home or attending post secondary training. in this way, it is reasonable to propose that, in many cases, off-reserve first nations teenaged lone mothers are relying on extended family members for additional support in day-to-day household activities. 7 quinless: first nations teenaged female lone parent families published by scholarship@western, 2013 with regard to the proportion of hours first nations teenaged lone mothers aged 15 to 19 years living off-reserve spent doing unpaid housework, those residing in one family households spent considerably more time doing unpaid housework, as compared to those women living in multiple family households. for example, we found that, across all time categories (ranging from less than 5 hours to 60+ hours), teenage mothers living in one family households spent nearly double the amount of time doing unpaid housework, when compared to those women residing in multiple family households. this observation is an important clue that lends support to the idea that first nations teenaged lone mothers rely on the support of family members for day-to day-household activities. when analyzing the proportion of hours spent by first nations teenaged lone parent mothers living in multiple family households doing unpaid childcare by place of residence, it was found that mothers living on-reserve spent more time looking after children, when compared to their female counterparts living off-reserve in 2006. this may be due to the fact that female teenaged lone parents living on-reserve generally tend to have more children in their household, as compared to their counterparts living offreserve (hull, 2001; hull, 2006; quinless, 2011). in this case, unpaid childcare includes time spent taking care of one's own children or looking after the children of relatives, friends, or neighbours. the preceding observations are not meant to imply that the children of first nations teenaged lone mothers living off-reserve are not receiving adequate childcare or these women are spending less time looking after children without pay. rather, it could be that many off-reserve first nations teenage mothers have children that are of school age and attending preschool and elementary schools or these women may be involved in paid employment or educational pursuits outside of the home. nonetheless, these findings are important because they further suggest that some informal “network of care” is in place and perhaps is playing a more critical role in the range of social support systems available to these women. in essence, these women may be relying more on their extended family for support in the nurturing and care of their children than do their on-reserve counterparts. income is often used as an indicator to understand the relationship between levels of poverty and inequality, as well as a measure of an individual’s socio-economic status and social location. the following section examines the relationship of first nations teenaged lone mother’s total household income in 2005 by household type and place of residence. first of all, it was found that for all age groups considered the average total household income for first nations lone mothers is significantly higher for those living in multiple family households than those living in one family households, as one might expect due to multiple incomes. for example, there was a $25,000 average household income difference between first nations lone mothers of all age groups living in single family households, compared to those residing in multiple family households. what is interesting here, however, is that it might suggest one of the reasons as to “why” first nations lone mothers may choose to live within multiple family households, often with extended family members is for economic support. in digging deeper into the 2005 incomes of teenaged lone mother households both living on-reserve and off-reserve, significant differences were found between the average household incomes of one family and multiple family households, regardless of teen mothers’ place of residence. for example, for those first nations teenaged lone mothers living on-reserve, there was a significant difference of $34,000 in total household income between one and multiple family households. similarly, for those women living offreserve, there was a difference of $26,000 between those women living in one family households and women residing in multiple family households. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 12 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/12 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.12 finally, while investigating the average total 2005 household income for first nations lone parents, aged 15 to 19 years, by number of persons in multiple family households and place of residence, it was learned that the average multiple family household total income tends to increase with the number of persons residing in the household. this suggests that there are more adults living in the house with incomes that contribute to the overall reported household income. with the two exceptions (i.e., an income difference of $300 for 2 person households and $5,000 for 5 person households for lone mothers living on-reserve), the average multiple family household total income tends to be slightly higher for those first nations lone mothers living off-reserve. this finding lends further support to the notion that first nations teenaged lone mothers may tend to live with extended family members, whether they live onor off-reserve, as a way to obtain financial support. d i s c u s s i o n since 1996, the incidence of lone parent families has increased among both canada’s aboriginal and non-aboriginal populations. this increase, however, has been much greater among the female registered indian (first nations) population living on-reserve (statistics canada, 2008). lone parent families with pre-school and school age children have different needs, economic concerns, and social pressures, compared to families with older children. this is even more the case when compared to families without children. research shows that the high costs of housing, low wages, irregular child support, and caring for young children often results in lone parents, especially lone mothers, living with low incomes and in poverty (johnser, 2007; mulroy, 1995). several studies support the viewpoint that early motherhood can increase the vulnerability of first nations women, who are already at a socioeconomic disadvantage based on a variety of factors, such as age, place of residence (living onor offreserve), educational attainment, income, and employment (castellano, 2002; cunnington, 2001; east, 1999; galarneau, 2006). using data from the 2006 census of population, this paper provides a brief statistical description of the socio-economic conditions of female first nations teenaged lone parents in canada. more specifically, it examines existing social and economic support systems, formal and informal, available to first nations lone mother families in multiple family households, compared to first nations lone mothers in single family households. this sheds light on the varying degrees that informal “networks of care” may be available to first nations lone mothers living on-reserve, compared to those living off-reserve, who can access varying degrees of support from extended family members for the care and nurturing of their children. despite the dominant westernized view of the negative impacts that teenaged lone parenting can have on women and their children, this paper illustrates that there seems to be a culturally interrelated system, or “networks of care,” available to these women. such “networks of care” have often been overlooked in the research on lone parenting. there remains much diversity among aboriginal lone parent families, when factors, such as age of parent, number of children, place of residence (onor off-reserve), education, employment, and income, are taken into account. therefore, the assumption that the social and economic disadvantage of becoming a teenaged lone parent will result in the same circumstances and place all teenaged lone parents in the same “disadvantage” is not necessarily accurate, at least in the first nation context. many factors contribute significantly to the social and economic experiences of female first nations teenaged lone parent families and their children based on social location, which is 9 quinless: first nations teenaged female lone parent families published by scholarship@western, 2013 comprised of gender, age, number and age of children, place of residence (onor off-reserve), income level, educational level, labour force participation, and the type of “network of care” that is in place. this paper does not intend to dismiss previous research findings that have consistently shown that many first nations female lone parent families in general are disproportionately unemployed, are less likely to have a university degree, rely on government transfer payments as their major source of income, live in low income, and have more children when compared to other aboriginal identity groups and also to the non-aboriginal population (beckert, strom, strom, darre, & weed, 2008; castellano, 2002; hull, 2001; hull, 2005). rather, this paper suggests that it is important to apply census concepts, terms, and definitions from a less conventional lens and, thereby, make a concerted effort to consider research findings that are more culturally appropriate to diverse family situations and structures that exist within the first nations community and, in particular, lone parenting. with this in mind, researchers and experts have, at least, sufficient information to identify general trends in various first nations teenage lone parent family structures and organizations. by acknowledging that additional factors, such as father involvement and social support networks, do exist among first nations teenaged lone parent families, social policies will be better able to focus on improving the programs and services offered to first nations teenaged lone parents and their children. extended family relationships are networks that many first nations teenaged lone parents depend on. there is emerging research examining the role and importance of aboriginal fathers in canada. studies are currently indicating that, while there are increasing levels of participation of aboriginal men in their children’s lives, both as noncustodial parents and as lone parents, these men still remain on the margins of mainstream society. the real issue is that there is often little social advocacy or help for men to become good fathers (ball & george, 2005). factors that have been identified as affecting first nations children’s well-being in lone parent families include the father’s involvement in the child’s upbringing, which has a direct impact on their health, development, and even survival (ball, 2008; ball & moselle, 2007), and residual effects of the residential school system that have led to generations of first nations parents who lack the proper role models and upbringing to positively parent their children (ball, roberge, joe, & george, 2007; morrissette, 1994). lone mothers require higher incomes and employment equity (ambert, 2006), subsidized good quality childcare centres are necessary to remove barriers to single parenting (ambert, 2006), and fathers need more support and available resources to encourage their involvement in parenting. the fatherhood involvement research alliance also suggests that policy and program changes could support fathers’ efforts to be more effective in their roles (ambert, 2006; ball et al., 2007). by understanding the social and economic conditions of first nations lone mother families according to factors, such as age, place of residence, number and age of children, income levels, and access to social networks, we can gain some further insight into the cultural complexity of their unique living circumstances. from here, more effective programs and policies can be implemented that actually meet the needs of first nations teenaged female-headed families. s t u d y l i m i t a t i o n s this study has several limitations. first, while the objective of the census of population is to provide a snapshot of detailed socio-economic characteristics of the population on census day, inevitably segments of the population are not included. under coverage is an important issue to consider especially when interpreting and analyzing census data for the first nations population. it can be difficult to 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 12 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/12 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.12 delineate an accurate portrait of first nations lone parent families, and first nations teenaged female lone parents in particular, who reside in urban centres due to the high degree of mobility. research has shown that a significant proportion of the first nations population are transient and frequently move between on-reserve and off-reserve locations, as well as within census metropolitan areas and out of province (galarneau, 2006; haskey, 1991; hull, 2001; hull, 2006). in addition, it is important to consider the magnitude of undercounted first nations people and how this impacts the population counts. for example, some indian reserves and settlements did not participate in the census because enumeration was not permitted or it was interrupted before completion. for example, in 2006, there were 22 incompletely enumerated reserves. data quality rules require these non-enumerated areas be excluded from census based data tabulations and, therefore, these areas and their teenaged female lone parent population are not included in this analysis. second, the standard definition of “motherhood” derived from census data is a woman living in a household with her children at the time of the census. this definition does not consider the fact that children may be absent from the household on the census day for various reasons, such as shared custody arrangements, children given up for adoption, or those who were placed in foster care. a portion of the first nations teenaged female lone parent population that should have been included in this analysis may be missing. third, the census does not ask for details on the biological association of other census family members residing in the multiple census households to the female lone parent family member. for this reason, this study was not able to examine the identity of the other census family members in the household, and, therefore, we can merely speculate as to their relationship to the lone mother (i.e., sister, brother, aunt, uncle, grandmother, etc.). data that focuses on the relationship to the lone parent would be extremely valuable in order to examine and describe in greater detail the multiple census family household structure. fourth, while the total multiple family household income data was a useful way to examine combined incomes of the female lone parent family and other family members, it does have limitations. it is difficult to determine with accuracy the extent to which other family members contribute to the overall economic functioning of the lone parent household. fifth, the definition of both hours spent doing unpaid housework and childcare pertain only to those spent on the activity during the week before the census day (may 7 to 13, 2006). this may provide an underestimate of the hours spent at various points throughout the year when families are in transition, such as with the birth of a child, relocation, children entering the school system, and even the start of a new employment opportunity for the mother. this makes it difficult to accurately capture the amount of support that is provided by extended family members to first nations teenage female-headed lone parent families. in future research it would be beneficial to examine the extent to which teenaged lone mothers, first nations or otherwise, are engaged in educational pursuits and/or paid employment outside the home and compare this to varying degrees of time spent doing unpaid housework and childcare for both one family and multiple family households. 11 quinless: first nations teenaged female lone parent families published by scholarship@western, 2013 a p p e n d i x a . a n o t e o n d a t a data presented in this paper are based on semi-customized tabulations prepared by aboriginal affairs and northern development canada using the 2006 census of population. according to statistics canada, in 2006 about 98 percent of households were enumerated using the self-enumeration method. in this case, 70 percent of households were mailed a census questionnaire and 30 percent of households received their questionnaires from a census enumerator. completed census forms were either returned by mail or completed on-line. in addition, about 2 percent of households in remote communities, northern areas of the country, and in large urban downtown areas with transient residents completed their (2d) census long form using the canvasser method, which uses a personal interview conducted by a census enumerator. all on-reserve households received the long form (2d) and completed the questionnaire with the aid of a statistics canada interviewer. i n t e r p r e t i n g r e s u l t s statistics canada applies a confidentiality procedure of random rounding to all census data to avoid the possibility of associating statistical data with any identifiable individual. with this method, all data, including totals and margins are randomly rounded either up or down to a multiple of 5 or in some cases 10. as a result, the sum of a set of data may not add up to the total, and percentages, which are calculated on rounded figures, do not necessarily add up to 100 percent. the impact of this procedure is particularly noticeable on small counts. in effect, small numbers may lose their precision, and percentages calculated based on these numbers may not represent the proportion of the population indicated. this is especially important when interpreting findings for smaller population sizes. in such cases, the percentages in a table may add to more than, and in some instances less than, 100 percent. again, the reader is advised to proceed with caution when interpreting the findings. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 12 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/12 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.12 r e f e r e n c e s ambert, a-m. (2006). one parent families: characteristics, causes, consequences, and issues. contemporary family trends. ottawa: the vanier institute of the family. retrieved from htttp://www.vifamily.ca/library/cft/oneparent.pdf ball, j. (2008). policies and practice reforms to promote positive transitions to fatherhood among aboriginal young men. horizons: hope and heartbreak: aboriginal youth and canada’s future, 10(1), 52-56. ball, j., & george, r. (2005). policies and practices affecting aboriginal father’s involvement with their children. presentation at second triennial aboriginal research policy conference relationships: policy, research, results, ottawa. ball, j., & moselle, k. (2007). father’s contributions to children’s well-being. research reviewed for the public health agency of canada, population health fund project: father involvement for healthy child outcomes: partner’s supporting knowledge development and transfer. ball, j., roberge, c., joe, l., & george, r. (2007). fatherhood: indigenous men’s journeys [dvd]. available from early childhood development intercultural partnerships website http://www.ecdip.org/order/ bauman, z. (1997). the making and unmaking of strangers. in p. werbner & t. modood (eds.) debating cultural hybridity: multicultural identities and the politics of anti-racism (pp. 46 57). london: zed books ltd. beckert, t. e, strom, p. s., strom, r. d., darre, k., & weed, a. (2008). single mothers of early adolescents: perceptions of competence. adolescence, 43 (summer), 275-290. bianchi, s. m. (1995). the changing demographic and socioeconomic characteristics of single parent families. in m. b. sussman & s. hanson (eds.) single parent families: diversity, myths and realities (pp. 71 98). new york: the haworth press, inc. burns, a., & scot, c. (1994). mother-headed families and why they have increased. hillsdale, new jersey: lawrence erlbaum associates. castellano, m. (2002). aboriginal family trends: extended families, nuclear families, families of the heart. contemporary family trends. ottawa: vanier institute of the family. cunnington, a. j. (2001). what's so bad about teenage pregnancy? the journal of family planning and reproductive health care, 27, 36 41. east, p. l. (1999). the first teenage pregnancy in the family: does it affect mothers’ parenting, attitudes, or mother-adolescent communication? journal of marriage and family, 61(2), 306 319. 13 quinless: first nations teenaged female lone parent families published by scholarship@western, 2013 galarneau, d. (2006). education and income of lone parents. perspectives on labour and income, 18(1), 7 18. retrieved from http://www.statcan.gc.ca/pub/75-001-x/11205/8981-eng.pdf guimond, e., & robitaille, n. (2008). when teenage girls have children: trends and consequences. horizons: hope and heartbreak: aboriginal youth and canada’s future, 10(1), 40 51. haskey, j. (1991). lone parenthood and demographic change. in m. hardey & g. crow (eds.), lone parenthood. coping with constraints and making opportunities in single parent families (pp. 19 – 46). toronto: university of toronto press. hull, j. (2001). aboriginal single mothers in canada, 1996: a statistical profile. ottawa: indian and northern affairs canada. retrieved from http://www.ainc-inac.gc.ca/ai/rs/pubs/re/smt/smteng.pdf hull, j. (2005). an overview of the educational characteristics of registered indians in canada. ottawa: indian and northern affairs canada. retrieved from http://dsp-psd.pwgsc.gc.ca/ collection/r2-399-2001e.pdf hull, j. (2006). aboriginal women: a profile from the 2001 census. ottawa: women’s issues and gender equality directorate indian and northern affairs canada. johnser, r. l. (2007). allostatic load: single parents, stress-related health issues, and social care. health and social work, 32(2), 89 94. lindsay, c. (1992). lone-parent families in canada: target groups project (catalogue no. 89-522e). ottawa: statistics canada. luong, m. (2008, may). life after teenage motherhood. perspectives. ottawa: statistics canada. retrieved from http://www.statcan.gc.ca/bsolc/olc-cel/olc-cel?lang=eng&catno=75-001x200810510577 mcewen, b. s. (2000). allostasis and allostatic load: implications for neuropsychopharmacology. neuropsychopharmacology, 22, 108 124. morrissette, p. j. (1994). the holocaust of first nation people: residual effects on parenting and treatment implications. contemporary family therapy, 16(5), 381 392. mulroy, e. a. (1995). the new uprooted: single mothers in urban life. westport, ct: auburn house. quinless, j. (2011). aboriginal lone parent families in canada in 2006: a statistical profile. ottawa: indian and northern affairs canada. statistics canada. (2006). aboriginal peoples in canada in 2006: inuit, métis and first nations. 2006 census of population. retrieved from http://www12.statcan.ca/english/census06/data/ profiles/ aboriginal/index.cfm?lang=e statistics canada. (2008). aboriginal peoples of canada 2006 census [cd rom]. ottawa: author. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 1 [2013], art. 12 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss1/12 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.1.12 statistics canada. (n.d.a). census family. retrieved from http://www.statcan.gc.ca/concepts/definitions/c-r-fam-eng.htm statistics canada. (n.d.b). economic family. retrieved from http://www.statcan.gc.ca/concepts/definitions/fam-econ-eng.htm 15 quinless: first nations teenaged female lone parent families published by scholarship@western, 2013 the international indigenous policy journal march 2013 first nations teenaged female lone parent families in canada: recognizing family diversity and the importance of networks of care jacqueline m. quinless recommended citation first nations teenaged female lone parent families in canada: recognizing family diversity and the importance of networks of care abstract french abstract spanish abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license first nations teenaged female lone parent families in canada: recognizing family diversity and the importance of networks of care the truth and reconciliation commission of canada: insights into the goal of transformative education the international indigenous policy journal volume 2 issue 3 truth and reconciliation article 4 august 2011 the truth and reconciliation commission of canada: insights into the goal of transformative education karina czyzewski university of toronto, karina.czyzewski@utoronto.ca recommended citation czyzewski, k. (2011). the truth and reconciliation commission of canada: insights into the goal of transformative education. the international indigenous policy journal, 2(3) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.3.4 this research is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. the truth and reconciliation commission of canada: insights into the goal of transformative education abstract in 2006, the government of canada announced the approval of a final residential schools settlement agreement with the collaboration of the four churches responsible (united, anglican, presbyterian, catholic), the federal government and residential school survivors. schedule "n" of the agreement lists the mandate of the trc; therein, the trc states one of its goals as: (d) to promote awareness and public education of canadians about the system and its impacts. can education as the trc hopes to engender truly be transformative, renewing relationships and promoting healing in the process of forging these new relationships? the literature reviewed and the conferences attended highlighted that generating empathy may be a necessary ingredient for the instigation of social change, but is insufficient. transformation through education, or reconciliation through truth-telling, testimonial reading and responsible listening would mean claiming a genuine, supportive responsibility for the colonial past. educational policy and media initiatives are fundamental to creating awareness, developing public interest and support of the trc's recommendations. however, authors also stress the importance of critical pedagogy in the whole process of truth and reconciliation, and that real reconciliation would require confronting the racism that initiated these institutions and allowed for a decontextualization of their impacts. keywords trc, canada, indigenous, public education, transformative education, testimonial reading acknowledgments the author would like to acknowledge the generous direction and feedback from dr. martin cannon at oise. she would also like to acknowledge subsequent reviews by nicholas czyzewski, and her colleagues emily anson, emma yasui and anatoly venovcev. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ introduction the residential school system was a colonial policy that operated for over one hundred years, with the last school closing in 1996.1 despite this fact, it is not uncommon to have conversations with people of varying ages that have never heard of this system. in 2006, the government of canada announced the approval of a final indian residential schools settlement agreement (irssa) in collaboration with four of the churches who operated residential schools (united, anglican, presbyterian, and catholic), the federal government, and residential school survivors. the agreement provided for individual common experience payments and an independent assessment process, but also included collective measures such as the truth and reconciliation commission (trc of canada). schedule "n"2 part of a contemporary international trend, the truth and reconciliation commission shares with similar initiatives the notion that a more inclusive citizenship, as well as reconciliation, can be achieved through truth-telling and subsequent public education about "past" injustices. this goal, which mainly speaks to a discourse on empathy, is supposed to produce a transformation in settler canadians vis-à-vis indigenous peoples. what would this goal require canadians to do? when we confront nationals of the agreement lists the mandate of the trc; therein, the trc states one of its goals as: "(d) to promote awareness and public education of canadians about the irs system and its impacts". also within this section, the trc claims that reconciliation is a process that necessitates the commitment of all parties -indigenous peoples, the government and all canadiansto work toward a healthier future together, however that is defined. to go from a largely unaware public to a place of understanding (and widespread commitment to "healthy" relationships) is not so easily conceived. if “the residential school system is powerfully symbolic of the flawed relationship[s]” (castellano et al., 2008, p. 404) between settlers and indigenous peoples, and “the work of truth and reconciliation has at its core human relationships,” (erasmus, 2009, p. ix) then the trc must conceptualize its role in relation to the necessity of transforming these relationships. 3 the foreword to schedule "n" of the irssa, the trc's mandate, describes how the trc is part of an effort to put the "events of the past behind us." the mandate's authors state that the trc is symbolic of the government's sincere interest in holistically addressing the impacts of the residential school system and forging respectful, lasting relationships with all the parties involved. on the impacts of colonialism, who gets to feel bad and who is doing the transforming (ahmed, 2005, p. 11)? what are the risks of empathy in the context of social change and reconciliation? can canadians be engaged in a "testimonial reading" ((boler, 1997 p. 263) and listening of the trc and its report? how does public education and desired transformations translate into actual social change? what are the consequences to any and all in this process? and finally, does the trc and its mandate overshadow (as some would argue) more pressing issues around indigenous rights (such as land claims) or citizenship (indian status) and does its recovery discourse overlook the significance of regeneration, restitution and resurgence (alfred, 2005, p.151)? 1gordon reserve residential school, saskatchewan. retrieved april 1, 2010 from http://www.anglican.ca/rs/history/schools/gordons-school-punnichy.htm 2 will be referred to as sch."n.” see appendix (1). 3 thobani (2007, p. 248) describes the national subject as one that is exalted to a “higher order of humanity” through a political process “organized by the juridical order and the institution of citizenship” and through the exclusion of others. 1 czyzewski: the trc: insights into the goal of transformative education published by scholarship@western, 2011 they also suggest that truth-telling and sharing of common experiences with all canadians will offer the route to reconciliation. can education -as the trc hopes to engendertruly be transformative, renewing relationships and promoting healing in the process of forging these new connections? this article seeks to unpack the aforementioned questions by problematizing the ideal of transformative education as exemplified in the trc's mandate. a potential lesson plan for the trc i shut my eyes tight and tried not to listen to what [father millar] was doing. it made me so sick to hear that, and sarah, she didn't say a word, didn't make a sound, didn't even cry. i think he did that to her a lot. she was always sick, always in the dorm. she finally died too. that must have been a relief for her. she suffered so much (jaine ed., 1993, p. 123). the abuse that occurred behind the walls of the institutions that were the residential schools is certainly no secret. one need only to look at the form for the independent assessment process to get an indication of some of the atrocities that involved students and staff. these included physical assault for speaking a native language, to sexually explicit comments, to rape. children also had their hair cut off, symbolic of a severed cultural connection. they were malnourished, had to endure harsh physical labour, faced exposure to the elements from inadequate clothing, and were unable to speak to siblings or see family, in some cases for years. although not all students went through the same experiences, or underwent the same degree of negativity, all were made to live in fear (sinclair, 2009) and were disconnected from language, spiritual and cultural teachings, family, community, and a nurturing environment. public education for the trc would require several components if it is truly to address the effects of the residential schools. it would need to include an examination of the motivations for implementing such a system, the workings of the system itself, and the implications this system has had on people today. this multi-faceted education would speak to the fact that this was a mandatory system with over 150,000 attendees (legacy of hope foundation, 2010). it would outline the negative environment forced upon students, some below the minimum age for school attendance4 awareness of the residential school system via the trc is intended to target the whole of the canadian public. as beverly jacobs (2008, p. 225) commented, "everyone [in canada] needs to know this part of our shared history–all indigenous peoples (first nations, métis and inuit) and all settlers" . it is also pivotal to convey details on the generations of students that survived, as well as the nature and process of intergenerational trauma in its contributions to domestic violence, low self-esteem and depression, and negative life situations. a complex and layered public education is necessary for non-indigenous peoples to grasp the severity of this colonial system's effect on entire nations. only such an educational framework could adequately describe a system that impacted every indigenous person directly or indirectly, and where there remains an estimated 85,000 (ibid.) survivors alive today dealing with these (for the most part unacknowledged) impacts by the canadian public. 5 4the law enforced that children were taken between the ages of 7-15 years (kelly, 2008, p. 23). . the education of the "truth" about residential schools to the canadian public is 5 the term "settler" encompasses all of whom are not indigenous and who therefore settled on native land: early french and english settlers and their descendants; subsequent groups of settlers; as well as recent 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 3 [2011], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.3.4 intended to enlighten them about indigenous realities in canada, a country that once explicitly envisioned indigenous demise or complete assimilation for numerous decades. this knowledge then, of a disturbing reality and the injustices and trauma of lived indigenous experiences under such a system, is hypothesized, from the statement we saw earlier, to transform canadians to feel empathetic toward indigenous peoples. this transformation, as described in schedule "n,” is the route to reconciliation; it is to be the basis for establishing healthy relationships. it is to be the basis for forging a brighter future together where indigenous peoples are respected for their "citizens plus" status, and their previous treaty promises and rights as the first peoples of canada and are upheld. difficult knowledge is “necessary to break us out of a numbing routine [...] to provoke selfdoubt” (britzman & dippo, 2000, p. 34); it is from “the persistence of awful thoughts [that]a state of open-mindedness where exploring issues of allegiance, commitment, destruction, trauma, and community can be taken seriously” (p. 36). neither can it simply be more knowledge –"disruptive" knowledge is required for challenging oppression (kumashiro, 2000, p. 34), like deconstructing “normalcy” as a socio-cultural construct. however, if indigenous peoples are opening up and sharing painful stories to inactive ears, or not being heard at all, who is doing the transforming? on a deeper level, by striving for reconciliation, the trc is presumably asking more of canadians than simply being put to tears by painful stories .what a public education of assimilative colonial policies, of genocidal policies, of building healthy relationships and reconciliation between indigenous peoples, non-indigenous and the canadian government truly means is claiming a genuine, supportive responsibility for the colonial past. and this is indeed a lofty goal. from truth to reconciliation: pedagogical possibilities canadians taking responsibility for our colonial legacies involves the acknowledgement that non-indigenous peoples are all complicit in allowing a destructive system to go on for so long. it is an acknowledgement of the types of beliefs that rationalized such a system and that it has taken until 2010 for the stories to be shared in a public space for a national audience. it is also an acknowledgement of the ignorance and erasure of the impacts the residential school system has had on an entire population and how these account for many negative behaviours present today. these acknowledgements are profound and would require a shifting, at least momentarily, of canadian pride to that of guilt and shame for having such stains on our national conscience (alfred, 2005), and feelings of empathy for those who have fallen victim to such a regime. learners would be encouraged to achieve a critical consciousness about the privilege that they hold in a society where, due to their heritage, but not that of certain "others,” they were exalted as representative canadians. they held a perceived desired citizenship as national subjects, which allowed for them to dictate how these "others" should live, while avoiding the turmoil their dictates imposed (thobani, 2007). the confidence-shaking of such learning would recognize privilege not as a quality acquired by hard-working immigrants that "pulled themselves up by their bootstraps"; but instead, as a social position granted via prejudice and racial bias. reflecting on freire's pedagogy of the oppressed, disruptive learning shifts the focus to a "pedagogy for the privileged" (currystevens, 2007), where learners are encouraged to recognize that those who hold power as a newcomers to canada. 3 czyzewski: the trc: insights into the goal of transformative education published by scholarship@western, 2011 dominant group, dictate privilege: who will have better access to privileged life situations, opportunities, as well as be able to disadvantage and differentiate themselves from those deemed "inferior" based on ethnocentric criteria. this includes policies such as placing children in residential schools to "civilize" them. as a set of steps in the process of confidence-shaking for privileged learners then, one must begin with an awareness of oppression as present, and then explore oppression as being structural and not confined to the past (curry-stevens, 2007, p. 45).this partly entails reconsidering the idealized canada many believe in, in addition to recognizing the naturalization of dominance (ibid., p. 46). this learning would then encourage a critique of the dynamics of oppression in our society and a structural analysis of power (ibid., p. 47). another important aspect to this learning requires us to situate ourselves, according to curry-stevens, as oppressed. this is relevant because we can all share in the common experiences of having suffered injustices in our lives. that this be affirmed is inherent to all human beings and provides the foundation from which we build empathy for one another (ibid., p. 48). from here stems the more difficult task of locating oneself as privileged, recognizing the "benefits that flow from that privilege,” and then seeing oneself as oppressor (ibid., p. 49). learners are asked to recognize that "their life experiences have been affected by their privileged identity,” "their social location" in society (ibid., p. 48-9). "most important of all, no one is off the hook since we can all claim to stand as oppressor and oppressed in relation to someone else," (razack, 1998, p. 47). this last step where we understand how we act to oppress others will encounter much resistance, but it is a necessary final culmination to this education. ultimately, this would be an education not only for the privileged, but for all canadians newcomers and established settlersin the hopes of deconstructing oppression and breaking down oppressive structures. what follows from these steps is then a process of confidencebuilding, wherein the learner is encouraged by the educator to unlearn domination and thus improve social justice by challenging inequality (curry-stevens, 2007, p. 54).this challenging could come in the form of transformed relationships, to the coalition-building between immigrant and indigenous peoples that thobani espouses (2007, p. 17). moreover, sinclair points out that newcomers are not exempt from the process of continued colonial relations because what they are gaining now is something that was taken away from indigenous peoples, mainly land and resources (2009).this is not an easy task to ask of persons who may be fleeing from oppressive regimes themselves, but a working example of how our identities as oppressor and oppressed can be simultaneous, or how class solidarity could be more constructive to attending to injustices than solidarity along racial or gender lines (collins, 1989, p. 1). this pedagogical framework demonstrates how education can indeed be transformative: how empathy, as it were, can translate into social action. the trc may catalyze empathy in some, where people would then be motivated to press for more funding for on-reserve schools, for instance, or would recognize the importance of keeping the only first nations university in canada in existence and well-funded. however, much of this pedagogy depends on an effective and supportive educator, or basically a social justice coach. the next section complicates the notion of empathy and national sentiments even further and elaborates on some of the shortcomings the trc may face in light of their public education aspirations. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 3 [2011], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.3.4 complicating the empathetic body politic in the politics of bad feeling (2005), sara ahmed problematizes notions of "national shame" and "feeling bad" with regards to the injustices toward indigenous peoples in australia. structured around "sorry days" and "sorry books” (an opportunity for members of the australian public to apologize for their country's own assimilationist policies), the author argues that these feelings fall short of creating solidarity or reconciliation; that the latter necessitates instead solidifying sentiments into action, creating different relationships between people and the "effects of histories of violence" (ahmed, 2005, p. 84).she claims that through these shaming events, the body politic moves too quickly through guilt, shame and mourning in the hopes of "putting the past behind us,” or in other words: now that non-indigenous canadians have felt bad, they are entitled and empowered to feel good again. these bad feelings allow for the reader to enter into a relationship with the "other,” but one wherein "the pain of others becomes 'ours', an appropriation that transforms and perhaps even neutralizes their pain into our sadness" (ibid., p. 74). monture-angus (1999) reiterates this point: "when non-aboriginal guilt becomes the focus of any process meant to address historical wrongs, aboriginal pain is appropriated and then transformed. this transformation is a recreation of colonial relationships" (p. 26). these feelings of shame emanate from the acknowledgement of a history of unjust social relations. if these feelings go unquestioned or uncriticized however, in the movement from shame to pride, we will then witness a re-covering of the nation through a forgetting of those very relations of violence (ahmed, 2005). this premature movement from shame to pride does not represent reconciliation because it is not inclusive of all who are still injured from historical wrongs and from our failure to recognize them today. the forging of new relationships is not confined to interpersonal relations, but extends to the connections we have to our own feelings and injuries. recognition of injury through truth-telling and our witnessing of such stories is necessary for reconciliation, wherein "feeling better" would be achieved through the exposure of healing as a form of recovery, and not simply "feeling better" through the recovery of pride. in the risks of empathy, boler (1997) argues that "passive empathy" -concerns directed to a distant other is insufficient at educating the reader to engender social change; this type of reading enables simplistic and consumptive modes of identification with the “other.” passive empathy situates the privileged in a position of "voyeuristic pleasure of listening and judging the other from a position of power/safe distance" (boler, 1997, p. 260). through her own experiences as a professor of multiculturalism, boler argues that educators should be pushing for a "testimonial reading,” invoking the responsibility of privileged listeners. educating nationals and thus shifting the colonial imaginary requires questioning if we can truly know the "other's" experiences, because empathy implies full identification with their suffering. instead, the author suggests that "testimonial reading inspires an empathetic response that motivates action: a 'historicized ethics' engaged across genres, that radically shifts our self-reflective understanding of power relations" (boler, 1997, p. 256). empathy implies a fear for oneself, where the "other" and their pain become secondary to the concern that these injuries could potentially happen to you. empathy operates insomuch that it identifies our differences wherein i can safely say i am not presently the one suffering. this "empathetic identification requires the 'other's' difference in order to consume it as sameness" (ibid., p. 258), as shared history. a testimonial reading then would require students to place themselves alongside the "social forces that create the climate of obstacles the other must confront," (ibid.,p. 257) in an effort to persuade students to act upon these forces. 5 czyzewski: the trc: insights into the goal of transformative education published by scholarship@western, 2011 "testimony,” as is necessary in statement gathering of residential school experiences, “is trauma's genre" (boler, 1997, p. 264): these "uncomfortable stories" (st. denis, 2009, p. 178) of excess and unimaginable horrors promote self-reflective engagement of the reader's position of power and safe distance, and also abdicate the reader’s responsibility for these oppressive social forces, attitudes, practices and structures. listening differently is crucial to this process of critical learning and of establishing relationality with truth-tellers, where we are continually unsettled by asking ourselves what it means to be taught by the experiences of others (simon et al. eds., 2000, p. 6), in particular by historically suppressed voices. "education remains important to any struggle to reduce inequality" (mickelson & smith, 2004, p. 269), but education on its own does not necessarily lead to social change. in this regard, razack (1998) suggests "ground-clearing activities" as a conduit to such a goal: what [this refers to] is reflecting critically on how we hear and how we speak; on the choices we make about which voice to use and when to use it; and, most important of all, on developing pedagogical practices that enable us to pose these questions and use the various answers to guide those concrete moral choices we are constantly being called upon to make (razack, 1998, p. 54). we can see after exploring these examples that the trc cannot expect transformation simply through storytelling. these painful experiences, where the opening of wounds may not be heard because of the consumptive benefit the dominant population may derive from them (ibid., p. 48), will demand an ethical listening and reading, and will necessitate follow-up discourses and activities in order to produce social change. beyond risks: important obstacles to reconciliation let us return to the reasons why the government implemented the policy of promoting awareness and public education of the irs system, and the education that is truly needed to be able to embark on a path of reconciliation. in other words, if education was to be truly transformative, what would that transformation look like? this question elicits the broader theme of what it is we would like to see change about the way canadian society operates, the latter's relations with indigenous peoples, and why transformation is needed. in race and reconciliation in a post-trc south africa, valji (2004) argues that the transition from apartheid to democracy and the subsequent ideologies espoused by the trc have been far more complex than idealized. she describes how racial prejudice and violence did not suddenly disappear post-trc, but continues to be an obstacle to substantive equality and inclusive citizenship. valji evaluates the contribution of the trc to current understandings of history and identity, and how the trc's ironic silence on the issue of "race" constitutes a barrier to real reconciliation. she problematizes the trc’s role in producing transformation and outlines the importance of taking ownership of our colonial history to advance reconciliation (younging et al., 2009). real reconciliation would entail acknowledging the inherent racism necessary to devise institutions like the residential schools. the pervasiveness of this racism can also partly explain why it took until 2008 for the government to issue a public apology. indeed, "one way to dehumanize an individual or a group is to deny the reality of their experiences," notes collins (1989, p. 11). therefore, we will know that reconciliation has occurred when every canadian truly 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 3 [2011], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.3.4 knows not only about the residential school system, but more importantly how such a system becomes naturalized and its impacts become decontextualized. the impacts of colonial policies and canadians' indifference to them produce and reproduce various social issues such as discrimination, inadequate housing, domestic violence, poverty, and destructive lifestyles. reconciliation will only be possible, then, if racism is recognized as structural, pervasive and on-going; but is also addressed as impactful, and inherently linked to other forms of discrimination, like sexism. canadians have denied that racism and gendered violence fuelled colonization, whose benefits are not restricted to the past and early colonial canadians, but continue to benefit all non-indigenous. we thrive off of what was taken away from indigenous peoples (sinclair, 2009). this lack of understanding supports the inappropriate notion that racism is based on individual acts and not generated through systemic, structural means (dion, 2009, p. 150). addressing racism through critical pedagogical practices would be representative of the government of canada and canadians' "profound commitment to establishing new relationships embedded in mutual recognition and respect” (sch.“n”), whereas a conventional education may "initiate a response to the suffering but refrain from engaging in a discussion of the cause of that suffering" (dion, 2009, p. 126). one onkwehonwe6 as beverly jacobs noted in her address in the house of commons in june 2006 and in her response to prime minister stephen harper's apology two years later, the unjust realities that many indigenous peoples face are human rights violations or, as ward churchill (2004) put it, crimes against humanity. it is under these conditions that trcs are created. jacobs states in her response that undergoing transformation will be observed when change has occurred: when languages have been revitalized, women are no longer targets of violence, and indigenous peoples are no longer disproportionately living in poverty (2008, p. 225). "i look forward to the day when we are no longer fighting for equality because we have reclaimed our way of being," (2008, p. 225) says jacobs. perspective on learning offered by alfred (2995) advocates that learning is itself one of transformation, an act of radical defiance that defines a warrior. a critical education is needed then to support questioning of the interconnectedness of knowledge and power; where there is a language of critique to address the systems in place that racially discriminate, but as well, a language of possibility that maps out hopeful relationships and the path toward them (dion, 2009). change and transformation therefore are related to a shifting of power wherein the dominant culture no longer tolerates taken-for-granted stereotypes and "we know what's best for you" attitudes. "the process of reconciliation must first recognize and then ameliorate the power imbalances between canada as a nation and first nations" (monture-angus, 1999, p. 33). we will witness this transformation and reconciliation when it spells a national acceptance of indigenous title and rights, and status as "citizens plus" 7 indeed, one might question the sincerity of the government's "profound commitment" ; when there is a reaffirming of nation-to-nation relations; when adequate financial resources are allocated to alleviating social ills; when canada fully acknowledges these human rights violations and significantly tries "to remedy in full the consequences of colonial imposition" (ibid., p. 23). 6original people (alfred, 2005, p. 19). 7construction coined by harry b. hawthorn in what has now come to be known as the "hawthorn report": hawthorn, h. b, ed. (1966-7). a survey of the contemporary indians of canada: economic, political, educational needs and policies. ottawa. 7 czyzewski: the trc: insights into the goal of transformative education published by scholarship@western, 2011 (sch.“n”) when confronted with the news of funding cuts to the aboriginal healing foundation (ahf) for the 2010 fiscal year. the ahf was directly funded by the government to address the legacies left behind by the residential schools, and the ahf in turn funds community-planned, community-driven projects on the ground. we are left wondering if this sort of action really adds validity to the statement that the trc is part of a process of "sincere indication and acknowledgement of the injustices and harms experienced by aboriginal people and the need for continued healing" (sch."n"). these funding cuts come in light of the fact that these testimonies, these truths, will require the opening of wounds, which has already been initiated with the common experience payments and independent assessment processes. if this trc process is only superficially taken up by canadians and we do not see a sincere implementation of canada's apology, then as monture-angus (1999) writes, [t]his kind of apologizing accomplishes more in the direction of massaging white guilt than in alleviating indian pain. in fact, in the aftermath of the so-called [1998] apology, i was witness to an unleashing of memories and pain in indian communities--communities where existing social services and health resources were largely inadequate to deal with the memories that were turned to the surface by the minister's apology ( p. 26-7). this sentiment of unease was reiterated as well at the "truth, reconciliation and the residential schools" conference at nipissing university in march 2010. indigenous peoples in canada and the marginalized are burdened by the telling and retelling of personal, traumatic stories because of the inability for many canadians to listen, or to act once these stories have been heard. furthermore, “if the truth is told and goes without response, this might result in further harm to the relationships involved” (llewellyn, 2008, p. 200). the opening up of these wounds would not be in vain then if once heard, we saw a sincere working toward reconciliation and toward an inclusive citizenship. other obstacles to this goal of reconciliation initiated by the trc are outlined in its very mandate. the trc is not allowed to cover the experiences of those who were in day schools; they have financial limitations; there will be no naming-of-names, which would make certain people, groups or organizations accountable for their actions; and the commission will only operate for five years, after which, how this education will continue has not been decided. the methods for public education have not been established beyond the national events, which seems problematic in terms of who will witness these events and if they can genuinely generate a sustained commitment to change. advocating responsibility and recognizing our complicity as oppressors is usually characterized by rather intimate processes of confidence-shaking, as the work of the educators quoted above in workshops and classrooms attest to. transformative education is already complex and without a clearly defined trajectory, it becomes that much harder to imagine. some scholars have critiqued the commission overall because it may in fact be distracting from potentially more important issues such as land claim settlements. the residential school legacy is part of a longer colonial history that began with the dispossession of indigenous lands. this last point speaks to a discourse that sees the theme of "recovery" as restraining, and suggests one of "regeneration" instead. according to alfred (2005), a “regeneration of ourselves and our nations” (p. 151) would promote a transcendence of these colonial experiences. what would follow is "restitution,” instead of reconciliation, the latter alfred describes as “fatally flawed because it depends on the false notion of a moral equivalency between onkwehonwe and settlers and on a basic acceptance of colonial institutions and relationships” (ibid.). according to this 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 3 [2011], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.3.4 reasoning, reconciliation is a “western-based concept to be imposed on the aboriginal peoples without regard to their own traditional practices of restoring personal and collective peace and harmony,” not to mention that several authors argue that conciliation had never even taken place (ibid., p. 22; ahf trc, 2008). indigenous peoples do not need to reconcile with colonialism, but instead canadians need to establish, according to alfred, “how to use restitution as the first step towards creating justice and a moral society” (alfred, 2009, p. 182). a last consideration is the centrality of collective indigenous “rights”8 and land claims in many of these struggles that can largely be understood as antithetical to the neoliberal functioning of the canadian state. the issue of land claims which goes hand in hand with establishing sustainable economies can be construed by nationals as barriers to individual settler claims, territorial expansionism and related capitalistic endeavours. these are enormous obstacles to feasibly establishing the equal relationships needed for reconciliation, and it remains to be seen "whether a genuine multiracial democracy can be created and sustained in an era of global economy and a moment of xenophobic frenzy" (west, 2004, p. 126). some recommendations to the trc the trc will end its mandate with the creation of a research centre and a report complete with recommendations. considering that the aforementioned structural limitations are evident and sinclair, chair of the commission, himself has doubts about the potential impact the trc (cbc, 2010), these recommendations then could potentially be catalysts for restoring relationships through transformative education. the recommendations would do well to propose educational policy that would mandate an accurate history of indigenous-settler relations in schools. on the other hand, some are sceptical of the possible extent of critical pedagogy in state-run institutions.9 the trc might also recommend language revitalization programs, renewed funding for the ahf and equitable funding to on-reserve first nations students. they could recommend funding for site-specific services in urban centres that would address stressful life situations that are attributable to these legacies and intergenerational trauma (menzies, 2008; spittal, 2002). the trc could also recommend a more pervasive allowance for the possibilities of self-determination over education and health services, for instance. ultimately though, so that these recommendations are acted upon by government, they need to be endorsed by a wider canadian public, which “requires that they attach a lot of significance on a daily basis to everything that can foster constructive management of the relationship” (dussault, 2009, p. 33). this would necessitate garnering public interest and support through community and national-level awareness and media campaigns. these circumstances made the recommendations put forth by the berger inquiry impossible to ignore and indicate mechanisms for success (stanton, 2010). parliament needs to “make room for aboriginal representation in mainstream political life” (amagoalik, 2008, p. 95) in general. what would be complimentary or at least equally helpful is therefore, imaginative pedagogical avenues run jointly or perhaps separate from the state’s ideological apparatuses all-together may be necessary. 8 rights have been criticized as an essentially western concept, as well as rights are state-defined and divvied out as such. 9althusser (1971) describes schools as state apparatuses and antonio gramsci (1971) states that schools maintain hegemony and the dominant social order, as also cited by kumashiro (2000, p. 36). 9 czyzewski: the trc: insights into the goal of transformative education published by scholarship@western, 2011 pressing for an international body that would overlook trc processes globally and press for change post-trc. “the conversation about reconciliation is not optional, and it could be central to the agenda of the united nations if we acknowledged global realities” (mckay, 2008, p. 104). this is an avenue the trc has already implicated itself in by presenting a proposal to the un. education and awareness are fundamental to developing public interest and support, and highlight the significance of pedagogy in the whole process of truth and reconciliation. transformation through education, or reconciliation through truth-telling and responsible listening, will only be achieved if these obstacles are addressed and overcome. the trc may possibly provide the spark from which we will see the beginning of an engagement by the canadian public toward this shared colonial history, its impacts and ongoing relations. the methods necessary for attending to these items and the place of transformative education within the trc process still remain to be determined as the commission's work unfolds. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 3 [2011], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.3.4 references ahmed, s. 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(2009). response, responsibility, and renewal: canada's truth and reconciliation journey. ottawa: aboriginal healing foundation research series. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 3 [2011], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.3.4 the international indigenous policy journal august 2011 the truth and reconciliation commission of canada: insights into the goal of transformative education karina czyzewski recommended citation the truth and reconciliation commission of canada: insights into the goal of transformative education abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license the truth and reconciliation commission of canada: insights into the goal of transformative education indigeneity-grounded analysis (iga) as policy(-making) lens: new zealand models, canadian realities the international indigenous policy journal volume 1 | issue 1 article 4 may 2010 indigeneity-grounded analysis (iga) as policy(making) lens: new zealand models, canadian realities augie fleras university of waterloo, fleras@uwaterloo.ca roger maaka eastern institute of technology, rmaaka@eit.ac.nz recommended citation fleras, a. , maaka, r. (2010). indigeneity-grounded analysis (iga) as policy(-making) lens: new zealand models, canadian realities. the international indigenous policy journal, 1(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.4 this policy is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. indigeneity-grounded analysis (iga) as policy(-making) lens: new zealand models, canadian realities abstract engaging politically with the principles of indigeneity is neither an option nor a cop out. the emergence of indigenous peoples as prime-time players on the world’s political stage attests to the timeliness and relevance of indigeneity in advancing a new postcolonial contract for living together differently. insofar as the principles of indigeneity are inextricably linked with challenge, resistance, and transformation, this paper argues that reference to indigeneity as policy(making) paradigm is both necessary and overdue. to put this argument to the test, the politics of maori indigeneity in aotearoa new zealand are analyzed and assessed in constructing an indigeneity agenda model. the political implications of an indigeneity-policy nexus are then applied to the realities of canada’s indigenous/aboriginal peoples. the paper contends that, just as the government is committed to a gender based analysis (gba) for improving policy outcomes along gender lines, so too should the principles of indigeneity (or aboriginality) secure an indigeneity grounded analysis (iga) framework for minimizing systemic policy bias while maximizing indigenous peoples inputs. the paper concludes by theorizing those provisional first principles that inform an iga framework as a policy (-making) lens. keywords indigeneity as policy lens, principles of indigenity, politics of maori indigeneity, gender-based analysis framework, indigeneity-grounded analysis acknowledgments a revised version of this invited paper was presented to the aboriginal peoples research conference, ottawa, 9 march 2009 creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ introduction: the politics of indigeneity as a policy(-making) paradox the politics of indigeneity1 are proving a paradox. to one side, indigenous peoples2 worldwide remain structurally excluded and culturally marginalized because of a pervasive (neo)colonialism3(maybury-lewis, 2002; maaka, and andersen 2006). even in seemingly progressive settler societies like canada and new zealand, indigenous peoples continue to experience punishing levels of poverty and disempowerments whose sources (and solutions) are systemic and foundational rather than attitudinal and incidental (maaka and fleras 2005). to the other side of the political divide is a fundamentally different narrative. indigenous peoples are striding across the world’s political stage by capitalizing on indigeneity principles and indigenous politics as catalyst for empowerment and engagement. in a relatively short period of time, indigenous peoples have managed to achieve all or parts of the following: shed the most egregious dimensions of colonialism; recover and articulate their voices; transform political and public attitudes; secure international support in defense of their claims; enlist international law to prove violations; and propose a specific agenda of indigenous peoples rights (xanthaki 2008). the emergence of indigenous peoples as peoples with rights rather than minorities with problems not only attests to this transformation, but also propels the politics of indigeneity to the forefront of policy(-making) debates. politically engaging with the principles of indigeneity along policy lines is no longer an option or excuse. put bluntly, those colonial foundational principles whose governing logic continues to impoverish and disempower will persist without an indigeneity policy lens to challenge, resist, and transform (turner and simpson 2008; ladner and dick 2008). insofar as there appears to be a dearth of indigenous peoples’ policy(-making) input (chesterton 2008), this paper proposes an indigeneity-grounded analysis (iga) policy model not only too offset 1 fleras and maaka: indigeneity-grounded analysis (iga) published by scholarship@western, 2010 systemic institutional biases, but also to ensure intended outcomes and fair results. the paper contends that an iga model must go beyond design or content to ensure success. no less critical is a focus on policy process by incorporating multiple indigenous stakeholders in shaping policy outcomes (chataway 2004). to put this argument to the test, the politics of maori indigeneity in aotearoa new zealand are explored to demonstrate advances in constructing indigenoussensitive policy(-making) models. this is followed by proposing an indigeneity-grounded analysis (iga) framework as policy (-making) lens for canada’s indigenous peoples. the paper concludes by analyzing the application and implications of a policy-indigeneity nexus (an iga framework) to improve the relational status and well-being of aboriginal peoples within a post colonial matrix (white et al 2003). the paper is predicated on simple yet powerful premise. neither policy nor policy making are neutral or value free. rather, as socially constructed conventions, policy and policymaking are loaded with dominant values, eurocentric ideals, and vested interests. so systemically embedded are notions about what is normal, desirable, or acceptable with respect to policy design, underlying assumptions, priorities and agenda, and process that even institutional actors are rarely aware of the logical consequences by which some are privileged, others excluded. in challenging the policy(-making) myth of value neutrality 4 – after all, even evidence-based policy(-making) may prove systemically biasing since a commitment to race neutrality bolsters white eurocentricity as the norm, while discrediting the legitimacy of indigenous peoples claims to sovereignty status – the kungarakany and first australian scholar, steve larkin (2007:178), bristles with indignation when writing of …. …the systematic and racialised denial of indigenous sovereignty in evidence-based processes of thinking about/doing things differently, and how things might be different 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.4 from the way they are-how indigenous issues are problematised and subsequently converted into discrete programs. white policy-makers and researchers need to become vigilant to how their whiteness shapes the production of research knowledge and their interpretation of what gets to count as evidence when considering indigenous health policy. the conclusion seems inescapable: in that settler/eurocentric values continue to permeate and guide policy assumptions and processes (see peters and walker 2005), the value of a indigeneitysensitive policy approach is both necessary and overdue – necessary, because of the centrality of dominant values and eurocentric assumptions in framing policy issues; overdue, because conventional policy agendas continue to fold indigenous peoples’ experiences and realities into the governing logic of a neo-colonial constitutional order. just as the canadian government endorses the principle of gender based analysis (gba) for improving policy outcomes for both women and men, so too should the logic of indigeneity as principle and practice be incorporated into the policy agenda as a principled category of analysis and transformation. the politics of indigeneity in aotearoa new zealand indigenous peoples around the world are in the throes of re-constitutionalizing their relationship with societies at large. developments in aotearoa new zealand are no exception to this pattern (fleras and spoonley 1999; durie 2005; o’sullivan 2008). the politics of maori indigeneity have proven pivotal in securing an indigeneity perspective not only at the political level but also in the design and implementation of policy and programs. admittedly, the new zealand state has been slow in coming around to acknowledging the primacy of maori indigeneity. much of the reticence reflects a political unwillingness to provoke public anger over perceptions of maori privilege in seemingly violating the meritocratic principle of equality and 3 fleras and maaka: indigeneity-grounded analysis (iga) published by scholarship@western, 2010 fairness (durie 2004). nevertheless, indigeneity as an overall approach to maori-crown relations is increasingly embedded in public policy development – not always on the basis of disadvantage or compensation, but because of indigenous rights. maori indigeneity politics are not restricted to a single body rather they are multi-vocalic in scope and direction, including national maori advisory bodies (like the maori womens welfare league and the new zealand maori councilitself the only pan-tribal organization to exist under an act of parliament (the 1962 maori community development act)). despite the importance of the nzmc and the mwwl as forerunners in jump-starting maori indigeneity, this paper will focus instead on three policy making catalysts, each of which is shown to have advanced the principle of a maori indigeneity as policy(-making) lens. included are (a) the presence of maori in parliament (including seven guaranteed seats, maori lists in a mixed member proportional systems, and emergence of a maori party), (b) an advisory and advocacy body with policy making influence to review indigenous affairs legislation (te puni kokiri) and (c) a commission of inquiry (waitangi tribunal) for ‘righting historical wrongs’ involving crown breaches to the treaty of waitangi principles.5 te puni kokiri (tpk) tpk or the ministry of maori development was established in 1991 under the auspices of the government’s mainstreaming policy phase. under mainstreaming as policy, the delivery of services and programs to maori was conveyed through mainstream agencies that serve the general public, rather than direct service provisions by specific government department like the maori affairs department (levy 1999). over time, the core functions of tpk have changed, although tpk remains the only government department solely focused on maori. as an integrated policy ministry that advocates on behalf maori, iwi, and hapu, tpk serves as liaison 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.4 with other government agencies for improving maori outcomes through more responsive mainstream institutions and services. in keeping with its mandate as instrument of maori development, tpk is strategically positioned to bolster the prospect of maori succeeding as maori by aspiring to a sustainable level of success as individuals, in organizations, and as collectivities. tpk also represents a principal advisor on crown relationship with maori hapu and iwi, in part by providing policy advice, in part by monitoring policy and legislation, in part by partnering maori investment to advance maori potential. for example, the current realising maori potential program is predicated on the premise that significant potential exists among maori, thus better positioning maori to build upon and leverage off their collective resources, knowledge, skills and leadership capabilities (tpk 2008). in other words, \rather than delivering government policies as was the case in the past, tpk is in the business of designing policy advice to minister of maori affairs. in advancing its policy(-making) mandate, tpk also maintains interactive links with maori across the land through a network of ten regional offices. maori parliamentary seats and the maori party maori constitute one of the few peoples in the world with guaranteed parliamentary seats (geddis 2007; joseph 2008). four separate maori electorates were established in 1867 based on the principle of an adult male franchise. originating for a variety of reasons ranging from the calculating to the expedient, the arrangement was intended to last five years or until the maori land court converted communal maori land tenure into individual freehold, thus entitling maori to enfranchisement under standard property owning qualifications (joseph 2008). but the complexities of maori land ownership, together with the momentum of inertia and a labour party stranglehold on maori seats for nearly 75 years, reinforced the status quo until the 5 fleras and maaka: indigeneity-grounded analysis (iga) published by scholarship@western, 2010 introduction of mixed member proportional in 1993. under mmp, the number of dedicated maori seats were allowed to rise to seven (based an influx of maori voters to the maori roll rather than the general roll). as well, a significant number of maori have appeared as party list members whose placement is based on the proportion of popular vote captured by each political party. the end result is a formidable maori presence in parliament. in the 2008 elections, a total of 22 seats in a 121 strong parliament were held by maori, thus accounting for about 19 percent of the total in contrast to their proportion (around 15 %) of the total population. a maori party has sat in parliament since the exodus of maori mps from the labour party in 2005. controversy over a labour government ruling that pre-empted maori from exercising the right to claim ownership of the seabeds and foreshore resulted in a split from the labour ranks. as a party for, about, and by maori, the goal of the maori party is “..to achieve self determination for whanau, hapu, and iwi within their own land, to bolster a strong, united, and independent voice, and live according to kaupapa and tikanga handed down by ancestors “(maori party 2008). in the 2005 election, the maori party won four of the seven labour-locked maori seats, including 2.19 percent of the national vote. in 2008, the maori party increased its popular vote to 2.39 percent, in addition to capturing another seat from labour, in the process securing an independent and powerful maori voice in parliament (winiata 2007). with the support of the maori party, the national party formed the government, then promptly rewarded its coalition partner with two cabinet positions, including the minister of maori affairs portfolio (pita sharples; co leader of the maori party) and minister for community and voluntary sector (tania turia, co-leader of maori party) . 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.4 waitangi tribunal: treaty principles as maori indigeneity a restitutional process is currently in place to compensate indigenous maori peoples for historical wrongs. in securing a basis for resolving long standing maori grievances in a principled way, the labour government established the waitangi tribunal in 1975 as a commission of inquiry to (a) make recommendations on claims to past and present breaches to treaty principles (b) consider whether any crown action or proposed legislation was inconsistent with treaty principles and (c) determine the "meaning and effect" of the treaty by negotiating the differences between the english and maori language versions. bicultural in mandate as well as process and composition (about half of the 16 members are maori while procedures are conducted in accordance with maori custom), the waitangi tribunal represents an institutional forum in which oppositional readings of the treaty re-appraise maori indigenous rights in light of emergent realities. the waitangi tribunal can be likened to a ‘truth and reconciliation’ forum and function (waitangi tribunal 2006). a permanent commission of inquiry is in place that registers maori claims or grievances over crown breaches to the treaty of waitangi, inquires into them through a public forum that tests these claims for legitimacy and validity, publishes reports on the accuracy of the claims, and proposes solutions for righting crown wrongs. the importance of tribunal rulings and published reports have proven critical in unsettling settler-maori relations. the reports provide a balanced assessment of what the crown could and should have done in meeting its treaty obligations, whether the claimant communities suffered harm because of crown in/actions in breaching the treaty, and makes recommendations for removing the harm, remedying the grievance, and repairing the relationship. by restoring maori to the national agenda, so to speak, the cumulative impact of these rulings in ‘radicalising history’ is consequential not only in exposing crown duplicity in compromising treaty 7 fleras and maaka: indigeneity-grounded analysis (iga) published by scholarship@western, 2010 principles, but also for advocating a new postcolonial contract for living together differently. admittedly, tribunal recommendations are neither binding (except in rare cases) nor do they have any legal standing in ruling on points of law over the return of land. still, these recommendations provide input in shaping subsequent government policy and settlements in ways scarcely conceivable even a generation ago. in addition to ruling on specific maori claims, the tribunal has been charged with promulgating the principles for living together differently. the tribunal’s mandate rests in looking beyond strict legalities for ascertaining the meaning of the treaty in hopes of harmonizing the differences between the english version (with its kawanatanga commitment to state determination) and the maori version (with its rangatiratanga focus on indigenous self determining autonomy) (maaka and fleras 2008). differences in maori and english texts of the treaty, coupled with the need to apply the treaty to specific circumstances, has resulted in parliament (and the courts) relying on treaty principles for guidance and justification rather than the actual texts. four major principles prevail: the overarching (reciprocity-exchange) principle. of paramount importance is the overarching principle or the 'reciprocity-exchange' principle. according to the overarching principle, maori ceded de jure sovereignty over the land ('kawanatanga') in exchange for reciprocal crown guarantees of maori self determining autonomy (de facto sovereignty or tino rangatiratanga’) over land, resources, and ‘things maori’. as far as the tribunal is concerned, stakeholders in the treaty process must acknowledge the crown's sovereign right to govern under article one. however, stakeholders must also accept the equally unassailable guarantees of rangatiratanga under article two which qualifies the crown's power to absolute governance. (similarly, the delgamuukw ruling in 1997 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.4 affirmed that crown assertion of absolute sovereignty over canada did not displace existing aboriginal orders, lands, and rights, but puts the onus on protecting them (henderson 2004)). admittedly, the crown possesses overriding rights to exercise kawanatanga (‘state’) authority over rangatiratanga (‘nation’) guarantees. but it can only do so when national interests are at stake and by way of consultation, consent, and compensation. the principle of partnership. at the heart of the treaty is the promise of a mutually beneficial relationship between maori and the crown (new zealanders) a partnership based on joint planning and shared vision (durie 2005). according to the partnership principles, maori tribes and the crown (or more generally, pakeha) must be seen as equal partners that is, co-signatories to a political covenant whose partnership is constructed around the sharing of power, resources, and privileges. reference to the treaty as a “dialogue between sovereigns” establishes a partnership that obligates both maori and crown/pakeha to act toward each other reasonably, with mutual trust, and in good faith. in other words, the treaty is not a unilateral declaration involving closure, but entails an obligation on the part of the crown to engage meaningfully and bilaterally consult. the principle of active protection. the crown has a duty to actively protect maori rangatiratanga rights as set out in article two. the principle of crown fiduciary relationship ('trust') of protection is particularly applicable when one side is weaker and more vulnerable than the other. two kinds of protection prevail: reactive and proactive. reactive protection entails the removal of laws, barriers, and constraints that inhibit maori self determination. proactive protection includes measures to preserve and enhance 9 fleras and maaka: indigeneity-grounded analysis (iga) published by scholarship@western, 2010 maori resources and taonga – especially in those cases where developments may imperil maori taonga. the principle of autonomy. the concept of autonomy is justified on historical and principled grounds. when two people meet, the tribunal has argued, their joint differences must be worked through in a manner that engages both as equals, invokes the validity of difference, and allows for the mediation of differences through negotiation, compromise, and adjustment. autonomy cannot be vested in only one of the partners; rather, each partner is expected to recognise, respect, and be reconciled with the autonomy of the other. reference to autonomy by way of tino rangatiratanga secures the ground for controlling domestic affairs though political arrangements that sharply curtail state jursidiction while solidifying maori control over land, identity, and political voice. to date, tribunal rulings and reports appear to have initiated a dialogue for rethinking the prospect of living together differently in a deeply divided aotearoa. terms of the dialogue include a comprehensive package that emphasizes constitutionalism over conflict, engagement over entitlement, relationships over rights, interdependence over opposition, cooperation over competition, reconciliation over restitution, and listening over litigation (maaka and fleras 2005). by balancing morality with practicality (james 2004), tribunal rulings and reports have proven transformative in two ways: first, in the articulation of four principles for ascertaining which crown actions were/are inconsistent with the spirit of the treaty. second, in advancing a new constitutional order for living together differently by privileging a maori indigeneity perspective. a post colonial socio-political contract is promulgated that incorporates the policy(making) principles of power sharing, partnership, property return, and meaningful participation. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.4 to sum up. the evidence seems inescapable but subject to debate and resistance. thanks to the politics of maori indigeneity, new zealand is cresting the wave of a postcolonizing from within – at least in theory if not in practice. to one side are those treaty principles that secure the grounds of maori indigeneity as policy lens. to the other side is the emergence of numerous stakeholders in directing the policy making process, including a powerful maori dynamic in parliament, the policy advisory platform of tpk, and the waitangi tribunal in crafting principles to live by. of course, no is contending that new zealand has discarded those foundational principles that continue to secure a colonial constitutional order. moreover, pockets of resistance to the principle of maori indigeneity continue to persist, as might be expected when collective rights clash with individual rights. both politicians and the public continue to play the ‘indigeneity card’ by drawing attention to the alleged unfairness of maori privilege in a democratic society where everyone is formally equal before the law (durie 2000). but a post colonizing process is in progress (albeit a far from finished project) that promises to fundamentally realign the policy dimensions of maori-crown relations (johnson 2008). indigenizing aboriginal policy(-making) in canada are the politics of indigeneity situation specific or generalizable? can the insights of new zealand be applied to canada (helin 2007; quesnel 2008)? how feasible is a maori indigeneity perspective for policy(-making) in a canada that lacks comparable power brokers within the policy circle? in some ways, not, given the differences between canada and new zealand with respect to history, geography, demographics, and politics. consisting of the different tribes (iwi) and subtribes (hapu) of varying sizes, maori constitute about 16 percent of new zealand’s population of 4 million, with the vast majority (about 83 percent) living in larger 11 fleras and maaka: indigeneity-grounded analysis (iga) published by scholarship@western, 2010 urban centres, but often continuing to maintain close ties with their rural-grounded tribal or subtribal origins. unlike those aboriginal peoples in canada, maori neither entered into treaties nor experienced the realities of an imposed reserve regime or a centralized registration system. these differences make it difficult to compare the contexts, let alone to assume that what works in one jurisdiction will flourish in another. yet differences are not the same as incompatibilities. like aboriginal peoples in canada, the status of maori in general reflect similar patterns of poverty and powerlessness, largely because of the institutional and systemic biases that inform a neo-colonial constitutional order (maaka and fleras 2008). moreover, canada like new zealand is also in a position to endorse an indigeneity-grounded analysis framework – in part because of indigeneity politics, including a crown duty to consult, but also by capitalizing on a precedent that already exists within government circles. the existence of a gender based analysis framework (gba) provides a template for an indigeneity grounded analysis framework involving an aboriginal perspective for policy(-making). gender based analysis as policy(-making): a gender agenda in 1995 the government of canada responded to the challenges emanating from the beijing platform to foster gender equality. gba emerged as an action plan that compelled federal departments and agencies to conduct an impact assessment on policies and legislation (where appropriate) for addressing issues of concern to women (nwac 2007). by acknowledging significant differences between and within men and women, in effect recognizing that policy cannot be separated from the social context, gba proposes to examine existing and proposed policies to ensure they are having an intended effect and producing fair results (annual report, immigration, 2008). insofar as gba is more than an add-on but applied along 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.4 all points of the policy making process, it focuses not only on outcomes but also on the concepts, arguments, and language employed to justify putting gender back into the picture. in short, gba constitutes a gender-sensitive tool for policy development, in addition to assessing the potentially differential impact of proposed policies on women and men, then responding with options and strategies. gba is widely applied across the federal sector, including its inception into inac in 1999. but aboriginal groups have shown a lukewarm reaction to gba as it stands. aboriginal women have argued that a gba fails to address their needs or to reflect the realities of canada’s indigenous peoples, in large part by failing to consider the legacy and impact of colonialism. also glossed over are those policy(-making) frameworks that reflect, reinforce, and advance existing neo-colonial structures – to the detriment of indigenous peoples, nations, and communities (awhhrg 2007). a cultural relevant gba is prposed that acknowledges the centrality of colonialism in terms of how gender impacts on indigenous identities (and vice versa). also implied is an aboriginal inspired gba that incorporates the politics of indigeneity as principle and practice. the implications are inescapable: just as the canadian state acknowledges the gendered basis of policy and policy making, with gba as a way of neutralizing the bias, so too should central authorities discredit the eurocentric grounds of current indigenous policy by endorsing an indigeneity grounded analysis (iga) model for policy(-making). principles of iga framework: an indigeneity agenda indigenous peoples struggles to sever the bonds of dependency and underdevelopment are widely acknowledged (niezen 2003). several innovative routes have been explored for improving aboriginal peoples–state relations, including indigenization of policy and administration, devolution of power, and decentralization of service delivery structures. 13 fleras and maaka: indigeneity-grounded analysis (iga) published by scholarship@western, 2010 admittedly, many of the initiatives involve little more a bureaucratic/managerial exercise in offloading government responsibility to indigenous communities, with minimal transfer of power or authority. still, the shift toward a more decentralized arrangement is not without promise, especially in creating a blueprint for local autonomy and control. pressure is mounting to discard an positivist policy models for framing aboriginal peoples–canada relations. a more flexible and principled approach is advocated that emphasizes negotiation over litigation, engagement over entitlement, relationships over rights, interdependence over opposition, cooperation over competition, reconciliation over restitution, and power-sharing over power conflict (maaka and fleras 2005). of particular relevance is the incorporation of indigeneity perspectives – including the core rubrics of representation, recognition, rights, and resources within government policy circles. an iga framework incorporates five first principles that both inform and legitimize a principled indigeneity perspective in policy(-making): indigenous difference, indigenous rights, indigenous sovereignt; /indigenous belonging, and indigenous spirituality (including traditional knowledge). these principles are somewhat consistent with other proposals to transcend the paralysis of current policy paradigm 6 indigenous difference indigenous peoples in settler/colonial societies are spearheading an international renaissance in indigenous identity by advocating an essentialized concept of indigenous difference (niezen 2003; kowal 2008). indigenous peoples are fundamentally different because of their unique constitutional status as descendents of the ‘nations within/. acknowledgement of indigenous difference is critical; without constitutional recognition of indigenous difference, indigenous peoples have no more moral authority than other racialized or immigrant minorities in challenging the governance agenda and the constitutional order upon which it is based. the 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.4 politics of indigenous difference are justified on grounds of original occupancy, together with the corresponding rights and power that flow from this constitutional status. indigeneity difference asserts a special relationship between indigenous peoples and the state involving a complementary set of unsurrendered rights and unextinguished powers that inform this relationship. in that indigenous peoples define themselves as constitutionally different and deserving of differential status and treatment because of displacement and dispossession, these difference must be taken seriously in defining and allocating recognition, reward, and relationships (macklem 2002). not unexpectedly, programs and policies that apply to non-indigenous minority groups are dismissed as inapplicable and counterproductive. no less conflicting are efforts to reconcile the particularistic difference of indigenous peoples with the liberal universalism of the liberal state (kowal 2008) indigenous peoples are neither ethnic minorities with needs nor canadian citizens who happen to live on reserves. rather they constitute fundamentally autonomous political communities who are sovereign in their own right with respect to land, identity, and political voice, yet sharing in sovereignty of society by way of concurrent jurisdictions of mutual concern. unlike ethnic and immigrant minorities who are voluntarily looking to settle down and fit in within the existing social and political framework, indigenous peoples constitute forcibly incorporated nations who want to ‘get out’ of imposed political arrangements that deny, exclude, or oppress. proposed are governance arrangements that bolster their inherent right to indigenous models of self determining autonomy over internal jurisdictions. clearly, then, the politics of indigeneity difference transcend the limitations of institutional reform. rather than a commmitment to improve socioeconomic status, indigeneity difference is about power-sharing for initiating transformational change along the lines of a post 15 fleras and maaka: indigeneity-grounded analysis (iga) published by scholarship@western, 2010 colonial constitutional order. a post colonial social contract is endorsed instead based on the foundational principles of partnership, participation, and power sharing. precise governance arrangements for rearranging power distributions and constitutionally entrenched power sharing are varied, of course, but predicated on the principle of justice rather than technicalities or points of law. indigenous rights indigenous peoples are neither a problem for solution nor a need to be addressed. rather than framing indigenous peoples as a disadvantaged minority, proposed instead is view of indigenous peoples as members of distinct political communities who wish to retain identity, political voice, and land (humpage and fleras 2002; o’sullivan 2006). indigenous peoples are a peoples (or nations) with collective and inherent rights derived in part from a body of common and international law that acknowledges the unique constitutional status of the original inhabitants and their descendents. these indigenous rights include the right to ownership of land and resources, the right to protect and promote language, culture, and identity, the right to political voice and self-governance, and the right to indigenous models of self-determination. the rights of indigenous peoples are regarded as sui generis, that is, they differ from ordinary citizenship rights by virtue of their status as the original occupants (borrows and rotman 1997). the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (2007) articulates the rights of indigenous peoples, including the rights to language, culture, and identity; rights to maintain institutions of relevance; rights to pursue development consistent with their level of development; and rights to full and equal participation in all matters of concern to them. these sui generis rights are collective and inherent: collective, in that indigenous communities can exercise jurisdiction over the individual rights of community members; 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.4 inherent, in that they are not delegated by government (crown, parliament, or judicial) decree, but intrinsic to indigenous peoples because of first principles. the legitimacy of indigenous rights is derived from original occupancy, is bestowed by the creator, reflects the consent of the people, complies with treaties or international law, and cannot be extinguished even with explicit consent. in other words, indigenous rights must be accepted as being independently sourced rather than delegated and shaped for the convenience of the political majority or subject to unilateral override (asch 1997). indigenous sovereignty indigenous peoples constitute (or claim to constitute) a de facto sovereign political community (peoples) whose inherent and collective rights to self-governance and nationhood reflect the principles of indigeneity rather than those of need, pity, or compensation. as the original occupants whose inalienable rights have never been extinguished by conquest or surrendered by treaty, indigenous peoples do not aspire to sovereignty per se. as political autonomous peoples who predated the formation of the nation-state that invaded and dispossessed them, they are sovereign because of ancestral occupation and original occupancy (moreton-robinson 2007). to be sure, indigenous peoples are not looking to separate or become independent. except for a few ideologues, appeals to sovereignty are largely about establishing relationships of relative yet relational autonomy within a new constitutional order (maaka and fleras 2005). the fact that indigenous peoples are sovereign at least for purposes of entitlement or engagement (de facto) rather than on the basis of legal recognition (de jure) all that is required for putting the principle of indigenous sovereignty into policy practices are appropriate policy making structures (shaw 2008). 17 fleras and maaka: indigeneity-grounded analysis (iga) published by scholarship@western, 2010 indigenous belonging for indigenous peoples, belonging matters. the protection of the different loyalities and distinctive patterns of belonging may be as important as protection of indigenous rights to land and resources (xanthaki 2008). indigenous patterns of belonging to society are anchored in primary affiliation with the group (and their homeland) rather than as individual citizens, thus implying that peoples can differently belong to the parts without necessarily rejecting loyalty to the whole. patterns of belonging are not only critical in ensuring sui generis relationships with the state (or crown) from which flow power, recognition, and resources. they also are crucial in securing political and theoretical space for indigenous peoples to establish terms of constructive engagement on the basis of non colonial relations (o’sullivan 2007). in short, as dominic o’sullivan argues, the principle of indigeneity serves a transformative role in allowing indigenous peoples to frame their belonging to the nation-state in terms of their aspirations and experiences. indigenous spirituality spirituality is crucial to indigenous well-being. indigenous spirituality can encompass a range of dimensions, including the values of reciprocity, mutual respect, regard for planet earth and all creation as relatives (kin), traditional cosmologies and philosophies, the cultural ethos upon which individual and group identities unfold, and sustainable consumption practices that involve stewardship for all living things (indigenous peoples summit 2008). in terms of a definition, spirituality incorporates an overarching construct involving beliefs and values that provide a sense of meaning, purpose, connectivity, and unity with respect to peoples notions of self, community, nature and the universe (tse et al 2005). in that its not always formally expressed in doctrine or compartmentalized from everyday life, an indigenous world view of 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.4 spirituality often entails a unity of body, mind, and spirit, within the context of something greater that sustains and guides. indigenous spirituality can be expressed in myriad ways. in some cases, the focus of indigenous spirituality embodies the beliefs and practices of introduced religious doctrines. in other cases, spirituality is focused on traditional beliefs and practices derived from a sense of belonging to the land, to people, to culture, and to the creator, including fundamentally distinct ways of thinking about the world and relating to it holistically. in still other cases, a commitment to a formal religion does exclude an abiding belief in traditional spirituality (mcpherson 2001). clearly, then, spirituality for indigenous peoples is not necessarily about a corpus of knowledge. rather it’s about a way of knowing that not only applies a spiritual dimension to all aspects of reality, but also (in)fuses the spiritual with the natural and human in ways that often clash with western modes of thought. for example, the dreaming among australia’s first peoples constitutes a complex network of beliefs and practices that derive from creation stories. these cosmologies pervade all aspects of spiritual and non spiritual life, including structures of society, rules of social behaviour, rituals to nourish the land and resources, and punishment for those who transgressed the rules for living (penrith 1996). to sum up: an indigeneity-grounded analysis framework is proposed to ensure that policy issues of relevance to aboriginal communities are appropriately addressed. the rationale for this proposal is drawn from an existing gender based analysis framework: just as a gba is employed to empower women by engendering government policy(-making), so too does an iga framework put the principles of indigeneity into the policy picture. an iga framework provides an indigeneity sensitive tool for policy development by analyzing and assessing the potentially differential impact of government policies and programs on aboriginal communities, 19 fleras and maaka: indigeneity-grounded analysis (iga) published by scholarship@western, 2010 then responding accordingly. proposing five key constituents for an indigeneity perspective provides a provisional basis for operationalizing the concept of iga framework as policy lens. the politics of indigeneity as policy prism indigenous peoples are gradually breaking free of colonial structures and racist strictures (xanthaki 2008). in aotearoa new zealand the articulation of treaty principles by the waitangi tribunal promises a maori-based framework for national governance, while in canada, the courts have articulated a series of enforceable legal principles that serve to protect aboriginal and treaty rights (morrelato 2008). the politics of indigeneity/aboriginality in challenging and transforming a settler constitutional order have also proven critical in advancing an indigenous perspective in policy and policy making (see also marscheke et al 2008). under an indigeneity perspective, emphasis is focused on advancing a principled relationship by incorporating shifting social realities in sorting out who controls what in a spirit of give and take. a commitment to indigeneity as a visionary policy lens is not intended to displace evidence/empirical based policy research. but a visionary lens may be just as important in advancing the constitutional and policy yardsticks. an iga framework intends to improve policy(-making) by assisting policy makers and practitioners to see reality through indigeneity-tinted spectacles. but an indigeneity policy lens as challenge and transformation is likely to encounter resistance and resentment. of growing concern is a belief that indigeneity as perspective and preference not only runs counter to the democratic principle of universal (identical) equality, but also constitutes a form of racism in a society that aspires to colour blind equality (also durie 2000). a rethinking of what constitutes equality in settler society may be in order. that in a deeply divided society with competing rights and entitlements, difference is as important as commonalities. both individuals and groups 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.4 must be treated the same (equally) as a matter of course; however, they must also be treated differently (as equals) when the situation demands. another mindset shift is no less overdue in advancing an indigeneity logic. indigenous peoples should not be considered a competitor to be jousted or a problem to be diminished, but as constitutional partners sharing the same land as sovereign co equals. in acknowledging that “let’s face it, we are all here to stay,” as former canadian chief justice antonio lamer once observed, is there any other option except to nurture the primacy of belonging together separately the politics of policy cannot be viewed as final or authoritative, any more than they can be preoccupied with “taking” or “finalizing.” (cassidy 1994) by situating an iga framework within the context of “power-sharing” “partnership” and “meaningful participation, ” wisdom and justice prevail over politics rather than the other way around. 21 fleras and maaka: indigeneity-grounded analysis (iga) published by scholarship@western, 2010 footnotes (1) definitions of indigeneity are intensely political and sharply contested (shaw 2008). indigeneity can take on different meanings, largely because indigeneity as a concept may be difficult to pin down in terms of meaning and substance. others (green 2009) argue that with the addition of the suffix eity to indigenous, indigeneity has joined ranks with equally vacant and essentially empty abstractions like nationality.nevertheless, it remains important for legal purposes, self identification, and understanding social marginalization (marschke et al 2008) . in general, indigeneity refers to the state of being indigenous. more specifically, it can refer to the distinct historical, cultural and political realities of indigenous peoples, in part because of their unique experiences and relations with european settlers, in part because of their unique relationship to their homelands and their lands as sources of identity, belonging, and subsistence (turner and simpson 2007). references to indigeneity can also embrace the idea of politicizing the status of original occupancy as a basis for challenge and change as well as recognition, rewards, and relationships (maaka and fleras 2005). any references to indigeneity as marginalization, indigeneity as identification, and indigeneity as resistance reflect dynamic and evolving processes that vary over time and across space (marschke et al 2008). (2) an appropriate terminology remains problematic.: indigenous peoples? aboriginal peoples? natives? native americans? first nations? first peoples? autochthonous peoples? this paper uses the term indigenous peoples as a widely accepted category, despite its tendency to suffer from the specificity of its broadness (technically indigenous can include peoples such as quebecois who, after all, are indigenous to canada.even 6th generation anglo-celtic canadians might consider themselves indigenous to canada) (shaw et al 2006; also forte 2008). the term aboriginal peoples is used when referring to canada’s indigenous peoples (as with indigenous, 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.4 aboriginal is a loaded term as well, since the prefix ab implies ‘taking away’ from or ‘negation’ of original peoples. we prefer the greek term, autochthonous (meaning springing from the earth) peoples but have difficulty envisioning narratives that embrace autochthoneity as discourse and politics, despite indigenous continuity to land (xanthaki 2008). (3) colonialism possesses a material and ideological dimension (turner and simpson 2007). it can refer to the expansion of one society into the territory of another. it also includes those set of ideas and ideals that are used to justify this expansion and the fundamentally exploitative relationship that exists because of it. neo colonialism refers to a process by which the most egregious violations of colonialism are eliminated; including the exclusion of the colonized from positions of power. remaining in tact, however, are the foundational structures and systemic biases that inform a colonial constitutional order. post colonialism does not refer to the end of (neo)colonialism; more accurately, it involves challenges to the existing patterns of colonialism that continue to privilege eurocentric notions of identity and belonging based on illegal possession of land and sovereignty. in that the politics of indigeneity is an ongoing and unfinished project rather than a fait accompli, it may be more useful to employ the term post colonizing to convey the contingent and continuing nature of the process over time and across space (moreton-robinson 2007; kowal 2008). (4) policy making continues to informed by a modernist approach with its connotation of rationality, planned intervention, binaries of right and wrong, and assumptions of progress and perceptions of linear improvement as demonstrated by measurable performance indicators (waters 2007). this commitment would appear to be inconsistent with fragmented, diverse, discontinuities, changing, and contested world of indigeneity. 23 fleras and maaka: indigeneity-grounded analysis (iga) published by scholarship@western, 2010 (5) a political covenant between maori and the crown signed in 1840 by representatives of the crown and nearly 500 maori chiefs, the treaty of waitangi continues to define, inform, and guide maori-crown relations, despite the passage of time and shift in power. to be sure, no consensus prevails regarding its importance or scope, except that (a) the crown has a duty to consult with maori when required, (b) the crown is responsible for righting historical wrongs, and (c) crown actions cannot be inconsistent with treaty principles (palmer 2006). however, there is growing consensus that treaty principles embraced a vision of dual sovereignty: a ‘hard’ sovereignty involving british governorship (kawanatanga) and the ‘soft’ sovereignty of maori ownership of land and resources (maaka and fleras 2008). admittedly, treaty provisions are unenforceable unless explicitly incorporated into national statute or local law. nevertheless, the treaty is widely acknowledged as a constitutional blueprint and foundational document that not only codifies pre-existing indigenous maori rights, but also secures those principles to live by (james 2004). 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zealand models, canadian realities abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license indigeneity-grounded analysis (iga) as policy(-making) lens: new zealand models, canadian realities interplay wellbeing framework: community perspectives on working together for effective service delivery in remote aboriginal communities the international indigenous policy journal volume 9 | issue 1 article 1 january 2018 interplay wellbeing framework: community perspectives on working together for effective service delivery in remote aboriginal communities eva mcrae-williams batchelor institute of indigenous tertiary education, eva.mcrae-williams@batchelor.edu.au jessica yamaguchi department of the prime minister and cabinet, australia, jessica.yamaguchi@network.pmc.gov.au byron wilson menzies school of health research, byron.wilson2@menzies.edu.au rosalie schultz centre for remote health, alice springs, rosalie.schultz@flinders.edu.au tammy abbott ninti one, tammy.abbott@nintione.com.au see next page for additional authors recommended citation mcrae-williams, e. , yamaguchi, j. , wilson, b. , schultz, r . , abbott, t. , cairney, s. (2018). interplay wellbeing framework: community perspectives on working together for effective service delivery in remote aboriginal communities. the international indigenous policy journal, 9(1). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.1 interplay wellbeing framework: community perspectives on working together for effective service delivery in remote aboriginal communities abstract access to effective services and programs is necessary to improve wellbeing for aboriginal and torres strait islander people living in remote australia. without genuine participation of aboriginal community members in the design, governance, and delivery of services, desired service delivery outcomes are rarely achieved. using a "shared space" model, aboriginal communities, governments, and scientists came together to design and develop the interplay wellbeing framework. this framework brings together stories and numbers (or qualitative and quantitative data) to represent community values for the purpose of informing program and policy agendas. this article unpacks what community members saw as making a service work well and why. the domains of empowerment and community functioning are discussed and their relationship to effective service delivery demonstrated. keywords interplay project, aboriginal and torres strait islander, remote australia, well-being, service delivery, empowerment, community functioning, local governance acknowledgments the work reported in this publication was supported by funding from the australian government cooperative research centres program through the cooperative research centre for remote economic participation (crc-rep) hosted by ninti one limited. the views expressed herein do not necessarily represent the views of the crc-rep or ninti one limited or its participants. errors or omissions remain with the authors. we acknowledge the support and involvement of our key organisational stakeholders: centre for remote health (flinders university and charles darwin university), department of prime minister and cabinet (pmc), northern star resources, yalu marŋgithinyaraw aboriginal corporation, marthakal homelands resource centre, central desert native title services, poche centre of indigenous health, miwatj health aboriginal corporation, australian bureau of statistics (abs), muntjiltjarra wurrgumu group (mwg), kalano community association, wurli-wurlinjang health service, strongbala men's health program, flinders nt-katherine, katherine stolen generations group, banatjarl strongbala wumin grup, martu rangers (wiluna), ngangganawili aboriginal health service community (nahs). creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. authors eva mcrae-williams, jessica yamaguchi, byron wilson, rosalie schultz, tammy abbott, and sheree cairney http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ i n t e rp l a y w e l l b e i n g f ra m e w o rk: c o m m u n i t y pe rs p e c t i v e s o n w o rki n g t o g e t h e r f o r e f f e c t i v e s e rv i c e d e l i v e ry i n r e m o t e a b o ri g i n a l c o m m u n i t i e s the holistic nature of wellbeing for indigenous peoples, including the australian aboriginal and torres strait islander population, has been recognised in the literature for more than 25 years (national aboriginal health strategy working party [nahswp], 1989). however, in dominant statistical data indigenous peoples continue to be represented primarily in terms of comparisons with non-indigenous populations with emphasis on poorer outcomes in relation to health, education, and employment determinants. despite such recognition, policies and programs focused on closing “the gap” between non-indigenous and aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples in australia are not achieving the desired results (australian government, 2017). the interplay project (cooperative research centre for remote economic participation [crc-rep], n.d.a) therefore aims to drive positive policy change and program delivery for the benefit of aboriginal communities, particularly those residing in remote australia (cairney, abbott & yamaguchi 2015; cairney, abbott, quinn, yamaguchi, wilson, & wakerman 2017). aboriginal and torres strait islander communities in remote australia are often distinct from those in more urban and regional settings. local indigenous languages often dominate and lives are predominately lived and governed by locally specific and unique cultural worldviews, which can be quite different from dominant australian (or more western) orientations. taking diversity into account, this article presents a mixed methods approach emphasising that accountability in numbers (quantitative data) needs to be accompanied by accountability in stories (qualitative data). the aim of this article is to explore what makes a service work well and why, from the perspective of local people living in four discrete remote communities. an overview of the interplay wellbeing framework and a subsequent quantified interrelationship identified between empowerment, community functioning, and service delivery (derived from surveys with 842 aboriginal adults) will be discussed. this interplay will then be further explored through analysing qualitative data collected between 2014 and 2015, which involved a range of focus groups and semi-structured interviews with 75 adults (91% local aboriginal people). the quantitative interplay will be positioned alongside the dominant theme of “working together” (and the interrelated subthemes of consultation, engagement, and the role of local representation on boards, community driven agendas, and local employment opportunities). this analysis, supported by a large body of existing literature, emphasises the relevance of strong local governance for effective program delivery in the social services space. the article proposes that resources should be redirected from supporting top-down engagement agendas and processes towards more recognition, strengthening, and building of local engagement capacities and capabilities. l i t e ra t u re r e v i e w there is substantial evidence, collected over decades of rigorous evaluative work, that demonstrates without genuine local engagement and involvement (empowerment and community functioning) desired service delivery outcomes are rarely achieved in remote aboriginal australia (the australian national training authority research advisory council, 1998a, 1998b; dudgeon, milroy, & walker, 2014; fisher et al., 2011; ivers et al., 2006). the desert services that work project (2006-2009) found that many initiatives and programs in remote australia concentrated on developing and delivering their 1 mcrae-williams et al.: aboriginal community perspectives and service delivery published by scholarship@western, 2018 own services to a particular standard and therefore focused mainly on the supply side of the service equation. this extensive research demonstrated that “there is a significant mismatch between supplyside activities and demand-side realities” (fisher et al., 2011, p. 92). the following key elements for the effective functioning of services in the education sector (burton & osborne, 2014; guenther, bat, & osborne, 2014; tjitayi & osborne, 2014; young, guenther, & boyle, 2007), the training and work sector (australian national training authority research advisory council, 1998b; guenther, castle, raymond, & berschl, 2011; guenther, falk, arnott, lucardie, & spiers, 2008; mcrae-williams, 2014), the health and wellbeing sector (arnott, guenther, davis, foster, & cummings, 2010; dudgeon et al., 2014; smith, grundy, & nelson, 2010; tsey & every, 2000), and in the domestic violence, child protection, and justice sectors (arnott, guenther, & cummings, 2010; arnott, guenther, & williams, 2009; blagg, 2016) and more across generally across the board (arbon, 2008; fisher et al., 2011; mcrae-williams, guenther, jacobson, & lovell, 2016; morley, 2015; verran & christie, 2011) have been consistently identified: • local ownership, leadership, and control over decision making; • inclusion of local cultural priorities and values; • local aboriginal and torres strait islander staff working on the program; • the harnessing and building of local strengths and resilience; • the importance of flexibility in timelines and operations (context specific); • building an evidence base with local involvement in research design, monitoring, and evaluation; and • the value of partnerships based on trust and long-term relationship building. in this large body of literature, programs found to be the most successful are those where local people defined their own needs, and then they designed and controlled the response through partnerships based on mutual trust. yet, from a service provider or governmental perspective, community engagement is usually understood as sitting along a hierarchy of levels from informing and initial consultation to community decision making and full control (milton et al., 2012). while the successful programs outlined above sit high on this hierarchy, many (or most) interventions in remote aboriginal australia continue to operate much further down this ladder. as eversole (2011) has highlighted, there is now an evident and common belief that governing is more effective when governments and/or service providers and communities work together, an idea that extends well beyond the remote aboriginal community domain. however, eversole (2011) also argued that engagement remains framed on the government’s terms and that costs and frustrations surrounding this engagement become the burden of communities. she stated, “by valuing communities in theory but failing to recognise how they work in practice, policy makers saddle themselves with an uphill battle for community engagement, even as they risk undermining existing community capacity” (p. 68). in a recent keynote address at the developing the north conference in darwin, australia, peter yu (2016) also raised the issue of differences in our understandings regarding the nature of engagement. in his critique of the developing the north white paper (australian government, 2015), he argued that, while partnerships and working with aboriginal peoples are mentioned, it is unclear and questionable how true and meaningful this engagement would actually be (see also mcrae-williams & guenther, 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.1 2016). he concluded by emphasising, “we need new, innovative and creative indigenous engagement and consultation strategies” (yu, 2016, n.p.). fisher et al. (2011) similarly warned that failing to distinguish between true engagement and simply talking to the community can undermine good program design. as eversole (2011) pointed out, bureaucratic institutions have particular ways of working, which involve formal structures of authority and control, as well as legal frameworks and paid administrators. in this context, the logic that good engagement is represented through signed forms, detailed and documented processes, risk assessments, and so forth is not questioned. community-based processes, on the other hand, represent different ways of operating and are based on “personal and relational networks of trust and influence, informal rules and norms, enforcement via social pressure, and work done primarily by unpaid volunteers with a personal stake in the outcome” (eversole, 2011, p. 65). the interplay project survey results below indicate a significant interrelationship between empowerment, community functioning, and self-reported satisfaction with service delivery. an analysis of interplay project qualitative data provides further depth in understanding how these interrelationships unfold in practice. t h e c o o p e ra t i v e r e s e a rc h c e n t re f o r r e m o t e e c o n o m i c pa rt i c i p a t i o n ( c r c r e p) i n t e rp l a y pro j e c t the interplay project found that, while tailored government health and wellbeing frameworks exist for aboriginal populations (australian bureau of statistics [abs], 2011; australian health minister’s advisory council [ahmac], 2015), these frameworks failed to adequately address cultural diversity, community development, or empowerment components relevant to the remote context (nguyen & cairney, 2013). over 4 years, remote aboriginal communities were consulted and their corroborated priorities of culture, empowerment, and community are represented as domains in the interplay wellbeing framework, alongside the government priorities of education, employment, and health (abbott & cairney, 2014; cairney et al., 2017; crc-rep, n.d.b). e t h i c s s t a t e m e n t . ethical clearances were obtained from the human research ethics committee (hrec) of the northern territory department of health and menzies school of health research, and from the western australian aboriginal health ethics committee. additional approvals and support were received from local health and education boards, government data-linkage services, land councils, and local partner organisations. all participants gave written informed consent to participate. 3 mcrae-williams et al.: aboriginal community perspectives and service delivery published by scholarship@western, 2018 figure 1. i n t e rp l a y w e l l b e i n g f ra m e w o rk. q u a n t i t a t i v e s u rv e y m e t h o d o l o g y from the foundation of this framework, a rigorous process was undertaken to develop a survey tool with cultural and scientific validity (cairney et al., 2015, 2017). the survey was designed to collect subjective quantitative data against the interplay wellbeing framework in order to build an evidence base (numbers story) to inform policy and practice. the development of the interplay survey involved a comprehensive review of all measurement tools related to wellbeing or any of its subcomponents that have previously been developed and validated (both scientifically and culturally) for use with aboriginal and torres strait islander people (cairney et al., 2017). secondly, all questions and strategies used in comparable research were reviewed, including the longitudinal study of indigenous children (lsic, n.d.; also see biddle, 2001), the west australian aboriginal child health survey (zubrick et al., 2005), the national aboriginal and torres strait islander social survey (natsiss, 2014), strong souls (thomas, cairney, gunthorpe, paradies, & sayers, 2010), the global empowerment measure (gem; haswell et al., 2010), the seiqol (chenhall, senior, cole, cunningham, & o’boyle, 2010), the national indigenous languages survey (nils; marmion, obata, & troy, 2014); the caring for country questionnaire and the sf36 (burgess, berry, gunthorpe, & bailie, 2008; burgess et al., 2009). the ngurru-kurlu was also used to inform cultural indicators (pawa-kurlpurlurnu, holmes, & box, 2008). a case study approach was undertaken and four communities (3 located in the northern territory and 1 in western australia) were engaged in the project. these four communities represent diversity across geography, culture, language, population size, models of infrastructure, and service delivery. aboriginal community researchers from all sites reviewed the drafted survey questions and worked with the 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.1 research team to tailor and contextualise to their local environment. as such, the final survey questions reflected in-depth discussions between aboriginal community researchers, with their knowledge of everyday scenarios faced by people in remote communities, and scientists, with their knowledge about how to represent these scenarios in statistically sound survey questions. the framework has been statistically validated as a collaborative or holistic approach to assessing wellbeing (cairney et al., 2017). the survey was administered by ninti one (n.d.) aboriginal community researchers using ipads loaded with the isurvey software. each individual survey took approximately 1 hour to complete. the final survey cohort comprised 842 participants (353 males, 489 females; mean age 25.2 years, standard deviation 5.3). the quantitative survey questions associated with the interplay wellbeing framework domains and subdomains were modelled with a 5-point likert scale ranging from 0 (not at all) to 5 (lots; cairney et al., 2015, 2017). higher scores indicate higher levels of the variable or latent trait. s u rv e y f i n d i n g s — e m p o w e rm e n t , c o m m u n i t y f u n c t i o n i n g , a n d s e rv i c e d e l i v e ry this article explores one particular statistical interrelationship identified between the key domains of empowerment, community functioning, and service delivery. table 1 identifies the latent trait (domain) and the survey item (focus of the question asked). initially used to validate the interplay wellbeing framework and survey, the following was then applied to understand the interrelationship discussed in this article. using the statistics package spss and analysis of moment structures (amos) version 23, bivariate pearson’s correlations were calculated between each pair of measures and a structural equation model (sem) was conducted to examine hypothesised relationships between the latent traits. the sem was validated by checking a variety of model fit indices, including chi-square, goodness of fit (gfi), adjusted goodness of fit index (agfi), comparative fit index (cfi), and the root mean square error of approximation (rmsea). the resultant measurement model is presented in figure 2. this figure shows that personal empowerment was found to have direct positive impacts on both community functioning and service delivery. it also shows that improved community functioning has direct positive impacts on service delivery. participants with higher self-reported scores for personal empowerment also reported higher scores relating to their satisfaction with community functioning and service delivery. importantly, this suggests that individual empowerment is a key underlying factor in community perceptions around healthy community functioning and effective service delivery. this suggests that improved community functioning builds from the actions of individuals who feel empowered. yet, the influence of local contexts, social determinants, and power structures adds certain complexities and challenges to this process. this will be explored through an analysis of the qualitative data below. q u a l i t a t i v e m e t h o d o l o g y the qualitative data involved contributions from 75 individuals who resided within the same communities where quantitative data was collected. between june 2014 and june 2015, 14 focus groups and 8 semi-structured interviews were undertaken. in each of the four research sites, consultation with local aboriginal community researchers and key research partners was used to identify main programs or services that were perceived to work well (cairney et al., 2015). 5 mcrae-williams et al.: aboriginal community perspectives and service delivery published by scholarship@western, 2018 t a b l e 1 . l a t e n t t ra i t a n d r e l a t e d s u rv e y i t e m s latent trait survey item areas empowerment identity self-efficacy resilience community functioning community safety community working well together trust and respect leadership service delivery school/education employment health figure 2. s e m m o d e l . chi-squared (χ²) = 2.93; goodness of fit index (gfi) = 0.98; adjusted goodness of fit index (agfi) = 0.96; the competitive fit index (cfi) = 0.99; root mean square of approximation (rmsea) = 0.05 with pclolse = 0.60. all paths are significant (p < 0.001). the services identified included aboriginal corporations and associations holding diverse portfolios including programs in areas such as education, consultancy and research services, homeland management, land and sea management, municipal services, work programs, community patrols, home 0.39 0.17 0.27 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.1 and community care and rehabilitation services, and small independent enterprises operating under their umbrella. a number of health services and programs and one family-owned business enterprise were also included. both aboriginal and non-aboriginal individuals involved and/or employed in these services participated in focus groups and interviews. users of these services and or those targeted by these services were also included in discussions and there was considerable overlap between different roles. for example, individuals may have been community members, service users, program managers, employees, association members, or service founders, often representing a combination of these positions. table 2 identifies the number of participants from each service or program, aboriginal or nonaboriginal status, and their gender. in total, 75 people participated in this study with the large majority (n = 68) being of aboriginal heritage and only 7 identifying as non-aboriginal. almost all (91%) of participants were long-term, local residents in the research sites. focus groups and interviews ranged from 60 to 90 minutes and a relatively informal approach was taken to promote spontaneous directions of discussion. drawing from a yarning method (bessarab & ng'andu, 2010), recognised as culturally relevant in aboriginal research contexts, the facilitators used guiding questions such as: • what was the service or program they were involved with and what did they do in their role; • what was good about the service or program; and • what other programs and services did they think worked well in their community and why. all focus groups and interviews were recorded, and one of the research team members also took notes during discussions. using an inductive approach, the audio and expanded notes were jointly analysed by the team for core meanings relevant to the key question: what makes a service work for the people they are serving and why? inductive logic and reasoning was used to code the data using the software nvivo. l i m i t a t i o n s . a limitation of this study is that participants were not drawn from a more representative landscape of services and programs. for example, services like power and water, telecommunications, australia post, centrelink, or transport services were not represented. however, this reflects our quantitative data that focuses on service delivery related to health, education, and general employment sectors. the prevalence of aboriginal associations and/or corporations with large portfolios included in this study reflects a context where such organisations are the common contact point or umbrella for many community services. it is also worth mentioning that the interplay research team were all female and that 59 percent of participants were also female; therefore, a potential bias towards female perspectives should be acknowledged. 7 mcrae-williams et al.: aboriginal community perspectives and service delivery published by scholarship@western, 2018 t a b l e 2 . q u a l i t a t i v e s t u d y pa rt i c i p a n t s s e rv i c e a b o ri g i n a l n o n a b o ri g i n a l t o t a l m f m f aboriginal corporations and associations 7 17 1 2 5 women’s council 4 4 health services 10 1 1 3 1 5 ranger programs 7 2 9 small enterprise 1 1 community focus groups 1 20 2 1 t o t a l 2 6 4 2 4 3 7 5 q u a l i t a t i v e f i n d i n g s when participants were asked what makes a service work well, a number of interrelated themes emerged. the overarching theme focused on understandings of “working together.” under this umbrella, three other themes were evident. these included: • consultation, engagement, and the role of local representation on boards, • community-driven agendas, and • local employment opportunities. unpacked below, to a certain extent, these reflect the interrelationship identified in the interplay project quantitative data between empowerment (self-efficacy), community functioning (working well together, trust and respect, leadership), and satisfaction with service delivery. w o rki n g t o g e t h e r. all participants couched their responses within narratives of people working or not working together. particularly strong in these narratives was an emphasis on working with and engaging with people in their own local community. this was expressed and discussed in a number of ways. for example, participants emphasised that “working with community” was fundamental to services working well. many also discussed engaging with local people as a key responsibility or obligation associated with their own employment position. it was also common across the focus groups for a motivation, passion, and interest in “working for” the benefit of their community to be shared with the research team. yet, alongside the unquestioned value and necessity placed on working with their local community were also discussions on the reality of being part of a particular local social, cultural, and political structure, and the complexities of enacting and maintaining “everybody’s” engagement. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.1 c o n s u l t a t i o n , e n g a g e m e n t , a n d t h e i m p o rt a n c e o f l o c a l r e p re s e n t a t i o n o n bo a rd s initial consultation with the community was perceived as essential in service planning by many participants. for example, as one participant stated: before deciding on funding [there is a] need to consult with the community . . . to find out what the community wants. if they threw money down on the table and said, “decide” then we would have to sit down and think wisely and talk to people. ongoing engagement between a service and the community was also highlighted as a significant priority: consultation is more than getting feedback, its ongoing engagement, it’s an ongoing thing. it’s more than just getting the information. as another participant suggested: it’s not fair to employ a ceo to do this on their own in isolation—we need to make sure community does know which takes time. the significance of respecting the time needed to consult and engage effectively, and build relationships was acknowledged by many in the focus groups. the value of local representation on service provider boards was commonly emphasised as a positive way to ensure ongoing processes of community consultation and ongoing community engagement in decision making. these boards were viewed as supporting service delivery through facilitating local governance, and through input into program focus and design. it was also mentioned by one group of employees that local representation on boards could operate as a mechanism for information sharing across community organisations or service sectors. for example, one participant said: there is an overlap of board members from <service> with board members from <service>— that is okay because there is a linking up, stories from everywhere come together. however, the issue of recognising and reflecting on who could legitimately occupy these governance positions from a broad community perspective was also highlighted as a key factor in the success of this form of engagement. c o m m u n i t y d ri v e n a g e n d a s . beyond the importance of service providers initially consulting and committing to ongoing engagement with the community, many of the participants emphasised that what made a service or program work well was when it was instigated by, rather than imposed on, a community. when the idea of the program “came from the community,” participants believed that this contributed to success. there was significant agreement across the participant groups that this kind of development, when followed by ongoing community control over decision-making processes, was the ideal way for a service to work. as one community member explained: 9 mcrae-williams et al.: aboriginal community perspectives and service delivery published by scholarship@western, 2018 you need to be responsible for your services, responsible to deliver to your people services, less interventionist and more empowerment. l o c a l e m p l o y m e n t o p p o rt u n i t i e s . alongside community-initiated services with local governance structures, many participants identified local employment positions and opportunities as another important ingredient for services to work well. the extent a workplace was able to acknowledge employees, local perspectives and knowledge, and appreciate their abilities to act in culturally appropriate ways correlated with the level to which a service or program was viewed as working well for its target group. such workplaces were associated by a number of participants as being “employers of choice.” this was further articulated by one aboriginal program manager, who stated: [it is about] unlocking the potential in local people instead of trying to import a way of doing things or the skills you need to have. it’s recognising the skills people already have and what interests and building on these. many local community members employed in services spoke about how their role enabled them to identify community needs and to negotiate culturally appropriate delivery. for example, one community member explained: if we see gaps we can liaise with community and <our service> to get a service to fill the gap— rather than the other way around . . . we go around to our people, talk to them put in their ideas. a sense of responsibility and obligation to their local community was a sentiment in many participants’ responses. for example, one focus group spoke about “just getting on and doing things.” they expressed frustration at bureaucratic processes associated with community engagement and stated, “if there’s matters to be dealt with straight away, we do that straight away.” it was from this position of responsibility and obligation that participants primarily talked about and negotiated their own work roles. for example, one local entrepreneur explained that what made his small business work well was: [it] has always been based on cultural decision-making processes—flow on benefits to community and cultural benefits. related to this emphasis was a strong sentiment across all focus groups and interviews that participants held motivations, passions, and commitments to “working for” the benefit of those around them, “working with others” to improve social and other outcomes for their families, young people, and local communities. for example, a number of participants spoke about the value of services involving young people and the broader community through school or recreational activities, career days, and social/cultural events as strategies for facilitating and supporting the engagement of others. the importance of local community engagement was not questioned by any of the participants and was fundamental to their responses regarding what makes services work well. yet, the challenges of establishing and maintaining ongoing engagement between services and local people were also raised. the complexity of creating an environment where everyone felt equally included and informed and where the ideals of “everybody working together” could be realised was captured in the comments of one participant who explained that the biggest challenge to services working well was “getting mob on board.” another participant also highlighted that there are: 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.1 a lot of personal disputes that get in the way. if one person has an argument with one other person—they will stop talking to each other and also the families stop talking to each other. beyond personal disputes, it was also mentioned that certain shifts in terms of which clan or family was benefiting or seen to be benefiting from particular services or resource access also played a role in the complexity of community engagement ideals. participants highlighted the challenges they experienced in their engagement endeavours, where there might be limited transparency or inequality in terms of community representation, where young people may not be interested, or where other activities not associated with their service or program agendas may be prioritised. d i s c u s s i o n by telling stories through numbers, the interplay quantitative findings highlight that fostering individual empowerment can create broad reaching benefits in terms of satisfaction with community functioning and have subsequent positive implications for service delivery. the qualitative data presented also validates much of the literature on what makes a service work well and why in the context of remote aboriginal communities. it also provides deeper insight into the quantified interrelationship identified through the interplay survey. this data suggests a causal relationship, where high levels of empowerment—through a strong sense of identity, self-efficacy, and resilience—impacts how safe individuals think their community is and how well they think people and programs work together with trust and respect. the qualitative data confirmed that participants valued the notion of communityinitiated ideas or grassroots development and having ongoing local influence over decision-making processes through local employment. it was also clear that the motivation behind undertaking their employment or voluntary roles was a desire to support the wellbeing of those living with and around them in their community. the relationship between this motivation of “working for” the benefit of community (or more broadly for aboriginal peoples) and employment outcomes and experiences has also been identified in other crc-rep projects (mcrae-williams, 2014; mcrae-williams et al., 2016; parkes, mcrae-williams, & tedmanson, 2014). as identified in the literature, the notion of community is a complex one, and who and for what purpose it is being defined can influence what “working with community” may mean and involve. while in reality many of the services discussed by participants sat closer to the “informing and initial consultation” level on the milton et al. (2012) hierarchy of engagement, participants strongly expressed their desire for services to move towards engagement that reflected community decision making and full control. this is not a new assertion, with an existing evidence base demonstrating that this level of engagement is necessary for services to achieve their desired broadly scoped wellbeing outcomes. yet, it is also important to acknowledge that participants emphasised complexities associated with engaging with their own community where a desire to get “everyone involved” was often difficult to enact. when their challenge to engage is then positioned within a context of different policy and program expectations around community consultation and engagement processes, things become even more complex. as eversole (2011) has highlighted, contradictions inevitably emerge in the intersection between public policy aspirations for engagement and the agency of particular communities. competing demands to get things done quickly and efficiently, and for meaningful engagement processes involving 11 mcrae-williams et al.: aboriginal community perspectives and service delivery published by scholarship@western, 2018 time and patience, can see governments and service providers from different perspectives: as either failing to act or failing to adequately engage. yet, it is clear that “working well” mostly occurs where strong local governance structures are in place, where local influence over decisions has been enacted, and where local employment is a key component of service delivery. a logical conclusion from this evidence base would be for there to be more investment in service delivery models that prioritise local ownership and control. however, participants in this study also discussed the challenges of engaging meaningfully with their own communities, and emphasised the value they placed on doing this well. this suggests the need to acknowledge, recognise, resource, and support the development of local governance capacities and local peoples’ own strengths and capabilities for engaging effectively with their own communities. despite the evidence cited above, it would seem that a top-down approach to planning, doing, and recording community engagement objectives and activities in remote aboriginal australia remains. if the primary focus was to shift from identifying process and best practice for how governments (or outsiders) must, can, and should engage with communities towards supporting local people in choosing and shaping how they wish to engage, it is likely that significant improvements in desired outcomes could be achieved. it is important to note here, however, that both the quantitative and qualitative data discussed in this article may not necessary relate to all service sectors. while it is clear that meaningful engagement in all areas represented by the interplay wellbeing framework including land use, health and wellbeing, education, and economic participation were of priority, it is possible that effective engagement may differ in other service delivery sectors. yet, it is beyond question that “working together” or community engagement practices need to be grounded in local priorities. guenther and mcrae-williams (2014) found that many aboriginal people in remote aboriginal communities choose to work in four key industries of employment (public administration and safety; education and training; health care and social assistance; and arts and recreation services), highlighting good places to start in terms of adequately resourcing and supporting processes of local ownership and control. c o n c l u s i o n there are recognised tensions in spaces of engagement between governments, service providers, and within communities. there is also a strong evidence of the importance of local community control and ownership in social delivery sectors such as health and wellbeing, land management, education, and employment. yet, as yu (2016) has emphasised, “we need new, innovative and creative indigenous engagement and consultation strategies” (n.p.), in order to strengthen and build meaningful relationships which benefit aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples. in this article, it has been argued that these new strategies must be framed by local priorities and will need to recognise, resource, and support the strengthening of local capabilities and capacities for effective engagement. these findings will also be used to further inform the key concepts of empowerment and community that are represented holistically in the interplay wellbeing framework. the interplay wellbeing framework and survey may have applicability in measuring outcomes of programs and services where local priorities and ownership are central, and where the goal is to improve community wellbeing. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.1 r e f e re n c e s abbott, t., & cairney, s. 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(2005). the western australian aboriginal child health survey: the social and emotional wellbeing of aboriginal children and young people. perth: curtin university of technology & telethon institute for child health research. retrieved from http://www.ichr.uwa.edu.au/waachs 17 mcrae-williams et al.: aboriginal community perspectives and service delivery published by scholarship@western, 2018 the international indigenous policy journal january 2018 interplay wellbeing framework: community perspectives on working together for effective service delivery in remote aboriginal communities eva mcrae-williams jessica yamaguchi byron wilson rosalie schultz tammy abbott see next page for additional authors recommended citation interplay wellbeing framework: community perspectives on working together for effective service delivery in remote aboriginal communities abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license authors interplay wellbeing framework: community perspectives on working together for effective service delivery in remote aboriginal communities toward a new era of policy: health care service delivery to first nations the international indigenous policy journal volume 2 issue 1 health and well-being article 11 may 2011 toward a new era of policy: health care service delivery to first nations miranda d. kelly university of british columbia, school of population and public health, vancouver, mirandadkelly@gmail.com recommended citation kelly, m. d. (2011). toward a new era of policy: health care service delivery to first nations. he international indigenous policy journal, 2(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.11 this research is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. toward a new era of policy: health care service delivery to first nations abstract the disproportionate burdens of ill health experienced by first nations have been attributed to an uncoordinated, fragmented health care system. this system is rooted in public policies that have created jurisdictional gaps and a long-standing debate between federal, provincial and first nations governments as to who is responsible for first nations health care. this article examines: (1) the policies that shape first nations health care in canada and in the province of british columbia (bc) specifically; (2) the interests of the actors involved in first nations health policy; and (3) recent developments in bc that present an opportunity for change to first nations health policy development and have broader implications for indigenous health policy across canada and worldwide. keywords first nations, health policy creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ introduction aboriginal peoples in canada are disproportionately burdened with ill health as compared to other canadians (waldram, herring, & young, 2006). the high rates of morbidity and mortality among aboriginal peoples have been attributed in part to an uncoordinated, fragmented system of health care service delivery. this system is rooted in public policies that have created jurisdictional gaps such that a longstanding debate continues between federal, provincial and aboriginal governments as to who is responsible for the delivery of health care to aboriginal peoples (jacklin & warry, 2004; pierre, pollack, & fafard, 2007; lavoie & forget, 2008; british columbia provincial health officer, 2009). while first nations, inuit and métis are collectively recognized as aboriginal under the canadian constitution act of 1982, policies are not applied consistently across the three groups and therefore, each group faces its own unique set of challenges in navigating the canadian health care system. this article will examine the policies that have and continue to shape first nations health care service delivery in canada, and in the province of british columbia (bc) specifically. next, the interests of the actors involved in first nations health policy will be examined. finally, recent developments in the province of bc will be examined as an opportunity for change in the process of first nations health policy development. currently, the federal government accepts responsibility of delivering primary health care services on-reserve, as well as providing funding to the province for cost-shareable programs, contracted services, and health care premiums (in provinces that charge premiums) for status indians (lavoie & forget, 2008; british columbia provincial health officer, 2009). the province, meanwhile, is responsible for primary health care services off-reserve, as well as hospital and physician services. while these jurisdictional boundaries may be clear in theory, they have proven to be ambiguous and complex in practice, suggesting a need to revisit the policies that have shaped this current system of health care delivery. policies regarding first nations have previously been analyzed as occurring in discrete waves, or, eras. lavoie, forget and browne (2010) described these policies as occurring in four waves: (1) early institutionalized contact policies (pre-1860); (2) post-confederation protective paternalistic policies (1860-1920); (3) assimilative paternalistic policies (1920-1960); and (4) policies that respect cultural identity and political autonomy (1960 – present). for a large part of canadian history, the goal of first nations policy was assimilation. policies that emerged under the assimilation paradigm developed through a “process that heard no aboriginal voices and did not wish to” (cairns, 2000, p. 95). in this article, policies are described as occurring in two eras: policies of assimilation and policies of recognition. the intent of examining policies in terms of these two eras is to highlight the key policies that have and continue to shape first nations health care service delivery, and to guide the reader through the gradual shifts in policy-making that bring us to our current state of affairs. policies of assimilation while this author recognizes ‘first nations’ and ‘aboriginal’ to be preferred terms for use in contemporary canada, the term ‘indian’ is used here to remain consistent with the terminology used at the time of policy development. historic treaties (1871 – 1921) between 1871 and 1921, the crown signed treaties with some first nations wherein the first nations gave up areas of land to the crown in exchange for reserve lands, annual payments, fishing and 1 kelly: toward a new era of policy published by scholarship@western, 2011 hunting rights, schools and educational resources, farm equipment and animals, and other material goods. while treaties were settled in northern ontario, manitoba, saskatchewan and alberta, only parts of bc were settled by treaty. it is also noteworthy that only one treaty (treaty no. 6 between the crown and the plains cree) included from the crown “the promise of a medicine chest”, which has been interpreted by some to be a promise for provision of health care (indian affairs and northern canada, 2010). british north america act (1867) the british north america act defined indian affairs as a federal jurisdiction and health care as a provincial jurisdiction. this division has served as a starting point to the debate regarding jurisdiction of indian health care (lavoie & forget, 2008; lavoie, forget, & browne, 2010). indian act (1876) the indian act has two major influences on the delivery of health care services to first nations. first, the indian act dictates who is an indian. by way of assigning “status”, the indian act is a tool that the federal government has used to determine who is considered an indian and who, therefore, is a federal responsibility. second, the indian act established reserves. the reserve system is another mechanism used to define federal jurisdictional boundaries, as the federal government restricts its responsibility for health care provision to “on-reserve”. the white paper (1969) and the red paper (1970) the federal government’s 1969 white paper proposed the removal of status under the indian act and the special services that came with status as a means to increase the assimilation of indians into the rest of society (health canada, 2005). it is notable that while indian leaders were consulted during development of the white paper, their input was not included in the final product, thereby contributing to the strong opposition that the white paper aroused from indian peoples (cairns, 2000). the official indian response to the white paper was the red paper of 1970, which emphasized federal responsibility for health care to indians and the desire to strengthen community control of health programs. the white and red papers were key developments that pushed federal policies into a new era, putting “an official end to what had been the basic policy of the canadian state from its inception… the goal of assimilation” (cairns, 2000, p. 51). with the end of the goal of assimilation came the next era of policy: policies designed to recognize indian culture and rights to control health programs. policies of recognition indian health policy (1979) in recognition of the poor health outcomes among indians and the need for indians themselves to participate in change, the federal government’s indian health policy was designed with the goal to “achieve an increasing level of health in indian communities, generated and maintained by the indian communities themselves” (first nations inuit health branch, 2007). this policy is significant in that the 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 11 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/11 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.11 federal government acknowledged its roles to be to advocate on behalf of indians to the larger canadian society, promote capacities of indian communities, and provide public health and health promotion activities on-reserve. the role of the provinces is identified to include diagnosis and treatment of illness and rehabilitation. the role of indian communities is emphasized: to play a role in health promotion and in the administration of community health programs. canada health act (1984) the canada health act (cha), which established national standards for health care service delivery, does not explicitly address the issue of first nations health care jurisdiction. persons insured under the cha (and therefore within provincial jurisdiction) are defined as residents of the province other than members of the canadian forces or royal canadian mounted police, federal inmates, or residents of the province who have not completed a minimum period of residence (department of justice, 2010). the coverage of status and/or treaty indians is not stated, although macintosh (2008) has argued that under the cha, “provinces have agreed to deliver insured health services to all persons normally resident in the province, which includes aboriginal residents regardless of whether they live on or off reserve” (p. 86). indian health transfer policy (1989) the indian health transfer policy is an offer by the federal government to first nations communities south of the 60th parallel to transfer resources for health programs over to control by the community (health canada, 2005). the transfer occurs in gradual phases, requires specific mandatory public health programs to be provided, gives communities flexibility to allocate funds according to community priorities, and limits funding, by way of a non-enrichment clause, to health care delivery costs at the time of transfer (macintosh, 2008). the indian health transfer policy, as a follow-up to the indian health policy of 1979, was the next step toward increasing the involvement of indian communities themselves in the delivery of health care services. royal commission on aboriginal peoples (1991 1996) a royal commission is an instrument used in canada to charter a new path for the future and to draw recognition to a critical national issue. commissioned in 1991, the royal commission on aboriginal peoples (rcap) was tasked with addressing issues of aboriginal peoples, including their recognition, status, and future prospects. the final rcap report, published in 1996, consisted of five volumes and over 4,000 pages that called for a new relationship between aboriginal and non-aboriginal people and the provincial, territorial, and federal governments. the report’s recommendations addressed a scope of issues, including housing, child welfare, education, and health. although the federal government has not implemented the rcap recommendations, the rcap has arguably succeeded in gaining recognition of aboriginal issues in canada. as cairns (2000) stated, “the mere existence of rcap… signaled a paradigm breakdown in the aboriginal/non-aboriginal relationships, and the search for a more positive successor paradigm” (p. 19), that is, a new relationship. the above description of key policies influencing first nations health service delivery has provided some indication of the various actors involved in shaping first nations health policy. however, it would be useful at this point to take a more in-depth look at the interests of the actors involved. 3 kelly: toward a new era of policy published by scholarship@western, 2011 interests of the actors the goals of the policies described above gradually shifted from assimilative to supportive of first nations control and autonomy. however, the more recent policies that were designed to support transfer of resources and control over to first nations communities were not universally embraced. some communities and scholars were suspicious of the motivations behind the policies, and wondered if the federal government was acting in its own best interest rather than that of the first nations (jacklin & warry, 2004; macintosh, 2008). in the following section, the interests of four separate actors will be examined: the federal government; the provincial government of bc; the general public; and first nations. federal government it is important to understand that throughout the eras of policy development, the federal government has never acknowledged a legal obligation to provide health care services to first nations. rather, the federal government’s stance is that it has a special relationship with first nations, which it is committed to preserving (first nations inuit health branch, 2007) and that its provision of health services on-reserve is a matter of goodwill (british columbia provincial health officer, 2009). some have argued that the federal government has provided care for socio-political and economic reasons, as well as practical reasons, such as to prevent spread of disease to the non-aboriginal population and to serve isolated and remote communities (jacklin & warry, 2004; lavoie et al., 2010). however, lavoie et al. (2010) have argued that in recent years, the federal government has actively sought to distance itself from health care service provision by way of transferring responsibility to the provinces and first nations under the guise of supporting community control and autonomy (lavoie et al., 2010). indeed, the suspicion with which some communities regarded the indian health transfer policy has not gone unfounded. evaluations of the health transfers have shown significant costshifting to first nations with limited benefits at the community-level (jacklin & warry, 2004; lavoie et al., 2010). another mechanism by which the federal government can shift the costs of health care service delivery over to the provinces and first nations is through its “closely guarded” (lavoie et al., 2010, p. 86) construction of who is an indian. through amendments to the indian act (e.g. bill c-31 and bill c-3), the federal government can extend or restrict eligibility for indian status. restricting eligibility for indian status results in a larger number of non-status first nations persons who fall under provincial jurisdiction for health care services. conversely, extending eligibility for status increases the number of status indians that fall under federal jurisdiction, but the increased population size of persons entitled to access services on-reserve has typically not been accompanied with increased federal budgets for community services, thereby shifting costs to the community itself (lavoie et al., 2010). frustrations with the federal government’s reluctance to increase its financing of first nations health care services were further fueled when stephen harper’s conservative government, elected in 2006, would not commit to investing $5 billion into aboriginal health care – a promise made by paul martin’s liberal government in the 2005 kelowna accord (pierre et al., 2007). overall, financial motivations appear to play a key role in how the federal government interprets and develops first nations health policy. of course, one should not overlook the influence of the global political climate on the policy decisions of the canadian federal government. for example, the desire to gain credibility and avoid criticism from the united nations (un) factored into canada’s extension of voting rights to indians in 1960 and the 1969 white paper’s proposal to abolish indian status (cairns, 2000). in 2007, canada voted against the un declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples, citing concerns that the declaration was 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 11 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/11 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.11 inconsistent with the canadian constitution act of 1982 and the canadian charter of rights and freedoms (indian and northern affairs canada, 2009); however, in 2010, canada officially endorsed the declaration and reaffirmed the nation’s “commitment to promoting and protecting the rights of indigenous peoples at home and abroad” (indian and northern affairs canada, 2010). moving forward, international pressures will likely continue to shape the federal government’s position on public policy and first nations health. regardless of the underlying reasoning, “the federal government continues to promote first nations-controlled health services as the preferred mechanism for alleviating the health inequalities” faced by first nations communities (lavoie et al., 2010, p. 84). provincial government of bc the provincial government of bc, like the federal government, has interests that underlie how first nations policy is shaped. in bc, the ministry of aboriginal relations and reconciliation is the primary agency that deals with first nations policy. the ministry negotiates treaties and other agreements, and cites its reasons for these negotiations to be moral, economic, constitutional and legal (ministry of aboriginal relations and reconciliation, n.d.). the provincial government acknowledges that policies need to support improving quality of life of first nations and create economic opportunities for first nations. as far as constitutional and legal reasons, the ministry of aboriginal relations and reconciliation states, “the courts have told government repeatedly that aboriginal rights and title exist, and that these rights have significant impact on the way government does its business” (ministry of aboriginal relations and reconciliation, n.d.), suggesting that the provincial government may wish to avoid legal troubles and engage in first nations policy development in a more inclusive way. with regards to health, the government of bc supports full participation of first nations in the design, delivery and evaluation of health care services (british columbia provincial health officer, 2009). through its ministry of health services, the province “provides stewardship and expertise to help close the gap in health status” between first nations and non-first nations british columbians (ministry of health services, n.d.). the province continues to work toward establishing provincial and regional targets for the health status of first nations in bc, hold ministries and health authorities accountable for progress toward those targets, and support efforts of first nations to achieve self-determination and sense of control over health (british columbia provincial health officer, 2009). general public some of the canadian public is wary of or resistant to the idea of aboriginal autonomy in health care, or any self-governance for that matter. these feelings are often based on the belief that first nations do not deserve preferential services or entitlements based on ethnicity (lavoie et al., 2010). the interests of voters are important to the federal and provincial governments; therefore, both levels of government have worked toward raising public awareness of health issues among first nations (e.g., the federal government’s 2008 apology to former students of the indian residential schools), and the need for unique solutions to address these issues. 5 kelly: toward a new era of policy published by scholarship@western, 2011 first nations first nations have long sought public awareness of health disparities and advocated for greater autonomy in health care governance. the stated goal of the assembly of first nations’ health and social secretariat, for example, is to achieve “first nations’ control of the development and delivery of all health and social services, and programs” (assembly of first nations health and social secretariat, n.d.). while more than half of first nations in bc have achieved some level of management of their own health services on-reserve through the indian health transfer policy (british columbia provincial health officer, 2009), there remains considerable variation in the degree of funding, autonomy, and provision of quality health care services. the indian act has also imposed divisions between first nations (e.g., status vs. non-status, on-reserve vs. off-reserve, and provincial and national borders) that have increased inequities between first nations persons. therefore, first nations are concerned not only about the disparities between first nations and the general population, but the disparities between first nations. to address these inequities, first nations need more than participation in and control over the design, delivery, and evaluation of health care services. they also require meaningful participation in policy development and decision-making. it is evident that the interests of the key actors presented above have not only shaped first nations health policy, but also the relationships between actors. as described earlier in this article, by the late 1990s, with the publication of the rcap report, there was a call for a new relationship between first nations and the federal and provincial governments. in the following section, developments toward a new relationship in bc will be examined. a new era of policy while policies toward community-control and self-determination have made progress toward improving health care service delivery to first nations, they have not yet been sufficient to eliminate the disparities of health between first nations and between first nations and the general population. as macintosh (2008) has argued: …changing who is planning and delivering programs … is unlikely to engender improvements, either because the problem is one which plagues the health care system generally, or because the problem requires a comprehensive response which is beyond the authority or resources of most first nations. (p. 73) to date, health care service delivery to first nations has been narrowly defined by the jurisdictions, priorities, and mandates of the provincial and federal governments while the need for an overall efficient system has been largely overlooked (lavoie & forget, 2008). lavoie and forget (2008) have recognized that, “gains will be realized only if we look for improving efficiency in the system as a whole, and with the establishment of cross-jurisdictional cooperative processes of planning and decisionmaking” (p. 119). the rcap report’s call for a new relationship between the federal government and aboriginal and non-aboriginal canadians has not gone ignored. on june 11, 2008, stephen harper’s federal government made a historic apology to survivors of the indian residential school system. in his apology, harper acknowledged that “policy of assimilation was wrong, has caused great harm, and has no place in our country” (harper, 2008). as a step toward healing, the federal government has also established the indian residential schools truth and reconciliation commission (trc). the trc can be seen as: 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 11 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/11 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.11 … a positive step in forging a new relationship between aboriginal peoples and other canadians, a relationship based on the knowledge of our shared history, a respect for each other and a desire to move forward together with a renewed understanding that strong families, strong communities and vibrant cultures and traditions will contribute to a stronger canada for all of us. (harper, 2008) as part of this renewed relationship should come a new process of policy development, based not on the assimilative goals of the past, but on today’s goal of mutual respect and understanding. the new relationship in bc an exciting example of a new relationship is currently underway in bc. since 2005, significant steps have been taken toward improving relations and coordination between first nations in bc and the provincial and federal governments. in march of 2005, a leadership accord was signed between the first nations summit, union of bc indian chiefs, and bc assembly of first nations to formalize a cooperative working relationship between the parties to represent first nations of bc (first nations summit, union of british columbia indian chiefs, bc assembly of first nations, 2005). executives of the parties form the first nations leadership council (fnlc). one goal of the fnlc is to work toward policy change that will benefit all first nations. toward this goal, the fnlc and the province of bc agreed in april of 2005 to “a new government-to-government relationship based on respect, recognition and accommodation of aboriginal title and rights” (first nations leadership council, government of bc, 2005). then, in november of 2005, the fnlc signed the transformative change accord (tca) with the province of bc and the government of canada, thereby marking the beginning of a revolutionary collaborative and coordinated cross-jurisdictional partnership with the intent to make first nations “full partners in the success and opportunity of the province” (government of british columbia, government of canada, and first nations leadership council, 2005). health has been a top priority throughout the development of this new relationship. in the document entitled, first nations health blueprint for british columbia, the fnlc (2005) envisioned a “distinct yet interdependent health system” (p. 2) for first nations, wherein first nations and the governments of bc and canada work in partnership in the development of public policy aimed at improving first nations health, and “are equal partners in the process” (p. 2). the blueprint emphasizes the need for balance in government-to-government relationships, particularly with respect to first nations participation in governance, decision-making, policy-making (including the legislative process), planning, and delivery and evaluation of health services. also in 2005, the tca identified health as one of the key areas for action (government of british columbia, government of canada, and first nations leadership council, 2005). this landmark accord was followed by the transformative change accord: first nations health plan (tca:fnhp) (first nations leadership council and province of bc, 2006) and the first nations health plan: memorandum of understanding (mou) (first nations leadership council, government of canada, and government of british columbia, 2006), both in 2006. the mou acknowledges that “maintaining the status quo will not close the health gaps between first nations and british columbians” and reiterates the importance of collaborative and coordinated partnership between first nations, bc and canada for improving health of first nations. the mou identifies four areas for collaboration: (1) governance, relationships and accountability; (2) health promotion and disease and injury prevention; (3) health services; and (4) performance tracking. the tca:fnhp builds on the tca and the first nations health blueprint for british columbia, proposing 29 actions required in the four key areas for collaboration. some of the noteworthy action items include establishing a first nations health council to advocate for first nations with respect to health issues and to provide leadership in the implementation of the tca:fnhp (the first nations health council was established in 7 kelly: toward a new era of policy published by scholarship@western, 2011 february of 2007); appointing a first-ever aboriginal physician advisor to the provincial health officer to advise on aboriginal health issues (dr. evan adams was appointed aboriginal physician advisor in april of 2007); and establishing a first nations health advisory committee to monitor the regional health authorities aboriginal health and wellness plans and to provide advice to the parties on closing health gaps (this committee first met in september of 2007, and later became the provincial committee on first nations health). in june of 2007, the tripartite partners signed the tripartite first nations health plan (tfnhp), which is a 10-year plan that builds on the mou and tca:fnhp (first nations leadership council, government of canada, and government of british columbia, 2007). the tfnhp introduced two important new actions: (1) to form a first nations health governing body (now designated to be a first nations health authority) to take over the management and direction of the services currently provided by the first nations and inuit health bc regional office; and (2) to form an association of health directors to provide voice to health professionals working in first nations (this association was formed in april of 2010). a central component of the tca:fnhp is the development and implementation of a new governance system for health services for first nations. the development of the new governance system is an ongoing process. currently, the plan for implementation of the new health administrative arrangement is based on four components: the first nations health council (fnhc), the first nations health directors association (fnhda), the provincial committee on first nations health, and the first nations health authority (fnha). this structure is further described in the 2010 document, basis for a framework agreement on health governance (first nations health council, government of canada, government of british columbia, 2010). one of the principle intentions of the basis for a framework agreement is to “provide for the transfer of the policy and service delivery role currently undertaken by the federal government to bc first nations” (first nations health council, government of canada, government of british columbia, 2010, p. 6). while this document is a non-legal agreement, it forms the basis for a legal framework agreement between first nations and the governments of bc and canada. so far, implementation of the tripartite health plan has not been without challenges, as will be described below (first nations health council, 2010). when the fnhc was formed in 2007, its primary roles were: (1) to support first nations in achieving health priorities, objectives and initiatives; (2) to participate in federal and provincial government health policy and program planning processes; and (3) to provide leadership in the implementation of the tfnhp (first nations leadership council, government of canada, and government of british columbia, 2007). the fnhc membership reflected that of the fnlc in that it was composed of politically appointed representatives. in the interim, the first nations summit acted as the administrative host agency, which included managing finances and entering into legal agreements. however, as the new governance system developed and the workload increased substantially in volume, there was need for this structure to evolve. the first nations health society was formed in 2009 to act as the corporate governance and operational arm for the fnhc, thereby relieving the first nations summit of its interim administrative duties and the associated legal and financial risks. in march of 2010, the union of bc indian chiefs passed a resolution calling for the restructuring of the fnhc to replace the politically appointed representatives with three regional representatives from each of the five regions in the province. this resulted in a regionally appointed fnhc for a two-year term (2010-2012). the new structure of the fnhc has served to put some separation between political and health priorities, and will provide more direct reporting and accountability to regions and first nations. the fnhc has been tasked with supporting bc first nations in achieving health priorities, objectives and initiatives. this requires extensive community collaboration and communication, which is no easy task given the diversity and geographic span of the 203 first nations across the province. the fnhc has found a number of avenues to overcome this challenge, which includes forming regional caucuses and community engagement hubs, and holding annual community engagement forums (first held in 2007) (first nations health council, 2010). the fnhda will also support community collaboration 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 11 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/11 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.11 and communication, by representing health professionals working in first nations and advising the fnhc. funding has also been a challenge. the cost of implementing the 29 action items in the tca:fnhp was estimated to be $24 million, yet at the time that partners signed the tfnhp there was no agreement established for providing funds to cover these costs (first nations health council, 2010). the fnhc reached a four-year funding agreement with the government of canada by 2007-2008, and in the recent basis for a framework agreement on health governance, it is agreed that the federal government will negotiate a 10-year funding agreement (first nations health council, government of canada, government of british columbia, 2010). however, federal funding has been inconsistent, with delivery of funds being delayed by one or two fiscal years (first nations health council, 2010). in 20092010, after strong advocacy from the fnhc, the government of bc committed to a 10-year agreement of $83.5 million to implement the tfnhp. long term funding is key to the success of this endeavor for, as the fnhc (2010) states, the partners “do not want to fall into the trap of making immediate shortterm decisions due to financial constraints” (p. 97). possibly the greatest challenge to the tripartite partnership and the development of a new health governance system is that this process has never been implemented before in canada (first nations health council, 2010). there is no existing model for this kind of partnership or governance structure. the provincial and federal governments were not designed for this type of partnership, and the large bureaucratic structures of the provincial and federal partner organizations could easily overshadow the fnhc and its technical team. as described in our story – a three year progress report 2007-2010, “for the fnhc, the tfnhp is the number one priority. for the tripartite partners, the tfnhp is one of many priorities” (first nations health council, 2010, p. 95). problems have been encountered in communicating roles and responsibilities, learning jargon and structure of government ministries and health authorities, identifying counterparts in partner organizations, bringing decision-makers to the table, and raising awareness of first nations perspectives. the partnership must also endure restructuring of partner organizations, for example, the 2008 split of the bc ministry of health into the ministry of health services and ministry of healthy living and sport, and the subsequent merging of the these two ministries in october of 2010. in addition, tripartite partners have struggled to draw on first nations expertise while not draining resources away from communities. overall, significant time has been invested in engaging partners to establish effective communication and collaboration, and this remains an ongoing challenge. despite these challenges, the tripartite partners have remained committed to establishing a new model of cross-jurisdictional cooperation in first nations health governance. a key component of the new governance structure is the meaningful participation of first nations in policy and decisionmaking. to avoid repeating the mistakes of the past, first nations need to be involved in health policy development. only then will we have forged the new relationship that was envisioned in the rcap report and the 2008 apology to survivors of residential schools. the tripartite partners recognize the importance of first nations involvement in health policy: the parties recognize that the transfer of health policy and program responsibilities to bc first nations would facilitate the development of holistic and better integrated programs that could improve necessary linkages in education, child and family, housing, etc. this would have the dual benefit of improving health services and facilitating action on the social determinants of health. (first nations health council, government of canada, government of british columbia, 2010, p. 8) although the process is still underway, the development of a new first nations health governance system in bc presents an exciting opportunity for change in the way first nations health policy is 9 kelly: toward a new era of policy published by scholarship@western, 2011 developed and implemented. the “new relationship” in bc could launch a new era of first nations health policy – an era when policy is not made for first nations, but by first nations. conclusion the disproportionate burdens of ill health experienced by first nations have been attributed in part to an uncoordinated, fragmented system of health care service delivery. this system is rooted in a series of key public policies that have created jurisdictional gaps and a long-standing debate between federal, provincial and first nations governments as to who is responsible for the delivery of health care to first nations. throughout canadian history, policies have gradually shifted from assimilative to supportive of first nations control and autonomy. however, simply increasing first nations control and autonomy in health care programming has not proven sufficient for closing the gaps in health between first nations and the general population. recent developments in bc are shifting toward a collaborative and coordinated partnership across jurisdictions for the improvement of health of first nations in the province. the inclusion of first nations as equal partners in this tripartite process may set a new standard for health care service delivery, not just within the province of bc, but across canada and for indigenous peoples worldwide. with the prospect of first nations in bc fully engaging in policy development with their provincial and federal partners, it suggests that perhaps a new era of first nations health policy is upon us; an era of moving forward together. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 11 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/11 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.11 references assembly of first nations health and social secretariat. 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(2009). canada's position: united nations draft declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples. retrieved from http://www.ainc-inac.gc.ca/ap/ia/pubs/ddr/ddr-eng.asp indian and northern affairs canada. (2010). canada's statement of support on the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples. retrieved from http://www.ainc-inac.gc.ca/ap/ia/dcl/stmt-eng.asp jacklin, k. m., & warry, w. (2004). the indian health transfer policy in canada: toward self-determination or cost containment? in a. castro, & m. singer (eds.), unhealthy health policy: a critical anthropological examination ( pp. 215-234). walnut creek, ca: altamira press. 11 kelly: toward a new era of policy published by scholarship@western, 2011 http://www.afn.ca/article.asp?id=103� http://laws.justice.gc.ca/eng/c-6/fulltext.html� http://www.hc-sc.gc.ca/ahc-asc/branch-dirgen/fnihb-dgspni/poli_1979-eng.php� http://www.hc-sc.gc.ca/ahc-asc/branch-dirgen/fnihb-dgspni/poli_1979-eng.php� http://www.hc-sc.gc.ca/fniah-spnia/pubs/finance/_agree-accord/10_years_ans_trans/2_intro-eng.php� http://www.hc-sc.gc.ca/fniah-spnia/pubs/finance/_agree-accord/10_years_ans_trans/2_intro-eng.php� http://www.ainc-inac.gc.ca/ai/mr/is/tra-eng.asp� http://www.ainc-inac.gc.ca/ap/ia/pubs/ddr/ddr-eng.asp� http://www.ainc-inac.gc.ca/ap/ia/dcl/stmt-eng.asp� lavoie, j. g., & forget, e. l. 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(2007). aboriginal health policy. in health policies and trends for selected target groups in canada: an overview report for the canadian association of occupational therapists (caot) (pp. 712). ottawa: canadian policy research networks. waldram, j. b., herring, d. a., & young, t. k. (2006). aboriginal health in canada: historical, cultural, and epidemiological perspectives (2nd ed.). toronto: university of toronto press. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 11 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/11 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.11 http://www.gov.bc.ca/arr/treaty/negotiating/why.html� http://www.health.gov.bc.ca/aboriginal/index.html� the international indigenous policy journal may 2011 toward a new era of policy: health care service delivery to first nations miranda d. kelly recommended citation toward a new era of policy: health care service delivery to first nations abstract keywords creative commons license toward a new era of policy: health care service delivery to first nations no jordan’s principle cases in canada? a review of the administrative response to jordan’s principle the international indigenous policy journal volume 6 | issue 1 article 6 january 2015 no jordan’s principle cases in canada? a review of the administrative response to jordan’s principle anne blumenthal university of michigan ann arbor, anneblue@umich.edu vandna sinha centre for research on children and families, mcgill university, vandna.sinha@mcgill.ca recommended citation blumenthal, a. , sinha, v. (2015). no jordan’s principle cases in canada? a review of the administrative response to jordan’s principle. the international indigenous policy journal, 6(1). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.6 no jordan’s principle cases in canada? a review of the administrative response to jordan’s principle abstract jordan’s principle is a child first principle intended to ensure that first nations children do not experience delay, denial, or disruption of services because of jurisdictional disputes. this article describes the development of a federally-led administrative response to jordan’s principle and recent legal challenges to this administrative response. we identify seven major conceptual issues that currently prevent realization of the child first approach at the heart of jordan’s principle and may also introduce new inequities for first nations children. through content analysis of legislative, administrative, and judicial documents related to jordan’s principle, we demonstrate the complexity of policy making processes affecting indigenous peoples in canada, and in other countries (like the u.s.) that have similar structural frameworks. keywords jordan’s principle, policy implementation, first nations, jurisdictional dispute, canada, health and social services, content analysis, child welfare acknowledgments we thank marv bernstein and lisa wolff (unicef canada); nico trocmé and lucyna lach (mcgill university); elizabeth moreau (canadian paediatric society); and doug maynard (canadian association of paediatric health centres) for their invaluable feedback on earlier drafts of this paper. we also extend our gratitude to cindy blackstock of the first nations child and family caring society for her vital assistance in locating documents related to the review. this research was supported by a social sciences and humanities research council partnership grant and by a gift from the royal bank of canada foundation to support the mcgill centre for research on children and families’ children’s services research and training program. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/   n o j o r d a n ’ s p r i n c i p l e c a s e s i n c a n a d a ? a r e v i e w o f t h e a d m i n i s t r a t i v e r e s p o n s e t o j o r d a n ’ s p r i n c i p l e jordan’s principle is a child first principle named in jordan river anderson’s memory; it is intended to facilitate compliance with canada’s national and international obligations to ensure the equitable treatment of first nations1 children and to uphold their human rights. in particular, the goal of jordan’s principle is to ensure that status first nations children are not subjected to delay, denial, or disruption of services due to disputes between and within governments or government departments (blackstock, prakash, loxley & wien, 2005). a motion (m-296, 2007) that “the government should immediately adopt a child first principle, based on jordan's principle, to resolve jurisdictional disputes involving the care of first nations children” was passed unanimously in the house of commons in 2007 (jordan’s principle, n.d., para. 2). since that time, several publications have described the passage of jordan’s principle as well as the legal and administrative challenges that have arisen during the implementation process (blackstock & auger, 2013; blackstock, 2008a, 2009, 2012; canadian paediatric society, 2012; king, 2012; lett, 2008a, 2008b; n. e. macdonald, 2012; nathanson, 2010; unicef canada, 2012; wekerle, bennett, & fuchs, 2009; woodgate, 2013). however, a comprehensive review of the governmental response to jordan’s principle has never been formally published. this article documents the results of a descriptive content analysis (neuendorf, 2002) of jordan’s principle-related documents that were retrieved through the multiple means described in table 1. the compiled document base included records of the bipartite and tripartite jordan’s principle agreements struck in four jurisdictions: new brunswick (nb), saskatchewan (sk), manitoba (mb), and british columbia (bc) as well as supporting documentation at the provincial and federal levels. although our search was exhaustive, information about jordan’s principle was often difficult to obtain and some relevant documents may have been unintentionally excluded from our review. an advisory team composed of mcgill-based researchers, and representatives of the assembly of first nations (afn), unicef canada, the canadian paediatric society (cps), and the canadian association of paediatric health centres (caphc) supported compilation and analysis of documents. this article summarizes the results of a content analysis that focused on constructing a timeline of steps in the governmental response to jordan’s principle. we describe significant elements of a federally-led administrative response to jordan’s principle, outlining the development and implementation of federal and provincial or territorial policies for identifying and addressing cases involving jurisdictional disputes over payment for services to first nations children. we also summarize two recent legal challenges to this administrative response. our analysis suggests that seven major conceptual issues prevent the current administrative response from fully implementing a child first principle that ensures that first nations children do not experience delays, disruptions, or denials of services due to jurisdictional disputes.                                                                                                                     1 first nations are one of three groups of aboriginal peoples in canada specifically recognized by the constitution act (1982), the other two being the inuit and métis. 1 blumenthal and sinha: jordan's principle review published by scholarship@western, 2015 t a b l e 1 . i d e n t i f i c a t i o n o f j o r d a n ' s p r i n c i p l e r e l a t e d d o c u m e n t s r e v i e w e d f o r t h i s a r t i c l e m e t h o d o f i d e n t i f i c a t i o n s o u r c e o f d o c u m e n t s i d e n t i f i e d t y p e s o f d o c u m e n t s i d e n t i f i e d e le ct ro n ic s ea rc h es f o r "j o rd an 's p ri n ci p le " systematic search in academic databases scopus, proquest, jstor, eric, and pubmed academic articles, published non-governmental organization reports, and publically available government reports systematic search in legislative databases and websites legisinfo and websites of provincial houses of parliament hansard (debate proceedings), jurisprudence, and publically available government reports web search google non-governmental organization reports and publically available government reports a cc es s to i n fo rm at io n r eq u es ts aboriginal affairs and northern development canada documents referring to “jordan’s principle” first nations child and family caring society of canada internal government memos and reports requests to responsible departments in: nb, sk, and mb information officers internal government documents related to bilateral and trilateral agreements d ir ec t r eq u es ts t o g o ve rn m en t d ep ar tm en ts request for formal bilateral and trilateral agreements from responsible ministers in: nb, bc, sk, and mb provincial government officials bc agreement phone calls to each fnihb and aandc region requesting focal point contact information hc and aandc employees information regarding the existence of designated focal points for jurisdictional disputes in each region o th er r et ri ev al m et h o d s examination of the references lists of previously retrieved documents google, scopus, proquest, jstor, eric, and pubmed academic articles, published non-governmental organization reports, and publically available government reports identification of documents by advisory committee members google academic articles, published non-governmental organization reports, publically available government reports review of documents made public through the canadian human rights tribunal process first nations child and family caring society of canada internal government memos/reports note. fnihb is the acronym for the first nations inuit health branch of health canada (hc). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.6 b a c k g r o u n d a n d c o n t e x t j o r d a n ’ s s t o r y jordan river anderson, a first nations child from norway house cree nation in manitoba, was born with a rare neuromuscular disease in 1999 (lavallee, 2005). because his complex medical needs could not be treated on-reserve, jordan was transferred to a hospital in winnipeg, far from his community and family home (n. e. macdonald & attaran, 2007). in 2001, a hospital-based team decided that jordan’s needs would best be met in a specialized foster home closer to his home community. however, federal and provincial governments disagreed regarding financial responsibility for jordan’s proposed in-home care (blackstock, 2008a). the disputes ranged from disagreements over funding of foster care to conflicts over payment for smaller items such as a showerhead (n. e. macdonald & attaran, 2007). during these conflicts, jordan remained in hospital for more than two years, even though it was not medically necessary for him to be there. in 2005, jordan died in hospital, at the age of five, never having had the opportunity to live in a family home (king, 2012). n e e d f o r a c h i l d f i r s t p r i n c i p l e in jordan river anderson’s case, tragic delays in service resulted from a jurisdictional dispute: provincial and federal government departments disagreed on who should bear financial responsibility for jordan’s in-home care. a jurisdictional dispute of this kind could potentially arise in any situation involving unclear delineation of the jurisdictional authorities of two or more governments or government departments. however, status first nations individuals and residents of reserve communities are particularly vulnerable to jurisdictional disputes due to their unique treatment under canadian law and policy. while provincial and territorial governments both fund and directly provide almost all health and social services for non-aboriginal canadians and most services for first nations canadians living offreserve, the federal government generally funds on-reserve services to first nations individuals (romanow, 2002). the federal government maintains that they fund on-reserve health services as a matter of policy and not because of legal obligation (boyer, 2004); others maintain that the federal government has a constitutionally mandated, fiduciary obligation to first nations individuals (boyer, 2003, 2004; romanow, 2002). this dispute is further complicated by the fact that, while services for status first nations people living on-reserve are generally funded by the federal government, they are regulated by provincial or territorial legislation and standards, and may also be delivered through provincial and territorial service systems. thus, the structure of services for status first nations people living on-reserve inherently presents added possibilities for jurisdictional disputes because it fundamentally differs from the structure of services for all other people. the potential for jurisdictional disputes in service provision and the need for a clear dispute resolution process were well established prior to the dispute around funding of in-home services for jordan. documented concerns about jurisdictional disputes in services for first nations peoples are apparent even as far back as the 1967 hawthorn report (see cairns et al., 1967). more recently, in an exhaustive review of first nations child and family services funding, the joint national policy review found that jurisdictional disputes were common (mcdonald & ladd, 2000). the review found that “case-by-case” dispute resolution mechanisms were the norm, but that first nations child and family service agencies reported the need for a formal, tribunal-like dispute resolution process (mcdonald & ladd, 2000). it 3 blumenthal and sinha: jordan's principle review published by scholarship@western, 2015 recommended that “diand[2], health canada, the provinces/territories and first nation agencies […] give priority to clarifying jurisdiction and resourcing issues related to responsibility for programming and funding for children with complex needs, such as handicapped children and children with emotional and/or medical needs” (mcdonald & ladd, 2000, p. 120). the national advisory committee of the joint national policy review requested that the first nations child and family caring society (the caring society) undertake in-depth research regarding funding of services for first nations children on-reserve (blackstock et al., 2005). this project, which resulted in the three wen:de reports, included a survey of 12 first nations child and family service agencies that reported experiencing 393 jurisdictional disputes in the prior year (blackstock et al., 2005). on average, each dispute took 54 person-hours to resolve, imposing a heavy human resource burden on agencies. the jurisdictional disputes reported by agencies included those between federal government departments (36%), provincial government departments (27%), federal and provincial departments (14%) (blackstock et al., 2005). a d m i n i s t r a t i v e r e s p o n s e t o j o r d a n ’ s p r i n c i p l e building on the evidence from the wen:de reports, first nations organizations began to advocate for a child first principle to promote the efficient resolution of jurisdictional disputes (blackstock, 2008a). one of the first appearances of the term “jordan’s principle” in print was in the 2005 report entitled “wen:de: we are coming to the light of day:” in keeping with the united nations convention on the rights of the child, we recommend that a child first principle be adopted in the resolution of inter-governmental jurisdictional disputes. under this procedure the government (provincial or federal) that first receives a request to pay for services for a status indian child where that service is available to other children, [. . .] will pay for the service without delay or disruption. the paying party then has the option to refer the matter to a jurisdictional dispute resolution table. in this way the rights of the child come first whilst still allowing for the resolution of jurisdictional issues. in honor and memory of jordan we recommend the childfirst principle to resolving jurisdictional disputes be termed jordan’s principle [sic] and be implemented without delay. (k. a. macdonald & walman, 2005, p. 107)   advocacy around jordan’s principle started with jordan’s family and was extended by trudy lavallee, a child advocate with the assembly of manitoba chiefs (blackstock, 2009). cindy blackstock, executive director of the caring society, continued the advocacy work with leaders from norway house cree nation, the assembly of manitoba chiefs, and the assembly of first nations (afn) (blackstock, 2009). early advocacy and support for jordan’s principle reflected more than a simple need to resolve jurisdictional disputes; a fundamental goal was to achieve the equitable treatment of first nations                                                                                                                   2 aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc) was formerly known as indian and northern affairs canada (inac) and, before that, as the department of indian affairs and northern development (diand). we use these terms interchangeably, in accordance with the documents being referenced. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.6 children relative to other canadian children. thus, jordan’s principle was intended as a mechanism for ensuring greater adherence to the principles outlined in the convention on the rights of the child (crc, 1989), the canadian charter of rights and freedoms (1982) (the charter), and other provincial, territorial, and federal legislation. the crc (1989) is an international agreement affirming the civil, social, political, cultural, and economic rights of children; canada ratified the convention in 1991 and it came into force in 1992 (standing senate committee on human rights, 2005). article 23(1) speaks directly to the specific details of jordan’s case: stating first, that governments recognize a disabled child “should enjoy a full and decent life, in conditions which ensure dignity, promote selfreliance and facilitate the child's active participation in the community.” article 23(3) further specifies that disabled children should have access to services “in a manner conducive to the child's achieving the fullest possible social integration and individual development, including his or her cultural and spiritual development.” at a more general level, article 3 (1) of the crc establishes a governmental obligation to ensure that the “best interests of the child” are a primary consideration in all services to children. article 2 (1) stipulates that the crc must be applied to each child “without discrimination of any kind, irrespective of the child’s […] ethnic or social origin.” article 3 (1) is paralleled by child welfare legislation in each canadian province and territory, which specifies the need to act in the best interest of the child (child welfare policy group, 2013). additionally, article 2 (1) is mirrored in section 15 of the charter (1982), which declares that every individual “is equal before and under the law and has the right to the equal benefit and protection of the law, without discrimination.” jordan’s principle has received support from numerous governments, and national and international organizations. an afn special chiefs assembly (2005, 2007) called for a child first principle to be implemented without delay in december 2005 (resolution 67) and renewed their support for implementation in 2007 (resolution 36). federal government endorsement came in the form of unanimous house of commons passage of private member’s motion (m-296, 2007), introduced by member of parliament (mp) jean crowder, in 2007. debate on the principle considered its applicability in broad terms. mp steven blaney expressed the government’s support of jordan’s principle this way: in other words, when a problem arises in a community regarding a child, we must ensure that the necessary services are provided and only afterwards should we worry about who will foot the bill. thus, the first government or department to receive a bill for services is responsible for paying, without disruption or delay. that government or department can then submit the matter for review to an independent organization, once the appropriate care has been given, in order to have the bill paid. i support this motion, as does the government. (parliament of canada, 2007, private member’s business, aboriginal affairs, paras. 3-4 ) mp blaney’s paraphrasing of jordan’s principle corresponds the position of the caring society, which defines jordan’s principle as applicable to situations in which “a jurisdictional dispute arises between two government parties (provincial/territorial or federal) or between two departments or ministries of the same government” for services that are normally available to all other children (first nations child and family caring society, n.d.b, para. 3). as of may, 2014, more than 8,000 individuals and organizations had signed on as supporters of jordan’s principle, including: the afn, the canadian nurses association, the canadian paediatric society (cps), the canadian association of paediatric health centres (caphc), the canadian medical association journal, and unicef canada (first nations child and family caring society, n.d.a). 5 blumenthal and sinha: jordan's principle review published by scholarship@western, 2015 l e g i s l a t i v e e f f o r t s t o d e f i n e a n d o p e r a t i o n a l i z e j o r d a n ’ s p r i n c i p l e the denotation of jordan’s principle in the wen:de reports and the endorsement of jordan’s principle by the house of commons provided the foundation for implementation of a child first principle. subsequently, several legislative efforts attempted to specify the measures needed for effective implementation of a child first principle. legislative efforts to operationalize jordan’s principle at the federal level were first mounted in 2008 through house of commons private member’s bill c-563 (2008). this bill specified a repayment principle, requiring the department responsible for services to reimburse a department which paid for services within 30 days. it also required the minister of indian affairs and northern development to appoint an adjudicator to resolve disputes that arose between federal departments or between federal and provincial or territorial departments. notably, these provisions would only have applied in disputes involving payment for health services. the bill, which was reintroduced three times (also as bill c-249, 2008) never proceeding beyond first reading in the house of commons, made no mention of social services (i.e., education or child welfare services). attempts to legislate jordan’s principle were also made at the provincial level. in manitoba, concern over slow and informal implementation of jordan’s principle led to the introduction of private member’s bill 203 in 2008 (see bill 203, 2008; bourassa, 2010; lett, 2008a). bill 203 (2008) focused on health and social services, defining a jurisdictional dispute as “a dispute between the federal government and the provincial government or a government agency that is responsible for paying for the health care or social services required by a child” (definitions section, para. 5). the bill would have affirmed the right of all children to receive the best health care and social services on a timely basis in their homes or communities. in situations in which these rights were contravened, bill 203 directed provincial representatives to act to ensure that the child’s rights were protected and to prevent similar occurrences in the future. if these corrections were not undertaken, the guardian could apply to the court for a remedy; however, the dispute resolution mechanism was never fully detailed (nathanson, 2010). the bill was introduced three times, as bills 233 (2008) and bill 214 (2009), but did not proceed beyond first reading in the legislature (lett, 2008a; nathanson, 2010). two other provincial and territorial assemblies also introduced motions mandating governments to implement a child first policy. in the yukon, a notice of motion (motion 700, 2006), issued in 2006, urged the territorial government to implement a child first policy and work with other jurisdictions to investigate payment mechanisms that ensured equitable services for first nations children. we could find no record of an endorsement of or action on this motion. finally, in april, 2010, new brunswick’s legislative assembly endorsed a motion (motion 68, 2010) mandating a tripartite partnership to: (a) develop an agreement on the application of jordan’s principle, (b) negotiate new child welfare service funding, and (c) develop a plan to address the underlying causes of poor child welfare outcomes. the motion did not give details of the funding mechanism, but stated that “where required, funding disputes would be resolved with a dispute resolution mechanism but disagreements would not delay the provision of service” (legislative assembly of new brunswick, 2010, p. 253). n o n l e g i s l a t i v e e f f o r t s t o d e f i n e a n d o p e r a t i o n a l i z e j o r d a n ’ s p r i n c i p l e while politicians and advocates were pursuing legislative approaches to jordan’s principle implementation, the federal government began to discuss non-legislative agreements with provincial and 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.6 territorial governments. in may 2008, the minister of health and the minister of indian affairs and northern development invited provincial and territorial governments "to work together to implement a child first principle to resolve jurisdictional disputes involving the care of first nations children" (inac & federal interlocutor for métis and non-status indians, 2010, p. 22). soon after, manitoba became the first province to reach a bilateral agreement with the federal government to implement a jurisdictional dispute resolution process for first nations children (inac & federal interlocutor for métis and nonstatus indians, 2010). a joint committee composed of federal and provincial representatives was established in 2008 and began work on a jordan’s principle case conferencing and dispute resolution document (government of canada, 2012; terms of reference officials working group, 2009). the preliminary report drafted by this working group outlined the spectrum of cases that would fall under jordan’s principle and described potential processes for determining the agency with primary responsibility for funding services. it also described potential case conferencing mechanisms, dispute resolution processes, and appeal processes (terms of reference officials working group, 2009). we were unable to obtain further documentation of jordan’s principle policies in manitoba. in 2009, the federal government, saskatchewan government, and federation of saskatchewan indian nations (fsin) reported reaching a trilateral jordan’s principle agreement (aandc, 2011). the agreement was described in an interim implementation document that briefly outlined, in very broad terms, the need to formalize case conferencing practices, the definition of cases that would fall under jordan’s principle, key jordan’s principle related terminology, and a long-term agenda for implementing jordan’s principle (including development of “dispute avoidance processes” (fsin, government of saskatchewan, & government of canada, 2009). in june 2012, fsin notified aandc that it was suspending negotiations around implementation (because of concerns highlighted in an ongoing court case, pictou landing band council & marina beadle v. attorney general of canada, described below) (lerat, 2012). representatives from provincial and territorial governments signed a final bilateral dispute resolution protocol in july 2012 (government of saskatchewan & government of canada, 2012). in manitoba and saskatchewan, jordan’s principle was operationalized as applying to cases in which the following five criteria are met: 1. a first nations child who has status or is eligible to have status is involved; 2. the child is ordinarily a resident on-reserve; 3. the child has been assessed by health and social service professionals and has been found to have multiple disabilities requiring services from multiple providers; 4. the dispute is between the federal and provincial government; and 5. the assessment is made based on normative standards of care provided to similar children in a similar geographic location (aandc, 2013; fsin, government of saskatchewan, & government of canada, 2009; terms of reference officials working group, 2009). thus, the administrative response to jordan’s principle agreements implemented in these jurisdictions reflected a considerably narrower operationalization of the principle than that which was endorsed by 7 blumenthal and sinha: jordan's principle review published by scholarship@western, 2015 the house of commons. an afn special chiefs’ assembly (2008) carried, by consensus, a resolution (63/2008) that condemned the operational definition of jordan’s principle adopted by the federal government as unreflective of the intent of the house and discriminatory. british columbia (bc) premier gordon campbell gave his full support to jordan’s principle in 2008 and a tripartite jordan’s principle working group, including representatives of the british columbia and federal governments as well as members of first nations organizations, was formed (turpel-lafond, 2008). three years later, in 2011, the british columbia and federal governments reached a formal bilateral agreement to implement jordan’s principle (aandc, 2012). as shown in table 2, a federal government assessment of jordan’s principle implementation indicated that a draft bilateral statement on jordan’s principle was distributed to first nations in british columbia at the same time that trilateral discussions were taking place. in 2012, the british columbia assembly of first nations (2012) passed a unanimous resolution (1(n)/2012) decrying the creation of a bipartite dispute resolution mechanism without the incorporation of first nations as equal partners. details of the bilateral agreement in british columbia were outlined in a 2011 report jointly released by the british columbia and federal governments (government of british columbia & government of canada, 2011). the report outlined an operational definition of jurisdictional disputes and the joint commitment to developing a dispute resolution mechanism; it also explicitly noted that the federal and provincial operationalizations of jordan’s principle differed (government of british columbia & government of canada, 2011). in british columbia’s operationalization, jordan’s principle applied to all first nations children under the age of 19; in contrast, the federal operationalization was consistent with the manitoba and saskatchewan agreements, invoking the five requirements discussed above. the report did not outline steps to resolving the differences in operationalization nor did it give any details of a dispute resolution process. in new brunswick, a tripartite jordan’s principle implementation agreement was reached between aandc, new brunswick, and first nations chiefs in new brunswick in december of 2011 and announced in 2012 (first nations chiefs of new brunswick, government of new brunswick, & government of canada, 2011; government of canada, 2012). in an internal document retrieved through an access to information request, aandc noted that “the [new brunswick] agreement is of particular note as it is the first tripartite document to include both a case conferencing and dispute resolution mechanism and is serving as a model for other jurisdictions” (aandc, 2011, p. 4). much like in british columbia, the new brunswick agreement noted differences in the federal, provincial, and first nations understandings of the scope of jordan’s principle. the federal government maintained the fivecriteria operational definition used in other agreements, while new brunswick’s perspective was slightly broader and the first nations parties’ definition affirmed the right of every child to have access to equitable services (first nations chiefs of new brunswick et al., 2011). 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.6 t a b l e 2 . f e d e r a l m e m o r a n d u m : f e d e r a l a n d p r o v i n c i a l e n g a g e m e n t o n j o r d a n ' s p r i n c i p l e ( 2 0 1 0 ) p r o v i n c e o r t e r r i t o r y e n g a g e m e n t s t a t u s n o t e s alberta wishes to reach an agreement "province has expressed interest in establishing a dispute resolution process for jp implementation and working with first nations." british columbia wishes to reach an agreement "draft bilateral joint process for the implementation of jp has been shared with first nations; bilateral and tripartite discussions are ongoing." manitoba has an agreement "tripartite agreement on an interim implementation plan. work is ongoing." new brunswick wishes to reach an agreement "developing a tripartite joint statement which outlines an agreed upon case conferencing/dispute resolution approach." newfoundland & labrador not interested in formal process "province has indicated they have sufficient processes in place to address cases/jurisdictional disputes." northwest territories* nova scotia not interested in formal process see newfoundland & labrador note. nunavut* ontario wishes to reach an agreement "does not see a need for a formal […] mechanism […] but would like to work with canada and first nations to support jp implementation." prince edward island not interested in formal process see newfoundland & labrador note. quebec not interested in formal process see newfoundland & labrador note. saskatchewan has an agreement "tripartite agreement on an interim implementation plan. work is ongoing." yukon "canada maintains a watching brief on activities inside the yukon." note. source: government of canada (2010, p. 1). * territories not mentioned in the document. 9 blumenthal and sinha: jordan's principle review published by scholarship@western, 2015 we were unable to obtain documentation of jordan’s principle agreements reached in other provinces and territories. as indicated in table 2, the federal government’s 2010 assessment of its administrative response to jordan’s principle described nova scotia,3 newfoundland and labrador, prince edward island, and quebec as uninterested in establishing formal dispute resolution processes. ontario was characterized as desiring a jordan’s principle agreement and, in statements to the legislative assembly of ontario in 2009, the ontario government announced support for jordan’s principle (garrick, 2009). in 2010, a provincial study of ontario’s children aid’s societies indicated that jordan’s principle was not being consistently applied (ministry of youth services, 2010), but there is no indication of a subsequent agreement. the federal assessment also described alberta as being interested in establishing a dispute resolution process, but our review did not yield any documentation of a resulting agreement. despite the mixed assessments reported in 2010, the federal government stated in 2012 that all provinces “have been engaged in discussions and have put joint processes in place” (government of canada, 2012, p. 17). however, the nature, extent, and quality of these joint processes remain unclear. documentation to support further assessment of the quality of the joint processes was unavailable. aandc itself has acknowledged discontent with these joint processes, stating that: advocacy groups, first nation leadership and provinces continue to be critical of the federal government for perceived lack of progress in implementing jordan’s principle and its narrow focus on first nations children with multiple disabilities and federal/provincial disputes. generally, these groups would like jordan’s principle to apply to all first nation children and address gaps in services between all levels of government. (aandc, 2011, p. 4) c a s e c o n f e r e n c i n g a n d d i s p u t e r e s o l u t i o n p r o c e s s e s while the existence of federal-provincial agreements suggests a framework for implementation of a child first principle and the development of dispute resolution processes, many details remain unclear. the most detailed and recent description of jordan’s principle case conferencing and dispute resolution processes appeared in the new brunswick agreement. aandc has identified this agreement as the template for other provinces (aandc, 2011) and, indeed, the steps outlined in the tripartite dispute resolution agreement in new brunswick closely mirror the language in the bipartite dispute resolution agreement in saskatchewan. table 3 summarizes steps outlined in the new brunswick process. this process heavily emphasizes the idea that most disputes should be resolved at the local level and that progress to a formal case conferencing procedure should happen only in exceptional circumstances. no timeline is specified for progression to formal case conferencing. the emphasis on local level resolution is echoed in aandc’s public documentation of the administrative response, which stated, “case management will occur first at the local level” (inac, 2010, p. 54).                                                                                                                   3 in nova scotia, a tripartite agreement was reached between federal and provincial governments and mi’kmaw family and children’s services in 2009 (cps, 2012). 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.6 t a b l e 3 . c a s e c o n f e r e n c i n g a n d d i s p u t e r e s o l u t i o n p r o c e s s e s o u t l i n e d i n t h e n e w b r u n s w i c k j o r d a n ’ s p r i n c i p l e a g r e e m e n t c a s e c o n f e r e n c i n g s t e p s t e p i n p r o c e s s t i m e f r a m e s p e c i f i e d 1 resolution reached through case conferencing at the local level no time frame specified 2 referral to focal point if not resolved at local level no time frame specified 3 focal point will hold an initial case conference meeting with focal points from other parties within 10 work days of receiving necessary information 4 resolution at focal point level within an additional 45 work days 5 if not resolved at the focal point level, relevant assistant deputy minister decides whether to declare a jurisdictional dispute no time frame specified 6 relevant assistant deputy minister notifies responsible counterpart in federal or provincial ministry, in writing, of a jurisdictional dispute and requests to enter into dispute resolution process no time frame specified 7 counterpart assistant deputy minister responds to request to enter into dispute process from primary assistant deputy minister. if accepted, jordan’s principle jurisdictional dispute is declared. within a reasonable time frame 8 once a jordan’s principle dispute is declared, and the service is deemed by the province as a provincial normative standard, then the department of first contact covers the cost of services until matter is resolved d i s p u t e r e s o l u t i o n s t e p s t e p i n p r o c e s s t i m e f r a m e s p e c i f i e d * 9 resolution attempt at the assistant deputy minister level within 30 days 10 selection of a professional mediator if no resolution within 20 days 11 mediation facilitation and mediator's report within 30 days 12 if mediators recommendations are not accepted, dispute referred to deputy ministers of responsible departments to agree to a resolution within 60 days *all timeframes in the dispute resolution process outlined are extendable by mutual agreement 11 blumenthal and sinha: jordan's principle review published by scholarship@western, 2015 comments made during a 2009 appearance by a senior inac official before the standing committee on aboriginal affairs and northern development offered some additional insight into a multi-step dispute resolution process. at this meeting, the official highlighted a case-by-case approach: in terms of what we're doing on jordan's principle, we do have a group we work with at health canada where, if we are made aware of a case, we have identified focal points in both departments in our regional offices. when these cases are brought to our attention, we then branch out and look at what program is implicated in our particular department. we look to see if we can resolve the case through that approach and do the case conferencing. but what's important is our need to be made aware of these cases. (johnson, 2009, p. 18) focal points were described as individuals designated to “help navigate cases within the existing range of health and social service based on the normative standards of care provided to children off-reserve in similar geographic locations” (inac, 2010, p. 54). testimony from pictou landing band council and maurina beadle v. the attorney general of canada, 2013 (plbc v. canada, described below) also indicated that the focal point is responsible for gathering necessary information and determining a resolution through the formal case conferencing process (robinson, 2011). through phone calls to aandc and first nations inuit health branch (fnihb) offices, we were able to identify the names of focal points in most regions. however, little additional information about the focal points charged with facilitating case conferencing is publicly available. the new brunswick agreement specifies that a focal point must convene an initial case conference within 10 days of receiving the following: an assessment of the child from a health and service professional, information on current and proposed service plans for the child, a report of the issue or reason for referral to the focal point, and a summary of steps taken to resolve the issue. the focal point must then complete case conferencing within 45 subsequent working days. the case conferencing process involves: (1) verification of a child’s diagnosis, (2) review of goods and services recommended and currently provided, (3) identification of unmet goods and services needs, (4) clarification of mandates for provision of required goods and services, and (5) “examination of provincial normative standards of care to understand comparable services available to children with multiple disabilities (special needs) living off reserve in a similar geographic location” (first nations chiefs of new brunswick et al., 2011, p. 11). if a resolution is not reached through case conferencing, formal declaration of a provincial–federal jurisdictional dispute is the next step (steps 5 8 in table 3). though no time limit for this step is indicated in the new brunswick documentation, a jurisdictional dispute is only considered to formally exist once declared (in writing) by a provincial or federal assistant deputy minister (first nations chiefs of new brunswick et al., 2011) and accepted by the corresponding provincial or federal assistant deputy minister (baggley, 2014a). it is only “once a jordan’s principle dispute is declared and the service is deemed by the province as a provincial normative standard” that “the federal or provincial department [sic] of first contact will cover the cost of the disputed service related to that case throughout the dispute resolution process until the matter is resolved” (first nations chiefs of new brunswick et al., 2011, p. 5). thus, it is at this point—after a local level case conferencing process of undetermined length, a formal case conferencing process, which may last up to 55 working days, and a formal declaration by two deputy ministers—that a child first principle is applied. services that are consistent with the provincial 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.6 standard assessed by a focal point and by “the province,” are to be paid for by “the current service provider” or “in the absence of a current service provider, the agency of first contact” until the resolution of the jurisdictional dispute (first nations chiefs of new brunswick et al., 2011, p. 3). the dispute resolution process includes four steps, each with “established timelines” that may be extended if agreed upon by the parties (see table 3). first, a dispute resolution attempt is made at the between federal and provincial government assistant deputy ministers within 30 days. if there is no dispute resolution at this level, the parties then have 20 days to agree upon a professional mediator, who has 30 days to facilitate dispute resolution and submit a recommendations report. if the parties refuse the recommendations, the deputy ministers have an additional 60 days to agree to an alternate resolution (first nations chiefs of new brunswick et al., 2011). i n d e p e n d e n t a s s e s s m e n t s o f j o r d a n ’ s p r i n c i p l e i m p l e m e n t a t i o n in the 2012 edition of their status report on canadian public policy and child and youth health, the canadian paediatric society (cps) provided ratings of the implementation of jordan’s principle in all provinces and territories. drawing on government documents, websites, and personal communications, cps assessed jordan’s principle implementation on the four-category rating scale described in table 4 (cps, 2012). the findings stand in contrast to the federal government’s 2012 statement that all provinces had put in place joint processes for addressing jordan’s principle (government of canada, 2012). there were no changes in the cps’ ratings of implementation of jordan’s principle by provinces and territories between 2009 and 2011. eight of the provinces and territories were rated as “poor,” meaning that there was no child first policy in the jurisdiction. four provinces were rated as “fair.” in nova scotia, the only jurisdiction that cps rated as “good,” jordan’s principle implementation was the site of a legal challenge that is discussed in detail below. l e g a l c h a l l e n g e s b a s e d o n j o r d a n ’ s p r i n c i p l e p i c t o u l a n d i n g b a n d c o u n c i l & m a r i n a b e a d l e v . a t t o r n e y g e n e r a l o f c a n a d a ( p l b c v . c a n a d a ) pictou landing first nation is a mi’kmaq community located on a small parcel of land next to pictou harbour, nova scotia and is governed by the elected pictou landing band council (plbc). maurina beadle, a resident of pictou landing, is single mother and the primary caregiver for her son, jeremy meawasige. jeremy has been diagnosed with hydrocephalus, cerebral palsy, spinal curvature, and autism; he has high care needs, and can be self-abusive at times (champ & associates, 2011). in may 2010, ms. beadle suffered a stroke and was hospitalized; she subsequently required assistance with her own care and could no longer care for jeremy at the level that he required. the plbc began funding 24-hour inhome care to assist both ms. beadle and jeremy. ms. beadle’s condition improved; however, an october 2010 assessment by the pictou landing health centre recommended that the beadle family continue to receive in-home care services from a homecare worker to meet jeremy’s 24-hour care needs (champ & associates, 2011). 13 blumenthal and sinha: jordan's principle review published by scholarship@western, 2015 t a b l e 4 . j o r d a n ' s p r i n c i p l e i m p l e m e n t a t i o n r a t i n g s b y t h e c a n a d i a n p a e d i a t r i c s o c i e t y ( 2 0 1 2 ) p r o v i n c e o r t e r r i t o r y 2 0 0 9 2 0 1 1 alberta poor poor british columbia fair fair manitoba fair fair new brunswick poor poor newfoundland & labrador poor poor northwest territories poor poor nova scotia good good nunavut poor poor ontario fair fair prince edward island poor poor quebec poor poor saskatchewan fair fair yukon poor poor c a n a d i a n p a e d i a t r i c s o c i e t y r a t i n g s c a t e g o r i e s e x c e l l e n t province or territory has adopted and implemented a child first principle to resolve jurisdictional disputes. g o o d province or territory has a dispute resolution process with a child first principle for resolving jurisdictional disputes. f a i r province or territory has adopted a child first principle to resolve jurisdictional disputes, but has not yet developed or implemented specific strategy. p o o r province or territory has not adopted a child first principle. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.6 the plbc estimated that jeremy’s in-home care expenses totalled around $8,200 a month, which amounted to nearly 80% of the total monthly block contribution that plbc received for home care services (champ & associates, 2011; plbc & marina beadle v. attorney general of canada, 2013). in february 2011, the plbc health director contacted the health canada regional director to discuss options for jeremy’s care. the health director was aware of jordan’s principle and requested case conferencing regarding his needs. two case conferencing meetings subsequently occurred between representatives of the nova scotia department of health and wellness, plbc health services, health canada, and aandc (the aandc representative served as a focal point in this case). the provincial representative explained that an off-reserve child requiring similar care would receive a maximum of $2,200 per month for in-home respite services. he further explained that, while the province would not provide home care exceeding this limit, it would fund the cost of institutional care (estimated to be approximately $10,500 per month, or 130% of the cost of jeremy’s in-home expenses at the time) (plbc & marina beadle v. attorney general of canada, 2013). around the same time that case conferencing was occurring in jeremy’s case, the nova scotia supreme court decided on a similar issue of in-home care services, raised in the case of nova scotia (community services) v. boudreau (2011). brian boudreau was a nova scotia resident who suffered from severe autism and required 24-hour care. the province had limited his in-home care service payments to $2,200 per month (identified as the standard maximum). the respondent in nova scotia department of community services (nscs) v. boudreau charged that, in doing so, the nova scotia department of community services violated legislation allowing for in-home care funding exceeding the standard maximum in “exceptional circumstances.” on march 29, 2011, the nova scotia supreme court ruled that the department of community services was obligated to provide additional in-home care funding for brian. in addition to finding that brian’s case was one in which there were “exceptional circumstances,” the ruling noted that section 9 of the nova scotia social assistance act (1989) directs the province to “furnish assistance to all persons in need” (section 9(1)) and that “home care” is included in the list of services that the province must provide under the terms of the municipal assistance regulations. in nscs v. boudreau, the court ruled that departmental discretionary regulations and policies do not take precedence over relevant legislation. the plbc health director attached a copy of the nscs v. boudreau ruling to a formal request for federal authorities to provide additional funding for jeremy’s in-home care. the focal point responded on behalf of health canada and aandc, concluding that jordan’s principle did not apply because provincial and federal government agencies were in agreement that services provided to jeremy should not exceed $2,200 per month. the focal point also reiterated that jeremy’s needs met the criteria for placement in fully funded institutional care (plbc & marina beadle v. attorney general of canada, 2013). in june 2011, the pictou landing band council and marina beadle filed an application asking the federal court to quash the focal point’s decision in jeremy’s case, and to declare that the federal government’s actions in the case violated the nova scotia social assistance act, jordan’s principle, and the charter. they argued that jordan’s principle is an essential mechanism for ensuring the protection 15 blumenthal and sinha: jordan's principle review published by scholarship@western, 2015 from discrimination on the basis of race, national or ethnic origin, or colour that is guaranteed by section 15 (1) of the charter (champ & associates, 2011). the respondent, the attorney general of canada, argued that jordan’s principle was not engaged in this case. the attorney general suggested that, because the province and federal government agreed, there was no jurisdictional dispute and further argued that, because the very recent supreme court ruling in nscs v. boudreau had not yet resulted in a change in provincial practice, the $2,200 per month cap on in-home service payments remained the normative provincial standard. finally, the government argued that plbc was not entitled to reimbursement for the cost of jeremy’s care. the attorney general of canada (2012) stated: while the applicants have a right to seek judicial review regarding the [focal point’s] decision that jordan's principle was not engaged here, if they are unhappy with the amounts they receive under their funding agreements, then their course is to ask canada to renegotiate and amend those agreements. (p. 672) accordingly, canada argued the decision did not violate the charter, and that jeremy’s needs were treated no differently than any other nova scotian with similar needs. in 2013, the federal court ruled in favour of plbc and maurina beadle, finding that the federal government’s interpretation and application of jordan’s principle was inadequate. the court ruled that, in assigning jordan’s principle focal points, the federal government accepted the task of implementing jordan’s principle and, thus, incurred a responsibility to do so. moreover, the court found that jordan’s principle applied in jeremy’s case and that, accordingly, it did not need to consider the question of whether the aandc decision in that case violated jeremy’s charter rights. the court rejected canada’s arguments that the “exceptional case” clause in existing regulation did not apply and that a jurisdictional dispute did not exist. on the issue of the applicability of the exceptional case clause, the court stated: the nova scotia court held an off reserve person with multiple handicaps is entitled to receive home care services according to his needs. his needs were exceptional and the saa and its regulations provide for exceptional cases. yet a severely handicapped teenager on a first nation reserve is not eligible, under express provincial policy, to be considered despite being in similar dire straits. this, in my view, engages consideration under jordan's principle which exists precisely to address situations such as jeremy’s. (plbc & marina beadle v. attorney general of canada, 2013, p. 31) with regard to the existence of a jurisdictional dispute, the court stated: i do not think the principle in a jordan’s principle case is to be read narrowly. the absence of a monetary dispute cannot be determinative where officials of both levels of government maintain an erroneous position on what is available to persons in need of such services in the province and both then assert there is no jurisdictional dispute. (plbc & marina beadle v. attorney general of canada, 2013, p. 28) the court further clarified the interpretation of a jurisdictional dispute and the findings on canada’s claim that jordan’s principle did not call for reimbursement in cases involving block funding: 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.6 jordan's principle applies between the two levels of government. in this case the plbc was delivering program and services as required by aandc and health canada in accordance with provincial legislative standards. the plbc is entitled to turn to the federal government and seek reimbursement for exceptional costs incurred because jeremy's caregiver, his mother, can no longer care for him as she did before. (plbc & marina beadle v. attorney general of canada, 2013, p. 34) accordingly, the court ruled that jeremy did qualify for home-care funding greater than $2,200 per month, quashed the aandc decision, and directed the federal government to provide reimbursement to the plbc for jeremy’s in-home care without delay. on may 6, 2013, the attorney general of canada appealed the decision to the federal court of appeal. canada’s memorandum of fact and law for the appeal argued that the court erred in the interpretation and application of jordan’s principle by focusing on an underlying service disparity rather than a jurisdictional dispute. further, canada argued that the decision was unreasonable because it ignored evidence and instead was based on “opinion” (attorney general of canada, 2013, p. 18). finally, canada argued that the court did not have authority to mandate the remedy granted to the respondents (attorney general of canada, 2013). by march 2014, the caring society, amnesty international, and the assembly of manitoba chiefs had been granted the right to intervene in the case (federal court of appeal, 2014a, 2014b). on july 11, 2014, without explanation, the attorney general of canada filed a notice of discontinuance in the case, formally dropping the appeal. thus, the 2013 ruling in plbc & marina beadle v. attorney general of canada stands (attorney general of canada, 2014). it remains to be seen how the federal government adapts its administrative response to jordan’s principle to comply with the ruling. f i r s t n a t i o n s c h i l d a n d f a m i l y c a r i n g s o c i e t y o f c a n a d a a n d t h e a s s e m b l y o f f i r s t n a t i o n s v . a t t o r n e y g e n e r a l o f c a n a d a the federal government’s administrative response to jordan’s principle also lies at the heart of the ongoing canadian human rights tribunal case, first nations child and family caring society et al. v. the attorney general of canada. this case is based on a complaint, first filed in 2007, which alleged that federal government underfunding of on-reserve child welfare services amounted to discrimination on the basis of race and ethnicity. the complainants argued that the failure to provide first nations children and families ordinarily on-reserve children with child welfare funding and benefits comparable to those received by all other children and families contravened jordan’s principle. they asked for an order mandating that federal authorities apply jordan’s principle to federal programs affecting children and that plans for implementation of jordan’s principle be approved by the canadian human rights commission (wilson christian llp, 2013). the federal government made concerted efforts to have the case dismissed, but was ultimately unsuccessful. the canadian human rights tribunal began hearing evidence in this case on february 25, 2013; the final witness testified in may of 2014 (first nations child and family caring society, 2014). in closing submissions, the complainants provided evidence on the current administrative response to jordan’s principle, and argued that a full and properly scoped implementation of jordan’s principle, as it was “conceived of as a means to prevent first nations children from being denied essential public services” is required (power law, 2014, p. 145). a ruling in the case is expected in 2015 (first nations child and family caring society, 2014). 17 blumenthal and sinha: jordan's principle review published by scholarship@western, 2015 k e y i s s u e s i n i m p l e m e n t a t i o n o f t h e a d m i n i s t r a t i v e r e s p o n s e t o j o r d a n ’ s p r i n c i p l e the administrative response to jordan’s principle has evolved in an iterative fashion, emerging from negotiations between the federal and provincial and territorial governments, and being further clarified in response to challenges like the plbc & marina beadle v. attorney general of canada case. our review of jordan’s principle documents and of plbc & marina beadle v. attorney general of canada suggests that, in its current form, this administrative response fails to implement the child first approach that lies at the heart of jordan’s principle. the current response: 1. limits the population eligible under jordan’s principle, thereby creating disparities in the protections available to different groups of first nations children. 2. narrows the operational definition of jurisdictional disputes to exclude intra-governmental disputes, thus further limiting the cases to be considered under jordan’s principle. 3. treats the existence of a formal payment dispute to be the indicator of a jurisdictional dispute, thereby potentially excluding cases involving known service disparities from consideration under jordan’s principle. 4. institutionalizes a potentially lengthy case conferencing process as a precursor to declaration of a jurisdictional dispute, thus introducing possible service delays. 5. fails to specify a consistent mechanism for repayment of costs incurred by the government or agency providing services during case conferencing and dispute resolution processes. 6. excludes first nations from administrative and dispute resolution processes. 7. lacks mechanisms for transparency and accountability, which are essential to the protection of human rights. l i m i t s o n e l i g i b i l i t y jordan’s principle, as documented in the wen:de reports and as endorsed by the house of commons, applies to all status first nations children. in contrast, under the operational definition put forward by the federal government and agreed to by multiple provinces, child first protections apply only to status or status-eligible children who are ordinarily a resident on-reserve, have been assessed by health and social service professionals, and have been found to have multiple disabilities requiring services from multiple providers (aandc, 2013; indian affairs and northern development, 2010). this operational definition denies access to jordan’s principle processes to first nations children who have multiple disabilities that have not been professionally diagnosed or do not require services from multiple providers. moreover, it excludes all first nations children who do not have multiple disabilities from jordan’s principle protections. accordingly, the federal operationalization potentially creates new disparities in access to services for first nations children. the most explicit justification for narrowing the scope of eligibility provided in the documents we reviewed came in a 2011 statement before the standing committee on the status of women. a senior analyst from inac explained the narrow operationalization, stating, “the focus is on those who were like jordan—those who are the most 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.6 vulnerable, those who have multiple disabilities and require multiple services from across jurisdictions” (baggley, 2011, mrs. corrine baggley section, para. 1). t h e n a r r o w i n g o f t y p e s o f j u r i s d i c t i o n a l d i s p u t e s a d d r e s s e d the concept of a jurisdictional dispute is central to jordan’s principle, and the existence of a jurisdictional dispute has been emphasized in all operationalizations of jordan’s principle we reviewed. federal funding of health and social services for on-reserve status first nations people (which are largely funded, provided, and regulated by provinces and territories off-reserve) is a core justification for a child first principle, which focuses specifically on first nations children. the potential for jurisdictional disputes around specific services for first nations children in care, with medical needs, or with disabilities has been clearly outlined in some jurisdictions (bourassa, 2010; fsin, 2008; woodgate, 2013). thus, the presence of a jurisdictional dispute can be seen as a defining characteristic of a jordan’s principle case, one that distinguishes it from other human rights cases in which a child is denied the equal treatment and protections guaranteed by provincial, territorial, federal, and international laws and agreements. despite the centrality of jurisdictional disputes for jordan’s principle, this concept has never been clearly defined. existing scholarship documents the occurrence of jurisdictional disputes in areas of jurisdictional overlap, like the one inherent to the divided responsibility for on-reserve services (nathanson, 2010), but does not offer a clear standard for assessing whether a jurisdictional dispute exists. while no explicit definition of a jurisdictional dispute was presented in the jordan’s principle documents we reviewed, a de facto definition was evident. collectively, the reviewed documents indicate that, under the current administrative response, the operational definition of a “jurisdictional dispute” is a case in which: • there is disagreement between the federal and provincial governments; • case conferencing occurred at the local level but did not lead to case resolution; • an aandc focal point made an assessment of unequal services, based on a comparison of normative standards of care provided to similar children in a similar geographic location; • an aandc focal point determined that there is a formal payment dispute between provincial or territorial and federal governments even after case conferencing has occurred; and • assistant deputy ministers, within both a provincial and a federal government department, formally declare a jurisdictional dispute. the federal operationalization has a narrow focus on disputes between provincial and federal governments. this stands in contrast to broader operationalizations—such as those outlined in discussions leading to the house of commons endorsement of jordan’s principle and in subsequent descriptions of the principle by first nations groups—which include disputes between departments of a single government. the limited available evidence suggests that restricting jordan’s principle application 19 blumenthal and sinha: jordan's principle review published by scholarship@western, 2015 to those cases in which there is a dispute between federal and provincial or territorial governments may exclude consideration of many situations in which first nations children experience delay, denials, or disruptions of service. the wen:de reports indicated that disputes between federal government departments were the most common form of jurisdictional dispute; the number of inter-departmental disputes at the federal level that were reported by 12 sampled agencies was more than 2 times the number of federal–provincial disputes (blackstock, et al., 2005). federal inter-departmental disputes are also specific to status first nations children; they do not occur around the provincially and territorially funded services provided to non-status children. these disputes, however, are not captured within the federal government’s narrow operationalization of jordan’s principle. d e c l a r a t i o n o f a f o r m a l p a y m e n t d i s p u t e a s t h e i n d i c a t o r o f a j u r i s d i c t i o n a l d i s p u t e the potential for additional children to be excluded from jordan’s principle eligibility because of the federal government’s narrow definition of a jurisdictional dispute was made clear in the plbc & marina beadle v. attorney general of canada ruling. reflecting on the provincial–federal agreement that the $2,200 per month limit for in-home care services applied, the court noted that the absence of a monetary dispute was not a valid indicator of the absence of a jurisdictional dispute if both levels of government “maintain an erroneous position on what is available to persons in need” (plbc & marina beadle v. attorney general of canada, 2013, p. 28). thus, the ruling highlighted a potential for intergovernmental collusion that is implicit to the federal government’s operational definition of jordan’s principle. first nations children who experience delays or disruption of services normally available to other children can be excluded from jordan’s principle protections if federal and provincial governments simply decline to formally declare a jurisdictional dispute. the systemic implications of this potential for collusion were evident in the federal–provincial working group report on jordan’s principle implementation in manitoba (terms of reference officials working group, 2009). the report enumerated a number of “service gaps and service disparities,” or situations in which the on-reserve services funded by the federal government were not equal to the provincially funded services provided off-reserve (terms of reference officials working group, 2009, p. 12). examples included on-reserve provision of only one new assistive device (e.g., a lift or wheelchair) every five years with no installation assistance, while off-reserve funding covered multiple devices and installation; and the limitation of physiotherapy for first nations children to hospital settings, while offreserve children could access free physiotherapy at home or in health care centres (terms of reference officials working group, 2009, pp. 13–14). the report also suggested that out-of-home placement through the child welfare system would be one way for on-reserve children to “more easily” access services in keeping with normative provincial standards (terms of reference officials working group, 2009, p.15). however, the report, authored by a working group that included federal representatives, stressed that “these examples of service disparities are not the result of a dispute between the federal and provincial jurisdictions over responsibility for the provision or funding of services. as such, these differences do not relate to jordan’s principle, as there is no jurisdictional dispute” (terms of reference officials working group, 2009, p. 15). thus, on a systemic level, defining a jurisdictional dispute as a situation in which a formal payment dispute exists serves as a basis for excluding on-reserve children, receiving services that both federal and provincial governments have identified as failing to meet provincial normative standards, from jordan’s principle processes and protections. 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.6 in plbc & marina beadle v. attorney general of canada, the federal court ruled that a jurisdictional dispute existed because the federal funding provided was insufficient to allow plbc to provide services in compliance with provincial legislation. accordingly, it indicated that an alternate means of identifying jurisdictional disputes would be to assess whether or not the services and funds being provided were sufficient to meet the requirements set forth by existing legislation and standards. in this approach, the existence of a service disparity or service gap would be the trigger for provision of jordan’s principle protections. the potential for federal–provincial collusion highlighted by plbc & marina beadle v. attorney general of canada suggests that an independent body should carry out this assessment and that there should be a mechanism for appealing the assessment. i n t r o d u c t i o n o f s e r v i c e d e l a y s the administrative response to jordan’s principle requires that a case proceed through multiple stages of assessment and case conferencing prior to being declared a “jordan’s principle case” and becoming eligible for payment of services. the documents we reviewed suggested that formal case conferencing is only initiated once local level case conferencing, of an unspecified duration, has been completed and necessary information has been forwarded to the focal point. documentation from new brunswick specifies that there are up to 55 working days allotted for formal case conferencing facilitated by the focal point (first nations chiefs of new brunswick et al., 2011). recent testimony from a senior aandc official at the canadian human rights tribunal confirmed that the process could be lengthy. in one example, the aandc official testified regarding the case conferencing process for an on-reserve, status first nations child who required a medical bed, normally available to off-reserve children, in order to prevent a life threatening emergency. it took over six months to complete case conferencing and deliver the bed to the child (baggley, 2014b). additionally, the requirement that the provincial normative standard be determined prior to payment seems to imply that services will be only be covered in accordance with provincial standards. there is no indication of an alternative to a lengthy legal challenge if, as in the case of plbc & marina beadle v. attorney general of canada, the provincial standard itself is in question. the prevention of service delays and disruptions for first nations children has been a primary purpose of jordan’s principle from the outset. yet, an operational standard defining what constitutes a service delay is curiously absent from the documents we reviewed. at its core, the administrative response appears to involve formalization of the same type of potentially lengthy case conferencing process that occurred for jordan river anderson. the federal–provincial working group in manitoba proposed an alternative case conferencing process (terms of reference officials working group, 2009). it called for a primary agency of responsibility (par) to be determined and for payment of services to begin prior to case conferencing. however, the document did not specify who should determine the par. moreover, the par process was outlined in a draft document, and we were unable to obtain documentation of the current processes in place. f a i l u r e t o s p e c i f y a c o n s i s t e n t r e p a y m e n t m e c h a n i s m the current administrative response does not appear to specify a formal mechanism for repayment of funds dispensed for services provided during the case conferencing or dispute resolution process. aandc has publicly indicated that, in cases involving children already receiving services, “[t]he current 21 blumenthal and sinha: jordan's principle review published by scholarship@western, 2015 service provider that is caring for the child will continue to pay for necessary services until there is a resolution” (aandc, 2013, para 6). the new brunswick agreement further specified that in a case where there was no current service provider, the government or agency of first contact would be liable for payment of new services until the resolution of the jurisdictional dispute (first nations chiefs of new brunswick et al., 2011). however, we did not find any specification of a formal timeline for ensuring repayment of costs incurred by a current service provider, or government or agency of first contact. we also did not find any indication of a source for compensation funds in the event that a focal point determines that the cost of services provided exceeded the normative standards of care provided to similar children in a similar geographic location. the 2008 federal budget established a four-year, 11 million dollar reserve fund to support jordan’s principle implementation (government of canada, 2012). this fund was intended to “provide interim funding to cover the costs of a child’s care in the event of a jurisdictional dispute” (government of canada, 2012, p. 19). in 2012, noting that the fund had not been accessed in its three-year existence, the federal government cancelled the fund, one year before its designated sunset date (government of canada, 2012). we found no indication that other funds have been designated for repayment in such cases (government of canada, 2012). indeed, the new brunswick agreement specifically noted that “jordan’s principle implementation does not create a new program, service or funding source itself, rather solutions will be pursued within existing agencies, services and funding agreements” (first nations chiefs of new brunswick et al., 2011, p. 3). thus, the current administrative response appears to create a risk that, in some circumstances, governments or agencies honouring a child first principle may not be reimbursed. the potential for repayment is even more tenuous for first nations service providers, which are responsible for the provision of a large, and increasing, proportion of health and social services in first nations communities (sinha & kozlowski, 2013; smith & lavoie, 2008). the new brunswick agreement noted that “in the unlikely event that a dispute cannot be resolved, the government of first contact, who has paid the service during the dispute resolution process, will not seek reimbursement from the first nation or first nation child and family services agency” (first nations chiefs of new brunswick et al., 2011, p. 5). however, there is much less clarity around the reimbursement process if a first nation or first nations agency, as the current service provider, or government or agency of first contact, pays for services during case conferencing and dispute processes. in jeremy meawasige’s case, the pictou landing band council covered service costs during these processes, providing for jeremy’s in-home care from 2010 until 2013. yet, in plbc & marina beadle v. attorney general of canada, the federal government argued that plbc was not entitled to compensation for these costs, stating that, “if they are unhappy with the amounts they receive under their funding agreements, then their course is to ask canada to renegotiate and amend those agreements” (attorney general of canada, 2012, p. 672). accordingly, it appears that first nations service providers cannot expect their costs to be reimbursed under the current administrative response. when the expenses represent a significant proportion of the service provider’s budget, the block funds they have available to provide services to other children may be depleted. thus, this aspect of the administrative response may have the perverse effect of creating new situations in which first nations service providers lack the resources to provide on-reserve children with the same level of service available to their off-reserve counterparts. indeed, in the plbc case, federal officials recognized that plbc could not sustain the cost of jeremy’s care, indicating that if 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.6 plbc were to cease funding respite services, the options for jeremy’s care would be institutionalization or out-of-home placement through the child welfare system (were, 2011). e x c l u s i o n o f f i r s t n a t i o n s the potential burden that the current administrative response imposes on first nations is even more problematic given that collaboration with first nations in developing and implementing this response has been mixed, at best. manitoba and british columbia both have bipartite agreements (government of canada, 2012), to which first nations were not party. both the british columbia assembly of first nations (2012) and the assembly of first nations special chiefs assemblies (2008) passed resolutions (1(n)/2012 and 63/2008, respectively) decrying exclusion of first nations from the jordan’s principle case definition and policy implementation process. in saskatchewan, jordan’s principle agreement negotiations began in a trilateral fashion, but ended in a bilateral agreement after fsin withdrew from jordan’s principle agreement negotiations citing concern around the wording used in the agreement (lerat, 2012). in addition, definitional differences between government authorities and first nations authorities in terms of the scope of jordan’s principle were evident in the documents we reviewed from british columbia, new brunswick, and saskatchewan (fsin et al., 2009; first nations chiefs of new brunswick et al., 2011; government of british columbia & government of canada, 2011). finally, there is also some suggestion of exclusion of first nations in other jurisdictions. for example, noting that an existing tripartite agreement between mi’kmaw family and children’s services (government of canada, 2012), which included a mechanism for “resolving jp [jordan’s principle] type issues” (government of canada & government of nova scotia, 2010), the federal government concluded that nova scotia did not need a jordan’s principle agreement. however, notes from an exploratory jordan’s principle meeting between federal and nova scotia government representatives suggest that first nations were not involved in making this assessment (government of canada & government of nova scotia, 2010). first nations were also excluded from participating in implementation of the administrative response to jordan’s principle. at the national level, the afn made numerous attempts to ensure first nations participation in the designation and training of jordan’s principle focal points, but were not included in these processes (afn national first nations health technicians, 2009). there are some indications of first nations participation at the provincial level; for example, engagement of the chiefs of new brunswick in negotiating the dispute resolution process in that province (baggley, 2014a). however, the nature and extent of the inclusion of first nations representatives in these implementation processes is unclear. additional information regarding partnerships with provincial or national first nations organizations was notably absent in the documents we reviewed. exclusion of first nations from the development and implementation of an administrative response is troubling given the genesis of jordan’s principle: it is named in memory of a first nations child, was drafted by first nations advocates, and has been championed by first nations organizations (blackstock, 2009). moreover, it is directly associated with the health and welfare of first nations children, domains in which first nations have asserted their pre-existing rights and responsibilities. the need for first nations control over health and social services has been widely acknowledged, and first nations increasingly play health and social service-provision roles (auditor general of canada, 2008; blackstock, cross, george, brown, & formsma, 2006; sinha & kozlowski, 2013; smith & lavoie, 23 blumenthal and sinha: jordan's principle review published by scholarship@western, 2015 2008). thus, the provincial and federal governments have a moral and ethical duty to consult with first nations on matters concerning the health and welfare of first nations children. such consultation may increase efficacy—there is evidence that engagement of aboriginal representatives in health services provision can dramatically increase referrals from aboriginal communities (health canada, 2010). it is also in keeping with a worldwide focus on supporting stakeholder engagement in policy development and implementation in order to improve governance (the world bank, 2011). l a c k o f t r a n s p a r e n c y a n d a c c o u n t a b i l i t y m e c h a n i s m s along with stakeholder participation, accountability, and transparency are recognized as integral elements of democratic governance and protection of human rights (kaufmann, 2004; united nations & office of the high commissioner for human rights, 2007). our review of the administrative response to jordan’s principle indicates that transparency of jordan’s principle processes and outcomes is severely lacking. the process for pursuing a jordan’s principle case is unclear; focal points are not always easily identifiable. afn health technicians previously indicated that, in many regions, first nations had no idea who the regional focal points were (afn national first nations health technicians, 2009). we attempted to locate focal points while researching this article. we found no contact information on the internet but were able to identify focal points in most regions through calls to aandc and fnihb regional offices. in some instances, focal points were easily identified by the person answering the phone. however, in others, identification was only possible after jordan’s principle and the focal point role was explained to the person answering the phone; in some cases, several call transfers and discussions with multiple federal employees were required. moreover, we were unable to locate any publically accessible documentation of the procedures followed once a case is brought to the attention of a focal point. even basic documentation of jordan’s principle policies was difficult to obtain. the bilateral and trilateral agreements on jordan’s principle are not publicly accessible and direct requests to provincial health and social ministries did not result in the agreements being turned over.4 access to the jordan’s principle related documents reviewed in this article was greatly facilitated by the caring society’s efforts to bring documents related to the first nations child and family caring society et al. v. attorney general of canada (2014) case into the public domain, the sharing of information by other aboriginal organizations and advocates, and the filing of provincial level access to information requests. still, it was time consuming and difficult to piece together information needed to describe the processes for pursuing a jordan’s principle case. transparency with respect to the outcomes and effectiveness of jordan’s principle policies is also lacking. federal representatives previously stated that “case conferencing” occurred on a number of “jordan’s principle-related” cases and that all these cases were resolved “before there was a formal payment dispute,” but then indicated that information about case resolutions could not be made public (government of canada & government of nova scotia, 2010, p. 2; see also inac, 2010). a recent disclosure at the first nations child and family caring society et al. v. attorney general of canada (2014) tribunal hearing included federal documentation of 27 “jordan’s principle related” cases, but did                                                                                                                   4 the sole exception was in british columbia, where letters to provincial ministers requesting documents resulted in access to information requests automatically being filed on our behalf. 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.6 not include any indication of the timing or duration of case conferencing processes. it did indicate that case conferencing and dispute resolution processes were ongoing for several cases and that federal representatives lacked the information needed to characterize the resolution of several additional cases. the resolutions noted for remaining cases included provision of one-time services on compassionate grounds, negotiation of manufacturer price reductions by front-line staff, and referral to alternate administrative processes. we were not able to locate any additional documentation about the number, nature, procedures, or time to resolve jordan’s principle cases. the lack of transparency around the administrative response to jordan’s principle translates into a lack of government accountability. the basic information required to support rigorous, independent assessment of jordan’s principle processes, and to ensure that the administrative response functions in accordance with canada’s national and international obligations, is currently unavailable. drawing on a human rights framework, unicef canada (2012) assessed jordan’s principle implementation and called for the following elements to be implemented in order to meet “human rights standards of transparency and accountability” (p. 4): • a common and properly scoped definition of jordan’s principle, including when/how a claim will be identified as subject to jordan’s principle; • standards for response time; • a clearly identified focal point to receive queries; • a transparent and consistent process for the resolution of claims, including standardized comparison and assessment methods; • an independent oversight body; • an appeal process rooted in procedural fairness; • sufficient and designated financial and human resources for policy implementation, including a budget for adjudicating (as distinct from servicing) claims; • regular access to training and capacity building amongst government officials and other relevant governance bodies, such as first nations agencies; and • a process of monitoring and evaluation, including regular, public reports on case management and outcomes. (unicef canada, 2012, pp. 4-5) c o n c l u s i o n federal officials have publicly stated that they know of “no jordan’s principle cases” in canada (government of canada, 2012; inac, 2010). however, multiple sources of evidence suggest the existence of cases which fall within the scope of jordan’s principle, as originally envisioned and endorsed by the house of commons. in addition to the first nations child and family caring society et al. v. attorney general of canada (2014) case, there is another human rights case under review at the 25 blumenthal and sinha: jordan's principle review published by scholarship@western, 2015 canadian human rights commission alleging inequitable service provision for status first nations individuals (aandc, n.d.; n. e. macdonald, 2012; robinson, 2014). there are also reports that norway house cree nation paid for services for 37 children that were denied in-home medical and social services due to a jurisdictional dispute between federal and provincial agencies in 2008 (blackstock, 2008b, 2009; lett, 2008b). moreover, recent research on the experiences and perceptions first nations people documents perceptions that status first nations children have experienced delay, denial, or disruption of health and social services ordinarily available to other children (first nations information governance centre, 2012; woodgate, 2013). these perceptions of service inequities are supported by strong documentation of gaps in, and/or chronic underfunding of, on-reserve health and social services (auditor general of canada, 2008; blackstock, prakash, loxley, & wien, 2005; committee on the rights of the child, 2012; house standing committee on public accounts, 2010; king, 2012; loxley et al., 2005; mcdonald & ladd, 2000; terms of reference officials working group, 2009). our analysis suggests that the claim that there are no jordan’s principle cases in canada flows from an administrative response that severely narrows both the child population and the range of jurisdictional disputes to be considered under jordan’s principle. the federal government’s administrative response excludes most first nations children from jordan’s principle protections, thereby potentially creating disparities between different groups of first nations children. moreover, our analysis suggests that the current administrative response burdens the families of vulnerable first nations children with responsibility for transforming known service inequities into jurisdictional disputes that qualify for jordan’s principle protections. the family of a status first nations child living on-reserve must know, or at least suspect, that they are being denied services that would normally be available to off-reserve children. they must persevere through a local case conferencing process and have the situation brought to the attention of a focal point. they must then navigate a multi-step, potentially lengthy, formal case conferencing process. only once normative provincial standards have been assessed and a jurisdictional dispute has been declared by both federal and provincial governments will the costs of services be covered. even then, there is no consistent payment or repayment mechanism to ensure that a service provider assuming the cost of service provision during case conferencing and jurisdictional dispute processes will be reimbursed. there is no independent oversight of the process for determining the services to be covered. there is no recourse, other than costly and time-consuming legal action, for families who disagree with the resolution reached through the formal case conferencing process. moreover, even if case conferencing yields needed services for a specific first nations child, there is little indication that resolution of a jordan’s principle case leads to underlying service inequities being addressed at a systemic level. accordingly, the administrative response to jordan’s principle falls far short of realizing a “child first principle,” which systematically prioritizes the best interests of first nations children and ensures that they receive services in accordance with the human rights principles and constitutional mandates that canada is obligated to uphold. a new approach to implementing jordan’s principle—one that starts with consideration of canada’s legal and ethical obligations to uphold the human rights of first nations children, prioritizes the clinical needs of vulnerable children over administrative concerns, and engages first nations as full partners—is required. 26 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.6 r e f e r e n c e s aboriginal affairs and northern development canada [aandc] (n.d.). jordan’s principle roll-out document (evidentiary disclosure in first nations child and family caring society of canada et al. v. attorney general of canada: can022748_0053). aboriginal affairs and northern development canada [aandc]. 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(2009). editorial: the legacy of a child: jordan’s principle. first peoples child and family review, 4(1), 5–7. were, w. (2011, august 7). pictou landing case (health canada internal document). wilson christian llp. (2013). statement of particulars, disclosure, production of the complainants. toronto, on. retrieved from http://www.fncaringsociety.com/sites/default/files/complainant%20stat%20of%20part.pdf woodgate, r. (2013). understanding the disability trajectory of first nations families of children with a disability: advancing jordan’s principle. retrieved from http://umanitoba.ca/faculties/nursing/research/media/booklet_june_summit.pdf the world bank. (2011). supporting open and collaborative governance. washington, dc: the world bank. retrieved from http://wbi.worldbank.org/wbi/data/wbi/wbicms/files/drupalacquia/wbi/governance2011_nospread.pdf   35 blumenthal and sinha: jordan's principle review published by scholarship@western, 2015 the international indigenous policy journal january 2015 no jordan’s principle cases in canada? a review of the administrative response to jordan’s principle anne blumenthal vandna sinha recommended citation no jordan’s principle cases in canada? a review of the administrative response to jordan’s principle abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license no jordanâ•žs principle cases in canada? a review of the administrative response to jordanâ•žs principle ms 1458 stelkia book review structures of indifference.rce.pdf the international indigenous policy journal volume 11 | issue 3 july 2020 book review: structures of indifference: an indigenous life and death in a canadian city krista stelkia simon fraser university, canada, kms16@sfu.ca recommended citation stelkia, k. (2020). book review: structures of indifference: an indigenous life and death in a canadian city. the international indigenous policy journal, 11(3). https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.10800 book review: structures of indifference: an indigenous life and death in a canadian city abstract the case of brian sinclair, a first nations man who died in a winnipeg, manitoba, hospital emergency room in 2008 after waiting 34 hours for medical care to treat a preventable infection, represents the degree to which structural indifference exists within canadian society. this article reviews the book structures of indifference: an indigenous life and death in a canadian city by mary jane logan mccallum and adele perry, published by university of manitoba press in 2018. the review will provide a content summary of each chapter along with an assessment of the strengths and weaknesses of the book. a critical analysis of how the authors examined this case, using a place-based approach of the city, the hospital, and life and death of brian sinclair, is discussed. the review will identify critical concepts and lessons relevant to the development of indigenous health policy and practice, which will be applicable to both a national and international audience. keywords structural racism, indigenous health, settler colonialism, canadian health care system creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. 1 stelkia: book review: structures of indifference published by scholarship@western, 2020 book review: structures of indifference: an indigenous life and death in a canadian city mccallum, m., & perry, a. (2018). structures of indifference: an indigenous life and death in a canadian city. university of manitoba press. 192 pp. $17.95 (paperback). isbn: 978-088755-835-1. structures of indifference: an indigenous life and death in a canadian city examines the life and death of brian sinclair, a first nations man who died in 2008 in a winnipeg, manitoba, hospital emergency room after waiting 34 hours for medical care to address an easily treatable infection. in reviewing a detailed timeline of events leading up to the death of brian sinclair, mccallum and perry provide an empirical and historical analysis of the city, the hospital, and the life of brian sinclair. the authors focus on the experiences and treatment of indigenous peoples in settler spaces within canadian colonial society, including how the legal system views indigenous deaths through the omission of influential mitigating factors such as racism, colonialism, and structural indifference. structures of indifference is 192 pages with an introduction, three main chapters (titled the city, the hospital, and brian sinclair), and a conclusion. the introduction, titled thirty-four hours, situates the life and death of brian sinclair in the context of historical and ongoing settler colonialism. the authors examine the 34 hours leading up to brian sinclair’s death by recounting a timeline of events from the moment he arrived at the health sciences center (hsc) emergency department in winnipeg, manitoba, at 2:53 p.m. on september 19, 2008, to the time he was pronounced dead at 12:51 a.m. on september 21, 2008. chapter 1 provides a detailed examination of the history of winnipeg, manitoba, from pre-settler contact to the present day. the chapter begins with a historical account of the anishinaabeg and cree ancestral lands on which winnipeg is located and then moved into an empirical review of the rise of eighteenth and nineteenth century settler colonialism in the area. the authors describe the geographical segregation of first nations and métis peoples from settler societies, and they recount the growing urbanization of first nations moving from reserves to urban winnipeg post-1951. from a historical perspective, they highlight how racism and discrimination have become a major part of life in winnipeg, both through interpersonal and systemic accounts. chapter 2 describes the history of winnipeg’s hsc, where brian sinclair sought medical treatment that he ultimately did not receive, resulting in his death. in reviewing the case, the authors argue that these events cannot be understood without examining the historical context and experiences of indigenous people accessing the health care system in the province. the authors provide a historical account of the evolution of the racially segregated health care system that exists in manitoba: where settler populations received the latest modern medicine, while indigenous people were systematically excluded and received substandard care. the chapter concludes by discussing how hospital institutions across canada have been shaped and influenced by settler colonialism, which is an integral part of understanding the racist ideologies, indifference, and discriminatory societal structures brian sinclair faced when he entered hsc for treatment that day. chapter 3 focuses on the person at the center of this tragedy, mr. brian sinclair. the authors share the story of who brian sinclair was, provide an overview of his life, and demonstrate how far the racist and discriminatory assumptions made by hospital staff were from the true brian sinclair known to his family, friends, and community. for instance, several hospital staff at hsc falsely assumed mr. sinclair was 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.10800 intoxicated and homeless. furthermore, his presence in the emergency room was assumed to be solely because he was sleeping off his intoxication (brian sinclair working group, 2017). browne et al. (2016) stated, the “colonizing image of the ‘drunk indian’ is one of the most harmful stereotypes operating in health care settings” (p. 3). these harmful stereotypes and assumptions continue to permeate the lived realities of indigenous people who access health care services and are a demonstration of how structural and lethal racism continues to manifest within settler colonial societies. the chapter concludes by countering the false assumptions made about mr. sinclair by sharing accurate and factual details about his life. the book concludes by reflecting on the 10 years since the passing of brian sinclair and how similar injustices continue to happen in hospitals, schools, courtrooms, jails, and other colonial spaces across the canadian state. the authors argue this is a continued demonstration of the colonial violence and devaluation of indigenous lives that persists in settler colonial spaces, such as hospitals, which are mandated to help, but instead commonly become places of indifference, racism, and death for indigenous people. a distinctive strength of this book is the way mccallum and perry take a place-based historical approach, grounded in a critical anti-colonial lens, to contextualizing the life and death of brian sinclair. the authors’ backgrounds as historians is a strength in this work that is revealed in the depth and detail of the historical analysis, which is very compelling. for example, when examining the history of the hospital, the authors go back to the original title deed and transfer of land on which hsc was founded, which showed that the very existence of the hospital relied on the transfer of indigenous land. furthermore, a critical examination of the settler doctors, nurses, businessmen, military personnel, and donors whose names brand the hsc buildings and the streets that surround it paint a picture of the city’s indigenous and colonial history. the inclusion of supporting visuals, such as photos and maps, helps to orient the reader to the space of winnipeg and hsc. taking a place-based historical approach aids the reader in the realization that these histories and events cannot be examined in silos. mccallum and perry state, “when we separate the history of people like brian sinclair and institutions like the hsc and cities like winnipeg from the wider history of the dispossession of indigenous people and land, we radically misunderstand and underestimate the context—the structures—that shape our lived experiences” (p. 14). the authors demonstrate how the amalgamation of the historical, political, and social environment of hsc, the city of winnipeg, and the overall canadian state are integral factors in examination of the tragic death of brian sinclair. the existence of racism and discrimination against indigenous peoples when accessing health care has been well documented across various points of the health care system (allan & smylie, 2015; boyer, 2017; boyer & bartlett, 2017; browne & fiske, 2001; browne et al., 2011; furniss, 1999). approximately 24% of first nations adults in canada have reported being discriminated against in the last 12 months (first nations information governance centre, 2018). furthermore, a 2017 ipsos public affairs survey of the canadian college of health leaders found that, out of 225 health organizations, 51% reported that anti-indigenous racism existed within their organization (richardson & murphy, 2018). an important strength of this book is the explicit focus on examining structural levels indifference, racism, and colonial violence within canadian society. rather than solely focusing on interpersonal racism and the acts of the service providers who ignored brian sinclair, which lead to his death, the authors take a broader focus on examining how structural racism and indifference continues to impact the everyday 3 stelkia: book review: structures of indifference published by scholarship@western, 2020 lived experiences of indigenous peoples in canada. while the primary focus of the book is on the health care system, the authors also demonstrate how structures of indifference towards indigenous peoples manifest across various domains including the criminal justice, media, and child welfare systems. importantly, the points raised in this book help to focus attention on the broader societal issues that allow structural inequities to exist within canada. overall, mccallum and perry provide a wellresearched and evidence-based narrative that unpacks the ways in which settler colonialism and racism continue to permeate indigenous life and death in canadian cities. although the book is only 192 pages, the content-heavy chapters provided a rich source of information on the themes outlined by the authors. key arguments are amply supported with empirical literature and are discussed in a way that is digestible to a non-indigenous health-specialist audience, while still providing a valuable perspective for the broader public health, policy, or health practitioner community. despite the detail that went into describing the city and the hospital, a criticism of this book is the lack of detail about the life of brian sinclair. in fact, the chapter on brian sinclair is one of the shortest chapters in the book. given the notoriety of this case, i appreciated the authors dedicating a chapter to the person at the center of this tragedy. while the authors clearly state that they relied on “twenty-first century colonial records available in libraries and online, namely newspapers and the records associated with the inquest into brian sinclair’s death” (p. 106), the chapter would have been further strengthened with quotes and stories from interviews with his family. in addition, the authors failed to provide recommendations on potential solutions to address structural indifference and racism. while there was a strong emphasis on examining history and the role of colonialism when analyzing such cases, supplementing the chapters with recommendations on how best to move forward in indigenous policy, practice, and research would have further strengthened the content of the book. this book accomplishes its overarching goal of showcasing, through the brian sinclair case, the ongoing impacts of settler colonialism and indifference on the lives of indigenous peoples in settler spaces. the authors bring focus and attention to the role of history, racism, and colonization in understanding mr. sinclair’s case and others like it. this is critically important because in trying to understand the cause of death and how they could have been prevented a number of inquests and inquiries into deaths of indigenous people have omitted or refused to put racism and colonialism on the public record (razack, 2015). as discussed briefly in the book, the inquest into mr. sinclair’s death primarily focused on failed triage procedures and policies in the hsc emergency department and did not examine the broader issue of racism and discrimination (brian sinclair working group, 2017). therefore, mccallum and perry provide an alternative viewpoint that shows how structural indifference, racism, and settler colonialism were central issues surrounding mr. sinclair’s death. this perspective is important to further advance meaningful reconciliation in canada because denial about our colonial history and its continued impact on the health and well-being of indigenous peoples still exists (browne, 2017; henry & tator, 2010; loppie-reading & wien, 2013; mcgibbon & etowa, 2009). we continue to witness discourses of denial and racist rhetoric across canadian society, including by those who hold positions of power in government. a recent example is that of senator lynn beyak, who was suspended from the senate of canada in 2019 and again in 2020 for refusing to remove letters that were overtly racist toward first nations from her website, citing the benefits of the indian residential school system and promoting the idea that survivors had a positive experience in these schools, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary (joseph, 2019; mosby, 2013; office of the senate ethics officer, 2019; tasker, 2019, 2020; truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015). denial is an integral factor in maintaining the 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.10800 pervasiveness of racist ideology and can lead to the justification by members of society, governments, and organizations that no action is required and the status quo remains (henry & tator, 2010). therefore, the perspectives of mccallum and perry are integral in exposing the impact of settler colonialism on the lives of indigenous people and helping to make more meaningful advancements towards reconciliation. there has been a concerted effort nationally to try and address racism in response to the truth and reconciliation commission of canada’s (2015) call to action #24 to provide anti-racism training for students in medical and nursing schools. over the past five years, medical schools, health professional associations, and universities across canada have begun to incorporate anti-racism, implicit bias, and cultural safety training into course curricula and professional development with the aim to reduce antiindigenous racism in the health care system (richardson & murphy, 2018; vogel, 2019). furthermore, organizations such as the college of family physicians of canada have developed a guidebook for physicians to understand the role of systemic racism in impacting the health and patient experience for indigenous peoples (college of family physicians of canada, 2016). while focusing attention to interpersonal and systemic racism is needed, the perspectives and key issues raised in this book around structural racism and indifference are critically important to make further advancements in the field of indigenous health policy and practice. a decade after brian sinclair’s death in a winnipeg hospital, structures of indifference provides an opportunity to critically examine this unacceptably common case in order to shed light on missed opportunities and lessons learned to better inform future indigenous health policy and practice. to make advancements in addressing anti-indigenous racism in the health care system, nationally and internationally, structures of indifference provides a much-needed perspective in critically examining the treatment of indigenous people in institutions mandated to provide medical care and treatment. mccallum and perry confront the indifference that colonial settler societies have towards indigenous peoples and demonstrate the importance of examining indigenous deaths as intrinsically linked to the ongoing history of colonial violence. a key lesson relevant to indigenous health policy and practice is that using a placed-based historical approach in examining these cases provides a more comprehensive view into the systemic and structural indifference towards indigenous peoples within society. employing this type of approach will not only lead to the development of more effective indigenous health policies aimed at preventing and addressing future cases, but it will also begin to hold systems and structures accountable for the death of indigenous people in colonial institutions (krieger, 2014; razack, 2015). overall, structures of indifference is an important and timely contribution to indigenous health literature and a valuable resource for scholars, students, policymakers, health care professionals, and health administrators who seek to understand the historical impact of colonization on present-day forms of structural violence and racism against indigenous peoples in canadian society. more broadly, this book adds to a growing body of literature that focuses on structural racism and its impacts on the health and well-being of indigenous peoples. if the next generation of indigenous health policy leaders and practitioners make a collective effort to formally assess the impacts of colonialism on the health of indigenous peoples, this will lead towards significant advancements in addressing indigenous health inequities both nationally and internationally. 5 stelkia: book review: structures of indifference published by scholarship@western, 2020 references allan, b., & smylie, j. (2015). first peoples, second class treatment: the role of racism in the health and well-being of indigenous peoples in canada. https://www.wellesleyinstitute.com/wpcontent/uploads/2015/02/summary-first-peoples-second-class-treatment-final.pdf boyer, y. (2017). healing racism in canadian health care. cmaj, 189(46), e1408–e1409. https://doi.org/10.1503/cmaj.171234 boyer, y., & bartlett, j. (2017). external review: tubal ligation in the saskatoon health region: the lived experience of aboriginal women. https://www.saskatoonhealthregion.ca/ documentsinternal/tubal_ligation_inthesaskatoonhealthregion_the_lived_experience_of _aboriginal_women_boyerandbartlett_july_22_2017.pdf brian sinclair working group. (2017). out of sight: summary of the inquest into brian sinclair’s death. https://media.winnipegfreepress.com/documents/out_of_sight_final.pdf browne, a. j. (2017). moving beyond description: closing the health equity gap by redressing racism impacting indigenous populations. social science and medicine, 184, 23–26. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2017.04.045 browne, a. j., & fiske, j. (2001). first nations women’s health care services. western journal of nursing research, 23(2), 126–147. https://doi.org/10.1177/019394590102300203 browne, a. j., smye, v. l., rodney, p., tang, s. y., mussell, b., & o’neil, j. (2011). access to primary care from the perspective of aboriginal patients at an urban emergency department. qualitative health research, 21(3), 333–348. https://doi.org/10.1177/1049732310385824 browne, a. j., varcoe, c., lavoie, j., smye, v., wong, s. t., krause, m., tu, d. godwin, o., khan, k., & fridkin, a. (2016). enhancing health care equity with indigenous populations: evidence-based strategies from an ethnographic study. bmc health services research, 16(1), 544. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12913-016-1707-9 college of family physicians of canada. (2016). health and health care implications of systemic racism on indigenous peoples in canada. https://www.cfpc.ca/uploadedfiles/resources/_pdfs/ systemicracism_eng.pdf first nations information governance centre. (2018). national report of the first nations regional health survey phase 3: volume 2. https://fnigc.ca/sites/default/files/docs/fnigc_rhs_ phase_3_volume_two_en_final_website_0.pdf furniss, e. (1999). the burden of history : colonialism and the frontier myth in a rural canadian community. university of british columbia press. henry, f., & tator, c. (2010). the colour of democracy: racism in canadian society (4th ed.). nelson education. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.10800 joseph, r. (2019, march 29). lynn beyak’s ‘racist’ letters are still online—a week after she was ordered to remove them. global news. https://globalnews.ca/news/5111181/lynn-beyak-racist-letters/ krieger, n. (2014). discrimination and health inequities. international journal of health services, 44(4), 643–710. https:// https://doi.org/10.2190/hs.44.4.b loppie-reading, c., & wien, f. (2013). health inequalities and social determinants of aboriginal peoples’ health. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2214.2009.00971_2.x mcgibbon, e., & etowa, j. (2009). anti-racist health care practice. canadian scholar’s press inc. mosby, i. (2013). administering colonial science: nutrition research and human biomedical experimentation in aboriginal communities and residential schools, 1942–1952. histoire sociale/social history, 46(1), 145–172. https://doi.org/10.1353/his.2013.0015 office of the senate ethics officer. (2019). inquiry report under the ethics and conflict of interest code for senators concerning senator lynn beyak. http://sen.parl.gc.ca/seo-cse/pdf/inquirybeyak2019-e.pdf razack, s. h. (2015). dying from improvement: inquest and inquiries into indigenous deaths in custody. university of toronto press. richardson, l., & murphy, t. (2018). bringing reconciliation to healthcare in canada. http://www.healthcarecan.ca/wp-content/themes/camyno/assets/document/ reports/2018/hcc/en/trcc_en.pdf tasker, j. p. (2019, may 9). lynn beyak suspended from senate after refusing to take down letters condemned as racist. canadian broadcasting corporation. https://www.cbc.ca/ news/politics/tasker-beyak-ethics-report-1.5129767 tasker, j. p. (2020, february 27). lynn beyak has been suspended from the senate for a second time. cbc news. https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/lynn-beyak-suspended-second-time-1.5478536 truth and reconciliation commission of canada. (2015). truth and reconciliation commission of canada: calls to action. government of canada. http://publications.gc.ca/collections/ collection_2015/trc/ir4-8-2015-eng.pdf vogel, l. (2019). medical schools to boost numbers of indigenous students, faculty. canadian medical association journal, 191(22), e621–e621. https://doi.org/10.1503/cmaj.109-5753 implementing the policy of the u.n. declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples the international indigenous policy journal volume 5 | issue 1 article 4 january 2014 implementing the policy of the u.n. declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples roxanne t. ornelas miami university, ohio, ornelart@miamioh.edu recommended citation ornelas, r. t. (2014). implementing the policy of the u.n. declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples. the international indigenous policy journal, 5(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.4 implementing the policy of the u.n. declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples abstract on september 13, 2007, the united nations general assembly voted to adopt the declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip). this was an historic event as work on undrip had been ongoing for 30 years before its passage. today, undrip provides a framework for addressing human rights protections for indigenous peoples globally. this article examines the significance of undrip as a public policy tool for developing national policy to support future resource and land management consultations that are based on free, prior, and informed consent. keywords human rights, idle no more, sacred lands, trust in governance, united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ i m p l e m e n t i n g t h e p o l i c y o f t h e u . n . d e c l a r a t i o n o n t h e r i g h t s o f i n d i g e n o u s p e o p l e s on september 13, 2007, news about the passage of the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (united nations [un], 2010) by the general assembly began to spread, especially throughout global grassroots email listservs. this author learned of the news that day while preparing to teach an evening university class about public policy and the sacred lands of indigenous peoples in the united states. coincidently, the students in the class had read the then draft undrip during the previous week’s assigned homework. what was particularly unique about the circumstances of the class was the fact that the author had actually worked on earlier versions of undrip in an international collaboration with indigenous peoples from around the globe. the monumental news about undrip’s passing represented the culmination of over 30 years of work that had begun with a small group of indigenous leaders in 1977. they had been invited to the united nations to discuss discrimination against indigenous peoples (ornelas, 2007). that year was the first time that indigenous peoples had been extended an invitation to visit the united nations to discuss international policy regarding their populations. at the time, little did they know that first meeting would initiate what would result in decades of meetings and international debates on the topic of their human rights. from that point forward, dedicated individuals began to outline a set of formal resolutions and articles to address the human rights of indigenous peoples on a global scale. the passage of undrip was a cause for celebration in the sacred lands class that evening. pizza was ordered and the students talked about the potential of the document for addressing the human rights of indigenous peoples. there was a great deal of excitement and hope for the future of public policy, especially for the native american graduate students in the class. despite the excitement of the evening, the next day, local and national newspapers were devoid of any news regarding the passage of undrip. the author found one short report in the new york times on the inside of the front section on page 6. it simply read: the general assembly overwhelmingly passed a declaration on the human rights of the world’s indigenous people, but australia, canada, new zealand and the united states voted no, saying it went too far in giving indigenous peoples ownership of their traditional lands and veto rights over national legislation and local management of resources. the declaration, which had been debated for 20 years1, is nonbinding. voting in favor were 143 nations, and 11 countries abstained. (hoge, 2007) there was virtually no reporting in newspapers or on national television news networks concerning “the declaration.” it was incredible to those who had worked on undrip for 30 years that no one other than global indigenous populations seemed to be acknowledging and celebrating its passage.                                                                                                                 1 it took approximately 10 years for members of the 1977 work group and others to develop an initial draft set of articles to be submitted for review at the united nations in the 1980s.   1 ornelas: policy of undrip published by scholarship@western, 2014 in the six years since the 2007 vote on undrip, the four countries that originally opposed it, australia, canada, new zealand, and the united states, have since announced that they will support it. the united states was the last of the four to proclaim its support on december 16, 2010 (united states department of state [usdos], 2013). the 46 articles included in the document cover a broad range of issues addressing the human rights of indigenous peoples, including sovereignty, treaty rights, cultural preservation, education, freedom of religion, and the protection of sacred lands, to name a few (un, 2010). this article will mainly highlight articles in undrip that relate specifically to future intergovernmental processes that encourage “free, prior and informed consent” as vital elements to establishing effective and transparent intergovernmental consultations. recent uprisings in the united states and canada by indigenous populations have shed light on increasing tensions over forced and unwanted resource extraction development projects on aboriginal lands. this article will discuss cases within the united states and canada that are clear examples of how and why a lack of communication and transparency in dealings with tribes has reached a tipping point. most importantly, the author will discuss the developing idle no more movement by indigenous peoples in both countries that has been organized in response to perceived human rights violations. ethnographic research methods have been employed in this project as a way to tell a story a human story from the ground up. the author was in canada at the beginning of the idle no more movement and will describe firsthand accounts and observations to later address the topic of governance and policy development in both the united states and canada. in doing so, this article will present a set of recommendations intended to begin the implementation of undrip into national policy. e n v i s i o n i n g i n t e r n a t i o n a l h u m a n r i g h t s it is necessary to review past successes at the united nations with regard to human rights before focusing on the present implications of undrip. toward the end of world war ii, details about horrific atrocities and alleged war crimes against humanity were being revealed. liberating allied troops who marched into prisoner of war camps found emaciated and severely tortured prisoners who had been confined under the worst possible conditions. in particular, the discovery of dying prisoners and the dead bodies of mostly jewish prisoners were found in and around concentration camps throughout europe and the findings shocked the world (kondoyanidi, 2010; levinson, 2011; sedgwick, 2011; spielberg, 1999; weingartner, 2011). the reorganization of war torn countries, and the revelation of crimes that were committed, led the international community to establish the united nations from existing allied countries (donnelly, 2003; ornelas, 2007). in response to the crimes, the united nations appointed a special committee to draft an international agreement for all nations to adhere to in order to address the human rights and dignity of all global citizens into the future. upon the establishment of the united nations, president harry s. truman appointed several delegates to represent the united states at the newly formed united nations general assembly. among the delegates was former first lady eleanor roosevelt. in 1946, soon after her appointment, mrs. roosevelt was chosen as the first chairperson to head up the united nations human rights commission (black, 2007; glendon, 2001). she was charged to lead a committee of international members from allied countries to draft what would eventually become the united nations universal declaration of human 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.4 rights (undhr). when the committee submitted their final draft to the general assembly for a vote by its member countries, delegates voted in favor of it on december 10, 1948 (united nations, 1948). the undhr includes a set of 30 articles aimed at protecting human rights in the hope that crimes such as those that were perpetrated during world war ii should never happen again. the overall intention of the document is encapsulated in the preamble. it states that the undhr is the: [c]ommon standard of achievement for all peoples and all nations, to the end that every individual and every organ of society, keeping this declaration constantly in mind, shall strive by teaching and education to promote respect for these rights and freedoms and by progressive measures, national and international, to secure their universal and effective recognition and observance, both among the peoples of member states themselves and among the peoples of territories under their jurisdiction. (united nations, 1948, preamble, para. 8) this standard of the undhr outlines a strategy for all countries to aspire to in order to address the ethical treatment and protection of human rights for all peoples. and it is from these historic beginnings that the hope of undrip was first envisioned and later developed. p e r i l s t o p r o g r e s s with the undhr as its historic guide, the passage of undrip provided the framework for moving forward. the vision for the future was outlined from the outset as demonstrated in the language of the very first article, which states: indigenous peoples have the right to the full enjoyment, as a collective or as individuals, of all human rights and fundamental freedoms as recognized in the charter of the united nations, the universal declaration of human rights and international human rights law. (un, 2010, p. 4) after 30 years of meetings and planning, indigenous peoples were convinced that they could now begin working in their various countries and communities to start implementing the articles to address their life circumstances and to resist the continuing violations of their human rights. even though the hopeful beginning in 2007 was celebrated around the world by aboriginal communities, the past six years have shown the difficulty of implementing undrip into national policy. it is clear that it is more problematic to achieve in practice what took 30 years to define. in the meantime, the wheels of governmental bureaucracy continue to turn without undrip and with continuing violations of human rights. while the united states and canada did agree to publically support undrip, their national policies and actions toward their populations of indigenous peoples continue to prove otherwise. for example, in the united states, the ongoing struggle to protect the sacred lands of native communities continues despite ongoing protests. in south dakota, the sacred mountain bear butte “mato paha” is being encroached upon by motorcycle bars and gas and oil interests (ornelas, 2011). even after the state of south dakota decided to limit gas and oil permits around mato paha, the local meade county commissioners objected and threatened to sue the state’s board of minerals and environment (montgomery, 2011). the board later ruled that the county had no legal standing in the matter because they were not parties in the original permit request (south dakota board of minerals and environment [sdbme], 2011). the historic significance of bear butte was recognized in the summer of 2011 when 3 ornelas: policy of undrip published by scholarship@western, 2014 the national trust for historic preservation (nthp) listed it first in its annual list of “11 most endangered historic places” (nthp, 2013). in their description of the historic site, the nthp wrote that bear butte is a location, “believed to be the spot where the creator communicates with his people through vision and prayer” (nthp, 2013). for the numerous tribes living in the region, this designation helped to draw attention to the site’s cultural and historic significance in support of continuing efforts to protect it from further development. in the province of new brunswick in canada, at the time of this writing in late november 2013, first nations and national allies are united in their efforts to block attempts to expand hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking,” of shale by the southwestern energy company (swn) on treaty lands there. many citizens from surrounding communities have joined in protest by blocking swn trucks and supplies from moving into the area since the beginning of summer (cbc news, 2013a). swn sought and received an injunction on october 3rd against the protestors, now being referred to as “protectors” by many community members, to force them to allow swn to conduct seismic testing in the area. however, on october 17th, events took a critical turn when heavily armed officers from the royal canadian mounted police (rcmp) fueled an already tense situation by bringing in snipers, armed officers in camouflage gear, and police dogs to force protectors off the blockades in an attempt to enforce the injunction (“the last 48 hours”, 2013). a heated confrontation ensued resulting in 40 people being arrested and rcmp vehicles being burned. conflicting reports on social media at the time included everything from claims that the rcmp set the vehicles on fire themselves to assertions of outside agitators being hired by swn to incite a riot. several people were injured and tear-gassed, including elsipogtog chief aaron sock and his entire council were arrested (cbc news, 2013a). chief john levi had been arrested for protesting during the summer and later released with restrictions being placed on his ability to protest in public (cbc news, 2013b; howe, 2013). on october 21st, the queen’s bench denied a request by swn to extend their original october 3rd injunction (global news, 2013). this decision led to the release of several protectors while others remain jailed for related offenses. at the center of such protests as those described above is a core belief in the sacredness of the lands that are being encroached upon. the earth is a living entity to be protected and honored. for the various groups of indigenous peoples trying to block development and extraction efforts on their lands, their battles are often complicated by their isolated geographic locations. because of news media blackouts in the united states, which this author has witnessed firsthand, many people have no idea what conflicts are taking place in their own country, let alone outside of it. is this lack of reporting due to general disinterest in the affairs of indigenous peoples? or is it an intentional disregard to report on the current human rights violations being committed by canada and the united states against their indigenous populations? with thousands of miles of open acreage, it is difficult for tribal governments to focus limited resources and personnel to halt attempts by their national governments to bypass and ignore treaty agreements and put forward claims of human rights violations, much like those now being reported out of the red lake indian reservation in minnesota (cornelius, 2013). there, the reservation is attempting to halt enbridge energy from laying pipeline across their tribal lands in order to connect to the xl keystone tar sands pipeline project in alberta, canada. the following examples demonstrate other similar conflicts and perils to progress and why it is time to implement undrip into national policy. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.4 b e i n g i n p l a c e a s m e t h o d the ethnographic field research that was conducted for this project provided this author with first person accounts of many of the events reported on throughout the paper. over the fall of 2012 into the new year 2013, the idle no more movement originated in canada with an eruption of updates and reporting over social media sites. more will be discussed about the movement in a later section. in addition to the developing movement, hunger strikes were declared by attawapiskat chief theresa spence and grand elder raymond robinson on december 11th to protest the government’s mistreatment of first nations peoples and its apparent manoeuvrings to overstep their treaty rights and sovereignty. chief spence hoped that the hunger strike would help draw attention to her demand to meet with canada’s prime minister stephen harper. after learning of prime minister harper’s refusal to meet with chief spence, i decided that a trip to ottawa was required in order to observe and report back to people living in the united states, as there was effectively a media blackout at the border about the protests and nonviolent civil disobedience actions that were taking place throughout canada at the time. it is important at this point to provide a bit of historical background as to what motivated the hunger strikes. chief spence was moved to take action to draw attention to the fact that the government had failed to address the concerns she had raised in 2011 about the substandard housing and deteriorating health conditions for first nations at her attawapiskat reserve, located on the shores of james bay in northern ontario, canada (angus, 2011a; fletcher, 2011; strapagiel, 2011). in october 2011, chief spence officially declared a state of emergency at the reserve but her plea for assistance from the government essentially went unanswered (angus, 2011a). in a video that was posted on youtube on november 2011, the realities of the housing crisis were shockingly revealed (angus, 2011b). the film was recorded during a site visit by member of parliament (mp) charlie angus, network for patriotism and progress (mpp) member gilles bisson, mushkegowuk grand chief stan louttit, deputy grand chief leo friday, and dr. john waddell. even after mp angus revealed the dilapidated and unhealthy conditions that were depicted in the film, by december 2012, no financial assistance or other forms of aid had been received from the federal government. the government of canada has constitutional responsibilities and longstanding treaty agreements with first nations to respond to these types of health and human rights requests (flanagan, alcantara, & le dressay, 2010). furthermore, the government’s alleged support for undrip had already been given (dearing, 2010). in desperation, chief spence commenced her hunger strike with the support grand elder robinson and, eventually, the entire idle no more movement. upon arrival to victoria island in the province of ontario, one could see the numerous tents and tipis of supporters camped out in support of chief spence that december. there was a prayerful and solemn atmosphere to the encampment as supporters were gravely concerned about the health of chief spence and grand elder robinson who were now several weeks into their hunger strikes from that location. a steady stream of visitors came and went throughout the days to offer their support by sitting together around the sacred fire or by bringing food and supplies. they did this even though many of the supporters were not able to visit with either of the leaders, due to their fragile health conditions. being near the center of national government was, in itself, another way to view the goings on from behind parliament hill on victoria island. the island is under the control of first nations and it is located on the ottawa river within the city limits of ottawa. from that location, there is no escaping the 5 ornelas: policy of undrip published by scholarship@western, 2014 offensive view of the rear of the parliament building. it is constructed in the shape of an enormous tipi. as one indigenous young man mused bitterly as we stood looking at the structure on the morning of new year’s day, he told me that he had grown up being told a story about how the design was intentional so that first nations would always know that the biggest tipi on the ottawa river belonged to “the great white father” (personal communication, january 1, 2013). sharing stories about encounters such as the one told above is part of an experience that would not be available if one were to simply observe from a distance. the peeling away at layers through storytelling is an important part of teaching and learning about indigenous peoples and their oral traditions. as kovac (2009) has written, “stories remind us of who we are and of our belonging. stories hold within them knowledges while simultaneously signifying relationships” (p. 94). the stories that were told around the sacred fire and the songs that were sung at the encampment on victoria island demonstrated the depth of meaning and fellowship the gatherings had for those in attendance, for this was a life and death matter. the weight of this knowledge was borne by not only the supporters, but by the nation itself. both chief spence and grand elder robinson were willing to die for their cause. based on my two personal meetings with chief spence throughout my time in ottawa, i can relay with certainty that i know what bravery looks like while standing on the edge of life. i saw unwavering determination and courage in chief spence’s face while she held to her conviction in calling for changes to the government’s apparent arrogance and mistreatment of first nations. when she spoke with me on new year’s day, i was able to offer my commitment to tell of her plight through my scholarly work and teaching (personal communication, january 1, 2013). not only was i going to take my research experience back home with me, i was able to offer her reciprocity by circumventing the media blackout by telling what news i could outside of her country. it was important enough for me to tell this to chief spence that i drove thousands of miles from the midwest in the united states in the middle of winter to meet with her. it was the least i could do to witness chief spence’s fight for human rights and to experience the beginning of the idle no more movement and to report back on what i had observed. it is a slippery slope in terms of one’s own positionality to function within an activist-scholar paradigm in research. teachings during graduate school advised that the “ideal” research was a detached rationalist approach to a subject. i was perplexed because the reason for my research was that i wanted to transform governance and raise awareness about exclusionary practices and policies of governments when it came to working relationships with their indigenous populations. after working on several federal and state projects that went awry because of the marginalization of indigenous peoples and their exclusion during the public participation process, i saw the negative costs in terms of the added years to projects that had lacked input from tribal governments, as required by law. back to the drawing board they went as meetings had to be organized to allow for the testimony of all parties involved, whether the governments considered the evidence or not in their final decisions. my work over the years has been in direct response to this type oversight. as an indigenous identified scholar, i know what that exclusion looks like on many levels. so, how does one change and transform governments? as ladson-billings & donnor (2008) have noted, “all scholars of color must know the intellectual antecedents of their cultural, ethnic, or racial group. this is important for combating persistent ideology of white supremacy that denigrates the intellectual contributions of others” (p. 74). by putting myself in place, not only am i frequently seen as “the other” attempting to break down 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.4 historic barriers while involved in these activities, i can still report back as a witness with a knowledge that frames my understanding based on observed experiences and exchanges in the “real world.” i want to know what the most pressing issues are for indigenous peoples today when trying to broach seemingly unresponsive governmental structures. transforming anachronistic governmental paradigms requires one to be involved, to be present, and to push back against unyielding injustice. i d l e n o m o r e one of the most pressing concerns for many indigenous communities is the fact that they are often left out of land management decisions that may negatively impact them until it is almost too late to respond before an action is taken. by law and by treaty agreement, tribal governments are required to be included in intergovernmental consultation processes, especially in matters relating to potential harmful impacts on the environment. this point is considered so important that it is described in undrip in several places. in the united nations general assembly’s affirmations at the beginning of the declaration, they describe their covenant by: recognizing [italics in original] that respect for indigenous knowledge, cultures and traditional practices contributes to sustainable and equitable development and proper management of the environment. (un, 2010, p. 2) in the example of the new brunswick incident described previously, and in numerous other actions taking place by indigenous peoples throughout north america, there are concerns regarding the protection of sacred lands and water resources (dadigan, 2013; levi & sock, 2013; mother earth water walk [meww], 2013; seventh generation fund [sgf], 2013; sinnema, 2013). in canada, the standoff between first nations and the government of prime minister harper reached a new level of intensity with the passage of omnibus bill c-45 on december 14, 2012 (jobs and growth act, 2012). the bill demonstrated another breakdown in transparency as it made changes to agreements outlined in the indian act of 1876. it changed fundamental protections under the indian act, the navigable waters protection act (now renamed the navigation protection act), and the environmental assessment act (cbc news, 2013c; indian country today media network, 2012). all of these legislative changes were made without the free, prior, and informed consent of first nations. their response to other alleged violations and the impending passage of the bill led to the beginning of the idle no more movement and the escalating rallying cry for justice. in the fall of 2012, four activist canadian women were communicating with each other about the negative impact that the passage of bill c-45 would have on indigenous rights and sovereignty. the women were from saskatchewan – jessica gordon, sheelah mclean, sylvia mcadams, and nina wilsonfeld (cbc news, 2013c). in november 2012, they started a facebook page in order “to share information in regards to the legislation the harper government is attempting to pass and impose on first nations across canada. plus any other information relevant to first nations across canada” (facebook: idle no more, 2013). they also maintain a website with more information and opportunities for individuals to connect with other social media networks, such as twitter (idle no more, 2013a). the idle no more mission statement on their facebook page states their goals as: 7 ornelas: policy of undrip published by scholarship@western, 2014 • to support and encourage grassroots to create their own forums to learn more about indigenous rights and our responsibilities to our nationhood via teach-ins, rallies, and social media. • build relationships and create understanding with allies across canada. • take steps to contribute to building relationships with international agencies such as the un to raise awareness to the conditions indigenous people have been subjected to and assert our sovereignty in the international arena. • acknowledge and honor the hard work of all grassroots people who have worked, and continue to work towards these goals – you are our inspiration. (facebook: idle no more, 2013) by december 2012, through social media and by word of mouth, a call to mobilize for a national day of action on december 10th spread throughout canada and, eventually, around the world (idle no more, 2013b). indigenous peoples began organizing for the action in protest of the upcoming vote by the government on bill c-45. one of the key elements later spurring the growth of the idle no more movement was the hunger strike that was begun by chief spence and grand elder robinson (ball, 2012; bogado, 2013; hopper, 2013). the combination of the hunger strike and the growing idle no more movement led to the mobilization of a global response network. as it was discussed previously, this author met with chief spence on victoria island in december 2012 through january 2013 and can attest to a diverse array of supporters. social media networks were buzzing with daily reports and updates about protests taking place throughout canada, the united states, and internationally. visitors to victoria island included indigenous peoples, but there were also “settler” supporters who objected to the changes being made to national laws that threatened to weaken protections for waterways throughout canada. this author also met with several international supporters from countries like japan, new zealand, and norway, in addition to the many canadian citizens from all walks of life who came over their winter holiday to lend their support. after 43 days, and at the urging of supporters, chief theresa spence and elder ray robinson agreed to end their hunger strike after a 13 point declaration of commitment “first nations: working for fundamental change” was developed by the assembly of first nations (afn) leadership (afn, 2013; canadian, 2013; cbc news, 2013d). the plan is designed to begin a positive dialogue with the canadian government to create change in governance matters with first nations over the next five years. the plan sets forth a vision for intergovernmental cooperation by stating: in the true spirit of commitment to initiate dialogue to discuss both treaty and non-treaty indigenous issues on behalf of our first nations peoples of canada, chief theresa spence of attawapiskat first nation and mr. raymond robinson of cross lake, manitoba will continue their hunger strike, pending outcome of this written declaration. we also like to acknowledge mr. jean sock of elsipogtog, new brunswick and all other fasters who have shown their deep dedication and courage in support of protecting and honouring both treaty and non-treaty 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.4 obligations as written, entered into or understood by all peoples, with the federal government of canada including each provincial/territorial signatory. further, we agree the self-sacrifice and the spiritual courage of chief theresa spence, along with elder raymond robinson and all other fasters have made clear the need for fundamental change in the relationship of first nations and the crown. we fully commit to carry forward the urgent and coordinated action required until concrete and tangible results are achieved in order to allow first nations to forge their own destiny. therefore, we solemnly commit to undertake political, spiritual and all other advocacy efforts to implement a renewed first nations – crown relationship where inherent treaty and nontreaty rights are recognized, honoured and fully implemented as they should be, within the next five years, (afn, 2013) now, it is only a matter of time and true commitment whether or not this declaration will result in a force for change into the future. t h e p r o b l e m a t i c s o f o m n i b u s b i l l c 4 5 while bill c-45 (jobs and growth act, 2012) made significant legal alterations, there are three changes that impact first nations the most. c-45 removes important management oversight and decisionmaking protections to control access to their territories and natural resources that were previously safeguarded under the indian act. changes to the navigable waters protection act are thought to further reduce enforcement and regulation of oil pipeline and power line projects and lessen protections for a majority of fishable waters, rivers, lakes, and streams (flegg, 2013; gotz, 2012; mcgregor, 2012; unionbc, 2012). key objections to the legal changes included the following: i n d i a n a c t : first nations communities can now lease designated reserve lands if a majority attending a meeting called for that purpose vote to do so, regardless of how many people show up. previously, approval required the support of a majority of eligible vote. the minister of aboriginal affairs can call the meeting to consider surrendering band territory. the minister can choose to ignore a resolution from the band council that's in opposition to a decision at the meeting. idle no more says these changes allow "for easier opening of treaty lands and territory"(cbc news, 2013c). n a v i g a t i o n p r o t e c t i o n a c t : under the act, major pipeline and power line project advocates are not required to prove their project won't damage or destroy a navigable waterway it crosses, unless the waterway is on a list prepared by the transportation minister. idle no more claims the amendments remove that protection for 99.9 per cent of lakes and rivers in canada. e n v i r o n m e n t a l a s s e s s m e n t a c t : the first omnibus budget bill had already overhauled the assessment process and the second one reduces further the number of projects that would require assessment under the old provisions. idle no more objects to the faster approval process (cbc news, 2013c). 9 ornelas: policy of undrip published by scholarship@western, 2014 many of the water systems of concern are within first nations’ territories. the modifications to environmental assessment will lessen requirements for oversight by allowing development projects to move forward without regulatory control that would have been required assessment under the previous provisions (levitz, 2012). the idle no more constituencies continue to object to the faster approval process and reduced environmental protections. t r u s t a n d t r a n s p a r e n c y i n g o v e r n a n c e there are several articles in undrip that describe the necessity for free, prior, and informed consent in consultation. with regard to the issue of transparency in governance, article 19 of undrip clearly establishes the requirement. the article describes that: states shall consult and cooperate in good faith with the indigenous peoples concerned through their own representative institutions in order to obtain their free, prior and informed consent before adopting and implementing legislative or administrative measures that may affect them. (un, 2010, p. 8) this requirement has been repeatedly ignored during the development of c-45, despite the fact that canada did agree to endorse undrip in 2010 to support better relations with its first nations. at that time, john duncan, the minister of indian and northern affairs, stated that: "canada strongly supports these principles and believes that they are consistent with the government's approach to working with aboriginal peoples” (dearing, 2010, para. 5). to this day, continuing complaints from first nations regarding the lack of consultation remains a mobilizing cause for protest and resistance. based on recent events, trust relationships that had been in place before the passage of c-45 have been severally damaged. canada, the united states, as well as other developed nations, can work on restoring trust relationships with their populations of indigenous peoples in the way they conduct government-togovernment interactions. it is purely a matter of seriously beginning to work within the framework of undrip to build open and transparent avenues for better communication. over the years since the 1977 meeting at the united nations, a lot of the ground was covered by those individuals who toiled on developing the articles in undrip. as article 27 advises, “states shall establish and implement, in conjunction with indigenous peoples concerned, a fair, independent, impartial, open and transparent process” (un, 2010, p. 9). not only does this scenario create an atmosphere of openness, it opens the door to building trust in governance. in 2003, nobel prize award recipient eleanor ostrom (2003) asked: how do communities of individuals sustain agreements that counteract individual temptations to select short-term, hedonistic actions when all parties would be better off if each party selected actions leading to higher group and individual returns? in other words, how do groups gain trust? (p. 19) as an economist who spent a lifetime engaged in research on the subject of hardin’s (1968) concept of “the tragedy of the commons,” ostrom examined ways in which groups could improve upon methods of managing the environment “common-pool-resources” for the higher group over individual gain. key practices for improving trust and transparency requires cooperation and open communication. ostrom 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.4 (2003) wrote further, “thus understanding how trust, reciprocity, and reputation feed one another (or how their lack generates a cascade of negative effects) helps to explain why repeated face-to-face communication can have a major effect” (p. 53). by not including indigenous peoples at the decision making table, actions like those of chief spence and idle no more continue to be motivated by their exclusion and desire to be listened to and heard. in addition to open exchange, there must be an understanding about indigenous ways of viewing the world, especially with regard to their sacred places and spirituality. as anishinaabeg environmental justice activist winona laduke has been quoted: i think that there is a lot of beauty in the other ways that people talk to the creator. what i would say is that our worldview is based on our spirit, our heart, and our physical being. all those aspects, which are our way of life, are reflected in our spiritual practice. (smith, 2006, p. 42) also, renowned indigenous legal scholar, vine deloria, jr. (1994), wrote almost 20 years ago that: sacred places are the foundation of all other beliefs and practices because they represent the presence of the sacred in our lives. they properly inform us that we are not larger than nature and that we have responsibilities to the rest of the natural world that transcend our own personal desires and wishes. this lesson must be learned by each generation; unfortunately the technology of industrial society always leads us in the other direction. yet it is certain that as we permanently foul our planetary nest, we shall have to learn a most bitter lesson. there probably is not sufficient time for the non-indian population to understand the meaning of sacred lands and incorporate the idea into their lives and practices. we can hope that some protection can be afforded these sacred places before the world becomes wholly secular and is destroyed. (pp. 281 282) article 34 in undrip speaks directly to this topic. it declares that: indigenous peoples have the right to promote, develop and maintain their institutional structures and their distinctive customs, spirituality, traditions, procedures, practices and, in the cases where they exist, judicial systems or customs, in accordance with international human rights standards. (un, 2010, p. 12) with increasing pressures for access to natural resources growing every day, many countries continue to ignore or stumble over undrip since its adoption. whether development efforts are advocating for the damming of rivers, or for the expansion of mining and other resource extraction efforts, nations can now begin to transform their governance structures by listening to what over 30 years of struggle and determination can bring to the table by including indigenous peoples in consultation that is based on free, prior, and informed consent. it is important to include their perspective and land ethic to the process because it means so much more than the land. the belief in the sacredness of places is also tied to the preservation of their culture and heritage. article 38 in undrip clearly advises that, “states, in consultation and cooperation with indigenous peoples, shall take the appropriate measures, including legislative measures, to achieve the ends of this declaration” (un, 2010, p. 13). if countries like canada 11 ornelas: policy of undrip published by scholarship@western, 2014 and the united states took the step to openly proclaim their support of undrip, how, indeed, do bills like c-45 get passed without any consultation with their populations of indigenous peoples? this is the question for the future that must be broached if there is going to be the successful implementation of undrip into national policy. u n d r i p i n t h e f u t u r e as leaders among developed nations, canada and the united states now have an opportunity to lead the way by modeling the spirit and intention of undrip. both countries include some of the largest populations of indigenous peoples in the world. there are already numerous tribal governments that have begun to reference undrip as a mechanism for protecting their human rights, sovereignty, and territories. however, tribal governments are stymied at every turn since there is no real enforcement mechanism in place to enforce undrip on national or international levels. this fact needs to change if transparent and collaborative progress in governance is going to be achieved. many of the growing protests that are ongoing in canada and the united states, and that are most recently inspired by the idle no more movement, have been emboldened by the various protections that are highlighted under undrip. it is no longer business as usual in terms of the historic marginalization and mistreatment of indigenous peoples. the continuance of policies that promote and perpetuate racism against their populations is at the center of many debates, no matter how loudly governments deny this fact. one need only to ask any of those persons who are presently involved in protecting against the expansion of fracking in new brunswick or those attempting to hold annual sacred ceremonies at mato tipula if their human rights are being addressed and protected. for now, no one appears to be listening as indigenous peoples and their quest for human rights continue to be ignored. if tribal governments are continuing to go on record in protest of improper actions by their national, state, and local governments, it only makes sense that the missing piece to the puzzle is that those noncompliant governments are unwilling to relinquish their positions of power. as ostrom (2003) advised, in order to build trust relationships and an atmosphere of reciprocity, all parties must work together for the higher good while eschewing independent gains. but will societies continue to “foul our planetary nest,” as deloria (1994) foretold, by forcing technologies upon the rest of us that are not sustainable in favor of short term gains and corporate profit? this is the question that we all need to be asking ourselves. are the rising voices of indigenous peoples around the globe the proverbial canary in the coal mine when it comes to applying environmental protections? the challenge for overcoming the fits and starts of undrip requires focused and ongoing collaboration and communication with tribal governments. in other words, to improve on damaged relationships, all governments must adhere to the critical requirement of free, prior and informed consent. the following are recommendations for initial steps to begin developing the future policy of undrip based on personal and practical firsthand experience working on intergovernmental affairs with indigenous populations. they are listed as follows: 1. national governments that sign to support and recognize the human rights initiatives set forth in the articles of undrip must develop a statutory and regulatory mechanism for 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.4 implementation and enforcement within five years of acknowledgment of formalized support. 2. the articles of undrip will function as foundational principles for all public and private entities governing or interacting in any way with populations of indigenous peoples. 3. all national governments must put in place a undrip working group to develop a permanent agency or sub agency within the united states department of state or the aboriginal affairs and northern development canada, or a comparable level of government, within three years of formalized support. 4. the undrip agency or sub agency shall receive an annual operating budget as part of the appointed branch of government. 5. a permanent liaison from the developed agency or sub agency shall be appointed by that entity and be headquartered within the offices of the united states department of state or the aboriginal affairs and northern development canada, or a comparable level of government. 6. a regional undrip representative shall be appointed to coordinate, communicate, and facilitate all human rights matters under consideration within the region. 7. no development or resource extraction projects within the reservations or territories of indigenous peoples can begin without a public consultation process that is based on free, prior, and informed consent. 8. no development or resource extraction projects within the reservations or territories of indigenous peoples, or outside of those land borders that are deemed to hold cultural, historic, ceremonial, or sacred importance, can move forward in any way upon notification of such significance without conducting further review that is based on free, prior, and informed consent. 9. the undrip agency or sub agency and its respective representative shall hold regional annual meetings within the reservations or territories of their constituencies for progress reports and public input. these basic recommendations are more than what are in place in either the united states or canada at this time. there must be more transparency and action coming from the national government instead of the gratuitous proclamations of support that were offered in 2010. so far, efforts at getting undrip integrated into national policy have been moving at a snail’s pace. it is time for a different vision for the future recognition of human rights for indigenous peoples around the world. c o n c l u s i o n on june 19, 2013, the canadian government passed the safe drinking water for first nations act (aboriginal affairs and northern development canada [aandc], 2013). is this a panacea for the 13 ornelas: policy of undrip published by scholarship@western, 2014 irreversible environmental damage that has already taken place in the waterways located within the land holdings of first nations? or, is it a distraction from the sweeping changes that were made to the navigable waters protection act under omnibus bill c-45? one way or the other, concerns have been raised by first nations and they are continuing to be ignored (parliament of canada, 2012; uechi, 2012). on march 5, 2013, the united states department of interior announced its “action plan to implement the memorandum of understanding (mou) regarding interagency coordination and collaboration for the protection of indian sacred sites” (united states department of interior [usdoi], 2013). the plan includes the following outline of its guiding principles as follows: the participating agencies are committed to interagency coordination and collaboration to enhance the protection of and tribal access to indian sacred sites. the participating agencies: • will consult with indian tribes, as appropriate, in developing and implementing the actions outlined in this plan; • recognize that consistency in policies and processes can be developed and applied, as long as such policies and processes remain adaptable to local situations and mission requirements; and • recognize that tribal input is essential to ensure that tribal perspectives are incorporated into the actions undertaken pursuant to the mou and to ensure the development of meaningful strategies for sacred sites protection. (usdoi, 2013, p. 2) the plan will review previous acts or executive orders that might relate to sacred lands. unfortunately, none of these acts or executive orders has been seriously adhered to in dealings with tribes up to now. this plan is a perfect opportunity for the united states department of interior to begin the integration of undrip as a framework for future consultations and negotiations with indigenous peoples for the protection of their sacred lands. the winds of change appear to be blowing in both the canada and the united states. their populations of indigenous peoples are organizing and asserting their rights and challenging their governments in new ways, as the recent rise in protests and grassroots actions indicate. successful governance in the future will have to be built upon trust and transparency. the tools are there to do it. the undrip toolkit needs to be opened and justly supported through action and consultations that are based on free, prior, and informed consent. only then will the door be opened to begin developing the policy potential of undrip. the time is now.     14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.4 r e f e r e n c e s aboriginal affairs and northern development canada [aandc]. 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(2011, november 26). attawapiskat reserve: canadian red cross pledges to help with aid for community in state of emergency. the huffington post. retrieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2011/11/26/attawapiskat-reserve-red-cross-canadaemergency_n_1114208.html?ref=canada#undefined the last 48 hours tell us a lot about the next 2 years in canada. (2013, october 18). #mikmaqblockade #elsipogtog. retrieved from youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mr7rpxvjzl0&feature=share uechi, j. (2012, december 29). harper government bills that sparked idle no more. vancouver observer. retrieved from http://www.vancouverobserver.com/politics/harper-governmentbills-enraged-first-nations-and-sparked-idle-no-more unionbc. (2012, november 12). union of bc indian chiefs. retrieved from http://www.ubcic.bc.ca/news_releases/ubcicnews11211201.html#axzz2a58ozzbd united nations [un]. (1948). universal declaration of human rights. geneva, ch: commission on human rights, un economic and social council. united nations[un]. (2010, august 24). united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples. retrieved from http://www.un.org/esa/socdev/unpfii/documents/drips_en.pdf united states department of interior [usdoi ]. (2013, march 5). action plan to implement the memorandum of understanding regarding interagency coordination and collaboration for the protection of indian sacred sites. retrieved from http://www.doi.gov/news/upload/ss-mouaction-plan-march-5-2013.pdf united states department of state [usdos]. (2013, may 30). announcement of u.s. support for the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples. retrieved from http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/ps/2010/12/153027.htm 19 ornelas: policy of undrip published by scholarship@western, 2014 weingartner, j. j. (2011). americans, germans and war crimes justice: law, memory and "the good war." santa barbara, ca: praeger. 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 5, iss. 1 [2014], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol5/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.4 the international indigenous policy journal january 2014 implementing the policy of the u.n. declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples roxanne t. ornelas recommended citation implementing the policy of the u.n. declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples abstract keywords creative commons license implementing the policy of the u.n. declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples “is it safe?” risk perception and drinking water in a vulnerable population the international indigenous policy journal volume 3 issue 3 water and indigenous peoples article 9 september 2012 “is it safe?” risk perception and drinking water in a vulnerable population nicholas spence western university, nspence@uwo.ca dan walters nipissing university, danw@nipissingu.ca recommended citation spence, n. , walters, d. (2012). “is it safe?” risk perception and drinking water in a vulnerable population. th e international indigenous policy journal, 3(3) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.9 “is it safe?” risk perception and drinking water in a vulnerable population abstract access to safe drinking water is a pressing social policy issue globally. despite the milestones reached in this area of canadian public health, marginalized and vulnerable populations, including those founded on racialized identity, such as first nations, continue to be plagued by accessibility issues. this work sheds new perspective on the issue, arguing for a research and policy focus that is inclusive of risk perception. a model of risk perception of drinking water is developed and tested for first nations on reserve in canada using the 2001 aboriginal peoples survey. it is shown that the analytical use of racialized identity advances understanding of risk perception and the environment (water). moreover, a large degree of heterogeneity within the first nation population across a number of social determinants of risk perception illustrates the shortcomings of framing the issue in a simplistic manner (first nation population versus general population). implications for risk research, including risk communication & management, and policy are provided. keywords safe water, environment, health, risk perception, risk communication, risk management, vulnerable populations, race/ethnicity, social policy, inequality, first nations, canada creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ “is it safe?” risk perception and drinking water in a vulnerable population water – in its absence we would not survive. according to the world health organization (2008), worldwide, the inability to access safe water annually contributes to significant mortality and morbidity, including 1.4 million child deaths from diarrhea and 860,000 child deaths from malnutrition. access to safe drinking water is a health issue facing all countries of the globe. of course, this homogenizes the state of affairs; the issues surrounding access to safe water tend to be disproportionately pressing in developing countries. however, tragedies such as the escherichia coli (e. coli) outbreak in walkerton, ontario, canada, the cryptosporidiosis outbreak in north battleford, saskatchewan, canada, and the release of a damaging report in 2008 by eggertson (2008b) in the canadian medical association journal (cmaj) documenting that over 1,760 boil water advisories were in effect across canada remind us that we, too, are vulnerable. nevertheless, for most canadians the availability of safe drinking water is a public health milestone, commensurate with improvements in the social determinants of health, which is often taken for granted. unfortunately, the experience of one socially vulnerable group – first nations on-reserve – has been less than satisfactory. while the attawapiskat water crisis has received wide political and media attention, unsafe water in first nations communities is an all too common occurrence: boil water advisories occur 2.5 times more frequently than for non-first nations communities; 30 percent of community water systems are “high risk,” and water borne infections are 26 times higher than the national average (eggertson, 2006; patrick, 2011). moreover, as of june 30, 2012, 146 first nations communities were under a drinking water advisory (health canada, 2012b). indeed, this is a serious social policy issue that has yet to be resolved. this paper contributes to the dialogue, providing a brand new approach to understanding this complex puzzle. first, using a national sample, it will address a major gap in the risk research literature by examining the determinants of risk perception of drinking water among a vulnerable population in canada, focusing on racialized identity,1 a dimension of stratification, for first nations on-reserve. the paucity of national data to conduct such an analysis has likely impeded research progress in the area, but this will be addressed using the 2001 aboriginal peoples survey.2,3 second, this work will provide some perspective for social policy. government, community leaders, and other stakeholders seeking to promote public health and involved in the regulation of health and safety issues surrounding water must possess an understanding of the thought processes and responses to risk by consumers (slovic, 1987). in fact, perceptions of safe water have been widely recognized as having significant implications for the development of appropriate programs and policies to improve water management and the provision of water services as well as risk communication (doria, 2010; doria, pidgeon, & hunter, 2005; dupont, 2005). finally, an understanding of perceptions of risk enables the shaping of consumer behaviours and choices (anadu & harding, 2000; doria, 2006), as perceptions of drinking water are related to increased consumption of both unhealthy beverages, such as soft 1 a product of groups possessing differential access to power, racialized identity refers to the social categorization of people based on phenotypical characteristics, embedded within historical and cultural contexts (baum, 2006; grabb, 2007; veenstra, 2009). these racialized identities are salient to understand social processes and inequality given their varied experiences, life outcomes, and positions within the structure of power. 2 the aboriginal peoples survey has received much praise for its depth and scope, including the on-reserve and offreserve populations; however, the 2006 aboriginal peoples survey included the only off-reserve population, which prevented us from using the more recent dataset. 3 an ekos research associates incorporated survey in 2009, conducted for health canada, is one of the only large scale sources of survey information on water among first nations on-reserve, including perceptions of water quality and safety, communication of related risk information, uses of tap water, and consumption of tap water substitutes. the information in the report by ekos (2009) is noteworthy; however, it is only the first step in understanding the drivers of perceptions of safe water. this dataset is not publicly available at the present time for analysis by the authors. 1 spence and walters: "is it safe?" published by scholarship@western, 2012 drinks, and tap water substitutes, including bottled water (dupont, adamowicz, & krupnick, 2010; hanrahan, 2003; wescoat, headington, & theobald, 2007).4 in sum, social policy directed at ameliorating inequalities in a key determinant of health – drinking water – for first nations may be ineffective without understanding the social factors associated with risk perception, given their unique cultural, historical, and socioeconomic conditions. literature review research has shown that the availability of safe drinking water is an ongoing concern to many residents across the country (tromp-van meerveld, crooks, johnston, baird, & spencer, 2011). this issue is particularly salient among first nations on-reserve (health canada, 2012b). research and policy papers have focused on a variety of key issues: “objective” data capturing the technical aspects of risk, such as drinking water advisories (health canada, 2009); source water protection (patrick, 2011); funding and legislation (eggertson, 2008a; simeone, 2010); governance (graham, 2002); program and policy evaluation of existing initiatives (auditor general of canada, 2011); case studies, documenting the human face of the water crisis and “on the ground” experiences (polaris institute, 2008); and descriptive statistics and cross tabulations on consumer preferences, quality, and perceptions (ekos research associates incorporated, 2009). however, overall, work with a social determinants of health and well-being approach has been underrepresented, but gaining some momentum recently, and a theoretically rooted examination of the determinants of “subjective” dimensions of risk (i.e., risk perception) pertaining to drinking water for first nations on-reserve has received a scant amount of attention. our focus is on the latter. the general risk literature has recently focused attention on specific environmental issues surrounding the determinants of perceptions of safe drinking water, both internationally (doria, 2010; doria, pidgeon, & hunter, 2009) and nationally (dupont et al., 2010; jones et al., 2005; jones et al., 2006; turgeon, rodriguez, thériault, & levallois, 2004). however, specific analyses of special populations, such as vulnerable groups in canada based on race and ethnicity, have not been carried out, particularly large-scale work. this is far from a benign issue as differences in risk perception among ethnic groups has been documented across a number of issues, including the environment and health (flynn, slovic, & mertz, 1994; palmer, carlstrom, & woodward, 2001). the perception of risk cannot be divorced from its social and cultural milieu (wildavsky & douglas, 1982); therefore, an examination of first nations on-reserve is particularly important in understanding risk perception as well as reducing inequalities. the policy implications are vast; for example, different risk communication strategies must be developed and implemented given varied perceptions of risk, which this work seeks to uncover. more specifically, the determinants of perception pertaining to water risks and quality have been identified across many studies (doria, 2010; doria et al., 2005; doria et al., 2009; griffin & dunwoody, 2000; health canada, 2012a; jardine, gibson, & hrudey, 1999; jones et al., 2006), and there are many, including degree of isolation, organoleptics (odours, flavour, colour), water chemicals and microbiological parameters, contextual indicators (state of the household, community, rivers, lakes), past negative health experiences, familiarity and prior experience, impersonal and interpersonal information (acquaintances, friends, family, water companies, media), trust in water companies and other groups, perceived control, demographics, cultural background, 4 the average household spends $250 to $400 per year for water services with a substantial increase over the last few decades in households making “defensive expenditures” on tap water substitutes, including bottled water and different filtration devices (dupont, 2005). in particular, bottled water has been the focus of much attention given the large expenditures by consumers, with the costs of bottled water 240 to 10,000 times that of tap water (ferrier, 2001; olson, 1999). given that estimates indicate approximately 64 percent of first nations on-reserve have used bottled water for any purpose, which is 18% higher than non-reserve residents of other small communities, and 40% of first nations onreserve use a combination of bottled plus filtered water for drinking versus 32% for the general population (ekos research associates incorporated, 2009), these expenditures are particularly concerning for this vulnerable population that is socioeconomically disadvantaged (white, beavon, & spence, 2008). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.9 and worldviews. comparisons between studies can be difficult as a result of the use of different definitions of concepts and operationalization of measures. furthermore, even when the factors which influence perceptions of water have shown some explanatory value in cross-national and intranational research, their relative importance in models tends to vary significantly (anadu & harding, 2000; doria et al., 2009); for example, flavour has been demonstrated to have a much stronger effect on risk perception in portugal than in the uk (doria et al., 2009). in addition, in locations where water safety is a pressing social policy issue, as in the case of first nations on-reserve, the relationships may operate quite differently than in cases where access to safe water is the norm, such as the supply of municipal water in the rest of canada, which is highly regulated and monitored. therefore, we cannot take for granted that the observed models and effects in canada will hold across first nations on-reserve. from a policy planning perspective, the first nation population is young and rapidly growing, and, according to government data, if the migration assumption is correct, the proportion of registered indians living onreserve is projected to increase from an estimated 60 percent in 2001 to 75 percent in 2021(indian and northern affairs canada, 2004). hence, our understanding of the dynamics surrounding perceptions of water in these communities would be profitable as the future on-reserve population increases substantially. methods research question the research question for this study is as follows: what are the determinants of risk perception of drinking water in the home among first nations on-reserve in canada? dataset the file used for this analysis is the 2001 aboriginal peoples survey. the aboriginal peoples survey is a postcensus survey, which means that the selection of respondents was based upon their responses to the 2001 census. for those respondents chosen for the aboriginal peoples survey, information collected from the 2001 census was added to their responses. the survey was conducted in partnership between statistics canada and aboriginal organizations (statistics canada, 2003). sampling strategy the aboriginal peoples survey includes residents who occupy private dwellings in all of the provinces and territories, while those in collective dwellings (lodging or rooming houses, hotels, motels, tourist homes, hospitals, staff residences, communal quarters, military camps, work camps, jails, missions, and group homes are excluded from the survey (statistics canada, 2003). the strategy was to conduct the survey in the largest reserves of each province, which resulted in 44 percent of the entire on-reserve population being surveyed in each province. in other words, there was no randomness in the selection process and no randomness in the reserves that refused to participate. some of the largest reserves did not participate in the survey and smaller reserves were then selected. in british columbia, coverage of the reserve population was reduced because of the significant number of small reserves in the province, which would have been costly to sample. in total, 145 first nations or reserve communities were selected for the aboriginal peoples survey and approximately 123 were surveyed (statistics canada, 2003). most importantly, because the sampling strategy did not include smaller reserves, the data are not representative of the entire on-reserve population. a study was completed to evaluate the comparability of the data collected on the aboriginal peoples survey selected reserves to the entire on-reserve population. an examination of seven demographic variables found that the differences in the distributions of the variables were very small. the differences varied by region and the greatest differences were in quebec and ontario (statistics canada, 2003). 3 spence and walters: "is it safe?" published by scholarship@western, 2012 population this analysis pertains to aboriginals on-reserve.5 it should be noted that about 96 percent of the on-reserve population has the aboriginal status of registered first nation; hence, the results apply to that population. missing data the researcher’s data matrix typically contains values that are observed and missing. there are various ways of handling this missing data in the social sciences (allison, 2002; maxim, 1999). this research project deals with missing data through the multiple imputation method, which is considered the method of choice of most statisticians in principle (king, honaker, joseph, & scheve, 2001). variables and hypotheses in exploring the determinants of risk perception of drinking water in the homes of the first nations population on-reserve, we draw from the general literature on risk perception, distinct research on water quality and perception, and associated aboriginal-specific work. all concepts are defined, operationalized, and accompanied by hypotheses regarding the relationship with the dependent variable. the dependent variable in this analysis is the subjective perception of water, that is, do you consider the water available to your home safe for drinking? the responses are “yes” and “no.” age of respondents has been shown to have a weak and inconsistent effect on risk perception of water (doria, 2010; parkin et al., 2001). while the historical relationship between first nations and the greater canadian society, particularly the government, has been poor, increased awareness and recognition of the many injustices faced by this group, coupled with policy to address the plight of this vulnerable population have been a step forward. although canadian society is only beginning to address the shameful conditions of aboriginal people, many indicators of well-being have improved over time, with much work left to be done (white et al., 2008). in this study, we expect older respondents to possess a particularly negative perception of institutions responsible for the well-being of first nations residents, especially regarding issues pertaining to water, given the historical record. the result is a higher degree of skepticism towards the safety of drinking water in the home. this variable is continuous in this analysis, including respondents 15 years and over. the gender variable refers to the socially constructed categories of male and female. more specifically, it captures the institutional arrangements, norms, behaviours, and organization of society for males and females in a manner that influences differential access to resources, opportunities, and life experiences (benoit et al., 2009). women have exhibited greater concerns for societal issues, including drinking water (park, scherer, & glynn, 2001). also, they generally perceive higher risks (anadu & harding, 2000), which may be function of a variety of factors, such as a higher sense of vulnerability, social and political factors, as well as differences in their world view and levels of trust (doria, 2010). in the case of first nations women, they hold a unique role with water; in fact, they are seen as guardians of this precious resource and have greater traditional learning and knowledge about it than men. in this regard, their awareness of the struggles accessing safe water would be pronounced. thus, we expect that women will possess more negative perceptions than males regarding the safety of drinking water in the home. 5 on-reserve population is a derived census variable that is captured by using the census subdivision (csd) types according to criteria established by indian and northern affairs canada (inac). on-reserve population includes all people living in any of the seven csd types legally affiliated with first nations or indian bands (indian reserves, indian settlement, indian government district, terres réservée, nisga’a village, nisga’a land, teslin land), as well as selected csds of various other types that are northern communities in saskatchewan, the northwest territories, and the yukon territory as identified in table 7 of the census dictionary (catalogue no 92-378-xie) (statistics canada, 2003). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.9 the effect of income on perceptions of water is mixed (grondin & levallois, 1999; syme & williams, 1993). more generally, income is indicative of one’s standard of living, but it provides access to resources in a market society, including access to tap water alternatives, such as bottled water. the costs of tap water alternatives were outlined earlier, and they are particularly important among first nations who may have limited disposable income for such purchases. research on the use of tap water has shown that it is heavily influenced by the ability to use an alternative, such as bottled water, which is dictated by the resolution of cost issues (doria et al., 2005). while this does not speak directly to risk perception of drinking water in the home, we suggest that the relationship between higher incomes and the consumption of tap water alternatives may contribute to a rationalization of such purchases, including higher reported risk perception of residential drinking water. it is measured as a continuous variable via economic family income. to take into account differences in family composition, the square root equivalence scale is used. the effects of household income on perceptions diminish as the level of income increases, and this will be reflected in the analysis by using the natural logarithm of household income. education has been found to be a determinant of health and well-being for a variety of reasons, such as lifestyle choices, personal control, and learned effectiveness (goldman & smith, 2011; kunst & mackenbach, 1994; mirowsky & ross, 2003). the ability to assess health risks associated with drinking water in the home may influence perceptions in a positive or negative manner. if the water is truly safe, higher educated respondents would be more likely to categorize it in that manner and vice versa, given the enhanced ability among this group to filter information and assess the situation in a systematic manner. however, empirically the relationship between risk perception of water and education has been mixed (park et al., 2001; syme & williams, 1993). we expect that higher educated individuals, compared to the greater society, will be more aware of the relative deprivation associated with access to safe water and the ongoing water issues on reserves. this will result in a more negative perception regarding the safety of drinking water in the home than less educated respondents. education is operationalized with three levels: low education, medium education, and high education. the state of being married, relative to individuals who are single, widowed, separated, or divorced, has been found to have a protective effect on individuals, for a number of reasons, including economic efficiency, orderliness, regulation of risky behaviours, and emotional social support (kim & mckenry, 2002; simon, 2002; umberson, 1992). it would, therefore, be expected that a skeptical and more cautionary attitude towards safe drinking water in the home would be observed by married respondents. this variable has three categories: divorced/separated/widowed, married, and single. the presence of children in a household influences choices regarding consumption of water, with an observed “father effect” and “mother effect,” in that those individuals with children may be more concerned with issues pertaining to the local environment (blocker & eckberg, 1989; dupont et al., 2010). moreover, individuals with children, particularly younger children, would be much more critical of the supply and safety of drinking water in the home, given their vulnerability. there is empirical support for this finding for first nations on-reserve (ekos research associates incorporated, 2009). the variable is measured by the presence and age of children in the household: no children, children less than 15 years, and children greater than 15 years. subjective health status is probably the most widely used way to describe the health status of individuals as it is a reliable and valid indicator, across diverse cultural groups and ages, for health problems, morbidity, mental health, health care usage, longevity, mortality, and the onset of disability (health canada, 1999; idler & benyamini, 1997; mirowsky & ross, 2003). having a lower health status makes individuals more vulnerable to the negative effects of lifestyle choices, increases awareness of health damaging behaviour, and increases interaction with health care providers, who underscore education and preventative behaviours. it is expected that poorer health will heighten risk perception towards the safety of drinking water in the home. self-rated health of respondents in this study is categorized as good or poor. 5 spence and walters: "is it safe?" published by scholarship@western, 2012 the cultural context in which water is experienced is of principal importance, particularly for first nations on-reserve. in her seminal work on risk, douglas (1966, 1992) emphasized the role of sociocultural practices, norms, artifacts, and traditional knowledge in understanding the definition and perception of (e.g., susceptibility) and the appropriate responses to it, given the sociocultural organization of the group. this is echoed, specifically in the context of perceptions of water, in the work of finucane, slovic, mertz, flynn, and sattersfield (2000) and canter, nelson, and everett (1993/1994) who address the manner in which culture, such as trust in institutions, affects this process. undoubtedly, the history of colonialism, suffering, and shameful social conditions on many reserves, paired with the experience of the broader canadian society and its formal institutions, would definitely figure into the process of risk perceptions. if we think of cultural attachment as a measure of immersion within the community, this would likely create more opportunities for learning about the history and problems on reserves, influencing overall outlooks on social issues and levels of trust in formal institutions. it is hypothesized that perceptions of the safety of drinking water in the home will be more negative for those with higher cultural attachment. the ability to understand or speak an aboriginal language is a measure of one’s ethnic and cultural identity (royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996). thus, attachment to aboriginal culture is operationalized as the ability to speak or understand an aboriginal language, with responses of “yes” or “no.” in terms of water, people prefer what they know because it becomes the “norm” and the standard by which a variety of factors, such as organoleptics (hardness, taste, colour, and odors), influencing perceptions of risk and quality are judged (doria, 2010; owen, colbourne, clayton, & fife-schaw, 1999; strang, 2001). for this study, familiarity with the water is operationalized by place of residence one year earlier (2000), either same census subdivision or different census subdivision, with the latter group more likely to perceive the drinking water in the home as unsafe. if we think of water and its consumption as embedded within the greater physical and social environment, both proximate and distal characteristics of the context, such as the distribution system pipes (contu, carlini, maccioni, meloni, & schintu, 2005; jones et al., 2007; parkin et al., 2001), state of the areas surrounding bodies of water (house & sangster, 1991; moser, 1984), and community satisfaction (syme & williams, 1993), influence perceptions of safety. in the dataset, as a measure of the quality of the context in which water is consumed, we are drawing on the question, “is your home in need of major repairs (for example, a new roof, plumbing, repairs, or structural repairs)” with responses of “yes” and “no.” individuals in residences in need of major repairs would possess more negative perceptions of the safety of drinking water than those residing in better housing conditions. risk assessment is the production of objective scientific knowledge of specific risks by scientists (lidskog & sundqvist, 2012). according to boyne (2003), this is usually defined and operationalized in technical terms, using numbers and probabilities; for example, the number of drinking water advisories over a specific time period for a given geographical area or the morbidity rate from consuming unsafe water for a specific year. in this study, an objective measure of risk in the context of the safety of water had to be derived from the aboriginal peoples survey, which was not designed for these purposes. we used the best indicator available, “are there times of the year that your water is contaminated?” with responses of “yes,” “no,” and “do not know.” we advise readers that this measure is categorical and, therefore, is accompanied by the shortcomings of using discrete, rather than continuous, indicators. also, the assumption is that knowledge pertaining to the contamination of water is derived from formal tests and experts, such as water authorities, chiefs, indian affairs canada, environment canada, health canada, etc., conveying information including drinking water advisories or boil water advisories. in understanding the relationship between technical indicators of risk and risk perception, we turn to the deficit model of public understanding. the deficit model of public understanding of science captures the gap in understanding between the knowledge produced by scientists and the greater society (irwin & wynne, 1996). thus, when the ideas and actions of the public surrounding risk decision making contradict the technical, objective, scientific knowledge originating in the community of scientists, this is attributed to lack of communication, the public’s ignorance, or an inability to understand science. the convergence of risk assessment between experts and laymen occurs through communicating and 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.9 educating the public (gouldson, lidskog, & wester-herber, 2007; zinn, 2008). in line with the deficit model, residents who are aware of water contamination issues over the year, in terms of their drinking water in the home, will be more likely to perceive that their water is not safe compared to those individuals who do not report contamination issues. in the context of safe water, it has been documented that the degree to which all canadian communities are “at risk” varies to a large extent, with small, remote, and isolated communities being disproportionately affected (health canada, 2012b). similarly, regional variation in safe water in non-reserve areas has been documented with a survey in 2008 showing some areas, such as prince edward island, reporting zero boil water advisories, compared to ontario with 679 (canadian medical association, 2008). both survey and case study research has illustrated geographic and situational diversity with respect to the experience of the water crisis facing first nations in canada (ekos research associates incorporated, 2009; polaris institute, 2008). further, the intra-aboriginal differences in canada across a number of well-being indicators have been illustrated (maxim, white, beavon, & whitehead, 2001; spence, white, & maxim, 2007; white et al., 2008). o’sullivan and mchardy (2007) have documented regional variation in well-being (education, housing, income, labor force activity) from the 2001 census indicating that the atlantic provinces, british columbia, and the north are at the top, followed by ontario and quebec, and finally manitoba, saskatchewan, and alberta. these measures of well-being in each region may be indicators of institutional quality and social processes affecting such resources as water. there are two measures associated with geography. first, the province or territory of residence includes “newfoundland and labrador,” “prince edward island,” “nova scotia,” “new brunswick,” “quebec,” “manitoba,” “saskatchewan,” “alberta,” “british columbia,” “yukon territory,” “the northwest territories,” and “ontario.” we expect reports of perceived risk of the safety of drinking water in the home to be inversely related to community well-being. with ontario as the reference group, individuals in quebec should report similar perceived risk, the atlantic provinces, british columbia, and the north should report less, and manitoba, saskatchewan, and alberta should report more. the second geographical measure of isolation is categorized as urban, rural, or arctic.6 we expect that communities with larger populations and less isolation will have better institutional mechanisms in place for ensuring the safety of water, given the difficulties of delivering services to widely dispersed and isolated populations. results descriptive statistics of the sample are provided in table 1. in the case of a dichotomous outcome, such as in the present study, indicated by 1 (no, drinking water in the home is not safe) and 0 (yes, drinking water in the home is safe), the probability that y=1 is denoted as π, where logit(π) is the logit link function of this probability and equal to the natural logarithm of the odds, that is, π /(1π). hence, the linear relationship between logit (π) and the independent variables is given as follows: logit(π) = ln π /(1π) = α + β 1x1+ β 2x2+ …+ β kxk the interpretation is simply that the natural logarithm of the odds that y=1 (no, drinking water in the home is not safe) varies as a function of the linear predictor α+β1x1+ β2x2+ …+βkxk (hosmer & lemeshow, 2000). for ease of interpretation the regression coefficients are typically presented as odds ratios (or) with their associated significance levels. 6 the arctic refers to the area covered by the four inuit regions, as defined by the inuit tapiriit kanatami (i.e., the northern coastal region of labrador, the nunavik region of northern quebec, the territory of nunavut, and the inuvialuit region of the northwest territories). this variable further classifies the area outside of the arctic according to statistics canada’s definition of urban and rural areas, as follows: an urban area is an area with a population of at least 1,000 and no fewer than 400 persons per square kilometer. territory outside urban areas is classified as rural (statistics canada, 2003). 7 spence and walters: "is it safe?" published by scholarship@western, 2012 table 1. descriptive statistics of the sample variables frequency (%) mean (sd) risk perception of water yes, water available in the household is safe for drinking 73.1 no, water available in the household is not safe for drinking 26.9 age 36.4 (16.1) gender male 49.9 female 50.1 (ln) equivalized economic family income ($) 9.5 (0.9) education low 56.2 medium 22.0 high 21.8 marital status married 32.2 divorced, separated, widowed 12.1 single 55.7 presence of children 15 + 11.5 <15 42.5 no children 46.0 health poor 17.9 good 82.1 culture yes, speak or understand aboriginal language 80.0 no, do not speak or understand aboriginal language 20.0 familiarity with water supply different csd as one year ago 3.8 same csd as one year ago 96.2 context of water consumption yes, home needs major repairs 46.3 no, home does not need major repairs 53.7 objective risk (contaminated water during the year) don’t know 10.9 yes 40.8 no 48.2 region arctic 2.5 rural 88.9 urban 8.6 province newfoundland and labrador 0.7 pei 0.2 nova scotia 3.2 new brunswick 1.3 quebec 9.7 manitoba 19.4 saskatchewan 18.8 alberta 17.2 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.9 variables frequency (%) mean (sd) british columbia 13.6 yukon 0.7 northwest territories 4.9 ontario 10.3 * percentages may not add up to 100 due to rounding n = 17,506 table 2 presents the main findings and relationships of interest, including bivariate and multivariate analyses. the multivariate logistic regression model presents the unique effects of each independent variable, which is the main focus of interpretation. table 2. logistic regression: determinants of risk perception of drinking water variables unadjusteda or adjustedb or age 1.001 1.000 gender male 0.864*** 0.876** female 1.000 1.000 (ln) equivalized economic family income 1.062** 0.995 education ** *** low 0.842** 0.786*** medium 0.899 0.888 high 1.000 1.000 marital status * married 1.127** 0.912 divorced, separated, widowed 1.062 1.072 single 1.000 1.000 presence of children *** * 15 + 1.150* 1.023 <15 1.177*** 1.162** no children 1.000 1.000 health poor 1.264*** 1.284*** good 1.000 1.000 culture yes, speak or understand aboriginal language 1.058 0.837** no, do not speak or understand aboriginal language 1.000 1.000 familiarity with water supply different csd one year ago 1.044 1.096 same csd one year ago 1.000 1.000 context of water consumption yes, home needs major repairs 1.690*** 1.437*** no, home does not need major repairs 1.000 1.000 objective risk (contaminated water during the year) *** *** don’t know 5.396*** 5.262*** yes 10.784*** 9.625*** no 1.000 1.000 region *** ** arctic 4.162*** 1.941** rural 0.883 0.901 urban 1.000 1.000 9 spence and walters: "is it safe?" published by scholarship@western, 2012 variables unadjusteda or adjustedb or province *** *** newfoundland and labrador 30.915*** 12.722*** prince edward island 0.109*** 0.211* nova scotia 3.359*** 1.793*** new brunswick 4.242*** 4.379*** quebec 4.650*** 2.202*** manitoba 1.984*** 1.790*** saskatchewan 1.367*** 1.196* alberta 1.613*** 1.752*** british columbia 1.730*** 1.560*** yukon 1.376 1.442 northwest territories 1.302** 1.435** ontario 1.000 1.000 mcfadden’s ρ2 = 0.20 note. for categorical variables with more than two categories, the significance level for the variable is provided, followed by significance levels for the categories contrasted with the reference group, denoted by an odds ratio of 1.000. n= 17,506 or = odds ratio a bivariate relationship with the dependent variable b multiple logistic regression with coefficients adjusted for all other variables in the model *p<.05; **p<0.01; ***p<0.001. the model is highly satisfactory given the effect size, that is, mcfadden’s ρ 2 = 0.20. in examining the bivariate analysis, age, culture, and familiarity with the water supply were not statistically significant in explaining perceptions of safe drinking water. the multivariate analysis did not differ much in that age, income, marital status, and familiarity with the water supply were not statistically significant in the model. variables associated with reports of a greater perception of risk for drinking water in the home included being female, being highly educated, having children less than 15 years of age, being in poor health, having less attachment to aboriginal culture, living in a residence requiring major repairs, reporting water contamination during the previous year or being uncertain of the contamination status of water, and residing in the arctic, newfoundland/labrador, nova scotia, new brunswick, quebec, manitoba, saskatchewan, alberta, british columbia, or the northwest territories. discussion and policy implications the findings in this study illustrate some interesting patterns, which we will discuss in terms of the literature on risk perception and water while providing policy implications where applicable. age demonstrated no effect in our analysis, which is relatively consistent with the literature (doria, 2010; parkin et al., 2001). we suggested that older individuals may possess a more skeptical outlook and view of society given their historical experiences; on the other hand, despite the ongoing problems for first nations on-reserve, older respondents have also witnessed relative improvements and concessions from society and government on various issues over time. therefore, their perspectives may be less negative than anticipated. there was no effect for income on risk perceptions of drinking water. this finding is similar to other work in the area (doria, 2010; grondin & levallois, 1999; syme & williams, 1993). while the bivariate analysis was consistent with our hypothesis that higher income would create opportunities to purchase alternatives to tap water, which may be justified by the perception that the drinking water in the home is unsafe, after controlling for other relevant factors that are associated with income and the dependent variable, such as education, the effect disappeared. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.9 as hypothesized, first nations women were more concerned about the safety of drinking water than males. we suspect that this is partly a reflection of the culture, given first nations women are viewed as guardians of water, possessing greater traditional learning and knowledge of the natural resource, corresponding with the notion that education coincides with concern. although we were unable to examine other reasons for this observation, they likely include greater feelings of vulnerability, social and political factors, as well as differences in world view and levels of trust as indicated in other non-aboriginal contexts (doria, 2010). we were correct in suggesting that higher education corresponds with more concern about the safety of drinking water, probably due to learned effectiveness and control, as well as general awareness and an understanding of the health implications of consuming contaminated water. first nations parents with children under 15 years of age were more concerned about the safety of drinking water than individuals with no children. indeed, the role of parent has a unique impact on individual perceptions of water, which is expected as they must make careful and, ideally, informed decisions for their vulnerable children, in the face of the potential hazards of consuming contaminated water. we have illustrated once again that parents are mindful of issues surrounding the environment as documented previously (blocker & eckberg, 1989; dupont et al., 2010). the absence of an effect for parent(s) with children over 15 years of age is likely a function of parents with older children being less preoccupied with issues surrounding contaminated water because older children are considered mature enough to make their own decisions and are perceived as being less vulnerable. despite initial support for the effect of marital status as predicted, this disappeared once theoretically relevant variables were included in the model. this conflicts with the literature that has generally found that being married has a unique protective effect on individuals through the regulation of risky behaviours and cautionary attitudes towards potential dangers (kim & mckenry, 2002; simon, 2002; umberson, 1992). it may, however, be the case that the processes governing safe water, specifically, are different than other health-related issues. another explanation is that the characteristics of marriages are different in this context. since we are unable to assess marriage quality, satisfaction, and meaning, using this dataset, it is difficult to pinpoint the null effect of marriage. we suggest that this specific relationship in the first nations population, examined within the context of safe water, requires further examination. access to proper housing continues to be a pressing issue for first nations on-reserve (auditor general of canada, 2011). its effects are far reaching; there is support for the hypothesis that the context in which water is consumed may affect perceptions of safe water beyond socioeconomic status. housing in need of major repairs may be a signal for a low quality environment or a cue for proximate water infrastructure that is subpar. the examination of other relevant levels of context, such as the physical characteristics (rivers, lakes, streets, forests) and social aspects (social capital, social cohesion) of the local and regional communities is deserving of attention in the future. this may be particularly important in reserve areas lying on or near resource rich lands (oil, gas, uranium, etc.) where issues surrounding development and environmental degradation are all too common. as expected, people with existing poor health outcomes are more likely to possess suppressed immune systems and be physiologically vulnerable to potential health damaging effects in the community, including the consumption of unsafe drinking water; therefore, they must be cognizant of such issues and possess a heightened awareness. unfortunately, we could not gauge whether individuals had a history of ill health effects from the consumption of water in their community. such an occurrence would likely play a strong role in risk perception given the direct association between previous consumption and illness. it may also have long standing effects on risk perception and consumer attitudes and behaviours despite any advances in the provision of safe water over time. 11 spence and walters: "is it safe?" published by scholarship@western, 2012 supporting our hypothesis, there appears to be congruence between objective and subjective risk indicators of water. those who specified that there are times of the year when water is contaminated are much more likely to believe that the water in their home is not safe for drinking. the state of uncertainty – not being aware of whether water has ever been contaminated during the year – also negatively influenced perceptions of drinking water in the home. from a policy perspective, this supports the deficit model of public understanding of science (irwin & wynne, 1996), which supports the educational approach in risk communication. in other words, providing lay people with objective science-based knowledge, including drinking water advisories, may empower them to make health promoting decisions. while we do have some evidence that knowledge of an objective measure of risk is a predictor of subjective risk perception, unfortunately, we do not know whether this affects consumption of drinking water. there is empirical support for the role of perceived risk in drinking tap water at home in subsequent consumption behaviour, although consumption is also influenced by taste and the ability to use alternatives, including bottled water (doria et al., 2005). as well, we cannot gauge the effectiveness of these instances of risk communication (content of messages, outreach) nor the specific reasons people may still perceive their water as safe irrespective of technical risk awareness. the hypothesis regarding culture was not supported. being able to speak or understand an aboriginal language was associated with being less concerned about drinking water. given that this variable is a measure of the extent to which an individual is immersed within aboriginal culture and the community, we would expect it to raise awareness, making individuals more knowledgeable of the problems surrounding safe water. while this may be true, risk perception research has documented that increased contact and familiarity with a “threat” is associated with individuals becoming accustomed or habituated to its presence – in other words, a hazard and the issues that accompany it become normalized, consistent what is termed “the normalization of risk” (halpern-felsher et al., 2001; lima, barnett, & vala, 2005; richardson, sorenson, & soderstrom, 1987). for first nations, access to safe drinking water and related community issues have been ongoing and experienced first-hand in many communities, but the experience may be pronounced for those individuals who are immersed in the culture and community. they may become particularly desensitized to the dangers, and the risk is then normalized. in contrast to other work in doria (2010), owen et al. (1999), and strang (2001), prior experience, that is the hypothesis that “people like what they know,” was not supported by the familiarity measure in our analysis. in other words, mobility did not influence perceptions of safe water in this population. this may simply indicate that the differences in water quality and organoleptics (flavour, taste, colour) do not vary in an important way for the individuals in this sample moving between census subdivisions. the regional variation in perceptions of safe water by urban, rural, arctic, provincial, or territorial divide captures the extent to which the experiences and perceptions of drinking water in the home for first nations across canada differ. once again, this signals us to the diversity of intra-aboriginal social conditions, which is increasingly being recognized as important in understanding social inequality in this typically homogenized population (bell, schuurman, hameed, & caron, 2011; chandler & lalonde, 1998; white et al., 2008). residents in every region, except prince edward island and the yukon, were more likely to report being concerned with drinking water than those individuals in ontario. prince edward island and the yukon did not show evidence of any difference. we indicated that there are variations in well-being by region, but these indicators only partially coincided with perceptions of drinking water. residents in those regions reporting the highest well-being, including the atlantic provinces, british columbia, and the north, were expected to be less concerned with the safety of drinking water than ontario. on the other hand, as expected, residents in areas with poorer well-being (manitoba, saskatchewan, and alberta), were more concerned about the safety of their drinking water in their homes than residents of ontario. consistent with our hypothesis, prince edward island stands alone as an anomaly in the atlantic region. what do all these results indicate to us? they tell us that there are other processes at work besides traditional socioeconomic measures of well-being. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.9 this variation can be attributed to a number of processes at the community and regional levels impacting perception, such as the lack of a universal indicator of drinking water quality as addressed by the canadian institutes of health information (2005). also, in the absence of nationally enforced standards, the regulations governing boil water advisories, issuance of public notice of advisories, monitoring and reporting of water quality, certification of systems and operators, compliance and enforcement, and public reporting requirements vary across regions (health canada, 2009; isfeld, 2009). for example, one of the main problems cited in a recent report by the auditor general of canada (2011) on programs for first nations on-reserve is that indian and northern affairs canada and health canada do not ensure that drinking water is tested on a regular basis, unlike the existing regime at the provincial and territorial levels; in fact, it was underscored that, in the absence of regular testing and legislated standards, more than half of the drinking water systems pose risks to residents. there have been efforts to address some of these issues over the years, including the five point plan of action for drinking water in first nation communities of 2006 and, more recently, the changes introduced into parliament with the proposed safe drinking water for first nations act on february 29, 2012. although the central ideas of the newly proposed legislation echo the sentiments of bill s11, it should be noted that the government has incorporated substantial changes to the current bill that will allow it to develop, in partnership with first nations, enforceable federal regulations, which will be a step closer towards ensuring access to safe, clean, and reliable drinking water, the effective treatment of wastewater, and the protection of water sources on first nation lands (aboriginal affairs and northern development canada, 2012). nevertheless, without a doubt, the aforementioned issues, which have yet to be resolved, contribute to the diversity of outcomes observed and influence the knowledge and scope of safe water issues, as well as perceptions and consumption habits across regions. on another note, the variations across the canadian landscape represent a variety of contextual and institutional factors at the community and regional levels for which we do not have appropriate indicators. reserves are geographically meaningful places in which first nations people live. legally, reserves are pieces of land to be held by the government for the use and benefit of bands of indians.7, 8 reserves can be host to a variety of initiatives and policies that impact on the day-to-day lives of its constituents (e.g., the building of schools, the creation of health projects, and a variety of issues surrounding safe water). these social spaces are historically important locations for first nations of canada. there is a distinct set of social networks, norms, and attitudes which are formed within these geographical spaces (mignone, 2003; white, spence, & maxim, 2005). therefore, it is prudent to entertain the possibility that there may be key differences in the determinants of perceptions of safe water that reflect the various social experiences and institutional arrangements within these social spaces. our ability to fully tease out regional differences in perceptions of drinking water is hindered by the absence of data to examine the effect of theoretically relevant variables, 7 according to the indian act (department of justice canada, 2006): (1) subject to this act, reserves are held by her majesty for the use and benefit of the respective bands for which they were set apart, and subject to this act and to the terms of any treaty or surrender, the governor in council may determine whether any purpose for which lands in a reserve are used or are to be used is for the use and benefit of the band. (2) the minister may authorize the use of lands in a reserve for the purpose of indian schools, the administration of indian affairs, indian burial grounds, indian health projects, or with the consent of the council of the band, for any other purpose for the general welfare of the band, and may take any lands in a reserve required for those purposes, but where an individual indian, immediately prior to the taking, was entitled to the possession of those lands, compensation for that use shall be paid to the indian, in such amount as may be agreed between the indian and the minister, or, failing agreement, as may be determined in such manner as the minister may direct. (section 18) 8 according to the indian act (department of justice canada, 2006): (1) “band” means a body of indians (a) for whose use and benefit in common, lands, the legal title to which is vested in her majesty, have been set apart before, on or after september 4, 1951, (b) for whose use and benefit in common, moneys are held by her majesty, or (c) declared by the governor in council to be a band for the purposes of this act. (section 2) 13 spence and walters: "is it safe?" published by scholarship@western, 2012 such as governance, cohesion, the nature of relationships with governments (provincial and territorial) and federal institutions directly involved in safe water issues (i.e., health canada, indian affairs, and environment canada), expenditures directly and indirectly supporting access to safe water, retention of qualified water personnel, and attention at the local, regional, and national levels directed towards the issue (drinking water advisories, radio and news broadcasts, etc.). for example, if we turn back the clock to events in proximity to the collection of the 2001 aboriginal peoples survey, we are reminded of the tragedies in walkerton and north battleford. although not aboriginal-specific events, they garnered significant media attention, public awareness, and increased monitoring of the situation in first nations communities. this attention was far from universal across all first nations communities, as evidenced by a headline on november 10, 2000, when residents in about 215 communities in newfoundland were under a boil water advisory and the cbc posted the national headline “hundreds of newfoundland communities get ‘boil water’ order” (2000). as noted in the article, this was a product of a review prompted by the e. coli tragedy in walkerton, ontario. this reflected the state of drinking water conditions, but it also had the effect of raising the profile of this issue, particularly for those residents in the area, likely affecting perceptions of their drinking water. perhaps coincidentally, newfoundland/labrador reported the highest degree of concern regarding the safety of drinking water in the home. the urban-rural divide did not prove to be a key distinction in the final model; however, the effect of residing in the arctic was important with those residents being more concerned about the safety of drinking water in the home. this is somewhat consistent with previous findings examining the relationship between isolation and safe water (health canada, 2009). specifically, this partially supports the idea that communities with larger populations and less isolation will have better institutional mechanisms in place for ensuring the safety of water given the difficulties of delivering services to widely dispersed and isolated populations. for those individuals in the far north (arctic), these issues are particularly relevant. variability within the first nations population given the findings, it is clear that there is a high degree of diversity within the first nations population onreserve. this is often missed as issues, such as colonialism for example, are typically framed in a simplistic manner, that is, in reference to the general population or the common experiences of first nations. we found that there is much variability in perceptions of safe water across a host of socially relevant factors, which is consistent with studies examining a variety of other issues in this population (white et al., 2008). this work is also consistent with more general research in risk perception from sociologists and anthropologists highlighting the dangers of homogenizing the mechanisms driving these social processes across different cultural groups and contexts (wildavsky & douglas, 1982). we strongly emphasize the role of diversity among first nations to understand not only intergroup social inequality (focus of most research), but also intragroup social inequality, leading to the development of appropriate policy in terms of water and other associated issues. more specifically, in terms of policy, the diversity documented in this work provides a starting point for the development of appropriate interventions to communicate risk information effectively on an essential health concern. given the ongoing issues surrounding access to safe water for first nations in canada, any policies and programs must be examined from objective (e.g., boil water advisories) and subjective (e.g., perceptions of safe water) perspectives. vast “objective” improvements in the quality and quantity of water will not be fully realized if residents continue to be skeptical and their perceptions negative. the implications for the development of risk communication strategies that take into account the unique factors outlined in this paper and are sensitive to the historical context of safe water for this population will pose great challenges. not only must the dissemination of such information be “aboriginal friendly,” it must take into consideration the heterogeneity within this group to truly connect in an effective manner. thus, risk communication strategies may be most successful when designed in the presence of community-based partnerships with researchers and policy personnel. the integral role of localized risk communication and risk management approaches is a direct implication of these findings. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.9 limitations of data for research and policy the use of secondary data in this analysis has many advantages for both research and policy, such as the national coverage of first nations on-reserve, a group often excluded from surveys or sampled in a manner not amendable to hypothesis testing, with limited generalizability for large-scale public policy decision making. despite its merits, there are limitations with the 2001 aboriginal peoples survey, and we will discuss a few of them with hopes that it will encourage policymakers and researchers to create relevant data on this issue. we begin with the operationalization of measures in the dataset. many indicators were not appropriate, given the research question at hand. for example, the dependent variable used in this analysis, risk perception of drinking water in the home, was operationalized as a categorical variable as opposed to a continuous variable. this prevented us from assessing the degree of risk perception reported by respondents. not only would a more appropriate measure be useful for research, but, from a social policy standpoint, tracking changes in the magnitude of risk perception over time would be possible to gauge progress and the perceived seriousness of the issue in a more precise manner. next, the availability of concepts and measures associated with risk perception of drinking water was limited in the survey, excluding salient factors such as organoleptics, institutional processes, public trust, water chemicals and microbiological parameters, and impersonal and interpersonal information sources about water (see doria (2010) for a comprehensive list). these concepts have all been given strict attention in the literature, but we currently have no such measures within the context of first nations on-reserve at a national level. this is a serious issue, as tracking perceptions across a wide range of indicators and relevant determinants will be necessary to understand the process of risk perception among this group and develop appropriate improvements. unfortunately, the coverage of the aboriginal peoples survey changed to the offreserve population exclusively in 2006; therefore, related comparisons through time are no longer feasible with this survey. future surveys, such as the one conducted by ekos research associates incorporated for health canada in 2009, are a step in the right direction, providing some more in-depth insights into safe water issues for first nations on-reserve. however, given the literature on the issue, there are some important elements that remain uncovered in any existing data, which informed policymaking will demand, particularly given the major ongoing changes within the realm of water policy. moving on, in terms of limitations of the data, risk perception of the safety of drinking water in the home may be capturing other social processes and concerns of individuals on reserves. it has been shown that risk perceptions may not simply be about the risk issue at hand, but they may actually be a proxy for other social and ideological concerns (doria, 2010; slovic, 1987; wildavsky & douglas, 1982). similarly, there is evidence that the link between citizen participation, institutional trust, and environmental issues is important to ameliorate environmental inequity (williams & florez, 2002). for the first nation population, the social conditions on reserves, across all measures of health and well-being, continue to be unacceptable (white et al., 2008). therefore, the measure in this analysis may be capturing concerns about broader social policy and inequality issues of residents. the data did not allow us to tease out these different effects. from a policy perspective, failure to take these issues into consideration could complicate assessments aimed at tracking progress specifically directed at water. pushing forward, the degree to which first nations on-reserve perceive the risk related to drinking water may be underreported in this survey. the relatively poor conditions on-reserve across a range of social indicators, including drinking water, compared to the general population are well documented. as mentioned earlier, risk perception research has documented that increased contact with a “threat” is associated with individuals becoming accustomed or habituated to its presence, a phenomenon known as “the normalization of risk” (halpern-felsher et al., 2001; lima et al., 2005). for first nations, the inability to access safe drinking water has been an ongoing issue experienced first-hand in many communities. also, communication channels 15 spence and walters: "is it safe?" published by scholarship@western, 2012 disseminating this information more readily than ever before create a common awareness among this vulnerable group, and many individuals may become desensitized to the dangers and the risk normalized. policymakers will need to take this issue into consideration in assessing risk perception survey research on safe water. lastly, data collection in the future and associated research and policy must ensure that attention is paid to the lived experiences and social practices of the individuals affected by this issue, as it is through these processes that perceptions are formed and internalized. thus, community engagement is the way to proceed. indeed, when people are directly engaged in dealing with an issue, in this case safe water, they will “buy in,” and, through involvement (knowledge) and taking ownership, a more sophisticated view will be developed. in other words, true partnerships that are inclusive of communities are required for effective research, understanding, and policy to develop. overall, we suggest that the issues be approached by using mixed methods. conclusions our work has added to the body of research on the intersection of risk perception, the environment (water), and a key determinant of health, developing an understanding among a vulnerable population in canada, first nations on-reserve. it was demonstrated that one dimension of stratification, racialized identity, must be a point of focus in risk perception research to contribute to the more general goal of understanding and reducing inequalities in health related to this issue. what has become painfully obvious is that “safe water” is no longer primarily a technical problem, as the advances in technology have been profound over time. we suggest that the solutions and focus must lie with the social world. in that respect, we propose an analytical approach to drinking water that is inclusive of risk perception along with contributions from the social determinants of health literature. while research and policy addressing this specific issue are dominated by work examining the “objective” dimensions associated with safe drinking water and the related policy framework and processes which may influence it, this research has examined a less followed path looking at the subjective dimensions associated with access to safe drinking water. although the social processes affecting risk perception have shown some similarities to other research and populations, there are also unique issues, founded on race and ethnicity, such as colonialism, ongoing struggles with canadian institutions, poor social conditions, and the diversity within first nations across social indicators that we examined, which deserve much more attention. the uphill battle in improving the safety of drinking water on first nations reserves will be a long one. this work cautions stakeholders that objective improvements in many of the issues brought forth in research and policy papers, such as training of personnel, sampling and testing, design, construction, operation, maintenance of water systems, governance issues, funding, and legislation surrounding water quality standards and practices, are no doubt of the utmost importance (aboriginal affairs and northern development canada, 2012; auditor general of canada, 2011; simeone, 2010), but the commensurate changes in risk perception and consumer behaviour must be seen as a related, but separate, issue. we suggest that perceptions of safe water are a useful complement to objective assessments offering new insights into this complex problem. no doubt, the ability to translate improvements in objective conditions (i.e., a reduction in technically defined risk) into reduced subjective perceptions of risk is far from simple, contingent on effective risk management and risk communication among other things. these understandings must be examined in greater detail in conjunction with changes in policy and programming aimed at addressing the ongoing technical risks related to water in too many first nations communities. positive changes can only be fully realized if such information can be managed appropriately and communicated effectively to those affected, influencing risk perceptions and drinking water behaviour. this is no small feat; for example, dupont et al. (2010) have found that even in the general canadian population, where issues surrounding safe water are largely an irrelevant 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.9 issue “objectively,” the majority of citizens believe that bottled water is safer than tap water. furthermore, the broader social context in which these developments occur cannot be separated from historical events, the legacy of mistrust, and the ongoing hideous social conditions on many reserves. no doubt, many challenges exist, and in our view changing perceptions must be a long-term policy goal. 17 spence and walters: "is it safe?" published by scholarship@western, 2012 references aboriginal affairs and northern development canada. (2012). water. retrieved from http://www.aadncaandc.gc.ca/eng/1100100034879/1100100034883 allison, p. (2002). missing data. oakland, ca: sage. anadu, e. c., & harding, a. k. 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(2008). introduction: the contribution of sociology to the discourse on risk and uncertainty. in j. o. zinn (ed.), social theories of risk and uncertainty: an introduction (pp. 1-17). malden: blackwell publishing. 23 spence and walters: "is it safe?" published by scholarship@western, 2012 the international indigenous policy journal september 2012 “is it safe?” risk perception and drinking water in a vulnerable population nicholas spence dan walters recommended citation “is it safe?” risk perception and drinking water in a vulnerable population abstract keywords creative commons license microsoft word 317297-text.native.1352735563.doc capacity-building and participatory research development of a community-based nutrition and exercise lifestyle intervention program (nelip) for pregnant and postpartum aboriginal women:information gathered from talking circles. the international indigenous policy journal volume 2 issue 1 health and well-being article 8 may 2011 capacity-building and participatory research development of a community-based nutrition and exercise lifestyle intervention program (nelip) for pregnant and postpartum aboriginal women:information gathered from talking circles. michelle f. mottola the university of western ontario, mmottola@uwo.ca maggie m. sopper the university of western ontario lindsay doxtator the university of western ontario katie big-canoe the university of western ontario harry prapavessis the university of western ontario recommended citation mottola, m. f. , sopper, m. m. , doxtator, l. , big-canoe, k. , prapavessis, h. , harris, s. , hanley, a. (2011). capacity-building and participatory research development of a community-based nutrition and exercise lifestyle intervention program (nelip) for pregnant and postpartum aboriginal women:information gathered from talking circles.. the international indigenous policy journal, 2(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.8 this research is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. see next page for additional authors capacity-building and participatory research development of a community-based nutrition and exercise lifestyle intervention program (nelip) for pregnant and postpartum aboriginal women:information gathered from talking circles. abstract objectives were to gather information from talking circles of aboriginal women who participated in a maternal nutrition and exercise lifestyle intervention program (nelip) to identify strategies to bring nelip into the community. twelve first nations women participated. several main themes were identified regarding health: balance, knowledge/education and time management. benefits of the nelip were improvement in health, stamina, stress, and a healthy baby, no gestational diabetes and a successful home birth, with social support as an important contributing factor for success. suggestions for improvement for the nelip included group walking, and incorporating more traditional foods into the meal plan. the information gathered is the first step in determining strategies using participatory research and capacity-building to develop a community-based nelip for pregnant aboriginal women. keywords talking circles, healthy lifestyle, women, pregnancy acknowledgments the authors sincerely thank the southern ontario aboriginal diabetes initiative (soadi) for their partnership in the use of the “ribbon of life” for our talking circles; especially roslyn baird, program director; carol loft, diabetes prevention coordinator-eastern region and barbara whiteye, diabetes prevention coordinator-western region. the authors also wish to acknowledge and thank vivian peters – coordinator, and debbie dolson – liaison counsellor, indigenous services, university of western ontario. funding for this project was provided by the canadian institute of health research: institute of aboriginal peoples’ health. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. authors michelle f. mottola, maggie m. sopper, lindsay doxtator, katie big-canoe, harry prapavessis, stewart harris, and anthony hanley http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ introduction health disparities, where less affluent members of a population suffer from higher morbidity and mortality than those more prosperous, present major public health and social justice concerns (frohlich, ross & richmond, 2006). the evidence for patterns of health disparities in canada and the suggested mechanisms for these patterns are based on the interaction of several social determinants of health, including aboriginal status, income and where an individual lives (frohich, ross & richmond, 2006). poor health outcomes in aboriginal people (first nations, inuit and metis) are related to reduced access to health resources and opportunities, to lack of knowledge and education based on poverty and income, and inequitable access opportunities to safe neighbourhoods and health services in relation to other canadians (frohich, ross & richmond, 2006). development of policies relating to aboriginal health must first address the mechanisms for the pattern of health disparities, be flexible enough to consider the interplay of the determinants of health between aboriginal communities (large and small) and consider the interaction of health at both the micro and macro levels (jacklin, 2009). policy makers responsible for aboriginal health should initiate policy development at the micro level by listening to the health needs and wants of members of the community. this will allow community and health planners to make recommendations and focus on root causes leading to prevention of disease and on the cultural and community strengths of empowerment to improve health. this would send a strong message to the governmental level of policy development that each community has a different approach to health improvement, supporting intra-community diversity that underlines the importance of self-determination and emphasizes the strength of cultural healing and disease prevention for aboriginal people, based on the needs of the collective members. policy makers and planners could then create more effective policies and programs and direct community resources more appropriately and efficiently. at the macro level, society may then understand the challenges faced by aboriginal peoples and communities, reversing the portrayal of a sick population, by emphasizing strengths, healing and disease prevention (jacklin, 2009). health disparity indicators show that the life expectancy of aboriginal people is lower, infant mortality is higher, diabetes rates are double, and obesity rates are higher, compared to non-aboriginal people in canada (garner, carniere, sanmartin, & lhad research team, 2010; carriere, garner, sanmartin, & lhad research team, 2010). health policies aimed at disease prevention rather than treatment at the micro level may help decrease health disparities in the aboriginal population. as one example, first nations people with diabetes were more likely to be overweight and less likely to exercise compared to the general population (bobet, 1997). when questioned, first nations people with diabetes perceived their disease as a health problem and although many believed that community-based nutrition awareness programs would help, almost no-one mentioned exercise as a solution (bobet, 1997). the message that exercise combined with healthy eating, or a healthy lifestyle reflecting the traditional (time-honored) way of life, can help prevent or manage diabetes and other health related problems, should be reinforced in the aboriginal population, starting at the micro level, one individual at a time, using programs that are culturally specific to each individual community. health disparity indicators for aboriginal women have shown that this sub-population group has many risk factors for chronic disease. aboriginal women have a greater body mass index (bmi) than nonaboriginal women and a central body fat patterning that places them at high risk for obesity and gestational diabetes mellitus (gdm) (young, 2001). about 30% of aboriginal women with type 2 diabetes reported that their condition was first diagnosed during pregnancy (young, o’neil & elias, 1997). gdm has been shown to be a predictor of type 2 diabetes and obesity later in life for both mother and offspring (young et al., 1997). if gdm is a significant initiating factor in the type 2 diabetes epidemic in aboriginal populations then prevention of gdm may lead to lower rates of type 2 diabetes in successive generations (dyck, klomp, tan, turnell, & boctor, 2002). 1 mottola et al.: talking circle information regarding a healthy lifestyle program for women published by scholarship@western, 2011 although pregnancy is a vulnerable time for excessive weight gain and gestational diabetes development, it is also an opportune time for the initiation of community-based intervention programs, since pregnant women can be motivated to adopt healthy lifestyles to benefit fetal health. in traditional aboriginal cultures, women are the givers of life and are highly respected in this role (grace, 2003). within the aboriginal community, pregnant and post-partum women are major caregivers for other children, holding a powerful influence on lifestyle, including both eating and activity habits for young children before they attend school. targeting pregnant women, many of whom also have pre-school aged children, may lead to prevention of excessive weight gain and diabetes through healthy living; subsequently, these health outcomes and habits can be passed on to children through a communitybased program. there is a growing acceptance among aboriginal communities for traditional forms of healing (grace, 2003). in order to understand fundamental concepts of aboriginal health, a holistic definition of health and the notion that there are differences between communities is imperative (dowling, 1999). many aboriginal communities commonly describe health and well-being in terms of the spiritual, emotional, physical and mental (or intellectual) aspects of the whole person (malloch, 1989). bartlett (2005) used this approach in examining the health and well-being of metis women in manitoba using a “talking-circle methodology” (gathering wisdom and knowledge), in which symbolism grounded in aboriginal culture and tradition was used for data collection. participants were asked to hold a symbolic object (a stone) when speaking, which provided spiritual space to reflect deeply and personally, while facilitating active listening of the others in the circle (bartlett, 2005). a facilitator was used to ask specific questions of the group (eyler et al., 2003a, 2003b) and to direct the object to each participant (bartlett, 2005). a recorder or transcriber was also present to track and record the statements of the group participants. data were processed through synthesis of descriptive narratives by coding transcribed statements, and then each talking circle narrative summary was analysed for themes (bartlett, 2005). one of the major themes identified was that an important motivating factor for metis women in maintaining well-being was grounded within a sense of community (collectivism) rather than individualism and that most health promotion continued to focus on the individual. this approach did not support the metis women’s community orientation to life. they concluded that health was expressed as involving physical aspects of life while well-being included holistic integrated dimensions of spiritual, emotional, physical and intellectual/mental aspects (bartlett, 2005). based on these findings and others, it is important to understand the views and culture of aboriginal peoples, including their perception of body image, physical activity and healthy foods (gray-donald et al., 2000), in order to improve the health disparities found in canada among aboriginal women. we have developed an intervention tool consisting of nutritional control and healthy eating in combination with an individualized walking program for pregnant and post-partum women, called the nutrition and exercise lifestyle intervention program (nelip) that prevents excessive weight gain during pregnancy and helps regulate blood glucose concentrations in overweight women at risk for gdm (mottola et al., 2010). from the original study, 26% of these participants were aboriginal women. the description of nelip is published elsewhere (mottola et al., 2010) but briefly consisted of a meal plan based on nutritional therapy of smaller meals more often with carbohydrate-intake controlled, and distributed throughout the day, modified from the meal plan given to women with gdm (gunderson, 1997). the exercise intervention consisted of walking for 25 minutes per day, 3-4 times per week, increasing the time by 2 minutes per week until 40 minutes was achieved (mottola et al., 2010). from the original nelip, a specialized meal plan was developed in partnership with two aboriginal dieticians who incorporated more traditional foods for the aboriginal participants while the walking program remained the same. each participant was required to come to the research lab to exercise once per week and to be monitored (body weight, blood pressure, and capillary glucose pre and post exercise), or one 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 8 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.8 member of the research team would meet the participant, monitor her and walk with her in her community. our original longitudinal intent was to collect information concerning health at the individual level relating to participation in nelip in order to facilitate the development of a community-based intervention for pregnant and postpartum aboriginal women. figure 1 outlines the strategies we intend to follow for a successful nelipresearch-based community program with dissemination of knowledge to all partners and stake holders ultimately leading to improvement in community health. in developing the community partnership program we recognize all partners in the research process: researchers, community health workers, and the women participants. the information discussed in the present study resulted from the talking circles of the aboriginal participants. these were held to determine each woman’s views and beliefs regarding health and how the nelip could be used to develop a communitybased program, which represents the first element or stage in the initiation of capacity building and program development. objectives the objectives of the present study were to bring together talking circles of those aboriginal pregnant and post-partum women who participated in the nelip. all four aspects of health, spiritual, mental, physical and emotional, were examined. the information gathered by these talking circles was used to help us identify the potential strategies for success in developing a community-based program and to identify themes regarding barriers (reasons for not being able to participate), and strategies to overcome these barriers to the nelip. methods capacity building is an important component in community-based research development (pegler, debruyn, burrows, gilbert, & thompson, 2003). we partnered with indigenous services at the university of western ontario in order to give first nations senior students the opportunity to learn about community-based participatory research and aboriginal talking circle methodology. two first nations research assistants worked with a first nations facilitator, who was experienced in focus group and talking circle methodology. the hired facilitator was highly recommended by indigenous services. several meetings took place prior to the talking circles with advisors from indigenous services, the researchers and the facilitator to discuss the questions and format to be used. the students learned key practical applications to community-based qualitative research and assisted in transcribing the discussions from the talking circles. based on figure 1, this was the first in a series of capacity-building initiatives in which there was knowledge and experience gained for first nations university students who will be future workers and advocates for aboriginal communities. from the original nelip (mottola et al., 2010), 27 pregnant aboriginal women who were living either on-reserve 1 1 living within a first nations or indian band community as defined by statistics canada – cat. # 97-558-xie2006001 or off-reserve participated. from this initial recruitment, 17 women who lived within driving distance were contacted by the first nations research assistants and 12 women agreed to participate in the talking circles. transportation costs were covered, and incentives, babysitting and healthy foods were provided at each talking circle meeting. all women gave informed consent and approval was given by the health sciences ethics review board at the university of western ontario. 3 mottola et al.: talking circle information regarding a healthy lifestyle program for women published by scholarship@western, 2011 through our partnership with the southern ontario aboriginal diabetes initiative (soadi), we were able to use a culturally relevant resource called the “ribbon of life”. the ribbon of life was also adopted by the national aboriginal diabetes association as the national symbol of diabetes awareness among aboriginal people in 2006. we partnered with soadi to develop and modify the ribbon of life as a symbol for pregnant aboriginal women to help increase the awareness of preventing gestational diabetes. in the original ribbon of life, there are 4 ribbons which represent the four seasons and the importance of exercise, healthy eating, stress management and medicine, in addition to the 4 aspects of human nature, spiritual, emotional, physical and mental (soadi). the four colours of ribbon (white, black, yellow and red) represent all the different nationalities that are dealing with diabetes. the ribbon of life may be adapted to resemble each individual’s origin, by positioning the beads on the appropriate colored ribbons (soadi). there are seven blue beads that represent water that sustains life and represents seven generations. the ribbon without any beads signifies, for example, the aboriginal person with diabetes and how individuals stand in their aloneness with this disease (soadi). the modified ribbon of life (figure 2) consists of one ribbon with three beads (one of which is the original blue) that represents the family. the red bead symbolizes the pregnant mother, indicating mother earth and women. the smaller green bead represents the baby and symbolizes new life and renewal. these additional beads were added to symbolize women who are dealing with gestational diabetes (soadi). the importance of the ribbon of life is the necessity of balance and regaining health when one has diabetes. through our partnership with soadi, the ribbon of life was used as a neutral symbol for the talking circles, since not all of the participants came from the same community and all women could relate to gdm prevention; one of the initial objectives of our program. all talking circles began with a smudging ceremony conducted by the facilitator, assisted by the two research assistants. all of the individuals in the room were of first nations descent. researchers were not present in order to encourage the women to speak honestly about the program. one research assistant projected blank templates of a circle on a screen to assist the participants in answering the questions. the first circle projected illustrated the 4 sides of a medicine wheel to represent the 4 aspects of one’s health, i.e., spiritual, emotional, mental and physical. the second circle projection represented self, family, community and nation. participants were asked to hold the ribbon of life as the talking circle symbol when speaking. this represented a neutral symbol and one that all could relate to in gestational diabetes prevention. the facilitator asked specific questions of the group (eyler et al., 2003a, 2003b) and directed the object to each participant (bartlett, 2005). the facilitator acknowledged the direction the “talking circle” took – either clockwise or counter clockwise and this direction was agreed upon by the group. the person holding the ribbon of life was the only person speaking and answering the questions posed by the facilitator. the facilitator also made sure that each person had the opportunity to speak first while still keeping the circle going in the appropriate direction. each person’s response was typed into the appropriate area of the circular templates projected on the screen by the first research assistant. the second research assistant ran the audiotape and kept notes on procedure. questions asked by the facilitator were: 1) “what does being healthy mean to you – think about this in regards to the holistic or whole person (the mental, physical, emotional, and spiritual)”? based on the response of the individual, the facilitator ensured that each aspect of health corresponded to the 4 sides of the medicine wheel (template projected on the screen). if the participant did not mention a certain aspect of health, the facilitator would respond by saying, “what about the emotional aspect?”, for example. the facilitator also made sure that each person not only focused on nelip but also considered all aspects of health. once the facilitator ensured that each participant spoke, each person was asked if there was anything else that could be added to the discussion. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 8 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.8 2) “how can your health or certain aspects of your health be improved?” again the role of the facilitator was to “peel away” layers of the conversation and to probe into all aspects of the individual’s health – based on the above question. 3) the facilitator then briefly described nelip as a nutrition and exercise lifestyle intervention program which led into the next question, “what did you find beneficial for your health in taking part in the nelip?” the facilitator continued the holistic theme of health as stated above and prompted each individual to consider all aspects of health. the facilitator continued with the question, “what was successful for you in taking part in the nelip?” and then asked, “what barriers did you have to overcome to make it successful for you?” if the individual responded that nelip was not successful for her, the facilitator responded by asking, “why did nelip not succeed for you?” and “what barriers existed that prevented you from being successful in the nelip?” for the above questions regarding barriers, the facilitator inquired as to when these barriers or obstacles occurred during the program, if and when there occurred a change in barriers, and what helped the participant overcome these barriers. the answers to the following questions below were projected on a circle template reflecting four areas: self, family, community and nation. 4) “how can we improve our nutrition and exercise lifestyle intervention program?” “what can we do to help you participate more or how could we have helped you incorporate healthy choices into your lifestyle while you were pregnant and going through nelip?” (self) 5) “how can we assist other pregnant first nations women in joining the nelip?” (family) 6) “what would be the best way to initiate a community-based program?” (community) 7) “how best can we involve the community as a whole?” the facilitator followed up with “how can we start involving the community as a whole, who to contact, what may work, what barriers or obstacles may be present and how may we overcome them?” (nation) at the end of the session, the facilitator asked each participant if there were any other issues that should be raised or discussed upon reflection of the responses typed into the projected circle templates. participants agreed that the responses projected on the screen summarized the reflections of the discussions. validity of response occurred when the participants verified the research summaries projected on the screen (struthers, hodge, geishirt-cantrell, & decora, 2003). all participants were given a ribbon of life kit to assemble in order to reflect upon diabetes prevention. each session was audiotaped, with permission of the participants, and the tapes were transcribed verbatim by the research assistants. inductive content analysis (patton, 1990) was used to allow for an in-depth exploration of the holistic determinants of health (spiritual, emotional, physical and mental/intellectual) in relation to the questions asked. data were processed through synthesis of descriptive narratives. each talking circle summary narrative was analysed for themes (bartlett, 2005). all aspects of the inductive content analysis were consensually validated through a process of achieving mutual agreement relative to the final themes and categories that emerged from the descriptive narratives (lincoln & guba, 1985) separately by the research assistants. in order to validate and reduce the bias in interpretation, the separate analysts achieved mutual agreement in the compilation of narrative quotes. a computerbased program (nud*ist-qsr n6 2002) was also used in 5 mottola et al.: talking circle information regarding a healthy lifestyle program for women published by scholarship@western, 2011 which the narrative quotes were entered into the computer and clusters and commonalities were identified by a research assistant who did not attend the talking circles. results participants of the 12 women who agreed to participate, all identified themselves as first nations descent, and all grew up and spent most of their adult life living on a reserve. seven women were currently living off-reserve at the time of the current study. four talking circles were held with at least 3 women present each time. three was determined as the number necessary to generate discussion (bartlett, 2005). the talking circles were held at the university of western ontario and all women were reimbursed for their travel costs. talking circle results talking circle themes were identified (table 1) for each question. with regards to question 1, in which each participant reflected on her definition of health and what being healthy means, many found it hard to put into words. one woman suggested that, “..making choices for self at the right moment – whether that is eating healthy, being active or sleeping”. another said “…that combining all of those (spiritual, emotional, mental and physical) to be in balance with all areas working together and make you feel good, if one is not in balance than you are not healthy”. it was apparent that all four aspects of health must be in line for the whole person to be considered healthy. question 2 referred to how each woman’s health and well being could be improved. many women identified knowledge and seeking out information as an important aspect to improve their health. in addition one woman suggested that for her it was important “…to identify what areas you need to work on and identifying where you need assistance, …whether it is to see a doctor, or a dietitian and then following through with that decision”. one participant said that “remembering who i am and where i came from and going back to cultural ways” was important for improving her spiritual health. other important aspects of improving health were making time or time management to include all aspects of health in everyday life. upon reflecting on what was beneficial to each participant’s health through the nelip, answers to question 3 appeared positive. education and increasing one’s knowledge in healthy eating and being physically active were considered beneficial. one participant said that .. “our people just don’t know….i learned a lot … (through) good advice and knowledge”. another said that “..they (the researchers) were very understanding about us, culturally and accommodating”. one individual said that the “one on one was key, …the sample menus were easy to follow and i learned a lot about food and options of healthy food”. others felt that learning how to read nutrition labels on foods was also valuable. with regard to the walking component, many women liked to use a pedometer as a motivator to increase their daily step counts to keep active. one respondent said that … “i liked that it is a flexible program and the daily walk turned into a family walk after dinner”. when asked about the individual successes they achieved as part of the nelip many women commented that a healthy baby, managing sugars and gestational diabetes prevention were very important. one participant commented that “having a healthy and successful pregnancy and just proving to the doctors that just because you had one unhealthy pregnancy it’s not inevitable that the next one will be unhealthy”. in addition, one respondent commented that 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 8 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.8 “…it was a good pregnancy and i was, i guess with this program i just felt, the support (and) the information made me keep off the weight i guess and i knew i was eating healthier for my baby….i trusted that things were going to be ok..my goal was, i had always wished to have a home birth but because of my sugar levels that was never something that was possible……care had to be transferred to an obstetrician… so that was always my goal (home birth) ….and i was able to not have to have a doctor and not have to give birth in a hospital so i was really grateful this last time, and i just, i can’t say how much i am grateful for this program..” many women attributed social support as an important factor contributing to the success of the program. with regards to overcoming barriers to be successful in the program, many women who lived outside the city said that travel and coming into town once per week were barriers they had to overcome. in addition, these women also said they did not like to drive alone to and from their community, which they had to overcome to be successful in the program. in addition, lack of motivation and scheduling issues were barriers at times, but seeing weekly progress helped with motivation. when asked how nelip could be improved (question 4), a few women suggested incorporating more cultural or natural foods such as corn into the meal plan and improving the options for transportation to the lab. one participant also suggested that it would be important for researchers to understand the difficulty women encountered when changing their eating habits and beliefs, especially when the rest of the family did not want to. one way to overcome this was to include the partner and other family members in the program. one respondent said that .. “not just focusing on the pregnant mom but the family altogether cause to create your whole family healthy … because they started to eat a little better because i had to…” when asked how we could make the nelip more accessible to other aboriginal women (question 5), the participants said that awareness, more advertisements, presence at community health fairs, and bringing the program into first nations communities were important ways to make the program more accessible. one woman suggested that “word of mouth” and “bringing the program out to the reserve” were also important. she also suggested that a first nations participant be important as a “role model” to speak about the program to other pregnant women in her community. when asked how to initiate the community aspect of the nelip (question 6), one participant suggested that .. “let your community know then you have community support.. and i know that is a really hard thing from experience…also too.. like parents and grandparents involvement….but if they actually understood it (gestational diabetes prevention) then they would have that knowledge to be more supportive….when they cooked their meals it might be more healthy too”. one woman suggested “really getting in those first providers of care and getting the word out through them… try to find a fun way of getting people involved…. come read about gestational diabetes and we’re gonna, i don’t know have a party, i don’t know…finding innovative ways to get people to participate… i’m not sure how to do it but find a way to get the younger moms involved…. we have a lot of young moms and they are healthy and fit but that’s the last thing from their mind is i’m going to be unhealthy but try and get them to see their future too”. the notion to include all first nations women, not just those at high risk for developing gestational diabetes, appears to be important because all women need to follow a healthy lifestyle in order to give birth to a healthy baby. in addition, the women recommended that there should be support from administration (band and council), and a qualified individual from the community to supervise a community walk to make it accessible for all participants. to make this more feasible, one suggestion was “to incorporate the program into something they have already established with not a whole lot of extra work on top … to create partnerships between this program and community health services”. one participant suggested 7 mottola et al.: talking circle information regarding a healthy lifestyle program for women published by scholarship@western, 2011 …“maybe through having a stroller parade and be a part of community events… do something creative.. who has the best dressed stroller creation and have a little prize, or ribbon… making exercise fun…a get fit mommies team .. using creative things”. many of the community suggestions can also be used to involve first nations people as a whole (question 7). one respondent suggested starting with “one person at a time and then building into family and the whole community”. education attainment and the transfer of knowledge about the program were also important. the final thoughts on the program before closing the talking circles were quite positive. one participant said, “i know the program helped me… i wouldn’t want to see it go away…i hope that it’s here and i hope we can expand it”. another woman summarized by saying, “it seems like its catching on… hopefully it can continue… healthy habits i picked up from the program, the walking and the eating… its helping me with my family and my children are benefitting and also my husband too… i think it starts with yourself and you know.. you can make a lot of changes with other people too… so i would like to see other women benefit from this program…that’s why i am here today is to, you know, do what i can to help because it helped me..” discussion some of the main mechanisms and social determinants for health disparities in canada are aboriginal status, income and where an individual lives (frohlich, ross, & richmond, 2006). although these are important mechanisms that identify health disparities, aboriginal people have identified many determinants of health that are specific to their well-being. in a recent report six determinants of health from first nations and inuit community health representatives across canada were identified: balance, life control, education, material resources, social resources and environmental/cultural connections (richmond & ross, 2009). in the small population of aboriginal women who participated in a nutrition and exercise lifestyle intervention program (nelip) many themes were identified that corresponded to some of these determinants of health. the two main determinants identified by both the onand off reserve women appeared to be balance and knowledge/education. “being healthy” means that a balance exists between all aspects of health; the emotional, physical, spiritual and mental. if one aspect of these four components is not in balance it is critical to have knowledge and seek out information to restore the balance. rest and having a quiet spirit and communicating a healthy lifestyle to family members were also identified as being important aspects of a holistic healthy person. one additional theme that emerged in the context of the improvement and maintenance of an individual’s overall health was time management. time management was important in life control as a determinant of health because the participants were empowered to control their environment and make it healthy for the growing baby as well as for themselves. many participants discussed the importance of knowledge attainment relating to gestational diabetes and how to prevent it through healthy living. they commented on the educational materials they were given, the social support, and being accountable to others helped keep them motivated and on track. social support has been listed as an important determinant of health in aboriginal communities and those communities seemingly reported healthier populations (richmond, 2007). it appeared that a successful program should have many levels of social support, from the individual’s support-seeking behaviour (downstream – educational attainment to make healthy choices, richmond, 2007) to a greater support system in the community (administration) and beyond (upstream, richmond, 2007). among aboriginal women, all types of social support were related to thriving health (positive health outcomes) (richmond, ross, & egeland, 2007). perhaps the network of support offered by nelip provided empowerment for each participant, providing her with motivation and the skills necessary to continue down the pathway to improved health. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 8 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.8 feedback from the participants regarding food and nutrition from the nelip indicated that many women said they learned about healthy food choices, reading nutrition labels on packaging, simplifying menus, and nutrition benefits to their children. unhealthy food cravings were diminished. participants also commented on the benefits to their health as they reported increased stamina, less stress, a healthy baby, no gestational diabetes and a successful home birth, in addition to quitting smoking. suggestions for improvement for the nelip included group walking with other women, incorporating more traditional foods into the meal plan, and assistance in how to change eating habits when the rest of the family does not want to. reverting back to traditional foods and being active were identified as environmental/cultural connections, as these were listed in the health determinants that improved the quality of health for aboriginal people (richmond & ross, 2009). childbirth as a spiritual life event in aboriginal cultures has a great impact not only on the woman giving birth but also on her family and community (lalonde, butt & bucio, 2009). aboriginal midwifery is an important part of many communities and being able to give birth at home with a traditional midwife was important to one of the participants. she was not able to accomplish this before because she had trouble controlling her blood sugar. however, by getting her health back in balance through healthy eating and walking, she was able to achieve this goal and deliver at home, with the assistance of a traditional midwife. one limitation of the present study was that there was a mixture of offand on-reserve women, who had to drive into the city to participate. however, all participants grew up on reserves and were familiar with community life. regardless of location, all women were enthusiastic about the development of a community walking program. many women suggested that a walking program would be an effective way to improve the health of community members. they also suggested ways to increase community participation by advertising at health fairs and in schools, offering more incentives, making exercise fun, using aboriginal role models as success stories, visiting other communities with successful participants, and by providing transportation or an accessible and safe location for the walking program. in addition, successful community walking programs must have sufficient infrastructure such as a community centre, safe walking trails (no off-leash dogs) or sidewalks. all communities are different but without administrative (band and council) support and a role model or champion from that community, advertising and awareness of diabetes prevention, the chances of success would be limited. community involvement is another important aspect of capacity-building and community empowerment to improve the health of each member. talking circles have been used as a traditional pattern of intragroup communication specific to aboriginal communities (becker, affonso, & blue horse beard, 2006). they have been used to provide culturally rich group discussions, stories about how a participant thinks and feels about specific topics (becker et al., 2006). in addition, talking circles were used as an intervention to supply education about diabetes to on-reserve american indians (struthers et al., 2003). in the current program, talking circles were an effective means of gathering information and may, in the future, be used to teach, educate and pass on knowledge relating to gestational diabetes and diabetes in general for the pregnant and postpartum women in aboriginal communities. this may be an important first step in partnering, capacity-building and sharing information about healthy eating and lifestyle to start the communitybased nutrition and exercise lifestyle intervention program. future directions based on the talking circle information presented, the nelip program will be adapted to combine community needs with research expertise, in order to meet the needs of each woman in her own community. this strategy is the first step in the plan of capacity-building and participatory research 9 mottola et al.: talking circle information regarding a healthy lifestyle program for women published by scholarship@western, 2011 development of a community-based program. based on the results of the talking circle themes, reasons for the success of our program and potential ways to overcome the barriers to becoming healthy through nutrition and exercise lifestyle changes were presented. the participants determined how best to involve more of the community as well as reported individual successes in the program. one of the best ways to ensure community involvement and social support in the future is to include community health representatives. by including community health care workers in future talking circles, in addition to pregnant and post-partum women participants, the “voice” of the community would be emphasized, which encourages all participants to reveal strengths and to identify barriers that pertain to the effective implementation of preventing gestational diabetes in the community (boston et al., 1997). through this participatory research investigation, courses of action and recommendations can be planned to overcome the potential barriers to participation (boston et al., 1997). the findings of these talking circles will be incorporated to improve the nelip as an ongoing collaborative process between the community and the research investigative team. in the next phase of development, using participatory action research, we aim to utilise this forum where equal partners meet, enter into dialogue and share knowledge, experience and expertise (boston et al., 1997, pegler et al., 2003) on how best to develop strategies for a community-based program to prevent gestational diabetes and excessive pregnancy weight gain using nelip for aboriginal women. as we progress through this process of capacity-building, we aim to disseminate the knowledge gained to all partners and stakeholders, develop new community partnerships, expanding into a program that can be utilized by all aboriginal communities to improve prenatal and postnatal health care. by starting at the individual level, building upon and listening to health care needs for disease prevention, expanding to the community and health care workers, community and health planners can make recommendations to health policies focusing on cultural and community strengths to improve health and prevent disease, diminishing health disparity indicators for aboriginal women and their families. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 8 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.8 table 1 talking circle themes were identified from each question question themes question # 1what does being ‘healthy’ mean to you? eating well exercise balance knowledge resting communication question #2how can your health and well-being be improved? expanding knowledge exercise time management eating well question #3a) what was beneficial to your well-being and health through participating in nelip? 3b) what did you consider the successes achieved for ‘self’? 3c) what were some barriers you overcame to achieve your successes? 3a) gdm education access to dietician social support walking having a home birth staff understanding participants positive effects diabetes prevention 3b) successhealthy baby healthy eating home birth diabetes prevention improved quality of life childcare 3b) barriersmotivation transportation time management question #4how can nelip improve to help you in terms of participation and incorporating healthy choices into your lifestyle (during pregnancy and afterwards)? travel cultural recipes question #5how can we assist/encourage other pregnant first nations women to join in nelip? awareness education incentives aboriginal role models bring to communities question #6what advice would you give to improve the community aspect of nelip? band/administrative support education community involvement walking groups question#7how best can we start involving first nations people as a whole? band/administrative support family involvement education 11 mottola et al.: talking circle information regarding a healthy lifestyle program for women published by scholarship@western, 2011 figure 1. the plan of capacity-building and participatory research development of a community-based nutrition and exercise lifestyle intervention program (nelip) for pregnant and post-partum aboriginal women. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 8 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.8 figure 2. in partnering with the soadi, the ribbon of life was used as the talking circle symbol to represent the aboriginal woman’s struggle to prevent gestational diabetes. 13 mottola et al.: talking circle 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(2006). health disparities in canada today: some evidence and a theoretical framework. health policy 79:132-143. garner, r., carriere, g., sanmartin, c., & lhad research team. (2010). the health of first nations living off-reserve, inuit, & metis adults in canada: the impact of socio-economic status on inequalities of health. statistics canada. cat. # 82-622-xno. 004. grace, s.l. (2003). a review of aboriginal women’s physical and mental health status in ontario. can j public health 94, 173-175. gray-donald, k., robinson, e., collier, a., david, k., renaud, l., & rodrigues, s. (2000). intervening to reduce weight gain in pregnancy and gestational diabetes mellitus in cree communities: an evaluation. cmaj 163, 12471251. gunderson, ep. (1997). intensive nutrition therapy for gestational diabetes. diabetes care 20(2), 221–226. jacklin, k. (2009). diversity within: deconstructing aboriginal community health in wikwemikong unceded indian reserve. soc sci med 68, 980-989. lalonde, a.b, butt, c & bucio, a. (2009). maternal health in canadian aboriginal communities: challenges and opportunities. jogc 31(10), 956-962. lincoln, y.s., & guba, e.g. (1985). naturalistic inquiry. sage publications. newbury park, ca. malloch, l. (1989). indian medicine, indian health: study between red and white medicine. canadian women studies 10(2-3), 105-112. mottola, m.f., giroux, i, gratton, r., hammond, j, hanley, a, harris, s, mcmanus, r, davenport, m, & sopper, m. (2010). nutrition and exercise prevents excess weight gain in pregnant overweight women. med sci sports exerc .42(2):265-72. patton, m.q. (1990). qualitative evaluation methods (2nd edition) sage publications: newbury park, ca. pegler, j. debruyn, l., burrows, n., gilbert, e.d., & thompson, j.l. (2003). sharing a vision of hope for diabetes care and prevention among american indian and alaska native communities: the national diabetes prevention center. j public health man pract nov(supp), s26-s29. richmond, c. (2007). narratives of social support and health in aboriginal communities. can j public health. 98(4), 347-351. richmond, c., ross, n.a., & egeland, g. (2007). social support and thriving health: a new approach to understanding the health of indigenous canadians. am j public health. 97(9), 1827-1833. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 8 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.8 richmond, c., & ross, n.a. (2009). the determinants of first nation and inuit health: a critical population health approach. health & place. 15, 403-411. struthers, r., hodge, f., geishirt-cantrell, b., & decora, l. (2003) participant experiences of talking circles on type 2 diabetes in two northern plains american indian tribes. qualitative health research 13(8), 1094-1115. young t. k., o’neil, j. d., & elias, b. (1997). chronic diseases. chapter 3. in first nations and inuit regional health surveys. published by the first nations and inuit regional health survey national steering committee, canada. young, k. (2001). impact of obesity on canada’s aboriginal peoples. in: a national dialogue on healthy body weights: summary of proceedings. cihr-nutrition, metabolism & diabetes & obesity canada: toronto, ont. p. 5-6. 15 mottola et al.: talking circle information regarding a healthy lifestyle program for women published by scholarship@western, 2011 the international indigenous policy journal may 2011 capacity-building and participatory research development of a community-based nutrition and exercise lifestyle intervention program (nelip) for pregnant and postpartum aboriginal women:information gathered from talking circles. michelle f. mottola maggie m. sopper lindsay doxtator katie big-canoe harry prapavessis recommended citation see next page for additional authors capacity-building and participatory research development of a community-based nutrition and exercise lifestyle intervention program (nelip) for pregnant and postpartum aboriginal women:information gathered from talking circles. abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license authors capacity-building and participatory research development of a community-based nutrition and exercise lifestyle intervention program (nelip) for pregnant and postpartum aboriginal women:information gathered from talking circles. navigating structural violence with indigenous families: the contested terrain of early childhood intervention and the child welfare system in canada the international indigenous policy journal volume 8 | issue 3 article 6 july 2017 navigating structural violence with indigenous families: the contested terrain of early childhood intervention and the child welfare system in canada alison j. gerlach national collaborating centre for aboriginal health, university of northern british columbia, alison.gerlach@telus.net annette j. browne school of nursing , university of british columbia, annette.browne@ubc.ca vandna sinha centre for research on children and families, mcgill university, vandna.sinha@mcgill.ca diana elliott aboriginal infant development programs of bc, bc association of aboriginal friendship centre's, delliott@bcaafc.com recommended citation gerlach, a. j. , browne, a. j. , sinha, v. , elliott, d. (2017). navigating structural violence with indigenous families: the contested terrain of early childhood intervention and the child welfare system in canada. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(3). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.6 navigating structural violence with indigenous families: the contested terrain of early childhood intervention and the child welfare system in canada abstract internationally, the welfare of indigenous children continues to be severely compromised by their involvement with child welfare authorities. in this context, there are calls for greater investment in early childhood programs to support family preservation and children’s well-being. this article reports on the findings from a critical qualitative inquiry undertaken with aboriginal infant development programs (aidps) in canada. the findings highlight how aidp workers’ relational approaches countered indigenous mothers’ experiences of feeling "like a bad parent" as a result of their involvement with the child welfare system and how workers navigated an increasingly close relationship with this system. we draw on the concept of structural violence to discuss the impact of the child welfare system on indigenous families and aidps. keywords aboriginal, child welfare system, residential schools, children, early intervention, structural inequities, neglect, family well-being acknowledgments we extend our sincere appreciation to all the participants in this study who generously shared their time and knowledge. we also wish to recognize dr. melinda suto at the university of british columbia and dr. margo greenwood at the university of northern british columbia for their contributions to the larger study on which this article is based. development of this paper was supported in part by a doctoral award held by the first author with the canadian institutes for health research. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ n a v i g a t i n g s t ru c t u ra l v i o l e n c e w i t h i n d i g e n o u s f a m i l i e s : t h e c o n t e s t e d t e rra i n o f e a rl y c h i l d h o o d i n t e rv e n t i o n a n d t h e c h i l d w e l f a re s y s t e m i n c a n a d a state1 intervention in indigenous2 families’ and children’s lives continues to be an apparently normal aspect of many contemporary settler colonial societies (tilbury & thoburn, 2011). in canada, child welfare policies have been described as constituting “a broader colonial system” that has become “so fully naturalized as to be mostly invisible, especially to settler-colonists” (de leeuw, 2014, p. 60). in this socio-political landscape, indigenous leaders and child advocates have long called for a greater emphasis on, and investment in, early childhood programs that support both family well-being and preservation as well as children’s optimal health and development (aboriginal children in care working group, 2015; hughes, 2013; john, 2016; representative for children and youth, 2011). currently, the influence of and relationship between the child welfare system and indigenous-specific early childhood programs has yet to be adequately examined or addressed. this article draws on the findings from a larger critical inquiry conducted in british columbia (b.c.), canada, with a province-wide indigenous early childhood intervention program, the aboriginal infant development program (aidp; gerlach, 2015). the study explored how aidps both influenced families’ and children’s health and well-being and fostered child health equity (gerlach, browne, & suto, 2016). aidps provide an entry point for examining the influence of, and relationship between, the child welfare system and indigenous-specific early childhood intervention programs. in this article, we focus on the findings that show: 1. how aidp workers were increasingly drawn into state mechanisms of surveillance and intervention; 2. how workers’ strengths-based relational approaches provided a critical counter narrative to indigenous mothers’ experiences of being disempowered, judged, and required to prove themselves to the state in order to keep, or reclaim their right, to raise their children; and 3. the tensions aidp workers experienced as they navigated an increasingly close relationship with the child welfare system. we start with an overview of the socio-historical context of indigenous families’ and children’s experiences of state intervention, and of indigenous early childhood programs. next, we describe and discuss our study and its research design. following this section, we discuss the findings, which center on four themes: • helping mothers and children to make sense of what’s happening; 1 by using the term “state,” we draw from fiske (2006) who noted, “we have yet to find an alternative concept to describe the comprehensive power exerted by governing authorities over citizens’ daily lives” (p. 248). 2 in this article, the term “indigenous” denotes “a collective history among indigenous peoples of the world regardless of borders” and, in the canadian context, is inclusive of all peoples who self-identify as having indigenous ancestry, including first nations, métis, and inuit peoples (canadian institutes of health research, 2014, p. 2). 1 gerlach et al.: navigating structural violence with indigenous families published by scholarship@western, 2017 • resisting the judgment of “bad parent”; • being drawn into a crisis-oriented system; • becoming “the eyes of the ministry.” finally, we close with a discussion about the implications of the increasingly complex relationship between aidps and the provincial child welfare system in b.c., and we conclude by offering several policy recommendations. t h e s o c i o h i s t o ri c a l a n d po l i t i c a l c o n t e x t o f s t a t e i n t e rv e n t i o n there are an estimated 1.4 million indigenous peoples in canada, who make up 4.3% of the country’s total population (statistics canada, 2013). prior to colonization, indigenous children were frequently raised, cared for, and educated within extended and interdependent systems of relationships, which helped to ensure their safety and well-being (irvine, 2009). however, multiple generations of indigenous children have grown up denied of their families, communities, and ancestry as a result of historical and ongoing colonial policies and practices underpinned by assimilation, paternalism, and protectionism (mckenzie, varcoe, browne, & day, 2016). for over 100 years, the state attempted to assert canada’s nationhood through a legislated and mandatory residential school system (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015). children as young as 5 years old were removed, by force if necessary, from their families and home communities to attend state funded, church-run residential schools3 (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015). syilx okanagan scholar, writer, and activist armstrong (1996) has described this system as “the single most devastating factor in the breakdown of our society. it is at the core of the damage, beyond all the other mechanisms cleverly fashioned to subjugate, assimilate, and annihilate” (p. x). children’s experiences of physical punishment and emotional and sexual abuse, together with the absence of healthy and loving relationships with their siblings, parents, and extended families continue to impact indigenous families and communities today, with many parents struggling to care for themselves and their children (cull, 2006; truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015). today, the continuity of colonial state power is structured through the contemporary child welfare system (mckenzie et al., 2016), which is upheld by enduring patriarchal and racialized discourses that portray indigenous women as “unfit” mothers and their children as “at risk” (cull, 2006; de leeuw, 2014). in the province of b.c., where this research took place, indigenous children currently comprise 8% of the total child population and 53% of the child population living in “out-of-home care” (representative for children and youth, 2013). across canada, more indigenous children have been removed from their families by child welfare agencies than were removed at the peak of the residential school system (canadian human rights tribunal, 2016). first nations children (who make up 66% of indigenous children) are investigated for maltreatment related concerns at a rate 4 times higher than non-indigenous children (sinha, ellenbogen, & trocmé, 2013). 3 residential schools were operated under partnerships between the federal government and the catholic, methodist, anglican, and presbyterian churches, with the explicit goal of transforming indigenous children into “de-indigenized” adults (de leeuw, 2009). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.6 the primary driver of indigenous overrepresentation in the child welfare system is neglect4 (sinha et al., 2011, 2013), which, for both indigenous and non-indigenous families, has been closely linked to both poverty and other caregiver household factors, such as challenges related to single parenting, overcrowded housing, caregiver mental health, and substance abuse (connell-carrick, 2003; sinha et al., 2011; trocmé et al., 2006). for indigenous families, these factors have been shaped by colonial, canadian, and provincial or territorial policies (evans-campbell, 2008; royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996; truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015). these policies include the construction of systems for assessing various forms of neglect, in which the default is to operationalize neglect as the failure to comply with normative (i.e., non-indigenous) standards of parenting behaviour (combs-orme, wilson, cain, page, & kirby, 2003; hearn, 2011). moreover, canada’s child protection approach to child welfare means that agencies are poorly equipped to support families struggling with chronic risk factors that are associated with neglect. the canadian system is rooted in an anglo-american approach that emphasizes individual caregiver responsibility for children, restricts child welfare intervention to relatively serious cases, focuses on investigation in order to determine whether children are exposed to harm or at serious risk of harm, and uses out-of-home placement as a key measure to protect children (cameron, freymond, cornfield, & palmer, 2007; gilbert, 2012; swift, 2011). per this approach, investigation serves to document the ways in which parental action or inaction places children at risk of harm and to inform the development of plans to protect children from future harm. over the last decade, child welfare systems grounded in this approach have adopted more child development and family support focused elements (gilbert, 2012). in b.c. for example, families that meet the threshold for being screened into the child welfare system, but are assessed as having a relatively low risk profile, are streamed into a non-investigative service track, which features collaborative approaches to determining and supporting family needs (fallon et al., 2015; merkel-holguin, kaplan, & kwak, 2006). nonetheless, a child protection mandate remains at the core of the b.c. child welfare system. this focus is clearly reflected in provincial legislation,5 in which the majority of clauses focus on “child protection” or “children in care,” and the need for protection is explicitly linked to parental infliction of, or failure to prevent, physical or emotional harm to a child. given this mandate, the provision of supportive services to help prevent “neglect” and other forms of child maltreatment are inadequately recognized or addressed (cameron et al., 2007; gilbert, 2012). as we examine in this article, the tendency of the child welfare system to emphasize neglect from an individualistic perspective has significant implications for indigenous early childhood programs. 4 neglect can result from the influence of individual, family, social, and structural factors on the ability of a parent to meet their child’s basic needs. from a social work perspective, neglect tends to be defined as including both “failure to provide minimum care” and “lack of supervision.” from this perspective, neglect represents a risk of serious harm to a child and thus meets the legal standard for state intervention. the concepts of neglect and “failure to provide minimum care” are often not clearly or consistently delineated (blumenthal, 2015). 5 in b.c., child welfare is governed within the legal framework of the child, family, and community service act (2016), which was originally passed in the legislative assembly in 1996 and was amended in 2011. child welfare in b.c. is administered and funded through the ministry of children and family development. 3 gerlach et al.: navigating structural violence with indigenous families published by scholarship@western, 2017 i n d i g e n o u s e a rl y c h i l d h o o d pro g ra m s in response to the persistent overrepresentation of indigenous children in state “care” in canada, there have been renewed calls from both indigenous communities and leaders as well as child and youth advocates for proactive, community-based early childhood programs and services (auditor general of alberta, 2016; hughes, 2013; john, 2016; representative for children and youth, 2013; truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015). in canada, as in similar settler colonial societies, early childhood programs that are designed and delivered specifically for indigenous families and children have become an established feature of the community landscape—primarily in response to indigenous leaders, communities, and families reasserting their roles and rights with respect to what they want for their children (british columbia aboriginal child care society, 2014; greenwood & jones, 2015; guilfoyle, sims, saggers, & hutchins, 2010; kaomea, 2012; mitchell, tangaere, mara, & wylie, 2006; wise, 2013). high quality indigenous early childhood programs are increasingly viewed internationally as critical sites for pursuing cultural and language revitalization and as pathways to the collective health and well-being of indigenous families and communities (grace & trudgett, 2012; greenwood & jones, 2015; guilfoyle et al., 2010). internationally, key features for quality programming include: • a grounding in indigenous knowledges, values, and ways of caring for young children; • community governance, involvement, and accountability; • a broad and relational view of health and well-being; • family and elder involvement; • comprehensive and coordinated programs; and • sustainable funding and structural supports (ball & le mar, 2011; british columbia aboriginal child care society, 2014; greenwood & de leeuw, 2006; guilfoyle et al., 2010; mitchell et al., 2006). aidps are unique to b.c. and emerged from an established mainstream infant development program in 1992. aidps workers, who typically have backgrounds and training in early childhood education, provide home visiting, outreach, and/or centred-based early intervention for indigenous families with young children. as identified in this research and reported elsewhere, aidps are characterized by their use of relational perspectives towards family well-being, which emphasize the inseparability between maternal and child health, the influence of structural social factors on families’ life circumstances, and broader, socially responsive scopes of practice (gerlach et al., 2016). there are currently 49 aidps of varying size across b.c.; they are administered and hosted by a diverse range of indigenous and mainstream community-based organizations in on-reserve and off-reserve communities. host organizations in on-reserve communities receive funding for aidps primarily from the federal government, whereas off-reserve communities receive funding for aidps from the provincial ministry of children and family development (mcfd)—the same ministry that is responsible for administering and funding the child welfare system in the province. currently, there is no explicit policy framework in place to guide aidps’ relationship with the child welfare system. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.6 m e t h o d s a n d m e t h o d o l o g y a detailed description of this study’s research methods has been outlined in an earlier publication (gerlach et al., 2016) and is summarized here. this qualitative study was undertaken by the primary author and guided by a community research partner (crp), the provincial leadership of the aidp, with whom the primary author had a long-term research relationship prior to beginning this study. this study was grounded in relational epistemologies (thayer-bacon, 2003; wilson, 2008) and postcolonial feminist (j. anderson, 2002; browne, smye, & varcoe, 2007) and indigenous feminist (k. anderson, 2000; larocque, 2007) theoretical perspectives. using this comprehensive theoretical and analytical framework, we sought to reveal how intersecting microand macro-level social, historical, and political relations and factors shaped indigenous families’ and children’s everyday lives, health, wellbeing, and experiences with aidps. pertinent to the findings discussed in this article, an unforeseen consequence of using this theoretical lens was that it revealed how aidps were influenced by broader social and structural contexts, including the provincial child welfare system. this research was undertaken in seven urban-based aidps that are hosted by diverse community organizations in four distinct regions of b.c. the primary author conducted semi-structured individual and small group interviews (see appendix for summary of interview guide) with a total of 35 participants. these participants consisted of: aidp workers (n = 18), indigenous women caregivers (n = 9), indigenous male caregivers (n = 1), elders (n = 4), and administrators of host organizations (n = 3). the findings in this article are centered on the indigenous women caregivers, including eight mothers and one auntie who were aged between 30 to 48 years, had between one and eight children under the age of 18 years, and had varied educational and employment histories. the majority of the mothers in this study reported that their children had been removed from their care while the mothers were in late adolescence or young adulthood. all of the aidp workers were women aged 30 to 58 years. eight selfidentified as indigenous and 10 as euro-canadian, and they had on average 20 years of experience in mainstream and indigenous early childhood programs. the elders who participated (n = 3 women, n = 1 man) had been actively involved with an aidp for many years. the administrative leaders who participated were indigenous (n = 1) and euro-canadian (n = 2) and had many years of experience working with organizations that provided support to women, families, and children. using procedures described for narrative data (braun & clarke, 2006), preliminary thematic analysis was undertaken concurrently with data collection. the primary author used a qualitative software program, hyperresearch©, to help organize and code transcribed interview data. analytical themes were identified and subsequently refined, clarified, and synthesized into findings through immersion with the data. strategies to strengthen the credibility of the analysis included seeking feedback from the crp and indigenous early childhood stakeholders at two community meetings in which preliminary analytical insights and framing of the findings were presented, as well as ongoing self-reflexivity by the primary author. the credibility of the findings was further strengthened through both the inclusion of diverse research settings and participant groups (berg & lune, 2012) and the alignment between the research purpose, theoretical framing, and methodology (tracy, 2010). 5 gerlach et al.: navigating structural violence with indigenous families published by scholarship@western, 2017 f i n d i n g s analysis of the findings centers on four themes. the first two interrelated themes of “helping mothers and children to understand what is happening” and “resisting the judgment of ‘bad parent’” focus on how aidps acted as a buffer between families and the harmful effects of state surveillance and intervention. the next two interrelated themes, “being drawn into a crisis-oriented system” and “becoming the eyes of the ministry,” focus on the effects of aidps’ increasingly close relationship with the child welfare system. by presenting these findings, however, we are cognizant that our analysis was not inclusive of the perspectives of child welfare personnel. h e l p i n g m o t h e rs a n d c h i l d re n t o m a ke s e n s e o f w h a t ’ s h a p p e n i n g an unexpected finding of this study was the extent to which aidp workers’ caseloads were full of families who were involved with “the ministry”6 or children who were in the foster care system. as one worker stated: this year is the worst year i’ve had for families involved . . . before it would be like not even half but now it’s like 94% to 96% of my families are involved with the ministry. workers reported that they had had to educate themselves about the child welfare and legal systems in b.c. in order to support parents navigating the often opaque and inconsistent state-mandated requirements. one mother noted, for example: my [aidp] worker helped me to understand all the court information that i needed . . . because i didn’t understand it. even reading the instructions it’s like i don’t understand this. parents often asked workers to help them understand and meet the necessary conditions to either prevent losing custody of their children or to help get their children back. as the following excerpts highlight, workers also “helped parents to make sense of everything” and encouraged them to stay mindful of their children’s well-being during the process of being apprehended. as one mother related: it’s kind of traumatic for a parent to go through things like that with their children and having another person there that can explain things too if you don’t understand is really like heartwarming for the parent, it helps you keep your parent face and keep your strength for your child. one worker provided another perspective, noting: the parents are confused and in shock . . . so they’re going through trauma and they can’t see things clearly. they need clarity and so you’re that person . . . stepping in and helping them to make sense of everything because sometimes they just don’t really understand what is going to happen next. 6 “the ministry” is the term that participants frequently used to refer to the provincial ministry of children and family development (mcfd), which provides child welfare services in five regions through 429 ministry offices and 22 delegated aboriginal agencies. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.6 workers reported that an increasing number of children who were living in the foster care system on a short-term or permanent basis had been referred to them. when workers were notified that children in one of their families were going to be apprehended, they asked to be present in order to support children through this traumatic process. as one worker recounted: i had a relationship with the children . . . but no one was talking to the children. so that was really important to me, to be sitting on the floor and saying to the children, “so what we’re going to do now is we’re going to get some of your things together and we’re going to go in this car,” which if i wasn’t there who’s talking to the children? what’s going to happen? those children were really confused and in shock . . . but being able to stay with them at the home with the foster parents who just met them and the social worker left. as trusted people in families’ lives, aidp workers supported mothers and children to “make sense of what was happening,” and they strived to mitigate the trauma of a system of state surveillance and intervention that has been has been described by the representative for children and youth (2013) in b.c. as “confused,” “unstable,” and “chaotic” (p. 4). in this system, frontline child protection workers’ “chronically heavy workloads, combined with onerous responsibilities for paperwork, have undermined their ability to build the kinds of relationships with children and families that would help resolve safety concerns” (representative for children and youth, 2015, p. 2). r e s i s t i n g t h e j u d g m e n t o f “ba d pa re n t ” as noted by hughes (2013), the child welfare system has historically “focused on investigating and then addressing parental shortcomings or misconduct” (p. 30). in the b.c. context, the framing of child welfare intervention has been linked to parental “failure,” and the child family and community service act (2016) explicitly terms a child in need of protection as a child who has been harmed, abused, or exploited by their parent or another person and whose parent is “unwilling or unable to protect” them (section 13c). consistent with this viewpoint, workers voiced their concerns that mothers were frequently judged in ways that disregarded their positive attributes, achievements, love for their children, and the impact of poverty on their daily lives. workers described supporting mothers who “felt like bad parents” because of their interactions with the child welfare system. one explained: i worked with this mom, she was in tears because she told me that the ministry made her feel bad and made her feel like she was a bad parent and she couldn’t do anything right. the transparent, nonjudgmental, and strengths-based nature of workers’ relationships and interactions with the mothers in their programs provided a critical counter-narrative to women’s experiences of feeling disempowered, judged, and mandated to prove themselves to the state in order to keep, or reclaim their rights, to raise their children. one worked noted, for example: it’s all about relationship. it’s all about these moms who have never been connected to somebody without feeling judged or having to be something . . . if we can go in and just accept them for who they are, right there we’ve done more for that person than anything else. because really that’s what we all want—to belong and to be accepted and not to be told, you have to do 7 gerlach et al.: navigating structural violence with indigenous families published by scholarship@western, 2017 these million and a half things the ministry often does about parenting and i totally get it. and they might say, okay, these are your skills but it always comes with a but. many of the mothers noted that their participation with aidps had helped them “break the cycle of what we went through growing up” and “raise our kids differently from the way our parents raised us.” in alignment with existing research noting opportunities during pregnancy and early parenting to turn around the effects of intergenerational trauma and related substance use (rutman, 2013; smith, varcoe, & edwards, 2005), workers recounted many “success stories” of parents in their programs: and hearing that . . . if mother gets pregnant again that they’re having healthy babies, you know, “oh this time i didn’t use at all. you know i have no concerns for this child because i know i didn’t use at all”—it’s really something to hear. (worker) in her work, métis feminist scholar k. anderson (2000) has referred to a process of positive identity formation whereby indigenous women resist “negative definitions of being” (p. 115). this study’s findings show how aidp workers’ explicit resistance to the child welfare system’s perceptions of indigenous mothers created a relationship in which mothers could exert their resistance to negative definitions of being “a bad parent,” thereby reaffirming their agency in motherhood. however, as we discuss in the following section, workers’ trusting and supportive relationships with and “relational accountability to families” (gerlach et al., 2016, p. 10) often conflicted with their increasingly close relationships with the child welfare system. be i n g d ra w n i n t o a c ri s i s o ri e n t e d s y s t e m workers described the emotional toll of co-navigating opaque and inconsistent state-mandated requirements that determined whether parents would retain or regain their rights to raise, or be involved in raising, their children. as one worker stated: there’s no transparency . . . there’s no honesty. you know it feels like that and i’ve got families that have children in care, families have supervised access and families truly believe that “oh my baby is coming home soon” . . . and there may be no intention of returning baby to family … no they’re just building a case against that family . . . and i mean it’s heartbreaking for me and they’re not my children. workers consistently reported that, despite their long-term relationships with families, they were frequently not informed or “told too late” of a child’s apprehension. in addition, workers expressed their concerns about being drawn into a reactive, crisis-oriented system that undermined their potential to play a preventative or proactive role: it was always in that crisis state rather than that prevention state . . . and it spiked in the last few years. it’s not improving which is what bothers me because i know aidp has that opportunity to do that. the findings also highlighted workers’ frustration with a system that has failed to recognize the structural root causes of families’ living situations and has frequently defaulted to “pulling these kids out of their homes” as the primary solution. as one worker stated: 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.6 often most of the family situations, it was poverty and neglect that was removing these kids, which i just struggle with always because i think rather than spending money and pulling these kids out of their homes and spending money over in this [foster] home, why don’t you spend the money in that family and keep the child intact but that’s not the way it worked. workers reported that “ministry orders” frequently failed to consider families’ incomes. in the following excerpt, a worker describes the expectations the ministry applied to a young family living in a house with multiple occupants: [there are] issues in that family that are deemed by the ministry as unsafe . . . an expectation on that family is to go out and find their own apartment to live together but their income is probably next to nothing. these findings point to a conflict regarding how aidp workers and the child welfare system frame and seek to address “the problem.” the concept of “neglect” has been defined by the provincial ministry as a “failure to provide for a child’s or youth’s basic needs” and “involves an omission by the parent or guardian” (ministry of children & family development, 2016, p. 25). while the child welfare system emphasizes the need to protect the child, aidp workers’ orientation focuses on supporting families. as one worker stated: we all have different agendas or different purposes with a family. so my purpose isn’t going to fit with the purpose of the social worker. these findings also highlighted how aidps’ potential to provide proactive, preventative forms of early intervention with families and children was hamstrung by their increasing pull towards a reactive child welfare system that, as hughes (2013) has reported, is focused on moving from crisis to crisis and lacks the necessary resources to address the impact of poverty on families’ living conditions. be c o m i n g “t h e e y e s o f t h e m i n i s t ry ” embedded throughout the findings of this study were ways in which aidps were shaped by the increasing number of direct referrals from child welfare social workers. for example, although aidp workers repeatedly asserted the importance of their programs’ voluntary nature, the findings show that parents’ participation was increasingly mandated by social workers. in this context, workers described the challenges of engaging with parents: sometimes the social workers do pressure the family to be part of it [the program] because they can see that it would meet maybe some goals that they have or whatever. but because it’s coming from the social worker they [parents] feel they should say yes. but then to follow through with them [the parents] and have conversations with them on the phone they don’t necessarily call you back because they don’t want to. under the provincial child, family and community service act, aidp workers have a legislated responsibility to report and share information about suspected “child abuse and neglect” (ministry of children & family development, 2016). workers described the importance of being clear and transparent with parents, often during their initial interactions, about their “duty to report” and 9 gerlach et al.: navigating structural violence with indigenous families published by scholarship@western, 2017 supporting families where appropriate in addressing any specific concerns in lieu of or prior to initiating contact with the ministry. as one worker noted: i will talk to [parents] first, i won’t run and call the social worker because i don’t think you’ve changed your kid’s diapers in the past hour or you need to clean your house. i will say to them i will bring my concerns to you first, see how i can help you with that, if they’re not addressed then i will contact the social worker. despite this, however, workers expressed concern that they were frequently asked to report back to social workers on issues that were not directly related to a child’s welfare, such as a parent’s participation in their programs. for example, one worker explained: often it’s highly suggested from social workers . . . that parents have a part in our program and i know for me that’s a bit of struggle because . . . they’re not participating, like if the parents aren’t on board . . . and we have to tell the social worker if they decline, and so then they get their hands slapped for not participating right. workers also expressed concerns about being, as one worker described, “the eyes for the ministry” through their close relationships with, and consequent expectations from, child protection workers. for example: we worked really hard at being in contact with the social workers regularly . . . but i think you have to maintain a certain distance . . . [social workers] are not trusting regardless of who they are and where they’ve come from. they work for the institution that has removed many of their kids, and so you have to maintain an arm’s length. in addition, workers frequently noted tension created by the ministry of child and family development’s responsibility for administering and funding b.c.’s child welfare system and early childhood intervention programs, including aidps. as one worker stated: the truth is we’re funded by the system so how are you going to fight the system . . . you do have to be careful . . . at the end of the day we’re there to support families and that’s our role . . . but we’re still navigating the relationship. these findings shed new light on how aidps are being utilized by the child welfare system in ways that create tensions for workers and influence families’ voluntary participation in their programs. while families may undoubtedly benefit from being referred to aidps, these findings raise serious concerns that aidp workers are being pulled, albeit unwillingly, into a system that wells (2009) has described as regulating, disciplining, and governing parents. d i s c u s s i o n in b.c. and across canada, neoliberal modes of governance, which shape contemporary child welfare policies, work to transfer responsibility from the state to individual families (gurstein & vilches, 2011). in this socio-political landscape, “the personal and individualized nature of child welfare work functions to separate mothering work from its context” (swift, 1995, p. 173). thus, locating blame and 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.6 responsibility for change becomes the prerogative of individual, neglectful parents—as opposed to that of the state and its auxiliary agencies (sinha et al., 2013). as we have explored in a previous paper based on this research (gerlach et al., 2016), these findings point to the importance of understanding indigenous families’ experiences of the contemporary child welfare system within the broader socio-historical contexts of their lives (walkem, 2015). this research also illustrates how aidp workers’ resistance to the state oppression of indigenous women was enacted through aidp relational practices that emphasized women’s positive identity and agency in motherhood. a strengths-based relational approach provided a critical counter-narrative to historicallyconstituted and persistent racialized discourses that pathologize indigenous women as unfit and uncaring mothers, thereby legitimizing the need for “child protection” (de leeuw, 2014; maxwell, 2014). aidps’ strengths-based and relational orientation to supporting family well-being (gerlach et al., 2016) is consistent with a transformative approach to the child, family and community services act; this transformative approach has been advocated by indigenous communities and leaders in b.c. (john, 2016; walkem, 2015), and it stands in sharp contrast to the child protection focus of the child welfare system both in b.c. and across much of canada (gilbert, 2012). moving beyond individualistic analyses in our discussion of this study’s findings, we draw on the concept of structural violence. originating from the work of galtung (1969), structural violence has yet to be adequately explored in relation to indigenous children or early childhood programming. the concept is closely aligned with social injustice in that structures and social mechanisms constitute forms of structural violence when they cause harm, deny human rights, constrain human agency, and/or prevent particular individuals and population groups from having the resources necessary to help them reach their full potential while sparing other groups from the same treatment (farmer, nizeye, stulac, & keshavjee, 2007; hanna & kleinman, 2013). the insidious and silent nature of structural violence frequently results in its near invisibility, which prompts its acceptance as “the way things are” (farmer, kim, kleinman, & basilico, 2013, p. 5). adopting a lens of structural violence disrupts the notion of neglect as a “personal problem” (swift, 1995), refocusing attention on the responsibility of governments to recognize and address underlying structural inequities. for example, poverty-reduction policies, particularly for single-parent indigenous families led by women, are central to (a) disrupting the “social reproduction” of indigenous women as negligent (swift, 1995), and (b) reducing the number of indigenous children in care (aboriginal children in care working group, 2015). in addition, child protection workers must be provided with the resources necessary to both adequately address risks beyond those located at the level of individual parents and support family preservation by helping families access basic determinants of health, particularly secure food and housing (hughes, 2013). a failure to address underlying socioeconomic structural inequities means that poverty, as a form of everyday structural violence experienced by a high proportion of indigenous families, will continue to be misconstrued within the child welfare system as “willful parental neglect” (sinha et al., 2013). the prolonged underfunding of the provincial child welfare system in b.c. has left frontline child protection workers overburdened and children under protected (representative for children and youth, 2015). according to the representative for children and youth child (2013) in b.c., child protection workers’ engagement with indigenous families is affected by: 11 gerlach et al.: navigating structural violence with indigenous families published by scholarship@western, 2017 • lack of knowledge about the indigenous children and families being served; • confusion around roles, responsibilities, and mandates in indigenous child welfare; • failures to fund, regulate, and support the development of services required by indigenous children and youth. in this provincial landscape, the inability of child protection workers to meet ministry standards around family engagement and support (representative for children and youth, 2015) has serious ramifications for indigenous families, children, and early childhood programs. this research brings to light how the lack of both a policy framework and targeted funding for family preservation and support services in b.c. (representative for children and youth, 2013) has led to the increasing use of aidps as ad hoc extensions of the child welfare system. moreover, having the same ministry responsible for both child welfare and early childhood programs may have facilitated the silent process by which aidps have become involuntarily enrolled in governing families. while referrals to aidps are consistent with a “family development response”7 to intervention by the ministry (ministry of children & family development, 2016), the increasing rates of referrals from the child welfare system, without increased resources or funding, risks eroding the potential of these programs to limit or prevent families’ interactions with child welfare authorities. moreover, aidps’ growing affiliation with “the ministry” may make some families reluctant to choose to participate in their programs, thereby making it more difficult for all indigenous families and children to receive early intervention. the apparent appropriation and tacit re-colonization of aidps is a serious concern, given that decreasing indigenous families’ access to timely, proactive, and supportive early childhood intervention risks continuing to both “over-police” indigenous mothers (cull, 2006) and over represent indigenous children in state “care.” a limitation of this research is that the majority of caregiver participants were women living in offreserve, urban centers. the absence of teenage parents, particularly those who have grown up in the foster care system, is salient given participants’ concerns that this population is at high risk of having their children apprehended—often from birth. additional research is needed to explore the perspectives of teenaged and male caregivers, and to examine how the relationship between other indigenous programs and services and child welfare authorities is impacting family well-being and indigenous children’s health and health equity. c o n c l u s i o n oppressive structural policies that result in high numbers of indigenous children being removed from their parents and family homes are not historical events, but current lived realities that are apparently acceptable in canadian society. moreover, there is ample evidence that the underfunding, current structure, and “protection first” agenda of the child welfare system is failing to support or improve the “welfare” of indigenous families and children, both in b.c. and across canada (hughes, 2013; lafrance 7 “family development response is an approach that focuses on keeping a child or youth safe while the family stays together and works through its challenges. family development response emphasizes and builds on the family’s strengths and connects them with resources such as counselling, parenting programs and other services in their community” (ministry of children & family development, 2016, p. 49). 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.6 & bastien, 2007; representative for children and youth, 2013; sinha et al., 2011; swift, 1995; tait, henry, & loewen walker, 2013). in this socio-political landscape, federal and provincial governments in canada largely ignore the need to invest in indigenous early childhood programming that could support family preservation and children’s optimal health and well-being, as well as reduce the number of indigenous children in state “care” (hughes, 2013; john, 2016; tait et al., 2013). this study provides insight into how aidps, as a province-wide indigenous early childhood intervention program in b.c., can disrupt the continuities between residential schools and neoliberal child welfare policies, and thereby the transmission of trauma from one generation to the next (mckenzie et al., 2016). importantly, these findings raise concerns about an increasingly close and complex relationship between aidps and the child welfare system. by framing the impact of a chronically underfunded and individualfocused child welfare system on aidps from a perspective of structural violence, we have raised questions about aidps unintentional involvement in the state oppression of indigenous women and children. this article makes visible what is currently happening in b.c., and it has international relevance for all indigenous early childhood and child health programs questioning their relationships with child welfare authorities. po l i c y r e c o m m e n d a t i o n s the following policy recommendations need to be undertaken in close partnership with indigenous leadership in b.c. for the provincial government: a. to make greater investments in indigenous early childhood programs so that they can play a greater role in timely and proactive prevention with all indigenous families and with all indigenous children in the foster care system. for the provincial ministry responsible for child welfare and early intervention programs: a. to develop a policy framework and targeted funding that supports child protection workers in their efforts to provide prevention services for indigenous families, including proactive policies and resources to support families who struggle with chronic poverty. b. to develop a strategic plan regarding how to address the increasing number of families and children being referred to aidps by child welfare social workers. c. to invest in training for all early childhood program workers and social workers who work with indigenous families. this training needs to include: i. the history and impacts of the residential school system, ii. how trauma is manifested in maternal–infant attachment and children’s development, and iii. traumaand violence-informed care. for the aidp leadership: 13 gerlach et al.: navigating structural violence with indigenous families published by scholarship@western, 2017 a. to collect data, which could be used to support increased funding for aidps, on the number of families and children on each worker’s caseload that: i. have been mandated to attend by a child welfare social worker, or ii. have some form of “ministry involvement.” 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.6 r e f e re n c e s aboriginal children in care working group. 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(2011). kiskisik awasisak: remember the children. understanding the overrepresentation of first nations children in the child welfare system. retrieved from http://www.fncaringsociety.com/sites/default/files/docs/fncis-2008-report.pdf 19 gerlach et al.: navigating structural violence with indigenous families published by scholarship@western, 2017 smith, d., varcoe, c., & edwards, n. (2005). turning around the intergenerational impact of residential schools on aboriginal people: implications for health policy and practice. canadian journal of nursing research, 37(4), 38-38. statistics canada. (2013). aboriginal peoples in canada: first nations people, metis and inuit, national household survey, 2011. retrieved from http://www.stratejuste.ca/uploads/3/1/8/4/31849453/aboriginal_release_nhs_briefs_sept _16.pdf swift, k. (1995). manufacturing ‘bad mothers’: a critical perspective on child neglect. toronto, on: university of toronto press. swift, k. 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(2015). wrapping our ways around them: aboriginal communities and the child, family and community service act guidebook. retrieved from http://cwrp.ca/sites/default/files/publications/en/wowat_bc_cfcsa_1.pdf 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.6 wells, k. (2009). childhood in a global perspective. cambridge, uk: polity press. wilson, s. (2008). research is ceremony: indigenous research methods. halifax, n.s.: fernwood. wise, s. (2013). improving the early life outcomes of indigenous children: implementing early childhood development at the local level (issues paper no. 6 produced for the closing the gap clearinghouse). retrieved from http://www.aihw.gov.au/uploadedfiles/closingthegap/content/publications/2013/ctgcip06.pdf 21 gerlach et al.: navigating structural violence with indigenous families published by scholarship@western, 2017 a p p e n d i x : i n t e rv i e w g u i d e f o r pa rt i c i p a n t s i n t e rv i e w q u e s t i o n s f o r a i d p w o rke rs 1. can you describe your program? 2. can you tell me about the families and children who receive your program? 3. can you tell me about your experiences providing aidp? 4. are there any ways that you think your program could improve their services to families and young children? 5. is there anything else that you think i should know about? i n t e rv i e w q u e s t i o n s f o r i n d i g e n o u s c a re g i v e rs 1. can you tell me about your experiences with the aboriginal infant development program? 2. can you tell me about your aidp worker and what it is like when she visits you at home? 3. if you could give advice to a new aidp worker working in your community, what would you say? 4. if you could have whatever you needed for your family and children, what kinds of supports or services would help your family the most? 5. is there anything else that you think i should know about? i n t e rv i e w q u e s t i o n s f o r e l d e rs 1. can you tell me about your involvement with aboriginal infant development program? 2. how do you think the aidp supports families and young children? 3. aidp workers visit a lot of families in their homes—what do you think about home visiting? 4. is there anything else that you think i should know about? i n t e rv i e w q u e s t i o n s f o r a d m i n i s t ra t i v e l e a d e rs 1. prior to starting your current position, what did you know about aboriginal children and their early healthy and well-being? 2. can you tell me about your experiences, as an administrative leader, with your aidp? 3. how do you think aidp supports families and young children? 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.6 4. are there any ways that you think aidp could improve their services to families and young children? 5. is there anything else that you think i should know about? 23 gerlach et al.: navigating structural violence with indigenous families published by scholarship@western, 2017 the international indigenous policy journal july 2017 navigating structural violence with indigenous families: the contested terrain of early childhood intervention and the child welfare system in canada alison j. gerlach annette j. browne vandna sinha diana elliott recommended citation navigating structural violence with indigenous families: the contested terrain of early childhood intervention and the child welfare system in canada abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license navigating structural violence with indigenous families: the contested terrain of early childhood intervention and the child welfare system in canada 10679 cherubini rce.pdf the international indigenous policy journal volume 11| issue 3 july 2020 education in the post-pandemic era: indigenous children and youth lorenzo cherubini brock university , canada, lorenzo.cherubini@brocku.ca recommended citation cherubini, l. (2020). education in the post-pandemic era: indigenous children and youth [editorial]. the international indigenous policy journal, 11(3). https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.10679 education in the post-pandemic era: indigenous children and youth abstract the covid-19 pandemic crisis resulted in more than 100 countries legislating school closures in march 2020. in response, provincial ministries and their respective publicly funded school boards have implemented online learning platforms to avoid disruptions to student learning. for students already ostracized in public education, online learning may serve to further embed them in the proverbial margins. this editorial speaks to the urgency for educators at all levels to prepare for the potentially devastating outcomes on indigenous student learning and progress in post-pandemic public schools and classrooms. the preparation for these realities has to be both immediate and retrospective given the complexities of these unique circumstances that have created interwoven layers of marginalization for indigenous students. keywords indigenous education, indigenous student learning, post-pandemic, covid-19, digital divide, online learning creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0license. 1 cherubini: education in the post-pandemic era published by scholarship@western, 2020 education in the post-pandemic era: indigenous children and youth the covid-19 pandemic crisis resulted in more than 100 countries legislating school closures in march 2020, significantly altering the education of over 860 million children and youth globally (viner et al., 2020). across canada, provincial ministries of education enacted landmark policy decisions to close publicly funded schools, and ontario was among the first jurisdictions in the industrialized world to issue a ministerial order to close schools in an effort to contain the spread of the virus (ontario ministry of education, 2020). in response, provincial ministries and their respective publicly funded school boards have implemented variations of online learning platforms to avoid major disruptions to students’ learning and progress. teachers are required to deliver online learning modules and/or virtual lessons in a timely and grade-appropriate fashion. teachers also will continue to assess and evaluate student progress in accordance with provincial policies. in these unprecedented times of social distancing, online learning appears to be the only recourse in lieu of postponing the education for the just below five million elementary and secondary school students across canada (duffin, 2020). for some students, however, virtual learning is not conducive to learning (szabo et al., 2020). moreover, for children and youths who already feel ostracized in public education, online learning may serve to further embed them in the proverbial margins. this may be the case for many indigenous students across the country who experience a range of educational disparities that are compounded by the lack of infrastructure and support related to the necessary technology to sustain virtual learning (friesen & krauth, 2010; steeves et al., 2010). it should be noted that public education in canada is governed by each respective province and territory, with the exception of first nations education on reserve that receives funding from the federal government to build and operate education infrastructure. indigenous students are disproportionately affected by issues related to higher rates of poverty, substance abuse, and health-related issues (cumming & draper rodriguez, 2019; richards et al., 2010). further contributing to marginalization is the fact that many indigenous students attend schools that do not include culturally informed curriculum and pedagogical practices (cherubini, 2014; philpott & nesbit, 2010) and may have experienced the residual consequences of the residential school era (brade et al., 2003). indigenous students also have higher transient school enrolment and attendance rates compared to indigenous students, contributing to their comparably lower secondary school graduation rates (julien, 2016; puchala et al., 2010).1 consider too that the earnings gap between indigenous and non-indigenous males is cited as ranging from 20% to 50%, with an even wider range for those living on reserve (feir, 2013). the employment rate among indigenous peoples is nearly 25% lower than for non-indigenous people in canada. they also have, on average, lower levels of technology skills, due in part to the systemic barriers related to accessing technology (hu et al., 2019). for students living in isolated indigenous communities, the barriers to broadband internet access, as well as other inequities related to social exclusion, are heightened (subhan et al., 2020). it is interesting, though, that indigenous students living in many of these remote indigenous communities are privy to the traditional land-based teachings and activities of elders (oskineegish, 2014). traditional knowledge and land-based teaching practices may have an even 1 it should be noted that indigenous people represent over 4% of the population in canada. this population has seen a 20% increase between 2006 and 2011, compared to a 5% growth rate among non-indigenous canadians (gordon & white, 2014; statistics canada, 2016). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.10679 greater currency given the closure of schools and places of social gathering. for some, the violations of treaties and land agreements by colonizers, assimilation policies that included removing children from indigenous families, and the indirect repercussions of education policies that discriminate against indigenous learners “locates disadvantage as an inherent and self-evident part of aboriginality” (walter, 2009, p. 2; see also brown, 2019). in the current online learning environments engendered by the global pandemic, the aforementioned inequities experienced by some indigenous students complicate their already marginalized experiences. this editorial, consequently, speaks to the urgency for education ministries, board and school administrators, and classroom teachers to prepare for the potentially devastating outcomes on some indigenous students’ learning and progress in post-pandemic public schools and classrooms. the preparation for these realities has to be both immediate and retrospective given the complexities of these unique circumstances that have created interwoven layers of marginalization for indigenous children and youth. when schools return to normal, educators will have to account for the varying levels of discontinuity of many learners. indigenous students, already in the margins of education policies and practices, may be situated in significantly more complex and nuanced post-pandemic realities. context although canada is ranked quite favourably among organisation for economic co-operation and development (oecd) member countries in terms of delivering an equitable education system, there are educational gaps between higher and lower ses students (castejón & zancajo, 2015; chmielewski & reardon, 2016). students from higher ses backgrounds benefit more from the support networks available to them and from greater access to information and services (anisef et al., 2010). the educational disparities of indigenous students are especially marked by these ses factors (mayor & suarez, 2019). while indigenous people certainly are not a homogenous population, they “do share a common experience with colonization and racialization” (st. denis, 2007, p. 1087). according to schick (2014), indigenous peoples are historically situated as “other” in the social and political contexts of white settlers, which contributes to (and fosters) the despairing socio-economic inequities between indigenous peoples and non-indigenous people (loppie et al., 2014). moreover, the meaningful inclusion of indigenous epistemologies in classrooms to honour indigenous students’ identities is uncommon (cherubini, 2015; miller, 2018), as is the use of indigenous traditional knowledges to strengthen students’ self-esteem (mcdonald, 2011). instead, the hidden curriculum of public schools—representing mainstream white traditions and values—underscores the significance of eurocentric knowledge paradigms and student behaviours that are rewarded and celebrated (rahman, 2013). students’ success in education is largely dependent upon their assuming an identity that may not be their own, as well as their ability and willingness to conform to mainstream schools’ predetermined values and behaviour (kentli, 2009). as watego (2005) suggested, the sociocultural norms related to compliance with mainstream public schools’ expectations are not necessarily familiar to some indigenous students and communities. often, indigenous families and communities are perceived inauspiciously by mainstream educators who attribute indigenous persons’ seeming lack of involvement to disinterest (lea et al., 2011), resulting in fewer opportunities for indigenous students to acknowledge their unique epistemologies and worldviews, which ultimately contributes to feelings of inadequacy and disengagement from formal education (julien, 2016). this may explain the growth of 3 cherubini: education in the post-pandemic era published by scholarship@western, 2020 alternative education programs tailored specifically for indigenous students who have not fared well in mainstream schools.2 in ontario, as an example of one canadian province, ontario native friendship centres oversee 11 different alternative school settings for indigenous youths studying in nontraditional classrooms and earning secondary school credits. quite clear in all of the above context is that for some indigenous students’ success in public education is erratic and elusive. their relationship to mainstream teachers and school policies and practices is often incongruous with the dominant values espoused by the hidden curriculum of schools; instead, theirs is a plurality of social, cultural, and traditional interpretations that in many instances is in stark contrast to eurocentric paradigms of teaching and learning. as a function of these differences, many indigenous students feel marginalized in mainstream public schools and classrooms and cannot distill their unique identities in these socio-political learning climates. discussion the current online delivery models designed to curtail the covid-19 outbreak may serve to position some indigenous students in even more interwoven layers of marginalization in post-pandemic schools and classrooms. consider, first, how the online platforms adopted across the canada may disadvantage indigenous epistemologies based on holistic and communal learning. for indigenous students already struggling with attendance issues due to their disengagement in public education, the demands of online learning certainly are not beneficial. for those students living in poverty who depend on schools for nourishment and health-related services, virtual education essentially will be useless. furthermore, the achievement gap between indigenous and non-indigenous students may be widening significantly during the response to “flatten the curve.” indigenous students may return to post-pandemic classrooms with an even narrower focus on learning and with far less capital to identify and build on their knowledge. this is not to ignore the fact that some indigenous students are prepared to manage the demands of online instruction and are benefitting from the virtual learning. these are the students that have gained from various education policy directives that have commissioned principals, teachers, and other educators to account for indigenous students’ diverse learning needs and preferences (cherubini, 2014). these students have been successful in learning environments that have appealed to their unique identities as indigenous peoples (toulouse, 2013). moreover, since the release of the trc (2015b) final report, there has been a renewed focus on fostering harmonious relationships between indigenous peoples and non-indigenous peoples in a spirit of respect and relationality (cutrara, 2018). the trc (2015a) report’s call to action #62 points to the significance of implementing culturally appropriate curriculum in k to 12 publicly funded schools to promote intercultural understandings that reflect indigenous students’ epistemic and cultural realities. however, one cannot help but wonder if some of the progress made in educational outcomes and in indigenizing education at both the federal and provincial levels will be curtailed and/or eliminated in the wake of the costs incurred by all levels of government in response to the pandemic and in light of the 2 according to winzer’s (1997) research spanning the 1980s and 1990s, nearly 25% of students in canada who were identified as needing specialized help attended alternative education placements. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.10679 impending recovery measures. we need to look no further than the ontario (canada) conservative government’s decision in 2018, despite the trc calls to action and the ontario ministry of education’s (2007) declaration of indigenous education as a priority, to cancel the curriculum writing sessions meant to infuse indigenous content and history into the school curriculum (benzie, 2018). the decision to cancel the project that included elders and indigenous educators from across the province was explained as a cost-saving measure. post-pandemic education systems may be well-served to prepare themselves for mitigating the outcomes of similar decisions. it is imperative, too, to consider how the deficit discourse that typically frames indigenous students and communities in mainstream schools will be accentuated if indeed the learning gaps between indigenous and non-indigenous students are even more pronounced when schools reopen. this may contribute to further racist experiences for indigenous students (see bodkin-andrews & carlson, 2016) and thus result in an increase in inequitable practices (ferguson, 2003). indigenous students may be exposed to an even deeper layer of stereotype threat, described as students’ “perception of their teacher’s negative opinion of their potential [to] create enough emotional dissonance to be detrimental towards their achievement or relationship with the school” (riley & pidgeon, 2019, p. 127; see also hynds et al., 2017). such a threat can be an affront to indigenous students already feeling marginalized and may contribute to their leaving school altogether (dharan et al., 2012). educators may have to reflect on and expand their knowledge of indigenous students’ realities in preand post-pandemic circumstances, and plan for shared interactions with indigenous students, families, and communities. parental involvement contributes to student achievement, just as community collaborations with health and social service agencies enhance student well-being (phillips et al., 2011). by inviting indigenous parents and communities to plan for post-pandemic realities, teachers can learn how to implement culturally appropriate instruction that complements the worldviews students learn at home (pushor & murphy, 2004). it also creates a new way in which indigenous parents can be actively involved in their children’s progress and development in school. in this way, teachers may perceive themselves as working alongside parents in meaningful acts of engagement (pushor, 2012). educators can learn more about the interdependence of child rearing shared by the extended family to support indigenous children in the development of their education (irvine, 2009). by considering thoughtfully the disruptions and distortions of indigenous students’ experiences, teachers will be better able to plan individualized and consistent strategies to (re)engage such students into more inclusive and inviting classrooms. the onus will be on educators at all levels to develop culturally appropriate and informed courses of action in the context of the interwoven layers of marginalization that some indigenous students may bring back to post-pandemic classrooms. there is also the issue of the digital divide that marginalizes some students. indigenous communities have petitioned for greater broadband connectivity and integrated information communication technology and identified them as essential for the delivery of social and education services; further, indigenous communities have cited the high costs of satellite technology to connect northern and remote locations across canada (assembly of first nations, 2016). despite an investment of over $500 million dollars in 2016 by the canadian federal government to extend broadband internet to remote communities, there is still a significant difference in service between urban and remote areas. in prepandemic times, the digital divide prevented students living in remote indigenous communities from having equitable access as non-indigenous students to services and connectivity (ruimy, 2017). to facilitate the successful transition to online learning, the digital divide for some students has only 5 cherubini: education in the post-pandemic era published by scholarship@western, 2020 widened. indigenous students may not have access to the necessary hardware, technical support, or digital skills to successfully negotiate the demands of virtual classrooms (resta & laferriere, 2015). such demands may underscore the disparity between mainstream canadians and indigenous peoples that already existed before the pandemic (koncan, 2014). the lack of infrastructure, expensive technology, sparse support with technology, and the shortage of teachers with expertise in information technology contributes to the digital exclusion of some indigenous students (resta & laferriere, 2015). educators will need to assess the extent to which students were able to connect and engage in their studies during the pandemic and have thoughtful plans for encompassing the wide range of learning outcomes across the digital divide. for those indigenous students attending alternative school settings, the complexities inherent in the tiers of marginalization that divide them from mainstream school systems are not any simpler. indigenous students who have left mainstream schools were already divided from mainstream students (thorne, 2017). if their learning progress has been stifled by online learning delivery models, a return to alternative school may further accentuate their sense of marginalization. one cannot help but wonder how these students will have fared emotionally with having their learning restricted even in alternative settings. the “at-risk” designation applied to students enrolled in alternative education placements already implies a sense of inferiority to mainstream students and contributes to their alienation (julien, 2016). educators need to examine and prepare for these students who may feel unsuccessful and unable to respond positively to the complicated and possibly confusing demands of the alternate school programs, which include students with a myriad of learning needs, styles, and preferences. students are generally scheduled in a single cohort or classroom but are functioning at different levels. this makes programming complex for teachers (accounting and balancing these needs) and often means employing different pedagogical practices to meet the epistemic preferences and interests of these students. teachers will have to create invitational learning environments that recognize the sense of dignity and worth of each student well before any implementation of instructional design. the layers of marginalization may underscore the exceptionally unfavourable circumstances experienced by some indigenous learners. conclusion post-pandemic classrooms, in both mainstream and alternate school settings, will be very different for indigenous students—especially those who were already feeling marginalized prior to the school closures. educators at all levels, from ministry and first nations policy makers to classroom teachers, are commissioned to take intelligent action to address indigenous students’ marginalization when the school bell rings again. such action must account for the socio-economic realities that have historically contributed to indigenous student underachievement in public schools, but also recognize how the online delivery models may have further privileged what in pre-pandemic conditions was already middle-class positioning (see julien, 2016). teachers must remain aware of the implications of deficit discourse as they prepare for what may be even larger learning gaps between indigenous and nonindigenous students, as one of many other inequities. it may be fruitful for mainstream educators to consult community elders and indigenous education leaders in their school communities for guidance on how to successfully address the layers of marginalization experienced by some indigenous students. it may be fruitful for principals and teachers, in their post-pandemic planning, to inquire about indigenous 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.10679 perspectives on land-based education (simpson, 2014) as a means of furthering all students’ knowledge about the importance of respecting the land and all living things. datta (2018) refers to marie battiste’s (mi'kmaq from the potlotek first nation) point that: collective (indigenous and non-indigenous) move/transformation from western to land-based learning does not reject western science; however, battiste challenges current uneven forms of education. through the concept of move/ transformation, she seeks revitalization, which can bridge indigenous and western ways of thinking. (p. 52) given that many outdoor green spaces across the country are considered safer venues in the prevention of the spread of the virus, teachers can consider how land-based education may be a much better alternative to virtual learning. place-based education utilizes hands-on and active learning techniques that may also be more conducive to student engagement than online learning (calderon, 2014). in this way, indigenous students’ needs, ambitions, and abilities can complement teachers’ planned learning goals. by being both retrospective and immediate in their collective and individual responses, educators can aim to represent and honour indigenous student realities, identities, and epistemologies in postpandemic schools and classrooms across the country. references anisef, p., brown, r. s., phythian, k., sweet, r., & walters, d. 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(1997). disability and society before the 18th century: dread and despair. in l. j. davis (ed.), the disability studies reader (pp. 75-109). routledge. the path of creating co-researchers in the file hills qu'appelle tribal council the international indigenous policy journal volume 9 | issue 4 article 1 october 2018 the path of creating co-researchers in the file hills qu'appelle tribal council jessica dieter file hills qu'appelle tribal council, jessica.dieter@fhqtc.com lauren t. mckim heath sciences north research institute, lauren_mckim@hotmail.com jenna tickell health sciences north research institute, jtickell@hsnri.ca carrie a. bourassa health sciences north research institute, cbourassa@hsnri.ca jaime lavallee file hills qu'appelle tribal council, jaime.lavallee@fhqtc.com see next page for additional authors recommended citation dieter, j. , mckim, l. t. , tickell, j. , bourassa, c. a. , lavallee, j. , boehme, g. (2018). the path of creating co-researchers in the file hills qu'appelle tribal council. the international indigenous policy journal, 9(4). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.1 the path of creating co-researchers in the file hills qu'appelle tribal council abstract currently, there is a need for implementing ethical, culturally safe practices when engaging in research with indigenous communities. as a result, best practices in culturally-safe indigenous health research have been created to mitigate the existing barriers in health and health research stemming from canada’s colonial history. this article includes a brief examination of those best practices, including community-based participatory research, ocap® principles, knowledge translation, and positioning communities as co-researchers. furthermore, it provides an overview of a community-based research project that examines community members’ knowledge of and experiences with dementia. the central themes that emerged during this project are also discussed, reaffirming the need for a culturally safe dementia research model in indigenous communities. keywords indigenous community-based research, dementia, indigenous community-based research methods, ethically engaged research acknowledgments we would like to thank the canadian consortium of neurodegeneration and aging for their investment in our research. without their generous support, we would not have been able to extend our research into the communities and collaborate with the file hills qu'appelle tribal council. we would also like to thank the file hills qu'appelle tribal council for all of their dedicated work in assisting us with our community-based project and research. our research team would also like to acknowledge the file hills qu'appelle tribal council community research advisory committee, comprised of elders, nurses, health directors, and community members. without the guidance and support of this committee, we would not have been able to engage in the community in an ethical and inclusive way. finally, we would like to extend our sincerest thanks and gratitude to all of the participants who shared their stories and granted us the permission to share their words with others. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. authors jessica dieter, lauren t. mckim, jenna tickell, carrie a. bourassa, jaime lavallee, and gail boehme http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ the path of creating co-researchers in the file hills qu’appelle tribal council indigenous communities in canada, despite an aggressive colonial history, including policies and practices that have impacted their health and well-being, remain resilient. when engaging indigenous communities to examine the existing health disparities, it becomes critical to use a community-based participatory research model that situates communities as co-researchers and implements ownership, control, access, and possession (ocap®), knowledge transmission, and reciprocal learning principles. this is important because it enhances the relevance and value of the research by including community members. it grounds the research in the real-life experiences of those being researched and creates the potential for ongoing research relationships between researchers and communities. this prevents harmful top-down approaches that recognize academics as experts and objectify participants. it focuses on locally-identified priorities, rather than issues put forth by academics (westfall, vanvorst, main, & herbert, 2006). priorities include using combined education and experience to breakdown stereotypes, acknowledging and resisting colonial practices and beliefs, implementing cultural safety, and learning from past research mistakes. once communities are engaged as “researchers,” they are better positioned for self-determination and can begin to take steps to implement necessary health interventions based on community-identified needs. this article explores the best practices for creating a culturally safe ethical engagement model that can be used when exploring dementia and other related health conditions in first nations communities. specifically, we examine the ways in which several first nations communities in the file hills qu’appelle tribal council (fhqtc) region can access dementia information and support services by engaging community members as a vital part of the research process in order to determine how programming and supports should be delivered. furthermore, we provide a detailed account of the ways in which these communities were ethically engaged through the implementation of a community-based culturally safe research model, which can be used in the future to explore other health topics both in this region and beyond. using non-indigenous health research methodologies when establishing best practices in ethically engaging indigenous communities, it is beneficial to examine previous community-based projects, particularly those that failed to engage communities respectfully. several studies, both from the past and very recently, highlight our colonial history and the opportunistic and exploitative ways in which researchers have interacted with indigenous peoples. this includes the exploitation of indigenous peoples in canada, often at the hands of health or science researchers for the purposes of performing experiments that would be deemed unsafe and unethical to perform on members of the non-indigenous population. evidence was recently discovered which verified that nutritional studies were performed during the 1940s on indigenous children who attended indian residential schools, which were church-run industrial schools funded by the federal government. these nutritional studies examined the links between an inadequate food supply and the negative health outcomes of long-term starvation on the body, such as anemia, significant bone and muscle loss, and brain development (mosby, 2013). the sub-standard living conditions and subsequent malnourishment of these children was considered acceptable—it was seen as an unexpected opportunity to conduct otherwise grossly unethical medical experiments on children (mosby, 2013). this research demonstrates the canadian government’s direct role in this exploitation and exposes the neglect that indigenous children suffered daily (mosby, 2013). 1 dieter et al.: the path of creating co-researchers in the fhqtc published by scholarship@western, 2018 more recently in the canadian arctic, environmental organizations and researchers have been attempting to engage inuit communities in discussions and actions in order to address the impacts of climate change. however, these organizations have not used community-based practices and, as a result, problematic initiatives have been implemented. for example, when ford et al. (2015) began their research, they chose to only consult with local inuit leaders, instead of the longer and more involved process of building a research project with the community. the researchers outlined the research questions and how they intended to do their work without consultation with or input from the community. furthermore, the project lacked long-term funding in order to continue the work of reducing the impacts of climate change once the study was discontinued (ford et al., 2015). eventually, when the project dissolved, the community members who had been employed by the project felt frustration and a loss of power, which increased the vulnerability of this already marginalized population (ford et al., 2015). furthermore, many community members reported that the research methods used, including in-depth interviews, felt intrusive. they were often viewed as a distraction because of the frequency and number of interviews, and because other personal issues within the participants’ lives had to take precedence. others were uncomfortable with the questions asked, as researchers often forced participants to speak about the future world, a concept that does not align with inuit spiritual beliefs (ford et al., 2015). in this case, and in many other examples of researchers working in canada’s indigenous communities, the research was not complementary to or primarily concerned with the community’s overall well-being. these studies are not isolated examples; they point to a larger, systemic concern within indigenous health research. there is often a narrow focus within mainstream health research in indigenous communities that leads to a disproportionate number of studies relating to topics such as diabetes and little to no health information on other issues such as dementia (jacklin, walker, & shawande, 2013). examining past research studies also reveals the historical underpinnings of exploitive health research and ensures similar mistakes are not perpetuated (walters et al., 2009). stereotypes associated with poverty and social problems, which often serve as the foundation for misguided and potentially unethical research projects, must be broken down (fine, weis, weseen, & wong, 2003). these stereotypes may be broken down through indigenous culturally based education programming focusing on health promotion and knowledge specific to indigenous people for all health researchers and health care workers (macaulay, 2009; smylie et al., 2009). these education models must extend to all fields and sectors within health care and should include information about the negative impacts of colonization and the indian residential school system, as well as the role of the social determinants of health. furthermore, there should be a sharp focus on improving education and employment opportunities for indigenous peoples, particularly in the health and health research sectors (macaulay, 2009). we need to advocate for many culturally relevant changes in indigenous health research, such as the inclusion of indigenous-run organizations, the implementation of indigenous knowledge and methodologies, the movement towards positive patient care, and the formation of reciprocal relationships between indigenous communities and the health care system (macaulay, 2009). community-based participatory research (cbpr) principles are integral to fostering these research relationships (walters et al., 2009). as one knowledge keeper stated, “if we have been researched to death . . . maybe it’s time we started researching ourselves back to life” (castellano, 2004, p. 98). this statement acknowledges the complexities that have resulted from non-community-based research within indigenous communities and populations. on the one hand, many indigenous peoples believe that they 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 4 [2018], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.1 have been over-researched because they have experienced few benefits from the research and have rarely been agents of control or change in research. on the other hand, despite these perceptions, there are still areas of health research that go unexamined in indigenous communities. the ethics-based fundamentals of cbpr are autonomy, justice, and beneficence (meaning that research should have beneficial results for the community). cbpr is a widely used research methodology, as it ensures that people will be invested in the project from the beginning and more likely to use the findings to create positive change in their communities (smith & blumenthal, 2012). dementia in indigenous communities in canada: a brief overview there is limited data available regarding the prevalence and incidence of dementia in first nations1 communities in canada. however, it is viewed as an emerging health issue for all indigenous peoples as the rates for dementia are set to double among the general canadian population in the next 30 years and, therefore, will also rise within the indigenous population (jacklin et al., 2013). in fact, many first nations communities are already reporting similar trends in their communities. this has been attributed to several factors including population aging, higher reporting due to increased awareness of dementia, disproportionately higher rates of associated risk factors (including diabetes, high blood pressure, obesity, and smoking); impacts of the social determinants of health such as socioeconomic status, employment, and access to health care services; and co-morbid illnesses (including diabetes and depression; jacklin et al., 2013). dementia has gone underreported, misdiagnosed, and unmanaged for decades in many indigenous communities as a result of a lack of access to health care facilities and services, education, screening, and medications. furthermore, some indigenous peoples view it is a natural part of the aging process, as opposed to a medical problem. this view is shared by many canadian seniors, which can lead to a failure to access necessary and appropriate health care services (cammer, 2006). for example, when talking to aging indigenous women, lanting, crossley, morgan, and cammer (2011) discovered that many seniors viewed dementia as part of the circle of life, where aging and its effects on the brain and body are seen as a transition before passing to the spirit world. this viewpoint may run counter to the information provided by doctors and health care professionals who view dementia as a disease, which can lead to misunderstandings or patient distrust. furthermore, many first nations living on reserve report obstacles to accessing dementia information and health care interventions as a result of language barriers, transportation issues, culturally unsafe care, and a general fear and distrust of the health care system, particularly when the care is provided in larger urban centers (cammer, 2006; forbes, blake, thiessen, & finkelstein, 2013). researching dementia in the file hills qu’appelle tribal council region the file hills qu’appelle tribal council (fhqtc) is an organization that represents 11 distinct indigenous nations from five linguistic and cultural groups —cree, saulteaux, nakoda, lakota, and dakota—and covers a vast section of land in the treaty four territory in southern saskatchewan. the fhqtc is a service delivery organization with a governing body comprised of first nations’ leadership from the member first nations of fhqtc. included in this service delivery model is the commitment 1 in canada, there are three main groups of indigenous peoples: first nations, métis, and inuit. 3 dieter et al.: the path of creating co-researchers in the fhqtc published by scholarship@western, 2018 to providing information and access to services and supports for a wide range of health issues. the organization provides services for health issues that are familiar and unfamiliar, including ever-present and emerging concerns. dementia represents a cluster of unfamiliar diseases and conditions. the prevalence rates are also on the rise in the fhqtc area. this project had two goals: (a) to provide community members with access to dementia information and supports through existing communitybased health initiatives, and (b) to gather input and information about community members’ experiences through focus group discussions. establishing & implementing the principles of ethical engagement in the file hills qu’appelle tribal council region ensuring cultural safety. recent research into successful dementia interventions that yielded positive impacts within first nations communities often focuses on a sharing dementia care knowledge model. this model centres on developing trusting relationships; accessing, adapting, and contextualizing the information provided to fit the perspectives of community members; and applying the information in a respectful manner (forbes et al., 2013). culture plays a significant role in implementing this sharing dementia care knowledge model. the success of dementia programming and services, particularly when looking at indigenous perceptions of normal aging and dementia, relies heavily on the inclusion of the community's cultural needs (cammer, 2006; forbes et al., 2013). for medical interventions to be successful, they must ensure cultural safety. this includes incorporating the voices of community knowledge keepers (previously referred to in some communities as elders). communities are dynamic and fluid and their knowledge and perspectives on dementia have changed over the past century, which means that the causes attributed to dementia and the community’s responses to those affected are not static. throughout the research project, cultural safety was the touchstone that grounded our research goals and initiatives. cultural safety is a broad and complex concept developed originally in the 1980s by indigenous māori nurses in new zealand. cultural safety analyzes power imbalances in health care and the larger society. it addresses institutional discrimination, colonization, and relationships with colonizers as they apply to health care, and it requires an examination of how personal biases, authority, privilege, and territorial history can influence the relationships between health care providers and indigenous peoples. cultural safety relies on both the self-reflection of researchers and the incorporation of critical reflection into the research project through the questions, data analysis, and reporting. a key element of culturally safe practice is establishing trust with the patients or research participants, and culturally safe care empowers people because it reinforces the idea that each person’s knowledge and reality is valid and valuable (brascoupe & waters, 2009). cultural safety is a significant aspect of ethical engagement with indigenous communities (health council of canada, 2012). when people have negative experiences with the health care system, they are less likely to seek assistance in the future, which can have serious implications for the health of the individual and community (health council of canada, 2012). studies have found that when cultural safety is present and indigenous patients feel safe and validated by health care practitioners, their engagement with the health care system increases and negative health outcomes decrease (health council of canada, 2012). cultural safety can be attained through creating a comfortable environment for patients. if indigenous people feel respected and heard, and interactions are collective and mutual, 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 4 [2018], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.1 indigenous community members will begin to feel more comfortable. in addition, when indigenous community members are also the health care providers and non-indigenous providers take part in the learning process, great strides toward cultural safety can be achieved (health council of canada, 2012). cultural safety is possible when health care providers acknowledge their own cultural background, perspectives, and personal biases and how these impact patient care, particularly, when the patient has a cultural background that differs from that of the practitioner. this model hinges on respect for cultural diversity, reciprocity, a redistribution of power, and constant reflection from all parties (health council of canada, 2012). cultural safety and competency are central to the canadian health care system, since equity within health care services is lacking and, as a result, indigenous people are facing a significant deficit that directly affects their health and well-being (health council of canada, 2012). researchers have a responsibility to the communities they work with to “be a champion for cultural safety and provide culturally safe care to first nations, inuit, and métis people” (health council of canada, 2012, p. 64). this includes ensuring that all indigenous patients receive high levels of patient care with a focus on empathy, dignity, and respect (health council of canada, 2012). when cultural safety and competency are practiced throughout the entirety of the research project, ethical engagement with indigenous communities is more likely to be achieved. in order to foster a culturally safe health care system, researchers also need to partake in culturally safe education, implementation, and reflection processes. while engaging in research that works with individuals or communities who are often ignored or silenced, it is important that researchers constantly reflect and question their work and their personal perspective in relation to the participants (fine et al., 2003). when, in an attempt to remain neutral or dispassionate, we fail to reflect as researchers, we are also failing to act socially responsible and, instead, allowing harmful research practices to continue under the guise of researcher “objectivity” (fine et al., 2003, p. 203). cultural safety calls into question this type of objectivity and demands that researchers present their own biases, assumptions, privileges, and power in order to ensure greater integrity and validity of the research outcomes. moreover, it is important to revisit past projects and learn from mistakes in order to establish best practices in ethically engaging with indigenous communities. the research team for this project was comprised of researchers from an indigenous community-based research lab (morning star lodge) operating in regina, saskatchewan, and community partners from the file hills qu’appelle tribal council including community representatives, researchers, and local knowledge keepers. throughout our research process, we implemented a culturally safe care model by focusing on researcher self-reflection, project reflection and discussions, and a redistribution of power during data collection and analysis. the researchers met prior to beginning the project to discuss any personal or professional biases they have, as well as to evaluate their own cultural background, knowledge, and understandings. this conversation also presented a wonderful opportunity for the researchers representing the fhqtc to lead powerful discussions on how to best engage the community and how to ensure the research was grounded in the local treaty four indigenous protocols and processes. in addition, the research team focused on creating trusting and respectful relationships with their co-researchers, the fhqtc, and research participants. for example, during the focus groups, the researchers chose to audio record rather than take notes to ensure the participants felt they were engaging in an active conversation rather than being “observed” as test subjects. the participants were also able to exercise agency and autonomy over the direction of the conversation, instead of being 5 dieter et al.: the path of creating co-researchers in the fhqtc published by scholarship@western, 2018 interviewed or surveyed through a set number of stock questions, which had to be answered in a certain manner. they were able to tell their own stories, offer feedback and support to their fellow community members, and create an opportunity for an on-going dialogue regarding dementia in their communities. creating community-based participatory partnerships. in order to avoid intentional or accidental exploitive research towards indigenous communities, it is important to cultivate community-based partnerships alongside and directed by indigenous communities (walters et al., 2009). studies have shown that it is beneficial to begin research with community engagement information sessions regarding the research project, whereby community members gather with researchers to highlight issues and discuss possible research pathways (smylie et al., 2009). this can also be a catalyst for recruiting community researchers and participants. in order to facilitate ethically and culturally safe community meetings, there are several key elements that must be present, including face-to-face interactions, storytelling, and knowledge keepers holding roles in decision making. knowledge keeper, instead of elder, is the preferred term used by many within treaty four territory. todd cappo, the community health program coordinator at fhqtc health services, explained this role as: “one that understand[s] our ceremonies, the value of our culture, and our medicines.” knowledge keepers provide a link between the past and present, creating a sense of cultural continuity despite ever-changing community health needs and responses (hulko et al., 2010). engaging with the fhqtc area and its 11 diverse nations requires a keen understanding of the collective history these first nations share as well as the distinctive, unique history each of the communities possess. in addition, engagement must align with fhqtc values and follow their plans for building strong communities. in the case of this dementia research project, engagement started with exploratory discussions between the health directors of the fhqtc and the co-researchers. once the directors saw the value in and endorsed the project, they followed the appropriate community-based research protocols and sought approval through the executive council and chiefs. after all of the members of the fhqtc were engaged, they created a community research assistant (cra) position. the members then recruited the community research advisory committee (crac), which is a group comprised of knowledge keepers, frontline health workers, community members, and health directors who drive and guide the research. this project also sought to ensure both community researchers (who were referred to as knowledge brokers) and knowledge keepers were an integral part of the research team. in order for ethical engagement to work effectively in research, both knowledge keepers and invested community members require designated roles and responsibilities and equal opportunity to design and direct the project. community members were utilized in many ways. for example, the cra was the primary contact for the crac and for individual community members. this role allowed the community to employ one of their own as a researcher and, in this role, ensure the project was conducted in an ethical and culturally safe way. in addition, the cra ensured community engagement by attending events such as treaty days, health fairs, education sessions, and wellness clinics, as requested by the communities. the cra further facilitated the focus groups in order to engage knowledge brokers and open up a community dialogue about dementia, which was previously absent. community members were also engaged through the creation of the crac. this committee was comprised of a diverse group of community knowledge keepers, frontline health workers and directors, 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 4 [2018], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.1 and community members from all of the fhqtc communities. the committee was open to whoever had a passion for dementia research and was either a member of one of the eleven communities or was a front-line health care professional working in these communities. the initial members were recruited during the fhqtc health directors meeting following a recommendation from a health director. recruiting for the crac was an on-going process. the crac met with the cra and research team members on a bi-monthly basis. the crac played an integral role throughout the research project. they provided insight into working within the community and helped to drive the research by drafting and finalizing the research questions. they reviewed and approved research materials and were able to determine what could and would be done as part of the research project. currently, there are 12 crac members, each with their own strengths and offering a unique perspective related to the project. our focus on creating trusting and authentic relationships with community members also enabled the opportunity for long-term research partnerships with the fhqtc and community members. furthermore, by using a cbpr research model, we were able to ensure higher rates of participation than is typical when researchers attempt to engage with community members without the inclusion or direction of the fhqtc. creating this community-based participatory partnership with the fhqtc is a step in the direction of self-determination for this tribal council and many others. the fhqtc has created an opportunity to spearhead further research on this and other emerging health issues, without waiting for issues to be identified by outside medical agencies or the federal government (for example, during census enumeration). the fhqtc maintains the control over how dementia is researched in the community, how the findings are presented, and how to best implement and advocate for care and supports. creating dementia programs that are culturally safe and appropriate for first nation communities and their membership requires work and continuous reciprocal learning. it is beneficial for all of those involved because it is rooted in the values and cultural understandings that first nation peoples know. it is important to note that a successful program that works well in one particular first nation community does not automatically mean that same type of success will be replicated in a different first nation community. furthermore, past studies have revealed the importance of community leadership and self-determination regarding community programs and services in relation to indigenous-specific health information education (smylie et al., 2009). ownership, control, access & possession (ocap®). recently there has been an increase in the funding of community-based research projects in canada (gibson & lund, 2012). when initiating research projects that include both non-communityand community-based researchers, it is important that power and ownership are shared equally. one example of how this can be done successfully is data sharing agreements, which help to establish effective partnerships and highlight the changing research world in which non-community researchers become research facilitators and community partners become researchers (gibson & lund, 2012). a number of different research terms have emerged for this type of partnership, including community-based participatory research and action research. regardless of the term used, the concept is the same; it is a respectful partnership that honours the autonomy of the community being researched (gibson & lund, 2012). indigenous peoples in canada strive towards self-determination, and the principles of ownership, control, access, and possession (ocap®) can help achieve it, particularly with research focusing on and 7 dieter et al.: the path of creating co-researchers in the fhqtc published by scholarship@western, 2018 taking place within indigenous communities (schnarch, 2004). ocap® identifies who owns the information gathered, who has control in the research, who can access and use the information and data gathered, and, lastly, who will be in possession of the data in the shortand long-term. it is important to note that ocap® principles are not static; it is not a one-size-fits all process. ocap® is a starting point for indigenous communities to achieve self-determination throughout the research process within their communities by providing the opportunity for communities to make these decisions during the research process (schnarch, 2004). historically, health research has demonstrated a disregard for indigenous communities, their beliefs, and their needs. harmful research practices involving indigenous peoples in canada include a lack of consultation, communities and individuals being over researched, research undertaken without the proper consent, and participants being pressured during data collection. an absence of ethical engagement within research has resulted in indigenous peoples being resistant to research in their communities (schnarch, 2004). researchers need to understand and support the goals of the indigenous communities that they work with and collaboratively build healthy relationships. there is a need to focus on community involvement, participation, respect, and consultation, as well as capacity development. this style of research challenges research norms and allows researchers to question what constitutes proper research, and the abilities and biases of existing gatekeepers (e.g., academic peer review committees, funding agencies) who evaluate indigenous research (schnarch, 2004). it ensures that researchers will reflect the research findings back to the communities to ensure that what comes out of these projects aligns with the communities’ intentions and goals (schnarch, 2004). creating ethical engagement is a dynamic process that must be rooted in the needs and strengths of the community. fortunately, a relationship of trust and honour was already built between the fhqtc and the principal researchers. creating the research agreement was a collaborative effort that ensured a community-based participatory partnership, instead of the traditional researcher and research subject dynamic that has often dictated previous research projects within the fhqtc. as such, both research partners are considered co-researchers and co-authors of the project. moreover, the collaborative effort ensured ocap® principles were followed and data collection and sharing arrangements were implemented. all consent forms, data, and research materials would be stored at a mutually agreed upon local research lab; however, the data would remain the property of the fhqtc. furthermore, the research agreement also states that “all data (electronic or paper) will be given to fhqtc at the end of the project for storage or destruction.” in addition, there were specific protocols and procedures outlining how the participants and the community would be protected throughout data collection, analysis, storage, and dissemination (e.g., research materials, surveys, datasets, paper records, electronic records, visual aids). it was determined that the fhqtc would be considered the primary decisionmaker regarding future data sharing and authorship. outlining the specific data collection, ownership, and storage details was essential in guaranteeing that a reciprocal relationship existed and provided a solid foundation to move the research project forward. knowledge brokers: community members as researchers. when conducting community-based research, it is also important to facilitate room for dialogue between researchers and indigenous communities, creating a safe space for commonalities and differences to be addressed (canadian institute of health research [cihr], natural sciences and engineering research council of canada [nserc], & social sciences and humanities research council of canada [sshrc], 2014). the core 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 4 [2018], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.1 commonality between indigenous communities and non-community-based researchers is reciprocity. reciprocity is necessary for ethically engaged research in order to maintain relationships and strengthen mutual trust. trust is built when community researchers fulfil their roles as "knowledge brokers" who have the ability to transform knowledge from the research project in ways that benefit the communities involved in the study (fornssler, mckenzie, dell, laliberte, & hopkins, 2014, p. 180). an integral part of the knowledge-broker process is this ongoing dialogue with the communities and the recognition of the socioeconomic barriers and structural determinants specifically unique to indigenous communities (ford et al., 2015). having community partners that are passionate about the research avoids research fatigue while simultaneously building trust with the non-community researchers and the communities (gibson & lund, 2012). indigenous community-based research acknowledges the value of profound local knowledge and experience, as it is fundamental to have community members actively involved in the creation of the research questions that the community will engage with and benefit most from (gibson & lund, 2012). in addition, there is a need to define roles within the research partnerships. ideally, minimal turnover among both non-community and community researchers is best for the project; this also ensures the language used to define the research and the research partnership is accessible to community members. often times, when research partnerships change, and new non-community members join already existing research projects, there is a shift in the research language used, which may or may not align with that used by the community members. decreasing the chances of turnover by ensuring both non-community and community members are equally invested and committed lessens the likelihood of confusion or misunderstandings to occur during the research process (gibson & lund, 2012). each meeting began with presenting tobacco to a knowledge keeper for opening prayers to ensure proper protocol and to fully ground the project in the cultural practices and traditions necessary for the project to continue in a good way. beginning each meeting in this way also established that the knowledge keepers were essential members of the research team who offered valuable insights and grounded the project in the spiritual, cultural, and traditional ways of the community. this also symbolizes the project’s commitment to preserve the integrity and value the input of these first nations communities. it is a significant step towards creating a culturally safe model of dementia health research in the tribal council area because it demonstrates the value placed on knowledge keepers as leaders, teachers, healers, and protectors of the people. knowledge translation & reciprocal learning. the ultimate goal of ethically based indigenous research is to gather and preserve indigenous knowledge using a community-driven approach. research has created a space for mutual learning between institutional-based researchers and community members, despite possible resistance from non-community researchers in admitting that they can learn from community members (smith & blumenthal, 2012). traditional western research is done to communities, rather than with communities. research based on indigenous ethics, in contrast, is collective and collaborative, creating a space where reciprocal learning happens (smith & blumenthal, 2012). by utilizing community-based participatory research practices, these projects enable capacity building, respect the ethics of the community, and empower community members through employment and engagement. these reciprocal acts leave a lasting positive impact (smith & blumenthal, 2012). 9 dieter et al.: the path of creating co-researchers in the fhqtc published by scholarship@western, 2018 indigenous knowledge translation (kt) is an emerging concept defined as the process(es) through which knowledge is transformed into strategic action (estey, kmetic & reading, 2008). indigenous kt is rarely written about; yet, it is critical to consider within the parameters of indigenous research because of the disproportionate burden of ill health experienced by indigenous populations compared to the general population of canada (estey et al., 2008). kt provides an alternative model to research that problematically puts forward invalid pan-indigenous experiences and presents the indigenous health model and the western health model as two mutually exclusive perspectives (ermine, 2007; estey et al., 2008). in order to bridge the divide between these models, academic researchers must work with indigenous communities in a more complex way so that both parties can engage in a safe discussion and feel validated (estey et al., 2008). finally, indigenous ways of knowing accept everyone’s knowledge, as it is only through acknowledging multiple perspectives that the world can be understood in its entirety (martin, 2012). it is here that the concept of reciprocal learning emerges, which is a way of understanding the world from both western and indigenous perspectives (martin, 2012). reciprocal learning recognizes the need to respect the diversity of all knowledge presented in research by merging indigenous knowledge and contemporary western academic research systems and beliefs. it is particularly beneficial within health research, as it can be used to properly address major health issues that indigenous populations face (martin, 2012). furthermore, in addition to focusing on kt and reciprocal learning, researchers must ensure that their end result or final goal is to leave the communities with attainable, effective action-based measures, which then strengthen the communities as a whole (estey et al., 2008). after recruiting the crac, we began engaging the community by offering educational sessions on dementia in cooperation with the alzheimer’s society of saskatchewan. in the spring, we hosted two educational sessions in fort qu’appelle. all who attended were provided with a meal, and travel honorariums were given to show appreciation for those who travelled from out of town. the cra went to the local health centres to recruit for these sessions and, as a result, both of the sessions were wellreceived and attended. word travelled to the community of peepeekisis, and the members requested the cra come out to provide an educational session for their community during one of their monthly wellness clinics. the alzheimer’s society of saskatchewan gave the cra the necessary training on presenting and offered their continued support for the project in any capacity. the project began by taking dementia information to the people, then allowing other communities to identify the sessions they needed. we then provided the opportunity for these other communities to determine when, where, and in what capacity the research team should come and provide information. this demonstrates cultural safety and community members as co-researchers in action. the crac and fhqtc health directors suggested that attending the fhqtc treaty days in several communities would be an opportunity to engage the community and provide information on dementia services and supports available to first nations people in the fhqtc area. subsequently, project representatives attended treaty days in six communities: piapot, muscowpetung, nekaneet, pasqua, carry the kettle, and the file hills (okanese, starblanket, and little black bear first nations). two other communities in the fhqtc region—standing buffalo and wood mountain—did not enter into treaties and, therefore, do not host treaty days. in order to engage with these two communities, the research group found other opportunities during relevant community events. for example, they attended wood mountain’s health fair during their annual summer gathering, for which many 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 4 [2018], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.1 members travel back home to the community. to engage with standing buffalo, the project partnered with the regional health survey and the school of tobacco health programs to provide information about the programs during a lunch-and-learn. a lunch-and-learn is an informal information sharing strategy where community members are invited to learn about a particular project or idea, while also being able to share food in a socially comfortable setting. this education outreach initiative accomplished three things: it allowed the community to become familiarized and have trust in the research assistants and vice versa; it helped recruit potential focus group and interview participants; and it exposed a need for greater awareness and education about dementia in indigenous communities. these initial findings led the cra to offer educational sessions to any community in the tribal council that requested them. for example, the all nations healing hospital, an entity of fhqtc, contacted the team requesting to hear about dementia at their annual women’s wellness day. the feedback from the presentation was very positive and many people identified the presentation as the one they enjoyed the most at the conference. following these outreach initiatives, focus groups and interviews were facilitated in the communities by the cra. these focus groups allowed community members to come together and share their knowledge, learn from one another, and access further information and supports regarding dementia. the groups were comprised of a dynamic group of individuals who were either dealing with dementia themselves or helping care for a loved one who was dealing with dementia or a related health condition. these focus groups moved away from traditional methodological practices where community members are interviewed in isolation and/or where a certain set of research questions are asked in a group context. here, each group determined how dementia was addressed and some spoke of their own circumstances, while others shared broader thoughts or unrelated health concerns. during this time, the cra facilitated, but did not direct community members in their sharing. this allowed community members to become knowledge brokers and co-researchers capable of shifting and focusing the research lens and scope. lessons learned: creating a culturally safe model for dementia research best practices in ethically engaging communities are deeply rooted in culturally safe models of health research. this project was able to implement a culturally safe model for dementia research by focusing on four central tenets: (a) relationships between researchers and community members are essential; (b) the environment within which the research project takes place is important; (c) knowledge keepers play a vital role in dementia health research in first nations communities; and (d) the reflection of the research team must be continuous. relationships have been identified as critically important in previous dementia studies with first nations communities. in this case, the fhqtc health directors and research team created a long-term reciprocal relationship. they then turned to the community knowledge keepers before engaging the community. these relationships focused on trust, bidirectional learning, personal reflection, and further addressed previous issues and concerns with dementia research in the communities. this very important relationship building piece occurred before the project was implemented, allowing the fhqtc and community knowledge keepers opportunities to design and determine the research questions, processes, and protocols used. for example, proper community protocols were followed when the health directors sought approval from the executive council and chiefs to begin the research project, and they were continued through the hiring of the 11 dieter et al.: the path of creating co-researchers in the fhqtc published by scholarship@western, 2018 cra and formation of the crac. these protocols helped to solidify strong working relationships and connected the outside researchers to the fhqtc, the knowledge keepers, and the community. for many first nations community members, dementia and other hidden health issues are not discussed openly with health care providers outside of the community, and/or health care providers are not aware of the need for these services. dementia is still viewed as both a natural part of the aging process and a condition with limited treatment and management options. while this may not necessarily be the case, it is important to value these insights and, instead of providing services and supports that challenge these ideas, to meet the community members where they are at and work with the knowledge they have of their bodies, their beliefs, and their decisions. adopting this culturally safe cbpr research model, which was congruent with local indigenous norms and research methodologies, allowed us to explore the impacts of dementia on the communities, while simultaneously implementing strategies to assist people. for example, in addition to collecting valuable information from participants about dementia, there were opportunities during the health fairs to provide dementia information and referrals to health services. as well, the focus groups acted as a place of information sharing among participants, while also providing a great sense of comfort for others who felt isolated because of this condition. many of the findings emerging from the focus groups highlighted the difference between indigenous ways of framing dementia as a natural part of the aging process and the traditional western medical view of the disease model. for this reason, our researchers were careful not to imply that the participants should reframe or shift their perspective to align with mainstream medicine. however, we were able to convey that the two approaches, although different, still focus on health, establishing a good quality of life, and providing medical or healing interventions when applicable. while many participants did not wish to be thought of as sick or diseased, but rather as moving through a natural life cycle, they still acknowledged that pain and suffering for both themselves and their families was not desirable or necessary. the researchers, therefore, did not attempt to change or alter the participants’ traditional beliefs or experiences; instead, participants were able to keep their beliefs while still accessing modern medical care and supports. the environment where research occurs matters. along with validating the unique knowledge of the community members, it was also important to value the community itself and its geographical location. previous dementia research discovered that first nations people are more likely to engage in dementia education and support services when the information and service delivery is brought directly to them. in this case, the research team brought the research directly to the communities during their education outreach and the subsequent focus groups. they acknowledged that this outreach should be done during already existing community events such as treaty days, health fairs, and other wellness events. lack of transportation, unease navigating urban medical clinics, and non-indigenous health care practitioners showing a lack of empathy and understanding prevents many first nations seniors from accessing dementia services offered in nearby urban centres. it became essential, then, to tie service delivery to community events and have dementia education and awareness become a part of the already existing community conversation on health and well-being. knowledge keepers are also an essential part of this project. culturally safe projects foster trust and value the insights and opinions of community members. as there is frequently mistrust of outside health researchers and practitioners amongst community members, it was important to consult knowledge 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 4 [2018], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.1 keepers to create trusting relationships. it was also clear from previous dementia health research that, in order to create a sharing dementia care knowledge model, knowledge keepers must be more than simply consulted or considered after a project is designed. in this case, the fhqtc knowledge keepers were a part of designing the research questions, overseeing the project, and grounding it in cultural and spiritual traditions by performing necessary ceremonies to ensure cultural safety. finally, the continuous reflection of the research team is of the utmost importance. this includes acknowledging the possible personal biases, privileges, and authority of the researchers prior to engaging with the community. the team met regularly with the fhqtc health directors, the executive council and chiefs, knowledge keepers, and community members prior to designing the research questions. this provided an opportunity to ensure all members agreed about the biases they might be bringing to the project and how to respectfully engage with community members. each and every researcher was also tasked with self-reflection and bringing any issues, concerns, and questions they had to the team meetings. these open and honest meetings created the space needed for personal and group reflection and prevented harmful practices or culturally unsafe interactions from occurring once the initiatives were rolled out into the communities. they created a climate and culture that was proactive and based on healthy communication and reciprocal learning. using a culturally safe, cbpr research model created an opportunity to “research back to life” the needs and concerns of the participants in the fhqtc. traditional western approaches have typically silenced issues such as dementia and other neurological conditions in first nations communities because they do not have a prevalence rate high enough to warrant research initiatives or intervention. unlike wellknown health issues such as substance abuse and diabetes, dementia often goes undetected and untreated, even when individuals do seek health care assistance. this research project created a space for the fhqtc to determine the needs of its community members and, before creating any programming or initiatives, allowed the community members to identify their concerns, beliefs, and health care needs. unlike a western medical approach (which would have identified the issue of increasing dementia rates through gathering data, implemented a program based on those findings, and, finally, surveyed participants when evaluating the success of the intervention), our research model connected us with the community members prior to even establishing the research questions. conclusion it is clear when working with indigenous communities that there is a need for implementing ethical, culturally safe research models. canada’s colonial history and practices continue to influence the ways in which health research is both framed and implemented today, resulting in devastating intergenerational impacts and health disparities for indigenous people. despite these barriers in health and health research, best practices in culturally safe health research are possible, and several working models exist in communities today. at the heart of these best practices is learning from past research mistakes, acknowledging and resisting colonial practices and beliefs, and implementing community-based participatory research principles. this model utilizes ocap©®, knowledge transmission, and reciprocal learning, and positions communities as co-researchers, thus shifting destructive power dynamics that situate non-community members and researchers as the sole experts. 13 dieter et al.: the path of creating co-researchers in the fhqtc published by scholarship@western, 2018 the tribal council and the associated research team demonstrated the promise and possibilities of using an indigenous community-based participatory action research model to ethically engage with community members. this project centred on providing information and education on dementia to first nations community members in the tribal council region and, in turn, sought the feedback and gained valuable insights from community members. we ensured cultural safety and ethical engagement by first approaching 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(2006). community-based participatory research in practice-based research networks. annals of family medicine, 4(1), 8-14. doi: https://doi.org/10.1370/afm.511 17 dieter et al.: the path of creating co-researchers in the fhqtc published by scholarship@western, 2018 the international indigenous policy journal october 2018 the path of creating co-researchers in the file hills qu'appelle tribal council jessica dieter lauren t. mckim jenna tickell carrie a. bourassa jaime lavallee see next page for additional authors recommended citation the path of creating co-researchers in the file hills qu'appelle tribal council abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license authors the path of creating co-researchers in the file hills qu'appelle tribal council transforming first nations health care in british columbia: an organizational challenge the international indigenous policy journal volume 9 | issue 1 article 4 january 2018 transforming first nations health care in british columbia: an organizational challenge stephen wilmot the university of derby, s.wilmot@derby.ac.uk recommended citation wilmot, s. (2018). transforming first nations health care in british columbia: an organizational challenge. the international indigenous policy journal, 9(1). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.4 transforming first nations health care in british columbia: an organizational challenge abstract following a series of agreements on first nations health care in british columbia beginning in 2005, several organizations were created to contribute to the development of a system of health care for first nations in the province, with the aim of transforming first nations health care to better meet users’ needs. this article considers the role of these organizations and their relationships with the provincial government, the federal government, and the first nations people of british columbia. it explores possible levels of transformation, as well as the possibilities and problems for these organizations in undertaking the transformation process, particularly with regard to their position on the boundary between the worlds of first nations and canada. it also considers sources of, and threats to, their legitimacy in this undertaking. finally, wider points of relevance beyond british columbia are identified. keywords boundary, british columbia, canada, first nations, health care, legitimacy, organizations, transformation creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ t r a n s f o r m i n g f i r s t n a t i o n s h e a l t h c a r e i n b r i t i s h c o l u m b i a : a n o r g a n i z a t i o n a l c h a l l e n g e this article discusses a group of organizations created in 2005 to provide and regulate health care for first nations in british columbia. i will view these organizations in the context of the decolonization of indigenous health and health care, and i will argue that this process of decolonization requires a redefinition of the terrain of indigenous health by personnel and organizations with the legitimacy to do so. i will identify relevant questions at political, organizational, and policy levels, and i will also consider the aforementioned organizations in relation to their development, structure, and relationships, and to issues related to legitimacy and effectiveness in this task of redefinition. although the context of my discussion is british columbia, these considerations can apply to indigenous health care in the rest of canada and also to some degree in the us, australia, and new zealand, as those countries have similar histories of colonization of indigenous peoples, pursuing comparable processes of health care reconfiguration. as indigenous peoples develop political structures to work toward self-government, health care organizations necessarily play a role in this process, and the work of decolonizing will fall in part on them. the developments in british columbian health care organizations exemplify this process. l i t e r a t u r e r e v i e w unlike most other canadians, whose health care is controlled by provincial governments, first nations health care has historically been the responsibility of canada’s federal government. many commentators argue that first nations’ health care is inferior to that of other canadians in several ways (boyer, 2004; health council of canada, 2005, 2012; romanow, 2002). one problem is under-resourcing. first nations are a growing segment of canada’s population, with many living in remote areas that are expensive to serve, and rigid funding mechanisms fail to adapt to these needs (see lavoie & forget, 2006). there are also problems of cultural insensitivity and racism, manifesting in negative assumptions about first nation patients, which lead to a failure to achieve trust and cultural safety in health care (health council of canada, 2012). first nations cultural perspectives on health are distinctive, diverse, and complex, but generally include a view of health as collective, communal, and environmental, and as permeated with spirituality (levesque, li, & bohemier, 2013); a valuing of indigenous healing traditions; an emphasis on the health benefits of cultural vitality (gehl & ross, 2013); and a distinctive view of health decision making (gomes, leon, & brown, 2013), health research, and knowledge (barwin, crighton, shawande, & veronis, 2013; hernandez, 2012). the health council of canada (2012) argued that the devaluing of these perspectives in the health care system has a negative impact on the quality of first nations health care. it is difficult to establish how much damage poor health care does to a community’s health, compared with other factors. on average, first nations have poorer health than other canadians (health canada, 2009, 2014), but health inequality is also associated with deficits in housing, education, economic conditions, and social relationships (mikkonnen & raphael, 2010; wilkinson & pickett, 2010). economic inequality and social exclusion, through experiences of mistrust and powerlessness, seem to have a particularly significant impact for first nations. similar problems affect indigenous peoples throughout the world (pulver et al., 2010) and are perhaps best understood as products of colonialism. 1 wilmot: transforming first nations health care in british columbia published by scholarship@western, 2018 the transfer of health care to first nations themselves is widely seen as a solution to the shortcomings of federal provision (waldram, herring, & kue young, 2006). since the 1980s, reacting against the earlier policy of assimilation, the policy of first nations health transfer has involved the allocation of some health care functions from the federal government to individual first nation organizations (lavoie & dwyer, 2016). the mix of functions has varied from nation to nation—from comprehensive primary care through to public health to specific programs such as diabetes care (warry, 2009). in some cases, this has involved greater participation by provincial health ministries, as in british columbia, where regional health authorities have sought closer coordination with first nations health initiatives at the instigation of the provincial health ministry. again, this process is mirrored in other countries with indigenous populations (dwyer, o’donnell, lavoie, marlina, & sullivan, 2009) including new zealand and australia (panaretto, wenitong, button, & ring, 2014). the canadian health care transfer process has been uneven, suffering from funding and organizational problems; however, the potential benefits are recognized in principle by several commentators including smith and lavoie (2008), waldram et al. (2006), and warry (2009). there are also notable instances of health care transfer improving the cultural sensitivity of care (kelm, 2004; smith & lavoie, 2008; warry, 2009). however, the impact on health indices is difficult to quantify. at their time of writing, waldram et al. (2006) still awaited quantitative evidence that transfer was improving first nations health. in its 2014 statistical profile of the health of first nations, health canada (2014) found that between 2002 to 2003 and 2008 to 2010 there was no change in some indices and deterioration in others, though most indices were not comparable between the two time periods. the evidence is inconclusive. however, given that the quality of care is only one of several factors affecting population health, the effects of care improvement are likely to take some years to show. n e w o r g a n i z a t i o n s beginning in 2005, a series of agreements involving the federal government of canada, the provincial government of british columbia, and several first nations organizations at the band, national, and provincial levels formulated a set of principles for the development of first nations health care in british columbia. part of the impetus for this came from the 2005 kelowna accord, wherein federal and provincial governments and indigenous representatives attempted to reshape the relationship between canada and its indigenous peoples (alcantara & spicer, 2016). federal interest in the kelowna process faded, but some provinces retained momentum, and this energized health care development in british columbia. a group of health care bodies eventually emerged from the british columbia process, including the first nations health council (hereinafter the council), a representative body of 15 members set up in 2005 with members appointed by regional caucuses representing first nations in the five health regions of british columbia; and the first nations health directors association (hereinafter the association), consisting of directors of first nations health care providers. this collaboration culminated in the 2011tripartite framework agreement between the aforementioned first nations organizations, the federal government, and the government of british columbia (first nations health authority, 2011). this agreement established the first nations health authority (hereinafter the authority) as the health care provider. initially, members of the council (though acting as members of the authority) appointed the authority’s board of directors and the board of directors in turn appointed the authority’s management. in setting up the authority, the tripartite agreement completed the group of organizations and committed the federal and provincial governments to finance the enterprise (first 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.4 nations health authority, 2011). in 2013, the authority started to take over health programs from the federal government (first nations health authority, 2014), while first nations regional health and wellness plans were developed in each of the five health regions of british columbia. this took place under the auspices of the council, as well as local and regional bodies representing first nation communities. these plans elaborated the principles mapped out by the council since 2005, summarized in its “seven directives” (first nations health authority, n.d.), and began to translate these directives into commitments and practices. however, negotiating a complex and innovative set of relationships between disparate organizations and groups proved a slow process. as kelly (2011) pointed out, these developments are part of a history of health care initiatives that have sought to move from pre-1970 assimilationism into what she terms “policies of recognition” (p. 1), including the federal government’s indian health policy of 1979 and the 1980s indian health transfer policy. this latter policy laid the foundations of a “targeted parallel” (p. 6) system of first nations health care—that is, a system that targets the needs of a particular minority by substituting focused services for mainstream ones (lavoie, 2014). lavoie’s classification is adapted from healy and mckee (2004), who distinguish the targeted parallel system from targeted alternative services (which target minority needs alongside mainstream services) and from non-targeted universal services. part of the context of this development is the historic aspiration of canada’s first nations to political self-determination. significantly, the tripartite framework agreement declares that its terms shall not prejudice selfdetermination for individual first nations (first nations health authority, 2011). otherwise, presumably, the already-established tripartite health care system could cut across individual first nations self-governance arrangements. nonetheless, the authority, the council, and the association clearly have a potential role in first nations self-determination, through their potential political clout and professional credibility. the investment of political capital in these bodies by government and first nations opens a window of opportunity for political influence within the tripartite machinery and in the politics of british columbia health care. the tripartite agreement places the authority below the provincial health ministry level, on a par with the province’s five health authorities, in a provider rather than a political role. but political linkage to the council, the association, and the tripartite committee connects it to the provincial and federal health ministries, and this provides a potential conduit for political influence. it is not yet clear where political and philosophical leadership will come from within this group of organizations. the council is identified as the political actor (first nations health authority & first nations health council, 2013; first nations health authority, first nations health council, & first nations health directors association, 2012). it conducted the negotiation with the federal and provincial governments, and it may continue to provide political leadership in tandem with the association—with the authority in a subordinate position planning and delivering health care. however, the documentation de-emphasizes hierarchy in their dealings with one another, instead emphasizing mutuality, negotiation, and consensus; as a result, power relations are somewhat unclear to the outside reader. nonetheless, an alternative scenario is imaginable, where increasingly politicized professionals and managers in the authority propel their organization to develop its own political agenda. of the other political forces involved, no doubt the provincial and federal health ministries will continue to exert influence through the supervisory function of the tripartite committee, as paymasters of the new system (first nations health authority, 2011). in addition, the regional caucuses will create a bottom-up input into the authority through their regional health and wellness plans, developed over 3 wilmot: transforming first nations health care in british columbia published by scholarship@western, 2018 the last 2 years. the five regional plans express allegiance to the goals of the tripartite framework and the seven directives (first nations health authority, n.d.), but the detail of regional priorities varies, and the authority will need to balance these to retain the support of the caucuses. despite the emphasis on collaboration, there is a possibility of tension developing between the authority and its partners. differences in occupational culture and day-to-day political pressures could encourage diverging goals, though much will depend on the flexibility and creativity of senior personnel. the balance of leadership is not yet clear. my discussion will therefore relate to all three bodies together—authority, council, and association—to avoid assumptions about who will take the lead. throughout this article, i will refer to “the trio” rather than name all three organizations. my discussion of these bodies is informed by an overview of relevant documents from the period under discussion (2010-2015). these are listed in the appendix and include annual reports of the authority, council, and tripartite committee, published agreements between the bodies in the tripartite agreement, plans, updates, summaries, the authority’s guidebook, and health and wellness plans published by the regional tables of the council. this overview aims to capture the main sources of information, but does not purport to be systematic or exhaustive. a first reading of the documents generated questions, and a second reading was initiated within that framework of questions concerning the relationships between the organizations, their conceptions of their enterprise as embodied in the questions outlined below, and their conception of their accountability and legitimacy in the management and delivery of health care. w o r k i n g o n t h e b o u n d a r y the trio operate in two worlds: the first nations world, defined and constituted by the experiences of first nations in canada and the canadian world of health care politics. the trio inhabit a boundary. since the development of the boundary concept in ethnic relations in the 1960s (barth, 1998), it has been applied to interactions between ethnic, cultural, and national groups. according to barth, the boundary constitutes the zone where two cultural worlds interface; where those worlds are mutually identifiable and reinforced, but also interact. the boundary concept applies particularly to groups in constant, close contact, so it works well for the relationship between first nations and canada. for example, poliandri (2011) used the concept of the boundary in her study of the relationship between a mi’kmaq reserve community and the surrounding nova scotia town. she found that the boundary varies in visibility and permeability, being in different contexts including the psychological, social, geographic, and political. health care can be a boundary zone, as illustrated by mattingley (2006). in her study, white-dominated medical culture interfaced with the culture of african american patients, but this could also apply to the relationship between white-dominated health care culture and first nations. moreover, the trio are boundary organizations themselves. they are canadian health care agencies, linked to the health ministries of british columbia and canada, and they need to maintain a working relationship with these bodies; however, they are also first nations organizations in their moral responsibility and formal remit. as a result, they need to manage the boundary, particularly its permeability, in both directions and on several levels. for instance, the trio will be working on the boundary between first nations conceptions of health and health care, and canadian conceptions—a boundary similar to that described by mattingley (2006). they will need to decide how they manage that boundary, and where it will run through their activities. for example, they will need to decide in 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.4 which situations indigenous-healing traditions will be involved, and in which roles appropriate practitioners will be engaged. at the organizational and political level, the trio will also need to decide how to make the boundary permeable in the “outgoing” direction by deciding to what degree they will project professional and political influence across that boundary. they will need to decide how they present themselves to british columbia’s political class and public, and how they project their agenda into the wider canadian discourse. their effectiveness in this could crucially affect their overall success, not least in terms of the resources they will likely need from across the boundary. they will also need to decide what allies to seek across the boundary, among the political class, and what friends to seek within the population. there may be an opportunity to transform the terms of discussion of first nations health matters, using cross-boundary links to promote first nations principles, terminology, and political traditions. this opportunity also makes it possible to contribute to the decolonization of canada, a process envisioned by macdonald (2013) as indigenizing canada’s political discourse. shaping public perceptions is an important part of political practice, and its application to canadian health care has been analyzed in terms of rhetoric by conrad and cudahy (2010), demonstrating the importance of framing the debate in a way that validates one’s case and connects with clearly targeted audiences. this is a resource-heavy process (think tanks, foundations, journals, etc.) and friends on the other side of the boundary could be crucial for mobilizing resources and identifying receptive audiences. the boundary role might also involve acting as a filter in the “incoming” direction. the profitability of health care in north america attracts commercial providers, seeking to exploit the more profitable parts of canadian health care (angell, 2008), and these providers generally have a vested interest in doctor-dominated, pharmaceutically focused health care with minimal cultural sensitivity. for first nations health care, the trio may be the only significant countervailing force, being potentially the holders of a uniquely powerful moral high ground that, if used skilfully, could restrain commercial expansionism. m a p p i n g a n d t r a n s f o r m a t i o n in order to manage the boundary effectively, the trio will need to have a clear overview of what the first nations side of the boundary looks like. they will need to map the first nations health world, with their version of health care mapped onto it. this has already been acknowledged implicitly, as the guidebook (first nations health authority & first nations health council, 2013) predicts a shift in the process of transfer of health care from federal to first nations organizations, from “transition” to “transformation,” wherein health care will be transformed to reflect first nations perspectives. this is likely to take several years. however, in developing their political machinery, a cadre of leaders and managers, and in running their complex and demanding arm of government activity on a province-wide scale, they could in due course make a significant contribution to first nations self-determination. the planning period from 2005 has involved much discussion of the principles upon which first nations health care should be based (first nations health authority & first nations health council, 2013). these are presented in the trio’s documents as reflecting a consensus within british columbia first nations; in their breadth and inclusiveness, the principles certainly suggest a commitment to achieving consensus. however, their breadth will also require interpretation into more specific medium and long-term choices, and that interpretation will involve considerable intellectual and political work, including the identification of underpinning principles at several levels, if it is to achieve clarity and 5 wilmot: transforming first nations health care in british columbia published by scholarship@western, 2018 consistency. the transition and transformation agenda offers an opportunity to redraw first nations health care from first principles. the possibilities of transformation, explored through a first reading of the documents listed in the appendix, resolve themselves into choices at five levels, which i explore below. a . t h e m e a n i n g o f h e a l t h the most fundamental level of transformation concerns the meaning of health for first nations in british columbia. questions include: • what are the definitional boundaries of health as a good, and how is health to be distinguished from other goods such as education, physical skill, stamina, happiness, wellbeing, and spirituality? • is health an individual or a collective good? • what is the moral and proprietorial relationship of health to those who enjoy or seek it? is it a gift, a right, a commodity, or a virtue? addressing these questions would provide a base for the development of the other levels of the system. a view of health and health care that reflects first nations experience provides the basis of legitimacy for the system, and the trio will need to establish what they reject and what they retain of western philosophizing on health and health care (see for example seedhouse, 2001), western medical epistemology (see for example khushf, 2013), and where to replace these principles with concepts from first nations philosophies of health (see for example levesque et al., 2013; robbins & dewar, 2011) and indigenous perspectives on epistemology (see for example hernandez, 2012). an inclusive first nations view might be achievable here. if it is not, multiple perspectives may need to be built into the system. b . h e a l t h c a r e p r o v i s i o n a s p a r t o f t h e p o l i t y the next level addresses the principles upon which the provision of health care becomes part of the first nations polity. these relate to issues posed by commentators such as weinstock (2011). the overarching question here might be: how should health care provision relate to the general obligations binding first nations as a political community? and that question generates further questions: • should first nations claim a significant part of the resourcing of first nations health care from canada? if so, should the claim be for health care resources: • as a fiduciary treaty-based obligation (boyer, 2004)? • as restitution for colonization? • as a benefit equally available to all citizens (wilmot, 2014)? 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.4 • how should the relative requirements of just distribution of resources on the one hand and justice in the recognition of identity (including past denials of identity) on the other be balanced (fraser, 1995)? • what is the appropriate balance between health care as an expression of solidarity within the community, and health care as a vehicle of collective self-determination? • how far can collective self-determination in health care accommodate individual selfdetermination (napoleon, 2005)? • should first nations health care seek to achieve justice between present and future generations on, for instance, the 7-generation principle (horn-miller, 2013)?1 • should first nations health care provide: • a safety net to guarantee basic protection against the personal, social, and economic disruption inflicted by sickness for every member of the community? • a level playing field for people to pursue their individual interests, in accordance with daniels’s fair equality of opportunity (daniels, 1985; rawls, 1971)?2 • should first nations health care aim to redistribute resources within the community? for example, should it, through provision of health care based on progressive taxation, shift resources from people who are better off to those who are worse off? • should users be passive recipients of communal resources, as in the modern welfare state liberal view; individuals with responsibility for self-provision, as under a classical liberal framework (gaus, courland, & schmitz, 2014); or citizens with responsibility to contribute to the polity and its activities, as in the civic republican view (honohan, 2002)? c . t h e d i s t r i b u t i o n o f c h o i c e a n d r e s p o n s i b i l i t y w i t h i n t h e s y s t e m this level of exploration would require decisions on: • who should choose what particular mix (or mixes) of health care provision to provide, and to whom to provide it? • how much freedom providers should have in choosing what mixes of health care they offer? • how much freedom users should have in choosing which mixes of health care they access? 1 a principle of the kahnawa:ke nation that collective decision-making should take into account the assessed impact of a decision seven generations into the future. 2 a principle developed by john rawls (1971, and applied by norman daniels (1985), that in a competitive society people should have a “level playing field” not skewed by health or educational disadvantage. 7 wilmot: transforming first nations health care in british columbia published by scholarship@western, 2018 • who should pay what proportion of the cost and through what process? so, would a single program be available for everyone? would choice operate entirely through democratic accountability, or entirely through the market, or somewhere in between? health care systems within advanced economies show many different balances of public, voluntary, and commercial provision, putting power of choice in different places, to be exercised in different ways, collectively or individually, with different locations for the tasks and incentives of providing (see for instance reid, 2010). in our case, there may be reasons to locate responsibility with certain institutions—for instance, at the community level in a decentralized structure or in smaller units in medical savings accounts as described by cherry (2012). in these choices, the trio will need to apply the principles decided under heading (a) above. d . t h e i n d i v i d u a l s e r v i c e u s e r s ’ e n t i t l e m e n t the ground-level questions arising from (a) to (c) concern the individual service-users’ entitlement. this would ideally require a consensus on what constitutes a just distribution of resources. distributive justice, as a branch of western moral philosophy, can aid decisions on the relative importance of the principles of equality, utility, rights, need, and deserving (butler, 1999), but a further judgement on the relative weight of these and other principles in the context of first nations traditions of moral determination would need to be made here. if general principles cannot be agreed upon, a just process of negotiating separate arrangements for different nations or communities espousing different principles would have to be achieved. an acceptable system of resource allocation and rationing is imperative for the credibility of the system. e . h o w d e c i s i o n s o n ( a ) t o ( d ) a r e m a d e finally, an agreement would be needed on decision-making procedures for the above four levels. in one scenario, a common health care program might be achieved through deliberation. in another, different nations or communities might have different preferences, with programs specific to those, possibly along the lines of emanuel’s “liberal communitarianism,” wherein different communities with different values subscribe to different programs within a common system (emanuel, 1991). the trio will need to find a workable balance between the range of indigenous models for political decision-making (cornell, 2015; horn-miller, 2013) and the non-indigenous approaches to this process as surveyed by ham (1997) and sabik and lie (2008). the above five areas identify the levels at which the transformation of first nations health care can happen. levels (a) and (b) seem to fall into the remit of the council, though the input of the authority is likely to become important here as its thinking develops. level (c)—including the specific content of the health care program—appears to fall at least partly into the remit of the authority. levels (d) and (e) involve all participants. logic suggests starting with the most fundamental questions at levels (a) and (b), but the politics and psychology of that process risk an ungrounded and indecisive debate. perhaps level (c), allowing a more concrete and decisive discussion, is a better starting point, later providing a platform for deeper debates at levels (a) and (b). wherever it starts, level (e) must be addressed effectively. the legitimacy of the whole enterprise depends on decision-making structures and processes being acceptable to those 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.4 directly affected by the outcome, and those with the power to facilitate or derail the process. there will be demands on other resources, but a major demand will be on the vital resource of legitimacy. l e g i t i m a c y , a c c o u n t a b i l i t y , a n d g o v e r n a n c e the trio has as their constituents some of the most marginalized people in canada, whose needs have been poorly served by previous organizations, which means the trio would need to overcome that legacy in order to achieve legitimacy with their first nations constituency. the trio’s relationships, internally and externally, are crucial to legitimacy and accountability. the principle of reciprocal accountability, which frames accountability as mutual rather than hierarchical, is cited as a guiding principle (first nations health authority & first nations health council, 2013). judged in traditional organizational terms, the official documents (appendix) define accountability between the trio organizations somewhat ambiguously. this ambiguity is also acknowledged by dwyer, boulton, lavoie, tenbensel, and cumming (2014) in their overview of health care contracting for indigenous peoples in several countries. i would suggest that a rationale for this apparent ambiguity around accountability can be found in the principle of multilevel governance, developed as an alternative to traditional organizational hierarchies (hooghe & marks, 2001) to replace hierarchical accountability (lower bodies implementing the policies of higher bodies) with a system of negotiated collaboration between bodies at different levels in the hierarchy. in the view of alcantara and nelles (2013), multilevel governance underpins several organizational developments in the governance of indigenous peoples worldwide, typically involving a government-level body collaborating with non-governmental or quasigovernmental bodies. the formal hierarchy is de-emphasized in the relationship between these bodies, and principles of co-operation and shared accountability guide the process of governance, with decisions being made through negotiation. papillon (2011) explained the attraction of multilevel governance in the canadian context as a response to the inability of canada’s constitutional traditions to accommodate indigenous self-government. he argued that canada, unlike the us, does not view first nations as having pre-existing sovereignty, and consequently the canadian state has consistently resisted sovereignty and self-government claims. he suggests that multilevel governance provides a way of circumventing these constitutional roadblocks by allowing the development of organizational relationships operating to non-hierarchical principles. it provides a better account of the trio’s roles than traditional governance principles, and the ambiguity in accountability (in traditional administrative terms) reflects its principles. in addition, multilevel governance fits with the boundary situation discussed in the third section of this article. its emphasis on negotiated relationships and non-hierarchical transactions provides the flexibility for organizations to co-operate across the kind of boundary discussed there. however, this approach to accountability also raises questions about legitimacy. the legitimacy of organizations can be viewed in three dimensions: input, output, and throughput. i n p u t l e g i t i m a c y input legitimacy, as discussed by boedeltje and cornips (2004) and borrás, koutalakis, and wendler (2007) concerns an organization’s links to sources of legitimacy, including democratic institutions and the community it exists to serve. for the trio, two relationships are relevant: the relationship with democratic institutions such as the provincial assembly and federal parliament, and the relationship with 9 wilmot: transforming first nations health care in british columbia published by scholarship@western, 2018 the first nations community. the trio are all relatively new bodies, and their links to the established structure of the canadian state—through the provincial and federal health ministries—are based on the tripartite agreement, which, according to their espoused model of reciprocal accountability, connects them laterally rather than hierarchically. their flexible, negotiated, multiple-level, and cross-boundary relationships seem to reflect the multilevel governance principle. they certainly do not fit comfortably within the traditional view of legitimacy, which tends to be conferred hierarchically. as for links to the first nations population, the authority has no representative structure, and it can only derive input legitimacy from linked organizations. within the trio, the council might provide that link, being nation-based, community-oriented, and representing british columbia’s first nations on several levels from nation governments through regional caucuses to a central council. but whatever input legitimacy the council has, it is not clear how much it can transmit to the authority. it is difficult to find a clear documented account of the formal relationship between the two and, again in keeping with multilevel governance, the process of the relationship seems to be clearer than its structure. however, clarity and stability in the relationship are vital for input legitimacy, and they depend on structure. a lack of clarity in organizational relationships threatens input legitimacy. that lack of clarity can be attributed in part to the cross-boundary role of the trio, in that their organizational relationships have developed across the first nations–canada boundary, so first nations as yet have neither a clear organizational structure setting them apart from provincial and federal ministries, nor a readily identifiable process connecting them. the resulting vagueness in the relationship between these bodies, canadian and first nations, limits the trio’s input legitimacy. o u t p u t l e g i t i m a c y output legitimacy is identified by boedeltje and cornips (2004) and also by mena and palazzo (2012), and it concerns the degree to which the organization’s output is valued and trusted by those who confer legitimacy. in this case, those who confer legitimacy are the user population, the canadian state, and the canadian public. several authorities have suggested that canadians see their health care system as a significant component of the canadian national identity (rachlis, 2001; romanow, 2012) and a first nations health care system might reasonably aspire to be similarly valued by its users. however, where a new health care system has high hopes riding on it, there is a risk of disillusionment. if the new system fails to visibly ameliorate first nations’ health disadvantages, its output legitimacy may be compromised. creating a new health care system is probably not the best way to tackle health inequality, which is typically associated with the determinants of health discussed earlier, including housing, education, economic conditions, social relationships, and socioeconomic inequality. as argued by williams, costa, odunlami, and mohammed (2008), interventions likewise need to be targeted to those “upstream” areas, which merit at least as much priority as the health care system. as these limitations start to become apparent to first nations service users, there is a risk of popular disappointment and further discontent could arise from rationing decisions. like other publicly funded health care bodies, the authority will need to prioritize and ration resources. some people will view certain decisions as unfair and these feelings will be intensified by disappointment that, after campaigning for the creation of a first nations health care system, that body is providing inadequate care. this would threaten the output legitimacy of the trio, both for individual first nation service users and for participating nations, with a risk of inter-nation disagreement over resource allocation. the risk applies also with regard to canadian governments, provincial and national, who will be looking for solutions, not political 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.4 embarrassment, and for canadians in general, among whom such problems could serve to confirm colonial prejudices. again, the boundary is part of this problem. the authority is inheriting part of canada’s health care machinery, and there will be a transition period during which some of that machinery will remain on the “wrong” side of the boundary in terms of personnel, methods, and working culture. until service users see the authority’s service as part of the first nations world, it is unlikely that service users will feel that it is their “own” health care system. users often become frustrated with their heath care system, but their sense of ownership of that system can create a bond protecting its legitimacy in difficult times. arguably, this has happened in canada, but the location of first nations health care within the federal government system means that first nations have not had ownership of their health care. that ownership needs to be built, and it will take time to become secure. consequently, output legitimacy is at present not a firm basis for the trio’s work of transformation. t h r o u g h p u t l e g i t i m a c y iusmen and boswell (2016), schmidt (2013), and van meerkerk, edelenbos, and klijn (2015) all identify a third source of legitimacy, throughput legitimacy, which involves maximum consultation and involvement of service user populations by public bodies providing a service. this concept was developed for european union (eu) organizations with complex and indirect accountability to democratic bodies. it provides a direct way to gain democratic accountability and legitimacy. the trio is also characterized by complex and indirect accountability: internally in the link between the council and the authority, and externally in the trio’s relationship with the tripartite committee. these links do not show a clear path of accountability to democratic bodies such as the british columbia provincial legislative assembly and the federal parliament and, as i suggested above, this weakens their input legitimacy. however, there is potential for throughput legitimacy. the trio have the advantage of a clearly defined service user population who know who they are and who are already organized locally through indigenous political institutions and leaders. therefore, consulting that population should be easier than similar consultations undertaken by eu bodies, in that the protagonists in this dialogue will be operating on the same side of the boundary. throughput consultation between service users and authority personnel regarding what the first nations version of health and health care should look like can be conducted according to first nations norms, locating it on the first nations side of the boundary. in addition, flexible, negotiated relationships (commended by the multilevel governance principle) can facilitate trust between participants and help service users tolerate shortcomings in provision. however, there are also risks. some negotiation (where bargaining, deal making, and compromise are involved) is virtually impossible in public, as generations of politicians have discovered. the degree to which consultation can convert into negotiation is not clear. in their study of throughput legitimacy in eu institutions, iusmen and boswell (2016) argued that there may be a need for “backstairs negotiations” to achieve optimum legitimacy. they also report that consultation that is perceived as tokenistic can increase cynicism among participants, so weakening throughput legitimacy. lastly, they conclude that such consultation processes can be disruptive of the ability of what they term the “technocratic” body (in our case the authority) to perform its task. how might these risks be avoided? the process of consultation will be demanding, and it will require the trio to navigate the above risks while nonetheless keeping their momentum. if the trio is to be 11 wilmot: transforming first nations health care in british columbia published by scholarship@western, 2018 successful in transforming health care, they will need to achieve a close and equal relationship with the service user population. that equal relationship will involve thousands of conversations between service users and trio personnel, and the council alone could not sustain that degree of intensity and detail. managers and professionals from the authority would also need to be involved in conversations with members of first nations. this has considerable implications for the way power is distributed in the authority, in that service users will need to relate in a close and equal way to the personnel, who represent the authority to them, to be fully involved in the transformation. for service users to take that conversation seriously, they will need to know that authority personnel will listen and in turn will be listened to within the authority. that requires a decentralized authority with a listening culture and known and trusted local personnel, who are seen to be listened to, at the centre of the organization. the management structure of the authority as presented to the outside world appears to offer the space for this to be realized. it simply needs to happen. however, the trio will still have a legitimacy problem across the boundary. the legacy of colonialism in canada creates a legitimacy problem for any first nations enterprise, as it will risk being perceived as inferior and exotic, and structures and outcomes (that is, input and output) may well be insufficient to overcome this perception. i suggested earlier that the trio might choose to take the initiative in presenting their enterprise to the rest of canada, perhaps using traditional and electronic (including social) media to frame the issues to their advantage. however, beyond political spin the trio also has something authentic to offer to canadian thinking about health care. aspects of the five levels of transformation outlined earlier have been discussed several times in the history of canadian health care, but the discussion has generally been inconclusive. as canada’s publicly funded single-payer health care system grew piecemeal, there was never an opportunity to think from first principles. romanow’s (2002) inquiry into canadian health care, and the inquiry by the senate standing committee on social affairs, science and technology (2002) in the same year, perhaps came closest to working from first principles. however, neither set of recommendations settled arguments about the appropriate direction for health care. indigenous peoples have generally been outsiders to this process, as their health care has been seen as a separate, marginal matter. but now first nations are in a position to address these questions from a place closer to first principles than has previously been possible in canada, and this process could reinvigorate health care thinking in the country as a whole. this is not part of the trio’s remit, but might well establish them in the canadian context as important and legitimate players. c o n c l u s i o n in this article, i have identified the creation of new organizations for first nations health care in british columbia (the trio) as a step forward in first nations health policy development. i have suggested that the internal politics within these bodies, as it takes shape, will be crucial to the development of the initiative. in addition, i have considered their boundary location and their transformational agenda in order to identify five focal levels of health care transformation. i have suggested that ambiguities in the trio’s accountability, though politically rational within the principle of multilevel governance, nonetheless raise legitimacy problems. i have identified the concept of throughput legitimacy as a potential strength for the trio and have also suggested that the trio could significantly influence the debate on canadian health care. the main points from this discussion initially concern british columbia, and do not all apply equally to other canadian provinces and territories where the organization of health care varies. however, the shared basis of publicly funded health care provides 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.4 enough common ground to make much of this analysis applicable to the rest of canada. there are also commonalities with other countries, particularly the us, australia, and new zealand. as lavoie (2014) demonstrated, comparisons can be made with scandinavia because of their indigenous populations and similarities in terms of culture and society, particularly with canada and new zealand. elsewhere, there is more diversity in the context in which health care is delivered and common ground diminishes. for other indigenous peoples who want jurisdiction over service delivery, two recommendations can be made. first, all five levels of transformation discussed in the mapping and transformation section of this article are potentially relevant (though in diverse ways) to indigenous peoples in other developed countries. in addition, all five levels need to be addressed sooner or later, in any initiative comparable to the one in british columbia. if any one area is neglected, it could eventually destabilize whatever system is developed. second, legitimacy problems will likely affect indigenous organizations in this situation. these require a double response: one to the indigenous community, prioritizing relationship building at all levels in the organization in order to optimize throughput legitimacy, and the other to the surrounding state, proactively promoting the indigenous initiative within the wider politics of health care. the latter offers a window to enhance the legitimacy of the relevant indigenous institutions across the boundary. for indigenous bodies engaged in this process, i also offer two recommendations based on this article. first, commitment on all sides is needed to move toward clear lines of accountability to the indigenous user population. reciprocal accountability and multilevel governance are probably the right place to start; however, a more formal system needs to be a medium-term goal, providing long-term support for the institutions. second, friends and allies across the boundary need to be identified and cultivated. it might be worth appointing senior personnel to focus full-time on this goal. finally, to return to british columbia, i recommend that the tripartite committee commission competent external bodies to monitor the initiative on at least the following four levels. first, long-term transformation goals, reflecting the five transformation levels discussed, should be formulated, operationalized, and reviewed at 2to 3-year intervals. clearly, these are not all objective or quantifiable, and the fact that they include political and moral judgements needs to be publicly acknowledged and deliberated. second, first nations health indices should be publicly monitored. however, this needs to be done in conjunction with data on social determinants of health in order to promote understanding of the relationships between determinants and health, and the trio’s contribution to this process is understood in context. third, trio’s 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(2010a). first nations health society annual report 2009 2010. west vancouver, bc: author. retrieved from http://www.fnha.ca/about/governance-and-accountability/annual-reports 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.4 first nations health council. (2010b). our story—a three year progress report 2007-2010. west vancouver, bc: author. retrieved from http://www.fnha.ca/about/governance-andaccountability/annual-reports first nations health council. (2011). british columbia first nations perspectives on a new health governance arrangement. west vancouver, bc: author. retrieved from http://fnhc.ca/aboutus/reports-and-plans/ first nations health council. (2012). interior region nation executive & interior health authority: partnership accord 2012. west vancouver, bc: author. retrieved from http://www.fnhc.ca/pdf/interior_partnership_accord_final_copy.pdf first nations health council. (2015). collaboration and partnership working group report. west vancouver, bc: author. retrieved from http://fnhc.ca/wp-content/uploads/cpwg-reportto-the-fnhc-january-2015.pdf first nations health society. (2011). first nations health society 2010-2011 annual report. west vancouver, bc: author. retrieved from http://www.fnha.ca/about/governance-andaccountability/annual-reports health canada. (2011). british columbia tripartite framework agreement on first nation health governance. ottawa, on: author. retrieved from https://www.canada.ca/content/dam/hcsc/migration/hc-sc/fniah-spnia/alt_formats/pdf/pubs/services/tripartite/framework-accordcadre-eng.pdf 23 wilmot: transforming first nations health care in british columbia published by scholarship@western, 2018 the international indigenous policy journal january 2018 transforming first nations health care in british columbia: an organizational challenge stephen wilmot recommended citation transforming first nations health care in british columbia: an organizational challenge abstract keywords creative commons license transforming first nations health care in british columbia: an organizational challenge “we’ve been researched to death”: exploring the research experiences of urban indigenous peoples in vancouver, canada the international indigenous policy journal volume 9 | issue 2 article 3 april 2018 “ we’ve been researched to death”: exploring the research experiences of urban indigenous peoples in vancouver, canada ashley goodman bc centre on substance use, bc centre of excellence in hiv/aids, agoodman@cfenet.ubc.ca rob morgan western aboriginal harm reduction society ron kuehlke western aboriginal harm reduction society shelda kastor western aboriginal harm reduction society kim fleming see next page for additional authors recommended citation goodman, a. , morgan, r . , kuehlke, r . , kastor, s. , fleming, k. , boyd, j. , aboriginal harm reduction society, w. (2018). “we’ve been researched to death”: exploring the research experiences of urban indigenous peoples in vancouver, canada. the international indigenous policy journal, 9(2). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.3 “ we’ve been researched to death”: exploring the research experiences of urban indigenous peoples in vancouver, canada abstract the belief among many indigenous peoples of being over-researched, often through questionable research practices, has generated mistrust towards researchers. despite growing critiques of conventional research practices, understanding of indigenous peoples’ contemporary research experiences remains limited. the research this article describes was undertaken by a community organization led by indigenous peoples who use illicit substances. community researchers facilitated talking circles to explore the research experiences of peers living in a highly-researched inner-city neighbourhood in vancouver, canada. while participants reported distrust towards researchers, this wariness did not preclude participation in research given a context of extreme poverty. participants noted lack of transparency in research and perceived research as having little benefit to their community. we argue for increased support for indigenous-led approaches to research that emphasize community concerns and meaningful community participation. keywords community-based participatory research (cbpr), indigenous methodologies, indigenous peoples, research, substance use, canada acknowledgments the authors thank the study participants for their contribution to the research, as well as current and past researchers and staff with the western aboriginal harm reduction society, the vancouver area network of drug users, and the british columbia centre on substance use. this study was supported by the ubc peter wall institute for advanced studies/solutions initiatives and canadian institutes for health research foundation grant (fdn-148476). this article is dedicated to tracey morrison for her contribution and commitment, and for her endless advocacy in sharing this research; her selflessness will always be remembered. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. authors ashley goodman, rob morgan, ron kuehlke, shelda kastor, kim fleming, jade boyd, and western aboriginal harm reduction society http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ “ w e ’ v e b e e n r e s e a r c h e d t o d e a t h ” : e x p l o r i n g t h e r e s e a r c h e x p e r i e n c e s o f u r b a n i n d i g e n o u s p e o p l e s i n v a n c o u v e r , c a n a d a “we’ve been researched to death here on the downtown eastside.” globally, indigenous peoples have a long-standing history as research subjects. their involvement dates back to the time of imperialism when early european travelers, pioneers, and missionaries began observing and recording indigenous peoples under doctrines of discovery and conquest (martin, 2003). led by european colonists and scientists, this “research” was founded in an assumed superiority over indigenous peoples (wolfe, 2006), a concept deeply engrained in the tactics of colonization. this allowed for the body parts and cultural objects of indigenous peoples to be taken in the name of scientific interest, and such specimens and remains can still be found in museums and laboratories (prior, 2007). in the service of the “advancement of knowledge,” indigenous peoples and their lands were systematically named and claimed by colonizers, taken as their own, and subsumed into its cultural archive (smith, 1999). indeed, these efforts were part and parcel of wider colonial processes involving the subjugation and exploitation of indigenous peoples, and served to facilitate their dispossession from their lands and social, economic, political, educational, and cultural systems (smith, 1999). these early epistemologies contributed to the detrimental effects of colonization that continue to manifest among generations of indigenous peoples (adelson, 2005; kovach, 2015). ironically, the resulting social, economic, and health disparities between indigenous and non-indigenous groups have served as an impetus for their ongoing research. unsurprisingly, indigenous peoples have grown wary and mistrusting of researchers (humphery, 2001; hunter, 2001; smith, 1999). this suspicion has caused some to resist research altogether, while others have responded by reclaiming their involvement in research and, as māori writer linda tuhiwai smith (1999) argued, they have begun to “research back” (p. 7; see also humphery, 2001). despite ongoing research efforts dedicated to indigenous health, little progress has been made towards bridging the health gap between indigenous populations and western societies. much like other indigenous groups, canada’s indigenous population experience significant disparities in health status, including morbidity and mortality rates, compared to the non-indigenous population (adelson, 2005; allan & smylie, 2015; allard, wilkins, & berthelot, 2004; bourassa, mckay-mcnabb, & hampton, 2009; frohlich, ross, & richmond, 2006; macmillan, macmillan, offord, & dingle, 1996; reading & wien, 2009). premature mortality has a number of causes, including high rates of suicide, tuberculosis, hiv/aids, and diabetes, and an increased risk of problematic substance use (public health agency of canada, 2014, 2015). likewise, the indigenous population does not experience these inequities equally (estey, kmetic, & reading, 2007). health outcomes in canada are framed by past and present colonial state practices, which continue to negatively shape the lives of indigenous peoples. first nations people, for instance, are managed within the indian act, which regulates the lives of status indians (million, 2013). indigenous women in canada are especially vulnerable to gendered violence (harper, 2010; million, 2013). state interventions, for which indigenous people are particularly overrepresented, such as child apprehensions (statistics canada, 2015; turpel-lafond & kendall, 2009) and prisons (sapers, 2014), further reinforce and 1 goodman et al.: exploring the research experiences of urban indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2018 reproduce racialized socioeconomic inequalities, including health outcomes (allan & smylie, 2015). the state of indigenous health in canada thus presents a compelling case to call for effective research. some have argued that the means by which research is carried out with indigenous communities is just as pertinent in addressing health disparities as is the knowledge acquired about a particular health problem (cochran et al., 2008). in the past, research was often led by non-indigenous scholars and thus, often reinforced the western domination over research involving indigenous peoples. calls for action have led to innovation in research methodologies, such as participatory and collaborative research frameworks, culturally appropriate methods, ethical considerations, and the development of guidelines specific to research with and by indigenous peoples (anderson, 2010; blodgett, schinke, smith, peltier, & pheasant, 2011; castleden & garvin, 2008; denzin & lincoln, 2008; evans, hole, berg, hutchinson, & sookraj, 2009; faculty of human and social development, 2003; kovach, 2010, 2015; lavallée, 2009; loppie, 2007; louis, 2007; smith, 1999). early on, the principles of ownership, control, access, and possession (ocap®), developed by the national steering committee of the first nations regional longitudinal health survey, represented the desire for self-determination in research among indigenous peoples in canada (schnarch, 2004). however, humphery (2001) argued that efforts to challenge conventional research practice often have “too great a reliance on written guidelines and positive rhetoric” (p. 201). in her historical review of the “reform” of indigenous health research, humphery (2001) further argued that this work rarely materializes in practice. recently, health research conducted by indigenous scholars explores culture-based approaches and reciprocity (anderson, 2010), and the meaning of healing and self-determination in the neoliberal canadian state (million, 2013). feminist and critical indigenous researchers, attentive to the ways that conventional research is implicated in the colonial process and marked by unequal power relations, have proposed decolonizing methodological approaches (chilisa, 2012; olsen, 2017; smith 1999). as dominant methodologies are constitutive of a western worldview, some indigenous scholars have advocated for the recognition of and support for indigenous methodologies, such as conversational methods developed from oral traditions of knowledge sharing grounded in indigenous perspectives and epistemologies, or ways of knowing (kovach, 2010; wilson, 2001). nevertheless, st. denis (2007) has noted that there is value in tracing the canonical practices of western knowledge in order to demarcate the ways in which it (re)produces difference by constructing indigenousness, for example, through racializing discourses. aside from indigenous peoples’ participation in knowledge production and the development of research guidelines, there is still more room in academia for indigenous peoples to speak more candidly about their experiences of being research subjects. within the context of our research, this limited knowledge further intersects with the dearth of literature on participants’ experiences and perceptions of research among economically disadvantaged and/or marginalized populations, including indigenous people who use drugs. research in this area has largely focused on the role of financial payment for research participation and is often discussed within the framework of research ethics (fry & dwyer, 2001; hughes, 1999; singer & bossarte, 2006; slomka, mccurdy, ratliff, timpson, & williams, 2007). in light of ongoing research reform and research efforts involving indigenous peoples, we propose that additional work is needed to document their contemporary research experiences. we further argue that this knowledge should be produced by unconventional means that overturn the very structures that have been problematized (i.e., western, non-indigenous-led research). led by a community organization comprised of indigenous peoples who are current or former users of illicit drugs and/or alcohol residing 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 2 [2018], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.3 in an impoverished, and arguably over-researched, inner-city neighbourhood, this research provides insight into the unique urban research experiences of a group of marginalized indigenous peoples. c u r r e n t p r o j e c t t h e s e t t i n g a n d c o m m u n i t y this research was undertaken in vancouver, british columbia, canada. in 2011, federal census statistics estimated vancouver as being home to approximately 12,000 indigenous people, who accounted for 2% of the city’s total population (statistics canada, 2015). community members involved in this research consisted of individuals who identify as indigenous, use illicit drugs and/or alcohol, and live in an innercity neighbourhood—the downtown eastside (dtes). the dtes is located on unceded coast salish territory and is a neighbourhood marked by high rates of poverty, homelessness, substance use, mental health issues, and violence, as well as immense social and economic marginalization (kazempiur & halli, 2000; miller et al., 2002; shannon et al., 2008; spittal et al., 2002; werb et al., 2010; wood & kerr, 2006). the dtes is also unique in that at least one-third of the city’s total indigenous population lives in or near the area (cardinal & adin, 2005), making up approximately 10% of the population (city of vancouver, 2012), and is known for its “open” drug scene (fast, shoveller, shannon, & kerr, 2010). the unique challenges experienced by this community have made it a hub for activism, health services, and research. t h e r e s e a r c h t e a m the research team comprised of a partnership between a community organization, the western aboriginal harm reduction society (wahrs), and academic researchers from the british columbia centre on substance use (bccsu). wahrs is an indigenous-led organization that represents current or previous users of illicit drugs and/or illicit alcohol. they are dedicated to harm reduction and the improvement in the quality of life of indigenous people who use illicit drugs or alcohol by encouraging the development of support, education, and training programs that reflect the values of indigenous peoples. wahrs board members undertook dual roles as both community researchers and participants. as a community research team, wahrs developed both the research topic of interest to be investigated and the research methodology, and they were responsible for data collection and analysis. academic and research support was provided by the bccsu, which included a designated research coordinator for the project. p r o j e c t b a c k g r o u n d this community research collaboration was a result of a longstanding research relationship between the bccsu and the dtes community. in recognition of the significant research presence in the community and critiques of the effectiveness of traditional research methods, the bccsu partnered with wahrs to conduct community-based research to explore indigenous experiences as research subjects. to address power imbalances between research institutions and community partners, wahrs board members adopted active roles as community researchers and employed indigenous ways of knowing and sharing to carry out this research. 3 goodman et al.: exploring the research experiences of urban indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2018 t h e p r o j e c t with significant research activity in the community, the research team sought to collectively explore and share their personal research experiences amongst their peers through the use of talking circles. healthbased research related to indigenous peoples’ contemporary experiences as research subjects is scarce. more significantly, there is a shortage of indigenous-led health research with peer-run drug user groups. this article seeks to contribute to the literature in this area, shedding light on marginalized indigenous peoples’ participation in research—specifically, their perceptions of research processes and outcomes, and motivation to participate. this article is designed to illuminate how indigenous people who are faced with multiple disparities, arguably those populations of most interest to scientists, experience research. m e t h o d the methods used in this study have been described in detail elsewhere (goodman et al., 2017). indigenous knowledge is premised upon oral traditions so the community research team selected talking circles as a culturally appropriate conversational research method (kovach, 2010). two wahrs board members (i.e., community researchers) facilitated talking circles to explore their peers’ (i.e., community participants) experiences as research subjects. participation in the talking circles was open to warhs members, and both facilitators and community participants were limited to participating in one talking circle. community researchers served as facilitators to the talking circles, while also contributing their own lived experiences. during the wahrs weekly membership meetings, convenience sampling was used to recruit participants. the names of those members interested in participating were submitted into a draw to be selected for the talking circles, which were limited to 10 participants. this selection process is regularly adopted by wahrs to facilitate their memberships’ participation in research and various other activities that involve compensation (i.e., stipends) to provide equal opportunity to members and avoid intragroup conflict. a total of three talking circles were completed, each averaging one hour in length, with 10 participants. each speaker was given approximately 5 minutes to share, but could pass on speaking if they preferred. an eagle feather was held by the person speaking, signifying a space to speak without interruption. in respect of indigenous oral traditions, participants provided informed consent verbally, which was completed prior to their participation. the research was undertaken with ethical approval granted by the university of british columbia providence healthcare research ethics board. each talking circle was led by two community researchers who introduced the research topic to the group and then initiated the talking circle by sharing their personal experiences with research as an indigenous person who uses illicit drugs and/or alcohol, and who lives in the dtes. discussion was not limited to specific types of research or research methodologies, but rather sharing of all research-related experiences were encouraged. participants took turns speaking. in addition to the collection of field notes by the project coordinator, the talking circles were audio recorded and transcribed verbatim. upon completion of each talking circle, the two community researchers and research coordinator reviewed the field notes for accuracy and preliminary themes. with a few exceptions, wahrs board members participated in the research as community researchers. qualitative analysis of the data was undertaken individually and as a group, which involved detailed review of the transcripts. community researchers identified emerging themes and illustrative quotes. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 2 [2018], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.3 during the group analysis, the transcripts were read aloud and then coded line-by-line by hand to identify key themes. following group consensus on key themes, the community research team compiled a series of recommendations. a meeting with the wahrs general membership was held to present a preliminary summary of the analysis and findings for input and validation. a total of 36 individuals attended the group meeting. at the meeting, members were encouraged to provide additional insight on the research topic and findings, and to contribute to the recommendations. upon completion of data collection and analysis, an indigenous researcher from the bccsu extensively reviewed the research data for the purpose of drafting an academic peer-reviewed research article. the authors adopted an iterative writing approach to ensure this article represents wahrs’ analysis and interpretation of the data, and presents an accurate depiction of their research experiences. this circular process entailed several joint meetings with wahrs board members to share, discuss, and revise the manuscript. manuscript meetings were audio recorded and transcribed verbatim by the first author. the transcriptions further allowed the first author to maintain the integrity of the community researchers’ voices in the development and writing of this manuscript. f i n d i n g s the talking circles revealed high rates of research activity and subsequent participation among community members. participants’ primary interest in being a research subject was associated with financial compensation. while research opportunities represented a welcomed resource to earn wages for many, a few reported dissatisfactions with research participation that stemmed from a lack of knowledge translation and transparency in the research process. “ w e ’ v e b e e n r e s e a r c h e d t o d e a t h ” : r e s e a r c h a c t i v i t y i n t h e d o w n t o w n e a s t s i d e participation as a research subject appeared to coincide with living in the dtes. while the need for local research seemed warranted by participants, much research activity was described as excessive. however, many described countless and seemingly endless participation in studies: i’ve been in a lot of surveys. lots. like lots […] i’ve been in so many different uh programs down here. can’t even count how many. (female participant, talking circle #1) another likened the local research efforts to living under constant scrutiny and intrusion: since i been living down here [i.e., downtown eastside] […] there’s been so many research opportunities that you know, it gets to a point where you think—you feel like you’re a lab rat, eh. […] when they’re […] targeting a certain group of people. […] so you feel targeted. i feel targeted. […] as long as we’re here, in the downtown eastside, we still gonna have people walking through and wondering what makes us tick. and it could be positive, it could be negative but you know, i still don’t mind being researched. (male participant, talking circle #1) in recognition of the prevalent social and health issues in the community, most understood the motivation for the community-focused research. however, narratives often depicted the research as unnecessary scrutiny and irrelevant to the community’s needs. in spite of regular participation in studies, 5 goodman et al.: exploring the research experiences of urban indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2018 some appeared antipathetic to research and spoke of simply trying to tell researchers what they wanted to hear: we’ve been researched to death here on the downtown eastside […] researchers come in and ask us who we are and about the “informal consent” about hiv [tests] and about all sorts of things—smoking crack, injections. we get researched so much by people coming in that we just tell them what they want to hear. (female participant, talking circle #3) not only was the number of research activities seemingly overwhelming, many questioned the practicality and appropriateness of research they had been involved in. focus group didn’t work. it was just what [researchers] wanted, i mean, they wanted to do this focus group and it was just too much information. too many questions. here at least we have one question [referring to the research presented here]. what’s your experience? (female participant, talking circle #3) this participant continued on to tell of her experience with the community-based research presented in this article, and contrasted that with experiences in other non-indigenous-led research projects: i’ve been part of actually peer-run research. which is what this is. where, people you know, not people in suits, you know or white jackets come and ask you questions. and for me when i do research in that sense, i tell the person what they wanna hear. […] so i find like the peer-run research is way better. because you’re actually talking to people who you know and who you are comfortable with. you know. […] i’m so, uh, i feel so blessed to be part of this aboriginal research cause i’ve never really been in any aboriginal research. (female participant, talking circle #3) for another, participating in aboriginal research represented an act of reclaiming his aboriginal identity in the city and, as was shared by others, the talking circles provided a safe space to speak candidly to personal experiences: we were holding a feather. got us a chance to speak. and you know i kinda combine the two as in talking circle and healing circle. cause it’s confidential and we’re pouring out stuff that we feel we’re comfortable with other people allowing them to know. […] i like the setting of this circle. i mean it’s like a thing that’s been done for many generations of first nations people. […] it’s kinda really neat. i would never have thought i could see one in the downtown eastside. and here it is. there i am, part of it. i really like it. (male participant, talking circle #2) despite the overrepresentation of indigenous peoples and abundance of research in the dtes, aside from this research project, not a single participant referenced any experience with indigenous research (i.e., research in partnership with indigenous peoples, indigenous-led research, or research employing indigenous methodologies). 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 2 [2018], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.3 “ i l o v e b e i n g r e s e a r c h e d . a s l o n g a s i t h a s t h a t m o n e y t a g a t t a c h e d t o i t ! ” i m p l i c a t i o n s o f a “ r e s e a r c h e c o n o m y ” participation in research studies was largely motivated by compensation, with most relying on research stipends as a form of income. consequently, participants’ strong motivation for economic gain was at times associated with providing false information to meet study eligibility. several participants described efforts to fit the research criteria: i’d tell ‘em that i was homeless because i wanted a cigarette and candy that they gave you. right. so, in a lot of things when you, try and reach the criteria, you just tell ‘em what you wanna, what they wanna hear. so it’s not really, truthful. (female participant, talking circle #3) pretending to meet the research criteria in exchange for stipends as meagre as a candy speaks to the state of deprivation in the dtes. furthermore, her comment alludes to the power and persuasion that researchers can exude over economically disadvantaged groups through the lure of research incentives. participants conceded to actively seeking out surveys for the financial reward: i’m an addict too right. you know and, and i do surveys. […] i actually look around for them. […] cuz it helps feed my addiction. (male participant, talking circle #2) another noted how community members had little choice, but to participate in studies in light of their economic deprivation. there’s quite a few different [surveys], but it’s like he said over there, [people] go, you always gotta go cause of the money. cause we get so little money down here right. (female participant, talking circle #1) while a few described using research stipends to purchase drugs, it was evident that for most personal reliance on research compensation was significant for survival. as one woman explained, research earnings provided her with the stability to transition out of sex work: i was switching off actually from being a working girl in the bar […] my gig was the bars. that’s how i got my, you know my clients. to get outta that, a friend told me about these surveys. so that was kind of like my, you know, extracurricular activities during the day and at night and then i’d pass these uh numbers out to everybody if they wanted to [participate] and give ‘em the criteria they need to get in [the surveys]. (female participant, talking circle #3) with limited opportunities to earn wages, research was recognized as an important component of the local economy, as one labeled it the “research economy.” the associated incentives prompted impoverished individuals to agree to partake in research. for most, the value of research was tied to financial gain, but a few noted alternative profits of study participation. one participant shared his experience with participatory research and explained how community members were involved in the development of research questions and priorities. 7 goodman et al.: exploring the research experiences of urban indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2018 i was with the study from the day one and […] we were part of [developing] that survey. […] they [researchers] were using us to put the questionnaire together […] but it [the research] is really what we want to know. subsequently, the research resulted in evidence in support of the opening of north america’s first supervised injection site: they opened the safe injection site (sis). before people were doing it in the [sis], [they were injecting] in the alleys, in the park […] no wonder they got all the hepatitis and all the disease and everything. [researchers] had to find out what the hell was going on here. (male participant, talking circle #2) unlike most others who only alluded to the good intentions of community research, yet rarely saw any tangible benefits materialize, this participant was one of the few to have witnessed firsthand positive research outcomes and to have been directly involved in research design. while only two shared such research experiences, it is telling of both the perceived and actual potential of community-based participatory research. “ w h e r e d o e s a l l t h i s i n f o r m a t i o n g o ? ” t h e p r a c t i c e o f ( u n ) i n f o r m e d c o n s e n t i n r e s e a r c h most raised concerns about transparency in the research process. as participants recounted their involvement with various studies, individuals reported little understanding of their and others’ access to research data, as well as the dissemination and use of findings. one individual shared a disturbing experience: i was working with linguists from the states. he was paying maybe 25 dollars an hour for my own language while he recorded it. wrote it down. and when he was through with me, i was disappointed. i could not get a hold of him again. no email. no facebook. no cellphone number anymore. after he got all the information from me, it was on, recorded on tape recorder. and i would say in my language then he would say it back to me then i’d define it for him. so to this day he’s never to be found. maybe he’s got a book out somewhere. (male participant, talking circle #2) most reported research objectives were not understood. some attributed this to a lack of transparency in the research process, while others accredited this to participants’ fixation on the economic gain: i’ve asked them before, eh. after they did that, why can’t i look at the results of my brain. right? what’s, what’s going on with my brain? why are you guys so interested once a year to look at what’s happening in my brain? and uh, they didn’t answer that question. (male participant, talking circle #1) i mean on our end a lot of times for a survey, they’ll offer us, um, a stipend so we’re thinking of just money […] where it goes no one’s really thinking about it. (male participant, talking circle #2) 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 2 [2018], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.3 ironically, often the informed consent process was rather ambiguous and left most uninformed. for one, providing consent was described as relinquishing one’s rights and knowledge: where does all this information go? like once you sign the consent form basically all we’re saying is that it doesn’t really matter where it’s going, eh, because we’re giving you our consent. right? (male participant, talking circle #1) as participants shared common feelings that information was taken and never returned to study participants, the dearth of knowledge translation undertaken by community researchers was highlighted. many perceived the lack of follow up by researchers as a missed opportunity for public health education, which was seen as particularly important given the numerous social and health issues experienced in the community. it’s good to have these surveys, but it’s good to have the feedback. […] that means public awareness nowadays. you gotta be educated nowadays with all these diseases so. but it’s good […] to have the feedback too. like just not give it out and take the information and go elsewhere with it. (female participant, talking circle #2) many felt the valuable information acquired through research was produced for the consumption and benefit of audiences outside of the community (i.e., academics, government). i kinda wonder myself a lot of times, where particularly does this information go. you know cause, i’m gonna surmise per se that it gets broken down, disseminated, hopefully it gets into a peer-review paper, if it’s at the uh, university level. and then possibly published or, possibly online, if i can access it. (male participant, talking circle #2) additionally, revealing personal information to strangers was a cause for anxiety for some, especially when the research appeared obscure, and the questions were sensitive and possibly incriminating (i.e., illegal activities) in the event confidentiality was compromised. with the exception of compensation, research participation could be perceived as a wasted effort without knowledge of research outcomes or implications: i’ve always wondered what they do with those, uh, surveys [name of longitudinal survey], like they do it every 3, 6 months or something. and they’re asking all these questions of [what do] you use and where do you get it and all this like, they get really personal sometimes. and oh do the cops stop you and all that and why are they even asking these questions if they’re not gonna do nothing about it? like that’s crazy, but i don’t know how they’re researching that, uh, drug users or something. it’s supposed to be for [name of university] or something. […] i dunno what they’re doing with that information. (female participant, talking circle #2) 9 goodman et al.: exploring the research experiences of urban indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2018 d i s c u s s i o n i think personally why this research works is because it was done in the community, for the community and for a specific reason because we have been researched to death and we want it in a good way. we want change. we are sick and tired of not even being classified as human beings, especially with doctors and academics, that’s how i feel. (wahrs, community researcher) this project was born from the desire for wahrs and the bccsu to work together on research that meaningfully explores and addresses community issues, but with the recognition that the research methods traditionally relied upon by our local academic community were not serving researchers or the community. this realization was exemplified by a case where lab tests completed as part of another research study were collected for a purpose that was incongruent with what indigenous participants in the area were reporting. naturally, without an in-depth or accurate understanding of community issues, research will have little to no effect in producing change for the betterment of those it intends to serve. as leung, marshall, and wilson (2007) have noted, researchers must continually evaluate their research methodologies and data interpretations, a process that must involve the participation of colleagues, community partners, and participants. fittingly, this discussion section presents research recommendations and implications as put forth by our indigenous co-researchers. it has been written to preserve wahrs’ voices (represented by verbatim quotes in the results section) and their understandings of the findings based on their lived experiences. skepticism and distrust towards researchers are common sentiments held by many indigenous peoples (humphery, 2001; hunter, 2001; smith, 1999); yet, the wariness shared by talking circle participants did not preclude high participation in local research activities. in fact, the profusion of research among the impoverished neighbourhood was found to be seemingly welcomed, as it represented an important income source. similarly, others have found incentivized research to be favourable among those who are economically disadvantaged as it contributes to an “informal economy” (bell & salmon, 2011; slomka et al., 2007), albeit only temporarily and superficially (salmon, browne, & pederson, 2010). interestingly, to the best of our knowledge, this research is the first of its kind to report such willingness among indigenous peoples to participate in research. while some participants’ hesitation towards research were attributed to perceptions that there were little associated tangible benefits, the financial gains were seen by most to outweigh these shortcomings. we argue that research participants should be paid for their expertise, while also acknowledging that the reported reliance on and interest in research wages among participants raises some important ethical questions in relation to the economic and social structural conditions of their lives. ethical considerations regarding incentivized research practices are particularly heightened when research concerns the involvement of vulnerable populations like those economically marginalized (fry, hall, ritter, & jenkinson, 2006; head, 2009; macklin, 1981; mcneill, 1997; salmon et al., 2010). arguments surrounding the ethical debate on the use of incentives in research with human subjects typically postulate whether incentives cause undue influence or serve as coercion to participate and compromise the dignity of the subject (grant & sugarman, 2004). for those populations who use drugs, there are additional concerns that financial payment may facilitate substance use and enable “addictive” behaviours (buchanan et al., 2002; hughes, 1999). however, such concerns are grounded in moralizing discourses. while some participants noted that they used research payments to purchase drugs, they also 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 2 [2018], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.3 illustrated that research compensation provided a means to earn income that, for some, would otherwise be earned by activities that carry significant risk (e.g., sex work). our research demonstrated that incentives could induce participation among this population, with even the scantest of honorariums serving as a forceful motivator. as other community research has found, incentives can serve as leverage with those living in poverty in the dtes, making it difficult for individuals to refuse to participate in research even where ethical concerns exist (damon et al., 2017). this type of inducement runs counter to conventional research ethics guidelines (dunn & gordon, 2005; medical research council of canada, 1987; ripley, 2006), which assert that financial gain should not be a primary motivation for participation in research. these findings speak to the need to address economic deprivation among this population, alongside ensuring research results in material improvements for marginalized communities. incentivized research may also negatively impact the research(er) through the loss of data integrity and rigour due to the provision of misleading research criteria information. providing misleading research criteria information to secure research income was common practice amongst participants; yet, it must be considered alongside participants’ extreme social and economic marginality (salmon et al., 2010). researchers who inadvertently exposed pertinent study criteria, often during the research script or consent process, enabled the provision of misinformation related to participant eligibility. while participants could feel disempowered by their research participation, mainly as a result of stigmatizing research methods and/or inadequate knowledge translation or transparency in research, arguably many claimed a minute level of control over their narrative as a means to economic survival. indeed, for many, this tactic of “telling [researchers] what they want to hear” was perceived as an exchange for much needed income facilitated by the over-researching of people in our setting. yet, for others, it was associated with mistrust of and discomfort with the researcher, due to experience with questionable research practices. also, we cannot ignore the persisting power imbalances that exist between the “native” and the “academic,” or as one participant described, those in “white jackets” and “suits,” and the ongoing colonial undertones of traditional academic research captured by participants’ feelings of exploitation and marginalization (smith, 1999). one co-researcher explained misrepresentation was not always calculated with malice; an unwillingness to answer truthfully could be attributed to “shyness, sometimes because of stigma, sometimes because of lack of not knowing what one can say to somebody and trust how it is going to be perceived” or how their information will be used. overall, participants may simply not feel comfortable disclosing personal information to a person in a position of power or to those in suits. as indigenous participants previously noted, distrust resulted in the underreporting of hiv risk behaviours to local academic teams. this wariness and that described by participants here may be explained in part as a result of experiences of misrepresentation and subsequent stigmatization of indigenous peoples. without an in-depth understanding or analysis, research can result in the stigmatization of a population or community. for instance, reporting data demonstrating a higher incidence of substance use based on the single determinant of ancestry (i.e., indigenous versus nonindigenous) without contextualizing or explaining the underlying causes of such disparities not only intensifies negative stereotypes (elliott & de leeuw, 2009), it also prevents the development of meaningful solutions to address health inequalities (marshall, 2015). unfortunately, the immense disparities and social challenges affecting both indigenous peoples and the dtes have made this population vulnerable to stigmatizing research practices (culhane, 2011). 11 goodman et al.: exploring the research experiences of urban indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2018 in attempt to address the historical and ongoing tumultuous research relations with indigenous populations (humphery, 2001; hunter, 2001; martin, 2003; smith, 1999), community-based participatory research is increasingly being adopted by canadian researchers to facilitate research with indigenous peoples versus on indigenous peoples (anderson, 2010; castleden & garvin, 2008; canadian institutes of health research [cihr], 2007; kovach, 2010, 2015). such participatory paradigms may facilitate transparency in the research process as these frameworks serve local needs and interest by adopting principles of co-learning and mutual benefit (blodgett, schinke, peltier, et al., 2011; frisby, reid, millar, & hoeber, 2005; wallerstein & duran, 2006). certainly, research efforts in the dtes have resulted in positive changes for the greater community (boyd, murray, & naomi patients association, 2017; culhane, 2011; salmon et al., 2010; small, palepu, & tyndall, 2006; wood et al., 2001). yet, most participants reported being uninformed of research outcomes, which may explain why many perceived research as having little benefit to the community and participants’ reticence towards researchers. our findings suggest establishing trust and rapport with participants are important elements to conducting respectful and robust research: “you gotta have a connection with those people and at least have an understanding of the people you are researching.” peer ethnographic research holds trust and rapport as prerequisites to social research and is “based on the premise that what people say about social life and behaviour changes according to the level of familiarity and trust established between the researcher and researched” (price & hawkins, 2002, p. 1328). as one co-researcher explained, when being interviewed by a peer, participants can respond more accurately “without feeling the stigma and without being judged,” which would allow researchers to “actually get to the core truth and get to the actual reasons of the issue” under investigation. others have shared these feelings in the community. for example, damon et. al (2017) found that participants are more willing to provide accurate and detailed responses to peer researchers. therefore, the mediating effects of peer researchers in the research process and their importance in mitigating against misperceptions about marginalized populations often held by researchers is significant (coser, 2010; damon et al., 2017; israel, schulz, parker, & becker, 1998). with the immense health disparities indigenous peoples face, it is critical that research does not contribute to negative stereotypes and assumptions. one co-researcher referred to this as “getting to know a little bit about them [indigenous peoples] besides the diseases.” peers may also support the credibility of research findings by verifying researchers’ data interpretations and coding processes (graneheim & lundman, 2004; ryan-nicholls & will, 2009). certainly, the use of peer researchers in community-driven academic-based research is not without its challenges. for instance, those peer researchers who were deeply committed to the process had to balance their participation with other limitations, such as health concerns, given their extreme marginalization, while working to minimize the reproduction of unequal power relations through attention to “responsibility, reciprocity and respect” (olsen, 2016, p. 29; see also olsen, 2017). this process and dialogue was ongoing throughout the study. peer researchers must be thoughtfully selected with consideration of community dynamics and politics, and to ensure stringent practices of participant confidentiality are upheld. similarly, community-based participatory research must be adopted with careful consideration and execution of its core principles as to not risk reproducing stigma and reinforcing power structures between researchers and communitybased peer researchers (damon et al., 2017; travers et al., 2008), which can result when co-researchers exist as tokenistic to the research process. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 2 [2018], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.3 supporting indigenous-community led research is one way to avoid such tokenism in research. while a methodological evaluation was not the aim of this article, several participants and community researchers attributed the success of this research (i.e., fulfilling the credentials of what was perceived as “good research”) to the method used. beyond the benefits of being peer-led, using indigenous methodologies was perceived as “groundbreaking” amid local research experiences, which are consistently dominated by non-indigenous practices. this research allowed community members to take control and ownership over the research, thus adhering to the principles of ocap® described previously. in contrast to experiences in which participants often perceived control or oversight over personal information was relinquished through non-indigenous research practices, indigenous approaches to research can provide participants with a sense of maintaining control over their knowledge and community information. before concluding, we must note that this research is limited to the experiences of a group of participants who have a longstanding partnership with a research institution and reside in a hyper-researched innercity neighbourhood, and therefore our findings cannot be generalizable to other indigenous peoples and neighbourhoods. although participants did comment on the methodology of this particular indigenousled research project, this was not the intended topic of investigation. as such, future work exploring the significance of indigenous-led research projects and an evaluation of the application of indigenous research methodologies would be of great value and could further contribute to a movement away from non-indigenous research. as a few participants noted, and we can appreciate, research does have the potential to provide much benefit to the communities and populations it intends to serve, and there have been some material improvements in the dtes as a result of research. however, with the exception of the research presented here, the fact that participants rarely perceived such benefits and instead felt research was for the obscure benefit of “others” emphasizes the need for research to be done in a “good way”; this means embracing indigenous approaches to research to ensure individuals and communities are both informed of and touched by research outcomes in ways that foster the empowerment of indigenous peoples in research. to move beyond superficial benefits and to work towards structural and policy change, we must call for a shift in research practices towards methods that emphasize meaningful community participation, are action-oriented, and address indigenous community concerns —“nothing about us, without us!” 13 goodman et al.: exploring the research experiences of urban indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2018 r e f e r e n c e s adelson, n. 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(2006). what do you do when you hit rock bottom? responding to drugs in the city of vancouver. international journal of drug policy, 17(2), 55-60. doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.drugpo.2005.12.007 wood, e., tyndall, m. w., spittal, p. m., li, k., kerr, t., hogg, r. s., montaner, j. s. g., o’shaughnessy, m. v., & schechter, m. t. (2001). unsafe injection practices in a cohort of injection drug users in vancouver: could safer injecting rooms help? canadian medical association journal, 165(4), 405-410. 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 2 [2018], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.3 the international indigenous policy journal april 2018 “we’ve been researched to death”: exploring the research experiences of urban indigenous peoples in vancouver, canada ashley goodman rob morgan ron kuehlke shelda kastor kim fleming see next page for additional authors recommended citation “we’ve been researched to death”: exploring the research experiences of urban indigenous peoples in vancouver, canada abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license authors â•œweâ•žve been researched to deathâ•š: exploring the research experiences of urban indigenous peoples in vancouver, canada promoting or protecting traditional knowledges? tensions in the resurgence of indigenous food practices on vancouver island the international indigenous policy journal volume 9 | issue 4 article 4 october 2018 promoting or protecting traditional knowledges? tensions in the resurgence of indigenous food practices on vancouver island megan k . muller carleton university, meganmuller3@cmail.carleton.ca recommended citation muller, m. k. (2018). promoting or protecting traditional knowledges? tensions in the resurgence of indigenous food practices on vancouver island. the international indigenous policy journal, 9(4). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.4 promoting or protecting traditional knowledges? tensions in the resurgence of indigenous food practices on vancouver island abstract indigenous knowledges are increasingly promoted within scholarship and policy making as a necessary component of the well-being and self-determination among indigenous peoples. this article contributes to this discussion by raising practical and ethical questions surrounding the resurgence of traditional food practices in western canada. based on ethnographic fieldwork conducted with cultural activists and elders in central vancouver island, this article reveals how this resurgence is framed by competing and contradictory pressures to build wider inclusion and awareness while simultaneously protecting knowledge and resources from exploitation. due to this complication, it is imperative that scholars and policy makers develop and apply a more nuanced understanding of indigenous knowledges in contemporary contexts that can better respond to the needs of indigenous communities. keywords indigenous knowledge, food sovereignty, resurgence, ethnography acknowledgments the author would like to acknowledge with gratitude those who participated in this research. thank you for the invaluable wisdom and memories shared. the author would also like to acknowledge alex strating from the faculty of social and behavioral sciences at the university of amsterdam for his mentorship, helpful suggestions, and much-needed encouragement. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ promoting or protecting traditional knowledges? tensions in the resurgence of indigenous food practices on vancouver island now we have a young generation who want these things. and want the traditional foods, and want to try these, and developing connections and starting to see the natural resources in the land as something more than just greenery. or as something more than just deemed to be developed or built on. that their health and their wellbeing are mediated by the wellness of the land around them and how they interconnect with it. (elder ipswa, personal communication, march 2013) to counteract the colonial suppression of traditional knowledges and the increasing scarcity of traditional food resources, indigenous elders and activists across vancouver island are developing new spaces for sharing traditional food knowledges and asserting the importance of indigenous food systems. these spaces include grassroots organizations, workshops, gatherings, and protests. though these emerging spaces for traditional knowledge transfer can be understood as responses to the changing role of traditional food knowledges within daily life, they also serve several objectives by promoting public recognition of traditional knowledges and practices. often, these spaces are facilitated through partnerships with public organizations within the education and health sectors. while resurgent practices that bring new life to indigenous food knowledges are often grassroots in nature, the ubiquity of this trend can be examined as a social movement that is linked to the global indigenous food sovereignty movement (ifsm). the ifsm has emerged in recent decades to address the social injustices linked to colonization that have led to food insecurity and the overrepresentation of diet-related diseases within indigenous communities (morrison, 2015; rudolph & mclachlan, 2013). within the ifsm, activists assert that traditional foods are intrinsically tied to cultural integrity, productive communities, and wellbeing (krohn et al., 2015; morrison, 2006). moreover, the ifsm’s goal of reinstating local control over food systems resonates with the call that has been made by many indigenous groups in canada for political sovereignty and rights to land, hunting, and fishing (rudolph & mclachlan, 2013). seeking to re-localize food systems, the concept of food sovereignty arose during the 1990s as means to contest the negative impacts of neoliberal trade regimes, resource extraction, and industrial agriculture on health, the environment, and sustainable food systems (kamal, linklater, thompson, dipple, & ithinto mechisowin committee, 2015). however, among indigenous peoples, the reality of living within food sovereignty is remembered and retold through intergenerational knowledge about fishing, hunting, and gathering practices (morrison, 2015). within many indigenous contexts, food sovereignty is tied to the land and culture and is dependent on community-based control over food systems through 1 muller: promoting or protecting traditional knowledges? published by scholarship@western, 2018 the application of traditional knowledges (kamal et al., 2015). the ifsm incorporates many goals, values, and approaches that stem from the diversity of indigenous cultures and lived experiences.1 through both the harvesting and the preparation of wild foods, as well as the underlying social protocol associated with these practices, traditional food practices have been recognized as a remedy to many health, social, and environmental concerns within indigenous communities today (davis & twidale, 2011; kamal et al., 2015). one of the primary reasons for the rising interest in traditional food practices within indigenous communities, research, and policy has stemmed from concern over the prevalence of diet-related disease among aboriginal populations. for instance, several studies have indicated that the shift from traditional foods to processed foods containing refined carbohydrates is associated with a rise in metabolic syndromes, including diabetes, obesity, and heart disease (waldram, herring, & young, 2006). the revival of traditional food practices has often been cited as a solution for food insecurity in indigenous communities (elliot, jayatilaka, brown, varley, & corbett, 2012) and has also been linked to self-determination, cultural reclamation (kamal et al., 2015), and rebuilding family and community connections (rudolph & mclachlan, 2013). at the same time, however, many of the species integral to indigenous cultures and livelihoods on the northwest coast of british columbia are becoming increasingly threatened by climate change, environmental contamination, and resource extraction (turner, 2005). given the potential for the misappropriation of traditional knowledges, the benefit of gaining public recognition must be carefully weighed in terms of not only the sustainability of indigenous knowledges, but also the sustainability of wild foods and associated ecosystems. based on 3 months of ethnographic research conducted in nanaimo, british columbia, this article addresses the ethical implications that arise as traditional knowledges are asserted and adapted to changing socio-political circumstances. in this context, i argue that competing and contradictory pressures frame the resurgence of traditional food practices between building wider inclusion and awareness while simultaneously protecting knowledge and resources from exploitation. as such, the ethics surrounding the appropriateness and methods of inclusion pertaining when, how, and with whom traditional knowledges are shared reveals a tension inherent in the broader indigenous food sovereignty movement. this article extends the work of anthropologists who have taken a critical stance towards the recognition of traditional knowledges within academia and policy, highlighting the potentially detrimental impacts to indigenous communities (coulthard, 2014; cruikshank, 2005; matsui, 2015; nadasdy, 2003; povinelli, 2002; simpson, 2014). specifically, it explores the nuances of this dilemma—of weighing the benefits and risks of sharing indigenous knowledge—by exploring how it has been negotiated within the grassroots traditional foods movement in coastal british columbia. certainly, it is difficult to refute that cultural vitality is instrumental to the wellbeing of all people, and that nurturing cultural traditions is especially key to rebuilding communities that have suffered the impacts of colonization and cultural or 1 within the province of british columbia, there are two notable ifsm organizations. the working group for indigenous food sovereignty, a province-wide organization founded to collaborate with indigenous communities to support increasing food security and sovereignty (morrison, 2015). the vancouver island and coastal communities indigenous food network (viccifn) was established through support from the community dietician program offered by island health, the regional health authority serving vancouver island. the aims of viccifn are to support indigenous food systems, honor cultural knowledge, and create opportunities for youth and elders connect through revitalizing traditional teachings (viccifn, 2011). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 4 [2018], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.4 political marginalization (auger, 2016; chandler & lalonde, 1998; king, smith, & gracey, 2009). however, the recognition of indigenous knowledges within policy is not enough to redress the marginalization and cultural suppression faced by indigenous peoples. as this article reveals, engaging in consultation processes regarding traditional knowledge places indigenous communities at risk for the commodification of their knowledges, lands, and resources, the criminalization of prohibited harvesting methods, and the closure of previously-accessed harvesting sites. thus, it is pertinent for scholars and policy makers to develop and apply a more nuanced understanding of indigenous knowledges in contemporary contexts through authentic and broad consultation so as to mitigate placing indigenous knowledges and related ecosystems at risk. literature review the following discussion approaches the ifsm as an emerging form of activism grounded in the resurgence of traditional food practices. drawing from recent works by indigenous scholars in canada, indigenous resurgence can be understood an increase of momentum in the flow of ways of life that have been passed down through generations. for instance, alfred (2005) has suggested that because resurgence is rooted in indigenous ways of being, the preservation and application of traditional knowledge is fundamental to the concept. traditional knowledges consist of comprehensive frameworks incorporating practices, skills, and modes of learning (cruikshank, 2005; martin-hill, 2003). moreover, they are typically experiential, lifestyle based, morally imbued, spiritual, and rooted in a sense of place (alfred, 2005; coulthard, 2014; dei, hall, & rosenberg, 2000; menzies & butler, 2006). an important way that the connection between tradition and resurgence has been described is through the concept of practice, wherein resurgence requires the embodiment and enactment of traditional values and principles (alfred, 2005). therefore, “indigenous resurgence is at its core a prefigurative politics—the methods of decolonization prefigure its aims” (coulthard, 2014, p. 159). viewing resurgence as a practice implies that a range of traditional practices, “whether a song, dance or a spoken word story, becomes then an individual and collective experience, with the goal of lifting the burden of colonialism by visioning new realities” (simpson, 2011, p. 34). indigenous resurgence draws on traditional practices to discover pathways to community healing, development, or political assertions, which are informed by indigenous ways of being. traditional knowledges in the public consumption and policy making social scientists working in international development and environmental studies have become increasingly interested in the study of indigenous or traditional knowledges2 (dei et al., 2000; menzies, 2006; turner, 2005). for these scholars, traditional knowledges offer an alternative to western hegemonic paradigms for addressing the “shortcomings of contemporary resource management” (menzies & butler, 2006, p. 5) and formulating sustainable development initiatives. these authors claim that the recording and teaching of indigenous knowledges offers a form of political resistance, which can transform the way indigenous ways of knowing are valued in academia and policy. the work of scholars in this area has been instrumental in elevating the presence of indigenous knowledges in development 2 i have opted the use the term traditional knowledges throughout this article, as it is commonly used within the indigenous food sovereignty movement on vancouver island, likely due to its reference to longstanding cultural autonomy. i designate knowledges as plural to reflect to diversity of indigenous experiences and histories. 3 muller: promoting or protecting traditional knowledges? published by scholarship@western, 2018 and policy frameworks internationally (dei et al., 2000). furthermore, it has been demonstrated that the revitalization of indigenous knowledges is key to improving the socio-economic status and wellbeing of indigenous peoples. martin-hill (2009), for example, has discussed how preserving indigenous knowledges is key to cultural identity, self-determination, and combating racism—the necessary building blocks for community healing. furthermore, policies and programs informed by indigenous knowledge integrate indigenous values and beliefs, thereby increasing effectiveness and impact (dell et al., 2011). in the canadian context, the recognition of indigenous knowledges within policy can be traced to the 1996 report of the royal commission on aboriginal peoples (castellano, 2000). while many scholars have advocated for the legitimacy of indigenous knowledges for informing policy, others have remained critical. for instance, though traditional knowledges are sometimes recognized within canadian policy, the state offers no protection of community ownership and traditional knowledges are not considered tied to indigenous rights and governance (matsui, 2015). furthermore, canadian scholars have noted that many indigenous peoples find that subjecting traditional knowledges to regulation and scientific scrutiny detracts from the sacred and social contexts of traditions (martin-hill, 2003; warry, 1998). battiste and henderson (2000) have similarly voiced concern over the decontextualization of traditional knowledges through their integration into scientific or policy frameworks. through this process, oral knowledges are translated into written accounts, categorized, and subjected to a foreign system of validation, which can lead to seemingly unrelated elements being discarded (cruikshank, 2012; menzies & butler, 2006). given the claim that indigenous knowledges encapsulate a worldview, traditional knowledges should instead be understood within their own inherent logic as a part of a holistic system of thought (cruikshank, 2005; kovach, 2009). nadasdy (2003) has revealed that the promotion of traditional knowledge in environmental management and land claims policy has had subtle, yet detrimental, implications for indigenous communities in the yukon because the policy frameworks were founded on an essentially eurocanadian worldview. thus, indigenous claims were frequently dismissed, even when expressed in the appropriate manner and context. in this way, nadasdy (2003) has argued that the incorporation of traditional knowledge into policy can further perpetuate the displacement of traditional ways. menzies and butler (2006) have suggested that this process requires a “cultural triage;” whereby the translation of information about traditional land-use practices aids in the preservation of some areas from resource development, but inherently excludes other areas from protection as policy makers set boundaries surrounding protected lands. scholars have similarly suggested that western law, inherently centered around individualism, is ill-equipped to manage either collective innovation or shared cultural knowledge (battiste & henderson, 2000; shiva, 2007). it is important to extend this discussion from the realm of policy making to the realm of public consumption. for instance, social movements such as the ifsm have garnered wider public acceptance and awareness through their work towards affecting policy change. but, as this article reveals, subjecting indigenous knowledges to public awareness and policy development places the knowledges, resources, and related communities at risk for exploitation, criminalization, and overharvesting. as such, this article contributes to a growing discussion of the role of traditional knowledge in public consumption and policy frameworks. specifically, this article reveals the material implications of sharing traditional 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 4 [2018], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.4 knowledge while emphasizing what is at stake both in garnering recognition for traditional food knowledges and protecting these knowledges from exploitation. methods this article is informed by data collected during a three-month period of ethnographic fieldwork in nanaimo, british columbia in 2013.3 in collaborating with indigenous activists and elders engaged in efforts to revitalize traditional food practices, the methods used included participant observation and unstructured interviews. through participant observation, i engaged as an ally and volunteer in community events and in public protests asserting indigenous rights. community events included workshops, community gatherings, consultation sessions with regional decision-makers, and traditional foods conferences. participants for this project were identified through their involvement with indigenous foods organizations and recognition as leaders or knowledge keepers.4 the unstructured interviews were guided by a relational and decolonizing methodology. a relational interview approach is contingent on mutual respect and trust, developed through a reflexive approach to understanding how knowledge is co-constructed through a dialogical process of interpretation and sharing between the researcher and participants. to this end, participants maintain a degree of control over the conversation and knowledge they share (kovach, 2009). a decolonizing approach to interviews carries the ethical imperative to advance the stories of indigenous peoples for restorative justice and healing (roulston, 2010). both relational and decolonizing interview approaches operate through an unstructured format, as this allows participants to direct conversation towards the issues they deem most important. this necessitates a careful consideration of the impact of research within participating communities, with the objective of bringing attention to tensions that impede the further advancement of indigenous rights. the interview and participant observation data collected, including field notes and interview transcripts, were analyzed through an inductive and emergent process (mosher, long, & harding, 2017). the methodology guiding this research project involved a multi-sited ethnographic approach (coleman & von hellerman, 2011; gupta & ferguson, 1997). this research was not conducted primarily within a geographically-bounded community, but rather traced the networks of activism and resurgence that connect communities and urban indigenous peoples through a set of shared goals. as such, the research process was situated within non-profit and grassroots organizations that promote the resurgence of traditional food practices. this method reflects the dynamic nature of cultural belonging in light of the ongoing movement of peoples between urban centres and their home communities. moreover, membership in traditional food organizations often crossed community boundaries. my intention was to move beyond a geographically delineated description of cultural practice towards salient discourses surrounding traditional foods that seemed to both overlap between communities as well as bridge urban and reserve life. 3 ethics approval for this research was granted by the graduate school of social sciences at the university of amsterdam. 4 the interview sample for this research included five primary informants, including three elders (two female and one male, aged 50-75) and two traditional foods activists (both male, aged 23 and 40). the majority of those who have shared their words within this text chose to be recognized for their expertise through the use of traditional names, however one participant opted to remain anonymous through the use of a pseudonym. 5 muller: promoting or protecting traditional knowledges? published by scholarship@western, 2018 as a non-indigenous ally, understanding how to speak out against the ongoing impacts of colonization from a place of respect is a continuous learning process. in the context of this research, it implied a commitment to relationality and reflexivity throughout the research process, understanding that the sharing of knowledge and life experiences comes with a responsibility to carry forward what has been shared in a way that empowers rather than objectifies indigenous communities (archibald, 2008). as such, this article has been carefully reviewed and approved by research participants. indigenous foods of vancouver island within canadian policy frameworks, the original inhabitants of north america are referred to as aboriginal peoples. this designation is further subdivided between first nations, inuit, and métis. this article adopts the term indigenous to reflect the socio-political experience of colonized peoples worldwide. the traditional territories of vancouver island have been and continue to be inhabited by three distinct indigenous language families: coast salish, kwakwaka’wakw, and nuu-chah-nulth. these language families can be further subdivided into local dialects. for instance, the city of nanaimo is located on the traditional territory of the snuneymuxw first nation. the coast salish dialect spoken by snuneymuxw people is hul’qumi’num, which they share in common with people of the cowichan tribes, as well as other groups on southern vancouver island and the lower mainland of british columbia. the participants of this study represented diverse nations but primarily included métis, kwakwaka’wakw, and coast salish individuals living in vancouver island’s central region. because vancouver island is characterized by linguistic and geographical diversity, food practices and cultural protocols differed greatly between indigenous nations. however, there are number of characteristics that are shared among groups. for instance, access to harvesting sites and related knowledge was often passed through family lineages (trosper, 2003). traditional foods common to indigenous communities in the area included wild game, fish, shellfish, roe, seaweed, berries, and medicinal herbs (kelm, 1998). traditional food practices also include specific preparation and cooking methods, such as extracting fish oils, drying or smoking fish, pit cooking, and the use of bentwood boxes. moreover, because traditional harvesting and food preparation requires diverse skills, this knowledge was typically passed down through ongoing practice and cultivated over the course of a lifetime. as elder ipswa, a métis traditional food activist living in nanaimo, explained: that kind of teaching isn’t something that you can just sit down in one afternoon . . . you know, it comes with a lifetime of being connected to that land, and harvesting on there and doing activities so that you can . . . read all those nuances; become a whole way of connecting that doesn’t relate to the weekend warrior “let’s go hunting or get our hunting gear on today and go collect some food.” and it doesn’t even come with years of experience because my grandmother, she lived her whole life on the land and at 80, 90 years of age she had that intrinsic lifestyle living in that community and knowing how things were working, on a deep sense of connection to the ecology of everything, that even in my age, although i’d been there a long time, i haven’t nearly the connection. according to elders, embodying traditional knowledges requires continuous practice both under the guidance of knowledgeable community members and through ongoing interactions with the land. both 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 4 [2018], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.4 are necessary in order to internalize the values and protocols associated with traditional food harvesting and preparation. indigenous food practices and colonization the resurgence of traditional food practices can be partly understood as a response to colonial disenfranchisement of indigenous knowledges and ways as life. on vancouver island, as was the case throughout canada, processes of settler colonialism profoundly affected indigenous cultures and, through mechanisms of cultural assimilation, has been detrimental to indigenous peoples’ ability to conduct traditional practices. this context reveals both the motivations behind the traditional foods movement as well as the kinds of barriers elders and activists face in their work to preserve traditional knowledges for future generations. the institution of reservations in the mid-1800s was followed by the mass relocation of people from traditional territories onto designated sites (kelm, 1998). as elder hyamiciye', a renowned medicine woman from the cowichan first nation, explained, “once they got relegated and instituted to reserves, you know, you’re in this square. ‘now don’t leave this square.’ and all those things [medicinal plants] aren’t growing in this square.” while some of these reserves were located at traditional village sites, many were not and often excluded camp sites used for seasonal fishing, hunting, gathering, or canoe building (kelm, 1998). scholars have claimed that this loss of connection to ancestral lands operated as a tool of colonialism by weakening traditional knowledges and the economic independence of indigenous nations (bagelman, devereaux, & hartley, 2016; martin-hill, 2009; turner, 2005; waziyatawin, 2012). another method of state-endorsed assimilation was the indian residential school (irs) system. residential schools were operated by the department of indian affairs and christian churches between 1831 to 1996. residential schools had a detrimental impact on the teaching of traditional knowledges by removing indigenous children from their communities, enforcing the adoption of european customs, and suppressing indigenous languages and lifeways (kelm, 1998). children in residential schools were prevented from learning the community-oriented lessons inherent in traditional food practices, as they were removed from the family structures that were the predominant source of knowledge transfer. elder hyamiciye' shared some of her experiences reconnecting individuals with traditional practices during community teaching events: i asked the elder to share a story about sea eggs [herring roe], right? and he probably called me back later and did tell me that he shared a story with the kids. but it was my story; that i had told him. and then the next time, something else happened [where he needed my advice]. and that’s how to fix the stick for the fire for the fish, right? to smoke the fish, it’s called a pi’kwan. and, like maybe there’s an idea of stuff in the background but after the third time, and i realized that he really didn’t have his own story, because he was at [residential] school. thus, in the context of communities seeking to restore the transfer of traditional knowledges, elders have expressed the impact of this shift in the form of knowledge transferal and the difficulty of incorporating traditional foods into daily life. as elder hyamiciye' further explained, some people make sure that i get some stuff here and there but that’s the only way it can be done. by the goodwill of your family. by somebody being in your family being indigenous food7 muller: promoting or protecting traditional knowledges? published by scholarship@western, 2018 oriented and keeping it. and if there isn’t at least one person in a family doing that, then the whole family is lost in that line. so that’s how the residential food thing, when they took them [the children] away and took them away from this being as a daily norm. so now they have to be taught it, as not even a daily norm. as a treat! indigenous food practices in the context of scarcity the changing role of traditional foods is not solely the result of political and economic forces; it is also intrinsically linked with changes to the natural environment. elders explained that the most drastic changes to the role traditional foods played in daily life occurred as recently as the late 1980s, due to a decline in the abundance of traditional foods through the loss of both marine biodiversity and vegetation associated with old growth forests. kwin’wah’tala galis of the gwawaenuk tribe, a traditionalist and indigenous activist, explained: from my own experience, not too long ago, like 1990, we had an abundance of food. it wasn’t really scattered. again, it was a sense of security and dependence. and once again, because of development, our natural environment, our resources have been disturbed. i’ll give you an example of traditional food sovereignty. you know, we could go any given time and even if we went as far as the beach, in front of our coastal village site, and be able to harvest seafood from there. it was always plentiful . . . i can give you one good example, of our halibut fishing days, where we used to be able to, we literally count up to three, drop four lines and catch four halibut at the same time. so, by 11 o’clock in the morning we’d have eight halibut. then that was enough, right. we only took what we needed. brought it home and processed them. but there was one particular spot at the north end, the northern end of vancouver island where there was halibut habitat. the draggers come in and they scrape the bottom and they fill their nets with every other types of species we can name. and from what i understand they destroyed that halibut habitat . . . and as a result, we end up not catching any halibut after that fact. access to traditional foods has changed drastically within decades due to several processes, including environmental, commercial, and regulatory changes. important environmental concerns that have impacted and continue to impact the availability of traditional foods include climate change, diminishing biodiversity, and environmental contamination. on vancouver island, the primary sources of impact stem from conventional forestry practices, mining, and commercial fisheries (turner, 2005). indigenous communities also face barriers due to government regulations, including fishing closures and catch restrictions instated by the canadian fisheries act and the department of fisheries and oceans (turner & clifton, 2006). furthermore, due to hunting licensing as well as seasonal and site restrictions, first nations people have been prosecuted in british columbia for “essentially preventing starvation,” as elder ipswa explained.5 for example, david, a coast salish activist explained that the traditional means of salmon harvesting from his community involves spear fishing; however, this method is outlawed under provincial law. exacerbated by the barriers of environmental contamination, commercial resource exploitation, and the regulatory restrictions described above, indigenous peoples also face difficulties continuing traditional 5 for a case from vancouver island examined in provincial court, see r. v. morris (2006). 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 4 [2018], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.4 food practices in terms of accessibility. primarily, issues of accessibility to traditional foods are the result of privatization of land and urban encroachment. due to the establishment of reserves and ongoing natural resource exploitation, many traditional harvesting sites have been privatized or turned in to parks (davis & twidale, 2011). as urban encroachment increases, the proximity to traditional foods greatly decreases. as elder ipswa explained: i used to be able to walk just a way up here on wakesiah, to gather traditional plant medicines and herbs, but because of the encroachment, i would now need to be able to travel miles and miles away, so the cost of equipment, gas, and fuel, for the return, becomes an expense. when understanding the resurgence of traditional food practices, it is also important to consider the context of living on reserves adjacent to urban centres or for families who have chosen to live away from home. elder ipswa expressed the “lost knowledge of deep ecology” among his grandchildren’s generation due to the obligations of urban life and the greater spatial distance from sites where traditional foods are available. he explained that there is little room for the teaching and learning of traditional practices when it is no longer an integral aspect of everyday life. similarly, david explained the difficulties of finding time between the obligations of education and employment to “maintain a connection,” noting: it’s a culture clash, because in a way we’re trying to preserve our way of life but now we’re getting into a generation that is assimilated into western society and it’s a danger to the culture in that if we don’t keep up the cultural practices when we have the time to do it, then it’s going to be gone. thus, those promoting the continuation of traditional food practices, particularly those living in urban environments, must make a conscious effort to practice and transfer their own embodied memories, or in elder hyamiciye'’s words, shift towards “teaching” instead of a “daily norm.” through the combined efforts of elders, activists, and grassroots organizations, new forums for teaching traditional knowledges are emerging, drawing on themes of feasting and commensality as avenues for sharing cultural knowledge. these public opportunities for knowledge transferal aim to re-infuse learning into a context where traditional food as an embodied daily norm is less tenable; specifically, they do this by reincorporating urban youth and disenfranchised community members into community and land-based knowledges (bagelman et al., 2016). these spaces can take various forms; they may be coordinated within a particular community or facilitated by organizations that span between communities—such as indigenous non-profit organizations, universities, or health advisory boards. owing to the multi-stakeholder nature of these spaces, they often operate at the intersection of agendas, including indigenous cultural resurgence, social or leisure interests, efforts to combat food insecurity or nutrition-related health problems, responses to environmental degradation, and sovereignty over sustenance and cultural expression. promoting and protecting traditional knowledges the resurgence of traditional food practices plays an important role for improving nutritional health and honoring cultural knowledge. however, new spaces for teaching traditional food knowledges are framed by contradictory pressures to promote broader awareness of traditional food practices while also protecting knowledges and resources from misappropriation. promoting an awareness of indigenous 9 muller: promoting or protecting traditional knowledges? published by scholarship@western, 2018 knowledges can be an important avenue for cultural empowerment. speaking on the relationship between traditional foods and indigenous activism, kwin’wah’tala galis explained the public promotion of traditional knowledges as a way of renewing public acceptance of indigenous culture following a history of colonial discrimination. in the past it [indigenous knowledge] hasn’t been accepted as a form of technology, for example. or a science. because, for one, sadly enough, it wasn’t considered civil, it wasn’t an acceptable form. so, because people are getting more consciousness, more awareness of it, it’s becoming more of an acceptable form. and people are beginning to realize that first nations people have a lot to offer to the world and the larger society. as kwin’wah’tala galis further explained, the importance of creating awareness of indigenous food practices stems from an aspiration for “independence:” the recognition that these practices would, potentially, afford greater protection as an inherent right and, in so doing, form a stronger base for land claims. in this sense, the wide dissemination of traditional food knowledges is a necessary step to protecting related resources through asserting self-determination. similarly, social scientists have argued that the reaffirmation of indigenous knowledge can: • reinforce a sense of identity and wellbeing (burgos, 2014; hunter, logan, goulet, & barton, 2006; iwasaki, bartlett, & o’neil, 2005); • build awareness of what is at stake for indigenous peoples with respect to environmental degradation, loss of biodiversity, and climate change (turner, 2005; waziyatawin, 2012); • enforce the role indigenous peoples should have in managing resources and development (dei et al., 2000); and • influence policy around restrictions to hunting regulations and land access (menzies & butler, 2006). yet, another key motivation behind the emergence of new spaces for traditional foods knowledge sharing is to increase the knowledge base—especially as a response to the impacts of colonization—by including individuals who may not have had access to mentorship from elders. considering that these new spaces of traditional knowledge sharing aim to build wider inclusiveness, and often dovetail with other public interests by sharing funds and resources, managing access to traditional knowledges becomes an important concern. while some elders and activists i spoke with were quite open about sharing knowledge, others used their own methods for determining when and how much knowledge they would impart to a particular group or individual. some elders were quite critical of the possibility of traditional knowledges falling into the “wrong hands”—that is, to individuals who may exploit resources or harvest in a disrespectful way. while grassroots organizations and indigenous activists are now seeking to share traditional food knowledges more widely so as to preserve cultural ways and promote knowledge transferal, many of the resources fundamental to traditional food systems are currently threatened by population decline. individuals invested in the promotion of traditional foods thus maintain a constant awareness of the urgent need to protect these resources from exploitation. as such, there is an observable tension between efforts to share traditional knowledges and the obligation to protect knowledges from exploitation. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 4 [2018], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.4 in many cases, the colonial legacy of discrediting indigenous knowledge has led to widespread skepticism and distrust. david explained this as a commonplace attitude: you know, kind of a lot of people are very wary with discussing with white people about a lot of these things because of us being taken advantage in many ways, that is through, you know, politically, and culturally, and economically. often, we’re just means to an end in many ways. this perspective is reflected in battiste and henderson’s (2000) writing on indigenous intellectual property rights. concerning the growing interest in indigenous knowledges within academia and policy, they stated, “these outsiders have not attempted to prevent the extermination of indigenous peoples or their ecosystems; instead, they have intensified their efforts to access, to know, and to assert control over this endangered knowledge and these endangered resources” (p. 290). particularly on the northwest coast, indigenous peoples have experienced a history of commodification of resources important to their communities. the salmon industry and the harvesting of seaweed by cosmetic companies offer two prominent examples of this history (turner & clifton, 2006). pacific salmon have been an important staple for many indigenous groups in the region for centuries. yet due to climate change, overfishing, habitat destruction, and diseases introduced through the salmon farming industry, several species of pacific salmon are currently listed as threatened (gresh, lichatowich, & schoonmaker, 2000; krkošek et al., 2000; noakes, beamish, & kent, 2000). similar concerns have been raised about many of the plant and animal species important to indigenous food systems. for instance, elder ipswa emphasized the importance of sharing traditional knowledge to support the re-development of traditional foods networks linking indigenous communities. yet he explains: i get extremely worried that if, like if any other sort of new commodity, it comes out on the market and everybody suddenly decides that they want . . . if everybody decided tomorrow to eat all coast salish, the demand on the food would eliminate the resources for the next generation. elder ipswa’s concerns regarding the potential overuse of resources is framed around an awareness of outsiders’ interests in traditional foods. he further explained that public preoccupation with “super foods,” popularized for their health benefits, has led to the overharvesting of salal berries in the nanaimo area. many participants emphasized the importance of understanding traditional food knowledges within the broader context of indigenous values, beliefs, and food harvesting protocols that ensured the use of wild foods in a respectful and sustainable way. for instance, david explained: and so, because our methods of harvesting are so convenient, if we gave it to these people who don’t understand the meaning of the land and the culture that we are a part of, then they would not try to preserve any of it. they would go and take as many salmon as they could. they would go and take as many deer as they could. and you could watch half of it go to waste, because they don’t know how to preserve it. concerns regarding the overuse of traditional resources have necessitated apprehension over the terms by which access is granted to these knowledges. while there are several coordinated initiatives to protect natural resources under the guidance of elders across vancouver island, these organizations experience barriers in terms of acquiring the knowledge about specific harvesting locations and practices required to make a strong case to protect resources within policy frameworks. this is due to the situation in which 11 muller: promoting or protecting traditional knowledges? published by scholarship@western, 2018 first nations communities may not have “authorized” access to areas abundant in traditional foods. elder hyamiciye' explained the difficulties of reaching out to such organizations: i went to a couple meetings and one of them was, “okay, so where do you go harvest? so, we can protect those areas.” but, i don’t know, i’ve lost so many areas to development that how can you predict those areas? when, really, they’re owned by other people . . . and how can you say, “this is where i harvest,” when they say, “oh, well that’s crown land. oh well that’s . . . somebody owns that.” traditional foods may be harvested in covert ways, either because the methods don’t meet provincial regulations or because harvesting is conducted on private land. thus, some elders fear that too much knowledge shared openly might result in either the criminalization of their activities or the closure of areas they access. thus, the collaboration between new spaces for knowledge transferal and external organizations operate in a contested field, wherein efforts to protect traditional food resources through public awareness are always susceptible not only to misuse by outsiders but also to the loss of access. those seeking to encourage the transferal of traditional food knowledges must negotiate between revitalizing knowledge while maintaining a level of secrecy surrounding the actual practice of harvesting traditional foods. this complicates the nature of teaching, as elders and activists must navigate the tension between promoting traditional knowledge more widely to reincorporate community members, while simultaneously limiting access to these knowledges to prevent misappropriation. the tension i have outlined is not intended to represent two sides of an opposing debate; rather, individuals are often conflicted with both considerations and change their approaches towards knowledge sharing depending on context. however, this tension nonetheless reveals the conditions under which these boundaries of inclusion and access to traditional food resources have been—and can be—drawn. as was expressed by elders, the sharing of traditional knowledge before colonization occurred through direct, often family-based relationships. in this way, the transmission of indigenous knowledge was primarily based on the enactment of social obligations to people, animals, and the environment. as the format for sharing indigenous knowledge has shifted to an educational approach, operating more within the tension between revitalizing knowledges while protecting them, it has become more necessary to determine the appropriateness of with whom and under what circumstances traditional knowledges are shared. during my research, i encountered several strategies to negotiate this tension. for instance, in speaking about the public dissemination of traditional knowledge, a respected elder explained that “you can give them all the knowledge you want, but don’t give them the locations.” this elder was advocating for an inclusionary approach yet did not remove all obstacles to accessing traditional food resources. individuals would have to show a level of commitment, through uncovering their own areas for harvesting, that would demonstrate their ability to interpret and understand the landscape within an indigenous knowledge framework. this approach to traditional food knowledges often constructs a contrast between hunting and harvesting as a way of life and the “weekend warriors,” or sport hunters, whose experiential connection to land exists only in a fragmentary way. for instance, elder ipswa spoke about contrasting practices between indigenous people and non-aboriginal sports hunters who tend to damage animal populations due to their lack of selectiveness when choosing which animals to cull. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 4 [2018], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.4 so it’s a hobby versus attempting to sustain their living. and that’s where i think as aboriginal people we struggle because for most of us, we’re not doing this for sport, although there are times where it’s recreational, it’s mostly for teaching the younger generation the cultural bits of why do we have teamwork? why do we pull together? how come the hunters play an important role? . . . there’s whole sets of steps in each of them and each of them are offered in ways of connecting with the natural world. and a lot of that is that indigenous way of seeing things. understanding traditional food knowledges within a broader indigenous intellectual and spiritual framework was considered key to the ethical use of wild foods. traditional food knowledges are embedded within a framework including intergenerational teachings about land ownership and stewardship, an intuitive understanding of the seasons and tides, and a spiritual or philosophical framework encompassing social protocols (turner, 2005). these protocols outline responsibilities to community, animals, and the environment through values such as an interconnection to the land, respect, reciprocity, and practical knowledge about when and how to harvest so as to promote the longevity of ecologies. for example, elder hyamiciye' described the protocol involved with salmon fishing whereby fishers returned the remains of the salmon to the water in order to support future salmon runs. she emphasized that “there really, really is a whole story, and a whole ritual. and maybe all those rituals were there, every single ritual was there to make sure all those things stay in place.” the argument follows that appropriate harvesting requires a lifetime of living with traditional food as an aspect of daily life, especially with the guidance of elders to internalize and embody the associated values and ways of knowing. however, given the context that many community members have experienced disenfranchisement due to residential schooling as well as the suppression of cultural practices through colonial policies of assimilation, the boundaries of what constitutes such experience are not easily drawn. thus, the scenario becomes much more complex than a simple division between indigenous–western or subsistence–sport harvesting. for instance, there is concern that the obligations of contemporary life take up much of the time individuals could have otherwise spent internalizing indigenous harvesting knowledges and associated protocols. the resurgence of traditional food knowledges thus requires the continuity of traditional knowledges, but it operates within the context of discontinuity of knowledge transferal. spaces for knowledge transferal such as community gatherings, educational conferences, and workshops, have emerged to address these concerns. yet at the same time, a tension remains unresolved in terms of how to promote the continuation of indigenous food knowledges without making them susceptible to exploitation through processes of resource commodification and land privatization. discussion the transitional role of traditional food from a habitual practice imbued with values guiding human and environmental relations to the more explicit sharing of memories has been expressed in new public forums, often facilitated by external actors, such as public health agencies, educational institutions, and non-profit organizations. these semi-public spaces for the sharing of traditional food knowledges are embedded within competing obligations to garner recognition of indigenous lifeways and ensure the vitality of indigenous teachings, while at the same time protecting knowledges from commodification or exploitation. while the indigenous food sovereignty movement holds important objectives, such as the recognition of indigenous rights and cultural reclamation, the sharing of indigenous knowledges within public and policy domains can sometimes place those knowledges and related resources at risk. 13 muller: promoting or protecting traditional knowledges? published by scholarship@western, 2018 anthropologists and indigenous scholars have expressed skepticism about the increasing trend to incorporate indigenous knowledges within policy and research, especially in the sense that the extraction of these knowledges within western frameworks negates their sacred, context-based, dynamic, and adaptive aspects. this article has extended this discussion by exploring the perceptions and experiences of elders and indigenous activists, revealing the practical implications for communities working to rebuild cultural knowledge and assert its role in contemporary life. such implications involve the importance of garnering recognition to combat the loss of access to land, to rectify hunting and fishing regulations, and to challenge the colonial suppression of traditional knowledge. these must be checked against the possible risks of increasing species loss, privatization of land, and commodification of knowledges and resources. given this situation, it becomes clear that scholars and policy makers should develop and apply a more nuanced understanding of the contemporary role of traditional knowledges, an understanding that recognizes what is at stake for indigenous communities regarding the loss of biodiversity, privatization of land, commodification of indigenous foods, and the criminalization of hunting and harvesting activities. it is important to recognize that when indigenous knowledges are shared publicly, they should continue to remain the property of those communities. while traditional knowledges contain wisdom that could benefit society at large, failing to guarantee communities ownership over their knowledges could effectively usurp their control over these knowledges. while it is important that leaders and scholars are supporting the recognition of indigenous knowledge and considering their implications for policy frameworks on both national and international levels, it is imperative to assert that that these knowledges are rooted in the communities whose livelihoods and traditional territories are directly impacted by potential policies. my intention in bringing attention to these tensions has been to highlight the necessity of understanding both the range of opinions held within indigenous communities as well as the contexts from which these opinions arise. it is pertinent for those engaged in this work to understand the environmental, political, and social context of each indigenous community in order to mitigate the potential risks attending their decisions to share their traditional knowledges within public and policy domains. from this place of greater understanding, policy makers and researchers could work collaboratively with a wide representation within a particular community or indigenous organization to develop safeguards before taking any action. for instance, a potential safeguard could involve the establishment of legal provisions to protect individuals and communities from criminalization or the closure of lands if they disclose traditional knowledges and practices that contradict current law. while the conditions of settler colonial society impose a tenuous balance in terms of how traditional knowledges can be shared and asserted, indigenous food sovereignty activists and elders are creatively finding ways to bring forward traditional knowledges in ways that benefit their communities and neighboring ecologies. the ethics of when and with whom it is appropriate to share traditional knowledges is something many, if not all indigenous communities, are currently grappling with in their efforts to reassert cultural identity and reclaim indigenous territories and governance. as such, it is ever more necessary to understand indigenous knowledges within context. this requires that indigenous knowledges are understood not 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(2012). the paradox of indigenous resurgence at the end of empire. decolonization: indigeneity, education, and society, 1(1), 68-85. 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 4 [2018], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.4 the international indigenous policy journal october 2018 promoting or protecting traditional knowledges? tensions in the resurgence of indigenous food practices on vancouver island megan k. muller recommended citation promoting or protecting traditional knowledges? tensions in the resurgence of indigenous food practices on vancouver island abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license promoting or protecting traditional knowledges? tensions in the resurgence of indigenous food practices on vancouver island moving towards an indigenous research process: a reflexive approach to empirical work with first nations communities in canada the international indigenous policy journal volume 10 | issue 1 article 6 january 2019 moving towards an indigenous research process: a reflexive approach to empirical work with first nations communities in canada elaine toombs lakehead university, etoombs@lakeheadu.ca alexandra s. drawson lakehead university lori chambers lakehead university tina l. r . bobinski dilico anishinabek family care john dixon dilico anishinabek family care see next page for additional authors recommended citation toombs, e. , drawson, a. s. , chambers, l. , bobinski, t. l. , dixon, j. , mushquash, c. j. (2019). moving towards an indigenous research process: a reflexive approach to empirical work with first nations communities in canada. the international indigenous policy journal, 10(1). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.6 moving towards an indigenous research process: a reflexive approach to empirical work with first nations communities in canada abstract moving towards reconciliation within indigenous research requires the careful examination of existing practices at all stages of the research process. engagement in and dissemination of reflexive processes may increase the relevance of research results for indigenous communities and partners. this article describes and contextualizes the results obtained from this qualitative research study examining parenting needs and child reunification in these communities. the initial results were deemed relevant by the partnering community but research stakeholders reported that they did not reflect all community values. based on the advice of the research advisory group, the research team decided to further analyze the results to address these shortcomings. the reanalysis process focused on improving the perceived meaningfulness and relevance to communities. exploration of how these results were re-situated in an indigenous framework of wellbeing is discussed. researcher reflections about the project processes and considerations for future research are explored. keywords indigenous research, indigenous research methods, first nations mental health, qualitative research methods acknowledgments we would like to acknowledge the work of our community partner agency throughout this project, including agency staff and members of represented first nations. dr. christopher j. mushquash’s involvement with this work is partially supported by the canada research chairs program. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. authors elaine toombs, alexandra s. drawson, lori chambers, tina l. r . bobinski, john dixon, and christopher j. mushquash http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ moving towards an indigenous research process: a reflexive approach to empirical work with first nations communities in canada a wide variety of disciplines, domains, and community partners engage in indigenous research; yet, knowledge mobilization related to these research experiences are not always documented (roy & campbell, 2015). given the historically poor representation of indigenous needs and values within institutional research endeavors, researchers working with indigenous communities must be careful to ensure that their research remains both relevant and beneficial to the communities and populations with whom they work (bainbridge et al., 2015). research methods that result in both increased knowledge for and better partnerships with communities, as well as evidence that can promote wellbeing for indigenous peoples, are valuable. overall, it is challenging to identify best practices or “gold standard” approaches for conducting research with indigenous peoples given the varying needs of individual communities. however, sharing research experiences—successful or otherwise—can facilitate better translation of useful methods between communities. while this type of communication is typically completed through formal and informal research networks, conferences, and research gatherings, peerreviewed literature on this topic includes relatively few examples of individual reflections. in response to this gap in the literature, this article describes the process of completing a research project in collaboration with an indigenous mental health agency and partnering first nations communities in northwestern ontario, canada. this article describes and contextualizes the results obtained from this qualitative research study examining adult community members’ perceptions of the experiences and needs of children and their families in these communities. the initial results were deemed relevant by the partnering agency, but other research stakeholders reported that they did not reflect all community values. based on the advice of the research advisory group, the research team decided to further analyze the results to address these shortcomings. the reanalysis process focused on improving the perceived meaningfulness and relevance to communities. exploration of how these results were resituated in an indigenous framework of wellbeing is discussed. reflections on this process of description, analysis, and further contextualization are presented, particularly from experiences of two nonindigenous student researchers involved with the project. specifically, this article discusses researchers’ reflections on and experiences completing the project, including the reanalysis of results in order to disseminate results that could be readily implemented by indigenous community partners. background indigenous research practices incorporate indigenous values, beliefs, ways of knowing, and ways of understanding into research endeavors (kovach, 2010). these practices have resulted in methods that are specifically designed to meet the individual needs of communities, resulting in a heterogeneous, and, at times, eclectic variety of research approaches (drawson, toombs, & mushquash, 2017; wright, wahoush, ballantyne, gabel, & jack, 2016). drawson, toombs, et al. (2017), for example, found that, although many research projects that engage indigenous methods tended to use community-based participatory approaches, there was a broad range of indigenous methods used within research literature. the methods used are important because they determine what information is collected, deemed relevant, and disseminated. further, they found that reflecting on existing indigenous research strategies promotes understanding of how knowledge is shared within indigenous communities. 1 toombs et al.: moving towards an indigenous research process published by scholarship@western, 2019 historically, research practices have not represented indigenous needs; research has been completed on indigenous populations rather than with indigenous communities (canadian institute of health research, natural sciences and engineering research council of canada, & social sciences, and humanities research council of canada, 2014). such research on indigenous populations has contributed to the further colonization, assimilation, and marginalization of indigenous peoples (skewes & lewis, 2016). indeed, violations of indigenous rights through colonial research endeavors continue to exist through practices such as pursuing research priorities that are not valued by indigenous communities, using measures that are not validated with indigenous populations, or publishing results without consulting study participants (canadian institute of health research et al., 2014). this is particularly troublesome given that research findings that are interpreted with no contextual understanding of a community’s cultural and social contexts can result in misleading conclusions (drawson, mushquash, & mushquash, 2017). drawson, mushquash, et al. (2017) have demonstrated the necessity of cultural and contextual considerations when analyzing data. specifically, they showed that, without such considerations, hierarchal regressions using a large data set could be interpreted to suggest a statistical finding that a community’s use of its traditional language decreased its overall wellbeing (drawson, mushquash, et al., 2017). this finding makes it clear that it is essential to include cultural and contextual knowledge so that data are presented in a way that accurately reflects the experiences and needs of the populations who participate in research projects. attempts have been made to build research skills in ways that benefit indigenous communities. kirkness and barnhardt (1991), for example, described four fundamental “r’s” of research with first nations communities, specifying the necessity of respect, relevance, reciprocity, and responsibility into every stage of the research process. although initially conceptualized as tools to promote first nations attendance in higher education, these principles have since been applied to research work with many indigenous communities (markiewicz, 2012; moniz, 2015). moreover, walters et al. (2009) have expanded kirkness and barnhardt’s principles to include reflection, resilience, retraditionalization, and revolution. similarly, indigenous scholars have developed theoretical understandings of research methodology and methods (kovach, 2010; wilson, 2001). the implementation of ownership, control, access, and possession standards (ocap™; first nations information governance centre, 2014) has also created formalized structures for respectful research practices with indigenous communities. researchers who abide by ocap™ principles when working with indigenous partners aim to eliminate exploitive research practices and share knowledge in a way that meets the requested needs of indigenous communities (canadian institute of health research et al., 2014). more broadly, gray and oprescu (2016) have noted that changing perspectives on what is considered valuable research for indigenous communities and stakeholders results in changing development, practices, analyses, and dissemination of knowledge. to this end, training non-indigenous investigators within community-research partnerships can increase communities’ access to specialized research knowledge. as a result, communities can use partnerships between themselves and non-indigenous researchers to develop research projects that meet their contextual and cultural needs (gray & oprescu, 2016). recent developments within indigenous research have reflected a convergence of multiple methods, methodologies, and epistemologies that have been created or modified to meet the needs of indigenous communities. despite their shared use of the term “indigenous,” the methods used within these approaches have varied so significantly that their differing conceptualization of “indigenous” becomes relevant (drawson, toombs, et al., 2017). although many approaches promote shared values or beliefs, 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 6 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.6 conceptualization of knowledge in indigenous frameworks differs from non-indigenous paradigms. this differing conceptualization can vastly change the way that knowledge is discussed and applied in research. for example, within many indigenous communities, knowledge is often considered shared with all of creation (wilson, 2001) while remaining relational, reciprocal, and respectful (weber-pillwax, 2001). moving towards reconciliation within indigenous research practices requires careful consideration of existing research practices (canadian institute of health research et al., 2014). discrepancies between academic and community research priorities, processes, and authorship have been identified and documented within indigenous community-based research processes (castleden, sylvestre, martin, & mcnally, 2015). for example, the relational nature of community-based work often requires increased time for relationship building, collaboration, and partner engagement. academic intuitions that prioritize research productivity may not allow for or value how long it takes to engage with community partners—especially when considering the career trajectories of people who work with indigenous communities. if researchers are using these projects to bolster their careers or increase publication counts, then the actions required to timely complete these goals may be incongruent with the expectations and research processes in indigenous communities (castleden et al., 2015). in this sense, good intentions do not necessarily result in good research practices. carefully reviewing individual research priorities among stakeholders before beginning a project can identify how partnership values are aligned and ensure the research is truly community-based (simonds & christopher, 2013). analysis of frequently-used indigenous research methods can both assess the utility of proposed approaches for indigenous communities and consider the presence of existing implicit biases or assumptions (drawson, toombs, et al., 2017). however, it is important to—as stated above—balance such analysis with the specific needs of individual communities; research project decisions that are intentionally aimed at benefiting indigenous communities may inadvertently promote inaccurate results that do not reflect communities’ true values (drawson, mushquash, et al., 2017). the use of indigenous methods is assumed to produce indigenous data that remains situated within an indigenous framework. though many researchers have demonstrated their good intentions engaging with indigenous research, not all of them have produced research that aligned with indigenous values (foulks, 1989). notably, research institutions do not typically require researchers to align their research results with existing bodies of indigenous knowledge or describe how their research processes embodied best-practice research standards, such as the ocap™ principles (first nations information governance centre, 2014). specific governing bodies—particularly through research ethics committees, granting agencies, and individual reporting at universities—often encourage researchers to identify these positive practices, but the responsibility of ensuring research is community-based falls on partnering communities. although researchers must obtain ethics approval and establish community partnerships, they are often not required to define the specific indigenous methods they used or will use to gather or analyze knowledge. lavallée and leslie (2016) have emphasized that, as the ethical responsibility placed on the academic institution now shifts to communities within community-based research, it remains the responsibility of the researcher to engage in appropriate ethical decision making. reliance on singular researcher values, rather than those formed through partnerships, can result in an unhelpful or inconsistent application of appropriate methods within a community, even when the methods are used in the context of an ethically appropriate framework. appropriate methods can include contextual understanding of the formulation of scientific inquiries, collection of data, and validation or 3 toombs et al.: moving towards an indigenous research process published by scholarship@western, 2019 confirmation of results. within indigenous research, developing projects situated within community values can improve the relevance of research for communities (walters et al., 2009). the study description of the original study the data originally analyzed were obtained from a qualitative research study that was completed in collaboration with a first nations mental health service delivery agency (toombs, drawson, bobinski, dixon, & mushquash, 2018). the research team was comprised of two non-indigenous graduate students in clinical psychology at a local university, and their graduate supervisor, an indigenous faculty member and longstanding member of the partner agency. this supervision provided additional support to the graduate students in addition to ongoing collaboration with various levels within the agency. additional support, including research assistants and secondary graduate supervision, was provided as required based on program-specific requirements. a research advisory group guided and retained authority over all study activities. the research advisory group consisted of organizational leadership within the first nations mental health service delivery organization. the group consulted with other project stakeholders, including additional indigenous researchers and student investigators outside of the research team, when required. these stakeholders provided study directives or action plans. this research structure has been used to collaborate on numerous projects to date and aims to address research questions proposed by the partnering first nations mental health organization. the research advisory group retains control of all study data and activities, and it aims to champion the needs of their partnering communities and research stakeholders. the aim of the study was to determine strengths, barriers, and community needs related to parenting and experiences with the child welfare system. to ensure participant discomfort was minimalized, contacts in each community were asked to review and provide feedback about the study questions prior to the interviews. participants were community members and they were asked to describe the experiences of children in their communities. we wanted to be inclusive of anyone that wanted to participate. many were parents (or were kin or non-kin caregivers) of children in the community and therefore were able to share personal experiences. given how small the communities were and the high rates of child welfare involvement, many could speak about experiences with or perceptions of the child welfare system. despite it not being in the criteria for participation in the study, we were able to access local community knowledge on the subjects within a general community sample because of these community demographics. high rates of apprehension, child welfare agency involvement, and removal of children from communities due to placement with families in other regions (kin or otherwise) were identified as being of concern to community members (both parents and non-parents). community definitions of child reunification with respect to child welfare services within communities were collected, and participants were asked to identify resources that would promote positive parenting practices. members from seven first nations communities in northwestern ontario participated in the study. in total, 24 adult participants participated in either a focus-group or individual interviews. participants were recruited through a local community contact person, who was established with the permission of each community’s leadership. participants were also recruited through word-of-mouth and snowball 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 6 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.6 sampling techniques in partnering communities that were providing formal support for the study. focusgroup and individual interviews were recorded and transcribed with one exception. the participants in one focus group elected to not have their data recorded. instead, they consented to note taking by the student researchers, which were analyzed in the same way as the transcripts. the data were analyzed using a blend of thematic analysis and grounded theory, with open coding completed using the techniques described by braun and clarke (2006). results were validated by all levels of the group, as well as any community members who were interested in or involved in the project. we used relationships formed through the group to disseminate project information in order to check the results for accuracy and to also share findings with various communities. we did not have permission to consult with participants, but we did return to participating communities to share and validate results with them. there was the option for participants to attend these events. interested communities chose how they preferred the information to be shared. we did some initial community presentations and asked for clarification the results; we also shared results internally through the partnering community organization. additional members from other mental health agencies, indigenous health service providers, and interested community members were also consulted based on prior collaborations. although the group approved the study methods, the implementation of these methods by nonindigenous stakeholders may have changed the way that participants responded to the study’s questions. for example, it is possible that having non-indigenous researchers inquiring about barriers or concerns related to parenting or child welfare may have reduced overall participation in the study, due to potential community discomfort surrounding the high rates of child apprehension by non-indigenous child welfare workers. further, engaging in these conversations while being represented by an indigenous agency that provided mental health services to children, families, and communities may have made participants feel uncomfortable or vulnerable to agency intervention. consequently, when the study’s results were initially validated with research stakeholders, they were found to be congruent with the beliefs, values, and/or knowledge of this subject area held by the group. moreover, in follow-up knowledge dissemination activities—in which the study’s results were validated by community members—participants noted that the results were representative of their communities’ perspectives on parenting and child reunification. this positive representation was attributed to increased transparency of research activities, multiple community and advisory consultations, and a prioritization of research collaboration within the study’s community-based participatory framework. results in the study’s original analysis were coded into six main categories: • the removal of children from their families, • support for families during placement, • reunification with parents, • identified community supports, • identified community barriers, and • requested services and supports. thematic analyses identified three themes (see table 1) that were found to be relevant to all categories and were embedded throughout all participant discussions of child welfare. these themes emphasized broader aspects of ideas that had been obtained from participant data and emphasized areas of potential 5 toombs et al.: moving towards an indigenous research process published by scholarship@western, 2019 intervention. these themes were then configured from combining similar sub-themes that were obtained from the codes generated by initial analyses. table 1. thematic analysis results of original analysis obtained themes description sub-themes 1. healing the community to help the child social determinants of health, such as poverty, housing instability, racism, and gender were mentioned by participants as systematic concerns in communities. many participants mentioned addiction concerns and the historical trauma of residential schools as influences within community circles, as well as a general lack of local services to address these concerns. • building communities • healing communities • using local services 2. empowerment and selfefficacy participants discussed the need to support one another. having first nations individuals engaged in first nations services and being the ones who design and develop these services was noted as a critical need. participants saw a need to reduce perceived stigma attached to accessing some parenting or child welfare services, specifically for fear of agency apprehensions. • helping each other • empowering parenting • reducing stigma • building hope 3. culture and tradition in regard to reunification practices, the importance of connecting first nations children with traditional teachings and facilitating engagement with cultural practices was identified as a priority. if a child is removed from a home, participants were concerned about their access to culture and tradition. • engaging with values and beliefs • traditional teachings • prioritizing culture these results were reviewed by participating community leadership, the mental health service delivery organization that championed the project, and other interested community members. reviewing these results through respectful communication with prior participants, additional interested community members, and members of the group maintained ongoing community partnerships. consultations with these research stakeholders helped the group determine whether the study’s initial results described communities how they wished to be portrayed. at this stage, the role of the researcher was primarily gathering information and synthesizing further results. throughout the research process, reviewers indicated that they found the results depicted both community knowledge of parenting and child 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 6 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.6 reunification and community experiences of these concepts. however, these consultations also revealed that, although the analysis reflected the experiences of communities, the results were likely situated in a non-indigenous, deficit-based model of health. through multiple consultations, a variety of presentations, written dissemination of results, and oral feedback, research stakeholders reported that the analysis of the results failed to embody an indigenous model of wellness and did not frame data in a way that was most useful to the organization. for example, although the initial study results described a holistic understanding of healing, it did not portray the connectedness to other aspects of healing, parenting, or child welfare. many indigenous models of wellness, such as the medicine wheel, emphasize the importance of obtaining balance. the medicine wheel, consisting of mental, physical, emotional, and spiritual wellness, reflects a holistic, interconnected understanding of wellbeing for many indigenous communities; within this framework, one facet of wellbeing cannot be promoted in isolation, and a reduction in one domain can negatively affect others (reading & wien, 2009). a focus on deficit-based models of mental health, together with conceptualizing good health as an absence of illness, is thus not congruent with indigenous models of wellbeing. instead, "living the good life” through the balance of the four directions of the medicine wheel is a more positive, strength-based approach to wellbeing (king, smith, & gracey, 2009). given stakeholders’ concerns, it was necessary to revisit the study’s results and rectify the shortcomings of the initial analyses. situating the results within an indigenous model of knowledge synthesized information and reported results in a way that aligned with indigenous conceptualizations of wellness. this helped to further meet the needs of our indigenous community partners. for the researchers, this involved purposefully re-evaluating both the research process and the meaning of the results towards indigenous models of wellness. this required self-reflection, a humble approach with the community and results, and an openness to new, relational ways of conceiving wellness. rationale and process for study reanalysis project stakeholders recognized that the data obtained and initially analyzed were not a final depiction of participants’ experiences. the initial results did not situate worldviews, assumptions, and lived experiences in the relevant context for partnering communities. in general, feedback from community members stated that the initial results: a. were not appropriately situated in indigenous ways of knowing and, as a result, may not be as easily understood or used by communities. b. would be more useful if they were placed in a framework that had been implemented by first nations communities and based on indigenous knowledge. c. needed to be described in greater detail and discuss next steps in terms of assessment or intervention to change these processes with communities. by situating results in a framework relating to overall wellness, specific points of intervention could be created. recommendations included creating parenting programs or groups, which are discussed in the original article (see toombs et al., 2018). using a framework of wellness for these results seemed to better organize ideas for future research projects as well. 7 toombs et al.: moving towards an indigenous research process published by scholarship@western, 2019 reanalysis of collected data to incorporate additional beliefs and changing environmental contexts can promote relevance, respect, responsibility, and reciprocity within existing research partnerships. incorporating a relational approach to data analysis can realign results to incorporate various worldviews, which can then be modified to fit within various environments (kovach, 2010). for example, a relational approach can assume that an indigenous researcher and a non-indigenous researcher may view the world differently and contextualize results differently due to differences in their lived experiences. within a more relevant framework of indigenous knowledge, information remains dependent on context. value judgments of correctness, appropriateness, or worthiness of the knowledge are not assigned, and knowledge remains relational to the environment in which it is obtained. smithers-graeme (2013), using weber-pillwax’s (2001) articulation of indigenous research values, has suggested six guiding questions to explore the presence of potential researcher bias when engaging with indigenous research paradigms. these questions assessed topics related to: a. methods that build respectful relationships between the topic and the researcher; b. methods that build respectful relationships between researchers and research participants; c. methods that create respectful relationships within research partnerships; d. identification of the researcher’s role and responsibilities; e. how to fulfil these obligations within research partnerships; and f. the reciprocity of the research relationship, including contributions made by the researcher. as the original study results were not situated within a relational framework, members of the group and the first author’s thesis committee recommended returning to the data for reanalysis. two nonindigenous student researchers were asked to explore how the study’s results might be better situated within the broader context of indigenous understandings of knowledge held by our partnering communities. the goal of engaging in this reanalysis process was determined by the group and specific processes were first conceptualized by student researchers and then approved by all stakeholders. the student researchers used smithers-graeme’s (2013) six guiding questions to generate questions to both assess potential researcher biases and help clarify and further contextualize the study data for the group. these questions were intended to guide the process in a systematic way in order to address the goals set out by the group. questions used to guide the reanalysis process included: a. how do we re-cast this knowledge in a way that better connects with indigenous teachings? b. throughout the analysis, was there an imposition of beliefs or values that do not belong? did it change the way the evidence was analyzed? c. is there an existing indigenous framework that can be applied to these results? d. how would reworking the results change the way they are implemented or used by communities? e. how could the original data analyses better incorporate community-specific indigenous knowledge, values, and beliefs? connecting knowledge with indigenous teachings generally, qualitative methods have been described as strategies that can both contextualize knowledge embedded in existing data and represent data through interpretation (creswell, 2009). non-indigenous 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 6 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.6 researchers completed data collection and analyses, which necessitated frequent consideration of existing biases when engaging in data analysis. it was not within researchers’ duties to “find,” “expand,” or “give” representation to participants’ knowledge, but rather attempt to find commonalities in the knowledge that participants had shared. we connected this knowledge with previously documented indigenous understandings of family, parenting, and wellbeing. for example, the group provided guidance concerning how results could be contextualized with local values, beliefs, and community knowledge. we used the relevant peer-reviewed and community literature provided to guide fitting knowledge that emerged from the research within local indigenous teachings. we deliberately kept interpretation to a minimum, and descriptions of the results were given to the group in order to be integrated with their existing knowledge and community expertise. in the original analysis of the study’s results, researchers did not attempt to generalize the knowledge or assume the results represented all experiences of the seven first nations communities participating in the study—let alone indigenous communities on a larger scale. identification of existing values and beliefs within our research although the study methods, including the plan for data analysis, were designed and reviewed by the group, non-indigenous graduate students from the research team completed the data analysis. the subjective nature of decisions relating to data categorization may have been influenced by researcher values and the research paradigm.1 as a result, the obtained data, including the described themes, were reviewed to determine if the results aligned with the community partners’ research paradigm. the group assessed the relevance of these results and determined they could be aligned with previously conceptualized models of indigenous wellbeing. therefore, the results were recategorized to better align with this framework of indigenous knowledge. the group encouraged the student researchers to reflect on their experiences throughout the research process, so they kept reflection journals in which they recorded their personal insights, potential biases, and moments of learning. student experiences were brought forward through formal and informal supervision meetings with their thesis advisor. for example, one student reflection (modified for clarity with the student’s permission) explained: the absolute necessity of a research advisory group in indigenous research was made apparent to me within the entirely different domain of motorcycle safety research. being an avid motorcyclist, i was interested to see what the expected results were, and how the research study could keep me safer on my bike. what i found was that, although the research was well-meaning 1 a research paradigm is the overall approach, related to how theories, methods, and analyses are selected within research, taken by a researcher. identification of a research paradigm can provide contextual information about researcher-made project-specific decisions. it can also provide a rationale for potentially subjective processes and decisions. many paradigms can result in similar project goals and practices but can also influence the effect of researcher biases on the research, which in turn affects how the research aligns with previous studies, community values, and best practices within the literature. for example, within indigenous health research, researchers have identified a diverse range of research paradigms (drawson et al., 2017) that can influence how results are contextualized within communities. 9 toombs et al.: moving towards an indigenous research process published by scholarship@western, 2019 and well-researched, the fundamental measures used in the study to capture motorcyclist safety behaviours were not relevant or accurate for actual day-to-day biking. it turned out that no members of the research team drove a motorcycle. as a non-indigenous researcher, and the non-expert, i was concerned that general community knowledge was not being incorporated into this project. given that i was not a member of any one of our partnering communities, it was unlikely that i would know for sure if this was the case. ongoing discussions with the group promoted growth in the students’ understanding of the roles of non-indigenous researchers engaging in indigenous research practices. the students found their reflection journals promoted insight, documented personal growth, and described lessons for future research. moreover, the journals helped students identify their own beliefs associated with research processes and challenge their assumptions related to knowledge acquisition. situating obtained results within an indigenous framework we sought to analyze the data and categorize the findings in a way that would better reflect indigenous ideals of wellness. our goal was to situate results into a previously documented model of indigenous health that was already being utilized by the community organization and that aligned with their values and service mandate. there was a limited number of indigenous models of wellness available that encompassed these organizational values, which made it challenging to consider multiple, contrasting models. as such, the researchers chose a model that had been developed by first nations peoples and embodied their cultural knowledge: the first nations mental wellness continuum framework (fnmwcf; health canada, 2015). given that the partnering organization’s mandate included improving the wellbeing of first nations individuals, the fnmwcf was a well-utilized and useful tool within the organization. the fnmwcf was developed as a holistic representation of indigenous wellbeing. the fnmwcf aimed to describe broad determinants of health and wellness on a continuum that incorporated multiple facets of health, including spiritual, emotional, mental, and physical wellbeing. rather than using a deficit-based, symptom-dependent model of health, the fnmwcf promotes overall mental wellness for indigenous peoples (health canada, 2015). indicators of wellbeing within each of these domains were developed that include hope, belonging, meaning, and purpose. spiritual wellness was associated with hope for the future and holding a sense of personal identity. emotional wellness was associated with a sense of belonging within a community, culture, and family. mental wellness was associated with an increased sense of meaning in one’s life. physical wellness was described as a sense of purpose, determined by living one’s life with wholeness (health canada, 2015). one goal of the initial study was to establish ways that may improve the overall wellbeing of both individuals and communities. all research partners agreed that the use of a wellbeing framework was a viable way to recontextualize results. therefore, the study data were reanalyzed and recategorized according to the fnmwcf outcomes of hope, belonging, meaning, and purpose in order to develop preliminary themes (see table 2). 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 6 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.6 table 2. reorganization of original themes using an indigenous model of mental wellness outcomes fnmwcf outcomes description reorganized study subtheme supporting quotation hope • spiritual wellness • hope for the future • sense of personal identity • building hope • traditional teachings • prioritizing culture “more people are getting back to their roots that way (referring to cultural engagement), and i think that’s also been important for our community.” belonging • emotional wellness • belonging within community • belonging within family • using local services • helping each other “i think it’s important for us to keep our kids, um, within the community or, you know, that making them feel like they still belong.” “i think when you’re taken away from the community, i’ve never been separated from my family, but i think they lose something in their lives.” meaning • mental wellness • meaning within an individual • meaning within a family • building communities • healing communities • engaging with values and beliefs “a healthy family and a healthy community makes [sic] a healthy child. you need to have, um, a healthy community in order to… that’s the future. like, whatever we’re doing as parents, we’re teaching our kids. “they know the … the values of the community, the people of the community.” purpose • physical wellness • sense of purpose • living life with wholeness • contributing to communities • reducing stigma • empowering parents “i think that because there’s a lot of social programs that happen here, and a lot of people… different people come out and they participate, so, you know, that encourages more community togetherness.” 11 toombs et al.: moving towards an indigenous research process published by scholarship@western, 2019 sub-themes were recategorized based on fnmwcf’s four outcomes. coded participant descriptions within each sub-theme were assessed to determine whether they matched the description of a fnmwcf outcome. the sub-theme data were not recoded because they accurately reflected the common threads in the participant data. rather, they were situated within a broader framework that the group deemed to be the most useful to the community. after the sub-themes were recategorized, the group deemed the final reorganization to be appropriate. usefulness of the modified results situating the study’s results within the fnmwcf was beneficial to both the group and the study’s community partners. recategorizing the results aligned the outcomes of the study with a meaningful indigenous wellness framework that community partners were already using in their work. furthermore, using this framework to guide the reanalysis of the data generated results that were more useful to community partners. the new results enabled communities to more readily mobilize the knowledge emerging from the study in their work with the community. in aligning the results with the goals of fnmwcf, local indigenous communities can integrate community parenting knowledge with strategies that promote indigenous family wellbeing. relating the initial project knowledge to a previously documented model of wellness further affirmed that the study’s depiction of parenting and child reunification practices as ways of promoting wellbeing was valid. a measure capturing outcomes of the fnmwcf has been developed and validated with local communities and has been used by the organization to capture wellbeing for children (unpublished data).2 the reconceptualization of the current project results to these outcomes may be able to contribute to measurement of helpful parenting strategies or successful child reunifications within partnering communities. the identification of positive parenting practices and strategies to promote indigenous family wellbeing directly aligned with outcomes in the fnmwcf. this additional interpretation ensured that the study comprehensively explored its research questions and goals and demonstrated that there were no noticeable gaps in its data. reflections on the research process weber-pillwax’s (2001) guide to indigenous research that is based on respect, relationality, and reciprocity is a useful tool for non-indigenous researchers. smithers-graeme (2013) has asserted that weber-pillwax’s framework provides an appropriate guide for researcher self-reflection, arguing that weber-pillwax’s questions should be reviewed at every step of the research process. non-indigenous researchers working on this study embodied a co-learner, non-expert approach throughout the project, as described by castleden and kurszewski (2000). all research activities, including the reanalysis, were completed by students coming from a position of humility, genuine 2 the fnmwcf is currently being used by a few multiple-community agencies to guide implementation of the framework within indigenous communities. the assembly of first nations (2015) and thunderbird partnership foundation (2016) have funded initiatives, but outcomes have not been reported to date. for example, the thunderbird partnership foundation (2017) developed the moving from crisis to wellness initiative, which aims to help communities develop their own crisis planning resources and supports, using the fnmwcf to create a service delivery model. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 6 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.6 curiosity, and a desire to learn, rather than from a position of formal expertise. this was a novel experience for some students, who had learned through non-indigenous research methods that the researcher is typically the knowledge holder or expert. in this study, however, indigenous partners maintained responsibility for the authentic representation of community knowledges. although community knowledge was represented within the study’s original results, it was challenging for the nonindigenous researchers to assess if the results encompassed all aspects of the communities’ knowledge. as a result, the reanalysis requested within the partnership better encompassed community knowledge and translated it in a way that was more useful to communities. conclusion this article described the process of resituating results from a community-based, qualitative research study within an indigenous wellness framework— the fnmwcf. the steps completed by the research team throughout this process, with guidance from an indigenous research advisory board, were outlined. by working with project stakeholders, which included partner first nations communities, an indigenous health agency, and an indigenous advisory group, through all phases of the research, we were able to improve the relevance and usefulness of the research results for our research partners. we utilized an existing indigenous wellness framework to modify the initial results to better align with community knowledge and practices. analyses were initially completed by non-indigenous student researchers. by presenting and disseminating initial results to indigenous research stakeholders, we were able to use their feedback to reanalyze the data so that the results supported community-based action. these practices increased the relevance of the results for communities, encouraged researcher responsibility (to maintain ongoing partnership and collaborative agreements), facilitated stakeholder reciprocity (through generation of useful results and incorporation of additional knowledge), and prioritised ongoing respect of community values. obtaining research results and publishing manuscripts does not conclude the research process. smithers-graeme’s (2013) reflection questions emphasize that research is a continuous, reciprocal process of learning, growth, and sharing. disseminating shared knowledge built through research relationships holds researchers accountable to their partnering communities and ensures that their data analysis fully captures participants’ perspectives and experiences. this type of result validation by participants, community members, and community experts (such as elders or community leadership) provides additional information about the relevance and contextualization of results. it can also potentially increase the utility of data by conceptualizing the results in the way that is most relevant for the communities that own and intend to use it. for this study, rather than assuming data offered a final depiction of the results, reanalysis involved further considerations of both culture and context. such processes were necessary, as they increased the accountability and relevance of this research to community stakeholders. our experience highlights the critical importance of collaborating with indigenous research partners through all phases of the research—not just the planning phase. a major strength of our partnership has been the involvement of research partners throughout the analysis, results, and dissemination phases of the research project. it shows the depth and ongoing reciprocity required for meaningful community collaboration. 13 toombs et al.: moving 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(2016). qualitative health research involving indigenous peoples: culturally appropriate data collection methods. the qualitative report, 21(12), 2230-2245. retrieved from http://nsuworks.nova.edu/tqr/vol21/iss12/5 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 6 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.6 the international indigenous policy journal january 2019 moving towards an indigenous research process: a reflexive approach to empirical work with first nations communities in canada elaine toombs alexandra s. drawson lori chambers tina l. r. bobinski john dixon see next page for additional authors recommended citation moving towards an indigenous research process: a reflexive approach to empirical work with first nations communities in canada abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license authors moving towards an indigenous research process: a reflexive approach to empirical work with first nations communities in canada canada's truth and reconciliation commission: settling the past? the international indigenous policy journal volume 2 issue 3 truth and reconciliation article 2 august 2011 canada's truth and reconciliation commission: settling the past? kim stanton stanton legal, stanton@stantonlex.ca recommended citation stanton, k. (2011). canada's truth and reconciliation commission: settling the past?. the international indigenous policy journal, 2(3) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.3.2 this research is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. canada's truth and reconciliation commission: settling the past? abstract the indian residential schools (irs) system has been referred to as “canada's greatest national shame”. the irs system is now the subject of the canadian truth and reconciliation commission (trc). unlike other truth commissions that have been created due to regime change, where a majority of citizens sought a truthseeking process, canada’s trc arose as a result of protracted litigation by survivors of the irs system against the government and churches that ran the schools. this article reviews the genesis of trc in a legal settlement agreement, along with some of the challenges this origin entails. keywords truth and reconciliation commission, residential schools, legal settlement agreements creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ the indian residential schools (irs) system1 has been referred to as “canada's greatest national shame”.2 for over a century, the canadian government sought to assimilate indigenous children into the non-indigenous culture by promoting and then requiring their attendance at church-run schools. the first indian residential schools opened in the 1880s in western canada and eventually, they operated in every province and territory except prince edward island, new brunswick and newfoundland. the system was at its height in the 1920s with compulsory attendance under the indian act and over 80 schools in operation. the irs system is now the subject of the canadian truth and reconciliation commission (trc). unlike other truth commissions that have been created due to regime change, where a majority of citizens sought a truth-seeking process, canada’s trc arose as a result of protracted litigation by survivors of the irs system against the government and churches that ran the schools. this article reviews the genesis of trc in a legal settlement agreement, along with some of the challenges this origin entails. 3 most indian residential schools were run by entities of the catholic church,4 children were separated from their families and communities and sent far away to schools where they were forbidden to speak their languages, practice their spirituality or express their cultures. the impacts of this policy as manifested through irs have echoed down the generations. indigenous people who never attended an irs have nonetheless suffered from the harms inflicted there due to the interruption of traditional cultural transmission and parenting skills, the loss of skills enabling traditional life on the land, the pathologies and dysfunction now endemic in many indigenous communities and the loss of language, culture and spirituality. it is only in the last few years that the government has acknowledged that its assimilation policy was harmful. with others run by the anglican, presbyterian, methodist and later the united churches. 5 1 books that provide much more extensive information about irs than is possible to provide here include j.r. miller, shingwauk's vision: a history of native residential schools (toronto: university of toronto press, 1996) and john s. milloy, a national crime: the canadian government and the residential school system, 1879 to 1986 (winnipeg: university of manitoba press, 1999). see also the report of the royal commission on aboriginal peoples vols. 1-5 (ottawa: supply and services canada, 1996) [rcap report], especially vol. 1, part 2 “false assumptions and a failed relationship”, c. 10 “residential schools”. “indian” is the antiquated and incorrect moniker used in government parlance for canada’s indigenous peoples. it has done so only in response to overwhelming legal pressure. 2 adrienne clarkson, “her excellency the right honourable adrienne clarkson address at the university of toronto faculty association's c.b. macpherson lecture” (31 march 2004). 3 miller, shingwauk's vision, supra note 1, at 142. 4 see rcap report, vol. 1, supra note 1, part 2, c.10, text accompanying table 10.1: “in 1931 there were 44 roman catholic (rc), 21 church of england (ce), 13 united church (uc) and 2 presbyterian (pr) schools. these proportions among the denominations were constant throughout the history of the system.” note that the catholic church is not organized as one central body, but rather as individual orders. see canadian conference of catholic bishops, “apology on residential schools by the catholic church”, online: <http://www.cccb.ca/site/content/view/2630/1019/lang,eng/>: “the catholic community in canada has a decentralized structure. each diocesan bishop is autonomous in his diocese and, although relating to the canadian conference of catholic bishops, is not responsible to it.” 5 according to pamela o'connor, “squaring the circle: how canada is dealing with the legacy of its indian residential schools experiment” (2000) 28 int’l j. legal info. 232 at 236, the federal government only recently admitted that the policy purpose of irs was one of assimilation rather than education. 1 stanton: canada's truth and reconciliation commission: settling the past? published by scholarship@western, 2011 while it is true that there were caring individuals among the teachers and workers at some of the schools, and some children did receive an education, the dominant narrative of the schools reveals the violence inherent in the policy behind the irs system: to “kill the indian [to] save the man”.6 despite earlier press reports those that escaped physical or sexual abuse still suffered the loneliness of separation from family, the confusion of being taught their culture was inferior, and the loss of their language and spirituality. eventually the government concluded that the schools were not successful tools of assimilation. the government withdrew from its partnership with the churches in 1969, at which time it took over the irs and began to transfer control to indian bands. the majority of residential schools were closed by the mid-1980s, with a few remaining until the last closure in 1996. 7 and several criminal investigations by police in the late 1980s,8 the irs issue did not garner national attention until 1990, when chief phil fontaine went public with his experience of irs abuse,9 opening the door for other survivors to begin sharing their experiences. the extent of the irs legacy became better known with the establishment of the royal commission on aboriginal peoples (rcap).10 rcap was established in 1991, and during the course of 178 days of public hearings in 96 communities, many survivors of the schools gave emotional and troubling testimony recounting the abuses they had suffered, thus bringing wider attention to the irs legacy. in 1996, rcap made its recommendation calling for a public inquiry into irs. no public inquiry was established in response to that recommendation. the federal government made what it called a statement of reconciliation.11 minister of indian affairs jane stewart made the statement but for many, it fell short of an apology.12 the native women’s association of canada formally refused to accept the statement as an apology, and the inuit tapirisat of canada found the statement to be incomplete.13 6 j.a. macrae, department of indian affairs inspector of schools for the north west in the 1880s, quoted in milloy, supra note indeed, the word “apology” did not 1, at 27. 7 see for example: maureen brosnahan, “indians recall bitter school days” winnipeg free press (22 june 1982), at 21. 8 miller, shingwauk's vision, supra note 1, at 329, citing investigations at williams lake and lytton, british columbia. 9 assembly of manitoba chiefs, “residential schools: a chronology”, online: assembly of manitoba chiefs, http://manitobachiefs.com/issue/residential.html (accessed january 2009). 10 j.r. miller, “troubled legacy: a history of indian residential schools” (2003) 66 sask. l. rev. 357 at 381. the five volume, 3,500-page rcap report covers 500 years of history between non-indigenous and indigenous peoples in what is now canada, and makes 440 recommendations calling for comprehensive changes in the relationship between canada’s indigenous and non-indigenous peoples: rcap report, supra note 1. 11 see canada, gathering strength: canada's aboriginal action plan (indian affairs and northern development: public works and government services canada, 1997); “statement of reconciliation: learning from the past.” statement read by hon. jane stewart, minister of indian affairs and northern development (7 january 1998). 12 buti, antonio. "responding to the legacy of canadian residential schools." (2001) murdoch university electronic journal of law 8 (4) at para. 36, citing law commission of canada, minister's reference on institutional child abuse: discussion paper (1999) 15. 13 morse, bradford w., and tanya m. kozak. “gathering strength: the government of canada’s response to the final report of the royal commission on aboriginal peoples.” blind spots: an examination of the federal government's response to the report of the royal commission on aboriginal peoples. (ottawa: aboriginal rights coalition, 2001), [“blind spots”] 32, at 36. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 3 [2011], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.3.2 appear in the statement. observers suggest that the government did not issue a full apology for fear it would be viewed as an admission of liability that would weaken its legal position in the various court claims being brought by irs survivors.14 in the late 1990s, the failure of the government to adequately respond to rcap, and in particular, to adequately address the recommendations on irs, created enormous frustration amongst survivors and dashed any hopes of a political resolution to the issue. 15 this frustration with the lack of a political response prompted irs survivors to turn to legal responses in an effort to seek redress in the courts for the harms they suffered, a strategy that ultimately led to a negotiated solution.16 in 1997 phil fontaine was elected national chief of the assembly of first nations and commenced negotiations with the churches and the federal government for a settlement for irs survivors. settlement discussions began to be impacted when the courts started to decide some of the first irs civil cases, apportioning liability between the government and the churches. the legal mechanisms survivors turned to included criminal prosecution, civil litigation, and alternative dispute resolution. criminal prosecution resulted in some retributive justice with respect to a few individual aging perpetrators of sexual abuse, but could not address systemic issues and harms of irs. civil litigation also resulted in some damage awards for a few survivors, but the process was lengthy and again the harms acknowledged by the courts were limited. alternative dispute resolution (adr) was an attempt to remedy the difficulties of the civil litigation system but it too ultimately failed to fulfill the goal of having a streamlined and effective process to address survivors’ needs. thus, each mechanism offered a measure of assistance in bringing the irs legacy to public attention, but each mechanism failed to adequately address the historical injustices created by the irs system. 17 following the launch of multiple class action lawsuits,18 a consensus developed around the assembly of first nations’ recommendations in its 2004 report which called for a lump sum reparations payment, additional compensation for specific abuses, expedited payments for the sick and elderly, and a truth-sharing and reconciliation process.19 in november 2005, the parties reached an agreement in principle that was finalized in may 2006,20 and approved by the courts later in the year.21 14 morse, blind spots, at 46. the settlement agreement came into effect 19 september 2007. by the time of the settlement agreement, 14,903 survivors had filed claims against the government. only 2,805 15 stewart, phillip. “federal government’s response to the royal commission on aboriginal peoples” in blind spots, 49 at 54. 16 these are legal mechanisms utilized in the canadian legal order to address the irs legacy. 17 see for example blackwater v. plint (1998), 161 d.l.r. (4th) 538 (bcsc). 18 in addition to the cloud v. canada (attorney general) (2004), 247 d.l.r. (4th) 667 (ont. ca) class action in ontario, there were four others within a few years: canada, notice of class actions (indian residential school alternative dispute resolution process), online: assembly of first nations, http://www.afn.ca/residentialschools/pdf/notice_of_class_actions.pdf (accessed 30 november 2010). 19 see letter from indigenous bar association to frank iacobucci (17 october 2005), on file with the author. 20 the indian residential schools settlement agreement (the “settlement agreement”) was concluded may 8, 2006, following an agreement in principle (“aip”) signed 23 november 2005. schedule n of the settlement agreement, “mandate for the truth and reconciliation commission” (schedule e of the aip), sets out the terms of a truth commission. 21 see for example the 15 december 2006 decision quatell v. attorney general of canada, 2006 bcsc 1840, per brenner c.j.; and baxter v. canada, (2006) 83 o.r. (3d) 481 (ont. sup. ct.) per winkler j (as he then was). 3 stanton: canada's truth and reconciliation commission: settling the past? published by scholarship@western, 2011 http://www.lexisnexis.com/ca/legal/search/runremotelink.do?service=citation&langcountry=ca&risb=21_t6996380178&a=0.534600597966695&linkinfo=f%23ca%23or3%23page%25481%25vol%2583%25sel2%2583%25&bct=a� claims had been resolved through litigation or the adr process, with damage awards upwards of $110 million.22 the irs settlement agreement is the largest class action settlement in canadian history 23 and has well over 100 signatories. the settlement agreement sets aside $1.9 billion for the approximately 80,000 living survivors of the irs schools.24 the settlement agreement comprises several mechanisms of redress for survivors of irs, including a common experience payment,25 an independent assessment process,26 a fund for commemorative projects,27 and a fund for healing projects.28 the trc is like other truth and reconciliation commissions in that it is an official, temporary, non-judicial fact-finding body set up to investigate a pattern of abuses of human rights committed over a number of years. finally, the settlement agreement provides for the establishment of the truth and reconciliation commission. 29 22 canada, indian residential schools resolutions canada, “backgrounder: indian residential schools” (ottawa: indian residential schools resolutions canada, 2005). that is, it is a government-sponsored commission, with a five-year mandate, intended to investigate the irs system and its legacy. like other truth commissions, the trc mandate includes the creation of a historical record and the making of recommendations. however, aside from the unique mandate and structure that reflect the national context in which the trc is taking place, the trc is distinctive in that it is the only truth commission to be created out of litigation. in other contexts in which truth commissions have arisen, they have been instigated by a new regime to look into the abuses of a past regime, as in argentina, peru and chile. occasionally, a truth commission arises as part of a peace accord brokered between parties to a conflict, as in el salvador, guatemala and sierra leone. in canada, the trc is a result of negotiations between multiple parties of class action lawsuits. this means that the trc will be faced with the need to prompt canadians to invest in and take ownership of a process that they did not instigate. that is, the trc was not created out of a groundswell of concern about irs survivors by the public; rather it was agreed to by their government’s legal advisers in order to settle costly litigation. were it not for the enormous financial cost to the government of continuing to defend against the class actions, the trc would not exist in canada. 23 indian and northern affairs canada, “backgrounder indian residential schools settlement agreement” (2008), http://www.ainc-inac.gc.ca/ai/rqpi/info/nwz/2008/20080425b_is-eng.asp (accessed 30 november 2010). 24 survivors who wished to retain their right to sue the government and the churches had to formally optout of the settlement agreement by 20 august 2007. had more than 5,000 survivors opted out, the settlement would have been void: settlement agreement, supra note 20, at para. 4.14. 25 the common experience payment is $10,000 for the first year a person attended irs and $3,000 for each additional year. the payment is symbolic and intended to acknowledge the fact that simply attending an irs was a harm: settlement agreement, supra note 20, schedule n, art. 5. 26 those survivors who wish to be compensated for harms that are ordinarily compensable in the tort system, such as serious physical and sexual abuse, can make a claim under the independent assessment process, which has a schedule of monetary compensation for a range of abuses depending on their severity. settlement agreement, supra note 20, schedule d “independent assessment process”. 27 this is a $20 million fund for activities that commemorate the children and communities affected by the schools. settlement agreement, supra note 20, schedule j. 28 the settlement agreement provides for an additional $125 million over five years to support the projects of the aboriginal healing foundation. settlement agreement, supra note 20, schedule m, s. 3.03. 29 based on the definition set out in report of the secretary-general, the rule of law and transitional justice in conflict and post-conflict societies, un doc. s/2004/616, para. 50 at 17. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 3 [2011], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.3.2 as adverted to above, one of the reasons that people sought a truth commission in canada was that the usual legal mechanisms had proven to be inadequate. in response to survivor experiences with the criminal and civil litigation processes, it appears from schedule n that the settlement agreement negotiators sought to establish a body that would not mimic a legal proceeding such as a trial. schedule n specifies the powers, duties and procedures of the trc, including receiving statements.30 the schedule also sets out what the trc may not do in pursuit of its mandate; it shall not hold formal hearings, have subpoena powers, or name names, as discussed below. the trc’s responsibilities with respect to methodology and procedure are enumerated.31 the factors the trc must take into account in exercising its duties are set out, including a direction that the commissioners: “shall not hold formal hearings, nor act as a public inquiry, nor conduct a formal legal process”.32 the guiding principles state at the outset of the mandate that the trc will focus on being victim-centred, and respect the health and safety of participants. these aspects acknowledge that previous legal mechanisms have caused grief and pain to survivors, and attempt to avoid duplication of that occurrence. with this wording, the negotiators of the settlement agreement likely were trying to stress their intention for the trc not to duplicate criminal or civil court proceedings or the independent assessment process. nor is the trc to repeat the perceived difficulties encountered with public inquiries in the past, where adversarial processes overtook the substance of the inquiry. this section of the mandate can be read as eschewing a formal legal process for the trc, and by formal, it seems to refer to adversarial processes. 33 the trc was sought as a mechanism that would operate in a non-adversarial manner. in other contexts, truth commissions have been expected to be less ‘lawyer-driven’ than other legal mechanisms.34 in canada, where the government and the churches have acknowledged that abuses occurred and that the irs system was harmful, the evidence that is presented to the trc is not for the purposes of convincing the commissioners that the abuses occurred. the trc is occurring separately from the reparations process and other elements of the settlement agreement. the while all truth commissions do involve lawyers in their activities to varying degrees, the idea that negotiators in canada gleaned from international examples is to emphasize the focus on victims, and reduce the focus on the skill of legal counsel to shape the information gained. this reduced focus on legal personnel arose because sometimes truth commissions are established in environments where the legal system may be in disarray, with few lawyers and judges left in a country (either alive, or who are not part of the prior regime). it may also be because the number of violations is so large that the prosecutorial system is overwhelmed and another mechanism is necessary to seek accountability. a truth commission may also be sought in order to elicit truth-telling in an environment where the adversarial approach of a trial, with its tools such as cross-examination, would be inappropriate. 30 settlement agreement, supra note 20, schedule n, s. 2. 31 ibid., schedule n, s. 3. 32 ibid., schedule n, s. 2(b). 33 mike cachagee, executive director of the national residential school survivors' society, has noted that it will be difficult for some survivors to trust an organization run by the government when the schools were mandated by that government: canadian press, “truth commission may not bring forgiveness: chair” (21 february 2010), http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/story/2010/02/21/man-truth-reconciliationcommission-sinclair.html (accessed 23 march 2011). 34 see mark freeman, truth commissions and procedural fairness (cambridge, new york: cambridge university press, 2006) at 124. 5 stanton: canada's truth and reconciliation commission: settling the past? published by scholarship@western, 2011 purpose of having the trc as a separate body allows for a focus on its distinctive goals: acknowledging and witnessing the irs experience, promoting awareness of the irs system and its impacts, and creating a public record of the irs legacy.35 alleged perpetrators have no incentive to participate in the trc but perhaps they may be more willing to engage in the process if they know that they will not be subject to any legal proceedings as a result of their participation. a truth commission is intended to promote public accountability and combat impunity for human rights violations, so a refusal to name names where there is clear evidence of culpability may attract criticism. on the other hand, while most truth commissions have the power to name perpetrators, few have done so. these goals suggest a desire for a less adversarial process than the court process. 36 aside from the frustrations of the lack of a political response to the irs legacy and the dissatisfaction with the other legal mechanisms available, a further reason that survivors sought a truth commission in the irs negotiations was the widespread ignorance amongst non-indigenous canadians about the irs system and its profound and continuing effect on indigenous communities. the advantage of a truth commission for combating such ignorance is the ability to create an incontrovertible historical record and enable significant public education. the trc is tasked with creating a record of the irs system and its impacts. and in the canadian context, the institutional nature of the main “perpetrators” – the government and the churches – alters the dynamic. many of the people who staffed the schools or directed government irs policy are dead, thus there will be more participation of present day government and church institutional representatives than of individuals who were directly involved with the irs. as parties to the settlement agreement, there is an expectation that the institutions will participate in the trc process. given that most of their representatives will not themselves have been perpetrators of specific abuses, it is perhaps not surprising that the trc has neither subpoena power nor the power to name names, two commonly allocated powers for truth commissions. however, while gaining the truth about irs for non-indigenous people may be educational, it may be re-traumatizing for survivors.37 in addition, the truth will be different for each person depending on their experiences. some survivors and church or government representatives will resist the idea that the irs system was wholly negative, preferring to focus on the fact that some children did receive an education and that some survivors look back to their teachers with fondness.38 consensus that residential school experience was injurious in itself, not just in instances of physical and sexual abuse, is shared by only a small proportion of still, the truth that the irs system existed and that it has been largely devastating for indigenous peoples is already known to indigenous peoples, but this truth is not well known to the majority of canadians: 35 see settlement agreement, supra note 20, schedule n, “mandate for the trc”, s. 1. 36 priscilla b. hayner, unspeakable truths: confronting state terror and atrocity (new york: routledge, 2001) [hayner, unspeakable truths], at 107. 37 i acknowledge that there is no one truth to be found or uncovered, but rather a narrative to be constructed based on the information gathered by the truth-seeking process. 38 miller, shingwauk’s vision, supra note 1 at 341-2. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 3 [2011], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.3.2 canadian citizens, in contrast to the view of most first nations, inuit and métis people.39 there are significant gaps between the knowledge and understanding of the irs system that many non-indigenous people may be expected to have as compared to that of many indigenous people. 40 these gaps arise from longstanding beliefs about the history and intentions of government policy, and the legacies of such policies such as cycles of dependency and negative social indicators.41 as with other truth commissions, it is not that the trc is likely to expose facts that were previously unknown; rather, it will “make an indispensable contribution in acknowledging these facts”. in other contexts, truth commissions have attempted to create a more complete historical record of a tragic period in a state’s history by rounding out the state’s version of events with information gained from investigation, records and testimony. 42 in canada, the factual truth about irs may be publicly available, but that truth is still resisted in the dominant narrative. this dominant narrative says that the schools were created and run with the best intentions and that in hindsight some of the methods used and some of the individuals involved may have been overly harsh or abusive. at variance with that narrative is a conflicting account that views the schools as one attempt at obliterating the indigenous cultures in what is now canada.43 some view the irs system as only one component of a larger colonial project that is embodied in many aspects of the indian act.44 however, non-indigenous canadians will largely be unaware of the systemic aspect of the irs legacy.45 39 marlene brant castellano, “a holistic approach to reconciliation: insights from research of the aboriginal healing foundation” in marlene b. castellano, linda archibald and mike degagné, eds. from truth to reconciliation: transforming the legacy of residential schools (ottawa: aboriginal healing foundation, 2008) 385 at 386. in the canadian case, the fact that the government has issued an unequivocal apology may help to refute the myth held by many non-indigenous canadians that irs was akin to a bad boarding school, where individual 40 this is not to suggest that all the learning will be on the non-indigenous side; rather, it is just to note that more non-indigenous people will have more to learn than non-indigenous people since the irs system is generally better known in indigenous communities. for polling information on the latter point, see environics research group, final report: 2008 national benchmark survey (prepared for indian residential schools resolution canada and the truth and reconciliation commission, 2008) [environics, benchmark survey], at 13ff. 41 the differing perceptions are evident in the stereotypes that are visible in mainstream media coverage of the settlement agreement. see for example jack branswell and ken meaney, “residential school cash has deadly fallout; suicides, drug abuse attributed to compensation” calgary herald (26 january 2009) a7; canadian press, “racist overtones surround residential school payments: national chief” guelph mercury (20 september 2007) a6. 42 pablo de grieff, “justice and reparations” in jon miller and rahul kumar, eds. reparations: interdisciplinary inquiries (toronto: oxford university press, 2007) 153 at 161-162. 43 roland chrisjohn, sherri lynn young and michael maraun, eds. the circle game: shadows and substance in the indian residential school experience in canada (penticton, b.c.: theytus books, 2006) at 4-5. 44 see courtney jung, “canada and the legacy of the indian residential schools: transitional justice for indigenous peoples in a non-transitional society” (8 april 2009), social science research network, http://ssrn.com/abstract=1374950, (accessed 30 november 2010) at 2. 45 a poll conducted for indian residential schools resolution canada and the trc in may 2008 found that six in ten canadians were unable to cite any long-term consequence for survivors of having gone through the irs system: environics, benchmark survey, supra note 40, at 20. 7 stanton: canada's truth and reconciliation commission: settling the past? published by scholarship@western, 2011 teachers were abusive. the apology acknowledged that irs was intended to force assimilation of indigenous children – “to kill the indian in the child”.46 canadians may find that a commission addressing the legacy of residential schools provides a manageable way to learn about and understand the larger causes of the colonial policy under which irs was created. still, given that the trc will not be able to identify perpetrators in its report, the truth it tells about irs will necessarily be incomplete. the trc report will therefore need to address the broader truth about the irs system itself, identifying the structures and institutions that created and perpetuated the toll upon indigenous peoples. the ability to focus on the larger picture can then be a strength of the trc. the importance of the work the trc must do, at the outset, to address these differing narratives cannot be underestimated if the reconciliation aspect of the mandate is to have any chance of success. one of the most important things a truth commission can do is to engage the wider public with its work. the utility of the commission is lessened if it compiles a history that is destined to silently land on a library shelf.47 a commission must create a narrative that may form the basis of national reconciliation, but the commission must first “manage to penetrate the collective consciousness of the people.”48 how can this be achieved? hayner and freeman set out factors that are likely to improve the chances of a truth commission being effective. in particular, they note the importance of public support for the establishment of a truth commission; the presence of a vigorous and engaged civil society (and in particular of strong victims’ groups, human rights groups, religious leaders and intellectuals); widespread social identification with the victims of the abuses; vocal and independent media; and persistent international attention and pressure.49 the canadian trc has not yet attained all of these factors. it is unclear how wide public support was for its establishment since the canadian public at large was not formally consulted in the irs negotiations. while canada has strong civil society organizations, there is not yet any organized coalition (outside the parties to the settlement agreement) vocally supporting the trc’s work. there has been some positive media coverage but the trc is yet to be ubiquitous in the press, either domestic or international.50 an unusual aspect of this trc is that its mandate does not direct that it will hold hearings. rather, schedule n refers to receiving “statements”, holding “sessions”, “consultations” and certainly with a country as large as canada, the media will be an important tool in engaging those who are unable to participate in the trc’s national events because the events are distant from where they live. 46 stephen harper, prime minister, “statement of apology – to former students of indian residential schools” (ottawa, 11 june 2008), online: http://www.ainc-inac.gc.ca/ai/rqpi/apo/index-eng.asp>. 47 neil j. kritz, “where we are and how we got here: an overview of developments in the search for justice and reconciliation” in a. henkin, the legacy of abuse (new york: the aspen institute and nyu school of law, 2002) 21, at 38. 48 erin daly and jeremy sarkin, in reconciliation in divided societies (university of pennsylvania press, 2007) at 110. 49 priscilla b. hayner and mark freeman, “‘truth-telling’ in international institution for democracy and electoral assistance”, reconciliation after violent conflict: a handbook (stockholm: international idea, 2003) [idea handbook] 122 at 128-9. 50 most canadians who had heard about the settlement agreement had done so due to mass media: environics, benchmark survey, supra note 40 at 27. the polling report notes at 25 that overall, awareness among canadians of the settlement agreement was “fairly low” – only four in ten had heard of the common experience payment, and two in ten or fewer had heard of the other elements of the settlement agreement. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 3 [2011], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.3.2 “public events”.51 as noted above, the mandate states that the trc: “shall not hold formal hearings”.52 while this is no doubt in part to protect the privacy of survivors, it also shields the government and churches from scrutiny by the public. it means that the trc will not hold an activity that is virtually a hallmark of truth commissions elsewhere. this aspect of the trc’s mandate must be explained to and by the media for the public to understand, since most people associate truth commissions with the south african trc, which held public hearings, and people may thus reasonably expect a truth commission to hold hearings.53 other truth commissions have held institutional hearings to focus on the issues arising in certain sectors of the public service or society at large. for instance, south africa had hearings on the legal profession and the judiciary, while ghana had institutional hearings with respect to the security sector, media, prisons, as well as the legal profession and the judiciary. 54 the purpose is to reveal the structural and institutional nature of the human rights violations that occurred in order to recommend ways in which to prevent future recurrences, regardless of the individuals who may be in charge of or working for those institutions. it is not clear if the trc will hold any such hearings, yet institutional hearings with respect to government policy in different areas of indigenous people’s lives may be useful and important for preventing recurrences of abuses such as irs.55 the mandate as set out in schedule n of the settlement agreement frames the trc as part of a process of “rebuilding and renewing … the relationship between aboriginal and nonaboriginal canadians”, requiring “commitment from … the people of canada”. in order to work toward reconciliation of the canadian society as a whole, there needs to be active, sustained and significant outreach to civil society beyond the parties to the settlement agreement. such processes of dialogue and consultation help to generate awareness and then cultivate ownership of the national reconciliation process. there is no requirement for a report at the end of the five-year mandate of the trc, but such a report would be useful in order for the trc to have the opportunity to assess the material it has reviewed and heard to identify structural or systemic issues. both institutional hearings and a final report are vehicles with important potential for public education by the trc. while the canadian trc is a result of a legal settlement that includes parties that represent some components of civil society, they are by no means broadly representative of canadian society as a whole. although some of the major aboriginal organizations are involved in the trc process, not all aboriginal organizations are parties to the settlement agreement. large 51 the trc held its first national event in winnipeg in june 2010. the event did not receive broad media attention such as to captivate the nation. 52 settlement agreement, supra note 20, schedule n, s. 2(b). 53 perhaps the best known truth commission, the south african truth and reconciliation commission reported to then president nelson mandela in october 1998, after conducting hearings over the course of three years in which it heard from close to 20,000 victims of the apartheid era. 54 ghana’s national reconciliation commission was inaugurated in 2002 to investigate periods of unconstitutional rule since independence. 55 see for example edward john, “from apology to action: a response to the residential schools apology” vancouver sun (12 june 2008): today we find that over 50 percent of all children in government care are aboriginal and in the north region of the province the percentage is a staggering 77 percent. … it is estimated that there are three times the number of children in government care now than there were children in residential schools at the height of their operations. edward john is grand chief, tl'azt'en nation. 9 stanton: canada's truth and reconciliation commission: settling the past? published by scholarship@western, 2011 swaths of the non-indigenous public have no involvement in the trc so far. involving the broader public will be easier if civil society organizations, beyond the parties to the settlement agreement, get involved and support the work of the trc. this could be instigated by outreach from the trc itself, but given its limited resources, it would be useful if the parties to the settlement agreement could take the initiative. church groups and survivor groups could collaborate and contact other civil society organizations to form a broad-based coalition to support and to increase awareness of the trc’s work. in canada, indigenous legal institutions and systems have often been ignored and devalued. the trc must proceed with an acute awareness of this history and adopt the advice of rcap on the concept of respecting the systems of traditions of the peoples whom it hopes to reconcile. as llewellyn observes, the trc’s mandate does not provide much detail with respect to the reconciliation aspect of its work.56 the mandate refers to healing the relationship between peoples.57 in the transitional justice context, mechanisms such as apologies, commemoration, reparations, and truth commissions are viewed as means for achieving societal reconciliation. reconciliation is a multifaceted process and often, as with south africa, truth commissions are expected to engage several of these mechanisms in an effort to achieve societal healing. canada’s trc is not asked to do all the work of redress because the elements of commemoration and reparations are structured as different parts of the settlement agreement. this means that the focus of the trc’s work need not be to determine the compensation that survivors should receive or to duplicate the commemorative work that is already being done by the aboriginal healing foundation, a body created in response to rcap’s recommendations on irs.58 an additional element critical to the reconciliation process that the trc does not have to address is that of an apology. the trc was inaugurated on 1 june 2008. although not part of the settlement agreement, on 11 june 2008, the government gave its long-awaited apology to survivors of the irs. 59 the prime minister gave this apology in the house of commons. the leaders of the other federal parties represented in parliament also gave an apology. the leaders of five national aboriginal organizations responded from the floor of the house. the apology received a generally positive response from survivors and the public and marked a rare moment of awareness in the general canadian population.60 truth commissions are often expected to make recommendations with respect to appropriate reparations for the victims such as compensation that may enable the victims to improve their quality of life. these recommendations are adopted to varying degrees by the state. in the canadian context, the reparations have already been determined in large part through the the apology also provided the trc with a good start: the government acknowledged the truth of the irs system’s harms, enabling the trc to commence its work without having to convince the country that the irs legacy existed. 56 jennifer llewellyn, “bridging the gap between truth and reconciliation: restorative justice and the indian residential schools truth and reconciliation commission” in castellano, archibald and degagné, supra note 39, 185 at 186. 57 see settlement agreement, supra note 20, schedule n, preamble. 58 despite its reputation for excellence, the aboriginal healing foundation’s funding was not renewed by the government of canada in the march 2010 federal budget, signaling a lack of concern by the harper conservatives for the reconciliation process that the ahf’s work supports. 59 stephen harper, “statement of apology” supra note 46. 60 just after the apology, a poll found an unusually high level of awareness: 83 percent of those surveyed were aware of the apology: omar el c, “school-abuse apology widely backed” globe and mail (14 june 2008) a4, citing an innovative research group conducted the poll between june 11 and 13. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 3 [2011], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.3.2 common experience payment and independent assessment process. what if the trc makes determinations that go far beyond what the reparative mechanisms of the settlement agreement encompass? what can be the response to the trc’s findings if the apology and reparations have already been meted out? these are challenges that may arise given the ambitious structure of the settlement agreement. it is too early to tell whether these matters will arise, but they are possibilities that the trc can contemplate in determining its process. the fact that the irs negotiators decided to have a trc in addition to and separate from these other aspects of the settlement suggests that there is something to be gained from having the trc process itself. that is, something is expected from the trc that is different from the usual truth commission results of making recommendations for commemoration, apology and reparation. there is something about the process itself that is valued here; something unique to the canadian context. it remains to be seen if separating the truth-seeking process from the reparations process is an appropriate way of proceeding. again, this is one of the reasons why it will be so important for the trc to actively educate the public as to its operations and goals. how well a truth commission educates the public about its work will determine its ability to garner public support. a high level of public support can bolster a commission’s credibility and thus its reputation, which can in turn smooth the way for the commission to access information and address the needs of victims. also important for maintaining its own credibility is a truth commission’s management of public expectations about its work. this is another task that does not appear in any written mandate for a truth and reconciliation commission. the trc will need to be extremely conscious of the expectations that it may arouse in survivors of irs. these expectations will be of an order entirely different and more complex than those of the nonindigenous public. truth commissions have often raised expectations of victims that there will be some resolution to their situation because the very existence of a commission suggests that its presence will make a difference.61 another challenge for the trc relates to the likelihood that most of the testimony it receives will come from survivors. this may create the appearance that the trc will rely upon the survivors to do the work to be reconciled or perhaps reintegrated (or “conciled”/integrated) into canadian society. the trc must be careful not to reinforce the idea rejected by rcap: that the government avoided responsibility by expecting irs survivors to do the work to heal themselves. expectations may be even higher when the commission seeks not just truth but also reconciliation as a central goal. 62 61 see sam garkawe, “the south african truth and reconciliation commission: a suitable model to enhance the role and rights of the victims of gross violations of human rights?” (2003) 27 melbourne u.l.rev. 334, at 351. the means of reconciliation include truth telling, acknowledgement of past wrongs, reparations for the victims, addressing the structural causes of the wrongs, and a rebalancing between societal groups to prevent the harms recurring. the trc must find a way to include the nonindigenous public such that they acknowledge the irs system is everyone’s problem to address. the reconciliation process must be framed by the trc as a mutual process to be engaged in by indigenous and non-indigenous peoples alike; it should not be a one-sided process. 62 see discussion of report, vol. 1, supra note 1, part 2, c. 10, section 4 “epilogue”, text accompanying notes 330-332, 335. 11 stanton: canada's truth and reconciliation commission: settling the past? published by scholarship@western, 2011 while the settlement agreement negotiators emphatically sought to distinguish the trc from the south african version,63 it is important to glean from the comparative experience some realistic guidance about what this trc can achieve. not all truth commissions have framed their goal as reconciliation of the country, but “[t]hose that have – including south africa’s trc and the national commission on truth and reconciliation in chile – have found it to be a very difficult mission.”64 further, the term “reconciliation” implies that the parties were once whole, experienced a rift, and now must be made whole again. but in colonial settings, this is not the case. the relationship between indigenous and settler peoples in canada was one of nations encountering nations, where one gradually oppressed and marginalized the other. indigenous peoples never agreed to the denial of their sovereignty, cultures or identities. reconciliation may or may not occur on an individual or national level; calling the exercise “truth and reconciliation” sets up both concepts as a goal, but no one can declare a person or nation to be reconciled. in addition, it is possible that truth (a slippery concept at the best of times) and reconciliation will be viewed completely differently depending upon who is asked. some may see that these objectives have been achieved while others will dispute that perception. the latter may be concerned that those in power have appeared to support reconciliation for their own political purposes. 65 thus, in the canadian context, reconciliation must refer to “transformative” as opposed to “restorative” reconciliation.66 one commentator notes that reconciliation on a national level must be at least in part a political process that includes acknowledgement of political and legal rights of indigenous peoples.67 63 at a june 2007 conference on the then upcoming canadian truth and reconciliation commission, national chief phil fontaine adamantly stated that the canadian commission was not modeled on the south african truth and reconciliation commission: phil fontaine, “the long journey to justice: the personal as political” (lecture presented at “preparing for the truth commission: sharing the truth about residential schools. a conference on truth and reconciliation as restorative justice”, university of calgary, june 15, 2007) [calgary conference, 2007] [unpublished]. fontaine stepped down as national chief at the assembly of first nations annual general meeting in calgary on july 21, 2009. this highlights the difficulty with public expectations that can be created when a body called a “truth and reconciliation” commission is created. the trc cannot reasonably be expected to reconcile on its own the entire relationship between indigenous and non-indigenous peoples in canada. on the face of it, the trc’s mandate is limited to the irs system: to create a historical record of the irs system and to educate the public about the irs legacy. 64 priscilla hayner, “same species, different animal: how south africa compares to truth commissions worldwide” in charles villa-vicencio and wilhelm verwoerd, eds. looking back, reaching forward: reflections on the truth and reconciliation commission of south africa (cape town: university of cape town press, 2000) 32 at 39. 65 indeed, as noted by mclachlin c.j.c. in haida nation v. british columbia (minister of forests), 2004 scc 73 at para. 25: “put simply, canada’s aboriginal peoples were here when europeans came, and were never conquered.” 66 will kymlicka and bashir bashir, eds., the politics of reconciliation in multicultural societies (oxford: oxford university press, 2008) “introduction” at 19, describe these two modes of reconciliation: “the restorative dimension seeks to restore and heal a pre-existing ‘we’, by closing up a temporary breach, while the transformative dimension seeks to create a new ‘we’, which requires opening up new possibilities that did not exist before.” 67 chris cunneen, “reparations and restorative justice: responding to the gross violation of human rights” in heather strang and john braithwaite, eds., restorative justice and civil society (cambridge: cambridge university press, 2001) 83 at 90. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 3 [2011], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.3.2 in canada, continued power imbalances will make it difficult for a reconciliation process to truly take root.68 when he was lieutenant governor of ontario, james bartleman, a member of the chippewas of mnjikaning first nation, warned that unless canadian society as a whole signals that it is serious about according equal economic and social rights to indigenous canadians, the trc’s commissioners will find that “they have been shod with shoes of clay. there can be no true reconciliation and canada cannot claim it is a just and equal society unless economic and social equality is accorded to aboriginal people.”69 how can the trc contribute to a broader sense of reconciliation in a society that is only prepared to address these power imbalances in an incremental way? 70 castellano recalls the observation in rcap’s report that in the search for reconciliation between peoples, the leadership of public institutions in adopting a more respectful stance is extremely important.71 gonzales lists advantages canada has compared to other states in holding a truth commission, including the government’s apology, the presence of “sophisticated advocacy institutions” that have assisted survivors, and the settlement agreement on reparations and the fact that the mandate does not provide much detail does offer an opportunity for the trc to broadly interpret its possibilities. while the trc must exercise caution with respect to what it can reasonably accomplish in the five years it has been granted, perhaps the irs system can be a springboard for the exploration of broader issues in indigenous/non-indigenous relations in canada. after all, there is a distinction to be made in the trc’s mandate – the trc is expected to address the irs system, but it is also expected to address the irs legacy. the irs system is something that can be quantified with respect to how many schools, where they were in operation, for how long, and under what government directives. the irs legacy is a much more amorphous question. the trc can complete an effective historical study of the irs system while exploring broader political questions in its discussion of the irs legacy. this may include situating the irs legacy within colonialism, making connections between irs and socioeconomic conditions for indigenous communities, consideration of the levels of violence, criminalization, marginalization and discrimination experienced by indigenous people, or a myriad of other possible avenues of investigation. 68 ibid. at 146. 69 james bartleman, “the importance of truth telling in a just society” ((lecture presented at “preparing for the truth commission: sharing the truth about residential schools. a conference on truth and reconciliation as restorative justice”, university of calgary, 15 june 2007) [unpublished]. 70 indeed, some critics of the trc process view the concept of “reconciliation” as a way for the canadian government to appear to address an issue without actually addressing it. see roland chrisjohn and tanya wasacase, “half-truths and whole lies: rhetoric in the ‘apology’ and the truth and reconciliation commission” in gregory younging, jonathan dewar and michael degagné, eds. from truth to reconciliation: response, responsibility and renewal – canada’s truth and reconciliation journey (ottawa: aboriginal healing foundation, 2009) 217 and see taiaiake alfred, “restitution is the real pathway to justice for indigenous peoples” in younging, dewar and degagné, ibid., 179, at 184, for an assessment of canada as an “imperial enterprise … operating in the guise of a liberal democratic state [that] is, by design and culture, incapable of just and peaceful relations with indigenous peoples.” 71 marlene brant castellano, “renewing the relationship: a perspective on the impact of the royal commission on aboriginal peoples” in aboriginal rights coalition, blind spots supra note 15, 1, at 12. 13 stanton: canada's truth and reconciliation commission: settling the past? published by scholarship@western, 2011 truth-telling.72 he states that unlike most societies seeking to inaugurate a truth commission, canada is not emerging from a period of prolonged or significant violence that has left legal and governance institutions in disarray.73 nonetheless, even if canada does have certain advantages compared to other countries establishing truth commissions, it has some challenges ahead: “multiple violations of the human dignity of aboriginal peoples over generations and their relative powerlessness in the face of public institutions have created distrust that public dialogue can bring about change.”74 canada has a comparatively privileged opportunity to make considered decisions with respect to institutional design of mechanisms to address deep societal problems. it has a functioning parliament and justice system, a constitution that includes a charter of rights and freedoms, an independent judiciary, thousands of trained legal professionals, an active civil society and a rights-conscious culture. these factors can facilitate a process that is responsive to survivors of historical injustice. however, it was a legal settlement agreement that produced the trc in canada. survivors called for the truth commission after years of seeking redress through other legal mechanisms; a truth commission was not the government’s choice of how to proceed. 75 other established democracies that are faced with addressing historical injustices might glean from the canadian process that a truth commission process may have stronger prospects if it arises from a societal decision, rather than as a result of a settlement of litigation. the survivors sought a legal mechanism other than those that have been tried so far in canada to address the legacy of irs. in its mandate, the trc is designed to fulfill the goals of the parties. however, while the trc may fulfill some of the needs expressed by survivors for a reconciliation process, given the negligible involvement of the non-indigenous public, it is hard to say whether reconciliation on a broader societal level can be initiated. 72 eduardo gonzales, “residential schools: give truth a chance, canada” globe and mail (4 november 2008). gonzales is a senior associate with the international center for transitional justice, and has consulted for the trc. 73 jung, supra note 44, subtitles her 2009 article “transitional justice for indigenous people in a nontransitional society”. this assessment may not accord with perspectives of indigenous communities whose legal and governance institutions have been severely damaged by colonization and who may consider that a transition is underway. 74 castellano, “a holistic approach to reconciliation”, supra note 39, at 386. 75 the proposal for including a truth commission in the settlement agreement did not come from the government; it came from the survivors of the schools: rick mofina, “‘truth commission’ urged: hearings may satisfy victims of residential school abuse without assigning blame” the [saskatoon] star phoenix (6 june 2000) front page. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 3 [2011], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.3.2 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(2001). gathering strength: the government of canada’s response to the final report of the royal commission on aboriginal peoples. in aboriginal rights coalition, blind spots: 17 stanton: canada's truth and reconciliation commission: settling the past? published by scholarship@western, 2011 http://www.thestarphoenix.com/� an examination of the federal government's response to the report of the royal commission on aboriginal peoples (p. 32-48). ottawa: aboriginal rights coalition. o'connor, p. (2000). squaring the circle: how canada is dealing with the legacy of its indian residential schools experiment. international journal of legal information, 28, 232. quatell v. attorney general of canada, 2006 bcsc 1840 stewart, p. (2001). federal government’s response to the royal commission on aboriginal peoples. in aboriginal rights coalition, blind spots: an examination of the federal government's response to the report of the royal commission on aboriginal peoples (p. 49). ottawa: aboriginal rights coalition. taiaiake, a. (2009). restitution is the real pathway to justice for indigenous peoples. in g. younging, j. dewar, & m. degagné (eds.), from truth to reconciliation: response, responsibility and renewal – canada’s truth and reconciliation journey (p. 179). ottawa: aboriginal healing foundation. u.n. security council. report of the secretary-general on the rule of law and transitional justice in conflict and post-conflict societies (s/2004/616). 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 3 [2011], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.3.2 the international indigenous policy journal august 2011 canada's truth and reconciliation commission: settling the past? kim stanton recommended citation canada's truth and reconciliation commission: settling the past? abstract keywords creative commons license canada's truth and reconciliation commission: settling the past? women's use of indigenous knowledge for environmental security and sustainable development in southwest nigeria the international indigenous policy journal volume 9 issue 3 special issue: indigenous peoples, climate change, and environmental stewardship article 2 july 2018 women's use of indigenous knowledge for environmental security and sustainable development in southwest nigeria yetunde adebunmi aluko nigerian institute of social and economic research (niser), yetkoo.ya@gmail.com recommended citation aluko, y. a. (2018). women's use of indigenous knowledge for environmental security and sustainable development in southwest nigeria. the international indigenous policy journal, 9(3). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.2 women's use of indigenous knowledge for environmental security and sustainable development in southwest nigeria abstract indigenous women are important part of a community’s social capital. this study examined women’s use of indigenous knowledge (ik) for environmental security and sustainable development in southwest nigeria. qualitative data was collected using in-depth interviews conducted among 80 purposively selected rural yoruba women. the data were analysed using descriptive tools such as frequencies, percentages, and content analysis. the findings reveal an extensive wealth of ik used in agriculture, food processing and preservation, family health care, and child care. the findings also suggest that paying attention to ik will help to incorporate culture as part of rural development and sustainable development in nigeria, leading to more successful outcomes using place-based knowledge. indigenous women can, and should, contribute to the design and implementation of sustainable development initiatives because of their extensive ik. keywords women, indigenous knowledge, environmental security, sustainable development, southwest nigeria. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ women’s use of indigenous knowledge for environmental security and sustainable development in southwest nigeria historically, african rural communities have been greatly endowed with indigenous knowledge (ik) regarding how to carry out activities to ensure survival and over time notable progress in development has been made using this knowledge. many indigenous people believe that there is a holistic interconnection among all things on the planet: animals, plants, natural forces, human beings, and the supernatural life. indigenous modes of traditional farming, fishing, pastoralism and herding, foraging, and forestry are based on long-established knowledge and practices that help ensure ongoing agricultural diversity and the preservation of valuable landscape and seascape features, livelihoods, and food security (food and agriculture organization of the united nations [fao], 2009). the fact that humans depend on the environment for their existence and sustenance means that life is shaped by the environment and this underscores the need for protection from all forms of environmental degradation, especially those brought about by the activities of humans. in light of the significance of the environment for human survival, many environmental issues have received global attention, and communities across the world have undertaken efforts to make the world a better place for human habitation. indeed, this is likely because the state of the environment continuously affects the health of those who depend upon its provisions. development planners and policy makers are beginning to recognise the need to understand existing knowledge systems and decision-making processes as they focus their attention on small-scale agricultural producers. however, traditional livelihoods and indigenous plant varieties, landraces, and animal breeds are increasingly endangered by large-scale commercialization of agriculture, changing population dynamics, land-use or cover changes, and the impacts of global climate change. ill-informed climate change-related strategies, policies, and interventions could exacerbate underlying vulnerabilities to the impacts of climate change. research on local communities’ experiences with climate change in sub-saharan africa show that unpredictable and severe weather phenomena such as floods, droughts, and desertification have affected food security, access to water, livestock and wildlife management, and community cohesion (raufu, kibirige, & singh, 2015). a critical look at these issues shows that environmental security, ik, and sustainable development are very closely linked. ik is an important asset with regard to the social capital of local people, particularly insofar as it often constitutes the main resource for their livelihoods (nnadi, chikaire, & ezudike, 2013). in nigeria, however, the efficacy of ik in enhancing sustainable development has not been effectively incorporated into most development projects. since nigeria’s independence in 1960, communities and other stakeholders have implemented many different development initiatives; many of which have not achieved or recorded much in the way of notable successes due to their failure to include ik (olatokun & ayanbode, 2009). ik’s potential ability to improve agricultural production can be gauged by the traditional agricultural sector,1 which accounts for the largest proportion of the economy in tanzania (mushi, 2008). for 1 the traditional agricultural sector is characterized by multipurpose units geared to subsistence production using simple technologies, with a division of labour based on sex and age. the soil and plants are often treated with noxious, laboratory-produced products to prevent disease or pests from blighting the plants. 1 aluko: women's use of indigenous knowledge published by scholarship@western, 2018 instance, some farmers have planned their agricultural production by using ik to ensure both food security and sustainable agricultural production (asogwa, okoye, & oni, 2017). by storing and preserving food, households ensure that they secure food without jeopardizing future access to it or consumption of it (kamwendo & kamwendo, 2014), thereby translating into resource access, entitlement, and security. in this way, ik represents a valuable source of local solutions to issues of food insecurity, particularly in terms of the ability of rural populations to access food during seasonal shortages or major stress periods such as droughts. ik is also part of the healthcare systems in many indigenous communities. according to eyong (2007), more than 80% of the world’s population uses traditional healthcare services. this claim is supported by soewu and ayodele (2009), who have found that traditional healthcare is often combined with conventional healthcare systems. in some communities, traditional healing approaches are the main ways through which to address various health and well-being problems. this indicates that ik can positively address and impact the health of people in many communities. another area in which ik plays an important role is the conservation of water. cheserek (2005) has noted that, in order to protect water bodies from contamination, indigenous communities follow certain taboos. these taboos include not washing in or near the river or stream, not allowing lactating mothers to come to water points, and prohibiting the throwing objects into water bodies. these taboos are intended to assist the efforts of communities to protect and conserve water, which is a very important resource. the success of development projects and initiatives in some communities has depended solely upon grassroots participation of local people—which is a result of understanding and harnessing of their ik. rural women are pivotal to development in african countries as they play diverse roles in development projects and initiatives. they contribute to wage activities, engage in the marketing and distribution of foodstuffs, and ensure the survival of both the family and social unit. specifically, their domestic activities make vital contributions to the maintenance of local economies. for example, yoruba women possess an enormous amount of knowledge about food production and processing, medicine, childrearing, and other survival skills. it is therefore important that indigenous women, as custodians of knowledge about both biodiversity and land use and management, are recognised and encouraged to use their knowledge to enhance sustainable development. the abysmal failure of non-traditional agricultural techniques in africa has made it critically necessary for africa's agricultural policies to revert to its age-old indigenous agricultural technologies. olukoya (2006), in his study with the ikale-yoruba people, has argued that the utilisation of the ikale’s ik system enabled ikale farmers to become the undisputed regional experts in food crop production in southwestern yoruba land during the period under review. he further argued that modern approaches to agricultural development in africa will continue to fail unless they take into consideration africa’s homegrown innovative farming techniques and ik systems. in essence, yoruba ik finds application and relevance in all spheres of human activity and forms the basis of development. a careful reading of yoruba intellectual traditions reveals the extent and ramifications of yoruba knowledge, which, if properly studied, would reveal an uncommon commitment to inquiry, research, investigation, and the functional application of knowledge to solving human problems. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.2 the problem the most serious problems facing the world today include water and food supply crises, extreme volatility in energy and food prices, rising greenhouse gas emissions, large income disparities, chronic fiscal imbalances, and terrorism (unu-ihdp & unep, 2012). these challenges stem from environmental mismanagement or inequality—or, indeed, from both. indigenous peoples inhabit some of the world’s most challenging, vulnerable, and biodiverse environments—many of which depend mainly on the use of natural resources for subsistence—which suggests that indigenous peoples should play a crucial role in the sustainable management of these lands and waters, as well as the natural resources and species that share these environments with indigenous communities. unfortunately, however, the voices of indigenous women are seldom heard when discussing, planning, and implementing sustainable development and environmental conservation projects. often, potential solutions are masked or hidden because they come from women, whose voices are either not heard or not included in decision-making processes. ignoring indigenous women in the planning and execution of sustainable development initiatives not only violates these women’s right to participation, but also forecloses the inclusion of that valuable, sometimes even critical, contributions regarding opportunities for better planning and implementation. women have taken a great interest in environmental resource management and have generated a wealth of ik (denton, 2002). in yorba communities, men and women often have different needs and different priorities when it comes to resource use and management. they have different degrees of access to and control over natural resources (in accordance with customary laws and practices of their distinct communities). they use the environment in different ways, they may use different resources or the same resources in different ways, and they have different knowledge the ways in which the environment and natural resources suffer as a result of environmental degradation following unsustainable resource extraction and destructive infrastructure projects. yoruba women, through their roles as farmers and collectors of water and firewood, have a close connection with their local environments and often suffer most directly from environmental problems. their direct contact with their environment has produced their deep knowledge about it. they have served as agriculturalists, water resources managers, traditional scientists, and more. with this in mind, the underlying premise of this study is that indigenous yoruba women are an important part of their community’s social capital, which enables them to the design and implementation of sustainable development initiatives. with their gender-specific knowledge, skills, social relations, and networks, indigenous yoruba women can make critical contributions to designing viable, practical solutions to the challenges posed by environmental change and unsustainable development (ibnouf, 2013). they can: • help conserve the diversity of native and domesticated plant varieties that are necessary for maintaining resilience in agriculture and ensuring food security (nnadi et al., 2013); • enhance existing knowledge about agricultural and seed conservation, medicinal plants, and healing practices that can be integrated into community health programs (aluko, 2016; asia indigenous people’s pact [aipp], 2012; borokini, ighere, clement, ajiboye, & alowonle, 2013); and 3 aluko: women's use of indigenous knowledge published by scholarship@western, 2018 • propose alternative land-use practices or income sources to reduce pressure on endangered species and resources that are critical for local livelihoods (aipp, 2012). it is against this backdrop that this article examines the link between yoruba women’s use of ik for environmental security and sustainable development in southwest nigeria. since indigenous peoples around the world have developed close connections with the lands, waters, and environments in which they live and work, it has become clear that their ik can be a valuable resource for addressing resource management and environmental security. often, environmental degradation has serious negative consequences—droughts can cause food shortages and the spread of infectious diseases, for example. indigenous women possess special knowledge about how to ensure the survival of the family in these situations; their domestic activities contribute to the maintenance of local economies to enhance sustainable development. this study aims to highlight indigenous women’s potential and emphasize their innovation through their use of ik for environmental security and sustainable development. conceptual issues indigenous knowledge (ik) in this article, ik refers to traditional knowledge associated with african cultures. it is largely inherent in the community, and it is not associated with any form of formal learning or training; rather, it is transmitted or taught through oral tradition and is deeply rooted in african culture (ugboma, 2014). african cultural heritage consists of different cultural values, ik, and heritage materials. ik resides in the heads and on the lips of its custodians, passed down through generations through oral tradition. even in an increasingly digital age, oral tradition remains an important means of preserving and transmitting ik. in this study, ik represents a possible alternative path for progress among the world’s rural poor. as escobar (1995) has stated, “the remaking of development must start by examining local constructions, to the extent that they are the life and history of the people, that is, the conditions for and of change” (p. 98). such an approach to “remaking development” (escobar, 1995, p. 98) can be supported by careful ethnographic work that seeks to tease out the complex interrelationships between communities and places (herbert, 2000). importantly, this approach implies a change that comes from within communities themselves by demonstrating confidence in and deployments of ik, among other things, as factors that can bring about economic and social progress. in this way, the rural poor would have a voice in discussions about progress that materially affect them, and outsiders would listen seriously to them, learn from them, and respect their realities and priorities (chambers, 1983). environmental security the relationship between the natural environment and the security of humans has been the object of much research and the subject of many publications in recent decades, but it has only recently become an important focus of international environmental policy. even though there is no universally agreed upon definition or concept of environmental security, it is evident that the cold war meaning of “security”—which invokes the spectres of militaries and nuclear fallouts—no longer dominates international discussion of what the word security implies for policymaking. today, security possesses a broader meaning, one that includes economic stability, population growth, sustainable natural resource 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.2 use, and environmental protection. this understanding of security generally puts more emphasis on the security of people and their overall well-being and needs than it does on the security of nation states. environmental security is central to national security insofar as it comprises the dynamics of and interconnections between natural resource bases, the social fabric of a state, and the economic engines of local and regional stability (myers, 2002). to the extent that humankind neglects to maintain the lifesupporting ecosystems that generate water, food, medicine, and clean air, current and future generations will be confronted with increasingly severe instances of environmentally induced change (floyd, 2007). examples of emerging environmental change include the depletion and pollution of fresh water supplies; the depletion of fisheries; the degradation and disappearance of biodiversity; the degradation and loss of agricultural lands, food, and health and safety, as well as stratospheric ozone depletion and global warming. indeed, our ability (or lack thereof) to make innovative institutional arrangements and/or technological advances to manage these environmental security challenges will immediately impact global security. though the concept of environmental security is not easy to define, this article approaches it in relation to environmental changes. in the light of degradation and loss of agricultural lands, food, and health and safety, how indigenous women are able to use the knowledge they are endowed with to protect their environment from the dangers caused by natural or human processes in order to support health, livelihoods, and food production is of critical importance. sustainable development the term sustainable development has been defined as “development that meets the needs and aspirations of the current generations without compromising the ability to meet those of future generations” (nigerian institute of social and economic research [niser], 2009, p. 13). generally, sustainable development balances the conservation of natural resources with the needs of development. for this article, sustainable development refers to developments that improve the quality of human life from within the capacities and limits of supporting ecosystems. as noted by harris (2000), the need to achieve environmental sustainability is rooted in recognition of the fact that (a) the benefits of development have been distributed unevenly, and (b) development has negatively impacted both the environment and social structures. it has been recognized, for example, that many traditional societies have been devastated by forest depletion, water system disruption, and overfishing; similarly, urban centres in many developing countries have suffered and continue to suffer from extreme pollution, inadequate transportation, poor water quality, and lack of infrastructure. mead (1974) has referenced this negative trend, stating: we are living beyond our means. as a people, we have developed a life-style that is draining the earth of its priceless and irreplaceable resources without regard for the future of our children and people all around the world. the fear is that, if the trend of environmental degradation and resource depletion continues, the achieved benefits of development may be eroded. there may also be a collapse of ecosystems that will jeopardize present and future development. 5 aluko: women's use of indigenous knowledge published by scholarship@western, 2018 importance of indigenous knowledge in attaining environmental security and sustainable development while ik practices rely on vibrant, reliable principles of interaction between humans and their environments (shaw, takeuchi, & sharma, 2009), the policy context for its use in the in management of environmental issues still remains undefined; this is due largely to the ongoing privileging of scientific and technology-based forms knowledge. in the last decade, the global explosion in population, accelerated urbanization, and income growth have become unsustainable. together, they have generated growing, often competing, demands for food, natural resources (such as soil and water), and productive land (ayeni & olorunfemi, 2014). in this context, ik seems like an attractive solution; however, its inclusion in policymaking on sustainable agricultural production and environmental security is only possible through social change—ideally through non-violent mass movements—that is mobilized through organizations that ensure ik is employed from start to finish—from goal setting, to strategizing, to developing, to sustaining change. it is, however, difficult to change or redirect human behaviours, attitudes, and perceptions toward change—accepting ideas that can actually effect change is even more difficult. many factors other than people's attitudes, perceptions, and participation in sustainable development affect their understanding of their immediate environment, and environmental security issues are best influenced through people's longstanding, collective knowledge. meanwhile, in order for younger generations to become champions of ik in policymaking, the desire for change has to be fostered by present day traditional environmentalist through day-to-day research battles that showcase the relevance of ik in sustainable development. the most urgent environmental security issues are related to the scarcity of resources like water and land (un-ihdp & unep, 2012). considering the mismatch between existing global management capacity and threats to environmental resources, there is a need for environmental policy reform. sustainability, integrated protection of the environment, and development are closely linked. in africa, environmental insecurity has become the major threat to national economies, posing significant problems for the continent’s growing population. it has become a global issue of critical importance that is increasingly acknowledged as one of the main challenges to sustainable development (ayeni & olorunfemi, 2014). specifically, nigeria has faced, and will continue to face, many significant challenges associated with environmental insecurity. in all parts of nigeria, there exist ethno-religious conflicts and these, according to ibrahim and igbuzor (2002), have emerged because of new and particularistic forms of political consciousness and identity often structured around ethno-religious identities. control over scarce resources, power, land, chieftaincy, local government, councils, markets, and sharia, among other trivial issues, have resulted in large-scale killings and violence amongst groups in nigeria (adagba, ugwu & eme, 2012). in addition, the porosity of the nigerian borders has led to an influx of migrants from neighbouring countries such as the republic of niger, chad, and the republic of benin (adeola & oluyemi, 2012). these migrants, who are mostly young men, are some of the perpetrators of crime in the country. although nigeria has a strong and diverse economy relative to other countries in sub-saharan africa, significant portions of its population and economy are tied to environment-sensitive activities, such as agriculture. the fact that communities have survived despite the country’s rapid growth suggests that 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.2 the ik held by some tribes, ethnic groups, and clans—particularly in the rural areas—is used as mechanisms for coping and adapting to these changes (federal government of nigeria, 2012; society for water and sanitation [newsan], 2013). indigenous peoples’ ik, which helped them cope with past environmental extremes (e.g., flood, drought, and water stress), can potentially guide current and future responses to environmental threats. for instance, millions of traditional farmers and indigenous communities use their ik to ensure food and livelihood security in a wide range of ecosystems, including fragile and harsh ones. traditional practices are embedded cultural traditions and bio-cultural dynamics, and they can regenerate local food systems while increasing socio-environmental sustainability and resilience. these practices can be applied in innovative ways to help tackle current environmental problems. through their on-farm or in situ conservation and management of resources, farmers, pastoralists, herders, fishers, foresters, foragers, mountain people, and other communities following traditional lifestyles maintain high levels of genetic and biological diversity for food and agriculture. this creates an important basis for the food security of present and future generations worldwide. the application of traditional knowledge in such areas as ecosystem and landscape management, water management, soil conservation, biological control of pests and diseases, ecological agriculture and livestock practices, and plant and animal breeding often enhances food security and prevents or alleviates poverty. yoruba indigenous knowledge (ik) systems yoruba ik systems cover all aspects of human life, including how to manage the natural environment. these systems have been a matter of survival for the people who generated them; they are cumulative, representing generations of experience, careful observation, and trial-and-error experiments (ajala, 2009). for centuries, yoruba ik has guided people on how to sustainably utilize their natural resources and deal with environmental conservation and natural disaster management. this knowledge has been handed down orally from generation to generation, and it is closely interwoven with the people’s cultural values (makinde, 2016). for instance, ik is used in soil classification, with factors like soil colour and texture functioning as key common factors in indigenous soil knowledge. farmers are aware of the link between soil texture and the differential deposition of river sediments, as well as the “feel” of soils and their moisture content (makinde & shorunke, 2013). they use this knowledge to enhance crop production using practices such as shift cultivation, mixed cropping, intercropping, and transhumance. some of these innovations are particular to certain environments and cannot be replicated elsewhere. often, conservation measures are intuitive hazard-prevention measures. for example, conservation of indigenous trees and vegetation along riverbanks serves both to protect water catchments and reduce flooding and soil erosion. the use of ik for conservation tends to affect all aspects of the environment. for instance, in many communities, certain forests are designated as shrines and are effectively considered protected areas. these protected forests have multiple functions because they also influence other elements of the environment, such as biodiversity, forest conservation, and land use and management. as such, they serve as important frontiers for the regeneration of flora and reproduction of fauna. conservation practices are vital to indigenous communities as they ensure the sustainability of natural resources so as 7 aluko: women's use of indigenous knowledge published by scholarship@western, 2018 to guarantee their availability for future generations (makinde & shorunke, 2013). moreover, maintaining the delicate balance of the ecosystem ensures that other practices that rely on the environment, such as weather prediction and traditional medical practices, will continue to flourish. women’s contributions to indigenous knowledge indigenous women are not only excluded from public decision making, but they are often invisible as knowledge makers—especially in mainstream science, which has undervalued their knowledge. however, as producers, custodians, and consumers of traditional knowledge, women have been recognized in major international agreements (e.g., the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples [undrip], 2007). their contributions have been noted as crucial to biodiversity management, the sustenance of family and community, and the development of new knowledge (fao, 2005). women produce 80% of the food in africa, 60% of the food in asia, and 40% of the food in latin america (fao, 2005). due to their work providing food, water, fuel, medicines, fodder, and other necessities to their families, rural women have wide and diverse knowledge about the uses of local resources. however, the loss of biodiversity increases the women’s burden as they perform their daily chores. for example, water scarcity and contamination and deforestation has made many women’s waterand fuel-gathering tasks more taxing and time consuming (gibb, 2007). rural women have a lot at stake in ensuring the health of local ecosystems now and in the future, and they play a key role in the preservation of biodiversity. the demand from global markets for cheaply produced agricultural products has intensified the expansion of commercial agriculture into rural areas in developing countries. this expansion has threatened the biodiversity of local ecosystems as monocropping, the introduction of alien species, and the clearing of forests has intensified. it has also resulted in a division of labour in many communities: men tend to be more involved with raising commercial crops and women tend to be involved with raising crops for personal consumption. because of this, women tend to have more specialized knowledge of wild plants than men (gibb, 2007). however, the increased centrality of money in these rural economies has further lowered women’s status—they do not earn cash like the men do. this further degrades women’s economic contributions to local economies. this partly explains why many projects aimed at assisting farmers deal only with men—it is their commercial, moneymaking contributions that matter. this approach not only excludes women from participating in the planning and decision-making stages of development projects, but it also excludes them from reaping any resultant benefits. in this way, gender-blind development work can reinforce gendered inequality. theoretical perspectives the idea that development that is responsive to the needs of people in the developing world should come from within their own communities is not new. gegeo (1998), foucault (1980, 1988), amin (1976, 1989), freire (1970, 1984), and nyerere (1990) have all argued that development that is dictated from outside, rather than anchored within, the knowledge base of a target population will not be fully concerned with local needs. while it is true that globalizing forces may be realized in uniquely local forms (cvetkovich & kellner, 1997; keesing, 1992; wilson & dissanayake, 1996), it is also true that western-oriented development in developing countries has been haunted by the ghost of 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.2 underdevelopment. it is for this reason that this article includes african feminist perspectives in order to analyse indigenous women’s knowledge related to environmental security and sustainable development. modernization is the imposition of a dominant political, economic, and socio-cultural system on indigenous peoples. it has dire consequences for indigenous peoples since it is based on massive resource exploitation, market-driven production, and unfair trade and competition without regard for cultural diversities, local economies, and the sustainable resource management systems of indigenous peoples. modernization often results in systematic and large-scale displacement of indigenous peoples, the destruction of their resources and livelihoods, and the weakening of their socio-cultural systems. traditional religious beliefs and cultural traits, according to the theory, usually become less important as modernization takes hold. following the loss of access to resources, indigenous women often become more economically dependent on men, which further weakens their social status. at the same time, the burden to take care of and provide for children continues to rest disproportionately on their shoulders. their role to ensure food security is often seriously threatened, while increased resource scarcity, environmental hazards, and disasters make them vulnerable to serious reproductive health conditions. as indigenous women are forced to seek other sources of livelihood, they become more vulnerable to sexual and other forms of violence. large numbers of indigenous women and girls work in domestic households. domestic work is outside of the regulatory framework for employers, which leaves women and girls isolated and vulnerable to physical and sexual abuse by employers. in light of this, african feminists have emphasized the need for an approach that is anchored in a retrieval, revitalization, or restoration of african indigenousness (wane, 2005). such an approach requires that african people reposition their cultural resource knowledge and use the power of collective responsibility to tackle social issues. although much of its content is ancient, ik has proven its usefulness in addressing modern issues. it is based on cognitive understandings and interpretations of the social, physical, and spiritual worlds and encompasses concepts, beliefs, and perceptions of local peoples and their natural human-built environments (dei, 1999). a commonly held societal view is that ordinary african women lack power and agency due to their lack of “appropriate” knowledge or disadvantaged economic and political positions. this view is often justified as the result of low levels of education, poverty, and the unequal distribution of resources. the lack of acknowledgement and support for women’s traditional knowledge systems and their contributions to development are presented as natural and inevitable consequences of a busy, dynamic world. a number of african scholars, many of whom are women, have challenged this assumption and opposed the global onslaught of imposed modernization (aidoo, 1998; mama, 1997; nwapa, 1966, 1970; ogundipe-leslie, 1994; wa thiongo, 1985). indeed, generations of african women writers have built careers on intimately interrogating the microand macro-effects of both modernization and the resistance strategies undertaken within their communities. these voices of de-westernization deplored the lack of women’s voices in the public discourse (sadaawi, 1997, see pp. 143-208). however, within the confines of patriarchal culture and an approach to nationalism that limits women’s agency, women’s voices are fewer and further between. yet, african women are the guardians of traditional knowledge and are often leaders in resistance struggles. despite the efforts of the western world to disrupt indigenous practices, women’s role as traditional teachers has never ceased. they have continued their 9 aluko: women's use of indigenous knowledge published by scholarship@western, 2018 work in different ways so as to break the silence and speak their truths, as they know them. the transformation of traditional society gave way to years marked by fierce battles between tradition and modernity, which included conflicts about women’s participation in environmental security and sustainable development (swai, 2011). indeed, women battled for their very lives and for their continued existence as integral members of the community. methods objectives of the study the main objective of the study is to examine the rural women’s use of indigenous knowledge for environmental security and sustainable development in southwestern part of nigeria. it asks the following research questions: a. what ik exists among yoruba women in rural nigeria? b. what ik do yoruba women use to protect their environment from threats like climate change? c. how is ik used as part of sustainable agricultural development in their communities? study area: southwest of nigeria the yoruba people, who occupy the southwest of nigeria, are a highly researched ethnic group in africa. their rich cultural heritage is manifest in their history, society, and philosophy (olajubu, 2008). the yoruba make up about 93% of the inhabitants of southwestern nigeria—as of 2006, 39.8 million of the 46 million people living in this area were yoruba (national population commission [npc], 2006). based on the average nigerian annual population increase of approximately 3 percent (federal office of statistics, 2009), the yoruba population had likely grown to about 40.9 million by 2009. southwestern nigeria has six states: ekiti, lagos, ogun, ondo, osun, and oyo; of these, two states, oyo and ogun, were chosen for the study. oyo state—ibadan. oyo state has 33 local government areas (lgas) that are made up of rural, rural– urban, and urban communities; it is known as the “pace-setter state.”2 ibadan is the capital of oyo state. the principal inhabitants of the state are the yoruba people, and their main indigenous occupations are subsistence farming and trading (onibokun & faniran, 1995). this study was carried out in the ido lga, formerly known as akinyele west lga. its headquarters were at ido town due to its many rural communities and large population of rural women with appreciable use of ik. the lga has a population of about 55, 893 and occupies a landmass of 865.49 km2, with about 57% of the land used for agricultural purposes (npc, 2006). it is bordered by akinyele, oluyole, and ibarapa, which are lgas of oyo state, and odeda lga of ogun state. the inhabitants are predominantly farmers and farming accounts for 63% of the lga’s total economic status. the lga consists of about 78 settlements, which are distributed into 10 wards (oladeebo, oyeleye, & oladejo, 2013). 2 the nickname of oyo state. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.2 ogun state—abeokuta. ogun state has 20 lgas that are made up of rural, rural–urban, and urban communities; it is known as the “gateway state”3 because of its strategic position as the road, rail, air, and sea link to the rest of the country. abeokuta is the largest city and state capital of ogun state. abeokuta means “under the stone,” and the city lies below the olumo rock, which is home to several caves and shrines. the town depends on the oyan river dam for its water supply, though it is not always dependable (kayode-adedeji, 2010). odeda lga was chosen for this study based on (a) its nearness to ido lga of oyo state, and (b) the large number of rural communities and large population of rural women with appreciable use of ik. data collection procedure the research presented in this article is the result of an exploratory study, owing to the size of the population, respondents’ levels of literacy, respondents’ locations, and time and financial constraints. the study employed a qualitative methodology, using direct interaction with participants through interviews to gather information. the participants of the study included women farmers (subsistence farmers) located in the rural communities of both ido lga in oyo state and odeda lga in ogun state. the participants were selected based on population density, the accessibility of their locations, the available financial resources for the study, and the fact that their locations supported farming, which is the main occupation in the study area. a multistage sampling technique was employed in the sample selection. first, in order to select a sample that was representative of the population within a limited geographic area, a cluster sampling technique was used to select women at both lgas. second, a purposive sampling technique was used to select four villages from each lga (eight villages altogether) in order to get information from rural women. overall, 80 respondents (10 per village) were purposively selected for the study (see table 1). an indepth interview guide was used to explore the women’s use of ik for environmental security and sustainable development in their communities. the interviews were conducted in the yoruba language and later transcribed. the qualitative data collected were analysed by manual content analysis and descriptive statistics, such as frequencies. content analysis is a systematic, replicable technique for compressing text into content categories based on explicit rules of coding and identifying themes or patterns. research instrument: in-depth interview guide the aim of the in-depth, semi-structured interview was to explore rural women’s use of ik for environmental security and sustainable development in southwestern nigeria. the main interview questions fell into four categories: 1. background information: respondents were asked about the location of their community, and their occupation, literacy level, and level of education. 2. types of existing ik: respondents were asked to describe the types of ik that exist among rural women of the yoruba ethnic nationality in nigeria. 3 the nickname of ogun state. 11 aluko: women's use of indigenous knowledge published by scholarship@western, 2018 3. use of ik: respondents were asked to describe what ik women use to secure their environment, areas of life in which rural women use ik, and rural women’s adaptation strategies to climate variability and change. 4. role of ik in sustainable development: respondents were asked to describe the role of ik in sustainable development—particularly in terms of the availability of food, cultural promotion, health provision, childcare, and poverty reduction—and in what ways ik has increased women’s level of economic empowerment. results and discussion background information table 1 shows the number of women from each rural community who participated in the study. table 2 lists the demographic characteristics of participants by their occupation, literacy level, and level of education. farming is by far the most common occupation (53.75%), followed by food processing and sales, herb making and selling, petty-trading, hairdressing, and tailoring. there was a high level of illiteracy among participants: 65.0% of respondents could neither read nor write, and 23.75% could only read. of the 80 participants, only 9 (11.25%) could read and write. relatively low literacy rates may explain why so many work as farmers. overall, only 35.0% participants could read, with 78.57% only able to read in the yoruba language and only 21.43% able to read both yoruba and english. in terms of participants’ level of education, the majority (68.75%) had no formal education. only 10 (12.50%) completed secondary school education, while 18.75% completed primary education (which contributes to a low level of literacy). these findings suggest that the socioeconomic conditions (both in terms of location and literacy) of indigenous women in rural areas influence their choice of occupation. types and use of indigenous knowledge table 3 shows the types of ik that participants used; many participants mentioned that ik had been available and used in different aspects of their lives. most noted that they inherited ik from their parents or relatives, explaining that the knowledge was transferred to them verbally through taboos and the telling of folktales. most women employed ik for their farming activities, food storage and processing, family health, saving and lending practices, and cultural preservation. the women use ik specifically created from african modes of thought that is an alternative to western means of enhancing sustainability. traditionally, they practiced non-tillage farming techniques by using indigenous soil preparation and planting materials for their farms. this means that they clear the land, which is done either by hand or by burning, and then raise crops with minimum disturbance to the soil (insofar as the soil is not tilled). holes for planting are made with sticks that are large enough for the planting material. in the case of cocoyam (“koko;” colocasia esculenta), the apex of the shoot is placed in the hole and its base is covered with soil. for cocoyam, there are no significant differences in yield between tillage and non-tillage treatments. however, weed infestation is greater with tillage treatments, and non-tillage treatments come with the benefit of soil conservation and lower labour inputs. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.2 table 1. location of rural communities site number state lga name of community number of respondents percentage (%) 1. oyo ido odebode akufo araromi aderoju 10 10 10 10 12.5 12.5 12.5 12.5 2. ogun odeda anigilaje ojoo eweje ijemo-fadipe 10 10 10 10 12.5 12.5 12.5 12.5 total 80 100.0 note. source: fieldwork, 2014. table 2. demographic characteristics of respondents variables frequency percentage (%) occupation: farming food processing and sales herb making and selling petty trading hair dressing tailoring 43 18 9 5 3 2 53.75 22.50 11.25 6.25 3.75 2.50 literacy level: can neither read nor write can only read able to read and write 52 19 9 65.0 23.75 11.25 level of education: no formal education ssce primary education 55 10 15 68.75 12.50 18.75 total 80 100.0 note. source: fieldwork, 2014. 13 aluko: women's use of indigenous knowledge published by scholarship@western, 2018 table 3. types and uses of indigenous knowledge among yoruba women indigenous knowledge purpose farming practices non-tillage slashing and burning mulching use of organic manure use of locally made pesticides use of ash for seed treatment food processing and preservation sun drying pounding with locally made mortar roasting and frying food grinding with stone early harvesting with hand use of sacks burying in moistened soil mixture of red pepper wood ash application placing under fire family health child care: depressed fontanel (“oro agogo”), navel pain (“ejinrin were”) curing multiple diseases, such as skin disease, chicken pox, inflammation, malaria fever, etc. (“dongoyaro”) note. source: fieldwork, 2014. farmers indicated that cocoyam should be planted with the arrival of the rainy season, as planting in the dry season might negatively affect the cocoyam due to a lack of moisture. among the women, 87% planted cocoayam tubers (“isu”) and cassava (“ege”) with planting sticks, and their crops sustained their families. any extra crops were sold for income. normally, the women work the digging sticks into the soil, levering in three or four directions to make the right-sized hole. the apex of the shoot is then placed into the hole and the stick is used to press the soil against the shoot. the women’s use of inorganic fertilizer was limited, as were biocides that pollute the environment, mainly because they lacked the financial ability to purchase them. instead, most of the women noted that they used organic manure from animals. farm practices like crop rotation systems and planting cover crops greatly enhance the uses of organic manure, and leftover plant materials are used to feed livestock such as goats, sheep, and poultry. these animals are also food sources and income sources for families. these practices show that the women appreciated the usefulness of conserving and protecting their farms and materials to enhance their livelihoods. another practice was the women’s pest control method of mixing ash with kerosene and spreading it over vegetables infected with aphids. on 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.2 homestead plots, women also noted that they often hung banana leaf threads over garden eggs (“igba;” solanum melongena) to prevent bird attacks. on food processing and preservation, women used sun drying to preserve most of their food, from elubo to gari, melon, and peppers. women also smoked and used charcoal (“eedu”) to preserve their food, citing charcoal’s inhibiting effect on microorganisms (olatokun & ayanbode, 2009). one respondent noted, for example: one method is to immerse fresh products, for example vegetables, in salted boiling water for a few minutes and then dry them under the sun for about three days. these are then stored in a safe, dry place. this method is also used to dry edible insects such as locusts and caterpillars. another method is to directly spread the food under the sun. food crops like sorghum, pearl millet, beans, and groundnuts are usually kept drying under the sun before storage in traditional underground store or pits to increase their shelf life. other food is first salted if there is danger of decaying during the drying process, as is the case with meats and tomatoes and afterwards stored in dry place at room temperature. dried tomatoes are then soaked in warm water to be turned into tomatoes sauce. (respondent 31) through such practices, these women have contributed to increased food safety for their households by using locally made, traditional pesticides that are not environmental pollutants. traditional pesticides, such as citrus lemon leaves and neem (“dongoyaro;” azadirachta indica), were also mentioned as pest controlling agents. the women also referenced various methods through which they had adapted to climate variability and change. these methods depended on the resources they were exposed to, their levels of education, and their distinct forms of ik. specifically, this article considers the women’s use of alternative energy sources for cooking, as participants noted using maize, guinea corn stalk, and cow dung in place of firewood for their cooking. these women indicated that the smoke from these materials affected the aroma of the food and that the fires using these fuels required constant attention, which takes much of the women’s time along with that of female children, who are considered a suitable assistant. however, time spent in cooking food by women under scarcity of firewood was not considered in this study. the materials used by women for cooking are biodegradable and could be used in the production of biogas. regarding family health, some participants, who are herb sellers, referenced ik about plants and their medicinal properties. this indicated that they use herbs for both preventive medicine and as an alternative means by which to treat diseases. noting that their diagnostic method is mainly biological examination, participants explained that they used their sensory organs to examine afflicted individuals, even though they lack medical, scientific knowledge. in the short time the researcher spent with the women, the following indigenous practices were used to treat the different ailments. for treating depressed fontanel in newborn babies (popularly known as “oka ori”), the participants noted that a major symptom is babies’ incessant, unprompted crying. the euphorbia kamerunica plant (popularly known as “oro agogo”) is often prescribed, and the root of the plant is often used to cure the ailment. one respondent explained: for newborn baby medications, all you need to do is just boil “aidan” [tetrapleura tetraptera bark], “oko eran” [boscia anguistifolia bark], “iyeye” [spondias mombin bark or hog plum], 15 aluko: women's use of indigenous knowledge published by scholarship@western, 2018 “alubosa elewe” [allium ascalonicum bulb or leafed onion], and “eru” [xylopia aethiopica seeds or ethiopian pepper] with water and give [to] the baby. (respondent no. 35) similarly, one participant noted that to treat babies’ navel pain, they would: boil leaves of “ejinrinwere” [momordica charantia or bitter gourd], “osan wewe” [citrus aurantifolia root or lime fruit], and “erawonka” [xylopia quintasii leaves] with water and administer [it] to the child. (respondent no. 47) to treat multiple diseases or ailments, many women used neem (azadiracha indica). one respondent explained: to treat wounds and sore[s], a paste of “dongoyaro” is applied. even smearing honey is a common practice for recovery from burning and wounds. (respondent 12) overall, respondents reported that economic viability and compatibility with socioeconomic and cultural conditions are the indicators that demonstrate the appropriateness of indigenous health and environmental management practices in this setting. therefore, it is necessary to incorporate local indigenous practices into mainstream research in order to ensure outcomes are appropriate within the setting. role of indigenous knowledge in sustainable development in the communities respondents emphasized that farming activities done with ik are less expensive and result in more crop production and, thus, more food. ik and practices in food processing and preserving can be considered an ideal method of dealing with the practical circumstances surrounding household survival, and women offer many traditional food products that support food supply, and food quality and safety. these food products contribute to improving food access and availability by meeting household needs in an undesirable climate and undesirable socioeconomic conditions. women are able to use locally available raw agricultural materials that are processed into food products at relatively low cost, resulting in food with a higher nutritive value compared to the raw material, a better taste, and a longer shelf life. in addition, ik methods of preventing and treating diseases have increased both infants’ and adults’ chances of survival. indeed, the provision of health-related services further confirms the role indigenous women play in family care. malaria and measles are the major diseases that affect infants in rural areas; according to ik, if the right herbs are used at the right time, infant mortality from these diseases can be reduced. when women are financially empowered through the sale of farm products, herbs for medicinal use, and other trading activities then they have the means to purchase other necessities for themselves and their families. however, it is evident from the women’s accounts that income generated is generally only enough for family sustenance. in the words of one of the respondents: there is a little reduction in poverty since we are able to feed ourselves and sponsor our children’s education. one major measurement of poverty is inability to afford three square meals, and this we have. (respondent 62) 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.2 conclusions ik is crucial to community sustainability and development. it can provide convenient, effective alternatives to western knowhow and gives additional options to local people in carrying out their daily activities. traditionally, the yoruba practice non-tillage farming techniques, using indigenous soil preparation and planting materials. women, more so than men, have generated significant ik surrounding family health, food processing, and methods of food preservation. ik and practices related to food processing and preservation can be regarded as optimum methods of addressing the practical circumstances surrounding survival of households. as they became part of rural livelihoods, traditional methods of processing and preserving food products were modernized and adapted. lessons can be drawn from the specific indigenous practices discussed in this article. for effective responses to climate change, women need to be supported in taking their place as active participants in developing and designing beneficial adaptation strategies. for example, when firewood is scarce, women spend a significant amount of time finding materials with which to cook food. a common practice is to burn rice husks indiscriminately, increasing pollution and carbon dioxide (co2) in the atmosphere. alternatively, energy saving stoves could be developed from local materials like clay and briquettes produced from rice husk in rice growing communities to serve as firewood. if briquettes and energy saving stoves were developed and distributed, this would reduce the time women and girls spend collecting firewood, which would in turn provide opportunities for girls to go to school and allow women to engage in other activities. it is possible to empower women in their communities while pursuing and developing biodiversity work. the challenge, however, is ensuring that this is done in a way that includes women’s voices from project planning, to decision-making, to determining methods, and measuring outcomes. policy recommendations a. the efficient utilization of local resources plays a key role in enhancing the capacity of peoples in rural areas to adapt to changes in climate and socioeconomic conditions. efficiently using local resources ensures the availability of indigenous food sources for rural communities with high rates of poverty and limited access to outside resources. ik and practices related food processing and preservation can provide valuable lessons to policymakers. insufficient attention has been given to ik as part of environmentally sustainable practices and household food production; however, integrating ik into mainstream development interventions could facilitate the development and implementation of more culturally acceptable initiatives that are more likely to achieve desirable outcomes. b. the nigerian government has passed many laws against gender discrimination, but the spirit of these laws is not necessarily reflected in practice. the government tends to be silent on protecting women’s rights on issues of ik and traditional knowledge. because women are often “invisible” in community decision-making and research, stakeholders should carefully map out their methods to ensure that women’s voices are effectively heard. the use of women-specific methods in research has been shown to be effective not only in identifying differences between men’s and women’s situations, but also in ensuring that women are 17 aluko: women's use of indigenous knowledge published by scholarship@western, 2018 heard. it is necessary reject the patriarchal tendency to think and decide for women, regardless of the idealism of our intentions. at the same time, we must be aware of the tremendous challenges that women face in asserting their rights and work to overcome those barriers. c. women should be empowered to use their ik and traditional knowledge in order to protect and promote biodiversity. there is currently no provision to ensure that indigenous women have equal access to, control over, and the right to share in payments that might result from the use of ik. when traditional knowledge is used to commercial purposes, discriminatory practices, rooted in the gendered nature of society, often mean that women do not get an equitable share in the distribution of benefits. women, just like men, have a stake in a creating and supporting healthy ecosystems. 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.2 references adagba, o., ugwu, s. c., & eme, o. i. 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(1996). global/local: cultural production and the transnational imaginary. durham, n.c.: duke university press. doi: https://doi.org/10.1215/9780822381990 23 aluko: women's use of indigenous knowledge published by scholarship@western, 2018 the international indigenous policy journal july 2018 women's use of indigenous knowledge for environmental security and sustainable development in southwest nigeria yetunde adebunmi aluko recommended citation women's use of indigenous knowledge for environmental security and sustainable development in southwest nigeria abstract keywords creative commons license women's use of indigenous knowledge for environmental security and sustainable development in southwest nigeria what can traditional indigenous knowledge teach us about changing our approach to human activity and environmental stewardship in order to reduce the severity of climate change? the international indigenous policy journal volume 9 issue 3 special issue: indigenous peoples, climate change, and environmental stewardship article 6 july 2018 w hat can traditional indigenous knowledge teach us about changing our approach to human activity and environmental stewardship in order to reduce the severity of climate change? john g. hansen university of saskatchewan, john.hansen@usask.ca rose antsanen university of saskatchewan, roa353@campus.usask.ca recommended citation hansen, j. g. , antsanen, r. (2018). what can traditional indigenous knowledge teach us about changing our approach to human activity and environmental stewardship in order to reduce the severity of climate change?. the international indigenous policy journal, 9(3). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.6 w hat can traditional indigenous knowledge teach us about changing our approach to human activity and environmental stewardship in order to reduce the severity of climate change? abstract many indigenous communities living on traditional lands have not contributed significantly to harmful climate change. yet, they are the most likely to be impacted by climate change. this article discusses environmental stewardship in relation to indigenous experiences and worldviews. indigenous knowledge teaches us about environmental stewardship. it speaks of reducing the severity of climate change and of continued sustainable development. the methodology that directs this research is premised on the notion that the wisdom of the elders holds much significance for addressing the harmful impacts of climate change in the present day. this article's fundamental assumption is that indigenous knowledge offers practical and theoretical recommendations to current approaches to human activity and environmental issues. we share findings from interviews with cree elders who discussed their worldviews and knowledge systems. findings revealed that indigenous knowledge offers a philosophy and practice that serve to reduce the severity of climate change. keywords indigenous knowledge, elders, traditional teachings, land-based education, climate change, environmental stewardship acknowledgments to the elders of the swampy cree territory of northern manitoba. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ what can traditional indigenous knowledge teach us about changing our approach to human activity and environmental stewardship in order to reduce the severity of climate change? many people around the world have become materialistic and money orientated. however, a cree worldview teaches us that the resources of the world are gifts from manitou (the creator) and that we must respect these gifts (antsanen & hansen, 2012; champagne, 2015; ermine, 1995; hansen & calihoo, 2014; truth and reconciliation commission of canada [trc], 2015). indigenous knowledge has sustained indigenous lands for thousands of years, and it promotes values that compel people to have a reciprocal relationship with the environment. such a reciprocal relationship with the natural world challenges the prevailing overexploitation of resources. the purpose of the article is to discuss the knowledge of cree elders indigenous to northern manitoba as it relates to climate change. more specifically, we will discuss the worldview of cree elders from northern manitoba in order to avoid presenting a homogenous indigenous worldview. the major postulation of this study is that indigenous peoples have crucial traditional knowledge, important values, and culture, which provide a model for environmental stewardship that can serve to reduce the severity of climate change. relevant literature the literature on climate change and indigenous people is both cultural and traditional. indigenous people are perceived as the "stewards of the land." the west colonizes, develops, progresses, modernizes. the indigenous world resists colonization and assimilation. instead of embracing colonization, some indigenous communities attempted to retain their social and cultural way of life (adams, 2000; antsanen, 2014; blaut, 1993; champagne, 2015; hansen & antsanen, 2015). many elders have stressed the importance of maintaining indigenous culture and knowledge, and they advocate for the reproduction of indigenous culture and values. this resistance to colonialism has been a major factor in the preservation of traditional indigenous knowledge and culture (antsanen, 2014; champagne, 2015; hall et al., 2015; hansen, 2015; michell & akienhead, 2008). harmful climate change has become a crucial issue. with the increased intensity of storms and natural disasters, and in the midst of intensified droughts, the indigenous world is now actively inserting itself very firmly in climate change consciousness (hansen, 2015; ishaya & abaje, 2008; michell & akienhead, 2008). indigenous knowledge, in its relation to an indigenous worldview, provides us with a model for environmental stewardship in order to reduce the severity of climate change. ishaya and abaje (2008) observe that indigenous peoples “are vital and active parts of many ecosystems may help to enhance the resilience of these ecosystems. their livelihoods depend on natural resources that are directly affected by climate change” (pp. 137-138). indigenous knowledge is considered a major factor in challenging climate change even though some parts of indigenous knowledge have been eroded or lost through colonization. however, its most basic tenets remain in existence, and so the knowledge as a whole has not been wiped out or destroyed by colonization. although there are many distinctions between indigenous nations and their epistemological systems, there are also significant similarities such as the respect for the elders and the land (antsanen, 2014; aikenhead & michell, 2011; cajete, 1994; charlton & hansen, 2016; charlton & hansen, 2017; ermine, 1995; hansen, 2009). indigenous communities and their cultures recognize that the elders are knowledge keepers (champagne, 2015; hansen & antsanen, 2015; trc, 2015). the old cree people 1 hansen and antsanen: indigenous knowledge and environmental stewardship published by scholarship@western, 2018 teach the importance of environmental stewardship through respect for the land, water, animals, and plants. articulate how and why indigenous knowledge and culture can address climate change indigenous knowledge has much to offer for changing human activity and promoting environmental stewardship. yet, the approach often used by government and industry is to compensate indigenous peoples for damage to their lands and resources as a result of economic activity. compensating, in part for the exploitation of the natural world, is counter to indigenous culture, values, and ideas, consisting of traditional teachings, reciprocity, relationships with nature, spirituality, and so on. it could be argued that nothing could completely compensate indigenous peoples for damage to lands and resources, so the exploitation of the indigenous world should not be excused. as furgal and seguin (2006) noted, “all over the world, including across canada, indigenous and local peoples have noted recent changes in weather patterns and have observed their effects on species’ life cycles, productivity and interrelationships” (p.180). such changes in weather patterns are noticed by indigenous communities, which have also experienced a disproportionate amount of hazardous dumping in or near the communities they live; it is, in other words, environmental racism, “the idea that non-whites are disproportionately exposed to pollution” (pulido, 2000, p. 532). champagne (2015) concurred that during “the 1960s many environmental activists and scholars became aware that a disproportionate amount of waste, poor water and bad air were found in minority and poor communities” (p.100). these environmental hazards have harmed indigenous communities. as wright and white (2012) advised, “the development of oil and gas resources can also lead to economic inequality, inflation, social upheaval, displacement, housing shortages, social tensions, loss of traditional lifestyles, and significant environmental damage” (p. 1). however, indigenous knowledge holds hope and optimism for coping with loss and may even be much needed in the struggle to reduce the severity of climate change. the response of indigenous peoples to the harmful effects of climate change is perhaps the primary display of indigenous people’s connection with the environment. ishaya and abaje (2008) noted that indigenous peoples tend to “interpret and react to climate change impacts in creative ways, drawing on traditional knowledge as well as new technologies to find solutions, which may help society at large to cope with the impending changes” (pp.137-138). although indigenous societies did not contribute much to climate change, they are impacted by it immensely (green & raygorodetsky, 2010; wright & white, 2012). according to green and raygorodetsky (2010), “indigenous people living on their traditional lands bear little responsibility for current and future projected consequences of a changing climate. despite this, they are likely to suffer the most from direct and indirect climate change due to their close connection to the natural world and their reduced social–ecological resilience—consequence of centuries of oppressive policies imposed on them by dominant non-indigenous societies” (p. 239). although indigenous people have been exploited in many parts of the world, they must be credited for adapting to forced changes brought on by colonization and using these adaptations to develop resiliency against harmful and destructive climate change. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 6 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.6 worldview in colonial societies, the west exploited the indigenous world: indigenous people, their lands and resources. however, indigenous knowledge is now receiving significant attention as a result of climate change, and, in this context, they are receiving recognition as stewards of the land (champagne, 2015; ermine, 1995; hansen & antsanen, 2016). yet, even when a peoples’ culture and worldviews are oppressed, there are still other ways of interpreting the world. champagne (2015) noted that the “worldview of indigenous peoples includes relations with plants, animals, and cosmic powers of the universe” (p. 127). such worldviews compel people to respect human and non-human life, including the land, plants, and water. champagne (2015) wrote: “traditional worldviews do not see tribal governments or nations of humans as the central force or beings of the universe, but as beings who share the universe with other powers and nations of human and non-human beings” (p. 127). therefore, indigenous worldviews teach that humans are not above nature. instead, they see themselves (humankind) as a humble part of nature. indigenous languages are significant to indigenous knowledges because they embody crucial understanding of worldviews, cultures, and identities. cajete (1994) has discussed the connection between language and spirituality: language is an expression of the spirit because it contains the power to move people and to express human thought and feeling. it is also the breath along with water and thought that connects all living things in direct relationship. (p.42). in the language of the cree, ininew was the original name for the people, but that name was changed to “cree” by the colonizers. smith (1999) observed that reclaiming language and naming the world in accordance with indigenous languages is important for decolonization. naming “is about retaining as much control over meanings as possible . . . [by naming the world] . . . people name their realities” (p. 30). smith (1999) has discussed the significance of decolonization as it relates to recovering indigenous interpretations of the past and centering indigenous worldviews. she wrote, “part of this exercise is about recovering our own stories of the past . . . centering our concerns and worldviews and then coming to know and understand theory and research from our own perspectives and for our own purposes” (p. 39). ermine (1995) has discussed the cree worldview as a basis for holism; he noted that for the cree, the “fundamental insight was that existence was all connected and that the whole enmeshed the being in its inclusiveness” (p. 103). ermine further explained that negative effects occur when we fail to look at things holistically: “we see the wretchedness and world despair that western science has produced based on this fragmentary worldview” (pp. 102-103). herman (2015) concurs that colonization has functioned to reduce indigenous ways of knowing to caricatures and gross distortions. spiritual ceremonies long considered the main avenues for developing and reinforcing our worldview and passing on our indigenous knowledge systems, were legally banned in canada . . . early colonizers and priests often made a mockery of indigenous ways of knowing and being which led people to begin questioning their own healers and spiritual leaders (michell, 2015, p. 90). however, in terms of reconnecting with traditional teachings, cajete (1994) noted that the idea of “breath—consciously formed and activated through language, thought, prayer, chanting, ritual, dance, 3 hansen and antsanen: indigenous knowledge and environmental stewardship published by scholarship@western, 2018 sport, work, story, play, and art—comprised the parameters of communication in tribal education” (p. 43). we would have to see that indigenous people valued the spiritual power of spoken words in the sense that words can help one heal. an important concept that elders often emphasize is the value of reciprocity. it is important to be reciprocal in our relationships with the land and the natural world. as cajete (1994) advised, “thinking the highest thought means thinking of one’s self, one’s community, and one’s environment richly” (p. 46). thinking the highest thought also includes thinking of the environment because without a healthy environment there cannot be a healthy community. for indigenous people the land is paramount, and this cultural significance is reflected in the notion of indigenous people’s deep-rooted connection to the land (antsanen, 2014; cajete, 1994; champagne, 2015; ermine, 1995; wotherspoon & hansen, 2013). what these cultures have done, however, is to forge through time and ritual a relationship to the earth that is based not only of deep attachment to the land but also on far more subtle intuition—the idea that the land itself is breathed into being by human consciousness. mountain, rivers, and forest are not only perceived as being inanimate, as mere props on a stage upon which the human drama unfolds. for these societies, the land is alive, dynamic force to be embraced and transformed by the human imagination (davis, 2009, pp. 123-124). the old people teach us that the land is alive, and that it is important to respect the land that sustains us. as michell (2005) noted, “it is often said the earth feels the pull of her hair when plants are picked. strict protocols are used to ensure ethical conduct and reforestation of balance” (p. 6). therefore, indigenous environmental stewardship is holistically interrelated with cultural, environmental, and social ways of life. the elders the search for knowledge in the indigenous world necessitates visiting the old people and listening to their words. how were elders selected? the elders were selected due to the development of a relationship between the researcher and the elders that spanned many years. these elders had been instrumental in teaching the researcher valuable lessons about life; in particular, sylvia hansen who is the first teacher and mother of the researcher (john hansen). we wish to express deep thanks to the elders: stella neff, sylvia hansen, john martin, william g. lathlin, dennis thorne, and jack (pseudonym) for participating in this study. since the researcher developed a personal relationship with the elders while living in the north, they were selected to participate in this study. method this study applies qualitative research methods. creswell (1998) instructed that qualitative research is appropriate when the research question asks how (p. 17). in this research, the elders were asked how they see the world. as creswell (1998) goes on to say, in qualitative research, “the researcher builds a complex, holistic picture, analyzes words, reports detailed views of informants, and conducts the study in a natural setting” (p. 15). this study also utilized indigenous research methodologies. as with many other indigenous cultures, the cree have a custom to respect the elders and often turn to them in the 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 6 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.6 search for knowledge (ermine, 1995; hansen, 2013). in this study to ensure the interviews were culturally appropriate and followed indigenous protocols, the elders were offered tobacco, sweetgrass, coffee, and a meal. these offerings acknowledge the elders for sharing their knowledge and is a reflection of the cultural value of reciprocity. data collection and analysis data was collected through open-ended interviewing, field notes, and general observations. the aim of the research was explained to the elders before they were interviewed. the interviews were done at a time and place chosen by the elders, which enabled the elders to express their perspectives and knowledge. the interviews were audio recorded. the researcher (the first author) transcribed the interviews in order to develop a solid understanding of the data. the collected data were analyzed for themes from which we drew conclusions. this study was approved by the research and ethics board at the university of regina. the elders views of the world when asked, “in your view, are there differences in your way of life and the way you see the world as compared to mainstream canada?,” john replied: yes, we know that the way we see ourselves as a native person or an aboriginal person is that there are two laws, the law of nature with the creator and the law of manmade. anything that has to do with nature we know we have to be careful in how we conduct ourselves, how we treat people, anything like that in how we treat it . . . you see in life, in our way, which we are as a person, i am a cree they say, but for me the word cree doesn’t mean anything to me. being inninew, i am a four directions person. that’s what it means, inninew it means four, i have my mind, my body, and also i have a spiritual being, i have feelings. (john) this response by john illustrates the way he perceives himself and understands the world is reflected in the language of the inninew (cree people). the word for a cree person, inninew, connotes much deeper understanding than the anglo term aboriginal. in conceptualizing his cree identity, john defines the term inninew, as “a four directions person.” the language of the omushkegowuk1 people, therefore, provides valuable conceptualizations into our worldview. inninew is, in other words, an interpretation of holism and identity from an indigenous point of view. much like john, stella responded to the opening question in accordance with a worldview difference. she states: 1 the omushkegowuk are known as the swampy cree (omushkegowuk means “people of the muskeg”). they are the section of the cree people who live in swampy areas throughout northern ontario and northern manitoba (along james bay and hudson’s bay). they speak the n-dialect of the cree language and the omushkegowuk people are also called inninew, which means “the people.” the study took place on opaskwayak territory, which is an omushkegowuk, swampy cree community some 600 highway kilometers northwest of winnipeg near the saskatchewan border. 5 hansen and antsanen: indigenous knowledge and environmental stewardship published by scholarship@western, 2018 yes there are definite differences in my way of life especially in my past way of life and the way i look at the place where i lived which was mosakahiken grand rapids very different in the way i was raised because up until my teenage years there was no highway into grand rapids, there was no hydro damn and there was no rcmp and no nursing station. people relied on their own systems for nursing and for justice and also for living because there was only one little store that had the supplies. as soon as manitoba hydro brought in the road they built the beer parlor and brought liquor into the community. and as soon as the beer parlor came in, the police came in, and the nursing station was built and that was the beginning of the sickness of the people in grand rapids and also the destruction of the way of life that the people had. we had no electricity but life was better, we had no plumbing, but life was better, and we had no tv, no radio, but we still, i still say that life was better for us as cree people because we didn’t rely on the stores that we do now and the tv for entertainment and all the other things that manitoba hydro brought into the community . . . i see my world especially grand rapids my land differently. when people think of housing they think this is my house. well i think of all the trapping areas, the sacred areas, all the areas that are sacred to me just like it is part of my house, and i look after it because that’s the way it is supposed to be for us to look after the land because it has sustained us for thousands of years . . . i look at my land at our land differently compared to the people that moved in there and just think about logging and cutting down trees and flooding. they have flooded the rest of the area and now they are coming in and just totally cutting down all the trees and just destroying the land destroying the wildlife and i feel very protective of the land and yet i feel so very helpless. (stella) stella indicates that the land holds sacred purpose and meaning, but that the exploitation of the natural world brings sickness to the people. certain places where the land and wildlife were destroyed are no longer in existence. stella feels very protective of the land, which shows respect for the gifts. for stella, life was better before modernization, and the exploitation of the land is very much connected to emotional attachment. stella states, “i feel so very helpless,” which is indication of indigenous people’s marginalization. however, sylvia’s response to the question is seemingly indirect probably because she interpreted the question in the context of differences in the western education system in the past and the present. sylvia states: well, when i was in the boarding school those schools were so different than compared to the schools now. it was pretty strict but, at the same time the kids were more behaved, there behavior was much better than the ones i see now . . . [pause] . . . but that was the same thing in the day schools, on the reserve they were the same kind, like my father he had a teacher her name was mrs. macmillan, at the big eddy day school. and that teacher would go to church and if she sees that one of the children was not there she would ask them the next day on monday why they were not there in church. that’s how; i guess she was a very strict that way. (sylvia) sylvia’s response demonstrates the ways in which indigenous worldviews were colonized by the church and government run residential schools. sylvia state later that: 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 6 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.6 . . . there used to be lots of old people who would talk to young people and tell them to . . . they used to advise kids about things . . . a lot of the old people at that time used to tell the girls to watch for themselves at that time so that they don’t get in trouble like to go and get pregnant. those people used to tell that to the kids. but that’s the same thing with the boys, they were told to behave. (sylvia) sylvia’s statement reflects the culture of the cree in the sense that the elders’ guided younger people into the realm of knowledge and passed on the values and traditional teachings. similarly, william responded to the question by stating: there are many differences in my language, the food that i eat the preparation of my food and those have an impact on my health right now because i sort of changed my ways. rather than preparing my own food i buy it at the store. in the old way, to me, it was the best way to prepare the food. those kinds of things and also the home life are kind of different too. like before there were harmony and peace and all of that growing up as a child and now there is not that with my kids. i don’t have the communication that’s supposed to be there with my children because i lost that somewhere. and that’s one of the basic teachings of our people is to be able to communicate with yourself and your surroundings and everything in your environment actually. and that i guess is the way of life that is our culture. to me, culture is the way you live it’s not just your language, your music, food and all that, it’s the way you live. and that’s something that has slowly been eroded by what’s been going on in today’s society. the education system and i guess the colonial things that came with it. when they said that our language was no good, and what we did and the way we speak was no good, and the english language was the best. and that’s something that i’ve found to be in conflict with me as a person. (william) william expresses his worldview in which one must show respect for the gift of resources from the environment, particularly the food it provides, and he speaks of environmental stewardship: gather your food, prepare it, know it, and appreciate it. similarly, dennis tell us that environmental stewardship is part of the teachings from the creator: . . . when the creator first put the indigenous people on this earth no matter what nation or what country they were given laws to live by. according to the cree and the first nations in canada they were given a way of life they were given instructions on how to live they were given responsibilities on how to look after the land, the animals, and the water. you may hear some elders say that they were stewards of the land. what they mean is they made an agreement with the animals a long time ago. in the time when they could communicate with the animals they spoke the same language and the animals said that they would give their lives to us to eat if we respected them and looked after them. to give something back, the first hunt the first kill, whether it was animals or fish, the four legged to give something back in order to respect the life that they gave. (dennis) this statement by dennis refers to environmental stewardship: "they were given laws to live by" is a reference to taking care of the land, the animals, and the environment. dennis points out the responsibility to "look after the land, the animals, and the water," and he also illustrates the value of reciprocity. as dennis explains, the animals “give their lives to us to eat if we respected them and looked 7 hansen and antsanen: indigenous knowledge and environmental stewardship published by scholarship@western, 2018 after them.” for dennis, the animal offers itself so that the people can live, and that humans must respect and nurture the gift. dennis states later: today is a big issue about environment. there wasn’t from our thinking that the environment turned out the way it did. it was from another way of looking at life and other worldview that is not ours so today we all have to suffer. and if we take another look at our laws i think we can help them understand that our laws are not based on greed . . . ours is based on good health, help, understanding and happiness. our laws are for those four things only, for the survival of the people, for the survival of medicines, the survival of animals, the winged ones. so these laws are not only to protect the earth, but all humans all life. (dennis) within the context of environmental stewardship, dennis explains that we must continue to respect the gifts of the creator. if we do not respect the gifts, as dennis puts it, "we all have to suffer." therefore, respect for the land is a theme that emerges in their conceptions of worldview. dennis states: natural laws travel in a circle or a cycle. when you put out something it’s gonna come back whether it’s positive or negative. you put out a positive that’s what will come back, you put out a negative that’s what will come back, either to you, your family or intergenerational, the effect will come back. it will keep going unless you restore it to balance and harmony in a good way. we had ceremonies to put an end to a negative cycle whether it was grieving or conflict, whether it was between families, individuals, between communities or between nations. we had a way of restoring balance and harmony and the pipe was used to restore peace and harmony. (dennis) dennis expresses that the cycles and patterns in nature function in harmony with environmental stewardship. you should not exploit the land because it is negative and, by instilling negative relations, it comes back as negative effects, which can be interpreted as harmful climate change as a result of negative human activity that does not respect the gifts. when asked, “is there a connection to the land in terms of peacemaking methods?” john responded: well that's part of it. they say the natural law is how you understand my culture, land, and language. and our young people, having their own minds developing and to develop the mind, we need to know this is the way we have to do it. and we have to use our own ways, our mind that comes from the spirit, the spirit world, the creator, the clans, the four directions, that’s the way we have to develop that understanding. (john) this passage illustrates that john draws a connection between culture and language, and between the mind and the spirit. the connection is holism. such a connection reflects the importance of indigenous spirituality. thus, there is a spiritual connection to the land and harmonizes with environmental stewardship. in her response to the same question, stella explains: when you’re so dependent on the land like we were then the land had to be a part of every decision because that’s what sustained us, so protecting the land and protecting the hunting areas, the trapping areas, and all of the water areas, it had to be above all protected from any damage. so i think that if there was any conflict in these areas it was considered very serious, especially if there was any kind of environmental damage done by the wrongdoer and i am 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 6 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.6 specifically thinking about setting fire or things like that could destroy so much land and sometimes they talk about it where they are just as some people on an island my brother went there for three or four days on an island because he was drinking too much and so my father just dropped them off there. so that was something he could think about for a few days later but he never forgot that experience, he never forgets it because he saw himself there when you start getting hungry and when you start seeing visions and when you start seeing himself he became scared and so that’s one lesson we used to go and see visions. (stella) in stella’s answer, it is interesting to observe the spiritual connection to the land, which is reflected in cree traditional practices that sought the vision quest, which helps us find purpose and meaning in life. thus, the land was used for teaching values for life. in his response to the question, william stresses the connection to the land and feelings of peace. there has to be that connection because if there isn’t, to me, then it’s all hostile. there is no peace, if you go out into the bush by yourself it is so peaceful, and you can hear the bugs on the floor or on the grass and the trees. (william) william’s response emphasizes the importance of the land and as the traditional way of life upon which our society was structured. it appears to me that the elders demonstrate the significance of maintaining a reciprocal relationship with the land. summary of the elders’ worldview in the context of worldview, the elders identified factors that promote indigenous knowledge as well as factors that obstruct indigenous knowledge (table 1). the themes are summarized in table 2. table 1. factors affecting indigenous knowledge by participant participant promote indigenous knowledge obstruct indigenous knowledge stella neff elders teachings, ceremonies, vision quest, connection to the land, stories, counseling from the old people disconnection from the land, residential school experience sylvia hansen elders teachings, spirituality residential school experience john martin language, spirituality, connection to the land, ceremonies, sweat lodge, healing circles, vision quest, the old people, mainstream justice system, exclusion of spirituality in the courts, exclusion of community in the justice process william lathlin elders, connection to the land, language, ceremonies disconnection from the land dennis thorne traditional teachings, ceremonies, sweat lodge erosion or loss of traditional knowledge 9 hansen and antsanen: indigenous knowledge and environmental stewardship published by scholarship@western, 2018 table 2. identifying the themes in the worldview factors that promote indigenous knowledge factors that obstruct indigenous knowledge traditional teachings ceremonies (sweat lodge, vision quests) spiritual connection to the land disconnection from the land residential school experience discussion contextualize the interviews with the elders what does climate change look like from their personal, cultural, and geographic perspective? the elders had a consciousness rooted in traditional knowledge that harmonizes with efforts to challenge harmful climate change. the elders said that the traditional teachings they have experienced or witnessed in their time are primarily concerned with respecting the environment and teaching appropriate conduct in order to promote respect for the natural world. however, the elders expressed that western colonialism had changed relationships in their communities and with the natural world. the elders expressed that colonial education, that is, residential schools, were instrumental in shaping negative perceptions of indigenous identity and culture that weakened the people. the old one’s expressed that restoring indigenous knowledge would play an important role in healing the people from colonialism. the thematic healing factors identified by the participants were, traditional teachings, indigenous knowledge, the value of reciprocity and a spiritual connection to the land. the elders tend to think holistically in terms of their worldviews on environmental stewardship. the notion that indigenous worldviews are holistic is reflected in the elders responses including the need to perpetuate indigenous knowledge. in the problem that concerns us most, that of reducing the severity of climate change, the teachings put forward by the elders are in harmony with indigenous knowledge reflecting the stewards of the land theory. we have discussed some of the cultural reasons why elders remain committed to reproducing indigenous knowledge as valuable teachings for protecting the environment. conclusions this study discussed indigenous knowledge as a model that can teach lessons for environmental stewardship in a cree context. in recent years, there has been an outpouring of research that strongly encourage changing our approach to human activity in order to reduce the severity of climate change. upholding the indigenous stewards of the land theory in the cree context, we have discussed the elders’ worldviews as it relates to the environment, the effects of colonialism, and the importance of indigenous knowledge to the well-being of people and the environment. new stories (or revised forms of old 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 6 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.6 stories) are put forward about the reasons for or significance of traditional indigenous knowledge and there are discussed in relation to environmental stewardship. the cree elders provided teachings that promote respect for the environment. recommendations this study recommends enhancing and supporting indigenous knowledge in the public schools, community colleges, and universities in canada and in other countries around the world. integrating indigenous knowledge into schools will contribute to conscious awareness of the reality that indigenous knowledge supports sustainable development, with the implication that the land is to be protected and preserved for future generations. therefore, it is our hope that integrating indigenous knowledge into schools and teaching the issue of climate change and environmental stewardship in schools will serve to improve environmental practices in canada and other parts of the world. indigenous knowledge needs to be incorporated into training programs related to disaster planning, land-use development, environmental preservation, and strategies for sustainable development. indigenous knowledge holders are dedicated to raising awareness about climate change because without social change harmful climate effects will continue to develop to the detriment of all people throughout the world. 11 hansen and antsanen: indigenous knowledge and environmental stewardship published by scholarship@western, 2018 references adams, h. 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(2012). developing oil and gas resources on or near indigenous lands in canada: an overview of laws, treaties, regulations and agreements. the international indigenous policy journal, 3(2). doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.5 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 6 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.6 the international indigenous policy journal july 2018 what can traditional indigenous knowledge teach us about changing our approach to human activity and environmental stewardship in order to reduce the severity of climate change? john g. hansen rose antsanen recommended citation what can traditional indigenous knowledge teach us about changing our approach to human activity and environmental stewardship in order to reduce the severity of climate change? abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license what can traditional indigenous knowledge teach us about changing our approach to human activity and environmental stewardship in order to reduce the severity of climate change? competing purposes: mother tongue education benefits versus economic interests in rural zimbabwe the international indigenous policy journal volume 8 | issue 1 article 1 january 2017 competing purposes: mother tongue education benefits versus economic interests in rural zimbabwe gamuchirai tsitsi ndamba great zimbabwe university, ndambagt@gmail.com micheal m. van wyk university of south africa, vwykmm@unisa.ac.za josiah c. sithole great zimbabwe university, josiahsithole@yahoo.com recommended citation ndamba, g. t. , van wyk, m. m. , sithole, j. c. (2017). competing purposes: mother tongue education benefits versus economic interests in rural zimbabwe. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(1). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.1 competing purposes: mother tongue education benefits versus economic interests in rural zimbabwe abstract the purpose of this qualitative study was to explore the perceptions of educators on the barriers to the implementation of the zimbabwean language-in-education policy, which recommends use of indigenous languages up to the end of the primary school level. postcolonial theory informed this case study. individual interviews and focus group discussions were conducted with 15 rural primary school teachers, 3 school heads, and 2 school's inspectors who were purposefully selected from masvingo district. data were analysed using the constant comparative method for thematic coding. the findings revealed that participants strongly believed that the english language offers socio-economic opportunities, a factor which may negatively influence teachers in the implementation of the mother tongue-based policy. recommendations that inform policy-makers are made. keywords language-in-education policy, mother tongue education, economic factors, zimbabwe, rural primary schools creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ c o m p e t i n g pu rp o s e s : m o t h e r t o n g u e e d u c a t i o n be n e f i t s v e rs u s e c o n o m i c i n t e re s t s i n r u ra l z i m b a b w e there is overwhelming evidence in favour of the pedagogical benefits of learning in one’s mother language, particularly in africa where the ex-colonial language is hardly spoken outside school premises (alidou, boly, brock-utne, diallo, heugh, & wolff, 2006; bamgbose, 1991, 2009; brock-utne & mercer, 2014; brock-utne & skattum, 2009; desai, 2012; ferguson, 2013; le mottee, 2008; ngefac, 2010; philips, 2011; prah, 2000, 2009). zimbabwe is one of the countries striving to achieve additive bilingualism by using indigenous languages during the primary years of schooling (chimhundu, 2010; magwa, 2008; makoni, 2012). under the education act (1987a), a policy was put in place whereby learners were allowed to access the curriculum in their home language during the first three years of primary school. the policy was amended in 2006 to enable the mother tongue to be the language of education up to the end of primary school (education act, 1987b). section 55 of part x1 (revised 1990 and 1994) of the education act (1987a) stipulated that children in grade 1 up to grade 3 should be taught in the mother tongue in all subjects and that english becomes one of the subjects as indicated below: languages to be taught in schools: part xi general 55. 1. subject to the provisions of this section, the three main languages of zimbabwe, namely, shona, ndebele and english, shall be taught in all primary schools from the first grade as follows: a. shona and english in all areas where the mother tongue of the majority of the residents is shona; or b. ndebele and english in all areas where the mother tongue of the majority of the residents is ndebele. 2. prior to the fourth grade, either of the languages referred to in paragraph (a) or (b) of subsection (1) may be used as the medium of instruction, depending on which language is more commonly spoken and better understood by the pupils. 3. from the fourth grade, english shall be the medium of instruction: provided that shona or ndebele shall be taught as subjects on an equal-time-allocation basis as the english language. 4. in areas where minority languages exist, the minister may authorise the teaching of such languages in primary schools in addition to those specified in subsections (1), (2) and (3). the policy was amended again in 2006, whereby teaching in the mother tongue was extended up to grade 7 as illustrated by the amended policy quoted below: the education act (1987b, chapter 25: 04) as amended, 2006 part xii section 62 languages to be taught in schools 1 ndamba et al.: competing purposes published by scholarship@western, 2017 1. subject to this section, all the three languages of zimbabwe, namely shona, ndebele, and english, shall be taught on an equal-time basis in all schools up to form 2 level1 (former group a schools2 included). 2. in areas where indigenous languages other than those mentioned in sub-section (1) are spoken, the minister may authorise the teaching of such languages in schools in addition to those specified in sub-section (1). 3. the minister may authorize the teaching of foreign languages in schools. 4. prior to form one, any one of the languages referred to in subsection (1) and (2) may be used as the medium of instruction, depending upon which language is more commonly spoken and better understood by the pupils. 5. sign language shall be the priority medium of instruction for the deaf and hard of hearing. the position taken by the zimbabwe government can be applauded in that the language-in-education policy (hereafter to be referred to as the liep) allows students to learn in their mother tongue up to grade 7 and, at the same time, it recognizes the crucial role played by english as the language of international communication. however, this position may not be appreciated by stakeholders in education, who want their children to focus on the school language from the beginning, as education is equated with thorough knowledge and proficient use of english (peresuh & masuku, 2002). this study was motivated by the desire to understand why the liep, which is meant for the benefit of particularly rural primary school pupils through learning in their mother tongue, continues to be disregarded. the findings of this study are part of a larger research on barriers to the implementation of the liep for zimbabwe (ndamba, 2013). l i t e ra t u re r e v i e w t h e a d v a n t a g e s o f l e a rn i n g t h ro u g h i n d i g e n o u s l a n g u a g e s baker (2006) noted that, as early as 1953, a united nations educational, scientific, and cultural organization (unesco) report, entitled the use of vernacular languages in education, stated that pupils should begin their schooling through the medium of the mother tongue because they understand it best (p. 293). unesco still maintains its position on the significance of the mother tongue and has further developed its stance to consider mother tongue instruction as a means of improving the quality of education by tapping into the existing knowledge base of both teachers and learners (brock-utne & mercer, 2014; le mottee, 2008). citing the united nations (un, 2013) report on the post-2015 development agenda, brock-utne and mercer (2014) further noted that the need to bring about “access 1 in the zimbabwean education system, form 2 is a post-primary level, which is attained after 2 years of secondary 2 these are schools that during the colonial period catered to white students, as distinct from group b schools, which catered to african students. these schools were better resourced than the latter. after independence, they opened up to african students to reflect the spirit of the new political dispensation of equality and nondiscrimination. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.1 for everyone to quality education” might not be achieved in africa where learners continue to learn through foreign languages, which they do not understand (p. 789). the intrinsic value of local languages and cultures is now being appreciated globally for the purposes of education in particular and national development in general (ball & mcivor, 2013; brock-utne, 2010; brock-utne & skattum, 2009; ferguson, 2013). the mother tongue plays a crucial role in creating the capacity for children to access and create knowledge. prah precisely summed up the benefits of learning in the mother language by saying that “the value of mother tongue instruction is literally incontestable” (cited in makoni, makoni, & rosenberg, 2010, p. 2). whereas research has demonstrated that learning in the first language allows learners to access the curriculum with ease, those who use a foreign language are presented with multiple tasks, which disadvantage them in making school progress. such tasks include trying to understand higher-level vocabulary, the abstract concepts being taught, and the unfamiliar language through which they are presented (ademowo, 2010; alidou et al., 2006; bamgbose, 2009; benson & kosonen, 2013; matsinhe, 2013; mutasa, 2006; ssentanda, 2013; unesco, 2008). webb (cited in orman, 2008) aptly summarised the significance of language in cognitive development by arguing: cognitive skills, such as the ability to understand the central purpose of the text or to summarise its main line of argument, the ability to select information and to organise it into a new coherent whole, the ability to discover and formulate generalisations, the ability to understand abstract concepts and to manipulate them in arguments, the ability to recognise relations between events (e.g. cause and effect) and so on can only develop in and through a language in which learners are highly proficient. generally, such a language is the learner’s first (or primary) language. (p. 96) the majority of people who live in rural areas in zimbabwe have a scant understanding of english because social relations and regular communication are largely carried out through the use of the mother tongue. the implementation of a mother tongue liep would be of great benefit to learners in rural primary schools in zimbabwe since they may lack the requisite proficiency in the second language to enable them to tackle analytical skills required in the learning discourse. despite the advantages of mother tongue education, some stakeholders in education, particularly most african parents, believe in uninformed language myths that assert that the best way to learn a foreign language is to have it as a language of instruction (dalvit, murray & terzoli, 2009). for example, brockutne (cited in yohannes, 2009) asserted that it is a misconception to assume that learning in english is helpful in learning to speak, read, and write english better. the same view was further pursued by benson (2005), who also affirmed that there is no evidence that the second language must be used as the medium of instruction in order for it to be learnt well: in countries like sweden, learners achieve high levels of competence in the second language when it is taught as a subject and the first language is preserved as the language of instruction. in light of the above stated evidence, black parents in excolonial countries in africa, therefore, wrongly argue that their children being taught in their second language is the only way through which they can master english effectively (baker, 2006; brock-utne, 2010; orman, 2008). thus, simply exposing learners to a second language by using it in instruction does not necessarily assist learners to acquire the second language. 3 ndamba et al.: competing purposes published by scholarship@western, 2017 t h e i n t e rn a t i o n a l s t a t u s o f e n g l i s h barriers to implementation of a mother tongue policy in africa were viewed by kamwangamalu (2004) in terms of socio-economic power and the international status of english. this notion was supported by coetzee-van rooy (2009) who observed that english was gaining an even more significant role as an international language. as a result, kamwangamalu (2004) noted that black parents and pupils were aware of the social, economic, and political power of english and perceived that their own languages had no economic benefits either locally or internationally. the great attachment to english experienced by africans from countries with a colonial history appears to come from a purely instrumental motivation (blommaert, 2006; hornberger, 2002; orman, 2008; lo bianco cited in ridge, 2004). consequently, prinsloo (2011) proclaimed that “english is indeed the elephant in the room” (p. 5), implying that english is the most preferred language because it plays a major role in and offers hope for upward social mobility. citing opinions viewed as representing those of the majority of ordinary black africans in south africa, moodley (2000) gave this telling example: “the reason people like me choose english is very simple. there is an entire world of knowledge, skills, jobs, power and influence which is totally closed to us if we can only speak an indigenous language” (p. 111). the sentiments expressed in this quotation have direct relevance to this study—rural primary school teachers in zimbabwe may experience such sentiments in their day-to-day interaction with stakeholders in education. for blommaert (2006), language preferences that favour english should be viewed as being motivated by “international mobility, the desire to ‘get out of here’ and into a better, more prosperous environment” (p. 10). nkomo (2008) supported this observation by arguing that, in the case of zimbabwe, indigenous languages are considered to have less capacity in dealing with issues of economic development, international trade, science, and technology. with this background on language choices in mind, in the context of this study, it can be argued that rural primary school teachers may be aware of and may believe in the instrumental value of english—a factor which may hinder them from effectively implementing a mother tongue policy. in the same context, prinsloo (2011) demonstrated that speakers of african languages face a dilemma in the sense that an ex-colonial language is viewed as a “supra language” of status (p. 2), hence to insist on equality between and among african and ex-colonial languages does not change the fact that there are linguistic hierarchies that operate in african countries. the question of language policy cannot be determined purely on pedagogical grounds because it is influenced by factors such as historical, political, economic, and cultural issues (mwamwenda, 2004; prinsloo, 2011). such effects of colonialism are evident in the way the images of indigenous african languages are threatened by the high status and dominance of english, a situation that needs to be addressed in order for local languages to be effectively used in education (mustapha, 2011; makoni cited in pennycook, 2002; ssentanda, 2013). according to kamwangamalu (2009), due to the instrumental value and status of ex-colonial languages, they are widely held in high esteem in africa. t h e m a rke t i n g pro b l e m another source of language attitudes is what kamwangamalu (2004, 2009) referred to as the marketing problem, whereby it is felt that for african languages to be accepted as languages of teaching and learning they need to be given “buying power.” this implies that indigenous african languages need to become languages that empower individuals to access resources and employment, political participation, 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.1 and upward social mobility (webb cited in kamwangamalu, 2004; matsinhe, 2013). since indigenous african languages lack that power, orman (2008) asserted that in south africa the position of african languages within the education sector remains very weak, while english is becoming more and more dominant. this point was demonstrated by findings from a study conducted by chick and mckay (cited in hornberger, 2002) where principals and teachers in six newly integrated schools in durban in kwazulu-natal province rejected the use of zulu in classes, citing the fact that students needed to improve their english and that english is required for economic advancement. in another study conducted by mashiya (2011) in kwazulu-natal, mentor teachers and school principals did not want student teachers to practise bilingual education skills by teaching in isizulu at the foundation phase (grade r-23) as a way of practising skills learnt at university. the main reason given was that the schools would produce incompetent learners who would fail to secure good jobs. according to orman (2008), although the constitution is committed to mother tongue usage in learning, this position does not reflect the language attitudes of many south africans who insist on english as the medium for education, even in the earliest stages of primary education. for orman, the reason why african communities prefer english to indigenous languages is that, like consumers, they are interested in comparing the material benefits of an education in an indigenous african language with the excolonial language. kamwangamalu (2009) declared, “a language policy that does not have economic benefits is doomed to fail” (p. 139). applied to this study, the attitudes that educators have about english may also be commensurate with the functions that the language is perceived to be performing in zimbabwe. the marketing value of english, as opposed to african languages, which are associated with nonachievement, led grin (cited in kamwangamalu, 2004) to ask the following questions: for instance, would an education through the medium of an indigenous african language ensure the language consumer socio-economic self-advancement? would that education enhance the language consumer’s standard of living? would it give the language consumer a competitive edge in the employment market? or, put differently, what benefits would individuals actually reap, particularly on the labour market, because of their skills in the mother tongue? (p. 40) it can be argued that the above questions are likely to be asked by language consumers in the zimbabwean context, where the liep encourages the use of the mother tongue up to the end of the primary school. as such, questions like these demonstrate the perceived decreased value of african languages on the linguistic scale (blommaert, 2006). kamwangamalu (2004) asserted that the most central question is not so much whether or not the mother tongue should be used as the medium of instruction, but rather on the pay-off of mother tongue education. the reason for favouring english is because african languages do not offer access to socio-economic benefits such as jobs, power, wealth, and technological and scientific development (alidou et al., 2006; banda, 2000; kamwangamalu, 2009; simango, 2009). mustapha (2011) demonstrated the above assertion by noting that in the context of nigeria any attempt by school administrators to use indigenous 3 in the south african context, grade r to grade 2 belongs to the foundation phase, with grade r being a preparation year for grade 1. during this phase, the focus is primarily on mother tongue instruction. 5 ndamba et al.: competing purposes published by scholarship@western, 2017 languages in education incurs the wrath of parents and guardians who may, in reaction, withdraw their children from such schools and send them where english is used as the medium of instruction. alexander (2004) further affirmed that for people to have positive attitudes, it is essential to assign an economic value to the mother tongue in the linguistic market place, in the short to medium term. in zimbabwe, english language skills are regarded as one of the crucial factors contributing to global mobility. according to hungwe (2007), the demand for english appears to be “an essentially rational choice outcome” (p. 146). in order to enrol in tertiary institutions in zimbabwe, learners have to obtain a pass in english language at “o” level4 (makoni, dube & mashiri, 2006). dominguez (1998) entertained the notion of the economic value of language by declaring that, at a personal level, access to or promotion in certain jobs requires a language qualification, which means language has very tangible economic benefits. the findings of this study were based on primary data from teachers, school heads, and school’s inspectors who happen to be the custodians of the policy on the language of education. a number of african countries have policies that allow learners to learn in their mother tongue in primary education (alidou et al., 2006; chimhundu, 2010; mtenje, 2008; mutasa, 2006). however, a review of literature on the implementation of the liep indicates that most researchers focus on challenges that learners face when learning through a foreign language (brock-utne, 2007; brock-utne & skattum, 2009; desai, 2012). few studies, if any, have been conducted in zimbabwe specifically to examine why rural primary school teachers do not implement the policy on the language of education. this study was thus guided by the following research question: “what perceptions are held by rural primary teachers, school heads and school’s inspectors towards the mother tongue-based liep?” m e t h o d o l o g y the major purpose of this case study was to identify barriers to the implementation of the mother tongue-based liep in rural primary schools in masvingo district. the qualitative research methodology was used since it derives meaning from the perspectives of research participants (creswell, 2007; de vos, strydom, fouche, & delport, 2011). in order to explain why the mother tongue policy was being violated in zimbabwe, a former colony, our study was guided by the paradigm of postcolonial theory (chilisa, 2012; phillips, 2011; ratele, 2006; rivas, 2005; rizvi, lingard & lavia, 2006; viruru, 2005). the postcolonial theory paradigm is a relatively new perspective, particularly in the education context in zimbabwe. shohat (cited in mfum-mensah, 2005) regarded “postcoloniality” as a new designation for critical practice of enquiry that analyses issues emerging from “colonial relationships and their aftermath, covering a long historical span (including the present)” (p. 74). ashcroft, griffiths, and tiffin (1998) stated that the term “postcolonialism” is now used to mean the political, linguistic, and cultural experiences of those societies that were formally colonized (p. 186). in this study, we focus specifically on the postcolonial linguistic experience. hence, with reference to ghana and other african countries, mfum-mensah (2005) argued that the issue of the language policy continues to attract attention in postcolonial education reforms in many formerly colonised nations and yet little attention has been paid 4 a post-primary qualification reached after 4 years of secondary education in zimbabwe. it was inherited from the colonial system run by cambridge university but is now administered by a local examinations body. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.1 to the discussion about how colonial education contributed to the shaping of the ideology of the colonised. in light of the above observation, the postcolonial theory paradigm was considered appropriate for this study, which assumes that rural primary school learners are disadvantaged by the failure of teachers to teach in the mother tongue in line with the requirements of the language-ineducation policy of 2006. this policy is premised on additive bilingual education in a postcolonial context. it was vital to ascertain what teachers, school heads, and school’s inspectors perceive as factors militating against the effective implementation of the liep. purposive sampling was used to select participants who had the right information for the study (cohen, manion, & morrison, 2011). fifteen rural primary school teachers, three school heads, and two school’s inspectors were selected. in-depth, semi-structured interviews were used as means of gathering data on the experiences of participants as follows: individual interviews for school heads and school’s inspectors while focus group discussions were conducted with primary school teachers. a digital voice recorder was used to record proceedings of each individual interview and focus group discussions. recorded tapes were transcribed verbatim upon completion of the fieldwork. analysis of data was done using the constant comparative method for thematic coding. according to gray (2009), for most qualitative approaches, reliability is improved and even guaranteed by triangulation, where information is gathered, for example, from multiple sources or by using multiple tools for gathering the data. accordingly, in order to provide multiple perspectives on various aspects of the same situation in relation to this study, data were collected from rural primary school teachers, school heads, and school’s inspectors as a way of achieving triangulation of data sources. by collecting the perspectives and experiences as articulated by people from these different personnel categories, who occupy different positions in the field of education, we are able to focus on the same issue, implementation challenges related to the liep in rural primary schools, from various angles. in addition to triangulation of data sources, methodological triangulation was also employed to enhance the credibility of the study by including individual interviews with school heads (principals) and school’s inspectors, as well as three focus group discussions with teachers. similar questions were raised in both sets of interviews in order to find out how the participants would respond to these questions. the research was a case study on policy implementation challenges; hence, it was an example of a complex phenomenon that deserved the use of triangulation (cohen et al., 2011). by using triangulation of data sources, as well as methodological triangulation, the researchers had more confidence in the research results. participation was voluntary and the selected participants were assured of their anonymity. each participant was asked to sign a consent form after the researcher explained the specifics of the study. in this research, written permission to conduct the study was granted by the ministry of education, through the provincial education director for masvingo. 7 ndamba et al.: competing purposes published by scholarship@western, 2017 f i n d i n g s m o t h e r t o n g u e e d u c a t i o n be n e f i t s in acknowledging the benefits of learning through the mother tongue as opposed to using english second language as the medium of instruction, the following statements from teachers at each of the three schools are representative of the views of the majority of teachers: the recipients find it very difficult to comprehend english as the medium of instruction. perhaps it’s because of the rural environment where they come from. very little english is spoken at home. (teacher 2, school 1) they will not understand what you want to say to them. they will just stare and look at you until you appear to be stupid then you have to come back again in order for you to be in line with them, that is when you need to speak in shona. (teacher 4, school 2) most of the time you tend to be just talking to yourself and pupils do not enjoy when they do not understand. they feel bored and some may even play truant because they are afraid of this language, the l25, yes. (teacher 2, school 3) thus, it is clear from the above excerpts that learners struggle to understand concepts taught in a foreign language whereas they may improve their performance and maximize their learning when the curriculum is accessed through the mother tongue. english was highly favoured by participants in this study due to economic interests, a factor that may contribute to neglect in the implementation of liep. five categories were identified to support their preference and these are: a. english is an international language of communication; b. it is the language of examinations; c. it creates employment opportunities: d. parents expect teachers to use english from the beginning; and e. learners prefer to learn in the english language. e n g l i s h a s a n i n t e rn a t i o n a l l a n g u a g e o f c o m m u n i c a t i o n almost all of the 15 teacher participants indicated that, if they were given a choice, they would opt for english as the only language of education for various reasons, chief among them being that english was viewed as the language of communication both locally and internationally. this finding is illustrated in the following responses from each of the three schools, which are typical of most responses from teacher participants: 5 it is a second, foreign language a person knows or is learning in addition to their native language (l1). 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.1 the pupils will be able to read any information exposed to them. the pupils will also be able to communicate with people from anywhere in the world. in fact the pupils will fit well in the global community. (teacher 3, school 1) english is a language on demand. it enables young and old to be on the net developing skills and knowledge. the era we were brought up encourages us to know much about the world due to english. (teacher 1, school 2) english is the best to use. limiting the pupils to shona will hinder them from keeping in touch with information on health and other important information internationally. (teacher 4, school 3) similarly, one of the three school heads had this to say: our school would prefer to use english as a medium of instruction. the reason is that u-m-m we will make our pupils fit in the society well because this language is an international language so children will end up in america and britain, where ever. (head, school 3) one of the teacher participants who preferred mother tongue use had this to say: i would prefer vernacular language particularly if all the people in that country share one vernacular language. pupils understand instructions in vernacular language more easily than they do with a second language. (teacher 4, school 1) t h e r o l e o f e n g l i s h a s t h e l a n g u a g e o f e x a m i n a t i o n s participants in this study viewed english as a superior language because they believe that it enables learners to answer examination questions. all the participants raised the issue of examinations as one of the major reasons why educators preferred english as the language of education. english hegemony in zimbabwe was evident in that examinations for all primary school subjects except for indigenous languages were written in english. as a result, the teachers who were study informants strongly felt that they were justified to favour english because: most of the teaching business in schools is exam oriented, so teachers’ concerns have to do with preparing a child who passes at the end of the course. anything that exists out of the limits of the exams is not worth committing oneself. (teacher 3, school 1) if assessment is going to be done in english then it holds no value [laughter] because the pupils will even find it more difficult in converting what i will have said in shona and change it to english in an exam, it will be difficult. (teacher 2, school 2) the problem is that in future, you see, the exam is set in english and english is the current official language so it does not make sense later when the exam is in english. (teacher 5, school 3) the above sentiments were corroborated by one of the school’s inspectors who declared that: 9 ndamba et al.: competing purposes published by scholarship@western, 2017 as for the use of the mother tongue as the sole language of education up to grade 7, i totally disagree with that because right now when it is not being fully implemented we are seeing the effects. children don’t master concepts, they cannot express themselves and it will be worse when it comes to exams. they will not be able to attack questions; they will not be able to express or to answer questions meaningfully because their level of understanding will be very low. (school’s inspector 2) therefore, participants were of the opinion that as long as tests and examinations were set and written in english, it was illogical to teach in the mother language and then examine candidates in english as learners would not have grasped the requisite vocabulary to enable them to tackle examination questions at the end of grade 7. e m p l o y m e n t o p p o rt u n i t i e s most of the participants claimed that the major reason for them choosing english as the language of education was that it had an advantage over the mother language—it was currently a requirement for one to be formally employed and to enter institutions of higher learning. this kind of thinking was expressed in the statements below: the advantage is that the popular language is currently the official one. it enables you entry into white-collar jobs you see, without that you don’t get there as of now. (teacher 1, school 1) the major advantage is that u-m-m when pupils leave school they want to be employed formally; they want to go to universities and colleges. they can’t go to those important places of their lives without having passed the english language, so they need to exercise speaking it and they need to pass it and need to know it fully in depth because they will need it in future for their careers. (head, school 2) teachers want to be promoted, they want to advance. one cannot enter the university, now there are so many universities which have mushroomed in this country. (school’s inspector 2) the other school’s inspector was of the opinion that the government contradicted itself by changing goal posts, thereby causing confusion with regard to teachers’ confidence in the mother tongue as the language of education. this view was expressed by one of the school’s inspectors as follows: the same teachers who were allowed to enter tertiary (teachers’ colleges) without english, they were asked now to obtain english language on their certificates and very old women and men found themselves now attending lessons in the afternoon at the nearby central schools in the rural areas so that they can write and so that they can have the english language as a subject, as a requirement, because for now you cannot be promoted. (school’s inspector 1) all the three categories of participants in this study, namely, teachers, school heads, and school’s inspectors claimed that english had to be maintained as the language of education in primary schools because of its superior role as the language of communication internationally, for examination purposes, for subsequent access to tertiary institutions, as well as for the acquisition of good jobs later on in life. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.1 pa re n t s ’ pe rc e i v e d be l i e f s o n t h e r o l e o f e n g l i s h teachers, school heads, and school’s inspectors expressed how parental opinions might negatively influence the implementation of the liep in rural primary schools in zimbabwe. all the participants in this study were of the view that parents had a high regard for english, as they believed that it would assist their offspring in getting good jobs. the following statements represent this kind of thinking from many of the participants’ responses: the parents are aware of the importance of english. i think it will be a problem for them to hear that teachers are now teaching every subject in shona [laughter]. they will come and have a battle with us here and say, what are you doing here? (teacher 5, school 1) most jobs require someone to have english, so they know that if the child is developed at primary level, he or she will be able to obtain english at “o” level and it will be easy for the child to be enrolled in white collar jobs. (teacher 2, school 2) right, i don’t think they are going to appreciate it (policy) because they feel that language may be inferior you see, that inferiority complex that we have as shona people [---]. i feel they need that english language to be used for teaching so that pupils can fit in the society well. (head, school 3) but the war with parents, i doubt if we will win the war with parents [---]. the problem is that when now the parents will compare their children they will say ah! no, in the rural areas there is no education because pupils are doing everything in shona, while these ones in town do it in english. teachers in rural areas are getting government money for nothing because our children cannot talk in english. (school’s inspector 1) the above responses from the teachers, school heads, and school’s inspectors demonstrated their assertion that parents held conservative views whereby the mother language was looked down upon and english was perceived as profitable. l e a rn e rs ’ pe rc e i v e d r e a c t i o n s the expected reactions from learners, who are the direct beneficiaries of the intended liep, were sought from teachers and school heads. some of the responses were as follows: they may have a negative attitude towards the teacher, thinking that he or she cannot use english. they won’t be eager to learn. (teacher 5, school 2) we mean that children mainly like english so if shona is used continuously you would see that children, the learners, will get bored [laughter]. (teacher 3, school 3) i don’t think they would appreciate it, i don’t think they would take it up as a good policy as such […]. they have a negative attitude towards their own language, yes, they don’t feel it is a good language because once you learn in english you can communicate with someone in america in which everyone wants to go there and talk with those white people, you see. (head, school 3) 11 ndamba et al.: competing purposes published by scholarship@western, 2017 one of the school heads expressed a directly opposite view pertaining to what he perceived to be the reaction of learners if the mother tongue policy was implemented. his response was: as far as the learners, from my experience as a head, when i supervise, you find the learners feel more at home when the teacher teaches them in shona. in english there is a bit of a problem there, so they will actually accept it hundred percent. (head, school 1) one teacher participant who felt that learners would welcome such a policy had this to say: i think they will enjoy it since it enhances better comprehension of concepts. english is a barrier to their understanding since it is a second language. (teacher 1, school 2) results indicated that the majority of participants in this study preferred english as the language of education, contrary to the recommendation of the current liep of 2006. d i s c u s s i o n o f f i n d i n g s in this study, teachers admitted that there was little comprehension of lessons taught in the second language because learners did not understand concepts that were presented in english. as a result, the learners’ second language could not be counted as a tool for learning (desai, 2012). since the results show that learners’ understanding was limited when the second language was used, it can be argued that, as a result, learners lacked the necessary confidence to engage in discussion, debate, or to be involved in problem-solving activities using english (orman, 2008). in a study conducted in south africa, holmarsdottir (2003) found that when a foreign language was used learners learnt through memorization and could hardly answer questions that required explanation until the teachers reverted to the mother language. valdes (cited in baker, 2006) also established that learners who were not conversant in english as a second language found it impossible to question, apply critical thinking, and collaborate, although they had the ability to complete these tasks when using their first language. the superiority of english as an international language was a prominent theme in responses: it is the language of examinations, further education, future employment, and promotion to posts of responsibility. as a result of beliefs and positive attitudes associated with the english language, it was difficult for teachers, school heads, and school’s inspectors to embrace a liep that recommends mother tongue use in education. therefore, when teachers strongly believe in english hegemony and do not see a compelling reason for policy change, they may ignore or resist the mother tongue policy in education (collarbone, 2009; rogan & grayson, 2003). owing to its perceived superiority, the central issue raised by participants in this study was that english played a significant role as an international language, as learners expected that they would get good jobs in the international community upon completion of their studies. learners in this study were alleged to have fallen in love with english from an early stage. it can be argued, since teachers in this study were aware of the learners’ language choices, that factor could contribute towards implementation failure pertaining to the current liep. the same findings were established in south africa, where black african 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.1 and coloured6 students indicated that they preferred to learn in english for the purpose of international “mobility” (moodley, 2000; prinsloo, 2011). however, despite their assumed high hopes for becoming a part of the international community, relatively few would enter the mainly white-collar jobs for which english is useful (matsinhe, 2013). learners in the current study were likely to get sub-standard varieties of english (blommaert, 2006) since, as makoni et al. (2006) reported, some zimbabwean primary school teachers in their study were found not to be competent enough to teach in english. in describing the positive attitudes towards european languages, adegbija (1994) asserted that such attitudes were created when those with the knowledge of english were promoted to higher positions, which were instrumental to their gaining material rewards. likewise, findings of this study indicated that qualified teachers who did not have english language at “o” level could neither be promoted to headship positions nor enter tertiary institutions for professional development. the result is that participants have come to strongly believe that the english language is superior because it is the only language that is used in higher education and other positions of power. speakers of african languages are said to be facing a dilemma in the sense that an ex-colonial language is viewed as a language of status (mwamwenda, 2004; owino, 2002; prinsloo, 2011). in uganda, ssentanda (2013) reported that mother tongue education is influenced by colonial legacies, which in turn affect stakeholders such as teachers and parents. according to ferguson (2013), english is seen as “a potential path out of poverty” (p. 18). similarly, teachers in this study appeared to face the same dilemma because they considered english to be a prestigious language that learners cannot do without because it is difficult, if not impossible, for them to be successful in life without a working knowledge of english. thus, colonial effects were evident in the study findings as teachers, school heads, and school’s inspectors all wanted to be associated with english because of its history as the language of education and employment, whereas indigenous languages have been too long underrated as result of colonialism (ball & mcivor, 2013; kamwangamalu, 2004, 2009; magwa, 2008; mustapha, 2011; orman, 2008; ssentanda, 2013). the marketing problem facing the mother language, therefore, may be considered as a factor that contributed towards implementation failure of the current liep. study findings indicated that all the three categories of informants had positive attitudes towards english, whose perceived functions were seen as superior for socio-economic benefits. this finding was similar to the major concern raised by african communities pertaining to the extent to which learning in the mother tongue would benefit individuals in terms of accessing resources and employment as well as global mobility (kamwangamalu, 2004). adegbija (1994) further illustrated the perceived role of ex-colonial languages by arguing that european languages are positively evaluated because of “what they can give, what they stand for, where they can take you to, and what they can make you become in life” (p. 46). with reference to canada, ball and mcivor (2013) stated that among the factors that threaten the use of indigenous languages in education is that in some cases there is lack of support from the indigenous people themselves because of the global expansion of english. 6 in southern africa, “coloureds” is the name given to an ethnic group composed primarily of persons of mixed race. 13 ndamba et al.: competing purposes published by scholarship@western, 2017 in south africa, mashiya (2011) found that, during the foundation phase, teachers did not want to teach in the mother language because that would “prevent children from getting good jobs and from travelling and working abroad” (p. 25). consequently, by teaching in english, teachers were convinced that they were creating better opportunities for children since english was viewed as the language of power. likewise, teachers in this study saw no relevance in the liep of 2006, which they viewed as being of no market value since it calls on mother tongue use in education (nkomo, 2008). for this study, it was vital to gain insight from participants about the attitudes of parents and learners in order to establish the extent to which these beliefs may actually impact teachers’ practices. parents in this study, who are the major stakeholders in education, were alleged to have high hopes for their offspring. the research informants assumed that parents and guardians would not accept the mother tongue policy, a finding that was corroborated in nigeria (mustapha, 2011). a possible explanation is that the negative attitudes towards the mother tongue may emanate from uninformed language myths, which research has found to be more false than true (dalvit et al., 2009). nkomo (2008) reported that, in zimbabwe, indigenous languages were viewed as less capable of adequately dealing with economic development, international trade, and science and technology issues. in a related study, ndamba (2014) conducted research whose findings indicated that zimbabwean parents believed in language myths that favoured an english-only policy from grade 1, while indigenous languages were denigrated. african parents, therefore, may wrongly assume that the language of education ought to be the second language in order for their children to learn it well (brock-utne, 2010; brock-utne & mercer, 2014). foley (2008) declared, “if learners and their parents do not desire mother tongue instruction, then all the effort in the world will not make the policy viable” (pp. 9-10). it can be argued that when teachers are aware of parents and pupils’ expectations on the instrumental role of english, they may find it difficult to implement a policy that recommends the use of indigenous languages in primary schools (benson, 2005; brock-utne & skattum, 2009; makoni et al., 2006; ndamba, 2008, 2014; orman, 2008; peresuh & masuku, 2002; setati, 2005; unesco bangkok, 2008). in order for parents and their children to appreciate the use of indigenous african languages in education, it may be necessary to enlighten african communities on the role of mother tongue education in learning, which leads to clear benefits by empowering people economically, socially, and academically (ferguson, 2013; foley, 2008; qorro, 2009; ssentanda, 2013). if parents and learners in rural areas in zimbabwe believe that quality education comes from learning in english, zimbabwean primary school teachers may resist the mother tongue policy in a bid to please these stakeholders. with regards to the superior status of english, it is assumed in the literature that africans from countries with a colonial history look up to the ex-colonial language for social, economic, and political power and prestige. african languages are thus viewed as being of no “market” value (kamwangamalu, 2004, 2009; matsinhe, 2013) for the reason that they do not empower individuals to access high paying jobs, power, wealth, and further academic opportunities. hence, the positive attitudes towards english, which appear to be driven by the instrumental value of this language, tend to contribute as a barrier towards implementation of a mother tongue policy in education (coetzee-van rooy, 2009; foley, 2008; hungwe, 2007; makoni et al., 2006; prinsloo, 2011; ridge, 2004). 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.1 c o n c l u s i o n it can be concluded that the benefits of a language can be measured in economic terms. participants in this study believed in the superior role of english in terms of socio-economic interests at the expense of mother tongue education benefits. participants in this study saw english as mainly being capable of creating opportunities for further education and a profitable future, whereby those who learn in english could join the ranks of global elites. such a finding clearly demonstrated that the challenges that appear to be hurdles with regard to mother tongue education in zimbabwe may be a response to the colonial language legacy; thereby, making it almost impossible for teachers, school heads, and school’s inspectors to accept and implement the current mother tongue liep. r e c o m m e n d a t i o n s it is only when they become aware of the didactic benefits associated with education in the mother language that education authorities would then be able to support and monitor the mother tongue policy more seriously (ball & mcivor, 2013). therefore, in order for the current liep for zimbabwe to be successfully implemented, school’s inspectors, school heads, and primary school teachers may need to be educated accordingly through in-service programmes which can be offered by the ministry of education and teacher education institutions. use of the mother language in education was also shunned because it was not considered of value since grade 7 examinations were written in english, and english was also demanded as a requirement for entry into tertiary institutions, and into the future world of employment. for the status of the mother language to be raised, firstly, grade 7 examinations should be set and written in the mother language. secondly, an african language should be supported by an economic advantage such as making it a requirement for entry into tertiary institutions along with english and other subjects so that stakeholders may view it as an instrument for upward social mobility. it would be paramount to inform parents about the current international research findings on the pedagogical benefits of learning in the mother language (qorro, 2009; ssentanda, 2013). this sensitization exercise should be deliberately conducted as an advocacy measure meant to popularize the liep. the dissemination of knowledge on the significant role of the mother language could be done by school’s inspectors and school heads who are currently working with parents through the school development committees. when the parents and the entire community are convinced about the value of teaching and learning in the first language at primary school level, they can make informed decisions pertaining to the choice of language for the education of their children. therefore, before the government enforces the use of the mother language in line with the requirements of the current zimbabwean liep, it is prudent that they hold awareness campaigns for the benefit of parents and learners, in order to avoid conflict between the school and societal expectations. if parents are enlightened on the academic role played by the mother tongue, they may not resist the policy change in cases where universities may want to conduct experiments pertaining to teaching and learning in the first language in rural primary schools. l i m i t a t i o n s o f t h e s t u d y our study may be useful as a source of literature on economic factors that contribute towards implementation failure with regards to the mother tongue policy in zimbabwean rural primary schools. however, there are some limitations that may be considered when future studies are conducted. the 15 ndamba et al.: competing purposes published by scholarship@western, 2017 findings of this study were based on views given by rural primary school teachers, school heads, and school’s inspectors pertaining to the attitudes of parents and learners. as parents and pupils are crucial stakeholders in the language of education, getting data directly from them would have been an ideal situation in obtaining more in-depth information. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.1 r e f e re n c e s adegbija, e. 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(2005). postcolonial analysis of educational research discourse: creating (mexican) american children as the “other” (unpublished doctoral dissertation). texas a & m university, college station, texas. 21 ndamba et al.: competing purposes published by scholarship@western, 2017 rizvi, f., lingard, b., & lavia, j. (2006). postcolonialism and education: negotiating a contested terrain. pedagogy, culture and society, 14(3), 249-262. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/14681360600891852 rogan, j. m., & grayson, d. j. (2003). towards a theory of curriculum implementation with particular reference to science education in developing countries. international journal of science education, 25(10), 1171-1204. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/09500690210145819 setati, m. (2005). access to mathematics versus access to the language of power: the struggle in multilingual mathematics classrooms. paper presented at the 4th international conference on mathematics education and society, australia. simango, s. r. (2009). weaning africa from europe: toward a mother-tongue education policy in southern africa. in b. brock-utne & i. skattum (eds.), languages and education in africa: a comparative and transdisciplinary analysis (pp. 201-212). oxford: cambridge university press. ssentanda, m. e. (2013). exploring connections: reflections on mother-tongue education in postcolonial uganda. stellenbosch papers in linguistics plus, 42, 281-296. doi: https://doi.org/10.5842/42-0-163 united nations (un). (2013). a new global partnership: eradicate poverty and transform economies through sustainable development. report of the high-level panel of eminent persons on the post-2015 development agenda. new york: author. united nations educational, scientific, and cultural organization (unesco). (2008). improving the quality of mother tongue-based literacy and learning: case studies from asia, africa and south america. bangkok: unesco bangkok. viruru, r. (2005). the impact of postcolonial theory on early childhood education. journal of education, 35, 7-29. yohannes, m. a. g. (2009). implications of the use of mother tongues versus english as languages of instruction for academic achievement in ethiopia. in b. broke-utne & i. skattum (eds.), languages and education in africa: a comparative and transdisciplinary analysis (pp. 189-200). oxford: cambridge university press. 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.1 the international indigenous policy journal january 2017 competing purposes: mother tongue education benefits versus economic interests in rural zimbabwe gamuchirai tsitsi ndamba micheal m. van wyk josiah c. sithole recommended citation competing purposes: mother tongue education benefits versus economic interests in rural zimbabwe abstract keywords creative commons license competing purposes: mother tongue education benefits versus economic interests in rural zimbabwe introductory essay: an rx for indigenous health inequality: the social determinants of health the international indigenous policy journal volume 2 issue 1 health and well-being article 12 may 2011 introductory essay: an rx for indigenous health inequality: the social determinants of health nicholas spence university of western ontario, nspence@uwo.ca recommended citation spence, n. (2011). introductory essay: an rx for indigenous health inequality: he social determinants of health. he international indigenous policy journal, 2(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.12 this letter from the editor is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. introductory essay: an rx for indigenous health inequality: the social determinants of health abstract it is with great pleasure that i am able to serve as the first special guest editor (health) of the inter-national indigenous policy journal. this special edition is a compilation of some of the best research con-ducted on indigenous populations. moving beyond the disturbing trends so many of us are already well aware of, this body of research provides new theoretical, policy, and practical approaches for researchers, decision makers, and communities seeking to improve health outcomes for indigenous populations. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ introductory essay an rx for indigenous health inequality: the social determinants of health it is with great pleasure that i am able to serve as the first special guest editor (health) of the international indigenous policy journal. this special edition is a compilation of some of the best research conducted on indigenous populations. moving beyond the disturbing trends so many of us are already well aware of, this body of research provides new theoretical, policy, and practical approaches for researchers, decision makers, and communities seeking to improve health outcomes for indigenous populations. there is much diversity in the expertise of researchers in this edition, representing a variety of organizations and perspectives. also, these papers showcase a variety of research methods (quantitative, qualitative and culturally appropriate), providing different lenses to examine indigenous health issues. despite the differences in these approaches, the picture is clear: the works illustrate the importance of the social determinants of health approach to understand how social processes contribute to health inequalities of indigenous populations. from the lingering effects of colonialism in policy and research to innovative health care models meeting the diverse needs of indigenous populations to mental health to obesity to diabetes to tuberculosis, the researchers remind us that it is impossible to divorce health outcomes from the greater social milieu. the social determinants of health are broad, including virtually every aspect of society. while debates on the definitions, relative importance, and ways to measure these determinants continue, readers will observe the prominence of colonialism, culture, geography, housing, and poverty in this special edition. this research shows that the social determinants of health are related in a highly complex manner, with some determinants playing a more distinguished role than others in generating health outcomes, depending on the issue under discussion. at the international indigenous policy journal, we aim to attract scholarly level research with significant policy relevance. in this special edition, there are many policy implications offered given the research findings, providing practical options for stakeholders seeking to make evidence based policy decisions. the path towards reducing health inequalities of indigenous populations is complex, but it is clear that any attempts must be rooted in an agenda which makes the reduction of social inequalities a priority. indeed, by addressing indigenous health issues, we must, by definition, change the social conditions of this population. the special edition begins with a strong policy piece by melanie ferris that examines an important topic among indigenous populations, childhood obesity. despite the ‘simple’ messages by experts to eat right and get active, she illustrates in her work that indigenous children and their parents face unique barriers associated with the social determinants of health that impact on the ability of indigenous children to grow up free of obesity. next, kulmann and richmond argue for a focus on the social determinants of health to address the high rates on tuberculosis (tb) among indigenous populations. they show that public health initiatives must be grounded in both biomedical and social determinants of health approaches, given the strong association between poverty, housing and rates of tb. the case of the inuit in canada exemplifies that in a developed country, infectious diseases such as tb will continue to be a public health issue if a social determinants of letter from the guest editor nicholas spence 1 spence: introductory essay: an rx for indigenous health inequality: the s published by scholarship@western, 2011 health approach is relegated to the fringes of research and policy. mignone, elias and hall argue for an emphasis on the effects of community characteristics on health in indigenous communities. although the effects of social structure have a long history in the social determinants of health literature, very little work has examined the effects on indigenous populations, and empirical relationships examining such concepts as social capital are virtually non-existent. these researchers successfully develop a culturally appropriate measure of social capital, validated with the manitoba (canada) first nations regional health survey. readers will be excited for the future ‘causal’ research possibilities coming out of this work. using the stress process model, wingert’s work examines how the social structure distributes risk and protective factors and mental health outcomes within the off reserve indigenous population in canada. it also examines whether these outcomes are mediated or moderated by risk and protective factors, namely stress, mastery, and social support. given the high rates of mental health issues in this population coupled with limited data to test relevant hypotheses with a quantitative approach, this work is a first in the area. karina czyzewski makes a strong case for colonialism as the predominant social determinant of health. through an examination of discourses surrounding indigenous mental health in canada, and an emphasis on the notion of intergenerational trauma, she shows there are real health effects of social, political, and economic marginalization at both the individual and community level. czyzewski argues that colonialism can also be enacted and reinforced within indigenous mental health discourse, influencing scholarly and popular perceptions. she concludes that improving indigenous health is inextricably tied to eliminating colonial relations and increasing self-determination. the theme of colonialism is also seen in the next study by maar et al., who address the type 2 diabetes mellitus epidemic, a progressive metabolic disorder that affects indigenous populations disproportionately around the world. despite the effectiveness of diabetes treatment strategies to manage the disorder and reduce associated complications, indigenous populations tend to develop complications rapidly and at a young age. the barriers to evidence-based self-management behaviors and education are identified from the perspectives of indigenous people living with type 2 diabetes and their health care providers on manitoulin island in ontario, canada. focusing on ‘structural violence’ of indigenous people, they outline the social and political arrangements that impede effective diabetes management. the high rate of substance abuse and its social causes in indigenous populations has been well documented. however, for tempier et al., the concept of spontaneous recovery (sr) from substance abuse in general, and specific to indigenous peoples, has not been examined in any detail. there is also limited understanding of the healing process associated with sr. employing a decolonizing methodology, thematic analysis of traditional talking circle narratives identify an association between a traumatic life event and an ‘awakening.’ this ‘awakening’ is embedded in primary (i.e., consider impact on personal well-being) and secondary (i.e., implement alternative coping mechanism) cognitive appraisal processes and intrinsic and extrinsic motivation rooted in increased traditional indigenous cultural awareness and understanding. this contributes to both abstinence (i.e., recovery) and sustained well-being (i.e., continued abstinence). three key interrelated ‘themes’ specific to the role of culture in sr and recovery maintenance are identified: indigenous identity, cultural practices, and traditional values. their model advocates for abuse treatment and intervention policy to privilege culture as a determinant of health and well-being. again, stressing the role of culture in health, the next article provides an example of a successful hands-on program aimed to increase the health outcomes of pregnant women and their offspring. from talking circles of indigenous women who participated in a maternal nutrition and exercise lifestyle intervention program (nelip), mottola et al. seek to identify ways to develop a community based nelip for pregnant 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 12 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/12 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.12 indigenous women, given the high rates of obesity and diabetes mellitus in this population. this program shows much promise with participants demonstrating improvement in health, stamina, stress, and a healthy baby, no gestational diabetes and a successful home birth, with a key social determinant of health, social support playing a prominent role in the success of the program. this example of a successful, culturally appropriate intervention is a useful tool for stakeholders aiming to affect lifestyle behaviours. much research tends to frame indigenous issues in a simplistic manner, ignoring the diversity within the population. the next two articles examine the issues of specific indigenous subpopulations: women and seniors. maranzan, sabourin and simard focus on the needs of women in first nations communities using data from northern ontario, canada. the survey is part of a larger initiative of the nishnawbe aski nation called the women’s development project for women residing on reserve. the work demonstrates that understanding and improving the social conditions and inequity experienced by first nations women is necessary in order to promote the health and well-being of this group. addressing another special population, bonita beatty and loleen berdahl document the unique health care needs of the growing urban indigenous senior population in the canadian context. they present a policy framework to improve the health and well-being of urban indigenous seniors so that they can have good quality living reflective of their needs and culture. this framework must address the following: socioeconomic conditions; underutilization of urban health services; jurisdiction; and elder abuse. publicly funded elderly care and caregiving models are examined in scandinavian countries of sweden, denmark, and iceland. the final paper by miranda kelly focuses on the effects of health care models on indigenous people in canada. there has been much debate about the most effective health care model to meet the challenging needs of indigenous populations, including issues surrounding geography, self governance, and culturally appropriate service delivery. she highlights the detrimental effects of the uncoordinated, fragmented health care system, characterized by jurisdictional gaps and debates between federal, provincial and first nations governments about responsibility for first nations health care. recent developments in british columbia represent a shift toward a collaborative and coordinated partnership across jurisdictions for the improvement of health of first nations in the province. the inclusion of first nations as equal partners in this tripartite process has opened new paths and possibilities for health care service delivery with potential to transform indigenous health policy nationally and internationally. 3 spence: introductory essay: an rx for indigenous health inequality: the s published by scholarship@western, 2011 the international indigenous policy journal may 2011 introductory essay: an rx for indigenous health inequality: the social determinants of health nicholas spence recommended citation introductory essay: an rx for indigenous health inequality: the social determinants of health abstract creative commons license introductory essay: an rx for indigenous health inequality: the social determinants of health framing indigenous bioenergy partnerships the international indigenous policy journal volume 9 issue 3 special issue: indigenous peoples, climate change, and environmental stewardship article 5 july 2018 framing indigenous bioenergy partnerships melanie zurba the school for resource and environmental studies, dalhousie university, melzurba@gmail.com ryan bullock environmental studies & sciences, & centre for forest interdisciplinary research, the university of winnipeg, r.bullock@uwinnipeg.ca recommended citation zurba, m. , bullock, r. (2018). framing indigenous bioenergy partnerships. the international indigenous policy journal, 9(3). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.5 framing indigenous bioenergy partnerships abstract the rapidly expanding forest bioenergy sector in canada promises to support low carbon energy options that also support economic development and indigenous involvement. little empirical research has been conducted on indigenous participation in forest bioenergy in canada, which points to the need for a nuanced and reliable knowledge base to foster innovation in bioenergy that will contribute to community and economic development. however, before empirical research can be conducted it is important to understand the issues that influence indigenous participation in the bioenergy sector. we therefore look to and conduct a frame analysis of allied sectors to develop insights about the policy and participatory landscape in which forest bioenergy in canada is situated. our analysis illustrates that identities and perspectives linked to energy and forestry can be complex and can shift depending on how business is done around such projects. strengths in the current state of knowledge include the breadth of research regarding participatory natural resource management in canada, particularly with regard to northern and indigenous communities and territorial lands. our review indicates that even the emerging bioenergy literature that exists now, when paired with that of allied sectors, can help analysts understand and make sense of energy and energy-related issues. keywords bioenergy, energy partnerships, framing, indigenous, renewable resources acknowledgments this work was supported by the social sciences and humanities research council (sshrc) of canada (#872-2016-1036) and biofuelnet canada (#so-3-bullock). creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ framing indigenous bioenergy partnerships canada is a top five global energy producer and thus in a leadership position with respect to how it engages with international markets and, increasingly, in energy partnerships. furthermore, local and global energy markets are growing, and domestic and international firms are pressuring indigenous communities to participate in energy development because of their proximity and access to energy resource rich areas, and their rights to natural resources (eckerberg, 2015). running in parallel with increased demand, firms are more aware of the need to obtain social license to operate1 (haley & nelson, 2007). in addition, they must seek licences from provincial and territorial governments, which have fiduciary obligations to consult and accommodate indigenous peoples about development projects that could have an impact on their traditional territories and livelihoods (krupa, 2012). such is the case with the rapidly expanding forest bioenergy sector, which promises to support low carbon energy options that also support economic development and indigenous involvement (henderson & sanders, 2017). this promise of industry growth must be carefully considered alongside the benefits to be realized by would-be partners, such as indigenous communities or businesses. how canada’s indigenous forest bioenergy partnerships unfold will signal its policy and leadership preferences to the world, and ultimately, shape alternative energy progress and reconciliation efforts.2 indigenous issues and engagement in energy development are being heavily promoted in canada (gris, 2013), and there is acknowledgement that more needs to be done to design and conduct proper engagement processes, build cross-cultural partnerships, and understand similarities and differences in views and values (coates & crowley, 2013). within energy partnerships, there are several possible social and economic benefits (e.g., employment, infrastructure development) for communities (bristow, cowell, & munday, 2012); however, local agendas and views may differ from domestic and international strategic agreements. establishing an advanced forest bioenergy industry in canada will not occur with only basic information about indigenous partnerships. there has been little empirical research conducted on indigenous participation in forest bioenergy in canada, which points to the need for a nuanced and reliable knowledge base to foster innovation in bioenergy that will contribute to community and economic development (bullock & zurba, 2017). however, before empirical research can be conducted, it is important to understand the issues that influence indigenous participation in the bioenergy sector. it is therefore imperative to look to allied sectors to develop insights about the policy and participatory landscape in which forest bioenergy in canada is situated. our analysis focuses on the nuanced discourse that exists in published literature on energy and allied renewable resource (i.e., forestry) partnerships with indigenous communities and organizations, thus providing new insights on existing knowledge. we use the literature on indigenous participation in global and local partnerships in forestry and energy development to create a deeper understanding of the different frames relating to ongoing forest bioenergy development in canada. in particular, we probed 1 social licence to operate is a term emerging in the mid-1990s regarding how companies respond to social risk. it refers to the acceptance of a company’s business practice by invested parties, such as employees, communities, or the general public (moffat & zhang, 2014). 2 in 2008, the truth and reconciliation commission of canada (trc) was established as a component of the indian residential schools settlement agreement. the truth and reconciliation commission of canada: calls to action serve as a guide to reconciliation for the government of canada and all canadians and refers several times to indigenous lands (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015). 1 zurba and bullock: framing indigenous bioenergy partnerships published by scholarship@western, 2018 how current global–local framings position communities and their partners in development, and how different groups frame bioenergy economic and policy opportunities. we conclude by making recommendations for policy and future research. background resource development and indigenous peoples in canada forest bioenergy development in canada could impact and/or benefit indigenous communities in similar ways to other natural resources developments, such as forestry and other types of energy projects (krupa, 2012). benefits to indigenous communities are generally shortand/or long-term economic gains, including employment, increased investment, and other forms of community enhancement such as infrastructure (caine & krogman, 2010). impacts can also be shortor long-term, including degradation to the environment, as well as impacts on the social and economic well-being of communities and on indigenous rights and civil liberties (e.g., disruption of traditional economies and community social networks; willow, 2012). these impacts have adverse effects, including contamination of lands and waters, and community members becoming disconnected from their traditional territory and traditional practices, such as hunting, fishing, and trapping (tobias & richmond, 2014; willow, 2012). despite impacts associated with the dispossession and degradation of land, indigenous peoples in canada maintain strong connections to their traditional territories and are forging new ways to assert traditional custodial rights and responsibilities (bone & anderson 2017). due to court decisions (e.g., recognition of aboriginal title for the tsilhqot’in nation in british columbia in 2014) as well as collaborative actions (e.g., collaborative governance and shared tenure through the miitigoog partnership inc. in northwestern ontario), governments and resource development companies are shifting towards greater indigenous participation. arrangements such as co-management have more fully recognized indigenous peoples’ decision-making authority regarding their traditional territories (bullock, broad, palmer, & smith, 2017; wyatt & nelson, 2016). international advisory bodies such as the international union for the conservation of nature (iucn) and the united nations have also been bringing together multi-institutional perspectives (i.e., community representatives, non-governmental organizations [ngos], national and regional governments) to contribute to building guidelines for new policy affecting indigenous peoples. the united nations’ declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip) is a leading example of such policy. this monumental declaration indicates a major shift in international values, norms, and politics regarding indigenous peoples, their roles in governance, and their rights to sovereignty and other forms of decision-making power. canada joined undrip as one of the last signatory nations in november 2010 (indigenous and northern affairs canada, 2010). in total, 15 of the 46 declarations relate to the rights of indigenous peoples to participate in decisionmaking processes that affect their livelihoods (united nations, 2007). current profile of bioenergy development and partnerships in canada in canada, much of the bioenergy development focused around indigenous communities involves woody biomass, which is derived from forests (natural resources canada, n.d.). the canadian energy strategy (council of the federation, 2015) and the kenora declaration of forest innovation (government of canada, 2015) both emphasize the role of indigenous businesses and innovation in 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.5 growing canada’s bioeconomy (canadian council of forest ministers, 2015). all provinces and territories have policies and/or programs or policy language referring to bioenergy development, and the bioenergy sector in canada is expected to continue to grow (natural resources canada, 2016). according to the canadian energy strategy (council of the federation, 2015), provincial and territorial governments seek official involvement in international energy dialogues, while being committed to engage their indigenous leadership counterparts. at the same time, growing global demand and international firms place demands on indigenous communities and lands where benefits could exist, but also where local agendas and views may differ from international strategic agreements. the confluence of endogenous and exogenous influences creates trilateral, multi-level, and, in the case of forest bioenergy, multi-sector (e.g., energy and forestry) arrangements. these arrangements involve parties with different rights, capacities, and objectives, as well as different forums for engaging one another. in practice, there are currently twelve indigenous biomass energy projects in canada, 10 of which are in in british columbia, and the other two are in ontario and québec (henderson & sanders, 2017). established in 1993, the earliest biomass energy project involving an indigenous community is the oujebougoumou cree nation (obcn) district energy system. the obcn district energy system currently provides the district with 75% of its thermal energy requirements (36 mw), providing heat to 135 homes and 16 public buildings (fvb energy inc., n.d.a). the corporate partner for obcn district energy system is the swedish company fvb energy inc. (n.d.b). other biomass energy projects involving indigenous communities have been established more recently (2011-2015). in january of 2017, the first nations forestry council (fnfc) signed a memorandum of understanding with three domestic3 and one multinational4 pulp and paper companies located in british columbia. the agreement promotes information sharing between industry and first nations and commits parties to support policies, projects, and regulations that equally benefit first nations and companies (mercer inc., n.d.). the largest bioenergy project involving indigenous people in canada is the celgar green energy project (100 mw), which is part of the celgar mill located in castlegar in the british columbia interior (mercer inc., n.d.). two other large biomass energy projects involving indigenous communities in british columbia are the gold river power project (90 mw) and canfor northwood pulp mill–pgp bioenergy (55.4 mw). a first nations clean energy business fund revenue sharing agreement exists between green island energy and the mowachaht/muchalaht first nation for the gold river power project, which exports energy to the british columbia hydro grid (british columbia government, n.d.). the canfor northwood pulp mill engages the west moberly first nations in the pgp bioenergy project through new business relations that produce new training and employment opportunities (canfor, 2016). there is only one biomass energy project in ontario engaging an indigenous community. white river forest products uses biomass energy (7.5 mw) for the operation of its mill. this opportunity emerged when a major downturn in the forest economy in 2008 and 2009 caused the existing conventional sawmill to close, thus creating a space for a new and innovative partnership 3 catalyst paper company (based out of richmond, bc) for the crofton and alberni biomass projects, nanaimo forest products (based in nanaimo bc) for the harmac pacific biomass project, and paper excellence canada (based in richmond bc) for the lp golden biomass project (“fnfc signs mou,” 2017). 4 mercer international group (multinational corporation with offices in germany, canada, and the us) for the zellstoff celgar limited partnership and celgar green energy project (“fnfc signs mou,” 2017). 3 zurba and bullock: framing indigenous bioenergy partnerships published by scholarship@western, 2018 approach earlier thought to be unviable by industry (mcintyre, 2018). in february of 2016, biigtigong nishnaabeg (a.k.a., pic river first nation) purchased harvesting equipment and launched mkwa timber, a forestry company that negotiated an agreement to supply timber to the white river forest products mill (“pic river first nation”, 2016). research approach social framing: making sense of collaboration and conflict understanding identities, issues, roles, and responsibilities is integral to understanding environmental governance systems that are inclusive of indigenous peoples (corntassel, 2012; miller & davidsonhunt, 2013). we use kooiman’s (2003) definition of governance as “the totality of interactions, in which public as well as private sectors participate, aimed at solving societal problems or creating societal opportunities” (p. 4). social framing theory provides a systematic approach for building understanding of different viewpoints, shifting perspectives, and the production of shared meanings (benford & snow, 2000; gray, 2003; schön & rein, 1994). framing theory is frequently used in public policy and organizational research to examine public discourse and “make sense” of complex natural resource policy issues (metze, 2017; van herzele & aarts, 2013). analyzing the frames mobilized by different actors can indicate problem and solution definitions among different individuals and groups, and also help to identify attributions of blame or praise, as well as desired future actions (schön & rein, 1994). applying frame analysis to situations where new issues and risks are emerging, such as periods of economic transition and environmental conflict, is helpful in explaining different perceptions that direct adaptation, investment, and even political support (bullock et al., 2016; keskitalo, klenk, bullock, smith, & bazley, 2011). frame analysis also provides insight on actions that are the products of new relationships, including how individuals begin to learn together and build trust and other foundations for moving past conflict towards building collaboration (bullock, 2013). social framing analyses commonly employ identity, characterization, prognostic, and diagnostic frames to make sense of the issues, perspectives, roles, and responsibilities relating to governance systems. identity frames make it possible to understand how different actors view and position themselves (i.e., whether they are for, against, or neutral) with relation to development projects (bullock, 2013). characterization frames then relate to how the different groups characterize others in relation to particular issues and existing or future possible outcomes, commonly linked to the perceived roles of other people, groups, or entities. for example, different groups may view certain parties as influencing resource developments that may have adverse or acceptable amounts of effects on the environment, positive or negative socioeconomic outcomes, and/or as enhancing or diminishing equity within a resources governance system. diagnostic frames define the issues and personal reasoning for issues, and prognostic frames outline potential solutions and the roles and responsibilities involved in implementing solutions (gray, 2003). in order to provide context and a framework for understanding the issues relating to indigenous participation in forest bioenergy development in canada, we focus on the nuanced discourse in the published literature on energy and allied renewable resources partnerships (i.e., forestry) with indigenous communities. therefore, the social framings analysed in our study relate to a focused body of literature, and we must acknowledge that the framing is derived from several layers of interpretation. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.5 the first layer of interpretation is by the study participants documented directly in research papers, the second is the author(s) of the articles that were reviewed for this synthesis, and the third layer is our own influence on meanings produced by the research team who applied the frame analysis to the articles. the perspectives of parties involved in governance were more directly conveyed through articles that reported findings from empirical research engaging participants in discussions on forest and energy development(s) and governance. in such cases, articles offered perspectives “by” parties. other articles, which were policy or topic focused, provided syntheses and insights about a policy or an issue linked to indigenous participation in forest and/or energy development. such findings are important because they illustrate how “experts” cast partnerships and describe the implications of the different framings. through accounting for the variety of different perspectives, we develop understanding of how indigenous partnerships are framed and how those framings are connected and mobilized through the current literature. literature a comprehensive search of recent research articles and grey literature was conducted using isi web of science (wos), which is considered one of the most comprehensive and extensively used academic databases for literature reviews (cañas-guerrero, mazarrón, pou-merina, calleja-perucho, & díasrubio, 2013). we chose to work with wos because it is international in scope and captures a large diversity of literature (e.g., books, proceedings, and reports) from multiple databases (yu, akin-fajiye, thapa magar, ren, & gurevitch, 2016). however, we also took into consideration some of the challenges that occur when using databases such as wos, such as limitations in searches related to multi-disciplinary literature (mongeon & paul-hus, 2016), and conducted searches within google scholar to crosscheck and ensure that key literature was not being excluded. an initial search was conducted with search terms that would narrow in on the literature on all forms of indigenous participation in bioenergy projects published in the last 10 years (2008-2017), which corresponds with the main phase of forest bioenergy development in canada. this initial search produced only one result, indicating that the peer-reviewed literature in this particular area is exceedingly limited, which reflects the relative newness of forest bioenergy development in canada (table 1). the scope of the literature search was then broadened to be inclusive of all topics relating to forest and energy development and the different forms of indigenous participation. this search produced 29 results, inclusive of the one that was part of the initial search. this literature became the data for the frame analysis for indigenous participation in forest and energy sectors. abstracts of the articles that were results of the broader isi web of science were reviewed for relevance and criteria for inclusion and exclusion were developed (berrang-ford, pearce, & ford, 2015). to be included, a paper had to directly discuss indigenous participation, consultation, engagement, and/or collaboration in forest and energy sectors in the canadian context. papers discussing resource sectors or topics outside the canadian context (e.g., palm oil production by canadian companies abroad) were excluded. papers not relating to indigenous participation, and industries not involving forests or energy, were also excluded. a total of 6 articles were excluded from the review because they fell within the exclusion criteria or were records of articles that were no longer accessible (e.g., part of the grey literature that are no longer supported through affiliated institutions). therefore, 23 peer-reviewed sources (journal articles, conference papers, etc.) were used for the frame analysis. 5 zurba and bullock: framing indigenous bioenergy partnerships published by scholarship@western, 2018 table 1. search terms for the bioenergy and affiliated resource sectors literature review search search terms search 1 canad* and (indigenous or aboriginal* or “first nation”* or métis) and (biofuel* or biomass or bioenerg*) and (participation or engage* or consultation* or collaboration*) and (compan* or corporat* or business* or developer* or proponent* or industr*) search 2 canad* and (indigenous or aboriginal* or “first nation”* or métis) and (biofuel* or biomass or bioenerg* or energy or forestry or “forest* management” or “forest planning” or “forest governance”) and (participation or engage* or consultation* or collaboration*) and (compan* or corporat* or business* or developer* or proponent* or industr*) standard bibliometrics, including the year of publication, article keywords, region of study, and authorship, were analysed to provide a portrait of the literature used for the frame analyses (bullock & lawler, 2015; song & zhao, 2013). of the 23 articles that were included, 14 were from the past 3 years (6 from 2015, 5 from 2016, and 3 from 2017). the other 9 were spread across 2008 to 2013 (2 in 2008, 2010, and 2011; none in 2009 and 2012; and 3 in 2013). a total of 88 different keywords were associated with the articles. the most common keywords were: “canada” and “first nation(s)” (occurring 4 times each), “governance,” “forest(s),” and “aboriginal people(s)” (occurring 3 times each), and “aboriginal participation,” “collaboration,” “forest governance,” “forest policy,” “québec,” “sustainable development,” and “sustainable forest management” (occurring 2 times each). among the articles, 9 broadly related to canadian issues and policy, and were not focused on a particular province, territory, or region in canada. regional policies, programs and/or cases were discussed in such papers only as examples that would demonstrate the points being made about the broader issues around indigenous participation in forestry and energy development in canada. most cases were situated in british columbia (4 articles), québec and alberta (3articles each), followed by ontario, new brunswick, saskatchewan and the northwest territories (2 articles each). authors of the articles were mostly from academic institutions, with the exception of one article that is authored by a member of a corporation. articles were affiliated with the university of british columbia (5 articles), the university of moncton (6 articles), the university of saskatchewan (4 articles), laval university (4 articles), lakehead university (3 articles), the university of québec (2 articles), the university of winnipeg (2 articles), and york university (2 articles). these universities have forestand resource-based programming, which accounts for the frequency of articles that are produced. several of the articles also had international co-authors (in some cases first author) from universities such as 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.5 cambridge university (uk), utretcht university (netherlands), university of bergen (norway), and university of arizona (usa). a total of 14 authors were female and 40 were male. of the lead authors, 7 of the 23 were female and 16 were male. data analysis: applying social framing a coding framework was developed based on analytical constructs from the literature (i.e., frame categories) to assist classification, and open coding was used to help account for emergent findings. all statements relevant to energy and forestry issues and perceptions were coded. content analysis involved theme coding, pattern matching, and ranking to construct profiles of the different perspectives and positions that currently underlie indigenous partnerships in the bioenergy sector (yin, 2014). characterization, identity, diagnostic and prognostic frames were coded. in adhering to kooiman’s (2003) definition of governance, identity frames and related codes therefore included groups involved in governance: community, government, ngo, and proponent. subset codes for each of the identity codes were used to indicate whether the party was supportive, neutral, or against the development being discussed in the literature. characterization frames and codes related to whether the development in question was characterized as being positive, negative, or neutral relating to the environment, socioeconomics, and equitable decision-making outcomes for indigenous communities. diagnostic frames and codes described whether community(s), company(s), government(s), and/or ngo(s) were the parties responsible for the characterizations of development. this relates directly to characterization frames and codes, for example, where the government could be deemed responsible for a situation that is inequitable for indigenous communities. prognostic frames and codes indicated what parties were thought to have the solution(s) to the resource development issues at hand. prognostic codes therefore included: communities, companies, the government, and/or ngos as having the solution. a fifth code was also produced to account for instances when the author or participants believed that the solution lies in partnership. this code included the subset codes: led by communities, led by companies, led by the government, led by ngos, and led by all parties. two types of emergent codes were derived. the first type of emergent code was types of indigenous participation that were featured in the literature (e.g., criteria and indicator development, impact benefit agreements, collaboration, and power-sharing). the second type were captured themes highlighted through the literature (e.g., barriers to participation, decolonization, feasibility). in addition to coding for frames mobilized in current policy and research discourse, statements in non-academic and academic literature were coded for magnitude to further probe attitudes, motivations, and priorities (after plummer, baird, bullock, dupont, & renzetti, 2018). magnitudes were empty (descriptive), implicit (advisory), or explicit (directive). this method helped us to make sense of the nuanced discourse that bridges domestic and international actors, and that provide new insights on existing knowledge produced over the past 10 years to advise energy policy and indigenous engagement. results and discussion perspective and issue frames identifying the underlying perspectives surrounding energy and forest sector development is important for contextualizing the issues relating to indigenous participation within such sectors. framing of identities revealed some differences in support for development projects by different parties 7 zurba and bullock: framing indigenous bioenergy partnerships published by scholarship@western, 2018 (proponents, government, communities, and ngos) involved in governance. energy and forestry proponents were always supportive of new development projects that would enhance their corporate revenue. governments were mostly supportive of new resource developments as a way of strengthening regional and national economies. however, there were some cases where the government demonstrated uncertainty or a lack of support for energy and forestry development. for example, articles by griffith, diduck, and tardif (2015) and krupa (2012) reported that the scale of the development has in the past had an effect on whether a development project would receive the government’s support. griffith et al. (2015) reported that manitoba’s provincial forestry branch had an aversion to small scale forestry, and a study by krupa (2012), in the context of bioenergy development, reported that ontario government officials were hesitant to embrace large biofuels developments because their region was still recovering from major losses in forestry and that the industry was still “fraught with major pitfalls” (p. 119). hesitation on the part of the government may reflect a certain culture of risk aversion with regard to development opportunities that can generate conflict. such frames and associated decision behaviours can hamper innovation necessary to bolster new development and partnerships. governments wanting to support innovation should perhaps be aware of the implications of mobilizing such frames; proponents advancing new projects could pay attention to considerations of scale to ensure they make a solid case for submission. innovation-directed policies should be designed to accommodate scale considerations (alexander, andrachuk, & armitage, 2016). community support for projects typically depended on the type and level of participation, as well as the potential for benefits to be received through participation and from the development. benefits and incentives for participation in governance included influence on how projects took shape (including the assertion of rights), as well as socioeconomic outcomes for communities, such as jobs and community infrastructure (beaudoin, bouthillier, & chiasson, 2015; fortier, wyatt, natcher, smith, & herbert, 2013; laurin & jamieson, 2015; montsion, 2015; wanvik, 2016; zurba, diduck, & sinclair, 2016). with regards to energy development, the articles reviewed were in the context of non-renewable resources (the literature on renewable resources and indigenous participation was too scant), namely oil and gas production and transportation via pipeline infrastructure. it is highly likely that this would have influenced the perspectives and support for existing and/or future developments. for example, several of the articles refer to the potentially severe impacts of oil and gas development on the environment and how such impacts could affect indigenous livelihood strategies that are connected to the environment, such as hunting, fishing and trapping (bagelman, 2016; laurin & jamieson, 2015; mathewson, 2013; montsion, 2015). demonstrating benefits that will accrue to communities beyond jobs, such as cultural enrichment and relevance, as well as environmental protection, are paramount to successful proposal and implementation of bioenergy development. new partnerships that meaningfully account for livelihood, cultural, and environmental concerns have a better chance of building community support requisite for success. the challenge here for international partners is whether and how they can become locally acquainted so as to build meaningful relationships. laurin and jamieson (2015) and montsion (2015) commented on the potential impacts to indigenous rights and sovereignty from different forms of development projects. the characterization regarding environmental impacts and acceptability of forestry projects by communities generally related to the area of harvest (beaudoin et al., 2015, 2016; wyatt, fortier, natcher, smith, & hébert, 2013), harvesting techniques (wyatt, kessels, & van laehoven, 2015), and whether or not communities had a history of forestry and/or negative experiences in dealing with forestry companies in the past (zurba et 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.5 al., 2016). in the context of oil energy development, laurin and jamieson (2015) highlighted that developers are aware of impacts and are increasingly modifying their consultation and development practices to meet the needs and requests of indigenous communities. however, they also explained how this modification of practice is perceived by industry as enhancing the “above the ground risks” of projects (i.e., legal, regulatory, financial, and reputation). corporate risk is often perceived to increase with increased interactions with the public; in other words, adapting processes to meaningfully engage indigenous groups carries more corporate risk. the prior experiences of indigenous groups with industry and their perspectives on resource development could work either way to mitigate or build conflict with resource companies (zurba et al., 2016). prior experience with flawed engagement processes can enhance conflict. these views may signal immaturity of engagement processes and point to the need for innovation in process design. the willingness of energy companies to modify engagement processes based on indigenous direction can be seen as a positive feature of such partnerships, especially where positive measurable participation outcomes are demonstrated. the type of participation in the governance resources related directly to how the project was characterized in terms of being equitable for indigenous communities. non-renewable energy development in canada has produced a variety of different types of participation, ranging from direct conflict between communities and companies (i.e., within meetings and through protests) to participation in energy development consultation through impact benefit agreements (ibas) and environmental assessments (eas) (bagelman, 2016; laurin & jamieson, 2015). companies may obtain social licence to operate (slo) when communities participate through such processes, but this does not predetermine legal consent to the development (laurin & jamieson, 2015; wyatt, 2016). slo processes can be highly variable for what they deliver in terms of effectiveness and equity to indigenous communities that are potential future partners with industry (wyatt, 2016). slo processes are especially vulnerable to limited capacity and transparency, as well as the legal frameworks that dictate development (e.g., forest harvesting; wyatt, 2016). similar in some ways to the slo process, free, prior and informed consent (often referred to as fpic) has entered the landscape of different standards for working with indigenous communities mostly through political processes and legal decisions, particularly canada’s legal obligation to consult and accommodate (forest stewardship council, 2012; laurin & jamieson, 2015; wyatt, 2016). however, fpic is largely a consultation approval process (wyatt, 2016) and consent is an ongoing issue for indigenous participation in energy development, which is confounded by the fact that there is no single process for obtaining full legal consent from communities (laurin & jamieson, 2015; wyatt, 2016). the same is true for forestry in canada. however, forest governance systems have evolved structurally over the past few decades as a result of social and economic factors, such as the economic downturn impacting forestry in the early 2000s (zurba et al., 2016). our systematic review accounted for several different types of indigenous participation in energy and forest development with varying degrees of equity for the parties involved (e.g., criteria and indicators processes, advisory committees, consensus building, international negotiations). in the context of forest management, fortier et al. (2013) and wyatt et al. (2013) use a typology with 5 top-level categories: (1) treaties, agreements and memoranda of understanding (mou); (2) aboriginal involvement in forestland planning, management and land use studies; (3) influence on forest management decision-making, subtypes; (4) aboriginal-held forest tenure; and (5) economic roles and partnerships. 9 zurba and bullock: framing indigenous bioenergy partnerships published by scholarship@western, 2018 within the types of participation and tools used to facilitate participation, indigenous communities have varying degrees of ability to assert rights, values, and aspirations, as well as varying abilities to reap socioeconomic benefits (krupa, 2012; laurin & jamieson, 2015; mathewson, 2013; wyatt, 2008; zurba et al., 2016). the shifts in forest policy and management in canada have also been influenced by national and international policy documents, such as the royal commission on aboriginal peoples (rcap) and the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip; mcgregor, 2011; wyatt, 2016). however, adam and kneeshaw (2011), beaudoin et al. (2015) and wyatt et al. (2015) found that the sustainability and equity of a management system or development project can be negatively impacted if consultation tools (i.e., facilitating different types of participation) are designed only to suit government and industry proponents. overall, despite shifts in tenure arrangements and changes to types and level of participation, participation in forest management remains inequitable for indigenous communities (adam & kneeshaw, 2011), especially those that might want to assert rights and visions that are perceived to be incompatible with development. it thus appears that the many avenues available to establish new partnership developments in bioenergy may be imperfect in so far as equity and efficiency. the ability to move swiftly from a business perspective may need to be tempered by the need to move more slowly in order to get partnerships “right” and properly account for equity issues. problem and solution frames the perspective and issue frames detailed above provide a context for understanding problem frames (i.e., diagnostic frames) and solution frames (i.e., prognostic frames) regarding indigenous participation in energy and forest development (gray, 2003). assertions of responsibility for enabling indigenous communities to participate in resource governance included governments, companies, and communities themselves as the primary actors. within energy and forest development contexts, there is resounding agreement that governments are responsible for consulting with indigenous communities because they have a fiduciary responsibility laid out by the crown and are also responsible for setting the policy agenda for the community participation that ultimately take place (laurin & jamieson, 2015; wanvik, 2016). governments may also change policy and what is possible for indigenous participation in development for political reasons (e.g., changes in government) that are not connected to the successes of current governance structures (zurba et al., 2016). despite the ability to change tenure policy and community consultation protocols, provincial and federal governments in canada do not have ultimate authority. case law at the level of the supreme court and provincial courts supersedes government decision making and can affect federal and provincial policy relating to natural resources developments (laurin & jamieson, 2015; menzies, 2015; montsion, 2015). nonetheless, collaborative policy development for bioenergy expansion, if that is the will of governments, industry, and communities, seems the path most likely to achieve governance arrangements customized for success. such “preventative” policy making would better address indigenous participation issues, although certain rights-based issues may still need to be resolved by the high court, even if parties have amicable working relationships. it is also apparent that the onus to improve indigenous involvement is not the sole responsibility of any one entity, whether government, court, community, or industry. given the multi-scale nature of international energy partnerships, solutions could also be found across different regions and sectors. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.5 governments have been credited with facilitating the development of new policy tools and frameworks that promote indigenous participation, facilitate partnerships, and enhance equity within agreements (mcarthur, 2017; zurba et al., 2016). solution frames directed at the government relate to national and regional domestic policy development, as well as the need for the government to acknowledge international guiding frameworks such as undrip (laurin & jamieson, 2015). the tone with regards to government solutions frames was often explicit (i.e., directive). connected to the call for policy supports and reform is the call for political will in association with acknowledgement of the rights and titles held by indigenous peoples (bagelman, 2016; laurin & jamieson, 2015; mathewson, 2013; mcarthur, 2017; menzies, 2015; montsion, 2015). the foundation of responsibility for indigenous communities is their custodial role in the stewardship of the land (bagelman, 2016; beaudoin et al., 2015; laurin & jamieson, 2015; mcgregor, 2011). the importance of stewardship to indigenous identities intensifies the connection between identity and diagnostic or prognostic framings of environmental issues. community leadership, as well as individual members and groups, thus engage by necessity in environmental governance through different forms of action, which in turn relate to the solution frames that communities continue to put forward (e.g., stewardship, restricting access to development). indigenous communities engage in forging solutions to participation through their on-going involvement in processes related to environmental governance. such processes not only include forms of participation that reduce conflict, but also types of participation that enhance conflict, such as protest and the development of alternative structures for consultation (bagelman, 2016; menzies, 2015). a noteworthy example of governance outside of state politics is the development and actions of the first nations energy and mining council (fnemc) (montsion, 2015). the fnemc was formed by british columbia first nations as an alternative organization (alternative to the government of canada) that would conduct “direct, independent and collaborative relations between indigenous peoples and [foreign] investors” with regards to energy development in canada (montsion, 2015, p. 1). the fnemc represents an assertion of first nations sovereignty and, in 2011, they initiated a strategy entitled first nations & china: transforming relationships. the strategy was designed to promote reciprocal investments and acknowledgement of development interests on indigenous lands (montsion, 2015). non-state actions taken by the fnemc are an example of disruption and self-affirmation, and they could act as a touchstone for indigenous communities wishing to assert their sovereign interests with foreign interests. indigenous concerns and actions go beyond state designed processes and policies. indigenous identities, problem framings, and solution framings may therefore offer innovative ways to develop bioenergy partnerships and solve problems that are produced by, and even hampered by, canadian trade policies. indigenous motivations and needs cannot be fully accounted for with current arrangements, so new ones are being developed to suit indigenous and international partners that better reflect the roles they see themselves fulfilling. companies operate within the legal and policy frameworks set forth by government; yet, they maintain responsibility for how they engage indigenous communities within what is possible according to policy (mathewson, 2013; mcarthur, 2017; montsion, 2015; wyatt, 2015). this responsibility also applies to consultants that are hired by companies to consult with communities or engage them in development planning related processes, such as anthropological research (menzies, 2015). companies have the ability to create meaningful pathways and support capacity building for developing participation, and 11 zurba and bullock: framing indigenous bioenergy partnerships published by scholarship@western, 2018 they can divest responsibilities to communities that enable them to play a role in decision making and receive direct returns from their involvement (zurba et al., 2016). solution frames connected to companies were often explicit (i.e., directive) and/or implicit (i.e., advisory) in tone. most solution frames were directed towards companies in general, with no distinction between domestic and international firms. the authors stressed the importance of improving relationships with communities through genuine forms of engagement (bagelman, 2016; zurba et al., 2016). they also promoted participatory spaces, where communities are empowered to communicate on their own terms, as having the greatest potential for working through conflict and facilitating the development of trust, among other relational qualities (beaudoin et al., 2015; reed, 2010; wyatt, 2016; zurba et al., 2016). furthermore, the call for shared value initiatives where business success is connected to community prosperity is a stated solution for community well-being and participation in development projects (laurin & jamieson, 2015). more recent articles suggested solutions that were based on different types of collaboration, including corporate partnerships involving companies and indigenous communities (laurin & jamieson, 2015; wanvik, 2016; zurba et al., 2016). divestment is an important part of such partnerships where communities take on leadership and decision-making roles (mcarthur, 2017; zurba et al., 2016). provincial governments often have a strong role to play in creating spaces for collaboration through shifting policy, and local government managers working with companies and indigenous communities have a role to play in facilitating new collaborative agreements (zurba et al., 2016). zurba et al. (2016) reported an example of a recent shared-tenure agreement (sustainable forestry licence administered by the ontario ministry of natural resources) for the kenora forest (1,225,536 ha), the miitigoog partnership inc. in northwestern ontario (est. 2010), which involves first nations, domestic and international forestry companies, and small regional licence holders. within the agreement, first nations have redeemable and retractable shares and 50% of the seats within the board. as part of the agreement, first nations were also supported by the parties to develop the first nations fully owned miisun integrated management co., which oversees day-to-day operations on the licensed public land base. the miitigoog partnership illustrates power sharing and collaboration that emerged out of regional conflict around forestry and relationship building during a time of relatively slow economic growth (following the economic downturn of the early 2000s). regional cooperation and coordination are increasingly popular approaches to implementing political and economic strategies, especially in underserved rural and remote areas. regional economic development corporations, de facto regional governance forums including groups of band and municipal leaders, and economic working groups extend governance infrastructure available to support bioenergy development as such arrangements are likely to intersect geographically (bullock & reed, 2016). syndicates of communities could therefore lobby government and apply concerted effort to attract international investment for bioenergy development, and likewise defend territorial values by mobilizing common identity and solution frames to steer policy discourses. while collaboration can create structural changes that can enhance equity for all parties, it is not guaranteed. furthermore, such structures are often based heavily on relationship building and the collaborative development (not simply implementation) of governance frameworks (beaudoin et al., 2015; laurin & jamieson, 2015). our review of solution frames relating to collaboration revealed that 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.5 there is explicit language stating that relational (i.e., building understanding through interpersonal relationships and informal interactions) and affective interactions (i.e., understanding the emotions of parties, deep listening, and learning) are important for building meaningful and long-term collaboration (bagelman, 2016; zurba et al., 2016). connected to the need for long-term development of relationships is the call for a two-row approach to collaboration, which is built upon the common interpretation of the treaties as two distinct groups traveling a path of sharing where one does not aim to disempower the other for the other’s sake (bagelman, 2016; mcgregor, 2011; wyatt, 2008). the tworow approach provides guidance for understanding indigenous identity, and problem and solution frames with respect to how indigenous communities and organizations may wish to engage settlers and perhaps international partners. conclusions our analysis revealed that identities and perspectives concerning energy and forestry can be complex and can shift depending on how business is done around such projects. strengths in the current state of knowledge include the breadth of research regarding participatory natural resource management in canada, particularly with regard to northern and indigenous communities and territorial lands. our review indicates that even the emerging bioenergy literature that exists now, when paired with that of allied sectors, can help analysts understand and make sense of energy and energy-related issues. in particular, existing research confirms what we know of typical resource development models in canada— that is, proponents support projects to generate corporate revenue, communities demand benefits from such projects, and governments support new resource development to strengthen economies. however, the rising importance of concepts and practices like social license to operate, community-led companies, and local or municipal intermediate facilitation in “higher order” structures and processes (i.e., corporate-community collaboration) all highlight that conventional roles and agendas are shifting. this bodes well for canadian communities and would-be national and international partners seeking to do business in canada’s sustainable and renewable natural resource industries. however, there are many examples of indigenous communities in canada that have had negative experiences with international companies (including those in forestry). reframing characterizations of international interests will therefore be important to building trusting relationships. moreover, as framings are fluid and contingent upon actors and context, much thought could be given to how current and future bioenergy relationships are framed in international policy forums. since local intentions and meanings can be interpreted differently by “outside” or international actors, greater consideration given to local perspectives will help maintain the influence and intent of community decision and policy makers in international initiatives. furthermore, we know, for example, that there are differences in how indigenous and non-indigenous groups frame their involvement in governance and their responsibilities. it would be helpful to know more about the interplay of these framings and fully grasp the differences in order to craft policy for the expanding bioenergy sector, as well as any evolving role identities of various parties, from domestic or international firms, governments, or communities. governance research to support decision making and social-economic development is needed to balance the focus on and government investment in renewable bioenergy technology and engineering research and development. there remains a need to fully document bioenergy policies, including conducting comparative policy analyses across the provincial and territorial resource sectors. this could 13 zurba and bullock: framing indigenous bioenergy partnerships published by scholarship@western, 2018 include examining the implications of the language in existing policies relative to current framings emerging from literature on energy and forest sector developments. there is also a need for local frames to be incorporated in international policies and dialogues. such changes could help inform canada’s international leadership and development of engagement guidelines, as well as outward-looking national strategies intended to direct how canada engages with international firms, governments, and ngos. incorporating indigenous community and business perspectives in such protocols would enhance indigenous engagement and perhaps even lead to greater control through management decision making when they are engaged by international companies. increasing international dialogue and embracing existing frameworks would help close the gap between how local and global groups frame bioenergy development by increasing understanding of the discourse that bridges local domestic and international actors. further to this point, our findings show that governments, industry, and communities are all seen to share responsibility for improving indigenous involvement; this responsibility must be extended to international entities involved in matters related to canadian business and governance. bioenergy development is a useful opportunity through which the appropriate roles for international partners can be identified. given its international appeal, crosssectoral relevance (energy, forestry, food), and socio-economic and environmental links to indigenous cultural, stewardship, and livelihood concerns, there is great potential for the bioenergy sector to demonstrate how relevant international conventions such as undrip and existing practice aimed at guiding foreign investment (e.g., first nations energy and mining council) could be meaningfully embraced and more broadly implemented. how canada’s indigenous bioenergy partnerships unfold will signal its policy and leadership preferences to the world, and ultimately, how international relations are mobilized to shape timely initiatives directly connected to bioenergy, such as renewable energy, climate policy, and reconciliation efforts. while possible synergies hold promise, they are not automatic, and statements of commitment need to be backed by specific actions and resources. a complicating factor is that we do not fully acknowledge or understand the interplay of western and indigenous knowledge and governance systems as this relates to processes and conditions that support innovation in energy and allied sectors. for example, it has been difficult to realize the full contribution and benefits of indigenous involvement in environmental resource management because their knowledge, if it is used at all, is often used inappropriately through selective and de-contextualized applications (stevenson, 2013). thankfully, research has demonstrated that knowledge and governance systems are pluralistic and evolve (bullock & reed, 2016). still, much more effort is spent devising technologies and products than is spent building relationships, common lexicon and protocols, and decision-making procedures and processes. there is much work to be done in the human dimensions of energy and forestry, which likewise might be considered the social innovation side of bioenergy partnerships involving indigenous representatives and their partners (mulgan, 2011). like technological innovation, social innovations require experimentation, failure, and perseverance (olsson & galaz, 2012). examples of current community-led partnerships emphasize that such activities are ongoing and are essential to upholding local control, building respect, and support (pengelly & davidson-hunt, 2012). more empirical research with and by communities actually involved in biofuels development is needed. the bioenergy sector is expanding, and thus so too must this area of research, which can be described as emerging at best. there are a small number of biomass energy projects in canada involving indigenous 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.5 communities, most of which are in british columbia. further analysis of such projects could be a useful next step in the research towards developing transferrable lessons and, in particular, analysis of evolving policy discourse and its alignment with community and broader natural resource strategies. there is also a need for definition regarding how international and national firms can properly engage indigenous partners in bioenergy development. this could mean creating and making explicit the proper protocols, expectations, and roles of partners in sector activities and new projects. in addition, the question of what bioenergy-specific policies can be developed to build on lessons learned and also avoid the pitfalls of previous governance work remains to be answered. one step would be to consult national and international policy documents, such as the rcap and undrip while developing bioenergy strategies and policies to direct canada’s future energy sector. 15 zurba and bullock: framing indigenous bioenergy partnerships published by scholarship@western, 2018 references adam, m. -c., & kneeshaw, d. 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(2016). first nations and industry collaboration for forest governance in northwestern ontario, canada. forest policy & economics, 6, 1-10. 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.5 the international indigenous policy journal july 2018 framing indigenous bioenergy partnerships melanie zurba ryan bullock recommended citation framing indigenous bioenergy partnerships abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license framing indigenous bioenergy partnerships contested territories: water rights and the struggles over indigenous livelihoods the international indigenous policy journal volume 3 issue 3 water and indigenous peoples article 5 september 2012 contested territories: water rights and the struggles over indigenous livelihoods rutgerd boelens wageningen university, rutgerd.boelens@wur.nl bibiana duarte universidad javeriana rossana manosalvas wageningen university patricio mena wageningen university tatinana roa avendaño censat agua viva see next page for additional authors recommended citation boelens, r. , duarte, b. , manosalvas, r. , mena, p. , roa avendaño, t. , vera, j. (2012). contested territories: water rights and the struggles over indigenous livelihoods. the international indigenous policy journal, 3(3) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.5 contested territories: water rights and the struggles over indigenous livelihoods abstract this paper examines the threats to indigenous water rights and territories in the andean countries. it analyzes how water and water rights are embedded in indigenous territories, and how powerful actors and intervention projects tend to undermine local societies and indigenous livelihoods by developing large-scale water infrastructure. three cases illustrate the encroachment process. in colombia, the embera katio people’s water territory is colonized by a large-scale hydropower development project. in ecuador, large-scale drinking water development for megacities aims the water belonging to the oyacachi community’s indigenous highland territory. in peru, communal water rights of the colca valley indigenous peasantry are under threat because of large-scale irrigation development. as the cases show, indigenous peoples and communities actively contest the undermining and subordination of their water and territorial rights through a myriad of multi-scalar livelihood defense strategies. the challenges that indigenous peoples face to defend their water-based livelihoods are, however, enormous and growing every day. keywords water rights, policies, politics, hydraulic megaprojects, indigenous territories, livelihoods, culture, neoliberalism, social mobilization, andean region acknowledgments this paper is based on action-research and academic investigations realized by researchers of the justicia hídrica alliance from 2009 to 2011. the justicia hídrica alliance is a broad international network of scholars, activists, grassroots leaders and water professionals committed to critical water policy and rights analysis, working chiefly in latin america, but also in africa, asia, north america and europe. research, training and advocacy activities are done in close collaboration with indigenous, small-holder and civil society organizations (see www.justiciahidrica.org). creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. authors rutgerd boelens, bibiana duarte, rossana manosalvas, patricio mena, tatinana roa avendaño, and juana vera http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ contested territories: water rights and the struggles over indigenous livelihoods water is essential to life, livelihoods, and cultural identities. in many places around the world water acquires additional importance for marginalized peasant communities and indigenous peoples because they commonly have to sustain their livelihood and water security through subsistence economies that, in current processes of globalization, face extremely adverse physical and political conditions. for them, connections between water sources, people, places, production, and identity are crucial and profoundly relate to the particular ways of perceiving, creating, and re-creating “territory”. dominant classes and cultures, however, tend to impose policies and qualifications on territories and water rights that fiercely clash with local cultures and territorial livelihood strategies (gelles, 2002; getches, 2012; hinojosa, chummacero, cortez, bebbington, & humphrey bebbington, 2012; roth, boelens, & zwarteveen, 2005). the last decades have shown how water officialdom has embraced mainstream water science, officially endorsed as rational “water culture,” and policies built on universalistic recipes, but failed to consider existing water societies, identities, and practices that have been successful (boelens & vos, 2012; vera, 2011a). the conflict between cultures, divergent economies, and sociopolitical structures in disputes over water rights is especially well illustrated in latin america, for instance, in the highland and tropical rain forest communities of peru, chile, bolivia, ecuador, and colombia. these countries vary in their professed respect for indigenous and campesino cultures, but all have enacted water laws and pronounced policies that can abrade local cultures (bebbington, humphreys bebbington, & bury, 2012; boelens, cremers, & zwarteveen, 2011; boelens, getches, & guevara, 2012; hendriks, 2012). despite the reality of multiple cultural identities and livelihood strategies, an array of stereotypes about the moral and economic features of peasant communities and indigenous populations exists. these images have been influenced by racist impulses to discipline the indians, as well as by motives emerging from progressive, humanistic ideals. throughout history, paternalistic, apparently benign, attempts to “civilize” indians by bringing them into the mainstream have been endemic to nation-states that have encountered different cultures and peoples within their borders (assies & gundermann, 2007; baud, 2012). new water policies in latin america would seem to offer more room for local indigenous normative systems and water cultures. while water scarcity and competition for water resources are increasing (from indigenous and peasant populations, mining, export-oriented agribusiness, the urban water supply sector, and other stakeholders), the idea that problems should be solved with less control from the top down and more local control and initiatives has spawned proposals for less “state-centered” policies. still, these latest, especially market-oriented, models reflect a universalizing bias by offering blanket prescriptions for the vast diversity of local contexts (boelens et al., 2012). further, the approach of “normative decentralization” in water governance often has a privatizing, individualizing aim, clearly working against collective water management by rural and indigenous communities (achterhuis, boelens, & zwarteveen, 2012; bakker, 2010). as observed by assies (2012), the neoliberal model and its policies are not just economic, but include a cultural program which is a powerful tool to establish a particular, market-based relationship among the state, the market, and civil society stakeholders (cf. foucault, 1991). rather than establishing strategies or policies seeking collective action, new neoliberal policies create competition for water and foster speculation by current users and by new economic agents (achterhuis et al., 2012). water rights and water security frameworks in andean countries’ highland communities and tropical rain forest indigenous territories differ from privatized models by featuring collective, territorial water rights. as getches (2012) argues, indigenous peoples' ability to perform water-dependent vocations, such as farming, strategizing interconnected livelihood activities, perpetuating territorial cultures, and keeping alive spiritual practices, depends on achieving success in limiting the encroachment of incompatible political, economic, and legal practices embodied in the economic policies and water laws of host nations and transnational actors (manosalvas, 2012; roa-avendaño & duarte, 2011; cf. vera, 2011a, 2011b). this challenge has been enormously difficult in most latin american countries; as barkin (2009) observes regarding the construction of mega-projects that reconstruct indigenous territories, “the dams and massive floods are designed to remake topography in a gigantic effort to restructure the region’s economy and place it at the service of international capital. little consideration is accorded to the 1 boelens et al.: contested territories published by scholarship@western, 2012 millions of people in communities that have tried to manage these ecosystems and protect their resources, while forging a society and economy that takes the biosphere’s needs into account” (p. 10). this paper analyzes the ways in which indigenous water sources, water rights, and territories in the andean countries are contested. the next section briefly examines how local water uses and rights are embedded in indigenous territories and how the development of large-scale water infrastructure projects by national policies and transnational interest groups threatens and even undermines local, water-based livelihoods of indigenous communities. section three presents three common, illustrative cases: the water territory of the embera katio communities in colombia is encroached on by a large-scale hydropower development project; the indigenous highland territory of the ecuadorian oyacachi community is invaded by a megacity drinking water development project; and the indigenous peasant communities in the colca valley of peru are dried out by a large-scale agribusiness irrigation project. section four examines the responses of the indigenous peoples and communities, in terms of their strategies to defend themselves against these encroachment policies and practices. section five presents the overall conclusions, locating the three countries’ experiences in the wider socio-political context of latin american power structures and water governance arenas. indigenous territories and disputed waters in the demands and struggles by rural and indigenous peoples in latin america, defending and recovering their territories is a central goal. regarding the territorial rights of indigenous peoples, the international labour organization (ilo, 1989) agreement 169 urges governments to recognize “ownership and possession of the peoples concerned over the lands which they traditionally occupy” (article 14, item 1) and safeguard the right to use land to which they have traditionally had access for their livelihoods. article 15 (item 1) adds that, “these rights include the right of these peoples to participate in the use, management and conservation of these resources.” such provisions, like others in various international agreements and conventions on indigenous rights to water (for a broad overview see getches, 2012), are a great step forward in defending territorial rights. even so, in the andean countries – in those few cases when governments pay any attention to the conventions that they have signed – it is common for them to attempt to limit application to a geographical-biophysical space with rigid boundaries, although the indigenous peoples view a territory as a whole and not a sum of its parts. therefore, in the eyes of these peoples, territories cannot be divided up or sectioned (manosalvas, 2012; roa-avendaño, 2012). for indigenous peoples, claims of territory include, on the one hand, taking control, use, enjoyment, and management of the natural resources in their territory and, on the other, being able to make decisions about political, economic, social, and cultural issues (gelles, 2012; roa-avendaño & duarte, 2011). an initial approach to the complex definition of water territories involves those situations in which local peoples and communities take responsibility for managing their co-existence with society, nature, and agroecology around them sustainably, and struggle against control externalization. “this process implies the active construction and reconstruction of ‘water territory’ as a socioproductive, cultural and political living space and ‘home-base’, as a rooted and multi-layered ‘political water community’, as a scheme of mutual belonging that enables the rebirth of collective imagination. such water territories involve socio-natural webs with landscapes and waterscapes in which people live and make livelihoods and identities, for which people feel responsible, in which they are morally involved” (boelens et al., 2012, p. 19). obviously, local communities, immersed in unequal power relationships and globalizing contexts, do not always achieve such lasting management. further, other external (and generally more powerful) stakeholders have their own definitions and constructs regarding the meaning of “territory.” roa-avendaño & duarte (2011) argue that, in political and economic practice, territories are configured through social and power relations, so that externally imposed spatial organization generates contradictions with local cultural referents and senses of identity. these modern mindsets that define control over territory are often based on individual economic interests that are legitimized through concepts of development and progress and ignore cultural diversity and indigenous livelihoods. therefore, not only stakeholders and entities, but also different 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.5 worldviews and political frameworks, face off when the fundamental aim is to define, organize, and defend water territory (hinojosa et al., 2012; cf. manosalvas, 2012). to understand territorial and water rights according to local concepts, there are many elements that will be overlooked when applying an approach that is simply “functionalist and productivist”; for example, the right to water is located not only in technical, organizational, and economic settings, but also in political, cultural, and even ethical, religious, and epistemological domains (boelens & gelles, 2005). the rules, rights, and duties related to water are closely linked with cultural systems of meanings, symbols, and values. in many communities, control over, and distribution of, water are profoundly involved in both human and supernatural or spiritual institutions and relations; both are viewed as elements that influence and define control over water. expressly or implicitly, supernatural authority often reinforces the legitimacy of a particular human authority and action; communities turn to symbolic and religious powers to control water and regulate families’ behavior, either unconsciously or with clearly practical purposes, for example, agroproductive or political aims (boelens, 2009; hinojosa et al., 2012; roa-avendaño, 2012; cf. vera, 2011a) so, water control, use, and rights are embedded in historical and context-specific relationships determining the nature, value, and function of water, which ties them closely to the identity of the communities holding such rights. in this context, water, land, territory, and community form a whole that must be viewed in its entirety, without denying that each element also has its own specific features. recognizing these interrelationships present a major challenge to bureaucratic and neoliberal policies that assume people put aside their social identities and relations for “rational, efficient water management.” for rural communities and indigenous peoples, water is one of many elements that inhabitants share, one part of the multiple relations among them (arroyo & boelens, 1997; de vos, boelens, & bustamante, 2006). modernist water policies, training, and intervention programs, indeed, tend to portray such local views on water and territory as “traditional” (and not as dynamically constructed in current, globalizing times) and “backward.” they often have the implicit objective of protecting local water user communities from their own perverse, backward identities and limited water cultures, supposedly freeing them from their inefficient, irrational water rights systems. it is commonly thought that legal training, schooling in expert-based frames of water rights and techniques, development of water markets, and correction or formalization of their informalities is required for those supposedly excluded from modernity to be included – through adequately adapting the inadequate, consciousness-raising among the unconscious, and capacity-building with the incapable (boelens, 2009). as the following cases testify, water reforms and intervention programs, commonly presented as sets of neutral, scientifically objective government techniques to foster progress, have deeply social, political, and cultural consequences for existing indigenous territories and water rights collectives (achterhuis et al., 2012). they are attempting self-reproduction – crafting a water world after their own likeness (boelens, 2009). although they explicitly claim to promote respect for local territorial and water rights, most contemporary latin-american nation states have promoted a form of multiculturalism that actually destroys collective management of water territories whenever the market’s rules of play are not followed (assies, 2012). with the latest neoliberal wave in the andean countries, which is fostered by banks and international agencies and by states themselves, globalizing forces strengthen the market-based institutional models that threaten to co-opt local territorial systems and community management forms (bakker, 2010; hendriks, 2012; perreault, 2008). 3 boelens et al.: contested territories published by scholarship@western, 2012 illustrations in cases from colombia, ecuador, and peru colonization of the embera katio people’s river territory in colombia the embera katio1 indigenous territory has been subjected to successive waves of pressure throughout history, disputing access to and control over the natural assets of the sinú river valley.2 colonization to extract timber, appropriation of land for agriculture, and intensive livestock raising have broken down this indigenous people’s territorial structures. further, penetration by, and confrontations among, armed groups have forced these communities to displace toward the outskirts of municipal areas. throughout these processes, the inter-american development bank has generated study guidelines for integrated development of the sinú watershed to regulate and control the river to generate electricity, increase productivity, and develop land in the river valley. the urrá hydropower development project was conceived starting in the mid-twentieth century, and, despite decades of indigenous protests, the urrá s.a. multipurpose company began construction in 1993 during columbia’s energy crisis. this occurred after the institute of renewable natural resources (inderena – now the ministry of environment) granted the environmental license to build a major reservoir 30 kilometers upriver from the municipality of tierralta, córdoba. although the project would seriously affect the embera katio people, small communities of fishers, and indigenous people in the lower sinú basin, none of them were consulted, despite colombia’s 1991 constitution (and law 21) that recognizes ethnic communities’ right to prior consultation and to taking part in decisions about projects or works affecting their territories. this urrá i hydropower dam began operating in 2000, but its severe consequences, including the flooding of 7,400 hectares and displacement of communities, were visible long before. the urrá company took advantage of the growing conflicts, outside pressures, and internal divisions among the indigenous people to push through the approval license for new mega-hydraulic plans quickly (the sinú project, also called urrá ii). the government did not take a neutral position or guarantee the customary rights proclaimed in the constitution; instead, it supported the company’s economic interests. the alliance between political power and geo-territorial interest groups, intimately linked to economic power, stood in the way of any genuine public involvement of local communities. the indigenous communities reject this new urrá project because the mega-project will transform and fragment their territory and destroy the river and its aquatic wealth. water has been fundamental in the embera katio culture, in economic, ecological, social, and cultural terms. in fact, for these indigenous groups, the most important myth involves the origin of water. in this myth, the emberas’ main cultural hero, karagabí, rescues the water from stingy people so all emberas can enjoy it. the felling of the large jenené tree by karagabí created all the rivers, wetlands, creeks, and lakes and compensated for the pettiness of jenzerá, the ant who had accumulated and appropriated the water flows. the embera katío believe that water, like all of nature, belongs to all people, so everyone is responsible for conserving it (jaramillo, 2011). before paramilitary forces assassinated him for defending the river and its people, indigenous leader, kimy pernía domicó, said, “sure, we said that karagabí left this legacy, that he created water so everyone can use it ... because otherwise, we emberas would disappear, or be cursed by karagabí for betraying his legacy (…)” 1 the embera katios are an indigenous people of the karib language family, originating in the amazon region. when the spanish invaded the americas, they migrated following the negro and orinoco rivers down to the caribbean coasts, and mainly settled in the pacific region. the embera katio people of the upper sinú, descendants of a group of the migrants, number about 3,200 and are located in 19 communities scattered along the sinú (keradó), esmeralda (kuranzadó), and verde (iwagadó) rivers (jaramillo, 2011). 2 the sinú basin starts at the paramillo knot (at 3960 m altitude). it covers an area of 1,207,000 hectares and is 415 kilometers long, crossing south to north through the department of córdoba and emptying at the mouth of tinajones, across from the caribbean sea (roa-avendaño, 2010). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.5 (personal communication, 2010).3 the indigenous people defend their territory because they believe that their community’s survival depends on the life of the river – damming and deviating the river’s water would mean death for the embera-katio culture. their diet is based on the protein provided by the great abundance of fish in the rivers and creeks of the sinú basin, complemented by banana, manioc, and rice they grow on the floodplains. the new approach to controlling water – building the first urrá dam and deviating the river – led to the end of their fishing. numerous species have disappeared. further, their survival as a people is jeopardized as their livelihood and traditional knowledge about the river’s natural dynamics can no longer be applied and their cultural and economic meaning is being lost. for decades, the indigenous people, together with peasant and fishing communities of the lower basin, have been struggling against de-territorialization driven by this hydroelectric mega-project. sometimes they were successful in court challenges; for example, the constitutional court, in its t-652 ruling in 1998, supported the embera people’s rights, ... constructing the civil works of the urrá i hydroelectric plant was more harmful for the cultural and economic life of the embera katío people in the upper sinú valley, than the territorial pressure and lack of recognition that they had been subjected to since the spanish conquest: such works not only constitute another territorial pressure, but made it absolutely impossible for these people to continue their livelihoods of hunting, gathering and itinerant crops, that enabled them to survive for centuries without degrading the fragile tropical rain forest environment that is their home (cited in baleta, 2006, p. 29). but such rulings did not diminish outside economic and political pressures for continuing large-scale infrastructure building. hydropower plants are temples of modernity, representing human progress in dominating nature (mccully, 2004). leader kimy pernía never doubted that the ongoing hydroelectric project had the purpose of drying the wetlands in the lower basin, to be taken over by the region’s wealthy cattle ranchers and agroindustrialists. to this respect, alfredo molano (cited in roa-avendaño, 2010) relates that these ranchers would do anything to dry up the indigenous wetlands to expand their haciendas. he explains how, since the 1950s, politicians, businesspersons, and hacienda owners have dreamt of plans to regulate water. in doing so, the irrigation districts and hydropower plants have created large societal confrontations. the words of kimy pernía give us a glimpse into the far-reaching tragedy engulfing the lives of indigenous communities in the last few years: i learned about development about 20 years ago, when a priest named betancur told us that, if we didn’t accept the dam, we would go to hell. what development has meant for us has been to trample our rights, kill our fish, divide our community, and murder lucindo domicó. ... development has flooded 28 of our sacred places. (pernía domicó, 2011, p. 41) for centuries the indigenous peoples of the lower sinú have had access to a thriving amphibian culture created by the natural flooding in the lower basin (fals borda, 2002). despite this, politicians and environmental authorities in the region used “flood control” as their banner for social consensus behind building the dam. in july 2007, the lower sinú basin was impacted by severe floods, demonstrating that controlling the river’s flow was more to dry up land for export-oriented enclaves than to curb flooding (leguizamón, 2010). the embera katios have publicly denounced the way that public entities and officials have lied to the indigenous people. the harshest criticism has been for the minister of environment then in office. pernía 3 interview with kimy pernía domicó in leguizamón. kimy pernía domicó was one of the most important indigenous leaders of the embera katío resistance against the urra hydroelectric project. he was murdered on june 2, 2001, by the orders of carlos castaño, a paramilitary leader, in tierralta, córdoba. he was killed and his body dismembered, then thrown into the sinú river. 5 boelens et al.: contested territories published by scholarship@western, 2012 domicó (2011) denounced, “first he authorized the pre-filling (of the reservoir) without any consultation. then he tried to fool our elder nokos to get them to authorize filling the reservoir, agreeing to consult about it afterward. [...] then, on the license, he ignored the entire proposal by the embera katío people” (p. 41). further, a study by the ministries of mines and energy and the environment to assess the urrá project found large deficiencies in the project’s environmental impact study, for example, regarding water quality impacts throughout the basin and the negative effects that the salt wedge would have at the mouth of the river (pernía domicó, 2011, p. 43). these are just a few of the most serious impacts that both fishers and indigenous people warned about before the project was built. the tragedy, one in a lengthy series, closely reflects the title of a work by colombian writer gabriel garcía-márquez – chronicle of a death foretold. generating water scarcity and conflict in the territory of oyacachi, ecuador a second illustration, apparently quite different but confronting a political process with very similar features, comes from oyacachi, an indigenous territory in the high andean zone of northern ecuador. oyacachi is a community of indigenous people of cayambi origin who fled from the highlands during the war of conquest by the incas in the second half of the fifteenth century, took refuge, and made their livelihoods on the eastern slopes of snowcapped mt. cayambe (ayala-mora, 2008). oyacachi, like many other indigenous communities in ecuador’s highlands, achieved legal recognition as a “community” in 1939, after uprisings about land and the headway by the indigenous movement in the early twentieth century. the community is inside the cayambe-coca national park, located in a high-altitude andean valley from 1,600 meters up to 4,300 meters. in the last 20 years, this community has lost its obscurity and become a national, even international, center of attention. this notoriety has several sources. on the one hand, scientists and conservationists are interested in the remarkable, unique biodiversity of these andean forests and páramos (high-altitude moorlands), complemented by the scenic beauty, hot springs, and their distinctive handicrafts. however, the greatest interest focuses on the páramos in their territory, where many important water sources are located. this water is fundamental to local people, but it also has many other users, especially to the west, where it is used for human consumption, irrigation, energy, industry, and domestic use. one of the main water users is the capital city, quito, with over two million inhabitants. quito has tapped the water from the surrounding páramos since precolonial times, but in the last few decades the city’s rapid growth and unbridled demand for water have driven municipal authorities to seek and use ever-more-distant sources, which are very complex to manage (swyngedouw, 2004). at this time, quito is using water coming from the territory of its metropolitan district, but also from other cantons in the province of pichincha and even other provinces, such as napo and cotopaxi. this trend has reached the extreme with water from sources that naturally flow to the amazon basin being transferred westward and tapped. the metropolitan public water supply and sanitation enterprise of quito (emaap-q) began one of its main projects to supply water to the capital in 1987, by applying to access water from the páramos in the national park – an ecological reserve (a less restrictive category for human activities within the national protected areas system in ecuador). some páramos belonged to oyacachi territory, so quito formulated its major papallacta project, which was completed in 1990. the construction of phase two, called “optimizing the papallacta system,” was completed in 2002 and included the building of a dam with a storage capacity of 12.5 mcm (million cubic meters) to meet 75 percent of the city’s demand (fonag cited in ffla, 2010). the project included the use of water from rivers that supply the salvefaccha waterfall, which is important to the community of oyacachi for both spiritual reasons (many of the community’s rituals and myths involve it) and ecological and economic practices (this zone oxygenates the water for their fish populations). at the same time, damming water sources with the salvefaccha dam also affected other indigenous communities, including inhabitants of the cangahua zone, the driest and most eroded area on the western slopes of mt. cayambe. the 48 farming communities located there, organized under the guanguilquí6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.5 porotog board (legalized in 1988), have a long background of fighting for their land and water rights. guanguilquí-porotog was granted a water concession in 1993 from the salvefaccha and tumiguina rivers, but in 1995 the water enterprise applied for and obtained the same concessions. a rush for water concessions began, with emaap-q racing against the guanguilquí-porotog board and the community of oyacachi. this race was encouraged by the national water resource council (now called senagua, national water secretary), the top government regulator governing water in ecuador, which recommended applying for concessions before someone else got them.4 this encroachment by a state project, in this case a powerful municipality, is reflected in the history of its planning and implementation. the community of oyacachi only learned of the salvefaccha dam construction in 1996 when the building company’s machinery moved into their territory. at the time, the community complained about the company trespassing on their indigenous territory, but their indignation turned to protests and mobilizations that stopped the construction and obliged the water enterprise to sit down at the negotiation table. in compensation for the environmental and social damage, the community asked for a series of basic facilities for their village, such as water supply, sewerage, and access roads – the enterprise only provided a water supply. deviation of indigenous community water from the colca river to the pampas de majes, peru as in the colombian and ecuadorian cases, peru’s recent history is replete with conflicts over land and water. in these clashes, the indigenous peoples and rural communities are being deprived of their territories and livelihoods by development policy that grants priority to “national progress by hydraulic mega-projects.” the majes project is a prime example. the colca river, the main tributary of the colca-majes-camaná basin that includes the andes and part of the arequipa coast, is 300 km long. the upper part of the basin has a damp, cold climate with an average annual precipitation of 630 mm. this zone is one of the most important fresh water reserves for the arequipa region. raising alpaca is one of this region’s most important small-farmer economic activities. the intermediate part of the basin has a temperate climate, averaging 482 mm of rainfall annually, concentrated in three months of the year (january-march). this zone of the colca valley is home to 6,000 families living in 16 rural towns or communities. residents of these valley communities have farmed since long before the incan empire. due to the scarcity of rainfall, agriculture depends mainly on irrigation. ancestors living in this area gained nearly 12,000 hectares of farmland by building terraces and irrigation systems that are still being used today. however, consecutive policies of marginalization over the years have prevented maintenance of the irrigation infrastructure; therefore, two thirds of the terraces are no longer irrigated (denevan, 1986). farmers from several communities must irrigate their crops every 70 to 90 days, and, in each community in the colca valley, all the productive, social, cultural, and political activities revolve around water. their cultural identity is based on water, so the water authorities, irrigation organization, rituals, traditions, and norms for water management play a preponderant role in community dynamics. the lower colca-majes-camaná basin has a dry, tropical climate. on the desert plains of majes and siguas in this zone, there is practically no rain. here the pampas are “cut” in a u shape by the colca river (also called the majes river and then the camaná river along its way toward the ocean) and the siguas river, forming narrow inter-coastal valleys (100-1,000 meters wide), where agriculture is highly productive, due to the fertility of their alluvial soil. for decades politicians and engineers in arequipa have dreamed of progress and development based on highly modern agriculture by irrigating 22,000 hectares of the desert pampas of majes flower (and 4 personal communication, cristóbal ascanta, president of oyacachi local government, february 1, 2011. 7 boelens et al.: contested territories published by scholarship@western, 2012 subsequently 34,000 hectares in the pampas of siguas), but they have lacked the resources (water and funding) to make this project possible. in 1946, pre-feasibility studies proposed to store and transfer the water of the colca river in the upper basin. in 1971, with support from the world bank, the inter-american development bank, and other international banks, the government offered all its support to commence this project. the majes consortium (macon), comprising international companies from switzerland, england, spain, canada, and south africa, was to handle all the majes irrigation project (pim) construction, beginning in 1972. macon used the latest cutting-edge technology (laser beams) for the water transfer, at an exorbitant cost (us$1.32 billion, part of the foreign debt), so the investment was us$88,000 per hectare – extremely high for anywhere in the world – bearing in mind that by 2007 the pim had made 15,000 hectares usable for agriculture. the average cost to make a hectare of land usable for agriculture in other irrigation projects on the coast was us $6,500 (vera, 2011a, 2011b; vera & zwarteveen, 2008). an amazing feature of the pim is that it failed to consider the rural indigenous communities of the colca valley as direct project beneficiaries, although their water needs were urgent when the project feasibility studies were being prepared. on the contrary, the water sources of almost half the communities were seriously affected (dried up) by construction of the pim’s hydraulic infrastructure. villagers have had to fight for many years to be considered beneficiaries. ironically, up to 2009, the peruvian government had invested only us$311 per hectare (0.35% of pim spending) to improve and rehabilitate the irrigation infrastructure for the 6,000 farmers in the colca valley (atdr, 2006). in 1983, macon finished building the hydraulic infrastructure and the transfer of water began that same year. that infrastructure included, among other facilities, the condoroma dam, a mega-dam constructed right on the river at 4,158 meters altitude, with the capacity to dam up 285 mcm. from this dam, water is released (through a regulated flow of some 8 m3/sec) into the colca river, and the flow is dammed 70 km downriver again at the dam-intake of tuti,5 where another approximately 276 mmc of water joins it from the uppermiddle part of the colca-majes-camaná basin. at tuti, the river’s full flow is deviated and transferred to another river, the siguas river, through a canal 100 km long (of which 88 km are tunnels) crossing the rocky andes running along the whole left edge of the colca valley. deviating the entire flow of the river, the project affects the fish population (the population’s main food source) downriver and the watershed runs the risk of drying up (at least during the nine months of no rain), since only little creeks run crosswise into the valley. several indigenous communities had to forget their dreams of getting irrigation water from the colca river downstream from the tuti intake. the pim canal has the capacity to conduct up to 34 m3/sec of water. current flow through the canal is 10 to 15 m3/sec. it is planned to use the canal’s full capacity when the majes ii project is built, leading all the water downstream to the land of the agro-export industries and wealthier agri-biz farms. from 2004 to 2008 the government implemented the program to formalize water use rights (profodua),6 also with support from international banks, to register (legalize) water use rights with public registers on an individual and block level (the term “collective right” was avoided). profodua has basically formalized water rights for irrigation users on the coast; funds ran out when they began to work in the andes. by 2007 profodua had granted 278,119 users water rights, of which 78 percent were males (guerrero, 2007). in the case of pim, profodua formalized the usage rights for 2,587 users, recognizing the water volume being used at the time. in short, this means that 560 mmc of water are legally registered for the pim. 5 tuti is one of the first communities in the mid-high basin where agricultural activities begin. upstream only livestock and fishing activities are possible. 6 profodua is a program implemented to meet the requirements for the free trade agreement (fta) between peru and the united states. this “formalization”, although not explicitly set forth in the legal wording, includes (among other administrative procedures) public registration of usage rights to certain volumes of water. such rights may be traded or exchanged by their holders, which, in practice, means a water rights market. the program is totally implemented with public and international (idb) funding by atdr (now ala) technicians and supervised by the intendence of water resources of inrena. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.5 other users, such as rural indigenous communities in the colca valley, can no longer access the water that is dammed up in tuti. on the contrary, they are accused of affecting the river’s ecological flow, since one of the towns ventured to build – with their own efforts – an intake and canal to use the remaining water of the colca, downstream from the tuti dam. defending territory and water: responses by indigenous population groups amidst seriously unequal power structures, combining class-based subordination with racism grounded in notions of western-modern superiority versus indigenous inferiority, indigenous peoples and rural indigenous communities have not been silent victims of this capitalist usurpation and accumulation. under complex conditions, they pursue their strategies of resistance and defense, openly and undercover. this resistance, however, as the cases show, takes place under extremely difficult circumstances and in contexts of outright plunder, often including tragic and violent loss of lives. the embera katio people in colombia, for example, have had to struggle for self-defense in a dramatically militarized, violent context. over 20 of their leaders have been assassinated, and others have disappeared or been displaced.7 their fight became public with the dowabura,8 in november 1994, navigating down the sinú river. approximately 700 embera katío indigenous started off on rafts from the high andean forest headwaters of the river and continued down to lorica, córdoba, near the caribbean sea, to make the impacts that the dam would have on their territory visible. subsequently, they occupied the embassy of sweden, where they signed an agreement to be compensated for the damage caused by the hydropower for flooding their territory.9 non-compliance with these agreements led them, in december 1999, to peacefully occupy the offices of the ministry of environment, in bogotá, after a 700-kilometer march by 700 indigenous. when they were ousted and repressed, they took over the ministry’s gardens, with support from the fishers of the lower basin. this sit-in lasted until an agreement was reached with the company after several months; the agreement, however, was never fully kept. this political mobilization was supported by, and coordinated with, other indigenous actions, such as the u'wa people versus the petroleum industry. political action by the embera katio people achieved a major national and international impact. the indigenous leaders made several tours around the country and visited the countries that economically supported the project to demand that the work be suspended. they have also used intense legal mobilization, with support from various scholars and attorneys. in over 15 years, the embera katio people have coordinated different strategies to defend their territory, including social mobilization and political and legal actions; however, the core of their struggle has been cultural resistance. the embera katio decided that the water origin myth should become the force mobilizing their people to face the threats to their territory. like the great tree, jenené, the emberas should feed and hold fast to their roots: territory, organization, nature, and culture. “this bridge based on cultural roots and worldviews, to analyze the problems of the embera katio people of karagabí, enabled to established strong communication among the leaders and their communities” (jaramillo, 2011, p. 59). at this time, resistance by the indigenous and fishers aims to prevent progress with the project’s second phase: construction of the urrá ii hydroelectric plant. likewise, in the case of oyacachi, ecuador, since 1998 there have been community struggles using several defense strategies, including the judiciary. in 1998, the community of oyacachi obtained water concessions to seven mineral water springs and 18 hot springs located in the micro-watershed of the cunuyacu river. that same year, emaap-q realized that those concessions were in the zone where the salvefaccha dam was to be 7 the rich embera katio territory has been disputed by guerrilla and paramilitary groups because of its geo-strategic location. the paramillo natural national park that coincides with the indigenous territory makes it possible to control exit routes from the interior toward the gulf of uraba and of morrosquillo in the caribbean, and traffic between the caribbean and the pacific. 8 “dowabura” in the embera language means “saying farewell to the river.” 9 the flooding affected more than 7,000 hectares and displaced about 130 embera katio families. 9 boelens et al.: contested territories published by scholarship@western, 2012 built in the future. by holding protests and marches the indigenous community forced the state to renegotiate and redesign the intervention. the recognition of water concession ownership was one of the reasons the company finally decided to compensate the community for the damage caused. in 2001, an economic indemnity of approximately us$65,000 was agreed upon as an initial sum, with annual payments to be made for 47 years starting the first year of operation. outside intervention could also be confronted by reaching an agreement with the ministry of environment under which the territory of oyacachi was expanded, whereby both parties would examine, analyze, and approve or reject any project in which third parties, including local, provincial, regional, and national government entities, wanted to use or extract natural and cultural resources from the area. with the public deed and agreement with the ministry of environment, oyacachi made its claim to emaap-q, justifying the ownership of 44,500 hectares (11% of the national park) (lasso, 2011). further, they complained to the ministry of environment for having left them alone in this situation. unfortunately, the dispute over these water resources has made relations between the indigenous communities of cangahua (guanguilquí-porotog board) and oyacachi, once based on marriage alliances, barter, and other exchange arrangements, antagonistic. this conflict has worsened with the intervention by emaap-q. the guanguilquí-porotog board receives 250 l/s of water from the salvefaccha dam to continue with the canal project (mainly for irrigation, but also for domestic use), while people of oyacachi feel they have been shortchanged and, sooner or later, the water supply for a growing community with large-scale tourism projects will be insufficient. in the colca valley in peru, indigenous peasants have also reacted in different ways to the majes irrigation project. local folk initially collaborated with the macon company with the understanding that the pim was going to provide water to satisfy their irrigation needs. they provided labor and their draft animals to haul construction material, food, housing, and water to mix tons of cement. they even let the company destroy their terraces of crops to construct (temporary) roads and dry up local water sources to open up the canals and tunnels. however, they found, to their great surprise and disappointment, that the project had excluded them. in 1975 canocota, a town located near the dam-intake of tuti, reacted by demanding that pim construct a new bridge because the only bridge existing at the location, one that was made by the communities themselves, was being used by heavy equipment to transport construction materials and it soon started to collapse. then cabanaconde, a town located almost at the end of colca valley, began holding peaceful protests, at first calling on the government to include them as beneficiaries. however, after being ignored and urgently needing water, they were forced to dynamite a stretch of the imposing majes canal in 1983. following this act, their leaders were imprisoned and the townspeople were accused of being terrorists, very dangerous accusations in those years when the shining path was up in arms (see gelles, 2002, 2012). however, after a series of negotiations, several water valves were installed to provide a total of 350 l/s of water. following this action, eight towns on the left side of the valley were encouraged to join together and demand that the government open up more water valves for their communities also. their claims were disregarded. officials refused to attend the public meetings, listen to the complaints, or allow community committee members at the negotiation table. indigenous women representatives of the committee decided to bring the government authority on board by force. they dragged off the top government representative (subprefect) and dunked him completely in the water tank of the main fountain of chivay, capital of the province of caylloma. they purposely created the metaphor of drowning the official in water that was “stolen” from them. they wanted the authorities and politicians to understand that they were ready to do anything in order to get back the water that had dried up (see vera, 2011a). finally, the eight towns got their hearing, but the allocated water did not cover the local irrigation needs. communities, such as pinchollo, were forced to illegally make their own valves to access canal water (in 2005). they are currently being punished by the government and have to pay a fine for breaking the state water law. the community of coporaque has also responded by building an intake and canal seven kilometers downriver from the tuti intake to satisfy their irrigation needs and demanding their rights to use the water 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.5 from the colca river. initially, four towns on the right side joined together to negotiate with the pim management, asking them to let some water run downstream and conduct it to a multi-community canal in a future project. when the pim authorities refused and the government displayed apathy, the four towns desisted; only coporaque persisted with the project and managed to build a canal. with tremendous work and 25 years of struggle, they now have access to 280 l/s of water, but this canal is used only at one third or sometimes half its capacity because there is no water in the river. the town of coporaque has not yet given up. conclusions the variety of indigenous peoples and rural communities in the andean countries with their own repertoires, symbols, normative meanings, and substantial local economies represent specific historical and cultural arrangements in the collective management of natural resources in particular territories. however, this does not lend itself to romantization or folklorization. in this age of neoliberal globalization, the political, economic, cultural, and ecological dynamics interact with local indigenous systems in the management of water and demand for innovative solutions to problems in the constantly changing situations. this paper has analyzed how economically and politically powerful agents, such as national governments and multinational companies interested in large-scale water development projects, have intervened in, undermined, and “disembedded” the water uses and rights of indigenous communities, profoundly challenging the integrity of their territorial livelihoods. water territories and water management collectives of the embera katio people in colombia, the oyacachi community in ecuador, and the colca valley indigenous peasant communities in peru have been confronted with fierce encroachment practices. this often takes place under the banner of “participatory policies” and “multicultural recognition” – which are explicit components of the legislative frameworks in all three countries. similarly, in all the countries the official policy discourses strongly defend these projects in the name of progress, modernization, and development. hence, the politics of the co-optation of local communities and factions is an important ingredient. the dramatic and increasing influences of globalizing neoliberalism clearly show that national and international government or marketbased policies do not attempt to adapt to local contexts – as the participatory discourses advocate – rather, they seek to transform and control these locally particular territorial spaces. there is an ongoing and intensively growing effort to reorient the geopolitical configuration and make waterscapes and territories serve the demands of the world market (barkin, 2009; mccully, 2004; swyngedouw, 2004). such external encroachment and control projects, however, require more than enacting new laws and policies. a new water-political order becomes institutionalized in local societies only when it becomes integrated within its economic, moral, and ideological structure. laws cannot act; only societal forces can shape such change. water user collectives, peasant communities, and indigenous peoples in andean countries often manage to resist externally-imposed policies that attempt to impose “normalization” and take control of water rights and management systems. their resistance in the water domain includes opposing distributive inequalities of the benefits and burdens of water access and development, resisting non-democratic forms of representation, and challenging the rules of the game and the politics of water, territory, and identity themselves. indeed, since power games in the andean water control arenas show the intimate links between socio-economic exploitation and cultural-symbolic subordination (being distinct, but intertwined, in multistranded ways), the struggles for alternatives also dynamically combine strategies and claims for economic redistribution, on the one hand, and cultural justice, political representation, and democracy, on the other. many peasant and indigenous water user collectives and federations gain political effectiveness by combining class and identity struggles. their struggles to re-appropriate or defend their water sources simultaneously seek to decolonize the modernist water cultures and defy the individualistic, profit-maximizing, or statedependent user identities they were assigned (boelens, 2009). as the cases from colombia, peru, and ecuador have made clear, indigenous peoples contest the undermining and subordination of their water and territorial rights through a myriad of multi-scalar 11 boelens et al.: contested territories published by scholarship@western, 2012 livelihood defense strategies. this harsh, extremely difficult, unequal fight necessarily involves strategic choices and changes, in their productive, technological, and ecological foundations, as well as their cultural, political, and normative institutions. thus, by defending their water and territorial rights systems, they simultaneously re-create and re-shape them. in the end, resistance to modernist water reforms, neo-colonial normalization, and neoliberal market-led encroachment is both about securing access to water and other inseparable socio-natural territorial components and continuing to exist as territory-based political and cultural communities. in this respect, the challenges that indigenous peoples in the andean countries face are enormous and mounting daily. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 3 [2012], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.5 references achterhuis, h., boelens, r., & zwarteveen, m. 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(2011b). la seguridad hídrica y los procesos de acumulación de los derechos de uso del agua en los andes: una cuestión de política cultural’. in r. boelens, l. cremers, & m. zwarteveen (eds.), justicia hídrica: acumulación, conflicto y acción social (pp. 431-452). lima: iep & fondo editorial pucp. vera, j., & zwarteveen, m. (2008). modernity, exclusion and resistance: water and indigenous struggles in peru. water for people. development, 51(1), 114-120. 15 boelens et al.: contested territories published by scholarship@western, 2012 the international indigenous policy journal september 2012 contested territories: water rights and the struggles over indigenous livelihoods rutgerd boelens bibiana duarte rossana manosalvas patricio mena tatinana roa avendaño see next page for additional authors recommended citation contested territories: water rights and the struggles over indigenous livelihoods abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license authors microsoft word 316200-text.native.1351779630.doc success in closing the socio-economic gap, but still a long way to go: urban aboriginal disadvantage, trauma, and racism in the australian city of newcastle the international indigenous policy journal volume 10 | issue 1 article 3 january 2019 success in closing the socio-economic gap, but still a long way to go: urban aboriginal disadvantage, trauma, and racism in the australian city of newcastle deirdre howard-wagner australian national university, deirdre.howard-wagner@anu.edu.au recommended citation howard-wagner, d. (2019). success in closing the socio-economic gap, but still a long way to go: urban aboriginal disadvantage, trauma, and racism in the australian city of newcastle. the international indigenous policy journal, 10(1). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.3 success in closing the socio-economic gap, but still a long way to go: urban aboriginal disadvantage, trauma, and racism in the australian city of newcastle abstract the research presented in this article is based on a four-year place-based qualitative case study of aboriginal success in addressing aboriginal disadvantage in the australian city of newcastle. the article presents extracts from in-depth interviews with aboriginal people working on a day-to-day basis with aboriginal and/or torres strait islander people experiencing disadvantage in this city. interviewees define indigenous disadvantage in a way that differs considerably from how it is defined in mainstream policy circles. they describe indigenous disadvantage as being grounded in the histories of social exclusion from australian society, rather than merely a contemporary phenomenon related socio-economic factors (i.e., lack of educational and employment opportunities). they indicated that it was (a) closely tied to aboriginal experiences of displacement and trauma; (b) not just a material problem but a historical and social structural problem; and (c) unique to each community. for instance, urban indigenous disadvantage is distinct from indigenous disadvantage in remote areas. this supports the claims of indigenous sociologist maggie walter (2009). in doing so, the article more strongly aligns with a critique of a neo-liberal racial project, which defines indigenous disadvantage within an individualistic framework of individual rights and in terms of socioeconomic gaps, from the voices of aboriginal representatives. keywords urban indigenous disadvantage, racism, colonisation, indigenous policy, aboriginal and torres straight islander, australia acknowledgments this article is produced from a study titled indigenous societies, governance and wellbeing: indigenous success in addressing indigenous disadvantage and improving indigenous wellbeing, which was made possible through the australian research council’s discovery early career research award funding scheme (project number de120100798). the views expressed herein are those of the author and are not necessarily those of the australian research council. this research has benefited enormously from, and would not be the same without, lengthy discussions and engagement with local aboriginal people during the design, development, and feedback phases of the project. it would not have been possible without the contribution of interviewees who collaborated in the research. i thank everyone for their generosity, not only for sharing their time in discussing the research design, but also for participating in lengthy, meaningful interviews and sharing their knowledge, stories and rich understandings. disclaimer although this research is based on comprehensive in-depth interviews with aboriginal people who were generous and willing participants in this research, i would like to note, by way of respect to them, that this paper does not "speak for" or represent an indigenous voice, or claim an indigenous authority. aboriginal interviewees were given opportunities to comment on the findings of this research in the form of three discussion forums held in april 2014, november 2015, and march 2017. they also saw a first and second draft of a lengthy community report that was circulated in november 2015 and march 2016, and earlier and later versions of the discussion paper that were circulated in october and november 2016. however, the writing of this article involves a non-indigenous researcher imposing their theoretical and analytical understanding onto data that were collected from in-depth interviews with aboriginal people. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. this research is available in the international indigenous policy journal: https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/3 http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/3?utm_source=ir.lib.uwo.ca%2fiipj%2fvol10%2fiss1%2f3&utm_medium=pdf&utm_campaign=pdfcoverpages success in closing the socio-economic gap, but still a long way to go: urban aboriginal disadvantage, trauma, and racism in the australian city of newcastle on november 19, 2015, an indigenous discussion forum was held to discuss the findings of a three-year study of indigenous success in addressing indigenous disadvantage in the australian south-eastern coastal city of newcastle. the forum was one of three designed to elicit feedback as part of the study at hand. present were chief executive officers and directors of local indigenous organizations, as well as aboriginal people employed in senior policy and program officer positions in local offices of various state and federal government departments. those who had facilitated the research design and process were also present. all had been interviewed. all present interact directly on a day-to-day basis with aboriginal and torres strait islander people experiencing disadvantage in this city. the discussion concerned how indigenous disadvantage is a complex social phenomenon as experienced by local aboriginal people living in newcastle. one participant noted that, statistically speaking, the aboriginal and torres strait islander population in the newcastle local government area sits at the “top of the bottom socio-economic pile” (forum participant 1/interview 58). the australian bureau of statistics (abs, 2001, 2006, 2011) census data from 2001 to 2011 confirmed the assertion. while those participating in the discussion agreed, they also noted that “[there is] a long way to go” (forum participant 1/interview 58). those present spoke about local employment and education indicators, illustrating socio-economic improvements among local aboriginal people. relative socioeconomic improvements in this locality allowed participants to draw attention to the “disadvantage that aboriginal people continue to experience once they get an education and a job” (forum participant 1/interview 58). the discussion about local success in closing the socio-economic gap had the effect of exposing the limitations of framing indigenous disadvantage in policy in terms of a specific set of socioeconomic outcomes that are the same for indigenous and non-indigenous australians (fogarty, bulloch, mcdonnell, & davis, 2018). participants at the forum agreed with interviewees who were not at the forum, explaining how the disadvantage local aboriginal people experience is historically informed (paradies, 2016). how they framed indigenous disadvantage indicated that it “operated outside the usual theoretical understandings of poverty and social stratification,” and that “aboriginality is at the crux” of indigenous disadvantage in newcastle (walter, 2009, p. 5). this supports the claims of palawa sociologist maggie walter.1 walter’s supposition is that indigenous poverty, or disadvantage as it is referred to in australia, is a concept and lived reality that is the product of social relations. like walter (2009), those present asserted that the components of the domain of aboriginality are complex and multifaceted with intersecting and intertwined layers in the context of indigenous disadvantage. while not disagreeing with walter’s theorizing of aboriginality in relation to indigenous disadvantage, those present at the forum, along with interviewees generally, gave prominence and drew attention to the deeply racialized dimensions of indigenous disadvantage in newcastle. the discussion exposed and illustrated how indigenous 1 the terminology used in this article is relevant to the circumstances being discussed. palawa are the indigenous people of the australian state of tasmania. indigenous disadvantage is the phrase used in national policy circles. indigenous australian peoples are referred to as two distinct cultural groups: aboriginal people and torres strait islander people. newcastle is on awabakal country. awabakal is the nation and language group for the traditional owners of the land. 1 howard-wagner: success in closing the socio-economic gap published by scholarship@western, 2019 disadvantage is associated with past policies of racial ordering, dispossession and trauma, and contemporary racism. partly, this concerns a long-held proposition that socio-economic accounts of indigenous disadvantage ignore individual and institutional racism, and that multiple forms of racism are determinants of disadvantage (hummer, 1996). this proposition has received limited sociological consideration in australia (howard-wagner, 2018; walter 2009), but has been explored in detail by sociologists and philosophers in the united states, particularly in relation to the intersectionality between race and poverty (mills, 2015; soss, fording, & schram, 2011; wacquant, 2010; winant, 1994, 2004). for example, american scholars show the persistent power of race in poverty governance, linking past racialized state policies to present day poverty in the united states (soss et al., 2011). it is a proposition that challenges australian national (federal and state) indigenous policy in the twenty-first century. the national policy has leant toward contemporaneous understandings of indigenous disadvantage. it is a policy approach that ignores different social histories and divergent social locations, and past and present effects of discriminatory treatment (howard-wagner 2018). indigenous disadvantage has instead been interpreted as a social product of contemporary socioeconomic inequality and is situated within a political economy of poverty (howard-wagner, 2018; walter, 2009; walter & saggers, 2007). while policy makers have been concerned with removing the barriers that prevent aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples from fully participating as australian citizens in australian society, the council of australian governments’ (n.d.) national indigenous reform agreement (closing the gap), in its various iterations from 2009 to 2017, is a policy premised on the rights to work, to good health, to a sound education, and to a decent home (howard-wagner, 2018). in 2009, closing the gap involved the adoption of a comprehensive and integrated approach across seven strategic platforms, or what the policy document referred to as “building blocks” (council of australian governments, 2009). the seven “building blocks” were: early childhood, schooling, health, economic participation, healthy homes, safe communities, and governance and leadership. this policy lens sees indigenous disadvantage as a phenomenon in its own right, but it is essentially a large scale anti-poverty program. the solution is a redistributive paradigm that prescribes to an “atomic individualist ontology” (mills, 2015, p. 84), which addresses disadvantage through an individualistic framework of individual rights—the rights to a job, education, and housing—and targets individual agency (howard-wagner, 2018). that is, it offers the individual indigenous citizen, as the beneficiary of redistribution, the opportunity to become part of the mainstream economy (howard-wagner, 2018). it is also a policy premised on the notion that indigenous disadvantage will be eliminated once material inequality is overcome and the conditions that produce socio-economic inequality among individual indigenous citizens is eliminated (maciel & vine, 2012). so, like poverty governance in the united states, indigenous poverty governance in australia ignores the radically disparate impact of the past history of racially differentiated and discriminatory treatment (howard-wagner, 2017; mills, 2015). it dissociates indigenous disadvantage from an understanding of past policies of racial ordering, dispossession and trauma, and contemporary forms of racism (bodkin-andrews & carlson, 2016; howard-wagner, 2009). elsewhere, i develop this argument “reveal[ing] how discursive racial practices converge to form an interconnected neo-liberal racial project in governing through indigenous disadvantage in australia, which concerns the framing of indigenous disadvantage as a racial epistemology” (howard-wagner, 2018, p. 1339). importantly, i argue that epistemic practices underpinning indigenous policy in the present moment enact racial legacies (howard-wagner, 2018). in doing so, i reveal the persistence of 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.3 the colonial in neoliberal knowledges and understandings of the social world (howard-wagner, 2018). this concerns how and whose knowledge frames understandings of indigenous disadvantage. thus, the findings of this research speak back to such epistemic practices in indigenous policy in relation to closing the gap in indigenous disadvantage in australia, introducing new considerations in relation to how “aboriginality is at the crux of indigenous disadvantage” (walter, 2009, p. 5). it does so by revealing how those who participated in a collaborative research project in newcastle situate historical and relational racialized considerations as critical to addressing the disadvantage aboriginal people experience in newcastle. methodology the research on which this article is based takes as its starting point a four-year place-based qualitative case study of aboriginal community development in newcastle dating back to the 1970s. this study has key characteristics associated with the urban indigenous movement, such as the formation of urban indigenous community based organisations, and it predates the popularisation of a top-down indigenous development paradigm in countries like australia, canada, and the united states in the twenty-first century (howard-wagner, 2017). the purpose of the research is to explain aboriginal success in addressing disadvantage and promoting wellbeing across the council of australian governments’ national indigenous reform agreement (closing the gap) “building blocks” in this city, basing this success on urban indigenous-driven development (howard-wagner, 2017). the research was conducted by a non-indigenous researcher between 2012 and 2016.2 relationships forefront my way of being, way of knowing, and way of doing research with aboriginal people. this is how i conducted research, which was built on a sociological ethnography on racism, whiteness, and aboriginal marginalization, in the city of newcastle from 2000 to 2006 (howardwagner, 2006, 2009, 2015). it built on an existing relationship of openness and trust with aboriginal partners and organizations in this urban locality. the earlier project led to the one at hand. the research agenda was set by local aboriginal elders and senior position holders in aboriginal organisations. local aboriginal elders and senior position holders with aboriginal organizations presented the idea for this research at the human rights and equal opportunity commission (hreoc) community consultation on racism in newcastle held in july 2001 in the lead up to the united nations world conference on racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance.3 a key concern among those present was a continued propensity within the mainstream to ignore local aboriginal success and preserve a deficit mentality around indigenous issues locally. the aboriginal and torres strait islander commission (atsic) regional councillor at the time stated: “media alerts from atsic never get used— like the release about 30 aboriginal students accepted to study medicine at the university of newcastle” (howard-wagner, 2006, pp. 250-251). a representative from the local aboriginal land council noted: “there is a proliferation of racism through the media—they focus on the 2 this research was supported under australian research council’s discovery early career research award funding scheme (project de120100798). the views expressed herein are those of the authors and are not necessarily those of the australian research council. 3 i attended this event as a researcher conducting participant observation and taking detailed field notes. i sought permission from and had signed consent forms from the organizers and attendees to observe and document the event for the purpose of my research. 3 howard-wagner: success in closing the socio-economic gap published by scholarship@western, 2019 bad news stories” (howard-wagner, 2006, pp. 250-251). a representative from a local aboriginal community based organization stated: “i get calls from a young woman at the newcastle herald who rings me each month to do negative stories—only interested in alcoholism, domestic violence and bad issues and who won’t report good news stories” (howard-wagner, 2006, pp. 250-251). the focus on failure or dysfunction “squeeze[d] out news focusing on success, strength or ‘good news,’ which [was leading] to a distorted public perception” (fogarty et al., 2018, p. 23). the discussion revealed not only an entrenched deficits view, but also how race and racism were deeply intertwined with the framing of indigenous failure or dysfunction in newcastle. such narrative framings have long been reproduced in australian indigenous policy in relation to indigenous disadvantage (fogarty et al., 2018; howardwagner, 2018). this relates to how: the extent of the “aboriginal problem” [in australian policy] is determined through extensive monitoring and surveillance that references no less than 170 social measures, standardised against the norms of mainstream australians . . . the so-called objective facts that emerge are used unfailingly to confirm the status quo. that is, the “aboriginal race’” is an intractable “problem.” (nsw aboriginal affairs, 2018, p. 8) success, even in the limited form of the extent to which indigenous australians conform to a set of predetermined, measurable characteristics (fogarty et al., 2018), remained invisible. it also suggested that “success [and disadvantage] can mean quite different things to indigenous and non-indigenous people” (finlayson, 2004, p. 2). the intent of this collaborative research project was to speak to such issues. the aim was to explore urban aboriginal success in addressing disadvantage, but also to explain how local aboriginal people defined success and disadvantage in this context. the australian city of newcastle is an extremely suitable case study for achieving the aims of the research in a wider policy context as well. this large post-industrial city has gone through significant change, in part, as a part of the closure of the major industry, bhp billiton steel works, in 2000. it has transitioned into a vibrant regional capital and tourist destination. for example, it is a regional center for health and social services and is a regional headquarter for government agencies that service the greater region. its economy has also been buffered by the australian mining boom: newcastle is a major port city servicing the manufacturing sector, particularly heavy engineering, and the mining industry in the hunter region (to its immediate north) and the central coast (to its immediate south). it is a working class town with a long history of progressive politics. it is renowned for its trade union history. newcastle also has a fraught colonial past. in 1804, it became a penal colony for convict recidivists, who worked under harsh conditions extracting coal from the banks of the coquun (hunter) river. the awabakal people initially co-existed with the penal settlement until the 1820s. newcastle’s status as a penal settlement prevented large land grants from being made in the area (brayshaw, 1986). in 1826, the first indigenous mission in australia was set up by reverend threlkeld on the gunya hotel site at belmont—a gathering place for awabakal people—almost 20 kilometers south of newcastle (carey, 2004; johnston, 2006; keary, 2009). while still on country, the awabakal people were contained within the site of the mission. the awabakal people’s language was documented and published by reverend threlkeld in 1827, making it the first australian indigenous language to be written down (threlkeld, 1834). in successive years, as this land became valuable, the awabakal people were displaced and dispersed, and this resulted in a rapid decrease in their numbers (threlkeld, 1834). similar to many other 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.3 stories about the decline of australia’s indigenous peoples, smallpox, dispossession, and violent conflict lead to a significant decrease in the number of awabakal people in the hunter region during the 1800s (blyton, 1995; roberts, 2002). during the twentieth century the aboriginal population of newcastle recovered with aboriginal people relocating to newcastle from outlying rural areas in the north and west of the australian state of new south wales (nsw). aboriginal people came to newcastle because of its employment opportunities and lower levels of racism and discrimination (heath, 1998). urban aboriginal relocation and migration from rural and regional parts of nsw to newcastle from the mid-1950s to the 1970s also occurred in the context of a specific history of racialized laws, policies, and practices dating back to the early 1800s that progressively saw many aboriginal people dispossessed from their land and relocated and segregated on missions, reserves, and stations in this australian state. like most urban areas in australia, the population of aboriginal (n = 5,259), torres strait islander (n = 104), or aboriginal and torres strait islander (n = 110) people living in newcastle is now a “mixed mob” comprised of traditional owners and aboriginal and/or torres strait islander people who have moved to the area (abs, 2016; howard-wagner, 2017). newcastle is also a regional center for servicing many of the outlying aboriginal communities to the north and west of newcastle. local aboriginal people have been successful in working with federal, state, and local governments, and non-government organizations, in developing aboriginal-centered economic, social, and cultural initiatives, programs, and businesses that empower local aboriginal people, tackling significant social problems and ameliorating local aboriginal socio-economic disadvantage (howard-wagner, 2017). newcastle provides significant examples of successful indigenous governance and indigenous community entrepreneurship in practice, having set up separate community operated organizations and services that deliver government subsidized or wholly funded programs and initiatives (howardwagner, 2017). importantly too, since the 1970s, there have been many studies documenting the economic opportunities available to aboriginal people in newcastle, community needs, and migration of aboriginal people from rural areas to this city (arthur, 1994; ball, 1985; guth, 1971; guth & valance, 1972; hall & jonas, 1985a, 1985b; heath, 1998; maynard, 2001; mitchell, 1978). these studies offer evidence that two main reasons aboriginal people moved to newcastle from outlying regional and rural areas in the australian state of new south wales were because “the employment picture for aboriginal people in newcastle [was] at the level of dependable long term working class employee” (guth, 1971, p. 49) and “liberal uninformed acceptance” among non-aboriginal people in newcastle compared with the high levels of unemployment, segregation, and in-your-face racism prevalent in those areas (guth, 1971, p. 46). the objective of this study was to build on this knowledge. by working with aboriginal people with whom i already had existing relationships, we designed the research to facilitate shared interests and be of practical benefit to newcastle’s aboriginal community. this research relationship came about because of longstanding local relationships. over the years of doing my phd and living in newcastle and giving back to the community in many capacities, i had become known among local aboriginal people in newcastle, particularly to many long-term leaders, elders, and senior position holders within organizations. i had also established credibility locally and nationally through publications, which local 5 howard-wagner: success in closing the socio-economic gap published by scholarship@western, 2019 aboriginal people had read. the research was designed in collaboration with a group of five chief executive officers (ceos), managers, and board members from the core local aboriginal organizations, who directed aspects of the research, assisted with the design of the interview questionnaire, and assisted with the interpretation of the research findings. consent and access was sought and negotiated at all stages of the research, including prior to the main ethics application in late 2011. the purposive qualitative research design involved a form of criterion sampling (palys, 2008), which targeted frontline workers addressing indigenous disadvantage in newcastle in areas of employment, education, housing, early childhood, child protection and wellbeing, health, and justice (civil and criminal). the data itself was derived from 71 in-depth interviews (individual and group) with people working at the frontline of indigenous service delivery in the greater newcastle region. access to interviewees in 14 indigenous organizations, eight mainstream not-for-profit organizations, and seven government departments in the newcastle region was formally sought through high level bureaucrats in head offices in sydney and canberra or ceos of aboriginal and torres strait islander organizations, and in many instances the boards of the organizations. high level bureaucrats and ceos of aboriginal and torres strait organizations identified potential interviewees, providing the email and telephone contact details of potential interviewees. interviewees were individually approached via email or telephone. they were advised that: a. they were under no obligation to participate; b. their participation was entirely voluntary; c. there would be no information given to their organization as to whether they participated or not; d. they would not be identified in the research; and e. they could withdraw at any time. it happened that no torres strait islander people were interviewed as part of this study. that is, aboriginal people working in aboriginal and torres strait islander organizations and indigenous identified positions in government and non-government organizations in newcastle were interviewed.4 while interviews were the primary research method, the undertaking of an in-depth, place-based case study enabled the adoption of similar methods to an ethnographic study without the heavy reliance on participant observation. the methodology and methods combined complementary constructivist and indigenous methodologies and methods (denzin, tuhiwai smith, & lincoln, 2008; moreton-robinson & walter, 2009; tuhiwai smith, 1999), such as indigenous discussion circles (ciftci & howardwagner, 2012), which were used as a means of developing the research instruments and verifying the findings of the research in collaboration with the research collaborators. for example, prior to commencing interviews and designing the research questionnaire, i convened a discussion circle with 12 local aboriginal elders. this took place in the regular setting of the elders’ local craft morning. the unrecorded discussion circle involved me describing the intent of the research, its history, and my history in relation to partnering with local aboriginal people in research. i then yarned with elders for about three hours about aboriginal success in addressing disadvantage in newcastle. while we weaved 4 the study was not designed to focus on aboriginal people; rather, no torres strait islander or aboriginal and torres strait islander people living in newcastle participated in the study. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.3 baskets, they weaved together a bricolage of narratives about newcastle’s aboriginal history over the last 40 years. this knowledge assisted the design of the interview questionnaire. the primary data was also supplemented by over 100 interviews conducted with local aboriginal and/or torres strait islander people living in the greater newcastle region as part of the australian broadcasting commission (abc) newcastle radio series titled meet the mob (abc, 2016), many off-the-record informal yarns,5 and print media documents. the purpose of analysing the meet the mob interviews is that they provided important historical background on community building and development in newcastle, including the history of activism and the role of different aboriginal people and organizations in furthering the rights of, and addressing the needs of, local aboriginal people. a number of those interviewed also talked about racism. the research process was further complemented by successive follow-up interviews, observations, three discussion forums discussing the findings of the research, and collaborator and participant feedback on a lengthy report of the research findings. what we aimed for was to ensure that i did not misrepresent collaborators or participants, which i hope we achieved through processes of verification. at the request of the research collaborators, these layered processes of verification took the place of co-authoring. they explained this preference by their desire to maintain a distance between the research and local aboriginal partners and organizations. unfortunately, at the time, their reason for this and the need to do so said something too about indigenous representation in australian indigenous policy spaces in terms of not only marginalization of indigenous voices, but the weight given to those voices. along with other questions, interviewees were asked a number of questions designed to collect data on factors contributing to the aboriginal community’s success in overcoming aboriginal disadvantage in this city. the first interview question asked: “whether newcastle’s aboriginal community could be considered a success in overcoming indigenous disadvantage and promoting indigenous wellbeing?” the majority of interviewees responded “yes” to this question. interviewees were also asked: “why do you think this is the case?” the majority of interviewees attributed this success in closing socioeconomic gaps between the indigenous and non-indigenous population in newcastle to local indigenous organizations (howard-wagner, 2017). there were no dissenting views, but a couple of interviewees, who had only lived in newcastle for a few years, did not feel they were in a position to comment. they were then asked: “what would you describe are the key indicators of local aboriginal community’s success in addressing disadvantage and promoting wellbeing among local aboriginal and/or torres strait islander peoples?” other related questions included whether the interviewee “considered any service or program among the then seven closing the gap building blocks to be particularly successful (early childhood, schooling, health, economic participation, healthy homes, safe communities, and governance and leadership)? if so, why?” this question concerned the model then adopted under council of australian governments’ (n.d.) national indigenous reform agreement (closing the gap) in 2009. interviewees also responded to questions asking them to define indigenous 5 bessarab and ng’andu (2010) define a yarn or yarning “in a semi-structured interview [as] an informal and relaxed discussion through which both the researcher and participant journey together visiting places and topics of interest relevant to the research study. yarning is a process that requires the researcher to develop and build a relationship that is accountable to indigenous people participating in the research” (p. 38). 7 howard-wagner: success in closing the socio-economic gap published by scholarship@western, 2019 disadvantage, including what disadvantage means to them. interviews lasted between one and three hours, with many interviewees providing rich, detailed narrative responses to the questions asked. while based on comprehensive in-depth interviews with aboriginal people who were generous and willing participants in this study and some being partners in designing the research, it should be noted, however, that i am not representing an indigenous voice or claiming an indigenous authority. interviewees were given opportunities to comment on the findings of this study in the form of three discussion circles and a first and second draft of a community report circulated to interviewees and organizations in november 2015 and april 2016, and they were in agreement with the findings of the research and were at ease with how it was presented and interpreted. my aim was to rigorously convey the ideas discussed by aboriginal contributors and it is local aboriginal people who give this sociological account its meaning. however, the writing of this article involves a non-indigenous researcher imposing their theoretical and analytical understanding onto local indigenous narratives (christie, 2008). so, while naming my location as a white female researcher has important epistemological value in terms of positionality, i believe it is also important to indicate the disciplinary space from which my voice emanates. i am a sociologist and socio-legal scholar who adopts a critical lens for understanding australian indigenous policy in the neoliberal age. i draw on a wide range of tools from my critical toolkit that is a grab bag of critical theory and standpoints, including race and whiteness approaches and indigenous standpoints. how “aboriginality is at the crux” of indigenous disadvantage in newcastle this article is premised on the proposition that the aboriginal and torres strait islander population in the newcastle local government area “sits at the top of the bottom socio-economic pile” (interview 58). the abs census data snapshots tend to support this. for example, while still relatively high at 15.3%, aboriginal and/or torres strait islander unemployment in newcastle has significantly decreased over the last decade. in 2001, unemployment rates in this population were over 25%, which was higher than both the state and national averages (nsw: 23.1%; australia: 20.0%; abs, 2001, 2006, 2011, 2016). by 2011, this unemployment rate among aboriginal and torres strait islander populations had dramatically decreased, almost halving to 13.4%, a figure below the state and national averages (nsw: 16.9%; australia: 17.1%). importantly, between 2001 and 2011, unemployment rates for aboriginal and/or torres strait islander peoples in newcastle not only declined but declined faster than that of the general population. therefore, the gap between unemployment rates in the indigenous and general population also decreased. this was despite newcastle transitioning from an industrial to post-industrial city. although newcastle now has a mixed economy relying on its position as a regional service center, its economy was nonetheless buffered by the mining boom in australia. again, the abs (2016) census recorded unemployment rates as slightly higher for aboriginal and/or torres strait islander people in newcastle (15.3%) compared to the general population (7.4%). this was lower than the national unemployment rate for aboriginal and/or torres strait islander peoples (18.3%), but higher than the national (6.9%) and state (6.3%) rate for the general population. the end of the mining boom may account for the recent creep in unemployment rates in both the aboriginal and torres strait islander and non-indigenous population in newcastle. additionally, the rate of high school completion (14.6%) and bachelor’s degree level and above completion rates (11%) are also slightly higher for aboriginal and/or torres strait islander peoples 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.3 living in the newcastle region compared with the state (year 12: 12.4%; degree: 6.7%) and national (year 12: 14%; degree: 5.8%) rates among aboriginal and/or torres strait islander peoples living in newcastle (abs, 2016). relative improvements in urban aboriginal and/or torres strait islander education and employment outcomes in newcastle, however, only tell part of the story. for example, while individuals are “doing okay” (interview 66), interviewees consider the gap in terms of the community as a whole, which is struggling, thereby mitigating an individualized socio-economic success narrative. i think some of us are doing okay. but as a whole, as a community, i think we’re struggling and severely struggling. because the gap that exists between those that are doing well and those that aren’t doing so well, is still a pretty significant gap. but at the same time, the number of people not doing so well, still largely outweigh the number of people that are doing well. (interview 66) because of the frontline work they do, interviewees were in a position to observe the limitations with framing indigenous disadvantage simply in terms of socio-economic outcomes, such as getting a job and an education. as one interviewee notes: once you address jobs and education, you are still left with the “hard” social policy issues— housing shortages, homelessness, areas of entrenched poverty, child removal, racism, high levels of contact with the justice system, youth disengagement . . . (interview with ceo local aboriginal and torres strait islander organization 9) interviewees reveal the complex, multi-faceted nature of aboriginal disadvantage, which exists beyond employment and education opportunities. they explain how “aboriginality is at the crux” (walter, 2009, p. 5) of indigenous disadvantage in newcastle. this quote extracted from an interview with a ceo of a community-based indigenous organization, which provides housing and other social services, illustrates this point particularly well: if you’ve never rented before, you’ve got a disadvantage. if you’re an aboriginal person and you’ve never rented before or you haven’t come from this area, it’s almost impossible. there’s a massive gap there. there’s not accommodation in this area for whole families in crisis . . . we also have a higher representation of children in out-of-home care. we’re more disadvantaged there. we have a lot of children removed for, at times, totally unnecessary reasons. we’ve just had a family woken up at 3 o’clock in the morning and the children taken out of their beds. that’s not appropriate under any circumstance without—we weren’t told a context of those sorts of things. they were our children. they were children from our—they were from our service. the gaps are really large as far as how many of our young people are in jails as well. we’re in partnership with crc [community restorative centre], which is a prison release program. our young people are very highly represented within that. i mean, i think it’s like a vicious circle in some circumstances, no money, no home, break the law, go to jail. (interview 55) 9 howard-wagner: success in closing the socio-economic gap published by scholarship@western, 2019 like others, the interviewee not only draws attention to the links between disadvantage and being an aboriginal person, but also the intersectionality between race and aboriginal disadvantage. for example, the interviewee explains how homelessness and housing shortages, child removal, domestic and family violence, high incarceration rates, and low incomes are some of the significant social problems that aboriginal people continue to experience in newcastle. however, in describing these experiences of ongoing social problems in which very little has changed in terms of high rates of child removal and incarceration and the inability to rent a house, they also draw attention to how the social service system remains racially stratified. like interviewees generally, they also explain the interconnections between different social problems, such as how family violence has far reaching effects on homelessness among aboriginal women, children, and men, and is a major contributor to social problems among young aboriginal people living in newcastle, including school attendance, out-of-home care, and contact with the justice system. they point to how the region has the highest proportion of aboriginal children and young people in out-of-home care in nsw (virtue, 2016). indigenous organizations providing services to homeless aboriginal youth say that aboriginal youth homelessness is on the rise in newcastle (abc news, 2015). what the interviewee also draws our attention to is the ways in which aboriginality is at the crux of indigenous disadvantage in this city (walter, 2009). that is, the interviewee illustrates the complex layers of indigenous disadvantage as it is experienced by aboriginal people living in newcastle, including discrimination and cultural alienation, which would not be experienced by non-indigenous novocastrians. this concerns the “constellation of disadvantage experienced by aboriginal people that is an artefact and legacy of australia’s settler colonial history and the institutionalized structuring of aboriginal/settler social relations in australia over 200 years” (howard-wagner, 2018, p. 1338). this finding is not new. a new finding concerns how disadvantage continues despite improving material conditions or socioeconomic circumstances, which also draws attention to a more nuanced understanding of the intersectionality between being an aboriginal person, racism, discrimination, and disadvantage. this was expressed in a number of ways in the interview data. for example, it was expressed in the context of aboriginal social mobility. that is, employment and education opportunities have led to aboriginal social mobility, creating what interviewees describe as an “urban indigenous middle class” in newcastle (see also lahn, 2012; walter & saggers, 2007), who are university educated and occupy professional positions in indigenous organizations and the state and federal bureaucracy, and who are “well remunerated” (paradies, 2006, p. 58). yet, interviewees describe how they, who are at the top of the bottom socio-economic pile, still deal with the effects of aboriginal displacement, disempowerment, racism, and discrimination. many have chronic health issues, such as diabetes and heart disease, and they often care for extended family who are much worse off. there’s still a gap within health . . . overrepresentation with diabetes, heart disease, and a whole lot of other things, there is still a huge gap in there. the hospitals don’t help . . . i had open heart surgery. (interview senior position holder aboriginal organization 8) those at the top also provide support to extended aboriginal family members and many provide services to aboriginal and torres strait islander clients with severe disadvantage, serious chronic social and health issues, and trauma. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.3 many of those at the top give back too, working hard, long hours in the indigenous social and health sector in aboriginal and torres strait islander organizations and indigenous-identified positions in government and non-government organizations. they “go beyond their job descriptions” (interview 17), trying to make a difference in the lives of aboriginal and/or torres strait islander people in the region. they have to face the racism, ignorance, paternalism, and indifference at the frontline, while advocating for their community, their organizations, and local aboriginal and/or torres strait islander peoples. they face indigenous trauma, disadvantage, and disempowerment on a day-to-day basis in their private lives and at work. as one ceo of a community-based aboriginal organization notes, those engaged in delivering services and supporting disadvantaged aboriginal and/or torres strait islander peoples in newcastle “don’t clock off at night—many go home to deal with the effects of indigenous trauma and disadvantage in their homes” (interview 67). this too is reflected in the following interview extract with another ceo of a community-based aboriginal organization, who formerly worked in a senior position in a nsw government department: i had a white colleague i used to work with in sydney—she goes home to her family—nice little average family and she leaves all the stuff at work behind. i go home to all of those things i’ve mentioned, shit, you know. that’s what we deal with on a daily basis and then come to work and you’re still dealing with all of that. then you go home and you are still dealing with all of that. you don’t ever get away from that—you can’t just shut off from it . . . . that’s what our management team was talking about the other day . . . about having so much shit with them before they even get to work, and then before you even start your day you’ve walked out the door and carried all this crap. then you go to work and you’ve got everyone else’s crap. how do you support staff to keep them focused on their job? so, that’s what i reckon disadvantage is! (interview with ceo, local aboriginal and torres strait islander organization 10) this concerns the challenges of local aboriginal people who are now in professional positions, who see their roles as part of their community obligation, especially in terms of the “importance of reciprocity in aboriginal community” (behrendt cited in upton, 2011, reciprocity section, para. 1; see also lahn, 2012). however, this also reflects what walter (2009) describes as the effects of colonization as it relates to indigenous disadvantage in which “dramatically circumscribed life chances and a hard, daily reality have become a normalized aspect of indigenous life” (p. 7). interviewees do not suggest that indigenous disadvantage is intractable (paradies, 2006), but that it is far more complex than getting an education, professional status, and remuneration, and thus social mobility and class. thus, interviewees identify the complex forms of disadvantage local aboriginal people experience despite social mobility and relative improvements in education and employment. they therefore explain how aboriginality is at the crux of indigenous disadvantage in newcastle, which continues despite socioeconomic outcomes improving. 11 howard-wagner: success in closing the socio-economic gap published by scholarship@western, 2019 “we’re not poor whites in black skins”: interviewee standpoints on urban indigenous disadvantage aboriginal disadvantage and non-aboriginal disadvantage are very different. they’re not comparable. (interview 62, group of four interviewed) interviewees thus reveal how indigenous disadvantage does not simply concern how aboriginal people are “firmly wedged at the bottom of australian society” (walter, 2009, p. 2). as one interviewee concisely puts it, “[w]e’re not poor whites in black skins” (interview 58), a point consistently made. thus, interviewees associate disadvantage with what walter (2009) defines as characteristics of the “domain of aboriginality” (p. 6.). while walter (2009) identifies four clusters, the interview data suggests that while socio-economic deprivation (cluster one) and absences or invisibility (cluster two) matter, interviewees focused mostly on the “burden of disregard” and “dispossession” (p. 6). the “burden of disregard” includes the “normalisation of disrespect which underpins the climate of everyday racism that is the lived experience of aboriginal people in australian society” (walter, 2009, p. 7). the “burden of disregard” also involves “a broad acceptability of the denigration of indigenous culture” (walter, 2009, p. 7). it is the interconnections between “the burden of disregard” and “dispossession” and aboriginal disadvantage that make the disadvantage aboriginal people experience distinguishable from the socio-economic disadvantage experienced in the wider mainstream community. importantly though, interviewees do not describe indigenous disadvantage as a homogenous social phenomenon. this is captured in the following interview extract: i think urban aboriginal populations typically suffer disadvantage that is distinctly different to remote communities because we’ve suffered more in terms of the impacts of colonization, you’ve had greater levels of displacement, you’ve had a lot more—a loss of cultural heritage, loss of cultural identity, you’re seeing a lot more drug and alcohol issues in urban aboriginal populations, you’re seeing a much higher propensity to mental health issues. those mental health issues are not always drug related, or alcohol related, they’re related to that displacement and the psychological trauma from being displaced. the disconnect in family and loss of cultural identity, there is a whole range of different things that are all bundled up together. (interview 57) what the interviewee does, and other interviewees do, is link urban indigenous disadvantage to presentday effects of grief, loss, and trauma associated with the history of complex social stratification in australia. as briefly mentioned above, colonial and later australian law and policy saw higher levels of indigenous dispossession from the land in the south-eastern states of australia and greater numbers of aboriginal children being removed from their families. this too is captured in the following interview extract: there is so much grief and loss. there’s the trauma. there’s dispossession. there’s colonizing— aboriginal disadvantage is all of that stuff. you can throw money into all those services, you can buy that, you can fund that, but to fix all of that—that’s what i call disadvantage. so, it’s that generational stuff—the stolen generations is a good example. newcastle’s full of it. we have a lot of people who are not sure about their identity—don’t know where they come from—not sure who they are connected to. i think that actually makes people really sick, as well as the grief and loss and all the funerals. so, there’s always something there, sort of lingering . . . all that stuff 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.3 i think has so much impact on somebody’s ability to be—to meet their potential. how do you fix that? (interview ceo, aboriginal organization 8) interviewee discourses reveal how indigenous disadvantage in this city stems from historical racialized relations, which persist in contemporary forms. interviewees thus explain indigenous disadvantage in newcastle as a highly racialized social phenomenon, associating it with racialized exclusion (goldberg, 1993), as opposed to the effects of social externalities, such as standard indicators of poverty, place effects, or postcodes (hunter, 2007; price-robertson, 2011). for example, like others, the two interviewees draw our attention to what sociologist joe feagin refers to as the distinctive social worlds that have been created by racialized oppression since colonization, such as child removal (feagin, 2006). policy disassociation: aboriginal disadvantage and historical racialized relations and racism as a deeply embedded societal phenomenon [o]ne of the real huge issues that affects and undergirds all the others remaining. [there is] a wide gap in regard to equality . . . economic inclusion that comes back to employment, but it also comes back to prejudices around opportunities being available to aboriginal people. even for access to rental properties, funding for business, breaking out of the mold or the stereotype. that’s a long-term outcome that we hope to see . . . as we keep trying to close this gap. (interview 56) racism is ugly. racism is huge and that’s part of what we fight every day. that’s part of why we’ve got the gap that we’ve got. (meet the mob interview, abc radio newcastle, transcript 73; see emberson, 2015) interviewees point out how the national policy in relation to overcoming indigenous disadvantage is disassociated from not only historical racialized relations, but also racism as an everyday lived reality for aboriginal people living in newcastle (howard-wagner, 2009). interviewees describe the extent to which institutional racism is experienced “through economic and political systems and maintained by the policies and practices carried out by government and other institutions . . . [across] all sectors, from public housing to health care” (larson, gilles, howard, & coffin, 2007, p. 322). racism and discrimination are deeply intertwined with indigenous disadvantage in newcastle. racism is thus a significant part of what local aboriginal and torres strait islander people fight every day in their efforts to overcome indigenous disadvantage (see opening quote). arguably, as the ceo of a communitybased aboriginal organization points out, it is part of why the gap exists today (transcript 73; emberson, 2015). so, racism is not something that is gradually going away. racism is an everyday burden that aboriginal people live with (essed, 1991; walter, 2009). while interviewees described a range of what sociologists miles and brown (2003) described as “racist incidences” that they encounter today (p. 70), they are essentially describing the continuing existence of a racialized social system, which they encounter in society. racism is not described as the “overt behavior of individuals,” but rather in terms of how it “functions to the disadvantage of indigenous people” (moreton-robinson, 2005, p. 63). the point is that racism and racist incidents are not described as a psychological phenomenon in terms of particular individual encounters or the encountering of particular individuals in society, but as encounters within policy, as discussed above, and mainstream society, as discussed below. 13 howard-wagner: success in closing the socio-economic gap published by scholarship@western, 2019 [t]here’s still a fair bit of racial profiling that goes on in newcastle. during the [new south wales] aboriginal [rugby league] knockout last year, i was reminded how redneck newcastle is . . . and it was quite affronting. the saturday night, we had the after party for the knockout and you had about 300 blackfellas here in town, at panthers. it’s awesome when you got a bunch of blackfellas all getting together and having a good time and it’s great, but once the venue closed, all of a sudden, you had a heap of blackfellas out on the street, looking to go to the next place. every place, every club we went to, we couldn’t get in and cops . . . this was before the one o’clock lock-out. we weren’t being admitted to clubs. we had cops turning up . . . and that was when it—then i was reminded that we’ve still got some ways to go. . . . it was the first time that i’d seen it like that, so blatant. the last time i can recount it being that blatant was the last time i went to [the small township] of moree [in rural nsw]. (interview former ceo, aboriginal organization 10) racism too is encountered in mainstream organizational cultures of paternalism in employment, educational, and housing contexts. i facilitated a community meeting with 60, 80 community members. those principals had to sit there and listen while everybody said, this is no good, this is racist, this is below expectations and you’re letting us down, you’re killing our future . . . [t]he community and all the aboriginal mums, dads, aunts, grandparents in particular were very, very vocal around, we want the best for our children and you are not delivering it . . . [t]hat has been the attitude in newcastle for a long time . . . [i]t built up over a period of time of total disappointment in the fact that those people in charge of helping create the future with the kids are actually colluding with low expectations . . . whereas the truth is, our kids can do as well, if not better than anybody else . . . we need to get rid of the deficit conversations. (interview 7) as the interviewee indicates, non-indigenous educators continue to possess highly negative stereotypes and imaginings of aboriginal students in terms of deficits and the aboriginal community more widely. where such views persist, as in the context of schooling above, they act as a barrier toward realizing the full potential of students (sarra, 2005). racism not only affects the capacity of aboriginal people to secure employment, but also the willingness to work in certain environments or to maintain employment. like larkin (2014), ganter (2016), and lahn and biddle (2016) found, interviewees who work in mainstream government and non-government organizations continue to be confronted by ignorance, prejudice, and racism in the local, state, and federal government workplaces. i love my job. i love getting out in the communities and meeting people . . . and seeing a difference through what we do. that’s the tough thing, i do like my job . . . i don’t like the policy stuff that, as being a senior aboriginal programs officer . . . you have to sort of do sometimes . . . i think it’s really hard, because again, you’re a lone voice. i’m the only aboriginal worker in this directorate. so, i’m on the management team . . . so, you come up against some resistance . . . i call it ingrained . . . [b]asically, people who are raised with racism, and they might have changed 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.3 their ideas as adults, but it’s still there . . . [t]hey’re not even aware that they’re doing it . . . they don’t even know that it’s racism. (interview 41) while others do, the interviewee is not describing “virtuous whiteness” (feagin, 2010) or the wellmeaning racist, who unintentionally makes a racist comment or is paternalistic in their awkward interactions with aboriginal colleagues, but rather the deeply ingrained, historically embedded racist attitudes that are expressed by white colleagues in the workplace. interviewees describe this as manifesting in different forms, such as overt expressions of paternalism, prejudice, and stereotypes. this concerns how interviewees make sense of their social interactions and society as deeply racialized (trepagnier, 2010) and observe disadvantage in employment, education, and housing as evidence of the deep, foundational, and systemic nature of racial oppression in australia (feagin, 2006). these accounts are described as “ingrained” societal attitudes. importantly then, what the interview extracts presented throughout this article reveal is how interviewees associate indigenous disadvantage with the australian social body, its institutions, and larger social patterns. they perceive it more like what feagin (2006) described as “a nightmare on the brain of the living” (p. 7), connecting past policies of racial ordering, dispossession, and trauma to contemporary forms of disadvantage. this is in keeping with the understandings of many contemporary sociologists of race and whiteness (e.g., bonilla-silva, 1997; feagin, 2006; howard-wagner, 2009, 2015, 2017; trepangier, 2010; walter, 2009; waquant, 2010). concluding comments contemporary indigenous policy at the state and federal level in australia treats the disadvantage aboriginal people experience as marginalization from the mainstream economy, and emancipation from disadvantage is about the facilitation of individual autonomous aboriginal agency within it (howardwagner, 2018). what this research found is that even though the newcastle aboriginal community sits at the “top of the bottom socio-economic pile” (interview 58), improvements in education and employment outcomes only tell part of the story. what is more, through conducting a study in an urban locality where the gap between indigenous and non-indigenous socio-economic disadvantage is slightly narrower than other localities and aboriginal people have achieved greater educational and employment outcomes, and by interviewing those who have achieved such outcomes, this research demonstrates that indigenous disadvantage is a far more complex social problem than socio-economic indicators suggest. in doing so, this research explains how indigenous disadvantage cannot be reduced to an issue of poverty or socio-economic circumstances. it is not one in which “getting an education” and “getting a job” is the simple solution as is often politically suggested (howard-wagner, 2017). importantly, interviewees do not define indigenous disadvantage as comparative to non-indigenous disadvantage or as simply exclusion from the economy, but instead define it as a social phenomenon related to past social and racial injustices and exclusion from the broader social, cultural, and political processes within society. the disadvantage aboriginal people living in newcastle experience is not experienced by all novocastrians of lower socio-economic status. importantly, borrowing again the phrase from one interviewee, “we’re not poor whites in black skins” (interview 59). from the standpoint of interviewees, who work at the frontline, the disadvantage aboriginal people experience in this urban locality is described as being grounded in the histories of social exclusion from australian society, displacement, and colonization. overcoming indigenous disadvantage in newcastle is seen as requiring 15 howard-wagner: success in closing the socio-economic gap published by scholarship@western, 2019 different solutions to those currently offered under indigenous policy frameworks. interviewees argue that it requires addressing deeper racialized societal inequalities. they draw attention to the contemporary existence of a racialized social system and racialized epistemologies that exist around the disadvantage they experience. in making this argument, interviewees situate the disadvantage aboriginal people experience as an artifact and legacy of australia’s history and the institutionalized structuring of social relations in australia over 230 years. recognizing the historical antecedents of social relations to present day disadvantage in australia includes recognizing the effects of the dispossession from culture, the dispossession from land and the placement of ownership of aboriginal land in the hands of the “crown,” and the nationwide appropriation and removal of aboriginal children. this article has explored in more depth the interconnections between the domain of aboriginality and disadvantage, revealing the ways in which aboriginality is at the crux of indigenous disadvantage in newcastle. it reveals how “the domain of aboriginality is the central core, with other aspects of poverty intimately interwoven [in this city] and interpreted through aboriginality” (walter, 2009, p. 8). this concerns the “dramatically circumscribed life chances and [how] a hard, daily reality has become a normalized aspect of indigenous life” (walter, 2009, p. 7), but also how the “burden of disregard” in terms of “the undercurrent of everyday race relations in which indigenous people live their lives” is part of the everyday disadvantage experienced by aboriginal people living in newcastle (walter, 2009, p. 11). this does not negate aboriginal agency in the present moment. in fact, a key point that interviewees made is that aboriginal people themselves have played a central role in addressing the disadvantage they experience in this city through the creation of indigenous organizations, programs, and services aimed at improving socio-economic outcomes and social conditions in culturally appropriate and less discriminatory ways (howard-wagner, 2017). their endeavors to do so reinforce a long-held belief that overcoming indigenous disadvantage is not as simple as getting an education and/or a job. that is, historical and contemporaneous racialized social relations and epistemologies matter. while federal indigenous policy and practice continues to fail to recognize the broader determinants that shape aboriginal peoples’ lives and experiences, such as the “burden of disregard” and “dispossession,” there are emerging examples of policies and programs that could be used as a starting point or roadmap in the future, such as the new south wales aboriginal affairs (2013) policy known commonly as ochre (opportunity, choice, healing, recognition, empowerment). ochre “recognises the failure of policies fixated on ‘the gap’ and ‘disadvantage’ and by contrast, respects aboriginal peoples’ culture, rights and contributions to the social, cultural and economic development of the state” (ardler cited in nsw aboriginal 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(2004). behind blue eyes: whiteness and contemporary us racial politics. off white: readings on power, privilege, and resistance, 2, 3-16. 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.3 the international indigenous policy journal january 2019 success in closing the socio-economic gap, but still a long way to go: urban aboriginal disadvantage, trauma, and racism in the australian city of newcastle deirdre howard-wagner recommended citation success in closing the socio-economic gap, but still a long way to go: urban aboriginal disadvantage, trauma, and racism in the australian city of newcastle abstract keywords acknowledgments disclaimer creative commons license success in closing the socio-economic gap, but still a long way to go: urban aboriginal disadvantage, trauma, and racism in the australian city of newcastle digital divides and the 'first mile': framing first nations broadband development in canada the international indigenous policy journal volume 2 | issue 2 article 2 june 2011 digital divides and the 'first mile': framing first nations broadband development in canada rob mcmahon mr. simon fraser university, rdmcmaho@ualberta.ca susan o'donnell dr. university of new brunswick, susanodo@unb.ca richard smith dr. simon fraser university, smith@sfu.ca brian walmark keewaytinook okimakanak research institute (kori), brian.walmark@knet.ca brian beaton keewaytinook okimakanak kuhkenah network (ko-knet), brianbeaton@knet.ca see next page for additional authors recommended citation mcmahon, r. , o'donnell, s. , smith, r. , walmark, b. , beaton, b. , simmonds, j. (2011). digital divides and the 'first mile': framing first nations broadband development in canada. the international indigenous policy journal, 2(2) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.2.2 this research is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. digital divides and the 'first mile': framing first nations broadband development in canada abstract across canada, rural and remote first nations face a significant 'digital divide'. as self-determining autonomous nations in canada, these communities are building broadband systems to deliver public services to their members and residents. to address this challenge, first nations are working towards a variety of innovative, locally driven broadband development initiatives. this paper contributes a theoretical discussion that frames our understanding of these initiatives by drawing on the paradigm of the 'first mile' (paisley & richardson, 1998). we argue that broadband development policy in canada must be re-framed to address the specific needs of first nations. the first mile position foregrounds community-based involvement, control, and ownership: a consideration we suggest has particular resonance for first nations. this is because it holds potential to move beyond the historical context of paternalistic, colonial-derived development policies, in the context of broadband systems development. we argue first nations broadband projects offer on-the-ground examples of a first mile approach, and call for more research in this area. keywords broadband policy, broadband networks, community networks, first nations issues, digital divide, policy frameworks, rural and remote broadband acknowledgments the authors would like to acknowledge and offer our thanks to everyone who participated in the discussions and research leading to this paper. we are grateful for the opportunity provided by the social sciences and humanities research council’s knowledge synthesis grant for a digital economy, and hope our research will be useful for the wider federal consultation on industry canada’s emerging digital economy strategy. the case studies featured in the putting the ‘last-mile’ first report featured in this article include the contributions of many individuals working on first nations and inuit connectivity in canada. the authors also thank the assembly of first nations ict ad hoc working group who invited us to discuss an earlier draft of the putting the last-mile first report and made several very helpful suggestions. the authors would also like to thank our partners for the putting the last-mile first report: keewaytinook okimakanak in ontario, mik’maw kina’matneway / atlantic canada's first nation help desk in nova scotia, the first nations education council in quebec, and the first nations technology council in british columbia. these partners offered valuable feedback and ideas throughout the project. finally, the authors thank the anonymous reviewers who provided constructive and helpful comments on an earlier version of this paper. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. authors rob mcmahon mr., susan o'donnell dr., richard smith dr., brian walmark, brian beaton, and jason simmonds dr. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ this research is available in the international indigenous policy journal: http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss2/2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss2/2?utm_source=ir.lib.uwo.ca%2fiipj%2fvol2%2fiss2%2f2&utm_medium=pdf&utm_campaign=pdfcoverpages introduction across canada, rural and remote first nations face a significant ‘digital divide’. as selfdetermining autonomous nations in canada, these communities are faced with the task of building broadband systems to deliver public services to their members and residents. to address this challenge, first nations are working towards a variety of innovative, locally driven broadband development initiatives. this paper draws on the paradigm of the ‘first mile’ (paisley & richardson, 1998) to help structure our understanding of these initiatives. we argue that broadband development policy in canada must be re-framed to address the specific needs of first nations. the first mile position foregrounds community-based involvement, control, and ownership: a consideration we suggest has particular resonance for first nations. this is because it holds potential to move beyond the historical context of paternalistic, colonial-derived development policies, in the context of broadband systems development. we argue first nations broadband projects offer on-the-ground examples of a first mile approach, and call for more research in this area. differing levels of access to broadband infrastructure and connectivity services exist across canada. large metropolitan centres such as toronto and vancouver have broadband systems in place that enable many residents to enjoy widespread access to broadband. outside of major population centres many rural and remote communities, including first nations, remain comparatively underserved. these realities demonstrate the persistence of various digital divides in canada. “digital divides” refer to disparities among different population groups or geographical regions in their access to broadband systems (norris, 2001). however, alongside ongoing discrepancies in access to broadband, individuals and communities across the country are working to address these challenges through innovative, locally driven initiatives. this paper contributes a theoretical discussion that situates and frames an understanding of why first nations would want to get involved in broadband development initiatives and the significance of their activities. the “first nations communities” we are referring to in this article are groups of people with distinct status as self-governing nations in canada, and are located in specific geographic locations, also known as reserves. while we recognize that many members of the large and growing urban first nations population face barriers to access to and use of broadband systems, this paper focuses on rural and remote first nations communities and the specific digital divides they face vis-à-vis urban communities. the discussion applies the paradigm of the ‘first mile’ development to the many locally-driven first nations broadband initiatives currently underway. the first mile approach to broadband development policy re-frames the decision-making process to emerge from rural and remote local communities (paisley & richardson, 1998). proponents of a first mile approach argue that plans to address disparities in access to and use of broadband systems are almost always designed through processes generating from centralized institutions located far from local communities. such processes often exclude community members in network planning and implementation (ramirez, 2001; 2007). in some cases, such ‘last-mile’ approaches build on solutions flowing from metropolitan centres. the lastmile approach frames the differences between rural and urban communities as ‘problems’ or ‘shortcomings’ to be addressed by simply linking unserved communities to already-existing systems and infrastructures. in contrast, the first mile approach argues that first and foremost, decision-making about broadband development must be grounded in and emerge from the specific needs of local communities. the broadband policy-making process then becomes an opportunity for community members to articulate and address their needs, before technical development and planning takes place. this position seeks to re-frame solutions to the ‘digital divide’ in ways that support community-based involvement, control, and ownership. we suggest that the first mile approach to broadband policy development has particular resonance for first nations communities in rural and remote regions. to move beyond the historical 1 mcmahon et al.: digital divides and the 'first mile' published by scholarship@western, 2011 context of paternalistic, colonial-derived development policies, the first mile recognizes that first nations communities and governments are best positioned to decide when and how they access and use newly developing technologies, including broadband systems. this position reflects statements expressed by indigenous peoples in international fora like the world summit on the information society (fiddler, 2008). it is also an important component of indigenous-led broadband development projects in countries like australia (hartley, 2004; landzelius, 2006; leclair & warren, 2007), the united states (morris & meinrath, 2009; sandvig, 2012), canada (fiser, 2010; mignone & henley, 2009; o’donnell, milliken, chong & walmark, 2010; t. whiteduck, 2010) and elsewhere. we argue that these various indigenous community-driven initiatives offer on-the-ground examples of a first mile approach to broadband development policy. research on first nations community-driven broadband initiatives research on first nations broadband initiatives is currently in its infancy. although considerable research on first nations telehealth programs and projects, and some research on distance education initiatives in these communities, has been published (see for example carpenter & kakepetum-schultz, 2010; gideon, nicholas, rowlandson & woolner, 2009; walmark, 2010), there has been very limited indepth research on community-driven broadband system development initiatives (for some examples, see fiser 2010; mignone & henley, 2009; sandwig, 2012; j. whiteduck, 2010). the most comprehensive overview on the topic is the recent report: “putting the ‘last-mile’ first: reframing broadband development in first nations and inuit communities” that highlighted examples of first nations and inuit communities using technologies to support their community and economic development goals (mcmahon, o’donnell, smith, woodman simmonds & walmark, 2010). the report synthesized a body of knowledge and research in canada demonstrating how rural and remote first nations communities are shaping and using broadband technologies. funded by the social sciences and humanities research council of canada through a knowledge synthesis grant for a digital economy, the report combined a literature review and interviews with 23 individuals involved in first nations and inuit broadband development.1 the report is a broad overview. it was conducted over a short time frame (three and a half months) that only allowed for a general survey and a snapshot of some current projects. despite these limits, it supported previous research demonstrating a widespread lack of broadband infrastructure and robust connectivity services in many rural and remote first nations communities (alexander, 2001, 2009; fiser, 2010; o’donnell et al, 2010; walmark, o’donnell, & beaton, 2005). it also supported previous findings that many first nations are engaged in a range of innovative, community-driven broadband and ict development projects. it employed a participatory research process through which researchers from two universities (simon fraser university and the university of new brunswick) worked in partnership with four first nations ict organizations: keewaytinook okimakanak tribal council (keewaytinook okimakanak council’s kuhkenah network, ko-knet, and the keewaytinook okimakanak research institute, kori); atlantic canada’s first nation help desk; the first nations education council in quebec; and the first nations technology council in b.c. to date, two studies conducted in partnership with fort severn first nation in ontario are the first published research focused on first nations community broadband networks that consider first mile concepts. the first (o’donnell, kakekaspan, beaton, walmark & gibson, 2011) describes how fort 1 while the original project looked at both inuit and first nations communities, since the research team did not include representatives from inuit organizations, the authors decided to restrict their discussion to first nations communities and contexts to ensure we do not misrepresent inuit communities. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 2 [2011], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.2.2 severn first nation is putting first mile concepts into action. working with their tribal council, keewaytinook okimakanak, and other strategic partners to develop the broadband networks in the community, fort severn has shaped these technologies to meet the community’s needs. community priorities for broadband-enabled services identified more than 10 years ago included network services, education and health. the study demonstrates how today the broadband networks in fort severn are cross-sector enablers that support the community’s delivery of these core community services and activities. the second study, on fort severn’s new cell phone service, found that keewaytinook mobile (km) exists in fort severn first nation because of the leadership shown by ko/k-net and fort severn in developing telecommunication services to meet the community’s needs (o’donnell, kakekaspan, beaton, walmark, mason & mak, 2011). the community worked with federal and provincial government and private sector service providers to fund, design and implement the service despite considerable challenges, and km has built solid business relationships with strategic partners that can be leveraged in future development of the service. in early 2011, ko/k-net received confirmation that the northern ontario heritage fund corporation (nohfc) would provide the funding to develop the km infrastructure in 10 more remote first nations communities in northwestern ontario. this will increase the number of first nation owned gsm cell systems from the current seven to 17 in the region. doctoral research is currently underway on another first mile initiative the northern indigenous community satellite network. nicsn is the result of a jointly managed, inter-provincial partnership between first nations and inuit communities in northern quebec, ontario and manitoba (national c-band benefit user group, 2005). it is an example of a regional broadband network that is owned, managed, operated and maintained by 46 first nations and inuit member communities and three regional organizations: ko-knet in ontario; the kativik regional government (krg) in quebec; and the keewatin tribal council, which formed broadband communications north (bcn) in manitoba. to ensure community-level participation in network design, control and administration, these three organizations share management and engineering resources. managed from the hub earth station in sioux lookout, ontario (which serves as the internet gateway and network management centre), nicsn partners support each other’s autonomy by allowing for different regional network management models (albeit with backbone technology standardized across the network). the group also supports local community-level network management. digital divides and first nations in canada to understand the broader context in which these initiatives are taking place, it is important to outline the overall context of broadband development in canada, with specific focus on first nations. canada has a long history of broadband development. in 1997, it was the only oecd country whose citizens exhibited a measureable uptake of broadband connectivity (middleton, 2010). however, many communities and individuals did not have access to these newly developing technologies, a condition typically described as the ‘digital divide’ (norris, 2001). early-stage government policies designed to bridge the digital divide focused on quantitative issues of access that aimed to increase measurable levels of ict diffusion (unwin, 2009). this goal was supported by the technologically determinist argument that a robust ‘information society’ would ‘naturally’ develop through the provision of connectivity and information and communications technologies (icts). critical scholars pointed out this unreflexive approach failed to consider the qualitative, contextual factors that can aggravate the ‘digital divide’ even in the face of high levels of quantitative diffusion (schiller, 2007). these contextual factors include socio-economic inequalities between and inside nation-states that limit the abilities of individuals and communities to access and use technologies (raboy & schtern, 2010; shade, 2010; 3 mcmahon et al.: digital divides and the 'first mile' published by scholarship@western, 2011 wilson, 2008). for example, a diffusionist perspective that fails to develop the local expertise required to manage broadband systems can lead to the (re)production of dependency relationships, with local communities left reliant on external service providers (alexander, 2005; mattlelart, 2000; shapiro, 1999). in response to these perceived shortcomings, researchers and policy makers in canada argued for a more holistic definition of the ‘digital divide’. these proposals sought to consider the social relations and power inequalities that exist between various stakeholders in technology development. for example, shade (2010) writes: “while it is acknowledged that access to networks and services should be equitable, affordable, and ubiquitous, it is also recognized that access depends on diverse physical, technical, economic, social and cultural factors” (shade, 2010, pp.125-6; for other examples, see clement & shade, 2000; howard, busch, & sheets, 2010). matear, 2002; middleton, 2010; o’donnell et al, 2009). norris (2001) offers a summary of this perspective with her three-part definition of the digital divide that includes the global divide (between industrialized and developing societies), the social divide (inside each nation), and the democratic divide (which considers issues of technological ownership, control, access and use) (p.4). these kinds of proposals frame icts as more than already-existing artefacts: they are seen as sociotechnical ensembles (bijker, 1993); an analytical approach that expands the focus beyond physical technology to also consider the broader social context of how an artefact is shaped, distributed, adopted, and used. a 2010 world bank report applies this kind of perspective to broadband, defining it as an “interconnected, multilayered ecosystem” that includes networks, services, applications, and users (kim, kelly & raja, 2010, p.15). viewed this way, broadband development policy takes on a broader focus than simple diffusion: [b]uilding a high-speed telecommunications network is only the necessary first step in developing a broadband system. a range of policies and programs are needed to promote and universalize the use of this network by supporting the development of services and applications, encouraging users to go online, and taking steps towards wider inclusiveness. (kim et al, 2010, p.17) in canada, proposals have emerged to support this more holistic approach to broadband development. for example, proponents of community informatics argue that communities be supported to take ownership of the design and administration of broadband systems (gurstein, 2000; 2007). gurstein (2007) highlights the need to design socio-technical systems that support community-based participation and control, for example through mechanisms of decentralized local governance. this perspective considers “the design of the social system in which the technology is embedded as well as the technology system in which it interacts” (gurstein, 2000, p.2). another proposal from this perspective is clement and shade’s (2000) access rainbow, which includes questions about levels of digital literacy and governance alongside broadband penetration statistics. these kinds of proposals are acknowledged by canada’s federal government in numerous policy documents (see for example the crtc, 2009; national broadband task force, 2001). they also share parallels with canada’s long history of development of large-scale communication infrastructures for telephony and satellite television. the historical development of these infrastructures received government support through subsidies and regulation, as shaped with reference to the public benefits their diffusion and use among residents could support (babe, 1990; raboy & shtern, 2010, p.75). at present, broad areas of canada still lack a robust broadband infrastructure (fiser, 2010; o’donnell et al, 2010; white et al, 2010). given their remote and expensive-to-serve locations, rural and remote regions remain unattractive targets for profit-oriented telecommunications companies, due to high infrastructure development costs and lower levels of potential profits (mciver, 2010, p.156; see also crtc, 2009; wilson, 2008). evidence also highlights pricing mechanisms and infrastructure costs as 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 2 [2011], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.2.2 a primary source of this digital divide between urban and rural first nations communities in canada. for example, in 2009-10, fiser found an average household subscriber in the 537 first nations census subdivisions he examined pays more and receives less access to broadband, compared to residents in the urban south (fiser, 2010, p. 35). in 2007, fraser found that costs to access broadband in nunavik and nunavut can be three to five times higher than in southern urban centres -with download capacity only a fraction of what is available in the south (fraser, 2007). policy contexts are never static, and given the continuing need to address these ongoing digital divides among first nations communities in canada, there may be an opportunity to introduce a new policy framework that recognizes the unique needs of these communities. in recent years, critics point to an uneven application in federal policy of the holistic considerations noted above. for example, shade (2010) writes that over the last decade, ict policy has shifted “toward a discourse that merely advantages consumers’ access to goods and services” (p.122). raboy and shtern (2010) similarly question whether twenty years of government policies to ‘connect canadians’ will culminate in simply improving technology penetration statistics (p.76). they offer the example of $225 million pledged in the 2009 federal budget through the broadband canada: connecting rural canadians program (industry canada, 2010). they argue that even as this new funding was released, the federal government was simultaneously reducing the budgets of longstanding (and positively evaluated) community connectivity programs like schoolnet and the community access program (raboy & shtern, 2010; see also moll, 2011). for rural and remote first nations, these policy challenges, and efforts to address them, must be accompanied with specific considerations that relate to their unique status as self-governing aboriginal nations (alexander, 2009; fiser & seibel, 2009; mcmahon et al, 2010). first nations have long argued that centralized government programs and policies preclude the efforts of their own aboriginal governments to secure self-determination. such actions on the part of the federal government appear in several cases of broadband development policy. for example, in 2009-10, formal consultations accompanying the federal government’s announcements to develop a national digital strategy did not refer to the specific contexts of onand off-reserve first nations, inuit, and métis communities -despite recommendations to do so provided through past government-funded programs such as the aboriginal canada portal (alexander, 2005). during interviews for the recently published (december, 2010) report putting the ‘last-mile’ first, representatives from a broad sample of first nations regional technology organizations across canada consistently spoke about their lack of involvement in and problems with federal broadband development policy-making (mcmahon et al, 2010; see also o’donnell et al, 2010). some of these informants described how public investments in corporate and private infrastructure often leave first nations communities without equitable and affordable services and long-term, sustainable broadband solutions. such arguments echo public calls for more substantive first nations involvement in broadband development put forward by political groups like the national assembly of first nations (j. whiteduck, 2010; whiteduck, burton, whiteduck, & beaton, 2010), and by academic researchers working in this area (fiser, 2010; fiser, & siebel, 2009; mcmahon, 2011; mignone & henley, 2009; o’donnell et al, 2010). for example, in 2010 the assembly of first nations outlined a strategy for a national, community-based first nations broadband network called the “e-community ict model” (j. whiteduck, 2010) but at time of publication this proposed network remains unfunded by the federal government. the next section of this paper outlines an alternative approach to connectivity policy-making articulated in the late 1990s called the ‘first mile’. we suggest this ‘first mile’ policy framework is useful for the specific context of first nations broadband development in canada, and potentially for other indigenous peoples. the first mile approach shares many of the same considerations as community informatics and the access rainbow, and in particular foregrounds that broadband development must 5 mcmahon et al.: digital divides and the 'first mile' published by scholarship@western, 2011 emerge from, and be shaped to fit, local community contexts. however, we suggest the first mile approach has particular resonance for indigenous peoples. during the world summit on the information society (2003 to 2005), indigenous peoples highlighted the need to balance equitable access to information and communications technologies with the need to retain their unique, locally grounded indigenous rights, cultural identities, traditional territories and resources. participants noted that indigenous peoples themselves are best positioned to decide when and how they access and use new technologies such as broadband systems (aboriginal canada portal, 2005). this position echoes other aspects of indigenous policy development, for example the principles of ownership, control, access and possession, or ocap, initially developed for the purposes of aboriginal health research in canada (schnarch, 2004). furthermore, it is reflected in many examples of local indigenous communities around the world working to secure local control and ownership of broadband systems, including the projects in canada described earlier in this paper, and in regional projects like the outback digital network and the tanami network in australia (landzelius, 2006, p.6; see also hartley, 2004; latukefu, 2006; leclair & warren, 2007). as ginsberg (1995) writes, the satellite-based tanami network connects four aboriginal communities in such a way that “local areas are the centre from which information emanates, a reversal of the european model that sees the urban cities as the center and the remote communities as the periphery” (ginsberg, 1995, p.131; see also meadows, 1995). some researchers suggest this approach to network development has implications for policy-making in other areas. as latukefu writes: governments in australia have tried to fashion a response to indigenous issues largely by creating structures which best suited the federated units that emerged out of the colonial system. needless to say, these characteristically have not reflected indigenous forms of governance or their power structures, nor have they recognized the diversity of cultures, languages and societies that make up what is monolithically regarded as ‘aboriginal australia.’ (latukefu, 2006, p.51) in the canadian context, some first nations are similarly working to ensure broadband systems are guided by development policies that recognize their unique status as self-governing, sovereign nations. in this context, we suggest they are asserting their self-determination in the context of broadband development: an effort captured in the policy framework of the ‘first mile’. bringing back the first mile first mile approaches are still in the minority among the hundreds of remote and rural first nations across canada; many and probably most first nations are struggling to develop and use broadband networks effectively in “last-mile” development contexts. as already mentioned, research on first mile initiatives in first nations is at its earliest stages. much more community-based investigation will be necessary to fully explore these initiatives. at this early stage, however, we believe that the first mile offers a solid and very promising alternative to traditional policy approaches to addressing the digital divide in first nations. in the late 1990s, a group of rural telecommunications technicians, communication for development practitioners, university-based researchers, community-based connectivity professionals and policy-makers formulated the concept of ‘first mile’ connectivity (paisley & richardson, 1998). drawing on historical models, such as the american rural telephone development cooperatives of the early 20th century (garcia & gorenflow, 1998), the first mile project examined the decision-making processes used in rural telecommunications infrastructure development. employing a ‘communication 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 2 [2011], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.2.2 for development’ approach, proponents argued that policy-making can be articulated and supported through the participatory use of media technologies like film (snowden, 1998), radio and video (norrish, 1998), and the internet (moetsabi, 1998; richardson, 1998b), and in public forums held in ‘multipurpose community telecentres’ (ernberg, 1998). these media technologies would be used by local community members to express ideas and requirements to policy-makers charged with developing connectivity infrastructures. as mcconnell writes: the focus of ict research is currently fixated on the institutional level, which is composed of internet service providers (isps), policy makers and governments. while the value of such research is not challenged here, the fact remains that very little investigation has been conducted concerning the impacts of ict on those who have the most to gain through the expansion of ict in the developing world: the stakeholder communities. (mcconnell, 1998, para 2) by framing the connectivity policy-making process this way, the first mile project sought to highlight ways that user communities, rather than centralized governments or service providers, can drive development. local community members would ideally control and administer the resulting connectivity infrastructure, which was seen as offering little value unless it directly and substantively benefitted user communities. this perspective aligns with community informatics, which insists that technology in itself will not support community development unless it supports collaboratively-identified goals. both approaches involve an increased role for local leadership, planning, design, training, and supporting structures (gurstein, 2003). as garcia and gorenflow write about the first mile approach: “if networking technologies are to promote development, deployment strategies must be integrated with complementary social and economic policies” (garcia & gorenflow, 1998, para 4). the first mile approach sought to address the formation of long-term dependency relationships on external providers of connectivity services. richardson (1998a) argued that “the biggest drawbacks of rural telecommunication systems are dependency on largely urban-centred telecommunication regulations and legislation” (para 26). the first mile sought to redistribute power and control of these systems to and in local communities. some proponents argued this increased local control might encourage take-up of technologies among community members (dymond, 1998). by encouraging community members to articulate how and why they will use newly available technologies before these tools are put in place, proponents theorized that icts are more likely to be recognized as valuable to community users. in order to engage community members, the first mile required appropriate communication platforms they could use (richardson and rajasunderam, 1998). interactions between community members and decision-makers would be facilitated by media technologies like video or radio (anyaegbunam, mefalopulos & moetsabi, 1998; norrish, 1998). the goals of this communications process included articulating specific needs and counteracting biases on the part of urban-located decision-makers tasked with developing connectivity policy (anyaegbunam et al, 1998; ernberg, 1998; ramirez, 1998). for example, as paisley and richardson (1998) write: the concept of the ‘last-mile’ carries a lot of negative connotations and compels us to assume the perspective of an urbanite looking down at the rural margins…[t]he ‘first mile of connectivity’…expresses a more equitable and far less urban-centric view of the challenge of providing everyone with the option of connecting themselves to the rest of the world and all it has to offer (para 1). 7 mcmahon et al.: digital divides and the 'first mile' published by scholarship@western, 2011 in short, the first mile project in the 1990s argued the process of connectivity development in local communities must be fundamentally re-framed to support and encourage participation of community members in all stages of planning, implementation and use. it argued that the most effective, efficient connectivity designs and applications are those rooted in the specific requirements of local communities. to address the challenges of power discrepancies, differing cultural worldviews, and potential dependency on external service providers, the first mile process sought to re-distribute decision-making power to community members, supported through interactive media technologies. links between the first mile and first nations political autonomy we suggest that a first mile policy approach in canada might support first nations leadership to make decisions about broadband development for and in their communities. this approach recognizes specific differences between first nations communities and non-aboriginal communities in canada. first nations are self-governing autonomous political entities, with each first nation responsible for providing political, social, economic, community and cultural services to its members and residents. these responsibilities are different from those of municipal governments: they are grounded in the legal and political status of first nations as sovereign peoples with political treaty relationships with the federal government and with inherent, group differentiated rights. it is important to note the variety of interpretations and applications of self-determination and self-government by first nations (abele, 1999; abele & prince, 2006; macguire, 2008; tully, 1999). this paper avoids commenting on the form of self-determination that individual first nations express. however, it does recognize these political considerations are central to efforts of first nations to secure control over broadband development. this is one reason we suggest that examples of first mile broadband development are best examined on a case-by-case basis. while group-differentiated aboriginal rights are enshrined in formal documents, including section 35 of the canadian constitution (1982), there is a long history and ongoing denial of these rights by the institutions of the canadian state (jenson, 1999; tully, 1999). there is also a lack of clarity around the scope of these rights, and the opportunities first nations have to exercise them in practice (abele, 1999; culhane, 1998, p.41; mcmillan & yellowhorn, 2004). these challenges impact the ability of first nations to secure control over policy development and service delivery. they are reflected in ongoing funding constraints, fragmented government policies, and a policy development process typically developed in centralized, urban institutional environments. compounding these challenges, many first nations communities have small populations and are relatively geographically isolated, with some only accessible year-round through fly-in access. many lack roads or other infrastructure, including for broadband. we suggest that these conditions, as well as the ongoing digital divide these first nations communities face, support arguments that broadband development policies involving canada’s first nations must be fundamentally transformed. drawing on the ‘first mile’, we argue this transformation must support policy-making grounded in and emerging from first nations communities themselves. as noted earlier, first nations organizations, including the assembly of first nations (j. whiteduck, 2010; whiteduck, burton, whiteduck, & beaton, 2010) and the various regional it organizations interviewed for the putting the last-mile first report (mcmahon et al, 2010), have long advocated more involvement in broadband development. in many cases, their arguments are framed around their perception of a disjoint between the needs and processes employed by urban-located public and private sector institutions, and those of the various first nations. first nations argue that centralized government programs and policies created in isolation from the communities they are intended to serve preclude rather than support efforts to address the digital divide their communities face. furthermore, they argue broadband development policy should support principles developed and 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 2 [2011], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.2.2 employed by aboriginal governments in canada in other areas of government policy, such as the principles of ownership, control, access and possession (ocap) (schnarch, 2004, see o’donnell et. al, 2011). conclusion first nations communities presently face challenges of connectivity similar to those described in the first mile project of the late 1990s. in policy development, rural and remote first nations are historically framed as the last mile of connectivity to be serviced by external providers (mcmahon et al, 2010). yet at the same time, first nations in canada are engaging in a broad variety of communitydriven broadband development projects. there are many concrete examples of canada’s rural and remote first nations communities shaping and using broadband systems to meet their unique, local requirements -a process described and supported through years of research and on-the-ground work (fiser & seibel, 2009; mignone & henley, 2009; o’donnell et al, 2010). we argue that these projects offer concrete examples of first mile broadband and connectivity development in action. it is important to note that the first mile approach should not be uncritically accepted as a panacea to broadband development policy. internally, one major challenge these communities face in achieving first mile broadband systems is a lack of human and technical resources. it is not enough for a community to simply build local broadband infrastructure; many remote and rural first nations communities lack the capacity to manage them. for example, some satellite-served remote communities must employ technically sophisticated bandwidth management strategies to accommodate their needs, but sometimes lack human and technical resources and expertise needed to operate them effectively (o’donnell, simms, walmark & hancock, 2009). in terms of usage of these systems, there are often low levels of awareness among first nations community members that broadband technologies are available and useful. for example, even 10 years after introducing videoconferencing equipment, in some communities people do not integrate this technology in their daily work. this is often due to a lack of basic training, high levels of staff turnover, and the lack of community engagement skills. externally, first nations control and ownership of broadband systems is impacted by the uncertain nature of federal government funding programs (mcmahon et al, 2010). while government funds for public services in first nations are guaranteed due to treaty relationships, levels of funding are often insufficient and not administered by the federal government in a manner that meets community needs. a trend over the past two decades indicates that the federal government has been converting program funding in government departments to short-term project and one-time capital funding, and therefore many social and community services lack stability (gibson, o’donnell, & rideout, 2007). the federal government continues to reduce funding for technology initiatives, and in 2011 cut the first nations schoolnet program despite positive outcomes and an excellent evaluation from its sponsoring agency (indian and northern affairs canada, 2009). conversely, the government provides funding directly to commercial telecommunications companies to develop broadband infrastructure in rural and remote first nations, instead of giving it to first nations to develop it themselves (o’donnell, kakekaspan, beaton, walmark & gibson, 2011). despite these challenges to its implementation, we suggest the first mile policy framework offers an opportunity for first nations in canada to secure self-determination in broadband development. following macguire’s (2008) argument that self-determination is most effectively articulated by the parties engaging in it, our tentative suggestion is that the first mile projects underway in canada offer examples of self-determination in action. there are many historical and contemporary 9 mcmahon et al.: digital divides and the 'first mile' published by scholarship@western, 2011 examples of how indigenous peoples around the world have struggled for greater self-determination in a variety of fields, including contemporary social movements taking place through the networks made possible through digital technologies and the internet. we suggest that a first mile approach offers a policy framework that supports first nations control and ownership of community-driven broadband development. the specific forms that first mile projects take are grounded in local communities (and/or partnerships between communities) and contingent on local contexts (thiessen & looker, 2008). as noted several times in this paper, in-depth research of first mile projects is at its very earliest stages. in future, as more studies with these community projects are completed, they will showcase how first nations are planning, administering, managing and retaining ownership of the digital networks and technologies that deliver public and community services. grouped under the paradigm of the ‘first mile’, we propose that these projects hold potential and relevance in the international context of indigenous self-determination in broadband development. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 2 [2011], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.2.2 references abele, f. 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(2008). the last mile: service tiers versus infrastructure development and the debate on internet neutrality. canadian journal of communication, 33(1), 81-100. 15 mcmahon et al.: digital divides and the 'first mile' published by scholarship@western, 2011 the international indigenous policy journal june 2011 digital divides and the 'first mile': framing first nations broadband development in canada rob mcmahon mr. susan o'donnell dr. richard smith dr. brian walmark brian beaton see next page for additional authors recommended citation digital divides and the 'first mile': framing first nations broadband development in canada abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license authors digital divides and the 'first mile': framing first nations broadband development in canada implementing indigenous and western knowledge systems in water research and management (part 1): a systematic realist review to inform water policy and governance in canada the international indigenous policy journal volume 8 issue 4 reconciling research: perspectives on research involving indigenous peoples—part 2 article 7 october 2017 implementing indigenous and western knowledge systems in water research and management (part 1): a systematic realist review to inform water policy and governance in canada heather e. castleden queen's university kingston, ontario, heather.castleden@queensu.ca catherine hart queen's university, cathart28@gmail.com sherilee harper university of guelph, harpers@uoguelph.ca debbie martin debbie.martin@dal.ca ashlee cunsolo labrador institute of memorial university, ashlee.cunsolo@mun.ca see next page for additional authors recommended citation castleden, h. e. , hart, c. , harper, s. , martin, d. , cunsolo, a. , stefanelli, r. , day, l. , lauridsen, k. (2017). implementing indigenous and western knowledge systems in water research and management (part 1): a systematic realist review to inform water policy and governance in canada. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(4). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.6 implementing indigenous and western knowledge systems in water research and management (part 1): a systematic realist review to inform water policy and governance in canada abstract indigenous (first nations, inuit, and métis/metis) peoples in canada experience persistent and disproportionate water-related challenges compared to non-indigenous canadians. these circumstances are largely attributable to enduring colonial policies and practices. attempts for redress have been unsuccessful, and western science and technology have been largely unsuccessful in remedying canada’s water-related challenges. a systematic review of the academic and grey literature on integrative indigenous and western approaches to water research and management identified 279 items of which 63 were relevant inclusions; these were then analyzed using a realist review tool. we found an emerging trend of literature in this area, much of which called for the rejection of tokenism and the development of respectful nation-to-nation relationships in water research, management, and policy. keywords indigenous knowledge systems, water research, water management, water policy, integrative knowledge, systematic realist review, canada acknowledgments tremendous thanks go to our national advisory committee as well as to those who participated in the water gatherings for your significant guidance on our research design and process, our preliminary findings, and our recommendations. we particularly wish to thank mr. guy freedman, elders barbara dumont-hill, maria campbell, and albert dumont for helping us undertake this work with good hearts and minds, and helping us to see ourselves, and our relationship to water, in new and wonderful ways. thank you to all those who passed on their knowledge from generation to generation, to those who shared this knowledge with us, and to those who will take this knowledge forward. the authors would also like to thank the canadian water network for funding this knowledge integration project, and we would like to thank the canadian water network’s research management committee for their ongoing feedback throughout the project. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. authors heather e. castleden, catherine hart, sherilee harper, debbie martin, ashlee cunsolo, robert stefanelli, lindsay day, and kaitlin lauridsen http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ i m p l e m e n t i n g i n d i g e n o u s a n d w e s t e r n k n o w l e d g e s y s t e m s ( p a r t 1 ) : a s y s t e m a t i c r e a l i s t r e v i e w t o i n f o r m w a t e r r e s e a r c h , p o l i c y , a n d g o v e r n a n c e i n c a n a d a in canada, the current circumstances of persistent and disproportionate water-related challenges, threats, and burdens experienced by indigenous (first nations, inuit, and metis/métis) peoples have not occurred in a vacuum; they have arisen from enduring colonial structures, policies, and practices (castleden & skinner, 2014; galway, 2016; mcgregor, 2012; phare, 2009; white, murphy, & spence, 2012).1 although their relationships to the water in their traditional territories have been established and preserved for hundreds of generations, current problems (e.g., contaminated drinking water supplies, flooding, ineffective wastewater treatment, agricultural and industrial draws on watersheds) are often a matter of environmental injustice (mascarenhas, 2007). as a result, indigenous peoples in canada face substantial disparities in water quality, accessibility, and availability when compared to their nonindigenous counterparts (adelson, 2005; basdeo & bharadwaj, 2013; hrudey & hrudey, 2007; white et al., 2012). these disparities emerge from, and contribute to, major challenges for effective water management and research in indigenous contexts (canadian water network, 2013) and for the country as a whole. in canada, the federal government and others (including media, academic researchers, and research funders) acknowledge that inequities exist when it comes to clean drinking water (health canada, 2015) and that there are significant impacts from resource development and climate change on water (ford, 2012; harper, edge, schuster-wallace, berke, & mcewen, 2011). but their attempts to address the problems have frequently been unsuccessful (mcgregor, 2012; phare, 2009, 2011; white et al., 2012). first, both government-led investments and academic-driven research have predominantly focused on drinking water, creating a false fragmentation of the transboundary and ubiquitous lifeline that water embodies (basdeo & bharadwaj, 2013). second, attempts to provide access to safe drinking water, wastewater services, and water management have often failed because both government and educational institutions have relied on what is understood to be western scientific knowledge (mcgregor, 2012; white et al., 2012). while western knowledge is a fluid and evolving knowledge system, its predominant form (as generally employed by government, engineers, and scientists to provide clean drinking water) subscribes to positivist and reductionist notions (mazzocchi, 2006). what this means in practice is that the focus on “objectivity” has translated to top-down approaches concentrating on infrastructure and technological solutions, rather than the systemic social, economic, and cultural transformation that is needed to protect water, in all of its relationships with people and other species (ayre & mackenzie, 2013; durning, 1992; jackson & morrison, 2007; mcgregor, 2012). 1 while our research focus examines the canadian context, access to safe and secure water resources is a global crisis. most recent data from the world health organization (who, 2017) stated that approximately 2.4 billion people lack sufficient sanitation facilities, while nearly 700 million do not have access to potable drinking water. as humanity continues to contaminate and divert the earth’s finite freshwater supply, the disparity between marginialized populations and water “haves” and “have-nots” will continue to be exacerbated across the planet (barlow, 2009). though parts of many countries of the global north are running out of fresh water resources, they are not yet experiencing water shortages due to their wealth and ability to import water from other sources (barlow, 2009). this is not the case in the poorer nations of the global south and, as the global population continues to increase beyond 7.5 billion people, water scarcity and the resulting effects will be felt hardest in these developing nations. 1 castleden et al.: a review of integrative indigenous and western water knowledge published by scholarship@western, 2017 in recent years, it has become increasingly apparent that western knowledge, science, and technology are not addressing water issues and water-related challenges in indigenous nations and other communities in canada (canadian water network, 2013; health canada, 2015; mascarenhas, 2007; sanderson et al., 2015; white et al., 2012). academic researchers (the vast majority of whom are nonindigenous) as well as funding agencies are beginning to recognize that local and indigenous knowledge systems offer the potential for successful and sustainable emergent solutions through context-specific approaches to problem-solving. nevertheless, despite a recent proliferation of case studies and empirical research on the subject, there has been no systematic review to critically examine what approaches offer the most promising ways to move forward in water research, management, and policy development, nor why or how these approaches hold promise. as such, the purpose of this combined systematic and realist review (srr) was to examine the extent, range, and nature of peer-reviewed and grey literature that discuss contemporary approaches to integrative indigenous and western knowledge systems in water research and management practices in canada. 2 m e t h o d s this srr was conducted as part of a comprehensive integrative knowledge project for the canadian water network (cwn), a network centre of excellence for research encompassing the range of natural sciences and engineering, health sciences, and the social sciences. the overarching goal of our project was to identify and assess the most promising integrative research and management practices, as well as to explore challenges and opportunities for water-related research that uses indigenous and western knowledge and science to inform and transform water management practices in integrative ways. through a model of shared decision making and a balance of power and control (e.g., castleden, garvin, & huu-ay-aht first nation, 2008), our program of research was informed by input from a national advisory committee (nac), comprised of western-trained water experts and indigenous knowledge holders and leaders. to establish an integrative approach to our research design, we held a national water gathering in 2014 to seek a broad range of perspectives from additional indigenous and non-indigenous water researchers, managers, and integrative knowledge practitioners. they provided feedback and direction that guided and shaped our project in the following instrumental ways: we codetermined the inclusion and exclusion criteria for the srr; we co-created reflective questions to analyze the results; and we contextualized the results to create recommendations at a second water gathering in 2015, reconvening the same group of indigenous and western water experts. d a t a c o l l e c t i o n a srr approach benefits from the strengths of both systematic and realist review methods. while a systematic review provides a rigorous, reliable, and replicable methodological approach that examines what was done and by whom in a comprehensive way (shamseer et al., 2015), a realist review asks about the reasons for what has already been done and its level of success (or failure): why, how, for whom, and under what circumstances particular processes or practices work (pawson, greenhalgh, harvey, & walshe, 2005). in combining both review strategies, we systematically identified what had been 2 throughout this article, we use the term “integrative approaches,” rather than “integrated approaches,” to refer to the dynamic and ongoing process of knowledge co-production (bartlett, marshall, & marshall, 2012; bartlett, marshall, marshall, & iwama, 2015). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.6 published in the area of integrative water research and management, and examined why particular approaches, processes, and models have (or have not) worked and the context in which their success or lack thereof occurred. this review strategy is consistently being used within the field of social sciences (pawson et al., 2005; petrasek macdonald, ford, cunsolo willox, & ross, 2013), and our use of it builds on a growing body of systematic realist reviews. we conducted a search of peer-reviewed and grey literature, published in english for the time period beginning january 1979 to october 2014; a replicate search was conducted based on direction from our nac in order to compile any new material published from october 2014 to the end of august 2015 (end-date of the project). the search was conducted across three electronic aggregator databases (scopus, web of science, and google scholar), using keywords established by the authors and refined through consultation with a reference librarian (see table 1 for search strings). citations returned from scopus and web of science were screened for relevance using a two-stage process by two independent reviewers from our team: first, titles and abstracts were screened for relevance, followed by a full text screen. articles returned from google scholar were reviewed and collected for inclusion until the entire results page was deemed irrelevant to the scope of the project (as per furgal, garvin, & jardine, 2010). the grey literature was searched using one electronic database (library and archives canada) and two agency websites (canadian public policy collection; government of canada publications). in addition, an online search engine (google) was used to perform a scan of the grey literature,3 where the first 50 records were examined to retrieve any missing literature (see furgal et al., 2010). a final search occurred by visiting organization and agency websites whose published reports emerged in the first round of grey-literature retrieval with the hope of finding similar reports. articles were screened to ensure that they were water-focused within a canadian context and reported empirically on integrative knowledge processes of research and/or management. where disagreement occurred between team members conducting this screening, meetings were held until all were in agreement. relevancy to the project was determined using a ratings scale of 0 to 3 (see table 2 for inclusion criteria and scaled rating). four reflective questions (box 1) guided the decision to exclude or include. in cases where relevance could not be determined, or if two or more reviewers did not initially agree on inclusion or exclusion, the research team conducted a full text review. the full text review applied the same inclusion and exclusion criteria. 3 defined for the purposes of our research as original material published online or in print outside of peerreviewed academic journals. this includes, for example, government and non-governmental organizations (ngos), among others. 3 castleden et al.: a review of integrative indigenous and western water knowledge published by scholarship@western, 2017 t a b l e 1 . l i t e r a t u r e s e a r c h k e y w o r d s t r i n g s u s e d t o s e a r c h t h e a r t i c l e d a t a b a s e s a n d g e n e r a t e o u r l i s t o f i n c l u d e d r e c o r d s g o o g l e s c h o l a r , s c o p u s , a n d w e b o f s c i e n c e g o o g l e (1) = first nation or metis or inuit or aboriginal or indigenous and water (1) and collaboration (1) and co-management (1) and governance (1) and indigenous knowledge (1) and source water protection (1) and water access (1) and water quality (1) and water security aboriginal or indigenous and water and canada and report and governance aboriginal or indigenous and water and canada and report and management aboriginal or indigenous and water and canada and knowledge integrative traditional knowledge and water management indigenous traditional knowledge and water management and community report t a b l e 2 . i n c l u s i o n a n d e x c l u s i o n c r i t e r i a s c a l e d r a t i n g u s e d t o d e t e r m i n e a r t i c l e e l i g i b i l i t y f o r i n c l u s i o n i n o u r r e v i e w 0 water is not the central component to the research; no empirical data are discussed; integrative knowledge or knowledge integration is not referred to; not a canadian context 1 water is somewhat central; some empirical data are discussed; integrative knowledge processes and practices are implied/can be inferred; not a canadian context, but it is arguing for generalizability 2 water is either central or a wholistic perspective has been used and water is discussed at length; empirical data are discussed; integrative knowledge processes/practices are referred to; canadian context is discussed 3 water is central (whether a wholistic perspective is used or not); empirical data are discussed; integrative knowledge processes/practices are described fully; canadian context is discussed 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.6 b o x 1 . i n c l u s i o n a n d e x c l u s i o n c r i t e r i a r e f l e c t i v e q u e s t i o n s a. is the article reporting on empirical data? b. does the article describe integrative knowledge processes of research or management with respect to water? c. is water the focus of the article, or is a wholistic perspective taken within which water is included? d. is it describing a canadian context? d a t a a n a l y s i s to facilitate analyses and synthesis of relevant articles, a “reporting tool” was created through discussions with the project’s nac and attendees to the first water gathering. the srr reporting tool was comprised of 33 questions (see table 3) that were framed around the following broader research considerations: • what integrative knowledge approaches have worked in the past; • how were benefits perceived and actualized from a research, management, and/or community point of view; • what were the findings, implications, and conclusions of previous studies that have sought to implement indigenous knowledge and methodologies with western knowledge and methodologies; and • how were indigenous perspectives and methodologies (including those that were consistent with indigenous paradigms of relationality [wilson, 2008]) implemented during the research process in ways that were culturally appropriate, and that ultimately helped to promote effective water policy, governance, and/or decision-making (if at all)? for our analysis, the literature was divided into groups (first nations, inuit, métis/metis, and multi-site contexts) and analysed by three research team members. for each piece of literature, they responded to all 33 questions as fully and accurately as possible, given the available information. these responses were then compiled and coded; responses were graphically illustrated where possible, though some questions elicited detailed responses that required analysis after close reading. 5 castleden et al.: a review of integrative indigenous and western water knowledge published by scholarship@western, 2017 t a b l e 3 . s y s t e m a t i c r e a l i s t r e v i e w r e p o r t i n g t o o l v a r i a b l e d e f i n i t i o n / d e s c r i p t i o n d e s c r i p t i v e 1 . y e a r p u b l i s h e d year in which the article was published. 2 . j o u r n a l t i t l e title of journal in which article was published. 3 . t i t l e o f a r t i c l e / r e s e a r c h p r o j e c t full title of the article/research project. 4 . t y p e o f a r t i c l e classification of article type • full length • phd dissertation • master’s thesis • report • conference paper • workshop summary • water stewardship strategy • discussion paper • other considerations: editorials, reviews, commentaries 5 . c l a s s i f i c a t i o n o f a r t i c l e classification of article: • theoretical • empirical with data • mixed • water stewardship strategy • workshop summary • report • reflection paper • other (please specify) 6 . f i r s t a u t h o r a f f i l i a t i o n information about the first author, the institution/organization that the author was associated with when they produced the article. first author affiliation can usually be located within the article (below abstract or at the end of the article). in cases where an association is not provided, google search engine will be used to identify the primary affiliation at the time of the publication. • researcher • government • non-governmental organization (ngo) • civil society • other (please specify) researcher individual is associated with an educational institution (university or college). also includes individuals working for private and/or for profit company conducting research for the purpose of fulfilling company goals and objectives. government individual working for or in association with a municipal, provincial, federal, or international government body. ngo individual working for or in association with a non-profit organization on the work in question. civil society public servants (e.g. health care professionals, legal practitioners, public safety personally) or any others whose primary profession is to serve the public, but who is not a government employee. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.6 t a b l e 3 . s y s t e m a t i c r e a l i s t r e v i e w r e p o r t i n g t o o l ( c o n t i n u e d ) v a r i a b l e d e f i n i t i o n / d e s c r i p t i o n 7 . d o e s t h e f i r s t a u t h o r s e l f i d e n t i f y ( i n t h e t e x t o f t h e a r t i c l e ) a s i n d i g e n o u s , i n u i t , f i r s t n a t i o n s , o r m é t i s / m e t i s ? does the first author self-identify (in the text of the article) as indigenous, inuit, first nations or métis/metis? • yes (give details) • no 8 . f i r s t a u t h o r b a c k g r o u n d department that the first author is affiliated with at the time of publication. this will usually be identified within the article; if not provided, google will be used to identify the primary affiliation at the time of publication. • health • science • social science • engineering • geography • interdisciplinary • other (please specify) 9 . c o n t a c t i n f o r m a t i o n corresponding author listed and email address. 1 0 . c o r r e s p o n d i n g a u t h o r a f f i l i a t i o n ( i f f i r s t a u t h o r i s d i f f e r e n t f r o m c o r r e s p o n d i n g a u t h o r ) information about the institution/organization that the corresponding author was associated with when they produced the article. corresponding author affiliation can usually be located within the article (below abstract or at the end of the article). in cases where an association is not provided, google search engine will be used to identify the primary affiliation at the time of the publication. • researcher • government • ngo • civil society • other (please specify) 1 1 . c o r r e s p o n d i n g a u t h o r b a c k g r o u n d ( i f f i r s t a u t h o r i s d i f f e r e n t f r o m c o r r e s p o n d i n g a u t h o r ) department that the corresponding author is affiliated with at the time of publication. this will usually be identified within the article; if not provided, google will be used to identify the primary affiliation at the time of publication. • health • science • social science • engineering • geography • interdisciplinary • other (please specify) 1 2 . f u n d i n g a g e n c y funding agency (or agencies) acknowledged. c o n t e x t 1 3 . g e o g r a p h i c f o c u s geographic location in which the research was based. • detailed state, province, territory, region • mixed/multiple • other 1 4 . p r o j e c t l e a d ( i f s t a t e d ) person identified as the project lead. 7 castleden et al.: a review of integrative indigenous and western water knowledge published by scholarship@western, 2017 t a b l e 3 . s y s t e m a t i c r e a l i s t r e v i e w r e p o r t i n g t o o l ( c o n t i n u e d ) v a r i a b l e d e f i n i t i o n / d e s c r i p t i o n 1 5 . w h o d o e s t h e p r o j e c t i n v o l v e ? list the names of identified partners involved in the development, implementation and/or evaluation of the project. • community • government (municipal, provincial/territorial, federal) • other organizations or institutions • other stakeholders 1 6 . w a s a n i n d i g e n o u s c o m m u n i t y / o r g a n i z a t i o n p a r t n e r i d e n t i f i e d ? w a s t h e i n d i g e n o u s c o m m u n i t y i d e n t i f i e d a s a “ p a r t n e r ” o r w a s t h e l a n g u a g e u s e d s u g g e s t i v e o f o t h e r r e l a t i o n s h i p s ( e . g . , p a r t i c i p a n t s i n a s t u d y ) ? t h a t i s , w a s a c o m m u n i t y b a s e d p a r t i c i p a t o r y r e s e a r c h ( c b p r ) o r c o n v e n t i o n a l a p p r o a c h u s e d ? was an indigenous community/organization partner identified • yes • no if yes – who is identified as the community/organization partner? 1 7 . i s w a t e r t h e m a i n f o c u s ? is water the main focus? • yes • no what form of water is being referred to? • drinking water • storm water • wastewater • sea ice • lakes, rivers, streams • sea or ocean • watershed/ water basin • water governance • other (please specify) 1 8 . h o w i s w a t e r i n c o r p o r a t e d i n t o t h e s t u d y ? describe how water has been incorporated into the study. what aspect(s) of water research or management are addressed in the study? • public health • resource management • environmental/ecosystem health • infrastructure (e.g., water treatment, sewage, storage) • cultural and/or gendered significance/relationship • governance • transportation • sport/recreation • water safety • other 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.6 t a b l e 3 . s y s t e m a t i c r e a l i s t r e v i e w r e p o r t i n g t o o l ( c o n t i n u e d ) v a r i a b l e d e f i n i t i o n / d e s c r i p t i o n 1 9 . w h a t w a s t h e r e s e a r c h p u r p o s e ? list the research question(s) and/or research objectives listed by the authors. 2 0 . d o e s t h e a r t i c l e a c k n o w l e d g e t r e a t y a n d a b o r i g i n a l r i g h t s t h a t r e c o g n i z e t h e r i g h t t o c l e a n w a t e r ? i f s o , i n w h a t w a y ? does the article acknowledge treaty and aboriginal rights that recognize the right to clean water? • yes • no if yes, describe what role treaty and aboriginal rights played. mechanisms 2 1 . w h a t m e t h o d o l o g y / m e t h o d o l o g i e s w e r e u s e d ? list the research methodology/methodologies used by the researchers: • ethnography • phenomenology • grounded theory • cbpr • case study • experimental • empirical • mixed methods (identify all methodologies used) • other(s) (please specify) 2 2 . w h a t r e s e a r c h m e t h o d s w e r e u s e d ? methods used for data collection (list all that apply). • interviews (structured, semi-structured, unstructured) • focus group • survey • participant observation • document review • monitoring • photovoice • digital media, including participatory video or digital storytelling • sharing circle • oral history • ceremony • other(s) (please specify) 2 3 . d i d t h e a u t h o r s d i s t i n g u i s h b e t w e e n i n d i g e n o u s a n d w e s t e r n m e t h o d o l o g i e s a n d / o r m e t h o d s ? did the authors distinguish between indigenous and western methodologies and/or methods? • yes • no 2 4 . h o w w e r e i n d i g e n o u s m e t h o d o l o g i e s / m e t h o d s d e f i n e d ? definition of indigenous methodology/methods by authors (if provided). please note if no definition was provided. 2 5 . h o w w a s i n d i g e n o u s k n o w l e d g e d e f i n e d ? definition of indigenous knowledge by authors (if provided). please note if no definition was provided. 9 castleden et al.: a review of integrative indigenous and western water knowledge published by scholarship@western, 2017 t a b l e 3 . s y s t e m a t i c r e a l i s t r e v i e w r e p o r t i n g t o o l ( c o n t i n u e d ) v a r i a b l e d e f i n i t i o n / d e s c r i p t i o n 2 6 . w a s t h e i n t e g r a t i o n o f i n d i g e n o u s a n d w e s t e r n s c i e n c e / m e t h o d s s t a t e d e x p l i c i t l y ? was the integration of indigenous and western science/methods stated explicitly? • yes • no 2 7 . w e r e i n t e g r a t e d / i n t e g r a t i v e p r o c e s s e s i d e n t i f i e d a n d i f s o , h o w ? describe how the authors talked about integrative processes. 2 8 . h o w w e r e i n t e g r a t i o n / i n t e g r a t i v e p r o c e s s e s d e f i n e d ? definition of integration/integrative processes by authors (if provided). please note if no definition was provided. 2 9 . w h a t d e s c r i p t i o n o f t h e r e s e a r c h r e l a t i o n s h i p o r c o m m u n i t y b a s e d r e s e a r c h a p p r o a c h w a s p r o v i d e d ? how is the research relationship described? what, if any, steps were taken to engage indigenous community/organization partner involvement through all or some of the research process? • design • oversight • data collection • data analysis • knowledge sharing (academic, policy, community/organization, other) • not sure/not specified • other (please specify) 3 0 . l i m i t a t i o n s a c k n o w l e d g e d ? what, if any, limitations were acknowledged? outcomes 3 1 . a r e a n y o f t h e f i n d i n g s s p e c i f i c a l l y d i r e c t e d a t i n t e g r a t e d w a t e r m a n a g e m e n t ? i f y e s , w h a t a r e t h e y ? list the key findings and conclusions from the study that are specifically related to integrated water management. 3 2 . h o w w a s i n d i g e n o u s k n o w l e d g e i m p l e m e n t e d ? look to the outcomes of the project or conclusions of the paper to help determine whether they reflect partial, full, or no implementation of indigenous knowledge. report what the authors describe as evidence for having implemented indigenous knowledge. 3 3 . w h a t b e n e f i t s t o t h e c o m m u n i t y a n d b e y o n d w e r e d i s c u s s e d ? what were the benefits described (perceived or actualized)? • policy • governance • health • theoretical • environmental • band council • cultural • economic • social • not sure/not specified • other (please specify) 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.6 f i n d i n g s after the title and abstract search, 226 articles were retrieved from scopus, google scholar, and web of science. after screening the titles and abstracts for relevance, 29 articles were included, 37 excluded, and 36 moved to a full text review. the full text review resulted in an additional 11 peer-reviewed articles included (leading to a total of 40 included; 64 excluded). with respect to the grey literature, a total of 13 theses and dissertations and 40 reports were retrieved; two reports had to be excluded due to inaccessibility. after review, 12 reports and 11 theses and dissertations were also included in the srr (see figure 1). in sum, 279 documents were reviewed, and 63 documents were included in our srr. we have grouped the results of our findings into six broad thematic categories that emerged from the literature: a. descriptive data; b. context, that is, under what context water was considered or discussed; c. research purpose; d. mechanisms, that is, what methodologies were employed and/or discussed within the literature; e. integrative knowledge approaches employed and discussed; f. cited outcomes. d e s c r i p t i v e d a t a o f a u t h o r s a n d a r t i c l e s although our literature search spanned 35 years, all of the retrieved literature was published in or following the year 2000. the majority of included peer-reviewed and grey literature (71%)4 was published after 2009, with a surge in publication during 2013 (figure 2). the majority of literature reviewed were peer-reviewed articles (n = 40 articles, 63%), with most of these articles (n = 35, 88%) describing primary research. approximately one quarter (n = 15, 24%) of all first authors identified as first nations, inuit, or métis/metis within the text of the article (figure 3). within the sample, 38 articles (61%) identified non-indigenous researchers working in partnership with indigenous communities, and 14 of the included works (22%) discussed working with indigenous organizations or creating knowledge exchange opportunities bringing indigenous and non-indigenous peoples together. the majority of the first authors were from the social sciences (n = 38, 60%), with little representation from the fields of health (n = 7, 11%), natural sciences (n = 4, 6%), or engineering (n = 3, 5%; figure 4). c o n t e x t a n d s c o p e o f i n c l u d e d a r t i c l e s the geographic focus of the literature was predominantly ontario (n = 13; 21%), british columbia (n = 11, 17%), nunavut (n = 8, 13%), and the northwest territories (n = 7, 11%). all projects, however, did involve communities from all across canada. 4 percentages have been rounded to the nearest whole number. 11 castleden et al.: a review of integrative indigenous and western water knowledge published by scholarship@western, 2017 f i g u r e 1 . p r o c e s s o f s r r l i t e r a t u r e i n c l u s i o n a n d e x c l u s i o n . figure 2. year of publication of included records. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.6 f i g u r e 3 . p r o p o r t i o n o f i n d i g e n o u s a u t h o r s h i p o n i n c l u d e d r e c o r d s . 13 castleden et al.: a review of integrative indigenous and western water knowledge published by scholarship@western, 2017 f i g u r e 4 . p r o p o r t i o n o f i n c l u d e d r e c o r d s b y d i s c i p l i n e . aligning with our inclusion criteria, 89% of the examined literature had water as its main focus. our review confirmed that the research to date has predominantly focused on water in the context of drinking water (26%); those that did not, instead used water as an example of how indigenous knowledge, ideas, and practices are applied to water and used in other environmental contexts (see jones, rigg, & lee, 2010; king, 2004; peace & myers, 2012; riedlinger & berkes, 2001). the literature revealed a recent rise (n = 14, 12%, published after 2009) in the number of articles written about water governance. while this might suggest an expansion in the conversation about indigenous governance in canada, it is notable that the authors of half of the records focusing on water governance (8 of 14) are associated with a single research group, the water policy and governance group (i.e., baird et al., 2013; cave, 2012; dupont et al., 2014; finn, 2010; plummer, de grosbois, armitage, & de loë, 2013; von der porten & de loë, 2010, 2013a, 2013b, 2014). for the most part, authors in general did not give more than a cursory acknowledgement of aboriginal and treaty rights (n = 25, 40% discussed or acknowledged), if at all (n=32, 51% no acknowledgement). researchers focusing on communities in british columbia (western canada) referred to the relative absence of written treaties in that province, in comparison to other provinces and territories in canada (see jones et al., 2010; king, 2004; sam, 2013; von der porten 2013; von der porten & de loë, 2014). discussion of aboriginal rights in the northern territories of canada focused on land claims in research, rather than water rights (berkes, berkes, & fast, 2007; woo et al., 2007). only one article stated that aboriginal rights to natural 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.6 resources were ceded in written agreements that would give them a level of access and control over these resources (grimwood & doubleday, 2013), while others highlight that the federal government still does not actively support the terms of these agreements (szach, 2013; von der porten, 2013). w h a t t h e r e s e a r c h s t a t e s a s i t s p u r p o s e a n d o b j e c t i v e s we examined the stated research purposes and the objectives of the author(s), in order to gather a more indepth and nuanced view of current foci in water research and management. the goals of the research included in the srr fell into five broad thematic categories: a. integrative approaches to research and knowledge co-production; b. indigenous relationships to waters and lands; c. institutional arrangements and capacity; d. water governance; and e. drinking water and human health. i n t e g r a t i v e a p p r o a c h e s t o r e s e a r c h a n d k n o w l e d g e c o p r o d u c t i o n . when authors explicitly stated that their intention was to use indigenous knowledge and western science alongside each other, they were referring to: a. producing new knowledge, b. describing a process about how this was done, and/or c. theorizing how this can be done. the language used in these articles reflected the intention to use indigenous and western science in complementary ways, including discussions about cooperative or collaborative management (comanagement; for examples, see armitage, berkes, dale, kocho-schellenberg, & patton, 2011; gearheard et al., 2006; plummer et al., 2013; riedlinger & berkes 2001; wolfe et al., 2007). only gearheard and colleagues (2006) explicitly stated researcher reflexivity in their objectives, though wolfe and colleagues (2007) incorporated a consideration of the challenges “linked to the integration of western science and traditional knowledge approaches” (p. 76) within their objectives, implying reflective practice. i n d i g e n o u s r e l a t i o n s h i p s t o w a t e r s a n d l a n d . this literature documented indigenous relationships to water and/or lands, oral histories, and traditional knowledge. interestingly, these articles also tended to be published more recently; two-thirds of articles in this category were published after 2010 (anderson, chow, & haworth-brockman, 2011; baird et al., 2013; caine, 2013; fresque-baxter, 2013; grimwood & doubleday, 2013; longboat, 2012; mcgregor, 2012; peace & myers, 2012; restoule et al., 2013; sam, 2013; szach, 2013). three articles specifically explored the perspectives of women and their relationship with land and water (anderson, 2008; mcgregor, 2011; szach, 2013) and one focused on youth (fresque-baxter, 2013). 15 castleden et al.: a review of integrative indigenous and western water knowledge published by scholarship@western, 2017 i n s t i t u t i o n a l a r r a n g e m e n t s a n d c a p a c i t y . the articles in this category sought to identify institutional arrangements for water management and flesh out the roles and purposes included therein. they also attempted to determine the institutional impacts on particular management processes and whether they constrain or facilitate the water-related management goals and outcomes. these inquiries were undertaken in order to facilitate navigating the complex institutional arrangements and responsibilities vis-à-vis water in canada (for examples, see armitage et al., 2011; cave, 2012; chilima, gunn, nobel, & patrick, 2013; gajadhar, 2013; graham, edgar, & mitchell, 2009; health canada, 2015; joe-strack, 2012; king, 2004; lebel & reed, 2010; lemoine, 2012; longboat, 2012; rizvi, adamowski, & patrick, 2013; sam, 2013; willms & shier environmental lawyers, llp, 2006). w a t e r g o v e r n a n c e . articles that discussed water governance critically evaluated current governance regimes and governing bodies in order to determine methods that work and to identify the opportunity for alternative models. alternative models were predicated on indigenous governance models and sought to overturn the colonial relationship between settlers5 and indigenous peoples as it is experienced within research and beyond (see baird et al., 2013; cave, 2012; gajadhar, 2013; jones et al., 2010; lemoine, 2012; norman, 2012; von der porten, 2013; von der porten & de loë, 2010, 2013a, 2013b). d r i n k i n g w a t e r a n d h u m a n h e a l t h . the research purposes for articles in this category linked water management strategies to the relationships between drinking water quality and physical health in an effort to improve both water and human health. these articles generally retained a focus on water quality (see harper et al., 2011; martin et al., 2007) and did not include discussions of emotional, mental, cultural, or spiritual health connections to water, though there were exceptions to this rule (e.g., goldhar, bell, & wolf, 2013; patrick, 2011). m e c h a n i s m s f o r c o n d u c t i n g r e s e a r c h the most commonly used methodology was a case study6 approach (28%) followed by empirical approaches (17%) and literature reviews (12%). a community-based participatory approach was noted in eight (13%) of the included articles. interviews (n = 40, 27%) and document or literature reviews (n = 31, 21%) were the most commonly used methods, followed by focus groups (n = 15, 10%) and participant observation (n = 13, 9%). storytelling (see berkes et al., 2007; caine, 2013), place-based learning (caine, 2013; grimwood & doubleday, 2013), oral history (berkes et al., 2007; riedlinger & 5 in the context of this article, a settler is any non-indigenous person in canada, whether through ancestral or contemporary immigration over the past 500 years. 6 we use the language provided by authors describing their own studies; with respect to ‘case studies’, we recognize that many may actually be referring to empirical approaches. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.6 berkes, 2001; sam, 2013), and sharing circles (szach, 2013) were also identified. the majority of articles (87%) did not define or distinguish between indigenous and western methods and/or methodologies.7 indigenous knowledge was referenced more frequently, with approximately one-quarter of articles including a definition of indigenous knowledge, and an additional one-fifth acknowledging its existence without offering a definition. in most cases, indigenous knowledge was not explicitly or “neatly” defined, reflecting its intangible nature and echoing historical challenges with respect to the definition of indigenous knowledge (matsui, 2013). in several articles, definitions were based on the community research partners’ input (e.g., grimwood & doubleday, 2013; woo et al., 2007). however, references to respect, local understandings of place, spirituality, language, and fluidity over time were consistently included in definition discussions. i n t e g r a t i v e k n o w l e d g e a p p r o a c h e s the srr revealed that 35% of articles explicitly stated that they were employing indigenous and western ways of knowing in integrative ways. written discussions about integrative processes considered the research relationship; the importance of knowledge exchange opportunities and how these function as integrative processes in and of themselves; knowledge co-production, including how integrative processes can be used to form policy that respects, values, and is a proponent of multiple ways of knowing; as well as how indigenous and western knowledge used together benefit each other as well as improve the success of the goal or problem to which they are being applied. similarly, recognizing that integrative approaches might include any number of methods, huntington, gearheard, mahoney, and salomon (2011) noted that, most importantly, respect and interpersonal relationships must be present. while mcgregor (2008), in her review of the 2000 state of the lakes ecosystem conference, described how indigenous representatives saw the approach taken there to be an “add-on approach,” where indigenous knowledge was to be incorporated or integrated into an existing western scientific framework.8 the barriers to integrative approaches were acknowledged as limitations in some papers, which included language and translation challenges (e.g., berkes et al., 2007; lemoine, 2012; nichols, berkes, jolly, snow, and the community of sachs harbour, 2004; perron, 2011) but also considered the lack of indigenous voices in decision-making processes about water (e.g., white et al., 2012) and the unequal weight given to western knowledge in comparison to indigenous knowledge (e.g., geertsema, 2009). similarly, the challenges of “fitting” indigenous knowledge into western structures was noted as problematic, in that it reflected the divisions between wholistic and siloed worldviews (berkes et al., 7 cree scholar shawn wilson (2008) posits that relational accountability (researchers as actors and interpreters in and of our relationships with each other and the cosmos) is the key to determining whether or not research methods fall within an indigenous research paradigm. wilson (2008) goes on to state, “traditional indigenous research emphasizes learning by watching and doing” (p. 40), though participatory research methods are not necessarily required as long as the borrowed methods are consistent with an indigenous research paradigm. cree and saultaux scholar margaret kovach (2009) also argues that ensuring value for the community is integral to indigenous methods and indigenous research paradigms as a whole. 8 this was a common problem described by members of our project’s nac and water gathering participants, and which is inherently disrespectful and devaluing of other ways of knowing. 17 castleden et al.: a review of integrative indigenous and western water knowledge published by scholarship@western, 2017 2007). perhaps most importantly, mcgregor (2008) argued that indigenous knowledge loses its meaning when applied outside of its original context within a western scientific setting. r e s e a r c h o u t c o m e s a n d a u t h o r r e c o m m e n d a t i o n s the reported outcomes of the research papers included in the srr fell into three general categories: a. findings specifically directed at integrative water management; b. implementation of indigenous knowledge in (western) research or management processes; and c. benefits to the community and beyond. f i n d i n g s s p e c i f i c a l l y d i r e c t e d a t i n t e g r a t i v e w a t e r m a n a g e m e n t . papers that offered findings about integrative water management identified the need for place-based approaches to contemporary water research and management through the inclusion of local indigenous knowledge systems and community partners, as this approach—several authors argued—leads to more meaningful and mutually beneficial research and management outcomes in comparison to non-integrative research. authors argued that the implementation of indigenous and western knowledge systems can improve water and human health outcomes for all those involved (baird et al., 2013; berkes et al., 2007; daley, castleden, jamieson, furgal, & ell, 2014; goldhar et al., 2013; harper et al., 2011; huntington et al., 2011; lawrence & pillsworth, 2011; von der porten & de loë, 2010). several authors reported findings specific to co-management processes, while others alluded to possible improvements within existing institutions and their arrangements. grimwood and doubleday (2013) underscored the importance of recognizing diverse perspectives, rights, and responsibilities. time, trust, effective communication, and “sensitivity” to canada’s colonial history were also acknowledged as necessary (armitage et al., 2011; wolfe et al., 2007). an emphasis on redefining indigenous peoples’ roles in collaborative water management also emerged from our analysis. many authors acknowledged that implementing indigenous knowledge in water research and management strategies would serve to benefit all canadians and emphasized the importance of respecting indigenous knowledge and treating it as equal to western knowledge (chiefs of ontario, 2007; lavalley, 2006; szach 2013). while some argued effectively for a nation-to-nation governance model (see, for example, von der porten & de loë, 2014), there was little to no discussion of how this could be operationalized. that said, two publications highlighted that dependency relationships on governments must dissolve by either pooling common resources through nation-tonation collaboration (von der porten, & de loë, 2010) or evolving self-government (white et al., 2012). findings from co-management experiences were also offered as recommendations to improve the work of integrative approaches to water management and research (see box 2). 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.6 b o x 2 . r e c o m m e n d a t i o n s f r o m c o m a n a g e m e n t l i t e r a t u r e a. improved communications between first nations and government officials (finn, 2010) and, specifically, prioritization of face-to-face communication (wolfe et al., 2007); b. culturally sensitive operator certification (graham et al., 2009, smith, guest, svrcek, & farahbakhsh, 2006); c. application of traditional conflict resolution techniques (graham et al., 2009); d. new and enforceable water laws that involve first nations in their creation (finn, 2010); e. knowledge holders from the communities should define the process in which it is applied into policy (finn, 2010; von der porten & de loë, 2010); f. increased data sharing and collaboration between first nations leaders, industry, academia, and jurisdictions (joe-strack, 2012; von der porten & de loë, 2010). i m p l e m e n t a t i o n o f i n d i g e n o u s a n d w e s t e r n k n o w l e d g e s y s t e m s . in the papers we reviewed, integrative implementation in research and management processes generally took the form of a collaborative team of indigenous and settler peoples, but these teams did not necessarily reflect equal responsibility or participation throughout the project; rather, it was often that indigenous peoples would participate at specific points in the process. there were cases where the authors discussed the implementation of indigenous knowledge systems in management, such as the aboriginal steering committee that emerged from northern voices, northern waters (miltenberger, 2011), the great bear lake management plan discussed in caine (2013), and the whitefish lake plan (natcher, 2000). in their paper, peace and myers (2012) noted that their knowledge mobilization products included film and photovoice products that were published online, community-based ice monitoring, surveillance, and communication networks, and information products on land, water, and ice safety. these types of outputs are outside the box of conventional academic publications that tend to narrate findings and conclusions to academic audiences, and speak to the importance of long-term partnerships that can support such integrative knowledge implementation. b e n e f i t s t o t h e c o m m u n i t y a n d b e y o n d . benefits that authors identified for taking an integrative approach were listed as enhanced understanding about a particular phenomenon, such as water governance (cave, 2012; finn, 2010; von der porten, 2013). more often, however, these benefits were identified as new knowledge that translated (or could be translated) into cultural, and/or environmental (water), and/or human health benefits. while much of the srr literature included identification of the potential to influence policy through their research or project outcomes (anderson, 2011; armitage et al., 2011; gearheard et al., 2006; harper et al., 2011), it was often difficult to discern whether the research translated into direct benefits for the community partner. 19 castleden et al.: a review of integrative indigenous and western water knowledge published by scholarship@western, 2017 d i s c u s s i o n our srr findings pull together, in one place, the gamut of scholarship on water research and management that has sought to implement indigenous and western knowledge systems in canada over the past 35 years (1979 2014). our findings first provided some descriptive data about this body of work before moving into an analysis of breadth and depth of approaches. here, we identified five broad themes: integrative approaches to research and knowledge co-production; indigenous relationships to waters and lands; institutional arrangements and capacity; water governance; and drinking water and human health. using our srr tool, we then explored the methods that have been used to do this type of work, the extent to which such implementation is described or discussed in the literature, and the outcomes or recommendations arising from undertaking this integrative approaches. these findings are discussed below. the descriptive data about the literature recorded through the srr reveals an increasing awareness of the value and necessity of collaborative, integrative, community-based and participatory approaches in research and water management, as evidenced by the recent upsurge of relevant publications. the bulk of included literature was published after 2009, which flows soon after the united nations announced its declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (2007)—a global call for recognition of indigenous rights to, among other things, environmental decision-making and self-determination. additionally, in 2010 the panel on research ethics in canada outlined new guidelines for research involving indigenous peoples, which encouraged implementation of indigenous knowledge in indigenous-focused research. the descriptive and contextual insights into these publications also characterizes who is undertaking these approaches to water management and research—and what gaps or opportunities for future work might exist. perhaps not surprisingly, only a minority of first authors identified as indigenous (although more could self-identify and not include this designation within the text of their article), as the reality of water governance and research landscapes in canada is still very much dominated by the settler population; thus, it is their voices that are still dominating the water narrative. while our data are specific to the water context, this finding reflects the fact that despite increasing numbers of indigenous researchers, settlers still dominate the research landscape, even when it comes to issues concerning indigenous peoples (ball & janyst, 2008), thus pointing out the need to address the gap in indigenousled scholarship in the academy by supporting capacity development and mentorship (see, for example, the work of canadian institute of health research in that area: richmond, martin, dean, castleden, & marsden, 2013). the dearth of first authors and funding emerging from the science and engineering disciplines is also worth noting. this could be because there are relatively few researchers from the natural sciences or engineering undertaking integrative, collaborative, or community-based participatory research approaches in their work relating to water. this trend has also been noted elsewhere (see feldman, 2004; also cited in kershaw, castleden, & laroque, 2014) and was echoed by participants at our water gatherings, a group that included natural scientists and engineers who felt as though they were anomalies in their fields. yet the strengths of integrative knowledge approaches are equally applicable in their contexts; using integrative approaches can help ensure that results better address the needs of the community, strengthen relationships, build capacity, and ultimately improve water quality or management processes (lavalley, 2006; mcgregor, 2012; phare, 2011; walkem, 2007). we also 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.6 recognize that description about the inclusion of integrative methods and findings may not have been deemed important by some authors, peer reviewers, and/or editors in these (and other) fields of study, potentially leaving some of the “story” on the editing room floor. thus, while acknowledging the value of indigenous knowledge systems and approaches to research is increasing in the water-related literature, we “aren’t there yet” in terms of creating space for indigenousled or co-led research in collaborative inquiry or for applying integrative research approaches across all disciplines; in fact, we are no where near “there.” given the legacy of failure and harm resulting from decades of neglecting and de-legitimizing indigenous ways of knowing in settings both within and beyond the academic research environment (koster, baccar, & lemelin, 2012), bringing indigenous and western knowledge together makes (urgent) sense, particularly in response to canada’s newly released truth and reconciliation commission of canada’s (2015) calls to action. at the same time, we agree with bartlett and colleagues (2012, 2015), who noted that trying to implement indigenous and western approaches in wholistic and equitable ways in any given research project is often easier said than done, and the message from castleden, sloan morgan, and lamb (2012), who noted that many researchers who take integrative approaches need to “spend the first year drinking tea” (p. 160). the srr revealed several gaps with existing integrative knowledge approaches. the most commonly employed research methods were described as “western,” with few research or management approaches including explicit mention of indigenous methods or methodologies. most articles considered water only in the context of drinking water; importantly, gendered and generational relationships to water, as well as emotional and/or spiritual connections to water, were almost always ignored, contributing to an erasure of complex, multilayered, and wholistic understandings of water. an exclusive focus on endpoint solutions, such as drinking water treatment and sanitation does little to incorporate indigenous methodologies such as relationality (wilson, 2008), by minimizing or blanket erasure of any spiritual and relational components of water, rather than considering it as an aspect of a legitimate ontology. this is problematic as the creation and implementation of new knowledge cannot occur within an exclusively western research paradigm; attempts to do so will result in the extractive nature of science that has occurred for decades in academe: removing context that matters (koster et al., 2012). research principles such as those described in bartlett and colleagues (2012) and community-based participatory research (e.g., castleden et al., 2012) that seek to develop research projects through an entirely collaborative process can prove effective in generating meaningful engagement and knowledge implementation. however, these approaches are still on the margins in the canadian research community, and so, not surprisingly, were not cited as frequently used. this raises concerns (also reflected within some of the reviewed literature) that indigenous knowledge is incorporated into an existing western scientific framework as an afterthought, or through an “extract and add-on” approach. similarly, some papers raised the issue of the absence of indigenous knowledge and voice when moving research to decision making and action. western knowledge is frequently privileged over indigenous knowledge, particularly in decision-making contexts (geertsema, 2009; white et al., 2012). outside the realm of water-focused integrative approaches, nadasdy (2003) interrogates the political milieu in which co-management operates in the context of wildlife management, where decision-making power is vested in western institutions, systems, and structures. nadasdy argued that truly “equal” valuation and representation is impossible without a restructuring of the institutions, practices, and underlying 21 castleden et al.: a review of integrative indigenous and western water knowledge published by scholarship@western, 2017 assumptions of wildlife management itself, because the political power to act on knowledge remains with western institutions. in the context of water governance and nation-to-nation relationships, the conspicuous absence of discussion on indigenous and treaty rights throughout the reviewed literature points towards opportunities for stronger consideration and meaningful and nuanced inclusion. despite the challenges we have identified within the literature, this srr has also provided insight into the central lessons learned amongst researchers and practitioners who undertake integrative approaches to their water work. for example, they have noted that indigenous knowledge is embedded within the context, language, and places it is produced, and thus, context-specific integrative approaches to contemporary water research and management is central to encouraging better research and management outcomes, and associated improvements in water and human health (woodward, jackson, finn, & mctaggart, 2012). as well, there is a consistent message that integrative approaches must be in line with each individual community’s standards, desires, and directives (e.g., perron, 2011). other overarching themes and lessons that emerged from the texts include the development of respectful relationships to carry out projects, from initial design to knowledge sharing and decision making; this was repeated throughout many papers, underscoring the importance of face-to-face relationship building and the trust it facilitates (e.g., huntington et al., 2011). it is essential that the processes of integrative knowledge production reflect the values of equity, reciprocity, and shared responsibility (e.g., armitage et al., 2011; cave, 2012; gearheard et al., 2006; longboat, 2012). particularly in the context of canada’s ongoing colonial relationship with indigenous peoples, there is an emphasis on redefining indigenous peoples’ roles in collaborative water management, either through nation-to-nation models of water governance or co-governance; a project which requires not only the transformation of the ways we produce knowledge, but also changes to the ways knowledge informs decision-making processes, and to those decision-making processes themselves. l i m i t a t i o n s the srr was intended to capture the breadth and depth of integrative water research and management in canada. with any study, comes limitations. here we recognize that the srr only captured what has been published in english, which is a key limitation to a canadian-focused review as the country has two official languages, english and french, and french was excluded.9 additionally, our knowledge of the authors’ experiences is constrained by what can be conveyed through written work, as well as what has been able to be published. one important lesson learned through the course of this research, including the water gatherings, is that there is a wealth of knowledge, experience, and even written documentation that is absent from the published literature and, therefore, inaccessible through our database searches. we have sought to overcome this limitation by reaching out to the first authors (typically academics) of exemplars in this field (identified through the srr) to conduct semi-structured qualitative interviews with them and their community partners (castleden et al., 2017 as part 2 of this research in this journal). 9 for an international comparison, please see stefanelli et al. (2017a, 2017b). 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.6 r e c o m m e n d a t i o n s this research examined literature within the canadian context, and through this examination, we have provided recommendations derived from the authors of included literature, as well as our own insights from reflecting on our past research practices in this area. additionally, though these recommendations emerged from the canadian context, they have research and policy implications that can be translated to broader international contexts. a. increased support for indigenous people to encourage success in the realm of academia. as peer-reviewed, published literature from reputable journals guides the discourse, the encouragement of strong indigenous voices through financial and educational support is integral to integrative research in water resource management and beyond. b. encourage collaboration between indigenous and western knowledge holders at the outset of a research project proposal. designing a project with guidance from indigenous community leaders and members runs counter to the current funding structures in academia whereby grant submissions require detailed descriptions of research proposals, therefore an increase in grant development funding can further support this type of approach to research, where it can become community-driven not just investigator-driven. c. collaboration between the natural sciences, engineering, social sciences, and health sciences on research teams presents an opportunity for integrative research to occur if indigenous knowledge systems across these disciplinary divides are also equitably engaged. d. as the global population, and subsequently the stresses on finite freshwater resources, continues to increase, researchers are encouraged to take a more wholistic perspective of water quality – beyond encouragement solely for investments in infrastructure. pollution, diversion, and water ethics did not appear often in this research, despite their tremendous importance. e. indigenous peoples have developed complex systems of place-based knowledge. the placebased nature of this knowledge, however, does not necessarily translate between contexts or lend itself to the development of “cookie-cutter” policies that can be used in various contexts. instead, we recommend spending time with communities and engaging in meaningful discussions to develop community-specific objectives for addressing water challenges. c o n c l u s i o n this article contributes to filling a substantial knowledge gap regarding the state of integrative indigenous and western knowledge approaches to water research and management in canada, which, to date, has been largely understood through case studies and general review articles. importantly, this work accompanies a burgeoning field of literature on integrative approaches, and substantiates findings from community-based participatory research, and other integrative approaches to research and management that have application beyond the canadian context examined in this work. ultimately, the 23 castleden et al.: a review of integrative indigenous and western water knowledge published by scholarship@western, 2017 insights from this research support indigenous nations and organizations, and their allies who are building partnerships, striving for reconciliation, and healing by working together for a shared future. the importance of establishing an advisory committee comprised of indigenous and settler water experts to guide this research cannot be overstated. this committee allowed for indigenous and western knowledge holders to contribute to the design, analysis, and dissemination of the research. due to the international nature of the ongoing water crises, and the generations of place-based knowledge held by indigenous populations across the globe, the establishment of an indigenous–settler advisory committee is a strategy that is applicable for integrative water research in international contexts for governments, academia, and beyond. throughout this article, we have used the term “integrative approaches,” rather than “integrated approaches,” to refer to the ongoing process of knowledge co-production. this language was an intentional decision, arising from input gathered through discussions with our nac, water gathering participants, and within the literature. the term “integrated” suggested that an endpoint exists, and has maybe even been reached, where two dichotomous knowledge systems have come together in stasis. in contrast, the term “integrative” is meant to imply that the co-learning journey is neverending, and to reflect the fluid nature of knowledge and knowledge exchange (bartlett et al., 2012, 2015). this, we maintain is a key take-home message from our research. in light of the truth and reconciliation commission of canada’s (2015) final report and calls to action, the current federal government’s claim to wanting a nation-to-nation relationship with indigenous peoples in this country, and the united nations (2007) declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (which canada only recently agreed to support, without qualification), water is a catalyst for changing our relationship to the land and with each other. political will from institutional environments (i.e., funding agencies and universities) is needed to support the transformational learning and research processes that value indigenous ways of knowing as equal to (and in some cases, preferred over) western systems of knowledge and practice. in the context of disproportionate burdens associated with water-related challenges and risks experienced by indigenous nations, and in light of the strengths and benefits of integrative research and management approaches, we cannot continue with the status quo of exclusion or tokenism if we are to 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(2017). progress on drinking water, sanitation, and hygeine. retrieved from http://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/10665/258617/1/9789241512893eng.pdf?ua=1 33 castleden et al.: a review of integrative indigenous and western water knowledge published by scholarship@western, 2017 the international indigenous policy journal october 2017 implementing indigenous and western knowledge systems in water research and management (part 1): a systematic realist review to inform water policy and governance in canada heather e. castleden catherine hart sherilee harper debbie martin ashlee cunsolo see next page for additional authors recommended citation implementing indigenous and western knowledge systems in water research and management (part 1): a systematic realist review to inform water policy and governance in canada abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license authors implementing indigenous and western knowledge systems in water research and management (part 1): a systematic realist review to inform water policy and governance in canada health planning for indigenous populations: a rapid evidence review the international indigenous policy journal volume 9 | issue 1 article 7 january 2018 health planning for indigenous populations: a rapid evidence review david loutfi mcgill university, david.loutfi@mail.mcgill.ca susan law trillium health partners, susan.law@thp.ca chris mccutcheon mccutcheonc@gmail.com robert carlin cree board of health and social services of james bay, robert.carlin@ssss.gouv.qc.ca jill torrie cree board of health and social services of james bay, torrie.jill@ssss.gouv.qc.ca see next page for additional authors recommended citation loutfi, d. , law, s. , mccutcheon, c. , carlin, r. , torrie, j. , macdonald, m. (2018). health planning for indigenous populations: a rapid evidence review. the international indigenous policy journal, 9(1). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.7 health planning for indigenous populations: a rapid evidence review abstract addressing health inequalities for indigenous peoples and communities is an urgent priority in canada. the aim of this evidence review was to better understand the challenges and best practices of health planning for indigenous populations. in total, 29 articles met our inclusion criteria, from which we distilled four main themes: (a) managing health care in organizations serving indigenous clientele; (b) assessing indigenous health needs and their related costs; (c) toward cultural safety in health planning; and (d) stakeholder participation in health planning. our review indicates that while little has been published about challenges and best practices of health planning for indigenous populations, there are important lessons to be learned from this literature, including promising practices for decision makers. keywords indigenous, health planning, health services, rapid evidence review acknowledgments this work was carried out by the authors on behalf of a partnership involving the mcgill intersectoral indigenous health research team and the management team of the iiyuu ahtaawin miyupimaatisiiun planning initiative of the cree board of health and social services of james bay. we thank martin morris, msc (liaison librarian: life sciences, schulich library of science and engineering, mcgill university) for developing the electronic search strategies and for methodological guidance. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. authors david loutfi, susan law, chris mccutcheon, robert carlin, jill torrie, and mary ellen macdonald http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ h e a l t h p l a n n i n g f o r i n d i g e n o u s p o p u l a t i o n s : a r a p i d e v i d e n c e r e v i e w addressing the health inequalities experienced by indigenous populations in canada is an urgent priority. compared to the country’s non-indigenous population, indigenous peoples generally experience a greater burden of illness, though there are variations between regions (gracey & king, 2009; reading, 2009; statistics canada, 2011). further, indigenous peoples often experience stigma, stereotyping, and discrimination when accessing health services (cameron, carmargo plazas, salas, bourque bearskin, & hungler, 2014). planning health services that are accessible and culturally safe is essential to ensuring good health. how to accomplish this goal is not always obvious, however, especially in the face of the multiple challenges. these challenges include: • a lack of baseline data about the services received by indigenous people (particularly in urban areas), • poor linkages between health databases (minore, katt, & hill, 2009; smylie & anderson, 2006) • jurisdictional complexities, • a lack of infrastructure and human resource capacity, • a need for culturally-relevant health measures, and • challenges of disseminating information to health planners and policy makers (smylie, 2010). in order to improve the health of the communities it serves, the cree board of health and social services of james bay (cbhssjb) has supported a large-scale grassroots health planning process across its territory in the province of québec, canada, with local ownership of community-based initiatives. to inform this process, the cbhssjb partnered with an academic research team to examine existing research on indigenous health planning processes. finding no published synthesis of current knowledge about health planning processes for indigenous populations, together we developed a protocol for a review of the relevant literature to help inform the cbhssjb’s planning process and evaluation. in doing so, we sought to provide similar organizations with a basis from which to plan health services in their own communities. the results, which are described below, present an overview of the current literature on challenges and best practices in health planning for indigenous populations. in our findings, we use the term “indigenous” to refer to first peoples generally. this includes but is not limited to first nations, métis, inuit, australian aboriginals, and torres straight islanders. when referring to particular communities, nations, or tribes, we use the names included in the original sources or studies. m e t h o d s with engagement from key stakeholders, we conducted a rapid evidence review. a rapid evidence review is a literature review designed to quickly (typically in about 6 months), yet systematically, gather and synthesize evidence on a focused topic (khangura, konnyu, cushman, grimshaw, & moher, 2012; mccutcheon, 2013; thomas, newman, & oliver, 2013). our intersectoral team included academic researchers (from medicine, anthropology, natural resources, health services, and education) and public health knowledge users from the cbhssjb. cbhssjb participants included directors and assistant directors of public health and program staff responsible for implementing a health planning process. 1 loutfi et al.: health planning for indigenous populations published by scholarship@western, 2018 the participatory process we employed helped ensure the research question and results were relevant to the knowledge users and grounded in their underlying contexts; generally, such participatory processes improve the likelihood that results of research can usefully inform local health planning processes (cargo & mercer, 2008; jagosh et al., 2012). r e s e a r c h q u e s t i o n d e v e l o p m e n t in order to define the research question, our team worked through a series of queries (see figure 1) designed to develop a rich understanding of cbhssjb’s needs. this process included soliciting a general description of the problem, key terms in the local vernacular for the literature search, an understanding of how the resultant review would be used, and relevant contextual information. the final research question, achieved through team consensus, was: what are the challenges and best practices in health planning for indigenous populations? r a p i d e v i d e n c e b r i e f c o n s u l t a t i o n f o r m h e a l t h p l a n n i n g f o r i n d i g e n o u s p o p u l a t i o n s completed in discussion with cbhssjb decision-maker leads at project initiation. 1. provide a brief but detailed description of the topic. 2. are there specific questions you wish to have answered? 3. how is this evidence brief relevant to your organization and how might the results be used? 4. is there any other contextual information that could be relevant to this evidence brief (i.e., known barriers or facilitators, recent changes to policy, populations affected)? 5. please list keywords or search terms that you think would be relevant to the search. 6. do you know of any key articles, documents and/or reports that should be included in the review? 7. is there anything else you would like to add? f i g u r e 1 . r a p i d e v i d e n c e b r i e f c o n s u l t a t i o n f o r m . this form was completed in discussion with the cbhssjb to guide this review. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.7 s e a r c h s t r a t e g y the overall search process, including the number of records identified, included, and excluded, is depicted in figure 2. the literature search was conducted between march and august 2014 and updated between march and august 2017 by four members of the academic team (c. m., d. l., s. l., & m. e. m.) with the help of an academic health librarian with experience conducting systematic reviews. a preliminary search used keywords (e.g., planning, health, indigenous, aboriginal) drawn from both the research question and the aforementioned discussion among members of the intersectoral team. titles and abstracts of retrieved articles were reviewed by the academic team, who retained any that were relevant to the research question. the academic health librarian then created a formal search strategy using the retained articles; the librarian limited this search to publications from 2000 onwards. the following electronic databases were searched per this strategy: medline (ovid), pubmed, embase, cinahl, scopus, web of science, biosis previews, cochrane, and trip. the combined electronic search (original and updated search) yielded 9,584 articles in total. s c r e e n i n g o f s e a r c h r e s u l t s two team members (c. m., d. l.) screened all titles and abstracts using the inclusion and exclusion criteria specified in table 1. this process reduced the yield to 690 articles; however, the majority of those articles were still not directly relevant to the research question. upon reflection, it became clear to the team that there was lack of precision in operationalizing the term “health planning.” to address this problem, we used google and google scholar to search for a relevant definition; the best fit came from the world health organization (world health organisation, n. d.), which we have simplified thusly: health planning is the process of selecting policies and services to meet the health needs of a population. it requires at least two components: a. a method for identifying health needs, and b. a process for developing a policy or service that considers resources and evidence. with this definition, the academic team reviewed a subset of 100 titles and abstracts, labelling each as “in,” “out,” or “maybe.” after this calibration, c. m. and d. l. screened the remaining 590 articles; 143 of these 590 articles were retained. the four researchers ranked them according to relevance. highly relevant scored 8-10, relevant scored 4-7, and or not relevant scored 1-3. only the highly relevant articles (n = 29) were included in the synthesis. articles that scored 7 were scanned for possible inclusion, but none were included. we then conducted a thematic analysis (silverman, 2009) of the articles to determine shared themes regarding best practices and challenges related to planning for the health of indigenous populations. given that this review is being used to inform a grassroots planning process in 10 communities, the analytic lens we applied to our thematic analysis followed developmental evaluation (patton, 2011) to ensure that our analysis was relevant to the specific indigenous context and their planning process. a draft of this paper was written by the academic team and then reviewed and revised with input from members of the cbhssjb team, ensuring cultural and organizational relevance (j. t., r. c.). 3 loutfi et al.: health planning for indigenous populations published by scholarship@western, 2018 f i g u r e 2 . p r i s m a d i a g r a m o f r a p i d e v i d e n c e r e v i e w . id en tif ic at io n sc re en in g el ig ib ili ty in cl ud ed records identified through database searching (n = 9,584) records for initial screening (titles and abstracts by one reviewer) (n = 9,584) records for secondary screening (titles and abstract by multiple reviewers) (n = 690) records excluded for lack of relevance (n = 528) and unavailability of publication (n = 19) total (n = 547) full-text articles assessed for eligibility (n = 143) full-text articles excluded (see exclusion criteria) (n = 114) studies included in qualitative synthesis (n = 29) records excluded (n = 8,894) 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.7 t a b l e 1 . i n c l u s i o n a n d e x c l u s i o n c r i t e r i a f o r s c r e e n i n g s e a r c h r e s u l t s i n c l u s i o n c r i t e r i a all research methodologies, including case studies interventions studies that describe the design and implementation of the intervention (i.e., must have a planning component) tools or methodologies that could be useful to managers or policy makers who conduct health planning for indigenous people (if the article describes their use in the planning process) articles looking at the health system or population level (e.g., not simply one community) e x c l u s i o n c r i t e r i a opinion pieces or editorials theoretical articles interventions that only include health outcomes (i.e., they do not describe the design or implementation of the intervention) articles that do not focus on policy or services for indigenous people studies of health status or prevalence of disease studies on the training of new health professionals articles on how to ethically conduct research with or for indigenous people small-scale interventions that do not look beyond a single community articles describing sources of information or techniques for acquiring information that would be useful inputs to health planning but do not describe how they have been used or could be used in health planning articles published before 2000 5 loutfi et al.: health planning for indigenous populations published by scholarship@western, 2018 r e s u l t s our final synthesis included 29 articles that were deemed highly relevant to our research question. the majority of these articles used case study methodologies and included descriptions of their planning approaches. few articles provided evaluation data (see table 2 for a summary of the articles). our analysis identified four broad domains related to indigenous health planning: 1. managing health care in organizations serving indigenous clientele: challenges and considerations; 2. approaches to assessing indigenous health needs and service delivery costs; 3. toward cultural safety in health planning; and 4. stakeholder participation in health planning. table 2 outlines the key findings of each article, and table 3 summarizes key messages for decision makers from across the thematic analysis. the articles often touch upon more than one of the domains as identified in the last column of table 2. it is worth noting that the four domains are complementary—for example, stakeholder participation is connected to culturally safe planning. m a n a g i n g h e a l t h c a r e i n o r g a n i z a t i o n s s e r v i n g i n d i g e n o u s c l i e n t e l e : c h a l l e n g e s a n d c o n s i d e r a t i o n s members of the cbhssjb were interested in both the role of indigenous culture in health planning and the effects of indigenous management styles and staff members on organizations and their health plans. these issues were addressed in several articles discussing aboriginal community controlled health services (acchs),1 implemented in australia (coombe, 2008; fuller et al., 2005; taylor, dollard, weetra, & wilkinson, 2001). additionally, these themes were addressed in articles discussing the restructuring of indigenous health services in british columbia, canada (anderson & hansson, 2016), workforce planning (panzera et al., 2016), priority setting (otim, asante, kelaher, anderson, & jan, 2016; otim, kelaher, anderson, & doran, 2014), and how to ensure indigenous control of health services (lavoie & dwyer, 2016). 1 an aboriginal community controlled health service is “a primary health care service initiated and operated by 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.7 t a b l e 2 . s u m m a r y o f a r t i c l e s f i r s t a u t h o r / d a t e / c o u n t r y / i n d i g e n o u s g r o u p t i t l e m e t h o d k e y f i n d i n g s o r p r o c e s s e s d o m a i n * allen/2004/usa/ american indian and alaskan native mapping pathways to services: description of local service systems for american indian and alaska native children by circles of care description of health services this description of health services used focus groups, interviews, internal reports, agency statistics, and gis mapping. it found that community member interviews were important to identify gaps in services, and using gis was an effective way to display and understand the health system. 2, 4 anderson/2016/canada/ first nations, urban aboriginal peoples, métis (including dakelh, dené, ktunaxa, nlaka’pamux, secwepemc, st’at’imc, syilx, and tsilhqot’in) engagement in system redesign case study describes interior health, a regional health authority in british columbia, canada. interior health collaborated with communities to create interim regional health and wellness plans. these were then used to create one aboriginal health and wellness strategy. the four key priorities were (a) advancing cultural competency and safety, (b) ensuring meaningful participation, (c) improving health equity, and (d) improving mental wellness. 1 andrews/2002/australia/ aboriginal in new south wales identifying and overcoming the barriers to aboriginal access to general practitioner services in rural new south wales case study consultation with indigenous communities is key for planning. general practitioners and aboriginal health workers working in silos is a barrier to good care. 4 7 loutfi et al.: health planning for indigenous populations published by scholarship@western, 2018 t a b l e 2 . s u m m a r y o f a r t i c l e s ( c o n t i n u e d ) f i r s t a u t h o r / d a t e / c o u n t r y / i n d i g e n o u s g r o u p t i t l e m e t h o d k e y f i n d i n g s o r p r o c e s s e s d o m a i n * chatwood/2015/canada/ indigenous groups in circumpolar settings approaching etuaptmumk – introducing a consensus-based mixed method for health services research methods paper examines how the nominal group technique was a good method that allowed the integration of indigenous ways of knowing. 2, 4 coombe/2008/australia/ aboriginals and torres strait islanders the challenges of change management in aboriginal community-controlled health organisations. are there learnings for cape york health reform? literature review (nonsystematic) participatory approaches are essential when working with aboriginal populations in australia. those populations tend to favor consensus building and so using an authoritarian approach is counterproductive in light of historical injustices. 1 durey/2016/australia/ aboriginal peoples in perth improving healthcare for aboriginal australians through effective engagement between community and health services qualitative evaluation district aboriginal health action groups were created in 5 districts, consisting of aboriginal community members nominated by their communities and health service providers. the chairpersons were aboriginal people. the process was broad enough to capture a range of perspectives and met expectations. their views were heard and translated into action; explanations were given if they were not. participants felt empowered and trust built between mainstream health services and the aboriginal communities. 4 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.7 t a b l e 2 . s u m m a r y o f a r t i c l e s ( c o n t i n u e d ) f i r s t a u t h o r / d a t e / c o u n t r y / i n d i g e n o u s g r o u p t i t l e m e t h o d k e y f i n d i n g s o r p r o c e s s e s d o m a i n * edgerly/2009/usa/ anishinaabe steps to a healthier anishinaabe, michigan: strategies for implementing health promotion programs in multiple american indian communities case study used 5 steps to implement health promotion programs: 1) use a tribal coordinator in each community, 2) develop a community action plan in each tribe, 3) adapt best practice interventions to be culturally appropriate and tribe specific, 4) provide ongoing technical assistance, and 5) respect tribal sovereignty. 3 english/2004/usa/ navajo intermediate outcomes of a tribal community public health infrastructure assessment case study it was possible to adapt a health system assessment tool by providing simple (lay) descriptions of the tool to navajo partners and then adapting it for their context. 3 fricke/2004/canada/ inuit development of a communitybased medical rehabilitation programme in the kivalliq region of nunavut, canada case study to develop a needs assessment for rehabilitation services, they (a) conducted surveys to people in health, social services, and education; (b) conducted surveys with those who would have benefited from services in the last 5 years; (c) conducted radio call-in shows; and (d) conducted key informant interviews with patients, service providers, and administrators. 2 9 loutfi et al.: health planning for indigenous populations published by scholarship@western, 2018 t a b l e 2 . s u m m a r y o f a r t i c l e s ( c o n t i n u e d ) f i r s t a u t h o r / d a t e / c o u n t r y / i n d i g e n o u s g r o u p t i t l e m e t h o d k e y f i n d i n g s o r p r o c e s s e s d o m a i n * fuller/2005/australia/ pika wiya (aboriginal controlled health service provider) sustaining an aboriginal mental health service partnership case study both interpersonal and formal relationships between stakeholders were necessary, though not sufficient, for developing and sustaining the program. sustainability would be improved by: (a) providing training in cross-cultural mental health care management, and (b) using data to communicate the value of the partnership. 1 gibson/2007/canada/ tåîchô setting our minds to it: community-centered research for health policy development in northern canada content analysis analyzing tåîchô stories and songs provided an understanding of tåîchô values, which were then incorporated into frameworks for planning health policy. 1, 3, 4 kerr/2010/new zealand/ māori kaupapa māori action research to improve heart disease services in aotearoa, new zealand action research/case study separate consultation of health professionals and māori led to improved cross-cultural communication and changed practitioners’ views of the māori. 4 lavoie/2016/canada/ indigenous peoples in canada implementing indigenous community control in health care: lessons from canada review implementing community control is long, requires sustained funding, and needs appropriate indicators for accountability. 1 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.7 t a b l e 2 . s u m m a r y o f a r t i c l e s ( c o n t i n u e d ) f i r s t a u t h o r / d a t e / c o u n t r y / i n d i g e n o u s g r o u p t i t l e m e t h o d k e y f i n d i n g s o r p r o c e s s e s d o m a i n * logiudice/2012/ australia/ indigenous australians in looma lungurra ngoora—a pilot model of care for aged and disabled in a remote aboriginal community— can it work? case study the development of a steering committee consisting of representatives from the community council, government services, and non-governmental organizations was essential for monitoring, decision-making, and governance. 4 look/2012/usa/ native hawaiian and other pacific people developing a culturally based cardiac rehabilitation program: the hela study communitybased participatory research consultation with the community and researchers led to the development of a hula-based rehabilitation program that was culturally appropriate and consistent with current scientific evidence. 4 mccalman/2016/ australia/ aboriginals and torres strait islanders the effectiveness of implementation in indigenous australia healthcare: an overview of literature reviews review effective implementation requires cultural adaptation, indigenous leadership, and decentralized implementation. 4 mcdonald/2017/ australia/ aboriginal communities in northern territory participatory systems approach to health improvement in australian aboriginal children indicator development this study described how indicators for child health in aboriginal communities were developed by combining frameworks from relevant literature with extensive aboriginal involvement. 2 11 loutfi et al.: health planning for indigenous populations published by scholarship@western, 2018 t a b l e 2 . s u m m a r y o f a r t i c l e s ( c o n t i n u e d ) f i r s t a u t h o r / d a t e / c o u n t r y / i n d i g e n o u s g r o u p t i t l e m e t h o d k e y f i n d i n g s o r p r o c e s s e s d o m a i n * o’kane/2004/australia/ n/a towards needs-based mental health resource allocation and service development in rural and remote australia development of planning process proposal for a five-step process that involves sociodemographic mapping, estimating service usage and adjusting cost based on demographic features (remoteness and aboriginal status). 2 o’neil/2016/canada/ first nations in british columbia transforming first nations’ health governance in british columbia description of health services this article describes how first nations health governance in british columbia has changed since the creation of the first nations health authority. interviews and group discussions with executives at organizations involved in providing health services in b.c. explored how the transformation of governance has occurred. key themes include partnerships, relationships, reciprocal accountability, first nations perspectives on health and wellness, and cultural safety. 1 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.7 t a b l e 2 . s u m m a r y o f a r t i c l e s ( c o n t i n u e d ) f i r s t a u t h o r / d a t e / c o u n t r y / i n d i g e n o u s g r o u p t i t l e m e t h o d k e y f i n d i n g s o r p r o c e s s e s d o m a i n * ong/2012/australia/ indigenous australians differences in primary health care delivery to australia’s indigenous population: a template for use in economic evaluations mixed methods (literature review, stakeholder decisions, and key informant interviews) costs of health services for indigenous populations can be estimated using a framework that accounts for: basic health intervention delivery characteristics; population health, social, and community activities; management and government structures; patient transport services; provision of services to a large remote population; and differences in the rates of indigenous utilization of services and adherence to treatments. 1, 2 otim/2014/australia/ decision makers in indigenous health in victoria, australia priority setting in indigenous health: assessing priority setting process and criteria that should guide the health system to improve indigenous australian health crosssectional survey discusses priority setting and states that better economic data will help ensure resources are spent appropriately. 2 otim/2016/australia/ decision makers in indigenous health in victoria, australia acceptability of programme budgeting and marginal analysis as a tool for routine priority setting in indigenous health mixed method survey program budgeting and marginal analysis is potentially acceptable as a priority setting mechanism for decision-makers. 2 13 loutfi et al.: health planning for indigenous populations published by scholarship@western, 2018 t a b l e 2 . s u m m a r y o f a r t i c l e s ( c o n t i n u e d ) f i r s t a u t h o r / d a t e / c o u n t r y / i n d i g e n o u s g r o u p t i t l e m e t h o d k e y f i n d i n g s o r p r o c e s s e s d o m a i n * panzera/2016/australia/ indigenous groups in queensland regional health workforce planning through action research: lessons for commissioning health services from a case study in far north queensland case study offers an example of how participatory health workforce planning could be carried out by involving stakeholders in 4 steps: 1) needs assessment, 2) remodeling the health system, 3) workforce redesign, and innovation, 4) training plan. 1 parter/2012/australia/ aboriginal people in new south wales developing an aboriginal health plan for nsw: the consultation process case study stakeholder participation in developing a health plan is key, particularly to countermand the history of ignoring indigenous voices. 3, 4 polus/2012/australia/ indigenous australians embedding chiropractic in indigenous health care organisations: applying the normalisation process model case study engaging elders is key to adapting and implementing chiropractic services in indigenous communities. 4 santos/2008/usa/ native hawaiian institutionalizing a comprehensive tobacco cessation protocol in an indigenous health system case study long-term commitment to consultation with partners is key, both to support local champions and to ensure partners have appropriate supervisor support. 3 taylor/2001/australia/ aboriginals and torres strait islanders contemporary management issues for aboriginal community controlled health services literature review (nonsystematic) the participatory style of acchs allows them to provide integrated and holistic care. however, maintaining participation may be difficult as health service management is increasingly complex. 1 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.7 t a b l e 2 . s u m m a r y o f a r t i c l e s ( c o n t i n u e d ) f i r s t a u t h o r / d a t e / c o u n t r y / i n d i g e n o u s g r o u p t i t l e m e t h o d k e y f i n d i n g s o r p r o c e s s e s d o m a i n * walker/2010/canada/ anishinabe (primarily) achieving cultural integration in health services: design of comprehensive hospital model for traditional healing, medicines, foods and supports case study consultations with elders and creation of an elders council to inform the development of the traditional medicine and healing program were considered central to ensuring culturally appropriate care. 1, 3, 4 walker/2015/usa/ indigenous communities in washington state american indian perspectives on evidence-based practice implementation: results from a statewide tribal mental health gathering case study cultural adaptation of evidence-based interventions should be considered at the outset of implementation. consortiums that allow tribes to share costs and knowledge can be an alternative to carrying out an adaptation of the evidence in each community. 3 note. *domains: 1. managing health care in organizations serving indigenous clientele: challenges and considerations, 2. approaches to assessing indigenous health needs and service delivery costs, 3. toward cultural safety in health planning, 4. stakeholder participation in health planning. 15 loutfi et al.: health planning for indigenous populations published by scholarship@western, 2018 t a b l e 3 . k e y m e s s a g e s f o r h e a l t h p l a n n e r s k e y m e s s a g e s f o r h e a l t h p l a n n e r s • indigenous communities have adapted non-indigenous health planning tools to improve their cultural relevance and safety. they have also developed health-planning frameworks based entirely on traditional values and beliefs. • participatory approaches, in which the views of both community members and health practitioners are brought together, is a potential best practice for improving health planning. • some authors have suggested that priority be given to elders when seeking advice or information from indigenous communities. • it can be difficult to develop indicators that are useful for health planning, fulfill accountability requirements, and reflect indigenous values and understandings of what it means to live well. • empirical data about health status and health services is often scant when it comes to specific indigenous populations. in this case, one can estimate health need, the appropriate level and mix of services, gaps, and cost-effectiveness through modeling. in one example, the costs of delivering rural health services were estimated by multiplying the cost of urban care by 1.5; to estimate the cost of treating indigenous people, $50 per capita was added for specialist care and an additional $150 per capita for health programs delivered by indigenous organizations (o’kane & tsey, 2004). qualitative methods (interviews, focus groups, etc.) are also promising for determining use of health systems, informal support systems, and traditional healing. • there is little quality research in the health literature that looks directly at health planning with and/or for indigenous populations. it would be worthwhile to conduct targeted searches on the domains identified in this review. it is also important to seek evidence in other literatures (e.g., management, built environment). 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.7 the acchs model was of particular interest for this review, as acchs are autonomous grassroots organizations that are mandated to deliver healthcare. an important challenge these organizations face is bridging unique cultural approaches with differing, sometimes conflicting, approaches to management, planning, and health (coombe, 2008; taylor et al., 2001) as they partner with other organizations for funding and integrated service provision. these other organizations often have their own priorities, processes, and accountability requirements that are more directive or “top–down” than community organizations (coombe, 2008). thus, compatibility with other organizations can be a significant challenge. for example, acchs is committed to providing an integrative model of primary care so as to address social determinants of health. this commitment has proven challenging since direct funding is not available for an integrated model and instead must be sought for individual services (taylor et al., 2001). one case study showed that indigenous health service providers sometimes have to refer patients to providers who do not share the acchs’ commitment to culturally appropriate care (fuller et al., 2005). such experiences can fuel concerns that non-indigenous approaches to governance will supplant indigenous values and acchs organizations will perform less like extensions of indigenous communities and more like mainstream services (coombe, 2008). similar concerns were raised in an article focused on an indigenous community in north america (gibson, martin, zoe, edwards, & gibson, 2007). in 2005, the tåîchô community service agency in canada’s northwest territories tried to develop policies and principles of service delivery that were based directly on tåîchô traditions, thereby bypassing non-indigenous practices of priority-setting and governance (gibson et al., 2007). an example was the service agency’s development of indicators of health and well-being. during two workshops, academics, elders (the term for respected knowledge keepers within the community), chiefs, and senior tåîchô government staff worked to develop indicators that were useful for health planning, fulfilled accountability requirements, and reflected indigenous values and understandings of what it means to live well (gibson et al., 2007). indigenous populations in british columbia, canada, have also re-structured health services delivery. in this context, the first nations health authority (fnha) is responsible for planning, delivering, and funding health services for indigenous populations in british columbia. a national body, health canada, previously carried out this work. fnha has worked closely with regional health authorities, such as interior health, to align priorities among agencies. for example, interior health held meetings with stakeholders to create an aboriginal health and wellness plan with indigenous partners, and then attempted to align its priorities with the fnha (anderson & hansson, 2016). a qualitative description of the fnha (based on interviews with stakeholders from the provincial ministry of health, the fnha, and first nations communities) has outlined how its creation has led to relationship building, reciprocal accountability, and increased indigenous representation in health services planning and governance, with the goal of improving quality of care and cultural safety (o’neil et al., 2016). as the fnha is relatively new (at least compared with acchs), more time is necessary in order to evaluate its impact on the health of indigenous populations. returning to the australian context, a notable characteristic of acchs for this review was its horizontal, participatory management style (coombe, 2008; taylor et al., 2001). this style is not surprising, considering that the acchs was formed out of and represents community interests and health 17 loutfi et al.: health planning for indigenous populations published by scholarship@western, 2018 priorities. this participatory style is advantageous insofar as the organization involves a diverse group of stakeholders and thus can acknowledge and adapt to their needs. coombe (2008) has argued that a participatory management style derives from and is generally amenable to indigenous culture in australia. in contrast to non-indigenous approaches to governance, coombe has suggested that management styles in acchs value an egalitarian approach, consensus decision-making, collective responsibility, and an approach to communication that is informal and built upon personal relationships and face-to-face interactions. coombe has also argued that authoritative management styles can be detrimental because they can trigger resentment related to historical injustices experienced by indigenous populations and the trauma of colonialism. yet, there may be limitations to participatory management styles. take, for example, the membership of the acchs boards. according to taylor et al. (2001), a high value is placed on board members elected from the community who have rich knowledge of the culture and a high standing in the community. however, these elected members do not always possess the specialized health knowledge (e.g., clinical or policy-related expertise) that is important for making informed decisions. thus, it can take time to build the capacity of the board and find appropriate roles for all board members. further, given that a participatory approach to management requires substantial time, resources, and ongoing commitment, organizations may find it difficult to maintain a participatory management style when faced with short timeframes for making decisions and addressing complex issues (taylor et al., 2001). finally, as taylor et al. have pointed out, there is not always an “exact fit between community need and service provision” (p. 129). in this sense, community-identified priorities can be supplanted by funding issues and the terms of service arrangements with other organizations, which can lead to community discontent. feelings of resentment can also arise when it appears that the priorities of some community members are taking precedent over others (taylor et al., 2001). in addition to the structure and management style of health services, workforce planning is an important dimension of health planning for (often remote) indigenous communities. panzera et al. (2016) have outlined four steps for workforce planning. first, a needs assessment was carried out by identifying local and regional stakeholders, discussing needs and available services, and the gaps between them. second, health service delivery models were drawn to illustrate both the current system and the desired system, and priorities were chosen. third, the workforce required to achieve these priorities was discussed— with a focus on physicians, nurses, midwives, allied health personnel, and indigenous health workers— while emphasizing the need for multi-skilled staff. fourth, a costed workforce and training plan was created to support development opportunities for rural and remote regions as compared with urban counterparts. ensuring indigenous involvement in health planning can be challenging, as lavoie and dwyer (2016) have pointed out in their article comparing how community control of health services is being implemented in canada. the authors noted that, as of 2008, it had taken 20 years for 89% of 610 eligible first nations communities in canada to reach a funding arrangement with the federal government about how to manage their community health services. as part of the arrangement, every 5 years these communities receive funding to evaluate their health services in order to adjust their community health plans. however, managing accountability when handing over control was challenging. onerous reporting requirement for these communities were first partially ignored, then implemented, and then dropped due to the large administrative burden and small benefits. lavoie and 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.7 dwyer (2016) concluded that ensuring indicators are relevant to the communities and to the federal government is essential to ensuring good partnerships. a p p r o a c h e s t o a s s e s s i n g i n d i g e n o u s h e a l t h n e e d s a n d s e r v i c e d e l i v e r y c o s t s setting health priorities is not always straightforward and can be challenging without good data on the health status and needs of local populations. this is particularly problematic for indigenous populations (milne, lafontaine, & konkin, 2016). for example, otim et al. (2014) have written of a study with an indigenous group in australia that adopted an approach to planning and priority setting known as program budgeting and marginal analysis (pbma). pbma exposed the need for both better data and evidence as well as long-term perspectives when allocating resources; the approach also involved the consideration of a notional fixed budget and varying how funds are distributed among various programs so as to identify priorities and thereby maximize health. the process included an advisory panel made up of stakeholders and community members. despite the limitations in data, almost 80% of respondents from the acchs thought this method had potential (otim et al., 2016). regardless of approach, a key component of health planning is information. in order to know which services to provide and in what quantities, planners need to know the particular health problems and needs of communities, communities’ patterns of health service utilization, what resources are available to communities, and the costs associated with health services. one difficulty attendant to planning health services for indigenous populations is that accurate data for each of these components is often incomplete and/or unavailable—whether it has been collected and is difficult to obtain or has not yet been collected at all. the indigenous health service delivery template (ihsdt), a tool described by ong, carter, kelaher, and anderson (2012), has worked to account for the unique needs of indigenous populations in the health planning process. the template was created in response to the perception that indigenous health services in australia were underfunded. in the absence of indigenous-specific cost-effectiveness data, resource-allocation decisions were being made based on mainstream cost-effectiveness evidence; these calculations did not consider differences in “demographics, the target disease burden, the prevalence and distribution of harmful exposures, the way health interventions are delivered, and their effectiveness” (ong et al., 2012, p. 2). as such, ong et al. sought to account for not only the unique health needs of the indigenous population, but also the different approaches to primary healthcare that have been adopted to meet these health needs. at the heart of the ihsdt is a framework that compares how a health service would be delivered in a mainstream, general practitioner setting, and how the same service would be delivered through an australian acchs. the framework includes six categories: 1. basic health intervention delivery characteristics; 2. population health, social and community activities; 3. management and government structures; 4. patient transport services; 5. provision of services to a large remote population; and 6. differences in the rates of indigenous utilization of services and adherence to treatments (ong et al., 2012). 19 loutfi et al.: health planning for indigenous populations published by scholarship@western, 2018 these categories break down the aspects of an intervention that would lead to cost differences between mainstream delivery and acchs delivery. ong et al. (2012) claimed that data on mainstream interventions could be adapted via the ihsdt to reflect the cost of delivery to indigenous populations. notably, the acchs approach to delivery involves multiple supplementary services in addition to those accompanying standard interventions; as such, the cost of delivery under the acchs approach (as opposed to under a mainstream, general practitioner setting) can be high. however, this delivery generally leads to improved health benefits, as it is associated with higher treatment adherence rates. ong et al. (2012) have argued that costeffectiveness should not be the only metric by which to evaluate the success of health services delivery; rather, one should also consider the value of health equity when determining the allocation of funds for various services. that is, they have suggested that it may be worth spending more on indigenous health services in order to achieve health equity. similarly, o’kane and tsey (2004) have addressed the types of services and levels of funding that are required to meet the mental health needs of people in rural and remote communities in australia. they found that much of the information necessary to plan for local needs did not exist, and thus they developed a framework to allow extrapolation from available data. while their estimates used proxy sources of information, they argued that their modelling is more accurate than common ad hoc and anecdotal approaches to funding and service delivery. building their framework involved five steps. first, they created a regional socio-demographic profile capturing both the remoteness of the region and the proportion of the population that is indigenous (o’kane & tsey, 2004). next, they estimated the types and levels of mental illnesses in the region based on local and related epidemiological data (when such data was available). the third step estimated how often potential services would be used, and they found sufficient evidence to reasonably predict what proportion of the mentally ill population would require specialist services. fourth, they determined what types of specialist care were needed, adjusting data on the resource requirements of urban populations to reflect the local population addressed by their framework. finally, to estimate cost, they used calculations for remoteness and for indigenous status from other studies. for remote care, they multiplied the cost of urban care by 1.5; for the cost of treating indigenous populations, they added $50 per capita for specialist care and an additional $150 per capita for the provision of “social and emotional well-being programmes delivered by aboriginal organizations” (p. 393). applying their method to the region of central australia, they showed that there is inadequate specialist care capacity and that funding levels were approximately half of what was required to meet mental health needs. allen, lemaster, and deters (2004), writing about native american communities in the united states, have described a different approach to identify health-planning priorities. per the circles of care initiative, the federal government provided grants to native american communities to build comprehensive descriptions of the services available for children with serious emotional disturbance. this initiative was considered a first step in the health planning process. in order to participate, each organization filled in templates with information on numerous health and social services (e.g., education, mental health, general health, recreational services, juvenile justice, traditional healing). the information collected included the components of the system, characteristics, interactions among components, accessibility of services, and gaps in service. most of the data were collected through 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.7 interviews with workers in the healthcare system and community members. the interviews with community members were especially valuable when it came to identifying the informal systems of support and care that were bridging the gaps in the formal healthcare system. additional data were collected through focus groups and surveys that were targeted to a broader range of stakeholders, including traditional healers. the data were used in two ways. first, they were used to create descriptions of the healthcare system that depicted the many ways in which families attempted to access services, were provided services, or were denied services and had to find alternative approaches to treatments. second, many of the grantees used gis mapping technology to create visual representations of the health services available for children who were seriously emotionally disturbed. these maps simplified the complex interactions among different provider organizations, and made apparent how areas of strength and weakness were distributed geographically. the maps showed: (a) provider characteristics such as training and ethnicity; (b) agency characteristics such as physical location of agencies, distances involved, and catchment area served; (c) cross-service sector characteristics such as differences in staffing levels, training, and turnover across sectors, and (d) congruencies and incongruities in organization of services across sectors and regions. (allen et al., 2004, mapping section, para. 2) a surprising outcome of the service descriptions was the discovery of the many ways in which providers were innovating to make their services culturally safe. furthermore, the service descriptions highlighted that there were already viable, and often-used, traditional healing resources in communities (allen et al., 2004). the authors emphasized the importance of drawing on community members and leaders in addition to health system experts in order to arrive at a true description of how the system functions for the people using it (allen et al., 2004). likewise, an article by mcdonald, bailie, and morris (2017) from australia has described how to develop indicators for child health in remote indigenous populations. after initial consultations and workshops with indigenous stakeholders in two communities—which emphasized social determinants of health as important upstream factors of child health—a framework was developed that was informed by the literature. the framework was then brought back to the communities to ensure that it reflected what had been discussed. indicators were then identified in the literature and, after extensive consultations, two frameworks were combined to include both environmental factors (such as air, water, and food), and social factors (such as influences of family and institutions). finally, two tools were developed that reflected the adaptation of existing frameworks to fit indigenous knowledge: the health community assessment tool, and the household assessment tool. finally, fricke et al. (2004) used qualitative methods to conduct a community needs assessment. focusing on the planning of rehabilitation services in nunavut, canada, they used surveys and key informant interviews with health workers and patients to arrive at estimates of the number of people who would benefit from rehabilitation services and the areas of greatest priority (fricke et al., 2004). 21 loutfi et al.: health planning for indigenous populations published by scholarship@western, 2018 t o w a r d c u l t u r a l s a f e t y i n h e a l t h p l a n n i n g health planning for indigenous populations often requires bridging indigenous and non-indigenous cultures of health and management. one of the challenges indigenous communities often face when managing their own health services is finding ways to incorporate best practices from non-indigenous healthcare systems—whether health interventions, models and frameworks for system design, or approaches to governance and management—in ways that reflect indigenous worldviews and values. non-indigenous tools for health planning risk being culturally incongruous with their built-in assumptions about resources and infrastructures. notwithstanding this caution, many of the articles reviewed for this article have suggested how non-indigenous tools for health planning can be successfully adapted for use by indigenous communities (edgerly et al., 2009; english et al., 2004; parter, gassner, atkinson, & mckendrick, 2012; santos, braun, ae`a, & shearer, 2008). for example, english et al. (2004) have written about a partnership between the ramah band of navajo indians, the albuquerque area indian health board, the university of new mexico, and the university of nevada that attempted to adapt one non-indigenous tool for use by indigenous communities. the partnership’s attempt to implement the centre for disease control’s public health system performance assessment instrument was delayed because community stakeholders found the language of the instrument foreign to daily tribal living. as such, a process for interpreting and modifying the instrument was developed. this process included giving stakeholders both plain language summaries of the main sections of the planning instrument and definitions of the key terms prior to implementation. the project partners then received recommendations from community stakeholders and created a revised instrument along with a tribal users’ guide to assist with implementation. the team leading the implementation used their “lessons learned” from the implementation to create guidelines for improving the applicability of non-indigenous assessment instruments for use with tribes. the guidelines include removing unnecessarily complex and bureaucratic language; explaining new terminology with examples that are relevant to tribal communities; ensuring that community members and researchers who have experience working with indigenous populations review materials before implementation; and respecting sovereignty issues, including issues regarding data ownership (english et al., 2004). in addition to arriving at a more culturally safe public health assessment instrument, the adaptation and implementation process yielded several other benefits. these benefits included: • community members and health-related staff had a better understanding of the public health concepts and how they apply to services; • collaboration between tribal health programs increased; and • new relationships and partnerships were formed between tribal organizations and researchers (english et al., 2004). in contrast, the state of michigan’s steps to a healthier anishinaabe program tailored its resources from the outset and was thus able to build-in steps for community-specific implementation of its public health initiatives (edgerly et al., 2009). according to edgerly et al. (2009), all the communities served by the program shared the same culture and demographics, including similar risk factors and disease burden; however, the communities differed in terms of their priorities, resources, and infrastructures. the steps program asked all participating communities to pursue standardized goals and objectives, but how this 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.7 would be achieved was left up to the communities themselves. to balance best practices and applicability, they followed five steps when working with each community: a. employed a tribal coordinator; b. developed a community action plan; c. adapted best practice interventions to be culturally sensitive and tribe specific; d. provided ongoing technical assistance; and e. respected tribal sovereignty (edgerly et al., 2009). it was recommended that the tribal coordinator be an individual with some health expertise who could facilitate a connection between health knowledge and cultural knowledge for each community. the coordinator also maintained the link between the community and the inter-tribal council of michigan, which managed the steps program (edgerly et al., 2009). the resultant community action plan (cap) was built through a standardized template provided by the program, but local healthcare professionals and community members put it together. central staff provided technical assistance and guidance on completing the action plan, data collection, progress reporting, and facilitating partnerships with other health promotion organizations (edgerly et al., 2009). in order to understand how mainstream health services can work better with indigenous communities, walker, whitener, trupin, and migliarini (2015) examined indigenous perspectives on evidence-based practice implementation. in this context, there had been hesitation in some indigenous communities to enact non-indigenous policies due to both the history and legacy of colonialism, and to fears that evidence-based practices were not been tested in indigenous communities. at a statewide tribal gathering on behavioural interventions for youth, the perspectives of participants on the strengths and weaknesses of five programs for youth delinquency were sought. findings from the meetings indicated that cultural issues should be considered at the outset of implementation. second, it was suggested that the existing model of cross-tribal collaboration be adopted to share costs and act as a learning community to share best practices related to implementation. walker et al. (2010) have noted, by moving away from mainstream modes and constructing planning frameworks based entirely on traditional beliefs and values, culturally appropriate health planning can also be achieved. for example, the sioux lookout meno ya win health centre in northern ontario, canada, used this approach when developing the traditional healing, medicines, foods and supports (thmfs) program, which guided their health planning (walker et al., 2010). their tool incorporated principles of service delivery that are based on traditional values and community preferences. the framework has five categories: a. governance and leadership; b. patient, resident, and client supports; c. traditional healing practices; d. traditional medicines; and e. traditional foods (walker et al., 2010). this approach was constructed after extensive consultations with community members and site visits to other organizations across canada that had been recognized for delivering culturally safe care. 23 loutfi et al.: health planning for indigenous populations published by scholarship@western, 2018 the views of elders formed an important component of these consultations. over 50 elders were consulted, and the elders interpreted the results of the entire consultation process. moreover, the priorities that emerged through this process included language, comfort, escorts, and spirituality (walker et al., 2010). the prioritization of language involved having interpreters available who could speak all three of the local indigenous languages. comfort covered access to traditional foods and cultural activities to make treatment experiences less foreign. escorts refer to professionals who assist with the transition into and through the health centre. the spirituality priority prioritized the availability of traditional healers and affording traditional forms of spiritual healing the same stature as non-indigenous forms of healing (walker et al., 2010). gibson et al. (2007) have noted how the tåîchô first nation in british columbia, canada, has also taken an innovative approach to planning across their public services. with a land claim settlement on the horizon, the tåîchô first nation sought a way to plan governance structures and public policies that met contemporary standards of accountability, transparency, and effective management, but were built first and foremost on their own traditions. the tåîchô first nation used their traditional songs and stories as a starting point for this planning, and with the assistance of researchers from the university of british columbia, a group of 20 community leaders analyzed tåîchô songs and stories to draw out key ideas, themes, and core values. the results were validated with members of the community and enhanced through discussions of what it means to live well in tåîchô culture (gibson et al., 2007). the results were used in multiple ways. first, the participants (elders, chiefs, senior tåîchô government staff, and researchers) developed a framework representing what it means to live in the tåîchô way: first as a mind map and then as a visual representation more in line with tåîchô tradition (gibson et al., 2007). a definition of tåîchô wellness complemented the framework: “daily relationships with others, as achieved through speaking the language, eating food together, practicing skills, and learning through observation” (gibson et al., 2007, p. 44). from this foundation, participants endeavored to build policy frameworks that connected tåîchô values to mainstream notions of policy and governance. for example, for the policy area “child protection, community standards and social workers” (p. 48), the participants identified values such as “identity and cultural identity,” “recognition of what was there before,” and “control over our lives (independence and uniqueness)” (gibson et al., 2007, p. 49) as important components of potential policies. policy and program ideas emerging from these values included having elders teach traditional values to families, bringing children and family members out on the land, and training social workers from within the community (gibson et al., 2007). s t a k e h o l d e r p a r t i c i p a t i o n i n h e a l t h p l a n n i n g the final domain common to articles included in this review was the need to involve stakeholders when planning health services for indigenous populations. while the extent of involvement or participation may vary from simple consultation to empowering partners to make their own decisions, the underlying purpose has been affirmed as ensuring that indigenous peoples have a say in how they receive healthcare. an example of prioritizing a participatory process is the australian government’s development of their aboriginal health plan, as has been discussed by parter et al. (2012). parter et al. (2012) have noted that the majority of participants in each consultation meeting were purposely indigenous, and that this inclusion was a gesture intended to counter australia’s history of silencing indigenous voices. 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.7 consultation has also been employed as a method to determine health needs and to identify the strengths and weaknesses of extant health services; it has been especially useful for ensuring that resultant services are designed in culturally safe ways. look, kaholokula, carvahlo, seto, and de silva (2012) have discussed an example of this practice in their assessment of indigenous community members and health practitioners integrating their views when creating a cardiac rehabilitation program for native hawaiians. researchers consulted with native hawaiian elders and experts in the cultural practice of hula to assess the acceptability of basing a rehabilitation program on hula. parallel meetings were held with cardiac rehabilitation experts to ensure that the hula-based therapy was clinically safe and consistent with the latest scientific evidence. the researchers then formally integrated the clinical and cultural recommendations into the intervention design, and they found that adherence to treatment improved (look et al., 2012). andrews, simmons, long, and wilson (2002) have demonstrated how bringing together the views of indigenous community members and the clinicians who work in their communities can both uncover entrenched viewpoints, and barriers to care and create opportunities for collaborative problem-solving. andrews et al. (2002) discussed a project in which 15 consultation meetings brought together general practitioners, indigenous health workers, and community members to discuss how to improve access to general practitioner services in australia. among the several practical outcomes, the most transformative involved a change in how general practitioners worked with the indigenous health workers and indigenous healthcare organizations. to this end, the authors recognized that one of the major barriers to indigenous populations accessing health services was the tendency of general practitioners and indigenous health workers to work in silos. similarly, kerr, penney, barnes, and mccreanor (2010) have detailed a new zealand project, in which both māori communities and practitioner communities were consulted. the project aimed to improve care for māori with ischemic heart disease. the consultations with māori populations focused on local knowledge of ischemic heart disease and the ways in which people accessed the health system, and they revealed many negative interactions between māori and healthcare professionals. consultations with healthcare professionals uncovered their negative views towards māori populations, including views that tended to blame māori populations’ poor health on lifestyle choices instead of recognizing systemic factors that are deleterious to māori health. following these consultations, separate meetings were held with each group to discuss the findings and then meetings with all stakeholders were held to discuss strategies for improving heart disease services. kerr et al. (2010) argued that the integrative approach to consultation led to improved cross-cultural communication and significantly changed practitioners’ views of their māori patients. a similar study, addressing an australian context, has described how indigenous populations were involved in decisions around health service provision (durey et al., 2016). district aboriginal health action groups, consisting of both indigenous community members nominated by their communities and health service providers, were created in five districts to practically address indigenous health needs (e.g., by identifying local solutions and avoiding tokenism). durey et al. (2016) used a qualitative evaluation to examine whether indigenous populations found this method of engagement to be effective. results showed that the process was broad enough to include diverse perspectives, their views were heard and acted upon, and explanations were given when their views were not acted upon. 25 loutfi et al.: health planning for indigenous populations published by scholarship@western, 2018 participants felt empowered, and the authors noted that this process built trust between mainstream and indigenous health services. chatwood et al. (2015), writing from a canadian context, have given a practical example of a method that is well suited to balancing indigenous and non-indigenous views. the nominal group technique they presented involves identifying lists of priorities, ranking them, and then choosing a way forward. indigenous participants were involved in selecting the research question, deciding who the participants would be, co-facilitating the discussion, and deciding how the results should be disseminated. the article highlighted how this method of engagement (e.g., co-facilitating discussions) allowed indigenous knowledge to be shared in films, photos, and stories alongside non-indigenous methods (e.g., workshops and cue cards). a review of the effectiveness of implementation strategies in australian indigenous populations found that programs were not effective when cultural differences were ignored. typically, we found that indigenous leadership was essential, and that programs that were centrally developed and then implemented in a decentralized manner allowed for community participation and adaptation of the interventions (mccalman, bainbridge, percival, & tsey, 2016). in many indigenous communities, elders hold an eminent status that should be prioritized in consultation processes. in their attempt to implement chiropractic services in an indigenous community in australia, polus, van rotterdam, and vindigni (2012) proposed a protocol for introducing new health programs in indigenous communities. this protocol listed consulting with elders and presenting them with implementation plans as its first step. similarly, as mentioned above, in developing the hula-based cardiac rehabilitation program, look et al. (2012) held focus groups with native hawaiian elders to ensure that their study was congruent with cultural protocols. the traditional health, medicines, foods and supports (thmfs) program, also discussed above, went even further by implementing an elders council that sits alongside the medical advisory committee and advises on both health planning and the management of the thmfs program (walker et al., 2010). the council is made up of eight elders from the communities served by the program. d i s c u s s i o n our goal with this review was to summarize the published evidence on health planning for indigenous populations so as to identify best practices to inform local planning processes. we also sought to contribute to the existing body of literature that has been published on indigenous health services development and planning. while our review was rapid, it was systematic and showed that the current evidence base is not extensive. no review articles were available on this topic, and the level of evidence was weak. in fact, few articles extended beyond a local, descriptive case study approach to the topic. as a result, we were unable to conduct a quality assessment of the articles. these limitations notwithstanding, the results of our review nonetheless help map the existing literature, provide a guide regarding how health planning is discussed in relation to indigenous health, and offer lessons and promising practices for communities and planners alike who seek to improve health and health services in indigenous communities. from our review, four salient areas requiring further development and research in relation to health planning emerged. these areas are: 26 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.7 a. understanding the gap between written and oral knowledge, b. building culturally-safe management, c. advancing the data base, and d. understanding the importance of elders in health planning processes. a g a p i n t h e l i t e r a t u r e o r a g a p i n o u r s e a r c h s t r a t e g y ? as mentioned above, it was challenging to find articles that directly addressed our topic: the challenges and best practices for health planning for indigenous populations. an important bias in our search strategy may have been our focus on published work. while many indigenous communities use written knowledge transfer, it could be that some indigenous planning processes occur in communities with a strong oral tradition and thus their knowledge lies with community members and not within published literature. for example, in developing research ethics codes, it is important to recognize that community knowledge can come from community members who are educated in oral tradition (castellano, 2004). the kahnawake schools diabetes prevention project, for example, has made use of a research partnership agreement to acknowledge that rules of conduct may be either written or spoken (code of research ethics, 2007). while our review set out to understand what was in the published literature, health planners who rely too heavily on published literature may miss important indigenous models and priorities. further, health planners could also benefit from looking at unpublished grey literature such as reports and planning documents. c u l t u r a l l y s a f e m a n a g e m e n t there is a growing body of literature on culturally safe health services, of which this review has only captured part. cultural safety emerged as a nursing concept in new zealand to ensure that patient safety included cultural as well as physical and mental aspects (papps & ramsden, 1996). while the concept is continuously being refined, brascoupé and waters (2009) have stated that “essential factors in the definition of cultural safety are the visibility of cultural differences and the power that may flow from that visibility, leading to the demand for equality, respect and control by aboriginal people” (p. 12). the need for cultural safety stems from the historical and ongoing racism experienced by indigenous populations (allan & smylie, 2015). indeed, the notion of cultural safety extends beyond individual patient safety to acknowledge and address the power dynamics between patients, communities, institutions, and management. acknowledging the often neo-colonial approach to indigenous affairs can motivate health institutions to partner with indigenous groups and, in so doing, provide indigenous populations with more power to determine how their health services are organized (brascoupé & waters, 2009). with a view to social determinants of health, it is important to consider cultural safety in areas such as education, economic opportunity, and justice (brascoupé & waters, 2009). for example, one health, a broad initiative in canada, has encouraged cross-disciplinary collaboration to address health issues by considering social determinants of health such as climate change and the relationship between the environment, animals, and humans (ruscio, brubaker, glasser, hueston, & hennessy, 2015). planners in health and these other fields could benefit from an awareness of the literature on cultural safety, though it is beyond the scope of this review to cultivate such awareness (a targeted search could provide more detail on this topic). furthermore, health planners should look to the literature on built 27 loutfi et al.: health planning for indigenous populations published by scholarship@western, 2018 environment (e.g., housing, infrastructure, air and water quality), as it could impact indigenous health inequities (gelormino, melis, marietta, & costa, 2015). however, while existing literature will provide guidance, much health planning depends on local realities, and community priorities may vary based on politics, history, and economics (browne et al., 2016). adapting to local contexts is essential to providing culturally safe care, and it can provide innovative ideas such as look et al.’s (2012) hula-based cardiac rehabilitation program in hawaii and the use of tåîchô songs and stories to develop policy frameworks grounded in tåîchô values (gibson et al., 2007). partnering with communities in a sustained manner can help ensure local needs and preferences are brought forward (potvin, cargo, mccomber, delormier, & macaulay, 2003). moreover, acknowledging the differences among indigenous communities will also help move planning from an approach that is top–down to one that is bottom–up, prioritizing and building from communities’ unique needs and preferences. b u i l d i n g t h e d a t a b a s e f o r p l a n n i n g since many of the articles we reviewed were case studies of individual communities or groups, they tended to describe planning processes rather than to evaluate or compare the outcomes of using specific processes. as such, it is difficult for this review to identify “best practices” that can transcend a local community. despite the lack of formal evaluation, however, the value of having accurate information on indigenous populations as a basis for future planning has increasingly been recognized by knowledge organizations in canada. data on indigenous populations is collected by statistics canada and the canadian institute of health information (to name but two agencies), although it is not always easy to identify indigenous people in the data or to combine different data sets. the first nations information governance centre (fnigc), a non-profit canadian organization, has aimed to fill this gap by carrying out additional surveys (milne et al., 2016). in 2015, for example, fnigc asked first nations, federal departments, research agencies, and other stakeholders for their priorities for health research; 14 priority areas, including mental health and the impact of residential schools, were addressed in the surveys (milne et al., 2016). carrying out more evaluations of health planning processes with indigenous communities will help bolster the existing body of literature and improve the data upon which health planners base their decisions and actions. p a r t i c i p a t i o n o f e l d e r s many of the articles we reviewed discussed the importance of participatory approaches to health planning. similar to participatory research (cargo & mercer, 2008), it has been argued that health service planning should be conducted in partnership with affected indigenous stakeholders. in particular, the high value placed on consulting community elders was presented in three studies included in this review (look et al., 2012; polus et al., 2012; walker et al., 2010). elders are knowledge keepers; they pass on knowledge within a community and act as leaders and role models for youth (warburton & mclaughlin, 2006). authors in other disciplines, such as wildlife research (byers, 1999) and the development of educational programs (simpson, 2002), have recommended including elders in the research process. the inclusion of elders and other indigenous people should always acknowledge the history of injustices and traumas related to colonialism; qualitative methods, participatory approaches, and decolonizing frameworks may help to ensure that elders and others can participate as 28 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.7 equal partners, and are not used as “token” participants (braun, browne, ka‘opua, kim, & mokuau, 2014; smith, 1999). a notable absence in the reviewed literature was a lack of youth involvement in health planning. although one study included in our the review consulted youth (allen et al., 2004), this omission was striking given the large proportion of youth in many indigenous populations. c o n c l u s i o n this review has offered a guide to published literature on health planning, and it is intended to help inform future investigations on this 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(n.d.). health systems strengthening glossary. retrieved from http://www.who.int/healthsystems/hss_glossary/en/index5.html 35 loutfi et al.: health planning for indigenous populations published by scholarship@western, 2018 the international indigenous policy journal january 2018 health planning for indigenous populations: a rapid evidence review david loutfi susan law chris mccutcheon robert carlin jill torrie see next page for additional authors recommended citation health planning for indigenous populations: a rapid evidence review abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license authors health planning for indigenous populations: a rapid evidence review the international indigenous policy journal volume 13 | issue 1 june 2022 indigenous engagement in health research in circumpolar countries: an analysis of existing ethical guidelines josée lavoie university of manitoba, canada, josee.lavoie@umanitoba.ca jon petter stoor university of umea, sweden, jon.p.stoor@uit.no katie cueva university of alaska anchorage, united states, kcueva@alaska.edu gwen healey akearok qaujigiartiit health research centre, canada, gwen.healeyakearok@qhrc.ca elizabeth rink montana state university, united states, elizabeth.rink@montana.edu christina viskum lytken larsen centre for public health in greenland, denmark, chly@sdu.dk elena gladun tyumen state university, russian federation, efgladun@yandex.ru recommended citation lavoie, j., stoor, j. p., cueva, k., healey akearok, g., rink, e., larsen, c. v. l., & gladun e. (2021). indigenous engagement in health research in circumpolar countries: an analysis of existing ethical guidelines. the international indigenous policy journal, 13(1). https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.10928 indigenous engagement in health research in circumpolar countries: an analysis of existing ethical guidelines abstract in this paper, we review existing ethical guidelines that support circumpolar indigenous peoples’ engagement in health research. for this study, we collated national and regional ethical guidelines addressing health research engaging with indigenous communities. our study found that ethical guidelines addressing indigenous engagement in health research have emerged in canada and the u.s.a. currently, there are no indigenous-specific provisions in national guidelines, or legislation concerning health research engaging indigenous peoples, in denmark, finland, greenland, norway, sweden, or russia. where guidelines exist, they show considerable variations. we conclude that guidelines are essential to ensure that research undertaken in indigenous communities is relevant and beneficial to those communities, is conducted respectfully, and that results are appropriately contextualized and accurate. we believe that our analysis might serve as a checklist to support the development of comprehensive guidelines developed by, or at least in partnership with, arctic indigenous communities. keywords american indians, alaska natives, sāmi, first nations, aboriginal peoples, arctic, partnership, canada, united states, greenland, denmark, finland, norway, sweden, russia acknowledgments we wish to acknowledge the arctic communities where we have lived or worked, which have and continue to inspire us to effect change for present and future generations. we also wish to acknowledge the financial support of the fulbright foundation for supporting individual and collective research undertaken through the fulbright arctic initiative 2018– 19. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ 1 lavoie et al.: indigenous engagement in health research in circumpolar countries published by scholarship@western, 2021 indigenous engagement in health research in circumpolar countries: an analysis of existing ethical guidelines internationally, the last two decades have seen a change in the way health research has been conducted. changes have been motivated primarily by the ethical misconduct of some researchers (moodie, 2010; resnik & master, 2013; resnik et al., 2015) and governments (mosby, 2013). after world war ii and the nuremburg trials, the world medical association’s declaration of helsinki was the first example of the international community coming together to identify ethical guidelines for research involving humans (world medical association, 1964). since, international and national guidelines have been developed to regulate biomedical research involving human subjects, patient safety, clinical practice, medical devices, and biological material (for an international and national compilation of guidelines, see u.s. department of health and human services office for human research protections, 2017). in addition, there are a diversity of national and regionally specific guidelines for the protection of information, knowledge, and personhood (bracken-roche et al., 2017; canadian institutes of health research et al., 2014; flicker et al., 2007; inuit tapiriit kanatami et al., 2010; mcgrath, 2004; olsen, 2003; united nations educational scientific and cultural organization (unesco), 2005; urregomendoza et al., 2017; weijer et al., 1999). in the last decade, some indigenous nations have drawn attention to how indigenous peoples have been and are engaged in indigenous health research. motivations include the need to safeguard against research-related misconduct, including exploitation, damaging representation of indigenous peoples in the communication of results, and erroneous conclusions (couzin-frankel, 2010; dyke & anderson, 2014; garrison, 2013; garrison & cho, 2013; pacheco et al., 2013). some indigenous nations have also sought to protect intellectual property rights over indigenous knowledge documented during the research process (dutfield, 2017; feldman et al., 2013). most often, research with indigenous peoples has benefited “the pursuit of knowledge,” but failed to benefit those who were being studied. indigenous nations have expressed an interest in leading research that addresses their own information needs, and directly benefits their communities (dedats'eetsaa: tłı ̨chǫ research & training institute, 2017; eriksen et al., 2021; kovach, 2009; kukutai & taylor, 2016; kyoon-achan et al., 2018). several indigenous communities and organizations (anderson et al., 2003; cunningham, 2003; fitzpatrick et al., 2016; gwynn et al., 2015; humphery, 2003; oneha & beckham, 2004; prior, 2007) have drawn from article 20 of the helsinki declaration to advocate for greater involvement in research: 20. medical research with a vulnerable group is only justified if the research is responsive to the health needs or priorities of this group and the research cannot be carried out in a nonvulnerable group. in addition, this group should stand to benefit from the knowledge, practices or interventions that result from the research. (world medical association, 1964) ethical guidelines generally provide guidance for research conducted among vulnerable populations, defined as “those whose ability to provide voluntary consent may be compromised by social pressures” (bracken-roche et al., 2017, p. 3). some indigenous nations have vehemently rejected being labeled as a 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.10928 “vulnerable group,” pointing to centuries of resistance to assimilative policies and practices. they have argued that this definition is paternalistic and blames indigenous nations for their reality, instead of holding nation-states to account for their marginalizing and oppressive practices (brant castellano & reading, 2010; kukutai & taylor, 2016; rainie et al., 2017). arguments from indigenous communities and organizations to foster meaningful engagement in the research process have hinged on three prerogatives: 1) to prioritize research that benefits their people; 2) to end research processes that perpetuate collective marginalization and exclusion from decisionmaking; and 3) to end the exploitation of indigenous knowledges, sacred medicines, lands, and other related priorities (anderson, 2019; beans et al., 2019; hiratsuka et al., 2017). in this paper, we review existing national ethical guidelines that support circumpolar indigenous peoples’ engagement in health research. we define national ethical guidelines as guidelines developed by national authorities for the ethical review of research projects. national guidelines are also increasingly used, at least in canada, by funders to inform the peer review process. we distinguish national guidelines from regional and local guidelines and guides. a large number of discussion papers and publications have been produced by a variety of agencies, indigenous communities, and researchers, offering perspectives on ethical conduct when engaging with indigenous communities (for examples, see angal et al., 2016; chadwick et al., 2014; hull & wilson dine, 2017; inuit tapiriit kanatami & nunavut research institute, 2007; ongomiizwin indigenous institute of health and healing, 2015; sámiid riikasearvi, 2019; the interagency arctic research policy committee (iarpc), 2018). some regional and localized guidelines have become authoritative, in that indigenous communities refuse to partner in projects that do not comply with their own requirements and protocols (dedats'eetsaa: tłı̨chǫ research & training institute, 2017; nunatukavut community council research advisory committee (ncc-rac), 2013; qaujigiartiit health research centre, 2019). these initiatives are very important. however, because they are less likely to inform the research funding process at the time of peer review, these initiatives are not presented in our analysis. we anchor our discussion in four articles prominent in the united nations’ declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip), which focus on indigenous peoples’ rights to: (1) self-determination (article 3); (2) maintain and strengthen their distinct political, legal, economic, social and cultural institutions (article 5); (3) maintain, control, protect and develop their cultural heritage, traditional knowledge, and traditional cultural expressions (article 31); and (4) determine and develop priorities and strategies for the development or use of their lands or territories and other resources (article 32, united nations, 2007, p. 9). we see these four specific provisions as highly relevant to discussions of indigenous engagement in all research including health research. 3 lavoie et al.: indigenous engagement in health research in circumpolar countries published by scholarship@western, 2021 to date, undrip has been endorsed by seven of the eight circumpolar nations,1 russia being the exception. we acknowledge that signatory countries are not obligated to implement undrip. only canada has made an explicit commitment, and included this commitment in adopted legislation, and in legislation under review (last, 2019; government of british columbia, 2019; government of canada, 2019). further, all countries including non-signatory nations can use undrip to inform the creation of policies. for instance, the russian federation acknowledges indigenous people’s rights “in accordance with usually accepted global law principles and standards" (19, article 69). framework in this paper, we use a framework developed by weijer and colleagues (1999) to assess the comprehensiveness of existing and proposed health research ethics guidelines in the circumpolar regions that are specific to indigenous peoples of the arctic. this framework was developed through a review of indigenous-centric guidelines in canada and australia. we selected this framework because canada and australia developed some of the most comprehensive indigenous-centric guidelines in use. weijer and colleagues’ review identified key requirements for guideline development and research process requirements, which in our view, dovetail neatly with the undrip articles framing our analysis, and validates the use of the framework. we made small adaptations to the framework to more explicitly differentiate indigenous communities, to acknowledge the right to collective consent, and to add explanations for each criterion. the final framework is shown in table 1 and was used as a checklist against guidelines to assess comprehensiveness. 1 circumpolar countries include canada, the kingdom of denmark (including greenland), finland, iceland, norway, russia, sweden and the united states. our article focuses on seven of these countries, since iceland does not have an indigenous population. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.10928 table 1. framework developed by weijer and colleagues (adapted from weijer et al., 1999) requirements explanation guideline development 1. target community guidelines are explicit about the indigenous populations for which the guidelines were created. 2. community representation on committee drafting guidelines indigenous populations for whom the guidelines were developed were involved in their development. guideline requirements 1. consultation in the research protocol development a) respect for culture explicit statement that researchers respect the culture of the indigenous community. b) input on protocol the indigenous community was involved in the development of the research protocol. c) research useful explicit provisions emphasizing that the research needs to be considered helpful to the indigenous community, and/or align with local priorities. d) respect for knowledge and experience the research protocol makes space for indigenous knowledge and experience in the research process. this may include recognition and compensation for elders and knowledge keepers, the hiring of local indigenous researchers, etc. 2. collective and individual consent: process and informed consent a) non-technical and appropriate disclosure guidelines specify the need to communicate with community leadership and participants in a non-technical manner. b) face-to-face meetings guidelines specify the importance of face-to-face meetings to discuss the study. c) adequate time for review guidelines require researchers to ensure that the community and individual participants have adequate time to review the protocol before providing consent. d) consent required for protocol changes researchers are required to submit any change to the research protocol to the community for consent. e) may withdraw consent the guidelines specify that individual participants and participant communities can withdraw consent at any time. 3. involvement in research conduct a) transfer of skills and research expertise ideally, the transfer of skills and expertise is described as bidirectional. at the least, the need to support skill development within the community is mentioned. b) employment indigenous employment is mentioned. c) reimbursement for research costs the guidelines make explicit recommendations on how to compensate indigenous communities’ costs related to their engagement in research. 5 lavoie et al.: indigenous engagement in health research in circumpolar countries published by scholarship@western, 2021 table 1. framework developed by weijer and colleagues (continued) requirements explanation d) informed about research progress the guidelines recommend regular community updates on the progress of the research. 4. access to data and samples a) consent for further use of samples and/or data secondary analysis of data and samples requires community consent. b) storage of data negotiated community has a say in how long data is kept, how it is destroyed (especially for tissue samples), and whether data of cultural significance can be kept by the community. 5. dissemination and publication a) involvement in manuscript preparation community and/or local staff included as co-authors, and/or have a right to review and comment. b) draft report for comment all publications are submitted to the community for validation, feedback, and comments. adequate time is given. c) acknowledgement the role of the community and any elders and knowledge keepers is explicitly acknowledged in all reports and publications. d) consent to identify community and participants (especially elders and knowledge keepers) are explicitly asked whether and how they want to be identified in all publications and reports. e) report compliance with guidelines all reports and publications explicitly report on the role of the community in research. f) final report a final report is provided to the community. g) consent for researcher media interview the community can designate representatives who may be the researchers and/or members of the community to participate in media interviews. methods this work was undertaken in the context of the 2018-19 fulbright arctic initiative program, which brought together indigenous and non-indigenous arctic scholars from canada, the kingdom of denmark (including greenland), finland, iceland, sweden, russia, and the usa. our collective purpose in developing this article was to highlight areas where circumpolar ethical guidelines hold promises for ensuring ethical indigenous engagement in health research, thus improving opportunities for relevant research and ensuring enhanced health and wellbeing. our team includes researchers fluent in danish, english, norwegian, russian, and swedish. all researchers have extensive experience in conducting research with indigenous organizations and 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.10928 communities, including in alaska, nunavut, greenland, norway, sweden, finland, and russia. all have extensive experience with the national and regional ethical guidelines in place in their own country and in countries where they conduct research. all have experienced the ethical review processes required. some have also worked on the creation of existing guidelines. in addition, we conducted a search for additional national ethical guidelines through a review of national sites hosting ethical guidelines in the countries under study, and through internet searches using key words such as indigenous, aboriginal, american indian, alaska native, sámi, inuit, and their equivalent in danish, norwegian, russian, and swedish. we specifically looked for guidelines and additional directives addressing health research engaging with indigenous communities. findings as summarized in table 2, indigenous-centric ethical guidelines for health research have emerged in some circumpolar countries (primarily canada, the united states, and more recently, norway). the sámi parliaments of norway and finland have created guidelines to inform and regulate sámi health research (finland sámediggi, 2016; sámediggi, 2018). in 2020, sámi-specific ethical guidelines for health research in norway were adopted as policy and a sámi specific ethical review system is now in place (sámediggi, 2020). in contrast, the finnish guidelines focus exclusively on traditional knowledge and cultural heritage research, in relation to the convention on biodiversity: they do not include health research. at present, scholars at the finnish university of lapland are working with sámi researchers and organizations to develop comprehensive guidelines for research with the sámi (eriksen et al., 2021). greenland is also in the process of developing its own general guidelines for research. 7 lavoie et al.: indigenous engagement in health research in circumpolar countries published by scholarship@western, 2021 table 2. existing circumpolar countries’ indigenous-centric health-specific ethical guidelines region/indigenous populations indigenous population, total population (% of total population) indigenouscentric national ethical guidelines and processes regional ethical guidelines and processes yukon (canada)/ indigenous people 8,195; 35,111 (23.3%)a ch 9 of the tricouncil guidelines (canadian institutes of health research et al., 2014) protocols and principles for conducting research with yukon first nations (government of yukon cultural services branch department of tourism and culture, 2013) nwt (canada)/ indigenous people 20,860, 41,135 (50.7%)a • nwt licensing required • no specific guidelines were located. nunavut (canada)/inuit 30,550, 35,580 (85.9%)a check list created by the qaujigiartiit health research centre (qaujigiartiit health research centre, 2019). nunavik (qc, canada)/ inuit 10,880, 7,965,450 (0.1%)a labrador (nfld&lab, canada)/innu and inuit 1,285 (innu) and 6,450 (inuit)/512,250 (1.5%)a denmark/ greenlanders estimate, 16,470; 5,581,190 (0.30%)b none located greenland 50,187; 56.421 (89.8%)c none located. scientific ethics committee for biomedical research. code of conduct has been produced by the greenland medical society. guidelines for research involving the health care system has been produced by the government of greenland (grønlandsmedicinsk selskab [greenland medical society], 2015).. finland/sámi estimate, 9,000; 5,517,830 (0.2%)d none located sweden/sámi estimate, 20,00040,000; 10,230,185 (0.2-0.4%)d none located 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.10928 table 2. existing circumpolar countries’ indigenous-centric health-specific ethical guidelines (continued) region/indigenous populations indigenous population, total population (% of total population) indigenouscentric national ethical guidelines and processes regional ethical guidelines and processes norway/sámi estimate, 55,544; 5,295,619 (1.0%)d proposal for ethical guidelines for sámi health research and research on sámi human biological material (sámediggi, 2018) russia/north, multiple tribes estimate, 270,000, based on small population rule; 146,000,000 (0.2%)e none located alaska (u.s.a.)/ alaska native peoples 147,954 of 796,697 in 2018 (18.6%)f • belmont report, • common rule • alaska area institutional review board (smith, 2013). • regional tribal health organizations, such as southcentral foundation (hiratsuka et al., 2017) a(statistics canada, 2017); b(statistics denmark, 2018); c(det gronlandske hus, n.d.); d(samiskt informationscentrum, 2020); e(international work group for indigenous affairs, 2019); f(alaska department of labour and workforce development, 2010) ethical review processes vary by countries. in canada, all university-affiliated researchers must follow the tri-council2 guidelines (canadian institutes of health research et al., 2014). ethics review boards (erbs) exist in all universities and non-university institutions that are eligible for tri-council funding, such as teaching hospitals. as a result of recent changes in policy, a small but growing number of indigenous organizations have also begun to develop erbs and have adopted their own guidelines (dedats'eetsaa: tłı̨chǫ research & training institute, 2017; nunatukavut community council research advisory committee [ncc-rac], 2013). indigenous organizations and communities who pursue research or who partner with universities or hospitals in research might have erbs themselves, with their own binding guidelines. generally, and in accordance with tri-council guidelines, university erbs require formal indication by the indigenous partner that the study has been reviewed by the 2 canada has three primary research funders, the social sciences and humanities research council (sshrc), the national science and engineering research council (nserc), and the canadian institutes of health research (cihr). these form the tri-council and have harmonized policies regarding ethics. 9 lavoie et al.: indigenous engagement in health research in circumpolar countries published by scholarship@western, 2021 indigenous partner and is acceptable. this may take the form of a letter or of a formal partnership agreement detailing the governance of the study, budget, community involvement, intellectual property rights over the data collected, and mutual obligations related to the publication and dissemination of results. in the northwest territories and nunavut, the scientists act 1988 (government of the northwest territories, 1988) describes territory-specific research licensing processes and other regulations designed to ensure that all research conducted in the territories is locally reviewed for relevance and benefit, and catalogued. in nunavut, a licensing process exists which requires any study undertaken in nunavut to undergo ethical review in nunavut, informed by a guide created for that purpose (qaujigiartiit health research centre, 2019). in the united states, the predominant framework for analysing ethical issues comes from the belmont report (national commission for the protection of human subjects of biomedical and behavioral research, 1979), which identifies respect for persons, beneficence, and justice as the three ethical principles to govern research on human beings. the belmont report is silent on the importance of collective consent and on the specific needs of indigenous peoples. the common rule, first adopted in 1991 and amended in 2018, added provisions for certain vulnerable subjects. both versions recognize the laws of “federally recognized american indian and alaska native tribal governments” thereby entrenching recognition of indigenous peoples’ sovereignty over research conducted on their territories within the united states (angal et al., 2016; chadwick et al., 2014). across the united states, a system of institutional review boards (irbs) is federally mandated. this process of review was developed within institutions such as universities or health research organizations (catania et al., 2008). some indigenous nations in the united states have developed their own research review processes, which vary by tribal entity, and may change over time. for example, some indigenous communities and organizations have declared a moratorium on research, others may require a letter of support from an indigenous official or research review board, and others have chosen to develop indigenous irbs to review and approve potential research (harding et al., 2012). in alaska, researchers hoping to conduct research with alaska native people are required to submit their research for review by the tribal health organization in the region where they intend to work, which may also require review by the alaska area irb of the alaska native tribal health consortium. in addition, academic researchers are often bound to ethical review of research at their home academic institution. for example, at the time of writing this paper, the process to conduct research with alaska native people in southcentral alaska for a researcher who works at the university of alaska anchorage (uaa) would entail first submitting a concept proposal to southcentral foundation (an alaska native healthcare organization in southcentral alaska), comprised of a brief document in lay language outlining the idea, method, and potential benefits of their proposed research. once reviewed, and if approved, southcentral foundation would provide a letter of support to the researcher, who then would apply to alaska area irb through an online portal. the research may be submitted for exempt, expedited, limited, or full review, depending on the topic and subjects of research. if the proposal is approved, an 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.10928 application would then be submitted to southcentral foundation for their review and approval. in addition, the researcher would submit an irb application to the uaa irb, including information on their tribal and alaska area irb review and approvals, as well as an explanation for how their proposal is responsive a series of principles produced by the interagency arctic research policy committee for the conduct of research in the arctic (the interagency arctic research policy committee [iarpc], 2018). this process is intended to ensure that research is both methodologically sound (aairb and academic home institution irb), as well as benefits tribal communities (tribal health organization review). however, the length of the process can be a barrier for researchers to engage in community-based participatory research, especially when communities’ research needs are immediate and where community engagement requires flexibility in design and approach. in the nordic states, ethics in health research is primarily influenced by the helsinki declaration (world medical association, 2013). therefore, in these countries, the main provision for indigenous rights in the health research context has been the categorization of indigenous peoples as a “vulnerable population” as per the helsinki declaration article 20. the general data protection regulation legislation, introduced in the european union in may 2018, is now the underlying regulation of all data collection and research in eu countries, which include denmark as well as sweden and finland (european union, 2018). sámi in nordic countries have pushed for a change towards systematically ensuring that sámi interests are prioritized within research (sámediggi, 2011). for example, the sámi parliament of norway has been calling for establishment of a sámi ethical review board since 1997, which would review projects, including those related to health (sámediggi, 2018). following this, the northern norway ethical review committee hired a sámi medical consultant, to be called upon if needed in matters concerning sámi health research. however, it is unknown to what extent this practice was successful in fulfilling its purpose, and the procedure has been discontinued for several years (stordahl et al., 2015). regardless, the lack of structures and guidelines securing inclusion of sámi interests in health research ethics review processes has resulted in considerable variations, within and between countries, in terms of how sámi interests are operationalized in the ethical review processes (sámediggi, 2018). to remedy this within norway, the sámi parliament of norway has supported the adoption of a set of sámi specific ethical guidelines in health research (sámediggi, 2018). those guidelines were created by a committee organized by the sámi parliament of norway, inspired by discussions with other indigenous groups (most notably, aboriginal people in australia and māori in new zealand) and are now in effect (sámediggi, 2020). the two main principles of those guidelines are the right to collective consent (likely to be given through creation of a new sámi ethical review board, supplementing the existing structure), as well as acknowledgement and recognition. this last principle addresses the right of sámi people to be recognized as such, including being allowed to register their ethnicity in health registers (currently, registering ethnicity and similar categories including race is illegal in nordic countries). although the sámi parliament in sweden have made it a political priority to establish similar ethical guidelines 11 lavoie et al.: indigenous engagement in health research in circumpolar countries published by scholarship@western, 2021 (sámediggi, 2019), no similar developments have taken place there, nor in the other parts of the sámi homeland (finland and northwestern russia). most of the research undertaken in greenland is organized by or in partnership with danish universities. danish universities have ethical guidelines directing researchers on ethical conduct, but these do not recognize the need to engage indigenous communities in the design and implementation of studies. greenland has a scientific ethics committee for health research where all biomedical research must be approved (www.nun.gl). health researchers are encouraged to submit all research protocols to the ethics committee, although this is only mandatory for biomedical research following the helsinki declaration (and consistent with the practice in nordic countries). along with their protocol researchers must submit a lay description of the project and a copy of the information provided for participants in the research projects in kalaallisut (the inuit language in greenland). the greenland medical society has published a code of conduct for health research (in danish only) focusing on local (not indigenous-specific) engagement, but these are not official guidelines nor legally binding (grønlandsmedicinsk selskab [greenland medical society], 2015). further, the ministry of health has published guidelines to ensure respect for limited capacity in the health sector (naalakkersuisut [government of greenland], 2015). natural sciences research is regulated through a mandatory permitting process for expeditions to remote areas (government of greenland, 2010). as with denmark, these guidelines do not include indigenous-centric provisions. in russia, neither university ethics review boards nor arctic research centres existing in most arctic territories of the country use indigenous-specific guidelines. as a result, researchers’ engagement with indigenous communities depends on the relationships between the researchers and the indigenous communities in which they work. some attempts at addressing ethical issues in indigenous-centric health research can be found in regional policies and target programs. for instance, two programs (yamalo-nenets and nenets) have been designed with the objective to ensure availability of research and to increase efficiency of research aiming at new models of health care in the context of traditional lifestyle and changing conditions of northern indigenous peoples. still, the purpose of such programs is to promote health research rather than to involve indigenous peoples in leading the study or to conduct studies according to specific values or perceptions of indigenous peoples. very often, research with indigenous populations is complicated by geographical, cultural, and historical specificity of the russian arctic— indigenous settlements are sparsely spread in the arctic territories with insufficient road and air transportation; certain groups of the contemporary indigenous population preserve nomadic or semi-nomadic lifestyles based on reindeer breeding and migrate long distances which make research relationships difficult to almost impossible to sustain; research is sometimes conducted in the context of limited staff, insufficient financing, and reluctance of indigenous population to interact with cultural outsiders. within these circumstances, the lack of clear guidelines in russia might result in missed opportunities for indigenous communities to be either actively engaged in the research or to benefit from findings, and might result in irrelevant or erroneous findings. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.10928 we reviewed more closely national ethical guidelines that are health-focused and contain indigenousspecific provisions. table 3 shows variations in the guidelines we reviewed, which included: • canada: tri-council policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans – tcps 2 (canadian institutes of health research et al., 2014). • the united states: the belmont report: ethical principles and guidelines for the protection of human subjects of research (national commission for the protection of human subjects of biomedical and behavioral research, 1979); the federal policy for the protection of human subjects ('common rule'), and the revised common rule (u.s. department of health & human services office for human research protections, 1991, 2018). • norway: proposal for ethical guidelines for sámi health research and research on sámi human biological material (kvernmo et al., 2018). table 3. analysis of existing national ethical guidelines specific to health research that contain indigenous-specific provisions country canada u.s.a. u.s.a. norway guideline tcps2a belmontb common rule 2018 amendmtc egshre national, regional or community specific guidelines national, overarching national, overarching national, overarching sápmi year 2018 1978 1991, 2018 2018 1. indigenous-specific component ch 9 none recognizes tribal laws all 2. indigenous representation on committee drafting guidelines extensive none noticeable none noticeable extensive guideline requirements 1. consultation in research protocol development a) respect for culture √ √ b) input on, co-development of protocol √ √ c) research useful √ √ 13 lavoie et al.: indigenous engagement in health research in circumpolar countries published by scholarship@western, 2021 table 3. analysis of existing national ethical guidelines specific to health research that contain indigenous-specific provisions country canada u.s.a. u.s.a. norway d) respect for local knowledge and experience √ √ 2. collective and individual consent: process and informed consent a) appropriate disclosure of research protocols √ b) adequate time for review √ c) consent required for protocol changes √ d) may withdraw consent √ √ 3. community involvement in research conduct a) recognition of community expertise, indigenous knowledge √ √ b) employment √ c) reimbursement for research costs √ 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.10928 table 3. analysis of existing national ethical guidelines specific to health research that contain indigenous-specific provisions (continued) country canada u.s.a. u.s.a. norway d) researchers' continued accountability to the community √ √ 4. access to data and samples a) consent for further use of samples, data √ √ b) storage of data negotiated √ 5. dissemination and publication a) involvement in manuscript preparation √ b) draft report for comment √ c) acknowledgement √ d) consent to identify √ e) report compliance with guidelines f) final report √ g) consent for researcher media interview 15 lavoie et al.: indigenous engagement in health research in circumpolar countries published by scholarship@western, 2021 table 3. analysis of existing national ethical guidelines specific to health research that contain indigenous-specific provisions (continued) country canada u.s.a. u.s.a. norway a tri-council policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans – tcps 2 (canadian institutes of health research et al., 2014); b the belmont report: ethical principles and guidelines for the protection of human subjects of research (national commission for the protection of human subjects of biomedical and behavioral research, 1979); c federal policy for the protection of human subjects ('common rule'), and the revised common rule (u.s. department of health & human services office for human research protections, 1991, 2018); d procedure for seeking the free, prior, and informed consent of the sámi from the sámi parliament in finland for research projects dealing with sámi cultural heritage and traditional knowledge and other activities that have or may have an impact on this heritage and knowledge (finland sámediggi, 2016); e proposal for ethical guidelines for sámi health research and research on sámi human biological material (sámediggi, 2018). f participation in research activities is mentioned, employment is not specifically mentioned. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.10928 overall, guidelines used in canada appear to be the most comprehensive and include indigenousspecific provisions. in contrast, the u.s. belmont report and common rule defer indigenous-specific provisions to tribal law, and presumably, to indigenous guidelines where they exist. as discussed, alaska native people have developed a different process through both regional tribal organizations and the alaska area irb of the alaska native tribal health consortium. thus, regional variations have been systematized, reflecting principles of indigenous sovereignty, and the diversity of indigenous nations in the u.s. guidelines in sápmi could not possibly defer to sámi “tribal laws” since this structure is not relevant in the sámi context. provisions for collective consent have nevertheless been included in the norwegian sámi-specific guidelines. areas that remain outstanding in these guidelines include recognition of sámi contributions in dissemination and publication activities. discussion our study focused on an analysis of national guidelines as they pertain to indigenous health research. we recognize clear limitations to our study. to begin, we limited our research to national guidelines, which although authoritative, remain subject to interpretation. second, countries lacking explicit guidelines might nevertheless have adopted practices that align with the principles described in table 3. given our team’s engagement in the funding and peer review process of research in our respective countries, we are confident that if this is the case, then these practices are localized and tied to specific individuals whose influence may be considerable in specific settings but unnoticeable elsewhere. we also recognize that individual researchers might have co-developed their own research processes with indigenous communities which go beyond the expectations embedded in national guidelines. finally, we acknowledge that high level guidelines represent a minimum for ethical expectations, which may be deemed insufficient by indigenous communities. our study shows that to date, ethical guidelines addressing indigenous engagement in health research have emerged in canada, norway, and the u.s.a., with more integrated and streamlined implementation processes in alaska. guidelines with an indigenous-specific focus are under discussion in greenland. progress is not apparent on indigenous-specific ethical guidelines for health research in sweden or russia. the guidelines we reviewed harmonize to some extent with articles 3, 5, 31, and 32 of undrip discussed earlier in this paper (united nations, 2007). the variations appear to reflect the extent of debate on indigenous self-government within each country. we recognize that these debates are fluid, vary in aspiration and scope, and are evolving (broderstad, 2014; shadian, 2017; strommer & osborne, 2015). where guidelines and processes exist, evidence of partnership-based research is emerging in the published literature (beans et al., 2019; chu yang et al., 2018; hiratsuka et al., 2017; kyoon-achan et al., 2018). we recognize that the inclusion of a description of partnerships may be underrepresented as a result of editors and peer reviewers insisting that such detail is unnecessary, as we have experienced. 17 lavoie et al.: indigenous engagement in health research in circumpolar countries published by scholarship@western, 2021 literature is also emerging on lessons learned from projects undertaken in partnership, although thus far, this literature has only emerged in canadian and alaskan contexts (ball & janyst, 2008; baydala et al., 2013; genuis et al., 2015; morton ninomiya & pollock, 2017; vukic et al., 2009; wallis et al., 2015). where clear guidelines and process do not exist, some iteration of partnerships and collective consent may be present (for example, stoor et al., 2015), but this is less likely to be reported in detail. this lack of reporting perpetuates the impression that indigenous peoples are the object of research, and that these studies are poorly aligned with undrip. in all countries under study, we note that canada generally tends to have more comprehensive guidelines for health research, with explicit provisions for indigenous health research. we link this to the creation of the canadian institutes for health research (cihr), which replaced the medical research council of canada in 2001. since its creation cihr’s funding of research has seen a proportional shift, from funding nearly exclusively discovery research (biomedical and clinical research) in 2001 to progressively increasing investments in health systems and services research and population health research. these latter themes focus on system and population health transformation and require decision-makers, patients, and the community to be involved in the research process. as a result, ethical guidelines have expanded their focus to provide guidance on how to best protect human participants in participatory studies. these new guidelines recognize that participants in such studies might face significant risk, but also that that risk is very different from the risk patients engaged in a randomized controlled trial might encounter. alongside these developments, indigenous communities in canada have become more vocal about the need for university-based researchers to stop studying indigenous peoples and to instead engage them as equal in the research process. thus, the development of indigenous-centric guidelines are the results of two processes: increased funding to health system and population health research and associated expectations that the result will produce improvements (rather than simply naming the problem), and a push by indigenous communities for increased participation in research that benefits them. as a result of these changes, which echo changes in ethical guidelines in australia, new zealand, and elsewhere, the canadian journal of public health issued what is, to our knowledge, the first guideline requiring a disclosure of researcher–indigenous partnership as a condition of publication (canadian journal of public health, 2020). this guideline resonates with a small but emerging literature (beans et al., 2019; huria et al., 2019). this initiative, should it spread to other publishers, could add pressure onto researchers to adopt partnership-based practices, and add important energies to national discussions. conclusions international trends towards greater inclusion of indigenous peoples in research leadership roles are apparent in research ethics processes in canada, the united states, and, most recently, in norway. these trends are emerging in greenland and finland but remain largely absent in other circumpolar contexts. 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.10928 we reflect that this may be attributed to different factors, including more emphasis (and importance) being placed by funding bodies on biomedical and clinical research, where the development of mechanisms supporting participatory research is less relevant. alternatively, or alongside, circumpolar countries have various levels of commitment to indigenous self-determination. we surmise that a lack of indigenous-specific guidelines might signal as lesser commitment, more so than an endorsement of undrip. we acknowledge that indigenous and non-indigenous researchers engaging in research across circumpolar contexts may readily partner with indigenous communities, endorse principles entrenched in undrip, and adhere to indigenous-centric ethical guidelines even when they are not in place in their jurisdictions. while this voluntary endorsement of principles is commendable, it is insufficient to expect all researchers to voluntarily adhere to guidelines they may not even be aware of. we contend that indigenous-centric ethical guidelines are required in all circumpolar contexts, developed by, or at the least co-developed with, indigenous stakeholders. our work shows considerable variation between existing indigenous-specific guidelines for ethical heath research, which might reflect divergent priorities between indigenous nations, or incomplete guidelines. the generation of knowledge that accurately reflects 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(2013). world medical association declaration of helsinki: ethical principles for medical research involving human subjects. journal of the american medical association, 310(20), 2191–2194. https://doi.org/10.1001/jama.2013.281053 https://www.wma.net/policies-post/wma-declaration-of-helsinki-ethical-principles-for-medical-research-involving-human-subjects/ https://www.wma.net/policies-post/wma-declaration-of-helsinki-ethical-principles-for-medical-research-involving-human-subjects/ https://doi.org/10.1001/jama.2013.281053 first nations women in northern ontario: health, social, and community priorities the international indigenous policy journal volume 2 issue 1 health and well-being article 9 may 2011 first nations women in northern ontario: health, social, and community priorities k . amanda maranzan lakehead university, kamaranz@lakeheadu.ca alice sabourin beedaubin resources christine simard nishnawbe aski nation recommended citation maranzan, k. , sabourin, a. , simard, c. (2011). first nations women in northern ontario: health, social, and community priorities. the international indigenous policy journal, 2(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.9 this research is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. first nations women in northern ontario: health, social, and community priorities abstract this article reports on data from women dwelling in first nations communities regarding (1) baseline statistics about women’s circumstances, needs, interests, and opportunities for community engagement, and (2) information about women’s present status, experience, interest, and other questions of social, economic, and health status. two hundred twenty-six women from 35 first nations communities completed the survey. this paper focuses on the main findings from the survey, which fall into 4 thematic areas. theme 1 consists of demographic information as provided by participants. theme 2 consists of social information such as housing and education. theme 3 includes information about participants’ top community health concerns. theme 4 examines participants’ community involvement. use of the survey in directing women's social policy is discussed. keywords first nations; women; social determinants of health acknowledgments funding for the nishnawbe aski nation major women’s development project was provided by indian and northern affairs canada, ontario trillium foundation, ontario women’s directorate, and status of women canada. no endorsement by the funders is intended or should be inferred. the authors wish to thank two anonymous reviewers for providing feedback on an earlier draft of this manuscript. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ the health and socioeconomic conditions of canadian first nations peoples are of concern to health care workers, researchers, and policy makers. regardless of the health outcome-mortality rates, self-rated health status or disease diagnosis-health disparities exist between first nations peoples and the general canadian population (frohlich, ross, & richmond, 2006). along with indigenous populations in the united states and australia, canadian first nations groups have a significant history of colonialism, and their position in society today is a direct result of the colonization process (frideres & gadacz, 2001). the colonization process included (but was not limited to) wardship through the 1876 indian act and related federal policy (waldram, herring, & young, 2006), forced removal of children from their families and placement in residential schools and foster care (kirmayer, simpson, & cargo, 2003), creation of the reserve system and forced relocation of communities (adelson, 2005), and racism and discrimination towards first nations peoples (waldram et al., 2006). discrimination frequently results in social and economic marginalization. members of marginalized groups are often exposed to inadequate access to health care, environmental hazards and socially inflicted trauma, which can influence health directly or indirectly (krieger, 1999). compared to minority men, minority women are more likely to suffer ill health effects due to racism (karlsen & nazroo, 2002), making them a particularly vulnerable sub-group. this legacy of colonization continues to affect first nations peoples’ health, social, economic, cultural, and political status to this day (spitzer, 2005; waldram et al., 2006). there exists a wealth of literature demonstrating how inequalities in social, economic, cultural, and political status are associated with health disparities (c.f. adelson, 2005; cooper, 2002; frohlich et al., 2006; krieger, 1999; spitzer, 2005; trovato, 2001). these social determinants of health must be addressed in order to reduce the health disparities experienced by first nations peoples. this paper summarizes the unequal distribution of education, employment, income, and housing among canada’s indigenous peoples. we use the term “indigenous” to refer to first nations, métis, and inuit peoples collectively. whenever possible we specify the particular group represented. this paper has a particular focus on the first nations population and demonstrates the lack of information specific to women’s social and economic context. we conclude by describing a survey designed to collect data on the social and political status of first nations women, reporting on the key information obtained. the main findings from the survey identify the intersection of health, social, and community priorities of first nation women in northern ontario. the survey was implemented within the context of a large-scale women’s development project under the direction of co-author c. simard (nishnawbe aski nation). coauthors a. maranzan (lakehead university) and a. sabourin (beedaubin resources) were project evaluators for the larger women’s development project. education, occupation, and income socioeconomic status (ses) is traditionally defined by an individual or family’s education, income, and occupation; several health problems including low birthweight, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and cancer are linked to low ses (adler & newman, 2002). in general, the educational attainment of canada’s indigenous peoples is lower than that of the general population (bougie & senécal, 2010; health canada, 2005). for example, the canadian community health survey indicated that 43.9% of indigenous peoples (off-reserve) had less than a high school education compared to the general population at 23.1% (tjepkema, 2002). the 2001 canadian census indicated that on-reserve first nations peoples also had lower rates of educational attainment across all levels including elementary, postsecondary, and college/university (health canada, 2005). in a sample of 301 on-reserve first nations people only 10% had completed a university education, compared to 33% of people of european descent (anand et al., 2001). 1 maranzan et al.: health, social, and community priorities published by scholarship@western, 2011 rates of employment are similarly lower among the indigenous population. the canadian community health survey asked respondents to indicate if they had worked the entire previous year; among those aged 15 to 75, only 38.1% of off-reserve indigenous respondents had worked, compared to 53.2% of the general population (tjepkema, 2002). this difference seems to be magnified for females; data from the 2006 canadian census indicated that 20% of on-reserve first nations females were unemployed, compared to 29% of their male counterparts (quinless & anderson, 2010). income is a key determinant of health in canada and other countries around the world (raphael et al., 2006) and is closely related to an individual’s educational attainment and available employment opportunities. higher income can promote health and well-being through supply of better nutrition, housing, schooling, and recreation (adler & newman, 2002). in general, indigenous household incomes are significantly below that of the general population. for example, the canadian community heath survey indicated approximately 27% of off-reserve indigenous peoples had a low income compared to 10% of the general population (low income was defined as less than $15,000 for 1-2 person households, less than $20,000 for 3-4 person households, and less than $30,000 for 5+ person households; tjepkema, 2002). the 2006 canadian census indicated that the average income for off-reserve first nations females was $21,773, compared to $30,110 for first nations men (quinless & anderson, 2010). there is some data to suggest a relationship between income inequality and mortality. for example, data from the united states showed a strong relationship between income inequality and mortality for the working age population; as income inequality increased mortality also increased (ross et al., 2000). in canada, however, this relationship was not significant perhaps due to differences in social and economic resource distribution in canada. canadian provinces and metropolitan areas had lower income inequality and lower mortality compared to the united states (ross et al., 2000). however, a separate canadian study noted higher mortality rates in health regions characterized by high unemployment, low educational attainment, and low household income (berthelot, wilkins, & allard, 2004). education, employment, and income are inter-related and have a significant impact on health and well-being (spitzer, 2005). housing socio-economic factors are also related to housing and are particularly important among the indigenous population when coupled with the inequities in education, employment, and income described above (dunn, hayes, hulchanski, hwang, & potvin, 2006). several housing characteristics have the potential to influence health, such as physical hazards and crowded living conditions. adelson (2005) summarized the available information about housing, which indicated that compared to the general population indigenous peoples were twice as likely to live in homes requiring significant repairs (data included onand off-reserve indigenous peoples). data from the 2006 canadian census indicated that 28% of off-reserve first nations people, 14% of métis people, and 28% of inuit people lived in homes in need of significant repairs, compared to only 7% of the general population (statistics canada, 2008). these figures increase on reserves. for example, in 2001 55.8% of homes on first nations reserves were considered adequate (i.e., did not require major repairs and were large enough for the size of the household), while 36.0% were in need of major repairs (health canada, 2005). indigenous peoples (onand off-reserve) are 2 to 8 times more likely to experience crowded living conditions compared to the canadian general population (adelson, 2005). for example, the 2006 canadian census indicated that off-reserve first nations peoples were four times more likely to reside in crowded dwellings (i.e., more than one person per room) compared to the general population; three percent of inuit and métis people lived in crowded conditions. crowding was especially common on first nations reserves, where 26% of people lived in crowded conditions (statistics canada, 2008). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.9 compared to the general population, indigenous people are 90 times more likely to have no piped water, and 5 times more likely to have no bathroom facilities (adelson, 2005; data included on and off-reserve peoples). many first nations reserves lack basic sanitary infrastructure (frohlich et al., 2006). enteric, food, and waterborne diseases such as giardiasis, shigellosis, verotoxigenic escherichia coli (e. coli) and hepatitis a are more easily spread in communities with substandard water and sewage systems. given the data presented, the picture that emerges is one of poor distribution of the social determinants of health among indigenous peoples, including first nations. first nations peoples have lower educational attainment, employment, and income, and are more likely to live in crowded and substandard conditions. data that are specific to the experiences and needs of first nations women are difficult to come by, in part because most statistical reports focus on the first nations or indigenous groups as a whole, without conducting gender-based analyses. what little data are available suggest that these women experience an even greater amount of inequity compared to first nations men (c.f. adelson, 2005; quinless & anderson, 2010). in the next section we describe a survey that was designed to identify the social, economic, and political status of first nations women in northern ontario, canada; we report on statistical data collected by the survey in order to provide a snapshot of the women’s current experience. nishnawbe aski nation major women’s development project throughout the rest of this paper, we use the term “first nations community” and “community” as synonymous with “reserve” in keeping with the terminology preferred by nishnawbe aski nation and the people it represents. nishnawbe aski nation (nan) is a regional organization that represents the interests of approximately 45,000 first nations peoples dwelling in 49 communities within the territories of james bay treaty 9 and treaty 5 (ontario portion). members of nan are individuals who are members of one of the 49 first nations bands, regardless of their place of residence or treaty status. located in northern ontario, canada, nan’s territory occupies a land mass of approximately 210,000 square miles (figure 1; nishnawbe aski nation, 2011). in march 2007 a nan chiefs-in-assembly resolution (#07/33) recognized a need to facilitate the on-going involvement of women in leadership and called for the examination of how women could be included in nan’s leadership processes. in response to this recognized need, approximately 100 nan women attended a conference in thunder bay, ontario. participants discussed the potential use of workshops to address the social and economic concerns of women living on reserves, and the outcome of the conference was the development of a draft socio-wellness health plan from the perspective of the participants. this plan evolved into an initiative termed the major women’s development project. a director of women’s development (co-author c. simard) and project assistant (collectively the “women’s development team”) were hired to further develop the project in consultation with key stakeholders. input was obtained from women living on nan reserves as well as women from the nan women’s council. the women’s council consists of 8 women chosen through election, and one youth representative; its role is to bring forward issues that pertain to women within the context of chiefs’ meetings, and ensure the on-going involvement of women in decision-making processes. the major women’s development project developed through consultation with the stakeholders described above. in its final form, the major women’s development project consisted of three elements: (1) four-day workshops on leadership and personal capacity development, to be delivered to women residing in each of the 49 nan communities (results not described here), (2) curriculum and training to develop and support women’s groups in the nan communities (results not described here), and (3) development and implementation of a survey to collect statistical information 3 maranzan et al.: health, social, and community priorities published by scholarship@western, 2011 about the needs and experiences of nan women. thus, the focus of the major women’s development project was on women dwelling in nan’s communities and not on urban-dwelling (off-reserve) women. the focus of this paper is on the survey’s findings. the nan women’s council and women’s development team designed the survey to determine the health, social, and community priorities of nan women. the women’s council wanted to collect this information for two purposes. the first purpose was to have more information with which to advocate for women’s resources and services. the second purpose was to have a baseline measure of women’s experiences and needs; a follow-up survey could then determine if allocation of resources had an impact on women living in the communities. the three elements of the major women’s development project were implemented simultaneously. between 2008 and 2010, over 200 women residing in 43 of nan’s 49 communities attended the workshops. during the workshops the curriculum regarding women’s groups was also delivered. workshop participants completed the survey upon conclusion of the workshops. the present study as described above, nan chiefs-in-assembly resolution #07/33 called for the examination of how women could become involved in nan’s leadership process and was the impetus for development of the major women’s development project. given the lack of statistical information specific to first nations women, development and delivery of a survey to collect such information was an important element of the major women’s development project. we will now summarize the key findings from the survey, identifying the health, social, and community priorities of first nations women residing in northern ontario. our aim is to demonstrate that understanding and improving the social conditions and inequity experienced by first nations women is necessary in order to promote the health and wellbeing of this group. methodology participants all women who participated in the leadership and personal capacity development workshops were invited to complete the survey. measure the survey included 33 items regarding demographic information (e.g., age, marital status, number of children), community health concerns (e.g., diabetes, doctor shortage, nutrition), social concerns (e.g., housing, income, education), and community involvement (e.g., volunteering, role models). it has become an accepted flexible data collection instrument within nan that not only collects demographic information but allows women to express their top community health concerns, identify positive aspects of their communities, and identify challenges facing their communities with suggestions for change. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.9 procedure administered in hard copy format, participants completed the survey anonymously. data were collected upon conclusion of the 4-day leadership and personal capacity development workshops. ethical approval the major women’s development project was initiated by nishnawbe aski nation and developed by nan women, for nan women, as described previously. support and approval for the overall project, including development, administration, and analysis of the survey, was obtained from the nan executive. each participating reserve’s chief and/or council gave consent prior to implementation of the workshops and survey on their reserve. additionally, the lakehead university research ethics board provided ethical approval to analyze the anonymous survey data. results data were obtained from 226 first nations women residing in 35 first nations communities throughout northern ontario, representing an average of 6.5 women per community. the number of women from each community ranged from 1 to 20. data were analysed using spss 16.0 and are reported as frequency distribution tables. using the data from the survey, we were able to report baseline statistics across four thematic areas. theme 1 consists of demographic information. theme 2 consists of social information such as housing and education. theme 3 includes information about the participants’ top community health concerns, separated by women’s health concerns and men’s health concerns. theme 4 examines the participants’ community involvement. not all participants responded to each question; some categories include missing data. theme 1: demographic information table 1 displays the participants’ age groups and current marital status. fifty-two percent of the women were 40 years of age or less, with the 31-40 age bracket most represented. the majority of participants were common-law or married (58.0%) with the remainder single (25.2%), separated/divorced (11.1%) or widowed (4.4%). the average number of children for participants was 2.8 (sd = 2.03) and this number ranged from 0 to 12 children. the majority of these children were aged 18 years and older, followed by children aged newborn to 6 years. english was the first language for the majority of participants (53.1%) followed by oji-cree (15.9%), ojibway (15.0%) and cree (7.1%). in addition to their first language, the women indicated they could also speak ojibway (19.9%), oji-cree (13.3%), and cree (5.3%) and a minority of women could write in ojibway syllabics (9.7%), oji-cree syllabics (10.6%), and cree syllabics (1.3%). we divided the participants into two groups based on age (15 to 40 years, and 41 years and older) to determine if first language differed by age group; there was no difference in first language for any age group. the majority of participants had completed at least some high school (51.8%). an additional 19.9% had attended at least some college/university, while 12.8% indicated elementary school was the highest level of education received. 5 maranzan et al.: health, social, and community priorities published by scholarship@western, 2011 theme 2: social information participants were asked if their home has enough bedrooms and living space to meet their family’s needs. seventy-four women (32.7%) indicated this was not the case; among these women the average number of people who live in the home was 5.4 (sd = 2.5) and ranged from 1 to 14 people. this same sub-group of women had an average of 3 rooms in their home (sd = 1.2, min = 1, max = 6). fiftyeight percent of women (n = 130) indicated they do have enough bedrooms and living space to meet their family’s needs (9.7% missing data). one quarter of the women (26.1%) had a total personal annual income between $20,000 to $30,000 while an additional 40.7% made less than $20,000 per year. approximately half of the women (56.6%) indicated that “work” was their current source of income. the next largest categories were social assistance (9.3%) followed by spouse’s income (6.6%), disability (4.0%) and pension (2.7%). theme 3: community health concerns participants were asked to identify the top 5 community health concerns from a list provided to them, developed by the women’s development team and nan women’s council, separated for men and women (see table 2). the top concerns for women were diabetes (88.9%), addictions (75.7%), nutrition (60.2%), cancer (50.4%) and doctor shortage (50.0%). the top concerns for men were similar: diabetes (61.9%), addictions (57.1%), nutrition (37.6%), cancer (34.5%) and mental illness (33.2%). more participants endorsed concern about women’s health issues compared to men’s health issues. theme 4: community involvement the women were also asked about the extent of their involvement in the community. approximately one-third of the participants (38.5%) indicated that there are women’s groups in their community. twenty-three communities (65%) had women’s groups but not all of the women from these communities were aware of the women’s group(s) in their own community. in communities that have women’s groups, an average of 11 reported participating in them. the majority of women (76.1%) indicated that they volunteer for their community. the types of volunteer activities endorsed by the women are displayed in table 3. the most common volunteer activities were helping at community events (50.0%), fundraising (46.0 %), and cooking (42.0%). babysitting and helping with events for children/youth were additional examples of volunteer activities the women engaged in. finally, the women were asked if they had ever run for chief and/or council, or thought of running. thirty-nine women (17.3%) had run for chief and/or council, while 65 women (28.8%) had thought about it. potential barriers experienced by women who run for chief and council were family responsibility (48.7%), community pressure (44.7%), home responsibility (43.4%), lack of support (38.1%), self-esteem issues (26.5%), and financial concerns (18.1%). discussion this study provided insights into some of the social and political realities of women residing in first nations communities in northern ontario, canada. a survey administered to women attending leadership development and personal capacity building workshops collected key statistical information. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.9 findings from the survey highlight the demographic characteristics of the participants, social information, community health concerns, and women’s involvement in their communities. future research could focus on obtaining a representative sample in order to increase our understanding of women’s context and experiences. taken together, the demographic, social, and health information collected by the survey are consistent with data reported elsewhere in the literature. among the participants, approximately half obtained a high school education, a finding that was slightly higher than educational attainment rates reported elsewhere in the literature. it may be that self-selection to participate in the workshops (and hence completion of the survey) influenced this statistic, with women with lower educational attainment being less likely to participate. this selection bias may have occurred due to the method in which the workshops were advertised; promotional materials were posted mainly in the community’s band office and other places of employment. approximately one-third of the women indicated that their home did not have enough bedrooms and living space to meet their family’s needs. on average, these women lived with 5 people in a home with three rooms. previous research demonstrated that first nations peoples are more likely to live in crowded living conditions compared to the general canadian population, and our work is consistent with this finding. almost 60% of the participants were married or common-law, and the average number of children in the group was 2.8 (sd = 2.03). thus, the majority of the women who participated in the survey carried significant responsibilities in terms of child-rearing and family. this finding corresponds with two of the frequently-endorsed barriers to leadership participation for these women: family responsibility and home responsibility. several of the participants commented that, when a woman holds a position of leadership, she also retains responsibility for her children and family, and these priorities can be challenging to balance. the survey also reported on new data about women’s community involvement and leadership. almost twenty percent of participants had run for chief and/or council, and over twenty-five percent of participants had thought about running for such a position. however, first nations women continue to experience challenges which inhibit their full contribution (castellano, 2009). the data from the present study certainly suggest that other responsibilities carried by women can act as barriers to their participation in the political arena, particularly those associated with child rearing and other family responsibilities. community pressure and lack of support were additional often-cited barriers experienced by women who run for political office. a major strength of the survey is that it was developed and delivered by first nations women, for first nations women. however, it is important to note that this study did not employ a representative sample, but rather a convenience sample. therefore, the results do not generalize to the entire female population dwelling in first nations communities. the major women’s development project only targeted women living in first nations communities; future research should consider the social context of women living off-reserve. conclusions taken together, the data from the current study indicate that first nations women continue to experience inequities in social and economic status. furthermore, the data indicate that women form the minority of political leadership. the other two elements of the major women’s development project were implemented in order to begin to change women’s political status by further developing the skills and strengths of nan’s women and facilitating their involvement in leadership. the survey from the present study will be used as one mechanism of measuring change in women’s social, economic, and political status in the communities. 7 maranzan et al.: health, social, and community priorities published by scholarship@western, 2011 as previously described, the nan women’s council has input in the decision-making processes of the nan executive. the nan women’s council intends to use the survey data to advocate for resources and programs that will address women’s current needs, with the ultimate goal of reducing inequities and improving the health of women, families, and communities. castellano (2009) acknowledged the importance of women’s voices in public dialogue about health and healing of first nations communities. she also described the increasing influence women have in political forums. the present survey, therefore, is an important step forward for the nan women’s council. survey information about the inequities experienced by women, as well as the strengths and resources identified by the survey, will be used to inform and direct policy regarding women’s issues. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.9 table 1 demographic characteristics of participants demographic n % age group 15-20 16 7.1 21-25 19 8.4 26-30 21 9.3 31-35 27 11.9 36-40 35 15.5 41-45 21 9.3 46-50 25 11.1 51-55 22 9.7 56-60 13 5.8 61-65 8 3.5 66-70 7 3.1 70+ 1 0.4 unknown 11 4.9 marital status single 57 25.2 common-law 47 20.8 married 84 37.2 separated 13 5.8 divorced 12 5.3 marital status widowed 10 4.4 unknown 3 1.3 9 maranzan et al.: health, social, and community priorities published by scholarship@western, 2011 table 2 top community health concerns for women and men, as endorsed by participants health concern for women health concern for men concern n % n % diabetes 201 88.9 140 61.9 addictions 171 75.7 129 57.1 nutrition 136 60.2 85 37.6 cancer 114 50.4 78 34.5 doctor shortage 113 50.0 74 32.7 mental illness 84 37.2 75 33.2 nursing shortage 83 36.7 54 23.9 transportation 62 27.4 47 20.8 health cards, status cards 54 23.9 38 16.8 hiv/aids 46 20.4 39 17.3 tuberculosis 25 11.1 23 10.2 other 33 14.6 22 9.7 table 3 volunteer activities endorsed by participants activity n % cleaning 69 30.5 cooking 95 42.0 community events 113 50.0 fundraising 104 46.0 crisis response 67 29.6 visiting families in need 52 23.0 community hall 39 17.3 midwifery 5 2.2 other 29 14.1 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.9 figure 1. map of ontario, canada, showing nishnawbe aski nations’ territory, affiliated first nations communities, and tribal councils. 11 maranzan et al.: health, social, and community priorities published by scholarship@western, 2011 references adelson, n. 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(2000). relation between income inequality and mortality in canada and in the united states: cross sectional assessment using census data and vital statistics. british medical journal, 320, 898-902. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 1 [2011], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss1/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.1.9 spitzer, d. l. (2005). engendering health disparities. canadian journal of public health, 96, s78-s96. statistics canada (2008). aboriginal people in canada in 2006: inuit, metis, and first nations, census 2006 (statistics canada catalogue no. 97-558-xie). ottawa: author. tjepkema, m. (2002). the health of the off-reserve aboriginal population. health reports, 13, 73-88. trovato, f. (2001). aboriginal mortality in canada, the united states and new zealand. journal of biosocial science, 33, 67-86. waldram, j. b., herring, d. a., & young, t. k. (2006). aboriginal health in canada: historical, cultural and epidemiological perspectives, second edition. toronto: university of toronto press. 13 maranzan et al.: health, social, and community priorities published by scholarship@western, 2011 the international indigenous policy journal may 2011 first nations women in northern ontario: health, social, and community priorities k. amanda maranzan alice sabourin christine simard recommended citation first nations women in northern ontario: health, social, and community priorities abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license first nations women in northern ontario: health, social, and community priorities overqualification among aboriginal workers in canada the international indigenous policy journal volume 9 | issue 1 article 2 january 2018 overqualification among aboriginal workers in canada jungwee park statistics canada, jungwee.park@canada.ca recommended citation park, j. (2018). overqualification among aboriginal workers in canada. the international indigenous policy journal, 9(1). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.2 overqualification among aboriginal workers in canada abstract this study examines education, employment, and the extent to which adult aboriginal workers (aged 25-64) were overqualified for their jobs compared to non-aboriginal workers. data are from the 2011 national household survey (nhs) including 415,115 aboriginal workers and 13,301,610 non-aboriginal workers. aboriginal workers with higher levels of education (bachelor degree or higher) were less likely to be overqualified than their non-aboriginal counterparts; but aboriginal workers with lower levels of education (less than university level) were more likely to be overqualified than non-aboriginal workers. this study also highlights differences in overqualification by field of study: among aboriginal workers who earned university degrees, low overqualification rates were found among those who studied education; mathematics, computer, and information sciences; architecture, engineering, and related technologies; and health fields. keywords indigenous, aboriginal, employment, national household survey, overqualification, skill levels, field of study, education, canada disclaimer this paper was funded by the strategic research directorate at indian and northern affairs canada (inac). the views expressed in this document, however, are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the position of statistics canada or inac. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ o v e rq u a l i f i c a t i o n a m o n g a b o ri g i n a l w o rke rs i n c a n a d a in today’s economy, a skilled and educated workforce has become essential to productivity and economic growth (uppal & larochelle-côté, 2014; scottish executive, 2004). in response, both governments and individuals are increasing resources devoted to postsecondary education. between 1995 to1996 and 2005 to 2006, public expenditure on postsecondary education increased 35%, from $23 billion to $31 billion, in 2001 constant dollars (yuen, 2010). at the individual level, more people are obtaining postsecondary credentials despite rising tuition fees. among employed individuals aged 25 to 34, the proportion that had a university degree rose significantly, from 18% in 1991 to 33% in 2011 (uppal & larochelle-côté, 2014). however, skilled jobs may not always be available to the increasing number of skilled candidates. rather, a divergent labour market trend has been observed: some jobs are unfilled because employers cannot find workers with the right skills (jobs without people) and an increase in the number of canadians looking for work (people without jobs) as opportunities in certain occupations disappear (tal, 2012). as a result, a considerable number of employees would be “overqualified”—possessing an education level higher than what is typically required for the job (uppal & larochelle-côté, 2014). in 2011, among university graduates aged 25 to 34, 18% of men and women worked in occupations requiring a high school education or less, and about 40% worked in occupations requiring a college-level education or less (uppal & larochelle-côté, 2014). this job–education mismatch may contribute to a rise in long-term unemployment and limit the growth potential of the labour market and the economy as a whole (frenette, 2000, 2004; gingras & roy, 2000; li, gervais, & duval, 2006). as well, individual overqualified workers tend to have lower earnings, lower job satisfaction, and lower levels of productivity (crompton, 2002; frenette, 2000; li et al., 2006). moreover, it is reported that overqualified workers tend to be at risk of poorer mental health and general health decline (chen, smith, & mustard, 2010; johnson & johnson, 1999). the body of literature on overqualification points out that specific population groups may be at differential risk to be overqualified than the canadian population as a whole (frenette, 2000, 2004; galarneau & morissette, 2004; li et al., 2006). identifying these subgroups and addressing their specific risks is important for policy makers. this study focuses on the overqualification among aboriginal workers. previous research has demonstrated that aboriginal people in canada have historically been limited in their access to the resources and conditions necessary to maximize socioeconomic status (galabuzi, 2004). as a result, aboriginal people are less likely than other canadians to participate in the labour force, are more likely to be unemployed (reading & wien, 2009), and are less likely to be re-employed after an economic downturn (usalcas, 2011). according to the 2011 national household survey, unemployment rates among individuals aged 25 to 64 are higher for first nations with indian status, first nations without status,1 inuit, and métis people with rates of 17%, 9%, 17%, and 9% respectively compared to an unemployment rate of 6% for the non-aboriginal population (aboriginal affairs and 1 in canada, the term aboriginal is used as an umbrella term to describe indigenous peoples. there are three main groups: first nations, métis, and inuit. registered indian and status indian are the official terms for first nations people who are registered under the indian act. first nations who are not registered are non-status indians. 1 park: overqualification among aboriginal workers published by scholarship@western, 2018 northern development canada [aandc], 2013). most of the employment losses in 2008 and 2009 among non-aboriginal people were recouped in 2010 whereas the employment among aboriginal people continued to decline. to be more specific, according to data from the 2008 to 2010 labour force survey, the post-2008 labour market downturn was shown to last longer for aboriginal people than nonaboriginal people (usalcas, 2011). moreover, there exists a considerable gap in employment earnings between aboriginal and non-aboriginal workers (centre for the study of living standards, 2012; wilson & macdonald, 2010). aboriginal people tend to be employed in low-paying and support labour positions. for example, the top three occupations for aboriginal workers in canada were sales and service (mainly retail sales clerks and cashiers, food and beverage occupations, protective service, and child care and home support as opposed to sales specialist positions); trades, transport, and equipment operators (mainly mechanics, contractors, construction trade workers, and transportation equipment operators as opposed to supervisory positions); and business, finance, and administration (mainly clerical workers, and administrative and regulatory workers as opposed to professional occupations in business and finance) (luffman & sussman, 2007; usalcas, 2011). aboriginal people’s labour market disadvantages such as higher unemployment rates and lower earnings have been explained by their lower level of educational attainment, especially the lack of postsecondary levels of education (bougie, kelly-scott, & arriagada, 2013; centre for the study of living standards, 2012; conference board of canada, 2012; health council of canada, 2005). one’s educational attainment, however, can pay off only when it helps find an appropriate job in the labour market. thus, it is worth investigating whether aboriginal people equipped with higher levels of education would be able work for the types of jobs that match their level of education. in other words, it is important to examine whether or not aboriginal workers are likely to be overqualified for their job. despite a number of empirical reports on the general labour market conditions of aboriginal people, there has been little documentation as to whether aboriginal people have jobs that match their educational levels. this study attempts to fill this data gap. the national household survey (nhs) provides detailed demographic and labour market information including level of education, field of study, employment status, and job skill level categories to allow for an examination of the issue of overqualification among the total aboriginal population as well as among specific aboriginal groups. using the nhs, this study investigates the level of overqualification among aboriginal workers in the canadian labour market in comparison with non-aboriginal workers. it also describes sociodemographic factors associated with overqualification. finally, it discusses policy implications based on the findings. more specifically, this study answers the following research questions: • in canada, to what extent do aboriginal workers aged 25 to 64 work at a job typically requiring an education level lower than what they actually possess (i.e., overqualification)? what proportion of first nations, métis, and inuit people are experiencing overqualification in their current jobs? are aboriginal workers more likely to be overqualified than nonaboriginal workers? • how are levels of education related to overqualification among aboriginal workers? what other sociodemographic factors are associated with overqualification? are there specific sociodemographic subpopulations at higher risk of being overqualified? 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.2 • how are specific fields of study related to overqualification among aboriginal workers? what fields of study are more prone to overqualification in the labour market? m e t h o d s d a t a s o u rc e the data used in these analyses come from the 2011 national household survey (nhs). the study included employed men and women aged 25 to 64. in the nhs, a random sample of 4.5 million dwellings was selected, accounting for almost 30% of all private dwellings in canada (but it excluded persons living in institutional collective dwellings such as hospitals, nursing homes, and penitentiaries; canadian citizens living in other countries; and fulltime members of the canadian forces stationed outside canada). the overall response rate for the nhs, a voluntary survey, was 68.6%. the final responses were weighted so that the data from the sample accurately represent the nhs's target population. nhs collected not only basic demographic information, but also more detailed information on labour market activities. the large sample size of the nhs allowed this study to analyze labour market-related variables for specific aboriginal groups. this analysis is based on the information from 415,115 aboriginal workers (175,255 registered indian, 65,900 non-status first nation, 155,700 métis, and 14,415 inuit workers) and 13,301,610 non-aboriginal workers. s t u d y po p u l a t i o n this study examines the overqualification of employed workers aged 25 to 64. compared to their nonaboriginal counterparts, aboriginal workers were slightly younger (table 1). the median age for nonaboriginal workers was 45 years compared to 43 years for aboriginal workers. a higher proportion of aboriginal workers were male compared to their non-aboriginal counterparts. in terms of the skill level of their jobs, 23% of aboriginal workers were managers2 and professionals (skill level a) compared to one third of non-aboriginal workers. overall, aboriginal workers showed a lower level of educational attainment than non-aboriginal workers. almost 20% reported that they did not have high school education and 12% were university graduates. in contrast, 29% of non-aboriginal workers were university graduates and less than 9% had received no certificate, diploma, or degree. for those workers with postsecondary education, there was one notable difference in terms of fields of study. more than 10% of aboriginal workers (15% among inuit workers) were graduates of the personal, protective, and transportation services field compared with 6% of non-aboriginal workers. 2 occupations that are included in the management category may have various educational requirements, depending on the exact nature of the position (uppal & larochelle-côté, 2014). thus, the management category was not included for the analysis of overqualification. it accounted for about 9% of the aboriginal sample. 3 park: overqualification among aboriginal workers published by scholarship@western, 2018 t a b l e 1 . s e l e c t e d c h a ra c t e ri s t i c s o f a b o ri g i n a l a n d n o n a b o ri g i n a l w o rke rs a g e d 2 5 t o 6 4 , c a n a d a , 2 0 1 1 registered indian nonstatus first nations métis inuit total aboriginal nonaboriginal n 175,255 65,900 155,700 14,415 415,115 13,301,610 sex (%) male 51.60 47.67 50.00 48.54 48.86 51.95 female 48.40 52.33 50.00 51.46 51.14 48.05 age group (%) 25-29 13.20 14.84 14.30 15.74 14.01 12.01 30-34 13.35 14.00 13.36 15.39 13.52 12.40 35-39 14.94 14.23 13.32 15.30 14.23 12.65 40-44 15.52 14.18 13.80 16.86 14.68 13.65 45-49 15.66 15.51 15.80 14.07 15.62 15.73 50-54 13.83 13.33 14.42 10.79 13.87 15.14 55-59 8.56 9.19 9.79 7.54 9.08 11.49 60-64 4.93 4.73 5.21 4.31 4.99 6.94 skill levels (%) skill level a: managers 8.92 9.64 9.61 8.56 9.28 12.73 skill level a: professionals 13.64 12.83 13.83 14.54 13.62 20.51 skill level b: college or apprenticeship training 34.89 35.14 37.09 32.06 35.68 32.36 skill level c: high school or jobspecific training 28.11 30.81 29.63 28.07 29.10 26.11 skill level d: on-the-job training 14.44 11.58 9.85 16.78 12.32 8.28 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.2 t a b l e 1 . s e l e c t e d c h a ra c t e ri s t i c s o f a b o ri g i n a l a n d n o n a b o ri g i n a l w o rke rs a g e d 2 5 t o 6 4 , c a n a d a , 2 0 1 1 ( c o n t i n u e d ) registered indian nonstatus first nations métis inuit total aboriginal nonaboriginal province and territories (%) newfoundland and labrador 1.74 5.23 1.42 12.76 2.63 1.33 prince edward island 0.17 0.45 0.07 f 0.17 0.42 nova scotia 2.24 4.55 2.29 1.54 2.61 2.64 new brunswick 1.66 2.65 1.04 1.03 1.57 2.16 quebec 10.17 17.22 8.73 21.14 11.20 23.89 ontario 24.68 35.37 18.84 6.84 23.61 38.58 manitoba 12.06 3.10 18.59 1.65 12.66 3.21 saskatchewan 10.74 2.57 11.19 0.34 9.18 2.85 alberta 14.94 9.43 21.51 5.11 16.18 11.70 british columbia 18.60 18.62 15.35 2.23 16.80 13.02 yukon 0.99 0.47 0.19 f 0.57 0.10 northwest territories 1.98 0.31 0.73 7.48 1.42 0.09 nunavut 0.03 0.04 0.05 39.63 1.41 0.02 educational attainment (%) no certificate, diploma, or degree 23.34 14.93 15.07 37.20 19.28 9.05 high school diploma or equivalency certificate 22.02 25.67 24.32 18.14 23.34 21.98 registered apprenticeship certificate or other trades certificate or diploma 14.65 16.24 17.00 15.34 15.86 12.35 college, cegep,a or other nonuniversity certificate or diploma from a program of 3 months or more 23.28 25.88 25.47 19.62 24.39 22.74 university certificate or diploma below bachelor level 4.63 3.78 3.82 2.04 4.11 5.05 university certificate, diploma, or degree at bachelor level or above 12.08 13.50 14.32 7.66 13.02 28.82 5 park: overqualification among aboriginal workers published by scholarship@western, 2018 t a b l e 1 . s e l e c t e d c h a ra c t e ri s t i c s o f a b o ri g i n a l a n d n o n a b o ri g i n a l w o rke rs a g e d 2 5 t o 6 4 , c a n a d a , 2 0 1 1 ( c o n t i n u e d ) registered indian nonstatus first nations métis inuit total aboriginal nonaboriginal fields of study (%) for those with postsecondary education education 8.74 6.41 7.25 9.00 7.75 6.80 visual and performing arts, and communications technologies 2.30 3.44 2.49 2.08 2.56 3.61 humanities 3.44 3.15 3.25 3.28 3.31 4.99 social and behavioural sciences and law 11.41 9.86 8.99 11.13 10.21 10.49 business, management and public administration 22.43 21.08 20.83 21.75 21.56 22.25 physical and life sciences and technologies 1.06 2.08 1.75 2.30 1.54 3.62 mathematics, computer and information sciences 2.74 3.72 3.17 2.45 3.06 4.75 architecture, engineering, and related technologies 20.43 22.56 23.59 22.06 22.07 21.77 agriculture, natural resources and conservation 2.69 2.11 2.90 2.70 2.70 2.31 health and related fields 14.01 15.25 16.49 8.70 15.05 13.71 personal, protective and transportation services 10.68 10.32 9.29 14.51 10.17 5.68 other 0.06 f f f 0.03 0.02 aboriginal language (%) spoken most often at home 10.46 0.22 0.26 41.33 5.99 na mobility status—past 5 years (%) migrants 16.37 20.68 18.88 13.40 17.92 18.99 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.2 t a b l e 1 . s e l e c t e d c h a ra c t e ri s t i c s o f a b o ri g i n a l a n d n o n a b o ri g i n a l w o rke rs a g e d 2 5 t o 6 4 , c a n a d a , 2 0 1 1 ( c o n t i n u e d ) registered indian nonstatus first nations métis inuit total aboriginal nonaboriginal area of residence (%) on reserve 36.31 1.10 0.48 0.31 15.74 0.09 rural 14.54 23.49 27.46 52.21 22.20 17.49 small or medium population centre 21.85 28.12 29.58 34.54 26.27 19.94 large urban centre 27.30 47.29 42.48 12.94 35.80 62.48 note. source: national household survey, 2011. a cegep refers to collège d'enseignement général et professionnel or general and vocational college, which is a pre-university public college in the province of quebec. m e a s u re s o v e rq u a l i f i c a t i o n . overqualified workers are individuals who hold higher levels of education than required for their job. the measure used in this study is based on the education–occupation matrix developed by employment and social development canada, a department of the government of canada responsible for social programs and the labour market at the federal level (human resources and skills development canada [hrsdc], 2011; uppal & larochelle-côté, 2014). there are five measures used in this analysis: • university degree holders (above the bachelor level) working in jobs that require a college education or less: the national occupational classification (noc) skill levels b, c, d; • university degree holders (above bachelor level) working in jobs that require a high school diploma or less: noc skill levels c, d; • bachelor degree holders working in jobs that require a college education or less: noc skill levels b, c, d; • bachelor degree holders working in jobs that require a high school diploma or less: noc skill levels c, d; • postsecondary graduates below bachelor’s level working in jobs that require a high school diploma or less: noc skill levels c, d; • postsecondary graduates below bachelor’s level working in jobs that require on-the-job training: noc skill level d 7 park: overqualification among aboriginal workers published by scholarship@western, 2018 e m p l o y e d w o rke rs . a person is considered employed if he or she had a job in the reference week (week preceding the census or survey)—this includes persons who were temporarily absent for the entire week because of vacation, illness, a labour dispute at work, maternity or parental leave, bad weather, fire or family responsibilities, or for some other reason. individuals who had a job in the previous year, but did not have a job in the reference week, were excluded from the sample. f i e l d o f s t u d y . this variable refers to the predominant discipline or area of learning or training of a person's highest postsecondary degree. in total, 12 fields were identified for this analysis: education; visual and performing arts, and communications technologies; humanities; social and behavioural sciences and law; business, management, and public administration; physical and life sciences and technologies; mathematics, computer, and information sciences; architecture, engineering, and related technologies; agriculture, natural resources, and conservation; health and related fields; personal, protective, and transportation services; and other (ferguson & zhao, 2013). e d u c a t i o n a l a t t a i n m e n t . this analysis relies on the following categories of educational attainment. • a b o v e b a c h e l o r’ s l e v e l includes university certificate or diploma above the bachelor’s level; degree in medicine, dentistry, veterinary medicine, or optometry; master's degree; and doctoral degree. • ba c h e l o r’ s d e g re e . • po s t s e c o n d a ry e d u c a t i o n b e l o w b a c h e l o r’ s l e v e l, which includes: • u n i v e rs i t y c e rt i f i c a t e o r d i p l o m a b e l o w b a c h e l o r’ s l e v e l: certificates or diplomas awarded for non-degree programs completed through a university. these are often connected with professional associations in fields such as accounting, banking, insurance, or public administration. if the certificate or diploma program does not require a bachelor’s degree to enroll, it is classified as below the bachelor’s level. • c o l l e g e d i p l o m a : college, cegep (collège d'enseignement général et professionnel, or general and vocational college), or other non-university certificate or diploma. • t ra d e s c e rt i f i c a t e : apprenticeship or trades certificate or diploma, including “registered apprenticeship certificates” and “trades certificates other than registered apprenticeship certificates.” • h i g h s c h o o l d i p l o m a o r e q u i v a l e n c y c e rt i f i c a t e . • l e s s t h a n h i g h s c h o o l d i p l o m a o r e q u i v a l e n t . a re a o f re s i d e n c e . area of residence refers to the following geographic areas: on reserve, rural area, small population centre, medium population centre, and large urban population centre. population centres and rural areas (off reserve) are defined using counts from the 2011 census of population. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.2 • o n re s e rv e : includes six census subdivision (csd) types legally affiliated with first nations or indian bands, that is, indian reserve (iri), indian settlement (s-é) (except for the five yukon settlements, namely champagne landing 10, klukshu, two and one-half mile village, two mile village, and kloo lake), indian government district (igd), terres réservées aux cris (tc), terres réservées aux naskapis (tk), and nisga'a land (nl), as well as the northern village of sandy bay in saskatchewan. • r u ra l : any area outside a population centre is classified a “rural.” a “population centre” has a population of at least 1,000 and a population density of 400 persons or more per square kilometre. • s m a l l p o p u l a t i o n c e n t re s : population centres with less than 30,000 persons. • m e d i u m p o p u l a t i o n c e n t re s : population centres with a population between 30,000 and 99,999 persons. • l a rg e u rb a n p o p u l a t i o n c e n t e rs : population centres with a population greater than 99,999 persons. a b o ri g i n a l g ro u p s . in recognition of the uniqueness of each of the four aboriginal groups, where sample sizes allowed, analyses were conducted and presented separately for registered indian, nonstatus first nations, inuit, and métis. a b o ri g i n a l l a n g u a g e s s p o ke n m o s t o f t e n a t h o m e . this variable measures whether aboriginal respondents indicated an aboriginal language as the language spoken most often at home. m o b i l i t y — pl a c e o f re s i d e n c e 5 y e a rs e a rl i e r. mobility refers to the relationship between a person's usual place of residence on the reference day (may 10, 2011) and his or her usual place of residence on the same day 5 years earlier. a person is classified as a non-mover if the place of residence has not changed in the interval. otherwise, a person is classified as a mover. movers include nonmigrants and migrants. non-migrants are persons who did move but remained in the same city, town, township, village, or indian reserve. migrants include internal migrants who moved to a different city, town, township, village, or indian reserve within canada. external migrants include persons who lived outside canada at the earlier reference date. this analysis only examines whether a worker was a migrant or not. a n a l y t i c s t ra t e g y descriptive statistics were calculated for rates of overqualification by aboriginal status, aboriginal group (registered indian, non-status first nations, inuit, and métis), education level, and field of study. by conducting multivariate analyses, correlates of overqualification among aboriginal workers were identified. a series of logistic regression analyses were conducted to examine correlates of overqualification for each group of aboriginal people. a separate logistic regression analysis was conducted to examine differences in overqualification between aboriginal and non-aboriginal workers after controlling for sociodemographic confounders such as age, sex, province, and area of residence. 9 park: overqualification among aboriginal workers published by scholarship@western, 2018 r e s u l t s o v e rq u a l i f i c a t i o n r a t e s v a ry b y e d u c a t i o n l e v e l separate overqualification rates were calculated for three different education levels: university education above the bachelor level; university education bachelor’s degree; and postsecondary education below bachelor level (including trades certificate, college diploma, and university education below bachelor level). those individuals with the education level of high school or less were not included as they were assumed to not be overqualified for their jobs. overqualification rates varied by level of education attained. figure 1 presents the proportions of overqualified workers for each education category. about 1 in 4 aboriginal workers with above the bachelor level of education were overqualified. in occupations requiring college level education or lower, 40% of aboriginal workers, who had a bachelor’s degree, were overqualified. in addition, 39% of aboriginal workers with postsecondary education below the bachelor level were overqualified because they were working in jobs requiring high school education or lower. within this educational category, it is of note that aboriginal workers with a registered apprenticeship certificate showed a significantly lower rate of overqualification compared with other aboriginal workers in the same category (postsecondary education below bachelor’s level). in addition, among aboriginal workers with a registered apprenticeship certificate, there was no statistical difference in overqualification compared with their non-aboriginal counterparts (data not shown). for each educational category, significant differences were found between aboriginal and nonaboriginal workers. however, the nature of the differences changed according to the education level of aboriginal workers: compared with their non-aboriginal counterparts, aboriginal workers with university level education (bachelor or higher) were less likely to be overqualified, while aboriginal workers with less than university education were more likely to be overqualified. table 2 provides specific overqualification rates for each aboriginal group. a significantly lower percentage of aboriginal workers (8%) compared to non-aboriginal workers (12%) with a university education above the bachelor level were overqualified; that is, working in occupations usually requiring high school or lower. a similar difference was demonstrated for bachelor level of education. approximately, 15% of aboriginal workers with a bachelor degree (13% registered indian, 16% nonstatus first nations, 17% métis, and 14% inuit workers) were overqualified (in occupations requiring high school or lower) compared to 19% of non-aboriginal people. compared with their non-aboriginal counterparts, aboriginal workers with university level education (except for inuit workers with a university education above the bachelor level) were less likely to be overqualified. on the other hand, most aboriginal workers with less than a university education were more likely to be overqualified than non-aboriginal workers. métis workers with less than a university education did not show significant differences in overqualification from their non-aboriginal counterparts. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.2 figure 1. pro p o rt i o n o f a b o ri g i n a l a n d n o n a b o ri g i n a l w o rke rs w h o a re o v e rq u a l i f i e d b y e d u c a t i o n l e v e l . aboriginal works with university level education are less likely to be overqualified. *significantly different from non-aboriginal workers (p < 0.05). source: national household survey, 2011. 0.00 0.05 0.10 0.15 0.20 0.25 0.30 0.35 0.40 0.45 0.50 university education above bachelor level university education bachelor degree postsecondary education below bachelor level total aboriginal non-aboriginal * * * university education university education postsecondary education above bachelor level bachelor degree below bachelor level 11 park: overqualification among aboriginal workers published by scholarship@western, 2018 table 2. proportion of workers aged 25 to 64 who are overqualified, canada, 2011 registered indian non-status first nations métis inuit total aboriginal non-aboriginal p̂ 95% ci p̂ 95% ci p̂ 95% ci p̂ 95% ci p̂ 95% ci p̂ 95% ci university education above the bachelor level occupations requiring college or apprenticeship training or lower 0.28 0.26 0.30 0.24 0.21 0.28 0.24 0.22 0.27 0.24 0.13 0.34 0.26 0.24 0.27 0.28 0.28 0.28 occupations requiring high school or lower 0.09 0.08 0.11 0.05 0.03 0.07 0.09 0.07 0.10 0.02 -0.01 0.06 0.08 0.07 0.09 0.12 0.12 0.12 bachelor degree occupations requiring college or apprenticeship training or lower 0.37 0.36 0.39 0.40 0.37 0.43 0.42 0.40 0.43 0.36 0.30 0.42 0.40 0.39 0.41 0.46 0.46 0.46 occupations requiring high school or lower 0.13 0.12 0.14 0.16 0.14 0.18 0.17 0.16 0.19 0.14 0.10 0.18 0.15 0.15 0.16 0.19 0.19 0.20 postsecondary education below bachelor level occupations requiring high school or lower 0.39 0.39 0.40 0.40 0.39 0.41 0.37 0.37 0.38 0.40 0.38 0.42 0.39 0.38 0.39 0.37 0.37 0.37 occupations requiring on-thejob training 0.10 0.09 0.10 0.08 0.07 0.09 0.07 0.06 0.07 0.10 0.09 0.11 0.08 0.08 0.08 0.07 0.07 0.07 note. source: national household survey, 2011. p̂ is the proportion. ci = confidence interval. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.2 o v e rq u a l i f i c a t i o n r a t e v a ri e s b y f i e l d o f s t u d y the nhs collected information about the field of study and the predominant discipline, area of learning, or training of a person’s highest postsecondary degree (ferguson & zhao, 2013). overqualification rates differed by field of study (figure 2). among aboriginal workers aged 25 to 64 with a university education, overqualification rates were higher than 50% among graduates from fields such as humanities; visual and performing arts and communications technologies; and personal, protective, and transportation services. on the other hand, a lower than average likelihood of overqualification was found among aboriginal workers who earned university degrees in education; mathematics, computer, and information sciences; architecture, engineering, and related technologies; and health fields. the relationship between field of study and overqualification changed when aboriginal workers did not attain university levels of education. as compared to the overall average, among aboriginal workers with postsecondary education but below the bachelor level, a lower probability of overqualification was found among those who studied social and behavioural sciences and law; architecture, engineering, and related technologies; and physical and life sciences and technologies. on the other hand, higher overqualification rates were found among aboriginal workers who had college majors in agriculture, natural resources and conservation; personal, protective, and transportation services; health and related fields; and business, management, and public administration. pe rs i s t e n t e f f e c t s o f e d u c a t i o n a l a t t a i n m e n t a n d f i e l d o f s t u d y o n o v e rq u a l i f i c a t i o n among aboriginal workers with university level education (bachelor degree or higher), the level of educational attainment is still associated with overqualification after controlling for other demographic factors including sex, age, geographic location, mobility status, area of residence, aboriginal language use, and field of study. those with a bachelor’s degree were almost 1.7 times as likely to be overqualified as those with a higher than bachelor’s level of education such as master’s, professional, or doctoral degree (table 3). as well, some significant effects from field of study were found. for example, among aboriginal workers, compared to those who majored in business, management, and public administration, a lower likelihood of overqualification was found among those who studied education, mathematics, computer and information sciences, architecture, engineering, and health sciences. among aboriginal workers who have postsecondary education below the bachelor’s level, those with a college diploma (odds ratio of 1.7) and those with a trades certificate (odds ratio of 2.3) were more likely than those with a university certificate to be overqualified. after controlling for sociodemographic factors, those who graduated from the fields of visual and performing arts; social sciences; physical and life sciences; mathematics, computer, and information sciences; and engineering were less likely to be overqualified for their job compared to other aboriginal workers with degrees in business, management, and public administration. 13 park: overqualification among aboriginal workers published by scholarship@western, 2018 figure 2. overqualification rates among aboriginal workers aged 25 to 64 with postsecondary education by field of study. source: national household survey, 2011. * significantly different from the overall average overqualification rate at the same education level. (p < 0.05). 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 overall average education visual and performing arts, and communications technologies humanities social and behavioural sciences and law business, management and public administration physical and life sciences and technologies mathematics, computer and information sciences architecture, engineering, and related technologies agriculture, natural resources and conservation health and related fields personal, protective and transportation services bachelor or higher lower than bachelor * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.2 t a b l e 3 . o v e rq u a l i f i c a t i o n o d d s r a t i o s a m o n g a b o ri g i n a l w o rke rs a g e d 2 5 t o 6 4 , 2 0 1 1 workers with university education (bachelor or higher) workers with postsecondary education below bachelor degree or 95% ci or 95% ci sex men (ref.) 1.00 … … 1.00 … … women 0.76 0.72 0.79 1.28 1.24 1.31 age 0.99 0.99 1.00 1.00 1.00 1.00 aboriginal group registered indian (ref.) 1.00 … … 1.00 … … non-status first nation 1.03 0.97 1.10 1.07 1.04 1.11 métis 1.08 1.03 1.14 0.93 0.91 0.96 inuit 0.87 0.74 1.01 1.13 1.05 1.21 education higher than bachelor degree 1.00 … … … … … bachelor degree 1.72 1.64 1.81 … … … university certificate or diploma below bachelor level … … … 1.00 … … college, cegep a, or other non-university certificate or diploma … … … 1.69 1.62 1.75 registered apprenticeship certificate or other trades certificate or diploma … … … 2.27 2.18 2.37 province or territory atlantic provinces 1.24 1.14 1.34 1.03 0.99 1.08 quebec 0.77 0.71 0.83 0.95 0.92 0.99 ontario (ref.) 1.00 … … 1.00 … … manitoba 1.06 0.99 1.14 1.17 1.12 1.21 saskatchewan 1.08 1.00 1.17 1.16 1.11 1.21 alberta 1.24 1.15 1.32 0.97 0.94 1.01 british columbia 0.95 0.89 1.01 1.10 1.07 1.14 territories 0.95 0.80 1.12 0.92 0.86 0.99 15 park: overqualification among aboriginal workers published by scholarship@western, 2018 t a b l e 3 . o v e rq u a l i f i c a t i o n o d d s r a t i o s a m o n g a b o ri g i n a l w o rke rs a g e d 2 5 t o 6 4 , 2 0 1 1 ( c o n t i n u e d ) workers with university education (bachelor or higher) workers with postsecondary education below bachelor degree or 95% ci or 95% ci mobility status past 5 years non-migrants (ref.) 1.00 … … 1.00 … … migrants 0.96 0.92 1.01 0.90 0.88 0.93 area of residence on reserve 1.14 1.04 1.24 1.09 1.05 1.13 rural 1.03 0.97 1.09 0.98 0.95 1.00 small or medium population centre 0.98 0.93 1.03 1.08 1.05 1.11 large urban centre (ref.) 1.00 … … 1.00 … … language spoken most often at home non-aboriginal language (ref.) 1.00 … … 1.00 … … aboriginal language 0.95 0.83 1.08 0.92 0.87 0.97 field of study education 0.32 0.30 0.34 1.13 1.06 1.20 visual and performing arts, and communications technologies 2.40 2.12 2.72 0.92 0.86 0.98 humanities 1.84 1.71 1.99 1.01 0.93 1.09 social and behavioural sciences, and law 1.25 1.18 1.33 0.65 0.62 0.68 business, management, and public administration (ref.) 1.00 … … 1.00 … … physical and life sciences, and technologies 1.28 1.16 1.41 0.75 0.65 0.86 mathematics, computer, and information sciences 0.44 0.38 0.51 0.87 0.82 0.93 architecture, engineering, and related technologies 0.33 0.29 0.37 0.58 0.55 0.60 agriculture, natural resources, and conservation 0.95 0.82 1.09 1.25 1.18 1.34 health and related fields 0.33 0.30 0.35 1.22 1.18 1.26 personal, protective, and transportation services 2.01 1.55 2.62 1.39 1.34 1.44 other 0.93 0.44 1.95 0.73 0.35 1.52 note. source: national household survey, 2011. or = odds ratio. ci = confidence interval. a cegep refers to collège d'enseignement général et professionnel or general and vocational college, which is a pre-university public college in the province of quebec. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.2 for all levels of postsecondary education, aboriginal workers with degrees or certificates in personal, protective, and transportation services were consistently more likely to be overqualified than graduates of business-related studies. more than 10% of aboriginal workers were educated in the field of personal, protective, and transportation services. among aboriginal workers with an education level lower than university, those who migrated interprovincially or intra-provincially were less likely than non-migrants to be overqualified in their job. also, those who reported that an aboriginal language was the language spoken most often at home were less likely to be overqualified. compared to residents in large urban centres, aboriginal workers living on reserve or in small or medium sized population centres were more likely to be overqualified. d i f f e re n c e s be t w e e n a b o ri g i n a l a n d n o n a b o ri g i n a l w o rke rs pe rs i s t after controlling for gender, age, province, and area of residence, aboriginal workers at each education level showed significantly different probabilities of overqualification compared with their nonaboriginal counterparts (figure 3). that is, results of multivariate analyses confirm differences found in overqualification rates: aboriginal workers with higher education levels (bachelor degree or higher) had lower odds of being overqualified than their non-aboriginal counterparts, but aboriginal workers with less than university were more likely to be overqualified than non-aboriginal workers with the same education. table 4 provides odds ratios for more specific categories for each aboriginal group compared to nonaboriginal workers. again, the same pattern between aboriginal workers’ education and overqualification were found: if they were university graduates, they were less likely than non-aboriginal workers to be overqualified, but if their level of education was below bachelor higher overqualification rates were found for all four aboriginal groups. for example, compared to non-aboriginal workers, the university-educated inuit workers were 80% less likely to be employed in occupations requiring high school or lower (or = 0.2); on the other hand, inuit workers with postsecondary education lower than bachelor level were 60% more likely to work in occupations requiring on-the-job training (or =1.6). d i s c u s s i o n this study examined the match between level of education and the skill level typically required for the job held by aboriginal and non-aboriginal workers, using the 2011 national household survey, a canadian voluntary survey. compared to their non-aboriginal counterparts, aboriginal workers with university level education (bachelor degree or higher) were less likely to be overqualified. aboriginal workers with less than university levels of education were more likely to be overqualified compared to non-aboriginal workers with the same level of education. this pattern persisted after controlling for sociodemographic factors. aboriginal people’s labour market disadvantages have often been explained by lower than average levels of educational attainment, especially at the postsecondary degree level (bougie et al., 2013; centre for the study of living standards, 2012; conference board of canada, 2012; health council of canada, 2005); the present study demonstrates higher levels of education are particularly advantageous. the findings of this study further confirm associations between the level of education and labour market experiences. higher levels of education are associated with employability (bougie et al., 2013), but they are also connected to better matched jobs and a lower likelihood of overqualification. 17 park: overqualification among aboriginal workers published by scholarship@western, 2018 figure 3. differences in the odds of overqualification between aboriginal and non-aboriginal workers (with controls for age, sex, province, and area of residence). source: national household survey, 2011.* significantly lower odds than non-aboriginal workers (p < 0.05). # significantly higher odds than non-aboriginal workers (p < 0.05). skill level b requires college or apprenticeship training. skill level c requires high school or job-specific training. skill level d requires on-the-job training. 0.00 0.20 0.40 0.60 0.80 1.00 1.20 1.40 higher than bachelor degree working at skill level b or lower higher than bachelor degree working at skill level c or lower bachelor degree working at skill level b or lower bachelor degree working at skill level c or lower postsecondary education lower than bachelor degree working at skill level c postsecondary education lower than bachelor degree working at skill level d * * * * # # 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.2 table 4. overqualification odds ratios1 among aboriginal workers aged 25 to 64 compared to non-aboriginal workers, 2011 registered indian non-status first nation métis inuit or 95% ci or 95% ci or 95% ci or 95% ci workers with university education above the bachelor level occupations usually requiring college or apprenticeship training or lower 0.83 0.78 0.88 0.82 0.76 0.90 0.74 0.70 0.79 0.68 0.51 0.90 occupations usually requiring high school or lower 0.66 0.59 0.73 0.41 0.34 0.49 0.62 0.56 0.68 0.20 0.08 0.47 workers with a bachelor degree occupations usually requiring college or apprenticeship training or lower 0.93 0.90 0.96 0.90 0.86 0.95 1.01 0.98 1.04 0.94 0.81 1.08 occupations usually requiring high school or lower 0.78 0.74 0.82 0.87 0.80 0.93 0.95 0.91 0.99 0.92 0.75 1.14 workers with postsecondary education below the bachelor level occupations usually requiring high school or lower 1.09 1.07 1.11 1.15 1.12 1.17 1.07 1.05 1.08 1.35 1.27 1.43 occupations usually requiring on-the-job training 1.17 1.12 1.22 1.17 1.12 1.22 1.01 0.98 1.04 1.60 1.45 1.76 note. source: national household survey, 2011. controls for age, sex, province, and area of residence included in the model. or = odds ratio. ci = confidence interval. 19 park: overqualification among aboriginal workers published by scholarship@western, 2018 this study also points to differences in overqualification by field of study for aboriginal workers: among aboriginal workers who earned university degrees, low overqualification rates were found for those who studied education; mathematics, computer, and information sciences; architecture, engineering, and related technologies; and health fields. among aboriginal workers with postsecondary education below the bachelor level, lower overqualification rates were found in such fields of study as social and behavioural sciences and law; physical and life sciences and technologies; and architecture, engineering, and related technologies. on the other hand, certain fields of studies were related to higher rates of overqualification among aboriginal workers. for example, aboriginal workers with degrees or certificates in personal, protective, and transportation services were more likely to be overqualified than graduates of business-related studies. more than 10% of aboriginal workers had studied in the field of personal, protective, and transportation services. l i m i t a t i o n s the large sample size of the nhs allowed me to analyze sociodemographic and labour market-related variables for aboriginal populations. however, there are a few limitations of note. estimates of aboriginal workers might be affected by the incomplete enumeration of certain indian reserves and indian settlements in the nhs. in 2011, there were a total of 36 indian reserves and indian settlements that were “incompletely enumerated” in the nhs. for these reserves or settlements, nhs enumeration was either not permitted or was interrupted before it could be completed, or it was not possible because of natural events (for instance, forest fires in northern ontario) (statistics canada, 2013). as well, given the voluntary nature of the nhs, there are inherently more potential groups and geographical areas that may be under enumerated. it is also possible that the non-response bias is likely to impact indigenous estimates generally and rural centres particularly (gordon & white, 2014). in this analysis, due to restricted sample sizes, overqualification by specific field of study could not be examined separately for first nations, inuit, and métis groups but is an area for future study. po l i c y i m p l i c a t i o n s a n d f u t u re r e s e a rc h n e e d s in today's labour market, skilled jobs are not always available to the increasing number of skilled and highly educated workers. as a result, a considerable number of employees are overqualified. preventing overqualification becomes especially important to the aboriginal labour force whose working age population is growing significantly in number. also, aboriginal workers are relatively young and have been closing the gap in education with their non-aboriginal counterparts. this study has examined the likelihood of overqualification among aboriginal workers. it is important to note that aboriginal workers with a high level of education, especially at the bachelor level or higher, are significantly less likely to be overqualified compared with their non-aboriginal counterparts. promoting postsecondary educational opportunities among aboriginal youth may be effective in reducing overqualification in the labour market. education improves aboriginal people’s employability in general and it helps them obtain a job that matches their level of education. however, the field of education may be an important factor in rates of overqualification. this analysis showed that within certain fields of education aboriginal people had higher odds of find a job that matched their level of education. 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.2 future studies may breakdown these fields of study into finer detail in order to examine which specific fields were most mismatched with the labour market, especially for the fields requiring postsecondary education below the bachelor level, which was the educational level of about 45% of aboriginal workers aged 25 to 64. similarly, the level of education needs to be investigated more specifically. as discussed previously, the likelihood of overqualification may be different among different types of postsecondary education, especially between workers with trades education and others. for example, respondents who completed a registered apprenticeship-training program were less likely be overqualified than other workers with postsecondary education below bachelor level and their overqualification rate was not statistically different from that of non-aboriginal workers. in this analysis, the measure of overqualification was based on self-reported levels of education. selfreported education is only one way to express the qualification or skill-level that workers possess. future research could use other measures, such as objective measures of skills. one example is the programme for the international assessment of adult competencies (piaac) survey (bobet, 2015), which included direct and objective measures of skills. an examination of education, skills, employment, and overqualification adds a different dimension and contributes to our understanding of overqualification. 21 park: overqualification among aboriginal workers published by scholarship@western, 2018 r e f e re n c e s aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc). (2013). fact sheet —2011 national household survey aboriginal demographics, educational attainment and labour market outcomes. ottawa: author. retrieved from https://www.aadncaandc.gc.ca/eng/1376329205785/1376329233875 bobet, e. (2015). results of the 2011-12 programme for the international assessment of adult competencies survey among aboriginal people: descriptive report. unpublished manuscript, aboriginal affairs and northern development canada. bougie, e., kelly-scott, k., & arriagada p. (2013) aboriginal peoples survey 2012—the education and employment experiences of first nations people living off reserve, inuit, and métis: selected findings from the 2012 aboriginal peoples survey. ottawa: statistics canada. centre for the study of living standards. (2012). aboriginal labour market performance in canada: 2007-2011 (csls research report 2012-04). ottawa: author. chen, c., smith, p., & mustard, c. (2010). the prevalence of over-qualification and its association with health status among occupationally active new immigrants to canada. ethnicity and health, 15(6), 601-619. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/13557858.2010.502591 conference board of canada. (2012). understanding the value, challenges, and opportunities of engaging métis, inuit, and first nations workers: education and learning. ottawa: author. crompton, s. (2002). i still feel over-qualified for my job. canadian social trends, 67(winter), 23-26. ferguson, s. j., & zhao, j. (2013). education in canada: attainment, field of study and location of study. national household survey, 2011. (statistics canada catalogue no. 99-012-x2011001). ottawa: statistics canada. frenette, m. (2000). over-qualified? recent graduates and the needs of their employers. education quarterly review, 7(1), 6–20. frenette, m. (2004). the over-qualified canadian graduate: the role of academic program in the incidence, persistence and economic returns to over-qualification. economics of education review, 23(1), 29–45. doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/s0272-7757(03)00043-8 galabuzi, g. (2004). social exclusion. in d. raphael (ed.), social determinants of health: canadian perspectives (pp. 235-252). toronto, on: canadian scholars’ press inc. galarneau, d., & morissette, r. (2004). immigrants: settling for less? perspectives on labour and income, 5(6), 5-16. gingras, y., & roy, r. (2000). is there a skill gap in canada? canadian public policy 26(supplement), 159-174. doi: https://doi.org/10.2307/3552510 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.2 gordon, c. e., & white, j. p. (2014). indigenous educational attainment in canada. the international indigenous policy journal, 5(3). doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2014.5.3.6 health council of canada. (2005). the health status of canada’s first nations, métis and inuit peoples. a background paper to accompany health care renewal in canada: accelerating change. ottawa: author. human resources and skills development canada (hrsdc). (2011). national occupational classification 2011 (cat. no: hs18-29/2011e-pdf). retrieved from http://publications.gc.ca/collections/collection_2012/rhdcc-hrsdc/hs18-29-2011eng.pdf johnson, g. j., & johnson, w. r. (1999). perceived over-qualification and health: a longitudinal analysis. the journal of social psychology, 139(1), 14-24. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/00224549909598358 li, c., gervais, g., & duval, a. (2006). the dynamics of overqualification: canada’s underemployed university graduates. retrieved from https://www.statcan.gc.ca/pub/11-621-m/11-621m2006039-eng.htm luffman, j., & sussman, d. (2007). the aboriginal labour force in western canada. perspectives on labour and income, 8(1), 13-27. reading, c. l., & wien, f. (2009). health inequalities and social determinants of aboriginal peoples’ health. retrieved from http://www.nccah-ccnsa.ca/docs/social%20determinates/nccah-loppiewien_report.pdf scottish executive. (2004).the framework for economic development in scotland. retrieved from http://www.gov.scot/resource/doc/25725/0025718.pdf statistics canada. (2013). aboriginal peoples reference guide—national household survey, 2011. ottawa: author. tal, b. (2012). the haves and have nots of canada’s labour market. retrieved from http://research.cibcwm.com/economic_public/download/if_2012-1203.pdf uppal, s., & larochelle-côté, s. (2014). overqualification among recent university graduates in canada. retrieved from http://www.statcan.gc.ca/pub/75-006-x/2014001/article/11916eng.pdf usalcas, j. (2011). aboriginal people and the labour market: estimates from the labour force survey, 2008-2010. ottawa: statistics canada. wilson, d., & macdonald, d. (2010). the income gap between aboriginal peoples and the rest of canada. ottawa: canadian centre for policy alternatives. 23 park: overqualification among aboriginal workers published by scholarship@western, 2018 yuen, j. (2010). job–education match and mismatch: wage differentials. perspectives on labour and income, 11(4), 16-26. 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.2 the international indigenous policy journal january 2018 overqualification among aboriginal workers in canada jungwee park recommended citation overqualification among aboriginal workers in canada abstract keywords disclaimer creative commons license overqualification among aboriginal workers in canada the international indigenous policy journal volume 13 | issue 1 june 2022 a thematic analysis of indigenous students’ experiences with indigenization at a canadian post-secondary institution: paradoxes, potential, and moving forward together iloradanon efimoff university of manitoba, haida nation, canada, efimoffi@myumanitoba.ca recommended citation efimoff, i. (2022). a thematic analysis of indigenous students’ experiences with indigenization at a canadian post-secondary institution: paradoxes, potential, and moving forward together. the international indigenous policy journal, 13(1). https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.10700 a thematic analysis of indigenous students’ experiences with indigenization at a canadian post-secondary institution: paradoxes, potential, and moving forward together abstract indigenization is a relatively new phenomenon in canada. it is a broad concept that includes everything from changing physical spaces to challenging western epistemologies and the status quo. in this study, i describe nine indigenous students’ experiences with indigenization at the university of saskatchewan. students were impacted both positively and negatively by their engagement: they described both opportunities borne of engagement with indigenization and detriments such as exhaustion and lack of basic needs. in terms of methods to indigenize, the participants described the importance of representation, centring indigenous values and knowledges, and creating communities that can indigenize. i end the paper with four policy recommendations for post-secondary institutions interested in indigenization. keywords indigenization, canada, post-secondary, recommendations acknowledgments i would like to thank dr. laura funk for her thorough and considerate comments on my first draft of this paper. i’d also like to thank reviewer f for their insightful and detailed comments. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ 1 efimoff: a thematic analysis of indigenous students’ experiences with indigenization at a canadian post-secondary institution published by scholarship@western, 2021 a thematic analysis of indigenous students’ experiences with indigenization at a canadian postsecondary institution: paradoxes, potential, and moving forward together haw’aa, iloradanon efimoff hínuu díi kya'áang. hello, my name is iloradanon efimoff. i am haida and european settler. my father is haida and russian and my mother is descended primarily from irish, german, norwegian, and english ancestors, but identifies as white and canadian. as young as i can remember, i have known i am haida: my hadáas (father and paternal uncles), awáa (mother), skáanaa (paternal aunt), náanaa (grandmother), and chanáa (grandfather) have made this clear. the northwest coast and the haida nation are home, despite having lived so many years away from them. the haida nation is a first nation, one of three broad categories that make up “indigenous peoples” in canada, the other groups being métis and inuit. indigenous peoples are the diverse original inhabitants of what most now call canada. indigenous peoples have resisted violent and racist european-settler policies for centuries. for example, indigenous people often experience racism through the education system. a prominent example in canada is state and church-run residential schools. these schools were designed to destroy indigenous culture (truth and reconciliation commission of canada [trc], 2015a). the last of these schools closed in 1996 (trc, n.d.) but other educational institutions continue to marginalize indigenous ways of knowing and being (fitzmaurice, 2011). specifically, though canadian postsecondary institutions are sites of learning and growth, they have long been sites of racism. for example, the indian act of 1876 dictated that status indians could not pursue a university degree unless they revoked their indian status (stonechild, 2006). current examples of racism in canadian institutions are plentiful. debassige and brunette-debassige explain that indigenous people in universities are expected to conform to western norms at the threat of marginalization and are often denied their agency in knowledge-making (2018). indigenous students experience racism at universities (cote-meek, 2014), such as microaggressions like stereotypes about indigenous peoples (clark et al., 2014; currie et al., 2012), and erasure or misrepresentation via curriculum (bailey, 2016; clark et al., 2014). at the university of saskatchewan in particular, students have, for example, rallied to create an indigenous students’ union, in part to address discrimination (macpherson, 2018). these experiences of racism, discrimination, and misrepresentation are troubling, especially in light of international and national statements on indigenous peoples’ rights in education. that is, the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (united nations, 2007) and the trc’s 94 calls to action (2015b) call for educational changes. article 15 of undrip demands appropriate representation of indigenous peoples in education. the trc’s calls to action 62–65 call for a series of educational changes, such as mandatory indigenous content in current curricula (including teacher training to teach this content), building the ability of students to have better intercultural relationships, teacher education on teaching indigenous knowledges and pedagogies, hiring senior-level officials focused on indigenous curricula, and funding reconciliation research. they call for many of these changes to be done with residential school survivors, indigenous peoples, and educators. one way in which post-secondary institutions are responding to the trc’s report and calls to action is through indigenization. in this paper, i focus on indigenous students’ experiences with indigenization at 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.13.1.10700 the university of saskatchewan. i start by discussing indigenization at canadian post-secondary institutions. indigenization at canadian post-secondary institutions though indigenization efforts have been underway for many years (kuokkanen, 2008; lavallee, 2020; mihesuah & wilson, 2004), they have expanded rapidly in recent years as canadian post-secondary institutions work to respond to the trc’s calls to action via indigenization (bédard, 2018; debassige & brunette-debassige, 2018; fiola & mackinnon, 2020; gaudry & lorenz, 2018). there is no consensus on the definition of indigenization in post-secondary institutions (bédard, 2018; fiola & mackinnon, 2020). many researchers describe indigenization as a process of embedding indigenous ways of knowing and being within post-secondary systems as well as increasing the number of and success of indigenous people in post-secondary contexts (bédard, 2018; blair et al., 2020; bopp et al., 2017; canadian association of university teachers, 2016; compton, 2016; debassige & brunette-debassige, 2018; efimoff, 2019; fiola & mackinnon, 2020; fitzmaurice, 2011; gaudry & lorenz, 2018; kinzel, 2020; newhouse, 2016; ottmann, 2013; pidgeon, 2014; pidgeon, 2016; poitras pratt et al., 2018). some descriptions of indigenization call for radical paradigm shifts to achieve such goals (e.g., blair et al., 2020). importantly, indigenous peoples must be at the head of these initiatives, as without indigenous knowledges, one cannot indigenize (gaudry & lorenz, 2018; grafton & melançon, 2020; ottmann, 2013). many researchers describe indigenization as deeply interconnected with decolonization1 (blair et al., 2020; debassige & brunette-debassige, 2018; fellner, 2018; gaudry & lorenz, 2018; george, 2019; grafton & melançon, 2020; madden & glanfield, 2019; mihesuah & wilson, 2004; ottmann, 2013). some examples of indigenization at canadian universities include providing indigenous-specific scholarships, offering programs to transition incoming indigenous students into university life, creating indigenous course content requirements, hosting indigenous events, or creating indigenous hiring strategies (university of calgary, n.d.; university of manitoba, n.d.; university of saskatchewan, n.d.a; university of winnipeg, n.d.; vancouver island university, n.d.). gaudry and lorenz (2018) provide helpful guidance about indigenization. they describe three types of indigenization. first, indigenous inclusion, or increasing the number of indigenous people on campus. second, reconciliation indigenization, or attempting to reconcile indigenous and european knowledges in part through changes to university structure. and third, decolonial indigenization, or a radical shift in structures and systems to change knowledge production. gaudry and lorenz (2018) argue that most canadian post-secondary institutions practice indigenous inclusion instead of reconciliation indigenization or decolonial indigenization. other research highlights experiences within indigenization. most published work on indigenization shares the valuable experiences and observations of indigenous people involved with canadian post-secondary indigenization processes (bédard, 2018; brulé & koleszar-green, 2018; cote-meek & moeke-pickering, 2020; debassige & brunette-debassige, 2018; downey, 2018; fellner, 2018; fiola & mackinnon, 2020; george, 2019; hewitt, 2016; johnson, 2016; 1 in an education context, decolonization is “identifying how colonization has impacted education and working to unsettle colonial structures, systems, and dynamics” (poitras pratt et al., 2018, p. 1; but see tuck & yang, 2012). 3 efimoff: a thematic analysis of indigenous students’ experiences with indigenization at a canadian post-secondary institution published by scholarship@western, 2021 lavallee, 2020; louie et al., 2017; ottmann, 2013; pete, 2015). many indigenous authors involved in indigenization express feeling frustrated at seemingly ineffective or tokenistic institutional indigenization processes, such as adding indigenous art to physical spaces (lavallee, 2020), being treated as a token indigenous person at events or in projects (bédard, 2018; lavallee, 2020), a lack of system change (gaudry & lorenz, 2018), pressure to conform to eurocentric educational norms (debassige & brunette-debassige, 2018), or the expectation that indigenous peoples in post-secondary institutions will do indigenization work (debassige & brunette-debassige, 2018; fiola & mackinnon, 2020; grafton & melançon, 2020; lavallee, 2020). though indigenization efforts can undoubtedly help indigenous people at post-secondary institutions (bédard, 2018; lavallee, 2020), indigenous peoples’ experiences with indigenization highlight its shortfalls. and indeed, indigenization as a concept is not without critique. for example, grafton and melançon (2020) argue that, if not carefully implemented, indigenization can lead to “misrepresentation, tokenism, and even cooptation” (p. 144). simiarly, newhouse (2016) warns that indigenization may be another way for universities to attempt to assimilate indigenous peoples, given universities’ history of assimilationist tendencies. overall, the existing indigenization research is valuable and informs indigenization efforts; however, there are gaps. specifically, no known research has assessed indigenous students’ experiences within indigenizing postsecondary institutions. this is despite the fact that indigenous students are the largest indigenous group impacted by indigenization, as there are more indigenous students on campuses than indigenous staff, faculty, or administrative members. indigenous students are also often heavily involved in indigenization processes (efimoff, 2019). thus, it is important to expand this indigenization research to assess indigenous students’ experiences with indigenization. in this study, i expand the indigenization research within the context of the university of saskatchewan. as such, i describe their indigenization processes next. indigenization at the university of saskatchewan the university of saskatchewan2 has made indigenization a strategic priority (university of saskatchewan, n.d.b). in their view, indigenization is a set of institutionally integrated changes that increase accessibility, support societal reconciliation, and increase understanding of past and present realities of indigenous peoples (university of saskatchewan, n.d.b). indigenization includes adding indigenous content to courses where appropriate and is intended to “challenge and contribute to western understandings of knowledge and truth” (university of saskatchewan, n.d.b, para. 7). in theory, then, the university of saskatchewan may fall in the first two positions along gaudry and lorenz’s (2018) continuum of indigenization, as they focus on including indigenous content (indigenous inclusion), supporting societal reconciliation, and challenging and contributing to western knowledge (reconciliation indigenization). in practice, the university of saskatchewan has taken action to work toward indigenization. these changes range from inclusion or representation (e.g., presenting indigenous artwork throughout campus) to more structural changes (e.g., hiring a vice-provost indigenous engagement). the 2 the university of saskatchewan is in saskatoon, saskatchewan, canada. the university has roughly 22,000 students, nearly 3,000 of whom identify as indigenous (university of saskatchewan, 2020). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.13.1.10700 university of saskatchewan appears to have created space for indigenous students by building the gordon oakes red bear student centre, a space for indigenous students on campus, and various indigenous-specific educational programs (such as the indian teacher education program and the saskatchewan urban native teacher education program). the university has also initiated mentoring programs for indigenous students, such as indigenous student achievement pathways and the aboriginal student peer mentor program. they also host many indigenous-related events, such as the building reconciliation forum, indigenous achievement week, and a graduation powwow. it is important to note that many of these initiatives were instigated by the indigenous community on campus and then supported by the institution. the university of saskatchewan has also made several changes that might be considered more structural or systemic. for example, they have “indigenized” their learning charter to incorporate indigenous knowledges into this guiding document (university of saskatchewan, n.d.c). the university’s college of arts and science (which hosts the largest number of students at the institution; university of saskatchewan, 2020) is currently developing an indigenous content requirement for their undergraduate students to facilitate a better understanding of indigenous peoples in canada (university of saskatchewan, 2017) and some programs already have this in place (e.g., bachelor of education; university of saskatchewan, n.d.d). they even have an indigenous faculty hiring strategy (university of saskatchewan, n.d.e). some smaller organizations within the institution, such as the graduate students’ association, have created formal positions for indigenous leadership on their executive team (university of saskatchewan graduate students’ association, 2020). even these structural or systemic changes may still be considered “inclusion” practices, as they mostly consist of including more indigenous content and people in the institution. this might be the predecessor of decolonial indigenization (gaudry & lorenz, 2018), as systemic changes, such as indigenizing the learning charter, might combine with increased numbers of indigenous peoples on campus to build capacity to challenge the status quo. overall, the university of saskatchewan appears to focus its indigenization efforts on indigenous inclusion. some of their more structural changes may push the institution into reconciliation indigenization. however, the university of saskatchewan, like most canadian post-secondary institutions, appears far from decolonial indigenization (gaudry & lorenz, 2018). this is the context in which i conducted the current study. the current study i came to this project through my own experiences as an indigenous student in leadership positions at the university of saskatchewan between 2016 and 2018 (described further in efimoff, 2019). i was impressed with the indigenization efforts i saw. coming from a small undergraduate institution with very little indigenous presence, i was pleased to attend indigenous talks and events, work in the gordon oakes red bear student centre, and join indigenous graduate students’ groups. however, i also saw areas for improvement, and thus the impetus for this paper was born: institutions may be able to create appropriate and effective indigenization policies if they understand indigenous students’ experiences with indigenization. as such, the purpose of this study was to share indigenous students’ experiences with indigenization. i share the results of my descriptive thematic analysis and discuss the policy implications for post-secondary institutions that may be indigenizing. this is the first study that i know 5 efimoff: a thematic analysis of indigenous students’ experiences with indigenization at a canadian post-secondary institution published by scholarship@western, 2021 of to assess indigenous students’ experiences with indigenization and thus centers indigenous students within the discussion of indigenization at post-secondary institutions. method in this study, i qualitatively describe participants’ experiences with indigenization. using this descriptive approach (as opposed to, for example, interpreting constructed meanings) facilitates sharing participants’ experiences with indigenization and provides a broad basis for future research. in this paper, i privilege and center indigenous students’ voices and work to tell their stories, and thus attempt to center indigenous ways of knowing. this study was approved by the university of saskatchewan research ethics board. participants in total, i recruited 10 participants. i recruited seven students who held indigenous leadership positions on campus with the assumption that they were likely to have experience with indigenization (purposive sampling; kovach, 2009; palys, 2012). i also recruited three students through a study invitation on a university of saskatchewan online student platform (i posted here to ensure other indigenous students had the opportunity to participate). participants’ engagement included involvement in indigenous student clubs, holding formal indigenous student leadership positions, or sitting on committees focused on indigenization. their involvement spanned between 2 months to 3 years. slightly more participants were women than men, as aligns with university of saskatchewan demographics (university of saskatchewan, 2020). participants ranged in age (from 20 to 61 years) and life experiences (from a selfdeclared privileged upbringing to residential school survivors). three were parents, and two held staff positions as well as being students. all participants identified as indigenous, and some were of mixed indigenous and non-indigenous ancestry. participants’ academic programs included education, business, medicine, history, indigenous studies, environmental science, physiology and pharmacology, and social work. data collection process i inductively developed the interview guide for the open-ended qualitative interviews based on my experiences as an indigenous student in leadership positions at the institution (appendix a). i used the guide flexibly, and participants shared beyond it. interviews lasted between 30 and 90 minutes and were collected between july 2017 and april 2018. all interviews occurred in a public place on campus. after participants provided informed consent, they reviewed the interview guide, and we completed the interview. next, i collected demographic information from the participants and presented participants with a smudging packet3 and tobacco4 to thank them for sharing their knowledge and time. participants decided whether they wanted to remain anonymous, be identified by demographic information, or have their names attached to any quotes i used. 3 smudging a common practice in many indigenous cultures in canada, where a bundle of sacred medicines (herbs) is burned as part of a cleansing process. 4 in many indigenous cultures in canada, tobacco is given to acknowledge knowledge sharing. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.13.1.10700 building trust is important when generating knowledge with indigenous communities, given the frequency of problematic research practices involving indigenous peoples and knowledges (mosby, 2013; tuhiwai smith, 1999). as i was an indigenous student in leadership positions at the university of saskatchewan while i collected this data and had worked with some of the participants who were also typically in leadership positions, they appeared to trust me to gather and share their stories appropriately (some even mentioned this explicitly). though my experiences as a community member made establishing relations relatively easy, using this type of emic approach also has limitations. for example, when reviewing the data, i noted that i did not always ask participants to explicate the implicit—the things we both knew and appeared to agree on. i addressed this during my analysis by closely evaluating my conclusions (e.g., by reviewing my conclusions multiple times after taking time away from the data). next, i discuss the analysis. data analysis process i used thematic analysis to analyze the data. i started by transcribing audio recordings using nvivo (versions 11 and 12, a qualitative data analysis software) as soon as possible after the interview to ensure i could include non-verbal cues in the transcript. during transcription i wrote out preliminary analytical insights. i read the transcripts in their entirety to anonymize them and sent them to the participants. participants had the opportunity to review the transcript and make changes before signing a transcript release form, confirming they had reviewed and edited the transcript, that it was accurate, and that i could use it for my research. one participant did not acknowledge receipt of their transcript or sign the transcript release form; after multiple contact attempts, i decided to omit this participant’s data from the analysis. next, i started the coding process. i read through each transcript in its entirety again and began coding using nvivo. i used a primarily inductive approach, though, of course, the impact of my own experiences undoubtedly impacted my coding, as no researcher comes to data completely objectively. after coding the transcripts, i reviewed the codes and created a map of the relationship between the codes in nvivo. i worked through multiple iterations of the code map, each time gaining a better understanding of recurring concepts and contradictions in the data, eventually identifying themes. i then read through each transcript again in its entirety to identify new insights, other pieces related to the themes, and connections among different codes. next, i discuss the findings, which i present in two parts: the impacts of indigenization on the participants and methods to indigenize. findings personal impacts of engagement with indigenization on a personal level, participants experienced positive and negative impacts from indigenization at the university of saskatchewan. participants appeared to positively experience many of the indigenousoriented initiatives on campus. for example, some shared stories of experiencing personal and professional growth through their engagement with indigenization, such as gaining skills or experience in public speaking, mentorship, event facilitation, and community-building. other participants seemed to indicate that spaces, such as the gordon oakes red bear student centre, were permanent places 7 efimoff: a thematic analysis of indigenous students’ experiences with indigenization at a canadian post-secondary institution published by scholarship@western, 2021 where indigenous students could be authentic and safe from racist comments and also had the symbolic effect of conveying that the institution was “serious” about indigenizing. participants also noted that cultural events, such as the graduation powwow, helped situate indigenous cultural practices in the present, showing newcomers these practices are a part of indigenous life. lastly, participants noted that programming designed to support indigenous student success, such as the aboriginal student achievement program and the aboriginal student peer advisor program, helped indigenous students feel comfortable, forge relationships, and access opportunities, ranging from public speaking to meeting the prime minister. some participants also characterized their engagement with indigenization as having affirming effects on their identity development. for example, one participant stated: i guess without the process of indigenization … i wouldn't have wanted to sort of indigenize myself i guess, or decolonize myself and my ways of thinking … a lot of that was done through peers ... elders … really made me feel like i was missing something to myself … without this entire process i wouldn't have had that urge to want to learn about a lot of the traditional ways. (participant 1) for this participant, self-decolonization was informed by their peers and elders and further reinforced by their engagement in indigenization. more of their peers and elders may have been on campus due to the explicit indigenization processes at the university of saskatchewan; the university may have indirectly facilitated this process via recruitment. another participant described how these processes contribute to cultural identity resurgence: indigenous student leaders … that are really entrenched in their culture, and they’re proud of it, and seeing that affirmation by them, and seeing that they're okay, kind of encourages other students to come out and be like oh, hey, i want to participate in my culture! so i think it does help with cultural resurgence … seeing indigenous peoples being proud of their culture kind of makes you proud of your own culture, right? (participant 2) for this particular participant, their cultural resurgence and identity journey developed further with support from their supervisor: i had a little bit of an existential crisis, i was like "oh my god, i don't know if i can call myself métis or not!" and [my supervisor has] been there helping me, saying identity is always pull and push … so in that sense i feel that the university has been very supportive, but that's also through my supervisor himself. (participant 2) here, both indigenous student leaders on campus and the participant’s supervisor have helped this participant continue to develop their identity. again, the effect of indigenization is more distal: the institution may have created an environment where indigenous students feel they can be proud of their identity and hired faculty (such as this supervisor) who can support indigenous students. unfortunately, however, not all experiences were positive. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.13.1.10700 participants also spoke of poor physical and mental health outcomes due to their engagement in indigenization, such as exhaustion and burnout, in addition to financial and social impacts (for a description of academic impacts, see efimoff, 2019). for instance, terrance recounted what happened after he shared his residential school experience with his classroom: i went and had such a hell of an anxiety attack after that, [name of friend] had to come and sit with me for about 45 minutes during class time … cripes that bugged the hell out of me. i can't do that. i can't do it … i’ll do it for my class because i think it's important for them to understand. and they ask questions and we're able to interact. and they're able to feel empathy. and they're able to support me too like if i didn't have [name of friend] there i don't know what the hell i woulda did. terrance’s sense of responsibility to share this information with the class, and in a way, to help indigenize (i.e. through sharing lived experiences of residential schools, terrance may create safer spaces for indigenous students and increase non-indigenous students’ understanding) had immediate and direct harmful personal impacts. participant exhaustion due to engagement with indigenization was common and connected to involvement on multiple institutional committees, and the physical, emotional, and psychological work required, including the pressure of being the “voice” of indigenous students. this aligns with many other indigenous scholars’ experiences of indigenization overwork (debassige & brunette-debassige, 2018; fiola & mackinnon, 2020; grafton & melançon, 2020; lavallee, 2020). although two participants were paid for their time on one research project investigating indigenous education techniques, positions in many indigenous student groups are unpaid, and these students are regularly called upon to sit on committees and otherwise be involved in unpaid (volunteer) indigenization work. though some participants actively strove to decline requests to prioritize their academic studies, many participants discussed a sense of responsibility and a desire to give back to their community. this drew many participants to take on extra volunteer tasks (such as sitting on committees or organizing events related to indigenization) that took away from their ability to secure paid work, focus on course work, or even obtain basic needs like time with friends, sleep, food, and housing. other participants felt impacts on their relationship with their families, and for the following participant, their community and land: i do find myself not getting enough time to go home and spend with family and sort of reconnect with my community … to connect with our part of the earth as well … when i was little, my dad taught me exactly where the reefs are. and as i was driving he reminded me “oh, you're gunna hit a reef if you keep going straight.” so i was like oh goodness! [laughter] so it takes its toll i guess on like family as well, cause during the school year ... i had to make a lot of sacrifices, and family was, unfortunately, one of them too … i didn't go home once during the second term. (participant 1) being away from family is difficult for many students, and the added responsibility of engagement with indigenization may exacerbate this for indigenous students. 9 efimoff: a thematic analysis of indigenous students’ experiences with indigenization at a canadian post-secondary institution published by scholarship@western, 2021 despite these paradoxical impacts at the personal level, participants expressed ongoing desires for involvement, representation, self-determination, and ultimately, to challenge current systems. many participants discussed how indigenization could be improved through indigenous student representation, incorporating indigenous knowledges and values, and engaging the broader community. next, i discuss each of these methods of indigenization in detail. ways to indigenize representation many participants talked about indigenous student representation as a good way to indigenize. they conceptualized representation broadly, as having indigenous students, faculty, and staff on committees; consulting with indigenous students about indigenization; and simply having more indigenous people on campus. for example, though terrance valued the hiring of indigenous senior administration members, he wanted to see more indigenous people on campus in general. jacqueline explained the need to bring indigenous speakers and elders to her program (medicine). both terrance and sabrina also referred to representing indigenous culture within campus spaces—terrance felt represented by the college of education because they made indigenous people “more visible” physically in the space, and sabrina explained, “at the gordon oakes, i feel like i am represented and feel like i am able to see myself reflected in the campus.” many participants had a specific role in representing other indigenous students on campus through their involvement on committees or in leadership positions. sabrina, terrance, and two other participants held formal positions in recognized indigenous student organizations on campus and were often invited to committees to discuss issues relevant to indigenous students or indigenization. these participants appeared deeply motivated to do their best to represent indigenous students. however, direct consultation, in some participants’ estimation, was limited: “i have yet to see somebody from administration come and ask the indigenous student body ‘what does indigenization mean to you?’” (participant 1). this participant goes on to explain that there are many active indigenous students, elders, and knowledge keepers who could be drawn on, and that the university should engage indigenous peoples broadly in creating their vision of indigenization. participant 3 explained how they had never had a member of an indigenous student organization approach them about indigenization, and that overall, consultation was sparse. the privileging of only a few voices may contribute to the exhaustion of these select students. relatedly, it may simply be ineffective, as indigenization is not a oneperson job (lavallee, 2020). furthermore, when these students leave the university, they leave gaps in institutional memory, which may stall progress. though the participants in this study had the opportunity to directly share their thoughts on indigenization on committees or in other forums, much of the indigenous student body presumably does not. indigenization processes, thus, might be improved with broader consultation. however, representation in and of itself is insufficient unless the spaces opened are those in which indigenous voices are seriously considered. gabrielle explained this in detail: “i think the best thing the universities can do is just to leave space … space on committees, space to speak, be heard, space to be taken serious[ly] ... that's the number one thing.” she went on to explain that indigenous paradigms are 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.13.1.10700 fundamental in creating anti-oppressive approaches for indigenous students to succeed. thus, it is important to have consultations where students meaningfully influence indigenization practices and policies. several participants, including gabrielle, discussed the importance of being able to control what indigenization looks like, and how indigenization requires meaningful engagement that yields tangible outcomes. for example, participant 1 explained how indigenous representation is important but notes that when it comes to what indigenization should look like, “the reality is the university is already establishing their [vision].” relatedly, terrance (and other participants) distinguished between two approaches: “either for indians5 or by indians. by indians is us. for indians is them getting money to do [indigenous programming], whether we even wanted it or not.” the “for indians” approach described by terrance can mean that the work accomplished may not be something that indigenous peoples wanted in the first place (and thus is potentially not meaningful), and yet the organizers may not even know this because they have not worked with indigenous peoples. the implication is that if indigenous peoples were fundamental in the creation of such programs, such programs could be much more effective. this desire for indigenous representation and leadership in the indigenization process also reflects the experiences of indigenous scholars more broadly (gaudry & lorenz; grafton & melançon, 2020). participants deemed a lack of representation as problematic. for example, participants often cited tokenism and paternalism as problematic within the indigenization process. meaningful representation can help to avoid paternalism and tokenism. participants described interpersonal experiences of tokenism within their classrooms. for example, for participant 4, when an indigenous topic was raised in class, other students slowly turned to look at them for comment. participants also experienced tokenism on a broader level. participant 1, who sits on a variety of committees, explained their perception of current consultation processes as infrequent, inauthentic, and insufficient: sort of like having these big meetings regarding indigenous peoples and then inviting an elder but only to say the prayer and then that's it … just like a little dab of this, a little dab of landbased knowledge, a little dab of elders, and that's it. we're indigenized. a very “surface” level of indigenization means that indigenous practices are sprinkled on top of already existing programs, but not necessarily integrated or meaningfully addressed (also observed by gaudry & lorenz, 2018; lavallee, 2020; newhouse, 2016; pardy & pardy, 2020). sabrina, who also sits on a variety of committees, takes this idea a bit further: indigenization efforts on administration level, like university council, are done very in a salt and pepper manner so that they politically can say that they're doing a lot to indigenize the campus … throughout the years [i] have seen or heard about indigenization differently, which had kind of made me a little less hopeful for indigenization. sabrina identified political motivations for the indigenization process at the university of saskatchewan, namely that indigenization sometimes feels like something the university does to “look good” (as in 5 though first nations in canada are legally known as “indians,” the term is considered inappropriate by many people in current times. however, some indigenous people still use the term, especially in older generations. 11 efimoff: a thematic analysis of indigenous students’ experiences with indigenization at a canadian post-secondary institution published by scholarship@western, 2021 bédard, 2018; grafton & melançon, 2020) the lack of tangible action after indigenization discussions has made her less hopeful. this connects with concerns that administrative members of the university were not asking students about their perspectives on indigenization; this, combined with the lack of tangible action observed by sabrina, might imply the university is not working for the students’ benefit, but a reputational benefit. despite these concerns, sabrina acknowledged the good indigenization work occurring (as in lavallee, 2020) and understood that larger changes take time. however, ultimately, she hoped for an indigenization that focuses on “epistemologies or indigenous frameworks.” another way that the participants discussed representation was by talking about their own experiences as indigenous people, and how indigenization could be designed with these experiences in mind. for example, terrance, being a residential school survivor, spoke about the life-long impacts of trauma on learning and explained that faculty needed sensitivity to the level of trauma experienced by some indigenous students, such as himself. being highly engaged in his home community, when tragedy struck, terrance was often on the front line; in one case, a community member was shot, another died in a fire, and another died of cancer in quick succession. he remembers how he felt when he read a harshly worded sign on a professor’s door: “‘students,’ it says, ‘i want your assignments here, i don't care, the work is no excuse. they have to be here on time.’ that was his sign on his door.” in this case, terrance was able to contact health services on campus to help; regardless, universities may strive to challenge the institutional culture epitomized in that cold and impersonal sign on a professor’s door. this would likely help many students, not solely those experiencing community crises or other trauma, and may help institutions to better support indigenous students throughout indigenization. relatedly, jacqueline explained a lack of understanding about residential school trauma: people learn that “oh this is what happened to indigenous people a hundred years ago.” it's not history because it's still impacting us. people talk about residential school like it was a long time ago. no. i went to residential school. i'm 30 years old. i went to residential school … i went to residential school when i was 8 and i remember, i feel like that's just burned into my memory. in this case, trauma lingers, as jacqueline remembers her residential school experience as if it were “burned” into her memory. it seems likely that students who are residential school survivors may feel unheard or hurt when hearing others situate the impact of residential schools in the past. recognizing that current students may be residential school survivors or experience intergenerational impacts (bombay et al., 2011; elias et al., 2012), or experience deep-rooted colonial trauma in other ways, could help universities work toward an indigenization process that considers these diverse needs, and thus, is broadly representative of the many diverse indigenous student experiences. the paternalistic, tokenistic nature of some indigenization processes, even if intended to help indigenous people on campus, sat poorly with many of the participants. ensuring meaningful consultation, collaboration, and broad representation alongside follow-through and tangible outcomes and actions is important. participants’ reflections also highlighted the importance of integrating indigenous knowledges, discussed in the next section. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.13.1.10700 indigenous values and knowledges incorporating indigenous ways of knowing is fundamental to indigenization. participants discussed the importance of privileging indigenous values including spirituality, self-determination, future-looking, culture, and community in the university. participant 2 explained the need to include indigenous peoples in the indigenization process because, “if you’re not indigenous, how do you know the indigenous ways?” they went on to discuss epistemological indigenization as not only representing indigenous perspectives but as necessary for challenging western ways of knowing: i do think that we need to … constantly try to think in an indigenous way. that's going to seem like you're de-balancing western academic ways of doing things, but i think that's really necessary for the individual researcher's ability to have that equal footing. because without that kind of heightened sensitivity to indigenous ways of doing research, you're not going to be selfconscious of your own western biases. given the overwhelming reliance on western ways of knowing within the academy, we must critically assess our use of these ways of knowing and attempt to consciously incorporate and make space for indigenous ways of knowing and doing research (also observed by other indigenous scholars such as blair et al., 2020; ottmann, 2013). for some participants, this happened through research. jacqueline spoke explicitly about gaining a deeper understanding of data when she was allowed to use the cree language and her own experiences as a cree woman in the analysis process as a research assistant. terrance and another participant were also involved in a research project assessing different types of indigenous knowledge as a way to complement or enrich western academic styles. these types of projects were held in high regard by the participants as good ways to do research with indigenous people. they showcased indigenous ways of knowing in an indigenizing institution. terrance also talked about making space for spirituality, as an indigenous way of knowing, within the institution: you can't deny the spiritual side of people's beings. it's a part of understanding our world. it's a part of understanding things that we can't see, in a spiritual sense ... if the university is going to do something about that, they've got to accept us on that level. so at least their doing some stuff by letting us have our cultural practices. allowing for spiritual practices on campus like smudging is one concrete example of making space for spirituality and the indigenous knowledge held in such practices. fire codes, safety regulations, and institutional policies can make smudging complicated, however, the university of saskatchewan has a smudging policy that provides space for spirituality in this regard (2015). other participants talked about the importance of indigenous values, such as self-determination. for example, participant 1 talked about the two-row wampum belt (see hallenbeck, 2015) or treaties as ideal frameworks for indigenization: “[indigenous and white people are] on common ground and they’re working toward a prosperous future. together. but also being able to do that in their own independent ways.” in this sentiment, the participant expresses themes of autonomy, independence, and self-determination, along with good relations between groups and a shared future. gabrielle also spoke passionately about the need for self-determination in the form of self-governance; for designing unique 13 efimoff: a thematic analysis of indigenous students’ experiences with indigenization at a canadian post-secondary institution published by scholarship@western, 2021 systems that reflect traditional governance practices; and for challenging current systems that are designed to oppress indigenous peoples broadly. in terms of indigenization, self-determination implies large-scale changes, such as wide-scale consultation, actions determined meaningful by indigenous peoples, and shifting power to indigenous peoples in the process. another indigenous value participants discussed was thinking about the future. many participants were motivated to work toward indigenization when thinking about future generations. sabrina explained, “i think with indigenization and the continual momentum to move forward, we're doing it not for our own benefit but for the years to come which is obviously embedded in our world view.” sabrina was enrolled in the saskatchewan urban native teacher education program (suntep), which was created to provide structural support for non-status indians6 and métis7 bachelor of education students. suntep itself illustrates how indigenous values and knowledges are a method of indigenization, as students “are encouraged to use [their] world view to teach in the classroom,” world views that include working for those who come after us. indigenization may also be guided by engagement with indigenous culture, which is tightly connected to indigenous knowledges and values. some participants acknowledged how important indigenization was in creating an environment where both they and other indigenous students could reconnect to indigenous culture. this is illustrated by participant 3’s experience. their primary caregiver was part of the 60s scoop,8 and, as such, they explained how they felt they did not know their indigenous culture. they were worried about reconnecting because they did not want to, for example, mishandle a pipe at a pipe ceremony, or interact inappropriately with an elder. they wanted to see workshops that help guide indigenous students on ceremonial protocol. another participant from a different part of the country explained that they did not know the protocol to engage in the indigenous ceremonies hosted at the university of saskatchewan, which is one of the reasons why they did not attend. some may argue that learning in indigenous communities is experiential: learning through observation and attempts, instead of being “taught” in a workshop format. regardless, providing options for indigenous students who want to connect but do not know how might help address some students’ experiences and simultaneously promote indigenization, and in some ways, even decolonization. that is, though workshops might be considered “colonial,” such workshops could help students realize the experiential nature of learning in indigenous community, and thus be decolonizing. community is another foundational aspect of indigenous ways of knowing that may help to indigenize institutions. participant 1 explained: “when i think of the word indigenization, i think of tradition as well. sort of the aspect of building community. that's how many of our peoples had survived for thousands of generations.” this participant situates community building as part of indigenous culture and fundamental to indigenous peoples’ survival, as for thousands of years indigenous peoples’ survival 6 non-status indians are people who identify as first nations but are not considered a legal “indian” by the government of canada (government of canada, 2012). 7 métis people are an indigenous people in canada with a unique culture and language who have historic connections to fur trading (métis nation, n.d.). 8 staring in the 1950s, a series of policies resulted in thousands indigenous children being taken from their families, put into foster care, and then adopted by white families. these children were typically cut-off from their culture (dart, 2019). 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.13.1.10700 depended on working together in community. and indeed, community effort has been key in producing some of the indigenous initiatives on campus mentioned previously. thus, indigenization can be done well with an indigenous community who inherently indigenizes as part of their way of being, by their mere presence. a sense of community is fundamental to participants’ positive experiences within indigenization projects and programs, helping them feel connected and supported in a space where they are otherwise underrepresented. here we can see the importance of indigenous recruitment efforts, as discussed by other authors, to build indigenization capacity (bédard, 2018; canadian association of university teachers, 2016; gaudry & lorenz, 2018; lavallee, 2020; newhouse, 2016; pidgeon, 2014) the examples discussed above illustrate the importance of these indigenous values and ways of knowing in successfully indigenizing, and how indigenous participants incorporate these into their university experience to succeed. another important way to indigenize is through community. creating a community that can indigenize indigenization is a big project, and the participants’ stories conveyed that it takes a community to indigenize. the challenges that indigenization might address are broad and structurally rooted. participants discussed racism as one of the main challenges. racism was not the focus of these interviews, but over half of the participants mentioned witnessing, experiencing, or hearing about racism on campus; some even experienced this in their classrooms or interactions with professors (see efimoff, 2019 for more details). sabrina discussed fearing anti-indigenous racist comments when in nonindigenous spaces and online on a popular page unofficially affiliated with the university of saskatchewan (you sask confessions, n.d.). participant 4 explained how non-indigenous students have blatantly applied stereotypes to them as an indigenous person. terrance spoke about the university's expectations of indigenous people to “be white indians. middle-class values. look like them, only skin's brown.” here, terrance appears to allude to assimilationist tendencies—the desire to assimilate indigenous people into broader settler canadian society to ultimately make them disappear. these tendencies are alarming because assimilation is connected with, for example, long standing-racist and genocidal institutions such as residential schools (trc, 2015a). related to racism is non-indigenous students’ resistance to indigenization. sabrina recalled nonindigenous student backlash when the indigenous course requirements were released, with students not understanding the need for the requirement. merely not understanding why a mandatory indigenous course is required is indicative of systemic racism, of a culture that overlooks the fundamental importance of race in everyday life. other participants voiced concerns around mandatory indigenous courses in the context of non-indigenous students’ resistance. jacqueline had some specific concerns about indigenous students’ experiences in those courses. she explained that a lot of people in saskatchewan have poor attitudes toward indigenous peoples, so an indigenous student enrolled in this class may have an uncomfortable experience: i'm going to feel like for one, all of the sudden i'm the expert on everything indigenous. two, i'm gunna have to deal with those people that don't want to be there. and that may say things that are obviously going to be inappropriate because they have bad feelings about indigenous people. i'm going to be put in a position where i don't feel safe. 15 efimoff: a thematic analysis of indigenous students’ experiences with indigenization at a canadian post-secondary institution published by scholarship@western, 2021 jacqueline’s experience of feeling like she is suddenly the “expert on everything indigenous” aligns with other indigenous scholars’ experiences (lavallee, 2020; pete, 2015) and reflects how non-indigenous people demand that indigenous people provide education on indigenous issues (pardy & pardy, 2020). thus, simply mandating indigenous content is not necessarily the solution, and may have unintended consequences that speak to the pervasive nature of racism: students in the class may say “inappropriate” things about indigenous people due to “bad feelings” toward indigenous peoples. racism is a widespread canadian issue that requires engaging the broader population. to make institutions safe and welcoming for indigenous students, the entire institutional community needs to acknowledge and address racism. however, participants in this study suggested there are additional systemic challenges the campus community must overcome to successfully indigenize. for instance, participants talked about how either themselves or their friends and colleagues also doing indigenization work need institutional (e.g., changes in policies, administrative support) and financial support. gabrielle explained the administrative barriers to support her kokum’s kitchen initiative (an indigenous-led inter-cultural cooking group designed to increase intergroup contact and understanding and address widespread on-campus food insecurity), such as an institutional liability policy, that prevented her from cooking on campus. her attempts to create programming to support indigenous students, to bring indigenous culture to the forefront, and to work toward good intergroup relations, faced hurdles at each step in the process. as another example, sabrina explained, that in some cases, the responsibility for indigenization work is repeatedly handed back to unpaid and overworked students instead of being addressed at the level of institutional governance. this is of particular concern in cases where administrators are those with the necessary power to create change, as participant 5 explained: and it's like, [indigenous students] are not facing the same barriers, we're in fact facing more barriers than [university of saskatchewan employees] are. you can say we're going to indigenize, and the flows going to get going . . . that's because they have less barriers. so as students, where do we fit in that? . . . what do we do? what can we do? other than just be indigenous. [laughter] for the university to better engage in the process of indigenization, this quote highlights that there is a need for explicit conversations between indigenous students and university administrators. these power differentials are systemic and impact indigenous students’ ability to be involved. despite racism and other systemic challenges, the participants discussed several different ways to create a community that can work to indigenize. first, institutions could work to build the capacity of indigenous peoples on campus. for example, jacqueline talked about having more indigenous faculty members, speakers, and elders incorporated into her program. jacqueline noted how odd it felt to her, as an indigenous student, to see white folks researching indigenous issues: “i know so many great indigenous academic people that could come in and present on these things!” unfortunately, it appears there just aren’t enough indigenous people in her faculty; as such, it appears that building indigenous capacity is important to build the indigenization capacity of that faculty. sabrina talked about having formal, paid positions for people who provided support to indigenization efforts, such as elders or other 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.13.1.10700 knowledge keepers on campus, as a way to build indigenous capacity to indigenize. other participants talked about the importance of the university providing space for the indigenous community on campus to gather and build capacity themselves, connecting with the concept of self-determination discussed earlier. importantly, during the interviews, the indigenous student body on campus came together to call for an indigenous students’ union (isu) to represent indigenous students’ unique needs. participants discussed the isu as a way to build capacity to indigenize. for example, participant 2 explained, “i don't see how an isu would not lead toward indigenization.” thus, building indigenous capacity on campus, for some, is tightly related to self-governance and self-determination. in objective and tangible terms, financial support for the indigenous student leaders who are working to indigenize would be valuable. though some of the participants explained they did not care about money, others acknowledged it would be helpful. and given housing and food insecurity for some students, money for this type of work would help create stability in those students’ lives, and potentially in indigenization efforts. second, institutions could work to forge community relationships. the participants discussed the need for all of the campus community to be involved in indigenization. terrance talked about providing more supports for on-campus units that were working to indigenize. he explained that some units on campus might not know where to start, but “at least if we've started it then i don't fault anybody for doing stuff … and i think it's up to us to try and help them as much as we can too.” here, terrance seems to be talking about the importance of the institution and indigenous peoples on campus working together to indigenize. sabrina shared something similar. she explained that the university needed to understand that indigenization can only occur through “teamwork with indigenous communities, with indigenous students on campus.” so indigenous people must work with the institution and the institution must work with indigenous people to indigenize (as in gaudry & lorenz, 2018; grafton & melançon, 2020; ottmann, 2013). third, the indigenization process must engage non-indigenous people on campus. curriculum is one way to engage non-indigenous students, and the participants discussed cases of excellent curriculum that integrates indigenous issues, and examples of poor or even harmful attempts to include indigenous content (see efimoff, 2019, for further description). despite some harmful experiences with professors who were trying to indigenize their curriculum, participant 3 explained “non-indigenous profs are also working really hard … profs who are wanting to be involved and wanting to learn more and wanting to see indigenous students succeed.” two participants in the natural sciences were hopeful too; despite the seemingly inherent challenges of indigenizing their curriculum, they maintained that there were ways to bring indigenous content in. participant 5 explained non-indigenous interest in indigenous content may have a snowball effect; if a non-indigenous professor and other non-indigenous students in the class were passionate about indigenous issues, it could increase the willingness of disinterested nonindigenous students to engage. however, curriculum is not a cure-all, and may not be the most effective in some cases, especially considering concerns around mandatory indigenous content. furthermore, as jacqueline explained, indigenous content may be ineffective if students are unprepared to engage in the material. importantly, this sense of unpreparedness may be distinct from the potential anti-indigenous sentiment discussed in the context of mandatory courses. for example, students may feel like they should not speak to indigenous issues as a non-indigenous person. 17 efimoff: a thematic analysis of indigenous students’ experiences with indigenization at a canadian post-secondary institution published by scholarship@western, 2021 many other factors may influence non-indigenous peoples’ engagement in indigenization. for example, participant 4 discussed the broader socio-cultural environment as a reason for this, as they expressed doubt that indigenization could truly reach the many non-indigenous students who seem to have grown up in racist households in saskatchewan. they discuss building empathy and understanding as a way to engage non-indigenous people: for the idea of indigenization to become a pretty prevalent idea here at the university of saskatchewan, i really think that other students and other cultures need to understand what it's actually like to be like, to feel like, a native person. furthermore, participant 2 speculated that non-indigenous people did not want to be involved in indigenization for fear of becoming a target of public hostility. being non-indigenous and working toward indigenization can be a dubious position, requiring a keen awareness of your positionality. however, it is also important to consider the concept of allyship. though in some cases participants were frustrated with non-indigenous individuals calling themselves allies, in other contexts, they were grateful. participant 2 says “i think a lot of non-indigenous people are doing a great job trying to indigenize.” in sum, given the large-scale challenges we need to overcome to indigenize, it undoubtedly takes a community to do so. discussion participants described growing personally, professionally, and culturally through their engagement with indigenization, as indigenization offered opportunities to participants. in tandem with these benefits, participants often experienced poor physical health, mental health, financial, and social outcomes due to their engagement with indigenization. this was often due to participants feeling obligated to contribute to indigenization and thus spending many hours engaged with indigenization initiatives. relatedly, some of the benefits of indigenization were not strictly benefits; for example, many participants may have benefited through gaining professional skills, but simultaneously spent less time with family and community. others experienced identity crises through their continued engagement with indigenous issues that are at the forefront of an indigenizing institution. the current study is a good example; though many participants commented after the interview that appreciated the chance to share and directed their colleagues to contact me to get involved, it likely had negative impacts. specifically, it is ironic that i have asked already overworked students to give me even more time and energy to another indigenization project. despite these negative impacts, participants strove to be engaged with indigenization and shared many ways to improve indigenization, namely, representation, embedding and privileging indigenous values and knowledges in indigenization initiatives, and creating a community that can indigenize. though this study assessed indigenous students’ experiences at only one institution, the findings presented in this paper may be useful to other indigenization postsecondary institutions, both in canada and internationally. the overlap between participants’ experiences and the broader literature (spanning countries and continents) suggests these results are broadly relevant. the participants’ attitudes toward indigenization might be best characterized as ambivalent optimism. many of the participants had high hopes for indigenization and benefited from some initiatives coming 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.13.1.10700 out of the process (as in lavallee, 2020). however, they simultaneously discussed their growing cynicism and skepticism about the process based on their personal or their colleagues’ experiences throughout their engagement with the indigenization process. their skepticism may be related to desires for a decolonial indigenization while the university of saskatchewan’s indigenization more aligns with indigenous inclusion or reconciliation indigenization (gaudry & lorenz, 2018). indeed, participants discussed indigenization in ways often aligned with decolonial indigenous approaches, which may reflect their desire for this means of indigenization. this skepticism about indigenization is reflected in current events: in the last five years, nine indigenous faculty members have left the university of saskatchewan due to “racism, a hostile work environment and the slow pace of reforms” (warick, 2020, para. 1). indigenous faculty members’ experiences at the university of saskatchewan aligned with the participants’ experiences in this study. they cited tokenism, racism, dismissal of faculty ideas, seeming inaction or slow reforms to address indigenous issues, barriers to making changes, overwork of indigenous faculty members, a dismissal of indigenous knowledges, and resulting poor health outcomes (warick, 2020). it appears, then, that indigenization is a paradoxical pursuit: initiatives that are designed to include and support indigenous students also, ironically, harm them through overwork, over-engagement, and the inevitable exhaustion and burn-out. this situation likely reflects institutional awareness that indigenization cannot be done well without student input. indeed, indigenous students often want to be involved in the process, and in some cases, resolutely claim that indigenous student engagement is fundamental to indigenization; however, as this study shows, they are often overworked and not provided institutional support. with this in mind, i want to address a likely critique: “the participants are volunteering to do this work! the university is not forcing them to engage with indigenization.” but, the reality is, the indigenous participants interviewed in this study felt compelled to do this work. they felt responsible for creating a better place for the next generation of indigenous students to be educated and improving the current indigenous community on campus. importantly, this is not to say that institutions should somehow prevent indigenous students from engaging with the indigenization process (as this would directly contradict indigenous students’ desires to be engaged). institutions should, however, realize the potential for these deep community commitments and strategize ways to best support indigenous students and prevent exploitation. institutions must understand indigenous students’ experiences to support them. for example, broadly, indigenous peoples are already at risk for food and housing insecurity (chan et al., 2019; homeless hub, n.d.), and participants’ aid with indigenization may exacerbate these risks, as some participants chose to engage in indigenization rather than paid work. while it is not the university’s job, per se, to feed and house students, these lived realities impact indigenous students who are already engaging intensely with indigenization processes on campus. beyond the participants interviewed in this study, many indigenous students may have somewhat unique experiences in being far from home (as many indigenous students come from smaller communities outside of saskatoon to attend school) and coming from communities that may be more likely to experience tragedy (e.g., widespread suicide in indigenous communities in saskatchewan’s northern region; modjeski, 2016). these experiences influence students’ ability to engage in school, let alone the indigenization process. these realities need to be considered in supporting indigenous students who are engaged in indigenization. 19 efimoff: a thematic analysis of indigenous students’ experiences with indigenization at a canadian post-secondary institution published by scholarship@western, 2021 an indigenous student experience that requires special attention is racism. the participants interviewed in this study are not alone in their experiences of racism; other research has illustrated racism toward indigenous students at post-secondary institutions in canada (clark et al., 2014; currie et al., 2012). racism is highly relevant to indigenization, as one of the intended outcomes of indigenization is presumably reducing racism. for example, the university of saskatchewan includes teaching the historical and present inequities caused by colonial processes in their description of indigenization. ideally, these discussions will curb racist conceptions of indigenous peoples and spur understanding of intergenerational trauma and effects. and indeed, many agree that education is an effective strategy to challenge racism (e.g., justice murray sinclair, as cited in watters, 2015). institutions that have begun to indigenize by requiring indigenous content in courses might later evaluate the impact of these courses on settler student perceptions of indigenous peoples. aside from being particularly relevant to indigenization, racism is also interconnected with indigenization. for example, for indigenous ways of knowing to be incorporated into curricula as valid and complementary to western ways of knowing as part of indigenization, students and faculty members must have open minds and hearts to indigenous knowledges, and must not express epistemological racism. racism is varied and ubiquitous, but so are strategies to challenge it. the diversity of racism was paralleled in the range of strategies and thoughts participants had about ways to indigenize: from the integration of indigenous knowledges, to advertising campaigns on the value of indigenous knowledges, to an indigenous students’ union, to building empathy, to dismantling entire governance systems. many of these strategies could be quite effective. increasing empathy toward indigenous people through a virtual reality experience, for example, can improve attitudes toward indigenous people (starzyk et al., unpublished data). educational interventions are also potentially useful; one meta-analysis indicates that teaching participants about the history of indigenous people in canada can help to increase empathy (neufeld et al., 2021). such individual interventions can help improve interpersonal relationships, but systemic changes are also imperative. for example, the university of manitoba faculty of health sciences created ongomiizwin in 2017 (an indigenous health institute with anti-racism as a guiding imperative; cook et al., 2019) and recently approved canada’s first anti-racism policy at a postsecondary institution in canada (um today news, 2020). such approaches may help challenge the racism embedded within post-secondary systems at the university of saskatchewan. so, where do we go from here? as indigenization is a relatively new phenomenon, there are many other possible research questions. one that comes to mind immediately, given the importance of the entire institutional community engaging in indigenization to make it happen, is the perspectives of nonindigenous university community members on indigenization. why are they engaged? why are they not? is racial anxiety (the concerns surrounding interracial interactions, such as white people fearing that they are perceived as racist; godsil & richardson, 2017) fuelling disengagement from indigenization? how does ignorance come into play? how about outright hostility? in understanding non-indigenous university members’ attitudes toward indigenization, institutions can understand what strategies might be most effective in encouraging widescale engagement. it is important to note, as well, that many of the participants discussed a constant push-and-pull during discussions of decolonization and traditional governance mechanisms and systems that often left 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.13.1.10700 participants reflecting on their need to walk in two worlds (the indigenous world and the white or western world). some students discussed feeling paradoxical themselves: questioning their connections to their identity, the irony of doing this work on campus instead of in their home community, and having this work be restricted by the policies of a colonial and western institution. the internal conflicts of students in these positions, the inability to feel authentic or be taken seriously, and the deep desire to be at home in their communities would make an enthralling future study. policy recommendations i have gleaned the following four policy recommendations from this study that may be useful for academic institutions attempting to indigenize. a. ensure authentic indigenous student representation is foundational in indigenization processes. since there are typically more indigenous students than indigenous faculty or indigenous staff at postsecondary institutions, indigenous students could benefit the most from well-designed indigenization processes. each institution will undoubtedly have multiple different contexts, such as geography, student demographics, cultural groups, size of institution, etc. contextualized processes are fundamental—what works at the university of saskatchewan may not work in other institutions. it is fundamental to discuss indigenization with indigenous students, to work with indigenous students, and to ensure that indigenous students are meaningfully represented. institutions might ask, what does indigenization mean to indigenous students? what actions might be considered indigenization? how do indigenous students want to engage? the key takeaway: ask. participate in open communication. listen and understand. b. acknowledge the impact of engagement with indigenization on indigenous students and work with them to mitigate it. the indigenous students i interviewed in this study were incredibly dedicated to their work on campus with the indigenous community, much of which included indigenization work. understanding indigenous students’ lived experiences at an institution and acknowledging the impact engagement with indigenization may have on indigenous students is important. notably, this does not mean that institutions should prevent indigenous student engagement, but should work with indigenous students to best understand how they might provide support. given potentially unique differences in lived experiences when compared to non-indigenous students, such as anti-indigenous racism and intergenerational trauma, institutions might consider offering tailored services that will help indigenous students to engage in the indigenization process. these services should come from careful consensual consultation processes to avoid paternalistic or tokenistic practices. indigenous people on campus may want to create their services, such as the participants’ desire to create an isu. in some cases, autonomy may be valued above institutional support. institutions may consider creating “indigenization” roles for staff or faculty to fill, providing stipends to indigenous students in roles related to indigenization, or simply providing space and resources for indigenous students to lead the way. ultimately though, have these discussions. indigenous peoples are incredibly diverse, and there are many different ways to 21 efimoff: a thematic analysis of indigenous students’ experiences with indigenization at a canadian post-secondary institution published by scholarship@western, 2021 indigenize. this ties to the first policy recommendation; institutions really must ensure they authentically engage indigenous students in indigenization processes to understand how best to support them as they contribute to indigenization processes, if they choose to at all. c. co-create a community that can indigenize. related to institutional support for involved students, post-secondary institutions should look to cocreate a community that can indigenize. this means that institutions should support indigenous and non-indigenous peoples alike to work toward a goal of indigenization. significantly, as indigenous peoples must be at the forefront of indigenization processes, it is important for indigenous peoples doing this work to have the space, resources, and self-determination to discuss how they want nonindigenous people to be involved. as many participants said, it takes a community to indigenize. this means that we need better relationships between indigenous and non-indigenous peoples on campus. strategies to accomplish this could range from intercultural programs, changes to the curriculum, cultural events, or even allyship brochures. many disciplines, such as social psychology, offer insight into intergroup processes, so further research into these intergroup relationships in the context of indigenous and non-indigenous relations would be beneficial. d. make indigenous knowledges and values fundamental in indigenization processes. many of the participants in this study discussed the importance, in specific or general terms, of making indigenous knowledges and values fundamental in indigenization processes. this is, of course, embedded in the first three policy recommendations. for example, one can easily see how relationality is imperative in building relationships among indigenous and non-indigenous people on campus to create a community that can work together. working with indigenous students, staff, and faculty is crucial to be able to bring diverse indigenous knowledges and values to the fore. grounding indigenization processes in these recommendations will help to avoid tokenism or inappropriate indigenization efforts (recommendation 1) and institutional exploitation of indigenous students engaged in indigenization (recommendation 2). they may also help reduce anti-indigenous racism at post-secondary institutions through improving intergroup relations (recommendation 3) and challenging epistemological racism (recommendation 4). these policy recommendations are mutually reinforcing. for example, ensuring indigenous peoples are authentically foundational in indigenization processes would likely encourage engagement in indigenization, and thus be part of building a community that can indigenize. they also may help with addressing indigenous faculty concerns with indigenization (warick, 2020). conclusion institutions across canada are taking steps to indigenize. it is fundamental that indigenous peoples be at the center of these processes and have space and support to work toward indigenization as they see fit. indigenization, just like indigenous peoples, is diverse; it might come to life through the privileging of 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.13.1.10700 indigenous values and knowledges, through understanding indigenous experiences, or through working as a community to challenge racism and structural barriers that stymie it. the participants in this study acknowledged the good work being done and shared their thoughts on improving indigenization processes. indigenization without indigenous input is not indigenization, and institutions looking to indigenize must privilege indigenous voices, input, and meaningful representation. references bailey, k. a. 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(n.d.). indigenous student awards. http://umanitoba.ca/financial-aid-andawards/indigenous university of saskatchewan. (2015). smudging and pipe ceremonies. https://policies.usask.ca/policies/health-safety-and-environment/smudging-and-pipeceremonies.php university of saskatchewan. (2017). appendix c8 indigenous learning requirement decolonization in the classroom. https://artsandscience.usask.ca/college/curriculumrenewal/appendix-c8.php university of saskatchewan. (2020). student headcount and demographics. https://www.usask.ca/isa/statistics/students/headcount-demographics.php university of saskatchewan. (n.d.a). indigenous learning requirement: how did we get here? https://artsandscience.usask.ca/college/curriculumrenewal/appendix-c2.php university of saskatchewan. (n.d.b). indigenization. https://teaching.usask.ca/curriculum/indigenization.php#indigenizationandtheuniversityofs askatchewan university of saskatchewan. (n.d.c). our learning charter. https://teaching.usask.ca/about/policies/learning-charter.php university of saskatchewan. (n.d.d). bachelor of education (b.ed.). https://programs.usask.ca/education/bachelor-of-education-bed/bed-early-middleyears.php#years1and260creditunits university of saskatchewan. (n.d.e). appendix c2 indigenous learning requirement background on process and consultation, and next steps. https://artsandscience.usask.ca/about/curriculumrenewal/appendix-c2.php#indigenouslearningrequirementhowdidwegethere university of saskatchewan graduate students’ association. (2020). university of saskatchewan graduate students’ association constitution. https://gsa.usask.ca/documents/importantdocuments/gsa-constitution-april-23,-2021.pdf university of winnipeg. (n.d.). indigenous course requirement. https://www.uwinnipeg.ca/indigenous/indigenous-course-requirement/ index.html vancouver island university. (n.d.) indigenous events. https://aboriginal.viu.ca/ 28 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.13.1.10700 warick, j. (2020, august 30). indigenous professors cite racism, lack of reform in university of saskatchewan exodus. cbc news. https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/saskatoon/ indigenous-professors-cite-racism-lack-of-reform-in-university-of-saskatchewan-exodus1.5703554 watters, h. (2015, june 1). truth and reconciliation chair urges canada to adopt un declaration on indigenous peoples. cbc news. https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/truth-and-reconciliationchair-urges-canada-to-adopt-un-declaration-on-indigenous-peoples-1.3096225 you sask confessions. (n.d.) home [facebook page]. facebook. retrieved march 10, 2021, from https://www.facebook.com/yousaskconfessions/ 29 efimoff: a thematic analysis of indigenous students’ experiences with indigenization at a canadian post-secondary institution published by scholarship@western, 2021 appendix a: interview guide 1. are you involved with the indigenous community at the university of saskatchewan? please describe. 2. are you engaged in any way with indigenization? 3. why are you engaged in indigenization? what factors contributed to your engagement? 4. do you have a role in the process of indigenization at the university of saskatchewan? a. probes: this may include others requesting you to sit on committees, attend meetings, and participate in events. it can also include your own initiatives geared toward indigenization. please share anything that comes to mind that you are comfortable with. 5. would you describe your experiences with indigenization at the university of saskatchewan as positive? a. probing questions: can you tell me about how your experience with indigenization at the university of saskatchewan has improved your academic success, social life, health, cultural connection, or family relations? 6. would you describe your experiences with indigenization at the university of saskatchewan as negative? a. probing questions: if applicable, can you tell me about how your experience with indigenization at the university of saskatchewan has decreased your academic success, or negatively affected your social life, health, cultural connection, or family relations? 7. if you are contributing to indigenization, do you feel supported by the university of saskatchewan in this process? why or why not? if no, how could the university of saskatchewan better support you? "a serious rift": the indigenous health research community's refusal of the 2014 cihr funding reforms and underlying methodological conservatism the international indigenous policy journal volume 13 | issue 3 december 2022 "a serious rift": the indigenous health research community's refusal of the 2014 cihr funding reforms and underlying methodological conservatism john rose queen’s university, canada, jwlrose@gmail.com heather castleden university of victoria, canada, castleden@uvic.ca recommended citation rose, j., & castleden h. (2022). "a serious rift": the indigenous health research community's refusal of the 2014 cihr funding reforms and underlying methodological conservatism. the international indigenous policy journal, 13(3). https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.13961 "a serious rift": the indigenous health research community's refusal of the 2014 cihr funding reforms and underlying methodological conservatism abstract in 2014, the canadian institutes of health research (cihr) senior administration established reforms to the open suite of programs and peer review processes (osp), implementing changes that it claimed would improve its funding and peer review structures. the purpose of the research reported in this paper was to investigate how cihr reforms to the osp were poised to negatively affect indigenous health research. we found that the reforms were guided by a governmental and institutional trajectory of methodological conservatism that (a) privileged commercial research over projects that focus on social determinants of health and community relations, and (b) created a peer review system re-designed in ways that reduce inclusiveness. interventions by the cihr institute of indigenous peoples health' advisory board and an ad-hoc indigenous health research steering committee (kahwa:tsire) were urgently organized and mobilized to reverse the cihr decisions that were being made under the guise of so-called 'consultation.’ keywords indigenous health, indigenous health policy, aboriginal health policy, canadian health policy, colonialism and health policy acknowledgments our deepest gratitude to the participants who volunteered their time, expertise, and experience to discuss the issues addressed in this study. our further thanks to the research assistance of marc calabretta and the copy-editing of dawn loewen. lastly, we dearly appreciate the constructive critiques of the peer reviewers who volunteered their time and expertise when reading an earlier draft of this paper, and the journal’s editorial staff for their support in moving this paper through to publication. funding from the canada research chairs program and the queen’s university research leaders fund supported the costs associated with this research. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ 1 rose & castleden: the indigenous health research community’s refusal of the 2014 cihr funding reforms published by scholarship@western, 2022 “a serious rift”: the indigenous health research community’s refusal of the 2014 cihr funding reforms and underlying methodological conservatism introduction: indigenous health in the colonial context purpose: reforms and research the canadian institutes of health research (cihr) is canada’s health research investment agency that supports biomedical, clinical, health systems services, and population (social, cultural) health research. comprising 13 institutes, cihr invests approximately $1 billion per year toward health initiatives through investigator-driven projects via open project competitions, as well as priority-driven projects identified by the government of canada as pressing health issues. the cihr governing council oversees strategic directions, performance, objectives, and budgets, and it appoints advisory boards that give non-binding advice to the 13 institutes. scientific directors lead each institute and form a science council that develops research and knowledge translation strategies for cihr (cihr, 2022). comparatively speaking, cihr performs functions similar to the national institutes of health in the united states, the national health and medical research council in australia, and the medical research council in the united kingdom. the purpose of the research reported on in this article was to investigate how cihr reforms to the open suite of programs (osp) and peer review processes from 2012 to 2014 affected the indigenous health research community in actual and perceived ways. cihr designed the reforms to change funding and peer review structures as administrators “became aware of the need to modernize existing frameworks to better capitalize on canada’s health research strengths” (cihr, 2012b, p. 36). cihr management identified a “paradigm shift” in how health research was being conducted around the world, arguing that “multidisciplinary, networked collaborations and timely research in emerging areas” were becoming the norm (cihr, 2012b, p. 36). by exploring strategic plans, internal and external reviews, design documents, and interviews with 22 indigenous health researchers, 1 we problematize the sweeping nature of these reforms. interestingly, not everyone saw the reforms as problematic. indeed, at an urgently called indigenous-led national meeting to call the reforms into question, the then cihr president, who made a public speech at the time, commented: “i would like to bring my personal views, not only those of cihr, about the stormy weather we have been experiencing lately . . . but not in the spirit of reconciliation, because i don’t think anything has been broken” (eggertson, 2016, para. 6). the dismissal of indigenous health researchers’ and indigenous health leaders’ concerns created a serious rift in the relationship. amplifying the voices of indigenous health researchers, this paper is part of an ongoing movement towards decolonial scholarship to counterbalance conventional eurocentric or western institutional policies and values (castleden et al., 2015). 1 when we use the term “indigenous health researchers,” we mean both indigenous and non-indigenous people who conduct research related to indigenous peoples. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.13961 the reason for investigating the cihr reforms is not just to understand the mechanisms that deliver health research funding, but to understand the unintended consequences of reforming funding and peer review processes in an era of so-called truth, healing, and reconciliation in canada (national centre for truth and reconciliation, 2022). while our focus is on cihr, our analysis has the potential for transferability to other funding and peer review reform contexts now and into the future, as well as how institutions are still largely ineffective in their responses to the 2015 truth and reconciliation commission’s 94 calls to action (see, for example, castleden et al., 2022; white & castleden, 2022). to understand how such reforms affected the indigenous health research community, the analysis requires some context about colonialism (not to mention neoliberalism as well, see swarts, 2013). understanding the nature of pervasive colonial policies and practices in canada is integral to comprehending the state of indigenous health; these policies, practices, and people have had profoundly negative impacts on indigenous peoples’ livelihoods. this paper is situated within a larger international discussion about how health policy can marginalize indigenous health research and community-based projects. research in new zealand, for example, criticized the restructuring of national science funding and how health reforms (commercialization) lacked consultation and consideration for culturally distinct māori knowledge (prussing & newbury, 2016). similarly, research in south america argued that reforms to health care services (contracting out services to the private sector) have created barriers to collaboration between government and communities in providing health care services (maupin, 2009). researchers in asia argued that the inclusion of indigenous knowledge in health policy is valuable to future medical challenges when integrating biomedical practices (janes, 1999). health research in australia, canada, new zealand, south america, and the united states has demonstrated that increased participation of indigenous community members, self-governance initiatives, and community-motivated health policy improves access to health services (bernstein, 2017; feagin & bennefield, 2014; kelaher et al., 2014). colonizing indigenous bodies in canada the effects of colonialism are ongoing, and canadian institutions have historically been responsible for indigenous health crises (daschuk, 2013; royal commission on aboriginal peoples [rcap], 1996). dispossession and appropriation have obscured and ruptured cultural continuity by changing and restricting access to the land—yet land is central to maintaining health for indigenous peoples (castleden et al., 2016; milloy, 1999; tobias, 1991). current indigenous health is connected to the past, as distal determinants of health (the political, economic, and social contexts of colonialism) construct the intermediate determinants (health care systems and delivery and the systemic barriers associated with them) and influence proximal determinants (statistics, indicators, individual behaviours; reading & wien, 2009). current health care systems and frames of analysis often neglect historical context and do not reflect wholistic approaches to health that take physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual dimensions into consideration (reading & wien, 2009). many elements common to indigenous understandings of health are absent from canadian health care (e.g., the importance of seasons, directions, the elements of life, and spiritual entities; castleden et al., 2016). health data has historically been fragmented as national surveys often neglect indigenous people, and there has been an 3 rose & castleden: the indigenous health research community’s refusal of the 2014 cihr funding reforms published by scholarship@western, 2022 absence of health measures that are culturally relevant and reflect indigenous perspectives (reading & wien, 2009). the harm from historical and ongoing colonialism (see, e.g., churchill, 2004; miller, 1991; rcap, 1996) motivates approaches to research that follow distinct ethical guidelines (ball & janyst, 2008; castellano & reading, 2010). in the past (and today), academic work involving indigenous peoples has often privileged the researcher over the researched, necessitating collaborative approaches (battiste & youngblood henderson, 2000). the 2007 cihr guidelines for health research involving aboriginal people promoted collaborative approaches to research through the four ethical principles of ocap® (ownership, control, access, and possession of data) underpinning research involving any first nations (cihr, 2007, section 2.3). those guidelines were replaced in 2010, and updated in 2018, with the tricouncil policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans; its chapter 9 provides ethical guidance for indigenous-focused research in canada (panel on research ethics, 2018). the document has had a relatively productive influence in cultivating relationships built on ethical principles, allowing researchers to learn what ethics means to indigenous communities (moore et al., 2017). the guidelines highlight community-based participatory research, a well-recognized approach in indigenous research that promotes shared decision-making power between researchers and communities, reducing power imbalances, co-creating knowledge, and encouraging the decolonization of traditional research processes (castleden et al., 2012). with this context in mind, along with the perspectives of indigenous health researchers, this paper considers who benefits from funding reforms, and the value institutions place on scholarship that does not adhere to traditional eurocentric or western deliverables. case context and reform opposition when cihr was founded in 2000, the institute of aboriginal peoples’ health (iaph; now the institute of indigenous peoples’ health or iiph) was one of 13 founding institutes.2 its purpose is to “[foster] the advancement of a national research agenda to improve and promote the health of first nations, inuit and métis peoples in canada through research, knowledge translation and capacity building” (iiph, 2022). one of the first initiatives of the iaph was to create the aboriginal capacity and developmental research environments (acadre) program to build capacity and train indigenous health researchers. the need for such an initiative was clear, as there were only a handful of senior indigenous health scholars at the time and the academy was (and continues to be) steeped in colonial and racial ignorance (godlewska et al., 2010). the acadre program evolved into the network environments for aboriginal health research (neahr) in 2007, which included nine research centres across the country (richmond et al., 2013). the centres were designed to pursue scientific knowledge, advance capacity and infrastructure in indigenous health research, provide the appropriate environment for scientists to pursue research in partnerships with indigenous communities, provide opportunities for indigenous communities and organizations to identify research objectives in collaboration with health researchers, and provide the appropriate environment for indigenous and non-indigenous students to pursue careers in indigenous health research, services, and professions (neahr, 2011). 2 in this paper, we use the term “indigenous” to refer to the original inhabitants of the land now known as canada, and we use “aboriginal” if we are referring to a specific organization that uses the term aboriginal peoples. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.13961 while indigenous health researchers valued neahr (and acadre) as an important capacity-building network, cihr senior administration defunded the program in 2014 (mccormick & wien, 2014). a report for the iaph from 2011, produced by an expert review team comprising dr. jeffrey henderson, professor linda tuhiwai smith, and professor fiona stanley, noted that both the acadre and neahr programs were the primary vehicles for iaph to “address student and faculty development and training, institutional infrastructure, community outreach and engagement, bioethics and knowledge translation” (henderson, 2011, p. 3). the expert review team characterized neahr as the “flagship program” of the iaph. researchers saw neahr as transforming the indigenous health research landscape by funding graduate work and providing mentorship for building community relations; many researchers attribute their success to the acadre and neahr programs, which provided training and funding, and supported their ability to make connections that continue in their work as tenured faculty. scholars, faced with reforms to funding models, peer review processes, and invaluable capacity-building programs, thus organized to protect indigenous health research from administrative decisions.3 cihr began internally producing reform documents in 2012, and as rumours began swirling about the potential for dramatic change, indigenous health researchers organized to voice their opposition. in 2014, dr. jeff reading (former scientific director of iaph) drafted an open letter to cihr administration addressing “a serious rift” between cihr and indigenous health researchers, and invited colleagues to sign in support. in response, 75 indigenous health researchers, health practitioners, and scholars signed. the letter argued that cihr was ending a commitment to build capacity by eliminating mechanisms that provided space for indigenous health priorities. the signatories claimed that cihr was constructing barriers that would discourage proposals from the indigenous health research community (mccormick & wien, 2014). the letter, addressed to then president alain beaudet, did not receive a substantive response (kahwa:tsire, 2015). the letter campaign marked the beginning of an ad hoc aboriginal health research steering committee (ahrsc), which formalized itself in november 2014 and became the driving force for opposing the reforms and advocating for trainees as well as early career indigenous health researchers. ahrsc was formed initially by senior researchers (full professors and professors emerita) and representatives from national indigenous organizations to raise concerns about the new reforms and to suggest postponing implementation and considering alternatives. it was seen as creating a unifying voice and ensuring the iaph scientific director, the iaph advisory committee, and indigenous organizations were involved and informed: “each of the steering committee members wrote compelling letters to the cihr president and to governing council. these letters, too, did not merit a response” (kahwa:tsire, 2015, para. 2). reflecting on that time, interview participants, by and large, felt the decisions around funding for indigenous health research were not consultative, were not meaningful, and did not constitute free prior and informed consent. the ahrsc campaign networked with national indigenous health organizations and convened a oneday meeting in ottawa in 2016 with the cihr president and vice presidents, the scientific director of 3 kahwa:tsire, a movement which details the responses of indigenous health researchers to what they/we considered an emerging crisis between the funding agency and the indigenous health research community at the time, can be found at https://kahwatsire.files.wordpress.com https://kahwatsire.files.wordpress.com/ 5 rose & castleden: the indigenous health research community’s refusal of the 2014 cihr funding reforms published by scholarship@western, 2022 the iaph, and representatives from at least 30 major health organizations across canada, as well as cmaj (canadian medical association journal). the meeting increased pressure on cihr senior management to seriously consider ahrsc recommendations regarding the reforms. it was at this meeting that the cihr president made the previously quoted comments about approaching the meeting “not in the spirit of reconciliation” because he did not believe “anything had been broken” by the reforms (eggertson, 2016, para. 6). the ahrsc had recommended increasing indigenous health research funding from its then current amount of less than 1% to 4.6% of the cihr budget (representing the indigenous population in canada; eggertson, 2016, para. 1). cihr investment in indigenous health research slipped from 3.7% in 2009 to 3.3% in 2014 then to 1% (webster, 2015, para. 6). ahrsc also recommended maintaining face-to-face peer review processes and increasing indigenous representation on the cihr governing council, as well as adding a new vice president of indigenous health research. methods data collection we collected two types of data: interviews and documents. we conducted 22 semi-structured interviews with indigenous health researchers from january 2017 to may 2017 to understand their perspectives on cihr reforms. we recruited interviewees from the list of signatories to the letter campaign opposing cihr reforms and/or individuals who were involved in the ahrsc in an effort to reach informed participants about the ongoing changes to cihr’s funding and review structures. participants were asked open-ended questions about their relationship with indigenous health research, cihr, and the proposed changes to funding models and peer review processes to ensure depth in responses (denzin & lincoln, 2011). the second author was an active member of the iaph advisory board when the reforms were being enacted. respondents were interviewed and recorded, by phone or in person, by a trained research assistant. interviews lasted from 15 to 60 minutes and were then transcribed verbatim. the documents we used in the study include government policy papers, articles from cmaj covering the reforms, and cihr strategic plans, progress and program reviews, funding statistic reports, and reform design documents. this project was approved by the general research ethics board at queen’s university. all participants identified as indigenous health researchers (n = 22), 45% identified as indigenous (n = 10), and 68% were women (n = 15). a majority 55% of participants identified as senior or late-stage researchers (n = 12), and 86% of participants worked under pillar 4 (socio-cultural research) of cihr (n = 19), but 36% of participants worked under at least two different pillars (n = 8). a majority 77% of interviewees had participated in the peer review process either as reviewers or as committee members (n = 17), and 86% had cihr funding at the time of the interview (n = 19). data analysis coding of both interviews and documents followed a thematic content analysis approach by identifying terms, phrases, and ideas that were either common between interview participants or identified as meaningful by participants through direct statements or repeated use of phrases, terms, or ideas (berg, 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.13961 2001; cope, 2016; waitt, 2016). the data were coded in qualitative data management software based on themes and subjects of inquiry (e.g., peer review processes, capacity-building programs, funding model reforms). a second round of coding used a similar process, identifying themes stressed in the documents as well as relevant themes identified by interview participants. reform framework methodological conservatism methodological conservatism emphasizes positivist or clinical research models and “produces and privileges” specific types of scientific knowledge (lincoln & cannella, 2004, p. 7). institutional governing bodies seek to create a monoculture by promoting “a single discursive and methodological community that speaks the same language and takes concerns from the same perspectives” (lincoln & cannella, 2004, p. 8). alternative modes of inquiry (e.g., qualitative) are often labelled as less rigorous, non-intellectual, “soft,” or lacking reason (denzin & lincoln, 2011, p. 2; lincoln & cannella, 2004, p. 8). an increase in popularity of positivism in government institutions across north america since the mid-1980s leaves qualitative study often treated as a “quasi-discipline” (atkinson & delamont, 2006, p. 751). institutions create “guiding principles” that attempt to shift the defining characteristics of “good” or “appropriate” research toward more positivist approaches (block, 2004, p. 100). for example, analysis of the no child left behind act of 2001 in the u.s. found that regulations established what kind of studies would be funded and what kinds of evidence would be considered “scientific” (lincoln & cannella, 2004, p. 7). in education research and literacy, empirical strategic interventions like test scores, cost-benefit analyses, and the discourse of “hard scientific evidence” helped define “effective” scientific inquiry (block, 2004, p. 98). positivist, evidence-based models of inquiry can neglect the diversity of qualitative inquiry, privileging numbers and figures over stories and narrative; evidence is not singular, and knowledge is relational with contexts (denzin, 2009; hammersley, 2001). a critical document analysis of cihr reforms reveal a methodological conservatism as certain models of scientific inquiry were given an advantage over others. indigenous health researchers opposed reforms that risked homogenizing research around already-established positivist norms by privileging senior, established researchers rather than acknowledging the cultural contexts necessary to pursue community-engaged research. the documents that animated the cihr reforms reveal institutional changes that privileged established research in technical pillars over emerging community-based research. findings 1: reform design and context pre-reform documents several organizational documents point to the motivations for reforming cihr’s osp, framing the trajectory of health research largely around industry, technology, and commercial outputs rather than community-based research. the 2007 federal strategy “mobilizing science and technology to canada’s advantage,” released by industry canada, prompted the early stages of reform and emphasized a strong private-sector commitment to science and technology. the conservative government of the day argued that the private sector would “identify and lead new research networks” with government support for “large-scale research and commercialization” (government of canada, 2007, p. 13). 7 rose & castleden: the indigenous health research community’s refusal of the 2014 cihr funding reforms published by scholarship@western, 2022 the 2009 cihr “health research roadmap” (hrr) strategic plan drew from the “mobilizing” strategy and focused on the commercialization of health research, international collaboration, and multidisciplinary training. the hrr stated that “there is considerable room for improvement of commercialization of health research results,” noting the importance of patents and that “investing in health research yields significant economic returns” (cihr, 2009, context for strategic planning section, paras. 6–7). the hrr’s strategic directions emphasized supporting “commercialization by creating incentives for health researchers to work with private sector partners” (cihr, 2009, strategic direction 3, para. 4). the hrr concentrated on finding ways to yield economic returns on health research and working with private partners like pharmaceutical manufacturers to improve technologies and health products. this emphasis on commercial potential and economic yields formed a trajectory, through clear strategic directives, that posed a challenge to indigenous health researchers whose approach to improving health included building community relationships, committing to participatory research, and understanding indigenous ways of knowing. the 2011 cihr international review panel (irp), comprising health care professionals and scholars largely from the united states but also the united kingdom, western europe, and australia, also made several recommendations related to funding structures and industry relationships. the irp called for commercialization of research, echoing the “mobilizing” strategy and hrr, and argued that the “translation of canadian science into products and services that can sustain competitiveness” was lacking (cihr, 2011, p. 1). the irp noted there was no strategy “to actively commercialize basic research findings” to create high-profile technology, well-paid jobs, and tax revenue for canada (cihr, 2011, p. 14). another major recommendation from the irp was to issue larger grants with longer terms to relieve peer review fatigue and consolidate grant committees (cihr, 2011, p. 11). the cihr’s 2014 hrr ii strategic plan also focused on “leveraging successful commercialization networks and hubs, forging alliances and creating pre-competitive consortia with new industry partners, and supporting public-private partnerships and collaborations” (cihr, 2015, p. 24). in short, cihr’s public documents leading up to the reforms all employed language related to conventional industry, biotechnology, and commercialization but almost completely neglected discussing the value of community-engaged research, justice, equity, and indigenous ways of knowing. the cihr reforms were guided by a governmental and institutional trajectory that explicitly favoured research that promised economic returns. cihr funding structure cihr documents drew from the aforementioned pre-reform documents, recommending a new “streamlined” osp and a “need to modernize existing frameworks and systems to better capitalize on canada’s health research strengths” (cihr, 2012a, p. 3; cihr, 2012b, p. 36). after the federal government released the “mobilizing” strategy (government of canada, 2007) and cihr issued the hrr (2009), the cihr science council established a reform task force in 2010 that included representatives from each of the four cihr pillars of health research (biomedical, clinical, health systems services, and socio-cultural). cihr released a preliminary reform “design discussion document” to canadian health researchers in february 2012 (cihr 2012a), followed by a survey detailing health researcher feedback (solicited through meetings and online forums) in august 2012 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.13961 (“what cihr heard”; cihr, 2012c), and a final proposal for the new reforms to the osp in december 2012 (“designing for the future”; cihr, 2012b). as a result, two new funding schemes emerged, both of which rewarded established researchers. the new foundation scheme was established to create granting opportunities for long-term support to “research leaders” with “demonstrated track records of success” who have made an impact in their field of study (cihr, 2012b, p. 7). the new scheme aimed to reduce the time these seasoned researchers spent on writing or renewing grant applications. this commitment to established researchers in the foundation scheme concerned indigenous health researchers who, as noted below, worked to support emerging researchers committed to new, participatory methods that did not necessarily conform to established institutional approaches and outputs. a new project scheme proposed supporting grants for new, innovative research, and “high-risk lines of inquiry or knowledge translation approaches” (cihr, 2012b, p. 9). the foundation scheme was much more lucrative, and although the project scheme was available to emerging researchers, the emphasis on commercially viable research and lack of definition of “high-risk” inquiry left the parameters of the scheme open-ended. the february 2012 “design discussion document” noted that too much peer review committee time was being spent discussing applicants everyone agreed should be funded, or applications that were severely flawed (cihr, 2012a, p. 4). the new schemes were designed to “help manage applicant and reviewer burden by reducing the number of applicants who move on to full application,” and the new screening process was designed to allow for early recognition of outstanding and non-competitive applications (cihr, 2012a, p. 4). cihr peer review two crucial changes proposed to the peer review process involved creating a college of reviewers to manage reviewing, and implementing virtual (online) or asynchronous reviews. the rationale for the changes came from the 2009 hrr, which drew from the cihr’s irp from 2005–2006 and the president’s roundtable discussion in 2008–2009, both of which noted fatigue in the current peer review system. the main issues were related to time, the high volume of applications, and increasing multidisciplinary proposals. the hrr committed to ensuring that review panels had proper expertise, reviewers were given a reasonable number of applications, there were qualified reviewers with more international experts, and appropriate instructions would be provided to reviewers (cihr, 2009). while the hrr argued that the cihr peer review system had served canadians well and was internationally recognized for its design and effectiveness, the document still called for improvements (cihr, 2009, strategic direction 1). the 2011 irp included a synopsis of the peer review system and argued it suffered from “excessive complexity”; reviewers were fatigued from reviewing previously submitted proposals multiple times, and the proliferation of grant committees caused confusion amongst scientists applying for grants (cihr, 2011, p. 11). the college of reviewers was created to facilitate access to appropriate expertise and provide frameworks to recruit and train reviewers. it was designed as a framework for organizing and managing groups of reviewers, instead of institutes organizing committees themselves (cihr, 2012a, p. 19; cihr 2012b, p. 22). the new college was imagined as a “centrally-managed resource” providing “support and orientation” for reviewers (cihr, 2012b, p. 23). as indigenous health researchers note below, this system risked obfuscating the emerging, nuanced approaches to community-based research and 9 rose & castleden: the indigenous health research community’s refusal of the 2014 cihr funding reforms published by scholarship@western, 2022 indigenous ways of knowing amidst a large, centralized system dominated by conventional approaches to research. moreover, the new review process would involve more impersonal, virtual environments controlled by senior administration through the college of reviewers. the design documents argued that virtual reviews would “bring reviewers together in a virtual space” for “internet-assisted discussions (virtual peer review).” reviews, for the most part, “would be individual . . . with opportunities to discuss, justify, and exchange perspectives” (cihr, 2012a, p. 20). cihr institutes and budgets in addition to the new funding schemes and peer review reforms, cihr senior administration reformed the institutes in 2014, including reallocating 50% of each institute budget to a common research fund. the “institutes modernization,” as it was termed, was designed to “enhance collaboration across research pillars, disciplines, communities and sectors” (cihr, 2014, section 1). many indigenous health researchers felt this program, in conjunction with the earlier reforms, created a disadvantage for indigenous health research by drawing away much-needed funds for capacity-building, communitybased research (e.g., through neahr). cihr eliminated institute advisory boards and reassigned and laid off several ottawa-based institute staff, many of whom had a wealth of knowledge of their specific associations within their institutes (eggertson, 2015). findings 2: resistance and criticism reform criticism the interview participants (referred hitherto as “participants” were worried about how the reduction of institute budgets would disproportionately affect indigenous health research through a common, competitive pool of funds (mccormick & wien, 2014). they felt the amount of money going into indigenous health research would decrease with the rumoured reforms, signalling a move away from relying on the iaph. some participants went as far as calling the reforms “disastrous” and “chaotic.” ultimately, participants resented the reforms and felt they were problematic. even participants who felt the reforms may have been well intended were still critical and wondered if the funding process was fair and equitable. convention, competition, and homogenization: methodological conservatism in reforms one of the major criticisms from participants related to the privileging of established researchers, and creating more competition between early, senior, and mid-career scholars. participants felt that indigenous health research was still “emerging” and not well established in mainstream health scholarship, thus putting their research at a disadvantage in the foundation scheme competition which awards “superstars in their field.” as one participant noted, the new scheme “marginalizes indigenous health research and researchers” as “a lot of us are relatively new—we’re early or mid-career.” other participants remarked that indigenous health research is at a disadvantage because it is less established than other fields like cancer research, genetics, molecular biology, or beta cell transplantation in diabetes. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.13961 some participants felt the new funding pool created competition between researchers in a way that failed to take into account disciplinary practices around publishing. publication numbers become central to the competition, but community-engaged research often puts more emphasis on capacity-building, reflection, and action and less emphasis on publications. as one participant argued: in order to obtain a foundation scheme grant you really have to demonstrate that you are the top in not just your own field, but you’re competing against all these other folks that are in all these other fields that have different measures of success. . . . if you’re going up against someone whose whole career has been built around publishing . . . and your career is built around community relationships and understanding different ways of knowing as a means to improve health, then your ability to compete is compromised. another participant described reforms as a form of forced homogenization that marginalizes indigenous health research: “without thinking about equity. without thinking about the impact and basically saying ‘well, indigenous health research is just health research. and so, we’re going to do everything the same.’” participants felt that the initial screening process for foundation scheme funding emphasized “traditional scholarly success measures” where “one is challenged to see where those who excel in relationship-building with aboriginal communities and other qualities essential to the field would detail this information.” participants further argued that the “shape of cihr funding” did not appear to be community-based or in line with indigenous political, social, health, or policy goals; nor did it involve authentic consultations with communities and researchers but, instead, took a top-down approach. there were concerns that community-engaged research and indigenous ways of knowing might not be seen as valuable in the broader health research world, or that there would be insufficient funds for research into social determinants of health. it is well established that privileging conventional, quantifiable academic metrics of success (number of publications, amount of grant funds held, commercialization) disadvantages community-engaged research (castleden et al., 2015). participants argued that cihr had a heavy bias toward the biomedical field or at least emphasized biomedical research. indigenous health researchers acknowledged the importance of the biomedical pillar, but a difficulty in doing biomedical research “without making indigenous people the objects of research” rather than collaborators. some participants said there was an expectation from cihr that scholars should find funds from industry partners, which could be a conflict of interest for indigenous health research—for example, if a resource extraction company is funding research, but was a source of ill health to the community, or where commodification of intellectual property is not in line with indigenous values. participants emphasized the social determinants of health, as one participant noted: indigenous understandings of health tend to be very wholistic and encompassing the spiritual, the emotional, the intellectual, and the physical. that needs to be reflected in health funding. if we overemphasize the biomedical and clinical, which are very, very expensive forms of health services, we’re not really reflecting the indigenous ways of knowing . . . we can’t really respond effectively to indigenous health issues, as identified by indigenous peoples and nations. the letter campaign in 2014 indicated the successes of indigenous health researchers and community partners and noted the dominance of funding for the biomedical pillar and the importance of socio11 rose & castleden: the indigenous health research community’s refusal of the 2014 cihr funding reforms published by scholarship@western, 2022 economic, cultural, and historical approaches to the iaph research community (mccormick & wien, 2014). participants commented on the specific challenges of doing community-engaged indigenous research, and the time and energy it takes to develop relationships with community members, put together proposals, and meet unrealistic institutional deadlines, when new reforms may not allow reviewers to appreciate the value and depth of such research. much of the frustration with the direction of research at cihr was about endangering engagement with communities and having a level playing field for all research pillars. the funding schemes were not the only point of contention, as the peer review process was also a subject of concern. peer reviews participants expressed concerns about the qualifications of peer reviewers for indigenous health research proposals. participants favoured institute-specific review committees, face-to-face meetings, and an iterative review process; they felt the college of reviewers was limited in its capacity to review, as most health researchers were not informed about community-engaged research. participants were largely opposed to the college of reviewers introducing new conditions on who could be accepted as a reviewer. one participant noted that the new peer review process felt like “a lottery,” possibly insinuating that the reviewer selection process did not consider expertise on certain subjects. since institute-specific review committees no longer existed, participants were concerned that review processes could include unfair bias, and knowledge of indigenous health research would not be required to review related project proposals. one participant noted that there were “biomedically trained researchers talking about doing cohort studies for my project, which makes absolutely no sense for my proposed community-based, participatory research that was qualitative in nature; a random control trial would have no value in this context.” others noted that reviews of indigenous health proposals were being conducted by non-experts, which could disadvantage applications when reviewers do not understand the content. participants felt that biomedical and clinical researchers were often not qualified to review indigenous health research proposals and felt reviewers sometimes did not engage meaningfully with their projects and take them seriously. participants received praise from their fellow indigenous health researchers for their work, but biomedical colleagues sometimes did not see the value in the achievements and innovations of indigenous health or traditional medicine. if reviewers did not have certain knowledge—for example, if they did not know what “two-eyed seeing” embodied (an iaph guiding principle)—then participants felt the reviews were not actually peer-to-peer; it was as if an ophthalmologist was being asked to evaluate a heart surgeon’s protocol, or vice versa—they were simply unqualified to do so. it was important to participants that reviewers understand that “certain groups face systemic oppressions that are going to impact their output in ways [that] it’s not impacting other people.” the collaborative and personal nature of face-to-face reviews was important to participants. peer reviewing was regarded as a moment when “everyone learns from each other.” many felt that reviews for indigenous health research should include indigenous reviewers “who can articulate whether the research will be successful in terms of the prospective methodologies that they would be comfortable with.” one participant noted that having indigenous and non-indigenous reviewers at the same table is important for working together and talking about issues, and there should be space for elders and 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.13961 indigenous knowledge-holders on review committees. virtual review formats can cut discussions short and make it more difficult to communicate ideas. ensuring reviewers were accountable to one another was also important to participants. the value of face-to-face discussions in the review process was expressed by many, who noted that sitting across the table from one another is necessary to read body language, but virtual reviews do not require the same level of “serious review” and nuances that face-to-face reviews offer. one participant noted that face-toface reviews allow opportunities to catch issues with proposals that might go unnoticed in a virtual process where individual reviewers are not present and attentive and where they “can’t engage as deeply with the conversation.” another participant noted: well, there’s nothing saying that i couldn’t give it [a review] to one of my research assistants and say, “here, review this. write up your comments. i’m paying you to do it,” and then just enter them in. . . . [a]cross [all four pillars] there was concern that this was happening because we know it happens in other circumstances . . . and it’s unethical. but having a face-to-face meeting really forces people to get their work done before they have to show up at the meeting and speak with at least some authority on the subject to be able to say what the strengths are and what the weaknesses are. ultimately, the participants felt that face-to-face review meetings ensured accountability, encouraged a deeper consideration of proposals, and were more interactive with “much broader and much deeper and richer conversations” than online. participants largely felt that the college of reviewers could not adequately train reviewers to understand the historical context of indigenous health issues, as providing such training would involve experience in conducting community-based or participatory research. one participant noted that videoconferences are, at least, “much better than the phone” and save on time. indigenous health researchers, then, were not completely closed to the idea of using online processes, but rather the concern was about quality and accountability. conclusion fundamental problems participants felt that the reforms seriously threatened indigenous health research writ large, as the foundation scheme privileged senior, established researchers in the biomedical and clinical pillars, while indigenous health research remained only an emerging field within the funding landscape. participants noted that an emphasis on conventional and technical scholarly measures of success (publications, commodities) risked homogenizing research at cihr and marginalizing indigenous health research, which emphasizes capacity-building and relationships. the peer review reforms created a centrally managed college of reviewers, eliminating the institute-specific review boards, leaving participants feeling that reviewers often did not possess the knowledge to understand the methods and/or value of community-led indigenous health research. the covid-19 pandemic has altered the landscape of scholarly communications. perspectives about virtual peer reviews that were done in 2014 and the view of participants from 2017 data collection may 13 rose & castleden: the indigenous health research community’s refusal of the 2014 cihr funding reforms published by scholarship@western, 2022 differ considerably in 2022, especially as we have been living through extensive, wide-ranging, and lengthy lock-downs. the concerns that indigenous health researchers expressed about peer review qualifications, institute-specific review committees, and knowledge of indigenous ways of knowing remain important to responding to the health needs of indigenous peoples. the technological shift we have witnessed over the past two years, due to covid-19, adds an additional challenge to scholars committed to community-based participatory research and the personal nature of building relationships. the lens of methodological conservatism illuminates how ideological contexts influence reforms, how certain kinds of research are privileged over others, and what is deemed appropriate research in peer review processes. the reforms constituted a trajectory of supporting established researchers, and homogenizing research by emphasizing commercially lucrative and technologically centred research. cihr built the reforms on a government framework that emphasized conventional industry and commodification. as participants noted, the reforms reflected a conservatism that valued more accepted research methodologies, designed to standardize and homogenize research. defunding capacity-building programs and continuing to support technical pillars normalizes a positivist approach to research, devaluing the work of building connections between researchers and communities; community-based research and collaboration with indigenous communities caters health research to people’s actual needs (castleden et al., 2012; reading & wien, 2009). indigenous health researchers recognize that they work in the context of colonialism, racism, and intergenerational trauma, all of which require adherence to certain practices that ensure community involvement toward culturally safe decolonizing research (e.g., the previously mentioned chapter 9 of the tri-council policy statement and the cihr guidelines for health research). the gap between what indigenous health researchers needed to continue their work and what cihr senior administrators wanted to change through reforms was expressed through one participant’s frustrations: “it’s like we’re talking two different languages.” while cihr senior administration conducted consultations with health researchers, many participants saw the consultation process as unilateral, top-down, and without free and prior informed consent. cihr released reform design documents in early 2012, and consultation feedback later that year, including town hall discussions, meetings, emails, letters, and online surveys completed by researchers to gauge perspectives on the reforms. the consultations included 82 discussions with institutes and associate partners, 22 comments on a web feedback forum, and over 200 emails from mostly senior researchers in the biomedical pillar (cihr, 2012c). cihr sent an anonymous feedback survey to 513 researchers across the four pillars, but many researchers from the socio-cultural pillar were not represented in the feedback. only 16% (n = 82) of health researchers in the socio-cultural pillar responded. such a small fraction of responses makes the ahrsc’s work important as a collective voice for the indigenous health research community, as many participants felt cihr failed to understand their needs. future considerations as a result of the actions of the indigenous health research community, cihr began to reverse some of its reforms. in 2017, cihr senior administration released a plan titled “action plan: building a 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.13961 healthier future for first nations, inuit and métis peoples.” this 10-point plan called for the implementation of a new institute advisory board for the iaph and increased indigenous health investments to 4.6% of the cihr budget (cihr, 2017). however, the socio-cultural pillar is the only one with a fiscal year investment that decreased from 2012 to 2016. post-reforms, socio-cultural and health systems services were the least funded pillars at 8% of total cihr funding (cihr, 2018a). a relatively recent cihr initiative entitled pathways to health equity for aboriginal peoples (cihr, 2018b) includes the network environments for indigenous health research (neihr) program. functioning much like the former neahr program, neihr commits over $100 million to capacitybuilding, research, and knowledge translation. this post-reform commitment from cihr to continue capacity-building is notably responsive to the concerns of indigenous health researchers. the 1996 rcap report and the 2015 truth and reconciliation commission calls to action recommended closing the health gaps between indigenous and non-indigenous people in canada, creating equitable health policies with appropriate finances for implementation, and respecting the distinct health needs of indigenous peoples (rcap, 1996; trc, 2015). thus, the efforts of the ahrsc were responding to a substantial body of work. why was it necessary to cancel the neahr program, revise the iaph budget, and implement dramatic changes to funding and peer review processes? it is puzzling that the cihr senior administration disregarded the praise the 2011 irp panelists gave the iaph for excelling at public engagement in research projects (kondro, 2009). the irp noted that other institutes serving non-indigenous communities ought to embrace the value of more public engagement to put knowledge translation into practice (cihr, 2011, p. 17). the efforts of indigenous health researchers to resist the reforms represent an important lesson in why all researchers ought to take a critical interest in how funding agencies are structured and how funding decisions impact equity in the social, health, and natural sciences. references atkinson, p., & delamont, s. 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(2010). indigenous peoples and climate change. the international indigenous policy journal, 1(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.2 his editorial is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in he international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. indigenous peoples and climate change abstract there has been a growing attention on the need to take into account the effects of global climate change. this is particularly so with respect to the increasing amount of green house gas emissions from the untied states and europe affecting poor peoples, especially those in developing countries. in 2003, for example, the experts of several international development agencies, including the world bank, prepared a special report titled “poverty and climate change: reducing the vulnerability of the poor through adaptation” (oecd 2003). this report followed the eighth session of the conference of parties (cop8) to the united nations framework convention on climate change (unfccc) in new delhi, india in october 2002. it showed that poverty reduction is not only one of the major challenges of the 21st century, but also that climate change is taking place in many developing countries and is increasingly affecting, in a negative fashion, both the economic conditions and the health of poor people and their communities. keywords indigenous populations, climate change, green house gas emissions acknowledgments this paper is based on a presentation given at the naimun conference on february 15, 2008 creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ introduction there has been a growing attention on the need to take into account the effects of global climate change. this is particularly so with respect to the increasing amount of green house gas emissions from the untied states and europe affecting poor peoples, especially those in developing countries. in 2003, for example, the experts of several international development agencies, including the world bank, prepared a special report titled “poverty and climate change: reducing the vulnerability of the poor through adaptation” (oecd 2003). this report followed the eighth session of the conference of parties (cop8) to the united nations framework convention on climate change (unfccc) in new delhi, india in october 2002. it showed that poverty reduction is not only one of the major challenges of the 21st century, but also that climate change is taking place in many developing countries and is increasingly affecting, in a negative fashion, both the economic conditions and the health of poor people and their communities. the “poverty and climate change” report by the oecd (2003) notes that, in order to deal with the effects of climate change on poor people and their communities, it is necessary to create and strengthen several climate change adaptation efforts that have a significant and concurrent effect on both poverty reduction and sustainable development. further, this report also suggests that progress in such adaptation efforts necessarily requires provision of “improved governance” and “empowerment of communities” so “they can participate in assessments and feed in their knowledge to provide useful climate poverty information” (2003, xi). finally, the report also states that to empower such poor communities “they will also need full access to climate relevant information systems” (2003, xi). 1 davis: indigenous peoples and climate change published by scholarship@western, 2010 it is also interesting to note that along with this report on “poverty and climate change,” there was also a very important statement by indigenous peoples from around the world, who held a special indigenous peoples caucus at the cop8. this “indigenous peoples statement” stated that “we consider that our mother earth is sacred…[and] it must be honored, protected, and loved” (un 2002, 1). it also affirmed that “this special relationship to mother earth binds us to conserve the biodiversity for the survival of the present and future generations” (un 2002, 1). [furthermore, o]ur duty as indigenous peoples to mother earth impels us to demand that we be provided adequate opportunity to participate fully and actively at all levels of local, national, regional and international decision-making processes and mechanisms on climate change…[and that w]e, indigenous peoples, live in sensitive zones where effects of climate change are most devastating. traditional ways of life are disproportionately affected by climate change particularly in polar and arid zones, forests, wetlands, rivers and costal areas (un 2002, 1). based upon these and other noted reasons, the “indigenous peoples statement” called upon the members of the unfccc to recognize the fundamental role of indigenous peoples in tackling climate change and environmental degradation [and to] approve the creation of a working group of indigenous peoples on climate change to meet the objectives to study and propose timely, effective and adequate solutions in response to the urgent situation caused by climate change (un 2002, 2). despite this attempt by several of the world’s indigenous peoples in 2002 to get greater international focus on the role that climate change was having on their lifestyles, environments, 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.2 and cultures as well as their capacity to assist in the protection against and control of climate change, there was little formal attention to the concerns of indigenous peoples relating to climate change until five years later. in 2007, the general assembly of the united nations adopted the declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples. in that same year we note a growing amount of attention on the part of the united nations and other international agencies on the need to take into account the rights, needs, and knowledge of indigenous peoples in projects dealing with climate change. in the remainder of this paper, i will focus on what we have learned in the last two years about the rights, needs, and knowledge of indigenous peoples in relation to the mitigation of, and adaptation to, climate change. i would also like to discuss not only how some of the members of the united nations have focused upon the rights, needs, and knowledge of indigenous peoples in relation to climate change, but also how there have been some difficulties in introducing these rights, needs, and knowledge of indigenous peoples into the recommendations that resulted from the un conference on climate change held in bali, indonesia in december of 2007. recent studies: universities and non-governmental organizations on climate change and indigenous peoples i would like remind us that there are estimated to be over 350 million indigenous persons, comprising 5,000 different aboriginal tribes, who live in more than 70 countries throughout the world, including here in the untied states, canada, and all of the countries of latin america, as well as within the continents of africa, asia, and most of the islands of the pacific. in may 2007, a very important report entitled “indigenous peoples and climate change,” was published as a result of a symposium held at the tyndall centre for climate change research at the university of oxford in england in april of 2007. this report indicated that 3 davis: indigenous peoples and climate change published by scholarship@western, 2010 several actions need to be taken to respond to the situation of climate change faced by indigenous peoples in numerous regions and countries throughout the world. along with the effects of global climate change on indigenous peoples of the polar regions of alaska and northern canada, who have been affected by the melting of ice shields and permafrost, the report also focused upon the threats that increased droughts and fires pose for indigenous and other local peoples who occupy tropical rainforests in such areas as asia, the pacific, and the amazon region of south america. with respect to the amazon region of south america, the oxford university report notes that if climate change continues at its current pace, there may be an overall decrease in rainfall of 20 percent or more in this region. additionally, the report also observes that “the effects of climate change on the amazon forest are exacerbated by deforestation and forest fragmentation which in turn releases more carbon into the atmosphere and creates yet more climate change” (salick and byg 2007, 9). hope for the future in this region “lies with the indigenous peoples themselves, who are very successful in preventing deforestation and managing natural rainforests” (salick and byg 2007, 9). the oxford university report also focuses upon the effects of climate change on high mountain cultures or what are termed alpine regions, such as the mount kilimanjaro region of tanzania in east africa, the tibetan mountain region in central asia, and the andean region in south america. in all of these highly mountainous countries, which have large populations of culturally unique indigenous or tribal peoples, the report notes that there are threats posed by retreating glaciers and changing resources bases: “alpine ecosystems around the world are warming up at a disproportionate rate (predicted to increase by as much as 5-6 degrees centigrade in the 21st century under present conditions)” (salick and byg 2007, 7). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.2 iconic peaks, such as those in the mount kilimanjaro region of tanzania in east africa, will have no more snows, if such climate change continues. at the same time, the oxford university report remarks that some studies have discovered that there has been an upward movement on some of these mountains of tree lines and alpine plants. it is suggested that alpine warming and deforestation will further threaten endangered animals such as snow leopards and mountain sheep. further, the report states that little attention is paid to the importance of these floras and faunas to indigenous peoples. for example, tibetan and andean highlanders are dependent upon alpine floras for medicines, food, grazing and hunting: “in the future, when trees cover the high mountains, these people will be deprived of important traditional resources central to their livelihoods” (salick and byg 2007, 7). this same report also highlights the effects of climate change on tribal peoples who occupy desert regions such as kalahari which is predicted to double in size and wind speeds are expected to increase dramatically. thousands of inhabitants will struggle to survive with cattle and goat farming becoming less feasible coupled with their traditional resource base for hunting and gathering severely affected. according to the report, in the present day “indigenous groups which have been forced to become sedentary, huddle around government drilled boreholes for water, and many are dependent on government handouts for survival…without doubt, indigenous peoples of the deserts are on the frontline of global climate change” (salick and byg 2007, 9). based upon these conditions of indigenous and tribal peoples in tropical rainforests, alpine areas, and deserts, as well as in other areas such as polar regions, islands, and temperate ecosystems, the oxford university report calls for support of the world’s indigenous peoples, especially in terms of their capacity to maintain biodiversity as a buffer against climate change 5 davis: indigenous peoples and climate change published by scholarship@western, 2010 (salick and byg 2007). it is also remarked that indigenous peoples can play an important role in observing, interpreting, and adapting to climate change. the report concludes by outlining a “proposal with indigenous peoples and climate change.” among other things, the oxford university report states in this proposal that “from the data and perspectives on indigenous peoples and climate change, it becomes evident that indigenous knowledge and perceptions must be incorporated into the climate change forum” (salick and byg 2007, 25). it also states that “indigenous peoples offer local observations and techniques for adapting to and mitigating climate change [and that] indigenous peoples must exercise self-determination and be empowered to deal with climate change which threatens their livelihoods, indeed their very existence” (salick and byg 2007, 25). in addition, the report remarks that “integration and feedback loops between climate change science and indigenous peoples must be established and employed. both parties – that is climate change scientists and indigenous peoples – can gain knowledge from each other and support each other in action” (salick and byg 2007, 25). the national museum of the american indian: recognition of protection and the control of global climate change it is worth mentioning that, along with the report by the tyndall centre for climate change research at oxford university in england, the national museum of the american indian (nmai), established in the year 2004 as part of the smithsonian institution in washington dc, also began to focus on a similar issue. the nmai is interested specifically in issues relating to both the needs of america’s indigenous peoples but also in how the contemporary existence and positive effects of indigenous people’s traditional knowledge can be taken into account in the mitigation of climate change. this is to say that among other things, the nmai has a focus on 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.2 the role of traditional knowledge in the protection of the environment and the potential control of global climate change in the united states, canada, and other countries throughout the americas and the world. on july 7, 2007, for example, the nmai organized an event on the national mall in washington dc for the inauguration of the so-called “live earth concerts,” which were introduced to rally global action on climate change both here in the united states and in several other countries throughout the world. this event at the nmai was titled “mother earth” and was a “special indian summer showcase event in the spirit of the live earth concerts” (smithsonian national museum of the american indian 2007a). at the opening of the nmai “mother earth” event, a speech was given by al gore, the former vice-president of the united states, producer of the academy award-winning documentary film titled “an inconvenient truth” on the threat of global warming, and nobel peace prize recipient for work on global climate change (smithsonian national museum of the american indian 2007b). i attended this event and what follows is based on notes i took during the speeches at the “mother earth” event, starting with gore’s address. in his opening speech, former vice president al gore (2007) stated that “the american indian people and the elders of native cultures here and around the world, have been very eloquent in their warnings about what we are doing to the earth.” he also remarked that the indigenous peoples in the untied states and throughout the world “remind us that solving the climate crisis will require not only new laws and new technology, but also new understanding that we are connected to the natural world” (2007). a number of other persons, many of native american background in the united states, also spoke and highlighted the role of indigenous peoples in protecting the environment, 7 davis: indigenous peoples and climate change published by scholarship@western, 2010 promoting sustainable development and having the potential to counter climate change. tim johnson (2007), who at the time was the acting director of the national museum of the american indian, for example, is quoted as saying at the “mother earth” event that “there is no more important matter before us than the question of how to live sustainably on the earth.” similarly, there were two other persons, both native american women, who also made statements at the “mother earth” event in july of 2007. one of these persons was ms. katsi cook barreiro, who is of mohawk background and is a maternal child-health coordinator for the united south and east oklahoma tribes as well as the field coordinator for an organization called running strong for american indian youth in alexandria, virginia. in her presentation at the “mother earth” event, she stated “my message to all the world’s leaders is simple and clear: think not only of today, [but] think of your grandchildren. think [also] of your greatgrandchildren…[and] think of the impact of your decision on the seventh generation yet to come” (cook barreiro 2007). she also said the following: we human beings who walk about on mother earth must remember that our survival depends on our humility, depends on our ability to express our love for her, and to do everything in our power so that our future generations will enjoy the benefits of this wonderful earth. (cook barreiro 2007) and, in her conclusion, she stated, “our mother the earth, it must be that we defend her” (2007). a second native american woman who spoke at the 2007 nmai mother earth event was henrietta mann. mann is cheyenne and a professor emeritus as well as special assistant to the president of montana state university, while also serving as an interim president of the cheyenne and arapaho tribal college at southwestern oklahoma state university. she stated in her presentation that: 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.2 we agree with the broad consensus of our most respected international climate scientists that global warming is upon us, and it is destabilizing the natural rhythms of mother earth. we also agree with the broad scientific consensus that human activity, including deforestation and greenhouse gas emissions, is a primary cause. for these reasons, we call upon all the peoples of the world to awaken and respond to our collective human responsibility to the seventh generation. ours is a call for consciousness. each of us is part of the sacred service of life, [and the] earth is our mother and we must care for her. (mann 2007) un reponses to the rights, needs, and knowledge of indigenous peoples in response to climate change it is interesting to note that a few weeks after the nmai “mother earth” event in washington dc, mr. ahmed djoghlaf, the executive secretary of the un convention on biological diversity, in a statement at the occasion of the international day of the world’s indigenous people on august 9, 2007, noted that: the celebration of the international day of the world’s indigenous people presents an opportunity to draw attention to the contribution of indigenous and local communities to the conservation and sustainable use of the world’s biological diversity. it also provides opportunity to highlight how these communities, as environmental managers with immense ecological knowledge, are crucial partners in our efforts to address the two most serious environmental threats facing mankind today: the loss of biodiversity and climate change (djoghlaf 2007). 9 davis: indigenous peoples and climate change published by scholarship@western, 2010 it is also interesting to note that on the same day as the united nations “international day of the world’s indigenous peoples,” august 9, 2007, mr. ban ki-moon, the secretary general of the united nations, was quoted as saying the following: recently, the international community has grown increasingly aware of the need to support indigenous people – by establishing and promoting international standards, vigilantly upholding respect for their human rights, integrating them in the international development agenda, including the projects, and reinforcing indigenous peoples’ special stewardship on issues relating to the environment and climate change (ki-moon 2007). just one month following this “international day of the world’s indigenous peoples,” the un general assembly approved a declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples. this declaration not only called for the recognition of the land and territorial rights of indigenous peoples throughout the world, it also presented the idea that indigenous peoples should be provided with a degree of self-determination that would enable them to have prior and informed consent before any outside activities could be carried out on the land and territories that they occupy in order to respond to climate change (united nations 2007). although the un government representatives for the united states, canada, australia, and new zealand voted against this comprehensive declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples in september of 2007, all of the members of the un human rights council and 143 other country representatives voted in favor of the declaration. it was also hoped that the adoption of the declaration would result in more emphasis and focus upon the rights, needs, and knowledge of indigenous peoples in the upcoming un climate change conference, held in bali, indonesia in december of 2007. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.2 as we shall see in the final part of this paper, there were some problems posed in the consideration of the views of indigenous peoples at the bali conference on climate change. moreover, these problems continue to face indigenous peoples both in the united states, canada, australia, and new zealand as well as in the developing countries throughout the world in terms of how governments and various international development agencies, such as the world bank, the inter-american development bank, and the asian development bank, consider the rights, needs and knowledge of indigenous peoples in dealing with climate change. the position of indigenous peoples at the un conference on climate change in bali, indonesia in december 2007 i would like to conclude with a brief statement on the position of indigenous peoples at the un conference on climate change in bali, indonesia in december 2007. one of the major points of focus for several of the government and international agency representatives attending the unfccc in bali was the idea of focusing future carbon credits on the preservation of tropical forests in developing countries. this was seen as a means of controlling greenhouse gas emissions and reducing climate change in developing countries. it was also seen as a future mode of trade agreements between commercial forestry and agricultural companies in both developed and developing countries (un 2008b). despite the fact that a special delegation of indigenous peoples was invited to attend the bali conference, this delegation was forcibly barred from entering a meeting between the executive secretary of the unfccc, yvo de boer, and various civil society representatives invited to the conference (new consumer 2007; peterman 2008). it is also important to note that indigenous peoples were not only marginalized from the discussions at the bali conference, but also there was no mention of the rights, needs, and 11 davis: indigenous peoples and climate change published by scholarship@western, 2010 knowledge of indigenous peoples in the large number of unfccc documents prepared on climate change prior to the conference. this latter point is particularly problematic given the fact, as mentioned above, that indigenous peoples, especially in developing countries but also in the arctic regions of the united states, canada, greenland, and parts of northern europe, are suffering most from climate change. many indigenous peoples, including those who formed part of the indigenous delegation at the bali conference, were concerned that some of the climate mitigation projects being promoted by the unfccc might negatively affect the traditional lands and territories where they live. in fact, by shutting the indigenous peoples out of the climate change negotiations, the indigenous delegates at the bali conference felt that some of the modes of reducing carbon emissions from deforestation in developing countries could lead to the involuntary relocation of indigenous peoples and some of them could even be killed (peterman 2008). this point was made by victoria tauli-corpuz, who is an indigenous woman from the philippines and has served as the chair of the un permanent forum on indigenous issues for several years. she made a statement at the bali conference on december 11, 2007, in which tauli-corpuz presented some of her views and the concerns of indigenous peoples in relation to a special forest carbon partnership facility being prepared in a number of developing countries by economists and climate change specialists at the world bank in washington. in her statement, she said that “those of us who live and depend on forests, are pleased that there is growing international consensus that policies to address climate change must include measures to combat deforestation and forest degradation in tropical and sub-tropical forests” (tauli-corpuz 2007, 1). she also said that the members of the un permanent forum on indigenous issues “welcome the 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.2 stern review which urges the actions to prevent deforestation on a large-scale must be taken as soon as possible” (tauli-corpuz 2007, 1). however, tauli-corpuz (2007) also noted that the tropical and sub-tropical forests, which are the focus of the forest carbon partnership facility of the world bank and several other international development agencies, including some of them in the un, are the home to about 160 million indigenous persons, the custodians and managers of forest diversity. these same indigenous persons, she also noted, “remain in very vulnerable situations because most states do not recognize their rights to these forests and the resources found, therein” (tauli-corpuz 2007, 1). as the chair of the un permanent forum on indigenous issues, tauli-corpuz recommended that the representatives of the foreign carbon partnership facility of the world bank and the various governments, corporations and ngos attending the bali conference should unequivocally state that they recognize and respect indigenous peoples rights as contained in the un declaration of the rights of indigenous peoples and that should be the starting framework for any discussion of negotiations related to access and use of resources by the carbon partnership facility of the world bank and other international development institutions (tauli-corpuz 2007, 2). she also stated that “indigenous peoples’ free, prior and informed consent should be obtained before any initiative on reducing emissions from deforestation in developing countries (redd) that is pursued in their territories and forests” (tauli-corpuz 2007, 2). unfortunately, despite these concerns, the government representatives at the bali conference did not take into account indigenous people’s rights, needs and knowledge in the final agreements they proposed at the end of the conference (new consumer 2007). 13 davis: indigenous peoples and climate change published by scholarship@western, 2010 based upon the lack of focus on the rights, needs, and knowledge of indigenous peoples, especially in relation to the lands and territories in which they live and the future of their existence, in the resource and project recommendations resulting from the bali conference, there remains a significant need for both international development agencies and state governments to take into account the role of indigenous peoples in climate change. these needs are being considered at various fora; for example, the “social development and climate change conference,” held by the world bank in march 2008; a conference held by the un permanent forum on indigenous issues in april/may 2008, which had as a special theme “climate change, bio-cultural diversity and livelihoods: the stewardship role of indigenous peoples and new challenges” (united nations 2008a); and, the student working group on indigenous peoples of the georgetown university center for latin american studies also held a seminar in the spring semester of 2008 on “indigenous peoples and climate change in bolivia and peru”. despite these efforts, there remains much to be done in supporting indigenous peoples in the face of climate change. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.2 references cook barreiro, katsi. 2007. “international day brings recognition of indigenous peoples’ contribution to environmental protection, combating climate change.” indigenous people indigenous voice. press release, 19 april 2007. retrieved august 13, 2009 (http://www.un.org/esa/ socdev/unpfii/documents/int_day_press_release07.pdf). djoghlaf, ahmed. 2007. “message from the executive secretary, ahmed djoghlaf, on the occasion of the international day of the world’s indigenous people.” 9 august 2007. retrieved august 13, 2009 ( http://www.un.org/esa/socdev/unpfii/en/news_ internationalday2007.html). gore, al, 2007. “remarks at the opening of the mother earth event for climate change.” remarks, mother earth event for climate change, washington, dc, 7 july 2007. johnson, tim. 2007. ““remarks at the opening of the mother earth event for climate change.” remarks, mother earth event for climate change, washington, dc, 7 july 2007. ki-moon, ban. 2007. “international day brings recognition of indigenous peoples’ contribution to environmental protection, combating climate change.” indigenous people indigenous voice. press release, 19 april 2007. retrieved august 13, 2009 (http://www.un.org/esa/ socdev/unpfii/documents/int_day_press_release07.pdf). mann, henrietta. 2007. “remarks at the opening of the mother earth event for climate change.” remarks, mother earth event for climate change, washington, dc, 7 july 2007. new consumer. 2007. 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vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.2 united nations. 2002. “indigenous peoples statement.” presented by the indigenous peoples caucus at the eight session of the conference of the parties. united nations framework convention on climate change. new delhi, india (23 october to 1 november 2002). retrieved august 13, 2009 (http://unfccc.int/resource/docs/2002/cop8/stmt/ngo/005.pdf). ______. 2007. “united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples. resolution 61/295.” retrieved august 13, 2009 (http://www.un.org/esa/ socdev/unpfii/en/drip.html). ______. 2008a. seventh session of the united nations permanent forum on indigenous issues. special theme: climate change, bio-cultural diversity and livelihoods: the stewardship role of indigenous peoples and new challenges. new york: 21 april 2 may. retrieved august 13, 2009 (http://www.un.org/esa/socdev/unpfii/en/session_seventh.html). ______. 2008b. “report on the conference of the parties on its thirteenth session, held in bali from 3 to 15 december 2007. addendum part 2 action taken by the conference of the parties at its thirteenth session.” fccc/cp/2007/add1*. retrieved august 13, 2009 (http://unfccc.int/resource/docs/2007/cop13/eng/06a01.pdf). 17 davis: indigenous peoples and climate change published by scholarship@western, 2010 the international indigenous policy journal may 2010 indigenous peoples and climate change shelton h. davis recommended citation indigenous peoples and climate change abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license indigenous peoples and climate change beyond the “haves and have nots”: using an interdisciplinary approach to inform federal data collection efforts with indigenous populations the international indigenous policy journal volume 8 issue 4 reconciling research: perspectives on research involving indigenous peoples—part 2 article 5 october 2017 beyond the “haves and have nots”: using an interdisciplinary approach to inform federal data collection efforts with indigenous populations c. aujean lee university of california, los angeles, aujean@ucla.edu recommended citation lee, c. (2017). beyond the “haves and have nots”: using an interdisciplinary approach to inform federal data collection efforts with indigenous populations. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(4). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.5 beyond the “haves and have nots”: using an interdisciplinary approach to inform federal data collection efforts with indigenous populations abstract this study demonstrates how multiple methods can inform national survey data collection efforts for indigenous populations using pacific islanders as a case study. national data surveys are oftentimes limited in how they collect data on small populations due to data suppression, and they lack nuance in how they aggregate distinct populations. i conduct linear regression models of u.s. census data to demonstrate that pacific islanders lag behind whites in income, even after controlling for household characteristics and geography. further analyses of oral histories and interviews with pacific islanders demonstrate that income disparities exist in part because of remittances, competing financial demands, and citizenship status. i argue that it is important to add survey questions that capture migrant experiences to improve national data survey collection efforts. by utilizing and improving both types of data collection, researchers can better comprehend the barriers and opportunities for decreasing the racial income and wealth gap, which will strengthen the economic stability of pacific islanders in the united states. keywords federal surveys, pacific islanders, income, racial disparities, oral history, mixed methods acknowledgments this paper expands on a report by the ucla asian american studies center, which was funded by the ford foundation's building economic security over a lifetime initiative. thank you to keith camacho, randall akee, paul ong, and melany de la cruz-viesca for support of this project. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ b e y o n d t h e “ h a v e s a n d h a v e n o t s ” : u s i n g a n i n t e r d i s c i p l i n a r y a p p r o a c h t o i n f o r m f e d e r a l d a t a c o l l e c t i o n e f f o r t s w i t h i n d i g e n o u s p o p u l a t i o n s over the past 30 years, the racial economic gap has substantially increased in the united states, with white people experiencing the most growth in income and wealth relative to racial minorities (asantemuhammad, collins, hoxie, & nieves, 2016). these trends are alarming for the future economic growth of the country. families of color are falling further behind whites in their ability to pay for everyday necessities with their income. many studies have focused on the racial wealth and income gap between black and white people, in part because of the foundational work of oliver and shapiro (1995), which traced the wealth gap from slavery to other historical policies of discrimination and disparities in inheritance and redlining (see also blau & graham, 1990; conley, 1999; wolff, 2002). yet, little is known about smaller indigenous populations, in large part because of data and methodological issues with national surveys. in this study, i focus on pacific islanders, who have a long history as part of the united states dating back to the 19th century. since that time, the united states has increased its territories, colonies, and diplomatic ties in the pacific to expand its military stations (camacho, 2011). however, it is commonplace for researchers to group pacific islanders with asian americans, american indian and alaska natives, and/or other immigrant populations (see for example chang, 2010; hanna & lindamood, 2008; rothwell & han, 2010) because of issues around respondent privacy. nevertheless, the u.s. office of management and budget (omb, 1997) has mandated that pacific islander data be collected and reported as a separate racial group. thus, this study demonstrates how multiple methods can inform national survey data collection efforts for smaller indigenous populations. these issues related to how national surveys can collect quality, relevant data are particularly pertinent, as the u.s. census bureau has begun efforts to modify the 2020 census of the nation. the decennial census and, more recently, the american community survey (acs) are surveys administered by the u.s. government, which are mandated by the u.s. constitution to accurately allocate congressional districts. the surveys are also critical because $400 billion of federal funds for infrastructure and public amenities are allocated based on its population counts (u.s. census bureau, 2010). the bureau had also started researching and testing new questions since 2013. however, national surveys, such as the decennial census or acs, should incorporate additional variables to understand income disparities and the social contexts of smaller population groups. by incorporating qualitative efforts, national surveys can better understand how to improve data collection efforts with indigenous populations. to the author’s knowledge, this is the first study to examine income gaps between pacific islanders and non-hispanic whites (hereinafter referred to as “whites”) who live in the united states using multiple methods. i have examined the magnitude of racial income disparities with statistical analyses of the 2008-2012 acs 5-percent public use microdata sample (pums). using multivariate regressions, i tested whether income gaps persisted after controlling for household characteristics and location. the quantitative analyses demonstrate what kinds of information are gleaned from the current acs questions. however, large federal data sets are limited because they are oftentimes not designed to capture indigenous population income disparities. thus, i examine published oral histories and interviews to identify additional questions that can help explain these economic impacts. with quantitative 1 lee: between the haves and have nots published by scholarship@western, 2017 methodological data issues for smaller indigenous populations, the findings support the need for interdisciplinary studies and methodological nuances to understand how available quantitative data can be improved to capture national economic trends and their effects on individuals and families. l i t e r a t u r e r e v i e w p a c i f i c i s l a n d e r s a n d m e t h o d o l o g i c a l i s s u e s w i t h q u a n t i t a t i v e d a t a while small in number, the pacific islander population has steadily grown in the united states. between 2000 and 2010, the pacific islander population grew by 40% to more than 1.2 million people living in the united states (empowering pacific islander communities [epic] & asian americans advancing justice [aaaj], 2014). the census bureau predicts there will be nearly 3 million pacific islanders in 2060 (colby & ortman, 2015). pacific islanders have varying socioeconomic backgrounds because of the myriad of relationships the united states has with each island (epic & aaaj, 2014).1 depending on citizenship status, some pacific islanders are at a greater disadvantage in terms of their access to jobs in the united states and in developing credit or assets. for instance, immigrants oftentimes do not inherit wealth, their educational credentials from their home country may not transfer easily to the united states, and they may have limited knowledge of the united states labor market (hao, 2001). despite their long history with the united states government, there are few studies that examine pacific islanders and economic stability because of challenges in finding and using quantitative data on pacific islanders. first, de la cruz-viesca (2011) and yao (2008) described how government data sets, including the consumer expenditure survey, survey of consumer finances, and the health and retirement study combine pacific islanders with asian americans and/or native americans in an “other” category to meet sample size requirements. by combining hundreds of groups, these studies create a category that is meaningless because of the significant differences within and among these populations (ericksen, 1997; fernandez, 1996). in trying to meet statistical significance thresholds, the collected data do not shed light on how pacific islanders fare. second, there are issues with how to report race and ethnicity. many surveys have a select number of categories for participants to self-report their race and ethnicity (okazaki & sue, 1995). consequently, participants from smaller populations may not have a category to select. in other instances, studies do not allow respondents to select more than one racial or ethnic category. this restriction proves particularly problematic for pacific islanders since a majority identify as multiracial (56 percent; epic & aaaj, 2014; kanaʻiaupuni & malone, 2006; yao, 2008). individuals who are mixed-race also do not self-report consistently over time, depending on their context (siegel & passel, 1979). 1 individuals from guam, hawaiʻi, and the commonwealth of the northern mariana islands are considered american citizens, can work and live in the united states legally, and qualify for public benefits. american samoan residents are u.s. nationals and can work in the united states and qualify for some federal benefits, but must obtain citizenship. residents of the federated states of micronesia (which includes yap, chuuk, pohnpei, and kosrae), republic of the marshall islands, and republic of palau are allowed to work and live in the united states, but do not qualify for federal benefits and are not citizens. immigrants from papua new guinea, tonga, samoa, tokelau, kiribati, and other islands are not citizens, must apply for legal permanent resident status to work or live in the united states, and have to wait 5 years to apply for public benefits (epic & aaaj, 2014). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.5 third, collected data on pacific islanders may be suppressed. for instance, the acs suppresses data to keep respondent information anonymous and prevent the publication of unreliable statistics (u.s. census bureau, 2016). the acs also sets a minimum threshold of 65,000 per subgroup in a geographic area for the 1-year survey or 7,000 per subgroup for the 5-year survey. most quantitative analyses using census data cannot include pacific islanders for most local analyses—researchers can only examine pacific islanders for the total united states or within the few states with substantial pacific islander populations. with these difficulties related to data access, researchers often exclude pacific islanders from their analyses (okazaki & sue, 1995). e x i s t i n g s t u d i e s o n p a c i f i c i s l a n d e r i n c o m e despite these methodological issues, some studies have measured pacific islander income and wealth differences. overall, they have shown that pacific islanders fall behind the general population of the united states. first, higher proportions of pacific islanders live in poverty and earn less per capita income than the total population (epic & aaaj, 2014). they also have lower homeownership rates and are more likely to be housing burdened2 (epic & aaaj, 2014). in part because of their concentration in low-income jobs, the insight center for community economic development (2011) found that native hawaiians received about 45 percent of the average social security benefit3 of nonnative hawaiians. with less income, it is difficult to set aside funds for the future as savings and investments. a study by national coalition for asian pacific american community development (capacd), the national urban league, and the national center of la raza (2014) found that most lowand moderate-income asian american and pacific islanders primarily save with a savings account (65 percent), compared to 14 percent who had a retirement account, and 7 percent who did not save at all. naya (2007) also found that native hawaiians had on average lower interest, dividend, and rental income. they also received fewer benefits as a result of retirement, social security, and supplementary security income than nonnative hawaiians in hawaiʻi. native hawaiians also earned less income from household assets (sum of interest, dividends, net rental income) in hawaiʻi—on average, native hawaiians had $2,000 in assets compared to whites who on average had $8,430 in assets (ong, 2006). these studies start to provide a statistical description of pacific islanders. however, the majority of studies do not test whether racial differences exist after controlling for household characteristics. second, by relying on quantitative data, these studies do not capture the web of factors that contribute to barriers in income and wealth accumulation, such as employment, education, household formation, and citizenship. they are instead using existing secondary data that is not designed to capture indigenous population characteristics. 2 housing burdened families are those who pay more than 30 percent of their income on housing (schwartz & wilson, 2008). 3 social security benefits provide support for americans who are retired, have disabilities, or are survivors of a family member who passed away. while not meant to replace a worker's total income, social security replaces 40 percent of a person's income upon retirement (social security administration, 2017). 3 lee: between the haves and have nots published by scholarship@western, 2017 this study contributes to existing literature by using federal data to examine locational and household factors that explain income disparities between whites and pacific islanders. i focus on income because it allows me to use the u.s. census, which is one of the few federal surveys that disaggregate pacific islanders from other racial groups. i test differences across the united states and in a state-level analysis that focuses on california and hawaiʻi because they have larger populations of pacific islanders. after introducing the data, i utilize oral histories and interviews to understand what additional variables could be added in the acs to further explain these disparities. this study provides an example of how interdisciplinary methods can inform national data collection efforts to provide a more comprehensive portrait of pacific islander economic statuses. r e s e a r c h q u e s t i o n s a n d m e t h o d o l o g y this study asks the following research questions: a. what are the differences in household and per capita income between pacific islanders and whites in the united states? b. do these differences persist after accounting for a number of household characteristics and geography? c. how do qualitative data inform additional variables that can be used in federal surveys to better understand pacific islander economic disparities? q u a n t i t a t i v e a n a l y s e s to address the first two research questions, i used 2008-2012 acs 5-percent pums to examine household and per capita income (u.s. census bureau, 2015) by calculating bivariate statistics in sas 9.4. acs contains a 5 percent sample of housing units, and acs counts are averaged from samples during the 5-year period. i focused on data from the head of household, and white (n = 4,472,390) and pacific islander (n = 6,059) households. data are weighted by housing unit because the study focuses on households. acs only surveys households in the 50 states and washington, dc, and it does not include pacific islander households in a territory. to compare per capita household income with household income, per capita income is calculated by dividing household income by the number of persons in the household.4 this study focuses on both household and per capita household income because pacific islanders tend to live in larger households. in the 2008-2012 acs, the average household size for whites was 2.36 while the average household size for pacific islanders was 3.23 in the united states. by supporting more individuals in a household, household income may mask economic disparities. for example, if a sixperson household has a total household income of $100,000 relative to a three-person household with an income of $75,000, the three-person household would have a higher per capita income than the sixperson household. to address the second question, i used multivariate linear regressions to test how much household characteristics and location account for racial disparities in the united states. i 4 this method differs from the published acs data, which calculates per capita income by dividing aggregate income by total population. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.5 compare pacific islanders and whites because whites are still the majority group and are used as a benchmark in income disparity studies. whites were single-race and non-hispanic, while pacific islanders included multiracial and multiethnic individuals. i used household variables consistent with similar human capital models that suggest that investment in people leads to economic benefits. types of investment include education, labor skills, years of work experience, or worker’s age to approximate experience (mincer, 1958; psacharopoulos & patrinos, 2004; sweetland, 1996). i included age, gender, educational attainment, marital status, number of children, employment status, citizenship status, and multigenerational households. age was used as a proxy for work experience. age squared was also included to test for the growth and decline in income over the lifecycle. for gender, males were coded as 1 and females were the reference category. investment in education is highly correlated to income, and educational attainment was separated into less than a high school diploma, high school graduate, and post-secondary degree5—the reference group was less than a high school diploma. marital status used a dichotomous dummy variable—unmarried people were the reference group. individuals who are married would assumedly have a higher household income because there are possibly two people contributing to the household income. citizenship was categorized as those who were born in the united states or are naturalized citizens, with noncitizens as the reference group. u.s.-born respondents include those who are born to american parents abroad or in territories. a dichotomous variable indicated whether the household had more than two generations living in the same household (multigenerational). it is expected that larger households have more workers and/or dependents, affecting the aggregate household income and per capita income. to test the effect of geography, the study used three analyses: united states, california, and hawaiʻi. in the country-level regressions, i controlled for california and hawaiʻi as variables because these states have the largest pacific islander populations in the country and are the least affordable states to live in among the 50 states (u.s. news & world report, 2016). the national regressions identify whether there are racial disparities after accounting for the effects of living in either state. the study also tested racial income differences within california and hawaiʻi using the same household variables to understand if these patterns continue within the states. q u a l i t a t i v e a n a l y s e s i complement the quantitative analysis with analyses of published oral histories and interviews that focus on pacific islander experiences in the united states and income disparities. other studies have conducted analyses of published qualitative materials (see gillies & edwards, 2005; godfrey & 5 the post-secondary degree category includes those who have completed any post-secondary education beyond high school (e.g., trades certificate, community college diploma, or university degree). 5 lee: between the haves and have nots published by scholarship@western, 2017 richardson, 2004; lykes, 1983).6 i examined pacific voices talk story (lenson, 2001, 2003, 2004, 2007); pacific islander voices (national asian pacific center on aging, 2010); and minnesota history center’s asian american and pacific islander oral history project (minnesota historical society, 2012a). other published oral histories were available online but were excluded because they were available in video format without a transcript, were focused on a specific event, and/or were collected before 2000.7 oral histories from before 2000 were excluded because of the difference in time context compared to the other qualitative texts. people from diverse ethnic backgrounds living in different states were interviewed for pacific voices talk story in order to convey the experiences of a broader range of pacific islanders who were born in or migrated to the united states. lenson (2001, 2003, 2004, 2007) collected the oral histories for preservation rather than primarily for data analysis. the national asian pacific center on aging (2010) focused on pacific islander seniors who work in their partner organizations, and they included mostly the experiences of samoans in the united states. the minnesota history center (2012) collected and published oral histories on immigrant and refugee populations; the center has five in-depth oral histories of pacific islanders who settled in minnesota. i used a mix of inductive and deductive coding to identify themes (fereday & muir-cochrane, 2006). i first identified themes as related to employment, education, multigenerational households, and citizenship because these factors were statistically significant in the regressions. as fereday and muircochrane (2006) recommended, i also inductively analyzed the texts for additional themes that relate to understanding the causes or impacts of income disparities among pacific islanders. while the interviews and oral histories were examined for social phenomenology, or subjective meanings, in the daily lives of pacific islanders (schutz, 1967), there are limitations in the themes and data because the author coded them without input from other researchers. nevertheless, the focus of the study is to identify how mixed methods can inform federal data collection of indigenous populations using these examples of qualitative texts rather than an exhaustive accounting of pacific islander economic statuses and experiences. 6 there is some controversy over secondary analyses of qualitative data because the purpose of examining the text is different from the original purpose of data collection (heaton, 2008). heaton (2008) also noted that secondary analyses have no control over data collection. bishop (2007) examined differences between primary and secondary analyses of qualitative texts, and she argued that few distinctions exist between these analyses. she acknowledges two points in time—when data were collected and when the data were analyzed—affecting distinctions with the individual interaction, situation, and institutional or cultural contexts. though the researcher was not present for the original data collection, there are other instances in qualitative data collection where a researcher may not be present for the interview when, for example, working in a team setting. also, bishop described how data have to be recontextualized after an interview is conducted, whether immediately after data collection or at a later point. lastly, bishop (2007) asserted that after understanding the context of data collection and the purpose, researchers can assess how appropriate it is to analyze published qualitative data. 7 see the university of hawaiʻi at mānoa’s center for oral history (2010) or marshallese educational initiative’s (n.d.) marshallese oral history project for example. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.5 r e s u l t s m a g n i t u d e o f r a c i a l d i f f e r e n c e s pacific islanders earned less household and per capita income than whites (see figure 1). there was a $9,000 gap in household income (p < 0.01). the gap increases for per capita income—pacific islanders earn about $12,000 less than whites (p < 0.01). pacific islanders may have lower per capita income on average because, on average, each person in their households earns less than those in white households; alternatively, more children or older relatives in a household increases the number of dependents and decreases the per capita income of working adults. whites and pacific islanders also have different household characteristics that affect income (see table 1). first, whites are more likely to be older—the average white person was 53 years old, while the average pacific islander was 45 years old. whites also have higher educational attainment than pacific islanders. while 42 percent of whites have a post-secondary degree, 27 percent of pacific islanders have a similar level of education. age and education have a strong relationship with income because income tends to peak in middle age before retirement, and more education oftentimes leads to greater employable skills (wolla & sullivan, 2017). whites have additional household characteristics that contribute to higher income. whites have fewer children on average (0.47 across all households) than pacific islanders (0.95). the lifetime income is highest for households without children because of the additional costs associated with children (scholz & seshadri, 2009). an overwhelming majority of whites are also citizens (98 percent), compared to 72 percent of pacific islanders. citizens have more opportunities to build their credit and assets (hao, 2001). the geographical distribution of whites and pacific islanders varies significantly. while 28 percent and 25 percent of the pacific islander population in the country lives in hawaiʻi and california, respectively, 0.2 percent and 8 percent of whites live in these states. it is important to recognize that a higher proportion of pacific islanders live in more expensive states than whites—even if pacific islanders earn higher wages, they have to pay more for housing costs. thus, statistical analyses that do not control for geography may overestimate the incomes of pacific islanders. these factors help to explain why pacific islanders fall behind whites in income. the next section describes statistical analyses that help to explain how much these factors account for racial income disparities. in other words, after accounting for household characteristics and where people live, are there still unexplained racial discrepancies in income? 7 lee: between the haves and have nots published by scholarship@western, 2017 f i g u r e 1 . r a c i a l i n c o m e d i s p a r i t i e s i n t h e u . s . , 2 0 0 8 – 2 0 1 2 . s o u r c e : u . s . c e n s u s b u r e a u , p u b l i c u s e m i c r o d a t a s a m p l e , 2 0 0 8 2 0 1 2 . p a c i f i c i s l a n d e r s a r e t h o s e w h o a r e m u l t i r a c i a l a n d m u l t i e t h n i c , w h i l e w h i t e s a r e d e f i n e d a s n o n h i s p a n i c w h i t e . g r o u p m e a n d i f f e r e n c e s a r e s t a t i s t i c a l l y s i g n i f i c a n t ( p < 0 . 0 1 ) . $70,200 $25,300 $78,900 $37,500 $0 $10,000 $20,000 $30,000 $40,000 $50,000 $60,000 $70,000 $80,000 $90,000 mean household income mean per capita income pacific islander white 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.5 t a b l e 1 . d e s c r i p t i v e s t a t i s t i c s o f h o u s e h o l d c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s a n d g e o g r a p h i c d i s t r i b u t i o n b y r a c e pacific islander white mean age 44.49 52.60 male 53% (71,566) 55% (44,816,059) average number of children 0.95 0.47 married 58% (78,549) 54% (43,431,490) employed 71% (96,432) 63% (51,035,661) multigenerational household 11% (14,286) 2% (1,935,681) educational attainment less than high school 11% (15,171) 8% (6,801,443) high school diploma 62% (83,966) 50% (40,546,578) post-secondary degree 27% (36,629) 42% (33,756,348) citizenship status us born 75% (101,384) 96% (77,520,112) naturalized 11% (15,089) 3% (2,334,997) noncitizen 14% (19,293) 2% (1,249,260) geography live in california 28% (37,916) 8% (80,963,719) live in hawai’i 25% (33,836) 0.2% (140, 650) sample size 135,766 81,104,369 note. source: u.s. census bureau, public use microdata sample, 2008-2012. for all variables, group mean differences are statistically significant (p < 0.01). sample size is included in parentheses for categorical variables. 9 lee: between the haves and have nots published by scholarship@western, 2017 s t a t i s t i c a l l y s i g n i f i c a n t r a c i a l d i s p a r i t i e s the multivariate linear regressions show statistically significant racial income gaps remaining after accounting for household characteristics. tables 2 and 3 show that racial disparities persist in three models that predict income—each subsequent model adds in more variables to demonstrate how much of the association between income and racial group (model 1) can be explained by household characteristics (model 2) and geography (model 3). the models do not explain why there are racial income disparities, but rather highlight different factors that contribute to these associations. the statelevel regressions test only models 1 and 2. table 2 displays the regression models predicting household income. all of the variables are statistically significant (p < 0.01). model 1 shows a statistically significant log difference of -0.054 between pacific islanders and whites in household income. in model 2, the household characteristics are significant predictors of household income. as predicted, variables such as post-secondary degree, employment status, multigenerational households, and marital status would be associated with higher household income. racial income disparities continue to be significant between pacific islanders and whites. model 3 shows that after adding geography (california and hawaiʻi) into the statistical model, the racial income gap persists. the other coefficients of household variables are similar between models 2 and 3 except for citizenship—the difference in household income between citizens and noncitizens increases after controlling for geography. thus, after adjusting for where people live and household characteristics, there are racial differences in household income. there are also differences between racial groups when examining per capita income. table 3 shows a statistically significant difference of -0.42 in log per capita income between whites and pacific islanders (p < 0.01). as with table 2, the household characteristics have a statistically significant relationship with per capita income (p < 0.01). as expected, having a larger number of children and living in a multigenerational household were associated with lower per capita income. higher educational attainment and being employed also predicted higher per capita income values. while household characteristics help to explain racial disparities in income, there is still a statistically significant difference in per capita income between pacific islanders and whites in model 2. similar to household income, the other coefficients for the household variables are similar between models 2 and 3. also, model 3, which contains all of the countrol variables, continues to show an unexplained gap in per capita income between whites and pacific islanders. the multivariate regressions for california and hawaiʻi show similar findings with the country-level analyses, where racial disparities endure even after controlling for household characteristics (see appendix). the coefficients for the household variables are also similar in the state-level and countrylevel tests. however, the racial disparities between pacific islanders and whites are greater in california and hawaiʻi. in other words, after accounting for household characteristics, the difference in predicted household and per capita income for these racial groups is higher in california and hawaiʻi. as expected, in the two states with higher costs of living, the racial income gap is greater, and pacific islanders fall even further behind whites. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.5 t a b l e 2 . l i n e a r r e g r e s s i o n m o d e l s p r e d i c t i n g h o u s e h o l d i n c o m e ( l o g g e d ) household characteristics model 1 model 2 model 3 race pacific islander -0.054 -0.036 -0.088 (0.011) (0.009) (0.009) white reference reference reference age 0.034 0.033 (0.000) (0.000) age squared -0.025 -0.025 (0.001) (0.000) gender male 0.093 0.093 (0.008) (0.001) female reference reference number of children 0.020 0.021 (0.000) (0.000) martial status married 0.641 0.644 (0.008) (0.001) not married reference reference employment status employed 0.622 0.624 (0.001) (0.001) unemployed reference reference multigenerational family 0.334 0.331 (0.002) (0.002) educational attainment post-secondary degree 0.768 0.757 (0.001) (0.001) high school diploma 0.311 0.306 (0.001) (0.001) less than high school reference reference 11 lee: between the haves and have nots published by scholarship@western, 2017 t a b l e 2 . l i n e a r r e g r e s s i o n m o d e l s p r e d i c t i n g h o u s e h o l d i n c o m e ( l o g g e d ) ( c o n t i n u e d ) household characteristics model 1 model 2 model 3 citizenship status citizen 0.059 0.074 (0.003) (0.003) non-us citizen reference reference geography california 0.182 (0.001) hawai’i 0.071 (0.008) rest of the us reference intercept 10.880 8.537 8.517 (0.000) (0.005) (0.004) observations 4,439,946 4,439,946 4,439,946 r-squareda 0.000 0.368 0.370 f-value 22.37 234,644 200,703 note. source: u.s. census bureau, public use microdata sample, 2008-2012. robust standard errors are in parentheses. all variables are statistically significant (p < 0.01). aadjusted r-squared and r-squared had the same values. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.5 t a b l e 3 . l i n e a r r e g r e s s i o n m o d e l s p r e d i c t i n g p e r c a p i t a i n c o m e ( l o g g e d ) household characteristics model 1 model 2 model 3 race pacific islander -0.419 -0.137 -0.181 (0.011) (0.009) (0.009) white reference reference reference age 0.033 0.033 (0.000) (0.000) age squared -0.021 -0.021 (0.000) (0.000) gender male 0.099 0.099 (0.001) (0.000) female reference reference number of children -0.273 -0.273 (0.000) (0.000) marital status married 0.154 0.156 (0.001) (0.001) not married reference reference employment status employed 0.610 0.611 (0.001) (0.001) unemployed reference reference multigenerational family -0.454 -0.456 (0.002) (0.002) educational attainment post-secondary degree 0.829 0.820 (0.001) (0.001) high school diploma 0.333 0.328 (0.001) (0.001) less than high school reference reference 13 lee: between the haves and have nots published by scholarship@western, 2017 t a b l e 3 . l i n e a r r e g r e s s i o n m o d e l s p r e d i c t i n g p e r c a p i t a i n c o m e ( l o g g e d ) ( c o n t i n u e d ) household characteristics model 1 model 2 model 3 citizenship status citizen 0.041 0.054 (0.003) (0.003) non-us citizen reference reference geography california 0.158 (0.001) hawai’i 0.051 (0.008) rest of the us reference intercept 10.167 8.134 8.117 (0.000) (0.004) (0.004) observations 4,439,946 4,439,946 4,439,946 r-squareda 0.000 0.310 0.312 f-value 1,534.84 181,262 154,919 note. source: u.s. census bureau, public use microdata sample, 2008-2012. robust standard errors are in parentheses. all variables are statistically significant (p < 0.01). a adjusted r-squared and r-squared had the same values. thus, the quantitative analyses of acs data demonstrate that there are significant gaps between whites and pacific islanders in household and per capita income. however, i examine if there are additional questions that can be added to federal surveys to improve data collection of indigenous populations. the next section answers the third research question by using oral histories and interviews to identify additional variables that can strengthen census data collection. i focus on remittances, competing demands, and citizenship status as variables that can better inform researchers’ understandings of economic circumstances among pacific islanders. a d d i t i o n a l v a r i a b l e s t o u n d e r s t a n d i n c o m e d i s p a r i t i e s r e m i t t a n c e s while the census includes questions related to income, it does not ask respondents about connections to other countries and how it may affect their economic status. as with other migrants, pacific islanders oftentimes move to the united states to pursue economic or educational opportunities. after moving, 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.5 they continue to provide financial support for their families on the islands. acs currently does not include questions related to remittances, or sending money to family. a number of interviews explained how remittances to family are a core motivator for moving. for example, makalio or “max” described how: the first priority in each person leave the country are go and help the family back home. that’s all. so that’s why all these people everywhere, that was their priority, to come to this country or any country in the world, find a good job or find a job and support family back home . . . whatever is left from my budget for this month, i gotta send home to help my sisters and my brothers and my nephews and my nieces. (minnesota historical society, 2012b, pp. 23-24) petelo echoed this sentiment, “i work now because i need the money. i take care of my wife from samoa over here. i send the money over for my wife and kids. this is very important to me” (national asian pacific center on aging, 2010, p. 29). these family pressures can be tied to additional stress. for example, vete (1995) also noted, “the amount and frequency of remitting to parents are taken as measures of one’s love . . . anyone who does not appear to love their parents by remitting frequently is frowned upon . . . this can be absolutely humiliating and heart-rending” (p. 62). not only are remittances important for the family unit, but also help to support the islands’ overall economy. dan stated: even to this day, a great deal of the economies of american samoa and (western) samoa stems from families in the us, new zealand, and australia sending money home . . . people still migrate from samoa, raising money in these other places to send remittances back home that help the family. i know that many in our generation moved from samoa for this same reason. (lenson, 2001, p. 151) other surveys have yielded mixed results about the prevalence of remittances. in their survey of federated states of micronesia migrants in the united states, guam, and commonwealth of northern mariana islands, hezel and levin (2012) found that migrants remitted an estimated total of $1.7 million per year to guam, $655,000 to hawaiʻi, and $15,000 to the federated states of micronesia. the authors were surprised at the small percentage of migrants who sent remittances, and they found in focus groups that individuals were helping family through other financial gifts, such as buying airfare or cash gifts to address special circumstances (holidays, weddings, or funerals; hezel & levin, 2012). in contrast, the 2010 federated states of micronesia census reported that 11 percent of the population received cash remittances, or about $7.7 million total (federated states of micronesia office of statistics, 2010). the u.s. census bureau survey does not have a question related to sending money to family. other national surveys are beginning to add these variables, such as the national asset scorecard for communities of color; however, this survey focuses on five american cities (meschede, darity, & hamilton, 2015). if acs includes questions on remittances, researchers can examine how prevalent remittances are and how much money (for both gifts or cash) respondents send, which may also help explain economic disparities. 15 lee: between the haves and have nots published by scholarship@western, 2017 c o m p e t i n g d e m a n d s as the quantitative analysis displayed, pacific islanders tend to live in larger households than whites, which was associated with higher household income and lower per capita income. participants shared that their households included both immediate and extended family members. sulu shared, “i have eight natural brothers and sisters and also cousins who lived with us forever. i consider them my family to this day . . . my father raised about fourteen of us in all” (lenson, 2004, pp. 148-149). ba-maurie also extended the definition of family by raising his nephew and now his nephew’s extended family: “well, this nephew’s mother left him when he was a baby, so i took over raising him . . . he’s married and lives in my house with three kids, a wife, a brother-in-law, and a step-daughter” (lenson, 2001, p. 100). these households include more people because of family interdependence. napua’s family lived together in hawaiʻi because if they “didn’t have enough money, we shared something” (lenson, 2003, p. 289). for example, lee (2003) described how tongans oftentimes live in larger households because older generations take care of new grandchildren; in return, working family members help care for older family members to avoid sending them to retirement facilities. additionally, it is commonplace for various relatives to temporarily stay with families while looking for employment. for example, sulu described how her “parents took in every one of our cousins who came over . . . for six months, a year, or two years” (lenson, 2004, p. 149). sulu partially attributed it to cultural reasons: “back home, samoans take care of their own” (lenson, 2004, p. 148). the consequences of living with more family members are mixed. within the household, there are more people to contribute financially, and a number of interviewees were working a range of jobs to help. for example, after attending school, tui described how “we had to clean and check the vegetables, because we would sell them to the neighbors to make money and grow some more” (lenson, 2004, p. 124). saichi similarly remembers, “i come from a poor family and have always been a worker, starting from when i delivered newspapers on my bike . . . there wasn’t time for sports since working for the family came first” (lenson, 2004, p. 90). by supporting family, though, some pacific islanders experienced challenges with having their income pay for competing demands. for example, ba-maurie had expected that her nephew and his family would help to support their housing expenses. instead, she lamented: now i want my own house back . . . my nephew won’t leave. then, last year, my niece and her husband moved in with me [in an apartment]. . . i’m paying a lot of rent just to help my nephew live in my house! . . . my problem is i try to help, but who helps me? i live on my social security and retirement, not that much. (lenson, 2001, p. 101) with many family members depending on her, ba-maurie is in a financial bind, especially because she is retired and lives on a fixed income. while pacific islanders may live in larger households to help take care of each other, doing so can either help pool resources or create additional economic strain on the entire household. the u.s. census asks respondents about some additional costs they spend on housing. for example, acs includes questions about condo fees, utility bills, property taxes, or rent. however, the survey overlooks other competing demands that may strain households’ incomes. while remittances relate to families’ overseas expenses, it would be critical for acs to also include domestic costs that migrant or multigenerational families may experience. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.5 c i t i z e n s h i p s t a t u s income disparities are also affected by citizenship and migration. many migrated for better opportunities for themselves and their families. jim noted that he left american samoa because “the wages were very low” and came to the united states to work in a power plant—he “wanted to come away from there to take care of [his] family and raise them the normal way” (lenson, 2007, p. 17). however, this process of moving to the united states had challenges. esther observed that new migrants: just get on the plane and come . . . [but] they have no knowledge about budgeting or stretching your money to make it last. they don’t know that you have to pay for housing, rent, utilities, food, gas—everything! (lenson, 2004, p. 257) a number of respondents also described experiencing difficulties because of language. eseneiaso felt that: the hardest thing about adjusting was english. i didn’t have enough education. it was hard to speak out. i learned english at school in samoa. but here, you use it all the time. back home, you only use english at school. (national asian pacific center on aging, 2010, p. 32) as with other immigrants, it took some pacific islanders time to adjust to everyday life in the united states. however, pacific islanders’ adjustment also depended on citizenship status because of varying experiences in moving. for example, some respondents explained that they were able to easily migrate to the united states because of military service. for example, sulu’s father was in the american military and was able to move his family from samoa to guam and eventually honolulu because people from american samoa are considered u.s. nationals. on the other hand, as a migrant from the marshall islands, que experienced significant barriers to becoming a citizen, affecting his educational opportunities. he had lived in honolulu and sought citizenship there, eventually moving to los angeles. however, immigration services kept his passport in honolulu, and immigration services in los angeles “cracked down,” telling him that they would deport him if he could not obtain his passport (lenson, 2007). he described how “for three years . . . [he] had to go to downtown la, face these immigration guys . . . otherwise [he] wouldn’t be able to graduate” (lenson, 2007, p. 164). he was eventually able to resolve his situation, in part because he performed academically well in school and had consistently attended school. the relationship between the united states and the islands also affected employment opportunities. jim’s citizenship status also impacted his employment opportunities. he was a u.s. national after moving from american samoa and did not apply for citizenship. his employer, convair, eventually “kicked [him] out” since the united states would not allow noncitizens to work on projects like missiles and in the defense program” (lenson, 2007, p. 12). while jim’s citizenship status negatively affected his employment opportunities, esther found that she had an easier time getting other types of government jobs. she explained trying to recruit more micronesians into california jobs: 17 lee: between the haves and have nots published by scholarship@western, 2017 i tried to tell other micronesians to log onto the state’s website and look at the jobs. they’re entry level, the pay’s not all that great, but the benefits—medical, dental, vision—all of that counts . . . even though fsmers—people from the federated states of micronesia—are not citizens, a provision in the compact of free association allows them to work for the state and federal government. (lenson, 2004, pp. 234-235) the acs currently asks respondents about their citizenship status and if they were born in the united states, born in u.s. territories (puerto rico, guam, u.s. virgin islands, or northern marianas), born of american parent(s), or had become a citizen through naturalization. this question does not capture the complex relationships that the united states has with the islands in the pacific. by simplifying the question on citizenship status to these categories, the acs data do not include information tied to whether migrants can easily move to and from the united states, whether they can work or serve in the military, and other connections to the united states. p o l i c y i m p l i c a t i o n s a n d c o n c l u s i o n the current acs data demonstrate that pacific islanders do experience disparities in household and per capita income relative to whites. not only are there discrepancies, but also racial gaps in income persist even after controlling for household characteristics and geography. these disparities are particularly exacerbated by the challenges that some pacific islanders experience in their efforts to expand their economic opportunities. however, the acs does not include variables that sufficiently capture the experiences of migrant and indigenous groups with different citizenship statuses. while the acs is meant to capture the experiences of respondents in the 50 states, the study demonstrates the importance of adding questions that recognize an individual’s financial connections to family in other countries or islands. i also recommend including questions related to other costs that affect households, such as family expenses, education, or raising children. the acs also can further distinguish among immigration statuses because of their implications for citizenship, employment, and eligibility for public benefits. there are some upcoming challenges for the next iterations of the acs and decennial census. the u.s. government accountability office (2017) report on high-risk federal programs warned of underfunding the population count—as the number of households has grown over the past several decades, they estimate that the cost to count each household has increased from $16 to $92 between 1970 and 2010 (in 2010 dollars). also, the rates of unreturned mail responses has grown over the years, and the census bureau has not conducted enough tests to evaluate new technologies, such as internet survey response, and the associated risks to privacy (u.s. government accountability office, 2017). there are also political challenges. for example, congress approved a census bureau budget with10 percent less funding for the than under the obama administration and both political parties are debating how to deal with unreliable cost estimates—the director of the census bureau also abruptly announced that he will resign from his position june 30, 2017 (bahrampour, 2017; u.s. government accountability office, 2017). while recent political debates have focused on the decennial census, the funding also affects the acs, which is administered annually and has more detailed questions about population characteristics than the decadal census. any group or geographic region that is undercounted is penalized and underfunded. 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.5 in times of fiscal constraints, it is imperative for policymakers to reinvest funding to improve the acs and upcoming decennial census. without having accurate counts and data on populations in the united states, policymakers do not have information on how to spend or save funding related to transportation, educational grants, infrastructure, health services, and other public amenities or programs. the findings demonstrate the possibilities of using qualitative data to inform national data collection efforts of indigenous populations. however, the study is limited in several ways. first, it is beyond the scope of this study to examine differences based on pacific islander respondents’ country of origin or ethnicity. second, the study is also a useful starting point for future studies to examine differences between individuals who decided to migrate and those who decided to stay on the islands (see for example akee, 2010; hezel & levin, 2012). third, it would also be useful to collect additional interviews or oral histories that examine pacific islanders’ experiences with economic disparities—because the interviews asked respondents about their lives overall, not all respondents shared issues related to income. nevertheless, the findings demonstrate the policy benefits of using multiple methods to revise data collection with indigenous groups. the study included a preliminary analysis of the income gap that pacific islanders experience in the united states using an interdisciplinary approach and mixed methods. for a smaller population that oftentimes experiences challenges related data availability and sample size, it is imperative to include other forms of data that can provide additional context and framing of pacific islander experiences. the qualitative analysis also highlights other areas of future research and can inform quantitative data collection. by utilizing and improving both types of data collection, researchers can comprehend the barriers as well as the opportunities for decreasing the racial income and wealth gap, which will strengthen the economic stability of pacific islanders in the united states. 19 lee: between the haves and have nots published by scholarship@western, 2017 r e f e r e n c e s akee, r. 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(2017). education, income, and wealth. st. louis, mo: federal reserve bank of st. louis. retrieved from https://files.stlouisfed.org/files/htdocs/publications/page1econ/2017-01-03/education-income-and-wealth_se.pdf yao, r. (2008). financial behaviors of asian americans. in j. j. xiao (ed.), handbook of consumer finance research (pp. 303-318). new york: springer. 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.5 a p p e n d i x a p p e n d i x t a b l e 1 . l i n e a r r e g r e s s i o n m o d e l s p r e d i c t i n g h o u s e h o l d i n c o m e ( l o g g e d ) f o r c a l i f o r n i a household characteristics model 1 model 2 race pacific islander -0.125 -0.113 (0.023) (0.019) white reference reference age 0.030 (0.000) age squared -0.023 (0.000) gender male 0.083 (0.003) female reference number of children 0.022 (0.002) marital status married 0.634 (0.003) not married reference employment status employed 0.655 (0.004) unemployed reference multigenerational family 0.305 (0.009) 25 lee: between the haves and have nots published by scholarship@western, 2017 a p p e n d i x t a b l e 1 . l i n e a r r e g r e s s i o n m o d e l s p r e d i c t i n g h o u s e h o l d i n c o m e ( l o g g e d ) f o r c a l i f o r n i a ( c o n t i n u e d ) household characteristics model 1 model 2 educational attainment post-secondary degree 0.713 (0.007) high school diploma 0.292 (0.007) less than high school reference citizenship status citizen 0.184 (0.008) non-us citizen reference intercept 11.072 8.745 (0.002) (0.016) observations 347,656 347,656 r-squareda 0.000 0.323 f-value 30.03 15,096 note. source: u.s. census bureau, public use microdata sample, 2008-2012. robust standard errors in parentheses. all variables are statistically significant (p < 0.01). aadjusted r-squared and r-squared had the same values. 26 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.5 a p p e n d i x t a b l e 2 . l i n e a r r e g r e s s i o n m o d e l s p r e d i c t i n g p e r c a p i t a i n c o m e ( l o g g e d ) f o r c a l i f o r n i a household characteristics model 1 model 2 race pacific islander -0.534 -0.231 (0.021) (0.018) white reference reference age 0.031 (0.000) age squared -0.020 (0.000) gender male 0.081 (0.003) female reference number of children -0.271 (0.002) marital status married 0.158 (0.003) not married reference employment status employed 0.641 (0.004) unemployed reference multigenerational family -0.493 (0.009) 27 lee: between the haves and have nots published by scholarship@western, 2017 a p p e n d i x t a b l e 2 . l i n e a r r e g r e s s i o n m o d e l s p r e d i c t i n g p e r c a p i t a i n c o m e ( l o g g e d ) f o r c a l i f o r n i a ( c o n t i n u e d ) household characteristics model 1 model 2 educational attainment post-secondary degree 0.789 (0.007) high school diploma 0.324 (0.007) less than high school reference citizenship status citizen 0.153 (0.008) non-us citizen reference intercept 10.380 8.287 (0.002) (0.016) observations 347,656 347,656 r-squareda 0.002 0.263 f-value 621.79 11,258 note. source: u.s. census bureau, public use microdata sample, 2008-2012. robust standard errors in parentheses. all variables are statistically significant (p < 0.01). a adjusted r-squared and r-squared had the same values. 28 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.5 a p p e n d i x t a b l e 3 . l i n e a r r e g r e s s i o n m o d e l s p r e d i c t i n g h o u s e h o l d i n c o m e ( l o g g e d ) f o r h a w a iʻi household characteristics model 1 model 2 race pacific islander -0.200 -0.089 (0.026) (0.025) white reference reference age 0.014 (0.003) age squared -0.005 (0.003) gender male 0.113 (0.019) female reference number of children -0.015 (0.010) marital status married 0.562 (0.019) not married reference employment status employed 0.645 (0.023) unemployed reference multigenerational family 0.498 (0.042) 29 lee: between the haves and have nots published by scholarship@western, 2017 a p p e n d i x t a b l e 3 . l i n e a r r e g r e s s i o n m o d e l s p r e d i c t i n g h o u s e h o l d i n c o m e ( l o g g e d ) f o r h a w a iʻi ( c o n t i n u e d ) household characteristics model 1 model 2 educational attainment post-secondary degree 0.512 (0.046) high school diploma 0.157 (0.045) less than high school reference citizenship status citizen 0.278 (0.042) non-us citizen reference intercept 10.317 9.024 (0.011) (0.095) observations 8,880 8,880 r-squareda 0.006 0.253 f-value 57.44 273.96 note. source: u.s. census bureau, public use microdata sample, 2008-2012. robust standard errors in parentheses. all variables are statistically significant (p < 0.01). a adjusted r-squared and r-squared had the same values. 30 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.5 a p p e n d i x t a b l e 4 . l i n e a r r e g r e s s i o n m o d e l s p r e d i c t i n g p e r c a p i t a i n c o m e ( l o g g e d ) f o r h a w a iʻi household characteristics model 1 model 2 race pacific islander -0.636 -0.241 (0.026) (0.024) white reference reference age 0.015 (0.003) age squared -0.004 (0.003) gender male 0.125 (0.018) female reference number of children -0.285 (0.010) marital status married 0.168 (0.018) not married reference employment status employed 0.647 (0.022) unemployed reference multigenerational family -0.364 (0.041) 31 lee: between the haves and have nots published by scholarship@western, 2017 a p p e n d i x t a b l e 4 . l i n e a r r e g r e s s i o n m o d e l s p r e d i c t i n g p e r c a p i t a i n c o m e ( l o g g e d ) f o r h a w a iʻi ( c o n t i n u e d ) household characteristics model 1 model 2 educational attainment post-secondary degree 0.577 (0.044) high school diploma 0.195 (0.043) less than high school reference citizenship status citizen 0.320 (0.040) non-us citizen reference intercept 10.317 8.475 (0.011) (0.091) observations 8,880 8,880 r-squareda 0.065 0.310 f-value 616.33 364.00 note. source: u.s. census bureau, public use microdata sample, 2008-2012. robust standard errors in parentheses. all variables are statistically significant (p < 0.01). aadjusted r-squared and r-squared had the same values. 32 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.5 the international indigenous policy journal october 2017 beyond the “haves and have nots”: using an interdisciplinary approach to inform federal data collection efforts with indigenous populations c. aujean lee recommended citation beyond the “haves and have nots”: using an interdisciplinary approach to inform federal data collection efforts with indigenous populations abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license beyond the â•œhaves and have notsâ•š: using an interdisciplinary approach to inform federal data collection efforts with indigenous populations indigenous data governance in australia: towards a national framework the international indigenous policy journal volume 14 | issue 1 april 2023 indigenous data governance in australia: towards a national framework james rose the university of melbourne, australia , james.rose@unimelb.edu.au marcia langton the university of melbourne, australia . m.langton@unimelb.edu.au kristen smith the university of melbourne, australia . kristens@unimelb.edu.au darren clinch the university of melbourne, australia , darren.clinch@unimelb.edu.au recommended citation rose, j., langton, m., smith, k., & clinch, d. (2023). indigenous data governance in australia: towards a national framework. the international indigenous policy journal, 14(1). doi: https://10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.10987 indigenous data governance in australia: towards a national framework abstract australia's distinctive colonial administrative history has resulted in the generation and capture of large quantities of personal data about indigenous peoples in australia, which is currently controlled and processed by government agencies and departments without coherent regulation. from an indigenous standpoint, these data constitute stranded assets. established legal frameworks for pursuing recovery of other classes of asset alienated by governments from indigenous peoples in australia, including land, natural resources, and unpaid wages, have not yet been extended to the recovery of indigenous data assets. this legacy scenario has created a disproportionate administrative burden for indigenous organisations by sustaining their dependency on government for necessary data, while simultaneously suppressing the value of their own contemporary community-owned data assets. in this article, we outline leading international legal, economic, and scientific frameworks by which an equitable arrangement for the governance of indigenous data might be restored to indigenous peoples in australia. keywords indigenous data governance, indigenous data sovereignty, indigenous property rights, indigenous australia, data science, data policy, scientific data, personal data, data rights, intellectual property rights, indigenous land rights, native title creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ 1 rose et al.: indigenous data governance in australia published by scholarship@western, 2023 indigenous data governance in australia: towards a national framework the indigenous data network (idn) is an indigenous-led research project with several aboriginal community partners as well as data custodians from the australian government sector. based at the university of melbourne, idn researchers are working with our partners to develop a distinctive indigenous data governance framework to enable the greatest degree possible of self-determination for indigenous data owners and stewards. we are working to deploy their substantial data assets for the benefit of their communities, while prioritising indigenous futures. the historical context of this initiative has required bringing a decolonising logic to our work to reframe several key concepts in this field. in this paper we review key international data governance principles and guidelines with the intent of addressing the restitution of australian indigenous rights and interests in data, and propose a synthesised model that should form the basis of our data governance: (in)digenous (dat)a (o)wnership, c(ustodianship), and (s)tewardship or “indatocs.” indigenous data is one among a set of asset classes in which indigenous individuals and communities held an interest prior to the assertion of sovereignty over australia by britain in 1770. since the amendment of the australian constitution in 1967, which allowed the australian commonwealth as heir to british colonial rule to make laws with respect to indigenous peoples in australia for the first time,1 the pre-existence of indigenous interests in four of these asset classes has been acknowledged by a flow of legal challenges in a range of court jurisdictions, and by a series of acts of legislation at both federal and state levels. in the 1970s and 1980s, this flow focused on the prior and continuing ownership of land (chartrand, 1981). then, during the 1990s, more sophisticated legislation focused on interests in so-called “bundles of rights,” including not only interests in the ownership of land, but also in non-proprietary access to land, use of natural resources, and agreement-making with respect to both land and natural resources (o’faircheallaigh, 2007; tehan, 2003). most recently, in the 2000s and 2010s, existing racial discrimination legislation has been tested as a means to address indigenous interests in labour, which was systematically exploited under a framework of legalised slavery or “stolen wages” for nearly two centuries prior to the 1970s (kinnane, et al., 2015). throughout this same period, from the late 1970s onwards, existing copyright law2 has been leveraged and refined as a means for exercising indigenous intellectual property rights in certain domains of knowledge, such as medicine (evans et al., 2009), art (anderson, 2005), and music (janke & iacovino, 2012). this evolution of legal and administrative thought in australia may be understood in terms of a gradual realization that indigenous individuals and communities bear inherent interests in certain classes of asset by virtue of their distinct identity as a people. this is an identity with a distinctive spatiotemporal character, defined by the ancient and continuing occupation of australia independently of other peoples, and independent of the existence of the commonwealth that currently purports to make laws with respect to them. in the evolutionary process so far, the asset classes recognised include three classes of tangible asset and one class of intangible asset, viz:. 1) land; 2) natural resources, including their ownership, use, and exchange; 3) labour; and 4) 1 prior to the 1967 amendment, australia's 1901 national constitution restricted to lower state governments the passing of laws affecting indigenous australians. prior to 1901, australia was governed via six independent power-sharing agreements between the british colonial office and six separate colonial authorities distributed around the continent. these governments were free to make laws regarding indigenous australians that reflected their own ideological and economic interests. 2 particularly the commonwealth copyright act (1968). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.10987 intellectual property. each set of interests is distinguished from those of non-indigenous peoples based on the broadly uniform reasoning that they have been transmitted via a hereditary mechanism from one generation of individuals to another over a period extending from the present to a point in the distant past that predates the assertion of sovereignty over australia by the british and thence commonwealth governments. it is this convergent understanding of indigenous property rights, as bearing a spatiotemporal depth greater than those of non-indigenous peoples, which has given rise to the distinctive recognition of those rights under the law. importantly, the four classes of asset recognised so far all comprise well developed and widely understood objects of market value. the acceptance by commonwealth and state governments of indigenous interests in each of the four classes of asset has generally emerged concurrent with a decline in value of the respective asset on the open market, insofar as the interests of non-indigenous peoples has lessened sufficiently and been sufficiently regulated, so as not to be threatened by the inclusion of indigenous interests in the corresponding market for that object of value. procedures available to indigenous individuals and corporations for pursuing their interests within these markets, whether administrative or litigious, have involved the development of relevant governance frameworks that interdigitate with extant australian administrative culture and jurisprudence. no such framework yet exists for the governance of indigenous data as an asset in which indigenous individuals and communities hold a persistent and ongoing interest. in this paper we work through each of the constituent elements involved in a prospective indigenous data governance framework that would give voice to this interest. these include a) defining and modelling data as a quantifiable output of human work; b) defining indigenous data as an output distinguished by its unique spatiotemporal character, in line with other indigenous asset classes; c) characterising the existing data governance environment in australia; d) identifying leading extant international regulatory frameworks for data governance; and e) understanding the historical use of data by australian governments in the governance of indigenous peoples in australia. to this end, section 1 addresses definitions of data governance, the semantic and financial value of data as an asset, and indigenous data as a specific class of data, culminating in the introduction of the indatocs model of indigenous data governance. section 2 addresses the current legislative landscape in australia with regard to data regulation, the transformation of historical indigenous data from a live administrative state into an “archival” state, and international benchmarks for the regulation of personal data as an asset. section 3 reviews existing non-enforceable data governance principles and guidelines that bear the most relevance to development of a coherent framework for indigenous data governance in australia. section 4 concludes with a summary of these elements' relevance and recapitulates their interdigitation in the indatocs model of indigenous data governance, newly presented here. 1.1 data governance and data sovereignty in recent years the phrase “indigenous data” has been closely attached to the term “sovereignty” (kukutai & taylor, 2016; lovett et al., 2019; rainie et al., 2019; walter & suina, 2019; walter et al., 2021). this latter term has two meanings in late colonial settings that do not frequently intersect. one of these meanings is aspirational, reflective of and giving voice to both the heritage of indigenous peoples as free and independent polities, together with a vision to restore that freedom and independence. the other meaning of the term “sovereignty” reflects the enforceable basis on which governments assert the authority to make laws with respect to a given jurisdiction. the phrase 3 rose et al.: indigenous data governance in australia published by scholarship@western, 2023 “indigenous data sovereignty” (“idsov”) connotes both these meanings. on the one hand, it indicates that data has been and continues to be generated by and about indigenous peoples independently of colonial assertions to authority. on the other hand, it also indicates that the authority to make laws with regard to data depends on the enforceability of those laws. the term “governance” means something else altogether, having to do with the roles, functions, and relations that unite individuals and organisations, including communities, institutions, and governments, into a system of administration that channels goods and services efficiently and coherently throughout a population. the phrase “indigenous data governance” emphasises the discrete existence of indigenous data alongside data about other sections of a national population, and implies its value as bearing discrete relevance to the interests of indigenous individuals and communities, alongside other forms of interest. it also connotes the special place that indigenous interests hold in a national governmental system. in this paper, we use the phrase “indigenous data governance” as bearing a more functionally oriented and broadly encompassing set of concepts than that of “indigenous data sovereignty” alone. while we consider both meanings of the term “sovereignty” as vital in this context, we also treat it as relating to a more specific and subset question of the legal authority of governments. we therefore consider indigenous data sovereignty a subset issue of indigenous data governance. 1.2 the data information knowledge wisdom (dikw) hierarchy in non-scientific discourse, the term “data” is often used interchangeably with terms such as “information,” “knowledge,” and “wisdom” without formal definition (commonwealth of australia, 2019; rainie et al., 2019). however, in business analytics, data science, linguistics, and social semiotics, these entities form discrete elements in a system of cognitive and intellectual work. the taxonomic model known as the “data information knowledge wisdom (dikw) hierarchy” was first formally developed in the late 1980s as a heuristic means for explaining the way in which quantifiable sensory inputs are acquired and progressively generalised through a series of transformations into incrementally more valuable states (ackoff, 1989; bernstein, 2011; sharma, 2008). the underlying explanatory function of the dikw model was to show how cognitive and intellectual work is applied to information flows in order to yield increasingly valuable semantic “products” at each of four steps. the model highlights that data, information, knowledge, and wisdom each bear distinct types of utility across varying social and cultural contexts. the formality of this model is approximate however, designed for business analytics rather than data science. in refining and adapting the model, data scientists have pointed out that if the explanatory focus of the dikw model is one of serial refinement at successive points in a production flow, then the order of that series should be inverted so that the most generalised and structurally complex semantic product, wisdom, is construed as the primary sensory input from which successively more specific units are distilled, ultimately yielding irreducible bits of data (batra, 2014; tuomi, 1999). linguists and social semioticians have provided corollary models (bernstein, 1999, 1999; halliday 2005) for the purposes of understanding individual and community interests in data, this convergence between business analytics, data science, and linguistic and social semiotic theory reflects a congruent model in which data is the most refined semantic product of cognitive and intellectual work by individuals and communities over time. for indigenous peoples in australia, this interest spans tens of thousands of years and more than one thousand generations of people continuously 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.10987 occupying the same continent and exercising a constant cognitive and intellectual effort that gives rise to multiple types of semantic product. the importance of distinguishing data from other semantic products of cognitive and intellectual work lies both in the practicality of applying a potential administrative framework to the legal recognition of indigenous data as an asset, and in a coherent technical definition that reflects the specialist disciplines relevant to the study of data and its generation. 1.3 data as an intangible asset the classification of data as an asset is no different than the classification of the other four assets listed above, insofar as the market value of data is now accepted, and insofar as the data market, dominated by what is known colloquially as the “tech sector,” has reached a high level of maturity (bhansali, 2013; laney, 2012, 2017; schwab et al., 2011). however, there are some important distinctions in the way that data is classified as an asset and in the way that it is traded. firstly, the speed at which the data market has expanded and matured is unprecedented compared with the development of markets for other indigenous assets. secondly, there is a lack of local variation in the way that data is traded across this new market, both in geographic terms, and in terms of the sectorspecific actors operating within the data market. this lack of variation is reflected in the homogeneity of the global market, which is distinct from the heterogenous markets in which other indigenous asset classes are traded. dominant actors in the data market are all large international traders associated with the tech sector, such as google, apple, amazon, facebook, and others. by contrast, at the time that indigenous interests began to be acknowledged by australian governments between the 1970s and early 1990s, the dominant traders in markets for land, natural resource, labour, and intellectual property assets were mostly national-level actors within australia. the rapid maturation of the data market, combined with its global homogeneity, have caught existing market participants by surprise, such that even established sectors within this market, such as the fossil fuel industry, which has traded in geological and chemical data assets for more than a century, have been slow to realise data’s changing value (perrons & jensen, 2015). this pattern is indicative of an uneven distribution in capacity to realise data asset value, even where established market actors may already possess high asset volumes. it explains the pronounced profitability of companies that are geared to trade exclusively in data rather than mixed assets, as governments do. it is not surprising, then, that middle power national governments such as the australian commonwealth have been slow to respond with regulatory measures to the rapid and unprecedented emergence of the data economy. under these circumstances, the prospective recognition and acceptance of indigenous interests in data assets by the australian government may deviate from previous attitudes to the management of information, since there is unlikely to be a diminution in market value or significant change in regulatory oversight in the foreseeable future, as presaged the historical acceptance by government of indigenous interests in other forms of asset. 1.4 data governance roles, functions and relations: the ocs model as with systems of governance generally (koliba et al., 2018), data governance is properly construed as an organisational system comprised of roles and relations, each of which are defined by intersecting functions (aisyah et al., 2018; cheong & chang, 2007; otto, 2011; sarsfield, 2009). the governance of data is realised in three such roles, including data owners, custodians, and stewards (aisyah et al., 2018; cheong & chang, 2007; laurie et al., 2018; otto, 2011; sarsfield, 5 rose et al.: indigenous data governance in australia published by scholarship@western, 2023 2009), or what we refer to here as an (o)wnership, (c)ustodianship, and (s)tewarship model of data governance. modes of governance vary according to the functions assigned to these roles and relations by corresponding governmental authorities. in some instances, as discussed below with regard to the european union’s general data protection regulation (2018), data custodians may bear responsibility to data owners, while stewards act under instruction from custodians. in other cases, as discussed below with regard to australia’s legacy colonial administrative regime, all three roles may be collapsed under the authority of a single entity such as a state or commonwealth government. the roles, functions, and relations of a generic ocs data governance model are summarised below: • role: data owner o function: determines all purposes for which and means by which a data asset is generated, stored, accessed, processed, and destroyed. o relation 1: data owner->data custodian (determines custodianship) o relation 2: data owner->data steward (determines stewardship) • role: data custodian o function: supplies data storage and access services. o relation 1: data custodian<-data owner (supplies custodianship services on behalf of a data owner) o relation 2: data custodian<->data steward (supplies access and storage services to a data steward) • role: data steward o function: supplies data processing services, including creation, linkage, modelling, analysis, and destruction. o relation 1: data steward<-data owner (supplies stewardship services on behalf of a data owner) o relation 2: data steward->data custodian (supplies processing services to a data custodian) these roles, functions and relations may be visualised as a triadic network (see figure 1). figure 1. visualisation of the ocs model of data governance, integrating the roles, functions, and relations of systematic data (o)wnership, (c)ustodianship and (s)tewardship the ocs model of data governance introduces an important perspective for the governance of indigenous data where, under most current legal frameworks, government performs all three roles of owner, custodian, and steward. this is the case even where the legislation under which data may 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.10987 originally have been generated has since been repealed, including various state and territory aboriginal “protection” acts and the sections of australia's federal constitution that devolved all powers regarding indigenous peoples to state and territory governments prior to 1967. as discussed below, the general administrative assumption in australia has been that data generated by and about indigenous individuals and communities under moribund legislation, automatically takes on the form of “archival records,” the most relevant governing instruments for which are contained in privacy legislation. from our perspective, this is an unsatisfactory position because it does not give regard to the very real and substantive ongoing value of the data encoded in so-called “archival” records for the purposes of contemporary indigenous community vitality. longitudinal modelling and analysis of indigenous health, education, and economic participation are foremost among these contemporary applications of so-called “archival records,” and even then, comprise only one among a panoply of other potential applications from which indigenous peoples in australia might benefit. reformulating the administrative understanding of this material as a data asset in which indigenous individuals and communities hold real financial interest is convergent with current government and community priorities. in the rest of this paper, we orient discussions of existing data governance instruments and frameworks towards the model of data governance described above. for this purpose, we confer upon the role “data owner” the more specific title “indigenous data owner.” the criteria for such a status is consistent with other administrative and legal definitions of indigenous asset ownership in australia, i.e., having either been personally responsible for the generation of that asset, or being a hereditary heir of those involved in the generation of that asset. this means that an indigenous data owner is a person who has been involved in the generation of a data asset either in whole or in part, either through their own direct activity, or the activity of one or more of their ancestors, or though the indirect act of being a subject of the activity of another person or organisation. by this, we mean that indigenous data is generated either by or about indigenous individuals and communities, and so is owned by them either in whole or in part and is transmissible via an intergenerational hereditary mechanism. in this paper, we seek to give voice to the real and specific interests of indigenous australian data owners by prefixing these formal terms and definitions of indigenous data to the ocs model. we refer to this governance model of (in)digenous (dat)a (o)wneship (c)ustodianship, and (s)tewardship forthwith as “indatocs.” 1.5 the data life cycle the roles, functions, and relations that constitute systems of data governance all contribute to the structure of what is referred to as a “data life cycle” (mcdowall, 2018a; pandit et al., 2018; wing, 2019). as suggested by the term, a data life cycle describes the processes to which data is subjected between the points of its generation and destruction. the model of a life cycle confers a temporal order on the otherwise weakly directed structure of the ocs data governance model described above. in other words, it gives direction to the flow of processes via the functions and relations between the roles of data owner, custodian, and steward. figure 2 integrates this temporal ordering into the model of systemic governance shown in figure 1 above. 7 rose et al.: indigenous data governance in australia published by scholarship@western, 2023 figure 2. data life cycle integrating roles, functions, and relations of the ocs model of data governance the life cycle of indigenous data in an australian setting is complicated by governments’ pervasive occupation, either asserted or actual, of all three ocs roles of owner, custodian, and steward. with respect to indigenous data assets characterised as “archival records,” for example, contemporary government departments and agencies that have replaced those responsible for past injustices against indigenous peoples, have inherited the practical authority associated with the role of data owner from historical actors, while at the same eschewing other negative associations of those actors. in circumstances such as these, data life cycles that span multiple generations of indigenous individuals and communities extend beyond the lifetime of government agencies and departments that inflicted grave trauma on indigenous peoples and later express remorse for such conduct. scenarios such as these clearly demonstrate the unviability of governments’ claims to the status of owner with respect to indigenous data. while it may be appropriate for contemporary government agencies and departments to perform the functions of data custodianship and stewardship under present circumstances, claims to ownership of data are inconsistent with contemporary australian jurisprudence on the issue of data interests. the indatocs model of data governance introduced in section 1.4 above both integrates into the ocs model the temporal ordering of a data lifecycle, as defined by mcdowall (2018a), pandit et al. (2018), and wing (2019), and gives voice to the interests of indigenous data owners in australia with respect to the distinctive lifecycle of indigenous data generated during australia’s colonial administrative history. these interests are those in which the lifecycle of indigenous data has been historically skewed towards the deliberate, ongoing alienation of indigenous peoples in australia from data assets to which they hold a rightful claim under the terms outlined above. 1.6 indigenous data as a special spatiotemporal class of personal data as with indigenous interests in land, natural resources, labour, and intellectual property, discussed above, indigenous interests in data are premised on the distinct status of indigenous peoples as preexisting other peoples in a region of geographic space and historical time. individuals and communities in australia are definable as indigenous because they and/or their antecedents existed within the spatial limits of current australian jurisdiction prior to other individuals and communities. the very existence of indigenous individuals and communities in present-day australia implies an unbroken process of population regeneration since the incursion of individuals and communities arriving from other regions of the planet. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.10987 the legal recognition of pre-existing interests as inherent to indigenous peoples, precludes further denial of this recognition with regard to any other asset that can be shown to exist in australia. this means that data, defined as an asset with financial value, must also have scope for a distinct indigenous character where its generation is dependent upon the existence of indigenous individuals and communities. whereas indigenous interests in more generalised and complex semantic products, such as “knowledge,” have been widely recognised and accepted in law in terms of intellectual property rights (anderson, 2005; evans et al., 2009; janke & iacovino, 2012), indigenous interest in data are yet to be recognised and accepted in law as bearing such a character. as outlined in section 1.5 above, integration of indigenous interests into an ocs model of data governance via the indatocs reformulation allows for the formal definition of indigenous interests in data lifecycles historically skewed against them. the further specification of those interests as originating in the distinctive spatiotemporal attributes of indigenous data, lays the foundations for coherent data provenance tracing mechanisms. in summary, indigenous data is defined here by its unique features on the five measures listed above, including 1) ownership of data underpinned by a discrete form of sovereignty; 2) data as the semantic product of cognitive and intellectual work within a cultural context of origin specific to indigenous peoples; 3) data as an intangible asset in which indigenous peoples hold a specific interest in tension with the historic interests of colonial governments; 4) the three-part ocs model of data governance in which indigenous individuals and communities comprise a specific class of data owner, and consequently; 5) indigenous data as exhibiting a life cycle with a spatial and temporal depth characteristic of indigenous peoples exclusively. as stated above, we propose that the unique combination of these five features in the formal definition of indigenous data, give rise to the need for a distinctive data governance framework in australia. we propose further that this framework is most effectively based on the internationally accepted ocs model described above, which can be usefully operationalised by indigenous individuals and communities in an australian setting by reformulation as the indatocs model of indigenous data governance. in the following two sections of this paper, we describe the ways in which existing australian and international regulatory instruments and extant principles and guidelines construe and operationalise the five features of data governance defined here, either individually or in combination. the purpose of this review is to illustrate why an integrated national framework for indigenous data governance is necessary for australia, how existing regulatory instruments, principles, and guidelines may be relevant to such a framework, and, ultimately, how such a framework should operate on the basis of the indatocs model. 2. existing australian and international regulatory instruments there are currently no australian or international regulatory instruments specifically identifying indigenous data as a discrete category of intangible asset attached to enforceable laws. while the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip) is accurately cited as the most likely relevant international instrument undergirding a potential framework for the legal recognition of indigenous interests in data (kukutai & taylor, 2016), data is not mentioned in the declaration itself. the closest formal approximation of a reference to interests in data are articles 3132, which address rights to “maintain, control, protect and develop” various forms of indigenous property, including intellectual property. the assessment of the undrip's relevance to indigenous 9 rose et al.: indigenous data governance in australia published by scholarship@western, 2023 data interests tends to be made on the grounds that aspirations to indigenous data sovereignty in particular are reflected in a broader aspiration to self-determination set forth in the declaration (kukutai & taylor, 2016). rights to indigenous data governance are likewise inferred, rather than explicitly described. sophisticated extrapolations of both concepts have been put forward by a number of indigenous legal, health, and data science experts (davis 2016; griffiths et al., 2019; madden et al., 2016; rainie et al., 2019). following the lead of these authors and others, we extend the analysis of the undrip’s general relevance to a more specific comparative analysis of existing regulatory instruments, with particular regard to australia. we begin by summarising the features of the regulatory environment in australia, focussing on the recently established office of the national data commissioner, its precursor and sister organisation the office of the australian information commissioner, and relevant legislation, particularly the consumer data right and the data availability and transparency frameworks, the latter of which was recently introduced to the australian parliament at the time of writing. we then turn to what is widely regarded as the world’s leading data regulation, the european union’s general data protection regulation, enacted in 2018. 2.1 the australian data governance environment historically, governance of data pertaining to indigenous individuals and communities in australia individuals and communities was held to be the domain of specialised academic administrative fields, typically social or cultural anthropology, and state-based governmental agencies, such as “aborigines protection boards” and later “aboriginal welfare boards,” which in many instances were directly staffed by anthropologists3. although some of these domains of authority have undergone adaptation since the 1970s, particularly with the emergence of indigenous controlled organisations operating in multiple essential service sectors, the understanding of indigenous data as a discrete form of asset is still relatively alien. the overarching understanding of data generated by these domains of research has remained similarly unaltered, characterised broadly by a focus on rights to individual privacy and confidentiality rather than on interests in property (e.g., aiatsis, 2014; nsw office of aboriginal affairs, 2020; south australian museum, 2017; toussaint, 2017). this is generally reflective of a national regulatory environment in australia that is not explicitly cognisant of the financial value of data as an asset. existing australian legislation directly regulating data generation and exchange is limited to privacy protections. this includes federal, state, and territory laws regulating the collection of identifiable attribute data or “metadata” about individuals and their relationships, including names, ages, genders, physical addresses, financial and medical attributes, and so on. these laws may be broadly classified as pertaining to one or a combination of key service sector domains, including health, education, employment, finance, policing, and telecommunications. of these, health and policing have received significant media attention in recent years, particularly in relation to the “my health record” initiative (2018), which involves the aggregation and centralisation of individual health records on a national scale, and the telecommunications legislation amendment bill (2018), which 3 e.g. a.p. elkin who was both professor of anthropology at the university of sydney and vice-president of the new south wales aboriginal welfare board between the 1930 and1970s. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.10987 compels information technology and telecommunications service providers to ensure personal communication device decryption is made available to government security forces. the office of the australian information commissioner (oaic), established in 1989 and originally titled the “office of the australian privacy commissioner,” is responsible for a number of regulatory functions under australia’s federal privacy act (1988) and freedom of information act (1982). both these pieces of legislation predate the emergence of the data economy by nearly two decades, with the oaic itself predates that event by nearly a decade. major legislative reforms in 2010 refocused the functions of the oaic on administration of public access to government records. separately, the australian competition and consumer commission (accc), established in 1995, is responsible for the administration of australia’s federal trade practices act (1974), now renamed the competition and consumer act (2010). the accc’s interest in data is limited to the regulation of its access and pricing by retailers and does not address questions of generation or ownership (competition and consumer act 2010). in mid-2017, the oaic and the accc were made jointly responsible for developing and implementing new rules, referred to as an “instrument” of the competition and consumer act (2010), and termed the australian consumer data right (cdr) (bradshaw, 2020). these rules came into effect in early 2020 and were amended in late 2020 before having their enforcement functions transferred from the accc to the australian treasury (accc, 2020a, 2020b). the cdr is designed to fill gaps in the competition and consumer act (2010) relating to the protection of personal data generated by consumers of retail products, including financial, energy, and communications services (bradshaw, 2020). while the cdr appears to provide a framework for the regulation of data ownership, custodianship, and stewardship, it does so only in relation to the trade of products where data is a secondary by-product of that trade, and does not address the financial value of data (esayas & daly, 2018). further, the cdr appears to maintain a regulatory focus on privacy rather than asset interests, consistent with australia’s longstanding regulatory orientation to data as a financially valueless or at least value-neutral entity (goggin et al., 2019). in late 2018 the federal government launched the office of the national data commissioner (ondc), which between 2019 and 2020 undertook a series of stakeholder consultations in the lead-up to release of a working paper on the functions and objectives the data availability and transparency bill (dat, 2020), currently before the australian parliament. like the oaic, the objective of the ondc is to “enhance accessibility” to data, in this case on both the part of the australian public with respect to australian government data, and on the part of government with respect to australian citizens’ personal data (commonwealth of australia, 2019). although the ondc has given consideration to the question of subsidiary classes of data to which it may direct attention, indigenous data has not yet been formally addressed beyond a single targeted stakeholder roundtable discussion. 4 like the proposed cdr, the general theme of the dat bill (2020) may thus be reasonably characterised as focusing on the regulation of access to data, irrespective of the circumstances of its generation, whether via the provision of services by government or by community-controlled organisations, or in the course of private business activities. this commonwealth-wide trend is most clearly articulated in the ondc’s september 2019 discussion paper (commonwealth of australia, 2019), which calls for the removal of individual consent provisions in subsequent data governance legislation (barbaschow, 2019). these moves reflect a 4 held 19 september 2019 in melbourne. 11 rose et al.: indigenous data governance in australia published by scholarship@western, 2023 trend towards the expansion and strengthening of commonwealth access to and control over personal data, rather than on the regulation of the trade in data among owners, stewards, and custodians, indigenous or otherwise. these trends are not inconsistent with historical australian government approaches to the treatment of indigenous data specifically, which were broadly aimed at monitoring and controlling the indigenous population in line with assimilationist objectives and the eugenicist theories that informed them until the mid-20th century. following the 1967 constitutional referendum and consequent dissolution of those laws, the primary attitude towards surviving records was one of restriction and concealment. those records that were not deliberately destroyed are now treated as highly sensitive confidential archival material and regulated by archivists who police access by survivors of those historical regimes. access is generally granted on the basis of a “right to know,” rather than on a right to equity in the asset as a whole, consistent with outmoded practices of data custodianship rather than stewardship as discussed below. such an approach is incompatible with the internationally recognised ocs model of data governance, where the distinct roles of owners, custodians and stewards are enshrined in the inherent property rights of data owners. 2.2 the eu general data protection regulation: a model governance framework during the past decade, data governance in the european union has been trending in the opposite direction to that of australia, towards the strengthening of access to and control over personal data on the part of the individuals by or about whom it is created. in 2018, this governance trend found expression in the enactment of the general data protection regulation (gdpr), which is oriented specifically towards the recognition of data as an asset via its regulation in the eu’s single digital market (palmirani et al., 2018). the gdpr enshrines eight personal rights in relation to the controlling and processing of personal data by entities operating in the european union, including the right to: • access; • be informed; • object; • withdraw consent; • rectification; • erasure (i.e., to be “forgotten”); • data portability; and • restrict processing. the determination of these rights is contingent upon definitions of the roles of individuals and other entities participating in the eu’s digital economy. these roles are, in turn determined by the definable functions that each individual or entity performs under the gdpr, and the relations consequently enacted between each of them. each of these roles, functions, and relations contributes to the designation of the other in a self-consistent systematic manner comparable to the ocs model of data governance described at section 1 above. article 4 of the gdpr defines the primary roles of the regime as those of data subjects, data processors, and data controllers (general data protection regulation 2018), together with accompanying functions and relations, which may be synthesised using the following taxonomy: • role: data subject 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.10987 o function: an individual about whom personal data is generated in such a way as to distinguish them from others, whether by name, code, or some other identifier, anonymised or otherwise. o relation 1: data subjects<-data controller (subject to data control). o relation 2: data subjects<-data processor (subject to data processing). • role: data controller o function: an individual or entity that determines the purposes and means of the processing of personal data consistent with the rights enshrined in the gdpr. o relation 1: data controller->data subject (exercises control on behalf of a data subject) o relation 2: data controller->data processor (determines the purposes and means of the processing on behalf of a data subjects). • role: data processor o function: an individual or entity engaged in the generation, storage, modelling and analysis of personal data. o relation 1: data processor->data subject (processes data about a data subject) o relation 2: data processor<data controller (processes data on behalf of a data controller) the gdpr’s model of roles, functions and relations is illustrated at figure 3. figure 4 maps these roles, functions, and relations onto equivalents defined by the ocs model of data governance described at section 1 above. figure 3. gdpr roles, functions, and relations 13 rose et al.: indigenous data governance in australia published by scholarship@western, 2023 figure 4. gdpr mapped onto the ocs model of data governance roles, functions, and relations this remapping illustrates how the ocs model of data governance may be adapted to suit the specific regulatory objectives of a particular authority, in this case the european union’s objective of protecting the interests of its citizens, in the personal data that is generated by or about them. the gdpr serves as a leading example of the kind of governance framework that australia might consider with regard to the data interests not only of indigenous citizens, but of the population at large. with respect to indigenous australians specifically, implementation of a comparable framework would involve conferring an auxiliary status of “special data subject” on indigenous individuals as part of the indatocs data governance model. in conferring such a status, the commonwealth would give rightful regard to the established status of indigenous australians as bearing both a unique spatiotemporal heritage deeper than that other australians, but also as survivors of a centuries-long program of targeted data theft by the commonwealth and its predecessors. by adopting the indatocs model of data governance as described above, the commonwealth would set an administrative precedent not only for the recognition of indigenous interests in data assets, but for the wider adoption of ocs-based models of data governance nationally. 3. non-enforceable international guidelines and principles turning from enforceable instruments to standardised international policies and guidelines, in this section we provide an overview of established international and sectorial voluntary instruments widely accepted among peak organisations and regulators. this includes the five safes framework for data governance, the alcoa data integrity principles, the fair guiding principles, the care guiding principles on indigenous data, the first nations principles of ocap, and the trust 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.10987 principles for digital repositories. each of these voluntary instruments provides proximal guidelines for defining one or a combination of terms forming part of the ocs data governance model described in section 1. however, none of these instruments lists all relevant terms of the ocs model covered by the gdpr (2018). in response, the indatocs model proposed here, draws on either one or a combination of elements of each of the six voluntary instruments lists as the basis for an integrated, comprehensive, and functional framework both suited to australia’s specific administrative history and contemporary regulatory environment, and reflective of internationally accepted ocs-based standards. with regard to indigenous data governance principles that might serve as a precedent for an indatocs-based regulatory framework in australia, there currently exist a number of nongovernmental, national-level initiatives targeting a range of indigenous data governance issues, but which are yet to conform around a coherent set of policy objectives. these initiatives include the united states indigenous data sovereignty network (usidsn), the first nations information governance council (fnigc) in canada, 5 the te mana raraunga (māori data sovereignty network) in new zealand/aotearoa, 6 the maiam nayri wingara aboriginal and torres strait islander data sovereignty collective in australia,7 and the indigenous data network (idn) in australia,8 among others. each of these indigenous data initiatives promotes its own set of guiding objectives and principles, and several are members of the international collective, the global indigenous data alliance (gida).9 despite this latter international coalition, there is not yet any standardised set of terms or definitions around which a legal and administrative framework might recognise and value indigenous interests in data as an asset. for this reason, we focus on existing australian and international regulatory instruments relating to individual and community interests in data, elements of which are suited to integration into the more specific and functionally oriented terms and definitions relevant to the indatocs model presented here. 3.1 the five safes framework the five safes framework was originally developed by the united kingdom’s office of national statistics in 2003 as a set of protocols for managing conditions on data access (desai et al., 2016; ritchie, 2017). although they bear relevance to all roles, functions, and relations of an ocs-based model of data governance as described above, the five safes framework is most closely focused on the role and functions of data custodianship. the framework has now been adopted worldwide, not only by national statistics agencies but by a range of both government and non-government data custodians operating at a range of jurisdictional levels. in australia, all commonwealth accredited integrating authorities conform to the framework, including the australian bureau of statistics, the australian institute of health and welfare, the australian institute of family studies, and the commonwealth department of social services, among others. 5 https://fnigc.ca/ 6 https://www.temanararaunga.maori.nz/ 7 https://www.maiamnayriwingara.org/ 8 https://mspgh.unimelb.edu.au/centres-institutes/centre-for-health-equity/research-group/indigenous-data-network 9 https://www.gida-global.org/ https://fnigc.ca/splash/ https://www.temanararaunga.maori.nz/ https://www.maiamnayriwingara.org/ https://mspgh.unimelb.edu.au/centres-institutes/centre-for-health-equity/research-group/indigenous-data-network https://www.gida-global.org/ 15 rose et al.: indigenous data governance in australia published by scholarship@western, 2023 the five safes framework generally lists five prospective questions for custodians and stewards to consider in determining access and the means and purposes for which data is modelled and analysed. table 1 presents an exemplary form of these questions used by the australian institute of health and welfare, together with operationalised interpretations. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.10987 table 1. constituent elements of a generic five safes framework (aihw 2019) safe projects is the use of the data appropriate? interpretation: use of the data is legal, ethical and the project is expected to deliver public benefit. safe people can the users be trusted to use it in an appropriate manner? interpretation: researchers have the knowledge, skills, and incentives to act in accordance with required standards of behaviour. safe data is there a disclosure risk in the data itself? interpretation: data has been treated appropriately to minimise the potential for identification of individuals or organisations. safe settings does the access facility prevent unauthorised use? interpretation: there are practical controls on the way the data is accessed— both from a technology perspective and considering the physical environment. safe output are the statistical results non-disclosive? interpretation: a final check can be required to minimise risk when releasing the findings of the project. the five safes framework has potential to advance the interests of indigenous australians in data assets via an indatocs model, where the undergirding concept of “safety” has already been defined. as the aihw’s interpretations highlight, the contingent factor for definitions of safety is “appropriateness” of each point in the framework. concepts of appropriateness are obviously politically, culturally and historically variable. data custodianship and stewardship priorities deemed appropriate to the interests of indigenous peoples in australia by commonwealth, state, and territory governments prior to the 1967 referendum have changed markedly in the time since, as described in section 1. by defining data as an asset, and indigenous data as an asset in which indigenous peoples in australia have a specific and inherent interest in line with the indatocs model proposed, the definition of “safety” is refined sufficiently to make the five safes framework functionally useful for indigenous data governance with respect to the role of data custodianship, thereby aligning it more specifically with the indatocs model. we reframe the aihw’s interpretive model in table 2 below. 17 rose et al.: indigenous data governance in australia published by scholarship@western, 2023 table 2. constituent elements of a five safes framework interpreted for the purposes of indigenous data governance safe projects is the proposed custodianship and stewardship of the data in the interests of indigenous data owners? safe people do data custodians and stewards have the experience, knowledge, skills, and motivation to act in the interests of indigenous data owners? safe data has the data been assessed to measure its potential for undermining the interests of its indigenous owners? safe settings have custodianship and stewardship functions been set to minimise risks of the data being used contrary to the interests of indigenous owners? safe output are the results of modelling and analysing indigenous data non-disclosive? while based on ocs governance model roles, the five safes framework is oriented primarily to an active data-use environment and does not account for situations in which data assets are effectively stranded in a dormant state because of inadequate governance arrangements. because this is an ongoing feature of the indigenous data governance landscape in australia, and consequently an objective of the indatocs data governance model, we consider other existing data governance instruments that give regard to such omissions. these omissions are partly addressed in different respects by the alcoa data integrity principles and the fair guiding principles discussed below. 3.2 the alcoa data integrity principles the alcoa data integrity principles were initially developed as a quasi-formal framework by the united states food and drug administration (usfda) in the late 1990s as a means for regulating the information structure of physical records relating to pharmaceutical products. the objective of these principles was to define data governance functions that ensured information relating to drugs traded in the usa be (a)ttributable, (l)egible, (c)ontemporaneous, (o)riginal, and (a)ccurate (mcdowall, 2018b; williams et al., 2017; wollen, 2010). the demonstrated utility of the alcoa principles was such that in 2003 the usfda properly formalised them as part of its code of federal regulations on electronic records and electronic signatures (usfda, 2003). the principles were expanded to include requirements that data relating to the manufacture not only of pharmaceuticals but also of medical equipment, and which was now predominantly electronic, also be “complete, consistent, enduring, and available,” and that the acronym be altered to “alcoa+.” from this point, the aloca+ principles spread to international usage in all domains of medical research (jordan, 2016). in late 2019, following initial publication as an annex to a 2016 technical report, the world health organisation released independent draft guidelines on the use of alcoa+ principles for the handling of contracts relating to medicines and medical supplies internationally (who, 2016, 2019). the structure of the who guidelines indicates that they are applicable not only to medical 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.10987 supply chains but also to the maintenance of data integrity standards throughout data life cycles more broadly (who, 2016, 2019), visualised at figure 5 below. figure 5. alcoa data integrity functions mapped to an ocs-based data governance lifecycle the relevance of the world health organisation’s extended alcoa+ principles for indigenous data governance, is that they reinforce and consolidate key terms, definitions, and standards by which the ocs-based roles of data owners, custodians, and stewards may coordinate their interactions with one another, independent of the rights-based priorities that may vary among governing authorities. in an australian setting, this means that even in the absence of subjectoriented protections, such as those conferred under either the data availability and transparency framework or the consumer data right, described at section 2.1 above, the life cycles of data assets in which indigenous individuals and communities hold an interest may nevertheless be governed consistently independent of the legal validation of that interest. the linkage here is between the orientation of the who’s alcoa+ guidelines towards the data integrity of supply chains over time, where in australia this is precisely the form taken by contemporary indigenous data assets that have been developed over decades and centuries of administrative record-keeping. in other words, those data assets currently treated as indigenous “archival records,” are more properly treated as indigenous “data products,” which exhibit supply chain histories comparable to life science data and medical products typically subject to the who’s alcoa+ guidelines. the alcoa+ guidelines consequently provide an illustration of how an ocsoriented data life cycle governance model might be incorporated into an indatocs model of indigenous data governance, as outlined at section 1.5 above. 3.3 fair guiding principles on scientific data the fair guiding principles on scientific data stewardship and management were initially published in 2016 by a consortium of 47 predominantly european scientists seeking to establish a standard for the governance of scientific research data (wilkinson et al., 2016). the fair acronym encodes four functions that the consortium considers critical to data governance roles, such that these roles ensure data is made (f)indable, (a)ccessible, (i)nteroperable and (r)eusable. following publication, the fair principles have been rapidly endorsed by a number of international 19 rose et al.: indigenous data governance in australia published by scholarship@western, 2023 governmental entities, including the european council and european commission, the g7, g20, the international science council's committee on data (codata), and the research data alliance, among others (mons et al., 2017; stall et al., 2019). in 2019 the australian academy of science commenced formal discussions with codata on development of a national fair data strategy for australia (aas, 2019). in terms of their orientation towards an ocs model of data governance, while wilkinson et al. (2016) referred exclusively to data stewardship, the four functions encoded in the fair principles are tacitly oriented towards both data stewardship and data custodianship. figure 6 visualises this distribution of the fair functions, mapped onto the two roles of data stewardship and custodianship, including the corresponding relations between them, as well as the third governance role of data ownership. in this configuration, data custodians bear a responsibility to both owners and stewards to ensure that data is findable and accessible, while data stewards bear a responsibility to both owners and custodians to ensure that data is interoperable and reproducible. figure 6. ocs-based data governance roles mapped to the functions of the fair guiding principles the allocation of the four fair functions to each of the two ocs-based governance roles of custodianship and stewardship is made according to the extent to which each of those four functions involves the processing of data. with respect to the functions of making data findable and accessible, both roles require either no processing or very little processing. to use concrete examples provided by wilkinson et al. (2016), findability and accessibility are enhanced by appending unique identifiers to metadata indexes and by the storage of data on an accessible resource. by contrast, ensuring that data is interoperable and reproducible may require variable degrees of restructuring, including file formatting, and rearrangement and redefinition of data classes, for example (wilkinson et al., 2016). such restructuring is the epitome of data processing. with regard to the governance of indigenous data assets using the proposed indatocs model, the fair guiding principles provide an important augmentation to both the temporal “productionline” orientation of the alcoa+ principles, and the risk-mitigation orientation of the five safes framework. while the alcoa+ principles specify the utility of functions over time, such as in the case of the maintenance and development of archival records, they do not allocate these functions explicitly to ocs-based data governance roles. the fair guiding principles fill this gap in the alcoa+ principles by providing clear links between ocs-based roles, functions, and relations. conversely, while the five safes framework provides a detailed scaffolding for allocating riskmitigation functions to ocs stewardship and custodianship roles in an active data governance 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.10987 regime, they do not elaborate the distribution of these functions over time, during the life cycle of a data asset. the fair guiding principles address this latter gap by emphasising the future utility of research data beyond the immediate validation of the study for which it was initially generated. it is this linkage between the five safes framework and the alcoa+ principles, provided by the fair guiding principles, which makes them a central instrument in the operationally oriented indatocs model of indigenous data governance proposed here. 3.4 care principles for indigenous data governance the care principles for indigenous data governance are a response to the fair guiding principles, intended as an augmentation to the latter, which more effectively account for inequities in indigenous control over research data generated by and about indigenous people (carroll et al., 2019; hudson et al., 2020). the care mnemonic encodes four priorities for the governance of indigenous research data, comprising (c)ollective benefit, (a)uthority to control, (r)esponsibility, and (e)thics. each priority consists of several constituent parts in a structure similar to that of the fair guiding principles (carroll et al., 2020), although the former encodes a thematic mnemonic, rather than a set of programmatic governance functions as the fair guiding principles do. the care principles were developed following the 14th plenary of the research data alliance (rda) in botswana in 2018, which formed a special platform for promotion of the fair principles. having been initially drafted at the co-hosted event “indigenous data sovereignty principles for the governance of indigenous data workshop” (carroll et al., 2020), co-signatories to the care principles include representatives of many of the canzus (canada, australia, new zealand, united states) indigenous data sovereignty initiatives listed above, including the us indigenous data sovereignty network, the māori data sovereignty network, and the australian aboriginal and torres strait islander data sovereignty collective. this community of signatories reflects the primary objective of the care principles as identifying data generated by and about indigenous peoples as subject to a specialised definition of personal data linked to the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples. this is a definition bound up with the objective of collective self-determination, free of restrictions imposed by colonial governmental authorities. with regard to the ocs model of data governance outlined in figure 1, the care principles are thus oriented towards defining in a thematic sense the roles of and relations between data owners, custodians, and stewards. by focusing on the fair principles, the care principles target the same two aspects of the roles, functions, and relations of data governance addressed by the fair principles, viz. a) risk mitigation in the relations between data owners and both custodians and stewards, and b) temporal sequencing of functions in order to maximise data integrity over time. the care principles are a valuable contribution to the international repertoire of data governance principles and guidelines. by setting as an overarching objective data sovereignty, rather than data governance, the care principles clearly define the intended beneficiaries as data owners, i.e., indigenous peoples, rather than the data market as a whole. this aligns with the tone of the gdpr in setting out a rights-based, data subject-oriented framework for the ownership of data as an asset, although unlike the gdpr, the care guiding principles do not include a description of the mechanisms by which those principles might be implemented. in terms of their relevance to the indatocs model of indigenous data governance proposed here, the care guiding principles 21 rose et al.: indigenous data governance in australia published by scholarship@western, 2023 reinforce the central importance of data ownership in any ocs-based model of indigenous data governance. 3.5 the first nations principles of ocap the first nations principles of ocap provide a health-oriented framework for the collection, protection, use, and sharing of data about first nations individuals and communities in canada (fnigc, 2014a, 2014b; mashford-pringle & pavagadhi, 2020; mecredy et al. 2018; sabeti et al., 2021; schnarch, 2004; slater et al., 2019 )10. similarly to the care principles, the ocap principles emphasise a set of thematic priorities or “notions” concerning the roles and relations between data owners, custodians, and stewards within an ocs-based framework, namely (o)wnership, (c)ontrol, (a)ccess, and (p)ossession (fnigc, 2014a, 2014b). the ocap principles were originally developed in the late 1990s by the national steering committee of the first nations regional longitudinal health survey (rhs), a recurrent data collection exercise undertaken by the first nations health authority in canada. 11 at its inception, the principles were known as “oca” and were held to apply to any and all “research, monitoring and surveillance, surveys, statistics, and cultural knowledge” (schnarch, 2004, p. 80; fnigc, 2014a, p. 4). by 2004, the rhs steering committee had evolved to form the first nations information governance council (fnigc), which now oversees the rhs together with implementation of the ocap principles and broader issues related to “first nations data, research and information” (schnarch, 2004, p. 80; fnigc, 2014a, p. 4.). the fnigc is composed of representatives from 10 regional first nations organisations, mandated by and reporting to the assembly of first nations’ chiefs committee on health (ibid.) consistent with the thematic approach shared by the care principles, the definitions of ocsoriented roles, functions, and relations provided by the ocap principles are generalised. in this sense, the ocap principles avoid distinguishing data from either information or knowledge (fnigc, 2014a), or distinguishing data generated by indigenous individuals or communities from that generated about those individuals and communities by other parties (fnigc, 2014a). while the four principles of ownership, control, access, and possession capture to varying extents dimensions of the data life cycle as described above (fnigc, 2014a), they emphasise a theme of indigenous sovereignty over and above programmatic functions targeted at data as a formally defined asset (mecredy et al., 2018). this is consistent with the fnigc's stated aim of asserting a jurisdictional authority contra that of canadian governments (fnigc, 2014a). to this end, ocap's possession principle is described by the fnigc as follows: while “ownership” identifies the relationship between a people and their data, possession reflects the state of stewardship of data. first nation possession puts data within first nation jurisdiction and therefore, within first nation control. possession is the mechanism to assert and protect ownership and control. first nations generally exercise little or no control over data that is in the possession of others, particularly other governments. (fnigc, 2014a, p. 5.) 10 fingc: https://fnigc.ca/ocap-training/ 11 https://www.fnha.ca/what-we-do/research-knowledge-exchange-and-evaluation/regional-health-survey 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.10987 with regard to the indatocs model of indigenous data governance proposed here, the ocap principles form a useful international example of an indigenous-led effort to assert control over information assets, which commenced prior to the emergence of the data economy in the 1990s and has been iteratively adapted over time to deal with a changing information landscape. in terms of their relevance to the australian situation, the ocap principles illustrate an approach to data governance by an indigenous organisation, the fnigc, operating under legacy british colonial conditions, and their successful promotion to government and tertiary education organisations. 3.6 the trust principles for digital repositories the most recent addition to the growing international body of data governance guidelines and principles are the trust principles for digital repositories, published by an international consortium of 20 computing, science, and humanities researchers specialising in a variety of dataintensive fields, ranging from physics and engineering, through to ecology and archival document management (lin et al., 2020). like the care principles, the trust principles comprise a thematic mnemonic rather than a grammatically consistent codification of data governance functions and relations, namely (tr)ransparency, (u)ser-focus, (s)ustainability, and (t)echnology (lin et al., 2020). also like the care principles, the trust principles have been designed in response to the fair guiding principles’ perceived emphasis on the interests of data custodians and stewards rather than owners and other community stakeholders, or “users.” to this end, the authors of the trust principles describe their objective as providing guidelines for the operation of “trustworthy digital repositories” (lin et al., 2020). while the role of “repository” is consistent with the functions of data custodians, the inclusion of data “users” as a focus of the guidelines effectively includes data stewards in the principles’ target group of beneficiaries as well. in terms of the ocs model of data governance described in section 1, the trust principles represent an interesting hybrid approach. while, like the fair and care principles, the trust principles set as their objective a more ethical set of obligations on the part of data custodians and stewards towards data owners, they do so by seeking to define desirable themes of the latter two roles. by contrast, the fair principle focus on the functions of these roles rather their themes, while the care principles focus on defining the thematic role of data owners rather than the role of either custodians or stewards. the relevance of the trust principles to indigenous data governance lies in their intent to establish an ethical theme for obligations of custodians and stewards towards data owners. while the authors of the principles do not refer to the care principles, there are important overlaps between the two in their thematic structure, which mutually reinforce the centrality of data ownership in any responsible data governance framework. with respect to the indatocs model of indigenous data governance advanced here, the trust principles illustrate how an ethical rather than exclusively functional definition of the roles and relations between data owners, custodians, and stewards may assist in giving rise to a more just outcome. conclusion: the indatocs model of indigenous data governance in this paper we have identified six key features of existing data governance frameworks, legislation, guidelines, and principles relevant to the interests in data as an asset to indigenous individuals and 23 rose et al.: indigenous data governance in australia published by scholarship@western, 2023 communities in australia. we have proposed that these features are suited to integration into a single national indigenous data governance framework for australia, based on an ocs data governance model. an integrated national framework of this kind would involve six corollary definitions: 1. the definition of the relationship between data sovereignty and data governance, where: a. data sovereignty refers both to the aspiration of indigenous individuals and communities to autonomous ownership and control of data assets in which they hold an interest, and to the legally enforceable mandate of governments to exert authority over the governance of data within a given jurisdictional domain, and where; b. data governance refers to the roles, functions and relations involved in exerting this authority, which consequently encompass the concept of sovereignty. 2. the definition of data as the semantic product of cognitive and intellectual work in a sequential process undertaken over time, which follows the preceding generation of at least two other semantic products, including knowledge and information, such that the production chain involved in the generation of data follows the sequence knowledge>information>data. 3. the definition of data as an intangible asset with real financial value. 4. the definition of data governance as an organisational system titled “ocs,” comprised of roles, functions and functions, namely: a. three roles: ownership, custodianship, and stewardship b. two sets of functions: controlling and processing. c. three relations: owner<>custodian; custodian:<>steward; steward<>owner 5. the definition of a data life cycle as encompassing all instances of controlling and processing between the instant of a dataset's creation and the instant of its destruction over time; 6. the definition of indigenous data as a special class of data asset distinguished by its multigenerational life cycle, extending over a period that predates the assertion of a colonial data governance regime. in this paper, these six definitions are used to characterise the extant australian data legislative landscape with regard to data governance, the european union's general data protection regulation, and six sets of international principles and guidelines. the purpose of this exercise has been to illustrate how each set of principles and guidelines expresses to varying degrees, one or a combination of the six features listed above, and how each may be drawn upon in the development a convergent and self-consistent regulatory framework. in summary, we propose that the internationally recognised data governance roles of ownership, stewardship, and custodianship, together with the similarly recognised governance functions and relations that characterise each role and integrate them into a systematic and operational model, be recognised in the acronym “ocs,” and be given further, specialised recognition with regard to the other five features described above. as elaborated in each section of this paper, we propose that these five features be encoded in the acronym (in)digenous (dat)a (o)wnership, c(ustodianship) and (s)tewardship or “indatocs.” we propose further that such a model should form the basis on which indigenous communities in australia, community controlled organisations, business, and governments might effectively address the unique and ongoing situation facing indigenous peoples in australia with regard to the restitution of their rights and interests in data that has been and continues to be generated by and about them following the assertion of sovereignty by britain over 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.10987 the continent of australia. to this end, the indatocs model of indigenous data governance represents the integration of internationally recognised and adopted best practice data governance, with the specific concerns of indigenous data owners in assets to which they hold a rightful claim. references ackoff, r. l. 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(working document qas/19.819). draft for comments. https://www.who.int/docs/defaultsource/medicines/norms-and-standards/current-projects/qas19-819-rev1-guideline-ondata-integrity.pdf https://www.who.int/publications/m/item/trs-966---annex-5-who-good-data-and-record-management-practices https://www.who.int/publications/m/item/trs-966---annex-5-who-good-data-and-record-management-practices https://www.who.int/docs/default-source/medicines/norms-and-standards/current-projects/qas19-819-rev1-guideline-on-data-integrity.pdf https://www.who.int/docs/default-source/medicines/norms-and-standards/current-projects/qas19-819-rev1-guideline-on-data-integrity.pdf https://www.who.int/docs/default-source/medicines/norms-and-standards/current-projects/qas19-819-rev1-guideline-on-data-integrity.pdf ms#1468 wotherspoon what do indigenous final.pdf the international indigenous policy journal volume 11|issue1 march 2020 what do indigenous education policy frameworks reveal about commitments to reconciliation in canadian school systems? terry wotherspoon university of saskatchewan, terry.wotherspoon@usask.ca emily milne macewan university, milnee4@macewan.ca recommended citation wotherspoon , t., & milne, e.(2020). what do indigenous education policy frameworks reveal about commitments to reconciliation in canadian school systems? the international indigenous policy journal, 11(1). doi: https://www.doi.org/ 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.10215 what do indigenous education policy frameworks reveal about commitments to reconciliation in canadian school systems? abstract the national truth and reconciliation commission of canada has challenged governments and school boards across canada to acknowledge and address the damaging legacies of residential schooling while ensuring that all students gain an adequate understanding of relations between indigenous peoples and non-indigenous peoples. this article explores the dynamics and prospects for effective change associated with reforms in elementary and secondary education systems since the release of the commission’s calls to action, focusing on the policy frameworks employed by provincial and territorial governments to guide these actions. the analysis examines critically the overt and hidden messages conveyed through discourses within policy documents and statements. the key questions we address include: what do current education policy frameworks and actions regarding indigenous peoples reveal about government approaches to education and settler–indigenous relationships in canada? to what extent is effective reconciliation possible, and how can it be accomplished in the context of institutional structures and discourses within a white settler colonial society? the findings reveal that substantial movement towards greater acknowledgement of indigenous knowledge systems and incorporation of indigenous content continues to be subordinated to or embedded within western assumptions, norms, and standards. keywords education policy, indigenous education, reconciliation, truth and reconciliation commission of canada creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0license. 1 wotherspoon & milne: education policy frameworks and reconciliation published by: scholarship@western, 2020 what do indigenous education policy frameworks reveal about commitments to reconciliation in canadian school systems? the question of how to achieve meaningful reconciliation between indigenous peoples and nonindigenous peoples in canada has emerged as a major national priority since the 2015 release of the truth and reconciliation commission (trc) of canada final report. through the trc’s (2015a) comprehensive calls to action, the report outlines a vision for a positive way forward that acknowledges and addresses the damaging legacy in which policies and practices associated with residential schooling have suppressed indigenous cultures and destroyed family and community connections for several generations. the report places schools and educational activities at the heart of processes to advance reconciliation (trc, 2015c). this article aims to critically examine reconciliation-related educational policies and practices that are oriented to ensure all students have an adequate understanding of residential schools, treaties, the historical and contemporary contributions of indigenous peoples to canada, and the relationships supported through this knowledge. in this article, we present our findings from the first stage of a larger research project on schooling and reconciliation, focusing here on a critical discourse analysis of policy frameworks and documents related to elementary and secondary schooling in provincial and territorial jurisdictions across canada. we highlight the core policies and official statements related to indigenous learning and reconciliation in each jurisdiction before exploring their alignment with the education for reconciliation calls to action put forward in the trc final report. our discussion is framed by two broad questions: what do current education policy frameworks and actions reveal about government approaches to education related to indigenous peoples and relationships between indigenous peoples and settlers in the canadian context? to what extent is effective reconciliation possible and how can it be accomplished in the context of institutional structures and discourses framed within the context of a white settler colonial society? by exploring these questions, we seek to understand the extent to which these initiatives may or may not represent a matter of performativity and good faith rather than a movement towards foundational change. many relevant initiatives began to emerge in the late 20th and early 21st centuries, including advocacy and position papers advanced by indigenous organizations, government agencies, and other organizations. however, the trc calls to action have fostered a sense of urgency to undertake more comprehensive reform frameworks. in response, new policies and initiatives to support indigenous students and advance reconciliation objectives have proliferated rapidly across educational levels and jurisdictions. our analysis does not claim to cover all such policies, due to ongoing developments. nonetheless, at this stage, no other documentation or analysis of indigenous education initiatives exists in the literature. literature review education lies at the heart of the trc mandate, which calls for action to advance reconciliation, especially by supporting indigenous students’ success and fostering among all students an understanding of and respect for indigenous peoples and their experiences and perspectives (trc, 2015b). these principles reinforce international recognition of indigenous rights and knowledge as expressed in the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (united nations, 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1, art. 6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.10215 2008) and other global frameworks that affirm indigenous rights, self-determination, and indigenous knowledge (battiste & henderson, 2008). educational jurisdictions across canada have acted promptly to express formal commitment to these mandates, supported by numerous measures dedicated to improving educational outcomes for indigenous learners and incorporating culturally relevant curriculum and programming into educational practices, in many cases building upon existing policy frameworks and reform initiatives (e.g., british columbia ministry of education, n.d.b; kairos canada, 2015, 2018; ontario ministry of education, 2007). recent actions suggest a significant shift in momentum and focus to achieve stated objectives. however, the trc underscores concerns that several decades of previous calls by indigenous organizations for effective educational change have yielded limited progress (assembly of first nations [afn], 1988, 2013; national indian brotherhood [nib] & afn, 1972; royal commission on aboriginal peoples [rcap], 1996). the trc (2015c) call to “eliminate” educational achievement gaps between indigenous peoples and non-indigenous peoples echoes an extensive body of previous scholarship and policy statements in canada and other white settler colonial nations (see also gordon & white, 2014; hogarth, 2018; mahuika, berryman, & bishop, 2011). the trc observed several damaging legacies of residential schooling that continue to destabilize many indigenous people and their communities. the intergenerational impact of the residential schools is represented in such phenomena as high rates of family violence, addictions, physical and mental health issues, child custody in foster care, adult incarceration, learning problems, and low educational attainment (trc, 2015b), all of which warrant immediate as well as longer term action. however, the commission also emphasized the dual significance of contemporary education as a means to ensure that all canadians understand the history and legacy of residential schooling and to ensure that indigenous and non-indigenous students alike are provided the tools for meaningful social and economic participation (trc, 2015c). as time elapses, it is important to monitor progress towards achievement of these aims; in this case, by understanding the extent to which frameworks for reconciliation implemented in response to these calls to action are reflected in educational practices. an extensive range of research and policy literature documents educational disparities between indigenous peoples and non-indigenous peoples in canada (gordon & white, 2014; statistics canada, 2013, wilson & macdonald, 2010) to the extent that the need for educational improvement signifies a “national priority” (council of ministers of education canada, 2015, p. 3) and “great social policy challenge facing canada” (richards, 2008, p. i) that must be met through effective responses to a broader national “crisis” (anaya, 2014). the literature cites several factors that contribute to these observed differences in educational outcomes and performance, including school-related dimensions (such as curriculum, instructional approaches, student support, and student–teacher relationships), community contexts, and school–community relations (council of ministers of education canada, 2010), as well as socioeconomic conditions underlying structural and institutional conditions (gerber, 2014; mendelson, 2006). these factors, along with racism and disconnection between official school processes and indigenous perspectives (bougie, kelly-scott, & arriagada, 2013; riley & ungerleider, 2012; sfeir, 2016; st. denis, 2010), typically intersect with and reinforce one another (bruce, marline, & raham, 2012). the calls to action highlight the importance of integrating indigenous content and perspectives within curricula, in part to address widely held concerns among indigenous students that they do not see 3 wotherspoon & milne: education policy frameworks and reconciliation published by: scholarship@western, 2020 themselves or their heritage adequately reflected in schools, teacher-training programs, and other educational sites (afn, 2011; cajete, 2000; kim, 2015). the calls to action also signify the importance of further strengthening educational success and school–community relations by ensuring that programs address these concerns in a manner that is accurate, respectful, and culturally affirming (battiste, 2013; goulet & mcleod, 2002; tupper, 2014). orientations that acknowledge the contributions and capabilities of indigenous peoples and their perspectives are essential in advancing beyond the limits of a deficit approach, narrowly focused on bridging gaps, which can perpetuate problems that educational reforms are seeking to address (battiste, 2013; fayden, 2005; gebhard, 2017; munroe, borden, orr, toney, & meader, 2013). the calls reinforce an affirmative approach that acknowledges and builds on the capabilities of indigenous students and communities, substantiated with holistic orientations to indigenous knowledge and cultural perspectives that are not simply add-ons to existing curricula (battiste & henderson, 2009). as progress is made to address these concerns, several obstacles remain. educators committed to changing pedagogical practices and incorporating curricular content that acknowledges indigenous cultural heritage and learning contexts often lack the knowledge, confidence, or support to do so effectively (canadian teachers’ federation [ctf], 2015; milne, 2017; people for education, 2017; wotherspoon, 2006, 2008). an ontario study revealed that educators sometimes have limited knowledge about official indigenous curricular policy documents and directives, while others have difficulty finding, interpreting, and using resources to the extent that non-indigenous students sometimes “go through their entire educational career without learning about indigenous peoples and the history and legacy of residential schooling in canada” (milne, 2017, p. 10). these issues reinforce the common observation in social and educational policy literature that the rhetoric and realities associated with education policy and reform are frequently misaligned (labaree, 2010; pak tee, 2008). while the discussion in this article focuses on policy frameworks rather than implementation, the analysis is oriented in part to the degree of specificity, guidance, and support contained within policy directives and guidelines, which may influence the extent to which effective actions may or may not be constructed. our analysis also recognizes that reconciliation itself is a contested concept. for some teachers and community members, relatively modest reforms such as the addition of cultural awareness and indigenous voices to the curriculum may be sufficient or even too much. literature on colonization and indigenous–settler relations, by contrast, highlights the deep challenges associated with the transformative significance of reconciliation. there is an inherently contradictory nature to settler colonial societies insofar as they bear foundations of colonization that cannot disappear entirely without the disappearance of either the colonizer or the colonized and the land-based rights to which they are entitled (bell, 2014; veracini, 2015; wolfe, 2006). colonization is embedded within relationships that are unsettling, reinforced by deep forms of violence that must be clearly acknowledged, understood, and reconciled. without this recognition and accountability for what it draws attention to, some scholars warn that reconciliation advances the way towards extinguishment of indigenous rights and status (alfred, 2009; chrisjohn & wasacase, 2009; tuck & yang, 2012; turner, 2013). others, while acknowledging some potential within a settler colonial framework for coexistence among indigenous and western structures and epistemologies, nonetheless emphasize that reconciliation is not possible without parallel measures to ensure that canada’s institutional structures, social relationships, and discursive practices undergo some fundamental transformations (henderson, 2013). in the context of a 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1, art. 6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.10215 nation established by white settlers through colonial relations with indigenous peoples, who have constitutionally protected legal rights and status, reconciliation involves contradictions that will continue to play themselves out over an extended period of time (bell, 2014; veracini, 2015; wolfe, 2006). informed by these debates, the current analysis includes a critical assessment of how reconciliation is defined and acted upon in policy directives and guidelines issued by major educational jurisdictions. theoretical framework this research is informed by an integrative framework, particularly influenced by bourdieu (1998; bourdieu & passeron, 1979), that situates practices and strategies undertaken by social actors within a political economic orientation in relation to social structures and institutional relationships. in this framework, educational reform oriented to reconciliation occurs within the field (or social space) of schooling, which in turn intersects with other important fields including those of policy and the economy. participants in those fields have particular resources, or forms of capital, that have specific importance within each field and are part of the relationships or positioning of actors in relation to one another. in the case of education, significant forms of capital include cultural capital (forms of knowledge and understandings associated with education that can be converted into credentials and opportunities beyond schooling), economic capital (financial assets), and social capital (networks of relationships). reconciliation processes involve, in part, efforts to reshape the kinds of cultural capital that matter by recognizing and according significance to indigenous cultures, histories, and perspectives. labaree’s (2010) model of school organization—highlighting intersections across levels of organization from the broader social context, rhetoric (influenced by policy makers and educational leaders), formal structures (policies, initiatives), community and neighbourhood, parent perceptions, teaching practices (perceptions, uptake), and student classroom learning—is instructive in framing key elements to be taken into consideration with respect to the analysis of educational policies. also important is the cultivation of understandings about the impact of residential schooling and other aspects of colonization on indigenous experiences, as well as the ways in which broader canadian history and perspectives have been configured by these relationships. to highlight the significance of relationships between settler colonialism and indigenous peoples and perspectives that are the focus of reconciliation processes, the current analysis is further informed by what go (2016) describes as a “postcolonial-perspectival realist” approach. this orientation, influenced by postcolonial analysis and feminist standpoint theory, begins by acknowledging that our social positions or location in social space influence (but do not determine) how we understand the world (go, 2016). an adequate scientific understanding builds from these multiple partial perspectives to construct a more comprehensive view of significant social phenomena. this analysis, complementary to that of bourdieu, is relational in nature, augmented by recognition that social science perspectives grounded in western epistemological traditions are themselves products of colonial relationships (connell, 2014). to appreciate what is meant by reconciliation and explore possibilities associated with its achievement, it is necessary to identify various perspectives associated with these objectives while remaining sensitive to how colonization has shaped experiences and knowledge for dominant groups as well as for the colonized and other subaltern groups (bhambra, 2014). adherence to democratic principles that assert we are all equal or that the law treats all individuals the same, for instance, can obscure the realities that have made some people more vulnerable through dispossession from land, 5 wotherspoon & milne: education policy frameworks and reconciliation published by: scholarship@western, 2020 family, or community supports. in what henry and tator (2010) refer to as “democratic racism,” formal recognition of democratic rights such as legal protections against discrimination coexist with practices and discourses that maintain systemic barriers against racialized minorities. these relationships can be reconceptualized as “democratic colonialism” in the case of relationships between indigenous peoples, the canadian state, and non-indigenous people insofar as formal recognition accorded indigenous rights and status may be undermined by attitudes, actions, or policies that ignore or misrepresent those rights (wotherspoon, 2014). perceptions that indigenous peoples should not have any entitlements, protections, or forms of curricular recognition that other canadians do not have, for instance, may be based on interpretations of indigenous rights as “special” rights. our analysis seeks to highlight the ways in which educational jurisdictions across canada have interpreted and articulated education for reconciliation within policy and practice. under canada’s federal system of government, education is an area of provincial and territorial jurisdiction (except for education in first nations communities, which is regulated by the federal government). despite some convergence across the 10 provinces and three territories, significant variations are evident in some educational policies and practices (wallner, 2014). the literature demonstrates that, despite broad support for such policies, this diversity is evident with respect to perspectives and positions regarding the meaning and practices associated with reconciliation. we are especially interested in exploring the impact that these configurations of meanings and positions may have on education policies. methods data for this article are drawn from a review of educational policies and initiatives across canada, conducted as part of a broader program of research that explores the ways in which diverse educational participants are reforming education to support reconciliation. findings are based on an interjurisdictional scan of statements, principles, and guidelines outlined in provincial and territorial ministries of education websites and public documents. the documents covered in the analysis are cited in the appendix. an initial search of provincial and territorial ministry websites and education databases (e.g., eric), augmented by broader google and web searches, was conducted using key terms to locate policy statements and relevant documents. the authors and a research assistant followed up with emails and calls to ministry offices and education departments in canada in order to clarify and confirm information. the analysis is conducted at three levels. first, policies and statements are summarized on a general thematic basis to identify commonalties and to compare and contrast the statements. we read through the policy statements (e.g., policy vision, principals, and goals) and used an inductive approach to identify themes and patterns. second, content analysis is employed to determine the extent to which specific elements of organizational and curricular mandates appear in each context and identify specific features in the policy statements that align with the trc (2015a) calls to action that may or may not be present within each thematic area. finally, we employ discourse analysis in order to develop a deeper understanding of the themes and messages conveyed in the policy frameworks and statements. several previous studies have demonstrated that discourse analysis and critical discourse analysis can be effective tools for the analysis of educational practices and policies (lester, lochmiller, & gabriel, 2016, 2017; liasidou, 2008; rogers 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1, art. 6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.10215 et al., 2016; taylor, 2004). discourse analysis, according to van dijk (1993), seeks to understand “the role of discourse in the (re)production and challenge of dominance [italics in original]” in order to draw out the deeper meanings and relationships represented in the policy statements (p. 283). our analysis highlights key words and phrases employed in the policy statements in relation to the context in which they are presented, with reference to particular actors or groups, mandated activities, and objectives. within the documents or statements under review, statements that signify particular activities, power relations, and other core relationships are identified and categorized in accordance with specified organizational principles (such as statements that convey directives, such as “the teacher should . . .” or “parents are responsible for . . .,” that signify hierarchical relationships directed from educational centres; those that are focused on addressing “gaps” or deficits; or others framed in such terms as “shared responsibility” or “mutual collaboration”). the authors independently read all policy statements to identify keywords, phrases, and context, and compared notes and findings to ensure agreement. we summarize below the main foci and themes covered in the policy statements and related guidelines in relation to four categories prior to consideration of what these signify in relation to reconciliation objectives and orientations. findings formal commitments to reconciliation all jurisdictions across canada have expressed commitments or initiated actions related to reconciliation since the release of the trc report. six provinces (british columbia, alberta, saskatchewan, manitoba, ontario, and new brunswick) and all three territories produced official statements identifying commitments to reconciliation, expressing the expectation of a renewed relationship with indigenous peoples and a desire to move forward with the trc (2015a) calls to action. education ministries in seven jurisdictions have specific branches or units dedicated to indigenous education1—alberta (first nations, métis, and inuit education directorate), british columbia (aboriginal education branch), manitoba (indigenous inclusion directorate), ontario (indigenous education office), nova scotia (mi’kmaq services), new brunswick (office of first nations education branch), and northwest territories (indigenous languages and education secretariat). six jurisdictions (british columbia, alberta, saskatchewan, manitoba, ontario, and nova scotia) maintain web pages dedicated to indigenous education information and resources,2 and each of these jurisdictions, along with new brunswick and northwest territories, have a senior-level position in government dedicated to indigenous content in education in accordance with the trc (2015a) calls to action (call 62.iv).3 this broad policy landscape—provincial and territorial government commitments to reconciliation accompanied by a more mixed set of institutional and organizational responses—is also 1 government of british columbia, n.d.; personal communication, ted cadwallader, july 13, 2018; government of manitoba, n.d.b; government of new brunswick, n.d.; government of northwest territories, n.d.; personal communication, wyatt white, july 30, 2018; and personal communication, taunya paquette, august 3, 2018. 2alberta (alberta education, n.d.), british columbia (government of british columbia, n.d.), manitoba (manitoba education and training, n.d.), nova scotia (nova scotia aboriginal affairs, n.d.), ontario (ontario ministry of education, n.d.), and saskatchewan (government of saskatchewan, n.d.). 3 government of alberta (2018a); personal communication, ted cadwallader, july 13, 2018; personal communication, helen robinson-settee, july 31, 2018; personal communication, kim skilliter, july 12, 2018; personal communication, mira dunn, july 17, 2018; personal communication, wyatt white, july 30, 2018; personal communication, taunya paquette, august 3, 2018; and personal communication, rob currie, july 27, 2018. 7 wotherspoon & milne: education policy frameworks and reconciliation published by: scholarship@western, 2020 characteristic of the more specific dimensions within the policy frameworks, though in an even more fragmented manner. policies and official statements all provinces and territories have identified commitments and goals to improve education and cultural recognition for indigenous peoples, but these vary considerably in vision, scope, and detail.4 most predate the trc (2015a) calls for action, though in some cases, notably saskatchewan and manitoba, earlier policy frameworks have been replaced in response to the trc. for several years, nunavut has had the most comprehensive approach, guided by inuit qaujimajatuqangit knowledge and worldviews embedded within a broader orientation to self-determination (nunavut department of education, 2007). three provinces—alberta (alberta learning, 2002), ontario (ontario ministry of education, 2007), and saskatchewan (saskatchewan ministry of education, 2018)—have adopted integrated guiding formal policy frameworks dedicated to indigenous education, and strategic actions in manitoba follow a comprehensive draft policy (manitoba education and advanced learning, 2016). all three territorial jurisdictions have introduced action plans to guide progress towards the achievement of indigenous education priorities: northwest territories (northwest territories education, culture and employment, 2011); nunavut department of education (2007); and yukon (government of yukon, 2014). in the northwest territories, a more recent document titled education renewal and innovation framework: directions for change (northwest territories education, culture and employment, 2013) is oriented to improve the education system for all students. although indigenous peoples and their voices, languages, and cultures are integrated throughout the document, its focus is not indigenous education by name or purpose, so we do not include it in the analysis below. british columbia has introduced aboriginal education enhancement agreements (aeea) to facilitate cooperation between individual school districts, local indigenous communities and organizations, and the ministry of education (british columbia ministry of education, n.d.a; white, budai, mathew, deighan, & hartej, 2012). while these frameworks have contributed to some observed improvements in academic success, trust, cultural alliances, and collective responsibility (kitchenham, fraser, pidgeon, & ragoonaden, 2016), many school districts have not yet negotiated aeeas.5 five jurisdictions—new brunswick, newfoundland and labrador, nova scotia, prince edward island, and quebec—have in place specific curricular initiatives, programs, or organizational structures dedicated to indigenous students and cultures, but these exist separately from general education policies and frameworks to support all students. the following section considers policy and official statements on indigenous education across canada with reference to the seven jurisdictions with comprehensive indigenous education frameworks— ontario, manitoba, saskatchewan, alberta, northwest territories, nunavut, and yukon. we begin by exploring the messages and relationships conveyed through four themes represented in the policies in relation to purpose, voice, knowledge and worldview, and teaching, learning and assessment. 4 this article focuses specifically on official indigenous education policy statements and does not include analysis of the many education resources and support documents published by canadian and international jurisdictions. 5 there is no current count of how many british columbia school districts have aeeas in place (personal communication, ted cadwallader, july 12, 2018). 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1, art. 6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.10215 purpose in this section, we explore the stated purpose or rationale for each document, taking into consideration the drivers or modes of legitimation employed in order to justify the need for the policy as well as the motivations outlined for stakeholders to implement the policy or statement. the analysis also focuses on the ways in which the statements are framed with respect to representative voices or sources of authority and intended audiences. while the specific focal points and details contained in these frameworks vary considerably across jurisdictions, several notable elements stand out. the policies highlight an orientation to long-term development, whether in the form of lifelong learning (alberta, ontario, yukon), early childhood foundations (northwest territories, yukon), or capacity for socioeconomic contributions (manitoba, northwest territories, ontario, yukon). in several instances, the vision statements and related objectives refer to the achievement of equitable educational opportunities and outcomes for indigenous youth relative to other learners (nunavut, saskatchewan), sometimes posed as deficit reduction or elimination of gaps (ontario, northwest territories). in most cases, voices that privilege the dominant state and education system perspectives are prevalent in the language and priorities conveyed in the statements. however, two frameworks stand out from the others with respect to the integration of indigenous worldviews and perspectives into the education system. in saskatchewan (the only jurisdiction by the end of 2018 to have introduced a new plan in response to the calls for action), there is explicit reference to the “foundational” placement of indigenous knowledge systems, cultures, and languages throughout the entire kindergarten to grade 12 education system. nunavut’s policy is framed through a 2007 document, inuit qaujimajatuqangit education framework, named to recognize inuit perspectives and worldviews, which inform the foundations of teaching, learning, and curriculum in the nunavut education system. the focus of the latter is the achievement of self-reliance and individual success “guided by inuit cultures and values” (nunavut department of education, 2007, p. 7). these two examples demonstrate that, at least with regard to the general framing of educational policy, it is possible to embrace educational orientations to reconciliation in which indigenous perspectives are deeply embedded within educational organizations and practices rather than simply added on. draft frameworks in other jurisdictions, notably manitoba, promise further movement in this direction. nonetheless, there are reasons to question how much progress has been made in these regards. the strong focus on long-term development, while important for all education systems, does not speak directly to key dimensions of reconciliation except for occasional references to indigenous culture and residential schools, and it does not acknowledge and address factors that represent and may continue to serve as barriers to such development for indigenous children and youth. for instance, the current alberta policy framework (alberta learning, 2002), which is a revised version of the 1987 framework, suggests that the “urgency” of priorities to increase the educational success of indigenous peoples remains a longstanding but unfulfilled objective. many of the plans identify general outcomes or individualized performance targets such as standardized test score results (alberta learning, 2002) or gaps in academic achievement (government of yukon, 2014), literacy and numeracy, and graduation rates (ontario ministry of education, 2007), which stand in marked contrast to more holistic indigenous conceptions of learning and success (bouvier, 2010). in one case (the northwest 9 wotherspoon & milne: education policy frameworks and reconciliation published by: scholarship@western, 2020 territories), the framework document employs the word “gap” 21 times, reinforcing the supremacy of western models of education success oriented to measurable performance standards. these relationships are explored further in the next section by focusing on how the policy statements represent and position key educational participants in relation both to one another and to other potential audiences. voice and audience all of the indigenous education policy statements speak directly and indirectly to particular intended audiences through voices given varying degrees of expression or privilege. this includes whether multiple perspectives including those of indigenous peoples and organizations are captured; the general approach to education, in terms of one-sided or shared responsibility; and who is and is not part of decision-making processes. we focus on whether there is a “problem” or “solution” identified, if a deficit approach is taken, and how and by which standards education success is framed. the policy frameworks are oriented toward various education system participants and broader audiences. several, including alberta and yukon, highlight processes of public consultation and engagement with indigenous communities, elders, and other representative groups that inform policy statements. in the case of nunavut, consultations and meetings with an elders’ advisory committee and many other groups and committees spanned several years. the nunavut document sought to capture diverse voices and contributions: in order to establish a philosophical and foundational grounding in inuit qaujimajatuqangit, curriculum school services development work on this document began with consultation with elders, inuit educators and community experts. focused discussion addressed the following questions: what’s worth knowing? how should it be taught? what are the values behind what we are teaching? (nunavut department of education, 2007, p. 20) the saskatchewan provincial framework also stresses that “first nations and métis education goals and outcomes are not an ‘add-on’ but are integral to the planning and focus of the education sector as a whole” (government of saskatchewan, 2018, p. 5), noting further that the “infusion of indigenous content, perspectives and ways of knowing” in the curricula “benefit[s] all learners” (p. 2). acknowledging that the provincial education system “is not the sole expert,” the policy framework commits the ministry to consultation with key stakeholders, including indigenous organizations, elders, and knowledge keepers, for their “expert opinion when it comes to educating first nation students” (government of saskatchewan, 2018, p. 3). the ontario first nation, métis and inuit education policy framework (ontario ministry of education, 2007), by contrast, speaks mostly to educators, school boards, and ministry officials. the framework document does not provide details about how the policy came to be or what, if any, consultation was done with elders, indigenous educators and organizations, or local indigenous communities. the document does express a desire to increase involvement of and collaboration with indigenous parents, communities, and educational authorities at the ministry, school board, and school level but does not elaborate on how this would be accomplished. although, at one point in the policy, it is stated that the framework is intended to aid education stakeholders “to help” indigenous students “achieve their [emphasis added] education goals,” success seems to be framed in the document around 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1, art. 6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.10215 “achieving the ministry’s goals [emphasis added] for improving education outcomes of first nation, métis, and inuit students” (ontario ministry of education, 2007, p. 9). by privileging official aims over goals set by indigenous peoples and students themselves (which may be framed through alternative conceptions of success), the policy has potential to undermine rather than enhance orientations to education consistent with processes of reconciliation. the contrasting approaches conveyed in the diverse framework documents point to the varied ways in which different types of knowledge, perspectives, and ways of knowing are positioned in educational policies. knowledges and worldviews across jurisdictions, indigenous education policy frameworks recognize the importance of including indigenous knowledges and perspectives in schooling practices and curriculum. however, with a few exceptions, educational practices that build on indigenous cultural knowledge and orientations continue to be overwhelmed by content, individualized orientations to learning and outcomes, and measurable attributes grounded in western knowledge and perspectives. indigenous perspectives are more often presented as means to achieve official state ends than as crucial features of a fully rounded educational experience. the alberta policy framework, for example, advances goals that are intended to “support” indigenous students and “not intended to diminish or detract from the importance of their strong value systems, cultures, languages and communities,” with a specified objective to “strengthen the use, sharing, recognition and value of indigenous knowledge and language” (alberta learning, 2002, p. 11). ontario’s indigenous education policy framework speaks to the importance of supporting indigenous students while also enhancing knowledge and understanding of indigenous cultures and histories among all students and education stakeholders. while the ontario document acknowledges indigenous worldviews and ways of knowing through passing references to indigenous perspectives, it provides little sense of whether or how these might be integrated into the total school experience. some jurisdictions do appear poised to integrate indigenous perspectives more fully into educational practice. saskatchewan’s framework stresses the importance of validating and drawing on indigenous knowledge, acknowledging from the start “first nations and métis worldviews as valid ways of knowing and understanding the world” (government of saskatchewan, 2018, p. i). this commitment is supported by objectives to ensure that all students will be able to gain knowledge and understanding of indigenous worldviews through the “infusion” of indigenous perspectives and ways of knowing in provincial curricula (government of saskatchewan, 2018). the yukon action plan (government of yukon, 2014) seeks to balance its focus on mainstream success with learning models based on “traditional knowledge, cultural practices, histories and languages,” which are oriented to “knowing the traditional cultural way of life” (pp. 5-6). similarly, manitoba’s draft first nations, métis, and inuit education policy framework (manitoba education and advanced learning, 2016) identifies “criteria for ensuring that the curriculum reflects the perspectives of first nation, métis, and inuit peoples” along with other knowledge and skills to ensure that indigenous students are equipped “to walk in both western and indigenous ways of life” (p. 6). the northwest territories framework also focuses on curricular aims that enable indigenous peoples to develop the capacity to live in “two worlds,” combining a strong sense of identity and ability to navigate the western world with skills and knowledge to continue indigenous languages and traditions (northwest territories education, culture and employment, 2011). the document cites in several places the importance of including indigenous languages and cultures in education programs, citing the need to revise the kindergarten to grade 12 11 wotherspoon & milne: education policy frameworks and reconciliation published by: scholarship@western, 2020 curriculum to include “literacy competencies and life skills reflective of northern worldviews and citizenship” (northwest territories education, culture and employment, 2011, p. 30). however, the policy statement does not address the place of indigenous knowledge and, as in most other jurisdictions, indigenous education policy is oriented more to indigenous learners than to students in general. the nunavut education framework is more comprehensive, embedding indigenous voices and philosophies not as a specific indigenous educational initiative, but at the core of its overall education policy framework. inuit perspectives and ways of knowing and doing inform every page of the 62-page policy document, speaking to the core of the curriculum, as well as learning and assessment approaches, grounded in continual acknowledgement that “inuit beliefs, laws, principles and values are the foundation of education in nunavut”(nunavut department of education, 2007, p. 56). inuit peoples appear to have been consulted and involved in all aspects of creating this document, which recognizes elders, families, youth, schools, and community learning centres collectively as sources of knowledge (nunavut department of education, 2007, p. 17). the education frameworks, collectively, demonstrate some movement toward incorporation of indigenous knowledge, perspectives, and orientations into learning. the extent to which these commitments can be sustained or realized remains uncertain. knowledge about indigenous cultures, languages, and experiences is a specific form of cultural capital that many teachers have not yet developed the capacity and confidence to draw upon. moreover, some educators regard the incorporation of indigenous content into classroom teaching and learning as optional, on the periphery of mandated curriculum, or segregated and sometimes exotic content (milne, 2017; schaefli, godlewska, & rose, 2018; st. denis, 2010). prospects to integrate indigenous content and learning orientations into the curriculum are also jeopardized by offsetting demands to prioritize learning outcomes oriented to individualization, globalization, multiculturalism, and market competitiveness (bouvier, 2010; st. denis, 2011). these patterns are also evident in the policy objectives related to teaching, learning, and student assessment. teaching, learning, and assessment all of the policy frameworks draw attention to the need to incorporate indigenous content and culturally appropriate curricula, pedagogical approaches, and services to support student success. several common themes appear across frameworks, though there are significant variations in the depth to which these commitments are acknowledged and outlined. broad support for teaching indigenous languages is represented as central to policy frameworks in the northern territories and saskatchewan, whereas it is framed more narrowly in other cases, including the mi’kmaq-specific policy in nova scotia. saskatchewan’s policy statement repeatedly asserts the importance of implementing “culturally responsive and affirming curricula, relevant instruction and assessment” (government of saskatchewan, 2018, p. 6). this theme is echoed in other frameworks to highlight the need to build capacity around understanding and employing teaching methods and assessment tools that reflect indigenous learning styles and cultural perspectives (ontario ministry of education, 2007); the principle of culturally respectful, sensitive, “learner-centred and equity focused” educational activities (alberta learning, 2002, p. 14); and orientations to teaching and curricular content that reflect “culture-based education” teaching approaches and curricular content (northwest territories education, culture and employment, 2011, pp. 18, 29-30). 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1, art. 6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.10215 another common feature within the indigenous education frameworks is the identification of benchmarks or indices of success. some of these, informed at least in part through consultation with indigenous educators and community members, incorporate holistic and relational conceptions of success. the nunavut framework refers to a process of “dynamic assessment” informed by inuit philosophies but also “linked closely” to achievement outcomes: this [assessment] process must involve students and parents in both setting goals and in assessing progress towards meeting those goals throughout the student’s learning path. at the completion of each learning stage, there is a set of task-based benchmarks that will help track student progress in relation to others and to set common standards for all students in nunavut schools. (nunavut department of education, 2007, p. 53) other plans also refer to success in terms of relationships (between students and teachers, schools and communities, and indigenous and non-indigenous participants) and indigenous principles (such as the holistic “cycle of lifelong learning” conceptual framework underlying saskatchewan’s plan). however, parallel to the broader aims conveyed through many of the policy frameworks, learning-specific outcomes are also commonly presented with reference to measurable individual outcomes defined in accordance with education system norms and expectations, rather than with reference to holistic development and indigenous conceptions of learning success. saskatchewan’s framework, which otherwise reflects adherence to the calls to action, targets specific benchmarks defined by western standards including aims to reduce the gap in graduation rates by 50 percent and have “eighty percent of students . . . at grade level or above in reading, writing and math” by 2020 (government of saskatchewan, 2018, p. 18). in some cases, even objectives associated with knowledge about indigenous peoples and cultures are quantified, as illustrated with alberta performance measures determined in accordance with the “percentage of learners with knowledge and understanding of first nations, métis, and inuit cultures as identified through provincial grades 3, 6, and 9 achievement tests and diploma examinations” (alberta learning, 2002, p. 24). commitments to integrate indigenous content and adopt pedagogical strategies to engage indigenous students more fully stand as the most consistent and visible features of policy reform frameworks across jurisdictions. as observed in the next section, they are in most cases supported by initiatives consistent with the advancement of educational objectives outlined in the trc calls to action. what remains uncertain is the extent to which such measures may gain traction or effectiveness in education systems confronted with guidelines and expectations that are not always consistent with, and sometimes stand in tension with, priorities associated with reconciliation. alignment with education for reconciliation calls to action this section considers the alignment between provincial and territorial efforts and education for reconciliation calls to action put forward in the trc (2015a) report. a summary is first provided of the alignment between the policy statements examined above and the education for reconciliation calls to action (table 1), supplemented by discussion of additional materials beyond the official policy statements to provide a snapshot of where canadian jurisdictions are at in terms of movement towards the education for reconciliation calls to action. 13 wotherspoon & milne: education policy frameworks and reconciliation published by: scholarship@western, 2020 table 1. alignment with education for reconciliation calls to action ju ri sd ic tio n c lo se g ap s pa re nt & fa m ily p ar tic ip at io n t ea ch er tr ai ni ng & p ro fe ss io na l d ev el op m en t im pr ov e in di ge no us st ud en t s uc ce ss & ed uc at io n at ta in m en t c ul tu ra lly re le va nt te ac hi ng & le ar ni ng op po rt un iti es t ea ch in g of in di ge no us la ng ua ge s c ul tu ra lly a pp ro pr ia te e ar ly e du ca tio n pr og ra m s se ni or le ve l p os iti on s i n go ve rn m en t de di ca te d to in di ge no us c on te nt in e du ca tio n curriculum t re at ie s & tr ea ty re la tio ns hi ps le ga ci es o f r es id en tia l s ch oo ls h is to ri ca l & c on te m po ra ry c on tr ib ut io ns of in di ge no us p eo pl es on x x x x x x x mb x x x x x x x x sk x x x x x x x x x ab x x x x x x x x nt x x x x x x x yt x x x x x x nu x x x x x note. on = ontario, mb = manitoba, sk = saskatchewan, ab = alberta, nt = northwest territories, yt = yukon, nu = nunavut. most of the policy statements were produced before the release of the trc report in 2015, with the exception of the saskatchewan and draft manitoba policy documents, which speak directly to trc calls to action. as a result, the existing policy statements may not reflect fully other provincial and territorial efforts introduced to align with the trc’s education for reconciliation calls to action. therefore, our analysis of the extent to which progress is being made to align education systems with calls to action associated with education draws from personal communication, media releases, news stories, and information provided on provincial and territorial websites as well as from the policy framework statements. curriculum the trc (2015a) has called upon education systems to take several actions to implement curriculum and educational practices that acknowledge and address the legacies of residential schools, honour and advance understanding of treaties and treaty relationships, preserve and revitalize indigenous languages and cultures, and educate students about the historical and contemporary contributions of indigenous peoples (calls 13-14 and 62-63). jurisdictions to varying extents have taken steps to include indigenous content in the curriculum. two territories—nunavut and yukon— have integrated indigenous content throughout all subject areas and grade levels. in the northwest territories, indigenous content is 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1, art. 6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.10215 mandatory in the social studies curriculum from kindergarten to grade12 and a northern studies course is required for graduation, supported by two curriculum documents, the dene kede (northwest territories education, culture and employment, 1993) and inuuqatigiit (northwest territories education, culture and employment, 1996), to provide cultural and linguistic guidance for educators as they integrate indigenous content into classroom instruction. alberta, british columbia, manitoba, newfoundland and labrador, saskatchewan, and ontario have mandatory indigenous content integrated into social studies curricula throughout grade levels. nova scotia has mandatory indigenous content integrated into social studies in several grades as well as in a course on citizenship and canadian history. in prince edward island, indigenous content is integrated into grade 9 social studies. no evidence was found of mandatory content in new brunswick and quebec curricula. several jurisdictions also have optional course offerings, including blackfoot language, cree language, and mi’kmaw studies courses (alberta, nova scotia) and native studies or aboriginal studies courses (alberta, manitoba, ontario). anti-racism is cited as an important dimension of many of the curricular initiatives, but manitoba addresses the phenomenon most directly by outlining measures to support anti-racist education. several documents (those for ontario, manitoba, saskatchewan, alberta, yukon, northwest territories, nunuavut) acknowledge the importance of indigenous rights as recognized in constitutional and inherent rights, land claims, treaties, and indigenous peoples’ authority, control, and responsibility over education. the policy frameworks stress that knowledge, learning, and preservation of indigenous cultures and languages are important; in many cases, framing education as a mechanism or vehicle for preserving culture and language. however, they are less likely to speak directly to concepts of worldviews, perspectives, ways of knowing, or indigenous knowledge. the term “worldview” is used throughout the saskatchewan and draft manitoba documents; twice in the nunavut document; once in the northwest territories, ontario, alberta; and it is not mentioned in the yukon document. similarly, reference to “ways of knowing” appears throughout the saskatchewan document and once in the manitoba and nunavut documents, and is absent from the ontario, northwest territories, alberta, and yukon frameworks. the saskatchewan, manitoba, ontario, and nunavut documents highlight in several places the distinctiveness of indigenous “perspectives,” which are also acknowledged in a single entry in each of the alberta and yukon documents, but not in the northwest territories. the notion of “excelling in both worlds” is discussed in the manitoba, yukon, and northwest territories policy documents, and referenced in a side quote in the alberta document. these uneven responses are reflected in a report card produced by kairos canada (2018) to assess progress in relation to the level of public commitment to and implementation of actions to advance reconciliation in each province and territory. with respect to public commitment, four jurisdictions received a grade of “excellent,” including alberta, manitoba, northwest territories, and ontario. eight jurisdictions (british columbia, new brunswick, newfoundland, nova scotia, nunavut, prince edward, saskatchewan, and yukon) received a grade of “good,” and one jurisdiction, quebec, received an assessment of “needs improvement.” with respect to implementation, only one jurisdiction (manitoba) received a grade of “excellent” while 10 (newfoundland, prince edward island, nova scotia, ontario, saskatchewan, alberta, british columbia, northwest territories, yukon, and nunavut) were assessed as “good,” one (new brunswick) was rated “needs improvement”, and one (quebec) was assessed as having “significant work required.” 15 wotherspoon & milne: education policy frameworks and reconciliation published by: scholarship@western, 2020 teacher training and standards the calls to action speak explicitly to teacher training and professional development (trc, 2015a, call 63 iv) to advance reconciliation. three jurisdictions have teacher quality standards or teaching standards in place for current teachers related to learning about indigenous peoples through teaching certification or professional development required for teaching. alberta announced plans in 2018 to implement appropriate quality standards for new teachers and superintendent leadership that would apply to all educators and administrators in the province’s education system beginning in september 2019 (government of alberta, 2018b, 2018c, 2018d). these standards include requirements related to understanding indigenous worldviews, beliefs, and values and applying foundational knowledge about indigenous peoples in classroom learning. in the northwest territories, new teachers’ teaching certificates are good for two years in which time they complete 50 hours of professional development. after this period, they are eligible for another certificate, valid for five years during which they undertake another 50 hours of professional development. the professional development changes according to needs but there is always an indigenous learning component embedded within the training (personal communication, simon lepage, july 9, 2018).the northwest territories has also required educators since the 2010-2011 school year to dedicate a minimum of two full days of on-the-land culturally appropriate orientation for their teaching and school administrative staff (northwest territories education, culture, and employment, 2011). in the yukon, cultural inclusion standards require all school staff and school councils to participate in mandatory cultural awareness training through yukon college and a mandatory annual orientation by the local first nation (yukon government, 2016; personal communication, joy dornian, july 9, 2018). with regard to pre-service training, we identified through email communication and searches of program calendars requirements for students to complete an indigenous focused course or learning requirement before graduation in 34 out of the 51 canadian faculties or colleges of education. many of these, such as requirements for a single course in indigenous studies over a four-year degree program, are relatively loose. only two jurisdictions so far—manitoba and ontario—require teachers applying for certification to have mandatory training in indigenous learning or relevant knowledge, though these are paralleled tacitly in many other jurisdictions through the teacher training program requirements. in manitoba, requirements for the permanent professional teaching certificate include the need for “3 credit hours of aboriginal issues coursework” (government of manitoba, n.d.a, certificates table, academic requirements and permanent professional teaching certificate cell; see also the education administration act, 2016). meanwhile, ontario does not have mandatory indigenous issues courses, but regulation 347/02 of the accreditation of teacher education programs specifies that teacher education programs must include content about indigenous histories, cultures, perspectives, and contributions (ontario college of teachers, 2017). as in many other areas, some progress is being made towards ensuring that teachers are well equipped to understand indigenous peoples and act in ways that advance reconciliation. however, much ground remains to be made up, especially given the prominence within the literature of concerns that teachers often lack the knowledge and confidence to address important issues related to indigenous cultures and rights and indigenous–settler relations (canadian teachers’ federation, 2015; milne, 2017; people for education, 2017; wotherspoon, 2006, 2008). 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1, art. 6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.10215 concluding observations our analysis of policy frameworks and related guidelines reveals considerable movement towards greater incorporation of indigenous content in both school curricula and teacher education across the country. however, there is also tremendous variation in the depth and intensity of these developments, raising questions about whether commitments to reconciliation can be realized in many contexts. while our focus in this article has been limited to provincial and territorial policy documents, it is likely that an examination of implementation and pedagogical practice would reveal even further nuances (see for example gebhard, 2017). to a large extent, the policy documents and statements represent a kind of public performance—idealized broad statements and wish lists with little specification of roles and responsibilities and few concrete statements on tasks and timeframes. the implementation of initiatives in response to the trc calls to action across provincial and territorial jurisdictions in canada is a large task involving coordination among several large, diverse, and complex organizations. efforts to date appear to be somewhat piecemeal with little concerted centralized efforts or communication at the national (see for example government of canada, 2018), provincial and territorial, or local levels. further research is needed to examine current understandings and perceptions of education for reconciliation among teachers and school staff who are interpreting and implementing policy directives on the ground. what impact do the emerging reconciliation-related policies and initiatives have on teacher practice and classroom learning? to what extent are these initiatives a matter of performativity and good faith as opposed to a movement towards foundational change? the evidence to date suggests that formal commitments to reconciliation and related curricular and pedagogical actions are notable steps forward in addressing damaging colonial legacies of schooling. however, they are not in themselves guarantees that schools across canada will become spaces in which indigenous peoples and their voices and experiences are affirmed and advanced. the current policy frameworks, with a few exceptions, continue to position indigenous peoples as the “other,” who are now being repositioned to fill historical curricular voids. the plans are mostly silent on fundamental questions about what reconciliation really represents and what models of schooling and educational practice would be necessary in order to advance these meaningful forms of reconciliation. while some of the reform commitments present opportunities to include more indigenous content in the existing curriculum and within the existing curriculum boundaries, they do not call into question the dominant structures and practices, including those represented by schooling itself, that in many respects continue to suppress many opportunities to fulfill the social and educational aspirations of indigenous students. if progress is going to be made towards reconciliation, stakeholders at all levels of the education system need to put words into action. one indigenous educator explained to us that she does not support education for reconciliation-related policies and provincial or territorial statements of commitment, such as those identified above, because they seem politically motivated and are not sincere. beyond words, she is waiting for action to demonstrate a real commitment. another educator who works at a high school that serves a predominantly indigenous student population shared the saying with us that “weighing a pig doesn’t make it fatter.” this means, in part, that the propensity to focus on evaluating indigenous students by western education measures will not address issues of educational disparities (richards & mahboubi, 2018). it also means that educational policies must be guided by, and contribute to, continuing critical reflection among educational participants and scholars on the meaning 17 wotherspoon & milne: education policy frameworks and reconciliation published by: scholarship@western, 2020 of reconciliation and how reconciliation, in turn, may be limited by a failure to place a focus on decolonization at the core of educational practice. effective educational reform requires attention to the broader context, including the political and economic characteristics of the regional and jurisdictional sites in which school systems operate as well as the deeper working of settler colonial relations. mcgregor’s (2013) observation with respect to schooling in nunavut also has much wider significance: the process of decolonizing schools is not achieved solely through the integration of indigenous content, but through examining the power relationships that determine questions (and answers) regarding school structures, policy and decision-making, curriculum and pedagogy, teacherstudent-community relationships, access to and assessment of student success. 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(n.d.b). professional certification. retrieved from http://www.edu.gov.mb.ca/k12/profcert/certificates/iet/certificates.html government of new brunswick. (n.d.). aboriginal affairs. retrieved from http://www2.gnb.ca/content/gnb/en/departments/aboriginal_affairs.html government of northwest territories. (n.d.). indigenous languages and education secretariat. retrieved from https://www.ece.gov.nt.ca/en/services/indigenous-languages-and-educationsecretariat 29 wotherspoon & milne: education policy frameworks and reconciliation published by: scholarship@western, 2020 government of saskatchewan. (n.d.). first nations and métis education. retrieved from https://www.saskatchewan.ca/residents/education-and-learning/first-nations-and-metiseducation manitoba education and training. (n.d.). indigenous education. winnipeg, canada: government of manitoba. retrieved from http://www.edu.gov.mb.ca/k12/abedu/index.html northwest territories education, culture and employment. (1993). dene kede. education: a dene perspective. yellowknife, canada: government of northwest territories. retrieved from https://www.ece.gov.nt.ca/en/services/curriculum/dene-kede-and-inuuqatigiit northwest territories education, culture and employment. (1996). inuuqatigiit: the curriculum from the inuit perspective. yellowknife, canada: government of northwest territories. retrieved from https://www.ece.gov.nt.ca/en/services/curriculum/dene-kede-and-inuuqatigiit northwest territories education, culture and employment. (2013). education renewal and innovation framework: directions for change. retrieved from https://www.ece.gov.nt.ca/ sites/ece/files/024-renewal_framework_en_proof_2.pdf nova scotia aboriginal affairs. (n.d.). education: learning guide. halifax, canada: government of nova scotia. retrieved from https://novascotia.ca/abor/education/learning-guide/ ontario college of teachers. 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(2016). cultural inclusion standards in all schools. retrieved from http://www.education.gov.yk.ca/pdf/schools/cultural_inclusion_standards_in_all_schools. pdf microsoft word ms 1460 cover page.docx the international indigenous policy journal volume 11|issue 3 september 2020 “the legacy will be the change”: reconciling how we live with and relate to water lindsay day university of guelph, canada, lindsay@gordonfn.org ashlee cunsolo labrador institute of memorial university, canada, ashlee.cunsolo@mun.ca heather castleden queen's university, canada, heather.castleden@queensu.ca alex sawatzky labrador institute of memorial university, canada, asawatzky@mun.ca debbie martin dalhousie university, canada, dhmartin@dal.ca catherine hart queen's university, canada, cathart28@gmail.com cate dewey university of guelph, canada, cdewey@uoguelph.ca sherilee l. harper university of alberta and university of guelph, canada, sherilee.harper@ualberta.ca recommended citation day, l., cunsolo, a., castleden, h., sawatzky, a., martin, d., hart, c., dewey, c., & harper, s. l. (2020). “the legacy will be the change”: reconciling how we live with and relate to water. the international indigenous policy journal, 11 (3). https:// doi.org/10.18584/ iipj.2020.11.3.10937 “the legacy will be the change”: reconciling how we live with and relate to water abstract current challenges relating to water governance in canada are motivating calls for approaches that implement indigenous and western knowledge systems together, as well as calls to form equitable partnerships with indigenous peoples grounded in respectful nation-to-nation relationships. by foregrounding the perspectives of first nations, inuit, and métis peoples, this study explores the nature and dimensions of indigenous ways of knowing around water and examines what the inclusion of indigenous voices, lived experience, and knowledge mean for water policy and research. data were collected during a national water gathering that brought together 32 indigenous and non-indigenous water experts, researchers, and knowledge holders from across canada. data were analyzed thematically through a collaborative podcasting methodology, which also contributed to an audiodocumentary podcast (www.waterdialogues.ca). keywords water governance, first nations, inuit, métis, indigenous knowledge systems, western knowledge systems, twoeyed seeing, canada, environmental dispossession, environmental repossession, podcast, water acknowledgments our sincerest thanks to all the participants in this research for sharing their stories, experience, and wisdom, and to the national advisory committee for their guidance and encouragement of this project. we extend a special thanks to the podcast editing and research team members tim anaviapik-soucie, george russell jr., and clifford paul for their generous commitment and contributions. thanks also to research assistants in the larger project, robert stefanelli and kaitlin lauridsen. we also thank the funders of this research, the canadian water network. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0license. day et al.: “the legacy will be the change” published by scholarship@western, 2020 1 “the legacy will be the change”: reconciling how we live with and relate to water water is a priority policy issue worldwide as natural water systems across the globe come under increasing strain from pollution, excessive agricultural and industrial withdrawals, land conversion (e.g., urbanization, deforestation), diversion of waterways, population growth, and the impacts of climate change (cosgrove & loucks, 2015; pérez-jvostov et al., 2019; vörösmarty et al., 2010). these pressures and stressors on water systems create issues for water quality and access—in many cases perpetuating social inequities related to water (united nations world water assessment programme [unwwap], 2015). increasingly, these critical and mounting water-related challenges compel us to re-examine our values, policies, and actions with respect to how we use, impact, and protect—or fail to protect—the water on which all living beings depend (sandford & phare, 2011; schmidt, 2017; wilson, 2019). in canada, the fundamental need for such critical re-evaluation is perhaps nowhere more evident and urgent than with respect to addressing the longstanding and pervasive water-related issues faced by indigenous communities. these issues are reflected, in part, by longstanding boil water advisories, and inadequate, absent, or inappropriate water infrastructure (auditor general of canada, 2005; simeone, 2009). for example, as of january 2020, indigenous services canada (2020) reported 57 long-term drinking water advisories in effect on first nation reserves. with respect to drinking water infrastructure, a comprehensive, independent national assessment commissioned by the government of canada between 2009 and 2011 found that of the 807 drinking water systems evaluated in first nation communities, 63% posed a high or medium “overall risk to water quality” (neegan burnside ltd., 2011). studies pertaining to a number of northern inuit communities reflect similar concerns regarding access to, and quality of, drinking water (daley et al., 2014, 2015; goldhar et al., 2013; hanrahan et al., 2014; sakar et al., 2015; wright et al., 2018), including concerns regarding impacts of climate change (goldhar et al., 2014; harper et al., 2011; martin et al., 2007). concerns over water in many indigenous communities extend well beyond drinking water, wastewater, and related infrastructure. repeated flooding (auditor general of canada, 2013; ballard & thompson, 2013; khalafzaia et al., 2019), environmental contamination (harada et al., 2011; sandlos & keeling, 2016; smith et al., 2010), and declining health of aquatic ecosystems and species habitats (page, 2007; prowse et al., 2009) are other examples of issues that change and reduce the ways in which indigenous peoples can access and use water. richmond and ross (2009) used the term “environmental dispossession” to describe the direct and indirect mechanisms that change and reduce indigenous peoples’ access to environmental resources, including physical displacement from traditional lands, loss of access to and control over these lands, and the impacts of assimilationist policies, pollution, and climate change. processes of environmental dispossession can impact indigenous peoples’ health, wellbeing, livelihoods, and cultures in myriad ways, such as limited access to traditional foods and medicines (tobias & richmond, 2014); fewer opportunities for land-based education and knowledge sharing (greenwood & lindsay, 2019; richmond & ross, 2009); strains on social cohesion and connections (harper et al., 2015); and impacts to the distinctive spiritual, place-based relationships many indigenous peoples hold with the lands, animals, plants, and waters that are essential components of cultural identities (arsenault et al., 2018; cunsolo willox et al., 2012; richmond & ross, 2009). the pervasive water-related issues stemming from environmental dispossession experienced by indigenous peoples in canada are complex, broad ranging, and ultimately rooted in historic and the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.10937 2 ongoing colonial processes (basdeo & bharadwaj, 2013; stefanelli et al., 2017; walkem, 2007). many indigenous scholars, leaders, and communities argue that prevailing approaches to addressing water issues that are embedded in colonial structures and policies—and that exclude, devalue, or ignore indigenous knowledges, leadership, and autonomy—are not only ineffective but deeply unethical and, ultimately, unsustainable (borrows, 2002; walkem, 2007; wilson & inkster, 2018). in response to ongoing and increasing environmental dispossession, indigenous peoples in canada and around the world are engaging in processes of environmental repossession as a way forward for research, governance, and policy at the indigenous environment–health interface (big-canoe & richmond, 2014). “environmental repossession,” as described by big-canoe and richmond (2014), involves the social, cultural, and political processes that support reclamation and renewal of relationships with the land through pathways such as sharing indigenous knowledge and strengthening social connections within and between generations (see also tobias & richmond, 2014). emerging from, and working within, a framework of environmental repossession, responsible and inclusive water governance that prioritizes indigenous peoples’ rights to health equity in canada involves building renewed, genuine, and respectful nation-to-nation relationships with all levels of government (castleden, martin, et al., 2017; von der porten & de loë, 2014). as part of a growing movement towards the recognition and assertion of indigenous peoples’ rights, the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip, 2007) was ratified in 2007. with respect to water in particular, article 25 of undrip states: indigenous peoples have the right to maintain and strengthen their distinctive spiritual relationship with their traditionally owned or otherwise occupied and used lands, territories, waters and coastal seas and other resources and to uphold their responsibilities to future generations in this regard. a starting point for achieving these nation-to-nation relationships involves entrenching article 25 of undrip into canadian law (craft et al., 2018) to protect the rights of indigenous peoples as they engage in processes of environmental repossession and follow more holistic approaches to water governance that are centred around indigenous knowledges and epistemologies (arsenault et al., 2018; mcgregor, 2014). in linking principle and action with respect to undrip and nation-to-nation relationships, governments, researchers, and societies at large must move away from conceptions of water as a resource to be owned and managed, and create space for engaging and prioritizing indigenous voices and knowledge in a dialogue around how we live with and relate to water, including on a spiritual basis (craft et al., 2018). to contribute to this dialogue, this study explores first nations, inuit, and métis lived experiences and ways of knowing around water, as well as settler perspectives and experiences, and examines what the inclusion of indigenous voices and perspectives mean for water policy and research. the perspectives shared by participants in this research provide not only a greater appreciation and understanding of the water issues faced by indigenous communities across canada and their impacts on indigenous peoples, lifeways, and knowledge systems, but they also highlight the work involved in addressing water-related disparities, rebalancing relationships with water, and building renewed and day et al.: “the legacy will be the change” published by scholarship@western, 2020 3 respectful relations between cultures, peoples, and nations for indigenous peoples and non-indigenous peoples alike. background this research stems from a larger project, funded by the canadian water network, that sought to identify, examine, and assess methods and models that bring together indigenous and western knowledge in canadian water research and management through a systematic realist literature review (stefanelli et al., 2017), as well as interviews with academic and community-based researchers who conducted water research with a stated intent to implement western and indigenous knowledge systems (castleden, martin, et al., 2017). this project followed a collaborative and participatory research approach, premised on principles of relationality, equity, co-learning, and mutual benefit for all those involved in the research process (tobias et al., 2013). a national advisory committee (nac) of indigenous knowledge holders and other canadian water experts from across the country was formed, and subsequently two national water gatherings were held to engage the nac as well as other invited indigenous and non-indigenous researchers and knowledgeholders. water gathering participants included first nations, inuit, métis, and non-indigenous individuals identified by the research team and the nac based on their experience with water management in indigenous contexts, indigenous ways of knowing, and/or integrative approaches of bringing together indigenous and western knowledge. the first water gathering (june 2014) informed the direction of the project in foundational ways, while the second, a year later (june 2015), provided an opportunity to reconnect, discuss preliminary results and next steps, and co-develop recommendations for future water research and management in canada. through ceremony, storytelling, and dialogue facilitated by a sharing circle format, these gatherings were central to relationship building and the strong sense of good will that informed and stemmed from the project (castleden et al., 2015). methods data collection data presented in this article were gathered during the second national water gathering (ottawa, ontario, june 2015) through a collaborative podcast methodology—a participant-directed podcast creation process involving collaborative approaches to design, content, data gathering, and data analysis (day et al., 2017). this collaborative methodology enabled co-learning among researchers and participants that prioritized community concerns, and honoured local knowledges and participant expertise, and contributed to the production of a three-part audio-documentary podcast, water dialogues, exploring how we live with and relate to water in canada (day, n.d.; see http://waterdialogues.ca/).1 this method was chosen in response to the request from the nac and the water gathering participants to create public outreach and dialogical contributions, and to gather data through a method that was reflective of indigenous ways of knowing and storytelling and could serve as a decolonizing approach to research. the podcast data were gathered via large sharing circles and one-onone interviews. 1 podcasts are digital audio files made available on the internet for downloading or “on demand” streaming. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.10937 4 sharing circles the one-day water gathering was structured around a series of three sharing circles, an approach to group dialogue and healing that is based in ceremony, in which each person has a turn to speak and be heard free from judgement, and where all voices and knowledges are valued equally (lavallée, 2009; tachine et al., 2016; wilson, 2008). the first circle, “open waters,” offered opportunities for participants to (re)introduce themselves and share stories and reflections on the past year. the second circle, “the narrows,” was a modified sharing circle where participants could provide feedback on any aspect of the project. the third circle, “tidal shift,” involved a discussion around next steps and building a collective vision for water in canada (hart et al., 2015). there was a total of 32 participants at the water gathering including the research team, the nac, and other invited participants, most of whom had participated in the first water gathering of the project a year prior (table 1). the sharing circles were audio recorded, with permission, totaling 524 minutes of recorded discussion. interviews one-on-one interviews with 16 participants were conducted at the water gathering with the aim of prioritizing indigenous voices, with an additional two participant interviews conducted in the days following. of the 18 interviews, 12 were conducted with indigenous participants. these interviews were predominantly unstructured and conversational in nature (kvale & brinkmann, 2009), though a general interview guide was developed (available upon request). this approach fostered natural and spontaneous dialogue and allowed participants to delve deeper into topics and experiences offered during the sharing circles. in this way, participants were able to focus on what they felt was most important, rather than being restricted by a pre-determined structured series of questions. the interviews were audio recorded with permission and lasted an average of 19 minutes in duration. written and informed consent was obtained from all water gathering participants at the beginning of the event, prior to any recording. this research protocol received research ethics board approval from the university of guelph, queen’s university, and cape breton university. data analysis data analysis and podcast editing occurred simultaneously among the research and podcast editing teams (day et al., 2017). the research team was comprised of indigenous and non-indigenous researchers from multiple regions across the country, and the podcast editing team included core members of the research team as well as three water gathering participant volunteers. a member of the research team (day) transcribed the interview audio recordings verbatim and created a detailed audio log with time codes from the sharing circles that was used to navigate the various pieces of audio during analysis and podcast creation. any quotes from the sharing circles that were included in the water dialogues podcast were transcribed verbatim for the podcast script (a text document detailing all auditory material including quotes, music, other sounds, and narration). day et al.: “the legacy will be the change” published by scholarship@western, 2020 5 table 1. summary demographics of water gathering participants by region, gender, and identity characteristic n region manitoba 3 nova scotia 10 nunatsiavut (newfoundland & labrador) 2 nunatukavut (newfoundland & labrador) 1 nunavut 2 ontario 14 gender female 16 male 16 participant identity first nations 10 inuit 4 métis 2 non-indigenous 16 n 32 thematic analysis of the interviews and sharing circle discussions followed a multi-stage, iterative process (braun & clarke, 2006). first, a member of the research team (day) read interview transcripts and the sharing circles’ audio log multiple times while simultaneously listening to the audio recordings and recording memos in the margins (birks & francis, 2008). next, drawing from the memos and assisted through the use of concept mapping, we identified thematic categories inductively to provide a means through which to synthesize the material (wheeldon & faubert, 2009). several strategies were used to establish rigour throughout the analysis and podcast editing processes (morse, 2015). these strategies included triangulation of data from the interviews and sharing circle discussions to expand and include multiple understandings of the themes, and peer debriefing among the research and podcast editing teams to identify, refine, and validate thematic categories (creswell & miller, 2000; morse, 2015). additionally, a draft of the podcast was shared with all water gathering the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.10937 6 participants2 for review, a process that served to facilitate member checking, solicit feedback from participants, identify potential concerns, and ensure participant vetting of all themes and content prior to release of the podcast and presentation of findings (creswell & miller, 2000). altogether, these strategies for establishing rigour held the research and podcast editing teams accountable to participants by enabling team members to acknowledge and address individual biases and ensure respectful and ethical representation of participants’ voices and contributions (day et al., 2017). findings three main themes were identified through this research: relationships and responsibilities to water; confronting colonialism in the water sphere; and mobilizing diverse ways of knowing to better live with water. in presenting these themes, we provide representative quotes from the water dialogues podcast, as well as from additional interview material that informed but was not shared in the podcast. while these themes resonated across the group dialogue and participant interviews, we also acknowledge the heterogeneity within and between the perspectives, knowledge, and experience of first nations, inuit, métis, and settler peoples and cultures. “i am part of the earth”: relationships and responsibilities to water the first mother was our sacred mother, the earth. the water that runs through her, runs through us. (elder barbara dumont-hill, minute 17:21, water dialogues3) relationships with water were discussed and described by participants in myriad ways, reflecting the intricate manner in which water flows through all facets of our lives and, indeed, all life on earth. perspectives shared by first nations, inuit, and métis participants conveyed that these relationships with water exist at personal, cultural, and spiritual levels, and are often embodied in a deep-rooted connection to traditional and current homelands, and the waterways and waterbodies within them. for example, in describing his connection to water, one inuk participant shared: we drank from this land. we ate from this land. this land sustained us for generations, as far as our memory can go back. we ate the fish. we ate the birds. we went fishing as the tide turned. we launched our boats when the tide was high. and through time we come from there. we come from this land. we come from this water. it’s part of us. participants further highlighted the foundational role that these intimate connections play in indigenous knowledge systems. for example, one first nations participant described indigenous ways of knowing, as being “developed in a relationship with the land, relationship with mother earth, relationship knowing where you are in the universe.” indigenous knowledge pertaining to water was described in terms that encompassed both the nature of these relationships, and the information garnered through participating in them, thus illustrating the ways in which indigenous knowledge is intimately linked with 2 participants’ names were included with the presentation of their quotes in the podcast with informed consent. 3 participants’ names were included in the publicly released water dialogues podcast with informed consent and are included here where direct quotes from the podcast are presented. day et al.: “the legacy will be the change” published by scholarship@western, 2020 7 the places, people, and processes through which it is cultivated. as a northern community-based water expert shared: the residents of nunavut, [who] are 85 to 90% inuit, still maintain very, very close connections to the land and water. a lot of people still identify traditional [drinking water] sources—raw, untreated, natural sources—as, by far, their preferred [drinking water] source, which are a source of vitality and health and cultural connection for the inuit who use them. how to locate, collect, assess, and protect those traditional [water] sources is a really important part of traditional inuit knowledge, and again is specific to families and regions. though expressed in culturally diverse ways among participants, the perspectives shared all reflected a deep and fundamental respect for water and its essential role in nourishing and supporting all life. for example, from some first nations and métis perspectives, water was described as sacred and “the lifeblood of mother earth.” in terms of inuit perspectives on water, one participant described the term avatittinnik kamatsiarniq, an overarching principle from inuit knowledge, “which means respect and care for the environment—and that encompasses land, water, and wildlife.” for all participants, this sense of respect and stewardship for water was also encompassed in a connection to the land more broadly. as one inuit participant described her relationship: there’s a deeper, stronger connection to the land because that is where your family comes from. this is where you can go to feel at peace. so it makes you feel proud that, yes, this is where i am, but i’m also respecting it by taking care of the land. underpinning these perspectives was a strong appreciation for the interconnectivity among humans and the natural world, or what one first nations participant described as the “constant flux and motion” within and through life. as this participant further expressed: i always say that with water alone, life will be good and true. once we start damaging the water, we damage life. we damage ourselves. expressing concern over the current ways with which we live with water, a métis participant shared: the idea that you can get rid of your waste in the water and it goes away from you, is an idea that we need to throw away. we need to understand that all of our systems are affected. indeed, concern over the health and management of water today was something shared by all participants, indigenous and non-indigenous alike. many participants also emphasized responsibilities towards water, as well as future generations. as one first nations participant and elder stated: nature has rights. humans are responsible. and to me, that sums up our role into this scheme of this creation. another participant expressed this in terms of the mi’kmaq concept of netukulimk: “taking what you need for today but leaving enough for future generations.” expressed in diverse ways, this responsibility the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.10937 8 to care for water specifically and the environment more broadly was common across many of the first nations, inuit, and métis perspectives shared. drawing from the teachings that had been shared with them over the course of their lifetime, a first nations participant explained: from traditional teachings we believe everything has a spirit . . . if we talk about the quality of the water that’s in [a] stream and whether it supports life, then we are talking about the fact that the spirit is strong. if that water is polluted then that spirit is weak. so the work we have to do today in order to prepare our world for seven generations into future is to work on strengthening the spirit of our water, which means cleaning up our water systems, taking responsibility for things such as sewage, pesticide runoff, not doing too many diversions . . . and in doing this, like you are actually doing sacred work. the special role of women as sacred protectors and carriers of water in first nations cultures was also described and reflected on by many participants. illustrating this unique connection between women and water, one first nations elder reflected: how can i forget that for the first nine months of my life i was in the ocean of water? another first nations participant articulated the connection between a society that disempowers women and the current state of water, expressing: i feel that if we empower women, we will be in a better position to have a stronger spirit of our water, or in other words, better quality of water. “you can’t just ignore us”: confronting colonialism in the water sphere this prayer you are going to hear has been in this country for thousands of years. and it was outlawed, because our spirituality was outlawed. our right to vote was outlawed . . . the right to vote is powerful, but our spirituality is even more powerful than that. (elder albert dumont, minute 3:00, water dialogues) in discussing how we live with and relate to water in canada today, participants’ experiences, stories, and reflections illustrated the far-reaching impacts of historic and ongoing colonialism on the health of indigenous peoples, indigenous cultures and knowledges, relationships with water, and the health of the land and water itself. participants described issues related to inequitable access to safe drinking water, environmental degradation, contamination, and other adverse effects from industrial and development activities that impact indigenous lands and waters. a primary concern for all was the lack of input from and involvement of indigenous communities in decision-making around water management and land use. many first nations, inuit, and métis participants expressed deep frustration over the lack of recognition and respect for indigenous knowledge systems and self-determination in canada today. their nonindigenous allies at the gathering noted the same. as one northern non-indigenous participant described: day et al.: “the legacy will be the change” published by scholarship@western, 2020 9 there’s a lot of disillusionment and disengagement, i find, with some decision-making processes, because people feel, “oh, they’re not going to listen to us anyway.” a first nations participant spoke to the ways in which “our communities, our leadership, are so overburdened with different corporations, and federal departments, and provincial departments, that now it’s just everything is being streamlined.” as this participant described, there was little room for the inclusion of community members and indigenous ways of knowing in decision-making processes: because of that gap, we are almost, how i see it is, we have essentially become somewhat assimilated. several participants shared stories and experiences with respect to the water-related impacts of resource development and the failure of existing mechanisms of engagement to provide meaningful inclusion in decision-making processes. as one inuk participant described his experience related to northern resource development: we engaged with proponents; we engaged with both levels of government; we did extensive aboriginal traditional knowledge gathering, adding it into the whole environmental [assessment] process . . . and we had a lot of legitimate concerns. and, you know, at the end of the day when we see a letter signed by the minister of the environment [approving the project] . . . it makes you wonder, why did we do it? what did we gain by sharing our information, sharing our knowledge? projects like that, mega projects, have such a profound impact on the aboriginal people that are closest to these developments. the damage is irreversible. impacts from development such as these were said to reduce or eliminate access to culturally and nutritionally significant food sources, and affected relationships with the natural world that lie at the core of indigenous ways of knowing, identity, and lifeways. describing inuit-observed changes from a hydroelectric dam built in the 1960s, another participant explained: we saw changes in our area where we don’t get cod fish any more, our ice isn’t as hard as it was supposed to be, we don’t get a certain kind of seal that used to come in and give birth. none of that is happening anymore. but because there’s no [western scientific] proof, because there was no study [about the impact of the dam] done in the 60s, nobody is believing us now. with another hydro-electric project on the horizon in this participant’s region, they continued to say: as people who live off the water, as people who live off our land, they’re slowly killing what we need in our communities. as a first nations participant shared with respect to a community impacted by industrial effluent routed to an estuary adjacent to their community: this [mi’kmaq] term, weji-squalia‘timk, which translates to “the land that we sprouted from,” conveys how the [first nation] community believes about their origin. so when you pollute it with environmental pollutants, you are polluting where we believe we came from, where all of the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.10937 10 creation has come from. so you are cutting us off from our spiritual connection, from our cultural connection, our ability to pass on those traditions. and so that whole concept is so central to what has to be rebuilt to get that connection back to before they started polluting the land [and water] in the first place. participants spoke to the need for communities “to heal from all the taking that’s been done,” and “for governments to start listening.” healing was also described in the context of environmental restoration. referring to a project that brought first nations, non-indigenous communities, and government together to protect a lake system, one participant described a responsibility towards “assist[ing] the healing process of mother earth.” reflecting the different mindset this entails, this participant explained: we as human beings can’t “fix” mother earth, but we can work with her. participants also stressed the importance of recognizing and supporting the indigenous “traditions and relationships [with water] that are thriving today,” and creating space to celebrate indigenous cultures and resiliency, highlighting the transformation that can occur when “people are committed to retelling the narrative from a different perspective.” several participants spoke about efforts toward reclaiming and strengthening cultural practices, indigenous ways of knowing, and relationships with water and land. as one first nations participant described” a lot [of our community members] have been removed from the river systems in [the region], so we’re trying to get their boots back on the water. highlighting the importance of indigenous languages and the concepts and understandings conveyed within them, another participant described how “with trying to restore the environment, we are also trying to restore language because they are so interconnected.” a number of participants also emphasized the importance of connecting youth with elders to support intergenerational transfer of knowledge that might not otherwise be occurring as it traditionally did in the past. for example, one inuk participant described a research initiative that involved taking youth out on the land with elders to learn about water: they [the elders] always have stories and ways to make the young understand. and when they do that they all have a good time and it’s easier to teach them things . . . our elders always say any knowledge passed down is good. any knowledge someone takes is good because they can do something with the knowledge and pass it on. indeed, many participants noted the importance of on-the-land and experiential learning with respect to indigenous ways of knowing. as one first nations participant explained with respect to fostering a relationship with the natural world: how can a teacher teach it in school from a textbook? you have to be out there living it. day et al.: “the legacy will be the change” published by scholarship@western, 2020 11 “connecting the dots”: mobilizing diverse ways of knowing to better live with water i think it [other peoples turning to indigenous knowledge for guidance] is happening now. some accept it, some embrace it, some old school don’t even want to look at it. but we are seeing change. the movement is there, and the world is slowly, like a clam i guess, slowly opening up to it. sometimes it’s shut; sometimes they say, “oh this is interesting.” so the stories will help it a lot. (clifford paul, minute 49:11, water dialogues) this final theme centered around possibilities and pathways for working together, across our diverse knowledge systems, to transform how we live with water, as individuals, communities, and nations that all call these shared lands home. participants emphasized that caring for water needs to be understood as a responsibility shared by all people in canada, illustrated by some first nations participants through the understanding that “we are all treaty people” with treaty responsibilities. another participant expressed: when we work with this indigenous knowledge, we come across this sense of stewardship from our people, and we have to promote that role, that we as individuals—canadians, first nations, or otherwise—we have to promote that stewardship within ourselves and make it a message for future generations. the symbolism of the two-row-wampum4 was used by some first nations participants to illustrate a process of working together in ways that do not compromise the integrity of different knowledge systems, cultures, and ways of knowing by, for example, subsuming one within the other, as is often the case when there is only tokenistic consideration of indigenous knowledge. as one first nations participant explained: we will work together but we are going to paddle in our own canoes . . . with western science and indigenous knowledge, i think that is the approach that, yeah, we’ll show you how we do things, and you show us how you do things . . . today we live where we can’t ignore western science, but part of that, there is still a place for traditional knowledge. there will always be that. i think those two paths will always be there. part of this process, as this participant further described, involved “recognizing each other’s values and what they are bringing into the project or discussion.” another participant, speaking to the teachings of first nations elder murdena marshall, described this in terms of being able to “walk around” one’s knowledge system in order to understand both the strengths and limitations, as well as how it “exists in relationship with other knowledge systems.” this sentiment was shared among all participants, and also included recognizing the “responsibilities [you have] to the knowledge system and the community of people who wish to draw upon that knowledge.” 4 the two-row wampum is a haudenosaunee treaty belt from the 17th century, consisting of alternating rows of purple and white wampum beads running the length of the belt. the two purple rows symbolize the paths of two vessels – one european and one haudenosaunee – travelling down the river of life together, but with each society remaining in their own vessel, signifying sovereignty over their own affairs (ransom & ettenger, 2001). the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.10937 12 all participants spoke to the necessity of engaging and mobilizing indigenous and western-based knowledge systems together in the context of water research, governance, and policy. specifically, participants emphasized the need to follow indigenous methodologies or approach water research from the lens of indigenous peoples and include indigenous knowledges in water-related decision-making processes. as one métis participant expressed with regards to including indigenous knowledge in water governance and policy, “the importance really can’t be overstated that there is knowledge out there,” in addition to western knowledge systems, and “we just need to include people and be respectful of the people who have that knowledge.” many participants emphasized the need to “invest in people and communities” by using bottom-up and grassroots approaches to develop indigenous and community-led water research and programs that were reflective of community priorities. approaches that were responsive and accountable to community priorities could help build capacity and ensure greater autonomy among indigenous peoples over related decision-making processes to inform policy. as one northern community-based water expert expressed: when the research and the monitoring is initiated from concerned people in communities, and not kind of introduced or imposed on, then i think there will be natural opportunities for local knowledge and inuit perspectives to be integrated in those research processes and to be scaled up to the bigger water management frameworks. participants also spoke to the need to create space for respectful dialogue in order to listen and learn from each other, recognizing that “our relationships and our stories really do matter,” and that when working together “the room is smarter than the smartest person [in the room].” as one southern-based academic and non-indigenous participant described: decolonization is really about reorienting ourselves, so that we can create inclusive spaces, that we can allow diverse approaches, that we can respect differing viewpoints. learning in these contexts was described as “ever ongoing” and transformational, in that “it becomes part of who we are.” sharing stories, and engaging the head, heart, mind, and spirit, were seen as essential to moving forward with water issues in a good way. as a first nations participant described: you always have to share the stories. you always have to put it in story form. and your management plan may not be something that’s on paper but in the hearts of the people. the legacy will be the change, not a document collecting dust on a shelf when i’m dead. discussion as the experiences, knowledge, and wisdom shared by participants in this research illustrate, current approaches to managing water in canada do not always meaningfully or equitably include indigenous peoples or their knowledge systems, and are thus failing to protect the health of water and ecosystems, both within and beyond indigenous communities. rather, opportunities to participate often occur within colonial water governance and natural resource management frameworks that do not respect indigenous self-determination and ways of knowing (borrows, 2002; castleden, hart, harper, et al., day et al.: “the legacy will be the change” published by scholarship@western, 2020 13 2017; castleden, martin, et al., 2017; mcgregor, 2009; simms et al., 2016; von der porten & de loë, 2013, 2014; walkem, 2007). these colonial water governance frameworks are especially destructive for indigenous peoples, communities, and cultures (basdeo & bharadwaj, 2013; borrows, 2002; laboucane-benson et al., 2012; royal commission on aboriginal peoples [rcap], 1996; walkem, 2007), as seen with water dispossession under a regime of settler governance in mushkegowuk territory due to a series of mining developments (daigle, 2018), and oceti sakowin’s (the great sioux nation) protection of sacred waterways from the dakota access pipeline (young, 2017). further, these frameworks can be destructive to water itself, by perpetuating colonial conceptions of water as a material resource available for human exploitation, ownership, management, and pollution (mcgregor, 2014; wilson, 2019). as the experiences shared by participants in this research indicate, severed or otherwise adversely impacted connections with water also represent a significant form of environmental dispossession faced by indigenous peoples in canada (tobias & richmond, 2014). like other forms of environmental dispossession, these impacts to water have wide-ranging and interrelated impacts on the health and wellbeing of indigenous peoples, cultures, spirituality, and on the ability to practice and transmit indigenous knowledges (basdeo & bharadwaj, 2013; king et al., 2009; laboucane-benson et al., 2012; mcgregor, 2009). importantly, however, participants spoke to the strength and resiliency of indigenous peoples and cultures in the face of these harms and emphasized the importance of ongoing efforts towards supporting the revitalization of indigenous knowledges and relationships with water through language and ceremony (among other pathways). participants described this need for revitalization both in terms of recognizing the strength and vitality of relationships with water that continue to exist today, as well as engaging in efforts to rebuild these relationships and reclaim indigenous ways of knowing where they have been weakened or (for a time) lost. these findings highlight the importance of such efforts in addressing the negative impacts of environmental dispossession as it pertains to water, and align with a growing body of indigenous scholarship on the resurgence, reclamation, and revitalization of indigenous knowledges, spirituality, laws, and systems of governance (alfred & corntassel, 2005; big-canoe & richmond, 2014; borrows, 2002; coulthard, 2014; craft et al., 2018; simpson, 2011). nishnaabe scholar and writer leanne betasamosake simpson (2011) describes that engaging in processes and practices to reclaim and revitalize indigenous ways of knowing are “about creating decolonized time and space where indigenous voices and indigenous meanings matter” (p. 96). in this regard, participants in this study described how land-based learning and opportunities for intergenerational transfer of land-based knowledge could help provide a foundation for centering and cultivating indigenous knowledges in policy and decision-making related to water, and contribute to environmental repossession that is informed by indigenous conceptions of health, well-being, and resiliency (big-canoe & richmond, 2014; hansen & antsanen, 2016; mcgregor et al., 2010; redvers, 2016; restoule et al., 2013; robbins & dewar, 2011; tobias & richmond, 2014). this study also illustrates the importance of indigenous languages in conveying indigenous ways of knowing and understanding relationships with water. indeed, a number of participants described indigenous concepts and terms that reflect and contain within them teachings of a fundamentally different orientation to the natural world than dominant western perspectives. the interrelationship the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.10937 14 between environmental restoration and revitalization of language was also noted. pointing to the power and potential within such (re)newed understandings (for all peoples), indigenous scholar and plant biologist robin kimmerer (2011) explains how the revitalization of indigenous language(s) “allows us to imagine and potentially implement different visions of sustainability” (p. 263). though expressed and experienced in culturally and regionally diverse ways, relationships with water are fundamental to indigenous ways of knowing and lifeways, and entail both a respect for the importance of water as our source of life and a responsibility toward protecting and caring for it (anaviapik soucie et al., 2015; anderson, 2010; anderson et al., 2013; blackstock, 2001; laboucane-benson et al., 2012; lavalley, 2006; mcgregor, 2008, 2012; walkem, 2007). as the first nations, inuit, and métis participants in this project described, these relationships are embodied in deep-rooted connections to place, and founded in an appreciation for the interconnectedness and “constant flux and motion” of all life. indeed, participants often spoke of their relationship with water in the context of, or as included within, their relationships with the land or the rest of the natural world. these perspectives underscore the diverse ways in which the health and well-being of indigenous peoples and the integrity of indigenous cultures and ways of knowing are intimately linked with both the health of the land and water, as well as the ability to engage in respectful relationships with these lands and waters (adelson, 2000; battiste & youngblood henderson, 2000; cunsolo willox et al., 2013; kimmerer, 2011; mcgregor et al., 2010). in understanding these place-based relationships among indigenous peoples and water, water is not only a resource that makes life possible, water is life (wilson & inkster, 2018). indigenous-led water governance structures that frame water as a living entity necessarily prioritize relationality among peoples, lands, and waters, and enable indigenous peoples to assert their sovereignty according to these relationships (wilson & inkster, 2018). further, in the context of place-based water governance structures, participants in this research emphasized the value of, and need to recognize, diverse perspectives, experiences, and ways of knowing. this relates to an understanding that there is no one-size-fits-all approach to addressing water challenges in indigenous communities, and that the needs, desires, and path of each community towards selfdetermination may differ. simpson (2011), for example, speaks to the need for “diverse nation-culturebased resurgences” (p. 17), or re-investing and regenerating political traditions, legal systems, and ceremonial pursuits that are specific to each nation and culture. diverse nation-culture-based resurgences in addressing water-related issues in indigenous communities will necessarily involve culturally grounded, community-led approaches to research, programming, and policy that align with the growing recognition of, and demand for, decolonizing systems of water governance and management that are defined and determined by communities themselves (castleden, martin, et al., 2017; mcgregor et al., 2010; smith, 2012). participants stressed that responsibilities towards water are shared by all, and that caring for water today means utilizing the strengths of both western and indigenous sciences. this approach must find traction in non-indigenous institutionalized colonial spaces (e.g., government agencies, universities, industry, etc.) where those dominant discourses are taking place. to build trust, understanding, and capacity for collaboration, spaces for respectful dialogue between indigenous and non-indigenous scientists, policymakers, and community members must be cultivated where multiple ways of knowing and learning can be honoured and mobilized (castleden, hart, cunsolo, et al., 2017). it also means day et al.: “the legacy will be the change” published by scholarship@western, 2020 15 fundamentally rethinking the way individuals and communities residing in what is now canada live with and relate to water, and the concepts, values, laws, and decision-making processes that legitimate and even encourage the continued degradation of water and ecosystems on which we all depend. conclusion: responsibility in a time of reconciliation findings from this study reflect the value and power of shared dialogue and storytelling in reclaiming responsibilities and relationships among indigenous peoples and water in canada. indeed, centering relationships among indigenous people and water in this way represents a shift in dominant discourses around water governance and management. such a shift is part of a larger movement towards reenvisioning policy and decision-making processes that foster more equitable, just, and respectful nationto-nation relationships in canada, relationships that hold space for indigenous-led and indigenousfocused water governance and management that prioritize health equity. undrip marks a major accomplishment in the international recognition of indigenous peoples rights and is viewed by many indigenous groups and organizations in canada as an important starting point for decolonization, reconciliation, and respectful nation-to-nation relationships (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015). and yet, while canada affirmed its commitment to upholding undrip “without qualification” in 2016,5 doing so will not only require strengthening relationships among nations, but honouring relationships and responsibilities among people, waters, and the rest of the natural world (arsenault et al., 2018). as such, water governance structures that protect the health of people, water, and ecosystems must rethink laws, regulatory rules, and institutional structures with indigenous knowledges and worldviews in mind, ensuring decision-making with regards to water is in line with indigenous notions of relationality, respect, reciprocity, and kinship (wilson & inkster, 2018). in this light, mitigation efforts for addressing water-related issues in indigenous communities must be considered alongside preventative efforts to protect water sources (arsenault et al., 2018). notably, as the participants in this study described, centering indigenous knowledges and worldviews in water governance structures is more than an intellectual or political exercise. that is, in order to renew, repair, and rebuild relationships, with each other and with the natural world, we must participate in them, and in so doing we transform ourselves—a generative source for real change. 5 canada was originally one of four 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(2017). the sioux’s suits: global law and the dakota access pipeline. american indian law journal, 6(1), 173–238. ms 1460 cover page.pdf ms 1460 day legacy will be the change rce.pdf microsoft word 13369 cover page.docx the international indigenous policy journal volume 11 | issue 4 december 2020 tobacco smoking among first nations youth living on reserve and in northern communities: a mixed methods study laura wright university of saskatchewan, canada, laura.wright@usask.ca colleen a. dell university of saskatchewan, canada, colleen.dell@usask.ca first nations information governance centre* canada, info@fnigc.ca recommended citation wright, l., dell, c. a., & first nations information governance centre. (2020). tobacco smoking among first nations youth living on reserve and in northern communities: a mixed methods study. the international indigenous policy journal, 11(4). https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.13369 * corresponding author tobacco smoking among first nations youth living on reserve and in northern communities: a mixed methods study abstract the prevalence of tobacco smoking among first nations youth living on reserve and in northern communities is significantly higher than off-reserve indigenous youth in southern communities and non-indigenous youth, although the majority do not smoke. using a mixed-methods approach, we examine factors that support on-reserve first nations youth’s resilience to smoking. logistic regression analyses using data from the nationally representative first nations regional early childhood, education, and employment survey suggest that not using other substances, having friends who do not smoke or use other substances, and having good mental health is associated with not smoking. a review of select community initiatives and in-depth interviews with first nations anti-tobacco initiative managers and frontline workers about the initiatives also revealed the need for genderand community-specific programming, recognition of indigenous social determinants of health, and addressing the normalization of smoking in some community contexts. keywords first nations, youth, on-reserve, smoking, health behaviours acknowledgments we gratefully acknowledge the research assistance of maria cruz and maryellen gibson. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. 1 wright et al.: smoking among first nations youth living on reserve and in northern communities published by scholarship@western, 2020 tobacco smoking among first nations youth living on reserve and in northern communities: a mixed methods study the prevalence of tobacco smoking among first nations youth living on reserve and in northern communities is significantly higher than for off-reserve indigenous youth and non-indigenous youth in canada (bougie & kohen, 2018; elton-marshall et al., 2011; gionet & roshanafshar, 2013). recent reports, however, indicate that the majority of first nations youth do not smoke tobacco (first nations information governance centre [fnigc], 2016b). moreover, the number who do smoke has declined in recent years, with most first nations youth identifying as having never smoked tobacco (fnigc, 2018). nonetheless, tobacco is an addictive substance and smoking tobacco is a leading cause of premature death in canada (government of canada, 2011), including among first nations. the non-sacred smoking of commercial cigarettes is associated with negative health effects such as cancer, pulmonary and cardiovascular diseases, as well as death (canadian substance use and addiction, 2018; canadian tobacco alcohol and drugs, 2017; government of canada, 2016). with this recognition, it is important to also acknowledge that, historically and in the present day, tobacco use has traditional spiritual and ceremonial purposes as a sacred medicine for first nations. therefore, it is important to understand the factors associated with first nations youth refraining from smoking tobacco for non-ceremonial purposes based on a strength-based cultural perspective. this article focuses on factors associated with resilience to tobacco smoking amongst first nations youth (ages 12-17) living in first nations communities. our study is based on the 2013 to 2015 first nations regional early childhood, education and employment survey (fnreees),1 a review of select community tobacco initiatives aimed at reducing tobacco use, and interviews with the managers and frontline workers. the aim of this article is to contribute to this under-researched area to better understand the tobacco smoking behaviours of first nations youth on reserve and in northern first nations communities. background there has been considerable attention paid to youth tobacco smoking behaviours amongst the general canadian population (see for example saewyc et al., 2006), but less towards first nations youth. very few studies have examined the smoking behaviours of first nations youth living on reserve and in northern communities, or the factors that promote resilience to smoking tobacco (fnigc, 2016b; fnigc, 2018). one notable exception is the 2016 report of the first nations information governance centre (fnigc, 2016b). this study analyzed data from first nations youth aged 12 to 17 living on reserve and in northern communities from the first nations regional health survey (fnrhs, or rhs) with a specific focus on protective factors, which are reviewed in the following sections. 1 the 2013 to 2015 fnreees was conducted by the first nations information governance centre, an independent first nations-led research and data governance body. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.13369 personal or individual attributes gender and age the rhs found that first nations male youth living in first nations communities were more likely to be non-smokers than females, which is similar to the gender differences found for first nations youth living off reserve (elton-marshall et al., 2011), but opposite to what has been found among non-first nations youth in canada (leatherdale & burkhalter, 2012). further, amongst first nation youth who smoked tobacco, the rhs reported that males tend to smoke more cigarettes than females. this discrepancy could be explained by the influence of gender roles, which can affect how males and females are differentially perceived by their families, peers, and communities (de finney et al., 2013). gender roles can also carry stereotypes and expectations such as familial support and domestic responsibilities (de finney et al., 2013; julien et al., 2008). some indigenous communities are traditionally matriarchal, and colonialism disrupted this structure and imposed western gender roles. as a result, one reason for the discrepancy could be that female indigenous youth are subject to more social stressors than their male counterparts and tobacco smoking acts as a coping mechanism (de finney et al., 2013). in terms of age, the literature on canadian youth smoking rates indicates that when compared to their younger counterparts, older adolescents are more likely to smoke tobacco (larsen et al., 2017). mastery another personal attribute considered in the rhs that has been shown to serve as a protective variable for indigenous youth tobacco smoking behaviours is mastery, or the perceived control over one’s life (fnigc, 2018; younger, 1991). previous research on cigarette smoking identifies that the achievement of goals through a person’s own means is associated with a reduction in the number of cigarettes smoked per day (warner et al., 2018). as adolescence is marked with an increasing desire for autonomy (arnett, 1998), an analysis of the ability or perceived ability to independently handle situations could add further insight to the trends in smoking among indigenous youth. for example, many youths on first nations reserves have limited options for local higher education opportunities, thus making career goals more difficult to achieve. mental health the rhs indicated that youth who reported better mental health were more likely to be non-smokers (fnigc, 2018). the literature also draws a relationship between mental health complications and tobacco use among indigenous children and youth. specifically, low self-esteem, stress, and suicidal ideation have been found to be associated with tobacco use among indigenous children and youth (de finney et al., 2009; lemstra et al., 2011). other substance use the use of other substances, including the misuse of prescription medications, is commonly associated with smoking, especially during adolescence (leatherdale & burkhalter, 2012; yu et al., 2005). in the general youth population, over 99% of canadian youth who had ever smoked a cigarette had also tried either alcohol or marijuana (leatherdale & ahmed, 2010), and youth who engage in binge drinking are more likely to use tobacco and/or marijuana (leatherdale et al., 2008). based on responses to health 3 wright et al.: smoking among first nations youth living on reserve and in northern communities published by scholarship@western, 2020 canada’s youth smoking survey, misuse of prescription drugs has been increasing among first nations youth, and rates are up to 5 times greater than their non-indigenous counterparts (currie & wild, 2012; webster, 2012). thus, the use of both prescription and non-prescription substances may be an additional factor to be considered when assessing youth tobacco smoking, which the rhs did not examine. education and extracurricular activities school enrolment the rhs data revealed that youth who attended school were more likely to be non-smokers (fnigc, 2018). in the literature, school enrolment has been found to have a protective effect on adolescent cigarette smoking, especially among those who feel a strong sense of connection to their school community (azagba & asbridge, 2013). this could result from students having a routine of attending classes and doing homework, and spending more time doing supervised activities (barnes et al., 2007). extracurricular activities findings from the rhs also discussed the negative relationship between youth smoking and extracurricular physical activities (fnigc, 2018). this could be explained by the association between canadian youth who are involved in extracurricular activities, such as sports, and higher pro-social behaviour and self-esteem, as well as lower anxiety scores (guèvremont et al., 2014). among a representative sample of 14to 17-year-old canadian high school students, participation in extracurricular activities resulted in more positive academic, emotional, and behavioural outcomes (guèvremont et al., 2014). moreover, youth who were involved in both physical activities and nonsports extracurricular activities, such as volunteerism, were less likely to have tried smoking tobacco (guèvremont et al., 2014). family and household characteristics family and peer influences the health of indigenous youth is influenced by their family and community surroundings (greenwood et al., 2018). according to the rhs, youth who lived in a smoke-free home and who lived with their biological parents were more likely to be non-smokers (fnigc, 2016b). among the general and off-reserve first nations youth populations, peer tobacco smoking was also found to have an influence on youth smoking behaviour. far higher proportions of current smokers have friends who smoke, compared to non-smoking youth (bougie & kohen, 2018; kaai et al., 2014; population health research group, 2008). while families and peer groups are influential in teen smoking initiation (valentine et al., 2003), having a best friend who smokes has been identified as the most powerful predictor of tobacco smoking among indigenous youth (hutchison et al., 2008). as the sale of tobacco products to minors is prohibited by law, these factors can play a primary role in providing easier access to tobacco (jetty, 2017). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.13369 social support previous studies have shown that youth with the most social support are more likely to have the ability to avoid negative health behaviours (abel et al., 2011; gagnè et al., 2015). similarly, canadian adolescents with a history of smoking cigarettes reported having less social support than those who have never smoked (pederson et al., 1997). due to stressors more frequently experienced at this time, such as changes in their work and school environments, living arrangements, family structure, and social networks (hammond, 2005), it has been suggested that youth who do not have strong social support networks would be more likely to resort to smoking as a means to cope with these changes (johnson et al., 2003; low et al., 2012). socioeconomic status studies examining the general youth population of canada and the us find that household stability, uncrowded housing conditions, no experience in foster care, and higher parental education are associated with less youth smoking (karlsen et al., 1998; lemaster et al., 2002; saewyc et al., 2006; shpiegel et al., 2017; simons-morton & farhat, 2010; soteriades & difranza, 2003; wen et al., 2009). data from the rhs also show that low family socioeconomic status is a risk factor for both youth and adult smoking (fnigc, 2016b). while the bivariate link has been established, further investigation as to whether these factors are important once other factors are considered is warranted. first nations traditional culture historical trauma and culture analysis of the rhs showed no statistically significant association between first nations traditional culture and language and youth smoking behaviour (fnigc, 2016b), although youth who frequently participate in cultural events are less likely to report smoking than those who never participate. by examining the relationship between identifying as indigenous, historical trauma, stressful life events, and smoking tobacco, soto et al. (2015) identified a correlation with tobacco use and experiences of historical trauma and stressful life events. indigenous identity and cultural participation were identified as protective factors. while cultural participation did not predict tobacco smoking behaviours, tobacco may be used as a coping mechanism to deal with intergenerational and vicarious trauma. there are several potential protective and risk factors that are unique to first nations youth that also warrant further attention. historical traumas, which include the colonial and indian residential school systems, have produced social, political, and economic inequalities, and these have greatly impacted the health of indigenous people in canada (loppie reading & wien, 2009; soto et al., 2015). residential school attendance has created long-lasting harmful individual and intergenerational effects (bombay et al., 2009). these negative effects include psychological health problems, and disconnection from family, community networks, culture, and language, all factors which have been found to influence potentially harmful health behaviours such as smoking tobacco (bombay et al., 2009). strong connections to spirituality may be a protective factor for first nations youth as youth who placed higher importance on traditional cultural activities and understanding cultural teachings report higher levels of emotional competence, which was found to be protective against smoking tobacco (andersson & ledogar, 2008). a meta-analysis of canadian indigenous youth resilience studies did not find a clear and consistent 5 wright et al.: smoking among first nations youth living on reserve and in northern communities published by scholarship@western, 2020 relationship between traditional culture, spirituality, and tobacco use (andersson & ledogar, 2008). yet, the inability to link resilience with specific cultural or spiritual factors may largely reflect a “failure to ask the right questions” (andersson & ledogar, 2008, p. 65). the “right questions” may include knowledge about culture, such as first nations language and rights, and the importance youth place on this knowledge. methods this article seeks to address the gaps in the literature on the smoking behaviours of first nations youth living on reserve and in northern communities. by drawing on the fnreees survey, which includes detailed information about youths’ knowledge, appreciation, and involvement with their traditional first nations culture, the relationship between traditional cultural participation and resilience to tobacco use can be more thoroughly examined. moreover, while the fnigc (2016b) report provides important information about a variety of factors that protect against youth tobacco smoking, it relies solely on bivariate analyses, which do not allow for an examination of the unique effects of each factor, controlling for other differences. the present article is able to build on this foundation by conducting multivariate analyses. based on the literature on protective factors, we also draw on qualitative data from a series of interviews with first nations managers, frontline workers, and authorities about on-reserve tobacco prevention, education, reduction, and cessation initiatives. our mixed-method approach provides a rich analysis of the factors that promote resilience to youth smoking and allows us to explore the relationship between traditional cultural connection and resilience to a greater depth than currently exists in the literature. the fnigc, the corresponding author on this article, established the ocap® principles, which recognize “the rightful ownership, control, access, and possession of first nations’ data by first nations” (fnigc, 2020, para. 3). the fnreees survey data is possessed by the first nations data centre and all analyses using these survey data, and the analysis of the in-depth interviews, were conducted in collaboration with the fnigc to ensure shared control over all aspects of the research process. as a program evaluation-type review, this project did not require university research ethics board review. survey data we use data from the fnreees to analyze the protective and risk factors associated with youth tobacco use. fnreees was conducted by the first nations information governance centre (fnigc) and its regional partners between 2013 and 2015 and survey weights are applied to all analyses to ensure the data are representative of the population of first nations youth living on reserve and in northern communities across canada. the sampling frame was based on the indigenous and northern affairs canada (inac) indian registry counts of those living on reserve or on crown land. the complex sample design incorporated a two-stage sampling strategy. the first stage involved the selection of communities, stratified by region, sub-region, and community size (large = 1,500 or more people, medium = 300 to 1,499 people, and small = fewer than 300 people) to participate in the survey. large communities were automatically included, while medium and small communities were randomly selected with equal probability within their respective strata; communities with a population of less than 75 were not included in the survey. the second stage pertained to the random selection of individuals within 10 age and sex groups (i.e., each sex by 5 age groups) in each community in the national sample. community members were identified using band membership lists. the fnreees achieved obtained 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.13369 responses from 69.5% of the target sample, across 243 first nations communities (fnigc, 2016a) and included 3,842 youth respondents. the analyses in this article uses complete case analysis of selfreported data from 1,764 youth, aged 12 to 17, drawn from the youth survey component using spss version 24. youth with missing data on any of the included factors were excluded from the analysis. survey measures youth smoking behaviours were measured by responses to the following question: “at the present time, do you smoke cigarettes daily, occasionally, or not at all?” respondents who smoked less than daily were classified as occasional smokers, so this category can encompass a broad range of youth who smoke any amount ranging from a few times per week to a few times per year. youth who reported that they smoked daily or occasionally were grouped together because of the relatively small categories compared to those who did not presently smoke. since the survey question refers to current smoking behaviours, past smoking behaviour cannot be identified, and those who stated that they do not presently smoke may have smoked in the past. we examined the effects of 21 protective and risk factors on youth smoking. these included selfreported gender, which was recoded dichotomously;2 age, which was grouped into ages 12 to 14 and 15 to 17; education, which included a measure for whether respondents were currently in school, had completed school, or had left school without graduating at the time of the survey; and volunteer activities, which included dichotomous measures for whether the youth volunteered in the community without pay when the survey was taken. the other health behaviours included as predictors of youth smoking were binary variables for whether the respondent drank five or more alcoholic drinks in one sitting (binge drinking), used marijuana or other illicit drugs, or misused prescription drugs in the last year. measures for the substance-related health behaviours of the respondents’ friends included dichotomous measures for whether the youth had no friends who smoked, compared to those who reported that some, most, or all of their friends smoked. peer drinking and peer drug use measures were created in the same way. family factors included dichotomous measures for whether youth lived in a smoke free home or not, whether they had ever been in foster care, and whether the respondent had any family member (mother, father, grandparent, or sibling) who attended a residential school. family structure was classified into three categories: living with two biological parents, one biological parent, or any other family structure. a crowded home is classified as a home with more people living in it than the number of habitable rooms, and not crowded otherwise. parental education is classified into four categories: both parents have less than a high school education, at least one parent has a high school diploma, at least one parent is educated beyond high school, and parental education is unknown. respondents were also asked to rate the importance of learning about traditional teachings, and their responses were coded into two categories: not or a little important and very or somewhat important. youth’s self-reported mental health is classified into two categories consisting of excellent, very good, or good and fair or poor. dichotomous measures for whether they participated in sports or physical 2 the survey does not provide an option to indicate a non-binary gender identity. 7 wright et al.: smoking among first nations youth living on reserve and in northern communities published by scholarship@western, 2020 activities at least once per week outside of class were included. a dichotomous measure of social support was also created to capture whether respondents felt that they had someone in their lives who would help them if things went wrong. we included a composite measure of level of mastery. respondents were asked to rate their agreement with seven statements related to their level of mastery and sense of control over their lives on a fourpoint likert scale, and their responses were averaged to create the composite measure (a = 0.71). finally, respondents were asked to state how often they felt in balance in four aspects of their life— physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual—on a five-point likert scale ranging from all of the time to none of the time. responses to these four questions were averaged to create an overall balance measure ranging from 1 to 5, with higher values signifying greater balance (a = 0.88). quantitative analytic strategy the examination of protective and risk factors for youth tobacco smoking proceeds in two steps, which were determined a priori. first, a series of bivariate cross-tabulations of the various risk and protective factors and youth tobacco smoking behaviour are estimated. next, a multivariate logistic regression model predicting non-smoking that includes all the protective and risk factors found to be significant in the bivariate analyses is estimated to examine the unique effect of each factor. this analytic strategy allowed us to examine a very wide range of potentially protective factors in the bivariate analyses, but not overburden our final multivariate model with variables that we found not to be directly related to youth tobacco smoking. qualitative interview data to complement the fnreees quantitative data analysis, interviews were held with key first nations on-reserve tobacco initiative managers and frontline workers and authorities in the field of tobacco and culture (including prevention and education, reduction, and cessation; n = 8). the majority (n = 6) of the interviews were held after the preliminary findings of the quantitative data analysis were identified. this allowed for questions specific to these findings to guide the interviews. the contacts for the interviews were snowball sampled, starting with the thunderbird partnership foundation (tpf). the tpf’s mandate is to be “the national voice advocating for inuit and first nations culturally-based addictions services” (thunderbird partnership foundation, 2018a, mandate section, para. 1). tpf identified two experts connected to their organization in the field of tobacco prevention, and each was contacted to identify key community-based initiatives covering each of the three areas of interest to this report (prevention, reduction, and/or cessation). the individuals interviewed ranged from program managers (n = 3) to frontline workers (n = 2) to topic area experts (n = 3). the approximate 10 reviewed initiatives variously addressed the three areas in their operations (noting limited attention to reduction). the interviews covered different areas of canada, including rural, remote, and close to urban settings, but are in no way representative. common amongst the interviews was a solid understanding of tobacco and its sacred and contemporary use amongst youth and/or the 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.13369 role of traditional first nations culture in individual and community health. a 2015 report by the canadian partnership against cancer (cpac, 2015), titled leading practices in first nations, inuit and métis smoking cessation program scan, “provides information on current practices in smoking cessation programs developed by, with and for first nations, inuit and métis across canada by jurisdiction” (slide 2). noting it is an adult focused report, it concluded, “relatively few smoking cessation programs developed by, with and for first nations, inuit, or metis exist in canada” (cpac, 2015, slide 24). the same is true for first nations youth, including in the areas of prevention and reduction, with the exception of health canada-funded tobacco projects. the following overarching questions were addressed through a structured interview: a. do the protective and risk factor findings from the fnreees analysis apply to the community programs? b. are any additional protective and risk factors identified in the community programs for understanding youth tobacco smoking? c. what individualized (community-specific) program approaches are applied (culture, gender)? the interview questions consisted of the following: 1. describe the program or programs you are generally familiar with. 2. describe “common” program participants or youth generally regarding uptake of smoking. 3. what is the cultural foundation of the program or programs generally (developed by, for, and with first nations)? 4. what specific factors lead to reduction or cessation? 5. do you have any additional thoughts on the key findings shared with you from preliminary analysis of the quantitative data for this report? the average length of the interview was 35 minutes. all answers were recorded in verbatim format for select sentences and at other times in a summary format (when verbatim was not possible) by typing directly into a word processing program. all interviews were reviewed upon completion for general, overarching themes using a version of saldaña’s (2009) content analysis coding guide. this guide was chosen based on the direct nature of the interview questions—there was not a lot of flexibility for topics to emerge from the interviews that were outside the structured interview guide. also, as explained, the interviews were held following the quantitative data analysis, which directed the areas in which we gathered information. one researcher took the lead on the data gathering, and upon review of the data using a combined structural and descriptive coding (first cycle) and pattern coding (second cycle), the information gathered was presented back to interview participants for validation. 9 wright et al.: smoking among first nations youth living on reserve and in northern communities published by scholarship@western, 2020 results survey results bivariate analyses table 1 displays crosstabulations and chi-square significance tests for the protective and risk factors and youth smoking. overall, 76.3% of first nations youth aged 12 to 17 report not smoking tobacco at the time of the survey, and there are no significant differences between females and males. smoking tobacco is more common among older youth than younger youth. youth who are currently in school are the least likely to smoke tobacco, followed by those who have finished high school, and those who have left school before graduation are the most likely to smoke. youth who volunteer without pay in their communities are more likely to smoke tobacco than youth who do not participate in any volunteer activities. youth who use other illicit substances are far more likely to smoke tobacco than youth who do not. the majority of youth who report drinking five or more alcoholic beverages in one sitting also report smoking. in contrast, only 1 in 10 young people who do not binge drink report smoking tobacco. youth who report never using marijuana, misusing prescription drugs, or using any other illicit drugs in the past year are also very unlikely to smoke tobacco. having friends who do not smoke tobacco, drink, or use drugs is highly protective against smoking. nearly all youth who reported that none of their friends smoke tobacco are non-smokers themselves. a similar pattern is evident for friends’ drug use, which includes marijuana, prescription misuse, and illicit drugs. youth smoking is also associated with a variety of family characteristics. living in a smoke-free home is strongly associated with non-smoking among first nations youth. youth who live in families with two biological parents are less likely to smoke tobacco than youth who live with one biological parent, or any other family form. first nations youth who have ever been in foster care are more likely to be smokers than youth who have never been in foster care. family experience of residential schooling is significantly associated with youth smoking behaviours. youth living in crowded homes are more likely to smoke than youth living in homes that are not crowded. youth whose most highly educated parent has a high school diploma are the most likely to be non-smokers, followed by those with at least one parent who is educated beyond high school, and youth whose parents do not have a high school diploma are the most likely to smoke. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.13369 table 1. sample characteristics by smoking status: first nations youth ages 12-17 living on reserve and in northern communities smoke do not smoke chi-square test total % % % total 23.7 76.3 100 gender female 23.3 76.7 0.11 n.s. 46.0 male 24.0 76.0 54.0 age 12-14 years old 7.5e 92.5 178.81 *** 41.3 15-17 years old 35.0 65.0 58.7 school enrollment in school 20.1 79.9 26.49 * 66.0 completed school 24.7e 75.3 6.8 left school 32.0 68.0 27.2 volunteer activity volunteer 30.0 70.0 34.02 ** 46.7 do not volunteer 18.1 81.9 53.3 alcohol consumption no binge drinking last year 10.4 89.6 436.01 *** 71.8 binge drank in last year 57.3 42.7 28.2 illicit drug use no drug use last year 3.9e 96.1 566.15 *** 59.8 any drug use last year 53.0 47.0 40.2 peer smoking no friends smoke f 98.4 246.33 *** 34.1 some, most, or all friends smoke 35.1 64.9 65.9 11 wright et al.: smoking among first nations youth living on reserve and in northern communities published by scholarship@western, 2020 table 1. sample characteristics by smoking status: first nations youth ages 12-17 living on reserve and in northern communities (continued) smoke do not smoke chisquare test total % % % peer alcohol consumption no friends drink f 88.8 97.73 ** 39.1 some, most, or all friends drink 31.7 68.3 60.9 peer illicit drug use no friends use drugs f 92.3 192.48 *** 43.5 some, most, or all friends use drugs 36.0 64.0 56.5 home smoking environment live in a smoke-free home 20.2 79.8 19.40 * 62.1 smoking in home 29.4 70.6 37.9 family structure live with 2 biological parents 16.0 84.0 41.59 ** 41.0 live with 1 biological parent 30.0 70.0 41.8 other family structure 26.7 73.3 17.2 foster care experience never been in foster care 22.6 77.4 12.24 * 92.2 ever been in foster care 35.8 64.2 7.8 family experience of residential school no family members attended residential school 15.7 84.3 21.78 ** 25.8 at least one family member attended 26.5 73.5 74.2 home crowding status home is not crowded 20.3 79.7 18.81 * 63.5 live in a crowded home 29.5 70.5 36.5 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.13369 table 1. sample characteristics by smoking status: first nations youth ages 12-17 living on reserve and in northern communities (continued) smoke do not smoke chisquare test total % % % parental education both parents less than high school 35.1 64.9 72.30 ** 24.7 at least one parent high school graduate 14.7e 85.3 23.4 at least one parent more than high school 19.2 80.8 42.3 do not know or not applicable 35.8e 64.2e 9.6e perspective on importance of traditional teachings traditional teachings somewhat or very important 25.8 74.2 17.28 ** 79.2 not or a little important 15.5 84.5 20.8 mental health excellent, very good, or good mental health 21.8 78.2 56.30 *** 94.4 fair or poor mental health 54.9 45.1 5.6 physical activity physically active once per week or more 21.3 78.7 8.45 n.s. 60.5 physically active less than once per week 27.3 72.7 39.5 social support if something went wrong, no one would help me 37.5 62.5 25.10 *** 11.8 if something went wrong, someone would help me 21.8 78.2 88.2 13 wright et al.: smoking among first nations youth living on reserve and in northern communities published by scholarship@western, 2020 table 1. sample characteristics by smoking status: first nations youth ages 12-17 living on reserve and in northern communities (continued) smoke do not smoke p-level total mean [ci] mean [ci] % balance 3.8 [3.62, 3.93] 3.9 [3.80, 3.95] n.s. 3.9 mastery 2.8 [2.71, 2.87] 3.0 [2.90, 2.99] *** 2.9 notes. n = 1,764. significant differences between youth who smoke and do not smoke determined using chi-square tests for categorical variables and confidence interval estimates of means for continuous variables. e = high sampling variability, interpret with caution. f = very high sampling variability, estimates cannot be displayed. ci = confidence interval. *** p < .001 ** p < .01 * p < .05 n.s. = non-significant differences youth who report that it is somewhat or very important to learn about traditional teachings are less likely to be non-smokers than those who perceive that it is only a little or not at all important to learn about traditional teachings. there are large differences in the smoking behaviours of first nations youth based on their self-reported mental health. youth who report excellent, very good, or good mental health are more likely to be non-smokers than those who report fair or poor mental health. however, youth who participate in physical activity once per week or more are no more or less likely to smoke tobacco than youth who are less physically active. there are also large differences between youth who feel like they have strong social support who are much less likely to smoke, compared to youth who do not report having strong social support. youth who do not smoke tobacco report similar physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual balance than those who smoke. youth who report being non-smokers report higher levels of mastery than youth who smoke. multivariate analyses in the next step of the analysis, we estimate a multivariate logistic regression model predicting nonsmoking that includes gender and all of the protective factors that were found to be significant predictors of youth smoking in the bivariate analyses. as shown in table 2, there are eight factors that are uniquely and significantly related to first nations youth tobacco smoking. of the factors, 10 that were found to be significant in the bivariate analyses lost significance once all the factors were considered at once (i.e., gender, peer drug use, living in a smoke-free home, living in an uncrowded home, family structure, experience in foster care, family attendance at residential school, parental education, importance placed on traditional teachings, social support, and mastery). 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.13369 table 2. logistic regression predicting not smoking among first nations youth ages 12-17, living on reserve and in northern communities odds ratio std. error p-level gender male 1.25 0.23 n.s. female ref. ref. age 12-14 years old 2.36 0.28 ** 15-17 years old ref. ref. school enrollment in school ref. ref. completed school 2.54 0.47 * left school 0.90 0.27 n.s. volunteer activity volunteer ref. ref. do not volunteer 2.22 0.23 *** alcohol consumption no binge drinking last year 5.41 0.28 *** binge drank last year ref. ref. illicit drug use no drug use last year 9.39 0.36 *** any drug use last year ref. ref. peer smoking no friends smoke 11.18 0.56 *** some, most, or all friends smoke ref. ref. peer alcohol consumption no friends drink 0.22 0.40 *** some, most, or all friends drink ref. ref. 15 wright et al.: smoking among first nations youth living on reserve and in northern communities published by scholarship@western, 2020 table 2. logistic regression predicting not smoking among first nations youth ages 12-17, living on reserve and in northern communities (continued) odds ratio std. error p-level peer illicit drug use no friends use drugs 1.78 0.42 n.s. some, most, or all friends use drugs ref. ref. home smoking environment live in a smoke-free home ref. ref. smoking in home 0.90 0.24 n.s. family structure live with 2 biological parents 1.18 0.30 n.s. live with 1 biological parent 1.15 0.36 n.s. other family structure ref. ref. foster care experience never been in foster care 1.34 0.34 n.s. ever been in foster care ref. ref. family experience of residential school no family members attended residential school 0.81 0.27 n.s. at least one family member attended ref. ref. home crowding status home is not crowded 1.16 0.25 n.s. live in a crowded home ref. ref. parental education both parents less than high school 1.48 0.39 n.s. at least one parent high school graduate 1.19 0.38 n.s. at least one parent more-than-high school ref. ref. do not know or not applicable 0.87 0.35 n.s. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.13369 table 2. logistic regression predicting not smoking among first nations youth ages 12-17, living on reserve and in northern communities (continued) odds ratio std. error p-level perspective on importance of traditional teachings traditional teachings somewhat or very important ref. ref. not or a little important 1.22 0.27 n.s. mental health excellent, very good, or good mental health 4.03 0.45 ** fair or poor mental health ref. ref. social support if something went wrong, no one would help me ref. ref. if something went wrong, someone would help me 1.43 0.25 n.s. level of mastery 1.52 0.29 n.s. nagelkerke pseudo r2 = 0.611 model wald f statistic = 11.87 (p < .001) notes. n = 1,764. e = high sampling variability, interpret with caution. *** p < .001 ** p < .01 * p < .05 n.s = non-significant differences age, school enrollment, volunteering, drinking and drug use, peer smoking and drinking, and selfreported mental health are all important factors predicting youth smoking in the multivariate model. younger first nations youth, aged 12 to 14, are 2.36 times more likely to be non-smokers compared to older first nations youth, once the other factors are considered. youth who have completed school are 2.54 times more likely to be non-smokers compared to those still in school, all else being equal. the odds of not smoking tobacco are 2.22 times higher for youth who do not volunteer, compared to youth volunteers. the respondent’s own health behaviours, and the health behaviours of their peers are very strongly associated with smoking behaviour. youth who did not binge drink alcohol in the past year have 5.41 times higher odds of being non-smokers, those who did not use drugs last year have 9.39 times higher odds of not smoking, and those whose friends do not smoke have odds of not smoking that are 11.18 times higher compared to their counterparts who engaged in these behaviours, controlling for other factors. peer drug use is not significantly associated with tobacco smoking but surprisingly, peer drinking is associated with a reduced likelihood of smoking. finally, youth who report having excellent, very good, or good mental health have odds of not smoking 3.44 times higher than those with poor or fair mental health, after controlling for other factors. 17 wright et al.: smoking among first nations youth living on reserve and in northern communities published by scholarship@western, 2020 community tobacco initiatives: results from qualitative interviews there were four overarching themes across the interviews regarding tobacco initiatives for first nations youth on reserve: absence of attention to a sex and gender lens, importance of community-specific developed programming, recognition of indigenous social determinants of health, and normalization of cigarette smoking. first, the interviewees relayed that a sex and/or gender lens is rarely placed on youth tobacco initiatives, including in their own communities. as one interviewee said: none of what we do is gender specific, we are age specific only. it was shared that if gender is recognized, it is most often specific to female adults and pregnancy. in reference to gender specific programming, an interviewee shared: we take it outside of youth programming, and into pregnancy. another interviewee shared: do we need a gender lens? yes we do, but the emphasis is usually on pregnancy. that is where [we] see prevention messages. female-specific messaging is generally that women should not smoke during pregnancy; however, the message is not typically expanded to include those in the childrearing years. there is some attention given to partners and the community in supporting women to not smoke while pregnant, but overwhelmingly public health messages are focused on the pregnant female. one interviewee reinforced that “a gender-based approach is not just about women.” this does not mean that gender-informed programming does not exist in canada for first nations youth on reserve, but it was generally absent in the interviews for this study. one example of the existence of such programming is the on-reserve work of the canada prenatal nutrition programs, which have the opportunity to discuss tobacco with women and use resources such as the sacred tobacco, sacred children (best start, 2012) materials about smoke free homes, produced by best start in ontario. some interviews recognized that females are more likely to smoke in comparison to males, and for different reasons such as to address negative emotions, including both daily stressors as well as ongoing personal challenges like anxiety. some also shared that they felt females smoked in response to what was described by one interviewee as “emotional work” taken on at an early age and tied to female gender roles (e.g., care for siblings) and non-gender-specific roles as well (e.g., planning required to keep family problems from being “found out”). some interviewees also shared that a gender lens needs to be considered with respect to first nations culture (e.g., recognizing the traditional role of females and tobacco in ceremonial teachings in some communities). “culture is important, including to indian women, and more now than ever,” shared one interviewee. second, recognizing that each first nations community is unique, tobacco programs were identified by the interviewees as lacking in community specificity and focus. for example, one interviewee shared that youth smoking in the community they worked in was highly influenced by the perceived “coolness” of 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.13369 smoking amongst youth, whereas, in another community in which they worked, this was not the case and youth reported to smoke for other reasons (e.g., coping). interviewees also shared that tobacco smoking initiatives need also to be youth specific and focused. an example of a youth-centered smoking prevention campaign created by first nations youth was identified in bc (first nations health authority, 2017). interviewees shared that, overall, there is limited empirically based youth-focused tobacco programming available to access as a starting point, and even fewer that are specific to first nations youth. at the same time, it was suggested that there is a need for approaches to youth cigarette smoking that are: more organic: bring youth together and have opportunities for them to check in with one another and spontaneously share about progress they have made, like with trying to quit smoking. central to tobacco smoking initiatives shared by the interviewees was the need for attention to culture. this includes making the critical distinction between commercial cigarette smoking and sacred tobacco use and its linkage to cultural knowledge. one interviewee shared: culture is incorporated into everything we do. start with a circle and smudging—[sharing] uses of tobacco, offering tobacco as prayers when dancing, after with the sacred fire. start with [it in] ceremony in everything we do. we respect the tobacco in this way. third, the influential role of the social determinants of indigenous health were recognized as underlying reasons for smoking. one interviewee shared: we need to think about gender and culture together. and other determinants of health too. so much going on that we need to embrace. according to the work of loppie reading and wien (2009), “the social determinants of health can be categorized as distal (e.g., historic, political, social, and economic contexts), intermediate (e.g., community infrastructure, resources, systems, and capacities), and proximal (e.g., health behaviours, physical, and social environment)” (p. 1). the same interviewee further shared: we need to be ready with indigenous-specific ways of approaching—culturally safe ways of addressing tobacco that take into account all the determinants of health (gender, violence, remoteness, education). my biggest critique with the tobacco field in the past and today is still its narrow focus. for example, the interviews identified the relationship between youth smoking and coping (e.g., depression, anxiety), and the need to address this in a larger context. another interviewee shared: [we] need to do larger mental health initiatives (prevention) where it is clear to the youth that if you have mental health problems, and no alternative coping skills, then you may end up smoking. 19 wright et al.: smoking among first nations youth living on reserve and in northern communities published by scholarship@western, 2020 they also identified the linkage between first nations youth on reserve smoking and inter-generational colonial processes resulting in individual and communal loss, grief, pain, and trauma, while at the same time, they recognized the scared and beneficial cultural role of tobacco. an interviewee shared: culture needs to be there. it was taken. culture in itself is a protective factor, it is identity, selfworth. other things that lead to smoking are symptoms of addiction. trauma, pain. so many other things, [we] need culture to heal. need better coping mechanisms so youth don’t see the need to smoke. there is a colonization linkage. [we need to] respect tobacco so then [we] won’t use. fourth, the interviewees shared that tobacco use in most reserve communities has cultural and spiritual significance, but that the commercial use of tobacco by cigarette smoking is highly normalized, including among traditional community leaders (e.g., elders, sweat lodge keepers). comments from the interviewees include: no, culture [referring to cultural ceremonies] is not a protective factor for smoking. a lot of the drummers and pow wowers and sweat lodge conductors smoke—in fact, [they are] one of the largest smoking groups (may be part generational). it is still socially acceptable in that group. another shared: there are cultural programs that speak about the importance of tobacco, offering it to the land, connecting to the creator—but there is contradiction because the people smoke. we need to have elders sharing who do not smoke. people smoke at the sweat; they smoke in the lodge. but if the elder is there that does not smoke, they don’t. this can result in contradictory cessation program messaging for the youth. an interviewee shared: traditional elders always talk about the spiritual use of tobacco. it is more powerful when a nonsmoking elder shares this though. kids are noting the contradiction; they are even telling elders that their [the elders] use is not traditional use! the general acceptance of tobacco smoking across communities was identified by the interviewees. one interviewee identified it as the “lesser of the evils, when compared to suicide or drugs” and as “an accepted means to cope.” another shared: they do it because it is cool, everyone in their families is doing it (it is normalized), and gangs ask them to. unique to some communities is commercial tobacco’s commodity or value-based role and an entrenched resistance to view it otherwise. related, commercial cigarettes were also shared as being easy to access for first nations youth on reserve in part because of the lower cost due to taxation laws. discussion the majority—about 3 out of 4—of first nations youth living on reserve and in northern communities do not currently smoke tobacco but, given the significant health consequences of smoking and the 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.13369 higher rate of smoking for first nations youth living in these communities compared to other indigenous youth (bougie & kohen, 2018; elton-marshall et al., 2011; gionet & roshanafshar, 2013), it is critical to understand factors that promote youth resilience against tobacco use. this is particularly important for the development of programming. smoking tobacco is a leading cause of premature death in canada, and as such, needs to be paid adequate attention. we found in this study that a higher percentage of female than male youth report being daily or occasional smokers. these differences are also found in other studies of first nations youth smoking, including the rhs study of first nations youth living on reserve and in northern communities. acknowledging that the health risks of tobacco use for women and girls are higher in comparison to men and boys (allen et al., 2014), the fnreees and other study findings support the need to consider sex and gender when studying protective factors for tobacco smoking (amos et al., 2012; greaves, 1996, 2015; greaves et al., 2016; stewart et al., 2011). it is important to consider this alongside our finding from the interviewees that sex and gender are seldom accounted for in tobacco interventions because of a lack of awareness and knowledge by program developers. at the same time, while bivariate analyses of both fnreees and rhs data showed a higher prevalence of smoking among females than males, the multivariate analyses in this report did not show significant sex differences once other factors are considered, suggesting that differences between males’ and females’ smoking are explained by the other factors considered here. again, further research and programming attention to both sex and gender is warranted. our finding that smoking tobacco is more common amongst older youth to younger, with the typical age of onset between 12 and 14 years of age, is reflective of the general youth smoking literature (cantrell et al., 2018; kendler et al., 2013). our interviewees highlighted their concern that education and prevention work need to be increasingly undertaken at younger ages and school grades to continue this trend. this supports the literature indicating the protective importance of delaying the age of onset of tobacco use among youth (azagba & asbridge, 2013; glynn, 1989; ryan et al., 2016). our full logistic regression model showed several protective factors for non-smoking amongst first nations youth: younger youth, youth who do not volunteer in the community, youth who report having good mental health, youth who did not binge drink alcohol or use illicit drugs in the past year, and most importantly, youth who have friends who do not smoke are less likely to be smokers. these finding coincide with the latest empirical evidence. mental health and other addictions are strongly correlated to smoking in the empirical literature (khaled et al., 2009; kirst et al., 2013). whether a youth has friends who smoke is the strongest predictor of youth smoking in our analysis, which is consistent with past research which finds that peer associations are highly influential, including smoking (albert et al., 2013; hutchison et al., 2008). more complex statistical analyses, including longitudinal measures following smoking behaviour and the behaviour of peers over time would be useful to gain even further understanding of how unhealthy behaviours may spread across social networks. the strong protective influence of having friends who do not smoke suggests that efforts to reduce youth smoking may reverberate through friendship networks, which is particularly promising. at the same time, we can consider this finding alongside the interviewees reporting that there is an absence of first nations youth-specific, empirical-based tobacco initiatives that consider other 21 wright et al.: smoking among first nations youth living on reserve and in northern communities published by scholarship@western, 2020 substances. this is not reflective of the current addiction literature supporting a holistic approach to addressing addiction (i.e., accounting for multiple substance use; dell et al., 2011). the research evidence also suggests that mental health approaches need to encompass a broad understanding of wellness, as shared by the interviewees as important for programming—for example, accounting for indigenous social determinants of health, ranging from economic status through to cultural identity (rowan et al., 2014). the interviewees shared that prevention initiatives currently highlight general education about the harms of non-sacred tobacco use, with specific attention to the importance of peerto-peer programming. taking this further, it was noted that there was nearly no attention paid to tobacco reduction, secondhand smoke, e-cigarettes and vaping, marijuana use, and chewing tobacco. the harm reduction literature supports their incorporation (e.g., cox & dawkins, 2018; fisher et al., 2019; holitzki et al., 2017; notley et al., 2018). one of the most interesting findings in our analysis of the fnreees is that the importance youth place on traditional culture was not identified as a protective factor,3 which is somewhat at odds with the interviewee data. there are many possible explanations for this discrepancy. first, as mentioned by the interviewees, tobacco smoking (both sacred or cultural and commercial) is highly normalized in some communities, including at first nations cultural activities and amongst cultural leaders (cote-meek et al., 2014). this may influence youth tobacco smoking uptake and continuation through role modelling. this may also explain the association between volunteering in the community and tobacco smoking; youth who volunteer may have more exposure to adults who smoke, thus normalizing the behaviour. likewise, youth who live with people who smoke in the home are also more likely to smoke for these reasons. this suggests that efforts to reduce adult smoking may create positive change for youth as well. another reason for the unexpected lack of relationship between traditional culture and smoking may be that the questions asked on the fnreees regarding culture are not capturing the aspects of traditional culture that are protective against youth tobacco smoking. for example, the native wellness assessment© (nwa) “measures the impact of cultural interventions on client wellness and proves something that first nations have long known: culture is the key to restoring and maintaining wellness” (tpf, 2018b, para. 5). instead of a western-influenced questionnaire, the questions in this nwa reflect indigenous knowledge. illustrations of questions include: “ceremonies and cultural activities open me up to share my thoughts and feelings with others.” “the more i learn about my culture, the more confident i feel about my life.” and “i listen to traditional teachings to learn how my ancestors understood and lived life” (tpf, 2015, pp. 4, 6). the literature speaks to the need to further look at current youth indigenous identity, and that it may be necessary to combine indigenous and western worldviews (dell et al., 2011; hall et al., 2015). in general, there is a need for first nations youth to know their cultural background and participate in ceremony: the interviewees shared that this is well established within communities and not specific to youth who smoke. 3 we examined a variety of traditional cultural and language knowledge and involvement and found very few significant relationships (results available upon request). 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.13369 much of the programming that has been developed for first nations youth in addictions and mental health generally has been grounded in eurocentric models of risk and resiliency. it is well established that solutions to problematic substance use among first nations youth need to be culturally specific and rooted in indigenous and western ways of knowing, with priority given to the former. the first nations mental wellness continuum framework recognizes the balance of mental, physical, spiritual, and emotional wellness factors in first nations communities in the offering of mental health and addictions programming (health canada & assembly of first nations, 2015). with this understanding, it may be worth considering whether it is possibly overreaching to suggest that participation in culture by itself is going to impact youths’ smoking behaviors as a single outcome. if wellness is understood as a holistic concept, that is, from a first nations worldview, then it may not make sense to separate smoking behaviors from other health behaviors. further, examining the wellbeing factors together in any analysis may be important; for example, creating a composite that tackles cultural engagement by combining the variables in such a way that they assess the same underlying domain to create a more meaningful variable (as opposed to looking at the questions in isolation). there is a need to account for indigenous and western ways of knowing, with priority given to the former as it is inherently strengths-based, in place of the typical deficit-based western eurocentric model. this strengths-based indigenous model and the guidance offered by the trc makes it clear that there is an important opportunity that needs to be recognized in a range of indigenous-specific activities, including the findings of this study. according to the trc (2015a), “reconciliation is about establishing and maintaining a mutually respectful relationship between indigenous and non-indigenous peoples in this country. in order for that to happen, there has to be awareness of the past, acknowledgement of the harm that has been inflicted, atonement for the causes, and action to change behavior” (pp. 6-7). it is important to have data, both quantitative and qualitative, to guide such action. the findings from this study can support this effort, with guidance offered specifically by calls to action 18 and 19.4 the findings can also be linked with other canadian initiatives, such as the renewed federal tobacco control strategy that “support the development and implementation of comprehensive tobacco control projects that are holistic, and socially and culturally appropriate” (health canada, 2017, p. 13). this study has several limitations. the most apparent is working within the confines of the available quantitative data from the fnreees. there are likely other factors that protect first nations youth 4 truth and reconciliation commission call to action #18: we call upon the federal, provincial, territorial, and aboriginal governments to acknowledge that the current state of aboriginal health in canada is a direct result of previous canadian government policies, including residential schools, and to recognize and implement the health-care rights of aboriginal people as identified in international law, constitutional law, and under the treaties. truth and reconciliation commission call to action #19: we call upon the federal government, in consultation with aboriginal peoples, to establish measurable goals to identify and close the gaps in health outcomes between aboriginal and non-aboriginal communities, and to publish annual progress reports and assess long-term trends. such efforts would focus on indicators such as: infant mortality, maternal health, suicide, mental health, addictions, life expectancy, birth rates, infant and child health issues, chronic diseases, illness and injury incidence, and the availability of appropriate health services (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015b, pp. 2-3). 23 wright et al.: smoking among first nations youth living on reserve and in northern communities published by scholarship@western, 2020 from tobacco use that cannot be included in the present study, such as household income, because these measures are not available. although the fnreees was created and conducted by the first nations information governance centre under the ocapò principals of first nations’ ownership, control, access, and possession of data, the indigenous community members from the tobacco programs interviewed for this study were not involved in the construction of the interview questions. this would have been useful given the diverse content of the eventual interviews, even though the primary aim was to gain insight on the fnreees data analyses. third, we have not addressed the neurobiology of addiction, including tobacco smoking, in this study, which should be explored in community youth tobacco smoking prevention, reduction, and/or cessation programming. fourth, the fnreees is a cross-sectional survey that asks youth questions specific to their current and not past smoking behaviours, limiting our ability to make causal claims. further, it would be interesting and important to examine smoking behaviours over time, which is not possible with the present data. finally, the qualitative interviews were with a select sample of key contacts for first nations on-reserve tobacco prevention, education, reduction, and cessation initiatives and so are not generalizable, but are nevertheless helpful in understanding anti-smoking initiatives. conclusion smoking tobacco is a leading cause of premature death in first nations in canada. this article focused on factors associated with resilience to tobacco smoking amongst first nations youth (ages 12-17) living in first nations communities. we concluded that not using other substances, and especially having friends who do not smoke or use other substances, not volunteering in the community, and having good mental health is associated with not smoking. our mixed-method approach allowed us to explore the relationship between traditional cultural connection and youth non-smoking behaviors. it is critical that the factors that promote youth resilience against tobacco use be understood, so evidence-based and culturally and community specific programming can be implemented. references abel t., fuhr, d., bisegger, c., & ackermann, r. s. 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(1991). a theory of mastery. advances in nursing science, 14(1), 76-89. https://doi.org/10.1097/00012272-199109000-00009 yu, m., stiffman, a. r., & freedenthal, s. (2005). factors affecting american indian adolescent tobacco use. addictive behaviors, 30(5), 889-904. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.addbeh.2004.08.029 13369 cover page.pdf 13369 wright smoking among first nations youth rce.pdf microsoft word ms+10969+cover+page.docx the international indigenous policy journal volume 12| issue 3 october 2021 indigenous governance systems and democracy in ethiopia: yejoka qicha system of the gurage people birhanu bitew debre markos university, ethiopia, birhanubitew87@gmail.com asabu sewenet debre markos university, ethiopia, asabusewnet@gmail.com getachew fentahun debre markos university, ethiopia, getachewfent.12@gmail.com recommended citation bitew, b., sewenet, a., & fentahun, g. (2021). indigenous governance systems and democracy in ethiopia: yejoka qicha system of the gurage people. the international indigenous policy journal, 12(3). https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.10969 indigenous governance systems and democracy in ethiopia: yejoka qicha system of the gurage people abstract indigenous governance systems within the eastern african nation of ethiopia are often dismissed by western political elites as undemocratic. we assessed the nature of and level of democracy in indigenous governance systems in ethiopia by focusing on the yejoka qicha of the gurage people. we found that, while the yejoka qicha system includes democratic elements that can support national efforts to consolidate democracy, it also marginalizes some groups, such as women, from political and economic benefits. as such, we recommend the implementation of policies that eliminate the oppressive aspects of the yejoka qicha system, while also recognizing the role that these indigenous governance systems can have in promoting democracy within ethiopia. keywords democracy, governance, gurage, indigenous, yejoka qicha creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. 1 bitew et al.: indigenous governance institutions and democracy in ethiopia published by scholarship@western, 2021 indigenous governance institutions and democracy in ethiopia: yejoka qicha of the gurage people recently, many scholars have discussed the importance of indigenous governance institutions in guiding the socioeconomic and political affairs of societies around the globe (boahene, 2017; holzinger et al, 2020; wedajo et al., 2019). governments are increasingly providing constitutional recognition to indigenous practices in administration processes (holzinger et al., 2020). the afrobarometer surveys revealed that citizens of african countries continue to consider indigenous institutions important and express a desire for a greater political role for indigenous leaders (logan, 2013). state constitutional laws encourage indigenous institutions supporting the political system. out of 193 member states of the united nations, 61 countries recognize the necessity of indigenous institutions in administration (holzinger et al., 2016). the juriglobe world legal systems research group (n.d.) also estimates that 57% of the world’s population lives in countries where indigenous governance systems and other forms of administration coexist with state governments. increasing global recognition of indigenous governance suggests a veritable revitalization from western denigration and trivialization—an indigenous resurgence. indigenous governance institutions were labelled as primitive, backward, and resistant to change by western travellers and colonial agents, and westerners claimed these institutions were replaced by the “advanced” culture of the west. hlawnching (2006) had this to say in this regard: when the outsiders met [i]ndigenous [p]eoples for the first time over five centuries ago, their concept [for] understanding … [i]ndigenous [p]eoples was very disparaging and [they] called them aborigine, natives, tribal, schedule tribe, ethnic minorities and ethnic nationalities, connoting backwardness and primitiveness. …[i]ndigenous systems including governance, culture, social, legal and judiciary, philosophy, [and] economic systems were replaced with supposedly more advanced systems to assimilate and “modernize” [i]ndigenous [p]eoples. (p. 2) the prevalent discourse around governance in africa focuses primarily on achieving and imbibing western values and ideals (damptey, 2017). this view exists partly because many african scholars think that indigenous institutions are undemocratic, and therefore they have seen limited potential for political development (dake, 1996; simiyu, 1987). in contrast, the majority of african citizens value their indigenous cultures, customs, and governance systems, which were formed over centuries before their disruption by colonialism (zartman, 2000). prior to colonization, african societies had rich indigenous institutions that oversaw social control, the allocation of resources, and law-making (boahene, 2017). indigenous institutions were integral parts of african culture, which brought harmony and stability to society. they influenced politics and were used in dispute resolution, land administration, and the provision of social security (holzinger et al., 2017). moreover, they were the custodians of the people’s norms, cultures, and practices. in contemporary africa, these institutions shape various issues, ranging from the provision of public goods (baldwin & mvukiyehe, 2015) and economic development (baldwin & holzinger, 2019) to fostering peace and stability. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.10969 like other african countries, ethiopia is rich in indigenous institutions that can maintain peace and security, foster social harmony, and allocate public goods. nevertheless, the relevance of indigenous institutions to political development in ethiopia has been overlooked on the grounds that they are undemocratic (messay, 2008). these denigrator arguments have been made without properly studying, analysing, or interpreting indigenous institutions. while social organizations in ethiopia were nonegalitarian, and this feature denied some citizens an opportunity to rise to the highest social and political ranks, this does not mean that these systems have no democratic elements. administrative activities in indigenous governance institutions are based on people’s participation, and, according to customary laws, leaders will be sanctioned if they try to act arbitrarily. ethiopia’s efforts to build genuine democracy were derailed by the introduction of western discourses, which supplanted indigenous systems of governance. rooted in the tradition of western modernity, ethiopian elites pursued political ideals that have led to the self-destructive political patterns that the country currently experiences (teshale, 2008). ethiopia currently lacks a democratic political culture. these democratic limitations contribute to today’s political atmosphere, which is full of uncertainty and despair. harsh political, psychological, and economic realities are manifesting themselves daily within the sociopolitical landscape of the country. in light of the present challenges facing ethiopia, revisiting old wisdom may have worthwhile outcomes. the revival of old wisdoms is possible through empirical investigations of the nature of indigenous institutions. taking yejoka qicha, the indigenous governance institution among the gurage, as a litmus test, this article critically examines whether the structure and functions of yejoka qicha are democratic. the examination of the degree to which indigenous institutions are democratic is imperative to inform the appraisal and criticism of their mode of governance and to assess its pertinence to contemporary governance. the nature of yejoka qicha is examined from the perspective of the structure and function of indigenous governance institutions, without comparing them to western democracy. this is because democracy is a system that is practised differently by different institutions (ayittey, 1999). indigenous institutions have democratic elements in their own respect, including people centredness, consensual decision-making, governance through social values and practices, decentralized administration, and transparent criteria to select leaders. thus, the present article used these defining features as an analytical framework to examine the nature of yejoka qicha. while the contemporary political crisis that inundates ethiopia is the result of the failure to strengthen indigenous governance institutions and the inappropriate application of western structures, the existing literature has failed to closely examine it. messay (2008) examined how the advent of marxism caused cultural dislocation in ethiopia. he argued that marxism brought antagonistic political interests, including the nationalities question, which was followed by politically motivated killings and ethnic conflicts, in contrast to the culture of pardon and reconciliation within traditional political systems. teshale (2008) discussed how eurocentric readings of ethiopian history created political narratives based on western political traditions, rather than the “communal democracy”—the horizontal social ties among the people, which took democratic forms. understanding the relevance of indigenous institutions to political development requires expanding the literature by using empirical approaches to examine indigenous institutions at the local level. indeed, bahiru (2002) assessed the local system of governance among the gurage people of ethiopia. providing 3 bitew et al.: indigenous governance institutions and democracy in ethiopia published by scholarship@western, 2021 a detailed description of the gurage governance systems, yejoka qicha and gordanna sera, bahiru focused on the revitalization process that these institutions have experienced since 1991. he argued that, although their influence has fluctuated over centuries, gurage indigenous institutions “helped to foster and sustain the people’s sense of identity” (p. 27). though bahiru’s work contributes to the understanding the origins of yejoka qicha and gordanna sera and its relevance to the solidarity of the gurage people, it failed to address the nature of these governance systems. this article thus aims to fill this knowledge gap by investigating the nature of yejoka qicha in order to reconcile two polarized views of indigenous institutions: romanticism by the traditionalist approach and trivialization by the modernist approach. setting the context like many other ethnic groups in ethiopia, the origin and history of the gurage people is relatively unknown, making their culture susceptible to subjective interpretations by a coterie of scholars who have studied them. due to this fact, studies of the gurage people have “generally suffered from the opposite defects of insulation and extrapolation” (bahiru, 2002, p. 19). the gurage are semitic people who belong to the ensete (false banana) cultural complex of southwestern ethiopia (worku, 2000). farming, livestock raising, trade, and migration constitute the major economic activities of the gurage. linguistically, the gurage are divided into three groups: the northern gurage (aymellel, kestane, and sodo), eastern gurage (silite and wollene), and western gurage (the sebat bet), as described in bahiru (2002) and worku (2000). in spite of the strong belief among ethiopians that they have common identity, which leads to the gurage being treated as a single ethnic group, these are distinct categories. religiously, the gurage share an indigenous religion whose deities have followers and ceremonial leaders throughout gurage land. three major branches are waq (warrior god) for men, damwamit (goddess) for women, and bwaja (thunder god) for both sexes, are organized on a territorial basis (markakis, 1998). these religions have a hierarchical structure beginning at the sub-clan level and at the apex is the paramount figure who resides in the location where an annual pan-gurage festivals takes place. currently, indigenous religious systems are on the verge of collapse as a result of the incursion of christianity and islam deep into the gurage homeland. political authority among the gurage reflects genealogical segmentation, with clans and sub-clans functioning quite autonomously and lacking an established hierarchy (markakis, 1998). historically, the gurage is thus known with its “tradition of political fragmentation” (bahiru, 2002, p. 20). oral tradition among the gurage indicated that political fragmentation bred a good deal of internecine strife and a high incidence of enslavement. it is from this political and social turmoil that the idea of forming an alliance among the gurage was initiated. the alliance between the western clans, named the sebat bet, gave birth to the gurage qicha subsequently named yejoka. a parallel process also resulted in the promulgation of the yegordanna sera in the northern gurage (bahiru, 2002). thus, it is fair to argue that the typical feature of the gurage land is the prevalence of indigenous institutions, which helps to foster solidarity among the gurage. it is this aspect of the gurage that interests us in this article. we will concentrate on the nature of yejoka qicha. yejoka qicha is selected as an illustrative case study because its laws and principles were codified within a single document by gurage elites in 1998 and then revised in 2008. it is important to highlight, 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.10969 through empirical investigation, the lessons contained in this example of development so that other groups in ethiopia can benefit. codifying indigenous governance systems can help identify ways in which they effectively address local problems, and they can inform the national policy arena. codification prevents the erosion of indigenous systems due to the advancement of globalization, modernization, and development-induced human displacement. methodological approaches and methods this study employed indigenous methodologies, which are relationship based. these methodologies are shaped by local knowledge and traditions, and they acknowledge life experience and stories as authentic ways of knowing (kurtz, 2013). indigenous methodologies are fundamentally rooted in the traditions and knowledge systems of indigenous peoples and allow indigenous people to create their own images and stories (evans et al., 2014). the goal of indigenous methodologies is to enable indigenous people to develop knowledge and to speak for and of themselves about all elements of the world they inhabit. in this study, we consulted with religious leaders, local elders, clan chiefs, and yejoka leaders to critically investigate the nature of yejoka qicha systems from the perspective of the local community. this led us to employ a qualitative approach to provide a deeper understanding and interpretation of the issues under investigation. data collection for this study included in-depth interviews and focus group discussions (fgd). the study participants were selected using purposive sampling based on criteria, such as their knowledge, life experience, or characteristics or role within a group and community (khan & manderson, 1992). hence, informants and participants for this study were selected based on their position as a clan chief, religious leader, local elder, or other leadership role within the yejoka. secondary sources were used to supplement the primary data. sources were screened for their relevance and academic credibility. books, articles, conference proceedings, and working papers were analysed to enrich the outcomes of the study. the researchers developed the interview and fgd guidelines before starting the fieldwork. once in the field, we contacted local people and found two field assistants who helped us to find informants and arrange fgds. we conducted the fieldwork over three months (from may 20, 2020, to july 27, 2020). the sample size was determined by the data saturation point (kumar, 2011). a total of 16 interviews were conducted with local elders (n = 4), yejoka leaders (n = 3), religious leaders (n = 3), and clan chiefs (n = 6). moreover, two fgds were organized with local communities, which separate groups for males and females. during the interviews, participants gave informed consent. the interviewees were informed that the purpose of the study was for academic use only. in order to show respect for the traditions and customs of the local communities and the stories that the informants told us, the researchers took care to record what was shared accurately. in the analysis section, we have further secured the participants’ privacy by withholding their names and using codes as identifiers. most importantly, we believe that acknowledging the authors of works cited and the views of research informants and fgd discussants is a critical component of research ethics. the researchers took notes and tape recorded during the interview and fgd sessions. after completing the fieldwork, the researchers transcribed the data and consulted with informants, who validated the transcript, in order to increase the trustworthiness of the data. in the end, the data were analysed 5 bitew et al.: indigenous governance institutions and democracy in ethiopia published by scholarship@western, 2021 through thematic analysis, which helped the researchers develop a model that could be locally contextualized and interpreted. according to braun and clarke (2006), thematic analysis is a method used for identifying, analysing, and reporting patterns (i.e., themes) within the data. thus, the data that were collected from interviewees, fgd participants, and documents were structured into themes to allow clear analysis of the results based on the established objectives. theoretical framework indigenous governance institutions and the concept of democracy there have been contentious scholarly debates over the nature and functions of indigenous governance institutions in africa. the debate revolves around the two main approaches towards indigenous institutions: those of modernists versus traditionalists. modernists view indigenous institutions as gerontocratic, chauvinistic, authoritarian, and increasingly irrelevant form of rule that is antithetical to democracy. simiyu (1987), a kenyan historian, claims that indigenous institutions in africa were nonegalitarian, which denied some citizens an opportunity to elevate themselves to the highest social and political ranks. gerontocracy is an important feature of african social organizations and decision-making processes, which has led some to conclude that indigenous systems are intrinsically non-egalitarian and undemocratic (dake, 1996). in general, modernists view indigenous governance institutions as relics of the past that may impede democratic development and must therefore be abandoned entirely. through abandoning indigenous institutions, modernists envisioned the replication of western democracy in africa. they argued that the west’s institutional form of liberal democracy is universally valid and that africa’s aspiration to a democratic system of rule should look the same (logan, 2008). liberal democracy is presented in this modernist model as the best political system because indigenous institutions are believed to restrict the individual rights of citizens and inhibit the development of democratic states (mamdani, 1996; ntsebeza, 2005). this argument developed as a result of europe’s global hegemony since the 14th century, which fortified the assumption that western development experiences were universal. but these derogative and one-sided arguments of modernists have been challenged by many african scholars who argue that democracy is not simply practised “correctly” by one culture or race but is used differently by various cultures (ayittey, 1999). grefe faremo (cited in teffo, 2002) supported ayittey’s argument: we must not forget that democracy must grow from local roots. … it cannot be imposed from outside. the people of each nation must take their fate into their hands and shape the form of government most suited for national aspiration. consequently, we must avoid imposing predefined model of democracy on african countries. (p. 2) labelled as traditionalists, this group regards africa’s indigenous chiefs as the true representatives of their people—accessible, respected, and legitimate. traditionalists note that although heredity often served as the basis for assigning leadership, many systems had means for unseating leaders who did not meet with the community’s approval (ayittey, 1991). the traditionalists’ perspective on indigenous institutions was best captured by keulder (1998): for them, the institution of traditional leaders and its procedures of governance is not only a simpler form of government, but also a more accessible … and a more participatory one. it is 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.10969 more accessible because it is closer to the subjects than any other system of government; subjects have more direct access to their leaders because they live in the same village and because any individual can approach the leader … decision making is [by] consensus, which create[s] greater harmony and unity; it is transparent and participatory because most people attend tribal meetings and express their views directly, not through representatives. (p. 11) in pre-colonial africa, strands of democratic participation could be found in decision-making processes, involvement in communal affairs, and functional representation of different sectors within the ruling council (chazan, 1994). according to wiredu (1995), african society practised a kind of democracy called consensual democracy, which ensures that the community is unified by the individuals that belong to it. in the tradition of consensual democracy, decisions were made through consensus rather than the liberal democracy principle of majority vote. the premise behind making decisions through consensus was to ensure that minority positions were heard and taken into account. modernists critique indigenous institutions by claiming that they are unaccountable because their leaders are undemocratic and not subject to electoral sanctioning (baldwin & holzinger, 2019). however, according to the same authors, indigenous governance institutions can be compatible with democracy and accountable to their citizens insofar as they adopt inclusive decision-making processes, and leaders have strong non-electoral connections to the community. the inherited chieftainship in indigenous systems may seem feudalistic, but the process of selecting leaders has democratic manifestations. indigenous leaders are selected by community members on the basis of knowledge about custom and tradition, protection, honesty, wisdom, generosity, and sense of justice. hlawnching (2006) described the selection process for indigenous leaders: the chief did not establish the village and rule the people who lived there—the village was established first and the villagers selected someone who had certain characteristics to be a leader … generally, the villagers selected someone with extensive knowledge of custom, wisdom, as well as prowess and organizational ability. the selection of the chief was conducted through a community meeting of all mature village members. (p. 4) thus, it is fair to argue that governance in pre-colonial africa started and ended with the people (bell, 2002). based on this fact, williams (1987) commented that the concept of the people’s sovereignty was as natural as breathing in africa. the very defining characteristic of indigenous governance institutions, therefore, is its people centredness. in indigenous governance systems in africa, the people are the first and final sources of power (williams, 1987) and are the building blocks of government (ayittey, 1991), decisions are made through consensus (wiredu, 1995), and the political system is decentralized. thus, the african pre-colonial past can serve as a guide to its re-democratization (barber & watson, 2001) and can support democratic consolidation efforts. a homegrown constitution, which stems out of the values of the society, is important in settling contemporary predicaments of the continent. according to tiky (2014), this new constitution would eliminate the current western approach to democratic promotion, which focuses exclusively on elites and a few urban activists. rather than searching for indigenous solutions to ethiopia’s political predicaments, many scholars and politicians advocate for support of liberal democracy, based on their admiration of its so-called success in the west. scholars have ignored the fact that ethiopia had well-developed indigenous governance 7 bitew et al.: indigenous governance institutions and democracy in ethiopia published by scholarship@western, 2021 systems prior to its contact with the west. as teshale (2008) succinctly put it: “ethiopia was ruled on the basis of rule of law. the powers that be were mandated to abide by the established law, written and/or customary” (p. 364). the sophisticated governance systems of the yegobez aleqa in amhara society, the gada system in oromo society, and similar systems used by other ethnic groups were used to manage the affairs of the ethiopian people. some aspects of such indigenous governance systems could guide us towards consolidating democracy and dignified political arrangements that would allow for the nation’s desired creativity, authenticity, workability, and progress in political domains. political systems that emerge from domestic realities will address the needs and fit the realities of the people. it is from this ground that haile sellassie (1968/2009), the majestic emperor of ethiopia (1930–1974), once said, “no modern legislations, which do not have roots in the customs of those whom it governs, can have strong foundations” (p. v). for ethiopia to come out from the vicious cycle of undemocratic systems, scholars need to “re-examine [i]ndigenous political systems, revitalize them, and make them pertinent to contemporary applications” (bahiru, 2002, p. 18). constrained by western political discourses, ethiopia at present lacks genuine democracy. the ethiopian people are divided along parochial ethnic lines. the introduction of western modernity eroded indigenous forms of communal life, without providing an alternative form of social cohesion. as a result, polarized political narratives and ethnic tensions dominate the news in ethiopia today. given the overall problems facing the country, there needs to be a deeper understanding and critical investigation of indigenous governance institutions and their relevance to nationwide political development. results the earliest account of yejoka qicha the gurage people are a part of different clans. the chief of each clan administered diverse sociopolitical and economic issues. the chief of each clan was called yegondar nigus, which is literally interpreted as “the king of the necklace.” the title was given to the leaders of the gurage clans, and each were bestowed necklaces, which served to distinguish them from the local people. the chief served as a clan leader, administrator, and judge. according to oral traditions of the gurage, clan chiefs were given the power to settle inter-clan and intra-clan disputes. thus, clan chiefs served to provide social harmony and a peaceful way of life among the gurage. after the inclusion of the gurage into the wider ethiopian state, through the unifying force of emperor menelik (1889–1913), who defeated italy at the battle of adwa in 1896, the title of the gurage clans chiefs was changed to azmach. azmach is an amharic title for the hereditary political leader of the gurage. today, the person with the title of azmach serves the gurage people as a clan leader and symbol of unity. in the tradition of gurage, the man elected as an azmach must show his courage by fighting against enemies, and he must be the eldest son of a family. the gurage oral tradition shows that personal qualities such as courage, kindness, honesty, and generosity were used to evaluate people, and public feasts and political actions were used as a formal means to select outstanding candidates for important titles, such as abegaz (the commander chosen for 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.10969 his military exploits) and azmach. men who achieve high status bring prestige to their lineage, clan, and people, and they were sometimes immortalized in poetry and songs. in the late 18th century, the gurage clans were in the midst of struggle—at the end of which they decided to establish a common political institution to preserve peace among them (markakis, 1998). mature male members of the community directly participated in the creation of an alliance of the gurage clans (assefa, 2009). the alliance between the western clans gave birth to the sebat bet gurage qicha subsequently named yejoka. the term yejoka is believed to have been derived from the zegba (podocarpus) tree that serves as the venue for assembly (bahiru, 2002). discussing the very beginning of yejoka qicha, one elder informant said: there was a time in the history of gurage that self-appointed leaders ruled the local community. such leaders appointed themselves using economic power and social prestige as a means to convince or dominate the people. they acquired social prestige through creating fear within society, claiming that they are brave and courageous and that they can bring suffering to those who didn’t accept their leadership position. in this time, there were no customary laws that could prevent arbitrary rule and due to this fact, there was a state of anarchism … leaders were heavily involved in the arbitrary killing of local people, the abduction of women and girls, stealing the property of innocents, and inter-clan conflicts. as the state of anarchism and arbitrary rule reached its highest point, a few members of the gurage raised the main concerns of the community in the main square by masking their body through a leaf called foreforemat. it is in this situation that the most respected elders of the gurage came together to discuss how to solve the predicaments that the community was experiencing. in the meeting, the idea of a pangurage alliance was initiated. the yejoka was formed by representatives of the five clans of the western gurage. representatives discussed several issues and enacted the qicha. seeing the positive outcomes from yejoka qicha, the remaining two clans of the western gurage joined and became part of this institution. and now, all the sebat bet clans of gurage are ruled by the system of yejoka qicha. (personal interview, june 21, 2020) yejoka qicha is a collection of laws enacted for the administration of inter-clan relations and settlement of disputes between the sub-clan and clan levels. the yejoka qicha assembly combines legislative and judiciary functions. representatives of the constituent units of the sebat bet gather together to agree on the fundamental rules governing the community. indigenous religion, as embodied in the deities of waq and damwamit, feature prominently in the traditions of both the promulgation and administration of yejoka (bahiru, 2002). periodic meetings were also held to revise laws, when deemed necessary. the yejoka laws are subject to continuous modifications, adaptations, and amendments in accordance with the changing nature of socioeconomic and political systems, new ways of life, and the burgeoning of new social developments. to consolidate these amendments, a group of gurage intellectuals, who lived in addis ababa, compiled the fragmented customary laws into a single document for the first time in 1998, and then revised them in 2008. included in the latest version of the document is information on issues related to hiv and aids prevention, new technologies, sociocultural changes like wedding and mourning ceremonies, and new types of crime. 9 bitew et al.: indigenous governance institutions and democracy in ethiopia published by scholarship@western, 2021 in today’s context, yejoka qicha operates side-by side-with the modern state agencies in administering the affairs of gurage members (assefa, 2009). in term of organizational form, a council of elders set up different administrative levels, including for the neighbourhood, village, clan, and tribe. its purpose is to set and enforce norms and rules ranging from simple socioeconomic relations between individuals to laws for the wider community. the institution is engaged in the settlement of disputes and management of conflicts in order to obtain justice and social order among communities. it also serves as the custodian of cultures, traditions, social values, and customs that cement the gurage people. social values as peacemaker the gurage have a reputation in ethiopia for being sociable, welcoming, and peace-loving people. this belief emanates from their social values, which are rooted in antiquity. social values help the gurage to have positive communication, cooperation, a peaceful way of life, and deep social solidarity. local associations, which are part and parcel of the gurage’s social values, are imperative in building and improving the social capital. geze, for instance, is a local associations of gurage men that is established temporarily so that members can perform agricultural tasks together. the gurage people are very reluctant to commit crimes because of their entrenched social values. one example of a social practise that yejoka leaders have used to foster a sense of justice in gurage society is the tradition of teya (swearing in the name of god). yejoka leaders employed teya to investigate crimes committed in a covert manner and in situations where there was no witness who could expose the culprit. in the tradition of teya, suspected individuals are asked to swear in the name of god and say, “i am innocent.” if they swear, they are innocent; otherwise, they will be seen as being guilty by yejoka leaders. as one informant eloquently said: before the ceremony of teya begins, every person suspected of committing a crime is gathered together and detained in a single house. and then, a group of experts from yejoka qicha force them to expose the culprit. they expose the real culprit because they fear the cantankerous outcomes of teya. the gurage used to say this proverb, “yeseb zer mere yejepun bewuri teya, yeche zer mere yejepun bewuri wesa [when one is asked how the human race was devastated, it is swearing in the name of god; when one is asked how the plant race was devastated, it was the axe],” to show the dangerous consequences of teya. thus, fear of the consequences of teya makes the gurage not falsely swear in the name of god that they are the culprit. in cases in which none of the suspects are found to be guilty, the plaintiff is brought in front of the yejoka leaders and ordered to pay remuneration. (personal interview, july 7, 2020) beriche, wherein morally deviant individuals are cursed by local elders, religious leaders, and community leaders, is cited as another indigenous social practise that prohibits them from committing crimes. the curse is believed to have negative effects across seven generations. the fear of the elders’ curse motivates the gurage to abstain from wrongdoing. in the tradition of gurage, local elders and religious leaders have a prominent role in settling disputes. due to this fact, it is the local elders and religious leaders who have the power to facilitate the ceremonies associated with beriche. since it is believed that beriche has a generational impact and its curse is believed to be dangerous, religious leaders try not to practice it. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.10969 the other social practise that facilitates a peaceful way of life among the gurage people is the concept of tihur, which means blissful, virtuous, and morally correct. in contrast to beriche, tihur is blessing by the most respected local elders, religious leaders, and community leaders. according to the oral tradition of the gurage, tihur prevents a person from doing evil acts by blessing those who commit a morally favourable action. the gurage elders say to a person who commits a morally favourable action, “tihur yegebabet bet yihun, tihur yewotabet bet ayihun [literally interpreted as “may tihur enter into your house, may not tihur run out of your house”]. gurda is another of the social practice that facilitates peaceful relationships and fosters justice within the yejoka system. gurda is a kind of personal promise between a man and woman that, when they face divisive issues, they will not betray each other. the role of gurda in maintaining social solidarity and fostering justice is best explained in the statement from an elder: when individuals agree to make gurda, their witness is the gurda itself rather than a person. the gurage believe that, while we make gurda, the sky and the earth observes what we are doing. in the tradition of gurage, the sky serves as god’s throne and the earth as the stool for god’s feet. when we make gurda, we say, “afer etonhe egzer dagnhe [the earth is a witness, god is the judge].” we believe that no one is hidden from the eye of god … if we violate the gurda, god will bring severe punishment upon us. as a result of gurda’s strong connection to god, it is a highly respected tradition among the people … calling the name gurda directly is forbidden. the gurage used to say, “yethebed gurda [glory to gurda],” when someone accidentally called it out loud. (personal interview, july 5, 2020) all the social practises that the gurage people have developed are part of the yejoka qicha system. in this system, preventive mechanisms to reduce social conflicts are employed. in addition to preventive mechanisms, the gurage people have a system called heterat, which is employed as a temporary resolution mechanism during times of war and in local conflicts. heterat is a kind of buffer zone between conflicting parties—local elders order the disputants not to cross the line until the case is settled peacefully. when the gurage elders say heterat, they mean begoita anq kum [stay there in the name of god]. heterat is important to prevent the escalation of conflicts and to give enough time for elders to see and analyse the different dimensions of the case before administering an agreement. the gurage believed that heterat is not only the desire of yejoka leaders but also the command of god. hence, the conflicting parties give respect to heterat because they fear the punishment from the heavenly power, as well as earthly sanctions. these social values show that the people prioritize communal interests rather than individual ones. communalism among the gurage holds that individuals, by nature, are an integral and inalienable part of the social structure and the social fabric. their communalism captures the aristotelian view that the individual’s participation in society cannot be optional. working for the fulfilment of the community is an essential attribute of human beings within the communal tradition of the gurage. the gurage will say of an individual whose conduct does not display compassion, generosity, respect, or concern for others is behaving in a way that is not conducive to the welfare of others. however, communalism does not discourage the individual from realizing their own aspirations and potentials. each individual is responsible for the pursuit of their own life path. the individual is recognized as having free will that enables them to initiate a free action in pursuit of goals and in fashioning their own destiny. 11 bitew et al.: indigenous governance institutions and democracy in ethiopia published by scholarship@western, 2021 most interviewees agreed that, in the contemporary period, indigenous institutions and social values have been significantly degraded, mainly due to the advent of the ideals of modernity and globalization. many participants argued that, unless reclaimed and revitalized, these values would be abandoned. gurage youths have to grapple with western culture and values, which many believe represents civilization and is believed to be a sign of modernization. some of the youth label local values as uncivilized and primitive, believing they should be replaced with western ideals and values. elder informants said that youths are not in a position to question the good values of their forefathers because they lack knowledge about them. youth accept western values without reflection in order to be considered modern and successful in business and education. as one local elder put it: currently, the youth are not in a position to follow the path of their forefathers because they have labelled our social values as backward and consider the elders to be conservative and resistant to change. they are swallowed up by the culture of the city, which is far from our forefathers’ customs and practices. you can see their clothing style, their way of speaking and their treatment of elders; nothing has to do with our culture. if the situation continues at this pace, i fear that our social values that cement us will disappear from the surface of the earth. (personal interview, july 7, 2020) the other factor threatening gurage communalism is the expansion of extreme individualism, which has disrupted the social values that have enabled the gurage people to live together for centuries. social marginalization many scholars have critiqued indigenous institutions for limiting the rights of citizens, augmenting biases against historically marginalized groups, and undermining the rule of law (baldwin & holzinger, 2019). they have documented the “weak” rights afforded to marginalized groups, especially women, under indigenous systems. bahiru (2002) found the tendency to marginalize women and other social groups to be pervasive in the governance systems of the gurage, despite cultural values requiring that women be respected. the yejoka qicha can be used to construct and sustain male dominance in many social endeavours, especially in marriage, in ways that oppress women. traditionally, the family chooses a husband for a gurage woman. participants said that this tradition has recently changed to allow women some choice in who they marry. however, the acceptance and blessing of her family is still mandatory. since the extended family takes part in the formation of the marriage, they are also seen as having decision-making power when it comes to marital conflicts. in the tradition of gurage, divorce is rarely regarded as a solution; the elders place more emphasis on creating harmony between married couples. if a woman seeks a divorce, it is only granted if the elders, her husband, and the extended families reach an agreement. this limited right to divorce is perpetuated through belief in a curse called anqit. anqit is believed to be a binding agreement between a bride and a bridegroom before marriage. once the anqit is signed, women cannot break the relationship agreement or divorce without the consent of their husbands. no matter how badly women are treated by their husbands, the tradition of anqit can be used to undermine women’s capacity to seek a divorce. oral tradition says that women who defy this custom are very likely 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.10969 to experience “supernatural punishment,” such as the inability to bear a child, giving birth to a disabled child, or accidental death through being struck by lightning (tigist, 2009). the system of governance under yejoka qicha also reflects the patriarchal nature of gurage society. women were marginalized in the decision-making process. they had no power to put forward ideas and no right to be part of decision-making. women were not represented in the assembly of yejoka qicha and were rarely allowed to present their cases by themselves. in addition, they were not allowed to own property, including land and other means of production. in gurage society, the social roles of women were largely confined to composing poems describing the nature of social communities, praising the brave, and chiding the cowards (bahiru, 2002). it is these restrictions that gave rise to one of the most remarkable gurage women, activist yeqaqe wardewat. this famous woman, who we call a gurage feminist, rose against the tradition of yejoka qicha and challenged the existing social system. her defiant struggle against the male-dominated norms of her society has been celebrated in poems and anecdotes. tradition says that she led a delegation of women to one of the yejoka assemblies and demanded, at the very least, that women should be free to attend meetings and that they should have the right to divorce their husbands. her eloquent oration has been recorded in the following manner in gebreyesus (1991): we women, your sisters, your mothers and your obedient servants for all time, appear before you today to ask for our rights if we, at all, have any! we women are treated as if we are created only for the pleasure of men. you never make us participate in things you are doing or planning. we have no security. if you like us, we are lucky, we live with you, and when you dislike us, we are chased out empty-handed. therefore, we came here to yejoka today to beg for some rights even if it is not the same rights as for men. it is not to beat our husbands as you do your wives or to scold them. we shall remain obedient to our husbands, continue to wash their feet and cook food for them. we are not asking you either to test us in the battlefield at the initial stage. this can come eventually. all we are asking you is to give us some minimum rights, like to be free to come to yejoka and share our views with you concerning all the problems pertaining to “your country” or if we will be allowed to say so, “our country.” second, when we feel repressed, to leave our husbands and go without being tied up by the rigid procedures of divorce, which remain based upon rigid customary laws and traditional beliefs, the anq’it. when you divorce us, you just say go because you are not tied up by anq’it. let us have the same right, although we cannot tell you go from your establishments. but for us to be able to say, “i am going and goodbye.” (p. 158) bahiru (2002) continued the story: the male community—so the tradition continues—was momentarily flabbergasted by this challenge. but, in the end they were able to isolate wardwat by intimidating her companions. to mollify her, they gave her the right to choose her husband and divorce him whenever she so wished and the option of attending yejoka meetings. the tragic finale of her remarkable story, wherein she is struck dead by a thunderbolt, must have served as a severe warning to all gurage women to stick to their assigned place. (p. 24) 13 bitew et al.: indigenous governance institutions and democracy in ethiopia published by scholarship@western, 2021 despite these social sanctions, the gurage social system provided respect to women in their home-based activities. they celebrate a special day labelled as anthroshit each year. anthroshit is the day for giving thanks to mothers. oral tradition suggests that this day began to be celebrated before the battle of adwa, which ended italy’s ambition to colonize ethiopia. the day is celebrated in january, a month in which gurage mothers completed the production of enset, a staple food. after several months of a heavy workload, on this day, gurage mothers take a rest, wash their bodies, wear new clothes, and enjoy time with their family. under the tradition of yejoka qicha, it was not only women who were excluded from the decisionmaking process. the amarican are one of the gurage clans who are considered to be inferior because of their professions. their name is derived from unites states of america because their knowledge of poetry, weaving, architecture, and crafting were equated with american civilization. far from earning them respect, these skills contributed to their marginalization (bahiru, 2002) and exclusion from decision-making power within yejoka. even though these professions are indispensable to the living conditions of the gurage people, they were not allowed to marry people from other clans. key informants said that there has in recent times been a change in attitude among the gurage people: local relations have changed from being closed to being more open to the amarican. they are often called “fuga,” a derogatory name that implies they are slaves or migrants in the language of the local community. thus, by calling them amarican, the local community shows its respect and appreciates the indispensable role of their professions to the survival of the gurage. democracy and yejoka qicha system since the incursion of western democracy in africa, existing literatures on the nature of indigenous institutions have been dominated by the ideals of liberal democracy. as a result, the dominant existing frameworks for understanding indigenous institutions emphasized fundamental incompatibilities between indigenous institutions and liberal democracy. modernists disregard indigenous governance systems and structures as atavistic and pedantic and, as such, not only contrary to democracy but its antithesis and nemesis (vincent & chikerma, 2014). to that end, they recommend abandoning indigenous governance institutions and replacing them with “advanced” liberal democracy. in contrast, traditionalists claim that indigenous chiefs and elders are the true representatives of their people and therefore still essential to political development. these institutions are associated with the customs and traditions of the local people; they are accurate reflections of historic governance systems. indigenous institutions do incorporate democratic procedures, participatory decision-making processes, and soft accountability backed up by social pressure (baldwin & holzinger, 2019). as such, the inclusivity of decision-making practices and the non-electoral connection of leaders to their constituents must be reflected to form an accurate representation of the influence of indigenous institutions in democratic systems. under indigenous governance systems, decisions are made in accordance with the values and norms of society. decision-making processes are inclusive in the sense that local people directly participate in the surrounding discussions. the goal of these discussions is not simply to reach a majority decision, as is the case in a liberal democracy, but to reach a consensus—a decision that reflects the views of all participants. as gyekye (1997) pointed out, the pursuit of this kind of agreement requires “patience, 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.10969 mutual tolerance, and attitude of compromise” (p. 136). wiredu (1995) argued that indigenous ideas about consensus and political organization provide the base for developing what he calls consensual democracy. these democracies include local decision-making bodies, national advisory councils, and deliberate processes geared towards achieving consensus rather than simple majority. yejoka qicha, therefore, consists of important features of democracy. historically, the gurage people gathered in a specific place, such as around big trees, to discuss issues. customary laws were enacted and modified in meetings that directly involved the local people. inter-clan and intratribal conflicts were also resolved through meetings of all mature members of the local community. in settling conflicts, disputants have the unconditional right to present their case to yejoka elders. every participant in the conflict resolution process has the right to raise concerns that may mediate the dispute. finally, the elders make a decision after analysing the case presented by the conflicting parties. the decision is not made arbitrarily; rather, it is based on agreed upon cultural values. the decisions made by yejoka leaders are held in high regard by the local community because the gurage people have immense respect for their elders. the gurage person refers to older men and women using the title baliqe—a word for elder. according to tigist (2009), the name itself suggests that the individual has earned respect from their community. in the tradition of gurage, baliqes are chosen to be mediators of social problems because they are wise, eloquent, calm, and have knowledge of customary laws. the court system in the yejoka tradition is hierarchical. social problems, such as personal and family issues, are resolved by local leaders through sera—local law below the yejoka qicha. complex problems such as inter-clan conflicts and community problems were settled through the yejoka qicha. the decisions of local elders could be appealed to the yejoka leaders. if someone is dissatisfied by the verdict of the local elders, they have the right to appeal and transfer the case to yejoka court for the application of qicha. moreover, every clan has the power and authority to deal with its own social problems through their leaders. it is only when the case is too difficult to solve that it comes to the attention of yejoka. the verdict given by the yejoka leaders is final and binding. every gurage person is obliged to respect the leaders’ decisions because the failure to do so could lead to social ostracization. the goal of democracy is to create peace and stability, meet the needs of the populace, and maintain social solidarity. to reach these goals, it is essential that citizens participate in setting policy priorities, electing their leaders, and having the ability to remove them from power. the people should have control over the government they have elected, which is only possible when the system is sociopolitically and psychologically connected to the people. this implies that governments should be established based on local traditions rather than imported from abroad. as secretary-general boutrosghali (1995) stated in his report to the un general assembly: “democracy is not a model to be copied from certain states, but a goal to be attained by all peoples and assimilated by all cultures. it may take many forms, depending upon the characteristics and circumstances of society” (p. 2). moreover, as prah (2007) succinctly put, “democracy has the best chance of institutionalized success when it is homegrown and enjoys the active participation in its development by the society as a whole” (p. 5). institutions that are established on the basis of societal traditions are more accessible, better understood, and more participatory. they are accessible because they exist in closer proximity to the people than any 15 bitew et al.: indigenous governance institutions and democracy in ethiopia published by scholarship@western, 2021 other form of government. the yejoka system, for example, is transparent and participatory because many people attend the meetings and express their views directly. within the yejoka system, leaders are elected by the local people. moreover, each of the sebat bet gurage clans have representatives within the yejoka. thus, yejoka leaders are more effective in providing solutions to problems impacting the gurage because they know the social fabric of each clan. the role of yejoka leaders includes maintaining peace and stability, inspiring and motivating the people towards development, advocating for cooperation, and supporting the national government in implementing national policies. yejoka leaders are successful in achieving their goals because their words are respected, their praise is appreciated, and their examples are emulated by the people. nevertheless, yejoka qicha has been criticized for its systematic marginalization of women, as well as some clans, that prevents them from participating in the decision-making process. many scholars argue that yejoka qicha governance institutions are dominated by men who are often reluctant to support changes that would allow equitable participation by women (bahiru, 2002). modernists have presented indigenous leadership systems as a major setback to democracy because they believe the systems privilege customary patriarchal values by silencing many members of the society (vincent & chikerema, 2014). in contrast, traditionalists claim that in the indigenous governance systems of many african societies “women are much revered due to their supposed knowledge acquired through lived experience” (boahene, 2017, p. 10). in pre-colonial african societies, as byanyima (1992) succinctly stated, “there was no distinction between the public and the private spheres … women could play indirect roles in the extended family, via husband, brothers, sons and clans peoples” (p. 136). however, it is undeniable fact that although women played many key social roles in pre-colonial africa, the patriarchal system rarely allowed them to participate in decision-making on public issues. the yejoka qicha system has historically been patriarchal—men had unrestricted power in public and private spheres. women had no role in this system besides giving birth and raising children. they were forced to marry and were not allowed to own property or obtain a divorce without their husband’s consent. in the yejoka system, they had no right to attend meetings and had no power to initiate ideas. in addition to women, social groups like the amarican were underrepresented in the tradition of yejoka. the amarican were marginalized from the socioeconomic and political affairs of the gurage. although they were not represented historically in governance roles, there are currently some women and amaricans represented in the yejoka system. more recently, women have also been allowed to attend yejoka meetings and present their cases to the court of yejoka. therefore, the patriarchal nature of the yejoka system has been diminished in gurage land, and the derogatory labelling of the amarican as slaves and migrants has also changed. conclusion our findings indicate that yejoka qicha incorporates elements of democracy. within this governance system, leaders are selected through the direct participation of all mature male members of the community. the selection of leaders is guided by well-specified criteria, including a sense of justice, generosity; specialized knowledge of custom, tradition, and customary laws; protection; honesty; and ability to help reach a compromise on divergent interests. after being selected by the people, leaders were expected to act as administrator, judge, and representative of the people in every aspect of gurage 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.10969 life. their words, decisions, and orders are respected by the community because they are believed to be the true representatives of their people. furthermore, leaders’ decisions are usually accepted and respected because the leaders use social values in administration. social values have been employed to settle wars, reconcile controversial issues, and solve family issues. the traditions of teya, beriche, tihur, gurida, and heterat are the most frequently used social practices in the administration and conflict resolution systems of yejoka qicha. these social practices are used to govern social relations in the local community; settle inter-clan, intra-clan, and personal conflicts; and are used by yejoka qicha leaders to reconcile divergent interests. with the exception of heterat and teya, which are curative mechanisms, the rest of these social practices are used by the local community and yejoka leaders to prevent conflicts. within the tradition of yejoka qicha, administration has been hierarchical. this structure allows for the decentralization of decision-making and division of power in administering sociopolitical activities. the gurage sera were employed by local elders to govern communal affairs including personal and family issues. complex social affairs such as inter-clan and intra-clan conflicts were administered and settled by the leader of yejoka qicha, who referred to the principles of qicha in decision-making. in addition, the decisions of local elders were subject to appeal to the yejoka leaders if one of the parties was not satisfied with the verdict. the verdicts of yejoka leaders were final and binding. they were expected to be accepted and respected by all members of the community. the failure to accept and respect leaders’ decisions led to one of the most severe punishments within the gurage society—social ostracization. although the system of yejoka qicha is praised for its democratic elements, it is criticized for the exclusion of women and members of the amarican clan from participation in decision-making processes. gurage society is patriarchal, and, as such, it prevents men and women from engaging equally in public and private matters. women are not allowed to own property, and they are forced to marry without their consent. the amarican clan was also excluded from participation in yejoka meetings and were prohibited from social relations with other clans of the gurage because of their professions. most recently, however, the system of yejoka qicha has allowed these formerly marginalized groups to participate in meetings and bring forward ideas that contribute to solving social problems. given that yejoka qicha possessed important features of democracy and its leaders are believed to be the true representatives of the local people, the national government needs to implement initiatives to recognize and encourage its role in economic and political development efforts of the country. local elders and yejoka leaders are valuable assets in informing the central government about the interests of local communities as well as in mobilizing the people for active engagement in development activities. this is partly because they share interests with and think like their people, making them better equipped to know how to mobilize local people towards these common interests. thus, the government should increase its partnerships with yejoka leaders to promote cooperative state–society relations. this would promote democracy and development, which is aspired to in this country. the relationship between the state government and indigenous governance institutions can be improved through the adoption of appropriate policy frameworks. the government needs to enact a policy framework that recognizes the role of indigenous institutions in the political development of the country. indeed, the constitution of the country, under article 34(5), recognized the role of these 17 bitew et al.: indigenous governance institutions and democracy in ethiopia published by scholarship@western, 2021 institutions in adjudication of disputes relating to private and family matters (constitution of the federal democratic republic of ethiopia, 1995). however, as empirical findings show, the tradition of yejoka qicha settles social problems beyond private and family matters. thus, clear and detailed policy frameworks are needed to recognize indigenous institutions’ roles in governing matters related to ethnicity and religion. moreover, these policy frameworks should be supported by empirical investigations by scholars. through empirical investigations, researchers can identify the attributes of indigenous governance institutions that can be used to promote democratic governance, as well as those aspects that are oppressive and need to be modified. thus, the government should encourage research on indigenous governance institutions in order to devise policy frameworks. references assefa, g. 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(2000). introduction: african traditional conflict “medicine.” in w. zartman (ed.), traditional cures for modern conflicts (pp. 1–14). lynne reiner publishers. ms+10969+cover+page.pdf ms+10969+bitew+indigenous+governance+systems+rce.pdf aboriginal perspectives on social-emotional competence in early childhood the international indigenous policy journal volume 4 issue 4 educational pathways of indigenous learners article 2 october 2013 aboriginal perspectives on social-emotional competence in early childhood melissa tremblay university of alberta, mkd@ualberta.ca rebecca gokiert university of alberta rebecca georgis university of alberta karen edwards university of alberta berna skrypnek recommended citation tremblay, m. , gokiert, r. , georgis, r. , edwards, k. , skrypnek, b. (2013). aboriginal perspectives on social-emotional competence in early childhood. the international indigenous policy journal, 4(4) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.2 aboriginal perspectives on social-emotional competence in early childhood abstract gaining an understanding of how best to support the development of aboriginal children is important in promoting positive social, emotional, educational, and health outcomes. the purpose of the current study was to identify the most important elements of healthy development for aboriginal children, with a particular focus on social-emotional development. focus groups were conducted with 37 aboriginal canadians, including parents, service providers, adolescents, and young adults. five inter-connected themes emerged: cultural wellness, emotional wellness, mental wellness, social wellness, and strong identity, with strong identity described as central and foundational to the other themes. this study strengthens the assertion that aboriginal children require an additional set of social-emotional skills to successfully navigate different cultural contexts during development. implications for research and practice are discussed. keywords early childhood, social-emotional development, indigenous, aboriginal creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ a b o ri g i n a l pe rs p e c t i v e s o n s o c i a l e m o t i o n a l c o m p e t e n c e i n e a rl y c h i l d h o o d recently, the social-emotional competence of young children has gained increasing attention from researchers and educators. social-emotional competencies have been defined to include behavioural and emotional regulation, understanding emotions, showing self and social awareness, social problem solving, as well as relationship skills (denham, 2005; mccabe & altamura, 2011). the development of social-emotional competencies during early childhood can significantly impact outcomes in the areas of learning and academic success, mental health, and general wellbeing (peth-pierce, 2000; rhoades, warren, domitrovich, & greenberg, 2011; shonkoff & phillips, 2000; zins, bloodworth, weissberg, & walberg, 2004). for aboriginal children in canada, who include first nations, métis, and inuit children under the constitutional definition (indian and northern affairs canada, 2002), socio-cultural adversities related to colonization and loss of language and culture have contributed to long-lasting struggles with social and emotional wellbeing and with positive identity development (chandler & lalonde, 2008; king, smith, & gracey, 2009). aboriginal children represent the fastest growing segment of canada’s population (statistics canada, 2008); yet, are among the lowest ranking groups in the country in terms of health status, as well as social, educational, and economic wellbeing (national association of friendship centres, 2009). further, due to colonization, aboriginal children develop within multiple contexts in canada (i.e., urban, rural, on-reserve, traditional or non-traditional) that may, at times, be incongruent with one another. as a result, aboriginal children and youth may receive and have difficulty reconciling contradictory information about who they are, how they fit into their heritage culture and the dominant culture, as well as the meanings associated with being a visible minority (corenblum, 1996; toombs, 2011; wang, 2010). despite these acknowledged struggles, little is known about the social-emotional development of aboriginal children (sarche, croy, big crow, mitchell, & spicer, 2009). as such, gaining an understanding of how best to support the development of aboriginal children is important in preventing social, emotional, educational, and health problems in later life (rabaa, 2010). research has demonstrated that early intervention with respect to social-emotional issues is paramount for ensuring optimal developmental trajectories (baggett et al., 2010; mccabe & altamura, 2011). in order to engage and effectively serve aboriginal children and families through early childhood interventions and programming (e.g., head start), programs must have a foundation in aboriginal ways of knowing and being (hare, 2011; taylor, 2011). however, of the 0to 6-year-old aboriginal children who attend early childhood programming in canada, less than 20 percent attend programs that promoted first nations, métis, and/or inuit cultures (statistics canada, 2008). in recognition of this deficit, culturally appropriate early childhood programs are beginning to emerge. however, systematic evaluations of these programs are lacking, in part because tools that measure culturally relevant aspects of development for aboriginal children are similarly lacking (ball, 2009). the lack of culturally sensitive tools can have multiple consequences for aboriginal children. interpretations generated from culturally insensitive tools can result in children being incorrectly identified as experiencing difficulties and can result in inappropriate placements in special education programs (de plevitz, 2006; gould, 2008). alternatively, there may be specific social and emotional competencies that aboriginal children require that are not reflected in commonly used screening and assessment tools. the use of tools that fail to measure such potentially important aspects of 1 tremblay et al.: aboriginal perspectives on social-emotional competence published by scholarship@western, 2013 development can result in under-identifying aboriginal children who may require additional supports in these critical areas. clearly, the long-term health and development of today’s aboriginal children hinges on a better understanding of developmental processes, coping responses, and the competencies required to effectively straddle two or more cultural contexts, as well as how these competencies can be measured and supported in early learning settings (padilla, 2006). it is also evident that the perspectives of aboriginal peoples must be central in the identification of these essential elements of development (d’aprano, carapetis, & andrews, 2010). as such, the purpose of the current study was to identify the most important elements of healthy development for aboriginal children from the perspectives of aboriginal peoples, with a particular focus on social-emotional development. m e t h o d s this qualitative community-based participatory research (cbpr) (israel, schulz, parker, & becker, 1998) study was conducted as a partnership between university researchers and an aboriginal-serving community-based agency. a cbpr approach to research attends to the relationships between partners and aims to benefit the partners involved (minkler & wallerstein, 2003). this study was reviewed and approved by the human research ethics board at the university of alberta. pa rt i c i p a n t s the partners engaged in purposeful sampling of focus group participants in order to recruit those who could provide the richest information about the competencies most important for aboriginal children (abrams, 2010). the focus group participants were 37 aboriginal canadians and consisted of parents (1 male and 10 females), service providers including 1 elder (11 females), adolescents (5 males and 6 females), and young adults attending university (4 females). service providers were involved in a number of agency programs and services, including: (a) school outreach;(b) sharing circles and cultural family nights; (c) programs that support pregnant women and parenting families; and (d) an aboriginal head start program. parent participants were from families with young children who had received or were currently receiving programs or services offered by the partner agency. adolescent participants recruited by the partner agency were taking part in a skill development program intended to address the issue of high school attrition in aboriginal youth aged 16 to 25. university student participants were studying education, psychology, and political science at the undergraduate level. a graduate student working on the study utilized snowball sampling to recruit university student participants. consistent with a qualitative research framework, the sample size was not pre-determined (lincoln & guba, 1985); rather, the point at which saturation in the data was reached dictated the size of the sample. saturation occurs when no new information is surfacing in the data collection process and when collecting more data would, as a result, not be helpful in understanding the data (mayan, 2009). f o c u s g ro u p s for parent participants, a focus group was held at the partner agency and facilitated by agency staff members who were working directly with the researchers. for service providers, a separate focus group was held at the partner agency and facilitated by the researchers. for adolescent focus group participants, researchers facilitated focus groups at the partner agency on three separate days with the same 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.2 participants. university students participated in a focus group facilitated by the researchers on the university campus. for those focus groups that took place through the partner agency, audio recording was not possible due to an agency policy prohibiting voice recording. in the instances where audio recording was not possible, three researchers participated in detailed note taking and/or focus group facilitation. because the focus group with university students took place independent of the partner agency, this discussion was audio taped with participants’ permission and transcribed verbatim. using a basic interpretive inquiry method to “simply seek to discover and understand a phenomenon, a process, or the perspectives and worldviews of the people involved” (merriam, 1998, p. 11), participants were asked semi-structured questions about the most important skills, strategies, and resources necessary for healthy development in the early years and more specifically in the area of social-emotional development. following a qualitative approach to simultaneous data collection and analysis (suter, 2006), subsequent focus group questions were modified to reflect the findings of previous focus groups. d a t a a n a l y s i s consistent with a qualitative inquiry approach, data were analyzed and collected concurrently (morse, 1999). a series of systematic steps were carried out to analyze the focus group data using content analysis (morse & field, 1995). initially, three researchers independently read through focus group transcripts and notes and engaged in the process of memoing (mayan, 2009). next, the researchers came together to code the data by identifying recurring phrases and concepts in the transcripts, and to subsequently group them into categories (mayan, 2009). finally, after a coding scheme was developed based on a thorough analysis of one of the focus groups, the other focus group data were analyzed using this scheme. representatives of the partner agency, who had in-depth understandings of aboriginal worldviews, reviewed the themes that emerged in order to ensure cultural appropriateness. f i n d i n g s five broad, inter-connected themes emerged from the data, as depicted in figure 1: cultural wellness, emotional wellness, mental wellness, social wellness, and strong identity. strong identity was foundational to the other themes and will be discussed first. each theme is described in detail using participants’ voices to maintain the integrity of the data. s t ro n g i d e n t i t y for focus group participants, social-emotional health corresponded to having a strong identity, which in turn contributed to overall health and wellbeing. according to participants, having a strong identity meant: knowing who you are; being confident, proud, and accepting of who you are; having self-respect; loving yourself; and having a sense of authenticity. participants also suggested that having a strong identity provided a sense of grounding and belonging. further, a reciprocal relationship emerged between the theme of strong identity and each of the other themes. in particular, having a strong identity clearly facilitated social, emotional, mental, and cultural wellness, while alternatively health and wellness in these four areas facilitated the development of a strong identity. participants described the facilitating factors and challenges in developing a strong identity. 3 tremblay et al.: aboriginal perspectives on social-emotional competence published by scholarship@western, 2013   f i g u re 1 . v i s u a l d e p i c t i o n o f t h e m e s . part of having a strong identity simply involved knowing who you are. according to one participant: success is almost the same as that self-actualizing, when you get to the top of maslow’s pyramid. once you’re there, it doesn’t matter how much money you have or regardless of you’ve been to school or not, as long as…you have that sense of identity and who you are… having a strong identity also meant having pride and confidence in oneself as an aboriginal person. parent participants extensively discussed how younger generations needed to “get their pride back” and needed to “be taught how to be proud of their cultural heritage.” in this sense, a strong identity was described as: a fundamental confidence, sense of belonging to your identity…i think it’s confidence…in who you are as a person and knowing certain things about yourself. i’m not gonna not be who i am, i’m confident in who i am. another participant stated that [a]dopting my aboriginal culture makes me feel good about who i am ... i think we find a connection in ourselves when we belong to our heritage. having a strong identity also meant finding an inner contentment and respect for oneself: [f]or me, success isn’t what society says. it’s an inner thing. being happy with who you are, contentment. s t ro n g i d e n t i t y c u l t u ra l w e l l n e s s s o c i a l w e l l n e s s e m o t i o n a l w e l l n e s s m e n t a l w e l l n e s s 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.2 challenges to the development of identity included experiences that contributed to cultivating shame and self-hatred. participants described the impact on aboriginal children and families of historical experiences with residential school and continued experiences with colonization: when you have families that have had residential school experiences, you’ve taken away the ability to teach their children and how to parent. all those things essential to being a parent were taken away and that took away who they are and being able to have an identity… so a lot is missing there and a lot of kids struggle with how to identify. participants described the significant challenges faced in developing a strong identity in the context of a mainstream culture that is often racist toward aboriginal peoples: no matter how much you try to assimilate to white culture, you know you don’t quite fit in. because racism exists. as a child you know you’re not accepted and it affects you socially, emotionally, in your development. as another participant described: growing up, it was kind of hard to…accept that you were … aboriginal … ‘cause people have stereotypes attached to being aboriginal, or you’d be like, “i’m aboriginal,” and they’d be like, “oh, well, you’re not that type of aboriginal person,” so…i didn’t fully accept it until grade 11 or 12, so it took a long time. participants also described familial experiences with internalized racism, wherein parents relayed to their children that it was necessary to reject their aboriginal heritage in order to be successful. as one participant stated: i was brought up non-aboriginal. my mom grew up in a residential school and she didn’t want us to be aboriginal. she said, if you wanna go far in life, you have to be caucasian. but i didn’t look like a caucasian person. another participant described the negative implications associated with her struggle to develop an identity as an aboriginal person: when i was going through identity and living in mainstream society, and also trying to follow the native culture, i had a lot of conflict with, i didn’t wanna be native and, and i wanted to party and get drunk and do drugs. in order to achieve a strong identity, aboriginal children had to overcome these barriers. in sum, this became increasingly possible when cultural, emotional, social, and mental wellnesses were attained. alternatively, wellness in these four areas, discussed below, strongly facilitated a strong identity. c u l t u ra l w e l l n e s s cultural wellness was described as particularly important in the development of a strong identity. again in relation to residential schools, one participant stated that 5 tremblay et al.: aboriginal perspectives on social-emotional competence published by scholarship@western, 2013 [m]any children were taken away from their heritage and weren’t with their families, so it’s important to encourage that in kids because you feel stronger once you connect to your culture. of particular significance to the development of cultural wellness was the need for children to develop knowledge of aboriginal history. participants pointed out that many aboriginal people lack information important to understanding their histories. as one participant stated, [t]he first thing that pops out about being proud of your heritage is assuming everyone really understands their heritage…many aboriginal people don’t understand their history. according to another participant, it’s great to feel proud, but in order to be proud, you first have to understand your heritage. many participants emphasized that aboriginal history should be embedded in the mainstream school curriculum. they expressed frustration with not having the opportunity to learn about aboriginal history because [t]hey teach us about nazi germany and…the holocaust, but they won’t teach us about…the 60’s scoop and the residential schools. a participant voiced further frustrations about her schooling experience: these are just facts that could be in the textbooks…i feel like in the social studies textbooks…they’re just not giving you the complete truth… participants also emphasized the importance of broader society having knowledge of aboriginal history. according to participants, all canadians should be educated as to the history of aboriginal peoples in order to promote understanding, empathy, and respect between aboriginal and non-aboriginal people: i think when non-aboriginal children will learn that in the schools, they’ll go home and ask their non-aboriginal parents, and…maybe they’ll teach their parents and so it’s a whole community that starts learning…the whole city…will start learning and having more empathy. another strong element of cultural wellness was knowledge of aboriginal language. participants reported that if children know their aboriginal language, their connections to family, culture, and their identity can be strengthened: it’s the communication part. just being able to have that at home, something on my own, and i know that it made our family stronger. mainly, most of the time when we did speak it was during the ceremonies and during the society gatherings and during ceremonies. that’s when we spoke it for real. alternatively, some participants spoke about feelings associated with not knowing their aboriginal language and how this could interfere with a sense of connection to culture: 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.2 it’s a sense of loss and you feel kind of sad because you don’t know your own language. and i attend a lot of ceremonies, and everyone speaks in the cultural language…you still feel like you’re not fully understanding everything you need to be, and not fully experiencing it ... engaging in cultural practices was another important element of cultural wellness. participants shared that when children had the opportunity to become familiar with their own culture as they grew up, they developed a set of skills that allowed for a culturally and spiritually rich life, and they began to understand what constituted culturally appropriate behaviour. one participant stated that [t]here’s certain places, you know, the ceremonies you go to and there’s a certain way to act. finally, participants described the importance of spirituality and belief systems in building cultural wellness. participants emphasized educating children about the creator and the story of creation as it existed in their own communities, as well as educating children to respect differences in spiritual beliefs. learning about and experiencing spirituality was also important for facilitating connections to culture and community, and was described as a potential resource for aboriginal children and families: i think my outlet, too, was my spirituality, the fact that i knew that even though i’m living this life here, you know, off the reserve and then when i come home there’s always good things about coming home too…there was that balance at home… according to participants, when children knew and understood their aboriginal history and language, had opportunities to engage in cultural practices, and had connections to spirituality and belief systems, it allowed them to achieve cultural wellness, which in turn contributed to overall social-emotional wellness. s o c i a l w e l l n e s s participants discussed the importance of children being connected to family, culture, and community. in order to experience a sense of social connectedness, participants described how children must be socially involved with other individuals and groups. as one participant stated, i think first being committed to your own family is important to feel connected once you grow up. my nephew isn’t connected to his family…and he’s learned helplessness and giving up. alternatively, having social connections assisted with identity struggles and confusion. according to one service provider, [i]n high school, you’re lost and you don’t know…what culture are you? so it’s good to have youth drop-ins so they can stay connected. for one participant, social connectedness was the basis for defining overall success: [f]or me, success is being able to raise your kids or teach your family to grow up in society to feel some sort of connection. 7 tremblay et al.: aboriginal perspectives on social-emotional competence published by scholarship@western, 2013 related to social connectedness was the element of social support. family members were particularly important in helping children deal with challenges and generally acting as a support system: i have to give credit to my parents and my grandparents just because they were so supportive and any time i’d go home, i’d have issues…i had an older sister too and she was two grades ahead of me, so she…really helped me as well. the children that i’ve seen and i’ve worked with…they don’t have the parents that are there to support them or the family. or they’ve all been split in different directions…they create their own family…and it’s really sad ‘cause you see a lot of those children from the child welfare system create that support within the gang system now…but that’s all they need is support. families also provided support by encouraging children toward pursuits outside of their own communities. for participants who lived in communities that struggled with high rates of crime, violence, and substance abuse, this encouragement was initially unwelcome, but later greatly appreciated: my grandparents and my parents forced me…at times i wanted to go to school on the reserve and say you know what, my friends are on the reserve, can i just go, i’m tired of riding the bus… and…they said you have to learn how to be there….‘cause we don’t wanna see you live in this community…my mom didn’t want me to become one of the teen pregnancy statistics…and so i think that’s what really helped was the fact that i was forced to do it. peers were also an important source of social support. for some participants, it was especially valuable to have aboriginal friends with whom they could share their experiences related to identity development. as one youth stated, i think it was the peer support…just being able to empower each other and support. another youth shared that [m]y best friend…he’s métis also, and we went to the same high school together so we got involved and…started actually accepting the fact that we were aboriginal…so that kind of…let me fully accept it. role models such as teachers, youth leaders, and older family members also provided support, as one participant described: [t]here are positive role models and it is okay to accept who you are and do your culture…and it’s supposed to be a fun thing. people who acted as role models demonstrated a positive acceptance of aboriginal culture and an ability to balance mainstream and aboriginal contexts: i seen her and how she…played basketball and she was on the honour roll, like she was living both lives too but she was successful in both kind of cultures… 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.2 finally, participants discussed the importance of children being respectful to others. many participants had experienced a lack of respect from others and saw the value in teaching children to respect differences: a lot of it is respect. and that’s what’s missing in our culture…then anger comes out in the wrong way…when you teach your kids to be prejudiced, they carry that with them and it’s wrong…a lot of where our culture gets lost is where we don’t respect each other. insofar as children were respectful of others, received support from family members, peers, and role models, and were connected to their families, communities, and culture, they were able to successfully function in different social contexts and learn how to develop a strong identity, self-confidence, and pride. e m o t i o n a l w e l l n e s s participants relayed that it was crucial for aboriginal children to develop the capacity for love, empathy, and understanding. children who experienced and focused on feelings of love for themselves and others were able to forgive, heal from negative experiences, and engage in successful social relationships. one participant spoke about the capacity for love and understanding: for someone to love themselves within, inside and out, unconditionally is what i believe is true happiness because once you love yourself you can show others how to love…and along with the love, then you then have empathy…and then it becomes more you’re not mad or sad because this person acted a certain way towards you. you would understand that maybe they don’t understand what they’re doing at that time… another participant stated that [u]nderstanding is a big one. understanding how others are feeling. not only understanding our own kids but how everyone feels. healing was also discussed as important for emotional wellness: you see the street people and you know they need healing. and you know a lot of them, given the right tools, they’ll get themselves out of that…so for them to be able to shape shift into the student or whoever they wanna be, it’s healing and acceptance and that authenticity of…okay, well…i’m gonna, you know, find the healing i need. for participants who had experienced challenges and hardships in their relationships, forgiveness was also emphasized. particularly for those children whose families had been impacted by residential school experiences, forgiveness provided a transition beyond natural feelings of anger and pain. participants shared the importance of focusing on positive emotions relative to negative emotions, and recognizing where negative emotions come from. this helped in allowing participants to make the conscious decision to move on from negative emotions toward emotional wellness. as one participant stated: 9 tremblay et al.: aboriginal perspectives on social-emotional competence published by scholarship@western, 2013 you’re not experiencing it but thinking about it’s because of residential school but it is still there and you still get the sense of anger and hurt and pain even though you haven’t been a part of it you still are experiencing the ripple effect of what has happened. children who experienced and expressed positive emotions including love, empathy, understanding, forgiveness, as well as self-respect and an inner contentment, rather than focusing on negative emotions such as anger and blame, were better able to relate to others and to develop pride in themselves. m e n t a l w e l l n e s s mental wellness was described as the ability to develop and maintain a strong, positive attitude and mind. in recognition of the problems and challenges that many aboriginal children face in the course of development, problem solving was an important element of mental wellness: another skill that people need to be successful is the ability to problem solve. find solutions. kids especially need to learn that. when kids don’t have that skill, life can be very challenging. related to problem-solving skills was the ability to approach challenges with a determined attitude. a mentality of determination allowed aboriginal children to persevere when faced with barriers: i like the words perseverance and persistence. there’s so many challenges to get through before kids get to the good stuff…there’s lots of barriers. it’s also attitude…you need and can find a way to live and solve problems. participants discussed how having an attitude of determination could help children to anticipate and achieve success. on the other hand, a defeatist attitude could interfere with the achievement of success: success is something you’re taught as a child. if you’re taught you can be successful, you can reach for the next thing. and that’s why our families in the system are defeatist because they haven’t been taught success. similarly, it was also important for children to have the ability to derive motivation from negative experiences: some of the motivators i had were the negative things that i witnessed and a lot of it, like, losing a parent…i didn’t wanna keep living that and living in that cycle…so it was prevention…i’m not gonna let myself, you know, live this life. some participants had grown up and/or were still living in communities where substance abuse and criminality were significant issues. they described their continued ability to witness others making poor decisions and to utilize what they had witnessed to motivate their own success: going home every day, seeing negativity…people smoking on the streets or [prostitutes]…it just makes me not wanna be like that and to try to work hard so i don’t end up like that. and then seeing my friends or family in jail…all that just makes you wanna…keep working hard. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.2 participants also discussed the importance of witnessing others’ success in order to motivate their journey toward their own achievements: well i experienced the non-aboriginal life…my white friends at school…when they turn 18 they get a vehicle and university…you experience it and you want a kind of taste of it…and you know you want it. just, it works both ways, negative too… finally, participants relayed the importance of children exhibiting adaptability in different social and cultural contexts. a crucial element of adaptability was being able to fit in to different contexts while still retaining your core identity: there’s that authenticity…it’s a real asset to have. ‘cause…there’s certain places, you know, the ceremonies you go to and there’s a certain way to act and, you know, on the street…there’s a survival thing that sort of kicks in…that adaptability is really important. just being authentic in those situations…being yourself or being your professional self or being your student self or being…your cultural self. essentially, this meant having an integrated sense of self that could look slightly different depending on the varying contexts that aboriginal children found themselves in. one participant described this ability as becoming a “chameleon.” on the contrary, some participants described the necessity to change their roles as burdensome: i feel like i have…all these different people i have to be…when you go…to the street or to see your cousins, they’re all gangsters, like, you’re a different way, then you go to, like, a gala and you’re all…high class…i feel like i’m always switching my roles. it’s hard living like that…always having to change your role and change your identity for…people you’re around…i even noticed here…hanging out with a group of…aboriginal friends…we’re just really lax and open, we can talk about anything. but then…once you go into a certain… seminar or something and you’re talking about the same issues…but you have to watch what you’re saying or…you have to be…the educated person… in order for a child’s adaptability to serve their overall wellbeing and contribute to a strong identity, it was necessary for adaptability to come from a place of strength and authenticity, and not a place of vulnerability. aboriginal children need to have the ability to competently fit in to different social and cultural contexts while retaining their strong identities, rather than attempting to act as someone that they are not by hiding parts of their identities in order to fit in. d i s c u s s i o n the current study has identified key elements of the healthy social-emotional development of aboriginal children from the perspectives of a sample of aboriginal canadians. data analysis revealed important elements of cultural, social, emotional, and mental wellness that contribute to the development of a strong identity. this study found that a strong and proud identity is central to social-emotional health, and therefore imperative to the overall health and wellbeing of aboriginal children. 11 tremblay et al.: aboriginal perspectives on social-emotional competence published by scholarship@western, 2013 for aboriginal children, having a strong identity meant knowing and having pride in who you are as an aboriginal person. echoing the voices of participants in this study, kickett-tucker (2009) identified that a strong racial identity and related self-esteem is like a hub of a wheel because without the hub, the wheel can go nowhere. like the hub, racial identity is the centre of a child’s and youth’s well being... (p. 130) further, the findings of the current study are consistent with research indicating that a strong cultural identity can be a protective factor against suicide in canadian aboriginal youth (chandler & lalonde, 1998; chandler & proulx, 2008), and is associated with more favourable outcomes related to school attendance and academics (purdie, tripcony, boulton-lewis, fanshawe, & gunstone, 2000). conversely, research indicates that social, emotional, and behaviour problems exhibited by aboriginal children may be linked to lack of a positive identity (zubrick et al., 2005), which is consistent with the challenges discussed by participants. there is also a growing literature base to support the elements of cultural wellness identified by participants in this study. to illustrate, knowledge of a cultural language has been linked to positive school outcomes for aboriginal children (guevremont & kohen, 2012). according to ball (2004), first nations leaders have linked improvement of developmental conditions for children to the reconstruction of their cultural identity, revitalization of intergenerational transmission of culture and traditional language, and reproduction of culturally distinctive values and practices in programs for children and youth. (p. 455) as part of cultural wellness, participants in the current study discussed the importance of children knowing and understanding their cultural history; at the same time, they expressed frustration with their own prior lack of knowledge of aboriginal history due to the omission of these topics from school curricula. aboriginal youth in lee and cerecer’s (2010) qualitative study identified similar frustrations and emphasized that it was unacceptable to leave aboriginal culture, language, and history out of their education. in a policy report, toulouse (2008) identified that respect for aboriginal culture and traditions, as manifested by representing aboriginal cultures, languages, and traditions in the classroom, is crucial for supporting and ensuring the academic success of canadian aboriginal youth. the current study adds to the growing evidence base supporting the importance of a strong identity and cultural wellness and highlights the need to address issues of culture and identity development in screening, assessment, and educational programming for aboriginal children. participants also discussed aspects of social, emotional, and mental wellness that are particularly important for aboriginal children. in aboriginal populations, connections, relations, and family are considered fundamental aspects of overall wellness (king et al., 2009) and are important in promoting aboriginal child health (long & sephton, 2011). further, when aboriginal children have access to family members and other adults who can provide social support, their knowledge of aboriginal language and culture is strengthened (bougie, 2010). the capacity to respect others has also been cited as a core value of aboriginal peoples (kirkness & barnhardt, 1991; toulouse, 2008); in particular, it is essential for children to learn to respect elders as keepers of knowledge and wisdom (roué, 2006). although a history of colonization and discrimination could understandably interfere with the development of a sense of respect in aboriginal children, this is essential for moving toward emotional 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.2 wellness. the aspects of emotional wellness discussed by participants (i.e., inner contentment, selfrespect, forgiveness, love, empathy, and understanding) are also particularly relevant for aboriginal children because they are developing and learning in the context of pervasive challenges that they must face simply by virtue of their heritage. these challenges include disrupted attachment caused by residential schooling, which has continued to have an intergenerational impact, and has contributed to racism, marginalization, and inequities in virtually all areas of health and education (heath, bor, thompson, & cox, 2011; king et al., 2009). similarly, the elements of mental wellness identified in the current study (i.e., problem solving abilities, a determined attitude, the ability to derive motivation from negative experiences, and adaptability) are especially important for aboriginal children, given the current social and political landscape within which aboriginal children are developing. indeed, it is evident that the barriers aboriginal children face may make it more difficult for them to achieve success than their non-aboriginal counterparts (priest, mackean, davis, waters, & briggs, 2012). this is particularly relevant to the skill of being adaptable, where aboriginal children must learn to fit into different social and cultural contexts while maintaining authenticity. when participants described the course of their development, they spoke about feeling challenged in terms of maintaining authenticity; part of mental wellness involves aboriginal children maintaining their sense of identity while flowing between contexts. the findings from the current study can also be discussed in the context of recent literature on socialemotional development. in the research literature, social-emotional development is defined as involving self-regulation, understanding emotions, self and social awareness, social problem solving, and relationship skills (denham, 2005; mccabe & altamura, 2011). self-regulation can involve the expression of more positive emotions relative to negative emotions (denham, 2006). this was a strong component of emotional wellness in the current study: participants discussed the need for aboriginal children to focus on and express positive emotions such as forgiveness and love in order to achieve wellness and move on from feelings of anger and pain. self-regulation and emotional understanding are also described in the literature as having the ability to regulate emotional and behavioural responses appropriately in different contexts (denham, 2006). this was echoed in aboriginal participants’ descriptions of adaptability and authenticity. in particular, participants relayed that aboriginal children need to have knowledge of the emotional responses and behaviours that are suitable for the different social and cultural contexts in which they grow and develop, as well as the ability to act appropriately based on that knowledge. further, literature on social-emotional development emphasizes social and relationship skills. similarly, aboriginal participants discussed the importance of social connectedness and of having relationships with peers, role models, and family members who can support and contribute to overall wellness. however, despite some similarities between the literature on socialemotional development and the findings of the current study, it is clear that literature is lacking with respect to a focus on cultural wellness. also, the most prominent theme that emerged from the current study was that of a strong identity. although self-concept is discussed in the literature as part of socialemotional development, this refers to a sense of self-efficacy, self-worth, or mastery (denham, 2005; mccabe & altamura, 2011) and is not tied to culture. for aboriginal participants, a strong identity was clearly related to a sense of pride and belonging as an aboriginal person. with respect to screening and assessment tools, current measurement tools and processes do not reflect the importance of children having knowledge of culturally relevant history, heritage language, cultural practices, spirituality and belief systems, social connectedness, the ability to draw motivation from 13 tremblay et al.: aboriginal perspectives on social-emotional competence published by scholarship@western, 2013 negative experiences, and a strong identity. examining how these elements of wellness can be incorporated into screening and assessment processes and tools will be important to more accurately reflect aboriginal child development and for achieving enhanced indicators of both short and long term outcomes. further, because these elements are not currently captured in measurement tools, the current study suggests that the results of mainstream tools should be interpreted with caution when used with aboriginal children. moreover, this study provides the foundation for future research into the evaluation and enhancement of commonly used screening and assessment tools to better reflect our multicultural landscape and the elements of wellness that lead to healthy development outside of euro-western standards and norms. further, findings from the current study highlight that, in order to obtain a complete picture of aboriginal child health and wellness, the child must be considered in his or her entirety; in addition, attention must be paid to elements such as his or her context, support systems, and available opportunities. social-emotional development for all children can best be understood in the context of additional developmental domains (squires, 2003); this study highlights that for aboriginal children, considering other domains such as identity and cultural wellness and their influence on development is particularly important. with respect to screening and assessment, this could involve utilizing multiple informants (e.g., the child, parents, caregivers, teachers) and multiple methods (e.g., interviews, questionnaires, direct observations, valid assessments). although screening and assessment tools and processes do not reflect many of the elements of wellness identified in this study, children can be given opportunities to develop these elements of wellness by attending culturally appropriate programming in their early years. early childhood programs that honour and respect aboriginal worldviews are being increasingly recognized as crucial for supporting the healthy development of aboriginal children (hare, 2011; mckeough et al., 2008). in order to develop a strong identity, aboriginal children need to have opportunities for early learning experiences that are grounded in culture (best start resource centre, 2010). accordingly, it is imperative for early childhood programming to move toward focusing on these critical areas for aboriginal children. c o n c l u d i n g r e m a rks this study strengthens the assertion that aboriginal children require an additional set of socialemotional skills to successfully navigate different cultural contexts during development. these additional skills, particularly relevant to cultural wellness and a strong identity, are not reflected in the literature on social-emotional development or in current early childhood screening and assessment tools. clearly, further research is needed to elevate understanding of social-emotional wellness in aboriginal children and to begin to incorporate additional elements of wellness into screening and assessment tools, as well as into early childhood programming. aboriginal child development should also be conceptualized holistically. utilizing the lived experiences and perspectives of aboriginal peoples to enhance programming, screening, and assessment will heighten the potential to optimally support aboriginal children and families. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.2 r e f e re n c e s abrams, l. s. 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(2004). the scientific base linking social and emotional learning to school success. in j. e. zins, r. p. weissberg, m. c. wang, & h. j. walberg, (eds.), building academic success on social and emotional learning: what does the research say? (pp. 3 22). new york, ny: teachers college press. 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 4, iss. 4 [2013], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol4/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2013.4.4.2 zubrick, s. r., silburn, s. r., lawrence, d. m., mitrou, f. g., dalby, r. b., blair, e. m, griffin, j., milroy, h., de maio, j. a., cox, a., & li, j. (2005). the western australian aboriginal child health survey: forced separation from natural family, forced relocation from traditional country or homeland, and social and emotional wellbeing of aboriginal children and young people. perth, wa: curtin university of technology and telethon institute for child health research. 19 tremblay et al.: aboriginal perspectives on social-emotional competence published by scholarship@western, 2013 the international indigenous policy journal october 2013 aboriginal perspectives on social-emotional competence in early childhood melissa tremblay rebecca gokiert rebecca georgis karen edwards berna skrypnek recommended citation aboriginal perspectives on social-emotional competence in early childhood abstract keywords creative commons license aboriginal perspectives on social-emotional competence in early childhood systems, self, and sovereignty: non-indigenous practitioners negotiate whiteness in aboriginal partnerships the international indigenous policy journal volume 9 | issue 1 article 5 january 2018 systems, self, and sovereignty: non-indigenous practitioners negotiate w hiteness in aboriginal partnerships tania l. searle flinders university of south australia, tania.searle@flinders.edu.au monique mulholland flinders university of south australia, monique.mulholland@flinders.edu.au recommended citation searle, t. l. , mulholland, m. (2018). systems, self, and sovereignty: non-indigenous practitioners negotiate whiteness in aboriginal partnerships. the international indigenous policy journal, 9(1). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.5 systems, self, and sovereignty: non-indigenous practitioners negotiate w hiteness in aboriginal partnerships abstract australia is built upon a foundation of colonial conquest, and it continues to implement government policies and systems of management based on a colonising logic and the denial of indigenous sovereignty. this study employed qualitative methods and discourse analysis to draw on the experiences of six non-indigenous australians employed by the south australian government in aboriginal partnerships and natural resource management. drawing on critical whiteness studies, the article reveals that participants in this cohort are largely critical of colonial structures of government and the inequalities that arise. despite this critical awareness, there was often a difficulty in finding a language to describe the fog of whiteness, along with the tendency to describe ecological knowledge at the expense of more complex issues of first nations sovereignty. keywords whiteness, natural resource management, first nations or indigenous, government partnerships, decolonisation acknowledgments the authors recognise the many first nations whose lands the work of aboriginal partnerships, government of south australia, is conducted upon, including, but not exclusively, kaurna, ngarrindjeri, alinytjara wilurara, and anangu pitjantjatjara yankunytjatjara. we pay our respects to elders past, present, and future. we thank the participants in this study who donated their time and thoughts, and the aboriginal partnerships working group, department of environment, water and natural resources, government of south australia. special mention is given to barbara baird for her comments on an earlier draft. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ s y s t e m s , s e l f , a n d s o v e r e i g n t y : n o n i n d i g e n o u s p r a c t i t i o n e r s n e g o t i a t e w h i t e n e s s i n a b o r i g i n a l p a r t n e r s h i p s the denial of indigenous sovereignty and the imposition of patriarchal, white sovereignty are foundational to current australian policy contexts and frameworks. tanganekald meintangk scholar irene watson (2009) stated, “the foundation of the australian colonial project lies within an ‘originary violence,’ in which the state retains a vested interest in maintaining the founding order of things” (p. 45). goenpul scholar aileen moreton-robinson (2009) argued, “patriarchal white sovereignty in the australian context derives from the illegal act of possession and is most acutely manifest in the state and its regulatory mechanisms” (p. 64). sustained complexity, historical anomalies, and policy contestation shape australian indigenous affairs today (hunt, 2008). first nations1 continue to assert their sovereign rights within a highly charged political environment where the australian nation-state holds preeminent power (smith & hunt, 2008). the skew of power and the denial of indigenous sovereignty directly affects first nations peoples as political decisions and public policy impacts upon their daily lives (jeffries & menham, 2011). australia’s first nations peoples have a long history of frustrations with government policies and governing structures (foley, 2000). while colonial paternalisms have largely been replaced with current discourses of mutual responsibility in the development and delivery of indigenous policy in australia, the emphasis often remains on changing the behaviour of indigenous communities and indigenous people (howitt et al., 2014). however, australia’s history of colonisation and legalised white supremacy is manifest in policy and carried by non-indigenous practitioners into the everyday work that government carries out with indigenous australians. examining the role of non-indigenous australia, in policy and practice, is essential if we are to adequately address the persistent failures of government in indigenous affairs in australia. this article employs the insights of critical whiteness scholars to explore these persistent policy failures. it presents the findings of a study undertaken with non-indigenous employees in the department of environment, water, and natural resources, government of south australia (dewnr). dewnr is a steward for the state’s natural resources, public parks, gardens, heritage places, and crown lands. within dewnr, the aboriginal2 partnerships working group co-manage natural resources with first nations in south australia, under the natural resource management act 2004 (sa) (government of south australia, 1972). pratt’s (1991) concept of a contact zone is a useful framework for describing this partnership space—a space where cultures meet, primarily in contexts of asymmetrical power relations. whiteness allows the exploration of power relations that underpin this relationship, and how nonindigenous employees understand the habits of whiteness in the day-to-day operations of this partnership. unlike most non-indigenous australians, including public servants and executives of indigenous programs who have limited social interaction, knowledge, and/or experience of indigenous peoples (larkin, 2013), these employees are immersed in the contact zone working on the ground with 1 first nations is used to encompass the diversity of indigenous nations in australia. 2 aboriginal is the term used by the government of south australia for first nations people living in the state. 1 searle and mulholland: systems, self, and sovereignty published by scholarship@western, 2018 indigenous peoples. in this setting, such habits of whiteness include the normalising of western worldviews and science as “truth,” indigenous ontology being viewed as cultural and traditional-as-past, indigenous capabilities as being deficit, non-indigenous time is valued monetarily, and non-indigenous people are seen as individuals while indigenous people are racialised. as seminal whiteness scholars dyer (1997) and frankenberg (1993) remind us, despite anti-racist intentions, invisible privileges of whiteness continue to locate white subjects at the normative centre. they remind us that the centred position of whiteness sets up a politics of gazing that looks out, overdetermining the differences of raced others through a white gaze. as indigenous critical scholars argue, indigenous communities continue to be gazed at, or blamed for the problems experienced in their communities, rather than processes of colonisation, dispossession, and white sovereignty. these issues exist globally. critical whiteness studies is an international interdisciplinary field providing developments in the areas of communication, culture and post-colonial studies, critical race theory and sociology, feminism, education, psychology, and international relations (hunter, swan, & grimes, 2010). to date, australian studies of whiteness have explored a broad range of topics including nationhood (bielefeld, 2009/2010; boucher, 2007), immigration (barton, 2011; dewhirst, 2008), indigenous rights (foley, 2000; howardwagner, 2009), education (hatchell, 2004; macgill, 2010; schulz, 2011), social work (walter, taylor, & habibis, 2011; young, 2008), health (kowal, 2015; nielsen, stuart, & gorman, 2015) and research (carey, boucher, & ellinghaus, 2007; moreton-robinson, 2006). these studies in whiteness contribute to conceptual and practical opportunities for decreasing colonial practices. however, literature on natural resource management (nrm), whiteness, and non-indigenous employees remains limited; while the policy tools, and administrative and accountability structures of nrm, inherited from a system designed upon white supremacy, maintain barriers for first nations (searle & muller, forthcoming). current work within the field of nrm has revealed issues related to conflicting ontologies, imbalanced power relations, and the dominance of western institutional structures (ens, finlayson, preuss, jackson, & holcombe, 2012; haynes, 2013; howitt et al., 2013; muller, 2014; nursey-bray, 2013; wiseman & bardsley, 2013); yet, this is not named as whiteness. hemming and rigney (2008, 2010; rigney & hemming, 2013) discussed whiteness in their work on nrm from an ngarrindjeri perspective with critical analysis of systemic issues, and marika, yunupingu, marika-mununggiritj, and muller (2009) mentioned whiteness in their work within the rural nrm space. however, we have found no scholarship on nrm that employed a whiteness framework to analyse the perspectives of nonindigenous practitioners on first nations co-management in australia. to address this gap, we asked the following question: how might frameworks and discourses of whiteness shape the perspectives of non-indigenous australians who work within aboriginal partnerships with the south australian government? what are some examples of habits of whiteness that emerge in this partnership space? how does co-management work in practice? where are the opportunities for whiteness to entrench colonial perspectives and practices? how might indigenous sovereignty be supported by analysing these practices and processes? applying a whiteness framework unveils the historical and enduring relations of power that are often invisible to non-indigenous people, yet hypervisible to indigenous peoples. in 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.5 bringing the invisible to the fore, the tools of whiteness allow non-indigenous practitioners to examine themselves. the article will begin with an exploration of critical whiteness studies, and how this theoretical framework is vital for understanding the relationships between indigenous and non-indigenous practitioners in partnership spaces. it will then describe the study that was undertaken with workers from dewnr, along with the underpinning methodology, before moving on to present the narratives of the participants through three themes: systems, self, and sovereignty. finally, it will outline insights and recommendations for policy frameworks that will have import in partnership spaces, both in australia and internationally. c r i t i c a l w h i t e n e s s s t u d i e s a n d p a r t n e r s h i p s i n t h e c o n t a c t z o n e since the enlightenment, europeans constructed themselves as the rational, moral, civilised, and superior race of humans, while indigenous peoples were constructed as “backward,” “primitive,” “uncivilised,” and “barbaric” (anderson, 2001). this construction of the superior human justified the colonial mission the world over and established the western world as we know it. in the australian context, as with other western countries, race is used as a marker to include or exclude members of the nation. critical race and whiteness scholars theorise whiteness as a set of habits inherited from colonial history, whereby white, anglo subjects are positioned at the normative centre (hage, 1998). credit is paid to w. e. b du bois (1995a, 1995b) for laying the theoretical foundation of critical whiteness studies in the 1930’s, by naming whiteness as a historical construction that is maintained by its invisibility. from the 1980s, white3 academics began to respond to the challenge of black4 and postcolonial scholars to reverse the gaze and interrogate their own culture rather than problematising the oppressed. aileen moretonrobinson (1998, 1999, 2000, 2004; 2005; 2006, 2007, 2009, 2015) has written extensively on whiteness and its relationship to indigeneity in australia. in the white possessive: property, power, and indigenous sovereignty (moreton-robinson, 2015), she stated, “white possessive logics are operationalized within discourses to circulate sets of meanings about ownership of the nation, as part of common sense knowledge, decision making, and socially produced conventions” (p. xii). she reminds us that whiteness is not invisible to first nations peoples’ but is hypervisible (moreton-robinson, 2015, p. xiii). she invites international discussion on whiteness and the denial of indigenous sovereignty and notes that scholarship on whiteness and first nations sovereignty in america is minimal (moretonrobinson, 2015). asymmetrical power relations and white race dominance is perpetuated by the operations of white privileges, which include ignorance of indigenous epistemologies (larkin, 2013), avoidance, denial, 3 the word white is used here to maintain consistency with the original works, describing people of anglo-celtic origin. 4 black is the self-defined termed used by these scholars to denote their african heritage. 3 searle and mulholland: systems, self, and sovereignty published by scholarship@western, 2018 colour blindness, complicity, defensiveness, and accusations of reverse racism (pease, 2010).theories of whiteness break down the good anti-racist versus bad racist dichotomy by revealing how good antiracists, who may be aware of inequalities, nonetheless remain beneficiaries of colonial power (kowal, 2015; salter, 2013). policy processes, traditionally thought of as either a linear progression of agenda setting, decision making, and implementation, or as the science of muddling through, often neglect issue of power and the agency of frontline workers (keely & scoones, 2003). in this case study, we investigate how power, as the normalising of colonial authority, or whiteness, inhibits equitable policymaking and muddies the translation of policy into practice. a plethora of australian guidelines that aim to redress the impact of colonisation are available for practitioners who work with first nations peoples (council of australian governments, 2009; government of south australia, 2006a, 2006b, 2011, 2014). dewnr’s reconciliation action plan foregrounds issues of colonisation, displacement, reconciliation, respectful and honest relationships, and listening before acting (government of south australia, 2014). however, the indigenous allied health australia (2015) publication cultural responsiveness in action: an iaha framework is the only document to date that includes “self-awareness” for non-indigenous practitioners as 1 of the 6 capabilities “essential for successful partnership and action” (pp. 12-15). while this document does not specify whiteness, it does attend to the importance of exploring perspectives and attitudes. it is important to note these attempts to redress the ongoing impacts of colonialism and disadvantage in government policies, frameworks, and actions. however, as argued by hage (2000) and stratton (1998), inclusionary language (in policies such as multiculturalism) can work to ignore and overlook the power of whiteness and the embedded processes of race, knowledge, and power. first nations traditional knowledge and land management techniques are now being incorporated into environmental management policy and practice internationally (black & mcbean, 2016) and in australian (mccarthy, 1996). first nations peoples are expected to work in co-management partnerships under bureaucratic systems fortified by western epistemologies, which underpin the authority of the colonised countries such as australia. this is a site where embedded whiteness in both government institutions and its staff intersect and affect the well-being of first nations peoples (black & mcbean, 2016; hemming, 2007). policymakers, scientists, engineers, and researchers lack in their understandings about how to move forward with incorporating indigenous environmental management techniques (black & mcbean, 2016). as such, this article examines how non-indigenous dewnr workers observe and experience these initiatives— how and in what ways do non-indigenous employees understand and negotiate the partnership? t h e s c e n e dewnr regulates eight nrm regions in the state of south australia. for each region, one or two people manage aboriginal partnerships. we spoke with six managers from four of those regions. on a day-to-day level, managers from aboriginal partnerships collaborate with first nations on projects such as feral species eradication, the creation of historical information boards for visitors to national parks, or in the identification of exclusion zones that protect sacred or secret sites from the public. depending on 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.5 the region, whether rural, remote, or urban, managers may spend blocks of time living in aboriginal communities on country and then return to their city offices. there are many first nations whose geographical boundaries do not align with the south australian state borders or nrm regions. some of the regions are comprised of a mix of first nations and some are predominantly a single first nation; therefore, some participants work mainly with one first nation while others work with many. across the state, there is a diverse range of different aboriginal family groups, corporate groups, native title5 holders, native title applicants, and freehold land rights6 owners. while this helps set the scene, the focus of this analysis is upon the perspectives common between participants in relation to the reproduction or deconstruction of whiteness regardless of similarities or differences of aboriginal people in south australia. m e t h o d o l o g y this is a cross-sectional study employing discourse analysis (bryman, 2008; johnstone, 2008). a key contact was located on the dewnr website, whom we then cold called, established rapport, and received direction on potential participants and the needs of dewnr—which ensured research relevance to the department. snowball sampling was used to recruit participants via the key contact who forwarded a letter of introduction onto the dewnr aboriginal partnerships working group (apwg). interested persons were free to contact the researcher privately. from the 12 non-indigenous members of the apwg, 7 responded with expressions of interest and 6 completed one-on-one semi-structured interviews. the interview questions were designed to: a. explore the centrality of participants’ location in mainstream australia. what is your personal background in understanding aboriginal culture and history prior to doing this work? what aboriginal cultural training have you undertaken through your work? b. identify if and how participants view whiteness in the structure and culture of the institution in which they are employed. what challenges have you personally faced in working with aboriginal partnerships with regards to aboriginal knowledge and sovereignty? can you identify a persistent problem that occurs between non-indigenous people and aboriginal people working in government partnerships? 5 the native title act 1993 (commonwealth) recognises and protects, within the australian legal system, the native title rights and interests of aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples related to land and waters and in accordance with their traditional laws and customs (commonwealth of australia, 2015). native title must be granted by a federal court of law. 6 the anangu pitjantjatjara yankunytjatjara land rights act 1981 (sa) and the maralinga tjarutja land rights act 1984 (sa) provide for the vesting of title to certain lands known as the anangu pitjantjatjara yankunytjatjara and the maralinga lands, respectively, in the people who are acknowledged as the traditional owners. 5 searle and mulholland: systems, self, and sovereignty published by scholarship@western, 2018 interviews were approximately 60 minutes in length and participants have been given aliases. discourse analysis and thematic coding of interview transcriptions drew out key themes common across participant responses (johnstone, 2008). systematic analysis of the transcripts searched for repetition and differences between transcripts. nvivo software was employed to identify frequent words across all transcripts, and conduct word counts and build matrices of coded themes in order to explore relationships, order patterns, and draw connections (bazeley & jackson, 2013). words and phrases that denote viewpoints—such as looking and seeing—are pertinent to unmasking the invisibility of whiteness. characteristics of whiteness, such a privilege, individuality, and paid employment, were used to code the data; however, this study engaged in cycles of inductive and deductive reasoning (o'leary, 2010), regularly returning to established theory as well as allowing for new themes to arise. as is common in qualitative work, the operationalisation of concepts was decided upon as they emerged from the data collection and analysis (natalier, 2013). the social and behavioural research ethics committee at the flinders university of south australia granted ethical approval for this study. approval from dewnr was granted on the condition that individual participant consent was obtained in conjunction with consent from their managing supervisors. r e s u l t s participants were non-indigenous adults, with five self-identifying as white and one self-identifying as of both polynesian and european descent. all had worked with first nations peoples between 4 and 10 years. most reported interactions with first nations children during their childhoods, yet had little formal education about first nations peoples in primary and high school. all had come across first nations issues during their university education, but there was no consistency in their participation in formal workplace cultural training at dewnr. the participants employed discourses of whiteness in complex ways, simultaneously reproducing and deconstructing whiteness. the participants negotiated meanings of whiteness through three key themes: a. systems of management within government departments, b. reflections on personal views and attitudes, and c. perspectives on broader structures of state, sovereignty, and knowledge. s y s t e m s the first theme that emerged from the interviews reveals participant’s perspectives regarding whiteness across systems of government and management within dewnr. australia’s governance systems are built upon a form of colonial whiteness that maintains inequalities for first nations, and participants in this study are highly aware and critical of systemic inequalities between themselves and the first nations peoples with whom they work. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.5 p a i d e m p l o y m e n t . scholars have drawn attention to paid employment, or wage labour, as a mechanism that laid the foundation of whiteness, (allen, 1997; du bois, 1962; roediger, 1991). this is referred to in the scholarship as the material benefits of whiteness. a critical awareness of inequalities around paid work and the lack of employment available to first nations peoples is clearly evident among this group of participants. co-management of lands between first nations and government often requires first nations peoples, as representatives of organisational bodies, to engage with government in their free time. first nations peoples are often not financially compensated for this highly political work, as are their non-indigenous counterparts who work in the same space. management plans place an enormous responsibility on first nations leaders and significantly add to the stress on first nations peoples (hemming, 2007). historically, non-indigenous people have filled paid colonial administrative positions, while first nations peoples have been subject to various top–down management regimes, including slavery. contemporary government has inherited this system, as noted in the following excerpts: ben: i’m paid to be here 5 days a week and a lot of the people that i work with live in aboriginal housing and volunteer their time in a whole raft of different areas, and it’s quite possible that the large majority of projects that i’m looking for help to do, whoever is doing them with me would be doing them on a voluntary basis, or with payment from me but it would only be you know one little bit of payment here and one little bit of payment there and while their whole world continues with kids and family and housing insecurity and all that sort of stuff. rick: this doesn’t apply to all aboriginal people but to a lot of aboriginal people they’re thinking about really fundamental life basic necessities, whereas we just take that for granted, oh i know my salary is going to go in every two weeks. the quotes above demonstrate the problematic of who achieves paid employment. participants recognised their privilege in being paid for the work they do while their first nations counterparts “volunteer” in the same partnership space. t i m e f r a m e s . working to timeframes is a persistent problem that arose frequently across all interviews. participants reflected critically upon dewnr’s regulated and compartmentalised timeframes, defined by western management systems, which operate as a top–down colonial approach that maintains inequalities. in so doing, they revealed the privileges of whiteness that define, structure, and organise the systems and processes of government departments. rick: so a lot of [colleagues] won’t even go there or won’t even bother to try to engage with [first nations peoples] cos they know that they’re gonna, in their words have a hard time, because they don’t work to the same timeframes. rick goes on to argue that indigenous people, rather than external factors, are often viewed as the problem: 7 searle and mulholland: systems, self, and sovereignty published by scholarship@western, 2018 rick: it has been extremely difficult and it’s been difficult because we want to do work around this waterhole and the waterhole is not on their property it’s on a neighbour’s property and the neighbour is not an aboriginal person, it’s a person with long standing connection to the pastoral region, political clout, an old family from that district, old in terms of european settlement and so has political power and is just resisting . . . now if i was to talk to someone [else that i work with]. . . he would have automatically assumed it was the aboriginal community that’s taking a long time; they’re too slow, they’re not organised, they’re fighting amongst themselves, all those common perceptions of what aboriginal communities are like. but that’s not the case at all. it’s actually the pastoralist that’s blocking, won’t participate. first nations peoples share a common complaint that the government does not deliver promised results (hemming, rigney, & berg, 2011). as such, a lack of delivery is an issue for both parties in this partnership space. one participant stated, “government’s really slow at doing stuff” (joe) and another saw that “red tape” (aaron) could leave elders dying before they saw outcomes. as alice argued: alice: and timeframes [pause] i-it gets very difficult, cos at the local level we can also appreciate that things take time but our governance structures don’t support that very well, that if we’ve got australian government funding and timeframes for delivery of that funding we always would struggle. c a p a c i t y b u i l d i n g a n d g o v e r n a n c e . the participants highlighted how responsibility is placed on first nations to adhere to established management systems. most participants avoided the typical trap of whiteness by refusing to name aboriginal people as the problem. however, it is difficult to avoid this “trap” as can be seen in the following excerpt, in which capacity building is viewed as an efficient way to “get on with things”: alice: how do you operate in this whitefella7 government society so that you can get what you need? because that is still the dominant society we’re in. those rulebooks are not going to get changed dramatically, they’re not. so if for that particular aboriginal traditional lands association or native title group if they understand how to work in white society better they can probably get what they need a lot better too. but it’s a corrupt system, that balance of it, not in any individual part but there’s some real complexities to how we try and overcome these cultural differences, because i still feel we’ve got this dominant hammer of white society coming in on aboriginal culture and saying “yeah you’re aboriginal, we get that, we respect that, but hey you still gotta do it our way.” however, participants were generally critical of existing structures of governance. jonnie argued that working groups needed to be built in collaboration and with culturally appropriate structures: 7 whitefella is a term used in australia to denote a non-indigenous person. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.5 jonnie: we’ve built a working group . . . in collaboration with the first peoples, and because there’s a broad group there, lots of language groups represented, what we’ve had to do is try and get a broad representation of that language group. so we’ve borrowed from . . . what [the first nations groups] consider culturally appropriate structure of having seven directors and built it into our working group simply because we want to have that representation across the board. i think when we started doing that everyone was going “that’s a lot of people, why do you have that many people, why can’t you have one person, the chair, you know, representing themselves?” it doesn’t work, and i think that’s really obvious that that doesn’t work, so having that group of people takes the pressure off that one individual to make decisions for a whole group of people. jonnie believes this is worthwhile because “it works” for the first nations partners he engages with and is a “step in the right direction.” privileging western systems of governance in aboriginal partnerships as normal, central, and superior reproduces the hegemonic nature of whiteness—several participants recognised that adapting those structures to match first nations governance models improves process and outcomes. insisting that first nations peoples and organisations work to the dominant system is a remnant of the colonial mandate to “civilise the natives.” joe was critical of this and spoke of “doing things in a culturally appropriate way . . . rather than the way you’ve grown up.” he cites an example of an international standard in conservation planning that was “not working” and rather than “barrelling through” it was adapted to suit first nations peoples’ approach to planning, especially in remote areas of australia. capacity building in the western tradition has seen a string of policy failures for first nations, and participants argued that building government capacity in non-western ways is a possibility: aaron: at the moment the way that we write, even the writing of things poses a challenge, ahh you know, a management plan could be potentially sung or drawn or whatever so there’s very different ways of doing it and they’re just sort of challenges, like it’s just about being creative on how you can merge those things together, about educating [non-indigenous] people that there is a difference . . . you know there’s potential to see things in different ways and to have better, better sort of outcomes. as keely and scoones (2003) stated about policy, “the way in which issues are talked about is highly significant . . . the language in which it is framed is as significant as the actual content” (p. 37). s e l f the role that whiteness played in participants’ behaviour, thoughts, personal interactions, and feelings was another important aspect explored during the interviews, and it was here that critical reflections on whiteness became a “trickier business.” i n d i v i d u a l i t y . as argued by dyer (1997), to locate white people as a racialised group is a mechanism for dislodging the position of power that comes from being just a person as opposed to being something 9 searle and mulholland: systems, self, and sovereignty published by scholarship@western, 2018 else. seeing oneself as an individual ties the western concept of individuality to the centrality of whiteness. as aileen moreton-robinson (2015) reminded us, first nations peoples do see white people as a group and are hyperaware of the centeredness of whiteness. aaron applied his critical awareness of belonging to a white cultural group in ways that reversed the gaze and contextualised the larger political shaping in which he sees himself as a “pawn”: aaron: i think a lot of us take it as an individual thing whereas the [first nation] movement is a nation-based thing, like it’s bigger than any individual [first nation person] as well. i think whitefella’s take things to heart as on an individual basis and kinda don’t get that what’s happening there is much bigger than just either one of us . . . i find reflecting back onto that as um, as something that can, you know, make me feel sort of little bit more comfortable in those situations. a l a n g u a g e f o r w h i t e n e s s ? many participants found it difficult to express or pinpoint a language for whiteness. finding a language to describe whiteness is a difficult task, and this is what organises its centred and normative position. frankenberg (1993) noted, we must “understand not only how race is lived but also how it is seen, or not seen” (p. 9) in the quote below, alice identified that whiteness exists but it remains invisible to her and she is asking for a way to see through the fog. alice: i think the biggest thing is whiteness is fog . . . whiteness is fog, is not knowing how to how to deal with it, so i know things are different, i know i should consider it, but how do i do that? similarly, when rick was asked if he had learnt anything about himself as a white person, he hesitated before he replied, “oh yeah yeah i think it’s difficult to, i find that difficult to actually put into words i think.” ben asked if we were interested in hearing a story about “being pulled up as a whitefella” and told the following story: ben: i was desperately needing to pee and we were at this [sacred] men’s site you know and um we were there for about an hour and i was absolutely busting and eventually we left and i was the driver and we jumped in the car and drove for about 50 meters and i stopped the car jumped out and had a piss and this old aboriginal bloke says “is that what you’re doing? you’re all the same, you think you’re so powerful that even your piss is going to damage the place,” and that was just sort of, that that was a humorous thing but it was also just this like [pause] dunno it just showed me we’re, we’re, they’re pretty grounded, pretty grounded, pretty humorous, pretty resilient. in this story, the “old aboriginal bloke” uses “all the same” and “you think you’re powerful” together as a cultural description of white people. ben begins to say, “it just showed me we’re we’re . . .” as if he is about to describe an aspect of whiteness, but changes mid-sentence to describe first nations peoples instead. he is struggling with finding the language and falls back into deflecting belonging to white culture by disguising it behind first nations humour. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.5 in some cases, participants could see the centred position of whiteness and attempted to reveal this in their practice. in the quote below, rick provided an example of making a conscious effort to amend his spoken language to deconstruct the invisibility and normativity of whiteness when telling a story about settling into working in an aboriginal community. rick repositions what would otherwise be centered as normal when he corrects himself mid-sentence to add, “what we would think.” here he acknowledges what is seen to be “personal” is not a universal truth but a cultural construct. rick: almost straight away people would be telling me quite personal, what we would think of as quite personal, quite personal things like their relationships with each other in the community. another participant reflected upon written language, giving the example that an ecological character description8 could reveal the “western science culture way” of looking at the environment, and name it as such. aaron: when you’re writing an ecological character description um, you don’t say this is the western science culture way of viewing the environment, that’s just being placed there as normal and the only bit that’s actually cultural is the indigenous bit that’s in there . . . i’d like to see . . . language inserted in the work that we do to acknowledge that this is the way that we, this is a cultural way of doing it, it’s not the way of doing it. there’s other ways of doing things and potentially better ways um, it’s making our culture and the things that we think normal like [pause] they’re invisible at the moment, i don’t think a lot of people see the way that we do things is just part of our culture. g u i l t a n d v i c t i m i s a t i o n . participants noted that workplace aboriginal cultural awareness training was heavily laden with history, which elicited responses of guilt in dewnr staff. this response is a privilege of whiteness. the participants view knowledge of history as a necessary component to contextualise the inequalities between first nations and non-indigenous australians; however, gaining an understanding of australia’s colonial history can be “confronting,” as demonstrated in the quotes below. aaron: [in dewnr] there is significant guilt in non-indigenous people about colonisation and its impacts. ben: the feedback what i’ve got from the people in dewnr, employees, that quite commonly cultural training follows a pretty similar path which is some historical coverage, some conversation around the political reasons, the policy reasons for why we’re in the current situation that we are in. quite often people leave feeling pretty deflated, possibly shameful, possibly guilty . . . and they’ve left feeling quite victimised. 8 an ecological character description describes in detail the species, communities, and habitats of a specific area. 11 searle and mulholland: systems, self, and sovereignty published by scholarship@western, 2018 it is important for first nations peoples’ to tell their stories of how colonisation affects them, past and present (cowlishaw, 2004) and, in hearing these stories, non-indigenous australians can feel uncomfortable in conversations about whiteness, race, and its legacy. as argued by maddison (2011), non-indigenous australians must move beyond guilt in order to progress towards decolonisation. s o v e r e i g n t y in addition to reflections about systems of government in dewnr and their personal thoughts and feelings about whiteness, participants’ perspectives revealed how whiteness works in relation to broader processes of nationhood and sovereignty. central to any relationship are the terms on which they were founded (salter, 2013). the colonisation of aboriginal people was based on the originary violence of terra nullius (watson, 2009), and this continues to frame the overarching authority of dewnr. on one level, participants were critical of the government’s tokenistic incorporation of traditional ownership and the symbolic violence inherent in this. they also wished to value and incorporate indigenous knowledge, especially ecological knowledge. t h e p o l i t i c a l l a n d s c a p e : s o v e r e i g n t y a n d t h e s t a t e . participants reflect critically on the government’s symbolic acknowledgement of traditional ownership. they argued that reconciliation action plans and performances of acknowledgement of country9 are important, and welcome to country10 delivered by first nations peoples is vital. however, this is undermined when the definition of “traditional” relegates first nations to the past while western paradigms are normalised as the only system under which to operationalise this partnership, as expressed by ben’s critical insights the quote below. ben: so we espouse this and a lot of our planning documents espouse this, you know the traditional owners of the land . . . but how does that articulate? well it doesn’t at all. aboriginal people are consulted generally late in any planning processes. if they are consulted early my feeling is that they’re consulted on this kind of symbolic action side of things rather than actual input into management you know, so for example, i feel like this department would like signs [in parks] that say this land here was used for this and this area here was that. do we actually want to work with aboriginal people on the more meaningful management actions about what should happen on their country? no i don’t think so. r e c o g n i t i o n o f e c o l o g i c a l k n o w l e d g e : a b a b y s t e p . in addition to this critical take on tokenism, participants argued for recognition of indigenous ecological knowledge. however, what is 9 acknowledgement of country is based on a traditional protocol of giving recognition to the first nations country upon which people stand and pays respect to elders past, present, and future. it is performed by nonindigenous australians or first nations people who do not have ancestral ties to the land upon which they stand. 10 welcome to country is traditional protocol performed by first nations peoples who have ancestral ties to the land upon which they stand, welcoming others onto their land and paying respect to elders past, present, and future. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.5 accepted as valid knowledge, including ownership of lands, is based on terms defined by the colonial mission, underpinned by orientalist frameworks of knowledge. as moreton-robinson (1999) argued, first nations culture is only recognised by the state if it is traditional and fixed. this is reflected in the ways in which participants spoke about “ecological knowledge” rather than broader questions of sovereignty and social or political knowledge. there is a growing space that is incorporating traditional indigenous ecological knowledge in nrm in australia and participants spoke about the ways in which dewnr sought to respect and protect this knowledge. participants were highly aware of the issue of traditional indigenous ecological knowledge as intellectual property and challenged white possessive logic in terms of this perspective (moreton-robinson, 2015). joe tells a story of a biologist who ignored community policy and excitedly wrote an article about his “new discovery” of grevillea, which led to businessman looking to secure a financial monopoly on the cultivation and sale of the grevillea. joe displayed a critical awareness of the perils of the white possessive in which non-indigenous people exploit and profit from first nations ecological knowledge. joe: we did like a joint biological survey between parks and wildlife and the community and it was a whitefella who pointed out this, a unique plant he’d never seen before, grevillea, and . . . then went “new species holy shit that’s awesome,” went and wrote an article about it and published it in their newsletter without running it past the community first, which everything was agreed gets run past the community first. next thing you know there’s a fella with an australian native plant nursery with a pretty bad reputation coming out looking for it, brandishing the article going “oh i’m just looking for this do you know where it is, can i have a look?” . . . so because this particular plant had great horticultural potential beautiful flowers and all this stuff and it wasn’t on the market this fella wanted to get the seeds and go through the process of getting plant breeders rights so he would have the monopoly over the sales of that plant. so total, just stuff up, little miscommunication on parks and wildlife behalf created a big issue for people on the ground. similarly, rick explained the development of new dewnr guidelines is an ethical process to protect first nations ecological knowledge and alleviate differences in approach to ecological knowledge. however, while recognizing the importance of these critical readings, it could be argued that the nature– culture dichotomy underpinning colonial discourses underpin this focus on ecological knowledge. colonial and orientalist discourses have a long history of framing indigenous knowledge as tradition, as closer to nature. indigenous ecological knowledge, which is seen as traditional, is arguably easier for nonindigenous practitioners to incorporate under paradigms of whiteness. a more decolonising move is to recognise the full extent of first nations knowledge, which includes not just connection to country and knowledge of natural and ecological landscapes, but also understandings of the state’s political and bureaucratic systems, and the complex issues of first nations sovereignty. one participant decisively moved the discussion on from ecology, as indicated in the quotes below in which first nations knowledge of bureaucratic and political systems is recognised by non-indigenous people. 13 searle and mulholland: systems, self, and sovereignty published by scholarship@western, 2018 aaron: aboriginal organisations have to go for a whole different range of um options, say if they wanna keep themselves running, a whole range of different ah grants or funding opportunities, they’ve got to liaise with a whole range of different people and i think they’ve got really much better insights in how to bring all those things together, so coordinating things, how you negotiate and work different parts of the network to progress things and i think a lot of nonindigenous people are quite blasé to that sort of thing, i have been anyway, but it’s interesting to see how an aboriginal organisation works that, you know looks at the key networks, looks at how they join together, looks at what you’d need to bring them together um like in an agreement making sense, bind that and to start working it. the [first nation i work with] has thought about that a lot and i guess they’re working that strategy on the state and it’s really a interesting thing to see because a lot of non-indigenous people don’t actually have to think about that. rick: if you go and talk to an aboriginal group they’re very really switched on about those kind of things [political rights], now how they’ve arrived at that position is, i don’t really know what it is, i can speculate but i don’t know for sure why they’ve arrived at that point of view. c o n c l u s i o n on the whole, participants in this study were critically aware of structural inequalities inherent in their day-to-day work, and they provided some fascinating critical and engaged reflections on problems emerging in the contact zone. however, we argue that the participants’ struggle for a meaningful language to understand the privileges of whiteness, and they often find it difficult to describe “the fog of whiteness.” in addition, their attempts to incorporate and value indigenous knowledge in the main focused on ecological knowledge at the expense of broader debates about first nation sovereignty. this is a difficult task, in view of the tensions these managers negotiate across various aspects of their work— however, harnessing the critical insights and frustrations articulated by the participants is vital in order to explore issues that arise in the contact zone. we argue that a critical awareness is not enough, rather a set of strategies are needed to shift the emphasis from awareness of aboriginal history, knowledge, and culture (government of south australia, 2014) to strategies that tackle the broader issues of sovereignty and power. while these insights are useful, they are not generalizable— a limitation of the study. future studies, conducted internationally, examining perspectives of non-indigenous practitioners working in partnership with indigenous peoples will contribute to a body of knowledge that can inform policymaking and its translation into practice. this is especially important as the shaping of environmental policy is currently influenced by the scientific discourses of “experts” in the international arena (keely & scoones, 2003). as we have argued throughout, whiteness underpins processes of organisational communication, culture, and power (grimes, 2002). this in part explains how privilege shapes relations, processes, contexts, policy and ecology documents, outcomes of work, and the structure of institutional management (al ariss, özbilgin, tatli, & april, 2014). participants in this cohort are largely critical of colonial structures of government and the inequalities that arise. throughout their narratives, 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.5 participants demonstrated a willingness to overcome inequalities and make moves to counter unbalanced systems in this partnership space, especially regarding structural inequalities. they are aware of how tensions exist in the contact zone between different systems of government, leadership models, and knowledge claims. strategies that relinquish western, eurocentric ownership are required. this research has revealed some important insights that lend themselves to the following recommendations for policy praxis in contact zones and partnership spaces. while this case is situated in south australia, we argue that these recommendations apply to indigenous policy and practice internationally. we recommend: a. practitioners continue to challenge colonial governance systems so that governance structures in partnership spaces reflect first nations governance structures. b. indigenous peoples’ time, physical labour, and intellectual labour be valued monetarily and equally to non-indigenous people. c. the compartmentalised timeframes in western management systems be reconsidered. d. governments reorientate partnership relationships around indigenous ways of knowing. e. formal cultural awareness training be delivered consistently in order to include explorations of whiteness and western cultural habits, providing them with a language for whiteness, as well as understanding indigenous cultures. f. understandings of indigenous knowledges move beyond ecology to acknowledge political knowledge and understandings of indigenous sovereignty. g. traditional be understood as traditional-and-ongoing not traditional-as-past. h. dialogue, decision making, agenda setting, policymaking, implementation, and evaluation should occur on a nation-to-nation level, and treaty commitments and agreements should be honoured by western governments. as argued by smith (2012), decolonisation needs a radical reworking knowledge construction: the intellectual project of decolonizing has to set out ways to proceed through a colonizing world. it needs a radical compassion that reaches out, that seeks collaboration, and that is open to possibilities that can only be imagined as other things fall into place. decolonizing methodologies is not a method for revolution in a political sense but provokes some revolutionary thinking about the roles that knowledge, knowledge production, knowledge hierarchies and knowledge institutions play in decolonization and social transformation. 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(2013). climate change and indigenous natural resource management: a review of socio-ecological interactions in the alinytjara wilurara nrm region. local environment, 18(9), 1024-1045. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/13549839.2012.752799 young, s. (2008). indigenous child protection policy in australia: using whiteness theory for social work. sites: new series, 5(1), 102-123. doi: https://doi.org/10.11157/sites-vol5iss1id82 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.5 the international indigenous policy journal january 2018 systems, self, and sovereignty: non-indigenous practitioners negotiate whiteness in aboriginal partnerships tania l. searle monique mulholland recommended citation systems, self, and sovereignty: non-indigenous practitioners negotiate whiteness in aboriginal partnerships abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license systems, self, and sovereignty: non-indigenous practitioners negotiate whiteness in aboriginal partnerships ms 1484 lachance more than words rce.pdf the international indigenous policy journal volume 11|issue2 june 2020 more than words: outlining preconditions to collaboration among first nations, the federal government, and the provincial government nathalie lachance athabasca university, nlachance1@athabasca.edu teresa rose athabasca university, teresa.rose@fb.athabascau.ca recommended citation lachance, n., & rose, t. (2020). more than words: outlining preconditions to collaboration among first nations, the federal government, and the provincial government. the international indigenous policy journal, 11(2). doi: https://10.18584/ iipj.2020.11.2.10692 more than words: outlining preconditions to collaboration among first nations, the federal government, and the provincial government abstract since 2015, there has been heightened interest in reconciliation and renewed relationships with indigenous peoples. anchoring our work in the definition of reconciliation provided by the truth and reconciliation commission of canada, we, as practitioner-scholars, sought to better understand the preconditions to collaboration among first nations, the federal government, and the provincial government in alberta. this participatory action research was conducted with midto senior-level public servants, who were involved in the further development and implementation of the 2014 joint action plan to improve the health of first nations in alberta, in either first nations, the federal government, or the provincial government. this article concludes that collaboration must consider the negative legacy of relationships between first nations and federal and provincial governments, as well as between first nations and settlers. keywords first nations, intergovernmental relations, health care collaboration, preconditions to collaboration, participatory action research, health services integration fund, practitioner-scholars acknowledgments we most sincerely thank the participants of first nations, the federal government, and the provincial government who so graciously shared their experiences. disclaimer the views, statements, and conclusions expressed and the recommendations made in this article are entirely those of the authors and should not be construed as statements or conclusions of, or as expressing the opinions of, indigenous services canada. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0license. lachance & rose: more than words published by scholarship@western, 2020 1 more than words: outlining preconditions to collaboration among first nations, the federal government, and the provincial government since the release of the final report of the truth and reconciliation commission of canada (trc, 2015), federal, provincial, and municipal governments have outlined the need for reconciliation as well as their desire for renewed relationships with indigenous peoples. the trc (2015) defined reconciliation as follows: reconciliation is about establishing and maintaining a mutually respectful relationship between aboriginal and non-aboriginal peoples in this country. in order for that to happen, there has to be awareness of the past, acknowledgement of the harm that has been inflicted, atonement for the causes, and action to change behaviour. (p. 6) we are interested in that latter part—actions to change behaviour. while we believe there could be a range of actions aimed at reconciliation, we anchor our work in collaboration. our interest in collaboration stems from our experiences as non-indigenous practitioner-scholars who have worked with indigenous peoples for decades. we have worked in indigenous organizations, as a consultant in an indigenous program, and for a federal department dedicated to serving indigenous peoples. collaboration was also the stated goal of the 2014 joint action plan to improve the health of first nations in alberta, which is the focus of this article. its goal was “to enhance collaboration between first nations [organizations and governments of treaties no. 6, no. 7, and no. 8], health canada [first nations and inuit health branch—alberta region], alberta health and alberta health services to achieve quality of health services for first nations peoples that is accessible, appropriate, acceptable, efficient, effective and safe” (co-management, 2014, p. 1). in describing collaboration, many scholars highlight its three phases: preconditions, processes, and outcomes (butterfield et al., 2004; wood & gray, 1991). with this article, we focus on the first phase— preconditions to collaboration among first nations, the federal government, and the provincial government. we seek to answer the following question: how are efforts to collaborate and engage in reconciliation thwarted by unattended preconditions? literature review prior to examining preconditions to collaboration among first nations, the federal government, and the provincial government, we provide an overview of collaboration literature as well as contextual information on intergovernmental relationships impacting health care collaboration. defining collaboration wood and gray (1991) stated, “collaboration occurs when a group of autonomous stakeholders of a problem domain engage in an interactive process, using shared rules, norms, and structures, to act or decide on issues related to that domain” (p. 146). they identified six elements within their definition. first, it acknowledges that stakeholders may have common or different interests in addressing a given issue. second, it indicates that participating organizations maintain their decision-making authority. third, by referring to an interactive process, wood and gray highlight the desire for change among stakeholders. with the fourth element, they highlight that shared rules, forms, and structures may or may the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.2.10692 2 not exist at the beginning of the collaboration. fifth, wood and gray stress the stakeholders’ commitment to action or to make decisions. finally, they refer to the need for “the participants to orient their processes, decisions, and actions toward issues related to the problem domain that brought them together” (wood & gray, 1991, p. 148). collaboration has three phases: preconditions, processes, and outcomes (butterfield et al., 2004; wood & gray, 1991). the preconditions phase is concerned with problem-setting (gray, 1985; logsdon, 1991), where interests, legitimacy, and interdependence of partnering organizations are recognized (hardy & phillips, 1998; logsdon, 1991; weick, 2001), as well as where the authority and representativeness of members are assessed (fawcett et al., 1995; gray, 1985; huxham & vangen, 2000; hocevar et al., 2007; westley & vredenburg, 1991). they describe the process phase as direction setting (gray, 1985) or more ambiguously as the “black box” of collaboration (gray & wood, 1991) as the steps leading from preconditions to outcomes are not explicitly stated. some authors include elements identified as preconditions by other authors, such as confirming membership and clarifying decisionmaking processes (roberts & bradley, 1991), coincidence of values (gray, 1985), and advocacy for formalization of processes (roberts & bradley, 1991; westley & vredenburg, 1991). the outcomes are the results achieved by the collaboration. while gray’s earlier work suggests linearity of collaboration, her more recent work “highlights how meanings and power shift within the field as partners negotiate the rules and norms that govern the field” (gray & purdy, 2018, p. 13). this more cyclical view aligns well with our experience as practitioner-scholars. as this article focuses on preconditions, we anchor our analysis on gray’s six preconditions to collaboration: identification of a requisite number of stakeholders; positive beliefs about expected outcomes; recognition of interdependence; perceptions of legitimacy amongst stakeholders; obtaining a legitimate, skilled convenor; and shared access and power (gray, 1985). relationships among first nations, the federal government, and the provincial government we understand that there are important legal and jurisdictional aspects to collaboration among first nations, the federal government, and the provincial government. however, for this research, we are interested in the social, cultural, and political aspects of collaboration as our interest is in collaboration at the practitioners’ level. even with this narrowed focus, we acknowledge that many indigenous scholars have documented both canada’s colonial past and its ongoing colonization of first nations (alfred, 2009; corntassel et al., 2009; corntassel, 2012; coulthard, 2014; little bear et al., 1992; martin et al., 2017; patrick et al., 2017; simpson, 2001, 2011). to understand these political circumstances, we briefly examine the context provided by documents from the 19th century: the constitution act (1867), the indian act (1876), and, as this research was conducted in alberta, to three of the numbered treaties: treaty no. 6 (1876), treaty no. 7 (1877), and treaty no. 8 (1899). in section 91(24) of the constitution act (1867) responsibility for “indians, and lachance & rose: more than words published by scholarship@western, 2020 3 lands reserved for the indians”1 is assigned to the federal government, while section 92(7) grants the provinces exclusive jurisdiction over “the establishment, maintenance, and management of hospitals, asylums, charities, and eleemosynary institutions in and for the province, other than marine hospitals.” in 1876, the federal government drafted the indian act to consolidate existing legislation. records show that the indian act “rests on the principle, that the aborigenes are to be kept in a condition of tutelage and treated as wards or children of the state” (department of the interior cited in the royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996, p. 349). the indian act has been described as “providing the legislative base for canadian government control over indians” (little bear et al., 1992, p. xix). the numbered treaties spoke of a different relationship between indigenous nations and settlers. grounding their work in international laws, indigenous scholars highlight that the numbered treaties are agreements negotiated between sovereign nations (alfred, 2009; borrows, 2002; cardinal & hildebrandt, 2000; little bear et al., 1992; turpel, 1991; venne, 1998). further, cardinal and hildebrandt (2000), who conducted focus group sessions with elders, wrote, “their view and understanding of the treaties differed significantly and substantively from the written text of the treaties” (p. 25). they link these differences to the worldviews of the signatories: “non-aboriginal understanding of treaties and the treaty process is shaped by its colonial history. the first nations’ perspective must be understood in the context of their worldviews” (cardinal & hildebrandt, 2000, p. 1). for first nations, the treaties “were understood as land-sharing agreements that assured first nations the right to earn a living through continuing traditional ways of earning a living or by adopting new ways” (cardinal & hildebrandt, 2000, p. 69). while most canadians understand health care as a provincial jurisdiction based on section 92(7) of the constitution act, first nations understand health care as a treaty right based on the medicine chest clause included in treaty no. 6 (1876), which states, “a medicine chest shall be kept at the house of each indian agent for the use and benefit of the indians at the direction of such agent” (para. 25). first nations people understood it to mean “the full benefits of medicare” (taylor, 1985, p. 36). first nations also requested a medicine chest clause as part of the negotiations leading to treaty no. 8 (1899). federal delivery of health services to first nations began in 1904 when the department of indian affairs appointed a general medical superintendent (health canada cited in brede, 2008). management of health services for first nations and inuit was transferred to the department of health and welfare upon its creation in 1945. medical services branch (msb) was established in 1962 (health canada cited in brede, 2008) and renamed first nations and inuit health branch (fnihb) in 2000. development and expansion of provincial health care systems began in the second half of the 20th century. in 1967, the hawthorn (1967) study stated, “the indian should [not] be required to assimilate . . . in order to receive what he now needs nor at any future time” (p. 6). the study advocated for the “right of indians to be citizens plus” (hawthorn, 1967, p. 6). in its 1969 white paper, the federal government proposed “that services come through the same channels and from the same government 1 in our work, we use the name of the specific nation (e.g., cree, blackfoot) when known. while we know the nation of most participants, we sought to protect their identity by using the more generic term first nations in this article. in national and/or international contexts, we opted to use the term indigenous peoples (vowel, 2016). when we refer to other sources, we respected the wording and capitalization used in the source document. more specifically, while we do not use the word “indian,” it has a legal connotation in canada as it is included in both the indian act and the constitution act. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.2.10692 4 agencies for all canadians” (government of canada, 1969, p. 7). first nations respond by declaring the proposed policy “a thinly disguised programme of extermination by assimilation” (cardinal, 1999, p. 1) and a way for the federal government “to wash its hands of indians entirely, passing the buck to the provincial governments” (cardinal, 1999, p. 1). the royal commission on aboriginal peoples (1996) indicated that the federal government withdrew the white paper but “its underlying philosophy seemed to animate federal policy for years to come” (p. 203). the 1974 policy of the federal government concerning indian health services indicated that its provision is voluntary and not based on treaty rights (health canada cited in brede, 2008). in its indian health policy (health canada, 1979), the federal government “recognizes its legal and traditional responsibilities to indians” (para. 2), while also highlighting the role of provincial governments in providing health care. blackfoot scholar leroy little bear and his colleagues (1992) identified both the reluctance of provinces “to accept financial responsibility for services to indians” (p. xiii) and the reluctance of first nations to accept this arrangement as “[t]hey interpret it as part of the federal government’s hidden agenda to abrogate its constitutional and treaty obligations to the indian people” (pp. xiii-xiv). over the last 30 years, there has been heightened interest in increasing first nations control over health care (health canada, 1999) and opportunities for greater collaboration among first nations, the federal government, and the provincial government (co-management, 1996; government of british columbia, government of canada, & the leadership council representing the first nations of british columbia, 2006). health care collaboration in alberta collaboration is not a new concept for first nations organizations and governments in alberta. one of the better-known collaborations is the co-management agreement signed in 1996 by many, though not all, first nations chiefs in alberta and the federal minister of health. at the time we conducted this research, 39 of the 47 first nations governments in alberta were signatories to the co-management agreement. the co-management agreement allows first nations organizations and governments and first nations and inuit health branch-alberta region (fnihb-ab) to co-manage the fnihb-ab funding (co-management, 1996). beyond the co-management agreement, there are many formal and informal collaborations, including memorandums of understanding or joint committees between first nations organizations or governments, and alberta health, alberta health services, or fnihb-ab, as well as practical approaches to increase access to provincial health care on-reserve (health canada, 2012). the 2014 joint action plan to improve the health of first nations in alberta was a province-wide health care collaboration involving first nations, the federal government, and the provincial government. it was a two-page document outlining a new multilateral health care collaboration to unfold over an 18-month period, which ended as the assembly of treaty chiefs decided to halt all trilateral discussions in february 2018. the joint action health plan included three objectives: strengthening relationships; increasing accessibility, coordination, and quality of health services; and increasing first nations control of health services and programs (co-management, 2014). fnihb’s health services integration fund (hsif) funded its further development and implementation, which was in turn influenced by three 2015 events. the first of these events was the release of the trc’s (2015) final report, which in call to action 18 highlights the impact of government policies on aboriginal health outcomes. the second event was the election of the alberta new democrats in may 2015, after more than four decades of progressive conservative party rule; in its first speech from the throne, the lachance & rose: more than words published by scholarship@western, 2020 5 provincial government stated, “we need to return to a respectful relationship with this land’s indigenous peoples” (alberta government, 2015, para. 60). at the federal level of government, the election of the liberal party of canada in october 2015 was the third event. in its inaugural speech from the throne, the federal government stated, “because it is both the right thing to do and a certain path to economic growth, the government will undertake to renew, nation-to-nation, the relationship between canada and indigenous peoples, one based on recognition of rights, respect, co-operation and partnership” (canada governor general, 2015, p. 6). the similarity in agendas changed with the re-election of the liberal party of canada at the federal level and the election of the united conservative party in alberta in 2019. methods this participatory action research was grounded in our experiences as practitioner-scholars. the first author (n.l.) was working with colleagues in first nations, the federal government, and the provincial government to further develop and implement the joint action plan to improve the health of first nations in alberta. during the research planning phase, she sought guidance from the health comanagement committee. the health co-management committee had no objections and approved the research. her employer, health canada, assessed potential conflicts of interest and found the research complied with their policy. in order to meet athabasca university’s ethical requirements and ensure cultural appropriateness, we also solicited input and feedback from a colleague at the alberta first nations information governance centre who helped ensure respect for first nations’ processes, as well as the ownership, control, access, and possession (ocap®) principles (first nations information governance centre, 2014). afnigc provided confirmation the protocol was appropriate and respectful, and they provided much valued guidance, including assisting me in obtaining first nations resources and templates (assembly of first nations quebec-labrador [afnql], 2014; university of manitoba faculty of health sciences, 2013). the athabasca university research ethics board granted ethics approval. as part of the process, participants were assured anonymity and confidentiality and consent forms were developed based on an indigenous research model (afnql, 2014). we also secured a research agreement with alberta health services. data collection and analysis were informed by qualitative and indigenous research methodologies (afnql, 2014; battiste, 2005; brant castellano, 2004; creswell, 2008; gaudet, 2014; kovach, 2012; simpson, 2001; smith, 1999; wilson, 2008). participatory elements included interviewees having the ability to shape the questionnaire, and the opportunity to request changes to their transcript, refer colleagues for interviews, provide input and feedback upon receipt of the summary of analysis shared with wave 1 participants, participate in a focus group (n = 15) to guide analysis and dissertation writing, and comment on a summary of findings. the interview guide consisted of open-ended questions that had been reviewed, pilot-tested, and received input from indigenous and non-indigenous participants. all interviews except one were audio recorded. we validated the findings through a focus group with members of the joint action health plan working group. all 25 participants were midto senior-level leaders in first nations, federal, or provincial governments or organizations. of the participants interviewed, 17 are indigenous. the gender distribution of participants was relatively equal: 13 women and 12 men. the average interview length was 65 minutes. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.2.10692 6 the first author (n.l.) conducted all interviews, thus increasing consistency across interviews. we made 35 interview requests and conducted 25 interviews for a participation rate of 71%. wave 1 involved 21 participants. membership in the joint action health plan working group and steering committee was never formalized so, as new colleagues started attending meetings, a second wave of interviews provided an opportunity to hear them. a second wave of interviews with 4 participants was conducted in the fall 2016—10 to 12 months after the first round of interviews. in the examples provided in the following section, participants working in first nations organizations and governments are identified by an alphanumerical code beginning by the letters fn. employees working for alberta health are identified by ah, and those from alberta health services by ahs. federal employees are identified by hc for health canada. the 25 interviews represent over 26 hours of audio-recording and 700 double-spaced pages of transcripts. findings preconditions to collaboration while we were interested in the “action(s) to change behaviours” identified in the trc’s (2015, p. 7) definition of reconciliation, we anchored our data gathering and analysis on gray’s (1985) preconditions to collaboration. these included identification of a requisite number of stakeholders; positive beliefs about expected outcomes; recognition of interdependence; perceptions of legitimacy amongst stakeholders; having a legitimate, skilled convenor; and shared access and power. as we will demonstrate below, some of the preconditions identified by gray were useful in describing our context (e.g., identification of stakeholders), while others were not perceived as particularly relevant by participants (e.g., legitimate, skilled convenor). furthermore, the inclusion of historical relationships within legitimacy may fail to highlight the importance of this element in collaboration among first nations, the federal government, and the provincial government. identification of stakeholders gray’s (1985) first precondition is the ability to identify the participants “whose expertise is essential to building a solution” (p. 918). there was consensus amongst participants as they identified the partnering organizations in first nations health care: first nations of treaty no. 6, treaty no. 7, and treaty no. 8, alberta health, alberta health services, and fnihb-ab. both federal and provincial ministers provided letters of support in february 2015 (ambrose, 2015; mandel, 2015). a first nation participant said: we didn’t really get a signed commitment from those three [health co-management] chiefs saying, we’re going to strive to work to get an agreement. they never ever signed . . . and that’s where it’s going to get derailed. (fn02) another first nation participant questioned the readiness of some first nations organizations and governments: lachance & rose: more than words published by scholarship@western, 2020 7 i think you have some groups out there who are ready, and you have some groups who are not ready . . . do we collectively have enough strength there and vision and support to move things forward? (fn08) these statements were made in the fall of 2015, more than two years before the assembly of treaty chiefs’ decision to halt all trilateral discussions. as a participant in this process, i (n.l.) was aware that the membership of the joint action health plan working group and steering committee remained fluid because some partnering organizations did not formally appoint representatives, staff turnover occurred, and some regular attendees identified themselves as observers rather than participants. some participants shared limitations regarding their ability to speak and make decisions on behalf of their organizations (ah02, ahs01), while others signalled the importance of members reporting back to their organizations and the communities they represent (fn05, fn10). therefore, participants’ input aligned with issues identified in the collaboration literature: ill-defined membership list, ambiguity about decision-making authority among members, representativeness of stakeholders, and challenges in reporting back to thinly institutionalized organizations2 (huxham & vangen, 2000; westley & vredenburg, 1991). the main issues with representativeness were that first nations participants were rarely formally appointed and had multiple accountabilities—to themselves, to the collective, to their organization, and to the communities they represent. colleagues from all partnering organizations also indicated feeling limited in their ability to speak and make decisions on behalf of their organizations.this answers the question, who is at the table? however, gray (1985) asked not only who participates but “whose expertise is essential to building a solution” (p. 918). to answer this question, we consider the participants’ input regarding relationships among first nations, the federal government, and the provincial government. relationships between first nations and the federal government a federal participant acknowledged “the federal government’s jurisdictional role as a representative of the crown with respect to being a treaty partner” (hc01). however, first nations participants questioned the willingness of the federal government to honour the treaties. a first nation participant indicated: they’re [federal government] not willing to step up to their side of the treaty and honour the treaty right to health and deliver the services to first nations the way they should. (fn06) another first nation participant shared that the 1979 indian health policy limits the ability to support better health outcomes and health care for first nations (fn01). first nations participants shared that frequent changes in terms of policy and organizational changes negatively impact their ability to build and maintain relationships with government partners (fn08, fn14). participants also referred to existing collaborations, such as the health co-management agreement, which they described as an 2 westley and vredenburg (1991) defined thinly institutionalized as “lack[ing] a developed internal hierarchy and a central authority” (p. 72). the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.2.10692 8 administrative agreement that enabled first nations and the federal government to co-manage fnihbab funding (fn03). a federal participant highlighted its importance in terms of relationships: co-management goes a long way to help facilitate a lot of those conversations. we are decades ahead as far as having an established working relationship with communities. we need to nurture and honour that relationship. (hc03) some federal and provincial participants were more optimistic after the 2015 elections, believing that they may have a more supportive political environment (ah03, ahs01, hc01, hc02). relationships between first nations and the provincial government first nations participants expressed their and/or their colleagues’ concerns about the involvement of the provincial government and its potential impact on the treaty right to health (fn03, fn08). a first nation participant who sought to establish stronger relationships with the provincial government indicated that she had been told by first nations colleagues that she was sleeping with the government and was accused of selling out their treaty rights (fn03). acknowledging these concerns, provincial and federal participants shared: there has to be an acknowledgment of the development of the treaties and what those treaties mean for communities and how working with the province might . . . jeopardize the responsibilities of the federal government to those treaties [and] to fulfill those treaty rights. (ah02) some [first nations] might hold very firm that they don’t even want to have a conversation with the province, because they feel like the province compromises their treaty right to health. they really feel that the federal government represents the crown and that special relationship with the crown through treaty. (hc03) some first nations participants (fn06, fn15) flagged the poor track record of the provincial government as a partner: the province doesn’t have a good history of inclusion of first nations people or first nations organizations in their delivery model systems. (fn06) i think that’s something we keep missing the mark is, we sit around those tables, and nobody really says from the provincial side, “this is how—exactly how we can help,” right. i think it would be good to know that from the outset. (fn15) we’re all albertans at election time, but once the election is over, then all of a sudden we’re referred back to being first nations again, and the province doesn’t want to come on reserve and help us out. (fn06) some first nation participants saw this relationship more positively. a first nation participant said: “alberta health services now is ready to engage with us” (fn13), while another referred to the lachance & rose: more than words published by scholarship@western, 2020 9 excitement of ahs workers “to see things change” (fn14). another first nation participant highlighted his increased work with the provincial government saying: when i first came in [as health director], i did all of my work with msb and health canada. and now maybe 10% of my work is with health canada and 90% is with the province. (fn08) even among first nations participants supporting provincial involvement, at least one questioned whether ahs operates as a service delivery agency rather than a “political body” (fn02). as alberta health and alberta health services only provided in-kind support to the joint action health plan, some participants questioned their commitment (fn02, hc02). provincial participants explained their inability to contribute financially due to “challenging economic times” (ah03), or due to the implicit understanding that provincial funding serves all albertans rather than specific groups (ah03, ahs02). they hoped that a solid proposal could be supported (ah03) or that an equity lens would be helpful in accessing funding (ahs02). unfortunately, these items were never specified within the joint action health plan or the interviews and no provincial funding was ever provided. despite misgivings about provincial participation, some first nations participants valued their participation (fn03, fn08), indicating “we cannot address health without the province being at the table” (fn03). relationships between federal and provincial governments a provincial participant acknowledged barriers within the context of federal and provincial relationships: on the provincial side, i think the barriers are, well, the federal government has to fund some of this. you have to work out funding relationships, because if the province just goes in and funds, then the feds will just back out, and that [there] will be floodgates, and we won’t be able to afford it—there are so many fears. (ah01) the sentiment expressed is neither new nor limited to alberta. blackfoot scholar leroy little bear and his colleagues (1992) wrote: although the constitution permits the provincial governments to extend any services to indians that the federal government allows (and the federal government has been extremely permissive in this regard), all provinces are uniformly reluctant to accept financial responsibility for services to indians within their boundaries. in part this explains why indian bands are still outside the bulk of provincial programs. (p. xiii) on a more positive note, a federal participant interviewed shortly after the 2015 elections highlighted similarities between the new federal and provincial governments: we both seemingly have some common vision, some common commitments, similar mandates in a lot of ways. both recognize that we need to do better in terms of first nation health outcomes. (hc02) therefore, participants were able to identify stakeholders “whose expertise is essential to building a solution” (gray, 1985, p. 918); however, this did not always result in a consensus about who should the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.2.10692 10 participate in the process. while they agreed on the participation of first nations and fnihb-ab, they expressed ambivalence about provincial involvement, which influenced the assessment of legitimacy among partners. stakeholders’ expectations about positive outcomes in defining stakeholders’ expectations about positive outcomes, gray (1985) asserted that participating organizations “must believe that collaboration will produce positive outcomes” (p. 920). participants outlined many expectations in terms of positive outcomes. first, participants identified the need to improve health outcomes among first nations (ah01, ah03, fn04, ahs03, hc03, fn11) and first nations health care (fn02, fn03, ah03, ahs01, ahs03, fn06, fn08, fn10, hc03, fn11). a first nation participant described it as follows: we are fighting and moving for future generations, and . . . the focus up to now is really about improving access, about improving health care for those future generations. (fn08) second, participants highlighted the need for greater engagement of first nations individuals, organizations, and governments in health care delivery (ah01, fn03, ahs01, ahs03, fn13, hc03). a first nation participant said: we cannot expect the federal government and the federal representatives to continue to always speak on our behalf. we have a voice. we should be able to bring it to the table as well. (fn03) the participant added: this is where we bring the voice to the ears who can make some changes, whether it be to policy, whether it [be] within their systems, whether it be addressing communications, whether it be addressing education, cultural competency, safety, and not only just for first nations but every culture that comes through their doors. (fn03) other participants referred to the establishment of working relationships between all parties (hc01, fn08), the establishment of more collaborative approaches (hc03, ah04), and a more formal partnership that would lead to a memorandum of understanding (fn14). third, participants highlighted the importance of responding to community needs (fn02, fn03, ah02, ahs01, ahs03, fn13), as a first nation participant said, “[first nations] communities have to lead the process” (fn08). further, participants shared expectations for policy and legislative changes (fn03, fn12, fn13, ahs02), as well as more evidence-based approaches informed by health information (fn01, ah02). in summary, there was a broad consensus amongst participants as they outlined their expectations for positive outcomes. however, these remained at a relatively high level without agreement on next steps, which was acknowledged by a participant who said, “we can agree with all of it, because it’s so high level, and it doesn’t really get into the details” (ahs03). these outcomes were also ambitious considering the 18-month timeline of the joint action health plan. lachance & rose: more than words published by scholarship@western, 2020 11 degree of recognized interdependence gray (1998) wrote, “the recognition by stakeholder groups that their actions are inextricably linked to the actions of other stakeholders is a critical basis for collaboration” (p. 921). members of the working group described the joint action health plan as the only trilateral health table in alberta and as an opportunity to “chang[e] our narrative, chang[e] our perspective on what relationships should be” (ah04). many participants are involved in other collaborations, which led first nations participants to acknowledge colleagues who, through their work on other projects, had the ability to help other initiatives (fn08, fn15). others flagged the benefit of other collaborations such as access to specialists on reserve (fn08) and work with local hospitals to find solutions as issues arose (fn02). however, not all collaborations are viewed positively: one participant referred to “lip service” (fn04). she flagged limited engagement and fear of engagement by government partners. this participant shared her frustrations in terms of her engagement with the provincial government and one of the alberta health services’ zones, indicating that she had ceased to attend some of the meetings. she also shared her concerns regarding engagement saying: “don’t build a bridge and ask me about brass or silver knobs, ask me if i think a bridge is a good idea.” provincial participants highlighted the contribution of the ahs wisdom council (ahs02, ahs03) in supporting increased cultural competency. also, a federal participant identified the management of a crisis, the 2013 floods in southern alberta, as having positively contributed to relationships between partnering organizations: after that there was a different feeling, different vibe. it was the first time . . . the province put big money and actually crossed that imaginary line in the sand. (hc02) so, participants recognized increased interdependence between partnering organizations. legitimacy of stakeholders gray (1985) defined a legitimate stake as “the perceived right and capacity to participate in the developmental process” (p. 921), which includes historical relationships and prevailing norms in collaboration. participants talked abundantly about the relationships between partnering organizations and described a complex environment that went beyond health care collaboration. assimilation, colonization, and oppression participants talked of assimilation, colonization, and oppression (fn01, ah02, fn06, fn07, fn11, fn15). a first nation participant said, “i’m not a big fan of that assimilation policy, and that’s exactly what i see” (fn06), before adding “they [federal government] want to assimilate us” (fn06). he also indicated that “the underlying assumption that canada is a colonizing state is not recognized” (fn06). he further compared the relationship between first nations and federal and provincial governments as an abusive relationship: it’s like a relationship. you cheat on me a couple times, even if i go back with you . . . i’m not entirely going to trust you. and that’s where i’m seeing there’s a lot of abuse between the federal government, provincial government, on first nations. first nations have no choice. we’re still the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.2.10692 12 having to go back to this partner, these abusive partners. and we keep hoping. so with the new liberal government now we get slapped instead of being punched. but the abuse will still continue. (fn06) other participants described the treatment of first nations since contact: that’s probably the greatest understatement of all time [to say] that we haven’t been treated fairly but it does a lot to a people . . . in a very negative way. (fn15) this is also congruent with indigenous literature: as métis scholar carrie bourassa and her colleagues (2004) wrote, “at a fundamental level, we understand that the colonization processes that began many years ago and continue today have material and social consequences that diminish access to social determinants of health for both aboriginal men and aboriginal women” (p. 27). a first nation participant questioned the decision to maintain policies that are causing harm (fn01), while indicating that “historical harms aren’t from contact because historical harms continue as [of] yesterday” (fn01). this ongoing colonization has been identified by indigenous authors and scholars (alfred, 2009; bourassa et al., 2004; corntassel, 2009, 2012; coulthard, 2014; fanelli, 2013; little bear et al., 1992). further, the trc’s (2015) call to action 18 calls upon governments to acknowledge the impact of government policies and legislations on the health status of indigenous peoples. the treaties as the foundation to our relationship in interviews, participants stressed the importance of the treaty relationship between first nations and the crown, highlighting the medicine chest clause in treaty no. 6 (ah02, ahs01, fn01, fn02, fn03, fn08, fn12, hc01). first nations participants outlined an understanding of the treaty relationship that is congruent with indigenous literature. first nations take a stance upholding the treaty and not doing anything to delineate or move away from the treaty relationship and always bringing that to the table that it supersedes the relationship that the federal government has with first nations because their treaty is not with . . . the federal government it’s with the crown . . . before this country was even created. (fn01) the federal government does not want to live up to their side of the treaty. they’re willing to ignore it. (fn06) it’s a battle of words, english words. that’s what it boils down to. it’s a battle of what the government actually puts in black and white, is where the battleground is and always has been, with the intent of, basically in our view trying to get out of the obligation of the treaties. (fn03) indigenous and non-indigenous scholars also criticize the federal government’s approach to the treaties (alfred, 2009; borrows, 2002; cardinal, 1999; dickason & newbigging, 2010; saul, 2014; venne, 1997, 1998, 2007). cree scholar sharon venne (1997) outlines that “the written text expresses only the government of canada’s view of the treaty relationship: it does not embody the negotiated agreement” (p. 173). a federal participant outlined the negative legacy that impacts our discussions as follows: lachance & rose: more than words published by scholarship@western, 2020 13 there is a very significant negative legacy that comes into play with respect to the crown and treaty first nations relationship . . . unless we can actually address some of those barriers in the context of the joint action [health] plan, it definitely will impede the overall effectiveness that we can have in the joint action [health] plan. (hc01) a provincial participant (ahs01) shared that awareness of treaties was limited within alberta health services while flagging the opportunity provided by the provincial government’s commitment for renewed relationships. limited trust, lack of trust, mistrust, and distrust as first nations participants shared their perceptions of the relationship among first nations, the federal government, and the provincial government, they referred to “limited trust,” “lack of trust,” “mistrust,” and “distrust.” first nations participants shared their lack of trust as follows: the trust is not there, and, quite frankly, i don’t think the federal and provincial governments are coming in all honesty with their full agendas available to first nations people and organizations. (fn06) until we reach that common ground . . . it is going to be us versus them, because we’re always in a mindset that the government has ulterior motives, and it’s hidden between the lines in their black and white . . . and that creates a trust factor, we’ll say. (fn03) the trust level was so low that we didn’t want to be even seen in the same room. (fn03) first nations participants also referred to mistrust (fn02, fn04, fn05, fn13) and distrust (fn06, fn10, fn13) towards federal and provincial governments. in describing distrust, a participant indicated: i think distrust is a really strong word, but i’m not sure of another word to use. but just kind of questioning or wondering what the agenda or the motives or the actions are from either alberta health or from fnihb themselves, whether or not they’re really working in the best interests of first nations. (fn10) participants working for federal and provincial governments acknowledged the limited trust (ah04, ahs03, hc02) and one of them shared that “based on history, i think that’s really quite reasonable” (ahs03). racism and discrimination first nations participants shared their experience with racism and discrimination. at a personal level, racism was identified within the context of our collaborative discussions and perceived as limiting our ability to work together: and just being [a] first nation woman, myself, i have seen over time, and i’ve experienced individuals who are a bit racist. you can see it in their mannerisms, the way they look at you, the tone of their voice. and there have been individuals like that at the other end of the table, is what the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.2.10692 14 i [have] seen and i observed. but i didn’t say anything. however, over time i notice that they drop off the table, because they don’t have any interest in trying to address the issue of systemic racism within the system itself when they have representatives who are. it’s very, very difficult. (fn03) at a system level, a first nation participant linked it to concerns regarding sustainability of first nations health care which will segue to the next section on inequities of resources: i don’t like to throw the race card out there, but i really like to try and believe that we’re treated like all canadians and all albertans, but we’re clearly not in service delivery because we are not being protected . . . we are being delivered a service which has no sustainability. (fn01) inequities in resource allocation first nations participants were concerned about the lack of capacity of first nations organizations (fn03, fn04, fn13, fn06, fn15). one participant said: we could do so much more, so much more if we are just provided the adequate capacity to do it. (fn03) in identifying concerns regarding equity of resource allocations, first nations participants did not limit their comments to the resources required for participating in the joint action health plan, nor to the funding related to health care. a first nation participant began by sharing: “we’re being deliberately underfunded,” adding: if we would have had access to the resources that were taken out of treaty 8 territory at a rate where we could fund our own health care, education, child welfare, a lot of these issues may have been addressed already, because our capacity would have been the same. however, all the money gets sucked out of treaty 8, sent to the federal government, who then doles out a pittance to treaty 8 first nations, and the rest of the money is spent to keep the rest of canada going. (fn06) first nations participants across the three treaty areas (fn02, fn03, fn06, fn07, fn12) referred to perceptions of canadians regarding first nations and taxation. they indicated that they pay taxes and that statements to the contrary are not accurate. a first nation elder said: i think that the indigenous people of this great land are the biggest taxpayers in the country by virtue of the wealth of this country. (fn07) a second first nation participant shared that first nations have significantly contributed to the development of canada and referred to accusations of not paying taxes as a reason to deny services: accusations and everything that we don’t pay taxes, we don’t deserve anything kind of attitude. but, in fact, we paid up front for all these services. we didn’t even get 1% of the land in total of canada, and look at the billions and trillions of dollars now that they’re receiving. and we get peanuts. (fn03) lachance & rose: more than words published by scholarship@western, 2020 15 in summary, there are concerns regarding the legitimacy of stakeholders when using gray’s (1985) two criteria of right and capacity. participants agreed that the federal government and first nations have the right to participate; however, the involvement of the provincial government and agencies was questioned. in terms of capacity, participants highlighted the capacity of federal and provincial governments while sharing that first nations capacity was much more limited due to a lack of sustainability and insufficiency of funding. convenor characteristics among the key preconditions identified by gray (1985) are the convenor characteristics, which she defines as one “who initiates collaborative problem solving [and] has a critical impact on its success or failure” (p. 923). while gray stresses the importance of a skilled convenor, this element is not apparent based on the input received from participants. invitations to participate in the joint action health plan were issued by the federal senior steering committee member. some meetings were facilitated by an external facilitator, while others were facilitated or co-chaired by staff from partnering organizations. some first nations participants highlighted the contribution of elders to discussions (fn03, fn11, fn13), while others talked of the contributions of influential first nations colleagues (fn08, fn15). so, while gray signals the importance of the convenor, participants did not identify any convenors to the joint action health plan. it is unclear whether the joint action health plan would have benefited from a convenor or if this precondition is not culturally relevant as participants answered this question by referring to more than one individual. shared access and power collaboration literature stresses the importance of power and its distribution among partnering organizations (foster-fishman et al., 2001; gray, 1985; mayo, 1997). participants identified power imbalances (ah02, fn01, fn11) and the need to level the playing field: in trying to work together without acknowledging the history and acknowledging that those imbalances of power exist, there is the potential for us to not [be] walking in the same direction as we try to move forward. (ah02) we don’t understand the significance of the power of information. and we don’t understand that since time of contact and since before contact that western thinkers have been driven, their data have driven policy, policy change, and policy development. we haven’t quite grasped that concept because data have not been available to us it’s only been taken from us and what we have perceived as being used against us. (fn01) rather than referring to power, two first nations participants talked of control: we have given the government too much control over us . . . we have given the medical community too much control over us . . . it would be better overall if we go back to doing things for ourselves. (fn07) the elders are telling us we have to take control of our own destiny, our own life. we have to get [for] lack of a better phrase, our house in order. we have to know who we are, and we have to the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.2.10692 16 take control of our lives, not feel that we’re under the indian act, to put it bluntly, but that’s not the end-all that governs us. we have to govern ourselves and get away from this mentality of paternalism. we’re nobody’s child. we’re adults. we have to take control of our own lives. (fn11) in summary, participants identified concerns regarding shared access and power imbalances among first nations, the federal government, and the provincial government in terms of information and resources that extends beyond the joint action health plan. discussion in table 1, we provide a summary of how participants assessed the preconditions to collaboration. while our focus was on the joint action health plan, this summary highlights that participants provided a much broader perspective encompassing relationships among first nations, the federal government, and the provincial government, as well as between first nations and settler society in canada. among these preconditions, gray (1985) indicated that “unless some consensus is reached about who has a legitimate stake in an issue and exactly what that joint issue is, further attempts to collaboration will be thwarted” (p. 917). joint issues participants demonstrated a high level of consensus as they shared expectations about positive outcomes including improving first nations health outcomes and health care; greater engagement of first nations individuals, organizations, and governments; establishing working relationships between all parties; responding to community needs including through policy and legislative changes; and using more evidence-based approaches informed by health information. would this high-level consensus meet gray’s (1985) requirement of a “joint issue?” probably not. first, while progress could be made on some of these outcomes, they were not achievable within the 18-month timeline initially established. second, even though the two joint action health plan committees met regularly until january 2018 and talked about the need to narrow the “joint issue(s),” this was never achieved prior to the february 2018 decision of the assembly of treaty chiefs to halt all trilateral discussions, which led to the abandonment of the joint action health plan. does this mean that all this collaborative work was for nothing? no, the ethical space framework that was developed became part of the memorandum of understanding on implementation of jordan’s principle (first nations health consortium, her majesty the queen in right of canada, & her majesty the queen in right of alberta, 2018). participants indicated having developed a better understanding of each other, their respective organizations, and other collaborations. the joint action health plan was a forum where participants shared their collaborative endeavours to improve access to and/or quality of health care for first nations. in terms of practical implications and considering the successes shared by participants, it appears that collaboration is easier (but by no means easy) at lower levels of aggregation, as clarifying a joint outcome may be easier to achieve (e.g., improving access to physicians and other providers or seeking better services in a local hospital). these collaborations were perceived as paving the way for further collaboration and participants highlighted the need to create a mechanism to share information on health care collaboration among first nations, the federal government, and the provincial government. province-wide initiatives such as the joint action health plan were perceived as desirable for their ability to generate more systemic approaches to lachance & rose: more than words published by scholarship@western, 2020 17 programs, policies, and relationships among first nations, the federal government, and the provincial government. however, such initiatives are more challenging in light of the negative legacy of relationships between first nations and federal and provincial governments, as well as the broader scope required to acknowledge the needs of many partners, which further impacts the capacity to deliver in a timely manner and endangers legitimacy. table 1. summary of preconditions to collaboration preconditions to collaboration feedback summary identification of a requisite number of stakeholders • broad consensus around the participation of first nations of treaty no. 6, treaty no. 7, and treaty no.8, and fnihb-ab • first nations participants are ambivalent towards provincial involvement positive beliefs about expected outcomes • high-level consensus on expected outcomes impacting ability to identify deliverables recognition of interdependence • increasing recognition of interdependence perceptions of legitimacy amongst stakeholders • historical relationships between partnering organizations limits perceptions of legitimacy • first nations participants were concerned over sustainability and sufficiency of funding for first nations organizations legitimate skilled convenor • no legitimate, skilled convenor was identified shared access and power • lack of shared access and power imbalances among collaborators legitimacy for gray (1985), legitimacy includes two key elements: the right and capacity to participate. participants identified a long list of concerns regarding the legitimacy of partners including: • canada’s ongoing assimilation, colonization, and oppression of first nations; • canada’s failure to fully acknowledge the treaties as the foundation to its relationship with first nations; • limited trust, lack of trust, mistrust, and distrust of first nations towards federal and provincial governments as a result of assimilation, colonization, and oppression, as well as failure of the crown to honour treaties; • racism and discrimination of first nations at personal and systemic levels; and the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.2.10692 18 • inequities in resource allocations between first nations and federal and provincial governments. these legitimacy concerns are serious and underscore the collaboration challenges among first nations, the federal government, and the provincial government. these concerns suggest that collaboration cannot occur without reconciliation, which includes “awareness of the past, acknowledgement of the harm that has been inflicted, atonement for the causes, and action to change behaviour” (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015, p. 6). in terms of practical considerations, legitimacy concerns require the federal and provincial governments to move beyond lip service and references to renewed relationships and reconciliation. participants in the process must demonstrate a true commitment to collaboration, which would include working with first nations organizations and governments based on the priorities identified by first nations. in terms of intergovernmental collaboration, this work should lead to questioning and revising current legislations, policies, processes, and approaches. it also highlights the need to better support the management of inevitable conflicts as first nations, the federal government, and provincial governments seek to develop and enhance collaboration. conclusion approaching this research as practitioner-scholars, we understood that collaboration is not easy. in our search for practical approaches to enhance collaboration, we initially focused on the second phase of collaboration (processes) and the opportunity to enhance the four elements of collaborative capacity: member capacity, relational capacity, organizational capacity, and programmatic capacity. however, as we conducted interviews, we realised that we had underestimated the importance of the preconditions to collaboration among first nations, the federal government, and the provincial government. this led to this article’s question: how are efforts to collaborate and engage in reconciliation thwarted by unattended preconditions? based on the information gathered, we identified social, political, cultural, legal, and jurisdictional aspects related to collaboration among first nations, the federal government, and the provincial government. arguably mid-level public servants have limited ability to address the legal and jurisdictional aspects of collaboration. however, we believe they have an important role to play in the complex web of relationships among first nations, the federal government, and provincial governments. from our research, we identify the following recommendations: a. collaboration needs to be led by first nations based on their needs rather than being dictated by federal government and/or provincial government agendas. b. federal and provincial public servants should heed the trc’s (2015) call to action 57, which calls for more education (including about the history of indigenous peoples) and training of public servants “in intercultural competency, conflict resolution, human rights, and anti-racism” (p. 271). further, based on participants’ input, we also recommend learning more on the treaty right to health and the medicine chest clause; health from a first nations’ perspective; the broader context of relationships between first nations and federal and provincial governments, as well as between first nations and settler society in canada; and indigenous worldviews. lachance & rose: more than words published by scholarship@western, 2020 19 c. mid-level public servants need to understand that their conduct in collaboration impacts other collaborations, which highlights the importance of conducting oneself honourably. as a participant indicated organizational trust cannot exist without personal trust (ah04). in conclusion, health care collaboration among first nations, the federal government, and the provincial government is not a panacea but an opportunity for “actions to change behaviour” that will ensure that reconciliation and renewed relationships are more than words. references alberta government. 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(2015). honouring the truth, reconciling for the future: summary of the final report of the truth and reconciliation commission of canada. http://nctr.ca/assets/reports/final%20reports/executive_summary_english_web.pdf turpel, m. e. (1991). aboriginal peoples and the canadian charter: interpretive monopolies, cultural differences. in r. f. devlin (ed.), canadian perspectives on legal theory series: first nations (pp. 40–73). emond montgomery publications limited. university of manitoba faculty of health sciences. (2013). framework for research engagement with first nation, métis and inuit peoples. https://umanitoba.ca/faculties/health_sciences/ medicine/media/uofm_framework_report_web.pdf venne, s. (1997). understanding treaty 6: an indigenous perspective. in m. asch (ed.), aboriginal and treaty rights in canada: essays on law, equity, and respect for difference (pp. 173–207). ubc press. venne, s. 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(1991). toward a comprehensive theory of collaboration. the journal of applied behavioral science, 27(2), 139–162. https://doi.org/10.1177/0021886391272001 estimating institutionalization and homelessness for status first nations in canada: a method and implications the international indigenous policy journal volume 9 | issue 4 article 2 october 2018 estimating institutionalization and homelessness for status first nations in canada: a method and implications donna l. feir university of victoria, dfeir@uvic.ca randall akee ucla, rakee@ucla.edu recommended citation feir, d. l. , akee, r. (2018). estimating institutionalization and homelessness for status first nations in canada: a method and implications. the international indigenous policy journal, 9(4). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.2 estimating institutionalization and homelessness for status first nations in canada: a method and implications abstract we propose an accessible and repeatable method for calculating rates of institutionalization and homelessness by age and gender among status first nations in canada. we calculate this measure by combining census and administrative data—a method that could be estimated fairly easily over time. we estimate extremely high rates of institutionalization and homelessness, especially among young status men. we estimate that, averaged over 2001 and 2006, 12% of the status male population was either institutionalized or homeless. we show that this high rate of institutionalization and homelessness results in a distortion in the male–female gender ratio, which may have long-run implications for the continued legal existence of status first nations in canada. keywords first nations, status indian, registered indian, homelessness, institutionalization, gender ratio acknowledgments we would like to thank siwan anderson, pascal courty, david green, robert l. a. hancock, anke kessler, eric mcgregor, kevin milligan, david scoones, manisha shah, erin o'sullivan, steven stillman, jacqueline quinless, and all those who commented on this work along the way. we would also like to thank indigenous and northern affairs canada for the access they granted to the data and statistics canada's research data centres staff. any errors or omissions are ours alone. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ estimating institutionalization and homelessness for status first nations in canada: a method and implications there is a broadly recognized need to further develop indicators of indigenous well-being. in canada, specifically, there have been calls for a more complete set of well-being measures that can be assessed over time (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015). concurrently, there have been independent calls for a more complete and consistent counting of the homeless (belanger, awosoga, & head, 2013; schiff, schiff, turner, & bernard, 2016) and institutionalized population (millar & owusubempah, 2011).1 in this article, we propose that current national census data and administrative data from indigenous and northern affairs canada can be used to construct national estimates of the rate of homelessness and institutionalization for the largest indigenous population in canada—status first nations—by gender and age. while our proposed measure cannot separately identify institutionalization and homelessness, it is easily accessible and repeatable and offers a meaningful measure of social marginalization. our method provides the first and most comprehensive estimates of institutionalization and homelessness among status first nations in canada by gender and age and may, by extension, be useful for indigenous people in other parts of the world.2 previous work on institutionalization and homelessness has either relied on specialized surveys in large, urban settings or focused on certain types of institutionalization or homelessness (see for example belanger et al., 2013; government of canada, 2016; schiff et al., 2016). measures of institutionalization and/or homelessness have also largely been flow based; for example, these measures tend to focus on the number of homeless people who are housed in a shelter over a given time period. these flow-based measures are not able to account for the entire population of homeless individuals as it is only able to identify those that have taken advantage of these homeless shelters or other assistance centers. while there are benefits to these types of measures in specific contexts, our method has several advantages over such measures. first, we rely on pre-existing data sets that will be maintained into the foreseeable future, making our method both inexpensive and repeatable. second, our method offers an inclusive measure of social marginalization available at the national level. third, it enables the identification of national-level demographic patterns and trends that small sample-based studies may miss. given that current measures of homelessness and institutionalization for the status first nations population are often based on inconsistently collected sample data for limited time periods or regions, they are unable to provide consistent national counts over long periods of time. alternatively, certain regions and/or areas may not be adequately represented in existing sample-based data, and the homeless or institutionalization incidence in rural or smaller urban areas may be completely ignored. inaccurate or non-existent data on homelessness or institutionalization necessarily impacts service provision and 1 the homeless and institutionalized population includes individuals in all forms of emergency shelters, individuals in group transitional housing, the unsheltered, and all institutionalized individuals such as those who are in prison, jail, group homes, or recovery facilities. 2 while the details of the method we propose is specific to the canada, it may prove useful anywhere indigenous people are identifiable and systematically under counted in official censuses but are identifiable through other official or administrative records at the community, village, or tribal level. for instance, india has explicit laws and programs for the scheduled tribes and castes, australia has programs for aboriginal peoples, and new zealand for māori peoples. 1 feir and akee: estimating institutionalization and homelessness published by scholarship@western, 2018 policy advocacy for vulnerable populations of first nations peoples. the systematic undercounting of these populations can result in a systematic under allocation of resources to address their needs. the methodology described here only allows us to provide our estimates of the status first nations population. status first nations are first nations individuals who are recognized under canada’s indian act as “indians” for the purposes of legal rights and entitlements. who is eligible for status is determined by a set of descendancy rules from the individuals first identified as members of an indian band in the late 1800s. while these descendancy rules historically have been gender biased, legislative changes in 1985 and 2010 corrected some of the most obvious biases (see hurley & simeone, 2014 for a recent discussion). while the descendancy rules are not strictly based on blood quantum, they effectively operate as such. in our discussion, we relate how our findings may interact with the definition of indian status to have significant implications for the status population. in the next section, we will describe the canadian context and discuss the institutions that have generated the data we used. in the following section, we will discuss the data itself. next, we will discuss our method for estimating the number of status women and men affected by institutionalization and homelessness. then, we will present our main results, and, finally, we will expand upon these results, discuss their implications, and conclude. background: the canadian context, registered first nations indian status, and the indian register as of 2011, the status first nations population in canada was approximately 637, 660, which represents roughly 75 percent of the total first nations population in the country and 2 percent of the total canadian population (statistics canada, 2013a).3 the remaining first nations population does not have indian status under the indian act; however, both status and non-status first nations are recognized as “indians” under the constitution act 1982 (daniels v. canada, 2016). there are two other legally defined groups of aboriginal peoples in canada: the inuit and the métis. while there are legal infrastructures surrounding these groups as well, to our knowledge, they are not nearly as systematic and pervasive as those governing status first nations (feir & hancock, 2016). ideally, we would measure these groups as well, but we are unable to do so using the method we propose in this article because comparable government data are not collected. since confederation, the canadian government has regarded indigenous peoples as wards of the state for whom it has the responsibility to manage, define, and document. in 1951, the canadian government established a centralized indian register that consolidated all existing band membership data into a single list. everyone who is classified as a status indian is on this list no matter where they live and regardless of whether they are institutionalized or not. in order to execute the will of a status first nations person or make arrangements for the administration of his or her estate, the death must be reported to the indian register. first nations governments (called bands) are also required to submit death certificates as part their funding agreements with the canadian government. individuals on the 3 the more accepted term in canada is first nations but, where applicable, we use the terms consistent with legislation and survey sources. some indigenous peoples in canada (approximately 25% of the population) may not meet the legal requirement for status based on ancestry; yet, they still either ethnically, culturally, or politically identify as first nations. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 4 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.2 death certificates as part their funding agreements with the canadian government. individuals on the register are also required to report if they leave the country or move. the indian register provides an official record identifying all status first nations persons in canada (indigenous and northern affairs canada, 2010).4 indigenous and northern affairs canada (inac) is the canadian federal department that currently oversees the indian register and is responsible for enacting the terms and regulations set out under the indian act. the legal definition of status indian confers certain rights and benefits. for example, among first nations, indian status confers the right to live on reserve, vote in band elections, receive money from one’s band, and own or inherit property on reserve (furi & wherrett, 2003). historically, indian status has also limited other rights and access to benefits that are available to non-status peoples in canada. for example, first nations have been subject to forced education programs (e.g., the indian residential school system), forced removals and relocations, prohibitions against using their traditional languages, restrictions on their self-governance, and restricted access to and control of their lands and natural resources. furthermore, the legislation that determined who could be registered as a status indian was explicitly biased against women who married non-status men until the mid-1980s (brownlie, 2006; furi & wherrett, 2003; government of canada, 2011; hurley & simeone, 2014).5 differences in living conditions between indigenous and non-indigenous peoples are well-documented in canada and elsewhere in the world.6 status indians, especially those living on reserve, have poorer health and lower average incomes than non-indigenous people, métis, and inuit populations (pendakur & pendakur, 2011; tjepkema, wilkens, senécal, guimond, & penney, 2009). however, current estimates of homelessness and institutionalization are incomplete as they often do not provide national coverage or detailed information that is organized by demographic characteristics (belanger et al., 2013; schiff et al., 2016; truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015). incomplete measures of homelessness and institutionalization (specifically by age and gender) may have significant impacts on our understanding of the social and economic dynamics experienced by status first nations peoples. research or policy that fails to account for the relatively large population of young males who are homeless or institutionalized, for example, will be overestimating the vitality of the population. to our knowledge, there are two national data sources that have estimated indigenous homelessness in canada. both have their weaknesses and neither provides a complete picture; however, one omits nonurban settings in its analysis and the other omits institutionalized populations. first, belanger et al. 4 it is worth noting that indian status is a legal construction that may or may not have any bearing on indigenous peoples own political or communal identities (cornet, 2007). however, the benefits associated with indian status are non-trivial. for example, status may confer exemption from certain federal income taxes, potential eligibility for treaty payments, and participation in band-level programs and services. 5 the grandchildren of women who had lost their status under the old legislation were differentially treated until 2010 (hurley & simeone, 2014); however, the treatment did not differ by the gender of the children. these status women (and their children) had their status returned in 1985, but it took until 2010 for indian status to be granted to their grandchildren. 6 see feir and hancock (2016) for a list of citations documenting this for canada. for the american case, see akee and taylor (2014) and greenfeld and smith (1999). for australia, see pink and allbon (2008). schulhoferwohl and todd (2015) have identified counties in the us that have mortality rates for american indians that exceed national averages. 3 feir and akee: estimating institutionalization and homelessness published by scholarship@western, 2018 (2013) collected data from 18 canadian cities with homeless counts that included individuals with selfreported indigenous identity. their findings suggested that nearly 7 percent of indigenous people in cities experience homelessness, while less than one percent of the general population experiences homelessness. this leads to the conclusion that 1 in 15 indigenous persons in urban centers experiences homelessness—roughly 20,358 individuals in 2006. however, as schiff et al. (2016) have pointed out, these counts do not include any rural areas or smaller cities in which indigenous homeless population counts could be non-trivial. the second notable data collection effort, undertaken by employment and social development canada, is the national shelter study (government of canada, 2016). this study collected anonymous information from 1.9 million people who stayed in one of over 200 emergency shelters (out of approximately 400) across canada over a 10-year period. in 2014, it used a stratified cluster sample of emergency shelters to estimate the demographics of users. they estimated that between 38,080 and 45,820 separate indigenous individuals used a shelter in that year. note that this estimate is a flow (a count of how many people used an emergency shelter in that year) and not a stock, as in belanger et al. (2013), which may be thought of as a snapshot at a specific time point. thus, these estimates are not comparable. the flow versus stock data distinction is also important for thinking about the available institutionalization data. for example, to our knowledge, incarceration data that includes indigenous identity is only available on the number of sentenced admissions to provincial or territorial custody, rather than on the number of incarcerated individuals at any given moment.7 the sentenced admissions data would only provide the incarceration of flow into correctional facilities, but it would not provide any information on the existing number of incarcerated status first nations peoples (i.e., the stock measure). in the absence of a base year measure of the stock of people in provincial or territorial custody by indigenous identity, there is no way to identify the number of indigenous people incarcerated in any given year. raw admissions data may potentially count the same individuals multiple times if they are sentenced more than once (brzozowski, taylor-butts, & johnson, 2006). in addition, regional reporting standards for the indigenous identity of individuals entering the system are not collected consistently or systematically by all districts or provinces (millar & owusu-bempah, 2011). while available statistics suggest that indigenous peoples are heavily overrepresented in the correctional system (perreault, 2009), to our knowledge, there are no comprehensive national statistics by age and gender that capture the number of status first nations (or indigenous individuals in general) institutionalized federally, provincially, in city jails, and in transitional homes.8 for both measures of homelessness and institutionalization, there is significant room for improvement in accounting for the indigenous population in canada. while the recent studies mentioned above fill serious data gaps, we see our work as offering a more comprehensive, easily repeatable metric of marginalization for status first nations in canada. existing studies provide a relatively narrow 7 while there is information on the number of incarcerated individuals by gender and age on the census day, there is currently no information on aboriginal identity (kong & beattie, 2005). 8 the adult correctional services survey has collected flow data (mentioned above) and the integrated correctional services survey collected more detailed demographics, but both include all jurisdictions (perreault, 2009). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 4 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.2 accounting of homelessness. for example, in the government of canada (2016), the sample is based solely on emergency homeless shelters and does not include women shelters and transitional housing. in addition, neither study mentioned above reports full breakdowns of homelessness by age and gender,9 nor are they able to include populations in transitional housing and more broadly at risk of homelessness. our proposed method is inclusive of a broader definition of institutionalization and is also able to disaggregate these counts by age group and gender. indeed, it is these differences that are the most important for researchers and policymakers. as we will show, the disparities in the incarceration and homeless population at various ages suggests a need for targeted interventions and policies. to be clear, our measure is not a perfect substitute for those offered by other studies. first, previous analysis has focused on all peoples of indigenous identity, while our measure is only available for status first nations. however, in the context of these other results, our work sheds light on the comprehensiveness of these other measures. specifically, our method inherently includes all individuals in all forms of emergency shelters (like shelters for domestic violence), those individuals in group transitional housing, the unsheltered, and all institutionalized individuals such as those who are in prison, jail, group homes, or recovery facilities. since we know the proportion of all indigenous peoples in canada who are status first nations, our estimates could give us a basis for estimating rates among the indigenous population more generally. while individuals experiencing different forms of institutionalization and forms of homelessness are all in fundamentally different circumstances, these situations are not disconnected. for example, the definition of homeless often also includes those at risk of homelessness (gaetz, donaldson, richter, & gulliver-garcia, 2013) and it is well documented that those who have been incarcerated are at greater risk of homelessness and that residential instability is a risk factor in re-incarceration (bird et al., 2010; brown et al., 2008; metraux & culhane, 2004; metraux, roman, & cho, 2007; walsh, macdonald, rutherford, moore, & krieg, 2011). in addition, all these phenomena have been linked to the historic institutionalization of large numbers of status first nations children in residential schools and involvement in the child welfare systems in canada (patrick, 2014; rand, 2011). description of primary data sources the two primary sources of data are administrative data from the indian register and from the canadian census of the population long-form questionnaire. the indian register data are collected by inac and is available to researchers; the census of the population long-form data are available publicly online. while here we use the confidential-use long-form census data available in canada’s research data centers (rdc) and confidential indian register data for as much accuracy as possible, in principle appropriately categorized public data could be used. below, we describe the two data sources and indicate who is and is not included in each data source. it is these systematic differences in coverage that allow us to use these data to infer the size of the homeless and institutionalized population by gender and age. 9 canada (2016) does offer relative rates of homeless between indigenous and non-indigenous peoples in four broad age categories: children (0-15 years old) are 9.2 times more likely to use a shelter than non-indigenous people, youth (16-24 years old) are 6.4 times more likely, adults (25-64 years old) are 12.9 times more likely, and seniors (65+ years old) are 20.5 times more likely). 5 feir and akee: estimating institutionalization and homelessness published by scholarship@western, 2018 the indian register population counts we use confidential administrative data from the indian register at inac. the data are indian register population counts for all status first nations for each year from 1975 to 2015 in 5-year age groups,10 gender, place of residence (on or off reserve) and first nation citizenship. thus, all status first nations will be included in the register whether they are institutionalized, homeless, or living outside of canada. while the indian register should contain the official count of status first nations, there are often delays in the reporting of births or deaths that may lead to some discrepancies in the data. the register relies on band governments11 to report births or deaths to the federal government (i.e., inac). in cases where registered members live off reserve, or are hard to trace, band authorities may not receive their birth or death certificates. because of the delay in reporting births averages about 3 years, we view our information in this age range as quite poor. we also exclude individuals over the age of 65 since previous work suggests underreporting of deaths in this age range (akee & feir, 2016). for these reasons, we focus on ages 5 to 64, as we believe that within these ranges, the reported births and deaths represent a reasonably accurate picture of actual events and therefore an accurate count of the status first nations population at a point in time. the 2001 and 2006 censuses and the 2011 national household survey we use the 2001 and 2006 confidential long-form census to establish the status first nations population counts. the 2001 and 2006 canadian censuses enumerate all households and provide a snapshot of the canadian population on census day. we do not use the more recent 2011 canadian census data (known as the national household survey) because the survey methodology and completion requirements changed dramatically in that enumeration.12 however, the mandatory long form census has been re-instituted as of the 2016 census and thus our method should apply to future censuses as they become available. the canadian census contains a long and a short-form survey. all households and communal dwellings receive the short-form which collects only the most basic demographic information such as gender and age. while the short-form census is distributed to everyone in the population including those in 10 the 5-year age groups are not available for 1987 and 1989. 11 a first nations indian band is defined “as a body of indians for whose collective use and benefit lands have been set apart or money is held by the crown, or who have been declared to be a band for the purpose of the indian act. many indian bands have elected to call themselves a first nation and have changed their band name to reflect this” (statistics canada, 2013b, p. 22). 12 the national household survey (nhs) in 2011 was entirely optional and replaced the mandatory canadian census questionnaire in 2011. approximately one-third of canadians were invited to participate in the nhs, while 100 percent of first nations living on reserve were invited to participate. the response rate for the nhs was only 69 percent (with a weighted response rate of 77%), while it had been approximately 94 percent for the longform census (statistics canada, 2012). additionally, there was a change in the eligibility for indian status starting in 2011, which would confound any comparisons with previous status first nations populations. these factors work in conflicting directions and would affect our estimates of institutionalization and homelessness in unknown ways. thus, due to the lower response rate, the possibility of selection bias, and the change in the status first nations population, we do not use the 2011 nhs in the analysis that follows other than to compute gender ratios; its inclusion does not affect the results. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 4 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.2 institutions and shelters, the long-form census is distributed to only 20% of households off first nations indian reserves and outside remote areas. the population counts are weighted upwards according the likelihood of being sampled based on the short-form. the long-form census is provided to 100% of the households on first nations indian reserves and in other remote areas. the long-form includes a rich set of information on households including whether the individuals are being categorized as status first nations. we use census years that ask whether each person in the household is a treaty indian (equivalent to being a registered indian) as defined by the indian act of canada. a treaty indian is someone who is a member of a first nation who has a treaty with the crown. treaty or registered indians are also called status first nations which is the term that has been used throughout this paper (statistics canada, 2013a). since the long-form census is not administered to those residing in institutions such as correctional institutions, shelters, institutions for people with psychiatric conditions, or long-term care facilities, it does not include a count of status first nations residing in these places. people without a fixed-address also do not receive the long-form census (or short-form for that matter). as such, the census count of status first nations will miss those who are located in institutions or are without a fixed-address. while censuses are intended to enumerate the entire population, an individual may not be included for a number of reasons. first, individuals may decide not to complete the census form, or they may misreport information on the form. in both 2001 and 2006, not responding and misreporting information were illegal in canada and we assume that any information reported in the census data for these years is accurate. those who do not complete their census forms or who misreport face fines up to 500 dollars or 3 months in prison. one exception to this is the non-participation of a number of entire first nations indian reserves, most noticeably in ontario. a number of reserves and settlements refused enumerators entry to their communities in 2001 and 2006 based largely on sovereignty grounds and thus entire reserves were not enumerated. the size of these communities by gender and age can be inferred from inac administrative data and we account for the non-enumerated reserves in the analysis that follows. individuals who have migrated abroad will also not be enumerated and counted in the census. while there are many potential destinations for canadians, the united states is the most frequent. examining the migration flow of canadians to the us indicates that these migrants are highly educated and tend to be concentrated in the knowledge-based industries (dion & v´ezina, 2010). given the average characteristics of both groups, it is unlikely that status first nations men comprise a large proportion of migration from canada to the us. while we cannot speak directly to the characteristics of the status population living in the united states or elsewhere, we will form some estimates of the degree to which status peoples may migrate to the us using some administrative records from inac by gender and using estimates of immigration rates by age to infer the size of this population. third, and most importantly for our purposes, the long-form census excludes individuals with no fixedaddress and does not collect information on individuals living in shelters or in other institutions. this means status first nations men or women in these institutions or who are homeless will not be included in official census population counts. 7 feir and akee: estimating institutionalization and homelessness published by scholarship@western, 2018 methods: estimating the institutionalized and homeless population our analysis focuses on identifying two combined areas of marginalization for status first nations in canada: institutionalization and homelessness. while we are not able to separately identify these outcomes, we believe that this analysis is an improvement over the current accounting of this marginalized population. we show that there is a direct mathematical relationship between the status first nations population reported in the indian register and the census data. while the indian register includes all individuals who are status first nations regardless of whether they are institutionalized or homeless, the long-form census data does not. therefore, the census data is a subset of the indian register data for the status first nations population in canada. in order to account for these population counts, let us define !",$,%& and !",$,%' as the indian register and canadian census population counts, respectively, which are allowed to vary by gender, age, and time period. note that for our purposes a ∈ [0, 5, 10, 15, 20, 25, 30, 35, 40, 45, 50, 55, 60], where each number denotes the lower bound of each age group; g ∈ [male, female]; and, t ∈ [2001, 2006, 2011]. we do not estimate the institutionalized or homeless for those over the age of 65 or under the age of 5. given this, we can express the relationship between the population counts in these two data sets as: !",$,%& = !",$,%' + !",$,%, + !",$,%+ !",$,%./ (1) in other words, this equation says that the count of status first nations in age group a for gender g at time t in the indian register data is equal to the equivalent group in the census data with the addition of the counts of people who are homeless or incarcerated, those who migrated abroad, and those who were not enumerated in the census. these three additional measures are denoted by !",$,%, , !",$,%, !",$,%./ , respectively. thus, given administrative data for both those status first nations people living abroad and the population sizes of those reserves that did not participate in the census by gender and age group, simple algebra implies we can infer !",$,%, given the indian register and census population counts.13 in the appendix we discuss how we construct estimates of those living abroad (!",$,%) and those not enumerated in the census using administrative data. once we have these estimates, we are able to infer the number of institutionalized and homeless individuals by gender and age group by rearranging equation 1 into the following: !",$,%,0 = !",$,%& − !",$,%' − !",$,%-0 − !",$,%./0 (2) where the estimates of the variables in equation 1 are denoted with the hat symbol (^). we use equation 2 to estimate of the institutionalized and homeless population. in the results section and in the appendix, we also show how our estimates of the homeless and institutionalized population would change if we allowed for varying degrees of non-compliance in filling out the long-form census. 13 in the appendix, we describe an additional potential component—overcount of status first nations in the indian register due to non-reporting of deaths to federal agencies. our analysis does not change substantially due to the addition of this component. see appendix table a1 for these estimates. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 4 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.2 therefore, the accuracy of our measure is based on the underlying accuracy of the existing administrative and census data. it is our intention to use these two well-established data sources to create a simple and transparent method for counting the status first nations population. estimates of institutionalization and homelessness for status first nations in canada table 1 reports the estimates constructed using equation 2 and averaged over 2001 and 2006 under various assumptions regarding census participation rates. note that homeless includes individuals who are without a fixed address; they may live in automobiles or in a variety of locations with friends and relatives over time. the final two columns of table 1 assume full compliance with the census; the next two columns assume a 95 percent compliance rate (which is approximately the compliance rate of the population as a whole); and the last two columns assume a 90 percent response rate. appendix table a3 repeats the assumptions about response rates, but now assumes that only band members who lived on reserve (and are from a first nation that decided not to participate in the census enumeration) did not fill out the long-form census. determining the true size of the status population that is institutionalized and homeless depends heavily on which census response rate we choose. given that the census non-response rate was approximately 94 percent for the general population (statistics canada, 2012) and we have already accounted for nonenumerated reserves and settlements, we believe that the most accurate estimates are given by the first four columns. however, we can glean further information on the most plausible estimates from other less comprehensive studies. for example, we can infer a lower bound estimate of homelessness using the data compiled by belanger et al. (2013). they use data collected from homeless population counts in 18 canadian cities to estimate the urban indigenous homeless population. the study counted a total of over 20,360 homeless people of indigenous identity. if one assumes that 50 percent of these individuals were status first nations (which is the same rate as in the general indigenous population; statistics canada, 2007) and 47.5 percent were men (gaetz et al., 2013), then this would mean there are approximately 4,835 status homeless men and 5,345 status homeless women in these cities alone. these lower bound numbers exceed our lowest estimate for the number of status first nations women and girls who are institutionalized or homeless. this suggests that our lower bounds on institutionalization and homelessness are likely a conservative estimate, at least for women. 9 feir and akee: estimating institutionalization and homelessness published by scholarship@western, 2018 table 1. estimates of the institutionalized and homeless population among status first nations average of 2001 & 2006 assuming 95% response rate assuming 90% response rate age group male female male female male female 05 to 09 1,205 1,330 * * * * (170) (65) 10 to 14 2,760 2,370 990 675 * * (445) (315) (585) (230) 15 to 19 4,015 3,735 2,475 2,255 770 615 (130) (885) (75) (720) (310) (535) 20 to 24 6,880 4,165 5,730 2,910 4,455 1,525 (430) (315) (300) (195) (150) (60) 25 to 29 6,570 3,605 5,530 2,420 4,375 1,095 (730) (210) (720) (185) (705) (150) 30 to 34 6,285 3,340 5,240 2,130 4,080 780 (55) (550) (45) (555) (30) (565) 35 to 39 5,885 3,575 4,835 2,350 3,665 985 (460) (315) (430) (320) (400) (325) 40 to 44 4,660 3,170 3,680 2,005 2,595 705 (260) (625) (120) (785) (35) (960) 45 to 49 3,085 2,870 2,270 1,900 1,365 820 (335) (60) (145) (140) (70) (365) 50 to 54 1,675 2,250 1,045 1,500 345 670 (20) (105) (160) (270) (320) (455) 55 to 59 1,065 1,870 590 1,305 60 680 (240) (190) (350) (325) (475) (475) 60 to 64 955 1,360 625 935 255 465 (130) (305) (60) (235) (15) (155) total 45,050 33,640 32,415 20,010 18,375 4,860 (1,555) (1,005) (440) (85) (795) (1,295) note. the estimated population numbers are calculated using equation 2 under various assumptions of nonreporting to the census. the results are averaged over 2001 and 2006. the average estimated population size rounded to the nearest five is listed in the first row with its standard deviation below it in parenthesis. * indicates a negative number, which have been suppressed. all estimates assume no response from individuals who live on reserves that did not participate in the census. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 4 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.2 we can also infer a lower bound on institutionalization using data from juristat14 and other surveys. first, we use survey data from admissions to provincial custody on indigenous identity and gender (statistics canada, n.d.a) to infer the percentage of status first nations who are admitted to custody under the assumption that 50 percent of individuals who identified as indigenous were status first nations (statistics canada, 2007). from that, we estimate the percentage of status first nations who are incarcerated by multiplying the percentage of status first nations we inferred were admitted to custody by the total number of youth and adults incarcerated federally or provincially (collected from statistics canada, n.d.b, n.d.c). we acknowledge that this is a strong assumption— if indigenous peoples serve longer sentences, then they will make up a larger percentage of the incarcerated population than the percentage admitted to custody captures. however, under the above assumptions, averaging between 2001 and 2006 suggests that 2,765 status first nations men and 340 status first nations women were incarcerated in this time period. this does not account for anyone in local city jails.15 this suggests that provincial and federal incarceration may account for only a small part of our estimates. two patterns are noticeable in table 1 regardless of which assumptions are maintained about the response rate. these patterns are depicted in figure 1 where we show the estimated rate of institutionalization and homelessness gender and 5-year age groups for status first nations, assuming full compliance with the long-form census. this figure is based on data from the final two columns in table 1. the first observable pattern is that institutionalization and homelessness for the status first nations population peaks around the ages of 20 to 44. this result holds broadly for both males and females in the population. the second pattern that emerges, and is perhaps most striking, is that the magnitude of institutionalization and homelessness differ dramatically by gender (as shown in figure 1). while men and women below the age of 19 are institutionalized or homeless in similar numbers and women are institutionalized or homeless at slightly higher numbers after 50, between the ages of 20 to 44 we find that status first nations men are far more likely than status first nations women to be counted as institutionalized or homeless. in this age range, status first nations men are almost twice as likely as status first nations women to be either homeless or institutionalized. this has non-trivial implications for the population which we discuss in the following section. 14 this publication of the statistics canada agency provides timely data and statistics related to canadian justice and public safety matters such as crime, victimization, and correctional services. 15 the estimated flow of custodial admissions to the provincial system among status first nations was approximately 18,890 males and 2,320 females averaged between 2001-2002 and 2005-2006. these numbers count admissions rather than individuals. re-offenders may be counted multiple times. 11 feir and akee: estimating institutionalization and homelessness published by scholarship@western, 2018 es tim at ed a ve ra ge n um be r 5-9 10-14 15-19 20-24 25-29 30-34 35-39 40-44 45-49 50-54 55-59 60-64 age group female figure 1. estimated average number of status first nations by gender and age who were institutionalized or homeless between 2001 and 2006. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 4 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.2 discussion implications for the gender ratio, the well-being of women, and the continued legal existence of status first nations populations the high rates of institutionalization and homelessness among status first nations males compared to status first nations females between the ages of 20 to 44 produce gender imbalances in the housed and non-institutionalized population. there is evidence that gender imbalances in either direction (skewed towards males or towards females) can have significant negative societal consequence. existing research from other countries suggests that gender imbalances can result in increased criminality, alcohol, drug and physical abuse, as well as a reduction in marital status and fertility levels.16 our results indicate that there are more status first nations men who are incarcerated or homeless than women, which may have significant implications for marital rates, female labor force participation, and female bargaining power (angrist, 2002; charles & luoh, 2010; chiappori et al., 2002; mechoulan, 2011). our intention in this analysis was to provide a useful measure of homelessness and institutionalization for the first nations population in canada. an important component of this measure, and potential benefit, is that it provides an a more accurate estimate of on-reserve gender ratios since it identifies which age groups and gender groups are more likely to be homeless or institutionalized. as mentioned above, gender imbalances can lead to negative societal consequences and our measures may be useful in identifying the relationship between these ratios and existing conditions in first nations communities in canada. figure 2 contains the gender ratio for the canadian population and the status first nations population in the 2001 and 2006 census and in the 2011 national household survey. in each year, there are significant differences between the gender ratios in the status population relative to the general canadian population. however, these gender ratios are skewed in favour of women. in the figure below, there are approximately 93 status males for every 100 status females, while in general there are 97 males for every 100 females in canada. since males tend to be born at higher rates than females and thus there are more males than females at young ages (dyson, 2012), and the status first nations population is substantially younger than the canadian population on average, we would expect the status first nations gender ratio to be higher than canadian average. to illustrate how the gender ratio varies by age, we calculate the average gender ratio in 5-year age groups averaged over the census years 2001, 2006 and 2011 for all of canada and status first nations (figure 3). the results indicate that there is relative parity in canadians and status first nations gender ratios up to 19 years of age. over this age, there is a drop in the status first nations male–female ratio. the ratio reaches 0.8 by retirement age, while it is still above 0.95 for the canadian population in general. this means that there is a precipitous drop in the number of men relative to women by age cohort in this population. 16 for evidence of the effect of gender ratios on marriage rates, single parenthood, female bargaining power, and labour force participation see amuedo-dorantes and grossbard (2007), angrist (2002), brainerd (2007), charles and luoh (2010), chiappori, fortin, and lacroix (2002), and mechoulan (2011). for evidence regarding the effects of gender ratios on crime, see edlund et al. (2013) and south, trent, and bose (2014). 13 feir and akee: estimating institutionalization and homelessness published by scholarship@western, 2018 it is immediately obvious from this figure that the skew in the status first nations gender ratio relative to the general population is attributable to the population over the age of 19, and this skew in the gender ratio becomes more dramatic in older age groups. between the ages of 25 to 54 there are about 8.5 noninstitutionalized and housed men for every 10 non-institutionalized and housed women. similar gender imbalances are observed in the african american population in the united states (wolfers, leonhardt, & quealy, 2015) and have been shown to have significant effects on family formation and female wellbeing (angrist, 2002; charles & luoh, 2010; chiappori et al., 2002; mechoulan, 2011). the skew observed in the above gender ratios by age group can be almost completely accounted for by institutionalization and homeless rates among status first nations men. these gender ratio imbalances could plausibly explain the high rates of out-marriage among status first nations women given the effect of the gender ratio imbalances on exogamy (anderson & saenz, 1994; hwang et al., 1997; pagnini & morgan, 1990). thus, the rates of institutionalization and homelessness of status first nations men could have implications for the continued existence of “indians” as a political category in canada. limitations and conclusion institutionalization and homelessness are associated with social and economic deprivation. we construct a new measure for estimating the population experiencing homelessness and institutionalization among status first nations in canada. we believe a reasonable estimate of the percentage of the status first nations population that was institutionalized or homeless between 2001 and 2006 is 8 percent, on average.17 this estimate is extremely large when compared to the nonindigenous population’s institutionalization rate. in addition, since institutionalization and homelessness disproportionately affect men, these channels of marginalization result in a gender imbalance in the non-institutionalized and housed population. this gender imbalance has the potential to reduce the number of eligible status first nations partners and may have long-term implications for the legal existence of status first nations in canada. status is defined under the indian act and has several conditions about how this status is transmitted to the next generation. generally, it is based on parental status, but, while there are no explicit blood quantum rules, there are implicit ones inherent in these rules. thus, out-marriage tends to reduce the probability of transmission of indian status across generations. any substantial revisions to the indian act in the future should take this into account. 17 the estimate of 8 percent is constructed by adding the third and fourth column of the last row of table 1 and dividing by the average population size between 2001 and 2006 (n = 630, 110), calculated from the indian register between the ages of interest. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 4 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.2 all canadians status indians figure 2. male–female gender ratio in the canadian population and the status first nations population from the 2001 and 2006 census and the 2011 national household survey. m al e/ fe m al e r at io .9 .9 1 .9 2 .9 3 .9 4 .9 5 .9 6 .9 7 15 feir and akee: estimating institutionalization and homelessness published by scholarship@western, 2018 figure 3. male–female gender ratio by age group averaged across the 2001 and 2006 census and the 2011 national household survey. all canadians status indians m al e/ fe m al e r at io .8 .9 1. 1 1. 0 59 1014 1519 2024 2529 3539 4044 4549 5054 5559 6064 3034 04 age group 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 4 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.2 our measures of homelessness and institutionalization are also useful for first nations governments, provincial governments, and the federal government in assessing the extent of this on-going problem. timely and accurate measures (as well as distribution over age groups) will enable more appropriate and targeted programs and policies that can help the affected populations. for instance, if the homeless or institutionalized population includes a relatively large number of elders in a single region or first nations reserve, a set of policies aimed at elder care and elder housing may be implemented. this contrasts with regions that may tend to have higher rate of homelessness or institutionalization among youths. in this case, the appropriate policy may be a focus on alcohol or drug rehabilitation programs or employment training programs. more accurate measures mean better data for government officials and policy makers at all levels. this work does not investigate the causes of high rates of institutionalization and homelessness among status first nations in canada and provides only a very broad estimate of the number of individuals facing this form of marginalization. however, a large literature exists on both the intergenerational trauma experienced by indigenous peoples and the historic policies and practices that have contributed to their marginalization throughout the world.18 further work investigating the nuances of these measures would be valuable. it would also be useful to identify methods to separately estimate institutionalization and homelessness using these same data sources. if the short-form census collected information on first nations status in collective dwellings and institutions, this could be corrected. 18 patrick (2014) has outlined a good deal of this literature in relation to indigenous homelessness. 17 feir and akee: estimating institutionalization and homelessness published by scholarship@western, 2018 references akee, r. & feir, d. 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(2007). 2006 aboriginal population profile (canada; 92-594-xwe)., statistics canada. retrieved from https://www12.statcan.gc.ca/census-recensement/2006/dppd/prof/92594/details/page.cfm?lang=e&geo1=pr&code1=01&geo2=pr&code2=01&data=count &searchtext=canada&searchtype=begins&searchpr=01&b1=all&geolevel=pr&geoco de=01 statistics canada. (2010). emigration from canada to the united states from 2000 to 2006 (catalogue no. 11008-). retrieved from https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/11-008-x/2010002/article/11287eng.htm 21 feir and akee: estimating institutionalization and homelessness published by scholarship@western, 2018 statistics canada. (2012). final report on 2016 census options: proposed content determination framework and methodology options. ottawa, on: author. retrieved from https://www12.statcan.gc.ca/census-recensement/fc-rf/reports-rapports/r2_index-eng.cfm statistics canada. (2013a). aboriginal peoples in canada: first nations people, métis and inuit. national household survey, 2011. ottawa, on: author. retrieved from http://www12.statcan.gc.ca/nhs-enm/2011/as-sa/99-011-x/99-011-x2011001-eng.pdf statistics canada. (2013b). national household survey dictionary, 2011. ottawa, on: author. retrieved from https://www12.statcan.gc.ca/nhs-enm/2011/ref/dict/99-000-x2011001eng.pdf tjepkema, m., wilkins, r., senécal, s., guimond, r., & penney, c. (2009). mortality of métis and registered indian adults in canada: an 11-year follow-up study. statistics canada health reports, 20(4), 31-63. truth and reconciliation commission of canada (2015). honouring the truth, reconciling for the future: summary of the final report of the truth and reconciliation commission of canada. retrieved from http://publications.gc.ca/collections/collection_2015/trc/ir4-7-2015-eng.pdf walsh, c. a., macdonald, p., rutherford, g. e., moore, k., & krieg, b. (2011). homelessness and incarceration among aboriginal women: an integrative literature review. pimatisiwin: a journal of aboriginal and indigenous community health, 9(2), 363386. wolfers, j., leonhardt, d., & quealy, k. (2015, april 20). 1.5 million missing black men. the new york times. retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2015/04/20/upshot/missingblack-men.html 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 4 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.2 a,t a,t appendix non-enumeration in the census (estimating ηne ) we adjust the indian register counts by excluding population counts of status indians that did not participate in the canadian census. the confidential-use census data allows us to identify the communities and bands that are not enumerated in the census, and we are thus able to remove these individuals from the indian register data. in 2001, 30 reserves were not included in the census and in the 2006 census, 22 reserves were not included. some of the excluded reserves are quite large, including the reserve with the largest population in canada: six nations 40, which has over 25,000 members with approximately half living on reserve. the vast majority of individuals who chose not to participate are from the province of ontario. table a2 reports the number of individuals excluded from the indian register. depending on the year, we exclude as many as 48,350 individuals. in our estimates, we make various assumptions regarding response rates. while our baseline estimates assume only those living on reserve did not fill out the census, in the appendix we make the extreme assumption that all individuals who were members of bands who were associated with reserves that were not enumerated did not fill out the census. we show these results for two reasons. first, it provides more conservative estimates of the homeless and institutionalized population. second, it seems to be a plausible assumption given the observed response rates of communities when the census is viewed as optional. the 2011 nhs is an optional survey and thus statistics canada published non-response rates by census subdivision for this survey. these nonresponse rates can be matched to reserves. in the communities that did not participate in the census the year before, response rates were extraordinarily low: sometimes as low as 6 percent. if band members interpret their reserves not participating in the census as giving them legal immunity from filling out the census, then they may be less likely to participate. migration abroad (estimating ηa) we also adjust the indian register data to account for individuals who are living outside of canada. the indian register provides information on population counts by band, gender, place of residence, and year (but not age group) for status indians living outside of canada. we use these counts to estimate the number of people with status indian who are included in the indian register data but would not be included in the census since they are outside of the country. in order to estimate this by age group, we use recent reports on the age distribution of canadians living in the united states to back out the status indian counts. finnie (2006) reported that 1 in 1,000 canadians leave canada in a given year. while not strictly comparable, the indian register data suggest that in 2006 approximately 16,000 status indians were residing outside canada or nearly 2 percent of all status indians. for these numbers by gender and age group, see table a4. once one excludes reserves that did not participate in the census from these migration counts, the estimated number of status indians living outside of canada falls to approximately 9,000 individuals. it is these adjusted numbers that are reported in table a4. 23 feir and akee: estimating institutionalization and homelessness published by scholarship@western, 2018 table a1. estimated overcounting in the indian register 2001 2006 2011 age group male female male female male female 05 to 09 0 5 0 5 0 0 10 to 14 0 5 0 5 0 5 15 to 19 5 5 5 5 5 5 20 to 24 5 10 10 10 5 10 25 to 29 10 10 5 10 10 10 30 to 34 10 20 10 15 10 15 35 to 39 20 25 20 25 20 25 40 to 44 55 25 55 25 50 25 45 to 49 65 50 80 50 80 55 50 to 54 80 60 95 70 115 75 55 to 59 115 65 125 80 150 90 60 to 64 120 85 145 95 165 115 total 490 360 550 390 610 430 note. these estimates constructed via the procedure in the methods section. these numbers of “overcounting” in the indian register due to underreporting of deaths are estimated using the number of deaths in the register by age and gender back until 1972 and the mortality rates for five-year age cohorts estimated in each year until 2011 averaged over each five-year period. scaling factors for sub-geographies between the vital statistics data and the inac data were used to form national level rates of under reported deaths (“overcounted persons”) in the register. 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 4 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.2 table a2. estimated number of persons from bands that did not participate in the census but who are counted in the indian register 2001 male female age group on reserve off reserve on reserve off reserve 0 to 04 1,790 680 1,930 640 05 to 09 2,420 1,070 2,570 1,140 10 to 14 2,140 1,050 2,360 1,150 15 to 19 1,910 1,230 2,010 1,130 20 to 24 1,740 1,240 1,770 1,250 25 to 29 1,740 1,450 1,860 1,430 30 to 34 1,890 1,590 1,890 1,500 35 to 39 1,840 1,620 1,770 1,410 40 to 44 1,550 1,510 1,410 1,080 45 to 49 2,530 1,000 2,590 1,100 50 to 54 1,150 1,320 1,060 920 55 to 59 890 1,070 790 690 60 to 64 770 830 580 480 65 + 2,030 2,370 1,370 1,340 all ages 24,380 18,040 23,970 15,250 total by gender 42,420 39,220 25 feir and akee: estimating institutionalization and homelessness published by scholarship@western, 2018 table a2. estimated number of persons from bands that did not participate in the census but who are counted in the indian register (continued) 2006 female male male age group on reserve off reserve on reserve off reserve 0 to 04 1,280 530 1,360 510 05 to 09 2,320 1,110 2,390 1,180 10 to 14 2,210 1,200 2,320 1,250 15 to 19 1,880 1,190 2,100 1,230 20 to 24 1,640 1,310 1,800 1,170 25 to 29 1,560 1,280 1,620 1,240 30 to 34 1,580 1,490 1,700 1,410 35 to 39 1,760 1,670 1,770 1,490 40 to 44 1,740 1,680 1,660 1,420 45 to 49 2,040 940 2,140 910 50 to 54 1,470 1,530 1,320 1,100 55 to 59 1,100 1,280 1,010 900 60 to 64 860 1,050 720 680 65 + 2,360 2,910 1,560 1,550 all ages 23,770 19,150 23,450 16,030 total by gender 42,920 39,480 note. all counts are rounded to the closest 10. these are the number of individuals excluded from the indian register counts in order to make them comparable to the census. 26 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 4 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.2 table a3. estimates of the status first nations institutionalized and homeless population: high non-response assumption average of 2001 & 2006 for canada assuming a 95% response rate assuming a 90% response rate age group male female male female male female 05 to 09 205 360 (40) (110) 10 to 14 1595 1285 130 (480) (290) (185) 15 to 19 2,820 2,605 1,280 1,125 (60) (780) (150) (615) 20 to 24 5,705 2,955 4,555 1,705 3,280 315 (360) (350) (225) (230) (80) (95) 25 to 29 5,360 2,335 4,320 1,145 3,165 (790) (165) (780) (135) (765) 30 to 34 4,950 1,975 3,905 765 2,740 (80) (425) (90) (435) (105) 35 to 39 4,435 2,035 3,380 810 2,210 (520) (390) (490) (390) (460) 40 to 44 3,210 1,525 2,235 470 1,145 (205) (660) (65) (660) (90) 45 to 49 1,835 1,280 1,020 310 170 (95) (60) (95) (260) (240) 50 to 54 665 825 115 185 (140) (250) (165) (260) 55 to 59 275 695 75 230 (385) (330) (105) (325) 60 to 64 375 420 50 25 (10) (145) (70) (35) total 31,425 18,295 18,790 4,660 4,750 315 (1,050) (495) (60) (595) (1,300) (95) note. these results are calculated using equation 2 under various assumptions of non-reporting to the census. all estimates assume no response from everyone who belonged to a band whose reserve did not participate in the census whether they lived on or off reserve. the results here are averaged for 2001 and 2006. negative numbers are suppressed and represented by a blank cell. the average counts rounded to the nearest five are listed in the first row with standard deviations below in parentheses. 27 feir and akee: estimating institutionalization and homelessness published by scholarship@western, 2018 table a4. estimates of migration among status first nations by age group, gender, and year age group % assumed 2001 2006 female male female male 0 to 04 5.75% 280 220 350 270 05 to 09 5.75% 280 220 350 270 10 to 14 5.75% 280 220 350 270 15 to 19 5.75% 280 220 350 270 20 to 24 10.60% 520 410 640 510 25 to 29 10.60% 520 410 640 510 30 to 34 10.60% 520 410 640 510 35 to 39 10.60% 520 410 640 510 40 to 44 10.60% 520 410 640 510 45 to 49 5% 240 190 300 240 50 to 54 5% 240 190 300 240 55 to 59 3.50% 170 130 210 170 60 to 64 3.50% 170 130 210 170 65 & over 0.60% 290 230 360 290 total 100% 4,860 3,850 6,020 4,780 note. all counts are rounded to the closest 10. these are the number of individuals subtracted from the indian register counts in order to make them comparable to the census since these individuals are not living in canada. the age distribution of status first nations no longer living in canada was assumed to follow the age distribution of recent migrants to the united states and was taken from statistics canada (2010) estimated from the 2006 american community survey. the distribution of emigrants is: 0-19 years 23%, 20 to 44 years 53%, 45-54 years 10%, 55 to 64 years 7%, and 65 years and over 6%. we then divide up these percentages into equal parts for our age groupings. for example, we have 4 age groups from 0-19, so there is 5.75% in each group. we then divide this by 100 and multiply for each gender and year, the population counts living outside of canada we derived from the indian register. 28 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 4 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.2 the international indigenous policy journal october 2018 estimating institutionalization and homelessness for status first nations in canada: a method and implications donna l. feir randall akee recommended citation estimating institutionalization and homelessness for status first nations in canada: a method and implications abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license estimating institutionalization and homelessness for status first nations in canada: a method and implications ms 10859 spence the covid-19 pandemic rce_nds_resubmission 27sept2020.pdf the international indigenous policy journal volume 11 | issue 3 september 2020 the covid-19 pandemic: informing policy decision-making for a vulnerable population nicholas spence university of toronto, canada, nicholas.spence@utoronto.ca vivian chau rotman research institute, baycrest health sciences, canada, v4chau@uwaterloo.ca maryam s. farvid harvard t.h. chan school of public health, united states, mfarvid@hsph.harvard.edu jerry p. white western university, canada, white@uwo.ca paranthaman rasalingam department of health and society, university of toronto, canada, james.rasalingam@utoronto.ca lawrence loh dalla lana school of public health, university of toronto, canada, lawrence.loh@peelregion.ca recommended citation spence, n., chau, v., farvid, m. s., white, j. p., rasalingam, p., & loh, l. (2020). the covid-19 pandemic: informing policy decision-making for a vulnerable population. the international indigenous policy journal, 11(3). doi: https://10.18584/iipj.year.volume.issue.paper#10859 the covid-19 pandemic: informing policy decision-making for a vulnerable population abstract the covid-19 pandemic has significantly impacted society. vulnerable populations are at heightened risk for exposure, as well as adverse health and social consequences. policymakers are operating under difficult circumstances, making crucial policy decisions to maximize impact and mitigate harm, with limited scientific evidence. this article examines the pronounced vulnerability of indigenous peoples in canada to the pandemic. we highlight the importance of moving beyond individual-level risk factors associated with covid-19 by identifying and classifying indigenous communities most vulnerable to the pandemic. we propose the use of a social diagnostic tool, the community well-being index, rooted in the social determinants of health, to predict community vulnerability and potentially guide policy decision-making in the fight against covid-19. keywords corona virus, pandemic, policy, community risk, social determinants of health, covid-19, well-being, vulnerable population, inequity, indigenous peoples, aboriginal peoples, first nations creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. 1 spence et al.: the covid-19 pandemic published by scholarship@western the covid-19 pandemic: informing policy decision-making for a vulnerable population pandemics are a relatively rare but potentially catastrophic disaster. although it may seem distant in the past, it was just over 10 years ago that the world health organization announced the arrival of pandemic influenza h1n1/09. a decade has brought the emergence of a novel coronavirus, originating in wuhan, china, called severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (sars-cov-2), which causes the coronavirus disease 2019 (covid-19). on march 11, 2020, the world health organization declared this novel respiratory disease a pandemic. as of may 30, 2020, according to the covid-19 case tracker from johns hopkins university (2020), there were about 6.1 million global confirmed cases and 368,604 deaths and, for canada, there were 90,179 confirmed cases and 7,073 deaths (health canada, 2020a). a recent model in the united states estimates the infection mortality rate among symptomatic cases at 1.3%, which is 13 times higher than seasonal influenza at 0.1% (basu, 2020). indeed, the high contagiousness and mortality rate of covid19 indicate the severity of this infectious disease (basu, 2020; meyerowitz-katz & merone, 2020; sanche et al., 2020). as a novel virus, initial control measures were implemented, owing to concerns of widespread population susceptibility to infection from a biological perspective. nevertheless, mounting evidence indicates that rates of infection and death mirror general patterns of social inequities (grabb, 2007), notably those based on race and socioeconomic status (chen & krieger, 2020). these key social determinants of health operate in numerous ways to affect risk of infection, including limited capacity for physical distancing and increased virus exposure; for example, low socioeconomic status is positively associated with inadequate housing, characterized by crowding and housing in need of major repairs; high-risk working conditions requiring in-person interactions; and reduced access to health-promoting resources. similarly, racialized minorities disproportionately have low socioeconomic status, reside in inadequate housing conditions, and work in high-risk jobs. for racialized minorities, such as indigenous peoples, the historic processes rooted in colonialism and ongoing systemic racism within social institutions accounts for many of the inequities across risk factors observed (royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996; truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015; white et al., 2007). this disproportionate risk associated with covid-19 has not gone unrecognized by the public. a recent ipsos poll across 15 countries showed that about 60% of people in canada are concerned for those who are vulnerable or at-risk amid covid-19 (bricker, 2020). these potentially disproportionate devastating effects of covid-19 among vulnerable populations, including indigenous peoples, brings previous work on pandemic h1n1/09 into stark focus. during pandemic h1n1/09, we outlined this risk in detail: efforts to mitigate the impact of [h1n1/09] . . . fail to address the underlying social factors, which leave many [indigenous] communities “at risk.” until these social factors are ameliorated, we will continue to witness disastrous outcomes with many faces for years to come. (spence & white, 2010, conclusion section, para. 1) those previously outlined conditions continue to be a pressing issue in canada’s response to covid19. despite improvements in the socio-economic well-being of indigenous peoples over time, the relative gap between indigenous and non-indigenous populations continues to be substantial 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.10859 (indigenous services canada, 2019), and the importance of intra-indigenous differences are often overlooked (spence, 2016). the biomedical tools in our arsenal to combat covid-19 are limited, with no clinically proven treatments or vaccines and limited testing capacity. this situation has led to the focus on nonpharmacological interventions, encouraging individual adherence to measures such as proper hygienic practices and physical distancing to reduce transmission of the virus (world health organization, 2020e). these efforts have been supplemented by macro-level policy responses, including large-scale closures, regulations limiting physical interactions, and strategic resource allocation. policy makers at all levels continue to be faced with making difficult decisions to address current shortfalls, anticipate future needs, and streamline limited resources, where they can maximize impact to mitigate harm. this is especially challenging for vulnerable populations. another key characteristic of the pandemic is the rapidly evolving scientific understanding of the situation day-to-day, which means many decisions are made in a context with a shortage of sound scientific evidence to guide the decisionmaking process. in this respect, we want to contribute to the discourse by leveraging an existing analytical tool to assist stakeholders in policy planning, responses, and assessing risk, which captures the vulnerability of communities, based on the social determinants of health. to accomplish this task, we will provide an indepth overview of the epidemiological and clinical features of covid-19, assess the unique vulnerability of indigenous peoples in canada, and briefly summarize the country’s pandemic response for indigenous peoples. consistent with an ecological approach, this work reviews the importance of moving beyond determining individual-level risk factors associated with covid-19 by identifying and classifying indigenous communities most vulnerable to the dire consequences of the pandemic. we argue that this can be accomplished by looking at intra-indigenous community differences, using an extant social diagnostic tool called the community well-being (cwb) index. applied properly, we posit that this tool can predict community vulnerability and potentially guide policy decision-making in the fight against covid-19. epidemiology of covid-19 risk factors for severity as a novel virus, all individuals are at risk of becoming infected with covid-19 when exposed (liu et al., 2020; world health organization, 2020a). however, the risk for disease severity is higher for individuals with existing health conditions (guan et al., 2020). as seen in figure 1, a chinese study found that case fatality rates for patients with cardiovascular disease, diabetes, chronic respiratory disease, hypertension, and cancer were significantly higher than the case fatality rate of 0.9% for patients with no comorbid conditions (the novel coronavirus pneumonia emergency response epidemiology team, 2020). individuals who are immunocompromised either from an existing illness or from medical treatment are also at elevated risk for infection (public health agency of canada, 2020a). additionally, increasing evidence has found that obesity is associated with worse clinical outcomes (hajifathalian et al., 2020; kalligeros et al., 2020; palaiodimos et al., 2020). 3 spence et al.: the covid-19 pandemic published by scholarship@western figure 1. reported case fatality rates among patients grouped by existing health conditions in a study examining covid-19 cases from china’s infectious disease information system (the novel coronavirus pneumonia emergency response epidemiology team, 2020). age has emerged as a primary risk factor for disease severity. a study comparing patients 60 years or older and under 60 years old found a higher percentage of older adults had a pneumonia severity index score of 4 or 5 compared to the younger cohort. a weaker immune system may be a contributing factor to the difference in disease severity between the two study groups (liu et al., 2020). this is aligned with existing evidence that individuals experience physiologic changes in their innate and adaptive immune responses as part of aging. coupled with natural age-related changes to organs that impact their functioning, it is challenging for older adults to fight infections such as covid-19 (el chakhtoura et al., 2017). the heterogeneity of older adult patients adds to the complexity of prevention and treatment as the risk for severity differs between healthy older adults and older adults with comorbidities. specifically, older adults who have chronic diseases such as diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and hypertension are at greater risk for mortality (the novel coronavirus pneumonia emergency response epidemiology team, 2020; world health organization, 2020a). further, when examining the prognosis of older adult patients at the renmin hospital of wuhan, researchers found that the risk for fatality increased 29.3 times for patients who had acute respiratory distress syndrome, 2.24 times for patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, and 1.86 times for patients with cardiovascular disease (wang et al., 2020). non-clinical factors often increase risk and severity of infection among some populations, particularly racialized minorities and the socioeconomically poor (chen & krieger, 2020; public health agency of canada, 2020a). these groups include people who may have limited access to resources, lack job security and/or flexibility, disproportionately work in high risk jobs, tend to be socially or geographically isolated, and live in precarious housing situations (chen & krieger, 2020; public health agency of canada, 2020a). faced with such challenges, these individuals often have poorer baseline health status, and they may also find it difficult to isolate and access basic necessities such as groceries and care. 0.9 10.5 7.3 6.3 6.0 5.6 0 2 4 6 8 10 12 no comorbid conditions cardiovascular disease diabetes chronic respiratory disease hypertension cancer case fatality rate (%) pa tie nt g ro up s case fatality rates in a study of 72,314 patients with covid-19 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.10859 additionally, smoking tobacco is a potential risk factor, as studies have shown that immune responses against infections are weakened from smoking (qiu et al., 2016). furthermore, smoking causes a multitude of chronic diseases and damage to the respiratory system (qiu et al., 2016; west, 2017). thus, individuals who smoke tobacco may be susceptible to serious health complications if infected with covid-19. similarly, smoking cannabis is a potential risk factor for disease severity. evidence shows that smoking cannabis is associated with respiratory syndromes and causes chronic bronchitis (ribeiro & ind, 2016). these negative impacts on the respiratory system may exacerbate a covid-19 infection. lastly, use of e-cigarettes may impair activation of the immune response, as shown in a mice model that exposed mice to e-cigarettes and subsequently infected them with influenza a (madison et al., 2020). researchers found that mice exposed to e-cigarettes also had lung inflammation (madison et al., 2020). therefore, individuals who use e-cigarettes may also be a high-risk group for covid-19. educational level and scientific literacy can be particularly important during a period of uncertainty, as the science evolves daily on covid-19, and people find themselves overwhelmed with an overabundance of information from a variety of reliable and unreliable sources. scientific literacy may be useful in light of the sea of messaging by enabling people to better interpret the scientific evidence, assess risk, and make informed decisions based on the best evidence available. for example, recent research in the united states has found that scientific knowledge is positively associated with educational attainment (kennedy & hefferon, 2019), and educational attainment is distributed unequally among racial groups with blacks, hispanics, and american indians and alaska natives lagging behind whites (national center for education statistics, 2019). moreover, vulnerability to conspiracy theories associated with covid-19 is inversely associated with level of education (schaeffer, 2020). given the history of mistreatment by the healthcare system and social institutions systematically discriminating and excluding them from full participation in society (allan & smylie, 2015; royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996; truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015), racialized populations may also be more susceptible to conspiracy theories (schaeffer, 2020). this may result in skepticism and a lack of trust in public officials and the health care system, which may lead to communities disregarding health information from authorities. indeed, for indigenous peoples in canada, the legacy of colonialism continues to plague relations with the broader society. transmission at this time, the index case for covid-19 has not yet been identified. early covid-19 cases were linked to a live animal and seafood market, called the huanan seafood wholesale market in china, with possible environmental and/or animal exposures as the source of disease (li et al., 2020). in december 2019, human-to-human transmission was reported (cowling & leung, 2020; li et al., 2020). covid19 is mainly spread through respiratory droplets of an infected individual (luo et al., 2020). it is possible to become infected from direct contact with individuals who have covid-19, as well as through aerosols and fomites (luo et al., 2020; van doremalen et al., 2020). in a study comparing levels of viable sars-cov-2 on different surfaces, researchers were able to find the virus on plastic and stainless steel surfaces for as long as 72 hours (van doremalen et al., 2020). therefore, contact with contaminated surfaces followed by contact with an individual’s mouth, nose, or eyes may cause infection. a cluster of cases from a public bath house in jiangsu, china, suggests that covid-19 is transmissible in warm, humid environments (luo et al., 2020). although estimates of the characteristics of covid-19 will become more precise over time, thus far, covid-19 appears to have a relatively high transmissibility 5 spence et al.: the covid-19 pandemic published by scholarship@western compared to other infectious diseases, while its virulence is lower than mers and sars, but higher than h1n1 and influenza (table 1). table 1. characteristics of select infectious diseases disease transmission (r0)a mortality (global) virulence covid-19 3.15 95% ci (2.41!3.90)b 368,604 deaths as of may 30, 2020c 1.8% case fatality rate 95% ci (1.18%!2.43%)b influenza 0.9 – 2.1d 294,000 518,000 deaths annuallye 0.1% case fatality ratef h1n1 1.4 – 1.6d 123,000 203,000 deaths in the year 2009g 0.05% symptomatic case fatality rateh middle east respiratory syndrome (mers) < 1.0i 866 deaths as of january 2020j 34.3% case fatality rate for end of january 2020j severe acute respiratory syndrome (sars) 3.0k 623 deaths as of may 17, 2003k 11.0% case fatality ratek notes. a r0 is the basic reproductive number that is used to describe the contagiousness or transmissibility of infectious agents; it can be interpreted as the number of secondary cases from one case, and it is a product of a wide range of factors (environmental, biological, sociobehavioral). an outbreak will continue if r0 is greater than 1 and end if r0 is less than 1 (paul et al., 2019). b he et al. (2020). c world health organization (2020b). d baldo et al. (2016). e paget et al. (2019). f lipsitch et al. (2009). g simonsen et al. (2013). h nishiura (2010). i world health organization (2017). j world health organization (2020d). k world health organization (2003). risk mitigation strategies to mitigate risk of infection focus on reducing human-to-human transmission (li et al., 2020; wilder-smith & freedman, 2020). these include quarantining individuals with possible exposure to covid-19 for 14 days, practicing physical distancing, and community-wide containment (li et al., 2020; wilder-smith & freedman, 2020). where physical distancing of at least two metres between people cannot be maintained, individuals are encouraged to wear a face mask or covering (health canada, 2020b). frequent cleaning and disinfection of surfaces is also recommended to prevent spread from contact with contaminated surfaces (health canada, 2020b). in china, additional measures such as provincial lockdowns and closure of public transportation services were used to curb disease spread (wilder-smith & freedman, 2020). in an article from the chinese center for disease control and prevention summarizing lessons learned, isolating cities and widespread public education on hand hygiene, information on access to health 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.10859 services, and use of face masks were effective in reducing the spread of covid-19 (the novel coronavirus pneumonia emergency response epidemiology team, 2020). a publication by the who–china joint mission on coronavirus disease 2019 also reported the importance of contact tracing, monitoring infected persons, and reporting illness as covid-19 control measures (the joint mission, 2020). testing most countries test for covid-19 by testing the rna from a nose or throat swab using reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (rt-pcr; iacobucci, 2020; subbaraman, 2020). this method produces results that have high accuracy in about one day (iacobucci, 2020). with rt-pcr, some false negatives may result due to differing viral loads depending on when the sample was obtained and where the sample was taken (udugama et al., 2020). for example, sars-cov-2 was detectable by nasal swabs within 14 days of disease onset, yet throat swabs could not reliably detect the virus after 8 days (pan et al., 2020). this can be problematic if testing programs do not use additional testing or epidemiological data to confirm test results, as some individuals with covid-19 may be misclassified as negative cases (udugama et al., 2020). the cost of producing pcr assays for sars range from $5.46 $9.81 cad, while commercial assays cost $40.37 (mahony et al., 2004). serological tests are being explored as they can detect antibodies, which identify both current and past covid-19 infections (iacobucci, 2020; subbaraman, 2020; udugama et al., 2020). serological tests can also be used for point-of-care testing, which would eliminate delays caused by sending samples to a laboratory for analysis (udugama et al., 2020). however, compared to rt-pcr, some serological tests have lower sensitivity and specificity, which may result in more false positive and false negative test results (iacobucci, 2020). because of its ability to identify individuals who were infected with covid19, singapore used serological tests to aid in contact tracing early in the outbreak (subbaraman, 2020). lateral flow antigen detection is an example of a serological test that can be used in a variety of settings to test for sars-cov-2 (udugama et al., 2020). lateral flow assays are inexpensive to produce and they can be easily produced; moreover, implementation cost is lowered as results are interpreted visually, without additional equipment (koczula & gallotta, 2016). lateral flow assays that detect igm in patients with covid-19 were found to have 57% sensitivity and 100% specificity; when detecting igg in patients with covid-19, sensitivity was 81% and specificity was also 100% (xiang et al., 2020). to better understand the spread of sars-cov-2 globally, the who launched solidarity ii, a serological study for covid-19 (world health organization, 2020g). this study aims to understand the distribution and proportion of previously infected individuals on a global level, which aids in ascertaining the proportion of individuals missed by surveillance measures and estimating covid-19 immunity (world health organization, 2020g). other potential testing options include specific high sensitivity enzymatic reporter unlocking (sherlock) and dna endonuclease targeted crispr trans reporter (detectr), with both using crispr gene-editing technology to identify viral rna (subbaraman, 2020). these tests can produce results within 5 to 10 minutes (subbaraman, 2020). as sherlock uses crispr technology, test results have high sensitivity and specificity (kellner et al., 2019). for example, in a 1ul sample, sherlock can detect a single molecule of dna, while high specificity is achieved using cas13 and cas12 enzymes (kellner et al., 2019). the cost of sherlock and detectr are similar due to 7 spence et al.: the covid-19 pandemic published by scholarship@western shared technology; one sherlock reaction can be as low as $0.61 usd (gootenberg et al., 2017). overall, sherlock has potential for scaling up from a cost and equipment availability perspective, since the cost per reaction is low and testing can be done on paper (gootenberg et al., 2017). also, sherlock may be deployable for covid-19, as it has been used before in other viral outbreaks, such as zika and dengue (kellner et al., 2019). treatment in the absence of an evidence-based cure for individuals infected with covid-19, current treatment recommendations from the world health organization (2020a) focuses on symptom management. individuals with mild symptoms are advised to isolate themselves and to treat their symptoms. for severe cases, patients receive supplemental oxygen therapy, while critical cases, such as individuals suffering from acute respiratory distress syndrome, receive advanced oxygen or ventilatory support. a study describing clinical characteristics of patients with covid-19 in china cited the use of iv antibiotic treatment oseltamivir to manage influenza-like symptoms, oxygen therapy, and mechanical ventilation for severe cases (guan et al., 2020). the world health organization (2020f) established solidarity, an international clinical trial involving over 90 countries, that is striving to find effective clinical treatments for covid-19. the study started recruiting on march 1, 2020, and will end on march 25, 2021 ( isrctn registry, 2020). within this study, enrolled participants are followed until an endpoint is met, either discharge from hospital or death (world health organization, 2020f). different participants may also be receiving different study drugs as the list of treatment drugs is expected to change throughout the clinical trial based on effectiveness ( isrctn registry, 2020). drug effectiveness will be chiefly determined by whether the participant died, followed by whether the participant required ventilation (world health organization, 2020f). one of the drugs being studied is remdesivir, as it yielded positive results in treating mers-cov and sars. lopinair/ritonavir, used for treating hiv, and interferon beta-1a, used for treating multiple sclerosis, are also under investigation (world health organization, 2020f). lastly, some studies conducted in china and france explored the use of chloroquine phosphate to treat covid-19. as such, hydroxychloroquine was also included in solidarity (world health organization, 2020f); however, use of hydroxychloroquine was subsequently stopped in the solidarity trial as it did not show any benefit to patients (world health organization, 2020c). gilead sciences, which manufactures remdesivir, has decreased production time from between 9 and 12 months to between 6 and 8 months, and it has been working to increase production of the drug (gilead, 2020). the company aims to produce more than 140,000 treatment courses by may 31, 2020, and a continued increase to 500,000 treatment courses by october 2020 (gilead, 2020). as of may 2020, gilead sciences also increased access to remdesivir by working with five generic drug manufacturers through a licensing agreement (pharmaceutical technology, 2020). as a result, the production and distribution of remdesivir will expand to 127 countries. as developer of lopinair/ritonavir, abbvie (2020) continues to monitor the covid-19 pandemic to ensure adequate supply and production of lopinair/ritonavir. a press release from pharmaceutical manufacturer mylan (2020) also stated that they will increase availability of lopinair/ritonavir to support treating patients with covid-19 should clinical trials show effectiveness. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.10859 vaccine development has also been a focus of study. there were 115 vaccine candidates on april 8, 2020, with 73 candidates in either exploratory or preclinical stages (le et al., 2020). as of june 11, 2020, three vaccine candidates were in phase two clinical trial: the bacillus calmette-guerin live-attenuated vaccine; azd1222, an adenovirus vaccine vector; and mrna-1273 (craven, 2020). as a vaccine for covid-19 is urgently needed, the timeline for vaccine development may be shortened to make it available by 2021 (le et al., 2020). though some vaccines have begun clinical trials, vaccine development is complex (lurie et al., 2020). thus, not all vaccines become viable and, when administering successful vaccines to the population, the number of doses required to gain immunity from covid-19 remains unknown (lurie et al., 2020). achieving herd immunity from vaccines in a population may be challenging as well, depending on factors such as interactions within and between groups, including tight-knit populations, which may promote virus transmission, thereby requiring a higher vaccination threshold (rashid et al., 2012). the demand for vaccines will also be high and urgent for this pandemic. to meet these needs, massproduction of vaccines before accumulation of large amounts of safety and immunogenicity data on the vaccine will need to occur (lurie et al., 2020). scaling up production of vaccines may also be slow if facilities producing vaccines do not have proper technologies and processes in place to mass develop a novel vaccine (lurie et al., 2020). the epidemiological and biomedical aspects of covid-19 continue to change at a rapid pace. we have highlighted some key work in the area, but this information is subject to revision as time goes on. social inequities in canada: indigenous peoples at risk social inequities in canada have driven vast differences in the health and well-being experienced by segments of society (grabb et al., 2017; raphael, 2016). the dimensions of inequities are numerous (grabb, 2007), including disparities rooted in racialized identity, particularly for indigenous peoples, whose standard of living in some regions is comparable in many respects to that of several developing countries (veenstra, 2017). this situation reflects the history of colonialism and policies that have eroded indigenous institutions, relegating indigenous peoples to the margins of society and resulting in intergenerational trauma and durable inequity (grabb et al., 2017; greenwood et al., 2018; raphael, 2016). numbering 1.67 million or 4.9% of the population in canada in 2016, aboriginal peoples or indigenous peoples are the first peoples of canada and their descendants. the canadian constitution recognizes three sub-groups of indigenous peoples, including first nations (n = 977,230), métis (n = 587,545), and inuit (n = 65,025). the term “indians” is a legacy term from the indian act, which was applied to first nations. “indians” are distinguished as registered or treaty, otherwise referred to as status indians, and non-registered or non-status indians, with the former making up 76.2% of the first nations population (statistics canada, 2017c). registered indians are registered under the indian act, which confers specific rights and benefits. treaty indians are those individuals who are part of a first nation or indian band that signed a treaty with the crown (aboriginal affairs and northern development, 2014). a band refers to indians for whose collective use and benefit lands have been set apart or money is held by the crown or declared to be a band for purposes of the indian act. a reserve is a tract of land that has been set apart by her majesty for the use and benefit of a band; however, the legal 9 spence et al.: the covid-19 pandemic published by scholarship@western title of the land is vested in her majesty. at the end of 2016, there were 618 bands or registry groups in canada and 3,247 reserves, although they are not all inhabited (government of canada, 2018b). non-status or non-registered indians are self-identified first nations but cannot register under the indian act. métis refers to a group of people that share mixed ancestry (first nations and european) and a distinct political-cultural heritage. inuit are indigenous peoples of the circumpolar region in arctic canada (aboriginal affairs and northern development, 2014). overall, indigenous peoples are a rapidly growing group, and almost a decade younger, on average, than the non-indigenous population (statistics canada, 2017c). geographically, the indigenous population is scattered across the country. they are characterized by diversity across history, languages, culture, customs, and traditional lands. most first nations people (registered or treaty and non-registered) live off reserve, with only about 44% of the registered first nations population living on reserve (statistics canada, 2017e). over twothirds of métis live in urban areas: eight census metropolitan areas have a métis population of more than 10,000 people (vancouver, calgary, edmonton, saskatoon, winnipeg, toronto, and ottawa-gatineau), which makes up one-third of the métis population (statistics canada, 2017e). finally, almost threequarters of the inuit population live in inuit nunangat, the inuit homeland (statistics canada, 2017e). why are indigenous peoples at elevated risk for infection and adverse outcomes for covid-19? this is captured by the social and health indicators in table 2, which illustrate differences between the general population and indigenous peoples by indigenous identity: in particular, within the context of previously identified risk factors for covid-19. among indigenous peoples, there is a high prevalence of pre-existing clinical (proximate) risk factors, such as diabetes and obesity, lifestyle factors (e.g., smoking), as well as markedly higher social (distal) risk factors, such as lower levels of education, income, employment, and adequate housing. moreover, access to safe water and health services have been two longstanding issues, as the federal government has been unsuccessful in providing these essential services at an acceptable standard for indigenous communities (allan & smylie, 2015; government of canada, 2017, 2018a, 2019; white et al., 2012), which are particularly salient during the covid-19 pandemic. thus, there is strong evidence for heightened susceptibility of indigenous peoples to the sars-cov-2 virus across both clinical (proximate) and social (distal) factors. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.10859 table 2. select health and socioeconomic indicators among indigenous peoples in canada risk factor general population inuit métis first nations on reserve first nations off reserve asthma, % 7.8 (2017)a 7.9 (2017)b 14.7 (2017)b 9.6 (2015/16)c 14.5 (2017)b diabetes, % 7.3 (2017)a 4.5 (2017)b 8.5 (2017)b 15.9 (2015/16)c 10.0 (2017)b chronic bronchitis, emphysema, copd, % 4.3 (2017)d 3.2 (2017)b 5.2 (2017)b 2.5 (2015/16)c 5.5 (2017)b heart disease, % 8.5 (2012/13)e 3.4 (2017)b 5.6 (2017)b 4.2 (2015/16)c 5.7 (2017)b high blood pressure, % 17.8 (2017)f 12.6 (2017)b 18.5 (2017)b 17.2 (2015/16)c 17.3 (2017)b obesity, % 16 (2007/10)g 26 (2007/10)g 22 (2007/10)g 40 (2008/10)h 26 (2007/10)g smoking (daily, ages 15+), % 11.6 (2017)d 55.9 (2017)b 21.7 (2017)b 40.3 (2015/16)c 25.8 (2017)b tuberculosis incidence rate per 100,000 (2016)i 0.6 170.1 2.1 34.1 14.5 life expectancy (years) at age 1 (2011)j 84.3 73.0 79.5 75.2k food insecure households, % 12.7 (2017)l 53 (2017)m 31 (2017)m 54.2 (2008/10)n 43.0 (2017)m median income pre-tax (2016), %o 34,604 24,502 31,916 16,907 25,134 education, 25-64 years old, certificate, diploma, or degree at bachelor level or above (2016), %p 29.3 5.3 13.2 5.4 11.6 11 spence et al.: the covid-19 pandemic published by scholarship@western table 2. select health and socioeconomic indicators among indigenous peoples in canada (continued) risk factor general population inuit métis first nations on reserve first nations off reserve education, 25-64 years old, less than high school (2016), %p 10.8 43.9 18.0 43.0 23.8 unemployment, 15 years and over (2016), %q 7.4 22.4 11.2 24.9 15.3 crowded housing (2016), %r 8.5 40.6 8.6 36.8 18.5s housing in need of major repairs (2016), %r 6.0 26.2 11.3 44.2 14.2s notes. a statistics canada (2019). b custom calculations using the aboriginal peoples survey 2017 (statistics canada, 2020). c first nations information governance centre (2018). d statistics canada (2018b). e public health agency of canada (2017). f statistics canada (2018c). g gionet and roshanafshar (2013). h batal and decelles (2019). i vachon et al. (2018). j tjepkema et al. (2019). k refers to all first nations. l tarasuk and mitchell (2020). m arriagada et al. (2020). n first nations information governance centre (2012). o statistics canada (2017b). p statistics canada (2017a). q statistics canada (2018a). r statistics canada (2017d). s registered or treaty indian status. pandemic response for indigenous peoples in canada given the heightened risk for indigenous peoples to the sars-cov-2 virus, what has been the response in canada? the response to the pandemic for indigenous peoples has been broad, including all levels of government, indigenous organizations, and local communities. we will now provide a brief overview of some main elements of the pandemic response for indigenous peoples as of may 2020, although new developments occur daily. initially, canada’s federal government dedicated $515.2 million to support the indigenous population (table 3; government of canada, 2020a). the funding was further bolstered by an additional $339.1 million for indigenous businesses and transportation (table 4; government of canada, 2020a). members of indigenous communities are also able to access funds that are universally available to all canadians, such as the $157.5 million in funding used for the reaching home initiative (rhi; government of canada, 2020a). the majority of dedicated funds for indigenous peoples have been allocated to service providers and organizations directly providing support and aid for indigenous communities, both onand off-reserve. indigenous services canada developed a covid-19 model to guide its funding process, with the underlying principles of preparedness, health human resources, infrastructure, infection prevention and control, medical transport, governance, communications, and surveillance (indigenous services canada, 2020). 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.10859 table 3. federal government funding for indigenous health and social services, as of may 2020 program funding amount (million cdn$) community support fund $305.0 public health preparedness and support $100.0 nutrition north canada $25.0 family violence prevention program $10.0 indigenous post-secondary students $75.2 table 4. federal government funding for indigenous businesses and infrastructure, as of may 2020 program funding amount (million cdn$) small and medium-sized indigenous businesses and aboriginal financial institutions that finance them $306.8 air transportation $17.3 support for northern businesses $15.0 total $339.1 the community support fund (csf) is the largest of these funds and contributes $305 million for grassroots plans within indigenous communities (government of canada, 2020e). the csf’s design provides indigenous leadership with the resources and autonomy to design and implement culturally appropriate solutions to combat and prevent covid-19 within their communities. of the total, $215 million dollars of this fund was dedicated to on-reserve and self-governing first nations communities, based on a funding formula that takes into account population size (2016 census), remoteness, and socio-economic conditions, with each community receiving a base amount of $50,000. an additional $45 million dollars from the csf was designated to each land claims organization and allocated by the inuit tapiriit kanatami and regional inuit land claims organizations. a further $30 million was directed to needs within métis communities through governing members. the final $15 million was used for groups and organizations operating in off-reserve and urban centers. the $100 million for canada’s public health response for indigenous communities is dedicated to federal responsibilities. this fund is intended to address any immediate short-term needs regarding primary health capacity and managing pandemic plans (government of canada, 2020c). communities are also encouraged to access support through the first nation and inuit health branch (fnihb), which provides both funding and expertise for pandemic planning. however, the fnihb may not be the first point of contact for communities, such as those in bc, yukon, and the northwest territories. in 13 spence et al.: the covid-19 pandemic published by scholarship@western these communities, the fnihb will be supporting local health authorities in their provision for these communities (government of canada, 2020c). indigenous services canada is also ensuring the continuity of essential services (e.g., non-insured health benefits, jordan’s principle, the inuit child first initiative, emergency management measures, income assistance, operations to maintain safety at any environmental remediation site, working collaboratively with first nations to ensure continued access to mental health and addictions resources) and an additional $10 million will be provided to the existing family violence prevention program as part of indigenous services canada’s network of 46 emergency shelters that support indigenous women and children fleeing violence (serving approximately 329 first nations communities), which are located on reserve and in the yukon (government of canada, 2020b). indigenous services minister marc miller indicated that the $305 million fund was just the beginning of the federal government’s financial commitment to the indigenous covid-19 response (stefanovich, 2020). despite the funding and support for indigenous peoples, several issues have been outlined by key indigenous groups and organizations. assembly of first nations national chief perry bellegarde commented that chiefs from across canada have stated that when support is divided among 634 first nations in canada, including 96 remote fly-in communities and 51 inuit communities in the north, métis nations in the west, and indigenous peoples living off reserve, the funding will not be sufficient to meet community needs (wright, 2020). similarly, grand chief jerry daniels, southern chiefs' organization inc., indicated during a house of commons standing committee on health meeting that less than 1% of the money allocated for canada to combat the pandemic had been designated for indigenous communities, despite indigenous peoples representing 4.9% of the population in canada (government of canada, 2020d). further, limited assistance was offered to off-reserve or urban indigenous peoples, even though 55.8% of registered first nations people live off reserve, with only $15 of $350 million allocated to the csf permitted to support urban initiatives (statistics canada, 2017e). restrictions included a proposal process for the csf’s urban and off-reserve initiatives, with the call for proposals launched on april 6 and a deadline just one week later (government of canada, 2020e). the rationale for this allocation of funds may be premised on the underlying assumption that off-reserve indigenous peoples may have greater access to urban resources and tend to fare better on social indicators of well-being than those on reserve (royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996; white et al., 2007, 2009). these concerns were raised by the president of the national association of friendship centers (nafc), christopher sheppard-buote, stating that an underfunded competitive program to procure funds in a limited timeframe by organizations with limited capacity who are trying get resources on the ground is problematic (government of canada, 2020d). the nafc has indicated that more resources are needed despite receiving $3.75 million from the indigenous community fund (government of canada, 2020d). valerie gideon, senior assistant deputy minister of the first nations and inuit health branch, department of indigenous services, outlined the complex policy framework surrounding jurisdiction, co-ordination, and collaboration issues between first nations-, inuit-, or métis-led services and a crosssection of federal, provincial, and territorial governments, as well as public health authorities, which can have its challenges, but has also been a strength during covid-19 (government of canada, 2020d). 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.10859 jocelyn formsma, executive director of the nafc, provided a concrete example of the problems with collaboration and varied responsibilities in practice (government of canada, 2020d): during the early phase of the pandemic, jurisdictional issues impeded their ability to respond, particularly as a result of the federal legal and policy framework that has been historically rooted in a restrictive model that focuses service provision on registered first nations on reserve and inuit residing in their traditional territories (indigenous and northern affairs canada, 2017). as a national organization, the nafc sought assistance from indigenous services canada; however, they were instructed that the provinces and territories would be expected to provide requested support for indigenous peoples in urban centers. when regional friendship centres sought out assistance from provincial and territorial associations, they were told to go to the federal government for financial support. the deferral of responsibility led to agencies, such as the nafc, being redirected from one level of government to another, resulting in a sub-optimal response. the nafc is one example of a key organization with a longstanding focus on service delivery among off-reserve indigenous populations, regardless of status, with 107 local friendship centers across the country (national association of friendship centres, 2020). they work closely with mainstream agencies and directly deliver a wide range of programs to support the local needs identified by urban indigenous peoples, addressing issues such as housing, family violence, food security, daycares, employment, education, and mental health. the provinces have dedicated a portion of their websites to providing information for members of indigenous communities and their leaders, often referring them to local organizations such as the nafc. as a result, these organizations have endured tremendous strain from an increase in service demand; for example, the british columbia branches of nafc have reported a 200% increase in service demand during the pandemic, while many friendship centers have been forced to physically close to reduce spread of the virus and come up with alternative modes of service provision ("indigenous friendship centres," 2020). the assembly of first nations (afn) created a national task force dedicated to assisting the afn in providing and distributing information, updates, and recommendations to first nations communities (assembly of first nations, 2020). inuit communities have also faced similar challenges. as of may 6, the government of nunavut had spent over $3.9 million towards developing and maintaining self-isolation hubs (cable public affairs channel, 2020). the isolation hubs act as a short-term substitute for home-isolation, through institutionally provided hotels with all essential living needs, with the goal of increasing self-isolation compliance, reducing strain on the healthcare system and its limited testing capacities, and mitigating potential household and community spread (dickens et al., 2020; government of nunavut, 2020). the government of nunavut was promised $30.8 million in federal funding; however, during the may 8 press conference, nunavut’s finance minister george hickes admitted that the funds have been inaccessible by his government (cable public affairs channel, 2020). some provinces have stepped in to take on the pandemic’s burden on indigenous communities with varied responses. ontario has dedicated $26 million to indigenous initiatives for both remote and urban first nations communities within the province (phillips, 2020). in contrast, british columbia announced the first nations emergency program act (bc government, 2020b), and increased funding for indigenous students (bc government, 2020a), as well as the first nations health authority, which helps coordinate resources such as sanitizers, disinfectants, medical transportation, and mental health services (first nations health authority, 2020). 15 spence et al.: the covid-19 pandemic published by scholarship@western additionally, many communities have exercised their own authority, mostly through prevention strategies (yellowhead institute, 2020). for example, many communities, such as fort mckay, have imposed a strict curfew to limit the mobility of residents to reduce the risk of transmission (malbeuf, 2020). longpoint first nation in quebec had even requested rcmp and armed forces for border enforcement assistance for their area. some communities, such as the curve lake first nation, use a flag system to address resident needs and maintain physical distancing (table 5). color coded flags made of anything (e.g., t-shirts or paper) are placed in a visible location of a residence, such as a window. the flags are monitored by volunteers and meant to help the most vulnerable remain in self-isolation. table 5. curve lake first nation’s flag code signals volunteers for needs within households flag color meaning white “everything is alright.” blue “we need water.” yellow “we need food.” red “we are sick.” green “non-health related help request.” the mohawk council of akwesasne and the siksika first nations were able to provide a mobile testing clinic for its community to address their geographical challenges and to ease the burden on local medical facilities (mohawk council of akwesasne, 2020; yellowhead institute, 2020). finally, in times of crisis, many communities would often turn to sweat lodges and other traditional ceremonies to support one another physically and emotionally. such traditions have been paused due to the risk of physical contact under the advice of indigenous doctors (sterritt, 2020). table 6 lists a sample of key indigenous specific pandemic response activities by various institutions. as things are developing at a rapid pace, an announcement from the federal government was released on may 29, 2020, outlining another $650.9 million in funding for indigenous peoples (table 7) (government of canada, 2020f). the increase was in addition to the promised $75 million towards the indigenous community fund, announced on may 21, dedicated to indigenous organizations focused on urban centres and off-reserve communities (government of canada, 2020g). this overview of the pandemic response in canada for indigenous peoples has described the magnitude of resource allocation, coordination efforts, and the multisectoral approach that has been adopted. moreover, we have outlined some of the issues that have arisen. these responses will continue to evolve and are critical to ensure the health and well-being of indigenous peoples throughout canada. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.10859 table 6. key pandemic response activities in canada for indigenous peoples institution activities federal government funding commitments and allocations, information dissemination, ppe and staff supply, economic management provincial government coordination and mediation between government levels as well as external stakeholders indigenous organizations distribution and coordination of funds, traditional medicine management, emergency response, public health management, communication to all levels of government local communities food supply, communication table 7. additional federal government funding in response to covid-19 for indigenous peoples, as of may 29, 2020 program funding amount (million, cdn$) community-led responses $285.1 supplement on-reserve income assistance program $270.0 spread over 5 years for constructing 12 new shelters $44.8 support operational costs for the 12 shelters $40.8 annual ongoing funding for operating costs for the 12 shelters $10.2 annual ongoing support for métis leaders and service provider engagement related shelter provision and violence prevention $1.0 total $651.9 moving beyond clinical factors and individual risk rapid changes in the policy environment have implications for the covid-19 pandemic response for indigenous peoples in canada. this comes as no surprise as a hallmark of a novel virus is the associated 17 spence et al.: the covid-19 pandemic published by scholarship@western scientific uncertainty, making it extremely difficult for policymakers to make high impact decisions that carry significant consequences. the severity of covid-19 has already been observed in many regions, such as italy, the united states, brazil, the uk, spain, and france, and it appears that significant heterogeneity, both interand intra-nationally will characterize this pandemic. history would indicate that the social determinants of health are extremely useful in navigating uncharted territory, given the powerful role of these factors across many health outcomes (raphael, 2016). further, important social determinants of health, such as socioeconomic status and racialized identity have been associated with pandemic outcomes, both in the past and present (abedi et al., 2020; chen & krieger, 2020; dee et al., 2011; quinn et al., 2011; vahidy et al., 2020). the disproportionate impact of pandemic h1n1/09 on indigenous peoples in particular has been documented (centers for disease control and prevention, 2009; groom et al., 2009; kumar et al., 2009; national collaborating centre for aboriginal health, 2013). along these lines, the landscape has disproportionately focused on risk factors at the individual level, such as the public health agency of canada’s vulnerable populations and covid-19 (public health agency of canada, 2020a). the document indicates that some canadians are more at risk of getting an infection and developing severe complications due to their underlying health, social, and economic circumstances (public health agency of canada, 2020a). the agency states that vulnerable populations may include anyone who is: an older adult, at risk due to certain underlying medical conditions, and/or at risk due to certain medical treatments. further, anyone who: has difficulty with any reading, speaking, understanding or communicating; has difficulty accessing medical care or health advice; has difficulty doing preventive activities such as frequent hand washing; requires ongoing specialized medical care or specific medical supplies; requires ongoing supervision or support for maintaining independence; or has difficulty accessing transportation. individuals experiencing economic barriers, unstable employment or inflexible working conditions, social or geographical isolation, and/or insecure, inadequate, or nonexistent housing conditions are also at risk. the agency’s focus in this document is on identifying vulnerability at the individual level; however, consistent with the ecological framework (mcleroy et al., 1988), we advocate for a renewed focus on the social causation of disease, consistent with an emphasis on the physical and social environment, and other levels of analysis and intervention, particularly communities. the international community has identified indigenous peoples as particularly vulnerable to covid19, given the lower social determinants of health of this group globally ( united nations expert mechanism on the rights of indigenous peoples, 2020). within canada, the chief public health officer, dr. theresa tam, indicated, “first nation, inuit and métis communities face a higher risk of ‘severe outcomes’ given health inequities, higher rates of underlying medical conditions and challenges of remote and fly-in communities” (cited in kirkup & mcleod, 2020, para. 6). with hundreds of indigenous communities scattered across the country, the geographic and socioeconomic conditions are diverse, which influences the proximity and degree of access to highly resourced urban health care centers as well as local community capacity and service provision; this begs the question, which communities are most vulnerable? how do we prioritize, manage, and allocate resources for the duration of the pandemic in the most impactful way? undoubtedly, a major shortcoming of research and policy approaches to understanding indigenous inequity is that intra-group differences are often overlooked. as a result, the wide range of social, 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.10859 cultural, and health characteristics of indigenous peoples are homogenized, with profound implications for scientific understanding of social and health issues, as well as hampering the development of tailored policy and interventions, as discussed in detail elsewhere (spence, 2016; wilson & young, 2008). relatedly, about 25 years ago, the royal commission on aboriginal peoples (1996) problematized the predominant focus on the individual level of analysis, with an appreciation for the role of community characteristics and broader social conditions fundamental to address the pressing social issues in the indigenous population. for example, indigenous communities or reserves are meaningful places in which a significant number of indigenous peoples in canada live (predominantly registered indians); they are unique physical and social environments given their geographical, historical, cultural, political, and socioeconomic features. moreover, within indigenous communities, a variety of programs and policies, as well as social norms and networks, govern and impact the day-to-day lives of constituents (mignone, 2003; white et al., 2013). empirical evidence has supported the variation between indigenous communities: for example, despite the higher rate of youth suicide among indigenous youth over a 5-year period, among first nations communities in british columbia, some had youth suicide rates 800 times the national average while more than half did not experience a single youth suicide (chandler & lalonde, 1998). similarly, a study on injuries in british columbia found vast differences in on-reserve injuries across indigenous communities: out of about 500 reserves, two accounted for onequarter of all on-reserve injuries, and less than 30% reported injury rates surpassing surrounding nonreserve areas (bell et al., 2011). in fact, the varying contextual environment of these communities may considerably affect health and well-being ( spence, 2016; spence et al., 2007; white et al., 2003, 2007, 2009), as well as indicate vulnerability to any disaster. a social diagnostic tool to predict community vulnerability to the covid-19 pandemic there is growing evidence linking community characteristics (e.g., socioeconomic position and race) and outcomes for the covid-19 pandemic (chen & krieger, 2020). in this regard, we propose that a social diagnostic tool to predict vulnerability of communities to covid-19 would be of potentially high value to decision makers in policy planning, by identifying relative risk and allocating finite resources in an optimal manner. the canadian context has one such social diagnostic tool rooted in work from researchers affiliated with the aboriginal policy research consortium (international) at the university of western ontario (canada), and the strategic research and data innovation branch, indigenous affairs canada, formerly the strategic research and analysis directorate, indian and northern affairs canada, who produced and refined the community-well being (cwb) index (o'sullivan, 2011; o'sullivan & mchardy, 2007). the cwb index measures the socioeconomic well-being of indigenous and non-indigenous communities at the community level over time, using the geographic unit of a census subdivision (csd), with each first nations or inuit community designated by 1 or more csds (indigenous services canada, 2019). there is no score for métis communities because there are only 8 métis designated settlement areas in alberta that are a smaller level of geography than csds. the data are from the census of canada (1981-2006, 2016) and the national household survey (2011). the cwb index is composed of four variables, which are important social determinants of health: income (per capita), housing (homes in an adequate state of repair and are not overcrowded), education (attainment of high school and university degree), and labor force status (labor force participation and employment; indigenous services canada, 2019). the individual scores on income, housing, education, and labor force status are combined to form a single cwb index score for every community, ranging 19 spence et al.: the covid-19 pandemic published by scholarship@western from 0 to 100. the most recent data from 2016 is based on cwb scores for 623 first nations, 50 inuit, and 3,781 non-indigenous communities (indigenous services canada, 2019). program and policy applications of the cwb index the cwb index provides an assessment of the gap between indigenous and non-indigenous communities over time. based on the most recent data from 2016, the pattern of inequity between indigenous and non-indigenous communities is striking (figure 2): first nations communities (n = 623, m = 58.4, range = 39); inuit communities (n = 50, m = 61.2, range = 30); non-indigenous communities (n = 3,781, m = 77.5, range = 20; indigenous services canada, 2019). figure 2. distribution of community well-being scores in canada by community type, 2016. as seen in figure 2, 98 of the lowest 100 cwb index scores were first nations communities, while at the other end of the spectrum, only 2 first nations communities had cwb index scores that were in the top 100 in canada (indigenous services canada, 2019). clearly, indigenous versus non-indigenous differences are striking and coincide with well-documented evidence of these social inequities (public health agency of canada, 2020b). on the other hand, there are important differences between indigenous communities that are notable. for example, the range in cwb index scores for first nations communities is almost double that of non-indigenous communities (indigenous services canada, 2019). indeed, this intra-indigenous heterogeneity is often missed, but discussed earlier and in detail elsewhere (chandler & lalonde, 1998; spence, 2016; waldram et al., 2006; white et al., 2003). beyond identifying indigenous peoples and communities as generally “at risk,” this work has potential policy 0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 15 20 20 25 25 30 30 35 35 40 40 45 45 50 50 55 55 60 60 65 65 70 70 75 75 80 80 85 85 90 90 95 95 100 cwb score inuit community first nations community non-indigenous community 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.10859 implications for assessing the vulnerability among indigenous communities during a pandemic. it is this intra-indigenous community variation that is our focus in developing policy initiatives. we propose that the cwb index is a socioeconomically comprehensive tool that may be used to predict those indigenous communities at greatest risk of being affected by the pandemic. this coincides with previous work, which documented the disproportionate burden of pandemic h1n1/2009 (centers for disease control and prevention, 2009; groom et al., 2009; kumar et al., 2009; national collaborating centre for aboriginal health, 2013), as some communities were hit much harder than others by the virus (spence & white, 2010). indeed, during pandemic h1n1/09, the sites of early and severe pandemic outbreaks included st. theresa point and garden hill. these communities had relatively low cwb index scores: st. theresa point and garden hill were in the bottom 10% among first nations communities. why are these data important? on the ground, these data can provide stakeholders at all levels with the capacity to concretely move beyond identifying individuals at highest risk to identifying communities at highest risk. this can be integral to prioritizing the allocation of finite resources in the short-, medium-, and long-term, given the number and distribution of communities across the country. for example, personal protective equipment, scaled up surveillance, testing and contact tracing, food, safe water, temporary housing to self-quarantine, financial assistance, childcare, access to high speed internet and telephone services, health services, education, and mental health resources are some immediate needs. as new treatments and vaccines are discovered, the allocation of these biomedical resources will require a strategic plan to maximize impact, as there will likely be limited supply initially, as we outlined earlier. prioritizing beyond individual level vulnerability and risk factors is an implication of this approach. of course, all needs must be addressed in a collaborative and culturally appropriate manner, respecting the governance structures, decision-making powers, and expertise of local communities. first nations leaders can use the cwb index to both assert their sovereignty and lobby the government to address inequities. thus far, limited use of the cwb index illustrates its utility as a credible tool that could directly benefit indigenous peoples (e.g., bc treaty commission, 2016). more generally, the cwb index may be used by local, provincial, and national policymakers to advocate for, prioritize, and guide, the flow of finite resources to communities at highest risk. this proactive approach would curb the spread of the virus and mitigate the shortand long-term consequences of the pandemic in these communities. the social, health, and economic impacts of the covid-19 pandemic will disproportionately affect disadvantaged populations, both in the shortand long-term. let us examine two examples—mental health and education. there is significant concern over mental health issues associated with the covid-19 pandemic (angus reid, 2020; qiu et al., 2020; rohr et al., 2020). an angus reid (2020) poll in canada found that half of canadians report a worsening of their mental health over the past six weeks related to the pandemic. this mounting evidence is consistent with well-documented research on the shortand long-term impacts of a variety of disasters on mental health (mak et al., 2009; norris et al., 2002a, 2002b; north, 2016; rodriguez & kohn, 2008). ensuring adequate community capacity and the implementation of culturally appropriate services and resources will be especially important (chandler & lalonde, 1998; spence et al., 2016), given the varying and unique needs of indigenous communities (bell et al., 2011; chandler & lalonde, 1998; spence, 2016; white et al., 2003), rooted in a history of institutionalized inequity, colonialism, and social exclusion. again, the cwb index can be used in conjunction with other available community information to guide policy by identifying communities with the fewest resources that can be mobilized to cope with the mental health consequences associated 21 spence et al.: the covid-19 pandemic published by scholarship@western with the pandemic, including post-pandemic when resilience resources (ungar, 2012) and attention dedicated towards these issues may wane. another example is the disruption of educational systems. the united nations educational, scientific, and cultural organization (unesco, 2020) indicates that nationwide closures are impacting over 72% of the student population globally, with disadvantaged communities particularly vulnerable to the consequences of school closures. in the context of indigenous peoples, these concerns are well founded, given major connectivity gaps to the internet (innovation, science and economic development canada, 2019), socioeconomic disparities in computer ownership (canadian radio-television and telecommunications commission, 2018), historical issues related to underfunding of education (drummond & rosenbluth, 2013), and limited household and community capacity to facilitate learning (white et al., 2009). indeed, the lower average educational attainment of indigenous peoples has been well documented (battiste, 2013; castellano et al., 2001; gordon & white, 2014; white et al., 2009), which has been a major impediment to health and well-being (white et al., 2007, 2009). the potentially long duration of the covid-19 pandemic, disrupting crucial educational processes and supports at the individual, familial, and community level (white et al., 2009), may exacerbate issues surrounding attainment, particularly in the most vulnerable indigenous communities, as indicated by the cwb, especially the educational component. thus, educational policy may benefit from use of the cwb index to streamline resources, ensuring vulnerable communities are able to deliver education and ensure inequities in education are not exacerbated by the pandemic. overall, we believe that the cwb index is an easy-to-use tool that may support the federal government’s indigenous services canada’s preparedness and response to covid-19, including preparedness, health human resources, infrastructure, infection prevention and control, medical transportation, governance, communications, and surveillance (indigenous services canada, 2020). in fact, our review of the indigenous pandemic policy response in canada found one instance of the use of the cwb index in the case of the indigenous community support fund, which is part of the covid-19 economic response plan, including $305 million to address immediate needs in indigenous communities. first nations communities are eligible for $215 million, with funding for each community based on a base amount of $50,000, the total population residing in the community, and an adjustment for remoteness and cwb index scores. we advocated for the use of this tool in previous work during pandemic h1n1/09 (spence & white, 2009, 2010) and, to our knowledge, this is the first instance of the cwb index being explicitly used in pandemic policy and resource allocation. we hypothesize that among indigenous communities, those in the bottom 10% of cwb index scores would be at particularly high risk. in a world with limits on resources and the need to move fast, there needs to be predictive assessments, not only reactive assessments. when unforeseen things happen, such as a community that has a relatively high cwb index score being disproportionately impacted, policy can be used to address these needs. the impact of the covid-19 pandemic will be seen in coming months. the way the story of this pandemic will play out will be a product of decisions and actions of stakeholders. moving forward, we advocate for a comprehensive review of the applicability of using the cwb index across all levels of pandemic policy decision making. despite the potential merit of the cwb index, without doubt, the cwb index is far from a comprehensive measure of the well-being of indigenous peoples in canada. given that the measure is capturing indigenous communities, indigenous peoples off reserve are not explicitly captured by the cwb index, as they are lumped together with non-indigenous individuals in non-indigenous 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.10859 communities. further, indicators that are specifically relevant to indigenous peoples’ experience of colonialism, including access to territories (water, resources, and land), social exclusion across social and cultural rights, discrimination, and governance and participation in decision-making are not captured by this measure, which are salient social determinants of health. these shortcomings of the cwb index are mainly a result of data limitations: national level data with coverage of indigenous and non-indigenous communities over multiple years that allows us to track changes in well-being, beyond socioeconomic indicators in the census, are not available. conclusion despite the significant challenges posed by the covid-19 pandemic thus far, the story is far from fully written. responses are best viewed in their totality when the balance of evidence has been accrued, put into its proper context, and the full impact of policy action is realized. this pandemic will be with us for the foreseeable future, in the absence of highly effective medical treatments or a vaccine. moreover, postpandemic challenges, including long term economic, social, and health challenges will require strict attention. in this environment, difficult decisions will have to be made across all realms of society. what we know is that historically, existing social inequities increase vulnerability to disasters for disadvantaged groups. efforts to mitigate the potential impact of the covid-19 pandemic are underway and will be essential to ensure the success of the pandemic response. we believe that the proposed approach to assess the degree of vulnerability to the covid-19 pandemic, using the cwb index, a social diagnostic measure for predicting community risk in canada, may be a valuable, evidence-based tool, for a cross-section of policy decision-makers, including indigenous communities, health planners and tribal councils, public health departments, regional health authorities, and provincial and federal governments. the main strength of the cwb index is that it is a theoretically rooted measure, composed of the pivotal social determinants of health, measuring the degree of social inequity. beyond the well-documented risk factors for the covid-19 disease identified at the individual level, the cwb index potentially provides actionable evidence for targeted interventions at the community level that address the heterogeneity in socioeconomic risk of indigenous communities across the country. we advocate for a comprehensive review of the applicability of using the cwb index across all levels of policy decision-making. also, we believe that there may be an application to nonindigenous communities in canada as well as other countries where indigenous peoples live in their own communities and have measurable socioeconomic indicators. the unpredictable nature of pandemics is unsettling but, given the longstanding evidence on the utility of the social determinants of health, we feel that this this social diagnostic tool may provide some scientific certainty in a time of scientific uncertainty to guide policy decision-making. of course, this is a short-term “reactionary disparities approach” to deal with a contemporaneous issue and mitigate inequities in relation to this specific disaster. in the long term, the covid-19 pandemic is yet another opportunity to highlight social inequities and the need for proactive measures to eradicate the socially unjust conditions which produce vulnerability, as we inevitably face new social, health, economic, and environmental challenges. 23 spence et al.: the covid-19 pandemic published by scholarship@western references abbvie. 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(2020). covid-19 in community: how are first nations responding? https://yellowheadinstitute.org/2020/04/07/corona-in-community-the-first-nation-response/ conservancies in british columbia, canada: bringing together protected areas and first nations' interests the international indigenous policy journal volume 2 | issue 2 article 3 june 2011 conservancies in british columbia, canada: bringing together protected areas and first nations' interests katherine l. turner university of manitoba, katelturner@gmail.com christopher p.h. bitonti bitonti.chris@gmail.com this research is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. recommended citation turner, k. l. , bitonti, c. p. (2011). conservancies in british columbia, canada: bringing together protected areas and first nations' interests. the international indigenous policy journal, 2(2) . retrieved from: http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.2.3 conservancies in british columbia, canada: bringing together protected areas and first nations' interests abstract the new protected area (pa) designation of conservancy in british columbia, canada marks a positive shift in government policy concerning pas and the role of first nations in provincial land and resource management and conservation. we present a review of the conservancy designation within a legal and political ecology context, and assess some of the related opportunities and challenges presented by this new designation. our data were gathered through document, literature and legal reviews, complemented by field research observations and personal communications with key informants from the gitga'at first nation. keywords protected areas, conservancy designation, british columbia, first nations, canada acknowledgments we thank fikret berkes, brian bawtinheimer, nancy turner and mary shariff for their insightful comments and support in writing and researching this paper. we also offer our sincere thanks to the members of the gitga’at first nation, particularly helen clifton, kyle clifton, ernest hill and lynne hill, for their many contributions to this paper, as well as their hospitality. we also thank our three anonymous reviewers for their time and helpful suggestions. fieldwork funding was provided by sshrc (ip robert anderson). we would also like to acknowledge support from university of manitoba graduate fellowship. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ introduction the new protected area (pa) designation of conservancy in british columbia, canada, is a positive addition to the provincial pa system because it marks a shift in government policy concerning pas and the role of first nations in land and resource management and conservation. until recent decades, many parks and other protected areas in british columbia, across canada, and elsewhere were regularly established with little to no recognition of indigenous people’s interests, traditional ecological knowledge, or territorial rights and title (calverley, 2009; dearden & langdon, 2009; diegues & nogara, 2005; kemf, 1993; spence, 1996). consequently, ecological conservation through pas has often resulted in negative impacts for aboriginal peoples in canada and other local and indigenous peoples around the world (adams & hutton, 2007; flynn-burhoe, 2008; hoole & berkes, 2010; peepre & dearden, 2002; scientific panel, 1995). the legal mandate of parks and other pas, as well as the assumptions surrounding them, however, appear to be changing in ways that better reflect, acknowledge and incorporate the resource and territorial rights of local and indigenous peoples (alcorn, 1993; canadian parks council, 2008; coastal first nations, n.d.a; also see, berkes, 2009; dudley, 2008; hoole & berkes, 2010). the incorporation of conservancies into the bc parks system, in 2006, is the first substantive evidence of a new approach to pas at the provincial-level in canada. unlike other designations under the bc park act, conservancies were created “expressly to recognize the importance of some natural areas to first nations for food, social and ceremonial purposes” (bc, 2011, p. 6). individual first nations and the provincial government are enacting this objective through collaborative planning and management (canadian parks council, 2008; coastal first nations, n.d.a.). this paper presents a review of conservancies within a political ecology and legal context, and offers a preliminary assessment of some of the opportunities and challenges presented by this new designation. we begin by providing an overview of conservancies in bc. next, we move to situate the emergence of bc conservancies within broader political and historical contexts. we do this first by looking briefly at some of the changes that have taken place in recent decades within national pa policy and practice, and then by discussing the set of conditions in bc which prompted the creation of a new pa designation. finally, we draw particular reference to the experience of the gitga’at first nation in the great bear rainforest, in order to consider some of the opportunities and challenges afforded by conservancies. we bring these insights together with literature to compile a summary and discussion of some of the strengths and weaknesses of the new designation. we conclude that, although conservancies are still new, they mark a positive shift in government policy concerning the management and purpose of pas and the role of first nations in planning, management, decisionmaking and use of british columbian lands and resources. our data were gathered through document, literature and legal reviews, complemented by field research observations and personal communications with indigenous knowledge holders in the gitga’at first nation. the new arrival: an overview of british columbia conservancies in 2006, the government of british columbia amended the province’s park act (the act) to establish conservancies as a new designation of provincial protected area. it is the first and only provincial-level pa designation in canada to explicitly incorporate first nations’ interests into its legal framework. pursuant to section 5(3.1) of the act, conservancies are set-aside for four distinct purposes: 1. “…the protection and maintenance of their biological diversity and natural environments”; 1 turner and bitonti: b.c. conservancies published by scholarship@western, 2011 2. “…the preservation and maintenance of social, ceremonial and cultural uses of first nations”; 3. “…the protection and maintenance of their recreational values”; 4. and, “…to ensure that development or use of their natural resources occurs in a sustainable manner consistent with the” first three purposes. the minister of environment has expressly stated that these four purposes (local ecological integrity, aboriginal use, recreation, and sustainable resource development) are intended to complement each other, with each being given equal priority in decision-making surrounding the use and management of a conservancy (bc, 2006). conservancies are distinguished from other pa designations under the act by two main features that reflect their purposes. first is the explicit recognition of first nations’ social, cultural and ceremonial uses within the pa. secondly, the test for issuing park use permits (pups) explicitly restricts commercial logging, mining, or commercial hydro-electricity (park act, ss. 9(10)(a), (b), and (c)), but allows local first nations on a priority basis (turning point, 2009), and others, to pursue a wider diversity of low-impact economic development activities within a conservancy than is possible within class a parks1 there is also a procedural difference that distinguishes conservancies from other provincial pas: the identification of areas for conservancy classification is undertaken in conjunction between individual first nations and the province (turning point, 2009; rozwadowska, 2011). in this way, first nations are partners in selecting locations within their traditional territories that could benefit from the protection and land use agreements afforded by a conservancy designation. it is important to remember, however, that aboriginal title has not been extinguished in british columbia (delgamuukw v. bc, 1997) and therefore conservancies may still be subject to aboriginal land claims despite the cooperative model for establishing and managing these pas. (bc, 2011). any party, including first nations, must apply for a pup permit, which will only be granted if the proposed economic use fits within the framework of the purposes of laid out in s. 5(3.1) of the act, the specific conservancy management plan, if there is one, as well as bc’s parks impact assessment (bc, 2011, p. 9). permissible economic activities include, wildlife viewing, guided hiking and fishing, shellfish aquaculture, and small-scale, run-of-the-river hydro projects for local and tourism needs (bc, 2011; turning point, 2009). the new conservancy designation has been widely implemented since its inception in 2006. by march 2011, 144 conservancies, covering 2,119,131 ha of the provinces, were established in bc through inclusion in schedules to the protected areas of british columbia act (bc, 2010a). conservancies now comprise approximately 16% of the bc’s total 13,142,123 ha of protected areas and are second in their contribution to this total only to class a parks (at 10,418,083 ha) (bc, 2010a). though originally created specifically for implementation in the north and central coast regions of the province (bill 28, 2006), the conservancy designation has since been extended to other regions, including haida gwaii, morice, and sea-to-sky (bc, 2010b). bridging ecological conservation, first nations' use, recreation and economic opportunity: the moksgm’ol/chapple-cornwall conservancy example moksgm’ol/chapple-cornwall conservancy, located in the great bear rainforest, provides an illustration of the four interlocking purposes and uses of a conservancy (bc, 2010c). it was 1 class a parks are managed by bc parks and limit the minister to issuing a pup where it is necessary to preserve and maintain the recreational values of the park (park act, ss. 8 and 9). class b parks are also managed by bc parks, but have a less onerous test for issuing a pup. in a class b park, the minister must be satisfied the issuance of the pup will not be detrimental to the recreational values of the park (park act, ss. 8 and 9). lastly, class c parks have the same test as class a parks for issuing pups, but differ in that their management is delegated to a local park board appointed by the minister (park act, ss. 8 and 9, s.10). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 2 [2011], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.2.3 designated in july 2006, covers 29,116 ha of princess royal island (bc, 2010c), and is nested within the traditional territories of the gitga'at and gitxaala first nations. from an ecological standpoint, this conservancy provides protection for a vast tract of oldgrowth coastal rainforest, as well as for lakes, rivers, and intertidal zones. by conserving these local ecosystems, particular species, including black bears (ursus americanus), and their subspecies kermode or sprit bear2 this area is of major cultural significance and has been used by local first nations for millennia. it encompasses many important harvesting, fishing and other traditional resource-use areas, as well as many archaeological sites. these sites are now protected, along with the activities and cultural opportunities that they afford. , bald eagles (haliaeetus leucocephalus), pacific wolves (canis lupus) and many species of salmon are also being protected. recreational uses of the area, including hiking, fishing, boating and wildlife viewing, also have existing, or potential, economic dimensions. guided wildlife viewing, guided fishing, and other ecotourism activities are some of the economic ventures being pursued within and around this conservancy (bc, 2010c; also see gitga’at, 2004; king pacific lodge, 2009). the gitga'at are engaged in this regional tourism economy, both through their own tourism operations (gitga'at, 2004), as well as through seasonal employment at the lodges (turner, 2010). they are considering expanding the tourism opportunities they currently offer to include experiences for their clients in and around moksgm’ol/chapple-cornwall (turner, 2010). moksgm’ol/chapple-cornwall joins with the kitasoo spirit bear conservancy on the southeastern side of princess royal island and is within close proximity to five other conservancies within the gitga'at territory alone (ilmb, 2007). within this larger, ecosystem-based management context, the moksgm’ol/chapple-cornwall is part of a network of conservancy areas intended to support ecological integrity, first nations uses, recreational uses, and sustainable development opportunities in the great bear rainforest (coastal first nations, n.d.a; gitga'at, 2004; price, roburn & mackinnon, 2009). conservancies within canadian protected areas: policy and practice conservancies are an international pa designation and one that is gaining currency in pas that are designated for local, sustainable resource use in many parts of the world, as in the conservancies of namibia (world resources institute, 2005). in canada and the united states, the designation of land trust has been a more common category than conservancy to denote areas of combined human use and ecological conservation, but these trusts often refer to private lands (borrini-feyerabend et al., 2004) and therefore are not appropriate for first nations’ lands. the search for a new category of pa within bc, in many respects mirrors a search in recent decades at international, national and regional levels for pa categories that provide for livelihood needs and “conservation with a human face” (borgerhoff mulder & coppolillo, 2005, p. 37), which includes respect for and recognition of the rights of indigenous peoples (c.f. un 2008; inter-american court of human rights, 2009). this search has resulted in new types of pas that provide more pluralistic options for conservation that recognizes humans as a part of, and not separated from, natural systems. at the federal level within canada, changes to national parks policy and practice are fledging, but apparent. the shift in federal policy to recognize the rights and perspectives of aboriginal peoples in parks and pa policy has been significantly influenced by a series of legal challenges by aboriginal peoples against the canadian government. the inuit initiated the first such case during the 1970s. they argued successfully that the federal government's plans to expand the national parks system through the establishment of a number of new northern parks was 2 the white spirit, or kermode, bear (ursus americanus kermodei) is a type of black bear that is sacred to coastal first nations (campbell, 2005). 3 turner and bitonti: b.c. conservancies published by scholarship@western, 2011 tantamount to unilateral expropriation of aboriginal lands and, therefore, in contravention of the canadian bill of rights (mcnamee, 2009). the result was an amendment to the national parks act that allowed for the creation of national park reserves, in which, “the native people were not giving up their claim to lands to which they asserted aboriginal title; they simply agreed to allow the federal government to administer parks on their land until such time as their land claims agreement was ratified by both parliament and the inuit” (mcnamee, 2009, p. 43). this process set a precedent for other national parks reserves3 changes to parks canada policy to recognize aboriginal interests in ecological protection alongside those of the government and other stakeholders also have implications for the stability of conservation through parks and other pas. boyd (2003) argues, “the strongest legal protection that can be given to a park in canada is inclusion in treaty and land claims settlements with aboriginal people” (p. 175). indeed, it has been suggested that canadian parks have entered a new era—the aboriginal period—in which aboriginal people are gaining a paramount influence in canadian conservation policy (dearden & rollins, 2009). subject to land claims in both northern and southern canada as well as for federal government negotiation with both affected aboriginal peoples and provincial or territorial governments during the creation of new national parks (mcnamee, 2009). the growing recognition of aboriginal rights within canadian pa policy has also been enhanced by a series of other court cases that are accumulating a growing body of law supporting aboriginal rights and title, including: the calder case, the sparrow case, the delgamuukw case (delgamuukw v. bc, 1997), and more recently haida and tuke and sappier and polchies, as well as lobbying efforts that led to changes in the constitution act, 1982 (dearden & langdon, 2009). these cases have established the legally constituted existence of aboriginal rights, as well as the duty of governments and industry to consult with aboriginal groups prior to land and resource use decisions affecting aboriginal peoples and territories. in spite of these successes, access by aboriginal peoples to lands and natural resources in canadian parks and pas can depend on a variety of factors, including the particular statutory framework of a park or other pa, treaty rights held by an aboriginal group4, as well as how, where and when aboriginal rights and title are established.5 resultantly, levels of access vary significantly across the country6 furthermore, changes in federal policy and practice have not been paralleled by substantive changes at the provincial and territorial level. provincial and territorial pas constitute approximately two-thirds of canada's total pa system (boyd, 2003, p.169). although there is a diversity of and many canadian aboriginal peoples continue to feel “locked out” (canadian parks council 2008, p. 2) and to petition for access to areas of their traditional territory designated as pas (dearden & langdon, 2009). 3 these include: gwaii haanas national park reserve and haida heritage site (established 1993; parks canada, 2010); pacific rim national park reserve (first established in 1970 and renegotiated as a national park reserve in 1987; great canadian parks, 2007; parks canada, 2011a); and, gulf islands national park reserve (established 2003; parks canada, 2011b) in bc. feasibility studies for another national park reserve in bc, south okanagan-lower similkameen, are also underway (parks canada, 2006). 4 treaties signed by the crown and aboriginal groups often consisted of a grant of title to the crown in exchange for money and access for an aboriginal group to unoccupied crown land for hunting and fishing purposes (hogg, 2007). when a park or pa is established on treaty land, however, such access is often discontinued by park regulations, which reclassified park areas as occupied crown land (see r v. bellegard and r v. sundown). 5 where the crown seeks to infringe on an aboriginal right by establishing a pa, part of the justification required under the s. 35 case law imposes a duty to consult with aboriginal groups beforehand, as per r v. sparrow [1990] 1 s.c.r. 1075 at 1113. for further discussions on duty to consult also see recent case brokenhead fn v. canada 2009 fc 982. 6 peepre and dearden (2002, p. 333-334) identify 23 out of 37 national parks they surveyed in 2001 as allowing no harvesting of natural resources by aboriginal peoples. four parks allowed only very limited harvesting, while another ten permitted limited harvesting. limited and very limited allow for some level of plant and animal resources use, dependent on the park and species involved. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 2 [2011], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.2.3 classifications for parks and other pas at the provincial-level, our review of provincial parks and pa categories across canada (see government of alberta, 2011; government of new brunswick, 2011; government of newfoundland and labrador, 2010; government of pei, 2011; government of saskatchewan, 2011; ontario parks, 2009; province of manitoba, 2011; province of new brunswick, 2010; province of nova scotia, 2011; redpath museum, 1999) found the designation of conservancy in bc to be the only provincial designation that explicitly incorporates first nations peoples into planning and management, and enshrines the “preservation and maintenance of social, ceremonial and cultural uses of first nations” (act, s. 5(3.1)), alongside the need for low-impact economic activities, as central features of a pa. momentum for a new approach to pas in british columbia bc's new conservancy designation emerged as part of a twenty-year shift in governmentfirst nations relations in the province (harcourt, march 3, 2011; ilmb, 2006). prompted by intense conflict between industry, first nations, environmentalists and other stakeholders over land and resource use during the 1980s and early 1990s (harcourt, 3 march 2011; also see scientific panel, 1995), the government committed to establishing what it termed a “new relationship” with british columbian first nations (ilmb, 2006; bc, 2006, p. 4096). these new relationship commitments with first nations emerged alongside other commitments by the province to develop a new collaborative land use approach for bc. the first steps in bridging these commitments focused on land use decisions on the central and north coast, which resulted in sub-regional land use plans containing recommendations to the province with respect to managing public land and resources. these land and resource management plans (lrmps) were initiated by the ministry of sustainable resource management in consultation with a broad set of stakeholders, including governments, conservation groups, industry, and first nations (bc, 2001). although coastal first nations were represented, they abstained from the decision-making process at the lrmp stage (coastal first nations, n.d.b), choosing instead to create their own land and resource management plans designed for their specific territories. discrepancies between the lrmps and the local land use plans were resolved first by coastal first nations7 the idea for conservancies emerged during the lrmps, lrpas, and slupas negotiations when it was recognized that a new pa designation was needed to support the lrmps and the new relationship (bc, 2011). and the province entering into the land and resource protocol agreements (lrpas) to structure decision-making (cfn and bc, 1996, p. 2) and next through strategic land use planning agreements (slupas), negotiated on a government-to-government basis between individual first nations and the province (see coastal first nations, n.d.b). slupas include demarcations of specific land-use zones in the territory, what those zones are intended for, as well as specific management objectives (c.f. gitga’at and bc, 2006). 8 areas within first nations’ traditional territory that first nations and the government felt could benefit from conservancy status were identified during the creation of land use plans (turning point, 2009). 7 the coastal first nations are a formal coalition of first nations, consisting of the gitga’at first nation, haisla nation, heiltsuk nation, kitasoo/xaixais first nation, metlakatla first nation, and the wuikinuxv first nation (coastal first nations, n.d.a). 8 in addition to the amendments to the park act, enabling conservancies, legislative amendments were also made to the forest and range practices act, the land act, and the wildlife act (bc, 2010d). 5 turner and bitonti: b.c. conservancies published by scholarship@western, 2011 assessing the contribution of conservancies to the bc pa system a first nations’ perspective the gitga’at first nation traditional territory is located 145 km southeast of prince rupert on the bc north coast. approximately 170 gitga’at band members live fulltime within their territory in the village of hartley bay. alongside the imperative of local job creation, hartley bay is working towards the goal of becoming “the greenest first nation community in canada” (pulse energy, 2009). the gitga’at have a long history of stewardship and management of their territory and are deeply committed to ensuring the ecological integrity of their lands and waters into the future (gitga’at nation, 2004; mccarthy, 2009). many gitga’at continue to actively use their territory to support their traditional economy, much of which is centred on wild food resources (turner and clifton 2006).9 a key informant explained that conservancies provide the gitga’at with a new tool to protect important areas within their traditional territory from ecological damage, while continuing to support and affirm local user rights and low impact economic opportunities within those areas (anon., pers. comm., 2010). for example, the moksgm’ol/chapple-cornwall conservancy, discussed previously, surrounds the ancestral gitga'at village site of kiel. kiel is used each year as a harvest camp during the month of may. the small village site itself is an indian reserve (ir #8 kayal), and is therefore excluded from the conservancy; however, the areas surrounding kiel that now comprise the moksgm’ol/chapple-cornwall conservancy are also key gitga’at resource use areas and help ensure the ecological integrity of the whole kiel area (british columbia, 2010a). unlike another important gitga'at village site, old town, which was logged during the 1970s and 1980s (turner, 2009), kiel is now protected from logging and other resource extraction activities that could have a negative or detrimental impact on the ecosystem and gitga'at activities. the harvest camp and the activities that take place throughout the year in the kiel area are not only valued by gitga'at for their contributions to local food sovereignty and food security, but also for the well-being of their society as a whole (turner, 2010). opportunities for intergenerational learning and spending time with family and friends, as well as sustaining individual and collective connections with the gitga'at territory and the other beings that inhabit it are some examples of the other benefits that gitga'at identified (turner, 2010). to date, approximately 30% of the gitga’at territory has been placed under a conservancy designation (anon., pers. comm., 2010; also see ilmb, 2007). many of these areas, as exemplified by the moksgm’ol/chapple-cornwall conservancy, are important sites for local food harvesting and other natural resources uses. the gitga’at are also choosing to undertake low-impact economic activities within some of their conservancies, some with support of funds which the community gained access to by entering into the 2006 slupa with the province (anon., pers. comm., 2010; also see coast opportunity funds, 2010). these initiatives include small-scale shellfish aquaculture, ecotourism activities, such as spirit bear viewing, as well as the building of a 1mw microhydroelectric facility to shift the community off diesel power (gitga’at nation, 2004; turner, 2010). the ability to pursue these economic activities, and the assurance that conservancy areas will be protected from large-scale developments in the future, are very important to the livelihoods of hartley bay community members and to the community as a whole (turner, 2010). the gitga’at are still in the process of establishing management plans for the conservancies in their territory. the general structures, however, are laid out in the slupa between the gitga’at and the province (gfn and bc, 2006). gitga’at involvement in the permitting process for economic 9 seaweed, halibut, salmon, berries, seals, and other game are examples of some of the foods that are regularly harvested and enjoyed by gitga’at. cedar for basketry and carving as well as other plants for medicinal and other purposes are also frequently harvested within the territory (turner and clifton, 2006; turner and thompson, 2006). 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 2 [2011], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.2.3 activities in conservancies, including those initiated and managed by gitga’at, is also essential and helps support gitga’at stewardship of their territory (anon., pers. comm., 2010). the main challenge of conservancies for the gitga’at has been building an understanding of the new designation within the community. many community members are still unaware of the location of conservancies within their territory and might not know to report illegal activities should they witness them (anon., pers. comm., 2010). as a key informant (anon. pers. comm., 2009) explained: …if you have areas that are being protected, they are more likely to be successful if people from the village are watching them. right now we have protected areas nearby our community, but nobody knows… if somebody sees a boat, we’ll just say, ‘we saw a boat.’ we won’t say, ‘i wonder what that guy is doing. maybe we should go check him out.’ furthermore, some gitga’at band members are discouraged because some activities that they do not support are still permitted within conservancies, including black bear sport hunting (anon., pers. comm., 2010; turner, 2010). in spite of these challenges, conservancies seem to be helping the gitga’at pursue their objectives of building their local economy alongside ensuring the long-term environmental integrity of their territory and their exercise their aboriginal rights and title. assessing new opportunities and changes the experience of the gitga’at helps to illustrate some of the advantages, challenges and drawbacks of conservancies, many of which appear to be shared by other first nations in the province, for example the squamish, l’il’wat and in-shuck-ch first nations (rozwadowska, 2010; 2011). as highlighted above, there are many compelling advantages as well as some potential drawbacks and challenges with the new designation (table 1). table 1 summary of conservancy strengths and challenges strengths challenges � respects aboriginal rights and remains subject to unextinguished aboriginal title and land claims, consistent with shifting international and parks canada policies and practices � addresses some ecological integrity concerns related to the selection and location of pas (many conservancies are in ecologically important areas) � established on a partnership-basis between individual first nations and the provincial government (allowing for cross-scale management) � supports local level job creation � provides first nations with a tool for protecting valued areas � balancing the distinct purposes of conservancies over the long term with changing local needs and interests, including restricting future economic development options � funding to support the expansion of the bc protected areas system over the longterm, including funding for public awareness building � creating better public awareness, both within first nations communities directly involved in conservancy processes, as well as the general public � no guarantee of long-term jobs for first nations � some activities (such as sports hunting) 7 turner and bitonti: b.c. conservancies published by scholarship@western, 2011 � if included in future land claims settlements, conservancies will have some of the strongest protection within the canadian legal system � facilitated a remarkable expansion of the bc protected area system within a very short period of time (2,119,131 ha between 2006 and 2011; bc, 2011) � provides a greater diversity of protected area categories within the province to allow for a plurality of approaches to ecological conservation deemed undesirable by some first nations are still allowed within some conservancies � building and sustaining capacity within bc parks for monitoring and enforcement of conservancy relations first and foremost, conservancies are, to our knowledge, the first pas of their kind at the canadian provincial-level that explicitly supports historical and cultural features, on-going traditional and economic practices, and the continuity of specific places of importance to first nations. moreover, involving first nations in the planning, development, implementation and management of conservancies sets a precedent for new, more equitable land management policies and practices in bc, particularly concerning conservation. the creation of conservancies therefore signals a dramatic shift in the nature and potential of bc pas and sets a precedent for bona fide consultation and collaboration in the identification, planning and management of pas. involving first nations in the identification of areas to be protected from large-scale development also helps ensure that social-cultural as well as ecologically important areas receive protection, which canadian park authorities, by focusing on areas of high scenic and recreational value, such as mountain tops, have not always done successfully (boyd, 2003)10 taking first nations’ customary and contemporary economic uses into account in the designation and management of conservancies helps ensure that first nations concerns related to limited access and use within class a and b parks are not transferred to conservancies (bc, 2011). by reconciling these concerns and bringing together the mutual conservation interests of first nations, the province and other stakeholders, conservancies have made a dramatic contribution to provincial environmental protection and conservation. . boyd (2003) concludes that throughout canada as a result of economic factors, “…the areas with the highest biodiversity value, which face the greatest threat from human activities, currently receive the least amount of protection” (p. 179). significantly, the areas of importance to many first nations are often places of high biological productivity, such as intertidal and estuarine zones, and consequently are prime areas to protect in order to support biological diversity and ecosystem integrity (turning point, 2009). 11 there are also drawbacks and ongoing challenges related to conservancies that must be recognized. for example, a recent judicial decision (da’naxda’xw /awaetlala v. bc) suggests that the collaborative management of these areas also helps ensure that they will continue to receive protection in the future, as the parties involved have pledged a responsibility to themselves and each other to uphold the mandate of the conservancies (wuixkinuxv and bc, 2007; kitasoo xaixais and bc, 2007). the network of government-togovernment relationships between individual first nations and the province helps establish conditions for cross-scale management, facilitating conservation and first nation specific management strategies, within the broader ecosystem-based management context of the new provincial land-use strategy. 10 boyd (2003, p. 179) cites a bc government study showing that 61.2% of newly created pas within the province between 1991 and 1996 were located in alpine and subalpine regions. 11 bc now protects 13.05 million hectares, representing 14.26% of its landmass, the most of any province. this includes 33% of the north and central coast (turning point, 2009). 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 2 [2011], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.2.3 conflict over restrictions to first nations economic development opportunities may occur as local conservation and development priorities change or new opportunities present themselves. balancing the distinct purposes of the conservancies may be an ongoing challenge, requiring regular monitoring, evaluation and consultation between the stakeholders. this points to some of the governance challenges involving conservancies. rozwadowska (2011) suggests that many first nations may not have the capacity or resources to manage conservancies, even within a collaborative management scheme, or to take advantage of the opportunities for economic benefits. she highlights the need for management and business plans to support potential economic opportunities (p. 52). this suggests that long term funding and support for individual first nations, through coastal first nations, coastal opportunities fund, and others, maybe be of central importance for ensuring conservancies bring benefits for first nations. ensuring that bc parks’ staff and local first nations have a clear understanding of the conservancy designation may be another initial challenge. a specific issue in this regard is related to monitoring and enforcement. first nations communities, particularly in isolated parts of the province, such as the gitga’at territory, have an important monitoring role to play in order to protect conservancies from prohibited activities. bc parks is attempting to formalize these monitoring roles by hiring more first nations as park rangers (north coast lrmp and british columbia, 2008, p. 4).12 the possibility of employment as a park ranger, however, has two related problems: such jobs are not guaranteed and it begs the question of whether the devolution of monitoring and enforcement power goes far enough. currently, the monitoring and enforcement capacity of government authorities, such as park rangers, in isolated areas is limited.13 in response to this, and out of a desire to ensure the protection of their territories, coastal first nations are also building their own monitoring capacity through the coast guardian watchmen network (coast guardian watchmen network, n.d.). currently, however, the watchmen have no legal enforcement authority. in the future, a more effective approach could be to invest in supporting the independent monitoring capacity and enforcement authority of local first nations, rather than trying to control monitoring and enforcement through top-down approaches. conclusions bc’s conservancy designation is a positive addition to the bc pas system, because of the unique combination of local ecological conservation, aboriginal use, recreation, and allowance for sustainable resource development intertwined in the conservancy mandate. furthermore, conservancies are significant because of the joint-management conditions under which new areas are identified, established and managed. as such, conservancies are an integrated response to the interlocking challenges facing many parts of the province: pressures for resource development, the need for job creation, and the imperatives of conservation and respect for first nations rights. the creation of conservancies seems to demonstrate a substantive shift in planning and management of parks and other pas in bc with respect to first nations-government relations. however, as berkes (2007, 2009) cautions, there are no panacea approaches to conservation. rather, plurality and inclusivity in the tools and approaches to conservation should be sought. in this way, conservancies are a positive addition to the bc protected areas system, since they increase the diversity and scope of pas within the province. 12 in this capacity, first nations can play a vital role as “bc park rangers provide an important function in the overall management of conservancies by monitoring recreational activities and park use permits and at the same time contributing to the maintenance of public safety and security” (north coast lrmp and british columbia, 2008, p. 4). 13 while bc protected areas have tripled between 1977 and 2000, the number of bc parks employees has fallen by 10% (boyd, 2003, p. 180). 9 turner and bitonti: b.c. conservancies published by scholarship@western, 2011 whether or not other provincial park authorities in canada will adopt similar designations in the future will likely depend on the continued successful implementation and management of bc conservancies. likely the success of individual conservancies in meeting their broad set of objectives will vary, reflecting a range in the effectiveness of capacity building, management plan implementation and evaluation, as well as other local and institutional contexts. an ongoing commitment by both the provincial government and first nations to work together and to invest time and resources in the management of bc’s new pas is vital in order to ensure that the spirit of the conservancy legislation, related government-to-government agreements and land management plans continue to be upheld in both the short and long term. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 2 [2011], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.2.3 references adams, w. m., & hutton, j. 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(2007). protected area collaborative management agreement. retrieved from http://coastalfirstnations.ca/files/documents/wuikinunx_cma.pdf 15 turner and bitonti: b.c. conservancies published by scholarship@western, 2011 the international indigenous policy journal june 2011 conservancies in british columbia, canada: bringing together protected areas and first nations' interests katherine l. turner christopher p.h. bitonti recommended citation conservancies in british columbia, canada: bringing together protected areas and first nations' interests abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license conservancies in british columbia, canada: bringing together protected areas and first nations' interests british columbia’s community benefits agreement: economic justice for indigenous workers in relation to union politics in urban infrastructure projects the international indigenous policy journal volume 13 | issue 2 september 2022 british columbia’s community benefits agreement: economic justice for indigenous workers in relation to union politics in urban infrastructure projects lisa berglund dalhousie university, canada, lisa.berglund@dal.ca jodi miles dalhousie university, canada, jd544008@dal.ca recommended citation berglund, l., & miles, j. (2022). british columbia’s community benefits agreement: economic justice for indigenous workers in relation to union politics in urban infrastructure projects. the international indigenous policy journal, 13(2). https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2022.13.2.14154 british columbia’s community benefits agreement: economic justice for indigenous workers in relation to union politics in urban infrastructure projects abstract british columbia’s community benefits agreement that aims to provide jobs in the construction trades for underrepresented groups serves as a case to explore the successes and barriers to distributing the benefits of urban development to indigenous groups towards the goal of economic justice. through a content analysis of stakeholder interviews and documents about the agreement, we found that, while there is optimism that the cba may help advance public discourse on economic justice for indigenous peoples, there are significant barriers that have gone unaddressed in this and other labor agreements due to a lack of community engagement. these include lack of transportation, continued marginalization of indigenous workers into unskilled labor, and the reinforcement of dependence on non-indigenous economies. keywords community benefits agreements, workforce development, first nations, infrastructure, economic justice acknowledgments we would like to thank the social sciences and humanities research council for their support of this work. we would also like to thank our participants for taking the time to shed light on this policy, and the anonymous reviewers who helped to improve this paper. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ 1 berglund & miles: british columbia’s community benefits agreement published by scholarship@western, 2022 british columbia’s community benefits agreement: economic justice for indigenous workers in relation to union politics in urban infrastructure projects in recent years, workforce development policies and impact benefit agreements have engaged with the challenge of advancing economic justice for indigenous peoples by providing employment opportunities and other economic benefits to compensate for the impacts of development. in 2018, the british columbia (bc) government announced a province-wide agreement with a coalition of 19 prominent unions (the allied infrastructure and related construction council of british columbia [aircc]) that is referred to as a community benefits agreement (cba). while similar agreements have been made with indigenous groups for specific projects, the cba uniquely covers infrastructure projects across the province that mostly service urban areas and requires that the aircc increase the representation of indigenous people1 in the construction workforce. the agreement aims to address the province’s looming labor shortage in the construction trades and increase the representation of indigenous people (among other underrepresented groups) (community benefit coalition of bc, 2019). the bc infrastructure benefits board (bcib) has invoked canada’s truth and reconciliation commission’s (trc) calls to action and the universal declaration of the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip) in their public statements around the agreement, as well as the province’s declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples act (government of british columbia, 2020). in canada, indigenous populations are a rapidly growing demographic. between 2006 and 2016, the indigenous population grew by 42.5%, which was more than four times faster than the growth of the non-indigenous population over the same period (statistics canada, 2019). according to statistics canada, in 2016, indigenous peoples made up 5% of the canadian population, but are expected to account for up to 6.8% of the canadian population by 2041 (statistics canada, 2021). as of 2016, more than half of the indigenous population in canada lives in western provinces, with 17.7% of the indigenous population living in british columbia (statistics canada, 2019). it is important to note that indigenous people are economically and socially marginalized in canada and experience lower life expectancies and levels of education, as well as higher unemployment rates when compared to their nonindigenous counterparts. for example, in 2011, census data showed that indigenous men had a life expectancy that was 8.9 years shorter than non-indigenous men, and indigenous women had a life expectancy that was 9.6 years shorter than non-indigenous women (tjepkema et al., 2019). as of 2016, indigenous women were 15.2% less likely and indigenous men were 17.6% less likely to attain a postsecondary qualification when compared to their non-indigenous counterparts (arriagada, 2021). as of 2021, the indigenous labour force had an unemployment rate of 11.6%, while the non-indigenous labour force has an unemployment rate of 7.4% (statistics canada, 2022). while the scholarship on community benefits agreements has at times focused on winning benefits for underrepresented communities in the construction trades, there has been little research on how cbas 1 the agreement itself refers to “indigenous people” which is inclusive of first nation, métis, and inuit. https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?japt4u 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.2.14154 can be leveraged to promote economic justice for indigenous peoples in urban settings. both cbas and impact benefit agreements are most often established on an ad hoc, project-by-project basis and have shown both successes and failures when it comes to their goals of sharing the economic benefits of projects. additionally, the adoption of policy-mandated cbas has become more prominent (normally at the municipal level) in the hopes of producing more consistent and enforceable benefits agreements, the outcomes of which are both still being studied by scholars and being tested by governments at multiple levels. through an examination of the early years of implementation of british columbia’s community benefits agreement, we aim to identify the barriers and opportunities for this provincial scale cba to promote economic justice for indigenous peoples through workforce development. a note on economic justice “economic justice,” while not typically used in literature on decolonization or indigenous sovereignty, is an important goal of the accountable development movement which has produced cbas (gross et al., 2002; parks & warren, 2009). scholars argue that a clear distinction is needed between fights for “justice” and the struggle for decolonization (tuck & yang, 2012). according to tuck and yang (2012), decolonization is a distinct process of removing settler cultural, social, and economic systems in an effort to achieve indigenous sovereignty and self determination, and “cannot easily be grafted onto preexisting discourses/frameworks [of human rights or civil rights], even if they are critical, even if they are anti-racist, even if they are justice frameworks . . . decolonization doesn’t have a synonym” (p. 3). in its attempt to bring economic opportunity in the form of jobs produced by existing economic structures in the construction trades, british columbia’s cba should be viewed as an effort towards distributive justice which can be defined as the socially just allocation of resources and opportunities (jasso et al., 2016); this is a different objective from decolonization. conceding that the cba can not be considered an effort towards decolonization or indigenous sovereignty because they attempt to draw economic opportunity for indigenous workers from practices of the settler state, this paper focuses on evaluating the agreement according to what is often a main aspiration of cbas: economic justice. drawing from the literature and the work of advocacy groups and cba campaigns, our analysis rests on a definition of economic justice based on one’s right to: 1) organize to resist unequal compensation for work due to socioeconomic status2 (fine, 2011; franklin, 2014; southern poverty law center, 2021); 2) have equitable access to work that is fairly compensated and is secure in the long term (rather than piecemeal, one-off opportunities) (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2012); 3) agency to determine one’s own line of work and derive economic opportunity from such work (i.e., economic self-determination) (united nations, 2007); 4) recognize and validate alternative and diverse economies (bledsoe et al., 2019). these characteristics of economic justice connect to themes of undrip and the trc calls to action. we view undrip’s commitment to economic self 2 by socioeconomic status, we mean the opportunities to access economic resources as determined by the intersection of one’s class, race, ethnicity, immigration status, ability, and/or gender profiles. 3 berglund & miles: british columbia’s community benefits agreement published by scholarship@western, 2022 determination as related to economic justice (robison et al., 2018; united nations, 2007). although undrip’s mandate is not explicitly described as “economic justice,” they are in substance similar. further, the trc’s calls to action that call for “long-term, sustainable benefits from economic development projects” represents common attributes with that concept of economic justice (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2012, p. 10). in accordance with tuck and yang’s (2012) definition, neither undrip nor the trc’s calls to action should be understood as decolonizing, as they aim to redistribute resources in a just fashion without shifting away from settler governance systems or economies. literature review government brokered cbas since the 1990s, community benefits agreements have become popularized as a way for communities local to a development to win benefits such as affordable housing, jobs, and services or amenities, in exchange for political support for the project (gross et al., 2002). while historically cbas have been extra-governmental arrangements between local communities and developers, governments have been increasingly directly involved in brokering both project-based agreements and passing legislation (like detroit’s community benefits ordinance and vancouver’s citywide community benefits agreement) to mandate benefits for development (berglund, 2020; wolf-powers, 2010). some scholars argue that the government should not have a primary role in the negotiation, implementation, or enforcement of cbas due to biases towards developers and what are sometimes weak enforcement mechanisms (de barbieri, 2015; parks & warren, 2009). others argue that the government’s involvement in cbas is crucial to their success or even unavoidable, particularly with regards to implementation and enforcement (eppes, 2018; ho, 2007; wolf-powers, 2010). according to gross (2008), the term “cba” has at times been co-opted by parties with interests that compete with community desires. cbas are increasingly used for agreements that have been negotiated by government officials, their political supporters and/or groups representing business interests, rather than between community groups and developers. nugent (2017) raises the concern that when governments work with community coalitions to broker community benefits agreements, there is a tendency for politicians and government agencies to use cba negotiations “as a ‘good news story’ to make [themselves] appear friendly to trade unions and equity-seeking groups” and that, they “give an appearance of democratic engagement without conceding any power, or worse, being used as political cover for deepening neoliberal governance” (pp. 87, 91). questions are also raised about the motives of labor unions when they are major stakeholders, with concerns that negotiations can be swayed by labor movement politics, instead of truly being representative of community interests (wolf-powers, 2010). in the cases of government brokered cbas that involve labor unions, the goal of bringing benefits to a community often goes hand-in-hand with agendas to increase union membership and gain political support in underrepresented communities broadly, which is not always consistent with the advancement of local community agendas (nugent, 2017). in contrast, leavitt (2006) and parks and warren (2009) https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?qvlrwn https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?hgqgvs https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?aeafip https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?aeafip https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?h8wfoh https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?z1zbne https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?lahumr https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?zzbpdw https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?cmep3o 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.2.14154 draw attention to the historic successes of community-labor coalitions in cbas, considering them a benchmark for successful agreements. a fundamental challenge to project-based cbas bringing economic justice to communities lies in their reformist tendencies and their inability to serve as a true alternative to neoliberal governance (nugent, 2017). according to kulchyski and neckoway (2006), cbas and similar agreements, when made with indigenous peoples, are steeped in a “mentality [that] treats local peoples, mostly first nations and metis, as obstacles whose support should be purchased with the minimum possible expenditures” (p. 3). while cbas aim to bring benefits to underrepresented communities, some argue that “exacting benefits or zoning changes for the particularist interests of neighborhoods on an ad hoc basis circumvents the fundamental goals of comprehensive city planning” (nugent, 2017, pp. 88–89); for this reason, the role of british columbia’s provincial cba is an important case and may advance our understanding of how the benefits of cbas might be distributed consistently across a wider geography. impact benefit agreements and indigenous workforce development related to cbas, impact benefit agreements (ibas) are agreements negotiated between indigenous communities and successful project proponents (usually in the resource extraction industry) which aim to ensure that indigenous communities receive benefits for the projects that take place on their land, and may also be used to mitigate the adverse environmental impacts of these projects (caine & krogman, 2010; gogal et al., 2005; hitch & fidler, 2007). these benefits often include employment and training opportunities, but may also involve other benefits, such as profit-sharing and business development opportunities (caine & krogman, 2010; hitch & fidler, 2007). the amount of success these agreements have depends on the case, but they have shown the potential to greatly increase indigenous representation in certain sectors (caron et al., 2019). abele (2017) notes that when large resource extraction infrastructure and operations are placed near indigenous communities, there are several areas of insufficient knowledge that negatively impact the effectiveness of ibas, including lack of traditional knowledge, lack of analysis of socioeconomic factors, and a lack of understanding of environmental issues such as water quality and habitat loss. he further highlights that there is a common belief that introduction of indigenous peoples into the wage economy through benefits like jobs and workforce development will improve socioeconomic issues; however, with a lack of these forms of knowledge about indigenous communities and their context, he argues that the impacts are inconclusive (abele, 2017). ibas are different from the typical cba (though closely related), as they always involve an indigenous community as one of the negotiators, in lieu of what is usually a community coalition. ibas (and most traditional cbas) also differ from the case of british columbia’s community benefits agreement in that they are project based and organized on an ad hoc, case by case basis. it is important to note that in the case of the non-renewable energy production and resource extraction industries in canada, agreements that provide benefits such as employment, training, and profit sharing are now fairly standard, though the degrees of success of these agreements are up for debate (abele, 2017). key aspects that impact the https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?i7mfpz https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?i7mfpz https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?gmwjtk https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?ve9npq 5 berglund & miles: british columbia’s community benefits agreement published by scholarship@western, 2022 success of workforce development in such agreements include having clearly defined hiring targets; providing training, culturally appropriate community outreach, and additional supports like childcare and mentorship and including strong monitoring and enforcement mechanisms (nugent, 2017). experts on the topic of indigenous workforce development discuss many barriers that prevent indigenous workers from entering or staying in the workforce or being included in the benefits of ibas. these include barriers to formal education and lack of recognized job experience due to the historic segregation of the skilled trades (cahill, 2018; caron et al., 2019; purdie et al., 2006), inaccessible application processes (cahill, 2018; sloan & oliver, 2009), socio-economic disadvantages, physical distance from workplaces, commitment to traditional activities (caron et al., 2019), and discrimination and racism in the workplace (caron et al., 2019, purdie et al., 2008). others have also found that directly addressing these barriers to employment in resource extraction industries contributes to financial stability, helps develop skills, and potentially allows for participation in land management (haley & fisher, 2012; loxton et al., 2012; ritter, 2001). though there are success stories that support the positive effects of indigenous workforce development strategies, there are still challenges that need to be addressed, and room for these strategies to be improved. just as with cbas, concerns can be raised about whether ibas represent true alternatives when it comes to economically just policy, or whether they serve as a way to reproduce neoliberal governance structures. mccreary and turner (2018) state that, “these contractual agreements reflect a neoliberal model of governance through the market rather than a commitment to uphold public obligations to indigenous peoples” (p. 236), and that more than anything, “these initiatives attempt to relegitimize resource extraction as an instance of indigenous-corporate partnership . . . ibas reflect the imposed capitalist legalities of private contracting and exist in considerable tension with indigenous modes of conducting lawful relations” (p. 227). by this argument, traditional ibas that have become commonplace therefore may not help to promote economic or environmental justice through implementation of development benefits. additionally, some argue that indigenous workforce development strategies run the risk of making indigenous communities dependent on the settler state, which could hinder the achievement of self-determination, as well as the creation of economically sustainable communities (brereton & parmenter, 2008; holcombe & kemp, 2020); others describe what can be an unbalanced power dynamic that puts indigenous groups at a disadvantage during the negotiation of labor agreements (caine and krogman, 2010; o’faircheallaigh & corbett, 2005). while the literature about indigenous workforce development has provided insights into barriers to indigenous employment opportunities and some suggestions for mitigating these barriers, it tends to focus on specific fields such as forestry, mining, and healthcare, and less on urban development or infrastructure as is the case with british columbia’s cba. in addition, impact benefit agreements covered in the literature analyze the effectiveness of one-off, project-based agreements, rather than blanket agreements meant to apply to projects in an entire, large-scale geography, as british columbia’s cba does. by researching this agreement, this paper will assess a unique example of an indigenous https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?afiufz https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?5i8kmk https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?nphoje https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?wqvngf https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?wqvngf https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?akwrtf https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?vtmczi 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.2.14154 workforce development strategy that follows the current trend of increasingly popular governmentbrokered cbas to incorporate jobs for indigenous peoples into urban development. we aim to address a gap in the literature that has not yet been explored: the role of government brokered cbas in efforts towards economic justice for indigenous peoples through urban development. methods this research is a thematic analysis of stakeholder interviews, policy documents, and informational materials. in total, we interviewed 17 people who belong to the following five groups: 1) representatives from labor unions (from 4 aircc unions and 2 non-aircc ); 2) representatives from provincial workforce training authorities (2); 3) contractors who have business partnerships with indigenous communities in bc (3); 4) representatives of indigenous communities that have been impacted by the cba (4); and 5) members of resource management consultancy firms who represent indigenous communities in negotiations for the cba (2). in total, seven out of 17 participants self-identified as indigenous. one limitation of our sample of stakeholders is the lack of representation from the bc infrastructure benefits board, which was created to implement and enforce the bc cba, or the bc community benefits office, which was responsible for the development of the bc cba. all representatives from these groups declined to be interviewed. participants were asked questions tailored to their experiences with the cba, infrastructure development, and indigenous workforce development. generally, the interview questions asked participants for their opinions about whether or not the cba will change how infrastructure development impacts indigenous communities, or how infrastructure development is done in bc. while not explicitly using the terminology of “economic justice,” questions were asked related to different aspects of the concept of economic justice. they were asked about whether the cba adequately addressed the needs and desires of indigenous communities, whether it will reduce the barriers that indigenous people experience in the construction trades, and whether it will provide any other types of economic opportunities for indigenous communities. indigenous participants were also asked whether they felt that indigenous communities were adequately engaged with during the process of developing the cba. the documents analyzed and informational materials in this study included the cba policy, websites and materials created by both the province and aircc unions, trc calls to action, undrip, and media articles. we analyzed the interview data and documents using qualitative coding (saldaña, 2012). coding involves determining relevant themes, locating said themes in the data, and analyzing nuances within the data associated with a given theme. informed by the literature and our research questions, our first inductive round of coding included (but was not limited to): experience with the development or implementation of the cba, infrastructure development and negotiations, indigenous workforce development and economic development, recommendations for the cba, and, for indigenous participants, we also asked about their personal experiences with workforce development. themes then emerged from the data such as housing challenges, transportation challenges, concerns about economic https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?3epnsg 7 berglund & miles: british columbia’s community benefits agreement published by scholarship@western, 2022 opportunities available, and concerns about job quality. the data for this research was done with the approval of a research ethics board, with special consideration and permissions due to the engagement of indigenous participants. british columbia’s community benefits agreement in july 2018, the bc government announced a province-wide cba framework which ensures that public infrastructure projects prioritize the hiring of local, under-represented workers, such as indigenous people, placing them at the top of its priority hiring list (bc infrastructure benefits inc. and allied infrastructure and related construction council of british columbia, 2018; community benefits coalition of bc, 2019). in addition to priority hiring, the framework also puts emphasis on implementing strategies to help indigenous employees transition to work by providing additional training programs, including indigenous cultural competency training, and ensuring that all workers are paid equitable wages (bc infrastructure benefits inc. and allied infrastructure and related construction council of british columbia, 2018) (see table 1 for a summary of the agreement and its outcomes to date). https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?yghqfs https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?yghqfs https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?yghqfs https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?mqmjmp https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?mqmjmp 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.2.14154 table 1. british columbia’s cba benefits, outcomes, and enforcement bc cba description: ● an agreement between the bcib, a provincial crown corporation, and the aircc, a group of labour unions, which establishes the mandatory provision of community benefits for any public infrastructure project initiated under the agreement. ● meant to promote the hiring and retention of indigenous workers, local residents, and other equity groups who are underrepresented in the construction trades (women, workers with disabilities, etc.) (bc infrastructure benefits inc., and allied infrastructure and related construction council of british columbia, 2018.) benefits included in the cba: ● priority hiring for indigenous peoples, equity groups, and local residents ● training and apprenticeship programs for indigenous peoples, equity groups, and local residents ● prioritizing apprenticeships (25% target ratio of apprenticeship hours to journeyperson hours) ● mandatory respectful workplace and anti-bullying and harassment training, be more than a bystander, foundational safety training, and indigenous cultural competency training for all workers on cba projects (bc infrastructure benefits inc., and allied infrastructure and related construction council of british columbia. 2018.). hiring outcomes so far: of the total trade hours reported for fiscal 2020/2021: ● 58% were completed by local workers (i.e., those who live within 100 km of the worksite) ● 12% were completed by women ● 15% were completed by indigenous peoples (bcib, 2021). enforcement of the cba: ● goals and benchmarks are established by bcib ● bcib is in charge of monitoring and reporting the agreement’s success ● statistics reported on bcib website (bcib, 2021) https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?qbv07j https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?qbv07j https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?qbv07j 9 berglund & miles: british columbia’s community benefits agreement published by scholarship@western, 2022 the cba framework was bc premier john horgan’s response to a looming skilled labor shortage in the province, which expects a further shortage of 8,000 skilled construction workers by 2026 (community benefits coalition of bc, 2019). though the bc new democratic party government played a fundamental role in enacting the framework, a group of bc companies and labor unions advised the government throughout the development of the cba. this group of stakeholders make up the community benefits coalition of bc, which was spearheaded in april 2018 by the bc building trades council, an umbrella organization representing 25 local construction unions (bc building trades, 2020). since then, the community benefits coalition of bc has grown to include over 40 companies, local governments, and members of the labor unions who share the goal of using taxpayer funded infrastructure projects to benefit local communities (bc building trades, 2020). there are currently three projects announced under the cba, including the pattullo bridge replacement project, the highway 1 four-laning project, and the broadway subway project. the highway 1: illecillewaet project began construction in september 2019. the employees working on this project received skills and safety training, as well as indigenous cultural competency training, in order to minimize conflicts and improve working conditions for indigenous workers. construction for the highway 1 project began in 2019, while the pattullo bridge replacement project (expected to open in 2024) and the broadway subway project (expected to open in 2025) are under construction at the time of this writing (province of british columbia and transportation investment corporation, 2021a; 2021b). after the bc government passed the cba framework, they established bc infrastructure benefits (bcib), the crown corporation responsible for hiring construction workers, managing payroll and benefits, and working with unions and contractors to dispatch labor for projects under the cba (province of british columbia 2020). during this time, the allied infrastructure and related construction council (aircc) was also created, which is a council representing bc’s 19 major building trades unions (woodin 2020). though the bcib is responsible for formally recruiting and hiring all workers for cba projects, the hiring process is collaborative, and workers can come from any of three pools: bcib lists, aircc members, or those who work for the contractor. contractors can request specific requirements for workers and name hire all supervisors and some employees, while bcib dispatches the rest of the workforce (bcib, 2022). bc’s cba framework was signed between the bcib and the aircc in july of 2018 (bc infrastructure benefits inc. and allied infrastructure and related construction council of british columbia, 2018). anyone is able to bid on public infrastructure projects, regardless of if they are a member of the aircc unions. however, workers are required to join one of these 19 unions for the duration of the project (woodin, 2020). bcib has been working to create a network of employment opportunities by connecting applicants to employment service partnerships and by engaging with indigenous communities in close proximity to the infrastructure projects. to date, they have met with all of the identified indigenous groups (iig) along the two highway 1 project sites (illecillewaet highway 1 and kicking horse canyon phase 4) and have reached out to all iigs who are connected to the pattullo bridge replacement project. for context, 198 first nations and 39 chartered https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?woysnh https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?woysnh https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?xxsjqp https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?xxsjqp https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?t8ujyh https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?8i0pjd https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?8i0pjd https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?mqafg1 https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?qimqzd https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?oo5tva https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?oo5tva https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?8wir8g 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.2.14154 métis communities are located in what is now bc. though all of these communities may have the opportunity to participate in cba projects in the future, about 133 of these first nations and 28 métis communities are located toward the south of the province, where most of these projects are concentrated (bc assembly of first nations, 2022; métis nation british columbia, 2022). while 70% of bc residents are in favor of the cba (community benefits coalition of bc, 2019), the framework also has many critics. public debates about the cba raise concerns about the possibility of it increasing costs for public infrastructure projects, as well as the framework’s requirement for workers to join one of the aircc unions for the duration of the project (kennedy, 2019). in august 2018, a coalition of contractors and building associations submitted a petition to the bc supreme court, asking them to strike down the government’s cba framework arguing that is in violation of their right to freedom of association (smith, 2018). this case was taken to the bc supreme court in february 2020, where the court rejected the challenge (woodin, 2020). successes of the agreement the bcib service plan states that a projected 28% of project hours worked were completed by “indigenous peoples and equity groups” that consist of “women, indigenous peoples, persons with disabilities, visible minorities and lgbtq2s+” (exceeding their target of 16% for 2021); 15% of these hours were worked by indigenous workers (bc infrastructure benefits, 2020; electrical contractors association of bc, 2021). while it would appear that a sizeable number of hours were worked by indigenous and underrepresented groups, the significance of this number is also difficult to evaluate due to a lack of a publicly available baseline number from before the agreement. this lack of transparent recordkeeping on the success and enforcement of benefits has been a challenge for ibas as well (nugent, 2017). while none of the participants felt that the potential of the cba had been fully realized yet in its early stages, many participants across groups were hopeful that the policy represented a step in the right direction. overall, union representatives tended to be more optimistic of the opportunities created for indigenous people through the cba, while consultants and indigenous group representatives were either doubtful that the policy would be successful, or cautiously optimistic. one representative of an aircc union stated that they felt that the cba was ground-breaking, noting that in the last 16 years, there had not been any language that mandated hiring of underrepresented groups in this way (union representative #1, personal communication, july 7, 2020). another representative of an aircc union was very optimistic about their ability to not only place indigenous workers in apprenticeships and jobs, but ultimately to help them build a career; this point was contentious with representatives from indigenous groups who were doubtful of the long-term employment opportunities from the cba. all participants agreed with the intention of the cba, and most union representatives were highly optimistic about the agreement. however, several consultants and indigenous group representatives were concerned about the enforcement, with one environmental consultant stating that, “as long as the follow-up is there, and you know, the ministry of transportation, the bc government, ensures that https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?sijpcf https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?clhpz6 https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?f0bfya https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?atxnhr 11 berglund & miles: british columbia’s community benefits agreement published by scholarship@western, 2022 whatever cba is signed and agreed upon is actually implemented, you know, well and properly, i think that it will have a positive impact on the communities” (development consultant for indigenous group #2, personal communication, september 23, 2020). in all, there was a mixed bag of opinions about the cba’s potential, with positive outlooks weighted towards union affiliated participants. beyond tangible positive impacts from the cba, some felt that the policy’s value was in its ability to change discourse and attitudes about the involvement of indigenous groups in the construction trades. the above environmental consultant described the cba as, “a framework to continue pushing the dialogue and pushing things forward” (development consultant for indigenous group #2, personal communication, september 23, 2020). similarly, one aircc union representative was hopeful that from the cba, “a trust will be established the same way it has slowly been changing for women joining the trade. more and more indigenous youth will choose to work where they are respected, and earn good money with good fringe benefits” (union representative #1, personal communication, july 7, 2020). another union representative for service workers related to cba construction described the possibility that the cba might change the values of the infrastructure construction process. they explained, “i think that finally the conversation is moving away from ‘we just need to build’. . . and i really truly believe that the conversation in bc has switched to not just ‘what’s the lowest bid?’ but ‘what’s the best bid?’, and ‘what are those jobs going to create for my community?’” (union representative #4, personal communication, august 7, 2020). in these perspectives, participants observed an important change in professional and cultural values that have accompanied the public discourse on the cba. potential barriers to economic justice for bc’s cba engagement of indigenous groups neither in the interview data nor in the policy is there any evidence or claims of engagement with indigenous communities during the passage of the agreement; the agreement itself is between the bcib and the aircc and does not include indigenous groups directly as main stakeholders. it is important to note here the well documented contentious history of racism and exclusion from unions experienced by indigenous people and other groups (fernandez & silver, 2017; hunt & rayside, 2000; mills & clarke, 2009). several participants across different groups felt that indigenous communities were left out of the discussions that put the cba in place and were only included after the fact. a representative for an indigenous workforce development program explained, “first nation communities who own most of the land in vancouver were never even approached to have input . . . that’s not how you negotiate cbas, you know? because to wrap them up, you have to have the players involved and not to come to them after the fact . . . it’s already too late for the communities to have input.” (workforce development professional #1, personal communication, october 26, 2020) 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.2.14154 this participant, among others, argued that this consultation process led to an agreement which is not feasible and not reflective of indigenous needs and interests. when one indigenous community representative was asked whether the cba addressed the needs and desires of their community, they responded, “no. only changes in law and a healthy respect for our ways, values and vision [would address this]” (indigenous community representative #3, personal communication, september 16, 2020). though this participant was unique in the sense that they saw no value in the cba, most participants (other than aircc union representatives) agreed that there were many indigenous needs and desires that went unaddressed in the agreement, likely due to a lack of engagement with indigenous communities. in terms of negotiating specific project agreements for infrastructure covered by the cba, some indigenous group representatives expressed frustration that the bc government tends to only communicate with the chief and council, and that information does not always filter down to community members or other branches of an indigenous community. an added issue is an ignorance of what it means to “engage” indigenous groups, which should be viewed in their entirety, rather than as entities that can be spoken on behalf of by a small handful of leaders. one participant who leads employment training for an indigenous group expressed that this stems from a lack of understanding about the values of indigenous communities, saying that “it’s interesting that often the government believes that who they need to talk to to have these communications is chief and council . . . by our standard, that’s not talking to the people. that’s talking to the colonized structure that’s set in place in order to work with provincial government” (indigenous community representative #2, personal communication, september 23, 2020). though only a few participants echoed this specific point about the colonial disconnect when it comes to how to engage with indigenous communities, most indigenous participants felt that the cba could be improved by using a more holistic and culturally appropriate communication approach with indigenous communities to ensure that all community members and departments have the chance to influence decision-making. since there was a lack of consultation in the passage of the agreement, the assumption that all indigenous groups can benefit from construction employment opportunities was not appropriate for communities that are, for example, aging, or own a high number of their own firms (which are often too small to bid on large infrastructure projects). additionally, for groups in urban areas, some stated that the lack of employment opportunities and need for construction jobs was overstated. one contractor who had partnerships with several first nations explained “the nations we’ve been chatting with . . . all they were looking for really was just a revenue-sharing agreement. and a gentleman i was speaking to said ‘quite frankly, our nation’s located in a major urban centre. those who want to work are working.’ so, while the employment opportunities are nice, they’re not necessarily relevant here” (contractor representative #2, personal communication, october 9, 2020). this perspective points to an added consequence of offering jobs to indigenous communities located in dense urban areas without proper consultation: the offer of construction work is perhaps not in as much demand in this context, where jobs in other sectors are more readily available. 13 berglund & miles: british columbia’s community benefits agreement published by scholarship@western, 2022 most indigenous participants emphasized that these types of misguided benefits were the result of a lack of meaningful engagement with the indigenous communities, as illustrated by one indigenous community representative who said, “they often aren’t willing to put dollars toward what we need, as opposed to what they think we need. there’s still a very patronizing feel to these things . . . we don’t feel like participating if you don’t feel like really listening [to our needs]” (indigenous community representative #2, personal communication, september 23, 2020). some felt that there was a significant amount of engagement through the negotiation process for projects, but that it was done in a way that held the possibility of jobs over the heads of indigenous groups in exchange for their approval of a project. this engagement was also generally not viewed by indigenous representatives or consultants as something that would actually allow indigenous people to have a say in the projects, but merely to get their blessing. one consultant from a firm who performs impact assessments for cba projects said, “there’s a feeling, i think with, not just with infrastructure projects, but with a lot of projects that if you don’t negotiate a benefits agreement, the project’s going to go ahead anyway, but then you’re going to get nothing” (development consultant for indigenous group #1, personal communication, august 12, 2020). in other words, while engagement takes place in many instances, indigenous participants did not feel that it was done in a way that allowed indigenous people to be equal stakeholders or have a sense of agency in the process; they felt they had little impact on how the project was going to be carried out, so they may as well reap any benefits they could, even if they were not terribly helpful to the community. this was particularly the case when it comes to urban indigenous communities who voiced that their members already have access to jobs in various sectors due to proximity to dense urban areas. barriers to hiring unaddressed by the cba a side effect of the disjointed community engagement through both the passage of the cba and the negotiations for specific projects has been a lack of understanding of the barriers faced by indigenous communities when it comes to participating in the construction trades, particularly in urban areas. several of the barriers we found echo the findings in the literature, such as education attainment, historic exclusion from construction trades, and access to hiring processes (cahill 2018; caron et al., 2019). however, from this study, several new barriers emerged regarding transportation and housing in urban areas. while the agreement states that workers will be provided with a travel allowance if they are using their own vehicle (excluding the heavily urbanized areas of the lower mainland and the fraser valley), we found that there are still several barriers to taking advantage of this benefit. one of the most frequently mentioned of these barriers among all participant groups was the difficulty of procuring a driver’s license to get to an urban job site. a consultant illustrated how simply getting a driver's license has presented challenges for workers on multiple levels: if you grew up in a city, it was pretty easy to go get your driver's license . . . you turn sixteen, you take your parents down to the registry, you write your test, maybe you pass, maybe you fail, you write it again, you pass, you have your learner’s permit. you can do it in an afternoon in under a https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?k1mucy 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.2.14154 couple hours. if you’re living in (a rural indigenous community), and you’ve got to drive into town, well, you need a car. you might not have a car—a reliable car. you need your parent’s consent—you might not have your guardian accessible or willing. you know? you need to have someone help you study for the test—who do i ask? you might not have that support network from your family or your teachers. you finally get in there and you need 30 bucks to pay for the test, the first time. you know, now you’ve gotta find 30 dollars . . . and this was just one very simple example . . . so if getting a driver’s license has all these barriers, you can imagine the barriers to becoming an electrician. (development consultant for indigenous group #2, personal communication, september 23, 2020) in fact, obtaining a driver’s license was among the most commonly mentioned barriers in the data, which is relevant beyond transportation to a work site, since many firms require a driver's license as a condition of employment to begin with (development consultant for indigenous group #2, personal communication, september 23, 2020). this issue is compounded by the fact that public transportation serving indigenous communities outside of urban areas was often described as lacking. because of the combined difficulty of obtaining a car and a driver's license, and the lack of adequate public transit disproportionately impacting indigenous communities, a representative working in indigenous workforce development described, “a really difficult cycle where people get fines that they can’t pay, so they lose their license, but we live in a rural area so they drive anyway, so they get caught, and they get fined, and [then] they can’t get their license” (indigenous community representative #2, personal communication, september 23, 2020). challenges are also presented when it comes to finding adequate housing at a work site for what can be months away from one’s community, in what are often high-cost urban areas. a consultant explained, “there’s nowhere for them to live while they do the work. and it’s not like they have the money to . . . find an apartment to live in vancouver. so, i think that consideration of accommodations for those communities who are still further away from the project, but still have strong interests and rights in the project area, is really important” (development consultant for indigenous group #1, personal communication, august 12, 2020). this point of discussion was relatively unique among our data, but this may be due to less common experiences with urban infrastructure projects among participants. the agreement states that room and board, or “living out allowances” may be given to workers living more than 100 kilometers from the work site. however, this excludes communities living within the lower mainland and the fraser valley, and though they are relatively closer to urban worksites in distance, these areas still have much variation in housing costs (province of british columbia, 2019). within 70 kilometers, compensation for transportation and room and board is limited to winter months. the challenge of spending months away from home for members of tight knit indigenous communities was mentioned by most participants across all participant groups as a negative aspect of joining the construction trades. compounding this issue, several participants noted that jobs in the construction trades were unlikely to give time off or funding for travel back to one’s community for important events (such as the death of a community member) or to take on other culturally specific responsibilities. a 15 berglund & miles: british columbia’s community benefits agreement published by scholarship@western, 2022 related and commonly discussed theme that often emerged in the data was the exclusion that indigenous people often feel in urban settings (such as vancouver) from cultural, financial, and geographic standpoints. because these urban areas are often located far away from indigenous workers’ communities, and because they are significantly more expensive to reside in, many indigenous workers prefer to work closer to home, where they have access to cultural resources and can live more affordably. as of 2021, the average cost of a one-bedroom apartment in vancouver was $1,434, with rental units in smaller cities and rural areas being drastically more affordable (cmhc, 2022). in summary, working on urban infrastructure covered by the cba is often too costly, too far, and too alienating to be feasible for many indigenous workers. a desire to develop indigenous enterprises the interview data revealed concerns about the effectiveness of the cba as a potential avenue for economic justice for indigenous peoples in some of the assumptions it makes about their capacity to develop their own firms and economic opportunities related to infrastructure projects (as opposed to relying on non-indigenous firms and unions, which the agreement aims to do). the agreement assumes a position of economic dependency for indigenous peoples on non-indigenous businesses for jobs that were not consistent with what was often the reality of indigenous firm ownership and entrepreneurialism, or the desire among indigenous peoples to own the means of production themselves. a concern that was repeated throughout interviews with indigenous representatives was that cba jobs, because they are dependent on the hiring practices of firms outside of their communities, often do not lead to careers, but only one-off job opportunities. most participants across all groups explained that the project-by-project nature of the construction trades, as well as the requirement for long-distance travel were barriers for some indigenous workers who found it challenging to leave their communities for extended periods of time. additionally, several participants recalled times where members of their communities were only hired for construction positions for large infrastructure projects, then did not continue employment in the construction trades. the ceo of a construction company explained that “you do a six-month job and you’ll finish, and there’s no work after that . . . it’s just like having a job for six months and then you get laid off, and i understand if a lot of people don’t have an appetite for that” (development consultant for indigenous group #1, personal communication, august 20, 2020). while the project-by-project basis of this work is part of being in the construction trades, challenges of urban infrastructure often being located far from indigenous communities presents barriers for indigenous people who want to continue on to the next project. in other words, simply including indigenous workers by hiring them on a project-by-project basis does not necessarily help them to develop careers in the construction trades or reach upward economic mobility. several participants felt that this precarity of employment and the historic exclusion of indigenous workers from construction unions could be mitigated through the indigenous ownership of both construction firms and supportive businesses such as advertising, security, and landscaping. these perspectives often included concerns about the precarity and unsustainability of operating as joint 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.2.14154 ventures with non-indigenous firms to access economic opportunities. one indigenous representative explained that, instead, “we started focusing on, in our community, on developing our own businesses. so rather than joint venturing with, say, a security company, or a janitorial company, we built our own businesses. and i still believe that that’s the way to build capacity – we have to support indigenous communities in operating their own businesses'' (indigenous community representative #1, personal communication, august 12, 2020). however, one ceo of an indigenous-owned construction company, which notably belongs to a union outside of the aircc, argued that the agreement actively excludes indigenous-owned businesses like his, due to the agreement’s mandatory aircc union affiliation. he explained, [the cba] just narrows the playing field . . . unfortunately our union is not listed among those with the ability to bid . . . nobody has come to us and explained that a first nation contractor is excluded from that narrow list of bidders and union affiliates. (development consultant for indigenous group #1, personal communication, august 20, 2020) this perspective illustrates how other indigenous businesses may potentially find the requirement to join an aircc union to be a barrier due to the poor relationships trades unions have had with indigenous communities historically. often accompanying wishes to own construction firms and supporting businesses was a desire to create new economic opportunities for future generations. a consultant explained, “they deserve better than that. i’m not going to go to a 17-year-old and say ‘hey, have you thought about the world of possibilities and considered construction?’ so, i think at [indigenous community] specifically, when we do have those youth who show a lot of potential, we’re also trying to target them to work for [indigenous community group]” (development consultant for indigenous group #1, personal communication, august 12, 2020). the consultant felt that given the precarity and difficulty of gaining and keeping employment in the construction trades (while it may be desirable for some indigenous youth), it might compete with a local community’s desire to nurture the talents of young people for use towards economic development in their own community. this perspective, along with the desires voiced by several other indigenous participants to own and operate multiple aspects of the construction industry and supportive businesses, illustrates an assumption made in the cba that the main way indigenous communities should be supported is through jobs that potentially reinforce economic dependence on non-indigenous businesses. as such, the agreement does not allow for economic self-determination, and potentially runs counter to economic development aspirations that indigenous groups may have within their communities. an added concern mentioned by some indigenous community representatives and consultants is that indigenous and non-indigenous businesses do not always necessarily have the same value systems. this can create challenges for long-term, sustainable business relationships that are also respectful of the economic development agendas in indigenous communities. the head of a consulting firm explained cultural differences in the measures of economic success, saying that: 17 berglund & miles: british columbia’s community benefits agreement published by scholarship@western, 2022 at the federal and provincial level, economy is only conceptualized in terms of gdp, or job numbers, or all of these things. and there’s a total ignorance about the fact that there’s types of economies outside of the very stereotypical capitalist indicators of economy . . . a lot of representatives say “oh well, this project is good for all canadians, because it will contribute to gdp!” but that has a very integral assumption that a high gdp is equitably distributed among all canadians, which it is not. (development consultant for indigenous group #1, personal communication, august 12, 2020) as this participant has indicated, competing notions about economic prosperity may result in differing views of what benefits or an inclusive negotiation process may look like for different groups. the agreement assumes that everyone has the same interest in employment in non-indigenous firms that benefit from provincial spending on urban infrastructure, and that all firms are positioned on equal footing to be hired and retained for such jobs if given the opportunity. indigenous marginalization within construction trades concerns about or acknowledgement of unequal treatment of indigenous workers in the construction trades was consistent across all participant groups. many participants were concerned that because of the challenges of attending trade school, and the historic lack of membership of indigenous workers in unions across many sectors (fernandez & silver, 2017; pitawanakwat, 2006), that their roles in cba projects would likely be relegated to lower wage, unskilled labor. a workforce development coordinator for an indigenous community said, “some of the employment benefits that come along with these projects are pretty minimal. so, they’re kind of entry-level. they’re either offered as a traffic-control person or maybe they’re just to use a shovel and dig post holes . . . they’re not quality jobs, sorry” (indigenous community representative #4, personal communication, september 16, 2020). this was a commonly mentioned concern amongst participants. another first nation staff member built on this point when she expressed frustration at the lack of diversity in jobs offered through these projects, as well as a lack of upward mobility. she stated, “it’s frustrating that there isn’t a more holistic approach. because there’s other positions, even in construction, right? so, where is the promotion for the safety officers, where is the promotion for the engineers, where is the promotion for higher learning? . . . i find that personally very frustrating” (indigenous community representative #2, personal communication, september 23, 2020). union representatives and development professionals shared similar concerns about indigenous workers becoming marginalized within construction work. several participants noted that apprenticeship and other work opportunities are often based on which social and professional networks a worker is a part of. the concern of lack of apprenticeship opportunities is also supported by the bcib’s service plan that states that only 8% of positions are apprenticeships, which is far below their 2021 target of 15%, which is still drastically lower than the estimated 25% of jobs that should be apprenticeships in order to reconcile the projected shortfall that was the catalyst for the agreement (bc infrastructure benefits, 2020). most participants outside of the union participant group also noted that there is a short timeline for hiring indigenous workers, which https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?puqoev 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.2.14154 means that they are often relegated to positions that require hard, unskilled labor. a consultant explained that the positions are: being finalized way too late for the training to be provided in a timely fashion for people to actually be ready for these jobs. because as soon as approval happens—in business, time is money. they want to start construction as soon as humanly possible. and so you’re looking at, like, “we agreed to these jobs two weeks ago and you’re starting construction now” . . . there’s no time to train people. (development consultant for indigenous group #1, personal communication, august 12, 2020) because of this short timeline for hiring, most indigenous workers are not given adequate time to enter training programs and obtain necessary work hours to develop their skills. in the recruitment phase of cba projects, they are therefore often relegated to low paying and temporary work. indigenous group representatives as well as development professionals voiced the opinion that the structure of the cba likely narrowed opportunities for indigenous people. this is in part because the agreement is between the bcib and the aircc, which includes unions that have historically excluded female and indigenous workers, and workers of color (hence the passage of the cba). though bcib controls hiring for all cba projects, the agreement requires all workers on cba projects to join one of the aircc unions. some participants argued that the longstanding rift between aircc unions and indigenous firms along with the agreement’s provision of mandatory aircc union membership reduces employment opportunities for indigenous workers who do not wish to join one of the aircc unions or who may already be aligned with a union that is not included in the aircc. many participants across groups raised concerns about the enforcement and evaluation of the success of the cba when it comes to equitable distribution of jobs by skill and pay. a union representative also questioned the lack of explicit enforcement and evaluation of the quality of jobs for indigenous workers under the cba, asking: are they only in pre-apprenticeship or low-level apprenticeship? are they making up those hours? . . . or are they making up a larger portion of the higher paying positions? because i think there’s still some inequity between the earnings, in a sense if the indigenous members—which i think i’m seeing, but i can’t guarantee— are all at the low end of the pay bracket, in the lowerskilled or beginning apprenticeships. (union representative #4, personal communication, august 7, 2020). though other participants did not speak to this type of monitoring for the cba specifically, many indigenous participants emphasized that this lack of monitoring for the equitable distribution of jobs has been prevalent in past, similar projects. these perspectives bring to light a potential new challenge when it comes to the enforcement of the cba, which is a lack of quality control for types of jobs offered to underrepresented groups. 19 berglund & miles: british columbia’s community benefits agreement published by scholarship@western, 2022 discussion despite the above barriers, does british columbia’s community benefits agreement, that has thus far focused mainly on urban infrastructure, show promise for promoting economic justice for indigenous workers? and is the policy an innovation, showing more promise than previously enacted strategies, like ibas, or project-based cbas? our research indicates that while the cba may have potential to increase the project hours of underrepresented workers and might play a role in promoting important new public discourses around economic justice, there are significant barriers to being able to align the cba with the economic justice goals associated with such agreements listed earlier. many of the barriers to hiring indigenous workers in the construction trades for cba projects echo the barriers mentioned in the literature, such as education and historic exclusion from construction trades (cahill, 2018; caron et al., 2019). however, new barriers emerged that were related to the urban setting of the projects, including housing and transportation, and that urban indigenous communities are already in closer proximity to a density of jobs (which is also where the key infrastructure projects covered by the agreement thus far have been located). these were barriers that likely could have been noted through adequate engagement with indigenous communities during the passage of the agreement; this is perhaps also a by-product of the fact that neither of the two parties actively involved in the agreement (the bcib and aircc) are indigenous groups. the lack of consultation with indigenous groups means that the agreement operates on the assumption that union jobs in the construction trades are not only attainable for indigenous workers, but that they are desirable; this lack of indigenous self-determination in economic development is a significant threat to economic justice as described by the trc and undrip, as well as the economic justice goal of determining one’s own line of work. several participants noted that, due to various characteristics of their communities, jobs in construction are not viewed as opportunities for economic development or personal upward mobility in the way that the cba describes. they also questioned the sustainability of such jobs (another cornerstone of economic justice mentioned by undrip, and our stated goals of economic justice). some pointed to other economic arrangements or non-construction jobs that they were hoping indigenous people could become a part of instead. the involvement of mostly unions as main stakeholders (who have a main goal of increasing membership) means that unsurprisingly the lack of community benefits from infrastructure projects is mainly addressed through hiring processes. it is important to note that though construction jobs may not be desirable for all indigenous people, these jobs can have the potential to offer significant economic benefits for many. however, there are several support systems that will need to be put in place to realize such benefits, as holcombe and kemp (2020) have noted in other cases of indigenous workforce development. these could include longer term training programs, access to transportation, and allowances for leave from work based on cultural considerations. without these supports, as this data has revealed, there is a risk of continuing to place indigenous workers in hard, unskilled labor positions, that tend to be one-off, short term job opportunities, instead of placing them in more skilled, lucrative positions that lead to a career. this https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?uuvlic https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?uuvlic https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?f1ynhh 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.2.14154 shortcoming is a barrier to achieving the right to fair compensation and equitable access to secure and sustainable work, and the right to resist exploitation on the basis of socioeconomic status. while strategies like providing training programs, transportation, and allowances may boost numbers of indigenous workers in long-term careers in the construction trades, they are not satisfactory when it comes to a true reorientation of this agreement towards economic justice, as power would still reside in the hands of the bcib and aircc, not indigenous communities. the nature of engagement with indigenous communities in both the passage of the agreement and negotiating project specific elements brings new concerns to gross’s (2008) observations about cooptation of the term “cba.” participants stated that the cba may have been used as a political tool by politicians and unions, rather than a tool for economic justice. a non-aircc union representative and critic of the cba explained the use of the term “community benefits agreement” with the view that perhaps it was named as such to garner public support: i mean, this isn’t new for [the new democratic party]. they were elected in the 1990’s in british columbia and they used exclusive project labor agreements back then. so, a cba is really just a project labor agreement. they’ve changed the terminology, they’ve changed and tweaked a few things to make it more palatable to the general public, and to those in construction, and those that they’re trying to sell this deal [to]. so, you know, brilliant on their part—to use the term “community benefit agreement,” but it’s really just a project labor agreement. (union representative #6, personal communication, november 6, 2020) gross (2008) and nugent (2017) have voiced concerns about cbas that misrepresent the role or agency of the communities they are meant to benefit. relatedly, the formulation of a provincial agreement between bcib and 19 unions that have historically excluded indigenous people and women, suggests, as some participants have noted, the agreement may actually narrow job opportunities for indigenous workers, rather than expand them. this dynamic is certainly a threat to economic justice for indigenous workers due to its exclusion of indigenous workers from determining their own work opportunities and is a new insight into the impacts of co-optation of cbas. participants noted the difficulty presented by this agreement in training and hiring indigenous workers, and the limitations now placed on indigenous firms who may not be part of aircc unions due to historic exclusion or by choice. the case of bc’s cba adds to concerns raised by holcombe and kemp (2020) and brererton and parmenter (2008) that certain industries may reinforce economic dependency. in this case, this potential for dependency is forged through an agreement between the province and labor organizations. these ideas are also consistent with nugent (2017) and mccreary and turner’s (2018) observations that government brokered cbas and ibas often represent ways of reproducing and strengthening neoliberal governance, rather than promoting true alternatives to socioeconomic inequality. at the moment, it seems that, at best, the cba represents a case where unions with the best of intentions are attempting to diversify their workforce and have missed critical aspects of community engagement; at worst, this agreement leverages the politically popular promise of promoting inclusive policy to allow https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?ipbaqk https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?qzsj7u https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?nf8xls https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?rux7wp 21 berglund & miles: british columbia’s community benefits agreement published by scholarship@western, 2022 aircc unions to monopolize state-led infrastructure construction in the face of their weakened stance in the neoliberal era. in all, the cba does not seem to be an attempt to reorient the power dynamics that have excluded indigenous workers from the economic benefits of urban development (or other industries, like resource extraction). the same entities, including the provincial government, construction firms, and key unions continue to control who has “the right to build the city” (nugent, 2017, p. 81), and perhaps even more so than before the agreement. these findings raise concerns about goals of the cba being too obtuse, and not deeply engaged with actual barriers of employment and power imbalances described by indigenous groups and their advocates. this and other issues made many participants concerned that the cba is bound to repeat the shortcomings of provincial project labor agreements in the past. however, the cba is still in its early years of implementation, and it remains to be seen whether large scale efforts to include underrepresented groups will present economic opportunity. being able to evaluate the effectiveness of the cba, and whether the bcib will be able to uphold enforcement accordingly, is a key challenge in this project, and other cbas, as stated in the literature (gross, 2008; gross et al., 2002; marantz, 2015; salkin & lavine, 2008). the goals of the accountable development movement do not often directly address decolonization as a main objective due to their focus on distributive justice. further, as our data has reflected, there are some who feel that british columbia’s cba should not be considered a cba at all, because of its prescriptive focus on providing jobs with no indigenous communities as signatories in the initial policy. we agree with this assessment, however, with that limitation and the above barriers in mind, several actions could be taken in the interest of creating more equitable opportunities for indigenous workers and firms. these suggestions may allow for participation and financial benefits from infrastructure development that may bring the agreement closer to something that could be considered a cba. first, the agreement could be amended to allow for indigenous groups to serve as direct signatories, and benefits could be added that are appropriate and useful for different communities. this could allow for a broader set of tailored benefits to be applied to infrastructure projects. engagement to determine such diverse benefits should be collaborative and informed by indigenous knowledge systems. contributing to economic justice via construction jobs is a very narrow focus and does not necessarily benefit all communities involved. this approach does not allow for indigenous communities to build wealth of their own. instead or in addition, profit sharing, co-management arrangements, and other forms of more sustainable economic benefits are also worth exploring. in addition, the agreement should be altered to offer jobs associated with construction that are not limited to the construction of infrastructure itself (e.g.: engineers, administrative jobs, project management jobs); training should also be provided for a diverse array of jobs that create opportunities for individuals to pursue their own unique talents and passions and build from existing skill sets. for construction work, the timeline for training should be greatly extended to avoid last-minute hiring that relegates indigenous workers to unskilled jobs. further, this investigation has revealed limitations in the justice frameworks commonly used when it comes to campaigns for community benefits. future research and organizing efforts should be made to consider https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?xpx3y5 https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?xpx3y5 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.2.14154 how colonial structures that are embedded in development practices threaten the inclusion of indigenous knowledge systems within accountable development movements (and whether such movements can become compatible with decolonization). conclusion this paper assessed the viability of british columbia’s provincial community benefits agreement from the perspective of making advances towards economic justice for indigenous workers. literature on cbas and indigenous workforce development focuses on resource extraction industries, and less is known about the potential for cbas (which are not typically associated with indigenous workforce development) to be leveraged to create jobs through urban infrastructure work in the interest of economic justice. we found that there are many threats to economic mobility posed by a lack of engagement with indigenous communities until after projects are already in development. this research adds to the literature by uncovering barriers specific to including indigenous workers in urban infrastructure including transportation and housing challenges, lack of cultural awareness in the industry, and the burden of time away from one's community involved in this type of work. in general, the urban location of infrastructure projects covered by the agreement so far has not been considered when it comes to the uneven distribution of jobs and development resources across the province or relative to indigenous groups. our data also points to a lack of engagement through the passage of the agreement. likely because of this lack of consultation, the agreement does not reflect understanding of the desire of some indigenous communities to pursue economic development on their own terms and to take advantage of opportunities in other sectors over construction. ultimately, the question of whether a provincial cba represents a means to economic justice by applying community benefits across a wide geography is complicated by the co-optation of the process by political interests. as indigenous groups are not formal stakeholders, the opportunities for employment and whether engagement is done to recognize and address barriers to hiring for urban infrastructure projects does not in and of itself promote economic justice for indigenous groups. references abele, f. 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(2020). updated: bc supreme court rejects community benefits agreement challenge. business in vancouver. https://biv.com/article/2020/02/bc-community-benefits-agreementchallenge-court-week https://www2.gov.bc.ca/assets/gov/british-columbians-our-governments/indigenous-people/aboriginal-peoples-documents/calls_to_action_english2.pdf https://www2.gov.bc.ca/assets/gov/british-columbians-our-governments/indigenous-people/aboriginal-peoples-documents/calls_to_action_english2.pdf https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?qbv07j https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?qbv07j https://www.zotero.org/google-docs/?qbv07j https://doi.org/10.1080/01944360903490923 https://biv.com/article/2020/02/bc-community-benefits-agreement-challenge-court-week https://biv.com/article/2020/02/bc-community-benefits-agreement-challenge-court-week “if you fall down, you get back up”: creating a space for testimony and witnessing by urban indigenous women and girls the international indigenous policy journal volume 10 | issue 1 article 1 january 2019 “if you fall down, you get back up”: creating a space for testimony and witnessing by urban indigenous women and girls elizabeth cooper university of the fraser valley, elizabeth.cooper@ufv.ca s michelle driedger university of manitoba, michelle.driedger@umanitoba.ca recommended citation cooper, e. , driedger, s. (2019). “if you fall down, you get back up”: creating a space for testimony and witnessing by urban indigenous women and girls. the international indigenous policy journal, 10(1). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.1 “if you fall down, you get back up”: creating a space for testimony and witnessing by urban indigenous women and girls abstract historical trauma and the negative effects of colonialism continue to be played out within canadian culture. these processes have a deleterious effect on physical and psychological health outcomes among indigenous peoples. through the creation of a safe space as part of a decolonizing, participatory activity program spanning 7 weeks, first nations and metis women and girls (aged 8-12) were able to begin to unpack what it means to be happy, healthy, and safe, and what is needed to actualize these goals. a community engaged, assetbased workshop approach provided a forum for participants to discuss the impact of traumatic experiences on the ability of adults to model a positive image of strength, independence, and confidence for their daughters, while creating a space to discuss change. keywords cultural responsiveness, first nations, aboriginal, metis, gender, cultural memory, advocacy acknowledgments we would like to thank the women and girls who participated in this study, and we acknowledge the families and community members who supported their participation. we would like to thank the manitoba metis federation health and wellness department for their support of this study. we would also like to thank dr. heather castleden, dr. tuula heinonen, and dr. josée lavoie for reviewing earlier drafts of this paper. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ “if you fall down, you get back up”: creating a space for testimony and witnessing by urban indigenous women and girls there are a number of elements that contribute to the health and wellbeing of individuals and communities, many of which are affected by aspects outside of an individual or community’s autonomy and shaped by policies and practices that exist within the historical and contemporary cultural landscape in which people live. healthy attachment and self-determination are two key aspects of indigenous wellbeing that have been systematically negated by the canadian government and popular discourse. healthy attachment is the relationship between children and their caregivers (ratnamohan & kozlowska, 2017; watt, o’connor, stewart, moon & terry, 2008). it contributes to an individual’s ability to develop important coping skills, and it affects physical health as well as emotional wellbeing (landa, peterson, & fallon, 2012; maunder et al., 2017). when there is a systematic disruption in the ability to parent children, the entire community is affected (nelson & wilson, 2017). within the canadian context, the residential school system and the sixties scoop were two government policies that interfered with the ability of parents to raise their children (mckenzie, varcoe, browne & day, 2016). historical trauma exists because of such experiences. cultural memory continues the justification of racialized policies and practices such as inequities in the canadian judicial, educational, and health systems. through this community-engaged study using an intergenerational workshop model, the researchers created a space for collective testimony and witnessing. first nations and metis women and girls (aged 8-12) were able to begin to address some of the experiences they have had and begin to imagine what healing could look like within their families and communities. through short quotations, descriptions, and theoretical positioning, we explore how the space for witnessing, testimony, and collective growth emerged in our study. background there is a high level of collective distress and mourning in contemporary indigenous communities related to events that happened in the past: for example, people have experienced physical, biological, and cultural genocide.1 genocide occurs when outside perpetrators engage in actions with destructive intent against a group of people (michaels, 2010). there have been a number of such examples within canada, such as indian residential schools, the sixties scoop, and policies that limited indigenous land use that have had a deleterious effect on indigenous families and communities. colonialism is a distal determinant of health. it underscores all other aspects of health and wellbeing, especially mental health (czyzewski, 2011; reading & wien, 2009). as colonial trauma is relived, restorative healing processes and reconciliation need to be undertaken with individuals, families, and communities (bombay et al., 2014; evans-campbell, 2008; gone, 2009; yellow horse brave heart, 1998). 1 the truth and reconciliation commission of canada (2015) summary report defined physical genocide as the mass killing of a group of people; biological genocide as the destruction of the ability to reproduce; and cultural genocide as the destruction of structures and practices that form cultural identity, such as loss of land, language, and spirituality. 1 cooper and driedger: creating a space for testimony and witnessing published by scholarship@western, 2019 forced removal of children and historical trauma residential schools were run by various christian religious denominations and the department of indian affairs between 1834 and 1996. the purported objective was to educate children; however, it is often argued that the goal of residential schools was cultural genocide (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015). children were often forcibly removed from their families and sent to live at residential schools. often these schools were thousands of miles away from the children’s homes. children were punished if they spoke their natal language or followed their cultural norms, and it was often impossible for parents and family members to visit their children. if parents did not send their children to residential schools, they could face criminal charges (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2016). at these schools, children received inadequate education, healthcare, social supports, and physical supports, including adequate nutrition. many children died at residential schools and many more were injured through abuse, accidents, and neglect (bombay, matheson, & anisman, 2014; milloy, 1999), which has had a profound intergenerational effect on physical health and wellbeing (mosby & galloway, 2017). the sixties scoop, which took place during the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s, followed government protocol of forced removal of indigenous children from their families. indigenous children were either placed in foster care with or adopted by non-indigenous families within or outside of canada. there often was no cause to remove children, except for the preconceived notion that children would be better off if they raised within settler society (dubinsky, 2010; johnston, 1983; strong-boag, 2011). the removal of indigenous identity through other policies had an equally profound influence on people and contributed to the legacy of historical trauma. for example, policies that restricted access to traditional lands and territories: indigenous people were not allowed to go onto their traditional land unless they sought formal prior permission from the government and could face fines and possibly jail time if they were caught hunting of fishing without having obtained prior permission (dickason & newbigging, 2010). in addition, there was segregation within health care systems by placing indigenous people in separate hospitals or wards away from non-indigenous patients, often with insufficient medical care (lux, 2016). historical trauma as a discipline emerged after world war ii as a way to explain mental and physical health challenges experienced by holocaust survivors, their children, and their grandchildren. the concept was then applied to other population groups, such as refugee populations and indigenous populations, the common thread being extreme historical distress caused by cultural suppression, government practices, policies, and historical events (hartman & gone, 2014; kirmayer, gone, & moses, 2014). within the context of indigenous peoples, the term intergenerational colonial trauma is often used. this draws specific attention to the ongoing effects of colonialism and reminds people that colonialism is not limited to events that happened in the past, which means that addressing colonialism is an ongoing issue (episkenew, 2009; maxwell, 2014). by including the term intergenerational in intergenerational colonial trauma highlights that harms are passed on from generation to generation. these may be trauma that can easily be named as well as those experiences that are subtler, often woven into the racialized fabric of many social norms found within dominant cultural narratives. while intergenerational trauma is a reality for many families who have had traumatic experiences, such as violent deaths, when it is combined with the legacy of colonialism, the trauma often presents in a more heightened form of historical trauma response. historical trauma response focuses on outcome 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.1 measures, whereas historical trauma explores pathways for distress. historical trauma response also examines proximal stressors and contemporary trauma, including post-traumatic stress disorder (ptsd) responses. the symptoms of historical trauma overlap with those of ptsd, however, addressing ptsd is different than historical trauma because the root cause is not a single event or series of events that happened to one person or to one family. for example, historical trauma goes beyond the cycle of abuse often experienced within households affected by ptsd. the experience of trauma is influenced by longstanding intergenerational and personal trauma responses (evans-campbell, 2008; gone, 2013). compared to ptsd, the response to historical trauma includes higher average levels of depression, withdrawal from community, anxiety, suicidal ideation, substance abuse, violence, anger, and a victim mentality. historical trauma response may result in difficulty with building interpersonal relationships, reduced energy, pathological expressions of mourning, nightmares about traumatic experiences, insomnia, social isolation, exaggerated dependency or independence, concern over betraying ancestors for being excluded from the suffering, an obligation to share ancestral pain, and other psychological or mental disorders (denham, 2008). socio-economic conditions, poor access to healthcare, governmental policies, and racism may exaggerate historical trauma responses by limiting access to supports and services that may be seen as an attempt to dismiss experiences and further marginalize individuals and their communities (denham, 2008). it is important to note that it is possible to address historical trauma even if the individual is not exhibiting signs of historical traumatic response. treatment for historical trauma often includes strategies to engage in cultural continuity, decolonizing methodologies, and traditional healing practices (auger, 2016; denham, 2008; duran, duran, yellow horse brave heart, & yellow horse-davis, 1998; evans-campbell, 2008; waldram, 2014; wesley-esquimaux & smolewski, 2004; yellow horse brave heart, 1998). the understanding is that, in order to treat both historical and psychological traumas, it is essential to legitimize post-colonial suffering and destigmatize people who face distress caused by historical trauma. hartman and gone (2014) summarized what they call the four cs of historical trauma: colonial injury, collective experiences, cumulative effects, and cross-generational impacts. colonial inquiry requires the consideration and positioning of the role that colonialism has had upon indigenous peoples; collective experiences highlights the collective injuries that have come from the shared experiences of colonization, such as loss of culture and language; cumulative effects calls for an examination of how these experiences have snowballed from generation to generation across communities; and cross-generational impacts explores the intergenerational response to the harms caused by colonialism (hartmann & gone, 2014). for historical trauma, the traumatic event is widespread and not contained to a specific individual or family experience (kirmayer et al., 2014). cultural memory historical trauma is ongoing. experiences are often compounded by neoliberal racialized policies, triggered by experiences of racialized violence, and legitimized by cultural memory. cultural memory for indigenous peoples, both within canada and globally, includes memories of colonial policies that were designed to have a deleterious effect on individuals, families, and communities. these often have had the express aim of annihilating those who were not assimilated into the dominant culture. the lasting legacies for indigenous communities are the significant economic, social, and health challenges that exist 3 cooper and driedger: creating a space for testimony and witnessing published by scholarship@western, 2019 today. the truth and reconciliation commission of canada referred to the political acts of the government as cultural genocide (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015). differentiated from other forms of cultural memory, the cultural memory of institutions, such as the federal government, has a profound influence upon individuals as these individuals attempt to find meaning within their lives (erll, 2011). cultural memory within institutions is grounded not only within individual and societal perspectives, but a legacy of funding, policy, procedural, and programming decisions. when decisions have been made that are seen as “effective” and “progressive” are questioned, such as hiring practices or access to resources and services, the ability to shift perspectives can become even more difficult—people may defend the institutional culture because they fear retaliation if they attempt to shift the status quo. this becomes even more apparent when trying to change both cultural memory at individual and community levels and the cultural memory of institutions. when continuously faced with barriers, questions arise as to how much freedom and autonomy people perceive they have within their own lives and their ability to affect change (de finney, 2014; smith, 2005; thomas, mitchell, & arseneau, 2015). cultural memory is what allows us to remember events and make meaning of both objects and experiences, including those we have and have not experienced directly. through cultural memory, we create a collective understanding and rationale that places meaning upon social, material, and mental aspects of objects and events. cultural memory provides a context for positionality as we place ourselves within various locations, institutions, and environments and try to make meaning out of our experiences (bal, 1999; de szegheo lang, 2015; hirsch & smith, 2002). cultural memory allows meaning to be attributed to a red dress, reminding both indigenous people and the general public of missing or murdered women, just as an image of a hockey stick, an eagle feather, or a red poppy connote cultural meaning. certain items hold deep significance and shape perspectives, even if one has not directly experienced the emotions associated with the symbolism of the items. understanding the influence of cultural memory on dominant mainstream culture is essential to understanding how historical trauma continues to affect indigenous communities. trauma is often heightened due to longstanding, intergenerational political oppression that limits the ability of indigenous peoples to act autonomously (maxwell, 2014). reconciliation and changes to the existing narrative need to take place within institutions and within the general population. cultural memory within the dominant culture often views first nations, metis, and inuit as the “other,” as lesser than and as either undeserving of or needing more assistance than other people. this point of view remains part of the popular narrative. indigenous peoples often distrust government policies and procedures because they see their purpose and rationale as being based on inaccurate perceptions and stereotypes of indigenous peoples, which includes the noble savage among others, that are perpetuated through popular discourse (henry & tator, 2009; larocque, 2010; strega et al., 2014). there is a clash between the dominant cultural narrative grounded in colonial ideology and the narrative grounded in the experiences and truths of indigenous peoples. the clash between the two narratives, that of settler colonialism and indigeneity, poses a challenge as indigenous peoples attempt to both situate themselves within and apart from the dominant culture (marshall, marshall, & bartlett, 2015). this has been highlighted within canada with the acquittal of gerald stanley in february 2018 in the murder of colton boushie, a first nations man who was shot in the back of the head while asleep or passed out in a parked car after he and some friends came onto the stanley’s rural property in the summer of 2016 seeking help to fix a flat tire. the case divided the county: a portion of the population 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.1 felt strongly that stanley had the right, and possibly the responsibility, to protect his property from the indigenous trespassers that he saw as a threat, and those who felt that there was no cause for violence, regardless of the reason that the youth were on the property. within days of the murder acquittal, crowdfunding to show support for stanley raised over $220,000 cdn from 33,000 donors (go fund me, n.d.). fake donor names listed well-known indigenous activists and others, such as “farmers need a voice,” further exacerbated the racialized divide within the country. these events led many to question the state of reconciliation and relationship building within the country because the case revealed very different concepts of justice and viewpoints on racialized violence perpetuated by the colonial state and its citizens (jago, 2018; starblanket & hunt, 2018). racialized violence towards indigenous peoples is a significant challenge within the fabric of canadian society. a study in ontario demonstrated that first nations people within that province were 2.7 times more likely to have intentional injuries than the general population (macpherson, jones-keeshig, & pike, 2011). within manitoba, in 2009, indigenous women were 3 times more likely than nonindigenous women to have been the victim of a violent crime and are more likely to report experiencing severe violence (government of manitoba, 2017a). within manitoba’s capital city of winnipeg, the majority of youth who access emergency medical services identify as indigenous (snider, jiang, logsetty, strome, & klassen, 2015), with over 1,000 youth accessing the emergency departments in 2012, of whom 20% visited on multiple occasions (snider et al., 2016). although causal inferences are neither possible nor appropriate, there are a number of theories about why violence occurs, and why it seems to occur more often in certain populations than in others. there are multi-faceted factors accounting for violence. factors include witnessing violence at a young age; lack of resources to provide for basic needs, such as safe housing or sufficient food; violence as part of initiation into social groups, such as street gangs; and political and social experiences that are used to justify violence, such as the acquittal of gerald stanley in the murder of colton boushie (gill, 2006). many of these mirror systemic inequities perpetuated by racialized policies that target indigenous peoples. cultural memory creates space for the interplay between the past and present, allowing for both individual acts of remembering as well as socio-cultural contexts of meaning-making (erll, 2011). this allows for the contextualization and shaping of future events, ideals, and rationalizations. cultural memory can also be of a place. thus, a physical location becomes a site of testimony, as people associate places with both events and sentiments. sometimes, the act of setting up a public space as in memoriam to an event is an attempt to call for action as well as a testimony to collective memory. testimony of place is often an act of remembrance for those who are both directly and indirectly involved in the creation and witnessing of such spaces. methods a decolonizing, participatory activity program was developed to assess priority-setting activities among urban indigenous women (n = 24) and girls (n = 36) in winnipeg, manitoba between september 2015 and march 2016 (university of manitoba ethics number: h2015:169). data collection included a series of three workshops that were one evening weekly for 7 weeks with women and girls between the of ages 8 and 12 within the women’s care. the workshops had a series of research objectives and participant goals. the research objectives were established by the researcher and the manitoba metis federation health and wellness department 5 cooper and driedger: creating a space for testimony and witnessing published by scholarship@western, 2019 (mmf-hwd). this study would serve as a needs assessment and would also collect information about health decision-making and priority-setting practices. participant goals were developed with the women and girls on the first week of each workshop series. these goals highlighted the need to improve intergenerational relationships, while providing a space for capacity building opportunities. through group discussion and games, participants determined the types of activities and themes that they would like for each of the seven workshop sessions, such as a nutrition night, a self-care night, and a games night. activities included non-competitive and improvisation games (e.g., telephone), walks around the neighbourhood, crafts, and shared meals. a combination of qualitative elicitation methods were used. these included arts-based methods, such as drawing pictures, creating sculptures, and creating jewellery; indigenous methods including discussion circles and storytelling; sports-based methods like playing group games, scavenger hunts, and games based on the medicine wheel; and participatory action data collection, which included transect walks and ranking activities. data collected included 877 photographs, 3 hours of video recordings, 19 hours of audio recordings, as well as 60 hours of observation and field notes. while all activities were designed to meet the needs and interests of participants, not all activities formed a base for data generation. in order to ensure consent, participants were asked prior to an activity about how it should be recorded (audio, video, field notes, or not recorded). participants were given the opportunity after each activity to determine if they were still comfortable with the activity being used as part of research. in addition, participants were given the opportunity to withdraw data for a month following the completion of each workshop, which also corresponded with a month-after member-checking activity. the majority of the meaningful conversations discussed within this article took place when the video camera and audio recorder were not turned on, since participants would frequently state, “don’t record this, but you can write and talk about this for your project.” as such, this article provides stories and short quotations to demonstrate the study’s findings, rather than longer participant quotations. descriptive data analysis was completed with participants during the workshop. while participants were offered the opportunity to be involved in more detailed data analysis and review of manuscripts, all declined. transcripts were transcribed verbatim and imported along with descriptive notes of art projects, field notes, and observation notes into nvivo 9tm, a qualitative data analysis software program, for theoretical and thematic analysis conducted by the authors. initial results were returned to participants within 2 weeks of the end of each workshop (cooper & driedger, 2018), with more nuanced results shared upon completion of the study. situating study findings a pan-indigenous approach the study was intended to be metis-specific. the metis focus was chosen to avoid various problems associated with pan-indigenous research. it also addressed a variety of gaps within literature, including a lack of intergenerational research and information about priority setting among metis families. it would also add to the data on metis wellbeing. while there are first nations-specific opportunities for research, programming, and access to services within manitoba, metis-specific opportunities are fewer and harder to access. the mmf-hwd was confident that with a young urban metis population, the recruitment of 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.1 8 to 10 families per workshop would be easy. based on previous research and community engagement carried out in partnership with the mmf-hwd, we were as well. recruitment efforts included posters (electronic and print), handbills, emails sent to targeted organizations, and by word of mouth through employees at community organizations. a number of phone calls from the general public were received in response to the recruitment advertisements, although not about participating in the study. members of the public, who had not previously engaged with the researchers, accused us of perpetuating the stigmatization of indigenous peoples by limiting recruitment to metis families. people asked why there was a research study that would “discriminate against families based on race.” some community organizations did not display the recruitment poster because of the perception of “racial profiling,” as one organization later stated. the rationale for using metis-specific sampling was met with scepticism. people articulated that this project was yet another attempt to “control” indigenous families. after discussions with the mmf-hwd about the general response we had been receiving, we decided to go ahead with the study without modifying the recruitment criteria. the first workshop would be a pilot, during which we intended to work with the four families who had signed up and then re-evaluate. three families completed the pilot workshop. one withdrew because they thought it was a language immersion program. indigenous language programs are an outreach initiative offered by another university within the city. on the first week, participants in the pilot workshop noted their concerns about the metis-specific recruitment criteria. the women explained that if the study was looking for a connection between ethnicity and a disease metis-specific research would be reasonable because there might be a genetic component. participants explained that families and communities are often comprised of individuals who self-identify as more than one indigenous category. participants also noted that there are many families where one parent identifies as metis and the other as first nations. their children may identify as metis, first nations, or both throughout their lives. participants also explained that communityengaged research about health and safety needed to be rooted within the broader community, where people with similar experiences could work together to promote healing and effect social change. they noted that this was especially important in light of the large number of missing and murdered indigenous women. in response to the requests to modify the recruitment criteria from participants and the community, changes were made for the second and third workshops. participants in these workshops said they appreciated the pan-indigenous approach. they explained that they were not seen as anishnaabe, cree, oji-cree, or metis within the urban context, but that identity, as one of the child participants stated, is based on “first-nations colours.” when her mother asked her what that would be, she replied “brown.” participants also wanted any familial female caregiver to be able to participate, rather than specifically recruiting mothers, explaining that many girls live with extended family. with the new recruitment criteria, community organizations not only put up the posters, but made additional copies and provided support to distribute posters around the city. we received phone calls thanking us for being inclusive of all indigenous peoples within the study, including metis who are often excluded in favour of a first nations-specific focus. after the changes to recruitment criteria were made and the recruitment for the second round of data collection was opened, the next two workshops were filled to capacity, necessitating the creation of a waiting list, within 36 hours. 7 cooper and driedger: creating a space for testimony and witnessing published by scholarship@western, 2019 a space for testimony about indigenous experiences and expectations finding a location to hold the workshop that held meaning for participants and would serve as a safe space for indigenous women and girls was a vital component of this study. the spaces selected were places that provide services and supports to indigenous community members and have collections of regional indigenous art and artifacts, such as baskets and clothing, displayed prominently. two spaces were used: the first workshop was held in a community office space, and the second and third were held in an indigenous community library. the design of these two spaces allowed them to act as sites of testimony and remembrance. the office space featured buckskin dresses, moss bags, birch bark baskets, photographs, posters, and signs in english, french, and michif (the language of the metis people). the library features an extensive collection of books and videos in multiple languages and at various literacy levels that are dedicated to indigenous topics. words of welcome in different indigenous languages surround the circular space. there was a wood inlay blanket pattern in the middle of the open space, and art adorned the walls, which included artifacts such as photos of chiefs, moss bags, cradle boards, drums, and jingle dance dresses from across canada. these elements highlighted that the space was a place for testimony and narrative. the artifacts create a sense of belonging and shared history. the artifacts and the memories associated with them, as well as the physical spaces these artifacts inhabit, foster strength, which are felt for generations (hooks, 2009). the location set a tone of respect for indigenous cultures and cultural safety within the workshop. the locations were designed to place value on indigenous cultures and histories and were intended to convey this sentiment to participants. the artifacts decorating the rooms from floor to ceiling encouraged discussion among individuals and families about the objects and their significance. participants shared stories with one another about attending pow wows, participating in drum circles, using moss bags or cradle boards, and other memories with positive cultural connotations. the simple act of remembrance triggered by the artifacts on display seemed to encourage further testimony and witnessing from the participants. being surrounded by artifacts seemed to enable the girls and women to begin to let go of some of the melancholy they expressed over the course of the workshop. the more positive outlook was enhanced throughout the 7-week workshop as women and girls discussed what wellbeing and happiness could look like, and how they could break the cycle of trauma. within the research workshops, participants drew on their experiences in various contexts and raised the notion of hidden, overt, and transitory locations of identity and meaning making. rebecca, a research participant who spoke about having multiple family members and friends on the list of murdered and missing indigenous women, discussed her participation in the creation of one such space. she also discussed how, through the workshop, she realized the need to voice her experiences within the greater community. she participated in a community-organized project in which community members tied red ribbons to bridges in winnipeg, manitoba. this act of testimony was inspired by a similar activity in the pas, manitoba, earlier in the year. the ribbons were a visible reminder of the ongoing need to continue to address racialized gendered violence (blunt, 2015). the bridge is a symbol of crossing and the ribbons act as a reminder to bear witness to the ongoing struggles families and communities face as they try to understand what has happened to their loved ones. the ribbons were a way to help shift cultural memory and provide a place of testimony and place of healing, reminding the general public, family members, and community members that the women who were lost are not forgotten. for rebecca, walking and sharing with others who had similar experiences was a meaningful act of healing. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.1 the act of sharing testimony was achieved through collective moments and a shared understanding and creation of meaning. through the shared construction of meaning, made by being present within a space, an archive of meaning and witnessing is both created and maintained. the archive of the collective memory includes the testimony of events, objects, and stories that remind people of cultural memory and also inspires change (emberley, 2015; episkenew, 2009). the archive is not necessarily of events that happened in the distant past; it also includes more recent events that add to the story. some memories are personal, whereas other stories have played out publicly within the media. we will explore two such narratives. while participants did note these events in each of the three workshops, the following information was not a prominent feature of discussions. we believe this was due to the forward-looking nature of the research. participants discussed the past briefly, contextualizing both their own lived experiences and the historical experiences of colonialism in canada. they used this as a stepping stone to focusing on the possibility of shared learning and actualizing change. it is important to understand the context and living memory that exists pertaining to indigenous women and girls within winnipeg: many participants said they were afraid that the children may not reach adulthood. there were two recent cases of violent attacks on young indigenous women that contributed to this fear. in 2014, the body of a teenage girl, tina fontaine, was found in a river in winnipeg. the tragedy surrounding her death was well documented within the news media (cbc news, 2014b; sinclair, 2014; taylor, 2015). a vigil, attended by hundreds of people, was held to pay homage to a life lost too soon. the eagle within anishinaabe teachings holds significant value, as it is able to pass messages from the earth to the creator. the eagle is a protector and is often associated with teachings of love. after tina fontaine’s body was found, an eagle was seen flying low over the location until the vigil began (sinclair, 2014). this memory of the vigil and the eagle remained a central part of the narrative shared as participants discussed the loss of this young life, and the loss of other women and girls. the testimony of the trauma that tina fontaine experienced in the last days of her life, as reported in the media (cbc news, 2014b), was followed a few months later by the violent attack on another first nations youth, rinelle harper, who was left for dead on the banks of a river within the city (cbc news, 2014a). the river bank where she was found has become a location of testimony and cultural memory. it has also strengthened recognition that more support, beyond what can be provided by the police, is needed to ensure safety. rinelle harper survived and has been placed in a role that she did not envision when she came to winnipeg to complete high school. she now speaks out against racialized and gendered violence (dean, 2015). the tragedy surrounding the death of tina fontaine led people in winnipeg to re-establish a group known as the bear clan patrol that was active in the 1990s. the bear clan patrol partners with the police and city government; however, they are largely an autonomous group that employs a non-violent approach to addressing challenges and conflicts. the bear clan patrol is a volunteer-run group who actively work to create a safe community and prevent violence by being present, visible, and engaged (“bear clan patrol,” n.d.). among participants, there was the communal memory of the bear clan patrol as an indigenous effort to create a peaceful and safe community for indigenous and non-indigenous people. in the media, the public affirmed the importance the bear clan patrol once had in ensuring safety, protection, and community mobilization, and it was re-established to meet growing recognition of community needs (taylor, 2015). a key part of the cultural memory transmitted through the dominant popular discourse and reported in the media, places blame on indigenous women and girls when they experience violence and see them as less worthy than nonindigenous girls (henry & tator, 2009; strega et al., 2014). however, through the living testimony of 9 cooper and driedger: creating a space for testimony and witnessing published by scholarship@western, 2019 indigenous youth, families, and communities, and the actions of groups such as the bear clan patrol, the dominant narrative is beginning to change. the active mobilization of the bear clan patrol in 2015 was a central event for many families within the girls night out research study. many participants envisioned a model that would ensure the safety and wellbeing of their daughters that did not involve the police or government and the bear clan patrol provided a beacon of hope for many. moving beyond violence the women who participated in this study saw the future for indigenous women through a cautionary lens. when asked to envision a future for their daughters, participants’ comments were filled with despair and melancholy. the women talked about their daughters’ futures. cheryl said, “i just want her to be strong and make the right choices.” violet believed, “it’s not going to be the way they hope it is.” as the women discussed their vision for their daughters’ lives as adolescents and young adults, they also reflected upon the experiences and perspectives that influenced their decisions and experiences. the women articulated a desire for their children to have more social supports than they currently had. they also discussed the financial challenges they faced as adolescents and expressed hope that their daughters would not have to engage in the same risky behaviours that they did in order to survive, such as engaging in gang-related activities. the women wanted their daughters to keep drug and alcohol use to a minimum in order to prevent the girls from becoming street involved and to enable them to finish school, gain employment, and to be viewed without the stigma that the dominant culture places upon indigenous women. the women felt that there was a slim possibility that their daughters would survive adolescence without experiencing the challenges that typified their experiences growing up. participants hoped that the girls will be able to “be strong through it all” [cheryl] and to “always appreciate what they have and be happy with what they get” [rebecca]. narratives as healing identity often hinges on the narratives told and how people position themselves within the story. when examining historical trauma and historical trauma response, the narrative of wellbeing is central within indigenous determinants of health (mowbray, 2007; reading & wien, 2009), creating an intersection where experience and cultural memory meet. these narratives provide guidance and a sense of purpose as people make decisions about how they are going to live their lives (tedeschi & calhoun, 2004). the ability to reconstruct personal and community narratives as characterized by strength, rather than victimization, allows people to address historical trauma and lessen the intergenerational effects of trauma (kienzler, 2008). when the girls were describing what an ideal indigenous community and/or family structure would look like, the description included single-parent homes, homes of other family members that they would visit, graveyards to burry family and friends, places to escape violence such as community centres or locations with signs that indicate they are safe spaces for children, and lowincome housing played prominently. the women were often upset when girls explained why these locations needed to be part of their communities. for example, a cemetery was needed for people who had been killed and signs were needed to indicate safe spaces to hide if you were in danger. this was a problematic finding for the women—they thought that they had successfully shielded their girls from realities such as unexpected death, interpersonal violence, and homelessness. the current dominant cultural narrative suggests that certain environments are “ideal” for raising children and the others are unhealthy or unsuitable, which has affected the identity of many families who participated in this 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.1 research. in addition to trying to live up to the standards in the dominant narrative, the participants were also trying to find ways to ensure that their daughters were not part of the negative stereotypes and statistics often cited as the rationale for racialized programs and policies. the women were afraid that their children will be removed from their homes and placed under the care of the state. currently in manitoba, 90% of children in the child welfare system are indigenous (manitoba families, 2017), while making up only 17% of the child and youth population in the province (statistics canada, 2017). other statistics, like that indigenous youth are 3 times more likely to witness family violence, that 53% of first nations children and youth under 18 years of age in manitoba were living in poverty (compared with 17% in the non-indigenous population), that 1 in 6 indigenous youth did not meet the numeracy performance expectations for grade 7 (government of manitoba, 2017b), contribute to negative perceptions about indigenous children and families. these statistics are used, in part, as a justification for funding allocations, but it also plays strongly into the cultural memory of who indigenous people are, what children are like, and the justification for intervention by state organizations. even when reports make claims about historical trauma and the need for reciprocity and cultural relevancy, these stark statistics paint a picture of children suffering rather than succeeding, which reinforces the narrative that continues to support the removal of indigenous children from their communities to be placed in the care of the government. cultural memory has perpetuated the stereotype of unfit indigenous families, which has contributed to removal policies such as the sixties scoop—a topic that was raised by participants within each of the three workshop groups. the sixties scoop had a direct impact on many of the adult participants in the group who had either personally experienced being removed or had a family member who had been. currently, there are more youth in the child welfare system than were attending residential schools at the height of their operation (blackstock, 2003). the women discussed how they had lost their identity including their names, familial histories, and sense of who they were and where they belonged. they shared that they wanted their daughters to always feel proud of who they were, where they came from, and to know that they would always be loved and have a family to come home to, regardless of where they lived or how old they were. they stated that these feelings were something they still were working on in their personal lives. stories define us, shape who we are and how we see ourselves, and they help to define our backgrounds (coiser, 2011). mainstream culture provides a limited narrative, embedded in cultural norms, about what it means to be a woman or a girl. when those narratives intersect with cultural narratives related to race and colonialism, many indigenous women and girls feel overlooked (driscoll, 2002). institutional racism, classism, sexism, and ageism are embedded within identity formation (coiser, 2011; driscoll, 2002; sue et al., 2007). participants discussed how the narratives of missing and murdered indigenous women and indigenous women as unfit parents shaped the definition of what it means to be an indigenous woman or girl. this narrative is perpetuated by discourse within popular culture through the media, the public, and government policies. it was also discussed within the workshops and was challenged in the final weeks of the workshop as participants engaged in critical reflection about self-determination and planned strategies to prevent violence rather than accepting the seeming inevitability of violent experiences. participants noted that it is vital to continue to shift public and private perspectives on what an indigenous woman or girl looks like. children generally learn from what they see and hear around them, even if it is not explicitly stated. however, if not explicitly stated, the narrative about why particular decisions were made may change and become distorted by the perception of other people involved. girls may not realize that the reason 11 cooper and driedger: creating a space for testimony and witnessing published by scholarship@western, 2019 their parents respond in a certain way is because of experiences of racial violence that parents have had. one of the girls in the workshop, tia, had a habit of running away. this scared her mother and often resulted in ineffectual punishments and no change in behaviour. at the workshop, tia’s mother was asked how she felt when her daughter was missing. she talked about how scared she was. tia looked surprised and said, “i didn’t know that you felt scared. i’m always okay.” the family reported the following week that they had discussed the issue further at home and tia agreed to a plan to let her parents know when she would be home and the general location she was going to, such as by the river or at the library. a month after this conversation, the family reported that the plan they devised was working and communication in general had improved within the home. many of the families had faced tragedies within their lives, in addition to the traumas experienced by previous generations. every adult participant independently discussed experiences of extreme violence within either her life or the lives of family members. the women strove to create a shared narrative to prevent less-optimal decision making regarding personal safety and wellbeing. as julieen, one of the adult participants stated: i am strong because i made it through everything. i’m still here. i haven’t given up and i’m not going to ‘cause i don’t want jessica to think, “oh, that’s how you live life. i can’t do it, so i’m not going to try again.” i tell her, “you can do it, try again. keep going, keep going, you can do it. if you fall down, you get back up. if you have a hard day you just move on to another day.” testimony and witnessing as healing testimony involves moments that provide an instance of recognition and interconnectedness. emberley (2015) explained that testimonies and testimonials tell us whose bodies are lovable and which “represent objects of violence to be disavowed or rendered disposable” (p. 136). episkenew (2009) wrote that “silence leads to isolation, causing many indigenous people to suppress their feelings, believing that they are alone in their experiences and responses. the effects of emotional repression on emotional and spiritual health are long lasting” (p. 16). bearing witness by peers is an important part of the healing journey and allows people to address historical trauma responses. participants within this project felt a lot of shame over a perceived lack of daily living skills often seen as necessary to lead successful lives, such as literacy skills or cooking skills. the women also experienced difficulty in dealing with acting-out behaviour among pre-pubescent girls. the adults questioned the impact their previous life choices and experiences would have on their daughters. they often expressed hope that their daughters would be able to have different experiences and opportunities and not knowingly enter into potentially dangerous situations. girls and women were asked to think about their ideal community. in their responses, they expressed a desire for a community that was safe, where everyone would be respected, and where community members would share and support one another. around week three of the workshop, this sense of community that participants envisioned began to take shape. the women stopped focusing on completing activities or talking specifically with their daughters and embraced all of the girls equally— helping them, listening to them, and encouraging them to voice their thoughts and opinions. it was interesting to watch the participants deliberately create by a space free from violence and “othering” during the workshop. for example, when a girl refused to sit next to another child and made negative 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.1 comments about the other child’s physical appearance or her use of traditional language, the girl was admonished by the adults, including but not limited to her family members. negative comments about life expectancy, violence, and sentiments of hopelessness were typically reserved for moments when adults were speaking out of earshot of the girls. however, the girls often mirrored negative sentiments within their own commentaries, thus demonstrating that the ideas were not as hidden as parents might have wished. the women continually tried to demonstrate what it means to be supportive of one another. the mask of insecurity began to fade during the course of the workshops. the women and girls wore less make-up, stopped worrying about checking their appearance throughout the night in the bathroom mirror, stopped wearing clothing to impress one another such as fancy shoes or form-fitting dresses, and began to embrace the space as one where they could be themselves. data collection activities were designed in a way to encourage positive thinking and capacity building. participants young and old were encouraged to play, to be silly, and to try new things. participants discussed how the workshop was a place where they could be themselves and learn together. in addition to trading in heels for moccasins and styled hair and extensive make-up for lip gloss, messy buns, ponytails, and braids, as women saw that value was placed on what they thought and felt rather than on their appearance, they appeared to become more comfortable within the space and provided what seemed to be less guarded responses within data collection activities. participants openly discussed how comments made during the first few weeks of data collection were not accurate representations of their situations. they explained that once they felt as if they were not being judged, they felt they could share different information and regretted providing misinformation initially. examples of topics included living situations, educational attainment, religious belief systems, and health-seeking behaviours. the women tried their best to be positive with one another, especially with the girls. they made a point of encouraging all the girls in the group by letting them know that they were doing a good job, that their ideas were of value, and that they were proud of them. jersey, one of the girls, was especially proud of her newfound ability to draw stars. although she was unsure about how to write her name, she said that she could draw stars instead because “kandace [one of the other mothers in the group] says i’m a star” and taught her how to draw stars. the response to adversity and the way that people negotiate public narratives of both survival and change can be a transformative process in and of itself (mohatt, thompson, thai, & tebes, 2014). for participants in the “girls night out” workshops, there was a change in how they positioned themselves at the end of the 7 weeks. the women began to characterize themselves as strong, capable caregivers who would be guiding the girls as they made decisions. the girls began to refer to themselves as strong in their own right. these changes were significant for many families and led people to return to school, seek employment changes, seek out healthcare services, and make different decisions regarding their interpersonal relationships. transformation occurs when people are able to exert power to achieve change (kienzler, 2008). the women often stated that they did not have strong role models around to guide them in using positive parenting methods with school-age girls. they talked about how this project helped to shape a new narrative about parenting. the women often talked about wanting to encourage their daughters, so they would be able to be strong. they also noted that there is a need for external support from family members and communities to ensure that they have the tools to stay strong 13 cooper and driedger: creating a space for testimony and witnessing published by scholarship@western, 2019 in the face of the various challenges that both adults and youth will likely face, such as lateral violence within the workplace and unexpected deaths of family member and friends. mohatt et al. (2014) wrote, “strong cultural identity may be emblematic of public resilience in the face of historical trauma” (p. 131). healing from wounds accumulated over generations is a slow process; it does not happen overnight and often it is realized in subtle ways when people see that they are not alone and that they are important (episkenew, 2009). feeling a sense of support and strength within the group provided the opportunity for parents to discuss their hopes for their daughters’ futures. many parents said that they want their daughters to know they are supported and to feel a different level of connection to family than they experienced. as georgina explained, “i want my daughters to know that i love them so very much, and that i will really stand by their side, encouraging them, loving them, and just cheering for them.” the girls replied with statements such as, “i want her to know that i’ll make her proud when i grow up” [mysti]. conclusion the legacy of residential schools, the sixties scoop, a staggering number of children within the child welfare system, and racialized violence against indigenous women and girls had a profound effect on participants. no matter how hard the women have tried to shield their daughters from trauma, the girls have witnessed the challenges their caregivers face and have had their own experiences of racialized aggression. as participants began to find a way to work together to promote safe spaces for dialogue and testimony, the cultural memory and positioning of indigenous experiences as explained by indigenous individuals and communities began to shift from neo-colonialist perspectives to their own notions of what an indigenous woman can and should be. when participants, both adults and children, discussed how to be healthy and safe, they pointed to the four c’s of historical trauma. participants discussed collective experiences and cross-generational impacts, framing these within cumulative experiences that shape who they are and how they see the world. for the participants within this research study, finding inner strength and the ability to carry on regardless of external challenges was of central importance in order to have the ability to be happy, healthy, and safe. participants identified the need for love as central in the exploration of these outcomes. they noted the need to have both the ability to love themselves and to demonstrate love for each other. participants discussed how this had been lost through the various colonial practices, such as the forced removal of children from their families and the need for colonial inquiry to provide space for changes to take place within intergenerational environments. in order to move forward, policies are needed to ensure that all stakeholders have the opportunity to engage in program planning and service delivery to help ensure both cultural relevance and capacity building. it is equally important to have opportunities to foster the development of decision-making skills because part of the legacy of colonization is that individual and community autonomy has often been stripped away. mentoring opportunities should feature prominently in culturally responsive service and education delivery platforms. in addition, all organizations that work with indigenous communities, including government, and the public and private sectors, need to receive training on identifying and understanding historical trauma and historical trauma response. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.1 shared engagement, through testimony and witnessing within the workshops, enabled the women and girls to better articulate their aspirations for a healthy and safe future for all members of their families and communities. it is important to understand that change does not happen quickly. creating a space for testimony and witnessing within the research, where participants could share as much or as little as they wanted, was an essential part of the study design. participants worked to build communities that would allow them to frame their understandings of what it is that they want to see in the future and how to achieve a place where their girls would be happy, healthy, and safe. everyone actively listened to the thoughts and feelings of the children and worked to create a space that was more than just one of speaking and listening, but of testimony and witnessing where changes began to take place and healing was encouraged. activities were planned around the wishes of the girls, which led to the involvement of all participants in acts of witnessing and building reciprocal relationships. ultimately, everyone within the workshop space articulated that they wanted to see the girls and their families succeed. the hope and pride children had in their female family members seemed to act as an instigator for adults to explore their own hopes and pride in both themselves and one another. this became apparent as relationships formed from week-to-week through the workshops and discourse moved from despair to hope. the trauma experienced and witnessed occurred over centuries, and daily, ongoing racially motivated micro-aggressions continue to influence people. children dream of a future where they have access to hospitals “to have babies in” [callie], as well as schools and libraries where they “can learn” [shalane]. they hope to have community centres where they can read books, watch movies, and play games. girls dream of communities where animals are treated fairly, where elders and parents are together, and where, as 10-year-old girls, they still embrace the thought of “no boys allowed . . . okay maybe some boys” [kylie]. the girls wanted a place where they could act as witnesses, where they could tell their stories, and they could be “brave girls” [lexi]. they want a place where they can feel safe, healthy, and happy 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(2011). fostering nation? canada confronts its history of childhood disadvantage. waterloo, on: wilfrid laurier university press. sue, d. w., capodilupo, c. m., torino, g. c., bucceri, j. m., holder, a. m. b., nadal, k. l., & esquilin, m. (2007). racial microaggressions in everyday life: implications for clinical practice. american psychologist, 62(4), 271-286. doi: https://doi.org/10.1037/0003-066x.62.4.271 taylor, j. (2015, august 16). tina fontaine: 1 year since her death, has anything changed? cbc news. retrieved from http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/tina-fontaine-1-yearsince-her-death-has-anything-changed-1.3192415 tedeschi, r. g., & calhoun, l. g. (2004). posttraumatic growth: conceptual foundations and empirical evidence. psychological inquiry, 15(1), 37-41. doi: https://doi.org/10.1207/s15327965pli1501 thomas, d., mitchell, t., & arseneau, c. (2015). re-evaluating resilience: from individual vulnerabilities to the strength of cultures and collectivities among indigenous communities. resilience, 4(2), 116-129. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/21693293.2015.1094174 truth and reconciliation commission of canada. (2015). honouring the truth, reconciling for the future: summary of the final report of the truth and reconciliation commission of canada. retrieved from http://www.trc.ca/websites/trcinstitution/file/2015/findings/exec_summary_2015_05_31 _web_o.pdf truth and reconciliation commission of canada. (2016). a knock on the door: the essential history of residential schools from the truth and reconciliation commission of canada. winnipeg, mb: university of manitoba press. waldram, j. b. (2014). healing history? aboriginal healing, historical trauma, and personal responsibility. transcultural psychiatry, 51(3), 370-386. doi: https://doi.org/10.1177/1363461513487671 watt, m. c., o'connor, r. m., stewart, s. h., moon, e. c., & terry, l. (2008). specificity of childhood learning experiences in relation to anxiety sensitivity and illness/injury sensitivity: implications for health anxiety and pain. journal of cognitive psychotherapy, 22(2), 128-142. doi: https://doi.org/10.1891/0889-8391.22.2.128 wesley-esquimaux, c. c., & smolewski, m. (2004). historic trauma and aboriginal healing. ottawa, on: aboriginal healing foundation. retrieved from http://www.ahf.ca/downloads/historictrauma.pdf 21 cooper and driedger: creating a space for testimony and witnessing published by scholarship@western, 2019 yellow horse brave heart, m. (1998). the return to the sacred path: healing the historical trauma and historical unresolved grief response among the lakota through a psychoeducational group intervention. smith college studies in social work, 68(3), 287-305. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/00377319809517532 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.1 the international indigenous policy journal january 2019 “if you fall down, you get back up”: creating a space for testimony and witnessing by urban indigenous women and girls elizabeth cooper s michelle driedger recommended citation “if you fall down, you get back up”: creating a space for testimony and witnessing by urban indigenous women and girls abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license â•œif you fall down, you get back upâ•š: creating a space for testimony and witnessing by urban indigenous women and girls indigenous rights and multilevel governance: learning from the northwest territories water stewardship strategy the international indigenous policy journal volume 9 | issue 2 article 4 april 2018 indigenous rights and multilevel governance: learning from the northwest territories water stewardship strategy alex latta wilfrid laurier university, alatta@wlu.ca recommended citation latta, a. (2018). indigenous rights and multilevel governance: learning from the northwest territories water stewardship strategy. the international indigenous policy journal, 9(2). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.4 indigenous rights and multilevel governance: learning from the northwest territories water stewardship strategy abstract states’ increasing recognition of indigenous rights in the realm of natural resources has led to a variety of comanagement arrangements and other forms of melded authority, evolving over time into increasingly complex governance relationships. this article takes up such relationships within the analytical frame of multilevel governance, seeking lessons from the experiences of indigenous involvement in water policy in canada’s northwest territories (nwt). it examines the way that effective collaboration in resource governance can emerge within the space of tension between evolving indigenous rights regimes and the continued sovereignty of the state. at the same time, the analysis raises questions about whether multilevel governance can contribute to meaningful decolonization of relationships between settler states and indigenous peoples. keywords indigenous rights, multilevel governance, natural resources, water policy, northwest territories acknowledgments the author would like to thank the participants in the research for their time, especially representatives of the department of environment and natural resources, and the members of the aboriginal steering committee. the research was supported by funding from the social sciences and humanities research council of canada. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ i n d i g e n o u s r i g h t s a n d m u l t i l e v e l g o v e r n a n c e : l e a r n i n g f r o m t h e n o r t h w e s t t e r r i t o r i e s w a t e r s t e w a r d s h i p s t r a t e g y i n d i g e n o u s p e o p l e s a n d n a t u r a l r e s o u r c e s : f r o m r i g h t s t o g o v e r n a n c e the emergence of an international framework of rights over the past 30 years has reshaped relationships between indigenous peoples and colonial states. this emerging international rights regime is especially associated with international labour organization convention 169 (ilo, 1989) and the more recent united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip; un general assembly, 2007). questions about the degree to which rights are effectively put into practice on the ground have received much attention in different kinds of forums and from various academic disciplines (anaya, 2013; aylwin, 2008; barelli, 2012; courtis, 2011; hill, lillywhite & simon, 2010; ilo, 2013; mitchell, 2014). in particular, this literature puts increasing attention on the nexus where indigenous rights intersect with the management, exploitation, and conservation of natural resources. the preamble to the undrip underlines indigenous peoples’ “right to development in accordance with their own needs and interests” (un general assembly, 2007, p. 2). nevertheless, reflecting historical patterns (coates, 2004), contemporary economic development in indigenous territories frequently entails the appropriation of natural resources by outside interests, often with a failure to respect indigenous peoples’ inherent rights in relation to their traditional territories, as now enshrined in the un declaration (anaya, 2013; aylwin, 2008). in the face of this tension between internationally declared rights and the socio-economically ingrained patterns of colonial relations, indigenous peoples have pursued diverse strategies to resist environmentally destructive development practices, lay claim to their share of the benefits from resource wealth in their territories, and assert their inherent autonomy (see for example alfred & corntassel, 2005; blaser, de costa, mcgregor & coleman, 2010; blaser, feit & mcrae, 2004; boelens et al., 2012; fenelon & hall, 2008; laplante & nolin, 2014; leifsen, sánchez-vázquez & reyes, 2017; stetson, 2012). as a result of these pressures, much has in fact changed, with state governments pursuing various kinds of constitutional and legislative measures that recognize degrees of indigenous land and selfgovernment rights. critics argue, however, that such changes are often superficial, generally conserving the supremacy of state sovereignty, imposing western models of land tenure, and in most cases continuing to leave indigenous communities exposed to unequal economic power relations (see for example coulthard, 2014; irlbacher-fox, 2009; lemaitre, 2011; milne, 2013; pasternak, collis & dafnos, 2013; reyes-garcía et al., 2014; samson, 2016). closely linked to the evolving domain of indigenous rights, new kinds of negotiated governance relationships have also emerged between indigenous governments and different levels of the state, making way for participatory conservation planning, resource co-management regimes, and other forms and degrees of shared decision making over lands and resources. often these negotiated relationships also include non-governmental actors, especially corporations. scholars increasingly use the concept of multilevel governance (mlg) to describe these often complex arrangements for sharing decision making authority and responsibility (see for example alcantara & nelles, 2014; alcantara & spicer, 2016; larson & lewis-mendoza, 2012; papillon, 2012; papillon & juneau, 2015; rodon, 2009). though this literature is mostly focussed on the canadian context, as an analytical framework it holds promise for generating lessons of wider relevance. 1 latta: indigenous rights and multi-level governance published by scholarship@western, 2018 in the present analysis, i take up one such mlg relationship, the 2010 water stewardship strategy (hereafter wss or “the strategy”) in canada’s northwest territories (nwt). well into its second implementation period at the time of writing, the strategy is, by existing accounts, a successful example of innovation in state–indigenous governance relations (beck, 2016; morris & de loë, 2016). through this case study, my aim is to probe the promise and shortcomings of this in-between space, where proposals and efforts towards collaboration in resource governance grow out of an active tension between indigenous rights and the sovereignty of colonial states. in doing so, i build on a range of other such case studies that have probed specific instances of indigenous mlg from various perspectives (see for example alcantara & spicer, 2016; denny & fanning, 2016; mcgregor, 2014; zurba, 2013). as a non-indigenous researcher and settler-citizen of canada, my aim herein is to contribute to debates that help us better understand how to decolonize relationships. if there are reasons to be hopeful about the kinds of consultative and even collaborative governance practices that are emerging in the nwt around water—and i believe there are—it is also important to be honest about the limits to those practices and the further challenges that remain. how much does the wss rebalance political agency visà-vis the conservation and management of natural resources? where does the wss fit within the broader landscape of indigenous rights and governance in the nwt? finally, what can we learn from this case about how mlg practices might pave the way for deeper structural changes in the relationships between states and indigenous peoples, not only in canada but elsewhere as well? the analysis is informed by research conducted within the context of a long-term research partnership agreement between wilfrid laurier university and the government of northwest territories.1 this relationship facilitated access to government officials in the ministry of environment and natural resources, who have in turn opened the space for me to engage with the aboriginal steering committee (asc) to the wss. as part of the research, i attended the annual wss implementation workshops in 2015 and 2016, and a special event at wilfrid laurier university shortly after the signing of the nwt– alberta transboundary water agreement. i also attended two asc meetings and conducted a two-hour focus group on the second occasion, in june 2016. i had further discussions with two members of the asc during an october 2016 workshop on consultation and consent hosted by matawa first nations in thunder bay. my arguments also draw on interviews conducted between june 2016 to march 2017 with six key informants who played (and in several instances continue to play) central roles for the government of northwest territories and the government of canada during the evolution and implementation of the wss.2 finally, i am indebted to other analyses of the strategy and the related transboundary negotiations, including the authors of the 2015 implementation evaluation report (independent evaluation, 2015), as well as recent work by other scholars (beck, 2016; morris & de loë, 2016). 1 the research was funded by the social sciences and humanities research council of canada, through a project titled, "resource governance and indigenous rights: understanding intercultural frameworks for negotiating 2 i am grateful to all the participants for their generosity. they included dahti tsetso, david krutko, leon andrew, peter redvers, shin shiga, sjoerd van der wielen, tim heron, bob overvold, erin kelly, jennifer dallman-sanders, meghan beveridge, merrell-ann phare, and teresa joudrie. while all research participants agreed to be identified in research outputs, not all members of the asc agreed to have their names associated with specific quotations; as a result, all quotes from asc members are rendered anonymous in this article. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 2 [2018], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.4 i n d i g e n o u s r i g h t s a n d m u l t i l e v e l g o v e r n a n c e i n c a n a d a in canada, the indian act of 1876 provides a hierarchical and paternal legal framework governing the relationships between indigenous peoples and the federal government. its backdrop is a constitution that recognizes only two founding peoples (english and french) and divides canadian sovereignty into federal and provincial levels. despite being effectively left out of the canadian federation, indigenous peoples do enjoy constitutional protections, with section 35 of the 1982 constitution act providing a key anchor for indigenous and treaty rights for first nations, inuit, and métis peoples. a series of supreme court decisions3 have contributed to confirming the status of these rights, and established that they must be protected in relationships between the crown and indigenous peoples through the principle of honourable negotiation. more commonly known as the duty to consult, this principle obliges the canadian government (or any subnational unit thereof) to consult indigenous peoples in cases where government decisions could affect the enjoyment of their constitutionally protected rights—with accommodation necessary “where appropriate” (aboriginal affairs and northern development canada [aandc], 2011, p. 5). legal scholars have pointed to the need for more effective mechanisms to incorporate the right to consultation and accommodation into regulatory processes, and ultimately to secure more just outcomes (mullan, 2009; potes, 2006; sossin, 2010). further legal decisions have borne out these criticisms, contributing greater clarity to the crown’s obligations (mullan, 2011). nevertheless, recent successful court challenges by first nations, including tsilhqot’in nation v. british columbia (2014) and coastal first nations v. british columbia (2016), suggest that the state continues to fall short of the kind of robust consideration of indigenous peoples’ concerns necessary to uphold their rights. although the evolution of regulatory, administrative, and legal relationships and procedures has been significantly driven by the courts in canada, this is not the whole story. indigenous organizations and institutions have gained increasing importance as representatives of their peoples in policy processes and constitutional negotiations. moreover, negotiated settlements creating new kinds of territorial and selfgovernment arrangements have given birth to new layers of decision-making authority for indigenous nations and also to new intergovernmental relationships. with this rising importance and recognition of indigenous governments and organizations, federal and provincial governments, as well as other important political and economic actors, have increasingly entered into more horizontal negotiated relationships with indigenous peoples in order to address shared concerns and advance common or intersecting interests. scholars in canada have increasingly come to treat these new relationships as instances of multilevel governance (alcantara & nelles, 2014; alcantara & spicer, 2016; ladner, 2010; papillon, 2008, 2012; papillon & juneau, 2015; rodon, 2009). originally developed within the context of the european union, the concept of mlg has been employed by scholars working in various regions of the world. of particular relevance to the present analysis, it has been widely applied in the sphere of environment and natural resources (armitage, 2007, 2008; berkes, 2010; bisaro, hinkel & kranz, 2010; cox, 2014; ebbesson, 2010; kluvankova-oravska, chobotova, banaszak, slavikova & trifunovova, 2009; koehn, 2008; larson & lewis-mendoza, 2012; newig & fritsch, 2009; rantala, hajjar & skutsch, 2014; suškevičs, 2012; wagner & white, 2009). 3 some key decisions include r. v. sparrow (1990), delgamuukw v. british columbia (1997), haida nation v. british columbia (minister of forests) (2004), among others. 3 latta: indigenous rights and multi-level governance published by scholarship@western, 2018 curiously, there are only weak links between this scholarship and the literature on mlg in relations between indigenous peoples and colonial states (one notable exception is larson & lewis-mendoza, 2012). instead, these themes come together within the rubric of collaborative or participatory governance of natural resources (see for example black & mcbean, 2016; bowie, 2013; denny & fanning, 2016; dokis, 2015; mcgregor, 2014; von der porten, de loë, & plummer, 2015; zurba, 2013), often linked to a longer-running literature on co-management (see for example cundill, thondhlana, sisitka, shackleton & blore, 2013; feit, 2005; goetze, 2005; mcgregor, 2011; mulrennan & scott, 2005; natcher, davis & hickey, 2005; stevenson, 2006; zurba et al., 2012). notions of collaboration and participation are certainly relevant to the present analysis, and co-management is a central facet of the broader environmental governance relationships i aim to discuss. nevertheless, i argue that an mlg approach can contribute to the discussion by bringing key questions into clearer focus at the intersection of resource governance and indigenous self-determination. what is meant by mlg in relation to indigenous peoples in canada has been refined in the recent literature. in an early contribution, papillon (2012) noted that the term points to governance innovations that emerge as a result of the fact that “[i]ndigenous [p]eoples are considered politically and legally distinct, but they are not recognized neither as full constituent partners within the federation nor as separate political entities entirely outside of federal boundaries”(p. 292). perhaps not surprisingly under these circumstances, papillon asserted that emerging forms of mlg exist alongside (and often in tension with) the formal structures of government within canadian federalism. they are a mode of adaptation “characterized by a multiplication of decision-making spaces and processes under which formal lines of authority, while remaining, are increasingly contested and replaced by negotiated rules” (p. 304). a subsequent study by alcantara and nelles (2014) helps further refine the definition for mlg involving indigenous peoples in canada. they set out three key criteria to distinguish instances of mlg from systems of intergovernmental relations within canadian federalism, summarized as follows: it is a policy process that engages a variety of actors (governmental, nongovernmental, and/or quasi-governmental) located at different territorial scales, the outcomes of which are the product of negotiation (decision-making processes or negotiated order) rather than traditional hierarchical orders such as delegation and devolution. (p. 189) together, these criteria highlight the need to understand what is going on outside the constitutionally prescribed system for decision-making within canadian federalism, but they also beg an important question in this regard: should we judge mlg in terms of specific policy processes and outcomes, or in terms of how it interacts with (and potentially reshapes) the federal ordering of political space? some observers put a greater emphasis on the former dimension. alcantara and spicer (2016), for instance, suggested, “if the goal is to create a policy-making process that respects the underlying logic of the canadian federation but creates space for nation-to-nation interactions within a policy-making process, then multilevel governance may be an ideal model”(p. 188). others put the second criteria at the core of the debate. in this vein, papillon (2015) underlined the importance of understanding both “the limits and the transformative potential of this new multilevel reality” (p. 5). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 2 [2018], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.4 without a doubt, mlg can be read as an example of the way colonial institutions adapt to new political pressures in ways that insulate themselves from radical challenges. as ladner (2010) asserted, from an indigenous perspective “most demands and aspirations involve decolonisation—internal (within nations) and external (within canada) and rebuilding indigenous nations economically, politically, culturally, linguistically and legally”(p. 68). she argued that many multilevel relationships have failed to escape the confines of the canadian colonial structure provided by the indian act; instead, she called for the discussion to shift from one of mlg towards international models of relationship between sovereign entities. nevertheless, others are less pessimistic about the potential of mlgs. papillon (2015) suggested that although incremental in nature, the changes brought about by mlg arrangements may have larger impacts over time: “in the long run, their cumulative effects on canadian federalism and on the future of aboriginal governance may well be as significant as comprehensive land claims and selfgovernment agreements, if not more” (p. 5). although the present analysis is certainly concerned with the prospect of better policy as a result of the relationships and negotiations that comprise mlg, it is equally preoccupied with this larger question of mlg’s transformative potential in relation to the structures of canadian federalism. does mlg open pathways towards decolonization and indigenous self-determination? these concepts involve an inherent challenge to the legitimacy of the colonial state (alfred, 2009; alfred & corntassel, 2005; coulthard, 2014; ladner, 2010). they also complicate claims to indigenous rights, since in practice rights depend on constitutional or parliamentary recognition, and their application is adjudicated by canadian courts. indeed corntassel and bryce (2012) called rights a form of “state affirmation” (p. 153). thus, if rights form part of the basis for practices of mlg, they are also part of the colonial relationship that conditions such practices. alcantara and morden (2017) draw out some of the other structural ways that power operates to shape mlg processes. for instance, working through the state’s prerogative to set the parameters for policy negotiations or through the unequal access to monetary and other resources that different parties can bring to the table. they characterize such factors as a “shadow of hierarchy” that hangs over mlg (alcantara & morden, 2017). as i set out to examine the interplay between the politics of rights and the politics of negotiated governance in nwt water governance, clearly the question of power relations is central. t h e n w t w a t e r s t e w a r d s h i p s t r a t e g y a s a c a s e o f m u l t i l e v e l g o v e r n a n c e t h e r e s o u r c e g o v e r n a n c e a n d m a n a g e m e n t s e t t i n g the wss took shape in an already complex governance landscape for natural resources. the roots of that landscape can be traced to conflict in the 1970s over the proposal for a gas pipeline through the mackenzie valley, which dominates the western half of the nwt’s geography. a federal government inquiry was launched in answer to indigenous peoples’ opposition to the pipeline, with justice thomas berger appointed as the inquiry’s commissioner. berger’s 1977 report, northern frontier, northern homeland, called for the settlement of land claims as a prerequisite for resource development in the valley (berger, 1977). the settlement of those land claims, some of which are still being negotiated, has created a patchwork of surface and subsurface land rights for indigenous peoples, along with royalty sharing measures and resource management frameworks. the claim settlements also include provisions for self-government or for subsequent self-government negotiations. 5 latta: indigenous rights and multi-level governance published by scholarship@western, 2018 integrated with the land claims process, the 1998 mackenzie valley resource management act established resource co-management boards for the mackenzie valley. the mackenzie valley land and water board and the mackenzie valley environmental review board, as well as the regional land and water boards linked to the gwich’in, sahtu, and tłı̨chǫ comprehensive land claim agreements, comprise a regulatory regime where indigenous governments hold 50% of the decision-making votes. that regulatory context falls outside the scope of the wss, though the land and water boards are included among the stakeholders. whether we characterize the land claim agreements and regulatory boards themselves as examples of mlg—alcantara and nelles (2014) would argue that they are outcomes of mlg, rather than ongoing instances thereof—they certainly generate an ongoing need for coordination across actors at different scales. in this sense, they create a policy environment that arguably fosters further instances of mlg. finally, it is important to situate the wss within the broader negotiated governance relationships in the mackenzie basin. the mackenzie valley river basin transboundary waters master agreement (1997), which came into effect in 1997, includes the federal government and all provincial and territorial governments in the basin as signatories. it established the mackenzie river basin board, which includes indigenous representation from each jurisdiction, and it set out basic principles for the subsequent negotiation of bilateral water agreements. it took almost two decades for those negotiations to finally come to fruition and it was principally the nwt, on the basis of its wss, that finally drove that negotiating agenda forward. hence, if the eventual negotiations between provinces and territories around transboundary waters were not strictly an instance of mlg at that interprovincial level of engagement, they occurred in a political space that was conditioned by mlg both at the broader basin level and, as we will see, within the nwt’s wss. i n t r o d u c i n g t h e s t r a t e g y the foundational document of the wss, northern voices, northern waters (2010), is the product of extensive engagement with water partners, broadly defined as “anyone that has a role in water stewardship” (p. 3), including various levels of government, regulatory boards, industry, and nongovernmental organizations. the highly participatory approach to the strategy’s development is carried into its implementation, with all water partners invited to participate in an annual two-day implementation workshop. they are also called upon during third-party evaluations at the conclusion of each five-year implementation cycle. as per the criteria outlined by alcantara and nelles (2014), the wss would appear to be a clear instance of mlg, especially in terms of the negotiated relationships between federal, territorial, and indigenous governments that lie at its heart. it is evident from the northern voices (2010) document that indigenous peoples (the language used here is aboriginal) have a special role amongst the other water partners. indeed, the message from the ministers, which acts as a preface, begins as follows: “on behalf of the aboriginal steering committee, the government of the northwest territories (gnwt) and indian and northern affairs canada (inac), we are pleased to present . . .”(p. 1). moreover, after brief introductory remarks, section 1.1 is dedicated to “the importance of water to aboriginal people in the nwt” (p. 4). finally, it is worth noting that this section is concluded with a featured textbox that highlights aboriginal rights, asserting that the wss in no way infringes upon, and indeed is in every instance superseded by, rights recognized in “existing or future treaties or land, resource and self-government agreements” (p. 4). as an exercise in 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 2 [2018], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.4 mlg, the wss clearly has a complex relationship with indigenous peoples in the nwt: they are placed on par with governments as authors of the initiative to build the wss; their relationships with water are at the heart of the wss’s concerns; and the wss must develop in accordance with their treaty and constitutional rights. northern voices, northern waters (2010) set out a key guiding vision: “the waters of the northwest territories will remain clean, abundant and productive for all time” (p. 10). as a kind of master plan for water governance in the nwt, the strategy itself did not prescribe any specific policy actions, but it did set the policy agenda and inform the concrete substance of policy development in crucial ways. for instance, the wss provided the rationale for the development of a robust territory-wide communitybased water monitoring program, which began operation in 2012. perhaps even more clearly, the strategy set out a watershed and ecosystem-based approach, which informed what was arguably the most important goal during the strategy’s first five-year implementation period: the negotiation of transboundary water agreements with neighbouring provinces and territories. in this way, the strategy has constituted a space of highly consequential public engagement within the broader context of water governance in the territory. as a final point of context for the wss, it is important to note that it took shape during federal-toterritorial devolution of powers. devolution was already on the political agenda in the years immediately prior to the birth of the wss and moved into formal consultations in 2010 (the same year the strategy was launched). a negotiated devolution agreement came into effect in 2014, giving the territorial government powers over lands and waters similar to those enjoyed by canadian provinces. at that point the federal government’s role in the wss became secondary, and they also withdrew from the transboundary water negotiations. in some ways, the strategy anticipated this shift in authority. though there was leadership and buy-in for the wss across both federal and territorial government agencies, the gnwt provided the initial impetus for the initiative and continued to be its main driver. in particular, the wss was a key priority for then gnwt minister of environment and natural resources (enr), michael miltenberger. this context is important because it signals the way negotiated governance relationships—rather than clear lines of hierarchical federal authority—formed the overarching context for collaboration. i n d i g e n o u s p e o p l e s i n t h e w a t e r s t e w a r d s h i p s t r a t e g y most research participants used the language of relationships and partnership to describe the involvement of indigenous peoples in the wss. this perception is also borne out in the 2015 implementation evaluation report, which conducted independent consultations with wss participants. the report noted, “the types of achievements that were most commonly identified were increased collaboration and improved relationships and trust” (independent evaluation, 2015, p. 7). reflecting on the early and extensive participation of indigenous representatives in the development of the strategy, the official who coordinated federal involvement, jennifer dallman-sanders, noted, “the water stewardship strategy—for me as a federal employee—was a new way of doing business with indigenous governments” (personal communication, november 10, 2016). 7 latta: indigenous rights and multi-level governance published by scholarship@western, 2018 the strategy was also experienced as an important shift in approach by a long-sitting member of the asc (asc1).4 he described an initial strategy meeting where the participation of numerous staff from both federal and territorial government ministries risked turning the process into a bureaucratic exercise. instead, an impromptu huddle outside the main meeting between high-level representatives (himself, one federal, and one territorial) resulted in a personal commitment to approach the wss differently. from that point onwards, indigenous representatives had a permanent seat at the table in dialogue with a small group of senior government officials—unlike other “water partners,” who were involved in extensive consultations but did not play the same ongoing role to shape the strategy. the asc came into existence through this dialogue as a permanent fixture of the wss. as asc1 summarized, indigenous peoples were involved “right from the bottom up . . . in partnership with federal and territorial government. all the aboriginal regional governments—they all had representatives” (personal communication, june 29, 2016). several other members of the asc concurred. asc2 put it as follows: “the strategy itself as a framework policy document was done in a way that ensured ownership, and the sense of ownership over the process” (personal communication, june 29, 2016). despite a degree of consensus on this point, it is important to clarify that some members of the asc were more cautious in describing the character of the partnership that the wss embodies. asc3 remarked, “ultimately, this is their process; it is enabling them to make better decisions” (personal communication, june 29, 2016). that public governments were willing and able to secure the involvement of indigenous governments from across the territory is significant for a couple of reasons. first, as several research participants noted, historical tensions between different groups often prevent this kind of collaboration. second, there were (and continue to be) differences between the federal and nwt governments with respect to who they recognize as indigenous governments. in the case of groups with settled land claims (the inuvialuit, gwich’in, sahtu dene and métis, and tłı̨chǫ), there is an officially recognized regional indigenous government counterpart, which provides the basis for intergovernmental relations. two key regions still had unsettled claims as the strategy was coming together (and during the research): the dehcho dene and métis, and the akaitcho dene. moreover, some individual communities, like k’atl’odeeche first nation, have opted out of regional land claims. finally, formal recognition of métis peoples by public government has been uneven. what is striking about the wss is how a diversity of groups had a place at the table—and were recognized by public government as having a legitimate stake there—even though a few indigenous governments also opted out. to the extent that a collective indigenous voice in the nwt is possible, the asc embodies this, and hence provided a key interlocutor for public government in the formation of the wss. as observed by the lead official from the federal government side during the formation of the strategy, teresa joudrie, “the steering committee really was useful . . . it’s one of the rare times that all of the parties come together to work on a common goal. that does not happen frequently” (personal communication, november 10, 2016). a shared interest in the long-term health and sustainability of nwt water systems was key to bringing together different actors in the wss. relatively early in the strategy, community-based water monitoring became one important vehicle for building on this common interest to develop relationships and build trust between indigenous communities and the gnwt ministry of environment and natural 4 as per my commitment to maintain the anonymity of quotes from the asc members, i have designated each asc participant a numeric value from 1-7. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 2 [2018], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.4 resources (enr). enr staff worked to set up protocols and train monitors in over 30 communities, with the communities closely involved in establishing priority monitoring locations. as acs2 noted, the gnwt—i think—has done a pretty good job of engaging with communities with respect to community-based monitoring, which is very dear to the heart of the communities. so there was also a bit of a trust relationship established both through the process leading to the water strategy and then through the implementation of the community-based monitoring. i think that was something that worked, and it was seen to work. (personal communication, june 29, 2016) although the monitoring itself collects data according to the principles of western science, community input to monitoring locations rests significantly on traditional ecological knowledge (tek). this established a precedent early in the strategy around respecting and working with different kinds of knowledge, demonstrating commitment on all sides to the principles expressed in the northern voices, northern waters (2010) document. the asc provided ongoing oversight as the community-based monitoring strategy emerged, while asc members also often played an important role in facilitating community-level engagement. work with communities to develop the water monitoring program overlapped with community engagement on another key priority during the first five-year cycle of implementation: transboundary water negotiations. the nwt is the final downstream jurisdiction in the mackenzie river basin, receiving waters that originate in british columbia, alberta, saskatchewan, and the yukon. upstream development, including the tar sands in northeastern alberta, as well as shale gas development and hydroelectric installations in northern bc, figure large in people’s concerns for aquatic ecosystem health downstream in the nwt. after little activity on bilateral water negotiations since the signing of the mackenzie basin transboundry waters master agreement (1997), the nwt began putting the issue back on the agenda even before launching the wss. the first set of formal negotiations, with alberta, began in 2011. it is within the context of the transboundary negotiations that we can gauge most clearly how the asc, along with the broader engagement of indigenous governments and communities by the federal and territorial governments, shaped the translation of the wss into concrete policy measures. t r a n s b o u n d a r y w a t e r n e g o t i a t i o n s all participants in the research characterized indigenous governments’ influence on the negotiations as substantial and crucial. the chief negotiator for the nwt, merrell-ann phare, underlined that the territory’s negotiating position necessarily had to reflect commitments set out in the treaties and comprehensive land claims, and that it was further shaped by the priorities identified by the wss. in this way, indigenous rights and voices were central ingredients for negotiating positions. those positions were shaped and refined through a series of engagements and consultations with indigenous governments, as well as the ongoing involvement of the asc. phare especially highlighted the importance of the asc for keeping the negotiating team grounded in the perspectives and interests of indigenous peoples in the territory: the committee was the primary point of contact for the negotiating team—for the whole team. so we routinely met with them . . . and we created a process that allowed us to engage the aboriginal steering committee both before and after meetings . . . so you could see with each 9 latta: indigenous rights and multi-level governance published by scholarship@western, 2018 step: interests, options, options refinement, and final agreements. (personal communication, sept 2, 2016) according to enr records (megan beveridge, personal communication, june 23, 2016), the transboundary negotiations team engaged and/or consulted on 79 occasions with 11 different indigenous governments while preparing the nwt negotiating position or as negotiations progressed with alberta, british columbia, saskatchewan, and the yukon. in addition, 18 meetings of the asc also addressed the transboundary negotiations to varying degrees. it is important to note that most of the engagement and consultation meetings took place in the regions, and that the entire negotiating team was normally involved. federal and territorial government officials who participated in the research underlined the significant expenditure of time and resources in order to create opportunities for meaningful dialogue. to further ensure that indigenous views were present at the negotiating table, an nwt and aboriginal affairs advisor was hired for the negotiating team. of sahtu dene origin, bob overvold is a former senior civil servant with both territorial and federal governments, who also spent seven years leading the dene nation in land claims negotiations during the 1980s. while his role was central, overvold was quick to clarify that the members of the asc “were the more legitimate voice” (personal communication, november 10, 2017). erin kelly, enr assistant deputy minister, who acted as lead negotiator and technical advisor for the transboundary negotiations, echoed overvold’s assessment: “bob was the voice for a lot of things but we were all grounded in the perspectives provided by the aboriginal steering committee” (personal communication, november 10, 2017). there was also a broad consensus among the research participants that indigenous governments’ input played a crucial role in the negotiations. the chief negotiator noted, “in terms of leverage, i’d have to say that we were able to assert the significance of the things we were asking for by indicating, “before this meeting and after this meeting, we are speaking directly to indigenous governments” (personal communication, sept 2, 2016). asc2 concurred from the asc perspective: “the asc has also helped or abetted the gnwt in its negotiations on the transboundary agreements . . . where the gnwt could go to the table with the backing of the aboriginal governments, that strengthened their hand in terms of negotiations” (personal communication, june 29, 2016). he goes on to describe this dynamic as a kind of symbiosis: the relationship really did advance the interests of all parties. the influence of indigenous peoples’ interests and perspectives are clearly visible in the outcomes of the negotiations. in a public talk at wilfrid laurier university shortly after the conclusion of negotiations with alberta, minister miltenberger and chief negotiator phare highlighted the way that indigenous tek, including a holistic view of the natural environment, shaped an unconventional basis for the new bilateral water agreements. where most transboundary agreements focus on water quality and quantity at the border, these instead make aquatic ecosystem health the centrepiece of bilateral management efforts. as phare noted later in an interview, “that flowed directly from the significance of all parts of the ecosystem, including fish, bugs, muskrats, water plants to traditional lifestyles” (personal communication, september 2, 2016). the agreements also provide for the inclusion of tek in the implementation of monitoring protocols. as lead negotiator and technical advisor kelly affirmed, “i think there were a lot of positive steps made in those agreements related to multiple knowledge systems” (personal communication, july 25, 2016). finally, the agreements stipulate the inclusion of an 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 2 [2018], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.4 indigenous representative on the bilateral management committees (bmcs), a role played by a different member of the asc for each of the concluded agreements. despite these positive outcomes, members of the asc expressed outstanding concerns. one is the bilateral agreements’ lack of regulatory teeth. as beck (2016) highlighted, indigenous governments in the nwt hoped that the agreements would contain binding mechanisms to protect water. instead, they conserve the principle of “no unreasonable harm” located in the mackenzie river basin transboundary waters master agreement (1997) and provide conditions for triggering engagement (rather than prescribing action) if harms are detected. second, while having an indigenous representative on the bilateral management committees for the agreements is viewed as a positive step, it is seen as an imperfect mechanism for ensuring representation of indigenous governments. finally, all members of the asc concurred about the challenges of ensuring more fulsome engagement with water governance “on the ground” in their communities. this final challenge relates to some of the more subtle ways that power relations remain present in spite of efforts to establish more horizontal working relationships. the difficulty of community-level engagement stems in significant part from the need for specialized knowledge of science, law, and policy in order to grapple with documents like the transboundary water agreements. always a problem in public participation for environmental decision-making, the knowledge differential is especially marked for remote indigenous communities, which face significant hurdles to access higher education. members of the asc are able to provide a degree of expertise to bridge the knowledge gap, but, as individuals, their own expertise is necessarily limited. as asc3 observed, “even i don’t feel like i have a very strong understanding of what’s in that agreement. and if i don’t, then i know my community members don’t and my leadership doesn’t” (personal communication, june 29, 2016). asc members also remarked that even putting aside the issue of expert knowledge, they face steep challenges in their advisory function, given that most of them must liaise with multiple community-level indigenous governments within their regions. as noted by asc4, “for my region, places are far and in between . . . part of it is not enough time to get around to do anything at all. basically, you are on your own, so that part is really difficult” (personal communication, june 29, 2016). asc representatives come from offices with limited staff and a series of other day-to-day demands, and they are also called upon for multiple other engagement processes in addition to the asc, around matters like protected areas, wildlife management, and resource development. in sum, despite gnwt’s recognition that capacity building is crucial, as well as its dedication to addressing that issue through various supports and programs, this exercise in mlg does not occur on a level playing field. in a follow-up on her comment about the knowledge gap, asc3 remarked, “we give advice, and it’s in our interest to participate, which is why we all come to the table, but there is definitely an unequal balance when it comes to resources and capacity” (personal communication, june 29, 2016). this view was also borne out in the 2015 wss implementation evaluation report, which highlighted capacity and resourcing issues as systemic challenges to the implementation of the wss (independent evaluation, 2015, p. 11). s i g n i f i c a n c e o f t h e w s s i n t h e b r o a d e r n w t g o v e r n a n c e c o n t e x t the wss is part of an evolving culture and practice of governance within the gnwt, informed by a key set of principles set out in a 2012 document, respect, recognition, and responsibility (executive and 11 latta: indigenous rights and multi-level governance published by scholarship@western, 2018 indigenous affairs, 2012). several research participants underlined the importance of the 2014 creation of the intergovernmental council on land and resources, a high-level annual meeting that brings together the gnwt and indigenous groups who are signatories to the 2014 devolution agreement. this council is not as inclusive as the wss asc, since indigenous groups with outstanding land claims were not part of the devolution negotiations and have not signed the final agreement, but it aims to eventually provide a high-level point of contact with the gnwt for all indigenous governments (intergovernmental council of the nwt, n.d.). itself an example of mlg, probing the council’s potential importance was beyond the scope of this research. nevertheless, it is worth noting that one early assessment of the devolution process and outcomes characterizes this as a lost opportunity for more meaningful collaboration between indigenous and public governments (irlbacher-fox, 2015). on the other hand, concrete examples where substantive collaboration has occurred are found in recent legislative processes. the wildlife act and the species at risk act were developed through fully collaborative processes—something asc5 referred to as having “a pen at the table” (personal communication, june 29, 2016). in the wake of the 2015 federal election, and the liberal government’s progressive discourse on indigenous rights (including their commitment to implement the undrip), merrell-ann phare and michael miltenberger, together with former assembly of first nations chief phil fontaine, presented a report to the federal minister of natural resources touting the nwt’s emerging practice of “collaborative consent” as a potential model at the national level (ishkonigan, phare law corporation & north raven, 2015). among research participants, there were different views as to the relative importance of the wss and the asc within this broader governance landscape. bob overvold remarked, “this water stewardship strategy probably in my mind was the single most important initiative that was about to help bridge and bring closer aboriginal governments and the territorial government” (personal communication, november 10, 2016). on the other hand, speaking from where she now sits in the gnwt department of executive and indigenous affairs, jennifer dallman-sanders, characterized the wss as “an example of those [evolving] relationships” (personal communication, november 10, 2016). other views fell somewhere between these two perspectives. despite frequent use of the language of partnership in reference to the wss, the asc is one-step removed from the policy-making function associated with co-drafted legislation; it is essentially an advisory body. nevertheless, it was obvious throughout the research that asc’s advice is very influential. as erin kelly noted from her position as assistant deputy minister of enr, “their input is definitely significant and highly considered in the decisions that we make”. the transboundary negotiations provide one obvious example of such consideration. during the june 2016 focus group discussion, asc members pointed to another smaller but significant example of their recent influence, in this case regarding a mechanism to facilitate inclusion of tek in enr decision-making: their advisory opinion sent the designers of the mechanism back to the drawing table. asc participants also noted the way that their mandate was increasingly being stretched by enr to include agenda items only tangentially related to water; the feeling was that because the asc “works,” its advice was being sought out beyond the immediate concerns of the wss. regardless of whether this is appropriate or not, it points to the fact that government—or at least enr—is increasingly seeking ways to factor indigenous perspectives into its policy decisions. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 2 [2018], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.4 overall, the relationship between enr and the asc seems well characterized by the notion of symbiosis noted earlier, in which all parties have an interest in making the relationship work. at least in enr (and the same is not always true across other government departments), there is a real desire to work with indigenous governments. that said, interests alone cannot explain the emergence of the wss, the influence of the asc, and the shape of the transboundary process. several of the research participants— both indigenous and non-indigenous—underlined that indigenous constitutional and treaty rights, and especially the comprehensive land claims, are an ever-present context for these innovations in participatory or collaborative governance. in her analysis of the transboundary negotiations, beck (2016) quoted tim heron, asc representative for the nwt métis nation, “aboriginal rights are always in our hip pocket” (p. 510). asc5 put it even more plainly as follows: “i think it’s the federal courts that have driven this issue to us being here today and being at this table” (personal communication, june 29, 2016). but if rights and land claims shape the possibilities for the wss and the asc, it isn’t clear that this runs both ways. asc2 reflected on the character of the asc as follows: we have to remember that this is ultimately an interest-based process. there is no authority here. . . . certainly the aboriginal governments see it in their interest being in this forum, because there is the opportunity to . . . influence some of the decisions. but there has been no…the asc does not represent any shift in governance. it doesn’t represent any shift in actual authority or systems (personal communication, june 29, 2016). this observation echoes cautions in the literature about the way mlg depends on specific individuals, conjunctures, and intersections of interests, which are not necessarily stable over time (alcantara & spicer, 2016; papillon, 2015). it also calls into question mlg’s ability to shift deeper colonial structures of hierarchy and power. c o n c l u s i o n s : t h e c o m p l e x d a n c e o f m u l t i l e v e l g o v e r n a n c e a n d i n d i g e n o u s r i g h t s recognizing the limits of my own non-indigenous perspective, i confess that the findings of this research have left me hopeful that multilevel resource governance can promote forms of collaborative decision making that go beyond the more narrowly focussed technical and regulatory engagements of comanagement regimes (for similar conclusions, see bowie, 2013; zurba, 2013). it is clearly a positive sign that public government in the nwt, and most particularly the gnwt, is seeking ways to proactively respect nationally and internationally enshrined indigenous rights by working directly with indigenous governments as counterparts in multilevel policy dialogue (see also beck, 2016 on this point). as a result, it would seem that indigenous peoples in the nwt are more likely to escape the fate they so often suffer in other jurisdictions, where they are treated as just another “stakeholder” in environmental governance processes (von der porten & de loë, 2013; von der porten et al., 2015). certainly the wss and related governance innovations are building important new levels of dialogue, trust, and influence in decisionmaking—adding a layer of policy engagement that addresses some of the limitations in the mackenzie valley resource management act and associated co-management boards identified by other scholars (coulthard, 2014; dokis, 2015; king, 2015). one key criteria for successful multilevel collaboration in the nwt, echoed by denny and fanning (2016) in their proposal for “collaborative co-existence” in nova scotia salmon co-management, could be the government-to-government level on which such relationships are being built. nevertheless, if 13 latta: indigenous rights and multi-level governance published by scholarship@western, 2018 high-level dialogue is important, it is certainly not enough. denny and fanning also call for the fulsome incorporation of indigenous knowledge, laws, and management practices. the wss only travels part way down this road. in addition, following bowie (2013), the success of such approaches depends on further resources and capacity building for indigenous self-government. indigenous communities in the nwt need more political space and financial resources to build robust self-government at the community level, as well as cultivating further technical capacity to better engage western science while advancing the role of tek in land and water stewardship. of equal importance, we can’t forget that the federal system continues to operate just below the surface of the new relationships emerging in the nwt. sovereignty lies no less with the state today than it did in the early 1970s, when many of the processes that lead to the present governance context were put into motion. this is true in spite of advances in indigenous rights and land claim processes over this period, and it means that the notion of nation-to-nation dialogue actually effaces the hierarchical relationships that persist. as coulthard (2014) argued, land claims involve a not-so-subtle solidification of canadian sovereignty over indigenous territory, where broad claims to territorial rights are traded in for a much smaller package of collectively held private-property rights guaranteed by the state (see also king, 2015). similarly, self-government negotiations involve exchanging fundamental claims to self-determination for strictly defined governmental powers delegated from federal and provincial authorities (see also irlbacher-fox, 2009). meanwhile, the broader indigenous rights regime evolves through the decisions of courts in a western system of law. these are the underlying contexts for processes of multilevel governance. hardly just a “shadow,” hierarchy remains the foundational structure of relations between public government and indigenous peoples in canada. my aim with these assertions is not to detract from the important work done by both indigenous and non-indigenous leaders, legal experts, and scholars to envision and promote a culture of mutual respect and “working together” as the basis for doing things differently in the nwt. in canada—and indeed internationally—the nwt stands out as a progressive example from which other jurisdictions have much to learn. instead, my hope is to ensure that these deeper questions about the colonial state remain in view, as there is always the risk that progress in state–indigenous relations can become a source of legitimation for the colonial structures that remain in place. ultimately, it needs to be asked what would be possible in the nwt and elsewhere if indigenous government were incorporated as another layer of sovereign authority in state constitutions, complete with significant territorial jurisdiction. multilevel governance can perhaps point the way to what nation-to-nation relations might look like, and even at times provide a way of making policy as if between equal parties, but the mechanisms seem lacking for it to achieve more transformative change. in this sense, inherent rights to territory and self-determination remain an indispensable assertion as indigenous peoples respond to overtures from settler states for collaborative modes of resource governance. the governments of those states need to be reminded that such collaboration is just a step along the way to truly decolonized relationships between peoples. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 2 [2018], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.4 r e f e r e n c e s aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc). 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(2012). building co-management as a process: problem solving through partnerships in aboriginal country, australia. environmental management, 49(6), 1130-42. doi: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00267-012-9845-2 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 2 [2018], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.4 the international indigenous policy journal april 2018 indigenous rights and multilevel governance: learning from the northwest territories water stewardship strategy alex latta recommended citation indigenous rights and multilevel governance: learning from the northwest territories water stewardship strategy abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license indigenous rights and multilevel governance: learning from the northwest territories water stewardship strategy indigenous federation: the case of borana oromo, ethiopia the international indigenous policy journal volume 8 | issue 1 article 2 january 2017 indigenous federation: the case of borana oromo, ethiopia dejene gemechu chala jimma university, dejekeno@gmail.com recommended citation chala, d. g. (2017). indigenous federation: the case of borana oromo, ethiopia. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(1). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.2 indigenous federation: the case of borana oromo, ethiopia abstract this article draws attention to the borana oromo gadaa system as an indigenous federation. gadaa is an indigenous democratic political system used by the oromo in which leaders are elected and their term in office is strictly fixed. data for this research were generated through interviews, observations, and focus group discussions. the findings of this research indicate that the borana have three gadaa councils at two levels: one at the center for the entire borana and two named after two borana clans. the later have relative autonomy under the cardinal law of the borana gadaa. this structure has been serving as a means of managing conflict, maintaining internal unity, and ensuring better governance and power devolution. finally, suggestions are made on how to support indigenous governance systems, which in this case includes acknowledging the values and principles of the gadaa system, as well as designing a legal framework that retains and protects the integrity and legitimacy of the system. keywords gadaa, federation, borana, gadaa council acknowledgments i would like to acknowledge several individuals and institutes for they contributed to the success of this work. the volkswagen foundation sponsored my phd study through the project entitled “traveling models of conflict management.” i was able to generate part of the data for this article during my stay in the field as part of my dissertation. being sponsored by jimma university, i was also able to attend the 40th gumii gaayoo in the summer 2012. furthermore, jimma university sponsored a research project entitled “borana’s response to local and global changes: amending gadaa law” in 2013/14, which enabled me to collect enriching data on the issue under discussion. i must express my deepest thanks to the borana elders and ritual leaders who assisted me accessing important information on borana gadaa federation. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ indigenous federation: the case of borana oromo, ethiopia the borana are predominantly pastoralists, inhabiting southern ethiopia in oromia national regional state (onrs1) and northern kenya. they are one of the major oromo groups. numerically, the oromo are the largest ethnic group in ethiopia (central statistical authority [csa], 2007). they occupy a land that extends from northeastern ethiopia to east central kenya and from the sudan in the west and ethiopian somali national regional state in the east. the oromo consist of many groups, which branch out from the borana and the barentu, the two principal moieties2 (hassen, 1994; huntingford, 1955; megerssa, 1993). in the oromo origin story, the borana are the senior division, considered as angafa oromo (first born of the oromo nation). gadaa and qaalluu3 institutions are among the major oromo institutions still actively working among the borana. hassen (1994) showed that the borana major branch was further divided into macha-tulama, the southern borana, and the gujii confederacies. the present article deals with the gadaa federation among the southern borana, specifically the sabbo and goona moieties (hereafter the borana). this article aims to depict how gadaa is structured among the borana in terms of power devolution among moieties, sub-moieties, and clans. first, the article draws attention to the prevalence of indigenous federal arrangements. next, the article presents an empirical case study for lawmakers to consider gadaa as a longstanding form of indigenous governance that embodies a number of democratic values and has been working parallel to the ethiopian state institutions.4 in this article, i do not intend to discuss the borana gadaa in terms of the distinctions between political philosophy, federalism, and institutional and structural techniques of achieving federalism.5 yet, as far as i use the term federalism to depict the borana gadaa arrangement, it is fair to see what federalism is and its major features. from this perspective, the article attempts to contextualize federalism in order to show how the borana gadaa is structured as federal system with all its peculiarities. contextualization of federalism is discussed in one of the later parts. afterward, i discuss the place of the gadaa system in the national and regional contexts of the successive ethiopian regimes since the establishment of modern ethiopian state follows. 1 onrs refers to one of the federal units in the present ethiopian federal structure. 2 anthropologists often define moiety as one of two unilineal descent units into which a given community is 2 anthropologists often define moiety as one of two unilineal descent units into which a given community is divided. usually, they are exogamous groups. 3qaalluu is a religious institution of the oromo that believes in one supreme creator called waaqa. waaqa is believed to be omnipotent, omnipresent, and omniscient, and communicates with human being from above. the leader of the institution is also called qaalluu. the office of qaalluu is hereditary with a lifelong the term in office. qaalluu has councillors elected for a single term, which is 8 years. 4 the post-1991 ethiopian state structure has provided a drastically improved political landscape. ethiopia introduced a federal structure and constitutionally guaranteed all ethnic groups in the country the right to speak, to write, and to develop their own language; to express, to develop, and to promote their culture; and to preserve their history. yet, still a legal framework defining the domains of local governance is missing. 5 in the study of federal political system, scholars make distinction between federalism and federation. according to fiseha (2007), federalism refers to a normative principle, while federation refers to the actual system of government or its tangible institutional facts. 1 chala: indigenous federation published by scholarship@western, 2017 the national political setting gadaa system in ethiopian regimes the advent of modern ethiopian state was realized during the last quarter of the 19th century through military conquest of areas commonly referred to as abyssinia6 (anyang’ nyong’o, 1991; baxter, 1994; markakis, 1991; gudina, 2003). with this expansion, the oromo in general and the borana in particular were incorporated into the ethiopian state. subsequent modern ethiopian regimes, until the demise of the socialist regime in 1991, persistently promoted a policy of assimilation aimed at national integration (markakis, 1991). these regimes believed that the ethiopian nation-building project was inconceivable without the imposition of the cultural, linguistic, and religious values of the abyssinians over the rest of the groups (gudina, 2006). this assimilation policy was blamed for causing considerable ethnic, economic, and cultural discrimination (anyang’ nyong’o, 1991). like elsewhere in colonial africa (see hagmann, 2007; kyed & buur, 2007), the abyssinian rulers used borana local institutions selectively. as it did not fit into the abyssinian monarchial system, the gadaa system was marginalized. the 1974 socialist revolution brought another political landscape to ethiopia—the monarchial regime was abolished, but the promotion of local cultures and institutions was not in place either. hinnant (1977) indicated that the incorporation of the oromo into the modern ethiopian state and resultant policies of assimilation by the successive regimes, together with inevitable internal dynamics, weakened the gadaa system in different parts of oromia. in some cases, gadaa has retained many of its rituals, and social symbols and values without significant political roles (baxter, 1994; bulcha, 1996; gemechu, 2012; legesse, 2006). however, compared to any other oromo group, in relative terms, gadaa has remained a living institution in its original features among the borana. the post-1991 guarantee of cultural rights ethiopia introduced an ethno-linguistic based federal state structure in 1991 following the downfall of the socialist regime. the federal democratic republic of ethiopia (fdre) was established, officially recognizing that ethiopia is a multicultural state. the new regime underscored that ethnic federalism was mandatory in order to ensure unity by accommodating diversity (fiseha, 2006; gudina, 2006). it aimed to reverse existing policies of assimilation and the consequent ethnic inequalities in the country. in the new ethiopian political landscape, the revival of traditional institutions was constitutionally guaranteed. article 39(2) of the constitution of the federal democratic republic of ethiopia (1995) reads, “every nation, nationality and people in ethiopia has the right to speak, to write and to develop its own language; to express, to develop and to promote its culture; and to preserve its history.” this recognition represents a dramatic change from past approaches with far reaching effects in addressing major grievances related to the former policy of ethnic domination and cultural suppression. following introduction of federal structure in 1991, the gadaa system has been used as symbol of oromo unity in reconstructing the national feeling of being oromo (oromummaa). some basic gadaa 6 abyssinia refers to the northern part of present day ethiopia. abyssinians are the semitic groups inhabiting this part of the country. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.2 terminologies and symbols have been used at the regional state level by the onrs. gadaa regalia have been translated into the state flag. red, white, and black are the three colors of the state’s flag. all were derived from the gadaa banner with more or less the same meanings attached to each color. furthermore, at the center of the flag a sycamore tree (odaa) is found, which was traditionally used for shade during gadaa gatherings. similarly, the general assembly of the gadaa government, which has decision-making and legislative power, is termed as caffee (chafe). this term is now the nomenclature of the legislative organ of onrs. in general, the gadaa system has survived the former external impositions and internal changes, and has been revived since the 1991 restructuring of the ethiopian state and as a result of its guarantee of rights for each cultural group. this is evidenced by the recent revitalization of different gadaa centers (see gemechu, 2012). the discussion of the present borana gadaa as an example of indigenous federation is addressed within this context. research methods this research uses an ethnographic research method. data were generated through extensive fieldwork using a purely qualitative methodological approach. i conducted a total of 13 months of fieldwork among the borana between may 2007 and september 2010 for my doctoral dissertation, which was focused on a different topic. this article focuses on a small segment of the empirical data related to indigenous federalism that i collected from the field setting during this period. in addition, i observed the last borana general assembly, which was conducted in the summer of 2012. ethics approval was granted by the concerned bodies at all levels. these include the max planck institute for social anthropology in halle (saale), germany, with which i was affiliated; the oromia culture and tourism bureau; the oromia administration and security bureau; the borana zone administration; and the borana zone culture and tourism office. interviews with key informants, participant observation, naturalistic observation, and focus group discussions were employed as instruments of data generation. gadaa leaders, qaalluu (religious leaders), partially retired gadaa officials of different ranks, borana oral historians, borana elites who have close communication with the gadaa officials, government officials, and the wives of the ritual leaders were interviewed in several rounds. some of the informants were identified purposively based on their knowledge about the borana gadaa system and pertinent issues, while others were identified through a snowball sampling procedure. i made several participant observations, as well as observations at different gadaa rituals and meetings. to mention some, i observed the buttee7 ritual in august 2007. buttee ritual is organized by the gadaa class coming into power. the ritual directly marks the separation of power among the borana gadaa councils and the establishment of the three mobile power centers (gadaa councils), which is the central focus of this article. in the meantime, the ritual defines and redefines the borana gadaa structure into two levels: the level of the entire borana, or the gadaa arbooraa council; and the branches, gadaa kontoma, with special autonomy. i physically stayed at the ritual place for a week. 7 a class would come to power just after 1 year of butte ritual. this ritual is one of the most important gadaa rituals performed for several successive days. 3 chala: indigenous federation published by scholarship@western, 2017 through personal participation and observation, i obtained additional data during the 40th borana general assembly, conducted in the summer of 2012. i observed this general assembly for 20 successive days between august 20 and september 10, 2012. the borana general assembly is held every 8 years for several weeks at a place called gaayo in dirree district. this assembly is known as gumii gaayoo. other similar rituals and meetings were observed over a considerable time period in the field. furthermore, data were generated from six focus group discussions that were organized on different occasions. participants of the discussions were borana ritual leaders, elders, and experienced women. in addition to field notes, data were captured using voice recorder, video recording, and photo cameras. to analyze the collected data, i employed ethnographic content analysis, particularly what is commonly known as conventional content analysis strategy. the very nature of my data pertinent to the issue under discussion does not lend itself to data presentation supported by direct quotes. for this end, the data were systematically classified, and themes were identified and compiled. in line with this approach, the discussion included a summary of how the findings from this study corroborate or deviate from other similar research works or theories of federalism. it also showed how this particular study contributes to knowledge in the area of indigenous governance in general and indigenous federation in particular. finally, it provided suggestions for future practice. credibility was ensured through diverse mechanisms including checking the authenticity of the findings. i tried to use a variety of methods that are appropriate for qualitative research. the different methods employed in generating data for this article aimed at triangulating data to ensure credibility and confirmability. data, which were generated through interviews, observations, and focus group discussions, were compared and contrasted to ensure insights on the issue under investigation that are more comprehensive. furthermore, since i am a native oromo, speaking the language (with a slight variation in accent), there was neither a language nor a cultural barrier. through my long stay in the field, i was able to establish rapport to ensure trust among informants who contributed to the data. however, since this study employed a qualitative design, the findings may not be transferable at face value. nevertheless, the accumulation of findings from this study is still relevant in providing an overall picture of gadaa federation, as far as the system is operational among the borana. conceptualizing federalism meanings and history the question that is important in guiding the present discussion of the borana gadaa system as an indigenous federation is: what kinds of state structure do we call federalism and when federalism did begin? law (2013) indicated that the political science literature on federalism has seemingly reached a mature state of development in that it has provided a wealth of fruitful insights into the character and execution of federal systems of government. however, there is no common agreement on the exact meaning of the concept. law (2013) provided a shorthand definition that academic discourses pertinent to federalism seem to commonly use. law’s definition focused on the division of sovereignty between two levels of government—the central and regional governments—neither of which is legally or politically 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.2 subordinate to the other. federalism is an arrangement in which a certain member state is guaranteed relative autonomy (see freeley & rubin, 2008; law, 2013; polten & glezl, 2014; uhunmwuangho & ekpu, 2011). in contemporary federal systems, for example in the us federation, a federal government can be understood as an association of states in which powers are divided between a federal government and state governments (wheare, 1963). burgess (2006) indicated that the principle of self-rule and shared rule can be successfully applied in a great many different ways. this flexibility leads to ambiguity and challenges efforts aim at theory building. this leads to the use of the term in a very wide and overarching sense. burgess (2006), citing murray forsyth,8 showed that the term federalism can be used not only in the range of federal unions, but also in a wide variety of governance arrangements. the second important question is when and where federalism began. papillon (2008) indicated that the greatest misunderstanding in the current literature on federalism is the tendency to reduce it to one specific form as exemplified in nation states, like the us, canada, and germany. papillon (2008) showed that the history of federalism predates the creation of the first modern federation in revolutionary america. söder and sandberg (2009), on the other hand, traced federalism as far back as ancient times in greece. the ancient league of greek cities was established with the basic aim of forming military alliances. the league was something similar to what we call federalism today. further, daniel elazar (cited in papillon, 2008) provided examples such as covenanted associations of hebrew tribes, which was started around 1300 ad and the helvetic confederation of 1291 ad. the swiss confederation, which was established in the 13th century, finally developed into a federation by the mid-19th century. the dutch federation, which was established in the 16th century, is worth mentioning here as another early example of a federation (söder & sandberg, 2009). based on this historical evidence, some writers have argued that the western world has no monopoly over the concept because federalism developed in other societies earlier (söder & sandberg, 2009). apart from these specific examples, the literature indicates that elements of federalism have been prevalent in different parts of the world and at different times. reilly (2006) also supports this contention by noting that federalism as a theory of organization is of great relevance to indigenous governance systems. similarly, papillon (2008) showed that, in essence, federalism is found in the institutionalization of a particular set of relationships among participants in political life, rather than in a particular set of institutions. this gives us different opportunities to see how the idea of federalism has been articulated. consequently, federalism can be translated into various forms of government. these discussions on the conceptual clarity of federalism and its historical accounts are quite relevant to the issue under investigation. as one of the basic features of federalism, the organizational arrangement characterized by the division of power at two levels is important in determining whether it is appropriate to qualify the borana gadaa as an example of an indigenous federation. since the borana gadaa has two levels of councils—the central and the autonomous branches—it satisfies this basic feature of federalism. furthermore, given the flexibility in the application of the term federalism, the use of the term in the context of the borana is justifiable. 8 murray forsyth is emeritus professor of politics at the university of leicester. he wrote about federal unions and is the author of unions of states: the theory and practice of confederation, published in 1981. 5 chala: indigenous federation published by scholarship@western, 2017 origins and types of federal structures currently, around 70% of the world states are believed to have at least some elements of federalism, although some of them are not formally recognized as federal states. furthermore, around 20 of the world’s nations, which constitute 40% of the world’s population, are considered to be federal states (söder & sandberg, 2009). söder and sandberg (2009) discussed whether there are common patterns that all these federal countries share or whether federalism is something that is created on an individual basis by country. scholars have tried to identify certain types of federal structures based on some shared parameters. citing the forum of federations, móntes (n.d.) classified federalism into three categories according to the context and process of federalization. these are coming together federations, holding together federations, and forced federations. coming together federations, also called born federations, are formed by distinct political communities that have banded together to form a federation. holding together federations, on the other hand, refer to countries that become federations with the objective of enhancing peaceful co-existence among political communities within the same country. finally, forced federation is imposed from outside bodies, such as international organizations and global superpowers, with the aim of keeping a nation intact. federations may also be classified according to the manner in which powers are distributed between the center and the constituent units, as well as among the constituent units. these are cooperative, competitive, permissive, symmetric, asymmetric, and consociational federations. according to móntes (n.d.), competitive federalism specifies separate roles for federal units and constituent units as much as possible and allows the latter to exercise their own rights. cooperative federalism creates arrangements where both levels of governments share responsibilities and work together. on the other hand, permissive federalism seems more like a unitary state in which the federal government defines the existence and powers of local governments. another classification of federalism deals with the horizontal distribution of powers among the subnational units, which is labeled as either asymmetric or symmetric. it is symmetric when the same powers and responsibilities are held among the constituent units. it is asymmetric when the powers given differ among the constituent units. in this type of federalism, some constituent units enjoy special privileges or autonomy compared to others. the last model is consociation, which is characterized by power-sharing mechanisms at the federal level as well as in the subnational level. móntes (n.d.) indicated that these power-sharing mechanisms may involve proportional representation for cultural groups in legislatures and within the bureaucracy, veto powers for minorities, and coalition governments. writers divide federalism into dual and cooperative systems based on the borderline between regional power and national power. a dual system is one in which most fundamental governmental powers are shared between the federal government and the state governments. meanwhile cooperative federalism is a concept of federalism in which the national state government and local governments interact cooperatively and collectively to solve common problems, rather than making policies separately (söder & sandberg, 2009). to summarize, the origins of federal arrangements and the types of federations found in the world are important in guiding the discussion of the gadaa federation, which has been used by the borana since at 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.2 least the second half of the 18th century. in order to identify how to classify the borana federation, it is important to consider how the borana central gadaa council works with the self-autonomous gadaa councils, and the horizontal power divisions among the various moieties and clans with all their peculiarities. the gadaa system: an overview gadaa is a political system that has guided the political, the economic, and the social life of the oromo since long ago (bassi, 2005; hassen, 1994; hinnant, 1977; legesse, 1973; van de loo, 1991). different scholars have provided different definitions of the gadaa system (see for example bassi, 2005; gololcha, 2006; hassen, 1994; legesse 1973, 2006; schlee, 1989). legesse (1973), who has meticulously studied this system, provided a relatively comprehensive definition of the term: the gada [also spelled as gadaa] system is a system of classes (luba) that succeed each other every 8 years in assuming military, economic, political, and ritual responsiblities. each gada class remains in power during a specific term (gada) which begins and ends with a formal power transfer ceremony. (p. 8) the definition indicates that the gadaa system has classes called luba, which are often referred to as a gadaa class. each class controls political and ritual power for 8 years. this time is a gadaa period, which is named after a specific gadaa class. to understand this system, it is important to make a distinction between luba and gogeessa for they are often confusing. gogeessa is a generational line, which divides all male members of the oromo into five groups. gogeessa is just like a political party. regardless of some controversial oral accounts, five gogeessa (gadaa parties) were established at a certain point in the history of the oromo by the founding generation of forefathers.9 the founders were neither from the same clan nor the same family. membership in a given gogeessa is structurally predetermined for they are hereditary. accordingly, forefather, grandfather, father, and son belong to the same gogeessa (gadaa party). however, they are of different generations and consequently different luba. in this regard, luba refers to a specific gadaa class of one of the gogeessa (political parties). in other words, luba is a segment of a gogeessa. periodic election is basic feature of the system. each gogeessa controls political and ritual power through its elected representatives for only single term in office, which changes in orderly rotation. as a result, each gogesssa, but successive generations (luba), serves in office for 8 years once every 40 years (see bassi, 2005; legesse, 1973, 2006). the 40 years of gadaa time is known as maragadaa10 (the gadaa cycle) (see bassi, 2005; legesse, 1973, 2006). power is equally divided among the five gogeessa and the successive luba of each gogeessa. the luba of a particular gogeessa rules for one gadaa period (8 years) before power is transferred to another luba of another gogeessa for the next 8 years. the gadaa period is often named after the gadaa leader of that particular gadaa period, like luba of so and so. since each gogeessa is supposed to assume 9 among the borana oromo, we know the names of the founding forefathers of each party, but nobody knows how party members were recruited initially. 10the borana call it mara gadaa, whereas the other oromo groups like the macha and tulama call it marsaa gadaa. 7 chala: indigenous federation published by scholarship@western, 2017 power only once within a gadaa cycle, there is no inter-gogeessa (horizontal) and/or inter-luba (intergenerational) competition over power. in the gadaa system, power is transferred peacefully. the final power transfer ceremony is termed as baalli ikennuu11 (handing over power). the gadaa federation the gadaa federation appears to be different from the contemporary notion of federalism—there are some distinct essences in all types of federal systems. most definitions of federalism include one of its most significant features; that is, division of power between the two orders of government. it is often understood from two angles: the ideological and the institutional. in the oromo case, the institutional milieu of federation is significant because it is embedded in the holistic socio-economic, political, cultural, and religious institution known as the gadaa system. various studies indicate that the oromo gadaa system has been taking a form of confederation12 and/or federation. the gadaa system, which has elected leaders within each generation and an orderly succession to various positions of political office, has also been dividing power among moieties, submoieties, clans, and sub-clans. some might call this a gadaa confederation (berisso, 1988; etefa, 2008; gololcha, 2006; hassen, 1994). the oromo had common gadaa government with a relative freedom for the different major groups. for instance, during the 16th century, there had been two powerful confederacies—the macha and the tulama. they had a common gadaa government and common law. the headquarters of the gadaa government was at oda nabe in fatager (hassen, 1994), about 30 kilometers west of addis ababa. yet, each moiety had relative freedom to deal independently with its own internal affairs. later, due to certain internal and external pushing factors, such as an increase in both the human and cattle populations, the macha established another confederacy. according to etefa (2008) and hassen (1994), the first of this kind was the confederacy of the four major macha sub-moieties—hoko, caliya, guduru, and liban—called afree, meaning the confederacy of four. this confederacy had its headquarters at tute bisil osole between gedo and bilbilo in the present west shoa zone13 of onrs. furthermore, the groups that occupied the southwestern part of the present onrs established another confederacy called the saddacha confederacy (the confederacy of three). the three groups, according to hassen (1994), were the suba, the obbo, and the hakako (sub-moieties of the macha moiety). similarly, the ballo of the bacho, birbirsa tiya of the soddo, the foqa awas of the jiddaa, and the caffee galaan of the galaan oromo are some examples among the tulama oromo of fully autonomous submoieties who at the same time had close contacts with each other. the sadacha confederacy of warra karrayyu, warra ilu, and warra noolee of the barentuu oromo in the wallo region in the north was another but similar instance (etefa, 2008). 11baallii designates the event in which power is transferred. in the ritual, the outgoing gadaa leader places an ostrich feather (known as baalguda among the borana) on the head of the incoming leader. 12 in contemporary political studies, confederation is defined as an association among sovereign states, established for the purpose of serving some of their common interests. since they are sovereign states, they are not governed under common constitution (fiseha, 2007). 13 this zone is an administrative unit next to the national regional state in the ethiopian federal structure. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.2 the same history holds true among the gujii oromo in southern onrs who are still practicing gadaa confederacy. the gujii have been practicing the gadaa system in the form of a confederation among three major clans: uraagaa, maattii, and hookkuu (berisso, 1988; gololcha, 2006; hinnant, 1977; vande loo, 1991). members of the confederacy are all self-dependent and have full authority. the entire gujii have a common gadaa center located at me’ee bokkoo. since the beginning of the gujii gadaa, me’ee bokkoo has existed as a well-known sacred place. yet, all three groups have their own independent gadaa councils with their respective ritual grounds and leaders. each council of the three clans perceives itself as independent, but work closely with each other on common purposes that affect the entire gujii. despite their autonomy, the gujii gadaa is governed by the same gadaa law, which can only be set by the gumii bokkoo (often called me’ee bokkoo) during the power transfer ceremony. this is one of the chief ritual ceremonies in the gujii gadaa. pertinent to the principle of power division, a different version of gadaa structure is prevalent among the borana. the borana have been practicing gadaa federation. consequently, the borana federation is a typical oromo federation in its adherence to relatively intact gadaa rules that are the result of unique historical and political circumstances. among the people, political, economic, and sociological perspectives led to the formation of federations. the borana gadaa federation the structure and power sharing. the borana have three gadaa councils, often called gadaa sadeen (see bassi, 2005; legesse, 1973). they have yaa’aa arbooraa (arbooraa gadaa council) at the center, and two other gadaa councils, named after two borana clans. this structure is strictly guided by the principle of power devolution among moieties, sub-moieties, clans, and sub-clans. the prevalence of these three gadaa councils, one at the center and the two branches, are often referred to by the borana at every occasion involving blessings and praying rituals. it goes as follows: “haay haay! waaqa gadaan yaasi, arbooraa abbaa biyyaa, kontomii dame.” the translation is: “let waaqa guide the gadaa. arbooraa is the ‘father’ to all (meaning the senior among the three mobile power centers). kontoma (the two autonomous gadaa councils that are named after two of the borana clans) are just branches.” as the oral history goes, the borana have been practicing gadaa federation since the second half of the 18th century. this time is known as the gadaa period of bulee dhaddachaa (1776-1783).14 to understand the guiding rule of the borana federation, we need to have an overview of the borana clan structure. the borana are divided into two exogamous moieties, sabbo and goona (often called goona bal’aa). goona is the senior moiety and sabbo is the junior. the sabbo moiety is divided into three major clans: maxxaarrii, karrayyuu, and digaluu. the goona moiety is divided into two major submoieties: fulleellee and harooressa. the first is divided into seven clans. these are daaccituu, maccituu, siraayyuu, galaantuu, odituu, koonnitu, and bachituu. the second is divided into eight clans, which are noonituu, qarcabduu, harusii, maliyyuu, warra jiddaa, dambituu, hawaxxuu, and halchaayyaa. these are further divided into different smaller kinship categories like sub-clan, lineage, minor linage, and extended families (see legesse, 1973). each clan has its own strong clan council that closely manages all aspects of clan issues. clan councils are in charge of the administration and 14 for the chronology of the borana gadaa see legesse (1973). 9 chala: indigenous federation published by scholarship@western, 2017 utilization of common resources such as deep water wells, supporting needy members of the clan, addressing issues of conflict, and nominating clan representatives in gadaa councils at different levels (for details see bassi, 2005). in addition to clan structure, an overview of the available gadaa offices is equally important. in the system, there are different offices, which vary in their political statuses and importance. focusing on the gadaa, there are three major typologies of hayyuu15 who occupy offices for a particular gadaa period (8 years). these are adulaa, garba, and medhicha, listed in descending seniority order. hayyuu adulaa refers to the top gadaa officials. these are the leaders of gadaa councils. the abbaa gadaa fiixee (prime gadaa leader) belongs to this group. they are from the active gadaa class (luba) of a particular gogeessa. they are six in number (see tables 1, 2, and 3, which show background information for each moiety, submoiety, and clan among the top gadaa officials for three consecutive gadaa periods since 1992). the second is called hayyuu medhichaa. this group is drawn from the luba and gogeessa of the hayyuu adulaa (from the same gadaa class). this group also constitutes six members (see table 4). the third one is called hayyuu garbaa. members of this group are drawn from the partially retired luba of any gogeessa. this means experienced individuals, whose class has already passed through its gadaa period, but who have not yet personally held office of this kind from any gogeessa, could serve as hayyuu garbaa in any other gogeessa. hayyuu garbaa are advisors in the gadaa. they are also delegates of their respective clans, which they represent at any one of the gadaa councils. currently, there are 18 offices of hayyuu garbaa, but given space limits this article focuses on the top gadaa officials.16 the system divides the six top offices (hayyuu adulaa) between the two halves of the borana (sabbo and goona). each moiety holds three of the six top offices. further, within the moiety, the available offices are equally shared among the clans or sub-moieties. accordingly, the sabbo moiety has three offices for hayyuu adulaa. since the sabbo has three major clans, each clan always holds one office of hayyuu adulaa. similarly, the goona hold three offices. since the goona has 15 clans, it is not possible for each clan to hold office for a particular gadaa period. as a result, the borana have arranged the division of power among the goona at the level of sub-moiety (fulleellee and harooressa). each sub-moiety holds at least one office of the hayyuu adulaa every gadaa period. since the goona moiety has three offices at its disposal, the third one goes to either the fulleellee or harooressa during different gadaa periods. data from the field indicated that, in addition to the six offices of hayyuu adulaa, the six offices of hayyuu medhichaa and 18 offices of the hayyuu garbaa are distributed equitably among the borana clans as much as possible. it is unusual to see two or more people from a particular clan holding any of these offices during the same term of office. apart from power sharing between the two moieties, and their sub-moieties and clans, the borana designed a kind of administrative self-government for the goona bal’aa. the two sub-moieties— fulleellee and harooressa—are allowed to have relatively self-governing gadaa councils. the hawaxxuu from harooreessa and the koonnituu from fulleellee are privileged with having their own separate gadaa councils. accordingly, in terms of its internal structure, the central council and the branches have different settings as described below. 15 hayyuu is the term used by the borana to refer to an elected office holder. 16 for typologies of hayyuu and the number of hayyuu adulaa, see bassi (2005) and legesse (1973). 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.2 table 1. hayyuu adulaa for the gadaa period of boruu madhaa (1992-2000) s.no name moiety sub-moiety clan 1 boruu madhaa goona harooressa noonituu 2 liiban olkaa sabbo — digaluu 3 dullacha diidaa goona harooressa hawaxxuu 4 boruu doyyoo sabbo — karrayyuu 5 guyyoo godaanaa goona fulleellee koonnituu 6 diida godaanaa sabbo — maxxaarrii note. source: fieldwork. table 2. hayyuu adulaa for the gadaa period of liiban jaldeessaa (2000-2008) s.no name moiety sub-moiety clan 1 liiban jaldeessaa goona fulleellee galaantuu 2 jaarsoo boruu sabbo — digaluu 3 hiddoo galgaloo goona harooressa hawaxxuu 4 halakee garbichaa sabbo — karrayyuu 5 jaldeessa borbor goona fulleellee koonnituu 6 jaarsoo taarii sabbo — maxxaarrii note. source: fieldwork. 11 chala: indigenous federation published by scholarship@western, 2017 table 3. hayyuu adulaa for the gadaa period of guyyoo gobbaa (2008-2016) s.no name moiety sub-moiety clan 1 guyyoo gobbaa sabbo — digaluu 2 jaldeessa diidoo goona harooressa qarcabduu 3 boruu jaarsoo sabbo — karrayyuu 4 rooba jarsoo goona harooressa hawaxxuu 5 qurii liiban sabbo — maxxaarrii 6 nuuraa jiloo goona fulleellee koonnituu note. source: fieldwork. table 4. number of hayyuu medhichaa and hayyuu garbaa in each council council status of the council hayyuu adulaa hayyuu medhichaa hayyuu garbaa arbooraa central 4 0 10 hawaxxuu/kontomaa gadaa branch 1 3 4 koonnituu/kontomaa gadaa branch 1 3 4 total 6 6 18 note. source: fieldwork (see also legesse, 1973, table 3.2 for typologies and terminological distinctions between the borana gadaa councils). 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.2 out of six hayyuu adulaa, four of them work within the arbooraa council. three of them are always from sabbo and one from goona. the council can be led by any one of them, except the one from karrayyuu17 clan of the sabbo moiety. the reason the karrayyuu clan is barred from the office of prime gadaa leader has to do with the basic philosophy of power division. since the karrayyuu clan holds one of the major qaalluu offices, which represents the entire sabbo moiety, this clan is not allowed to hold the leading position in the gadaa office in order to avoid any concentration of power in the hands of the clan. as part of their belief system, if the karrayyuu holds two leading positions, it would result in severe punishment from the supreme deity. the rule also has to do with separation of state and religion. in this case, the leader of the arbooraa council, named abbaa gadaa fiixee (prime abbaa gadaa), is the leader of the entire borana gadaa. the leader can be from the remaining two sabbo clans—maxxaarrii18 and digaluu— or the one elected from goona moiety with the exception of the hawaxxuu and koonnituu, which are already allowed separate gadaa councils and the oditu clan,19 which has a prominent qaalluu leader (see bassi, 2005; legesse, 1973). in addition, 10 hayyuu garba are elected into the arbooraa council for a single term of office. the councils of hawaxxuu and koonnituu, which represent the two sub-moieties of goona, are led by the hayyuu adulaa drawn from the two respective clans. in this case, two adulaa out of six are always from these two clans. in each council, there are three elected hayyuu medhichaa to increase the number of the councilors and to strengthen the gadaa kontomaa councils. for each council, four hayyuu garbaa are elected as indicated in table 4 above. all the three gadaa councils are guided by aadaa and seera borana (borana law and custom). they are guided by common gadaa rule that is enacted and/or amended every 8 years by the general assembly (gumii gaayoo). gumii gaayoo is the assembly of the multitude that convenes every 8 years at gaayoo (bassi, 2005; legesse, 1973). it is organized by the prime abbaa gadaa who is the leader of the arbooraa council. on the other hand, the two autonomous gadaa councils have the mandate to organize separate meetings called kora waarsuu and kora saddeetaa among the hawaxxuu and koonnituu clans, respectively. the gumii gaayoo, kora waarsuu, and kora saddeetaa differ not only in terminologies, but also in terms of their functions and power. the general assembly (gumii) is the only law-making body for the entire borana. on the other hand, the meetings (kora) organized by gadaa kontomaa councils are not focused on law-making. however, they are important in addressing vital societal issues regardless of clan affiliation. the mandate and power of the two self-governing gadaa councils in practice go beyond clan 17 karrayyuu clan has two major sub-clans—those who participate in gadaa are called warra bokkuu (people of gadaa) and those who are in charge of the religious institution are called warra qaalluu (people of qaalluu). 18 the maxxaarrii clan too has three minor qalluus drawn from three (garjeeda, kuukkuu, and karaara) of its seven sub-clans, which belong to warra qaalluu, while the remaining four (gaadullaa, maanqata, doorannii, and meettaa) are in the warra bokkuu division. since these qaalluus are minor ones, the clan is not barred from controlling the office of prime abbaa gadaa. 19 odituu is the qaalluu clan for goona moiety, which is also considered as the senior qaalluu of the entire borana. this clan is not elected at all levels in the gadaa system due to the division of roles. 13 chala: indigenous federation published by scholarship@western, 2017 issues. the borana clans are not territorial clans. as a result, issues are entertained by any gadaa council based on geographical proximity to the mobile camp of the gadaa council. the situation indicates that the borana have common laws that are made and amended by the general assembly, which comprises all officials at all levels and any interested borana men and women. the self-autonomous gadaa councils work within the general framework of the gadaa law. these findings are corroborated by legesse (1973) and bassi (2005). the history of the formation of the borana federation according to the borana’s oral history, a federal structure was adopted in response to borana inter-clan conflicts. the long run objective was to mitigate any internal unrest caused by conflicting interests among the various clans through the guarantee of self-rule. it was designed to accommodate clan diversity within borana unity in the framework of a single borana gadaa. apart from its conflict management role and maintaining internal unity, the system was also justified in favor of administrative convenience, bureaucratic efficiency, and power sharing. specifically, the introduction of a relatively self-governing gadaa council of the hawaxxuu (called yaa’aa hawaxxuu or gadaa kontomaa) emanated from the dispute between one of the higher officials of gadaa from hawaxxuu clan, by the name of huqqaa dooyyoo maalimoo, and the rest of the gadaa and qaalluu (religious leader) officials during the gadaa period of walee waaccuu (1722-1730).20 the dispute between the two became serious as huqaa dooyyoo established a separate ritual camp, which broke the former rule requiring a common ritual ground for gadaa leaders. this trend continued for six successive gadaa periods and the problem attracted serious attention from the entire borana. after a long series of deliberations, the disagreement was finally settled during the gadaa period of bulee dhaddachaa (17761783). a relatively self-governing branch of the hawaxxuu clan was permitted under the umbrella of borana gadaa (see bassi, 2005). the borana oral history still recalls the role of huqaa dooyyo in the formation of the hawaxxuu gadaa council, especially in the war song: kontoma huqqaan dhale huqqaa founded gadaa kontomaa council huqquu barbaadan dhale long war trek makes one thin barbaadaa dhiiraa mataan keessaan bokore trophy searcher’s hair grows wild but later adorned bokoree guyyaa galaa haati deette wallaalte even mothers never recognize the decorated brave sons. similarly, the borana oral history shows that the koonnituu clan was granted a separate gadaa council after serious conflict between the koonnituu clan and the rest of the borana. this time is known as the time of koonnituu war. the oral history suggests that the koonnituu men and women were brave 20 the oral history unequivocally indicates that the formation of a separate gadaa council for hawaxxuu was caused by inter-borana conflict. however, there are different versions of the cause of this conflict. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.2 fighters and proved their military supremacy not only over neighboring groups, but also over the rest of the borana clans. the rest of the borana clans were not happy with koonnituu’s military position and worked to relegate it. at one time, the koonnituu were bamboozled into fighting an unjust war against the arsi oromo for which they did not get the support of the remaining borana clans. consequently, the koonnituu lost the war. the then prominent warrior named waaqolee boora of the koonnituu clan made all of the necessary preparations to retaliate, especially against the borana, in response to the conspiracy. he trained young boys and girls with this aim. waaqolee boora finally waged war against the rest of the borana, as well as other neighboring groups. according to my informants, the koonnituu won due to their military superiority in the area. one of the famous female warriors who helped win the war against the borana by the koonnituu clan was adii duloo willee. the following song recalls that she was a brave fighter who threatened enemies all around. adii duuloo willee gaaltama leenphoo sirii sirii dhiira wal haatee namni boruu jirutti, hin jirre sirii yabiyyee deegaa takkaan dhalatte doote. the poem is difficult to translate, but roughly it means: adii duuloo willee a beautiful young lady mystery of a battle, life has no warranty mystery of poverty, the only calf dies.21 as oral history informs, hostility reached its highest pick and the koonnituu became outlaws by the borana standard. after series of negotiations that intended to end inter-clan conflict, the koonnituu were reintegrated into the borana gadaa with a gadaa council that was relatively self-governing. thus, self-government through the formation of a separate gadaa council of the koonnituu also appeared as a solution to the then existing conflict. the konnituu gadaa council was also established during the gadaa period of bule dhaddachaa (17761783) in borana gadaa chronology. the first leader of the newly established koonnituu gadaa council was waaqolee booraa himself. this is reflected in the gadaa praising song in honour of the three leaders of the borana gadaa councils. in remembrance of the major historical events during the bulee dhaddachaa’s gadaa period, the borana say, “arbooraa bulee dhaddachaa, hawaxxuu dhaddacha yaayyaa, koonnituu waaqolee booraa.” since their establishment, the two gadaa kontomaa councils have been working continuously. the establishment of separate gadaa ritual camps for the three councils is celebrated every 8 years just one year before a new group takes power. 21 cows were raided by adii duuloo and the calves left behind perished. 15 chala: indigenous federation published by scholarship@western, 2017 the borana elect all the six hayyuu adulaas 21 years before a luba assumes gadaa leadership role. the elected hayyuu establish the raaba22 mobile council 8 years after the election. the members of the council stay together for the next 13 years before assuming gadaa power. when just 1 year is left in their gadaa period, the six hayyuu are divided into three separate mobile power centers. the two hayyuu adulaa from hawaxxuu and koonnituu clans request the prime abbaa gadaa (abbaa gadaa fiixee) to allow them a separate gadaa council by saying “gadaa nuu kenni.” the abbaa gadaa (leader of the central council) responds as the custom dictates, by saying “gadaa isanii hin kennu, damee isanii kenne,” meaning “i do not give you the gadaa but a branch.” this indicates that the borana still maintain the unity of the gadaa but employ decentralization of gadaa power. with the permission of the abbaa gadaa, the two hayyuu immediately become leaders of their respective gadaa kontomaa and establish their own separate mobile gadaa camp. discussion this article is an empirical example revealing how a federal arrangement is working in the indigenous political system of the borana. the findings indicate that the gadaa system has implemented a division of power across the moiety, sub-moieties, and clan levels, which can be referred to as an indigenous federation. in this particular context, the system is characterized by two prominent council levels: gadaa arbooraa and gadaa kontomaa. this finding corroborated what other scholars have clearly identified as the shorthand definition of federalism within conventional academic discourses. it is unequivocally agreed that federalism refers to an organizational arrangement that consists of two levels—a federal state and individual member states (burgess, 2006; law, 2013; uhunmwuangho & ekpu, 2011; wheare, 1963). one of the characteristics of federal arrangement is the vertical and horizontal distribution of powers as stated by móntes (n.d.). pertinent to the distribution of power, field data for this empirical study indicated that the system of the borana has implemented an institutional arrangement in which certain activities are given to the center and others are shared between the center and self-dependent gadaa councils. gadaa law is made and amended exclusively by the general assembly, called gumii gaayoo, which is the highest legislative organ in the land. this gadaa law is the supreme law that governs the affairs of the entire borana. the power of organizing the assembly is vested in the central gadaa council (gadaa arbooraa). the legislative body is independent of both the central gadaa council and the autonomous gadaa councils. members of the assembly represent the entire borana including all gadaa leaders (the retired, prospective leaders, and those in office at all levels), elders, religious leaders, clan leaders, and interested individuals. while the central gadaa council is the highest executive organ, the law is implemented by each and every borana institution at all levels, including the central gadaa council, the gadaa kontomaa council, religious institutions, clan councils, neighborhood councils, age sets, and the like. these institutions also have judicial powers; however, major judicial matters are referred to the council of the guardians of the law (abbootii seeraa), which is constituted by experienced former gadaa leaders. within the framework of gadaa law and in the context of their respective clans, autonomous gadaa kontomaa councils, as well as clan councils and neighborhoods institutions have decision-making powers. they have executive and 22 raaba is the fourth gadaa grade. gadaa has grades in which every male member has to pass through. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.2 judicial powers on matters falling under their constituencies (issues of their respective clans or submoieties or localities). powers are given neither expressly nor concurrently to any of them with the exception of legislative power, which resides in the general assembly and is organized by the central gadaa council. by default, any administrative issues like conflict resolution and/or resource management can be taken as concurrent powers. in line with what móntes (n.d.) stated, the way in which powers are distributed between the center and constituent units within the borana gadaa federation falls under cooperative federalism. both levels of gadaa governments and clan councils share responsibilities and are working together. there is no clearly demarcated power vested only in the autonomous gadaa councils or the central gadaa council. moreover, in terms of the horizontal distribution of power, the arrangement can be labeled as asymmetric because only two major clans (the hawwaxxuu and the koonnituu) are privileged in leading and hosting the two autonomous gadaa councils. only 3 of the 18 clans —the odituu, the karrayyuu, and the maxxaarrii —have their own qaalluu institutions. except for the oditu clan, which is fully excluded from the gadaa, all the remaining borana clans can be represented in one of the gadaa offices. in addition, each clan has a council that is in charge of addressing every kind of issue affecting the clan. in this way, clan councils are also working as per the rules and regulations of the borana, which are directly drawn from gadaa law. the arrangement also involves a kind of power sharing in which the available offices are equally distributed between the two moieties, the sabbo and goona. for the sabbo, power is also equally distributed among the three major clans with one office of hayyuu adulaa allotted for each clan. conceptual support for this idea comes from móntes’ (n.d.) work, which stated that power sharing entails proportional representation among cultural groups in legislatures and within the bureaucracy, as well as mechanisms for ensuring the voices of minorities are heard. this finding clearly indicates that the gadaa federation shares some characteristics with contemporary federal systems. a federal government can be understood as an association of states in which powers are divided between a federal government and state governments. the former is independent of the government of the associated states in certain matters like the making of treaties and the coining of money. on the other hand, state governments, in turn, are independent of the federal government in certain matters. as a necessary consequence, the federal and regional governments both operate in ways that directly impact the people; each citizen is subject to two governments (wheare, 1963). however, this empirical study indicates that the borana gadaa federation is unique in several respects. primarily, the executive and judicial powers are not clearly separated because the guardians of the law are former gadaa leaders. judicial powers for routine operations are vested in the elders of the land, the custodians of borana law and customs, the gadaa councilors and leaders, and the qaalluu councilors alike. furthermore, this indigenous federation does not encompass a territorial boundary, mainly because the borana clans are not territorial units in both principle and practice. an individual borana family settles wherever resources are available regardless of their clan affiliation. as a result, the gadaa federation, as it has been working among the borana, is a unique instance in which institutions are not arranged based on an identifiable contiguous territory. yet, the same institutional arrangement is also ensures the provision of administrative services regardless of clan affiliation and territorial location across the whole borana territory. 17 chala: indigenous federation published by scholarship@western, 2017 currently, federalism is often praised as one of the institutional tools that provides room to freely exercise local customs, religious beliefs, and self-governance, and to accommodate diversity (nikodimos, 2004; todosijević, 2001). however, referring to the ongoing ethnic conflict in the former socialist countries, writers have argued that identity-based federalism is not the best option in preventing ethnic conflict. some have argued that it causes conflict (habtu, 2005; siegle & mahony, 2006; todosijević, 2001;). in spite of these competing approaches, ethnographic data from the borana shows that the indigenous federation has been enduring in relative harmony since its commencement in the second half of the 18th century. as oral history suggests, the borana adopted a federal structure as a means of conflict management to resolve the infighting at the time. this federation has led to harmony because it is based on the indigenous culture that is an integral part of their life. this does not mean that the borana have no experience with in-group conflict; rather, it shows how their political structure has enabled them manage conflicts. since their establishment, all of the three borana gadaa councils have been governed under a common law, which provides effective provisions for arbitration of internal conflicts, as well as ensuring access to power and resources. these provisions are of the utmost importance. thus, it can be contended that this institutional setting, the gadaa, has been maintaining internal unity among the borana clans and has enabled them to maintain military alliances in order to protect themselves from hostile neighboring groups. it has also been effective in managing clan diversities and identities under the umbrella of borana unity. bassi’s (2005) work also depicted these features of borana society. finally, given the constitutional guarantee of one’s culture and history in the present ethiopian political scene, other peoples in onrs have revived gadaa. furthermore, recently, a new form of gadaa council was established at the level of onrs. different oromo groups are represented in the council. however, a very important question is how the gadaa political structure is working in parallel with the state administrative structure. focusing on the borana, the government is specifically using the gadaa for implementing its policies and rules. practical cases indicate that gadaa councils have been working closely with local and regional governments. for instance, in consultation with the concerned government body, the last borana general assembly amended gadaa laws by declaring the prohibition of early marriage and circumcision of girls. other important issues including female education and environmental protection were among the items on the agenda of the assembly. however, cooperation with government has led to criticism in some cases. a common complaint is that gadaa leaders have been co-opted and manipulated into supporting the interests of the ruling party. conclusion the findings of this article indicate that the gadaa system with all its unique features has a federal structure. the system established two levels of gadaa councils: the gadaa arbooraa and kontomaa. the latter are named after two major borana clans. however, security concerns, and administrative and economic performance of the gadaa councils are not restricted to the clans, and neither are they territorially confined. they are in charge of issues brought before them or that attract the attention of any other council regardless of clan affiliation. the system allows the borana to have decentralized political institutions, which provides better governance to the citizens in that area. this indigenous knowledge and practices could contribute to friendly relations in the new ethiopian federal system to 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.2 ensure peace and stability. it would serve as a “fertilizer” in framing the principles of federalism in a culturally appropriate setting. thus, as a first step, i recommend a genuine acknowledgement and preservation of the values and principles of gadaa as an indigenous political system in administrative processes and in processes of democratization undertaken by policy makers and policy implementers. starting with the introduction of the ethiopian federal structure, the onrs has adopted some basic gadaa terminologies and symbols in its regional government structures. beyond adoption of terminologies and symbols, i further recommend that the regional states recognize and implements the basic principles and values of the gadaa system, such as processes to ensure the peaceful transfer of power, fixed terms in office, and fair access to power by all citizens. second, i recommend a healthy policy framework, and norms and standards that will define the place of indigenous institutions, like the gadaa system in the new ethiopian political landscape, and their role in society. third, i suggest a legal framework to retain and protect the integrity and legitimacy of the gadaa system as an indigenous federation. finally, the regional government needs to provide a statutory framework that enables the gadaa system to work to its full capacity. 19 chala: indigenous federation published by scholarship@western, 2017 references anyang nyong’o, p. 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(1963). federal government (4th ed.). london: oxford university press. 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.2 the international indigenous policy journal january 2017 indigenous federation: the case of borana oromo, ethiopia dejene gemechu chala recommended citation indigenous federation: the case of borana oromo, ethiopia abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license indigenous federation: the case of borana oromo, ethiopia microsoft word coverpage 13561.docx the international indigenous policy journal volume 12 | issue 1 february 2021 our people, our health: envisioning better primary healthcare in manitoba first nation communities grace kyoon-achan university of manitoba, canada, grace.kyoonachan@umanitoba.ca wanda phillips-beck first nations health and social secretariat of manitoba, canada, wphillips-beck@fnhssm.com kathi avery kinew first nations health and social secretariat of manitoba, canada, kathikinew@gmail.com josée g. lavoie university of manitoba, canada, josee.lavoie@umanitoba.ca stephanie sinclair first nations health and social secretariat of manitoba, canada, ssinclair@fnhssm.com alan katz university of manitoba, canada, alan_katz@cpe.umanitoba.ca recommended citation kyoon-achan, g., phillips-beck, w., kinew, k. a., lavoie, j. g., sinclair, s., & katz, a. (2021). our people, our health: envisioning better primary healthcare in manitoba first nation communities. the international indigenous policy journal, 12(1). doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2021.12.1.13561 our people, our health: envisioning better primary healthcare in manitoba first nation communities abstract recognizing the right to self-determination of indigenous peoples is essential to improving the state of communitybased primary healthcare (cbphc) of first nations in canada. understanding communities’ priorities and local health agendas is critical for primary healthcare transformation. we used a community-based participatory research approach to engage key partners: nanaandawewiwgamig, the first nations health and social secretariat of manitoba, and eight first nation communities. community-based research assistants conducted 183 in-depth interviews in their respective first nations. key themes that emerged from these interviews include primary prevention focused on health and social determinants; an integrated healthcare system providing access to both western medicine and first nations traditional health knowledge; infrastructure improvement; youth engagement; healthcare leadership; investing in community-based human resources; and promoting culturally respectful, responsive, and geographically sensitive and outcomes-oriented care. policy approaches could implement some local priorities with direct impact on healthcare, while other social determinants could create indirect, albeit critical, conditions for health and healthcare changes over time. keywords first nations, community-based primary healthcare, transformation, self-determination, health acknowledgments we acknowledge the 8 manitoba first nation communities who participated in this study, especially the 8 local research assistants who conducted all interviews and maintained a critical link to each community throughout the duration of the study. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. kyoon-achan et al.: our people, our health published by scholarship@western, 2021 1 our people, our health: envisioning better primary healthcare in manitoba first nation communities to indigenous peoples worldwide, collective and individual self-determination is an inherent right afforded by the creator. this right, recognized in canadian law and by the united nations (constitution act, 1867, 1982; royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996; united nations, 2008), frees indigenous peoples in canada, including first nations, from the shackles of colonization and the oppressive colonial tendencies of settler governments. this freedom can translate into safe and healthy communities, self-determination, empowerment, and the building of structures consistent with cultural values (auger et al., 2016; garces-ozanne et al., 2016). however, decolonizing for self-determination is a process. healthcare is at the heart of self-determination because health enables individuals and families to create healthy communities, structures, and systems to govern themselves. healthy communities in turn secure a healthy future for succeeding generations. the assembly of first nations’ 2012 vision statement posits that first nations are seeking to smash the status quo in dismantling conditions that hitherto have disempowered, disadvantaged, and harmed first nation peoples and communities (assembly of first nations, 2012). the report suggests that one way to accomplish this decolonization is to affirm first nation control over first nation interests, and essentially to transform any current services that are inefficient or inadequate in securing the health and wellbeing of the people. the current situation is that first nation communities continue to make do with services that the federal government funds and sometimes provides directly to first nations; for example, paying nurses who work at federal nursing stations rather than funding communities to hire nurses. these services are supposed to complement those the provincial government provides to first nation peoples and communities who are residents of the province, as outlined in the canada health act (1984). ironically, provincial governments and first nations continue to argue that the federal government holds a primary responsibility for the provision of community-based health services to first nations. this jurisdictional debate has existed for decades (booz et al., 1969; jordan’s principle working group, 2015). however, regardless of jurisdiction, gaps have been documented (jordan's principle working group, 2015; lavoie et al., 2008) and the responsiveness of these services have been called into question (davy et al., 2016; health council of canada, 2012; national inquiry into murdered and missing indigenous women and girls, 2019; truth and reconciliation council of canada [trc], 2015). some effort has been made to understand key drivers of health in first nation communities (bhawra et al., 2017; davy et al., 2016; kyoon-achan, philips-beck, et al., 2018; lavoie, 2013; smylie & firestone, 2015). these drivers include, among others, clarifying healthcare policies, addressing segregated healthcare systems, understanding barriers to care including inadequate medical transportation, increasing access to primary healthcare, addressing social determinants of health, obtaining accurate and relevant statistics for indigenous populations, and building adequate health structures and infrastructure (anderson & smylie, 2009; richmond & cook, 2016; richmond & ross, 2009). it has also been argued that canada needs a holistic first nations healthcare strategy that considers and addresses historical and ongoing structures fueling gross health inequities (auger et al., 2016; katz et al., 2017). in previous articles, we argued that transforming community-based primary healthcare (cbphc) should begin by understanding how that concept can take on an entirely different meaning for first nation peoples and communities, and it should proceed by developing policies that align with priorities determined by affected communities (kyoon-achan et al., 2019; kyoon-achan, phillips-beck, et al., 2018). in this the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 1, art. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.1.13561 2 article, we build further on this line of argument to assert that in order to secure long-term positive outcomes in first nations health, it is imperative to support the implementation of the visions and highest ideals stated by first nation peoples and communities. first nations live with those realities in their communities and know what changes could yield the most benefits for cbphc. background the innovation in community-based primary healthcare supporting transformation in the health of first nations and rural/remote communities in manitoba (iphit) program of research is a partnership between the university of manitoba, nannaandawewigamig, the first nations health and social secretariat of manitoba (fnhssm), and eight manitoba first nation communities. the five-year study is funded by the canadian institutes of health research (cihr; study #297945). through this program of research, we learned about the unique primary healthcare experiences of first nation peoples living in communities with various degrees of isolation. many first nation communities in manitoba are remote or isolated. this means that they are long distances away from urban settlements and services. the closest of the eight communities that participated in our study is 2.5 hours away by car from the city of winnipeg, manitoba. the farthest is isolated, meaning that it has no road networks, is fly-in only and to get there requires two flights of about 3.5 hours combined. it is well known that rural and remote communities face unique access and equity challenges when it comes to delivering healthcare that includes a lack of adequate resources, inability to retain healthcare professionals, almost non-existent access to emergency care, and lack of access to preventive care (fisher-owens et al., 2016; oosterveer & young, 2015). power dynamics and differential access to services and resources have historically defined relations between first nations and mainstream society, resulting in first nation communities facing health challenges and gross underservice (horrill et al., 2018; lux, 2010). northern isolated and semi-isolated communities in manitoba have federally funded nursing stations that provide basic first point of contact care, while communities with road access have health centres that provide basic public health services, and residents can presumably access more specialize healthcare in urban centres. long-term and continuing care, such as for elders and others needing palliative care, is offered outside of the community unless the community has a personal care home. many do not, so elders who need care end up having to leave their communities (standing committee on indigenous and northern affairs, 2018). this is a difficult experience for many elders (hampton et al., 2010). outsiders (usually agency nurses) are typically hired to work in rural and remote indigenous communities due to a lack of investment in the on-reserve workforce (wakerman et al., 2019). there is also high turnover among these workers because they may be comparatively under-remunerated and due to the sheer remoteness of the locations. this has significant effects on the quality of care delivered (minore et al., 2005; wakerman et al., 2019). it can also be said that limited services, while partially a function of remoteness, isolation, and small populations, is also largely the result of discriminatory policies and outright racism (bourassa, 2018). additionally, first nation communities find themselves entangled in jurisdictional quagmires that often leave the communities underserved when the federal and provincial jurisdictions are not able to clearly define and outline their responsibilities. this creates a paralyzing effect for first nations that need to access services (bourassa, 2018; jordan’s principle working group, 2015; kyoonkyoon-achan et al.: our people, our health published by scholarship@western, 2021 3 achan et al., 2019). these factors taken together result in large health disparities (benchimol et al., 2018; frohlich et al., 2006). against this background and considering that the health of first nation peoples continues to show worrying trends, we asked participants to envision and share what cbphc would look like if they could design their own healthcare system to address current challenges or optimize successes. this article shares the responses of eight manitoba first nation communities. following the aforementioned contextual factors affecting the health of first nation communities in manitoba and discussion of the concerns that informed this study, we briefly describe the method of engagement and discuss promising results for a healthcare system that could better serve first nations in community-based contexts. study design using a community-based participatory action research framework, all partners collaboratively designed and implemented the study. this method has been shown to support respectful research with indigenous peoples (see for example boffa et al., 2011; brunger & wall, 2016; flicker et al., 2015). ethical practice goes beyond merely following the usual recommendations made by institutions; it requires engagement that is meaningful and useful for community partners (brunger & wall, 2016; canadian institutes of health research, 2010; kyoon-achan, lavoie et al., 2018; phillips-beck et al., 2019). first nation communities and individuals participating in this study provided guidance and feedback at all stages of the study including questionnaire development, data collection, interpretation, analyses, and knowledge translation. we have published a more fulsome description of the methods (see kyoon-achan, lavoie et al., 2018). methods partnership formation the first nations health and social secretariat of manitoba (fnhssm) and university-based researchers teamed up with eight manitoba first nation communities. these nations were selected to represent all geographical locations in manitoba of isolated (no road access), semi-isolated (with seasonal roads), and non-isolated (with road access) communities (table 1). they also represent four of five first nation languages in manitoba: dakota, dene, cree, and ojibway. these partners had frequent in-person and teleconference meetings throughout the duration of the partnership (phillipsbeck et al., 2019). each community was equally represented by a local research assistant (lra) and health director. ethics approvals ethics approvals were sought and obtained from the university of manitoba human research ethics board (um-reb) and the first nations health information research governance committee (hirgc) at fnhssm. the first nation chiefs of manitoba mandated the hirgc since 1998 to oversee research ethics processes on behalf of manitoba first nations. following both approvals, consent letters in the form of band council resolutions (bcr) were also obtained from respective communities, and consent forms were completed by individual respondents prior to conducting interviews. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 1, art. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.1.13561 4 table 1. characteristics of participating communities community language size model of care geography community 1 ojibway medium nursing station southern isolated community 2 dakota small health centre south non-isolated community 3 cree large nursing station north semi-isolated community 4 ojibway small health centre south non-isolated community 5 cree medium health centre south non-isolated community 6 ojibway medium health centre south non-isolated community 7 cree large nursing station northern non-isolated community 8 dene small nursing station northern isolated note. north and northern communities are those north of the 53rd parallel in manitoba, while south and southern communities are located south of this parallel. written agreements written agreements were signed between first nation communities and researchers in keeping with hirgc requirements including first nations ownership, control, access, and possession (ocapò) principles (first nations information governance centre, 2014). ocapò and other principles are intended to regulate and guide research involving first nations so that research is conducted respectfully and meaningfully for community partners. it is also imperative that research data becomes a tool to strengthen first nation inherent rights to self-determination. therefore, to promote “ownership,” “control,” and “access,” the fnhssm acted as the “secretariat” for the study with all data management and analysis activities maintained at that location. participating communities can access the data at any time upon request. to ensure “possession” and use, all data were made available to participating communities in various formats: reports, presentations, conferences, meetings, publications, and factsheets. they were free to utilize this information for healthcare planning, decision making, and policy development during the study and thereafter. data collection purposive sampling targeted male and female community members, elders, healthcare workers in the community, and health services users. open-ended interviews adopted a decolonizing approach consistent with indigenous methods in that they were semi-structured and storied, inviting respondents to engage with the subject matter freely and expansively (baskin, 2005; chilisa, 2012; iseke, 2013). interviews and post interview data validations were completed between april 2014 and december 2016. in total, 183 interviews were completed with individuals from eight communities. the research team kyoon-achan et al.: our people, our health published by scholarship@western, 2021 5 recruited and trained eight community-based lras to collect data in each community. each lra could translate questions and responses into the respective local language or english, as necessary, to accommodate indigenous language speaking participants. a few respondents made comments in their own languages that were then translated by the lra into english before transcription. data analysis all interviews were sent to a professional transcriber for verbatim transcription. transcripts were then de-identified by removing any names and interview locations and sent back to communities for their information and for validation. usually lras, health directors, and other individuals chosen by the community vetted the data to ensure accuracy of concepts and to confirm any words or meanings that had been conveyed in local languages had been correctly translated. participating communities were also involved in the interpretation of data through community and regional workshops that continued into 2018. lras continued to be available to review, translate, and explain terms, meanings, and contexts for increased clarity throughout the data analysis. communities validating and essentially co-interpreting de-identified data to highlight key ideas in their data ensured accuracy and significantly reduced the “researcher effect” on the analysis (miles & huberman, 1994). two university-based and two fnhssm-based data analysts collaborated on the data analysis. however, one researcher who liaised between the university, fnhssm, and all partnering communities (gka) manually completed preliminary data analysis using an open coding system to identify key ideas and themes, then uploaded the data to nvivo 10 software for further coding. the results summarized below emerged from both the interview data as well as from interpretive discussions during community data validation and interpretation sessions. the quotes have been selected to represent themes emanating from all participating communities. results the results include 10 key themes that emerged (table 2), each presented according to its own merit and not in any particular order. there was no indication in the data that any one factor was more important or was preferred over others. some of the themes could have direct impact on healthcare while others could have indirect impact on healthcare services. some differences existed in the data between communities, reflecting unique circumstances such as size, model of care, and geographical location. for example, road-access communities highlighted the need for more vehicles to transport patients, while northern remote communities with nursing stations expressed the need for more nurses, larger health facilities, and community-based rather than transient staff who travel in and out of the communities. however, the focus of this article is to outline common factors that were important to all participating communities. common factors impacting first nations healthcare experiences drawn from individual community realities reveal the collective disempowerment of first nations in the larger healthcare system. however, in order to highlight the specific context, the respondent’s community is indicated at the end of quotations. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 1, art. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.1.13561 6 table 2. list of themes and potential impact on cbphc services direct impact on healthcare services indirect impact on health services integrated healthcare services focus on prevention larger health facilities intersectoral collaboration first nation control of resources empowerment medical transportation youth engagement permanent community-based staff leadership integrated healthcare system respondents want the “western” or modern healthcare system to collaborate with traditional health knowledge in the spirit of cooperation to serve first nation populations holistically. i would get two different options. one side would be traditional, one side would be [mainstream] medicine. so it will be both sides. if one person wants to take healing from both of them, they have that option. there’s [traditional] medicine men there that can do the quality work as a doctor but are not recognized in health authorities. they don’t have that paper saying i’m a doctor but traditionally they have that honor. so there will be options where people can go to. that’s a good health system. [large northern semi-isolated community respondent] it is believed that an integrated healthcare system could expand options to patients and provide first nation peoples the freedom to choose. we do offer the doctor or hospital type of stuff. but what about the traditional part of it? i’ve seen buildings where they have a specific room for smudging and for anybody who wanted to talk to somebody other than a mental health worker, somebody that would understand exactly where they’re coming from. [southern non-isolated community respondent] we would need to adopt a program that would be able to provide funds to access these herbs and roots, because i’m sure some of them are located in out of the way places. this is what supports are needed to promote use of traditional medicine. it’s educating and it’s also funding the access to these traditional medicines. [southern isolated community respondent] to enable a meaningfully integrated healthcare system, respondents want funding to support education about and access to traditional healthcare options so people can make educated choices when the need arises. kyoon-achan et al.: our people, our health published by scholarship@western, 2021 7 focus on prevention respondents talked about the need to focus on prevention in first nation communities as a way to protect and promote health rather than managing illnesses and diseases. we’re so focused on intervention right now, it’s really tough to focus on prevention models. if we could front-load our prevention models a lot more, then the better because that means we’re doing everything we can to provide tools and skills to address those health issues before they become life threatening. [southern non-isolated community respondent] they envisioned robust prevention programs that would begin with community assessments to determine needs. well, first of all you would have to do a thorough community assessment. and identifying those needs . . . to see what kind of needs we [as a community] have. you build your framework from there and then you designate how to build [based on] that framework and then you build. when you identify that that’s the priority in the community. [northern semi-isolated community respondent] you definitely have to consult with the grassroots people first before starting anything and ask them and get their input on what they would like to see within a health centre, or the health system . . . yeah, i'd definitely ask the grassroots people first and then work my way up that way. [southern non-isolated community respondent] the identification of community needs would then be followed by long-term program planning. rural first nation communities, the emphasis of the care is generally on reactional medicine as opposed to preventative medicine, as opposed to upper stream programming. time constraints limit us from being able to plan ahead with upper stream programming. [southern isolated community respondent] upstream programming would generate action in key areas respondents identified, including health promotion, community outreaches, education, and workshops in relevant areas. some specific examples mentioned include dealing with root causes of addictions in the community; educating parents on the impact of videogames on children; health and safety concerns, notably unsafe roads in the communities; and preventing pollution of waters by encouraging garbage cleanup. it was also pointed out that poor living conditions due to poverty, overcrowding, and mold in homes negatively affect health. respondents want first nation communities to be made amply aware of these factors. intersectoral collaboration respondents in all communities wanted health and social services operating in the community to be able to work together and share information, as necessary. [there is a perception that community-based staff] can’t legally share information with their clients or with other [programs]. that creates a wall and that creates a barrier . . . that’s what we the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 1, art. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.1.13561 8 need to address. if we really want to open these doors up to working with one another, we have to get over that confidentiality issue. one way i see us doing that is creating our own constitution as a community, creating our own law basically. an individual should be surrounded by all our support services, not an individual reaching out to our [various] support services. we need to flip that way of thinking around. but because of i’ll say, certain laws, we’re not allowed to do that. and our people are scared to breach those laws even though we as a community have a value of caring and they know that they can help a person by surrounding them with these different services. that's what's preventing us from really getting out there. [southern non-isolated community respondent] respondents also thought that bringing all services together would encourage collective program assessments in order to understand what is working and what areas may need improvements. we would have this wonderful nursing station where all the health resources people and their nurses are working together . . . all working together and were having meetings and we know what’s working and what’s not working. [northern isolated community respondent] it was further suggested that resources can be pooled together as one way to encourage the various sectors collaborating. it’s up to the people to come together, all combine as one package. with everybody on the train, you got to combine with one another to see how you can make everything better. [northern non-isolated community respondent] larger healthcare facilities respondents in larger communities wanted to have access to the same level of coordinated services available in non-first nations communities. one larger community had described this as a hospital due to the fact that their relative size would warrant such a facility if they were not under federal jurisdiction. some others called for a “healthcare centre” in their communities. our population has grown in the last few years; we have enough people here to have a hospital. this place needs a hospital. i mean we've just got a tiny little nursing station there; you go there and like you go there in the morning, whatever, that place is jammed pack, right until it's time to go home, whatever time they quit working there. [northern semi-isolated community respondent] the request for hospitals was associated with having larger facilities to accommodate the healthcare needs of growing population and to reduce overcrowding at the existing nursing stations. respondents also thought that having a community-based hospital would reduce the current practice where patients leave their families and communities to travel into towns and cities for medical care. many emphasized that difficulties currently being faced by commuting patients could be avoided especially if elder patients do not have to leave their communities for care elsewhere. examples were shared such as not having transportation to attend appointments and nonexistent or inadequate accommodations in towns and cities. kyoon-achan et al.: our people, our health published by scholarship@western, 2021 9 respondents also said that having larger facilities will enable all healthcare services to be under the same roof or closer together and perhaps communicate better when needed. making referrals would also be easier, and patients would possibly be more likely to follow through with their appointments. we’re all scattered. we’re not just in one building as health workers. the nursing station is over there, they are here and the [community health representative] are in a different area too. sometimes they don’t know what’s going on. so if we all have one building that would be easier. [northern semi-isolated community respondent] a “hospital” in the community, it was also believed, would have more equipment to serve the population such as a dialysis unit, x-ray machines, and other diagnostics. well like i said, hospitals, more resources in the community instead of having to go out of the community for resources such as certain x-rays which would be done here if we had the resources. [northern semi-isolated community respondent] all communities made requests to have community-based hospitals, as well as improved infrastructure with all equipment, amenities, and staff complement including physicians, dentists, pharmacists, etc. first nations control some respondents said that having first nations healthcare services under first nations control and ownership would result in better services for the communities. the system now is kind of segregated, different entities, and establishing the one entity, first nations controlled, has ownership, i think would provide better access and more would have a bigger effect on the overall community health of the people. [northern semi-isolated community respondent] [our] own health system, my idea is to pick our own people to run it, to give them the power, to empower them not to depend on the government. we run our own system, we make our own money to run our system, and our people to run healthcare, our nurses or doctors, counsellors, our elders. they run the show and we are all under one building where everybody will be at. [northern non-isolated community respondent] yes, run by our own people so that way we know what’s going on. [northern isolated community respondent] communities said that they would be better able to determine and implement programs that are really needed rather than whatever is dictated by funding and funders. it was suggested, for example, that current nursing and health care aide programs should be tailored and laddered to make it easier for first nations learners to achieve higher levels. in one respondent’s words, first nations ownership would entail: less interference from the [government], like right now really we’re simply an agent of the federal government, we administer their programs. we need access to resources which we [first the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 1, art. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.1.13561 10 nations] can control and be accountable for, but control as we see fit and i know that fnihb [first nations and inuit health branch] would argue that we have that now, but yeah the programs are still all too narrow and not enough. [for example] there is no traditional food program, there’s no traditional land use program, those are all health-related issues helping people with mental health for example through traditional land use, there’s no programming like that. there’s no money to help people decolonize, there’s a therapist that comes in, but do they really know anything colonization and whatever? we need to actually . . . create that here. that should be a responsibility of the federal government, because it’s through the residential and day schools that all got taken away. [southern isolated community respondent] first nations control was seen as a beginning to decolonization through which communities would be at liberty to design and implement programs to meet the current and future health needs of the people. the respondent implied that cbphc has been stymied by lack of committed resources by the federal and provincial governments. for example, federal funding to first nations health has been frozen for two decades due to federal insistence on meeting provincial standards, which may not be realistically attainable at this time. however, one specific area of need that first nations would prefer to immediately address is establishing personal care homes in the communities. every participating community expressed a desire for “old folks’ homes” for elders and sick people in the community. empowerment respondents recognize: first nation communities are behind in our health services compared to what they are given in provincial or off-reserve facilities and our people are struggling but they are trying hard. [southern, non-isolated community respondent] they thus imagined communities in which people would be empowered to take responsibility for their own health and have the options to make choices that lead to better health. i believe it lies with the community members themselves, taking responsibility of their own health, creating more independence for our community members because i do find a lot of them are dependent on our [health] services, which is great, but i would like to see more independence in their health and taking more part. [southern non-isolated community respondent] the hard part is implementing the process and the important part is people. so people have to buy in to change, to improve. there’s always resistance to change. i think when i look at the community as a whole, the whole community organization, our government structure, i think we’re too familiar with the way things have been that we can’t think forward. we don’t think ahead or visualize how it could be. it looks like a lot of work for people and maybe the motivation, the morale is low. it’s keeping people stuck. and not only one person can make those changes. it’s got to be people, community who say, “let’s get on board. let’s help one another and support one another and make those changes for our community.” it involves people as a whole to make the community better and improve. [northern isolated community respondent] kyoon-achan et al.: our people, our health published by scholarship@western, 2021 11 respondents suggested that with the right supports, first nation communities can assume increased responsibility for their health by implementing solutions that may be within or outside the current healthcare models currently available in communities. youth engagement respondents advocated collaborations between health services and schools in first nation communities. they maintained that this partnership could create joint activities to wrap around and strengthen supports for youth and solidify the health and social messaging to keep the young population healthy and living better lives. it was suggested that an investment in youth is an investment in the overall wellbeing of the community. one respondent expressed the sentiment as follows: i think we [health centre] need to have a better linkage with the school because they have 700 kids at that school . . . we could give them more services, we could help because the kids are going to make or break our community. so we need to focus on the kids and on the youth and because they’re the ones that are going to take over this health centre one day . . . if the kids got healthier and more cultural, it would be such a positive thing in all areas. not just the health like the whole community in general. [southern non-isolated community respondent] respondents said that youth living in first nation communities need a place to be and activities to engage them. there is nothing for them to do other than what they do at home. and they have all this technology they’re using and they don’t go outdoors. we need stuff out here to get these kids involved. [southern non-isolated community respondent] getting children and youth into more activities so that they do not turn to drugs or alcohol at an early age. [southern non-isolated respondent] several more respondents expressed concerns about kids eating unhealthy diets and leading sedentary lives. some therefore wanted fitness centres in all communities that do not currently have any. some envisioned that the fitness centre would have activities for all age groups and would be affordable. others mentioned having playgrounds and parks that are located in safe spots for children to play in. medical transportation respondents envisioned having effective medical transportation. these would include communityowned ambulances for use during emergencies, handicap vans for people with disabilities, and vans to transport people to and from medical appointments within and outside the community. it was said that some lives are lost, and other people miss medical appointments due to lack of transportation. we’d have our own ambulance. we’d have our own medevac. a quick way to get to our emergency situations. [southern non-isolated community respondent] the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 1, art. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.1.13561 12 and the ambulance and the handicap. we need handicap vans because a lot of our people here are going into wheelchairs and have difficulty accessing the hospital [and] clinics, so that’s what we would need out here. [southern non-isolated community respondent] respondents agreed that effective medical transportation would increase access to healthcare in general for people living in remote communities and for people who have become disabled due to other chronic health conditions. community-based healthcare leadership respondents pointed out the importance of having strong leadership for all healthcare programs in the community. we have to have a health director that cares for this community, the people, young and old. we have to have a health director to make sure everybody’s at work on time and leaves on time, that’s what i mean by consistency. we have to have a health director who does not travel and leave this community every friday and through the weekend. we need someone that stays within our community to oversee everything that is going on in that nursing station. [southern isolated community respondent] respondents want health directors that will be committed to the community, preferably reside in the communities that they work in and ensure that nursing stations, health centres, and all staff work diligently to serve the health needs of the communities. some respondents also pointed out the need for leadership to maintain “open dialogue” so the community is encouraged to provide feedback on all health programs and suggestions for how those programs can be improved. it was important for people that leaders and programs in the community work together. the people that are in charge of things have to work together you know . . . share their ideas and share their problems and come up with better solutions. like the doctor . . . when she’s here maybe she could come to those meetings and the nurse could be there . . . and the mental health worker could be there and maybe one person from the chief and council could be there, maybe the principal from the school could be there you know, maybe somebody from cfs [child and family services] could be there you know. a close working relationship is good, with all the programs, all the facilities. that is how i would design something, people to work together more closely. [southern isolated community respondent] permanent community-based staff additionally, respondents envisioned having permanent doctors, nurses, and staff who will reside in the communities they work in, and who get to know their patients better. we have different doctors coming in now and then. we need to have a permanent doctor stationed here in the community, to know the people, their health, to know that person slowly. and the person, the people will know this doctor. i don’t even know who my doctor is now. i don’t know what his name or her name is. they keep changing these doctors on us as well as kyoon-achan et al.: our people, our health published by scholarship@western, 2021 13 these nurses. but we need full-time staff in this facility so everybody will know each other. we’ll know who the doctor is, we’ll know who the nurses are, and the nurses as well and the doctor as well will know us. but if they keep changing them, you know, it’s confusing. it’s like when you read a book and you got a little way and then you put that book aside and then for two weeks or a month, and you have to start over again to read from the beginning. it’s like that and that’s what i see here, it’s like, you know, we need fulltime staff, nurses and doctors. [southern isolated community respondent] respondents want doctors to know their patients in communities better and for patients get a chance to cultivate relationships with their doctors over time as well. some also said that having full-time community-based staff will ensure that emergencies in the community will be better dealt with when they arise, and chances of delays or misdiagnosis may be reduced. discussion the eight manitoba first nations who participated in this study have discussed current issues in cbphc and provided a comprehensive vision of what they believe will make a significant difference in cbphc. themes include having integrated healthcare services that provide traditional health options, building larger health facilities, first nation control of resources so as to determine and fund priority needs, readily available medical transportation, having permanent community-based staff to promote continuity of care, a focus on key prevention programs and activities that support wellbeing and health, encouraging inter-sectoral collaboration and knowledge sharing among programs in the community, empowering youth, as well as strengthening local leadership. it is noteworthy that the recommendations to transform the system made by respondents in this study may not be groundbreaking by themselves, but their collective impact could be. manitoba first nations are requesting services that are routinely enjoyed by the majority of canadians who perhaps could not imagine living without those services. each theme could have significant effects on health outcomes. an integrated health system could allow first nation peoples to choose healthcare options that meet their health needs. studies have indicated promising practices through successful integration attempts (drost, 2019; fijal & beagan, 2019; ho et al., 2006; murdoch-flowers et al., 2019). within this system, access to and application of traditional healing protocols and ceremonies are provided within mainstream health facilities, cultural competency is an integral part of the healthcare environment, and dedicated funding is available to support the practice. including sacred spaces and incorporating the sweat lodge as a traditional healing ceremony into the alberta health services is a case in point, even though much work remains to be done (drost, 2019). another example is the inclusion of breathing techniques and traditional spirituality in a kahnawake school diabetes prevention project, which saw improvements in holistic health and wellbeing (murdoch-flowers et al., 2019). these practices do not merely target the body but also extend to support mental, emotional, and spiritual wellbeing. we know that first nation people utilize traditional medicines and therapeutic practices (colantonio & rivers, 2017; drost, 2019; lans, 2016; royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996). studies also share instances of people combining traditional remedies with mainstream approaches (cook, 2005; george et al., 2018; zubek, 1994) and finding them useful for their health and wellbeing. an integrated system would however require specific financial and technical supports for initiatives such as medical transportation to attend traditional healing practices and activities as necessary, remuneration for the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 1, art. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.1.13561 14 traditional medicine practitioners, and personnel to coordinate between traditional and allopathic medical care. an integrated system would also possibly require enhanced collaboration between traditional medicine people and practitioners of allopathic medicine (redvers et al., 2019). several respondents said they wanted “hospitals” in communities. upon closer examination, it appears that many respondents envision larger healthcare facilities, better access to physicians, specialists, technicians, nurses, all necessary equipment, and resources for use in the communities. with increasing populations, some first nation communities have outgrown their current healthcare facilities. respondents want to replace the understaffed and underfunded nursing stations or health centres with larger and better resourced facilities to accommodate the rising needs in communities. the current reality is that first nation communities operate models of care that draw heavily on nursing care and occasional physician visits. these models to do not support continuity of or quality of care (standing committee on indigenous and northern affairs, 2018). healthcare tends to fall in the hands of a few available workers, and it will become compromised and fragmented when these workers are overloaded, pressed for time, and poorly equipped, an observable occurrence in first nation communities. first nation communities suggest improving cbphc by providing larger, better equipped healthcare facilities. this could make it easier for first nation communities to attract and retain the services of healthcare workers, specialists, and physicians where possible. larger facilities can also make room for better diagnostic equipment. this could improve diagnostics and enhances early disease detection which in turn may reduce death rates (ball & balogh, 2016). first nation communities have decried the state of diagnostic equipment in their communities. patients often travel long distances for diagnostic tests that could be conducted at healthcare facilities in the community if they were available. this problem could be eliminated by purchasing new or updating existing equipment and then hiring or training first nation workers to fill those service positions in the community. medical transportation services are a determinant of first nation health and can significantly hamper or improve access to healthcare for first nation patients (davy et al., 2016). it is one of the health benefits that the federal government provides to first nation communities according to the government’s own regulations (government of canada, 2018). decision-making by first nations concerning medical transportation is limited by policy rules and regulations. for example, provincial requirements state that a physician at receiving institutions must approve medical evacuations. this often delays emergency decision-making depending on whether a physician is available or deems the circumstance to be an emergency, despite not being physically present to make an assessment. medical transportation is critical nonetheless, as some people living in first nation communities would otherwise not be able to commute to a nursing station in the community, get to medical appointments in different towns and cities, or be evacuated in a medical emergency to get help in a timely manner. this situation is made worse when there are no publicly funded transportation systems available in communities and many first nations do not have adequate emergency response services, do not own ambulance services, and often do not having physicians on site in communities to attend to medical emergencies. more so, increasing rates of chronic conditions, such as diabetes-related amputations in first nation patients (canadian diabetes association, 2016; pelletier et al., 2012), is creating additional need for accessible transportation for people with disabilities to support access to ongoing care. additional medical transportation in the form of vehicles, ambulances, and around the clock drivers will significantly improve access to care for first nations living in remote communities. kyoon-achan et al.: our people, our health published by scholarship@western, 2021 15 first nation communities have further highlighted the need to protect succeeding generations by occupying first nation youth with activities to inspire better choices for their own health and, in so doing, improve the health of entire communities in the long term. engaging youth in and of itself has been shown to curb social vices and create lasting change (geldhof et al., 2013; iwasaki & hopper, 2017; suleiman et al. 2006). first nations in this study recognize that youth are key allies in creating healthier futures for their communities and want them to be meaningfully engaged. this goal is being achieved in some cases through targeted first nations youth engagement initiatives, or support such as the establishment of junior chiefs and councils to enhance leadership skills, or junior ranger programs available in some first nation communities to promote land-based skills. these and similar activities are also avenues for health promotion and social awareness initiatives. it has previously been shown that first nations control of healthcare services benefits communities and leads to better health outcomes (lavoie et al., 2010). positive health outcomes could therefore be amplified with increasing first nation control over community-based healthcare systems, ensuring, for instance, that health programs are tailored to address specific community needs and priorities. the programs would be culturally relevant and possibly incorporate the languages of the populations that are served for easier and better communication. we already know that healthcare providers who understand the language, culture, and community context of their clients may build more trust which helps in providing quality care (ventura & rueter, 2018). the reverse can create feelings of distrust in patients (webster, 2018). this problem can be eliminated by adequately supporting first nation owned and controlled healthcare services predominated by first nation professionals with broad understanding of the socio-cultural milieu. more so, with greater control over resources, first nations can and do establish appropriate regulations and evaluation of healthcare services. conclusion first nations communities in manitoba have provided a vision for better cbphc. stakeholders including governments, policy makers, health planners, and community-based leadership can develop implementation strategies with and within concerned first nation communities. themes from respondents’ views should be seen as interconnected in their ability to contribute to better cbphc. it appears that self-determination is at the apex of respondents’ shared vision, and first nation control of resources is a component, which would allow communities to direct funds to priorities such as larger buildings for nursing stations, for example, or additional infrastructure such as personal care homes and lodges for elders and others requiring long-term care. first nations self-determined healthcare could put greater emphasis on prevention programs. local autonomy on healthcare planning and decisionmaking could also allow for integrated healthcare systems with easier access to traditional options. local control of medical transportation funding could also create easier and faster access to off-reserve care. in creating conditions and capacities to implement desired healthcare transformations over time, youth would be a key part of healthcare planning and would take the lead in addressing social determinants of health. this proximity to planning and decision-making may inspire youth entries into health professions and contribute to closing the gaps on permanent community-based workers when young people return to their communities to work. in general, however, a clear vision of optimal communitybased primary healthcare in first nation communities has been articulated, which could help in prioritizing funding and resources to meet needs in priority areas. ultimately, self-determination in the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 1, art. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.1.13561 16 cbphc is the goal, which could be achieved by supporting first nation communities’ paths to improved health for current and future generations. references anderson, m. j., & smylie, j. k. 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(1994). traditional native healing. alternative or adjunct to modern medicine? canadian family physician, 40, 1923-1931. coverpage 13561.pdf 13561 kyoon-achan our people, our health rce.pdf exploring the intersection of education and indigenous status from a social determinants of health perspective: parent and family engagement in secondary school in nunavik the international indigenous policy journal volume 7 issue 4 social determinants of indigenous well-being : building a more complete understanding article 4 october 2016 exploring the intersection of education and indigenous status from a social determinants of health perspective: parent and family engagement in secondary school in nunavik nicole ives mcgill university, nicole.ives@mcgill.ca vandna sinha centre for research on children and families, mcgill university, vandna.sinha@mcgill.ca recommended citation ives, n. , sinha, v. (2016). exploring the intersection of education and indigenous status from a social determinants of health perspective: parent and family engagement in secondary school in nunavik. the international indigenous policy journal, 7(4). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.4.4 exploring the intersection of education and indigenous status from a social determinants of health perspective: parent and family engagement in secondary school in nunavik abstract in canada, indigenous peoples’ health and wellbeing is linked with the legacies of colonization. a social determinants of health model shifts focus from individual-level health contexts to broader socioeconomic, cultural, and environmental conditions associated with population health outcomes. education is a key social determinant of health, closely tied to both positive health outcomes and socioeconomic status. in communities across canada, educational success remains out of reach for disproportionately large numbers of indigenous youth and adults. this qualitative study examined the intersection of two social determinants of health—indigenous status and education—by exploring educational engagement in secondary school for inuit parents and families, secondary school students, educators, and other inuit community members in an inuit community in nunavik, northern quebec. keywords inuit youth, academic retention, family engagement, social determinants of health acknowledgments the authors would like to thank the social sciences and humanities research council for the funding support which made this project possible, the advisory committee who guided the research endeavor, the research participants who shared their stories, and the entire research team who worked tirelessly with us. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ e x p l o r i n g t h e i n t e r s e c t i o n o f e d u c a t i o n a n d i n d i g e n o u s s t a t u s f r o m a s o c i a l d e t e r m i n a n t s o f h e a l t h p e r s p e c t i v e : p a r e n t a n d f a m i l y e n g a g e m e n t i n s e c o n d a r y s c h o o l i n n u n a v i k in canada, indigenous peoples’ health and wellbeing is linked with the legacies of colonization: consequences of the indian act of 1876, disregard for land claims, forced relocation, and the formation and enforced attendance of residential schools. the results have shaped indigenous peoples’ physical, mental, cultural, and community health outcomes (greenwood & de leeuw, 2012; reading, 2015). across canada, indigenous peoples have higher mortality and morbidity rates and higher rates of preventable chronic and infectious diseases, as compared to their non-indigenous counterparts (waldram, herring, & young, 2006; yi, landais, kolahdooz, & sharma, 2015). these disparities with regard to individual and community health outcomes have contributed to the increased attention paid to the ways in which the social environment impacts the health of individuals, families, and communities. while health inequities have traditionally been connected to biomedical determinants, social factors have been identified as important sources of differential health outcomes (wilkinson & marmot, 2003). the social determinants of health model advocates a shift in focus from individual-level health contexts to the broader socioeconomic, cultural, and environmental conditions that are closely associated with health outcomes in the population (mikkonen & raphael, 2010). there is general consensus across these models that social determinants account for the myriad conditions that shape individuals’, communities’, and regions’ health overall—in particular, the extent to which an individual stays healthy or becomes ill; the extent to which a person has the physical, social, and personal resources to identify and achieve personal aspirations, meet needs, and cope with his or her environment; and the quantity and quality of resources that a society makes available and accessible to its members (galea & vlahov, 2002; public health agency of canada [phac], 2010; raphael, 2009; wilkinson & marmot, 2003). studies examining social determinants of health have included multiple elements in their models, including income, education, indigenous status, gender, occupational status, employment status and working conditions, food security, housing, membership in a racialized group, access to health care services, addictions, and disability status (denton, prus, & walters, 2004; kosteniuk & dickinson, 2003; mikkonen & raphael, 2010; phac, 2010; raphael, 2009). education is a critical social determinant of health (marmot & wilkinson, 2005; mikkonen & raphael, 2010) and is closely tied to both positive health outcomes and socioeconomic status, as those with higher education levels are more likely to be healthier than those with lower education levels (phac, 2010). literacy, for both children and adults, contributes significantly to positive health and wellbeing for individuals, communities, and society more broadly by providing people with critical knowledge and skills, which can develop into effective environmental mastery (phac, 2010). moreover, educational achievement improves access to opportunities for income security, job security, and job satisfaction; thereby providing substantial benefits from both an economic and social justice-based perspective (suhrcke & kenkel, 2015; u.s. department of health and human services, 2013). as such, indigeneity and education are intersecting social determinants of health; in communities across canada, educational success remains out of reach for disproportionately large numbers of indigenous youth and adults. this study examined the intersection of these two social determinants of health— indigenous status and education—through the exploration of educational engagement in secondary 1 ives and sinha: exploring the intersection of education and indigenous status published by scholarship@western, 2016 school for inuit parents and families, secondary school students, educators, and other inuit community members in an inuit community in nunavik, northern quebec. key project objectives included: a. to better understand the relationship between indigenous and non-indigenous peoples and their respective intellectual and cultural traditions; b. to contribute to the expansion of research capacity and expertise of inuit community members through the training of students engaged in the study; and c. to increase awareness of traditional indigenous knowledge and knowledge systems in contemporary educational contexts. the study was intended as an initial step towards facilitating meaningful educational engagement for inuit families, secondary school students, educators, and other community members with the long-term goal of using the findings to develop interventions designed to increased student retention rates. the primary question guiding the research was: in what ways do key stakeholder groups in an inuit community in nunavik conceptualize academic success and family engagement in the secondary school system? l i t e r a t u r e r e v i e w e d u c a t i o n a s a s o c i a l d e t e r m i n a n t o f h e a l t h education contributes a unique element to one’s social status trajectory, which includes aspects that make it critical to health; it intersects with other social determinants to influence health in all stages of one’s life course, beginning in childhood (arim, tam, bougie, & kohen, 2016). for example, the relationship between children’s educational performance and their parents’ education levels would be weakened if affordable and high quality early learning programs were available in canada (mikkonen & raphael, 2010). the absence of such programs has a major influence on vulnerable children’s intellectual and emotional development. educational achievement sets the scaffolding for building social status at the start of adulthood, functioning as the main bridge between generations and also as the primary path of upward mobility (mirowsky & ross, 2003). education accomplishes this through its influence on occupation and occupational status, wages, personal and household income and wealth. education can also promote the adoption of healthy behaviors, increase options and awareness of options for addressing ill health and stress, and offer either freedom from economic hardship or a buffer in difficult economic times (mikkonen & raphael, 2010). one’s income potential is directly related to one’s accrual of abilities, skills, and educational experiences in childhood, which is directly linked to one’s ability as an adult to find employment. thus, education is considered a key mediator in this association, one that is firmly shaped by family context in childhood and becomes a key determinant of one’s income in adulthood (benzeval, judge, & shouls, 2001). during economic crises, having an education can facilitate one’s ability to negotiate with one’s employer, make one more resourceful, and improve one’s chances of obtaining whatever one might need and/or improvising with what one has (mirowsky & ross, 2003). education has also been found to make a 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 4 [2016], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.4.4 person more adept at societal and economic resource substitution (which is defined as using one thing in place of another). those with more education have an increased capacity for resource substitution, which makes the absence of any one resource less harmful, while those with lower education levels are less skilled at obtaining and creating resources, thus increasing one’s dependence on each standard resource (mirowsky & ross, 2003). as education contributes important effects to one’s life trajectory, including comprehensive effects on health, increasing the educational attainment of nunavik’s inuit population is a key societal goal. p a r e n t e n g a g e m e n t a s a d e t e r m i n a n t o f e d u c a t i o n a l s u c c e s s decades of research has shown that engaging schools, parents, and communities in partnership improves children’s educational outcomes (see eccles & harold, 1996; epstein, 2001; hill & taylor, 2004; lamb-parker, piotrkowski, & peay, 1987; lamb-parker et al., 2001). a significant part of this engagement involves negotiating the “culture of schooling” (weaver, 2007). this negotiation can be challenging for families from vulnerable populations, particularly for those in communities which, because of oppression, racism, and the historical intergenerational trauma from residential schools, find it challenging to interact with school communities and have feelings of distrust toward public educational institutions (madden, higgins, & korteweg, 2013; nekhwevha, 1999). epstein (1987, 2001) developed a theory of overlapping spheres of influence with regard to educational engagement, hypothesizing that student performance is enhanced when stakeholders work together to support learning and development. this theory emphasizes the need for collaborative relationships among “parents, educators and community partners that help them to understand each other’s views, to identify common goals for students and to appreciate each other’s contributions to student development” (epstein & sheldon, 2006, p. 119). the goal is to develop greater congruence between the values, norms, and goals that are endorsed in the three spheres. research has shown that engaging schools, parents, and communities in partnership improves children’s educational outcomes (lamb-parker et al., 2001; lawson & alameda-lawson, 2012). moreover, parental engagement has been theoretically linked to improved student behavior and academic achievement in schools (hill & taylor, 2004; kingston et al., 2013). by establishing relationships with schools, parents gain important information about the academic and behavioral expectations the school has for their students, and they learn to become partners in helping children meet these goals (sheldon & epstein, 2002). traditionally, parents’ engagement in their children’s education follows a “support model,” whereby parents assist the work of teachers, both at home and in school. yet, research has shown that parental engagement within this model often depends on their socioeconomic status and the role that education plays in their families (brown & beckett, 2007). for example, smrekar and cohenvogel (2001) found that low-income parents of colour tended to fall into a socially constructed role and “learn to think of themselves more as supporters, helpers, and fundraisers, than decision makers, partners and collaborators” (p. 87). similarly, friedel (1999) found that indigenous parents accepted that schoolteachers and administrators were “experts” who knew what was best for their children. smrekar and cohen-vogel (2001) suggested replacing a “support model” with a “partnership model” in which parents and teachers partner to build stronger school communities and families. this may be helpful in deconstructing existing perceptions that shape and delimit school–community interactions. 3 ives and sinha: exploring the intersection of education and indigenous status published by scholarship@western, 2016 s o c i a l d e t e r m i n a n t s o f h e a l t h f o r i n d i g e n o u s p e o p l e s in canada, indigenous peoples are disproportionately affected by determinants that impact physical and mental health across the board (baydala, ruttan, & starkes, 2015). indigenous peoples experience lower life expectancy, higher morbidity and mortality rates, and higher incidences of family abuse, alcoholism, injuries and deaths from injuries, living in substandard housing, unemployment, and exposure to environmental contaminants (hoover et al., 2012; organization for economic co-operation and development [oecd], 2002; plourde, 2007; saylor, 2004). life expectancy and infant mortality illustrate significant disparities. in 2001, the life expectancy for the total canadian population, was 77 years for men and 82 years for women, compared to 71 years for indigenous men and 77 years for indigenous women (statistics canada, 2006); the estimated life expectancy for inuit was 63 years for men and 72 years for women. indigenous peoples are more likely to die from injuries or poison, have 3 times the rate of diabetes than non-indigenous peoples in canada (oecd, 2002), and have twice the incidences of disability (veenstra, 2009) than other members of the canadian population. furthermore, the incarceration rate of indigenous peoples is 8.5 times higher than that of non-indigenous peoples in canada (oecd, 2002). the suicide rate is also much higher for indigenous youth than for any other group of canadian youth, and inuit have one of the highest suicide rates in the world (fraser, geoffroy, chachamovich, & kirmayer, 2015; kral, idlout, minore, dyck, & kirmayer, 2014; morris & crooks, 2015). indigenous peoples also experience lower graduation rates from high school and lower rates of higher education. in 2011, 48% of indigenous peoples aged 25 to 64 had a postsecondary qualification—in comparison, 65% of non-indigenous peoples in the same age group had some postsecondary qualification (statistics canada, 2015). educational outcomes for inuit populations were even poorer than for other indigenous groups; only 36% of inuit (aged 25-64) reported having postsecondary qualifications (statistics canada, 2015). in terms of parent engagement, studies have found a willingness on the part of indigenous parents to be involved in their children’s education, but parents’ own educational experiences, many of which ranged from negative to traumatic, have engrained a deep distrust of the current educational system, and have created serious barriers to their effective engagement (fisher & campbell, 2002; robinson-zanartu & majel-dixon, 1996). the legacies left by residential schools have had a substantial effect on family–school relations. previous studies found that a critical challenge to educational success was the history of trauma associated with a school environment (ives et al., 2012; yi et al., 2015). e d u c a t i o n a s a s o c i a l d e t e r m i n a n t i n n u n a v i k , q u e b e c nunavik, in northern quebec, is home to more than 12,000 residents, spread out across 14 villages that lack road access to southern quebec; of the 12,000, 90% are inuit (kativik regional government, n.d.; statistics canada, 2015). inuit have inhabited the northern quebec region for thousands of years, experiencing extraordinary social upheaval and transformation during the last century. traditionally, inuit of nunavik were a semi-nomadic people with a subsistence-based economy (pauktuutit inuit women of canada, 2006). in the 1940s and 1950s, the end of the fur trade and subsequent movement of inuit to permanent settlements undermined the traditional, semi-nomadic and subsistence-based lifestyle (duhaime, 2008; mcshane, hastings, smylie, prince, & tungasuvvingat inuit family resource center, 2009). the development of the residential boarding schools further divided inuit families, 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 4 [2016], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.4.4 creating a dramatic example of parent–child isolation, family dismemberment and trauma, and cultural erosion (stairs, 1992). in the face of this, however, inuit of nunavik have achieved remarkable cultural continuity—inuit control their own school board, inuktitut is spoken by over 95% of the region’s inuit population, and education is delivered in inuktitut through grade 3 (duhaime, lévesque, & caron, 2015; kativik school board, n.d.a). however, statistics on health and social determinants of health reveal the serious challenges faced by residents. the current life expectancy in nunavik is 66 years, and nunavut’s infant mortality rate is 3 times the canadian average (marchildon & torgerson, 2013; nunavik regional board of health and social services, 2011). in 2011, unemployment was 14.1% in nunavik for inuit, nearly double the rate of unemployment in quebec as a whole (7.2%), and the average household income is lower than in quebec as a whole (median income before tax for inuit in 2011 was $20,826 vs. $71,627 for non-inuit (duhaime et al., 2015). educational statistics also demonstrate ongoing challenges that take on special significance in the context of a region in which 1 in 3 residents is under the age of 15 (nunavik regional board of health and social services, 2012). in 2011, approximately 60% of inuit aged 15 and over had no high school certificate, diploma, or degree, compared to approximately 22% of the same age group in quebec excluding nunavik (duhaime et al., 2015, see table 6.2.3). for that same age group in the same year, only 10.4% had a university certificate, diploma, or degree equal to or above bachelor’s degree, compared to 23.3% for the same group in quebec excluding nunavik (duhaime et al., 2015). this low level of educational achievement reflects student and parent disengagement from education (steinberg, 1996). continuing high drop-out rates will further the social exclusion of canada’s inuit population in northeastern canada and ensure that the majority of jobs requiring higher education qualifications continue to remain out of reach for a majority of the region’s inuit population, thereby contributing to high unemployment levels. studies have found high levels of academic disengagement of inuit students in nunavik (berger, epp, & møller, 2006; freed & samson, 2004), and the importance of community and parental engagement has been recognized in inuit communities. one recommendation made following the nunavik educational task force in 1990 was that “each school should be a true community school that makes parents a valued and welcomed part of the learning process and that helps people understand the potential and uses of education” (vick-westgate, 2002, p. 288). in a discussion paper written for the national inuit education summit in 2008, parental and community involvement were highlighted as two ways to increase children’s regular school attendance (taylor, 2007). despite many parents’ willingness and motivation to be involved in their children’s education, language barriers, differing expectations of teachers’ and parents’ roles, as well as mistrust of the school setting have been found to be contributing factors to low parental engagement in school life (fuzessy, 2003). a study conducted in nunavik with former members of the region’s school board examined potential factors affecting the ongoing underachievement of inuit students (fuzessy, 2003), and researchers found that perceived cultural dissonance between non-inuit teachers and inuit students limited the teachers’ capacity to fully empower inuit students. 5 ives and sinha: exploring the intersection of education and indigenous status published by scholarship@western, 2016 a lack of synergy between the structure of pedagogy and formal education in inuit communities and inuit experiences and realities often leave inuit parents at a loss as to how they can partner with schools to support their children (taylor, 2007). mistrust of the formal education system due to many parents’ own negative schooling experiences, often rooted in the history of colonization, and feelings of inadequacy when meeting with inuit or qallunaat (non-inuit) educators are mentioned as possible obstacles to parental engagement in school settings (fisher & campbell, 2002; taylor, 2007). m e t h o d building on knowledge and contacts developed through prior research in nunavik, the research team partnered with inuit and non-inuit members of key social and political institutions in one nunavik community to form an advisory committee to guide a study focused on parental engagement in schools. the advisory committee was composed of representatives from the community secondary school, school board, regional government, and an organization mandated to protect the political, cultural, and economic rights and interests provided by the 1975 james bay and northern quebec agreement. initially, in addition to recruiting participants, the plan was for the advisory committee to develop the questions for all focus groups and interviews—except for the focus group with secondary school students—in conjunction with the research team. however, as a main study goal was to engage secondary students in the process of learning about community perspectives on an issue through group interviews, a decision was made, jointed by the advisory committee and the research team, to work with the students to develop all questions that would be used in the study. thus, in the fall of 2010, with the support of one of the committee members who was an administrator in the local secondary school, study researchers co-developed interview questions with 14 inuit secondary school students who volunteered to participate in the study. two research team members worked with secondary 4 and 5 students1 over the course of a ½-day workshop, using various brainstorming exercises to develop thematic areas for focus group questions as well as specific questions that students wanted other participant groups to answer. researchers then brought these student-generated questions to the advisory committee, which provided feedback in order to refine the questions and develop the interview guides used in all focus groups and interviews. interviews were conducted in 2011 and 2012. purposive sampling was used to recruit the majority of respondents, identified by the advisory committee. additional participants (i.e., school-leavers and one undergraduate student) were recruited using snowball sampling. the sample consisted of 29 nunavimmiut and 6 non-inuit. focus groups exploring perceptions of strengths and challenges related to academic retention of youth living in the community were conducted with inuit secondary school students (1 group, n=14), inuit elders (1 group, n = 6), non-inuit teachers (1 group, n = 6; inuit teachers were also invited, but declined to participate for undisclosed reasons), and inuit youth school-leavers (1 group, n = 4) using semistructured, open-ended questions. individual interviews exploring the same topics were conducted with an inuk undergraduate student (n = 1) and inuit parents (n = 4). all focus groups and interviews were 1 high school in quebec is secondary 1 through secondary 5, followed by collège d'enseignement général et professionnel (cegep) for two years. secondary 4 is equivalent to grade 10 and secondary 5 is grade 11. thus, an undergraduate university degree is three years if the student was educated in quebec. for those students who feel that they need additional support before cegep, there is a secondary 6 program such as the one in kangiqsujuaq. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 4 [2016], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.4.4 audio-recorded except for the elders’ focus group, where an interpreter was used and the researchers took notes. it should be noted that all secondary teachers were invited to participate in the teachers’ group; however, only non-inuit teachers attended. interview and focus group questions focused on four primary domains: challenges to school completion; experiences in school; challenges to negotiating home, school, and cultural contexts; and resources for addressing challenges. the focus group with youth school-leavers also explored reasons for dropping out of school and perceptions of supports that could have contributed to retention. the parent interviews and the focus group with elders explored educational needs for students and families, their own educational experiences, their experiences with their children’s schools, barriers to participation, expectations and hopes for children’s education, and how they see their engagement with education. focus group questions with teachers explored their efforts to engage parents, how they conceptualize parent and family engagement in education, ways they could be supported in facilitating family engagement, their perceptions of inuit parents and families, and their perceptions of education’s role in inuit communities. researchers employed thematic content analysis to interpret the qualitative data. interviews and focus groups were transcribed verbatim. open coding was used first, followed by more selective coding. for thematic analysis, coding consisted of breaking the text into small pieces and then interpreting it using data-developed frames, an asset-based theoretical framework, and previous empirical research (grbich, 2007). nvivo qualitative data analysis software facilitated this work. researchers co-coded the transcripts, discussing similarities and differences in their interpretations. these initial findings were shared with the advisory committee for feedback. discussions produced categories that emerged from the data as well as those that related specifically to study goals of exploring educational engagement and academic retention. f i n d i n g s there was general agreement among all respondents that education—either formal education in the canadian system and/or cultural education—is an important factor in shaping the overall health of the region. they also agreed that many challenges present in modern-day inuit communities, such as substance abuse, suicide, domestic violence, and early pregnancy, shape students’ experiences in the classroom and function as a hindrance for students’ academic success. such challenges are also a part of the social determinants of health model. each group of participants had slightly different perceptions of parental roles in education, particularly concerning how to be engaged. the following sections present major themes from participants, broken down into the following categories: students, school-leavers, teachers, and parents and elders. s t u d e n t i n t e r v i e w s the focus group of secondary students consisted of 14 students who had all helped to create the interview questions. student focus group participants and the post-secondary student interview participant spoke about the support and motivation they felt for attending school, particularly from relatives and peers, the school, and the community. they were motivated not just by parents, but also by grandparents, boyfriends or girlfriends, and friends to stay in school. they also noted seeing other students drop out and observing the consequences of that decision, which they perceived as being 7 ives and sinha: exploring the intersection of education and indigenous status published by scholarship@western, 2016 negative. these observations served to push them harder and to set goals for the future. for one student, her sister’s school-leaving experiences were a strong motivation to stay in school: i stayed in school because i saw my sister dropping out, trying to get a family already, so i kept on going and going. some expected to still be in school in 10 years (i.e., in college or medical school); others thought they might still be unemployed in nunavik. participants most often spoke of support from relatives and peers. the post-secondary student participant noted that parental encouragement was the most important factor in helping students remain in school: encouragement and support. the main one. and telling them ok, we’ll always be there for you, i know you are having a hard time and its difficult, but stay there and do your best. that will boost students up. however, students did not feel that their parents were directly involved in their education: in other words, parental encouragement did not translate into engagement with the school. for some parents, there was the barrier that they themselves had not completed secondary school, which, in the eyes of one student, could make it harder for parents to be role models for secondary school completion: the first thing i would say would be role models, but most parents too haven’t finished high school either. some students also identified “engagement” as the behavior of parents who spoiled their children, with some even giving them a “payoff” to attend school. students noted that this type of “engagement” was often to children’s detriment. one student described this as a vicious cycle: you don’t need to spoil kids just to go to school, because they are just gonna ask more and more, and then the parents are gonna get fed up. that’s how the students are gonna get dropped out. students identified commonly cited challenges as barriers to success in school, such as early pregnancy, substance abuse by students and family members, and overcrowded, inadequate housing as well as not being challenged enough. it was this last barrier that echoed among participants as particularly frustrating. for example, several students noted that they believed students their own age in southern, non-inuit quebec communities knew more because their teachers had higher expectations than the teachers in their community. they felt teachers in nunavik adapted the curriculum for the students, in a sense, “dummying it down” for them. when asked what the school could do to help students, several wanted to be challenged more and, specifically, as one student noted, to be given: harder work! because down south, quebec, 16 year olds pass secondary 5, but we’re older than that, and it feels like we’re dumb. [laughter] a little more harder work! this made them feel unprepared in terms of higher education and job market participation, and hurt their self-esteem. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 4 [2016], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.4.4 students described characteristics of teachers they liked: those who took the time to get to know them, explained subjects and materials in detail, had an engaging teaching style, and were motivating. unpopular teachers were described as those who were nagging, never asked questions, or were afraid of students. they cited enjoying “interest” classes (i.e., music, cooking, sewing, carpentry), and lamented that they had been removed from the curriculum: they took [interest classes] off the schedule, and like, everybody would be here, i mean, not just because of interests, but everybody was here, and it had more good teachers and everything, and it was fun . . . funner than now. while students wanted to have teachers who made an effort to get to know them better, there was also hesitation and mistrust on their part. in particular, students spoke of how they suffered as a result of high teacher turnover. the post-secondary student expressed this, stating: when there’s a lot of turnovers, there’s not much we could learn. furthermore, participants in the student and teacher focus groups explained that there were no substitute teachers to fill teaching vacancies so students were sent home during classes when there are no teachers. this problem was exemplified by the post-secondary student who recalled a situation where: there was this culture teacher . . . but this teacher, i don’t know, he stopped working, and all the boys when it was time for culture, they went home. students also desired greater language advancement in french and english to increase employment opportunities in southern quebec communities. overall, students wished for greater guidance regarding options after high school; several students were concerned about what they felt was an absence of effective preparation for post-secondary education. when asked about what they thought college would entail, one student replied: it sounds harder, or something. it sounds so hard, i don’t know. it feels like i’m not gonna make it. there are no post-secondary opportunities in nunavik, requiring students to go to southern quebec for further education and thus leave their families and communities. one student, when asked if she felt prepared for college, responded: no . . . no. i’m so scared to be on my own. the post-secondary student referred to how secondary schools could offer more support to students who are transitioning from high school to postsecondary education: i wish there was more of a booklet that says, here’s what [university] offers, and they say you need to take level 2 for the first year and level 3 on the second. i wish they informed us that. i was so lost when i was trying to make my courses and my schedules. 9 ives and sinha: exploring the intersection of education and indigenous status published by scholarship@western, 2016 students described wanting additional support for subjects to enable them to pass the exams required for college, such as “extra work, extra time” suggested by one student and “afterschool prep, stuff” by another. when a third student disagreed with those suggestions—“that’s like detention”—another student retorted, “but you’re learning.” students noted that one teacher offered a voluntary afterschool session for students interested in strengthening their knowledge of that particular subject. students expressed pride in their cultural education and wished there were more cultural accommodations for them in school, such as the goose break given to cree students. they were proud of their ability to succeed in inuktitut and wished to preserve this in school. several voiced the desire to continue more intensive study of inuktitut, with the same amount of time devoted to inuktitut as english or french in grade 4 and higher. one student felt that although their education was in english the school needed to help students improve their english proficiency since some who graduated were not able to go straight to collège d'enseignement général et professionnel (cegep)2 after secondary 5: some of us, we didn’t pass the [test of english as a foreign language (toefl)] test to go to college, so some of us must go to wakeham bay to go to secondary 6. some of us passed our toefl. arsaniq school in kangirsujuaq, also known as wakeham bay, has a post-secondary preparation program, which is considered secondary 6. from 2015 to 2016, there were 6 students enrolled in the program (kativik school board, n.d.b). s c h o o l l e a v e r i n t e r v i e w s those who had dropped out of school had a wide range of experiences with school. some recalled once enjoying school, and cited parental support or their own perceived success or intelligence as motivating factors, along with socializing with friends. reasons participants left school included bullying, early pregnancy, and succumbing to substance abuse. all expressed regret that they had left school. the school-leavers described bullying, by both boys and girls, as a central reason for dropping out of school. [i] really liked the work and all that, but it was just that [my] classmates were teasing [me] and all that. [i] really wanted to graduate but [i] couldn’t concentrate on work . . . i told them i don’t have to be beautiful or anything in any way to graduate, i can do this and they said, no you’re not. say whatever you want, i continued, i kept telling those girls, and i got tired of it and just decided to drop out. three participants also spoke of substance use, both by students and by members of their family, as an issue that negatively affected staying in school. one youth who had dropped out of school shared: when i got into drugs, i didn’t want to do anything. i mean it, anything. it felt like drugs were they only thing that kept me going but i was like, “this is stopping me from education.” 2 a cegep is a publicly funded pre-university college in quebec's educational system. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 4 [2016], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.4.4 another school-leaver described how her family life interfered with her ability to stay in school: we were in school because every lunch, we go home, our mother’s drinking and nothing to eat. kinda hard for kids like us. nothing to do. always have to be at our aunt’s house or grandma’s house to eat, or friends at their house to eat with them. it was kinda embarrassing at that moment. tensions between inuit and qallunaat teaching styles, as well as tensions between groups of students of different backgrounds and ages, served as demotivating factors for staying in school. grouping together students with different educational abilities and ages made some feel behind, while others did not feel challenged. one school-leaver described this phenomenon: in my age group, we were in high school secondary 3, 4, 5 together. it was a challenge when you were in secondary 3 to be in the same class as secondary 5. we had a lot of mix of inuit and qallunaat, it was difficult, a challenge for the group to work together with the other groups . . . when you are in a classroom when some are 12 and some are 18, they treat you like a kid, it’s frustrating. even if you are almost at the same level, like you ask a question, it makes you not want to ask questions and just be quiet. that’s how i felt. some who left high school found adult education to be a good option, and others had opportunities for learning through training offered by organizations outside of nunavik. still, some respondents described leaving adult education or even college because they felt that it did not meet their practical needs, and they found work more compelling. those who left adult education or college did so to work. there was still regret, however, over not completing secondary school. one participant still held onto the hope of finishing one day, but wrestled with the time required while also needing to work full time: i was in adult ed. [education] in 2010, i wanted to graduate because a friend of mine had graduated and i was really proud of her. and i wish i could get that same graduation. exams came and i kept failing, i don’t know how many times, i kinda lost count . . . because my mom told me to work and i wanted to finish my education at the same time. i had to go work, and i didn’t know what to do. respondents delineated several ways to support students to stay in school, starting with encouragement and prevention (i.e., birth control, substance abuse prevention education) at a young age. they also suggested a college in nunavik so that traditional lifestyles could be maintained while pursuing further education. if that were an option, people would not have to leave their families and homes: college in nunavik would be awesome. evening course. if there’s a college for evening course for people that work, who want to get degrees. i really want more inuit to finish their school. their future. they also recommended that teachers communicate more with parents so that parents have a clear idea of how their children are doing in the classroom. 11 ives and sinha: exploring the intersection of education and indigenous status published by scholarship@western, 2016 t e a c h e r i n t e r v i e w s the teachers interviewed were all from southern quebec because inuit teachers declined the invitation to participate in the focus group. teacher participants described a range of classroom experiences ranging from very positive to very challenging. challenges ranged from multifaceted educational roles to promoting parent engagement in a community with a difficult history with formal education. teachers saw their place in the school as being role models, motivators, and even counselors, straying from the traditional teaching role in the south. teachers felt a great weight in terms of the many hats that they were expected to wear in order to provide an environment where learning could take place. one teacher stated: you know if you have that parental support et cetera it makes a difference. the school for as long as i know has been sort of asked almost to be the parents. to be the teachers. in some cases to be the grandparents and the nurses. there’s a lot of things that are asked, and i know it’s common too in other schools. but without the foundation addressed here it’s very hard for good learning. so it’s like a vicious circle. if you don’t do some of these other things that are important, the learning doesn’t happen. teachers also saw themselves as needing to provide consistency and security for children who may not have it in other areas of their lives. two teachers described how they approached their teaching roles by “setting a tone for the kids to help them navigate their way better in this environment” and “creating a sense of consistency too that allows them to just feel comfortable in that space for however long they’re there for.” teachers also touched on the issues of expectations of and from students, echoing some of the frustrations expressed by participants in the student focus group. facilitating learning in an environment containing “a great range of abilities within a single classroom” was, according to one teacher, a significant challenge. one teacher noted that it was difficult to motivate all students consistently given community challenges that affected both students and teachers: one of the challenges too . . . [is] how to maintain high expectations but at the same time deal with the various realities that confront children amongst themselves but also the staff and how you go about working and teaching in this environment. and that’s sometimes very difficult. how do you maintain high expectations? teachers found that these roles were challenging and “not for the faint of heart,” but could be rewarding if teachers felt comfortable changing their perception of their role to fit these needs of inuit students. they described some frustration that parents rarely asked for help, although they expressed respect for parents who grew up with a completely different education system. one teacher described what he perceived as a lack of communication in the school as due to parents not seeing value in their children’s education: parents don’t demand very much, and that in itself is a problem . . . i’ve worked in all kinds of communities and in other countries of the world, but parents [. . .] when they see a value, when they want their children to be educated, they want to be involved in the school, and they want to 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 4 [2016], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.4.4 be there to ask the questions and to sometimes question what is being done . . . i very rarely get a parent here that ever asks me anything. and often times i’m the one that’s calling to ask them and so i find that odd. another teacher attributed parents’ lack of connection to the school as grounded in their historical relationship with education as it used to exist in the north. a lot of the families don’t have a background of going to school. the other thing too is the federal government and the provincial government here, in my background, they were the mama and the papa, the father and the mother, when they were here and believe me they never asked too many questions. a lot of stuff was done without a lot of consent, so there hasn’t been the experience of advocating for your children in a certain way. teachers commented that those who did have parental support did better in class. they wished more parents found teachers approachable and came for report card night. there was full agreement among the teachers that the key to success in the classroom was having a relationship with parents, which meant being approachable and taking the time to get to know students, their families, the land, and inuit culture. one teacher noted that her experience seeing students on the land helped her better understand how to teach them and challenged what she had considered valuable education. i remember there was this one time when i went out on the land with some of the kids, and they’re different on the land. and they’re beautiful to watch cause they’re just free. they’re wonderful. and then we went back to school and we were writing and it just struck me, “what am i doing? what am i teaching them?” it is finding a balance. it’s hard. if a central goal for the school board is to increase the educational attainment of nunavik’s youth, given the difficult history that parents and grandparents may have had with formal education, the school board and teachers need to be creative in their attempts to engage parents. one teacher suggested that the school: find some simpler ideas to invite parents in so perhaps they’ll feel more comfortable when the parents’ night comes around or something like that. and the kids whose parents do show up to things like that feel pretty good. they like to see their families come in. you’re not going to do that 100 times a year, but there’s ways that schools can reach out too. teachers have seen that parental engagement makes a difference to students, parents, teachers, and the broader community. completing high school is an important goal for students, even if they do not feel that college is in their future. some teachers felt that college was not necessarily the answer for all students, since it might not meet their needs as inuit community members. however, all respondents recognized that completing high school provides positive options in the community and in the south, thereby allowing students to choose their own paths. 13 ives and sinha: exploring the intersection of education and indigenous status published by scholarship@western, 2016 p a r e n t i n t e r v i e w s a n d e l d e r i n t e r v i e w s this section is based on four interviews with parents and a focus group with elders. given the small numbers of parent and elder participants, and the commonalities among the themes they discussed, we present analysis of the data for these two groups together. elders and parents we spoke with noted that their own school experiences were drastically different from the experiences of students today—they learned orally from those around them, and from their own parents and grandparents. elders noted that their learning was highly participatory, and occurred mostly outside the classroom: we learn from doing . . . not from paper or reading because that’s what our ancestors were like, and we continue that education, that’s how we learn. they valued hunting as the key piece of their education, and saw it as crucial to pass down to youth. they also described teaching others through observation and storytelling. parents also noted the reduced respect they felt children and youth had today for both qallunaat authority and parental authority. for example, one parent said that it used to be expected that parents ensured that children woke up early and were prepared for school each day—now, she felt that that was no longer the case, and the greater freedoms today’s youth enjoyed were negatively impacting parental authority. she recalled that her mother would “wake us up even if we don’t want to wake up.” when asked whether she did the same with her son, she replied: i tried . . . [youth] are more free of everything. they’re free to have friends, girlfriend or boyfriend. they’re free to go to the store by themselves. i wasn’t. elders expressed concern regarding what society was asking of today’s inuit youth, noting that the difficulties they faced, including dropping out of school, were because the youth were “not listening well . . . one person cannot have two ways of life being taught to them at once.” another respondent noted that if they were learning two ways, they would not be able to learn well in both ways, in two cultures. the elders were also concerned that, because teachers in the secondary school are primarily from the south, they do not know the inuit way of life. they wanted important pieces of cultural education to be included in the curriculum, such as building an igloo, and noted that these pieces were not being taught to youth. they cited family members as important bearers of this cultural education, for those who still knew it. parents also expressed a desire for more cultural education, stating that culture classes in the school were commendable, but that they did not go far enough. parents saw themselves as the primary cultural educators for their children, and noted that the different cultural contexts and value systems of qallunaat teachers caused tensions in the classroom. parents expected schools to address the social realities of students, many of whom may suffer from learning disabilities, mental health issues, or substance abuse. they wished that teachers would reach out more than just to inform them of behavioral and/or academic issues. thus, they saw communication with the school as primarily negative. parents criticized the high teacher turnover, making it difficult for 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 4 [2016], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.4.4 both students and parents to develop relationships with teachers. parents were not able to describe details of their children’s school experiences or make recommendations as to what they thought the school could improve. there was interest in their report cards, but no participation in report card night. all interviewees relayed a sense that parents were concerned about their children’s educations but were at a loss as to how to help. similarly, while elders felt that community presence in the school was not frequent enough, they did not think that they knew enough about modern-day curricula to be helpful in school. at the same time, elders recognized the inability to go back in time and acknowledged the importance of modern education, mentioning that children should attend school. d i s c u s s i o n adopting a social determinants of health approach means shifting the focus of health policy and service provision with regard to how a society organizes and distributes resources and the ways in which that organization and distribution impacts health outcomes, in multiple contexts, over one’s life course (raphael, 2009). these determinants are not mutually exclusive; they overlap, shape, and influence each other. education is a key social determinant of health, impacting occupation and occupational status, wages and economic security, income and wealth, options for promoting healthy behaviors, and good health (ives, denov & sussman, 2015; mikkonen & raphael, 2010). individual income potential is directly related to the accrual of abilities and skills, which impact adults’ abilities to find employment. education is a key mediator in this association, and, accordingly, is a fundamental determinant of health over the life course (mirowsky & ross, 2003). the importance of promoting educational attainment is enhanced in an inuit context, wherein health, socioeconomic, and educational outcomes lag far below the general canadian population (duhaim et al., 2015; marchildon & torgerson, 2013; nunavik regional board of health and social services, 2011) and the legacies left by residential schools have substantially damaged family–school relations to the detriment of present-day educational achievement (fisher & campbell, 2002; taylor, 2007). overlapping spheres theory and research suggests that collaborative relationships between parents, educators, and community partners can promote educational attainment by strengthening shared understanding of roles and responsibilities and by supporting the development of common goals, values, and norms across contexts students navigate (epstein & sheldon, 2006). participants in our study expressed shared perspectives and experiences that were consistent with overlapping spheres theory, highlighting both the perceived importance of congruence between school and family domains and the ways in which challenges to developing such congruence negatively impacted educational attainment. students emphasized the important role that parents, as well as extended family and friendship networks, play in motivating educational success. however, they also noted parent disengagement from educational processes, and uncertainty about the best ways to support students’ educational attainment. both parents and teachers echoed these sentiments. parents expressed a desire for more engagement with the school, but also uncertainty about how to do so. likewise, teachers also expressed a desire for increased parent engagement, but indicated they were not sure how to facilitate engagement. in keeping with prior research, some participants partially linked parental disengagement with residential schools and a history of colonization (fisher & campbell, 2002; taylor, 2007). teachers, students, school-leavers, and parents also highlighted the overlap between home and school spheres in discussing the impact of the social and economic realities students face at home on education. 15 ives and sinha: exploring the intersection of education and indigenous status published by scholarship@western, 2016 students and school-leavers described overcrowded housing, lack of sufficient food in the home, substance abuse by family members, and other challenges in the home as being barriers to educational performance. teachers spoke of the burden of addressing and adapting to students’ social realities, noting the need to play an almost parental role. parents expressed expectations that teachers seek to adapt to social realities. each group pointed to the inextricable links between home and school, and to the academic challenges that flowed from the disconnection between home and school contexts. parents further pointed to a possible solution, expressing expectations that teachers communicate with them about more than just students’ behavioral and academic problems. in keeping with past research, which has emphasized cultural dissonance as a key factor contributing to high dropout rates and low student achievement (fuzessy, 2003), participants in our study did note the impact of cultural dissonance on education in their community. elders pointed to the difference in qallunaat and inuit teaching and learning styles, lamenting southern teachers’ lack of cultural knowledge. parents also spoke of wanting more integration of cultural knowledge in education, identifying parents as the primary teachers of culture. both parents and elders noted a lack of respect from children, tying this to shifting cultural standards, and emphasizing the challenges this posed for adults seeking to support students’ educational attainment. however, our data pointed to an even more fundamental set of issues that must be addressed before cultural dissonance can be tackled. at the core of these issues is the problem of high teacher turnover. students described a pattern in which teachers came to the community and left shortly thereafter. teachers’ leaving disrupted the course of their academic studies and resulted in a general lowering of academic standards. in addition, student participants shared that high turnover resulted in a reluctance on their part to develop relationships with teachers. another outcome of high teacher turnover was an increased academic workload, as well as the need to provide emotional supports for students, among teachers who stayed. while the problem of turnover was pervasive, students expressed appreciation for non-inuit teachers who had lived and worked in the community for extended periods. one approach to addressing turnover could be to improve preparation and orientation for teachers who come from outside the community by supporting inuit-designed cultural immersion for non-inuit secondary school teachers (ives & loft, 2013). an in-depth orientation learning experience, such as cultural immersion, designed by inuit and centered on inuit ways of knowing, learning, and being could reflect “indigenous forms of practice, that is, to provide professional services in a manner that is effective and consistent with local cultures and contexts—local knowledge, local traditions and local practices” (gray, coates, & bird, 2008, p. 6). this kind of experience, adapted for non-inuit teachers already working in inuit schools or new to a community, could enable teachers to learn firsthand from community members through presentations, interactive workshops, and cultural activities, including experiences on the land. integration of land-based activities, which represented a common interest among participants, might also serve as a platform for the integration of culture and the engagement of community members in education. culturally responsive and relevant educational approaches, including traditional, land-based education and technical education, could provide greater options for students struggling linguistically or academically. such approaches could include outdoor, land-based activities, in some cases under the direction of elders who may or may not have completed formal education. activities such as camping, 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 4 [2016], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.4.4 berry picking, boating, hunting, and carving could provide a forum for the transmission of cultural knowledge. these activities can be overlooked by the current educational system, although they are seen by community members as having a legitimate place in schools and could serve to bridge the educational approaches of the north and south (ives et al., 2012). students and school-leavers in our study noted a desire for additional guidance in preparing for postsecondary education. if reducing teacher turnover, integrating culture, and engaging community members through strategies like those discussed above mitigated the challenges that students and teachers reported, then they might result in greater capacity for the school to provide guidance on posthigh school options and better prepare students to meet southern educational standards. in addition, the development or promotion of post-secondary options designed for the north’s specific needs and facilitation of inuit language and culture-centered learning would also be of benefit. the territory of nunavut, where 85% of the population identifies as inuit (statistics canada, 2013), is home to nunavut arctic college, which seeks “to provide high quality educational opportunities to all residents of nunavut” and also “seeks to promote and preserve the use of traditional inuit knowledge and technology” (nunavut arctic college, 2015, para. 1, para. 7). accordingly, provincial–territorial cooperation between quebec and nunavut could be one path towards developing additional postsecondary options for nunavik’s youth. participant reflections on education and on the challenges of navigating the overlapping social spheres that shape education must be understood in the broader context of social determinants of health. from this framework, addressing the challenges to educational attainment that were highlighted in our research is central to the broader goal of addressing persistent and pronounced disparities in health outcomes for inuit of nunavik. s t u d y l i m i t a t i o n s a n d d i r e c t i o n s f o r f u t u r e r e s e a r c h this was an exploratory study involving a relatively small number of participants in 1 of the 14 communities in nunavik. the inclusion of different groups of participants—teachers, students, schoolleavers, parents, and elders—allowed for validation of findings through triangulation across groups, but the transferability of findings is limited by the small sample size and non-representative sample selection. in addition, the use of focus groups naturally privileged the voices and perspectives of more vocal participants over others. a final limitation is that all teacher participants were non-inuit; while invitations to participate were extended to inuit teachers, they declined for reasons that are not known to us. accordingly, research involving larger, more systematically selected samples, as well as research presenting the perspectives of inuit teachers, is required in order to validate and assess the transferability of the findings reported here. there is a need for further research that explores specific themes emerging from this study. in particular, additional research aimed at better understanding the factors that fuel high teacher turnover in nunavik and at supporting the development of policies to combat such turnover is needed. in addition, research exploring the ways in which curriculum requirements mandated by the quebec education ministry might integrate opportunities for inuit families to work alongside teachers to promote mutual collaboration and facilitate mutual respect and understanding of both inuit and non-inuit styles of learning would also be useful. finally, future research might also explore the potential for, and 17 ives and sinha: exploring the intersection of education and indigenous status published by 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(2015). factors influencing the health and wellness of urban aboriginal youths in canada: insights of in-service professionals, care providers, and stakeholders. american journal of public health, 105(5), 881-890. 10.2105/ajph.2014.302481 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 4 [2016], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.4.4 the international indigenous policy journal october 2016 exploring the intersection of education and indigenous status from a social determinants of health perspective: parent and family engagement in secondary school in nunavik nicole ives vandna sinha recommended citation exploring the intersection of education and indigenous status from a social determinants of health perspective: parent and family engagement in secondary school in nunavik abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license exploring the intersection of education and indigenous status from a social determinants of health perspective: parent and family engagement in secondary school in nunavik implementing indigenous and western knowledge systems (part 2): “you have to take a backseat” and abandon the arrogance of expertise the international indigenous policy journal volume 8 issue 4 reconciling research: perspectives on research involving indigenous peoples—part 2 article 8 october 2017 implementing indigenous and western knowledge systems (part 2): “you have to take a backseat” and abandon the arrogance of expertise heather e. castleden queen's university kingston, ontario, heather.castleden@queensu.ca debbie martin dalhousie university, debbie.martin@dal.ca ashlee cunsolo labrador institute, memorial university, ashlee.cunsolo@mun.ca sherilee harper university of guelph, harpers@uoguelph.ca catherine hart queen's university, cathart28@gmail.com see next page for additional authors recommended citation castleden, h. e. , martin, d. , cunsolo, a. , harper, s. , hart, c. , sylvestre, p. , stefanelli, r . , day, l. , lauridsen, k. (2017). implementing indigenous and western knowledge systems (part 2): “you have to take a backseat” and abandon the arrogance of expertise. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(4). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.8 implementing indigenous and western knowledge systems (part 2): “you have to take a backseat” and abandon the arrogance of expertise abstract despite innovative technological "solutions" to address ongoing water crises in indigenous communities, significant disparities persist in canada. financial investment in infrastructure is necessary, but it is hardly sufficient to address the real problem: entrenched colonialism. one of the greatest challenges in decolonizing research is to prevent that research from reproducing the very categories it is seeking to critique and dismantle. we share findings from thematically-analyzed interviews with academic and community-based researchers who conducted water research with a stated intent to implement western and indigenous knowledge systems. findings revealed that while there is co-learning, ontological and epistemological assumptions carried into these relationships often impede truly integrative practice. respondents shared how they worked through these persistent barriers of a colonial system. keywords indigenous knowledge systems, water research, water management, water policy, integrative knowledge, semistructured interviews, canada acknowledgments tremendous thanks go to those who agreed to participate in our study; your willingness to share your experiences allowed us to undertake the research described herein. thanks also to our national advisory committee as well as to those who participated in the water gatherings for your significant guidance on our interview protocol, our preliminary analysis, and our discussion about our findings. we particularly wish to thank mr. guy freedman, elders barbara dumont-hill, maria campbell, and albert dumont for helped us undertake this work with good hearts and minds, helping us to see ourselves, and our relationship to water, in new and wonderful ways. thank you to all those who passed on their knowledge from generation to generation, to those who shared this knowledge with us, and to those who will take this knowledge forward. the authors would also like to thank the canadian water network for funding this knowledge integration project, and we would like to thank the canadian water network’s research management committee for their ongoing feedback throughout the project. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. authors heather e. castleden, debbie martin, ashlee cunsolo, sherilee harper, catherine hart, paul sylvestre, robert stefanelli, lindsay day, and kaitlin lauridsen http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ i m p l e m e n t i n g i n d i g e n o u s a n d w e s t e r n k n o w l e d g e s y s t e m s ( p a r t 2 ) : “ y o u h a v e t o t a k e a b a c k s e a t ” a n d a b a n d o n t h e a r r o g a n c e o f e x p e r t i s e water plays a significant role in canada’s national identity (bakker, 2011). the network of freshwater rivers and lakes that thread their way across the landscape and into canadians’ geographical imagination creates the illusion of abundant fresh, clean, and safe water (bakker, 2011; sprague, 2007). this illusion was, at least momentarily, shaken when national news networks ran the results of a 2008 report published in the canadian medical association journal, which noted the existence of more than 1,700 active boil water advisories across the nation, some of which have persisted for years (eggertson, 2008). while shocking to some, the media frenzy sensationalized what has been a common occurrence for a significant number of indigenous (first nations, inuit, and métis) communities in canada for quite some time (mascarenhas, 2012; white, murphy, & spence, 2012)—not to mention indigenous communities around the globe with similar histories (e.g., mcoliver et al., 2015; rigby, rosen, berry, & hart, 2011; salmond, 2014). the commonness of occurrences like these, however, does not make them acceptable in a just society. the obvious question they pose is: why are these occurrences so common? the answer is similarly obvious, but by no means uncomplicated. despite increases in funding to support infrastructure “solutions” designed to address ongoing water crises in indigenous communities, significant disparities persist between indigenous and non-indigenous communities in canada. this problem is by no means exclusive to canada—indeed, it is part of a global crisis. while most of the 2.4 billion people without access to sufficient sanitation reside in the global south (world health organization [who], 2017), water quality and quantity disparities in indigenous communities of the global north demonstrate that this is not a “far away” problem, though it has implications for populations across the globe. financial investment in infrastructure is certainly necessary here as well, though it cannot sufficiently address the real problem: the systematic marginalization, or outright disavowal, of the critical role that indigenous knowledge systems must play in addressing this crisis—a crisis that is, in part, born of the ill-conceived notion of settler colonial1 institutions, government agencies, and scholars that western knowledge systems and solutions are universally useful or applicable (mascarenhas, 2012; mcgregor, 2012; white et al., 2012). in recent years, it has become increasingly apparent that western knowledge, science, and technology are not addressing water issues and water-related challenges (e.g., increased risk of flooding, ineffective wastewater treatment, and agricultural and industrial draws on watersheds) in indigenous nations and other communities in canada (canadian water network, 2013; health canada, 2015; mascarenhas, 2007; sanderson et al., 2015; white et al., 2012). as a result, the canadian water network (cwn)2 issued a call for proposals in 2014 for a study that would (a) identify and assess the most promising water research and management practices involving indigenous and western knowledge systems and 1 settler colonialism names a formation of colonialism whereby, as wolfe (2006) has explained, settler colonizers come to stay and “invasion is a structure not an event” (p. 388). it is exemplified in the ongoing state building actions of nations such as canada, the united states, and australia and their relations to the indigenous populations over whose territories their nations claim sovereign rule. 2 the cwn is a network centre of excellence in canada, established by the three federal granting agencies for research, which encompass the natural sciences and engineering, the health sciences, and the social sciences. 1 castleden et al.: implementing indigenous and western knowledge systems published by scholarship@western, 2017 (b) explore associated challenges and opportunities through a systematic review of the literature, so as to inform and transform water management practices in integrative ways. our team was funded by cwn to carry out this work. drawing on the principles of community-based participatory research (castleden, sloan morgan, & lamb, 2012), we established a national advisory committee (nac) comprised of western-trained settler3 water experts and indigenous knowledgeholders to join us in our own co-learning journey by co-creating our research design. our design included holding a national water gathering to seek a broad range of perspectives from additional indigenous and non-indigenous water researchers, managers, and integrative knowledge practitioners about what to include and what to look for in our systematic review of the literature. in part 1 (castleden et al., 2017), we reported on our review of the academic and grey literature concerning integrative indigenous and western approaches to water research and management in canada. our methodological approach involved identifying 279 relevant documents. after a careful review, which was based on rigorous inclusion criteria, 63 were subjected to a systematic and realist review. our reporting tool included six broad categories: a. descriptive data; b. context (that is, under which context(s) water was considered or discussed); c. research purpose, which, when further analyzed, revealed five general areas (integrative approaches, relationships to water, institutional arrangements and capacity, water governance, and drinking water–human health connections); d. approaches (that is, what methodologies were employed and/or discussed within the literature); e. integrative knowledge approaches that were employed and discussed; and f. cited outcomes. our analysis revealed two broad themes across this body of literature: a. the recognition that tokenism is no longer acceptable practice, and b. the development of respectful nation-to-nation relationships in water research, management, and policy is needed.4 our systematic and realist review was intended to capture the breadth and depth of integrative water research and management in canada.5 perhaps unsurprisingly, in doing this review we identified 3 by settler, we mean any non-indigenous person living in canada—whether through ancestral or contemporary immigration to this country over the past 500 years—who, through intentional or unwitting actions, have dispossessed indigenous peoples from their lands and now inhabit their territories. 4 these findings are discussed in detail in part 1 (castleden et al., 2017). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 8 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.8 limitations, one of which we have attempted to overcome in this article. we recognized both that there are constraints regarding what can be conveyed in publications, as well as the reality that some exemplary work in this area may never be published. thus, we decided to reach out to the first authors (typically academics) of exemplars in this field to conduct semi-structured qualitative interviews with them and their community partners. the purpose of these interviews was to explore respondents’ experiences of undertaking integrative work and the strategies they used to conduct research. in the following section, we explore how assumptions regarding the most basic categories of inquiry can (most often unintentionally) reproduce deep forms of colonization. specifically, we examine how different ontologies of water (that is, fundamental assertions regarding the being or existence of water [e.g., water is sentient; water is inert]) are constitutive of different ways of relating to water. moreover, we examine how, in a settler colonial society structured through uneven relations of power, one knows water has an important effect on the allocation and enactment of roles in collaborative research partnerships. finally, we begin to sketch what a relational ontology for thinking about water might look like, and how it could inform new ways of both relating to water and to each other through research. m e t h o d s we developed an interview protocol in collaboration with our nac in order to generate appropriate questions to solicit respondents’ perspectives on the “effectiveness” of integrative approaches to water research and management. semi-structured interviews are common in qualitative research as they allow researchers to understand a respondent’s point of view and lived experiences, and to go in unanticipated directions as the interview unfolds (denzin & lincoln, 2005). interviews were conducted over the phone or skype™ and lasted approximately one hour. thirteen researchers were contacted and their participation was requested because they were the first authors of peer-reviewed articles that described exemplary integrative knowledge regarding water research. of those 13, 11 consented to be interviewed. a twelfth researcher, who was recommended via snowball sampling, also consented to be interviewed. we had originally hoped that study respondents could put us in contact with their community partners so we could engage with indigenous community coresearchers’ perspectives, but this quickly became untenable. in many cases, a significant period of time had passed between the completion of the published studies and our study, and we realized that community-based partners’ time and resources were either committed elsewhere or the research relationship had not been maintained.6 to obtain perspectives from community knowledge holders, we turned to the nac and received the names and contact information of individuals that nac members knew had experience as communitybased co-researchers. as such, interviewees were not all necessarily related to a specific project that was included in the systematic realist review, but are regarded as indigenous knowledge holders or have community-specific expertise about water (research, management, or relationships) from indigenous 5 we view integrative water research as research that embodies the ideals of ongoing knowledge co-creation between indigenous and western knowledge holders (bartlett, marshall, & marshall, 2012; bartlett, marshall, marshall, & iwama, 2015). 6 we recognize the contradiction that this presents regarding understanding “research as ceremony” (wilson, 2008), relational ethics (castleden et al., 2012), and friendship (de leeuw, cameron, & greenwood, 2012). 3 castleden et al.: implementing indigenous and western knowledge systems published by scholarship@western, 2017 perspectives. in the original and adapted recruitment process, we sought this method of purposive sampling to recruit interviewees based on specific experience and knowledge that could respond to the project’s inquiry (patton, 2002). twenty-five knowledge holders or community researchers or partners were contacted, and 11 consented to being interviewed. each interviewee was given the option of reviewing their transcript for accuracy and to review their quotations in the context they were used in the project’s final report. interviews were transcribed verbatim and analyzed using a thematic analysis (guba & lincoln, 1994). while the goal of the research and the advice from the nac framed our interview protocol and guided our coding process, we also employed data-driven coding (decuir-gunby, marshall, & mcculloch, 2011; weston, gandell, beauchamp, mcalpine, wiseman, & beauchamp, 2001). interview transcripts were coded and analyzed by three research assistants and our project manager, who was responsible for maintaining the codebook (an efficient practice as suggested by macqueen, mclellan, kay, & milstein, 1998). the codebook was maintained through an iterative process; as insights about the data were reached, they were included in the codebook with detailed definitions so as to increase consistency among the four coders (decuir-gunby, et al., 2011). f i n d i n g s our analysis resulted in three overarching themes: • the elucidation of a more-than-science relationship to water that many of our participants held or encountered in their co-learning journeys, • the perpetuation of colonially-inscribed roles in water research and management, and • moving forward for a shared future relationship with water and with each other. each of these themes is described below with representative quotations from respondents (r#=researcher; c#=community representative).7 f l u v i a l i n t i m a c i e s : e x p a n s i v e u n d e r s t a n d i n g s o f w a t e r a n d w a t e r o n t o l o g i e s it became apparent early in the interview process that respondents had understandings of water that extended beyond the dominant abstraction of water as merely h2o. an indigenous community representative succinctly captured this notion, stating: “when someone else looks at the land they see trees and water. but it means a lot more to us” (c5). the meaning of “a lot more” was expressed in a number of different ways by other respondents. for instance, many indigenous community representatives described how water is fundamentally constitutive of place: a lot of the water systems that we do use at our cabins have been used for hundreds of years . . . there is a connection, but where the water is always running it’s always different, but you know 7 to maintain anonymity, we have neither specified respondents’ gender nor identified institutional researchers as indigenous or settler, given the small pool of potential interviewees who were available to us through the systematic review (noted in part 1; castleden et al., 2017). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 8 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.8 where your grandfather’s probably stepped because there’s probably paths walking into . . . we’re probably still using the same path that he used, down and picking up our water and that. so there’s always a sense of knowing where to go, and knowing who you are, and knowing that your water will sustain you. you and your family to come. (c4) here, water is not abstracted from the places and peoples with whom it exists in relation. yet water remains central for subsistence, such that most indigenous community representatives point out: it’s critical. it’s transportation. it’s food. it’s sustenance. water is life itself, you can’t really live without it. so to contaminate it, to me, is unconscionable. (c7) in addition, many respondents noted how water also exceeds and spills over instrumental categories of understanding. as the previous respondent suggested, water-places are often essential sites for connection to the land and to one’s past and future relations. by speaking of water and water-places as playing a part in “knowing who you are,” this respondent highlighted how water partially constitutes one’s identity. this suggests a relational understanding of water that is far more expansive than hydrological conceptualizations of water that underpin dominant management discourses. respondents also expressed the notion of responsibility to water that as something that seems to greatly exceed hydrological understandings of water. one indigenous community respondent explained: well, my personal interest is part of what i understand to be our cultural responsibility towards the land and the water that we, as indigenous people, have been basically created to look after and steward and maintain protection of. and so, on a very personal level, i take that responsibility seriously. and i like to, basically, try to help educate and promote awareness to other indigenous people as well as non-indigenous people about what that responsibility is. (c9) similarly, indigenous and settler researchers who work and have worked with first nations and métis peoples addressed the ways that relations to water exceed narrow, techno-centric understandings of it. for instance, many researchers spoke about the central role of women in terms of responsibility to and for water. one researcher noted, touching once again on the intersections between water and identity, how their own identity and the source of their academic interest in water is in many ways: . . . personal in that it was driven by my personal responsibility. and i had the elders tell me that maybe it’s my responsibility [and . . .] i feel the need that something needs to be done about this [water crisis in canada]. (r3) expanding on this, another researcher spoke about the teaching they had received in a first nations context, whereby: . . . the responsibility for governance is something that was given to them by the creator. it is based on, in this case, women’s connection with water through childbearing and childbirth. it's something that is preserved over time. it has to do with an understanding that all things are sentient and so there is a respect for the water in the way that the water is equal to us and that 5 castleden et al.: implementing indigenous and western knowledge systems published by scholarship@western, 2017 she has her own purpose for existing that's quite independent of ours, and that we need to take heed to that and respect that. (r8) though these quotations can in no way do justice to the expansive and varied ways in which water is understood in different indigenous contexts, even a cursory reading of how many respondents talked about water suggests a significant tension with techno-centric, western paradigms that are embedded in water management. another researcher highlighted this tension when speaking about the challenges of doing truly integrative research: so we have to be aware of the values that we also bring that are fundamentally cultural. the idea that water does not have personhood—that’s really a cultural assumption that we carry with us when we conduct work as western scientists. so we really have to do our own self-reflection and assessing our own understandings of the world and the ways in which they’re informed by the culture of science and the practice of doing science. i think that in order to start in a way that is truly going to be integrative, we all have to be aware of that. (r11) as many of our respondents suggested, this belies a fundamentally different way of thinking about relationships to water than is present within dominant management discourses; yet this difference cannot simply be reduced to a question of culture. it is at an intersection between knowledge systems where the role of power becomes apparent. as one respondent noted, in order to acknowledge how power operates: as researchers, we have to acknowledge that the relationship between canadian government, the settler community—which is us—and the first nations and indigenous people and inuit has been a colonial relationship. (r2) this necessitates thinking about water “issues” as more than technical problems removed from broader social contexts. as one researcher explains: these problems are not simply technological problems or problems about knowledge integration, but they’re fundamentally problems about power and about the state’s refusal to acknowledge and respect indigenous communities’ responsibilities for water, alongside the ongoing processes of colonization, where there’s kind of a lack of recognition of the historical injustices that have often perpetuated some of these water crises or instances of concerns around water. it’s a recognition that it’s part of a larger history of colonialism rather than just a problem that kind of emerges out of the blue that somehow effects indigenous communities disproportionately, or a technical problem, right? . . . there are wider problems that involve power and are related to wider forms of colonization. (r11) statements such as these, it should be reiterated, are more than a matter of opinion. rather, they are rooted in experts’ experiences of witnessing the ineffectiveness of attempts to address emerging water crises without considering the historical and geographical contingencies that have been central to producing our contemporary reality. eliding the broader socio-political contexts in which current water crises arise is to compartmentalize the nature of these crises in such a way as to exclude historical and contemporary settler colonialism and the role of settler colonial states and societies in the creation of these problems. in contrast, speaking of fluvial intimacies is both a provocation and a means of 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 8 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.8 characterizing relational ways of thinking about water that open up to the mutually constitutive entanglements through which water, people, and non-human animals shape each other. bodies move through water, and water moves through bodies; each leave traces of their passing. water flows play, have played, and will always play a pivotal role in shaping the physical spaces people inhabit as well as the social relations that underwrite peoples’ political, economic, and health landscapes. s t a k e h o l d e r s a n d e x p e r t s : t h e s e t t l e r c o l o n i a l p e r f o r m a t i v i t y o f m a n a g e m e n t r o l e s narrowly framing water issues as a technical abstraction and assuming the primacy of western analytic categories also entails the assumption of specific roles within the process of engaging with water issues. respondents commonly affirmed that (other) researchers, managers, and policy makers tended to view first nations, inuit, and métis groups involved in research concerning water not as rights-holders, but rather as one of many stakeholders within a project; this meant that they often did not engage with indigenous knowledge systems in the same way that they did with western knowledge systems. in this sense, what could pass for progressive processes were instead deeply political truth claims, which assumed (and thereby reinforced) both the legitimacy of the settler state as the rightful sovereign over land and waters and western (i.e., scientific) knowledge over other knowledge systems. as another researcher observed: there’s a common assumption that first nations are [only] stakeholders. many people believe in earnest that that’s a really progressive step forward[,] is to be including first nations in this conversation. but viewing first nations as just one of many sui generis stakeholders, rather than the ones with the rights to those lands, is nowhere near the level of understanding or respect that’s needed to create a relationship where something could be done in terms of real action. (r7) within a historical context that has actively excluded indigenous peoples from decision-making processes for generations, opening space at the research or negotiation table for indigenous people as stakeholders may seem progressive. yet, it ignores, and works to erase, the fact that first nation, métis, and inuit peoples “[are] . . . indigenous nation[s] whose land is unceded” (r7). the same respondent went on to say that: “i think that if you’re treating [indigenous peoples] like stakeholders on their own land, progress will stagnate” (r7). indeed, the concept “stakeholder” is itself an exogenously imposed category that presupposes a limited range of acceptable behaviours. it also sustains a hierarchical set of distinctly western relationships that privilege state sovereignty and western science. it is such a worldview that makes the following a reality: federally and provincially they’re pretty biased in terms of a preference towards quantitative data . . . in their decision making. and those decisions they’re making based on that one kind of evidence and that one kind of truth impacts people that don’t necessarily identify the same way with that truth. they’ve got policies in this country founded and based and supported and justified from one knowledge system that are influencing and very directly impacting the lives of the first peoples of this country. (r9) the effects of water management decisions that are made with “one kind of evidence,” and that produce “one kind of truth,” work to delineate both the nature of the “problem” and the nature of the “solution” 7 castleden et al.: implementing indigenous and western knowledge systems published by scholarship@western, 2017 in ways that legitimize and privilege western science and a western knowledge system. moreover, doing so results in missed opportunities: indigenous knowledge . . . more than really trying to understand objects, [it] attempts to understand relationships, and this is what tends to be often missed in western knowledge. when we break down systems into small pieces, we also tend to remove some of those complex relational things that in a sense, make the system behave the way it does. (r2) indeed, as many of our respondents noted they had witnessed, even progressive efforts that have sought to include indigenous knowledge systems in water research and management practices are often woefully inadequate: i find a lot of the so-called efforts to integrate western science and traditional knowledge are very much of that flavour. when you look at what integration means, it’s like the really important questions get answered by the biologists, and then there’s this thin, sort of politically correct layer of indigenous knowledge that gets put on top of it. and i think that’s a bullshit kind of approach. (r4) aside from being critical of tokenistic engagement with indigenous peoples and their knowledge systems, the above quotation also represents a growing awareness on the part of settler researchers that different ontological positions are often reduced to multicultural differences, whereby western researchers and state institutions accommodate indigenous difference by opening a small place at the decision-making table. while this could be seen as an improvement from the repressive use of state power that has historically sought to disavow and bar indigenous presence at such tables, it is more insidious than that, and it remains deeply problematic. as one researcher pointedly noted: there’s also that power dynamic of sitting in a room, being not only a minority in terms of number, but also being a minority in terms of the type of system of thinking that you have and not feeling comfortable talking about that. so, indigenous knowledge is [often] left out for that power difference as well. (r7) what this respondent is alluding to is how disciplining modes of power function so that indigenous peoples must make their difference transparent and accessible to state actors, western scientists, and/or environmental managers. in these contexts, difference is exploited as the foil against which another knowledge system is taken for granted as the “norm.” the requirement for indigenous peoples to present their difference in a manner that is recognizable to the western gaze in order to be heard was a theme which materialized in a variety of different ways throughout our research (interviews, literature, water gatherings, and nac conversations) and speaks to the subtlety of contemporary colonial power relations. an oft-cited example by respondents noted differences between “rights to water” and “responsibilities for water.” for example: yet i do agree with the idea that inherent rights come to mind and the fact that i’d rather say inherent responsibilities. that’s what the elders talk to me more about. although they’ll use the term “rights,” they try to shun away from it. so, these are responsibilities . . . once we put it into inherent rights, we’re starting to get in . . . i feel and i think this has been communicated to me, we just move it into the legal realm. and we can sometimes be a little narrow once we start 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 8 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.8 talking rights. but certainly all of the indigenous communities and people that i’ve spoken with are really obviously moving into that narrative because it’s the narrative that resonates well within canadian policy. (r3) many respondents noted similar tensions; given the nature of relationships to water and how water was thought of at an ontological level, thinking and acting in terms of responsibility was deemed more appropriate than thinking and acting in terms of “rights.” however, given the necessity of engaging with the settler-colonial state, many indigenous peoples have had to engage in rights-based discourses rather than responsibilities-based discourses, lest they risk being invisible to the settler state (moore, von der porten, & castleden, 2016). r e l a t i o n s a n d d i f f e r e n c e : m o v i n g f o r w a r d t o g e t h e r despite the ways that historical and contemporary colonial relationships between indigenous nations and settler society in canada have shaped narratives of responsibility to water into discourses of natural resource management, both indigenous and settler respondents in this study still held considerable hope for developing novel approaches to integrative water research. there is recognition of the value of science in protecting health in deciding quality of food and water that is outside the scope of traditional ability. and on the flip side, there are a huge number of examples of where inuit knowledge had informed research, identified trends or factors that scientists had overlooked that led to improved research in many different ways. (c2) developing such approaches, however, requires asking the right questions, not the same old (western) questions that insert (tokenistic) indigenous responses with puzzlement afterwards about why it (e.g., technological solution, policy, program, etc.) did not work. all respondents were aware of the considerable work required to begin the process of decolonizing research relationships: so, you know, the old cliché of “it all starts with political will.” i think it is going to take the will of those involved in those areas to recognize that [there] has been some pretty fundamental ethnocentric, western ethnocentric, superior assumptions made about how research gets done in our communities. and to try to re-inform and re-educate about how that process should really happen in terms of human being to human being. that is a pretty fundamental process that needs, and would need to be implemented at different levels because obviously whether you are talking about government or the academic institutions, there are some pretty entrenched folks who have no time, nor interest, in trying to capture a new worldview on how research gets done. (c9) colonial subjectivities run deep and western frameworks for understanding the world remain hegemonic when it comes working with water. speaking about the necessity for processes of co-learning towards understanding that more than one knowledge system exists and can help us (all) think about and relate to water differently, this respondent alluded to the power of building relationships across difference in order to develop more expansive understandings of the various water crises in which we find ourselves embroiled. as an indigenous community representative noted, this is hardly a simple task: 9 castleden et al.: implementing indigenous and western knowledge systems published by scholarship@western, 2017 when you and i each have our own worldview, and while we accept knowledge that other worldviews exist and that they may have value, it can be really hard for us to step outside and really understand what the other is about. and you know, maybe we’ll convince ourselves that we do understand—and that can be damaging sometimes—or that we don’t need to understand. i think that is the biggest challenge. (c6) co-learning about others’ knowledge systems is always a social process and never an endpoint in and of itself. more than attempting to grasp and fix “what the other is about” (which we will discuss as a form of epistemic violence below), to “step outside” of one’s worldview involves re-thinking how we have come to know our own knowledge systems. given that many, if not most, indigenous peoples are accustomed to living in two worlds, what this really means is settlers accepting that aspects of indigenous knowledge systems will not be translatable or fit into the boxes of mainstream western approaches to water research and management and that extracting pieces to incorporate into management efforts is not just inappropriate, but colonial. an indigenous community representative succinctly underscored this point: the fact [is] that it is status quo, it is mainstream for [settler] academics to have to be able to access native traditional knowledge or indigenous traditional knowledge. we need to find a way to change the energy in that relationship because it is set up as a giver and a taker, and we need to get to a point where both give and both take. that sense of reciprocity is pretty much found throughout our natural laws—universal laws, that many, if not most of our cultures are based upon. (c9) researchers, indigenous and settler alike, noted a number of ways by which to begin re-orienting research relationships towards reciprocity. multiple respondents noted the importance of abandoning the conceit of considering oneself an expert in order to develop a sense of humility and an ability to listen. one noted, for example: you have to take a back seat to start. you have to listen. too often, people come into an indigenous community, and they want to talk. they want to lecture away at people, or they have solutions. and i think you really have to take this slower approach in terms of going in and listening first, right? (r6) similarly, several respondents noted the value of openness and getting to know the communities with whom researchers work (and likewise, communities getting to know researchers) so as to gain insights and understandings that can benefit integrative water research projects: i think coming in with an attitude that you’re open to anything [is important]. you don’t mind trying new things, you don’t mind . . . like, get out in the community. don’t just come in, stay in your hotel room, come to the office in the morning, leave again at 4:30, and stick in the hotel room. get out in the community, see what activities are in the community. if you want to play hockey, or if there’s a sewing group, just go. it's a way to connect. (c4) another widely discussed insight was the importance of creating spaces that facilitate more equitable modes of relationality: 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 8 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.8 one way of looking at it is just even the assumption that we “sit down” to talk about something. venue is one thing that could change. in some cultures, for example, decisions are made out on the land, and people talk as they are doing whatever they’re doing, be it gathering or moving around from one location to another, hunting—whatever it is. just that process of who makes decisions and when and how it’s discussed differs. so sitting down in a boardroom immediately biases the conversations to a western way—like sitting in a room, indoors and holding a meeting with robert’s rules. that is only one culture’s way of doing things. (r7) while small, the acts listed above all work to unsettle the power relations that have dominated indigenous–settler relationships in water research and management. rather than merely offering indigenous peoples a “place at the table” at which mainstream ways of conducting research and management are discussed, one respondent noted that we need to work toward a complete shift in how we approach this kind of work: talk about changing the premise, right? it’s none of this nonsense about, “well, what if we saved a seat at the table for our indigenous partners?” it’s, “what if we take the table and go, huff! new table?” so they start it over. (r4) when we begin to think about water and water management as more than a narrowly conceived technical problem, possibilities for growth, change, and healing emerge both within and across indigenous and settler communities: because of the fact that, even though we are known as people of [place name removed], and much like what has been referred to through the truth and reconciliation commission as the tacit recognition of cultural genocide that has impacted how we actively maintain our stewardship role . . . we have to re-awaken and re-orient our own people, and especially our youth around the watershed and species and how we are to have that connection and good relationship with all of creation around us . . . to me, [western] science and [indigenous] knowledge should work hand in hand, even if it seems as if they are opposing. because i think that . . . whatever the hypothesis, the observations are, it’s only through combining the two approaches will we, as human beings, be able to fully develop our faculties and our awareness and our understandings beyond the simple, physical, equational relationship that we have with everything around us and inside of us. (c9) all of the respondents talked about the search for ways to meaningfully relate across difference and build more expansive understandings of water. indeed, all of the respondents suggested that, were these ways to inform our relationships and the nature of the work we carry out together, the potential for integrative approaches is available for those who are willing to enter into a lifelong co-learning journey. per their assertions, entering these journeys will help make working with and thinking about water a way of healing our damaged relationships—both with each other and to water—that have been caused by centuries of colonialism. d i s c u s s i o n our findings reflected that a range of indigenous ways of thinking about water are more expansive than the dominant western conceptualization of water as simply h2o. for settler researchers, indigenous 11 castleden et al.: implementing indigenous and western knowledge systems published by scholarship@western, 2017 researchers, and community knowledge holders alike, our respondents articulated a number of ways of knowing water and the responsibilities that flow from these ways of knowing. both were articulated in relation to different indigenous territories, are born out of teachings which arise from heterogeneous, place-based ways of knowing, and inform and are informed by the specific ontologies from which they emerge. for example, from our small sample alone we saw that for some, water is sentient, animate, and alive; for others, the places from which water flows are fundamentally connected to how people come to know themselves. for still more others, (english) words were inadequate to describe their relationships to water. across the board, however, these ways of knowing and relating to water radically exceeded the ways in which most academically-trained (mostly settler) researchers relate to water. this is not to say that western-trained chemists, hydrologists, and water managers viewing water through only a western lens are wrong to do so; rather, it is to say that reducing water to its physicality severely constrains the sorts of questions we can pose and the sorts of answers we can come up with when seeking to address water issues in integrative ways. similarly, respondents discussed how their experiences with various forms of collaborative water research or water management partnerships were mediated and structured by pre-established roles. considering the categories of stakeholder, expert, and bureaucrat at an ontological level challenges any pretence to neutrality or progressiveness. these are sets of social relations with attendant settlercolonial hierarchies that, when enacted, work to reproduce and legitimize those hierarchies as natural or inherently valuable. scholars have noted, in manners aligned with many respondents’ experiences, that being compelled to adopt such roles as a precondition of “having a place at the table” lends itself to producing colonial subjectivities (alfred & corntassel, 2005; desbiens & rivard, 2014; howitt & suchet-pearson, 2006; nadasdy, 2005). this is certainly counterproductive to integrative approaches that argue for a lifetime of co-learning (bartlett et al., 2012). in part 1 (castleden et al., 2017), we challenged researchers and managers to desist with tokenism; here, our data allowed us to take our challenge a step further. being required to make the nature of one’s indigeneity transparent is to ostensibly compel indigenous peoples to make themselves and their knowledge systems “fit” into western management practices (howitt & suchet-pearson, 2006; mccreary & milligan, 2014). presumably, teasing out legible parts of indigenous knowledge systems from their respective ontologies is necessary if indigenous knowledges are to be subsumed into dominant (western) management paradigms—particularly in a way that does not call into question the latter’s neutrality and thereby legitimacy. interviewees, water gathering participants, and our nac all agreed: this is not the way forward. jumping scales, we can see parallels between the discourses emerging from co-management and collaborative contexts and coulthard’s (2007, 2014) argument of how the canadian state’s liberal politics of recognition has become the dominant discourse through which to approach indigenous selfdetermination. coulthard and others (day, 2001; povinelli, 2002) have argued that in order to be recognized as indigenous by the colonial state, indigenous peoples must be rendered static and legible in ways “that [do] not throw into question the background legal, political, and economic framework of the colonial relationship itself” (coulthard, 2007, p. 451). the result is a western ontology of indigeneity (hunt, 2014). we draw this parallel to note that the process of incorporating indigenous knowledges into natural resource management frameworks is bound up in much broader networks of colonial meaning making and the western ontologies they work to maintain. there are always particular 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 8 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.8 politics at work in the act of knowledge production. under such circumstances, the potential for indigenous ontologies to unsettle dominant ontologies can be easily neutralized if the effects of knowledge integration are ultimately (whether unwittingly or not) employed toward the selflegitimation of colonial institutions and the colonial state. put another way, integrative or collaborative research that compartmentalizes ideas shared by indigenous knowledge holders works to legitimize colonial mentalities. to avoid reproducing efforts at integrating indigenous knowledge into western discourse—the very issue we identify as problematic—we turned to the guiding principle of two-eyed seeing. two-eyed seeing, a concept introduced to the integrative sciences by mi’kmaw elder albert marshall, refers to learning to see the strengths of indigenous knowledge with one eye, and using the other eye to see with the strengths of western knowledge. in doing so, one can arrive at more comprehensive and mutually beneficial understandings (bartlett et al., 2012). the creation of an advisory committee comprised of indigenous and western water experts to guide our research from design through dissemination allowed us to see our research “with both eyes.” earlier in this article, we posed the question: why do water disparities between indigenous and settler peoples in canada (and elsewhere) not only exist, but exist commonly and frequently? we suggested that technology and capital were not the solutions; rather, confronting entrenched colonialism and the privileging of western science over indigenous knowledge systems were solutions more likely to effect real change. from this, the question becomes: how do we carry out effective and integrative decolonizing water research—research that does not reproduce the very categories and structures we seek to dismantle? according to respondents to this study, this does not happen behind a desk. overwhelmingly, the people with whom we spoke emphasized the importance of relationality. this means being on the ground and working with communities to co-construct engagement processes and study designs that take both indigenous and western knowledge systems into account. as hunt (2014) has suggested, “this may involve becoming unhinged, uncomfortable, or stepping beyond the position of ‘expert’ in order to also be a witness or listener” (p. 31). for those schooled in western ways of knowing, it involves fundamentally re-thinking what it means to know. but we are not seeking to replace one set of universalizing assumptions with another, nor are we suggesting the disposal of western knowledge altogether. the researchers and community knowledge holders to whom we spoke were all eager to find new and innovative ways of implementing western and indigenous ways of knowing sideby-side. what is necessary is that those who have been schooled in western traditions begin the laborious work of unpacking their own positionalities both within and beyond the research process. as we have attempted to demonstrate, thinking about how ways of knowing are both the products and constitutive parts of different ontologies can help us do this. l i m i t a t i o n s the purpose of this article was to expand on our previous research that sought to examine emergent themes in academic and grey literature on integrative water research and management by interviewing the authors of that literature, so as to generate a more comprehensive understanding of the strengths and challenges accompanying integrative water research and management. this research was not without limitations, however, as only a small sample size of interview participants participated in this study. we 13 castleden et al.: implementing indigenous and western knowledge systems published by scholarship@western, 2017 believe that this did not negatively impact our findings, though there is the possibility that further insight could be gained from more interviews. c o n c l u s i o n to conclude, we must acknowledge that respondents came from a variety of different places across canada. some were settlers, some were indigenous, and we have by no means captured all worldviews. our discussion is meant to offer an entry point of inquiry into integrative indigenous and western water ontologies. to do more would be beyond the scope of this article. moreover, for many of us, these are simply not our teachings to impart. our goal was to convey the experiences and challenges of working across difference that we hope will sensitize the uninitiated to ask different questions and more importantly to be able to hear different answers. we note that discussing western and indigenous knowledge systems we may have set up an illusory static dichotomy between the two; this is not our intention. while there are inherent differences between indigenous and western knowledge systems, all knowing systems are in constant flux and remain fluid over time with newly created knowledge and knowledge exchange. when thinking about and engaging with multiple ontologies, we all need to recognize that there are worldviews that exceed our categories of understanding. moreover, we need to learn to hear about things that our categories cannot grasp if we are to transform our relationships to water and to each other. we must engage difference without objectifying it. while indigenous and western knowledge systems can help to inform integrative research, and may at first seem quite disparate, they are not. as much as the growing engagement with co-management, collaborative partnerships, and community-engaged approaches to working with indigenous communities on water-related issues has been an important step in decolonizing research relationships and our relationships to water, we must be cautious of the unseen political work that occurs in the move toward using western and indigenous knowledge systems in integrative ways in both research and management. engaging with indigenous knowledge holders and their knowledge systems in a manner that ignores the political, historical, and geographical contingencies from which they arise is an act of epistemic violence. as we work toward reconciling and healing our deeply troubled relationships with both each other and with the lands, waters, and air around us, having indigenous ontologies inform both governance of and responsibility to water represents an immense opportunity for co-learning and healing. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 8 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.8 r e f e r e n c e s alfred, t., & corntassel, j. 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(2017). progress on drinking water, sanitation, and hygiene. retrieved from http://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/10665/258617/1/9789241512893-eng.pdf?ua=1 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 8 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.8 the international indigenous policy journal october 2017 implementing indigenous and western knowledge systems (part 2): “you have to take a backseat” and abandon the arrogance of expertise heather e. castleden debbie martin ashlee cunsolo sherilee harper catherine hart see next page for additional authors recommended citation implementing indigenous and western knowledge systems (part 2): “you have to take a backseat” and abandon the arrogance of expertise abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license authors implementing indigenous and western knowledge systems in water research and management (part 2): interviews with collaborative teams to overcome the limitations of literature reviews to inform water policy in canada the three râ•žs of seeking transitional justice: reparation, responsibility, and reframing in canada and argentina the international indigenous policy journal volume 2 issue 3 truth and reconciliation article 3 august 2011 the three r’s of seeking transitional justice: reparation, responsibility, and reframing in canada and argentina michelle bonner department of political science, university of victoria, mbonner@uvic.ca matt james department of political science, university of victoria, mattjame@uvic.ca recommended citation bonner, m. , james, m. (2011). the three r’s of seeking transitional justice: reparation, responsibility, and reframing in canada and argentina. the international indigenous policy journal, 2(3) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.3.3 this research is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. the three r’s of seeking transitional justice: reparation, responsibility, and reframing in canada and argentina abstract in canada an officially mandated truth commission inquiring into the forced assimilation and abuse of indigenous children in state-organized and funded residential schools raises profound and in many ways quite novel questions about transitional justice concerning indigenous peoples in advanced capitalist societies. this article compares the canadian case with that of a quintessential transitional justice pioneer: argentina. focusing on the efforts of justice-seekers in each country, it reveals similarities in their respective pursuits of what the article identifies as three important transitional justice goals: reparation, responsibility and reframing. however, the article also finds a crucial difference between the two cases. this difference is that justice seekers in argentina have placed a heavy emphasis on social and political accountability, a goal that, in various ways, has received much less attention in the canadian case. we conclude that this absence raises broader issues about transitional justice processes in countries marked by ongoing legacies of anti-indigenous colonialism—issues that canadians from the settler society, in particular, must begin urgently to address. keywords transitional justice; reparations; indigenous peoples; truth commissions; colonialism; argentina; canada acknowledgments both authors gratefully acknowledge support from the social sciences and humanities research council of canada. thanks also to julia bareman and adam molnar for excellent research assistance, and to rosemary nagy, pablo policzer, and robinder sehdev for helpful comments. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ introduction as is well known, practices of transitional justice aim to democratize, build cultures of accountability, and promote respect for human rights in countries emerging from authoritarian rule, dictatorship, or mass atrocity. less certain, however, is the applicability of transitional justice, as either a family of mechanisms or as an overarching conceptual framework, beyond the more familiar contexts of regime change or collapse seen most typically in countries of the global south. this question of applicability is central to a development addressed directly in this article: the advent in canada of an officially mandated truth commission inquiring into the forced assimilation and abuse of indigenous children in state-organized and funded residential schools. for more than a century, successive canadian federal governments operated a policy that took over 100,000 native children from their families and placed them in boarding schools operated by the country’s major christian denominations. the schools were established with the specific goal of eradicating indigenous languages and cultures, a goal they sought to achieve by separating children from their families and communities, denigrating native traditions and ways, and practicing ruthlessly punitive forms of quasi-military discipline (miller, 1996). physical and sexual abuse were rampant in the schools and shockingly high mortality rates from disease and neglect were common (hackett, 2005). furthermore, and contrary to the canadian prime minister’s recent assertion that his country has no history of colonialism (simard, 2009), the residential schools also advanced a broader agenda of settler colonization; by attempting to eliminate native capacities for cultural and community reproduction, the schools aimed to ensure that distinct self-governing indigenous communities would no longer exist. the emergence of a canadian truth commission into these outrages raises novel questions about the prospects for “transitional justice in a non-transitional society” (jung, 2009), particularly given the tendency in the literature to equate transitional justice with liberalization processes in the post-communist world or global south (e.g. hayner, 2002; phelps, 2004). but as eric posner and adrian vermeule (2003-2004) have pointed out, this view ignores the importance of quintessentially transitional questions of retroactivity, compensation, and historical inquiry in so-called “consolidated democracies” wrestling with their own abuses, injustices, and inequalities. indeed, the legal scholar jeremy webber concludes more specifically that canada’s colonial domination of indigenous peoples makes imperative what he describes as the quintessentially transitional task of developing legal cultures and institutions that respect rather than seek to smother cultural, normative, and legal diversity (webber, 2009). this article agrees with these latter arguments and views. at the same time, it takes a slightly different path. rather than asking broadly about the applicability of transitional justice in the global north or mounting a particular argument about what kind of legal or institutional innovations canadian circumstances may require, we undertake a comparative study of transitional justice struggles themselves. our goal is 1 bonner and james: three r's published by scholarship@western, 2011 to highlight the similarities, analyze the differences, and move beyond the assumption that the north has nothing to learn from the south. in terms of comparison, we seek critically to understand the character of canada’s initial engagement with transitional justice mechanisms and notions by considering the transition-related struggles of social movements in argentina, a country whose significant and well documented role as a transitional justice pioneer provides a useful baseline of assessment. at the same time, we wish to underscore our recognition of indigenous communities in canada as distinct political communities with the inherent right of self-determination; by focusing on social movement struggles, we do not mean to assimilate indigenous nations to prevailing scholarly conceptions of “social movements” (cf. woolford, 2005). instead, we mean only to highlight our overarching empirical focus on the key demands and themes of justice-seekers in the two countries. that is, we ask: what does a comparison of the two cases reveal about the transitional nature of the demands and themes of justice-seekers in canada? the justification for this kind of “bottom-up” approach is in fact strong, particularly in the canadian case. the point is simple. the circumstances of regime change or concerted international pressure typically associated with transitional justice are glaringly absent in canada. instead, the limited moves seen so far, such as the 2006 indian residential schools settlement agreement compensation package for former students, the official 2008 state apology for the residential schools policy, and the formal establishment in 2009 of the truth and reconciliation commission of canada, reflect indigenous mobilization and pressure in the face of official obfuscation and denial. thus, attention to these kinds of society-level struggles is arguably even more crucial in the canadian case than it might be in situations where the pressures for transition are more varied and multiple. the difficulties of an argentina-canada comparison must be acknowledged. in canada, the justice-seekers are indigenous communities addressing wrongs (in particular, brutally assimilationist residential schools) that occurred within a so-called liberal democracy over many decades; some of the very worst wrongdoing occurred more than thirty years ago and many of the perpetrators and architects of those abuses are no longer alive. in argentina, by contrast, the justice-seekers belong primarily to the dominant (non-indigenous) ethnic group and focus on the injustices of an authoritarian military regime which lasted only seven years; the injustices are also of sufficiently recent vintage that many of the direct perpetrators are still alive, with some even continuing to occupy positions of public power. these differences are significant. yet we contend that there is something to be learned from bringing together what the comparative political science literature would call these two, “most different” cases (przeworski & teune, 1998). argentina, a dramatic case of democratizing transition involving a move from classic authoritarianism to trials of senior regime figures in just a matter of years, offers an important vantage point of clarity on canada’s more diffuse processes of historical reckoning. precisely because of the vaster scale and shorter time-frame involved, the argentine case serves to 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 3 [2011], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.3.3 foreground important considerations about its canadian counterpart that might otherwise go unnoticed. our comparison also has a mildly subversive bent. while socalled “modernization” approaches have often sought paternalistically to apply theories and ideas constructed from the study of so-called established democracies to issues of political and economic development in the global south (see e.g. rostow, 1960; huntington, 1968), this article tries to reverse the modernization logic by asking what the so-called third world might teach the first. the conclusions emerging from our comparison are as follows. we argue that there is much to be gained from viewing the canadian case through a transitional justice lens and that the argentine comparison raises important considerations for projects of reconstruction in settler societies that, like canada, are marked by ongoing legacies of colonialism. more specifically, we emphasize the issue of accountability, a goal that, while central for justice seekers in argentina, is in many ways eerily absent in the canadian case.1 this emphasis on accountability follows in part from our consideration of the argentine case, which, as will be seen, stands as something of an exemplar to canada in this regard. but it also reflects what our analysis shows about the politics of reparation and truth-seeking in relation to the residential schools. in essence, the impact of colonialism on native communities means that indigenous priorities in the canadian context tend to involve projects of individual reparation, community healing, and political regeneration and rebuilding. these priorities leave indigenous peoples little opportunity and perhaps even little inclination to pursue a host of important forensic considerations pertaining to the identification and possible sanction of canadian individuals and institutions responsible for gross injustices and abuses of human rights. indeed, from the standpoint of indigenous emphases on decolonization and internal community rebuilding, a concern with accountability in the interest of improving and perhaps morally regenerating the structures of the settler state might seem beside the point; groups seeking to exercise their self-determination rights may simply have bigger to be sure, there are sound reasons why indigenous justice-seekers in canada have not prioritized accountability to the same degree or in the same way as have their argentine counterparts; this article explores some of the most important explanations. but a focus on argentine struggles for legal, political, and social accountability as a prerequisite for the transitional goal of ‘nunca más’ (never again) forces us to ask a question seldom heard in the canadian settler society. the question is this: in the interest of promoting a transition from the colonial authoritarianism manifested so glaringly in the residential schools, how might accountability—by which we mean not necessarily criminal trials but, perhaps more importantly, the full public disclosure of relevant facts and documents and, where possible, the identification and public answerability of architects and perpetrators of injustices—be pursued in a manner appropriate to the canadian context? 1 for more on the various forms of accountability see for example peruzzotti and smulovitz (2006). 3 bonner and james: three r's published by scholarship@western, 2011 fish to fry. but this does not mean that accountability for canadian institutions and actors should simply be sacrificed. finally, our comparison of the two cases shows profound similarities between the argentine dictatorship’s approach to its so-called subversives, on the one hand, and the treatment of indigenous peoples under the residential schools policy, on the other— similarities that many canadians, smugly confident in their country’s status as a “first world” liberal democracy, may be loath to acknowledge. thus, by highlighting the authoritarianism within canadian liberal democracy and by emphasizing what canada can learn from the role of justice-seekers in argentina’s democratizing transition, we hope ultimately to see at home what transitional justice aims to promote in other corners of the globe: political introspection in the service of political change. our analysis begins with argentina, an indisputable example of transitional justice; it then explores the canadian case. striving to ground the ensuing comparison in those local projects and aspirations that appear most pertinent to tasks of transition, the article compares the two cases by focusing on how justice-seekers in each country have approached three key areas of concern for groups promoting change in the wake of massive and systematic violations of human rights: reparation, responsibility, and reframing. reparation looks forward, signalling not only the concern of victims and survivors with monetary compensation but, just as importantly—as the word’s root, “repair,” indicates—with upholding dignity and recovering health in the wake of gross violations of human rights. by responsibility, we mean to emphasize the key backwardlooking tasks on which groups seeking reparation and political transition must focus: affixing causal responsibility and assigning moral blame for the relevant injustices (cf. james, 2009). finally, as students of social movements might suspect, our emphasis on reframing is meant more specifically to direct attention towards the quintessential justice-seekers’ imperative: to transform prevailing understandings about both the sources and the elimination of unnecessary suffering.2 argentina argentina is a classic case study of transitional justice. from 1976 to 1983 the country experienced a brutal military regime. as many as 30,000 people disappeared, thousands were killed, and thousands more were imprisoned for political reasons and tortured. during this period a vocal human rights movement emerged. the most 2 readers may wonder why we do not emphasize a “fourth ‘r’, reconciliation, given its prominence in both the title of the truth and reconciliation commission of canada and in transitional justice discourses worldwide. our reasoning is simple. reconciliation is not a primary goal of most politically engaged victims and survivors in the wake of massive injustice. it seems rather a prudential consideration raised by the need to live alongside former tormentors and antagonists and thus more often a priority for state actors. for a critique of the notion of reconciliation in the canadian context, see alfred, wasase. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 3 [2011], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.3.3 famous argentine human rights organization, the mothers of the plaza de mayo, drew international attention that contributed to the end of the military regime. today, the human rights movement remains prominent and influential in argentina. beginning in 1983, the newly elected government ended the military’s self-amnesty, freed political prisoners, sought to find the disappeared, established a truth commission, and initiated trials against those involved in the military regime’s abuses. subsequent governments have provided monetary reparations to victims and victims’ families, as well as assistance in finding missing grandchildren who were illegally adopted under the military regime. thus, argentina has used a wide spectrum of transitional justice mechanisms, some of which argentine human rights organizations have preferred over others. let us now look at the argentine pursuit of transitional justice through our lenses of reparation, responsibility, and reframing. reparation although the relevant scholarly literature often treats reparation as a relatively narrow matter of compensating victims materially for serious injuries or losses, it is useful to draw here on the broader definition adopted by the united nations general assembly (2006), which describes reparation as an ensemble of responses encompassing the following possible measures: “restitution, compensation, rehabilitation, and satisfaction and guarantees of non-repetition” (for a helpful discussion on the different notions of reparation, see de greiff, 2007). because justiceseekers are likely to pursue and emphasize different aspects of reparation in different historical situations and different cultural contexts, this broader definition is useful in a “most different” cases comparison as a means of ensuring that important aspects of reparation are not missed. indeed, it is evident that argentine human rights organizations and activists have pursued a wide range of reparative goals corresponding to what the un calls restitution, satisfaction, and guarantees of non-repetition. restitution involves, “whenever possible, restor[ing] the victim to the original situation before the gross violations of international human rights law or serious violations of humanitarian law occurred”; relevant examples range from the restoration of liberty to the reestablishment of family life. satisfaction tends to encompass still more specific instances of restitution, such as “the search for the whereabouts of the disappeared … for the identities of the children abducted …for the bodies of those killed [and] assistance in the recovery, identification and reburial of the bodies in accordance with the expressed or presumed wish of the victims” (united nations, 2006). collectively, these were the initial priorities of argentine human rights organizations; they remain priorities for some groups today, most notably, the grandmothers of the plaza de mayo. crucial about these restitution priorities in argentina is that their prominence reflected 5 bonner and james: three r's published by scholarship@western, 2011 the fact that there were indeed key aspects of past wrongdoing that could, in some form, be undone. goals pertaining to restitution and satisfaction in relation to the family are particularly central in the work of argentine human rights organizations. families were torn apart by the dictatorship and they now need to be rebuilt; this reality informed the creation of many of the most famous argentine human rights organizations, such as the mothers of the plaza de mayo.3 while the disappeared could not be returned alive other people could. after lobbying successfully the government to free political prisoners, human rights organizations turned their attention to the fate of children who had been adopted into homes considered “acceptable” by the military regime, which believed that the children were innocent victims of their parents’ subversion and could therefore be “re-educated” through adoption. the grandmothers of the plaza de mayo demanded that these children be given the truth about their identity and returned to their families (often grandparents). in 1992 president menem responded to these demands by establishing the national commission for the right to identity (conadi) whose mandate was to work with the grandmothers and the national bank of genetics data to assist in locating the missing grandchildren (bonner, 2007). as of september 10, 2008, ninety-five grandchildren had been located (abuelas de plaza de mayo, 2010). the mothers met and organized as a result of their individual struggles to find out from the military regime the location of their disappeared children and grandchildren and to have them returned. for years, from the time of the dictatorship until after its demise, the movement’s slogan was “return them alive.” when electoral democracy re-emerged, the mothers of the plaza de mayo met with newly elected president raúl alfonsín to discuss the return of the disappeared. alfonsín embraced this goal until it became clear that it would not be possible; the disappeared were gone and assumed dead. there have also been at least two further, more controversial attempts by argentine governments to make reparation. the first relates to that aspect of reparation corresponding to what the un calls “satisfaction.” some human rights organizations, most notably the argentine forensic anthropology team, but also the mothers of the plaza de mayo – founding line and others, argue that it is important to locate the bodies of the disappeared and to ascertain the truth about their identity; their argument is that recovering the bodies will allow families to confirm and mourn their losses. other argentine human rights organizations, such as the mothers of the plaza de mayo association, disagree, insisting that confirmation of death and date of death can lead to the imposition of statutes of limitations, thus shielding those who committed the crime. these latter groups have also argued that recovering bodies may suggest that the struggle for justice is over; from their perspective, locating bodies 3 other well-known family-based argentine human rights organizations include the grandmothers of the plaza de mayo, h.i.j.o.s. (children of the disappeared), and families of the disappeared and imprisoned for political reasons. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 3 [2011], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.3.3 impedes judicial sanction (another aspect of satisfaction) and could even thereby hamper retributively-focused efforts to “guarantee non-repetition.” the second government attempt to make reparation was a response to pressure from the inter-american court on human rights rather than from human rights organizations themselves. in this case the argentine state began in 1991 to provide financial reparation to political prisoners and family members of the disappeared who came forward, thus initiating the un’s “compensation” aspect of reparation. if claimed, ex-political prisoners are compensated $76.66 per day in jail, while families of the disappeared can receive $240,000 for each loved one who is recognized by the state as disappeared (bonner, 2007). most human rights organizations have accepted that these reparations represent the state’s partial recognition of the truth about what happened, while also noting the importance of financial compensation to families that had suffered great losses; for example, in some cases grandparents on pensions have been raising grandchildren, whose parents were disappeared. however, the mothers of the plaza de mayo association have made a forceful counterargument: that financial reparation is, in their words, “prostitution”; it involves the state buying the bodies of the disappeared and indeed buying its way out of responsibility. such criticisms may reflect hostility to the appearance of monetary compensation as a possible alternative to more thoroughgoing measures of accountability when military and authoritarian forces appear to threaten the goal of transition (cf. teitel, 2000). these concerns may indeed have been well-founded in argentina. a series of amnesty laws and pardons enacted between 1986 and 1990 freed or excused all military officers initially charged in national courts for human rights abuses (bonner, 2007); financial reparation in 1991 came immediately after these amnesty laws and pardons, possibly appearing to replace judicial sanctions. in such instances, therefore, human rights organizations may well have perceived that one aspect of reparation—financial compensation—was being used unreasonably to substitute for another, namely, the goal of satisfaction. thus, victims and justice-seekers in the argentine case have been concerned to prevent financial compensation from becoming a narrow substitute for more capacious and ambitious assignments of state responsibility. the article’s next section develops and expands upon this crucial point. responsibility in transitional justice, as with the notion of reparation itself, questions of responsibility are central; the relevant claims and debates revolve inevitably around issues of causation, moral blame, and contemporary reparative duty (james, 2009). of course, different campaigns and contexts will weigh and arrange these three elements differently, as the previous discussion of the controversies around reparative obligation in the argentine case has shown. now it is appropriate to ask: in what other ways have the groups struggling for justice in the aftermath of the argentine dictatorship 7 bonner and james: three r's published by scholarship@western, 2011 addressed the crucial transitional matters of determining causal responsibility and affixing moral blame? of paramount importance for argentine human rights organizations, these matters of responsibility have been pursued in relation to three quintessential instruments of transitional justice: the truth commission, criminal trials, and processes of lustration. the argentine truth commission was established five days after the newly elected government took office in 1983, and its best-seller report, nunca más, was published the following year. yet, like monetary reparations, the truth commission proved controversial within the argentine human rights movement. neither human rights organizations nor their representatives were included among the members of the commission, although the commission did meet with some of the human rights organizations and solicited information from all of them. most of the human rights organizations save one were willing to work with the truth commission, but for none was the “truth” ascertained and produced by the commission sufficient. for example, the number of people recognized in the truth commission report as disappeared by the dictatorship is 8,960; the number claimed by rights organizations is 30,000. indeed, full truth is still an important objective for argentine human rights organizations. during the 2008 demonstration commemorating the march 24, 1976 coup, a speaker stated to a supportive audience: “we call for the opening of the armed forces archives in order to know the entire truth. without this impunity persists, the perpetrators of the genocide maintain their pact of silence” (madres de plaza de mayo – línea fundadora, 2008). thus, critics—hoping both to know the truth for its own sake and to better apportion moral blame—have lamented the failure of the truth commission to establish the full scope and nature of the state’s causal responsibility. argentine human rights groups have also emphasized criminal trials as a means of ascertaining and apportioning responsibility. since the return of electoral democracy, trials and the related fight against amnesties and pardons have been central to the agenda of argentine rights organizations (bonner, 2005). in almost every year since 1984 the slogan for the yearly march of resistance, organized by many of the most prominent relevant groups, has included explicit references to “trial and punishment,” proclaimed “no” to amnesties and pardons (such as the due obedience and final point amnesty laws), and declared “no” to “impunity” (madres de plaza de mayo – línea fundadora, 2008). in 1989, the slogan of the event emphasized the link between trials and truth: “because we are not resigned to the lack of justice. because we are not resigned to the lack of truth. we say: no to final point. no to due obedience. no to the pardon. no to impunity” (madres de plaza de mayo – línea fundadora, 2008b). throughout, the argument has been that criminal trials will furnish truths hitherto missing, ensure the end of impunity, and thus force the state to take more fulsome responsibility for its wrongdoing. lustration, that is, the screening and dismissal of actual or potential officeholders for gross past misdeeds, has been associated with similar objectives. there are 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 3 [2011], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.3.3 countless examples of argentine human rights organizations demanding lustration or simply opposing electoral candidates with records of abuses; in some cases these organizations have been successful (elster, 2004). for example, in 2006 pressure from human rights organizations combined with other factors led then governor of the province of buenos aires, felipe solá, to retire thirty-seven buenos aires provincial police officers for having actively participated in clandestine detention centers during the last dictatorship (cels, 2007). lustration is not only punishment for the wrongdoer; it requires public knowledge of the name of the individual and of which among their deeds merit lustration. lustration thus makes the state take contemporary responsibility for past wrongdoing by removing known abuse perpetrators from its power structures. like incarceration, it removes human rights violators from powerful positions in public life, again helping to assure victims that state institutions can be trusted. thus, argentine activists and rights groups have struggled almost continually to go beyond the apportionment of causal responsibility and moral blame offered by the truth commission, demanding the removal of abusers from the government and state apparatus through jailing, lustration, or, where applicable, both. they argue that the conduct of numerous, determinate individuals demands the removal of said individuals from public life. their aim is not simply retributive in the classic criminal justice sense. instead, rights groups insist more specifically that what these individuals represent, and perhaps continue to value and believe, cannot be part of the new, post-transitional society that argentina must create. thus, the project of determining causal responsibility and affixing moral blame is also very much linked to the processes of political reframing that these groups promote. reframing as many authors have pointed out (teitel, 2000; payne, 2008; phelps, 2004), effective transitional justice involves changing the terms, discourses, and symbols used to explain past events in order to change the future. these processes are designated by the term, reframing (see gamson, 1985). the symbolic, ideational, and discursive efforts associated with processes of reframing are crucial to enterprises of transition because, over the long term, effective and meaningful transition tends to require replacing the conceptualizations of citizenship, belonging, and community that underpinned the violator regime with more satisfactory understandings and notions (barahona de brito, gonzaléí-enriquez, & aguilar). thus, because victims of the dictatorship were excluded from the regime’s definition of citizen and nation, activists seek reframed definitions that include themselves—the former so-called subversives— and their loved ones. at the same time, they have struggled to reframe understandings of the dictatorship from an allegedly necessary fight against subversion to a “genocide” 9 bonner and james: three r's published by scholarship@western, 2011 that assaulted and indeed nearly destroyed values essential to an even minimally just society. these aims have been articulated in two important ways. the first concerns the family. during the dictatorship the military regime called on mothers to defend the family and the nation by denouncing their children if they suspected them of being subversives. if their loved ones disappeared, families were expected to mourn in silence; not to do so was considered equivalent to supporting terrorism (bonner, 2007). accordingly, reclaiming citizenship and nation has involved concerted efforts to reframe the nation-as-family. the frame proposed by human rights organizations stresses that the causes of democratization and human rights require precisely the sort of respect for and protection of families that the dictatorship so manifestly failed to provide. for example, in 1983 a member of the grandmothers of the plaza de mayo explained, “what can one hope for from someone who thinks that destroying the family, hiding children, negating their identity, will lead to a democracy, an ideal family” (serpaj, 1983). not limiting human rights violations to the past, the mothers of the plaza de mayo association responded to the 2001 argentine economic crisis by explaining in an open letter to the government: “the mothers of the plaza de mayo put the responsibility of the crime of our children’s hunger on all those who govern. we cannot accept that our children eat stuffed toads, rats, rotten food, sick horses in order to survive. these are the future citizens we are raising?” (asociación madres de plaza de mayo, 2002). this reframing insists that defending human rights protects the family and in turn promotes a more appropriate and more democratic understanding of citizenship and nation. the second major reframing effort directly contests the idea, so central to the former dictatorship, that the disappeared deserved their fates because they threatened the nation. rights groups have argued in contrast that the disappeared were in fact heroes struggling for a better world and a more just argentina. from this standpoint, the continuation of the struggle of the disappeared is in fact a contribution to argentine democracy. consider, for example part of the lengthy slogan used in the annual march of resistance in 2006: because we defend the principles of the 30,000 detained-disappeared, their objectives, their struggle, their solidarity and their commitment to build a just and free country, with social laws that protect all of the people. because our children left their example of how to live. the mothers, we continue forward with them: in the defence of human rights, the right to freedom, the right to equality and against discrimination, to health, education and culture, to housing, work, just salaries, a dignified pension. (mpm-lf, 2008) particularly interesting about this reframing is its view on matters of social and economic rights. whereas social and economic rights are often presented in reparative 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 3 [2011], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.3.3 struggles as matters of rehabilitating individual victims, in the argentine conception the target is the entire society; that is, not only the living victims of the dictatorship (the exdisappeared, ex-political prisoners, and their families) need social services to heal, but all argentines. understanding this point requires grasping the importance to the dictatorship of neo-liberal economic policies, which, among other things, involved funding cuts to important social services. accordingly, many argentine human rights organizations frame the dictatorship as an “economic genocide,” stressing in particular that the broader end served by the disappearances and deaths was to impose on argentines an economic system that they did not want and from which they continue to suffer (bonner, 2007). reframing the dictatorship in this manner, human rights organizations aim to place health, education, and the economic well-being of all argentines—the goals pursued by the victims of the dictatorship—as central aspects of the new democratic argentina. in addition, many human rights organizations also address issues such as the rights of indigenous peoples and immigrants. for example, cels, a prominent argentine human rights organization, covers these topics in its yearly human rights reports, and apdh and serpaj-argentina have working groups dedicated to addressing human rights issues as they relate to indigenous communities. the new vision of the nation promoted by human rights organizations is of one that protects human rights for everyone in argentina regardless of political views, class, ethnicity, or citizenship. in this sense, justice is about understanding the past in such a way that the new nation includes those who were forcefully excluded. to summarize, the transitional justice work of argentine human rights activists and organizations has been analyzed here along three, interrelated planes of activity: reparation, responsibility, and reframing. within each category there is an array of possible means for achieving the relevant goals. the path to reparation pursued by argentine justice-seekers has emphasized undoing the wrongs of the dictatorship to the fullest extent possible; at the same time, it has de-emphasized the importance of monetary compensation. efforts to determine and apportion state responsibility have focused primarily on criminal trials and lustration; while certainly of considerable import, the official truth commission was seen by activists as somewhat disappointing in this respect. finally, argentine justice-seekers have sought to reframe past abuses in ways congenial to pursuing the broader and quintessentially transitional goal of forging a new, inclusive, democratic, and just—socially, economically, and politically— nationhood and citizenship. as the analysis of the canadian case now hopes to show, the efforts of justiceseekers concerned with the impact and legacy of the country’s system of residential schools for aboriginal, métis, and inuit peoples can also be usefully understood by focusing on matters of reparation, responsibility, and reframing. the following account indicates that the means pursued for achieving these goals, as well as the relative weighting among them, differ significantly from what has just been seen in the 11 bonner and james: three r's published by scholarship@western, 2011 argentine case. notwithstanding these differences, however, the article’s conclusion argues for more important overriding similarities, lessons, and linkages. first, it holds that the contrasts and comparisons offered here suggest the general applicability of transitional justice as a conceptual framework for understanding the recent canadian struggles over the residential schools. second, it maintains that these contrasts and comparisons also highlight important lessons for both canadians in particular and for those concerned with the prospects for transition from settler colonialism in general. specifically, we aim to draw the reader’s attention to the issue of accountability. canada canada’s century-long residential-schools policy separated, often permanently and violently, over 100,000 native children from their families, cultures, communities, and languages (miller, 1999; milloy, 1999). a former federal government advisory body, the law commission of canada, concluded that the schools reflected “genocidal intent” in deliberately exposing aboriginal and métis children to “abuses perpetrated with the explicit goal of eradicating native ways.” (claes & clifton, 1998, p. 18). by attacking their capacity to resist settler domination and encroachment and thus their capacities to exist as distinct self-governing communities, the residential schools policy was central to the larger canadian goal of colonizing indigenous peoples. physical and sexual abuse was also rampant in the schools. some researchers estimate that between 48 and 70 per cent of students were sexually abused (feldthusen, 2007, p. 62), while a leading account concludes that “a reign of disciplinary terror, punctuated by incidents of stark abuse, continued to be the ordinary tenor of life in many schools” well into the 1970s (milloy, 1999, p. 290). more recent scholarly and community work suggests that the schools are responsible for ongoing, intergenerational legacies of family and community dysfunction that affect negatively the health, happiness, and economic conditions of aboriginal, inuit, and métis communities (see chrisjohn, 2006). canada’s last residential school closed in 1986. from this brief account a canadian-argentine parallel immediately emerges. in both cases, authoritarian policies aimed to destroy families and communities whose existence was deemed ideologically or culturally incompatible with goals essential to the regime. furthermore, in both cases the brutal and long-term intergenerational effects of authoritarian policies have kept alive movements of families and survivors seeking both immediate reparation and long-term political change. therefore, both cases feature precisely the kinds of phenomena that serve to awaken and keep alive in victims a long-term thirst for transitional justice: “communication among the victims of wrongdoing … visible physical reminders of the wrongdoing, and perpetuation of the state of affairs caused by the wrongdoing” (elster, 2004, p. 223). 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 3 [2011], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.3.3 reparation as has already been seen, reparation was conceived initially in argentina as a question of restoring, to the maximum extent possible, the pre-dictatorship status quo. as it became apparent that the “disappeared” were in fact dead, reparative efforts turned quickly to matters of satisfaction. affected families sought information about the fate of the disappeared and official acknowledgment of the state’s role in their disappearance; reparation’s compensatory aspect was a distant and even controversial aim. in canada, by contrast, the evolution and dominant focus of reparatory efforts has been quite different. although the indigenous and métis communities affected by canada’s system of indian residential schools have emphasized a number of important reparative considerations, for a brief initial period their major focus was indeed on retributive justice traditionally conceived. the cruelty and suffering that constitute the schools’ main legacy gained significant canadian attention in the mid-1990s as survivors of sexual abuse persuaded authorities to begin laying criminal charges against individual school personnel who had committed acts of physical or sexual abuse (milloy, 1999). however, this retributive focus began quickly to shade into a reparative one. the first such indication came with a raft of civil actions, which, while continuing the classic retributive aim of affixing legal responsibility to and imposing punishment on individual wrongdoers, sought financial compensation for not only harms of physical and sexual abuse, but for losses of language and culture as well (buti, 2001). while complainants in the criminal trials and plaintiffs in the civil suits were clearly seeking to impose classic, western-style legal accountability on abusers and on the state and church authorities responsible for running the schools, they were, perhaps more importantly, seeking rehabilitation. often left destitute and with significant unmet medical and counselling needs, many former residential schools students stressed that the compensation potentially furnished by their legal suits was their best means of furthering personal recoveries amidst a prevailing climate of state and societal indifference (o’neil, 1998). the assembly of first nations, the body representing the leadership of the reserve communities created under canada’s indian act system, summarized the prevailing mood of this initial phase of response: “people [wanted] to work on themselves first, help family next, and then their communities” (assembly of first nations, 1994). most of the civil suits eventually coalesced into the landmark 2002 baxter class action, in which over 10,000 former students sought approximately $12 billion in damages for physical and sexual abuse, loss of language and culture, inadequate education and living conditions, family separation, and ongoing emotional and psychological harm (miller, 2003, p. 382). the focus on compensation and rehabilitation was not confined to the legal arena. following the 1996 recommendations of the royal commission on aboriginal peoples, numerous aboriginal, inuit, and métis organizations began to demand that the canadian federal government take direct responsibility for the harm it had caused by 13 bonner and james: three r's published by scholarship@western, 2011 implementing a multi-pronged program of financial, health care, and counselling assistance for all former residential school students (james, 1999). the affected communities also began to emphasize satisfaction and guarantees of non-repetition; they demanded that the state take responsibility for its wrongdoing by acknowledging and apologizing both for the harm caused by the schools and for the brutal aims of the residential schools policy (see assembly of first nations, 2005). by pressing for an official inquiry or truth commission they also urged that the intent and impact of the residential schools be conveyed to the wider canadian public as well (claes & clifton, 1998). thus, in the case of the residential schools, survivors and affected communities settled fairly quickly on a comprehensive reparative agenda emphasizing financial compensation, rehabilitation, and various aspects of satisfaction and guarantees of nonrepetition, particularly an official apology and truth commission. this predominant emphasis on compensation contrasts significantly with the argentine case. more subtly, the two cases differ in their reparative emphases on satisfaction and non-repetition. while argentine human rights campaigners have often focused on the forensic pursuit of information long denied, their indigenous and métis counterparts—only too familiar with the schools and their shameful legacies—have sought rather to bring to wider societal audiences information already in their possession.4 responsibility having discussed the forms of reparation pursued in the two cases, the comparison here proceeds by taking up matters of responsibility. again, the question is asked: in the wake of these gross violations of human rights, how have the victims and affected communities sought to determine causal responsibility and affix moral blame? in contrast to the quite targeted and specific argentine focus on determining the roles and culpability of individual wrongdoers and on holding those individual wrongdoers criminally and politically accountable for their actions, the situation in canada has been quite different. for example, whereas critics of the argentine truth commission worried that “truth” was being promoted as an alternative to justice, in the canadian residential schools debates the “truth versus justice” dilemma—once a staple in the world of transitional justice (hayner, 2002)—has thus far gone virtually undiscussed. of course, the transitional justice literature as a whole has replaced an 4 a partial exception is the very recent and as yet unfulfilled focus in the canadian case on the related questions of the whereabouts of children who disappeared from residential schools and the locations on or near former school sites of unmarked graves containing the remains of children who died or were killed while attending a residential school. see, canada, indian residential schools truth and reconciliation commission, missing children and unmarked burials: research recommendations (2009), http://www.trccvr.ca/pdfs/working_group_on_missing_children_e.pdf. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 3 [2011], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.3.3 earlier view of “truth” and “justice” as polar alternatives with a more nuanced recognition that the two objectives are mutually intertwined (cf. rotberg and thompson, 2000 and roht-arriaza and mariezcurrena, 2006). but in the canadian context, the kinds of forensic and retributive considerations typically associated as key elements of transitional justice have, in many cases, simply been ignored. notwithstanding the admittedly important case of the early focus on criminal prosecutions of sex abusers, there has been no argentinean-style effort to affix causal responsibility and moral blame to determinate individuals—or even in many cases to particular institutions. one important reason for this difference is that, in contrast to the argentine case, where most of the major primary victims are deceased, the residential schools have left behind tens of thousands of living survivors with significant, present-day reparative needs.5 this is not to say that issues of causation and blame have been ignored. the point is instead twofold: first, the dominant focus in the wake of the residential schools has been on forcing the canadian state to embrace its reparative responsibilities; second, this focus has shaped the approach taken by the victims and affected communities to matters of causation and blame. in the early years of mobilization, indigenous and métis communities were forced to devote the bulk of their political energies towards establishing in law the simple fact of the canadian state’s overall policy and control responsibility for the schools. for instance, in the civil suits seeking damages from the state for individual abuse victims, claimants had to engage in a protracted but ultimately successful effort to establish that, despite the role of the main church denominations in the day-to-day running of the schools, the canadian federal government—as the initiator of the residential schools policy and the funder of the schools—was in fact the entity bearing the primary legal responsibility for the harms suffered by residential schools students (assembly of first nations, 2004). in short, they sought to establish causal responsibility as a means of affixing moral blame in order to authoritatively assign contemporary reparative duties. this simple fact has meant that the justice struggles in canada have been shaped predominantly by the imperative to address the financial, health care, and counselling needs of the individual living survivors, their families, and their communities (see e.g. assembly of first nations, 2010). it has meant in addition that the suspicion of reparations that has figured so prominently in argentina, while not entirely absent, has been a relatively minor theme in the struggles around the residential schools. more broadly, an emphasis on reparative considerations also led communities and survivors to wage what turned out to be an at least partially successful effort to convince the canadian federal government and public that the harm caused by the schools extends far beyond individual cases of physical or sexual abuse. two major 5 as of 2007, it was estimated that there were approximately 80,000 living former residential schools students. bradford w. morse, “the indigenous peoples of canada and their efforts to achieve true reparations,” in reparations for indigenous peoples: international and comparative perspectives, ed. federico lenzerini (oxford: oxford university press, 2008), 281. 15 bonner and james: three r's published by scholarship@western, 2011 instances of this effort should be noted here. one is the mobilization against ottawa’s alternative dispute resolution process, a process that offered compensation only in specific individual proved instances of physical or sexual abuse. critics demanded, and eventually succeeded in winning, a global compensation regime that provides compensation not only for specific incidents of abuse but for each year that every former living student spent in a residential school.6 the point in discussing these efforts is to underscore that a dominant focus on responsibility for reparative needs has led to a corresponding neglect of the emphasis on the responsibility to be accountable—to hold trials, to initiate processes of lustration, to make public pertinent official documents and information—that has proved so prominent in the argentine case. consider, for example, the results of a search and content analysis using the canadian newsstand (proquest) database, covering the period between january 1992 and september 2009. using the keyword, “residential schools,” and focusing on mainstream media stories quoting indigenous sources, we discovered the following: the second relevant instance is the campaign to persuade the federal government to develop a comprehensive, marshallplan style approach to tackling the profound social welfare needs—income support, education, counselling, job training, and health care—stemming from the intergenerational impact of the schools (see e.g. assembly of first nations, 1990). although this campaign appeared to have borne fruit when the liberal government agreed to the 2005 kelowna accord, the accord was repudiated by the incoming conservative regime in early 2006. • 29 pieces containing calls for federal financial compensation • 27 stories about lawsuits seeking civil damages from government, churches, administrators, and abusers • 19 pieces with individuals or organizations demanding a federal government apology • 15 items containing calls for a truth commission • 11 reports featuring calls for federal government rehabilitative assistance • 7 stories including demands for church apologies • 5 items with voices urging the federal government to recognize the schools as sites of cultural harm • 2 reports with demands for information on the location of graves of students who died while at residential school 6 for evidence of the mobilization’s impact, see the reaction of the standing committee on aboriginal affairs and northern development (canada, standing committee on aboriginal affairs and northern development, 38th parliament, 1st session, study on the effectiveness of the government alternative dispute resolution process for the resolution of indian residential school claims (2005), http://www2.parl.gc.ca/housepublications/publication.aspx?docid=1707109andlanguage=eand mode=1andparl=38andses=1.). 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 3 [2011], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.3.3 while the filters and biases of canada’s corporate news media are notorious, this schematic accounting at least gives a rough sense of the prevailing emphases that indigenous and métis struggles for justice have managed to convey to the wider society. in short, the federal government’s reparative responsibilities have been foregrounded; direct calls for argentine-style accountability have been seldom heard. indeed, as will be soon seen, this point even applies to the struggles for a canadian truth commission. this is not to say that the reparative emphasis on federal government responsibilities has been narrow. on the contrary: it has involved extensive efforts aimed at convincing the canadian political community that the harm caused by the schools goes past individualized instances of abuse, and instead encompasses the collective, intergenerational trauma—including family separation, substance abuse, and loss of language and culture—caused by a policy whose goal was to exterminate aboriginal, inuit, and métis as distinct peoples. throughout, justice-seekers have sought to establish the federal government’s present-day reparative duty to address the needs of not only former residential schools students but those of their families and communities as well. these efforts bore some fruit in 2006 when the federal government abandoned its ill-conceived adr process and agreed instead, with the main churches, to establish the new, global compensation regime for all former residential schools students (residential school settlement, 2009). more diffusely, a growing acceptance by the canadian federal government and public that canada has been collectively responsible for the devastating intergenerational impact of a systematic assault on indigenous cultures was manifested symbolically in prime minister harper’s official apology (canada, 2008), which acknowledged the broader range of harms associated with the schools and the brutal assimilative impulse underlying the policy. at the time of writing, whether this acknowledgment would in fact lead to the desired results remained to be seen. the distinctiveness of this focus on responsibility has also shaped the indian residential schools truth and reconciliation commission, which was established in 2009 with a five-year mandate. with so far only minimal complaint from victims, and with the full participation of the assembly of first nations and other aboriginal, inuit, and métis organizations, the canadian truth commission has been conceived as what theresa godwin phelps (2004) would identify as a victimand narrative-focused commission, that is, one concerned primarily to collect and publicize survivor viewpoints and experiences (canada, 2009). despite being barred by its mandate from inquiring into specific questions of fault and blame, the canadian truth commission, beyond academic circles (see e.g. de costa, 2009; james, 2009), has attracted no controversies even remotely comparable to the argentine demonstrations against notions of amnesty and pardon. many of the initial proponents of the idea of a truth commission hoped that a commission would focus on achieving greater “public recognition and awareness” of the 17 bonner and james: three r's published by scholarship@western, 2011 effects of the schools in the hopes that such awareness would ultimately help to prompt appropriate reparative action.7 thus, while an emphasis on the state’s overall causal responsibility and moral blame for gross human rights abuses has characterized both the argentine and canadian cases, there has also been an important difference. in the argentine case, there has been a strong emphasis on using criminal trials and lustration to hold accountable those individuals who were responsible not only for perpetrating abuses but also for conceiving and directing the overall policy context in which abuses were carried out. in the canadian case, by contrast, there has been a comparable neglect of the actual conduct of residential schools personnel, save in the cases of particular incidents of actual direct abuse. indeed, there has been a general overall neglect of the command and policy roles played by individual canadian bureaucrats and officials working not only in the federal indian affairs ministry, but also—and this is important, given the serious allegations about inhumane and racist medical treatment, surreptitious burials, and systemic failure to address in-school deaths—in canada’s federal police force (the royal canadian mounted police), health ministry, medical profession, and various provincial police forces and coroners’ services (for a lurid, yet largely unrefuted, account see annett, 2005). this apparent lack of interest appears to reflect the relatively greater priority placed by justice-seekers in the canadian case on establishing the federal government’s overall reparative responsibilities to former students and their communities: a standpoint from which the potential contribution of mechanisms such as criminal trials and lustration, processes whose primary focus is on visiting retribution on individuals rather than on securing reparation from a political community, would seem fairly minimal. thus, the dominant reparative focus has meant that questions of responsibility in relation to the residential schools have been simultaneously cathected and diffused. when the initial emphasis on individual cases of sexual and physical abuse formed the dominant prism for viewing the residential schools experience, understandings of causal responsibility and moral blame for gross injustice were cathected, that is, channelled directly onto the figures of extraordinary individual abusers. as attention moved to the issue of ottawa’s contemporary reparative other supporters continue to emphasize the potential of such recognition and awareness to help promote social and political reconciliation between indigenous and non-indigenous peoples in canada (see e.g. flamand, 2009; wagamese, 2009). for their part, critics worry that the commission is a distraction exercise turning attention away from the issues of stolen land and self-determination for indigenous peoples (see e.g. alfred, 2009; waziyatawin, 2009). by contrast, the forensic weaknesses of the commission’s mandate are seldom noted; for example, only one chapter in the 400-plus page volume on the truth commission produced by the aboriginal healing foundation directly addresses this issue (chrisjohn & wasacase, 2009). 7 this was the motivation cited by many of the respondents calling for a truth commission surveyed in claes and clifton, “needs and expectations,” 61. 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 3 [2011], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.3.3 responsibilities, the focus then reversed, with truth commission supporters and critics alike taking a relatively diffuse approach to questions of casual responsibility and moral blame, stressing the reparative duties of the canadian government and political community. however, this is not to say that indigenous and métis communities have ignored other, quintessentially political concerns of the sort commonly associated with notions of transitional justice. grasping this point requires moving to our third and final “r.” reframing in the argentine case, reframing efforts have involved multifaceted discursive and symbolic attempts to transform the meaning, nature, and conduct of an entire political community. activists have sought to reframe previous understandings of citizenship and nation that excluded so-called subversives; to reframe the military dictatorship from an anti-communist bulwark to cruel offender against values ranging from conventional human rights to the very notion of family; and to reframe those formerly stigmatized as subversives into heroes who struggled for democracy. the overall aim has been to build a democratic political community that observes human rights and rule of law norms and that promotes social equality and healthy families. in canada, by contrast, and as the preceding discussion of responsibility has suggested, many of the early reframing efforts were driven primarily by reparative needs. struggling to address financial, health care, and counselling needs amidst shameful conditions of “fourth world” impoverishment, activists and community leaders sought to transform canadian understandings of the schools from institutions plagued by individual rogue abusers into repugnant manifestations of a devastating agenda of cultural assimilation. however, reframing efforts have also focused on fundamental matters of political reconstruction; over time these efforts have become increasingly central. for example, at the first ever canadian conference on the residential schools, then afn leader ovide mercredi concluded, “our fundamental problem is the nature of our relationship with canada. structural change in laws and policies is essential” (quoted in: claes & clifton, 1998, p. 97). in the succeeding years, first nation, métis, and inuit communities have worked to turn the residential schools into a “condensation symbol” (edelman, 1964) which encapsulates in pithy and powerfully accessible ways both the colonial injustices visited by canada upon indigenous and métis peoples and the steps that need to be taken to create more just political relationships today. an early example of this focus occurred when indigenous critics blasted ottawa’s 1998 “statement of reconciliation” (canada, 1998) on the residential schools for confining its words of apology only to the matter of abuse and for neglecting to admit that the main purpose of the schools was cultural genocide. in the succeeding years, numerous conferences, pamphlets, survivor testimonials, and academic works 19 bonner and james: three r's published by scholarship@western, 2011 have established the residential schools as the concrete reflections of a policy, which, by removing children from their communities and languages and by teaching them to despise and forget their heritages and cultures, aimed fundamentally to destroy indigenous and métis communities as distinct self-determining entities (see e.g. assembly of first nations, 1994; assembly of first nations, 2005; chrisjohn, 2006; claes & clifton, 2009; indian residential schools survivors’ society, 2009). furthermore, justice-seekers have noted, the intergenerational result has been not only a litany of counselling, financial, and health care needs, but, more profoundly, culture and language loss in indigenous communities and a diminished, though far from extinguished, capacity for political resistance. this, more explicitly political, reframing project has buttressed a range of aspirations for political transformation that tend to fall under the rubric of what indigenous leaders and advocates call decolonization (alfred & corntassel, 2005). a good overall sense of the aspirations can be garnered from the landmark study of the law commission of canada (claes & clifton, 1998), which drew on numerous books, documents, and conference reports produced by indigenous and métis organizations and researchers, and consulted extensively with former residential school students. the main themes as gathered and articulated by the law commission study (claes & clifton, 1998) are as follows. first, the profound and continuing harms created by the schools constitute damning and final evidence that assimilation is a failed policy that needs to be replaced by new governing frameworks based on the pluralisation of canadian horizons and cultural respect. second, recognizing this fact also requires rejecting the mistaken notion that the contemporary health and welfare needs of aboriginal and inuit peoples can be adequately or indeed appropriately met via some sort of benevolent humanitarianism that simply recreates in gentler, paternalistic form the basic cultural arrogance underpinning the schools. simply put, while ottawa’s responsibility for running the schools means that it has profound and ongoing reparative responsibilities in terms of funding, community needs must be determined and met by the communities themselves. third, the intergenerational weakening caused by the residential schools needs urgently to be reversed by processes of internal revitalization that restore significant measures of cultural autonomy to first nation, métis, and inuit communities. fourth, and finally, both federal government responsibilities and the importance of recovery and revitalization demand that sufficient control over lands, governance, and resources be transferred to indigenous and inuit communities to meet these diverse objectives. in short, therefore, addressing the legacy of the residential schools has been reframed as an enterprise of decolonization that demands from non-indigenous canadians profound attitudinal change, a new sensitivity and openness to indigenous cultures, a renunciation of paternalism, and a willingness to surrender some of the economic and political power unjustly seized through the colonizing process in which the residential schools policy played a central and longstanding part. the following utterances from indigenous and métis organizations concerned with the legacy of the 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 3 [2011], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.3.3 schools, as quoted in the claes and clifton volume (1998, p. 121, 99, 114), should give the reader a sense of the valence and texture of these reframing efforts: • “a fundamental focus for reform needs to be on the development of a true economy … sustainable in its methods and outcomes and [that] ensures equitable distribution to all within aboriginal communities” (four worlds international institute). • [a healing model must draw] on traditional understandings of interconnectedness and wholeness … the revival and maintenance of first nations languages [and] the development of policing and judicial systems culturally appropriate to first nations” (assembly of first nations). • “the only moral response to a crime of this magnitude is that it be undone. … we recommend the fair, just, and immediate settlement of land and resource claims … an open-ended fund to be used by aboriginal nations to … reconstitute their societies [and] the replacement [of the department of indian and northern affairs] by institutions reflecting aboriginal philosophies and under aboriginal controls” (roland chrisjohn, sherri young, and michael maraun). in summary, while canadian and argentine justice-seekers have both focused perhaps most fundamentally on far-reaching questions of political reconstruction, the former have tended to stress as their ultimate aim not democratizing the existing regime and including the previously excluded, but rather, effecting new relationships oriented towards the return of stolen land and socio-political decolonization. although the existing literature on transitional justice has tended to ignore this sort of decolonizing effort, it merits viewing from within a transitional justice lens. as the more familiar argentine case reminds us, transitional justice is fundamentally about the reconstruction of political community. and as webber has recently explained, although the theme has been given insufficient attention in the transitional justice literature, such reconstruction in fact tends to require the “adjustment of contending legal and political orders,” an enterprise that includes not only issues of constitutional reform based on responsiveness to the perspectives of the marginalized and oppressed, but also intensive struggles over what languages, idioms, and traditions ought themselves to inform the debates over transition (2010, p. 9-12). the reframing efforts surrounding the residential schools demonstrate the applicability of this fundamental transitional justice concern in the canadian case. conclusion a comparison of argentina and canada in terms of transitional justice is a comparison of “most different” cases. however, as this article has shown, the similarities between the two countries when analyzed through a transitional justice lens 21 bonner and james: three r's published by scholarship@western, 2011 are actually quite striking. in both cases large scale human rights abuses took place, affecting victims, their families, and the generations that followed. like argentine justice-seekers, canadian justice-seekers are engaged in pursuing reparation, assigning responsibility, and reframing political community. the comparison of the two cases reveals that, while initial concerns might have suggested the fanciful nature of a canada-argentina comparison, it is seen immediately that in fact the incidents at issue in the two countries have remarkable similarities. both the argentine dictatorship and the canadian residential schools policy involved the deliberate targeting of communities, networks, and families for, if not outright destruction, certainly severe intergenerational disruption. in both cases, this targeting manifested the attempt of an abusive regime to solidify its rule and its peculiarly unjust version of the ideal community by eliminating competitor views of how properly to arrange the political. thus, comparing the canadian and argentine cases helps to show that canada’s treatment of aboriginal peoples is indeed “authoritarian” in the classical political science sense of that term. furthermore, in both cases the intergenerational effects of policies of family and community destruction have kept alive in the affected communities a thirst for truth and justice—a thirst of precisely the sort seen in cases of transitional justice around the world. however, as is common in comparisons between countries in transition from gross human rights abuses, let alone in comparisons involving “most different” cases, there are important differences in the choices made by justice-seekers and in the weight assigned by justice-seekers to various transitional justice mechanisms (roht-arriaza & mariezcurrena, 2006). these differences do not suggest that the conceptual framework of transitional justice and its corresponding mechanisms are irrelevant to canada. rather, our understanding of the canadian case, and indeed of the options available to justice-seekers, policymakers, and academics concerned with canada-first nation relations, is enriched by viewing canada through a transitional justice lens. it would seem in turn that the literature on transitional justice could benefit from further consideration of the relevant issues and debates in settler liberal democracies in the global north. the comparison offered here has also identified important differences: in particular, the relative neglect of various accountability outcomes and goals in the residential schools case. but this finding, in particular, suggests the value of this kind of comparative work, highlighting a potential issue of canadian concern that has thus far received relatively little attention from scholars or practitioners. indeed, by prompting consideration of the possible reasons behind the relative neglect of important accountability outcomes and goals in the residential schools case, this article’s comparison helps us to consider the canadian case in a new and revealing light. of course, any adequate understanding of what canadian accountability might involve would require not only further research but also processes of normative argument and political struggle that have in many ways scarcely begun. as a first tentative step, we are suggesting that concerned groups and individuals from the non22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 3 [2011], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.3.3 indigenous canadian settler society need to begin focusing on questions of political and social accountability, in both the backwardand forward-looking senses. for example, at the most general level, what do we need to know about the individuals and institutions that allowed the residential schools and their attendant atrocities to persist over four generations in order to break canada’s longstanding colonial pattern? this kind of political accountability could include abolishing or, at least in the short term, significantly reconstructing institutions associated with grievous past wrongs relating to the schools, such as canada’s department of indian and northern affairs. social accountability might involve making key political figures and wrongdoers answerable to the public by forcing them, or at least somehow inducing them, to testify before the trc. it might also involve making public and, indeed, widely disseminating, key official documents and communications pertaining to the planning, execution, and ongoing mechanics of the wrongdoing. as this article has shown, these issues of political and social accountability have been little discussed in canada. we have suggested that the relative neglect of the kind of political and social accountability of which we are speaking reflects at least in part the choices and priorities of indigenous and métis communities. considering these choices and priorities in the context of this article’s canada-argentina comparison highlights the following important considerations about historic justice and political transformation in canada. first, the decisions to prioritize the financial and health care needs of residential school survivors and their communities reflect both the intergenerational devastation caused by the residential schools and the poverty and political marginalization faced by so many canadian indigenous and métis communities. second, reparative priorities aside, the more explicitly transitional or reconstructive goals of canada’s aboriginal, métis, and inuit peoples have not generally shared the concern of their argentine counterparts on transforming the internal workings and machinations of existing, mainstream political institutions. instead, their dominant transitional focus has been on reconstructing indigenous-canadian relationships and strengthening indigenous institutions. some may still insist that the long delay of transitional justice in canada means that our preoccupation with accountability is impractical, even moot. but it needs also to be understood—and this point raises the article’s third and final point about what the relative neglect of political accountability projects familiar from the argentine context reveals about the canadian case—what lies behind the delay. that is, it was precisely the political marginalization and oppression of canadian indigenous and métis peoples that prevented the injustices of the residential schools from being considered in a more timely fashion. indeed, and as this article has shown, residential schools survivors and their communities had to wage arduous, long-term battles to bring even the most elementary concerns about the schools onto the canadian public agenda. for example, whereas a truth commission was implemented almost as soon as the argentine military’s regime ended—the commission report then became an instant bestseller—it was two decades after the majority of residential schools had closed before the idea of a canadian truth commission was even publicly discussed. it then took a further decade’s 23 bonner and james: three r's published by scholarship@western, 2011 worth of political struggle before the notion received an even minimal degree of acceptance by the canadian federal government. in short, therefore, these findings and considerations do not suggest that transitional justice is an irrelevant conceptual category or practical goal in the canadian case. on the contrary: they indicate instead the extent to which the enormity of canada’s injustices have made the barriers to pursuing and even discussing notions of transitional justice in this country so much greater. the authors therefore reject the assumption that transitional justice is only for the global south or only for countries dealing promptly with extremely recent histories of egregious violation. instead, it appears that the relative neglect of both forensic, backward-looking accountability and forward-looking, politically transformative accountability by justice-seekers in the canadian case reflects the enormity of the subjugation and marginalization of canadian indigenous peoples. it also suggests that there may be an important role, currently missing, in canada for the mobilization of settler solidarity organizations to work for this accountability. thus, far from suggesting irrelevancy, this article’s enterprise of comparison has underscored not only the less propitious 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(2005). between justice and certainty: treaty making in british columbia. vancouver: university of british columbia press. 29 bonner and james: three r's published by scholarship@western, 2011 the international indigenous policy journal august 2011 the three r’s of seeking transitional justice: reparation, responsibility, and reframing in canada and argentina michelle bonner matt james recommended citation the three r’s of seeking transitional justice: reparation, responsibility, and reframing in canada and argentina abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license the three râ•žs of seeking transitional justice: reparation, responsibility, and reframing in canada and argentina being indigenous in the bureaucracy: narratives of work and exit the international indigenous policy journal volume 9 | issue 1 article 3 january 2018 being indigenous in the bureaucracy: narratives of work and exit julie lahn australian national university, julie.lahn@anu.edu.au recommended citation lahn, j. (2018). being indigenous in the bureaucracy: narratives of work and exit. the international indigenous policy journal, 9(1). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.3 being indigenous in the bureaucracy: narratives of work and exit abstract australia’s civil service has had some success in attracting substantial numbers of indigenous employees. but significant numbers also regularly exit the bureaucracy. retaining indigenous employees is recognised as an ongoing difficulty for government. this research with former and current indigenous civil servants outlines factors they identify as contributing to decisions to leave the bureaucracy. a key finding involves their general sense of being underutilised and undervalued— that forms of experience and understanding as indigenous people go largely unrecognised within government, which in turn constrains their potential to meaningfully contribute to improving government relations with indigenous australians or to enhancing the effectiveness of the bureaucracy more broadly. work as an indigenous civil servant emerges as a space of contestation with the possibilities and limits of statecraft. keywords civil service, bureaucracy, indigenous professionals, workplace diversity, retention, australia creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ b e i n g i n d i g e n o u s i n t h e b u r e a u c r a c y : n a r r a t i v e s o f w o r k a n d e x i t the research presented in this article explores aspects of indigenous peoples’ experiences of work in government bureaucracy, specifically aboriginal and torres strait islanders who work or have worked in the australian public service. the australian public service (aps) is a national civil service that is involved with the public administration of a range of departments and agencies that are linked to the federal (commonwealth) government in australia. national legislation requires commonwealth public sector organisations (including all government departments and authorities) to engage in equal employment opportunity (eeo) planning that addresses groups of people who have been excluded in the past. indigenous australians (i.e., aboriginal and torres strait islander people) comprise one of these groups. in addition, the aps is legally required to uphold and effect workplace non-discrimination and diversity principles in its employment practices. while indigenous peoples make up approximately 3% (670,000 people) of australia’s population, indigenous employees currently only make up 2.6% of the australian federal civil service (australian public service commission, 2015). this percentage highlights that the aps has not yet fulfilled its aim to reach parity between indigenous and non-indigenous peoples in its workforce (commonwealth of australia, 2015b). a series of challenges have contributed to the aps’ inability to reach this parity. firstly, indigenous civil servants have separated from or exited the aps at a greater rate than their nonindigenous co-workers (australian national audit office, 2014). secondly, indigenous employees have left the civil service earlier in their careers (australian public service commission, 2013a). thirdly, these separations and departures have generally overshadowed successful recruitment of indigenous employees, with recent net losses of indigenous employees, suggesting, “agencies are not gaining employment outcomes commensurate with their efforts” (australian national audit office, 2014, p. 23). in this article, i respond to the pressing need for both research concerning indigenous state employees’ relations with postcolonial countries and for accounts that move beyond simple narratives of co-option or ambivalence (radcliffe & webb 2015). aboriginal lawyer and academic megan davis (2016), for example, has observed that indigenous civil servants can play a critical role in aboriginal and torres strait islanders’ efforts to engage with complex australian politics and policy. she noted, “it takes a special kind of person to persevere with dedication and commitment to their mob” (para. 4), especially since recent governments have made a notable shift away from concepts of indigenous selfdetermination.1 despite this, few studies have recorded the experiences of indigenous bureaucrats themselves. this article provides some insight into these experiences, and points to future research directions in this important yet understudied area. to do this, i draw on interviews with current and former indigenous employees of the aps. these interviews sought to investigate indigenous employees’ perspectives of aps work in order to better understand the range of factors that shaped their decisions to 1 “mob” is a term that appears commonly in aboriginal english and one that can carry several meanings (adams, 2014), though it generally signifies a (extended) family network and/or group of people sharing identifying affiliations. 1 lahn: being indigenous in the bureaucracy published by scholarship@western, 2018 exit.2 it is worth noting that the findings presented in this article are likely relevant to industries beyond the public sector, insofar as attracting aboriginal and torres strait islander employees has been identified by a number of australian industries (e.g., banking and mining) as a priority. this identification has led to the development of strategies for engaging and retaining indigenous people (australian chamber of commerce and industry, 2014; constable, o’leary & roberts, 2013; daly, gebremedhin, & muhammad, 2013). i n d i g e n o u s e x p e r i e n c e s o f w o r k i n g i n s t a t e b u r e a u c r a c y : a n e m e r g i n g l i t e r a t u r e there has been little english-language research examining indigenous experiences of state employment. this is unsurprising given the dominant academic focus in postcolonial nations on both the circumstances of indigenous disadvantage and the reduced opportunities for professional employment in rural and remote settings. however, emerging research concerning indigenous peoples in urban contexts in canada (peters & anderson, 2013) and australia (kleinert & koch, 2012) suggests that this is changing. as a result, indigenous experiences with urban employment, social mobility, and involvement in professional forms of work have come into focus (anderson, 2011; lahn, 2013) alongside studies of indigenous involvement in professions such as nursing (usher, miller, turale, & goold, 2005) and medicine (anderson & lavallee, 2007). concomitantly, scholarship has started to address issues of inclusion and respect for indigenous peoples as they have been articulated under the umbrella of workplace diversity. this scholarship has paid attention to strategies and frameworks aimed at ensuring cultural awareness and cultural competency training (truong, paradies, & priest, 2014), as well as questions of supervision and support for indigenous staff (burgess & dyer, 2009; scerra, 2012). in the last 15 years, studies that specifically address aspects of indigenous employment in the civil service have become more common (almond, 2006; barnett, spoehr, & parnis, 2008; briggs, 2006; durie, 2003; dwyer, 2003; o’faircheallaigh & althaus, 2015; radcliffe & webb, 2015; ryan, ravenswood, & pringle, 2014); among these, studies addressing canada, new zealand, and chile have been prominent. in australia, larkin (2013) and ganter (2016) have authored key studies, which have offered crucial insights into the complex affect that issues of representation and race have on indigenous experiences of employment in government and how these issues can potentially contribute to high rates of exit. four major areas of difficulty emerge: role modelling; cultural obligations; professional development and skills recognition; and stereotypes, bullying, and racism. ganter (2016), who focused on senior indigenous civil servants in australia’s northern territory, has highlighted the uneasiness indigenous employees experience when they are faced with others’ expectations that they act as role models and/or speak “on behalf” of aboriginal peoples. in his work, larkin (2013) has emphasized that racism and racialised hierarchies in aps workplaces are often unrecognised by senior bureaucrats. other authors have noted that indigenous peoples’ cultural obligations to family and community loom large as moral rationales for entering and remaining in the government’s employ. yet, these obligations often simultaneously place additional pressures on these employees in terms of the need to care to 2 the research findings discussed in this article were drawn from a multi-methods investigation of indigenous exit from the australian public service (biddle & lahn, 2016). the research was funded by the australian public service commission. approval for the study to proceed was granted by the australian national university’s human research ethics committee. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.3 family members and communities (australian public service commission, 2013b; barnett et al., 2008; sully, 1997; wakerman, matthews, hill, & gibson, 2000). while the aps has developed provisions for cultural leave and flexible working arrangements, they are not always taken up by indigenous employees, which suggests that current aps measures are deficient (barnett et al., 2008; hunter & gray, 2013). although existing research has pointed to the difficulties and discomforts experienced by indigenous civil servants, it is necessary to focus more directly on what indigenous civil servants themselves have identified as factors influencing their decisions to remain in or exit civil sector employment. m e t h o d this study draws from a series of semi-structured, in-depth interviews with current and former and aboriginal and torres strait islander employees of the australian public service. its non-probabilistic, qualitative, and inductive methodology suits the exploratory nature of the research in seeking to elicit and identify a wide range of perspectives and experiences. four key foci guided the study: 1. what motivates indigenous people to join the aps? 2. what factors influence their decisions to leave the aps? 3. what factors influence their decisions to remain? 4. what forms of employment do indigenous civil servants engage in after departing the aps? half of the interviews were conducted face-to-face and the remainder were conducted by telephone. interviews lasted between 1 and 2 hours, during which participants were encouraged to reflect on their employment in the australian civil service. in total, 34 people participated in the research, 16 of whom were women and 18 of whom were men. the average length of interviewees’ aps employment was 9 years; the shortest length of employment was less than one year and the longest length of employment was several decades. all but three participants described themselves as the first member of their extended family networks to be employed in this sector. their collective experiences of aps work was diverse and encompassed both policy contexts and “frontline” interaction with clients across 13 individual departments and several statutory agencies. all major classification levels of aps employment were represented.3 participants entered the aps in a range of ways, including by applying for an advertised position, by completing a civil service examination (which is no longer available), through cadet and graduate programs, and through traineeship schemes that have indigenous-specific cohorts. it is important to note that interview participants were self-selecting. this was beneficial insofar as it provided participants an opportunity to discuss their work experiences and difficulties; however, this recruitment method may have left out others who were less willing or uninterested in participating, resulting in other factors influencing departure remaining unexplored. future longitudinal and real-time studies may address this limitation and identify the relative proportions of indigenous employees 3 australian public service (aps) 1-6; executive level (el) 1 & 2; and senior executive service (ses). 3 lahn: being indigenous in the bureaucracy published by scholarship@western, 2018 affected by the issues raised here. most participants responded to messages that were distributed via a government employee email network; the message highlighted experiences of civil service work and decisions to exit civil service work as areas of research interest. other participants made contact through other institutional and personal networks. participants included individuals who had already departed from the civil service as well as current civil servants who were actively seeking alternative employment in different sectors. a minority of participants were content to remain in aps employment for the foreseeable future, though they wished to express their views concerning colleagues’ departures and the general character of civil service employment for indigenous peoples. it is perhaps noteworthy that many of those comprising this minority have departed the civil service since participating in the research. a grounded-theory approach guided the data analysis. interviews were fully transcribed and initial-level categories, which reflected the key ideas and terms, were created for each interview. higher-order categories emerged through the comparison of these initial-level categories across multiple interviews. broadly shared commonalities between higher-order categories were then identified and developed into the final core thematic categories. all interviews were conducted in confidence and any identifying information has been omitted here. given the relatively small number of indigenous aps employees, particularly at senior levels, this necessarily includes reference to specific departments or agencies as places of work or individuals’ duration of employment. f i n d i n g s : i n d i g e n o u s n a r r a t i v e s o f w o r k a n d e x i t across participants’ interviews, five critical areas of difficulty that indigenous employees experience in the aps emerged: 1. overselling the bureaucracy, 2. politics and policy, 3. career and supervision, 4. racism and response, and 5. being undervalued. generally, no single factor accounted for a participant’s decision to exit public sector employment; rather, the decision to exit tended to be triggered by one or a combination of the above areas of difficulty. o v e r s e l l i n g t h e b u r e a u c r a c y all participants noted that, prior to entering the aps, they held inaccurate impressions regarding the nature of the work that was involved there. as a result, many participants felt that they were unprepared for the reality of the experience, which gave rise to a range of early negative reactions, including disappointment, disillusionment, and even dismay. specifically, individuals who gained aps entry 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.3 through the graduate program described feeling strongly that they had been encouraged to develop expectations of their future roles that were at best unrealistic, if not highly exaggerated. participants often used the expression “oversold” to describe this experience: for the vast majority of the grads, who are getting a more generalist position, it’s oversold, and you’re told “you’re the best of the best” and when you experience the programs, you hit the ground, very different to what’s been sold. and that’s true for all grad programs. [interview 5] the rhetoric doesn’t match the reality of the work of the public service. all agencies try to promote themselves as the employer of choice but they get the people through the door and they might be nice for a little while but then you know once it’s all worn off 6 months down the track people get back to reality find out this is not what attracted me to your agency in the first place. [interview 16] interviewees described their feelings of disappointment as incoming graduates and trainees as linked to the realisation that it can take many years of experience to reach positions of genuine “leadership” at senior levels of the civil service. attendant to this realisation was the negative feeling that there was limited opportunities where participants could “make a difference” through their work with the aps: coming into the public service was like being sold the dream, about making a difference, enabling people at the grassroots to do the work, about how we were the people [who would enable that]. that was the impression we were given. and i’ve been on the other side [within government] looking at how they pump up the tires on these guys [trainees], selling the public service to them, telling them “this is the job you want.” [interview 21] when i applied for the graduate program i was very idealistic and was really sold that aspect of why i wanted to work for the organisation . . . i think people who come in do so with the idea of effecting change from the inside then get frustrated with how slow change can be implemented when they get in. and you think, “oh i spent 12 months and i didn’t achieve anything and am i going to spend another 12 months and do the same thing?” [interview 30] the realization that advancing the interests of aboriginal people and their communities was quite delimited, and would almost certainly be postponed years into the future, featured strongly in participants’ accounts of frustration with the terms of their employment. p o l i t i c s a n d p o l i c y interviewees frequently expressed frustration at the extent to which political considerations and expediency pervade the aps, insofar as both tended to limit or undermine their senses of being involved in positive policy initiatives or delivering genuinely useful programs to indigenous people: in the aps decisions are made in a way that are almost warped. in that they are made on political grounds . . . the whole way the aps operates is politically driven and that’s what pollutes the environment. and that then reduces the capacity of your interventions to be successful. and when you’re aboriginal in the aps, and you’re working on those programs, that are the same as any other program in a way, except your attachment to those programs is much 5 lahn: being indigenous in the bureaucracy published by scholarship@western, 2018 greater, you really want them to work. i mean . . . you’re working on an indigenous program and the point is a social economic intervention to try to ameliorate disadvantage. [interview 4] participants also noted that the impact of “politics” sidelined the special expertise and experience of indigenous aps employees on indigenous issues. for example, one participant cited the accelerated recruitment of non-indigenous civil servants into indigenous affairs during a controversial and intense period of government attention, called “the intervention” (altman & hinkson, 2007), as an example of how people who were primarily interested in pursuing promotions—in a department that had become the focus of government attention, no less—worked to erode indigenous employees’ ability to make specific contributions as indigenous people. furthermore, this situation made indigenous employees feel less valued. several participants expressed the view that their personal and professional experiences and insights in relation to indigenous issues were marginalised by broad political considerations. participants linked this view to their strong dissatisfaction with specific policy directions or initiatives. sometimes you felt like you were talking to brick walls or bashing your head against a brick wall because what you are feeding up to national office would not be used or you just felt like you were so disconnected from policy ah and that sort of stuff and people just became cynical and more disillusioned. [interview 30] in particular, aps employees located in regional offices noted the negative consequences of being involved in executing, and at times publicly representing, what they regarded as poorly designed and implemented policy: [aboriginal] organisations got cagey, felt we were being misleading and you know, in the lead up to the [policy] roll-out there was a lot of talk about engaging with community, hearing their ideas, developing their ideas into projects and putting them up to fund, you know, be innovative and creative . . . and it doesn’t make us look very trustworthy when that fell through. and that’s with relationships that we’ve had for 10, 15 years, you know that you’ve built up with these organisations and that you’ve built up with these key people in these organisations. it was very damaging to that relationship and people’s reputations. [interview 30] the interviewee quoted above felt that the impact of poor policy design and implementation was damaging to personal relationships with community stakeholders, insofar as it forced them into the deeply uncomfortable role of the “messenger of bad news”; this was particularly uncomfortable considering the participant had built relationships and connections with communities over a lengthy period of time. c a r e e r a n d s u p e r v i s i o n a range of concerns were raised under the theme of “career and supervision,” and there was no overriding or conspicuously shared issue across the interviews. a number of participants expressed frustration at the lack of opportunities they had to utilise their pre-existing skillsets and/or those developed through aps training. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.3 i’ve become very frustrated and disappointed that all the skills i’ve learnt aren’t being utilised to their potential and not for want of trying. [interview 7] participants also noted experiencing career stagnation, encountering a range of problems regarding supervision, and feeling that there were few transparent mechanisms for career advancement. these experiences included the lack of adequate support from leadership teams. for example: it’s just frustrating. you go and ask the leadership team certain things about: “i’m going out in the community. i’m going to be doing this, this and this. can you advise me on the next template for the reporting for them so i can integrate that into my conversation?” and you get told, “i don’t know.” that’s really frustrating. [interview 28] in addition, these experiences included difficult or exploitative relationships with individual supervisors: i felt like i was supporting [a supervisor] to do his job. and often i had caught him out taking stuff i had discussed with him and passing it off as his own and call him out at meetings just to let him know that i knew it was going on. you just get to the stage when you are sick of being a stepping-stone for non-aboriginal people who work in indigenous areas who want it on their résumé and sometimes are not doing it for the right reasons. [interview 26] people don’t feel valued here for their experience and their knowledge. here you feel like you’re dictated to when we’re actually the experts on indigenous programmes but we’re not having any input into anything. [interview 16] one aspect of supervision that drew a number of negative observations from participants involved supervisors’ lack of familiarity or competency with indigenous cultures. participants noted that this created a range of difficulties ranging from undermining effective program delivery to poor management of indigenous staff. r a c i s m a n d r e s p o n s e participants frequently raised the issue of racism in the aps, whether they had experienced it personally or had observed it. some spoke of racism as a form of bullying, while others saw racism and bullying as separate issues. either way, instances of racism were viewed as directly undermining indigenous employees’ sense of being valued within the aps. it is interesting that interviewees often noted that encountering racism was expected, given similar problems existing in australian society more widely. even so, when instances did occur, participants found it deeply disappointing. one participant noted, for example: in indigenous affairs, we heard racist statements on a daily basis. one staff member was told “just let the discriminatory stuff go past you, it’ll be right” by a non-indigenous section manager. i’ve had other staff in tears when other people make open statements about “aboriginal organisations being so hopeless” . . . when those kind of comments are allowed to continue on a daily basis . . . you are forced to operate in a space which doesn’t value you at all. [interview 25] 7 lahn: being indigenous in the bureaucracy published by scholarship@western, 2018 however, while participants noted that they expected to encounter instances of racism, they also expressed concern regarding how to respond to racism. this emerged as a key point of concern for participants, many of whom noted that part of being an indigenous civil servant involved the tangible perception of being under scrutiny from non-indigenous colleagues and, consequently, strong pressure not to appear “thin-skinned” or “angry.” as one participant put it, a real risk in reacting to racism is that “you come off looking worse.” several participants were specifically concerned about negative repercussions from management. if an indigenous person takes offence then [the perception is] that person is being a little sooky4 and that’s not dealt with. like that person then goes to management and expects management to deal with it. but it’s not . . . but the perpetrators aren’t dealt with and the victim them becomes ostracised and seen as like, you know a little bit sooky and making trouble. like they’re the ones with the problem. it becomes that damaging . . . it becomes about them, not the people making the comments. it’s never knocked on the head and there’s never anything that says you can’t do this ‘cause this is racism. [interview 30] a majority view emerged that it was generally better not to respond, and certainly one should not make a formal complaint, in order to avoid negative reactions or repercussions. despite these significant obstacles, however, a small number of participants noted that they did make informal or formal complaints to their supervisors. the perception and experience of inadequate, ineffective, and/or equivocal responses to instances of racism in the working environment led participants to again question of the extent to which the aps valued them as indigenous employees. b e i n g u n d e r v a l u e d the fifth and final theme, “being undervalued,” has already been mentioned. a general effect of the critical areas of difficulty noted above was that they created a sense that indigenous employees were not being valued by the aps despite being specifically sought out. for some participants, this sense was expressed very strongly; for others, it was something that they were still exploring. participants often queried what the aps sought to gain from its indigenous employees as indigenous people. what was the substantive intent of indigenous recruitment? was it to meet their diversity targets, or did it extend beyond numbers and percentages? i don’t think the commonwealth i don’t think they actually come to grips with why they want to employ aboriginal and torres strait islander people. i think it’s a target and because they’ve been told they need a target that’s the only reason they do it. they don’t actually sit down and think about it. [interview 15] 4 "sooky” is a colloquial term used in australia to describe a timid, shy, cowardly person or a crybaby (macquarie dictionary, 2017). 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.3 part of the challenge is, do they understand why they want aboriginal and torres strait islander staff? increasing indigenous employment isn’t just about the target. it’s the experience and exposure that aboriginal and torres strait islander staff bring. [interview 25] many participants questioned the degree to which the aps had thought through the fundamental question of why indigenous people were being sought as employees. the issue was raised that departments were simply responding to required targets, rather than carefully considering the potential contribution indigenous people can make. d i s c u s s i o n : “ m a k i n g a d i f f e r e n c e , ” i n d i g e n o u s a g e n c y , a n d s t a t e c r a f t the perspectives of the research participants shed light on factors that have influenced indigenous civil servants’ decisions to exit the aps; moreover, they provide some clear direction for efforts aimed at improving the retention of aboriginal and torres strait islander employees. beyond these things, though, their vivid accounts of public sector employment raised broader matters than those regarding decisions to exit or remain. participants spoke powerfully of their intentions, hopes, and priorities in seeking aps employment, and offered insight into the obstacles and opportunities they encountered in civil service work. in doing this, they raised the important issue of agency—anticipated, potential, and real—vis-à-vis their engagements with statecraft. the social sciences have long tended to characterize the state as a substantive and monolithic entity that contrasts with society, which apparently consists of a citizenry or the subjects over which the state exercises its powers of governmentality (coulter & schumann, 2012; macclancy, 2017; shore, wright, & però, 2011). indeed, the interests of the state are frequently represented as distinct from, and positioned against, the interests of particular communities or specific groups within national populations. these kinds of depictions are similarly common in discussions relating to indigenous people. povinelli (2002) and kowal (2015), for example, have both penned evocative and sophisticated investigations of late-liberal multicultural nation-states, such as australia, and the profound impasses and unresolved tensions they have experienced in engaging meaningfully, positively, and equitably with the cultural difference and even “alterity” of their indigenous populations. at the same time, these analyses often juxtapose indigenous peoples with state administrators and the state’s implicit endorsement and elevation of non-indigenous “normative publics.” from this, it is helpful to question how such depictions of the state exist alongside the contemporary reality that indigenous people are becoming state administrators working as civil servants in public sector policy and program delivery in increasing numbers both in australia and in a range of other locations. if the state is re-envisioned less as a coherent, purposeful, and unified entity and more as an assemblage of different human actors and peopled institutions—especially ones whose multiple activities can reinforce and also contradict each other—then it becomes critical to give adequate attention to the experiences of indigenous people working in civil service bureaucracy. such attention can potentially reveal much about both the workings of statecraft and its multi-dimensional relationship with indigenous peoples. my research reinforces what has been produced by other authors in this emerging field by suggesting that, when indigenous people join state bureaucracy, struggles over representation, agency, and expertise inevitably follow. if the experience of public sector employment among the aboriginal and 9 lahn: being indigenous in the bureaucracy published by scholarship@western, 2018 torres strait islander participants in this study were summed up by a single concept it would be: unmet expectations—both expectations about how they would be treated by the aps and about the potential value of their individual contributions as indigenous employees. in the language of participants, many expressed disappointment at the limited ability to “make a difference” and contribute to the wellbeing of indigenous people and communities; they also expressed disappointment regarding the aps’s ineffectiveness in dealing with indigenous issues broadly. participants’ accounts suggested that, in order to foster a sense among indigenous employees that they can “make a difference,” their knowledge and experience must be both respected and sought out, especially regarding the design and delivery of policies impacting indigenous people. this concern with “making a difference” and retaining a “commitment to their mob” (as davis, 2016 has put it) has also appeared in recent studies of indigenous professionals in australia. these studies have highlighted indigenous professionals’ significant senses of obligation to their communities and to indigenous people generally, both in terms of choosing and succeeding in professional fields (davis, 2016; minniecon & kong, 2005; stewart & warn, 2017; upton, 2011). this sense of obligation has also been reflected in ganter’s (2016) australian-based research, specifically insofar as her research participants emphasized the “tied-in” (p. 163) character of their own lives in relation to the “absent indigenous subjects” of government policy (pp. 169-171). ganter (2016) has highlighted how the indigenous civil servants with whom she spoke drew on their personal relationships and connections when they sought to incorporate greater levels of mutuality and respect in the governance of indigenous people. they did this, she noted, while still working to ameliorate professional climates of elitism and excess state authority. radcliffe and webb (2015) have similarly pointed to “relations with ‘constituent groups’ in civil society” (p. 251) as a critical element to consider when assessing the character of indigenous civil servants’ engagement with the state. for participants in this research, relationships with communities and organisations were regularly described as playing important parts in their assessments of state employment as a meaningful arena through which to have a constructive impact on issues affecting indigenous people. one participant explained: you do get to see change when it happens. there is some really good work going on and some really good people with drive and ambition who want the betterment of their people, that’s the centre of what they do. you meet some really positive role models and that sort of thing, so the community engagement part is probably the most satisfying part, and you do meet some very committed people, some very good people in the organisations. [interview 30] in fact, a prominent reason participants gave for remaining in the aps involved their tangible and deeply felt personal involvements with work relating to indigenous people: i was thinking . . . “i’m doing good things serving people.” i was going to hang on to that. [interview 17] i think because we have that connection to our work [with indigenous people], the deeper connection, i don’t think it’s as easy for us to move on and up. [interview 28] 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.3 it is noteworthy that the second quotation links the importance of a sense of connection to reluctance among indigenous civil servants to seek career advancement that might move them away from indigenous issues. when participants felt linked to colleagues who shared their commitments, the desire to remain in state employment was stronger: the one good thing was you had the support of your teammates around you and you were all trying to do something good. [interview 23] i think now that i’ve found a really good support network here in terms of a couple of the other [indigenous colleagues]—i’ve found people that i can relate to. i’ve got friends that are nonindigenous that i have as a support network, but this is a little bit different, this is that sort of cultural stuff. i don’t know, we’re all just on the same wavelength and we’re all passionate about indigenous communities. [interview 26] when this sense of positive connection was endangered, undermined, or directly damaged by employment with the aps, participants spoke about reconsidering their positions: to start with i was proud of what i was doing. [but then] when i was at community events i would [just] say, “i worked for government.” i wouldn’t say i worked for [department x] because i was ashamed at where it was going. and the fact that there was so many aboriginal staff especially out in the network, which are the face that the department provides to community, and we had no say. we could see that [policy] wasn’t going to be good and it wasn’t, but we tried to work with what we had and make it as good as we could and it didn’t [work out well]. [interview 23] ganter (2016) has made a similar point, noting that the high standard of professional efficacy embraced by one committed civil servant “was never at the expense of community relationships” (p. 170). in this sense, being committed to making a difference for indigenous communities can be considered a source of both frustration and diligence for indigenous civil servants, insofar as it provides a source of motivation to seek and remain in such employment as well as a reason to depart if these commitments are frustrated. radcliffe and webb (2015) have suggested, “employment for marginal subjects inevitably raises questions about extent and scope for indigenous agency” (p. 251). indeed, having the agency to create positive forms of change and to support material gains for indigenous communities was often important for the participants of this study. such agency, or lack thereof, could influence participants’ decisions to depart or continue with state employment. this is evident from the following response of one participant, who explained their reasons for remaining in the aps thusly: for me it’s scale of impact. i can make a bigger change here with a small effort than i can with a ngo or somewhere like that. if i was working with a ngo [non-governmental organization], i could improve the lives of a couple of families but in my job here i can have a bigger effect on many more people. that’s why i’m staying. [interview 7] in this instance, an indigenous state employee critically appraises both existing forms of statecraft and their implications for their commitments to positive change for indigenous people within the “agency11 lahn: being indigenous in the bureaucracy published by scholarship@western, 2018 curtailing spaces” (radcliffe & webb 2015, p. 249) such statecraft frequently involves. the aboriginal and torres strait islander civil servants interviewed for this study were far from disciplined functionaries who have passively accepted state authority over the content of policy commitments. rather, many were acutely attentive to the areas of inconsistency between government rhetoric and practice, and reached conclusions informed by their own commitments to indigenous issues and concerns. participants in this study often positioned themselves as having more complete knowledge and nuanced insight about the needs of indigenous people than policymakers or politicians—a positioning which parallels that of the indigenous state employees discussed by radcliffe and webb (2015). but in the chilean context about which radcliffe and webb have written, indigenous professionals employed as civil servants expressed apprehension about the potential for “co-optation” (p. 255), whereby indigenous expertise and knowledge could be functionally incorporated into regulated and disciplining state formations. by contrast, participants in this study generally expressed frustration at the lack of acknowledgement of their expertise and personal connections to indigenous concerns, and actively sought opportunities to utilise both: people don’t feel valued here for their experience and their knowledge. here you feel like you’re dictated to when we’re actually the experts on indigenous programmes but we’re not having any input into anything. [interview 26] people just feel so disrespected and not valued for their experience and knowledge of what we could do to make a change . . . we’re not getting listened to at all. policy is made at a very high level by people who think they know but really don’t. and if we are ever asked to give feedback, it never seems to be considered. [interview 27] [our] value being the difference in perspectives and insight that aboriginal and torres strait islander staff bring. fundamentally that value is where [current arrangements] are lacking. [interview 25] i suggest that the imperative to consider outcomes and shortfalls against a sense of broader obligations to make a positive contribution to indigenous communities likely forms a key aspect of the unique position of indigenous people in state employment. the ways in which individuals engage in this process is undoubtedly complex and certainly worthy of further research attention. studies of policy approaches to indigenous affairs in australia have noted the propensity for governments and bureaucracy to either ignore or give nominal attention to cultural difference when devising policy and delivering programs (dillon & westbury, 2007). participants in this study emphasized feeling undervalued and underutilized, which captures how they felt about the limits of their individual agency to “make a difference” as indigenous civil servants. a key evaluative conclusion is reflected in the participants’ pointed queries concerning the fundamental rationale that underpins government efforts to employ indigenous people in the aps, and the assertion this should involve more than “just targets.” in this regard, it is useful to note a recent statement by two federal government ministers, which directly refers to the goal of increasing representation of 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.3 indigenous employees across the commonwealth public sector to 3 percent by 2018: “it is vital to improve the representation of indigenous australians in the workforce if the commonwealth is to capably respond to the needs of the community” (commonwealth of australia, 2015a, p. 1).5 by challenging the aps to clarify its approach to targeted indigenous employment, participants in this study probed the veracity of the government’s narrative of a “capable response” to indigenous needs. in addition, the participants highlighted the contradictions of this narrative when it is put into practice in the aps. in effect, they asked: precisely how will indigenous representation in the civil service increase the capacity of government to “respond to indigenous needs” if the specific knowledge and experience of indigenous matters brought to the civil service by aboriginal and torres strait islander employees are neither sought out nor valued? embedded in participants’ questioning was their perspective that indigenous participation in the civil service should be seen as enabling more direct involvement of indigenous perspectives in the design and administration of policy that directly impacts indigenous people. c o n c l u s i o n the arguments for engaging more fully with the expectations of indigenous employees are compelling, particularly dillon and westbury’s (2007) affirmation, in their review of decades of australian government engagement with indigenous people, that “policies and programs that ignore indigenous perspectives and social constructs inevitably fail” (p. 197). the indigenous civil servants past and present with whom i spoke viewed their expertise in indigenous matters as valuable resources that the aps routinely failed to either sufficiently recognise or constructively utilise. the extent to which this situation may change and what form such change might take remains an open question. certainly, if change does not occur, efforts to recruit indigenous people to the aps may continue to be viewed as a “hollow invitation” (ganter, 2016, p. 182). at the same time, however, the increasing presence of indigenous people in civil service employment underscores the necessity to move beyond structures that provide the state with a life and agency of its own separate from the diverse people and activities involved—what has been described as “the spell of bureaucratic disappearance” (lea, 2008, p. 19). there is a pressing need for rigorous, thorough research that aims to understand the human actions that go on behind the scenes of bureaucratic work. just as it is necessary to examine the programs and policies crafted, implemented, and forestalled by bureaucratic work, it is necessary to understand how the contexts and practices of statecraft (a) affect and relate to indigenous civil servants, (b) constrain indigenous civil servants’ efforts to work and effect meaningful policy change, and (c) facilitate indigenous civil servants’ efforts to act agentially. 5 two ministers’ offices were involved the media release (commonwealth of australia, 2015b; one of which occupies three ministries): senator the honorable michaelia cash, the minister for employment, women, and assisting the prime minister for the public service; and senator the honorable nigel scullion, the minister for indigenous affairs. 13 lahn: being indigenous in the bureaucracy published by scholarship@western, 2018 r e f e r e n c e s adams, k. 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(2014). equality and diversity in aotearoa new zealand. in a. klarsfeld (ed.), international handbook on diversity management at work (2nd ed., pp. 175194). cheltenham, u. k.: edward elgar. doi: https://doi.org/10.4337/9780857939319.00015 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.3 scerra, n. (2012), models of supervision: providing effective support to aboriginal staff. australian aboriginal studies, 2012(1), 77-85. shore, c., wright, s., & però, d., (eds.). (2011). policy worlds: anthropology and the analysis of contemporary power. new york, n. y.: berghahn books. stewart, j., & warn, j. (2017). between two worlds: indigenous leaders exercising influence and working across boundaries. australian journal of public administration, 76(1), 3-17. doi: https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-8500.12218 sully, v. 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(2000). beyond charcoal lane, aboriginal and torres strait islander health managers: issues and strategies to assist recruitment, retention and professional development. alice springs, nt: centre for remote health. 17 lahn: being indigenous in the bureaucracy published by scholarship@western, 2018 the international indigenous policy journal january 2018 being indigenous in the bureaucracy: narratives of work and exit julie lahn recommended citation being indigenous in the bureaucracy: narratives of work and exit abstract keywords creative commons license being indigenous in the bureaucracy: narratives of work and exit microsoft word 10936+cover+page.docx the international indigenous policy journal volume 12 | issue 2 july 2021 indigenous trauma intervention research in canada: a narrative literature review sarah panofsky university of british columbia, canada, sarah.panofsky@gmail.com marla j. buchanan university of british columbia, canada, marla.buchanan@ubc.ca roger john university of british columbia, canada, roger.john954@gmail.com alanaise goodwill simon fraser university, canada, agoodwil@sfu.ca recommended citation panofsky, s., buchanan, m., john, r., & goodwill, a. (2021). indigenous trauma intervention research in canada: a narrative literature review. the international indigenous policy journal, 12 (2). https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10936 indigenous trauma intervention research in canada: a narrative literature review abstract contemporary indigenous mental health research is beginning to address colonization, contextualizing indigenous health within a history of colonial relationships and inadequate mental health responses. in practice, however, dominant counselling models for mental health in canada have neglected indigenous perspectives and there is a paucity of research regarding interventions that address psychological trauma with indigenous populations. we identified 11 canadian studies that employed culturally appropriate trauma interventions within indigenous communities. we discuss the findings in relation to the study participants, outcomes reported, and research design. recommendations are provided to address the need for evidence-based trauma interventions that have efficacy for indigenous people in canada to address indigenous historical trauma. keywords indigenous peoples, mental health, historical trauma, trauma interventions, trauma counselling, canada acknowledgments we acknowledge the generous support for this research by the vancouver foundation. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. 1 panofsky et al.: indigenous trauma intervention research in canada published by scholarship@western, 2021 indigenous trauma intervention research in canada: a narrative literature review it is widely accepted that indigenous peoples1 disproportionately experience psychological distress and poor health compared with non-indigenous peoples in canada (adelson, 2005; gone et al., 2019; kolahdooz et al., 2015; statistics canada, 2018). contemporary indigenous mental health research is beginning to address colonization (nelson & wilson, 2017) by contextualizing indigenous health within a history of colonial relationships and inadequate mental health responses (mcintyre et al., 2017). mcintyre et al. (2017) found that epidemiological surveys of indigenous populations in canada, the united states, new zealand, and australia indicated that prevalence rates of mental health may be similar between indigenous and non-indigenous populations, but indigenous peoples experience a higher mental health burden due to higher rates of post-traumatic stress disorder (ptsd) and lack of adequate mental health care. in particular, the construct of indigenous historical trauma has been used to explain the health disparities and elevated rates of psychological distress experienced by indigenous peoples (brave heart, 1998; gone et al., 2019). indigenous historical trauma is a distinct form of psychological trauma; it is understood to have originated from colonization, and its impacts are collective, encompassing cumulative adverse events that span generations (bombay et al., 2014; gone et al., 2019). the legacy of historical trauma is sustained by ineffective, inappropriate, and often underfunded programs and services (adelson, 2005; gone, 2009). western biomedical approaches have failed to provide appropriate and adequate mental health services to indigenous peoples in canada, resulting in the underuse of these services and proliferation of mental health challenges (adelson, 2005). importantly, dominant paradigms of health have neglected indigenous perspectives that value holism, spirituality, relationality, and connection to the natural world (adelson, 2005; mccormick, 2008). counselling and psychotherapy interventions in indigenous communities that are reliant on theories and techniques rooted in a western biomedical model risk cultural displacement and assimilation, compounding the trauma that has already been experienced (duran & duran, 1995; gone, 2004). research on mental health interventions that address historical trauma in indigenous communities is nascent (adelson, 2005; bombay et al., 2009; mccormick, 2008; stewart & marshall, 2017). the truth and reconciliation commission (trc, 2015) has called for closing the gap between indigenous and non-indigenous indicators of health, particularly mental health, by addressing the distinct health needs of indigenous peoples, providing sustainable funding for existing and new indigenous healing initiatives, and recognizing the value of indigenous healing practices. given the gaps in knowledge regarding indigenous approaches to mental health and well-being, we address the trc’s calls to action by providing a narrative literature review of empirical studies conducted in canada that employed culturally appropriate interventions with indigenous peoples. this literature review highlights studies privileging indigenous healing practices to contribute to the development of a research base that validates indigenous healing initiatives. 1 we use the term indigenous to refer to the descendants of those who traditionally occupied the territory now known as canada prior to the arrival of europeans settlers. aboriginal has the same meaning as indigenous. we use aboriginal when describing published works that used this term. in the canadian context, the term indigenous includes first nations, métis and inuit. status and non-status are the legally defined categories applied to first nations people under the indian act of 1876. we also occasionally use the term indigenous in a similar manner when referring to the international context. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10936 mental health context of indigenous peoples in canada in 2016, there were 1,673,785 self-identified indigenous people in canada, making up 4.9% of the overall population. since 2006, the indigenous population grew by 42.5%, which is 4 times faster than the rest of the canadian population (statistics canada, 2018). despite the size and growth of the indigenous population, accessible and culturally relevant health assessment data for indigenous people, especially those living off reserve, is limited and must be approached with caution (smylie & firestone, 2015). indigenous self-identification indicators in health data and opportunities for indigenous leadership in the governance and management of indigenous health data are lacking (smylie & firestone, 2015). in addition, health services are typically under provincial or territorial jurisdiction in canada; however, first nations and inuit living in inuit nunangat fall under federal jurisdiction, which means health services are the responsibility of the federal government. status first nations and inuit recognized by an inuit claim organization are eligible for extended health benefits through the federal government. this jurisdictional patchwork leads to overlaps and gaps in both health services and health data. moreover, non-status first nations, métis, and indigenous people living in urban areas have not always been identified as indigenous peoples in federal and provincial health data, and this exclusion has impacted their access to health services (smylie & firestone, 2015). indigenous people have a life expectancy that is 12 years lower than the national average and experience higher rates of preventable chronic diseases compared to non-indigenous people living in canada (statistics canada, 2011). in 2016, statistics canada (2018) reported that half of children in foster care were indigenous, indigenous youth had high rates of mood disorders (11% of off-reserve first nations youth and 7.8% of métis youth), and indigenous women were almost 3 times more likely than non-indigenous women to be victims of violent crime. some of the most commonly experienced mental health challenges in indigenous communities were suicide (particularly in youth), alcoholism, violence, and depression (kirmayer et al., 2000). in a sample of indian residential school survivors, 64% were diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder (ptsd; bombay et al., 2009; brave heart, 1998). substance use and related harms have been identified as the top health priority by indigenous communities (firestone et al., 2015). in 2003, 74% of on-reserve first nations people rated alcohol and illegal drugs as their biggest health concerns (firestone et al., 2015). the rate of mortality due to alcohol related causes among indigenous peoples was almost twice that of the general canadian population (firestone et al., 2015). indigenous historical trauma the systematic erosion of the cultural, social, economic, and spiritual structures of indigenous peoples historically, as well as ongoing contemporary oppression, has created historical trauma among indigenous peoples and within their communities (poonwassie, 2006; stewart & marshall, 2017). psychological traumatic stress is defined as the psychological, physical, and mental effects related to a painful, distressing, or shocking experience with which an individual does not have the capacity to cope (stewart & marshall, 2017; straussner & calnan, 2014). complex psychological traumatic stress is described as: experiences that (1) are interpersonal and often involve betrayal; (2) are repetitive or prolonged; (3) involve direct harm through various forms of abuse (psychological/emotional, physical, and sexual), neglect, or abandonment by persons who are responsible for the care, protection or guidance of others, especially youngsters and offspring (such as parents, family 3 panofsky et al.: indigenous trauma intervention research in canada published by scholarship@western, 2021 caregivers, teachers, coaches, or religious advisors), or traumatic losses in those relationships; and (4) occur at developmentally vulnerable times in life, such as early childhood, or undermine important developmental attainments at any point in the lifespan. (ford & courtois, 2009, p. x) these constructs inform historical trauma, the “cumulative emotional and psychological wounding over the lifespan and across generations, emanating from massive group trauma experiences ... the collective, complex trauma is inflicted over generations on a group of people who share a specific identity or affiliation” (bombay et al., 2009, p. 23). colonial processes that have contributed to historical trauma include turning indigenous people into wards of the state, imposing the federal reserve system in place of traditional systems of governance, providing inadequate services on reserve, racist attitudes and discrimination, coercing first nations to forfeit their indian status, and removing indigenous children from their families and communities as a part of the indian residential schools system and child protection systems (adelson, 2005; kolahdooz et al., 2015). research about the experiences of holocaust survivors and the resulting transgenerational impacts provided the foundation for the concept of historical trauma among indigenous peoples (brave heart, 1998; bombay et al., 2009). studies have shown that the transmission of trauma from holocaust survivors to their children often occurs in ways that are similar to the transmission of culture. further, the trauma exposure of preceding generations is formative to an individual’s experience of post-traumatic stress (danieli, 1998; danieli et al., 2016). transmitted effects can include a predisposition to ptsd, general psychological stress, and insecure attachment styles (bombay et al., 2009). mental health conditions associated with psychological trauma include depression, panic disorders, ptsd, sleep disorders, and substance abuse disorders (van der kolk, 2014). trauma can cause disorganized thinking and awareness, impaired judgment, slower reaction time, unhelpful coping, and hypervigilance. trauma often results in socioeconomic disadvantages and maladaptive parenting styles, which contribute to intergenerational effects (bombay et al., 2009; straussner & calnan, 2014). survivors may see the world as unpredictable and unstable, and they may feel disempowered and helpless when facing the future (straussner & calnan, 2014). it is difficult to disentangle the effects of historical trauma from the everyday experiences of marginalized people living in poverty (bombay et al., 2009). there are unique differences in how poverty is experienced among indigenous peoples in canada as a result of colonial processes, which have had direct contributed to poverty and marginalization over generations (statistics canada, 2018). in a report from the government of canada (2018) entitled, opportunity for all: canada’s first poverty reduction strategy, the federal government recognized the need to identify and co-develop indicators of poverty, both incomeand non-income-based, and well-being that represent the diverse experiences of indigenous peoples in canada. non-income-based measures of poverty, such as literacy, numeracy, and youth engagement, reflect the power and opportunity to access and maintain a basic standard of living and to participate in society. regarding indigenous children, beedie et al. (2019) reported that 47% of status first nations children live in poverty (53% of those living on reserve and 41% of those living off reserve). in addition, 25% of inuit children, 22% of métis children, and 32% of non-status first nations children live in poverty (beedie et al., 2019). contemporary health and social conditions experienced by indigenous peoples together with persistent discrimination are a continuation of historical traumas (bombay et al., 2009; kirmayer et al., 2008). according to bombay et al. (2009), “poor well-being may reflect the direct actions of current events, the direct or indirect effects attributable to traumatic experiences in previous generations, or the synergy between the two” (p. 13). duran and duran (1995) 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10936 proposed a language for trauma that reflects an indigenous perspective, referring to trauma as a “soul wound.” duran and firehammer (2017) elaborated on soul wounding as an “injury where blood does not flow” (p. 107), underscoring historical trauma as destructive to the lifeworld of a people. indigenous wellness there is wide diversity among indigenous peoples and no single indigenous worldview; however, there are more similarities than differences between indigenous groups, and some generalizations can be useful in distinguishing indigenous worldviews from western (hart, 2016; mccormick, 2008). a worldview is defined as the way in which “a person perceives his or her relationship to the world” (sue & sue, 2003, p. 267), and structures an individual’s attitudes, values, opinions, and concepts, as well as how they think, understand events, and make decisions (sue & sue, 2003). according to hart (2016) and wilson (2008), within indigenous worldviews, core beliefs and values include collectivism; balance with the natural world; a present time orientation; relationships with family and community; belonging to community, land, and the cosmos; non-verbal communication; the spirit as inseparable from body and mind; and the goodness of human nature. non-dualistic thinking and relationality are central, and the wellness of the individual is intimately tied to the wellness of the community and the natural world. the phrase “all my relations” emphasizes that everything is connected and moving toward balance of mind, body, spirit, and heart (hart, 2016; wilson, 2008). within these worldviews, indigenous wellness is conceptualized as an active, forward moving process of healing (stewart, 2008). indigenous wellness is holistic, acknowledging the physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual aspects of a person in connection to family and community (adelson, 2005). one model of indigenous wellness is the medicine wheel, reflecting the interconnectedness and balance of the mental, spiritual, emotional, and physical aspects of health. these four realms represent the four directions, which signify the relationships among health, place, belonging, and the natural world, and the balance that exists between all things. within this understanding, illness stemming from imbalance, including mental illness, must be addressed in a holistic way (czyzewski, 2011; kirmayer et al., 2008; mccormick, 2008; stewart & marshall, 2017). the individual is understood as being embedded within a web of relationships of family, clan, ancestors, animals, nature, and the spirit world. relationship and interdependence are central to health (czyzewski, 2011; stewart & marshall, 2017). healing from an indigenous perspective involves helping people to understand their belonging in the overall cosmos including the social, natural, and spiritual worlds (duran et al., 2008). another dimension of meaning beyond individual psyche and the social world is spirituality, which can create a sense of connection, calm, clarity, and purpose within people. a person’s relationship to the land is marked by custodianship, an attendance to the needs of the land for the mutual benefit of the people and other living things that depend on it, and to the needs of the land itself. many indigenous traditions are characterized by a strong sense of place in which connection to land has spiritual, ethical, aesthetic, and historical dimensions and is central to resilience (kirmayer et al., 2008). indigenous comprehensive understandings of wellness that value holism, relationality, spirituality, and connection to the land translate poorly into the individualism and secular humanism of the western biomedical context of care (duran & duran, 1995; hart, 2016; mccormick, 2000, 2008). 5 panofsky et al.: indigenous trauma intervention research in canada published by scholarship@western, 2021 identified areas for research and practice the need for empirical research in the field of trauma and mental health that is collaborative with indigenous communities and culturally relevant has been widely documented (adelson, 2005; bombay et al., 2009). culturally relevant interventions are either developed for a distinct cultural group (culturally grounded) or adapted for use in a cultural group (culturally adapted; gameon & skewes, 2020). existing research on mental health interventions with indigenous peoples points to the indelible link between cultural continuity2 and positive health outcomes (bombay et al., 2009; chandler & lalonde, 2008), and the need for community-based interventions that are rooted in cultural models of health and healing and control of resources by indigenous peoples (stewart & marshall, 2017). research that is “inclusive, engaged and empowering” (adelson, 2005, p. s59) is severely underrepresented in the literature, necessitating decolonizing methodologies and research that incorporates meaningful dialogue with communities (adelson, 2005). decolonizing methodologies and trauma interventions entail addressing oppression and colonization. decolonization criticizes and challenges colonialism, legitimizes indigenous knowledge, and centres on liberatory healing practices (duran et al., 2008). similarly, community capacity building is needed to strengthen a community’s own ability to respond to health issues. more promising approaches are “ground-up” and “from the inside” (white, 2007). critically, “unless theory, practice, and research are deeply rooted in the life-world metaphor of the culture, effectiveness will be limited at best and more trauma will occur at worst” (duran & firehammer, 2017, p. 122). a narrative review of the literature a preliminary search of the literature was conducted to develop the design for the present review. this preliminary search established that there have been very few empirical studies about culturally relevant trauma interventions with indigenous peoples. we understood culturally relevant interventions to include approaches that were culturally grounded and/or culturally rooted interventions (gameon & skewes, 2020). there have been two systematic reviews about psychotherapy research with indigenous communities (drawson et al., 2016 [n = 9]; pomerville et al., 2016 [n = 20]). these reviews focused on studies based in the united states that targeted suicide prevention, substance use disorders, anxiety and depression, general mental health, psychological trauma, and ptsd. pomerville et al. (2016) included three canadian studies [cited studies dell & hopkins, 2011; gone et al., 2009, 2011; thomas & bellefeuille, 2006], and drawson et al. (2016) included no canadian studies. all of the studies reviewed looked at integrated indigenous and western approaches to psychotherapy. there has been one systematic review, which compiled 15 studies representing 10 interventions, that specifically looked at trauma interventions in indigenous communities (gameon & skewes, 2020). gameon and skewes (2020) reviewed culturally adapted and culturally grounded trauma interventions, including three canadian studies [cited studies heilbron & guttman, 2000; marsh et al., 2016; thomas & bellefeuille, 2006]. to date, there have been no systematic literature reviews related to trauma interventions looking 2 cultural continuity describes community level variables that measure the preservation of culture and self-determination (chandler & lalonde, 2008). signs of cultural continuity are settled land claims; self-government; community control of education services, police and fire services, health services; and cultural facilities within the community. research has found the prevalence of cultural continuity in indigenous communities is strongly related to lower incidences of youth suicide. in other words, communities with stronger cultural continuity proved to have less suicide. in particular, communities with some form of self-government had the lowest rates of youth suicide (chandler & lalonde, 2008). 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10936 exclusively at the canadian context, which is needed given the canadian history of colonization and the current state of reconciliation following the trc and the national inquiry into missing and murdered indigenous women and girls (mmiwg). the purpose of this study was to explore the research literature that utilized culturally relevant trauma interventions with indigenous peoples in canada. following from the aim of the present study, research questions were developed to structure the literature review process: • what themes and trends are found in the literature on trauma interventions with indigenous peoples in canada in terms of (a) study participants, (b) type of interventions, (c) highlights of findings, and (d) research design? • what are the strengths and gaps in the literature base? • what are the recommended future directions and opportunities for growth in trauma interventions with indigenous peoples in canada that utilize an indigenous approach? methods we followed a narrative literature review method for the present study because of its comprehensive approach and ability to consolidate the existing literature into a unified story about culturally appropriate trauma interventions with indigenous peoples in canada (baumeister & leary, 1997; green et al., 2006; record-lemon & buchanan, 2017). themes constructed through a narrative literature review can help to distinguish strengths, gaps, and recommended future directions and opportunities for growth in the research area (green et al., 2006). for the present review, we consulted methodological guidelines (baumeister & leary, 1997; green et al., 2006) to establish the following steps: (a) a guided keyword search utilizing electronic databases, (b) a search of reference lists from articles found through the keyword search, and (c) an examination of the literature base according to relevance and inclusion and exclusion criteria. procedures guided computerized database search the following databases were searched for the present literature review: the university of british columbia library, google scholar, academic search complete, education source, psycarticles, psycinfo, eric, and the wiley online library. keywords utilized in this search included combinations of trauma, indigenous, and therapy keywords, including “post-traumatic stress,” “historical trauma,” “intergenerational trauma,” “aboriginal,” “first nation,” “inuit,” “métis,” “counselling,” “psychotherapy,” “intervention,” and “canada.” reference list search the reference lists of the articles obtained through the literature search were scanned for cited articles that were relevant to the present literature review. 7 panofsky et al.: indigenous trauma intervention research in canada published by scholarship@western, 2021 literature set examination the literature set was examined for relevance by reading the article abstracts for matches with the present study’s keywords. duplicate studies were removed. following a duplication and title and abstract screening process, the articles were more thoroughly examined according to the inclusion and exclusion criteria. these guidelines were established to identify the full range of empirical studies on culturally appropriate trauma intervention research with indigenous peoples in canada. inclusion criteria for literature in the present study were as follows: (a) empirical investigations that employed clearly delineated methodology, (b) conducted in canada, (c) conducted with indigenous individuals or communities, (d) included culturally relevant interventions, (e) focused on trauma or post-traumatic stress, (f) published in peer-reviewed journals or dissertations, and (g) published in the english language. date restrictions were not specified. exclusion criteria for literature in the present study were as follows: (a) non-empirical and theoretical studies, (b) conducted outside of canada, (c) not conducted with indigenous individuals or communities, (d) did not utilize a culturally appropriate approach to interventions, (e) not focused on trauma or post-traumatic stress, (f) not published in peer-reviewed journals or dissertations, and (g) not written in or translated into english. results records identified during database and manual searching yielded 162 results (see figure 1). nine articles and two dissertations were examined for themes based on the criteria outlined above. the 11 documents found encompassed eight interventions (see table 1). the two dissertations (linklater, 2011; shrigley, 2019) were included because of direct relevance to the research questions. although the dissertations did not evaluate unique interventions, they provided a broad analysis of trauma interventions from the perspective of indigenous clients and mental health professionals. the search was done in june of 2020 and the dates of publication ranged from 2000 to 2019. the majority of the studies (n = 8) were published in the last 10 years, between 2010 and 2020. the articles were published in a range of peer-reviewed journals across the fields of community psychology, clinical psychology, counselling, indigenous policy, addictions, mental health, and indigenous mental health. research trends study participants participants in these studies included self-identified indigenous adult clients, counsellors, traditional healers, traditional counsellors, and program administrators. four studies took place on reserve, three studies occurred in urban settings, and one study included indigenous healthcare practitioners from canada and the united states. all clients, counsellors, and administrators who were participants in the studies self-identified as indigenous, including algonquian (gone, 2009, 2011), ojibway (heilbron & guttman, 2000), anishnaabe (linklater, 2011; marsh et al., 2016, 2018; reeves & stewart, 2014, 2017; shrigley, 2019), métis, cree, tlaxcaltec, dakota sioux, mohawk, and cree-métis (linklater, 2011). two studies did not specify the cultural group of their participants (thomas & bellefeuille, 2006; 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10936 thomas et al., 2013). the majority of the research occurred in ontario (n = 7), one study was conducted in manitoba, and one in british columbia. several studies included interventions that attracted indigenous peoples from a variety of communities (linklater, 2011; reeves & stewart, 2014, 2017; thomas & bellefeuille, 2006). sample sizes were small across studies, ranging from 3 to 19 participants. figure 1. screening process for included studies records identified through database searching n = 105 sc re en in g in cl ud ed el ig ib ili ty id en tif ic at io n duplicates excluded n = 22 abstract screening n = 83 records excluded non-empirical n = 57 master’s theses n = 4 full-text articles assessed for eligibility n = 22 full-text articles excluded non-indigenous focus n = 6 non-trauma focus n = 5 studies included in narrative review n = 11 9 panofsky et al.: indigenous trauma intervention research in canada published by scholarship@western, 2021 table 1. culturally relevant trauma interventions within indigenous populations in canada article author location of study study participants research design community involvement type of interventions duration of intervention highlights from the findings 1 gone, j. p. (2009). a communitybased treatment for native american historical trauma: prospects for evidence-based practice. northern algonquian reservation 19 administrators, counsellors, and clients qualitative design: discovery-oriented methodology, open-ended interviews, extended life narratives, participant observation, program records, ethnographic materials, thematic analysis community consent and approval prior to data collection psychoeducational lectures, one-on-on counselling, crisis counselling, community-based activities (workshops, fieldtrips, cultural activities), 12 steps of alcoholics anonymous, inner child explorations, guided imagery, meditation and visualization, anger discharge, acupuncture, neurolinguistic programming, genogram mapping, reiki, energy work, cosmo therapy, smudging, talking circles, tobacco offerings, pipe ceremonies, sweat lodge rituals, fasting camps, blessing rites 10 weeks key themes: emotional burdens, cathartic disclosure, self-asproject reflexivity, and impact of colonization 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10936 table 1. culturally relevant trauma interventions within indigenous populations in canada (continued) article author location of study study participants research design community involvement type of interventions duration of intervention highlights from the findings 2 gone, j. p. (2011). the red road to wellness: cultural reclamation in a native first nations community treatment center. northern algonquian reservation 19 administrators, counsellors, and clients qualitative design: open-ended interviews, participant observation, program records, ethnographic materials, thematic analysis community permission negotiated prior to research, draft report reviewed by lodge administrators and staff, article submitted to program staff for comment psychoeducational lectures, one-onone counselling, field trips, cultural events, participation in ceremonies, community education, outreach activities 10 weeks key themes: orchestrating the therapeutic, traditional ways, and healing discourse 3 heilbron, c. l., & guttman, m. a. j. (2000). traditional healing methods with first nations women in group counselling. ojibway reservation three ojibway women (focus of study), two nonaboriginal women participated in intervention (not included in data collection) qualitative design: analysis of group therapy transcriptions, open-ended evaluation forms collaboration with native women’s committee, group counselling meetings held at a native social services branch of the reserve where the participants lived healing circle and cognitive therapy, purification ceremony, traditional medicines (sage, sweet grass, cedar, tobacco), opening prayer 10 weeks key themes: inclusion of traditional ceremony and beliefs appeared to increase therapeutic effectiveness, community healing must be addressed as well as individual healing, healing circle provided safe and spiritually nurturing environment, and complexities faced by non-aboriginal counsellors 11 panofsky et al.: indigenous trauma intervention research in canada published by scholarship@western, 2021 table 1. culturally relevant trauma interventions within indigenous populations in canada (continued) article author location of study study participants research design community involvement type of interventions duration of intervention highlights from the findings 4 linklater, r. (2011). decolonizing trauma work: indigenous stories and strategies (dissertation). canada eight indigenous healthcare practitioners from across canada, two indigenous healthcare practitioners from the united states qualitative: storytelling as methodology, interview process, decolonizing research objectives guidance from elders, cultural protocols honouring spirit and spirituality, interconnected, medicine wheel approaches, identity development, connecting with family, community involvement, teachings and cultural resources, restorative justice practices not specified key themes: wellness in indigenous communities, wholistic healing with indigenous peoples, psychiatry and indigenous peoples, helping with trauma, helping with depression, and helping with experiences of parallel and multiple realities 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10936 table 1. culturally relevant trauma interventions within indigenous populations in canada (continued) article author location of study study participants research design community involvement type of interventions duration of intervention highlights from the findings 5 marsh, t. n., cotemeek, s., young, n. l., najavits, l. m., & toulouse, p. (2016). indigenous healing and seeking safety: a blended implementation project for intergenerational trauma and substance use disorders. atikameksheng anishnawbek first nation 24 participants who identified as ojibway, cree, and métis mixed methods design: two-eyed seeing, indigenous decolonizing methodology, questionnaire, semi-structured interviews, and sharing circle elders, community informants, and aboriginal advisory, indigenous supervisor, aboriginal committee member, indigenous intervention facilitators seeking safety western treatment model, medicine wheel, sweat lodge ceremonies, smudging, drumming, sharing circles, sacred bundle, traditional healers, elder teachings, and herbal medicines 13 weeks key themes: healing through traditional indigenous methods; impact, education, and knowledge through the seeking safety sharing circles; awareness, understanding, and the link between substance use, trauma and the impact of colonization; and integration and application of knowledge all participants showed significant improvements in reported substance use and intergenerational trauma symptoms five women regained custody of their children 13 panofsky et al.: indigenous trauma intervention research in canada published by scholarship@western, 2021 table 1. culturally relevant trauma interventions within indigenous populations in canada (continued) article author location of study study participants research design community involvement type of interventions duration of intervention highlights from the findings 6 marsh, t. n., marsh, d. c., ozawagosh, j., & ozawagosh, f. (2018). the sweat lodge ceremony: a healing intervention for intergenerational trauma and substance use. atikameksheng anishnawbek first nation 24 participants who identified as ojibway, cree, and métis qualitative design: two-eyed seeing, indigenous decolonizing methodology, semi-structured interviews and sharing circle elders, community informants, aboriginal advisory board, indigenous supervisor, aboriginal committee member, and indigenous intervention facilitators sweat lodge ceremonies 13 weeks key themes: sweat lodge ceremony helped with spiritual, emotional, and physical healing; restoring bonds; regaining trust in self; safety; connection to others 7 shrigley, t. l. (2019). understanding indigenous women’s experiences of engaging in activities to heal from intergenerational trauma (dissertation). first nations community in southwestern ontario four indigenous women who experienced and engaged in healing activities to recover from trauma, including intergenerational trauma qualitative design: in-depth interviews, interpretative phenomenology, decolonizing research intent collaboration with a first nations social services agency reconnection to language, ceremony, ancestry, spirituality, connection to community, interconnectedness, and one-on-one counselling variable key themes: complexity of healing from intergenerational trauma, motherhood as a catalyst for change, counselling as a transformational healing activity, (re)connection to indigenous worldviews, and interconnectedness in order to work with indigenous populations, mental health therapists must be traumainformed, resilienceinformed, culturally informed, and culturally humble 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10936 table 1. culturally relevant trauma interventions within indigenous populations in canada (continued) article author location of study study participants research design community involvement type of interventions duration of intervention highlights from the findings 8 thomas, w., & bellefeuille, g. (2006). an evidence-based formative evaluation of a cross cultural aboriginal mental health program in canada. winnipeg, manitoba six residential school survivors qualitative design: focus groups, conversational interviews intervention recruitment through aboriginal organizations healing circle & focusing oriented therapy integration 12 weeks key themes: value of experiential knowledge, relationships among all parts of creation, spirituality and connectedness, empowerment, selfawareness, and focusing 9 thomas, g., lucas, p., capler, n. r., tupper, k. w., & martin, g. (2013). ayahuasca-assisted therapy for addiction: results from a preliminary observational study in canada. rural first nations community (reserve) in british columbia 11 band members mixed methods design: difficulty in emotion regulation scale (ders), the philadelphia mindfulness scale (phlms), the empowerment scale (es), the hope scale (hs), the mcgill quality of life survey (mql0, 4 week substance use scale (4wsus), state of consciousness questionnaire (socq), semistructured interviews collaboration with band office, preparation of longhouse for retreat by elders ayahuasca-assisted group therapy, working with addiction and stress retreats 2and 4-day retreats statistically significant (p < 0.05) improvements for hopefulness, empowerment, mindfulness, quality of life meaning, and outlook self-reported alcohol, tobacco, and cocaine use declined; cannabis and opiate use did not participants reported positive and lasting changes from retreats 15 panofsky et al.: indigenous trauma intervention research in canada published by scholarship@western, 2021 table 1. culturally relevant trauma interventions within indigenous populations in canada (continued) article author location of study study participants research design community involvement type of interventions duration of intervention highlights from the findings 10 reeves, a., & stewart, s. l. (2014). exploring the integration of indigenous healing and western psychotherapy for sexual trauma survivors who use mental health services at anishnawbe health toronto. toronto, ontario 10 traditional mental health workers qualitative design: indigenous decolonizing methodology, story-based interviews carried out in partnership with anishnawbe health toronto, guided by anishnawbe elders, researchers were employed at the agency, researchers attended sweat lodge ceremonies throughout the study indigenous healing and western psychotherapy for sexual trauma survivors unspecified key themes: loss and recovery; positive identity work through connection with indigenous cultural wisdom, teachings, and spirituality; and integrative practices that include western psychotherapy 11 reeves, a., & stewart, s. l. (2017). healing the spirit: exploring sexualized trauma and recovery among indigenous men in toronto. toronto, ontario 10 indigenous mental health frontline workers (traditional indigenous counsellors or traditional indigenous healers). six male survivors of sexualized trauma qualitative design: decolonizing in intent, narrative inquiry, gendered lens carried out in partnership with anishnawbe health toronto (aht), research questions were raised by aht, research was approved by the staff and board of directors and took place under guidance of the executive director no specific interventions: participants had been accessing counselling for six months prior to the study unspecified key themes: patriarchy as a colonial wound to men, sexualized trauma as psychological trauma, isolation and shame, therapy and healing 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10936 characteristics of interventions all studies described the integration of indigenous and western approaches to trauma interventions; however, what integration entailed varied widely. in thomas et al. (2013), an ayahuasca ceremony was combined with western group therapy for addiction and stress. in thomas and bellefeuille’s (2006) study, focusing oriented therapy was applied collectively through healing circles. marsh et al. (2016, 2018) described the integration of seeking safety, a western treatment model, with indigenous healing practices including the medicine wheel, sharing circles, sweat lodge ceremonies, smudging, drumming, the use of sacred bundles, and the guidance of traditional healers and elder teachings. in gone’s (2009, 2011) research, psychoeducational lectures about trauma and colonization were integrated with the 12 steps of alcoholics anonymous, one-on-one counselling, the medicine wheel, field trips, cultural events, and participation in ceremonies. reeves and stewart (2014) described the integration of sweat lodge ceremonies and western psychotherapy. many interventions included facilitation by traditional healers and elders, alongside counsellors (gone, 2009, 2011; marsh et al., 2016, 2018; thomas et al., 2013; reeves & stewart, 2014). in thomas et al., 2013, a peruvian ayahuasquero facilitated the ayahuasca ceremony. the study by marsh et al. (2016) included traditional healerand elder-led sweat lodge ceremonies, drumming, sharing circles and other cultural activities. in reeves and stewart’s (2014) study, elders acted as advisors for the development of the intervention. additional culturally rooted intervention characteristics included use of the medicine wheel (gone 2009, 2011; linklater, 2011; marsh et al., 2016, 2018; shrigley, 2019; thomas & bellefeuille, 2006), healing circles or group therapy (gone, 2009, 2011; heilbron & guttman, 2000; marsh et al., 2016, 2018; reeves & stewart, 2014; shrigley, 2019; thomas et al., 2013; thomas & bellefeuille, 2006), sweat lodge ceremonies (gone, 2009, 2011; marsh et al., 2016, 2018), smudging and use of traditional medicines (gone 2009, 2011; heilbron & guttman, 2000; linklater, 2011; marsh et al., 2016, 2018; reeves & stewart, 2017; shrigley, 2019; thomas et al., 2013), and a holistic approach (gone 2009, 2011; linklater, 2011; marsh et al., 2016, 2018; reeves & stewart, 2017; shrigley, 2019; thomas & bellefeuille, 2006; thomas et al., 2013). psychoeducation related to trauma, addictions, and colonization was another intervention characteristic (gone, 2009, 2001; marsh et al., 2016, 2018), as well as the “talking cure” approach of verbally sharing personal traumatic experiences to a counsellor or in a group (gone, 2009, 2011; heilbron & guttman, 2000; linklater, 2011; marsh et al., 2016; reeves & stewart, 2017; thomas & bellefeuille, 2006). outcomes reported all studies reported that participants experienced a strengthening of their indigenous identity as a result of the interventions, which were central to healing. a key to culturally appropriate trauma interventions for participants was an increased understanding of historical trauma alongside an improved sense of personal empowerment and self-determination (gone 2009, 2011; linklater 2011; marsh et al., 2016, 2018; reeves & stewart, 2017; shrigley, 2019). connection to spirituality was identified as a key aspect of an interventions’ effectiveness (linklater, 2011; reeves & stewart 2016; shrigley, 2019; thomas & bellefeuille, 2006). the collective aspect of interventions—healing circles and relationships with counsellors, traditional healers, and other clients—helped participants develop trust (heilbron & guttman, 2000; marsh et al., 2018; shrigley, 2019; thomas & bellefeuille, 2006). participants reported that an outcome of interventions used was regaining trust in themselves and in connection to others 17 panofsky et al.: indigenous trauma intervention research in canada published by scholarship@western, 2021 (marsh et al., 2018). the trauma experienced by participants was described as a colonial wound and was expressed in terms of loss (reeves & stewart, 2017), which emphasized the depth of the emotional burdens that survivors carry (gone, 2011). shrigley (2019) noted the complexity of healing from intergenerational trauma and gone (2011) identified that interventions were a part of lifelong processes of healing from trauma. throughout the studies examined, individual healing was embedded in community healing, and holistic approaches addressed the interconnectedness of human beings with each other, all living things, and the land. research design the majority of the studies utilized qualitative methodologies, and two studies (marsh et al., 2016; thomas et al., 2013) undertook a mixed methods approach. in-depth interviews, sharing circles, focus groups, and qualitative evaluations were employed to collect data. indigenous methodologies highlighted the importance of guidance from elders and indigenous organizations, cultural ethics and protocols, and the importance of storytelling as a research method (linklater, 2011; reeves & stewart, 2014, 2017; shrigley, 2019). more recent studies contextualized their research approach within decolonizing methodologies (gone, 2009; marsh et al., 2016, 2018; reeves & stewart, 2017; shrigley, 2019). reeves and stewart (2017) described the decolonizing intent of their research as seeking “to honour indigenous knowledges and epistemologies, promote community healing using indigenous methods, and frame client mental health issues as belonging to larger structural inequities” (p. 35). gone (2009) emphasized that the research’s “decolonization efforts” were “culturally grounded” and “community-based” (p. 760) and advocated for bridging evidenced-based practice with culturally sensitive approaches. marsh et al. (2016, 2018) described their decolonizing approach in terms of its critical evaluation of methodology, ethics, and culturally acceptable practices. all studies involved collaboration with indigenous organizations, located both on and off reserve. researchers sought approval from the leadership of organizations with which they collaborated, elders, and band leaders. the interpretation of results across the studies involved thematic analysis conducted by researchers who identify as indigenous (linklater, 2011), non-indigenous (heilbron & guttman, 2000; shrigley 2019), or who did not identify their cultural background (gone 2009, 2011; marsh et al., 2016, 2018; reeves & stewart, 2014, 2017; thomas & bellefeuille, 2006; thomas et al., 2013). throughout all the studies examined, researchers were not a part of the communities in which the research was conducted. discussion strengths and gaps in the literature base the purpose of this project was to examine current studies regarding culturally relevant trauma interventions for indigenous peoples in canada. we identified 11 studies representing seven interventions utilized to treat trauma that highlighted the emerging research on this topic. the studies examined reflect local approaches to helping community members to heal from trauma. interventions were embedded in indigenous organizations and facilitated by indigenous administrators, elders, traditional healers, and indigenous counsellors. community protocols were followed both in implementing interventions and throughout the research process. interventions were founded upon key aspects of indigenous worldviews, namely holism, relationality, spirituality, and connection to the land. considering the preponderance of interventions studied that were conducted in ontario, there is a need 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10936 for research representing indigenous communities from all parts of canada. all interventions studied were conducted with adults. there remains a need for interventions and research to be conducted with children, youth, and families. considering the intergenerational impacts of trauma and the collective, familial orientation of indigenous worldviews, interventions with children, youth, and families represent a distinct gap. participants reported a general improvement in symptoms related to trauma; however, small sample sizes, lack of comparison groups, and limited follow-up protocols may limit the generalizability of these findings. more recent studies identified their research as using indigenous and decolonizing methodologies. in keeping with these methodologies, authors described their commitment to conducting research that benefits participating communities. qualitative or mixed methods approaches that utilized storytelling with a relational focus aligned well with indigenous worldviews. however, across studies, researchers external to the communities in which the research was grounded were responsible for the interpretation of results, typically through thematic analysis, highlighting a potential weakness in research using indigenous and decolonizing methodologies. despite the rigour visible in the research approaches used, there is opportunity to explicate and articulate what is meant by indigenous methodologies and decolonizing methodologies, particularly by authors claiming to use these approaches, and to use participatory approaches that allow the participants have power and voice throughout the research process, including during data analysis. recommended future directions given the mental health burdens experienced by indigenous peoples due to higher rates of ptsd and lack of adequate mental health care (mcintyre et al., 2017), there is an urgent need to expand trauma services within indigenous communities. these services should be based on research establishing their therapeutic effectiveness. indigenous communities are requesting interventions that are culturally adapted or grounded. they also have called for the resources to conduct their own research in order to better facilitate community healing (adelson, 2005; stewart & marshall, 2017). in particular, interventions developed for children, youth, and families are needed, as well as interventions that are tailored to a diverse range of indigenous groups and cultures. morrissette and goodwill (2013) provided recommendations about stages of intervention to assist indian residential school survivors during the formal disclosure process as part of the trc; these recommendations may be useful when considering future interventions. survivor engagement and validation highlights the need for empathic listening by therapists, consideration of potential impacts of the intervention on significant others, and recognition of diversity across indigenous groups. therapeutic socialization and intervention clarification entail a collaborative therapeutic stance in which therapists are transparent in their role. finally, abuse identification and clarification assist survivors in articulating their experience of abuse and its meaning in their lives. these recommendations may be beneficial to the future implementation of trauma interventions within indigenous communities in canada. limitations the small number of trauma intervention studies identified in this review allowed for a discussion of the approaches to trauma intervention research but not an evaluation of the efficacy or effectiveness of these interventions. there were limitations regarding the search strategy used. despite efforts to identify all 19 panofsky et al.: indigenous trauma intervention research in canada published by scholarship@western, 2021 published empirical studies of trauma interventions within indigenous communities in canada, some studies may have been missed due to search term limitations. the inclusion of “peer-reviewed empirical articles” could overlook studies with indigenous communities who may be implementing their own trauma interventions but not publishing the findings in scholarly journals. thus, expanding the search criteria to include grey literature related to community-based trauma interventions could offer additional insight pertaining to how indigenous communities are conducting their own research. conclusion this narrative literature review explored culturally relevant interventions that addressed psychological trauma with indigenous populations by identifying 11 studies representing seven interventions. this study highlighted the distinct canadian context and identified a need to fill gaps in the literature with research that is collaborative, community-based, and elaborates on the link between cultural continuity and positive health outcomes (adelson, 2005; bombay et al., 2009; chandler & lalonde, 2008; stewart & marshall, 2017). the studies examined reflect local approaches to helping community members heal from trauma, wherein interventions were embedded in indigenous organizations, facilitated by indigenous peoples, and founded upon indigenous worldviews. there is a need for additional research representing the diversity of indigenous peoples and communities across canada and for interventions and research to be conducted with children, youth, and families. the use of indigenous and decolonizing methodologies is a positive direction that is a foundational part of recent studies. it highlights the researchers’ commitment to ensuring that their studies benefit the participating communities and using relational methods, particularly storytelling, that are aligned with indigenous worldviews. future research in this field would be strengthened by authors articulating what is meant by indigenous methodologies and decolonizing methodologies and by the use of participatory approaches throughout the research process, including data analysis and dissemination of findings. references adelson, n. 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(2008). research is ceremony: indigenous research methods. fernwood publishing. 10936+cover+page.pdf ms 10936 panofsky indigenous trauma intervention rce.pdf international perspectives on the role of indigenous fathers in caring for their infants: a scoping study the international indigenous policy journal volume 13 | issue 3 december 2022 international perspectives on the role of indigenous fathers in caring for their infants: a scoping study amy l. wright university of toronto, canada, amyl.wright@utoronto.ca rachel vanevery mcmaster university, canada, and six nations of the grand river, bomberrm@mcmaster.ca david johnson six nations of the grand river, david_845@hotmail.com landon martin six nations of the grand river, landon.a.martin@gmail.com clare mcgall mcmaster university, canada, mcgallc@mcmaster.ca jennifer k. cano university of toronto, canada, jcano090@gmail.com heather burnside university of toronto, canada, heather.kewageshig@mail.utoronto.ca recommended citation wright et al., (2022). international perspectives on the role of indigenous fathers in caring for their infants: a scoping study. the international indigenous policy journal, 13(3). https://10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14491 international perspectives on the role of indigenous fathers in caring for their infants: a scoping study abstract effective early childhood development interventions require a thorough understanding parental roles in supporting their infants’ health. yet, the role of indigenous fathers is not well illustrated within the literature. this scoping study synthesizes the roles that indigenous fathers have in promoting the health and development of their infants, using an international perspective. findings support future research to develop effective early childhood parenting interventions that address the unique needs of indigenous fathers. methods scoping methodology was undertaken with inclusion criteria stipulating infants less than two years of age, and describing the role of indigenous fathers (or father figures) in meeting the health and/or developmental needs of their infants. descriptive and pattern coding were used during data extraction and synthesis. collaboration with indigenous community partners, including first nations fathers, promoted ethical research conduct and findings framed within indigenous ways of knowing. results findings highlight a journey to becoming a father, beginning with assuming a new identity as a father, establishing their fathering role, and supporting one another throughout the journey. this process has significant implications for a child’s development and wellbeing and related health policy. conclusions this review synthesizes the experiences of indigenous fathers across the globe, and while the journey is not fully understood, these initial findings are helpful to support future research and health policy. it is in the best interests of children if men are proactively supported in their transition to fatherhood as early as possible to promote a positive impact on their children’s development and future wellbeing. keywords indigenous fathers, infants, parenting, scoping study acknowledgments we would like to acknowledge the contributions of one additional first nations father who wishes to stay anonymous and not participate as an author. their insight and wisdom related to the journey to fatherhood is greatly appreciated. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ 1 wright et al.: international perspectives on the role of indigenous fathers doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14491 international perspectives on the role of indigenous fathers in caring for their infants: a scoping study optimizing the healthy growth and development of infants requires a holistic approach involving all parents, with important implications for children, regarding psychological development, school readiness, mental health, self-esteem, and resiliency (moore et al., 2015; priest et al., 2012). this is particularly poignant for indigenous infants who globally experience disparities and whose mothers face difficulties accessing early childhood services due to inequitable access, racist and discriminatory care, and social inequities (lee et al., 2010; sivertsen et al., 2020; wright, jack, et al., 2019). the unique role of fathers in supporting the developmental needs of their infants remains largely absent in the literature, as research has focused on the role of mothers as primary caregivers and fathers as economic providers (ball, 2010; cabrera et al., 2018; canuto et al., 2019; gerlach et al., 2017). yet, research among nonindigenous families has shown that early involvement of the father in an infant’s life is associated with positive outcomes, including lower rates of infant mortality and cognitive delay, and more secure infantchild attachment (allport et al., 2018; bamishigbin et al., 2020). further, paternal involvement is associated with a decreased likelihood of maternal and paternal depressive symptoms (allport et al., 2018; bamishigbin et al., 2020). the invisibility of indigenous fathers in studies exploring early childhood development is selfperpetuating; with less focus on fatherhood, indigenous fathers are perceived to be uninvolved in their children’s lives, and resources and programming are directed elsewhere (ball, 2010; canuto et al., 2019). with fewer resources supporting indigenous fathers, their needs may not be met (ball, 2010). programming that supports caregivers of young children can promote parent-child attachment, leading to infants developing with better coping mechanisms (lee et al., 2010; reilly & rees, 2018; sivertsen et al., 2020). specifically indigenous-focused prenatal and infant-toddler health programs have contributed to improved health outcomes, positive child development including reduced childhood obesity, reduced problem behaviours among children, improved home safety, better childhood immunization rates, and engagement with indigenous languages and culture (mccalman et al., 2017; smylie et al., 2016). typically, however, parenting programs are developed with a western approach, and may be culturally inappropriate to meet the needs of indigenous families (abawi & brady, 2017; canuto et al., 2019; lee et al., 2010; murrup-stewart et al., 2019). when traditional and culturally appropriate parenting programs are unavailable or inaccessible, opportunities to support families in their healing from intergenerational trauma stemming from past and current colonial practices is reduced (lee et al., 2010). alternatively, studies conducted in canada have demonstrated that family support programs are most helpful to indigenous parents when they are administered by indigenous people, incorporate traditional or cultural elements, and are located within their home communities (smylie et al., 2016; toombs et al., 2018). the consequences of reduced or absent family support services, in combination with imposed western standards of parenting embedded in health policy such as the child welfare system, are separation of indigenous children from their families, culture, and home communities (toombs et al., 2018). indeed, indigenous children are overrepresented in the child welfare system globally (australian law reform commission, 2017; berger & slack, 2020; hyslop, 2017; little drum consulting, 2016; tilbury, 2015; 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 published by scholarship@western, 2022 toombs et al., 2018). yet the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip) recognizes “the right of indigenous families and communities to retain shared responsibility for the upbringing, training, education and well-being of their children, consistent with the rights of the child” (united nations educational scientific and cultural organization [unesco], 2017). the impact of colonization aimed at assimilation and cultural genocide globally has resulted in the loss of cultural knowledge of traditional parenting practices among indigenous communities (greenwood & de leeuw, 2012; reilly & rees, 2018). survivors endure traumas that manifest today through intergenerational trauma and are perpetuated by systemic racism in health and social policies (ball & moselle, 2015; hyslop, 2017; lee et al., 2010). given this, a review of the literature concerning the role of indigenous fathers in meeting the needs of their infants is necessary to create evidence-based health policy that leads to parenting programs that holistically address the needs of indigenous families with young children. given the paucity of literature describing indigenous fathers’ experiences in canada, and the similar historical and ongoing colonial practices experienced by indigenous peoples in canada, australia, new zealand, and the united states (little drum consulting, 2016), this scoping study includes literature from all four countries. this review aims to 1) describe the research question: what is the role of indigenous fathers in meeting the health and developmental needs of their infants under two years of age?; and 2) identify gaps in the literature that warrant further study. methods this scoping study is guided by the arksey and o’malley (arksey & o’malley, 2005) framework and is enhanced by the work of levac et al. (levac et al., 2010). using five stages arksey and o’malley suggest: 1) identifying the research question; 2) identifying relevant studies; 3) selecting studies for inclusion in the review; 4) charting the data; and 5) collating, summarizing, and reporting the results (arksey & o’malley, 2005). levac et al. (levac et al., 2010) further enhance this framework by: 1) emphasizing the importance of linking a research question to the study purpose; 2) allowing for an adaptable datacharting form as new knowledge becomes known; and 3) using qualitative data analysis methods to add rigour to the data synthesis stage. strategies from this latter approach have been incorporated in the methodology. this scoping study employs two-eyed seeing, a framework developed by mi’kmaw elders albert and murdena marshall that embraces the contribution of both indigenous and western world views (bartlett et al., 2015). two first nations research assistants and indigenous community partners from the local indigenous friendship centre, the hamilton regional indian centre, provided their world views and lived experiences to the project, including formulating the research question, contributing to data extraction and analysis, and developing the manuscript. four first nations fathers applied their perspectives to data analysis and the writing of the manuscript. two non-indigenous undergraduate research students designed the search strategy in collaboration with these indigenous partners and the support of an information scientist. the senior author, also non-indigenous, has eight years of experience working with the local indigenous community and provided research expertise and guidance throughout this project. 3 wright et al.: international perspectives on the role of indigenous fathers doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14491 identifying relevant studies in this stage, the research team aimed to identify relevant peer-reviewed and grey literature through databases and online platforms. a comprehensive search of grey literature was undertaken following expert guidance sought from leading researchers in indigenous fathers’ health from around the world. both searches of published and grey literature databases were completed in april 2021. see table 4 for inclusion criteria and search strategy details. the medline search strategy is available in the supplementary information files for this published article. selection of studies for inclusion in the review studies to be screened underwent deduplication using bramer’s method (bramer et al., 2016), and then exported to covidence (covidence, 2021) for ease of screening. covidence software allows for independent screening of studies by title, abstract, and full text review. all studies were screened by two independent reviewers, and any disagreements were resolved by consensus or settled by the first author. charting the data next, pertinent data from included articles were extracted, including authorship, publication year, study design, sample size and demographics, geographical location, general results, and results relevant to the research question. the quality of primary studies was critiqued using a corresponding critical appraisal tool (jbi, 2020). studies were not excluded based on quality, but rather the quality was used to determine the methodological strength of the results. extracted data were imported into nvivo 12, a data management software program (qsr international, 2021). multiple rounds of coding, using strategies by saldana (saldana, 2016) were completed to interpret and synthesize the data, first by a non-indigenous research assistant and then by the first author, the first nations research assistant and a team of four first nations fathers. open coding strategies were used to initially sort the data, and initial codes were organized into categories. axial coding strategies and thematic analysis were used to find recurring patterns and initial themes among the codes. these initial patterns and themes were then shared with the team of first nations fathers to determine their relevancy to their own fathering experiences. together with a research assistant, the team of fathers formalized the themes and identified gaps in the literature. results a total of 7094 articles were retrieved from database searches and through hand-searching relevant journals and reference lists. following deduplication, 4859 sources were exported to covidence (covidence, 2021). articles were then screened for relevancy by title and abstract, and 306 articles were screened by full text. at full-text review, articles were excluded if they: a) were published before the year 2000; b) did not describe children under the age of two years; c) did not mention indigenous fathers; and/or d) did not describe a caregiving role. a final total of 64 sources met inclusion criteria and were included in the review. of these, 41 originated from published databases and 23 from grey literature sources. within the published records, 31 articles represented empirical studies, including 24 qualitative 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 published by scholarship@western, 2022 studies and 9 cross-sectional studies, and the remainder were reviews, reports, and theses. grey literature records were comprised of videos, news reports, websites, and reports. the included sources originating from australia (n=18), canada (n= 31), new zealand (n=5), and the united states (n=10). the screening process is described in the prisma chart in figure 1. see table 1 for details of the included articles. figure 1. prisma diagram 5 wright et al.: international perspectives on the role of indigenous fathers doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14491 table 1. article characteristics of included sources author (year) setting design/objective objective data collection methods participant and infant characteristics key findings related to review abel et al. (2001) auckland, new zealand qualitative study cross-cultural comparison of infant care practices and beliefs focus groups 150 caregivers with infants, including 38 indigenous men infant sleep practices & arrangements role of father providing partner food and relieving her of caregiving responsibilities ashbourne et al. (2011) several sites across canada qualitative study responsiveness in father-child relationships & its influence on fathers interviews 215 fathers (40 indigenous) with children <8 years fathers’ communication and responsive parenting to children’s cues ball (2009) british columbia, canada qualitative study challenges and opportunities for caring for children following decades of colonial interventions conversational interviews 72 first nations & 8 métis fathers with children <7 years traditional healing, indigenous knowledge and parenting capacities fatherhood and role identity ball (2010) british columbia, canada qualitative study socio-historical conditions that shaped indigenous men’s experiences of learning to be a father and becoming a man conversational interviews 72 first nations & 8 métis fathers with children <7 years fathers roles and perceptions of childcare and parent support programs ball (2012) canada commentary indigenous fathers’ potential to contribute to their children’s wellbeing n/a indigenous fathers in canada fatherhood as a life-long journey, contributing to the well-being of their children ball (2013) canada book chapter multigenerational challenges for indigenous fathers in canada n/a indigenous fathers in canada the healing journey of fatherhood and associated responsibilities british columbia tripartite first nations and indigenous maternal and child health working group (2015) british columbia, canada report what works in maternal/child health programs n/a program directors & coordinators working with first nations communities promoting male involvement by hiring male family visitors. connecting elders with fathers and involving them to restore the role of men in raising healthy families best start resource centre (2013) ontario, canada resource support pregnant and parenting indigenous youth n/a local program directors working with first nations, métis & inuit teens traditional beliefs and practices related to newborn and parent’s relationships with child. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 published by scholarship@western, 2022 author (year) setting design/objective objective data collection methods participant and infant characteristics key findings related to review bia (2011) arizona, united states qualitative study study of diné parenting reflecting on birth to four years of age. critical retrospective inquiry 1 diné woman diné culture and practices related to early childhood and raising children. binns et al. (2004) perth, western australia cross-sectional study prevalence of breastfeeding at discharge and determinants of breastfeeding initiation self-administered survey 425 indigenous mothers of newborn infants born in hospital breastfeeding initiation was strongly associated with mothers’ perception of fathers’ preferences for breastfeeding bowes et al. (2014) australia report parenting programs for indigenous families n/a healthcare practitioners & program directors working with indigenous australian communities successful parenting programs catered to indigenous fathers used appropriate content, language, and structure campbell et al. (2018) queensland, australia qualitative study evaluation of experiences of the baby one program implementation process semi-structured interviews 4 indigenous parents, 20 male indigenous members & 24 health workers and program staff inclusion of fathers in the program; fathers should share their parenting role canuto et al. (2019) south australia qualitative study indigenous men’s discourse on parenting yarning groups with a semistructured guide 46 indigenous men who were parents or provided caring for children of all ages, including infants. father as protector and supporter to partner need for culturally appropriate opportunities for men to participate in the birthing and parenting process. being present at birth formed a strong family bond and appreciation for fathering. carriere et al. (2009) canada book chapter attachment theory, connectedness and indigenous children in canada n/a indigenous children in canada fathers need support in the role of protector, provider, and nurturer of the mother and the child. dadcentral.ca (n.d.) ontario, canada website website for fathers with parenting manual and videos n/a indigenous fathers of infants men develop a positive relationship with their child using traditional beliefs; spending time with children; fathers are engaging in less traditional parenting roles. daly et al. (2012) several sites across canada qualitative study examine the diverse experience of father involvement interviews 215 fathers (40 indigenous) with children < 8 years fathers value spending time with their children; deliberate attempt to be different from men of previous generations. 7 wright et al.: international perspectives on the role of indigenous fathers doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14491 author (year) setting design/objective objective data collection methods participant and infant characteristics key findings related to review dodd et al. (2015) western australia qualitative study emerging issues on bed-sharing semi-structured interviews and focus groups participants 24 mothers (20 indigenous) of infants 2 to 12 months viewed co-sleeping as protective, father would leave the bed dorozio (2019) alberta, canada news story highlighted a nakoda-cree-métis family with young children n/a nakoda-cree-métis family father participates in baby naming ceremony. important to raise infant with nakoda language and as a nakoda thinker. elkington (2017) new zealand qualitative study explore the everyday realities of expectant and young māori fathers and partners semi-structured interviews 8 māori fathers (ages 16-25) described father’s non-traditional role as primary care givers as their partners worked. fathering roles influenced by previous experiences. eni et al. (2013) manitoba, canada qualitative study community perspectives on teenage pregnancy and parenting sharing circles 26 first nations women with history of teenage pregnancy described traditional roles of mothers and fathers. young fathers unsure about their roles. eni et al. (2014) british columbia, manitoba & ontario, canada mixed-methods determinants of breastfeeding for first nations women survey & focus groups 65 mothers from 7 first nations communities paternal grandmothers educated their sons about child-rearing and belongingness as fathers. facetubc (2015) british columbia, canada video n/a n/a indigenous fathers with history of cigarette smoking sharing experiences with other fathers is supportive. faulkner et al. (2021) new south wales, australia qualitative study sources of support for young indigenous fathers semi-structured interviews 10 indigenous and torres strait islander fathers fatherhood as an opportunity to take responsibility, become a financial supporter and role model, and share their culture. avoid mistakes as a father when faced with negative stereotypes. fletcher et al. (2017) new south wales, australia qualitative study feasibility of developing internet and mobile phone-based resources to support young indigenous fathers yarning groups 20 indigenous fathers (ages 1825) with 1+ child importance of fathers talking to one another for parenting advice and support herman et al. (2015) michigan, united states qualitative study beliefs about infant safe sleep practices, barriers to acceptance of prevention recommendations, and more effective messaging strategies focus groups 73 mothers and supporters, including indigenous women fathers influential about sleep location and avoiding bedsharing. open to learning about safe sleep. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 published by scholarship@western, 2022 author (year) setting design/objective objective data collection methods participant and infant characteristics key findings related to review hossain (2001) southwestern united states cross-sectional study division of household labour and family functioning in off-reserve navajo families survey 28, two-parent navajo families fathers perceived themselves to be as competent as mothers perceive themselves to be, viewed the positive aspects of their families. participation in cleaning, feeding, and playing with their infants. irvine et al. (2009) british columbia, canada report n/a n/a healthcare practitioners & programmers working with indigenous communities intergenerational role modelling and family cohesion impact becoming a father; mothercentric programs exclude fathers from accessing parenting programs iusitini et al. (2011) auckland, new zealand cross-sectional study nurturing and harsh disciplinary parenting practices of fathers of pacific children born in new zealand self-administered survey 823 pacific fathers with a pacific mother of their child & 1398 pacific infants nonresident fathers’ contact with their children tends to be more recreational than instrumental jones et al. (2017) new zealand mixed-methods approaches māori parents used to put their infants to sleep and the influencing factors online surveys and in-person semi-structured interviews 58 māori parents, infants (2 months-2 years) various sleeping-arrangement perspectives; preferred parent-assisted sleeping practices over self-soothing; convenience was a crucial factor in determining infant sleep location kim-meneen (2018) 10 treaty 8 woodland cree reserves of alberta, canada qualitative study parenting styles of second-generation adult children of first nation residential school survivors and the intergenerational effects on parenting styles interviews 20 cree parents (11 fathers, 9 mothers) birth of child motivated fathers to remain alcoholfree kruske et al. (2012) northern australia qualitative study experiences and beliefs of indigenous families as they care for children in their first year of life interviews 15 indigenous mothers (15-29 years) mothers play the most important role in an infant’s life while fathers help support the mother. kueh et al. (2014) australia cross-sectional study attitudes and roles of expectant indigenous fathers in antenatal care. survey 50 indigenous males; infants not yet born positive attitudes towards vaccination; ensuring their home was ready and safe for the baby leo (2012) saskatchewan, canada documentary n/a n/a indigenous fathers with young children being there from day one, role replacement, taking time away from children to heal limb et al. (2014) american indian perceptions united states cross-sectional study perceptions of nonresident indigenous-american father rights and responsibilities survey 209 indigenous mothers, 53 indigenous fathers providing financial support to his infant 9 wright et al.: international perspectives on the role of indigenous fathers doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14491 author (year) setting design/objective objective data collection methods participant and infant characteristics key findings related to review limb et al. (2014) strengthening american indian across the united states cross-sectional study impact of relationship quality on indigenous-american parenting and children survey 222 indigenous mothers and 144 indigenous fathers unmarried fathers were more engaged with their children; the more support indigenous-american parents received from one another, the more positive interactions they had with their child. little drum consulting (2016) british columbia, canada manual infant development program practice guidelines n/a indigenous families with infants in canada and infant program staff include fathers in programming; create groups for fathers only that focus on healthy lifestyles, role modelling, and exploring vulnerabilities monkman (2019) manitoba, canada news story n/a n/a indigenous fathers with young children appreciate sharing circles with other dads that discuss being a partner, general parenting tips, vulnerabilities; few father programs offered mussell (2005) canada guide challenges and healing of first nations men n/a first nations men in canada include infant family activities in ways that enabled them to see, experience and understand life. fears about inadequate childcare discourages men from cooperating and benefiting from resources. myers et al. (2014) victoria, australia qualitative study early childhood nutrition concerns, resources and services for indigenous families focus groups 34 indigenous & 1 torres strait islander parents confusion with breastfeeding process; gender norms prevent support of child-rearing. nahwegahbow (2013) northeastern ontario review model for traditional social framework that illustrates the central role of infants and young children n/a anishinaabe families construction of cradleboard provides physical and spiritual support for the infant national history education clearinghouse (2018) united states website n/a n/a indigenous american families in the 17th century expectant parents participated in rituals to guarantee a safe delivery, but men were rarely allowed in the birth room and were not allowed to see the birth native child and family services of toronto (2020) ontario, canada website n/a n/a indigenous fathers in toronto area programs and counselling for fathers that discuss birth year teachings and ceremonies nccih (2011) british columbia, canada report n/a n/a child and family healthcare practitioners & programmers working with indigenous communities children helped fathers on the right path; programs need to give fathers the safety to be open, provide cultural teachings and engage them in hands-on care 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 published by scholarship@western, 2022 author (year) setting design/objective objective data collection methods participant and infant characteristics key findings related to review nccih (2015) british columbia, canada report n/a n/a child and family healthcare practitioners & programmers working with indigenous communities fatherhood is leadership and it starts with supporting partners nccih et al. (2017) parents as first teachers manitoba, canada resource manual n/a n/a first nations and métis parents in manitoba engage in responsive care to facilitate cognitive development by talking, playing, singing with infant nccih et al. (2019) family connections british columbia, canada resource manual n/a n/a first nations and métis parents in british columbia bond with infants by cuddling, taking them to stores, teaching traditional games, songs and stories nccih et al. (2019) fatherhood is forever british columbia, canada resource manual n/a n/a first nations and métis parents in british columbia preparation for baby; cultural connection with child; joining a men’s group to become a healthy role model; part of breastfeeding process, changing diapers, attending to infant at night nccih et al. (2019) growing up healthy british columbia, canada resource manual n/a n/a first nations and métis parents in british columbia facilitate healthy infant development by taking them to health professionals, encourage language development, keeping infant active, avoiding hazardous food, and practicing safe sleep nccih et al. (2019) parents as first teachers british columbia, canada resource manual n/a n/a first nations and métis parents in british columbia touch and play with infant to bond neault et al. (2012) southwest united states cross-sectional study describe substance use patterns among young indigenous american fathers and examine intersection of substance use with men’s fatherhood roles and responsibilities survey 87 indigenous american male partners of adolescent mothers priorities of fatherhood are being a good role model and educating the child oster et al. (2018) alberta, canada qualitative study needs of cree fathers who supported their partners during pregnancy semi-structured interviews 6 cree fathers (18+ years) include infants in cultural activities; raised infants with their cree language; culture and elders support for fathers 11 wright et al.: international perspectives on the role of indigenous fathers doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14491 author (year) setting design/objective objective data collection methods participant and infant characteristics key findings related to review padilla et al. (2013) united states cross-sectional study associations among parental relationship, quality, father involvement, and co-residence survey 107 indigenous american fathers in urban areas (navajo, cherokee, nez perce, crow, northern cheyenne) stronger tie to family system results in increased father’s interaction with family members; indigenous american fathers need constructive role models penman (2006) australia review the growing up of indigenous and torres strait islander children n/a indigenous australians and torres strait islander children (0-18 years) responsive care framework for infant; teach ceremony and singing plunket (2021) new zealand website n/a n/a māori fathers in new zealand open communication is critical; caring for breastfeeding partner; parenting as a team and merging gender roles reilly et al. (2018) normanton, australia qualitative study examination of barriers and opportunities to strengthen the male parenting role in indigenous and torres strait islander communities yarning groups 25 indigenous and 6 nonindigenous stakeholders men’s groups are safe places to talk about fathering; antenatal programs too female-focused; felt underprepared and stigmatized about fathering reinhardt et al. (2012) united states cross-sectional study relationships between indigenous american fathers and daughters survey fathers self-identified as indigenous american with at least one indigenous american daughter 42% of fathers reported that their mother or their grandmother was their primary tribal cultural reference for raising a daughter compared to 8% of fathers who mentioned their own father ryan (2011) australia review traditional australian indigenous nurturance of infants & children through an exploration of the meaning of certain words from central and western desert indigenous languages n/a indigenous people from the central and western desert regions of australia bonding with infant by carrying, talking, singing, telling stories and cooking food for them scott (2013) british columbia, canada report n/a n/a child and family healthcare practitioners and programmers working with indigenous communities need programs for men by men with similar lived experiences; men encouraged to do 50% of parenting work to improve relationship with spouse starr et al. (2018) australia report n/a n/a child and family healthcare practitioners and programmers working with australian indigenous fathers having the resources and support prior to becoming a father; cultural responsibilities to attend to in first years of life; strength-based language in programming to empower men 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 published by scholarship@western, 2022 author (year) setting design/objective objective data collection methods participant and infant characteristics key findings related to review stayin’ on track (n.d.) australia website n/a n/a young australian indigenous and torres strait islander fathers supporting partner and stepping up to their role during pregnancy changed them as a person abandoned harmful social habits and parenting as a united front with partner tipene-leech et al. (2000) auckland, new zealand qualitative study māori infant care practices as they relate to health messages, infant care services and sids prevention focus groups & one-on-one interview 26 caregivers (from māori, tongan, samoan, cook islander, niuean and european communities in auckland region) perceptions of infant-parent co-sleeping and sleep location; various feeding methods (breast vs. bottle-feeding) urban indian health institute (2011) united states qualitative study insight from indigenous american and alaska native parents about keeping babies healthy and safe and effective messages and communication about these topics focus groups and individual interviews 39 indigenous american and alaskan native parents 27 mothers, 12 fathers parenting as a team; protective and ceremonial roles for fathers lack of cultural awareness made it challenging of maintain indigenous values when trying to keep infants healthy waddell et al. (2021) manitoba, canada qualitative study reflections on resources and barriers to wellness for indigenous men sharing circles and in-depth interviews 11 indigenous men (dakota and métis) fathering provided men motivation to heal and find cultural strength; taking care of their family was considered a modern-day warrior women’s health clinical support programs women and newborn health service et al. (2015) western australia pamphlet n/a n/a indigenous australian fathers with a new infant parent as a team, talk to male relatives about fatherhood note: only first authors and year have been provided due to space limitations. where the same author and date occur for more than one source, the first words of the title have also been provided. 13 wright et al.: international perspectives on the role of indigenous fathers doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14491 all studies were assessed as being methodologically strong, except for two cross-sectional studies assessed as having moderate methodological quality because they failed to meet three or more of the nine criteria (luo et al., 2014; neault et al., 2012). these criteria included inadequate sample sizes and response rates, invalid measurement methods, and a lack of methodological detail. all studies were included in the review, regardless of quality. the results of the critical appraisals are presented in tables 2 and 3. the findings resulted in three main themes which describe the journey on which indigenous fathers embark to become fathers. these themes include: 1) identifying as a father; 2) establishing a new fathering role; and 3) supporting one another. the following elaborates on these themes and their subthemes in more depth. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 published by scholarship@western, 2022 table 2. qualitative critical appraisals question a be l e t a l., 2 00 1 a sh bo ur ne e t a l., 2 01 1 b al l, 20 09 b al l, 20 10 b ia , 2 01 1 c am pb el l e t a l., 2 01 8 c an ut o et a l., 2 01 9 d al y et a l. 20 12 d od d & ja ck ie w ic z, 2 01 5 e lk in gt on , 2 01 7 e ni & p hi lli ps -b ec k, 2 01 3 e ni e t a l., 2 01 4 fl et ch er e t a l., 2 01 7 fa ul kn er e t a l., 2 02 1 h er m an e t a l., 2 01 5 jo ne s e t a l., 2 01 7 k im -m en ee n, 2 01 8 k ru sk e et a l., 2 01 2 m ye rs e t a l., 2 01 4 o st er e t a l., 2 01 8 r ei lly & r ee s, 20 18 t ip en ele ac h et a l., 2 00 0 u rb an in di an h ea lth in st itu te , 2 01 1 w ad de ll et a l., 2 02 1 is there congruity between the stated philosophical perspective and the research methodology? y y y y y y y y y y y y y n y y y y y y y y y y is there congruity between the research methodology and the research question or objectives? y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y is there congruity between the research methodology and the methods used to collect data? y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y is there congruity between the research methodology and the representation and analysis of data? y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y is there congruity between the research methodology and the interpretation of results? y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y is there a statement locating the researcher culturally or theoretically? y y y y y y y y y y y y y n n y y y y y y y y y is the influence of the researcher on the research, and viceversa, addressed? y y y y y y y y y y y y y y n y y y y y y y y y are participants, and their voices, adequately represented? y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y is the research ethical according to current criteria or, for recent studies, and is there evidence of ethical approval by an appropriate body? y y/ n y y y y y y/ n y y y/ n y y y y y y y y y y y y y do the conclusions drawn in the research report flow from the analysis, or interpretation, of the data? y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y y adapted from jbi (2020) checklist for qualitative studies y=yes, n=no 15 wright et al.: international perspectives on the role of indigenous fathers doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14491 table 3. quantitative critical appraisals question n ea ul t e t a l., 2 01 2 li m b & t ob le r, 20 14 li m b et a l., 2 01 4 pa di lla e t a l., 2 01 3 b in ns e t a l., 2 00 4 k ue h et a l., n .d . h os sa in , 2 00 1 iu si tin i e t a l., 2 01 1 r ei nh ar dt e t a l., 2 01 2 was the sample frame appropriate to address the target population? y y y y y n n y y were study participants sampled in an appropriate way? y y y y y y y y y was the sample size adequate? n y y y y n n y y were the study subjects and the setting described in detail? y y y y y n y y y was the data analysis conducted with sufficient coverage of the identified sample? y y y y y n n y n were valid methods used for the identification of the condition? n y y y y n y y y was the condition measured in a standard, reliable way for all participants? y y y y y y y y y was there appropriate statistical analysis? y y y y y y y y y was the response rate adequate, and if not, was the low response rate managed appropriately? u y y y y n y y n adapted from jbi (2020) checklist for prevalence studies y=yes, n=no, u=unclear 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 published by scholarship@western, 2022 identifying as a father the journey to becoming a father begins with grappling with the reality of this new identity and sense of self. three subthemes describe this process: i) timing varies; ii) being a role model; and iii) drawing on paternal experiences. timing varies. first, timing varies, as men described adopting their new identity as a father at varying time points. for some, becoming a father began during pregnancy (best start resource centre, 2013; bia, 2011; dad central ontario, n.d.; faulkner et al., 2021; national collaborating centre for indigenous health & manitoba government, 2017; national history education clearinghouse, 2018; oster et al., 2018; stayin’ on track, n.d.), while for others this identity shift began once the child was born (ball, 2009, 2010, 2013; daly et al., 2012; eni & phillips-beck, 2013; faulkner et al., 2021; matthew et al., 2018; oster et al., 2018). pregnancy was viewed as a time of opportunity, during which many men recognized the need to adopt their new identity as a father and assume responsibility for their unborn child (faulkner et al., 2021; oster et al., 2018). for some first nations communities, the belief that the unborn child chooses their parents in the period before birth helped to establish a relationship between fathers and their children during pregnancy that continued after birth and throughout their lives (best start resource centre, 2013; dad central ontario, n.d.; national history education clearinghouse, 2018). supporting their partners through pregnancy assisted men in assuming their new identity as fathers as they prepared for their new life with a child (bia, 2011; national collaborating centre for indigenous health & manitoba government, 2017; stayin’ on track, n.d.). still for other men, their acceptance of becoming a father occurred after the birth of their infant, and this timing varied depending on their personal circumstances (ball, 2010). for example, in a study of fathers in british columbia, canada, ball (ball, 2009, 2013) described how many fathers shared that their journey to accepting their new identities was a “long and winding road” (ball, 2013), during which time they came to understand the meaning of being a father, and how to enact their new role. in another study, first nations teenage mothers described young fathers as having strong apprehensions about identifying as a father because they were still maturing and were unsure of who they were or wanted to be (eni & phillips-beck, 2013). finally, some fathers required a period of maturation, labelled as “stepping-up” or “manning-up” by some men, before they were able to acknowledge their responsibility for their child; ultimately this maturation led them to finally identifying as a father (ball, 2010, 2013; faulkner et al., 2021). being a role model. identifying as a father also meant becoming a role model for their children (bc tripartite first nations and aboriginal maternal and child health working group, 2015; canuto et al., 2019; dad central ontario, n.d.; faulkner et al., 2021; neault et al., 2012; reilly & rees, 2018; urban indian health institute, 2011). a study in the united states found that partners of indigenous mothers considered being a good role model to their children as their top parenting priority (neault et al., 2012). some fathers described being a role model as having a healthy relationship with the child’s mother, providing for their children, being present with their children, and abandoning previous activities that took them away from home or jeopardized their health (ball, 2012; campbell et al., 2018; canuto et al., 2019; dad central ontario, n.d.; daly et al., 2012; faulkner et al., 2021; leo, 2012; matthew et al., 2018; neault et al., 2012; oster et al., 2018; stayin’ on track, n.d.; urban indian health institute, 17 wright et al.: international perspectives on the role of indigenous fathers doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14491 2011). fathers shared that being present for their infants contributed to their own self-esteem and gave them a sense of purpose in life (canuto et al., 2019; daly et al., 2012; faulkner et al., 2021; oster et al., 2018). still other fathers chose to be the primary caregiver for their children for a period of time after birth, and while some described this as isolating, they considered this a worthwhile sacrifice because of their role in positively shaping the development of their infants (elkington, 2017; plunket, 2021; stayin’ on track, n.d.). the importance of indigenous fathers both as caregivers for their children and as a vital part of their partners’ support network is becoming increasingly realized. as such, parenting programs for indigenous families are also beginning to encourage men to assume a primary caregiver role for their children during a period of their early years (campbell et al., 2018; plunket, 2021). drawing on paternal experiences. indigenous men spoke of drawing on past experiences with their own fathers when grappling with their new identity as fathers. some men wanted to be similar (faulkner et al., 2021; oster et al., 2018) while most wanted to act differently than their own fathers (ball, 2009, 2012; dad central ontario, n.d.; daly et al., 2012; elkington, 2017; faulkner et al., 2021; leo, 2012) who may have been absent, abusive, or neglectful. in a study by ball (2009), a majority of first nations and métis fathers explained that growing up with an absent or abusive father set the stage for their journey of fatherhood. studies support that men are deliberately attempting to be different from their fathers by making time for their children, to break unhealthy parenting cycles stemming from colonization and the residential school legacy which led to the loss of parental role modeling and the passing down of traditional knowledge and customs, and resulted in intergenerational trauma (ball, 2009; daly et al., 2012; irvine & national collaborating centre for indigenous health, 2009; leo, 2012; mussell & the aboriginal healing foundation, 2005; padilla et al., 2013; urban indian health institute, 2011; waddell et al., 2021). alternatively, some indigenous fathers described positive relationships with their fathers and other male relatives, and attributed these experiences to helping them become good fathers and providing motivation to continue a legacy of good fathering (daly et al., 2012; faulkner et al., 2021; oster et al., 2018). in summary, the process of identifying as a father is described as temporal in nature, with some men embodying this new role during pregnancy, others at or shortly after birth, and still others during early childhood. realizing their responsibility as role models for their children helped men to conceptualize their identity as fathers and what that meant for their parenting. while some men had positive paternal experiences from which to draw to make meaning of their new identity, others had to build this anew. the desire to break the cycle of absent or abusive parenting resulting from colonization and the subsequent loss of culture, language, and positive parenting role models was a strong motivator for men who desired to be present and positive role models for their children. establishing a new fathering role the second theme along the journey to becoming a father is “establishing a new fathering role.” evidence from the literature suggests indigenous men established their new fathering role through: a) assuming caregiving responsibilities; b) supporting the infant’s mother; and c) meeting spiritual needs. these components will now be described in further detail. 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 published by scholarship@western, 2022 assuming caregiving responsibilities. traditionally, indigenous men were considered providers for the family (carriere & richardson, 2009; eni & phillips-beck, 2013; waddell et al., 2021). while this role is still expected of many fathers, other roles are demanded as well (limb & tobler, 2014; urban indian health institute, 2011). upon becoming a father, the literature describes assuming caregiving responsibilities to meet the health and developmental needs of their infants. first, a father’s role in infant sleep was commonly discussed in the literature, with no single approach embraced more often than another (abel et al., 2001; dodd & jackiewicz, 2015; eni et al., 2014; herman et al., 2015; jones et al., 2017; tipene-leach et al., 2000). in a us study of indigenous fathers, men were found to be highly influential in decisions made about sleep location, as they felt it was important to implement safe sleeping practices to avoid sudden infant death syndrome (sids) (herman et al., 2015). some fathers viewed co-sleeping, or parents sleeping with the infant in a family bed, as leading to an infant’s dependence on the mother, and thus it was better for the baby to sleep separately from the mother to promote independence (abel et al., 2001; jones et al., 2017; tipene-leach et al., 2000). abel et al. (2001) found that pacific island fathers viewed bed-sharing as protective because the baby was near its mother who could react quickly. a second caregiving responsibility of fathers was their support of breastfeeding. in a study of indigenous fathers in australia, fathers were highly influential in the mother’s decision to breastfeed (binns et al., 2004). mothers who perceived their infant’s father as being in favour of breastfeeding were more than six times as likely to be breastfeeding upon discharge from hospital following delivery than mothers who perceived that their infant’s father preferred bottle feeding or was indifferent (binns et al., 2004; eni et al., 2014). findings were similar in a canadian study of first nations mothers, who were more likely to breastfeed if the infant’s father supported their decision (eni et al., 2014). generally, fathers were described as understanding the benefits of breastfeeding, and wanting to support the emotional, physical, and practical needs of the mother during the feeding process (campbell et al., 2018; eni et al., 2014; hossain, 2001; tipene-leach et al., 2000; urban indian health institute, 2011). in some cases, however, cultural and societal norms, or a lack of understanding of how to support their infant’s mother prevented fathers from being as supportive as they wanted to be (eni et al., 2014; myers et al., 2014; tipene-leach et al., 2000). two parenting resources, one for mãori parents in new zealand (plunket, 2021) and another for indigenous parents in canada (national collaborating centre for indigenous health & first nations health authority, 2019b), described ways for fathers to be a part of the breastfeeding experience. fathers were encouraged to bring the baby to the mother for night feeds, to burp the baby, stay close to the baby and mother, and support the mother by talking to her while she was breastfeeding and bringing her food and drink (national collaborating centre for indigenous health & first nations health authority, 2019b; plunket, 2021). third, several sources described the role of the father in promoting learning through providing responsive care. fathers were encouraged to respond to their children’s needs by being present, cuddling, loving, playing with them, and building trust with their children (national collaborating centre for indigenous health & first nations health authority, 2019a; national collaborating centre for indigenous health & manitoba government, 2017; plunket, 2021; vartuli & winter, 1989). other studies echoed these important caregiving skills, describing the role of fathers as providing a safe, positive, and nurturing environment for their infants and learning to respond appropriately to their 19 wright et al.: international perspectives on the role of indigenous fathers doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14491 different cries (ashbourne et al., 2011; bia, 2011; hossain, 2001; iusitini et al., 2011; luo et al., 2014; mussell & the aboriginal healing foundation, 2005; national collaborating centre for indigenous health, 2015; penman, 2006; ryan, 2011; urban indian health institute, 2011). in a canadian study examining responsiveness in child-father relationships, indigenous fathers said they developed an ability to understand what the child was communicating when they cried (ashbourne et al., 2011). several sources described the practical caregiving skills that fathers were increasingly acquiring, including changing diapers, bathing, pushing a stroller, doing housework, settling a crying infant, keeping their infant’s immunizations up to date, and caring for their infant’s oral health (campbell et al., 2018; dad central ontario, n.d.; national collaborating centre for indigenous health & first nations health authority, 2019b, 2019a, 2019c; plunket, 2021; reilly & rees, 2018; women’s health clinical support programs women and newborn health service & department of health government of western australia, 2015). finally, many studies described the role of fathers in providing financially for the family and, in particular, their continued responsibility to provide for their children even when no longer in a relationship with their child’s mother (canuto et al., 2019; carriere & richardson, 2009; eni & phillipsbeck, 2013; faulkner et al., 2021; limb & tobler, 2014; oster et al., 2018; urban indian health institute, 2011). finally, the literature recognizes that while the assumption of a father’s role as being a protector and provider for his family continues to be common, fathering also involves many other important roles. supporting the infant’s mother. the literature also described a father’s role as supporting the infant’s mother by being present, providing her with food and drink, communicating with her, and helping to relieve her of childcare responsibilities wherever possible (abel et al., 2001; bia, 2011; carriere & richardson, 2009; kruske et al., 2012; oster et al., 2018; plunket, 2021; stayin’ on track, n.d.; urban indian health institute, 2011; women’s health clinical support programs women and newborn health service & department of health government of western australia, 2015). in a study of indigenous parents in the united states by limb et al. (limb, white, & holgate, 2014), parents who supported one another had more positive interactions with their children, as well as when fathers were engaged with their children whether or not they were married to their child’s mother. this emphasis on sharing parenting roles and supporting each other is exemplified by some indigenous languages. thomas snow, a father from stoney nakoda first nation in canada, shared that there is no word specifically describing fatherhood or motherhood in the nakoda language (dorozio, 2019). instead the word parenthood is used to describe both parents working together to care for children (dorozio, 2019). supporting the infant’s mother in beneficial in many ways, as it has been found both to improve the father’s relationship with their spouse and to reduce the mother’s stress (dad central ontario, n.d.; scott, 2013). meeting spiritual needs. much of the literature spoke to the important role of fathers in meeting the spiritual needs of their infants and children. addressing the spiritual needs of children helped the children to feel connected to their community, ancestors, culture, and mother earth; provided children with a sense of identity and belonging; and was a source of comfort, pride, support, and resilience throughout the children’s lives (canuto et al., 2019; faulkner et al., 2021; national collaborating centre for indigenous health, 2011; national collaborating centre for indigenous health & first nations health authority, 2019b; oster et al., 2018; reinhardt et al., 2012; tipene-leach et al., 2000). 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 published by scholarship@western, 2022 some ways that fathers met the spiritual needs of their infants included song and prayer, participating in ceremonies and traditions such as smudging, caring for the placenta and umbilical cord, using a cradleboard, and teaching children their traditional language (ashbourne et al., 2011; bia, 2011; dorozio, 2019; matthew et al., 2018; mussell & the aboriginal healing foundation, 2005; nahwegahbow, 2013; national collaborating centre for indigenous health & first nations health authority, 2019a; native child and family services of toronto, 2020; oster et al., 2018; reinhardt et al., 2012; tipene-leach et al., 2000; urban indian health institute, 2011). how men establish a fathering role is broad and encompasses assuming caregiving responsibilities, supporting the child’s mother, and meeting the child’s spiritual needs. while the role of fathers in the past has been largely influenced by gender, with men acting primarily as protectors and providers for their families, the literature describes indigenous fathers as striving to engage in the full range of caregiving skills from playing with their infants to bathing them and changing diapers. the influence of the father on a mother’s choice to breastfeed was notable; mothers who felt supported to breastfeed by their infants’ fathers were more likely to do so. finally, the literature supports the strong role of indigenous fathers in meeting the spiritual needs of their infants; participating in ceremonies and traditions and teaching them to speak their language foster a sense of identity and connection to the community and the land, and promote pride and resilience. supporting one another the final theme along the journey to becoming a father is “supporting one another.” this theme includes three subthemes: a) healing; b) support networks; and c) parenting programs. healing. healing was an essential process in the journey to becoming a father. colonial legacies, including the dispossession of land and loss of traditional life and ways of knowing, have significantly disrupted parenting. for example, in canada the removal of children from their family homes during the residential school legacy and sixties scoop resulted in a lack of parenting role models, especially positive ones (ball, 2013; dad central ontario, n.d.). as these positive models were few and far between for indigenous children growing up in canada, many men do not have examples from which to draw when they become fathers themselves (ball, 2013; dad central ontario, n.d.; waddell et al., 2021). yet the journey to becoming a father is seen as an opportunity to heal and turn around the negative cycle of parenting that men and often their own parents as well have experienced (ball, 2009, 2012, 2013; canuto et al., 2019; dad central ontario, n.d.; facetubc, 2015; kim-meneen, 2018; national collaborating centre for indigenous health, 2011; oster et al., 2018; stayin’ on track, n.d.; urban indian health institute, 2011; waddell et al., 2021). for some fathers, healing involved substance abuse treatment (ball, 2009; dad central ontario, n.d.; facetubc, 2015; kim-meneen, 2018). for others, healing was fostered through being immersed in culture and community, engaging in self-care that promoted physical, mental, and emotional wellness, and just being around and playing with their children (ball, 2009, 2013; canuto et al., 2019; dad central ontario, n.d.; oster et al., 2018; plunket, 2021; stayin’ on track, n.d.; waddell et al., 2021; women’s health clinical support programs women and newborn health service & department of health government of western australia, 2015). 21 wright et al.: international perspectives on the role of indigenous fathers doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14491 support networks. support networks were a second and important aspect of fathers supporting one another. the support networks described in the literature consisted mainly of family members, with an emphasis on the important roles of the infant’s mother and both paternal and maternal grandmothers. these maternal family members were essential in assisting new fathers by being positive role models, teaching vital caregiving knowledge and skills, and assisting with child care (ball, 2009, 2010, 2013; eni et al., 2014; fletcher et al., 2017). extended family members, including aunties, uncles, grandfathers, and cousins, also supported fathers in similar ways, but were mentioned less frequently in the literature (abel et al., 2001; ball, 2009; canuto et al., 2019; faulkner et al., 2021; fletcher et al., 2017; urban indian health institute, 2011). support networks consisted of other fathers too, who afforded opportunities to observe positive parenting interactions, to share experiences with and learn from one another, and to support each other on their journeys to becoming fathers (ball, 2009; canuto et al., 2019; dad central ontario, n.d.; fletcher et al., 2017; monkman, 2019; national collaborating centre for indigenous health & first nations health authority, 2019b; women’s health clinical support programs women and newborn health service & department of health government of western australia, 2015). finally, two canadian sources mentioned the important role of elders in supporting first nations fathers by providing teachings related to traditional parenting roles and responsibilities, culturally relevant parenting advice, and opportunities to engage in ceremony (bc tripartite first nations and aboriginal maternal and child health working group, 2015; oster et al., 2018). with the support of elders, first nations fathers in canada are described as the vehicles to restore culture and tradition to the indigenous family model (bc tripartite first nations and aboriginal maternal and child health working group, 2015). parenting programs. the third and final subtheme of supporting one another was through the assistance of parenting programs. the literature demonstrates that indigenous men are commonly excluded from parenting programs because programs are either not culturally relevant or they are not designed for men (ball, 2009, 2010, 2012, 2013; canuto et al., 2019; fletcher et al., 2017; irvine & national collaborating centre for indigenous health, 2009; monkman, 2019; reilly & rees, 2018; urban indian health institute, 2011; waddell et al., 2021). indigenous men generally lacked a sense of belonging and felt uncomfortable in mother-centric parenting programs because of a lack of relevant information pertaining to them (ball, 2009, 2010, 2012, 2013; canuto et al., 2019; fletcher et al., 2017; reilly & rees, 2018; urban indian health institute, 2011). this was particularly problematic for men who were raising their children as single parents, as they did not have a partner who was attending parenting programs from whom to gain knowledge (ball, 2009, 2013). some of the exclusion of men from parenting programs has been attributed to racist and discriminatory policies. for example, as it is more likely not to record fathers’ names on the birth or child protection agency records of indigenous children, indigenous fathers may be forced to prove the legitimacy of their paternity (ball, 2012). additionally, despite their efforts to be good fathers, men still felt pressured to be viewed as “good dads,” lest they contribute to negative stereotypes of indigenous fathers as incapable parents (faulkner et al., 2021; irvine & national collaborating centre for indigenous health, 2009; reilly & rees, 2018). indeed, the fear of child protection services removing children from their care has been noted to discourage fathers from participating in parenting programs and using other resources (mussell & the aboriginal healing foundation, 2005). 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 published by scholarship@western, 2022 finally, indigenous men were more likely to feel safe in spaces that were created by indigenous fathers for indigenous fathers (ball, 2009; reilly & rees, 2018). parenting programs for men were viewed as successful if they took a strengths-based approach to parenting, providing hands-on learning relevant to men and flexible programming, incorporating elders in sharing lessons on the traditional roles of men and fathers, highlighting wellness through engaging events, offering opportunities for families to be engaged together, and giving space for men to share and to support one another (bc tripartite first nations and aboriginal maternal and child health working group, 2015; bowes & grace, 2014; little drum consulting, 2016; matthew et al., 2018; monkman, 2019; national collaborating centre for indigenous health, 2011; scott, 2013). “supporting one another” was the third integral component along the journey to becoming a father as evidenced in the literature. first, this component described the need of most men to heal from the devastating impacts of colonization on their parenting experiences and their internalized ideas of parenting so that they could become positive role models for their children. second, supportive networks included immediate and extended family as well as elders and other fathers, who helped men learn what it meant to be a father, and to become the type of father they wanted to be. finally, parenting programs, while commonly mother-centric, have been generally unhelpful in supporting indigenous men in becoming fathers, though there are some examples of indigenous-specific programming that have successfully engaged indigenous men and fathers globally. discussion this scoping study has synthesized what has been documented about the role of indigenous fathers caring for the health and development of their infants in australia, canada, new zealand, and the united states. findings highlight a journey to becoming a father, beginning with men grappling to assume their new-found identity as fathers, and establishing what their new fathering roles mean to them and how to enact them, all while supporting one another throughout the journey. this is an important process to understand, as a parent’s influence on their child’s early development has significant implications for a child’s health and wellbeing throughout their lives (hertzman, 2010; moore et al., 2015). therefore, it is not in the best interest of children to react to parenting challenges later in a child’s life, but rather to create health policy and programs to proactively support men in their transition to fatherhood as early as possible. as identified in the themes presented, colonization has had a negative impact on indigenous parents globally; the loss of culture, traditions, language, and indigenous ways of being and knowing have left men with few examples of traditional fathering roles. simultaneously, colonization has shifted society globally toward european values and ways of living, with parenting roles becoming gender-specific and traditional indigenous lifestyles of hunting, gathering, or growing food becoming inadequate to care for one’s family in a capitalist-driven system (reilly & rees, 2018; urban indian health institute, 2011). western values of parenting are particularly problematic for indigenous fathers, who shared their fear of the involvement of child protection services if they should be deemed to not meet them (faulkner et al., 2021; mussell & the aboriginal healing foundation, 2005). this fear is not unique to fathers. indigenous mothers and other caregivers in canada have also voiced this concern, and this fear makes 23 wright et al.: international perspectives on the role of indigenous fathers doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14491 parents wary of participating in programs that may render their parenting vulnerable to surveillance and scrutiny (national inquiry into missing and murdered indigenous women and girls, 2019; wright, ballantyne, et al., 2019). despite the needs and desires of indigenous men to regain their traditional parenting knowledge, skills, and roles in order to conceptualize positive identities as fathers and establish their fathering roles, parenting programs generally exclude fathers and most are not indigenous-specific. with the exception of the stayin’ on track program in australia (stayin’ on track, n.d.), other parenting programs identified in this review that included material aimed at fathers were either mother-centric, euro-centric, and/or written by women for men. this gap in indigenous and male-led resources appears to be a global problem and represents an important area for further research, and policy and resource development. regardless of the lack of resources available and the challenges arising from the continuing impacts of colonization, the literature demonstrates an evolving determination of indigenous men to create a legacy of positive fathering for future generations (elkington, 2017; faulkner et al., 2021; oster et al., 2018). indigenous fathers draw on family supports, particularly from the mothers of their children and their own mothers, but also from other family members and fathers in the community. with these supports, they strive to heal from painful and traumatic experiences, and develop new goals for their parenting. in particular, the role of fathers in teaching their children about their culture and traditions and meeting their spiritual needs was described as beneficial for all parties involved; fathers felt that it positively impacted their own self-esteem, but also contributed to their children developing a positive self-identity, sense of belonging, and pride (faulkner et al., 2021; vartuli & winter, 1989). future research and policy implications the desire of fathers to be involved, positive parents is shared by the first nations fathers in canada who collaborated on this review. they are striving to be the best fathers they can be, despite a lack of role models growing up or knowledge of traditional fathering roles. they too are spiritual leaders within their families, have goals for their children as well as for themselves as fathers, and are very involved in raising their children. collectively, these fathers identified gaps in the literature and the need for inclusive health policies. first, there is a lack of understanding of the different environments in which fathers have been raised and how these settings influence where and how fathers wish to raise their own children. additionally, the literature does not describe what characteristics men believe constitute a healthy environment in which to raise their children, or how existing or new policies can be leveraged to create healthy environments for indigenous families raising children. second, the literature does not adequately describe how men express and show love to their children. perhaps this is due to a gendered perspective that considers showing love and affection to be a mother’s role rather than a father’s; however, the role of men as fathers is changing, and how indigenous men demonstrate love toward their children warrants understanding in order to help new fathers feel confident about how to care for their infants in this way. third, the exclusion of men in parenting programs is evidence of the inadequacy of policy that privileges maternal parenting knowledge over that of fathers, and warrants investigation and adjustment to more holistically meet the needs of the family. fourth, there is a lack of discussion surrounding the goals that fathers have for themselves and for their children. instead, the literature focuses on parenting tasks rather than strategies that fathers cultivate and implement to promote their 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 published by scholarship@western, 2022 children’s growth and development. parenting curricula require a broader inclusion of parenting concepts beyond focusing primarily on task-oriented behaviours. fifth, while the literature does highlight the role of fathers as spiritual and cultural leaders and teachers, it lacks detail; in particular, how men address spiritual and cultural needs through their parenting and what impact this has on their children. finally, the journey to becoming a father is a complex and multi-faceted process that is influenced by many factors. in order to advance health policy that promotes the development of indigenous-specific and father-focused programming to support fathers along this journey, a more thorough understanding of their experiences, including addressing these gaps, is necessary. strengths this scoping study collaborated with the local indigenous community to ensure that indigenous perspectives and experiences, particularly those of men, were incorporated throughout the process. this approach was essential to ensuring that culturally relevant search terms were applied, themes reflected indigenous fathers’ experiences and ways of knowing, and that gaps identified were relevant to indigenous fathers’ understanding and perspectives of fatherhood, rather than those of women or western researchers. second, this review took a global approach, including both published and unpublished literature from countries that have undergone similar periods of colonization—canada, the united states, australia, and new zealand. this global perspective allowed for a more in-depth understanding of the experiences of indigenous fathers than could be gleaned from one country alone. as demonstrated in the results above, indigenous men, while representing unique and diverse cultures from around the world, share common experiences in their journey to becoming fathers. developing health policy and resources to support fathers along this journey will, however, require a nuanced approach that takes diversity and community context into account. limitations while we consulted with numerous experts, it is possible that local community resources or reports were not identified in our grey literature search. additionally, only those resources available online were included in the study, so offline resources may exist and were not included. finally, most records originated from australia and canada. although similar experiences are reported in the literature from new zealand and the united states, the depth of information is likely to be more reflective of the experiences of fathers in australia and canada. more research is necessary to understand the variations in experiences in all four countries. conclusion this study is an important step to understanding the journey that indigenous men embark on to becoming fathers. supporting men through this transition is an important way to support the early development of their children, encourage healthy and positive parenting within indigenous communities, and promote the health and wellbeing of indigenous families. while the literature does not provide a fully comprehensive understanding of this journey, it describes a common experience of 25 wright et al.: international perspectives on the role of indigenous fathers doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14491 first identifying as a father, establishing one’s fathering role, and the need for and benefit of supporting one another through this process among indigenous men. additionally, and most importantly, the literature describes indigenous fathers as fully engaged, positive role models for their children, and spiritual and cultural leaders within their families and communities. a more robust understanding of this journey to becoming a father, particularly as it differs according to context, is an important first step in developing supportive health policies and resources for fathers. creating inclusive policy specifically targeted to support men through this journey will be an important way to assist indigenous fathers in their goal of creating a legacy of positive fathering for generations to come. fostering the development and strengthening of these vital roles will have profound positive outcomes for fathers, families, and communities. references abawi, z., & brady, j. 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(indigenous or aborigin* or native* or indian*).tw,kf. 3. (first nation or first nations or métis or inuit*).tw,kf. 4. (māori or torres straight island* or pacific island*).tw,kf. 5. or/1-4 [indigenous] 6. parents/ or fathers/ 7. grandparents/ 8. caregivers/ or parenting 9. (parent* or father* or dad*).tw,kf. 10. (grandfather* or grand-father* or grandpa* or grand-pa*).tw,kf. 11. or/6-10 [father] 12. 5 and 11 [indigenous + father] 13. exp infant/ or infant health/ or exp infant care/ or father-child relations/ 14. (infant* or baby or babies or newborn* or neonate*).tw,kf. 15. 13 or 14 [infant] 16. 12 and 15 [indigenous + father + infant] discrimination against first nations children with special healthcare needs in manitoba: the case of pinaymootang first nation the international indigenous policy journal volume 10 | issue 1 article 4 january 2019 discrimination against first nations children with special healthcare needs in manitoba: the case of pinaymootang first nation luna vives département de géographie, université de montréal, luna.vives@umontreal.ca vandna sinha school of social work, mcgill university, vandna.sinha@mcgill.ca recommended citation vives, l. , sinha, v. (2019). discrimination against first nations children with special healthcare needs in manitoba: the case of pinaymootang first nation. the international indigenous policy journal, 10(1). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.4 discrimination against first nations children with special healthcare needs in manitoba: the case of pinaymootang first nation abstract first nations children face systemic barriers in their access to health, education, and social services ordinarily available to other canadian children. this article summarizes the findings of a research project initiated by, and carried out in partnership with, pinaymootang first nation, manitoba between 2015 and 2017. through this partnership, we were able to document the routine delays, denials, and disruptions of services that pinaymootang children with special healthcare needs experienced. we further described the impact that this discrimination had on children and their caregivers. here, we consider three specific service areas: medical services (primary and specialized), allied health services (e.g., language therapy), and additional care services (e.g., medication). our findings are drawn from formal and informal interviews with indigenous, provincial, and federal service providers; indigenous leadership; and caregivers of pinaymootang children with special healthcare needs. based on this information, we argue that discrimination is pervasive, rooted in canada’s colonial history, and actualized through three main instruments: administration of policies regulating the provision of services to first nations populations living on reserve, chronic underfunding of services targeting this population, and geographic isolation (i.e., distance from a service hub). the article concludes with nine recommendations prepared by the project’s advisory committee for future policy aiming to eliminate the discrimination first nations children with special healthcare needs experience by way of fully (and meaningfully) implementing jordan’s principle in canada. keywords canada, jordan's principle, pinaymootang, first nations, special healthcare needs, disability, children, discrimination acknowledgments we are indebted to all the members of the pinaymootang project advisory board and to the families who shared their experiences with us. in particular, we would like to thank amanda meawasige (first nations health and social secretariat of manitoba), who facilitated this partnership; gwen traverse (health director, pinaymootang health centre), who initiated collaboration; and lucyna lach (school of social work, mcgill university), and eric burnet, who played a crucial role in the elaboration of the original report on which this article is based. disclaimer this paper summarizes the main findings of a research project completed in 2017 and conducted in partnership with pinaymootang first nation. the full report can be downloaded from http://cwrp.ca/ publications/3328 creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://cwrp.ca/publications/3328 http://cwrp.ca/publications/3328 http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ discrimination against first nations children with special healthcare needs in manitoba: the case of pinaymootang first nation canada is a settler society built upon the plundering and near extermination of indigenous peoples (daschuk, 2013). throughout the last five centuries, colonial governments have asserted control over indigenous land; replaced pre-existing forms of indigenous government; denied the right to indigenous people to fully participate in canadian political, economic, and social life; outlawed indigenous spiritual practice; and systematically separated children from their parents and communities through the residential school and child welfare systems (daschuk, 2013; simpson, 2011; truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015). through such actions, colonialism has shaped the social determinants of health for first nations people.1 social determinants are understood as “the conditions in which people are born, grow, live, work and age . . . [which] are mostly responsible for health inequities—the unfair and avoidable differences in health status seen within and between countries” (world health organization, n.d., what are social determinants of health section, para. 1). colonialism has been widely recognized as a key determinant of health for indigenous peoples throughout the world and in canada (allan & smylie, 2015; czyzewski, 2011; mikkonen & raphael, 2010; mowbray, 2007; paradies & cunningham, 2009). in canada, aboriginal status has been identified as the most important of 14 mutually interdependent determinants of health for the overall population, the others being disability; early childhood development; education, employment and working conditions; food insecurity; health services; gender; housing; income and income distribution; race; social exclusion; social safety net; and unemployment and job security (raphael, 2009). the links between indigenous identity and healthcare are shaped, in part, by a long history of institutionalized discrimination against this group, and a current public service framework that flows directly from colonial history and ideology (czyzewski, 2011). this framework rests on three main instruments: the constitution act of 1867, the indian act of 1876, and the numbered treaties. article 91(24) of the constitution act gave exclusive responsibility over “[status] indians, and lands reserved for the indians” to the federal government; meanwhile, article 92 assigned responsibility for most health and social services for all other canadians to the provinces. the indian act defined eligibility, acquisition, and transmission of indian status, which is the mechanism used by the federal state to delimit the population directly under its jurisdiction. in the manitoban context, a series of numbered treaties were signed between first nations and the canadian government in the 19th century. these treaties defined the territory (reserves) where first nations were to settle, offering in exchange “rations in times of famine, medicines, and agricultural implements” (lavoie & forget, 2011, p. 127). this promise was later interpreted as including access to other publicly provided services. in combination, these three instruments have been interpreted as entailing federal responsibility to provide public services to status first nations people living on reserve (lavoie & forget, 2011). as a result, while the vast majority of canadians receive health and social services administered and delivered by the provinces, status first nations people living on reserve receive services provided by the federal 1 first nations, along with inuit and métis peoples, are the descendants of canada’s original peoples and are collectively referred to as indigenous peoples. 1 vives and sinha: first nations children with special healthcare needs published by scholarship@western, 2019 government and delivered by local providers. these providers are mandated to provide services in keeping with provincial standards but are limited by strict constraints imposed by federal funding. responsibility for services for status and non-status first nations people living off reserve is the source of much jurisdictional friction between the two levels of government (lavoie, 2013; office of the auditor general of manitoba, 2013). additionally, this division of responsibilities between the federal government and provincial governments divides the canadian population based on their race and place of residence, engendering contradictions, duplications, inequalities, and gaps in service (lavoie & forget, 2011). first nations children are caught in this system and routinely experience discrimination when they try to access health, education, and social services ordinarily available to other canadian children in similar circumstances. disparities between the services available to first nations children and other children in canada are longstanding, ongoing, and well-documented (canadian human rights tribunal [chrt], 2016a, 2017; the jordan’s principle working group, 2015; truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015). jordan’s principle is intended to be a key mechanism for eliminating this discrimination. the principle is named after jordan river anderson, a child from norway house cree nation in manitoba who was born with a rare and severe medical condition. jordan’s doctors approved his release from hospital when he was 2 years old. however, due to jurisdictional disputes between the federal and provincial government over payment for his out-of-hospital care expenses, jordan never set foot outside of a hospital. he died at the age of 5 (first nations child and family caring society of canada, n.d.). jordan’s principle is meant to avoid this happening again: jordan’s principle calls on the government of first contact to pay for the services required by a first nations child, without service denials, delays, or disruptions. once the child’s needs are provided for, government bodies may resolve jurisdictional disputes and seek reimbursements. (first nations child and family caring society of canada, n.d., p. 1) despite endorsement by the house of commons in 2007 and repeated calls for implementation, jordan’s principle is yet to be fully implemented (anaya, 2014; assembly of first nations, 2013; assembly of manitoba chiefs, 2006, 2011; assembly of manitoba chiefs & first nations health and social secretariat of manitoba, 2016; fontaine & assembly of first nations, 2008; the jordan’s principle working group, 2015; truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015). in 2016, the conclusion of a decade-long legal battle initiated by the first nations child and caring society of canada and the assembly of first nations brought new hope for the implementation of jordan’s principle. the canadian human rights tribunal’s (chrt) ruling identified inequitable funding and administration of on-reserve child welfare services as ethno-racial discrimination against first nations children. one of several immediate remedies focused on jordan’s principle: the chrt (2016a) ordered the federal government "to immediately implement [its] full meaning and scope" (p. 168, para. 481). in 2017, after three non-compliance orders, the tribunal deemed the federal government’s response fragmented and insufficient (chrt, 2016b, 2016c, 2017). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.4 this article discusses obstacles to service access for children with special healthcare needs (shn) in pinaymootang first nation, manitoba. 2 we begin by introducing this community and the group of children with shn who participated in our study. next, the methods used for this study is presented. we then introduce the three service areas we considered (medical services, allied health services, and additional care services); the subsections discuss obstacles encountered by children with shn in each of these areas. we argue that these obstacles translate into the denial, delay, and disruption of services for first nations children with shn living in pinaymootang. we present the three factors responsible for this discrimination, which are rooted in the legacy of canadian colonialism: funding disparities, administration of services, and geography. finally, we conclude with a discussion of nine policy recommendations proposed by the project’s advisory committee to implement jordan’s principle in manitoba. we also compare these recommendations with current efforts to implement jordan’s principle in canada. children with special healthcare needs in pinaymootang first nation our goal in this article is to understand how the discriminatory framework for services for first nations peoples impacts children with special needs, their families, and their communities. we focus on children from pinaymootang first nation, an ojibwe community located in treaty 2 territory, manitoba. the majority of the nation’s members reside in fairford reserve, which has a surface area of 7,412.60 hectares (1/15th of winnipeg’s metropolitan area) and is situated in the interlake region, about 250 km north of winnipeg along highway 6. the band had 2,812 members in 2016, 50 percent under the age of 20 (pinaymootang health centre, n.d.). like many other first nations throughout the country, pinaymootang faces a number of challenges: the community’s economic base has been decimated by colonial practices and, today, educational attainment is low and unemployment rates are high. at the same time, there is a sense of pride and kinship that informs the work done at the local level. respondents described their community as a friendly and welcoming place where neighbours take care of their lots, and where individual and communal achievements are celebrated. participants in this study also highlighted that the nation has come a long way in the last few decades, mainly thanks to partnerships established among the band, local service providers, and other regional stakeholders. the pride service providers take in meeting the needs of the community is evident when it comes to taking care of its most vulnerable members: in 2016, after years of lobbying with the federal government, the pinaymootang health centre secured temporary funding to implement a pilot project for children with special needs and their families. our discussion of obstacles to accessing equitable health, social, and education services in pinaymootang focuses specifically on the experience of a group of 12 children with shn who were enrolled in this pilot project in 2016. children with shn “have or are at increased risk for a chronic physical, developmental, behavioural, or emotional condition” (mcpherson et al., 1998, the new definition section, para. 2). they require ongoing or intermittent interventions, which vary in complexity, from different service agencies and professionals (hewitt-taylor, 2008; watson, townsley, 2 the report on which this article is based was a collaborative effort (vives, sinha, burnet, lach & pinaymootang first nation, 2017). lucyna lach, eric burnet, gwen traverse and the members of a pinaymootang based project committee played integral roles in the project summarized in the report and we are grateful for their contributions. 3 vives and sinha: first nations children with special healthcare needs published by scholarship@western, 2019 & abbott, 2002).3 as a group, children with shn are particularly vulnerable to service gaps. children are, by definition, largely dependent on adults for their well-being, and they lack the political tools to effectively advocate for changes in their living conditions. these vulnerabilities are amplified for children with shn, who typically require multiple services over a long period of time. not having access to services can prevent these children from receiving proper treatment for their complex medical and developmental conditions, force them to experience a poor quality of life, impact their chances of reaching their full potential, and even put their lives at risk. for children in pinaymootang, these challenges were compounded by the intersections between being first nations, being children, having shn, and living on reserve. their experiences were shaped both by the availability of federally funded services and by on-reserve conditions that stem from colonial policies and practices. reserve communities are often rural and sometimes remote. poverty, lack of affordable and salubrious housing, limited employment opportunities, and inadequate access to healthy food and drinking water are widespread in reserves, heightening the vulnerability of children with shn (reading & wien, 2013). pinaymootang children are exposed to all of these risk factors. methods: pinaymootang, a case study the information discussed in this article was collected as part of a collaborative project to document service access disparities experienced by children with shn from pinaymootang first nation and their caregivers. this partnership began in the summer of 2015, before the first chrt ruling related to jordan’s principle. community leaders initiated the collaboration with the research team, which was facilitated by nanaandawewigamig: first nations health and social secretariat of manitoba (fnnsm). the terms of the collaboration were established in a research agreement signed in january of 2016. the governing body for the project was a 15-member advisory committee that met monthly. members included one member of the band council, one regional and seven local service providers, three representatives of a major provincial indigenous organization, and three members of the research team. the primary goal of this collaboration was to produce a policy report that the community could use in their advocacy efforts, with possible additional publications, such as this article. we used a qualitative case study approach focusing on pinaymootang first nation in order to explore the context for and implications of discrimination against first nations children with shn in the public system of service provision. we collected information through participant observation in two sharing circles with families and one regional meeting on the implementation of jordan’s principle in the province; one focus group; eight semi-structured interviews with local service providers and local, regional, and provincial representatives of indigenous organizations (“key informants”); and 12 semistructured interviews with caregivers of pinaymootang children with shn (“caregivers”). key informants were recruited using convenience sampling with the project’s advisory committee as an entry point. caregivers were selected using purposive sampling from a larger group of families enrolled in a program launched by pinaymootang health centre to address the needs of children with shn in the community. additional information about the comparability of services in nearby communities off 3 the term shn includes a wider range of conditions than other terms more commonly used in the literature, which includes terms such as children with serious and complex medical conditions or children with severe disabilities. for example, one of the children in our sample suffered from severe eczema that required regular treatments and impacted his ability to socialize normally with other children. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.4 reserve was collected through unstructured conversations with representatives of the manitoba first nations education resource centre (mfnerc), health canada’s first nations and inuit health branch (fnihb), and manitoba’s children’s disability services program (cds). we conducted three separate validation sessions with caregivers, service providers, and community leadership prior to the publication of the final report. this research design responds to our objective of producing in-depth and community-based evidence with the potential of informing the implementation of jordan’s principle in canada. however, our conclusions regarding service disparities may not be generalizable to other first nations communities in manitoba or in canada. according to the chrt’s rulings (2016a, 2017), jordan’s principle should apply to all first nations children, regardless of their level of disability or place of residence. our specific focus on children with shn living on reserve reflects the priorities of our partners in pinaymootang first nation, who saw these children as the most vulnerable members of their community. understanding and addressing their needs is one step towards meeting the human, constitutional, and treaty rights of all first nations people. service disparities experienced by pinaymootang children with special healthcare needs by service area: medical services, allied health services, and additional care services we interviewed service providers and caregivers to assess the availability of services in pinaymootang according to three service areas that are typically required by children with shn: a. medical services, which for the purposes of this article are defined as those rendered or ordered by a nurse, a nurse practitioner, or a family doctor in support of their protected professional acts (with the exception of allied health services). examples included primary care, specialized care, diagnostic services, and surgical procedures. b. allied health services, which are those services delivered by healthcare professionals excluding nursing, medical, and pharmacy services (canadian association of allied health programs, n.d.). examples include occupational therapy, physiotherapy, speech and language therapy, and social work services. c. additional care services, which include any service necessary for the health, well-being, and general functioning of a patient accessed through health canada’s non-insured health benefits (nihb) program. examples include prescription medication, respite care, assistive devices such as wheelchairs or hearing aids, and medical transportation. some medical and allied health services were available on reserve for pinaymootang members, while others had to be accessed in nearby off-reserve communities or in winnipeg. providers for these two service areas are shown in figure 1 below. in the following sections we draw from interviews with key informants and off-reserve service providers (e.g., mfnerc, cds) to compare these services to those that would ordinarily be available to children with shn living in nearby off-reserve communities. eligibility and coverage for additional care services was determined by the child’s indian status (or her meeting the eligibility criteria to obtain it) and regular place of residence (on or off reserve). 5 vives and sinha: first nations children with special healthcare needs published by scholarship@western, 2019 figure 1. services accessible to children living in fairford reserve (pinaymootang first nation), in nearby communities, and in winnipeg. original data: google maps (n.d.). source: vives et al., 2017. medical services medical services on reserve were provided by pinaymootang health centre. however, when we conducted the interviews in 2016, the health centre was only funded to administer education and awareness programs (pinaymootang health centre, personal communication, november 2016). there were no physicians or nurse practitioners on staff. still, the health centre employed a team of registered nurses that provided medical services including basic checkups and immunization services, administration of medication, and assistance with regular treatments. for example, when one of the children in our sample suffered from severe allergies and eczema, the centre’s nurses changed his full body bandaging and applied antibiotic ointments. the child’s mother noted that this allowed him to stay close to his family when his condition worsened. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.4 the centre’s staff also coordinated services with other healthcare providers in neighbouring communities and in winnipeg—a key mediating role that enabled children to access specialized medical treatment. staff advocated for patients to be placed on physicians’ waiting lists and coordinated travel arrangements for medical visits off reserve. specific cases illustrate the importance of this task. for example, at the beginning of grade 2, staff at the local school determined that eric, a band member, had a cognitive disorder that needed to be evaluated and treated. eric’s father explained that the health centre “booked our appointments [with the medical specialists in winnipeg] and they gave us travel on a medical vehicle to take my son over there and back, and they also provided meal tickets” (caregiver 1 interview, march 2016). other caregivers similarly expressed that support provided by the health centre was essential to ensure access to services. having to commute regularly or to relocate off reserve to access primary medical services partially explained the disparities that pinaymootang children with shn experienced. as of 2016, the two closest medical facilities in the interlake region were ashern lakeshore general hospital (50 km south of pinaymootang on highway 6) and eriksdale e. m. memorial hospital (95 km south, also on highway 6). both hospitals (shown in map 1 above) provided primary and limited emergency health services. health centre staff indicated that general practitioners sometimes refused to add pinaymootang residents to their patient lists; additionally, children were removed from these lists if they missed a number of appointments within a pre-determined time period. in other words, primary medical services for children with shn were available, but not necessarily accessible, in pinaymootang or in nearby communities. the situation was different for specialized medical services. due to insufficient funding and regional labour shortages, neither ashern nor eriksdale hospital provided specialized medical services or assessment services. this affected all residents of the interlake region—on and off reserve (cbc, 2014a & 2014b). caregivers of pinaymootang children with shn avoided going to local hospitals. recounting a visit to ashern hospital with his shn child, a father said: [in ashern] they didn’t want nothing to do with [my son]. they used to make us wait in the waiting room and then finally said, “okay, now you have to go to winnipeg.” so why waste two, three hours when we can be in winnipeg in two or three hours? (caregiver 2 interview, march 2016) during the interviews, participants insisted that being indigenous was a factor that compounded the difficulties they faced in accessing medical services. although it would be difficult to prove that these specific families experienced racist discrimination, racism targeting indigenous peoples is widespread in the canadian and in the manitoban medical systems (allan & smylie, 2015; evans, white, & berg, 2014; de leeuw, maurice, holyk, greenwood & adam, 2012; puxley, 2013, 2014). furthermore, there is at least one open acknowledgement of racism towards first nations people accessing medical services in the interlake region. in 2013, following a number of incidents, the interlake eastern regional authority (ierha) apologized to pinaymootang’s chief for “the disrespectful behaviour shown by our staff towards your health staff and community members” (ierha letter to chief garnet woodhouse, personal communication, may 9, 2013). the letter acknowledged that, although “some of this can be attributed to the stressful healthcare environment that patients and staff must deal with . . . it is also impacted by long standing systemic racism.” caregivers mentioned perceived racism in nearby hospitals 7 vives and sinha: first nations children with special healthcare needs published by scholarship@western, 2019 as one the reasons they avoided them. key informants noted that, while first nations also experienced racism in winnipeg (allan & smylie, 2015), at least specialized care was available and relatively accessible in the city. allied health services our findings indicate that, of the three service areas considered here, pinaymootang children with shn experience the greatest degree of discrimination in their access to allied health services. pinaymootang service providers stated that, as of march 2016, there were no early intervention services available on reserve for children between the ages of 0 and 5. difficulties accessing assessment services further prevented most children in this age group from accessing early intervention allied health services off reserve (for a discussion on how the absence of early intervention programs affects other first nations communities throughout canada, see greenwood, leeuw & fraser 2007; preston, cottrell, pelletier, & pearce, 2001). older children with shn were expected to access these services through pinaymootang school. in early 2016, the school was able to provide limited allied health services to students with shn, including assessment services roughly twice a year, support for development of individualized education programs, and one-on-one support from educational assistants. caregivers and key respondents agreed that the range and frequency of fee-for-service allied health services provided through the school (e.g., speech and language therapy) was vastly insufficient to meet the needs of children with shn in the community. furthermore, school staff were not equipped to ensure individualized education programs were followed, monitored, or adapted to children’s evolving needs. other services were not provided at all due to a lack of funding (e.g., physiotherapy and counselling). as a result, a school manager explained, children with cognitive impairments were routinely placed in regular classrooms with no additional supports: we don’t have any special places for [a child with cognitive impairments] to go or any specialized person to help him. you have a child that comes in and you tell them “okay, don’t go there, don’t do that.” the next minute he forgets. they’re just put in the classroom, we were told, inclusion, not to separate them . . . and that’s a challenge for the teacher. (school manager, pinaymootang school, march 2016) conversations with caregivers and service providers on and off reserve revealed there was a sharp contrast between allied health services available for school age children living in pinaymootang and those living off reserve in the interlake region. the mother of kelly, a 14-year-old girl with a neurological disability who had attended two provincial schools in nearby off-reserve communities justified her choice not to settle in pinaymootang based on the availability of these services: [kelly] is able to access programs over there that she can’t on the reserve . . . after finding out from the school on the reserve that they wouldn’t be able to offer her any kind of special programming because of funding right i said, okay. so i put her in school off reserve and then they had all kinds of programming for her . . . they have different levels of funding for different levels of disabilities with kids, and [kelly] was a level 3, which is the highest needs. so she was fully funded, her [educational assistant] was fully funded just for her and her programming. you don’t get that on reserve. (brittany, caregiver interview, march 2016) 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.4 other caregivers had opted to settle in winnipeg temporarily to access allied health services for their children. a mother whose teenage daughter was diagnosed with autism moved to the city for a number of years and later returned to pinaymootang to be close to her family. this mother could compare the range of services available at the three different school districts her child had attended with those available in pinaymootang: mother: when we were living in the city [annabelle] had an occupational therapist, physiotherapist and a speech therapist. all would come to the house once a month . . . once she started school, she had all of those—[she had to] go to the school, they didn’t come to the house any more, they were at the school, and it was once a month there as well. and when we moved . . . to another school and there they had a great physiotherapy room . . . we ended up moving her to another school which was her third school in the city . . . and they had the speech in the school, they had physiotherapist in the school but they didn’t have the occupational therapist there. but in this school she received [these services] on a weekly basis. interviewer: okay. and then in the school, does she have access to [occupational therapy] at all? mother: here at [pinaymootang] school? no. interviewer: physical therapy? mother: no. interviewer: speech therapy? mother: no. the specialist came out but for some reason we never get to see them. i don’t know why but we never get to see them. (jacqueline, caregiver interview, march 2016) comparing kelly and annabelle’s experiences to those of first nations children living in pinaymootang shows that the difficulty in accessing allied health services for children with shn was not a result of geography or remoteness, but a result of the administrative division of responsibilities between the federal government (responsible for services for first nations on reserve) and the provincial government (responsible for services provided for all other residents of manitoba). in fact, kelly’s school was significantly farther from winnipeg than pinaymootang school, and yet the range and frequency of allied health services available to her were similar to those annabelle was able to access in winnipeg. administrators at pinaymootang school blamed insufficient funding for the situation. in this context, they adopted strategies to address the needs of children with shn enrolled in the school. these strategies focused on creating partnerships with provincial organizations, notably the federally funded mfnerc. this organization funded some of the allied health services provided through the school, sponsored the training of educational assistants and parents in winnipeg, and provided assistive devices for students with communication impairments. additional care services first nations children living on reserve generally access additional care services through the federal non-insured health benefits (nihb) program. in some cases, families living on reserve may also be eligible to access certain provincially funded services. nihb typically offers more limited coverage than provincial health insurance (canadian indigenous nurses association, 2017). authors have further noted that nihb funding has decreased in recent years despite an increase in the number of indigenous people eligible, the processes currently in place to obtain services are inefficient, providers are often 9 vives and sinha: first nations children with special healthcare needs published by scholarship@western, 2019 unwilling to serve patients enrolled in the program, and eligibility criteria are stringent and rigid (loyer & small legs, 2014). although the nihb program is, in general, far more restrictive than provincial insurance, it covers medical transportation, a service not covered by the provincial health insurance program for other children living in the interlake region (terms of reference officials working group, 2009). when compared to non-first nations children living off reserve in manitoba, pinaymootang children with shn were primarily discriminated against in their access to assistive devices and prescription medication. for example, one of the children in our sample was a teenage boy with a gross motor impairment. he required a wheelchair and his physiotherapist also requested an adapted tricycle as part of his treatment plan. however, nihb criteria established that this child could only receive one mobility device every 5 years, and this device could only be manual. thus, federal insurance guidelines forced him into a wheelchair that he would soon outgrow and ignored the advice of a medical specialist regarding a second device. the difficulties this child’s family faced were compounded by the fact that there were no wheelchair accessible vehicles on the reserve; the parents had to carry their 80 kg child in their arms to help him into and out of the family vehicle each time they left the house—a physically demanding endeavour. in contrast, the provincially funded cds program typically referred off-reserve children with gross motor impairment to another provincial program that allowed them to borrow a wheelchair (usually electric, although manual ones were also available). medical and allied health professionals from the child’s medical team could also request that cds cover the cost of more specialized mobility devices (e.g., an adapted tricycle). depending on the child’s specific circumstances and based on a medical referral, the program also offered a range of other services, including allied health services, respite care, after school care, funds to cover the costs of home and vehicle modifications, and summer programming (cds, personal communication, december 2016). these services are available to all manitoban children, with the exception of status indian children living on reserve because they fall under federal jurisdiction. a second area of disparities in access to additional care services was medication. key respondents indicated that the range of prescription medication that could be accessed through nihb was markedly inferior to those covered by provincial insurance. for this reason, caregivers and service providers felt doctors hesitated to prescribe pinaymootang children their first choice of medication, and settled instead for older, cheaper, and potentially less effective drugs that they believed were more likely to be approved by nihb. for example, one of the children in our sample had from severe allergies. at first, his doctor wanted to prescribe a new medication covered by the provincial insurance program; the child’s parents recounted the doctor’s hesitation and final decision to prescribe the older medication instead, which the doctor thought might be less effective but was covered by nihb. in addition, respondents found that federal policy changed quickly and often, and changes to the children’s medication regimes were not always communicated in advance (see also allec, 2000). an example came from another child in our sample who had a complex medication regime to treat his multiple health conditions. in at least two instances, his parents found out about changes to nihb medication coverage at the pharmacy counter. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.4 interviewees felt helpless in the face of the limitations imposed unilaterally by the nihb program. during the interviews, service providers insisted that there was no direct line of communication between them and the first nations and inuit health branch (fnihb), the agency in charge of implementing the nihb program. as for caregivers, while it is true that nihb decisions can be appealed, the process is notoriously opaque, lengthy, and cumbersome for families (auditor general of canada, 2015). for example, caregivers of the child with severe allergies (introduced above) had appealed nihb’s decision to not pay for an inhaler for their child; two years later, they had not received a response and were covering the cost of the medication out of their own pockets. we also discussed medical transportation, an additional care service typically not available for families living off reserve. this service exists to facilitate the commute to winnipeg for medical appointments, surgeries, and other pre-scheduled medical events. families appreciated this option, even if they rarely used it. there were several reasons for this lack of use: if using medical transportation, the round trip could take up to 14 hours (due to multiple stops), whereas with their own vehicle they could be back in 8 hours (including the time for the appointment). in addition, caregivers hesitated to travel in the medical van with shn children. medical transportation was simply not an option for children with severe behavioural dysregulation or heavily compromised immune systems, for whom a simple cold could quickly turn into a life-threatening condition. instead, they chose to use private transportation. denials, delays, and disruptions of services: the impact of service disparities on children and families our interviews with caregivers and service providers demonstrated that pinaymootang children with shn experienced denials, delays, and disruptions of services ordinarily available to other children in manitoba’s interlake region. these children were refused services, had access to a narrower range of services than were available off reserve, or were able to access those services less frequently than offreserve children (denial). they also experienced longer wait times for the provision of services when compared to other children off reserve (delay). finally, some pinaymootang children were able to access similar services to those available off reserve, but this access could be terminated suddenly and unexpectedly due to changes in policy (disruption). in all these situations, disparities and gaps in access to publicly provided health, education, and social services violate first nations children’s human, constitutional, and treaty rights (chrt, 2016a, 2017; the jordan's principle working group, 2015). denial of services was most clear with children’s access to allied health services, which were not available on reserve for children under the age of 5 and were rarely available for school-aged children. these denials impacted the ability of pinaymootang children with shn to communicate, socialize, and develop normally. for example, a child with a severe hearing impairment was unable to access american sign language (asl) training until he was 4 years old, and then only because his mother decided to temporarily relocate to winnipeg to access this service. until then, this child was only able to communicate with his mother and in a very rudimentary way. other children requiring counselling and speech and language therapy were also unable to access these services on reserve, something that affected their ability to socialize normally and to manage the psychological symptoms associated with their medical conditions (e.g., severe anxiety). the lack of services prevented children with shn from reaching a quality of life equivalent to children with similar medical conditions living off reserve. 11 vives and sinha: first nations children with special healthcare needs published by scholarship@western, 2019 pinaymootang children living on reserve also experienced delays in accessing services, particularly medical services. often, these delays were rooted in differential access to diagnostic and assessment services. in our sample, this was particularly a problem for children with neurodevelopmental disorders such as autism, who were typically not diagnosed until years after they started school. for example, a child living on reserve with oral communication impairments and suspected of being on the autism spectrum was still not diagnosed at the age of 11, despite repeated efforts on the part of his family to obtain an assessment that would enable him to receive therapy. access to early intervention is essential to support the development of children with autism and improve their social and daily living skills, decrease the frequency and intensity of autism symptoms, and improve cognitive skills (dawson & bernier, 2013; lang, hancock, & singh,2016; ouellette-kuntz et al., 2009). disruption of services ordinarily available to other children in manitoba was most clear with regard to nihb policy. policy changes made by health canada unilaterally and without warning or consultation with service providers left children vulnerable to sudden changes in their medication schedule. these changes, which included cessation of coverage or replacement of a medication with a similar product, could affect supplemental and core medication. for example, parents reported changes in coverage for melatonin (a hormone used to control the sleep pattern of children with autism) and phenobarbital (a central nervous system depressant that can be used to treat children with epilepsy). while it is not possible for us to assess the impact of these disruptions on specific children, the potential adverse health outcomes that can result from failure to consistently adhere to medication regimens are well documented (matsui, 2007; rapoff, 2010). changes in medications impacted patients’ lives, introducing setbacks in symptom management. for example, a change in medication might result in the return of a severely disrupted sleep cycle. in addition, we encountered children who were on medications that created physical dependency; when nihb suspended coverage for that medication without notice, caregivers suddenly found themselves without a treatment plan and without support to manage the child’s withdrawal symptoms. it was clear to caregivers and service providers in the community that modifications to children’s medication schedules were made by people unfamiliar with the child’s condition, history, and larger medication regime in response to policy considerations and without regard for the child’s best interest. denials, delays, and disruptions of medical services, allied health services, and additional care services limited the opportunity for pinaymootang children with shn to thrive and manage their medical condition. they also had a ripple effect on their caregivers, families, and pinaymootang first nation as a whole. some of the children in our sample suffered from medical conditions that required qualified respite workers that could handle seizures, manage severe behavioural dysregulation, or perform cardiopulmonary resuscitation. caregivers resented both the lack of respite care (at the time of the interviews, health canada did not provide long-term respite care for children in the community) and the absence of training opportunities that would allow able and willing relatives to fill in for them if needed. without properly trained respite care, children’s lives were dependent on their primary caregiver’s constant physical presence. pressure on caregivers increased due to the need to regularly commute to winnipeg to access services. because of the lack of appropriate support and the demands of constant travel, caregivers of children with shn felt overwhelmed and anxious. some were sleep deprived because their children had irregular sleep cycles resulting from their neurological disabilities, which meant that they were up most of the 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.4 night. others recounted sitting next to their child’s crib from dusk until dawn, counting breaths to make sure their child was alive. all worried about the care of their children once they transitioned into adulthood. as caregivers devoted their time and energy to ensure their children’s well-being, they became isolated. so much so that, at the beginning of this study, most did not know there were other pinaymootang families in similar situations to theirs.4 on top of all this, caregivers also found themselves under significant financial pressure. if the child lived with his or her parents, at least one of them had to give up his or her job to take care of their child—at a time when families faced additional related to their child’s health needs. a critical example was that of a family with a child with a complex medical condition. the child’s mother moved to winnipeg to complete her university studies and later returned to the community to implement an ambitious employment program on reserve. as it became clear that there were no services to help her care for her son on reserve and that the school was reluctant to accept him in the classroom as a full-time student, the family’s strategy shifted: the mother quit her job and the family began to rely solely on the father’s income. other caregivers in our sample (usually mothers) had similarly quit their jobs or stopped looking for paid work due to this lack of support. in this context, families faced three possibilities, each one of them essentially flawed. first, they could stay in pinaymootang, where they retained contact with their culture and their support networks, but their children received fewer and lower quality services. second, they could relocate to winnipeg, either permanently or with the hope of returning to the community. however, this would require giving up onreserve housing in a context where the demand is extremely high and the availability low (at the time of the interviews, a family that had relocated to winnipeg to be close to their son’s medical team had been on the housing waiting list for over two years). a third possibility was to transfer custody of their child to an indigenous child and family services agency in the hopes that they would be able to access better services through the agency. while none of the families in our study had made this decision, some mentioned that service providers outside of pinaymootang had explicitly asked them to consider it, and the family’s resistance to this possibility was a strong undercurrent in caregiver narratives. according to a 2008 study, families of first nations children with special healthcare needs living on reserve throughout the province face a similar set of possibilities (shackel, 2008). the emotional and physical strain they experience as a result of this impossible situation impacts their overall health and well-being (shackel, 2008). factors mediating access to services for first nations children: administration, funding, and geography the denials, delays, and disruptions of services that constrained the options available to the families of pinaymootang children with shn are the result of a public service network grounded in colonial history and ideology. the continuation of colonial ideology is mediated by three main factors that explain the discrimination first nations children with shn experience: the long-term underfunding of on-reserve services; administrative practices that engendered burden, uncertainty, and risk for community members; and the intentional geographic isolation of first nations communities. while none of these factors independently explains the challenges in accessing services for pinaymootang children with shn, the three factors interact in ways that perpetuate discrimination against first nations children. in 4 following a first meeting that brought caregivers of children with shn together around this study, the health centre instituted bi-monthly support meetings intended to reduce their isolation. 13 vives and sinha: first nations children with special healthcare needs published by scholarship@western, 2019 this section, we explore these three factors, giving examples of the specific ways in which they manifested in the pinaymootang context. funding: putting fnihb’s children services reference chart to the test significant funding gaps between provincially and federally provided services have been well documented in multiple service domains (auditor general of canada, 2011, 2015; canadian human rights tribunal, 2016a; the jordan’s principle working group, 2015; pictou landing band council and maurina beadle vs. attorney general of canada, 2013). for example, the office of the parliamentary budget officer (2016) recently calculated that the shortfall between provincial school funding across canada and that of federally-funded first nations-operated schools was between $365 million and $665 million in 2016. similarly, information accessed by member of parliament charlie angus in 2016 showed “a massive gap in health services compared to what was available provincially” (barrera, 2017, para. 5). we documented specific funding gaps in the pinaymootang context through interviews with advisory committee members and a focus group conducted in early 2016. our discussions were guided by the children’s services reference chart (vives et al., 2017, p. 72). produced in 2010 by a senior worker at fnihb, the chart summarized all federally funded services that could be provided on reserves across manitoba with funding from health canada and indigenous and northern affairs canada (inac, the federal ministry that was responsible for providing all non-health services on reserve). when asked about the services actually available in pinaymootang, respondents indicated that, in total, federal funds from these two ministries only allowed full implementation of 2 of the 14 programs listed in the reference chart. figure 2 shows all of the programs that could be administered on reserve with health canada’s funding. pinaymootang health centre respondents indicated that the funding they received only covered the costs of implementing 1 out of the 10 programs fully and on an ongoing basis: public health (child development screening and immunizations). five other programs were partially available: aboriginal head start on reserve, brighter futures, canada prenatal nutrition program, home and community care, and non-insured health benefits. four programs were not at all available: aboriginal diabetes initiative, the building healthy communities program, the fetal alcohol spectrum disorder program, and the maternal child health program. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.4 figure 2. health canada funded children’s services in pinaymootang first nation in 2016. figure 3 summarizes all of the programs that could be funded using resources from inac. inacfunded services available in pinaymootang were administered by the anishinaabe child and family services (acfs), the band office, and pinaymootang school. respondents from these institutions indicated that the funds they received only allowed for the full and ongoing implementation of 1 of the 4 programs identified in the reference chart: child and family services (protection and prevention services). two programs administered by the band office (income assistance and assisted living) were only partially available. to compensate for the lack of federal support, the band organized fundraisers as often as twice a month. often, funds were used to cover costs associated with the medical treatment and the relocation of families with children with shn to winnipeg. the high-cost special education program (implemented by the school) was also only partially funded. funding was based on the number of students with a special needs assessment enrolled in 2007 and had not been revised, even though the annual number of learning disability assessments increased from 22 to 45 between 2007 and 2016. the limitations in funding were compounded by uncertainty about cash flow timelines; many school-based services were provided only when (and if) there was funding remaining at the end of the funding period (vives et al., 2017). service providers explained that the lack of appropriate services at the school led some parents to keep their children with shn at home, indefinitely. although systematic comparison between resources in pinaymootang and other first nations communities was beyond the scope of our study, there are indications that the experience of other communities was similar. education specialists at mfnerc estimated that while first nations schools in manitoba received, on average, $7,000 to $8,000 dollars yearly per student enrolled at the time (all levels of need included), the amount for provincially funded schools ranged from $12,000 to $22,000 per student (mfnerc, personal communication, march 2016). further, local, regional, and provincial service providers interviewed indicated that they did not believe there to be a single first nations community in the province where all the services identified in the services chart were available. when we 15 vives and sinha: first nations children with special healthcare needs published by scholarship@western, 2019 asked a senior representative from fnihb about the discrepancy between the chart and the services available in pinaymootang, we were told that the federal government simply transferred the funds in the amount specified and under the conditions outlined in their agreements with the band; it was then the responsibility of the band and local service providers to decide which of the possible programs they would provide. figure 3. children’s programs and their components funded with inac’s resources in pinaymootang first nation in 2016. administration closely related to the funding gaps was the administration of federal funding for programs and services on reserve. policy guidelines, eligibility criteria, and coverage can differ for on reserve services and provincially funded and administered off reserve services. moreover, this division of responsibilities results in jurisdictional ambiguities over which level of government is responsible for providing services for first nations children whose status or residence on reserve is unclear or called into question (the jordan's principle working group, 2015).the direct impacts of administration on pinaymootang families were most evident when it came to nihb. as discussed previously, nihb standards and practices resulted in pinaymootang children being denied equipment that would be available to off reserve children. in addition, they experienced unexpected disruptions in their regular medication and long delays in service without any response to their appeals or queries. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.4 the focus group and interviews we conducted with pinaymootang service providers also shed light on the indirect ways in which challenges related to federal administration of funds impacted community members. they highlighted administrative practices that limited the ability of first nations and onreserve service providers to meet the needs of children with shn, which created burden, uncertainty, and risk for community service providers and pinaymootang families. the example of the pinaymootang health centre’s efforts to create a program that would meet the needs of children with shn in the community highlights these patterns of inadequate funding and support from government. in 2010, a pinaymootang family filed a complaint with the canadian human rights commission arguing that the services required to address their child’s special healthcare needs were not available in their community. in response, health canada asked the pinaymootang health centre to determine the costs of the child’s unmet needs. the health centre responded with a proposal for a program designed to address the needs of 11 children it identified as having shn, stating that it would be “unconscionable to advocate and provide services to one child, when there are numerous children and families within the community that are entitled to healthcare services and supports” (pinaymootang health centre email to health canada, personal communication, october 31, 2014). in response, health canada directed the health centre to submit three separate funding applications in 2014. preparation of each proposal took 20 to 60 hours, a burden that was accrued in addition to the staff’s regular responsibilities. after making their submissions, the health centre received no news for several months; during this time, management was unable to establish a direct or consistent line of communication with health canada staff. the first two funding applications were denied. the third funding application resulted in four months of temporary funding for the niniijaanis nide (my child, my heart) program, which engaged child development workers and a case manager to meet some of the needs of pinaymootang children with shn and their families.5 although funding for the program was announced in the summer of 2015, funds were not transferred until december, and the health centre was required to submit an accounting report and program evaluation three months later. funding was later renewed for two 1-year periods, but both renewals came only weeks or days before funding was to run out. the short-term funding and short notice of funding renewal created uncertainty and risk for all involved. service providers worried about the impact on clients if highly demanded services, such as respite care, were discontinued. one respondent suggested that, if that were to happen, “children and families would be worse off than if we’d never done anything at all.” moreover, service providers worried about clients potentially internalizing the message that “they don’t matter, their children don’t matter.” the uncertainty around funding also impacted the hiring and retention of qualified child development workers for the program. as a manager put it, “i feel i’m playing with people’s livelihoods here. if the funding is not renewed, how will [my case worker] provide for her family? where is she going to go? and what am i going to tell her?” in other words, the administration of federal funding compounded the challenges imposed by low levels of core funding. faced with these constraints, community service providers were burdened with the responsibility of mediating the resulting uncertainty and risk for both the families they served and the workers they employed. 5 members of our research team formed a second partnership with the health centre to conceive an evaluation plan for this program. where the honouring jordan’s principle report established a baseline for the inequalities experienced by children in the community (vives et al., 2017), the evaluation project tracked the evolution of the niniijaanis niide program (lach, saunders, & traverse, 2016). 17 vives and sinha: first nations children with special healthcare needs published by scholarship@western, 2019 geography the third factor is the intentional geographic isolation of first nations reserves. this isolation is rooted in the colonial governance practices and crystallized in the forced relocation of indigenous groups to lands away from large population centres. throughout canada, about half of reserves are rural or remote, with poorer access to services than urban centres (kulig & williams, 2012). this isolation means that, today, one of the main obstacles first nations children with shn encounter when accessing services is geography or distance from a service hub. the direct impact of geography on families was detailed in the previous section. limited availability of services in the interlake region meant that families often had to make the long commute to winnipeg, sometimes on a weekly basis. these trips took a heavy toll on children’s health and caregivers’ resources. additionally, as mentioned above, missed appointments could result in the refusal of future services. the pinaymootang school’s efforts to address staffing challenges exemplify even broader challenges related to geography. funding gaps combined with widespread regional labour shortages made it difficult for the school to hire and retain qualified staff. to work around this difficulty, the school (in collaboration with teachers, medical specialists, and parents) hired relatives of the children with shn to work as one-on-one educational assistants. this decision also addressed another geographically based concern. the school was one of the community’s biggest employers, and the hiring of community assistants fulfilled a perceived responsibility to provide employment in a community where opportunities were limited. however, the practice of hiring caregivers as educational assistants created an additional burden for caregivers who now had to provide care during the day as well, potentially increasing their need for respite care, which was minimally available in the community. the policy also created the expectation among parents of children with shn needs that they would be hired, which led to tensions between the school and children’s families. the legacy of colonial practices that forced first nations to settle in rural and remote reserves thus has multiple repercussions in term of the ability of communities such as pinaymootang to meet the needs of children with shn. rurality (and, in other cases, remoteness) limits access to qualified professionals. rurality also burdens community service providers to address these children’s needs, while also providing employment for the community’s members. in a context where job opportunities are scarce, conflict seems unavoidable. discussion: moving forward with the implementation of jordan’s principle in manitoba in this article, we have examined access to services for children with shn who lived on reserve in pinaymootang, manitoba in 2016 and 2017. we have found that these children experienced denials, delays, and disruptions in accessing and receiving medical, allied health, and additional care services. these experiences took a heavy toll on caregivers, who felt they had only three options: (a) move to winnipeg for better services, (b) stay in the community with more limited access to services, or (c) transfer custody of their children to child and family services. the service barriers faced by pinaymootang families arise from a colonial public service structure that creates challenges related to funding and administration of services, and geography. attention to each of these factors can be seen in the project advisory committee’s recommendations, presented in figure 4.the committee recommended that funding be allocated in order to close all known disparities in services and to allow first nations communities to assess their actual needs. they 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.4 further recommended that core service funding be determined on the basis of these needs, in recognition of the administrative burdens associated with short-term funding and with the failure to directly link funding levels to actual needs. additional consideration of the challenges linked to administration is evident in the recommendations around ongoing consultation with first nations and improved communication and collaboration between and within governments. finally, consideration of the geography-based challenges in attracting and retaining qualified staff are evident in the recommendations around supporting collaborations between first nations and investing in shortand long-term capacity building. both mechanisms for achieving economies of scale and sustained, purposeful investment in training are required to address the challenges to providing services in rural and remote communities. figure 4. recommendations from the project’s advisory committee to address the special health needs among first nations children living on reserve. 19 vives and sinha: first nations children with special healthcare needs published by scholarship@western, 2019 pinaymootang’s efforts to meet the needs of children with shn are inextricably bound to national and provincial level efforts to implement jordan’s principle. important advances toward the implementation of jordan’s principle have brought new resources and opportunities for pinaymootang. in response to the chrt rulings, in 2016, the canadian government committed to invest up to $382 million to implement a variety of three-year jordan’s principle-related pilot initiatives across the country (health canada, 2016).the niniijaanis niide program that the health centre launched to address the needs of pinaymootang children with shn received additional funding in 2016 from this government investment. as of november 2017, the model was being adapted and implemented, to different degrees, in 40 of the 61 first nations in manitoba. the provision of jordan’s principle funding for the continued implementation and replication of ninijaanis niide reflects an expanded and still evolving understanding of this mechanism. jordan’s principle aims to ensure first nations children have access to the services they require, but its interpretation and application have evolved over time (churchill & sinha, in press). for many years, the federal government used a narrow interpretation of jordan’s principle. as recently as 2015, only cases where (a) status first nations children, (b) who had complex disabilities, (c) lived on reserve, (d) and required services from multiple providers were considered; additionally, (e) the government required that a jurisdictional dispute exist between the federal and the provincial governments. the 2016 chrt ruling rejected this narrow interpretation. the tribunal established jordan’s principle as a mechanism for achieving “substantive equality” (chrt, 2017, b(i)39). it ruled that jordan’s principle applies to all first nations children in canada regardless of place of residence and level of disability. further, it should do this without compounding the disadvantage imposed by the historic discrimination against first nations through institutionalized systems and processes such as residential schools (chrt, 2016a). it is this interpretation of jordan’s principle that has resulted in extended funding for ninijaanis niide and has also brought access to an expanded range of services (e.g. manitoba adolescent treatment centre [matc], n.d.; st. amant, n.d.). these are important developments that have brought welcome and meaningful changes to pinaymootang, but the current approach falls far short of the recommendations made by our project advisory committee, and it also replicates many of the challenges that families in our study faced in meeting the needs of their child with shn. first and foremost, the current funding designated for jordan’s principle will end in 2019 (government of canada, n.d.). short-term funding means that the advisory committee’s recommendation of core funding based on needs has not yet been realized. as of june 2018, there has been no announcement about renewing this funding and, nationally, all programs and services supported by this fund are experiencing the uncertainty and risk that comes with short-term funding. further, investments in long-term capacity building and first nations collaborations, which are needed to achieve economies of scale, are not possible under a short-term funding plan. current approaches to the implementation of jordan’s principle on a national scale thus far show fundamental administrative flaws that make it impossible to address the needs of first nations children with shn. these flaws reinforce the obstacles to accessing services related to funding, administration, and geography that are discussed in this article. because the findings reported here are from a case study of a single first nations community, they cannot be generalized to other first nations communities in manitoba or elsewhere in canada. however, based on discussions with stakeholders at the federal and provincial levels, we believe that 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.4 aspects of the pinaymootang experience may resonate with other first nations communities that struggle to meet the needs of children with shn under current approaches to jordan’s principle implementation. the evidence presented here and the recommendations prepared by the advisory committee may be useful as stakeholders seek to clarify the next phase of implementation. we believe that if these recommendations are implemented to address the needs of all first nations children, and not only those children with shn, they will empower first nations communities to make decisions that improve their health and well-being, and they will begin to undermine the colonial framework that shapes their access to publicly provided services. much more must be done, however, both to fully implement jordan’s principle throughout the country and to erase colonialism as a social determinant of aboriginal health in pinaymootang, manitoba, and canada. 21 vives and sinha: first nations children with special healthcare needs 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(2009). age at diagnosis of autism spectrum disorders in four regions of canada. canadian journal of public health / revue canadienne de sante publique, 100(4), 268-273. paradies, y., & cunningham, j. (2009). experiences of racism among urban indigenous australians: findings from the druid study. ethnic and racial studies, 32(3), 548–573. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/01419870802065234 pictou landing band council & maurina beadle v. attorney general of canada. (2013). citation 2013 fc 342. retrieved from https://fncaringsociety.com/sites/default/files/ruling%20fed%20court%20beadle%20and%20pictou%20landing%20fn_0.pdf pinaymootang health centre. (n.d.). retreived from https://www.pfnhealth.com/ preston, j. p., cottrell, m., pelletier, t. r., & pearce, j. v. (2001). aboriginal early childhood education in canada: issues of context. journal of early childhood research 10(1), 3-18. doi: https://doi.org/10.1177/1476718x11402753 25 vives and sinha: first nations children with special healthcare needs published by scholarship@western, 2019 puxley, c. (2013). brian sinclair, winnipeg aboriginal who died after 34-hour hospital wait, assumed ‘sleeping it off.’ the huffington post. retrieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2013/08/29/brian-sinclair-winnipeg_n_3837008.html puxley, c. (2014). man’s death after 34-hour er wait must be ruled homicide, family’s lawyers tell inquest. national post. retrieved from http://news.nationalpost.com/news/canada/mansdeath-after-34-hour-er-wait-must-be-ruled-homicide-familys-lawyers-tell-inquest raphael, d. (2009). social determinants of health: canadian perspectives (2nd ed.). toronto, on: canadian scholars’ press. rapoff, m. a. (2010). adherence to pediatric medical regimens. boston, ma: springer. doi: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4419-0570-3 reading, c., & wien, f. (2013). health inequalities and social determinants of aboriginal peoples’ health. prince george, bc: national collaborating centre for aboriginal health. retrieved from https://www.ccnsa-nccah.ca/docs/determinants/rpt-healthinequalities-reading-wienen.pdf shackel, d. w. (2008). the experience of first nations people with disabilities and their families in receiving services and supports in first nations communities in manitoba: honouring the stories (master’s thesis). retrieved from http://hdl.handle.net/1993/8049 simpson, l. (2011). dancing on our turtle’s back: stories of nishnaabeg re-creation, resurgence and a new emergence. winnipeg, mb: arbeiter publishing. st. amant. (n.d.). jordan’s principle: child first initiative. retrieved from https://stamant.ca/programs/jordansprinciple/ terms of reference officials working group. (2009). jordan's principle dispute resolution. preliminary report. retrieved from http://charlieangus.ndp.ca/sites/default/files/multisite/76282/field_content_files/tab_302_j p_dispute_resolution_preliminary_report_2009_1.pdf the jordan’s principle working group. (2015).without denial, delay, or disruption: ensuring first nations children’s access to equitable services through jordan’s principle. retrieved from http://www.afn.ca/uploads/files/jordans_principle-report.pdf truth and reconciliation commission of canada. (2015). final report of the truth and reconciliation commission of canada: honouring the truth, reconciling for the future. volume one. retrieved from http://nctr.ca/assets/reports/final%20reports/executive_summary_english_web.pdf vives, l. sinha, v., burnet, e., lach, l. in collaboration with pinaymootang first nation. (2017). honouring jordan’s principle: obstacles to accessing equitable health and social services for first nations children with special healthcare needs living in pinaymootang, manitoba. fairford, mn: pinaymootang first nation. retrieved from 26 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.4 http://www.pfnhealth.com/_mndata/phc/uploaded_files/pinaymootang_honouring_jordan s_principle_web_20170714.pdf watson, d., townsley, r., & abbott, d. (2002). exploring multi-agency working in services to disabled children with complex healthcare needs and their families. journal of clinical nursing, 11(3), 367-375. doi: https://doi.org/10.1046/j.1365-2702.2002.00623.x world health organization. (n.d.) about social determinants of health. retrieved from http://www.who.int/social_determinants/sdh_definition/en/ 27 vives and sinha: first nations children with special healthcare needs published by scholarship@western, 2019 the international indigenous policy journal january 2019 discrimination against first nations children with special healthcare needs in manitoba: the case of pinaymootang first nation luna vives vandna sinha recommended citation discrimination against first nations children with special healthcare needs in manitoba: the case of pinaymootang first nation abstract keywords acknowledgments disclaimer creative commons license discrimination against first nations children with special healthcare needs in manitoba: the case of pinaymootang first nation microsoft word 11058+coverpage.docx the international indigenous policy journal volume 12 | issue 3 october 2021 community journey of change through relational determinants of health shelley cardinal canadian red cross, canada, shelley.cardinal@redcross.ca debra pepler york university, canada, pepler@yorku.ca recommended citation cardinal, s., & pepler, d. (2021). community journey of change through relational determinants of health. the international indigenous policy journal, 12(3). https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.11058 community journey of change through relational determinants of health abstract this article describes a model that maps indigenous communities’ journeys from the cycle of violence arising from colonization to the circle of wellness through relational determinants of health. this model emerged from learning with indigenous communities participating in research on violence prevention programming with the canadian red cross. indigenous communities have shown us that they are returning to a place of thriving by restoring relationality with land, culture, ceremony, and language. therefore, the relational determinants of health comprise the foundational relationships that contribute to wellness. the community journey of change model represents actions that communities can undertake in moving to wellness. the model has implications for policies, programs, and services for indigenous communities as they begin to restore health and wellness. keywords violence prevention, indigenous wellness, relational determinants of health, indigenous communities acknowledgments we acknowledge the work of all our team members, past and current, and gratefully recognize the contributions of indigenous community members who shared knowledge and guided our work together. dr. kathy absolon, dr. susan dion, and dr. onowa mcivor were important researchers helping to guide the indigenous research methods, ethics, and meaning making. judi fairholm, dr. wendy craig, and sarah burke helped us navigate through this complex project. we are grateful for the support of angela salamanca, the project coordinator who assisted with project logistics, julia riddell, who guided the qualitative analyses, as well as sabina bromley, who did years of work on the historical timeline. we are most grateful for the many community-based researchers including stephanie aulatjut, curtis bigeye, joni gibbons, fran hunt-jinnouchi, janice moise, nancy mcfarland, dawn-lee ricard, laurie sutherland, phoebe sutherland, and tanya smethurst. we also acknowledge the critical support of terrylynn beavereye, terrellyn fearn, janice morin, and shirley tagalik in helping establish and maintain the community partnerships. we appreciate the contributions of the research assistants melissa major, stephanie mckenzie, stephen pepler, and emily melo. the understanding of indigenous health from a canadian perspective was co-developed by dawn-lee ricard, debra pepler, and shelley cardinal. this research was funded through the social sciences and humanities research council of canada partnership grant #895-2011-1013. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. cardinal & pepler: community journey of change through relational determinants of health published by scholarship@western, 2021 1 community journey of change through relational determinants of health since 1998, the canadian red cross has been working with indigenous communities in canada to support them in capacity building and preventing violence in the lives of children and youth. working with communities, indigenous leaders, and allies, the canadian red cross developed a suite of violence prevention programs for indigenous communities. these programs focused on building awareness and capacity to promote safe environments for the healthy development of children and youth. the adult programs are grounded in the view that adults in the community have a responsibility to create safety for children and youth. participants focus on developing a comprehensive understanding of historical and current forms of violence. although the communities valued the violence prevention content, the workshops alone did not contribute to reduced violence within the community. this feedback led to the development of a community mobilization process. over the past 8 years, we have partnered with five indigenous communities to study community mobilization processes: two first nations reserve communities (in saskatchewan and ontario), two inuit hamlets in nunavut, and one urban indigenous community represented through a friendship centre in british columbia (canadian red cross, 2009). we, shelley cardinal of the canadian red cross and debra pepler of york university, have co-led this project. we acknowledge the work of all our team members, past and current, and gratefully recognize the contributions of indigenous community members who shared knowledge and guided our work together. in this article, we integrate the relevant literature and our learning with communities to highlight a pathway for moving away from historical harm and systemic violence and toward a landing place of wellness that is relational. muskwas nitanees, the daughter of little bear, also known as shelley cardinal, is cree and mennonite. she was raised with stories of cultural strength and stories of the harms that indigenous peoples endured. from a young age, she knew her life work would contribute to addressing the harms. as a daughter of a residential school survivor and thriver, and an aunty to many, shelley understands the power of strengthening culture and wellness. today, she leads indigenous relations, research, and engagement within the canadian red cross. debra pepler lives and works on the traditional territory of the wendat, the anishnaabeg, haudenosaunee, métis, and the mississaugas of the credit first nation. her european ancestors came as uninvited settlers to canada over a 150 years ago. she has been invited to be an ally and pursued a learning journey to understand the strengths of and challenges faced by indigenous children and youth in the context of their families and communities. debra is a mother, grandmother, and professor of psychology. her teaching and research focus is child and youth development in family and peer relationships. shelley and debra met over 15 years ago, and they recognized a common interest in promoting relationships and preventing violence. our collaboration began with a preliminary evaluation of the canadian red cross indigenous programming (pepler & rubin-vaughan, 2011), followed by a study of the processes that facilitators use to mobilize knowledge for indigenous peoples. we learned that the facilitators sought to deliver the program with fidelity, while balancing the needs of participants. they balanced the layers of harm being addressed with layers of safety (yamada, 2014). these studies raised questions about the processes of program delivery, community capacity for health promotion, and systems supports needed to achieve and sustain community wellbeing. communities highlighted gaps in violence prevention programming that focus primarily on understanding past and present violence. the programs seldom offer the advocacy and allyship needed to move beyond the harms and systemic barriers in order to enable communities to the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.11058 2 connect to a place of living in a healthy way grounded in cultural wellness. in this article, we present a model for communities’ journeys to wellness through relational determinants of health. challenges indigenous communities face in moving toward wellness the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip; un general assembly, 2007) acknowledged that indigenous peoples around the world have been oppressed, marginalized, and exploited because of historical and ongoing harms of colonization. these rights violations and inequities were formally recognized by the united nations in 1982 based on work by the working group on indigenous populations examining discrimination faced by indigenous peoples throughout the world. in 2007, ban ki-moon, the united nations secretary-general, stated that the undrip was “a triumph for indigenous peoples around the world … a historic moment when un member states and indigenous peoples reconciled with their painful histories and resolved to move forward together on the path of human rights, justice, and development for all” (ban, 2007, para. 1). canada did not endorse undrip until 2016, when the government stated: [undrip] provides us with a road map to advance lasting reconciliation with indigenous peoples. it shows us that further steps must be taken to respect, recognize, and protect the human rights of indigenous peoples and to address the wrongs of the past. (government of canada, 2016, paras. 1–2) as in many countries around the world, there is much work to be done in canada to meet the undrip standards for indigenous peoples’ rights. indigenous communities in canada have experienced chronic and multiple traumas since first contact, including displacement from traditional lands, devastation by diseases, subjugation under the indian act, banning of cultural practices, forced attendance at residential schools, child apprehension during the sixties scoop, and racist and systematic harms across many generations. the health of indigenous children and youth has been identified as a critical issue in canada: “after hundreds of years of colonial policies that intentionally eroded aboriginal health care systems, first nations, inuit, and métis children and youth lag behind their non-aboriginal peers on virtually every measure of health status” (blackstock et al., 2006, p. 3).1 addressing historical harm contributes to community wellness. however, if imposed systems continue to foster oppression and marginalization, community resources are drained, making it difficult for communities to be in right relationship within their world in order to achieve balance and their full potential. indigenous children, youth, and adults thrive in a healthy relational environment. therefore, our understanding of indigenous health is that it comprises the physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual wellbeing of the whole community, whether urban, rural, or remote.2 indigenous community health 1 we have followed the guidance of cyndy baskin (2016) and others who use the term indigenous, as opposed to the term aboriginal, to refer to first nations, inuit, and métis peoples in canada, as well as those around the world who are the original peoples on their lands. this collective noun is consistent with the united nations declaration of the rights of indigenous peoples. when we quote directly, we have maintained the authors’ original terms. 2 this definition of indigenous community health has been adapted from the australian national aboriginal community controlled health organization (2006). cardinal & pepler: community journey of change through relational determinants of health published by scholarship@western, 2021 3 relies on foundational relationships with land, culture, ceremony, and language that contribute to wellness. we understand these as relational determinants of health. for thousands of years, physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual relationships have created the foundations for indigenous peoples’ strength, wholeness, and wellness. communities helped us understand that their journeys to wellness involve recognition and restoration of the relationships that contribute to wellness. in their journeys, indigenous communities are coming back to a place of thriving by restoring their relationality with land, culture, language, and ceremony. therefore, we refer to the relational determinants of health as the foundational relationships that contribute to wellness. in considering the determinants of indigenous peoples’ health, de leeuw et al. (2015) argued that understanding needs to extend beyond purely social determinants of health. they noted three shortcomings in the current knowledge: a. colonialism has yet to be accounted for as an important determinant of indigenous peoples’ health, b. indigenous people’s health should be examined as a unique area requiring different perspectives, and c. literature on the social determinants of indigenous peoples’ health has been primarily written by non-indigenous people. according to de leeuw and colleagues (2015), the term “social” is inadequate in describing factors that influence the health of indigenous peoples including: “spirituality, relationship to the land, geography, history, culture, language, and knowledge systems” (p. xii). we propose that these factors are foundational to relational determinants of health. reconnections to relational determinants of health occur within broader historical, political, societal, and economic systems that shape indigenous peoples’ wellbeing and holistic health (reading, 2018). communities’ journeys to wellness are constrained by these systems, which still operate from colonizing and western perspectives that create marked inequities, limited opportunities, impoverished conditions, and discrimination. according to reading (2018), these distal historical, political, ideological, economic, and social foundations create the context from which all intermediate and proximal social determinants arise. therefore, indigenous communities strive to mobilize to a place of thriving by restoring relationality, which can only be effective when systems within and beyond the community facilitate, rather than disrupt, the journeys to wellness. programming in indigenous communities community-based prevention programs for indigenous populations can be effective in addressing a range of health challenges (e.g., mussell et al., 2004; rowan et al., 2014; tsey et al., 2003). when programming is delivered at a community level, the community becomes the context for treatment (jiwa et al., 2008). research points to several defining features of effective violence prevention programming in indigenous communities, including definitions of violence that recognize historical harms; strong community interest and engagement; community capacity building; community leadership in planning and delivery; recognizing culture as intervention and the role of traditional teachings and healing; inclusion of community, families, and individuals; coordinated service delivery; and sustainable the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.11058 4 resourcing and funding (jiwa et al., 2008; mussell et al., 2004). in developing indigenous programming, the canadian red cross has largely incorporated these elements. by studying the delivery of the red cross indigenous programming, we have worked to understand the historical context, multigenerational trauma, and current suffering in communities with the goal of understanding the pathways away from violence. in response to needs identified by communities, the canadian red cross has partnered with indigenous communities in preventing violence and promoting safe environments for children and youth for over 20 years. canadian red cross programs have been developed with and for indigenous communities that are seeking to understand and address challenges of violence. these programs promote understanding of the layers of historical harm, which are the foundation for current experiences of violence within communities. community members come to understand, name, and re-claim the past, then begin the transition from the cycle of violence to wellness—a journey beginning with awareness and moving toward prevention. in a preliminary evaluation, we learned that this programming was valued by community participants and effective in communicating key messages about violence and abuse prevention (pepler & rubin-vaughan, 2011). communities helped us understand that, although there was change in participants’ understanding after the programming, it did not create a collective violence prevention response. to address this concern, the canadian red cross (2009) developed a community mobilization process to create safe environments by: a. understanding the issue; b. recognizing the vulnerability and resilience of children and youth; c. defining protection instruments; d. creating a prevention team; e. completing a risk assessment; f. developing policies and procedures; g. educating adults, youth, and children; h. responding to disclosures of violence, abuse, bullying, and harassment; i. meeting community challenges around violence; and j. exploring how to maintain safe environments. to support self-determination, there is an urgent need for indigenous-led research on comprehensive, culturally relevant, and community-based violence prevention to understand what works, why it works, and what does not work. the canadian unicef committee (2009) report, leaving no child behind, calls for “increased capacity-building initiatives for aboriginal peoples to actively and effectively govern their own social, health, and education initiatives” (p. 9). in response to this need, we began our research partnerships to address the lack of knowledge about the implementation and effectiveness of violence prevention programming in indigenous communities. in conducting our research, we recognized the need to work in a decolonizing, humble, and relational way that enables communities to return to balance and wellness. we were guided by diverse ethical frameworks and worked with communities to bring these ethical principles to life as they related to the diverse communities partnering in the research (riddell et al., 2017). our approach was grounded in respect, open communication, understanding responsibility and accountability, and ensuring learning in all places. cardinal & pepler: community journey of change through relational determinants of health published by scholarship@western, 2021 5 developing a model of the community journey of change from the cycle of violence to the circle of wellness through our partnerships, we have been working to identify, document, and understand community processes that address the cycle of violence rooted in colonization and promote wellness rooted in indigenous traditions. as indigenous and non-indigenous scholars working with indigenous leaders on community-based research, we sought to understand the processes that enable indigenous communities to mobilize to promote individual, family, community, and cultural benefits. we also aimed to share knowledge within and beyond communities in canada. we were focused on understanding communities’ journeys to re-establishing health as they transition from the cycle of violence to community wellness. while working together toward a comprehensive evaluation of the violence prevention programming, we began to develop a conceptual model to describe the foundation for the work with indigenous communities, based on the cultural framework of the first nations longitudinal health survey (dumont, 2005). as we engaged in research with communities, they guided us to recognize their needs for understanding, sharing, and self-documentation of the harms they have experienced. we also recognized the need for a compilation of reports from across canada documenting the shared indigenous story of colonial harms. for this historical documentation, we gathered information from over 1,000 sources including research, news media, indigenous writing, government documents, films, etc. we developed a timeline of the harmful historical experiences that first nations, métis, and inuit peoples endured through colonization in canada: pathways to our truths. the review revealed that harms were systematically layered for the purposes of power, control, greed, assimilation, and genocide. we organized the findings in a twodimensional chart with blocks of time since contact intersecting with experiences that began to coalesce into layers of harm. this chart reveals 15 layers of harm that accumulated to explain the deep and ongoing disruptions in community, family, and individual wellbeing. the layers of harm included disruptive experiences: contact, environmental dispossession, slavery and missing persons, dislocation, disease, substances, imposition of christianity, residential schools, making and breaking of treaties, confederation, indian act and aboriginal policies, police and criminal justice, pass system, indian hospitals, and the sixties and millennial scoops (bromley et al, 2021). the review revealed that destructive layers of harm were planned and carried out based on previous layers of harm inflicted on indigenous people. these layers of harm have cascaded, with accelerated disruption and dis-integration, increasing the burden of trauma over the past 500 years. this timeline is now being developed into a website for all canadians and others to access and learn the truth about the harms from colonization. having identified these layers of harm from the literature, we developed a community journey of change model of the physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual harms arising from colonization over the past 500 years that still continue today. this model represents the pathways that communities can follow as they plan and travel away from the harms toward their journey to wellness by restoring and reintegrating the relational determinants of indigenous health and wellness that have been disrupted by colonization. with enhanced understanding from the timeline and from our experiences in communities, we depicted the cycle of violence that communities have struggled under, the circle of wellness that communities aspire to, and a sphere with cultural pathways that indigenous communities have used in their journeys, represented by a canoe in motion, to reach the relational determinants of health (see figure 1). our the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.11058 6 knowledge gathering from the communities that participated in the violence prevention research has enabled us to develop the community journey of change model. we are grateful to be able to integrate insights shared by community members to shed light on the meaning of the processes depicted in our community journey of change model. these insights were from recorded share-back sessions with communities that participated in our walking the prevention pathway research, funded by the social sciences and humanities research council. for a description of the project and its methods, see riddell et al. (2017). cycle of violence the stories that were generously shared in our research helped us to understand that every form of harm from colonization has created physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual violence and has disrupted all domains of indigenous wellbeing. colonization disrupted the foundational indigenous way of being in all my relations, which richard wagamese (2016) discussed in his book embers: one ojibway’s meditations: i’ve been considering the phrase ‘all my relations’ for some time now. it’s hugely important. it’s our saving grace in the end. it points to the truth that we are all related, we are all connected, we all belong to each other. the most important word is “all.” not just those who look like me, sing like me, dance like me, speak like me, pray like me, or behave like me. all my relations. that means every person, just as it means every rock, mineral, blade of grass, and creature. we live because everything else does. if we were to choose collectively to live that teaching, the energy of our change of consciousness would heal each of us—and heal the planet. (p. 36) in depicting the cycle of violence, we distributed the 15 layers of harm identified in the timeline among the four domains by assigning the harm to the domain where its disruption is most prominent. we recognize, however, that each harm fits into each domain and its effects span domains. the cycle of violence illustrates the immense impact of historical harms on indigenous nations, communities, and peoples. although we began our research with a trauma-informed lens and a deep understanding of historical harms, we were overwhelmed by the breadth, depth, and longevity of harms emerging from the research and depicted within the integrated pathways to our truths. the historical chart revealed a cascade of intentional harm and trauma. we were able to see how the cascade of harm gained intensity with each action by colonizers. as dodge et al. (2009) described, “the metaphor of cascades, as in tumbling water that increases in speed and force as it is altered by, and alters, rocks in its path, captures some of the dynamic and transactional qualities” (p. 5). indigenous peoples’ resistance to the intentional harm elicited quick and forceful reactions by colonizers to disrupt, displace, assimilate, and eradicate indigenous peoples in canada. cardinal & pepler: community journey of change through relational determinants of health published by scholarship@western, 2021 7 figure 1. community journey of change through relational determinants of health note. copyright 2018 by cardinal & pepler. • connecting to land and stewardship • access to essential elements—clean air, clean water, clean land • access to traditional medicines • nuturing, safe, and healthy physical development • adequate and traditional food • appropriate clothing • secure housing • locating self, locating nation • reconnecting to all my relations • cultural ceremony, cultural practices, cultural freedom • acknowledgement of natural gifts: every child is a gift • self-determination • traditional ways of knowing, being, and doing • restorative justice (community responsibility and accountability) • lifelong learning— language, culture, songs, dances, names • healthy relationships • family connectivity • support during dif!cult experiences • emotional safety • personal power—confidence, self-esteem, happiness • connectedness • belonging • identity • trust ph ys ica l spiritual • contact • relations to “resources” • disease • confederation • residential schools • treaties • medical “research” and “indian hospitals” • slavery/ missing people • spiritual dislocation • introduction of christianity • residential schools • indian act & aboriginal policy • residential schools • police & criminal justice • residential schools • sixties scoop & millennial scoop • rise of gangs • substances • reconnection to all my relations and creator • living cultural and individual gifts • resilience and resistance • healthy land, water, air, and living environment • relationship with and access to the land, traditional foods, and medicines • physical and social safety • grounded in traditional ways of knowing, being, and doing • self-determination • self and community responsibility and accountability • healthy, stable, and harmonious relationships • support during dif!cult experiences to build resilience • support and connectedness in family and community ph ys ica l spiritual mental emot ion al ph ys ica l spiritual mental emo tio na l © cardinal & pepler, 2018 mental em ot io na l cycle of violence relational determinants of health circle of wellness the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.11058 8 the accumulation of layers of harm and trauma within indigenous nations, communities, families, and individuals continues to this day. as one of our community participants explained: because we’re not [pause] we’re already damaged, we’re already broken, there’s nothing to be broken anymore, we’re just suffering … we just need to, you know, help each other to heal and to move forward. (community member)3 another community member explained how the traditional ways of living and collectively solving problems of violence were disrupted by colonization: before all that happened, all this violence. if there was an incident that happened within the camps, it was dealt with by the family, by an elder … with a small group like a parent, an elder and the person who was causing the problem … and there was like … everyone was connected … and after colonization, that stopped … people were trying to adapt i guess to the modern … modern way of life and they lost their culture and their ways, their connections. (hilary irwin) relational determinants of health with a view of the layers of harm and disruptions, we were then able to ask: what needs to be restored, repaired, re-placed, and re-integrated for the community journey to wellness? based on our experiences of working with communities, we wondered how we could understand and support communities in effecting these restorations in today’s reality. we examined each harm in the cycle of violence separately and were then able to consider the unique disruption caused by each harm for indigenous peoples. within the model, we have labelled this healing process as restoring the relational determinants of health—the foundational relationships that contribute to wellness. in identifying the journey that communities have used or may use to move from the cycle of violence to wellness, we have considered the determinants of indigenous health from a relational perspective. with an understanding of the harms, it becomes possible to consider the interventions that counter the disruptions and support the journey of restoring the relational determinants of physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual health. these interventions form the basis of the communities’ work in creating their journey through the relational determinants of health. for example, in the cycle of violence, there was dislocation from land and broken access to resources. in re-establishing relational determinants of health, the dislocation and disconnection can begin to be repaired by connecting individuals, families, and communities back to the land and providing access to essential elements: clean air, clean water, and clean land. the processes of reconnection to and repair of the land are complex and require consideration of governance, land ownership, and stewardship. allowing stewardship to emerge entails interactive processes of recognizing whose traditional territory one is on, supporting the traditional stewards of the territory, finding space for one’s own cultural activities and ceremony, and re-claiming the indigenous right to hunt, gather, and secure traditional medicines. shelley cardinal explained: “this is something we all need to do. as a cree woman living on lekwangan territory, i must always be 3 for our knowledge gathering, we recontacted community members who shared their knowledge to ask permission to include their quote and to ask whether they wanted their names to be linked to their statements or whether they wanted to be identified as a “community member.” we have attributed the quotes according to their wishes. cardinal & pepler: community journey of change through relational determinants of health published by scholarship@western, 2021 9 cognizant that i am a guest and a visitor, and i need guidance on respectful coast salish practice” (personal communication, october 4, 2021). indigenous peoples see their relationship to the land as central to their wellbeing: “one of our elders, sophie thomans from saik’uz, said, ‘if you take care of the land, the land will take care of you.’ that’s a very inclusive statement” (teegee, 2018, p. 239). sarah de leeuw (2018) noted that land is separate from a social determinant of indigenous identity and wellbeing: “land … is not enfolded into language culture, or spiritual values, but instead is ‘reflected’ in the sociological trait of being aboriginal” (p. 191). the journey through relational determinants of health highlights considerations for indigenous communities as they reconnect and repair. this journey highlights many relational processes that may be constructive for recovery from the harms and disruptions of colonization. for example, in the mental domain, healing programming can promote self-determination; traditional ways of knowing, being, and doing; traditional justice; and learning the languages, songs, dances, and names that give meaning to and define each community’s culture. although indigenous children, youth, and adults are embedded in the 21st century, our work with communities has helped us understand that they are restoring balance by being bi-cultural and strengthening their indigenous identities, meanings, and connections with culture. with culturally attuned supports, communities can mobilize away from the harms of colonization and onto pathways that re-create connections and enable movement toward health and wellness. according to one community participant, the restoration of relational determinants of health with culturally grounded pathways has seldom been implemented: although there’s been some different programs towards that, looking at the community from the top to find out what is really going on … that has been done, several times by different organizations, prevention organizations, but one of the things that they always seem to forget is that how it was in the past with the elders … that’s something that they always don’t include in these … programs. i may be wrong, but the prevention programs are always concentrating on the present day never … from the past … because in the past things worked with families … and what they are failing, i could be wrong but, what they, what they seem to be failing to do is put in that part into the programs. (billy ukutak) circle of wellness wellness from an indigenous perspective is a whole and healthy person expressed through a sense of balance of spirit, emotion, mind, and body. central to wellness is belief in one’s connection to language, land, beings of creation, and ancestry, supported by a caring family and environment. (dumont, 2014, p. 2) through learning together with communities, we began to understand the journey through relational determinants of health and recognize that a relational lens is integral to the circle of wellness. we came to understand that if colonization had disrupted all my relations, then wellness could be conceptualized as a state of re-integrated all my relations. we considered general principles that would represent restoration of all my relations within the physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual domains. within each domain, we identified three guiding principles for wellness (see figure 1). the circle of wellness is selfdetermined by communities as they envision their landing place for wellness and ask questions such as: the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.11058 10 what are our common goals for wellness? where do we come together to work on a common vision? what are our priorities in re-creating wellness within our community? we learned from communities that the pathways through the relational determinants of health and the landing place of wellness need to be identified and led by the community and its members. community members need to see and share a collective vision of a landing place for wellness in their community. the relational determinants of health indicate how communities can mobilize to restore their strong cultural foundations and provide clear guidance for interactions with systems both within the community and external to the community. stronger relational determinants of health correspond to a stronger cultural foundation and self-determination. from this place, the community can provide greater direction to whatever is happening within or coming into the community. restoring the relational determinants of health contributes to a shift in power dynamics—communities can engage in deep partnerships in which they are leading change to promote community health and wellbeing. by standing within their own culture, communities can identify the pathways through which to guide system change in ways that strengthen, rather than constrain, the relational determinants of health. a community member who participated in the violence prevention programming explained: i think the action plan in this process has brought light to the fact that there are people who can work together, so that the main tools that we can use are the tools of one another in different agencies, in different institutions and even just neighbours. (chi-chi arizne) another community member shared: whenever we go ask for help. they’re always willing to help. so, it’s the same thing with us … yeah. like i said we’re all striving for the same thing. we’re all trying to keep the community safe and better for the youth, and just the overall community in general … so i said that the motivation is still there. (community member) within indigenous communities, there is strong motivation and will for collective processes to restore health and move from the cycle of violence to the circle of wellness. as the truth and reconciliation commission of canada (trc, 2015) revealed, repair, restoration, and reintegration are needed in many facets of the lives of indigenous peoples and communities. the community journey of change model can guide organizations when invited to walk alongside indigenous communities through the process of identifying their journeys to wellness. the cycle of violence highlights the violence and trauma experienced by indigenous peoples through colonization, which is not only historical, but ongoing and cascading. the relational determinants of health clarify processes for re-establishing disrupted indigenous ways of knowing, being, and doing. the circle of wellness begins to provide clarity on the principles of wellness that communities can use to re-create their landing places for health and wellbeing. in this work, indigenous peoples can invite non-indigenous peoples to walk alongside them in repairing and restoring the wellbeing, integrity, traditions, and relations of indigenous individuals, families, and communities. cardinal & pepler: community journey of change through relational determinants of health published by scholarship@western, 2021 11 considerations for programs and services with indigenous communities the community journey of change model was informed by our research on the historical and ongoing harms of colonization for indigenous peoples in canada. undrip (2007) acknowledged similar harms experienced by indigenous peoples around the world who have “suffered from historic injustices as a result of, inter alia, their colonization and dispossession of their lands, territories and resources, thus preventing them from exercising, in particular, their right to development in accordance with their own needs and interests” (p. 3). reparation for these harms can only be made with policies and practices that enable indigenous communities to repair, re-place, and re-integrate what has been disrupted by colonization to meet their own needs and interests. given the disparate worldviews held within indigenous and western societies and their need to work together to restore balance and full rights for indigenous peoples, ermine (2007) proposed a strategy of creating ethical space. ethical space between indigenous and western systems requires engagement based on ethical and human principles, including humanity and respect. ermine (2007) identified significant work to be done to create ethical space: “to step out of our allegiances, to detach from the cages of our mental worlds and assume a position where human-to-human dialogue can occur” (p. 202). as we have walked alongside communities in their journeys to restore wellness, they have helped us to understand that policies, programs, and services must align with principles of ethical space. it is only when indigenous and non-indigenous people can come together to work within ethical space that the barriers related to shame, guilt, inequities, and intergenerational trauma can be overcome. through our research, communities have guided us in identifying six considerations for creating ethical space in which to develop policies, programs, and services that support communities’ journeys of change: a. look to indigenous leaders for organizational alignment and indigenous program development, b. respect self-determination and support community vision and actions (see also barker et al., 2017), c. ensure safety at all levels and for all participants (yamada, 2014), d. work to re-integrate culture (dumont, 2014; mussell et al., 2004), e. promote cohesion and culture within the community (chandler & lalonde, 2008), and f. lead systems change (reading, 2018; trc, 2015). each of these considerations is briefly described below. organizational alignment with indigenous development indigenous program development and service planning must be directed by indigenous leaders. external organizations with an interest in working alongside and support communities in restoring wellbeing must embed indigenous leaders within their organization. only these leaders are able to frame the policies, programming, and services through an indigenous lens. the core processes of addressing the cycle of violence and mobilizing communities toward wellness must be envisioned, developed, and delivered by indigenous leaders at all levels of the organization. this is the only approach that will the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.11058 12 provide a strong foundation for the other considerations: self-determination, safety, culture, cohesion, and systems change. self-determination a community’s vision of healing pathways and wellness is determined internally, not by an external program or service. programs and services are often bound by deliverables; however, there has to be shared leadership and flexibility to meet communities’ requests, visions, capacities, and paces of change. the communities need to lead their own healing processes and define their own landing place for wellness. to support self-determination, it is essential to ensure that external policies, programs, and services support indigenous peoples and communities and do not create dependency. safety the layers of harm and trauma from colonization need to be counterbalanced with levels of safety (yamada, 2014). within community-based programs and services, we can ask: what safety mechanisms are in place to counteract the layers of harm and trauma? how can trust and safe relationships be created and sustained while working within the community? how can safety be created in delivering programs and services? it is imperative to ensure that policies, programs, and services do no harm and intentionally work to counteract and end the ongoing harms of colonization. culture re-integrating the cultural foundation that has been eroded is the key to beginning the journey to healing (dumont, 2014). cultural continuity within a community is linked to the health and wellbeing of its members (chandler & lalonde, 2008). ideally, effective community-based programs and services arise from within the community; however, in the context of today’s reality, indigenous communities often invite external programs and services to address harms. any policy or program in an indigenous community needs to make space for culture. the community has to lead the processes of capacity building and mobilizing for healing. the agency, program, or service, not the community, must be responsible for finding those who can inform the cultural elements to be embedded into policies, programming, and services. cohesion cohesion is about working with all my relations and deepening relations to land, culture, language, and people. therefore, any healing process needs to be undertaken with a deep cultural consideration and by a collective, rather than an individual. leadership from a community team can guide progress in protection policies and measures, prevention efforts, and crisis responses. the journey taken in moving from the cycle of violence toward the circle of wellness will necessarily be specific to each community and embedded within its culture. systems change communities are not able to journey to wellness without significant shifts in western structures that create and sustain social, economic, environmental, political, and cultural inequities, marginalization, cardinal & pepler: community journey of change through relational determinants of health published by scholarship@western, 2021 13 and criminalization. our historical timeline reveals the ongoing trauma from colonization. with the burden of historical and current harms, communities are caught between a deep commitment to leading their own healing process and pervasive harmful societal structures, policies, and practices. the trc (2015) focused on reparations related to the legacy of residential schools and presented calls to action for change in many systems within canada including child welfare, education, language and culture, health, and justice. what systems changes are needed? these systems need to make room for natural indigenous systems that worked well for millennia. although self-determination is a guiding principle for journeying to wellness, it is difficult for indigenous systems to operate independently from the broader social, economic, and political systems within the country. moving forward our research with communities has enhanced our understanding of, not only the layers of violence and harm from colonization, but also how these have systematically fractured the foundational indigenous principle of all my relations. we have learned from communities that the journey to wellness is grounded in re-integrating the fractured relational determinants of health and the cultural foundation of knowing, being, and doing in communities. informed by the knowledge shared by communities, we are in the process of revising the violence prevention programming using our community journey of change model so that it is indigenized, re-integrative, and non-linear. this revised programming is being piloted and evaluated in communities across canada. although we are in the early stages of sharing the community journey of change model, we have already heard from many community members about the important meaning and guidance provided by the model and programming based on it. one elder shared: what was meaningful for me was your explanation of the landing place. we are not thinking about our landing place and that provides a good guide for what we need to do. we need to define our landing place. (community member) another community member explained: my learning through the community change journey massively increased my understanding of the role i play in my community and what my job is as a community connector. (community member) we believe that the community journey of change model provides guidance to those working with and within diverse indigenous communities to address the layers of harm from colonization and create culturally relevant pathways to restore the relational determinants of health. we are most grateful for the opportunities to work and learn with communities. we will continue to walk alongside and learn with indigenous communities as they mobilize for their journeys of change and restore their relational determinants of health. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.11058 14 references ban, k.-m. 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(2014). walking the prevention circle: bearing witness to an indigenous process for knowledge sharing [doctoral dissertation, york university]. york university library. https://yorkspace.library.yorku.ca/xmlui/bitstream/handle/10315/28236/yamada_samantha _a_2014_phd.pdf?sequence=2&isallowed=y 11058+coverpage.pdf ms+11058+pepler+community+journey+of+change+rce.pdf microsoft word 13707+cover+page.docx the international indigenous policy journal volume 12 | issue 4 october 2021 the covid-19 pandemic: invoking the famine and pestilence clause to be paired with the medicine chest clause from the numbered treaties carrie bourassa university of saskatchewan, canada, carrie.bourassa@usask.ca danette starblanket university of saskatchewan, canada, danette.starblanket@usask.ca jennifer langan university of saskatchewan, canada, jen.langan@usask.ca mikayla hagel university of saskatchewan, canada, mikayla.hagel@usask.ca sadie anderson university of saskatchewan, canada, sadie.anderson@usask.ca marlin legare university of saskatchewan, canada, marlin.legare@usask.ca meghan chapados university of saskatchewan, canada, m.chapados@usask.ca recommended citation bourassa, c., starblanket, d., langan, j., hagel m., anderson, s., legare, m., & chapados, m. (2021). the covid-19 pandemic: invoking the famine and pestilence clause to be paired with the medicine chest clause from the numbered treaties. the international indigenous policy journal, 12(4). https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2021.12.4 the covid-19 pandemic: invoking the famine and pestilence clause to be paired with the medicine chest clause from the numbered treaties abstract treaty-based strategies are required to address the unique needs of indigenous communities in canada during the covid-19 pandemic. a treaty-based approach should recognize provisions within the numbered treaties, including the famine and pestilence clause and medicine chest clause, agreed to during the signing of treaty 6 in 1876. the famine and pestilence clause established the crown’s obligation to aid indigenous peoples within treaty 6 territory in the event of calamities such as locust raids, storms, starvation, and disease. the medicine chest clause instituted the means through which the crown would provide medical care for indigenous peoples within the jurisdiction. the government of canada has a legal obligation to invoke the famine and pestilence clause and medicine chest clause in a strategy to address the spread of covid-19 in indigenous communities. keywords covid-19 pandemic, indigenous peoples, famine and pestilence clause, medicine chest clause, calls for action creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. 1 bourassa et al.: the covid-19 pandemic published by scholarship@western, 2021 the covid-19 pandemic: invoking the famine and pestilence clause to be paired with the medicine chest clause from the numbered treaties the spread of the covid-19 pandemic has the potential to create lasting negative health outcomes for first nations communities. in the context of this article, first nations communities are defined as a community on treaty territory that is inhabited and governed by first nations people. first nations are one of three groups of indigenous peoples (along with inuit and métis) of what is now canada. first nations are the only indigenous identity group that signed treaties with the crown and belong to larger tribal groups recognized by the government of canada as “status indians” (indigenous foundations, 2009). we began the first draft of this article in march 2020 as the first wave of covid-19 began in canada. the virus eventually spread throughout canada, including into indigenous communities. the government of canada was accused of failing to address the needs of indigenous communities quickly enough; instead, they indicated that they would monitor communities and respond as needed. in fact, the indigenous services minister was not appointed as a permanent member of the covid-19 committee, for which prime minister trudeau was later criticized (forester, 2020). the government of canada has since committed cad$305 million dollars in emergency funding to indigenous communities in canada (palmater, 2020). this money will go to 634 first nations communities, and a vast number of métis and inuit communities. the government of canada has announced this funding will flow through indigenous services canada (isc), but communities have cause to be concerned because of the history of bureaucratic challenges in accessing funding coming out of isc. in addition, isc (2021) has proposed to provide cad$1.2 billion to indigenous communities over the course of 2021 to 2022 for covid-19 response measures. canada is in a state of emergency and timing is critical in this crisis situation. a first nations-specific strategy to meet the anticipated needs of communities, including a concrete plan on how funding should be distributed, must be implemented. the funding amount must be relevant and based on aspects of equity rather than equality. the need for this funding is based on the pre-existing relationship between the government of canada and the first nations peoples in canada, a fiduciary relationship created from the treaty period, and as a result of treaties. the treaties in canada were negotiated with “indian” nations (now referred to as first nations) in order to open up the land for settlement (asch, 1997; jorgenson, 2007; poelzer & coates, 2015). in exchange, certain provisions were offered, and others were requested by first nations negotiators on behalf of their people (cardinal & hildebrandt, 2000; jorgenson, 2007). importantly, the indigenous peoples who signed treaty 6 secured provisions that were vital to their well-being: treaty six is unique because a number of eyewitness accounts of the negotiations were recorded and later published. these accounts contradict the official accounts published by treaty commissioner morris and emphasize the agency of the chiefs who managed to expand the treaty terms beyond what had been authorized by the canadian government, including protection from disease and famine, the medicine chest clause, and assistance in the transition to agriculture. (krasowski, 2019, p. 176) 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 4 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.4 provisions, such as the famine and pestilence clause, committed the crown to providing relevant and necessary assistance to first nations who signed the treaty in the event of a national calamity (morris, 1880/1991). in the event of a natural disasters or disease outbreak, first nations could request assistance, and the government was supposed to come to their aid and ensure the community was protected. according to miller (2007), “the 1876 treaty responded to the worsening conditions on the prairies with clauses dealing with famine and health care” (p. 179). however, even after the treaty was signed, disease and sickness continued to spread within the communities, in large part because government officials, including indian commissioner edgar dewdney, knowingly gave rotten food to them (university of alberta faculty of law, 2018). treaty 6 contained the famine and pestilence clause and medicine chest clause. these two clauses must be considered together when looking at the current crisis because they are intertwined and were negotiated in 1876 with the intent that they would be paired. the famine and pestilence clause and medicine chest clause were intended to ensure the first nations under the treaty would not suffer as a result of contact with the newcomers. after the treaties were signed, however, first nations continued to face health challenges. the ongoing impacts of colonialism have resulted in first nations populations, both on-reserve and off-reserve, being at higher risk of disease than non-indigenous peoples. the treaty relationship created when the famine and pestilence clause and the medicine chest clause were agreed upon is highly relevant to the current pandemic circumstances and must be fully understood in order to address the unique health needs of first nations peoples. as the name suggests, the medicine chest clause signified a guarantee that the indian agent, the government official designated to implement policies regarding first nations, would keep a medicine chest for use by the people residing in the territory. the treaty has been modernized and amended since its original signing in 1876 at fort carlton, saskatchewan, and the medicine chest clause was amended to include an additional clause stating that relevant relief must be provided in the case of overwhelming pestilence or famine (beal, 2020). the famine and pestilence clause came in as part of the medicine chest clause and at the same time. while the medicine chest clause eventually translated into provincial health care to be delivered to indigenous peoples and settlers in the provinces and territories in canada, these services have no recognized affiliations with the famine and pestilence clause. health care services for first nations people on reserve are an exception to provincial jurisdiction. these services are delivered through federal mechanisms. when health issues put first nations people at risk, the famine and pestilence and medicine chest clauses legally obligate the government of canada to assist first nations people under treaty 6 without delay. the spread of the covid-19 disease, caused by sars-cov-2 infection, necessitates the famine and pestilence clause and medicine chest clause in order to address the emergency needs of first nations communities. the assembly of first nations (afn, 2020), the political organization representing first nations nationally, along with numerous provincial and municipal jurisdictions (canadian press, 2021) have declared a state of emergency as a result of covid-19. as outcomes of this covid-19 pandemic are still unknown, and there is no end in sight, indigenous peoples in canada have the right to be confident their needs will be met in the form of a strategy that includes funding and support from the federal government now and over the next several months and perhaps years. 3 bourassa et al.: the covid-19 pandemic published by scholarship@western, 2021 in many first nations communities, health is understood as a balance between the mental, emotional, physical, and spiritual aspects of a person (bourassa et al., 2004). first nations peoples’ health is connected to canada’s history of colonization, resulting in a multitude of health challenges and inequities since contact (bourassa, 2010). these health challenges include the impacts of a lack of cultural safety, inadequate access to health services, remoteness, and migration into urban centres. the history and ongoing effects of colonization have led to first nations people having lower average socioeconomic status (palmater, 2020). with the increased migration to urban centres starting in the 1960s, first nations peoples experienced changes to their socioeconomic conditions, including homelessness, addictions, the apprehension of children into the child welfare system, higher rates of incarceration, and increased levels of poverty. the impacts of residential schools and the sixties scoop added to these challenges and created health issues for first nations peoples. as was emphasized in the reports of the truth and reconciliation commission of canada (2015) and the royal commission on aboriginal peoples (1996), these colonial institutions and policies have led to many ongoing health concerns in indigenous communities. further, indigenous peoples are not provided the same access to health care services and delivery as non-indigenous peoples in canada (forester, 2020). recently a class action lawsuit was launched for abuse and mistreatment of patients who attended federally run indian hospitals: the statement of claim alleges that first nations, inuit and métis patients— including many children—faced substandard health care, physical and sexual abuse, along with forcible confinement to beds at indian hospitals, which were run by the federal government across the country. there are at least 29 indian hospitals covered by the proposed class action, which covers 1936 to 1981. many of the patients sent to indian hospitals were treated for tuberculosis, and some have alleged that they were the subject of medical experiments. the federal government passed a law that allowed bureaucrats with the department then known as indian affairs to forcibly admit indigenous people to the hospitals who were suspected of having contracted the infection. (barrera, 2020, paras. 9–12) while attending residential schools and indian hospitals, indigenous people were subject to numerous unethical research projects (pelley, 2020). mosby’s (2013) research made public the nutritional experiments that took place in residential schools. this history of unethical medical experiments is relevant as it has caused suspicion and mistrust amongst indigenous people regarding immunizations, vaccinations, needles, and medical professionals and other care providers. some specific health challenges resulting from this history are, for the most part, unique to first nations peoples. they are based on numerous experiences with lack of access to health care and inequities in the healthcare system, along with the treaty relationship. the impoverished socioeconomic conditions faced by first nations peoples, which are demonstrated in data that is already well known to the government of canada and canadians generally, further compounds the crisis. the substandard living conditions created by the indian act have continued to impact indigenous peoples in canada. the 1880s brought health challenges to indigenous people, such as chronic infectious conditions such as tuberculosis and whooping cough, which are exacerbated by overcrowding in homes as well as lack of access to nutritious food and medicine. indian agents noted the various incidents of diseases, such as the misdiagnosed “land scurvy” (which was actually a glandular infection 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 4 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.4 associated with tuberculosis known colloquially as “scrofula”), sweeping through the first nations populations on reserve. the increase in diseases among indigenous peoples has been found to be the direct result of malnutrition causing weakened immune systems and lack of protective immunity (lux, 2001). this malnutrition was caused by food insecurity and changes in diet that occurred because of colonization. concerns around food safety and food security continue to exist in most communities today. the compounding effects of malnutrition, overcrowding, and exposure to novel diseases had a devastating effect on indigenous peoples upon initial contact (lux, 2001). in order to prevent epidemics and diseases from continuing, first nations leaders negotiated a clause that would protect them from any impending or subsequent crises. the office of the treaty commissioner (2007) documents speak to this clause: during the 1880s and at other times, severe famine struck treaty first nations across southern saskatchewan. the crown was obliged to assist them under treaty provisions and crown promises, yet officials used the rationing of food to weaken the first nations politically and splinter their ranks. once settled on reserves, they suffered chronic malnutrition as the result of rationing policies that in some cases led to death from starvation and susceptibility to disease. their pleas were all too often ignored by agents and officials in ottawa, who had the means and the power to provide, or withhold, relief. (p. 42) despite facing famine and food rationing, indigenous peoples were not weakened. their cultures, ceremonies, and traditions remain vibrant (manuel & derrickson, 2015; million, 2013). indigenous peoples have demonstrated incredible resilience through their history with the crown. however, as broken agreements have harmed indigenous peoples, a prompt and relevant response is expected from the government of canada in response to the ongoing global covid-19 pandemic. colonization introduced novel diseases to indigenous populations that had not previously been exposed (coletta & traiano, 2020; kelton, 2015). as colonization continued and inequities were exacerbated, those previously unexposed to diseases like smallpox and influenza were prone to devastating epidemics. kelton (2015) stated, “europeans were the opponents, and diseases served as their unwitting weapons” (p. 8). the spanish flu epidemic of 1918 caused an estimated 4,000 deaths of indigenous people in canada, or 37.7 deaths per 1,000 people (lux, 2001). comparatively, non-indigenous people only faced 6.5 deaths per 1,000 people. when comparing death rate statistics between indigenous and nonindigenous people during the 1918 epidemic, and more recently the h1n1 pandemic of 2009/10 (swine flu), the need for relevant support from the federal government for the current pandemic becomes clear. in order to avoid history repeating itself in terms of death rates, definitive action must be taken by federal authorities to provide a culturally relevant solution based on historic treaty obligations. the frequency of indigenous people having lung infections, such as tuberculosis, combined with lower average health status and chronic health conditions, puts first nations in an even more precarious position during this covid-19 pandemic. individual behaviours, such as tobacco smoking, and differences in the availability of services that necessitate, for example, the use of wood burning stoves for home heating, further compounds the risk for many. critical environmental factors in first nations communities, such as poor infrastructure and overcrowded housing conditions, as well lack of safe water 5 bourassa et al.: the covid-19 pandemic published by scholarship@western, 2021 and food, all contribute to the potential for the covid-19 pandemic to escalate at rates higher than that of the non-indigenous population. indigenous people in the united states are also expressing similar concerns that segments of their population are particularly vulnerable as a result of the history of colonialism (deerinwater, 2020). a recent environmental scan illustrated that first nations peoples are at high risk for contracting infectious diseases. in 2019, the morning star lodge partnered with the file hills qu’appelle tribal council (fhqtc) to bring a diverse group of indigenous community members to the knowing your health symposium in fort qu’appelle, saskatchewan, to learn about traditional health and to engage in a constructive dialogue regarding indigenous health and wellness. indigenous research methods and community-based involvement informed and framed the research project. with the involvement of the community research advisory committee and community health directors, an environmental scan was conducted, through an anonymous survey distributed to more than 100 respondents at the symposium, to learn more indigenous peoples’ health concerns. researchers engaged with indigenous peoples to learn about and gather baseline data on health behaviours, particularly nutrition, exercise, and selfmanagement of health and the relationship to cognitive function and dementia. the findings provided a complex overview of the health of indigenous peoples and identified issues in access to health care and health services, a high incidence of multi-morbidities including diabetes, heart disease, high blood pressure, and depression. when it comes to implementation of treaty obligations, the government of canada has an ethical obligation to address existing health issues as well as a legal obligation under the treaties (saul, 2014). the treaties “are unique and have a distinct place in canadian law” (public legal education association of saskatchewan, 2007, p. 5). the parties created a reciprocal relationship based on both trust and fiduciary obligations. indigenous nations shared the land with the crown with the expectation that the crown would nurture this relationship. for the first nations who agreed to the treaty, the use of the sacred pipe during the treaty negotiations implied that the nations were placing their trust in the crown to adhere to their treaty promises, including the financial obligations of the crown. there exist a number of legal instruments that should implicate the government of canada in addressing historical and contemporary inequities of first nations peoples. these include the royal proclamation of 1763, the british north america act of 1867, the numbered treaties (1871–1921) and the constitution act of canada of 1982. these legal instruments outline the legal obligations of the government of canada (and the british crown before them) to commit and flow financial and other resources as identified by indigenous communities. the royal proclamation of 1763 set the basis for treaty making and recognizing indigenous ownership of the land, sovereignty, and nationhood. the proclamation established that indigenous peoples had inherent rights and that they could not be “molested or disturbed on their land” (office of the treaty commissioner, 2007, p. 22). this recognition of rights and land ownership compelled the government to enter negotiations with indigenous peoples for access to their lands. the form of nationhood set out in the royal proclamation recognized the unique relationship between the crown and indigenous nations. the principles of the royal proclamation are entrenched in section 35 of the constitution act of 1982, which states that existing aboriginal and treaty rights must be recognized and affirmed. this 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 4 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.4 includes the provisions in the numbered treaties, such as the famine and pestilence clause and the medicine chest clause of treaty 6. the british north america act of 1867 made indigenous peoples a federal responsibility: section 91(24) stated, the federal government was responsible for “indians and lands reserved for the indians” (see also krasowski, 2019). according to the act, the government of canada was then responsible for entering into land sharing agreements with indigenous peoples. consequently, it is the government of canada that must address, without delay, the needs of the first nations population in this pandemic. the government of canada was quick to address the needs of small business and other cohorts of people but were slow in responding with a specific strategy for first nations peoples in regard to the covid-19 pandemic (hosgood, 2020). the numbered treaties signed between 1871 and1921 included many provisions. two that are especially relevant to implementing a treaty-based pandemic strategy are the famine and pestilence clause and the medicine chest clause. first nations negotiated both clauses as part of treaty 6 in 1876 as a form of protection or insurance. first nations within this territory contended that if they allowed the newcomers onto their lands and adopted farming for subsistence, they had to be given protection by the government of canada both from natural disasters that might destroy their crops and diseases the newcomers may bring. advocates of forming the treaty hoped these clauses would provide some assurance to skeptics who advised against allowing the settlement of non-indigenous people. these clauses further provided first nation signatories with peace of mind because it provided assurance that future generations would not suffer from the decisions they had made. the famine and pestilence clause and medicine chest clause was grandfathered (applied retroactively) into the earlier numbered treaties. the famine and pestilence clause, which, as stated, was put forward so first nations would not suffer or die because of contact with the newcomers, was to be applied to all treaties in times of calamity. first nations in treaty 6 territory recognized the importance of forcing assurances of protection: the most significant difference between treaty six and the previous numbered treaties was the addition of the medicine chest clause, protection in times of famine, and assistance in the transition to agriculture. … the addition of these terms reflected the agency of the chiefs, who were astute negotiators able to extend the mandate of the treaty commissioners. (krasowski, 2019, p. 275) in 1873, first nations were looking for ways to protect themselves against incursions by other nations. for example, they requested the north west mounted police (nwmp) be dispatched west to eliminate the american incursion of whisky trading and hunting wolves and bison to make robes. the establishment of reserves was based on this mindset of protecting first nations from outside threats and incursions, which still applies today, and first nations communities must be protected during the pandemic. there have already been cases in which non-indigenous canadians have attempted to squat on first nations reserves to protect themselves from covid-19 (cbc news, 2020). the government of canada must make clear to canadians that they cannot flee to remote reserve locations to escape the pandemic and create policies to protect reserve lands from outside exploitation. 7 bourassa et al.: the covid-19 pandemic published by scholarship@western, 2021 in 1880 the crown’s treaty commissioner, alexander morris, wrote about his experiences with some of the numbered treaties, including the famine and pestilence clause. in his address to the first nations in treaty 6, he stated: the government will not interfere with the indian’s daily life, they will not bind him. they will only help him to make a living on the reserves, by giving him the means of growing from the soil, his food. the only occasion when help would be given, would be if providence should send a great famine or pestilence upon the whole indian people included in the treaty. we only looked at something unforeseen and not at hard winters or the hardships of single bands, and this, both you and i, fully understood. (morris, 1880/1991, p. 241) morris also said about the first nations peoples residing in treaty 6 territory: in a national famine or general sickness, not what happens in everyday life, but if a great blow comes on the indians, they would not be allowed to die like dogs. what occurred in red river last year from the destruction of crops by the grasshoppers, affected our whole people, and without being bound to do anything, the charity and humanity of the government sent means to help them. (morris, 1880/1991, p. 228) in his text, morris provides the list of treaty 6 provisions. regarding the provision of assistance, he stated: that in the event hereafter of the indians comprised within this treaty being overtaken by any pestilence, or by a general famine, the queen, on being satisfied and certified thereof by her indian agent or agents, will grant to the indians assistance of such character and to such extent as her chief superintendent of indian affairs shall deem necessary and sufficient to relieve the indians from the calamity that shall have befallen them. (morris, 1880/1991, p. 354) this famine and pestilence clause was grandfathered into the earlier treaties (treaties 1 to 5) and those that followed treaty 6 (treaties 7 to 11), just as the medicine chest clause was. as the government of canada could not apply these clauses to only one treaty, they were applied to all the numbered treaties. according to st. germain (2005), in examining treaty 6: canada made no explicit written promise to subsist the plains cree. the closest that the government came to such a written commitment was the vague and highly discretionary ‘famine relief’ clause of treaty 6, which promised aid in the event of catastrophe. even then, however, it was subject to official confirmation and recommendation. (p. 78) furthermore, the university of alberta faculty of law (2018) describes how the canadian government failed to uphold its legal responsibility to indigenous communities, stating: the legacy of treaty 6 is a tragic example of how the colonial powers weakened indigenous communities to the point that they would desperately give up their rights in return for the promise of survival. it is an example of how even once their rights were given up, the canadian 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 4 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.4 government broke its promises to indigenous peoples and allowed continued suffering and death in indigenous communities. (para. 10) it is important to understand that the treaty negotiations make clear that first nations peoples were not expecting the crown to sustain them. however, they did expect provisions in exchange for opening up their land for settlement and allowing newcomers amongst them (manuel & derrickson, 2015; mcadam, 2015). the literature related to the famine and pestilence clause is extremely limited; however, the spirit and intent of the provisions can be understood from the perspective of first nations at the time of treaty signing (angus, 2015; price, 1991). the crown, and subsequently the government of canada, interpreted the treaties from a literal framework, where what is written is what was agreed to (asch, 1997), which is why there is so much divergence between government and first nations interpretations and implementation of the treaty agreements. in the wake of opening their lands to immigration, the first nations who negotiated the famine and pestilence clause and medicine chest clause were looking for a way to protecting their people from a calamity or a force that could not be prevented, and to safeguard the agreements (i.e., the treaties) into the future. for example, if first nations were to accept farming, then a disaster such as grasshopper or locust raids or dust storms could potentially wipe out their crops and destroy their means of sustenance—they knew they had to protect themselves against these catastrophes. to first nations, the famine and pestilence clause would make the crown responsible for providing assistance in the event of any calamity or disaster that would put first nations in a weakened state compared to their pre-treaty position. discussion and conclusion following the arrival of sars-cov-2, the situation worsened quickly and first nations peoples in the numbered treaty territories were faced with shortages of food and supplies and loss of employment, as well as an existing lack of adequate health care that limited access to testing and housing shortages and overcrowding in homes that increased the risk of household transmission. there is an urgent need to address gaps in pandemic response policies affecting first nations on and off reserve. indigenous leaders are concerned about the ongoing waves of this pandemic: indigenous leaders from across canada have been raising alarms about covid-19, worried that supports promised by the federal government to help first nations, inuit and métis might not do enough to prevent the most vulnerable people from falling through the cracks. (wright, 2020, para. 2) canada has a history of portraying itself as a humanitarian country (dhillon, 2017). canada now has an opportunity to demonstrate their commitment to indigenous peoples. the ontario human rights commission (2020) released actions consistent with a human rights based approach to managing the covid-19 pandemic with a section pertaining specifically to indigenous peoples: a. recognize that the impact of covid-19 will be exacerbated by the ongoing negative impact of colonialism on indigenous communities and will have a unique, intersectional impact on 9 bourassa et al.: the covid-19 pandemic published by scholarship@western, 2021 indigenous women and children, people with disabilities, people with addictions and older persons. b. take extra steps and provide funding to protect indigenous peoples’ health and human rights across the full range of social service sectors. c. make sure indigenous and other remote communities have immediate access to clean water. d. in cooperation with indigenous peoples, provide assistance to repatriate indigenous individuals who wish to return to their home communities who are homeless, released from incarceration or other institutional residences and/or are otherwise vulnerable. (respect the rights of first nations, métis and inuit (indigenous) peoples section, paras. 1–4). the government of canada and the british crown are legally obligated to commit and flow financial resources and other support as identified by the first nations communities. the ways in which these resources are allocated should depend on an engagement plan developed in collaboration with each first nation community based on their unique situation. engagement plans should be designed with attention to the community’s unique needs and available resources. for example, some tribal councils have hospitals or medical centres that can be used as a central location for medical services. in northern communities, people are going out on the land and living off the land, so a diversified engagement plan is necessary. in on-reserve and remote communities the engagement plan will be dependent on factors such as location and size. in urban centres the engagement plan will involve multiple jurisdictions and will need to be designed to accommodate each of them. an engagement plan for on reserve and remote communities should include the following: • mobile testing site and point of care analysis: the establishment of a mobile testing site located on their territory with rapid diagnosis and medical counselling services. • field testing equipment: testing kits to be administered at the mobile testing site and outreach to homes. • medical equipment: ventilators to be set up at the field hospitals with intensive medical care. • field hospitals: to be set up within their territories. • medical supplies: respirators, masks, gloves, gowns, face shields, and disinfectant to be made available. • vaccinations: educational outreach, community engagement, and information sessions regarding vaccinations; timely, priority access to the vaccination. • cures: timely, priority access to vaccine and boosters as approved by health canada for each sub-population (e.g., children). • other resources: as identified by the local health professionals within their health authority in their traditional territory. the leader of the saskatchewan new democratic party (ndp), the official opposition party, criticized the government of saskatchewan’s lack of adequate support for indigenous communities who are at higher risk than the mainstream population and called on the government to: 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 4 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.4 • ensure safe housing for onand off-reserve populations, including capacity for self-isolation; • address acute food security concerns in rural and remote areas of the province as supply chains are interrupted and prices rise; • increase testing and contact tracing throughout the north, on reserve across saskatchewan and in urban areas with high first nations and métis populations; • ensure protections for health care workers, including personal protective equipment (ppe) resources, in already challenging work situations; • increase communication with and involvement of first nations and métis leaders in decision-making. (ashley-hewitson, 2020, paras. 4–8) the governing saskatchewan party has indicated that they have been in contact with first nations leaders in saskatchewan but did not provide further detail. the federal government has indicated they have been in contact with the afn. whether true engagement has occurred is questionable. the federal government has sent the canadian military to some remote communities, where necessary, a tactic that has been criticized by some first nations (wright, 2020). in the long term, development of a treaty-based strategy is necessary to ensure the government of canada’s response is safe and timely in the event of a future public health crisis. as the treaties are legally binding in canada, it is necessary that the famine and pestilence clause and the medicine chest clause be immediately enacted within policy to implement the spirit and intent of protection the first nations negotiators intended for their communities. the famine and pestilence clause and the medicine chest clause do not expire; they exist as long as the treaties exist. honouring these clauses will ensure first nations communities are protected during the current pandemic and in the future. references angus, c. 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(2018). treaty 6: famine and pestilence. https://ualbertalaw.typepad.com/faculty/2018/09/treaty-6-famine-pestilence-and-mistahimaskwa.html wright, t. (2020, april 2). feds poised to call in army to help indigenous communities fight covid19. canada’s national observer. https://www.nationalobserver.com/ 2020/04/02/news/feds-poised-call-army-help-indigenous-communities-fight-covid-19 13707+cover+page.pdf ms+13707+bourassa+the+covid-19+pandemic+rce.pdf why are indigenous affairs policies framed in ways that undermine indigenous health and equity? examining australia’s northern territory emergency response the international indigenous policy journal volume 13 | issue 2 september 2022 why are indigenous affairs policies framed in ways that undermine indigenous health and equity? examining australia’s northern territory emergency response toby freeman flinders university, adelaide, australia, toby.freeman@flinders.edu.au belinda townsend the australian national university, canberra, australia, belinda.townsend@anu.edu.au tamara mackean flinders university, adelaide, australia, tamara.mackean@flinders.edu.au connie musolino flinders university, adelaide, australia, connie.musolino@flinders.edu.au sharon friel the australian national university, canberra, australia, sharon.friel@anu.edu.au dennis mcdermott flinders university, adelaide, australia fran baum flinders university, adelaide, australia, fran.baum@flinders.edu.au recommended citation freeman, t., townsend, b., mackean, t., musolino, c., friel, s., mcdermott, d., & baum, f., (2022). why are indigenous affairs policies framed in ways that undermine indigenous health and equity? examining australia’s northern territory emergency response. the international indigenous policy journal, 13(2). https://10.18584/iipj.2022.13.2.14012 why are indigenous affairs policies framed in ways that undermine indigenous health and equity? examining australia’s northern territory emergency response abstract the 2007 australian northern territory emergency response policy was harmful to the health of aboriginal and torres strait islander people. we thematically analysed 72 speech acts and reports from the three prominent perspectives: a northern territory government inquiry report, the federal government, and an aboriginal civil society coalition to examine how framings during the policy agenda setting phase constrained or supported scope for equitable health outcomes. the report authors and the coalition emphasised colonisation and other social determinants of indigenous health. the federal government used a discourse of pathology and white sovereignty. our findings highlighted the need for indigenous voice in policy making, and the need to address colonial assumptions underpinning policy framings to achieve indigenous health equity. keywords indigenous, policy, agenda setting, social determinants of health, australia acknowledgments this work was supported by a centre of research excellence grant from the australian national health and medical research council (grant # app1078046). creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ 1 freeman et al.: why are indigenous affairs policies framed in ways that undermine indigenous health and equity? published by scholarship@western, 2022 why are indigenous affairs policies framed in ways that undermine indigenous health and equity? examining australia’s northern territory emergency response in colonised countries, indigenous people continue to be denied health equal to that of nonindigenous people (anderson et al., 2016), an inequity driven by social determinants of indigenous health underpinned by historic and ongoing colonisation (carson et al., 2007; sherwood, 2013). one of the forms which ongoing colonisation takes is public policies that are enacted on indigenous peoples, that do not advance health equity for indigenous people. colonial policy making has been noted as a barrier to health equity for indigenous peoples in australia (george et al., 2019; henderson et al., 2007), new zealand (came, 2014; came, herbert, & mccreanor, 2019), the united states (mcleigh, 2010), and canada (de leeuw et al., 2010; mitchell et al., 2019). this suggests public policymaking, agenda-setting, and power need to be examined (harris et al., 2020; kingdon & stano, 1984). this paper presents a policy agenda setting case study of an australian indigenous affair’s policy, the northern territory emergency response (nter). this policy nominally addressed child sexual abuse in aboriginal communities in one australian territory. it outlined a series of draconian, punitive measures that was harmful to the health of aboriginal and torres strait islander people (australian indigenous doctors' association & centre for health equity training, 2010; gray, 2015; national aboriginal community controlled health organisation, 2017). these measures included increased policing, conditional welfare measures (where a cashless welfare ‘basics’ card was introduced to control where welfare recipients could spend their money), the banning of pornography in particular communities, and government acquisition of aboriginal townships. the nter involved army operations to implement these measures, and required the suspension of the racial discrimination act (gray, 2015; o’mara, 2010). the study is part of a centre for research excellence studying the full policy cycle across several sectors to understand how to improve public policy’s contribution to health equity (baum & friel, 2017). public policy plays a critical role in determining health equity in a population (baum & friel, 2017; carey & friel, 2015). factors that affect how public policy supports or undermines health equity occur during the agenda setting, formulation, and implementation stages of the policy cycle (baum & friel, 2017; carey & friel, 2015). in the agenda-setting period, studying the underlying ideas and assumptions informing policymakers’ approach is crucial to understanding how issues, including indigenous affairs, are framed and whose problem definitions and solutions get advanced (or not) (bacchi, 2009). this case study sought to examine how framings of the policy agenda for the nter supported or constrained the potential for the policy to improve or undermine aboriginal and torres strait islander health. while much has been written on the nter itself, there is no published literature using an equity lens to examine how decision making in the development phase of the nter was likely to affect the health of aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples. this paper reports on a framing analysis of the dominant and competing frames that shaped the agenda-setting of the nter policy. it seeks to identify how actors framed the problem, what assumptions informed their problematization, and thus the solutions they offered, and whether health equity was silenced or included in these frames. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol 13, iss 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.14012 background: australia’s northern territory emergency response in 2006, a nationwide series of television reports aired that described high levels of sexual abuse of aboriginal children in the northern territory (nt), particularly in more remote aboriginal communities. the nt government instigated an independent inquiry, resulting in the ‘ampe akelyernemane meke mekarle: little children are sacred’ report (northern territory board of inquiry into the protection of aboriginal children from sexual abuse et al., 2007). the report examined the extent and nature of, and factors contributing to the sexual abuse of, aboriginal children, and proposed recommendations to address child abuse and neglect in the nt. the federal government, particularly the then-aboriginal affairs minister mal brough and prime minister john howard, immediately criticized the report and the nt government, and launched the northern territory emergency response (nter) a week later. the top down, paternalistic and punitive approach of the nter was criticized by a coalition of aboriginal organisations in the nt (‘combined aboriginal organisations of the northern territory’) in an open letter. the group then published an alternative ‘emergency response and development plan,’ proposing a different approach to addressing child sexual abuse in aboriginal communities in the nt, focused on improving services for the communities. spokespeople from the coalition presented at the senate public hearing for the nter legislation on this alternative plan. the timeline of events leading to the nter are shown in figure 1. 3 freeman et al.: why are indigenous affairs policies framed in ways that undermine indigenous health and equity? published by scholarship@western, 2022 figure 1. timeline of events surrounding the northern territory emergency response. nt = northern territory. lnp = liberal national party. alp = australian labor party. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol 13, iss 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.14012 the lack of an evidence base and logic supporting the nter measures as a response to child sexual abuse has been raised by other writers (altman & russell, 2012; partridge, 2013). child sexual abuse within aboriginal and torres strait islander communities was also not a new issue—there had been a number of reports from states and territories on this issue, and there was no data to support that child sexual abuse was more prevalent in the nt than elsewhere (northern territory board of inquiry into the protection of aboriginal children from sexual abuse et al., 2007). these concerns make understanding the policy agenda setting period and the framings used particularly critical. the nter is also important to study because it is such a uniquely extreme recent example of state intervention in aboriginal and torres strait islander affairs in australia—its extremity demonstrated by the mobilisation of the army, and suspension of the racial discrimination act (altman & russell, 2012). the nter and health equity while the nter was presented as a policy focused on a social welfare issue (child sexual abuse), research has indicated it had a negative effect on the health and wellbeing of aboriginal and torres strait islander people in the northern territory (australian indigenous doctors' association & centre for health equity training, 2010; gray, 2015; national aboriginal community controlled health organisation, 2017). the negative health effects are due to the social and psychological impact of the racial discrimination and heavily stigmatising approach of the nter, the disempowerment of aboriginal peoples including weakening community control, decreased capacity for health due to the cashless welfare cards, and increased incarceration of aboriginal people (australian indigenous doctors' association & centre for health equity training, 2010; gray, 2015; national aboriginal community controlled health organisation, 2017). thus, our analysis of the case demonstrates that the policy was framed in a way that meant it would increase health inequities between aboriginal and torres strait islander people and non-indigenous australians. we use braveman and gruskin’s (2003) definition of health equity: the absence of systematic inequalities in the distribution of health caused by unfair distribution of resources or other unjust or unfair processes (e.g., racism and discrimination). the systematic health inequalities experienced by aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples arise from ongoing colonisation, racism, and unfair distribution of power, control, and other social determinants of indigenous health (carson et al., 2007; sherwood, 2013), and thus are clear, egregious health inequities. this is the case for many colonised countries, where the health of the indigenous peoples is inequitable (walker et al., 2017). we use the term indigenous when referring to peoples globally, aboriginal and torres strait islander when referring to australia, and aboriginal when referring to the communities and land specifically affected by the nter. the nter is generally condemned by academics and commentators as having a negative effect on the health of aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples (e.g. australian indigenous doctors' association & centre for health equity training, 2010; gray, 2015; national aboriginal community controlled health organisation, 2017). a health impact assessment (australian indigenous doctors' association & centre for health equity training, 2010) concluded it would do more harm than good because of the detrimental effects of the nter’s punitive, controlling, and stigmatising measures. gray’s (2015) scorecard indicated the nter failed to improve employment and economic participation, resulted in little change in education outcomes, increased rates of incarceration, and few improvements in health outside of decreasing child mortality. for one of the 5 freeman et al.: why are indigenous affairs policies framed in ways that undermine indigenous health and equity? published by scholarship@western, 2022 key health interventions, child health checks, bailie et al. (2008) found that without effective follow up systems in place, the checks would produce “little or no benefit” (p. 618). the main positive outcome cited from the nter is the investment in primary health care services (boffa et al., 2007; sorensen et al., 2014; tait, 2007). previous analyses of the framing of the nter we identified seven articles on the nter that employed a discourse or framing analysis. five focused on media, and two examined ‘speech acts’ (e.g. media releases, speeches, interviews, and press conferences; macoun, 2011; roffee, 2016). the media analyses highlighted the negative portrayal of aboriginal communities, the use of racialized constructions of aboriginal and torres strait islander people, denial of their voices and agency, and how media coverage was dominated by individual responsibility and failed social policy framings (dunne breen, 2015; mccallum et al., 2012; mccallum & waller, 2013; mesikammen, 2016; proudfoot & habibis, 2015). for the two analyses of speech acts, macoun (2011) examined how aboriginality was framed as primitive or savage, justifying colonialism and settler sovereignty. roffee (2016) analysed then indigenous affairs mp mal brough and prime minister john howard’s speech acts and concluded that they used the framing of a “state of emergency” (p. 138) to push consensus for the nter and prohibit debate, and denigrated aboriginal communities to justify government intervention. our analysis builds on these analyses by examining how the policy agenda setting period constrained or supported the potential for approaches positive for health equity in the final legislation and its implementation—an issue that has not yet been explored in the nter literature. conceptual framework three conceptual approaches informed our approach to analysing the documents: 1) framing, 2) social determinants of indigenous health, and 3) white possessive logics. framing. framing is an important ideational strategy that is used by policy actors to influence policymaking (alasuutari, 2015; bacchi, 2009; panizza & miorelli, 2013; schmidt, 2010). policy actors use frames to focus attention on issues and persuade others of their importance. how policies frame the problems, and therefore solutions, is critical to whether or not they are supportive of health equity (bacchi, 1999; mcinnes & lee, 2012; townsend et al., 2018). bacchi (2009) cites the nter as a ripe subject for analysis of framing of problems and solutions because the policy measures were not clearly linked to the problem, and because of the heavily paternalistic approach to indigenous affairs the policy signalled. social determinants of indigenous health. the social determinants of health comprise the living circumstances and social, political economic, and corporate drivers that affect people’s health and wellbeing, and include but are not limited to housing, employment, income, racism and discrimination, and the health care system (commission on social determinants of health, 2008). the social determinants of indigenous health (anderson et al., 2007; carson et al., 2007) extend on the social determinants of health (commission on social determinants of health, 2008; donkin et al., 2018) to foreground often-overlooked drivers of indigenous health, including cultural continuity and over-incarceration. they are a valuable lens through which to interrogate the framing of public policies that affect indigenous peoples (fisher et al., 2019). the australian health ministers' 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol 13, iss 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.14012 advisory council (2017) argue that 39% of the gap in life expectancy between aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples and non-indigenous australians is due to inequities in social determinants of indigenous health. white possessive logics. white possessive logics are the meanings, framings, and rationale that underpin, perpetuate, and are used to justify illegitimate non-indigenous sovereignty over australia (moreton-robinson, 2015). moreton-robinson (2015) argues that “[w]hite possessive logics are operationalized within discourses to circulate sets of meanings about ownership of the nation, as part of common-sense knowledge, decision making, and socially produced conventions.” (p. xii). one key strategy used to reproduce white sovereignty is the ‘discourse of pathology’ (pathologizing aboriginal and torres strait islander culture and peoples), used as “a means to subjugate and discipline indigenous people to be good citizens” (p. 155) and justify colonisation. moretonrobinson (2015) highlights the nter as an example of such logics, that “patriarchal white sovereign right was exercised using the [little children are sacred] report as evidence to further regulate and manage the subjugation of indigenous communities.” (p. 161). in conceptualising “white sovereignty” moreton-robinson draws on critical race theory on whiteness as “a form of power, as supremacy, as hegemony, as ideology, as epistemology and ontology” (moretonrobinson, 2015, p. xviii). here, whiteness “is not just about bodies and skin colour” (moretonrobinson, 2004, p. 78) but an ingrained world view that shapes our society, structures, and culture in a way that privileges western knowledge and interests and excludes indigenous perspectives. while moreton-robinson covers the nter, she does not include analysis of documents or speech acts. this framing analysis provides an opportunity to examine available material to understand how the reproduction of white sovereignty and the discourse of pathology shaped the policy agenda setting in favour of or against health equity. research questions our framing analysis examined the three main actor groups’ positions in the lead up to the nter (see table 1). these three groups were selected as they presented a collective proposal for a response to child sexual abuse in northern territory aboriginal communities. 7 freeman et al.: why are indigenous affairs policies framed in ways that undermine indigenous health and equity? published by scholarship@western, 2022 table 1. summary of the three most influential groups in the lead up to the northern territory emergency response (nter) perspective 1. little children are sacred report authors 2. federal coalition government 3. combined aboriginal organisations activity produced the report that triggered the federal government to respond with the nter developed the nter legislation argued against the nter and produced an alternative plan key actors pat anderson, rex wild (and clare martin as chief minister of nt) mal brough, john howard pat turner, olga havnen were key spokespeople aboriginal leadership some aboriginal leadership no aboriginal leadership full aboriginal leadership two reports were critical sources. firstly, the little children are sacred report was produced from the northern territory inquiry (australian health ministers' advisory council, 2017), after an eight month, highly consultative process. the 320 page report reviewed international literature and evidence and brought this together with the findings from the consultations to form a complex picture of the drivers of child sexual abuse in the northern territory, and provided 97 recommendations. secondly, the aboriginal coalition’s 30-page alternative plan (combined aboriginal organisations of the northern territory, 2007) was drafted by a coalition of 40 northern territory aboriginal and community sector organisations following the federal government’s announcement of the nter. the coalition’s plan outlined an alternative approach many of the issues the nter addressed, including child safety, alcohol, welfare, education, housing, employment, and land tenure and permits, and endorsed the recommendations from the little children are sacred report. we did not include the perspectives of individual commentators, who contributed to the debate (e.g., prominent aboriginal activist, lawyer, and academic noel pearson), but did not provide a proposed policy agenda. the research questions were: 1. how did the three positions frame the ‘problem’ of child sexual abuse in the northern territory? 2. to what extent were each of these three positions supportive of health equity? 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol 13, iss 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.14012 materials and methods following roffee (2016), we bounded the policy agenda setting period as beginning with the release of the little children are sacred (northern territory board of inquiry into the protection of aboriginal children from sexual abuse et al., 2007) report on 15 june 2007, and ending with the passage of the nter legislation (parliament of australia, 2007) through the senate on the 17 august 2007 (see figure 1). data collection we searched trove, the parliamentary record (hansard), google, and government websites (including pages for previous factiva members of parliament) using the terms: “little children are sacred report”, “northern territory emergency response”, “a proposed emergency response and development plan”, “combined aboriginal organisations of the northern territory”, and the names of key spokespeople of the three groups. we searched for speeches in parliament or elsewhere, media releases, or media interviews with or quotes from key actors during the policy agenda setting period (15 june–17 august 2007). for the media articles, only direct quotes of key actors were used, to further our understanding of the contribution of key actors to framings of the policy agenda. how the media framed the issues has been the focus of other research (dunne breen, 2015; mccallum et al., 2012; mccallum & waller, 2013; mesikammen, 2016; proudfoot & habibis, 2015), and was not the central question for our analysis. roffee (2016) argues the importance of examining pre-legislative speech acts as they seek to create consensus on the issue, often using persuasive imagery, and illuminate the interests of actors, and how language choice can be manipulated to drive the agenda. the little children are sacred report and the alternative plan were also included as key documents. data analysis the three positions were evaluated through a framing analysis of speech acts by key actors from each of the three positions. the 72 sources were imported into nvivo and categorised. two non-indigenous researchers (tf and bt) coded one to two documents from each of the three positions to develop a coding framework, which was then discussed with the wider team. codes covered white possessive logics (e.g., reproducing white sovereignty, discourse of pathology), social determinants of indigenous health, how the problem was framed (e.g., failure of aboriginal governance, racism), solutions proposed (e.g., law and order), considerations of health or social equity, and the role of evidence. aboriginal researchers, tm and dm, reviewed the coding framework, resulting in changes and addition codes. the coding framework was refined during coding by tf, bt, and cm, and workshopped with the research team to ensure coding was comprehensive, accurate, and theoretically justified. as part of the analysis, codes were compared and contrasted between the three different positions to identify differences in how the policy issue was framed (bazeley, 2013). overarching frames for each of the three positions were elucidated in a team analysis workshop. 9 freeman et al.: why are indigenous affairs policies framed in ways that undermine indigenous health and equity? published by scholarship@western, 2022 we analysed whether each framing was positive or negative for equity. we reviewed literature on the social determinants of indigenous health, including key review texts (anderson et al., 2007; carson et al., 2007; czyzewski, 2011; devitt et al., 2001; world health organization, 2007), and constructed a diagram (see figure 2) to identify policy factors that may increase or decrease aboriginal and torres strait islander health equity. tf, bt, and cm evaluated the three agenda setting framings using the social determinants of indigenous health framework for whether it promoted positive action for equity, or whether it promoted action that would have a negative effect. differences were discussed until agreement was reached. figure 2. social determinants of indigenous health that can support (left column) or constrain (right column) health equity for aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples. sdih = social determinants of indigenous health, phc = primary health care. aboriginal and torres strait islander health equity distal determinants: self-determination, sovereignty intermediate determinants: community control, capacity, infrastructure, decolonised systems, inclusion in government and policy processes, comprehensive phc, land rights & control over land, sdih approach to prevention proximal determinants: individual control over lives, good income, connection to culture and strong identity, workfulness/employment, education, housing, early life experiences, social support, food security, transport distal determinants: colonisation, institutionalised racism, dispossession intermediate determinants: systemic racism, colonial systems, disempowerment, oppression, exclusion from government and policy processes proximal determinants: interpersonal racism, poor income, undermining connection to culture, lack of culturally safe education, trauma, worklessness/unemployment, and housing, incarceration, stress, poverty, social exclusion, addiction, early life experiences, food security, transport. + positive determinants negative determinants 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol 13, iss 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.14012 results we found 72 sources from the three main perspectives (see table 2). table 2. sources included in the analysis 1. little children are sacred report authors 2. federal coalition government 3. combined aboriginal organisations • 1 report • 1 media release • 10 media articles quoting anderson and/or wild • 15 media releases/press conferences • 2 public speeches • 10 hansard speeches • 24 media articles quoting brough and/or howard • 1 alternative plan • 1 media release • 6 media articles quoting turner and/or havnen • 1 senate public transcript total: 12 51 9 the high number of federal coalition government sources reflects their domination of the media coverage. the analysis of the framings used by each of the three perspectives are outlined below, followed by an examination of differences and implications for equity. 1. framings of the problem little children are sacred report. the overarching frame in the little children are sacred report articulated child sexual abuse as an intergenerational problem stemming from colonisation. these forces were argued to have led to the most proximal determinants of child sexual abuse, such as poverty, overcrowded housing, and alcohol and other drug abuse. while the media coverage that instigated the report took an individual blaming approach (e.g. "aboriginal people choose not to take responsibility for their own actions”, australian broadcasting commission, 2006, para 2), the report took a consciously contextualised approach that provided a complex nuanced frame of the causes of the causes of abuse. the report highlighted barriers to successfully addressing child sexual abuse 11 freeman et al.: why are indigenous affairs policies framed in ways that undermine indigenous health and equity? published by scholarship@western, 2022 including disempowerment of aboriginal people in the northern territory, aboriginal people’s lack of trust in authority, and a predominance of culturally unsafe, non-consultative policies and programs: “the inquiry believes there needs to be a radical change in the way government and nongovernment organisations consult, engage with and support aboriginal people. … many aboriginal people felt disempowered, confused, overwhelmed, and disillusioned.” (northern territory board of inquiry into the protection of aboriginal children from sexual abuse et al., 2007, p. 50) federal coalition government. in contrast, the overarching frame in the federal government’s nter articulated child sexual abuse as a result of dysfunction and breakdown of aboriginal communities. the required response was thus government intervention in the form of increased policing, surveillance, and disciplining of aboriginal people (particularly men), drawing on preexisting race and gender stereotypes: “the communities are completely dysfunctional and in order to offer them any long-term hope you have got to intervene in a root-and-branch way, you've got to grab control of the communities, you've got to pursue the perpetrators, you've got to provide medical help for the children, you've got to staunch the flow of alcohol and you've got to instil responsibility in the dispersal of welfare payments” (john howard, then prime minister, in coorey, hartcher, & peatling, 2007) the discourse of pathology (moreton-robinson, 2015) and the reproduction of white sovereignty is very clear in the nter speech acts, evidenced by phrases such as the need “to grab control of the communities” above. coalition of aboriginal organisations. the overarching frame in the alternative plan and surrounding speech acts was that child sexual abuse was a result of under-resourced services (including housing, health care, and schools) and adverse social determinants (including housing and joblessness). the response identified was the need for greater and sustained government funding in partnership with communities. for example, the alternative plan argued that any response to child sexual abuse “should also address community safety and access to essential services including housing, health care and education. a failure to also commit to addressing these underlying issues will ensure the current risk factors contributing to existing child abuse and neglect will remain.” (combined aboriginal organisations of the northern territory, 2007, p. 3) 2. how supportive or unsupportive were the framings for health equity? the three different framings led to different proposed solutions, which included extent of focus on law and order, resources for services, aboriginal and torres strait islander governance, and aboriginal and torres strait islander people’s control. consideration of temporality, equity, northern territory-federal government roles, land, trust, rights, trauma, and the role of evidence differed across the three frames (see table 3). 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol 13, iss 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.14012 table 3. comparison of key framings and foci across the three perspectives, and whether the framing was positive (+), mixed or unclear (~), or negative (-) for health equity focus little children are sacred report nter legislation alternate plan law and order culturally inappropriate policing/justice is the problem. need to regulate industry (e.g., alcohol). avoid overincarceration. increasing aboriginal and torres strait islander law and governance, and partnership between aboriginal and australian law is a solution. (+) lack of law and order is the problem. increase policing, plus army presence. no mention of incarceration. (-) lack of resources for community capacity e.g., community justice groups, community services is the problem (and culturally inappropriate policing). avoid overincarceration. (+) temporality intergenerational, long term. (+) short term emergency response. (-) two tiers – emergency response then sustained resources for services. (+) resources for services emphasis: high. (+) emphasis: low, except health and policing. (~) emphasis: very high. (+) aboriginal and torres strait islander governance crucial that this is strengthened. worst abuse is where aboriginal and torres strait islander law is weakest. (+) viewed as part of the problem and has failed. government intervention to replace aboriginal and torres strait islander governance, including addressing permit system and government business administrators. (-) aboriginal and torres strait islander governance of services vital. (+) aboriginal and torres strait islander people’s control increase through education and empowerment. (+) control affected by conditional welfare, and law and order measures. (-) increase through community-controlled services. (+) equity equity in terms of ongoing colonisation and need for culturally appropriate responses. (+) equity as ‘colour blind’, aim for sameness. (-) self-determination, with same rights as nonindigenous. (+) northern territory-federal government roles needs to be priority for nt government and federal government and they need to establish a collaborative partnership on the issue. federal government actions not related to nt government’s lcas report. (+) child protection is a state and territory responsibility, but federal government required to intervene due to lack of adequate action from nt government. (~) nt and federal governments need to jointly develop plan. current responsibilities are patchy. both governments need to partner with communities. (+) land land connection and ownership not mentioned. (-) government to regain control of land to enact law and order, open communities to scrutiny, fix housing, and encourage tourism economy. (-) connection to land supports health. government ownership of land will weaken community capacity and violates hard won land ownership rights. (+) 13 freeman et al.: why are indigenous affairs policies framed in ways that undermine indigenous health and equity? published by scholarship@western, 2022 table 3. comparison of key framings and foci across the three perspectives, and whether the framing was positive (+), mixed or unclear (~), or negative (-) for health equity (continued) (+) = positive for health equity, (~) = mixed or unclear potential for health equity, (-) = negative for health equity focus little children are sacred report nter legislation alternate plan trust aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples’ mistrust of government contributes to not reporting, acting on child sexual abuse. community led approaches rather than submitting offenders to mainstream system desired. “relationships of trust” with aboriginal and torres strait islander communities are critical and require long term approaches. (+) establishing law and order will foster communities’ trust. (~) respectful partnership with aboriginal and torres strait islander communities required to establish trust in government, police, child protection. (+) rights international perspective on human rights, rights of the child. cultural/ indigenous rights need to be protected through cultural security. (+) rights of the child to safety. other human or collective rights need to be withheld to ensure children’s safety. rights as a vehicle for emphasising individual responsibility, e.g., “the right to welfare comes with obligations” (-) land rights. right to same benefits and services as other australians. (+) trauma intergenerational trauma as key issue. (+) no mention of trauma. (-) trauma and grief as “one of the most significant and frequent problems” (p.22)need for services for trauma. (+) role of evidence the report focused on building an evidence base in collaboration with aboriginal and torres strait islander people. recommendations are linked to both pre-existing evidence and proposing further evidence gathering including ongoing monitoring and evaluation. (+) engages with some evidence but views more evidence gathering as not necessarily and inhibiting action. predominantly non-indigenous “survey teams” sent into communities to gather evidence and to explain the intervention to community members. (-) draws on the evidence reported on in the lcas report, and other past reports. community knowledge is key to solution. including aboriginal and torres strait islander people living in the communities and the knowledge of service providers. challenges nter lack of evidence use and emphasises ongoing, independent monitoring and evaluation nter. (+) 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol 13, iss 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.14012 while the report calls for government action, they are framed as needed redress to inequities, rather than legitimising white sovereignty. there is repeated emphasis on the need for consultation and partnership. for example, the first recommendation of the report states: “it is critical that both governments commit to genuine consultation with aboriginal people in designing initiatives for aboriginal communities.” (p. 22). federal coalition government. while there was some discussion of social determinants including school attendance, housing, and employment in the federal government’s framing, these were largely to advance the discourse of pathology, e.g.: “the cycle of unemployment and welfare dependency, alcohol abuse and violence needs to be broken so that we can go on to build sustainable, healthy communities.” (brough, in hansard 7 aug 2007, p. 18). any potential positives were heavily outweighed by the systemic racism inherent in the nter framing, the ignoring of colonisation and intergenerational trauma, and the reduced control and stigmatisation of aboriginal communities. this meant the framing advanced the negative determinants of health equity in figure 2. thus, we judged the framing to be very negative for health equity. the discourse of pathology and white sovereignty necessitated a top-down policy approach that excluded aboriginal and torres strait islander people, seeing them as part of the problem and not as part of the solution. it led to solutions that increased white sovereign control over aboriginal communities through removing permit systems and compulsory government acquisition of five-year leases of aboriginal land, living areas, and town camps. the individual responsibility framing excluded consideration of contextual drivers such as colonisation and trauma, and resulted in punitive approaches such as income management. the racism inherent in the nter is clearly demonstrated by the need to suspend the racial discrimination act to implement it. coalition of aboriginal organisations. the alternative plan’s focus on the social determinants of indigenous health, particularly proximal determinants such as housing and education indicates it had the potential to improve health equity for aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples. the plan was clear that loss of land and control were negative determinants of health, and there was a strong emphasis on community control. thus, we judged the framing to be very favourable for health equity. in contrast to the little children are sacred report, the alternative plan was produced to provide an alternative to the nter. the alternative plan also had the little children are sacred report to build on, stating that “the response should build on the knowledge base already available to government, starting with the recommendations of the little children are sacred report.” (p.3). this meant that while not contradicting the little children are sacred report, the framing in the plan particularly emphasised those areas to which the nter presented a threat, such as aboriginal community control. the plan was also more careful in how it articulated the role of government in its framing, as a provider of funds for services to its citizens. the framing had a strong focus on the provision and historic underfunding of services. these foci strengthened its capacity to be positive for health equity. discussion our analysis revealed that the three key perspectives informing the agenda setting period of the nter policy presented conflicting narratives of the causes of child sexual abuse and the solutions 15 freeman et al.: why are indigenous affairs policies framed in ways that undermine indigenous health and equity? published by scholarship@western, 2022 needed to address it. we found the different framings had a strong effect on how much the proposed responses supported or undermined health equity. overall, the little children are sacred report and alternative plan were aligned with a health equity approach by addressing distal and proximate determinants of health. the federal government framing instead drew on racist and white supremist framings of aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples and conflicted with health equity. these findings are an example of how policymaking in australia is informed by underlying colonial and racist assumptions which detract from the evidence of what works for aboriginal and torres strait islander health equity: self-determination, community control, improving social determinants of health, and addressing colonial and racist structures (anderson et al., 2007; carson et al., 2007; czyzewski, 2011; devitt et al., 2001; world health organization, 2007). the little children are sacred report presented considerable evidence that this was the approach needed to effectively address child sexual abuse (northern territory board of inquiry into the protection of aboriginal children from sexual abuse et al., 2007). the demonization of aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples and communities, particularly men, is clear in the federal government discourse, and is a commonly used colonial tool of control and division (watson, 2009). one clear difference was the extent of involvement of aboriginal and torres strait islander voices in the three frames. there were none in the federal government framing, while the little children are sacred report and the alternative plan had aboriginal leadership, and were more conducive to health equity. this suggests firstly that the white colonial frames informing australian policymaking need to be countered through narratives that emphasise historic and ongoing colonisation, and secondly, that aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples need structural opportunities to have their voices heard and to lead policy that affects aboriginal and torres strait islander people. for example, humpage (2017) has argued that the māori party in new zealand has contributed to improved policy making for māori people. these two identified needs align with the 2017 uluru statement from the heart, developed from a national constitutional convention of aboriginal and torres strait islander people. the statement called for truth telling, enshrining the need for a voice in the australian constitution, and treaties between governments and first nations. the need for a structure for aboriginal and torres strait islander voices to be heard is particularly critical given the media was complicit in the racism in the nter agenda setting, and the silencing of aboriginal and torres strait islander dissenting voices (dunne breen, 2015; mesikammen, 2016; proudfoot & habibis, 2015). the truth-telling would reduce the opportunity for colonisation to be ignored in policy agenda framing, and a treaty or series of treaties would improve aboriginal and torres strait islander self-determination and foster more partnership approaches with government. it is clear the same discourses of pathology and white sovereignty continue in contemporary australian policy, evinced by the high rates of incarceration and child removal (finizio, 2018), the failure to act on evidence of human rights abuses of aboriginal and torres strait islander young people in detention (anthony, 2018), the dismissal by the federal government of the uluru statement from the heart, and the failure to progress treaties. this research was part of a broader centre for research excellence on the social determinants of health equity that focused on the concern that evidence is not enough for healthy and equitable public policy. we found the nter framing was not aligned with evidence on what works for health equity. rather, the federal government used the evidence in the little children are sacred report to 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol 13, iss 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.14012 frame the issue of child sexual abuse as an emergency, and silence dissent (roffee, 2016). this finding reinforces the need to understand what drives policies to address or be consistent with the evidence for health equity. international implications our findings reinforce international literature that has argued that negative, deficit framings of indigenous people, and institutional racism, has shaped public policies affecting indigenous peoples, including in new zealand (came, 2014; came et al., 2019) and canada (de leeuw et al., 2010). our study provides an empirical example of how such a deficit discourse framed a detrimental indigenous affairs policy in australia. our findings also accord with calls for public policy affecting indigenous peoples to be based on indigenous knowledges rather than colonial knowledges (brown, 2016; came et al., 2019; mcleigh, 2010). this analysis adds to the international literature on agenda setting for the social determinants of health. a recent review of this literature identified the role of framing in shaping agendas away from or towards a social determinants of health approach, including the negative consequences of neoliberal framings, a biomedical disease focus, and ‘othering’ of aboriginal and torres strait islander communities (baker et al., 2018). we add discourses of pathology wielded against indigenous peoples (and potentially other populations), and the reproduction of white sovereignty as underlying ideological frames that can shift policymaking away from a health equity approach. our framing analysis also revealed conflict between multiple levels of government, in this case a social conservative liberal-national federal government portraying the labor-led northern territory government as incompetent in aboriginal and torres strait islander affairs as a precursor to the militaristic intervention. multi-level governance is missing from the literature on social determinants and agenda-setting (baker et al., 2018), but appeared to play an important role here. many colonised nations are federated, with multi-level governance, including australia, canada, and the united states, adding complexity to the fight for indigenous sovereignty and self-determination. limitations of the study this analysis was conducted on available documents from the agenda setting period of the nter. it does not answer the question of why the two perspectives that supported health equity were sidelined, and why the federal government agenda proceeded to legislation and implementation almost unchanged. understanding these power dynamics may aid public health advocates to change dominant framings to support health equity in policy. conclusion our analysis found that the two framings that did not succeed in influencing the nter legislation both involved aboriginal leadership and had the potential to support health equity for aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples. the federal government proceeded instead with an agenda underpinned by racist discourses pathologizing aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples and reproducing white sovereignty and white supremacy. we argue that the recommendations in the uluru statement from the heart need to be urgently implemented to improve future policy support for aboriginal and torres strait islander health equity. a greater understanding of how to challenge dominant policy framings that are not supportive of health equity is required, so that the vast 17 freeman et al.: why are indigenous affairs policies framed in ways that undermine indigenous health and equity? published by scholarship@western, 2022 evidence on health equity can be better translated into public policy that fosters better population health and health equity. references alasuutari, p. 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(2007). social determinants and indigenous health: the international experience and its policy implications. adelaide, sa: world health organization https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9248.2012.00967.x https://doi.org/10.1111/spol.12026 https://doi.org/10.1177/1440783313482368 https://doi.org/10.1017/s175577390999021x https://doi.org/10.5172/conu.2013.46.1.28 https://doi.org/10.5172/hesr.2010.19.1.020 https://doi.org/10.5694/j.1326-5377.2007.tb01444.x https://doi.org/10.1080/09581596.2018.1509059 https://doi.org/10.1016/s0140-6736(17)32755-1 https://doi.org/10.1016/s0140-6736(17)32755-1 reflection, acknowledgement, and justice: a framework for indigenous-protected area reconciliation the international indigenous policy journal volume 9 issue 3 special issue: indigenous peoples, climate change, and environmental stewardship article 3 july 2018 reflection, acknowledgement, and justice: a framework for indigenous-protected area reconciliation chance finegan york university, finegan@yorku.ca recommended citation finegan, c. (2018). reflection, acknowledgement, and justice: a framework for indigenous-protected area reconciliation. the international indigenous policy journal, 9(3). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.3 reflection, acknowledgement, and justice: a framework for indigenousprotected area reconciliation abstract protected areas have been both tools and beneficiaries of settler colonialism in places such as canada, australia, and the united states, to the detriment of indigenous nations. while some agencies, such as parks canada, increasingly partner with indigenous nations through co-management agreements or on indigenous knowledge use in protected area management, i believe such efforts fall short of reconciliation. for protected areas to reconcile with indigenous peoples, they must not incorporate indigeneity into existing settler-colonial structures. instead, agencies must commit to an indigenous-centered project of truth telling, acknowledging harm, and providing for justice. i begin this article by outlining what is meant by reconciliation. i then argue for protected area-indigenous reconciliation. i conclude with a framework for indigenous–settler reconciliation within protected areas. keywords protected areas, reconciliation, indigenous peoples, park management, settler colonialism acknowledgments thank you to the two anonymous reviewers for your time and comments. ravi de costa, deborah mcgregor, and paul wilkinson have my gratitude for your guidance and support. i live on the traditional territory of the anishinaabe nation, the haudenosaunee confederacy, the huron-wendat, and métis peoples. i acknowledge the myriad ways i benefit from settler colonialism. toronto continues to be home to many indigenous peoples, including the current treaty holders, the mississaugas of the new credit first nation. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ reflection, acknowledgement, and justice: a framework for indigenous-protected area reconciliation in windswept oglala sioux territory, the united states national park service (nps) operates badlands national park. famed for its dusty, rust-colored earthen spires, the park is split into two distinct units: one north and one south. in the north unit, visitors encounter all the traditional trappings of a park: a visitor center, scenic drives, campgrounds, and hiking trails. in the south unit, visitors enter a landscape where “true roads are a rarity” (u.s. national park service, n.d., para. 7). the nps has indirectly suggested that it is nearly impossible to visit this part of the park, writing, “with the exception of sheep mountain table, those hoping to explore the stronghold [south] district must obtain permission from individual landowners prior to crossing their land to reach the park . . . these landowners can be difficult to identify or locate” (u.s. national park service, n.d., para. 2). to understand the difference between the south and north units of badlands national park, it is necessary to rewind to 1942, when the united states (u.s.) army seized 94,000 acres of oglala sioux territory for use as a bombing range (burnham, 2000; zach, 2016). the army promised to return the land after world war ii. however, after the war ended, congress decided the oglala sioux could only have their land “back” if they allowed the nps to manage it as part of badlands national park. the oglala sioux may own the ground taken from them in 1942, but they do not exert sovereignty over it. understandably, this history of land theft, destruction, and paternalistic management has not endeared the nps to the oglala sioux (lovell, 2014); friction persists in their relationship. across the settler-colonial world, but particularly in canada, aotearoa-new zealand, and australia, indigenous nations and settler colonists1 have become increasingly concerned with reconciliation. this article focuses on settler and indigenous reconciliation in protected area2 contexts in aotearoa-new zealand, australia, canada, and the united states, while drawing on examples from other locations. deeply traumatic colonial events, such as canada’s indian residential schools and australia’s stolen generations, have provided the impetus for official acts of and commissions for reconciliation in some settler colonies (nagy, 2012; short, 2003a). as a three-step process of truth-telling, acknowledging harm, and providing justice (short, 2003b), reconciliation invites participants to reflect on the past and, importantly, identify ways to specifically address previous wrongs done to indigenous peoples. as this article—and the origins of badlands’ southern unit—illustrates, protected areas are both tools and beneficiaries of settler colonialism, often in violent ways. given this history and context, it is important to ask whether parks can also be a locus of reconciliation efforts. i believe the answer is a resounding yes; more specifically, i contend that, for indigenous nations and settler-colonial states to 1 in this article, i use the term settler colonist to generally refer to non-indigenous persons residing in settlercolonial nation-states (e.g., canada, australia, the u.s., etc.). this would include recent immigrants who intend to remain in these countries. however, i recognize that not all non-indigenous people who live in these places are settler colonists (e.g., the descendants of slaves). for further reading on terms to describe non-indigenous people in settler-colonial nation-states, see vowel (2016, pp. 14-22). 2 i use park and protected area interchangeably in this article. while i recognize that distinctions exist between these, i make this choice to ensure varied word use. 1 finegan: indigenous–protected area reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2018 fully reconcile with one another, parks must be places of reconciliation given their historical and ongoing entanglement with settler colonialism. i advance three key assertions in this article. first, i assert that protected areas need to reconcile with indigenous peoples. this does not mean park managers simply need to “work better” with indigenous nations, as such an approach risks merely incorporating indigenous peoples into existing settler-colonial structures instead of challenging those structures. reconciliation demands an indigenous-centered agenda grounded in truth telling, the acknowledgement of harm, and the provision of appropriate, indigenous-defined justice. such a process offers parks the opportunity to advance the inherent sovereignty of indigenous nations. second, i assert this reconciliation process will require difficult conversations. the south unit of the badlands is not the only protected area situated on indigenous territory that has been gained through violence or coercion. approaching reconciliation in a parks context may be challenging because: a. land, sovereignty, and cultural continuity are inseparable for indigenous peoples (snelgrove, dhamoon, & corntassel, 2014; tuck & yang, 2012), and b. parks are, fundamentally, a means by which to exert control over who may do what on a given area of land (kelly, 2015). yet, having difficult conversations and feeling unsettled are not necessarily negative; indeed, settler colonists should feel disquieted by the usurpation of indigenous land and sovereignty that has been and continues to be done in their names. i acknowledge that public unease, coupled with the political nature of park management agencies, may pose challenges to reconciliation. although i briefly discuss the political feasibility of the approach i outline in this article, my focus is on asserting the need for park– indigenous reconciliation and outlining a framework for it. reconciliation must be driven by and accountable to indigenous interests rather than a sense of political expediency. it cannot be achieved without dismantling the settler-colonial systems, including ill-gotten control over land and resources, that permeate and subtend states like aotearoa-new zealand, australia, canada, and the united states. to this end, i contend discussions about land tenure within parks are unavoidable if true reconciliation is the end goal. finally, i assert that while some park agencies (e.g., parks canada) have been moving towards reconciling with indigenous peoples, existing efforts are generally too hodge-podge and localized. instead of working on a park-by-park basis, i argue, an indigenous-controlled commission is needed to address park–indigenous relations systemwide. parks are not selectively entwined with settler-colonial structures; rather, they are part-and-parcel of broader efforts to create and maintain settler-colonial regimes. as such, efforts at park–indigenous reconciliation must occur on and be coordinated at level of systems or agencies. to support these three assertions—the need for reconciliation, the importance of difficult conversations, and the need for systemwide efforts at change—i begin with a broad discussion of reconciliation. next, i demonstrate the connection between parks and settler colonialism, highlighting the resultant need for park–indigenous reconciliation. finally, i offer a framework for how parks might begin to reconcile with indigenous nations. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.3 what is reconciliation? i was initially hesitant and nervous about this project. for non-indigenous people like me, it is particularly easy to bandy about words like reconciliation and decolonization in ways that feel good but do little to advance indigenous interests. such use of these words “placat[e] white guilt . . . by narrowing the focus [e.g., to parks] to avoid conversations about bigger issues” (nagy, 2013, p. 53; see also waziyatawin, 2009, p. 193). i will not pretend to have the perfect solution to the trauma indigenous peoples have suffered and continue to suffer in their interactions with protected areas. however, i believe it is important to develop a clear understanding of reconciliation before thinking about how it might be applied—rather than prioritizing expedient solutions to centuries of abuse and then applying a post-hoc label of reconciliatory or decolonial to them. reconciliation has been described as a process of formerly opposed parties moving towards some sort of forgiveness or coming-to-terms with one another (corntassel, chaw-win-is, & t’lakwadzi, 2009; short, 2005). reconciliation has also been conceptualized as a process of “restoring and rebuilding relationships” in “novel and context-specific ways” (short, 2005, p. 268). both offer good starts but are somewhat vague, with the first presuming that forgiveness is the end goal of reconciliation. i prefer to follow short’s (2003b) model of reconciliation, which he has articulated as a process involving truthtelling, acknowledging harm, and providing appropriate justice. this three-step process both: a. provides clear guidelines for what constitutes reconciliation, and b. focuses its goal (i.e., justice) on indigenous peoples rather than on settler colonists’ feelings (i.e., their desires for forgiveness). importantly, reconciliation is about “both the past and the future” (rice & snyder, 2008, p. 48). short’s (2003b) inclusion of both truth-telling and the provision of justice speaks to reconciliation’s janus-like nature as a process that simultaneously looks forwards and backwards. for reconciliation to succeed, participants must seek to understand and document the past while focusing on settler colonialism’s ongoing structural inequities. this focus on the present and future is critical; indigenous peoples have criticized current reconciliation efforts in canada, for example, by noting their tendency to overemphasize past errors at the expense of beginning a more fulsome discussion about the country’s perpetuation of settler colonialism (querengesser, 2013). a firm commitment on the part of park agencies to providing justice may help to address such criticisms. reconciliation is a call to understand how settlers remain privileged because of their ongoing complicity in settler colonialism. unfortunately, recent moves towards reconciliation in canada and australia3 suggest that settlers tend to view themselves not as modern beneficiaries of ongoing structural genocide,4 but merely people who have inherited the legacy of past wrongs. reconciliation demands that settlers recognize how they continue to inflict grievous harms on indigenous peoples. in this way, 3 for example, canada’s truth and reconciliation commission and australia’s council for aboriginal reconciliation and justice. 4 wolfe (2006) writes that the term structural genocide recognizes that settler colonialism is not an event but a structure that requires the elimination of indigenous peoples. it also avoids the qualified nature of terms like cultural genocide. 3 finegan: indigenous–protected area reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2018 reconciliation is not an exercise in warmth, coziness, or security for settlers who have decided to “face up to” the sins of the past. instead, reconciliation is a process of dismantling of oppressive structures and coming-to-terms with how settlers continue to benefit from, enable, and perpetuate settler colonialism.5 framing reconciliation as what it is not can also be helpful. its goal cannot be to legitimize settler colonial seizure of indigenous territories and resources. rather, its goal should be appropriate, restorative, indigenous-centered, and community-designed forms of justice. agencies cannot begin reconciliation with the goal of “moving on” from the past, because the past shapes the present and future. approaching reconciliation with the assumption that “the past is over and reconciliation is about forgiveness and moving on” (nagy, 2012, p. 360) is the wrong approach. instead, reconciliation calls participants to: a. focus on how the past is still very much a part of peoples’ lived experiences, and b. build a new relationship, rooted in restorative justice, to atone for wrongdoing. reconciliation is not an exercise in addressing “the indigenous problem” faced by parks precisely because there is no such thing as an indigenous problem. rather, indigenous peoples confront protected area problems for which park agencies and settler-colonial governments are responsible. moreover, as the following discussions of co-management and indigenous knowledge should make clear, incorporating indigenous peoples into settler-colonial structures and institutions should not be the end goal of any reconciliatory process. if gaining legitimacy, “fixing the indigenous problem,” or “moving on” are the primary motivation(s) behind reconciliation, then it will fail. to avoid this, park managers should consider their motivations for pursuing reconciliation with indigenous peoples. have they (i.e., the managers) centered their own desires and goals, or have they started this difficult work because they wish to provide justice for those harmed by their profession? are they willing to recognize and attempt to end systemic, ongoing harm and parks’ role in perpetuating it? as with other things in life, it is important to start with heart. in this instance, if one’s goal is to serve indigenous interests, one’s heart is likely in the right place. there have, however, been significant criticisms of reconciliation—particularly as a framework for improving settler–indigenous relations. corntassel and holder (2008) have noted, for example, that reconciliation can place the onus on victims to become accustomed to their social, economic, and political disempowerment. similarly, nagy (2013) has affirmed that victim centering can shift social focus away from interrogating settler colonialism as a system of continuing oppression. martin (2009) suggests that it is easy to conflate reconciliation with “resolution, a term which also evokes the end of a conflict” (p. 52). such conflation mistakenly presumes an end or closure to settler colonialism, which is impossible for something that is both a structure and ongoing relationship. reconciliation calls upon settler colonists to understand how indigenous peoples have been and continue to be systematically oppressed by setter colonialism. focusing exclusively on the resultant 5 to offer a very brief example of the distinction between “facing up to the past” versus thinking about settler colonialism more broadly, the keeseekoowenin ojibway were forcibly removed from their homes to create riding mountain national park in 1936 (sandlos, 2008). reconciliation would entail an apology for this, yes, but more importantly, it means confronting the ways in which settlers continue to benefit from this violent dispossession. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.3 harms, however, would be a disservice. reconciliation’s goal should not be to proffer a newfangled “solution to the indian problem” in place of existing policies; martin (2009) has explained that “as the state attempts to leave the past behind . . . it fails to notice that every new indian policy risks echoing the . . . goal of finally getting rid of the indian problem” (p. 58). for example, canadian efforts at reconciliation have largely asked indigenous peoples to come to terms with canadian sovereignty, instead of the other way around (querengesser, 2013). why do we need reconciliation between indigenous peoples and park management? historically, protected areas have been overt tools of settler colonialism, serving to systematically extend state control over land to the detriment of indigenous peoples (mar, 2010; sandlos, 2007). to create some parks, such as riding mountain national park in manitoba, canada, settler-colonial governments violently evicted indigenous peoples.6 as discussed below, other parks have benefitted from settler colonialism without deeply engaging with the past. this also points towards the importance of reconciliation between parks and indigenous peoples, as both types of relations—parks as agents and parks as beneficiaries of settler colonialism—should compel park leaders to seek reconciliation with indigenous peoples. locating protected areas within broader settler-colonial structures is key to understanding the need for park–indigenous reconciliation. tuck and gaztambide-fernandez (2013) have noted that settler colonialism is primarily concerned with “replacement, which aims to vanish indigenous peoples and replace them with settlers, who see themselves as the rightful claimants to land” (p. 73). as veracini (2011) has written, settler colonialism requires a ceaseless attempt to extinguish indigenous peoples and their histories. consider the case of great smoky mountains national park in north carolina and tennessee, u.s.a., which occupies about 293 square miles of the cherokee nation’s traditional territory. over the winter of 1838 to 1839, the united states government forcibly evicted the cherokee from their traditional territory, including in the region that would become great smoky mountains national park. this was an act of violent ethnic cleansing; roughly 20% of the entire cherokee nation died during the eviction (u.s. national park service, 2015). today, great smoky mountains national park is home to no fewer than four significant facilities7 at which the park interprets its settler-colonial history. these facilities include preserved historic log cabins and other settlement-era structures. the park does not, however, have a single facility dedicated to interpreting cherokee histories of and perspectives on the park and/or the land. as a result, great smoky mountains national park does little to aid visitors in better understanding cherokee histories or perspectives. this is made even more frustrating by the park’s physical location: it is directly adjacent to the qualla boundary, a land trust held for the eastern band of the cherokee. 6 the government of canada marched the keeseekoowenin ojibway out of their homes at gunpoint and burned their residences to the ground in order to create riding mountain national park (sandlos, 2008). 7 cades cove loop road and the cable mill historic area, roaring fork motor nature trail, mountain farm museum and the mingus mill, and the cataloochee valley historic area. 5 finegan: indigenous–protected area reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2018 the park’s lack of cherokee-centric facilities clearly demonstrates veracini’s (2011) assertion that settler-colonist societies inherently eradicate indigeneity from the land. put another way, great smoky mountains “supports the claiming of space and place” by ensuring that visitors engage in a process of “forgetting of our own histories”8 (snelgrove et al., 2014, p. 20). until the park makes a serious commitment to returning the cherokee to the landscape and interpreting cherokee heritage and perspectives, the park is complicit in the cherokee’s removal. in virginia, u.s.a., cape henry national memorial marks the site of the first landing of the jamestown settlers in north america. an interpretive wayside panel at the park’s only parking lot describes this event, focusing on the actions of the settler colonists. its only mention of indigenous peoples is: “near the end of the day [4/26/1607], an encounter with indians left two of the party [of settler colonists] wounded.” this is a stunning erasure of indigenous peoples’ perspectives on the arrival of newcomers to their lands. can a park credibly claim to interpret a first contact story when it does not even deign to name one of the two present parties,9 much less present their account of the event? elsewhere, at cape cod national seashore in massachusetts, u.s.a., park staff completely omit indigenous nations from the “people” menu of the park’s website (u.s. national park service, 2017c). the narrative of pilgrims building a city on a hill in massachusetts obscures indigenous peoples to this day. despite this erasure, the park has identified indigeneity as a reason for the area’s significance: “cape cod was the site of early contact between native and european cultures. the national seashore encompasses archeological sites that document more than 9,000 years of occupation, including use by wampanoag indians that continues to this day” (u.s. national park service, 2017a, p. 5). can a park preserve indigenous histories while it expunges indigenous peoples from its story? parks continued centering of settler colonists on waysides, websites, and visitor facilities points towards the ongoing nature of colonialism, showing it is not an event confined to the past (snelgrove et al., 2014; tuck & gaztambide-fernandez, 2013). particularly in cases where parks purport to interpret colonization, their disregard for indigenous peoples lays bare their ongoing complicity in settler colonialism. snelgrove et al. (2014) have described settler colonialism as “temporality without end” (p. 7). as referenced above, the south unit of the badlands is supposed to, at some nebulous point in the future, be returned to the oglala sioux, but no firm plans are in place for the sioux to even co-manage the property with the nps, much less exercise sovereignty over it (tupper, 2015; zach, 2016). such permanently temporary parks call for reconciliation. protected areas often manage sacred sites or places of significance to indigenous peoples (beltrán, 2000; milholland, 2008; nie, 2008, such as uluṟu-kata tjuṯa (australia), devil’s tower (u.s.a.), bear butte state park (u.s.a.), pakasaivo and the kirkkopahta seida rock (finland), and mount tongariro (aotearoa-new zealand). managers of these sites work in a difficult environment. on the one hand, they might be expected to, for example, allow public access to a site while also responding to indigenous 8 that is of settler colonialism in the mountains. 9 that is give the name of the indigenous nation the settler colonists encountered. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.3 peoples’ desires for a restriction of access. the need for reconciliation between parks and indigenous peoples is painfully apparent in such places. at other sites, it is possible that managers have no immediate controversy or problem to address, but a lack of conflict does not relieve administrators from their moral duty to engage with indigenous peoples. for example, great smoky mountains national park desperately needs to re-think its relationship with the cherokee, given how it interprets cherokee heritage and perspectives. reconciliation need not always be prompted by an immediate disagreement or conflict. indeed, it can come from park management simply recognizing that they need to be more inclusive. extensive scholarship notes that protected areas are complicit in settler-colonial dispossession of indigenous land across the world10 (brockington & igoe, 2006; burnham, 2000; dowie, 2011; keller & turek, 1998; mar, 2010; sandlos, 2008). as previously mentioned, at some places—such as riding mountain national park (canada)—parks were born of a spasm of state violence. in other places, like yosemite national park, eviction has been more insidious.11 regardless of the level of violence attendant to land dispossession, the process alone suggests that reconciliation is necessary. admittedly, removal for conservation’s sake has been poorly researched; it is not clear precisely how many people have been removed from their lands to facilitate the creation of protected areas (agrawal & redford, 2009; brockington & igoe, 2006). estimates range from 10-20 million worldwide (agrawal & redford, 2009) to 14 million in africa alone (dowie, 2006). agrawal and redford (2009) have noted, however, that “the use of force is typically critical” to eviction and that removal for conservation has caused “social disarticulation and political disempowerment” (p. 5). importantly, expulsion-for-parks is not a process confined to the past. in colombia, for example, the early 2000s saw residents forcibly evicted to create tayrona national nature park (bocarejo & ojeda, 2016). it may be a stretch to claim all parks created in settler-colonial nation-states have unequivocally benefitted from and maintain the dispossession of indigenous lands. yet, it is not difficult to suggest the number of protected areas that have not or do not is quite short. consider the number of protected areas that fit within one or more of these categories: a. located on treaty-ceded land,12 b. located on land taken by force by settler colonists, c. either prohibit outright or do not encourage indigenous peoples to engage in traditional activities on their traditional territories, and/or 10 i recognize that not all who have been dispossessed by protected areas are indigenous. good examples of nonindigenous dispossession include the removal of acadians to create kouchibouguac national park (canada) and ozark national scenic riverways (u.s.a.). however, this article is focused narrowly on settler–indigenous reconciliation, not on settler–settler reconciliation, nor on an exhaustive discussion of expulsion for park creation. 11 there has never been a direct, violent assault on indigenous peoples at yosemite for park creation as there was at riding mountain, but the ahwahneechee and other southern sierra miwok were slowly squeezed out of the valley through nps policies that made it impossible for them to remain there (see spence, 1996, for a good overview of this history). 12 the different understandings held by indigenous peoples and settler colonists at treaty signings is worth contemplating (see miller, 2009, for an overview of this issue in canada). 7 finegan: indigenous–protected area reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2018 d. act to extend settler-colonial authority over a given area or resource. within each of these categories, parks have effectively displaced indigenous peoples and livelihoods from the land that the parks now protect. as short (2003a) has explained, there is a direct link between “structurally entrenched social disadvantage and the dispossession of land and loss of autonomy” (p. 299). protected areas are not the sole cause of indigenous peoples’ continued marginalization, but they are certainly an impactful one. indigenous peoples have shown they are not totally powerless to resist eviction efforts. consider, for example, the łutsël k’e dene first nation (lkdfn). in 1969, chief pierre catholique was “accidentally sent the minutes of a meeting” about a possible national park on lkdfn traditional territory; after he began to ask questions, he was flown to ottawa and presented with a document to sign for the park’s creation (bennett, lemelin, & ellis, 2010, p. 108). catholique refused and the lkdfn remained on their land.13 other examples of indigenous resistance include the timbisha shoshone’s tenacious residence in death valley national park in california and nevada, u.s. (burnham, 2000), the havasupai’s continued dwelling in the grand canyon (keller & turek, 1998), and métis jackie vautour’s14 efforts to remain within kouchibouguac national park in new brunswick, canada. indigenous attempts to resist park creation have also occurred through international bodies. for example, the international union for the conservation of nature’s (iucn) 1975 kinshasa resolution—passed because of indigenous activism—has forbidden forced evictions for conservation (colchester, 2004). the durban accord and action plan, passed at the 2003 world parks congress, required that park agencies respect indigenous rights and provide for full, free, and prior informed consent behind the creation of parks (brosius, 2004). as with the kinshasa resolution, indigenous peoples were the driving force behind the durban accord and action plan. indigenous peoples have also pressed the iucn for a formal redress process for grievances against protected areas. the whakatane mechanism, created in 2011, is supposed to do this, but it has only been used on a trial basis (colchester, 2014). moreover, it is worth noting that not all parks owe their existence directly to violent land expropriation. consider australia’s bunya mountains national park, situated on the traditional territory of the jarowair, wakka wakka, and barunggam peoples. australia gazetted the park well after these communities had been ejected from their land (mar, 2010). bunya mountains national park did not cause their dispossession—though it has undeniably benefitted from and, perhaps more crucially, maintained it. bunya mountain’s website blandly describes jarowair, wakka wakka, and barunggam dispossession as a time when “aboriginal people left or were removed from their country” (queensland government department of national parks sport and racing, 2017, para. 4). this call to mind shklar’s (1990) observation that parks have been “passively unjust” (p. 40) or willing to quietly accept injustices rather 13 interestingly, in 2001, then-chief felix lockhart reopened discussions with parks canada after a (failed) land claim process in the region highlighted encroaching natural resource extraction (bennett et al., 2010). negotiations and planning for thaidene nëné national park reserve are ongoing. 14 it should be noted that claims of eastern métissage are the subject of significant debate (gaudry & leroux, 2017). 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.3 than attempt to remedy them because addressing problems would cause political difficulties. it is easier to write that aboriginal people “left or were removed” (queensland government department of national parks sport and racing, 2017, para. 4) from their homeland in the bunya mountains than it is to talk about the “the putrefaction of [aboriginal] corpses” or “large pits . . . full of dead blackfellows” in 1870s queensland (mar, 2010, p. 6). by doing this, protected areas sidestep their entanglement in structural genocide to attend to visitor carry capacity, ecological integrity, and maintenance backlogs. the park’s website demonstrates its ongoing maintenance of and complicity in australian settler colonialism. it is hard to believe that park staff and managers are ignorant of both the white-onaboriginal violence that has characterized queensland’s history (bottoms, 2013) and the history of white australians asserting control over the bunya mountains. rather than face this history, however, park staff have chosen to gloss over it. beyond forcing indigenous peoples from their homes and towns, protected areas have also usurped indigenous peoples’ resource-use rights. consider the case of the sturgeon lake ojibway (today part of the lac la croix first nation). the sturgeon lake community was promised its winter hunting camps in the hunter’s island region of the quetico (ontario, canada) would be left undisturbed after the signing of treaty 3 in 1873. but in 1910, ontario evicted the community from hunter’s island after including the area in the new quetico provincial park (killan, 1993; manore, 2007). in wood buffalo national park in alberta, canada, officials systematically excluded indigenous hunters from the park despite agreements that stated they could continue to hunt there (sandlos, 2007). this conflict continues to this day (britneff, 2018). at algonquin provincial park in ontario, canada, the golden lake first nation (glfn) “has been denied any real influence in the use and management of the park” (hodgins & cannon, 1998, p. 58) even though glfn has not ceded the land within the park. algonquin provincial park has become “a space inaccessible to its former inhabitants . . . a place they could not enter to pursue their traditional lifeways” (manore, 2007, p. 135). in addition to excluding indigenous peoples, protected areas also represent a deeply held philosophical difference between settler colonists and many indigenous peoples. a fundamental principle underpinning western-style protected area management is that nature and people exist separately; there are spaces for nature and spaces for civilization (braun, 1997; cronon, 1996; nash, 2014). this stands in contrast to indigenous understandings of human and non-human relations, in which a distinction between the two is not necessarily carved out (adams & hutton, 2007; braun, 1997; nash, 2014; stevens, 2014b; turner, 2012; west, igoe, & brockington, 2006). parks canada (2014) highlights this in its guide to “building effective partnerships” (p. 1) with indigenous peoples: when the english version of sign text [for the nuu-chah-nulth trail in pacific rim] was being translated into nuu-chah-nulth, the elders stumbled over the word “wilderness” and arrived at the conclusion that there is no equivalent word or description for “wilderness” in their language, there is only “home.” this initially straightforward discussion led to a more comprehensive understanding of the philosophy that the nuu-chah-nulth have for their traditionally used lands. (p. 13) 9 finegan: indigenous–protected area reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2018 it is not my intention to dwell on the cultural constructions of wilderness; there is extensive literature on the subject.15 the profoundly different understandings of land and nature is an important challenge for protected are agencies to consider if they are to reconcile with their indigenous partners. in the united states, for example, the human–nature divide has been codified into federal law through the wilderness act, which proclaimed that wilderness is a place where “man does not remain” (88th congress of the united states, 1964, para. 1). similarly, aotearoa-new zealand has forbidden structures, roads, trails, machines, livestock, and vehicles from entering designated wilderness areas (cessford & reedy, 2000). new south wales, australia, defines wilderness as a place that, “together with its plant and animal communities, in a state that has not been substantially modified by humans and their works or is capable of being restored to such a state” (landers, 2008, p. 33). these articulations of wilderness conflict with the longstanding relationships that indigenous peoples have with the land in these countries.16 moreover, muller (2003) has explained that an imposed human–nature divide “denies the fundamental role of indigenous land management in the creation of these ‘natural’ landscapes and excludes indigenous people from areas of economic, cultural, and spiritual importance” (p. 4). while parks are ostensibly set aside from humanity, protected areas have long served commercial interests. in queensland, australia, in the 1890s, policy makers justified parks in “carefully expressed terms of economic utility” for the emerging settler-colonial nation (mar, 2010, p. 83). similar arguments were made for parks in the u.s. and canada (binnema & niemi, 2006; maceachern, 2011; runte, 1997). policy elites have continued to rely on the logic of parks as economic engines: on honduras’ north coast, ecotourism development, biodiversity conservation, and indigenous dispossession have gone hand-in-hand (loperena, 2016). as in queensland, indigenous people have been blamed for allowing natural resources to go undeveloped and underutilized (loperena, 2016). rooted in lockean philosophies (carroll, 2014; mar, 2010; tuck & yang, 2012), this blame has sought to justify indigenous dispossession and the promotion of conservation and tourism. the idea of parks-as-economic-drivers has merit, particularly in economically distressed areas, but this can systematically oppress and marginalize indigenous communities. if protected area agencies and managers begin to appreciate the connections between their work and larger, unjust systems, then the need for park–indigenous reconciliation would become increasingly apparent. are parks not already reconciling with indigenous peoples? before considering what reconciliation between protected areas and indigenous peoples might look like, i offer one final reason for engaging such work: existing efforts to draw parks and indigenous peoples closer together do not go far enough. the emerging “new paradigm” (stevens, 2014a, see pp. 53–55) for protected area management relies on tools like co-management and engagement with indigenous (sometimes called traditional) knowledge to “decolonize” park management (stevens, 2014b). however, these tools are both inherently problematic and insufficient in their scope. 15 see catton, 1997; cronon, 1996; harvey, 1991; and nash, 2014. 16 in australia, for example, “aboriginal people have been actively managing the land for at least 50,000 years” (muller, 2003, p. 4). 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.3 consider the use of indigenous knowledge for park management. i have noted that a shorthand definition of reconciliation is identifying truth, acknowledging harm, and providing appropriate justice (short, 2003b). incorporating indigenous knowledge into protected area management does not advance any of these components of reconciliation. doberstein and devin (2004) have traced the use of indigenous knowledge in resource management to the resumption of treaty making in canada in the 1970s. indigenous knowledge, they write, was first seen as a way to document land and resources for the treaty-making process (i.e., to create a historical record), but it is now viewed as a tool to ensure equitable management practices (i.e., making “right” decisions informed by “involving” local residents). treating indigenous knowledge as a “special sauce” to mix into pre-existing plans or structures along with western knowledge is deeply troubling. nadasdy (1999) has explained: since it is scientists and resource managers, rather than aboriginal hunters and trappers, who will be using this new “integrated” knowledge, the project of knowledge integration actually serves to concentrate power in administrative centers, rather than in the hands of aboriginal people. (p. 1) the use of indigenous knowledge by park agencies might lead to reconciliation and an end to the supremacy of western knowledge; it could be one part of a broad reconciliatory agenda, but, in and of itself, it does not resolve underlying settler-colonial power structures. similarly, co-management arrangements in which indigenous peoples and agencies share management authority over parks do not contribute to reconciliation in a meaningful way. berkes (2009) has suggested that co-management asks agencies to “look beyond government, toward public–private–civil society partnerships, as a way of dealing with the shortcomings of single agency, top-down management” (p. 1692). this leaves something to be desired, however—particularly in canada, where the federal minister responsible for parks canada still holds final authority for park management decisions (langdon, prosper, & gagnon, 2010). this co-management approach does not necessarily lead to partnership, nor is it the best way to address the problems created by the eviction of sovereign nations from their homelands. sandlos (2014) has scathingly critiqued co-management as something that “asks us to accept as a radical innovation the mere inclusion of aboriginal communities [in the decision-making process] who maintained absolute sovereign control over northern wildlife populations only a generation or two ago” (p. 146). co-management is not a vehicle for indigenous peoples to reclaim authority over their traditional territories, nor does it identify truth, acknowledge harm, or provide restorative justice. rather, co-management co-opts indigenous peoples into existing, settler-dominated government structures and processes. conversations about the shortcomings of co-management and the use of indigenous knowledge within parks recall tuck and gaztambide-fernandez (2013), who have suggested that one of the goals of white settler society is “absorbing” indigenous knowledge so that: 11 finegan: indigenous–protected area reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2018 actual participation by othered bodies is not necessary. like natty bumppo,17 the whitestream can integrate what it needs—once the [w]hite settler learns to dance like the other, learns to eat like the other, learns to dress like the other, and to consume and even to make objects like the other, the other is no longer needed, discarded, replaced. (p. 82) co-management and the use of indigenous knowledge for parks mirrors natty bumppo’s internalization of the knowledge he needs to survive from indigenous people. in this sense, protected area agencies are not engaged in reconciliation when they seek indigenous knowledge or to work with indigenous “comanagers” in an advisory role. parks are instead absorbing indigenous knowledge so meaningful participation by indigenous peoples is not necessary. they are listening to indigenous management advice so they can better learn to be like indigenous people, not to cede real authority and power to indigenous peoples. without lasting change to settler-colonial power structures, co-management structures and indigenous knowledge use in parks are neither reconciliatory nor decolonial. indigenous peoples, particularly in canada, have used the land claims and modern treaty process to create new protected areas. yet, i am not convinced this represents reconciliation for two reasons. first, this process necessarily entails the modern treaty table, which clark, de costa, and maddison (2016) have noted “entrenches” indigenous dispossession (p. 9). the canadian comprehensive land claims process is defined and controlled by the government, is burdensome for indigenous peoples to participate in, and is ultimately “microscopic and painstaking” in its approach (mchugh, 2011, p. 328). as mchugh (2011) has noted, canada’s modern treaty table is dysfunctional due to both its complexity and its costliness. second, i argue that creating new parks—however well-managed they may be—at the treaty table does not address the management of existing parks. reconciliation between protected area managers and indigenous peoples cannot happen if only newly created parks affirm indigenous rights. yes, the parks coming from the treaty table are steps in the right direction, but if existing parks are neglected then reconciliation is not happening. some protected area-focused international mechanisms and institutions seek to protect indigenous rights, but they are not reconciliatory in and of themselves largely because they have not been fully implemented. they do, however, articulate and summarize the justification for reconciliation. for example, the convention on biological diversity commented in 2012 that “less than a third of countries report significant progress towards participation [by indigenous peoples] in protected areas” (colchester, 2014, p. 45). additionally, the international expert workshop on the world heritage convention and indigenous peoples (2012) has released a “call to action” regarding the relationship between indigenous peoples and parks. the call to action noted the existence of “past and ongoing injustices, and chronic, persistence human rights violations . . . as a result of the establishment and management of protected areas” (para. 14). similarly, the african commission on human and peoples’ rights (2011) noted its “deep concern” about the creation of world heritage sites “without obtaining the free, prior, and informed consent,” explaining that many world heritage sites in africa have “management frameworks 17 the protagonist of james fenimore cooper’s series, the leatherstocking tales. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.3 [that] are not consistent with the principles of the un declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples” (para. 9). as indigenous peoples and international bodies continue to express, the relationship between protected areas and indigenous peoples is difficult. dispossession for conservation, a longstanding entanglement with non-indigenous business interests, and the privileging of settler colonists in interpretation and education efforts have not led to positive park–indigenous relationships. settler colonists claim and exploit indigenous land and resources, and, as settler-government institutions designed to control who may do what within a given space, protected areas are a tangible manifestation of settler colonialism. as such, park managers need to reconcile with indigenous nations. before moving on, i wish to recognize that protected areas have their benefits. at great smoky mountains national park, for example, the mountains were largely a clear-cut, muddy wasteland at the time of the park’s creation. today, the area is one of the world’s greatest temperate rainforests and biodiversity hotspots, providing ecosystem services and acting as an economic engine in a traditionally poor region. i am neither unaware of nor deliberately ignoring the benefits of parks; however, protected areas “trying to the right thing” for one context does not undo the damage they have wrought for others. good intentions will only take one so far in life; as muldoon (2005) wrote, redemption comes from accepting responsibility for the past and seeking to right previous wrongs. what might reconciliation in a parks context look like? truth telling is the first step to reconciling indigenous peoples and protected areas. indeed, it seems difficult to reconcile without knowing why it is necessary. there are micro-truths (e.g., an indigenous person being arrested for exercising their treaty rights within a park) and macro-truths (e.g., the fact that parks charged with preserving resources may have a hard time honoring treaty rights to harvest resources within parks). different scales of truth can be difficult to grasp at the level of individual parks. this difficulty, together with the broad, ongoing nature of settler colonialism, point to the need for a systemwide structure for approaching indigenous–park reconciliation. reconciliation should not be an ad-hoc process left to the discretion of individual park units or managers. agencies need broad, top-level commissions charged specifically and solely with reconciliation, because of both the amount and scale of the work involved in reconciliation as well as the nation-to-nation relationship indigenous peoples have with many (but not all) settler-colonial nation-states. an agency-wide commission would necessarily respect such nation-to-nation relationships and protocols. designing a park–indigenous reconciliation commission will require careful thought and planning. the body should be indigenous oriented, driven, and accountable, mirroring the broad characteristics of reconciliation overall. if the commission serves settler-colonial interests or ignores the ongoing nature of settler colonialism, it will falter. the willful framing of settler colonialism as finished business, coupled with a general blindness to the inherent sovereignty of indigenous peoples, directly led to the failure of australia’s council for aboriginal reconciliation (short, 2003a), for example. if the commission narrowly addresses only parks’ effects without considering the ongoing nature of settler colonialism and the denial of this nature by settlers, it may fail to advance reconciliation (rice & snyder, 2008). 13 finegan: indigenous–protected area reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2018 to help avoid these problems, a park–indigenous reconciliation commission should be designed by indigenous peoples and serve their needs. as an example, canada’s 2017 missing and murdered indigenous women and girls (mmiwg) commission of inquiry has not fully succeeded in part because the inquiry’s terms of reference do not unambiguously address discrimination against indigenous peoples by canadian law enforcement (glowacki, 2017; talaga, 2017). while indigenous peoples have long identified discrimination as a key problem that the mmiwg inquiry should directly address (talaga, 2017), an overt recognition of this is missing from the present inquiry’s mandate. park–indigenous reconciliation processes and commissions need to address the range of problems that indigenous peoples have identified. importantly, the burden of this work and its costs should fall on settler, not indigenous, shoulders. settlers should not be asking those they have oppressed “to do the work of reconciliation” for them (stanton, 2012, p. 94). how should a commission operate? first, it needs to build societal interest and support for itself. canada’s recent truth and reconciliation commission (trc) to address the indian residential school system started not because of societal pressure, but rather because of a legal settlement. the trc had to convince non-indigenous canadians to participate in a process they did not start, which posed a major challenge for the inquiry (stanton, 2011). a parks commission will have to work to avoid this problem. a parks commission would do well to follow the example of thomas berger’s mackenzie valley pipeline inquiry. as stanton (2012) has explained, berger leveraged the inquiry to increase canadians’ understanding of northern issues. a parks inquiry should follow a similar model. berger explicitly referred to his events in toronto as “travelling teach-ins” (cited in stanton, 2012, p. 96) that he used to engage non-indigenous canadians. given that many people are likely unaware of parks’ impacts on indigenous peoples, a similar focus on education would be useful for a parks commission. listening to and documenting indigenous peoples’ stories of how parks have affected them would also be wise. elders, leaders, and community members should all be invited to give their testimony. the commission should seek to learn about the effects of parks, indigenous peoples’ conceptions of appropriate justice for the oppression they have endured, and how parks and indigenous peoples can together transform their relationship and advance indigenous, not settler, cultural and economic interests and sovereignty. public processes of truth seeking and truth telling both creates space for indigenous peoples to speak and be heard and improves existing understandings of the park–indigenous relationship. this is important work; agrawal and redford (2009) have articulated that understandings of this relationship should include: • a knowledge of how particular management objectives have led to displacement for conservation, • determining the exact number of people displaced for park creation, • the full social impacts of eviction and displacement, • how governments should address those impacts, and • how economic displacement compares to physical eviction from protected areas. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.3 while this is an expansive list, i would add that any inquiry should place its concerns within an explicit settler-colonial context, building a narrative that extends beyond simply counting the number of people displaced or identifying what has been lost through dispossession. as hughes (2012) noted, a fundamental problem with canada’s trc was that it essentially “drew a line” in the sand and declared “all this in the past was bad, we [settler-canadians] are sorry, and we have stopped” (p. 102). this was insufficient since settler-colonial structures and systems remain in place in canada. inquiries need to gather data related to their mandates, but situating that data within larger, systemic contexts is key (nagy, 2013; stanton, 2012). as corntassel et al. (2009) have argued, truth-telling should go together with community-centering actions for stories and truths to have meaningful effects. such a focus on “actions beyond stories” can facilitate the move from truth telling to acknowledging harm, which is the second stage of reconciliation. acknowledging harm can entail a variety of strategies, one of which is formal apologies. in 2008, for example, the government of canada apologized to indigenous peoples for its residential school system; likewise, the government of australia has apologized (also in 2008) for the stolen generations (johnson, 2011). i suggest that protected area managers should begin the second stage of reconciliation by giving their own apologies. apologies present challenges, for they are “performative” acts designed for perpetrators to latch onto as a sign of “progress or impending change” (martin, 2009, p. 50). states, not victims, tend to choose the time, manner, and nature of apologies (corntassel & holder, 2008; gibney & roxstrom, 2001). in this way, apologies can work to advance state stability instead of addressing the underlying causes of a problem (querengesser, 2013). apologies of this nature do not require that indigenous peoples to respond or even accept them—instead, they center the feelings and perspectives of settlers, who seek to “lift reconciliation out of the political mire and into national affect” (johnson, 2011, p. 193). however, despite apologies’ limitations, i remain convinced protected area leaders should apologize for the profound harm they have sometimes caused. yet acknowledging harm should not stop with government statements or apologies. imagine, for example, if park maps and brochures contained a call-out text box that acknowledged the origins of the park. great smoky mountains national park’s might read: “great smoky mountains national park occupies land violently, illegally seized from the cherokee nation in the winter of 1838-1839 by the u.s. army. some cherokee, descendants of the survivors of this ethnic cleansing, continue to reside in the mountains, on a small piece of their traditional territory adjacent to the park.” an acknowledgment for bunya mountains might note “bunya mountains national park is situated on unceded territory belonging to the jarowair, wakka wakka, and barunggam peoples. the park recognizes that it benefits from their dispossession, which was often violent, to this day. the jarowair, wakka wakka, and barunggam peoples continue to inhabit part of their ancestral homeland in this region.” notice that such acknowledgements would explicitly state the problematic nature of the park’s creation, specifically name the relevant indigenous communities, and call attention to communities’ continued presence. these three aspects are key for meaningful land acknowledgments. strong language such as “ethnic cleansing” and “unceded territory” may provoke some visitors; indeed, it should. as marche (2017) has stated: “at least the [land] acknowledgment has shifted the question of the indigenous crisis, from ‘what is wrong with them [indigenous peoples]?’ to ‘what is wrong with us 15 finegan: indigenous–protected area reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2018 [settler colonists]?’” (para. 17). it is necessary to assert the problem is part of settler colonist, not indigenous, society. land acknowledgments that do not foster reflection on harms inflicted by settlers are merely platitudes. an acknowledgment of harm and territory should unsettle histories and stories currently free from indigeneity. the third aspect of reconciliation is providing appropriate justice. this can take different forms in different contexts. a helpful way to think about justice-in-reconciliation is as deep, meaningful, community-centered and -driven healing processes (corntassel et al., 2009). corntassel et al. (2009) have offered the story of a community that designated a day to collectively demolish a residential school and then hold a feast as an example of justice. for parks, justice could involve any or all of the following: • respecting, preserving, and ensuring continued indigenous access to sacred sites within parks. this would include restricting or forbidding certain visitor activities, if desired by indigenous peoples. • fostering settler–indigenous learning and dialogue through meaningful interpretation of indigenous histories and perspectives on equal footing with settler-colonists’ stories. • permitting traditional use of parks and their resources, with parks always honoring existing treaty rights. • setting and achieving indigenous hiring goals, especially for interpretation and visitor education staff. indigenous peoples, not settlers, should be sharing indigenous stories and perspectives behind parks and the lands upon which they are situated. • prioritizing indigenous enterprises in park contracting and concessions, so that indigenous peoples may continue their longstanding economic relationships with their traditional territories. • offering park programming and materials in indigenous languages (given the importance of language in cultural maintenance; truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015). multilingual materials would also serve as a reminder to settler colonists of the continuation of indigenous peoples and cultures.18 • working with elders to help indigenous youth reconnect with their heritage and traditions. for example, katannilik territorial park in nunavut, canada, facilitates a knowledge camp for inuit youth to visit the park and learn directly from elders about inuit heritage and lifeways (canadian parks council, n.d.). • fully implementing the whakatane mechanism worldwide. • designing new management paradigms that reflect the moral and legal rights sovereign indigenous nations have with respect to their traditional territories. • ensuring that no new protected area is created on indigenous territories without the full, free, prior, and informed consent of the affected nations. 18 this is already being done at some sites, such as kakadu national park (parks australia, 2018) and auyuittuq national park (parks canada, 2010). 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.3 the key to reconciliation is not necessarily the form that appropriate justice takes, but rather that indigenous peoples themselves identify and drive the process. agencies need to directly ask indigenous peoples: “what is justice in this case? how can we recognize the past and create space for a better future?” as noted above, reconciliation must be accountable to indigenous peoples and their futures; indigenous peoples, not settler colonists, must make decisions about and approve final forms of justice. only then is reconciliation possible. careful readers may note an omission relating to land in the above list of justice options. justice and reconciliation are fundamentally about land and sovereignty. this is, i stipulate, the most vexing question before protected areas. but it is a pandora’s box that must be smashed open. recall that australia’s reconciliation process has stalled due to failure to address issues of land. there is no escaping the fact that protected areas in settler-colonial nations have been both the direct cause or incidental beneficiary of land seizures that were, at worst, violent and illegal and, at best, contested. potential land tenure changes are understandably troubling for some and may be difficult to achieve, given the public nature of protected area politics.19 as wilson (1991) has noted, public agencies are partially guided by their employees’ professional norms and peer-group expectations. as such, if those are not favorable towards indigenous peoples, reconciliation may be elusive. peters and andersen (2013) have noted that social norms and expectations are particularly salient in highly urbanized societies like canada; clark et al. (2017) have offered a similar interpretation, noting that “a significant minority” of settlers want to “do something” towards reconciliation with indigenous peoples (p. 382). yet, living in urban areas tends to make settler colonists more likely to stereotype indigenous peoples and believe that reconciliation ought to be delegated to a third party (clark et al., 2017; de costa & clark, 2016). protected area managers and agencies in urbanized places like canada and australia may thus find themselves caught between competing interests to reconcile with indigenous peoples and to avoid land tenure changes for the benefit of park clients.20 wilson (1991) has suggested that, in such cases, agencies will be “held erect,” doing little due to the pressure coming from all sides (p. 78). clark et al. (2017) have offered advice on avoiding agency do-nothingness, highlighting the need to “[cultivate] a wider sense of ownership of and responsibility both for unfinished business and for contemporary inequalities” (p. 394). these issues reinforce the usefulness of berger’s inquiryas-travelling-teach-in model for a commission regarding park–indigenous relationships. if, through the truth-seeking process, indigenous peoples state they wish to have their land returned, park agencies must be prepared to have difficult conversations about land tenure changes. if parks choose not to have these conversations, then they are not reconciling with indigenous peoples. true reconciliation is not a feel-good effort to wash away guilt caused by the past with minimal cost. instead, meaningful reconciliation requires both a willingness to acknowledge the privilege accumulated through settler colonialism and, perhaps more importantly, to relinquish that ill-gotten privilege and thereby advance indigenous sovereignty, nationhood, and self-determination. a failure to engage in good faith with indigenous demands surrounding land and resource claims after truth telling and acknowledging 19 parks are generally governed by public agencies and are subject to client politics and capture by public interest groups (wilson, 1991). 20 for example, the tourism industry, environmentalists, visitors, etc. 17 finegan: indigenous–protected area reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2018 harm would reveal those actions to be hollow. tuck and yang (2012) have articulated this failure as settler colonists’ “moves towards innocence” (p. 3), in which settlers attempt to reduce their guilty feelings while simultaneously reinforcing and sustaining settler-colonist hegemony. moreover, if indigenous peoples demand the return of land taken from them for park creation, those demands should be addressed through nation-to-nation dialogue grounded in good-faith, a desire to provide justice, and an accountability to indigenous futures. as huyse (2003) has written: “peaceful coexistence, trust, and empathy do not develop in a sustained way if structural injustices remain” (p. 21). i do not stipulate that land tenure reform is inherently part of reconciliation, but rather that reconciliation demands park managers listen to indigenous peoples and be accountable to their goals, which may include land tenure changes. park–indigenous reconciliation is fundamentally an exercise in seeking restorative justice and a dismantling of persistent settler-colonial structures. if indigenous futures and goals permeate reconciliation efforts, the process may succeed. this may require park managers to reconsider parks’ place and function. after over a half-millennium of settler–indigenous conflict, it is time to be courageous, seek truths, acknowledge harm, and work to provide indigenous-centered forms of justice. examples of existing park–indigenous reconciliation park managers might find reconciliation to be intimidating or disquieting, but it is not a zero-sum game that must end with the dissolution of parks. so long as reconciliation is guided by and accountable to indigenous peoples and their futures, reconciliation can take different forms in different places. i will end this article by highlighting a few cases in which park managers have started transforming their relationship with indigenous peoples. indigenous protected areas (ipas) reimagine protected areas as institutions governed by and responsive to indigenous peoples themselves. canada’s 2018 federal budget includes $1.3 billion cad for conservation efforts and “puts indigenous people in charge of protecting land” (galloway, 2018, para. 1) with dedicated funding for ipas. this builds on a 2017 announcement that the labrador inuit will direct the management of 380,000 square kilometers of the labrador sea, which will include marine protected areas (galloway, 2017). in australia, ipas started in 1997 (ross et al., 2009) and have been described as a source of “pride in what has been achieved in a short time and with a small government investment” (szabo & smyth, 2003, p. 7). australian ipas are fully voluntary, and the level of non-indigenous support is up to individual ipa managers—although a condition of outside support is that management plans must center conservation (bauman & smyth, 2007). roughly 17% of protected area land in australia is part of an ipa (szabo & smyth, 2003). szabo and smyth (2003) have noted the significant advantages that aboriginal peoples see in australian ipas, including: “getting traditional owners back on country . . . transferring knowledge between generations and strengthening languages . . . re-establishing traditional burning practices . . . providing training and employment . . . [and] promoting renewed interest about caring for the country” (p. 7). ipas in both canada and australia are, so far, succeeding at centering and affirmatively supporting indigenous rights and aspirations. 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.3 meanwhile, in the united states, fort laramie national historical site protects a 19th century fur trading and military outpost where the northern plains indian nations and the u.s. negotiated the 1868 treaty of fort laramie. the treaty is a milestone in u.s.–indigenous relations, as it essentially created the modern reservation system (u.s. national park service, 2017b). moreover, the park “continues to be regarded by american indian tribes as the gathering site for negotiations” (u.s. national park service, 2017b, p. 8). in 2014, thomas baker became superintendent of the park (scottsbluff star-herald staff, 2014). before his tenure, the park primarily focused on the fort’s role as a fur trading center and military post along several east–west colonization trails (u.s. national park service, 2016). since assuming his position, baker has brought the park’s role as a site of settler–indigenous negotiations into the park’s foundation statement, which guides all management and programming at the park. under superintendent baker’s leadership, the park has worked with 25 affiliated treaty tribes on a bicentennial commemoration of the 1868 treaty signing, an event that will highlight “the resilience of the tribes” (u.s. national park service, 2016, para. 9). importantly, the u.s. national park service (2016) has affirmed that “the park wishes to provide logistical support for the tribes to permanently tell the complete story of fort laramie, not just the military story that has been interpreted since its establishment in 1938” (para. 9). fort laramie is a good example of a park moving towards reconciliation without being compelled by the need to solve an immediate conflict. superintendent baker has chosen to attempt to undo of the park’s disregard for indigenous stories and perspectives, challenging the settler-colonial desire to erase indigeneity and claim space and stories. roughly 2,200 miles northeast of fort laramie is torngat mountains national park in labrador, canada, which preserves 3,700 square miles of arctic mountains, fjords, and tundra. as a fly-in-only park with virtually no visitor facilities, the park might seem to be a wilderness without people, but it is not. labrador inuit continue to inhabit and use this land. with support from parks canada, labrador inuit are sustaining their cultural identity and sovereignty in the torngats. the canadian crown and labrador inuit negotiated the labrador inuit land claim agreement in the early 2000s. during these negotiations, the two parties agreed to jointly create and manage torngat mountains national park. unlike many other world heritage sites, canada gazetted torngat mountains with the full, free, prior, and informed consent of the affected indigenous nation. though this case is an exception to common practice (disko & tugendhat, 2014), it could serve as a valuable example for the creation and management of other parks. additionally, torngat mountains is an important source of economic opportunity for the labrador inuit, who have preference in park hiring and contracting (indigenous and northern affairs canada, 2008). as much as possible, the park leases physical assets from inuit corporations rather than purchasing items outright. park visitors engage the services of inuit-owned guides and concessionaries (fugmann, 2012). this ensures that labrador inuit continue to economically benefit from their traditional territory. 19 finegan: indigenous–protected area reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2018 finally, the park is cooperatively managed by parks canada and the labrador inuit via the torngat mountains cooperative management board. this arrangement is not immune from criticism,21 but leblanc and leblanc (2010) have noted that the management board has a unique ability to “speak directly to the management and staff of the park” (p. 24). the fact that park employees are mostly inuit reinforces inuit power over the park. in the torngats, criticisms of parks canada are somewhat less persuasive than they are elsewhere. however, it would be too much to say that parks canada deserves unqualified accolades for their work at torngat mountains. yes, much has been achieved— but this progress is rooted in talks conducted at a bargaining table for the labrador inuit land claims agreement. the day that parks like torngat mountains exist without a land claim behind them will be a day to celebrate. concluding remarks deciding to write about park–indigenous reconciliation filled me with anxiety: can settler-colonial parks ever hope to reconcile themselves with indigenous peoples? is there a clear path forward? can “reconciliation” be more than a trendy, feel-good buzzword? i have argued that the answer to each of these questions is an emphatic yes. there are many avenues through which protected area agencies may work towards reconciliation, so long as they allow themselves to be guided by and held accountable to indigenous peoples. reconciliation does not mean no new parks, nor does it entail the wholesale condemnation of parks as inherently evil institutions— torngat mountains, for example, demonstrates this. reconciliation offers park managers and indigenous peoples the opportunity to confront their shared past and address it by moving forward together in fraternal, rather than paternal or exclusionary, relations. for reconciliation to succeed, non-indigenous peoples must recognize and actively support indigenous peoples’ sovereignty. indigenous futures should be the guiding light for this work. if the end goal is not to provide restorative justice, then it is hard to see how reconciliation will allow for the settlercolonist–indigenous relationship to be reset or create space for healing. reconciliation is, i believe, at its core a humbling act. the protected area profession must accept responsibility for past harms. reconciliation asks settler colonists to turn a critical eye on themselves and their institutions, reflecting on how they treat and have treated those who have been their friends, neighbors, and hosts for centuries. it calls settlers to relinquish their privilege and focus on advancing indigenous sovereignty, rather than continuing to blithely assert settler-colonial control over land and natural resource management. 21 that is, parks canada retains final decision-making power and is accountable to the government of canada, not to inuit. 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.3 references 88th congress of the united states. 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(2017, july 28). families of murdered and missing women press inquiry to examine policing more closely. toronto star. retrieved from https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2017/07/28/families-of-murdered-and-missingwomen-press-inquiry-to-examine-policing-more-closely.html truth and reconciliation commission of canada. (2015). what we have learned: principles of truth and reconciliation. ottawa, on. retrieved from http://www.trc.ca/websites/trcinstitution/file/2015/findings/principles of truth and reconciliation.pdf tuck, e., & gaztambide-fernandez, r. a. (2013). curriculum, replacement, and settler futurity. journal of curriculum theorizing, 29(1), 72-90. tuck, e., & yang, k. w. (2012). decolonization is not a metaphor. decolonization: indigeneity, education, and society, 1(1), 1-40. tupper, s. 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(2017a). foundation document: cape cod national seashore. wellfleet, ma: u.s. national park service. u.s. national park service. (2017b). foundation document: fort laramie national historical site. fort laramie, wy: : u.s. national park service. u.s. national park service. (2017c). people. retrieved from https://www.nps.gov/caco/learn/historyculture/people.htm 28 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.3 veracini, l. (2011). introducing settler colonial studies. settler colonial studies, 1(1), 1-10. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/2201473x.2011.10648799 vowel, c. (2016). indigenous writes: a guide to first nations, métis & inuit issues in canada. winnipeg, mb: portage & main press. waziyatawin. (2009). you can’t un-ring a bell: demonstrating contrition through action. in g. younging, j. dewar, & m. degagné (eds.), response, responsibility, and renewal: canada’s truth and reconciliaiton journey (pp. 191-202). ottawa, on: aboriginal healing foundation. west, p., igoe, j., & brockington, d. (2006). parks and peoples: the social impact of protected areas. annual review of anthropology, 35, 251-277. doi: https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.anthro.35.081705.123308 wilson, j. q. (1991). bureaucracy: what government agencies do and why they do it. new york, n.y.: basic books wolfe, p. (2006). settler colonialism and the elimination of the native. journal of genocide research, 8(4), 387-409. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/14623520601056240 zach, b. e. (2016, december 14). in the badlands, where hope for the nation’s first tribal park has faded. new york times. retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/14/travel/badlandsfaded-hope-for-indian-tribal-park.html?_r=0 29 finegan: indigenous–protected area reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2018 the international indigenous policy journal july 2018 reflection, acknowledgement, and justice: a framework for indigenous-protected area reconciliation chance finegan recommended citation reflection, acknowledgement, and justice: a framework for indigenous-protected area reconciliation abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license reflection, acknowledgement, and justice: a framework for indigenous-protected area reconciliation i could turn you to stone: indigenous blockades in an age of climate change the international indigenous policy journal volume 9 issue 3 special issue: indigenous peoples, climate change, and environmental stewardship article 7 july 2018 i could turn you to stone: indigenous blockades in an age of climate change patrick c. canning vancouver island university / private practice lawyer, patrick.c.canning@gmail.com recommended citation canning, p. c. (2018). i could turn you to stone: indigenous blockades in an age of climate change. the international indigenous policy journal, 9(3). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.7 i could turn you to stone: indigenous blockades in an age of climate change abstract indigenous peoples in canada and around the world have, for years, used blockades and direct action when alternative means of asserting their rights have failed. the secwépemc first nation of british columbia, canada, has a myth where a character, sk’elép, encounters strangers who try to “transform” him, but fail. he tells them he could turn them to stone, but he will not. this myth is used as a lens to reflect, from a settler perspective, on the potential for future indigenous-led blockades, which could reach the point of mass economic shutdowns, in response to a lack of action on both indigenous rights and climate change. up until now, the policy of most colonial nations has been to deal with indigenous blockades by force or at best with localised solutions. this policy will not work regarding climate change. this article proposes that the western world faces a stark choice: truly embrace “free, prior, and informed consent” (fpic), or else face the possibility of large scale shutdowns from a growing alliance of indigenous peoples, environmentalists, and concerned citizens. keywords indigenous blockades, aboriginal protests, pipeline protests, climate change, climate movement, resurgence, free prior and informed consent, policy recommendations acknowledgments thank you to the reviewers who took the time to give very thoughtful and helpful feedback. to emery hartley and greg blanchette for last minute reviews. to claire, marion, and iona for moral support and inspiration. and to joe david for essential teachings. disclaimer this article is intended for general information purposes only and does not convey legal advice. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ “i could turn you to stone”—indigenous blockades in an age of climate change in a 2010 document memorializing a letter sent in 1910 the secwépemc first nation (also known as the shuswap) in the interior of british columbia, the story of sk’elép, a coyote or trickster figure from their mythology is retold. as the story goes, in the ancient past visitors came to secwépemc territory and tried to transform sk’elép. they were unable to. as they tried, he sat looking at them and finally said, you are making the world right—so am i. why try to punish me when i have done you no harm? this is my country. why do you come here and interfere with my work? if i wished, i could turn you into stone, but as you have likely been sent into the world, like myself, to do good, i will allow you to pass, but you must leave this country as quickly as you can. we should be friends, but must not interfere with each others’ work. (shuswap nation tribal council, 2010, p. 2) the secwépemc have occupied south-central british columbia for at least 10,000 years (ignace & ignace, 2017). this article does not purport to speak to what the story means to the secwépemc first nation, but rather reflects upon it from the perspective of settlers in a post-colonial context. sk’elep is a prominent figure to the secwépemc, who is featured in many stories and lessons as the giver of laws and customs, and the story reflects on the initial settler–indigenous relationship. in its way of reflecting on the relational nature of the meeting of cultures, it is similar to the two-row wampum story of central and eastern canada (seck, 2017). this story was chosen because it was used in the 1910 memorial to reflect the settler–indigenous relationship, and also for the particular motif of “i could turn you into stone.” the phrase is being used here as a metaphor for the possibility that indigenous peoples could paralyse the western economy, or part of it, through the use of blockades. that is particularly so if climate change is not addressed and indigenous peoples are not empowered to address it. the sk’elep story relays the principle that “each nation collectively holds its respective homeland and its resources at the exclusion of outsiders” (shuswap nation tribal council, 2010, p. 1). in that sense, it reflects the connection with land and the responsibility to protect it, which often undergirds actions relating to unwanted resource-use decisions. some examples of this are the 1984 meares island confrontation over old-growth logging (morrow, 2014); the 1990 “oka crisis” in oka, ontario (hedican, 2012; ladner, 2010); the 2013 elsipogtog fracking conflict in new brunswick (simpson, 2013); and in 2016 at standing rock in north dakota where the blockaders and protesters were called “water protectors” (rivas, 2017, pp. 66-67). europeans came and tried to transform indigenous peoples, and some would say they were successful (vanslyke, 2013; wahlquist, 2016). however, despite the cultural genocide in which the british-colonial and then canadian governments engaged, indigenous peoples and cultures remain. not only are indigenous peoples still here, but they are experiencing a resurgence with profound implications for canada and the entire world (saul, 2014). this resurgence has been expressed in growing political weight, legal victories, a growing population, increasing levels of education, increased participation in the business world, and increased cultural notice (manuel, 2017; nagel, 1996; saul, 2014). 1 canning: i could turn you to stone published by scholarship@western, 2018 throughout colonial history, but particularly and increasingly as part of this resurgence, indigenous peoples the world over have used blockades and direct action to get results when all else fails. this is a strategy that one could say western governments have encouraged by ensuring that all else generally does fail (borrows, 2016; hedican, 2012; manuel, 2017). the indigenous resurgence is arguably one of the two biggest phenomena currently shaping our future for generations to come. the other is climate change. the trapping of heat in our atmosphere due to increased greenhouse gases is already transforming our weather and our world (intergovernmental panel on climate change, 2018). the section on climate change will discuss these impacts generally and the impacts on indigenous peoples specifically. it will invite the reader to imagine what those impacts will mean to indigenous peoples, why it is a life or death issue for many indigenous peoples, and how it therefore could push indigenous peoples to desperate acts. climate change has disproportionate effects on indigenous peoples who live in the most directly impacted areas, as they tend to be more connected to the land and already marginalized (ramoscastillo, castellanos, & mclean, 2017; wilkes, 2006). that is additionally unfair when you consider that indigenous peoples have had only a minor role in causing climate change. climate change is a problem that cannot be solved without meaningful and widespread change. this article argues that the western world faces a stark choice: embrace the principle of free, prior and informed consent (fpic), as embodied in article 32 of the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip, 2007), or face the possibility of largescale shutdowns from a growing alliance of indigenous peoples, environmentalists, and people from all walks of life simply concerned about their futures. undrip was adopted by the un general assembly in 2007. article 32 of undrip is the most controversial, as it embraces the principle free, prior and informed consent for states, vis-à-vis indigenous peoples. that was the main reason for canada’s original refusal to sign, although they subsequently have done so (borrows, 2016; manuel, 2017; truth and reconciliation commission of canada [trc], 2015). the precise meaning of the term, and whether it creates a further duty to consult or a right to veto has led to considerable academic, public, and political discussion, with no clear resolution in sight. in canada, it will likely be resolved in the courts (imai, 2017). as we will examine, many authors have for years pointed out the possibility of large-scale blockades by indigenous peoples, such as those in relation to the oka crisis in 1990, idle no more in 2012, elsipogtog in 2013, and north dakota in 2016 (manuel, 2017). the threat or possibility of large-scale blockades, direct action, or shutdowns has loomed in these past events and others, but never reached the point of paralysing the economy or being a mass shutdown. it is proposed here that a failure to deal with climate change, particularly as it affects indigenous peoples, and any failure to empower indigenous peoples to protect themselves from climate change, could be a tipping point leading to drastic mass action. to any post-colonial settler looking at this story through the lens of climate change and indigenous actions, it should be a sobering reflection on the settler– indigenous relationship. the threat of being “turned to stone” highlights one potentially disastrous path—that of mass blockades and shutdowns by an indigenous–environmentalist–citizen alliance. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.7 this article is not advising the use of blockades, but rather is intended to draw attention to the increasing likelihood of them, based on various courses of action, and also suggests how to avoid that eventuality. this article will be laid out as follows: the first step will be to briefly give some background, review the related history of colonialism, and then discuss the indigenous resurgence. after those foundational matters are dealt with, the four theses will be discussed: a. that the current and longstanding conflict over indigenous land rights and decision making is bringing these two forces inevitably to a point of conflict; b. that the policy thus far in most colonial nations has been to ignore land rights issues, and to let the police, or at times the military, deal with them as conflicts arise (hedican, 2012); c. that because of the nature of climate change as both a global and a life-or-death issue, especially for indigenous people, the aforementioned policy will not work and will only lead to spiralling conflict; and d. that there is a better way: granting the veto power envisioned by undrip, ensuring its meaning is completely clear to all parties, and empowering indigenous peoples to develop their own governance and decision-making systems that are as free from the bounds of colonialism as possible. this article uses canada as a lens, but the issue is international and global in scope and will also be discussed on those levels. background the struggle over oil and gas development is merely the latest in a myriad of other issues in the struggle for indigenous sovereignty and recognition. the difference between oil and gas as an issue and past resource struggles involving indigenous peoples is that the threat of oil and gas development is not just local through spills, etc., but global, through climate change. the spectre of climate change has been looming for decades and now, with increasing storms, floods, and fires, is becoming a stark reality (gabbatiss, 2017). this battle against pipelines and runaway climate change squares indigenous peoples and environmentalists against the oil industry and the governments that promote it. the most recent front may have been in burnaby, against the trans mountain pipeline, but there have been many other recent incarnations, among them: north dakota’s standing rock protests against the keystone xl and northern gateway pipelines, in ecuador, the peruvian amazon, nigeria, kenya, among the inuit in the north, and too many others to list (boos, 2015; cultural survival, 2017; finer, jenkins, pimm, keane, & ross, 2008; lobe, 2002; manuel 2017; orta-martínez & finer, 2010; raygorodetsky, 2017; suzuki & moola, 2016). in peru, in 2009, indigenous peoples resisted the exploitation of amazonian oil reserves with peaceful protest for months. however, after the police were ordered to remove blockades by force, 50 indigenous people were killed, hundreds more wounded or arrested, and nine police officers were also killed (vidal, 2009). as this article is being written, indigenous and non-indigenous protestors are being arrested in burnaby, a suburb of vancouver, british columbia, over the trans mountain pipeline (trans mountain). the trans mountain pipeline runs from the alberta tar sands to burnaby, bc, just outside of vancouver. it 3 canning: i could turn you to stone published by scholarship@western, 2018 was built in the 1950s and, in 2013, then owner kinder morgan applied to twin the pipeline and nearly triple its capacity (canadian press, 2018b; “trans mountain pipeline,” n.d.b). there were early protests in 2014 over trans mountain, and the public review process was criticised as being undemocratic and even “fraudulent.” nonetheless, the federal government approved the application in november 2016, with the new bc new democratic party (ndp) government opposed to it and the alberta ndp government in favour, resulting in threatened and initiated (although incomplete) constitutional litigation. in that context, serious protests began in march 2018 and ended in august, with over 200 people being arrested for contempt of court and other charges (canadian press, 2018b; trans mountain pipeline, n.d.a). on april 7, 2018, in burnaby, the grand chief of the bc first nations organization, the union of bc indian chiefs (ubcic), along with key executives and such notables as author naomi klein, blockaded the trans mountain facility (then owned by kinder morgan), stopping work. unlike previous blockades, kinder morgan did not ask the rcmp to remove the protesters, but instead shut down operations for the day (canadian press, 2018a; ward, smart, bennett, rabson, & smith, 2018). on the following day, kinder morgan announced they were suspending all non-essential work on the pipeline, partly due to the intensity of the opposition, and expressed concerns about the wise use of shareholder resources. in the face of massive opposition and numerous lawsuits, largely from indigenous peoples, some speculated that the project is not viable, and this action was just a way to pressure the government to push their pipeline through or to get paid for having it fail (s. klein, 2018). around that time, the chiefs of ontario signed on to the north america-wide treaty alliance against tar sands expansion, adding a further 133 first nations to the 150 nations that had already signed (meyer, 2018a; treaty alliance against tar sands expansion, 2018b), reflecting the growing power and leveraging of solidarity (treaty alliance against tar sands expansion, 2018a). since that time, in a number of steps (or missteps, depending on one’s point of view), the government of canada became the new owner of the proposed trans mountain pipeline. when kinder morgan shut down work in april, they gave canada a one-month ultimatum—ensure their pipeline would get built, or they would pull out. canada instead offered to buy the pipeline for $4.5 billion, with a projected real cost of over $15 billion (allan, 2018). on august 30, 2018, the canadian federal court of appeal rendered its decision on the 12 legal challenges to the proposed pipeline’s approvals, striking them down for not having taken into account the negative impacts of increased marine traffic and for having failed to properly consult indigenous peoples (c. smith, 2018;tsleil-waututh nation v. canada (attorney general), 2018). the case was initiated directly in the canadian federal court of appeal, in 12 separate challenges to the november 29, 2016, federal approval on the basis of insufficient consultation, and not taking marine shipping into account. those cases were filed by a number of first nations, municipalities, and environmental groups, including chief ron ignace on his own and on behalf of the stk’emluosemc te secwépemc of the secwépemc nation. again, to remind the reader—the secwépemc are the nation that tells the story of sk’elép, who said, “i could turn you to stone” (shuswap nation tribal council, 2010, p. 2). the next day, kinder morgan shareholders voted to accept canada’s $4.5 billion-dollar offer, and canada become the owner of the project (clancy, 2018). on september 21, 2018, canada announced a 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.7 new, 22-week consultation process, with a longer and as of now uncertain timeline for consulting indigenous peoples (meyer, 2018b; wyld, 2018). the above story simply reflects a policy that this article proposes exists: that of ignoring indigenous concerns, rights, and land claims, and instead pushing projects forward and then resolving issues through conflict. it also clearly reflects the need for a reminder that there is a better way. at the same time, the story may reflect some progress. compared to earlier incidents, to be discussed later in this article (such as the oka crisis of 1990), the canadian government could be said to have used restraint in their application of force, in that the military was not used. the broad presence of non-indigenous protestors could have been a factor in the greater restraint, it is impossible to know. perhaps most importantly, the story reflects another powerful tool that the secwépemc, who tell the story, and all indigenous peoples have to turn unjustified projects to stone—the law. this would also be a useful point to note that robert lovelace, in his short work “notes from prison,” openly describes the four-prong strategy he used in fighting uranium mining in ontario and advises other indigenous peoples to do the same. the prongs are: research, community education, legal action, and direct action (lovelace, 2009). it would appear that the secwépemc may have used this strategy to powerful effect in their fight against the trans mountain pipeline (canadian press, 2018b; tsleil-waututh nation v. canada (attorney general), 2018). a history of trying to transform indigenous peoples the colonial project started in 1492, with christopher columbus’s arrival in the new world (often referred to as his “discovery” of it). it was enabled by papal bulls, or announcements made by the pope, in 1493 that laid the groundwork for the “doctrine of discovery,” the principle that european powers used to justify colonization of the americas, australia, and other places around the world (trc, 2015, p. 46). in 1497, john cabot arrived in newfoundland and, throughout the 1500s, european powers moved out into the world to conquer and claim at will, on the basis of religious and philosophical justifications (polack, 2018; trc, 2015). that said, colonialism did not really begin for indigenous peoples in western north america, and other places, until much later. the secwépemc did not encounter white people until the arrival of alexander mackenzie in 1793, and not in numbers until much later. the newcomers brought smallpox, which, between 1862 and 1863, wiped out two-thirds of the secwépemc population. this allowed wholesale takeover of secwépemc lands as settlers moved in to claim the country for themselves (ignace & ignace, 2017). the colonial process in north america can be described by a set of deliberate policies, actions, and events. a key event was the introduction of diseases that wiped out tens of millions of indigenous people (sellars, 2016). the first recorded epidemic in north america occurred in new england in 1616; it wiped out so many indigenous people that when settlers arrived a few years later all they found were bones, skulls, and abandoned villages and corn fields (reo & parker, 2013). an early policy, which was critical to the colonial project on the great plains, was the intentional destruction of food sources, such as bison (often referred to at the time as buffalo; phippen, 2016). the early and ongoing cultural invasion of missionaries was a key part of breaking down indigenous spirituality, family relationships, and cultural practices. it was state-sanctioned and integral to the colonial project whose key aim was the acquisition of land and resources (trc, 2015). some other colonial tools included offering bounties for killing indigenous people (paul, 2000), and signing but not honouring treaties (trc, 2015). 5 canning: i could turn you to stone published by scholarship@western, 2018 after confederation, unifying a number of provinces into the nation of canada, assimilation became the central policy regarding indigenous peoples. one of the key methods of assimilation was the residential school system. within that system, indigenous children experienced unprecedented levels of abuse, including harsh discipline, malnutrition, beatings, torture, sexual abuse and exploitation, medical malpractice and experimentation, and death (saul, 2014; sellars, 2016; trc, 2015). they were stripped of their language and culture, all for the purpose of answering the question of who owned the land. the thought was that if indigenous people were assimilated into mainstream society there would no longer be an issue (saul, 2014; trc, 2015). other elements of the post-confederation assimilation project were: the creation of indian hospitals where medical experiments were conducted, the banning of potlatches, banning indigenous peoples from hiring lawyers, disenfranchisement, and the pass system (saul, 2014; sterritt & dufresne, 2018; trc, 2015). mainstream canadian society has been fairly criticized for misrepresenting or understating the impacts of the colonial process and their depth. for that reason, it may be helpful to explore how colonialism is defined by indigenous canadians. umeek (e. richard atleo), hereditary chief of the nuu-chah-nulth, professor, and author, described colonialism by referencing the subtitle of darwin’s major work, on the origin of the species by means of natural selection, or the preservation of favoured races in the struggle for life. umeek points out, “the identity of the ‘favoured races’ and the identity of those not favoured translates into the coercive and hegemonic rule of the colonizer over the colonized” (umeek, 2011, p. 168). bev sellars, grandmother, former chief of the xatśūll first nation (soda creek indian band, part of the broader secwepemc first nation), indigenous historian, author, and activist, quotes malcolm x to describe how settler society views indigenous peoples even today: “i have no respect for a society that will crush a man and then criticize him for not being able to stand up under the weight” (cited in sellars, 2016, p. 185). sellars points out that the worst traumas foisted upon european society—the great plagues—had breaks of at least 40 years where people could recover and repopulate, but that the indigenous peoples of the americas have had no such breaks from disease and the weight of colonialism, for hundreds of years (sellars, 2016). canada’s truth and reconciliation commission (trc, 2015) has described colonialism as “cultural genocide,” as has canada’s current prime minister justin trudeau. others do not use the qualifier “cultural” and simply term canadian history regarding indigenous peoples as genocide (woolford, 2009). disadvantages have been stacked on the indigenous peoples of the americas and the world in the form of colonialism. key parts of that colonialism extend to the present day as government failures to deal with land issues and treaties, to honour treaties, and to resolve disputes over resources (hedican, 2013; umeek, 2011; wilkes, 2006). more recently, there has been the gross overrepresentation of indigenous peoples in prisons throughout the post-colonial world (trc, 2015; wilkes, 2006). in australia, aboriginal people make up 2.5% of the population, but 26% of the adult prison population, as of 2014 (weatherburn, 2014). the numbers are similar in canada, where indigenous peoples make up 4% of the population, yet 27% of the males and 43% of females in sentenced custody, with numbers in some provinces and territories as high as 71%, 78%, and up to 100% in nunavut (johnson, 2014; mcintosh & mckeen, 2018). the comparable numbers in australia and canada are due to their shared roots in colonialism (wahlquist, 2016). 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.7 in 2009, robert lovelace, an algonquin spiritual leader, wrote an apt description of the colonial process while in a maximum-security prison in kingston, ontario. he was there for the crime of contempt of court, for blockading uranium exploration in his traditional territory. he wrote that colonialism is “the process by which a group having exhausted its sustainability options dispossesses another group of its” (lovelace, 2009, p. ix). further reflecting on the colonial process, and the various means employed within it, robert lovelace (2009) wrote: using seduction or force, a dominant group undermines the power of multiple others. this is the principle mechanism that separates much of humanity from the sacred relationships with the earth and has become normalized in the governance of nations. (p. ix). a key part of the colonialist project has been the attempt to sever the connection between land and person. this has been done both overtly (manuel, 2017; saul, 2014; sellars, 2016; trc, 2015) and covertly (gill & zwibel, 2017; manuel, 2017; wilkes 2006). overtly, a key purpose of the purpose of the residential school system, which ran for over 150 years in canada, ending in 1996, was to break the cultural connection with the land in order to enable settlement (trc, 2015). both overt and covert methods were used in the fbi takedown of the american indian movement (aim) in 1972 in south dakota (churchill, 2003), and covert methods in spying on idle no more organisers in canada in 2012 (gill & zwibel, 2017). the history of colonialism in the americas, australia, new zealand, africa, and throughout the world, up to today, is an ugly one because of the acts that were committed against indigenous peoples. it is made even uglier when the reasons are considered—the acquisition of wealth in the form of land and resources. the policy of dealing with land issues through discrete conflicts indigenous peoples are the most disadvantaged group in canada, and government policies that fail to deal with land claims and resource issues have led to conflict, over and over again (hedican, 2012, 2013). when other routes have failed or been exhausted, “indigenous peoples in canada have used direct action as an important means of achieving social and political justice when more conventional routes have been blocked” (wilkes, corrigall-brown, & myers, 2010, p. 328; see also blomley, 1996; borrows, 2016). indigenous peoples have had to use marches and blockades to draw attention to issues and protect land and rights. road blockades and other tactics can be an efficient way to get attention without having the numbers of people available that could be drawn on in areas with a larger population base, and their use continues to increase (hedican, 2012; wilkes, 2006). blockades also turn the norm on its head, by restricting settler access to land, where normally and historically it is indigenous peoples whose movements are or have been restricted (borrows, 2016; blomley, 1996). blomley (1996) gave a thorough analysis of indigenous blockades in british columbia from 1984 to 1995, noting that there were 30 in the summer of 1990 alone. as blockades evolved as a tool, “many were now placed on public routes, including major roads and rail lines,” and that at one high point 7 canning: i could turn you to stone published by scholarship@western, 2018 vancouver newspapers “even began publishing traffic advisories for travelers, detailing interior blockades” (blomley, 1996, p. 9). the spike in blockades in british columbia in 1990 was at least partly caused by solidarity and support blockades, which sprung up all across canada in support of the mohawks at khanesatake, in the conflict known as the oka crisis (blomley, 1996). the whole world watched the oka crisis: the canadian military was called in, a policeman was killed, an indigenous elder died, and a 14-year-old indigenous girl was stabbed in the chest by a soldier with a bayonet on his rifle (horn-millar, 2014; york & pindera, 1991). the conflict was over the municipality’s attempt to bulldoze a sacred burial ground to expand a golf course. oka triggered a number of solidarity blockades in support of those under siege; one of which, at the mercier bridge in montreal, in addition to blockades of highways 132, 138, and 207, ground traffic to a halt over a broad area of montreal (borrows, 2016). oka is described as “a defining moment for both indigenous peoples and settler society separately, and collectively” (ladner, 2010), and comparisons are already being drawn to trans mountain protests in burnaby, british columbia (philip & simon, 2018). oka is an important lens for this article because another view of this topic is that it is about “the big one”—not an earthquake, but rather the everpresent, dreaded possibility of mass blockades by indigenous peoples, with a serious, widespread shutdown of economy and society. in the process of reflecting on some of the more serious conflicts and blockades in canada over the period of 1990 to 2007, hedican (2012) asked and reflected on some very reasonable questions: the wider question in these protest cases is: why are there not adequate means of conflict resolution that would avert such violent confrontations, which endanger people’s lives? the political leaders of this country, both at the provincial and federal levels, appear reticent about becoming involved, at least until the confrontation goes too far and results in property damage and personal injury. why, also, are the officers of the various police forces placed in harm’s way without adequate guidelines as to their appropriate conduct in such incidents? certainly, aboriginal protests pose an ambiguous situation for the police who are apt to feel uncomfortable with the idea that they are forced to act as mediators between first nations people and government officials in what are, in many cases, land claims negotiations that are essentially matters of civil litigation. (p. 3) in other words, if matters can be resolved with money, buy-outs, compensation, or in court, why are those avenues not pursued before violence arises instead of after? doesn’t this approach encourage violence? where resource or development disputes between indigenous peoples and the government start out as disputes with local settlers, state enforcement often steps in and uses force in suppressing dissent. take for example the 1995 occupation of ipperwash provincial park in ontario by the stoney point ojibway first nation, which lead to a conflict in which police shot and killed an unarmed man, dudley george. the ojibway occupied the park as a last resort to push the government to deal with their claim that the park, formerly reserve land that was appropriated under the war measures act, be returned to them (hedican, 2012). the resulting inquiry was known as the ipperwash inquiry. it found, relying in part on the work of indigenous legal scholar john borrows that “land and treaties are central sources for 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.7 these conflicts,” and that there are three main catalysts for conflict: unresolved land claims, natural resources regulatory regimes, and actual or potential desecration of sacred aboriginal sites or burial grounds (cited in commissioner of the ipperwash inquiry, 2007, p. 21). in their submissions to the ipperwash inquiry, the chiefs of ontario (2006) stated, until the fundamental issues that give rise to conflict are resolved, future protests are a certainty. how then do we each work together to avoid future tragedies? the chiefs of ontario submit that all levels of government would be wise to learn from past mistakes. the province of ontario (and canada) has been slow to resolve the underlying issues regarding first nations’ access to lands and resources. unless and until these issues are addressed to the satisfaction of all parties, future conflict is inevitable. (paras. 107-108) in burnt church, new brunswick, in 2000, a violent dispute erupted over fishing rights. it was initially between local fishers and mi’kmaq fishers, with violence initiated by locals. however, when the royal canadian mounted police (rcmp) and department of fisheries and oceans (dfo) stepped in, they essentially took over the role of the local fishers involved by taking up their cause (borrows, 2016). the rcmp and dfo used extreme force against largely unarmed civilian mi’kmaq fishers, running over their boats with larger boats and then beating and pepper spraying them once in the water (obomsawin, 2002). those unarmed mi’kmaq fishers were later charged with assaulting a peace officer and resisting arrest. in september 2001, the terrorist attacks known as 9/11 occurred and, in the aftermath, the consequences of violent action increased, and the pressure on indigenous activists to be peaceful activists increased along with it (horn-millar, 2014). since 9/11, the use of covert measures such as spying have increased. manuel (2017) described how both overt and covert methods have been used against indigenous activists: . . . the rcmp and national security officers have infiltrated our organisations and will use these infiltrators for information to convict us and, very often, as agents provocateurs who try to incite violence which they can use to isolate us and give the green light to the rcmp, provincial police or army to violently oppress us. violence is the game of our oppressor. our response is nonviolent resistance. (pp. 233-234) proulx (2014) argued that state surveillance is part of the ongoing colonial project. gill and zwibel (2017) documented how the canadian government has monitored indigenous activists and advocates. they tell the story of how dr. cindy blackstock, a children’s rights advocate who was fighting the government to provide equal funding for indigenous children, was monitored: . . . between 2009 and 2011, dr. blackstock was subject to extensive monitoring by indigenous and northern affairs canada (inac)— the government department responsible for indigenous issues—and the department of justice. officials monitored her personal and professional activities on facebook and attended between 75 and 100 of her public speaking engagements, taking detailed notes and widely distributing reports on her activities. (gill & zwibel, 2017, “surveillance of indigenous leaders” section, para. 1) 9 canning: i could turn you to stone published by scholarship@western, 2018 although canada’s privacy commissioner found that canada had violated dr. blackstock’s right to privacy, it has been reported that the practice continues (bronskill, 2018). the spectre of mass blockades was raised again with idle no more in 2012 and 2013. in 2012, a rather authoritarian conservative federal government passed legislation severely rolling back environmental laws in canada. though many opposed the move, it was indigenous peoples who really took to the streets under the idle no more banner. some said the reason was that they had nothing to lose, but it was also seen as a “sign of growing power and self-confidence” and that indigenous peoples had taken a leadership position (saul, 2014). in the words of indigenous scholar pamela palmater (2014), it was: . . . a coordinated, strategic movement, not led by any elected politician, national chief, or paid executive director. it is a movement originally led by indigenous women and has been joined by grassroots first nations leaders, canadians, and now the world. (p. 39). the idle no more movement was not successful in blocking the legislation at issue. however, it again served to remind canadians of the presence and power of indigenous peoples, and that the unhealthy relationship between resource extraction and the earth is of critical importance to many indigenous peoples (d. turner, 2014). then in 2013, in elsipogtog, new brunswick, 13 years after the events at nearby burnt church, another resource dispute erupted involving the mi’kmaq. this dispute was over proposed drilling for fracked gas, an issue that was opposed by 69% of the new brunswick population. the protest, composed of unarmed indigenous and non-indigenous people, was peaceful. nonetheless, tactical forces were deployed with snipers, dogs, and a full array of paramilitary police equipment. although no one was seriously injured, tension was high. in the end, the mi’kmaq were victorious in shutting down the project (n. klein, 2014; j. simpson, 2017; l. simpson, 2013). there are many more examples than can be cited here, but the above are some of the key ones. in order to reflect on indigenous peoples’ refusal to give up in the face of force and resistance, the words of indigenous author ryan mcmahon (2014), in discussing idle no more, are apt: without the land i am not anishinaabe. so, if you take away the land (literally or figuratively) from my people—what are we left with? being “canadian?” being “like everyone else?” is that not genocidal? (p. 141) post-colonial indigenous resurgence in the words of rueben george, manager of the tsleil-waututh nation sacred trust initiative, “there is an indigenous spiritual rising after the attempted genocide of our peoples. they tried to bury us. but what they didn't know is that we’re seeds and we’re growing” (treaty alliance against tar sands expansion, 2018a, slider bar above events section). an indigenous resurgence is happening all over the post-colonial world (alfred, 2005; corntassel, 2012). in canada, resurgence includes court victories, growing influence over lands and resources, a rapidly growing population, and growing business and political influence (saul, 2014). it is unclear exactly when decline turned into new ascent. canadian intellectual john ralston saul traces it to the early twentieth century (saul, 2014). wilkes et al. (2010) traced this collective resistance through the 1800s and found that the current phase started in 1969: 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.7 . . . when indigenous people successfully used mass mobilization to block the passage of the white paper, which was federal legislation aimed at eliminating “indian status” and the special rights this status entails (ramos 2008a, 2008b; sanders 1985; york 1989). in the decades to follow, the annual number of events began to rise such that by the mid-1980s and 1990s, they were a standard feature of the canadian national political landscape, drawing much-needed public, and political attention to long-standing grievances with deep roots in colonial history (ramos 2006; wilkes 2006). they have involved active and courageous struggles for change at considerable personal risk. (p. 330). reflecting what was certainly a change in direction and tactics, there have been several hundred direct action events or confrontations since the 1980s (wilkes et al., 2010). joane nagel (1996) attributed the indigenous resurgence in america to the red power movement of the 1960s and 1970s, which “put forth an image of american indians as victorious rather than victimized” (p. 140). kiera ladner (2010), an indigenous professor, referenced a song about a strike and an eight-year-long standoff by the gurinjii stockmen of australia. the song is called from little things big things grow, and ladner uses it as a motif for how “the echoes of such resistance continue to inspire future generations” and how resistance has fed a sense of pride and possibility (pp. 299-300). ladner then describes many other moments of resistance that may have seemed small or isolated at the time, but that continue to grow in ripple effect. one of those key moments was the oka crisis. ladner described it as “a ‘public announcement’ of sorts, warning of the cost of action and inaction” (p. 302). it is the cost of inaction, or following the status quo, that can be seen as the subject of this article. ladner’s (2010) use of the term “action and inaction” is wise, as what seems like inaction—following the status quo of colonialism and dispossession of indigenous peoples from their lands, rights, and decision making—is in fact an action. it is simply a deliberate choice to maintain direction, regardless of where events might be heading. near-future climate change impacts macmillan bloedel v. mullin (1985) was a case in which the tla-o-qui-aht and ahousaht first nations in clayoquot sound, bc, blockaded meares island, an island sacred to them, in order to prevent logging there. they were supported by locals and environmentalists. the logging company, macmillan bloedel, then sued for an injunction against the indigenous blockaders, and the indigenous people responded with a suit of their own seeking an injunction against macmillan bloedel. the court granted both injunctions: forbidding the blockading, but also the logging. the reason was that both parties had serious interests at stake. in granting the injunction preventing logging of an area claimed by the indigenous peoples, chief justice seaton said, “the proposal is to clearcut the area. almost nothing will be left. i cannot think of any native right that could be exercised on lands that have recently been logged” (macmillan bloedel v. mullin, 1985, para. 17). is it possible to imagine any indigenous right that could be exercised on lands that have been recently and permanently inundated by the sea? or burned in wildfires? to what degree can specific rights or practices be exercised on lands that have been irrevocably altered by weather patterns and never return to “normal” in our lifetimes? 11 canning: i could turn you to stone published by scholarship@western, 2018 macmillan bloedel v. mullin (1985) is arguably one of the most intellectually honest cases on indigenous law in canada, and also one of the most conveniently ignored. canada made significant amendments to the constitution in 1982, with a new constitution act. section 35 of that new constitution reads, “the existing aboriginal and treaty rights of the aboriginal peoples of canada are hereby recognized and affirmed” (constitution act, 1982). however, although the blockade of meares island happened in 1984, the court did not make its decision based on section 35 of the constitution. rather, it was a rare case where the court acknowledged the simple reality that the indigenous people at issue had never surrendered title, and therefore had a legitimate claim to the land. about the tla-o-quiaht and ahousaht first nations claim to have rights to the land, bc chief justice seaton said, “the indians have pressed their land claims in various ways for generations. the claims have not been dealt with and found invalid. they have not been dealt with at all” (macmillan bloedel v. mullin, 1985, para. 56). the claims of the tla-o-qui-aht and ahousaht first nations have still not been dealt with to this day, as is the case for the majority of indigenous peoples’ land claims worldwide. their rights to land are outstanding and unresolved, and meanwhile climate change impacts are already being felt around the world, often with the greatest impacts to indigenous peoples. the reason indigenous peoples tend to face more serious impacts is that they tend to live in the most extreme environments, often in poverty and in ways that rely on the natural world for sustenance, having been pushed to extremes by colonial processes, which claimed the best land for settlers (nakashima et al., 2012; raygorodetsky, 2017; n. j. turner, 2009; watt-cloutier, 2015). secret briefings to the canadian federal government, that were made in 2016 but only recently exposed in the media, affirmed that indigenous communities suffer more intense impacts from climate-change induced extreme weather in the north (m-d. smith, 2016). sheila watt-cloutier (2007), an inuit leader, described, in her testimony to the inter-american commission on human rights, how inuit hunters have been injured and died on ice that is melting out of season or impossible to judge the safety of. specifically, she said, many hunters have been killed or seriously injured after falling through ice that was traditionally known to be safe. thinner ice also means much shorter hunting seasons as the ice forms up later and melts sooner. in turn, some ice dependent species such as ringed seals, walrus and polar bears are experiencing impacts and the arctic climate impact assessment projects that these species will likely be pushed to extinction by the end of this century. inuit have relied on ringed seal for food and clothing for millennia. the lack of ice also has profound impacts on our communities. as the land fast ice and pack ice disappears, the coastline, where most inuit live, is exposed to fierce storms—whole communities, such as shishmaref in alaska, are having to move altogether, because the storms are eroding the land out from under them. these impacts are destroying our rights to life, health, property and means of subsistence. states that do not recognize these impacts and take action violate our human rights. (p. 2) additional impacts to the inuit include houses falling into the sea as shores erode due to rising sea levels, or houses shifting as permafrost melts. summer storage of food in permafrost cellars becomes impossible, and food itself is scarcer. travel on ice is more challenging and dangerous, cutting people off from communities and hunting grounds (nakashima et al., 2012; mercer, 2018). 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.7 the xat’sūll first nation, also known as the soda creek first nation and part of the secwépemc, or shuswap people (who tell the sk’elép story referenced herein), conducted two climate change adaptation workshops in 2012. the purpose was to develop a case study for how interior-bc first nations could incorporate climate adaptation into planning. the resulting document, the bc regional adaptation collaborative climate change adaptation case study, listed many negative impacts of climate change. key among those were decreased water supply, both in quality and quantity; loss of traditional dates for harvesting and planting, with a lack of clarity about appropriate dates for such; increased fire bans that restrict the ability to conduct sweat lodges and dry meat and fish; warming of creeks, causing a diminished ability for food fish to reproduce (e.g., salmon and trout); and a decline in quality and quantity of wild berries, fruits, and roots (xat’sūll first nation, 2012). the impacts on some small island developing states (sids) and their indigenous populations can range from complete inundation, loss of land and property, dislocation of people, and saltwater intrusion into freshwater resources, to coastline erosion. the initial impacts of rising seas can lead to a lack of drinking water and inability to irrigate crops. the increased frequency and severity of storms can also be devastating for indigenous peoples and the crops and ecosystems they rely on (tsosie, 2007). the same is true in australia, where sea level rise and increasing cyclones may force aboriginal people to move inland (zander, petheram, & garnett, 2013). in hawai‘i, climate change will bring risks to freshwater supplies that will impact businesses and communities. food security will be threatened through impacts to agriculture and fisheries due to changes in ocean, mountain, and forest temperatures, and weather patterns. coastal flooding and erosion, loss of habitat for endangered species, coral bleaching, and higher incidences diseases such as avian malaria will also impact already stressed, fractured, and threatened native plants, animals, and ecosystems. indigenous hawaiians still rely on native plants for many items that are part of their traditional culture such as specific woods to make calabashes for food storage, hula implements, and plant medicines (sproat, 2016). a distinct decrease in rainfall since 1980, combined with sea level rise and concomitant salinisation of groundwater have impacted traditional agriculture in hawai‘i. outright drought will devastate many traditional practices such as kalo cultivation. this could threaten the very ability to live in hawai‘i; for native hawaiians, leaving is not considered an option. this puts their very identity as indigenous peoples at risk (sproat, 2016). more generally, there will also be considerable impacts to indigenous peoples through forests and water. some of the key impacts to forests will be drought, changed weather patterns, an increasing rate and severity of forest fires, and invasive pests, which no longer face temperature barriers and find stressed forests easier prey. this will impact culturally important resources such as food, landmarks, and cultural practices related to fire (vogesser, lynn, daigle, lake & ranco, 2013). further impacts to and through water will include changes to precipitation regimes, air and water temperatures, and increases in the frequency of extreme weather events. these will lead to permafrost thawing, earlier snow-melt, changes in regional hydrology, habitat loss, and nutrient cycling. there will also be impacts to plant and animal food species (cozzetto et al., 2013). seen more broadly, the sad reality of climate change is that so far the direr scientific predictions, as far as pace and severity of change, are turning out to be closest to reality (gabbatiss, 2017), and we have just crossed the 410-ppm milestone for co2 last year (kahn, 2017). 13 canning: i could turn you to stone published by scholarship@western, 2018 in a recent report, the world’s top climate scientists found that the threshold for catastrophic climate change is much lower than previously believed: a 2-degree celsius rise would lead to an increase in storms, heatwaves, droughts, and food shortages that would trigger mass migrations (gatehouse, 2018). on october 8, 2018, the intergovernmental panel on climate change (ipcc, 2018) released a special report, titled global warming of 1.5°c: an ipcc special report on the impacts of global warming of 1.5°c above pre-industrial levels and related global greenhouse gas emission pathways, in the context of strengthening the global response to the threat of climate change, sustainable development, and efforts to eradicate poverty. there was considerable discussion about the report in the news on the day it was released and subsequently. the guardian published a piece titled, “we have 12 years to limit climate change catastrophe, warns un” (watts, 2018). in it, the author discusses the many dangers of failing to keep warming below 1.5-degrees celsius, noting that “even half a degree will significantly worsen the risks of drought, floods, extreme heat and poverty for hundreds of millions of people” (watts, 2018, para. 1). however, watts qualifies the threat and implies that in fact the report is understated: bob ward, of the grantham research institute on climate change, said the final document was “incredibly conservative” because it did not mention the likely rise in climate-driven refugees or the danger of tipping points that could push the world on to an irreversible path of extreme warming. (watts, 2018, para. 20) watts also noted that, at the current level committed to under the paris agreement, the world is heading towards 3-degrees celsius of warming, and it is not clear that countries will even meet their paris targets (watts, 2018). the report addresses just that, meeting paris targets, as it is also the first informal assessment of countries’ climate pledges and opportunity for discussion during the next united nations framework convention on climate change (unfccc) conference of the parties (cop24) in november 2018, in katowice, poland (ipcc, 2018). as part of the talanoa dialogue, the assessment “will be a crucial step for revising upwards national climate action plans needed to step up pre-2020 ambition and meet the long-term goals of the paris agreement” (euro-mediterranean center on climate change [cmcc], 2018, para. 7). climate change is not only happening, it is happening faster than predicted, and the window to act is closing (leahy, 2018; spratt & dunlop, 2018). it is a threat to indigenous peoples (and all peoples) in many ways—cultural, land, rights, and life itself. a perfect storm, a policy train wreck global warming will have a unifying effect on those who struggle against it because it is bigger than any one cause, including indigenous rights. it is about keeping the planet livable for all of humanity (manuel, 2017). solidarity, reciprocal, and sympathetic blockades are a phenomenon in indigenous blockades that has smouldered threateningly for years. there is still smoke. as recently as 2016 and 2017, many indigenous peoples from around the world stood in solidarity at standing rock. standing rock was a pipeline conflict that was most heated for a number of months through summer 2016 and into the winter of 2017. it happened on the traditional territory of the standing rock sioux tribe, where energy transfer partners, owners of the dakota access pipeline, tried to push the pipeline through without indigenous consent (worland, 2016). the resistance was unsuccessful, and the pipeline has been built, but the conflict generated unprecedented levels of 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.7 solidarity and has been described as having “turned into a mammoth indigenous-led spiritual mission and awakening” (archer, 2018, para. 4). standing rock will be discussed further in the next section. it is important to note that, although indigenous blockades may seem outwardly similar to other blockades, there is often a key difference: many roads and rail lines pass through reserve lands and, therefore, a blockade can be seen as “a legitimate denial of trespass onto first nations lands” (woolford, 2002, p. 104; see also blomley, 1996). perhaps the extremity of state responses to indigenous blockades is because they raise, at least unconsciously, the uncomfortable question of who is really trespassing (borrows, 2016). hedican (2013) referenced a quote by george erasmus, co-chair of the 1996 royal commission on aboriginal peoples (rcap), a report commissioned as a result of the oka conflict. erasmus said, “if the reality is that once more [aboriginal] peoples’ hopes have been dashed, and that this is all for nothing, then what we say is that the people will resort to other things.” hedican commented on that by saying, “erasmus did not elaborate on what these ‘other things’ might be, but we could use our imagination” (p. 30). indeed, we can. if climate change is not dealt with, and indigenous rights to land and to govern the land are not dealt with, indigenous peoples, having exhausted other reasonable options, could paralyze the western world. in the words of john ralston saul (2014): by a simple decision not to cooperate, they could bring the canadian economy in good part to a halt. this is true. and this has been threatened by some. (p. 82) converging issues and solidarity blockades the ipperwash inquiry into the 1995 murder by police of indigenous occupier dudley george noted the potential for “converging issues” in relation to the pervasiveness of the root causes, and the possible convergence of environmentalists and others in future blockades as a “sobering realization” (commissioner of the ipperwash inquiry, 2007, p. 32). arthur manuel (2017), secwépemc leader and author, a powerful voice for indigenous resurgence, noted that, in 2013, in new brunswick, canada, many locals had come to support a mi’kmaq-led blockade against fracking on unceded land. they were concerned about the impacts of fracking on their environment and wanted to stand with the indigenous people. there were also solidarity blockades in relation to elsipogtog as far afield as montreal, new york, and winnipeg (“editorial: first nations,” 2017). naomi klein uses the term “blockadia” to indicate interconnected pockets of resistance and draws attention to the growing alliance of indigenous and non-indigenous peoples in the fight against climate change. she quoted a non-indigenous protestor at elsipogtog who said, “we are united in what is most important” (n. klein, 2014, pp. 373). regarding the now-failed (but possibly revived) keystone xl pipeline, indigenous activist dallas goldtooth of the indigenous environmental network said that the rosebud sioux would also blockade in support of other nations. he summed up the reasons: . . . what we see are fellow native people that are suffering because of [a] continued colonial process of extracting minerals and resources from our communities without our consent, . . . and so we really want to stand in solidarity, across no matter what border may be, with our indigenous brothers and sisters (cited in boos, 2015, para. 14). 15 canning: i could turn you to stone published by scholarship@western, 2018 the keystone xl pipeline also generated an unlikely alliance of what was termed “cowboys and indians,” as ranchers and indigenous people stood together in opposition to the project, under the banner of “reject and protect” (moe, 2014). in 2016, at the oceti sakowin camp at standing rock, blocking construction of the dakota access pipeline: . . . thousands of tribal nation members and allies gathered in peaceful prayer and created a powerful movement. they labeled themselves the water protectors, an idea rooted in the fact that we are more connected to water than we think. (rivas, 2017, p. 65). standing rock, in 2016 and 2017, reflected growing and unprecedented levels of solidarity. protestors in manitoba shut down a major intersection in winnipeg during rush hour (cbc, 2016), and climate activists shut off a pipeline in solidarity (lewis & cryderman, 2016). on november 15, 2016, there were hundreds of actions worldwide in solidarity with standing rock, including europe, india, and japan (milton, 2016). manuel (2017) also described a number of these cross-connections, including how the secwépemc flag was flying when he arrived at standing rock, in 2017. he also noted how many people there committed to come to his home in british columbia to fight the trans mountain pipeline, in return. on the day manuel arrived at standing rock, a group of american military veterans also showed up, offering support and protection from unwarranted violence that had been perpetrated against the protestors by law enforcement and private security (osborne, 2017). other american tribes made a 23-tribe formal declaration of solidarity (standing with standing rock), a move that may have inspired the now over 200 nation-members of the treaty alliance against tar sands expansion, allied against the trans mountain pipeline (treaty alliance against tar sands expansion, 2018). some examples of the myriad further support for standing rock were a crowdfunding campaign that raised over a million dollars; actors who donated solar panels; benefit concerts; hundreds of thousands “checking in” on facebook; and a māori contingent who shot a video of a utaina haka, symbolizing “working together for the greater good.” the māori noted that the māori and sioux have been fighting the same fight since colonization (hirschlag, 2016). there was also support for standing rock from mennonites (amstutz, 2016), unions, and indigenous peoples from around the world (cultural survival, 2017). afterward, standing rock was described as the struggle that “drew together leaders and activists from tribal communities into a powerful network of resistance that is only beginning to make its power felt” (kennedy-howard, 2017, para. 1). even canada’s security agency, csis, noted, “there is strong canadian aboriginal support for the standing rock sioux tribe as many see similarities to their own struggles against proposed pipeline construction in canada (northern gateway, pacific trails, energy east, etc.)” (cited in gill & zwibel, 2017, “sharing and using the fruits of surveillance” section, para. 4). although this may more rightly be the subject of a different article, with the climate necessity defence for blockading oil industry projects and the increasing urgency of the situation, it is unclear for how long police and government prosecutors can even hope to continue pursuing legal action against those who defy injunctions that support and protect the oil industry (buncombe, 2018; long & hamilton, 2017; quirke, 2016,). unifying arguments are also taking shape in legal and academic circles, which may well lead to greater cohesion among groups opposed to fossil fuel development. analogies are being made more frequently to critical moral 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.7 and legal struggles of the past. legal scholar maxine burkett (2016) saw analogies in the 1960s civil rights movement, as well as in the abolition of slavery. as climate narratives evolve in the public sphere, the legal and moral arguments for activism will become more persuasive (nosek, 2017). burkett (2016) proposed unifying theories centered on shared core values through a grassroots environmental justice frame and drawing on the analogies of anti-slavery and civil rights. others propose a new way of organizing the “common concern” approach used in unfccc negotiations, “drawing on the practices of a global movement against fossil fuel extraction and in defence of land” (dehm, 2016, p. 160). the overlap between the arguments of manuel, burkett, nosek, and dehm have the potential to weave a new tapestry of unifying moral, ethical, and legal justifications for broad-based climate action at all levels. arthur manuel (2017), in discussing the dakota and keystone battles against pipelines, wrote, indigenous peoples from north of the border have shown their active support. in the future this can be a powerful alliance in defending indigenous lands from state and industry incursions throughout turtle island. that is where we are today. i cannot emphasize too often that in our struggle, we must show the same intensity as american blacks did in the 1960s. they had to march in cities across america and they filled up the jails. (p. 228) he went on, saying of the “land defenders”: our battle must be as intense as the fight against racism in the american south, and against apartheid in south africa . . . but finally, it will come from the grassroots, when we give our people the tools they need to make the change they need. they will block environmental disasters like the red chris mine from destroying our lands, and pipelines from carrying the oil and bitumen that is destroying our climate, as they are doing today. they will stand their ground on their own land and send out their message for solidarity to the world. (manuel, 2017, p. 229) the need for a new policy like all of us here on earth, indigenous peoples have nowhere else to go. on top of that, indigenous peoples have made it clear that they have, generally, been pushed far enough. as many authors have pointed out, indigenous blockades stem from having tried everything else (blomley, 1996; borrows, 2016; hedican, 2012; wilkes et al., 2010). regarding climate change, indigenous peoples have tried everything else. the current policy of the canadian government, and colonial western governments generally, is one of refusing necessary change, and therefore of allowing, or mandating by policy, the resulting chaos. national policies must change regarding indigenous peoples and the coming impacts of climate change. it is only just and fair that indigenous peoples have an equal voice in that which endangers their lives equally, if not more so. to be clear — this article is not advocating blockades, solidarity blockades, or anything of that nature. john borrows (2016) wisely pointed out that blockades are not always the solution, and sometimes cause more harm than good, especially to those who put them up. indigenous legal scholar val 17 canning: i could turn you to stone published by scholarship@western, 2018 napoleon (2010) also discussed the huge personal cost that many people face for standing on a blockade, both for themselves and for future generations. for instance, the conflict at oka in 1990 left the community scarred and divided. the pines were not turned into a golf course, a success, but their ownership is still unresolved (ladner, 2010; york & pindera, 1991). in 1995, at ipperwash park in ontario, dudley george lost his life (commissioner of the ipperwash inquiry, 2007; hedican, 2012). burnt church, in 2000, was similar. the battle over fishing rights started years before, and the mi’kmaq people had gone to great lengths to earn their right to fish in court. in 1999, after a long and expensive legal battle, the supreme court of canada released what was known as the marshall decision, granting the right to a commercial fishery to the mi’kmaq. after that, the mi’kmaq went fishing and promptly met violent resistance from local non-indigenous fishers. that resistance led to the conflict with the state over fishing rights (borrows, 2016). the dispute was successful in some ways, but it did not achieve the larger goal of indigenous control over the lobster fishery and left the community divided (borrows, 2016). on the other hand, the blockades of fracking at elsipogtog, which united indigenous people and environmental activists, on an issue with majority support from the public, was successful in stopping fracking and unified the community (n. klein, 2014; manuel, 2017; j. simpson, 2017; l. simpson, 2013). in the us, standing rock united indigenous people and environmental activists, who were willing to pay enormous costs in terms of personal safety, were ultimately unsuccessful in stopping that pipeline (archer, 2018; worland, 2016). in the trans mountain dispute, the concerned indigenous peoples initially sought to be part of the environmental review and consultation processes and, when that failed, took their battle to court. the company continued construction of the pipeline while the matter was before the courts, so indigenous and non-indigenous people blockaded and protested (“trans mountain pipeline,” n.d.b). through 2017 and 2018, construction on the trans mountain was slowed by blockades, then stopped by the court, and now the canadian federal government has bought it with a political promise to see it through (clancy, 2018; meyer, 2018b; s. klein, 2018). it could be described as a success in stopping the pipeline, not through blockades, but by litigation. a qualified success that may yet evaporate. it can fairly be predicted that if the federal government goes through a review process and then approves the project, again without indigenous consent, there will be further blockades, protests, and conflict. all of the above reflects the uncertain, risky, and desperate nature of blockades. the costs can be steep, in lives, scars, and divisions that can last lifetimes. yet, blockades and direct action become unavoidable, and inevitable, when people who are negatively affected by something are denied the power to change it. what is the solution? brugnach, craps, and dewulf found that there is a need for “collaborative governance frameworks,” in order to realize the potential inherent in indigenous decisionmaking regarding climate change mitigation (p. 20). that could involve using indigenous and local knowledge, collaborating with western scientists, and decentralising decision-making (brugnach et al., 2017). another, and potentially overlapping, approach is to truly implement undrip. tsosie (2007) stated that undrip “articulates a basis for recognizing a right of environmental selfdetermination that preserves the relationship between indigenous peoples and their traditional lands” (p. 1664). undrip 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.7 also represents a long and drawn out struggle by indigenous peoples to be recognised in international law (manuel, 2017; seck, 2017). the preamble to undrip states that the signatories are: convinced that the recognition of the rights of indigenous peoples in this declaration will enhance harmonious and cooperative relations between the state and indigenous peoples, based on principles of justice, democracy, respect for human rights, nondiscrimination and good faith. (undrip, 2007, p. 6) however, the facts so far suggest otherwise. in ongoing and recent battles, states have aligned with the oil and gas industry against indigenous and non-indigenous peoples concerned about land rights, the environment, and the climate, as discussed in previous sections. what is the alternative to chaos? while there are probably many, this article is not going to propose any new schemes. as stated above, there is already one present, “hanging in front of our faces,” as it were — that of free, prior, and informed consent. known as fpic and enshrined in s. 32(2) of undrip (2007), fpic mandates that indigenous peoples be consulted fully and then have the right to say yes or no to development that impacts their territory. canada was slow to sign undrip, and then had reservations, but under the new trudeau-led liberal government has withdrawn any reservations. however, canada has not adopted it into canadian law and is instead moving toward a “canadian version,” where fpic is redefined to mean less than a veto (manuel, 2017; trc, 2015). and yet, despite the slowness in implementing undrip, some progress is being made. in british columbia, the provincial government is giving indigenous peoples consent over fish farms in their territory, although not for 4 years (hunter, 2018). nonetheless, is the current canadian national model enough? or will a grant of “consent,” which is vague or unclear as to whether or not it means a veto, simply lead to more conflict, in court and in the streets? it is difficult to imagine how anything else could result. indigenous leaders, academics, judges, law firms, and environmentalists have called for the implementation of fpic (iaccobucci, 2016; manuel, 2018; orta-martínez & finer, 2010). jerome lewis (2012) gave a short and useful eight-step process for implementing fpic that starts with strengthening institutional capacities and ends with maintaining relationships after consent is given or refused. sasha boutilier (2017) gave a more in-depth study of steps to implement fpic in canadian law, which highlights some of the difficulties around the question of whether consent and a veto are the same thing. settler canada has a duty to raise the alarm: if we continue to treat indigenous peoples as we have— leaving them ignored; sidelined; bought off; belittled; not at the table; consulted, but ultimately with projects going ahead regardless of their views—we may well be “turned to stone.” if all that fpic means is a heightened level of consultation that will not solve the problem, which inevitably leads to conflict. it is not enough to say to indigenous peoples that they will be granted the right to give or deny consent. nor is it enough for indigenous peoples to be marginally or artificially included, as the canadian government has done regarding trans mountain, by saying there would be a rigorous consultation process, but then secretly telling top bureaucrats to push the approval process through as quickly as possible (de souza, 2018). as shrubsole (2011) pointed out, it never works to make decisions for indigenous peoples: 19 canning: i could turn you to stone published by scholarship@western, 2018 [the] overwhelming consensus is that indigenous voices, perspectives and frameworks need to be brought into the legal and political structures that dictate a significant portion of indigenous lives. (p. 14) if government and industry want certainty regarding projects, the only way to get that is to have complete clarity on all sides as to what consent or a veto means. the core policy proposal of this article is that fpic, as stated within undrip, must be adopted into national laws, and there must be clarity that it means a veto. that indigenous peoples must be equipped to make such choices in an informed and capable manner and that in order to give legitimacy to any consent, or veto, indigenous peoples must be empowered to develop their own governance and decision-making structures as free from the bounds of colonialism as possible. not only is bringing indigenous peoples into the decision-making framework just and fair, it is necessary. indigenous peoples have demonstrated resilience and knowledge systems related to the land and environment, which will be needed for human survival in a warming world (nakashima et al., 2012; raygorodetsky, 2017). indigenous peoples have some degree of control or management over a considerable portion on the earth’s surface (this article argues they should have a higher degree of control). according to ramos-castillo et al. (2017): indigenous peoples and their traditional knowledge have an important role to play in responding to climate change. indigenous peoples form approximately 5% of the world’s population, manage 11% of the world’s forest lands and customarily own, occupy or use somewhere between 22 and 65% of the world’s land surface. (p. 2; see also undp, 2011). raygorodetsky (2017) and others (davis, 2009; umeek, 2011) also argue that while indigenous peoples are often on the front lines of climate change, and the most impacted, they are also critical to dealing with climate change because they have, as a generalization, preserved the connection with the earth that will be required to move forward in a changing world. on top of resilience, control over or management of, and connection with the land, indigenous peoples have also demonstrated a marked ability to win in court. whether winning title to significant portions of land or to stopping pipelines, first nations and indigenous peoples around the world are rapidly becoming a legal force to be reckoned with, and already exercise some degree of control over whether projects go ahead (pasternak, 2014; saul, 20014; c. smith, 2018). in most federal states, there are already two levels of government that have the capacity to give or refuse consent regarding any given major project, according to their own processes. in canada, although the details are often hotly disputed, both levels of government have jurisdiction over projects in different ways—as do indigenous peoples, although their jurisdiction is largely undefined (gilchrist, 2018). grand chief sheila north of manitoba keewatinowi okimakanak echoed the voices of indigenous peoples all over the world when she said, “i do believe that the people that live off the land and come from the land should have a veto on rights to the resources where they come from” (cited in meyer, 2018a). to move forward, fpic will need to be brought into decision-making structures and to do that indigenous peoples must be allowed to develop their own systems to make informed choices about 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.7 giving consent to, or using a veto regarding, projects that impact their land and rights. it must be clear that fpic means a veto, as heightened consultation will only be a policy of continuing to resolve land and rights issues through conflict. indigenous peoples must also be supported in appropriate ways and be empowered to develop their own governance and decision-making structures free from the bounds of colonialism. previous problems have been resolved, for better or worse, through the policy of discrete conflict. but that will not work for climate change. if indigenous peoples are not given a voice over their fate, the rest of the world should expect desperate acts from indigenous and non-indigenous peoples alike. conclusion like sk’elép, who said, “i could turn you to stone” but instead allowed the strangers to pass, indigenous peoples have been kind to their colonizers. patient. yet, the colonizers have continued to try to transform them. and, when that failed, the colonizers have punished them. from residential schools, the white paper, indigenous overrepresentation in prisons, fighting for the rights of oil companies, to pillaging indigenous people’s land—the process has continued through to today. but because of the pervasive, continuing, and escalating nature of climate change, it is an issue that does not readily lend itself to easy buy-offs or settlements. it must be resolved justly, or not at all. without a change in course regarding climate change and indigenous peoples, the post-colonial world may well find itself paralyzed by allied, mutually supportive, interrelated, indigenous–environmentalist–citizen blockades worldwide. all other responses are precluded by current policy. a better way has already been mapped out: that of free, prior, and informed consent under undrip (2007). the sooner governments give a true veto to indigenous peoples and empower them to make informed choices regarding projects and developments that affect them, through their own governance and decision-making structures, and as free from the bounds of colonialism as possible, the more social and climate outcomes will improve. the sooner governments embrace the profound changes needed to address the climate crisis, the less likely extreme indigenous and citizen action becomes. as led zeppelin said, “there are two paths you can go by, but in the long run, there’s still time to change the road you’re on” (page & plant, 1971). 21 canning: i could turn you to stone published by scholarship@western, 2018 references alfred, t. 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(2013). stay or leave? potential climate change adaptation strategies among aboriginal people in coastal communities in northern australia. natural hazards, 67, 591–609. doi:https://doi.org/10.1007/s11069-013-0591-4 32 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.7 the international indigenous policy journal july 2018 i could turn you to stone: indigenous blockades in an age of climate change patrick c. canning recommended citation i could turn you to stone: indigenous blockades in an age of climate change abstract keywords acknowledgments disclaimer creative commons license i could turn you to stone: indigenous blockades in an age of climate change smoking among off-reserve first nations, métis, and inuit high school students the international indigenous policy journal volume 9 | issue 2 article 1 april 2018 smoking among off-reserve first nations, métis, and inuit high school students evelyne bougie statistics canada, government of canada, evelyne.bougie@canada.ca dafna kohen statistics canada, government of canada, dafnakohen@hotmail.com recommended citation bougie, e. , kohen, d. (2018). smoking among off-reserve first nations, métis, and inuit high school students. the international indigenous policy journal, 9(2). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.1 smoking among off-reserve first nations, métis, and inuit high school students abstract using data from the 2012 aboriginal peoples survey (aps), this study investigated associations between smoking and a number of school, peer, and family characteristics among off-reserve first nations (n = 2,308), métis (n = 2,058), and inuit (n = 655) high school students aged 12 to 21 years. logistic regressions revealed important group differences in indigenous youths' correlates of smoking. characteristics that were negatively associated with smoking included attending a school with a positive environment or having peers with high educational aspirations among first nations students; participating in school-based club extra-curricular activities or living in a smoke-free home among métis; and living in higher-income families among inuit. a consistent risk factor for smoking among all indigenous students was having close friends who engaged in risk behaviours. keywords tobacco, cigarette, indigenous, youth, family, peer, school climate, school connectedness, extracurricular activities, socio-economic status acknowledgments this study was sponsored by the first nations and inuit health branch (fnihb), health canada. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ s m o k i n g a m o n g o f f r e s e r v e f i r s t n a t i o n s , m é t i s , a n d i n u i t h i g h s c h o o l s t u d e n t s the negative health effects of smoking are well known and include cancer, respiratory illnesses, heart disease, and stroke (u.s. department of health and human services, 2014). compared to the nonindigenous population, off-reserve first nations, métis, and inuit in canada have a higher prevalence of smoking (gionet & roshanafshar, 2013). this is particularly true for indigenous youth, among whom the prevalence of smoking is at least twice as high as it is among non-indigenous youth (elton-marshall, leatherdale, & burkhalter, 2011; statistics canada, 2016). smoking prevalence is notably high among first nations youth who live on-reserve (first nations information governance centre, 2012). most smokers begin smoking in their teens (chen & millar, 1998; u.s. department of health and human services, 2012). early smoking initiation is concerning insofar as it has been associated with both significant health problems during adolescence and increased risk factors for health problems in adulthood (u.s. department of health and human services, 1994). for example, an early age of daily smoking initiation has been associated with earlier diagnoses of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (copd), heart disease, and/or rheumatoid arthritis (chen, 2003). it has also been shown that individuals who started smoking when they were under the age of 18 were less likely to quit than those who began smoking at older ages (shields, 2005a). the high prevalence of smoking among indigenous youth, together with the recognition that adolescence is a key period for the initiation of healthcompromising behaviours (lemaster, connell, mitchell, & manson, 2002), highlights the ongoing need to identify the risk and protective factors for smoking among first nations, métis, and inuit youth. understanding these factors may help inform smoking prevention and cessation programs aimed at this population. family, peers, and school are considered the key social contexts that influence child and youth behaviours like smoking (wen, van duker, & olson, 2009; wiium & wold, 2009), with peer and parental characteristics the most well established factors associated with teen smoking (seo & huang, 2012). however, school is an important context because of the large amount of time youth spend there (wen et al., 2009; wiium & wold, 2009). indeed, schools have often been seen as a target context for health behaviours as well as opportunities for education and promotion with youth (samdal, wold, klepp, & kannas, 2000). the goal of the present study was to investigate how particular aspects of schools, together with family and peer characteristics, are associated with smoking among off-reserve first nations, métis, and inuit high school students. s m o k i n g a m o n g a d o l e s c e n t s : f a m i l y , p e e r , a n d s c h o o l c o n t e x t s family environments have been recognized as an important immediate structure for child development (bronfenbrenner & morris, 1998). family characteristics that have historically shown consistent associations with adolescent smoking include socio-economic status (e.g., household income and parental education) and household members’ smoking behaviours (hanson & chen, 2007; leatherdale, smith, & ahmed, 2008; shields, 2005b; soteriades & difranza, 2003; wen et al., 2009; wiium & wold, 2009). ryan, leatherdale, and cooke (2017) have recently shown that off-reserve first nations and métis youth were more likely to smoke if they were from families with lower household incomes. generally, the mechanisms through which family characteristics relate to teen smoking are role 1 bougie and kohen: smoking among indigenous students published by scholarship@western, 2018 modelling and parenting style (wen et al., 2009; whitlock, sittner hartshorn, mcquillan, & crawford, 2012). as children grow into adolescents, their peers typically influence their decision making and health behaviours, including smoking, more strongly (wiium & wold, 2009). for example, past studies have found an association between teen smoking and teens who have friends who smoke in both indigenous populations (whitlock et al., 2012) and non-indigenous populations (alexander, piazza, mekos, & valente, 2001; chuang, ennet, bauman, & foshee, 2009; wen et al., 2009). the relationship between teens, their peers, and smoking behaviour is complex and has been explained through two mechanisms: socialization—which views an individual’s smoking behaviour as something that is influenced by the norms and behaviours of their peer group—and selection—which views this behaviour as the tendency of individuals to seek out peers with similar norms and behaviours (simons-morton & farhat, 2010). the school environment is an important context that can shape adolescent health behaviour because a lot of time is spent in school and many peer groups are established and maintained in school settings (wen et al., 2009; wiium & wold, 2009). specifically, scholars have noted that school connectedness— that is, the feeling of belonging to a school—is important for adolescents’ psychosocial adjustment (allen, vella-brodrick, & waters, 2016). school connectedness has been shown to be related to many behavioural, emotional, and academic outcomes among youth (monahan, oesterle, & hawkins, 2010). it is believed that students are more likely to engage in healthy behaviours when they feel connected to their schools (centers for disease control and prevention, 2010); conversely, students who feel alienated from their schools are more likely to engage in health-risk behaviours (nutbeam, smith, moore, & bauman, 1993). past studies conducted among the general population have found that school connectedness has a protective effect on adolescent smoking (azagba & asbridge, 2013; dornbusch, erickson, laird, & wong, 2001; gowing & jackson, 2016; resnick et al., 1997; sabiston et al., 2009). likewise, past studies have also shown that alienation from school is a risk factor for adolescent smoking (nutbeam et al., 1993; samdal et al., 2000). the definition of school connectedness has varied across studies, but common characteristics generally include feeling close to the people at a school, feeling part of a school, feeling safe and happy at a school, and being treated fairly at a school (azagba & asbridge, 2013; dornbusch et al., 2001; gowing & jackson, 2016; resnick et al., 1997; sabiston et al., 2009). school connectedness has been shown to be fostered by many factors (allen et al., 2016; monahan et al., 2010), including participation in extracurricular activities or afterschool programs (anderson-butcher, 2010; martinez, coker, mcmahon, cohen, & thapa, 2016; thompson, iachan, overpeck, ross, & gross, 2006), parental support and involvement in school (thompson et al., 2006; wang & eccles, 2012), and positive peer groups (centers for disease control and prevention, 2010; wang & eccles, 2012). notably, school connectedness might be particularly important for indigenous youth’s health outcomes in light of the legacy of the indian residential school system in canada (see aboriginal healing foundation, 2002 for a description of canada’s indian residential school system). the relationship that first nations, métis, and inuit youth have with formal education systems may be influenced by this legacy through the passing on of transgenerational effects (kirmayer et al., 2007) or historical trauma (soto, baezconde-garbanati, schwartz, & unger, 2015). previous studies have shown different school outcomes for indigenous children and youth who have family histories of residential school attendance 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 2 [2018], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.1 than for children and youth who do not have such a history (bougie & senécal, 2010; feir, 2016). in this study, the school characteristics that were explored—such as positive and negative school environments—have also been shown to be associated with the mental health outcomes of off-reserve first nations youth (guèvremont, arim, & kohen, 2016). however, no studies to date have examined the relationship between school characteristics and smoking for off-reserve first nations, métis, and inuit youth. this study examined the association between current smoking and school environments among offreserve first nations, métis, and inuit high school students, while also considering the influence of families and peers. the aspects of the school environment that were examined were determined by survey content and included: • positive and negative school environment; • attendance at a school that supports first nations, métis, or inuit culture through teaching and/or activities; • participation in extra-curricular activities (sport, art, and club) organized by schools; and • family involvement in school activities. the family and peer factors examined were: • household income; • maternal highest level of education; • presence of a regular smoker in the home; • peer educational aspirations; and • peer risk behaviours. this study was guided by the following research question: are there particular aspects of the school environment that are associated with smoking among off-reserve first nations, métis, and inuit high school students, over and above family and peer characteristics? m e t h o d s d a t a this study used data from the 2012 aboriginal peoples survey (aps). the aps is a national, crosssectional survey of first nations people living off-reserve, métis, and inuit in canada that has been developed by statistics canada. the aps did not include people living in institutions, and it excluded people living on indian reserves and settlements as well as in certain first nations communities in the yukon and in the northwest territories. participation in the aps was voluntary. data were collected directly from respondents through personal interviews or through computer-assisted interviews between february and july of 2012. proxy reporting was used for most children aged 6 to 14 years, nearly half of youth aged 15 to 17 years, and for adults in certain specific situations. the aps’ overall response rate was 76%. 3 bougie and kohen: smoking among indigenous students published by scholarship@western, 2018 s a m p l e the sample included all indigenous youth aged 12 to 21 who were attending high school (grades 7 to 12 or equivalent) at the time of data collection. students were categorized as first nations, métis, or inuit based on single aboriginal identity reporting. only inuit residing in inuit nunangat (the inuit homeland in northern canada1) were retained; the inuit student sample outside of inuit nunangat was too small to support multivariate analyses, and combining inuit living inside and outside inuit nunangat would have masked important differences between those two groups. from the initial study sample, about 2% of first nations, 1% of métis, and 5% of inuit students did not have any smoking data and were thus excluded. the final study sample consisted of 2,308 off-reserve first nations youth (mean age 14.8 years), 2,058 métis youth (mean age 14.9 years), and 655 inuit (mean age 15.0 years) high school students. proportions of males were similar across off-reserve first nations, métis, and inuit students, averaging at about 51%. i n s t r u m e n t s d e p e n d e n t v a r i a b l e — c u r r e n t s m o k i n g . current smoking was measured with the following question: “at the present time, do you smoke cigarettes daily, occasionally, or not at all?” the outcome of interest was current (occasional or daily) smoking versus non-smoking. i n d e p e n d e n t v a r i a b l e — f a m i l y . family characteristics included household income, maternal highest level of education (“what is the highest level of education that mother or female guardian has ever completed?”), and the presence of a regular smoker in the home (“including both household members and regular visitors, does anyone smoke inside your home, every day or almost every day?”). household income data were obtained from the respondents’ answers in the 2011 national household survey (nhs) appended to the aps master file. in this context, household income refers to the sum of the total incomes of all members of a household. household income was used as a continuous variable and operationalized as the after-tax household income (in canadian dollars) adjusted by a factor that accounted for household size. the highest level of education completed by the mother or female guardian was coded as less than high school, high school, or postsecondary education. i n d e p e n d e n t v a r i a b l e — p e e r s . the 2012 aps included several items pertaining to peer characteristics. an exploratory factor analysis indicated that a peer influence construct could be described by two factors: peer educational aspirations, which consisted of three items, and peer risk behaviours, which consisted of six items (findlay, 2013). respondents were asked how many of their closest friends: peer educational aspirations a. thought completing high school was very important; b. planned to further their education or training; c. thought it was okay to work hard at school 1 inuit nunangat is comprised of four regions: nunatsiavut (labrador); nunavik (northern québec); nunavut; and the inuvialuit region (northwest territories). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 2 [2018], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.1 peer risk behaviours d. skipped classes once a week or more; e. dropped out of high school; f. had a reputation for causing trouble; g. smoked cigarettes; h. used drugs; i. drank alcohol. each item was rated on a four-point scale, with 1 signifying none of a respondent’s close friends and 4 signifying all of them. response category 5 not applicable was re-coded as missing data. following this, items within each factor were summed to obtain an overall score. to augment the robustness of the construct, scores were only calculated in cases in which a respondent replied to a minimum of 75% of the questions (i.e., 2 out of 3 and 5 out of 6 questions) (findlay, 2013). cronbach alphas for peer risk behaviours and peer educational aspirations were acceptable at 0.85 and 0.77, respectively, for offreserve first nations, 0.82 and 0.75 for métis, and 0.78 and 0.69 for inuit students. i n d e p e n d e n t v a r i a b l e — s c h o o l . several items on the 2012 aps pertained to the school environment. an exploratory factor analysis of school characteristics items indicated that a “school environment” construct could be described by two factors: positive (four items) and negative (five items; findlay, 2013). respondents were asked to 1 strongly disagree, 2 disagree, 3 agree, or 4 strongly agree to the following statements: positive school environment a. overall, respondent feels safe at school; b. overall, respondent is happy at school; c. most children enjoy being at the school; d. the school provides many opportunities to be involved in school activities. negative school environment e. racism is a problem at school; f. bullying is a problem at school; g. the presence of alcohol is a problem at school; h. the presence of drugs is a problem at school; i. violence is a problem at school. items within each factor were summed to obtain an overall score. to augment the robustness of the construct, scores were only calculated in cases where the respondent replied to a minimum of 75% of the questions (i.e., 3 out of 4, and 4 out of 5 questions) (findlay, 2013). cronbach alphas for positive and negative school environment were acceptable at 0.76 and 0.80 respectively for off-reserve first nations, 0.76 and 0.81 for métis, and 0.66 and 0.74 for inuit students. one item that addressed whether a school supported first nations, métis, or inuit culture through teaching and/or activities (ranging from 1 strongly disagree to 4 strongly agree) did not load on any of the school environment factors and was analyzed separately. 5 bougie and kohen: smoking among indigenous students published by scholarship@western, 2018 the 2012 aps also contained questions about students’ participation in extra-curricular activities and families’ involvement with schools. respondents were asked to indicate whether they had taken part in activities outside of school hours at any time during the school year, including sport or physical activity, or organized sports (including taking lessons); art, drama, or music group or club (including taking lessons); a school group or club (such as student council, yearbook, or science club), or groups or clubs outside of school. respondents were further asked to indicate whether these activities were organized by their schools. for each activity (sport, art, and club) respondents were categorized into two groups: participated in activity organized by the school and did not participate in activity organized by the school. the response category not available was included in the did not participate category. respondents were also asked to indicate if any of their family members had done the following activities during the school year: speak to, correspond with, or visit the respondent’s teacher (including parentteacher interviews); attend a school event in which the respondent participated; or participate in other school activities. respondents were categorized into two groups: family is involved in at least two activities and family is not involved in at least two activities. d a t a a n a l y s i s data were examined separately for off-reserve first nations, métis, and inuit students since panindigenous analyses often mask important group differences. as such, this study described current smoking proportions both overall and by gender. then, this study investigated correlates of smoking through bivariate analyses and logistic regression analyses. first, bivariate analyses (chi-square tests and f-tests) examined the association of each family, peer, and school characteristic with a respondent’s current smoking; any variable whose bivariate test had a p value of less than 0.05 was selected for the multivariate analysis. second, we fitted one full model for each indigenous group that only included the variables that were significant in their respective group-specific bivariate tests. all variables were entered simultaneously. the full models controlled for age, sex, and proxy reporting. preliminary analyses showed no concern for collinearity among the independent variables, with all tolerance values over 0.50 (tabachnick & fidell, 2001) and all variance inflation factor (vif) values under 2 (stevens, 2002). the following variables had 5% to 10% missing data: peer risk behaviour (métis), peer educational aspirations (first nations), negative school environment (first nations and inuit), and school supports culture (first nations and métis). the following variables had more than 10% missing data: peer risk behaviour (first nations and inuit), peer educational aspirations (inuit), and maternal level of education (inuit). the final sample size for the regression analyses—that is, the number of respondents with complete data on all covariates—was 1,758 for first nations, 1,716 for métis, and 428 for inuit students. we report odds ratios as the measure of association between smoking and selected characteristics. odds ratios with a value of less than 1.00 indicate that a particular characteristic is associated with reduced odds of smoking, whereas odds ratios with a value greater than 1.00 indicate that a particular characteristic is associated with increased odds of smoking. sampling weights were applied to all analyses to account for the sample design, non-response, and known population totals. a bootstrapping technique with a fay adjustment factor was used when calculating estimates of variance in order to adjust for the complex survey design (cloutier & langlet, 2014). estimates with high sampling 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 2 [2018], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.1 variability have been identified by the letter e and should be used with caution. estimates flagged with the letter f are too unreliable to publish (budinski & langlet, 2014). r e s u l t s p r e v a l e n c e o f c u r r e n t s m o k i n g descriptive statistics for the prevalence of current smoking are presented in table 1. the majority of offreserve first nations and métis high school students were non-smokers—about 84% and 85% respectively. about 16% of off-reserve first nations high school students were current smokers—9% smoked daily and 8% smoked occasionally. among métis students, 15% were current smokers—8% daily and 7%e occasionally. as for inuit students in inuit nunangat, 46% were current smokers—35% daily and 11% occasionally—and 54% were non-smokers. chi-square tests of independence revealed a significant (p < 0.05) gender difference in current smoking prevalence among off-reserve first nations students, where current smoking proportions were higher among females than males, but not for métis or inuit students (p ˃ 0.05). f a m i l y , p e e r , a n d s c h o o l c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s descriptive statistics for the selected family, peer, and school characteristics are presented in table 2, both overall and by smoking status. in terms of family characteristics, 61.5% of off-reserve first nations, 66.7% of métis, and 21% of inuit students had a mother with postsecondary education, and 20.5%, 21.4%, and 27.8% respectively reported the presence of a regular smoker in their homes. the mean aftertax household income, adjusted for household size, was $31,309 for off-reserve first nations, $35,806 for métis, and $38,634 for inuit students. bivariate tests showed that compared to their non-smoking counterparts, off-reserve first nations, métis, and inuit students who smoked were significantly (p < 0.05) more likely to have a mother with lower levels of education, to report the presence of a regular smoker in their homes, and to live in lower-income households. in terms of peer characteristics, bivariate tests showed that smokers were significantly more likely than non-smokers to have high scores on the peer risk behaviour scale and lower scores on the peer educational aspirations scale. turning to school characteristics, about 40.4% of off-reserve first nations, 41.7% of métis, and 65.1% of inuit students participated in school-based sport activities. in addition, 33%, 32.1%, and 37.9%, respectively, participated in school-based art activities, and 19.3%, 17.6%, and 24.4%, respectively, participated in school-based club activities. more than half of off-reserve first nations (54.3%) and métis (53.9%) students, along with 67.4% of inuit students, had a family member who was involved in at least two school activities. bivariate tests showed that smokers were significantly more likely than nonsmokers to have higher scores on the negative school environment scale and lower scores on the positive school environment scale. smokers were also significantly less likely than non-smokers to have family members who were involved in at least two school activities. off-reserve first nations students who smoked were significantly less likely to participate in school-organized sport activities, while métis students who smoked were significantly less likely to participate in school-organized club activities. participating in school-based art activities and attending a school that supports indigenous culture were not associated with current smoking among any of the respondents. 7 bougie and kohen: smoking among indigenous students published by scholarship@western, 2018 t a b l e 1 . c u r r e n t s m o k i n g p r e v a l e n c e , o v e r a l l a n d b y s e x , o f f r e s e r v e f i r s t n a t i o n s , m é t i s , a n d i n u i t h i g h s c h o o l s t u d e n t s a g e d 1 2 t o 2 1 , c a n a d a , 2 0 1 2 o f f r e s e r v e f i r s t n a t i o n s o v e r a l l m a l e s f e m a l e s 95% ci 95% ci 95% ci % ll ul % ll ul % ll ul χ2 p value current smoking 16.3 13.7 19.2 13.2 10.4 16.5 19.6 15.5 24.4 0.02 daily 8.5 6.7 10.8 7.4 5.4 10.1 9.8 e 6.8 13.8 occasionally 7.7 5.8 10.2 5.8 e 4.1 8.0 9.8 e 6.6 14.3 current non-smoking 83.7 80.8 86.3 86.8 83.5 89.6 80.4 75.6 84.5 m é t i s o v e r a l l m a l e s f e m a l e s 95% ci 95% ci 95% ci % ll ul % ll ul % ll ul χ2 p value current smoking 14.9 11.9 18.5 14.1 e 9.5 20.3 15.7 12.2 20.0 0.64 daily 8.3 6.2 11.1 7.5 e 4.4 12.4 9.2 e 6.5 12.7 occasionally 6.5 e 4.5 9.4 6.6 e 3.5 12.1 6.5 e 4.4 9.5 current non-smoking 85.1 81.5 88.1 85.9 79.7 90.5 84.3 80.0 87.8 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 2 [2018], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.1 t a b l e 1 . c u r r e n t s m o k i n g p r e v a l e n c e , o v e r a l l a n d b y s e x , o f f r e s e r v e f i r s t n a t i o n s , m é t i s , a n d i n u i t h i g h s c h o o l s t u d e n t s a g e d 1 2 t o 2 1 , c a n a d a , 2 0 1 2 ( c o n t i n u e d ) i n u i t i n i n u i t n u n a n g a t o v e r a l l m a l e s f e m a l e s 95% ci 95% ci 95% ci % ll ul % ll ul % ll ul χ2 p value current smoking 46.3 42.0 50.7 43.3 37.3 49.5 49.4 43.2 55.7 0.18 daily 35.1 31.1 39.3 30.9 25.4 36.9 39.6 33.5 45.9 occasionally 11.2 8.8 14.1 12.4 e 8.8 17.2 9.9 e 7.1 13.6 current non-smoking 53.7 49.3 58.0 56.7 50.5 62.7 50.6 44.3 56.8 note. source: aboriginal peoples survey, 2012. χ2 tests of independence were conducted for current smoking versus non-smoking proportions. ci = confidence interval; ll = lower limit; ul = upper limit. e = use with caution. 9 bougie and kohen: smoking among indigenous students published by scholarship@western, 2018 t a b l e 2 . d e s c r i p t i v e f a m i l y , p e e r , a n d s c h o o l c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s f o r o f f r e s e r v e f i r s t n a t i o n s , m é t i s , a n d i n u i t h i g h s c h o o l s t u d e n t s a g e d 1 2 t o 2 1 , o v e r a l l a n d b y c u r r e n t s m o k i n g s t a t u s , c a n a d a , 2 0 1 2 o f f r e s e r v e f i r s t n a t i o n s c u r r e n t s m o k i n g s t a t u s o v e r a l l s m o k e r n o n s m o k e r 95% ci 95% ci 95% ci % ll ul % ll ul % ll ul χ2 p value maternal/female guardian highest level of education less than high school 17.8 14.8 21.4 28.4 e 19.4 39.6 15.9 13.0 19.2 0.005 high school 20.6 18.0 23.5 26.3 e 18.6 35.9 19.6 17.0 22.5 postsecondary education 61.5 57.4 65.5 45.3 34.1 57.0 64.5 60.5 68.3 presence of a regular smoker in the home yes 20.5 17.5 23.9 36.3 27.7 46.0 17.5 14.3 21.2 0.001 no 79.5 76.1 82.5 63.7 54.0 72.3 82.5 78.8 85.7 participated in school-organized sport activity yes 40.4 37.3 43.7 29.9 22.6 38.4 42.5 38.9 46.1 0.01 no 59.6 56.3 62.7 70.1 61.6 77.4 57.5 53.9 61.1 participated in school-organized art activity yes 33.0 29.5 36.7 25.2 18.1 33.9 34.5 30.4 38.8 0.06 no 67.0 63.3 70.5 74.8 66.1 81.9 65.5 61.2 69.6 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 2 [2018], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.1 t a b l e 2 . d e s c r i p t i v e f a m i l y , p e e r , a n d s c h o o l c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s f o r o f f r e s e r v e f i r s t n a t i o n s , m é t i s , a n d i n u i t h i g h s c h o o l s t u d e n t s a g e d 1 2 t o 2 1 , o v e r a l l a n d b y c u r r e n t s m o k i n g s t a t u s , c a n a d a , 2 0 1 2 ( c o n t i n u e d ) o f f r e s e r v e f i r s t n a t i o n s c u r r e n t s m o k i n g s t a t u s o v e r a l l s m o k e r n o n s m o k e r 95% ci 95% ci 95% ci % ll ul % ll ul % ll ul χ2 p value participated in school-organized club activity yes 19.3 16.7 22.2 f 19.9 17.2 22.8 0.56 no 80.7 77.8 83.3 83.6 69.3 92.1 80.1 77.2 82.8 family is involved in at least two school activities yes 54.3 50.7 57.9 39.6 28.8 51.5 57.2 53.6 60.7 0.003 no 45.7 42.1 49.3 60.4 48.5 71.2 42.8 39.3 46.4 o v e r a l l s m o k e r n o n s m o k e r m se m se m se f test p value household income ($) 31,309 753 24,450 1780 32,643 846 < .0001 peer risk behaviours score 1.5 0.02 2.2 0.06 1.4 0.02 < .0001 peer educational aspirations score 3.1 0.03 2.5 0.08 3.2 0.03 < .0001 positive school environment score 3.1 0.03 2.9 0.06 3.1 0.02 < .0001 negative school environment score 2.2 0.02 2.4 0.06 2.2 0.02 0.001 school supports first nations, métis, or inuit culture 2.8 0.03 2.9 0.07 2.8 0.03 0.47 11 bougie and kohen: smoking among indigenous students published by scholarship@western, 2018 t a b l e 2 . d e s c r i p t i v e f a m i l y , p e e r , a n d s c h o o l c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s f o r o f f r e s e r v e f i r s t n a t i o n s , m é t i s , a n d i n u i t h i g h s c h o o l s t u d e n t s a g e d 1 2 t o 2 1 , o v e r a l l a n d b y c u r r e n t s m o k i n g s t a t u s , c a n a d a , 2 0 1 2 ( c o n t i n u e d ) m é t i s c u r r e n t s m o k i n g s t a t u s o v e r a l l s m o k e r n o n s m o k e r 95% ci 95% ci 95% ci % ll ul % ll ul % ll ul χ2 p value maternal/female guardian highest level of education less than high school 11.7 9.4 14.5 20.3 e 12.0 32.1 10.3 8.2 12.9 0.03 high school 21.6 18.5 25.1 26.7 e 18.3 37.1 20.7 17.5 24.4 postsecondary education 66.7 62.7 70.5 53.1 40.6 65.2 69.0 64.9 72.7 presence of a regular smoker in the home yes 21.4 18.2 24.9 46.1 33.7 59.0 17.1 14.2 20.4 0.0002 no 78.6 75.1 81.8 53.9 41.0 66.3 82.9 79.6 85.8 participated in school-organized sport activity yes 41.7 37.7 45.8 33.7 e 23.1 46.4 43.1 38.9 47.4 0.14 no 58.3 54.2 62.3 66.3 53.6 76.9 56.9 52.6 61.1 participated in school-organized art activity yes 32.1 28.8 35.6 28.0 e 17.0 42.3 32.8 29.4 36.4 0.47 no 67.9 64.4 71.2 72.0 57.7 83.0 67.2 63.6 70.6 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 2 [2018], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.1 t a b l e 2 . d e s c r i p t i v e f a m i l y , p e e r , a n d s c h o o l c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s f o r o f f r e s e r v e f i r s t n a t i o n s , m é t i s , a n d i n u i t h i g h s c h o o l s t u d e n t s a g e d 1 2 t o 2 1 , o v e r a l l a n d b y c u r r e n t s m o k i n g s t a t u s , c a n a d a , 2 0 1 2 ( c o n t i n u e d ) m é t i s c u r r e n t s m o k i n g s t a t u s o v e r a l l s m o k e r n o n s m o k e r 95% ci 95% ci 95% ci % ll ul % ll ul % ll ul χ2 p value participated in school-organized club activity yes 17.6 15.0 20.5 7.6 e 3.9 14.2 19.3 16.5 22.5 0.0004 no 82.4 79.5 85.0 92.4 85.8 96.1 80.7 77.5 83.5 family is involved in at least two school activities yes 53.9 50.1 57.7 30.5 21.9 40.7 58.0 54.0 61.9 < .0001 no 46.1 42.3 49.9 69.5 59.3 78.1 42.0 38.1 46.0 o v e r a l l s m o k e r n o n s m o k e r m se m se m se f test p value household income ($) 35,806 779 28,686 1894 37,049 814 < .0001 peer risk behaviours score 1.5 0.02 2.1 0.07 1.4 0.02 < .0001 peer educational aspirations score 3.2 0.03 2.9 0.10 3.3 0.03 0.002 positive school environment score 3.1 0.02 2.9 0.10 3.1 0.02 0.03 negative school environment score 2.2 0.03 2.4 0.07 2.2 0.03 0.001 school supports first nations, métis or inuit culture 2.9 0.03 2.9 0.13 2.9 0.03 0.93 13 bougie and kohen: smoking among indigenous students published by scholarship@western, 2018 t a b l e 2 . d e s c r i p t i v e f a m i l y , p e e r , a n d s c h o o l c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s f o r o f f r e s e r v e f i r s t n a t i o n s , m é t i s , a n d i n u i t h i g h s c h o o l s t u d e n t s a g e d 1 2 t o 2 1 , o v e r a l l a n d b y c u r r e n t s m o k i n g s t a t u s , c a n a d a , 2 0 1 2 ( c o n t i n u e d ) i n u i t i n i n u i t n u n a n g a t c u r r e n t s m o k i n g s t a t u s o v e r a l l s m o k e r n o n s m o k e r 95% ci 95% ci 95% ci % ll ul % ll ul % ll ul χ2 p value maternal/female guardian highest level of education less than high school 64.1 59.6 68.4 72.4 65.4 78.4 57.8 51.7 63.6 0.01 high school 14.8 11.9 18.4 10.9 e 6.9 16.7 17.9 13.9 22.6 postsecondary education 21.0 17.7 24.8 16.8 12.2 22.6 24.3 19.9 29.4 presence of a regular smoker in the home yes 27.8 23.9 32.1 34.5 28.4 41.3 22.1 17.4 27.6 0.004 no 72.2 67.9 76.1 65.5 58.7 71.6 77.9 72.4 82.6 participated in school-organized sport activity yes 65.1 60.6 69.4 64.6 57.6 71.0 65.6 59.5 71.3 0.82 no 34.9 30.6 39.4 35.4 29.0 42.4 34.4 28.7 40.5 participated in school-organized art activity yes 37.9 33.6 42.4 40.2 33.8 46.9 35.9 30.4 41.8 0.33 no 62.1 57.6 66.4 59.8 53.1 66.2 64.1 58.2 69.6 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 2 [2018], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.1 t a b l e 2 . d e s c r i p t i v e f a m i l y , p e e r , a n d s c h o o l c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s f o r o f f r e s e r v e f i r s t n a t i o n s , m é t i s , a n d i n u i t h i g h s c h o o l s t u d e n t s a g e d 1 2 t o 2 1 , o v e r a l l a n d b y c u r r e n t s m o k i n g s t a t u s , c a n a d a , 2 0 1 2 ( c o n t i n u e d ) i n u i t i n i n u i t n u n a n g a t c u r r e n t s m o k i n g s t a t u s o v e r a l l s m o k e r n o n s m o k e r 95% ci 95% ci 95% ci % ll ul % ll ul % ll ul χ2 p value participated in school-organized club activity yes 24.4 20.7 28.6 22.1 16.7 28.5 26.5 21.6 32.0 0.27 no 75.6 71.4 79.3 77.9 71.5 83.3 73.5 68.0 78.4 family is involved in at least two school activities yes 67.4 62.9 71.5 60.0 53.1 66.5 73.7 68.1 78.7 0.002 no 32.6 28.5 37.1 40.0 33.5 46.9 26.3 21.3 31.9 o v e r a l l s m o k e r n o n s m o k e r m se m se m se f test p value household income ($) 38,634 1,036 35,156 1,324 41,633 1,554 0.002 peer risk behaviours score 1.7 0.03 2.0 0.03 1.5 0.03 < .0001 peer educational aspirations score 2.7 0.03 2.6 0.04 2.8 0.04 0.004 15 bougie and kohen: smoking among indigenous students published by scholarship@western, 2018 t a b l e 2 . d e s c r i p t i v e f a m i l y , p e e r , a n d s c h o o l c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s f o r o f f r e s e r v e f i r s t n a t i o n s , m é t i s , a n d i n u i t h i g h s c h o o l s t u d e n t s a g e d 1 2 t o 2 1 , o v e r a l l a n d b y c u r r e n t s m o k i n g s t a t u s , c a n a d a , 2 0 1 2 ( c o n t i n u e d ) i n u i t i n i n u i t n u n a n g a t o v e r a l l s m o k e r n o n s m o k e r m se m se m se f test p value positive school environment score 3.1 0.02 3.0 0.02 3.1 0.03 0.02 negative school environment score 2.3 0.02 2.3 0.04 2.2 0.04 0.02 school supports first nations, métis or inuit culture 3.2 0.03 3.2 0.04 3.2 0.03 0.08 notes. data source: aboriginal peoples survey 2012. ci = confidence interval; ll = lower limit; ul = upper limit. e = use with caution. f = too unreliable to publish. peer risk behaviours scores range from 1 to 4; a higher score indicates a greater number of peers engaging in risk behaviours. peer educational aspirations scores range from 1 to 4; a higher score indicates a greater number of peers with high aspirations. positive school environment scores range from 1 to 4; a higher score indicates a more positive environment. negative school environment scores range from 1 to 4; a higher score indicates a more negative environment. school supports culture scores range from 1 to 4; a higher score indicates a more culturally supportive school. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 2 [2018], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.1 l o g i s t i c r e g r e s s i o n a n a l y s e s in the presence of all examined family, peer, and school factors, the characteristics that remained significantly (p < 0.05) associated with current smoking were as follows and are illustrated in table 3. among off-reserve first nations students, decreased odds of smoking were observed in those who had high scores on the peer educational aspirations scale, or = 0.44, 95% ci [0.29, 0.66], and those who perceived a positive school environment, or = 0.44, 95% ci [0.22, 0.89], while increased odds of smoking were observed among off-reserve first nations students who had high scores on the peer risk behaviour scale, or = 6.8, 95% ci [3.4, 13.7]. among métis students, decreased odds of smoking were observed among those who participated in school-organized club extracurricular activities, or = 0.28, 95% ci [0.12, 0.63], while increased odds of smoking were observed among those who lived in a home where someone smoked regularly, or = 2.9, 95% ci [1.3, 6.5], and those who had high scores on the peer risk behaviour scale, or = 6.7, 95% ci [2.9, 15.8]. among inuit students, decreased odds of smoking were observed among those who lived in higherincome households, or = 0.86, 95% ci [0.77, 0.97], while increased odds of smoking were observed among those who had high scores on the peer risk behaviour scale, or = 6.8, 95% ci [3.2, 14.6]. the only characteristic that was consistently associated with smoking among all three groups of indigenous students was having many peers who engaged in risk behaviours. d i s c u s s i o n this study used population-based data to investigate the characteristics associated with current smoking among three groups of indigenous high school students in canada: off-reserve first nations, métis, and inuit. in order to do this, this study examined three social contexts that have been shown to influence adolescent smoking behaviour: family, peers, and school. we expected family and peer factors to be strongly association with smoking behaviours because families and peers reflect adolescents’ immediate social environments (wen et al., 2009; wiium & wold, 2009). however, since schools are often a key context for health education and promotion with youth (samdal et al., 2000), we also focused on school environment factors. a growing body of research has started to examine the factors associated with smoking among indigenous youth in canada and the united states. this research has addressed many contributing factors, including cultural factors (ryan et al., 2017; soto et al., 2015; yu, stiffman, & freedenthal, 2005); physical activity, co-occurring health-risk behaviours, and socioeconomic factors (ryan et al., 2017); historical trauma (soto et al., 2015); mental health and peer influences (whitlock et al., 2012; yu et al., 2005); perceived harm from tobacco use (beauvais, thurman, burnside, & plested, 2007); and academic orientation and stressful life events (lemaster et al., 2002). this study contributes to this growing body of research by investigating the associations between smoking and various school characteristics, together with family and peer factors, among off-reserve first nations, métis, and inuit high school students. 17 bougie and kohen: smoking among indigenous students published by scholarship@western, 2018 t a b l e 3 . l o g i s t i c r e g r e s s i o n m o d e l s p r e d i c t i n g c u r r e n t s m o k i n g , o f f r e s e r v e f i r s t n a t i o n s , m é t i s , a n d i n u i t h i g h s c h o o l s t u d e n t s a g e d 1 2 t o 2 1 , c a n a d a , 2 0 1 2 o f f r e s e r v e f i r s t n a t i o n s a 95% ci or ll ul p value f a m i l y c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s household income (divided by 10,000) 0.98 0.82 1.16 0.77 mother's education no high school (ref.) 1.00 high school 1.08 0.45 2.59 0.86 postsecondary 0.67 0.28 1.63 0.38 regular smoker in the home 1.73 0.94 3.17 0.08 p e e r c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s peer risk behaviours 6.76 3.35 13.65 < .0001 peer educational aspirations 0.44 0.29 0.66 0.0001 s c h o o l c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s positive school environment 0.44 0.22 0.89 0.02 negative school environment 0.70 0.41 1.21 0.20 participated in school-organized sport activity 1.11 0.64 1.92 0.72 family is involved in at least two activities in school 1.19 0.61 2.33 0.61 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 2 [2018], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.1 t a b l e 3 . l o g i s t i c r e g r e s s i o n m o d e l s p r e d i c t i n g c u r r e n t s m o k i n g , o f f r e s e r v e f i r s t n a t i o n s , m é t i s , a n d i n u i t h i g h s c h o o l s t u d e n t s a g e d 1 2 t o 2 1 , c a n a d a , 2 0 1 2 ( c o n t i n u e d ) m é t i s b 95% ci or ll ul p value f a m i l y c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s household income (divided by 10,000) 0.86 0.70 1.07 0.17 mother's education no high school (ref.) 1.00 high school 1.18 0.31 4.50 0.81 postsecondary 0.97 0.23 4.05 0.96 regular smoker in the home 2.90 1.30 6.51 0.01 p e e r c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s peer risk behaviours 6.73 2.87 15.79 < .0001 peer educational aspirations 0.99 0.56 1.74 0.97 s c h o o l c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s positive school environment 0.77 0.30 1.98 0.59 negative school environment 1.67 0.82 3.43 0.16 participated in school-organized “club” activity 0.28 0.12 0.63 0.002 family is involved in at least two activities in school 0.76 0.40 1.44 0.40 19 bougie and kohen: smoking among indigenous students published by scholarship@western, 2018 t a b l e 3 . l o g i s t i c r e g r e s s i o n m o d e l s p r e d i c t i n g c u r r e n t s m o k i n g , o f f r e s e r v e f i r s t n a t i o n s , m é t i s , a n d i n u i t h i g h s c h o o l s t u d e n t s a g e d 1 2 t o 2 1 , c a n a d a , 2 0 1 2 ( c o n t i n u e d ) i n u i t i n i n u i t n u n a n g a t c 95% ci or ll ul p value f a m i l y c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s household income (divided by 10,000) 0.86 0.77 0.97 0.01 mother's education no high school (ref.) 1.00 high school 0.62 0.32 1.21 0.16 postsecondary 0.56 0.31 1.01 0.05 regular smoker in the home 1.18 0.67 2.06 0.57 p e e r c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s peer risk behaviours 6.77 3.15 14.57 < .0001 peer educational aspirations 1.02 0.65 1.61 0.92 s c h o o l c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s positive school environment 0.61 0.30 1.22 0.16 negative school environment 1.01 0.55 1.84 0.98 family is involved in at least two activities in school 0.85 0.46 1.54 0.58 note. source: aboriginal peoples survey, 2012. the full model only includes the covariates that were significantly associated with current smoking at the bivariate level. the full model controls for age, sex, and proxy reporting (not shown). or = odds ratio. ci = confidence interval; ll = lower limit; ul = upper limit. a n = 1,758; c statistic = 0.90; somers' d = 0.80 b n = 1,716; c statistic = 0.90; somers' d = 0.79 c n = 428; c statistic = 0.82; somers' d = 0.65 our findings revealed important group differences in indigenous youth’s correlates of smoking. the only consistent risk factor for smoking among off-reserve first nations, métis, and inuit students was having many close friends who engaged in risk behaviours (including but not restricted to smoking). this finding is in line with past research regarding both indigenous and non-indigenous youth, which has shown an association between teen smoking and having friends who smoke (alexander et al., 2001; chuang et al., 2009; wen et al., 2009; whitlock et al., 2012). among off-reserve first nations students, those who had many close friends with high educational aspirations (i.e., who thought it was important to work hard at school and to complete high school, and who planned to further their education or training) showed decreased odds of smoking. past research focussing on indigenous youth has also found that their peers have an influence on their mental health outcomes (guèvremont et al., 2016; 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 2 [2018], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.1 kaspar, 2013); this study has highlighted the importance of peer behaviour and influence for smoking among this population. the relationship between peers and smoking behaviour is complex, and it is best seen as bi-directional insofar as youth can be influenced by the norms and behaviours of their peer group and/or seek out peers with norms and behaviours that are similar to their own (simons-morton & farhat, 2010). future research disentangling these different causal pathways is warranted, as are studies that actively examine the role of peers vis-à-vis other risk behaviours. as expected, family characteristics were associated with current smoking. in the presence of all examined factors, métis students living in homes where someone smoked regularly had increased odds of smoking themselves. the association between smoking and living with a regular smoker was in the right direction for the other two groups of students and was marginally significant among first nations students. this is consistent with past research on youth smoking, which has shown an association between youth smoking and being exposed to smoking in the home or living in a house where smoking is not completely restricted (leatherdale et al., 2008; shields, 2005b). among inuit students, living in lowerincome households was associated with increased odds of smoking. the association between smoking and household income was in the right direction for the other two groups of students. these findings are in line with the well-known associations between teen smoking and family socio-economic characteristics (hanson & chen, 2007; ryan et al., 2017; shields, 2005b; soteriades & difranza, 2003; wen et al., 2009; wiium & wold, 2009). future studies are necessary to better understand why youth from low-income families may be more likely to smoke. scholars have argued that low socio-economic conditions are proxy measures for other constructs that are related to smoking; one example is locus of control, or the belief that one is able or unable to influence their health by engaging in health-promoting activities (soteriades & difranza, 2003; stronks, van de mheen, looman, & mackenbach, 1997). it has also been argued that smoking may be a coping behaviour for the stress of living in disadvantaged circumstances (stronks et al., 1997). from this, it is possible that low household income may further be associated with unique barriers to smoking cessation; this could be investigated in future research. school-related characteristics were also found to be protective for indigenous student smoking, over and above the associations of smoking with family and peer characteristics. indeed, lower odds of smoking were observed among off-reserve first nations students who attended schools with a positive climate, and among métis students who participated in club activities organized by their schools. positive school environments were associated with a lower prevalence of smoking among off-reserve first nations students and, in this study, a positive school environment was defined as a place where students felt safe and happy, where most students enjoyed being at school, and where there were many opportunities to become involved in school activities. these items, although not identical, were consistent with how the construct of school connectedness has been typically operationalized in past studies that have found an association between increased school connectedness and decreased cigarette use (azagba & asbridge, 2013; dornbusch et al., 2001; gowing & jackson, 2016; resnick et al., 1997; sabiston et al., 2009). to our knowledge, this is the first study to show an association between off-reserve first nations students’ perception of school environment and smoking behaviours. participation in school-based extracurricular activities or afterschool programs has been shown to foster a sense of school connectedness (anderson-butcher, 2010; martinez et al., 2016; thompson et al., 2006). past research has shown an association between smoking and frequent participation in extracurricular sport activities among off-reserve indigenous youth (ryan et al., 2017). in this study, we 21 bougie and kohen: smoking among indigenous students published by scholarship@western, 2018 paid attention to extracurricular activities that were organized specifically by schools and, in this context, participation in school-based club activities was associated with a lower prevalence of smoking among métis students. supervised, organized extracurricular activities have been associated with positive outcomes among youth, especially if these activities are structured in a manner that supports adolescents’ developmental needs (e.g., forming caring relationships with adults and peers, engaging in identity exploration) (fredricks & eccles, 2008). it has also been suggested that different types of extracurricular activities (i.e., sport, art, or clubs) may provide students with qualitatively different developmental opportunities (martinez et al., 2016). to this end, more research is needed to identify the features through which school-based club activities are associated with lower smoking prevalence among métis high school students. among inuit students, the school characteristics that were significantly associated with smoking at the bivariate level—that is, family involvement in school activities as well as positive and negative school environments —lost their statistical significance in the multivariate analysis. this suggests that school factors, as measured in the 2012 aps, do not seem to play an independent role in current smoking among these youths, but that instead family and peer factors appear to have a stronger association with smoking. school factors as measured in the 2012 aps may also be weak proxies for school environments in inuit nunangat. l i m i t a t i o n s this study has a number of limitations that should be acknowledged. first, it is based on cross-sectional survey data and thus causal relationships between smoking and the factors investigated cannot be inferred. as well, this study focused on youth currently attending school; school leavers, who may be a high-risk group for smoking (hublet et al., 2006), are not represented in this study’s analysis. furthermore, this study relies on self-reported current smoking status; although it has been demonstrated that self-reported data on smoking status provide a valid estimate of the prevalence of smoking in canada (wong, shields, leatherdale, malaison, & hammond, 2012), self-reported smoking data have not been validated among either the indigenous population generally or the indigenous high school youth population specifically. in addition, the prevalence of current smoking among indigenous high school students could be underestimated because of the large proportion of proxy respondents in the 2012 aps among youth. indeed, preliminary data analyses (that are not shown) suggested that current smoking proportions were higher among non-proxy respondents. only respondents with complete data on all selected covariates were included in the regression analyses. the resultant reduced sample sizes for the three groups of students—especially for inuit—could have decreased the statistical power to detect significant differences. another limitation related to missing data is that the peer influence and the school environment scales were calculated only if respondents replied to a minimum of 75% of the questions comprising the scales. while this was done to augment the robustness of the scores, it also excluded respondents with missing data for these questions and is thus another limitation of the study. the associations of peer characteristics with smoking are complex. future studies using social network analysis or longitudinal network data to disentangle the friend selection versus socialization processes (e.g., schaefer, adams, & haas, 2013; seo & huang, 2012) are necessary in order to better understand 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 2 [2018], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.1 these dynamics. also, further analyses of participation in school-based extracurricular activities should adjust for potential self-selection biases—that is, further analyses should address whether participation in organized activity is due to pre-existing differences between participants and non-participants (fredricks & eccles, 2008; wang & eccles, 2012), such as access or availability. another limitation is that although family, peer, and school contexts were discussed in separate themes, the boundaries between these contexts are fluid and this study did not explore their complex interactions. in addition, the relatively small overall sample size of indigenous high school students precluded the analysis of gender-based correlates of smoking, or of neighbourhood factors associated with smoking. some have argued that neighbourhoods of different population densities (i.e., urban, suburban, or rural) have structural and cultural differences, which may affect the influence of family, peers, and potentially schools on adolescent smoking behaviours (chuang et al., 2009). this study is also limited to the content of the 2012 aps, which did not have any school policy information (such as whether or not respondents’ schools had tobacco-free policies). school tobacco policies can influence schools’ social environments (paek, hove, & oh, 2013), but this could not be taken into consideration in this study. as well, although several school characteristics were measured in the survey, there was no comprehensive school connectedness measure. there is evidence that school connectedness is a multidimensional construct that taps into many areas of youth’s school experiences, including school involvement, academic motivation, school attachment, teacher support, and peer relations (chung-do, goebert, chang, & hamagani, 2015). lastly, the 2012 aps is limited to the offreserve population. as such, future research using other sources of data to investigate the correlates of smoking among first nations youth residing in first nations communities is warranted. c o n c l u s i o n s this study adds to a growing body of research that has sought to identify the risk and protective factors for cigarette use among indigenous youth in canada. our results highlight a number of family, peer, and school characteristics that have been associated with smoking. our results also reveal important group differences in indigenous youth’s correlates of smoking, and this should be taken into consideration when developing interventions that target smoking among off-reserve first nations, métis, and inuit students in canada. even though more research is needed to disentangle the complex processes of peer influences on smoking, our findings do indicate consistent associations between smoking and having close friends who engage in risk behaviours including (but not restricted to) smoking. moreover, our findings suggest that tobacco control strategies either targeting or considering peer networks are warranted (kaai, brown, leatherdale, manske, & murnaghan, 2014). broadly speaking, our findings also suggest that interventions aimed at helping families make their homes smoke-free could help promote a smoke-free lifestyle among off-reserve indigenous youths, and that youth living in lowerincome families are at a particular risk for smoking and could thus be a focus for interventions. lastly, our findings suggest that indigenous youth attending schools that foster a sense of connectedness—either through school climate or school-based organized activities—may be less at-risk for smoking, regardless of their family and peer influences. some have suggested that schools can adopt strategies that promote school connectedness among students which can, in turn, lead to lowered risktaking behaviour, including cigarette smoking initiation (chapman, buckley, sheehan, & shochet, 23 bougie and kohen: smoking among indigenous students published by scholarship@western, 2018 2013). however, as has been pointed out by chapman et al. (2013), interventions targeting school environments are complex endeavours that require time, financial resources, and long-term commitments from schools and their administrations and staff. this, certainly, is something beyond the scope of this study and article. nevertheless, our study can help inform research on school-based interventions and programs to prevent the onset of smoking among indigenous students in canada. future research seeking to replicate and expand our findings should consider both using more multidimensional and standardized school connectedness tools and conducting qualitative studies that investigate the meaning of connecting to school among off-reserve first nations, métis, and inuit high school students in canada. 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 2 [2018], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.1 r e f e r e n c e s aboriginal healing foundation. 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(2005). factors affecting american indian adolescent tobacco use. addictive behaviors, 30(5), 889-904. doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.addbeh.2004.08.029 30 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 2 [2018], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.1 the international indigenous policy journal april 2018 smoking among off-reserve first nations, métis, and inuit high school students evelyne bougie dafna kohen recommended citation smoking among off-reserve first nations, métis, and inuit high school students abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license smoking among off-reserve first nations, mã©tis, and inuit high school students ms#1459 smith development of an undrip.rce.pdf the international indigenous policy journal volume 11 | issue 2 may 2020 development of an undrip compliance assessment tool: how a performance framework could improve state compliance jackson a. smith wilfrid laurier university, jackson.smith@uwaterloo.ca terry l. mitchell wilfrid laurier university, tmitchell@wlu.ca recommended citation smith, j. a., & mitchell, t. l.(2020). development of an undrip compliance assessment tool: how a performance framework could improve state compliance. the international indigenous policy journal, 11(2). doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2020. 11.2.10713 development of an undrip compliance assessment tool: how a performance framework could improve state compliance abstract improving state compliance with the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip) can be supported by monitoring and measurement. current approaches to monitoring state compliance with the undrip are qualitative and non-standardized, which limits comparability across time and across geopolitical lines. in this article, we introduce a novel approach to monitoring compliance with the undrip and human rights more generally. this work highlights the potential advantages of using a performance improvement framework to clearly identify gaps in compliance, monitor state compliance with the declaration over time, and effectively assess and compare state compliance. we describe the development of a standardized undrip compliance assessment tool and report the process and findings of a pilot test of the tool. the pilot assessment utilized the un special rapporteur on the rights of indigenous peoples’ (srrip; anaya, 2014) findings on the situation of indigenous peoples in canada in three thematic areas: (a) self-government and self-governance; (b) consultation and free, prior, and informed consent (fpic); and (c) land and natural resources. while insufficient for a fulsome assessment of canada’s compliance with the undrip, we restricted ourselves to the report for two reasons: first, to test the applicability of the tool for quantifying qualitative data; and, second, to evaluate the degree to which the un monitoring mechanism for indigenous rights adheres to the declaration’s articles for monitoring and reporting. we discuss implications and opportunities for improving human rights monitoring and state implementation efforts. keywords human rights law, human rights compliance monitoring, indigenous rights, measurement, performance improvement, united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples, undrip, policy design, policy analysis, policy evaluation author note jackson a. smith is now at the university of waterloo. acknowledgments this research was supported in part by the canadian graduate scholarship—master’s (cgs-m) from the social sciences and humanities research council (sshrc). we are grateful to the anonymous reviewers whose constructive feedback helped to strengthen this paper. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. 1 smith & mitchell: development of an undrip compliance assessment tool published by scholarship@western, 2020 development of an undrip compliance assessment tool: how a performance framework could improve state compliance indigenous peoples globally endure deprivations of their inherent rights, which result in social, economic, and health inequities relative to the non-indigenous citizenry (anaya, 2014; canadian human rights commission, 2013; kirmayer et al., 2000; mitchell & macleod, 2014; united nations [un] permanent forum on indigenous issues, 2009). canada is an example of a high-income country in which indigenous peoples have been noted to be living in conditions akin to those found in lowincome countries (anaya, 2014; un committee on the elimination of racial discrimination [cerd], 2017). numerous rights conventions focus on mitigating racial discrimination, including the un cerd (n.d.; established in 1962), the international convention on the elimination of all forms of racial discrimination (1965), and the international covenant on civil and political rights (1966). the international labour organization’s c107 (indigenous and tribal populations convention, 1957) and r104 (indigenous and tribal populations recommendation, 1957), implemented in 1959, were the first to recognize the unique rights of indigenous peoples (belanger, 2011). however, due to the lack of explicit mention of indigenous peoples, by the late 1960s indigenous people strengthened their demands for international recognition of their inherent rights. this led to the endorsement of the working group on indigenous peoples (wgip) in 1982, the revision of ilo c107, which passed as c169—indigenous and tribal peoples convention (1989) in 1989, and the drafting of the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip; un, 2007), first tabled in 1993 (belanger, 2011). in 2007, the undrip became an official international standard of indigenous rights, thereby establishing the recognition by the un general assembly of the need to advance indigenous peoples’ rights and commitment to support member state compliance. canada was one of only four countries to oppose the passing of the undrip in 2007 when it was officially passed by the un general assembly. the country remained in opposition to the undrip until november 14, 2010, when the federal government released an official statement of endorsement of the undrip. however, despite endorsing the declaration the government maintained their reservations about compliance, asserting, “[t]he declaration is an aspirational . . . non-legally binding document that does not reflect customary international law nor change canadian laws . . .” (aboriginal affairs and northern development canada, 2010a, paras. 3-4). additionally, the statement indicates that the endorsement of the declaration does not mean that the government of canada will make any amendments to domestic laws and policies in order to reflect the articles of the undrip, particularly in the domains of self-government and self-governance; free, prior, and informed consent (fpic); and land and natural resource rights (aboriginal affairs and northern development canada, 2010a, 2010b). it is apropos to point out that suggesting a human rights document can be accepted as binding only insofar as it is consistent with established laws is contradictory. part of the reason for the existence of human rights regimes is to identify aspects of domestic systems that are not in compliance with human rights responsibilities. if established laws are already in compliance, then the human rights document is redundant. although canada and other states have characterized their endorsement of the undrip as not obligating compliance due it being a declaration rather than a treaty, “soft law” instruments such as declarations can be considered sources of legal obligation through the establishment of norms and customary international law (joffe, 2010; jones, 2011; shelton, 2006). some legal scholars have asserted 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.2.10713 that many aspects of the undrip do indeed constitute customary international law, including the following rights: self-determination; autonomy or self-government; cultural rights and identity; land rights; and reparation, redress, and remedies (barnabas, 2017; boyer, 2014; graham & wiessner, 2011; gunn, 2011a, 2011b; international law association, 2010; un permanent forum on indigenous issues, 2014). further, under the various human rights treaties canada has signed and as a member of international organizations such as the un and the organization of american states, canada has obligations to ensure its domestic institutions and legal structures are in conformity with the undrip (barnabas, 2017). as such, contrary to the government’s assertion, the norms set out in the undrip are binding articulations of human rights obligations with respect to indigenous peoples. with the change in federal leadership in 2015, the discourse shifted. prime minister justin trudeau officially committed to the implementation of the undrip, publicly and through mandating the minister of indigenous and northern affairs to implement the undrip as her first priority (trudeau, 2015). additionally, the government of canada formally shifted its position within the un, declaring canada’s endorsement of the declaration without reservations (hill, 2016). in spite of the plethora of public promises and inspirational speeches about reconciliation since entering office, prime minister trudeau has continued the legacy of violating the rights of indigenous peoples within the undrip framework, particularly when the rights conflict with opportunities for the development or expansion of resource extraction projects. one such example is the issuing of permits to the site c dam, allowing the construction of the bc hydro project to continue despite ongoing legal challenges by two first nations, even after the federal–provincial review panel found that the dam “will result in significant and irreversible adverse impacts on treaty 8 first nations” (gilchrist, 2016, para. 2). another notable contradiction is the purchasing of the trans mountain pipeline in august 2018, as indicated by the federal court of appeal’s ruling for tsleil-waututh nation v. canada (2018), which struck down the government’s approval of the pipeline expansion in part because “ . . . canada’s execution of phase iii of the consultation process was unacceptably flawed and fell short of the standard prescribed by the jurisprudence of the supreme court. as such, the consultation process fell short of the required mark for reasonable consultation” (para. 557). in order to facilitate compliance with the undrip, it is important for the legitimacy and weight of the declaration within constitutional law to be better understood on all levels so citizens, organizations, and legal bodies can enforce the rights. additionally, there is a need for standardized methods to monitor compliance and provide specific feedback to support performance improvement. feedback, compliance monitoring, and performance improvement feedback has been used to inform and instigate behavioural and systems change in various sectors, including health care (lambert et al., 2001), mental health (kelly et al., 2009; riemer & bickman, 2011), and organizations and manufacturing (ilgen et al., 1979; taylor et al., 1984). a particularly useful method of feedback is negative feedback, where cognitive dissonance is created by exposing gaps between the commitments that individuals, organizations, businesses, communities, or governments make and their actual behaviours (riemer & bickman, 2011). monitoring states’ compliance with their human rights commitments is an important means for exposing where the gaps between the ideal and the reality lie—and publicly exposing these gaps can provide the impetus to make change by eliciting a sense of dissonance (within individuals or at a collective level) and/or tarnishing or threatening a public 3 smith & mitchell: development of an undrip compliance assessment tool published by scholarship@western, 2020 reputation (riemer & bickman, 2011). this discrepancy, according to control theory, “ . . . can trigger various reactions, including (a) increased effort to reduce or eliminate the gap to alter future feedback; (b) efforts to change the standard; and (c) rejection of the standard, among others” (guerra-lópez & hutchinson, 2013, p. 163). in canada, community-based, political, and legal pressure to comply has been mounting. since 2012, canada has seen the igniting of idle no more, the national inquiry into missing and murdered indigenous women and girls, and the truth and reconciliation commission of canada’s calls to action, not to mention the community-level protests, blockades, and rallies across the country. there have been sustained demonstrations against the trans mountain pipeline and a number of significant court rulings exposing inadequate consultation, including tsleil-waututh nation v. canada (2018), clyde river (hamlet) v. petroleum geo-services inc. (2017), and eabametoong first nation v. minister of northern development and mines (2018; see mitchell, 2019 for more examples). the truth and reconciliation commission of canada (2015), after a long process of revisiting and documenting the horrors of the indian residential school system across the country calls for the undrip to be the “framework for reconciliation in canada” (p. 15), urging the government of canada to follow through with their obligation to implement and respect the rights standards established in the undrip. additionally, a 2017 report of the united nations committee to eliminate racial discrimination (un cerd, 2017) indicated that the committee was “deeply concerned” by canada's continuous violations of the land rights of indigenous peoples: . . . in particular environmentally destructive decisions for resource development which affect their lives and territories continue to be undertaken without the free, prior and informed consent of the indigenous peoples, resulting in breaches of treaty obligations and international human rights law. (article 19a) within the same report, they recommend that canada ratify ilo c169 (1989) concerning the indigenous and tribal peoples convention. one challenge is the lack of governance mechanisms to monitor the implementation of the undrip internationally and domestically. such monitoring is necessary for pressuring states that “underperform” to conform to the rights norms by means of accountability measures and public “shaming” (kelly & simmons, 2015). aside from monitoring and enforcement, feedback and monitoring can be useful mechanisms for “performance enhancement” (increased compliance) by states who are motivated to improve compliance and look at specific indicators to measure their performance over time and develop strategies for change. this is particularly important when states value their international reputation and image, which is certainly the case in the current era of globalization and international market interconnectedness (romanow, 2010). it is conceivable that taking a performance enhancement approach, which has been demonstrated as effective for motivating organizational change, would be effective for supporting state efforts to comply with human rights standards. from an organizational change perspective, identifying specific performance gaps based on high-quality data, as well as clear, measurable goals, is the core of any effective change process (van tiem et al., 2012). for example, nutt (2008) compared the success of organizational decisions based on different forms of information and data and found that decisions 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.2.10713 based on quantitative performance data were “significantly more successful than those decisions made on the basis of personal ‘hunches’ or feelings, or on the basis of consensus of opinions of others” (guerra-lópez & hutchinson, 2013, p. 163). this does not suggest that the two latter perspectives do not have their utility; rather, it suggests that they must be triangulated with independently verifiable performance data. while there are some efforts underway to develop standardized and, in some cases, accessible tools for assessing state compliance with the undrip, including by the indigenous navigator—a partnership of the asia indigenous peoples pact (aipp), forest peoples programme (fpp), ilo, international work group on indigenous affairs (iwgia), tebtebba foundation, and danish institute for human rights, and the indigenous peoples major group for sustainable development (see indigenous navigator, n.d.) and the expert mechanism on the rights of indigenous peoples, there is currently no quantified and standardized assessment of state compliance with the undrip. further, in the realm of human rights compliance assessment, the predominant approach to compliance assessment focuses on monitoring and enforcement, rather than performance improvement. as such, the current approach to measuring state compliance with the undrip is inadequate for providing meaningful data to influence the behaviour of states. we present monitoring and assessment, therefore, as a complementary process in which state actors can improve their accountability through self-monitoring in alignment with international standards. this shift in reframing monitoring from solely an external human rights assessment to one also taken up inside the state could serve as a lever for change, precluding overcompliance (lightfoot, 2010), and thereby increasing state accountability for indigenous rights. in recognition of the need for a performance tool, we have constructed a undrip compliance assessment tool to quantify compliance with the rights within the declaration. this compliance assessment tool is informed by a managerial approach that provides regular and ongoing feedback mechanisms for selfmonitoring to advance increasing success in the implementation of international indigenous rights standards. method undrip compliance assessment tool the methodological tool we developed to assess compliance with the undrip is based on international rights standards. in order to construct this monitoring tool, we took an indicator approach, which has been utilized by numerous subsidiary bodies within the united nations human rights body (fukudaparr, 2006; united nations general assembly, 2001; welling, 2008). the tool is important for taking a snapshot of compliance at specific times and for measuring compliance with, and implementation of, the undrip across time. in addition to its utility for evaluating compliance with the undrip in single countries, we developed the metric with the intention of making regional and international comparisons of the situation of indigenous peoples in order to establish a ranking of countries. such a comparison can provide important feedback for nation states and contribute to the pressure to comply. further, this can be an appropriate tool beyond the level of the nation state. organizations and communities who interact with indigenous populations could also benefit from the use of the tool, as it would enable them to measure the fidelity of their policies and procedures to the rights standards set out in the undrip and develop strategic plans for change based on specific indicators. 5 smith & mitchell: development of an undrip compliance assessment tool published by scholarship@western, 2020 the evaluation metric consists of four designations ranging from 0 to 3 with the higher scores reflecting an increased level of compliance with the undrip. a general provision of what each designation entails is as follows: 0. an absence of compliance of the undrip: an active violation of indigenous peoples’ rights. this can also reflect negative actions to reverse compliance efforts. 1. limited compliance or the beginning of uptake: some efforts are made by the government and/or third-party actors in order to comply with the undrip. the efforts do not have a specific approach with indigenous peoples. no domestic laws are in place to enforce or reinforce the implementation of the undrip. 2. partial compliance or evidence of gradual implementation: state has made efforts to address indigenous issues. state has legal frameworks related to indigenous rights, but they do not comply with the standards set by the undrip. existing legal frameworks and indigenous rights mechanisms are not employed in practice. 3. full compliance of the undrip: state has well-developed domestic legal frameworks that comply with international standards for the particular rights. legal frameworks and indigenous rights mechanisms are employed in practice. state demonstrates appropriate levels of partnership working in good faith with indigenous peoples towards the protection and exercising of their rights. for instances where there is a lack of information to accurately assess compliance with a particular article, the label d/k is used to indicate that we do not know. in order to assess compliance according to this rating scale, we have begun to develop indicators for various thematic areas covered by the rights standards established in the undrip. as a first step in the development of this tool, and in conformity with the areas of our research network, we have established specific indicators for the following themes: (a) self-government and self-governance, (b) consultation and free, prior, and informed consent (fpic), and (c) land and natural resource rights (see tables 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5). these indicators were defined based on a review of human rights assessment and performance improvement indicator best practice (merry, 2011; un office of the high commissioner for human rights, 2001) and the undrip articles themselves. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.2.10713 table 1. self-government and self-governance indicators score description of indicator 0 indigenous governments are not legally recognized. the government is in charge of defining and developing programs related to socioeconomic and cultural issues without the participation of the indigenous peoples they affect. overall, indigenous peoples lack political representation. 1 some indigenous communities have been recognized by the government and have started strengthening their traditional structures. however, the government is in charge of defining and developing programs that affect indigenous peoples. the state has made efforts to incorporate indigenous perspectives, but participation is limited. programs in place are executed by government institutions and—in most cases—have inadequate funding and staff. 2 indigenous peoples enjoy self-government and self-governance rights in their territories and are responsible for designing their own programs related to their socioeconomic and cultural affairs. indigenous peoples participate in the political life of the state through their own representatives. however, the government intervenes in matters that are exclusively related to indigenous peoples or do not respect their decisions. indigenous governments and institutions are inadequately funded by the state. 3 indigenous peoples enjoy self-government and self-governance rights in their traditional territories, design their own programs related to their socioeconomic and cultural affairs, and fully participate in the political life of the state through their own representatives. all decisions made by indigenous peoples are respected by the state and are incorporated into decision-making. indigenous governments and institutions are adequately funded. the funding is administrated by indigenous governments without intervention or conditions imposed on the funds by the state. d/k insufficient information. do not know. 7 smith & mitchell: development of an undrip compliance assessment tool published by scholarship@western, 2020 table 2. consultation and free, prior, and informed consent indicators score description of indicator 0 no legal mechanisms exist to consult indigenous peoples in decision making in matters that affect them. 1 the government tries to incorporate indigenous peoples concerns through dialogue. these mechanisms are not permanent and do not constitute a formal consultation process. the right to consultation has not been incorporated into domestic law. 2 governments have implemented a consultation process. even though the consultation mechanism is regulated through domestic laws, the standards of the laws do not adequately meet the standards set by international documents. 3 the government, in cooperation with indigenous peoples, has defined a mechanism for consultation in order to obtain their free, prior, and informed consent. this consultation process has been incorporated into domestic law and complies with the international standards. d/k insufficient information. do not know. table 3. duty to consult indicators score description of indicator 0 in general terms, the state never consults indigenous people in matters that can affect them. 1 indigenous peoples participate in some processes of decision-making through institutions that do not respect their traditional representation. the state has not developed a special mechanism designed for consulting with indigenous peoples. 2 indigenous peoples participate in decision-making through their traditional authorities. the consultation processes have been incorporated into domestic law but sometimes do not fulfill international standards for consultation. 3 indigenous peoples, through their traditional authorities, participate in all decision-making in matters that can affect them. the consultation processes have been defined in cooperation with indigenous peoples and meet all of the international standards. in the case of extractive projects, this consultation takes place before starting a project. d/k insufficient information. do not know. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.2.10713 table 4. land and natural resources: access to land and natural resources indicators score description of indicator 0 indigenous peoples lack adequate access to their traditional lands, and their right to the land is not legally recognized. there are no specific programs to address this issue and governments do not recognize lands that were traditionally occupied by indigenous peoples. there is no compensation or redress when indigenous peoples’ lands are confiscated. in addition, indigenous peoples do not have the faculty to fully control or develop their lands and resources, and they struggle with issues such as invasion and illegal occupation, among others. 1 indigenous peoples lack adequate access to their traditional lands. the government has developed strategies focused on land delimitation and legal recognition of land, but there is no specific approach to indigenous peoples and lands that were traditionally occupied. there are mechanisms in place for redress and compensation, but these mechanisms do not have a specific approach to dealing with indigenous peoples’ claims. in addition, even though the government has made efforts to address issues related to invasion, illegal occupation, and other issues, these actions are not effective. indigenous peoples do not control or develop their lands and resources. 2 there is a well-defined mechanism developed in cooperation with indigenous peoples to grant legal recognition of lands including those that were traditionally occupied. in some cases, the process is slow and during the process indigenous peoples struggle with issues such as the invasion and illegal occupation of their lands, among others. when the lands cannot be restored, there is compensation or redress but sometimes these measures do not fulfill indigenous peoples’ cultural needs or are not fair. even though indigenous peoples have control of their lands, they only partially control the resources on their lands. 3 there is a well-defined mechanism developed in cooperation with indigenous peoples to grant legal recognition of lands including those that were traditionally occupied. this process is fair and effective. issues related to invasion and illegal occupation are resolved in an effective manner and, when the lands cannot be restored, the government applies adequate measures to compensate and redress indigenous peoples. indigenous peoples have full access and control of their lands and natural resources. d/k insufficient information. do not know. 9 smith & mitchell: development of an undrip compliance assessment tool published by scholarship@western, 2020 table 5. land and natural resources: environmental protection, restitution, redress, and consultation regarding extractive policies indicators score description of indicator 0 the state has not developed any programs or measures to preserve and protect the environment. the government does not have any mechanisms in place to mitigate secondary effects in indigenous communities caused by the approval of development projects or resource extraction. indigenous peoples do not participate in defining the strategies for managing and developing their lands and the state does not take into account indigenous peoples’ concerns. there is no consultation. 1 the state has developed programs to preserve and protect the environment, but these programs do not have a specific approach to dealing with indigenous peoples and their lands. in some cases, the government has carried out activities to mitigate secondary effects in indigenous communities caused by development projects or resource extraction, but there are no permanent mechanisms in place to remediate these effects. the government has started to engage in dialogue with indigenous peoples to address their concerns, but these efforts do not constitute a consultation process itself and, in some cases, this process is only carried out after a project or activity has already been initiated. in general, indigenous peoples do not participate in defining the strategies for managing and developing their lands. 2 the state has designed mechanisms to preserve and protect the environment with a specific approach to dealing with indigenous peoples and their lands. the state has designed mechanism to mitigate secondary effects in indigenous communities caused by development projects and resource extraction activities in their territories. however, these mechanisms lack proper funding and full implementation. the government consults with indigenous peoples and has incorporated and regulated this process through domestic law but, in some occasions, this consultation process does not meet international standards. indigenous peoples have some participation in defining the strategies for managing and developing their lands. 3 the state has adequate mechanisms to preserve and protect the environment with a specific approach to indigenous peoples and their lands. the state has developed and put in place adequate mechanisms to mitigate secondary effects in indigenous communities caused by development projects and resource extraction activities in their territories. the government consults with indigenous peoples in order to obtain their free, prior, and informed consent before approving any development project or resource extraction activity that can affect indigenous peoples. these processes have been incorporated into domestic law and comply with international standards. d/k insufficient information. do not know. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.2.10713 piloting the tool: canadian case study through the pilot of the assessment tool, we sought to address the following question: how do canada’s laws, policies, and practices, as indicated by special rapporteur on the rights of indigenous peoples (srrip) anaya’s (2014) canada report, comply with the standards set out in the undrip in the articles related to (a) consultation and free, prior, and informed consent; (b) self-governance and self-government; and (c) land and natural resource rights? due to the breadth of indigenous rights addressed in the undrip, we chose to narrow the scope of the data and limit the pilot assessment to only those rights that are most important for indigenous peoples’ ability to assert their land rights, their right to self-determination, and survival as indigenous peoples. therefore, the data that we included were those that address the articles of the undrip (un, 2007) related to self-government and selfgovernance (articles 3, 4, 5, and 20), consultation and fpic (articles 18 and 19), and land and natural resources (articles 26, 27, 28, 29, and 32). we used the srrip’s report on the situation of indigenous peoples in canada as the source of data for the pilot. the srrip’s report on its own is not an adequate basis for assessment of canada’s compliance due to the limited scope of the report and the aggregate nature of the data presented in the report. the limitations of using the srrip’s report will be outlined in the discussion. despite these limitations, we felt that the use of the report was appropriate for piloting the applicability to the assessment tool (i.e., to test the quantification of the qualitative data via the indicators) and to assess the fidelity of the un’s reporting mechanism to the articles of the undrip. coding and analysis we began by coding the content of anaya’s (2014) report based on the undrip articles. this involved combing through the content of the report to identify which information applied to each of the articles within the purview of the pilot (i.e., the three thematic areas). we then analyzed the quotes relevant to each of the articles and their sub-components using the indicators to determine scores. rarely did all of the evidence for a particular article clearly align with the indicators of one designation; as such, scores were assigned according to the general trend of the data (i.e., 4 out of 5 pieces of evidence point to a particular designation). in some cases, the evidence did not conform to the indicators of one particular designation but could be argued one way or the other (i.e., between either a score of 0 or 1). in these cases, the lower score was used as the default. additionally, as a general rule established for this tool, whenever there was contradictory evidence for a particular article (i.e., some positive examples of compliance and other examples of neglect and/or violation) the article could not be assigned a score higher than 2. validity and reliability validity and reliability are essential for any assessment tool of merit. one way that a measure can be construed as valid is by anchoring it to a well-established set of concepts. with this particular measure, we have anchored it in the actual articles of the undrip—a broadly accepted declaration that underwent over 30 years of development. this fact lends the tool validity because the concepts that the tool operationalizes have been well defined and elaborated by indigenous and non-indigenous experts from across the globe (see gunn, 2011b; inter-american commission on human rights, 2009; office of the high commissioner for human rights and asia pacific forum of national human rights institutions, 2013; xanthaki, 2007). 11 smith & mitchell: development of an undrip compliance assessment tool published by scholarship@western, 2020 reliability is another matter. in doing a content analysis, which utilizes the qualitative rather than quantitative data, it is best to think about this in terms of trustworthiness (padgett, 2012). trustworthiness is the degree to which the process of the results of a study are grounded in the data, and the availability of the rationale and “decision trail” that were used by the researcher when making conclusions based on the data (padgett, 2012). trustworthiness has four components: credibility (the degree to which the researcher’s description and interpretations reflects the respondents’ views), transferability and generalizability (the applicability of the study’s findings in other contexts), auditability and dependability (whether or not the researcher(s) documented the procedures using a sensible logic that can be traced by others), and confirmability (degree to which the findings are linked to the data; padgett, 2012). a limitation to using trustworthiness is that it does not demonstrate the degree to which the methodology will consistently reproduce the same results when employed by different raters (i.e., inter-rater reliability). inter-rater reliability testing will be important in the future for full-scale application of the undrip compliance assessment tool with a more comprehensive dataset. pilot assessment results the assessment of indigenous rights in canada on the identified themes of self-government and selfgovernance; consultation and fpic; and land and natural resource rights based on an analysis of anaya’s (2014) report on the situation of indigenous peoples in canada indicates that indigenous rights in canada in 2013, despite strong legal frameworks, did not adequately approach the rights standards set out in the undrip. taken together, the assessment of indigenous rights in canada in the themes selfgovernment and self-governance; consultation and free, prior, and informed consent; and land and natural resource rights was 13 out of 42 (30.95%). see table 6 for scores for each article organized by theme. it is important to unpack this score. as described earlier, the scoring system used spanned from 0 to 3 for each of the articles, 0 being an absence of compliance and active violation of the right, 1 being limited compliance and beginnings of implementation, 2 being partial compliance and evidence of gradual implementation, and 3 being complete compliance. applying this scoring framework to a percentage, 0% to 33.32% would reflect a score of 0 out of 3 on overall compliance with the undrip, 33.33% to 66.65% would reflect a score of 1 out of 3, 66.66% to 99.99% would reflect a score of 2 out of 3, and 100% would reflect a score of 3 out of 3. canada’s score applied to the compliance metric is 0.93 out of 3. consequently, canada’s final score indicates that canada violates indigenous peoples’ rights established within the undrip articles assessed in this study, with some evidence of the beginning of uptake. this provides a stark contrast to the government’s interpretation of the srrip’s report. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.2.10713 table 6. pilot assessment results: canada’s compliance scores by theme article undrip (2007) article statements score theme i: consultation and free, prior, and informed consent article 18 “indigenous peoples participate in decision-making in matters which would affect their rights.” 1 in decision-making matters, indigenous peoples have their own “representatives chosen by themselves in accordance with their own procedures.” d/k indigenous peoples have the right to “maintain and develop their own indigenous decision-making institutions.” d/k article 19 the state “consult[s] and cooperate[s] in good faith with the indigenous peoples concerned through their own representative institutions in order to obtain their free, prior and informed consent before adopting and implementing legislative or administrative measures that may affect them.” 1 theme ii: self government and self-governance article 3 “indigenous peoples have the right to self-determination.” 1 indigenous peoples “freely determine their political status.” d/k indigenous peoples “freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development.” 1 article 4 “indigenous peoples, in exercising their right to self-determination, have the right to autonomy or self-government in matters relating to their internal and local affairs.” 1 indigenous peoples have “ways and means for financing their autonomous functions.” d/k article 5 “indigenous peoples have the right to maintain and strengthen their distinct political, economic, and social systems or institutions.” 1 indigenous peoples have the right to “participate fully, if they so choose, in the political, economic, social and cultural life of the state.” d/k article 20 “indigenous peoples have the right to maintain and develop their political, economic and social systems or institutions, to be secure in the enjoyment of their own means of subsistence and development and to engage freely in all their traditional and other economic activities.” 1 “indigenous peoples deprived of their means of subsistence and development are entitled to just and fair redress.” 1 13 smith & mitchell: development of an undrip compliance assessment tool published by scholarship@western, 2020 table 6. pilot assessment results: canada’s compliance scores by theme (continued) article undrip (2007) article statements score theme iii: land and natural resources article 26 “indigenous peoples have the right to own, use, develop and control the lands, territories and resources that they possess by reason of traditional ownership or other traditional occupation or use, as well as those which they have otherwise acquired.” 1 the state gives “legal recognition and protection to these lands, territories and resources. such recognition shall be conducted with due respect to the customs, traditions and land tenure systems of the indigenous peoples concerned.” 1 article 27 “state has established and implemented, in conjunction with indigenous peoples concerned, a fair, independent, impartial, open and transparent process, giving due recognition to indigenous peoples’ laws, traditions, customs and land tenure systems, to recognize and adjudicate the rights of indigenous peoples pertaining to their lands, territories and resources, including those which were traditionally owned or otherwise occupied or used.” d/k “indigenous peoples . . . have the right to participate in this process.” d/k article 28 “indigenous peoples have the right to redress through restitution or compensation for land, territories and resources which they have traditionally owned, occupied or used and have been confiscated without their free, prior and informed consent.” 1 “unless otherwise freely agreed upon by the people concerned, compensation takes the form of lands, territories and resources equal in quality, size and legal status or of monetary compensation or other appropriate redress.” d/k article 29 states “establish and implement assistance programmes for indigenous peoples for conservation and protection of the environment without discrimination.” 0 states “take effective measures to ensure that no storage or disposal of hazardous materials . . . take place in the lands or territories of indigenous peoples without their free, prior and informed consent.” d/k states “take effective measures to ensure . . . that programmes for monitoring, maintaining and restoring the health of indigenous peoples [are] developed and implemented by the peoples affected by such materials.” d/k 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.2.10713 table 6. pilot assessment results: canada’s compliance scores by theme (continued) article undrip (2007) article statements score article 32 “indigenous peoples have the right to determine and develop priorities and strategies for the development or use of their lands or territories and other resources.” 1 the state “consult[s] and cooperate[s] in good faith with the indigenous peoples concerned through their own representative institutions in order to obtain their free and informed consent prior to the approval of any project affecting their lands or territories and other resources, particularly in connection with the development, utilization or exploitation of mineral, water or other resources.” 1 states “provide effective mechanisms for just and fair redress for any activities, and appropriate measures to mitigate adverse environmental, economic, social, cultural or spiritual impact.” d/k total score 13 / 42* (30.95%) note. d/k = do not know. * the denominator of the total score has been adjusted from 75 to 42 due to the 11 instances of d/k. thus, the final reported score does not include the sub-articles that could not be assessed with the data used for this pilot study. the area of most concern for canada pertains to consultation about resource extraction and development on indigenous territories. this is not surprising given the central role resource extraction and development, domestically and extraterritorially, plays in the canadian economy (mitchell, 2019). large improvements need to be made in the process of consulting with indigenous peoples with regards to proposed developments that may affect traditional lands. first and foremost, the most glaring insufficiency with the current duty to consult is the fact that indigenous peoples are not imbued with veto power; thus, governments and businesses do not have clear, consistent, or mandated processes for seeking consent. the fact that indigenous communities’ rights to fpic continue to be violated indicates limitations to their self-determination, which is an important right set out in articles 3 and 4 in the undrip. consultation and free, prior, and informed consent the results for the theme consultation and free, prior, and informed consent indicate that, within the canadian context, indigenous peoples’ rights to be consulted are continually being violated. governments and development and resource extraction corporations proceed with policy changes and development and extraction projects without consulting with or obtaining the free, prior, and informed consent of the affected indigenous peoples (anaya, 2014, paras. 47, 49, 73). these findings are consistent with the settler-colonial structure of canadian society. consulting with indigenous peoples and enabling them to have decision-making power is counter to the imposition of colonial rule—thus, it is not surprising that indigenous communities report either being entirely excluded from decision 15 smith & mitchell: development of an undrip compliance assessment tool published by scholarship@western, 2020 making processes or being inadequately heard. the subjugation of indigenous peoples continues to be present in canadian society. self-government and self-governance an important element that arose from the results was the continued denial of indigenous peoples’ rights to govern their own affairs. these rights to self-government and self-governance were particularly apparent with the limiting framework and dependency model imposed on first nations through the indian act. anaya’s (2014) report reiterates over and over the limitations put on first nations communities by the indian act structure (see paras. 13, 14, 42, 52, 55). anaya’s discussion of this touches on nearly all facets of life, with the consequences of community deviation from or resistance to the indian act being funding cuts—which, in already underfunded communities, is simply not an option. the coercive nature of this relationship embodies the tenets of settler-colonialism. land and natural resources all of these rights are interconnected and overlap with one another. thus, the rights to consultation and free, prior, and informed consent and to self-government and self-governance are intimately connected with indigenous peoples’ rights to their lands and natural resources. the violation of indigenous peoples’ rights to consultation and fpic and the imposition of governance structures that limit indigenous ownership and decision-making power hinders indigenous communities’ ability to assert their jurisdiction over their lands and resources. the results confirm that much improvement needs to occur in order for canada to be able to claim that indigenous peoples in canada enjoy the rights set out in undrip, in particular those rights related to articles about consultation, self-governance, and land rights. the research question that we sought to address could not be adequately answered due to anaya’s report containing insufficient information and thus resulting in d/k or do not know for numerous articles. the number of d/ks is problematic for drawing concrete conclusions and reliable scores. as a result, the findings should be taken with considerable reservation as the metrics may be under or overstated based on limited sources. discussion development of the undrip assessment tool the development of this tool provides an important contribution to knowledge and practice by proposing a novel approach to monitoring and enabling continuous improvement in terms of compliance with the undrip. this tool is an emerging metric for measuring state compliance with the undrip and is critical for providing numeric assessments. the methodological tool can be useful for governments, domestic and international human rights organizations, and academics to aid in the realization of article 38, which refers to the duty of the state to implement the rights set out in the declaration. likewise, this tool could be valuable for indigenous communities and organizations to aid in their efforts towards the realization of their rights by providing a concrete and clear picture of the degree to which a community enjoys the rights set out in the declaration. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.2.10713 as discussed earlier, feedback through constant evaluation is important for gaining awareness of progress and for identifying issues within a given system. additionally, an important aspect when considering feedback is that in order for people to pay attention, the feedback needs to be seen as credible and valid (riemer & bickman, 2011). reflecting on this makes clear the significance of this research. the utilization of metrics tied to key indicators can be used to inform how the evaluation of countries can be conducted and reported on in the future in order to hold more weight at all levels. this work contributes to the development of an evaluation and reporting mechanism, which will make it more difficult for states to misrepresent the qualitative findings of state-level human rights reviews from domestic and international human rights institutions. for example, while the current analysis of the anaya (2014) report does not establish a baseline for the comprehensive evaluation of a complete set of identified articles within undrip, the systematic review and efforts to quantify canadian compliance with identified components of undrip revealed significant deficits in compliance and a failed report card (13 out of 42; 33%) in contradiction to the official government representation of the country report. while the entire statement released by the government of canada is riddled with misrepresentation, the following text is illustrative: the report published by the special rapporteur today acknowledges that, while many challenges remain, many positive steps have been taken to improve the overall well-being and prosperity of aboriginal people in canada. canada’s diverse and multicultural society has been a leader on the world stage in the protection of human rights and, as acknowledged in the report, is one of the first countries in the modern era to extend constitutional protection to the rights of aboriginal people. our numerous laws, policies and programs aimed at addressing aboriginal peoples’ concerns allow for a positive collaboration with canada’s aboriginal and northern communities as we work together on shared priorities and towards a renewed relationship built on reconciliation and trust. as pointed out in the report, canada’s policies and processes to address historical grievances are an example to the world, and many of canada’s efforts provide important examples of reconciliation and accommodation. (valcourt, 2014, paras. 2-4) the review of relevant literature, development of the tool, and the piloting of the tool has provided important insights for the advancement of human rights assessment in general. to improve compliance monitoring, generally, we recommend the following: (a) use of a comprehensive and standardized reporting structure for state compliance assessments directly addressing the articles within the undrip, and (b) increase in transparency of assessment process by reporting in detail the data collection and analysis procedures. first, we recommend that domestic and international human rights reviewers adopt a standardized format for evaluating and reporting on a state’s compliance with the undrip. specifically, the recommendation is to adhere to a systematized structure to the monitoring and evaluation of adherence to each of the undrip articles, such as the approach described above. use of a standardized approach would enable comparability between assessments conducted by domestic and international human 17 smith & mitchell: development of an undrip compliance assessment tool published by scholarship@western, 2020 rights reviewers and across time. such an approach can also be appropriate for exposing overcompliance, whereby a particular state (such as canada) misrepresents the realities of their compliance efforts to preserve an undeserved reputation (lightfoot, 2010). additionally, the use of such an approach is important for clearly delineating the extent and ways in which compliance falls short and more readily supports strategic planning for improving compliance (van tiem et al., 2012). second, explicitly detailing the data collection and analysis procedures is important for increasing the transparency of the assessment process. one of the gaps that we encountered while reviewing anaya’s (2014) report was the lack of detail about the methods that the srrip and his team employed for gathering the data that informed his report. for instance, while anaya mentions the duration of his visit to canada and that he travelled across the country to speak to various indigenous communities and nonindigenous political actors, he did not include pertinent details, such as the number of communities he visited, how many politicians he spoke with, which parties they belonged to, et cetera. moreover, he provides limited sources documenting the legislative and policy data that were reviewed. outlining the data collection methods—as well as the data themselves—would increase the transparency of reporting and consequently enable the evaluation to hold more weight in effecting change in domestic policy and practice. pilot assessment of canadian compliance the intention of this pilot study was to demonstrate the utility of the quantitative undrip compliance assessment tool as a supplementary method for looking at the situation of indigenous rights within a given country and as a means of supporting accountability and performance improvement. this pilot demonstrates that greater accountability is needed regarding the implementation of the undrip, particularly for those rights related to self-government and self-governance, fpic, and natural resource rights. these rights were precisely those that led canada to be one of four states to reject the declaration when it was passed by the un general assembly in 2007 and to claim that the declaration is merely an “aspirational” document upon becoming a signatory state in 2010. the lack of compliance indicates the need for renewed pressure on the state to comply with these standards. monitoring the implementation of the declaration will be critical for holding the government accountable. the systematic scoring procedure reveals a failing grade on indigenous rights in canada. the empirical metric developed for the undrip compliance assessment tool contributes to a critical reflective discourse on canada’s relationship with indigenous peoples. based on this initial analysis of canada’s level of compliance regarding, self-government and self-governance, consultation and fpic, and land and natural resource rights, canada received a failing report card. the score is indicative of the much disguised and discounted adversarial approach to persistent colonial relations with indigenous peoples in canada. with this said, the pilot assessment of canadian compliance has limitations. limitations of the pilot the primary reliance on the srrip’s canada report (anaya, 2014) proved to limit the comprehensiveness of the undrip compliance assessment tool pilot assessment due to the limited and aggregate nature of the data. this hinders the applicability of this study to be used as a baseline of compliance. a satisfactory baseline measurement would need to sufficiently evaluate compliance with all articles and their sub-components. it is not within the srrip’s mandate to comprehensively monitor 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.2.10713 state compliance with the undrip. as such, anaya did not set out to provide a comprehensive review of compliance with the undrip in canada. future use of the undrip compliance assessment tool should include a much more extensive scope of document data, including legislation, case law, policies, government reports, industry reports, media reports, and scholarly articles. the data limitations highlight the need for greater resourcing for more comprehensive compliance monitoring for signatory states to the declaration. the srrip’s report does not systematically address the state’s compliance with the articles of the undrip but is constrained to the issues that are most salient during the srrip’s visit. it is not surprising that, given the short amount of time that the srrip was in canada, the report does not provide a detailed evaluation of canada’s compliance with all articles of the undrip, and thus it prioritized certain data to include in the report. with that said, effective monitoring is critical for establishing the grounds and evidence necessary for improving compliance as an internal change process and for enforcement (nutt, 2008). and while the srrip is not mandated to monitor and enforce state compliance with the undrip, the reports the office produces are important pieces of feedback. consequently, uncovering the limitations of the srrip’s reports can support the improvement of the reports or enable them to be more clearly positioned. this is important because this feedback can be construed as either praising the state or contributing to the impetus for change, as seen by the government of canada’s response to the srrip’s report. conclusion the development of the undrip assessment tool is important for providing a clear indication of the status of indigenous rights in the form of a quantified measure of compliance. this can be utilized as a monitoring measure for nations as well as a comparative compliance metric for nation states. a quantitative score is necessary for preventing states from misrepresenting the findings presented in a qualitative compliance report to suit their agenda, as the government of canada did in their official response to the srrip’s report (global affairs canada, 2014). in this article, we identified some of the weaknesses and vulnerabilities of current undrip monitoring mechanisms. the piloted undrip compliance assessment tool demonstrates the utility of quantifying compliance with the potential of increased implementation of undrip articles in national policies, legislation, and institutions. a monitoring metric from a performance improvement perspective, such as the one described in this article, can be used as a framework to help monitor and guide the uptake and implementation of the declaration and to hold canada accountable to national commitments to indigenous rights and reconciliation with indigenous peoples. the political context is rapidly shifting, with attention from the public, public figures, organizations and businesses, news, and politicians increasingly being directed toward the unsustainable and inequitable relationship between non-indigenous and indigenous peoples. building on this pilot research, further conceptualization and development of a common compliance metric would advance the international implementation and state compliance monitoring of the declaration. such a tool can contribute to the mounting pressures being placed on states to protect and respect indigenous rights as well as to enable states to clearly understand where there are gaps in compliance and how to move toward improved compliance. however, it is still a tool: one piece in a complex puzzle towards achieving rights-based coexistence. individuals, communities, local, national, and transnational organizations, businesses, and indigenous and non-indigenous people alike need to continue to take action, to demand that canada 19 smith & mitchell: development of an undrip compliance assessment tool published by scholarship@western, 2020 fully implement and protect the rights set out in the undrip, with full guidance and consultation from indigenous communities across canada throughout the entire process. the 43rd call to action from the final report of the truth and reconciliation commission of canada calls upon “the federal, provincial, territorial, and municipal governments to fully endorse and implement the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples as the framework for reconciliation” and the 44th call to action calls upon “the government of canada to develop a national action plan, strategies, and other concrete measures to achieve the goals of the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples” (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015, p. 4). the development of a compliance metric, as discussed in this article, can contribute to a concrete measure for assisting in the systematic self-monitoring of 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(2007). indigenous rights and united nations standards: self-determination, culture and land. cambridge university press. https://doi.org/10.1017/cbo9780511494468 microsoft word coverpage 10808.docx the international indigenous policy journal volume 12 | issue 1 march 2021 a review of literature on the involvement of children from indigenous communities in anglo child welfare systems: 1973-2018 vandna sinha university of colorado, boulder, united states, vandna.sinha@colorado.edu johanna caldwell mcgill university, canada, johanna.caldwell@mail.mcgill.ca leah paul mcgill university, canada, leah.paul@mail.mcgill.ca paulo roberto fumaneri mcgill university, canada, paulo.fumaneri@mail.mcgill.ca recommended citation sinha, v., caldwell, j., pauls, l., & fumaneri, p. r. (2021). a review of literature on the involvement of children from indigenous communities in anglo child welfare systems: 1973-2018. the international indigenous policy journal, 12(1). https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2021.12.1.10818 a review of literature on the involvement of children from indigenous communities in anglo child welfare systems: 1973-2018 abstract a series of recent legal and policy developments in canada have potential to contribute to reconciliation efforts, particularly related to the overrepresentation of indigenous children in child welfare systems. however, systematic collection, analysis, and synthesis of research knowledge—particularly, research that is locally grounded—on indigenous child welfare involvement is notably missing from these efforts. with the aim of collating existing research knowledge on this topic, this scoping review of literature includes a broad swath of literature spanning decades (1973-2018) and countries with similar settler colonial histories (canada, the united states, australia, and new zealand). our search yielded 881 unique research publications. there was an increase in the number of publications over time in all four countries and a trend toward more empirical literature than non-empirical literature. we found that a plurality of publications focused on programs and services (n = 191), and policy or legal (n = 168) themes. while our review highlights a large base of literature on indigenous child welfare involvement, it also illustrates the limits of the academic literature in representing the knowledge and experience of indigenous peoples and the need for more comprehensive synthesis and broader dissemination of the research related to indigenous child welfare. these limitations restrict the extent to which existing research can inform the meaningful development of indigenous child welfare policy in canada. due to these gaps, we advocate sustained investment in efforts to synthesize diverse sources of knowledge, support for open source publications, and structural support for indigenous control of knowledge collection and dissemination regarding policy development related to their communities. keywords child welfare research, child welfare system, settler colonial history, overrepresentation, epistemology, canada, the united states, australia, new zealand creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. sinha et al: a review of literature on the involvement of children published by scholarship@western, 2021 1 a review of literature on the involvement of children from indigenous communities in anglo child welfare systems: 1973-2018 in canada, there are new possibilities for research to support policy development in order to redress entrenched patterns of overrepresentation of indigenous children in child welfare systems. the context of indigenous child welfare in canada is rapidly evolving due to recent legal decisions, legislative changes, and growing public attention to intergenerational harm resulting from settler colonial actions. specifically, a series of decisions1 by the canadian human rights tribunal have led to rapid funding increases for historically underfunded first nations child welfare agencies, although these funding shifts are limited in their reach and inclusion of non-first nations indigenous communities.2 new federal canadian child welfare legislation, passed in june 2019, creates potential for recognition of indigenous self-determination in child welfare (bill c-92, 2019). there has been an increase in public discussion of reconciliation, most notably as a result of the truth and reconciliation commission of canada (trc), which heard testimony from hundreds of indigenous people who were removed from their families and placed in residential schools where they were often violently abused and neglected. in the trc’s (2015) calls to action, the first five recommendations relate to indigenous child welfare reforms. these recent developments may lead to tangible shifts in policy and practice for indigenous child welfare involvement in canada. however, the base of existing research that could inform the development of new programs and policies is still limited due to several structural realities. first, the lack of a federalized child protection system in canada means that child welfare data and policy are decentralized, resulting in a fragmented knowledge base. in canada, underinvestment in child welfare data and data related to indigenous children in particular is also an important barrier to understanding indigenous involvement in child welfare systems. whereas the u.s. has multiple, regular, national sources of child welfare data,3 canada has no comprehensive federal-level child welfare database. further, 11 years have passed between national-level child welfare studies in canada.4 in addition, provincial and territorial administrative data sometimes still excludes on-reserve first nation children, and complementary datasets focused on child health and wellbeing have also excluded on-reserve populations (de la sablonnière-griffin et al., 2016; jones & sinha, 2015). finally, to our knowledge, there has been no systematic effort to compile, analyze, and synthesize indigenous child welfare research produced at the local (community or agency) level. examination of the parallel histories across similar settler colonial settings may be relevant to the 1 see first nations child and family caring society and assembly of first nations v. attorney general of canada, 2016, chrt 2; 2016, chrt 10; 2016, chrt 16; 2017, chrt 7; 2017, chrt 14; 2018, chrt 4; 2019, chrt 7; 2019, chrt 39. 2 first nations are the largest group of federally recognized indigenous peoples in canada, with inuit and métis being the others. 3 these include the national data archive on child abuse and neglect (ndacan), which houses and distributes national-level datasets including the national child abuse and neglect data system (ncands), the national incidence study of child abuse and neglect (nis), the national survey of child and adolescent wellbeing (nscaw), the adoption and foster care analysis and reporting system (afcars), and the national youth in transition database (nytd; national data archive on child abuse and neglect, 2020). 4 the last canadian incidence study of child abuse and neglect (cis), a survey of select agencies, took place in 2008 and data collection for a subsequent study began in 2019 (canadian child welfare research portal, n.d.). the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.1.10818 2 development of policy supporting indigenous self-determination in canada. settler colonial histories in canada, the united states, australia, and new zealand have systematically disrupted traditional ways of life, community, spiritual practices, and family structures for indigenous peoples. this pattern has been described as cultural genocide (bintarsari, 2018; rensink, 2011; reyhner & singh, 2010; trc, 2015). in particular, colonial school systems in these countries grew out of missionary efforts to convert and “civilize” indigenous peoples: in canada, the u.s., australia, and new zealand, state school systems were key mechanisms of assimilating indigenous children into settler society (adams, 1995; milloy, 2017; trafzer et al., 2006; van krieken, 1999a, 1999b). these settler colonial institutions implemented assimilation policies designed to separate children from their languages, spiritual and land-based practices, and community and familial networks. since the mid20th century, child welfare systems in these four countries have increased state involvement in the lives of indigenous families. these systems have functioned to extend the impact of settler colonial intervention in indigenous families, and it has had disproportionate impacts on indigenous communities (cram et al., 2015; landertinger, 2016; tilbury, 2009; white, 2017). specifically, separation of indigenous children from their families, and often from their communities, through child welfare intervention is a much more frequent occurrence than for non-indigenous children in each of these countries (australian institute of family studies, 2020; children’s commissioner, 2016; ministry of social development, 2017; statistics canada, 2018; wildeman & emanuel, 2014). the removal of children by the child welfare system has, in many ways, perpetuated the destruction of indigenous community ties and local decision-making. there are several potential resources that may help elucidate the state of knowledge on indigenous children and child welfare. academic research from countries with a shared history of colonization and indigenous child removal represents one source. in recent years, there have been several notable efforts to compile and synthesize elements of the existing literature on indigenous child welfare (e.g., haight et al., 2018; di tomasso & de finney, 2015a, 2015b; fiolet et al., 2019; gatwiri et al., 2019; macvean et al., 2017; ritland et al., 2020). each of these reviews makes an important contribution to the existing knowledge base. however, they have all been relatively limited in the number of studies they examined and in the scope of the topics and literature considered, which may be an artifact of the strict selection criteria applied in reviews to distill them to the most rigorous research. while these reviews comment on the inadequacy of existing literature in reflecting the varied lived experiences of indigenous children, families, and communities, they may be missing existing literature that does contain crucial insights important for understanding indigenous involvement in child welfare systems. the task remains to create systematic links among the various forms of knowledge related to indigenous children and families and broader research literature. this article is an attempt to take stock of existing literature on indigenous child welfare involvement in canada and in other comparable settler colonial settings over the past several decades. while we are writing from north america, we are interested in contexts similar to the u.s. and canada and extend our analysis to australia and new zealand accordingly. we take a broad approach to identifying themes in the existing literature and suggest areas in which further synthesis may be warranted and useful. in particular, we examine the nature of literature prioritized in academic research spaces and the value assigned to empirical literature. we also aim to analyze and acknowledge what is being left out when mainstream standards around systematic review are applied to this field (e.g., all the literature produced by and with indigenous communities but not sinha et al: a review of literature on the involvement of children published by scholarship@western, 2021 3 published in mainstream academic journals). as a group of non-indigenous scholars, we attempt to illustrate what is accessible when searching from within a western, academic epistemological paradigm while acknowledging the great extent to which important sources of knowledge are deprioritized or missed entirely when doing so. we hope that the synthesis and analysis presented here will support ongoing work by indigenous communities and scholars in order to move beyond a western paradigm and highlight existing and new sources of knowledge that are grounded in indigenous perspectives and experiences. settler colonial legacies and state-sponsored indigenous child welfare involvement canada, the united states, australia, and new zealand are bound by similar histories of settler colonial policies and practices that have harmed indigenous children, families, and communities. indigenous peoples continue to deal with the traumas of forced child removal and inappropriate child welfare service provisions, resulting in the overrepresentation of indigenous children across child welfare systems (australian institute of family studies, 2020; children’s commissioner, 2016; ministry of social development, 2017; statistics canada, 2018; wildeman & emanuel, 2014). histories of settler colonial intervention that systematically separate and disrupt indigenous families and communities in these countries are well documented (buti, 2002; jacobs, 2006; milloy, 2017; simon & smith, 2001). structural legacies of poverty and intergenerational trauma—imposed by current and historical settler colonial policies and practices resulting in losses of land, culturally based systems of knowledge and care, and community ties—shape a context in which indigenous children today are overrepresented in child welfare systems (bombay et al., 2013; brittain & blackstock, 2015; johnston, 1983; milloy, 2017; navia et al., 2018). in recent decades, a transition toward some indigenous communities taking over jurisdiction of child welfare systems, along with some political endorsement of increased indigenous self-determination, has accompanied shifts in both recognition of these traumatic histories and possibilities for redressing them (libesman, 2014; macdonald & levasseur, 2014; rae, 2009). a brief overview of the strikingly similar colonial histories and ongoing child welfare involvement of indigenous children in these countries demonstrates the importance of better understanding how these patterns are documented, by whom, and for what purposes. beginning in the 19th century, state-sponsored education systems served to assimilate indigenous peoples into colonial societies. the residential school system in canada, boarding schools in the u.s., missions in australia, and native schools in new zealand5 resulted in hundreds of thousands of children losing ties with their culture, language, land, and communities. from the mid-1800s to well into the 20th century, native american children were systematically forced into residential schools off reserve in the united states. in 1973 alone, 60,000 native american children were enrolled in residential schools. in canada, an estimated 150,000 indigenous children attended residential schools (trc, 2015). in australia, poor record keeping makes it impossible to know the exact number of children removed (read, 2006), but one estimate is that at least 100,000 aboriginal children were removed from their 5 in new zealand, the structure of the schools was different: there were not as many boarding schools, settler and indigenous children were often in schools together, and indigenous adults sometimes had a role in the schools (see for example may et al., 2014; smith, 2009). however, infant schools in new zealand played a predominant role in assimilation, with very young children being “the best soil for cultivation,” as one 19th century missionary wrote (may et al., 2014, p. 197). the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.1.10818 4 families to attend residential schools between the late 1800s and the 1960s (e.g., human rights and equal opportunity commission [hreoc], 1997) under the guise of child protection by the state. in new zealand, schools were established to “educate” māori children. the number of māori children who attended is unclear and, though the schools were designed as instruments of assimilation, their spread has been described as both tempered by māori resistance and facilitated through māori participation (simon & smith, 2001; smith, 2009). violence, disease, abuse, and death have been well documented in residential schools in the u.s., canada, and australia (jacobs, 2006; milloy, 2017; trc, 2015). the often-stated mission of these institutions was to destroy community and familial ties, traditional cultural practices, and indigenous languages. for example, in canada the explicit goal of residential schools was to “kill the indian in the child” (trc, 2015, p. 130). in the second half of the 20th century, states continued to separate indigenous children from their families, communities, and cultures, but the mechanism shifted from schools to child welfare systems (australian law reform commission, 1997; halverson et al., 2002; milloy, 2017; timpson, 1995). recent literature suggests this history of state-sponsored removal of indigenous children from their homes precipitated the present overrepresentation in the child welfare system in the four countries we are considering here (sinha et al., 2013; tilbury, 2009). in canada, the residential school system began to phase out in the 1950s and 1960s and, during the same period, provincial child welfare systems began operating on reserve. thousands of children were placed in out-of-home care by child welfare systems, often due to poverty and cultural misunderstanding, resulting in what is called the sixties scoop (johnston, 1983; trc, 2015). in the u.s., there was a similar mid-century shift toward placing indigenous children with foster and adoptive families. u.s. senate hearings in 1974 demonstrated deep biases in social service workers in removing native american children from their homes, largely for reasons of neglect (subcommittee on indian affairs, 1974). in australia, aboriginal children removed from their homes—the stolen generations—were placed in foster homes or adopted by white families (australian institute of aboriginal and torres strait islander studies, 2018). similarly, while a transition away from native schools in new zealand toward state-run child welfare systems began in the 1920s, throughout the mid-20th century māori children were overrepresented in residential institutions (dalley, 1998; forbes & stevanon, 2017; united nations committee on the elimination of racial discrimination, 2017). recent data from these countries indicate that indigenous children continue to experience higher rates of involvement within child welfare systems than other children. in canada, indigenous children are less than 8% of the total child population but represent over 52% of the children in out-of-home care (statistics canada, 2018). in the united states, available data indicate that american indian and alaskan native children represent less than 1% of all children but make up over 2% of out-of-home placements (national indian child welfare association, 2017). this disproportionality is compounded over time; it is estimated that more than 15% of native american children, or 1 in 7, will enter foster care before they turn 18, in contrast to less than 6% of all children in the united states (wildeman & emanuel, 2014). in australia, indigenous children are less than 6% of the child population, yet represent 40% of the children in out-of-home care (australian institute of family studies, 2020). additionally, one longitudinal study showed that over half of all aboriginal or torres strait islander children had contact with the child welfare system (delfabbro et al., 2010). finally, in new zealand, māori children represent 25% of the child population, yet represent 55% of children in out-of-home child welfare placements (children’s commissioner, 2016; ministry of social development, 2017). sinha et al: a review of literature on the involvement of children published by scholarship@western, 2021 5 the involvement of indigenous children with child welfare systems is often driven by reports and investigations related to neglect. in canada, cases involving child neglect are a primary driver of overrepresentation of indigenous children and are linked to factors including poverty, poor housing, domestic violence, and substance use (sinha & kozlowski, 2013; sinha et al., 2011). conditions associated with neglect link back to colonial histories of displacement and violence. resulting economic disparities, intergenerational trauma, and differences in worldview can increase both the perception of neglect6 and situations of actual harm (caldwell & sinha, 2020; maceachron & gustavsson, 2005; swift, 1995). in the united states, american indian and alaskan native children are more likely to be involved with child welfare systems for reasons of neglect than were other groups, and they are the least likely to be involved for reasons of physical abuse (pew charitable trusts, 2007). similarly, in australia, emotional abuse and child neglect were the most frequent primary types of abuse and neglect experienced by aboriginal and torres strait islander children between 2017 and 2018. the high rates of neglect are consistent with the disadvantaged socioeconomic conditions prevalent in many aboriginal and torres strait islander communities, such as overcrowding, unemployment, and limited access to services (steering committee for the review of government service provision, 2014). available data from new zealand indicate a divergence from the pattern in the other countries. among māori children, the number of out-of-home placements for reasons of neglect is lower than for other maltreatment types (oranga tamariki, 2019).7 present-day policy and governance structures in canada, the united states, australia, and new zealand uniquely impact indigenous families and children. in canada, jurisdiction over indigenous child welfare and family services is fraught with confusion between the federal and provincial governments,8 and has led to denial and underfunding of services for first nation children, which was found to be a human rights violation by the canadian human rights tribunal. in the united states, federal legislation regulates indigenous child welfare systems through the indian child welfare act (icwa, 1978), which transfers legislative, administrative, and judicial decision-making to indigenous communities when an on-reserve child is apprehended in the child welfare system. in australia, federal and state governments share jurisdiction over indigenous child welfare affairs, though each state or territory is responsible for developing and implementing indigenous legislation and providing services. as a consequence, jurisdictional differences in indigenous child welfare provisions have generated service disparities between places of residency (paul, 2016). new zealand, which has full federal jurisdiction over child protection issues, continues to face criticism for failures in considering māori culture and community in 6 for example, when multiple caregivers are in one household, a parent may not need to be as attentive, which could be seen through a western child welfare lens as supervisory neglect (see for example neckoway et al., 2007). 7 we were not able to locate data on overall child welfare cases in new zealand, but the data on children in care indicate a lower level of neglect cases compared to the other countries we examined. the divergence between available data for new zealand and the other countries merits further study. 8 typically, provincial governments hold jurisdiction over child welfare in canada. however, through section 35 of the constitution act (1982), the federal government has jurisdiction over indigenous rights and treaty rights. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.1.10818 6 child protection decisions.9 systematically analyzing the variation in literature from across these four countries—which share similar settler colonial pasts but have divergent federal governance structures and policy realities—may be a valuable way to understand the variation related to indigenous child welfare in each country. similarities in governance structure across these four countries provide a foundation for cross-jurisdictional comparison of policies and practices impacting indigenous families. however, there are important differences in each of these countries in terms of their approaches to balancing federal, state or provincial, and indigenous governance to address the rights and unique needs of indigenous children, families, and communities. given the comparable but uniquely situated histories, governance structures, and present-day patterns of removal of indigenous children from their families in canada, the united states, australia, and new zealand, the present scoping review gathers and analyzes available research on indigenous involvement with child welfare systems in all four of these countries. we attempt to compile and examine research literature production over time and by critically examining the types and scope of literature, which arise (or are absent) from an academic search of literature. by synthesizing and comparing knowledge across and between jurisdictions, we hope to emphasize the potential for learning to both support implementation of new federal indigenous child welfare policy in canada and to inform further policy initiatives that improve outcomes for indigenous families. methods the following question guided this scoping review: “what is the state of literature on the topic of indigenous child welfare involvement in canada, the united states, australia, and new zealand?” our objective was to draw attention to the broad scope of existing research on indigenous child welfare. we also sought to better understand trends in research focus and type, as well as the gaps in available knowledge. based on arksey and o’malley’s (2005) scoping review model, which levac et al. (2010) further developed, we undertook a process of identifying, charting, and summarizing existing research related to our research question. multiple authors who have completed recent reviews of indigenous child welfare or child welfare related literature (e.g., fiolet et al., 2019; gatwiri et al., 2019; haight et al., 2018; macvean et al., 2017) that are narrowly focused on empirical literature have noted the dearth of indigenous voices and perspectives. accordingly, we kept our inclusion parameters wide, purposely seeking to include studies that might be excluded if we applied selection criteria that focused narrowly on methodology or research design. growing attention to indigenous ways of knowing and research methodology are increasingly challenging classifications such as empirical and non-empirical that have long been central to the dominant, western academic framework. though we do use these terms in organizing our search results, we do so recognizing that they risk perpetuating a paradigm that may not reflect the worldviews of indigenous families and children that are the focus of this literature. 9 the children, young persons and their families act (1989) articulated considerations of how child welfare decisions impact indigenous children. however, its application has been limited due to oversight and funding concerns (libesman, 2014). sinha et al: a review of literature on the involvement of children published by scholarship@western, 2021 7 we limited our search to literature pieces published between 1973—the beginning of the period for which our electronic search yielded consistent, annual results—and 2018. the inclusion of several decades of literature was intended to allow for the examination of trends over time, and to span the period in which the disproportionate involvement of indigenous children in all four countries emerged. our scoping review process is outlined in figure 1. figure 1. scoping review process our literature identification process involved searches in several social science electronic databases: assia (applied social sciences index and abstracts), medline, social service abstracts, socindex with full text, social work abstracts, psycinfo, and worldcat (mcgill university). we used two sets of keywords in our searches, summarized in table 1. our interest was in gathering the fullest possible set of literature produced over a long historical period; therefore, the first list included legacy search terms that may have been used in older sources but are now considered pejorative. the first and second sets of keywords were searched using the boolean operators “or” between words within each set and “and” to combine sets. after reviewing articles resulting from our searches, we included literature specifically pertaining to indigenous child welfare and excluded research focusing only on indigenous mental health, education, addiction, or other topics. only articles published in english were considered due to our research team’s the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.1.10818 8 linguistic capacity. after verification among members of our team, we included a total of 881 literature pieces for descriptive analysis in the scoping review. to document the literature found in our search, we created a database using microsoft excel to capture information about the included pieces. in addition to a citation and summary of each article, we included the following information in our database: type of work (journal article, thesis, book or book section, report, and conference paper); country (canada, u.s., australia, nz, or multiple countries); primary theme; literature classification (empirical or non-empirical); empirical study design (if applicable); and empirical study details (if applicable). table 1. keyword searches first set of keywords second set of keywords aboriginal, “first nations,” “native american,” inuit, métis, “torres island,” “torres strait islander,” māori, eskimo, “canadian eskimo,” aborigines, “indians of north america,” “arctic peoples,” “north american indians,” “american native,” “american indian,” indigenes, and indians “child welfare” and the following related words: “child protection,” “youth protection,” “child abuse,” neglect, “in care,” placement, “foster care,” “kinship care,” “foster home care,” “social work with children,” “child advocacy,” overrepresentation, “child care,” “out-of-home care,” “stolen generation,” “sixties scoop,” and “forced separation” as we reviewed the research publications, we identified themes through applied thematic analysis (e.g., guest et al., 2011; see figure 1). we conducted this iterative coding process through review of the abstracts, discussion among our team members about possible themes, and reassessment of some initially identified themes, which we collapsed due to low article counts or for the sake of conceptual clarity. for example, we originally coded child health trajectories and child wellbeing separately, but we decided to combine them as child health and wellbeing due to low numbers in each and the significant conceptual overlap between the two codes. this process yielded the following list of 11 primary themes: indigenous cultures and perspectives; programs, services; anti-colonial critiques and oppression; child health and wellbeing; knowledge transfer and methods; children in care; overrepresentation; policy and legal; forms of maltreatment; long-term outcomes, and residential schools and apologies. while the majority of articles were related to more than one theme (e.g., children in care and child health and wellbeing), we opted to assign each research publication a primary theme. one reviewer on our team assigned a primary code to each, and then a second team member re-coded some of the articles to establish consistency across the coding process. in our review of the classification of research publications, we initially coded them as empirical, theoretical, commentary, or review. the latter three classifications were considered non-empirical: articles classified as theoretical built on existing research and theory to extensively critique, significantly sinha et al: a review of literature on the involvement of children published by scholarship@western, 2021 9 extend, or reimagine existing theory; commentary pieces drew from existing knowledge and personal and/or professional experiences; and review publications summarized, synthesized, and commented on pre-existing empirical research, theoretical writing, or commentaries. these review pieces tended to propose important questions and areas for future research but did not extend the existing knowledge base by contributing new analyses of primary data. by contrast, empirical pieces presented original analyses of data and were sub-categorized as quantitative, qualitative, or mixed method. we included empirical study details in our database with further details on population, methods, and findings. findings our search of indigenous child welfare literature yielded 880 unique publications produced in canada, the united states, australia, and new zealand between january 1973 and april 2018. we analyzed this literature according to time, geography, and empirical classification. table 2 presents an overview of literature resulting from our search, which we analyze in more granular detail below. table 2. type of literature by country (january 1973 to april 2018) empirical non-empirical country n qualitative quantitative mixed methods total total canada 77 55 15 147 160 307 united states 51 86 25 162 156 318 australia 43 32 15 90 99 189 new zealand 6 9 1 16 24 40 multiple countries 2 2 0 4 23 27 category n 179 184 56 419 462 881 note. n = 881. total breakdown by country of the total of 881 research publications produced between january 1973 and april 2018, we found 307 articles focusing on indigenous child welfare in canada, 318 for the united states, 189 for australia, and 40 for new zealand. in addition, there were 27 articles that focused on indigenous child welfare in more than one country. over time, the number of total publications per year increased. figure 2 illustrates these results, covering the period from january 1995 to december 2017,10 during which time 87% (n = 767) of all publications we found were published. in the last decade in particular, we noted a higher 10 for graphical clarity purposes, we excluded pre-1995 counts, when no more than 10 research pieces were produced in any given year. we also excluded 2018 from the figure because the data accounted for only four months (january through april) of that year. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.1.10818 10 number of publications, with significant peaks in 2009 and 2014. since 2014, literature production has more or less stabilized at about 71 works per year across these four countries, although the literature is not evenly distributed across them. figure 2. literature counts by year and country of focus (1995-2017) trends over time by country as shown in figure 2, the quantity of indigenous child welfare literature focusing on canada, the united states, and australia has rapidly increased, with a smaller increase in literature focusing on the new zealand context. the expansion of child welfare research focused on canada, the u.s., and australia, parallels legal and policy developments that drew media attention to indigenous child welfare in the public sphere. in canada, the national truth and reconciliation commission of canada included extensive public testimony from indigenous people and an inquiry into painful histories of residential schools (trc, 2015). a canadian human rights tribunal case, initiated in 2007 and continued through 2016, focused on discrimination against first nations children in child welfare and has prompted further remedial action (blackstock, 2016; first nations child and family caring society, 2020b). in addition, the first nations component of the canadian incidence study of reported child abuse and neglect (fncis-2008), the first full-scale national study of first nations children in the child welfare system released findings demonstrating overrepresentation in 2011 (sinha et al., 2011). similarly, in the u.s., increases are likely associated with greater media attention surrounding the 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 # of p ub lic at io ns year canada u.s. australia new zealand multiple countries sinha et al: a review of literature on the involvement of children published by scholarship@western, 2021 11 overrepresentation of indigenous children in the u.s. foster care system. for instance, since 2011, the national council of juvenile and family courts judges has published annual briefs emphasizing this disproportionality (e.g., padilla & summers, 2011; summers et al., 2013). in addition, highly publicized national-level court cases11 that were linked to the icwa may have also prompted further publication. in australia, indigenous child welfare research production also increased beginning in 2009. similar to public reports in canada and the u.s., a report in australia on the separation of aboriginal and torres islander children from their families highlighted the overrepresentation of indigenous families and youth in the australian child welfare system (hreoc, 1997). the year 2017 marked 20 years since the publication of this report, which highlighted human rights violations against indigenous families and articulated calls to action to redress them. a number of media pieces from this same year also noted that little had changed for indigenous families since the report was published (brown, 2017; conifer, 2017; dabbagh, 2017; wahlquist, 2017), reflecting increased public attention to this issue. in new zealand, there was a consistently smaller number of publications overall compared to the number of publications in other countries at which we looked. however, the amount of literature focusing on new zealand has increased slightly since 2014. this uptick in publications seems to align with legislative reforms and federal government restructuring (keddell, 2017)12 that have been widely critiqued as deprioritizing the role of māori conceptions of family and increasing liability-focused child welfare assessment practices (hyslop, 2017). total empirical and non-empirical publications we found a balance among empirical and non-empirical publications when looking at the total number of publications between 1973 and 2018. empirical publications presented original analyses of data, while non-empirical publications were either theoretical, commentary, or review pieces. overall, we classified 47.5% (n = 419) of the literature reviewed as empirical and 52.5% (n = 462) non-empirical. this balance held across countries: our search yielded around 50% empirical and 50% non-empirical for each country. empirical and non-empirical publications over time over time, however, we noted a shift from a higher proportion of empirical publications toward more non-empirical publications. figure 3 presents the quantity of empirical and non-empirical literature that 11 for example, adoptive couple v. baby girl (2013), which questioned the applicability of the icwa, was heard by the u.s. supreme court in 2013. that same year, the american civil liberties union (aclu) filed a federal court lawsuit on behalf of the oglala sioux and the rosebud sioux tribes against the state of south dakota for not complying with the icwa. 12 in the mid-2010s, there were a number of reforms to federal legislation regarding child welfare. in april of 2017, a new ministry for vulnerable children, oranga tamariki, replaced the federal agency of children, youth, and families. the new ministry added preventive services and services for young people in care transitioning to adulthood to its mandate, among others (keddell, 2017). in 2017, two federal legislative amendments—the vulnerable children amendment act (2014) and the children, young people, and their families (oranga tamariki) legislation act (1989)—adapted existing child welfare laws to be more child-focused and attentive to context. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.1.10818 12 was produced between january 199513 and december 2017.14 as illustrated in figure 3, prior to 2007, the number of non-empirical research publications generally surpassed the quantity of empirical literature. since 2007, empirical literature production has steadily increased at a similar rate to that of non-empirical research. however, in 2017, the empirical literature quantity was more than double that of non-empirical figure 3. counts of empirical and non-empirical literature by year (1995-2017) empirical and non-empirical by country we further broke down empirical pieces according to research method (either qualitative, quantitative, or mixed methods; see figure 4); there is no clear trend over time. 13 for graphical clarity, we excluded pre-1995 counts, when no more than 10 research publications were produced in a given year. 14 2018 was eliminated because the entire year was not captured in our review. 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 # of p ub lic at io ns year empirical non-empirical sinha et al: a review of literature on the involvement of children published by scholarship@western, 2021 13 figure 4. percentage of empirical publications by research method over time (1995-2017) thematic coding findings table 3 provides a full summary of the results according to primary theme, empirical nature, and type of empirical study. we broke the classification of pieces down according to our thematic coding. themes that had the largest number of research pieces were programs and services (n = 191), policy and legal (n = 168), and overrepresentation (n = 104). conversely, the themes with the lowest number of pieces were indigenous cultures and perspectives (n = 37), knowledge transfer, methods (n = 34), and forms of maltreatment (n = 22). the following are core findings from the literature that are extracted from each of the 11 scoping review themes. 0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100% 19 95 19 96 19 97 19 98 19 99 20 00 20 01 20 02 20 03 20 04 20 05 20 06 20 07 20 08 20 09 20 10 20 11 20 12 20 13 20 14 20 15 20 16 20 17 % o f p ub lic at io ns year qualitative quantitative mixed methods the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.1.10818 14 table 3. descriptive results, indigenous child welfare research publications from canada, the united states, australia, and new zealand, january 1973 to april 2018 themes or codes total literature total nonempirical total empirical type of empirical, % qualitative quantitative mixed methods programs and services 191 90 101 61% 19% 20% policy and legal 168 135 33 70% 12% 18% overrepresentation 104 25 79 6% 89% 5% anticolonial critiques and oppression 89 77 12 67% 17% 17% children in care 87 23 64 50% 39% 11% residential schools and apologies 53 33 20 60% 35% 5% child health and wellbeing 52 26 26 27% 50% 23% long-term outcomes 44 6 38 5% 79% 16% indigenous cultures and perspectives 37 20 17 82% 18% 0% knowledge transfer and methods 34 20 14 57% 29% 14% forms of maltreatment 22 7 15 40% 47% 13% total 881 462 419 43% 44% 13% sinha et al: a review of literature on the involvement of children published by scholarship@western, 2021 15 programs and services the literature in this category describes and evaluates indigenous child welfare services and programs. literature in this domain highlights promising and best practices including culturally competent care (bessarab & crawford, 2010; red horse, 1982; sinclair, 2008; weaver, 1999), and relationship building between the worker and the family (hughes et al., 2016; kreitzer & lafrance, 2010; mcauliffe et al., 2016; sommerlad, 1977). it describes specific approaches, such as family group conferencing in which the social worker and child’s family and community unite to determine how to keep the child safe (connolly & mackenzie, 1998; ney et al., 2013; schmid & pollack, 2004; waites et al., 2004). it also details intervention models developed and implemented by indigenous community workers including interventions focusing on family preservation, fetal alcohol syndrome, and substance abuse (cripps & mcglade, 2008; howard-wagner, 2015; mckenzie, 1989; myhra et al., 2015). there are also recommendations for a social work education reform, including appeals for more cultural-competency training (harms et al., 2011; strega & esquao, 2015; zufferey et al., 2015). policy and legal the literature included in this category examines specific legislation, court cases, and policies related to indigenous involvement in child welfare. one focus is on past and current governmental policies that have shown to assimilate and marginalize indigenous peoples (armitage, 1995; d’souza, 1994; macdonald & ladd, 2000). also included are analyses of governmental policies that were introduced to address the overrepresentation of indigenous children in child welfare and service discrepancies between onand off-reserve communities (cradock, 2007; hudson & mckenzie, 2003; wien et al., 2007). some of the literature also addresses the canadian human rights tribunal (blackstock, 2009, 2011a, 2011b), jordan’s principle in canada15 (king, 2012; lett, 2008; macdonald & attaran, 2007), and the u.s. indigenous child welfare act (akhtar, 2012; bending, 1997; deitrich, 1982; yablon, 2004). literature in this primary theme also contains critiques of the neoliberal child welfare model, which is framed as reactive, bureaucratic, and managerial, resulting in greater policing of families (hackell, 2016; hyslop, 2017; keddell, 2017; libesman, 2015). alternative child welfare frameworks, such as a human rights framework, are proposed to be more collaborative with families in practice (filipetti, 2016; libesman, 2015) and are suggested as a way to “re-establish to the greatest extent possible individuality and sovereignty within each indigenous community” (paul, 2016, p. 188). overrepresentation the literature in this category includes analyses of child welfare population-based datasets, which consistently document the overrepresentation of indigenous youth in child welfare systems in the united states (collmeyer, 1995; crofoot & harris, 2012; mech, 1983), canada (blackstock et al., 2004; sinha et al., 2011; trocmé et al., 2003), australia (delfabbro et al., 2010; tilbury, 2009; zhou & chilvers, 2010), and new zealand (buchanan & malcolm, 2010; cram et al., 2015). in addition, there is a disproportionate number of indigenous families who are reported to and investigated by child welfare 15 jordan’s principle was conceived in response to a jurisdictional dispute over who would pay for first nations child jordan river anderson’s home care. the principle is meant to ensure that indigenous children’s needs are put first when they come in contact with health and social service systems and that provincial and federal governments reconcile costs post facto if needed (the jordan’s principle working group, 2015). the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.1.10818 16 officials (bailey et al., 2015; collings et al., 2018; sinha et al., 2013). the major correlate for this overrepresentation is parental neglect, which is often associated with poverty, inadequate housing, mental illness, and substance addiction (lujan et al., 1989; white & cornely, 1981). additionally, the overrepresentation can be linked to a lack of culturally appropriate services and cultural biases that can put indigenous parents at higher risk of scrutiny (dumont, 1988; hélie et al., 2013; hill, 2008). children in care the literature included in this category examines kinship care, foster care, and adoption practices, as well as the treatment and experiences of indigenous youth in care. kinship care, which is generally provided by grandparents, is often the optimal choice for indigenous children in care (hill, 2016; spence, 2004; worrall, 2006). although kinship care is challenging, it has been underfunded and under-resourced (hill, 2016; mutchler et al., 2007; purcal et al., 2014; worrall, 2006). additionally, there is a shortage of indigenous foster parents, despite there being an overrepresentation of indigenous children in the child welfare system, which has been attributed to a mistrust of social workers and traumatic child welfare experiences (brown et al., 2010; halverson et al., 2002; hanna et al., 2017). the literature suggests detrimental effects from placing indigenous children in white foster homes, especially because children who are disconnected from their indigenous culture and community tend to have difficulty developing a positive self-identity (becker-green, 2009; moss, 2009; sinclair, 2008). additionally, publications in this theme document discrimination, oppression, and inequities that indigenous youth in care experience (anderson, 2014; berlin, 1978; green, 1983). research calls for “culturally appropriate care,” which includes cultural connectivity plans with indigenous families and youth in care (anderson, 2014; green, 1983; klamn, 2009; raman et al., 2017). anticolonial critiques and oppression the literature included in this category focuses on the impacts of colonialism on indigenous families and children. some of this literature frames recent policies resulting in mass removal of indigenous children from their families and communities as an extension of the cultural genocide enacted against indigenous people through settler colonial policies and practices (cross & blackstock, 2012; cunneen & libesman, 2000; o’connor, 1994; richardson & nelson, 2007). discourse justifying the persistent state intervention in indigenous communities include “for their own good” rhetoric and the importance of civilizing the “savage” and “deviant” “native” (de leeuw et al., 2010, p. 286; landertinger, 2016, p. 1; palmer & cooke, 1996, p. 710). in addition, the literature comments on the neoliberal child welfare system that led to greater austerity, privatization of services, and bureaucracy, which is described as ultimately furthering inequities between indigenous and non-indigenous children and families (cunneen, 2015; haebich, 2016; kennedy-kish et al., 2017; rousseau, 2015). this literature also touches on historical and intergenerational trauma resulting from the systematic oppression of indigenous peoples under both colonial and neoliberal policies (burnette & figley, 2016; maxwell, 2014; moorehead & lafromboise, 2014; sherwood, 2015). residential schools and apologies the literature included in this category describes residential school experiences in canada, the u.s., australia, and new zealand, as well as government attempts to facilitate reconciliation in the wake of growing recognition of the harms and ongoing intergenerational impacts of these schools and their roles sinha et al: a review of literature on the involvement of children published by scholarship@western, 2021 17 in furthering cultural genocide (chadwick et al., 1986; jacobs, 2014; stephenson, 2006; van krieken, 1999a, 1999b). the literature details assimilation tactics employed to extinguish indigenous culture, as well as the child sexual and physical abuse that occurred within the school (burich, 2007; kuipers, 2015; matheson et al., 2016). it documents ongoing psychiatric problems that some residential school survivors continue to experience, including substance addiction, gambling addiction, depression, posttraumatic stress disorder, and intergenerational trauma (beiser, 1974; bombay et al., 2013; cromer et al., 2017; reed, 2010; ross et al., 2015). government-led investigations to determine the extent of harm as a result of the residential schools and reports detailing reconciliation processes occurred in the late 20th and early 21st centuries in canada and australia (attean et al., 2012; hreoc, 1997; wilson, 2015). a number of scholars have critiqued australia’s reconciliation process, which began more than 20 years ago, as most of the calls to action have yet to be actualized (davis, 2017; fejo-king, 2011; fernandez et al., 2017). child health and wellbeing the literature in this category examines inequities in health and social services and disparities in health outcomes for indigenous children, making links to child maltreatment and/or the child welfare system. it highlights a profound lack of culturally appropriate services for indigenous families, focusing on indigenous populations living on reserve in particular (canadian unicef committee, 2009; joshua et al., 2015; liu & alameda, 2011). service inequities augment the health and wellbeing challenges within indigenous communities, where higher rates of youth suicides and family maltreatment, compared to non-indigenous communities, have significant and long-lasting multigenerational impacts both for families and communities (berlin, 1987; kenney & singh, 2016; wallace, 1973). intervention models to promote indigenous child health and wellbeing are provided and a persistent recommendation is that greater connection to indigenous traditions and cultures is linked with better health outcomes (carriere, 2005; freeman et al., 2016; mcshane, 1988; priest et al., 2012). long-term outcomes the literature included in this category assesses trajectories and outcomes related to child maltreatment in indigenous communities. wide-ranging negative impacts on youth and adults are described. child maltreatment and foster care experiences have been associated with offending youth behaviors, teen pregnancy, and youth homelessness (barker et al., 2014; malvaso et al., 2017; nordberg et al., 2014; shah et al., 2017). a significant finding is the correlation of adult psychiatric symptomology and experiences of childhood abuse and/or neglect. specifically, several studies have demonstrated that indigenous adults with child maltreatment histories also had a greater chance of experiencing posttraumatic disorder, depression, substance addictions, and suicidality (barker-collo, 1999; mota et al., 2012; piasecki et al., 1989). indigenous cultures and perspectives the literature included in this category describes culturally based indigenous childrearing, as well as tensions between western and indigenous views on parenting, attachment, and maltreatment. this literature explores the impact of colonization and assimilation policies on indigenous childrearing (glover, 2001; moffat, 1994; neckoway, 2011; pihama et al., 2016). it also examines indigenous definitions of “family” as including extended family and community networks, contrasting with the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.1.10818 18 traditional western understandings of family that are more likely to emphasize nuclear families (cross, 2014; limb et al., 2008; montgomery-andersen & borup, 2012). some works in this category critique the application of western-based attachment theory in child welfare work with indigenous families, positing that it unfairly discredits indigenous parenting paradigms (lindstrom & choate, 2016; neckoway et al., 2003; yeo, 2003). knowledge transfer and methods the literature in this category explores patterns and gaps in indigenous child welfare research, research methodologies, and dissemination strategies. several publications maintain that more empirical evidence-based research is needed in the field of indigenous child welfare (e.g., bennett et al., 2005; timpson, 1995; wells et al., 2009) and note the shortage and shortcomings of existing, populationbased child welfare data (fraser, 2013; tilbury & thoburn, 2009; tonmyr et al., 2009). a number of publications advocate employing research methods, such as participatory action research, that center indigenous voices and experiences (mckenzie, 1997; poupart et al., 2009; timpson, 2010; waechter et al., 2009). strategies for indigenous child welfare research dissemination are also highlighted (bennett, 2007; de finney et al., 2009; green et al., 2010; leung et al., 2011). literature in this category also comments on the propagation of negative indigenous stereotypes and a lack of structural oppression analysis in recent indigenous child welfare reporting (harding, 2009; lonne & gillespie, 2014; maydell, 2018). forms of maltreatment the literature in this category includes research focusing on specific types and subcategories of child maltreatment and neglect in indigenous populations. the majority of the articles focus on sexual abuse or neglect. the neglect-focused articles explore associated risk factors, articulate divergent perceptions and definitions of neglect, and examine implications for indigenous children (evans-campbell, 2008; nelson et al., 1996; newton, 2017; slee, 2001). the research focusing on sexual abuse covers topics such as the correlates of sexual abuse, divergent perceptions and experiences of disclosing sexual abuse, the ways in which both communities and legal institutions silence and marginalize victims, and a lack of appropriate services in indigenous communities (bailey et al., 2015; hamilton et al., 2016; hodgson, 1990; smallwood, 1995; stanley et al., 2003). a handful of articles also focus on more specific topics such as maltreatment related injury (o’donnell et al., 2010; pike & first nations and inuit child and youth injury indicators working group, 2011). empirical literature by theme we further classified the research publications as empirical (publications that present methodological details to describe the approach to new analyses of quantitative and/or qualitative data) and nonempirical (reviews, commentaries, theoretical pieces, and information-memoranda). most empirical research was categorized under the themes programs and services (n = 101 research publications), overrepresentation (n = 79), and children in care (n = 64). six themes hold comparable proportions within the total and empirical literature. for example, child health and wellbeing research encompasses sinha et al: a review of literature on the involvement of children published by scholarship@western, 2021 19 both 6% of the total literature and 6% of empirical research publications.16 however, five themes hold dissimilar portions in the total and empirical literature. for instance, policy and legal makes up 19% of total literature in our review but represents only 11% of empirical research. this difference reflects the relatively large number of theoretical or conceptual discussion pieces included in this category. another noteworthy example is the quantity of overrepresentation research within total (12%) and empirical (19%) literature.17 the greater proportion within empirical literature may be a result of a number of large-scale quantitative studies, such as the fncis-2008, which document the overrepresentation of indigenous children in child welfare systems. figure 5 illustrates the breakdown of empirical research methods by primary theme. figure 5. empirical research methods by primary theme (canada, the united states, australia, and new zealand, 1973-2018) we found that qualitative research was most employed within the majority of the following thematic categories: indigenous cultures and perspectives (82%); policy and legal (70%), anti-colonial critiques and oppression (67%), programs and services (61%), and knowledge transfer and methods (57%). conversely, the following themes were most present in research using quantitative methods: 16 we considered proportions to be comparable if the difference between the proportion of total literature and proportion of empirical literature was 2% or less. in addition to child health and wellbeing, this was true for programs and services, residential schools and apologies, indigenous cultures and perspectives, knowledge transfer and methods, and forms of maltreatment. 17 the three other themes for which the proportion of empirical literature did not match the percentage of total literature were: children in care, anti-colonial critiques and oppression, and long-term outcomes. 0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100% forms of maltreatment knowledge transfer, methods indigenous cultures & perspectives long-term outcomes child health and wellbeing residential schools, apologies children in care anticolonial critiques, oppression overrepresentation policy, legal programs, services % of publications t he m e qualitative quantitative mixed methods the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.1.10818 20 overrepresentation (89%), long-term outcomes (79%), and child health and wellbeing (50%). mixedmethods research, containing both qualitative and quantitative research methods, was generally the least utilized within each thematic category. it was most used in research coded child health and wellbeing (23%). discussion at this critical time of rapid policy and legal development regarding indigenous involvement in child welfare systems in canada, the role of research to inform these shifts must be acknowledged. however, the extent to which policy changes support reconciliation efforts depend on how research is consulted, and what voices are included. cumulatively, a substantial body of research has been produced about indigenous involvement in child welfare in canada, the united states, australia, and new zealand. over the decades included in our search, we found 881 publications on this topic. our search found a marked increase over time in publications based in canada, the u.s., and australia, and to a lesser extent in new zealand. this body of literature covers diverse themes, with increasing attention to the complex settler colonial histories and present-day practices in these countries. we found a particularly large literature base focusing on programs and services as well as policy and legal components of indigenous child welfare involvement. there was a much smaller amount of literature on knowledge transfer and methods, and specific forms of maltreatment. despite the size of the existing literature base identified through our review, recognition and acknowledgement of the limitations of the literature base derived through our review is of critical importance. some of these limitations are linked to the methods we used in our literature search, others to the substantive focus of the literature reviewed. our reliance on large academic search tools such as psycinfo and medline means that we missed most of the grey literature available on this topic. for example, many organizations working with indigenous families have produced documents such as program evaluations, legislative summaries, and analyses of funding allocation (e.g., first nations child and family caring society, 2020a). many childand family-service agencies have invested in further research projects, and some have also thoroughly documented practice models, philosophies, and approaches (e.g., aboriginal children in care working group, 2015; dubois & ramdatt, 2006; goodluck, 2002; petiquan et al., 2015; southern first nations network of care, 2019). our search strategy may also have precluded us finding existing sources in indigenous-specific databases, which aggregate academic and non-academic sources.18 it is difficult to know much about this broad literature base (e.g., how much there is, its scope, and how comparable they are across jurisdictions) due to a lack of centralization of these reports which are sometimes treated as internal documents or are available only directly through individual agencies. further, limiting our search to publications that explicitly identified a focus on child welfare or related terms also excluded vitally relevant literature. for example, extant literature demonstrates that neglect investigations are the primary driver of the overrepresentation of indigenous children (pew charitable trusts, 2007; sinha et al., 2011; sinha & kozlowski, 2013; steering committee for the review of government service provision, 2014) and that neglect is strongly linked to a broad range of structural 18 two examples are the native health database at the university of new mexico and the indigenous studies portal at the university of saskatchewan. sinha et al: a review of literature on the involvement of children published by scholarship@western, 2021 21 and family-level risk factors including poverty and challenges related to substance use and mental health (maceachron & gustavsson, 2005; mulder et al., 2018). without including these cross-cutting issues, we potentially miss myriad publications relevant to this topic even when no link to child welfare is made in the publication. finally, unwritten histories and untold experiences are not captured here, nor could they easily be in future scoping reviews. the lack of space for oral histories or ways of knowing in written publications misses crucial insight and context of indigenous child welfare involvement (e.g., ormiston, 2010). thus, while our search is the broadest and largest we are aware of on this topic, it does not come close to reflecting the indigenous knowledge on child welfare involvement. future review or synthesis that is done in the realm of indigenous involvement in child welfare ought to push beyond reliance on academic search engines and traditional western, academic standards for assessing literature, lest the most potentially salient publications and experiences be excluded. this will necessitate inclusion of agency-level reports and program evaluations, which means supporting the development of a stronger base of studies produced by and in partnership with indigenous communities. failure to expand the range of knowledge that is considered in such reviews in this way means we will continue to ignore a potentially vast body of research and writing produced by, with, and for indigenous communities, families, and practitioners. meaningful review, synthesis, and connection to broader bases of research and knowledge that elevate and prioritize indigenous voices, along with ongoing monitoring of new research production, will necessitate redefining the standards for what a thorough review entails. it will also require significant resources to seek out publications intentionally and proactively, which are currently decentralized. a number of recent reviews of indigenous child welfare and related literature demonstrate growing awareness of the need for synthesis of the many dimensions of this broad topic. for example, macvean et al. (2017) compiled 16 publications on parenting interventions for indigenous child psychosocial functioning. similarly, di tomasso and de finney (2015a, 2015b) collated numerous sources on indigenous custom adoption practices in a two-part discussion paper. in a scoping review of 37 studies, haight et al. (2018) focused on indigenous involvement in north american child welfare systems. fiolet et al. (2019) examined 15 articles on indigenous help-seeking behaviors related to family violence. in a large review of indigenous youth in residential care in australia and other countries, gatwiri et al. (2019) included eight peer-reviewed articles and 51 grey literature publications. finally, ritland et al. (2020) reviewed 18 articles on culturally safe parenting programs to support indigenous families dealing with substance use. cumulatively, these efforts represent a big step forward for the state of academic knowledge on indigenous child welfare. several of them were published after april 2018, which is when we stopped our literature search, indicating increasing attention to the need for synthesis on this topic. still, in our review we found few articles that systematically work across existing literature to propose frameworks, create typologies, or consolidate research findings. for example, despite the large number of articles we coded as programs and services, we did not find any pieces that provided clear, explicit discussion of commonalities in terms of approaches, underlying practice values or paradigms, or challenges cutting across these programs and services. further, we did not find anything that treated variation in findings as a potential strength, examining key contextual factors and correlates of outcome variables in order to make sense of and reconcile disparate findings. our review suggests that researchers the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.1.10818 22 are still sorting out how to integrate literature across these academic silos in order to bridge to policy and practice settings. accessibility of publications synthesizing literature on indigenous involvement with child welfare systems is an important concluding point. among the recent reviews we found on this topic, most exist behind a paywall, meaning they are accessible only to those who have access to academic journals, typically through affiliation with a university.19 beyond this, even when these reviews are available as open-source publications (e.g., di tomasso & de finney, 2015a, 2015b), access to many sources cited within the text are still be limited to those with academic credentials. these paywalls keep important findings from policymakers and practitioners who are best placed to act on learnings from research. while many authors frame their findings as being relevant for policy and practice, the structure and flow of this “knowledge” hinder this translation from taking place. the investment of sustained public resources in canada to synthesize, summarize, and publicly disseminate findings from existing research related to indigenous child welfare involvement would catalyze the potential policy and program development, which could reduce the overrepresentation of indigenous children in child welfare systems. the united states has several organizations that are publicly mandated and funded to do just this, including the child welfare information gateway, which collates and disseminates research, statistics, legal information, and practice resources for practitioners and policymakers as well as academic researchers.20 issues of access to content, as well as prioritization of knowledge dissemination for policy and practice, will likely be best addressed through ensuring indigenous control of these processes. on a basic level, this is needed to help correct the imbalance in current literature. it is also important to promote the trust and collaboration that might facilitate compilation of grey literature (e.g., from practice agencies’ program evaluations). fundamentally, indigenous control of synthesizing literature about indigenous child welfare involvement will ensure that these processes reflect indigenous needs and perspectives. canada has recently taken steps to acknowledge the disproportionate representation of indigenous children in its child welfare systems, and passed federal legislation (bill c-92, 2019) to more adequately acknowledge the importance of indigenous children’s community, cultural, and linguistic ties in the child welfare system, as well as the importance of indigenous communities’ self-determination in decisions affecting local children and families. however, this legislation came without any funds appropriated to support its implementation, and critics suggest that it was not developed with sufficient consultation with local communities, limiting its potential to substantively shift child welfare practices on the ground. at a time when there is an opening for indigenous child welfare to be redefined at local levels, it is important that canada make public investments in seeking, consolidating, and learning from the diversity of knowledge related to indigenous child welfare. investing in these tasks would contribute not only to enhancing the rigor and quality of research publications in the domain of indigenous child welfare, but also to increasing the quantity of these publications, in order to inform smarter 19 without using our own academic credentials, the authors were not able to access several recent review articles (fiolet et al., 2019; 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(2022).zaatoonaa nibi (we love the water): anishinaabe community-led research on water governance and protection. the international indigenous policy journal, 13(2). https://10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.13697 zaagtoonaa nibi (we love the water): anishinaabe community-led research on water governance and protection abstract this paper presents indigenous community-led, collaborative, and community-engaged water governance research with a first nations community in the georgian bay and lake huron region in northeastern ontario, canada. the methodology draws on indigenous approaches to understanding and developing knowledge and is designed to build community capacity in research and in water protection and governance. this approach recognizes existing community strengths, including traditional knowledge, experiences, perspectives, and associated cultural perspectives and values, laws, responsibilities and lived experience in relation to water. results identify and contextualize community-held responsibilities and legal principles pertaining to water that support culturally relevant water governance and strategic planning. by synthesizing and extending previous water protection initiatives, this research meaningfully supports the community’s position and leadership on water security and governance. this, in turn, strengthens indigenous water governance and sustainable water governance broadly as indigenous understandings and approaches to water are holistic and concern relationships with and responsibilities to all of creation. keywords indigenous water governance, indigenous research methodology, anishinabek nibi giikendaaswin (indigenous water knowledge), anishinabek nibi inaakonigewin (indigenous water law), community-led research, collaborative research, great lakes acknowledgments the authors would like to acknowledge the leadership and contributions of the community-based researcher, elders and knowledge holders, all research participants, members of the water governance committee, and community leadership. funding for the research was provided by the first nation. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ latulippe & mcgregor: zaagtoonaa nibi published by scholarship@western, 2022 1 zaagtoonaa nibi (we love the water): anishinaabe community-led research on water governance and protection in global, national, and regional water assessments, climate change is predicted to intensify existing water security conditions (un world water development reports, 2014-2021). by 2030, the world is projected to face a 40% global water deficit under the business-as-usual scenario (un, 2015). indigenous peoples have been engaged in water-related stewardship and dialogue at multiple levels (see craft, 2018; laduke, 2020; tlatokan atlahuak declaration, 2006). however, in the absence of state recognition of indigenous rights to water, exclusion from decision making processes, and the continued exploitation of indigenous lands and territories, indigenous peoples will face on-going struggles for water security (conroy-ben & richard, 2018; lukawiecki et al., 2018; unesco, 2006). threats to the very survival of indigenous peoples continue, despite the establishment of international mechanisms to protect human rights. in canada, indigenous peoples face multiple water crises. at the time of writing, there are 52 long term drinking water advisories affecting public water systems on first nations reserves (indigenous services canada [isc], 2021). commitments from the government of canada to end long-term drinking water advisories in first nations reserve communities have translated into substantive budget allocations to build, improve, operate, and maintain on-reserve water and wastewater infrastructure (isc, 2020). while some progress has been made, federal and provincial sustainable water governance efforts continue to fail in spectacular fashion (lukawiecki et al., 2018). for example, neskantaga first nation, located 450 kilometers north of thunder bay, ontario, like many other remote first nations communities across canada has struggled with access to safe-drinking water. the community is “home to canada's longest standing boil-water advisory,” having been without safe drinking water for more than 25 years (cbc radio, 2020). children born in the community have grown into adults never having had access to safe drinking water in their lifetime. making matters worse, on october 19, 2020, “an oily substance was discovered in the reservoir”, forcing the community to shut down its water treatment plant (porter, 2020). the water was later found to be contaminated with hydrocarbon. with no water, the first nation community of roughly 300 people had to have an emergency evacuation. through this crisis, less than 20 people remained on the reserve. this current crisis is part of the ongoing water crisis in the community. in the early 1990s, the community’s filtration system was improperly built and since then the federal government has spent $609,000 on providing bottled water for the community instead of solving the crisis with their water system (edwards, 2019). prime minister trudeau promised to end first nations boil-water advisories under his 2015 election platform and the community was promised that it would have a working water plant by 2018, yet the community is still living without access to safe drinking water. neskantaga first nation has not had access to safe drinking water for well over 25 years; now, with the current water crisis in the midst of a global health pandemic, it is uncertain when they will be able to return home and have their basic human rights met. on account of serious, ongoing, and compounding infrastructural, jurisdictional, policy, and regulatory gaps, chronic water insecurity remains a reality for first nations across canada. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.13697 2 provincial and federal government provisions to improve the quality of drinking water on and off first nations reserves have proven inadequate. the department of indian affairs and north development (diand) controls funding formulas, not just for drinking water on reserves, but also for a broad range of public works such as wastewater systems and roads and bridges (mccullough & farahbakhsh, 2012); consequently, drinking water must compete with those other services for funding. the funding formula reinforces a top-down and one-size-fits-all decision-making structure that is guided by federal frugality, is unable to adapt to the local context, and creates vulnerability for drinking water services as they are subject to external evaluation (mccullough & farahbakhsh, 2012). government priorities come first. in ontario, where the research is situated, most first nations are located outside of source protection regions, watershed units mandated to develop source water protection (swp) plans after the 2000 walkerton drinking water contamination tragedy (collins et al., 2017). where first nations do participate, swp planning processes and implementation lack both regulatory oversight and the required funding, and indigenous traditional knowledge and cultural values are not meaningfully considered within the western scientific-and-technical knowledge-based swp paradigm (collins et al., 2017). the same inadequate regulatory and financial infrastructure exists within the federal government’s legislative framework for drinking water on reserves, the safe drinking water for first nations act (sdwfna), another settler-state assertion of jurisdiction over first nations lands that violates inherent and treaty rights. as a result, first nations have inadequate resources to support onreserve water and wastewater treatment and they have little or no control over the contamination of source waters beyond reserve boundaries. in recognition of the inadequacy of the sdwfna, in 2018 the assembly of first nation (afn) and the government of canada agreed to a first nations led process to co-develop new safe drinking water and wastewater legislation. discussions are underway and through engagement the afn has developed preliminary concepts that assert first nation authority and jurisdiction (afn, 2018). at a local level, some communities are taking steps to improve drinking water quality by developing and implementing community water and swp plans (arsenault, 2021; collins et al., 2017). this is one dimension of first nations leadership in water governance. as we show in this paper, indigenous-led water initiatives are holistic in that they often strive to protect all waters, not only source water for human consumption (fnfc, 2018). achieving water justice for first nations and sustainable water governance broadly will require more than a “techno-fix”, a term used to describe the dominant policy response to the drinking water crisis on reserves (human rights watch [hrw], 2016; mcgregor, 2012). the dominant model emphasizes improved funding, infrastructure, service levels, monitoring, assessment, and technical capacity (office of the auditor general, 2011; phare, 2009, 2011). while improvements in these areas are urgently needed to mitigate some of the existing gaps impacting drinking water quality on reserves, this response reflects an “apolitical reading” of water management and water governance (baijius & patrick, 2019, p.1). it fails to address broader and deeply rooted threats to water, such as historic and ongoing industrial point source pollution and the diversion of waters for industry and hydroelectric development, threats compounded by climate change (bradford et al., 2016; emanuel, 2018; sanderson et al., 2020; thompson et al., 2014; usher, 2003;). it fails to account for the violent system in which the drinking water crisis is produced and sustained, a system driven by the ongoing settler-colonial imperative to extract resources at the expense of life and lands, particularly of indigenous peoples, people of colour, and the poor (chief, 2020; neville & coulthard, 2019; sultana, 2018). latulippe & mcgregor: zaagtoonaa nibi published by scholarship@western, 2022 3 with a view to supporting indigenous-led and sustainable water protection and governance, this paper discusses an anishinaabe approach to water, water governance, and ethical community-based research practice. it advances an assertion, clearly made in the literature, that indigenous perspectives should not merely be “incorporated” into existing scientific, policy, theoretical, or methodological frameworks(an approach that nevertheless remains prevalent in environmental studies and resource management) (see von der porten et al., 2016; von der porten & de loë, 2014; wong et al., 2020), especially in an era of “reconciliation” (daigle, 2019; gaudry & lorenz, 2018). indigenous knowledge cannot be uncoupled from indigenous peoples as decision makers (latulippe, 2015a; mcgregor, 2004, 2012).1 indigenous research methodologies will vary by peoples, territory, and other contextual factors, but, as a paradigm (wilson, 2014), elements of indigenous research and principles of indigenous knowledge are shared by indigenous peoples in many parts of the world. our study is an application of one anishinaabe approach. the need to apply indigenous (and indigenist) research methodologies in support of the indigenous right to self-determination and inherent responsibilities to care for the land and waters is not only applicable in our study region, but across many indigenous territories. the focus of the paper is the research process with select results presented to show how the process influenced the research outcomes. it is based on a collaborative project developed and implemented with an anishinaabe first nation community in the georgian bay and lake huron region of northeastern ontario, canada. the community wishes to remain anonymous for the time being. to protect confidentiality, we have removed identifying names, citations, and other information. the project was initiated and developed by the community and designed and carried out in accordance with the mandates, knowledge, and ethics protocols and approval of the first nation. the purpose of the project was to work with the community to reconstruct their historical relationship and responsibilities to the water, and to research, explore, and engage the community on how best to reclaim their water rights and revitalize water laws (responsibilities). the results of this research project include a framework designed to support community efforts to advance their water security goals and aspirations. however, our decision to focus on research position and process rather than product enlivens principles that guide ethical research with indigenous peoples: ownership, control, access, and possession (ocap), which is a model for protecting indigenous data sovereignty (fnigc, 2014). it is a decision that recognizes the first nation’s ownership of the water governance framework. to contextualize our approach to the research, we begin with foundational and current approaches to indigenous water governance, knowledge, and research practice. supporting indigenous water governance through indigenous knowledge and research paradigms water governance is not a new concept for indigenous peoples. first nations have always had relationships with the waters of their lands (mcgregor, 2012; paisley et al., 2015). indigenous 1 similarly, the “incorporation” (emanuel & wilkins, 2020) and “participation” (hania, 2019) of indigenous people and knowledge within dominant decision-making regimes is equally harmful and inappropriate. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.13697 4 worldviews understand that water governs itself (gonzales, 2020) and that water governs us as human beings (craft, 2018). rather than conceptualize anishinabek water governance as “decision-making processes through which water is managed,” chiblow describes it as “relationship governance” (2019, p.8). it is how people manage human behaviour—our relationships with ourselves, with other people and living things, and how we take care of the water (chiblow, 2019; danard, 2015). indeed, anishinabek governance is “based on relationships with and responsibilities to all of life which includes nibi [water] governance” (chiblow, 2019, p. 8). anishinabek water governance is holistic; it exceeds notions of water as a resource or commodity, and encompasses the spiritual dimension, physical conditions of water, human health and that of other living beings, culture, ethical principles, and proper conduct regarding how water is used and treated. it takes numerous forms (craft, 2018). in light of anishinabek relationships to water, a research approach was required that reflects the underlying ontologies of water (mcgregor, 2018a). within holistic indigenous conceptualizations of water and water governance, not only are human relations with water considered; a foundational tenant of indigenous “hydrosocial relations” is that water is a living entity with rights and responsibilities to fulfill (mcgregor, 2021; wilson, 2014). this goes beyond the international human rights framework, which advocates for first nations drinking water as a human right in alignment with the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip) that access to clean drinking water and sanitation is a basic human right (craft, 2018; hrw, 2016; taylor & longboat, 2020). indigenous understandings of and relationships with water often exceed this framework in that water itself is understood to have rights and responsibilities that ought to be protected. this is evidenced in international indigenous water declarations (sanderson et al., 2020) such as the indigenous peoples kyoto water declaration (2003), tlatokan atlahuak declaration (2006), and garma international indigenous water declaration (2006) and reflected in the chiefs of ontario water declaration (2008) and grand council treaty #3 nibi declaration (craft & king, 2021). the research process described in this paper is informed by indigenous knowledge and ethical conduct in research with a first nation community. indigenous knowledge is a way of life that is embodied by indigenous peoples in their relationships with creation (mcgregor, 2004; 2018a). relationships with the environment are specific to place, to each nation, and emanate from the sacred (gonzales, 2020; kealiikanakoaleohaililani et al., 2016; yunkaporta, 2020). an important aspect of indigenous knowledge is the acknowledgement of the lands and the waters themselves as relatives and teachers, as significant sources of knowledge (kimmerer, 2013; mcgregor et al., 2020). indigenous knowledge is embedded in indigenous social systems and is often referred to as an indigenous knowledge system (mcgregor et al., 2019). indigenous knowledge systems (iks) are inter-related and inter-connected with indigenous cosmologies, practices, ethics, and decision-making processes (reo & whyte, 2012; wilson et al., 2019). there are protocols in place to guide appropriate and respectful engagement with iks and cross-cultural knowledge exchange (gonzales, 2020). reo et al. (2017) describe factors that support indigenous involvement in multi-actor environmental stewardship initiatives, while the climate and traditional knowledge workgroup (2014) outlines guidelines for considering traditional knowledges in climate change initiatives. in research, canada’s major federal research agencies, known collectively as the tricouncil, have established guidelines for conducting ethical research with indigenous peoples, while latulippe & mcgregor: zaagtoonaa nibi published by scholarship@western, 2022 5 many first nation communities have their own frameworks and protocols in place to guide ethical partnerships with outside researchers (mcgregor, 2018a; reo, 2019). for instance, the karuk advocate not for the recognition, documentation, and integration of indigenous knowledge within western knowledge paradigms, but for indigenous knowledge sovereignty, a dual process that entails both strengthening the internal use and transmission of knowledge and removing external policy and jurisdictional roadblocks to the enactment of indigenous knowledge on traditional lands (norgaard, 2015). whyte (2018) calls this the ‘governance value’ of indigenous knowledge systems: the essential role of indigenous knowledge in the revitalization of indigenous governance and related legal orders, land-based practices, diplomatic protocols, and other collective capacities that promote the wellbeing of lands and peoples. grounding these principles of ethical engagement with indigenous knowledge are indigenous research methodologies, what geniusz (2009) calls biskaabiiyang methodologies or “returning to ourselves”, and wilson (2008) refers to as ceremony. indigenous research is culturally specific but evidence from canada, the united states, hawaii, australia, and aotearoa new zealand show that it is shaped and supported by relationality (moreton-robinson, 2017), a process wilson (2008) describes as building more relations or constructing more knots in the web of relationships that produce knowledge. in water governance, indigenous research methodology is discussed by arsenault at al. (2018; arsenault 2021), fox et al. (2017), craft (2017; craft & king 2021), and chiblow (2019; 2020). in what chiblow (2019) refers to as “re-searching” nish nibi (water) giikendaaswin (knowledge) and responsibilities (laws), it consists of an all-encompassing methodology with numerous methods “as old as the peoples themselves” (p. 8). central to these processes is relational accountability, being accountable to one’s relations (reo, 2019; wilson, 2008). as such, ethical conduct in research with a first nation community must necessarily consider indigenous governance systems and legal orders. in the current context, nations are engaged in various processes to revitalize and in some cases to codify their laws (borrows, 2010a; clogg et al., 2016; todd, 2016). working with anishinaabe elders, youth and knowledge holders through stories, ceremony, and other land-based practices, craft (2014) identifies the following anishinabek nibi inaakonigewin (water laws): a. water has spirit e. women are responsible for water b. we do not “own” water f. we must respect the water c. water is life g. water can suffer d. water can heal h. water needs a voice notably, the spiritual nature of water comes first. indigenous law, conceptualized as original instructions and “respectful relationships and accords of reciprocity and responsibilities”, emanates from the sacred (gonzales, 2020, p. 87; king, 2007, p. 84). sacred nibi inaakonigewin (water law) is fulfilled through conduct and daily practice—it is a way of life (craft, 2018). a framework already exists to facilitate ethical relations between indigenous and non-indigenous peoples with respect to water laws, knowledge exchange, and governance. in many parts of canada, including where this research is situated, the relationship between indigenous and newcomer nations is the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.13697 6 supposed to be mediated by treaty, which is an indigenous framework for coexistence that is meant to sustain relations between peoples and to ensure the continuation of all life (borrows & coyle, 2017; king, 2007; mills, 2017).2 a nation-to-nation relationship mediated by treaty locates anishinabek inaakonigewin (law) as “a separate but equal system of law” in canada (craft, 2014, p. 24). the elders believe that anishinabek inaakonigewin should be used to inform and to interpret canadian law (craft, 2014). for example, it would be understood that water has the legal rights of a person if section 7 of the canadian charter of rights and freedoms, which protects “life, liberty and the security of the person”, were interpreted through the anishinabek legal concept, “water is life” (craft, 2014, p. 5). while treaties between indigenous peoples and the crown are violated by the settler-colonial state, the anishinabek never surrendered or gave up their relationships with the waters (harry bone in craft, 2014). treaty pre-dates the arrival of europeans on turtle island (north america). first treaty is with creation itself; it is sacred law or original instructions (gagnon et al., 2020; mills, 2017). first nations continue to enact their sacred responsibilities to nibi (water), to renew historic treaty relations (anishinabek news, 2014), and to assert jurisdiction over their lands and waters. this includes contemporary treaty and title claims to the waters within first nations’ traditional and treaty territories (mcfn, 2020; okt law, 2020). non-indigenous governments and society need to pick up their treaty obligations to the land and to the original land stewards. thus, there is a role for non-indigenous partnership and collaboration in the restoration of indigenous jurisdiction and legal frameworks. indeed, the elders want to “share what they know and make it more widely accessible” in ways that respect and accord with anishinaabe protocols (craft, 2014, p. 12). pathways exist to respectfully engage and meaningfully support indigenous systems of knowledge, research ethics, and research sovereignty (williams et al., 2020); for example, through reconciliation research (mcgregor, 2018b), indigenous-informed critical place inquiry (tuck & mckenzie, 2015), treaty-based research (latulippe, 2015b), and moving over (latulippe & klenk, 2020). foundational these approaches is a commitment to protect indigenous lands and ways of life (indigenous people/peoples and rights), and to end destructive colonial attitudes and behaviours regarding the water (mcgregor, 2004; chiblow, 2019). community context, research approach, and knowledge gathering and analysis methods the research was led by a first nations community in the georgian bay and lake huron region in northeastern ontario, canada. indigenous self-determination (reo et al., 2017) and knowledge sovereignty (norgaard, 2015; whyte, 2018) are foremost considerations in our research design and as such all efforts are made to protect the confidentiality of the data and community. in what follows, we describe the community context, project objectives and research strategy, followed by methods of community engagement and knowledge gathering. 2 by treaty we mean specific regional nation-to-nation agreements, such as the robinson huron treaty, 1850, multinational gatherings in which relations between indigenous and newcomer nations were renewed, such as the treaty of niagara, 1764, and indigenous treaties that pre-date european contact. latulippe & mcgregor: zaagtoonaa nibi published by scholarship@western, 2022 7 this research was part a broad and multi-scalar community water governance strategy that is guided by existing social, cultural, political, and technical water protocols and tools. the community has governed and managed the waters according to anishinaabe law, knowledge, and values for generations. however, due to compounding external threats and challenges to the waters, human health, and the health of ecosystems and the many living beings who rely on water, the community is engaged in multiple water rights, protection, security and governance initiatives and advocacy. existing strategic planning documents include a community source water protection plan, a water and wastewater action plan, and a 25-year water protection plan. other initiatives include a prohibition on the use of plastic water bottles at community events, substantial infrastructure upgrades, the conduct of water ceremonies, water walks, education, awareness building, and outreach, and everyday activities that use, protect and care for water (chiblow & mcgregor, 2016). the community does not act in isolation on water protection and governance. the first nation works within collective cultural and political advocacy networks such as the regional tribal council, the main treaty organization, the provincial coordinating body, chiefs of ontario, and the national assembly of first nations (afn). the first nation recognizes that the waters within its territory are intrinsic to broader anishinabek governance and legal orders. for instance, sacred sites are significant not only locally to the first nation, but to all citizens of the anishinabek nation (anishinabek nation, 2018; johnston, 2006). the first nation community acknowledges its responsibility to protect its sacred and heritage sites for the entire nation. the purpose of the research was to support the development of a framework for use by the community that could inform water security and governance initiatives and be leveraged in their political advocacy. the objective was to develop a position paper for the first nation community that outlines threats to the waters in the territory, develops recommendations based on community engagement, and provides a document that leadership can use to protect the waters. research activities included the review and documentation of written material collected and connected to the community’s historical water laws and uses (treaties, archival material, and resources); development of an annotated bibliography on indigenous water governance; community engagement sessions and key informant interviews with traditional environmental knowledge holders, traditional knowledge keepers, elders, youth, community, leadership, and academics to discuss issues as well as gather and document recommendations from the community on how to address their concerns; and the development of a position paper on water governance with specific recommendations for mitigating threats to the waters. the research was led, governed, and funded by the community with support from researchers, both academic and community based. a water governance committee comprised of community leadership, technicians, policy experts, academics, youth, traditional knowledge holders, language speakers and elders informed and oversaw the project, including the research objectives, deliverables, communication, and approval process. this committee also guided how the knowledge would be translated to community leadership, other stakeholders, and broader society. a research team including community-based and university researchers (the authors) were responsible for knowledge gathering, analysis, and communication of results. 3 all elements of the research were discussed with and vetted by 3 the community researcher cannot be identified as it would compromise community confidentiality. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.13697 8 the community water governance committee. in an ongoing manner throughout the research process, the researchers liaised with members of the water governance committee and collaborated on research design, the community engagement strategy and its implementation, recruitment of research participants for key informant interviews, and the interpretation of meaning. the committee was provided with ongoing written updates, progress reports, a summary of interview data, and draft research papers. at all stages, it was important that the research be community-driven and prepared in an accessible manner. research design included two kinds of engagement: community engagement sessions and key informant interviews. the key assertion behind community engagement is that community members know and relate to the waters in their traditional and treaty territory and thus are best positioned to speak to it. two community engagement sessions were held to reach as many people as possible (50 community members participated in total). the theme of community engagement sessions was zaagtoonaa nibi, we love the water, expressing the holistic and relational approach to water governance in the community (mandamin, 2012). sessions had three aims: to clearly present information to the community from previous water-related consultations, facilitate discussion and prioritization of previously and newly identified threats to water and opportunities to exercise anishinabek water governance and law, and gain information needed to communicate to leadership community-derived priorities with regards to water threats and opportunities.4 invitations to participate were circulated through the household newsletter. the sessions respected cultural protocols by opening in a traditional way with ceremony and a community feast. following an information session in which previous waterrelated community consultations were summarized, previously identified water threats and opportunities explained, and new opportunities and threats solicited and discussed, participants were invited to visually indicate through a participatory ranking exercise what they felt to be the most pressing (top three) water threats and opportunities (howe et al., 2013; morey & venette, 2021). key informant interviews (faifua, 2014; mackian, 2010) were designed with two goals: to engage community members who follow traditional land and water uses to discuss and record the community’s historical, cultural, and spiritual connection with water, and to discuss and record threats to water and opportunities to exercise anishinabek water governance and law. all interviews were conducted by the community researcher who is familiar with the elders and community members and comfortable with the anishinaabemowin language, which is integral as key concepts and practices are best expressed in anishinaabemowin. this method was informed by several underlying assumptions. first, engaging directly with knowledge holders recognizes the embodied and experiential nature of place-based (but not place-bound) anishinaabe gikendaasowin (knowledge) (larsen & johnson, 2017; mcgregor, 2021). second, it reflects ocap principles that guide ethical research with indigenous peoples as knowledge is exchanged between community members within the community. third, participation was designed and carried out in accordance with ocap and specifically according to the mandates and protocols of the first nation community. interview participants included elders, traditional knowledge holders, and language speakers, those who employ traditional uses of land and water, such as hunters, 4 threats to water had previously been identified in a series of community building exercises that led to an environmental management plan and source water protection plan. latulippe & mcgregor: zaagtoonaa nibi published by scholarship@western, 2022 9 fishers, and trappers, health practitioners and those who use plants for medicine and food. invitations to participate were done by invitation and referral, snowball sampling (noy, 2008), with the aim of seeking representation from each family group in the community. each interview followed appropriate cultural protocols, for instance, offering sema (tobacco) in part as an act of reciprocity for the information shared, and obtaining verbal verbal consent, including to audio-record the interview (chiblow, 2019; wilson & restoule, 2010). a set of questions was developed collaboratively by parties to this project that would facilitate informal conversational interviews (see table 1). in total, nine community members participated in the key informant interviews. the full written record of each interview was collated in a separate document that is kept by the first nation. table 1: guiding questions for key-informant interviews • can you please tell me about your relationship to water? • can you tell me about the importance of waters at culturally-significant areas? • are there any words or concepts in anishinaabemowin that convey a similar meaning to “protecting the water”? • what concerns you the most about negative changes to the water? what challenges do we face as a community? • what do you see as your role in protecting the water? • what do we need to do as a community to protect the water? what do our people need to know and do? • what do we already have that is a strength? what do we need to develop further? • do non-community members have a responsibility to the water? what is it? what do they need to know and do? • how do we know that protecting the water has been achieved? what would that look like? • any other ideas: funding, partnerships, collaborations, lobbying, or education and awareness building? a review of literature complemented the key informant interviews and community engagement sessions. literature reviewed included academic and grey literature on first nations water knowledge, governance, laws, policies, and indigenous research methodologies and ethics, codified forms of anishinabek law, and community reports and transcripts. together, these research methods acknowledge the myriad sources of anishinabek water knowledge, governance, and law, including historical and contemporary uses of water, oral histories, and traditional teachings about water (archibald, 2008), values, ethics, and legal principles concerning proper behaviour or right relations with water, and anishinabek and other indigenous legal frameworks concerning the protection of lands and waters. finally, several qualitative and basic quantitative data analysis methods were used by the researchers to analyze and generate meaning from the knowledge shared. perceived threats and opportunities to waters were ranked by a simple count of the number of times they were identified by participants as one of three top priorities. tallies were done at a number of registers: by issue (e.g., invasive species, shipping nuclear waste, etc.), category (e.g., tourism pollution, capacity issues, etc.), and by scale (e.g., local, international, etc.). qualitative information gathered at community engagement sessions and through key informant the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.13697 10 interviews contextualize and add nuance to the rankings. besides the ranking exercise, qualitative data was interpreted through thematic coding and interpretive analysis (braun & clark, 2006; mackian, 2010); through indigenous storywork, a holistic interpretive framework for learning respectfully from and with indigenous stories, protocols, and knowledge holders (archibald et al. 2019); and borrows’ (2010a) method of drawing out law from primary and secondary sources to identify anishinaabe legal principles and water laws in the community. together, these methods allowed the researchers to identify interpretive categories, how they fit together, and how they inform the overall story they tell about the data. the researchers shared preliminary research findings from community engagement and interviews with the water governance committee and feedback was sought before proceeding to the final stage, the development of a water security position paper. the water security position paper was developed for leadership to use in future negotiations with governments and other third-party interests to communicate the community’s position on water security. it includes 9 steps pointed at external water threats, to ensure water security for future generations. a longer water governance and law research findings report was also prepared for the community. it is a comprehensive account of the knowledge generated from this research, including literature review, community perspectives on water threats and opportunities, and anishinaabe water laws. finally, the research was used by members of the water governance committee to articulate a set of 10 internal community recommendations set out in a companion document. they are meant to strengthen anishinaabek water laws and practice in the community. these pieces constitute the core of a water governance and protection framework developed by and with the first nation. research results: water threats and opportunities, legal principles, and a path forward in this section we share some of the results of the research, including the identification and prioritization of threats and opportunities facing the waters, anishinaabe water laws, and a strategic path forward. first, it is important acknowledge anishinaabe perspectives or onto-epistemologies of water present in the research. in the community, concern for water is not limited to drinking water. from the interviews, water includes rain (many types of rain), waves, ice, snow, groundwater, drinking water, streams, springs, lakes, and shorelines. concern for water included concern for spiritual and other beings that reside in and dependent on the water, including fish, medicines, plants, berries, food (gardens), limestone, rock, human beings, the ancestors, and future generations. in its multiple roles and functions in the lifecycles of so many beings, water provides “everything” (research participant). water is a “lifeline” (ibid.). it meets physical, emotional, and spiritual needs. it meets intellectual needs, as water is related to how one thinks, and to how one considers and relates to others. water is teeming with life; it is alive, life giving, and sacred. water is life. previously documented concerns and perceived threats to water were fleshed out and prioritized during the two community engagement sessions. most of the threats identified by the community reflect broader historical and ongoing experiences of colonialism and dispossession. previous community reports and transcripts identified dispossession and limited access to traditional lands and waters as major threats to water security and governance. for instance, the creation of parks, development of private lands, and settler economies have restricted access to traditional hunting areas and disrupted latulippe & mcgregor: zaagtoonaa nibi published by scholarship@western, 2022 11 sacred sites and burial sites, traditional teachings, and practices. elders are concerned with the impacts of aquaculture, the destruction of sacred sites, and the contamination and pollution of waters from tourism, industry, and resource extraction activities. industrial development has impacted the quality and quantity of fish, water, medicine plants, and air quality, while truck traffic, noise and light pollution impacts fasting and other ceremonial practices. historical and ongoing issues are compounded by the impact of climate change, including changing ice conditions, lower water levels, more droughts, extreme storm events, hotter summers, algae blooms, invasive species, the potential for more fires, and negative impacts on traditional food sources, medicine plants, and maple sap. threats challenge mental, physical, emotional and spiritual health and wellbeing; for instance, the unpredictability and unreliability of the lakes freezing over impacts travel across the ice, recreational activities, ceremonies, and access to traditional foods. concern was raised about future impacts of a changing environment on community health, citing risks to future generations. through group discussion and participatory ranking, a clear link was made between local, regional, provincial, federal, and international threats and opportunities. for example, pressure-treated lumber may affect local fish habitats, but combined with aquaculture waste, the movement of water and air, aerial spraying, and negative changes to the health of the great lakes on account of industrial development and climate change, local threats are exacerbated by that which originates elsewhere. the protections that are supposed to be offered by jurisdictional and ecosystem boundaries collapse in the face of globalization and climate change, not a new challenge facing first nations whose authority to protect their interests on and off reserve is structurally limited. while serious perceived water threats were seen as beyond the control of the community, including threats to the great lakes from invasive species and nuclear waste and those stemming from inadequate canadian water policy frameworks (under-funding and legislative gaps), opportunities to protect the water were local and regional, such as strengthening local emergency responsiveness and forging constructive regional partnerships. emergency preparedness, controls on development, working effectively with those who share the waters, and strengthening community capacity, including as a treaty region involved in broader policy and lawmaking processes, were also identified as opportunities. opportunities recognize the need to resist and refuse government and other external intrusions, and to assert and strengthen inherent rights and responsibilities to the waters. the research was clear that anishinabek water governance is grounded in the inherent authority to make decision about the waters and responsibility to care for and protect the waters. this is a significant strength and opportunity for anishinaabe water governance and can be expressed in four legal principles. the following legal principles encapsulate comments made by community members about proper conduct and appropriate relations with water: respect, reverence, reciprocity, and responsibility. respect for the waters entails building a safe relationship with water. it was said by one research participant that water “is our lifeline” but it can “take life too.” respect for water includes respect for all the beings in water as citizens with their own rights and obligations of to fulfill. community members and the surrounding non-indigenous society (tourists and industry) should respect the water. not wasting water, not polluting the water, expressing gratitude and appreciation for the water, and exercising caution and safety were provided as examples of respect and reverence, of good relations with water. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.13697 12 reciprocal relations with water include ceremonies and making spiritual offerings to the water, as well as shore clean ups and other ways of protecting the waters. connecting to the water, developing and maintaining an active and embodied relationship with the water, are forms of reciprocity. connection helps people know what the water needs. cultural values such as sharing what one has, being generous with water, and letting the waters replenish (to assist the water) are seen as expressions of respect, reverence, and reciprocity. responsibility relates to the fact that water provides everything needed for survival and wellbeing. one elder stated, “no one ever claimed ownership to water because everyone needed it. the expectation was that everyone cared for the area.” all people, it was said, have a responsibility to build and maintain the quality and quantity of water, including all forms of water and water sources, and to protect the waters and all water beings. ultimately, to use the waters is to be responsible for protecting and revering it. respect and reciprocity are embedded in stories about power and balance involving water spirits, in historic treaty agreements to share land, and in the recommendations for more local information and awareness about climate change that will enable community members to uphold their responsibilities to the land. respect, reverence, reciprocity, and responsibility are not mutually exclusive, nor do they concern only interactions with water. water is multiple, so these principles guide proper conduct with water and relations with the self and with other beings. ultimately, the research shows that strengths and opportunities for indigenous water governance and implementation can be found in the oral histories, stories, and protocols to protect the waters. they embed unwritten rules and common sense into everyday practices and behavior. research participants made the following comments: the children listened to the stories and heard how we were to protect the water and be thankful the water was there for us to use. teach everyone about the importance of water. we need a clean-up day for the shoreline like we have—earth day when we clean up the community. we need a water day to clean up places. we need to do it when the ice is gone. take children to the water when the ice goes and talk about the water. children have the capacity to see the big picture because their imagination is so vibrant—teach to them at that time at the water. and even if there is garbage there, have them pick it up. hearing and seeing and doing will imprint their mind. because it is going to belong to them. stories and everyday practices embodying respect, reverence, reciprocity, and responsibility for water are sources of knowledge about proper water relations and water laws (gonzales, 2020). research participants identified many sources of knowledge, including spirit, the body, our senses, emotion, observation and intellect, historical land uses and management practices, scientific information about the water, ceremony, dreams, cultural and social norms, inter-generational and community knowledge, modeling, learning by doing, health and safety, communication with the natural world, the elders, stories, traditional teachings, prophecies, recreation, sustenance, livelihoods, identity, and anishinaabe latulippe & mcgregor: zaagtoonaa nibi published by scholarship@western, 2022 13 values. making mistakes and learning the hard way about appropriate water conduct also offer valuable lessons. this wealth of knowledge in the community is a strength and opportunity. due to external factors rooted in the settler-colonial structure, the implementation of anishinaabe water governance and law beyond reserve boundaries is a significant challenge. according to one of the elders: “i am afraid it might be too late to protect the water because there is so much industrial pollution.” another participant stated, “there is a lot outside of our control” and because of this “we can’t use the water like the way we used to.” frustration with government and feelings that it is “too late” reinforces the need to affirm the indigenous right to self-governance, including the right to say no, a right that is reflected in the principle of free, prior, and informed consent protected by international human rights standards (craft, 2018). guiding a pathway forward, elders involved in the research stressed the value of experiential and landbased learning that strengthens anishinabek knowledge, values, ethics, decision-making in the community. this reinforces earlier research explaining the successful implementation of first nations water initiatives: implementation is more likely to be a success when initiatives build on existing community strengths and efforts to protect and restore the waters (arsenault et al., 2018; collins et al., 2017). this is because of the persistence of external structural gaps (infrastructure, jurisdictional, policy, and regulatory) that challenge and undermine first nations water security. a growing body of evidence also demonstrates that working relationships between indigenous and nonindigenous communities can be effective in facing these challenges (larsen & johnson, 2017; ransom & ettenger, 2001; reid et al., 2020). factors that support indigenous involvement in multi-actor environmental stewardship initiatives include respect for indigenous knowledges, indigenous control of knowledge mobilization, intergenerational involvement, indigenous self-determination, continuous cross-cultural education, and the early involvement of indigenous people and communities (reo et al., 2017). community members involved in the research expressed a willingness to partner with outside agencies and to participate in the management of lands beyond the reserve boundaries. from an anishinaabe legal perspective, this is “not about creating partnerships, but rather about being respectful allies or relatives that do not interfere with each other’s law and governance” (craft, 2014, p. 24). overall, the research suggests that revitalizing and supporting indigenous land-based practices will strengthen connections to the land and strengthen first nations water security and governance processes. strengthening internal systems of knowledge, law and governance equip first nations to confront external challenges stemming from colonization. this is the governance value of indigenous knowledge (whyte, 2018) which can be supported through research and other means and mobilized to strengthen self-determination and sustainable water governance both on and off first nations reserves (baijius & patrick, 2019; paisley et al., 2015). these results were used to develop a water security and protection framework developed by and with the first nation. nine recommendations were identified from the research for use by the community to influence external agencies and interests. they concern jurisdiction, inherent rights and responsibilities to protect the waters; major external threats to the waters; anishinabek laws and legal pluralism the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.13697 14 (borrows, 2010b); resources and funding; free, prior, and informed consent; effective partnership; intellectual property and knowledge sovereignty; by-laws; and research, guidelines, and awareness. the water governance committee then drew on the research to articulate a set of ten internal recommendations to strengthen anishinaabek water laws and practice in the community. they involve specific advocacy and lobbying efforts; strategic partnerships; capacity building; education, research, and awareness building; intellectual property; financial resources and economic development; and the need to restore relationships with the waters. discussion: supporting and implementing indigenous self-determination and water security this paper focused on research process; essentially, relationship building and working in partnership, enabling anishinaabe perspectives to be the core and foundation of the research. the research was led, governed, and funded by the community—it was initiated and developed by the community and not by an external funding body, ethics board, or educational institution. it was designed and carried out in accordance with ocap and specifically according to the mandates, knowledge, and ethics protocols of the first nation community, which are distinct from and often more stringent than what is required from university ethics boards (luby et al., 2021). the methods employed were grounded in the teachings of the elders, participation in cultural practices, and in other forms of traditional knowledge held by community members. this adds another example of indigenous water research exceeding (as it should) the typical approach to indigenous knowledge research taken by academic institutions (see chiblow, 2019). the communication of research results also exceeds normal academic knowledge mobilization. notably, in this study, we are not in a position as authors to share all of the empirical results as they constitute the intellectual property of the first nation. an integral aspect of indigenous research is that the community owns and controls the information, in alignment with ocap principles, self-determination, and knowledge sovereignty discussed above. in so far as community knowledge, experience, and perspectives are central to the inquiry, this collaborative, community-led research is similar to approaches utilized by craft (2014, 2018) and chiblow (2019). it reflects the centrality of inawendiwin (relating) and relational accountability, the “interpretive and epistemic scaffolding” of indigenous research (kovach, 2009; moreton-robinson, 2017: 69; reo, 2019; wilson, 2008). it nurtures existing relationships and supported the development of new relations involving university and community-based researchers, youth, elders, technicians and policy experts, leadership, traditional knowledge holders, and language speakers. we shared some results to demonstrate how the process influenced the research outcomes. research outcomes respect and acknowledge anishinabek nibi giikendaaswin (water knowledge) and anishinabek nibi inaakonigewin (water laws), cultural perspectives, values, responsibilities, and lived experience. for instance, community-identified water threats and opportunities are not limited to technical concerns and western scientific knowledge about water, nor are they solely concerned with drinking water for human beings, which are dominant themes in mainstream water research, management, and decision-making paradigms (longboat, 2015; mcgregor, 2021). the research activates indigenous water governance, not limited to the rights of human beings to access clean drinking water but concerned with the rights and responsibilities of all waters and with the health and wellbeing of the land itself, including animals, fish, medicines, sacred sites, spiritual beings, and future latulippe & mcgregor: zaagtoonaa nibi published by scholarship@western, 2022 15 generations. strategies to address water protection—including ceremonies, responsibilities, intergenerational knowledge transmission, and land-based learning—exceed the normal technical provisions included within source water protection planning. water protection is rooted in ancestral connections to spirit and to land, expressed in the normal, everyday visions and practices. zaagtoonaa nibi (we love the water) typifies this relationship to water. the research also identifies settler-colonialism as a persistent source of harm to indigenous water security and governance. breaches of treaty and the failure to honour the spirit and intent of the treaties remain significant challenges (laidlaw & passelac-ross, 2010; phare, 2009). similarly, recommendations made to community leadership reflect the first nations’ relationship with the waters and ultimately strengthen the community’s existing approach to the protection and restoration of waters. recommendations resonate with the dual focus found in the karuk tribe’s approach to resource management, a strategy that involves both strengthening internal knowledge governance systems and removing external policy and jurisdictional roadblocks to the implementation of knowledge (norgaard, 2015; whyte, 2018). they also resonate with findings that indigenous selfdetermination is essential for achieving effective forms of collaborative resource management and environmental governance (bowie, 2013; cier, 2009; reo et al., 2017; von der porten et al., 2016). this research demonstrates how collaborative, indigenous-led and community-engaged research can synthesize, extend, and strengthen indigenous leadership on water protection and governance. it highlights the value and scope of methodologies that draw on indigenous approaches to understanding and developing knowledge to revitalize, support and strengthen indigenous water knowledge, governance, and law. the implications are far reaching (stefanovic & adeel, 2021) as indigenous water governance calls on all people to (re)learn and (re)establish sustainable relations with 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(2023). student transfer mobility within indigenous programs: pathways of access or appropriation? the international indigenous policy journal, 14(1). https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.10943 student transfer mobility within indigenous programs: pathways of access or appropriation? abstract mobility pathways to and from indigenous programs is one strategy post-secondary education (pse) institutions employ to support reconciliation, yet data is limited on the status or impact of these pathways. the current study examined program pathways of indigenous and non-indigenous learners within indigenous programming. fiftythree students were recruited from across pse institutions in ontario. chi squared tests indicated that the majority of students transferring to an indigenous program were indigenous; however, the study also found that nonindigenous learners were frequent users of pathways. results of this study provide cause for consideration about how settler normativity may permeate in pathway development and delivery. recommendations are provided on how pse can centre indigenous students in mobility program development. keywords indigenous studies, indigenous students, student mobility, reconciliation, decolonizing education acknowledgments miigwetch to the student participants and our partnering post-secondary institutions for their time, engagement, and expertise. the authors would also like to acknowledge janine landry and nicole dupuis for their work on the project and dr. kristin burnett for reviewing an earlier draft of this paper. funding for this research project was provided by the ontario council on articulation and transfer (oncat). creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ 1 ray et al.: student transfer mobility within indigenous programs published by scholarship@western, 2023 student transfer mobility within indigenous programs: pathways of access or appropriation? indigenous studies programs were introduced into post-secondary institutions in the late 1960s to improve post-secondary access and attainment levels for indigenous students (pidgeon, 2016). the impetus behind these programs was surmounting pressure from indigenous, civil rights, and anti-war political movements for post-secondary institutions to serve mandates of indigenous nation-building, cultural resurgence, and social justice (andersen, 2009; champagne, 1994; murry et al., 2022; taner, 1999). while indigenous programs have expanded and evolved within the discipline (murry et al., 2022) and there now exists indigenous-based programs across disciplines such as indigenous social work (lee, 2017; pidgeon, 2016; universities canada, 2019), indigenous programs remain committed to the initial goals of indigenous student access, nation-building, and the resurgence of indigenous worldviews, culture and language (e.g., fixico, 2001; lee, 2017). for today’s indigenous learners, indigenous programs can provide a safe haven from the colonial politics of recognition, representation, knowledge production and erasure in the broader institution (smith et al., 2018). indigenous spaces on campus, including programming, can foster resilience and provide an indigenous-centered space for learning (e.g., cote meek, 2014; jacob et al., 2019). since the truth and reconciliation commission of canada (trc) (2015), the discourse and practice surrounding indigenous education has been dramatically altered. while the calls to action coming out of the trc have been valuable to the advancement of indigenous education, including the call to integrate indigenous knowledge and teaching methods into classrooms (trc, 2015), the way the report recommendations have been interpreted and implemented by canadian governments, institutions, and society, has been widely criticized and largely performative (e.g., daigle, 2019; green, 2015). a consequence of the trc has been a heightened involvement (or perhaps, more accurately, control and surveillance) of indigenous programs and space on campus by the broader university (ray et al., 2019). as noted by denetdale (2020), “instead of a focus on indigenous nation-building and supporting indigenous sovereignty, an influx of non-indian scholars and administrators attempt shifts to “diversity” and “multiculturalism” (p. 624). while indigenous programs remain ghettoized through under resourcing (champagne, 1994; denetdale, 2020) and the undervaluing of scholarship (povey et al., 2021; waterfall & maiter, 2003) the scramble of universities to perform reconciliation has placed greater burdens upon indigenous programming (cook-lynn, 1997; daigle, 2019), including facilitating settler education. additionally, while indigenous programming initially focused on access as part of a broader strategy to support nation-building and indigenous knowledge systems, it is now commonplace for indigenous access and educational attainment to be approached through a framework of reconciliation (gaudry & lorenz, 2018; pidgeon, 2014). this framework endorses a neo-liberal model of inclusion that focuses on the presence and adaptation of indigenous bodies in place of radical models which would challenge current structures and promote system transformation (gaudry & lorenz, 2018). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.10943 pathways to and from indigenous programs have been identified as a strategy that can enhance access to post-secondary education for indigenous learners (e.g., camman et al., 2014; barnett et al., 2021; kerr et al., 2010; rosenbluth, 2011; smith et al., 2015; taner, 1999), and in recent years, indigenous program pathway development in canada has increased (ray, 2017; rhodes, 2019). however, bunda et al. (2012) caution that affirmative action projects are insufficient on their own and that entry programs and pathways need to exist alongside broader strategies that address the structural differences that produce inequity. recent scholarship also supports the claim that pathways in and of themselves are not an effective strategy to support access for indigenous learners who are among the most underrepresented in post-secondary education (pse) (ray, landry, et al., 2019). as henry et al. (2017) note, “notwithstanding the promise of equity, the university is a racialized site that still excludes and marginalizes non-white people, in subtle, complex, sophisticated, and ironic ways, from everyday interactions with colleagues to institutional practices that at best are ineffective and at worst perpetuate structural racism” (p. 3). thus, it cannot be assumed that solely developing pathways will be sufficient to attract students from underrepresented groups to pse (camman et al., 2014, p. 4). this paper presents the sub-set of results on program pathways to and/or from indigenous programs from an ontario-wide study to better understand program pathways in indigenous contexts. while the paper provides an overview of the results, it focuses on the potential implications of the findings that indigenous students were more likely to transfer into an indigenous program and non-indigenous learners were the most frequent users of indigenous program pathways. from these findings a discussion is launched on the potential impacts of indigenous program pathways on indigenous student access and experience within indigenous programs. by doing this, we interrogate the role of pathways in supporting the intent of indigenous programs as well as popular institutional defined notions of reconciliation. literature review since their introduction into public universities, indigenous programs continue to grow and evolve in canadian and international contexts (lee, 2017; murry et al., 2022). many programs exist across the globe, and in canada alone, universities experienced a 33% increase in indigenous programs over a twoyear span (2013-2015) (universities canada, 2015). today, ontario is home to many innovative indigenous programs, which in some cases are among the first of their kind in canada and north america (ray, 2017). indigenous program goals jacob et al. (2019) posit that “indigenous studies programs can perhaps be viewed as sacred spaces for the indigenous self-determination and decolonization taking root in an otherwise assimilative educational system for indigenous students” (p. 286). while indigenous programs are reflective of regional contexts, generally, they have been built for indigenous students and seek to revitalize and reflect indigenous worldviews and languages, and restore and defend communities and nations (denetdale, 2020; lee, 2017). in her pivotal article on the intent of indigenous studies, cook lynn 3 ray et al.: student transfer mobility within indigenous programs published by scholarship@western, 2023 (1997) argues that indigenous programs should focus on indigenousness (culture, place, and philosophy) and sovereignty (history and law). in an australian context, similar goals exist, requiring students to engage the politics of knowledge production, education, and self-determination (nakata et al., 2012). a recent content analysis of indigenous studies programs across canada, usa, australia, and new zealand, while noting a wide variance among programs also reaffirmed many of these goals, arguing that the current underlying factors of indigenous studies programs are indigenous methodologies, indigenous community involvement, indigenous ways of knowing and doing, indigenous languages, and indigenous student presence (murry et al., 2022). there is an ongoing recognition of the interrelationship of the two main goals of indigenous programs: revitalizing indigenous culture, language, and worldviews and indigenous community building and sovereignty (e.g., cook-lynn, 1997; corntassel & gaudry, 2014). a main theme at the “first convocation of american indian scholars” in 1970 was that “we cannot defend our languages and cultures if we cannot defend our homelands” (cook lynn, 1997, p. 9). indigenous governance systems emerge from relationship with place (ray & cormier, 2012) and yet cultural sovereignty is a predicate of political sovereignty (gross, 2003), making the two inextricably linked. indigenous knowledge systems one objective of indigenous programs has been to maintain and disseminate indigenous culture and worldviews (huaman et al., 2019; taner, 1999). centered in this privileging of indigenous knowledges is an understanding that indigenous students have a right to learn and enact their own knowledges: is should not only be a discipline where students can learn about indigenous peoples, similar to the way one would learn about ancient rome. indigenous studies should also be a way that indigenous students can obtain a college education that is in alignment with and inclusive of their indigenous orientations and perspectives (murry et al., 2022, p. 54) the first convocation of american indian scholars proposed a model of education by indigenous peoples for indigenous peoples, wherein content permeates from the languages, experiences, and geographies of indigenous peoples, allowing for indigenous peoples to see themselves, their community, and their nation reflected in their education system (cook lynn, 1997, p. 9-11). today, indigenous programs often reflect indigenous ways of knowing in their curriculum (bunda et al., 2012). many of these programs seek to draw from indigenous knowledge systems to identify and advance solutions to issues gravely impacting indigenous communities, including colonialism, dispossession, and racism (corntassel & gaudry, 2014; huaman et al., 2019). corntassel refers to this process of addressing issues through indigenous worldviews as insurgent education (corntassel, 2011 as cited in corntassel and gaudry, 2014, p. 168). nationhood and community 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.10943 since the inception of indigenous programs, issues of sovereignty and community need have been at the forefront (e.g., nakata et al., 2012). taner (1999) explains that in canada there was an expectation for indigenous programs to make education more practical and prepare indigenous learners for responsibilities associated with self-governance. in the united states, tribal colleges opened under a mandate of reflecting and serving local indigenous community needs (huaman et al, 2019). albeit, there are debates within the discipline of the best way to achieve this objective (e.g. see andersen, 2009). while turner (2006) argued for “word warriors” within indigenous nations that could use their academic training and indigenous ways of thinking to liaise and advocate within the current government structures, corntassel and gaudry (2014) insist that individuals be responsible to community, support community work, and work to dismantle current government structures (corntassel & gaudry, 2014). along a similar vein, lee (2017) argues for indigenous graduates to provide service to their community and explains that this is motivated through a “critical indigenous consciousness” in which one critically situates themselves within social and political conditions. student access indigenous programs in the areas of indigenous studies and indigenous education began to serve as access points in the 1960s for indigenous students, and this practice continues on with a more diverse range of program offerings (pidgeon, 2016). a similar impetus exists in the united states. enshrined into law in the 1970s, the tribally controlled community college act supported the construction of indigenous community colleges to address the disparity of post-secondary educational attainment rates, in which indigenous peoples were severely underrepresented (huaman et al., 2019). furthermore, the relationship between access and nationhood and indigenous knowledge systems are intertwined. indigenous peoples are the targeted recipients of program mandates of restoring indigenous nationhood and indigenous knowledge systems. in turn, programs that reflect indigenous peoples’ knowledges and experiences, are relevant to indigenous needs, and they provide a friendly environment to enhance indigenous participation in post-secondary education (taner, 1999). for example, the native american studies program at the university of new mexico (unm) seeks to facilitate students’ roles and connections to community, creating a learning community rooted in indigenous values for community (cajete, 2015; lee, 2017). the program includes a high number of the institution’s total number of indigenous learners as it enrolls approximately 400 students annually, many of which are indigenous (lee, 2017). indigenous programs and student post-secondary experience many indigenous learners congregate in indigenous programs and support services as a way to survive post-secondary institutions (cote meek, 2014; fredericks et al., 2022). indigenous students generally describe these “counter spaces” as places for positive social experiences and connection with other students, facilitating learning, supportive environments, and self and cultural validation (bailey, 2016, p. 5 ray et al.: student transfer mobility within indigenous programs published by scholarship@western, 2023 1271). an indigenous community is built within these spaces, which can be reminiscent of home for some students and work to mitigate against the impacts of epistemic violence housed within the broader institution (tuck & yang, 2012 as cited in jacob et al., 2019). while indigenous programs have been a place where indigenous ways of knowing are reflected in the curriculum, the wider academic community has not made significant changes and continues to maintain/sustain the status quo (bunda et al., 2012). indigenous students are faced with a multitude of barriers when studying at post-secondary institutions. they experience racism (bailey, 2016; fredericks et al., 2022; gaudry & lorenz, 2019; macdonald et al., 2023), interpersonal discrimination, frustration with the university system, and feelings of isolation and alienation from the non-indigenous student body (bailey, 2016). they contend with cultural misunderstandings and ignorance, and in the classroom they are often forced to bear the burden of educating non-indigenous students and professors about indigenous worldviews, decolonization, and responsible allyship (dubois brooks et al., 2021; jacob et al., 2019). so that they are not judged or feel that they are on display, indigenous students sometimes choose to not disclose their indigeneity (bailey, 2016). this unfortunate reality was affirmed by the ontario undergraduate student alliance’s report on the status of indigenous students which listed “leaving parts of yourself behind for the sake of safety” as a high-level concern (dubois brooks et al., 2021, p. 11). indigenous students’ voices and experiences can be erased in the classroom when they raise issues that are uncomfortable and serve as counter narratives to non-indigenous students’ and faculty’s understandings of the world (mcgloin, 2015). non-indigenous students may also reject their need for unlearning, pushing back against the material presented and the instructor presenting it (gaudry & lorenz, 2019). in some instances, indigenous students can be subject to derogatory comments by nonindigenous students (bailey, 2016; gaudry & lorenz, 2019). these words and actions by nonindigenous students can be triggering for indigenous students as well as indigenous educators (ward, 2018). overall, an individual’s race and ethnicity can influence their experiences as a student within postsecondary institutions (hern et al., 2019). for indigenous students, this experience is distinct as they must navigate the overt and subtle racial tensions couched within nation-to-nation struggles of decolonization, sovereignty, and settler colonialism (bailey, 2016, p. 1263; cote-meek, 2014). navigating racism in the academy, particularly in the classroom, can be traumatic for indigenous learners (cote-meek, 2014). indigenous students may be more at risk for mental health stress considering the wide range of stressors they are exposed to, including post-secondary environments (hop wo et al., 2019). the impacts can be accumulative, contributing to feelings of self-doubt and creating mental exhaustion (bailey, 2016, p. 1264). it is imperative that post-secondary institutions create [and maintain] welcoming environments for indigenous learners, which provide them with culturally safe interactions (hop wo et al., 2019). 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.10943 study purpose and hypotheses this paper presents a subset of data from an ontario-wide study with the primary purpose of describing post-secondary program pathways among indigenous learners in all post-secondary programming and pathways to and/or from indigenous programs among indigenous and non-indigenous learners. a program pathway was defined as a route from one program to another within or between postsecondary institutions that contains benefits such as transfer credits or guaranteed acceptance. these pathways can provide seamless transitions between programs through prearranged articulation agreements or can include additional components to facilitate the transition such as bridging programs. in the context of this paper an indigenous program pathway refers to a pathway between indigenous programs whether the learners are indigenous or non-indigenous. the purpose of the current study was to identify who is accessing indigenous program pathways, understand the transfer experience (including examining transitions to types of programming, attendance of bridging programs, and potential considerations of pathways in the context of indigenous programming), as well as to describe some inferential relationships between perceived support and satisfaction of transfer among program pathway students transferring to or from indigenous programs. it was hypothesized that pathways primarily support access to indigenous programs for indigenous students, and thus, the majority of pathway users will be indigenous. it was anticipated that students who report more transfers, with less credits transferred to their new program of study, would report significantly less perceived support and transfer satisfaction. method participants to be eligible for this study, participants had to be enrolled in a participating post-secondary institution in ontario and have transitioned to and/or from an indigenous post-secondary program. students who self-identify as indigenous but transferred to and from a non-indigenous program could also participate but are not part of the data subset described in this paper. of 1089 potential participants who were interested in the study, 1061 (97.3%) stated they read the initial study information and 963 consented to participation. of these potential participants, 194 met criteria for the broader study, and of these, 55 indicated that they transferred to and/or from an indigenous program. this paper presents the results from these indigenous program pathways respondents. partnering institutions all partnering post-secondary institutions were those that had consented to student participation in a larger study. although not all institutions were involved in student data collection, a total of 25 institutions participated in the study in some capacity, including 1 indigenous institute, 15 colleges, and 7 ray et al.: student transfer mobility within indigenous programs published by scholarship@western, 2023 9 universities. data collection was completed with students enrolled in one of 12 institutions (colleges n = 8; universities n = 4). research ethics board approval was received at all data collection sites. procedure electronic surveys were distributed to learners between january to march 2019 primarily via their student email accounts. in some instances, the survey was advertised on institution-wide communication bulletins and/or indigenous student support listservs. a brief letter at the beginning of the survey described the purpose to potential participants, and interested students were asked to complete consent through the survey platform. all data was anonymous in nature, as no identifying information was collected. given that the research process was participatory in nature, learners and members of the broader postsecondary community were engaged in all aspects of survey design, implementation, and analysis. the scope of institutional collaboration included: providing advisement on institutional processes for student engagement and supporting submissions to research ethics boards; participating in group sessions online or via telephone to provide input into survey design; facilitating student survey dissemination; providing advisement on and supporting student lunch and learns; participating in a oneday indigenous pathway forum to provide input into data analysis direction and interpretation of preliminary results; and, participating in group sessions online to provide further input on the data analysis and report recommendations. a small cohort of indigenous students provided feedback on the draft survey and three student lunch and learns were held at two colleges and one university. at these events results were presented and indigenous transition students had an opportunity to provide their interpretation of results and recommendations to enhance indigenous program pathways. study limitations this study has some limitations. sampling and participation biases within the current study exist, whereas only students currently enrolled in a post-secondary institution could participate in the study. it is likely that when some students are highly dissatisfied with their experience, they terminate their enrollment rather than transferring to a new program. additionally, due to the small sample size of indigenous students, it was not possible to separate their experiences from non-indigenous students for the purpose of inferential statistical analyses. results quantitative analyses of the online survey data were completed using spss statistics-26. descriptive statistics (including means, ranges, and percentages) reported participant demographic data. inferential statistical analyses were completed using independent t-tests and one-way analysis of variance (anovas) to compare student satisfaction (reported as a dichotomous variable) with the number of courses transferred and number of courses repeated. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.10943 demographics of the 55 students that transferred to and/or from an indigenous program pathway most were nonindigenous (n = 40; 72.7%). most participants reported being female (n = 38; 73.1%), with only 13 individuals self-reporting as male, and one individual preferring to not report their gender. the majority of survey respondents were between the ages of 19 and 24 (n = 29; 54.7%). nineteen learners were between 25–34 (35.8%), three between 35 to 40 (5.7%%), and two over 40 (3.8%). participants were asked to identify the community types in which they resided in the 5 years prior to attending pse. more than half of respondents (n = 30; 54.5%) resided in an urban community, whereas 20.0% (n = 11) of learners reported living in a small town and 10.9% (n = 6) lived in a rural community. individuals living in various types of first nation communities (rural, remote, or next to an urban centre) were the most underrepresented (n = 6; 10.9%) in the entire sample and comprised 38.5% of the indigenous respondent sample. most respondents were from the northern region of the province (n = 31; 62%), followed by the southwestern region (n = 15; 30%) and the central/metro/greater toronto area [gta] (n = 4; 8%). no respondents reported being from the eastern region of the province. transfer program pathways by program type and level of education transfers to and from indigenous programming chi squared tests compared program pathways to and from indigenous programs by examining indigenous and non-indigenous student transfers. when students (n = 27) reported their most recent type of program transfers,1 including to and from indigenous program transfers, there was a significant association between student identity and transferring to an indigenous program [χ2(1) = 5.17, p = .023], where more indigenous students reported transferring to an indigenous program (9 of 15, 60.0%) than non-indigenous students (2 of 12 students, 16.7%). a higher percentage of non-indigenous students transferred from an indigenous program to another program type, including to another indigenous program (n = 12, 100% of reported transfers), compared to 11 indigenous students (73.3% of reported transfers). chi squared tests did not indicate significant differences of these groups (p = .05). seven students (5 of which were indigenous) transferred to and from an indigenous program, 16 students (six indigenous) transferred from an indigenous program, and four (all indigenous) transferred to an indigenous-specific program. independent t-tests did not find significant differences among students who transferred to and from an indigenous program compared to students who transferred to or from an indigenous program in relation to reported program satisfaction, preparedness, or perceived applicability of student learning. transfers by general program type and level of education 1 calculated from qualitative participant self-report of most recent type of program transfers. 9 ray et al.: student transfer mobility within indigenous programs published by scholarship@western, 2023 participants were asked to identify their educational history following completion of secondary school. of these programs, most were classified (according to college ontario 2018) to be related to applied arts, followed by science/technology and health program specific domains. participants typically remained in the same field of study in their transfer (n = 30; 73.2%), and most students in this sample transferred from and to an applied arts program (n = 24; 61.5%). health was the only program domain that had more transfers to a program domain other than health (health n = 2; applied arts n = 3). see figure 1 for a description of program transfers based on program type. while vertical transfers were popular (n = 13; 35.1%), more students (n = 15; 40.5%) stayed in a program at the same education level. of the learners who participated in a vertical transfer, the vast majority (n = 11; 84.6%) transferred from college to university. the most popular lateral transfer was to and from a college diploma program (n=8; 53.3%). figure 1. transfer pathway endorsed by participants by program type 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.10943 figure 2. transfer pathway endorsed by participants by level of education transfer experience, learner preparedness, and access the majority of students did not attend a voluntary or mandatory bridging program (n = 29; 80.6%) to support their transfer. chi squared tests indicated that attendance of a bridging program was not associated with indigenous identity or gender. all survey respondents indicated that they were prepared for their transfer program to some degree, with most responding that they were very or mostly prepared (n = 31; 81.6%). only 37.2% (n = 16) indicated that they were very likely or likely to attend their receiving program if a program pathway was not in place. six (14.0%) students indicated that they were neither likely or unlikely, 16 (37.2%) were unlikely or very unlikely and five (11.6%) were unsure. transfer experience and learner satisfaction most learners (n = 13; 81.3%) were very satisfied or satisfied with their transfer experience and when asked retrospectively how likely they were to make the transfer again, the majority indicated that they were very likely or likely (n = 10; 75%). most respondents were satisfied (n = 28; 87.5%) with the number of credits that were transferred to their receiving program. independent t-tests assessed significant differences between reported student satisfaction (m = 2.58, sd = 1.82) and dissatisfaction (m = 1.20, sd = .44) with courses and number of credits transferred, detecting significant differences between these groups [t(32)= 1.67, p = 0.02]. a one-way anova indicated that there was a significant relationship between satisfaction with transfer overall and number of courses transferred [f (2, 6) = 5.444, p = .045]. an independent t-test found that students who indicated satisfaction with credit 11 ray et al.: student transfer mobility within indigenous programs published by scholarship@western, 2023 transfer (m = 1.20, sd = 1.52) reported significantly less courses repeated [t(19) = -2.38, p =.029] than students who were not satisfied with their credit transfer (m = 5.00, sd = 7.01). discussion learners were satisfied with their overall transfer experience and the number of courses repeated significantly impacted credit transfer satisfaction. these results were anticipated, and the high level of satisfaction may signal that credit transfer processes are successful in identifying program content equivalencies. however, it should be noted that this finding does not provide any information on what content in the receiving program may be missed or under-examined because of the transfer, only what is perceived to be duplicated. additionally, the result that most survey respondents’ program pathways were in the applied arts (61.5%) was expected. most indigenous programs fall under the applied arts umbrella and the vast majority of learners (74.4%) indicated that they remained in their same field of study. as anticipated, indigenous program pathways appear to support access to indigenous programs for some indigenous students. there was a significant association between student identity and transferring to an indigenous program [χ2 (1) = 5.17, p = .023], where more indigenous students transferred to an indigenous program (9 of 15, 60.0%). this finding appears to affirm that indigenous programs are still a desirable area of study for indigenous learners. moreover, in the study, program pathways are identified as a mechanism to support student access to indigenous perspectives and knowledges in post-secondary education. while it was outside the scope of this study, further research to identify if reasons for transfer to indigenous programs differ from reasons for transfers to non-indigenous programs will help better understand if indigenous students are purposefully utilizing pathways as mechanism to support access to indigenous perspectives and/or culturally safe environments. although pathways have traditionally been understood as a steppingstone to university (e.g., decock, 2006; kerr et al., 2010), more students (40.5%) stayed in a program at the same education level than vertically transferred (35.1%). these findings are consistent with college ontario (2018; 2022) studies which reported that recent college graduates were most likely to enroll at a university or continue studies at their college of graduation. in fact, the most recent report from colleges ontario (2022) shows an increase in the number of students within six months of graduation furthering education by returning to their own college. in 2017/18, 19% of students returned and by 2019-2020 25% of students returned (p. 21). yet, despite the high level of lateral transfers, over 37% of survey respondents indicated that they were unlikely or very unlikely to attend their receiving program without the pathway. among those who indicated they were unlikely to transfer without the pathway, eight students identified as indigenous (53.3% of respondents) as compared to the eight non-indigenous students (28.6% of respondents) who did so as well. these findings demonstrate that even among lateral moves, pathways can support access, challenging narrow conceptions of access that solely reference vertical pathways. moreover, coupled 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.10943 with the finding that indigenous students were more likely to transfer into an indigenous program, it may be that lateral pathway opportunities provide a mechanism for indigenous students to seek refuge in an indigenous program if they did not see themselves reflected in their original program. more research must be done to investigate this proposition. most unexpected of the findings is that the majority of learners who accessed pathways to and or from indigenous programs are from groups that are already among the most represented in pse (e.g., gordon & white, 2014; henderson & mccloy, 2019). in particular, three quarters of survey respondents were non-indigenous. while these findings were not anticipated, the number of non-indigenous students in indigenous programming is rising. phase 1 of this study which focused on understanding indigenous program pathways from institutional perspectives found that indigenous students are spread across the institution, and in one instance, non-indigenous learners comprised 40% of the student population in indigenous programs (ray, 2017, p. 20). this trend has also been reported internationally. nakata et al. (2012) remark that australian indigenous students are often the minority within indigenous programs because of the high number of australian students and increasing number of international exchange students. although more indigenous students transferred to an indigenous program than non-indigenous learners, these results invite consideration about the increase of non-indigenous students in indigenous programs and pathways. “being in indigenous classes but being surrounded with non-indigenous people” was a major concern raised in the ontario undergraduate student alliance’s report on the status of indigenous students (dubois brooks et al., 2021). an increase of non-indigenous learners in indigenous programs poses a number of challenges and considerations that are likely to be exacerbated if non-indigenous learners begin an indigenous program in an advanced standing. nakata and colleagues (2012) explain that indigenous and non-indigenous learners enter programs with their own vested interests and digest content and pedagogical approaches through their own social locations. a study of almost 3000 students in ontario revealed that first year university students lack a basic awareness of core concepts related to indigenous studies which impacted their ability to conceive of futurities of indigenous sovereignty (schaefli et al., 2018). students lacked knowledge of legal structures that impact indigenous peoples, the history of colonialism, structural racism, and ongoing trauma, and instead were far more conversant in indigenous deficit narratives (schaefli et al., 2018). moreover, non-indigenous students can have difficulty overcoming the conceptual limitations of western knowledge systems (phillips, 2011 as cited in nakata, 2012), decentering themselves from the conversations within indigenous studies (olsen, 2017, p. 209), confronting their own practices, complicity, and privilege (nakata, 2012), and moving past guilt or hopelessness to ethical and political commitments when confronted with the colonial violence that indigenous peoples face (mcgloin, 2015). traditionally, indigenous programs are places of community on campus for indigenous students (tuck & yang, 2012 as cited in jacob et al., 2019) and are among the few places in post-secondary institutions where indigenous students feel supported and safe/validated (bailey, 2016; cote meek, 2014). yet, as 13 ray et al.: student transfer mobility within indigenous programs published by scholarship@western, 2023 the student body in indigenous programs diversifies, indigenous students can be marginalized within the very spaces built for them. indigenous learner and community need is placed on the backburner while these spaces became reoriented, focusing on the education of settler students (gaudry & lorenz 2019). moreover, the politics of knowledge production is not the optimal learning space for indigenous students as they construct arguments to defend indigenous interests (nakata, 2012) and undergo their own interrogation on their reception of the seductive aspects of the nation-state (andersen, 2009, p. 85). the authors are not suggesting that there is no place for non-indigenous learners in indigenous programs. in fact, many scholars have articulated appropriate positions for non-indigenous learners within indigenous programs (e.g. corntassel & gaudry, 2014; olsen, 2017). however, active dialogue and strategies are needed when attempting to fulfill the needs of both indigenous and non-indigenous students (taner, 1999); especially considering the context which gave rise to indigenous studies programs. decock (2006) agrees with this position, arguing that pathways cannot claim that they are mechanisms to support access for racialized students in “the absence of a policy or mechanism to encourage transfer” (p. 14). while the authors believe that pathways are a worthy cause and do have a role to play in indigenization, a more critical stance and indigenous centered approach to pathway development is needed. specifically, bridging programs, institutional policies and procedures, and pathway development methodologies are key avenues to advance this principled approach. bridging programs very few students in this study reported attending a bridging program, however bridging programs may offer an opportunity for non-indigenous students to equip themselves with necessary tools and understandings. such programs could focus on key concepts and skills to enhance self-awareness and frameworks of knowing (nakata, 2012). resources are readily available which identify and discuss keystone concepts and pedagogical approaches in indigenous programming (e.g., moodie; 2019; teves, et al., 2014; vowel, 2016). for example, moodie (2019) suggests that those new to the discipline focus on understanding race, country, relationality, policy, and evidence as key concepts that aid in the interrogation of knowledge production in indigenous context, and olsen (2017) posits that a methodological and theoretical foundation consisting of (1) the need to privilege the indigenous; (2) an intersectional approach to the different encounters; (3) the use of critical perspectives; and (4) decentering is needed. institutional policies and procedures pathway development in indigenous programs need to be part of a coordinated institution wide effort to indigenize postsecondary institutions. this would allow for a relational lens in the building and evaluation of initiatives and support the privileging of indigenous experience and need. such a strategy should be indigenous led (ray, wabano, et al., 2019) and address systemic issues from which racism, discrimination, and settler normativity permeate. targeted strategies include the development of 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.10943 culturally relevant admission policies and procedures (pidgeon, 2016), recognition of indigenous experience by crediting prior learning for indigenous students (pidgeon, 2016; ray, 2017), and target ratios which privilege space for indigenous learners in indigenous programs and program pathways. moreover, those target ratios must account for the “less visible and more abstract aspects of diversity such as different world views which arise from intersectionality of, for example, age, class, and ethnicity” so that the focus is not just on indigenous learners who most resemble the norms of the institution accessing pathways (henderson et al., 2021, p. e95). regarding non-indigenous learners, this study found that more non-indigenous learners are transferring out of indigenous programs than into indigenous programs. understanding students’ motivations for transfer and experience in their current program would be helpful in evaluating the potential impact of such pathways as an indigenization strategy. gaudry and lorenz (2018) contend that settlers must not be the focus of indigenization. yet, a vast amount of time and resources have been invested in indigenous content requirements, resources that could be utilized to serve indigenous programs (innes et al., 2022). strategic and intentional program pathway development could be part of an indigenization strategy that does not reinscribe colonial norms by centring settlers. instead, resources that may be diverted from indigenous programs to support indigenous content requirements can be redirected back to indigenous studies, building their capacity to address the educational needs of non-indigenous students while not jeopardizing their commitment to indigenous students and nations. through targeted pathways, a student base that has knowledge and competencies in indigenous studies in nonindigenous programs can help to shift the culture and support informed and respectful conversations about settler colonialism and the issues that have arisen from it. also, in doing so, indigenous students may be less likely to be expected to bear the brunt for educating their peers on indigenous issues and addressing incorrect or problematic conversations. pathway development methodology interdisciplinary transfers challenge existing credit transfer methodologies due to differences in program type, structure, and content among institutions and assumptions of content equivalency mapping (rhodes, 2019). while indigenous programming arises from distinct genealogies and employs distinct intellectual traditions (champagne, 1994; simpson & smith, 2014, p. 1), indigenous program pathways have been approached from an interdisciplinary perspective. where the problem lies is that most nonindigenous programs lack knowledge of indigenous epistemologies, methodologies, and pedagogies, and deep conversations about decolonization and colonialism (andersen, 2009; rhodes, 2019, p. 5). this results in transfer students entering an indigenous program in an advanced stage without the necessary foundational knowledge of the discipline (ray, 2017). these disparities are further exacerbated by many non-indigenous students who are confronted by their own implicit or explicit role in settler colonialism for the first time within these environments, raising questions about the appropriateness of the use of transfer and articulation processes which have predominately functioned within discipline specific spaces in interdisciplinary and indigenous pathways (rhodes, 2019). 15 ray et al.: student transfer mobility within indigenous programs published by scholarship@western, 2023 scholars such as kennepohl (2016), roska and colleagues (2016), and rhodes (2019) have put forth an outcomes-based approach as one that is more appropriate to assess block transfers. this approach should be coupled with faculty participation in the transfer credit evaluation process to ensure that those with discipline-specific knowledge are involved in the process (ray, 2017). additionally, interdisciplinary transfers can focus on transferability of elective courses instead of required courses in indigenous programs. conclusion in addition to providing a snapshot on indigenous program pathway student experience, this paper has sought to raise key considerations about how indigenous program pathways in their current state can buttress colonial norms through the decentering of indigenous student experiences and indigenous program goals. while indigenous program pathways are developed under the umbrella of indigenous student access and success, this study has found that it is predominately non-indigenous learners who are accessing indigenous program pathways. while the study found that many non-indigenous learners utilized pathways from indigenous programs to other program types, indigenous program pathways in their current design can provide a mechanism for the influx of non-indigenous students in indigenous programs at an advanced standing. this can have dire consequences for indigenous programming and indigenous learners if non-indigenous students are ill-prepared for indigenous-centered spaces. the learning environments in indigenous programs can be coopted and indigenous students can be marginalized, hampering the educational attainment of indigenous students and the directives of indigenous programs. while this research was conducted in a canadian context, the findings of this study are salient beyond canadian borders, as post-secondary institutions around the world remain a site of colonial reproduction in which settler normativity is re-enshrined (e.g., smith, tuck & yang, 2018). postsecondary institutions around the globe continue to debate targets and caps for non-domestic students to ensure that they are able to fulfill their mandate to domestic students; however, in a time when there is a myriad of pledges related to indigenous peoples and reconciliation, there have been no alarms raised by post-secondary institutions in canada and beyond on the increasing number of non-indigenous students enrolled in indigenous classes and programs and the impact of this on indigenous students and faculty (in fact, many institutions tout this as an achievement toward reconciliation through indigenous content requirements and other initiatives). moreover, while bridging programs have long been associated with pathways and used as a strategy to address indigenous students’ “shortcomings” so that they can grow their resiliency and adapt to postsecondary education norms and expectations (mcmurtry et al., 2019; smith et al.,, 2015), this strategy has not been discussed, let alone employed, to support the readiness of non-indigenous pathway students to engage in indigenous spaces and to question their privilege and positionality. currently, there is a lack of critical conversations about the development of indigenous program pathways. when a plausible scenario exists whereby a non-indigenous learner can receive advanced 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.10943 standing into an indigenous program from an interdisciplinary transfer and an indigenous student with a lifetime of experience must attend a bridging program to enter these same programs, the foundation is laid for the appropriation of indigenous spaces on campus. operating in this framework of settler normativity is indicative of inclusive modes of reconciliation which have been widely critiqued for their focus on acclimatizing indigenous students to the current system, instead of implemented targeted and transformative change (e.g., daigle, 2019; gaudry & lorenz, 2018). in order for indigenous program pathways to move beyond this model of inclusion, indigenous program pathway development must begin to work within decolonizing frameworks and situate access within the goals of indigenous nation building and the resurgence of indigenous knowledge systems. references andersen, c. 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[paper presentation.] canadian critical race conference, vancouver, british columbia. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780429505010 https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctt183gxzb https://www.univcan.ca/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/indigenous-education-survey-results_uc-2020-1.pdf https://www.univcan.ca/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/indigenous-education-survey-results_uc-2020-1.pdf microsoft word 10202+coverpage.docx the international indigenous policy journal volume 12 | issue 3 august 2021 the historical roots of social assistance: an inadequate response to the colonial destruction of mi’kmaw livelihood in nova scotia declan cullen george washington university, united states, drcullen@gwu.edu heather castleden queen’s university, canada, heather.castleden@queensu.ca fred wien dalhousie university, canada, frederic.wien@dal.ca recommended citation cullen, d., castleden, h., & wien, f. (2021). the historical roots of social assistance: an inadequate response to the colonial destruction of mi’kmaw livelihood in nova scotia. the international indigenous policy journal, 12(3). https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.10202 the historical roots of social assistance: an inadequate response to the colonial destruction of mi’kmaw livelihood in nova scotia abstract social assistance and related programs are an important part of life in the 13 mi’kmaq communities of nova scotia. given the substantive importance of social assistance and related programs in mi’kmaq communities, it is surprising how little research has been conducted on the subject. this research aims to understand the origins of economic dependence and the related emergence of social assistance among the mi’kmaq in nova scotia. we identify key historical periods and processes that have shaped the current policy landscape. a defining characteristic of social policy on reserve has been the fact that first nations themselves have had very little say in how programs such as social assistance are designed and delivered. there is hope that a more self-determined and holistic approach may emerge. keywords mi’kmaq, social assistance, economic dependence, colonialism, self-determination acknowledgments the historical research reported here draws from a larger research project funded by the canadian institutes of health research and carried out with the cooperation of the mi’kmaq rights initiative (kwilmu’kw mawklusuaqn). members of the research team include cheryl bartlett, anita benoit, heather castleden, jeff denis, debbie martin, jane mcmillan, carla moore, fred wien, and tuma young. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. 1 cullen et al.: the historical roots of social assistance published by scholarship@western, 2021 the historical roots of social assistance: an inadequate response to the colonial destruction of mi’kmaw livelihood in nova scotia social assistance, also known as income support, income assistance, and welfare, among other names, is a significant part of life in nova scotia’s 13 mi’kmaq communities.1 in the most recent first nations regional health survey, conducted on reserve by the union of nova scotia indians (2013), 52% of adults said that they received at least a portion of their income in 2007 from social assistance. despite the prevalence of social assistance and related programs in mi’kmaq communities, and in first nations communities in canada more generally, little research has been carried out on the subject. one of the only significant histories of welfare among indigenous people in canada noted, “there is an abundant literature on issues related to indian self-government, health, land claims, economies and education, yet there is scarcely any on indian welfare” (shewell, 2004, p. 3). this article, drawing on federal and provincial archival sources, contributes to the task of understanding the historical roots of social assistance policy through situating its origins in the colonial destruction of the mi’kmaw indigenous economy. in doing so, we aim to contribute to contemporary mi’kmaw struggles to establish sovereignty over social assistance. the history of failure in the realm of social policy discussed here and continuing struggles over its governance, we argue, shows that it is beyond time to change social assistance policy in mi’kmaq communities. social assistance programs, as we think of them today, “provide financial assistance and in-kind goods and services to cover the cost of basic living requirements for an individual or family when all other financial resources of that individual or family have been exhausted” (federal–provincial–territorial directors of income support, 2016, p. 6). the jurisdictional organization of such programs in canada is complicated. under the constitution act, 1867, social assistance is a provincial responsibility. as a legacy of the indian act, 1876, however, first nations living on reserve receive last-resort support from the federal government. this study’s impetus lies in the federal government’s attempt to have social assistance policy on reserves exactly mirror monetary rates that are used in the provinces. mi’kmaq leadership have rejected this push (simon v. canada, 2012), arguing that, given the distinctiveness of reserve communities, it is both situationally and culturally inappropriate. current federal provisions, for example, though far from ideal, allow for higher spending on housing and utilities than provincial rates would allow. special consideration for elders and children is also possible, a situation ineligible under provincial policy. in response to proposed changes, mi’kmaq leadership, led by the mi’kmaq rights initiative (kwilmu’kw maw-klusuaqn) in nova scotia (hanrahan, 2016), has embarked on a path to negotiating a sectoral (self-government) agreement in the social policy area allowing greater control and design of policy. this article seeks to contribute to that process through detailing how the need for social assistance policy on reserve has emerged historically and why historical failures indicate a new path forward is necessary. the administration of social assistance programs is further complicated by the various names that have been given to it, depending on jurisdiction and time period. what we now call social assistance has also been called different things historically. in the early years of contact with settlers in nova scotia, for example, in the context of treaties of peace and friendship, assistance was part of a diplomatic exchange 1 here, our preferred usage is mi’kmaq. settlers have referred to them in many ways, including micmac. in canada, there are three major groups of indigenous peoples: first nations, métis, and inuit. mi’kmaq are first nations. first nations are also referred to as indians. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.10202 relationship and took the form of presents or gifts (wicken, 2002). subsequently, terms such as charity, relief, rations, and welfare were used as the relationship between the mi’kmaq and european colonists changed. while we know something of the history of such policies in early-colonial nova scotia (upton, 1973, 1975), very little has been written about the post-confederation period. this article begins to address that gap through detailing the historical production of economic dependence among the mi’kmaq2 in nova scotia and the role that social assistance played in this process. the changing name of social assistance leads to an important question regarding its role in mi’kmaw livelihoods: how has the need for social assistance emerged historically? this is an important question because framing social assistance as a historical relationship places its development within a set of economic conditions and emphasizes the broader context of values, assumptions, and perspectives that underlie and shape the policy area. social assistance policy’s origins: dependence and dependency theory much research on the origins of social assistance policy focuses on how european industrialization created mass social upheaval resulting in, first, charitable organizations and, later, state support for “those people who were falling through the cracks of the rapidly proletarianizing society” (fortier & hon-sing wong, 2019, p. 437). the origins of social assistance in canada are rooted, of course, in anglo-american industrialization and were a response to the harsh conditions and poverty faced by many settlers in the north american colonies (ives et al., 2020). that story, though, is a partial one. a growing body of literature has begun to address the colonial histories of social welfare policy in canada and beyond (brownlie, 2003; chapman & withers, 2019; midgley, 1997; shewell, 2004; taylor-neu et al., 2019). fortier and hon-sing wong (2019) claim that social assistance policy’s origins can be traced to paternalistic and “civilizing” colonial relationships “imposed on indigenous peoples by early traders and missionaries long before the mass migrations of white settler populations at the dawn of the long nineteenth century” (p. 438). contemporary social service provision, they argue, remains “circumscribed by logics of conquest, extraction, apprehension, management, and pacification that advance the settler project and seek to secure settler futurity” (p. 437). scholars have also shown how indigenous people have been characterized as dependent, lazy, and non-working. such stereotypical descriptions have been central to the historical logic of social welfare policy through which “the lazy indian” (lutz, 2008) became an object of policy intervention and colonial control (monaghan, 2013; o’ connell, 2013). social assistance policy, both present and past, then, is inextricably linked to the history of settler colonialism in canada. nova scotia is no exception. public and academic debates surrounding indigenous livelihoods and the origins and functions of social assistance have frequently centred on the contested significance of the term “dependence.” many communities economically rely on social assistance to supplement their income. that relationship has been framed, in various ways, as one of economic dependence (alfred, 2009; helin, 2006). the condition of dependence, meaning reliance on others, however, is often negatively perceived in relation to social assistance. for indigenous communities in particular, the spectre of dependence has been used to stigmatize and discipline social assistance recipients and undermine indigenous sovereignty (alfred, 2 mi’kmaq is the plural form of the singular word mi’kmaw. in addition to being a singular noun, the word mi’kmaw is also used as an adjective. historically, mi’kmaq and mi’kmaw were frequently written as micmac by colonists. 3 cullen et al.: the historical roots of social assistance published by scholarship@western, 2021 2009; harell et al., 2014; papillon, 2015). the question we address here, however, is how did this situation of economic dependence emerge? and what kind of relationship, precisely, does dependence suggest? to answer this question, we engage dependency theory as a means to frame the emergence of social assistance. global south scholars working on or in latin america and africa initially developed dependency theory in the 1960s. these theorists defined dependency as “a situation in which the economy of certain countries is conditioned by the development and expansion of another economy to which the former is subjected” (santos, 1970, p. 231). dependence in this reading also indicates reliance, but a reliance produced by uneven incorporation into the global capitalist economy, not by some primordial lack of development. as a general theoretical framework for inquiry, dependency theorists focus on the structure of asymmetrical economic forces and the social transformations that accompany them— external control of economic activity, the lack of economic diversification, and the structural distortions that afflict societies in peripheral regions (wallerstein, 2011a, 2011b). this focus on uneven geographic development was highly influential to scholars trying to understand the relationship between the socalled first world and the third world in the context of both decolonization and the persistence of unequal political and economic relationships. at a subnational, regional scale, this work was also influential, including in atlantic canada where scholars tried to explain the region’s underdevelopment relative to canada’s core industrial provinces (sager, 1987). how can dependency theory help us understand the historical emergence of social assistance among the mi’kmaq in nova scotia? some attempts have been made to apply dependency theory to indigenous peoples in north america (wilkins, 1993). such studies emphasize the importance of market relations and dispossession in undermining indigenous economic systems. historian richard white (1988) has shown, for the navajo, choctaw, and pawnee peoples, that “the collapse of their subsistence systems and their integration into world markets brought increasing reliance on the capitalist core, lack of economic choice, and profound changes within their societies” (p. xix). for white, the emergence of dependency was a complex process. settler dominance was not solely achieved by force. instead, market relations and the insidious logic of exchange took effect long before colonial military dominance had been established. indigenous societies, like the mi’kmaq, who had once easily been able to provide for themselves, saw their environmental, social, and economic structures deteriorate as trade relations deepened. gradually, white shows, indigenous peoples “obtained clothing and other manufactured items as the result of various exchanges (first of goods and military services, later of labor and the land itself) whose terms and methods were not beyond their control” (p. xix). increasingly, however, the impact of epidemics, growing european settlement, and land pressure, saw indigenous peoples lose power over the key issues of what was to be exchanged, and how it was to be received and used. this process subjected indigenous peoples to indebtedness, dispossession, expropriation, and extreme pressure to assimilate and disappear. dependency theory, then, brings a historical sensibility to the question of economic relations and social assistance. the emergence of social assistance programs, in this framework, can only be seen as the result of broader socio-economic forces—it is a situation that has been historically produced. however, one cannot simply read social assistance policy today from a uniform experience of colonization and integration into the global capitalist system. the mi’kmaq and choctaw experience of settler colonialism, for example, though parallel, were historically, geographically, and culturally distinct. dependency resulted from “a complex interchange of environmental, economic, political, and cultural 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.10202 influences understandable only within specific histories” (white, 1988, p. xix). below we trace the specific histories through which social assistance emerged. we do so to properly situate debates about the role of social assistance and its governance and to show that such policies have failed to pay close attention to the possibilities of mi’kmaq sovereignty in social policy. colonial transformation our discussion of colonial relief policy and later federal policy must necessarily begin with understanding how mi’kmaw communities in nova scotia (mi’kmaqi3) provided for themselves. the mi’kmaw economic cycle was based on a seasonal round that drew on a variety of land and marine resources. in the spring, the mi’kmaq inhabited coastal villages where they typically remained until fall. here they harvested marine food sources and gathered berries and groundnuts. many of these resources were stored for winter usage (gonzalez, 1981). in late fall and winter, the mi’kmaq moved further inland to hunt beaver, otter, bear, moose, and caribou. while a generalized picture, contemporary sources all note the variety of resources and the coastal-inland pattern of movement. this seasonal use maximized resource availability and emphasized changing ecological conditions. the social and cultural organization that developed in tandem with the region’s resource base emphasized mutual assistance. mi’kmaw economic activities were organized on a community or settlement basis (wicken, 2002). people lived in extended family groups and community leaders allocated hunting territories and resources (wien, 1986). community well-being was the overriding concern and extended families “ensured that each nuclear family could call on a sizable group of closely knit kin in the event of misfortune” (miller, 1995, p. 356). in such a society, providing aid in times of stress was considered a communal responsibility. early colonists such as pierre biard and marc lescarbot noted this social structure. biard wrote that the mi’kmaq shared everything: “no one would dare to refuse the request of another, nor to eat without giving him a part of what he has” (as cited in paul, 2006, p. 34). lescarbot (1928) spoke of mi’kmaq society’s “mutual charity,” “hospitality,” and acceptance of strangers in “their commonality of life” (p. 227). others noted how “the support of widows and orphans was assumed by the best hunters” (gonzalez, 1981, p. 15). a chain of benevolence and gratitude sustained this harmony and balance among living things. the sharing of gifts was also central to social relations, and it accompanied commercial and treaty arrangements. a person will share their home and goods with a visitor in need, who, in turn, would express gratitude by reciprocating inkind at a later date. sharing was not just one relation among many; it was the basis of all relations. mi’kmaq call this social support system tpitnewey (young et al., 2017). these aspects of society were put under severe pressure by the arrival of europeans in the 16th century. one of the immediate consequences of extended contact with europeans was deepening trade relations. the mi’kmaq initially exchanged furs and handicrafts for europeans tools, iron goods, and foodstuffs. the growing importance of furs, linked to an expanding european market, meant that opportunistic trading soon gave way to an organized fur trade. the fur trade’s growth initially built on existing mi’kmaq strengths—hunting, fishing, trapping, trading, and transportation. despite their central role in the trade, mi’kmaw traditional economic activities were gradually undermined as they became entangled 3 mi’kmaq traditional territory included nova scotia, prince edward island, the gaspé peninsula of quebec, the north shore of new brunswick and inland to the saint john river watershed, eastern maine, and part of newfoundland, including the islands in the gulf of saint lawrence as well as st. pierre and miquelon. 5 cullen et al.: the historical roots of social assistance published by scholarship@western, 2021 in the european-based market system. one of the central changes of this period stemmed from the transformation of hunting and production: from subsistence and socially oriented activities to activities carried out with the goal of market exchange. the fur trade exposed the mi'kmaq to market vulnerability. in addition, the demand for furs and more destructive hunting technologies seriously depleted animal stocks. as the fur trade expanded, the mi’kmaq altered their seasonal cycle in response to its demands (gonzalez, 1982). a longer period of the year was spent hunting in the interior and, consequently, less time in the summer was available to support traditional coastal subsistence activities. the effects were wide ranging, transforming mi’kmaq diets, clothing, settlement patterns, belief systems, and divisions of labour (hornborg, 2016).4 thus, while the fur trade offered some opportunities for the mi’kmaq, allowing them to maintain much independence (reid, 2004), it also posed significant problems as it undermined mi’kmaq self-sufficiency. its decline, however, was catastrophic. in the late decades of the 18th century, numerous changes occurred that further altered mi’kmaq livelihoods. the british defeat of the french in north america in the 1750s meant the mi’kmaq lost a valuable political ally and a strategic position as intermediaries. two decades later, the u.s. war of independence saw an influx of settlers from the south, while migration also increased from europe (reid, 2009). the new settlers took the best lands for agriculture, fishing, and lumber, placing increased pressure on resources. these activities replaced the declining fur trade. the mi’kmaq, as a result, largely became regarded as an obstacle to settlement. in effect, they lost their economic and strategic value as traders and warriors. colonial policy now explicitly viewed them as a social problem. pre-colonial livelihoods, already threatened, were now under severe pressure. there are many indications that mi’kmaq life was under siege. analyses of mi’kmaq population, for example, suggest that there was a decline from 26,000 in the pre-contact period to 10,000 by 1761 (miller, 1976). by 1849, mi’kmaq chiefs claimed that “the whole of our people in nova scotia is about 1,500” (gonzalez, 1981, p. 81). the dramatic transformations of the previous centuries threatened mi’kmaq survival. in this era of scarcity, the colonial government began to issue small amounts of supplies, called relief, to destitute mi’kmaw families. relief in the form of occasional grants of blankets, potatoes, shot, and other necessities acquired newfound importance. there is reason to believe that, as opportunities for trade declined, the mi’kmaq “returned to some extent to the more balanced and seasonably varied subsistence pattern that characterized aboriginal times” (wien, 1986, p. 10). however, the topography of mi’kmaq livelihoods had changed dramatically. the mi’kmaq had already begun to incorporate gift-giving, fur trading, and farming into their seasonal rounds by the 18th century (wicken, 1991). european colonization had, thus, permanently altered the economic conditions under which the mi’kmaq could remain self-reliant. as a result, selective engagement with changing economic opportunities became a key aspect of mi’kmaq survival. agriculture and colonial policy in 1768, britain gave responsibility for local affairs, including the mi’kmaq, to nova scotia’s colonial government. local control, however, did little to focus more attention on the mi’kmaq’s needs. amongst occasional grants of relief to those in dire need, a pattern began to emerge that would endure for much of 4 these transformations also had a gendered aspect to them. gonzalez (1982) argued that by 1850 the combined impact of western technology, religion, and new economic activities undermined the mi’kmaq’s traditionally “interdependent” gender relations. parnaby (2011) dated “the onset of female economic subordination” to the late 1800s (p. 24). 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.10202 the 19th century. in summer, mi’kmaq families would camp near a village to sell their handcrafts and wares. in winter, the people would return to the forest to hunt. if game was exhausted, they would remain near the village seeking relief as part of settler communities’ responsibilities to the “indigent poor” (upton, 1975). the classification of the mi’kmaq as “indigent poor” was frowned upon by parsimonious legislators who were reluctant to provide relief to the mi’kmaq at the colony’s expense. initial ad hoc policies aimed at addressing mi’kmaq problems focused on promoting agriculture, rather than granting relief, which, colonial administrators argued, only intensified “the worst traits of the indian character, indolence and drunkenness” (sargent et al., 1800, p. 3). agriculture, it was argued, would promote self-reliance, a claim that would have a long life in colonial policies imposed on the mi’kmaq (haigh, 2000; mrazek, 2017). this reluctance to systematically aid the mi’kmaq saw the nova scotia assembly vote to allocate a mere £350 for relief in 1800. after sending blankets, powder, shot, and potatoes to the first nations near lake antigonish, the committee stated: “it will be in vain to look to the government for annual support … they shall cultivate the ground, otherwise they will be abandoned to their fate” (sargent et al., 1800, p. 3). after 1800, a piecemeal approach emerged where lands were occasionally set aside for the mi’kmaq, a practice which set a precedent for the establishment of a formal reserve system. in 1820, for example, parcels of land were set aside for settlement but a combination of a lack of funding, training, implements, and encroachment by whites saw even this paltry attempt at alleviating mi’kmaq poverty fall short. however, “faced with either starvation or the possibility of receiving some meagre relief on these lands, some of the indians were drawn to the designated areas” (patterson, 1985, p. 14). neither agriculture nor sporadic relief funding, however, were sufficient for dealing with the perennial subsistence crises facing the mi’kmaq. by 1827, mi’kmaq destitution placed the colonial government under enough humanitarian pressure to compel annual grants for relief. an 1841 petition to queen victoria by chief louis benjamin peminuit paul outlined the continuing crisis: “my people are poor. no hunting grounds—no beaver—no otter—no nothing … white man has taken all that was ours” (as cited in whitehead, 1991, p. 219). on receipt of the petition, the colonial office in london demanded action from nova scotia’s new lieutenant governor, lord falkland, who in 1842 passed an act for the instruction and permanent settlement of indians. this act gave rise to the formal reserve system that would dramatically alter mi’kmaw life. to implement the act, joseph howe was appointed indian commissioner for nova scotia in 1843. howe subsequently launched an investigation into previous attempts to aid the mi’kmaq. of the 20,050 acres set aside as reserves, he reported, the majority were “sterile and comparatively valueless,” and where there was valuable land, its quantity had been “diminished by the encroachment of the whites” (howe, 1843, p. 5). though the colonial government had been charged with providing permanent lands for settlement, reserve land was rarely protected from the continued invasion of colonists. thus, though agriculture had been presented as a long-term solution for demands for relief, that solution was proscribed by settler colonial thirst for land. howe (1843) indirectly linked continuing mi’kmaw dispossession to growing demands for relief. in spring, he wrote, his home “was besieged, at all hours, by indians, who had been taught to believe that unbounded wealth was at my disposal, and that they were to be fed and clothed hereafter at the expense of the government” (p. 3). from its earliest days, the spectre of dependency haunted indian policy in nova scotia. in response to these claims, howe (1843) clarified relief’s governing principle: “the rule i adopted, was to give relief only to the old and infirm, the sick or maimed, or to those who had met with 7 cullen et al.: the historical roots of social assistance published by scholarship@western, 2021 some calamity” (p. 4). relief could only be granted in exceptional circumstances. as the report itself shows, however, the majority of the mi’kmaq were already living in such exceptional circumstances. an 1849 petition from mi’kmaq chiefs noted that their position had worsened after the potato blights of 1846 and 1848. without access to game, fishing, and a market for their products, their nation, the chiefs remarked was “like a withering leaf in the summer sun” (whitehead, 1991, p. 239). the requested help to pursue the government’s proposed agricultural policy was, predictably, not forthcoming. in fact, one of howe’s successors, william chernley, abandoned the settlement plan in 1853, concluding that, “since the mi’kmaq were ‘fast passing away,’ the most that could be done was to ease their last days by providing whatever relief the province would allow them” (as cited in patterson, 1985, p. 15). the mi’kmaq continued to eke out a living by adapting previous economic patterns, but every year returned to a lower level of subsistence. agriculture, it seems, was never considered a viable solution to mi’kmaq poverty. instead, farming and the reserve system was used to expropriate and confine the mi’kmaq to marginal lands, justify limited relief payments, limit mobility, and to facilitate monitoring and control. post-confederation and the provision of relief from the post-confederation period through to world war ii, two broad processes greatly impacted mi’kmaq livelihoods: confederation, including the federal assumption of responsibility for indian affairs, and industrial developments in nova scotia. together these processes transformed mi’kmaq life. though generally economic and administrative developments are treated in isolation, the links between them are crucial. it was here at the intersections between independent production, wage labour, and the long arm of the federal state that modern social assistance policy emerged. at the same time, as the federal government sought to transform the mi’kmaq into wards of the state, the mi’kmaq began to establish themselves in an industrializing settler economy. thus, despite increasing state intervention and the expanding apparatus of the department of indian affairs, the mi’kmaq retained much independence.5 the great depression and centralization policy in the 1940s dramatically undermined that independence, when the “hegemony of the canadian state” reduced many mi’kmaq to wards of the crown and “systematically denied first nations their inherent capacities to develop solutions to their own problems” (shewell & spagnut, 2002, p. 41). confederation transferred jurisdiction of indian affairs from nova scotia to the new federal government (shewell, 2004). early directives reaffirmed the colonial status quo: the mi’kmaq were expected to be self-sufficient, growing, where possible, their own food. indian agents were tasked with maintaining this situation by monitoring each reserve’s affairs and revenue, documenting its activities, encouraging agriculture, and granting relief to those in great distress. this state of affairs would remain in place until the second world war. in most cases, relief was an isolated response to hardships caused by food shortages, disease, and harsh winter conditions. despite its importance, however, there was no statutory provision for relief expenditure. the indian act was silent on the subject of the provision of essential 5 the department of indian affairs, established as a separate administration in 1880, has undergone numerous transformations over the past 140 years. it has been part of various government departments: the interior (1873–1880), indian affairs (1880–1936), mines and resources (1936–1950), citizenship and immigration (1950–1965), indian affairs and northern development (1966–2017), and, most recently, indigenous services canada. we refer to it here as the department of indian affairs, the most common usage during the period under examination. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.10202 services on reserve. as a result, relief policy was essentially laissez-faire, subject to frequent change and arbitrary decisions. mi’kmaw economic precarity was compounded by the ups and downs of the settler economy. nova scotia suffered during the economic depression that swept the u.s. and canada from 1895 to 1896. as was often the case with ecological and economic crises since colonization, the mi’kmaq were disproportionately affected. deputy superintendent general hayter reed (1895) reported that the depression “affected not only the whites but also the markets of the indians in the sale of produce, and manufactures and labour in various directions” (p. 39). in response to these economic difficulties, the government reduced relief spending across the provinces. in 1896, indian agents in nova scotia actually spent less than their allotted budget. out of $2,500 allocated to relief and seed distribution, $453 went unused (government of canada, 1896, p. 748). for those who relied on relief, such tight accounting could walk the fine line between survival and starvation. most department of indian affairs administrators saw relief as a form of charity necessitated by the perceived mi’kmaq inability to modernize and become farmers, and to their supposed “indifference about the future” (spragge, 1873, p. 8). as the mi’kmaq continued to resist colonialism’s onslaught, and were clearly not vanishing as predicted, the department of indian affairs still hoped that they could be “transformed into something approaching white settlers by reshaping, controlling, and managing their environments” (bednasek & godlewska, 2009, p. 444). in contrast to agriculture’s settled nature, mobility was still seen as a persistent problem to agents’ civilizing mission. in 1876, the agent at grand narrows reported that, instead of farming, the mi’kmaq “prefer to be migrating, with quivering muscles, from one place to another, begging their livelihood” (mcgillivray, 1876, p. 131). a wide range of reports reinforced the idea that indigenous people experienced poverty because of their “indolence” and predisposition to mobility (ellingson, 2001), a strategy that sought to delegitimize the historical and contemporary importance of migratory movement to indigenous political and economic autonomy (howard-wagner & kelly, 2011). despite such attempts to fix the mi’kmaq in place, they continued to leverage mobility as a key economic strategy. mi’kmaq resilience in an industrializing economy the 19th century could be characterized by the dramatic aftereffects of the decline of the fur trade, growing european settlement, the emergence of the reserve system, and the failure of agricultural policy. in the late 1800s and early 1900s, however, the “neat” story of the inevitable mi’kmaq decline and disappearance told by indian agents was arrested. part of this recovery lay in strategic mi’kmaq participation in broader economic developments in nova scotia. between 1870 and 1910, nova scotia’s economy industrialized rapidly (alexander, 1978; inwood, 1991; samson, 2008). emerging industrialization created coal, iron, and steel sectors whose development, though vulnerable to periodic global downturns, created expanding opportunities for wage labour. as a result, the nova scotian labour force underwent dramatic sectoral shifts. agriculture, hunting, and fishing, which made up 75% of the labour force in 1871, declined to 20% by 1940 (wien, 1986). nova scotia transitioned from an agricultural economy to an industrial economy, and the mi’kmaq joined this industrial labour force. as early as 1882, we see reports of mi’kmaq men engaged in summer work in lobster factories, sawmills, and rafting lumber. mcdonald (1884) commented that in response to “the disappearance of forest” and its “ancient occupation,” the mi’kmaq became farmers, miners, shipwrights, and carpenters: “there is no 9 cullen et al.: the historical roots of social assistance published by scholarship@western, 2021 employment in which he does not compete, occasionally at least with his white brethren” (p. 141). they engaged in a broad range of labour activities, which contributed to growing economic stability. by 1905, one agent reported that “some of them are quite independent and do not require any assistance; nor would they thank any one for offering them charity” (fraser, 1905, p. 149). expanding economic opportunities allowed the mi’kmaq to begin to rebuild their economic base in a way that agricultural policy and confinement to reserve never had. wage earning became a significant part of mi’kmaq subsistence strategies, a fact reflected in its inclusion as a category in indian agents’ reports to the department of indian affairs. in 1920, annual reported wages earned by the mi’kmaq in nova scotia were valued at $83,380, which is half of their estimated total income (government of canada, 1920, p. 72). during the remainder of the 1920s, wages declined slightly to hover around the $60,000 mark. occasional spikes in relief corresponded with economic downturns, showing that relief was not a consistent problem when employment was available. changes in wages earned, however, also reflected mi’kmaq choices regarding employment. in 1908, the department of indian affairs observed that engagement in wage labour fluctuated “in sympathy with the condition of their other available industries, and increased activity in their direction becomes apparent if husbandry, or hunting, fishing or trapping for any reason decline” (pedley, 1908, p. 41). steven high (1996) argued that first nations’ participation in the canadian economy occurred selectively to strengthen their traditional way of life. wage labour was part of a wide range of economic activities and must “be seen in relation to the resiliency of aboriginal societies” (p. 263). during this period, indigenous labour participation was rapidly growing across canada. the department of indian affairs noted in 1911 that across canada it was “worthy of attention from economists that the indian is a sufficient factor in the labour market to account for a million and a half dollars annually” (pedley, 1911, p. 44). the mi’kmaq were part of this broader canadian pattern. the mi’kmaq diversified their economic base. traditional hunting and fishing continued but were limited. colonial administration encouraged livelihoods such as farming and coopering, which became part of their survival strategies. the mi’kmaq developed a range of other activities. they became guides in the burgeoning tourism industry, worked as migrant labourers in agriculture, and mi’kmaq women continued the practice of making baskets and handicrafts. mi’kmaq economic activities, as they emerged in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, were a complex combination of government subsidized work projects, wage labour, “and activities that combined indigenous knowledge and skills with market demand” (gonzalez, 1981, p. 65). through mobility and economic adaptation, they retained a sense of autonomy. despite continual government pressure “they eschewed the stark set of choices laid out for them by the colonial (and later federal state) and european settlers—opting instead to farm, utilize their ‘customs,’ and serve their ‘maker’ at one and the same time” (parnaby, 2008, p. 96). the mi’kmaq participated in a wide range of economic activities that ensured their nation’s survival in changing economic circumstances. why have these developments in mi’kmaq economic activities received such little attention? the answer partly lies, we argue, in a reluctance to see the mi’kmaq as active economic agents. the mi’kmaq, like other first nations, were perceived as a people outside of history—traditional, static, and unchangeable. many agents approached their work through this framework of the “timeless indian,” which, according to one, “live from hand to mouth, are happy, and contented, and die with visions of blissful immortality—the happy indians” (macleod, 1906, p. 139). such statements reinforced the view of the 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.10202 primitive indian, a remnant of the past intruding on the modern world. the government’s policy of assimilation and protection also framed them as a people outside of mainstream society and, thus, outside of the economy. the orthodox economic view of modernization argued that modern life had passed the mi’kmaq by. anthropologist diamond jenness (1932/1977), for example, suggested that first nations lagged behind the march of progress. “socially,” he wrote, “they are outcasts, economically they are inefficient and an encumbrance” (p. 350). this static view vigorously opposed the idea that first nations exercised agency over their economic lives. one of the aims of such discourses was “the disabling of indigenous agency” in order to narrow the domains in which indigenous peoples could exercise agency (neu & graham, 2006, p. 73). denying the mi’kmaq agency rationalized the government’s paternal attitudes and control of indigenous affairs. this deliberate oversight of mi’kmaq agency matters, because by the end of this period in 1933, economic dependency was perceived as a permanently defining feature. framing the mi’kmaq as outside modern society and the economy was crucial to obscuring their economic agency. when their economic engagement has been grudgingly acknowledged, that participation has been seen as an indication of their abandonment of a traditional way of life (haddad & spivey, 1992; high, 1996). wage labour, in this sense, has been perceived to function as an instrument of assimilation, like property ownership: a symbol of acceptance of western society and values. various scholars question this reading, arguing that while indigenous agency has been “virtually undisputed in studies of the fur trade, little agency has been granted to those who participate in the later industrial economy” (high, 1996, p. 249). contrary to the traditional view of the period, first nations, including the mi’kmaq, did indeed participate in wage labour. the continued preference of first nations for casual work, however, “resulted in their own status being diminished, thereby generating the stereotype of the ‘shiftless’ and ‘undependable’ indian” (high, 1996, p. 253). casual work was pursued, nonetheless, because it allowed independent production to continue its central role in mi’kmaq life. thus, participation in wage labour and self-employment, or other off-reserve employment, did not represent an abandonment of traditional life. rather, it was a selective and complex adjustment to structural economic change and a form of resistance to an overbearing colonial administration. paying attention to mi’kmaq wage labour is crucial as it undermines the popular version of economic dependence as a timeless condition, and repositions it, according to dependency theory, as the result of a series of historical and structural changes in settler–mi’kmaq relations. the great depression and social assistance beginning in the 1920s, the nova scotian industrial economy began to decline (inwood, 1991). as in previous periods of broader economic hardship, the mi’kmaq were affected, and relief payments began to slowly increase (figure 1). economic circumstances were clearly central to rising relief payments to the mi’kmaq. however, a large part of it was also due to increases in medical spending, a growing mi’kmaq population, and the broader expansion of modern welfare services. in short, social welfare for both indigenous peoples and settlers expanded concurrently with industrialization (fortier & hon-sing wong, 2019). despite the growing remit of governments to provide basic services in periods of hardship, the department of indian affairs resisted this expansion and continued to blame rising expenditures on mi’kmaq dependence. 11 cullen et al.: the historical roots of social assistance published by scholarship@western, 2021 by 1918, indian affairs saw relief dependence as an entrenched problem in nova scotia. the department of indian affairs, preoccupied with treasury directives regarding canada’s world war i debt and public spending, went on the offensive. ottawa advised agents “to keep spending down to the lowest possible amount without inflicting suffering” (shewell, 2004, p. 107). the department of indian affairs began to cancel relief during summer months. rising unemployment replaced relative prosperity during the 1920s, which led to a “downward spiral in indian welfare and neglect” (shewell, 2004, p. 108). this general decline was dramatically punctuated by the great depression, which was a catastrophic event for the mi’kmaq of nova scotia. figure 1. department of indian affairs relief spending in nova scotia, 1914–1966. adjusted for inflation. source: compiled from library and archives canada, rg10, indian affairs annual reports, 1864–1990. extremely low commodity prices greatly affected the majority of the industries where the mi’kmaq had previously found employment. labouring at the margins of the economy, they were “traditionally the last hired and the first fired” (forbes, 1993, p. 275). the hard-fought economic stability won by many mi’kmaq communities remained precarious and the elimination of wage labour income caused severe hardship. by 1934, according to the department of indian affairs “virtually every indian in the province [was] on relief.” adjusted for inflation, relief spending almost tripled from $448,364 in 1928, to $1,293,501 in 1933 (figure 1). deputy superintendent harold mcgill (1934) outlined the severity of the situation: $0 $500,000 $1,000,000 $1,500,000 $2,000,000 $2,500,000 $3,000,000 $3,500,000 $4,000,000 $4,500,000 $5,000,000 year 1918 1923 1928 1933 1938 1943 1948 1953 1958 1963 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.10202 it is feared that the re-employment of indian industrial workers laid off due to the depression will be slow as in this field naturally unemployed whites have the preference in most communities and the indians are at the end of the line. in the maritime provinces, where indians in the past relied upon employment in the lumber camps, the sale of native wares and odd jobs, they are in more straitened circumstances than in other indian communities in the dominion. (p. 8) racialized hiring practices dictated that the mi’kmaq suffered more than their white counterparts. certainly, first nations in canada were disproportionately unemployed in the 1930s compared to the settler population. to make matters worse, relief scales for first nations were actually reduced during the great depression, leading to greater suffering and neglect. in 1936, 20% of the canadian settler population was on relief, compared with 33% of first nations. in addition, per capita relief expenditures in 1936 were $61.69 for the canadian settler population and just $20.57 for first nations (shewell, 2004, p. 123). furthermore, it appeared that some employers felt that it was not necessary to re-employ the mi’kmaq. as wards of the federal state, there seems to have been the belief among settlers that the department of indian affairs would take care of first nations people. an unsigned inspector’s report regarding the situation in nova scotia in 1933 confirmed the prevalence of this belief, writing: “the whole attitude of the white population is, why bother with the indians, the government is obliged to look after them” (department of indian affairs, 1933, p. 2). under these dire economic circumstances, relief became a necessity in most mi’kmaq communities. this development was an unwelcome one for the department. the department of indian affairs inspector claimed that the “genesis” of the relief problem was misplaced paternalism and the mi’kmaq ability to exploit government resources. thus, he remarked, indians were given free health care education, freedom from taxation, and reserves and once these had been provided “gratis,” food, clothing, and housing were expected. the federal government’s response to the erosion of mi’kmaq livelihoods was swift, misplaced, and guided by deep desire to reduce budget expenses. ultimately, the department of indian affairs’ plan to permanently reduce expenditure on the mi’kmaq of nova scotia proved catastrophic and dramatically expanded the reach of the welfare state into mi’kmaw lives. centralization the depression placed relief at the very forefront of the department of indian affairs’ concerns. the majority of correspondence from this period focuses on varied solutions to “the relief problem, which [had] grown beyond all reason and threaten[ed] to spread its tentacles if not subjected to immediate action” (department of indian affairs, 1933, p. 1). as relief spending continued to rise, officials began to revisit the idea of centralizing the 45 reserves in nova scotia. rather than attempt to help the mi’kmaq gain re-entry into the workforce and rebuild their economic base, the department engaged in a dramatic and ambitious social engineering project: centralization. the amalgamation of reserves had been subject to discussion for at least two decades. a small precedent was set in 1918 when 15 families of the halifax band were moved to the millbrook reserve after the halifax explosion. a flurry of letters in the 1920s advocated creating a systematic policy for centralizing reserve populations. dr. h. s. trefry (1924) suggested the department sell the province’s scattered 13 cullen et al.: the historical roots of social assistance published by scholarship@western, 2021 reserves and find “a good situation of fertile crown land, and collect all the indians to it” (p. 2). central reserves, he argued, were the only solution to “deplorable” conditions and considerable government spending with little result. ottawa assured trefry they would consider the problem carefully but that currently there was no solution as the mi’kmaq “appear to prefer their current mode of life and resent any form of paternalism, which might tend to restrict their liberty or repress their nomadic instincts” (campbell-scott, 1925, p. 1). the mi’kmaq, it seemed, were reluctant to give up their hard-won economic independence and surrender their mobility, which was historically a key economic coping strategy the idea of centralization continued to gather pace in the 1920s and 1930s as persistent reports normalized its logic. indian agent and crown timber officer h. j. bury’s (1925) report on “the indian situation in nova scotia” advocated amalgamation of reserves in three central locations, a process that would be paid for by the sale of all other reserves. bury also detailed the cost effectiveness and the moral and material benefits of having a full-time agent on reserve. in 1936, a specially commissioned report by departmental expert dr. thomas robertson (1936) argued that the mi’kmaq were “deteriorating and looking more and more to the government for his support” (p. 10). robertson suggested amalgamating reserves and that “direct relief be discontinued and all able required to work for anything received” (p. 11). centralization, thus, was conceived as a direct response to increasing relief expenditure. while centralization was debated, the department sought to restrain daily spending by decreasing relief rates. frequent changes occurred in relief rates to help foster organizational efficiency and fiscal control. these experiments occurred in response to rising expenditure and “established a new level of rationalized relief administration that would eventually apply throughout the country and that would make first nations even more concentrated ‘objects’ of bureaucratic oppression” (shewell, 2004, p. 121). in 1940, in an attempt to curb spending, the department issued a circular specifying the scale of monthly allowance to its agents and cutting numerous items. milk, eggs, tinned tomatoes, root vegetables, and apples could not be distributed without ottawa’s authority (shewell, 2004). these items, indigenous communities were informed, could be grown. lisa patterson noted that at the heart of centralization policy lay “an almost pathological fear of large expenditure” (patterson, 1985, p. 1). as expenditure on the mi’kmaq in education, healthcare, and relief increased persistently, it was thought that combining these costs and geographically centralizing them might solve the problems created by nova scotia’s economic downturn. finally, in 1941, the department of indian affairs commissioned a report by w. s. arneil into indian reserves in nova scotia. his report was the tipping point in a 20-year process. the federal government decided to centralize all reserve communities at two locations: shubenacadie in mainland nova scotia, and eskasoni in cape breton. arneil recommended that the mi’kmaq who were not receiving relief be allowed to stay on their present holdings and be encouraged to seek enfranchisement (arneil, 1941). the goal was clear. if proper supervision, education, and health care could be administered on reserves, it would make it easier for the mi’kmaq to join canadian society, though at a later date. the mi’kmaq were not consulted about the drastic changes to their life and rightful territories. some resisted, choosing to stay where they were (hanrahan, 2008). many moved, swayed by promises of homes, schools, jobs, and new services. others were forced into moving by the actual termination of services at their reserves. elders recall how smaller communities, such as malagawatch, port hood, and 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.10202 tufts cove, experienced dramatic losses in population. the mi’kmaq also recall the homes and communities they left behind being destroyed by indian agents (young et al., 2017). some of the more profitable and self-sufficient cape breton reserves were also emptied. as a consequence, gains in agricultural development were lost, and those who had made successful economic adaptations to life at their small reserves were uprooted. in addition, in the new locations, traditional activities like hunting and trapping declined because of a lack of game, fishing became difficult because of overcrowding, and the sale of handcrafts also declined due to the lack of access to markets. the promised benefits of centralization also failed to materialize. the reserves were plagued by mismanagement, and a lack of materials, roads, and steady employment. mi’kmaw ability to rebound from the economic deprivations of the 1930s was severely obstructed. arguably, centralization “affected indian life in the province more than any other post-confederation event; today its social, economic, and political effects are still felt” (patterson, 1985, p. 1). the effects were legion. for example, elders interviewed generally agreed that centralization devalued mi’kmaw spiritual life “by depriving them of the work and social interactions they previously enjoyed” (patterson, 1985, p. 114). others noted that community feeling was destroyed by tension and competition between newcomers and original reserve residents. self-sufficiency and pride in economic independence was also eroded by the new workfare regime on reserve. many noted conditions at eskasoni reserve on cape breton island were worse than what they had left behind. mi’kmaw elder victor jeddore, for example, recounted how he abandoned a life built on fishing, hunting, agriculture, lumberjacking, and off-reserve work at whycocomagh to move to eskasoni (patterson, 1985). self-sufficient producers like jeddore found themselves forced to work for welfare. the broader economic effects produced by isolation were just as problematic. long-term employment was difficult to generate for such large, concentrated, and isolated reserves. it seemed difficult to see where on-reserve employment would come from (steen, 1951). initially, departmental reports showed that “wages earned” dramatically increased from $20,000 in 1943 to a total of $98,500 in 1946, slightly higher than the estimated pre-depression peak in 1920. the vast majority of reported wages were earned in construction projects at the new reserves. thus, the earnings reflected more of a work-for-welfare situation than sustainable long-term employment. this situation was confirmed by the discontinuation of the “wages earned” category in 1946. earnings figures were simply folded into the larger category of welfare expenditure. despite centralization’s ostensible aim of reducing welfare expenditure, it continued to grow rapidly. in 1949 centralization was declared a failure. at least 50% of the mi’kmaq population had returned to their original reserves, where they attempted to pick up the pieces and re-establish some measure of economic stability. however, following centralization, unemployment continued its upward trend. mi’kmaq accounts of this period confirm that centralization was a key factor in establishing the centrality of welfare in these communities. furthermore, centralization eroded trust in the institutions of governance and administration. promises of jobs, housing, and community development were not kept and several elders mentioned that centralization did more to destroy the mi’kmaw way of life than anything else (young et al., 2017). at eskasoni and shubenacadie, unprecedented levels of social assistance were required to maintain their populations. social deterioration characterized the 1950s such that by 1958, according to one account, approximately 98% of the households at eskasoni and 78% of those at shubenacadie were receiving welfare. eskasoni was among the top 10 agencies in the country 15 cullen et al.: the historical roots of social assistance published by scholarship@western, 2021 terms of welfare expenditure per capita (hawthorn, 1966, p. 115). elders interviewed in 1974 and 1975 argued that the failed centralization experiment had a significant impact on communities by eroding economic independence, circumscribing mobility, and necessitating dependence on social assistance payments (patterson, 1985). conclusion mi’kmaq economic independence had been severely undermined by centralization, which precipitated the expansion of the post-war welfare state into mi’kmaq communities. as the 1940s turned into the 1950s and 1960s, canada gradually put in place the universal social programs that are the hallmark of the modern welfare state— programs such as unemployment insurance, pensions of various kinds, social assistance, and universal health care. first nation persons living on reserve were often not initially included, continuing to experience lower benefits and arbitrary administration as before. however, this changed as well and, by the mid-1960s, the mi’kmaq living on reserve for the first time began to experience a stable and predictable income floor on more or less the same basis as other canadians. over time, divergences have again emerged. the provinces, for example, offer a much broader array of programs to supplement the income support that is provided. they also provide occasional increments to their social assistance rates, something that has not happened on reserve since the early 1990s. indeed, indigenous services canada itself states that the federal government’s income assistance program “has not kept pace with renovations to provincial and territorial programming which offers similar programs” and that “a new approach, involving first nations communities and service providers, is needed” (government of canada, 2014, para. 1). such an approach must take into account the historical origins of social assistance policy outlined here and its failure to implement mi’kmaq-led approaches to community well-being. first nations communities continued to suffer from a historical legacy of dispossession, displacement and assimilation, and federal policy choices that were at best misguided and at worst deeply damaging, such as implementing residential schools and centralization. in this and other ways, their experience was not unique. stephen cornell, one of the principals of the harvard project on american indian economic development, puts this in a wider context, commenting on the individualizing effects of government policy. he notes that governments in the canzus countries (canada, australia, new zealand, and the united states) see indigenous people as a persistent policy problem. governments address indigenous issues by focusing on indigenous persons, believing that if you address enough individuals then the collective problem will be solved. i believe the approach is backwards. the collective, in fact—the nation, the community, the people, the tribe, whatever you call it—the collective is the heart of the matter. invest in the aspirations and well-being of peoples and the well-being of individuals will follow. (wien et al., 2018, p. 18) a defining characteristic of social policy on reserve has been the fact that first nations themselves have had very little say in how programs, such as social assistance, are designed and delivered. they have essentially been imposed from outside. for the mi’kmaq in nova scotia, however, a door was opened in 2016 when a new government in ottawa indicated it was prepared to consider a new approach to social assistance that is determined in large measure by the mi’kmaq themselves. at the time of writing in the 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.10202 summer of 2020, design work supported by research was actively underway in preparation for negotiations to begin in the near future. there is hope that a more balanced, holistic, and selfdetermined approach will result. our historical analysis shows that when the mi’kmaq have been free to choose their own path, they have found their own solutions to the continuing challenges of economic development and colonial control. references alexander, d. 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(2017). tptinewey: mi’kmaq elders’ perceptions of social assistance. report for the building a social policy framework for mi’kmaq communities: a two-eyed seeing approach. cape breton university. 10202+coverpage.pdf ms10202cullenthehistoricalrootsproof.pdf adapting to climate change through source water protection: case studies from alberta and saskatchewan, canada the international indigenous policy journal volume 9 issue 3 special issue: indigenous peoples, climate change, and environmental stewardship article 1 july 2018 adapting to climate change through source water protection: case studies from alberta and saskatchewan, canada robert j. patrick university of saskatchewan, robert.patrick@usask.ca recommended citation patrick, r. j. (2018). adapting to climate change through source water protection: case studies from alberta and saskatchewan, canada. the international indigenous policy journal, 9(3). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.1 adapting to climate change through source water protection: case studies from alberta and saskatchewan, canada abstract the protection of drinking water sources continues to gain momentum in first nation communities on the canadian prairie. through the identification of potential threats to drinking water sources communities are taking action to mitigate those threats. this article explores the extent to which climate change has been taken into consideration in recent source water protection planning community exercises. in addition, this article describes how source water protection planning has potential to enhance community adaptation strategies to reduce the impacts of climate change on source water and drinking water systems. results are based on six case studies from alberta and saskatchewan. keywords climate change, saskatchewan, alberta, source water protection, first nations, canada acknowledgments the author wishes to thank the working committee participants in each of the case study communities who contributed to their respective source water protection plans. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ adapting to climate change through source water protection in first nation communities: case studies from alberta and saskatchewan, canada in canada, access to safe drinking water in many first nation communities remains a challenge (bradford, bharadwaj, okpalauwaekwe, & waldner, 2016; galway, 2016;). today, approximately 1 in 5 first nation communities is on a boil water advisory, with some advisories lasting a decade or longer (bharadwaj, 2014; patrick, machial, quinney, & quinney, 2017). there are many factors contributing to this problem, including poor raw water quality, insufficient water treatment technology, inadequate water distribution systems, as well as local and regional water contamination by land users. institutional factors also contribute to the drinking water quality problem, such as inadequate design standards for wastewater disposal, difficulty with retention of qualified water treatment plant operators, as well as insufficient federal funding for water system upgrades (patrick et al., 2017). notwithstanding these challenges, first nation communities are dedicated to overcome these and other contributing factors to unsafe drinking water through the sustained efforts of water treatment plant operators, environmental health officers, circuit riders, and first nation leadership. however, a further challenge is now at play. climate change is poised to exacerbate the current drinking water quality challenges in many first nation communities within the prairie region (bharadwaj, 2014; patrick et al., 2017). the prevalence of extreme weather, unpredictable weather patterns, as well as fluctuation in climate trends is now contributing to unanticipated levels of community risk, including both flood and drought with variable impacts on water quality and quantity (bonsal, cuell, wheaton, sauchyn, & barrow, 2017; pomeroy, stewart, & whitfield, 2016; shook, 2016). research has shown that extreme weather will continue to produce not only seasonal fluctuations but also annual extremes in weather cycles that include rain-onsnow events, higher than normal summer rainfall, as well as prolonged periods of drought with variable, yet significant, impacts on the hydrological regime (buttle et al., 2016; dumanski, pomeroy, & westbrook, 2015; pomeroy et al., 2016). this article explores the impact of climate change on drinking water quality within first nation communities in the canadian prairie region and the role of source water protection planning as a means toward community adaptation. while climate change poses very real threats to the quantity of water supply across the prairie region, the focus of this article is on the quality of that supply. the principle of source water protection is prevention of contamination at the source of a drinking water supply, either groundwater or surface water. source water protection is operationalized through a planning process that first identifies land use activities, human practices, and natural processes that pose some level of risk to a drinking water source. next, specific management actions are assigned to each identified risk with the intent of reducing, or eliminating, each risk. implementation of the management actions and periodic review of the full source water protection plan complete the plan-making process. this article undertakes an assessment of management actions to determine the utility of source water protection planning as a form of community adaptation to climate change. data for this article has emerged from a cross-sectional analysis of six recently completed first nations source water protection plans in the canadian prairie region. the case study communities are all located in alberta and saskatchewan across treaty 4, 5, 6, and 7 territories (see figure 1). the names of the individual communities will not be identified in this article for privacy reasons. 1 patrick: adapting to climate change through source water protection published by scholarship@western, 2018 figure 1. numbered treaties and case study locations, canadian prairie extensive academic literature is dedicated to the impacts of climate change on indigenous communities in the canadian arctic where rates of global warming are most pronounced. less extensive literature exists for southern canada, and includes work describing climate change interplay between western science and traditional knowledge (sanderson et al., 2015), climate change adaptation planning (reid et al., 2014), water vulnerability assessment in first nations (plummer, de grosbois, armitage, & de loë, 2013), as well as methodological approaches to community health impacts (bradford et al., 2016). with the exception of work by bharadwaj (2014), there is limited attention to climate change impacts on drinking water quality in the prairie region. specific water-related human health impacts caused by climate change include adverse skin conditions and intestinal illness from consumption of contaminated drinking water (bharadwaj, 2014). in other regions of north america, the spread of wildfire caused by drought has resulted in the disruption of water service and negatively impacted source water quality. in a post-wildfire watershed, increased levels of turbidity in surface water may compromise disinfection treatment while also producing trihalomethanes, a disinfection by-product and proven carcinogen (emelko, silins, bladon, & stone, 2011; hohner, cawley, oropeza, summers, & rosario-ortiz, 2016; murphy, writer, mccleskey, & martin, 2015). under a drier canadian prairie-region climate the potential for similar impacts to surface water reservoirs is a concern. this article focuses on the nexus of climate change and source water protection planning in first nation communities with emphasis on the identification of adaptation strategies to protect sources of drinking water. under a changing climate, source water protection planning provides both a practical means of managing land use activities as well as a potentially useful tool for community-based climate change case study location alberta saskatchewan manitoba 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.1 adaptation. the focus of this research is at the local scale to answer calls for “a more nuanced understanding of factors contributing to vulnerability, as well as sources of capacity for adaptation” (plummer et al., 2013, p. 761). the term vulnerability to describe first nation communities with respect to climate change and access to safe water will not be used in this article. the vulnerability label presents a negative messaging of weakness, frailty, and inability to adapt (haalboom & natcher, 2012). to the contrary, first nation communities have survived myriad impositions over time—culturally and ecologically—resulting in a continued display of resilience, strength, and the ability to thrive (golden, audet, & smith, 2015; howitt et al., 2013; mcgregor, 2012). instead, opportunities for community adaptation will be explored. the article begins with an overview of the challenges facing first nation communities regarding the provision of safe drinking water followed by a description of source water protection planning and the multi-barrier approach to safe drinking water. a range of perceived threats to source water from six completed source water protection plans are discussed followed by a description of how these existing threats may be exacerbated by climate change. the article concludes by identifying a range of climate change adaptation strategies to help protect source water in first nation communities. first nations water progress in the prairie region, the protection of drinking water has moved beyond words and into action with the completion of source water protection plans in numerous first nation communities (patrick, 2017). these plans, and the planning process that guides them, have produced tangible action on the ground while empowering individuals and communities to take greater control over past and present land use practices that have compromised source water quality. source water protection planning, while a modern tool of western science, is consistent with indigenous traditional knowledge and value systems pertaining to water (lavalley, 2006). while source water protection introduces a “formal” planning activity, it is certainly not the first planning activity ever practiced by indigenous peoples. first nations have long been planners on the land, both pragmatically for decision-making around food gathering, settlement, and migration, and as long-term visionary planners represented by the seven generation model (jojola, 2008; porter, 2010). present day source water protection planning often plays a corrective role, identifying past and present land use activities that may pose a threat to a drinking water source. source water protection planning also has potential to re-connect community members, particularly youth, to the importance of clean water, indigenous values and beliefs, as well as elder knowledge (lavalley, 2006). the multi-barrier approach and source water protection the multi-barrier approach (mba) to safe drinking water gained attention in the water resources literature in the aftermath of the water contamination events in walkerton and north battleford (laing, 2004; o’connor, 2002). within the water industry, the mba is an effective means of safeguarding potable water delivery (canadian council of ministers of the environment [ccme], 2004). the mba is a series of operational redundancies, or barriers, that protects against full system failure should a single barrier fail. source water protection, often referred to as the first barrier in the mba, is vital to the protection of a water supply. the other key barriers include drinking water treatment such as chlorination and filtration, maintenance of the water distribution system, testing and monitoring, as well 3 patrick: adapting to climate change through source water protection published by scholarship@western, 2018 as emergency planning (ccme, 2004). however, there are two limitations to the multi-barrier approach. first, the mba concept is designed around municipal water service systems with a central water treatment plant, piped distribution system, and coordinated monitoring oversight. the water distribution system in most first nation communities is unlike municipal water service systems, and instead features a mix of piped water, trucked water, private wells, or no household water service. second, the impacts of climate change on a drinking water system were never envisioned within the mba concept. this omission enables communities to develop source water protection plans without due consideration of climate change impacts on their water system. arguably, the most appropriate place for climate change consideration is within the first barrier of the multi-barrier approach, source water protection. this article will identify climate change adaptation measures that may be applied at the time of source water protection planning. methods data for this article were extrapolated from six source water protection plans completed by first nation communities in the canadian prairie region between 2013 and 2017. selection of the communities was based on a combination of existing relationships between a community member and the author, willingness of the communities to participate, and emerging water quality problems. each of the source water protection plans followed the planning process as shown in figure 2 based on a planning template developed for the federal government (aboriginal affairs and northern development canada [aandc], 2013). each source water protection plan was developed by a working committee from each community. the author assisted each working committee in the form of group work facilitation as well as administrative and technical support. the planning process in each community began with an introductory meeting, or meetings, between the plan facilitator, in this case the author, and representatives from the community, including leadership, management, and staff. the introductory meeting was at the invitation of the community to explain the source water protection planning purpose and process. after the introductory meeting(s), and with expression to proceed from leadership in the community, the first task was to establish a working committee of key individuals from the community (stage 1). working committee make-up was reasonably consistent across all communities, normally consisting of an elder, water treatment plan operator, band councillor, land manager, health representative, other staff, and any interested community members. the size of each working committee was relatively consistent across all the communities, ranging from 6 to 10 persons. approximately eight meetings, each lasting five to six hours, enabled completion of each plan. protocol in each community was respected for all working committee meetings, often with an opening and closing prayer from the elder, a mid-day meal, and other protocols as deemed appropriate including gifting tobacco and other items. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.1 figure 2. source water protection planning process (aandc 2013) stage 2 in the planning process saw completion of a source water assessment to inventory the water source (surface or groundwater), water treatment methods, type of water distribution system (piped or trucked), number of water cisterns, type of water users (residential, commercial, industrial), and number of piped connections to households. the source of information for the water system assessment was taken from technical reports or previously completed engineering reports on file in each community. next, the working committee listed all potential threats to the water source using a brainstorming exercise or small group discussions. the location of each potential threat was noted on a map for future reference. following threat identification, a risk matrix assessment was applied to each of the identified threats as a means of ranking each of the threats on a scale of 1 (low threat) to 25 (high threat). the risk matrix uses two indices: likelihood of a contamination event and human health consequence of a contamination event. each water contamination threat previously identified by the working committee is tested against the risk rank matrix (see figure 3) to produce a relative risk ranking score. stage 3 of the planning process matches management actions to each of the identified risks. management actions include structural and non-structural activities aimed at reducing the identified threat. a structural activity includes the relocation of a landfill or fencing to provide well-head protection. a non-structural activity includes information posters or household newsletters and education programming in the local school. stage 4 of the planning process focuses on plan implementation. the estimated time to completion of each management action, associated costs and funding sources, and required partnerships and stakeholders were recorded in stage 4. stage 5 is a procedural stage requiring an annual review of the source water protection plan. this annual review process provides the opportunity to celebrate plan implementation success, but also a time to adjust the plan in light of any new information. 5 patrick: adapting to climate change through source water protection published by scholarship@western, 2018 figure 3. risk assessment score analysis matrix (based on aandc, 2013) results an aggregated list of threats to source water from the six communities is shown in table 1. all recorded data represents the direct input of the working committee from each of the plans. for the purpose of this study, only those threats reported consistently across four or more communities are reported in table 1. the risk ranking for each threat is listed. the highest risk reported across all six communities was evenly tied between sewage lagoons and illegal dump sites. past construction of sewage lagoons in first nation communities lacked impermeable liners. instead, sewage lagoons were dug into the ground and, depending upon local soil conditions, there remains potential for groundwater contamination. sewage lagoon capacity was reported to be a major concern in all six case study communities. unauthorized on-reserve dump sites were also consistently reported as a very high risk to source water. unknown solid waste materials and their potential cumulative effects on water sources were consistently reported across all six communities. uncapped private wells and agricultural runoff of fertilizer and pesticides were another source of concern for a majority of first nation communities. uncapped and therefore unsecured large diameter wells pose both a human safety risk from drowning as well as a human health risk from water contamination. small bore diameter wells are commonly reported as scattered throughout all six communities, a legacy of early farms and abandoned household wells after conversion to community piped water or trucked water systems. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.1 table 1. local source water threats and concerns threat (average risk ranking)a number of first nations reportingb concern sewage lagoons (25) 6 threat of overcapacity lagoons; aging facilities; some lagoons failing; few with industrial liners; potential groundwater contamination; susceptible to overflow; flooding from rivers, lake bodies. illegal dump sites (25) 6 aesthetic concerns; threat of unknown contaminants to surface and groundwater sources; potential impacts on drinking water and ecosystem; cumulative impacts from dump sites. uncapped private wells (abandoned) 5 threat of groundwater contamination. agriculture pesticides, fertilizer 5 threat of pesticide contamination; excess fertilizer increasing nitrogen and algae blooms of surface water sources; downstream or downslope impacts; biomagnification. household septic “shoot-outs” 5 threat of raw sewage deposition of ground surface outside residential homes; land and wetland areas becoming saturated; dangerous to health; potential for infiltration to water cistern or to groundwater, surface water supply sources. cattle and livestock encroaching 5 threat of nutrient and e. coli contamination to source water. lack of riparian protection, free range of livestock into surface water source, groundwater contamination. contaminated industrial land, fuel, & material wastes 5 threat of petroleum product spills, contaminated soils, leaching to source water supply. legacy of railroad activity, in-ground fuel tanks, work yards. solid waste landfills 5 threat of groundwater contamination in unlined landfill, unregulated landfill, lack of waste separation, unknown landfill products, cumulative impacts. poorly constructed landfills waste materials. groundwater contamination. well-head exposure 4 main water wells unprotected; land contour slopes to well-head; no fencing or barriers around wells; aging well-head and well casing. hazardous goods transport 4 threat of railway or highway accident; toxic spills (petroleum, etc.) with surface and groundwater contamination. potable water cisterns 4 cistern damage is caused by both human and climate-related impacts. freeze–thaw cycles impart damage to the concrete shell of a cistern. frost heave and uneven ground temperature adds potential damage. note. a 25 = highest; 1 = lowest risk ranking. b n = 6 7 patrick: adapting to climate change through source water protection published by scholarship@western, 2018 agricultural fertilizers and pesticides were another identified threat in many communities. while farm lease agreements often state that responsible fertilizer and herbicide practices would be followed, there was little or no means of confirming lease-holder practices. septic shoot-outs, or the discharge of liquid waste directly onto the ground adjacent to a home, were consistently reported as a major concern across all case studies. the combined problem of groundwater or surface water contamination and the immediate human health issue of untreated sewage discharge outside a home is a common concern in all case study communities. solid waste landfills, most at full capacity, with no waste separation, recycling, or monitoring programs in place was also voiced as a concern. other high risk concerns included contaminated former industrial lands, damaged water cisterns, hazardous goods transport, and livestock encroachment into surface water sources. exacerbated threats threats to drinking water sources with potential to be exacerbated by climate change are described in table 2 along with adaptation strategies. the exacerbated threats represent an extension of the concerns previously listed by each working committee in all six communities. community members reported an increase in sudden and violent rainfall events. in late winter, these events may be rain-on-snow events. more frequent flooding or extreme high water was reported to have a negative impact on existing water management infrastructure. for example, sewage lagoons were reported to be at or near capacity. the addition of flood waters from sudden storm events, either as rainfall or as rain-on-snow events, will only exacerbate the current sewage lagoon capacity problem. other climate change impacts that will exacerbate existing threats include the mobilization of land-based contaminants such as landfill leachate and other industrial wastes caused by localized flooding. climate warming is driving increased incidence of freeze–thaw cycles, exacerbating threats to drinking water sources. for example, concrete manufactured water cisterns were reported to be suffering internal cracks and breakage from more frequent cycles of freeze-thaw events. this situation is allowing surface water drainage and organic contaminants to contaminate household cisterns. adaptation strategies the source water protection planning process enabled the working committee to match adaptation strategies, identified as management actions in the planning framework (figure 2), to each of the identified risks. during this process, the working committee focused discussion on specific adaptation strategies. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.1 table 2. climate change adaptation strategies threat (number of first nations reporting)a accelerated climate change impacts adaptation strategies sewage lagoons (6) increased rainfall; rain-on-snow; seasonal storms all may cause flooding; river and lake flooding into lagoons; pothole region of poor drainage. develop new lagoons under current regulations; develop new lined lagoons to protect groundwater. illegal dump sites (6) mobilization of potential contaminants from flooding, increased summer rainstorm events; rain-on-snow events, poor land drainage. written notification to all contractors; community education, schools, radio, newsletters, website; coordinate with community clean up; community clean-up initiative; educational campaigns; community hazardous waste pick-up days; develop regular schedule for pick up; education signage; repair road access to main landfill; investigate transfer station; enforce land management act. uncapped private wells (abandoned) (5) uncapped wells allow direct pathway for groundwater contaminants; rain and flood events increase likelihood of contaminant entry. map and identify all uncapped wells; decommission all abandoned wells. agriculture pesticides, fertilizer (5) overland flow from heavy seasonal rain events, mobilization of pesticides and fertilizers. make use of lease agreements to enforce better management practices; obtain full information about chemical usage; restrict fertilizer and pesticide use near the community; as buffer encourage crop cover that does not need fertilizers or community gardens; talk to farmers; hold community workshops on proper product application. household septic shoot-outs (5) high water tables, flooding, violent summer storms, increased incidence of dry periods followed by large rain events have potential to mobilize shoot-out sewage waste, or cause localized (backyard flooding). extend pipe further from house; upgrade to inground septic system; extend community sewer system; education; bylaws requiring regular tank pump out. note. a n = 6 9 patrick: adapting to climate change through source water protection published by scholarship@western, 2018 table 2. climate change adaptation strategies (continued) threat (number of first nations reporting) accelerated climate change impacts adaptation strategies cattle and livestock encroaching (5) increased frequency of extreme dry and wet periods, flooding of land mobilizing manure waste. confine livestock at the farm property; keep horses and cattle away from village centre and well-head areas; fence to protect wells-heads; keep livestock and domestic animals out of drinking water sources; talk to farmers working treaty land entitlement (tle) lands, educational brochures; fencing; dugouts; bylaws. contaminated industrial land, fuel & material wastes (5) flooding, mobilization of contaminants, soluble soils, percolation of contaminants in flood events. collect all fuel tanks no longer in use; site remediation by professionals; decommission former industrial sites. solid waste landfills (5) old and abandoned sites (legacy issues). rainfall, rain on snow, saturation of landfill waste material, mobilization of waste materials. groundwater contamination. decommission old and abandoned landfill sites. initiate waste separation of main landfill. repair road access to landfill. fence landfill, hire a landfill operator, waste separation. longer term, consider conversion of landfill to a transfer station. well-head exposure (4) flooding, rain on snow; ponding of water in area of well-heads; long, dry periods broken by sudden large summer rain events. protect well-head from flooding, contamination, by extending well casing 1 metre above ground; mound fill and gravel material around casing, slope away from casing. fence around well-head to keep people, livestock, and domestic animals away. hazardous goods transport, oil pipelines (4) climate change impacts on roads, railways, reduced stability of land surface; road potholes, railway washouts. subsurface land subsidence causing pipeline fractures. railway and highways not in first nation jurisdiction. need for communication, partnership, collaboration with rail company and highways to maintain, repair; response plan for hazardous spills. pipeline mapping on first nations, greater awareness. potable water cisterns (4) increased incidence of local flood conditions (spring runoff and summer rains) adds to threat of water contamination; increased freeze– thaw with climate change damaging to concrete cisterns; damage by truck haulers with thawing ground. annual cleaning and repair program; cistern replacement program; install distribution system; grading and landscaping around cistern; testing schedule; improve, repair cistern collars, caps, and covers; move to a low pressure system. note. a n = 6 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.1 in the case of sewage lagoons, noted as high risk in all communities, there was little evidence of adaptation. in one alberta first nation, a large sewage lagoon was re-built on the same site as the previous lagoon, which was destroyed in the 2013 bow river flood, despite calls from the community directed at indigenous and northern affairs canada (inac) to re-build the lagoon on higher ground. the 2013 bow river flood is well documented as a flood event typical of a changing climate (pomeroy et al., 2016). given that many lagoons are gravity fed, moving existing lagoons to higher ground away from rivers and lakes initiates a long-term cost for pumping and hauling. additionally, to control lagoon overflow conditions the operation of these lagoons requires a release of liquid waste into an adjacent water body during late spring. relocating sewage lagoons to higher ground would not only add an additional cost to pipe wastewater over a greater distance for storage in the lagoon and discharge back into a waterbody. in several communities, overcapacity lagoons were leading to localized flooding within the community. unauthorized community solid waste sites were targeted with specific adaptation strategies in all six communities ranging from education regarding appropriate waste disposal, scheduling regular garbage pick-up, site reclamation, and establishing a waste transfer station. uncapped wells were identified in all but one community as posing a high risk to groundwater contamination. adaptation measures to help reduce risk of contamination included mapping uncapped or abandoned groundwater wells to be followed by well decommissioning. federal and provincial funding sources are available for well decommissioning in first nation communities. several case study communities have already taken advantage of these funding opportunities. mobilization of fertilizer as the result of more frequent summer rainstorm events has the potential to elevate nitrate levels in groundwater sources. adaptation measures include information sharing with the farm community, lease agreement restrictions on fertilizer application, as well as establishing buffer strips adjacent to community water sources. household sewage shoot-outs were identified as a threat with potential risk to source water and human health. shoot-outs consist of piped raw sewage from a home into a backyard area. adaptation strategies includes emergency repair of shoot-outs. longer term adaptation strategies include extension of the community sewer system and local area bylaws requiring regular septic tank pump-outs. livestock enclosures and other means of restricting both domestic and farm animals away from surface water sources, well-head areas, and water treatment facilities will help protect water quality. these adaptation strategies will be new to many communities where free-range livestock is a more common practice. well-head protection will increasingly be an effective, low cost solution to protect well-water supplies that are increasingly subject to seasonal flooding, which is common in many communities. the legacy of former industrial sites including gas stations, in-ground fuel tanks, and other hazardous material has potential to contaminate water sources under a changing climate. adaptation strategies include commercial and industrial site remediation. in addition, landfills are a concern in most communities. in all but one community, the active landfills were open to the public with no attendant, no community recycling, and no waste separation program in place. recent increases in localized flooding have raised concerns over groundwater and surface water contamination. as a result, all case study communities voiced concern for the long-term viability of existing unmanaged landfill operations. 11 patrick: adapting to climate change through source water protection published by scholarship@western, 2018 in all case study communities, landfills consisted of large, unlined excavations to be filled with all forms of domestic, commercial, and industrial waste. in a wetter climate, these landfill pits are at risk of filling with water thus mobilizing potentially toxic materials. climate change is currently impacting the integrity of water cisterns in first nations. flooding and more frequent freeze–thaw events will continue to threaten water quality and quantity in cisterns. adaptation will require more frequent cistern cleaning and repair programs. cistern replacement programs have begun in several case study communities. moving toward a low pressure water system to replace cisterns is an additional adaptation strategy that requires serious consideration and funding from the federal government. discussion source water protection planning serves as an effective tool to identify climate change adaptation strategies respecting safe drinking water in first nation communities. source water protection aids in the protection of drinking water sources through a deliberate, focused planning process (patrick, 2011; patrick et al., 2017). through identification of threats to a water supply, it is possible to produce a risk ranking followed by management actions to reduce those risks (aandc, 2013). in the prairie region, first nation communities are now engaged in source water protection planning to produce plans that have led to the implementation of management actions. the source water protection planning process has traditionally provided a means by which threats to source water may be identified, ranked in terms of risk, and mitigated through appropriate management actions. the impacts of climate change add another dimension to source water protection by introducing new threats (spread of wildfire) and by exacerbating existing threats (sewage lagoon flooding). policy recommendations it is recommended that the practice of source water protection be modified to include greater consideration of climate change impacts. with greater focus on climate change, source water protection planning will be more responsive to local conditions. the federal government, through agencies such as inac, is encouraged to fund source protection planning in first nation communities, particularly the implementation of completed source water protection plans. it is recognized that single-purpose planning, such as source water protection planning, must become multi-dimensional to include climate change impacts and adaptation strategies. to that end, a more robust source water protection planning framework that includes climate change impacts will provide a higher degree of relevant information to first nations. source water protection planning may be the best means of responding to climate change impacts affecting drinking water sources in first nation communities. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.1 references aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc). (2013). first nations onreserve source water protection plan: guide and template. retrieved from http://www.aadncaandc.gc.ca/dam/dam-inter-hq-enr/staging/textetext/source_1398366907537_eng.pdf bharadwaj, l. (2014). vulnerability of first nations communities in canada to environmental degradation. in v. grover (ed.), impact of climate change on water and health (pp. 173-199). boca raton, fl: taylor & francis group bonsal, b. r., cuell, c., wheaton, e., sauchyn, d. j., & barrow, e. (2017). an assessment of historical and projected future hydro-climatic variability and extremes over southern watersheds in the canadian prairies. international journal of climatology, 37(10), 3934-3948. doi: https://doi.org/10.1002/joc.4967 bradford, l. e. a., bharadwaj, l. a., okpalauwaekwe, u., & waldner, c. l. (2016). drinking water quality in indigenous communities in canada and health outcomes: a scoping review. international journal of circumpolar health, 75(1). doi: https://doi.org/10.3402/ijch.v75.32336 buttle, j. m., allen, d. m., caissie, d., davison, b., hayashi, m., peters, d. l., . . . whitfield, p. h. (2016). flood processes in canada: regional and special aspects. canadian water resources journal, 41(1-2), 7-30. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/07011784.2015.1131629 canadian council of ministers of the environment (ccme). (2004). from source to tap. guidance on the multi-barrier approach to safe drinking water. retrieved from www.ccme.ca/files/resources/water/source_tap/mba_guidance_doc_e.pdf dumanski, s., pomeroy, j. w., westbrook, c. j. (2015). hydrological regime changes in a canadian prairie basin. hydrological processes, 29(18), 3893-3904. doi: https://doi.org/10.1002/hyp.10567 emelko, m. b., silins, u., bladon, k. d., & stone, m. (2011). implications of land disturbance on drinking water treatability in a changing climate: demonstrating the need for "source water supply and protection" strategies. water research, 45(2), 461-472. galway, l. p. (2016). boiling over: a descriptive analysis of drinking water advisories in first nations communities in ontario, canada. international journal of environmental research and public health, 13(5), 505. doi: https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph13050505 golden, d. m., audet, c., & smith, m. a. (2015). "blue-ice": framing climate change and reframing climate change adaptation from the indigenous peoples' perspective in the northern boreal forest of ontario, canada. climate and development, 7(5), 401-413. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/17565529.2014.966048 13 patrick: adapting to climate change through source water protection published by scholarship@western, 2018 haalboom, b., & natcher, d. c. (2012). the power and peril of "vulnerability": approaching community labels with caution in climate change research. arctic, 65(3), 319-327. doi: https://doi.org/10.14430/arctic4219 hohner, a. k., cawley, k., oropeza, j., summers, r. s., & rosario-ortiz, f. l. (2016). drinking water treatment response following a colorado wildfire. water research, 105, 187-198. doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.watres.2016.08.034 howitt, r., doohan, k., suchet-peasron, s., lunkapis, g., muller, s., lawrence, r., . . . cross, s. (2013). capacity deficits and cultural interfaces of land and sea governance. in r. walker, t. jojola, & d. natcher (eds.), reclaiming indigenous planning (pp. 313-338). kingston, on: mcgill-queens university press. jojola, t. (2008). indigenous planning—an emerging context. canadian journal of urban research,17(1), 37-47. laing, r. d. (2002). report of the commission of inquiry into matters relating to the safety of the public drinking water in the city of north battleford, saskatchewan. retrieved from http://www.publications.gov.sk.ca/details.cfm?p=77712 lavalley, g. (2006). aboriginal traditional knowledge and source water protection: first nations’ views on taking care of water. toronto, on: chiefs of ontario and environment canada. mcgregor, d. (2012). traditional knowledge: considerations for protecting water in ontario. international indigenous policy journal,3(3). doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2012.3.3.11 murphy, s. f., writer, j. h., mccleskey, r. b., & martin, d. a. (2015). the role of precipitation type, intensity, and spatial distribution in source water quality after wildfire. environmental research letters, 10 (8). doi: https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/10/8/084007 o’connor, d. r. (2002). report of the walkerton inquiry: part 2, a strategy for safe drinking water. toronto, on: ontario ministry of the attorney general, queen’s printer for ontario. patrick, r. j. (2011). uneven access to safe drinking water for first nations in canada: connecting health and place through source water protection. health place,17(1), 386–389. doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.healthplace.2010.10.005 patrick, r. j., machial, l., quinney, k., & quinney, l. (2017). lessons learned through communityengaged planning. international indigenous policy journal, 8(2). doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.7 plummer, r., de grosbois, d., armitage, d., & de loë, r. (2013). an integrative assessment of water vulnerability in first nation communities in southern ontario, canada. global environmental change,23(4), 749-763. doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2013.03.005 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 1 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.1 pomeroy, j. w., stewart, r. e., & whitfield, p. h. (2016). the 2013 flood event in the south saskatchewan and elk river basins: causes, assessment and damages. canadian water resources journal, 41(1-2), 105-117. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/07011784.2015.1089190 porter, l. (2010). unlearning the colonial cultures of planning. farnham: ashgate. reid, m. g., hamilton, c., reid, s. k., trousdale, w., hill, c., turner, n., . . . matthews, h. d. (2014). indigenous climate change adaptation planning using a values-focused approach: a case study with the gitga’at nation. journal of ethnobiology, 34(3), 401–424. sanderson, d., picketts, i. m., dery, s. j., fell, b., baker, s., lee‐johnson, e., & auger, m. (2015). climate change and water at stellat'en first nation, british columbia, canada: insights from western science and traditional knowledge. canadian geographer, 59(2), 136-150. doi: https://doi.org/10.1111/cag.12142 shook, k. (2016). the 2005 flood events in the saskatchewan river basin: causes, assessment and damages. canadian water resources journal, 41(1-2), 94-104. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/07011784.2014.1001439 15 patrick: adapting to climate change through source water protection published by scholarship@western, 2018 the international indigenous policy journal july 2018 adapting to climate change through source water protection: case studies from alberta and saskatchewan, canada robert j. patrick recommended citation adapting to climate change through source water protection: case studies from alberta and saskatchewan, canada abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license adapting to climate change through source water protection: case studies from alberta and saskatchewan, canada two-eyed seeing in research and its absence in policy: little saskatchewan first nation elders' experiences of the 2011 flood and forced displacement the international indigenous policy journal volume 8 issue 4 reconciling research: perspectives on research involving indigenous peoples—part 2 article 6 october 2017 two-eyed seeing in research and its absence in policy: little saskatchewan first nation elders' experiences of the 2011 flood and forced displacement donna e. martin university of manitoba, donna.martin@umanitoba.ca shirley thompson university of manitoba, s.thompson@umanitoba.ca myrle ballard university of manitoba, myrle.ballard@umanitoba.ca janice linton university of manitoba, janice.linton@umanitoba.ca recommended citation martin, d. e. , thompson, s. , ballard, m. , linton, j. (2017). two-eyed seeing in research and its absence in policy: little saskatchewan first nation elders' experiences of the 2011 flood and forced displacement. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(4). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.6 two-eyed seeing in research and its absence in policy: little saskatchewan first nation elders' experiences of the 2011 flood and forced displacement abstract two-eyed seeing is a guiding framework for research that values and uses indigenous and western ways of knowing. in this article, we describe the merits and challenges of using two-eyed seeing to guide a collaborative research project with a first nation community in manitoba, canada devastated by a humanmade flood. in 2011, provincial government officials flooded 17 first nation communities including little saskatchewan first nation (lsfn), displacing thousands of people. to date, approximately 350 lsfn’s onreserve members remain displaced. two-eyed seeing ensured that the study was community-driven and facilitated a more thorough analysis of the data. this case study illuminated the absence of two-eyed seeing in policy making and decision making. we argue for the need to incorporate two-eyed seeing in policy making and program development, and to value and foster indigenous perspectives in decision making within communities, especially regarding activities that have a direct impact on environments within or surrounding indigenous lands. keywords first nations, elders, flooding, forced displacement, rebuilding, two-eyed seeing acknowledgments this study was funded by the canadian institutes of health research, institute of aboriginal people's health. we thank the participating elders and chief and council of little saskatchewan first nation for their support. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ t w o e y e d s e e i n g i n r e s e a r c h a n d i t s a b s e n c e i n p o l i c y : l i t t l e s a s k a t c h e w a n f i r s t n a t i o n e l d e r s ' e x p e r i e n c e s o f t h e 2 0 1 1 f l o o d a n d f o r c e d d i s p l a c e m e n t two-eyed seeing can both reframe questions asked by indigenous health researchers and inform solutions and policies concerning indigenous and western knowledges (black & mcbean, 2016; martin, 2012). in this article, we describe the merits and challenges of using two-eyed seeing to guide a collaborative research project with a first nation community in manitoba, canada that has suffered from human-made flooding. in 2011, provincial government officials diverted water from the assiniboine river through water control structures to lake st. martin, ostensibly to protect downstream towns and cities along the assiniboine river. as a result, 17 first nation communities were flooded and 4,525 first nations people were displaced (flood review task force, 2013). to date, over 2000 first nations people remain displaced and are unable to return to their home communities. forced displacement (fd) has been defined as the forced or obligatory departure from homes or places of habitual residence (cao, hwang, & xi, 2012). in the context of the 2011 flooding, community members were forced to flee their homes and lands following an emergency evacuation notice as a result of a human-made disaster. in this study, the two-eyed seeing approach facilitated an exploration of two perspectives on fd: first, we addressed “one-eye,” from the elders. second, we addressed the “other eye” of decision-makers (who are typically non-indigenous). by exploring fd from both perspectives, we could determine the reasons behind the lack of progress in meeting “eye to eye.” we argue that use of the two-eyed seeing approach should not be limited to conducting research with indigenous peoples; rather, two-eyed seeing can and must facilitate and guide exchanges on water and environmental management. further, we argue that two-eyed seeing can potentially facilitate more inclusive and socially just programs and policies with indigenous peoples globally (howitt, havnen, & veland, 2012). we support black and mcbean’s (2016) call for indigenous participation in decision making and the incorporation of local knowledge in environmental policy frameworks. although this study used two-eyed seeing to facilitate participatory research and integrated knowledge translation, limited progress has been made in terms of helping flood evacuees return to their home communities. this is because two-eyed seeing has not been incorporated into water, environmental, and resettlement policy frameworks in the province of manitoba. b a c k g r o u n d in this section, we provide an overview of two-eyed seeing as the guiding framework of this study, followed by a review of relevant literature. two-eyed seeing was integrated into each phase of this study’s research process, including the literature review. g u i d i n g f r a m e w o r k two-eyed seeing evolved thanks in large part to the curriculum work of elders albert and murdena marshall, along with their academic colleague cheryl bartlett. two-eyed seeing is: to see from one eye with the strengths of indigenous ways of knowing, and to see from the other eye with the strengths of western ways of knowing, and to use both of these eyes together, for the benefit of all. (bartlett, marshall, & marshall, 2012, p. 335) 1 martin et al.: little saskatchewan first nation elders published by scholarship@western, 2017 bartlett et al. (2012) have suggested that approaching research with indigenous peoples with both viewpoints allows a new way of seeing the world to emerge. mi’kmaq elders albert marshall and murdena marshall have described two-eyed seeing as a gift of multiple perspectives (bartlett et al., 2012). together, they integrated a longstanding indigenous way of knowing into elementary and postsecondary school curricula (specifically integrative science and indigenous health research methods) (iwama, marshall, marshall, & bartlett, 2009; vukic, gregory, & martin-misener, 2012). there have been some excellent examples of knowledge dissemination regarding the role and necessity of two-eyed seeing and related indigenous research methodologies in addressing health inequities (chatwood et al., 2015; hall et al., 2015; marsh, cote-meek, toulouse, najavits, & young, 2015; martin, 2012). in addition, elders, communities, academics, and funders have offered encouragement, knowledge sharing, and foresight regarding how to adopt community-based participatory methodologies, with particular emphasis on the utility of two-eyed seeing (black & mcbean, 2016; hall et al., 2015; martin, 2012; vukic et al., 2012). two-eyed seeing can reframe the nature of the questions that are asked in indigenous health research (martin, 2012), indigenize inquiry methods (lavallée, 2009), and be used to evaluate findings and policies (black & mcbean, 2016). if a power imbalance is retained by drawing conclusions or creating the policies to attempt to address health, social, and environmental inequities exclusively through western social science, there would be little purpose in carrying out research as it would fail to be meaningful and relevant to indigenous peoples. embedded in two-eyed seeing is the belief “that no one perspective is right or wrong; all views are seen to contribute something unique and important” (martin, 2012, p. 34). two-eyed seeing does not subsume one way of knowing over another. it encourages fluidity, multiple perspectives, and the use of self-reflection to pose questions and critically consider the partiality of one’s perspective (martin, 2012). thus, two-eyed seeing facilitates the interdisciplinary, intersectoral community engagement that is required for effective policy design, implementation, and application (black & mcbean, 2016). enhancing the two-eyed seeing approach to research and strengthening it through all stages of the research process involves creating and maintaining what ermine, sinclair, and jeffery (2004) have called “ethical space.” ermine et al. (2004) used the term “ethical space” to describe an abstract space that frames an encounter or interaction between two individuals or groups who come together with different perspectives and intentions. ethical space alluded to the space for meaningful dialogue between indigenous and western worlds. affirming ethical space where dialogue and cross-cultural engagement exists and frank, respectful discussion regarding participants’ intentions, values, and assumptions can take place has been a necessary element of our work. we argue for an ethical space within policymaking circles that prioritizes “engagement at the level of ideology,” since traditional policymaking tables are often spaces where “ideologies become so deeply entrenched that they are invisible to their beholders” (fridkin, 2012, p. 117). i m p a c t s o f f o r c e d d i s p l a c e m e n t o n i n d i g e n o u s p e o p l e s we located literature about flooding and fd, which was critiqued from the viewpoints of both western science and indigenous knowledge. specifically, we reviewed these studies to determine their inclusion of indigenous participants and knowledge. researchers described the short-term and long-term health 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 6 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.6 impacts of flooding amongst the general population (ahern, kovats, wilkinson, few, & matthies, 2005; alderman, turner, & tong, 2012). however, we found few studies about the impacts of flooding and fd that were specific to indigenous communities. of note, indigenous peoples tend to see these events differently: “indigenous groups believe that the devastation of their lands through globalization and commercial exploitation and climate change is equivalent to a physical assault” (king, smith, & gracey, 2009, p. 81). the destruction of indigenous peoples’ food sources, homes, and medicines violates their physical, spiritual, emotional, and social well-being in ways that are similar to traumatic, violent assault. the physical environment and connection to land have both been noted as critical elements of health for indigenous populations (reading & wien, 2009; richmond & ross, 2009). furthermore, indigenous groups have equated the decline of their traditional territories as a process akin to either a family member dying or physical dismemberment: “as traditional custodians of the land, dispossessed indigenous peoples have lost their primary reason for being” (king et al., 2009, p. 81). one study we reviewed investigated the intergenerational consequences of fd in four american indian communities in the united states and four first nations communities in canada by collecting survey data from 507 youth and their biological mothers (walls & whitbeck, 2012). this study noted that government relocation policies and fd caused harmful health effects in three generations of indigenous people, such as intergenerational substance abuse, depressive symptoms, ineffective parenting skills, and delinquent behaviour in youth (walls & whitbeck, 2012). fd was directly associated with alcohol abuse, which negatively impacted supportive parenting (walls & whitbeck, 2012). for indigenous peoples, the impacts of fd and loss of land directly influence and contribute to each other, as loss of land has been cited as one of the most significant factors contributing to health disparities (king et al., 2009; richmond & ross, 2009). while types of fd differ profoundly in their causes (which include but are not limited to natural disasters, human-made disasters, development projects, and conflicts), their consequences are similarly impoverishing (cernea, 2006). however, the economic impacts of fd on indigenous peoples are more catastrophic (ballard & thompson, 2013; ballard, thompson, & klatt, 2012; howitt et al., 2012). negative health impacts stemming from the fd of indigenous peoples are numerous and profound (denis, 2012; kingston & marino, 2010; lienafa & martin, 2010; maldonado, shearer, bronen, peterson, & lazrus, 2013; o’sullivan & handal, 1988; shearer, 2012; zander, petheram, & garnett, 2013). for example, thompson, ballard, and martin (2014) found: after involuntary relocation, rural [i]ndigenous communities have experienced a cultural identity crisis, resistance to innovation, and increased dependency . . . as well as increased morbidity and mortality. even the threat of such relocations has been associated with severe levels of psychological distress and dysfunction. (p. 80) studies examining the impact of fd among indigenous peoples indicated that sociopolitical contexts shape indigenous communities’ vulnerability. for example, kant, vertinsky, zheng, and smith (2013) collected 316 questionnaires to determine key contributors to well-being stemming from sociocultural factors and land use within two first nations communities (one in ontario and one in british columbia). the percentage of household meals from traditional diets and the impact of government regulations on land use were two factors strongly associated with well-being (kant et al., 2013). furthermore, a lack of inclusive, comprehensive policies and procedures—such as emergency 3 martin et al.: little saskatchewan first nation elders published by scholarship@western, 2017 management plans, clear breakdowns of roles and responsibilities, shortand long-term solutions to identified problems, different jurisdictional responsibilities, and inadequate funding—compounded the negative impacts of fd (kant et al., 2013; office of the auditor general, 2013; shearer, 2012). fd, coupled with inadequate governance mechanisms to support adaptation strategies, contributed to negative health impacts, a loss of community and culture, and economic decline, which further exacerbated tribal impoverishment and injustice (shearer, 2012). government agents lacked the power to fully assess, mitigate, and address the problem of fd (shearer, 2012). in a case study of the forced displacement of the kivalina, shearer (2012) concluded that the agencies responsible for relocation planning and disaster management should be more closely linked to each other and should receive significant input from affected indigenous communities. a number of authors recommended that policymakers attend to what local communities identify as important for the maintenance of their “new” communities (kingston & marino, 2010; lienafa & martin, 2010; maldonado et al., 2013; tousignant & sioui, 2009; zander et al., 2013). generally, communities have identified strong extended and nuclear family ties as important aspects of their communities. since european settlement, indigenous communities in canada have for centuries experienced negative impacts resulting from fd (black & burns, 2006; royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996; waldram, 1988). after confederation in 1867 and the indian act of 1876, fd of indigenous communities became a more common occurrence. historically, fds have been categorized as “relocations,” which are either administrative or developmental (waldram, 1988). administrative relocations have been defined as moves that facilitate federal government operations or address the perceived needs of indigenous peoples (black & burns, 2006). examples of an administrative relocation include the mass evacuation of thousands of indigenous peoples to southern sanatoria for tuberculosis treatment in the mid-1900s and the 1994 relocation of 1,000 members of the mushuau innu from davis inlet, labrador (black & burns, 2006; cameron, 2012). the mushuau innu’s nomadic way of life was drastically disrupted when they were forced to settle in davis inlet, a poorly serviced and overcrowded community. this change resulted in the loss of traditional livelihoods, social upheaval, and rampant substance abuse. in 1993, the canadian media televised scenes of mushuau innu youth abusing solvents, which prompted a wave of public outcry regarding solvent abuse and poor living conditions in the community. in response, governments funded another relocation of the mushuau innu to a community chosen site on the mainland (cameron, 2012). canada’s centuries-long history of colonization and fd of indigenous communities tells a story of domination, discrimination, and assimilation (denov & campbell, 2002). for example, the fd of the dene people, who were moved from little duck lake to a 300 by 600 foot camp near a cemetery on the outskirts of churchill, manitoba, offers an example of one-eyed seeing that does not consider the insights of local, indigenous knowledge when making decisions. a biologist took a photo of numerous caribou carcasses lying along the shore of little duck lake. from the biologist’s perspective, which was steeped purely in western science, to kill a number of animals and not use them immediately was seen as wasteful and overkill. he did not see the dene view that the caribou were being sustainably managed in order to continue to provide food for the long, very cold winter months in the arctic as had been done for centuries. the government took action without trying to understand or communicate with the dene. in order to protect the caribou herd population, the government relocated the dene away from caribou migration routes, thereby depriving them of food and clothing. for the dene, the relatively small camp was an ostensible prison for a tribe that depended on caribou hunting for sustenance. the 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 6 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.6 result of this fd was loss of culture, land, food, and a way of life. among those who were relocated, 117 of the 260 people died. the fd of the dene is just one example of many fds administered by the canadian government, most of which have been privileged only one way of seeing, or one-eyed seeing (malone, 2016). developmental relocations are often the result of agricultural expansion, land reclamation, urban development, or hydroelectric projects (waldram, 1988). the james bay hydroelectric project in northern quebec, for example, has had a large impact on the cree peoples due to the floodwaters from the dam structures (berry, wintrob, sindell, & mawhinney, 1982; salisbury, 1986). noah eagle from waswanipi first nation has explained how hydro québec disrupted his community’s oral tradition of storytelling by flooded the land (grand council of the crees, n. d.). historically, elders from waswanipi shared their knowledge and transmitted information about the local culture through storytelling, which would typically take place on the land. the loss of land resultant to hydro québec’s deliberate flooding meant that the oral, storytelling-based transmission of elders’ knowledge was replaced by books and writing. he explained: for years i have helped the cree youth. they have asked me to teach them the traditional practices. my response to them was it will be hard for you to learn, for everything done in our traditions relies on the land and comes from the land. today it is harder to teach these practices to the youth because the land is being destroyed by loggers and by hydro québec. a school teacher would probably say: how am i supposed to teach if i have nothing to teach with? (grand council of the crees, n. d., noah eagle, waswanipi section, para. 1) forced displacement must be considered alongside broader process of dispossession and displacement that are known to impact the cultural, spiritual, social, economic, and political aspects of indigenous peoples’ lives (black & burns, 2006). for example, the churchill river diversion in the 1970s, initiated by manitoba hydro and supported by the provincial and federal governments, resulted in fd of the south indian lake community (lienafa & martin, 2010; thompson, 2015; waldram, 1988). the chemawawin cree of easterville were relocated when the grand rapids dam (completed in 1964 on the saskatchewan river near the community of grand rapids) was flooded, destroying both peoples’ livelihoods and the habitat of species that provided sustenance for the people. in 2015, then-premier of manitoba greg selinger apologized for the impacts of hydroelectric development on indigenous peoples in manitoba: the effects of hydro projects include effects on transportation in summer and winter, effects on fishing, effects on water quality and, which in some cases includes significant flooding of first nation reserve land and other lands traditionally used by indigenous people . . . we recognize that hydro development can affect the cultural identities of indigenous peoples because of the close relationship of indigenous people to the land and resources. (kirby, 2015, para. 4) t h e c a s e s t u d y : l i t t l e s a s k a t c h e w a n f i r s t n a t i o n ( l s f n ) the lake st. martin basin has been divided into four reserves by the crown. little saskatchewan first nation is part of treaty 2, which was signed in 1871; the community’s land base is situated on the western shores of lake st. martin, approximately 225 kilometres northwest of winnipeg. please see figure 1 for a map of canada with the province of manitoba and a map of manitoba locating lsfn. 5 martin et al.: little saskatchewan first nation elders published by scholarship@western, 2017 f i g u r e 1 . l o c a t i o n o f l i t t l e s a s k a t c h e w a n f i r s t n a t i o n i n m a n i t o b a , c a n a d a ( i n d i a n a n d n o r t h e r n a f f a i r s c a n a d a , 2 0 1 0 ) . anishinaabe people have resided on the shores of lake st. martin for many generations, and elders from this region have shared their grandparents’ stories of how beautiful life was during their youth (ballard et al., 2012; ballard & thompson, 2013). elders have noted that the land was once home to bison and other wildlife, and it was fertile for agricultural activities such as growing hay and raising and ranching cattle. fishing, agriculture, and hunting provided abundant resources to feed and clothe families. from the mid-1850s until the creation of a water control structure in 1961, fishing and agriculture provided adequate income and sustenance (ballard et al., 2012; ballard & thompson, 2013). as with some first nations communities in canada, the church is a focal point. church ceremonies, gatherings, and practices are revered by most lsfn members. in 1961, a water control structure was constructed upstream at fairford river, an outlet from lake manitoba. in 1970, the creation of a second water control structure, the portage diversion, resulted in higher water levels in lake manitoba and lake st. martin. since the construction of these water control structures, lsfn and adjacent first nations communities have experienced recurring flooding (ballard, martin, & thompson, 2016; thompson, ballard, & martin, 2014). in canada, water is governed at the provincial level (ballard, 2017; thompson, 2015). in 2011, to protect downstream towns and cities along the assiniboine river from flooding, provincial government officials diverted the river’s water to flow through control structures to lake st. martin, thereby flooding 17 first nations communities and displacing 4,525 first nations people (flood review task force, 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 6 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.6 2013). the impacts of the government’s decision to flood this area were extensive. in particular, the flood, the emergency evacuation, and the resulting forced displacement continue profoundly impact members of little saskatchewan first nation (flood review task force, 2013). while most evacuated families from other affected first nation communities were able to eventually return to their homes, approximately 350 members (half of the on-reserve population) of little saskatchewan first nation still reside in temporary housing. the majority of displaced community members reside in winnipeg and resettlement has not yet occurred. provincial government officials utilized the emergency measures act to issue a call for emergency evacuation without consulting first nations communities. some community members have noted that they were provided with 24 to 48 hour notices to evacuate their homes, and they were given instructions to take two suitcases and leave all other possessions behind—including pets. initially, the manitoba association of native firefighters was tasked with managing the evacuation and the evacuees. this organization typically assists with smaller scale and short-term evacuations caused by forest fires. by 2015, the canadian red cross was designated as the “new” agency that would provide assistance to flood evacuees. reports of blatant racism, family breakups, increased family violence, drug use, substance abuse, and recruitment of youth by gangs in winnipeg have emerged regarding the 2011 flood evacuees (ballard et al., 2012). lsfn community members continue to be dispersed throughout winnipeg and the interlake region just north of winnipeg, which disrupts their existing social support systems and social networks (ballard et al., 2012). some flood evacuees have reported experiencing covert and overt racism on a frequent basis in their hotels and throughout winnipeg. furthermore, evacuees have reported the physical and verbal assault of elders, and being called “freeloaders.” these negative experiences were compounded by the media’s portrayal of evacuees as “living high off the public purse” (ballard et al., 2012). it is worth noting that some lsfn community members chose not to evacuate (because their houses were located on higher ground), and some evacuees whose houses were not totally damaged have returned to their home community. approximately 240 community members now reside in lsfn, though the buildings there are overcrowded and mould infested due to flood damage. the community members who have returned must reckon with both the loss of recreational and sacred land and major disruptions to their hunting, fishing, and farming industries (ballard et al., 2016). in 2011, the average annual income in lsfn among individuals over 15 years was $8,848 cad. among the 10% of community members who earned wages, the average was slightly less than $25,000 cad per year (indigenous and northern affairs canada, 2017). this average annual income is approximately onequarter the average income of manitobans ($32,090 cad) and canadians ($32,790 cad) in 2014 (statistics canada, 2016). currently, approximately 350 lsfn community members continue to reside in temporary housing. their lsfn homes are uninhabitable, condemned and full of black mold due to flood damage. these community members remain geographically and socially “removed” from their home community (flood review task force, 2013). 7 martin et al.: little saskatchewan first nation elders published by scholarship@western, 2017 some evacuees have identified that the health outcomes of their fd include premature deaths, increased rates of youth suicides, miscarriages, mental health issues, and worsening of chronic diseases such as cancer, diabetes, and cardiovascular disease (ballard et al., 2016). these impacts are expected to be profoundly negative and long-lasting because lsfn community members maintain a deep attachment to the land and were active in subsistence and resource livelihoods such as fishing and hunting, which were disrupted or permanently destroyed by the 2011 flood. from our understanding of both the lsfn fd and existing literature on fds in canada, we argue that a detailed understanding of lsfn elders’ experiences of fd after the 2011 flood, with specific focus on health impacts, is necessary. we argue that it is necessary because it begins to fill a major gap in the literature (which is written from a western perspective) and record and disseminate the elders’ knowledge (from an indigenous perspective). elders’ knowledge about strategies to heal can provide a foundation from which to inform programming and policies relevant to survivors of fd and their descendants. m e t h o d g u i d e d b y t w o e y e d s e e i n g guided by the insights of two-eyed seeing, we incorporated a participatory framework and integrated knowledge translation (ikt) into our study. by partnering with the chief and council of lsfn, we aimed to sustain a mutually respectful relationship based on shared responsibilities and benefits with relevant outcomes. community advisory board (cab) members were recruited based on their positions as well as their knowledge and wisdom about lsfn, indigenous ontology, and indigenous epistemology. a cab was established with two lsfn elders and the lsfn band councillor for health. the cab guided the multidisciplinary research team during every phase of the study. by incorporating an ikt approach, the research process was culturally appropriate, respectful, equitable, and reciprocal. similar to the design used by varcoe, brown, calam, harvey, and tallio (2013), this study used a critical ethnography approach (i.e., a western perspective) within a participatory framework (i.e., an indigenous perspective). ethnographic research provided us with data sources and activities that ensured a rich, “emic” or “insider” description of lsfn elders’ way of life after fd. the design ensured that the perspectives of lsfn elders were at the centre of this study’s analysis. importantly, this design orients the research to work with the community rather than on it (tobias, richmond, & luginaah, 2013). critical ethnography provided a critical, sociopolitical lens with the intent to promote change (o’mahony, donnelly, este, & bouchal, 2012). we adopted a critical stance, which facilitated our abilities to problematize current, dominant, and taken-for-granted understandings about lsfn elders’ experiences of fd (barron, 2013; ford & airhihenbuwa, 2010; hylton, 2012). critical ethnography provides procedures and tools to address how historical, social, political, and economic dimensions have shaped the experiences and health impacts of fd among lsfn elders. s a m p l i n g a n d r e c r u i t m e n t s t r a t e g i e s following approval from both the education/nursing ethical review board at the university of manitoba and the lsfn chief and council, we began recruiting participants for this study using a purposive sampling technique. data sources were lsfn elders along with other key informants such as health care providers, family caregivers, and community leaders. currently displaced and “resettled” lsfn elders were invited to participate in a one-hour interview session. the cab and research team 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 6 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.6 purposefully recruited key informants to extend our understanding of the health impacts of fd on lsfn elders, available and needed services and resources, and the historical or sociopolitical factors impacting the lives of displaced and resettled lsfn elders. d a t a c o l l e c t i o n m e t h o d s guided by two-eyed seeing, we believe that the most appropriate method of data collection was videorecorded, face-to-face interviews, because they honour the oral tradition of indigenous peoples. each interview session was conducted by ballard, who is fluent in anishinaabemowin—the traditional language spoken in lsfn, and recorded by a graduate research assistant. all video recordings were translated into english and transcribed verbatim into word documents for analysis. d a t a a n a l y s i s guided by two-eyed seeing, we began with low-level coding to describe the elders’ perceptions of their actions, behaviours, and events. the cab and the research team explored the subjective and normative realm of fd within the context of the elders’ hotel accommodations, multiple moves, temporary housing, and dreams of permanent homes in lsfn. we compared and contrasted the subjective realm of currently displaced elders with the on-reserve elders’ experiences. analysing the elders’ interviews, the cab and research team focused on the nature of power in order to determine how intergroup relations and multi-level government policies and procedures shaped lsfn elders’ fd experiences and health outcomes. from our perspective, two-eyed seeing provided a panoramic lens through which to analyse the data, thereby facilitating a more comprehensive description of elders’ experiences, health outcomes, and future plans for lsfn. i n t e g r a t e d k n o w l e d g e t r a n s l a t i o n the chief and council of lsfn requested two deliverables: a. a written report, and b. a video that documented both elders’ experiences and health outcomes stemming from the 2011 flood and fd, and their viewpoints about ways to heal and move forward. during the study, the research team, the lsfn chief and council, and cab met every three months to discuss issues relating to the research protocol and the study’s preliminary findings. these meetings served to guide the filming for the video and research focus. at the conclusion of the one-year project, the research team shared a written report with the lsfn chief and council, and two community-based video premieres of the study’s video, wounded spirit: forced evacuation of little saskatchewan first nation elders (ballard, martin, & thompson, 2016), were held and followed by traditional feasts and discussion. one premiere was held in lsfn and the other was held in winnipeg to ensure that the knowledge therein was shared with both on-reserve and displaced community members. following the premieres, community members were invited to provide their input about the video. following the premieres, and with permission from the cab and lsfn chief and council, the video was uploaded onto youtube.com for free public access. the cab, lsfn chief and council, and community 9 martin et al.: little saskatchewan first nation elders published by scholarship@western, 2017 members identified that future research focused on youth was needed to understand their experiences of fd. f i n d i n g s using a western and indigenous perspective throughout the data analysis phase of this study, we identified two major themes: “still adrift” and “rebuilding community.” these themes described the elders’ experiences, health outcomes of fd, and their perspectives on how to heal and move forward. the themes reflect the cultural and spiritual significance of water and land along with the need to build relationships. when providing direct quotes to illustrate this study’s findings, we use participating elders’ first names after having been granted permission. d e s c r i p t i o n o f t h e s a m p l e eight elders and seven key informants volunteered to participate in one-hour, video-recorded interviews. please refer to table 1 for a general description of participants. three elders were male and five were female. among the elders we interviewed, 2 of the 8 chose to remain in lsfn in order to continue their employment and protect their and others’ properties; the remaining six elders were evacuated from the community. to date, 4 of the 8 elders remain displaced and one elder has died. since the 2011 evacuation, one elder shared that she was required to move 12 times. all elders spoke anishinaabemowin during their interviews. participating elders noted that their community life was unstable and lost after the flood; they described this instability and lostness using the phrase “still adrift.” “still adrift” encapsulated the interrelated subthemes of the elders’ interviews. these subthemes were: a. multiple losses, b. never-ending stress, c. profound loneliness, and d. experiencing toxic environments. s t i l l a d r i f t elders’ losses resulting from the 2011 flood and fd included premature mortality of other members of lsfn (through either the worsening of chronic illnesses or the early onset of an acute illness). elders expressed grief and frustration over the loss of homes, possessions, the church, and their roles in lsfn. moreover, they shared that they have visited their former homes, even though the houses have mould damage following the flood. i go back home once and awhile, to go see the house. sometimes we sleep over, i'm lonesome; we want to go home. i still want to go back home, sometimes i go see my house for the weekend. (elder johnny, p. 2, line 23) 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 6 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.6 t a b l e 1 . d e s c r i p t i o n o f p a r t i c i p a n t s f i r s t n a m e r o l e e v a c u e e c h o s e n o t t o e v a c u a t e 1 albert band councillor ✓ 2 barry physician n/a 3 betty elder ✓ 4 charlene family caregiver ✓ 5 clifford elder ✓ 6 darrell band councillor ✓ 7 isabella elder ✓ 8 jerry education director ✓ 9 jonny elder ✓ 10 mary elder ✓ 11 maryjane elder ✓ 12 ray band councillor ✓ 13 thomas security personnel ✓ 14 wesley elder ✓ 15 wilma elder ✓ 11 martin et al.: little saskatchewan first nation elders published by scholarship@western, 2017 i was a bus driver when i was living in my community. i was a bus driver for 38 years . . . it was very hard especially losing my job that i loved doing. (elder maryjane, p. 1, line 12) participants shared that the emergency evacuation and fd created endless stress amongst all community members—both for evacuees and for those who were able to remain or return to lsfn. limited information and resources compounded the stress associated with fd. since 2011 a lot of things have changed around lsfn. i was so depressed after [the flood] . . . i got very depressed. (band councillor albert, p. 3, line 10) profound loneliness was a common among elders who were evacuees and elders residing in lsfn. prolonged displacement disrupted elders’ social connectedness and abilities to transmit cultural values, beliefs, and activities to youth. a lot of people that lived here and when they left, it’s been lonely and i miss them; a lot of them live in the city now. i miss them, there is no one to visit here. (elder jerry, p. 2, line 4) i have band members calling me, stressing their concerns of wanting to come home so how do you answer them? i myself i’m not a therapist myself, i can’t say oh i know what you’re going through, you’re sick or your missing your spouse, that you lost your loved one. (band councillor darrell, p. 8, line 3) in addition, elders described toxic environments resulting from substandard and overcrowded housing, a destroyed ecosystem, a poverty-stricken urban setting, and problematic intergroup relations. substandard and overcrowded housing was typical for evacuees and residents of lsfn. participants in lsfn described living in houses infested with black mould and snakes. please see figure 2 for a photo of a security personnel worker wearing a hazmat suit outside of a condemned home in lsfn 4 years after the human-made flood. i went and stayed in winnipeg because i started getting sick. it was always flooded in our basement [in lsfn]. the mould started coming around and i started getting sick from that. i started getting headaches and nose bleeds and then i got cancer . . . it affected us badly, our house was condemned, i had to move out of there . . . last year, snakes starting coming into the house and then i had to deal with them. (band councillor ray, p. 1, lines 2-4) 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 6 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.6 f i g u r e 2 . s e c u r i t y p e r s o n n e l e n t e r i n g a c o n t a m i n a t e d h o u s e a t l s f n i n 2 0 1 5 ( p h o t o s o u r c e : m y r l e b a l l a r d , 2 0 1 5 ) . elders also described feeling devastated by the human-made destruction of their traditional land and lakes. for example, elder isabella lamented, “maybe one day the birds will return.” we have people that are gone now that passed on [due in part to exacerbated stress and toxic environments caused by the human-made flood in 2011]. we lost a lot of loved ones in the community. (band councillor darrell, p. 2, line 4) i was healthy before we got evacuated . . . when we stayed in gimli, i was so sick, i think i almost died, slept all day and all night. i couldn’t eat. (elder wesley, p. 1, line 8, line 20) relocated elders shared health and social outcomes resulting from living in poverty in hotels and temporary housing in an urban setting. they associated the toxic urban environment with the loss of traditional foods, food insecurity, racism and bullying in schools, youth involvement in gangs, substance abuse, and marital breakups. 13 martin et al.: little saskatchewan first nation elders published by scholarship@western, 2017 there’s gangs, there’s drugs, there’s alcohol, there’s starvation. people are hungry, people want to come home and eat and you know, come home and live with their family and loved ones. (band councillor darrell, p. 3, line 6) [evacuees] get a supplement of $4 a day . . . i don’t know who can eat on $4 a day, especially in an urban setting where everywhere you turn today, you gotta pay for everything living in the city, at $4 a day . . . you know how to eat healthy in the communities and that has been taken away from us, the healthy eating lifestyle. (elder clifford, p. 3, line 6) participants shared their feelings of devastation regarding the destruction of the land and lake. they expressed that, historically, their land provided them with pastures for cattle, gardening, and recreational activities such as baseball. some participants shared that their families were required to sell cattle after the flood because there were no pasture lands available. likewise, gardening was limited due to the poor soil quality, and recreational activities like baseball, walking along the lakeshore, and swimming were no longer feasible. participants noted that the lake is now polluted with high levels of mercury from decaying trees and their well water has become discoloured and foul smelling. even his trees died from the flood. even the shacks he built, they’re all mouldy now. our anishinaabe lost a lot of things. (band councillor ray, p. 1, line 4) experiencing toxic environments also characterized the participants’ descriptions of problematic intergroup relations, lack of information, and limited opportunities to participate in decision making. participants described being excluded from discussions and negotiations with provincial and federal government officials about the provision of daily living allowances to evacuees, the limited mental health resources available to evacuees, water management, disaster relief measures, housing, and infrastructure. one key informant reported that lsfn received mental health services from one mental health counsellor 8 hours per month, noting that 8 hours per week was more appropriate for the lsfn’s needs. the government is only promising 60 houses and the rest are going to have to be dealt with in a comprehensive settlement agreement. i don’t find that fair at all because we saved the taxpayer . . . about two million because we have about 250 people still on the reserve that lived in condemned homes. (band councillor albert, p. 5, line 20) there is a felt sense of injustice and systemic racism relating not only to the housing crisis but also about the human-made flood, insofar as the water was diverted away from winnipeg to lake st. martin— affecting first nations peoples on-reserve rather than non-indigenous settlers in the city. the white people flooded us. they got me mad, because they didn’t care. they flooded us out, even with our cattle. the white man doesn’t want us to hurt them but they don’t care about us. (elder isabella, p. 8, line 17) r e b u i l d i n g c o m m u n i t y participating elders shared strategies regarding how to heal and move forward, and they noted their desires and abilities to facilitate self-determination in their rebuilt community. most participants acknowledged the need for lsfn community members to nurture themselves through prayer and 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 6 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.6 reconnect with their cultural identity, values, traditional healing, and other people (inside and outside lsfn) in order to rebuild a vibrant community. elders and key informants explained that reconnecting to cultural identity and learning about cultural values, beliefs, and activities, along with prayer, would nurture one physically, emotionally, mentally, and spiritually. fd took the “connection” to cultural identity away from the people of lsfn. one elder identified the need for a safe house in the community, which would be accessible to any member of the community, and would provide shelter and a resource person when necessary. if there is something bothering you in your life, make a fire and look at it, pray and talk to god. he’ll hear you wherever you are, inside or outside, he’s always there he’s close to you. especially if you are troubled in your life, that’s where it’ll help, the fire. it soothes your soul . . . that’s what helped me and satisfied my soul. (elder isabella, transcript 2, p. 1, line 1) we’re getting some houses later on but first they’re going to build a road. the government is really hard, they don’t want to help. they are giving us a hard time, very difficult. they said they are going to give us 60 [houses] for now, the ones that live in winnipeg will have first place. i guess to the reason why i feel better is because i pray before i go to bed and i go to church. i feel good when i get prayed for, prayer is strong. (band councillors raymond, p. 7, line 20) while most elders reflected upon the value of praying for their healing processes, one elder shared his reliance on traditional medicine, western health care, and prayer to heal a chronic illness that worsened during fd. [a medicine woman] is making me medicine. i drink a jug a week, two times a day. it washes away the cancer. what i know today, my late grandfather taught me, how to make medicine, i would make medicine for the sick kids that have teething problems. a lot of kids on the reserve are doing good because i looked after them. because i made medicine for them . . . someday when i die, i told my wife that she would take over and look after the little kids. all kinds of anishinaabe go and see [the medicine woman]. it helps a lot of people. (band councillor ray, p. 6-7, line 26) some elders noted that they made a conscious decision not to abide by the province of manitoba’s order to evacuate, instead staying behind to care for properties and pets and to continue employment. others decided to leave lsfn to access health services and/or to alleviate the negative health impacts of living adjacent to mould. the reason why i didn’t evacuate was because i felt i didn’t need to right away because they built a dyke here . . . the other reason why is because we didn’t know how long we would be evacuated and my children didn’t want to evacuate . . . when we told them we had to move into hotel rooms for the time, for a short time, they didn’t want to move. so i decided to stay home. the other reason why i didn’t evacuate also was because we were told if we evacuate we have to go on unemployment insurance and i didn’t want to go on unemployment insurance. i have a job to do. (band councillor albert, p. 1, line 4) 15 martin et al.: little saskatchewan first nation elders published by scholarship@western, 2017 most elders and key informants identified the need for all members of the community to come together and reconnect. self-determination was highly valued, and elders consistently emphasized the need to be proactive and collaborative when planning a new community. if you’re gonna build a community—build it right is what i said. this is something that our grandchildren, our grandchildren’s children are going to live in this community forever and ever. i don’t want any mistakes or any errors made while i’m under their watch i said. so build us a proper road, with a walking path or you know, i’ve been fighting strong and hard with the government. (band councillor darrell, p. 3, line 5) the government wants us to justify who is going to live in those new homes, which evacuees are gonna come home. they wanna conduct an interview with the evacuees who are going to be living in those homes and sign out on those homes. this is the province trying to dictate as to what they’re gonna do. but i said, where is it in the government that the province has any jurisdiction on the federally owned reserves. our reserves in canada are all governed by the federal government. so it’s just playing, it’s just another stall tactic that the government is trying to do with our people here and i said no, you’re not going to do that to us. so i’ve been arguing and fighting hard for our people. (band councillor darrell, p. 4, line 5) in summary, eight elders and seven key informants shared their perspectives about fd and its negative impacts on individual, family, and community health. elders were “still adrift” years after a human-made flood and fd. they experienced multiple losses: homes, possessions, livelihoods, health, place of worship, and premature deaths of family and community members. their grief was compounded by feelings of profound loneliness and witnessing the destruction of their traditional land and lake. high levels of stress and substantial negative health outcomes were exacerbated by poor living conditions regardless of whether they chose to stay in lsfn (overcrowding, mold) or were relocated to an urban setting infested with negative social problems (gangs, drugs, alcohol, and food insecurity). despite being “still adrift,” participants shared strategies to heal, move forward, and rebuild a new community. “rebuilding community” represented elders’ and key informants’ advice to attend to holistic health by integrating prayer and traditional medicines with western health services. elders acknowledged the significance of self-determination, rebuilding the community, reconnecting evacuees with non-evacuees, and the need to have a voice at the policymaking table. by focusing on children and youth, elders expressed hope to rebuild lsfn for future generations. d i s c u s s i o n participants were “still adrift” following the 2011 human-made flood. water represents life. one of the indigenous practices is to say prayers and give thanks when someone is near water (anderson, 2008). many traditions are also passed in or around water. to a western “eye,” water and land are seen as commodities, assets to be bought and sold for profit (ballard, 2017). from an indigenous perspective, relationships with land and water is much deeper, as land and water are interconnected, and every aspect of lsfn life revolves around water and land. the health of the land and water is central to lsfn’s culture. land is their mother. it is steeped in their culture, but also gives them the responsibility to care for it (laduke, 2002). 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 6 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.6 first nation elders forced to reside in a city experienced challenges. “still adrift” encapsulated these inter-related subthemes: (a) multiple losses, (b) never-ending stress, (c) profound loneliness, and (d) experiencing toxic environments. these elders experienced multiple losses as a direct result of the 2011 flood and fd. multiple losses included premature mortality of other members of lsfn through worsening of chronic illnesses or early onset of an acute illness. elders also described feeling devastated by the human-made destruction of their traditional land and lakes. this study’s findings contributed to the existing evidence that flooding and fd has a catastrophic impact on first nations communities (ballard, 2017; ballard et al., 2012; maldonado et al., 2013; o’sullivan & handal, 1988; thompson et al., 2014; waldram, 1988). it has been noted that a key determinant of indigenous peoples’ health is environmental stewardship (reading & wien, 2009); traditional ties to the natural environment have been recognized as contributors to superior health, which was enjoyed by indigenous peoples before colonization (reading & wien, 2009). the flood of 2011 destroyed the fabric of a community, insofar as it prompted a rapid state of transition from having a healthy relationship with the natural world to one of dispossession and disempowerment (reading & wien, 2009). this first nation community was given 24 to 48 hours notice to evacuate with no say or no knowledge where evacuees were going and the timeframe for the displacement. this case study provides further evidence that anishinabek people continue to be disempowered and marginalized (ballard, 2017). furthermore, this study’s findings support the stance of black and mcbean (2016) that two-eyed seeing approaches must be adopted in all levels of policymaking and programming. access to resources and supports are controlled by formal and informal institutions that were created to support settler society and take away land and resources from indigenous peoples (ballard, 2017). the anishinabek are particularly vulnerable as a result of these structures and processes. first nations communities exist on the margins of neoliberal settler society, which offers them no chance to participate, denies them human rights, and allows them no access to justice (ballard, 2017). the limited to no input from first nations communities on water management policies, evacuation procedures, disaster management policies, and health services, coupled with jurisdictional conflicts, has prolonged and compounded the negative health outcomes of fd (ballard, 2017; cameron, 2012; shearer, 2012; thompson, 2015). as thompson (2015) has noted, “displacement in manitoba compromises cultural identity for [first nations] communities, which has a high morbidity and mortality toll” (p. 248). what this study has added is elders’ advice about how to approach healing, move forward, and rebuild the community. given that the church is highly significant to lsfn community members, elders identified how prayer could be incorporated into learning more about one’s cultural identity, values, beliefs, and activities. the rigour of the study was strengthened by collecting data from multiple sources: (a) elders who evacuated, (b) elders who remained or returned to lsfn, and (c) individuals deemed knowledgeable about elders’ experiences and health impacts of fd. analysing the data from multiple perspectives (two-eyed seeing) including nursing, environmental sciences, critical social theory and indigenous ways of knowing also enhanced its rigour. incorporating two-eyed seeing into this study’s methods and design enables us to honour and respect participants’ identities, ways of life, use of their mother tongues, and cultural practices. the research team, cab, and lsfn chief and council engaged in several discussions about western science and 17 martin et al.: little saskatchewan first nation elders published by scholarship@western, 2017 indigenous ways of knowing in order to decipher what was meaningful and relevant to lsfn members. two eyed-seeing guided the researchers to view the data through both a strengths-based lens and an indigenous lens, which illuminated participating elders’ strategies to heal—namely, the significance of reconnecting the entire community (evacuees and non-evacuees) and their rights and self-determining actions. elders’ spiritual connections to the sacred land and water were described. incorporating two-eyed seeing into research was not without challenges, however. several members of the research team identified some difficulties placing equal value on western and indigenous ways of knowing. additionally, it was challenging to analyse data using both perspectives at the same time. some members of the research team were required to code a transcript several times. although this process was time consuming, it provided a more comprehensive analysis of the data and a more relevant written report and video (ballard et al., 2016). the lsfn chief and council and cab encouraged us to question the merits of two-eyed seeing in research because two-eyed seeing was not incorporated in policymaking and programming. in particular, we considered the benefits of incorporating two-eyed seeing in research when it is not valued or utilized by decision makers in policy or program development. participants voiced their desire for a functional community that provided the standard services available to municipalities across canada (e.g., safe drinking water, paved roads, standard housing). elders’ primary concern was securing a bright future for their youth by providing them with access to education and health care. participating elders recognized a need for new “resources for this community to function like a community,” since provincial government officials destroyed their community’s infrastructure, recreational spaces, and ancestral land and water. p o l i c y r e c o m m e n d a t i o n s we strongly support black and mcbean’s stance (2016) that two-eyed seeing be applied to policy and program development in order to enable a more egalitarian partnership between first nations and nonindigenous governments. in particular, it is incumbent upon researchers—as well as federal and provincial governments—to incorporate two-eyed seeing into water management, disaster management, and health care service policies and programs. environmental and social justice, along with health equity, may be attainable when all parties value and incorporate indigenous perspectives along with those pertaining to western science. we question why federal and provincial governments have promptly provided disaster relief to non-indigenous communities plagued by natural and humanmade disasters, yet disaster relief in affected first nations communities is lagging: many members of lsfn are still waiting to return home. c o n c l u s i o n guided by two-eyed seeing, we used participatory video interviews to explore little saskatchewan first nation elders’ experiences of fd, their related health outcomes, and their strategies to heal and move forward. in total, eight elders from lsfn and seven key informants volunteered to participate in the interviews. two-eyed seeing facilitated the establishment of a cab, integrated knowledge translation, data collection that honoured oral tradition and anishinaabemowin, and a rigorous, comprehensive analysis of the data. two major themes emerged from the data, which we have termed “still adrift” and “rebuilding community.” this case study illuminates both the merits of using two-eyed seeing in research and the necessity of partnerships between key stakeholders in policy-making processes and 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 6 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.6 program planning. for example, the perspectives and knowledge of first nations communities is crucial when it comes to programs and policies pertaining to water resource management, environmental studies, and health care services. in this way, we follow black and mcbean’s (2016) argument that twoeyed seeing is an approach that should not be limited to research. to respect indigenous peoples’ rights and knowledges, two-eyed seeing must be incorporated in policy and programs. this case study illuminated the need to incorporate two-eyed seeing in policymaking and program development, and to value and foster indigenous perspectives in decision making within communities, especially regarding activities that have a direct impact on environments within or surrounding indigenous lands. “the incorporation of traditional, local knowledge into environmental decisionmaking is an essential tool for working towards the improvement of indigenous health” (black & mcbean, 2016, p. 16). 19 martin et al.: little saskatchewan first nation elders published by scholarship@western, 2017 r e f e r e n c e s ahern, m., kovats, s., wilkinson, p., few, r., & matthies, f. 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(1988). as long as the rivers run: hydroelectric development and native communities in western canada. winnipeg, mb: university of manitoba press. walls, m. l., & whitbeck, l. b. (2012). the intergenerational effects of relocation policies on indigenous families. journal of family issues, 33(9), 1272-1293. doi: https://doi.org/10.1177/0192513x12447178 zander, k. k., petheram, l., & garnett, s. t. (2013). stay or leave? potential climate change adaptation strategies among aboriginal people in coastal communities in northern australia. natural hazards, 67(2), 591-609. doi: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11069-013-0591-4 25 martin et al.: little saskatchewan first nation elders published by scholarship@western, 2017 the international indigenous policy journal october 2017 two-eyed seeing in research and its absence in policy: little saskatchewan first nation elders' experiences of the 2011 flood and forced displacement donna e. martin shirley thompson myrle ballard janice linton recommended citation two-eyed seeing in research and its absence in policy: little saskatchewan first nation elders' experiences of the 2011 flood and forced displacement abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license two-eyed seeing in research and its absence in policy: little saskatchewan first nation elders' experiences of the 2011 flood and forced displacement ms 1462 williams advancing_indigenous_research_sovereignty final.pdf the international indigenous policy journal volume 11 | issue 1 february 2020 advancing indigenous research sovereignty: public administration trends and the opportunity for meaningful conversations in canadian research governance keith j. williams first nations technical institute and st. francis xavier university, keithw@fnti.net umar umangay first nations technical institute, umaru@fnti.net suzanne brant first nations technical institute, suzanneb@fnti.net recommended citation williams, k. j., umangay, u. & brant, s. (2020). advancing indigenous research sovereignty: public administration trends and the opportunity for meaningful conversations in canadian research governance. the international indigenous policy journal, 11(1). doi: https://doi.org/ 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.10237 advancing indigenous research sovereignty: public administration trends and the opportunity for meaningful conversations in canadian research governance abstract federally funded research in canada is of significant scope and scale. the implications of research in the colonial project has resulted in a fraught relationship between indigenous peoples and western research. research governance, as an aspect of public administration, is evolving. the relationality inherent in new public governance (npg)—a nascent public governance regime—may align with indigenous relationality concepts. recent societal advances, such as the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip), the truth and reconcilliation commission of canada (trc), and the indigenous institutes act in ontario, provide further impetus for indigenous self-determination in multiple domains including research. this article advocates for indigenous research sovereignty and concludes with suggestions for ways in which federal funding agencies, specifically the social sciences and humanities research council (sshrc), could contribute to the advancement of indigenous research sovereignty. keywords indigenous research, indigenous research sovereignty, new public governance, the kaswenta, self-determination, decolonization, social sciences and humanities research centre (sshrc) acknowledgments this research was supported by an indigenous research capacity and reconciliation—connection grant from the social sciences and humanities research council of canada. the authors would also like to recognize valuable contributions from dan longboat, luke jefferies, and alicia peltsch. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. 1 williams et al.: advancing indigenous research sovereignty published by scholarship@western, 2020 advancing indigenous research sovereignty: public administration trends and the opportunity for meaningful conversations in canadian research governance we are looking ahead, as if one of the first mandates given to us as chiefs, to make sure and to make every decision that we make relate to the welfare and well-being of the seventh generation to come, and that is the basis by which we make decisions in council. we consider: will this be to the benefit of the seventh generation? that is a guideline. (lyons, 1980, p.173) ongoing discussions regarding relationships, processes, boundaries, and content in indigenous research contexts have influenced policy considerations at the global and national levels. globally, the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip) and the world intellectual property organization (wipo) support indigenous self-governance and the protection of indigenous intellectual property (united nations, 2007; wipo, 2015). at the national level, the royal commission on aboriginal peoples (rcap, 1996) and the truth and reconciliation commission (trc, 2015) advocate educational equity for community-based initiatives and the inclusion of indigenous ways of knowing as a foundational element of mainstream education. we believe that indigenous research sovereignty is the only way to effectively address historical and contemporary injustices associated with western research. indigenous research sovereignty requires both adjustments to funding programs for researchers in mainstream universities and the formation of distinct “in-community” research administration bodies that would perform functions analogous to federal research bodies (e.g., canada’s tri-council agencies1), but would be based on indigenous principles and intellectual traditions, accountable to community, and responsive to the contemporary needs and aspirations of indigenous peoples. indigenous research sovereignty builds on and encompasses the indigenous data sovereignty movement, which insists on indigenous collection, ownership, and application of data related to indigenous peoples, their knowledges, experiences, or territories (rainie, schultz, briggs, riggs, & palmanteer-holder, 2017). recent developments regarding indigenous self-determination in the public policy arena, such as undrip (united nations, 2007), the trc (2015), and the government of ontario’s indigenous institute’s act (2017), all support indigenous research sovereignty. this article discusses each of the aforementioned policy instruments in light of indigenous research sovereignty, with a focus on canada’s tri-council agencies—specifically, the social sciences and humanities research council (sshrc). sshrc was formed by an act of parliament in 1977 and is mandated to support research and research training at the post-secondary level in the humanities and social sciences. sshrc funding is organized into three programs that focus on developing talent, investing in research that leads to insight, and fostering connections between researchers and research stakeholders. these are, respectively, the talent, insight, and connections programs, each consisting of multiple funding opportunities. sshrc (2017) is broadly concerned with improving the lives of canadians and ensuring a better future both domestically and globally by supporting independent thinking and creativity to address 21st century challenges. 1 canada’s tri-council agencies include the natural sciences and engineering research council of canada (nserc), the canadian institutes of health research (cihr), and the social sciences and humanities research council of canada (sshrc). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1 doi: https://doi.org/ 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.10237 the harmful legacy of research on indigenous peoples is one rationale for indigenous research sovereignty. part of that legacy is what spivak (1988) refers to as epistemic violence, which is the delegitimation—and even erasure—of other ways of knowing. we feel that the best way to avoid reproducing the structural discrimination associated with epistemic violence is to construct research policy in mainstream and indigenous contexts based on indigenous principles and intellectual traditions—indigenous onto-ethico-epistemologies (kuby & christ, 2018). mcgregor (2004) suggests that “. . . to understand where tek [traditional ecological knowledge] comes from one must start with indigenous people and our own understanding of the world” (p. 386). developing the pathway for further dialogue around indigenous community aspirations and the very nature of research originating from indigenous communities—including its philosophical underpinnings, multiple manifestations, and wholistic systems—is an important next step towards equity in indigenous research contexts. this article articulates a rationale for indigenous research sovereignty, or indigenous control of indigenous research. the final paragraphs of this section and the last section of this article offer some suggestions for actualizing indigenous research sovereignty in both mainstream academic institutions and indigenous institutes and research organizations. while we focus on the canadian context, the ideas presented here could be applied in other countries in which indigenous peoples aspire to research sovereignty. the views expressed in this article are influenced by our positionality. this article’s three authors identify as either indigenous or as has having indigenous ancestry. we all work at first nations technical institute, an indigenous governed post-secondary institution on tyendinaga mohawk territory, near deseronto, ontario. indigenous research and intellectual traditions indigenous peoples have been conducting research—systematically advancing human knowledge and understanding—for millennia (luarkie, 2017; tuhiwai smith, 1999). indigenous intellectual traditions are diverse, profound, and foundationally different from mainstream research paradigms (warrior, 1999). indigenous research recognizes relational responsibility between the researcher and creation, can be empirical, draws on traditional teachings, and may include explicit spiritual or revelatory elements (brant castellano, 2000; luarkie, 2017; wilson, 2001). warrior (1999) provocatively suggests that indigenous thought is fundamentally based on topos (place or territory), whereas western research paradigms are predicated on logos (reason). the centrality of territory to indigenous thought is also emphasized by sheridan and longboat (2006) who specify that imagination is not an abstract concept but rather emerges from, and is inextricably connected to, place. western research as colonial instrument western research is deeply implicated in the colonial project. western science, and its imperial sponsors, have long construed indigenous peoples as sub-human or not even human at all (tuhiwai smith, 1999), which justified the dispossession, assimilation, and extermination of indigenous peoples (culhane, 1998; rotz & kepkiewicz, 2018). this colonial mentality influenced, and continues to influence, research on indigenous peoples. for example, between 1942 and 1952 almost one thousand indigenous youth interred in canadian residential schools were purposely malnourished as unknowing participants in state-sanctioned nutritional research (mosby, 2013). sensational and fabricated anthropological 3 williams et al.: advancing indigenous research sovereignty published by scholarship@western, 2020 research conducted in the early 20th century that described human sacrifice in pueblo communities was used by new mexico state legislators to bolster laws limiting freedom of religious expression, furthering the assimilation agenda (suina, 2017). policies resulting from western research have been used to justify other aspects of colonialization such as the dispossession of indigenous peoples from their territories, murder (namaste & jauffret, 2006), and the forced sterilization of indigenous women (pegoraro, 2015). epistemic violence, mentioned earlier in this article, is that which constructs other knowledge systems as inferior and is exemplified by the colonial “palimpsestic narrative” (spivak, 1988, p. 25). this narrative, employed in mainstream western research paradigms, overwrites and in some cases subsumes or even erases indigenous knowledge systems and consequently invalidates indigenous peoples whose identities are constructed according to those knowledge systems (spivak, 1988; teo, 2010; vázquez, 2011). mainstream narratives about indigenous peoples embedded in research culture also damagingly construct indigenous peoples as “other.” one manifestation of this is the “saviour narrative,” with its implicit christian influences. on one hand, indigenous peoples are constructed as damaged, broken, deficient, and in need of “saving” (by research, enlightened public policy interventions, etc.). tuck (2009) described this as a damage-centered research. suina (2017) explained how this deficit narrative, which does not always reflect the self-perception of the indigenous community, is often necessary to secure funding for indigenous initiatives. on the other hand, indigenous peoples are sometimes fetishized as the primitive and vanishing keepers of ancient lore, which construes them as the saviours of the modern world. the publication of the brundtland report (world commission on environment and development [wced], 1987)—at the time, a high-water mark for the inclusion of environmental issues at the global policy level—includes a statement on indigenous knowledge that casts it as ancient and capable of teaching the mainstream how to solve environmental problems. according to the report: [indigenous communities] are the repositories of vast accumulations of traditional knowledge and experience that links humanity with its ancient origins. their disappearance is a loss for the larger society, which could learn a great deal from their traditional skills in sustainably managing very complex ecological systems. (pp. 114–115) a recently published paper that details indigenous andoque interactions with the more-than-human in the context of exploitative gold mining in the amazon concludes with “maybe the andoque can help us save ourselves?” (torres & verschoor, 2017, p. 58). as luarkie (2017) points out: . . . in our [puebloan] communities, there are people that are providing for their families, paying bills, holding jobs, caring for aging parents, helping their children with homework, continually teaching our indigenous customs and traditions, and living decent lives. however, when data collected and analyzed by primarily non-indigenous social and natural scientists tell the story of pueblo people, it is often that of deficit and deprivation, low levels of education attainment, health disparities, and impoverishment. (p. 132) the saviour narrative impacts how members of the mainstream community view indigenous peoples, and how indigenous people view themselves (walter & anderson, 2013). it leaves little room for authentic expression of indigenous aspirations in the research world. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1 doi: https://doi.org/ 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.10237 the public research context publicly funded research furthers understandings of the world and our place in it, informs public policy decisions, and addresses non-profit and private sector concerns (anderson & o’grady, 1999; carr, loucks & blöschl, 2018; mcnie, parris & sarewitz, 2016; smith, 2015). in canada, post-secondarybased research is primarily funded through the tri-council agencies: sshrc, cihr, and nserc. canada’s 2018 budget reveals a heavy investment in research, with a $3 billion allocation to fundamental research (government of canada, 2018). research is situated, globally and nationally, as a commodity of consequence commanding significant interest and resources from government and industry and conferring status on those that successfully conduct research (cheek, 2017a; macdonald & martinez-uribe, 2010). alejandro adem, the ceo of mitacs—a research and training non-profit organization based in vancouver—was recently cited in university affairs echoing a common sentiment: “science is a global endeavour . . . ideas transcend borders, no country controls the marketplace of ideas” (cited in owens, 2018, p. 18). spulber (2008) suggested that the primary source of global gain derives from trade in ideas and innovations rather than products and services. the neoliberal research marketplace can be characterized by the accumulation of capital in the form of, for example, peer-reviewed publications. research capital is then used as currency to invest in collaborative opportunities, grants, and tenure promotion (cheek, 2017a; cheek, 2017b; foskett, 2011). as a neoliberal manifestation of advanced capitalism (sassen, 2010), the research enterprise yields winners and losers. is this the best model for society to benefit from our collective intellectual capacity? the globalized neoliberal research model threatens indigenous intellectual property, exploits indigenous knowledge keepers and other indigenous people, and reproduces damaging narratives about indigenous knowledge and people (moore, castleden, tirone & martin, 2017; suina, 2017; tuck & yang, 2014). we suggest that indigenous research sovereignty—an equitable governance arrangement based on indigenous principles and intellectual traditions that is accountable to community and responsive to the contemporary needs and aspirations of indigenous peoples—is a better model for research with, and by, indigenous peoples in pluralist nations or nations aspiring to pluralism. in the remainder of this article, we describe governance trends in public administration. we then explore the contours of indigenous research sovereignty in light of the emergence of new public governance as an administrative model. finally, we suggest several shifts in mainstream research governance towards indigenous research sovereignty that would create a more equitable environment for indigenous research and researchers. public governance trends the past several decades witnessed successive public sector reform movements (ferlie, lynn & pollitt, 2007). the public research context, described in the preceding section, is situated on a continuum of public sector administrative approaches. understanding the history of public sector governance illuminates the potential for meaningful research governance in indigenous contexts under the emerging model. the following paragraphs detail the three most prominent regimes governing public policy construction and the provision of public services: classical public administration, new public management, and new public governance. 5 williams et al.: advancing indigenous research sovereignty published by scholarship@western, 2020 classical public administration. classical public administration (cpa), in which policy formulation and implementation are vertically integrated in a hierarchical system, was “confidently expected to meet all the social and economic needs of the citizenry, ‘from the cradle to the grave’” (osborne, 2006, p. 378). cpa was based on the primacy of representational government and associated democratic institutions (torfing & triantafillou, 2013) and the assumption that scientific approaches could reveal objective knowledge to shape and control the social and material environment (gruening, 2001). various permutations of cpa dominated public administration until the early 1980s (mcdavid & hawthorne, 2006). new public management. the economic recession of the early 1980s focused attention on what was perceived as a bloated and inefficient public sector. new public management (npm), a manifestation of neoliberalism (brown, 2015), inaugurated a wave of governmental reforms across the western world, notably in the united kingdom’s thatcher government and under the reagan administration in the united states (gruening, 2001; kisner & vigoda-gadot, 2017). npm describes the trend in public sector reform in which new initiatives draw on methods and experiences from the business world to ostensibly enhance effectiveness, efficiency, and performance of the public sector (kisner & vigodagadot, 2017). manifestations of npm include reduction in government, privatization of public services, production of the citizen as customer, regulation and performance evaluation as the primary means of ensuring program quality, reformulation of funding packages based on outputs and outcomes rather than inputs, and more (bleiklie, 2018; osborne, 2006). critiques of npm are myriad including, but not limited to, the “distortion, the deformation and ultimately the delegitimation” (doughty, 2016, p. 3) of public sector institutions, like education and health-care, the effective democratic functioning of which depends on a more complex calculus than the economic bottom line (hefetz & warner, 2004). another important criticism of npm is that it fails to adequately govern in the face of increasing competing norms and values, interorganizational and trans-boundary contexts, and governance fragmentation (koppenjan & koliba, 2013; osborne, 2010; rhodes, 1997). the identification of “wicked” social problems—those that are unbounded, intractable, and/or unpredictable (head & alford, 2015)—signals a recognition of the complexity of many issues faced by society, such as food insecurity, poverty, and addiction (candel, 2014; daley & feit, 2013; head, 2018). new public governance. a suite of programs and policy initiatives, referred to as npg, is emerging from both the shortcomings of npm and an obligation by the public sector to effectively govern in the current dynamic environment (koppenjan & koliba, 2013). npg is based on the acknowledgement of a plural and pluralist society—one in which multiple actors and processes ideally influence both the construction of policy and the production of public services (evans & sapeha, 2015; osborne, 2010). organizational sociology, particularly sub-disciplines with constructivist epistemological leanings (e.g., social network theory), informs conceptions of plurality in npg (osborne, 2010; ouchi, 1979; powell, koput, & smith-doerr, 1996). npg focuses on processes associated with building public–private interorganizational relationships and the resulting relational contracts and capital are situated as the core governing mechanisms (hilmer pedersen & johannsen, 2018; osborne, 2010). in emphasizing relationality, npg promises to unpack the “black box” of context that languished under the cpa and npm regimes (osborne, 2010). the emphasis on relationality suggests a compatibility with indigenous forms of governance. relationality is a fundamental aspect of indigenous worldviews 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1 doi: https://doi.org/ 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.10237 that reflects the profound and dynamic relationships within human communities and between humans and the more-than-human (weber-pillwax, 2001; whatmore, 2004). indigenous peoples are longstanding experts on this essential aspect of npg. we suggest that mainstream governments and governance researchers could productively engage with indigenous researchers and knowledge keepers to refine understandings of relationality and governance. public administration scholars note that successive trends in public sector reform (cpa, npm, and npg) do not represent discrete phases in governance regimes but may co-exist in various hybrid forms that may include the juxtaposition of conflicting theoretical approaches, processes, and institutional structures (christensen & lægreid, 2011; wiesel & modell, 2014). the following section describes several key policy developments and outlines the concept of indigenous research sovereignty considering the emergence of npg as a guiding approach in public sector governance. indigenous research sovereignty and the new public governance ocap®, sshrc, and indigenous research in 1998, the first nations information governance centre (fnigc, 2014) established the ownership, control, access, and possession, or ocap® principles for conducting research in indigenous communities and more broadly with indigenous information. schnarch (2014) enumerates the many benefits associated with ocap®: for example, following ocap® principles can lead to greater indigenous self-determination, meaningful capacity development, greater participation in research, and consequently more meaningful research outcomes. as schnarch (2014) points out, ocap® is adaptive and is best seen as an evolving process. we wonder if the next steps in the development of ocap® might include processes for better liaising with traditional governance structures and non-research affiliated (but research-impacted) people in indigenous communities. together with the tri-council policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans (tcps2), described below, these two instruments have shifted the ways in which academic researchers interact with indigenous peoples and data from what was an extractive and colonial relationship to one that emphasizes equity and relationality (ninomiya & pollock, 2017). sshrc’s (2016) current strategic plan (2016 to 2022) describes an intent to develop “an integrated strategy to support research by and with first nations, métis, inuit and other indigenous peoples, to ensure that research rooted in indigenous knowledge systems can be reviewed and supported across all of sshrc’s funding opportunities” (p. 7). in the same strategic plan, sshrc identifies three objectives that cut across each of the aforementioned three programs. two of the three objectives specify sshrc’s commitments to indigenous research, researchers, and community aspirations (sshrc, 2016): a. enable excellence in a changing research landscape —under this objective, sshrc will “support and advance research conducted by and with canada’s aboriginal communities.” (p. 12) b. connect social sciences and humanities research with canadians—sshrc poses the question: “how do we restore and maintain positive relations between indigenous and nonindigenous canadians, in support of a shared successful future?” (p. 16) 7 williams et al.: advancing indigenous research sovereignty published by scholarship@western, 2020 sshrc and the other members of the tri-council have taken steps towards respectful engagement with indigenous peoples through an emphasis on indigenous research by and with indigenous peoples, and the inclusion of the chapter research involving the first nations, inuit and métis peoples of canada in the revised version of the tri-council policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans (tcps2), released in 2010 (government of canada—panel of research ethics, 2018). the provisions outlined in this revised version of the tcps2 have, in some cases, led to more collaborative relationships between researchers and the indigenous community and more active involvement in the research process by indigenous partners (moore et al., 2017). however, the same study identified constraints to the ethical operationalization of tcps2 including lack of research capacity and time to devote to the research process at the community level, and limited understanding of the realities of community-based participatory indigenous research by university research ethics board (reb) members and financial service administrators. this article was prepared with support from sshrc’s indigenous research capacity and reconciliation—connection grant, a purpose of which is to codevelop with indigenous communities an interdisciplinary research and training model grounded in indigenous aspirations and methodologies (sshrc, 2018). indigenous perspectives on public research current legislation insufficiently protects indigenous intellectual property. for example, the language of article 9.18 in tcps2 leaves room for interpretation: “in collaborative research, intellectual property rights should [emphasis added] be discussed by researchers, communities and institutions.” who decides what research is collaborative and how is that determined? what about research that is not deemed collaborative? also, the word “should” suggests that intellectual property discussions are nonmandatory. university-based researchers are typically compensated for their expertise, knowledge, and research work in the form of salaries, stipends, or publications (cheek, 2017a, cheek, 2017b). based on our observations, compensation for indigenous community members—whether they are informants, research assistants, translators, or otherwise involved in the research endeavor—is not consistent with the levels of compensation enjoyed by university researchers. the current research compensation model discriminates against non-academic indigenous knowledge and expertise resulting in an inequitable distribution of benefits associated with the researcher–community relationship. finally, the notion of a global marketplace of ideas effectively ignores, at best, the legacy of exploitation of indigenous knowledge and people by western researchers. certain cultural expressions, ceremonial practices, and other indigenous knowledges already have a place in the corpus of teachings that are protected (and evolve) through inter-generational knowledge transfer. refusal research, an emerging approach, posits that certain knowledge should not be colonized by the academy, such as painful or demeaning experiences that humiliate the research subject(s) every time that research is cited or otherwise repeated (tuck & yang, 2014). refusal research serves to productively refocus the colonial gaze from constructions of the indigenous-as-deficient to structural power imbalances. refusal research can employ arts-informed methodologies to illuminate the contours of indigenous knowledges and perspectives without constructing damaging “othering” narratives (simpson, 2016) and may be applied to both damage-centered inquiry and research that attempts to intrude on private spaces. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1 doi: https://doi.org/ 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.10237 united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip) undrip is an international policy instrument, which canada has adopted, that explicitly commits to the protection of individual and collective indigenous rights (united nations, 2007). several undrip articles support our conception of indigenous research sovereignty. for example, article 4 states that “indigenous peoples, in exercising their right to self-determination, have the right to autonomy or selfgovernment in matters relating to their internal and local affairs, as well as ways and means for financing their autonomous functions” (p. 8). article 13 asserts the right of indigenous peoples to “revitalize, use, develop and transmit to future generations their histories, languages, oral traditions, philosophies, writing systems and literatures . . .” (pp. 12-13). article 14 states, “indigenous peoples have the right to establish and control their educational systems and institutions providing education in their own languages, in a manner appropriate to their cultural methods of teaching and learning” (p. 13). article 15 commits that “indigenous peoples have the right to the dignity and diversity of their cultures, traditions, histories and aspirations which shall be appropriately reflected in education and public information” (p. 14). the right to make decisions, “in accordance with their own procedures, as well as to maintain and develop their own indigenous decision-making institutions” is described in article 18 (pp. 15-16). article 31 also relates to indigenous research sovereignty: indigenous peoples have the right to maintain, control, protect and develop their cultural heritage, traditional knowledge and traditional cultural expressions, as well as the manifestations of their sciences, technologies and cultures, including human and genetic resources, seeds, medicines, knowledge of the properties of fauna and flora, oral traditions, literatures, designs, sports and traditional games and visual and performing arts. they also have the right to maintain, control, protect and develop their intellectual property over such cultural heritage, traditional knowledge, and traditional cultural expressions. (p. 22) finally, undrip article 39 states that “indigenous peoples have the right to have access to financial and technical assistance from states and through international cooperation, for the enjoyment of the rights contained in this declaration” (p. 26). champagne (2013) criticized undrip for enshrining civil rights, individual rights, and collective rights but not indigenous rights. specifically, the author maintains that undrip situates indigenous peoples as minority subjects within nation states but does not recognize the right to self-governance as a sovereign nation. despite this, champagne (2013) noted that “only the united states and canada have an unofficial form of plural citizenship for indigenous peoples, while most nation-states recognize indigenous peoples solely as national citizens” (p. 15). we believe that framing indigenous–settler relations from a nation-to-nation standpoint reflects the intent of selfdetermination explicit in undrip and that the articles of undrip support our vision for the coproduction and co-construction of indigenous research policy. the truth and reconciliation commission of canada (trc) the trc was established in 2008 to document the historical and ongoing impacts of the canadian indian residential school system on former students and their families. the trc (2015) released 95 calls to action with the expressed purpose of “redress(ing) the legacy of residential schools and advanc(ing) the process of canadian reconciliation” (p. 319). reconciliation, a term that has elicited significant critique (rice & snyder, 2012), is intended to repair the fraught relations between settler 9 williams et al.: advancing indigenous research sovereignty published by scholarship@western, 2020 canadians and indigenous peoples. call to action number 65 calls upon sshrc to “establish a national research program with multi-year funding to advance understanding of reconciliation” (trc, 2015, p. 331). sshrc’s indigenous research capacity and reconciliation—connection grants program, which funded the project leading to this article, is a response to call number 65. we believe that working towards indigenous research sovereignty represents an important step in the reconciliation process. indigenous institutes act, province of ontario the indigenous institutes act (hereafter referred to as the act) was recently passed by the province of ontario, canada (indigenous institutes act, 2017). there are currently nine indigenous governed and operated post-secondary institutes in ontario that serve the education and training needs of the communities in which they are based. up to this point, indigenous institutes primarily offered technical and vocational training and brokered degree-level programs from accredited universities (province of ontario, 2017). the act supports indigenous self-determination through indigenous control of indigenous post-secondary education and notably confers the right to grant post-secondary level degrees to recognized indigenous institutes (indigenous institutes act, 2017). research is of critical importance to undergraduate-level education. it can enhance the learning experience in multiple ways, such as providing experiential learning opportunities for students; developing students’ skills to effectively ask and answer research questions that may help them in further studies, their communities, or the workforce; and finally an active faculty research program can enrich the curriculum (hernandez, woodcock, estrada & schultz, 2018; kinkead, 2003; linn, palmer, baranger, gerard & stone, 2015). the act reinforces indigenous self-determination in the field of higher education. given the interconnectedness between degree level post-secondary education and research, a similar selfdetermined approach to in-community indigenous research should be supported. the kaswenta (two row wampum) as a model for indigenous research sovereignty npg, as a relational approach to public sector administration, is compatible with our notion of indigenous research sovereignty. sshrc solicited input for the development of a new interdisciplinary indigenous research and research training model from the indigenous research capacity and reconciliation—connection grant holders through position papers that each grant holder was required to prepare and through an in-person national dialogue event. this example of policy co-construction seems to be consistent with the relational aspects of npg. despite its emphasis on relationality, one shortcoming of npg is asymmetrical power dynamics (osborne, 2010), which are almost inevitable when state institutions engage with non-state actors, especially indigenous peoples and their knowledges as subaltern (see for example spivak, 1988). given the history of inequality between settler and indigenous nations, and the risk of unequal power arrangements in npg approaches, it is worth considering ways to mitigate the risk of inequality in these shared or transitional governance structures. we suggest that the two row wampum, or the kaswenta, represents the best process to align our thinking around respectful research relationships. the kaswenta represents the original treaty, from the early 17th century, between the haudenosaunee people and the dutch in what is now new york state. it is often depicted as a beaded belt, consisting of two purple rows separated by white wampum beads. the purple rows symbolize boats, one row is for the dutch and their 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1 doi: https://doi.org/ 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.10237 ship or sailboat, the other is for the haudenosaunee and their canoe. both vessels are depicted travelling down the river (or way) of life together, but apart (parmenter, 2013; ransom & ettenger, 2001). this seeming contradiction describes the respective sovereignty of both indigenous and settler communities but with an obligation to work together to address issues of significant mutual consequence (hill, 2013). onondaga chief irving powless jr. provides a particularly relational perspective on the kaswenta: as we travel down the road of life together in peace and harmony, not only with each other, but with the whole circle of life—the animals, the birds, the fish, the water, the plants, the grass, the trees, the stars, the moon, and the thunder—we shall live together in peace and harmony, respecting all those elements . . .” (cited in hansen & rossen 2017, p. 34) several researchers have suggested the two row wampum as a model for respectful indigenous–settler relations (kent, loppie, carriere, macdonald, & pauly, 2017; latulippe, 2015; mcgregor, 2009; ransom & ettenger, 2001). we advocate the use of the kaswenta for framing the relationship between mainstream research governance and indigenous research sovereignty, not because it represents a novel approach to indigenous–settler relations, but because it is one of the best models that we have encountered for a culturally appropriate approach to respectful research relationships that include all of creation. each of the recommendations in the following section are based on a model of research relationality, informed by the kaswenta, in which research infrastructure is housed in indigenous communities and all aspects of the research process (involving indigenous peoples or data) are governed by indigenous people and principles. this does not exclude research collaboration with mainstream researchers in areas of mutual significance. the suggestions presented in the following section, if implemented, would be a step towards indigenous research sovereignty consistent with the kaswenta. suggestions for supporting indigenous research sovereignty while canada’s tri-council agencies, sshrc, nserc, and cihr, have taken steps toward more ethical research with indigenous peoples, the research governance approach does not allow for the authentic expression of indigenous research aspirations. indigenous research sovereignty, as a guiding principle, is an important next step in decolonizing research administration in canada and beyond. the final section of this article outlines nine suggestions to advance indigenous research sovereignty, specifically to the canadian context but with potential applications for indigenous peoples worldwide. these suggestions are linked to a number of the trc’s recommendations, discussed earlier, that advocate for increased and authentic engagement with indigenous knowledge holders. we divided the recommendations into two broad categories, one that deals with enhancing the capacity of community-based research organizations to govern federally funded indigenous research and the other that details ways of ensuring that indigenous research sovereignty is supported in mainstream research institutions. 11 williams et al.: advancing indigenous research sovereignty published by scholarship@western, 2020 a. enhance the ability of community-based research organizations to govern indigenous research a.1. commit to working with indigenous community-based organizations, such as indigenous institutes, and indigenous academics and knowledge keepers to articulate in-community indigenous research sovereignty models for specific cultural contexts. conversations about the co-creation and coproduction of research governance policy with community-based indigenous research organizations and jurisdictional authority (e.g., which project types are funded by which body) are important first steps towards actualizing indigenous research sovereignty as an indigenous right in the spirit of the undrip articles and the trc recommendations. a.2. refine existing and further develop protocols for intellectual property rights associated with indigenous knowledge, traditional ecological knowledge, and indigenous language, culture, and perspectives. marie battiste (2007) and the updated tcps2 (government of canada—panel on research ethics, 2018) both point out that current legislation insufficiently protects indigenous intellectual property, specifically regarding the latitude in interpretation and application of the tcps2 (as discussed earlier). another concern is that once indigenous intellectual property has been commodified and enters the research marketplace, it can be freely used for purposes beyond original intellectual property agreements. for example, ethnopharmacological researchers at the university of new brunswick published a paper about the antimicrobial properties of sarracenia purpurea l., a carnivorous bog plant used traditionally by the mi’kmaq and wolastoqiyik peoples to treat tuberculosis and other ailments (morrison, li, webster, johnson, & gray, 2016). the traditional use of this plant, reported in a review text by daniel moerman (1998), led the researchers to assess its antimicrobial activity against the bacterium that causes tuberculosis and to identify several bio-active compounds. it is doubtful that appropriate permissions were received to use the intellectual property at the time the knowledge was originally collected. even if permission was granted by the mi’kmaq, should it still apply many years after the initial agreement? we suggest that considering a system that extends rights beyond single use may help to protect indigenous intellectual property. both copyright laws and plant breeders’ rights are specific about the types of use allowed and provide protection beyond single use (jondle, hill, & sanny, 2015), and these may serve as starting points for this conversation. finally, following marie battiste (2007), we venture that strengthened in-community research ethics organizations, perhaps modelled after successful groups like mi’kmaw ethics watch could result in more effective protection of indigenous knowledge, culture, language, and perspectives. sshrc and the other tri-council agencies in conjunction with in-community organizations could play a role in establishing dialogue towards greater protection of indigenous intellectual property. b. funding mechanisms for indigenous research at mainstream institutions should advance indigenous research sovereignty b.1. adjust research funding programs that support indigenous research to account for the additional time needed to build relational accountability between researcher and community. relational accountability in research acknowledges that all ideas are context-bound, and researchers must respect various positionalities and attendant responsibilities associated with all elements of the research project which could include people, territory, plants, animals, rivers, the cosmos, and more (wilson, 2008). 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1 doi: https://doi.org/ 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.10237 nicholls (2009) stresses that building the trust necessary for relational accountability in indigenous research contexts takes significant time, which may not correspond to tri-council funding cycles. b.2. partnerships between mainstream universities and indigenous research organizations (e.g., indigenous institutes) could facilitate knowledge sharing on equal terms. a joint canada research chair program—in which chairs are cross-appointed to indigenous research organizations and mainstream universities—would increase the likelihood that benefits from this program would extend to indigenous communities. visiting professorships and similar arrangements for research administrators would create opportunities for dialogue between similarly tasked personnel at universities and indigenous research organizations. a recent study determined that researchers who leave their home countries do not represent a “brain drain” as commonly believed but maintain active ties to researchers in their home countries, in what the authors refer to as “brain circulation” (sugimoto, robinson-garcia, murray, yegros-yegros, costas, & larivière, 2017). there are an increasing number of indigenous researchers in the academy (castleden, sloan morgan & lamb, 2012; stonechild, 2006). formalizing research ties between them and in-community research organizations—such as indigenous institutes in ontario— could ameliorate the isolation felt by indigenous academics in mainstream universities (battiste, 2018) and facilitate the extension of their expertise back to community. b.3. an additional funding envelope designated to hire elders, knowledge keepers, and/or other community members to provide research project guidance at all project stages (including conceptualization) would contribute to indigenous control of indigenous research. this funding needs to provide living wages for indigenous peoples, rather than honoraria or limited part-time salaries, to recognize and compensate for their expertise, and to help correct the power differential between specialists from the academy and specialists from community. some of this funding should be used to support capacity development for community-based research personnel so that the “professional development” opportunities afforded institution-based researchers are also available to their community counterparts. b.4. resolve ethical tensions regarding privacy considerations in chapter 9 of the tri-council policy statement of research ethics: research involving the first nations, inuit and métis peoples of canada so that indigenous research sovereignty is strengthened rather than eroded. días ríos, dion, and leonard (2018) pointed to a conflict between tri-council indigenous ethnics protocols and community-based research ethics protocols dealing with privacy. tri-council policy focuses more on individual privacy, whereas community-based policy emphasizes collective privacy and intellectual rights. this discrepancy undermines indigenous intellectual and research sovereignty (días ríos et al., 2018). b.5. continue building the capacity of sshrc’s adjudication committees around respectful and equitable assessment of research conducted in indigenous contexts or by indigenous scholars. as mentioned earlier, indigenous research methodologies are fundamentally different from western research paradigms. the illegibility of indigenous methodology-based research proposals to westernparadigm-oriented adjudication committees can yield epistemic violence (spivak, 1988)—the delegitimization of other ways of knowing—in the form of proposal rejection. refusal research, an emerging approach, posits that certain knowledge should not be colonized by the academy, such as painful or demeaning experiences that humiliate the research subject(s) every time that research is cited 13 williams et al.: advancing indigenous research sovereignty published by scholarship@western, 2020 or otherwise repeated (tuck & yang, 2014). refusal research serves to productively refocus the colonial gaze from constructions of the indigenous-as-deficient to structural power imbalances. refusal research can employ arts-informed methodologies to illuminate the contours of indigenous knowledges and perspectives without constructing damaging “othering” narratives (simpson, 2016). thick description, now a standard for ethnographic research, involves a detailed description of both behavior and context, typically with illuminating explanations or insights provided by the research subjects (geertz, 1973; kincheloe & mclaren, 2005). the potential incompatibility between refusal research, which evades the colonial gaze and thick description may result in refusal research suffering epistemic violence from adjudication committees steeped in western cultural mores. we suggest that understandings of equitable indigenous–settler research relationships are dynamic and evolving and that proposal adjudication committee members should be engaged in this process. b.6. implement a culturally appropriate program evaluation framework for assessing indigenous research at sshrc. this could involve employing participatory approaches to evaluation that include indigenous researchers and community members in the evaluative process (potvin, cargo, mccomber, delormier, & macaulay, 2003), an emphasis on narrative rather than statistical data (national collaborating centre for aboriginal health [nccah], 2013), and using indigenous principles to guide logic model outcome formulation (chouinard & cousins, 2007). designing indicators that align with indigenous principles and community aspirations which, ideally, have been used to formulate funding program objectives and the funded research projects would help to ensure that the evaluation of funding programs for indigenous research exhibit internal consistency, increasing the credibility of the results (lincoln & guba, 1985; patton, 2002). b.7. canada council for the arts (cca) requires that applicants working with “indigenous traditional knowledge, linguistic or cultural intellectual property . . . describe (their) relationship to this content” 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(2015). intellectual property and genetic resources, traditional knowledge and traditional cultural expressions. retrieved from https://www.wipo.int/edocs/pubdocs/en/tk/933/wipo_pub_933.pdf indigenous language knowledge and educational attainment among first nations people: trends over time the international indigenous policy journal volume 9 | issue 4 article 3 october 2018 indigenous language knowledge and educational attainment among first nations people: trends over time evelyne bougie statistics canada, evelyne.bougie@canada.ca dafna kohen statistics canada; university of ottawa, dafnakohen@hotmail.com anne guèvremont statistics canada, anne.guevremont@statcan.gc.ca recommended citation bougie, e. , kohen, d. , guèvremont, a. (2018). indigenous language knowledge and educational attainment among first nations people: trends over time. the international indigenous policy journal, 9(4). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.3 indigenous language knowledge and educational attainment among first nations people: trends over time abstract this study investigated whether associations between indigenous language knowledge and educational outcomes might be changing for cohorts of language speakers over time. using census and national household survey data, educational attainment for first nations people aged 20 to 34 was examined at four time points (1996, 2001, 2006, and 2011), separately for those able versus unable to speak an indigenous language and separately for those living on and off reserve. findings point to improvements in levels of education for indigenous language speakers among first nations people living on and off reserve. findings should be interpreted with caution as differences in educational attainment may reflect differences between language speakers and non-speakers that go beyond the ability to speak an indigenous language. keywords first nations, indigenous language, educational attainment, census, national household survey acknowledgments this study was funded by crown–indigenous relations and northern affairs (cirna), formerly known as indigenous and northern affairs canada (inac). the authors would like to thank rubab arim and leanne findlay for their comments on early versions of the manuscript. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ indigenous language knowledge and educational attainment among first nations people aged 20 to 34: trends over time in 2016, about 1 in 5 (21%) first nations1 people in canada reported that they were able to conduct a conversation in an indigenous language (statistics canada, 2017a). the proportion of first nations people able to converse in an indigenous language was higher among those with registered indian status (27%) than among those without registered indian status (2%); this proportion was highest among first nations people with registered indian status living on reserve (45%). many indigenous people are learning indigenous languages as a second language; indeed, the proportion of first nations people able to speak an indigenous language surpassed the proportion reporting an indigenous mother tongue, especially among younger first nations people (statistics canada, 2017a). indigenous languages are seen as an indicator of cultural continuity (hallett, chandler, & lalonde, 2007), and learning one’s indigenous language has been associated with many positive outcomes among indigenous children and youth, including better identity and self-esteem (bougie, wright, & taylor, 2003; wright & taylor, 1995) and higher grades and school attendance (guèvremont & kohen, 2012, 2017a; hallett, 2005). there is a significant body of research demonstrating the advantages of school programs (e.g., immersion programs) that include indigenous languages and cultures on educational outcomes (bell et al., 2004; fulford, daigle, stevenson, & wade, 2007; louis & taylor, 2001; wright & taylor, 1995), including literacy (rosier & holm, 1980) and numeracy (new zealand ministry of education, 2016; romero-little & mccarty, 2006; rosier & holm, 1980). although indigenous language knowledge has been associated with positive school outcomes for children and youth (guèvremont & kohen, 2012, 2017a), similar positive results have not been typically found for adults, particularly when examining population-based survey data sources. for instance, among adults, indigenous language knowledge has been associated with both a lower likelihood of high school graduation (guèvremont & kohen, 2012; hull, 2015; lamb, 2014; o’gorman & pandey, 2015) and a lower likelihood of obtaining postsecondary education (brade, duncan, & sokal, 2003; hull, 2015). guèvremont and kohen (2017b) explored potential reasons for the difference in associations of indigenous language knowledge and education outcomes for children compared to adults in a representative sample of off-reserve first nations aged 17 to 25 years. they found no association between indigenous language knowledge and high school completion among their sample of off-reserve first nations people, after accounting for important confounding variables, such as ever having attended school on a reserve, parental education, and family residential school attendance. yet, results from this study were not in line with past research that demonstrated positive relationships for indigenous language knowledge and education in off-reserve first nations children (guèvremont & kohen, 2012, 2017a) and negative relationships among off-reserve first nations adults (guèvremont & kohen, 2012). one potential explanation for this differential association of language and education among children and adults may be that the association between indigenous language knowledge and school outcomes is 1 throughout this article, the term first nations is used when statistics canada data are used for individuals who self-identified as north american indian or first nations (north american indian). 1 bougie et al.: aboriginal language knowledge and education published by scholarship@western, 2018 changing over time for different cohorts of indigenous language speakers because each group was born at a different time and was therefore exposed to different demographic, educational, and societal influences. using data from the 2001 aboriginal peoples survey, adults who spoke an indigenous language were less likely to have completed high school, even after controlling for socio-economic factors (guèvremont & kohen, 2012). however, using data from the 2012 aboriginal peoples survey, and also controlling for socio-economic factors, there was no difference in educational outcomes for adult speakers and non-speakers (guèvremont & kohen, 2017b). these studies suggest that the nature of the association between indigenous language knowledge and school outcomes may be changing for different cohorts over time. there are several reasons why the association of indigenous language knowledge with school outcomes may be changing over time. significant developments in the late 1990s may have led to a shift in the association between educational attainment and indigenous language knowledge; these include the release of the report of the royal commission on aboriginal peoples in november 1996 (royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996), the federal government’s response to the report in 1997 (indian affairs and northern development, 1997), and the creation of a 4-year indigenous languages initiative in june 19982 (department of canadian heritage, 2003). the royal commission on aboriginal peoples recognized that the revitalization of traditional indigenous languages was a key component in the creation of healthy individuals and communities; this recognition may have increased the perception of the importance of indigenous languages and cultures among both the indigenous and the general canadian population. moreover, there is evidence that the proportion of first nations people learning an indigenous language as a second language is increasing over time (norris, 2007). the gradual introduction of more secondlanguage learners into the group of individuals with indigenous language knowledge may contribute to a change in the group’s overall profile over time, both in terms of socioeconomic characteristics and in terms of sense of cultural continuity, esteem, and identity. since data for those living on reserve are missing from several survey-based studies, fewer populationbased studies have examined the associations between indigenous language knowledge and education outcomes for indigenous people living on reserve. it is important to examine the onand off-reserve populations separately, especially since indigenous language knowledge and educational outcomes are notably different for indigenous people living on and off reserve. for instance, the proportion of people reporting knowledge of an indigenous language is higher for first nations people living on reserve (norris, 2006; statistics canada, 2017a), while the proportion with postsecondary qualifications is higher for first nations people living off reserve (statistics canada, 2017b). in a study using the 2011 national household survey, hull (2015) showed that both on and off reserve the proportion who attained high school and postsecondary levels of education was lower among those who spoke an indigenous language at home relative to those who did not. to our knowledge, no research to date has examined the relationship between indigenous language knowledge and education outcomes over several time periods to examine whether the education gap between indigenous language speakers and 2 announced by the minister of canadian heritage on june 19, 1998, this initiative provided funding to community projects with the objective of emphasizing language acquisition and retention in the home. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 4 [2018], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.3 non-speakers is changing over time, and whether this relationship is changing in a similar way for first nations people living on and off reserve. in light of this, the goal of the present study was to describe, over four time periods, the educational attainment for first nations people aged 20 to 34 who reported being able and those reporting being unable to speak an indigenous language. this age group was chosen because it corresponded to the one used in past research (guèvremont & kohen, 2012) and because it allowed adequate time for individuals to complete a diploma. using three cycles of the census of the population (1996, 2001, and 2006) and the 2011 national household survey, our research questions were as follows: (a) is there an association between indigenous language knowledge and educational attainment among first nations people aged 20 to 34? (b) is the association between indigenous language knowledge and educational attainment changing over time? and (c) is the association between indigenous language knowledge and educational attainment different for first nations people living on and those living off reserve? methods data the data used were from the 1996, 2001, and 2006 census (long form) and the 2011 national household survey (nhs). several factors should be taken into account when data on indigenous people are compared over time, including differences in methodology in the nhs, changes to the wording and format of the questions, legislative changes, changes made to the definition of reserves, differences in the list of incompletely enumerated indian reserves, and individuals changing their reporting of indigenous identity from one data collection period to another. in this study, two adjustments were made to compare these data over time. first, because the population for the census long form includes usual residents in collective dwellings and persons living abroad, whereas the population for the nhs excludes them (statistics canada, 2013a), in this study, census data have been adjusted to the same universe used for the 2011 nhs (population in private households). second, because of changes that can occur to the geographies that define indian reserves and indian settlements between census years, in this study, we derived the on and off reserve population using the 2011 definition (statistics canada, 2014). statistics canada uses the definition of “on reserve” provided by indigenous and northern affairs canada (inac). in 2011, on reserve included six census subdivision (csd3) types legally affiliated with first nations or indian bands: that is, indian reserve, indian settlement (except for the five yukon settlements of champagne landing 10, klukshu, two and onehalf mile village, two mile village and kloo lake), indian government district, terres réservées aux cris, terres réservées aux naskapis, and nisga'a land, as well as the northern village of sandy bay in saskatchewan. 3 census subdivision (csd) is the general term for municipalities (as determined by provincial or territorial legislation) or areas treated as municipal equivalents for statistical purposes (e.g., indian reserves, indian settlements, and unorganized territories). 3 bougie et al.: aboriginal language knowledge and education published by scholarship@western, 2018 sample this study focused on individuals who self-identified as “north american indian” or “first nations (north american indian)” on the census or nhs4 (as a single response or in combination with another indigenous identity5) and who were aged 20 to 34 at the time of data collection. first nations respondents were further classified as living on or off reserve, and as being able or unable to conduct a conversation in an indigenous language. our study sample included those who lived in a total of 802 census subdivisions (csds) that were considered on reserve in 2011.6 when appropriate, comparisons were made with non-indigenous persons aged 20 to 34 living off reserve who were able to conduct a conversation in one of canada’s official languages (hereafter referred to as the non-indigenous population). measures indigenous language knowledge was based on responses to a question that asked in what language or languages, other than english and french, can the respondent conduct a conversation. respondents were classified as being able to conduct a conversation in an indigenous language (yes or no) using the first write-in response. another question asked about respondent’s ability to conduct a conversation in english only, in french only, in both english and french, or in none of the official languages of canada. this question was used to restrict non-indigenous respondents to those who were able to conduct a conversation in one of canada’s official languages; in other words, non-indigenous respondents who could not speak english or french were excluded from the sample. educational attainment refers to the highest level of schooling that a person has reached. highest educational attainment was coded in two different ways. first, we categorized respondents as having no diploma or any diploma as highest level attained. respondents with no diploma include those with no schooling and those who received some schooling but did not obtain a high school diploma. respondents with any diploma include those with a secondary (high school) diploma; those with some postsecondary education; and those with a postsecondary certificate, diploma, or degree as their highest educational attainment. respondents with “any diploma” cannot be referred to as high school graduates because some respondents with postsecondary education may not have received a high school diploma. second, we also categorized respondents as having no diploma, high school diploma or equivalent, or postsecondary education (some or completed) as highest level attained. respondents with postsecondary education (some or completed) are thus a subset of the previous any diploma category and this was done to specifically investigate those with a postsecondary education in a separate analysis. 4 the same aboriginal identity question was asked in the 1996, 2001, and 2006 censuses. this question reads as follows: “is this person an aboriginal person, that is, north american indian, métis or inuit (eskimo)?” (see statistics canada, 2007, aboriginal identity section, para. 4). the nhs aboriginal identity question differs slightly and reads as follows: “is this person an aboriginal person, that is, first nations (north american indian), métis or inuk (inuit)” (statistics canada, 2010, question 18)? 5 the 2006 census gathered information on whether a person identified with the aboriginal peoples of canada. in this document, the term indigenous is used in place of aboriginal. 6 in 2011, there were a total of 36 indian reserves and indian settlements that were “incompletely enumerated” in the nhs. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 4 [2018], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.3 analyses cross-sectional cohort analyses described educational attainment for four time periods (1996, 2001, 2006, and 2011), separately for language speakers and non-speakers and separately for first nations living on and off reserve. language speakers and non-speakers in their respective area of residence (on or off reserve) were compared to each other. for the off-reserve first nations population, comparisons with the non-indigenous population were also conducted. these comparisons were not conducted for the on-reserve first nations population; individuals living on reserve face greater barriers in accessing educational opportunities (statistics canada, 2013b) and this unique context is not amenable to comparisons with the off-reserve non-indigenous population. in this study, we investigated the proportion with any diploma and the proportion with postsecondary education separately. proportions with any diploma were first examined, followed by an examination of proportions with postsecondary education. three types of tests were performed. first, z-tests compared the proportion with any diploma and the proportion with postsecondary education for language speakers versus non-speakers at each point in time to examine group differences in educational attainment. second, cochran-armitage tests for trend examined the proportion with any diploma and the proportion with postsecondary education over time to determine if the educational attainment profile of language speakers and non-speakers was improving, worsening, or staying the same. third, we compared the trends in educational attainment for language speakers and non-speakers using the z statistic of the cochran-armitage tests. if the absolute difference between two z statistics was greater than 1.96, the two trends were said to be significantly different; otherwise, they were not (agresti, 2002). two trends that are significantly different from each other indicate that educational attainment over time for language speakers and non-speakers is not changing in the same direction—in other words, the gap is either decreasing or increasing. results table 1 and table 2 present the highest level of education attained of first nations people aged 20 to 34 living on and off reserve by reported ability to conduct a conversation in an indigenous language for each year. table 1 focuses on no diploma and any diploma as highest level attained, while table 2 focuses on no diploma, high school, and postsecondary education as highest level attained. finally, table 3 presents the trend analyses results by group. we first describe results for off-reserve first nations people, followed by results for those living on reserve. 5 bougie et al.: aboriginal language knowledge and education published by scholarship@western, 2018 table 1. proportion with no diploma and any diploma as highest level of education attained, population aged 20 to 34 years old, canada, 1996, 2001, 2006, and 2011 1996 2001 2006 2011 % lower cl upper cl % lower cl upper cl % lower cl upper cl % lower cl upper cl non-indigenousa no diplomad 19.8 19.8 19.9 16.4 16.3 16.5 10.6 10.5 10.7 8.9 8.8 8.9 any diplomae 80.2 80.1 80.2 83.6 83.5 83.7 89.4 89.3 89.5 91.1 91.1 91.2 total 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 on-reserve first nations speakersb no diplomad 67.0 66.5 67.6 63.1 62.6 63.7 60.9 60.4 61.5 59.8 59.1 60.4 any diplomae 33.0 32.4 33.5 36.9 36.3 37.4 39.1 38.5 39.6 40.2 39.6 40.9 total 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 on-reserve first nations nonspeakersc no diplomad 49.9 49.2 50.6 47.3 46.7 48.0 48.6 48.0 49.2 47.7 47.1 48.3 any diplomae 50.1 49.4 50.8 52.7 52.0 53.3 51.4 50.8 52.0 52.3 51.7 52.9 total 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 off-reserve first nations speakersb no diplomad 60.0 58.5 61.4 55.5 53.8 57.2 49.0 47.2 50.9 40.3 37.0 43.5 any diplomae 40.0 38.6 41.5 44.5 42.8 46.2 51.0 49.1 52.8 59.7 56.5 63.0 total 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 off-reserve first nations nonspeakersc no diplomad 42.4 41.6 43.3 37.5 36.7 38.4 30.5 29.7 31.3 25.6 24.7 26.5 any diplomae 57.6 56.7 58.4 62.5 61.6 63.3 69.5 68.7 70.3 74.4 73.5 75.3 total 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 note. data sources: 1996, 2001, and 2006 census; 2011 national household survey. cl = confidence limit. a non-indigenous persons living off reserve who are able to conduct a conversation in english and/or french. b persons who self-identified as first nations (as a single or multiple response) and who are able to conduct a conversation in an indigenous language. c persons who self-identified as first nations (as a single or multiple response) and who are unable to conduct a conversation in an indigenous language. d this category includes persons with no schooling and persons who received some schooling but did not obtain a secondary school diploma or equivalent. e this category includes persons with secondary school diploma or equivalent (highest attainment), some postsecondary education (highest attainment), or postsecondary certificate, diploma, or degree (highest attainment). 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 4 [2018], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.3 table 2. proportion with no diploma, high school, and postsecondary education as highest level of education attained, population aged 20 to 34 years old, canada, 1996, 2001, 2006, and 2011 1996 2001 2006 2011 % lower cl upper cl % lower cl upper cl % lower cl upper cl % lower cl upper cl non-indigenousa no diplomad 19.8 19.8 19.9 16.4 16.3 16.5 10.6 10.5 10.7 8.9 8.8 8.9 high schoole 29.8 29.7 29.9 28.9 28.8 29.0 29.5 29.4 29.6 28.2 28.1 28.3 postsecondaryf 50.4 50.3 50.5 54.7 54.6 54.8 59.9 59.8 60.0 63.0 62.8 63.1 total 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 on-reserve first nations speakersb no diplomad 67.0 66.5 67.6 63.1 62.6 63.7 60.9 60.4 61.5 59.8 59.1 60.4 high schoole 14.3 13.8 14.7 17.6 17.2 18.1 18.6 18.2 19.1 20.8 20.2 21.3 postsecondaryf 18.7 18.3 19.2 19.2 18.8 19.7 20.4 19.9 20.9 19.4 18.9 20.0 total 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 on-reserve first nations non-speakersc no diplomad 49.9 49.2 50.6 47.3 46.7 48.0 48.6 48.0 49.2 47.7 47.1 48.3 high schoole 23.1 22.5 23.7 24.6 24.0 25.2 26.9 26.3 27.4 30.1 29.5 30.7 postsecondaryf 27.0 26.4 27.6 28.1 27.5 28.7 24.5 24.0 25.0 22.2 21.7 22.7 total 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 off-reserve first nations speakersb no diplomad 60.0 58.5 61.4 55.5 53.8 57.2 49.0 47.2 50.9 40.3 37.0 43.5 high schoole 17.2 16.0 18.4 19.6 18.2 21.0 24.6 23.0 26.3 28.0 25.0 31.0 postsecondaryf 22.8 21.5 24.1 24.9 23.4 26.4 26.3 24.7 28.0 31.8 28.7 34.8 total 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 off-reserve first nations non-speakersc no diplomad 42.4 41.6 43.3 37.5 36.7 38.4 30.5 29.7 31.3 25.6 24.7 26.5 high schoole 27.4 26.6 28.2 28.8 28.0 29.6 32.7 31.9 33.5 34.6 33.7 35.6 postsecondaryf 30.2 29.4 31.0 33.6 32.8 34.5 36.8 35.9 37.6 39.7 38.8 40.7 total 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 note. data sources: 1996, 2001, and 2006 census; 2011 national household survey. cl = confidence limit. a non-indigenous persons living off reserve who are able to conduct a conversation in english and/or french. b persons who self-identified as first nations (as a single or multiple response) and who are able to conduct a conversation in an indigenous language. c persons who self-identified as first nations (as a single or multiple response) and who are unable to conduct a conversation in an indigenous language. d this category includes persons with no schooling and persons who received some schooling but did not obtain a secondary school diploma or equivalent. e this category includes persons who have obtained a secondary or high school certificate or its equivalent and who have not obtained any higher degrees, certificates or diplomas. f this category includes persons with some postsecondary education (highest attainment) or with postsecondary certificate, diploma, or degree (highest attainment). 7 bougie et al.: aboriginal language knowledge and education published by scholarship@western, 2018 table 3. trend analyses results by group, population aged 20 to 34 years old, canada cochran-armitage trend test statistic (z) two-sided pr > |z| trend differenced any diploma any diploma |z1 minus z2| non-indigenousa 292.1 <.0001 on-reserve first nations speakers and non-speakers 15.9 on-reserve first nations speakersb 17.6 <.0001 off-reserve first nations speakers and non-speakers 22.5 on-reserve first nations nonspeakersc 1.7 0.0848 non-indigenous and off-reserve first nations speakers 271.7 off-reserve first nations speakersb 20.4 <.0001 non-indigenous and off-reserve first nations non-speakers 249.2 off-reserve first nations nonspeakersc 42.9 <.0001 postsecondary education postsecondary education |z1 minus z2| non-indigenousa -241.2 <.0001 on-reserve first nations speakers and non-speakers 19.0 on-reserve first nations speakersb -2.5 0.0109 off-reserve first nations speakers and non-speakers 16.5 on-reserve first nations nonspeakersc 16.5 <.0001 non-indigenous and off-reserve first nations speakers 232.5 off-reserve first nations speakersb -8.7 <.0001 non-indigenous and off-reserve first nations non-speakers 216.0 off-reserve first nations nonspeakersc -25.2 <.0001 note. a non-indigenous persons living off reserve who are able to conduct a conversation in english and/or french. b persons who self-identified as first nations (as a single or multiple response) and who are able to conduct a conversation in an indigenous language. c persons who self-identified as first nations (as a single or multiple response) and who are unable to conduct a conversation in an indigenous language. d if the absolute difference between the two z statistics is > 1.96, the two trends are significantly different; otherwise, they are not. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 4 [2018], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.3 off-reserve first nations aged 20 to 34 as can be seen in figure 1, off reserve, more language non-speakers had obtained any diploma compared to language speakers (58% vs. 40% in 1996, 62% vs. 44% in 2001, 69% vs. 51% in 2006, and 74% vs. 60% in 2011). looking at trends over time, the proportion with any diploma significantly increased among both groups: from 40% in 1996 to 60% in 2011 among language speakers (z = 20.4, p < 0.0001), and from 58% in 1996 to 74% in 2011 among non-speakers (z = 42.9, p < 0.0001). trends for indigenous language speakers and non-speakers were significantly different from each other; the gap in the proportion with any diploma between language speakers and non-speakers remained stable at 18 percentage points between 1996 and 2006, and then decreased to 14 percentage points in 2011. the proportion with any diploma was consistently highest among the non-indigenous population at all time points examined. however, trends for indigenous language speakers and non-speakers were significantly different from the trend for the non-indigenous population; that is, the gap between the non-indigenous population and both first nations groups (language speakers and non-speakers) has consistently decreased over time. turning to postsecondary education (figure 2), off reserve, more non-speakers had postsecondary education than did language speakers (30% vs. 23% in 1996, 34% vs. 25% in 2001, 37% vs. 26% in 2006, and 40% vs. 32% in 2011). the proportion with postsecondary education increased significantly over the four time points among both language speakers (z = -8.7, p < 0.0001) and non-speakers (z = -25.2, p < 0.0001). trends for language speakers and non-speakers were significantly different from each other; the gap between language speakers and non-speakers with postsecondary education increased from 1996 to 2006, but then decreased in 2011. proportionally more individuals in the non-indigenous population had postsecondary education at all time points examined. the gap in postsecondary education between the non-indigenous population and both language speakers and non-speakers increased from 1996 to 2006; however, in 2011, this gap decreased among language speakers and remained stable for non-speakers. on-reserve first nations aged 20 to 34 as can be seen in figure 3, on reserve, more non-speakers had any diploma than did language speakers (50% vs. 33% in 1996, 53% vs. 37% in 2001, 51% vs. 39% in 2006, and 52% vs. 40% in 2011). looking at trends over time, the proportion with any diploma significantly increased among language speakers (z = 17.6, p < 0.0001), but not among non-speakers (z = 1.7, p = 0.08). one-third (33%) of language speakers had obtained any diploma in 1996; by 2011, that estimate reached 40%. the proportion with any diploma among non-speakers remained relatively stable, from 50% in 1996 to 52% in 2011. trends for language speakers and non-speakers were significantly different from each other; that is, the gap between language speakers and non-speakers with any diploma has decreased over time—from 17 percentage points in 1996 to 12 percentage points in 2011. 9 bougie et al.: aboriginal language knowledge and education published by scholarship@western, 2018 figure 1. percent with any diploma, off-reserve first nations and non-indigenous population aged 20 to 34, canada. data sources: 1996, 2001, and 2006 census and 2011 national household survey. significant trend for all (speakers, non-speakers, and non-indigenous population). trends for first nations speakers and non-speakers are significantly different from each other. trends for first nations speakers and non-speakers are significantly different from non-indigenous respondents. *significantly different from same-year first nations non-speakers estimate. 80* 84* 89* 91* 58 62 69 74 40* 44* 51* 60* 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100 1996 2001 2006 2011 non-indigenous population first nations non-speakers first nations speakers % 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 4 [2018], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.3 figure 2. percent with postsecondary education, off-reserve first nations and non-indigenous population aged 20 to 34, canada. data sources: 1996, 2001 and 2006 census and 2011 national household survey. significant trend for all (speakers, non-speakers, and non-indigenous population). trends for first nations speakers and non-speakers are significantly different from each other. trends for first nations speakers and non-speakers are significantly different from non-indigenous respondents. *significantly different from same-year first nations non-speakers estimate. 50* 55* 60* 63* 30 34 37 40 23* 25* 26* 32* 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100 1996 2001 2006 2011 non-indigenous population first nations non-speakers first nations speakers . % 11 bougie et al.: aboriginal language knowledge and education published by scholarship@western, 2018 figure 3. percent with any diploma, on-reserve first nations population aged 20 to 34, canada. data sources: 1996, 2001 and 2006 census and 2011 national household survey. significant trend for first nations speakers but not for non-speakers. trends for first nations speakers and non-speakers are significantly different. *significantly different from same-year first nations non-speakers estimate. turning to postsecondary education, on reserve (figure 4), more non-speakers had postsecondary education than did language speakers (27% vs. 19% in 1996, 28% vs. 19% in 2001, 25% vs. 20% in 2006, and 22% vs. 19% in 2011). among language speakers, the proportion with postsecondary education slightly (but significantly) increased over time (z = -2.5, p = 0.01); this was not the case among nonspeakers (z = 16.5, p < 0.0001), for whom the proportion with postsecondary education significantly decreased—from 27% in 1996 to 22% in 2011. trends for language speakers and non-speakers were significantly different from each other; that is, the gap in postsecondary education between on-reserve language speakers and non-speakers has decreased over time—from 8 percentage points in 1996 to 3 percentage points in 2011. however, the gap reduction was due to the proportion of non-speakers with postsecondary education decreasing over time while the proportion of speakers with postsecondary education remained stable. 50 53 51 52 33* 37* 39* 40* 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100 1996 2001 2006 2011 first nations non-speakers first nations speakers % 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 4 [2018], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.3 figure 4. percent with postsecondary education, on-reserve first nations population aged 20 to 34, canada. data sources: 1996, 2001 and 2006 census and 2011 national household survey. significant trend for all first nations (speakers and non-speakers). trends for first nations speakers and non-speakers are significantly different. *significantly different from same-year first nations non-speakers estimate. discussion this study described the educational attainment of first nations people aged 20 to 34 for four time points, separately for those who did and did not report being able to speak an indigenous language, and for those living on and off reserve. in doing so, this study sought to examine one potential explanation for the differential association of indigenous language knowledge and education among first nations children and adults (guèvremont & kohen, 2012; guèvremont & kohen, 2017b); that is, that the change in association between indigenous language knowledge and educational outcomes might be evolving over time. consistent with past research showing that, among adults, indigenous language knowledge is associated with both a lower likelihood of high school graduation (guèvremont & kohen, 2012; hull, 2015; lamb, 2014; o’gorman & pandey, 2015) and a lower likelihood of obtaining postsecondary education (brade et al., 2003; hull, 2015), the educational attainment of language speakers was lower than non-speakers at all time points examined, for those living on reserve and for those living off reserve. 27 28 25 22 19* 19* 20* 19* 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100 1996 2001 2006 2011 first nations non-speakers first nations speakers % 13 bougie et al.: aboriginal language knowledge and education published by scholarship@western, 2018 when examining trends over time, findings from this study revealed that no groups of language speakers had decreased educational attainment. off reserve, indigenous language speakers showed increases in educational attainment similar (postsecondary) or greater (any diploma) than the gains made by nonspeakers, although non-speakers recognized gains as well. on reserve, indigenous language speakers made larger gains than non-speakers in terms of having any diploma but did not show an increase or a decrease for postsecondary education. non-speakers on reserve showed the most cautionary pattern with no change over time for any diploma and decreases in attainment for postsecondary education. analysis of the gaps for the different time points revealed that the gaps in educational attainment between speakers and non-speakers were decreasing, for those living on and off reserve. however, for those living on reserve, this gap reduction was due to non-speakers’ outcomes remaining stable (any diploma) or decreasing (postsecondary education) while increasing or staying the same for speakers. the present study points to improvements in educational attainment for indigenous language speakers, particularly for first nations living off reserve in the most recent time interval examined (2006 to 2011). these findings may point to one explanation of why data from the 2001 aboriginal peoples survey showed negative associations with education outcomes for adults who spoke an indigenous language (guèvremont & kohen, 2012), while data from the 2012 aboriginal peoples survey did not replicate negative associations between language and education outcomes for adults (guèvremont & kohen, 2017b). taken together, these findings suggest that associations between indigenous language knowledge and educational outcomes have changed for first nations people over the time periods examined, as language speakers are “catching up” to their non-speaker counterparts, and this is demonstrated both off and on reserve. while the percentage with any diploma increased for language speakers on reserve, it did not increase for non-speakers; there was also a decrease in the percentage with postsecondary education for nonspeakers on reserve, while for speakers it remained stable. this finding may indicate a growing “shortage” of first nations aged 20 to 34 with postsecondary education credentials on reserves among nonspeakers (hull, 2015). a study conducted by hull (2015) suggests that large population centres, such as census metropolitan areas (cmas), attract indigenous people with postsecondary qualifications to live and work. in the present study, post-hoc exploratory analyses revealed that on-reserve first nations non-speakers were more likely to live on reserves that were inside a census metropolitan area (cma) or census agglomeration (ca), or in cmas or cas that have a moderate to strong metropolitan influence (that is, with a relatively high degree of integration with the core), whereas their indigenous language speaking counterparts were more likely to live in remote reserves (see appendix a and b). it could thus be that on-reserve first nations non-speakers, through their greater proximity to population centres, might be more likely to move, live, and work outside of their communities to obtain postsecondary education or afterwards, pointing to the importance of both educational and employment opportunities on reserve. although this was not directly tested in the present study, further studies, including qualitative studies, are warranted to better understand these findings. findings from this study must be interpreted with caution as differences in educational attainment may reflect differences between language speakers and non-speakers that go beyond the ability to speak an indigenous language. examples of other differences include enhanced identity and self-esteem (wright & taylor, 1995), as well as differences in location of educational opportunities, place of residence, and socio-demographic characteristics. hull (2015), for instance, found that the gap in postsecondary 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 4 [2018], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.3 education attainment between speakers and non-speakers of indigenous languages were largest in rural areas and smallest in urban areas. drawson, mushquash, and mushquash (2017) have also demonstrated that the negative relationship between the proportion of people in a community speaking an indigenous language and a community’s socio-economic conditions was non-significant once remoteness was accounted for, pointing to the importance of place of residence. guèvremont and kohen (2017b) have shown the importance of characteristics such as ever having attended school on a reserve, parental education, and family residential school attendance in the associations between indigenous language knowledge and high school completion. moreover, individuals who know an indigenous language as their mother tongue versus individuals who have learned an indigenous language as a second language are likely two different groups of people whose characteristics likely contribute to different sets of outcomes; future research disentangling education outcomes for those with indigenous language knowledge as a mother tongue versus those with indigenous language knowledge as a second language is warranted. therefore, other differences between language speakers and non-speakers likely contribute to the patterns of educational attainment observed in this study and call for the need to continue to understand these complex associations. this study examined the relationship between indigenous language knowledge and educational attainment using large data sets (i.e., statistics canada’s census and national household survey); while being nationally representative, these data sets contain broad socioeconomic indicators that are highly de-contextualized (drawson et al., 2017) and this not only calls for replication but also refinements using qualitative as well as other methods. furthermore, the current analytic lens plots together knowledge of traditional indigenous languages with a “western” concept—highest level of formal education attained (drawson et al., 2017). future research could examine outcomes that are more oriented towards indigenous ways of knowing. caution should also be exercised when examining trends over time based on self-reported indigenous identity. the composition of the indigenous identity population is affected by both demographic factors (birth, deaths, and migration) and by response mobility. response mobility refers to individuals changing, from one census to the next, the reporting of their affiliations from a non-indigenous to an indigenous identity (statistics canada, 2007) or vice-versa. the different “cohorts” of first nations people aged 20 to 34 examined in the present study may thus be different in composition due to response mobility. another limitation is that the on-reserve population was defined as per 2011 geographic boundaries and did not adjust for reserves that consistently or inconsistently took part in the census. taken together, these limitations emphasize the need for others to contribute to these findings to better understand the complexity involved in the relationship between knowledge of indigenous languages and educational attainment among first nations people. indigenous language knowledge is associated with other factors that may temper the association with educational outcomes; these factors not only include socio-economic circumstances, place of residence, and educational opportunities, but also historical experiences, parental education, and programs that support minority-language students (hull, 2015), as well as school attendance on reserve and family residential school attendance (guèvremont & kohen, 2017b). 15 bougie et al.: aboriginal language knowledge and education published by scholarship@western, 2018 conclusion this study investigated the change in association between indigenous language knowledge and educational outcomes from 1996 to 2011 among first nations aged 20 to 34. it showed that both on and off reserve, the gap in educational attainment between indigenous language speakers and nonspeakers has narrowed over time. future research is warranted to disentangle the independent associations of indigenous language knowledge, socio-demographic characteristics, and area of residence on educational outcomes through multivariate and other analyses. the continued exploration of the dynamics surrounding indigenous language knowledge and educational attainment is an important endeavour. the truth and reconciliation commission of canada (2015) has reaffirmed the importance of revitalizing and preserving indigenous languages, and of improving education attainment levels among indigenous peoples. enhancing our understanding of the interrelatedness between traditional indigenous language knowledge and successful participation in canada’s education system is crucial for creating and maintaining healthy individuals and communities. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 4 [2018], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.3 references agresti, a. 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(1995). identity and the language of the classroom: investigating the impact of heritage versus second language instruction on personal and collective self-esteem. journal of educational psychology, 87(2), 241-52. doi: https:/doi.org/10.1037/00220663.87.2.241 19 bougie et al.: aboriginal language knowledge and education published by scholarship@western, 2018 appendix a study sample by region distribution, population aged 20 to 34 years old, canada, 1996, 2001, 2006, and 2011 1996 2001 2006 2011 non-indigenousa atlantic 8.3 7.5 6.8 6.2 quebec, ontario 63.2 63.4 63.5 62.7 prairies 15.6 16.3 17.2 18.2 british columbia 12.6 12.5 12.3 12.6 northwest territories 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 on-reserve first nations speakersb atlantic 6.7 6.5 6.1 7.4 quebec, ontario 29.0 31.0 31.6 33.1 prairies 59.7 58.9 57.9 56.1 british columbia 4.6 3.6 4.3 3.5 northwest territories x x x 0.05 e on-reserve first nations non-speakersc atlantic 7.4 6.5 6.4 5.5 quebec, ontario 17.8 19.6 20.1 20.5 prairies 42.4 46.3 48.9 49.2 british columbia 32.3 27.6 24.7 24.7 northwest territories x x x 0.1 e off-reserve first nations speakersb atlantic 3.2 4.0 3.1 2.6 e quebec, ontario 28.8 27.6 30.7 20.0 prairies 50.0 51.3 47.7 54.3 british columbia 8.5 6.9 7.9 9.2 northwest territories 9.6 10.1 10.7 14.0 off-reserve first nations non-speakersc atlantic 3.8 4.9 4.2 7.1 quebec, ontario 35.8 34.1 36.1 37.8 prairies 29.5 33.3 34.0 31.2 british columbia 27.2 24.8 22.6 21.0 northwest territories 3.6 2.9 3.1 2.8 note. data sources: 1996, 2001, and 2006 census; 2011 national household survey. a non-indigenous persons living off reserve who are able to conduct a conversation in english and/or french. b persons who self-identified as first nations (as a single or multiple response) and who are able to conduct a conversation in an indigenous language. c persons who self-identified as first nations (as a single or multiple response) and who are unable to conduct a conversation in an indigenous language. e = use with caution. x = suppressed. 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 4 [2018], art. 3 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.4.3 appendix b study sample by miza distribution, population aged 20 to 34 years old, canada, 2001, 2006, and 2011 2001 2006 2011 non-indigenousb inside cma/ca 84.2 86.1 87.3 outside cma/ca, strong or moderate miz 10.1 8.7 8.7 outside cma/ca, weak or no miz 5.7 5.2 4.0 on-reserve first nations speakersc inside cma/ca 7.8 10.2 9.1 outside cma/ca, strong or moderate miz 9.7 5.7 10.4 outside cma/ca, weak or no miz 82.5 84.2 80.5 on-reserve first nations non-speakersd inside cma/ca 18.3 18.2 18.7 outside cma/ca, strong or moderate miz 20.0 17.8 27.7 outside cma/ca, weak or no miz 61.6 64.0 53.6 off-reserve first nations speakersc inside cma/ca 48.3 50.3 69.8 outside cma/ca, strong or moderate miz 5.3 4.9 6.3 outside cma/ca, weak or no miz 46.5 44.8 23.9 off-reserve first nations non-speakersd inside cma/ca 76.0 77.5 81.2 outside cma/ca, strong or moderate miz 9.2 8.4 9.5 outside cma/ca, weak or no miz 14.8 14.2 9.4 note. data sources: 1996, 2001, and 2006 census; 2011 national household survey. miz not available in the 1996 census data. a the census metropolitan influenced zone (miz) is a concept that geographically differentiates the area of canada outside census metropolitan areas (cmas) and census agglomerations (cas). census subdivisions (csds) within provinces that are outside cmas and cas are assigned to one of four categories according to the degree of influence (strong, moderate, weak, or no influence) that the cmas or cas have on them. csds within the territories that are outside cas are assigned to a separate category. b non-indigenous persons living off reserve who are able to conduct a conversation in english and/or french. c persons who self-identified as first nations (as a single or multiple response) and who are able to conduct a conversation in an indigenous language. d persons who self-identified as first nations (as a single or multiple response) and who are unable to conduct a conversation in an indigenous language. 21 bougie et al.: aboriginal language knowledge and education published by scholarship@western, 2018 the international indigenous policy journal october 2018 indigenous language knowledge and educational attainment among first nations people: trends over time evelyne bougie dafna kohen anne guèvremont recommended citation indigenous language knowledge and educational attainment among first nations people: trends over time abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license indigenous language knowledge and educational attainment among first nations people: trends over time canada's missing and murdered indigenous people and the imperative for a more inclusive perspective the international indigenous policy journal volume 10 | issue 1 article 2 january 2019 canada's missing and murdered indigenous people and the imperative for a more inclusive perspective john g. hansen university of saskatchewan, john.hansen@usask.ca emeka e. dim university of saskatchewan, emeka.dim@usask.ca recommended citation hansen, j. g. , dim, e. e. (2019). canada's missing and murdered indigenous people and the imperative for a more inclusive perspective. the international indigenous policy journal, 10(1). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.2 canada's missing and murdered indigenous people and the imperative for a more inclusive perspective abstract the national inquiry into missing and murdered indigenous women and girls (mmiwg) emerged to bring attention to the overrepresentation of missing and murdered indigenous women in canada. it has raised awareness about systemic racism and sexism as well as social and economic conditions experienced by canada's indigenous population. yet, research shows that indigenous males are the most likely to be murdered in canada (mulligan, axford, & soecki, 2016). since indigenous men are going missing and are murdered in disturbing numbers, and they are fathers, brothers, and sons to indigenous women and girls, it is understandable that many in the indigenous community wanted to include them in the inquiry. our analysis explores how the mmiwg and discourses about inclusion and exclusion have been framed in ways that limit interpretations about the root causes of problems experienced by indigenous people, especially when they exclude an important part of the indigenous population—indigenous males. we draw upon indigenous perceptions of the inquiry and analyses of social norms and stereotypes in order to explore the conflicting positions and experiences associated with missing and murdered indigenous people in canada. we conclude by exploring the need for a more comprehensive inquiry. we recognize that a holistic model of inquiry that honours the voices of indigenous communities is crucial to a proper investigation into missing and murdered indigenous people in canada. keywords missing and murdered indigenous people, justice, social exclusion, national inquiry into murdered and missing indigenous women and girls (mmiwg) creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ canada's missing and murdered indigenous people and the imperative for a more inclusive perspective this article developed out of a need to critically discuss the problem of canada's missing and murdered indigenous people,1 which is arguably one of the most crucial issues affecting the indigenous peoples in canada. it is crucial in the sense that indigenous peoples go missing with alarming frequency in canada; however, they receive little attention from the mainstream media and the justice system. the national inquiry into missing and murdered indigenous women and girls (mmiwg) began in the year 2015 after prime minister trudeau supported calls from indigenous women’s organizations to address the problem of the disproportionate numbers of missing and murdered indigenous women in canada (government of canada, 2016). the inquiry is supposed to engage indigenous families and communities in discussions about the racist, sexist, and colonial violence against indigenous women. its central goals are to reduce the violence and to promote healing within indigenous communities. despite calls for the inclusion of men in the inquiry, these requests have been rejected. according to officials, if men were to be included, it would only be to understand if their circumstances contribute to the vulnerability of indigenous women and girls (galloway, 2017b). in a position statement by the chief commissioner of the mmiwg inquiry, british columbia judge marion buller: the inquiry is looking at ways in which the testimonies and stories of men and boys can be “collected in safe, respectful, and efficient ways, insofar as this potential information may be relevant to its overall mandate of examining systemic causes of violence, including sexual violence, against indigenous women and girls.” (cited in talaga, 2017, p. 2) this statement by buller demonstrates that there is a need to include stories and testimonies of men and boys in the inquiry. however, we have not observed evidence of these testimonies in government reports or scholarly literature. there is definitely not enough knowledge on this issue, and it represents a lack of effort to examine the comprehensive issue of missing and murdered indigenous people in canada. this, in a way, is the central argument for this article. we confront statements of presumed sociological and scholarly fact, including prejudices and biases against indigenous peoples, and we attempt to demonstrate, with indigenous voices and research, that an inclusive inquiry is beneficial for indigenous women, men, families, and communities. our basic argument is all missing and murdered indigenous peoples matter. we do not argue for a separate inquiry for men—rather, the inclusion of men in an inclusive inquiry that has the potential to offer new insights into addressing the disturbing rates of missing and murdered indigenous people. and it could help communities, families, and survivors heal. the purpose of this article is to encourage the creation of an expanded inquiry, which the indigenous community has requested (paterson, 2016). we articulate the need to expand the mmiwg to include indigenous men. we provide a brief knowledge background of the mmiwg followed by the rationale for expanding the scope of the inquiry. in our view, there should be a follow-up inquiry that is inclusive of indigenous men, women, girls, and boys. colonizers have long used strategies to divide indigenous 1 the terms indigenous and aboriginal are used interchangeably to describe first nations, métis, and inuit peoples in canada. 1 hansen and dim: missing and murdered indigenous people published by scholarship@western, 2019 peoples. having a focus on indigenous women could restrict the potential for communities to work together and this development was reflected in the mmiwg, which led to infighting. therefore, this article recommends an all-inclusive inquiry. the article describes the knowledge shortage that points to the need to develop a more comprehensive inquiry. in reality, indigenous males in canada are at the highest risk of being victims of homicide (miladinovic & mulligan, 2015) and are therefore worthy of discussion. the article deals with the problem of missing and murdered indigenous peoples based on knowledge garnered from published literature sources. research results show that indigenous males are the most likely to be murdered in canada (mulligan, axford, & soecki, 2016). since indigenous men are going missing and are murdered in disturbing numbers, and they are fathers, brothers, and sons to indigenous women and girls, it is understandable that indigenous communities want to include them in the inquiry. the indigenous community also wants indigenous males to be included in the inquiry because there are some similarities with missing and murdered indigenous women, with the exception of experiencing sexism. thus, a contradiction exists. there are unique factors to explain the lack of concern for indigenous males that are related to stereotypes, including that they are criminals, violent offenders, as well as drunkards and gangsters (adams, 2000; blaut, 1993; champagne, 2015; charlton & hansen, 2017; comack; 2012; hansen, 2015; royal commission on aboriginal peoples [rcap], 1996; truth and reconciliation commission of canada [trc], 2015). these negative stereotypes may explain why extending the inquiry to include indigenous males does not generate much concern. understood in this way, we provide discussion of the perceived lack of concern for indigenous males. we maintain that including missing and murdered indigenous males is necessary as it can foster insight and support pathways to addressing the problem of missing and murdered indigenous women and girls. incorporating indigenous males in the inquiry should include relational approaches to collaborative research methods that engage indigenous males and females and their communities. we recognize that a holistic model of inquiry that honors the voices of indigenous communities is crucial to a proper investigation into missing and murdered indigenous people in canada. this work is dedicated to missing and murdered indigenous sisters in canada. context mmiwg inquiry the movement that led to canada's mmiwg is dedicated to indigenous women who ensured the search for their missing and murdered loved ones remained alive. at the same time, there is a lack of concern from the canadian government, and by extension the commission who have ultimately accepted the exclusion of indigenous males, for the disproportionate number of indigenous men who are murdered or go missing in the communities in which they live. the notion is both historical and contemporary. indigenous males are seen as the “abusers of indigenous women” (dickson-gilmore & laprairie, 2005). the inquiry into missing and murdered indigenous women and girls advanced quite sluggishly (galloway, 2017a). it was the efforts of indigenous women that enabled more urgency to be given to the inquiry (kirkup, 2017b). many of the murders of indigenous women are still unsolved. indigenous women often experience sexism, racism, and marginalization in colonial society. fortunately, indigenous 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.2 justice proponents, such as the native women’s association of canada (nwac) and jaime black who launched the redress project in the year 2010, have worked to ensure the inquiry has progressed. the redress project is a response to the high number of missing and murdered indigenous woman and girls (black, 2014). it encourages public discourse as a way to address the violence against indigenous females in canada. these struggles are reflective of indigenous peoples’ oppression in a colonial society. it also demonstrates that the women are the leaders in the indigenous inquiry, which demonstrates the custom of indigenous matriarchal society (champagne, 2015; hansen & antsanen, 2017; trc, 2015). indigenous communities perceive that there is a lack of research on missing and murdered indigenous women because only a few studies exist (nwac, n.d.a, n.d.b). they reported that indigenous women are most likely to go missing in urban areas, and “are almost three times more likely to be killed by a stranger than non-aboriginal women are” (nwac, n.d.a, p. 5). the nwac (n.d.a) observed: women involved in prostitution are extremely vulnerable and experience high levels of violence. nwac has gathered information about prostitution in only a small number of cases. of these cases, about half involve women who were not involved in prostitution, and about half involve women who were or were suspected to be involved in this area. (p. 5) this passage suggests that involvement in the sex trade is a key risk factor, however, indigenous women who are not involved in the sex trade are also more likely to be victims of violence in comparison to nonindigenous women. branded with racial stereotypes that cast them as promiscuous or sex trade workers, indigenous women are then overrepresented as victims of violence in a male dominated and sexist society. however, there has been considerable discussion in the media by indigenous people who urged the inquiry to include missing and murdered indigenous males (oliver, 2017; paterson, 2016; sweetgrass, 2014). as bernadette lahtail, the executive director of creating hope society stated: i don’t want to continue doing this but i have to. there’s nobody for our men and boys. it’s like the creator said, you must do it. so even when my boy is found i will continue doing this . . . the saddest part is that so many of our men and boys are missing and it’s not talked about, it’s not seen. (cited in sweetgrass, 2014, p. 1) furthermore, april eve wiberg, whose organization stolen sisters awareness march has been instrumental in bringing awareness to the number of murdered and missing indigenous women and girls, stated, “there is definitely not enough awareness on this issue [missing and murdered indigenous men] and it definitely speaks to the greater issue of our missing and murdered aboriginal people” (cited in sweetgrass, 2014, p. 1). by including their male comrades, an inquiry would more likely be able to develop the knowledge necessary to properly address the problem of missing and murder indigenous peoples. in other words, it is a voice from the margins calling for a holistic inquiry that is inclusive of indigenous males. the discussion around this phenomenon speaks to the need to develop a more holistic inquiry into the subject of the missing and murdered indigenous people. contemporary efforts to address the issue of murdered and missing indigenous women and girls are grounded in grassroots movements such as walking with our sisters, led by indigenous women. such indigenous-based movements assert the view that we must critically assess social problems in society 3 hansen and dim: missing and murdered indigenous people published by scholarship@western, 2019 and prevent future violence against indigenous women. these indigenous initiatives are about community building and healing and have a rich cultural significance that reveals a substantial aspect of what indigenous communities find so crucial about canada's missing and murdered indigenous women. indigenous peoples are the fastest growing population in the prairie provinces (kirkup, 2017a; paperny, 2017; turner, crompton, & langlois, 2013), and it is important to invest in assisting indigenous peoples to build a better future and build a more viable canadian society. the criminal justice system the tense relationship between indigenous people and the police goes back to the historical colonization canada. it was the north west mounted police (now referred to as the royal canadian mounted police [rcmp]) that carried out the policy to force indigenous children to attend residential schools, arresting their parents if they refused and also arresting indigenous people when they left the reserve without a pass (adams, 1975; comack, 2012; hansen & antsanen, 2015; trc, 2015). it is well documented that indigenous people suffer from ongoing colonialism and systemic discrimination. as a result, violence against indigenous people continues to increase and, although it is hoped that police will keep indigenous people safe, the police have not produced a dramatic impact in terms of reducing the overrepresentation of indigenous people among missing and murdered persons in canada. according to cfnmp (2004), “young aboriginal men and women have been beaten, disappeared and died while in police contact or shortly after police contact” (p. 5-2). these kinds of disappearances and deaths in and around contact with police suggests an intentional crime. these trends continue today. data from munch (2012) revealed that indigenous youths are overrepresented in custody: in 2010/2011, a disproportionate number of youth entering the correctional system were aboriginal . . . the disproportionate number of aboriginal youth admitted to the correctional system was particularly true among females. in 2010/2011, aboriginal female youth comprised 34% of all female youth in the correctional system, while aboriginal male youth made up 24% of all male youth in the correctional system. (p. 7) beyond overincarceration, indigenous peoples are also overrepresented as victims of crime, including non-spousal violent victimization. perreault (2011) noted: aboriginal people are more likely than non-aboriginal people to be the victim of non-spousal violence. in 2009, 12% of aboriginal people reported being the victim of at least one nonspousal violent crime, more than double the proportion of non-aboriginal people (5%). in total, aboriginal people self-reported 173,600 non-spousal violent incidents representing a rate of 198 violent incidents for every 1,000 aboriginal people. (p. 7) the number of cases of missing and murdered indigenous women continues to grow in canada even as the criminal justice system develops strategies to work with indigenous communities to achieve a safer society. however, the criminal justice system has a long way to go as the high rates of violence against indigenous people in canada continues to increase and expand ( hansen, 2015; trc, 2015). many indigenous communities believe that the police are part of the problem (commission on first nations and métis people [cfnmp], 2004; green, 1998; hansen, 2013; hansen, & hetzel, 2018; linden, 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.2 2016; ross, 1996). research concerning indigenous–police relations reveals that indigenous peoples are singled out by police and treated like criminals. indigenous peoples have been victims of police violence (cfnmp, 2004; comack, 2012; trc, 2015). for example, in saskatoon, saskatchewan, two police officers were found guilty of driving an indigenous man out of town and leaving him in freezing cold temperatures without proper clothing, which has been termed the starlight tours (radford, 2015; siegel & mccormick, 2012). in terms of the relationship between the police and the indigenous community, the police often view indigenous males are as criminal types—violent gangsters and drug dealers—while indigenous women are stereotyped as prostitutes (aboriginal justice inquiry, 1999; charlton & hansen, 2016; comack, 2012; hansen & antsanen, 2015; trc, 2015). it is apparent that police have used these criminal and racial stereotypes as an excuse to treat indigenous peoples badly ( aboriginal justice inquiry, 1999; comack, 2012; trc, 2015). the stereotyping of indigenous peoples has invariably led indigenous homicide victims to receive less attention in the media and the justice system than mainstream canadians who are victims of homicide. sociological research suggests that indigenous women who are victims of crime are seen as less-worthy victims. for example, is there any other reason why nonindigenous women who are victims of homicide have an 84% chance of having their cases solved compared to indigenous women for whom almost half of murders remain unsolved (cited in siegel, brown, & hoffman, 2013)? indigenous visions of justice are about community building and healing indigenous communities. it envisions more encouraging possibilities for justice. from this perspective, we would see that initiatives to help prevent the murder of indigenous women can also be applied to indigenous men. on a regular basis in canada, indigenous people have gone missing and there has been very little action towards addressing the issue. schmalleger and volk (2013), in their analysis of missing and murdered women in vancouver, drew a parallel between victimized indigenous women and the lack of police effort in investigating those cases. in 2007, robert pickton was convicted of the murders of six women and charged in the deaths of an additional twenty women (stayed in 2010), many of them prostitutes and drug users. the missing women commission of inquiry, established in 2010 by the b.c. lieutenant governor, released a report that identified blatant police failure triggered by systemic bias against poor, vulnerable women of vancouver’s downtown eastside as the reason that pickton was able to evade arrest for so many years. (schmalleger & volk, 2013, p. 33) this passage demonstrates the lack of concern for victims of crime who are from marginalized indigenous communities. it also suggests that police relations with indigenous people are unhealthy. research shows that indigenous people are less likely to report being the victim of a crime because they do not trust the police (cao, 2014; chrismas, 2012; comack, 2012; cotter, 2015; hansen, 2015; trc, 2015). indigenous peoples have compelling reasons to not trust the police (cao, 2014; chrismas, 2012; cotter, 2015). whether this perspective is acceptable or unacceptable is not the issue; rather we need to develop the knowledge required to understand the vibrant relationship between indigenous peoples, the police, and the criminal justice system, with the goal of providing new insights into how we can envision and 5 hansen and dim: missing and murdered indigenous people published by scholarship@western, 2019 improve the inquiry into missing and murdered indigenous peoples. one way to call attention to the overrepresentation as homicide victims is to examine social reality from an indigenous perspective. the overrepresentation the overrepresentation of missing and murdered indigenous people is a crucial concern for indigenous communities. through exploring the issue of canada's missing and murdered indigenous people, one can develop an understanding of how to address this widespread problem. in 2015, 148 of 604 homicide victims, or 25%, were reported by police as being aboriginal people. overall, aboriginal people were victims of homicide at a rate that was about 7 times higher than that of non-aboriginal people, with 8.77 victims per 100,000 in the aboriginal population versus 1.31 victims per 100,000 in the non-aboriginal population. aboriginal males were at greatest risk of being the victim of homicide (mulligan et al., 2016). in 2015, they were 7 times more likely to be the victim of a homicide compared with non-aboriginal males (12.85 per 100,000 population versus 1.87). they were also 3 times more likely to be a victim than aboriginal females (4.80 per 100,000; mulligan et al., 2016). the homicide rate for aboriginal females was 6 times higher than for their non-aboriginal counterparts (4.80 per 100,000 versus 0.77). the rate of aboriginal persons accused of homicide in canada was close to 10 times higher than the rate for non-aboriginal persons, with 10.13 aboriginal people accused per 100,000 population compared with 1.10 per 100,000 among non-aboriginal people. aboriginal people accounted for 61% of females accused of homicide in 2015, and 29% of males accused of homicide (mulligan et al., 2016). we would expect that there is a corresponding increase in the likelihood of being convicted of murder and other violent offences. given that indigenous men were accused of murder in 71% of cases involving an indigenous male victim (department of justice, 2017), we can assume they are also much more likely than any group to be found guilty of murdering indigenous men. it is not certain how many indigenous women have been murdered by indigenous men, but it is safe to say that it is too many. since it is very likely that indigenous men have murdered the majority of indigenous male murder victims, it would appear that many indigenous men have been victimized while others have been victimizers (and many have been both). understanding lateral violence in the indigenous community requires a discussion of indigenous men as both victims and victimizers. it is important to note the distinction between the violence indigenous women and men are involved with is so similar that it warrants indigenous men’s inclusion rather than their exclusion. the argument suggests that there are common factors related to colonialism that increase the risk of being a victim and being a perpetrator of violence. some of the ways that indigenous females and males experience common factors that increase the risk of being a victim and a perpetrator of violence are rooted in conditions and implications of historical colonization. royle (2017) noted, “in the waves of settlement in canada, european men were sexually violent towards indigenous women; creating a transformative property in the lives of indigenous women in that indigenous women faced a shift from a reputation under egalitarian values to a reputation under patriarchal values” (p. 2). colonization resulted in generations of indigenous children forced into residential schools where they experienced abuse, imperialism, racism and patriarchy. the effects of residential schools include addictions issues, low selfesteem, and male dominated communities. the present circumstances related to impoverished 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.2 indigenous communities in canada contribute to violence and crime. the criminal justice system and the mainstream media treat indigenous victims of crime as marginal, while at the same time indigenous accused of criminal offences generally receive harsher sentences than mainstream offenders (aboriginal justice inquiry of manitoba, 1999; champagne, 2015; hansen, 2015; trc, 2015). furthermore, there is very little knowledge about the number of missing and murdered indigenous men in canada. the findings of the inquiry are informed by numbers from the rcmp. the rcmp (2014) provided a report on the homicide rate and homicide-solve rates for the indigenous women, but not for the men (see also jones, 20152). perhaps the exclusion of indigenous males from the rcmp report is because males are outside the scope of the mmiwg inquiry. it may also be related to the stereotyping of indigenous males as violent criminals, which makes it understandable, but not acceptable, that their murders and disappearances receive very little attention. this lack of attention makes the expansion of the inquiry more imperative in order to collect and analyze these data among indigenous men. these statistics tell us that there is a knowledge gap that needs to be closed. developing an understanding of missing and murdered indigenous people as whole has the potential to address the issue of mmiwg more effectively. the inquiry is an important window into indigenous culture; more than just research, it can be considered an unofficial statement of what the elite decision makers in the inquiry think is best for indigenous communities in canada. exploring canada’s mmiwg serves to advance an indigenous interpretation of the topic and to enhance our knowledge of violence against indigenous women and girls; it presents a critical analysis of indigenous consciousness, narratives, and life experiences. the nwac was instrumental in creating the mmiwg. they worked for some 40 years to unmask the systemic violence against indigenous females, families, and communities. the work by the nwac (n.d.a) shows that indigenous women are more likely to be murdered by strangers than non-indigenous women and, when they are murdered, their killers are less likely to be convicted in comparison to non-indigenous women: aboriginal women were more likely than non-aboriginal women to be murdered by a stranger. most of the aboriginal women who go missing are or are murdered are under the age of 31, and more than two-thirds were living in cities. almost half of the murders of aboriginal women remain unsolved, compared to an 84 percent clearance rate for murders of non-aboriginal women. (siegel et al., 2013, p. 209) for the nwac, the inquiry should be culturally appropriate for indigenous communities. the inquiry needs to embrace community-based research that privileges the voices of indigenous peoples. the nwac (n.d.b) observed, the issue of “family violence represents one of the most urgent issues impacting aboriginal women. however, there is also a need for more research and awareness about 2 dr. adam jones is a professor of political science at the university of british columbia. he has demonstrated much concern for the lack of attention for missing and murdered indigenous people, particularly men. since there is a lack of literature documenting the large numbers of missing and murdered indigenous men, we have cited his work. we want to note that we do not intend to base our arguments on adam jones’ (2015) conclusion. the only information we draw upon from his op-ed in the national post are the facts and quotes that were provided in the article. we would like to state unequivocally that we do not accept the conclusions made by adam jones or any other men’s rights activists. 7 hansen and dim: missing and murdered indigenous people published by scholarship@western, 2019 other forms of violence—particularly violence perpetrated by strangers or acquaintances” (p. 4). all of this means that indigenous women experience violence and victimization inside and outside of their communities and, therefore, the voices of indigenous families and communities is central to the inquiry. although mmiwg was a crucial issue for indigenous communities in canada, former prime minister stephen harper stated in a national news interview with peter mansbridge that canada's missing and murdered indigenous women “isn’t really high on our [government’s] radar” (“full text of peter mansbridge’s interview,” 2014, “there seems to be some indication” section, para. 1; see also kappo, 2014). such attitudes and actions are reflected in a sociological conflict theory. as siegel and mccormick (2012) note: conflict theorists show that the criminal justice system is quick to take action when the victim is crime is wealthy, caucasian, and male but is uninterested when the victim is poor, a member of a minority group, and female, indicating how power relations affect justice. (p. 321) confronted with these disappointing realities, it must be recognized that the mmiwg extend beyond the scope of the police. the problem remains because of the impact of colonial domination on indigenous people is all-inclusive and extends beyond the scope of the canadian criminal justice system. still, there is a crucial need to investigate social inequality as it relates to canada’s missing and murdered indigenous women and this attitude is reflected among the grassroots people (charlton & hansen, 2017; hansen & antsanen, 2015). what is important to observe from an indigenous perspective, as demonstrated by the nwac, is the need for an inquiry into the widespread pattern of canada's missing and murdered indigenous women. this approach seeks to offer a culturally grounded interpretation of the incredible violence against indigenous women and it hopes to bring forth the experiences and aspirations of indigenous peoples in canada, which are essential to building a successful shared future. fortunately, parliament, under prime minister trudeau, demonstrated concern for the critical overrepresentation of missing and murdered indigenous women in canada and launched the inquiry. although the violence experienced by indigenous women and men is manifest differently, the causes are likely to be very similar. in terms of the mmiwg inquiry, the commissioners will likely make recommendations that are directed at indigenous women, such as the need to increase and sustain funding for support for survivors of abuse and for women’s shelters, but it is also likely to make recommendations that are directed at men because they are the perpetrators of most of the violence towards women. since many indigenous women experience violence from indigenous men, there will very likely be recommendations directed at indigenous men. perhaps they will recommend indigenous restorative justice programming because, in indigenous communities, justice means restoring balance, repairing harm, and healing victims, offenders, and communities (cfnmp, 2004; hansen, 2013; hansen & hetzel, 2018; trc, 2015). missing and murdered indigenous men and men’s issues in canada one of the core aims of indigenous perspectives is to broaden the discourse around missing and murdered indigenous people to include male victims. this approach takes the discourse about missing and murdered aboriginal people to a broader dimension as this line of inquiry includes structural factors that are associated with the victimization experiences of indigenous people. while our assertion that indigenous men should be included in the inquiry would have been stronger if it was made 10 or 15 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.2 years ago (and it is important to note that indigenous women have been advocating for this issue for at least that long), the result has been that the majority of indigenous men have been silent not only about the violence experienced by indigenous women but also the violence men face. however, we hope that this work provides an avenue through which to expand the discourse on missing and murdered indigenous peoples. it has also provided an avenue to contribute to rethinking the notion of the missing and murdered aboriginal people as a women-only issue. the data has shown that most men are far less likely than women to report their victimhood experiences to friends or to the police (burczycka & ibrahim, 2016; dutton & white, 2013; dim & elabor-idemudia, 2018; nagesh, 2016; robertson & murachver, 2009) because they do not see their victimhood experiences as worthy of reporting. today, there is a national inquiry into missing and murdered indigenous women and girls, which excludes men. data from statistics canada have shown that, between 1982 and 2011, 71% of aboriginal homicide victims in canada were men (cited in jones, 2015). in terms of the missing aboriginal people, the rcmp (2014) documented that there were about 105 missing aboriginal women in 2014 but it declined to compile statistics on missing aboriginal men. in the report, the rcmp revealed that about 1,017 aboriginal women had been murdered since 1980. the report also noted that the “solve rates” for murders involving aboriginal and non-aboriginal women were similar, about 88% and 89% respectively. however, the report did not address male murder victims. when asked about broadening the inquiry to all aboriginal people rather than only women, rcmp spokesperson greg cox said: “the rcmp does not have plans to broaden the national operational overview on missing and murdered aboriginal women to include all aboriginal peoples” (cited in andrew-gee, 2014, para. 16). also, as mr. mônijâw, a blogger on these issues, asserted: aboriginal men are murdered extremely often, relative to all other groups, and their homicides are more rarely solved. and nobody really cares. and you can even say you don’t care in public, as a representative of the police. because you know nobody else really cares either. (cited in jones, 2015, para. 9) in other words, the lives of aboriginal men are dispensable. however, arguments for inclusion based on claims made by men’s rights activists may work to undermine indigenous perspectives. for example, adams jones (2015) seems to place the blame on the exclusion of indigenous men from the inquiry on indigenous feminists. such theorizing does not take into account social and cultural interpretations within indigenous communities. since most indigenous women who advocated for the inquiry would not consider themselves feminists, probably because western feminists, although recognized as allies, do not speak for the indigenous community (hansen & antsanen, 2015; hookimaw-witt, 2010). although the arguments made by men’s rights advocates raise important issues, such as high rates of male suicide, job related deaths, social issues, and so on, they typically blame feminists for the fact these issues are not receiving much attention. however, it is important to keep in mind that feminists do not control what men can talk about. in reality, men generally do not talk about the issues they face, including the actual causes of the violence and destructive behaviours that men exhibit. so, the neglect of the missing and murdered indigenous men represents one of the issues within a broader context of social problems that men generally tend to face in society, which tend to be undermined and receive less attention (kay, 2015; urback, 2015). 9 hansen and dim: missing and murdered indigenous people published by scholarship@western, 2019 in view of the social stigma men may face in society regarding their perceived lack of machismo and other denigrations of their masculinity, they are reluctant to reveal their experiences of victimization (dim & ogunye, 2017; lupri & grandin, 2004; migliaccio, 2001). this also adds to the common narrative that men’s issues are negligible, including aboriginal men. statistics canada also revealed that, as of 2009, men are 3 times more likely to commit suicides than females (17.9 deaths per 100,000 for men; 5.3 per 100,000 for women; navaneelan, 2015). the rates of suicide for aboriginal men is higher than the general population. according to 2008 to 2010 data from the first nations information governance centre, aboriginal men had a suicide rate of 12 per 100,000 people (shulman & tahirali, 2016). in canada, men are victims of more than 97% of all workplace deaths (todd, 2011). according to data from the 2016 labour force survey, among people aged 25 to 64 years, 8.5% of men were high school dropouts compared 5.4% of women (uppal, 2017). furthermore, 20.1% of aboriginal boys were high school dropouts, which was the highest percentage in that category. similarly, attainment of university degrees was 29.6% for men compared to 41.8% of women (uppal, 2017). for aboriginal men, the figure was 9.1%, which represented the lowest percentage in that category. males accounted for 85% of persons admitted to provincial and territorial correctional services (correctional services program, 2015). according to the canadian center for justice statistics data from 2008, women were less likely than men to be convicted of crimes and more likely to receive lighter sentences for the same charges (kerr, n.d.). furthermore, about 63% of the homeless population are men (gaetz, donaldson, richter, & gulliver, 2013) and studies have shown a link between homelessness and incarceration (metraux, roman, & cho, 2007; walsh, macdonald, rutherford, moore & krieg, 2011). given the fact that proportion of people who are homeless are aboriginal men (patrick, 2014), this points to one of the reasons for the disproportionately high incarceration rates among aboriginal men. men are also more likely to be victims of physical assault, physical assault in a public place outside the home, and homicide than women (vaillancourt, 2010).3 in canada, attempts to create men’s issues awareness groups have been met with resistance or have been outright rejected (urback, 2015). yet, these groups can create the intellectual space where critical discourse can be furthered on the issues men face in canadian society and the world at large. according to the justice centre for constitutional freedoms (jccf), men’s issues groups have been denied certification at the simon fraser university (in 2012), queens university (in 2014), and ryerson university (in 2012 and 2015; urback, 2015). it is important to note that highlighting these facts does not, in any way, indicate that women do not face challenges in society, however, this article seeks to promote a more-inclusive gender approach in the general discourse of the human condition, and missing and murdered indigenous people in particular. 3 to be clear, the presentation of the above-mentioned facts is not in any way intended to lay blame about the issues men face in the canadian society. this article seeks to commence a conversation about the need to include missing and murdered indigenous men in the inquiry, within the broader context of the social problems men face in canadian society. it is said that men rarely talk about these issues and this article seeks to start that conversation without laying blame on any group, ideology, or persons. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.2 conclusion there is a crucial need to address canada's missing and murdered indigenous people. in effect, it is necessary to appreciate how issues pertaining to violence against indigenous people are influenced by social forces that go beyond policing. perhaps the most important need at this time is the need to explore the social forces that lead to the widespread pattern of missing and murdered indigenous people, such as racism, sexism, historical and contemporary forms of colonization, social and economic disparities, systemic discrimination, and so on. the exploration of canada's missing and murdered indigenous people needs to emphasize social change, where we must consider, among other things, how violence against indigenous people is influenced by racial inequality, poverty, the effects of colonialism, intergenerational residential school effects, and social exclusion. these collective forces are interconnected in historical and contemporary times and have rich social significance and reveal a great deal about what we find so crucial about studying canada's missing and murdered indigenous people. on the research topic that concerns us—that of elaborating on the ways in which indigenous men and women have shared risk in order to justify looking at the issue from an indigenous perspective first and foremost, as opposed to a gendered perspective—take into account the following: historical research concerning indigenous peoples has been written primarily by non-indigenous scholars whose views and interpretations were a major factor in the development of colonial research that served to silence indigenous voices. colonizing research was not in the past, nor is it today, interested in honouring indigenous voices or perspectives. fortunately, current indigenous research tends to challenge the eurocentric theories presented in colonial research. today, efforts to decolonize indigenous research is very concerned with presenting indigenous voices and perspectives. such scholarship is committed to indigenous explanations for much of the crucial issues pertaining to indigenous communities. the complexities presented in our discussion requires indigenous perspectives that ask for the inclusion of male victims. recommendations based on our review of the literature, we recommend that the federal and provincial governments bolster support for indigenous healing initiatives designed to address intimate partner violence in indigenous communities. more specifically, indigenous healing requires increased funding to provide culturally sensitive and success outcomes. further, we recommend increasing social justice and educational programs designed to meet the needs of the economic and cultural issues experiencing by indigenous communities. without these supports, indigenous people will continue to experience marginalization, racial discrimination, social exclusion, and lack of opportunities in the canadian society. we recommend that governments review and increase funding measures for programs, particularly those programs that have demonstrated positive results in indigenous communities, to help to deal with violence that indigenous men commit and are victims of. 11 hansen and dim: missing and murdered indigenous people published by scholarship@western, 2019 references aboriginal justice inquiry of manitoba. 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(2011). homelessness and incarceration among aboriginal women: an integrative literature review. pimatisiwin: a journal of aboriginal and indigenous community health, 9(2), 363-386. 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.2 the international indigenous policy journal january 2019 canada's missing and murdered indigenous people and the imperative for a more inclusive perspective john g. hansen emeka e. dim recommended citation canada's missing and murdered indigenous people and the imperative for a more inclusive perspective abstract keywords creative commons license canada's missing and murdered indigenous people and the imperative for a more inclusive perspective ms 8355 de zayas book review rce.pdf the international indigenous policy journal volume 11 | issue 1 march 2020 book review: suffer the little children: genocide, indigenous nations, and the canadian state alfred de zayas former secretary of the un human rights committee, un independent expert on the promotion of a democratic and equitable international order, alfreddezayas@gmail.com recommended citation de zayas, a. (2020). book review: suffer the little children: genocide, indigenous nations, and the canadian state. the international indigenous policy journal, 11(1). doi: https://10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.8355 book review: suffer the little children: genocide, indigenous nations, and the canadian state abstract in this timely and morally necessary book, tamara starblanket gives particular attention to the forced transfer of indigenous children to institutions whose raison d’être was to indoctrinate and “educate” them away from their culture and heritage so as to erase indigenous memory and reprogram younger generations as “canadians.” these institutions were notorious for death and disease, torture, forced starvation, forced labour, and sexual predation. the book’s structure is well-ordered, the argumentation compelling, but not in phoney “scholarly detachment,” instead in conscious compilation and analysis of the evidence, supported by the force of ethics and a commitment to truth and justice, regardless of zeitgeist and political correctness. keywords indigenous rights, genocide, cultural genocide, residential schools, canadian history, law, self-determination, colonial history creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. 1 de zayas : book review: suffer the little children published by scholarship@western, 2020 book review: suffer the little children: genocide, indigenous nations, and the canadian state starblanket, t. (2018). suffer the little children: genocide, indigenous nations and the canadian state. clarity press. pp. 374. $29.95 (paperback). isbn 978-0-9986947-7-1. there are books that should make us pause and reassess how we look at history and how it impacts today’s world. among such books are david stannard’s (1993) groundbreaking american holocaust and tamara starblanket’s dissertation, revealing the continuing process of physical and cultural extinction the original nations of north america. the potential of these books would be achieved if historians and the media were committed to comprehensive truth in the correct context and if they would abandon double standards, selective indignation, and that most effective weapon: silence. damnatio memoriae [damnation of memory] occurred not only in roman times (benoist, 2007), it has been practiced by all civilizations. ours continues the tradition through direct and indirect censorship. an incisive foreword by history professor ward churchill and a strong epilogue by international law expert sharon venne make this brilliant dissertation a political manifesto, a call for action to restore the human rights of the original nations of canada, especially their right of self-determination, which has been and continues to be violated by the colonizers: the canadian settler-society. in this timely and morally necessary book, starblanket gives particular attention to the forced transfer of indigenous children to institutions whose raison d’être was to indoctrinate and “educate” them away from their culture and heritage so as to erase indigenous memory and reprogram younger generations as “canadians.” these institutions were notorious for death and disease, torture, forced starvation, forced labour, and sexual predation. the book’s structure is well-ordered, the argumentation compelling, but not in phoney “scholarly detachment,” instead in conscious compilation and analysis of the evidence, supported by the force of ethics and a commitment to truth and justice, regardless of zeitgeist and political correctness. starblanket begins by addressing the catastrophe that befell the original nations, victims of a relentless colonial assault on their existence as “peoples,” characterized by massacres, expropriations, expulsions, and imposition of conditions of life prohibited by the letter and the spirit of the convention on the prevention and punishment of the crime of genocide (1948). starblanket puts emphasis not only on the physical destruction of peoples, but on the concept of cultural genocide, which was so important to raphael lemkin (1944), who coined the term “genocide” in 1944 and who clearly intended to have it apply to the attempt to destroy a people’s culture, identity, and traditions. the states parties that adopted the genocide convention on december 9, 1948, however, intended to continue their colonial practices of cultural genocide and thus dropped the concept of denying a people the right to their own culture and way of life, although this very right is protected by the constitution of unesco (1945) and by the subsequent unesco convention on the protection and promotion of the diversity of cultural expressions (2005). in the introduction, starblanket addresses the wall of evasion and denial surrounding the ongoing crimes against indigenous peoples. she quotes harold cardinal, a survivor of the residential schools: “the policies adopted by canada over the years with regard to indians are not different from the rationale employed by nazi germany in its implementation of what is called the ‘final solution’ residential schools were only one element” (p. 1). yet, the rubrics of denial are many. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8355 chapter 1 focuses on the definition of genocide and its application to indigenous peoples. chapter 2 describes the deliberate policies of separating indigenous children from their parents and the attempt at making true “canadians” out of them. there are many “smoking guns” that point at the “intention” to destroy indigenous cultures. as duncan campbell scott, superintendent of the department of indian affairs wrote: “i want to get rid of the indian problem . . . our objective is to continue until there is not a single indian in canada that has not been absorbed into the body politic and there is no indian question” (p. 1). one may add that campbell scott added insult to injury by referring to an “indian” problem, when he meant the right of identity of the original nations of canada—such as the algonquin, the cree, the lingit, the mi’kmaq, the mohawk, the oneida, and the squamish—none of them inhabitants of the indian subcontinent! chapter 3 reviews the history of canada as a colonizing state and analyses the phenomenon of “cognitive conditioning” (p. 160). she cites an insightful study by steven newcomb (2011),1 director of the indigenous law institute, on the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (2007) and “the paradigm of domination.” it is important to understand the unseen assumptions in colonial law, the media, and academia concerning the original nations of north america and the use of metaphors: “cognitive theory enables us to realize that [western] law is the result of non-indigenous cognitive processes, social practices and conventions, and cultural patterns, and of the way that members of the dominating society imaginatively project taken-for-granted categories and concepts onto indigenous peoples” of which the “overall effect has been the traumatic intergenerational domination of [indigenous peoples] existence.” (p. 161; brackets in original) chapter 4 is aptly titled smoke and mirrors: canada’s pretence of compliance with the genocide convention. starblanket cites eli wiesel’s famous book night: “they are committing the greatest indignity human beings can inflict on one another: telling people who have suffered excruciating pain and loss that their pain and loss were illusions” (p. 206). indeed, society and the media have been in denial of the crimes committed and still being committed against indigenous peoples. it is a kind of negationism, which, unlike the vulgar negationism of the holocaust, is more or less socially acceptable in the us and canada. starblanket refers to the genocide convention and cites the five acts “committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such: a) killing members of the group; b) causing serious bodily or mental harm to member of the group; c) deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; d) imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; e) forcibly transferring children of the group to another group” (for the original text, see convention on the prevention and punishment of the crime of genocide, 1948, article ii). she shows how these violations have been perpetrated against indigenous peoples. for example, she describes the forcible transfer of indigenous children to the custody of non-indigenous families, which prime minister harper blandly referred to as “profoundly negative” and therefore “wrong” (p. 220). yet, is “wrong” not a far cry from criminal? is it a subterfuge to avoid the possibility of legal recourse and remedy? 1 newcomb is the author of pagans in the promised land: decoding the doctrine of christian discovery, which has been a bestseller on amazon. he is co-producer of the the doctrine of discovery: unmasking the domination code, directed by sheldon wolfchild (dakota). 3 de zayas : book review: suffer the little children published by scholarship@western, 2020 there is an urgent need to rehabilitate indigenous communities and give them the necessary financing and space to allow them to reconstruct their lives and their future. notwithstanding lip service to the rights of indigenous peoples and attempts to recognize rights through ilo convention 169 and the un declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples, there is little or no conviction behind governmental pronouncements and the ultimate goal remains the “assimilation” of the remaining indigenous people after their respective cultures have been extinguished. there is something unnatural about the government of canada’s truth and reconciliation commission of canada, which in a real sense constitutes “a safety valve, enabling recognition without facing legal culpability” (p. 363), because of the legal loopholes built-in and other intellectual manoeuvres. surely everyone needs truth—most urgently non-indigenous people, 99% of whom have no conception of the monstrous crimes committed and still being committed against indigenous peoples—not only in canada, but in the united states, brazil, chile, colombia, guatemala, honduras, and others. in her conclusion, starblanket reminds us: the non-indigenous scholar is unable to conceive of his/her complicity in the brutal or destructive nature of colonialism, and furthermore cannot conceive that the problem exists in the society that allows horrific acts of violence against the innocent to continue. (p. 272) one would think that “there is no sugar-coating genocide” (p. 270), but the fact is that suppression of information leads to suppression of thought, of empathy, of the inner voice that tells us that something must be done. truth requires more than an “apology” followed by “business as usual,” but also a commitment to try to make some sort of reparation. this reviewer strongly agrees with starblanket’s assessment: so-called state solutions cloaked in euphemisms and rhetoric such as “reconciliation” only further the colonial agenda . . . for indigenous peoples who have undergone genocidal acts, reconciliation is an oxymoron. the illusion that indigenous peoples are now achieving justice must be dispelled. (p. 274) the problem remains that there is no genuine remorse, but only public relations exercises aimed at distracting attention and sowing confusion. as with the holocaust, all the billions of german marks and euros paid by germany to victims of nazism cannot undo the atrocities, but at least it is recognition, not a cover-up or whitewash. it evidences that moral responsibility has been awoken. in the case of the descendants of the 10 million indigenous people of north america (denevan, 1992; dobyns, 1966), there remains a legal and moral obligation to make reparation, which would amount to many billions (or even trillions) of dollars in compensation for the genocide that accompanied the deadliest “clash of civilizations.” the late un special rapporteur of the sub-commission on promotion and protection of human rights, professor miguel alfonso martínez, expressed a caveat: it is not possible to undo all that has been done . . . but this does not negate the ethical imperative to undo (even at the expense, if need be, of the straightjacket imposed by the 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8355 unbending observance of the “rule of [non-indigenous] law”) the wrongs [crimes] done, both spiritually and materially, to the indigenous peoples. (p. 269; brackets in original) i would like to be bolder and say that there must be a “road map” designed by indigenous peoples and supported by the office of the un high commissioner for human rights to make rehabilitation and reparation happen. the way ahead must be built on the imperative of implementing the right of self-determination for all peoples on this planet. as professor miguel alfonso martínez (1999) wrote in study on treaties, agreements and other constructive arrangements between states and indigenous populations: final report, indigenous peoples are entitled to the inalienable right of self-determination, which is enshrined in article 1 of the un charter, article 1 of the covenant on civil and political rights, and article 2 of the covenant on economic, social and cultural rights. this right of (and not just “to”) selfdetermination belongs to that category of peremptory international law principles known as jus cogens [compelling law]. my report to the un general assembly (de zayas, 2013) quotes extensively from alfonso martinez’s (1999) report. along with my report to the general assembly the following year (de zayas, 2014), both reports are devoted entirely to the theory and practice of self-determination. my report to the human rights council formulates 23 principles of international order, including the implementation of the right of self-determination as a conflict-prevention measure (de zayas, 2018). throughout the book, starblanket demonstrates a broad knowledge of both history and law. the documentation is vast and precise, as reflected in 79 pages of endnotes comprising more than a thousand reliable sources and commentary. the book challenges the reader to reassess mainstream “certainties” and “values” to test whether western “enlightened” societies and mainstream human rights activists are practicing what they preach. the book holds a mirror to every reader and invites them to come to grips with fundamental issues of natural justice, exploitation, discrimination, humiliation, impunity for genocide, and crimes against humanity. what can we learn from this book? perhaps the bottom line is that colonization by the europeans has never ended. there was no decolonization process like in africa or asia. to this day, the indigenous peoples of north america continue to live in a form of colonial subjugation and, unlike the peoples of africa and asia, the original nations of the united states and canada were never restored to independence and prosperity. partly, this is because the original nations were victims of physical genocide, and the european settlers—actually uninvited migrants—became so numerous that indigenous peoples—the nations that had given the names to the continent—became minorities in their own lands and their natural resources were looted. in a world plagued by fake news, fake history, and fake law, it is remarkable that this intellectually honest dissertation was accepted in a conformist academic environment. it is even more significant that starblanket’s necessary message has been published in book form. this gives reason for mitigated optimism. her book is a tour de force, important not only for indigenous peoples, but especially for nonindigenous people who may be moved to action based on the common humanity of all members of the human family and who believe that natural justice requires affirmative action to begin restoring indigenous peoples to a position that will guarantee the survival of their ancient culture and traditions. 5 de zayas : book review: suffer the little children published by scholarship@western, 2020 perhaps canada should consider nominating indigenous traditions as the intangible cultural heritage of humankind (unesco, n.d.) and take the measures necessary to preserve them. if a book ever deserved translation into the languages of other colonial states, surely starblanket’s study merits spanish and french editions. notwithstanding the excellent footnotes, a future english edition would benefit from a separate comprehensive bibliography, including pertinent un resolutions and reports as well as the jurisprudence of the inter-american court of human rights. as a professor of history and international law, this reviewer would have taken pleasure being an advisor on a dissertation of this superb quality. i would have graded the dissertation summa cum laude [with highest praise]. references alfonso martínez, m. (1999). study on treaties, agreements and other constructive arrangements between states and indigenous populations: final report (un doc. e/cn.4/sub.2/ 1999/20). https://digitallibrary.un.org/record/276353?ln=en benoist, s. (2007). mémoire et histoire: les procédures de condamnation dans l'antiquité romaine [memory and history: conviction procedures in roman antiquity]. centre régional universitaire lorrain d'histoire. the constitution of unesco, november 16, 1945, http://portal.unesco.org/en/ev.phpurl_id=15244&url_do=do_topic&url_section=201.html convention on the prevention and punishment of the crime of genocide, december 9, 1948, https://www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/crimeofgenocide.aspx convention on the protection and promotion of the diversity of cultural expressions, october 20, 2005, https://en.unesco.org/creativity/sites/creativity/files/passeport-convention2005web2.pdf de zayas, a. (2013). report of the independent expert on the promotion of a democratic and equitable international order (a/68/284). retrieved from https://documents-ddsny.un.org/doc/undoc/gen/n13/421/23/pdf/n1342123.pdf?openelement de zayas, a. (2014). interim report of the independent expert on the promotion of a democratic and equitable international order (a/69/272). retrieved from https://documents-ddsny.un.org/doc/undoc/gen/n14/497/95/pdf/n1449795.pdf?openelement de zayas, a. (2018). report of the independent expert on the promotion of a democratic and equitable international order (a/hrc/37/63). retrieved from https://documents-ddsny.un.org/doc/undoc/gen/g18/018/46/pdf/g1801846.pdf?openelement denevan, w. (1992). native american populations in 1492: recent research and a revised hemispheric estimate. in w. denevan (ed.), the native population of the americas in 1492 (pp. xvii-xxx). university of wisconsin press. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8355 dobyns, h. f. (1966). an appraisal of techniques with a new hemispheric estimate. current anthropology, 7(4), 395-416. lemkin, r. (1944). axis rule in occupied europe. the lawbook exchange ltd. newcomb, s. t. (2011). the un declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples and the paradigm of domination. griffiths law review, 20(3), 578-607. stannard, d. e. (1993). american holocaust. oxford university press. unesco. (n.d.). what is intangible cultural heritage? https://ich.unesco.org/en/what-is-intangibleheritage-00003 united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples, september 13, 2007, https://www.un.org/development/desa/indigenouspeoples/declaration-on-the-rights-ofindigenous-peoples.html venne, s. (1998). our elders understand our rights: evolving international law regarding indigenous peoples’ rights. theytus books. "a completely new approach" to indigenous cultural heritage: evaluating the queensland aboriginal cultural heritage act the international indigenous policy journal volume 9 | issue 1 article 6 january 2018 "a completely new approach" to indigenous cultural heritage: evaluating the queensland aboriginal cultural heritage act mark e. o'neill university of queensland, m.oneill@uq.edu.au recommended citation o'neill, m. e. (2018). "a completely new approach" to indigenous cultural heritage: evaluating the queensland aboriginal cultural heritage act. the international indigenous policy journal, 9(1). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.6 "a completely new approach" to indigenous cultural heritage: evaluating the queensland aboriginal cultural heritage act abstract the aboriginal cultural heritage act 2003 challenged the hegemony that western, archaeological methodologies has held over indigenous cultural heritage in australia. by choosing to relinquish state control and authority over cultural heritage in favour of the expertise of indigenous people, the act created a unique and innovative heritage policy. over the 10 years the act has been in force, it has seen a variety of approaches adopted as part of myriad projects. this has created a mature field of practice for investigation and analysis. this article examines and critiques the act to determine its successes and weaknesses. in doing so, it offers opportunities for other policy-makers to consider as part of policy review. keywords heritage protection, cultural heritage, heritage policy, indigenous heritage acknowledgments the author would like to thank john schiavo of the heritage unit of the department of aboriginal and torres strait islander partnerships and jacqueline murray for their contributions and comments on this article. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ “a c o m p l e t e l y n e w a p p ro a c h ” t o i n d i g e n o u s c u l t u ra l h e ri t a g e : e v a l u a t i n g t h e q u e e n s l a n d a b o ri g i n a l c u l t u ra l h e ri t a g e a c t the authority and role of indigenous people in the management of cultural heritage has been a touchstone of controversy and debate in many post-colonial societies (battiste & henderson, 2000). because the heritage discipline has been heavily influenced by “scientific conservation” principles, indigenous people’s knowledge, expertise, and methodologies have been marginalised in both legislation and practice (wharton, 2005). beginning in the 1980s, there has been an increased recognition of the importance of indigenous intellectual resources for cultural matters. these responses have differed across jurisdictions with varying levels of success. due to the relative nascence of this field, examinations of these various approaches are of tremendous value to policy-makers. understanding and critiquing legislative settings around the world in this field is an important means through which to improve both policy and practice concerned with indigenous involvement in the management of cultural heritage. one of the more interesting indigenous cultural heritage policies has developed in the australian state of queensland. the aboriginal cultural heritage act 2003(ach act) created the most distinctive heritage management regime in australia.1 rather than continuing the centralised, governmentcontrolled, heritage management process endemic throughout australia, the act established aboriginal parties as cultural heritage experts within their traditional country.2 in doing so, the ach act addressed criticisms that previous cultural heritage practices in queensland had overlooked the role and knowledge of aboriginal people (donovan, 2002). this was a dramatic shift. in taking such a step, the ach act created what one commentator called “a completely new statutory approach” to indigenous cultural heritage (stephenson, 2006, para. 73). this article argues that the ach act was groundbreaking in the way it returned statutory authority to aboriginal people for the management of their cultural heritage, and that it has resulted in mostly positive outcomes for aboriginal people, heritage, and project delivery in queensland. the act’s several weaknesses are also acknowledged. it fails in some circumstances to protect aboriginal cultural heritage, can exacerbate intraand interaboriginal community conflicts about who has the cultural authority to manage heritage (martin, sneddon, & trigger, 2016) and newer legislation in other states, especially the victorian aboriginal heritage act 2006, have provided systems that are viewed more favourably by some commentators, policymakers, and aboriginal people (kiriama, 2012; porter, 2006). regardless, the ach act’s status as one of the first pieces of legislation to address the marginalisation of aboriginal people and knowledge in cultural heritage means analysis and criticism of its functioning is valuable. 1 the author notes that the torres strait islander cultural heritage act 2003 was passed concomitantly and has had an equally profound affect on the philosophy and approach to managing cultural heritage in the torres strait islands. however, as the author has worked exclusively with the aboriginal cultural heritage act and acknowledging the cultural differences between aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples, the commentary and analysis in this article is restricted to the aboriginal cultural heritage act. 2 the term “country” has been explored and studied by a range of scholars in keeping with its multiple uses by the aboriginal community. it used in this article as an area of land traditionally occupied by an aboriginal group “around a kinship system that includes both living relatives and ancestral creator beings” (mcgaw & tootell, 2015, p. 91). 1 o'neill: "a completely new approach" to indigenous cultural heritage published by scholarship@western, 2018 a growing body of analysis of the operation of the ach act and its effectiveness in fulfilling the aspirations of aboriginal people, land users, the queensland parliament, and other stakeholders has emerged. however, this literature has been sharply focused, with authors choosing to consider singular aspects of the act and its operation such as compliance (rowland, ulm, & reid, 2014), commodification (martin et al., 2016), and legal implications (brockett, 2013; stephenson, 2006). few authors have examined the act by historically contextualising the evolution of cultural heritage legislation in queensland as a means to explain why this most recent attempt at statutory protection developed its philosophies and precepts. doing so facilitates a wide evaluation of its successes and failures, which other jurisdictions may consider as part of future policy direction. now is considered an appropriate moment to critique and examine the act’s operation in its practical and legislative context. there are two reasons. firstly, the act emerged in a period of growing recognition of the primacy of aboriginal people in cultural matters, which followed the acknowledgement of the native title rights of indigenous people in australia (butt, eagleson, & lane, 2001; marks & mcdonell, 1996; ritter, 2009a). for this reason, this act is instructive of the legislative response of one australian jurisdiction to the rights of indigenous people within a post-colonial nation (evatt, 1996). secondly, the act’s introduction also coincided with a period of rapid and sizable economic investment by the resources and infrastructure industries in queensland (sheehan & gregory, 2013). overwhelmingly, the resultant projects intersected with the ach act. as a result, the period from 2004 to 2017 saw a litany of methodologies and approaches adopted to comply with the ach act, providing a rich vein of practice and evidence to investigate. this mature environment fosters insights into the myriad ways this legislation has been adapted to diverse projects, allowing an analysis of the act as a policy response in multiple commercial, communal, and cultural settings. drawing on this evidence, this article examines and explores the operation of the ach act for its policy implications and values. in doing so, it is noted that a number of structural frameworks could lead to valuable evaluations. discourse analysis could be used to interpret the possession and operation of power by the government, land users, and aboriginal parties.3 an archaeological lens could evaluate the conservation of items of material cultural heritage. or a post-colonial methodology could reveal the legacy and continued functioning of western cultural, institutional, and scientific hegemony on notions of aboriginality and heritage in australia. these and many other approaches would be fruitful. however, this article evaluates the ach act by reframing its three seminal principles as investigative questions: have aboriginal parties across the state been able to manage cultural heritage according to their own mores and standards? has the queensland approach protected aboriginal cultural heritage? and, has the legislation provided land users with a framework for cultural heritage management to aid the delivery of projects? the article draws on available empirical evidence, the author’s 10 years of professional experience with the act, and the act’s operation to determine what elements have been beneficial to indigenous cultural heritage management and which have had negative outcomes. 3 under the ach act, aboriginal parties are defined through a link to the native title act 1993, with a registered native title claim resulting in aboriginal party status (stephenson, 2006). for those areas without a registered native title claim, cultural heritage bodies could be approved by the state. as noted by martin et al (2016), this has resulted in some contestation and disagreement among aboriginal communities as to who has the right to “speak for country.” 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 6 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.6 ba c kg ro u n d a n d m e t h o d o l o g y t h e e v o l u t i o n o f t h e a b o ri g i n a l c u l t u ra l h e ri t a g e a c t to analyse the operation of the ach act, it is important to understand the preceding legislative efforts to protect aboriginal cultural heritage in queensland and how these influenced the act’s drafting. this provides an explanatory context for the measures that were eventually incorporated into the ach act and a framework through which to examine its operation. in queensland, cultural heritage practice focuses on the identification and preservation of items and places considered to be significant to a community. it draws on an array of techniques to not only preserve these material remnants of the past, but to communicate and promote what is culturally significant about them. as with other jurisdictions in australia, the evolution of legislative protection for aboriginal cultural heritage in queensland took time and reflected evolutions in broader attitudes to both heritage preservation and the position of aboriginal people within australian society (mcgrath & lee, 2016; smith, 2000). the first legislative regulation and protection of what is now recognised as aboriginal cultural heritage in queensland came with the passing of the aboriginal relics preservation act 1967 (arp act). introduced by the governing national party, the arp act was dominated by two philosophies. in keeping with much historical and contemporary rhetoric, the arp act was prefaced on an assimilationist platform, which sought to inculcate and suppress aboriginal people and culture into broader australian society (queensland legislative assembly, 1967). accompanying the assimilationist intent, the arp act heavily favoured archaeological techniques. the identification and management of aboriginal cultural heritage under this act was the responsibility of the archaeology branch of the (queensland) department of aboriginal and islanders advancement and fisheries. aboriginal people had limited statutory or practical involvement (mcardle, 1997). as a result, cultural heritage was primarily restricted to material remnants of previous occupation and use of the land by aboriginal people, which was identified and managed by professional archaeologists (rowland et al., 2014). when the arp act was replaced by cultural record (landscapes queensland and queensland estate) act 1987 (cr act), the new legislation retained its predecessor’s assimilationist and archaeological underpinnings. the authority for the identification and management of aboriginal cultural heritage remained with the minister, who was delegated powers to identify sites, regulate or restrict entry to these sites, appoint heritage protectors, and establish a permitting process after seeking advice from qualified experts. furthermore, the cr act applied to all queensland heritage: aboriginal and historic (fourmile, 1996). many commentators saw the conflation of these two culturally distinct types of heritage as a continuation of attempts to diminish the uniqueness of aboriginal history and heritage within the australian community (mcardle, 1997). there were persistent weaknesses in and criticism of the cr act (donovan, 2002; fourmile, 1996; mcardle, 1997). aboriginal people generally agreed the act was “archaic and ineffectual” as it drew on an “outdated ideology” that excluded them from the decision-making and management process (watson & black, 2001, para. 1, outdated ideology section, para. 1). for land users, the lack of clear guidelines led to expensive, time consuming, and—in hindsight—often unnecessary, cultural heritage processes that caused project delays, cost overruns, and ultimately failed to protect cultural heritage (queensland legislative assembly, 2003). in 1998, the state premier described it as “antiquated and 3 o'neill: "a completely new approach" to indigenous cultural heritage published by scholarship@western, 2018 conceptually flawed” legislation and advised that he had initiated a review (queensland legislative assembly, 1998, p. 2635). other commentators agreed with the premier’s summation (donovan, 2002; fourmile, 1996; memmott, 1998). this position was acknowledged by the responsible minister during the second reading of the bill, which became the ach act, when he informed the house that the cr act had “proven to be an ineffective act” for all stakeholders (queensland legislative assembly, 2003, pp. 3179-3180). as a result, the queensland government, aboriginal people, industry groups, academics, and practitioners were in favour of new legislation to manage and protect aboriginal cultural heritage. work on developing a new approach to aboriginal cultural heritage commenced in 1998 (queensland legislative assembly, 1998). after an initial draft model was rejected by all parties in 1999, a revised model was released in 2001 and was introduced into parliament on august 21, 2003 (queensland legislative assembly, 2003). the revised model was the result of extensive consultation with a range of stakeholders including representatives of aboriginal groups, the queensland indigenous working group (qwig), land users, organisations such as agforce,4 industry groups, linear infrastructure providers (rail, electricity transmission, gas, and water pipelines), and government agencies. this wide consultation was seen to be a strength of the new bill (queensland legislative assembly, 2003). as a result, the new legislation was shaped to satisfy the broad range of stakeholders who were consulted, which is evident in both the drafting of the bill and its operation as legislation. central to the bill were three key aims. the first was “to recognise the fundamental right of aboriginal people to be involved in the process of assessment and management of activities that may harm their cultural heritage” (the state of queensland, 2003, p. 1). second was to ensure the protection of aboriginal cultural heritage. and the third was the creation of “certainty of process and timeframes for the assessment of cultural heritage and the management of possible impacts upon it” as part of projects and other developments (the state of queensland, 2003, p. 1). this combination of principles was novel and untested in heritage management in queensland, or in australia for that matter, and the provisions of the act attempt to guide this new approach. at the heart of the bill was the concept of state wide “blanket protection” of aboriginal cultural heritage (watson & black, 2001). blanket protection, under this act exclusively, meant all land users were required to satisfy a general duty of care to protect aboriginal cultural heritage regardless of the extent of previous studies or the nature of their activities (the state of queensland, 2003). such protection had been advocated to protect aboriginal cultural heritage throughout australia by other commentators (schnierer, ellsmore, & schnierer, 2011). this protection applied to all areas regardless of whether they had been subject to a survey or contained sites or places entered on a statutory list (stephenson, 2006). this was an innovation for heritage protection in queensland. under the arp act, the cr act, and the queensland heritage act 1992 protection of cultural heritage in queensland applied only to those places entered on a statutory heritage list (memmott, 1998). the ach act also shifted the authority to identify, assess, and manage cultural heritage away from centralised, “bureaucratic” government bodies and experts (watson & black, 2001). instead, aboriginal parties throughout the state would be given responsibility for managing cultural heritage within specified areas. section 5(b) of the act recognised “indigenous people as primary guardians” of cultural heritage 4 agforce is an industry group established to represent the interests of agricultural producers in queensland. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 6 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.6 with guardianship extending to include management of items of cultural heritage and the right for aboriginal people to make decisions regarding cultural heritage free from external opinion or influence (aboriginal cultural heritage act, 2003). this reflected advocacy from aboriginal people for such power to be returned to them in queensland through the “ithaca principles”5 in 1998 (donovan, 2002; memmott, 1998). it was also a move that corresponded with trends in other nations to return authority to indigenous people as part of land use planning and development (eversole, 2010; gardner et al., 2012). while this was a radical shift, it was tempered by the expectation that any such cultural heritage be “supported by appropriate anthropological, biogeographical, historical and archaeological information” (queensland, 2003a, p. 4409). the reliance on archaeological information and verification, or “scientific stewardship,” was consistent with the established framework of cultural heritage management throughout australia and showed a desire to retain part of the previous approach (smith, 2000, p. 109). as blanket protection applied to a plethora of activities, a flexible approach to managing cultural heritage was developed to recognise the potential impacts of a vast array of activities. the act effectively created a two-tiered heritage regime. for major projects that required an environmental impact statement (eis), consultation and agreement with the aboriginal party(s) for the project area was compulsory under part 7 of the act. such consultation had to be recorded and agreed in a cultural heritage management plan (chmp), which was approved and registered by the state (aboriginal cultural heritage act, 2003). the basic administrative requirements along with statutory timeframes for a chmp were included in the act (aboriginal cultural heritage act, 2003). however, the content of these agreements was left to the discretion of the negotiating parties and, unlike native title agreements, the state was not a party or signatory to these agreements. in fact, the ach act stipulates that the state “must approve” all chmps that satisfy the minimum administrative requirements, regardless of their contents (aboriginal cultural heritage act, 2003, s. 107). for projects not requiring a chmp, the act included provision for the gazettal of duty of care guidelines. these guidelines were designed to allow land users not requiring an eis to self-assess their proposed activities and determine if there was a requirement for consultation with the aboriginal party for the area. gazetted in april 2004, the guidelines contained five categories that focused on the nature of the proposed activity and evidence of previous ground disturbance (department of aboriginal and torres strait islander partnerships, 2004). new ground disturbance required engagement with the appropriate aboriginal party. no minimum standard of investigation or approved methodology was described and assessments would not need statutory approval nor the consent of the aboriginal party for the area. any project that could show compliance with the duty of care guidelines was compliant with the ach act (2003, see s. 23[3][a]). the role of the state in the management of aboriginal cultural heritage also changed dramatically. the act saw the state voluntarily cede its formerly dominant role as the arbiter, manager, and owner of cultural heritage. instead, the state became an administrative body with some limited enforcement and intervention powers. the act makes provision for the state to levy fines and issue reparation orders for 5 the ithaca principles were drafted following a meeting of aboriginal representatives in the ithaca town hall in brisbane in 1989. the guiding principle was that aboriginal people should be responsible for the management of their own cultural heritage (donovan, 2002). 5 o'neill: "a completely new approach" to indigenous cultural heritage published by scholarship@western, 2018 breaches (aboriginal cultural heritage act), gave the minister the power to issue a stop order to protect cultural heritage (aboriginal cultural heritage act, 2003) and allowed for injunctive relief under the land and resources tribunal act 1999.6 these reserve powers were considered ample protection against potential harm to cultural heritage and a necessary deterrent to land users considering avoiding or breaching the act (seiver, 2005; watson & black, 2001). it also meant the state played a minor role in cultural heritage management and compliance. in evaluating the proposed legislation, commentators nicole watson and russell black (2001) were optimistic that the new approach would be beneficial for aboriginal people. however, due to the novelty and the untested nature of several of the act’s principle tenets, they remained of the opinion that its effectiveness was something they “cannot predict” (conclusion section, para. 1). this article now examines the operation of the three key principles of the ach act in order to evaluate its effectiveness in implementing the goals set by the queensland parliament. a n a l y s i s a n d d i s c u s s i o n t h e f u n d a m e n t a l r i g h t o f c o n s u l t a t i o n the defining feature of the ach act was repealing previous state control over cultural heritage and returning it to aboriginal people. the right to identify and manage their cultural heritage had been explicitly demanded by aboriginal people in queensland in 1998 (donovan, 2002; memmott, 1998). in response, the queensland parliament acknowledged aboriginal peoples’ “fundamental right” to assess and mange their culture free from external control (queensland legislative assembly, 2003, pp. 44004401). to facilitate this, the ach act attempted to formalise and encourage a consultation process between aboriginal parties and land users7 to manage and preserve cultural heritage as part of projects and development. however, this right was tempered by the two-tiered approach of compulsory consultation for major projects and duty of care assessments for minor projects. for this reason, each tier of the regime must be considered separately. c o m p u l s o ry c o n s u l t a t i o n . as noted above, consultation with aboriginal parties and the agreement of a chmp is compulsory only for major projects requiring an eis. from the introduction of the ach act up to june 30, 2015 there have been 333 chmps agreed and registered with the state (department of environment and heritage protection, 2016).8 for each of these agreements, the land user and aboriginal party were required to negotiate on the management of cultural heritage within the project area. the contents of these agreements are confidential. however, the ach act provides for minimum negotiation timeframes and a range of matters that should be considered during consultation, meaning that each agreement is the outcome of direct engagement between the aboriginal party and the land user. 6 with the passage of land court and other legislation amendment act 2007, the powers of the land and resources tribunal were transferred to the land court. 7 land users are defined in the ach act as a person carrying out, or proposing to carry out, activities on land likely to materially affect the land. 8 some of these chmps have been entered into for projects that do not require an eis in accordance with section 83 of the ach act. this has been to provide both land users and aboriginal parties with certainty. these chmps must follow the same process as compulsory chmps and have the same advantages and disadvantages. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 6 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.6 taken at face value the positioning of aboriginal people at the centre of the chmp process for such projects is a success of the act. as noted during debate, the parliament sought to ensure that “aboriginal people are responsible for assessing the level of significance of their culture” as opposed to government officials and non-aboriginal experts (queensland legislative assembly, 2003, p. 3180). theoretically, these chmps are evidence of a significant number of major projects for which aboriginal people were the experts and primary managers of their cultural heritage. for each of these projects, the negotiations began from the standpoint that aboriginal people, not external specialists or government agencies, should advise and work with land users to manage cultural heritage. consequently, in the case of these projects, the ach act has offered an opportunity for aboriginal parties and their knowledge to be seminal to the management of cultural heritage. however, this tier is not without its flaws. when examined in more detail, there is evidence that the chmp process may not have been conducive to ensuring aboriginal cultural heritage management practices are fully realised, or at least realised in the form all aboriginal parties would prefer. the context of these negotiations is important. a chmp requires the deployment of well-honed skills in negotiation, contract drafting and interpretation, survey implementation, and commercial acumen. added to this are statutory timeframes that allow a land user to seek approval of a chmp through the land court. as a result, much like native title agreement-making, aboriginal parties in these negotiations find themselves in a “generally weak bargaining position” (o’faircheallaigh, 2008, p. 4). while the land user, as the plan sponsor, is required to make assistance available to the aboriginal party, this is inconsistent and often does not provide commensurate resources that larger land users may have at their disposal (o’neill, 2016). for these reasons, the aboriginal party may be placed in a position of agreeing to lesser, or non-preferred, cultural heritage management terms and conditions to avoid an adverse outcome and/or losing control of the cultural heritage process altogether as a result of a land court decision. this power disparity has also resulted in factionalism within some aboriginal parties, which has further reduced their bargaining power and cultural cohesion (martin et al., 2016). the combination of resource disparity and statutory timeframe pressures has meant many aboriginal parties have felt they have not been given the opportunity to develop and implement their preferred cultural heritage management strategies. consequently, the creation of a chmp agreement between a land user and aboriginal party does not always result in the involvement of aboriginal parties in the cultural heritage management process in a culturally appropriate manner. not all chmps have been manifestly in favour of land users or to the detriment of aboriginal parties. a significant number of aboriginal parties have negotiated multiple chmps (department of environment and heritage protection, 2016). using these experiences, some parties have developed sophisticated negotiation strategies and expertise, which they have deployed to ensure the implementation of methodologies that are in keeping with cultural traditions and expectations. in other cases, the aboriginal parties are simply more experienced and effective negotiators. these parties have been based predominantly in areas with extensive resource and infrastructure developments allowing them to develop and exercise both influence and expertise in the negotiation process. for these aboriginal parties, the advent of the ach act has been beneficial as it has not only brought them to the centre of the cultural heritage management system, but allowed them to exert significant authority in the way that cultural heritage is managed. 7 o'neill: "a completely new approach" to indigenous cultural heritage published by scholarship@western, 2018 while the compulsory chmp process has recognised the primacy of aboriginal people in the cultural heritage process, it has simultaneously moved it into what david ritter (2009a, 2009b) refers to as a commoditised, agreement-making process typical of native title agreements. while noting that this minimises the cultural aspect of the engagement process, ritter, along with o’faircheallaigh (2008) and o’neill (2016), adroitly argue that the better negotiator is often the most successful party in such agreement-making processes. based on the author’s experience, this is certainly the case with the ach act. while there are a large number of agreements providing evidence of a theoretical shift of authority to aboriginal parties for cultural heritage, the extent and exercise of that power is dependent on the capacity and capability of the aboriginal party to successfully negotiate a preferred outcome. d u t y o f c a re e n g a g e m e n t . crucial to the passage of the act was the gazettal of the duty of care guidelines to ensure “the legislation is flexible and workable without being unduly prescriptive” (aboriginal cultural heritage act, 2003, pp. 4-5). while the duty of care guidelines were intended as a first-step risk management tool, they have evolved, in many cases, to a method for land users to effectively exclude aboriginal parties from cultural heritage management (department of aboriginal and torres strait islander partnerships, 2016). by completing a due diligence assessment using the guidelines, a land user can assert the project area has been subject to extensive ground disturbance making it “reasonable and practicable that the activity proceeds without further cultural heritage assessment” (department of aboriginal and torres strait islander partnerships, 2004, ss. 4.2, 4.5, 5.2 and 5.5). it is not required that the due diligence assessment be approved by any government agency nor is it compulsory to advise the relevant aboriginal party of the assessment. instead, the land user can retain the assessment as proof of compliance with the ach act if challenged by the aboriginal party, the government administrator, or pursued by aggrieved parties through the land court. many aboriginal parties and archaeologists contend that the duty of care guidelines do not appropriately consider aboriginal people’s connection to country and the potential cultural heritage and scientific values of disturbed areas (rowland et al., 2014). it is argued that the guidelines contain three flaws. firstly, previous ground disturbance may not have resulted in all artefacts being removed, meaning a site may retain artefacts and scientific value. secondly, if any remaining artefacts are damaged or of limited scientific value, this does not detract from the cultural importance of these artefacts to many aboriginal parties. thirdly, by focusing on ground disturbance, the guidelines do not recognise the potential spiritual or cultural significance of an area for aboriginal people (godwin & weiner, 2008). in many cases by failing to consider material culture and potential intangible and cultural values associated with aboriginal parties’ connection with land, the duty of care guidelines run counter to the spirit of the ach act. added to these flaws in the duty of care guidelines, there are projects that have proceeded without any form of aboriginal cultural heritage assessment. while the ach act imposes a duty of care on all land users, it is rarely a mandatory condition of project approval. this has allowed projects to proceed, intentionally or not, without any form of cultural heritage assessment with regulators frequently forced to “guess” if projects are compliant with the act (rowland et al., 2014, p. 341). again, such actions are also detrimental to the ach act’s effectiveness. at the outset, such failures leave open the possibility that items and places of cultural heritage value may have been irretrievably damaged or lost. more importantly though, the fundamental precept of the ach act—which provides primacy to aboriginal 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 6 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.6 parties in managing cultural heritage—can be completely ignored, greatly detracting from its philosophical underpinning. however, it should be noted that aboriginal parties have not been denied involvement in all projects covered by the duty of care. in many cases, an assessment has led to the conclusion that consultation with the aboriginal party is the best path to compliance with the ach act and to reduce project risk. as a result, some land users have chosen to voluntarily utilise the part 7 chmp process. such agreements are identical in process and outcomes and with the same potential flaws as part 7 agreements described above. concomitantly, a large number of projects have achieved compliance with the ach act under section 23 in partnership with the aboriginal party. these are generally referred to as cultural heritage agreements or section 23 agreements. these agreements established between aboriginal parties and land users are not registered or approved by the state, and therefore the actual number of these agreements developed since 2004 is unknown. however, much like the chmp process, agreements complying with section 23 have provided opportunities and resources for aboriginal parties to identify and manage cultural heritage in ways that are appropriate to their tradition and custom. recognising some of these flaws in the guidelines, the department of aboriginal and torres strait islander partnerships (datsip), as the administrative agency for the ach act, has recently commenced a review. seeking comment from stakeholders, datsip advised that, in their opinion, the guidelines in some cases “fail to capture the residual cultural heritage values of an area” (department of aboriginal and torres strait islander partnerships, 2016, p. 1). such an admission from datsip reinforces the point that currently the duty of care guidelines do not provide adequate recognition of aboriginal parties in the cultural heritage management process commensurate with the precepts of the ach act. pre s e rv a t i o n o f c u l t u ra l h e ri t a g e in decentralising the cultural heritage process, the ach act returned responsibility for the identification and preservation of cultural heritage to distinct aboriginal parties across the state. this was a markedly new approach. from the 1960s onwards, scientific methodologies—predominately archaeology— dominated australian cultural heritage management (smith, 2000, 2004). aboriginal views were often disregarded. the rationale for this shift in queensland was that the evidence of aboriginal occupation and use of the land belonged to and should be managed by aboriginal people in a manner that fit traditional customs and mores. subsequently, the methods, standards, and assessments of aboriginal parties came to the fore. as expected, such an approach had consequences for the management of both material and non-material cultural heritage. as part of the large number of agreements and processes conducted under the auspices of the ach act since 2004, substantial areas of queensland have been subject to cultural heritage surveys. as part of these activities, 42,537 sites of cultural heritage significance have been added to the aboriginal cultural heritage database up to june 30, 2015 (department of environment and heritage protection, 2016). this is a remarkable number when it is considered that reporting of items or sites to datsip is not compulsory. this large quantum of discoveries points to extensive efforts to identify, manage, and preserve cultural heritage by aboriginal parties. however, much like the significant number of chmps and other agreements, these identified sites require further interrogation. 9 o'neill: "a completely new approach" to indigenous cultural heritage published by scholarship@western, 2018 while there has been substantial cultural heritage identified, the process of identification and management differs from traditional methodologies; in some cases, the difference is stark. the definition of conservation is central. traditionally, heritage conservation in australia is taken to mean the identification, preservation, and display of artefacts, items, and practices that are culturally significant (barber, 2006). such a process is wrapped up in traditional museological ideas of cultural conservation and archaeological approaches to identification and assessment of material (wharton, 2005). this approach to cultural heritage gained credence in australia from the 1960s onwards as university-based and trained archaeologists sought to codify their practice and gain credibility within the discipline globally (smith, 2000). when viewed from the perspective of archaeological techniques, the management of material cultural heritage in queensland since the introduction of the ach act has, on the whole, been poor. this is due to the act’s reliance on negotiated outcomes between aboriginal parties and land users as the principal heritage management technique and the state’s inability to insist on the use of archaeological techniques. as a result, the involvement of archaeologists and scientific techniques is reliant upon the aboriginal party and the land user. in a large number of cases, archaeological expertise is absent because either the aboriginal party may not request or require it or the land user may not agree to engage a heritage professional. combined with the absence of minimum qualifications to undertake such assessments, these surveys have seen “basic errors” of artefact identification in the experience of some archaeologists (martin et al., 2016, p. 148). as such, many surveys may not satisfy the desire of queensland parliament that all items and sites be supported by “authoritative anthropological, biogeographical, historical and archaeological information” or standard archaeological process (queensland, 2003a, p. 3180). as a result of this lack of a proscribed archaeological methodology or standards, the nature of what constitutes cultural heritage has been the most malleable and evolutionary element of the ach act. some aboriginal parties have insisted on the use of external, expert opinion and this has resulted in the creation of high quality reports and the publication of some academic papers (cochrane, habgood, doelman, herries, & webb, 2012; godwin & weiner, 2008; prangnell, 2004; prangnell & gorring, 2005; ross, 2010). however, not all aboriginal parties have adopted a standardised, systematic, archaeological methodology to identify and assess cultural heritage. parties have, instead, chosen how they manage their cultural heritage. this has fostered different methodologies for the preservation of cultural heritage beyond the formerly dominant western-scientific paradigm (byrne, 1991). aboriginal parties have subsequently reconnected with the past, reinterpreted the significance and utility of material culture, utilised professional techniques when it is considered appropriate and inscribed contemporary meanings onto traditional country. rather than rely only on archaeological evidence of past occupation and land use to establish significance, aboriginal parties have, in many cases, understood the landscape in ways that reflect their contemporary values and interpretations and eschewed the dominance of western views of cultural heritage. in evaluating this element of the ach act, broader consideration must be taken. if analysed only through the lens of archaeological methodologies, the act has been ineffective and possibly even destructive. however, the ach act has, in many cases, facilitated new cultural heritage practices. these new practices see the application of discrete, localised concepts of cultural heritage, which are not always commensurate with traditional archaeological methodologies. instead, aboriginal parties have been able to adopt approaches that are determined by and relevant to their traditional cultural standards and 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 6 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.6 contemporary needs. this has been one of the act’s most significant achievements. by creating an opportunity for aboriginal people to interpret and manage their past in their own way, the ach act has fostered the development of independent, aboriginal controlled processes for identifying, understanding, and managing heritage free from external influence. a c l e a r c o m p l i a n c e pro c e s s the third principle of the ach act was to provide land users with a clearly understandable compliance process to manage cultural heritage in a way that reduced project risks. economic development in the state was seen as important and the need to ensure all projects were able to proceed efficiently was a key element in the development and drafting of the act (queensland legislative assembly, 2003). to date, this has been the act’s most successful feature. economic activity in queensland reached record levels during the implementation of the ach act and few, if any, projects were stopped, faced delays, or were deemed economically unviable due to aboriginal cultural heritage. this absence of delay is especially interesting when the majority of these projects required complex cultural heritage agreements in areas with a high potential for the identification of cultural heritage. major projects requiring chmps provide the best examples of the lack of disruption. while the negotiation process may have been more challenging than anticipated and the implementation of agreements costlier than originally planned, no major projects have failed to gain approval or reach delivery due to cultural heritage. there have been some minor impacts. recourse to land court has occurred, infrequently, with 5 chmps being approved by this body (legend international holdings v. taylor aly awaditijia & anor, 2013; queensland electricity transmission coproation ltd. [trading as powerlink queensland] v. bonner & ors, 2006; state of queensland [represented by department of health] v. wesley aird & ors, 2008; state of queensland v. best & ors, 2006; surat basin rail pty ltd. v. gangulu people & ors, 2009; xstrata coal queensland ltd. & ors v. russell tatow & ors, 2008). however, when compared with the number of registered agreements (n = 333), this is a minor disruption. in the author’s experience, some land users have failed to implement the agreed chmps properly, causing delays and cost overruns during project delivery and some aboriginal parties have used cultural heritage to attempt to delay or stop a project for cultural or commercial reasons. nonetheless, the number of chmps agreed and successfully implemented point to the ability of land users and aboriginal parties to reach agreements, which facilitate the delivery of major projects. outside of major projects, the duty of care guidelines have allowed land users to proceed with significantly reduced project risk. it is difficult to quantify or qualify the number of projects that have proceeded under these provisions in queensland since 2003. however, there is limited evidence of aboriginal cultural heritage causing substantial project delays. without a doubt, the quality of cultural heritage assessment and management for these projects is unknown and has resulted in the exclusion of aboriginal parties from some cultural heritage processes and damage to items of archaeological significance. while such negative heritage outcomes were not explicitly considered by the parliament during debate over the act, the need for a reliable path to compliance was positioned as equal to the management and preservation of cultural heritage. as a result, those projects that have achieved compliance with the duty of care guidelines are further evidence of the effective implementation of the goals of the queensland parliament. 11 o'neill: "a completely new approach" to indigenous cultural heritage published by scholarship@western, 2018 prosecution and injunctive relief have also caused limited disruption to projects, both major and minor. a stop work order under the act has been issued by the administrator seven times since the introduction of the act (rowland et al., 2014; j. schiavo, manager of the department of aboriginal and torres strait islander partnerships, personal communication, may 11, 2017). there have also been three successful prosecutions of land users under the ach act showing there exists relatively widespread compliance with the act (chandler, 2008; “miner fined $80k for disturbing artefacts,” 2011; “xstrata mount isa mines fined over aboriginal heritage site,” 2010; rowland et al., 2014; j. schiavo, personal communication, may 11, 2017). injunctive relief has been granted by land court to an aboriginal party on only one occasion (adrian john beattie for the western wakka wakka aboriginal people v. nexus delivery, 2016; eastern yugemben people [applicants] and coomera waters village and resort and turnix pty ltd. [respondents], 2004). there have also been a small number of disputes settled out of court (j. schiavo, personal communication, may 11, 2017). a number of cases have appeared before the land court; however, these have predominantly been as a result of procedural, technical, or minor matters. this case law has been especially important for clarifying a number of issues not specifically considered in the legislation and for providing legal precedents and interpretation of the act. this evidence of limited judicial or administrative intervention shows that, on the whole, the failure to comply with the ach act has infrequently been the cause of substantial project delays. this is not to say that land users have been unaffected by the ach act. the act requires the devotion of resources often not envisioned at the start of the project. these costs include heritage assessment, meeting facilitation, consultation, agreement drafting, cultural heritage surveys, and other attendant expenses, which have an impact on project budgets and delivery timeframes. the ach act is also not well understood by many proponents. it contains few mandatory requirements and the demands and operation of each aboriginal party vary, meaning some land users are perplexed about the most appropriate means through which to achieve compliance. in some cases, land users are unsure if their project is compliant. while this carries a level of risk to project delivery, based on available evidence, the author’s experience and anecdotal evidence, there have been sparse adverse impacts on projects. overall, the ach act has provided a clear and concise pathway for land users to deliver their projects while achieving statutory compliance. land users and aboriginal parties have grown accustomed to the negotiation process and are able to reach agreement in a timely fashion, appropriate to each project. the act’s success in providing a clear path to compliance was confirmed in 2012 by a major industry body which described it as “the best indigenous cultural heritage legislation in australia” (queensland resources council, 2012, p. 1). however, the procedural success of the act should not be confused with the successful management of cultural heritage, and some commentators argue cultural heritage has fared poorly under the ach act because of its expediency (rowland et al., 2014). this potential outcome was accepted by the queensland parliament to redress the failings of previous legislation, satiate land users, stimulate economic growth, and in exchange for a decentralised management regime advocated by aboriginal parties. the parliament was clear that compliance with proposed legislation was an important element in the drafting of the legislation. for this reason, the ach act’s compliance regime must be counted as a success of the act, if not necessarily for the preservation of cultural heritage. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 6 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.6 c o n c l u s i o n s as with any new legislation, the ach act’s effectiveness has been mixed. when viewed through the tripartite lens of the act’s principal motivations, it has generally been effective. land users have been able to identify a way to deliver their projects without substantial delay and limited instances of prosecution. significant numbers of items and places of cultural heritage have been identified and preserved in a variety of ways as a result of cultural heritage surveys and other work. but most importantly, aboriginal people have resumed, and in many cases strongly exercised, a more authoritative role in the identification and management of their cultural heritage. while in other postcolonial nations the failings of such consultative approaches have led to “opposition” to the process, this has not been the case in queensland (gardner et al., 2012, p. 18). concomitantly, the act is generally seen by commentators to be successful, structurally sound but in need of some considered and targeted reform (brockett, 2013; martin et al., 2016). when considering the application of the precepts of the ach act to other jurisdictions in australia and internationally, however, its demonstrated weaknesses should be carefully assessed. at the forefront of such consideration is the consultation process. from a procedural point of view, the ability of land users to utilise the duty of care guidelines to avoid consultation with aboriginal parties severely undermines the act. while the administering department is taking steps to reduce such (mis)use of the guidelines, the success of this review is crucial to the proper functioning of the act and the full realisation of the rights of cultural authority returned to aboriginal people with the passage of the legislation. ensuring aboriginal parties are consulted in the appropriate manner and at the right stage of projects is crucial to ensuring their rights to manage their cultural resources are returned to them in full accordance with international declarations (lenzerini, 2016). the machinations and operation of the consultation process itself are also seminal. as noted above, and by many commentators, the ability of aboriginal parties to fully exercise their rights under this act is highly dependent upon their negotiation skills and capacity. such a situation is not conducive to the protection of cultural heritage nor the fulfilment of the rights of indigenous people to practice and preserve their culture free and unfettered from external pressures (united nations declaration, 2008). these pressures are partially a result of the disparity of power that currently exists between major land users and aboriginal people in australia (o’neill, 2016). in many circumstances, the cultural heritage process, legislated and practiced under the ach act, has only reinforced and exacerbated this power differential to the detriment of cultural heritage and aboriginal people. this power differential is also a direct result of the series of compromises that were made to ensure the passage of the legislation. the queensland parliament was adamant that the views of all stakeholders be considered during the development and implementation of this legislation and that this was to be an act that would not stifle economic development. this has resulted in land users being perceived has having substantial, institutionalised power in the negotiation phases of projects, to the detriment of cultural heritage and aboriginal people’s rights to control that heritage. this power imbalance is not consistent across all projects. however, other jurisdictions that look to the queensland example as part of policy review and re-design must carefully consider if they are willing to legislate such compromises into policy reform or innovation. 13 o'neill: "a completely new approach" to indigenous cultural heritage published by scholarship@western, 2018 these policy compromises also highlight the challenge the act provides to contemporary conceptions of the role of government in indigenous cultural heritage management. the responsible queensland government agency plays a minor, administrative role. this has been a considered and sustained decision, which was begun during the drafting of the act and has continued through its implementation. this minimal approach explains the inconsistent application of the act and the disenchantment of some aboriginal parties and stakeholders with its operation. however, this was considered necessary in order to return full control and management of cultural heritage to aboriginal people. the compromises that resulted in both the legislation and its application were and remain government policy. for jurisdictions considering adopting some elements of the ach act, the place and role of the government must be carefully considered and clearly defined. crucial to understanding the functioning and ways to improve the ach act is garnering the views of a wide variety of those who use it regularly. due to the nature of the legislation, there are myriad professionals and others involved in cultural heritage management in queensland. aboriginal people, archaeologists, project managers, lawyers, heritage professionals, government agents, field officers, environmental managers, and advocates all play legitimate and important roles. these individuals have different and diverse experiences of the functioning of the act, its fissures, strengths, and ideas to reform or reinforce many of its most controversial and important provisions. adding the views of these professions to the emerging critical literature on this act would provide a fuller understanding of its nuances and how it can be applied in different settings. encouraging diverse insights can only improve the functioning of this act and the deliberations of those seeking to consider and apply it in other statutory contexts. in the assessment of the author, the ach act does warrant such wider consideration by cultural heritage policymakers. despite the weaknesses and failings, highlighted here and by others, it remains a distinct and valuable attempt to grant primacy to indigenous people in the management of their cultural heritage. responding to calls by aboriginal people to have their right to manage their cultural resources returned to them, the act diverted markedly from the western, archaeological paradigm, which not only dominated cultural heritage management in queensland but had drawn the ire of many aboriginal people. although the principal of consultation with aboriginal parties has not been universally achieved, in situations where aboriginal parties are consulted, new, unique, and localised versions of cultural heritage controlled by aboriginal people have evolved. as a result, despite the undulations and tribulations experienced across aboriginal communities, within industry and among other stakeholders, the conceptualisation of cultural heritage has irrevocably changed in queensland. at the forefront of this evolution are indigenous people. this makes the ach act a worthwhile and, indeed, successful intervention in the management of cultural heritage in queensland and one with tremendous potential, if applied carefully, elsewhere. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 1 [2018], art. 6 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.1.6 r e f e re n c e s aboriginal cultural heritage act 2003: an act to make provision for aboriginal cultural heritage, and for other purposes. retrieved from https://www.legislation.qld.gov.au/view/pdf/inforce/current/act-2003-079 aboriginal heritage act 2006, act no. 16/2006. retrieved from http://www.legislation.vic.gov.au/domino/web_notes/ldms/pubstatbook.nsf/51dea4977 0555ea6ca256da4001b90cd/481f4f0770858034ca257169001d1f4a/$file/06-016a.pdf aboriginal relics preservation act of 1967: an act to 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(2005). indigenous claims and heritage conservation: an opportunity for critical dialogue. public archaeology, 4, 199–204. doi: https://doi.org/10.1179/146551805793156202 xstrata coal queensland ltd. & ors v. russell tatow & ors (2008) qlc 226. xstrata mount isa mines fined over aboriginal heritage site. (2010, july 9). the courier mail. retrieved from http://www.couriermail.com.au/business/xstrata-mount-isa-mines-fined-over-aboriginalheritage-site/newsstory/f78b35e098d923c6b00d529a43996d21?sv=5140e04d35cc61a5a2317632a7cb198e 19 o'neill: "a completely new approach" to indigenous cultural heritage published by scholarship@western, 2018 the international indigenous policy journal january 2018 "a completely new approach" to indigenous cultural heritage: evaluating the queensland aboriginal cultural heritage act mark e. o'neill recommended citation "a completely new approach" to indigenous cultural heritage: evaluating the queensland aboriginal cultural heritage act abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license "a completely new approach" to indigenous cultural heritage: evaluating the queensland aboriginal cultural heritage act 10733 lavoie modeling the impact of covid-19 rce.pdf the international indigenous policy journal volume 11 | issue 3 september 2020 modeling the impact of the covid-19 pandemic on first nations, metis, and inuit communities: some considerations josée g. lavoie university of manitoba, canada, josee.lavoie@umanitoba.ca razvan g. romanescu centre for healthcare innovation, university of manitoba, canada, razvan.romanescu@umanitoba.ca alan katz manitoba centre for health policy, university of manitoba, canada, alan_katz@cpe.umanitoba.ca nathan nickel manitoba centre for health policy, university of manitoba, canada, nathan.nickel@umanitoba.ca recommended citation lavoie, j. g., romanescu, r. g., katz, a., & nickel, n. (2020). modeling the impacts of the covid-19 pandemic on first nations, métis, and inuit communities: some considerations. the international indigenous policy journal, 11(3). doi: https://10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.10733 modeling the impact of the covid-19 pandemic on first nations, metis, and inuit communities: some considerations abstract objectives: this article articulates the complexity of modeling in first nations, metis, and inuit contexts by providing the results of a modeling exercise completed at the request of the first nations health and social secretariat of manitoba. methods: we developed a model using the impact of a previous pandemic (the 2009 h1n1) to generate estimates. results: the lack of readily available data has resulted in a model that assumes homogeneity of communities in terms of health status, behaviour, and infrastructure limitations. while homogeneity may be a reasonable assumption for province-wide planning, first nation communities and tribal councils require more precise information in order to plan effectively. metis and urban inuit communities, in contrast, have access to much less information, making the role of indigenous organizations mandated to serve the needs of these populations that much more difficult. conclusion: for many years, indigenous organizations have advocated for the need to have access to current and precise data to meet their needs. the covid-19 pandemic demonstrates the importance of timely and accurate community-based data to support pandemic responses. keywords infectious diseases, mathematical modeling, public health, indigenous, aboriginal, canada, covid-19, pandemic creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. 1 lavoie et al.: modeling the impact of covid-19 published by scholarship@western, 2020 modeling the impact of the covid-19 pandemic on first nations, metis, and inuit communities: some considerations across canada, researchers and health care decision-makers are working to model the potential impact of the covid-19 pandemic. the goal of modeling is to reduce uncertainty in the face of emerging outbreaks and assist in planning a public health response. for those new to modeling, this form of scholarship requires a significant mind shift—it demands synthesizing a significant, emerging, uneven, and largely non-peer reviewed body of knowledge, making inferences and assumptions, and producing models that can guide decision-making (jewell et al., 2020). the complexity of modeling is captured very well by various authors (pastory y piontti et al., 2019; weinersmith et al., 2020). the experiences of covid-19 from new york and italy early in the pandemic make the impact of “getting it wrong” somewhat palpable. modeling the pandemic with first nations, metis, and inuit communities in mind is made more difficult for a number of reasons. first nations, metis, and inuit communities are heterogenous and dispersed. pandemic planning for urban indigenous populations cannot simply emulate plans designed for remote communities, and vice versa. this article articulates the complexity of modeling in first nations, metis, and inuit contexts. we begin with an overview of methods. this is followed by a discussion of the complexity of populating modeling formula. we provide an example to illustrate our points. we then turn to sources of data for first nations, metis, and inuit people, and conclude with recommendations. modeling methods in this article, we present a model based on a compartmental sir model. this approach requires estimating the number of individuals susceptible to being infected (s(t)), number of people infected (i(t)), and number of people who have recovered (r(t)). some fairly classical manipulation of this model allows estimating a final size of the epidemic as a function of only the basic reproductive number of the disease (r0). this estimation is necessary in the absence of current data. the idea then is to estimate hospital utilization by comparing with the final size of a previous epidemic for which detailed information is available. these models assume a population of n individuals with homogeneous mixing, that is any two individuals have an equal chance of contact. at every point in time, there are s susceptible individuals, i infected individuals, and r removed (through recovery or death). for simplicity, models often assume a fixed population size (n), and no demographic processes (no births or deaths). this approximation is reasonable for closed populations over relatively short timeframes. the dynamics of evolution of the three compartments (s, i, and r) are governed by a system of differential equations. populating each component is however far more complex than suggested above. to begin, the basic reproductive number (r0) and fatality rate associated with covid-19 vary from country to country for a number of reasons. the fatality rate depends on the age of the population, which is likely a proxy for the presence of comorbidity (arentz et al., 2020; weston et al., 2020), the number of cases requiring advanced care at any given time, and the robustness of the health care system. as of july 31st, 2020, the world health organization (who) dashboard reported 16,812,755 covid-19 cases worldwide, resulting in 662,095 deaths (3.94% of cases; who, 2020a). in comparison, on july 31st, 2020, canada reported 8,923 fatalities out of 115,619 presumed and confirmed cases (or 7.72%, covid-19 canada, 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.10733 2020). all figures provided above have grown by a factor of 5 to 10 since we began working on this article a few weeks ago and percentages have also changed considerably. these mortality rates are, however, problematic because they are calculated using confirmed cases as the denominator. at this time, because testing has been focused on priority populations, we do not have a reliable count of how many canadians have been infected and are asymptomatic. this means that a canada-specific fatality rate cannot be confirmed. this is true for all countries, with perhaps the exception of iceland (gudbjartsson et al., 2020). the same problem exists for calculating the r0. transmission depends on exposure—crowded housing promotes transmission, while physical distancing reduces it. when modeling as if a country did not impose any physical distancing or other measures to prevent transmission, the who (2020b) considers the range 2 to 2.5 to be most likely. in a paper intended to guide community intervention policies in alaska, hennessy (2020) estimated an r0 of 1.3 for the first 4 weeks, dropping to 1.1 for weeks 5 to 8, and 0.8 for weeks 9 to 12 to be reasonable in an intervention scenario that arguably most resemble containment strategies adopted in canada. the transferability of these estimates to first nation, metis, and inuit contexts is unknown. at this point, all emerging estimates are based on samples of convenience (kobayashi et al., 2020). despite a rapidly growing body of literature, estimating the impact of covid-19 in first nations, metis, and inuit communities is challenging. following a request from the first nations health and social secretariat of manitoba, we attempted to model the potential impact of covid-19 in manitoba first nation communities to support planning and decision-making efforts. in our approach, first nation communities are defined as the geo-political location associated with a first nation’s traditional territory (most often) and now designated as reserve land according to the indian act (1985; see also indigenous and northern affairs canada, 2017). first nations face unique historical, colonial, social, and environmental circumstances. although the covid-19 virus is different and will behave differently than h1n1 both within the host and between hosts, social conditions, access to safe drinking water, crowding, age distribution, and comorbid profiles have not significantly changed since the h1n1 outbreak of 2009 (katz et al., 2019). international experience seems to indicate that local circumstances have a significant impact on how the pandemic evolves. the 2009 h1n1 pandemic may in time prove to be a good or poor fit. this will be known in hindsight, when the utility of modeling has waned. we used reports of the impact of h1n1 (green et al., 2013; zarychanski et al., 2010) as the starting point for our modeling exercise in order to estimate the impact of covid-19 under two scenarios: a. unrestricted spread, where no control measures are implemented; and b. after the introduction of a comprehensive set of containment measures, which could include school closures, shutdown of non-essential businesses, home quarantine for suspected cases, social distancing, and limiting public gathering to no more than 10 people. results table 1 translates our assumptions into weekly estimates of first nations requiring hospitalization, based on the h1n1 experience by community. in scenario a, where communities continue to allow travel from other communities and where quarantine or physical isolation measures are not observed, 3 lavoie et al.: modeling the impact of covid-19 published by scholarship@western, 2020 our model estimates 1,754.43 positive cases, with 413.97 (24%) requiring intensive hospital care. in scenario b, where containment measures are observed, only one third of the cases are anticipated. table 1. estimated number of manitoba first nation covid-19 related hospitalizations and intensive care using mathematical modeling scenario a: unrestricted (no quarantine or physical isolation measures) scenario b: containment (quarantine and physical isolation policies in place and respected) total populationa population on reserveb covid-19 cases requiring hospitalizationc covid-19 requiring icu cared covid-19 cases requiring hospitalizatione covid-19 requiring icu caref estimated total 162,780 93,603 1,754.43 413.97 626.41 147.80 notes. a total first nations population on and off reserve based on indigenous services canada and crown–indigenous relations and northern affairs canada’s indian register as at december 31st, 2019 (provided by first nations health and social secretariat manitoba). b total first nations population on reserve based on indigenous services canada and crown–indigenous relations and northern affairs canada's indian register as at december 31st, 2019 (provided by first nations health and social secretariat manitoba). c, e estimated total covid-19-related hospitalizations. rates used were 1,077.8/100,000 for when no action is taken, and 384.82/100,000 after containment strategies are introduced. rate was multiplied by population to generate estimates. d, f estimated number of covid-19 that might require intensive care unit (icu) care, including ventilation, based on zarychanski et al. (2010) and green et al. (2013), which implies a rate of 42/(42+136) = 23.6% requiring icu out of total hospital admissions. discussion our model is a unique attempt at modeling the pandemic in indigenous communities. to date, published models specific to racialized communities have primarily focused on black communities in the usa (holmes et al., 2020; millett et al., 2020; mollalo et al., 2020; poteat et al., 2020; sun et al., 2020). we are not aware of any other models being reported in the public sphere. although the viruses are different, and are known to behave differently, we used assumptions based on the impact of the 2009 h1n1 epidemic on first nation communities in manitoba in our model for a number of reasons. firstly, the trajectory of h1n1 in first nation communities in manitoba was well documented (green et al., 2013; zarychanski et al., 2010). secondly, social determinants are major factors impacting the trajectory of an epidemic. these factors have remained largely unchanged in first nation communities in manitoba (katz et al., 2019). our approach is justifiable in this context, despite a lack of precedent in the literature. models are only as good as the data with which they are built. variability in the quality of available data and missing data have long been reported by indigenous organizations. lavoie and colleagues (2016) have argued that studies that aggregate data regionally or provincially create urban-centric evidence and erase the reality of rural and remote communities. the sir model is a homogeneous mixing model, which may be appropriate for computing aggregated projections, but has more limited utility when making local predictions. in contrast, agent-based computational models (shoukat & moghadas, 2019) produce estimates that are more precise because they are built with individual-level data. this data is 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.10733 more readily available for first nations living on reserve in manitoba and ontario. using this data requires access to expertise in programming, and modeling requires substantial computational resources. while university-affiliated faculty members are generally able to access computational resources free of charge from their university, indigenous organizations committed to data sovereignty and wishing to do their own modeling may not have access to or want to use existing university or government-based computational infrastructure, and yet may not have sufficient resources in their own infrastructure. it is well documented that manitoba’s 63 first nation communities are heterogenous in terms of health status and infrastructure, which can impact transmission and severity (katz et al., 2019). data on health status and health behaviours (primarily smoking) are needed to estimate the number of first nations likely to experience severe covid-19 symptoms, which are caused by a respiratory virus. communities’ ability and opportunity to respond also depend on local infrastructure, which is heterogenous. the first nations population in manitoba ranges from 132 to 10,484, with 57.5% of members living on reserve (indigenous services canada, 2020b), and an additional number who travel to their home community to access services when needed (lavoie et al., 2015). as such, the on-reserve vs. off-reserve dichotomy adopted by statistics canada and others often underestimates the pressure on local services. indigenous services canada’s (2020a) website shows that 12 first nations in manitoba are currently under a longterm boiling water advisory, 1 community since 2004, and 5 communities since 2014. another 5 communities are under short-term boiling water advisories (indigenous services canada, 2020a). according to statistics canada, 40.7% of on-reserve dwellings in manitoba are considered to be crowded (chernikova, 2016), which is defined as more than one person per room. infrastructure shortcomings alone create added risk of transmission. we recognize some ethical issues associated with modeling for small populations. the model we report on is aggregated at the provincial level. we did provide first nation decision-makers with a breakdown by tribal council to support planning activities. these numbers will not be reported publicly due to the sample size. likewise, community-level models can be produced to support decision-making but may not be released publicly to protect individual and community-level confidentiality and prevent crosscommunity comparisons that might result in stigma. communities’ ability to respond is anchored in local health services. local access to health services depends on proximity to off-reserve points of care. existing models of primary healthcare in first nation, rural, and remote communities vary considerably, predominantly based on historical decisions grounded in convenience and the circumstances of the time, pragmatic considerations often gaged from southern urban perspectives, ability to recruit and retain professionals, and other contextual factors (lavoie et al., 2010). all communities provide some level of public health and primary prevention programs. currently there are 22 federally funded nursing stations in remote communities staffed with nurses working with an expanded scope of practice and 3 staffed nursing stations are provincially funded to deliver a limited complement of primary care services (lavoie et al., in press). other communities do not have primary care available within their communities (n = 38). table 2 summarizes data access issues for different indigenous populations. 5 lavoie et al.: modeling the impact of covid-19 published by scholarship@western, 2020 table 2. challenges and opportunities for modeling covid-19 in first nation, metis, and inuit populations challenges in estimating potential sources of data population figures and age structure little dependable demographic data exists for first nations not eligible for registration under the indian act, inuit outside of nunangat, and metis. population data for first nations who have status under the indian act are kept up to date by indigenous services canada (2020b). statistics canada and the governments of quebec, newfoundland and labrador, nunavut, and the northwest territories also publish population reports. risk factors associated with severe symptoms and death the reported severe and critical case ratio is approximately 7-10% (chan et al., 2020). the applicability of these analysis to first nations, metis, and inuit is unknown. it is generally assumed that all three populations will be at higher risk of severe disease. epidemiological studies are produced by all provinces and territories, as well as by the research community to nuance modeling. conclusions modeling the impact of covid-19 in first nations, metis, and inuit communities is complicated by the unique circumstances that apply to indigenous peoples in canada. models that focus on how the disease might progress in a single community once a case has been diagnosed are likely to have a higher reliability than macro-level models developed to support higher level planning. still, both are useful exercises aiming at reducing uncertainty, and planning for adequate resource allocation. we were able to draw on h1n1 studies conducted in manitoba to model the potential impact of covid-19 on first nations in manitoba. these studies were sufficiently detailed to support our modeling exercise. this is not necessarily the case for other regions, resulting in additional limitations. modeling the impact of the pandemic on urban first nations, metis, and inuit population is at this time virtually impossible because dependable population estimates do not exist. at this point in the pandemic, once again, we must recognize that the data we have is least adequate for what are likely the most vulnerable. an overall message we would like to highlight is that indigenous communities and organizations require accurate data to support their pandemic plans. it is imperative that research be undertaken to document the strengths of existing pandemic plans, trajectory of the covid-19 pandemic in indigenous communities, distill lessons learned, and support the refinement of pandemic plans and modeling for a potential second wave of covid-19 and subsequent pandemics. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.10733 references arentz, m., yim, e., klaff, l., lokhandwala, s., riedo, f. x., chong, m., & lee, m. 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(2010). correlates of severe disease in patients with 2009 pandemic influenza (h1n1) virus infection. cmaj, 182(3), 257-264. https://doi.org/10.1503/cmaj.091884 microsoft word cp10878lavalley.docx the international indigenous policy journal volume 12 | issue 3 september 2021 “i used to be scared to even like stand beside somebody who had it”: hiv risk behaviours and perceptions among indigenous people who use drugs jennifer lavalley university of british columbia, canada, jennifer.lavalley@bccsu.ubc.ca western aboriginal harm reduction society canada, wahrsdtes@gmail.com christopher livingstone western aboriginal harm reduction society, canada, livingstonechris@yahoo.com melissa steinhauer western aboriginal harm reduction society, canada, steinhauer.melissa07@gmail.com ashley goodman university of british columbia, canada, ashleynicolegoodman@gmail.com thomas kerr university of british columbia, canada, bccsu-tk@bccsu.ubc.ca recommended citation lavalley, j., western aboriginal harm reduction society, livingstone, c., steinhauer, m., goodman, a., & kerr, t. (2021). “i used to be scared to even like stand beside somebody who had it”: hiv risk behaviours and perceptions among indigenous people who use drugs. the international indigenous policy journal, 12(3). https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.10878 “i used to be scared to even like stand beside somebody who had it”: hiv risk behaviours and perceptions among indigenous people who use drugs abstract objectives: in canada, and elsewhere, indigenous people who use illicit drugs and/or alcohol (wuid/a) experience a disproportionate burden of hiv-related harm. this study examined hiv risk perceptions and behaviours among indigenous people wuid/a living in the downtown eastside (dtes) and the policies and practices that shape inequities and vulnerabilities for them in hiv testing and treatment. further, we aimed to situate the vulnerabilities of indigenous people wuid/a in hiv care within the context of wider structural inequality and generate recommendations for culturally relevant and safe hiv treatment options. methods: this research employed an indigenous-led community-based participatory approach using talking circles to explore experiences of indigenous people living with hiv. under the participatory research framework, community researchers led the study design, data collection, and analysis. talking circles elicited participants’ experiences of hiv knowledge, testing, and treatment, and were audio-recorded and transcribed. data were coded line-by-line and codes were organized into themes. results: five key themes were identified via the talking circles: evolving hiv risk perceptions (e.g., hiv knowledge and testing, and “intentional exposure”); research as an avenue for hiv testing; hiv treatment and discussions about grief and loss; hiv-related stigma and discrimination; and the importance of culturally-relevant and safe hiv treatment options for indigenous people wuid/a. discussion: our work reveals that indigenous people wuid/a do not have adequate access to hiv knowledge and education, often limiting their ability to access hiv testing and supports. participant stories revealed both internalized and community stigma and discrimination, which at times compromised connection with participants' home communities. further, our findings point to a failure in the public health system to deliver accessible hiv information to indigenous peoples, hence, many participants have solely relied on participation in communitybased research studies in the downtown eastside (dtes) for hiv education and knowledge. there is an urgent need for accessible, culturally safe, and community-based education and treatment options for indigenous people wuid/a within hiv care. keywords indigenous peoples, substance use, community-based participatory research, indigenous methodologies, marginalized populations, hiv/ aids, hiv treatment creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. 1 lavalley et al.: i used to be scared published by scholarship@western, 2021 “i used to be scared to even like stand beside somebody who had it”: hiv risk behaviours and perceptions among indigenous people who use drugs across the globe, hiv-related health disparities and stigma among those living with or vulnerable to hiv infection, especially those who are also structurally vulnerable and marginalized, have been widely documented (goldenberg et al., 2017; goodyear & cusick, 2007; hatzenbuehler et al., 2011; liamputtong, 2013; shannon et al., 2008). among those most affected by these hiv-related disparities and harms are indigenous peoples (barker et al., 2019; center for disease control and prevention, 2017). these disparities and harms include, but are not limited to, higher mortality rates, lack of access to health services, and multi-layered experiences of stigma and discrimination (woodgate et al., 2017). there are inextricable links between the social, economic, cultural, and political conditions—including racism and colonization—faced by indigenous peoples and the risk of hiv infection (negin et al., 2015). moreover, the everyday realities of indigenous peoples have not been adequately included in the global hiv response (hiv/aids and indigenous peoples, 2009; ontario hiv treatment network, 2019). in canada, it is well recognized that indigenous peoples (first nations, inuit, and métis) have inequitable access to healthcare, are overrepresented in the hiv epidemic, and experience a disproportionate burden of hiv-related harms (barker et al., 2019; negin et al., 2015; woodgate et al., 2017). for example, although indigenous people make up 4.9% of the total population in canada (statistics canada, 2018), they account for approximately 11.3% of new hiv infections (public health service canada, 2018). additionally, a small but growing body of evidence suggests that conventional approaches to hiv care, support, and treatment do not meet the unique cultural needs of indigenous people living with hiv, contributing to poor health outcomes among this population (jackson & reimer, 2008; mccall & lauridsen-hoegh, 2014). furthermore, past research has shown that indigenous people who use illicit drugs and/or alcohol (wuid/a) face compounded stigma and discrimination in healthcare settings, which in turn leads to poorer access and care (goodman et. al., 2017), including treatment and care for substance use and hiv disease. by consequence, indigenous people wuid/a often live with health challenges that go untreated, resulting in much preventable suffering, as well as a reluctance to seek care in the future. while these studies importantly elucidate some of the reasons why conventional hiv care does not meet the needs of indigenous peoples, they do not focus exclusively on the unique experiences of indigenous people wuid/a. past research has shown that indigenous people wuid/a face compounded stigma in healthcare settings leading to poorer access and care (goodman et al., 2017). drawing on a structural approach, we therefore examine and centre risk perceptions and behaviours among indigenous people wuid/a. the need to understand the perceptions of indigenous people wuid/a is particularly important in vancouver, canada’s major western urban centre—home to the largest urban indigenous population in british columbia (bc; mccall & lauridsen-hoegh, 2014), most acutely visible in vancouver’s downtown eastside (dtes; statistics canada, 2015). the dtes is a low-income neighbourhood that is a site of canada’s largest street-based illicit drug scene, characterized by high rates of poverty, substance use, violence, homelessness, and, historically, the epidemic of hiv infection (bc coroners service, 2020; hyshka et al., 2012; werb et al., 2010; wood & kerr, 2006). despite ongoing research 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.10878 efforts to understand the health inequities experienced by indigenous peoples, little is known about the distinct experiences of indigenous people wuid/a in the context of accessing hiv testing and treatment and experiences of stigma and discrimination within their home communities. given the ongoing challenges related to hiv among indigenous peoples in canada, we aim to make room in academia for the prioritization of the voices of indigenous people wuid/a in order to bring greater attention to cultural factors in hiv-related education, treatment, and care. current project this research was undertaken in vancouver, bc, where there are approximately 14,000 indigenous people, who account for 2.2% of the population (city of vancouver, 2017). all participants involved in this research consisted of community members who identify as indigenous people wuid/a living in the inner-city neighbourhood of vancouver’s downtown eastside (dtes) with some also identifying as a person living with hiv. the dtes is characterized by high rates of poverty, homelessness, substance use, mental health issues, and violence, along with immense social and economic marginalization (kazempiur & halli, 2000; miller et al., 2002; shannon et al., 2008; spittal et al., 2002; werb et al., 2010; wood & kerr, 2006). the dtes is also home to at least one-third of the city’s total indigenous population (cardinal & adin, 2005) and well known for its “open” drug scene (city of vancouver, 2013). conceptual framework the research team for this project includes the western aboriginal harm reduction society (wahrs), and academic researchers from the british columbia center on substance use (bccsu), as well as an indigenous research coordinator. according to o’brien et al. (2020), the leadership of indigenous researchers necessitates culturally appropriate research and ensures the overall appropriateness, relevance, and success of a research project. under the umbrella of vancouver area network of drug users (vandu), wahrs is an indigenous-led organization representing current or previous users of illicit drugs and or illicit alcohol. the organization is dedicated to harm reduction and improving the quality of life of other indigenous people wuid/a. their work involves the development of support, education, and training programs that reflect the values of indigenous peoples. within the context of this project, wahrs board members collaborated at all stages in the research design (e.g., research methodology, topic of interest, data collection and analysis, etc.) and are both community researchers and participants. the bccsu provided academic and research support and has a long-standing research relationship with the dtes community. the bccsu partnered with wahrs to conduct community-based research to explore their experiences with hiv. following the principles of community-based participatory research and indigenous methodologies, this project incorporates the values and beliefs of indigenous people wuid/a in its design, methods, and analysis (lavallée, 2009; smith, 2013; tuck, 2009), ensuring that the expertise, knowledge, and experiences of indigenous people wuid/a were leveraged and respected (o’brien et al., 2002). for this project, wahrs board members had active roles as community researchers, and employed indigenous ways of knowing and sharing throughout the project. talking circles were used to explore and share personal experiences with hiv amongst peers. 3 lavalley et al.: i used to be scared published by scholarship@western, 2021 this article is designed to illuminate the distinct experiences and perceptions of indigenous people wuid/a vulnerable to hiv. methods eligibility and recruitment the methods used in this study have been described in detail in goodman et al. (2017) and goodman et al. (2018). a series of peer-facilitated talking circles were held to explore indigenous community members’ experiences with hiv. talking circles are a culturally appropriate research method grounded in indigenous knowledge and reflect the values and beliefs of indigenous communities (lavallée, 2009; smith, 2013). talking circles were facilitated by two wahrs board members (community researchers) and participation was open to the wahrs membership. individuals participated in one talking circle each. in total, 31 indigenous people wuid/a participated in the talking circles. talking circle participants were recruited using convenience sampling during the community organization’s weekly membership meetings through a draw-system, which was used to select a maximum of 10 participants for each talking circle. wahrs board members contributed their own lived experiences during the talking circles. in total, three talking circles were completed, averaging 1 hour in length. ethical approval was granted by the university of british columbia providence healthcare research ethics board. data collection during each talking circle, the research topic was introduced to the group by the facilitators, who then initiated the talking circle by sharing their personal experiences with hiv. an eagle feather, a cultural symbol signifying honour and respect, was chosen and used to guide the facilitation. if desired, participants were allowed to pass on speaking. talking circles were audio recorded, transcribed verbatim, and reviewed for accuracy and preliminary themes by the community researchers and research coordinator. data analysis wahrs board members participated in the research as community researchers. qualitative analysis of the data was undertaken individually and as a group. first, we conducted a detailed review of the transcripts. preliminary themes and descriptive quotes emerged and were presented to the wahrs board for review. each transcript was read aloud by the research team and then coded line-by-line by hand to identify key themes and recommendations. wahrs presented a summary of the analysis and findings to a large membership meeting attended by 35 members. members were encouraged to provide insight on the research topic and findings, as well as to contribute to the recommendations. data was broadly reviewed by an indigenous researcher from the bccsu for the purpose of drafting an academic peer-reviewed research article. numerous joint meetings were held with wahrs board members to share, discuss, and revise the manuscript. manuscript meetings were audio recorded and transcribed verbatim by the first author. the first author reviewed the transcripts to ensure the community researchers’ voices were accurately represented in the writing of this article. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.10878 findings the data derived from the talking circles elucidated considerable misinformation about hiv and a lack of culturally safe and accessible hiv-related education. leading themes that emerged from participant narratives included evolving hiv risk perceptions (e.g., hiv knowledge and testing, and “intentional exposure”), research as an avenue for hiv testing, changing experiences with hiv treatment, hivrelated stigma and discrimination, and culturally safe and community-based hiv education. participants also emphasized their experiences of grief and loss, hiv-related stigma and discrimination, and the importance of accessible and culturally safe treatment options. participants all self-identified as indigenous (n = 31) and cisgender: men (n = 18), women (n = 13). evolving hiv risk perceptions the dtes and evolving hiv-related knowledge several participants’ narratives reflected common misconceptions about hiv and people living with hiv. however, a noticeable feature of participants’ life stories was the changing knowledge and perceptions of hiv after moving to vancouver—particularly after moving to the dtes. in general, most participants spoke about their initial lack of knowledge and information about hiv and how it is transmitted. for example, a female participant explained her early perceptions of hiv transmission: but yeah it was kind of a shocker to me what hiv was, as it was kinda like um, like oh my god you know, don’t touch a person or, even breathe in the same air. (female participant #1, talking circle #3) two other participants shared related misconceptions about “catching” hiv, which led some to believe they were not at risk for acquiring hiv. first, a male participant talked about his initial perception of how hiv was contracted: and uh, when i first heard of hiv like they said you can get it from uh a lion or a, a monkey. that’s where it came from. the jungles. and i used to think about that, if that’s true. and uh, everybody kept saying yeah you can catch it from monkeys. (male participant #1, talking circle #3) second, a participant noted that she used to think she could contract hiv by touching someone with the virus: when i first came to vancouver … i used to be scared to even like, stand beside somebody who had it. ‘cause, they said, contract the, [inaudible] contract like, like through the air by touching anybody. [it has] to be like through sex and stuff like that. i understand—like i, read a lot about that. (female participant #2, talking circle #3) another participant explained how when she first moved to vancouver, hiv transmission was primarily seen as a “man-to-man thing.” 5 lavalley et al.: i used to be scared published by scholarship@western, 2021 my experience with hiv was, years ago when i first came to the street here, like near the beginning, when the people started getting it, and blamed it on like man-to-man type thing. and it was a very, you know, they weren’t telling much people about what it was and stuff like that. (female participant #4, talking circle #2) despite originally having limited knowledge about hiv, several participants talked about their evolving understanding of hiv transmission and people living with hiv after moving to the dtes. for many of the participants their perception of hiv changed over a period of time and several participants talked about how their personal stereotypes and stigma toward people living with hiv shifted throughout their lifetime: anyways, i used to be scared to get this ‘cause at the time, i thought the only way to contact hiv was only through sex okay. now i know different. it’s important that we uh, we tell people about other ways to get uh hiv ‘cause at the time i never knew. (female participant #1, talking circle #1) risk behaviour and hiv testing hiv risk perceptions varied among participants. although many of the participants perceived themselves to be low risk for contracting hiv, some went on to describe themselves as “lucky” given their ongoing engagement in high-risk behaviours. further, many of those who engaged in ongoing risk behaviour resorted to frequent testing in response. for example, a male participant explained he was lucky given his “risky behaviours” (e.g., drug use): i’ve been lucky so far that, it hasn’t happened to me [contracting hiv]. um, i’ve been blessed not to, have gotten it. uh, even though, through the risky behaviours of, [inaudible] there on, drugs or whatever. (male participant #1, talking circle #1) another participant expressed similar feelings about being “lucky” despite being a person who injects drugs: but uh yeah i been pretty lucky i haven’t caught it [hiv] because i’m uh, oh i inject. and uh, and i, and i get, and i get checked out every three months so. (male participant #3, talking circle #1) a female participant explained that she feels “lucky” that she has not contracted the virus because she has shared needles with a person with hiv: you know some of the people that i shared uh needles with, some of them has uh are not around. they contracted hiv and they’re gone right. that’s why i’m so lucky to be here. i don’t have nothing. (female participant #3, talking circle #3) higher perceived risk of hiv transmission was often associated with sexual risk behaviours and for some prompted regular hiv testing. although participants were well aware of the risks, some persisted in engaging in riskier behaviours, but also went for hiv testing frequently. this was the case for one participant who regularly practices unsafe sex: 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.10878 you know what, you might think i’m crazy but i still have practised unsafe sex eh. because i’m not that type of person who will use it [safe sex supplies]. and um, i don’t know if i’m playing with fire, but i get tested every four months, and i’m always negative. (male participant #6, talking circle #1) intentional exposure interestingly, two participants described incidents of “intentional exposure” to the hiv virus. first, the above participant explained that he tried to “get hiv” so he could be eligible for disability assistance— government financial assistance for those living with a disability: you know. like i tried my hardest to get hiv for 2 years. and i didn’t get it. you know i kept going getting tested. (male participant #6, talking circle #1) a male participant discussed a similar dynamic with a former roommate: and he ended up acquiring it, quite frankly because the church that he was part of, looked down upon homosexuality. it wasn’t allowed. you’re not allowed to have a partner. so he actually [inaudible] went out to the go get, hiv. like unsafe stuff uh, known sexual meeting places for anonymous sex. he would frequent those so that he could catch it ‘cause he hated himself so much. which was—that’s how he explained it to me. (male participant #5, talking circle #1) research as an avenue for hiv testing several participants discussed how involvement with research studies in the dtes was a central avenue for hiv testing and, for some, these research studies have become both a source of supplemental income (i.e., via participant honoraria) and an ongoing source of routine testing. five participants routinely accessed an ongoing local cohort study as a first point of contact for hiv testing. a male participant stated: i heard about hiv but, not that much. and uh, but then after that i start to get like—i didn’t want to get it [hiv] so, tested like twice a year, like at [clinic name]. (male participant #2, talking circle #1) ongoing involvement with research studies then became a place where participants could access yearly hiv testing: i go to [name of clinic] every 6 months for blood tests. and, if um, they don’t get a hold of you in a couple weeks that means you’re uh okay i guess. (female participant #4, talking circle 3) general hiv knowledge and access to hiv testing was sometimes associated with research incentives in the dtes. by engaging those living in the dtes with research incentives, residents’ engagement and linkage to hiv testing improved. a participant explained that moving to the dtes exposed her to a lot of “firsts”—including hiv testing: my first hiv testing was here in the downtown eastside when they did the “blowout.” you get the 5-dollar army & navy. (female participant #1, talking circle 2) 7 lavalley et al.: i used to be scared published by scholarship@western, 2021 similarly, another participant, who identified as a sex worker, explained that she did not know much about hiv until she accessed services from a van ran by those leading a research study on sex work. she stated: yeah i didn’t know too much about hiv either but uh, because of the line of work i am in—i work on the streets right but anyways, i’ve known a couple girls that have hiv. and um because i just started hanging around down here and um, hanging around the corner and then a van pulled up … so they said oh here, we’ll give you a card, you go, test yourself. (female participant #2, talking circle #1) here she explains that this research incentive has led to other “girls” [sex workers] receiving regular hiv treatment: they [research staff] drive around maybe once or twice a week and they hand out tickets for the girls to come in and get themselves checked out. which is a good way of doing it because if you didn’t have that incentive, they wouldn’t do it. (female participant #2, talking circle #1) hiv treatment and discussions about grief and loss participants discussed three major themes related to experiences with hiv treatment. first, they talked about resistance to engaging with hiv treatment (e.g., taking medication). subsequently, stories of grief and loss were prevalent in their stories. the success stories of those taking medication, in more recent years, also emerged as a major theme in their narratives. experiences with hiv treatment many participants commented on experiences they have had with a friend or family member living with hiv who had chosen not to take medication. a female participant said, “when i moved down here i found out my friend of mine, had hiv and she wasn’t taking her medication” (female participant #3, talking circle #1). another participant discussed how her family member agreed to take treatment only after they got “too sick”: i have a family member that’s hiv. and i’ve kept after her to get the treatments right. ‘cause there is treatment … i know it doesn’t cure it completely but you can uh, get these treatments. i kept after her. no way she wouldn’t do it. until she really, really got too sick. so that’s when she decided to take the treatment. so, i think it’s important that we uh, tell our members about. (female participant #1, talking circle #1) participants also described experiences of their loved ones “surviving” for long periods of time without receiving treatment: i have had friends that have had hiv for a long time—20 years. maybe more than 20 years … they still live. i don’t see why you know. they survived, but they don’t take medication. (male participant #4, talking circle #1) 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.10878 participants also commonly expressed that they witnessed loved ones die due to avoiding treatment and medication: that was sad to watch him. you know. didn’t really know about hiv/aids. or heroin before i came to vancouver. everybody’s on heroin or whatever right. or methadone so. just kinda sad to watch somebody that you did know in their last stage of hiv, and dying ‘cause they just want it. (female participant #5, talking circle #3) participants also shared more recent stories of treatment success—in that either themselves or loved ones were successful in maintaining hiv treatment. a male participant described his past roommate’s experiences with hiv treatment: thing is though, that i’m impressed with is, whatever happened, his count went down enough— i mean, when i was his roommate, that was like in 1992. and now we’re talking 2013 and he’s still alive and well. you know. and doing really “good.” i mean he looks fantastic. (male participant #5, talking circle #1) here, a male participant described his journey in becoming “undetectable”—when the viral load of a person living with hiv cannot be detected by a blood test: ten years ago, i had full blown aids. they said i had 4 weeks to live. now, i’m undetectable. they gave me experimental drugs. like i was a guinea pig. that fucking near killed me … but it cured me of aids. i’m still alive. and i’m undetectable now. which doesn’t mean much. just aids is gone that’s all. (male participant #2, talking #2) grief and loss hiv-related grief and loss was an overwhelming theme in participants’ narratives. participants who witnessed a loved one experiencing health decline or passing often mentioned that their loved one was not taking their medication. many participants had experiences of knowing a friend or family member dealing with hiv-related complications. a male participant reported: my last friend, she was a woman eh. and so she died of aids man. she went from 160 pounds to 120 pounds, 90 pounds and that was it for her. (male participant #4, talking circle #1) another noted: but i know people who’ve had it and, i’ve lost a lot of friends. lots of friends over the years from it [hiv]. (male participant #1, talking circle #1) the emotional context facing family members supporting loved ones was profound. a female participant shared her story of witnessing the declining health of her nephew and sister: and, not only that like, my nephew, my sister’s stepson he’s in the hospital. he’s dying of hiv. he was in st. paul’s. we didn’t know for a long time where he was and finally found out. i’m scared, like i am scared to go visit him … ‘cause like he’s lost a lot of weight and then, for my sister like, i don’t know. it is very hard like you know, for people that have sickness and then i’ve 9 lavalley et al.: i used to be scared published by scholarship@western, 2021 known like a lot of people that have hiv are my friends. (female participant #2, talking circle #3) hiv-related stigma and discrimination stigma and discrimination caused significant barriers to support for indigenous people living with hiv. participants spoke about receiving limited support from peers, family, and community, as well as isolation and social rejection, after being identified as a person living with hiv. some participants shared their personal stories of fearing or experiencing rejection from people in their social networks. the following participant shared his experience of being rejected by his family when he was diagnosed with hiv: i miss my hugs from my kids when it—i had the hiv. they found out. no more hugs. no more jumping up [for] me and my kids. go to my family’s, i got my own cups, spoons stuff like this put away eh. it’s their house [inaudible] go by their rules. … so uneducated. (male participant #4, talking circle #2) internalized hiv-related stigma and discrimination prevented some participants from disclosing their hiv status to their families: and, none of my brothers, sister know, that i, got hiv. and none of my families, three families, know that i got hiv. ‘cause i never talk to ‘em, since i found out 15 years ago i, kept it to myself. i just thought i was gonna die and, now i’m okay about it. (female participant #4, talking circle #2) participants also encountered stigma and discrimination on a broader community level. one participant talked about his fear of “banishment” from his home first nations community and family due to his hiv status: and um, people’s frame of mind back then was that um, and um my fear was to get banished from my reservation eh. or even my number one fear was getting banished from my family. (male participant #6, talking circle #1) another participant expressed a comparable experience with stigma and blame in his home community. once it [hiv] got into the reserves … it did spread. and a lot of finger-pointing and, blaming and, uh anybody who came from, somewhere else, was likely the most—was a likely suspect who brought it in. (male participant #1, talking circle #1) culturally safe and community-based hiv education participant’s commonly positioned hiv education as inaccessible to residents of the dtes and offered criticisms and insights about the delivery of hiv-related information and services. a female participant noted that while health educators provide hiv education to community organizations, there is a lack of education for those who do not regularly access these organizations—namely for “people on the street”: 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.10878 education is really needed down here [dtes]. you know ‘cause, i walk the streets up here and you know, they’re talking about aids and hiv, and it’s just such bad stuff that they’re saying. you know like. no education. you know i think we need to start educating the people on the street. not just the people come into our organizations [vancouver area network of drug users], that’s all we know. but there’s people who don’t come to these places. … people that need to be educated, so you know that stigma’s not out there and that hatred. (female participant #1, talking circle #2) she also noted the ways in which hiv education can be more accessible to those living in the dtes: when people don’t know the ignorance of people, who don’t know about hiv, it needs to be told, maybe in a safe, clean way. you know like, it doesn’t have to be you know “mumbo jumbo” … just something plain and simple. that it can be told to the people on the streets. in our kind of language. in the, you know, the street language of the “downtown eastside language.” (female participant #1, talking circle #2) further, some participants talked about the importance of delivering information in an accessible and culturally safe way for indigenous peoples. one woman shared her idea of an accessible indigenousspecific cultural resource: i mean i wish they would find a way to, bring us information that we can enjoy reading. you know maybe pictures, cartoons. i dunno. something that we can, that catches our eye. that, um maybe, cultural. in a cultural way maybe, if we could get something for, aboriginal people to read. (female participant #1, talking circle #4) she also noted that accessible hiv-related information should be “something easier for us to access, knowledge and current knowledge … ‘cause things change. things change. with treatment.” further, as a female participant nicely summarizes, “the more you know, the more better, better off you are” (female participant #3, talking circle #2). discussion the knowledge and experiences of indigenous people wuid/a living in the dtes of vancouver, bc, provide valuable insights regarding everyday hiv risk behaviours and hiv-related perceptions. the intersecting issues affecting many of the indigenous people in this study, including discrimination, marginalization, and substance use, are the result of the legacy of racism and colonialism in canada. these intersecting issues also contribute to disparities in hiv knowledge, prevention, and support, which not only impact access to hiv knowledge and testing, but also limit engagement with and access to hiv treatment and care. some participants also experienced hiv-related stigma and discrimination within their own first nations communities, as well as profound experiences of trauma related to grief and loss. at the same time, while our findings further demonstrate that indigenous people wuid/a have gained better access to hiv testing and supports, enhanced access to culturally safe and community-based education and treatment options still needs to be prioritized. in order to investigate the experiences of indigenous people wuid/a, who are vulnerable to hiv, we must first understand the ongoing systemic impacts of colonization on indigenous peoples’ health. 11 lavalley et al.: i used to be scared published by scholarship@western, 2021 previous research on this impact has revealed that colonization continues to shape indigenous lives and health in complex ways, and this remains true for experiences with hiv prevention and treatment (allan & smylie, 2015; loppie reading & wien, 2013). subsequently, the impacts of colonization are integral to discussions surrounding indigenous peoples’ experiences and, in this case, are central to the discussion surrounding indigenous people wuid/a and hiv. without this understanding and articulation, indigenous peoples’ experiences of structural violence, racism, and social and health inequities are reinforced (adelson, 2004). health inequities experienced by indigenous peoples (e.g., inadequate access to healthcare services, higher morbidity and mortality rates, etc.) are linked to the intergenerational and continuing impacts of colonization, including the residential school experience, overrepresentation in the child welfare system, ongoing colonial policies (i.e., the indian act), and the sixties scoop (allan & smylie, 2015; goodman et al., 2017; hiv/aids and indigenous peoples, 2009; loppie reading & wien, 2013; negin et al., 2015). prior studies have shown how experiences with colonial trauma can shape hiv risk among indigenous peoples (bingham et al., 2014; negin et al., 2015). for example, a study looking at the hiv infection risk among indigenous women engaged in street-based sex work found that intergenerational trauma was a contributing factor (bingham et al., 2014). research has linked poorer health outcomes among indigenous people, particularly those living with hiv, compared to non-indigenous groups, with poor health most often stemming from the impacts of marginalization, colonization, and ongoing colonial practices that perpetuate state violence (barker et al., 2019; hiv/aids and indigenous peoples, 2009; negin et al., 2015; woodgate et al., 2017). our findings importantly highlighted that indigenous people wuid/a in vancouver do experience disparities in access to hiv prevention (i.e., education and testing), uptake of hiv care, and treatment outcomes. however, changes in hiv-related knowledge were associated with improvements in hiv treatment access and treatment acceptance. this finding is consistent with previous research that has linked increases in hiv knowledge to reductions in hiv risk behaviours (de santis et al. , 2017). for indigenous peoples, the lack of engagement with hiv treatment (i.e., taking medication) has been recognized as a common experience (barker et al., 2019; milloy et al., 2016). participants revealed that insufficient knowledge about hiv may discourage people from accessing appropriate hiv testing. similarly, previous research reported low levels of knowledge about hiv among indigenous youth and their parents, often leading to reduced prevention and testing (fagan & mcdonell, 2010; mitchell et al., 2004; negin et al., 2015). however, we also found that, in recent years, there has been significant improvement in hiv knowledge, as well as the uptake of hiv testing and treatment among indigenous people wuid/a (barker et al., 2019). while many participants described their loved ones “falling ill” from hiv, recent accounts of success stories affirm epidemiological evidence suggesting improved uptake of hiv testing and medication access among indigenous people wuid/a (martin et al., 2011; milloy et al., 2016; montaner et al., 2014; negin et al., 2015). we also attribute this finding to the fact that the dtes was the centre of a massive epidemic, leading to considerable hiv testing services being put in place, and the raising hiv awareness among residents. this finding further demonstrates that healthcare systems have denied equitable access to life-saving information to indigenous communities. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.10878 the positive impact of access and adherence to antiretroviral therapy (art) on rates of morbidity and mortality among people living with hiv has been well established (martin et al., 2011; milloy et al., 2016; montaner et al., 2014; negin et al., 2015). however, marginalized people living with hiv, including indigenous peoples, face significant barriers in accessing these treatments (barker et al., 2019). our findings further demonstrate that tailored interventions can improve the health and wellbeing for those who face intersecting barriers to hiv treatment, such as racism, substance use, sexism, transphobia, etc. (de santis et al., 2017; price et al., 2018; wolfe et al., 2010). culturally tailored interventions have been developed to increase access to life-saving treatments for indigenous people living with hiv, for example, collaborative approaches involving indigenous communities’ participation prioritizes relationship building, community readiness, trauma-informed care, and integration of traditional indigenous healing practices (jongbloed et al., 2019; larcombe et al., 2019; pearson et al., 2020; worthington et al., 2020). despite improvements in hiv screening and testing, studies suggest that disparate hiv risk perception among marginalized peoples is associated with high rates of hiv risk behaviours (de santis et al., 2017; montaner et al., 2014; negin et al., 2015). for indigenous people wuid/a, high-risk behaviours often stem from the systemic impacts of colonization and discrimination (barker et al., 2019; milloy et al., 2016; negin et al., 2015; woodgate et al., 2017). interestingly, several participants’ stories reveal that those engaged in high-risk behaviours were more likely to get tested in response. moreover, participants’ involvement with community-based research projects also contributed to an increase in hiv testing. previous studies have discussed the role of research studies as being an important access point for healthcare (sacristán et al., 2016). however, the reliance on research sites for testing in this instance does raise questions about the reach of conventional public health services that are designed to deliver hiv testing to marginalized populations. the reliance on research sites for testing may point to mistrust in healthcare systems that hinder access for many indigenous people due to stigma and racism that stems from the enduring impacts of colonialism (goodman et al., 2017). while hiv-related stigma and discrimination is common among all people living with hiv, a higher level of hiv-related stigma and discrimination is typically experienced by indigenous peoples, due to a complex set of historical, political, and cultural factors (bc office of the provincial health officer, 2009; reading et al., 2013; woodgate et al., 2017). some participants shared stories of facing stigma and discrimination within their own families and communities, much of which appeared to be rooted in a lack of knowledge about hiv transmission (e.g., you can’t hug an hiv positive person). research has shown that stigma and discrimination are often intensified in smaller communities—further preventing people from seeking hiv testing (heckman et al., 1998; orchard et al., 2010). stigma is even more compounded for indigenous women who experience gender discrimination, racism, and socioeconomic disadvantage (ship & norton, 2000). additionally, prior research has shown that those with internalized hiv stigma may have decreased confidence in their ability to adhere to hiv treatment regimens (seghatol-eslami et al., 2017). several participants shared stories of trauma related to the grief and loss of loved ones. past work has also revealed how indigenous peoples have experienced overwhelming collective trauma as the result of ongoing systemic oppression and discrimination rooted in colonialism and colonial institutions (allan & 13 lavalley et al.: i used to be scared published by scholarship@western, 2021 smylie, 2015; loppie reading & wien, 2013). colonization and forced assimilation have fundamentally shifted and complicated how indigenous peoples experience the grieving process due to a history of multiple stressors, including, but not limited to, residential school experience (spiwak et al., 2012). this intergenerational trauma has sometimes been referred to as a “soul wound” (duran et al., 1998) with psychological symptoms (i.e., pain, suffering, and guilt) that are part of survivor syndrome (spiwak et al., 2012). moreover, in many cases, hiv-related grief and bereavement can create significant mental health needs among people living with hiv, despite advancements in hiv treatment (sikkeman et al., 2003). given that grief and loss related to hiv may serve to compound existing collective trauma resulting from colonialism, it is important that healthcare providers understand and recognize the value of trauma-based approaches in indigenous models of care (jongbloed et al., 2019; mccall & lauridsenhoegh, 2014; pearson et al., 2020). our findings further emphasize the urgent need for hiv treatment and care programs to explicitly respond to the culturally specific needs of indigenous people wuid/a by recognizing and attending to the complex relationship between trauma, grief, and systemic oppression (mccall & lauridsen-hoegh, 2014; pearson et al., 2019). our findings further suggest that current models of hiv screening, treatment, and care must expand efforts to develop or adapt interventions addressing intergenerational trauma and recognize the intricate relationship between trauma and systemic oppression. the importance of delivering community-based and culturally specific education and safe treatment is consistent with previous work that recognized the success of this strategy (bingham et al., 2014; canadian aboriginal aids network [caan], 2021; flicker et al., 2015; hillier et al., 2020; jongbloed et al., 2019; majumdar et al., 2004; ontario hiv treatment network, 2019; reading et al., 2013). consistent with the recommendations from caan (2021), support for indigenous people living with hiv demands meaningful and culturally relevant interventions. culturally safe care and interventions should include more indigenous healthcare staff, cultural opportunities in the form of traditional wellness practices, and the use of elders to provide emotional support (reading et al., 2013). importantly, these interventions must be rooted in a culturally safe, trauma-informed, and patient-centred perspective (mccall & lauridsen-hoegh, 2014). notably, a research project that generated 29 hiv-related funding and policy recommendations directly from the lived experiences of indigenous people living with hiv stressed the vital importance of improving access to culturally appropriate care and services (hillier et al., 2020). our findings further emphasize the needs for accessible harm reduction services and peer-led groups to explicitly respond to the culturally specific needs of indigenous people wuid/a who are vulnerable to hiv. further, it is important to consider when exploring culturally safe hiv care, including hiv-related research, that conventional scientific hiv research approaches are often not consistent with indigenous ways of knowing and epistemologies and, as such, do not sufficiently address the needs of indigenous people living with hiv (ryan et al., 2020). indigenous epistemological and ontological considerations are necessary for culturally safe care and, thus, would allow indigenous people living with hiv to exercise more self-determination, control, and autonomy of their own health services, including hiv prevention strategies (flicker et al., 2019, nowgesic, 2010; ryan et al., 2020). throughout the talking circles, participants spoke about the significance of “reaching people on the street,” namely, creating accessible and adequate hiv-related education for people experiencing 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.10878 homelessness. research involving children experiencing homelessness reveals that peer education methods are a successful approach to increasing and improving knowledge and attitudes toward hiv (khezri et al., 2019). as previously stated, as part of a tailored and multipronged approach for community-based and led interventions, strategies must be embedded and informed by the varied experiences of indigenous people wuid/a. our study has some limitations. first, our research is limited to those experiences of a unique group of indigenous people wuid/a associated with a community-led organization, and thus may not extend to all indigenous peoples. however, it is important to note that our findings may extend to other colonized settings (e.g., australia and new zealand), where indigenous people experience similar health disparities (negin et al., 2015; shea et al., 2011). further, our study does not capture the unique lived experiences of indigenous women, queer, and two-spirit people living with hiv and, thus, warrants further investigation. conclusion these findings illustrate an urgent need to address the social structural inequalities faced by indigenous people wuid/a in relation to hiv that have arisen out of colonialism. the further development of culturally tailored strategies and programs that are directly informed by the diverse experiences of indigenous people wuid/a hold promise for achieving effective hiv prevention, treatment, and care efforts. despite efforts to increase hiv education, testing, and treatment, the health disparities and inequities faced by indigenous people wuid/a have increased in recent years. continued efforts by those in the healthcare sector must include a critical examination of the root causes of health and healthcare inequities among indigenous people wuid/a within historical, socio-political, and cultural contexts. references adelson, n. 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(2020). a qualitative study of community-based hiv/aids prevention interventions, 21 lavalley et al.: i used to be scared published by scholarship@western, 2021 programs, and projects for rural and remote regions in canada: implementation challenges and lessons learned. journal of public health management and practice, 26(1), e28–e37. https://doi.org/10.1097/phh.0000000000000878 cp10878lavalley.pdf 10878lavalleyusedtobescared proof.pdf microsoft word 10208 cover page.docx the international indigenous policy journal volume 12 | issue 2 may 2021 applying crime prevention and health promotion frameworks to the problem of high incarceration rates for aboriginal and torres strait islander populations: lessons from a case study from victoria samantha battams southgate institute for health, society and equity, flinders university, australia, samantha.battams@flinders.edu.au toni delany-crowe southgate institute for health, society and equity, flinders university, australia, toni.delanycrowe@flinders.edu.au matt fisher southgate institute for health, society and equity, flinders university, australia, matt.fisher@flinders.edu.au lester wright southgate institute for health, society and equity, flinders university, australia, lesw@att.net anthea krieg ceduna koonibba aboriginal health service (aboriginal corporation), australia, antheak@internode.on.net dennis mcdermott director, poche centre for indigenous health, college of medicine and public health, flinders university, australia fran baum southgate institute for health, society and equity, flinders university, australia, fran.baum@flinders.edu.au recommended citation battams, s., delany-crowe, t., fisher, m., wright, l., krieg, a., mcdermott, d., & baum, f. (2021). applying crime prevention and health promotion frameworks to the problem of high incarceration rates for aboriginal and torres strait islander populations: lessons from a case study from victoria. the international indigenous policy journal, 12(2). https://doi.org10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10208 applying crime prevention and health promotion frameworks to the problem of high incarceration rates for aboriginal and torres strait islander populations: lessons from a case study from victoria abstract this article examines what kinds of policy reforms are required to reduce incarceration rates of aboriginal and torres strait islander people through a case study of policy in the australian state of victoria. this state provides a good example of a jurisdiction with policies focused upon, and developed in partnership with, aboriginal communities in victoria, but which despite this has steadily increasing incarceration rates of indigenous people. the case study consisted of a qualitative analysis of two key justice sector policies focused upon the indigenous community in victoria and interviews with key justice sector staff. case study results are analysed in terms of primary, secondary, and tertiary crime prevention; the social determinants of indigenous health; and recommended actions from the ottawa charter for health promotion. finally, recommendations are made for future justice sector policies and approaches that may help to reduce the high levels of incarceration of aboriginal and torres strait islander people. keywords justice, crime prevention, health promotion, aboriginal and torres strait islander, the ottawa charter for health promotion author note anthea krieg is now at incompro aboriginal association. dennis mcdermott was pro vice-chancellor (indigenous) at la trobe university prior to his passing. acknowledgments we wish to dedicate this article to the memory of our late and esteemed colleague, professor dennis mcdermott, who was committed to social justice and reducing the high incarcerations rates of aboriginal and torres strait islander people. this article is based upon research funded by an australian research council grant (dp160100244). creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. 1 battams et al.: applying crime prevention and health promotion frameworks published by scholarship@western, 2021 applying crime prevention and health promotion frameworks to the problem of high incarceration rates for aboriginal and torres strait islander populations: lessons from a case study from victoria aboriginal and torres strait islander people in australia1 experience significantly worse outcomes than non-indigenous australians on many measures of physical or mental health (australian government, 2020). these health inequities occur in parallel with similar inequities in rates of aboriginal and torres strait islander incarceration, compared with non-indigenous counterparts (australian bureau of statistics, 2018). arguably, the root causes of both forms of inequity lie with the history and contemporary expressions of colonisation in australia. colonisation has disrupted the social, economic, and cultural bases of aboriginal and torres strait islander lives and health through introduction of infectious disease and an array of government-sanctioned processes including massacres, dispossession of lands and relocation, forced labour, removal of children, and enforced cultural assimilation (carson et al., 2007; sherwood, 2013). a contemporary result of these processes is that many indigenous australians are subject to social and economic disadvantages in areas such as income, employment, education, and housing (carson et al., 2007). the processes of colonisation also continue to adversely affect aboriginal and torres strait islander people through systemic racism, trauma, loss of culture, and limited access to culturally safe and appropriate healthcare (carson et al., 2007). exposure to such conditions affects health via pathways such as stress, infectious disease, injury, poor diet, smoking, and alcohol use (thomas et al., 2008). thus, the ongoing impacts of colonisation and resulting socioeconomic inequities are widely understood as social determinants of indigenous health in australia (carson et al., 2007). many of the same factors are understood to underlie high rates of aboriginal and torres strait islander incarceration, coupled with factors such as racist policing and harsh sentencing policies (australian law reform commission, 2017; reeve & bradford, 2014). thus, determinants of indigenous incarceration can be seen as consistent with models of social determinants of health that highlight ways in which politics and power in contemporary hierarchical societies operate through mechanisms such as income and education to distribute resources and create inequalities in living conditions and health status (solar & irwin, 2010). indigenous criminology has also emphasised the impacts of colonisation on contemporary justice experiences and analyses of indigenous communities’ contact with police and courts systems from a human rights and indigenous perspective (cunneen & tauri, 2018). such a perspective also recognises that experiences within the criminal justice system can themselves have negative impacts on health or determinants of health such as employment (reeve & bradford, 2014). the strong interdependence between various areas of aboriginal and torres strait islander disadvantage, especially interaction with the criminal justice system, long-term health, and labour force outcomes highlights the need for holistic policy approaches (reeve & bradford, 2014). 1 in this article, we use aboriginal and torres strait islander or indigenous australians to refer to the first peoples of australia. when referring to victoria government policies and programs examined in the article, we follow their practice of using “aboriginal” or “koori” to refer to the first peoples of victoria. agreements and policies were frequently developed in partnership with the first peoples of victoria for all aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples living in victoria. we use non-indigenous to refer to australians who are neither aboriginal nor torres strait islander. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10208 one crucial way in which governments can respond constructively to reduce health inequities is through holistic population-based social determinants of health approaches to health promotion and disease prevention. such approaches, described in landmark documents such as the ottawa charter for health promotion (first international conference on health promotion, 1986), hereafter the ottawa charter, eschew narrow, individualised strategies to modify health behaviours. instead, these approaches focus on what can be done through policies in all sectors to cultivate healthy social and environmental conditions and build community health capabilities. effective health promotion strategies can reduce premature disease and subsequent demand for expensive, remedial medical care. more recently, frameworks such as health in all policies have further developed and applied the notion of healthy public policy, as per the ottawa charter, informed by evidence on social determinants of health. health promotion advocates and practitioners have long recognised a need for primary, secondary, and tertiary approaches, aligned with frameworks such as the ottawa charter. primary prevention focuses on promoting health, while secondary prevention focuses on preventing disease in the general population and in groups considered at higher risk. a tertiary approach focuses on promoting health and managing disease among those with existing chronic ill-health conditions. primary, secondary, and tertiary strategies in health promotion have an established parallel with similar concepts in crime prevention (baum, 2008, 2015; baumann & ylinen, 2013). brantingham and faust (1976) define primary crime prevention as focusing on the population at large and on modifying environments and strengthening community supports to stop crime before it is committed. such initiatives may include promoting access to housing, employment, and education, which are also recognised as social determinants of health. secondary crime prevention focuses on individuals and communities considered at elevated risk of offending or victimisation, again in a similar way to secondary prevention in health. one form of secondary crime prevention is justice reinvestment, which aims to prevent crime and reduce imprisonment by redirecting public funding from prisons to programs to build individual and community resources in communities with higher incarceration rates (evans, 2018; tucker & cadora, 2003). such initiatives have demonstrated positive benefits in some indigenous communities in australia (kpmg, 2018), but have tended to be seen as project-based trials rather than as a systematic strategy for reducing high incarceration rates. tertiary crime prevention focusses on those who have already offended or become victims of crime, to prevent reoffending or repeat victimisation (baumann & ylinen, 2013). many of the strategies recommended in a recent australian law reform commission report (2017) on reducing incarceration of aboriginal and torres strait islander people were in this category, such as bail conditions, sentencing considering aboriginality, community-based sentencing, prison programs and parole, and police accountability. they did not address determinants of incarceration or primary and secondary crime prevention. however, the report did highlight a need for trauma-informed and culturally appropriate rehabilitation services, consistent with calls for such services in the health sector (dudgeon et al., 2014). as prisoners are more likely to have suffered trauma (maschi et al., 2011), trauma-informed services should be a key part of tertiary crime prevention strategies. 3 battams et al.: applying crime prevention and health promotion frameworks published by scholarship@western, 2021 any considerations of health promotion among indigenous australians should also recognise their holistic conceptions of health and wellbeing, which include deep connectedness with culture, spirituality, community, and country (dudgeon et al., 2014). alongside the negative determinants noted above, evidence on social determinants of indigenous health also recognises the health benefits arising from these cultural connections, alongside other positive factors such as access to culturally safe healthcare, control over life circumstances, and self-determination (dudgeon et al., 2014). theses holistic conceptions of wellbeing and positive determinants of indigenous health will also be relevant within a framework of primary, secondary, and tertiary crime prevention in australia. in this article, we explore how the ottawa charter principles for health promotion can offer insight into crime prevention strategies to reduce indigenous incarceration in an australian context. to do so, we examine indigenous justice sector policies and action plans in one australian state, victoria, to consider the extent to which they focus on primary, secondary, and tertiary crime prevention and correspond with ottawa charter and health in all policies (leppo et al., 2013) approaches. we selected victoria because, among jurisdictions in australia, it demonstrates a stronger commitment to the best practice of engaging with indigenous communities to prevent crime and reduce incarceration of aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples in victoria. yet, even with this commitment, rates of incarceration are increasing. literature review victoria and justice sector policy there are approximately 48,000 aboriginal or torres strait islander people living in victoria, constituting around 0.8% of the population. the extreme minority status of the indigenous population is more pronounced in south eastern australia, where colonisation occurred earlier and more completely than in other parts of australia and presents significant challenges for indigenous australians’ ability to influence policy (empowered communities, 2015). there has been a long history of partnership between the victorian justice sector and aboriginal communities in victoria, through successive aboriginal justice agreements (victorian government, 2013, 2018a) and structures that have enabled a partnership approach. table 1 tracks the range of policies relevant to the aboriginal justice sector in victoria, which has made this a unique jurisdiction in terms of its successive aboriginal justice agreements since the royal commission into aboriginal deaths in custody (dodson et al., 1991). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10208 table 1. inquiries and aboriginal justice inclusion initiatives relevant to the victorian justice sector national & state inquiries policy & key programs structures & roles 1991 royal commission into aboriginal deaths in custody koori youth justice program (1992) koori courts (2002) first victorian aboriginal justice agreement (aja1; 2000-2006) victorian aboriginal justice advisory committee (for first aja) 1997 national ministerial summit on indigenous deaths in custody second victorian aboriginal justice agreement (aja2; 20062012) aboriginal justice forum (statewide; 2000-current) 2009 senate legal and constitutional affairs committee inquiry into access to justice victorian government aboriginal inclusion framework (2011) aboriginal justice caucus (formerly koori caucus; statewide; 2001-current) 2010-2011 standing committee on aboriginal and torres strait islander affairs inquiry into the high level of involvement of indigenous juveniles and young adults in the criminal justice system mingu gadhaba: beginning together—koori inclusion action plan (2012) regional aboriginal justice advisory committees (current) 2012 protecting victoria’s vulnerable children’s inquiry koori family violence court support program (2012) koori family violence police protocols (2012) local aboriginal justice action committees (current) 2014 productivity commission inquiry into access to justice arrangements victorian aboriginal justice agreement phase 3 (aja3; 20132018) koori justice unit (current) 2015 in the child’s best interests. systemic review of the victorian child protection system’s compliance with the aboriginal child placement principle in victoria burra lotjpa dunguludja victorian aboriginal justice agreement phase 4 (2018) youth justice units (current) 5 battams et al.: applying crime prevention and health promotion frameworks published by scholarship@western, 2021 table 1. inquiries and aboriginal justice inclusion initiatives relevant to the victorian justice sector (continued) national & state inquiries policy & key programs structures & roles 2016 always was always will be koori children: systemic inquiry into services provided to aboriginal children and young people in out-ofhome care in victoria yarrwul loitjba yapaneyepuk— walk the talk together koori inclusion action plan (20172020) aboriginal children’s forum (current) & indigenous family violence partnership forum (current) 2017 australian law reform commission, pathways to justice—an inquiry into the incarceration rate of aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples wungurilwil gapgapduir: aboriginal children and families agreement and strategic action plan 2018 commissioner for aboriginal children and young people (2013) & special adviser for aboriginal self-determination (2018) & victorian treaty advancement commissioner (2018) during this study, the victorian aboriginal justice agreement (victorian government, 2013), hereafter aja3, was in its third phase. the aja3 was part of a broader suite of policies and initiatives supporting partnerships between aboriginal communities and the justice sector (see table 1), including the victorian government (2011) aboriginal inclusion framework. this framework refers to how government departments do business with aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples in victoria. arising from this framework are mingu gadhaba: beginning together—koori inclusion action plan (victorian government, 2012) and its successor yarrwul loitjba yapaneyepuk: walk the talk together: koori inclusion action plan (victorian government, 2017), which are action plans described further below. a treaty was also being developed between the government of victoria and aboriginal communities in victoria through the first peoples’ assembly of victoria: in 2018, the government appointed a special adviser for aboriginal self-determination and a victorian treaty advancement commissioner to progress a treaty. growing incarceration rates incarceration rates are rising in many countries, including the us (the sentencing project, 2019) and australia (australian bureau of statistics, 2019), whilst remaining steady or declining in some european countries (world health organization [who] regional office for europe, 2019). the australian imprisonment rate (which includes those in prisons and those detained in remand centres) has increased by 130% since 1985 (leigh, 2019). the 1991 royal commission into aboriginal deaths in custody (dodson et al., 1991) highlighted the high incarceration rates of indigenous people and deaths in custody, and how these are linked to colonisation, social and economic disadvantage, and social control. incarceration rates for aboriginal and torres strait islander people continue to be much higher 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10208 than for other australians (australian bureau of statistics, 2019), are the highest in the world for a specific population group (thalia, 2017), and are still increasing. victoria has rates of incarceration of aboriginal and torres strait islander people (2,266 per 100,000 population), which are slightly lower than that of australia as a whole (2,492 per 100,000; australian bureau of statistics, 2019). however, the rates of imprisonment of aboriginal and torres strait islander victorians have increased significantly: from 1,013 to 2,015 per 100,000 between 2008 and 2018 (australian bureau of statistics, 2018; victorian government, 2018a). between 2011 to 2012 and 2016 to 2017, there was an increase of 52.6% in the rate of aboriginal and torres strait islander people in victoria under justice supervision (community corrections and prison), compared with a 34% increase in the rate for non-indigenous victorians (state of victoria, 2019). the national policy context since 2008 the australian government has led a national closing the gap (ctg) strategy intended to eliminate or reduce inequalities between indigenous and non-indigenous australians in health (life expectancy, child mortality), education (literacy and numeracy, school attendance and completion), and employment outcomes. however, inequalities persist in all these areas and ctg targets are generally not being met (australian government, 2020). arguably, the limited progress of ctg policy can be understood as resulting from a lack of effective action on social determinants of indigenous health (mackean et al., 2019). high rates of incarceration also help to explain this lack of progress (reeve & bradford, 2014). in the justice sector, the australian law reform commission’s (alrc, 2017) pathways to justice: inquiry into the incarceration rate of aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples report called for greater government accountability and national criminal justice targets to reduce indigenous incarceration. it also called for local justice reinvestment strategies in partnership with indigenous australian communities, community-based initiatives to reduce the harmful effects of alcohol, and changing laws so that fine default does not result in imprisonment. the royal commission into the protection and detention of children in the northern territory (australian government, 2017) found poor conditions within and mistreatment of youth in detention centres, who were primarily aboriginal or torres strait islander children. the detention centres did not meet the standards set out by international guidelines or un child rights conventions. recommendations included improved government oversight, staff training, and a preventative public health approach to child health. this report highlighted the discrepancies across jurisdictions in australia, and how aboriginal justice sector voices (that do exist in victoria through various structures and mechanisms) can help prevent such poor conditions. full implementation of the recommendations of the alrc report and the royal commission has yet to occur. access to justice and police accountability strategies identified by national and state inquiries also have not been fully implemented. 7 battams et al.: applying crime prevention and health promotion frameworks published by scholarship@western, 2021 methods the research was part of a broader project considering how the social determinants of health and wellbeing were addressed in the urban planning, environment, energy, and justice sectors (baum et al. 2018). for the purposes of this larger project, the criminal justice sector was understood as the work of the department of justice and attorney general functions, courts, policing, and corrections. the policy analysis involved a systematic procedure for collecting the appropriate policy documents, and reading, coding, synthesising, theming, and theorising about the data (corbin & strauss, 2008; liamputtong & ezzy, 2006). for the justice sector aspect of the project, all current, strategic policy, selected legislative documents, and the most recent annual report from all criminal justice sector departments in the nine australian governments (all state and territory governments, and the federal government) were collected between march and september 2016. in total, 144 justice documents were collected. we considered the policies in terms of primary, secondary, and tertiary crime prevention, and created key terms associated with these categories, which we then used in our coding framework (see table 2). the framework for primary, secondary, and tertiary crime prevention was based upon previous analyses of these levels of crime prevention (brantingham & faust, 1976). the coding of documents (policy and interviews) was carried out by two team members, with the analysis cross checked with all members of the team. the research project was approved by the flinders university social and behavioural research ethics committee (project number 7176). the review of 144 justice sector policies across jurisdictions found little evidence of primary and secondary crime prevention or acknowledgement of the social determinants of health. however, victoria emerged as the jurisdiction that most considered the social determinants within policy and which had most emphasis on upstream prevention, especially in relation to indigenous incarceration. for this reason, victoria was selected as a jurisdiction to explore further through a case study and, specifically, to examine justice sector policies that focused upon aboriginal and torres strait islander communities. two key policies were identified as setting the overarching principles, goals, and strategies for victorian justice sector action on indigenous crime prevention and reduced incarceration at the time of our research: the aboriginal justice agreement phase 3: a partnership between the victorian government and koori community (aja3), and mingu gadhaba: beginning together—koori inclusion action plan (mingu gadhaba). koori is an indigenous term for aboriginal people in victoria. this article is thus based upon a qualitative analysis of these two policies. aja3 was developed as an updated version of previous agreements. mingu gadhaba was developed to extend commitments in the victorian government aboriginal inclusion framework into the justice sector. aboriginal policy actors and community representatives in victoria were involved in development of both policies. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10208 table 2. primary, secondary, and tertiary crime prevention primary crime prevention secondary crime prevention tertiary crime prevention definition stopping crime before it occurs by addressing social and situational factors that may lead to crime. strategies for whole of population. early intervention for population groups seen to be at high risk of or overrepresented in crime in order to prevent crime. efforts to prevent reoffending and divert people who have committed crimes away from imprisonment. examples policy and practices related to the justice sector • public safety campaigns (e.g., addressing violence against women and children) • neighbourhood & environmental design (e.g., crime prevention through environmental design) • drug and alcohol regulation, prevention programs and services • public and social housing investment • community-based programs • truancy campaigns • neighbourhood watch • community-led responses to crime • community-based programs • youth justice initiatives (e.g., crime prevention camps) • community-engaged policing • neighbourhood and transport policing • early intervention programs • justice reinvestment • detentions, fines • youth courts • therapeutic jurisprudence • diversionary courts • conciliation conferencing • restorative justice • family conferencing • prison-based education and employment programs • post-release programs (e.g., education and employment) • redistributive justice • suppression (e.g., cautions from police) key terms • public safety campaigns • stop/stopping crime • training & employment • poverty reduction • housing/accommodation • access to alcohol and other drugs • community development • community & school policing • urban renewal • neighbourhood design • security measures • community-based responses • justice reinvestment • early intervention • developmental strategies • social development model • community policing • neighbourhoods and populations at risk • indigenous community justice initiatives • recidivism • reunited/family reunification • child welfare • reoffend/reoffending • diversion/diversionary • therapeutic approach • therapeutic jurisprudence • therapeutic justice • rehabilitation • pre-and post-release • restorative justice/conferencing • family conferencing • procedural justice/fairness 9 battams et al.: applying crime prevention and health promotion frameworks published by scholarship@western, 2021 aja3 was the third justice agreement, a partnership between the victorian government and koori community of victoria. the first agreement emerged immediately following the royal commission into aboriginal deaths in custody (dodson et al., 1991). the aja3 aimed to improve koori justice outcomes in the areas of crime prevention and early intervention, diversion and strengthening alternatives to imprisonment, reducing reoffending, reducing conflict, violence and victimisation, creating responsive and inclusive services, strengthening community justice responses, and improving community safety. mingu gadhaba was the victorian department of justice’s koori inclusion action plan. it had four components: systemic inclusion; data and service improvement; koori employment and economic participation; and communication, engagement, and partnerships. it included targets such as increasing employment of koori in the justice sector and ensuring that koori businesses and/or staff were represented in procurement. mingu gadhaba corresponds with the victorian government’s aboriginal inclusion framework. in addition to analysis of these two key policies, we also considered policy developments since the period of interest to this study, including the burra lotjpa dunguludja: victorian aboriginal justice agreement—phase 4 (aja4), (victorian government, 2018a), and the successor to mingu gadhaba, yarrwul loitjba yapaneyepuk (victorian government, 2017). the policies were searched for keywords associated with the three levels of crime prevention, as shown in table 2. in addition to applying our crime prevention framework, we mapped victorian indigenous justice sector policies against the strategies recommended in the ottawa charter for health promotion (who, 1986). the ottawa charter includes five areas of action: building healthy public policy, creating supportive environments, strengthening community actions, developing personal skills, and reorienting health services towards health promotion. addressing social determinants of health is fundamental and cuts across all five areas. we applied these five action areas as a framework for our analysis of policy documents. in examining action to build healthy public policy, we took account of a health in all policies approach (leppo et al., 2013), which emphasises the need for all policy sectors to contribute to health and wellbeing through policy and actions. this approach is also relevant to addressing the multiple forms of disadvantage facing indigenous australians (reeve & bradford, 2014). the aim of undertaking further analysis of these policies was to understand in greater depth the way in which this jurisdiction incorporated primary, secondary, and tertiary crime prevention, and the social determinants of indigenous health within policies. it was also to understand why, despite having policies intended to reduce aboriginal and torres strait islander incarceration, rates have increased in recent years. as part of the case study, interviews were also conducted with key aboriginal staff in the justice sector in victoria. the objective of the interviews was to get the perspectives of people within the aboriginal justice sector who had been involved in policy processes related to mingu gadhaba and associated partnerships between the victorian government and aboriginal communities. all interviewees had close links with these communities. all potential interviewees were initially approached by email, through which they received information on the research and an invitation to participate with a consent form. a follow-up email or phone call was made two weeks later if no reply was received. all interviewees agreed 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10208 to be interviewed via this process and signed a consent form. interviews were conducted by phone and audio recorded. the recording was transcribed by a professional transcription service, de-identified, and stored securely on university servers. three interviews were conducted (in 2018) with the staff able to be contacted and available for interview; other staff members who participated in development of mingu gadhaba were unable to be contacted, despite several attempts to do so. whilst the small number of interviews is a limitation for this aspect of our study, it is important to note that the team involved in policy development was quite small to begin with. our interview participants were two aboriginal people employed within the justice sector in victoria in the aboriginal policy area, and one person who worked for an aboriginal community controlled organisation and was involved in regional and local aboriginal justice advisory committees and policy processes. the latter person provided a useful non-government perspective on incarceration rates and partnership arrangements in victoria. nvivo software was used to organise and code data from both the policies and interviews separately. interview transcripts were initially coded against our crime prevention framework (table 2) and the five categories of health promotion action derived from the ottawa charter. themes were drawn from the justice sector policies and triangulated with themes from data derived from the interviews and analysed in terms of the crime prevention framework utilised, the ottawa charter for health promotion, and a health in all policies approach. results in this section, we present our results according to the frameworks selected for analysis described above. ottawa charter—strengthening community action to enact the goal of strengthening community action, the ottawa charter calls for actions to engage communities in decision-making, vesting ownership and control in communities, and building community resources. there was a strong focus on partnerships between the victorian justice sector and aboriginal communities in victoria, commencing with the establishment of the first aja 20 years ago. both aja3 and mingu gadhaba refer to strengthening community action through partnerships. partnerships were strengthened through the development and implementation of mingu gadhaba, with a range of support structures in place (see diagram 1). these included the aboriginal justice forum (state-wide), the aboriginal justice caucus (state-wide), the regional aboriginal justice advisory committees (rajacs), the local aboriginal justice advisory committees (lajacs), and koori courts. also relevant to the justice sector were the aboriginal children’s forum and indigenous family violence forum. in addition, the government’s koori inclusion unit is located within the victorian department of justice to support implementation of policies. these various structures to support aboriginal community engagement in justice sector policy are shown in figure 1. 11 battams et al.: applying crime prevention and health promotion frameworks published by scholarship@western, 2021 figure 1. structures to support aboriginal community engagement in justice sector policy note. from victorian aboriginal justice agreement phase 3 (aja3): a partnership between the victorian government and koori community, by victorian government, 2013, p. 66. copyright 2013 by the government of victoria. the interview participants in the study suggested that the partnerships between the victorian government and indigenous groups through the various structures noted above have enabled input into decision-making and implementation for indigenous justice sector policies. and over the years that network has grown to the point now where we have nine rajac [regional aboriginal justice advisory committees] regions, we have a very, very powerful voice on that forum and throughout the state because we now have a koori justice, a very strong koori justice unit. we also have a koori caucus, which is made up of the chairpersons of the rajac as well as the other peak body members that are on the forum. membership is sort of, you apply for membership and then if the forum agrees to that then you become a member. so, we have all our aboriginal peak bodies as members of the forum. (interview 3, aboriginal community controlled organisation worker) the koori courts were a part of the current justice system, enabling the input of elders in the sentencing process. this was explained by one interviewee who emphasised that they were not about establishing a “separate” aboriginal justice system. at the start when we had koori courts, we had to be proactive in media engagement and trying to get the positive word out there around the fact that this wasn’t creating an alternate system. that it is actually within the parameters of the sentencing legislation. that all that it was, was an 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10208 ability for aboriginal elders and respected people to sit with the magistrate and think about what this person before them would need to stop them from their particular trajectory. that, essentially, the magistrate would still . . . be confined to the legislation in terms of how he or she would make a decision based on sentencing. so, we . . . were very clear about making sure that there wasn’t this backlash from community about aboriginal people having their own special or separate system . . . the only difference is that we had aboriginal voices embedded into the process. (interview 1, indigenous policy manager) the partnerships that have developed between aboriginal communities and government enabled greater participation in decision-making at a senior policy level when it came to justice initiatives that directly affected aboriginal and torres strait islander people. mingu gadhaba was also considered by interviewees to increase accountability to aboriginal communities. q: so, you’re saying that the koori community members actually meet with ministers, so there’s a level of formal accountability there, they can’t sort of hide from decisions that may be made that are not in the best interests of koori community members? a: yep. exactly right, and if there’s—what we’re finding at the moment is that bail and legislation reforms . . . will have, and will continue to impact on aboriginal people as a disadvantaged group, but we’re working to look at initiatives that might minimise that sort of contact, so we have support to do that through the department, and through the government. (interview 2, indigenous policy director) so we’ve kind of put that same accountability measures back on each of the departments to ensure that they are doing the right thing by us. (interview 3, aboriginal community controlled organisation worker) however, while there was community input into decision-making, one interviewee suggested that more extensive community control and empowerment in the way justice sector resources are used has not been achieved. i mean, it’s good that they can, community comes and talks to us about the things that are impacting on them . . . we’ll know we're successful when community has full control over the resources and decision-making in terms of outcomes for the community. (interview 2, indigenous policy director) ottawa charter—healthy public policy the charter calls for putting “health on the agenda of policy makers in all sectors” and for them to accept responsibility for the health consequences of their decisions (first international conference on health promotion, 1986, build healthy public policy section, para. 1), which is strongly consistent with health in all policies approaches. a whole of government, intersectoral approach was found within aja3, sitting under the broader victorian aboriginal affairs framework 2013-2018 (government of victoria, 2018b), which supported the development of partnerships between justice and other sectors: 13 battams et al.: applying crime prevention and health promotion frameworks published by scholarship@western, 2021 as the aboriginal justice agreement enters its third phase, the partnership is focused on improving justice outcomes by building stronger families and safer communities. work to improve education outcomes, enhance opportunities for employment and strengthen our economy has direct and positive impacts on reducing youth offending, lowering imprisonment rates and tackling family violence. this work is supported by every area of government … improved service coordination for at-risk koori youth and families across the justice, welfare, health, and education sectors is also a priority. closer collaboration between frontline workers is promoted across these areas, supported by integrated cross-sectoral approaches to prevention and early intervention. (victorian government, 2013, p. 3, p. 86) the aboriginal justice forum included representatives from a range of sectors and provided a space to discuss and address problems related to the justice sector. furthermore, the koori inclusion unit has prioritised the formation of relationships across sectors. other sectors were approaching the justice sector staff to develop policies and strategies for aboriginal people (e.g., education, child protection). the aja3 was seen to be the basis of an inclusive approach taken towards aboriginal people in victoria, across government (by aboriginal people employed by government, who had contact with a wide range of aboriginal and non-indigenous stakeholders). interviewees welcomed this cross-sectoral approach but noted a need to retain focus on key justice sector issues. through the justice agreement [aja3], we have a very strong cross-government relationship with health, human services, police, courts, and all of those sorts of things . . . with the previous aboriginal justice agreements, we were kind of like the be all and end all, because there were no other appropriate strategies across the other departments that influence on justice outcomes, but in the last five years, we’ve now got a really excellent education strategy, we’ve got one in health and human services, we’re starting one in forensic mental health, and the justice agreement. (interview 2, indigenous policy director) we have had, through the [aboriginal] justice forums, the engagement of [the department of] education, of dhhs [department of health and human services], of all the aboriginal organisations that also run in that more proactive strength-based space. (interview 1, indigenous policy manager) we’ve recently just gone through a review of the aja3 and as a part of that there’s been some concerns raised about losing sight of, or losing focus on, the justice issues itself because we deal with a lot of issues around dhhs and other areas where other agencies have responsibility. so, there was sort of like a push to perhaps reduce the [aboriginal justice] caucus and the [aboriginal justice] forum just to so that we can start to get back to dealing with core justice issues. (interview 3, aboriginal community controlled organisation worker) 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10208 mingu gadhaba—and its successor yarrwul loitjba yapaneyepuk—were described in interviews as policies to ensure that business units of the department of justice were geared towards inclusiveness and outcomes for aboriginal people in victoria (e.g., in staff employment, procurement practices, consultation and representation policies, responsiveness towards clients). the process by which mingu gadhaba was developed, and the partnership structures put in place, also ensured that justice sector business units were accountable for their objectives. there will be an increased koori uptake of support services such as consumer affairs victoria, dispute settlement centre, victims services, family violence courts division, and courts integrated service program. (victorian government, 2012, p. 15) mingu gadhaba . . . is very much about looking at responsibility being sat in all other parts of the department . . . it asks the questions, you know, “when you are looking at procurement practices within the line, the branch, within [the department of] justice, how aware are the procurement officers? how are considerations around . . . support of koori businesses embedded within their procurement policies?” . . . “where is your particular lens to supporting and encouraging aboriginal participation in your business unit practices?” (interview 2, indigenous policy director) ottawa charter—creating supportive environments here the charter recognises “inextricable links between people and their environments” as the basis for a social-ecological approach to health (first international conference on health promotion, 1986, create supportive environments section, para. 1), which is consistent with addressing social determinants of indigenous health. here our analysis showed that one of the principles of the aja3 was acknowledgement that “the impact of dispossession of traditional lands, languages and cultures, as well as past policies including the separation of children from families, continues to affect koori communities today” (victorian government, 2013, p. 63). mingu gadhaba was seen by interviewees to be part of an overall commitment to aboriginal and torres strait islander self-determination in victoria. the proposed victorian treaty was seen as an important step in self-determination for the aboriginal communities in victoria. our government here has just recently passed its legislation in looking at a treaty here in victoria, that passed a couple of weeks ago in parliament and providing of course the labor government gets back in, and also the notion of self-determination, which is what the government’s policy wants to be. and there’s been a lot of consultation around that. in fact, they’ve got an aboriginal person employed just to look at that. (interview 3, aboriginal community controlled organisation worker) well, the victorian government has given a commitment to victorian aboriginal people to not only engage in conversations about self-determination, but also about treaty. so, we have a victorian treaty commissioner at the moment who’s doing the scoping work around what a representative body would look like, and treaty not just for land, but for everything: economics, you know, the whole lot. so, our department and many other departments have been looking at, “what does self-determination mean in the community, and in the department?” and it means government having to hand over control and resources; i know that sounds huge, but hand over 15 battams et al.: applying crime prevention and health promotion frameworks published by scholarship@western, 2021 decision-making—but it’s the real participation in decision-making. (interview 2, indigenous policy director) although recognition of the impacts of colonisation and commitment to treaty and self-determination are significant, there was little evidence of other justice sector action to create supportive environments in the policy documents analysed. ottawa charter—developing personal skills the charter calls for actions to “support personal and social development” through information, education, and life skills (who, 1986, develop personal skills section, para. 1). part of aja3, the koori community safety grants program led to community-based violence prevention activities aimed at developing education and skills designed to prevent violence. therapeutic and skills-based programs were also delivered to aboriginal people who had committed crimes. empowerment was also evident in cultural strengthening programs for koori men and women in custody or on community orders (aja3). there was also evidence of support for koori people in developing personal skills through the aja3’s koori cognitive skills program, which focused on assisting people (in prisons and under community orders) to develop problem solving skills to deal with everyday problems. ottawa charter—reorient services the charter calls for actions to reorient health services away from purely clinical and curative care towards a health promotion approach. in this research, mingu gadhaba is a policy that seeks to reorient justice sector practices in general toward a partnership approach with victorian aboriginal communities. there was also evidence of reorienting services through the aja3’s focus on frontline programs that “encourage youth to build positive and healthy lives, through leadership, sport, arts, education, training and community development” (victorian government, 2013, p. 40). this could also be considered an example of a “settings” approach. primary crime prevention the aja3 had a strong focus on crime prevention and early intervention to prevent and reduce contact with the justice system for youth, as well as to prevent recidivism: aja3 maintains an emphasis on prevention, early intervention and diversion to reduce further progression into the justice system. (victorian government, 2013, p. 15) a key strategic focus of the aja has been to prevent young koories from coming into negative contact with the justice system, or if already there, to divert them from more serious contact. the other key focus has been to reduce reoffending and recidivism by those already in contact with the justice system. (victorian government, 2013, p. 27) the third aja included the following key initiatives for increasing crime prevention and early intervention and reducing reoffending: 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10208 • frontline youth initiatives and community initiatives programs (a range of funded community-based youth initiatives). • koori early school leaver program and youth employment service (diverting koori adolescents away from the justice sector by encouraging engagement in education and employment). (attorney-general’s department, 2013; victorian government, 2013) another primary crime prevention aim was to reduce community violence and conflict in aboriginal and torres strait islander communities. aja3 will focus heavily on reducing conflict and violence across our community to improve community safety. we will only achieve this through collaboration and strong partnerships with and between all stakeholders. (victorian government, 2013, p. 4) despite this focus on primary prevention, unmet needs related to primary crime prevention were discussed by interviewees. these included the need for justice sector strategies that addressed aboriginal and torres strait islander people’s needs in areas such as mental health, alcohol, and other drug support and rehabilitation; the need to protect vulnerable children and support parents and families; and more culturally responsive services for children in care. there is scope for the health promotion sector to play a greater role in all such activities. secondary crime prevention within aja3, a strong focus for secondary crime prevention was youth justice (e.g., koori youth cautioning program) and community development programs (which were largely project based), violence prevention programs in high-risk communities (funded through community-based grant programs), and the employment of 100 police aboriginal liaison officers and 9 aboriginal community liaison officers to work with aboriginal and torres strait islander people. an example of these initiatives is below. as part of the victorian government’s reducing violence against women and their children grants program, a $2.4 million koori community safety grants program is supporting several intensive community-based projects that aim to address the high level of violence in koori communities. (victorian government, 2013, p. 4) a deliberate effort has been made in victoria by the koori inclusion unit (within the department of justice) to focus on community strengths and avoid replicating a focus on deficits through policy and strategies, and this is considered to have strengthened community engagement. our community told us we have to approach all the work that we do in a strength-based approach. so, we know that the situation isn’t fantastic for our mob, but not everyone’s involved in the criminal justice system. and that was important for us to recognise that, and build on opportunities where we can strengthen the community's capacity and also obviously our own to work on policies, and programs, and procedures, and all sorts of things. (interview 2, indigenous policy director) 17 battams et al.: applying crime prevention and health promotion frameworks published by scholarship@western, 2021 however, this strengths-based approach did not translate to a strong focus on ongoing primary and secondary prevention. as outlined earlier, justice reinvestment strategies are part of secondary prevention and ideally direct funding to social and physical infrastructure in communities with high incarceration rates. there were no justice reinvestment strategies referred to in the victorian policies, and there is scope for such strategies to be funded in aboriginal communities overrepresented in the justice system. however, these strategies should be approached with caution as they have been developed and implemented in very different ways across jurisdictions. they can also obscure the reality that a significant proportion of government funding is being channelled into building prisons, rather than addressing drivers of incarcerations (such as homelessness and lack of spending on public housing) (millar & vedelago, 2019) and investing in community-led primary and secondary crime prevention responses. tertiary crime prevention our analysis of the policies showed that a strong focus on tertiary crime prevention was evident within aja3, with specific reference to roles for diversionary approaches for youth and koori women, and rehabilitation programs for prisoners. strategies included aboriginal-specific cultural strengthening programs, restorative justice, court liaison programs, and koori courts and liaison officers. the aja3 included the following tertiary crime prevention initiatives: • aboriginal cultural immersion program (a program that enables aboriginal prisoners and people who had committed crimes to develop greater awareness and understanding of their cultural identity). • koori cognitive skills program (a cognitive skills program adapted for koori people who had committed crime designed to prepare and motivate them for participation in moderate or higher intensity, targeted, and offence-specific interventions). • koori konnect transition and post-release support program (tailored cultural planning and mentoring programs). • aboriginal local justice workers and koori offender support and mentoring program (a program that ensures koori elders provide community-based local support, advice, and cultural connection to people who had committed crime, as well as supervise them undertaking mandated community work in culturally appropriate worksites; attorneygeneral’s department, 2013; victorian government, 2013). some examples of tertiary crime prevention initiatives within aja3 (victorian government, 2013) are: utilise koori liaison officers to ensure access and uptake by koories of courts integrated service program, and strengthen linkages between the program and koori courts at la trobe valley. (p. 101) ensure courts integrated service program brokerage models connect koories on bail to services that address underlying drivers of offending, including alcohol and drug abuse and mental health 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10208 concerns, including services delivered through aboriginal community controlled organisations. (p. 101) the local justice worker program and the koori offender support and mentoring program, which have already proven effective in helping koories to address fine payments, successfully complete community based orders, and reduce breach rates. (p. 29) the problems of unstable housing, homelessness, unemployment, and their impact upon reoffending were well articulated in aja3. whilst there was strong recognition of problems such as the shortage of affordable housing, housing instability, and unemployment, strategies to address these issues appeared to be limited or developmental. consider ways to improve access to post release housing for koori women, including opportunities for increasing planned exits and brokerage funding to explore long-term social housing, private rental and supported housing options. (victorian government, 2013, p. 118) establish an indigenous homelessness working group. this group will include department of justice representation and will be responsible for: identifying evidence-based housing and support models that assist koori men and women exiting prison to make a successful transition to long term housing and reduce recidivism. (p. 117) given the focus of mingu gadhaba was inclusiveness of aboriginal and torres strait islander communities within the justice sector, it is not surprising that its impact was largely discussed in terms of tertiary crime prevention: aboriginal-specific justice initiatives, routine notification of aboriginal or torres strait islander deaths in custody, justice sector staff’s cultural awareness and perceptions of aboriginal and torres strait islander people, taking a systems approach to problems experienced in the justice sector, and developing aboriginal and torres strait islander communities members’ trust and engagement in government offices and staff. the policy and associated processes also enabled a focus on procedural fairness and increased access to complaints mechanisms in the justice sector. we’ve got our koori court systems, that’s working well. both the magistrates and the children’s koori courts are working well because of the supports that are put in place. rather than putting our mob in prison they get support through aod services or other services that they may require. (interview 3, aboriginal community controlled organisation worker) there were several unmet needs related to tertiary crime prevention identified by interviewees. these included justice sector strategies that addressed mental health for aboriginal and torres strait islander people who had committed crimes, alcohol and other drug support and rehabilitation tailored for aboriginal and torres strait islander people, and long stays in remand—linked to alcohol and other drug problems and absence of accommodation options (especially for aboriginal or torres strait islander women and children). unmet needs that still required addressing also included bail and legislative reform, more aboriginal and torres strait islander control over boards and resources, raising the age at which children could be remanded in australia (currently 10 years of age), rehabilitation not providing adequate ongoing employment opportunities, negative public perceptions of aboriginal and torres strait islander-specific strategies, and breaking the nexus between child protection and youth justice. ideas for policy strategies for the future included prisons and out-of-home care run by aboriginal 19 battams et al.: applying crime prevention and health promotion frameworks published by scholarship@western, 2021 controlled organisations, strategies for families and children to maintain connection to culture, and the spread of koori courts. discussion our application of a crime prevention framework and the ottawa charter framework highlights the extent to which there has been a lack of focus on primary and secondary crime prevention strategies (and their evaluation), and the extent to which even progressive recommendations (such as those of the alrc) that do focus on indigenous people are stuck on tertiary approaches. applying these frameworks also suggests participation by indigenous people in the justice sector being an end in itself is insufficient and should rather be one vehicle to help address the underlying social determinants of high incarcerations rates of aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples. our broader research on justice sector policies indicated that victoria had the most progressive policies and partnership approaches; yet despite this, victoria has continued high and growing incarceration rates for aboriginal and torres strait islander people. this article has discussed some of the positive developments in the justice field in victoria for aboriginal and torres islander peoples. reducing socio-economic inequities and incarceration rates among this group is vital if their health status, as a whole population, is to improve. as highlighted by reeve and bradford (2014) and cunneen and tauri (2018), the multiple areas of disadvantage for aboriginal and torres strait islander people work together in complex ways and require holistic solutions. there are multiple, contributing factors explaining the increased rate of incarceration: rising inequity; reduction in public spending on health, housing, and education; a strong focus on tertiary crime prevention within victorian justice sector policy; public and political discourses on being “tough on crime;” and the ongoing effects of colonisation. rising inequities and incarceration rates will further impact other indicators of disadvantage (reeve & bradford, 2014). while tough-on-crime advocates may suppose that harsher sentencing policies will discourage crime, in fact they tend to increase rates of imprisonment, thus requiring extra public funds to expand capacity (brown, 2010). a shift toward primary and secondary crime prevention is essential to escape the damaging consequences of tough-oncrime politics, but is difficult when the issue is politicised, as has been the case in victoria in recent years (alcorn, 2018). evidence shows that spending on prisons in victoria increased by 90% between 2011 and 2018, whilst growth for public hospitals was 48%, school education 25%, and social and public housing just 1% (millar & vedelago, 2019). miller and vedalgo (2019) argued that this disproportionate increase in prison spending is an outcome of tough-on-crime policies. in a recent budget, victoria announced that it would spend $1.8 billion on upgrading existing prisons in 2019 (oxley, 2019). there is a specific need to modify these tough-on-crime discourses, and shift effort and resources to a prevention approach if incarceration rates are to be reduced. politicians in australia have argued that being tough on crime is the desire of the public, but this approach is not part of evidence-based leadership and, in australia, incarceration rates have increased with higher prison spending (knaus, 2017). in addition, being tough on crime may not be directly linked to the desires and understandings of the public. a recent american poll indicated that communities in the usa do not believe that more jails and incarceration lead to lower crime rates (greenberg quinlan rosner research, 2018). 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10208 who ottawa charter for health promotion when it comes to the justice sector and aboriginal and torres strait islander communities in victoria, there were areas where the jurisdiction was in accord with the ottawa charter. through policies and partnerships, engagement was deepened between the justice sector and aboriginal communities. the justice sector even appeared to be a vehicle for much intersectoral collaboration. however, overall, there was still a large focus on housing, education, employment support for ex-prisoners, and diversionary activities (i.e., tertiary crime prevention), with little evidence for “reorienting” justice sector activity towards secondary or primary crime prevention. intersectoral strategies with the potential to address social determinants of crime and incarceration among indigenous people lacked specificity and accountability mechanisms. in addition, much of the current activity is transitional or short-term support relying on the private sector (e.g., housing subsidies). however, there is some evidence that justice reinvestment strategies, part of secondary crime prevention, have reduced crime rates in aboriginal and torres strait islander communities (finizio, 2018). currently, in australia, there is a low political and funding commitment to justice reinvestment initiatives, and such initiatives are not routinely featured as a key element in australian policies, but tend to be project based (evans, 2018). additionally, there is greater scope for the health promotion sector to be involved in justice reinvestment activities, given that community development skills and partnership approaches (essential to health promotion) are a key part of this approach. there was some evidence that a health in all policies approach (leppo et al., 2013) was being taken in the justice sector in victoria, with key sectors such as the health, child wellbeing and protection, housing, and justice sectors working together—as recommended by reeve and bradford (2014). however, more whole-of-government accountability mechanisms are required. additionally, greater investment in primary crime prevention and primary prevention in health is still necessary, including greater investment in child wellbeing and prevention of out-of-home care (davis, 2019). in addition, many of the good secondary prevention initiatives in victoria were tied to short-term grants and were project based. there is more scope for whole-of-government activity involving the justice sector that addresses the underlying causes of socioeconomic inequalities, and for a focus on areas of disadvantage with relatively large aboriginal and torres strait islander populations. there are several policy areas that emerged from our study where more effective action across sectors would be beneficial: • co-ordination between justice, mental health, and housing services to ensure that people with mental health problems exiting the justice system have secure housing and do not end up homeless. • coordination between justice, child protection, domestic violence, and alcohol and other drugs services to break the nexus between aboriginal or torres strait islander children in out of home care and aboriginal or torres strait islander adults in the justice sector. strategies might include tailored support for aboriginal or torres strait islander parents (e.g., home visiting programs) and domestic violence or drug and alcohol programs. early intervention and prevention of contact with the child protection system and provision of 21 battams et al.: applying crime prevention and health promotion frameworks published by scholarship@western, 2021 culturally appropriate support for kids in out-of-home care (if required) is also necessary (see davis, 2019). • coordination between justice and employment sectors to deliver early-intervention employment programs for aboriginal or torres strait islander youth, and longer-term employment programs for ex-prisoners. links with housing programs are also required to help maintain people in employment. • all sectors should address racism through cultural competence and cultural responsiveness training. • trauma-informed policy and practices. primary, secondary, and tertiary crime prevention and the health sector there is evidence that primary health, or primary prevention activities can prevent or reduce crime. for example, there is some evidence for intensive early childhood education programs preventing crime (garcía et al., 2019; temple & reynolds, 2007) and parenting programs delivered in supportive organisations and structures reducing child abuse and neglect (shapiro et al., 2011). domestic and family violence prevention education and peer strategies to reduce violence are also effective (ellsberg et al., 2015). investment in and diversion to community mental health (evans et al., 2006) and alcohol and other drug programs (bondurant et al., 2016) have also been linked to a reduction in crime. whilst the health promotion sector is involved in many such initiatives, it is unclear how many of these strategies are tailored for aboriginal and torres strait islanders or involve the justice sector. interviewees in this study emphasised the need for more culturally tailored prevention and rehabilitation activities. integrated systems for youth with mental health issues and at risk of offending are also required (evans et al., 2006). strategies should be ongoing programs rather than being tied to grants and project based. many of the tertiary crime prevention strategies suggested by the alrc (2017) are already in place in victoria, but there was scope to expand these (for example, with respect to koori courts and aboriginalspecific rehabilitation programs). in addition, utilising the expertise of the health promotion sector in community development could be beneficial for justice reinvestment initiatives (which were not funded or referred to in victorian policy). international relevance of this research the victorian case has greater applicability beyond the state of victoria and has lessons for other countries, particularly when it comes to the development of partnership structures whereby public services and indigenous communities can engage more effectively. employment within the justice sector could be increased and justice sector procurement from aboriginal and torres strait islander businesses encouraged (the aims of mingu gadhaba and its successor). addressing aboriginal and torres strait islander people’s access to culturally relevant and safe services, along with increasing opportunities in areas such as child wellbeing, education, small business development, community development, culture and language, youth leadership programs, and care for country programs are required. such strategies can address the social determinants of indigenous health and wellbeing, applying a strengths-based approach. well planned approaches to reconciliation and programs to reduce racism within organisations and the broader community would likely augment the success of strengths-based strategies. the victorian government aboriginal inclusion framework (victorian government, 2011; 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10208 described earlier) does provide a platform for such activity across government and is a good example that other countries could adopt. globally, who engagement with the justice sector appears to be largely focused on tertiary prevention rather than a health promotion approach. the who stated that prison health should be a key part of the public health system (who regional office for europe, 2003), and a key report on adolescents recommends that the health sector collaborate with the justice sector for adolescent health (who, 2014). as recommended by the who, health ministries should be accountable for prison health, and health services provided to prisons should be independent of justice sector administration (united nations office of drugs and crime [unodc] and who europe, 2013). the who highlights that overcrowding and poor conditions within prisons along with inattention to health concerns of prisoners may lead to infectious diseases (and mental illness) in prisons and result in wider public health concerns. a strategic and collaborative approach to the provision of health services (including mental health services) to those in the justice sector—in alignment with who recommendations—is necessary, along with a greater focus on primary prevention. other key issues emerging from the research despite over 40 years of policy initiatives to address disadvantage and incarceration rates among aboriginal and torres strait islander people, little progress has been made. failure to make progress in indigenous affairs can be seen not simply as a failure of (holistic) policy, but also a failure to evaluate implementation, knowledge exchange, practice tools, and frameworks to determine what works in practice; too often key performance indicators are measured against overall policy without such complex evaluation occurring (moran, 2016). moran (2016) has argued that policy reforms should consider past failures to inform the future and critiques a lack of policy and research focus on practice, calling for a greater focus on the evaluation of practice. there are examples where tertiary crime prevention initiatives have been evaluated (e.g., drug treatment courts). however, the failure to address pressing issues such as housing, and family and child wellbeing outcomes (boles et al., 2007; wittouck et al., 2013), or access and transport issues for aboriginal and torres strait islander people (rsavy et al., 2011) has created issues for the success of initiatives. systematic reviews have shown that drug treatment courts lead to a reduction in general recidivism (general offending and convictions) and drug related recidivism (convictions on drug related charges) (mitchell et al., 2012; shaffer, 2011). however, one systematic review on recovery found that family drug treatment courts rarely focused upon life domain outcomes such as employment, social relationships, and health (wittouck et al., 2013), and another highlighted the need for participants to have access to housing, employment, and mental health services (boles et al., 2007). also, drug related recidivism is associated with completion of a drug treatment court program (mitchell et al., 2012). however, one australian study indicated that there were much lower completion rates of aboriginal and torres strait islander clients in the northern territory’s illicit drug court diversion program when compared to non-indigenous clients (rsavy et al., 2011), which may have been related to access to services or perceived lack of availability of culturally safe services. another broader issue has been the way in which, historically, crime prevention has been treated separately from indigenous affairs and failed to confront the issue of high incarceration rates for 23 battams et al.: applying crime prevention and health promotion frameworks published by scholarship@western, 2021 indigenous people. in the 1980s, an interest in crime prevention led to the establishment of separate crime prevention agencies across australia. however, in some states of australia, policing agencies have since absorbed crime prevention agencies (clancey et al., 2016). crime prevention has been narrowly focused upon neighbourhood and environmental design initiatives such as crime prevention through environmental design, often delivered through local governments (clancey et al., 2016), without addressing fundamental issues related to the effects of colonisation and relative disadvantage among indigenous people. thus, crime prevention policies and structures have historically been a “separate stream” from indigenous affairs and justice sector policies and structures. additionally, whilst there has been a move away from state-centric crime prevention approaches towards partnership approaches with communities, australian crime prevention strategies have failed to respond to the complex and diverse needs of aboriginal and torres strait islander communities in remote areas (georg & manning, 2019). they have failed to address community safety as defined and understood by these communities, and expansion of the concept of community safety is required to address the complex range of problems contributing to it (georg & manning, 2019). processes to better enable community-based understandings of issues to be addressed through policy are required. moran (2016) also argued that different elements of policy contradict one another, and we see such contradictions in victorian justice sector policy where there is both emphasis on reducing indigenous incarceration rates and high and increased investment in prisons (millar & vedelago, 2019). this suggests that not only are whole of government policy processes (such as health in all policies) required, but also that cross-sectoral accountability mechanisms and evaluation that considers primary and secondary prevention will be beneficial in the future. this should be in the broader context of more fundamental change, such as the introduction of genuine partnership approaches through treaties. high incarceration rates are an ongoing effect of colonisation, and efforts towards indigenous selfdetermination are required. whilst a treaty has been proposed between the state of victoria and its aboriginal and torres strait islander communities, this is yet to be developed. notably, an interviewee within our study recognised that control over justice sector “resources and outcomes” was still aspirational. nationally, a first nations voice to parliament is being advocated for through the uluru statement from the heart. establishing such a representative body will be an important part of decolonising governance in australia and will be important in achieving reductions in incarceration rates for aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples. conclusion victoria is an australian jurisdiction that provides a good model of policies and partnerships between government and aboriginal and torres strait islander communities, and of intersectoral policy, in alignment with “strengthening community action” and “healthy public policy” actions in the ottawa charter. such policies and their associated structures enabled the voice of local aboriginal and torres strait islander communities in decision-making processes and helped prevent situations that have arisen in other jurisdictions, such as poor conditions experienced by youth in detention found in the northern territory (australian government, 2017). the partnership approach taken by victoria, through aboriginal justice agreements and associated initiatives such as koori caucus and koori courts (which enable aboriginal and torres strait islander communities to have a role in justice sector decision24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10208 making processes) provide a good example for other countries with indigenous peoples. however, these policies, processes, and activities have not yet resulted in a reduction in reoffending and recidivism for victorian aboriginal and torres strait islander communities. a greater focus on equity and primary crime prevention, over secondary and tertiary crime prevention is required, along with secondary (e.g., justice reinvestment) and tertiary strategies better tailored to aboriginal and torres strait islander communities and integrated with other areas of indigenous affairs. a health in all policies approach with accountability mechanisms that include commitment and accountability from key sectors such as the health, child wellbeing and protection, education, housing, and justice sectors is required. internationally, there is great potential for health promotion sector knowledge and skills to be utilised within primary and secondary crime prevention activities, for example, through community development within justice reinvestment, child wellbeing, or domestic and family violence strategies. if we are to prevent crime, one specific precursor is a shift away from public spending on prisons towards health and social programs. greater investment in child wellbeing, parenting, health, education, housing, employment, and welfare strategies to prevent the conditions that lead to incarceration is a prerequisite for change and a reduction in incarceration rates for aboriginal and torres strait islander communities across australia. moreover, a change in aboriginal and torres strait islander incarceration rates is unlikely to be achieved whilst the legacy of colonialism in policies persists. this legacy is only likely to be reduced when 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(2019). health in prisons—fact sheets for 38 european countries. http://www.euro.who.int/en/health-topics/healthdeterminants/prisons-and-health/publications/2019/health-in-prisons-fact-sheets-for-38european-countries-2019 10208 cover page.pdf 10208 battams applying crime prevention rce.pdf indigenous methodology in understanding indigenous nurse graduate transition to practice the international indigenous policy journal volume 8 issue 4 reconciling research: perspectives on research involving indigenous peoples—part 2 article 9 october 2017 indigenous methodology in understanding indigenous nurse graduate transition to practice donna l. m. kurtz university of british columbia okanagan, faculty of health and social development, school of nursing, donna.kurtz@ubc.ca star mahara thompson rivers university penny cash federation university ballarat, australia jessie nyberg secwepemc nation, university of british columbia estella patrick moller nak’azdli first nation, hompson rivers university recommended citation kurtz, d. l. , mahara, s. , cash, p. , nyberg, j. , patrick moller, e. (2017). indigenous methodology in understanding indigenous nurse graduate transition to practice. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(4). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.9 indigenous methodology in understanding indigenous nurse graduate transition to practice abstract increasing indigenous health care professional presence in health care aims to reduce health inequities of indigenous peoples in canada. nurses are the largest health professional group and nurse graduates the main source of recruitment. the quality of graduate transition to practice is evident in the literature; however, little is reported about indigenous new graduates. we describe using indigenous methodology and two-eyed seeing (indigenous and western perspectives) in exploring indigenous transition experiences. talking circles provided a safe environment for nurses, nurse educators and students, health managers, and policy makers to discuss indigenous new graduate case scenarios. the methodology was critical in identifying challenges faced, recommendations for change, and a new collective commitment for cultural safety education, and ethical and respectful relationships within education, practice, and policy. keywords indigenous methodology, two-eyed seeing, cultural safety, indigenous health, new nurse transition, health human resource acknowledgments the research team thanks secwepemc and okanagan elders who ensured protection of indigenous knowledge and traditions associated with the peoples upon whose ancestral lands the study was conducted. we acknowledge dr. susan duncan for her contributions to the conceptualization of the study and funding proposal, and amber froste, pamela jules, kalea nokelby, jennifer mcdougall, and gina poschenrieder, new graduates, for their contributions to the one day forum and data analysis. this research study was funded by thompson rivers university and interior health and in-kind support from university of british columbia. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ i n d i g e n o u s m e t h o d o l o g y i n u n d e r s t a n d i n g i n d i g e n o u s n u r s e g r a d u a t e t r a n s i t i o n t o p r a c t i c e increasing the supply of indigenous1 health providers, including nurses, has been widely cited as a strategy for improving health services for indigenous peoples in canada and, ultimately, improving their health status, especially in indigenous communities where nurses make up a large proportion of the healthcare workforce (aboriginal nurses association of canada [anac], 2009; british columbia academic health council [bcahc], 2012; exner-pirot & butler, 2015; katz, o’neal, strickland, & doutrich, 2010). the truth and reconciliation commission of canada (trc, 2015) calls for the canadian government to identify and close the gaps in healthcare outcomes between aboriginal and non-aboriginal communities. actions are needed to increase the number of indigenous professionals working in the healthcare field, ensure the retention of indigenous healthcare providers in indigenous communities, and provide cultural competence and cultural safety education for all healthcare professionals to better understand health issues facing indigenous peoples and more effectively improve health outcomes. cultural safety is based in a critical perspective of culture that considers culture in ways that directly address issues of racism and discrimination. it necessitates that educators and practitioners move beyond cultural awareness and sensitivity to analyzing and challenging power imbalances, institutional discrimination, colonization, and relationships with colonizers, as they apply to education and healthcare (anac, 2009; national aboriginal health organization [naho], 2006). new graduates (ngs) make up the largest source of nurses for recruitment and the quality of the ng transitional experience can significantly improve their retention (duchscher, 2008; fox, 2010; rhéaume, clément, lebel, & robichaud, 2011; romyn et al., 2009). the complexities of nursing practice within a highly acute and complex health system challenge nurses at all levels of practice (adamack & rush, 2014; andrews et al., 2005) and ngs are often not prepared to meet these demands especially in the first two years (duchscher & myrick, 2008; romyn et al., 2009). the work world of ngs requires job-specific knowledge development and application to practice, and support by nurse preceptors in clinic and educational environments (rush, adamack, gordon, lilly, & janke, 2013). although the literature is plentiful regarding transition to practice for ngs in general, minimal evidence exists beyond the first two years. for indigenous nurse graduates, little is known about their postgraduation transition experiences at all, including the unique challenges they face and how best to support them toward a long, vibrant nursing career. this gap of knowledge and the increased enrollment of aboriginal students in nursing programs across canada (gregory, pijl-zieber, barskey, & daniels, 2008; lecompte, 2012) provided the impetus for this research on the transition experiences of indigenous ngs. 1 indigenous peoples is a collective name for the original peoples of north america and their descendants. the canadian constitution recognizes three distinct groups of indigenous (also called aboriginal) peoples: indians (referred to as first nations), métis, and inuit (constitution act 1867; government of canada, 2017). increasingly, and in keeping with international agreements, “indigenous peoples” is being used instead of “aboriginal peoples.” the term indigenous refers to aboriginal peoples globally regardless of borders, constitutional, or legal definitions and upholds indigenous rights movements (canadian institutes of health research [cihr], 2015). in this article, the terms aboriginal or indigenous are used in accordance with the term used by participants in the study or the cited author(s). 1 kurtz et al.: indigenous methodology published by scholarship@western, 2017 the purpose of this article is to share insights about selecting and using western and indigenous methodologies to explore and improve the transition and retention experiences of indigenous nurse ngs. working with local indigenous elders, the local health authority, and indigenous and nonindigenous health professionals including decision makers, a collective vision for respectful, inclusive, and culturally safe strategies for education, practice, and policy change was co-created. in describing our journey, we highlight ways in which we shifted from a solely western perspective to also embrace indigenous perspectives. we provide background to the study, ethical engagement, and the process of re-grounding the research methodology during which cultural relevance and distinctness are acknowledged in western and indigenous perspectives. we offer a critique of our initially selected western research approach, how we came to understand the need to shift to an indigenous methodology, and the effect of this shift on the research process, ethical engagement, collective voices, and outcomes. through sharing our experiences with using both western and indigenous approaches, we highlight insights for researchers, health authorities and communities planning or engaged in research in the development and sharing of new knowledge and ways of being, to better work together with each other. b a c k g r o u n d : t h e n e e d f o r i n d i g e n o u s n u r s e s nursing is a viable emancipatory profession that contributes to improved health of aboriginal peoples (canadian nurses association of canada [cna], 2014; national expert commission [nec], 2012). currently, there is professional, national, and political urgency to increase the number of indigenous professionals, specifically nurses, working in the healthcare field and ensure retention of indigenous healthcare providers in indigenous communities (association of registered nurses of british columbia [arnbc], 2015; british columbia nurses union, 2015; cna, 2014). the aboriginal health human resources initiative (ministry of health, 2016) was established to increase the number of aboriginal health professionals in canada (health canada, 2004; mcbride & gregory, 2005). this initiative developed actions to support the recruitment and retention of indigenous nurses in settings most in need (first nations health council, 2013; gregory, 2007; gregory, wasekeesikaw, macrae, wood, & amaral, 2002; hart-wasekeesikaw & hanson, 2007; kulig, stewart, morgan, andrews, & pitblado, 2006; mcgillis-hall, 2008; naho, 2008). the report by the nec (2012) and calls to action by nurses regarding the condition of the canadian health system, resulted in a meeting of nurse leaders in british columbia to discuss canadian nursing education reform for performance expectations of nurses, especially ngs, and how to support a long, vibrant professional career (macmillan, 2013). strategies to ease transition from student to practitioner and to support graduates as they move into their career track were identified as necessary to help students and ngs develop a strong professional nurse identity. to be successful, nurse graduate transition support efforts require in-depth collaboration between education and service industry (nec, 2012), as well as families and communities. for example, studies have found indigenous youth to have lower high school completion rates than non-indigenous youth. although these students bring many strengths, the legacy of residential schools has resulted in teachers and the educational system tending to lack confidence in their educational preparation and their ability to succeed in post-secondary studies (reading & wien, 2009). this has caused some family members and indigenous youth to believe that they or their children are unable to learn and will be unsuccessful in attaining higher education (kurtz, 2011). thus, for indigenous students considering nursing as their career, these assumptions need to be discredited through conversations with primary, secondary, and 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 9 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.9 post-secondary student advisors, students, families, and through incorporating successful indigenous registered nurse role models within home communities. working together requires a partnership in which equality and human rights are reinforced through decolonizing practices within contemporary colonial educational structures. partnerships with indigenous communities need to be respectfully built and supported, working with local educational institutions to engage whole communities in assisting and encouraging their children so that they have educational opportunities that are achievable and will benefit youth, families, and communities. hence, transformative action strategies that facilitate mutual understandings for preparation and success for aboriginal youth in post-secondary and nursing education are critical to meet current nursing shortage and demand for aboriginal nurses (martin & segurie, 2013). the idea that indigenous healthcare provisions should be provided by indigenous healthcare professionals is critical in that they bring a unique understanding of indigenous culture, knowledge, and lived experience pertaining to the complexities of health and social issues that commonly interrupt or deny health equity. these providers acknowledge the importance of indigenous knowing and healing (stephens, porter, nettleton, & willis, 2006). for indigenous people, having an indigenous person caring for them enables an . . . inner sense of knowing . . . way of working with us, and connecting with us, building relationships with us, and giving us an opportunity to be a part of [society] . . . that has been in both worlds and understands both of the worlds, rather than having the power over us, having the power within. (kurtz, 2011, p. 175) c o n t e x t o f t h e s t u d y this western canadian located study was co-led by research team members including indigenous and non-indigenous nurse researchers and educators, indigenous elder advisors, former nurses, and student research assistants from two local university schools of nursing (son), and the provincial health authority. this was established based on prior work together in the area of cultural safety practice standards, curriculum development, and education; indigenous nursing student recruitment and retention; indigenous health disparities and inequities; and related policy development. the goals of the research were to: a. to examine indigenous nurses’ transition from education to practice and their career development experiences; b. promote opportunities for safe and respectful dialogue between indigenous nurses, employers, educators, and policy makers about career experiences and retention strategies; c. increase understanding of issues related to retention of indigenous nurses in the workplace; d. transform this knowledge into strategic action in transitions and career paths of indigenous nurse graduates; and e. identify further areas for inquiry and knowledge development. 3 kurtz et al.: indigenous methodology published by scholarship@western, 2017 the interest in undertaking the study, formulating research questions, and seeking solutions were all based on evidence, experiential understandings, and concerns of indigenous nurses, nurse educators, and elders in local communities. in shaping the research to suit the local indigenous community, numerous safeguards were put in place before, during, and after the study. following educational and health institute ethics approvals that included specific ethical protocols for research involving aboriginal peoples of canada (canadian institutes of health research [cihr], natural sciences and engineering council of canada [nserc], & social sciences and humanities research council of canada [sshrc], 2014), the study was conducted in two phases. in phase one, nine indigenous bachelor of science in nursing (bsn) ngs from two universities were interviewed about their student-to-practicing nurse experiences. seven interview questions were used during telephone conversations with participants. interview transcripts were analyzed thematically by the research team including the elder advisors and four broad themes identified: a. supports; b. ngs in specialized practice areas; c. being an indigenous ng; and d. partnerships to support indigenous ng transitions. participant areas of nursing practice and setting varied significantly, yet interview responses and the experiences they shared were profoundly similar. to maintain confidentiality and ensure interviewed ng were not identifiable, we pieced together stories and quotes from all interviews into four different practice scenarios to best reflect their everyday life experiences in the first 5 years of practice. in phase two, 35 indigenous health and human resources leaders, nurse educators and nursing students, indigenous ngs, indigenous and non-indigenous nurses, managers and other decision makers from the regional health authority, and college of registered nurses of british columbia (crnbc), arnbc, and the anac participated in a one-day invitational research forum to discuss case scenarios, to better understand indigenous ng transition and career development experiences, and to develop strategies for change in practice and policy. research questions for the small group case scenario discussions included: what role can these various groups play in providing supports and resources for ngs? how could organizations partner to improve the transition experience of indigenous ngs? what recommendations can we make to employers, to new graduates, to educators? a research consultant with expertise in developing and facilitating culturally safe environments helped to prepare forum participants to ensure processes and protocols were understood and maintained during the process. preparations included connecting with all participants to ensure they appreciated the indigenous protocols and felt safe during the research. participants were placed into groups by the research team to form small talking circles. construction of each group was designed to have representation from ng, managers, and educators. each group was given two scenarios to consider. talking circles, each facilitated by an elder, were used to provide a safe respectful environment for forum participants to engage in dialogue arising from the case scenarios. talking circles are an ancient customary cultural way for indigenous people to share their stories; construct collective decisions to solve problems; and to carryout group processes (becker, affonso, & blue horse beard, 2006; struthers, hodge, geishirt-cantrell, & de cora, 2003). talking circles also provide a confidential reassuring 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 9 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.9 avenue for diverse groups of people to share knowledge, and for collective visioning, action planning, and healing (kurtz, 2013). they are common in indigenous group communications to provide opportunity for each member in the circle to speak uninterrupted and to share information and knowledge in a supportive atmosphere (struthers et al., 2003). the two-way (western and indigenous) engagement helped create contextual understandings to inform, guide, and prioritize actions for retention of new indigenous nurses and positively influence and shape their career paths in healthcare. to ensure participant insights, ideas, and recommendations were captured in the talking circles, summary notes of case scenario discussions were recorded on flip charts by the trained nursing student research assistants and shared with the large group of all forum participants, in order to help form broader understandings of issues and strategies pertaining to transitions and career paths of indigenous graduates. themes from forum discussions included: a. preparation for practice; b. development of leadership and self-advocacy skills; c. adequacy of academic–practice transition planning and pathway; and d. unique considerations for indigenous nursing students and new graduates. notes from the forum discussions were further summarized afterwards by research team members and elder advisors to illuminate themes embedded in transition experiences and challenges of indigenous new graduates and supports required for development as practicing nurses and retention in health careers. recommendations for transformative change included creating partnerships and developing best practices to support indigenous ng transitions and career planning, improving practice–education collaboration, increasing practicum opportunities for and with indigenous individuals, groups, and communities, and structured career planning and workplace supports in nurse retention. the central outcome was a call for stakeholders to combine their efforts to help indigenous ngs get the support they need to stay in this profession. this multiple perspective dialogue contributed to a fuller appreciation for group consensus, the research themes, and helped in the co-creation of a collective vision for current and future transitional support and retention strategies. the methodology used to conduct the study was crucial to ensure the inclusion of multiple perspectives and successful research study outcomes. m e t h o d o l o g i c a l c o n s c i o u s n e s s t o h o n o u r w e s t e r n a n d i n d i g e n o u s k n o w l e d g e initially, we chose an interpretive descriptive methodology (thorne, 2008). this qualitative western research approach is widely used in practice disciplines such as nursing because of its focus on resolving real-life clinical problems. we saw interpretive description as appropriate given our goal of creating knowledge that would result in strategic action to influence both nursing education and clinical practice. although we started the research using an interpretive descriptive methodology, for example, to write the funding proposal, we soon realized this methodology and ethical protocols within the academy, and those inclusive of indigenous worldview, experience, and knowledge were not well aligned. we realized the research design may not have been the best fit to provide opportunities for multiple western and 5 kurtz et al.: indigenous methodology published by scholarship@western, 2017 indigenous perspectives and discussed shifting to a research approach that was more mutually respectful, culturally relevant, and responsive in honouring indigenous traditions. an interpretive descriptive approach lacked the necessary groundedness in culturally relevant terms, such as how best to consider and approach recruitment, education, and retention of indigenous nursing students and ngs, a situation that runs far deeper than a “clinical” problem, to fill the void of the nursing shortage. this approach considers that clinicians use a form of reasoning that makes sense to them in terms of professional judgment. however, this reasoning is embedded in westernized nursing education, pedagogy, theory, and practice. within nursing, and other professions in which dominant western traditions are exalted, there is a struggle to recognize the embeddedness of processes and outcomes in methodologies that do not adhere to western traditions. historically, the nursing profession has been infused with structural, linguistic, and social practices that serve to colonize rather than liberate. indeed, both the profession and the healthcare system contribute to socially minimizing the cultural well-being of indigenous students and nurses, resulting in perpetuating intentional or unintentional loss of identity, rupturing of cultural practices, and adapting curriculum and pedagogies into assimilative spaces (battiste, 2013; giroux, 2005). from our experience in indigenous research, as well as nursing education and practice, we realized barriers to education and career options for indigenous people are rooted in historical and contemporary colonization, marginalization, and oppression. to overcome this, educational strategies should be developed in collaboration with indigenous educators, knowledge keepers, elders, providers, leaders, and community members to establish relevant decolonizing pedagogy and curriculum framework (martin & kipling, 2006; pijl-zieber & hagen, 2011; rowan et al., 2013; smith, mcalister, gold, & sullivan-bentz, 2011). promoting the success of indigenous nursing students and ngs requires attention to the complex interaction between many historical and contemporary vulnerabilities resulting from social, cultural, spiritual, and economic influences at several points along the healthcare career trajectory of aboriginal students (mcbride & gregory, 2005). instead of trying to make the research approach fit, one of us, an indigenous nurse educator and researcher, challenged us all to consider using a research methodology in which indigenous knowledge and inquiry is informed by elders who would guide the research process to ensure cultural protocols and ways of being were core to the study. in choosing to move forward with an indigenous methodological approach, we looked for ways to ensure what occurs in a study should make sense from an indigenous knowledge perspective (kovach, 2010). kovach (2009), for example, argued that indigenous methodologies are a pragmatic approach to research that influence the choice of methods, how the methods are employed, and the ways in which data are analyzed and interpreted. wilson (2001) stated “methods need to be useful from an indigenous perspective” (p. 177) to benefit current and future indigenous ngs. we needed a methodology whereby past practices within institutions, such as education, health, and social welfare, that have impacted indigenous peoples could be revealed. e m b r a c i n g a n i n d i g e n o u s a p p r o a c h western research processes often originate in large systems of oppression, which interfere with or fail to recognize methodologies that decolonize such practices (jiménez-estrada, 2005). interpretive research methodologies aim to understand and describe human nature and how it is experienced. it is built on 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 9 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.9 established trust, rapport, and authentic communication and truth as contextually dependent based on interviews, observation, photos, diaries, and documents (denzin & lincoln, 2005). without an awareness of underlying philosophical assumptions, the research approach does not mean absence of assumptions, but rather marks the danger of conducting research that fails to recognize societal and systemic colonial and power structures that remain unexamined and unrecognized. on the other hand, decolonizing methodologies “privilege indigenous knowledge, voices, experiences, reflections, and analyses of their social, material and spiritual conditions” (rigney cited in smith, 2005, p. 87) and, in doing so, increase the presence, visibility, and voice of indigenous people (brown & strega, 2005; kovach, 2005; smith, 1999), thereby protecting indigenous knowledge. critical to indigenous research is an understanding of the significance of indigenous knowledge and the ways in which indigenous people make sense of life in today’s world (kurtz, 2013). indigenous knowledge spans across cultures, histories, and geographic spaces that are beyond the physical world (dei, hall, & rosenberg, 2000). brown and strega (2005), anti-oppressive canadian scholars, suggest indigenous research is aligned with critical and decolonizing approaches that see research as an emancipatory commitment to empower a position of resistance and challenge power relations and systemic oppressions with the intent “to individually and collectively chang[e] the conditions of our lives and the lives of those on the margins” (brown & strega, 2005, p. 10). this approach asks whose interests are being served (smith, 1999) in order to challenge research processes that are steeped in dominance and subordination politically (kurtz, 2013). thus, an indigenous paradigm that includes historical, political, and cultural texts provides a “space for further dialogue within a framework that privileges the indigenous presence” (smith, 1999, p. 6). using indigenous methodology was important for indigenous community members to be part of the research process from idea generation and proposal writing, to knowledge transfer and future involvement in ongoing activities that evolved following the study, including education and research. the research methodology, methods, research questions, and the institutional human ethics application were reviewed by the local elders who had expertise in health provision and research and who agreed to be the elder advisors to the research. indigenous and western academic worldviews were discussed frequently with the nurse elder advisors, indigenous nursing student research assistants, and other research team members and collaborators during the study. gregory (2005) suggested that aboriginal nursing researchers are “integral to improving the health and well-being of aboriginal people and communities” (p. 14). indigenous researchers, elders, and community members provided insights into the ethical grounding and engagement of the research, and how it was shaped and shared. this was important and helped enrich the collaborative relationships within the borderlands of indigenous and western worldviews as the methodology evolved, and was enacted (kurtz, 2013). we needed to remember that what occurs today fosters life-long discussions towards acknowledging a shift from a colonial western view to a “twoeyed seeing” approach, which means: to see from one eye with the strengths of indigenous knowledges and ways of knowing, and from the other eye with the strengths of western (or eurocentric or mainstream) knowledges and ways of knowing . . . and to use both these eyes together, for the benefit of all. (marshall & bartlett, 2009, p. 9) 7 kurtz et al.: indigenous methodology published by scholarship@western, 2017 this way of “seeing” illuminates the importance of active and equitable roles in community–academic partner engagement and co-development throughout the research process (cihr, 2015). working in this way deepened understanding and wisdom, and it helped to co-create a more integrated view by weaving back and forth between these (two) perspectives (wiber & kearney, 2006). because the research team, collaborators, and potential participants represented multi-sector, multilevel systems within education and healthcare sectors, finding ways to build and nurture respectful relationships that also acknowledge multiple worldviews was critical to the study. accomplishing these commitments required attention to multilayered unfolding of the research process and an ethical disposition of openness. by choosing an indigenous methodological approach, what occurs in a study should make sense from an indigenous knowledge perspective (kovach, 2010). trying to apply western research methodologies and associated methods with indigenous knowledge systems and processes can intentionally or inadvertently minimize indigenous knowledge shared through experiences and stories, rendering voice and participatory protocols invisible. lack of acknowledgement diminishes engagement and silences participants so they cannot share their knowledge and the cultural underpinnings in which that knowledge is embedded (kovach, 2009; kurtz, 2013). as a result, the insights of two-eyed seeing are also not acknowledged. based on our previous experiences with indigenous research, and the guidance and support of elders, we were striving to ensure that the “indigenous perspective must be stated resolutely, explicitly, and unequivocally” (ermine, sinclair, & jeffery, 2004, p. 9). foregrounding the indigenous perspective(s) shaped by local indigenous knowledge, traditions, life experiences, stories, and visions enabled acknowledgement of the unique status of aboriginal people in canada (ermine et al., 2004). notably, indigenous methodologies respect collective voice, commit to reciprocal long-term relationships extending after the research study ends, and benefit the lives of those involved in the study—namely, indigenous peoples (kovach, 2005, 2009; kurtz, 2011, 2103; smith, 1999, 2012). m u t u a l b e n e f i t s w i t h i n d e c o l o n i z i n g m e t h o d s in this study, in order to open a safe space for the indigenous ngs, elders, healthcare providers, and decision makers, participants were invited to tell their personal and collective stories about their experiences working in western healthcare services. together, strategies aimed at change were formulated in a safe environment, shaping an indigenous methodology (brown & strega, 2005; smith, 1999). the underpinning of indigenous research acknowledges indigenous cultural systems as an almost instinctive understanding in knowing that we must take care of each other, being accountable to each other, our communities, clans, and nations. this collective is the “reciprocity and accountability . . . that creates a sense of belonging, place and home” (kovach, 2005, p. 30). belonging to a collective required diligence in ensuring that a western research approach was not used to define the research question, determine participants, choose the methodology, or direct the sharing of study findings. methods used in indigenous methodologies acknowledge alternate ways of knowing such as insights generated from dreams and storytelling. methods are nested in indigenous ways of knowing and cultural practices, and they are directed by community members participating in or potentially affected by the research. talking circles were a new experience for many participants, particularly employers and managers. in the closing talking circle, forum members went around the circle and reflected on the day events. several 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 9 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.9 talked about the impact that the small talking circles process had on them. elders opened each small talking circle with a traditional prayer and ensured the person speaking was uninterrupted. they stated that workplace meetings would benefit from such a respectful approach to dialogue—really listening and hearing what others have to say, honoring one voice at a time, and acknowledging the wisdom of the speaker. part of indigenous methodology that made the forum successful was the ongoing inclusion of indigenous knowledge and direction from elders throughout the research process. it enabled cocreation of a collective vision through talking circle protocols and a culturally safe environment. as part of historical and contemporary colonizing practices within large institutions and systems, racism is commonly present, problematic, and perpetuated. discussing aboriginal racism and how to address it requires a safe and supportive environment (reading, 2013). a major benefit of this methodological approach was that through safe and respectful conversations, often hidden and silenced experiences such as racism, unique to indigenous ngs, were revealed. this may not have been uncovered with our initial interpretive approach or overlooked within a western lens. being indigenous added additional levels of complexity to being a student, ng, and practicing nurse. indigenous ngs shared their fundamental and personal challenges requiring specific supports from an indigenous perspective. for example, they struggled with how to be a nurse grounded in one’s own culture within a western environment, and their professional and personal roles and responsibilities in caring for their own people. furthermore, indigenous ngs realized the broader scope of their transitions and careers not only within mainstream health but also within a larger context of health promotion and well-being of indigenous peoples. although government and agencies are beginning to become more sensitive to cultural preferences and perspectives, most organizations where ngs work are mainstream and do not reflect indigenous peoples or incorporate indigenous knowledge. many indigenous ngs work within the dominant biomedical model that does not harmonize with an indigenous model of healthcare. while an orientation to the healthcare agency is important to assist ngs, the institution also needs to consider in what ways western healthcare agencies frame the world of healthcare from perspectives that are often in conflict with and fail to acknowledge less dominant perspectives and knowledge. ngs found raising first nations issues to be challenging because of resistance to indigenous knowledge and a perceived lack of support for ng advocacy against bias and stereotyping. the graduates recounted that staff are unaware of racist attitudes, behaviours, and practice. they found a lack of knowledge and sensitivity about potential risk of triggers related to residential schools and support for ngs whose parents, and families, including those who had passed, had suffered. working within traditional talking circles and respecting protocols, forum participants identified current and future retention strategies and developed an informed vision of nursing education and healthcare practice, quality workplaces, indigenous peoples’ health, cultural safety, and partnerships. what arose was a strong commitment to work together toward strengthening student to practitioner transition, and creating nursing education and workforce actions to meet the needs of indigenous ng, employers, and indigenous peoples and communities, while maintaining culturally safe environments across healthcare settings. all actions recommended from the forum require the development of non-racist, nondiscriminatory education and practices through cultural safety to effectively support students, faculty, staff, and other partners in the ng transition. the central outcome of the forum was recognition that all those present shared a responsibility for the success of indigenous ngs in their transition period and 9 kurtz et al.: indigenous methodology published by scholarship@western, 2017 throughout their career. all agreed that effective change in support of ng transitions require work at both micro and macro levels to address issues at all levels of education and practice related to structural barriers within the larger system. this understanding benefitted from the decolonizing focus of the research approach. c o n c l u s i o n looking back and learning from our journey, it is possible to see the research process as organic and coconstructed with significant underpinnings grounded in indigenous ways of knowing. this included research team members hearing each other’s concerns and uneasiness with initially selecting a western research methodology. we realized that in using an indigenous methodology guided by elders, research team members, and participants, a two-eyed seeing approach for ethical engagement situated cultural relevance within all research processes and ways of being and learning from each other as critical throughout the study to completion and thereafter. methods used helped to build respectful relationships that facilitated a safer environment from which to conduct all aspects of the project, from research question development and data analysis, to dissemination of findings. thus, our learning research journey provided evidence that an indigenous methodological approach that includes cultural protocols fit best to offer safe environments for study team members and participants in which to share personal and collective stories about their experiences with western education, employment, and healthcare systems. together, we were able to formulate strategies for change. in this study, the identified strategies used during the research were built through respectful listening, consensus, and collaboration. this contributed to the creation of alternative visions of nursing education and workforce development, actions, and policy to meet the needs of indigenous graduates, employers, as well as indigenous peoples and communities in the future. for example, themes emerging from the talking circles reflected deeply held values and ideas. it was evident to all that transitioning from student to ng in the work setting environment is a difficult process. through the research, participants identified current and future retention strategies and developed an informed vision of nursing education and healthcare practice, quality workplaces, indigenous peoples’ health, cultural safety, and partnerships in strengthening the student to practitioner transition and creating nursing education and workforce development actions while maintaining culturally safe environments in various healthcare settings. the study results and recommendations for changes in policy and practice were summarized in a report with oversight by elder advisors, shared with participants for feedback and broadly distributed with the schools of nursing, regional health authority, and others that the team, elders, and participants suggested. in our experience, using a two-eyed seeing approach strengthened our commitment to change by bringing forth and acknowledging both western and indigenous perspectives. while the recommendations that resulted from this research are critical for the future, what happened in terms of the research methodology and methods provides additional insights that can inform dominant western research positions. at the start, the research team found that an indigenous methodology would offer a more insightful appreciation of the indigenous ng experience. herein lies why the methods chosen enabled the project to be successful. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 4 [2017], art. 9 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss4/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.4.9 cajete (2000) explained there is a shared understanding among many indigenous people that education is about helping an individual find his or her face, which means finding out who you are, where you come from, and your unique character. education should help the individual find their heart, the passionate sense of self that motivates the individual and moves him or her along in life. education should also help the individual find a foundation on which he or she may most completely develop and express both their heart and face. this foundation is their vocation, the work that they do, whether as an artist, lawyer, or teacher with the intent of finding that special kind of work that most fully allows one to express their true self: “your heart and your face” (cajete, 2000, p. 183). in this sense, we draw on timmins (2001/2002) who described indigenous research as a spiritual contract, a perspective which reminds us as researchers that indigenous knowledge, voice, and representation as well as western voice were core to the research—two-eyed seeing. however, indigenous knowledge is often challenged by working and living in a colonized system(s). this meant that the researchers and elder advisors continually guided the research to focused on processes of decolonization and self-determination (baskin, 2005) to foster personal and collective transformational action for all of us in the study. in doing so, strong respectful relationships were built from which collectively we could begin to implement the recommendations that arose. from an indigenous perspective, being part of a community in which respect for voice and indigenous protocols take precedence meant stepping away from colonizing research practices, which can overpower processes without recognition this is occurring. having elders participate and lead the research engagement served to ensure that protocols were enacted to support the centrality of shared, equal, participation. here the vitality of community was enhanced not only relationally but also in terms of sharing knowledge for the potential translation into action through policy and practice. shawn wilson (2008) stated, “if research doesn’t change you as a person, then you haven’t done it right” (p. 135). kurtz (2011) added: engaging in indigenous research, not only changes who you are, it enriches one’s life, builds lifelong respectful relationships with indigenous peoples, shifts the gaze, from a colonial view to a place of opportunities, in which to work harmoniously within the borderlands of western and indigenous worldviews, and inspires one to commit to ensuring aboriginal circles continue. 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(2008). research is ceremony: indigenous research methods. black point, ns: fernwood publishing. 17 kurtz et al.: indigenous methodology published by scholarship@western, 2017 the international indigenous policy journal october 2017 indigenous methodology in understanding indigenous nurse graduate transition to practice donna l. m. kurtz star mahara penny cash jessie nyberg estella patrick moller recommended citation indigenous methodology in understanding indigenous nurse graduate transition to practice abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license indigenous methodology in understanding indigenous nurse graduate transition to practice a bridge to reconciliation: a critique of the indian residential school truth commission the international indigenous policy journal volume 1 | issue 1 article 3 may 2010 a bridge to reconciliation: a critique of the indian residential school truth commission marc a. flisfeder university of windsor recommended citation flisfeder, m. a. (2010). a bridge to reconciliation: a critique of the indian residential school truth commission. th e international indigenous policy journal, 1(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.3 this policy is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. a bridge to reconciliation: a critique of the indian residential school truth commission abstract in the past year, the government of canada has established the indian residential schools (irs) truth and reconciliation commission (trc) to address the deleterious effect that the irs system has had on aboriginal communities. this paper argues that the trc as an alternative dispute resolution mechanism is flawed since it focuses too much on truth at the expense of reconciliation. while the proliferation of historical truths is of great importance, without mapping a path to reconciliation, the canadian public will simply learn about the mistakes of the past without addressing the residual, communal impacts of the irs system that continue to linger. the truth and reconciliation commission must therefore approach its mandate broadly and in a manner reminiscent of the royal commission on aboriginal peoples of 1996. keywords alternative dispute resolution, indian residential school, truth and reconciliation commission acknowledgments the author wishes to thank professor gemma smyth and ms. anna gersh for their generous support and feedback on earlier editions of this paper, as well as two anonymous reviewers for their commentary. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ introduction truth and reconciliation are separate and important elements in overcoming mass wrongs. while truth can be attached to fact finding, bridging the path to reconciliation can be far more difficult. in the ojibway creation epic, sky woman cast a curse upon the earth and odeina was one of the many who died. when odeina arrived at the spirit world, there was a chasm separating it from the earth, denying spirits their final resting place. odeina showed strength and wisdom by using the branches of trees to build a bridge to traverse the rift. for his selflessness, odeina was allowed to return to life and was given the added responsibility of sharing his wisdom (borrows 2006). a successful truth and reconciliation commission must be like odeina: it must have the wisdom to build a bridge over the chasm that separates truth and reconciliation, but it must also take on the responsibility of sharing this wisdom widely and with future generations. in the past year, the government of canada has established the indian residential schools (irs) truth and reconciliation commission (trc) to address the deleterious effect that the irs system has had on aboriginal communities. a trc is a commission tasked with investigating and revealing past wrongdoing by a government, or by non-state actors, in the hope of resolving conflict left over from the past. sadly, i do not believe the trc has been set up in such a way that will enable it to demonstrate odeina-like qualities, since the mandate of the commission focuses too much on truth and not enough on reconciliation. when addressing the problems faced by these communities, the experience of residential schools is only one piece of the puzzle. other variables must be specifically defined and addressed or, else, they will linger on in the background. the problem is that the trc is approaching the residential school problem as an isolated issue, rather than taking a holistic approach. this is contrary to traditional 1 flisfeder: a bridge to reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2010 aboriginal teachings that everything is related; wisdom is often represented visually by locating individuals at the centre of a set of concentric circles that ripple outward to include family, community, nation and the natural world (castellano 2008). while the commission may help define the “truth” of the residential school system, it fails to build a bridge to “reconciliation,” because it does not address the many ripples that have flowed from the irs system. without a holistic form of reconciliation, the trc cannot be successful. in explaining my concern for the commission, i will begin by sketching a history of the trc and how it came about. the purpose of this sketch is to place the current state of the trc into context. i will then explain how the trc differs from a typical courtroom adjudicative model and why the trc has the potential to be an effective form of alternative dispute resolution in addressing the mass wrongs of the irs system. the term “alternative dispute resolution” is used here in the sense that the trc is a method of resolving disputes that is alternative to a courtroom adjudicative model. however, since the trc is the result of a court-approved civil settlement of a class action lawsuit, the approach that i take in this analysis is legal rather than sociological. it will be noted that traditional legal models have failed to bring justice to irs survivors. nevertheless, a public inquiry such as the trc (particularly one headed up by a judge) will inevitably be treated in a quasi-judicial manner by some of the actors involved. this paper is not meant to displace the value of a social discussion of the trc but hopefully can serve as a companion to such work. following the section on how the trc differs from traditional courtroom adjudication, i will discuss the pieces that must fall into place to ensure that the trc will indeed be successful, including elements of a restorative justice model. for reconciliation to occur, the trc process must engage all levels of government as well as aboriginal and non-aboriginal peoples. finally, 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.3 i will close with an explanation of why those pieces have not in fact fallen into place by comparing the mandate of the trc with the royal commission on aboriginal peoples of 1996 (rcap), which undertook to review a multitude of problems faced by the aboriginal peoples of canada, including indian residential schools, and that has been successful in many ways. history of the trc: how and why it was created in order to understand the context in which the trc will take place, it is important to begin with an understanding of how the indian residential school system progressed over time (castellano, archibald and degagne 2008; milloy 1999). the physical and sexual abuses as well as the mass cultural appropriation suffered by irs survivors did not occur overnight. these atrocities are deeply set in the bowels of canadian history, since the irs system had a significant impact on the destruction of language, culture and identity of aboriginal communities. children were forcibly taken away from their families and punished for speaking their native tongue or observing traditional practices. traditional systems were regularly belittled and denigrated by the operators of the schools. the first missionary-operated school in canada was established near quebec city between 1620 and 1629, more than 200 years before the first indian residential school was opened in brantford, ontario in 1831. the brantford school would remain one of the longest lasting indian residential schools, closing its doors in 1969 (castellano et al. 2008; milloy 1999). however, back in 1892 the federal government entered into a formal operation partnership with various church entities that ran the schools in question. in 1907, red flags came up for the first time when indian affairs’ chief medical inspector p.h. bryce reported numerous deficiencies at the schools with respect to the health of students. notwithstanding this fact, in 1920 deputy superintendent general of indian affairs duncan campbell scott made residential 3 flisfeder: a bridge to reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2010 school attendance compulsory. in 1958, almost four decades later, indian affairs regional inspectors recommended the abolition of residential schools. rather than closing residential schools, the government ended its partnership with churches and began transferring control to indian bands starting in 1970 (castellano et al. 2008; milloy 1999). the first public reports of abuse came in 1989 from the mount cashel orphanage. two years later, grand chief phil fontaine of the assembly of first nations publicly disclosed tales of the abuse he personally suffered in the residential schools. around this time, churches started to issue apologies for their role in residential schools, including the united church (1986), the oblates of mary immaculate (1991), the anglican church (1993), and the presbyterian church (1994). in 2006, 99 years after the first warning signs were reported by inspector bryce and after it had become clear that the cost of litigation was erecting barriers to justice, the federal government signed the indian residential schools settlement agreement with legal representatives for the survivors, the assembly of first nations, the inuit representatives, and the church entities (castellano et al. 2008; milloy 1999). the truth and reconciliation commission was launched in 2008 as a part of the settlement agreement and, in the same year, the federal government formally apologized to the survivors of the indian residential schools. prior to the trc, rcap was established in august 1991 with broad terms of reference. these terms called for an examination into the problems that have plagued the relationship between aboriginals and canadian society throughout history and for recommendations to improve this relationship. the commission was composed of seven members and included four aboriginals with one, georges erasmus, being named co-chairperson. it was clear from the outset that rcap’s inquiry was to contain a significant aboriginal point of view. the commission released its final report in 1996, consisting of approximately 3,500 pages bound 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.3 within five volumes. several other interim or special reports were released during rcap’s discovery period. true to its mandate, rcap’s investigation into the present and past associations between canadian society and aboriginals was encyclopaedic and its recommendations were detailed and numerous. many of these recommendations can be seen as an attempt to redirect the evolution of the relationship between aboriginal and non-aboriginal society in positive directions (stack 1999). although rcap was not expressly set out as a truth and reconciliation commission, it was restorative justice and clearly an attempt at reconciliation. fast forward ten years to the trc, which forms part of the 2006 court approved agreement between the parties that settled the class action law suit launched by survivors. its mandate, purpose, system design and mode of operation are specifically set out in schedule “n” of the agreement (truth and reconciliation commission mandate). the preamble to schedule “n” states that the purpose of the commission is to promote “continued healing,” through an ongoing, individual and collective process. these objectives are more fully defined in section 1 of the agreement, which states inter alia: the goals of the commission shall be to . . . [p]roduce and submit to the parties to the agreement a report including recommendations to the government of canada concerning the irs system and experience including: the history, purpose, operation and supervision of the irs system, the effect and consequences of irs (including systemic harms, intergenerational consequences and the impact on human dignity) and the ongoing legacy of the residential schools (truth and reconciliation commission mandate: s. 1(f)). the goals are far reaching and suggest a desire to ameliorate some of the ills that have plagued aboriginal communities beyond the direct consequences of the irs system. 5 flisfeder: a bridge to reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2010 it is submitted that in order to fully address the deeply rooted history of the irs system and the related effects on aboriginal communities in canada, the trc ought to act with the intent of succeeding the royal commission on aboriginal peoples of 1996. since the releases of its final report as well as its interim reports, rcap has helped to frame the discourse of judges, lawyers and policy makers on a wide array of topics relating to the amelioration of social conditions faced by aboriginal peoples (stack 1999). indeed, the mandate of the trc expressly states that it “will build upon the work of past and existing processes, archival records, resources and documentation, including the work and records of the royal commission on aboriginal peoples of 1996” (truth and reconciliation commission mandate: s. 4(3)). the rcap final report included an entire chapter on the concerns raised by the irs system and its findings have been lauded for bringing aboriginal perspectives into canadian courtrooms (stack 1999). a successful trc must comprehensively identify historical truths and make recommendations that can be applied to wide ranging situations in order to truly realize its potential benefits. the successes of rcap and its role in producing restorative justice for aboriginal communities will be more fully addressed in the penultimate section of this paper. the deficiencies of the common law in dealing with aboriginal issues and the potential of the trc to be an effective form of alternative dispute resolution generally speaking, there are five aims to the canadian trc: 1) to discover, clarify and formally acknowledge past abuses; 2) to respond to specific needs of victims; 3) to contribute to justice and accountability; 4) to outline institutional responsibility and recommend reforms; and 5) to promote reconciliation and reduce conflict over the past (rice and snyder 2008). overarching these objectives is the fact that the trc must promote reconciliation within society as a whole, not just within aboriginal communities. a typical court room procedure could not 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.3 address sufficiently the many vagaries of the trc, nor would the formalistic approach of court room procedure necessarily be desirable. indeed, schedule “n” of the settlement agreement expressly states that the commissioners “shall not hold formal hearings, nor act as a public inquiry, nor conduct a formal legal process” (truth and reconciliation commission mandate: s. 2(b)). when violence is perpetrated on a mass scale, courts are often unable to process the huge number of claims, either in criminal court or in civil suits (rice and snyder 2008). moreover, the courts are not designed to heal broken relationships within society. the deficiencies of litigation in the irs system context first became apparent following the federal government’s statement of reconciliation (1988). after the statement had been made, a tide of litigation swelled to include thirteen thousand irs survivors alleging emotional as well as physical and sexual abuse (castellano, et. al. 2008). these court procedures took a tremendous financial toll on survivors, churches and government. eventually, it became clear that the costs were insupportable and were ultimately erecting barriers to justice. similarly, rcap favoured negotiated political solutions, because of the uncertainty involved in litigation (stack 1999). litigation in disputes between aboriginal communities and the crown is usually met with judicial restraint. it is therefore submitted that settlements involving aboriginal communities require some type of alternative dispute resolution (adr) process to take place outside of the typical courtroom setting. when litigation involving irs survivors sprung up, courts were not equipped with the tools needed to address all of the wrongs that had been claimed to that point. this may be because the legal structure and process were established by europeans without any consideration of aboriginal issues. little merit was attributed to causes of action based on cultural appropriation and courts were only concerned with claims of sexual and physical abuse. as loss 7 flisfeder: a bridge to reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2010 of culture is not a recognized cause of action, the complainants did not have the closure that would be granted from recognition of all the wrongs committed against them; indeed, the very purpose behind the irs system was cultural appropriation. most cases were addressed under the torts of sexual assault and battery, and any mention of cultural loss was just another factor to consider in the overall assessment of compensation. some academics assert that the law of torts is an inappropriate tool to tackle the subject of residential school cultural abuse, since cultural loss is a loss for the community, not just the individual, and, therefore, is inadequately dealt with by tort law’s narrow, individualistic paradigm (hutchinson 2007). the fact that courts refuse to recognize cultural appropriation as a cause of action is an indicator of why an alternative dispute mechanism is needed. however, the problems surrounding claims for loss of language and culture were also fuelled by the federal government’s initial adr program for residential school claims that was established following the original statement of reconciliation in 1998 (before the settlement agreement that created the trc). this out-of-court compensation scheme, launched in 2003, covered sexual and physical abuse but did not include payment for loss of culture and language. in fact, claimants who adhered to the adr process were required to sign a waiver which prohibited them from launching future claims on the basis of losses to culture and language. this had the effect of bringing the individualistic paradigm of tort law into the adr process. there were many calls for cultural loss compensation to be brought into the adr scheme, including calls from both the canadian bar association and the assembly of first nations (oxaal 2005). over time, it became clear that traditional legal proceedings as well as the first adr scheme proposed by the federal government were insufficient to adequately address the restitution sought by irs survivors. in the face of wrongs, people often turn to the courts as the 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.3 arbiters of truth. when courts are called upon to make determinations with respect to guilt, culpability or liability, however, they “must often strip away the complexity of the truth and make a judgement about what part of the truth matters to resolve a conflict or controversy” (llewellyn 2008: 191). the trc is not charged with the same task as the court. its concern and focus is reconciliation and, to this end, it cannot afford to strip away or ignore the messiness or complexity of truth.i as such, the trc has the potential to resolve matters that have handcuffed traditional legal proceedings. achieving success: overcoming communal post-traumatic stress disorder the aboriginal healing foundation, a publicly funded advocacy body, has framed the resolution of issues surrounding the irs system in the quartered circle of a medicine wheel, a figure widely used in first nations teachings (castellano 2008). the steps proposed for resolution are as follows: 1) acknowledgement − naming the harmful acts and admitting that they were wrong; 2) redress − taking action to compensate for harms inflicted, 3) healing − restoring physical, mental, social/emotional and spiritual balance in individuals, families, communities, and nations; and 4) reconciliation − accepting one another following injurious acts or periods of conflict and developing mutual trust. the process is circular since the forging of better relationships is ongoing. the goal of reconciliation raises the issue of relationships between peoples as well as dignity and mutual respect. however, the mandate of the irs trc does not clearly define what is meant by “reconciliation”. neither “the meaning nor means of reconciliation receive much attention in the mandate despite the hope reflected by its name that this body would be about both truth and reconciliation” (llewellyn 2008:186). the closest that the trc’s mandate comes to defining reconciliation appears to be the statement in the preamble that “[t]he truth of our common 9 flisfeder: a bridge to reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2010 experience will help us set our spirits free and pave the way to reconciliation.” this sentiment seems to be borrowed from the south african truth and reconciliation commission’s slogan: “truth. the road to reconciliation” (llewellyn 2008). the slogan seems to make clear that while truth is needed to establish reconciliation, truth alone is not enough. there must be a true map to reconciliation for the irs trc to be successful. moreover, there must be a clear definition of what is meant by “reconciliation” so that the destination is known before charting the map and building the bridge that traverses the chasm. a coherent process, therefore, requires a paradigm shift. reconciliation requires a number of systemic remedies to cure the mass wrong: it must present an opportunity for healing in aboriginal communities and involve non-aboriginal communities and the private sector. “reconciliation is about healing relationships, building trust, and working out differences” (rice and snyder 2008:45). true reconciliation is not “forgive and forget”; true reconciliation is “to remember and change” (lederach 1998:245). reconciliation must address concerns about both the past and the future. “acknowledgement of the past through truth-telling, recognition of interdependence, and desire or necessity for peaceful co-existence in the future are key elements of reconciliation” (rice and snyder 2008:46). admittedly, however, the term “reconciliation” carries varied meanings (mcneil 2003). the trc may wish to begin the process of reconciliation by determining what precisely it means for survivors and the wider public. since the irs system is so closely tied to aspects of colonialism, reconciliation in the canadian context must provide a holistic approach to ameliorate both the direct and residual social and psychological effects that the irs system has had on aboriginal communities. it must account for the many ripples that have flowed from the irs epicentre and continue to marginalize aboriginal people in canada. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.3 as previously mentioned in the discussion on regular court proceedings, the irs system had a significant impact on the destruction of language, culture and identity for aboriginal communities. children were plucked away from their homes and forbidden from speaking their native tongue or observing traditional practices. traditional systems were belittled or denigrated by church entities, the education system, and the laws that existed under the irs system, which has lead to an internalized sense of inferiority in aboriginal communities. this sentiment has been described as a communal post-traumatic stress disorder (rice and snyder 2008). when children returned from residential schools lacking language, relationships and practical skills to reintegrate into the community, the capacity of extended families to help reintegrate was far beyond what could be accomplished through one-on-one therapies delivered by mental health professionals (castellano 2008). a study of the aboriginal healing foundation revealed that: images of traumatic events and adaptive or maladaptive responses become imbedded in shared memories of the community and are passed on to successive generations by storytelling, community interaction and communication, patterns of parenting, emotionally laden memories, and inherited predisposition to [posttraumatic stress disorder]. even if events are not fully remembered, behavioural patterns rooted in collective memory persist in community life, becoming the backdrop for interpreting and responding to current reality (castellano 2008:390). many young people in aboriginal communities, who were not direct victims of the irs system, have inherited this sense of inferiority and have started to doubt the viability of their own traditional healing processes. the effect of which has been a lack of self-worth and endemic 11 flisfeder: a bridge to reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2010 suicides among the young who question the place of their traditions in contemporary society (hallett, chandler and lalonde 2007; chandler and lalonde 2008). the communal post-traumatic stress disorder felt by aboriginal communities is similar to the sentiments expressed during other truth commissions around the world. most often these commissions are set up by states recovering from civil war, dictatorships or internal unrest. however, the irs trc differs from other truth and reconciliation commissions since it has not come about in the face of political transition. as a settler society, the path to reconciliation has unique challenges. in this context, three major factors require attention in considering the path to reconciliation: 1) the legacy of colonialism that impacts the political, social, and economic life of aboriginal people; 2) the historical and contemporary myths prevalent in canadian society that rationalize canada’s policies toward aboriginal people; and 3) the impact of colonization/residential schools on aboriginal identities that adds an additional layer of healing to the reconciliation process (rice and snyder 2008). each of these factors requires deeper understanding of the social and psychological issues faced by aboriginal communities beyond a superficial discussion of facts of the irs system. in other words, the consequences of the irs system extend far beyond the wrongs felt by the survivors themselves and a holistic process is needed to bring forth healing and reconciliation. in achieving this end, there are lessons that can be learned from the experience in australia. in 1991 the australian parliament enacted the council for aboriginal reconciliation act, which was meant to begin a process of reconciliation between the indigenous peoples and wider society. however, the resulting process was framed in a nation building discourse that placed a “ceiling” on indigenous aspirations and demonstrated a subtle and perhaps even unconscious assimilationist agenda (short 2003). it is hoped that the canadian trc can learn 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.3 from the troubled australian approach to develop a system that is truly responsive to aboriginal aspirations. for reconciliation to occur, the wider society must adapt in response to the revelations of the trc. how to achieve success: restorative justice it has been argued that historic injustice, such as the irs system, should be used as a justification to expand and shape the protection of aboriginal cultural rights under section 35 of the constitution act, 1982 (hutchinson 2007). in this sense, the expansion of rights would be used as a form of compensation (hutchinson 2007). for the trc, however, reconciliation must go beyond mere judicial recognition of rights and should mean discovering ways to repair mental trauma of a collective community. this requires a view to the future and not simply a review of the truth of the past. reconciliation in this lens means restorative justice; restorative in the sense that aboriginal communities ought to be restored, as much as possible, to the condition they could have been, absent the mass wrongs committed in the irs system. this is essentially the philosophy underlying remedies in tort law: when an individual suffers physical trauma as a result of a tort committed by their neighbour, then it is expected that a court would award damages for loss of potential future income stemming from the inability to work while recovering from the injury. a judge in this case must assess “what could have been,” absent the wrongful act. reconciliation of wrongs committed in irs must also attempt to determine “what could have been,” if not for the atrocities committed to aboriginal communities. while admittedly some individuals who attended residential schools have argued that the experience was positive and promoted their quality of life as they grew older, most would state otherwise. 13 flisfeder: a bridge to reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2010 unlike the tort victim however, survivors cannot simply be “restored” through financial compensation. reconciliation through the restoration of potential focuses on the prospects of the victim. in the south african trc, many critics argued that the commission failed to prosecute and punish offenders, offering amnesty instead. these critics cried foul at the lack of “justice” that caused the gap between truth and reconciliation. justice in this sense was retributive and was thought to necessitate punishment, not acknowledgement and dialogue (llewellyn and howse 1999). what the critics failed to see was that a different form of justice was being used to build that bridge: restorative justice. “any bridge must pay close attention to the ground upon which it is anchored. . . restorative justice offers a clear picture of the nature of the ground on both sides of the bridge” (llewellyn 2008:188). the restorative potential of truth commissions has been viewed by some with scepticism. it has been argued that truth commissions tend to confuse aspiration with prediction, questioning whether anyone really knows that truth commissions secure the benefits of healing, catharsis, disclosure of the truth and so forth (allen 1999). while critics admit that in some instances, participation in the hearings of truth commissions does result in individual ‘catharsis,’ a feeling of settled business, they argue that in other instances rage and frustration may increase rather than abate (allen 1999). therefore, these critics argue that it is doubtful whether any general claims whatsoever can be made about the capacity of truth commissions to secure the claimed benefits and that the prospects for ‘collective healing,’ whatever that is, do not seem particularly promising in many cases (allen 1999). it is my view, however, that these critics focus on the challenges of a truth commission, rather than on their potential. while it is certainly difficult to 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.3 achieve successful reconciliation, i believe it is possible through clearly defined goals and objectives, or through understanding “the nature of the ground on both sides of the bridge.” first, restorative justice must engage the non-aboriginal public and communities. the view that the residential school experience was injurious in itself, and not just in instances of physical and sexual abuse, is shared by only a small proportion of canadian citizens, in contrast to the view of most first nations, inuit and métis people (castellano 2008). in other words, these divergent historiographies create a barrier to reconciliation, and non-aboriginal canadians would benefit from a greater appreciation of how aboriginal people and communities view the irs system. the trc is clearly designed to present the truth to the public through events, education campaigns, media, reports and public archives. this will allow the public to be witness to the atrocities of the irs system. however, it will be important to engage non-aboriginal canadians at a deeper level in order to work toward reconciliation. this can include efforts to reverse negative stereotypes that linger regarding aboriginal people and present a challenge to policy-makers wishing to narrow the gap in living conditions between aboriginal and nonaboriginal people. quite frankly, it is unlikely that most non-aboriginal canadians are even aware that there is a truth and reconciliation commission taking place, while others might not even care (wente 2007). providing non-aboriginal canadians with greater knowledge and understanding might encourage them to want to reconcile. engaging the non-aboriginal public in the process as parties and not simply witnesses will present a great challenge. nevertheless, it is an important one to address, since it is through their engagement and involvement that the reconciliatory process might begin (llewellyn 2008). second, restorative justice requires the restoration of relationships harmed. when a wrong is perpetrated, its harm extends throughout the web of interconnectedness that binds the 15 flisfeder: a bridge to reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2010 members of a society. at the south african trc, for example, an interesting phenomenon was the abundance of apologies that took place despite the fact that apologizing was not connected to amnesty in the mandate of the commission (weisman 2006). remorse in that sense was unexpectedly coupled with the healing process and helped to demonstrate that all parties to the mass wrongs were deeply and personally affected by them. this is demonstrative of just how truth commissions differ from war crimes tribunals as a response to mass wrongs. war crimes tribunals punish the guilty, while truth commissions have a view to the lasting relationship between actors. mass wrongdoing profoundly affects the victim, the wrongdoer and their immediate families, supporters, and communities; in essence, they affect the very fabric of society. reconciliation must go beyond truth and mend this web of interconnectedness. third, once the trc has the opportunity to review the truths and make recommendations on how to mend social relationships with a view towards reconciliation, it is important to ensure that these recommendations are indeed enforced. the recommendations of the trc will only be worthwhile if they are made known, understood and responded to (llewellyn 2008). if the truth is told and goes without a response, then this might actually further damage the relationships involved. the commission cannot expect to achieve reconciliation within its five-year mandate. therefore, it must make recommendations with a view to future generations. while el salvador’s truth commission was one of the few commissions whose recommendations were mandatory in the terms of reference, the recommendations of state-sanctioned commissions tend to be more influential than reports of non-governmental advocacy groups (rice and snyder 2008). therefore, there is hope that the recommendations of the trc will be enforced, though this remains to be seen. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.3 engaging non-aboriginal communities, mending the web of interconnectedness that connects members of society and ensuring that the recommendations of the trc are enforced are objectives that are easily stated but not easily achieved. while this might involve expanding aboriginal constitutional rights, it must first ameliorate the conditions in aboriginal communities in a non-judicial context, including the way that these communities are perceived by the general public. that is how restorative justice can be used as a tool for bridge building from truth to reconciliation and can ensure that the trc is successful in achieving the goals set out in its mandate. what the trc can do to ensure success far from attempting to provide restorative justice, the mandate of the trc is set up in such a way as to document truth but provides little in the form of reconciliation. by contrast, it is worth considering the hearings, research and report of the royal commission on aboriginal peoples, which first brought the devastating effects of the irs system of social engineering into public scrutiny (castellano et al. 2008). rcap highlighted the problems facing aboriginal communities in canada but also called for remedies through comprehensive recommendations. in calling for a more extensive public inquiry into residential schools, the commission wrote: no segment of our research aroused more outrage and shame than the story of the residential schools. certainly there were hundreds of children who survived and scores who benefited from the education they received. and there were teachers and administrators who gave years of their lives to what they believed was a noble experiment. but the incredible damage – loss of life, denigration of culture, destruction of self-respect and self-esteem, rupture of families, impact of these traumas on succeeding generations, and the enormity of the cultural triumphalism 17 flisfeder: a bridge to reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2010 that lay behind the enterprise – will deeply disturb anyone who allows this story to seep into their consciousness and recognizes that these policies and deeds were perpetrated by canadians no better or worse intentioned, no better or worse educated than we are today. this episode reveals what has been demonstrated repeatedly in the subsequent events of this century: the capacity of powerful but grievously false premises to take over public institutions and render them powerless to mount effective resistance. it is also evidence of the capacity of democratic populations to tolerate moral enormities in their midst (1996:601602). while i concede that there is an interest in fully documenting the past, it would seem from this statement that the overarching wrongs of the irs system are to an extent already documented, though not well disseminated. further truth telling will undoubtedly aid this dissemination process. however, rather than expunging their five-year term recording truth, it is once again submitted that the trc ought to use more time discovering ways of restoring justice to aboriginal communities. the mandate of the trc scantly sets out a path to reconciliation and that is why i fear that it will not be successful. the trc is more likely to build bridges, if it were to be mandated by principles more closely resembling rcap. as mentioned above, rcap is specifically referred to in the mandate of the trc. however, it is only referred to in the context of building “upon the work of past and existing processes, archival records, resources and documentation” (truth and reconciliation commission mandate: s. 4(c)). therefore, it would seem that the focus on rcap in the mandate is on its truth gathering, rather than on the impact of its recommendations. this is unfortunate considering the tremendous impact that the recommendations of rcap have had on canadian 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.3 courts and policy makers. the work of the royal commission has been used by judges and lawyers as a source of aboriginal perspective in a number of different ways. it has been used to inform the exercise of judicial discretion in the justice system. as well, it has assisted in the modification of the rules of evidence to make room for oral histories and it has been used to suggest a new approach to the right of self-government. most importantly, the work of rcap has been used as authority to justify the crafting of legal remedies that encourage negotiation between aboriginals and the canadian state (stack 1999). its success can be measured in its legacy. the most disappointing part of the mandate of the trc is that it apparently stops short of trying to build a similar legacy, or even build upon the work done by rcap. the mandate of rcap in finding ways to improve the relationship between aboriginal and non-aboriginal society is very similar to the manner that the courts have interpreted the obligations that section 35(1) of the constitution act, 1982 have bestowed upon them – to reconcile aboriginal and non-aboriginal interests (stack 1999). so it should not come as too much of a surprise that the work of rcap would be of interest to lawyers and judges, who seek to affect a fair and just reconciliation. considering such success, this is precisely the approach that the trc ought to take. rcap appears to have had the effect of bringing more aboriginal perspectives to bear in the courtroom and in canadian jurisprudence. moreover, the judicial trend appears to be that this is likely to continue into the future. while rcap may not be a cureall, it still has the hallmarks of a restorative justice approach. while the work of the trc will focus specifically on the context and impacts of residential schools, testimony invited before the commission and exploration of the history, purpose, and consequences of the schools will inevitably extend into broad systemic issues that ripple throughout society (castellano et al. 2008). the main problem with the mandate is that it 19 flisfeder: a bridge to reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2010 fails to open up to the reality that the testimony heard in the gathering of truth cannot be neatly summed up as relating to the irs system. it will be far-reaching and will inevitably touch on many of the ills associated with a colonial society. the commission ought to be prepared to take on greater issues in a manner similar to the rcap. otherwise, it will be gathering truth on one issue, while turning a blind eye to others. far from building bridges, this approach may very well prove destructive. conclusion there is one statement from the rcap report that particularly remains burned in the mind: “these policies and deeds were perpetrated by canadians no better or worse intentioned, no better or worse educated than we are today.” the statement is troubling because it suggests that the mindset that led to the atrocities of the irs system continues to be imbedded in the fabric of canadian society. how can the commission truly bring forth a path to reconciliation without first curing public consciousness? while the proliferation of truth is of great importance, without mapping a path to reconciliation, the canadian public will simply learn about the mistakes of the past, while committing entirely new ones. gathering truth is only the first part of changing perceptions. just as odeina returned to the earth to share his wisdom, the trc must spread the acumen of a reconciliatory approach to canadian society. the success of the irs trc cannot be measured on any simple scale. there is neither a comparator group nor a unit of measurement to determine if the canadian trc has achieved the goals set out in its mandate. only history will tell if the bridge between truth and reconciliation has truly been built. however, at this early stage in the process, considering the terms set out in the mandate of the trc, it is difficult to see how the bridge building process can possibly occur. the focal point of the mandate is too closely connected to truth at the expense of reconciliation. 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.3 without charting a course of action that encompasses the principles of a restorative justice approach, the trc will be an opportunity lost. odeina is remembered for both bridge-building and sharing his wisdom. i hope that the commission can learn from odeina and be successful. 21 flisfeder: a bridge to reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2010 endnotes i although and as i explain in later sections, the trc has failed to live up to this focus. 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.3 references allen, jonathan. 1999. “balancing justice and social unity: political theory and the idea of a truth and reconciliation commission.” university of toronto law journal 49:315. retrieved november 2008. available: quick law. borrows, john. 2006. indigenous legal traditions in canada. [unpublished, archived at the canada law commission]. cash, john. 2004. “the political/cultural unconscious and the process of reconciliation.” postcolonial studies 7:165. castellano, marlene brant. 2008. “a holistic approach to reconciliation: insights from research of the aboriginal healing foundation.” pp. 385-400 in from truth to reconciliation: transforming the legacy of residential schools, edited by marlene brant castellano, linda archibald and mike degagné. ottawa: aboriginal healing foundation. castellano, archibald and degagné, mike (editors). 2008. from truth to reconciliation: transforming the legacy of residential schools. ottawa: aboriginal healing foundation. constitution act, 1982, being schedule b to the canada act 1982 (u.k.), 1982, c. 11. indian and northern affairs canada, statement of reconciliation, online: inac <http://www.ainc-inac.ca/gs/rec_e.html>. hutchinson, celeste. 2007. “reparations for historical injustice: can cultural appropriation as a result of residential schools provide justification for aboriginal cultural rights?” saskatchewan law review 70:425. retrieved november 2008. available: quick law. indian residential schools truth and reconciliation commission. n.d. “truth and 23 flisfeder: a bridge to reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2010 reconciliation commission mandate.” retrieved november 2008 (http://www.trccvr.ca/mandateen.html). lederach, john p. 1998. “beyond violence: building sustainable peace.” pp. 236-248 in the handbook of interethnic coexistence, edited by eugene weiner. new york: continuum international group. llewellyn, jennifer j. 2008. “bridging the gap between truth and reconciliation: restorative justice and the indian residential schools truth and reconciliation commission.” in from truth to reconciliation: transforming the legacy of residential schools, edited by marlene brant castellano, linda archibald and mike degagné. ottawa: aboriginal healing foundation. llewellyn, jennifer j. and howse, robert. 1999. “institutions for restorative justice: the south african truth and reconciliation commission.” university of toronto law journal 49:355. retrieved november 2008. available: quick law. mcneil, kent. 2003. “reconciliation and the supreme court: the opposing views of chief justices lamer and mclachlin.” the indigenous law journal 2:1. milloy, john. 1999. a national crime – the canadian government and the residential school system – 1879-1986. winnipeg: university of manitoba press. oxaal, zoë. 2005. “‘removing that which was indian from the plaintiff’: tort recovery for loss of language and culture in residential schools litigation.” saskatchewan law review 367. retrieved november 2008. available: quick law. rice, brian and snyder, anna. 2008. “reconciliation in the context of a settler society: healing 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.3 the legacy of colonialism in canada.” pp. 45-61 in from truth to reconciliation: transforming the legacy of residential schools, edited by marlene brant castellano, linda archibald and mike degagné. ottawa: aboriginal healing foundation. royal commission on aboriginal peoples. 1996. report of the royal commission on aboriginal peoples: volume 1: looking forward, looking back. ottawa: minister of supply and services canada. short, damien. 2003. “australian ‘aboriginal’ reconciliation: the latest phase in the colonial project.” citizenship studies 7:291. stack, david. 1999. “the impact of rcap on the judiciary: brining aboriginal perspectives into the courtroom.” saskatchewan law review 62:471. retrieved november, 2008. available: quick law. weisman, richard. 2006. “showing remorse at the trc: towards a constitutive approach to reparative discourse” windsor year book of access to justice 24:221. retrieved november 2008. available: quick law. wente, margaret. 2007. “trapped in the aboriginal narrative.” the globe and mail, june 28. 25 flisfeder: a bridge to reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2010 the international indigenous policy journal may 2010 a bridge to reconciliation: a critique of the indian residential school truth commission marc a. flisfeder recommended citation a bridge to reconciliation: a critique of the indian residential school truth commission abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license a bridge to reconciliation: a critique of the indian residential school truth commission the importance of belief systems in traditional ecological knowledge initiatives the international indigenous policy journal volume 2 issue 4 traditional knowledge, spirituality, and lands article 8 october 2011 the importance of belief systems in traditional ecological knowledge initiatives nicholas j. reo university of michigan ann arbor, reon@umich.edu recommended citation reo, n. j. (2011). the importance of belief systems in traditional ecological knowledge initiatives. the international indigenous policy journal, 2(4) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.8 this editorial is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. the importance of belief systems in traditional ecological knowledge initiatives abstract resource managers are increasingly engaging with tribes and first nations and looking for methods to incorporate their perspectives, priorities and traditional ecological knowledge (tek) into public land and resource management. many initiatives that engage tribes and their tek holders only seek tribal input, such as biological data, that is most easily integrated into existing management structures. increasing attention on tribal belief systems would provide a more holistic understanding that could benefit tek-related initiatives. such a shift could reduce misunderstandings about tribal natural resource perspectives and lead to insights valuable for society at large. keywords traditional ecological knowledge; resource management; beliefs; values; ethics acknowledgments dr. nicholas j. reo (sault ste. marie tribe of chippewa indians) is a research fellow at the university of michigan school of natural resources and environment. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ increasingly, federal, state, provincial and territorial natural resource management agencies are working with indigenous peoples to incorporate their priorities, perspectives and traditional ecological knowledge (tek) into the management of public lands. a wide-ranging and informative literature exists describing how tek is embodied in tribal resource management systems and how it can help inform non-tribal resource management. despite this body of literature, many resource managers remain unclear about how to factor tek into their work. this essay provides a contextualized discussion about the nature of tek and how it manifests in tribal communities to help illuminate opportunities for utilizing tek in resource management applications. several authors have appropriately described tek as part knowledge system, part system of practice and part belief system (e.g., berkes, 1999; gadgil, berkes, & folke, 1993). dividing the knowledge system into these three general components helps conceptually; however, as others have noted, these elements are in reality interconnected and inseparable (berkes, 1999; menzies & butler, 2006; nadasdy, 2006). visualizing the interconnectedness and inseparability of the knowledge, practice and belief elements of tek, think of the following question: in tribal contexts, what is needed for sustained success in hunting? to be successful, hunters require knowledge of animals and animal populations, such as their sensory strengths and weaknesses, habitat use patterns and indicators of population decline. geographic knowledge is also important, such as the location of preferred habitat, migration patterns, daily travel routes, funnels and areas of refuge. this knowledge is learned experientially by participating in hunts and spending time on the land (i.e., practice informs knowledge). successfully application of this knowledge requires skills, techniques, expertise and mechanisms for interacting with other hunters so they can help each other, not hurt each other, and collectively avoid overharvest. in turn, these practices are adapted in response to newly acquired knowledge about environmental or biological changes, such as novel wildlife diseases (i.e., knowledge informs practice). tribal hunters generally believe their success is contingent on the generosity of prey animals that willingly give themselves up to respectful hunters. to sustain their success, tribal hunters show respect to animals variously through their actions and, in this way, their beliefs directly influence their hunting practices (tanner, 1979). furthermore, many hunting-related decisions require moral judgments that are based on traditional values (reo & whyte, in review). traditional morality and values, which are components of a belief system, are learned experientially through hunting and related activities (i.e., practice influences beliefs). these interconnections between beliefs, practice and knowledge are further illustrated in figure 1. while hunting can outwardly appear to be a purely practical thing, hunters embody broader systems of traditional knowledge that are quite complex and multifaceted. the same can be said for systems of gathering (e.g., wild rice, maple syrup, medicinals, craft materials), trapping, fishing, whaling and habitat management. these knowledge-practice-belief systems evolved within particular families within particular communities over the course of many generations. depending on how many different resource activities one participates in, an individual’s knowledge may be relatively narrow, but great depth of knowledge accompanies the dozens to hundreds of generations of family practice. such individuals are a tribal community’s most respected content experts. non-tribal policy makers and resource managers view scientific content expertise and local field expertise as different types of knowledge with different resource management applications. religious views are not officially supposed to factor into decision-making and the values and moral judgments that underlie management or policy decisions are usually not discussed. however, in tribal communities, all these forms of knowledge (deep content expertise, local field knowledge, knowledge of spiritual traditions and ethical knowledge) are embodied in tek holders. attempts to separate tek into segments can lead to misinterpretations (menzies & butler, 2006; nadasdy, 1999) or cause partnerships with tribes to fall apart. 1 reo: the importance of belief systems in tek published by scholarship@western, 2011 a common tendency is to seek data-oriented information from tek holders, ignoring ethical or spiritual dimensions such as traditional values and the nature of human-animal relations. the traditional belief systems of tribal communities are arguably the least studied and most misunderstood aspect of tek. however, when viewed broadly to include elements such as traditional morality and values (e.g., as represented in figure 1), and given tangible examples of how these elements influence tribal resource management systems (e.g., berkes, 1999; hager, 2010; nadasdy, 2005), it becomes clear that belief systems are fundamentally important elements of tek that deserve more attention. more holistic approaches that engage tribal belief systems could drastically improve tek-related initiatives. this shift toward understanding tribal beliefs, values and spirituality is especially critical in places where tribes have lost most of their land and, subsequently, lost knowledge of traditional land management systems. in such cases, a tribe’s traditional system of values and morality may be one of their most important contributions to regional natural resource management initiatives. tribal traditional values and morality form the foundation of a community’s perspectives about culturally significant plants, animals or geographic locations. these perspectives, which can be seen as an emergent property resulting from the community’s age-old tek, could provide policyand management-relevant information to society at large. for example, tribal relationships with top predators, such as the gray wolf (canis lupus) or grizzly bear (ursus arctos horribilis), are hundreds to thousands of years in the making and, if consulted, could inform strategies for reducing human-wildlife conflicts. this sort of information will become increasingly valuable as climate change forces wildlife populations into new locations creating novel human-wildlife interactions. furthermore, without a basic understanding of a tribe’s belief system, their natural resource perspectives and priorities are very likely to be misinterpreted (menzies & butler, 2006; nadasdy, 2005). a large proportion of the natural resource collaboration and negotiation failures involving tribes likely breakdown because of a mutual lack of understanding about fundamental values or beliefs that drive perspectives about natural resources. resource collaborations could endure longer and produce better outcomes, if they included explorations into the ways that worldviews inform natural resource values, which in turn inform moral judgments important to decision-making and resource prioritization. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 8 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.8 figure 1. conceptual diagram showing interrelationships between knowledge, practice and belief components of systems of traditional ecological knowledge. 3 reo: the importance of belief systems in tek published by scholarship@western, 2011 references berkes, f. (1999). sacred ecology: traditional ecological knowledge and resource management (1st ed.). philadelphia: taylor & francis. gadgil, m., berkes, f., & folke, c. (1993). indigenous knowledge of biodiversity conservation. ambio, 22(2-3), 151156. hager, b. (writer). (2010): aboriginal people's television network. menzies, c. r., & butler, c. (2006). understanding ecological knowledge. in c. r. menzies (ed.), traditional ecological knowledge and natural resource management. lincoln: university of nebraska press. nadasdy, p. (1999). the politics of tek: power and the "integration" of knowledge. arctic anthropology, 36(1-2), 118. nadasdy, p. (2005). transcending the debate over the ecologically noble indian: indigenous peoples and environmentalism. ethnohistory, 52(2), 291-331. nadasdy, p. (2006). the case of the missing sheep: time, space and the politics of "trust" in co-management practice. in c. r. menzies (ed.), traditional ecological knowledge and natural resource management. lincoln and london: university of nebraska press. reo, n. j., & whyte, k. p. (in review). hunting and morality as elements of traditional ecological knowledge. tanner, a. (1979). bringing home animals: indigenous ideologies and mode of production of the mistassini cree hunters. new york: st. martin's press. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 8 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.8 the international indigenous policy journal october 2011 the importance of belief systems in traditional ecological knowledge initiatives nicholas j. reo recommended citation the importance of belief systems in traditional ecological knowledge initiatives abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license the importance of belief systems in traditional ecological knowledge initiatives "learning from “our relations” indigenous peoples of australia, canada, new zealand, and united states: a review of culturally relevant diabetes and obesity interventions for health the international indigenous policy journal volume 13 | issue 1 june 2022 learning from “our relations” indigenous peoples of australia, canada, new zealand, and united states: a review of culturally relevant diabetes and obesity interventions for health donna kurtz university of british columbia, donna.kurtz@ubc.ca robert janke university of british columbia, robert.janke@ubc.ca julianne barry university of british columbia, julianne.barry@ubc.ca alexandra cloherty alex.cloherty@gmail.com sana z shahram university of british columbia, sana.shahram@ubc.ca charlotte a jones university of british columbia, charlotte.jones@ubc.ca recommended citation kurtz, et al., (2021). learning from “our relations” indigenous peoples of australia, canada, new zealand, and united states: a review of culturally relevant diabetes and obesity interventions for health. the international indigenous policy journal, 12(4). https://10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.14041 learning from “our relations” indigenous peoples of australia, canada, new zealand, and united states: a review of culturally relevant diabetes and obesity interventions for health abstract globally, indigenous peoples suffer disproportionately higher rates and complications of diabetes and obesity than non-indigenous people. western health interventions combined with culturally appropriate traditional approaches can reduce incidence, prevalence, and related co-morbidities. this literature review reports effective culturally relevant traditional and western diabetes and obesity prevention and management intervention programs for indigenous populations in australia, canada, new zealand, and the united states. experiential, immediate, interactive, and low-cost programs, co-developed and delivered by local indigenous people within the communities they live, are most effective in improving health and wellbeing. key themes of success, togetherness, empowerment, and local familiarity, inform action for policy and practice changes adaptable for chronic disease prevention, treatment and self-management programs for indigenous peoples globally. keywords indigenous peoples health and wellness, diabetes/obesity, culturally relevant health policy interventions, cultural safety, togetherness, empowerment acknowledgments this work was supported by the canadian institutes of health research [grant # frn-156075 and frf-417687] and michael smith foundation for health research [grant # 18523]. we are grateful to elder jessie nyberg for sharing her wisdom, providing support and feedback for the paper, and community interventions insights, and to research trainee brittany swanson for preliminary review support. we are honoured and thankful to the indigenous friendship and métis centre community partners for which this review has helped inform traditional and western diabetes and obesity community-led programs. we acknowledge the traditional, ancestral and unceded territories of the syilx, secwepemc, st’at’imc and tsilhqot’in nations, and four métis chartered communities where we work and live. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ 1 kurtz et al.: learning from our “relations” published by scholarship@western, 2021 learning from “our relations”—indigenous peoples of australia, canada, new zealand, and united states: a review of culturally relevant diabetes and obesity interventions for health globally, indigenous peoples are disproportionately and negatively impacted by diabetes, obesity, and their co-morbidities. type 2 diabetes (t2d) and obesity rates in indigenous adults, children, and youth in australia, canada, new zealand, and the united states of america (usa) are 2-5-fold higher compared to the general population (batal, & decelles, 2019; best practice advocacy centre new zealand, 2018; centers for disease control, 2018; magliano, et al., 2008; narayan, et al., 2003; public health agency of canada [phac], 2011; statistics canada, 2019; world health organization [who], 2000, 2021). the risk of developing t2d increases after the age of 40 in the general population. however, among many indigenous peoples incidences of diabetes and obesity, as well as the related complications in children and adolescents, are 3-5 times greater than in settler populations (best practice advocacy centre new zealand, 2018; crowshoe et al., 2018; maple-brown, et al., 2010; who, 2020). furthermore, rates of diabetes and obesity related mortality, including avoidable mortality (deaths that may have been averted by prevention or treatment), exceed those of the general population by 2-3-fold in canada (walker, 2020) and globally (park, 2015). the root causes of t2d and obesity are significantly more complex for indigenous peoples. the ongoing impact of historical and contemporary colonialism has resulted in loss of lives, land, and cultural identity and continuity. further, perpetuation of racism, discrimination, and inequality have led to ongoing intergenerational trauma, along with forced migration, urbanization, commercialism, and acculturation. together, these factors link to poverty, disrupted relations, overcrowding, inability to afford healthy foods, and decreased physical activity, along with a dramatic increase in the risk of chronic disease (gracey & king, 2009). western (mainstream) health systems have had limited success in providing effective health care for indigenous peoples. these systems fail to address the root causes and structural issues that contribute to socio-economic disparities, health care gaps, and mortality (crowshoe et al., 2018; henderson, et al., 2020; phac, 2011). western diabetes and obesity programs often lack local community engagement, cultural relevance, wholistic traditional practices and healing, all of which are critical to decrease gaps in health care and lessen the burden of disease that cause indigenous peoples to suffer unnecessarily (crowshoe et al., 2018; henderson, et al., 2020; phac, 2011). health care services and outcomes for indigenous people are improved by shifting from colonial control to community ownership and control. services, programs, and outcomes need to be inclusive of indigenous knowledge, cultural values, language, traditional healing and practices, self-determination, and governance (halseth & murdock, 2020). an essential component of culturally appropriate care is the inclusion of indigenous peoples as providers and teachers of traditional practices and healing (harfield et al., 2018; national aboriginal health organization, 2017). culturally relevant, more acceptable local initiatives are effective alone or when combined with western interventions (azzopardi et al., 2012; cunningham-sabo et al., 2008; kenyon, 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.14041 2013; kurtz et al., 2014). in their systematic review, trembley et al. (2020) described seven studies that demonstrated moderate evidence supporting three strategies (health provider education, culturally safe clinical environments, and indigenous health provider engagement) that were associated with improved access (to care), and diabetes-related outcomes among indigenous peoples. in the community-based kahnawake school diabetes prevention project, culturally based activities included social and interactive sessions, learning about cultural traditions, foods, spirituality, mindfulness and breathing, and participation in physical activities. adult participants felt spiritual, emotional, mental and physical health benefits, which were attributed to culturally based activities (murdoch-flowers et al., 2019). another study, among cherokee youth, family, and communities in the usa, reported living within one’s cultural traditions and values lowered the risk of obesity and stress (kelley & lowe, 2018). given the relevance of and evidence for effective culturally safe community interventions, it is vital to understand the key characteristics of these activities that contribute to improvements in health and wellbeing. thus, the purpose of this review is to explore the common factors associated with the delivery of effective, culturally relevant indigenous diabetes, obesity, and other health promotion programs. this knowledge will help to inform the planning, implementation, and evaluation of a community-led indigenous diabetes and obesity multi-site partnership research study with urban and rural indigenous communities in western canada. the project involves a team of indigenous and non-indigenous university, health authority, and community partner researchers, research elder advisors, and a collective of six distinct urban indigenous communities, each with site community advisory teams and community research liaisons. at the request of the communities, we are exploring how best to incorporate western (mainstream) and traditional practices and healing knowledge in the prevention, treatment and self-management of obesity and t2d among indigenous peoples. in particular, we were interested in “our relations,” indigenous populations with whom we share similar historical and contemporary generational impacts of colonization and health disparities (australia, canada, new zealand, and usa). from this, we decided on a research question for this review: what characteristics of effective culturally responsive health policy interventions facilitate more beneficial and successful health promotion programs for indigenous populations in australia, canada, new zealand, and usa? methods data sources and searches inclusion and exclusion criteria a systematic search of medline, embase, cinahl, and psycinfo was conducted with a combination of keyword and subject heading terms tailored to each database. four broad categories of search terms were used: (1) indigenous populations (i.e., "first nations", "native", "indian", aboriginal," "indigenous," "māori") (2) diabetes and/or obesity (i.e., "diabetes", "overweight", "obesity", "sugar"…), (3) cultural or traditional component (i.e., "cultural safety", "traditions", "wheel"…), (4) promotion or prevention (i.e., "education", "outreach", "health and wellness"…). these four concepts were linked together with and. a full search strategy for medline, conducted by janke, a research librarian with expertise in indigenous population health, is included in appendix 1. other sources, in addition to the 3 kurtz et al.: learning from our “relations” published by scholarship@western, 2021 article indexes outlined below, included preliminary literature searches, readings of papers prior to the systematic search, and reviewing reference lists of retrieved primary studies and literature reviews). inclusion criteria included: written in english, empirical, reporting urban and rural off-reserve traditional and/or culturally based approaches to prevention and/or management and selfmanagement of diabetes, obesity, or health promotion for indigenous populations in australia, canada, new zealand, and usa. exclusion criteria: populations outside of australia, canada, new zealand, and usa, general focus on chronic disease(s), results or approach not reported separately or specifically for indigenous population(s), review articles, and clinical trials. articles were included or excluded based specifically on these criteria. in order to get an indication of the quality of the evidence presented in the studies, we assessed the risk of bias as follows. the national institute for health and care excellence (nice) checklist (national institute for health and care excellence, 2012) for risk bias assessment was used on each article for inclusion. in addition, components of the cochrane method of bias assessment, including the robinsi assessment tool (higgins et al., 2021) were used to analyze potential bias. a total of 2783 articles published between 2005 and november 20, 2020, were identified: 2738 (736 in medline, 1369 in embase, 449 in cinahl, and 184 in psycinfo), and an additional 45 identified through other sources (above). after removal of duplicates, the research assistant (ra), an indigenous researcher trained in indigenous health and research methodology, screened abstracts of the remaining 1376 articles for relevance to inclusion criteria. the 167 research articles that met inclusion criteria (based on abstract screening) were read in full by the ra, with 70 primary research articles suggested for review. through this process there were also a number of review papers identified which contributed to the background section of the paper. the principal investigator (pi), an indigenous research scholar, performed an additional check for consistency of screened-in articles by reviewing relevant abstracts screened in by the ra (n=167). forty articles were selected for full independent assessment after consensus discussions by the ra and pi. however, following further consensus discussion and comparison of the relevance of articles, 30 articles met the inclusion criteria. two pods of two to three reviewers/data extractors (each comprised of at least one indigenous research team member) were each assigned one half of the articles. the pods included the pi, ra, librarian, a health equity, indigenous health researcher, a community-based participatory clinical researcher and indigenous ally. a summary of the literature search and study selection process is detailed graphically in figure 1. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.14041 figure 1. summary of literature search and study selection process. adapted from: moher d, liberati a, tetzlaff j, altman dg, the prisma group (2009). preferred reporting items for systematic reviews and meta-analyses: the prisma statement. plos medicine 6(7): e1000097. doi:10.1371/journal.pmed1000097 records identified through database searching (n = 2738) additional records identified through other sources (n = 45) records after duplicates removed (n = 1376) records screened (n = 1376) records excluded (n = 1209) full-text articles assessed for eligibility (n = 167) studies included in literature review (n = 30) 5 kurtz et al.: learning from our “relations” published by scholarship@western, 2021 data extraction and management the selected 30 research studies are summarized in table 1. data in the table includes: author, year, type of study, location of study, population, intervention and risk of bias. articles with overlapping data from a single research study were collapsed into a single entry to include all relevant information. beyond study identification, it was important to assure that all inclusion criteria were met and documented. most importantly, referring to the table should give the reader insight as to why we came to the conclusions that we did. thematic analysis (braun & clarke, 2020) was used to identify themes and characteristics of interventions in each paper that were then organized into common patterns of meaning or themes that provided an answer to the research question. thematic analysis was performed using a two-eyed seeing approach (bartlett et al., 2012), which respects and honours both indigenous and western knowledge and perspectives. reviewers in each pod independently undertook a thematic analysis approach for each paper. findings were discussed and consensus reached within each pod and then for both pods (all papers) on the themes or characteristics of interventions in each paper that helped to answer the research question. success of interventions was assessed using the reported outcomes in the source articles, i.e., significant changes in fruit and vegetable intake, significant increase in weekly physical activity, increased nutrition knowledge or self-awareness, or attitudinal changes about healthy living. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.14041 table 1. summary of articles author (year), type location population intervention results and risk of bias abbott et al. (2010), qualitative urban australia adults n = 23 aboriginal & torres strait islanders practical cooking 4-hour, 8-week program offered every 6 months over a 5-year period. taught by local aboriginal women with a focus on budget home cooking for diabetes/obesity control and group work in a culturally appropriate setting. strengths included practical, culturally relevant content and a culturally appropriate setting. weight loss and improved nutrition knowledge for healthier cooking and shopping, well-being, and motivation for lifestyle change. family and group learning were crucial motivators for healthy eating success. familiar recipes and ingredients preferred. moderate risk of bias. arora et al. (2013), qualitative rural/urban canada adults n = 10 indigenous community tele-ophthalmology clinic for diabetes eye-screening services. used religious/cultural artifacts and practices, ceremonies led by cree spiritual leaders, and indigenous nurses. incorporation of cultural activities were helpful. participants trusted indigenous nurses more than caucasian health workers. patients’ view of own health and diagnoses included physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual health. high risk of bias. bachar et al. (2006), mixed methods rural usa whole community n: not specified 3-part elementary school mentoring program, which included worksite wellness for adults, and church-based health promotion, all supported by social marketing component. emphasis on cherokee family, intergenerational learning, and spiritual health. increased physical activity amongst adults, selfreported knowledge about healthy food choices amongst students, community messaging about physical health, and fresh fruit/vegetable options in school meals. high risk of bias. brown et al., (2020), mixed methods rural usa adults n = 9 (interviews); n = 20 (feasibility study) american americans a community-based participatory approach (cbpr) and social-ecological model (sem) of health behaviour were used to understand opportunities and barriers related to gardening and using locally grown foods on an american indian reservation. this project sought to assess the feasibility of implementing a group gardening program and potential of collecting health outcome measures. in general, community members were not knowledgeable about growing food. in the group gardening intervention, there were no differences inbetween group changes (body mass index, blood pressure, or hgba1c). the profile of mood states (poms) inventory scores showed consistently positive (i.e., lower) change in score for the treatment group versus the comparison group. moderate risk of bias. 7 kurtz et al.: learning from our “relations” table 1. summary of articles (continued) author (year), type location population intervention results and risk of bias castro et al. (2009), quantitative urban usa adults n = 249 american indians 5-classes stanford university chronic disease self-management program with a curriculum of traditional health care, and regular exercise classes with a focus on mind, body, spiritual, and emotional health. services were provided by a diabetes case manager. used intergenerational community events, talking circles, and employed traditional healers. improved participant’s diabetes self-management, including knowledge of resources for managing diabetes. changes were observed by 98% of participants in one or more of: exercising, coping with diabetes stress, communicating with health care provider, and/or improving their eating plan. moderate risk of bias. cueva et al. (2020), qualitative rural usa youths n = 44 american indians using photovoice, american indian youths described their perceptions of an obesityprevention initiative, feast for the future, which focused on cultural connectedness and traditional food revitalization. common identified themes were: (1) traditional food is farmed or gardened; (2) traditional foods are healthy; (3) feast for the future supported positive connections to culture; (4) hope for more farming and gardening for future generations; and (5) store or less nutrient-dense food is unhealthy. high risk of bias. debruyn et al., (2020), mixed methods rural usa whole communities n: not specified american indians the traditional foods project (tfp) provided modest funding and support to 17 american indian/american native communities who designed their own t2d interventions to meet the needs of their communities. grantee partners embraced the tfp’s communitybased, tribally driven approach. there were seven main themes: (1) traditional knowledge and grassroots; (2) connections to health; (3) the power of stories and storytelling; (4) community engagement; (5) knowledge sharing and gratitude; (6) flexibility to do what works; and (7) program sustainability. data did not include aggregated health measures for individual participants (e.g., weight change over time) due to funding restrictions and more focus on environment and community. moderate risk of bias. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.14041 table 1. summary of articles (continued) author (year), type location population intervention results and risk of bias dreger et al. (2014), qualitative rural/urban canada adults n = 11 indigenous 8-week mindfulness intervention for diabetes management developed with community leaders and facilitated in familiar locations. used culturally relevant images and traditional activities such as storytelling. non-medical/alternative approach, cultural aspects, practicality, cultural social component, and interactive nature encouraged participation. time commitment was a barrier. outcomes of participation included increased awareness, improved health and well-being, behavioural and attitudinal changes, and positive regard for program/practices. low risk of bias. farmer et al., 2018, qualitative unspecified new zealand families n: not specified māori a culturally appropriate documentary created for māori individuals at risk for t2d. māori beliefs about diabetes, healthy eating, and exercise were gathered using community engagement, informant interviews and focus groups (hui). bandura's social cognitive theory was used as a culturally sensitive theory for behaviour change messaging along with positive messaging rooted in wholistic health for changes across family, children, grandchildren. māori health model was used. local role models and māori health providers were included to inspire the audience. tribal chairman opened the documentary with a karakia (prayer) ensuring the spiritual elements of te whare tapa wha incorporated. low risk of bias. fleischhacker et al., 2012), qualitative rural/urban usa whole community n: not specified american indians “tools for healthy tribes” toolkit and web resources. culturally appropriate tribe specific focus on community insights about local food environment and ways to stimulate action by tribal leaders and grassroots level. the cbpr intervention used mentoring and role models and modified talking circles. participants appreciated the empowering tone, practicality, and emphasis on talking circles. interest in more low-cost, immediate approaches to address economic development and health. future programs should: integrate traditional messages/stories and community role models, use intergenerational approaches and emphasize family, and address historical trauma. high risk of bias. 9 kurtz et al.: learning from our “relations” table 1. summary of articles (continued) author (year), type location population intervention results and risk of bias janssen et al. (2014), mixed methods rural/urban new zealand adults n: not specified māori 6-week 'wellness with diabetes' course followed by optional diabetes support group and one-on-one meetings with nurse educators. used a "family togetherness" approach and cultural activities such as sharing food, healthier ways of preparing traditional māori foods, and songs/prayers. participants valued the relaxed interpersonal relationship and disclosure from staff, use of humour, family togetherness, and learning from and being motivated by others with diabetes. participants reported gaining new knowledge and awareness related to diabetes and how to make personal changes. no other improvements in health outcomes over the program were reported. low risk of bias. jernigan & lorig (2011), qualitative rural/urban usa adults n = 27 (ai); n = 27 (non-ai) american indians alaska natives 6-week online workshop. topics on physical, mental, emotional, and social health with pictures and quotes from indigenous individuals, who co-developed or had taken the course. used a circular model for indigenous concepts of health and wellness. blood glucose, fitness, and action planning tracking tools were most helpful. participants appreciated interaction with other indigenous people via online 'bulletin boards', and the cultural relevance of circular curriculum model. low risk of bias. jiang et al. (2013), qualitative rural/urban usa adults n = 834 american indians alaska natives 16-lesson cbpr diabetes prevention project with curriculum focused on diet, exercise, and behaviour modification, supplemented with monthly individual lifestyle coaching sessions. communities translated the intervention into tribal languages and incorporated aspects such as talking circles, indigenous foods, or drumming. participants who attended all 16 classes had a lower risk of diabetes than those who attended fewer. weight loss and physical activity levels were greater (baseline to 3-year follow-up). systolic and diastolic blood pressure were improved at post program and 1year follow-up. hdl-c levels were increased (at all annual assessments) with reduced levels of ldl-c and triglycerides (post-program and annual assessments). low risk of bias. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.14041 table 1. summary of articles (continued) author (year), type location population intervention results and risk of bias kaholokula et al. (2014), quantitative urban usa families n = 239 native hawaiian pacific islanders adapted diabetes prevention program curriculum focused on diet, physical activity, and emotional health/management. included group work with participants encouraged to bring a family member or friend. lessons on economical healthy eating and communicating effectively with doctors were added. improved (pre-post program) weight loss, systolic and diastolic blood pressure, physical activity frequency, 6-minute walk test, and dietary fat intake. number of lessons received was not associated with weight loss. baseline weight and the communitybased organization at which the intervention took place were predictors of weight loss in multivariate analyses. low risk of bias. kelley (2017), qualitative rural/urban usa youth n = 112 american indians cooking with kids (cwk), a school-based food and nutrition education curriculum used photovoice, where youth were given three disposable cameras to take pictures over a 2week period of: (1) opportunities for healthful eating in their environment; (2) barriers/challenges; and (3) native/traditional foods and customs. photos taken were discussed in individual semi-structured surveys and a group discussion. youth perspectives were presented in collage exhibits to their parents, school administrators, and tribal leaders. youth identified-themes included: (1) this is better than that; (2) catering to picky eaters; (3) temptations at home; (4) if that’s what they give me at school, it must be good for me; (5) if i’m not overweight, i can eat what i want; (6) fast food is an obstacle; (7) we live in a food desert; and (8) traditional foods. low risk of bias. kimes et al. (2014), qualitative rural usa adults n: not specified american indians weekly classes for women about healthy eating and physical activity, led by native community lay health educators with the incorporation of religious messages into curriculum. churches became hubs for healthy living policies and physical activity and involved families. barriers included time stresses leading to high fast-food and processed-food consumption, pressure from families to cook traditional foods which often included highfat ingredients, and cost of healthy ingredients. moderate risk of bias. 11 kurtz et al.: learning from our “relations” table 1. summary of articles (continued) author (year), type location population intervention results and risk of bias lai et al. (2019), mixed methods rural/remote canada adults n = 15 indigenous thirteen-week walking activity, 30-45 min (weekly), facilitated by an indigenous community leader. individualized plans (3 days/week) based on intensity (mild to moderate), time (15-20 min/day) and type of activity (walking). motivational interviewing (focused on goals), held in a sharing circle format, was facilitated by community leaders. improved vo2max with greatest improvements seen in individuals with lower baseline vo2max. resting heart rate, resting systolic blood pressure, and resting diastolic blood pressure decreased. self-reported and accelerometry-measured frequency of mvpa increased, and total mvpa minutes were above international recommendations. vo2max change was correlated with change in self-reported and accelerometry-measured mvpa minutes. no changes in weight, body mass index, waist circumference, body fat, grip strength, and flexibility. motivational interviewing (through storytelling and knowledge sharing practices) integrated four of 93 specific behaviour change techniques. low risk of bias. mau et al. (2010), mixed methods rural/urban usa adults n = 351 native hawaiians pacific islanders 8 lessons, using a modified curriculum (translated to less formal language), were delivered over 12 weeks by community peer educators. topics included economical healthy eating and communicating effectively with doctors. themes identified included: food-related issues; physical activity-related issues; social support; using existing community assets; economics of eating healthy; and more effective communication with doctors. improved (pre-post program) weight, mean systolic and diastolic blood pressure, 6-minute walk test, mean dietary fat intake, and mean physical activity. moderate risk of bias. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.14041 table 1. summary of articles (continued) author (year), type location population intervention results and risk of bias mendenhall et al. (2010), quantitative urban usa adults n = 36 american indians 3-hour bi-weekly sessions over 6 months involved peers checking and recording symptoms and measures of diabetes, cooking, eating, discussing traditional meals. and educational components using talking circles or other traditional activities. the cbpr design with whole-family participation encouraged. improved systolic and diastolic blood pressure, and metabolic control (hba1c) at 3 months post program with weight loss reported at 6-month postprogram. moderate risk of bias. mercer et al. (2013), mixed methods rural new zealand adults n = 70 māori focus on replacing unhealthy activities with healthy activities. each community was free to establish unique interventions, using a cbpr approach. established interventions included: community gym, community gardens, cooking lessons, and class on portion sizes. emphasis on self-determination, inclusion of whole family, use of traditional māori activities, and adaptation of exercises to make them more 'māori'. socialization, group work, use of empathy rather than judgement, and intergenerational learning were important. high risk of bias. pirritt et al., (2019), mixed methods unspecified new zealand adults n = 13 pacific peoples (however, did not exclude based on ethnicity) 1-hour sessions delivered over 8 consecutive weeks (community hall; weekday evening). each session included: physical activity, talanoa about successes and challenges, nutrition education, goal setting, recording of body weight, and preparing/tasting a quick and affordable healthy meal. the program was highly acceptable with high attendance. improved eating behaviour, emotional well-being, physical activity, and mean weight. high risk of bias. 13 kurtz et al.: learning from our “relations” table 1. summary of articles (continued) author (year), type location population intervention results and risk of bias pylypchuk et al. (2008), quantitative rural canada adults n: not specified indigenous development of various client and health care provider-oriented initiatives, including annual programs of prevention and awareness, healthy living displays and classes, ongoing awareness programs to promote communitybased participatory diabetes action prevention, and training of home care nurses to become diabetes educators. cree language. nonsignificant observations included trends toward a decrease in mean systolic blood pressure, lower levels of smoking, and improved healthy diet choices over two years. high risk of bias. rosecrans et al. (2007), qualitative rural/urban canada whole community n: not specified indigenous five 6–10-week long phases focusing on local first nation foods and behaviours integrated across schools, local health and social services, and stores. school curricula used storytelling and participatory activities. held kick-off feasts and community walks. teachers were satisfied with lessons but reported time constraints. parents found curriculum culturally relevant and acceptable. suggestions for improvement included shortening lessons, more hands-on activities and exposure to promoted foods. in stores, one-onone communication with people was appreciated by customers and providers, and was perceived as more effective than shelf labels and posters. kick-off events and walking clubs were the most successful health and social services/community events. suggestions included using incentives for activities and shortening physical activity challenges. moderate risk of bias. saksvig et al. (2005), quantitative rural canada children n = 122 indigenous school-based intervention for grades 3-5 over one school year using four components: curriculum, family-based, peer-led, and environmental (school-wide). inclusion of first nation traditional foods and feasts, and activities, and learning from elders with the health education material delivered by storytelling. increased dietary intention, dietary preference and knowledge, dietary self-efficacy, and curriculum knowledge was observed over the intervention. low risk of bias. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.14041 table 1. summary of articles (continued) author (year), type location population intervention results and risk of bias satterfield et al. (2016), qualitative rural/urban usa whole community n: not specified american indians alaska natives cooperative agreement to increase and reclaim access to local and traditional foods and physical activity, revive and create stories around healthy traditional ways, and engage communities in addressing diabetes. focused on traditional knowledge and communitydriven planning for discussions about traditional food sheds/food pathways, land, and fostering intergenerational relationships. key program components included: providing workshops on cooking, hunting, gathering, fishing, preserving foods, and environmental stewardship, communicating traditional knowledge orally, reinforcing values through storytelling, gratitude for the gifts of the earth, and generosity, engaging elders and fostering intergenerational learning, using traditional foods to facilitate conversations about health, and emphasizing education. high risk of bias. seear et al., (2019), mixed methods remote australia youth/young adults n = 10 aboriginal a diabetes prevention program, held over 8 weeks with each session including: exercise circuit, outdoor cooking, and education (max of 30 min) with topics consistent with the diabetes prevention program. the program attendance was inconsistent, but the length, venue, and format were acceptable and local aboriginal facilitators seen as appropriate and effective. program measures, checklists, activities, and resources were also appropriate but limited availability of indigenous-specific resources was reported. reported improvements included: learning new information, healthy eating knowledge and awareness, and healthy eating. moderate risk of bias. 15 kurtz et al.: learning from our “relations” table 1. summary of articles (continued) author (year), type location population intervention results and risk of bias tipene-leach et al. (2013), qualitative rural new zealand whole community n: not specified māori diabetes population health intervention program/implementation plan across sectors, schools, retailers, employers, and tribal organizations. focused on community-wide health promotion initiatives, community education and monitoring strategies, and modifying local environments. initiatives were broadcasted over local tribal radio, and print resources featured photographs of local scenes and events. findings indicated that a successful community-wide health promotion diabetes project requires listening to and involving community members, cultural and religious values. changes included water-only and health lunch box initiatives in schools, school gardens, and community nutritionist services. moderate risk of bias. umaefulam et al., (2020), mixed methods rural/urban canada adult women n = 78 first nations métis mhealth intervention that disseminated diabetes-eye related text messages for 12 weeks via sms (bulk messaging). sharing circles were used to explore the impacts of the mhealth intervention. pre-intervention sharing circle themes included: (1) information on diabetes-eye care (sub-themes: information/resources on complications, prevention, and management of diabetes and diabetic retinopathy [dr]); and (2) strategy for information dissemination. post-intervention: improvements reported for: knowledge scores, attitude score, and median practice score. dr-adjusted attitude and practice post-scores increased (those with diabetes compared to at-risk of diabetes). age and education status were factors in improved knowledge and practice pre-post-change scores. low risk of bias. warbrick et al., (2020), qualitative rural new zealand adult males n = 23 māori "the best exercise for māori men"; a 12-week structured, "culturally enhanced" exercise program included three 30-35 min weekly sessions of standard resistance training, cross training, or high-intensity interval training. four main themes emerged: (1) the bros having fellowship and mutual motivation, (2) being better informed about exercise, (3) impacting overall wellbeing, and (4) disseminating findings to beyond the study. low risk of bias. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.14041 table 1. summary of articles (continued) author (year), type location population intervention results and risk of bias willging et al. (2006), qualitative urban usa adults n: not specified american indians focused on women using storytelling to share insights about diabetes. young american indian women, as role models, implemented the curriculum. traditional images and themes such as the medicine wheel were utilized. intercultural aspects of the intervention were not sufficiently interwoven. some participants disliked the focus on family and materialism. participants wanted more acknowledgement of historical traumas, interactive skills-building activities, and web-based interventions. high risk of bias. 17 kurtz et al.: learning from our “relations” results and discussion thirty articles (table 1), described culturally-relevant approaches for diabetes (arora et al., 2013; bachar et al., 2006; brown et al., 2020; castro et al., 2009; debruyn et al., 2020; dreger et al., 2015 farmer et al., 2018; janssen et al., 2014; jernigan & lorig, 2011; jiang et al., 2013; kaholokula et al., 2014; mau et al., 2010; mendenhall et al., 2010; satterfield et al., 2016; seear et al., 2019; pylypchuk et al., 2008; rosecrans et al., 2007; tipene-leach et al., 2013; umaefulam et al., 2020; willging et al., 2006), and obesity (cueva et al., 2020; fleischhacker et al., 2012; kelley, 2017; lai et al., 2019; mercer et al., 2013; pirritt et al., 2019; saksvig et al., 2005; warbrick et al., 2020), or both (abbot et al., 2010; kimes et al., 2014). studies also described interventions designed specifically for indigenous peoples in australia (abbot et al., 2010; seear et al., 2019), canada (arora et al., 2013; dreger et al., 2014; lai et al., 2019; pylypchuk et al., 2008; rosecrans et al., 2007; saksvig et al., 2005; umaefulam et al., 2020), new zealand (farmer et al., 2018; janssen et al., 2014; mercer et al., 2013; pirritt et al., 2019; tipeneleach et al., 2013; warbrick et al., 2020), and usa (bachar et al., 2006; brown et al., 2020; castro et al., 2009; cueva et al., 2020; debruyn et al., 2020; fleischhacker et al., 2012; jernigan & lorig, 2011; jiang et al., 2013; kaholokula et al., 2014; kelley, 2017; kimes et al., 2014; mau et al., 2010; mendenhall et al., 2010; satterfield et al., 2016; willging et al., 2006). study designs included qualitative (abbot et al., 2010; arora et al., 2013; cueva et al., 2020; dreger et al., 2014; farmer et al., 2018; fleischhacker et al., 2012; jernigan & lorig, 2011; jiang et al., 2013; kelley, 2017; kimes et al., 2014; rosecrans et al., 2007; satterfield et al., 2016; tipene-leach et al., 2013; warbrick et al., 2020; willging et al., 2006), quantitative (castro et al., 2009; kaholokula et al., 2014; mendenhall et al., 2010; pylypchuk et al., 2008; saksvig et al., 2005), or mixed methods (bachar et al., 2006; brown et al., 2020; debruyn et al., 2020; janssen et al. ,2014; lai et al., 2019; mau et al., 2010; mercer et al., 2013; pirritt et al., 2019; seear et al., 2019; umaefulam et al., 2020). all but one of the articles (williging et al., 2006) reported favorable outcomes related to integrating a variety of culturally relevant strategies into their interventions. these successes were almost all attributed to meaningful integration of cultural components throughout the process, in contrast to superficial or piecemealed approaches (willging et al., 2006). while not mutually exclusive, three overarching themes or characteristics were associated with effective culturally relevant diabetes and obesity interventions: togetherness, empowerment, and local familiarity. togetherness togetherness, which we define as a feeling of 'oneness' with one's culture, family, and community, is paramount to creating successful culturally appropriate interventions in all four countries (abbott et al., 2010; bachar et al., 2006; dreger et al., 2015; fleischhacker et al., 2012; janssen & nelson, 2014; mercer et al., 2013; satterfield et al., 2016). the common theme of togetherness was reflected in approaches that focused on the family, intergenerational communication, peer support and tradition. 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.14041 family togetherness family was often reported as both a crucial barrier and a motivator (abbott et al., 2010) for healthy eating and living in australia. in canada (saksvig et al., 2005), new zealand (farmer et al., 2018; janssen et al., 2014), and among families and youth in the usa (fleischhacker et al., 2012; kelly, 2017), individual health practices are nestled within everyday routines (such as the sharing of local foods) and family traditions (such as the inclusion of tribal leaders and the gathering of extended families). these routines and family traditions are recognized and emphasized in supporting one’s health. successful programs encourage family members or friends to attend interventions, emphasize family activities, or promote discussion of family goals and values to exemplify the traditional value of family togetherness in new zealand (mercer et al., 2013), and the usa (kaholokula et al., 2014; mendenhall et al., 2010). māori men shared that whanau health (immediate and extended family health) was positively impacted from their participation in a 12-week exercise program (warbrick et al., 2020). togetherness through intergenerational communication the opportunity to engage in intergenerational communication, within and between families, is an important feature of many of the successful interventions primarily in new zealand (mercer et al., 2013) and the usa (bachar et al., 2006; fleischhacker et al., 2012; satterfield et al., 2016). intergenerational communication is effectively supported by the inclusion of elders in teaching program content and in the use of role modeling in the development and facilitation of programs in canada (saksvig et al., 2005) and the usa (satterfield et al., 2016). several interventions included school mentoring programs, in which older indigenous children were healthy role models for younger children in canada (pylypchuk et al., 2008) and the usa (bachar, et al., 2006; fleischhacker et al., 2012). in addition, older indigenous children peer-led the activities in canada (saksvig et al., 2005). these programs facilitate mutual benefit and intergenerational engagement when older student mentors designed health education lessons for delivery to younger students. a similar mentoring approach was adapted for adults, with indigenous community mentors/role models and elders facilitating programs in all four countries (farmer, et al., 2018; fleischhacker et al, 2012; mercer et al., 2013; saksvig et al., 2005; seear et al., 2019). in all five of these studies, intergenerational knowledge sharing and learning components were reported to be beneficial and further strengthened overall 'togetherness' among participants and role models, thereby increasing their investment in participating in the interventions. peer support fostering togetherness peer support was effective across interventions in canada (saksvig et al, 2005) and the usa (fleischhacker et al., 2012; mau et al., 2010, mendenhall et al., 2010). in a canadian study (pylypchuk et al., 2008), the development of deep interpersonal relationships between fellow participants and facilitators or mentors was self-reported to improve social support, uphold traditional values of the community around open communication, and improve the success of t2d and obesity interventions. to achieve these similar goals, janssen and nelson (2014) recommend that interpersonal relationships 19 kurtz et al.: learning from our “relations” among all those involved in the intervention (māori people) should be relaxed and informal. community-based interventions that involved group work in australia (abbott et al., 2010), new zealand (mercer, et al. 2013; tipene-leach et al., 2013), and the usa (kaholokula et al., 2014), as well as social or cultural activities facilitated by local lay educators and health professionals, increased the social networking and participant engagement in these program activities. for example, in new zealand, important strategies included providing regular updates about community festivities or gatherings through local tribal radio, and printed resources/photographs of local events (tipene-leach et al., 2013). these informal and locally meaningful presentations and communications may provide a welcome relief from the typically strict manner of administering health care in indigenous communities. tradition weaved into togetherness emphasis on using oral tradition to share information was beneficial in communities and programs, in canada (dreger et al., 2015; lai et al., 2019; rosecrans et al., 2007; saksvig et al., 2005; umaefulam et al., 2020), new zealand (farmer et al., 2018; pirrit et al., 2019), and the usa (debruyn et al., 2020; kimes et al., 2014; satterfield et al., 2016; willging et al., 2006). often, storytelling was used to deliver educational interventions. this helped unravel and clarify medical jargon and relate new information in a more familiar and meaningful way. traditional stories, local characters and legends were used to convey health messages. for instance, willging et al. (2006) reported indigenous women using storytelling, traditional images, and the medicine wheel in their teachings. in a 12-week diabetesrelated eye complication mobile health (mhealth) intervention for first nations and métis women in canada, text messages incorporated aspects of the medicine wheel, and sharing circles were offered to explore impacts of the intervention (umaefulam et al., 2020). in the usa, debruyn et al. (2020) found storytelling was associated with increased interest and engagement in gardening and/or subsistence gathering, hunting, or fishing as part of a traditional foods project. in canada, dreger et al. (2015) codeveloped, with community members, a mindfulness intervention for diabetes management that included cultural aspects, which improved health, well-being, and behavioural change. satterfield et al. (2016) suggested interventions were more effective when oral traditions were used to share knowledge about cooking, hunting, and gathering. traditional food and feasts and learning from elders were also an important part of an ojibway-cree school-based health promotion intervention in canada (saksvig et al., 2005). in addition, rosecrans et al. (2008) worked with teachers and parents in canada to include traditional foods and traditional storytelling as part of school curricula. kimes et al. (2014) found lowcost healthy eating and physical activity interventions that included religious and spiritual oral sharing of knowledges and were led by native community health educators in the usa increased relevance of health messages. oral sharing of knowledge was also done by local elders and community health educators in new zealand who developed a community documentary in which storytelling and exercise demonstrations were used to teach healthy eating and exercise (farmer et al., 2018). pirritt et al. (2019) incorporated the interactive process of talanoa (“talking about nothing in particular”), used by pacific populations, to nurture empathy between pacific adults. weekly talanoas 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.14041 were held for participants to share knowledge and emotions about previous weeks’ successes and challenges. talking circles are effective ways of sharing traditional oral stories and providing an appropriate setting to come together for reflective listening and meaningful dialogue to learn about diabetes and obesity. they include cultural and personal experiences, knowledge, challenges, and successes. talking circles were used to help integrate western interventions into more familiar traditional activities in canada (lai et al., 2019; umaefulam et al., 2020), new zealand (janssen & nelson, 2014), and the usa (castro et al., 2009; fleischhacker et al., 2012; jiang et al., 2013; mendenhall et al., 2010). empowerment empowerment, both individual and community, was a common theme in all articles included in this review. individual empowerment refers to the acquisition of personal knowledge and skills related to self, while community empowerment embraces and acknowledges local knowledge and the steps taken collectively to engage the whole community (demarco & healey-walsh, 2019). the distinction between individual and community empowerment was seen as critical and connected to life and relationships within indigenous communities. both are deeply intertwined. individual empowerment was achieved through feelings of self-esteem, belonging, and togetherness within the community. many used local knowledge, traditional stories, and inclusion of community role models and local customs related to healthy life choices (traditional foods and activities). intergenerational connectedness was integrally embedded among individuals and community, as well as across communities, and emphasized family and community collectiveness as a way to address the underlying historical trauma that impacts health and wellbeing. two studies, one with māori peoples (farmer et al., 2018) and the other with american indians (fleischhacker et al., 2012), noted the importance of local knowledge, and culturally appropriate community-informed strategies for successful programs. they integrated intergenerational approaches among tribal leaders and community members. engagement of community leaders in the development and delivery of these programs improved community interest and attendance. tribal leaders were empowered, and often expected to leverage their authority to influence community commitment in raising healthier generations of american indian children (fleischhacker et al., 2012). respectful attitudes, and the expression of empathy led participants to feel less judged, stigmatized, or disempowered, as recipients of western diabetes and obesity care (fleischhacker et al., 2012). the māori principle related to reciprocation (manaakitanga) situates being māori as a strength/advantage over a cause of illness/weakness. manaakitanga led to a mutual relationship of respect and gratitude between the māori men and exercise trainers (warbrick et al., 2020). mercer et al. (2013) found government-wide strategies for obesity, physical and social programs that were developed and delivered by local māori coordinators resulted in trusting relationships, which were pivotal for a successful program. researchers also reported that appropriate health literacy levels should be considered for oral and written educational content, materials, and diagrams. in addition, humour was considered an 21 kurtz et al.: learning from our “relations” important part of teaching and learning in new zealand (janssen & nelson, 2014) and the usa (mau et al., 2010). individual empowerment depended heavily upon health education regarding western aspects of diabetes (janssen & nelson, 2014). many participants had little understanding of the pathophysiology of these conditions prior to participating in interventions, resulting in challenges in self-management and difficulties in interactions with health care providers (janssen & nelson, 2014). being fully engaged and able to relate to health and wellness information provided was key. for example, curriculum was translated into less formal medical and scientific language to help teach terms used by health professionals, or in client materials (mau et al., 2010). rather than lecturing, storytelling helped engage audiences in real life situations and solutions for affordable healthy eating in the usa (kaholokula et al. 2014; satterfield et al., 2016). the most important outcome of a māori community developed healthy foods and exercise documentary was that change is considered the responsibility of the collective, now and for the mokopuna (grandchildren) in the future (farmer et al., 2018). according to lai et al. (2019), a culturally appropriate way to improve community health and wellness in canada is through empowering indigenous leaders to be key advocates of health behaviour change. promoting community empowerment was also demonstrated through the creation of community gardens, in which interventions integrated experiential learning experiences such as producing foods, sharing expertise, working with the land, and engaging in physical activity. in addition, there was mutual benefit of cost savings in food sharing as a traditional practice that also emphasized the importance of community support in new zealand (janssen & nelson, 2014; mercer et al., 2013) and the usa (brown et al., 2020; satterfield et al., 2016). additionally, some interventions in canada incorporated community-wide activities such as celebratory feasts, or large community walks, where a sense of community-level empowerment was felt (rosecrans et al., 2008; saksvig et al., 2005). overall, empowerment was demonstrated through partnerships and respectful involvement of community members, mentors, teachers, stakeholders and health providers in shaping programs and activities. culturally responsive approaches provided space for self-determination, community ownership, and inclusion of local knowledge, stories, language, customs, and family in taking action to influence what was most relevant to impact health and wellness. local familiarity local cultural and traditional activities were essential for increased group and community engagement and participation in all but australia (janssen & nelson, 2014; mendenhall et al., 2010; mercer et al., 2013; saksvig et al., 2005). local familiar traditional physical and non-physical activities, ceremonies, and practices were incorporated into interventions to ground them within the contexts of the communities in which they took place warbrick et al. (2020) demonstrated an example of respecting māori culture in a 12-week “culturally enhanced” exercise program, with the initial meeting between 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.14041 māori men and researchers being held in a “whare tupuna on a local marae (a cultural meeting house located on a culturally significant meeting site)” (p. 799). to simultaneously support cultural relevance, build community, and integrate diabetes and obesity education, locally specific traditional non-physical activities such as basket-making, beading, berry-picking, drumming, snow games, role playing, play acting, drum-making, kite-making, and traditional singing were employed in the usa (jernigan & lorig, 2011; mendenhall et al., 2010) and waiata (māori traditional songs), karakia (māori traditional prayer or chant), and hongi (māori traditional greeting) in new zealand (janssen & nelson, 2014; warbrick et al., 2020). integration of local indigenous culture with health education was reported to have a positive impact for participants. health education activities were adapted to include relevant and meaningful cultural teachings within diabetes and obesity self-management. in canada, arora et al. (2013) invited participants in a diabetes intervention to make bracelets in a particular way so that the order of colored beads served as reminders to take prescribed medications at specific times. traditional physical activities such as walking, drumming, adapted chair dancing, and aerobics were used as physical activity interventions in the usa (jernigan & lorig, 2011; mendenhall et al., 2010). cultural expertise of spiritual and traditional local community leaders familiarity was key to the success of many interventions. some interventions in canada incorporated ceremonies led by local spiritual leaders (arora et al., 2013), while others in the usa included traditional healers who taught traditional knowledge to supplement biomedical diabetes and obesity education (castro et al., 2009). many interventions included lessons or workshops on traditional indigenous foods. these interventions featured classes or workshops on the preparation of traditional foods and found that the use of familiar recipes and ingredients was important. some interventions in the usa used traditional foods as a starting point for the facilitation of further dialogue and learning about health and nutrition (satterfield et al., 2016). in australia, participants easily integrated new knowledge into their daily lives by sharing healthy traditional recipes among participants, mentors, and facilitators (abbott et al., 2010), a common strategy also used in new zealand (farmer et al., 2018). similarly, discussion around local traditional food pathways and foodsheds (a geographic region/place in which food can be produced at the community) were used to facilitate further conversation among participants in new zealand and the usa (debruyn et al, 2020; jansssen et al., 2014; kelly, 2017; satterfield et al., 2016). some interventions took a broader focus by including workshops not only on accessing and cooking traditional foods, but also on hunting, gathering, fishing, and preserving foods, as well as the environmental stewardship associated with these activities (kimes et al., 2014; satterfield et al., 2016). familiarity with local foods and land comparison of traditional and modern western diets was another successful component of interventions in each country. for instance, in new zealand, suggestions were provided on how to make 23 kurtz et al.: learning from our “relations” familiar traditional foods healthier, along with simple nutritional recommendations that could be easily adapted (janssen & nelson, 2014). other programs compared traditional and modern westernized diets to demonstrate shortcomings of modern diets, and to provide recommendations on how to adapt current diets to better align to healthier traditional diets (abbott et al., 2010; fleischhacker et al., 2012; jiang et al., 2013; saksvig et al., 2005). familiarity with information sharing and intervention delivery emphasis on visual learning is important in culturally appropriate interventions. visuals used in interventions were effective in increasing feelings of recognition and familiarity with the material/content in all countries except australia. a variety of culturally relevant images, such as traditional art (dreger et al., 2015), food (farmer et al., 2018), and images of the medicine wheel and storyteller (willging et al., 2006) enhanced health messages. some interventions used images of individuals who had assisted with the development of, or participated in interventions, as motivators and models for embodying the health messages provided (jernigan & lorig, 2011). images of local scenery and events offered a unique, homegrown familiarity to each intervention (tipene-leach et al., 2013). youth took photos of healthy eating, traditional foods, where food comes from, how foods are packaged, and barriers/challenges to obtaining healthy foods (cueva et al., 2020; kelly, 2017). photos were made into collages and shared with parents, school administrators, and tribal leaders to highlight their need for more nutritious foods and culturally traditional nourishing foods. overall, local adaptation was found to be key in constructing effective interventions with and for indigenous peoples in many studies across the four countries. in recognition of the commonalities and differences among and between different indigenous peoples, adequate time must be provided to individual communities to ensure the inclusion of local culture in the modification of interventions (fleischhacker et al., 2012; jiang et al., 2013). this was accomplished in many interventions where local indigenous people taught or facilitated interventions and applied their own specialized knowledge in the implementation. for example, in canada, culturally relevant, extensive community engagement and locally led interventions, facilitated by local community members, leaders, restorative justice workers, qualified exercise professional, and community nurses, resulted in significant improvements in cardiometabolic health and physical activity behaviour (lai et al., 2019). successful interventions were also often locally adapted by including or sharing teachings of local elders, health workers, and others in health promotion and education materials (farmer, et al., 2018; tipene-leach et al., 2013). in order to navigate between western and traditional diabetes and obesity wellness, it was important to understand the factors that make culturally responsive diabetes and obesity interventions effective for indigenous peoples. through this review of literature, we identified three key themes associated with successful diabetes, obesity, and other health promotion interventions or programs: 1) togetherness through family, intergenerational communication, peer support, and tradition; 2) empowerment of individuals, community, and partnerships; and 3) familiarity of local spiritual and traditional leaders, 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.14041 community participants, and cultural and traditional ways of information sharing and intervention delivery. while the ways in which indigenous peoples experience and practice ceremony and cultural practices in each of these countries are very diverse and unique, there are inherent commonalities. “relationship is at the core of indigenous knowledge(s)” (greenwood, 2013, p. 99) and indigenous being (martin, 2012; wilson, 2008), or being indigenous. our findings are consistent with others in acknowledging the impact of “social-relational interconnections” (hovey et al., 2014). our relations embraces the complex web of realities “that connect us to our ancestors, relations, all people, the earth, universe and beyond” (kurtz, 2011, p. 274). this interconnectedness is part of our healing journey as indigenous peoples that traverses intergenerational traumas related to historical and contemporary colonization, racism, loss of land, family, spirituality, and cultural identity. the intersectional realities of togetherness are grounded in ethical and respectful relationships with peers, family, elders, community, local culture and tradition, allies, individuals, and communities. together, they nurture our self-determination, and empowerment which are necessary to achieve balance and achieve greater wholistic health and well-being (reading & wien, 2013). limitations globally, indigenous peoples are unique and geographically diverse, yet share ancient cultural, sacred, and traditional knowledge and practices. as a result, this literature review is not generalizable to any particular indigenous group or population. overall, 30 articles met our inclusion criteria and surprisingly, only two from australia. given the 10-year history of the well-funded, “closing the gap” initiative in australia (close the gap campaign steering committee, 2020) we expected to identify a plethora of recent studies. the limited number of articles in this review may be due to the challenges and possible barriers in publishing indigenous work in academic journals, as opposed to publishing in the “grey” literature, which we did not include in this review. additionally, the oral nature of sharing traditional knowledge in health and healing activities may contribute to the lack of published research or ‘recorded’ evidence about the effectiveness of including indigenous traditional healing and practices with western interventions. although limited in our ability to demonstrate success among all four countries, the work done mostly in the usa followed by canada and new zealand, all of which provided rich information to share with community partners and inform future interventions. this review adds to the literature as it brings forth suggestive evidence for successful diabetes, obesity, and health promotion wellness programs that include both traditional local protocols, customs, and practices and western approaches, that are associated with improved health equity and outcomes for indigenous peoples living in australia, canada, new zealand, and the usa. sharing the wisdom of “our relations” can inform changes in policy, and provide insights for chronic disease prevention, management, and self-management programs for indigenous peoples globally. 25 kurtz et al.: learning from our “relations” conclusion this review was completed to better understand the factors associated with effective culturally relevant diabetes, obesity, and health promotion interventions among indigenous peoples in australia, canada, new zealand, and usa. culturally appropriate diabetes, obesity, and health promotion interventions are more effective when co-developed and delivered locally by indigenous peoples within the communities they live. the majority of programs (85%) reported traditional components as critical for successful engagement and improved knowledge and wellness for indigenous peoples and communities. this work provides an in-depth understanding of what underlies the success of culturally relevant and safe interventions. it is through engendering feelings of closeness or togetherness, intergenerational communication, peer support and teaching, interwoven local/familiar culture and tradition, that greater self-determination is realized among individuals and communities. these strengths-based approaches combat the pervasive generational impacts of colonization and loss of cultural identity, from which optimal wholistic wellness can be achieved. health care organizations that provide health promotion, illness prevention, and self-management services for indigenous peoples globally could adapt their current policies and practices to promote togetherness, empowerment, culture, and tradition in ways that include: a. co-development of programs with communities. b. emphasis on local indigenous knowledge and traditional teachings. c. culturally relevant content and setting such as culturally relevant images, circles, and visual learning. d. local indigenous teachers and knowledge keepers, and indigenous health care providers. e. traditional cultural group activities including talking (sharing) circles, food and feasts, ceremony, songs, drumming, spiritual and religious components, use of local language, intergenerational activities and learning, and indigenous specific focus on concepts of health and wellness. f. interventions that are easily accessible within the community, practical, low-cost experiential, immediate, interactive, and empowering (strength-based). g. acknowledgement of the importance of intergenerational participation, feelings of togetherness, local familiarity, and community/practitioner co-led interventions to enhance success of culturally adapted interventions. by including these elements in intervention designs, diabetes and obesity health disparities and comorbidities may be better addressed, and wholistic health improved across indigenous generations. the 26 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.14041 shift from a marginally successful scientific western, medicalized approach to indigenous health, to the inclusion of tradition is a is a big step toward realization and support of indigenous rights. according to the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (2008), “indigenous peoples have the right to their traditional medicines and to maintain their health practices, including the conservation of their vital medicinal plants, animals and minerals. indigenous individuals also have the right to access, without any discrimination, to all social and health services” (p. 9). 27 kurtz et al.: learning from our “relations” references abbott, p., davison, j., moore, l., & rubinstein, r. 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(2008). research is ceremony: indigenous research methods. fernwood publishing. world health organization. (2021). diabetes. https://www.who.int/news-room/factsheets/detail/diabetes world health organization. (2000). obesity: preventing and managing the global epidemic. http://www.who.int/nutrition/publications/obesity/who_trs_894/en/ world health organization. (2020). obesity and overweight. https://www.who.int/news-room/factsheets/detail/obesity-and-overweight https://doi.org/10.25318/1310009601-eng https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jcjd.2019.11.006 https://doi.org/10.1080/13557858.2012.754406 https://doi.org/10.21037/mhealth.2019.12.01 https://www.un.org/development/desa/indigenouspeoples/ https://doi.org/10.1503/cmaj.190836 https://doi.org/10.1080/13557858.2018.1456652 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.evalprogplan.2006.01.005 http://www.who.int/nutrition/publications/obesity/who_trs_894/en/ https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/obesity-and-overweight https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/obesity-and-overweight 34 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.14041 appendix 1. detailed medline search strategy database: ovid medline(r) and in-process & other non-indexed citations <1946 to november 20, 2020> search strategy: ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1 (first nation or first nations).tw. (1579) 2 (native$ or indian$ or aborigin$ or indigenous).tw. (329338) 3 (inuit or eskimo$ or metis or māori or "pacific islander$").tw. (9861) 4 exp american native continental ancestry group/ (21614) 5 exp oceanic ancestry group/ (10463) 6 or/1-5 (345146) 7 (diabete$ or overweight or obes$ or weight$ or sugar$ or glucose).tw. (2005932) 8 exp glucose metabolism disorders/ (459869) 9 exp obesity/ (216788) 10 or/7-9 (2133745) 11 (cultur$ adj (safe$ or competen$ or divers$ or factor$ or sensitiv$ or aware$ or influence$ or appropriate$ or responsive$ or adapt$ or knowledge or specif$ or focus$ or considerat$ or grounded or informed or tailor$ or relevant or congruen$ or consisten$ or ident$ or socializ$ or sovereign$)).tw. (39623) 12 culturally competent care/ (1560) 13 cultural diversity/ (11619) 14 acculturation/ (6466) 35 kurtz et al.: learning from our “relations” 15 health services, indigenous/ (3359) 16 (tradition$ or holistic or wholistic or wheel or talking circle or medicine man or healer$ or spiritual$).tw. (436294) 17 exp health promotion/ (77965) 18 exp health education/ (246224) 19 exp primary prevention/ (154113) 20 exp secondary prevention/ (20701) 21 exp tertiary prevention/ (160) 22 (prevent$ or promot$ or educat$ or outreach).tw. (2821544) 23 (healthy or wellness).tw. (833517) 24 or/11-16 (487979) 25 or/17-23 (3790377) 26 6 and 10 and 24 and 25 (922) 27 limit 26 to (abstracts and english language and yr="2005 -current") (736) honouring water: the mistawasis nêhiyawak water governance framework the international indigenous policy journal volume 13 | issue 3 december 2022 honouring water: the mistawasis nêhiyawak water governance framework maria f. mora university of saskatchewan, canada, mariafer.mora@usask.ca anthony b. d. johnston mistawasis nêhiyawak, (first nation), anthony.b.johnston@gmail.com michelle watson mistawasis nêhiyawak, (first nation), mwats83@live.com lalita bharadwaj university of saskatchewan, canada, lalita.bharadwaj@usask.ca recommended citation mora et al., (2022). honouring water: the mistawasis nêhiyawak water governance framework the international indigenous policy journal, 13(3). https://10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14271 honouring water: the mistawasis nêhiyawak water governance framework abstract collaborative water governance in indigenous territories requires the building of a nation-to-nation relationship where different water worldviews and knowledges are acknowledged, valued, and included in water governance. this article presents the mistawasis nêhiyawak honour the water governance framework, an alternative collaborative water governance approach in saskatchewan, canada. the nêhiyawak principles, identity, knowledge, and self-determination are its foundation. equitable dialogue is the central axis. the framework represents an alternative water governance structure to the current canadian system that may more effectively respond to the water challenges of this first nation. this framework supports the appeal from mistawasis first nation and other nations, for the de-construction of hegemonic colonial water governance systems towards the coconstruction of shared processes of water participation, decision-making, and responsibility. keywords water governance, indigenous ontologies, collaboration, dialogue acknowledgments we would like to acknowledge that this dissertation was developed on treaty 6 territory and the homeland of the métis. we pay our respect to the first nations and métis ancestors of this land and reaffirm our relationship with them. a sincere thank you to the members of mistawasis nêhiyawak and their water partners in the north saskatchewan river watershed for sharing their time, knowledge, and experience of working together towards the wellbeing of water and people. we would also like to thank the global water futures program and the school of environment and sustainability at the university of saskatchewan for providing funding support. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ 1 mora et al.: honouring water published by scholarship@western, 2022 honouring water: the mistawasis nêhiyawak water governance framework water problems in indigenous territories within the borders of canada represent a constant challenge for many indigenous peoples including first nations, inuit, and métis. indigenous peoples’ physical health, their social, cultural, and spiritual well-being are negatively impacted by these water challenges (baird & plummer, 2013; basdeo & bharadwaj, 2013; bradford et al., 2017). many water problems can be attributed to failures of the current canadian water governance system, a system by complex institutional arrangements and power conflicts (arsenault et al., 2018; von der porten & de loë, 2014b). in canada, water governance works through a decentralized and multi-jurisdictional system that constitutionally recognizes the provincial governments as water authorities for waters that lie solely within a province’s boundaries. however, the federal government is considered the water authority on first nations lands. this institutional fragmentation has resulted in inter-governmental conflicts, duplication and overlapping responsibilities, ineffective means of data collection, poor water monitoring, and negative impacts on indigenous peoples’ wellbeing (baird and plummer, 2013; bakker & cook, 2011; bradford et al., 2017). in this complex system, colonial hegemonies exist, and indigenous peoples’ worldviews, knowledge, voices, and needs are underrepresented, ignored, and excluded. (day et al., 2020; jackson et al., 2019; memon & kirk, 2012; van tol smit et al., 2015; von der porten & de loë, 2013a; von der porten et al., 2016; von der porten et al., 2015; wilson et al., 2019). changes to the current water governance system are needed so that indigenous peoples’ needs and aspirations are included. the canadian water governance system requires reconsideration and modification to provide an opportunity for the co-existence and co-interaction among different ways-of-being with water to exist within the system of governance (wilson & inkster, 2018). collaborative strategies for water governance, built upon formal approaches to collaborative governance (koebele, 2015; simms et al., 2016; von der porten et al., 2016), have been proposed as suitable approaches towards equitable water arrangements (harrington, 2017). collaborative water governance is a mixture of collaboration (cooperation among stakeholders who voluntarily come to participate in public decision-making and meet common goals) and water governance (how societies arrange water actions and decision-making at different scales, levels, and through different mechanisms) (brisbois & de loë, 2016; orr et al., 2015; von der porten & de loë, 2013a). collaborative approaches are defined as holistic, inclusive, and representative (harrington, 2017). collaborative arrangements include “faceto-face deliberation, shared learning, a willingness to reconsider assumptions, pooling of resources, construction of long-term relationships, and consensus-focused decision making (brisbois & de loë, 2016). collaborative water governance approaches are seen as attempts to “operationalize” water governance in practice (harrington, 2017). collaborative approaches to governance are commonly cited as appropriate theoretical lenses to frame water governance discussions in indigenous territories (jackson et al., 2019; von der porten et al., 2015). collaborative approaches are known to better address representation conflicts while improving the durability and acceptance of decisions collectively taken (jackson et al., 2019). although collaborative approaches to water governance are recognized as constructive (brisbois & de loë, 2016), collaborative efforts are not facilitated when local indigenous water governance goals and self2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14271 determination are not recognized (von der porten & de loë, 2013a). inadequate or inappropriate inclusion of traditional knowledge (tk), insufficient dialogue, and limited indigenous representation in water decision-making also affect collaborative water governance efforts with indigenous peoples (jackson et al., 2019). when tk and indigenous worldviews are omitted in local water governance frameworks, gaps in water policy are often identified (anderson et al., 2013; maclean, 2015; mcgregor, 2012, 2014; von der porten et al., 2016). both in theory and practice, collaborative water governance requires the building of genuine relationships with indigenous peoples from a nation-to-nation perspective and the reassurance of indigenous peoples’ self-determination, knowledge, and worldviews (von der porten & de loë, 2013a). the recognition of alternative water governance models aware of a nation-to-nation foundation is needed. nations are demanding that tk form an integral part of water governance. tk bring insights and values that are currently missing in the water governance dialogue (mcgregor, 2014). alternative models of and holistic elements to frame water governance are needed to open spaces for shared dialogue and for the creation of meaningful collaborative water governance approaches that are respectful of indigenous peoples’ historical water demands and needs. the purpose of this article is to contribute to the discussion on collaborative water governance through the presentation of a collaborative water governance framework co-developed with mistawasis nêhiyawak first nation (mnfn) in saskatchewan, canada. the mistawasis nêhiyawak honour the water governance framework represents an alternative water governance structure to the canadian system that may more effectively respond to the existing water challenges in mnfn. the mistawasis nêhiyawak honour the water governance framework affirms the importance of holism, inclusiveness, and representation. it presents and represents, the nêhiyawak way-of-being with water, their knowledge, and their interconnected relationships with water. the meaning of water governance for the people of mnfn is represented through a symbolic framework that promotes collaborative water governance by honouring water. this paper begins with a theoretical discussion of collaborative water governance and decolonized approaches for opening paths for shared dialogue. the importance of water ontologies and epistemologies for decolonized collaborative water governance are discussed. from this theory, the case study and methodology are presented. the mistawasis nêhiyawak honour the water framework is then introduced. the meaning of water from the voices of mnfn members’ and each framework element is presented and described. the importance of the framework as an alternative to the current water governance system and for decolonizing collaborative water governance is discussed. we argue that by opening decolonized paths to reconcile indigenous and non-indigenous worldviews and perspectives positive outcomes for holistic, collaborative water governance systems in canada may be achieved. finally, conclusions and final thoughts are offered. 3 mora et al.: honouring water published by scholarship@western, 2022 collaborative water governance from a decolonized perspective defining collaborative water governance water is considered a ‘multipurpose flow resource’, whose benefits or harms cross political boundaries affecting different “users, sectors and scales of governance” (baird & plummer, 2013, p. 277). as a multipurpose flow resource, water governance requires more systemic approaches that can promote active stakeholder participation, governance institutions’ flexibility, and be sensitive to local contexts (de loë & patterson, 2017; schulz et al., 2017). one systemic approach is collaborative water governance. this approach comes from a political perspective that points to formal arrangements among state and non-state actors, who voluntarily come to participate in public decision-making (orr et al., 2015). the rationale of a collaborative approach refers to shared processes of decision-making among actors involved in and affected by water conflicts to achieve consensus by incorporating different types of knowledge (brisbois & de loë, 2016; von der porten et al., 2016; von der porten et al., 2015). specific guiding principles like representation, inclusiveness, fairness, equity, endured relationships, and face-to-face interactions contribute to consensus achievement (brisbois & de loë, 2016; von der porten & de loë, 2013a; von der porten & de loë, 2014b). collaborative water governance represents an opportunity to actively include indigenous peoples in solutions to water conflicts. nonetheless, collaborative solutions can fail when indigenous governance foundations are omitted. for example, wilson (2020) argues that placing indigenous peoples as stakeholders in the governance system reinforce colonial relationships based on power asymmetries. instead of stakeholders, indigenous peoples are right-holders having legitimate inherent rights for authority and power of decision-making from a nation-to-nation basis (castleden et al., 2017; von der porten & de loë, 2013a; von der porten et al., 2015; wilson, 2020). the reassertion of indigenous selfdetermination provides the political framework for the recognition and inclusion of indigenous worldviews and knowledge into water decision-making (bradford et al., 2017; de loë & patterson, 2017; montgomery et al., 2015; von der porten & de loë, 2013a; von der porten et al., 2016). the recognition of indigenous self-determination, worldviews, and knowledge is foundational for constructive decolonial venues for trustful relationships and shared arrangements in water decisionmaking (von der porten & de loë, 2014b; von der porten et al., 2015). the recognition of indigenous self-determination, acknowledgement of different ontologies and knowledge systems, spaces for cobuilding formal arrangements of shared decision-making, and working towards co-building long and trustful relationships between indigenous nations and water stakeholders are needed for decolonized collaborative water governance approaches. decolonized efforts also include the deconstruction of the meaning of water. with the inclusion of indigenous water worldviews into water governance, interconnected, respectful and reciprocal relationships between water and humans then become the foundational guidelines for water arrangements (arsenault et al., 2018). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14271 dialogue as a knowledge bridge in decolonized collaborative water governance dialogue is seen as one strategic tool for creating spaces of encounter between different epistemologies and worldviews (arsenault et al., 2018; leff, 2003; martínez-torres & rosset, 2014). dialogue has been defined as the space where different knowledges and ways of knowing are shared and exchanged on a horizontal basis without imposing one knowledge system over the other(s) (martínez-torres & rosset, 2014). dialogue requires opened spaces where different worldviews, knowledges, experiences, and interests bridge with western sciences (leff, 2003). as a result of dialogue, local communities and their local knowledge are empowered and respected (day et al., 2020), and reciprocal learning processes, where knowledge flows back and forth between learning partners, are promoted (arsenault et al., 2018). bridging indigenous and western knowledge is considered a means to promote dialogue in equal conditions (castleden et al., 2017; johnson et al., 2016) where social justice, identity, and selfdetermination of indigenous peoples are recognized (bohensky & maru, 2011). bridging knowledge systems highlights mutual benefits, not differences, while collectively working towards resilience, holistic environmental understanding, synergies, and complementarities (berkes, 2012; bohensky & maru, 2011; hatcher et al., 2009; plummer et al., 2017; tengöet al., 2014). all of which could improve collaborative efforts in the governance of water. decolonizing collaborative water governance in canada: what’s currently missing? indigenous water ontologies as the different ways-of-being-with water a lack of recognition and understanding of multiple water ontologies is a significant issue in the canadian water governance system and contributes to water problems and conflicts (brisbois & de loë, 2016; von der porten & de loë, 2013b, 2013a; von der porten & de loë, 2014b, 2014a; von der porten et al., 2015; yates et al., 2017). these water governance problems have, in part, been attributed to the absence of discussions about what water ontologies mean in the context of water governance. as harrington (2017) writes “[t]he overall absence [of water ontologies] (…) remains a significant oversight, given how important it is in establishing a credible understanding of how water governance is imagined, understood and performed” (p. 262). how people recognize, perceive, relate, live with, and value water may reveal a way in which water governance may be recognized, perceived, and lived (wilson et al., 2019; wilson & inkster, 2018; yates et al., 2017). recognizing multiple water ontologies can help to dismantle dominant forms of water governance based on the specific meaning and use of water. as harrington (2017) states “[c]ollaboration requires a shared ontological understanding of water, to determine what exactly is being negotiated. in other words, a shared language of water must be present for collaborative practices to be envisioned and undertaken” (p. 263). water ontologies are understood as multiple water realities or ways of being-with-water (harrington, 2017; wilson & inkster, 2018; yates et al., 2017). modern western water ontologies differ drastically from indigenous water ontologies. modernist western ontologies are rooted in scientific rationalism and water is conceived as a resource owned, used, and manipulated by humans (harrington, 2017; wilson & inkster, 2018; yates et al., 2017). indigenous water ontologies, however, are relational (datta, 2015). in indigenous water ontology, water is a living spiritual entity that connects (water-as-lifeblood), 5 mora et al.: honouring water published by scholarship@western, 2022 sustains life, and provides healing to people (baird & plummer, 2013; basdeo & bharadwaj, 2013; mcgregor, 2014; von der porten et al., 2016; wilson & inkster, 2018). indigenous water ontologies should be understood beyond water perceptions or cultural perspectives; indigenous water ontologies are realities built upon historic, cultural, and material processes (blaser, 2014; yates et al., 2017). indigenous water ontologies are absent in the canadian water governance system. the modern water ontology is dominant in the system while indigenous water ontologies are marginalized in water governance arrangements (mcgregor, 2014; yates et al., 2017). if modernist water ontologies are ruling water governance in canada, opportunities for collaborative efforts are challenged. collaborative water governance involves shared understanding and discourses of what water is, and from this understanding how relationships with water are built. it is argued that if this shared understanding is absent then collaborative efforts will be inefficient at addressing the complex water issues known in the context of canadian water governance (harrington, 2017). indigenous knowledges’ importance and challenges in collaborative water governance complex water problems affecting different people demand solutions based on different types of knowledges including indigenous knowledges (von der porten et al., 2016). indigenous knowledges are referred to as holistic ways of knowing that open space for sustainable environmental governance models (including water governance) aware of indigenous peoples demands and inherent rights (tengö et al., 2017; von der porten et al., 2016). indigenous knowledges symbolize collective adaptive processes that gather practices, interactions, and interconnections between alive and non-alive beings in equal relationships (battiste, 2008; golden et al., 2016; hart, 2010; kealiikanakaoleohaililani & giardina, 2016; muir et al., 2010). indigenous knowledges are claimed from ethical arguments that seek respectful and responsive spaces of indigenous priorities and needs in water governance (castleden et al., 2017; wilson et al., 2015). challenges, however, are present: “balancing multiple forms of knowledge remains a challenging component of water governance as many water worldviews exist, sometimes in complete opposition to one another” (simms & de loë, 2010, p. 12). water decision-making is based on western scientific knowledge (castleden et al., 2017; von der porten et al., 2016) leaving holistic contributions of indigenous knowledges overlooked (maclean, 2015). the lack of acknowledgement of indigenous knowledges inherent value perpetuates power asymmetries (mignolo, 2009; rathwell et al., 2015). indigenous knowledge has been disregarded and there have not been enough pragmatic bridges to interconnect oral and written forms of knowledge into the discussions around water governance (castleden et al., 2017; von der porten et al., 2016), thereby undervaluing indigenous oral experiences into the conversations and decision-making processes of water governance (day et al., 2020). given that collaborative water governance requires real efforts of bridging different knowledge systems by valuing and acknowledging indigenous water ontologies and epistemologies, in partnership with mnfn a collaborative water governance framework was co-developed as an alternative water governance structure to the canadian system that may more effectively respond to the existing water challenges in mnfn. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14271 methods research setting located in treaty 6 territory in saskatchewan, canada, approximately 77 kilometers southwest of the city of prince albert and 120 kilometers north of saskatoon, the cree first nation mistawasis nêhiyawak covers an area of 120 square kilometers with 681inhabitats registered by 2016 (statistics canada, 2016). mnfn is within the north saskatchewan river watershed nsrw (see figure 1) (saskatchewan watershed authority, 2007). the nsrw covers an area of 41,000 km2 and includes 51 rural municipalities, 29 first nations lands and 17 reserves. the north saskatchewan river begins in the columbia icefields in the rocky mountains of alberta, flows north-easterly towards saskatchewan to the south saskatchewan river, travels across manitoba, and drains into hudson’s bay. in saskatchewan, the nsrw includes the battle river, eagle creek, and the goose lake internal drainage basin while the physio-geographic regions identified in the province are the missouri coteau upland, the saskatchewan upland, and the saskatchewan rivers plain where mnfn is located (saskatchewan watershed authority, 2007). the 2013 nsrw environmental risk scan and assessment identified droughts and flooding due to runoff from intense thunderstorms as two main hydrological concerns (council, 2013). 7 mora et al.: honouring water published by scholarship@western, 2022 figure 1. mistawasis nêhiyawak in saskatchewan – canada (treaty 6) 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14271 mnfn experienced extreme flooding in 2011 and 2014 as a result of heavy snowfalls in winter coupled with early rapid snowmelt and heavy rains in spring. during this time, the nation experienced elevated water levels which damaged dams and levees used to prevent flooding impacts (thapa et al., 2019). the well-being of mnfn members have been negatively impacted by contamination of water sources, deterioration of riparian habitat, road infrastructure, and displacement of people from their homes (dawe, 2016; thapa et al., 2019). in the nsrw, water decision-making is shared between the water security agency (provincial government), local rural municipalities, indigenous communities, and landowners on a microscale (conversation with katherine finn, nsrcb manager, aug 2019). however, mnfn has water decisionmaking powers only within the boundaries of their reserve and treaty entitlement lands. outside the reserve, mnfn influence on water decisions depends on their leadership and capacity to build partnerships with neighbouring municipalities and other water stakeholders in the watershed. as a result of this water governance reality, mnfn water issues require approaches based on collaborations, shared capacity, and resources between them and water stakeholders in the watershed. following flooding in 2014, mnfn chief and council invited federal and provincial government organizations (environment canada, indigenous services canada and water security agency), rural municipalities (leask and canwood), a treasury board crown corporation (saskatchewan research council), a non-profit river basin council (north saskatchewan river basin council) and an academic institution (the school of environment and sustainability at the university of saskatchewan) to mnfn to initiate conversations and to develop partnerships to find, resolve, and apply solutions to their flooding issues. four meetings were held in the nation over a year. as an outcome of these meetings and with the support of invited partners, mnfn developed a three-year project called “honor the water.” this project, initiated in 2015, focused on source water protection, drainage studies and the implementation of innovative drainage systems for the prevention of flooding in the nation. the honor the water project grew beyond its initial goals and transformed into a mission to develop holistic water governance and management approaches for the benefit of water and the nation’s people. it opened up opportunities for mnfn to engage and develop long-term partnerships, and long-lasting friendships with non-indigenous water stakeholders within the nsrws who were interested in its governance. partnerships with the nsrbc and the school of environment and sustainability led to the co-development of successful proposals addressing climate change, health, and flooding. the codevelopment of the water governance framework, described herein, was one such project born through partnership development and directly contributed to the mission of honouring water in the nation. positionality and building relations driven by shared interests, four authors participated in this research. the first author (mora) latin scholar self-identified as ‘mestiza’ acknowledging the blend of indigenous and spanish roots as a result of colonization in south america. her work experience with indigenous communities in her home country informs her perspectives and critical reflections about diversity and the recognition of different 9 mora et al.: honouring water published by scholarship@western, 2022 ways of being, thinking, learning, and living. the second author (johnston) is an indigenous leader from mn and co-researcher for this research and lead of the honour the water project. as a descendant of chief mistawasis, who first signed treaty 6, johnston believes in and works towards real processes of reconciliation and partnerships with non-indigenous people as means to heal colonization legacies. the third author (watson) is a young women leader and member of mn and the second co-researcher for this research. her interest in the traditional relationship between water and women in her community guided her to learn how to honour water from her knowledge keepers. she was also part of the honour the water project and works as a member of the land committee. the fourth author (bharadwaj) is a non-indigenous scholar who has developed research relations with various first nations and indigenous groups in saskatchewan in the area of environmental health over the past 20 years. the research was codeveloped and was built on trustful relationships with people in mnfn. the first and fourth authors in the research are considered ‘outsiders’ as they are non-indigenous people. from an outsider positionality, there could be inherent western scientific biases that might have influenced the interpretation of the knowledge shared and data collected throughout the research process. nonetheless, the active participation of the two indigenous co-researchers contributed to be mindful of the possible bias while developing participative, trustful, and respectful approaches along the research process. the first author, who collected data in mnfn together with the two co-researchers, engaged with people in the nation by sharing common backgrounds and stories of marginalization and struggles in colonized societies. shared experiences opened spaces for dialogue and empathy that helped to engage, connect, and build solid and lasting friendships. a strong friendship among the research team was developed before the research activity. time to evolve and develop friendships opened up many opportunities to learn about mnfn history, culture, protocols, and aspirations for the wellbeing of their people and their land. participation in cultural events (e.g., pow wow, treaty day, and summer cultural camps) activities in the schools and various meetings occurred during this pre-research phase. this period provided space for horizontal and respectful dialogue along our research journey. research design and ethical consideration delineated within qualitative transformative research (kovach, 2009), this research was guided by the principles of community-based participatory research (cbpr) prioritizing the community’s issues, interests, and goals as the main objectives in all stages of the research (adams et al., 2014). the research process, co-developed to meet the needs of mnfn, consisted of six sequential stages: community engagement, literature review, semi-structured interviews, data analysis and presentation to mfn member participants, focus groups, which was followed by another phase of data analysis and presentation to co-researchers (see figure 2). iterative processes of learning and reflection were incorporated within the six stages to create spaces for communication and learning opportunities between researchers, co-researchers, and research participants (ball & janyst, 2008). 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14271 figure 2. research design – six sequential stages the research goals, objectives and process were presented to chief and council and mnfn members before community member engagement and initiation of research activity. this research was approved by the behavioral research ethics board of the university of saskatchewan (certificate number rebbeh-17-237). data gathering methods data was gathered by semi-systematic literature reviews, semi-structured interviews, and focus groups. data gathering was conducted by the first author (mora) and supported by the second and third authors (johnston and watson). literature review. a semi-systematic literature review was conducted to examine published literature on collaborative water governance. semi-systematic reviews do not intend to find all empirical evidence of any specific topic, but rather “look at how research within a selected field has progressed over time or how a topic has developed across research traditions” (snyder, 2019, p. 335). the main question guiding the review was: what does collaborative water governance entail in canadian indigenous contexts? the review objectives were to understand the meaning of collaborative water governance and to identify key aspects or elements of collaborative water governance. this information was shared with mnfn participants to initiate conversations around collaborative water governance and as a starting point to co-build a water governance framework. 11 mora et al.: honouring water published by scholarship@western, 2022 the review was conducted from may to august 2018 using four academic data bases (web of science, sci verse scopus, academic search complete, and google scholar) and key terms used included “water governance” and “collaborative.” duplicates were removed and the review involved a two-step screening process. firstly, records with two or more keyword combinations in the title and/or abstract were selected. secondly, articles were limited to peer-reviewed, english language, canadian context and published between 2000 and 2018. records were exported to microsoft excel (microsoft corporation 2013) for full text-review. questions used to select the final sample were: i) is collaboration an approach used to discuss water governance? ii) is participation and/or partnerships described as part of collaborative water governance? iii) is collaborative water governance linked to bridging knowledge systems? iv) does the article refer to self-determination? v) does the article mention reconciliation in the discussion? main themes were subsequently identified. semi-structured interviews. semi-structured interviews were conducted between september 2018 to january 2019 to gather information on the meaning of water and water governance, water issues and challenges experienced, participation in water decision-making, and water responsibility. thirteen community members were purposefully selected by the co-researchers (eight males and five females). among the participants were local leaders, elders, and community department, project, and water managers. tobacco was offered to each participant as a symbol of gratitude for their time and knowledge shared. interviews took place at places where participants felt most comfortable such as the health centre, the band office, and the buffalo iron centre. interviews were audio-recorded, transcribed, and provided back to participants for review and validation. focus groups. two focus groups were conducted in march and may 2019. an elder was invited with a tobacco offering to provide an opening and closing prayer at both focus groups. the first was held in march 2019 at the buffalo center in mnfn. eight adults participated (from 20-70 years old, four males and four females) and were purposefully selected by the co-researchers. participants included local leaders including women and elders and members who participated in interviews. some new participants were also invited. the first focus group was initiated with a presentation of the key elements of collaborative water governance that were identified through the literature review. a conceptual model of these key elements was presented (see figure 3) to initiate conversations around collaborative water governance. interview results about the meaning of water governance, dialogue, partnerships, water responsibilities, and participation were also shared. following these presentations participants engaged to co-build the mnfn water governance framework. the process for co-creating a water governance framework required finding symbolic representation of concepts that were abstract to participants. the initial question guiding this focus group activity was ‘if there is a symbolic representation of water governance, what should it look like?’ participants identified key water governance elements and corresponding symbolic representation for those key elements. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14271 figure 3. collaborative water governance conceptual model the second focus group was conducted in may 2019 in the mistawasis nêhiyawak high school with eight students from grade 12 (six girls and two boys). participants were purposefully selected by the coresearchers and the high school principal. the main purpose of this focus group was to bring younger voices into the framework. the framework co-built with participants in the first focus group was presented to the youth for discussion. the questions guiding youth discussions were: i) what does water mean to you? ii) what should water decision-making look like for you? iii) what elements are important in the framework? iv) what elements are missing in the framework? their responses were used to complement the framework. all focus group participants contributed to the co-creation of the water governance framework for mnfn. focus groups were audio-recorded, and notes were taken by the first author (mora) using flipcharts. focus group data was transcribed and provided back to participants for review and validation. data analysis two stages of data analysis were performed. literature was analysed and followed by the analysis of information gathered through interviews and focus groups. initial analysis was performed by the first author (mora) and results were subsequently shared with co-researchers and research participants for validation. literature review. qualitative analysis followed inductive approaches to identify the meaning and theoretical components of collaborative water governance in canada. a final sample of 208 records was reviewed, imported to nvivo software and main theoretical themes (e.g., collaboration, selfdetermination, indigenous ontologies and epistemologies, participation, relationships, partnerships, colonization legacies, etc.) were identified providing the theoretical basis needed to inform interviews 13 mora et al.: honouring water published by scholarship@western, 2022 and focus groups activities. four elements were found to be key to collaborative arrangements for the achievement and practice of decolonized efforts in collaborative water governance, the recognition of self-determination of first nations, the incorporation of different ontologies and knowledge systems, collective formal arrangements for shared decision-making, and efforts towards co-building long-term and trustful relationships. a conceptual model was developed, and its elements were not considered prescriptive and other elements could be suggested by water stakeholders and right holders at specific times or geographic locations. interviews and focus groups. inductive qualitative approaches were applied to data gathered through interviews and focus groups. transcription data collected from the interviews and focus groups were imported to nvivo qualitative research software package, version 8.0. (july august 2019). analysis followed inductive approaches by labelling main units and grouping them into themes (e.g., the meaning of water, water decision-making, local leaders, government roles, community participation, nêhiyawak culture, flooding, drinking water, lakes, tk, among others). additional themes obtained through the literature review were added (e.g., colonization legacies, power asymmetries, blending knowledge systems, collaborative water governance, water ontologies and indigenous knowledge). themes were reviewed by the second and third author (johnston and watson). results the mistawasis nêhiyawak honour the water governance framework the framework was named ‘the mistawasis nêhiyawak honour the water governance framework’ by research participants. for participants, water deserved honour in the sense of respect and protection because water represented a sacred entity and life: “[water] it’s the spirit that brings life to the community” (focus group, march 2019). all participants referred to the strong connection between water and life. expressions such as ‘water is life’, ‘water is the essence of life’, or that ‘water is the basis of existence’ were commonly mentioned. the connection between water and life helped participants to identify how water governance should look like in mnfn. water governance for participants was represented as a tree: “a tree is the image to represent what we're talking about here, a big strong birch, the tree of life, it’s a strong foundation” (focus group, march 2019). according to participants, the image of the tree (therefore the image of water governance) should look tall, strong, and healthy evidencing the wellness or the wellbeing of the tree. for participants, the wellbeing of the tree (water governance) assured the wellbeing of water and the people living in the nation. participants also stated that the tree (water governance) should be rooted in mother earth, the nurturer that will provide the nutrients needed for the tree to grow healthy. participants also indicated that it was important to have a vision for the water governance framework. participants referred to this vision as a promise that they would make as a nation. they stated: “mistawasis nêhiyawak recognizes the shared responsibility to protect, conserve, and maintain water for present and future generations.” for participants, water governance implied a sense of shared responsibility between people in mnfn and outside of the nation. water governance represented a collective work to protect and care for water for the wellbeing of water, people, and life. participants also mentioned the mistawasis nêhiyawak honour the water governance framework should be seen as a 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14271 dynamic system, constantly changing, and adapting to the present and future generations’ needs. the framework also presented represents a holistic acknowledgement that water governance should be inclusive in mnfn it [the framework] means that it’s holistic, comprehensive, all the opinions and views have to be included whether or not you believe in the traditional, you have to be respectful of everybody's views and opinions (focus group, may 2019). participants also identified the different parts of the tree (roots, trunk, and branches) with elements they thought important in the governance of water according to the mn worldviews (see figure 4). these elements are discussed in the subsections below. figure 4. mistawasis nêhiyawak water governance framework – the tree of life the nêhiyawak sacredness in water governance: the roots of the framework the nêhiyawak sacredness is represented in the roots of the tree. like roots of a tree, underground branches, connected to mother earth, so is the nêhiyawak sacredness. this sacredness provides the ‘nutrients’ or the foundation of who the nêhiyawak people are their values, identity, knowledge, and selfdetermination. for the governance of water, participants associated four main elements as the underground roots connected to mother earth. these four elements were the nêhiyawak values, the nêhiyawak identity, the nêhiyawak tk, and self-determination. 15 mora et al.: honouring water published by scholarship@western, 2022 participants identified the nêhiyawak values as the guiding principles or standards of behaviour guiding people, actions, and decisions within water governance. one of the participants referred to the importance of these values: mistawasis have been really working towards getting back to our traditional values and beliefs, our cultural way. we got the seven sacred teachings. i think those are the important ones to understand them. not only to guide us in making the best decisions for the community and water but to understand the impacts and how it [water] relates not only to us but to everything (interview 12s, october 2018). for participants, the nêhiyawak values of love, respect, courage, honesty, wisdom, humility, and truth provide space for developing an appreciation for water as the life provider. the values also provided the ethical guidelines for the arrangements needed in the governance of water. along with the values, reflections about the nêhiyawak identity were referred to. participants recognized themselves as nêhiyawak people with their own culture, language, worldview, and tk. according to participants, the nêhiyawak identity has been lost over time as part of the legacies of the colonization process. the loss of their identity implied the loss of their relationship with water as the water stewards. by bringing back the nêhiyawak identity the connection and relationship with water would also come back: we're supposed to be protecting mother earth, which includes the water. we’ve lost our role. we’ve lost that identity. we need to bring back our culture and strengthening people’s understanding of our culture, like the water ceremony we did. i think that really opened a lot of people’s eyes that were there, about just how important water is (focus group, march 2019). as part of water governance, participants also discussed tk with particular attention. they referred to the importance of tk for understanding water: i think [tk] it’s a big part of who we are and where we came from, and understanding the land, the water, and the environment. it’s what we observe, it’s about sharing with others and making good decisions about water (focus group, may 2019). by referring to tk, participants also talked about the important role that elders play in water decisionmaking. elders have the experience, the historical perspective, and the understanding of what water is and means: they [elders] should be present whenever decisions should be made because they’re our history. they have to bring the knowledge back to us that we don’t know, the ones that don’t know and haven’t been taught. it’s for them to bring our identity, our roles in protecting water (interview 10c, october 2018) finally, the reflections about tk and water governance opened space for discussion on selfdetermination. self-determination was proposed as the process for relationship-building between first nations and the canadian government from a nation-to-nation standpoint. for participants, the 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14271 recognition of their self-determination includes the recognition of their principles, rules, practices, and knowledge exercised and adapted in time: we want our self-determination, the governance of our own waterways, the funding beyond that to go ahead with certain things, to take care of things for the future for our children (focus group, march 2019). once the foundational elements were identified and formed the roots, participants referred to elements that formed the trunk and branches of the tree. shared dialogue as the trunk in the framework participants identified the need for pathways and spaces for shared dialogue between what they called “water responsible holders,” including indigenous and non-indigenous people. everyone has a responsibility for the well-being of water. the trunk represents shared dialogue and understanding among people’s different perspectives, approaches, and worldviews. participants remembered how shared dialogue was crucial for dealing with the past flooding crisis in the community: when we looked at the water, we dialogued and talked with other key government agencies, as well as technical people, institutions of higher learning, to come collectively to our community to help us resolve the issues of water, issues in the community, we were open to hearing and sharing strategies (…) you’ve got to have that dialogue. if you don’t have that dialogue, how are they [non-indigenous people) going to know what the needs of first nations are (…) dialogue makes us a stronger community when we align ourselves and work with other people, other communities at the same table (focus group, march 2019). by opening spaces for shared dialogue people in mistawasis reached out to different water stakeholders interested in working together with and contributing learning opportunities for the community. for participants, dialogue implied coming “all to the common table,” the table of water decision-making. at this table, everybody has a say, has knowledge and experience to share, and has power of decisionmaking. the trunk represents the means for communication between different worldviews, knowledges, and perspectives. shared dialogue represented for participants the strategy for achieving common goals by recognizing the responsibility that every actor (e.g., government, local communities, industries, and non-governmental organizations) has in the governance of water. elements needed to honour water: the growing branches and leaves honouring water is an action needed for the water governance system to grow and keep strong. the mfn participants identified five main elements to honour water, these include empowerment and leadership, community participation and responsibility, sustainable water management, collaboration and partnerships, and blending different knowledge systems. according to the research participants, the branches and leaves in the framework are related to specific tasks the community needs to work on for the tree (governance system) to keep growing. as the branches and leaves in the tree are responsible for 17 mora et al.: honouring water published by scholarship@western, 2022 converting sunlight into chemical energy for the growth and health of the tree, the actions to honour water provided the energy required for the water governance system to keep growing strong. empowerment and leadership. according to participants, water governance in mnfn requires local strong and empowered leaders to guide water decision-making. for participants, leadership in the nation should be given to elders and youth. elders or knowledge holders represent the wisdom, the knowledge, the experience, the learning, and the history while youth were seen as the future of their community: elders should play a big role in water decision-making. elders have that knowledge from the past and that understanding of water that a lot of us take for granted and don’t have anymore. they know what it’s like to have to haul water or to have to work hard to get to your water. nowadays, people just turn on a tap and they have water right there. they take it for granted so much. those elders have that respect for water, and they know what it took to get that water before. if they can bring that perspective to the table and help people understand just how important it is, then i think that they should be (interview 02d, october 2018). they’ve [the youth] gotta be part of the decision making because they are our future. you’ve gotta let them have that participation. that’s important for the leadership to bring this younger generation in and teach them that. they should be included in everything that they do with water so that they’ll know and they’ll understand what it is that we need to do. when it comes time for them to lead us now, they’ll only be that much stronger because they’ll have that background, and that information, and that understanding of water that they need to make proper decisions (focus group, march 2019). for participants, knowledge holders and youth should be more involved as leaders in water decisionmaking. elders are the source of knowledge needed for decisions and the youth is the future, the human resource the nation has for their survival as nêhiyawak people. although elders have been included in water decision making at some points, leadership roles are missing, and the same situation happens for the youth. community participation and responsibility. another element identified was the promotion of community participation and responsibility. community members in mnfn require to be actively involved in water decision-making as responsible holders in the water governance system. for research participants, participation issues are present in the nation because not all members are aware of their role as active decision-makers: i think there’s an incorrect community view that individuals or families or households aren’t involved in water decision making, i think that’s wrong. all community members should be involved, should take responsibility, and ask to be part of that process, rather than just say "oh, it’s somebody else’s responsibility." i think maybe for the community as a whole, we have to take that same view, that it’s not the responsibility of the federal government or the province, it’s not somebody else’s responsibility, it has to be the responsibility of mistawasis as a whole (focus group, march 2019). 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14271 participants reflected on the community’s awareness about the responsibility each person has over water, the decisions taken and how those decisions affect water and people’s lives. participants agreed that when people lose their responsibility to water, they also lose their connection and relationship with water, and this loss is what is preventing the community from honouring water. solutions or strategies to increase participation included (re)learning processes about the sacred relationship between people and water. sustainable water management. for participants, sustainable water management was referred to as the actions the nation needs to do to maintain a holistic and sustainable approach to water management. for the sustainable management of water, participants identified two first tasks: updating the community’s source water protection plan and working on environmental education to community members about water protection. participants identified these two activities require technicians or staff trained in environmental skills, education skills, and the availability of financial resources for covering expenses required. nonetheless, technical and financial resources are scarce in the nation representing constant obstacles in the management of water. one of the participants referred to the issues the nation faced regarding water monitoring: there's monitoring that needs to go on there to ensure that the garbage there isn't leaking into our aquifers, our groundwater source. there's no set schedule for that, there is no set guideline for that. but is there enough resources? in the community, no, there isn't. we don't have the finances in place to actually do that type of work. so in order for us to have these things in place, that does take money and time, people (focus group, march 2019). participants agreed the lack of technical and financial resources represent important barriers in the governance of water for this nation. nonetheless, these obstacles have been partially addressed through collaborative efforts with external partners. collaboration and partnerships. due to the lack of technical and financial resources explained before, participants and leaders in mnfn considered the importance of collaborative work by building trustful partnerships with indigenous and non-indigenous water responsible holders. the water problems mnfn faced, have been addressed mostly through trustful relationships built in the past. participants considered collaboration and partnerships as strategic resources for water governance: i think we've made many good connections with others. our partners, our ngos, the university, and from time to time, different levels of government. so we have those connections. but what we don't have yet is sort of a commonly understood way of working together. so it's fairly informal, but i think we're looking at ways to (focus group, march 2019). at times, we don't really realize how, perhaps, organized we are, but i think outside observers see that we're doing something together. but we don't have anything on paper, it's not defined. it's sort of an informal relationship right now, but i think there's a need to give it a definition because something is working good here (01a interview, october 2018) 19 mora et al.: honouring water published by scholarship@western, 2022 the good partnerships experienced in the community represented opportunities for finding spaces of collaborative understanding between people in mistawasis and outsiders. blending different knowledge systems. the last element identified in the branches was blending different knowledge systems as the opportunity for bringing together indigenous knowledges and western science as complementary for solving water issues in mnfn. by partnering with different organizations, spaces for inclusion of indigenous and western knowledges from a complementary perspective have been experienced in mistawasis. participants saw blending knowledge systems as the strategy for making better decisions: bringing both aspects of what traditionally all those keepers have and mix that into more contemporary aspects of how water quality should be monitored and engaged by blending both traditional philosophies in nêhiyawak but also the more modern-day aspects of what water regulatory standards mean to everybody (…) i think as we start to reconnect to land and water and have this other [western] knowledge and data, then we’ll make better decisions (focus group, march 2019). the combination of the elements placed in the roots, trunk, branches, and leaves represented the meaning of water governance from a collaborative perspective in mn. finally, participants stated their mission for water governance as a nêhiyawak community. the mission entailed notions of shared responsibility for protecting water in the present and the future. the last goal is the achievement of a beautiful or good life for water and people. discussion confronting hegemonic water governance ontologies and epistemologies in canada the mistawasis nêhiyawak honour the water governance framework is based on and composed of elements that represent the mnfn worldviews, culture, and values, (roots); the importance of shared dialogue in water governance (trunk); and specific tasks or actions the community is aiming to strengthen in the governance of water (branches and leaves). the elements in the framework confront current hegemonic water governance structures and systems in canada. the framework defies water governance to recognize and understand indigenous water ontologies and epistemologies historically relegated and underrepresented in canada (basdeo & bharadwaj, 2013; day et al., 2020; von der porten & de loë, 2013a). from the nêhiyawak worldviews and tk, water is life, it owns spirituality and sacredness. from this conceptualization, people in mnfn aim to develop a sociocultural relationship with water based on respect and honour. according to wilson (2014), the sociocultural relationships or “indigenous hydrosocial relations” are determined by the principles, beliefs, and knowledge indigenous people have, and from these hydrosocial relationships actions taken in water governance are delineated. the values, knowledge, and beliefs people in mnfn have are represented in the framework proposed, and from this knowledge system, the actions that will help the nation to honour water and honour water governance are delineated. the framework co-built with mnfn differs from dominant approaches that focused on the materiality of water as a resource to be used and having an economic value as the most important quality. the radical difference between indigenous ontologies and dominant western 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14271 ontologies is crucial for the practice and actions in water governance. for example, the incorporation of integrated approaches in water governance that will conceive “water-as-a-lifeblood” rather than “wateras-a-resource” in british columbia, canada is discussed (yates et al., 2017). hegemonic approaches divide water by its uses (e.g., drinking water, water for irrigation, etc.) and these approaches are the rulers of water governance and policies. the authors stated that alternative ontologies might develop different policies and actions that will conceive water as an interconnected system where humans and non-humans are constituent to the system, and they are connected. water governance requires the incorporation of indigenous ontologies and epistemologies beyond cultural constructions or beliefs. indigenous ontologies and epistemologies are official proclamations towards self-determination: “indigenous epistemologies and ontologies represent legal orders, legal orders through which indigenous peoples throughout the world are fighting for self-determination” (todd, 2016, p. 18). water ontologies represent a site of ‘political contest’ because in this space intersects multiple and diverse water worlds while challenging western ontologies dominant in the governance of water (yates et al., 2017). in canada, efforts towards the inclusion of indigenous ontologies and epistemologies in the governance of water are found. for example, arsenault et al. (2018) presented the influence of indigenous knowledge in the negotiations and policy agreements on great lakes water quality. after years of advocacy, the chiefs of ontario working with elders and knowledge keepers representing 133 first nations in ontario influenced and changed water policy and governance. by incorporating indigenous knowledge innovative water policy frameworks were developed such as the great lakes water quality agreement between canada and united states in 2012, the canada-ontario agreement on great lakes water quality and ecosystem health (coa) in 2014, or the great lakes protection act in 2015. decolonized water governance through equal dialogue and meaningful cooperation based on the sacredness of water, the mistawasis nêhiyawak honour the water governance framework suggests dialogue as the central axis in the governance of water. the framework calls for shared dialogue in equal conditions where dialogical approaches of complementarity between indigenous and western knowledges are the strategy for reaching more sustainable and holistic outcomes in the governance of water. from a complementary perspective, dialogue as the main axis (the trunk) connects internally the community (the roots), with actions and interactions among water responsible holders inside and outside the community (the branches and leaves). from mnfn worldviews and thinking, dialogue should open equal spaces for different ways-of-being-with-water, representation, participation, and learning opportunities in the governance of water. mnfn is calling for new and meaningful forms of collaboration in water governance as other indigenous nations are doing in canada. for example, yates et al. (2017) refer to experiences in the okanagan region of british columbia, where indigenous peoples use the philosophy of en’owkin, the process of consensus-making dialogue “that nurtures voluntary cooperation and which recognizes that existing life forms have status, rights and privileges that are equal to humans, and which must be protected” (p. 808). for mnfn, their framework is advocating for a collaborative dialogue that recognises multiple ontologies aware of the sacred value of water. the sacredness of water demands a relationship between humans and water based on the honour and respect water deserves. by incorporating mnfn water ontologies, the framework advocates for the affirmation of their indigenous laws, worldviews, and knowledge to govern, to relate, to be-with water. 21 mora et al.: honouring water published by scholarship@western, 2022 from this research, we have also found that the mistawasis nêhiyawak honour the water governance framework represents a bottom-up governance approach that differs drastically from the top-down centralized water governance model usually exercised in canada. the structure of water governance grows from mistawasis identified as a nêhiyawak community in the right to assert their self-governance, legitimize their tk, and recognize their identity as nêhiyawak people. crucial aspects for collaborative efforts in the governance of water. the vision the mistawasis nêhiyawak honour the water governance framework evidences the call mistawasis is doing for de-construction of hegemonic colonial water governance systems towards the co-construction of shared processes of participation, decision-making and responsibility while acknowledging mistawasis nêhiyawak knowledge, culture, self-determination, and their ways of being-with-water. the process for building the honour the water framework represented a decolonized effort in research in saskatchewan and canada. nonetheless, it will be naïve to say that the framework represents the perspective of every single nation member in mistawasis nêhiyawak, and that could be considered as one limitation of this study. this study represents the experience, knowledge, and aspirations that some members of mnfn have about water governance, the importance of collaboration and partnerships through inclusive and respectful dialogue. conclusions for indigenous peoples in canada, water issues and crises represent historical political conflicts of power. the solutions proposed so far demand the inclusion of collaborative approaches that will force the water governance system to structural changes aware of the recognition of water ontological disjuncture. the mistawasis nêhiyawak honour the water governance framework proposes a collaborative approach for the de-construction of hegemonic colonial water governance systems towards the co-construction of shared processes of water participation, decision-making, and responsibility by acknowledging different ways of being-with-water. the framework challenges water governance from overcoming cultural barriers to opening spaces for dialogue among multiple ontologies. the framework also represents a bottom-up approach to understand how to relate to water. by understanding water as life and sacred, the ethical guidelines in the water governance system change placing stewardship, relationships, partnerships as the key elements components in this system. the relevance of these components could potentially force decision-makers to change perspectives that tend to divide water by its use. ontological disjunctures are real and present in water governance; nonetheless, these disjunctures should be used for reformulating water governance from a complementary perspective and towards meaningful and inclusive water governance approaches respectful of indigenous authority over their wellbeing. this study contributes to the increasing debate regarding the importance of de-colonizing water governance in canada. new forms of governance are emerging in canada, and the mnfn framework is one of them. the mistawasis nêhiyawak honour the water governance framework provides important insights about perspectives and understandings that are omitted but needed when dealing with current water governance issues. the incorporation of this framework however requires that water governance systems are aware of legal pluralism that will affirm indigenous ontologies, knowledge, and laws. as rathwell et al. 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(2017). multiple ontologies of water: politics, conflict and implications for governance. environment and planning d: society and space, 35(5), 797–815. https://doi.org/10.1177/0263775817700395 https://doi.org/10.2166/wp.2013.046 https://doi.org/10.3138/jcs.2016.50.1.214 https://doi.org/10.1017/s146604661500006x https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geoforum.2014.08.005 https://doi.org/10.3390/w11071470 https://doi.org/10.1177/2514848618789378 https://doi.org/10.14430/arctic4459 https://doi.org/10.1177/0263775817700395 factors affecting initiation and duration of breastfeeding among off-reserve indigenous children in canada the international indigenous policy journal volume 10 | issue 1 article 5 january 2019 factors affecting initiation and duration of breastfeeding among off-reserve indigenous children in canada isabella romano university of waterloo, iromano@uwaterloo.ca martin cooke university of waterloo piotr wilk western university recommended citation romano, i. , cooke, m. , wilk, p. (2019). factors affecting initiation and duration of breastfeeding among off-reserve indigenous children in canada. the international indigenous policy journal, 10(1). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.5 factors affecting initiation and duration of breastfeeding among offreserve indigenous children in canada abstract indigenous children in canada are less likely to be breastfed compared to non-indigenous children; however, little information about rates and correlates of breastfeeding exist. we used a nationally representative survey to examine breastfeeding initiation (n = 9,330) and duration (n = 6,760) among first nations, métis, and inuit children. in our sample, 72.5% of children had been breastfed, and 57.9% of these individuals were breastfed until six months. factors associated with increased breastfeeding included mothers’ educational attainment, children’s weight at birth, mothers' residential school attendance, and region of residence. having indian status and lower household income were associated with lower breastfeeding initiation and duration. our findings suggest that targeted efforts to encourage and support breastfeeding among indigenous women are needed. additional research using contemporary data are required in canada. keywords indigenous population, breastfeeding, children’s health acknowledgments the authors would like to sincerely acknowledge and thank christopher j. ryan, msc, who provided consultation and support during the early stages of data analysis. disclaimer this research uses anonymous secondary data that are publicly available and was therefore not reviewed by a research ethics board (reb). the authors have no conflicts of interest to declare. this research was supported in part by a canadian institutes of health research operating grant. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ factors affecting initiation and duration of breastfeeding of off-reserve indigenous children in canada breastfeeding is one of the most effective means of promoting infant and child health. nutritional, hormonal, and microbial contents of mothers’ milk have short-term benefits in reducing the risk of respiratory infections and diarrhea among infants, and there is evidence of longer term effects that are associated with higher intelligence, lower risk of becoming overweight or obese, and being less likely to develop type ii diabetes (horta, loret de mola, & victora, 2015a, 2015b; victora et al., 2016). breastfeeding also has implications for mothers’ health through a reduced risk of developing ovarian and breast cancers (victora et al., 2016). the world health organization (2003) has recommended that breastfeeding be the exclusive mode of feeding for at least six months, and it should be continued for at least two years (see also kramer & kakuma, 2004). these recommendations have been adopted in canada (bank, 2012; critch, 2014) and the united states (eidelman, 2012). the percentage of canadian infants initially breastfed is high, with estimates at 90.3% in 2006, the year of the data used in our analysis (al-sahab, lanes, feldman, & tamim, 2010). rates of continuation are low, however, with only 13.8% of babies being breastfed exclusively for six months (al-sahab et al., 2010). both breastfeeding initiation and duration have been found to be associated with socioeconomic and demographic factors. in high-income countries, such as canada, higher education and family income are associated with higher rates of breastfeeding; whereas in lowand middle-income countries, children from impoverished households are most likely to be breastfed. studies of breastfeeding in the united states and australia have also found racial and ethnic differences in breastfeeding initiation and duration, both among indigenous groups and other racialized minority communities (adams et al., 2016; jones, power, queenan, & schulkin, 2015; thulier & mercer, 2009). breastfeeding is part of a web of social, behavioral, and biological determinants that affect the health of north american indigenous children (greenwood & de leeuw, 2012). within first nations, métis, and inuit communities, it is often viewed as an important practice that allows a mother to offer nourishment, protection, and comfort to her children, and traditionally would have been combined with other feeding practices for as long as five years (best start resource centre, 2013). as in the united states and australia, colonization and the loss of traditional culture, as well as the lower average socioeconomic status of indigenous populations, likely contribute to lower rates of breastfeeding among indigenous mothers and their children in canada. results from the 2009 to 2010 canadian community health survey (cchs) estimated breastfeeding initiation at 77.8% among indigenous mothers and 88.0% among non-indigenous mothers (health canada, 2012a). the percentage of indigenous mothers who had breastfed their last child for six months or more was 16.5%, compared with 26.7% of nonindigenous women (health canada, 2012b). these results represent the most recent published source of canadian breastfeeding statistics providing nationally representative comparisons of indigenous and non-indigenous women. given the strong traditional cultural ties to breastfeeding among indigenous peoples in canada, the inequitable discrepancy between belief and practice is particularly concerning from a public health and sociodemographic perspective. the issue deserves important consideration of the indigenous-specific factors influencing breastfeeding initiation and duration. indigenous youth— one of the fastest growing groups in canada—should be prioritized in health planning and promotion efforts that aim to build a healthier future, especially in relation to maternal and child health. 1 romano et al.: breastfeeding of indigenous children in canada published by scholarship@western, 2019 although lower socioeconomic status, measured in terms of income and education, has been associated with lower breastfeeding initiation and duration among canadian women (health canada, 2012a, 2012b), there has been no analysis of the factors that predict breastfeeding among indigenous women. the objective of our research has been to utilize this most recent set of nationally representative data on breastfeeding among off-reserve indigenous children, in order to emphasize the importance of these efforts at a public health and policy level. our analysis examined associations between characteristics of indigenous children and their households, including parents’ and children’s indigenous identity and residential schooling experience, and breastfeeding initiation and duration. theoretical framework we have adopted the life-course perspective as a theoretical framework through which to view the implications of breastfeeding practices on health and wellbeing within the context of indigenous-specific determinants of health. the life-course perspective frames health outcomes as influenced by early life events and further shaped by the broader social circumstances within which lives are situated (cable, 2014). provided the list of proximal and distal health benefits that breastfeeding has been shown to offer children and their mothers, adoption of this theoretical approach to understanding the importance of breastfeeding on life-course trajectories is warranted. this approach has been used previously in public health research addressing the wellbeing of indigenous populations (cooke & mcwhirter, 2011; estey, kmetic, & reading, 2007). moreover, this framework may help define breastfeeding practices as important trajectory outcomes in and of themselves. we hope to demonstrate an example of how the social, cultural, historical, and political environments experienced by indigenous peoples in canada work to shape breastfeeding practices that may, in turn, also influence the life-course trajectories of subsequent generations of indigenous children (estey et al., 2007). as such, several components of our analysis reflect important environmental contexts surrounding the predictors of breastfeeding initiation and duration, including measures of socioeconomic status, geographic location, and residential school attendance. according to the life-course perspective, variable life opportunities and obstacles that indigenous people may encounter could play a part in shaping vulnerabilities or resiliencies (cable, 2014), which we suggest may influence breastfeeding practices and patterns. the ongoing impacts of colonization, as well as intergenerational effects of historical trauma, have come to be widely known as important determinants of health status among first nations, métis, and intuit peoples in canada (neufeld, 2017). in adopting the life-course perspective alongside a social equity lens and public health policy approach, we aim to contribute to the area of breastfeeding promotion among indigenous populations in canada. the benefits of breastfeeding during infancy should be further appreciated in light of long-term and broad views of health, as well as the positive traditional beliefs and practices connected to breastfeeding within indigenous communities. by adopting this theoretical framework we hope to shed light on the broader factors influencing the phenomenon under question: why are indigenous children in canada less likely to be breastfed and to be breastfed for a shorter duration than their non-indigenous counterparts? given our use of secondary data from the 2006 aboriginal peoples survey, we are not able to address our research question longitudinally in such a way that informs life-course trajectories. despite this, we apply the life-course 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.5 perspective to our methods by accounting for determinants of breastfeeding that are seemingly distal and historical, such as mothers’ residential school attendance, but which may play an important role in influencing health trajectories of indigenous children throughout their own life-courses. materials and methods data we used the 2006 aboriginal peoples survey (aps) child and youth file to estimate rates of breastfeeding initiation and duration to six months, and to assess the effects of correlates of these practices.1 although there are other national sources of data on breastfeeding by canadian women, particularly the maternal experiences-breastfeeding module of the canadian community health survey (cchs; health canada, 2012a, 2012b) and the 2006 maternity experiences survey (mes; alsahab et al., 2010), those surveys do not include large enough samples to investigate the predictors of breastfeeding initiation or duration among indigenous women. these surveys also do not include detailed information regarding indigenous identity group or other indigenous-specific factors. in particular, we were interested in the potential relationship between mothers’ residential schooling experiences and breastfeeding behaviors, as well as the roles of socioeconomic and geographic indicators. as such, we present findings from the most recent and relevant nationally representative data available in canada. the aps is a voluntary post-censual survey of the population identifying as aboriginal (first nations, métis, or inuit) in the census who live outside of first nations reserve communities.2 data from the aps only represent off-reserve indigenous persons, who constitute the majority of the total indigenous population in canada (kelly-scott & smith, 2015). statistics canada administered the 2006 aps, which had a sample of 61,040 people (statistics canada, 2009). this represented a national population of 623,470 indigenous people living outside of reserves, more than 50% of the total indigenous population in 2006 (nguygen, 2011). the questionnaire was administered by telephone in most regions other than the north where it was administered in person. the 2006 aps was the only wave of the survey to ask respondents about breastfeeding. in the aps, questions about breastfeeding were asked in relation to children, not mothers. the “person most knowledgeable” (pmk) about the child was asked whether the child had ever been breastfed, and if so the duration of breastfeeding in months. the questionnaire collected a range of other information, including the indigenous identities of children and their parents and the educational attainment and age of the pmk. of particular importance, the survey collected information on cultural factors unique to indigenous peoples, including residential school attendance. the dataset also includes household characteristics collected as part of the census, including income. 1 the data for this study were provided by statistics canada through the research data centers program. the conclusions are the authors alone. 2 since the 2006 aps, statistics canada has sampled indigenous populations residing off reserve. in addition, surveys by the first nations information governance centre have collected data from first nations people of all ages living on reserve and in northern first nations communities. 3 romano et al.: breastfeeding of indigenous children in canada published by scholarship@western, 2019 sample the 2006 aps child and youth file sampled 15,660 children aged 6 to 14 years. we limited our analytic sample to the following inclusion criteria: a) children whose biological mother was the pmk, and b) children who were identified by the pmk as indigenous or had at least one parent who was identified as indigenous. a total of 10,210 children remained after deleting those whose pmk was not their biological mother, then 9,880 children remained once non-indigenous children (defined by their own identity or the identity of at least one parent) were removed from the sample. children whose mothers reported not knowing whether they had been breastfed (n = 20 of 9,980, or 0.2%) or the duration of breastfeeding (n = 70 of 7,230, or 1.0%) were excluded, as were cases with missing values for any of the predictors. in total, 6.5% (n = 650) and 6.7% (n = 480) of cases were excluded from the models for initiation and duration of breastfeeding, respectively. a total of 9,330 observations were used in the initiation analysis and 6,760 in the duration analysis. variables outcomes. we examined whether a child had been breastfed at all, as a measure of breastfeeding initiation. we used the responses to the question, “was he/she ever breastfed?” those who responded “yes” were then asked to state how long the child had been breastfed, in months or years. we dichotomized these numerical responses into “less than six months” or “six months or longer,” and we examined breastfeeding duration by estimating the likelihood of a child being breastfed at least six months. child's sex. child’s sex, as reported by mothers, was a binary variable with “female” as the reference group. child's age. child’s age was represented in the models as a continuous variable with a range of 6 to 14 years. child's weight at birth. mothers reported the weight of the child at birth in grams. this variable was converted to kilograms. child's indigenous identity or status. mothers were asked if their child belonged to one of three indigenous identity groups: “first nations (north american indian), métis, or inuk (inuit)” and whether or not the child was “status indian (treaty indian or registered indian)” as defined in the indian act. based on these responses, children were classified into five groups: first nations-status (reference), first nations-non-status, métis, inuit, multiple indigenous identity, and non-indigenous identity.3 due to the way in which the aps sample was chosen using self-identification from the 2006 census, it was possible for non-indigenous children or children with non-indigenous parents to be included in the data. children with non-indigenous identities were only included if at least one of their parents identified as indigenous. 3 in this variable, we combined the concepts of legal indian status under the indian act and indigenous identity. all children in canada who are registered under the act are coded as status first nations. children coded as non-status first nations, inuit, and métis are not registered under the act. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.5 mother’s and father’s indigenous identity. mothers were asked, “which of the following people in [child’s] family have any aboriginal origin? a) his/her mother and b) his/her father.” it was possible for indigenous identity children to have non-indigenous parents. mother's age at birth. mother’s age at the child’s birth was represented as a continuous variable, computed as the difference between mother’s age and child’s age at the time of survey. mother’s residential schooling. mothers were asked if they were “ever a student at a federal residential school or a federal industrial school.”4 this was included as a binary variable, with non-attendance as the reference category. mother's education. mothers were asked whether they had “completed the requirements for a high school diploma or its equivalent.” this was included as a binary variable with not having completed high school as the reference. low-income economic family. the aps dataset contained an indicator of whether a child lived in a family with income below statistics canada’s before-tax low income cut off (lico), which is adjusted for family size and economic region (health canada, 2012b). community type. households were identified as being in urban or rural areas, or in inuit nunaat.5 due to the small numbers of children, inuit nunaat was combined with other rural areas into one category. geographic region. households were categorized into one of six geographical regions of canada (atlantic, quebec, ontario, prairies, british columbia, territories) as defined by the census, with atlantic treated as the referent. statistical analysis we summarized child and family characteristics and compared them across both outcome measures of breastfeeding initiation (ever breastfed vs. never breastfed) and duration (six months or longer vs. less than six months) using c2-tests of independence for categorical measures and t-tests of difference between means for continuous measures. we then estimated three sets of models for each outcome. first, we used binary logistic regression models to assess unadjusted relationships between the predictors and the two outcomes. the sample included children as old as 14, and most of the socioeconomic variables reflected characteristics of households or parents at the time of the survey, not at the time that the child would have been breastfed. in the second set of models, we therefore included only predictors that could be safely considered time invariant, and which were not likely to have changed since the child’s birth. these were the child’s indigenous identity or status, the age of the mother at birth of the child, the child’s weight at birth, indigenous identity of the child’s mother and father, and mother’s residential school attendance. these were included as predictors in multivariate binary logistic regressions. the third set of models included these variables as well as those that were more likely to 4 federal residential or industrial schools, much like american indian boarding schools, refer to the system of christian boarding schools established to assimilate indigenous children into canadian society. 5 inuit homelands (nunavut, nunavik, inuvialuit, and nunatsiavut) are identified as “inuit nunaat” in the 2006 aps. 5 romano et al.: breastfeeding of indigenous children in canada published by scholarship@western, 2019 have changed between the infancy of the child and the time of the survey, including household income, mother’s education, and geography. the multivariate models included child’s age at the time of the survey as a control for the effects of time on recall. the child’s weight at birth was included as a rough proxy for the health of the child and the mother at the time of birth, both of which can affect a child’s ability to be breastfed. we tested linear and quadratic effects for continuous variables and report the best fitting models. sampling and bootstrap weights and the re-sampling procedure recommended by statistics canada were used to account for the multi-stage sampling design employed in the survey and to adjust for nonresponse (statistics canada, 2009). we used sas v.9.4 for analyses (sas institute, 2016). results mothers reported that 72.5% of children had been breastfed. of these children, 57.9% were reported to have been breastfed for at least six months. child and family characteristics by breastfeeding outcomes are reported in table 1a (for categorical measures) and table 1b (for continuous measures). unadjusted odds of having been breastfed were significantly higher for non-status first nations, inuit, mixed indigenous identity, and non-indigenous identity children (table 2, model 1). in the second model, including all time-invariant variables, the adjusted odds of having ever been breastfed were highest for inuit and mixed identity children (model 2). the full model, however, reveals that only nonindigenous identity children were significantly more likely to be breastfed than status first nations children, when controlling for all time-variant variables (model 3). children with older mothers were more likely to have been breastfed in models 1 and 2; however, mother’s age was not significant in the fully adjusted model (model 3). the quadratic effects of mother’s age were shown to have a negative effect on breastfeeding initiation in the first two models (models 1 and 2), meaning that the effect of age lessened at older ages. children with indigenous mothers were less likely to have been breastfed than children whose mothers were non-indigenous (models 1 and 2), but this effect no longer appeared once controlling for time-variant variables (model 3). children with higher birth weights were significantly more likely to have been breastfed in all adjusted and unadjusted models. mothers’ completion of high school was positively associated with children having ever been breastfed, while living in a low-income economic family was negatively associated with initiation (table 2). mothers’ residential schooling was not significantly related to breastfeeding initiation in the unadjusted or adjusted models. there was also no difference between children living in rural or urban areas (models 1 and 3). there were significant regional effects in both models 1 and 2, with children in the province of british columbia having much higher odds of having been breastfed than children in the atlantic region of canada, and children in the territories, ontario, and the prairie provinces also having significantly higher odds of initiation (table 2). 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.5 table 1a. child and family characteristics by breastfeeding outcomes—categorical variables full sample ever breastfed breastfed ≥ 6 months weighted n % c2 (p-value) % c2 (p-value) child’s sex female 4,890 72.8 0.4 (0.539) 57.3 1.0 (0.318) male 4,770 72.2 58.4 child’s identity first nations – status 2,730 69.2 35.1 (<0.0001) 60.3 37.5 (<0.0001) first nations – non-status 1,400 75.0 58.7 métis 2,630 71.5 57.0 inuit 360 75.0 72.0 mixed 160 81.3 50.0 non-indigenous 2,360 75.0 54.6 mother’s indigenous identity indigenous 6,980 71.2 21.7 (<0.0001) 58.2 0.9 (0.353) non-indigenous 2,660 75.9 57.0 father’s indigenous identity indigenous 5,490 72.1 0.7 (0.401) 58.0 0.0 (0.903) non-indigenous 4,170 72.9 57.8 residential schooling mother did not attend 9,270 72.6 2.1 (0.145) 57.5 9.0 (0.003) mother attended 390 69.2 66.7 mother’s education did not complete high school 2,430 62.1 173.4 (<0.0001) 54.7 7.6 (0.006) completed high school 7,230 75.9 58.7 family incomea low income 2,520 66.3 64.8 (<0.0001) 55.7 2.5 (0.113) not low income 6,110 74.8 57.9 community type rural 2,700 72.2 0.13 (0.741) 59.4 2.3 (0.130) urban 6,960 72.6 57.4 7 romano et al.: breastfeeding of indigenous children in canada published by scholarship@western, 2019 table 1a. child and family characteristics by breastfeeding outcomes—categorical variables (continued) full sample ever breastfed breastfed ≥ 6 months weighted n % c2 (p-value) % c2 (p-value) region atlantic (ref.) 690 62.3 215.2 (<0.0001) 48.8 114.3 (<0.001) quebec 1,040 63.5 49.2 ontario 2,450 72.2 54.2 prairies 3,590 71.0 57.7 british columbia 1,480 85.8 68.3 territories 410 75.6 69.0 total 9,660 72.5 57.9 note. sample sizes are weighted and rounded to the nearest 10. ref. = reference category. a low income is defined as income below the before-tax low-income cut-off (lico). does not include the territories. bold values indicate statistical significance at a < 0.05. table 1b. child and family characteristics by breastfeeding outcomes—continuous variables ever breastfed never breastfed breastfed ≥ 6 months breastfed < 6 months mean (sd) t (p-value) mean (sd) t (p-value) child’s agea (years) 10.0 (2.53) 10.3 (2.59) 4.8 (<0.0001) 10.0 (2.52) 10.0 (2.56) 0.7 (0.489) mother’s age at birth (years) 26.9 (5.67) 25.8 (5.82) -8.5 (<0.0001) 27.5 (5.69) 26.1 (5.57) -10.2 (<0.0001) child’s weight at birth (kg) 3.47 (0.59) 3.39 (0.64) -6.7 (<0.0001) 3.51 (0.58) 3.41 (0.61) -7.0 (<0.0001) note. a child’s age at the time of the survey, in 2006, as reported by the child’s person most knowledgeable (pmk). bold values indicate statistical significance at a < 0.05. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.5 table 2. logistic regression models predicting odds of a child ever having been breastfed model 1 model 2 model 3 odds ratios (95% ci) child’s agea (years) 0.96 (0.94 – 0.98) 0.96 (0.94 – 0.99) 0.95 (0.93 – 0.98) child’s sex female (ref.) 1.00 1.00 1.00 male 0.98 (0.86 – 1.09) 0.97 (0.85 – 1.09) 0.96 (0.84 – 1.10) child’s identity first nations – status (ref.) 1.00 1.00 1.00 first nations – non-status 1.30 (1.08 – 1.56) 1.15 (0.91 – 1.45) 1.12 (0.88 – 1.43) métis 1.12 (0.98 – 1.27) 1.02 (0.86 – 1.21) 0.92 (0.77 – 1.11) inuit 1.30 (1.03 – 1.64) 1.54 (1.13 – 2.10) 1.40 (0.85 – 2.30) mixed 2.01 (1.29 – 3.13) 1.82 (1.04 – 3.20) 1.61 (0.89 – 2.94) non-indigenous 1.28 (1.09 – 1.50) 1.20 (0.98 – 1.47) 1.28 (1.03 – 1.59) child’s weight at birth (kg) 1.29 (1.18 – 1.41) 1.33 (1.20 – 1.48) 1.26 (1.12 – 1.40) mother’s age at birth (years) 4.98 (2.43 – 10.20) 3.84 (1.57 – 9.40) 2.29 (0.83 – 6.32) mother’s age at birth-squared (years) 0.79 (0.70 – 0.90) 0.84 (0.71 – 0.98) 0.91 (0.76 – 1.09) mother’s indigenous identity 0.79 (0.69 – 0.89) 0.72 (0.60 – 0.86) 0.84 (0.70 – 1.00) father’s indigenous identity 0.97 (0.87 – 1.08) 0.89 (0.76 – 1.05) 0.95 (0.80 – 1.12) residential schooling mother did not attend (ref.) 1.00 1.00 1.00 mother attended 0.87(0.68 – 1.11) 0.84 (0.61 – 1.16) 0.79 (0.54 – 1.17) mother’s education no high school completed (ref.) 1.00 1.00 high school completed 1.92 (1.70 – 2.16) 1.89 (1.60 – 2.24) household income 0.66 (0.58 – 0.75) 0.78 (0.66 – 0.92) 9 romano et al.: breastfeeding of indigenous children in canada published by scholarship@western, 2019 table 2. logistic regression models predicting odds of a child ever having been breastfed (continued) model 1 model 2 model 3 odds ratios (95% ci) community type rural (ref.) 1.00 1.00 urban 1.03 (0.92 – 1.14) 0.98 (0.86 – 1.13) geographic region atlantic (ref.) 1.00 1.00 quebec 1.08 (0.88 – 1.34) 0.99 (0.77 – 1.27) ontario 1.65 (1.34 – 2.04) 1.57(1.24 – 2.00) prairies 1.54 (1.29 – 1.82) 1.84 (1.49 – 2.28) british columbia 3.92(3.11 – 4.95) 4.25 (3.21 – 5.62) territoriesb 2.00(1.54 – 2.59) note. ref. = reference category. ci = confidence interval. model 1: univariate, unadjusted. model 2: multivariate, adjusted, time-invariant variables. model 3: multivariate, adjusted, all variables. a child’s age at the time of the survey, in 2006, as reported by child’s person most knowledgeable (pmk). b territories were excluded from models involving income due to missing data. bold values indicate statistical significance at a < 0.05. among children who were breastfed at all, the unadjusted odds ratios reveal that inuit children were most likely to have been breastfeed for at least six months, while mixed identity or non-indigenous children were less likely to have done so (table 3, model 1). in the fully adjusted model, there was again a significant effect of inuit identity on breastfeeding duration, whereas métis children were shown to be significantly less likely than status first nations to have been breastfed for six months or longer (model 3). 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.5 table 3. logistic regression models predicting odds of a child having been breastfed for over six months model 1 model 2 model 3 odds ratios (95% ci) child’s agea(years) 0.99 (0.97 – 1.01) 1.00 (0.97 – 1.03) 0.99 (0.97 – 1.02) child’s sex female (ref.) 1.00 1.00 1.00 male 1.05 (0.94 – 1.18) 0.98 (0.86 – 1.13) 1.00 (0.87 – 1.15) child’s identity first nations – status (ref.) 1.00 1.00 1.00 first nations – non-status 0.91 (0.75 – 1.10) 0.96 (0.76 – 1.23) 1.00 (0.78 – 1.28) métis 0.88 (0.76 – 1.01) 0.84 (0.70 – 1.02) 0.80 (0.66 – 0.98) inuit 1.61 (1.24 – 2.10) 1.69 (1.21 – 2.36) 1.96 (1.14 – 3.36) mixed 0.66 (0.46 – 0.96) 0.68 (0.43 – 1.08) 0.65 (0.40 – 1.04) nonindigenous 0.78 (0.66 – 0.92) 0.75 (0.60 – 0.94) 0.82 (0.65 – 1.03) child’s weight at birth (kg) 1.37 (1.24 – 1.50) 1.34 (1.20 – 1.49) 1.33 (1.19 – 1.48) mother’s age at birth (years) 1.61 (0.67 – 3.89) 1.44 (0.52 – 4.00) 1.43 (0.49 – 4.21) mother’s age at birth-squared (years) 0.99 (0.84 – 1.16) 1.02 (0.85 – 1.23) 1.02 (0.84 – 1.24) mother’s indigenous identity 1.04 (0.91 – 1.18) 0.89 (0.73 – 1.08) 0.94 (0.76 – 1.15) father’s indigenous identity 0.99 (0.88 – 1.12) 0.87 (0.73 – 1.04) 0.87 (0.72 – 1.04) residential schooling mother did not attend (ref.) 1.00 1.00 1.00 mother attended 1.52 (1.14 – 2.03) 1.49 (1.04 – 2.12) 1.77 (1.14 – 2.75) mother’s education no high school completed (ref.) 1.00 1.00 high school completed 1.21 (1.05 – 1.39) 1.14 (0.93 – 1.38) 11 romano et al.: breastfeeding of indigenous children in canada published by scholarship@western, 2019 table 3. logistic regression models predicting odds of a child having been breastfed for over six months (continued) model 1 model 2 model 3 odds ratios (95% ci) household income 0.90 (0.78 – 1.04) 1.00 (0.84 – 1.19) community type rural (ref.) 1.00 1.00 urban 0.94 (0.84 – 1.05) 0.93 (0.81 – 1.08) geographic region atlantic (ref.) 1.00 1.00 quebec 1.03 (0.79 – 1.35) 1.04 (0.75 – 1.43) ontario 1.26 (1.00 – 1.60) 1.25 (0.94 – 1.66) prairies 1.45 (1.16 – 1.80) 1.53 (1.17 – 1.99) british columbia 2.28 (1.79 – 2.91) 2.28 (1.71 – 3.03) territoriesb 2.41 (1.80 – 3.22) note. ref. = reference category. model 1: univariate, unadjusted. model 2: multivariate, adjusted, timeinvariant variables. model 3: multivariate, adjusted, all variables. a child’s age at the time of the survey, in 2006, as reported by child’s person most knowledgeable (pmk). b territories were excluded from models involving income due to missing data. bold values indicate statistical significance at a < 0.05. there was no effect of mother’s age in the models of breastfeeding duration (table 3). likewise, mother’s indigenous identity was shown to have no effect on this outcome (table 3). interestingly, children whose mothers had attended residential schools had higher odds of having been breastfed for six months or longer, and this effect persisted across all models (table 3). mother’s completion of high school was positively associated with breastfeeding for six months or longer (model 1); however, this effect was insignificant in the fully adjusted model (model 3). unlike breastfeeding initiation (table 2), there was no relationship between having a low income and the likelihood of breastfeeding for at least six months (models 1 and 3). finally, regional differences within canada were similar to those in table 2, with children in british columbia being most likely to have been breastfed, followed by children in the territories (table 2). 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.5 discussion the results of our study confirm that breastfeeding initiation and duration are lower among indigenous children in canada compared to estimates available for non-indigenous children. moreover, we have identified factors associated with breastfeeding initiation and duration among indigenous children in canada. several factors were correlated with reported breastfeeding, such as having an older mother, a parent with higher educational attainment, and maternal history of residential school attendance; while others, such as lower household income and children’s indigenous identity, were correlated with decreased breastfeeding initiation and/or duration in our sample. the predictors we have identified in this study are consistent with existing breastfeeding literature, but also contribute to the larger body of knowledge through offering new insight into breastfeeding within indigenous-specific contexts—such as indigenous identity and maternal residential school attendance. the 2006 aps data show that breastfeeding initiation among indigenous children living outside of reserves was nearly 20% lower than a previous 2006 estimate for all canadian children (72.4% vs. 90.3%; thulier & mercer, 2009). this confirms the importance of understanding the factors influencing breastfeeding practices for indigenous women. rates of initiation were similar for all indigenous identity groups except for inuit children, who were more likely to have been breastfed, and to be breastfed for six or more months. children identified as métis, mixed identity, or non-indigenous were in general not different from status first nations children in initiation but were significantly less likely to have been breastfed for at least six months. these differences persisted after controlling for geography, household income, and mothers’ education. consistent with other canadian studies, mother’s completion of high school was a positive correlate of initiation and duration, but more convincingly so for breastfeeding having been initiated at all. the effect of living in low income, however, was somewhat inconsistent with previous canadian studies. according to the aps data, living in a low-income household was associated with higher likelihood of a child being breastfed, which suggests the inverse of the general relationships in canada. this warrants future research into the specific facilitators and barriers to breastfeeding initiation and duration among indigenous mothers in canada, as well as the perceptions surrounding its benefits. further research on the knowledge, attitudes, and beliefs influencing breastfeeding behaviours may help to elucidate some of these factors, as has been previously conducted through consultation with indigenous mothers in an american setting (eckhardt et al., 2014). beyond culture-specific norms and perceptions, consideration of broader socioeconomic determinants (e.g., mother’s educational attainment, household income) and family-level influences (e.g., mother’s age at child’s birth) are important for understanding the population under study. from a sociodemographic perspective, indigenous women are among the most impoverished groups in canada —particularly according to measures of educational attainment and income which, for indigenous populations, are directly linked to one another. indigenous women possess lower average educational levels and tend to earn less money than their non-indigenous counterparts in canada; rates of poverty for indigenous women have been estimated to be double that of non-indigenous women (national collaborating centre for aboriginal health [nccah], 2009). indigenous women in canada are also at greater likelihood of becoming mothers at young ages, relative to non-indigenous women. moreover, early onset of childbearing, especially during teenage years, might decrease mothers’ likelihood of 13 romano et al.: breastfeeding of indigenous children in canada published by scholarship@western, 2019 attaining secondary and post-secondary education (cooke, 2013; garner, guimond, & senécal, 2013). our findings are consistent with existing literature that describes these sociodemographic factors as influential on breastfeeding practices within a variety of contexts; however, they also highlight indigenous women as a particularly important population to consider in canada. our analyses demonstrate that geographic location of residence may also play an important role in promoting or hindering healthy breastfeeding practices. breastfeeding of indigenous children was more common, and conducted for longer, in western canada and in the north, compared with in eastern canada and quebec. this is consistent with patterns among other canadian mothers (al-sahab et al., 2010). the reasons for these regional differences remain unclear, although provincial policies might be influential. the province of british columbia, in addition to protecting breastfeeding practices under its human rights code, has taken a strong stance in support of breastfeeding promotion (british columbia ministry of health, 2012). the correlation between mothers’ attendance of residential school and breastfeeding had not been previously studied quantitatively. a qualitative study of intergenerational trauma on parenting found that among a group of first nations women, residential schooling was understood as a barrier to breastfeeding (eni, phillips-beck, & mehta, 2014). the findings reported here, along with the differences between indigenous identity groups, point to a need for further investigation of breastfeeding practices in their historical, social, and cultural contexts. future inquiries may benefit from addressing breastfeeding and intergenerational trauma through a resilience-based lens. limitations the most important limitation is the age of these data. the 2006 aps is the most recent source of national data that can be used to estimate breastfeeding prevalence among indigenous women living outside of reserve communities, and which includes indigenous-specific characteristics such as residential schooling. although the aps was again conducted in 2012, questions on breastfeeding were not included. nonetheless, these data referred to children born between 1992 and 2006, and more recent data are clearly required. while the age of the data poses a major limitation to the findings of this study, their significance suggests that a re-introduction of breastfeeding-related questions into subsequent waves of the aps is warranted. in doing so, opportunities for further cross-sectional investigations across time or in combination of multiple waves may be made possible. on account of the retrospective data collection method used, data were also subject to recall bias and mortality; only children who had survived to 2006 could be included in the sample. additionally, the survey did not ask whether the child had been exclusively breastfed, limiting comparability to previous studies on the general canadian population as well as to current breastfeeding recommendations (bank, 2012; critch, 2014; kramer & kakuma, 2004; who, 2003). the data are representative only of the indigenous population living outside of first nations reserves—the majority of the indigenous identity population in canada—so, an important subset of the population to consider. finally, while previous studies have identified differences in breastfeeding initiation and duration between indigenous groups and mainstream populations, the findings of this study have limited 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 1 [2019], art. 5 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.1.5 generalizability beyond that of a canadian context. however, the knowledge we have generated surrounding indigenous-specific predictors of breastfeeding behaviour constitutes strong groundwork for future investigators to ask the same questions in relevant cultural settings, namely among other indigenous-identity groups similarly affected by systemic barriers that produce health inequalities. for example, in the united states, where there are existing breastfeeding support interventions offered through the indian health service (england, 2017), future investigations should seek to address the unique barriers to breastfeeding initiation and duration faced by indigenous identity groups. policy recommendations these findings represent the most recent measurements and correlates of breastfeeding initiation and duration among off-reserve indigenous children in canada using the 2006 aps. the 2006 version was the last cycle of the aps to include any questions pertaining to breastfeeding initiation or duration because these questions were discontinued in the 2012 aps and have not been included in the 2017 aps. as such, we recommend that questions about breastfeeding initiation and duration become reintroduced in future aps cycles administered by statistics canada. continuing to collect these data on a nationally representative scale is necessary for implementing evidence-informed public health interventions that promote breastfeeding among indigenous mothers. this recommendation presents a practical, and relatively feasible, option for ongoing monitoring of the discrepancy in rates of breastfeeding initiation and duration between indigenous and non-indigenous populations. efforts should also be made at a policy level to protect and support breastfeeding as a factor of wellbeing among mothers and their children. breastfeeding promotion programs and educational campaigns have demonstrated success in some settings; however, broader efforts which target the systemic and structural determinants of breastfeeding initiation and duration may be more effective, albeit more difficult to implement. interventions should recognize that the factors influencing breastfeeding practices are interconnected and complex, as implied through the life-course perspective. for example, efforts which support reconciliation between indigenous and non-indigenous peoples are important for promoting social equity and health among first nations, métis, and inuit populations in canada; future research should seek to address how reconciliation may indirectly influence healthy behaviours such as breastfeeding. conclusions despite the emphasis placed on breastfeeding in primary obstetric care settings in canada, and in promotion of maternal and child health, breastfeeding is considerably lower among indigenous children than among the general population. this may be related to socioeconomic determinants, but further research aimed at understanding the specific barriers to breastfeeding faced by indigenous women is needed, especially in consideration of the health inequities they may be uniquely subjected to. the results suggest a need for intervention strategies designed specifically for indigenous women—giving special consideration to those who are younger, have not completed high school, are of lower socioeconomic status, and live in eastern canada—with emphasis on promoting and supporting breastfeeding continuation for at least six months. we also argue that the broader factors associated with social equity among first nations, métis, and inuit people in canada should be considered, as they may be important for protecting traditional breastfeeding practices among indigenous women. 15 romano et al.: breastfeeding of indigenous children in canada published by scholarship@western, 2019 while the aps data presented here were collected in 2006, they have not been previously examined with respect to breastfeeding, and we are not aware of another analysis of the predictors of breastfeeding initiation and duration 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(2003). complementary feeding: report of the global consultation, and summary of guiding principles for complementary feeding of the breastfed child. retrieved from http://www.who.int/nutrition/publications/infantfeeding/924154614x/ 19 romano et al.: breastfeeding of indigenous children in canada published by scholarship@western, 2019 the international indigenous policy journal january 2019 factors affecting initiation and duration of breastfeeding among off-reserve indigenous children in canada isabella romano martin cooke piotr wilk recommended citation factors affecting initiation and duration of breastfeeding among off-reserve indigenous children in canada abstract keywords acknowledgments disclaimer creative commons license factors affecting initiation and duration of breastfeeding among off-reserve indigenous children in canada increased indigenous participation in environmental decision-making: a policy analysis for the improvement of indigenous health the international indigenous policy journal volume 7 issue 4 social determinants of indigenous well-being : building a more complete understanding article 5 october 2016 increased indigenous participation in environmental decision-making: a policy analysis for the improvement of indigenous health kerry black university of guelph, kblack@alumni.ubc.ca edward mcbean university of guelph, emcbean@uoguelph.ca recommended citation black, k. , mcbean, e. (2016). increased indigenous participation in environmental decision-making: a policy analysis for the improvement of indigenous health. the international indigenous policy journal, 7(4). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.4.5 increased indigenous participation in environmental decision-making: a policy analysis for the improvement of indigenous health abstract improving the physical environment and indigenous participation in environmental decision-making is inherently related to the improvement of health among indigenous peoples. improving the state of the physical environment necessitates increased involvement by indigenous communities in decision-making and policy development. this involvement must integrate local traditional knowledge (tk) as an important tool in the decolonization of environmental decision-making, and a necessary step towards the improvement of indigenous health. with a focus on the physical environment as a social determinant of indigenous health, this article highlights the need for increased indigenous participation in the decision-making process on environmental issues and proposes a framework to accomplish this outcome. indigenous-centred policy frameworks should include the following five key principles: (a) the recognition of indigenous knowledge, (b) the recognition of the inherent right to self-determination, (c) the use of an inclusive and integrative knowledge system, (d) the use of community-based participatory approaches, and (e) the use of circular and holistic viewpoints. keywords environment, decision-making, indigenous, health, policy acknowledgments the authors are grateful to the university of guelph and the national sciences and engineering research council (nserc) for financial support. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ i n c re a s e d i n d i g e n o u s pa rt i c i p a t i o n i n e n v i ro n m e n t a l d e c i s i o n m a ki n g : a po l i c y a n a l y s i s f o r t h e i m p ro v e m e n t o f i n d i g e n o u s h e a l t h determinants of health are those social, environmental, and economic factors that impact the well-being of individuals (centre for disease control and prevention [cdc], 2016). a causal relationship can be articulated between socio-economic and environmental conditions, and higher incidences of illness or health issues. the physical environment is one example of these determinants that has an important role to play in health and well-being. the physical environment, which includes water and air quality, as well as the level of environmental degradation, is also an important element of indigenous life. indigenous peoples across the world have unique experiences, cultures, values, traditions, and perspectives that they have carried through their history. though traditional and local knowledge varies by community, geographic location, and historical context, there is a common thread between traditional knowledge holders regarding the importance of the environment. improvements to the physical environment can potentially have direct positive effects on indigenous communities, but increasing the role of indigenous peoples in decision-making processes about the environments (including discussions about environmental management, for example) in their communities, is an important first step. to date, there has been little guidance on how to adequately increase indigenous participation in and control over policies concerning environmental issues as a mechanism for the promotion of indigenous health. policy frameworks that impact the physical environment in indigenous communities need to take into account the unique experiences and perspectives of indigenous people. it can be said, “public policy— both national and global—should change to take into account the evidence on social determinants of health and interventions and policies that will address them” (marmot, 2005, p. 1099). indeed, there remains a need for policies and programs to address the “rippling effect of environmental dispossession and colonialism on the quality of health determinants in these communities” (richmond & ross, 2009, p. 410). this article, with an emphasis on existing canadian case studies, highlights the need for both increased indigenous participation in decision-making and the incorporation of traditional local knowledge into policy frameworks. key elements of a policy framework are presented, with an emphasis on the importance of the physical environment as a way to improve indigenous health and well-being. c a n a d i a n c o n t e x t the kinds of governance structures that operate within indigenous communities in canada today were developed primarily through the indian act; as the main mechanism through which federal jurisdiction over indigenous people in canada is exercised, the indian act articulates the “manner in which indian reserves and treaties are administered by the indian affairs department and the limited control exercised by bands and band councils” (bartlett, 1977, p. 581). while policies and programs that affect indigenous communities exist under a patchwork governance structure that is shared by several different federal departments, they fall primarily under the jurisdiction of indigenous and northern affairs canada (inac). in 1982, the constitution act recognized the rights of aboriginal peoples in canada. however, there are several flaws with this act, and “precedents need to be created through certain supreme court decisions about inherent or treaty rights of aboriginal peoples” (uribe, 2006, p. 1). recent court cases have affirmed and recognized both aboriginal inherent and treaty rights (r v. sparrow, 1990) as well as the fact that aboriginal title extends to land itself (delgamuukw v. british columbia, 1997). increasingly, indigenous communities across canada are calling for increased 1 black and mcbean: increased indigenous participation in environmental decision-making published by scholarship@western, 2016 autonomy and the recognition of a constitutionally protected right to make decisions regarding the resources within their lands. yet, indigenous people in canada currently have little control over the use and development of adjacent lands and resources, despite the fact that they are directly affected by the activities on those lands (patrick, 2011). despite significant improvements in the relationship between indigenous peoples in canada and the crown over the years, there continues to be significant tension between both parties (uribe, 2006). canada’s colonial history has shaped indigenous communities across canada. congruently, there is widespread agreement that the era in which indian residential schools existed was a devastating and destructive time period for indigenous populations in canada, with far reaching consequences. these residential schools are a part of canada’s very recent history, with the last federally run school closing in 1996 (canadian broadcasting corporation [cbc], 2008). in the mandate letters to ministers, prime minister justin trudeau urged that now is the time for a “renewed, nation-to-nation relationship with indigenous peoples . . . based on recognition of rights, respect, co-operation, and partnership” (prime minister of canada, 2015, paras. 25-27). a nation-to-nation approach involves federal, provincial, territorial and indigenous governments together, as first nations are simultaneously citizens of canada, a province or territory, and their indigenous nation. today there are 1.4 million people (4.3% of the total population of canada) who identify as aboriginal in canada, with 60.8% identifying as first nations, 32.3% as métis, and 4.2% as inuit (statistics canada, 2011). according to the recent national household survey, roughly one-quarter of all indigenous people live on reserve, with 49.3% of first nations people living on reserves, and 73.1% of inuit populations living in northern and remote settlements (statistics canada, 2011). indigenous peoples living on reserve face higher rates of unemployment and suicide, as well as reduced access to safe drinking water and the basic necessities of life (aboriginal healing foundation, 2007; macdonald & wilson, 2016) . t h e ph y s i c a l e n v i ro n m e n t : a s o c i a l d e t e rm i n a n t o f h e a l t h social determinants of health have been defined as the conditions in which we live and work that impact our health and well-being (irwin & scali, 2010). ranging from income distribution and education level to physical environment, these determinants of health relate to the social environment or social characteristics that contribute to one’s state of health (cdc, 2016). in indigenous communities in particular greater focus is placed on reducing health inequalities by addressing socio-economic conditions, as well as the physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual dimensions of health (adelson, 2005; reading & wien, 2009). indigenous peoples face unique challenges related to health, and, in the canadian context, there is an increasing recognition of the value of indigenous knowledge and practices in terms of their potential contribution to improving the health and wellness of indigenous people (national aboriginal health organization [naho], 2008). the physical environment and connection to the land is a critical element of health in indigenous populations (richmond & ross, 2009). the physical environment has been defined as (adapted from public health agency of [phac], 2016): 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 4 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.4.5 • levels of exposure to contaminants in the air, water, food, and soil, which can cause a variety of adverse health effects including cancer, birth defects, respiratory illnesses, and gastrointestinal ailments. • factors in the built environment related to housing, indoor air quality, and the design of communities and transportation systems, which can significantly influence both physical and psychological well-being. elements such as access to quality housing, shelter, clean water, and sanitation have been identified as basic human rights (united nations economic, scientific, and cultural organization [unesco], 2006). indigenous communities in canada face higher levels of inadequate housing, unsafe drinking water, and boil water advisories than non-indigenous communities in canada. according to a recent survey, 37.3% of first nation households require major repairs, with half of first nation adults reporting mold and mildew present in their homes (first nations information governance centre [fnigc], 2012). degradation of the physical and built environment directly impacts indigenous peoples and threatens their way of life (mcgregor & whitaker, 2001). most notably, “poor sanitation and waste management, unsafe water supplies, and lack of community resources represent physical conditions that jeopardize the health of aboriginal peoples” (reading & wien, 2009, p. 8). it has been argued that simple, affordable, and effective ways of improving indigenous health include the provision of clean drinking water and adequate sanitation (gracey & king, 2009). the long-standing effects of colonialism and the resettlement of indigenous peoples onto reserves have dramatically impacted indigenous peoples lives. it has been found that “regulatory regimes nested in colonialism . . . have been shown to produce health disparities” (patrick, 2011, p. 387). similarly, frohlich, ross, and richmond (2006) found that health disparities: manifested from a long history of oppression, systemic racism, and discrimination, and are inextricably linked to unequal access to resources such as education, training and employment, social and healthcare facilities and limited access to and control over lands and resources. (p. 136) the connection of indigenous peoples and their health to the land is a “fundamental component of indigenous culture, and central to the health and wellness of aboriginal societies” (richmond & ross, 2009, p. 404). reading and wien (2009) have argued that indigenous communities have: witnessed a rapid transition from a healthy relationship with the natural world to one of dispossession and disempowerment. aboriginal peoples are no longer stewards of their traditional territories, nor are they permitted to share in the profits from extraction and manipulation of natural resources. finally, contamination of wildlife, fish, vegetation and water has forced aboriginal peoples further from the natural environments that once sustained community health. (p. 20) it has been argued that one of the strongest links between the health of aboriginal peoples and their environments is traditional foods (kuhnlein & receveur, 1996; richmond & ross, 2009). industrial development and other anthropogenic activities have resulted in the contamination of traditional foods 3 black and mcbean: increased indigenous participation in environmental decision-making published by scholarship@western, 2016 and medicines, thereby causing the degradation of indigenous peoples’ physical and spiritual health (kuhnlein & receveur, 1996; richmond & ross, 2009). furthermore, richmond and ross (2009) have argued that “contamination does not only pose significant risks for physical health, but it can present a risk to the health of local economies as well” (p. 404). similarly, other elements of the physical environment, such as overcrowded housing conditions, poor sanitation, unsafe water supplies, and lack of community resources have been associated with decreased indigenous health and increased stress (canada mortgage and housing corporation [cmhc], 2004; indian and northern affairs canada [inac], 2003). i m p ro v i n g i n d i g e n o u s h e a l t h t h ro u g h i n c re a s e d i n d i g e n o u s pa rt i c i p a t i o n i n e n v i ro n m e n t a l d e c i s i o n m a ki n g the commission on the social determinants of health’s (csdh, 2008) most recent report stated that “resources and control over decision-making processes often remain beyond the reach of people normally excluded at the local and community level” (p. 63). colonialism and resettlement have been used to impose physical environments that are detrimental to health and well-being on indigenous communities, (reading & wien, 2009). the commission recommended “local government and civil society, backed by national government, establish local participatory governance mechanisms that enable communities and local government to partner in building healthier and safer cities” (csdh, 2008, p. 63). the commission pointed to three principles to guide the elimination of health inequities, including: a. improving the conditions of daily life (i.e., the social circumstances in which people are born, grow, live, and work); b. addressing inequitable distribution of resources; and c. measuring the problems related to health inequalities, evaluating the impact of policy actions, expanding the knowledgebase, developing a workforce trained in the social determinants of health, and improving understandings of the social determinants of health. during the development of the csdh guidelines, the public health agency of canada (phac) established the canadian reference group (crg) that would ensure canada had an opportunity to contribute to the csdh guidelines. this opportunity was subsequently extended to include the involvement of indigenous stakeholders (phac, 2013). while there is widespread recognition of the importance of a population health approach within the canadian context, there is no “universal canadian approach to research and policy implementation” regarding social determinants of health (native women’s association of canada [nwac], 2007, p. 4). raphael (2009) has argued that there exists a policy vacuum with respect to how to approach actions that address social determinants of health in canada. however, the csdh guidelines are important tools that help policy makers in canada address the health and well-being of canadians, particularly among marginalized populations such as indigenous people living both on and off reserve. to address the social determinants of indigenous peoples’ health requires increased indigenous involvement in both the decision-making process and development of policy. indigenous stakeholders continue to assert their right for increased control over decisions on policies that are either related to their lands or affect areas directly adjacent to their lands using the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous people (undrip), which 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 4 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.4.5 the government of canada has committed to uphold (government of canada, 2016). undrip advocates for indigenous peoples’ self-determination and authority over the environment and the resources within their lands, as well as any activities that may threaten their lands (united nations general assembly [unga], 2007). internationally, the brundtland report1 has emphasized the importance of the community participation in resource development decision-making (united nations world commission on environment and development [unwced], 1987). traditionally, indigenous peoples have been protectors of the environment through close, interconnected relationships with the land. it has been argued that colonialism destroyed this relationship (gracey & king, 2009). the impact of colonization is one of the critical social determinants of health impacting indigenous communities (csdh, 2007; gracey & king, 2009). specifically, in the context of the physical environment, the impact of colonialism has resulted in a diminished relationship between indigenous peoples and the land, the inability both to protect the environment and to continue to ensure long-term sustainability of their resources, including water. in their work, the csdh found that some means by which to counter the effects of colonization include supporting the right to self-determination, the restoration of land rights, and the rehabilitation of degraded environments (csdh, 2007). following the haida, taku, and misikew cree court cases that occurred between 2004 and 2005, the supreme court of canada ruled that the crown “has a duty to consult, and where appropriate, accommodate when the crown contemplates conduct that might adversely impact potential or established aboriginal or treaty rights” (inac, 2011, p. 1). this ruling means that the crown (the government) has a legal responsibility to consult with indigenous peoples prior to any action that may affect aboriginal and/or treaty rights. in order to meet the requirements of duty to consult, a change from the status quo is necessary, including ensuring indigenous participation in environmental decisionmaking. however, scholars have argued that this duty to consult does not sufficiently empower communities to achieve sustainable economic and social development on their own terms (mcfadgen, 2013). mcfadgen (2013) further argued, “only when the federal and provincial governments of canada go beyond the minimal requirements of the duty to consult will first nations communities be truly empowered in resource decisions” (p. 99). the significance of the role of indigenous people in environmental decision-making is evident in recent examples of environmental management in canada. there exists a knowledge gap in canadian public policy between how to engage meaningfully with indigenous communities, and what exactly meaningful engagement entails. in the absence of any specific policies, indigenous communities are included in discussions based on the triggering of a “duty to consult.” there is no shortage of examples showing the negative consequences of inadequate consultation and engagement with indigenous communities regarding activities that may impact their lands. in the case of grassy narrows first nation in northwestern ontario, a chlor-alkali plant pumped toxins, including mercury, into the river providing the community’s fish and water supply. the impact of this plant was widespread and had socioeconomic consequences for the community, including unemployment, changes in lifestyle, and an increase in significant health concerns (wheatley, 1998). there are also very recent examples of 1 the brundtland report, or our common future, was published by the united nations world commission on environment and development (wced) in 1987 and examines sustainable development internationally. 5 black and mcbean: increased indigenous participation in environmental decision-making published by scholarship@western, 2016 inadequate consultation that may potentially have significant impacts on indigenous communities in canada. the mi’kmaq opposition to the alton gas plan in nova scotia (campbell, 2014), for example, could threaten groundwater sources and affect local fish populations. likewise, there has been widespread opposition to the proposed site c dam in british columbia from communities across canada (bellegarde, 2016). many first nations and other advocates have opposed the site c hydroelectric project on the grounds that the project would be built across treaty 8 territory, located in british columbia, resulting in the creation of a large reservoir with potential impact on treaty rights, archaeological sites, as well as other environmental impacts. increasingly, in the absence of significant federal policies and full and meaningful participation of indigenous peoples in decision-making, communities are developing their own policies, including development principles, in the face of natural resource development on or near their lands. the tahltan nation and the wahnapitae nation have, for example, developed community-based natural resource development policies that outline their approaches to negotiations on mining, emphasizing development principles that require projects to not threaten irreparable environmental damage (whiteman & mamen, 2002). similarly, when the wahnapitae nation was faced with the potential environmental impacts from the closure of a nickel mine, the community developed its own natural resources policy. the development of community-based development principles was seen as a way of focusing the negotiations over the mine’s closure to address community needs (recollet 2000; whiteman & mamen, 2002). i n c l u s i o n o f t ra d i t i o n a l k n o w l e d g e i n t o e n v i ro n m e n t a l d e c i s i o n m a ki n g the preservation, recognition, and inclusion of traditional or local knowledge all represent important elements of indigenous health. traditional knowledge (tk) has been broadly defined, albeit in various ways, as “a cumulative body of knowledge, practice and belief, evolving by adaptive processes, and handed down through generations by cultural transmission, about the relationship of living beings (including humans) with one another and their environment” (berkes, 2012, p. 7). traditional ways of knowing and doing, and the incorporation of traditional knowledge into policy are viewed by indigenous and non-indigenous environmentalists as ways to encourage both sustainable environmental management, and a more holistic understanding of the environment (berkes, colding, & folke, 2000; huntington, 2000). similarly, tk can offer “contributions to environmental decision-making from a broader scope of environmental values, practices, and knowledge” (ellis, 2005, p. 67). scholars often discuss the difference between scientifically-based western knowledge and experiential, spiritually-based traditional knowledge. a key distinction between the two kinds of knowledge is that western knowledge is derived through hypotheses, acquired through experimentation, and transmitted through written records, whereas traditional knowledge is derived from examples and anecdotes, acquired through daily interactions with people and the planet, and transmitted through oral narratives (miltenberger, 2010). stevenson and webb (2003) and simpson (2004) have shown that western knowledge plays a superior role in environmental management, resulting in tk being de-legitimized and ranked lower than science-based knowledge. in addition, indigenous communities face very real concerns when confronted with sharing their knowledge, fearing “knowledge exploitation and appropriation as well as the issue of intellectual versus collective property rights” (wilkes, 2011, p. 34). 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 4 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.4.5 it is necessary to understand both the differences between knowledge systems, and the importance of incorporating tk into policy and programs related to environmental management. it has been argued (berkes & henley, 1997; ellis, 2005) that the inclusion of tk into policy development and implementation ensures the following: the recognition of inherent rights, the ability of indigenous communities to participate fully and meaningfully in decisions that affect their people, and the transition to self-determination. in the political realm, decision-makers have attempted to integrate tk into policy. the government of the northwest territories (nwt) was one of the first canadian entities to recognize the importance of traditional knowledge in the development of their tk policy in the late 1980s (miltenberger, 2010). this inclusion represents a significant advancement in the recognition of indigenous knowledge, and its incorporation into public policy. the importance of the role of tk has also been incorporated into other federal documents such as the canadian environmental assessment act (2012) and the mackenzie valley resource management act (1998), both of which indicate that indigenous and community-based knowledge should be used when conducting environmental assessments or monitoring the environmental impacts of development (ellis, 2005; miltenberger, 2010). similarly, the government of nunavut has incorporated tk as a guiding principle, labelled inuit quajimatunqangit (iq), into their mandate (national collaborating centre for aboriginal health [nccah], 2009). however, to date, there exists no cohesive framework through which to integrate tk into policy making. although researchers have developed greater understanding of the importance and the role of tk in environmental management, there is a lack of understanding from scientists, engineers, policy makers, and researchers about how to move forward with incorporating tk into environmental management while respecting the rightful knowledge holders. there is evidence that traditional knowledge has been used successfully to make resource management decisions (miltenberger, 2010; stevenson, 2005). miltenberger (2010), however, has argued that despite widespread recognition of the role of traditional knowledge, “the extent to which traditional knowledge has systematically been incorporated into environmental management and decision-making, and the degree to which opportunities have been formalized to ensure an effective role” (p. 222) has been limited. he has also highlighted an important concern among indigenous peoples, “regulatory and management decision-makers will take traditional knowledge out of context” and use it to justify their own particular and political ends (miltenberger, 2010, p. 214). similarly, “misconceptions (if not outright racism) prevent indigenous peoples’ environmental knowledge (which includes laws for resource conservation and use) from being incorporated into existing management regimes” (walkem, 2006, p. 310). further, walkem (2006) has stated that decision-making around water, land, and resources is typically constrained and includes only a limited number of participants. inadequate involvement in the decision-making process results in outcomes that are externally imposed onto indigenous communities and that fail to consider unique indigenous perspectives, as well as the specific community context; thus, resulting in solutions that are either not appropriate for, or not welcomed by, the community. there are generally two ways in which tk can be applied to policy and decision-making: top-down and bottom-up (ellis, 2005). in canada, the top-down approach, typically used by those bodies that are responsible for regulation and legislation (i.e., the federal government) attempts to accommodate tk within its existing legislative policy framework. the result is that this knowledge is neither fostered nor sought out by policy makers (ellis, 2005). however, in contrast, the bottom-up approach typically increases indigenous peoples’ ability to incorporate local knowledge into policies and governance 7 black and mcbean: increased indigenous participation in environmental decision-making published by scholarship@western, 2016 procedures. ellis (2005) argued that this bottom-up approach is “characterized by initiatives designed to encourage the learning and transmission of traditional knowledge at the community level, as well as developing the means to communicate this knowledge within the structures and processes of environmental governance” (p. 67). ellis (2005) further argued that top-down approaches are of little use if tk “cannot be accessed and is not forthcoming” (p. 69). in contrast, bottom-up (or “participatory”) approaches seek to build capacity at the community level, thereby increasing indigenous peoples’ ability to participate more fully in decision-making. bottom-up approaches tend to be community-based, and encourage learning and sharing at the community level. to date, there exists no cohesive framework through which tk can be incorporated into policy development and decision-making. policies that promote the inclusion of tk need to adapt “conventional environmental decision-making to [a]boriginal ways of knowing and doing, rather than the conventional converse” (ellis, 2005, p. 75). arguably, among the many challenges contributing to the lack of respect afforded to tk and its full incorporation into environmental management and decision-making is the critical “need to establish traditional knowledge as relevant and credible in regulatory processes” (miltenberger, 2010, p. 224). ellis (2005) has argued that tk can “offer contributions to environmental decision-making from a broader scope of environmental values, practices and knowledge” (p. 67). initiatives that attempt to incorporate tk into environmental decision-making can typically only be effective if a concerted effort is made to adapt conventional decision-making to indigenous ways of knowing and doing, rather than the opposite (ellis, 2005). ellis (2005) further argued: there must be a shift in the balance of power, a reformulation of the values, practices, and knowledge that underlie environmental decision-making processes. power over land-based knowledge and the consequent power over land must be asserted by [a]boriginal peoples, taken out of the exclusive realm of science and euro-canadian institutions, and taken into a realm where traditional ways of knowing and doing share equal influence. (p. 75) increasing indigenous participation in environmental management and the improvement of physical environments is an important step towards improving indigenous health. the inclusion of tk is necessary to ensure the meaningful and fair participation of indigenous peoples. there are some best practices and lessons about these issues that have been learned to date, which this article discusses below. a u s t ra l i a in 2004, the government of australia developed the national water initiative (nwi), a blueprint for water reform through which the government agreed on actions to achieve a more cohesive national approach to the way australia manages, measures, plans, prices, and trades water (national water commission [nwc], 2012). the nwi (2012) recognized indigenous people as “legitimate stakeholders in water planning and management, and acknowledged the need to identify indigenous water values and water requirements in water plans” (p. 1). while the initiative has received positive feedback, critics have argued that the national water initiative is essentially nothing but lip service. the indigenous provisions within the nwi received very little attention from policy makers, water managers, and researchers, and there is a lack of appropriate policy infrastructure to ensure follow-through on the engagement of indigenous peoples in water planning and governance (jackson, tan, mooney, 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 4 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.4.5 hoverman, & white, 2012). jackson et al. (2012) have argued that this is a limiting factor to australian water policy planning, explaining that “improved outcomes for indigenous people will at a minimum require [indigenous] direct participation in water planning as well as their informed contribution to water policy debates” (p. 58). the study by jackson et al. (2012), which looked at three regions in australia with three distinct frameworks for ensuring the participation of indigenous peoples in water planning, drew several conclusions on best practices intended to encourage more effective participatory approaches. their case study from the tiwi islands2 highlighted the necessity for adequate and appropriate consultation, and the authors concluded that the more “experiential the learning during the community meetings, the greater its engagement qualities, interest and impact” (p. 59). they developed a set of participatory tools, such as workshops on traditional lands, large scale mapping exercises, and models and aerial photographs, which were then evaluated by community members. all tools received a significant amount of support from participants. the importance of meaningful participatory approaches was echoed in their work across the three regions. from this work, jackson et al. (2012) highlighted several key principles for good practice in water planning, including: a. drawing on available indigenous knowledge that is typically underutilized and neither wellunderstood nor respected. b. involving indigenous peoples at all levels of the water planning process—from setting objectives and intents for a project to the final stages of continued monitoring. c. increasing capacity building within the community rather than having a select few “representatives” participating in the process. the authors argued that proper capacity building helps a larger number of individuals within the community to participate more effectively within all stages of the process, including when complex issues arise (jackson et al., 2012). in addition, the authors argued that technical assessments, such as water resource planning, need to take into account sociological factors, and that indigenous water requirements should be made a priority in any water plan development (jackson et al., 2012). this australian work offers within a canadian context unique insight into how the problematic history of a country vis-à-vis indigenous peoples might be addressed in and navigated by policy. broadly, of greatest importance is that problem solving and decision-making around inherently technical problems needs to consider the specific socio-economic conditions and contexts of communities. s u s t a i n a b l e f o re s t m a n a g e m e n t n e t w o rk ( s f m n ) the sfmn developed a document describing the benefit and use of tk for sustainable forest management. the document highlighted the importance of tk, emphasizing its ability to overcome the 2 the tiwi islands are part of the northern territory, australia. the islands are located 80 km to the north of darwin. 9 black and mcbean: increased indigenous participation in environmental decision-making published by scholarship@western, 2016 limitations of western science to “deal effectively with environmental issues of increasing magnitude and complexity,” and its use as a means by which aboriginal peoples could reassert their rights (stevenson, 2005, p. 4). stevenson (2005) has presented an alternative approach to decision-making, planning, and action in environmental resource management. typical scientific methodologies reinforce western approaches to managing environmental resources, whereas stevenson’s alternative approach suggests that any decision-making model must allow for the contributions brought by indigenous peoples and their knowledge. in sfmn’s proposed model, “tk is not forced into the western scientific paradigm . . . but [are] recontextualized to become part of a larger comprehensive strategy to achieve ecological, social, cultural and economic sustainability” (stevenson, 2005, p. 8). the report highlighted key principles in the development of any decision-making and planning model involving indigenous people, which were: a. tk should not be incorporated into any model without the involvement of its rightful owners. b. tk and western science are culturally constructed knowledge systems. c. tk informs indigenous ways of knowing and doing. d. both tk and western knowledge are needed in a successful model. e. indigenous peoples possess not only tk, but also other knowledge required for successful environmental management (stevenson, 2005). i n d i g e n o u s k n o w l e d g e t ra n s l a t i o n s u m m i t s t e e ri n g c o m m i t t e e ( i k t s s c ) the iktssc developed a policy-making toolkit in 2006 to provide assistance and guidance to community policy makers in the development of knowledge translation policy (gaye hanson & smylie, 2006). this toolkit provided an overview of the importance of knowledge translation, the development of policy from a community-based approach, and examples of a process for policy making. the toolkit provided valuable definitions of key terms, and is intended to give an overview of a possible process for policy making regarding knowledge translation at the community level. the importance of understanding a “knowledge circle” within a community was highlighted; particularly, how knowledge is acquired, how it is stored, how it is translated and shared, and how it is used at the community level— and how this may differ from typical western approaches. the most important elements of this toolkit are the questions that it suggests should be asked during the development of policy, such as: what processes are used to develop good policy that reflects the values and priorities of the community? who should be involved and how do they stay engaged throughout the process (gaye hanson & smylie, 2006)? these types of questions would be valuable for the development of any strategy for policy development and implementation. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 4 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.4.5 e l e m e n t s o f pro p o s e d po l i c y f ra m e w o rk t o s u p p o rt i n c re a s e d i n d i g e n o u s d e c i s i o n m a ki n g f o r i m p ro v e d i n d i g e n o u s h e a l t h improvements to the physical environment can support the betterment of indigenous health; such improvements require indigenous participation and control in the decision-making process. according to rockloff and lockie (2006), indigenous interests in resource management have been marginalized through piecemeal participation, preference of scientific knowledge over tk, and disregard for moral and legal rights. the development of a framework to ensure the participation of indigenous people in decision-making needs to acknowledge both the shortcomings of previous approaches, and the best practices or lessons learned from these approaches. it should also consider existing indigenous research methodologies, which provide a framework for working and researching with indigenous communities. following from chilisa (2012), these methodologies focus on four main principles: informing assumptions about reality, mobilizing knowledge and values with an indigenous research paradigm, targeting local phenomena, and maintaining context sensitivity and being integrative. maori researcher linda tuhiwai smith (1999) was one of the first individuals to bring attention to the concept of indigenous approaches to research, which she termed “decolonizing methodologies,” indicating that decolonization: does not mean and has not meant a total rejection of all theory or research or western knowledge. rather, it is about centering our concerns and worldviews and then coming to know and understand theory and research from our own perspectives and for our own purpose. (p. 39) one example of a framework that attempts to embody indigenous research methodologies is ocap®. ocap® stands for ownership, control, access, and possession through which research can enable “a way for first nations to make decisions regarding what research will be done, for what purpose information or data will be used, where the information will be physically stored and who will have access” (first nations centre, 2007, p. 1). in this context, ownership refers to the relationship of a first nations community to its cultural knowledge, data, and information. control relates to the right of first nations people to exercise control during all stages of the design process, whereas access relates to indigenous peoples’ right to all information about decisions, including the rationale, to ensure transparency, and possession provides ownership over the processes and outcomes. other examples of indigenous research methodologies are decolonizing approaches to environmental decision-making. research on decolonizing methodologies can be applied to environmental management in several ways. primarily, the recognition of historical and colonial contexts and their repercussions must form the basis of any environmental decision-making framework. work by smith (1999) and the principles of ocap® are important contributions to the discussion on increased indigenous participation in environmental management. the important pillars of transparency and cultural sensitivity are the basis for increased indigenous ownership and control over which activities occur on indigenous lands and in the surrounding areas. the decolonization of environmental decision-making has been presented as a necessary and needed process for “improving relationships between indigenous communities and various governments in canada” (wilkes, 2011). wilkes (2011) focused on the decolonization of indigenous environmental management through three critical elements within the framework. these 11 black and mcbean: increased indigenous participation in environmental decision-making published by scholarship@western, 2016 concepts have been incorporated into this article’s proposed policy framework. the first concept is of worldview: acknowledging the unique relationship that indigenous peoples have with their lands, their collective responsibility to protect their lands, and the importance of indigenous tk. the second concept presented is governance, including the recognition that indigenous peoples have inherent and legal rights, unique indigenous governance systems, and the unique right to autonomy regarding decisions made regarding their lands. the final critical concept is participation, which means the process is democratic, full participation is encouraged, and culturally appropriate protocols are in place. other important considerations include balancing the divide between western and indigenous ways of knowing and doing; increasing respect for indigenous laws, governance systems, and knowledge; creating space to allow indigenous communities to fully participate; and, finally, supporting unique cultural protocols as part of the process. it is from utilizing the lessons pointed out in the above case studies, including from important research work and from the incorporation of indigenous research methodologies, that we have developed a policy framework. e l e m e n t s o f a po l i c y f ra m e w o rk the proposed policy framework is based on the notion that improved indigenous health is inherently linked to indigenous control and decision-making power on environmental management issues. the elements of this proposed indigenous-centred policy framework include: a. the recognition of indigenous knowledge; b. the recognition of indigenous peoples’ inherent right to self-determination; c. the use of inclusive and integrative knowledge systems; d. reliance on community-based participatory approaches; and e. the use of circular and holistic viewpoints, as described below. r e c o g n i t i o n o f i n d i g e n o u s k n o w l e d g e recognition of the role of indigenous knowledge in the decision-making process is vital. through the nwt policy developments (discussed above), we have a greater understanding of the importance of including tk in policy processes. specifically, within environmental decision-making, the importance of local indigenous knowledge has been recognized (baird et al., 2013; corburn, 2003; miltenberger, 2010). within this framework, we include the following principles: a. indigenous peoples in canada have intimate knowledge of their environments (wilkes, 2011). b. indigenous peoples have a close, personal relationship with water (centre for anthropological research at the university of western australia [car], 1999). 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 4 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.4.5 c. indigenous peoples believe water is a living part of their ecosystem (chiefs of ontario [coo], 2008; mcgregor, 2012). d. indigenous peoples honour and respect water through sacred and traditional ways (mcgregor, 2012; unga, 2007). e. indigenous peoples have a deep sense of responsibility to the water and the environment (car, 1999; unga, 2007; wilkes, 2011). f. indigenous peoples feel that the degradation of water quality directly impacts people and threatens their survival (mcgregor, 2012). g. decision-making should recognize the role of spirit, culture, ethics, and practices (wilkes, 2011). the inclusion and respect of traditional knowledge is a necessary and important aspect of any decisionmaking framework (miltenberger, 2010; wilkes, 2011). i n h e re n t r i g h t t o s e l f d e t e rm i n a t i o n a n d g o v e rn a n c e decision-making frameworks must recognize and carefully balance indigenous peoples’ inherent right to govern themselves and exercise their right to ownership and control over traditional lands, territories, and natural resources. indeed, indigenous peoples have an internationally recognized right (as set out in the united nations declaration of the rights of indigenous peoples [undrip]) to self-determination and therefore the power to make decisions, based on traditional laws and customs, on how to manage the land and water (unga, 2007). in addition, frameworks must also include the recognition and respect of indigenous inherent rights and treaty rights. indeed, the recognition of the right to selfdetermination and governance has been identified as a key principle for improved environmental decision-making in indigenous communities (simpson, 2004). recognition of the right to selfdetermination also forms the basis of ocap® and thus represents an important element of any policy development process. i n t e g ra t e d a n d i n c l u s i v e k n o w l e d g e s y s t e m s building on the importance of indigenous knowledge, there also needs to be recognition within this framework of the importance of both indigenous approaches and western approaches to decisionmaking. indigenous ways of approaching environmental decision-making may incorporate storytelling, talking circles, communal dinners, and get-togethers; western approaches typically utilize conventional data collection and analysis techniques (ribeiro, 2014). simpson (2004) has argued that indigenous knowledge should be treated with the same respect and authority as western knowledge, and that any notion of the superiority of western knowledge should be disregarded. there is, however, an opportunity to utilize both indigenous and western knowledge systems, in a meaningful and productive way— the “key to success is respecting each other’s methods and information, while assessing the conclusions in a cooperative fashion” (emery, 2000, p. 18). how to successfully use both traditional and western knowledge is a task that differs between approaches. one 13 black and mcbean: increased indigenous participation in environmental decision-making published by scholarship@western, 2016 example is the two-eyed seeing approach, developed by mi’kmaw elder albert marshall. two-eyed seeing has been defined as: a. learning to see with one eye the strengths of indigenous knowledge and ways of knowing; b. learning to see with the other eye the strengths of western knowledge and ways of knowing; and c. learning to use both eyes together for the benefit of all (marshall & bartlett, 2010). within the two-eyed seeing approach, researchers used the concept of co-learning, from integrative science, to bring together indigenous and western scientific knowledge and ways of knowing for education, research, and other applications (marshall & bartlett, 2010). an important concept within two-eyed seeing is the “importance of giving equal consideration to diverse indigenous and nonindigenous worldviews such that one worldview does not dominate or undermine the contributions of others” (martin, 2012, p. 20). another example of an approach that uses both tk and western knowledge is turnbull’s (1997) concept of third space, which occurs when different knowledge systems come together, or converge. a third example is lateral knowledge transfer practices that give recognition to the sources of knowledge and to the expertise that reside within communities, in contrast to typical top-down approaches (wiebe, van gaalen, langlois, & costen, 2013). since policies relating to environmental management and the environment ultimately impact the health of indigenous people, these policies must be inclusive of different knowledge systems. c o m m u n i t y ba s e d , pa rt i c i p a t o ry pro c e s s e s community-based participatory processes in decision-making foster community-led prioritization of objectives, goals, and outcomes. whereas typical environmental decision-making looks to make decisions based on western ways of thinking, a shift to more community-based, participatory approaches to decision-making is necessary. at this point, it is important to note that this article has largely omitted the concept of consultation thus far. the reason for this is that the concept of consultation can be considered a western approach to indigenous involvement, whereby nonindigenous groups are responsible for “consulting” with indigenous communities. this concept implies a decidedly one-way flow of information and knowledge. rather than strictly focusing on legal requirements and the duty to consult, fostering community-based participatory approaches to decisionmaking results in indigenous communities becoming involved in every step of a process; in doing so, this makes clear that indigenous people are stewards, and hence decision-makers. the following concepts are important elements of our policy framework that have been adapted from undrip, the principles of ocap®, and wilkes’ work on principles of indigenous autonomy as part of community-based processes (see schnarch, 2005; unga, 2007; wiebe et al., 2013; wilkes, 2011): a. aboriginal people have the right to participate in decision-making processes using culturally appropriate means. participants (both aboriginal and non-aboriginal) must come to the table in the spirit of deep and mutual respect. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 4 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.4.5 b. participation with aboriginal people is carried out through fair, open, and transparent processes. c. the diversity of aboriginal peoples must be recognized. there must be recognition of diversity both within and between aboriginal communities. d. aboriginal communities have the right to set priorities within their communities and identify areas of concern. similarly, nine proposed key elements to community-based research in indigenous communities include (adapted from kenny, faries, fiske, & voyageur, 2004): a. the opportunity for community input at all stages, with more sensitivity to local values and practice; b. more time given to actual data collection; c. the elimination of language barriers; d. an emphasis on oral traditions (through interviews, focus groups); e. personal contact with participants; f. the provision of deeper understanding of relevant issues; g. the use of local, traditional, and other kinds of expertise (e.g., academic); and h. greater opportunities for training local people. the recognition of these principles should form the basis of policy development from which community-based participatory processes can be carried out. increased capacity, involvement, and representation increase indigenous decision-making authority, and thus are important steps towards improving indigenous health. h o l i s t i c a n d c i rc u l a r v i e w p o i n t s environmental decision-making should look holistically not only at the present, but also the past and future. this considers both the historical context (adapted from both western and indigenous knowledge) of an issue or project as well as the future impacts of any environmental decision. within indigenous tk, the future impacts of any decision are sometimes evaluated seven generations into the future, not simply 25 or 50 years from present day (which is common in western approaches) (lavallee & poole, 2010). frameworks should encourage the adoption of longer viewpoints by investigating past, present, and future contexts. through knowledge gathering, the environmental history in a community can be ascertained, which can help to frame future environmental decision-making. loiselle and mckenzie (2006) have argued that the aboriginal worldview is best portrayed by a circular or holistic vision. likewise, kenny and colleagues (2004) argued that a holistic approach to aboriginal policy research needs to honour not only the past, present, and future, but also the interconnectedness of life, 15 black and mcbean: increased indigenous participation in environmental decision-making published by scholarship@western, 2016 and the spiritual, mental, physical, and emotional elements of human beings. as a framework, ocap® promotes this type of holistic approach to research (schnarch, 2005). the proposed elements of our policy framework are presented graphically in figure 1. c o n c l u s i o n s overall, the health and well-being of indigenous communities worldwide is dependent on the ability to increase indigenous decision-making power within communities, especially regarding activities that have a direct impact on environments within or surrounding indigenous lands. the incorporation of traditional, local knowledge into environmental decision-making is an essential tool for working towards the improvement of indigenous health. similarly, addressing the on-going effects of colonialism and decolonizing environmental decision-making is inherently related to the improvement of indigenous health. the decolonization of policies and programs ensures a holistic approach to addressing health concerns in indigenous communities. as part of a decolonization process, it is essential to ensure full participation by indigenous community members in all stages of the process, but most importantly during the actual decision-making. policies and programs to address indigenous health, in particular those environmental factors that have an important role in indigenous culture, need to be indigenousled, where indigenous peoples are the key decision-makers on issues that affect their lands and, therefore, their livelihoods and well-being. the importance of recognizing indigenous peoples right to control their lands and the activities that surround their lands is reaffirmed in undrip and other international agreements. following an assessment of best practices in canada and abroad, and the literature, this article has identified and proposed the key elements of a framework to increase indigenous participation and decision-making control in environmental management. through a focus on the physical environment as a social determinant of health, the framework this article has proposed has five key principles to improve indigenous decision-making control on environmental issues. these principles are: (a) the recognition of indigenous knowledge, (b) the recognition of indigenous peoples’ inherent right to selfdetermination, (c) the use of inclusive and integrative knowledge systems, (d) the use of communitybased participatory approaches, and (e) the use of circular and holistic viewpoints. both the involvement of indigenous people and the use of traditional knowledge in decision-making are vital parameters to improving the physical environment and the health of indigenous people. policy development and implementation must address disparities between populations that limit and stifle indigenous participation in decision-making processes, particularly environmental decision-making that has a direct impact on indigenous health and well-being. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 4 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.4.5 figure 1. e l e m e n t s o f a f ra m e w o rk t o i n c re a s e i n d i g e n o u s p a rt i c i p a t i o n i n e n v i ro n m e n t a l d e c i s i o n m a ki n g . framework for increasing indigenous control in environmental decision-making recognition of indigenous knowledge recognition of the inherent right to selfdetermination inclusive and integrative knowledge systems communitybased participatory approaches circular and holistic viewpoints 17 black and mcbean: increased indigenous participation in environmental decision-making published by scholarship@western, 2016 r e f e re n c e s aboriginal healing foundation. 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(2014, september). ekwa inniw-nisitootumowin: using a two-eyed seeing methodological approach to aboriginal youth’s risky health behaviors. paper presented at the annual meeting of the congress of qualitative inquiry, urbana, il. richmond, c. a. m., & ross, n. a. (2009). the determinants of first nation and inuit health: a critical population health approach. health & place, 15(2), 403–411. doi:10.1016/j.healthplace.2008.07.004 rockloff, s. f. & lockie, s. (2006). democratization of coastal zone decision-making for indigenous australians: insights from stakeholder analysis. coastal management, 34(3), 251-266. doi:10.1080/08920750600686653 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 4 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.4.5 schnarch, b. (2005). ownership, control, access, and possession (ocap ®) or self-determination applied to research: a critical analysis of contemporary first nations research and some options for first nations communities. ottawa, on: first nations centre, national aboriginal health organization. retrieved from www.naho.ca/documents/fnc/english/fnc_ocapcriticalanalysis.pdf simpson, l. r. (2004). anticolonial strategies for the recovery and maintenance of indigenous knowledge. american indian quarterly, 28(3-4), 373-384. doi:10.1353/aiq.2004.0107 smith, l. t. (1999). decolonizing methodologies: research and indigenous peoples. new york: zed books. doi:10.1038/70963 statistics canada. (2011). national household survey: aboriginal peoples in canada: first nations people, métis and inuit. ottawa, on: government of canada. retrieved from http://www12.statcan.gc.ca/nhs-enm/2011/as-sa/99-011-x/99-011-x2011001-eng.pdf stevenson, m. 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(2007). united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples. retrieved from www.un.org/esa/socdev/unpfii/documents/drips_en.pdf united nations world commission on environment and development (unwced). (1987). report of the world commission on environment and development: our common future. retrieved from www.un-documents.net/our-common-future.pdf uribe, j. (2006). a study on the relationship between canadian aboriginal peoples and the canadian state. retrieved from http://www.focal.ca/pdf/aboriginals_uribe_relationship%20canadian%20aboriginal%20pe oples%20and%20canadian%20state_march%202006.pdf walkem, a. (2006). the land is dry: indigenous peoples, water and environmental justice. in k. bakker (ed.), eau canada: the future of canada’s water (pp. 303-319). vancouver, bc: university of british columbia press. 23 black and mcbean: increased indigenous participation in environmental decision-making published by scholarship@western, 2016 wheatley, m. a. (1998). social and cultural impacts of environmental change on aboriginal peoples in canada. international journal on circumpolar health, 57(1), 537-542. whiteman, g. & mamen, k. (2002). meaningful consultation and participation in the mining sector? a review of the consultation and participation of indigenous peoples within the international mining sector. ottawa, on: the north-south institute. retrieved from http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.199.2901&rep=rep1&type=pdf wiebe, p. k., van gaalen, r. p., langlois, k., & costen, e. (2013). toward culturally safe evidenceinformed decision-making for first nations and inuit community health policies and programs. pimatisiwin, 11(1), 17-26. wilkes, j. (2011). decolonizing environmental management: a case study of kitchenuhmaykoosib inninuwug (master’s thesis). retrieved from miningwatch.ca/sites/default/files/wilkes_james_2011_ki_case_study.pdf 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 4 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.4.5 the international indigenous policy journal october 2016 increased indigenous participation in environmental decision-making: a policy analysis for the improvement of indigenous health kerry black edward mcbean recommended citation increased indigenous participation in environmental decision-making: a policy analysis for the improvement of indigenous health abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license increased indigenous participation in environmental decision-making: a policy analysis for the improvement of indigenous health traditional knowledge in the time of neo-liberalism: access and benefit-sharing regimes in india and bhutan the international indigenous policy journal volume 8 | issue 1 article 3 january 2017 traditional knowledge in the time of neoliberalism: access and benefit-sharing regimes in india and bhutan indrani barpujari atal bihari vajpayee institute of good governance and policy analysis, indranib22@gmail.com ujjal kumar sarma indian institute of forest management, uks_wildlife@yahoo.co.in recommended citation barpujari, i. , sarma, u. k. (2017). traditional knowledge in the time of neo-liberalism: access and benefit-sharing regimes in india and bhutan. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(1). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.3 traditional knowledge in the time of neo-liberalism: access and benefit-sharing regimes in india and bhutan abstract in a neoliberal world, traditional knowledge (tk) of biodiversity possessed by indigenous and local communities (ilcs) in the global south has become a valuable "commodity " or "bio-resource," necessitating the setting up of harmonized ground rules (international and national) in the form of an access and benefitsharing regime to facilitate its exchange in the world market. despite criticisms that a regime with a neo-liberal orientation is antithetical to the normative ethos of ilcs, it could also offer a chance for developing countries and ilcs to generate revenue for socioeconomic development—to which they are gradually becoming open, but only under fair and equitable terms. based on this context, this article proposes to look into the legal and policy frameworks and institutional regimes governing access and benefit sharing of tk associated with biological resources in two countries of south asia: india and bhutan. the article seeks to examine how such regimes are reconciling the imperatives of a neo-liberal economy with providing a just and equitable framework for ilcs and tk holders, which is truly participatory and not top-down. keywords traditional knowledge, biodiversity, neo-liberalism, access and benefit sharing, india, bhutan acknowledgments the authors are indebted to the editor and independent reviewers for their comments and suggestions. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ t ra d i t i o n a l k n o w l e d g e i n t h e t i m e o f n e o l i b e ra l i s m : a c c e s s a n d be n e f i t s h a ri n g r e g i m e s i n i n d i a a n d bh u t a n traditional knowledge (tk) of biodiversity possessed by indigenous and local communities (ilcs) in the global south has been generated and nurtured in the context of a deep, symbiotic interrelationship with the environment and sustained over generations in an ethos of sharing. this tk is holistic in nature and has intrinsic value—social, spiritual, economic, intellectual, scientific, ecological, technological, educational, and cultural—for ilcs (world intellectual property organization [wipo], 2014). also, as a general rule, tk is communally held, barring instances of specialised knowledge, with customary laws generally not operating on the logic of exclusion (dutfield, 2006). with increasing realisation of the economic potential of tk (for instance, as valuable leads to modern pharmaceutical companies), this tk finds itself in a neoliberal world order as a valuable “commodity” or “bio-resource.” this necessitates the setting up of harmonized ground rules (international and national) in the form of an access and benefit-sharing (also called abs) regime to facilitate its exchange in the world market as well as to ensure that this exchange is based on just and equitable terms and that tk is not misappropriated. neoliberalism, as defined by harvey (2005), is “a theory of political economic practices that proposes that human well-being can best be advanced by liberating individual entrepreneurial freedoms and skills within an institutional framework characterized by strong private property rights, free markets and free trade” (p. 2). the role of the state, according to harvey, is to create and preserve an institutional framework appropriate to such practices; in other words, it establishes a rule of law that can protect and enforce contracts between juridical individuals in the marketplace. neoliberalism also makes a strong case for regulating international trade as a means of safeguarding the same kind of commercial liberty and strong property rights that ought to be realised at the national level (thorsen & lie, 2009). as saadfilho and johnston (2005) observed, “we live in the age of neoliberalism,” with neoliberalism being “the dominant ideology shaping our world today,” which as a hegemonic discourse has pervaded all aspects of human life, including tk generated in an entirely different life-world (p. 1). this is expected considering that neoliberalism is characterised by “the consistent expansion of the economic form to apply to the social sphere . . . transpose economic analytical schemata and criteria for economic decision making onto spheres which are not, or certainly not exclusively, economic areas” (lemke, 2001, p. 197). a prominent example involves efforts to assign a monetary value to the services rendered by nature (ecosystem services) and using it as a tool for ensuring conservation, which is in sharp contract with many indigenous people’s deep sense of oneness and kinship with the natural world that has ensured its preservation. similarly, such incongruence occurs when market values are imposed on tk, which is priceless, usually held collectively, and generated in “simple societies,” subscribing to a very different worldview and rationality than that of profitmaking. one of the primary critiques of such commodification has been posed by polanyi (2001) who contests the ethical correctness in putting a price on something that is priceless or whose value is more than merely monetary, which, in his view, produces fictitious commodities. this also leads to, in the words of robertson (2004), “a successful attempt by capital to colonize and dominate the rationalities of other systems, with which it articulates” (p. 371). further, the promise of socioeconomic development, which is the standard bait for participation in the neoliberal regime, remains unrealized in most instances (castree, 2010). in addition, under neoliberalism, individuals are expected to be autonomous entrepreneurs (lemke, 2001) who are solely responsible for the consequences of their action. instances 1 barpujari and sarma: tk in the time of neo-liberalism published by scholarship@western, 2017 of inequality and social injustice are morally acceptable, at least to the degree to which they could be seen as the result of freely made decisions (thorsen & lie, 2009). in the particular context of tk, critics point out that neoliberal access and benefit-sharing regimes focussed on commodifying nature by making resources and associated tk tradeable through bilateral contracts is antithetical to the normative ethos of the ilcs (nijar, 2013). it also poses challenges for the non-western others who seek to protect alternative forms of creative world making from appropriations and exploitations in western commodity markets (coombe, 2003). at the same time, the inevitability of participation in such a regime is bolstered by the neoliberal argument that the global south has many “unpriced” and often un-owned biophysical assets that, if inserted into global markets, could create revenue that would be able to support much needed socioeconomic development (castree, 2010). as we shall see later on, countries like india and bhutan are increasingly being persuaded by this logic with ilcs and tk holders in these countries becoming increasingly open to the idea of putting their tk in the market economy, but seek to do so under fair and equitable terms. also, famous instances of biopiracy like that of basmati, neem, and ayahuasca1 made developing countries and ilcs realise the imperativeness of protecting tk from misappropriation under the harmonized (trade-related aspects of intellectual property rights [trips] secretariat, 2002). in fact, the hegemonic overtones of the neoliberal regime have been continually countered and shaped through the participation of developing countries and ilcs in meetings under the convention on biological diversity (cbd), the trips council, and wipo. it is here that they have fought hard to incorporate justice, equity, and accountability in the international structure, while simultaneously contributing to the creation of innovative regimes of access and use of tk at local, regional, and national levels (coombe, 2003). it is against this backdrop that this article proposes to look at the legal and policy framework and institutional regimes governing access and benefit sharing of tk associated with biological resources in the two countries of south asia—india and bhutan. in this article, we seek to study this in the context of the international regime on access and benefit sharing, which provides a broad template for national regimes (which is usual in a neoliberal framework). the scope of this article extends to the intellectual property rights (also called ipr) regime as well to the extent of its overlap and linkage with the access and benefit-sharing regime. the provisions of intellectual property rights, particularly the patent regime, can have a considerable bearing on the effectiveness of the access and benefit-sharing regime in 1 biopiracy refers to the practice in which others (usually by biopharmaceutical companies) use tk for profit without permission from the tk holders and the country from which the resource is sourced, and without any sharing of the benefits. for instance, indian communities and farmers have known about and used the neem tree for its fungicidal properties for a very long time. based on this tk, which was in the public domain (and was accessed without prior informed consent or a benefit-sharing agreement), a patent was granted by the european patent office to a u.s. corporation for a method of controlling fungal diseases using neem oil extract. an opposition was filed by a group of international non-governmental organizations (ngos) and representatives of indian farmers and this patent was subsequently revoked. india also decided to step up protection for tk in its national laws. similarly, in the case of ayahuasca, the knowledge of the shamans of the amazon basin on the medicinal properties of the plant was patented in the u.s. and was opposed by representatives of indigenous tribes in the region. unfortunately, this opposition did not prevail, resulting in manifest injustice to tk and ilcs. such instances have advanced the case for establishing an access and benefit-sharing regime at the international and national levels, which would enable access to the tk while also ensuring that prior informed consent and benefit sharing are enforced. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.3 preventing misappropriation. for example, if the requirements of prior informed consent (called pic) and benefit sharing in the access and benefit-sharing regime are backed by provisions in patent law that require documentation of these in cases involving tk and in their absence the patent can be opposed or revoked then protections are strengthened significantly. out of eight countries in south asia, only these two—india and bhutan—have enacted laws and put in place a policy and institutional framework in tune with their international commitments on access and benefit sharing. these international commitments include the cbd (united nations, 1992), and the nagoya protocol on access to genetic resources and the fair and equitable sharing of benefits arising from their utilization negotiated within it (secretariat of the convention on biological diversity, 2010). for this reason, we focus on india and bhutan (though extremely disparate in terms of size and institutional arrangements) as representative cases of access and benefit-sharing mechanisms in south asia. both the countries have also been engaged in revising their legal and policy frameworks to ensure conformity to the same. a primary focus of this article is to examine how india and bhutan, through their national policy and legal frameworks, are reconciling the imperatives of a neoliberal economy with the need for a just and equitable framework for ilcs and tk holders, which is truly participatory and not top-down. this article also attempts to provide recommendations for ensuring adequate protections. this article is largely based on an analysis of relevant policies and laws at the international level as well in the context of the countries of india and bhutan. this analysis is supplemented by interviews with key stakeholders and the incorporation of indigenous perspectives and efforts to the extent that this is feasible. t h e i n t e rn a t i o n a l r e g i m e o n a c c e s s a n d be n e f i t s h a ri n g a n d i t s r e l a t i o n s h i p w i t h t h e t r i ps a g re e m e n t there is a growing realization, embodied in policy and scientific recommendations, of the tremendous value of biological diversity to present and future human generations. there is also cognizance of the human induced threats that underlie the united nations environment programme’s (unep) decision to create the ad hoc working group of legal and technical experts in the mid-1990s. this group prepared a new international legal instrument for the conservation and sustainable use of biological diversity, which took the form of the cbd in 1992 (cbd, 2007). it was mandated to take “particular account of the need to share costs and benefits between developed and developing countries and ways and means to support innovation by local people” (cbd, 2007). before the cbd, “common heritage of mankind” was the international principle with respect to genetic resources, which allowed them to be extracted and used with impunity to the detriment of developing countries in the south that possessed the most biodiversity in the world. the cbd (un, 1992) tried to make amends with these countries by doing away with the earlier principle and recognizing the sovereign right of countries over genetic resources within their jurisdiction and also recognizing the role of ilcs in preserving the same and the need to share benefits when their tk associated with genetic resources was utilized. the cbd constitutes the primary international agreement in the world today on biological diversity, with the avowed objectives of its conservation, the sustainable use of its components, and the fair and equitable sharing of the benefits arising out of the utilization of genetic resources (un, 1992, article 1). 3 barpujari and sarma: tk in the time of neo-liberalism published by scholarship@western, 2017 in recognition of the critical role of ilcs in biodiversity conservation, article 8(j) of the convention enjoins each contracting party, subject to its national legislation, to: respect, preserve and maintain knowledge, innovations and practices of ilcs embodying traditional lifestyles relevant for the conservation and sustainable use of biological diversity and promote their wider application with the approval and involvement of the holders of such knowledge, innovations and practices and encourage the equitable sharing of the benefits arising from the utilization of such knowledge, innovations and practices. article 15 recognizes the sovereign rights of states over their natural resources, granting them the authority to determine access subject to prior and informed consent with a duty on contracting parties to take steps to ensure the fair and equitable sharing of benefits arising from the commercialization or utilization, based upon mutually agreed terms. while primarily being an environmental agreement, as coombe (2003) observed, the cbd partakes in neoliberal logic with biological resources being represented as goods that are most appropriately dealt with in an open system of flows, which need to be efficiently mapped, monitored, and transferred so that information about genetic resources can be globally cumulated, communicated, and, most importantly, capitalized upon. the recognition of the role of ilcs is also attributed to the neoliberal interest of better management of biological resources. this includes ensuring the juridical conditions required for contractual relations involving their use and attempting to balance the desire to access to resources, which stems primarily from the global north, with rights concerning the use of knowledge, prior and informed consent, and the sharing of benefits, which predominantly affect those in the global south (coombe, 2003). despite its lofty ideals, the cbd (un, 1992) has also been subject to much criticism owing to a number of weaknesses that are perceived to dilute the provisions that are favourable to ilcs. in particular, there is the issue of whether the cbd mandates prior and informed consent and benefit sharing with respect to tk or whether these requirements are only applicable with respect to biological resources. there is also concern around the concentration of rights at the state level, which allows them to grant access (including on behalf of ilcs) to third parties under article 15. finally, there is the perceived ineffectiveness and lack of implementation of the access and benefit-sharing regime (koutouki & von bieberstein, 2012; nijar, 2013). there has been a lot of debate about whether parties are obligated to make prior and informed consent from ilcs a requirement of access to tk. in response to this concern, the fifth meeting of the conference of parties in 2000 established a general principle that access to tk should be subject to the prior and informed consent from its holders (nijar, 2010). further, several years into the cbd, there was hardly any effective access and benefit-sharing regime owing to the failure of user states to introduce their own benefit-sharing regimes, which compelled provider states to have extremely restrictive regimes as the latter remained the sole tool to prevent rampant biopiracy (kamau, fedder, & winter, 2010). all of these concerns provided the thrust for the conference of the parties (cop) to create the ad hoc open-ended working group on access and benefit-sharing (or wg-abs) at its fifth meeting, held in 2000 at nairobi (decision v/26) (cop, 2000). the working group was given the mandate to develop guidelines and other approaches for implementing access and benefit sharing. accordingly, the working group came out with the bonn guidelines on access to genetic resources and fair and equitable sharing of the benefits arising out of their utilization (secretariat of the convention on biological diversity, 2002), which was adopted unanimously by 180 countries. as the term “guidelines” indicates, these are voluntary but do constitute 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.3 the first widely accepted criteria on access and benefit sharing. later, the mandate of the working group was extended, in collaboration with the working group on article 8(j) and related provisions.2 this mandate aimed to elaborate on and negotiate an international regime with the aim of adopting an instrument or instruments to effectively implement the provisions of articles 15 and 8(j) and the three objectives of the cbd (cop decision vii/19 at the seventh cop held in kuala lumpur in 2004) (cop, 2004). on october 29, 2010, after 6 years of negotiation, the nagoya protocol on access to genetic resources and the fair and equitable sharing of benefits arising from their utilization was adopted at the tenth meeting of the conference of the parties in nagoya, japan. it came into force on october 12, 2014 (cbd, n.d.b). the seminal provision of the protocol with respect to tk associated with genetic resources is article 7, which provides that: in accordance with domestic law, each party shall take measures, as appropriate, with the aim of ensuring that traditional knowledge associated with genetic resources that is held by indigenous and local communities is accessed with the prior and informed consent or approval and involvement of these indigenous and local communities, and that mutually agreed terms have been established. (secretariat of the cbd, 2010) article 12(1) enjoins that: parties shall, in accordance with domestic law, take into consideration indigenous and local communities’ customary laws, community protocols and procedures, as applicable. (secretariat of the cbd, 2010) as per article 12(3), parties are to support, as appropriate, the development of the following by ilcs, including women within these communities: a. community protocols in relation to access to tk associated with genetic resources and the fair and equitable sharing of benefits arising out of the utilization of such knowledge; b. minimum requirements for mutually agreed terms to secure the fair and equitable sharing of benefits arising from the utilization of tk associated with genetic resources; and c. model contractual clauses for benefit sharing arising from the utilization of tk associated with genetic resources. (secretariat of the cbd, 2010) while the nagoya protocol has been hailed for its achievement in finally putting in place a “binding” regime on access and benefit sharing internationally with enhanced rights of ilcs over their tk, it has 2 the cbd, particularly the ad hoc open-ended working group on article 8(j) and related provisions, has set up mechanisms to ensure full and effective participation of ilcs in meetings held under the convention. these provision range from financial support to enable ilcs to attend the meetings, to logistical support, as well as participation in formal and informal groups (such as contact groups and friends of the chair groups). ilc representatives who attend meetings held under the convention form a caucus that is referred to as the international indigenous forum on biodiversity (cbd, n.d.a). 5 barpujari and sarma: tk in the time of neo-liberalism published by scholarship@western, 2017 been criticized chiefly for its use of debilitative qualifiers (e.g., “as appropriate,” “where applicable,” “as far as possible”) and weak language (e.g., “endeavour,” “encourage,” “consider,” and “promote”), which creates room for legal ambiguity and uncertainty (kamau et al., 2010). in addition, despite efforts to the contrary, the protocol, much like the cbd, continues to accord priority to state sovereignty over the rights of indigenous people, which severs the all-important connection between community and biodiversity to the detriment of both (koutouki & von bieberstein, 2012). the rights bestowed upon ilcs over tk and its access (secretariat of the cbd, 2010, see articles 7 & 12) are considerably watered down by the repeated stress on “in accordance with domestic law” and “as appropriate.” as per article 12(1), parties are to take into account customary laws only in accordance with domestic law (secretariat of the cbd, 2010). also, the protocol is silent over the question of intellectual property rights of ilcs related to their tk. interestingly, the protocol, in its preamble, makes cognizant note of the provisions of the un declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip) (un, 2007), which was adopted by the general assembly of the united nations in 2007. a number of provisions in undrip (2007)3 read and interpreted together provide a positive rights regime for ilcs with respect to their tk in the sense that the rights flow from their ownership of their tk and are not contingent or dependant on the state (which is the case, as discussed above in the cbd and nagoya protocol. however, undrip, adopted by means of a un general assembly resolution, is “soft” law that is nonbinding in nature and hence has limited potential to affect state behaviour (barelli, 2009). it would also be pertinent to discuss the interaction between the access and benefit-sharing regime and the trips agreement (world trade organization [wto], 1994), which is critical to the protection of tk from misappropriation. the trips agreement enacted within the framework of the wto lays down minimum standards of intellectual property rights protection in wto member countries and is the single most important international treaty on intellectual property rights today. trips does not deal with tk per se, but its provisions—particularly those dealing with patents—have a considerable bearing on the protection of tk. the trips agreement creates an obligation among wto members to provide patents for any invention, whether a product or a process, in all fields of technology based on three patentability criteria: novelty, non-obviousness or inventive step, and industrial application (wto, 1994). with most tk having been in existence for a long time, publicly known, and handed down from generation to generation, it fails to satisfy the criteria of novelty required by trips, which in turn facilitates its use as “prior art.” since the agreement does not recognize any intellectual property rights over tk, the laws of many developed nations permit the patenting of inventions based on these (amounting to biopiracy); thus, misappropriating the tk of ilcs in developing countries. the manifest injustice of the situation has prompted developing countries to lead the campaign to amend the 3 article 31(1) of undrip strongly affirms the rights of indigenous peoples to: maintain, control, protect and develop their cultural heritage, traditional knowledge and traditional cultural expressions, as well as the manifestations of their sciences, technologies and cultures, including human and genetic resources, seeds, medicines, knowledge of the properties of fauna and flora, oral traditions, literatures, designs, sports and traditional games and visual and performing arts. (un, 2007) it also recognizes upfront their right to maintain, control, protect, and develop their intellectual property rights over the same. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.3 agreement to achieve harmonization with the objectives of the cbd.4 they have also sought to incorporate provisions preventing the patenting of inventions based on tk and strong disclosure requirements (with respect to inventions based on biological resources and associated tk) within trips to prevent misappropriation of tk (submission by brazil, india, china and others at the trips council, 2002; submission by brazil, bolivia, cuba, dominican republic, ecuador, india, thailand, peru, and venezuela to the trips council, 2003). however, despite the mandate of the doha ministerial declaration (2001) requiring the trips council to look into the relationship between the trips agreement, the cbd, and the protection of tk, the matter continues to be opposed by many developed countries at the trips council. as a result, this issue remains unresolved and negotiations have been deadlocked (wto general council, 2008). following the nagoya protocol, a new proposal was submitted led by brazil, china, india, and other countries (trade negotiations committee, wto, 2011). this proposal focused on achieving mutual support among trips, the cbd, and the nagoya protocol through the incorporation of a new article 29bis in the trips agreement. member states would require patent applicants to disclose the origin of genetic resources and associated tk as well as evidence of compliance with the national access and benefit-sharing legislation of the provider country. however, to date, no breakthrough has come about; this diminishes the positive gains from the nagoya protocol since the trips agreement has greater influence, owing to its strong dispute settlement mechanism and capacity to impose trade sanctions. the mismatch between the intellectual property rights regime designed to protect private rights and the nature of tk has also led the intergovernmental committee on intellectual property and genetic resources, traditional knowledge and folklore (igrtkf), set up by wipo, and the working group on access and benefit sharing of the cbd to contemplate the possibility of a sui generis regime. it would be designed especially for the protection of tk while borrowing compatible elements available in existing mechanisms of intellectual property rights protection (cbd, 2007; wipo, 2002). however, not much headway has been made in this direction. a c c e s s a n d be n e f i t s h a ri n g r e g i m e s i n s o u t h a s i a : t h e c a s e o f i n d i a a n d bh u t a n i n d i a india is a mega-diverse country with over 91,200 species of animals and 45,500 species of plants documented in its 10 bio-geographic regions (ministry of environment and forests, government of india, 2014). it is also a vast repository of tk associated with biological resources and has a huge population that is dependent on it. india has been the forerunner in the south asia region in enacting and implementing an access and benefit-sharing regime for biological resources and associated tk in the form of the biological diversity act and the rules made thereunder in 2004 (national biodiversity authority, india, 2002, 2004), which are in line with the mandate of the cbd. the biological diversity act lays down the institutional structure as well as procedures governing access to biological diversity 4 article 16(5) of the cbd recognises that intellectual property rights, the subject matter of the trips agreement, “may have an influence on the implementation” of the cbd (un, 1992). it obliges states to cooperate in order to ensure that intellectual property rights are “supportive of and do not run counter to” the objectives of the cbd (un, 1992). 7 barpujari and sarma: tk in the time of neo-liberalism published by scholarship@western, 2017 and the associated knowledge. the act provides a three tier decision-making structure: the national biodiversity authority (nba) at the centre, the state biodiversity boards (sbbs) at the state (subnational) level, and the biodiversity management committees (bmcs) at the local level (national biodiversity authority, india, 2002). chapter ii of the act requires approval from the nba for commercial or scientific requests for use of biological resources by foreigners as well as all applications for intellectual property rights on biological resources and associated tk.5 the sbbs are empowered under section 23 to grant approvals for commercial or scientific use of biological resources by indians. section 41 of the act mandates that local bodies (panchayats and municipalities) establish biodiversity management committees (bmcs) in their area. the nba and sba are required to “consult” with bmcs while making any decision related to the use of biological resources and associated tk occurring within their territorial jurisdiction, with bmcs also empowered to levy collection fees from any person collecting or accessing any biological resource for commercial purpose in their area (national biodiversity authority, india, 2002). the biological diversity rules (national biodiversity authority, india, 2004) provide for the constitution of the bmc, which consists of a chairperson and not more than six persons nominated by the local body, of whom not less than one third should be women and not less than 18% should belong to the scheduled castes and scheduled tribes.6 the main function of the bmc (rule 22.6) is preparation of the people’s biodiversity register (pbr), which shall contain comprehensive information on availability and knowledge of local biological resources, their medicinal or other uses, as well as any other tk associated with them, in consultation with the local people (national biodiversity authority, india, 2004). section 21—which provides the procedure for benefit sharing—confers the main authority to the nba though it is mandated to consider the mutually agreed terms and conditions between the person applying for approval, concerned local bodies, and the benefit claimers. this authority is further reinforced by section 2(g), which defines fair and equitable benefit sharing as “sharing of benefits as determined by the national biodiversity authority (nba) under section 21.” section 6(2) further states that the nba may impose a benefit-sharing fee or royalty, or both in granting the approval (national biodiversity authority, india, 2004). from the above discussion, it emerges that despite the provision for a decentralised structure, the power to regulate access and benefit sharing is concentrated mainly in the nba, though the former is mandated to “consult” the local body (the bmc), thus depriving it of an equal stake in the access and benefitsharing negotiations. the act is also conspicuously silent about the actual right of knowledge holders over the question of access by a third party. further, the reduction of the role of the local body to mere 5 this provision is diluted by the absence of a similar provision in the patents (amendment) act (india) (2005), which is the primary national legislation governing patents. however, the guidelines for the processing of patent applications relating to traditional knowledge and biological material (2012) seek to address this shortcoming. they provide guidelines for better coordination between the patent office and the nba in dealing with patents related to biological resources and associated tk. tk is per se not patentable under the indian patent legislation, which has a disclosure requirement with respect to source or geographical origin of biological material used in the patent application. applicants must also disclose whether the invention or any claim under it is rooted in tk, oral or otherwise. non-compliance to these provisions is grounds for opposition and revocation of the patent (see section 25). 6 the scheduled castes (scs) and scheduled tribes (sts) are official designations given to various groups of historically disadvantaged indigenous peoples in india who are recognized in the constitution of india. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.3 documentation of its biological resources and associated tk, without corresponding ownership and control over the same has been subject to much criticism due to its hegemonic character and is perceived as “a sell out to bio-based trade at its best” (kohli, 2006). in fact, a protest was organised by approximately 300 representatives of panchayats and gram sabhas,7 supported by non-governmental organizations (ngos) and citizens’ groups on december 8, 2004, to protest against the rules. in 2007, resolutions from more than 3,000 gram panchayats, local institutions, and community organisations were sent to the prime minister, reiterating their refusal to form bmcs unless certain prerequisites for ensuring control by the people, recognition of their rights, and legal protection for pbrs were met (kohli & bhutani, 2014). partly in response to these demands, the nba brought out the guidelines for operationalization of bmcs in 2013, which required the involvement of tribal groups and other marginalised groups in the process of bmc formation. the guidelines also sought to expand the role and functions of the bmcs, apart from preparation of pbrs, to include: a. protecting the tk recorded in the pbr; providing feedback to the sbb (as well as the nba) in matters related to intellectual property rights, tk, and local biodiversity use; b. regulating of access to biological resources and associated tk for commercial and research purposes; c. ensuring sustainable use and benefit sharing; and d. documenting and enabling procedures for developing bio-cultural protocols. in addition, the guidelines on access to biological resources and associated knowledge and benefitsharing regulations (national biodiversity authority, india, 2014) were also brought out as a piece of secondary legislation under the biodiversity act (national biodiversity authority, india, 2002). the guidelines are to be commended for trying to make it so 95% of the accrued benefits, monetary and/or non-monetary, are passed on to concerned bmc(s) and/or benefit claimers (national biodiversity authority, india, 2014). these also recognize the claims of individuals, groups of individuals, or organisations from whom the biological resource or knowledge is sourced, providing for the direct transfer of the benefits received to the appropriate individual, group, or organisation. while continuing to reinforce the primary role of the nba, the rules provide a space, albeit a limited one, for participation of bmcs through the sbbs in whose jurisdiction the biological resources and the associated knowledge occur during the nba’s decision-making on a related application. thus, it emerges that, owing to pressure from local bodies and communities, the biodiversity act, while retaining the primary role of the centralised nba, is gradually moving towards more participation at the local level. however, the fact that these pro-people changes have been implemented through guidelines rather than through amendments in the main legislation itself weakens their legal enforceability. at the same time, there is a serious omission in these new guidelines, which were intended to give effect to the requirements of the nagoya protocol. there is the lack of recognition given to bio-cultural protocols, 7 local bodies under the panchayati raj system of local governance constituted through the 73rd amendment to the constitution of india. 9 barpujari and sarma: tk in the time of neo-liberalism published by scholarship@western, 2017 which serve as the primary tool for ilcs to lay down their terms for access and benefit sharing in sync with their customary laws and institutions (national biodiversity authority, india, 2014). here, it may be mentioned that different ilcs from different parts of india (for example, the baigas of chattisgarh, the monpas of arunachal pradesh, the danus and takuli of uttarakhand) with support from the united nations development fund (undp) have prepared about 12 bcps that are intended to be linked to the pbrs, but as of yet have no legal enforceability. a reading of the bcps makes evident that, while ilcs continue to treat tk—their ancestors’ knowledge—as sacrosanct, they understand that the modern regime necessitates sharing their knowledge. they are prepared to share their knowledge “on the basis of care for nature and reciprocity that must include benefit sharing” (monpas of salari, n.d., p. 6). the baigas of tatidhar village (n.d.) asserted, “we do not distrust outsiders . . . however, we have learnt about the many incidents and experiences in our country and other countries where tribal people have suffered” (p. 10). for this reason, they want outside agencies and individuals to seek their consent before accessing their knowledge or their plants. ilcs are also concerned about restrictions on their access to the forests, which are vital to their tk. the increasing lack of interest among youth and illegal extraction by outsiders are areas of concern. the authors’ own research among the members of the karbi tribe of assam shows that there are marked intergenerational differences within the same community regarding perceptions about knowledge, knowledge sharing, and intellectual property rights (sarma & barpujari, 2012). the study found that the younger generation, particularly educated youths, exhibit less reverence for the tk of the tribe and tended to dismiss many indigenous-healing practices as superstitions. however, ironically, they displayed considerable enthusiasm for the potential commercialization of this knowledge and for the idea of intellectual property rights and benefit sharing. on the other hand, the older generation, particularly those possessing specialist knowledge, expressed reluctance to share the knowledge because it is embedded within the socio-religious beliefs of the community and they feel an allegiance to its traditional ethos, which permits its use only for the welfare of the society and not for profit. turning to the implementation of the institutional mechanism after almost 14 years under the biological diversity act, current reports present a dismal picture: among 15 states surveyed, only 16% of the local bodies have constituted bmcs, while less than 3% of the local bodies have prepared pbrs (shrivastava, 2016). as far as access and benefit-sharing arrangements are concerned, while about 408 approvals have been sanctioned (national biodiversity authority, india, 2017), there have been very few instances of benefit sharing with bmcs, which has been mostly with respect to extraction of biological resources for which one-time payment has been made to the respective bmcs (kohli & bhutani, 2014). data from the nba indicates that monetary benefits have been minimal; for instance, between 2011 and 2012, the nba received only rs 1,98,603 (a very small amount) in royalties from access applicants (kohli & bhutani, 2015). bh u t a n bhutan is a small landlocked country between india and china in the eastern himalayas recognized as a global biological hot spot. it has about 300 species of medicinal plants found at different altitudes for which the himalayan kingdom has been referred to as lhomenjong or the valley of medicinal plants. these plants have been nurtured by local custodians motivated by “strong spiritual and cultural bonds with their local ecosystems” (ministry of agriculture and forests, royal government of bhutan, 2014, p. 2). conservation of biological diversity has always been an integral part of bhutan’s national policy 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.3 framework, with the protection of the country’s natural resources and environment mandated in the constitution of the kingdom of bhutan, which also recognizes the trusteeship of the bhutanese citizens over the same (royal government of bhutan, 2008, article 5). at the same time, the country has been very amenable to the neoliberal idea of exploiting its biological resources as “a development capital for national economic growth but within the limits of environmental sustainability” (ministry of agriculture, royal government of bhutan, 2009, p. 89). it has sought to capitalise on its “rich biodiversity and widespread existence of traditional knowledge and practices among local communities” to embark on bioprospecting as “a potentially very lucrative conservation enterprise” (ministry of agriculture, royal government of bhutan, 2009, p. 104). while recognizing the strong spiritual and cultural bonds of ilcs and tk holders with their local ecosystems and seeking to preserve them, bhutan has been pragmatic in realizing that such bonds could become frayed due to growing economic pressures. to address this issue, the country’s position has been to secure the economic value of biological resources and associated tk by facilitating research and commercial utilization, as well as ensuring fair and equitable sharing of benefits arising from such activities (ministry of agriculture and forests, royal government of bhutan, 2014). following the ratification of the cbd (un, 1992) by bhutan in 1995, the country enacted the biodiversity act of bhutan. the biodiversity act of bhutan, while asserting the national sovereignty of the royal government of bhutan over its genetic resources among other objectives, also seeks to prevent illegal access to genetic resources and associated tk, as well as aiming to recognize and protect tk, innovations, and practices of local communities (ministry of agriculture, royal government of bhutan, 2003, section 2). the act lays down procedures for securing access to associated tk, which involves obtaining prior and informed consent from the owners of tk in order to use tk for noncustomary uses (ministry of agriculture, royal government of bhutan, 2003, section 37). the importance of prior and informed consent is further reinforced as the fundamental principle for access in the preamble of the act. the applications for access and the necessary permits are processed by the authorised agency (defined as the body designated as authorised agency by the competent authority under the act). they are then submitted to the competent authority (defined in the act as the head of the ministry of agriculture, royal government of bhutan) who may grant or refuse applications (ministry of agriculture, royal government of bhutan, 2003, chapter 2). a noteworthy provision is the primary right of tk holders to either accept or reject an application for access (under section 38), though this right is not absolute because the competent national authority retains the final right to approve or deny the agreement based on national interests (ministry of agriculture, royal government of bhutan, 2003, section 39). section 42 provides for the inventorisation and documentation of tk to be done by the authorized agency in collaboration with the owners of tk. in addition, under section 35, owners under the act (the tk holders) are to enjoy the right in perpetuity, applicable even if the tk is not in material form as outlined in section 34 and as stated in section 36. these rights are in addition to 11 barpujari and sarma: tk in the time of neo-liberalism published by scholarship@western, 2017 and do not affect any rights that may subsist under any intellectual property rights laws8 (ministry of agriculture, royal government of bhutan, 2003). under section 49, the onus is on the competent authority to formulate and adopt rules and regulations to implement the act (ministry of agriculture, royal government of bhutan, 2003). despite efforts over the years to draft rules and regulations in order to implement the act—such as the biodiversity action plan (ministry of agriculture, royal government of bhutan, 2009)—even after 13 years, the act presently stands unimplemented.9 however, even in the absence an act, bhutan has had a functional access and benefit-sharing mechanism: the national biodiversity centre (nbc), which bhutan instituted in 1998 under the ministry of agriculture and forests. the nbc is the main implementing agency of the cbd. it is responsible for coordinating biodiversity conservation and sustainable use programs in the country. its mandate extends, among other things, to serving as the national focal agency to regulate access to biological resources and ensure equitable sharing of the benefits. it is responsible for developing policies and legal frameworks for conservation and sustainable utilization of biological resources. it also serves as the national focal agency for bioprospecting and documentation of tk (national biodiversity centre, bhutan, 2017). here, it may be mentioned that in 2009 a bioprospecting division was launched under the aegis of nbc, bhutan. it includes a traditional documentation unit, a bio-exploration unit, and a research unit. its objective is to tap into genetic resources and associated tk within the country in order to contribute to the development of new and clean industries based on bioprospecting and genetic engineering. this innovation is expected to place bhutan in the vanguard of scientific advancement for the benefit of humankind (planning commission, royal government of bhutan, 2011). at the same time, the importance of traditional medicine10 has been upheld as an integral part of the public health services system. traditional medicine units are attached to modern district hospitals and basic health units (bhus) that function under the guardianship of the institute of traditional medicine services (iitms, thimphu), which has now become the department of traditional medicine services under the health ministry. menjong sorig pharmaceuticals, formerly the pharmaceutical and research unit of iitms, is engaged in the production of traditional medicine using about 300 medical plants from the wild in order to supply to all the hospitals of bhutan. this process has involved communities in the sustainable collection and cultivation of medicinal plants from the wild (undp, 2014). the potential for bioprospecting on these 8 the primary intellectual property rights legislation of bhutan is the industrial property act of the kingdom of bhutan (2001). under this act, a patent is granted for an invention that is new, involves an inventive step, and is industrially applicable (section 5(1)). while methods for treatment of the human or animal body by surgery or therapy, as well as diagnostic methods practiced on the human or animal body are non-patentable (section 4 (3)(iii)), there is a proviso regarding its non-applicability to products for use in any of these methods. a broad inference can be drawn from these provisions—products based on tk are patentable in bhutan and require no disclosure of the use of the tk. 9 in an interview with dr. tashi yangzome dorji, program director of the nbc in bhutan, at thimphu in june of2012, we learnt that one of the reasons this legislation was kept on hold was that a draft access and benefitsharing policy, in line with commitments under the nagoya protocol, was being formulated. it was therefore necessary to subsequently amend the legislation in line with the policy. 10 bhutan is home to two forms of traditional medicines: local healing practices (mostly oral traditions) and the formalized traditional medical system known as gso-ba-rig-pa medical system, which is highly sophisticated and fully documented (wangchuk, 2008). 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.3 plants has highlighted the need for international collaboration in future research and production (wangchuk, 2008). in an interview with dr. tashi yangzome dorji, program director at nbc in bhutan, at thimphu on june 20, 2012, we learned that, until the biodiversity act is implemented, the nbc would continue to be the authorized agency responsible for receiving and approving applications for bioprospecting. when such a proposal is received, it is subject to scrutiny by a scientific review committee set up by the nbc. the scientific review committee is composed of experts from the department of agriculture, the department of forests and park services, the department of livestock, the department of agricultural marketing and cooperatives, the policy and planning division of the ministry of agriculture and forests, the council for rnr research of bhutan, the institute for traditional medicine services, the intellectual property division of the ministry of economic affairs, and the nbc. once an application is approved by the committee, final approval lies with the secretary of the ministry of agriculture and environment. at the time of the interview, only two cases had been approved—one involved a private sector collaboration with the nbc, while in the other instance a company outside bhutan collaborated with the government. the status in 2014 is not much different—three memoranda of agreement or understanding have been entered into with various private enterprises and an additional four proposals are in the early stages of consideration for potential access and benefit-sharing collaborations (undp, 2014).11 dr. tashi yangzome dorji said that the nagoya protocol of 2010 provided a boost to policy making in the area (personal communication, june 20, 2012). bhutan sought to firm up an access and benefitsharing policy and it was considering its stated position on bioprospecting and commitments under the protocol. the country has since firmed up the draft access and benefit-sharing policy of bhutan, in which access to genetic resources and associated tk is divided into two phases—a scoping phase and an actualization phase—with different conditions for each phase (ministry of agriculture, royal government of bhutan, 2014). permission for the scoping phase is envisaged through a scoping permit or an agreement between the national focal point and the user, which lays down a set of conditions for utilization (including the condition to fulfill the requirements of the actualization phase prior to engaging in the actualization phase). it will be conditional on payment of a processing fee and a cash deposit that is returnable on conclusion of the scoping phase. the actualization phase requires: a. an actualization permit to be issued by the national focal point; and b. an access and benefit-sharing agreement between the users and the providers of genetic resources and/or associated tk. 11 nbc has an access and benefit-sharing agreement with bhutan pharmaceutical private limited (bppl), a private national company, on ophiocordyceps sinensis and other insect fungi, while nimura genetic solutions, malaysia has so far invested approximately us$300,000 for technology transfer related to research and development and collaborative research on bhutanese star anise. nbc has also entered into a memorandum of agreement with an international company, quantum pharmaceuticals limited (qpl), for sale of orchid (cymbidium erythraeum) flowers as one of the ingredients for the production of a cosmetic product called redeem (undp, 2014). 13 barpujari and sarma: tk in the time of neo-liberalism published by scholarship@western, 2017 the national focal point will provide oversight, where appropriate, over negotiations between the users and the providers in the access and benefit-sharing agreement. the access and benefit-sharing agreement may include both monetary and non-monetary benefits (ministry of agriculture, royal government of bhutan, 2014). access to tk associated with biological resources (held by one community) will require an access and benefit-sharing agreement between the community based on their community protocol, with guidance from the national focal point and the user. where tk is held by more than one community, an access and benefit-sharing agreement will be negotiated between the communities in accordance with their community protocols under the guidance of the national focal point and the user. where this is not feasible, the national focal point shall enter into an access and benefit-sharing agreement on their behalf. the draft policy provides that monetary benefits derived from research and commercialization of genetic resources and/or associated tk (including the processing fee and the cash deposit payable at the scoping phase) is to be channelled to an access and benefit-sharing fund. this fund is managed by the national focal point, which shall disburse the funds for conservation and sustainable use of bhutan’s biodiversity and for the enhancement of rural livelihoods. while the draft access and benefit-sharing policy is still pending final approval, a new biodiversity bill of bhutan (2016) was added to the nbc website in march of 2016, which, as stated in the preamble itself, seeks to repeal the existing biological diversity act of 2003. a reading of the bill makes evident that its basic intention is to give legal teeth to the access and benefit-sharing mechanism envisaged in the draft access and benefit-sharing policy, such as the two kinds of access and benefit-sharing agreements, the creation of an access and benefit-sharing fund, etc. it also aims to provide the legal backing for the prevailing institutional arrangement with the nbc as the national focal point and the secretary of the ministry of agriculture as the competent national authority. however, what is striking is the concentration of all powers in the competent national authority and the national focal highlights the omission of communities and tk holders in the decision making process, which is a complete departure from the earlier act and even the draft access and benefit-sharing policy. to illustrate this, one can take section 26 on prior and informed consent, which specifies that access is subject to prior and informed consent of the competent national authority, which can seek prior and informed consent from the providers of genetic resources where it considers appropriate (proviso to section 26). further, section 27 provides that the competent national authority may grant or refuse prior and informed consent based on the recommendations of the national focal point. this is a major deviation from the biological diversity act of 2003, which gave communities the right to accept or reject an access application. it is indeed strange that while seeking to enact laws and policies to give effect to the nagoya protocol, which bhutan ratified in 2013, the new bill has a provision that goes against the fundamental principle of the protocol ensuring the prior and informed consent of ilcs and tk holders. the only time the prior and informed consent of local communities and tk holders is mandatory is during the process of documenting tk by the national focal point, which is required to maintain a national tk database (sections 61 & 62). the result is a situation where post-documentation ilcs and tk holders have no role in decision-making on the issue of access and benefit sharing, which becomes the prerogative of the state agencies. the act casts a duty on the national focal point to support and promote communities in developing community protocols on tk associated with genetic resources (section 64), but this is not backed by a requirement under the law to consult those communities while determining access and benefit sharing. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.3 now, if we are to look into the engagement of ilcs in the policy making process in bhutan, a survey of existing literature seems to indicate a low level of engagement among ilcs in the actual policy making process (unlike in india where local bodies and communities have fought hard to make laws more participatory). this may be attributed to a lack of awareness about and absence of community mobilisation on the issue, stemming from the socioeconomic conditions of rural communities in bhutan. rural communities tend to be composed of mainly small and subsistence farmers with limited access to fertile land who live in remote, mountainous terrain. these areas are characterised by low levels of literacy, considerable deprivation, and poverty in terms of access to income and economic opportunities, lower living standards, and a weaker human assets base (gross national happiness [gnh] commission, royal government of bhutan, n.d.). however, efforts can be seen in terms of the measures aimed at documenting tk by the nbc, which includes the involvement of local communities. this documentation has been carried out in 16 gewogs (an administrative unit composed of a block of villages) across eight dzongkhags (districts). this process has included prior and informed consent as part of surveying and documenting of tk related to the use of z. cassumunar in lokchina gewog in chukha dzongkhag in southwest bhutan (undp, 2014). with funding from undp, a major project was launched in 2014 aimed at helping bhutan implement the nagoya protocol (undp, 2014). in addition, the nbc has proposed to carry out fieldwork to provide additional tk documentation, covering all 20 dzongkhags across the country by the end of the ongoing 11th five year plan (2018). as envisaged, activities for tk documentation will in general involve community meetings for awareness and sensitization on access and benefit sharing and tk documentation, identification of tk holders, and consultations with individual tk holders to document tk (undp, 2014). c o n c l u s i o n a n d t h e w a y a h e a d from the above discussion, it is clear that the international access and benefit-sharing regime on biological resources and associated tk, as laid down by the cbd and the nagoya protocol, operates on the neoliberal rationality of commodification and facilitation of market exchange. however, it has also been continuously shaped by commitments to ensuring justice and equity to the real custodians and owners of these resources—ilcs. despite certain weaknesses in the regime in terms of strongly framed rights, comparative standing vis-à-vis the trips agreement and others, it provides a reasonably robust yet flexible framework for developing countries to devise national regimes, in line with their national contexts, priorities, as well as the needs and aspirations of their ilcs. india and bhutan are the only two countries in south asia that have enacted legislation and put in place institutional regimes, which have been operational for a decade or more. as we have already seen, india has a three tier institutional arrangement at the national, sub-national, and local level, which, while vesting considerable power in the national body, is increasingly becoming more participatory through the strengthening of local level bmcs in terms of legal provisions that are the result of community engagement and mobilization. on the other hand, bhutan has sought to capitalize on the neoliberal promises of bioprospecting as a key strategy to use its biological resources and associated tk to meet socioeconomic goals, as well as to contribute to the lives of tk holders and ilcs. despite the fact that the policy and legal landscape is still evolving, an institutional mechanism has been set up and has been functional for quite some time. however, in the process, the state agencies have assumed a primary role, entering into access and benefit-sharing negotiations on behalf of ilcs and tk holders, which may be attributed to low levels of awareness, socioeconomic conditions, and 15 barpujari and sarma: tk in the time of neo-liberalism published by scholarship@western, 2017 comparative isolation because of the mountainous terrain. at the same time, bhutan has also created a favourable environment for tk to thrive through its recognition of traditional medicine as an integral part of its public health delivery system and the efforts of the department of traditional medicine services in this direction. considering the overlap between the access and benefit sharing and the intellectual property rights regime, india has done well to take up steps to achieve a better alignment between the two regimes. the incorporation of a strong disclosure requirement for tk used in patent applications, as well as the greater role of the nba in patent applications dealing with biological resources and associated tk, will go a long way in preventing the misappropriation of tk in the form of patents without prior informed consent and benefit-sharing agreements. unlike the indian patent act, the bhutanese legislation has no requirement for disclosure of the use of genetic resources or associated tk, which makes tk vulnerable to misappropriation. while both india and bhutan have focussed on documentation of tk, it needs to be backed by stringent legal provisions to prevent misappropriation. as far as implementation is concerned, unfortunately, both india and bhutan have not fared very well, although the process in both countries has gathered momentum following the nagoya protocol and corresponding policy changes. it cannot be denied that there are many impediments, such as low levels of awareness, socioeconomic conditions, etc., to meaningful participation as equal partners in designing and in implementing access and benefit-sharing provisions by ilcs and tk holders in the two countries. while the basic idea of individuals as autonomous entrepreneurs participating in a neoliberal economy is laudable for its ability to empower, the experience across the world has demonstrated that neoliberal strategies tend to frequently disadvantage the poor and the powerless with the opportunities being “more apparent than real” (castree, 2010, p. 31). as vermeylen (2008) noted in her case study of the san in southern africa who had entered into a benefit-sharing agreement for the commercialization of hoodia, such commodification often takes the form of “desperate exchanges as the last resort to improve their lives” (p. 237). in the absence of the power and means to negotiate on equal terms, this process can never become an act of liberation, emancipation, and empowerment for indigenous peoples. hence, the case for building the capacity of tk holders and ilcs to effectively participate in policy making on issues that directly affect their lives, to protect their tk under an alien regime, and to negotiate contracts cannot be overemphasized. justice and equity demand that tk holders, who have nurtured their environment and knowledge over time, have control and ownership over it, the right to both grant and refuse access to their tk, as well as a right to a high degree of participation and engagement in structures that manage the resource and associated tk. it is only fair that that when people who are relatively disadvantaged and typically excluded are confronted with very complicated issues such as intellectual property rights and access and benefit sharing, they should have access to expert advice and representation (overwalle, 2005). policy regimes need to be increasingly sensitive to the local realities and socioeconomic contexts to ensure that access and benefit sharing does not reinforce existing dominance (for instance, caste hierarchies in indian villages) and that the most marginalized groups find representation in the process. the constant challenge for the two countries will be in reconciling the imperatives of a neoliberal world order with a just and equitable framework for ilcs and tk holders, which is truly participatory and not top-down. in this context, the case for arriving at tenable legal provisions geared to the unique context of tk and sensitive to the needs of ilcs and tk holders cannot be overemphasized. draft access and 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.3 benefit-sharing national legislation, as well as amendments to laws already in operation, need to clearly lay down the rights of ilcs over their knowledge vis-à-vis the rights and role of the state. they must recognize upfront the primary rights and powers of indigenous peoples to both grant and refuse access through organizations and traditional institutions representing their interests, with the state being the facilitator. there is also a need for provisions in the law recognizing bio-cultural protocols, peoples’ biodiversity registers (in the indian context), as well as customary laws—the terms under which communities may be willing to grant access. such a law may also provide the terms or clauses of the access and benefit-sharing contract as well as the right to a range of monetary and non-monetary benefits arising out of commercialization, depending on the priorities of the ilcs. in addition, the effectiveness of such a law would be suitably enhanced by remedies or penalties against infringement on the rights conferred. as already discussed, there is need to align a country’s patent regime with its access and benefit-sharing regime to create an effective deterrent to misappropriation of tk. finally, efforts at the national level on the part of developing countries need to be backed up by concerted action at the international level in forums like the trips council, wipo, and cbd to make 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(2008). issues related to the extension of the protection of geographical indications provided for in article 23 of the trips agreement to products other than wines and spirits and those related to the relationship between the trips agreement and the convention on biological diversity (wt/gc/w/591). retrieved from https://www.wto.org/english/tratop_e/trips.../giextension_cbd_dgreport_9jun08_e.doc 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.3 the international indigenous policy journal january 2017 traditional knowledge in the time of neo-liberalism: access and benefit-sharing regimes in india and bhutan indrani barpujari ujjal kumar sarma recommended citation traditional knowledge in the time of neo-liberalism: access and benefit-sharing regimes in india and bhutan abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license traditional knowledge in the time of neo-liberalism: access and benefit-sharing regimes in india and bhutan planting seeds of change: voices of indigenous youth on wholistic health the international indigenous policy journal volume 13 | issue 2 september 2022 planting seeds of change: voices of indigenous youth on wholistic health kathy moscou ontario college of art and design university, canada, kmoscou@faculty.ocadu.ca recommended citation moscou, k. (2021). planting seeds of change: voices of indigenous youth. the international indigenous policy journal, 12(4). https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2022.13.2.10977 planting seeds of change: voices of indigenous youth abstract indigenous youth are key partners in improving our understanding of holistic health and identifying solutions to address health-related issues. the urban gardens project was a community-based research partnership involving indigenous youth co-researchers, brandon university, indigenous knowledge users, elders, and indigenous organizations in winnipeg and brandon, manitoba. using the medicine wheel as an analytic framework, the study identified key indicators of spiritual, mental, physical, and emotional wellbeing that indigenous youth attributed to gardening. findings illuminate the need for policies to foster indigenous youth engagement, leadership, and urban gardening programs that advance indigenous cultural practices to contribute to indigenous health and wellbeing. the research was funded by the canadian institutes for health research (cihr). keywords indigenous, indigenous youth, urban gardening, photovoice, community-based participatory research acknowledgments i would like to thank the elder knowledge keepers involved in the urban garden project: frank tacan (brandon, mb), verna demontigny (brandon, mb), clarence nepinak (winnipeg, mb) and barbara nepinak (winnipeg, mb) for sharing their stories, cultural knowledge and wisdom with the youth coresearchers and university researchers. i would also like to acknowledge the project collaborative partners: the brandon friendship centre, manitoba métis federation southwest region, four arrows regional health authority and the brandon university indigenous people centre without whose support and advice this project would not have been possible. in addition, i would like to acknowledge the indigenous youth co-researchers and community partners that reviewed this manuscript and provided feedback. i would also like to recognize brandon university urban garden project co-investigators serena petrella, kim lemky, balfour spence and karen rempel for their participation in the research project and thank dion wiseman for his assistance in preparing the gis map. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ 1 moscou: planting seeds of change published by scholarship@western, 2022 planting seeds of change: voices of indigenous youth on wholistic health indigenous youth are key partners in improving understanding of wholistic health and identifying solutions to address health-related issues such as food insecurity in urban centres. demographic data from statistics canada reveal that the number of indigenous people living in urban census metropolitan areas is rapidly growing. indigenous youth are the fastest growing population in canada, increasing 39% since 2006 (statistics canada, 2018a). approximately 57% indigenous males and 52% indigenous females living off reserve in manitoba are under the age of 29 years (statistics canada, 2020). the median age of the indigenous population in manitoba is 22 years with 36% of the population under the age of 15 years and 18% between the age of 18-24 (statistics canada, 2020). the median age for the indigenous population in winnipeg is 27 years as compared with the 38.8 years in the overall winnipeg population (statistics canada, 2018b). this demographic data suggests that the perspectives of urban indigenous youth pertaining to health and wellbeing must be acknowledged. the truth and reconciliation commission (trc) call to action # 20, which demands that the distinct health needs of métis, inuit, and off reserve indigenous peoples be recognized, further demonstrates that the specific health needs of indigenous youth should be addressed. projects that involve indigenous youth as co-researchers empower youth to analyze conditions affecting their health and enable them to exercise leadership in order to contribute to positive change. few studies pertaining to health or food security have involved urban indigenous youth (cidro et al., 2015; companion, 2013; johnson-jennings et al., 2020; martin & hanson, 2019). the urban indigenous population is culturally diverse and consists of individuals new to the urban environment as well as those whose only experience is in living in urban areas. connection to traditional foods and cultural practices such as food sharing vary widely (skinner et al., 2016). research and programming for urban indigenous youth therefore must reflect their unique and diverse experiences. to work towards decolonizing health, researchers must respect that there is no monolithic indigenous experience. the distinct health needs of urban indigenous peoples must be understood and addressed, as called for by trc #20. the urban gardens: towards holistic health and food security for urban indigenous peoples project was a community-based research partnership involving indigenous youth, brandon university researchers, indigenous knowledge users, elders, and indigenous organizations in winnipeg and brandon, manitoba. the objective of this project was to investigate how gardening contributed to urban indigenous youth’s wholistic health and wellbeing. the study identified indicators of spiritual, mental, physical, and emotional wellbeing that urban indigenous youth derived from gardening. the study also examined the role of urban gardening in contributing to social and community cohesion in support of neighbourhood health. urban community gardens have the potential to be health promotive by improving food security, access to healthy food, and supporting overall wellbeing. findings aid in implementing trc call to action #22, to recognize and value indigenous healing practices within the canadian healthcare system (trc, 2015 p. 3) by identifying the unique perspectives of indigenous youth pertaining to health and wellbeing. findings will also provide support for policies that foster indigenous youth empowerment and community engagement. the research was funded by the canadian institutes for health research (cihr). literature review structural racism and colonization have resulted in a lack of indigenous representation in governance and contributed to economic, political, social, health, and access to healthy food inequities in indigenous peoples in north america, latin america, africa, australia, and the pacific islands. government land expansionist policies 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.2.10997 by european settlers disrupted access to traditional food sources (baskin, 2008; davy, 2016). extractive industries have similarly disrupted access to or polluted traditional food sources (whyte, 2016). assimilation policies have led to loss of traditional knowledge and influenced food preferences toward preferring western foods (davy, 2016; ngcoya & kumarakulasingam, 2017; whyte, 2016). prior to colonization, indigenous food systems and practices were health promotive (browne, et al., 2020). systemic racism continues to increase the prevalence of poverty affecting health and access to nutritious, healthy foods globally (browne, 2017; canadian centre for policy alternatives manitoba office, 2018; cidro et al., 2015; rotenberg, 2016). a toronto public health report on racialization and health inequities in toronto found that racism, poverty, and health were interconnected (toronto public health, 2013). although the report did not include indigenous people in the study, because “the historical and contemporary injustices they have experienced as a result of racism and colonization make their situation unique” (toronto public health, 2013), it is reasonable to conclude that given the history of residential schools and assimilation policies globally (smith, 2009), health inequities faced by indigenous peoples are also influenced by institutional racism. in canada, government policies pertaining to residential schools, assimilation, and confiscation of indigenous lands have negatively shaped traditional food practices and preferences that have affected food security and health (cidro et al., 2015; cidro et al., 2014; howell et al., 2016; skinner et al., 2016). indigenous people in canada face food security challenges whether living on-reserve or in urban communities (statistics canada, 2018a). food insecurity is a risk factor for poor health outcomes (browne et al., 2020; cidro et al., 2014; skinner et al., 2016). as such, food insecurity is a risk factor for poor health outcomes, and these are exacerbated within “food deserts.” “food deserts” refers to “socially-distressed neighbourhoods with relatively low average household incomes and poor access to healthy food” (larsen & gilliland, 2008, p. 1). food deserts limit access to nutritious food in low-income areas of brandon, winnipeg, other canadian inner-cities, and in neighbourhoods where indigenous people reside (cidro et al., 2014; cidro et al., 2015). winnipeg north end has been the centre of a vibrant movement to address food insecurity, create food sovereignty, and build political action for positive change. in winnipeg, youth-led grassroots movements, such as meet me at the bell tower, have empowered indigenous youth to engage in social activism to benefit their community (abusaleh, 2017). prior to closing in 2018, neechi commons, an indigenous run store in the north end, contributed to the wholistic health of the community by offering wholesome, traditional foods, indigenous arts, and community meeting space (hirschfield, 2018). the four arrows regional health authority kimeechiminan (our food)—food security program co-designs community-based gardening and backyard poultry projects employing traditional practices, and programs like “got bannock?” have provided meals to north end residents (golby, 2018). urban community gardens have the potential to further improve food security and therefore improve health as well. studies suggest that community gardening may produce wholistic health benefits for indigenous people living in urban neighbourhoods (cidro et al., 2015; companion, 2013; lavallée, 2009). the limited research available on urban community gardens has suggested that gardening may produce positive mental health and physical exercise benefits (lombard et al., 2006; skinner et al., 2016; stroink et al., 2010); provide a connection to nature and cultural roots (companion, 2013); and improve food security in affected households (cidro, adekunle et al., 2015; cidro, peters et al., 2014; skinner et al., 2016). gardening programs that link nutrition and food to revitalization of cultural knowledge and practices result in additional health benefits. companion (2013) suggests that community gardens benefit indigenous individuals and communities especially when they are designed to build capacity and social empowerment. social empowerment, self-determination, and community cohesion are intertwined and interconnected with resilience, which positively affects wellbeing. resilience is characterized by positive self-esteem that enables individuals to 3 moscou: planting seeds of change published by scholarship@western, 2022 overcome challenges and is linked to strong, positive connections to one’s indigenous community (donatuto et al., 2016). resilience is also an indicator of indigenous community health (donatuto et al., 2016). resilience is the intertwining of physiological and psychological processes that positively affect wellbeing and selfdetermination (kirmayer et al., 2009). recently, a groundswell of community-based collaborative research has begun to emerge that engages indigenous youth as equal co-researchers in a process of documenting community strengths and challenges (centre for rural and aboriginal studies, 2018; flicker, et al., 2014; gabel et al., 2016; genuis et al., 2015; moscou, lemky et al., 2018; moscou, rempel, et al., 2018; petrucka, et al., 2016; victor, et al., 2016). co-researcher projects respect the diversity of indigenous knowledge and culture—a critical step in the decolonization of research. that is why the first nations information governance centre (fnigc) created guidelines and principles for research with first nations communities that require indigenous ownership, control, access, and possession (ocap) of all research undertaken that involves indigenous peoples and indigenous knowledge (first nations information governance centre, 2014). specifically, the fnigc recognizes that research, and how it is used, is political. historically, research about indigenous people in canada and around the globe in the americas, africa, and asia has been used to portray indigenous people in the context of deficits. in doing this, the research has been used to marginalize indigenous people and justify colonialization and settler policies. the first nations information governance centre guidelines therefore aim to overcome these potential research pitfalls by ensuring indigenous control over all phases of the research. in the urban garden project, indigenous youth co-researchers collaborated on community-driven research to identify characteristics of gardening that supported the wholistic health of indigenous youth and urban indigenous neighbourhoods. a strength-based approach was used in this research to highlight resilience of indigenous youth. to further decolonize the research, the indigenous youth participating in the project were credited as a co-authors of the photovoice book and curators photovoice exhibition stemming from the project research. theoretical framework trc call to action #22 (trc, 2015, p. 3) states that “aboriginal healing practices must be recognized and valued within the canadian healthcare system.” as such, respecting that each indigenous community is unique, a paradigm shift towards wholistic health that integrates indigenous knowledge and culture is essential to decolonization of healthcare and research. indigenous knowledge, values and pedagogy were fundamental to this research project. the theoretical framework guiding the research was indigenous wholistic theory, a concept which emerges from indigenous epistemologies grounded in culture, language, and tradition in which there is a balance between the physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual (absolon, 2010; lavallée, 2009). indigenous wholistic theory explains health and wellness from indigenous perspectives. in the medicine wheel, this is represented as balance with others (family, community), the environment, and mother earth. health and wellbeing, as depicted by the medicine wheel, are interconnected and interdependent with community and the socio-political environment. although the spiritual, emotional, physical, and mental directions may vary, the medicine wheel’s symbolism, common to many first nations peoples, embodies metaphors for the life cycle and the harvest cycle (department of canadian heritage & national indigenous literary association, 2006-2015). the medicine wheel used by the brandon friendship centre aboriginal healing and wellness program which 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.2.10997 guided this project comes from indigenous knowledge, history, and cultural identity. spiritual health (spring), is the domain of the eastern direction of the wheel and is interconnected and interdependent with each of the sacred directions (absolon, 2010). the southern direction of the medicine wheel (summer) characterizes emotional health. emotional wellbeing is interconnected with community relationships. the collaboration amongst youth co-researchers and university researchers in this study fostered trust and strengthened the bonds to create a supportive community. fostering quality relationships is important to “living the good way.” absolon (2010) suggests that the summer is the time when a “critical understanding of the social contexts” for issues that affect indigenous people is formed. elders play a key role in imparting the historical context, culture, and wisdom during this period. the western direction of the medicine wheel (fall, the time of harvesting) represents physical health, which is advanced through collective work and is interconnected with socioeconomic health. fall is a time to listen to and take care of your body. mental health is represented by the medicine wheel’s northern direction (winter) and is a time for self-reflection and preparation for a new season. the centre of the medicine wheel is the fire of life and represents the “self.” wholistic health is conditioned on being in balance with spiritual health, emotional health, mental health, and physical health (absolon, 2010; lavallée, 2009). indigenous knowledge is an integrative, dynamic guide; thus, the medicine wheel has become central to the empowerment of indigenous youth irrespective of whether they reside in rural or urban communities. method qualitative research methods that include photovoice and focus group interviews were employed in this research. photovoice is a documentary community-based participatory action research method that gives voice to individuals (e.g., youth) often unrepresented in conversations about policies that will affect their lives (strack et al., 2004; wang & burris, 1997). photovoice makes the invisible visible by creating a platform for indigenous youth to tell their stories—stories that have historically been unheard or erased (flicker et al., 2014). the data derived from photovoice methods included youth co-researchers’ photographs, their descriptions of the photographs and why they photographed the image(s), and their stories about the meaning of the photos and why the image was meaningful to their lived experience. one 90-minute focus group session was held with winnipeg and brandon groups in their respective cities to gather additional perspectives about the wholistic health effects that they attributed to urban gardening. twelve out of the 14 youth co-researchers completing all phases of the project participated in the focus group sessions (brandon-4, winnipeg-8). focus group sessions were recorded and data transcribed. the data were collected between june 2017 and march 2018. data were read iteratively and coded using atlas ti v8.3 qualitative research software and analyzed for themes pertaining to factors contributing to wholistic health by the project’s principal investigator. data were analyzed to identify characteristics of urban gardening that contributed to mental, physical, spiritual, emotional, and community health. the youth co-researchers contributed to the analysis by categorizing their photos and stories according to the medicine wheel framework, individually and as a group. a semantic analysis of the data was conducted by the principal investigator to examine how words were used in context and their relationship to one another in the descriptions of the photographs and accompanying stories written by the youth co-researchers (bernard & ryan, 2010). the authenticity of the data analysis was established by having the indigenous youth co-researchers determine the meaning of the photographs that they took. quotes are verbatim, taken from the photovoice stories told in “planting seeds of change: voices of indigenous youth” (moscou, lemky et al., 2018). additionally, each youth 5 moscou: planting seeds of change published by scholarship@western, 2022 co-researcher and each indigenous community partner was provided a draft copy of the journal manuscript prior to submission for publication and asked to affirm the integrity of the analysis. their comments were integrated into the final analysis of the project. project planning the urban garden project followed tri-council policy (tcp2) guidelines for ethical research with first nations, inuit, and métis peoples in canada. in this study, research protocols were co-designed with area urban indigenous community research partners (brandon friendship centre, manitoba metis federation southwest region, brandon university indigenous peoples centre), brandon university centre for aboriginal and rural education studies, four arrows regional health authority (knowledge user), and brandon university researchers. an advisory committee comprised of representatives from brandon university, and each of the community research partners developed research protocols that adhered to the principles of ownership, control, access, and possession (ocap) advocated by first nations information and governance centre in canada and established terms of reference for managing, collecting, preserving, and sharing photographic data derived from the project. community-recognized first nations and métis elders in brandon and winnipeg provided advice and counsel to ensure that cultural protocols were followed as recommended by tcp2 guidelines (canadian institutes of health research, natural sciences and engineering research council, and social sciences and humanities research council, 2014). the two ojibway elders in winnipeg and a dakota and métis elder in brandon also shared traditional teachings and provided guidance to the youth co-researchers and the brandon university research team. recruitment indigenous youth (18-29 years) were recruited to participate in the urban garden project with the aid of our community research partners in brandon and winnipeg, manitoba, following ethics approval from brandon university (#22082). participants represented a convivence sample of youth that responded to the call for participants posters placed at each of the indigenous partners’ sites. to be eligible to participate, youth had to be between the ages of 18–29 years, reside in winnipeg or brandon, and self-identify as first nations, métis, or inuit. in addition to meeting the eligibility requirements, youth co-researchers were required to complete photovoice, photojournalism, and ethics training relevant to taking images and protecting anonymity. eighteen youth met all requirements for participation. project phases the urban gardens: towards holistic health and food security for urban indigenous peoples project was undertaken in four phases. phase 1. in the first phase, youth co-researchers conducted a survey of community gardens in winnipeg and brandon, manitoba, then mapped the location of neighbouring grocery stores and convenience stores. they participated in a workshop on geographic information system (gis) mapping to enable them to map the location of the first nations, métis, or inuit-run community gardens and community garden projects managed by non-indigenous 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.2.10997 groups in brandon and winnipeg. the gis workshop was held in brandon. winnipeg participants were provided transportation and housing to attend the gis workshop. a gis map of grocery stores and convenience stores was overlaid on the community garden map then analyzed to identify neighbourhoods where there were food deserts (figure 1). gis-based techniques have been used successfully to evaluate accessibility to grocery stores by foot and public transit in an urban setting (larsen & gilliland, 2008). the results of the analyses were used to establish six garden beds in brandon and 10 community garden beds in four winnipeg north end neighbourhoods. the north end, a historically indigenous neighbourhood, has a disproportionate number of food deserts (cidro et al., 2015). an inventory of urban garden programs that provided culturally relevant services for indigenous youth was planned but not completed. sharing circles about the medicine wheel were also held in winnipeg and brandon for youth co-researchers in phase 1. the sharing circles were facilitated by brandon and winnipeg elder knowledge keepers who shared their knowledge of the medicine wheel and indigenous perspectives of health and wellbeing. sixteen youth coresearchers participated in the medicine wheel sharing circles. they included all of the brandon youth coresearchers (seven youth) and nearly all of the winnipeg youth co-researchers (nine youth). phase 1 activities laid the groundwork for the next phases of the urban gardens project study. 7 moscou: planting seeds of change published by scholarship@western, 2022 figure 1. map of community gardens and grocers in brandon, manitoba 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.2.10997 phase 2. in the second phase of the project, youth co-researchers were equipped with cameras and taught how to document their experiences of urban gardening through photojournalism. all 18 youth co-researchers participated in this phase of the project. the indigenous youth co-researchers received training in photovoice research methodology, photojournalism, and research ethics pertaining to consent prior to beginning photovoice activities. photovoice is a community-based participatory research method that has been used to effectively engage youth in a process of documenting community strengths and challenges (strack et al., 2004; warne et al., 2012). photovoice uses participant employed photography and analyses to minimize the power differentials between researchers and subjects of research (christensen, 2012; lavallée, 2009; strack et al., 2004; warne et al., 2012). indigenous youth participating in photovoice and other visual research methods are researchers into their own lives in addition to the subject of the research (victor et al., 2016). phase 3. the urban community gardens in brandon and winnipeg were installed, managed, and harvested by the youth co-researchers in phase 3 of the urban gardens project. six garden beds were planted at three brandon locations (manitoba métis federation southwest region, flora residence at brandon university, and the brandon university indigenous peoples centre). ten garden beds were planted at four winnipeg north end locations. in each of the gardens, youth planted traditional foods using traditional planting methods under the guidance of an elder participating in the project and the co-researcher from four arrows regional health authority. as an example, the youth planted the three sisters (corn, beans, and squash) in each garden. an indigenous medicine garden was planted at the indigenous peoples centre at brandon university that contained tobacco, blueberries, strawberries, and sage. the garden was planted next to a cedar tree. the soil would not support sweetgrass, so it was not planted. the gardens were cultivated by the project youth over a two-month period and then harvested. planting, weeding, watering, and harvesting at the manitoba métis federation southwest region, brandon, was guided by the project’s métis elder knowledge keeper who shared cultural knowledge with the participants. participation in gardening activities varied with some youth participating in all activities and others only some. group participation rate ranged from 50% to 86% in each city. during phase 3, each youth co-researcher photographically documented their gardening experience and any effects on spiritual, mental, physical, and emotional wellbeing that they attributed to gardening. phase 4. in phase 4 of the urban garden project, participants engaged in photovoice storytelling to document their experiences with urban community gardening. youth co-researchers were asked to write stories about their photographs that would shed light on their lived experience and experience with urban gardening in the context of the medicine wheel. eight facilitated writing workshops were held so that youth co-researchers could reflect on the meaning of their photographs and gain insight from their peers about their photographs and stories. the writing workshops were guided by an adapted showed structure developed by wang and burris (1997). using the showed process, photovoice participants were invited to describe their photographs and consider the following questions: 1) what do you see here?; 2) what’s really happening here?; 3) how does this relate to our lives?; 4) why does this problem or strength exist?; 5) what can we do about it? (wang & burris, 1997). selfreflection writing templates aided the writing process. youth co-researchers were asked to select the writing 9 moscou: planting seeds of change published by scholarship@western, 2022 template that they thought was most relevant to the photograph they wanted to describe. youth co-researchers were asked to reflect on and write about what their photograph depicted and why they chose to take it (i.e., why it was meaningful to their lived experience). youth co-researchers chose from five templates according to which they reflected on and described how their photograph related their experiences of urban gardening: 1) how their photograph demonstrated the relationship between mental, physical, social, and/or emotional wellbeing and urban gardening. 2) how their photo showed culturally relevant indicators of the wholistic health benefits for indigenous youth. 3) how their photo showed food security or lack of access to food. 4) how their photo showed gardening projects, activities or programs that supported spiritual, emotional, mental, or physical health and food needs of first nations, métis, and inuit youth. 5) how their photo showed indigenous youth engaging in activities to improve neighbourhood health. results of the 18 youth that were recruited and trained to engage in photovoice and mapping research activities, 14 youth completed all phases of the research project. three youth from winnipeg and one youth from brandon left the project before the project end-date. one youth left due to employment and the others for personal reasons. the greater participation rate by brandon youth co-researchers may be due to their prior participation with the university research team in another youth co-researcher project. see table 1 below: 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.2.10997 table 1. youth co-researcher characteristics winnipeg brandon gender youth co-researchers completing all project phases* m f lgbtq2+ winnipeg brandon 11 7 7 10 1 8 6 *fourteen youth co-researchers completed all phases of the research project. four youth co-researchers left the project at various stages for work or personal reasons. indicators of wholistic health benefits of urban gardening as reported by indigenous youth co-researchers are shown in table 2. in this paper, quotes are derived from the stories written by the youth co-researchers and focus groups. when names are attributed to one of the youth co-researchers, the quote was derived from the photovoice booklet “planting seeds of change: voices of indigenous youth” that was created and distributed to the general public as part of the research project knowledge sharing plan. each youth consented to include their name, photos, and stories in the photovoice booklet as well as the photovoice exhibitions that were held as part of the knowledge sharing protocol. when a quote was derived from a youth co-researcher who participated in one of the focus group sessions, names were omitted and replaced by the youth’s participation group (winnipeg or brandon, mb) in order to maintain anonymity as per the research ethics protocol. 11 moscou: planting seeds of change published by scholarship@western, 2022 table 2. indicators of wholistic health: benefits derived from gardening using the medicine wheel framework medicine wheel indicator of spiritual, emotional, mental, and physical wellbeing spiritual health (east, spring, planting season) • greater self-reflection • positive feeling about contributing to something growing • feeling a connection with mother earth • a sense of calmness emotional health (south, summer, growing season) • feeling good about oneself • feeling a sense of connection to community • feeling a sense of connection to culture • feeling connection to family • social connections and healthy relationships • a feeling of self-sufficiency • a feeling of being inspired or inspiring others • a feeling of being motivated or motivating others • support and knowledge from elders • feeling good about helping others • feeling connected to a supportive network • pride • overcoming fear • dedication and patience mental health (west, fall harvest) • a sense of connectedness • feeling nurtured • feeling balanced • inclusion and acceptance • feeling connected to culture • feeling connected to the broader community • feeling connected to a support network • feeling vibrant, determined, strong and/or hearty • feeling a sense of accomplishment • a sense of purpose or meaning physical health (north, winter) • development of healthy habits and a healthy lifestyle • access to nutritious food and healthy food options • increased exercise such as walking • increased stamina • feeling connected to a supportive network that encouraged physical effort 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.2.10997 the preliminary findings are organized according the directions of the medicine wheel (i.e., mental, physical, emotional, and spiritual health). preliminary findings reveal that the indigenous youth co-researchers identified strong parallels between the iconography of the medicine wheel (birth, adolescence, adulthood, eldership) and the cycles of gardening (planting, growth, harvesting, wintering over). using the medicine wheel analytic framework, they identified indicators of mental, emotional, physical, and spiritual health as related to their experience gardening. as summarized by a winnipeg youth co-researcher: the medicine wheel has four quadrants. we are stuck in one part of it, we haven’t been trying to heal or replenish it, or cycle through it. to be healthy we need to return to the centre of the medicine wheel and begin the cycle again. nature, however, will adapt and change life. it will continue to flow. urban gardening groups like this, help . . . youth realize the state we are in. by gardening we are contributing to our physical and mental health. being a part of this project has helped me connect with people from different walks of life in my community. (alycia, winnipeg) the indigenous youth co-researchers also reported that participation in the urban gardens: towards holistic health and food security for urban indigenous peoples project benefited their mental health, emotional health, physical health, and spiritual wellbeing. mental health the indigenous youth participating in the urban garden project reported that gardening positively benefited their mental health. they used words like “calming,” “soothing,” and “balanced” to describe the effects of gardening. gardening nurtured them much like they nurtured the plants, which enhanced one participant’s interest in doing more with the group. gardening can contribute to mental wellbeing … because you feel genuinely good to be a part of something bigger than yourself. (alanna, winnipeg) i have minor anxiety and depression and gardening took the focus off myself and made it more about the plant and hoping it will thrive and helping it thrive helps me. (daylynn, brandon) emotional health the indigenous youth participating in the urban garden project reported that gardening contributed to their emotional wellbeing because it provided a sense of accomplishment, self-sufficiency, and pride. working as part of a gardening group provided a support network and a feeling of inclusion that contributed to participants’ emotional wellbeing. working with the elders participating in the project provided an opportunity for intergenerational learning that connected them with their indigenous culture. seeing this plant mature and bloom into something rather beautiful had an emotional impact on myself. this emotion made me realize that being part of the community was important, being a part of something larger added meaning and purpose, which would benefit [w]holistic wellbeing. (kelly, brandon) 13 moscou: planting seeds of change published by scholarship@western, 2022 i took this photo because during the installation of the medicine wheel garden i felt at peace, even with the hard labour involved … being involved in the project made me feel emotionally, mentally, spiritually and physically healthy … gardening helps me to connect to my roots and my métis grandfather. (daylynn, brandon) i have learned honestly, like everyone is like pretty chilled, they are not here to judge you. before i even first came, i was shy. well [i] am still kind of shy but i didn’t know how to say anything because i was afraid to be judged or not like listened to or something but now, i feel like i’m appreciated. in other words, that makes me feel good.” (winnipeg youth co-researcher 1, focus group) physical health the indigenous youth participating in the urban garden project reported that gardening contributed to a healthy lifestyle by providing physical and nutritional benefits—important because, “stuff like depression and diabetes run high especially in métis and aboriginal communities” (brandon focus group, youth co-researcher 2). kids nowadays are not getting enough exercise caused from a lack of stimulation. gardening brings people together to work with the same goal in mind. gardening can be the solution to these problems. it brings community together, is less expensive than grocery stores, connects people with nature and the environment, and encourages kids to put in the physical effort gardening requires. (alycia, winnipeg) gardening has both positive and negative aspects as it can take up quite a bit of time especially in the beginning. clearing the space for it was definitely the most physically demanding and took the most time, however it is extremely rewarding for your body. i definitely felt it the next day in my muscles, but i also felt very proud; like i had accomplished something great. (daylynn, brandon) spiritual health the indigenous youth participating in the urban garden project commented that their gardening experience connected them to their traditional indigenous beliefs necessary for spiritual healing. one youth reported that one of the moments they admired was burying tobacco by the garden beds to thank the earth for providing for us. when you get to connect back with mother earth and focus on that and not focus on the distraction instead of modern society that gets in the way of a lot of things and stuff. gardening is important cause we get to reflect and to be able to receive those oral traditions and stuff. (winnipeg focus group, youth co-researcher 3) the photo showcases why the soul garden is also referred to as the healing garden. it is all leading back to the spiritual fire we need to feed in order to achieve harmony in life … i took this photo after a long week of feeling emotionally, physically exhausted and with a sprained ankle sitting in the heart of healing garden. i wanted to recharge. (alanna, winnipeg) key findings emerging from the preliminary analyses of the data showed that indigenous youth co-researchers recognized the interconnectedness among spiritual, emotional, mental, and physical health realms. for example, one participant reported that gardening was calming on the emotional and spiritual level. another participant 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.2.10997 reflected that the discipline, time commitment and need to be outdoors to maintain the garden helped to balance mental and emotional health and rejuvenate the mind. gardening affected physical and emotional health by building relationships while encouraging youth to put in the physical effort gardening requires. finally, the plants were described by one participant as a metaphor for their resilience and connection to the creator and mother earth. the patience and dedication that gardening requires can help balance emotional health by allowing a positive outlet to purge negative energies. (toni, brandon) i took this photo because of the resilience and movement of the plant resembled us and how we are always connected to our creator and mother earth. (leo, winnipeg) the data also suggest that, for indigenous youth co-researchers, urban gardening is associated with connectedness, leadership, motivation, and community health. they expressed the view that a healthy neighbourhood must be cultivated. connectedness feeling connected to culture, community, family, and mother earth was expressed by participants as an indicator of wholistic health across each of the medicine wheel quadrants. connection to culture supported mental, emotional, and spiritual health. connection to community affected mental, physical, and emotional health by providing a support network that encourages physical activity as well as motivates and inspires change. being a part of a community created a sense of acceptance and inclusion that participants reported benefited their mental health. as an urban aboriginal anishinaabe, feeling left out and seeking acceptance from the community is a challenge. the soul garden helped our gardening team learn essential nurturing skills … it nurtures our spirits and brought out our anishinaabe connection to mother earth. (wayne, winnipeg) many of the youth co-researchers spoke of the symbiotic relationship they have to the land in terms of their identity and their place in the world. the youth co-researchers recognized the importance of transformative landbased and community integrative practices that they engaged in, grasping that urban gardening provided them much more than a simple food security solution, but also a way to connect to themselves, the land, their culture, and to others. leadership youth co-researchers found that their participation in the project and knowledge dissemination activities fostered leadership and empowerment to be change agents, and supported their emotional and mental health. they reported gardening contributed to mental and emotional wellbeing because it made them feel good to be a part of something bigger than themselves. it made us feel like we were taking leadership for ourselves and was really empowering. since being involved in the project, i have gotten asked a lot from my younger friends, how to get involved. (alanna, winnipeg) 15 moscou: planting seeds of change published by scholarship@western, 2022 i found that leadership in learning more about these gardens . . . is vital for the community and its future. . . . [m]ore indigenous youth leadership . . . would provide others with the same opportunity that i was given, which would perhaps someday help create even more access to community gardens that provide to the neighbourhood. (kelly, brandon) as a result of the urban gardening experience, one participant expressed that they saw themselves a positive role model and “being a positive influence on the community right now is really important” (alanna, winnipeg). another youth co-researcher commented that, “taking a step toward betterment of others and yourself, when the odds are against you, shows leadership” (alycia, winnipeg). one participant stated that, “nothing compares to the feeling you get from inspiring change in the smallest ways” (alanna, winnipeg). supportive networks in participating in the project, youth co-researchers built a network of individuals that motivated, inspired, and nurtured their personal growth. the positive attributes of nurturing were expressed by participants as an indicator of wholistic health across each of the medicine wheel quadrants. participants revealed a symbiotic relationship between nurturing the plants, nurturing themselves, and nurturing others. this project was a great way to nurture myself by bonding with other indigenous youth in our area and of course learning how to make my own garden at home. (daylynn, brandon) before i joined this project, i didn’t have a say in anything, so i think the first step is to value the opinion. opening that door to communication is really, really important. we get to share our fears and concerns and everything, which is nice, and i think the big thing is opening that communication. (brandon focus group, youth co-research 2) nurturing the garden had a major impact on individual mental health and the group’s mental wellbeing. “this nurtured state led to consistent balance by communicating with each other, staying focused and lending a hand” (wayne, winnipeg), described one winnipeg participant in their story for the photovoice project. key words that they used to characterize the benefits of the supportive networks created by urban gardening were: “encouraging,” “sharing,” “helping each other,” and “working together.” all were important to the social cohesion derived from the urban gardens project. indigenous youth reveled that encouraging people to garden instead of putting them down, helping each other and working together instead of against each other, was both an indicator of their community health and their individual emotional and mental health. “part of life is to build each other up not only in words but … teaching that they need to be nurtured and taken care of too, like the plants in this garden” (brittany, winnipeg), wrote one youth participant in her story for the photovoice project. community health indigenous youth co-researchers participating in the urban garden project reported that urban gardens were important to communities to reduce food insecurity. several winnipeg participants commented that gardening could provide access to healthy food in areas where there were food deserts such and winnipeg’s north end. and, the youth co-researchers demonstrated that gardens could be installed anywhere where there is soil, even indoor gardens! 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.2.10997 the north end is food desert so that’s a big thing and so gardening is i think would help people have more healthy options to healthy food and healthy lifestyle. (winnipeg focus group, youth co-researcher 3) preliminary findings suggest that indigenous youth understood that healthy neighbourhoods must be nurtured if they are to thrive, just like plants. youth co-researchers saw themselves as advocates for their community reporting that, “i think it’s on everybody to help who they can, when they can, because it’s not just a single person living there, … it’s up to all of us to make sure that the area is healthy and we have a good foundation to support each other” (brandon focus group, youth co-researcher 2). discussion the study augments the literature on the relationship between urban gardening and health by employing an indigenous framework to investigate indigenous perspectives of health and wellness. for many indigenous peoples, health and wellbeing is wholistic and integrative (absolon, 2010; kirmayer et al., 2009), emphasizing the interconnectedness of self and the environment. this makes the medicine wheel an ideal framework for analysis and identification of indicators for spiritual, emotional, physical, and mental health that are attributed to the act of gardening. a wholistic and integrative worldview is important to understanding the complex interaction between individual health and community health as perceived by indigenous youth in this project. throughout the project, youth co-researchers spoke of the intersectionality between a healthy neighbourhood and wholistic health. the indigenous youth co-researchers perceived that, just like plants, a healthy community must be cultivated and nurtured; they also saw themselves as agents of change. many of their stories demonstrate their resilience. one winnipeg youth co-researcher commented that “gardening may enhance resilience because it’s a reminder of our overcoming obstacles and to continue growing regardless” (leo, winnipeg). many of the indicators of emotional wellbeing and mental health that indigenous youth co-researchers attributed to their physical and psychological experience gardening are characteristics of resilience, such as feeling determined and strong, feeling a sense of purpose and accomplishment, inspiring and motivating others and self-sufficiency. in this study, photovoice provided an outlet for indigenous youth co-researchers’ creative expression and an alternate mechanism to articulate their ideas and share their perceptions of the world. through the process of selfexpression, youth co-researchers honed their communication and leadership skills. a study of positive leadership and indigenous youth (petrucka et al., 2016) found that that indigenous youth sought to meaningfully contribute to creating solutions to improve community health. this study similarly showed that when provided an opportunity to demonstrate leadership, resources, and training, indigenous youth co-researchers “stepped up” to expand current understanding of indigenous perspectives of health and explore solutions to improve food security in winnipeg and brandon, manitoba. this study contributes to the literature on indigenous youth participation as co-researchers. it highlights indigenous youth as key partners in improving our understanding of wholistic health and identifying solutions to address health-related issues. it is one of only a few photovoice projects that positions youth as equal coresearchers with university investigators. the study highlights the powerful potential of indigenous youth to meaningfully contribute to research processes and to co-create knowledge in an area that is important to them. “first nations youth [are] stepping up and making sure their voices and concerns are being heard across manitoba and canada … they are committed to using their vision, talent, education and experience for the good 17 moscou: planting seeds of change published by scholarship@western, 2022 of their community and/or family,” commented manitoba keewatinowi okimakanak grand chief sheila north wilson (centre for rural and aboriginal studies, 2018, p. 61). the urban gardens project provided the opportunity, resources, and training to acquire research skills that empowered the indigenous youth co-researchers to shed light on indigenous youth perspectives of wholistic health and to investigate factors contributing to food insecurity, a health issue created by food deserts in brandon and winnipeg. the project further contributed to the youth co-researchers’ social cohesion by providing opportunities for youth leadership in all areas of the project, ranging from designing and managing the gardens to designing the photovoice exhibitions at the art gallery of southwestern manitoba (brandon) and urban shaman gallery in winnipeg, manitoba. moreover, youth co-researchers gained understanding of their capacity to contribute to culturally based solutions to improve wholistic health. policy recommendations this study shows that indigenous youth are key partners in improving understanding of wholistic health, identifying solutions to address health-related issues, and co-creating knowledge in areas that they deem important. yet, spaces for indigenous youth to voice their concerns and potential solutions are limited. policies that foster indigenous youth engagement would empower youth to analyze conditions affecting their health, exercise leadership, and contribute to positive change. a recent systematic review of food policy actions to improve nutritional health outcomes in canada, usa, new zealand, and australia reported that although indigenous peoples were involved in the intervention design or evaluation, their participation was underutilized (browne et al., 2020). the study results lend support for actions to advance active engagement of indigenous youth in policy design and policy making spaces. this study further suggests that policies are needed to foster urban gardening and connection to the land in conjunction with indigenous cultural practices to contribute to indigenous health and wellbeing. the research reinforces trc call to action #20 that states that the distinct health needs of the métis, inuit, and off-reserve aboriginal people must be recognized, respected, and addressed, as well as reinforcing and trc call to action #22 which calls for indigenous healing practices to be recognized and valued within the canadian healthcare system (trc, 2015, p. 3). trc call to action #22 recommends policies be established that integrate culturally relevant indictors for wholistic health within the canadian context. assessments of indigenous community health have typically failed to include “intangible” aspects of community health as defined by members of individual indigenous communities (donatuto et al., 2016). if they are integrated into healthcare practice, the culturally relevant indicators of mental, emotional, physical, and spiritual health that were identified by the indigenous youth co-researchers in this study of urban gardening and health can aid in implementing trc call to action #22. policy recommendations include: a. in implementing truth and reconciliation commission call to action #20 and #22, the adoption of policy and protocols based on wholistic indicators that recognize the interconnectedness between community health and individual spiritual, mental, emotional, and physical health as defined by the urban indigenous youth in this project is recommended. policy adoption must assure that unique perspective of urban indigenous communities and indigenous youth are respected. 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.2.10997 b. universities, colleges, and other academic institutions collaborate with indigenous organizations and community to build capacity for indigenous youth-led research. this would support youth empowerment and community engagement, as shown in this study. c. municipal and provincial legislative bodies establish policies and resources to support urban community gardens in indigenous communities, especially where food deserts are prevalent. the global reclaiming of indigenous rights to self-determination of food systems and food sovereignty are interconnected (indigenous food systems network, 2010). neighbourhood revitalization projects that reduce food deserts, such as neechi commons and urban community garden projects, have the potential to advance food sovereignty and can improve food security and nutrition in inner-city neighbourhoods. community gardens offer a space to reclaim food sovereignty whereby indigenous communities exert control over access, choice of foods available, quality of food, and affordability of food. policy, changes to municipal bylaws, and the allocation of resources to create gardens in urban spaces, such as empty lots, would advance food security in areas where food deserts exist. d. establish policy and resources at all levels of government to advance indigenous cultural practices and land-based knowledge. the indicators of health and wellbeing identified by the indigenous youth co-researchers in this study support the establishment of policies and resources that advance indigenous cultural practices and land-based knowledge. in this study, youth co-researchers reported that participation in the gardening activities contributed to their wholistic heath, which they attributed in part to the project’s reinforcement of traditional culture and land-based practices. these findings are supported by the literature of indigenous peoples, food, and health (browne et al., 2020). e. foster elder knowledge keeper–youth engagement to build social capital and resilience. prior to colonization, intergenerational knowledge of health promotive food systems, traditional land cultivation practices, and culture was transferred to indigenous youth by elder knowledge keepers. expanding access to knowledge keepers would provide indigenous youth access to important social capital. as shown in this study, reclamation of traditional knowledge was reported to support emotional, mental, and spiritual wellbeing. f. integrate urban gardening into k–12 curricula on indigenous culture and land-based education. policy and resource allocation called for in recommendation (d.) would support the development of curricula and implementation of k–12 urban gardening programs employing indigenous culture and land-based education in winnipeg, brandon, and other urban centres. g. federal, provincial, and municipal governments collaborate with indigenous organizations to create spaces for indigenous youth representation in policy-making. 1 the right to indigenous food sovereignty and the global reclaiming of indigenous rights to self-determination over food systems 1 recommendation g. was advanced by indigenous youth in the policy paper “working together to support indigenous youth success: a policy framework prepared by the indigenous youth community circle” (murray et al., 2017). 19 moscou: planting seeds of change published by scholarship@western, 2022 was affirmed in the declaration of indigenous peoples for food sovereignty at the global forum for peoples food sovereignty in rome, 2009 (indigenous food systems network, 2010). representatives of indigenous peoples from the continents of asia, north america, africa, south america, and europe declared that indigenous peoples “should have the right to participate in the definition of specific policies that affect our right to food” (indigenous food systems network, 2010). this study shows that indigenous youth can improve our understanding of wholistic health by identifying solutions to address health-related issues important to them, such as food security. as such, their voice should be represented in policy making decisions. conclusion this research contributes to the literature on the role that community gardening can play in support of wholistic health and wellness of indigenous youth, particularly when twinned with indigenous knowledge and cultural practices. it builds on previous findings that community gardens contribute to health by specifically identifying indicators of wholistic health benefits derived from community gardening, as reported by the urban indigenous youth co-researchers. the youth co-researchers’ characterization of urban community gardening as a transformative land-based, community integrative practice that supported community health by enhancing food security as well as social and community cohesion expands current understanding of the benefits of community gardening for urban indigenous youth. it affirms that youth, when empowered, are essential partners in addressing food security and, in the process, derive wholistic health benefits including pride in reclaiming their traditional cultures (baskin, 2008). the understanding of wholistic health and food sovereignty as connected to the land, community, and family has been expressed in the culturally diverse perspectives of urban indigenous peoples in north america, latin america, africa, australia, and the pacific islands (baskin, 2008; gabel et al., 2016; indigenous food systems network, 2010; mundel & chapman, 2010; skinner et al., 2016). indigenous food sovereignty can be supported through urban gardening as gardening not only allows for participation in cultural practices, but also engagement in sustainable food production, distribution of nutritious traditional foods, and inter-community food sharing (desmarais & wittman, 2014; whyte, 2016). this study suggests that food sovereignty may promote community and social cohesion, and is important to emotional wellbeing by the indigenous youth co-researchers in this study. the research shows that indigenous youth welcome the opportunity to contribute to finding integrative community-based solutions to benefit wholistic health. however, few opportunities exist for indigenous youth to exercise leadership. photovoice is a powerful method for empowering indigenous youth in a process of 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(2012). photovoice: an opportunity and challenge for students’ genuine participation. health promotion international, 28(3). https://doi.org/10.1093/heapro/das011 whyte, k. (2016). renewing relatives: indigenous food sovereignty and settler colonialism. in m. c. rawlinson & c. ward (eds.), the routledge handbook of food ethics. routledge. https://www.toronto.ca/legdocs/mmis/2013/hl/bgrd/backgroundfile-62904.pdf https://doi.org/10.18357/ijih111201616020 https://doi.org/10.1177/109019819702400309 https://doi.org/10.1093/heapro/das011 microsoft word ms1451 poesche business ethics rce.docx the international indigenous policy journal volume 10 | issue 3 september 2019 business ethics and sovereignty in settler colonial states jurgen poesche aalto university, jurgen.poesche@hotmail.com recommended citation poesche, j. (2019). business ethics and sovereignty in settler colonial states. the international indigenous policy journal, 10(3). doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8251 business ethics and sovereignty in settler colonial states abstract the objective of this conceptual article is to make the case that indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty is valid throughout all of cemānáhuac (the americas), thus rendering settler colonial laws illegitimate and illegal. this in turn means that firms need to abide by indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ laws. theories relating to business, business ethics, compliance, and sustainability reflecting the assumptions of settler colonial sovereignty need to be reworked to take into account the ethical and legal reality of indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty. without coercion-free recognition from indigenous cemānáhuacan nations, firms cannot accept any claim of government authority, ownership, or sovereignty made by settler colonial states. this article closes a gap in the literature between indigenous sovereignty and business ethics in a settler colonial context. keywords ethical strategy; indigenous sovereignty; north america; central america; south america; indigenous nations; legal pluralism; theory of law; business ethics acknowledgments i wish to thank the reviewers for their constructive and valuable comments on an earlier version of this paper. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. poesche: business ethics and sovereignty published by scholarship@western, 2019 1 business ethics and sovereignty in settler colonial states the objective of this conceptual article is to make the case that indigenous nations’ sovereignty is valid throughout all of cemānáhuac,1 otherwise known as the americas. this sovereignty renders settler colonial laws illegitimate and illegal and requires business firms to abide by indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ laws. acknowledging that occidental terms like “law” and “sovereignty” are foreign to traditional indigenous cemānáhuacan conceptualizations, this article uses occidental terminology because extant academic publications in business and business ethics overwhelmingly use it. the term west is rejected in favour of occident because the former is ahistorical and ambiguous: west ( برغمل ) traditionally refers to the maghreb region in arabic and west(��) traditionally refers to central asia in chinese, among others. in this article, occident refers to the cultural sphere rooted in the grecoroman heritage and occidental christianity—protestantism and roman catholicism. based on an analysis of australia, nicoll argued that indigenous sovereignty can be understood as the opposite of terra nullius [nobody’s land]: it is an ethical frontier, “a point beyond which non-aboriginal australians should never have invaded” (cited in pratt, 2004, p. 45). therefore, the acknowledgment and recognition of indigenous sovereignty is a point against which contemporary policies and practices affecting indigenous peoples should be evaluated. the ethical frontier that should never have been crossed in the settler colonial context raises the issue of how firms should navigate business ethics and compliance. there is a nexus between ethics and law (beade, 2016), whereby the study of both are parallel (plunkett & shapiro, 2017). the premise that ethics and law are conjoined reaches into antiquity: roman law was held to always aim at aequum [right] and bonum [good, ethical] (zwalve, 2014). law needs an ethical foundation (stilz, 2015)— incidentally, the same foundation needed in law is needed in business ethics. in the context of indigenous cemānáhuacan nations and settler colonial states, it cannot be assumed that the metaethics are shared. as such, it cannot be assumed that normative ethics and applied ethics are compatible.2 given that coercive power is generally absent from indigenous cemānáhuacan nations, occidental firms are required to abide by indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ laws as the proxy of the level of business ethics. firms’ current business ethics become virulent if there are doubts about the legality and legitimacy of settler colonial laws in relation to indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ laws. for a lawmaker’s moral claim (soper, 2002), illegality and illegitimacy would be fatal. yet, settler colonial lawmakers’ lack of sovereignty means there are good reasons to doubt both their legality and their legitimacy. a fatal blow to the legality and legitimacy of settler colonial lawmakers’ laws is alonso de la vera cruz’s (1553/2007) finding in de dominio infidelium et justo bello [on the dominion of unbelievers and just war]3— 1 the aztec name cemānáhuac describes the land between two oceans, the atlantic and the pacific. such a description allows an expansive interpretation of cemānáhuac to encompass the land stretching from tierra del fuego to inuit qeqertaat and from the atlantic ocean to the pacific ocean. an alternative name would have been turtle island, but turtle island is used to connote only the northern part of cemānáhuac—also known as north america. 2 head and mann’s (2005) law in perspective contains critical analyses and syntheses of dynamic interactions between the economy, history, law, legal principles, philosophy, policy, and society. 3 alonso de la vera cruz was one of the first professors of the universidad de méxico. he was a defender of the human rights of indigenous peoples of cemānáhuac, and the (effectively sovereign) rights of indigenous cemānáhuacan nations in the the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3, art. 4 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8251 2 founded on natural law4 developed by saint thomas aquinas and ius gentium [law of nations]—that the conquest of cemānáhuac was merely a fait accompli [an action that has been accomplished and, therefore, is difficult to undo] and not legal (see westra, 2010). the treatment of indigenous cemānáhuacan nations and their legal systems as unequal to occidental states and their legal systems began with the occidental subjugation of cemānáhuac (bernal, 1989). settler colonial states refuse to recognize indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty (richland, 2016); yet, the illegality and illegitimacy of the occidental subjugation of the indigenous cemānáhuacan nations means that settler colonial states never achieved sovereignty and thus the right to pass laws in cemānáhuac—with or without democracy. commerce and war are interrelated (buckley, 2004). as such, firms cannot easily extract themselves from the ethical challenges associated with wars of subjugation. this illegality and illegitimacy is exacerbated by these states’ ethnocidal and genocidal policies. indigenous cemānáhuacans have experienced genocide (toko ngalani, 2010). occidental colonial expansion has been associated with the intent of spreading occidental culture (bardet, 2007), whereby cultural domination in the form of epistemological dominance has led to “epistecide” or the destruction of indigenous knowledge systems (dell’omodarme, 2016). the occident has ignored non-occidental philosophies (tshibilondi ngoyi, 2016). michel foucault saw modern occidental society as the result of the hegemony of one episteme of which law is an expression (teubner & boucquey,1992). settler colonial states’ laws and lawmaking processes are thus an expression of occidental hegemony. despite the united nations (2007) declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples and other intrastate legal frameworks formally protecting indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ rights, firms and settler colonial states continue to violate indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ fundamental rights. this is clear from reports filed by the un special rapporteur on the rights of indigenous peoples on the situations in, for example, brazil (united nations general assembly, 2016), canada (united nations general assembly, 2014), guatemala (united nations general assembly, 2011), paraguay (united nations general assembly, 2015) and the united states (united nations general assembly, 2017). these reports focus primarily on firms with activities relating to landownership and natural resource extraction; cited activities include the dakota access pipeline in the united states, the marlin mine in guatemala, and the são luiz do tapajós dam in brazil. however, the reports do not pay adequate attention to the detrimental effects of firms’ activities in the chemical, transportation, and telecommunications industries. although symptoms of these effects can be observed in individual operations and projects, the reports reveal a systemic problem in the behaviour of firms and settler colonial states; this behaviour requires an effective and efficient remedy. settler colonists have used force to demand and establish special rights for themselves instead of accepting the laws of the land—the indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ laws. building on hayes, introna, and kelly (2018), settler colonial states’ refusal to recognize the sovereignty of indigenous cemānáhuacan nations can be considered an institutionalization of inequality. one way of establishing mid-16th century. considered one of the founders of international public law, his de dominio infidelium et justo bello, published in 1553, is a key work in this context and postdates francisco de vitoria’s relectio de indis, published in 1539. 4ius naturalis [natural law] has a long history in the occident. representatives of natural law include aristotle, plato, cicero, saint augustine of hippo, saint thomas aquinas, bartolomé de las casas, and hugo grotius, among others. not surprisingly, there is no consensus about the source of natural law. consequently, the substance of natural law has varied considerably over time and space. poesche: business ethics and sovereignty published by scholarship@western, 2019 3 special rights is the reinforcement of settler colonial power structures via the use of legal positivism5 instead of natural law, and the use of settler colonial domestic law instead of international law. this strategy is clear in canada. in delgamuukw v. british columbia (1997), the supreme court of canada ruled that indigenous title “is inalienable and cannot be transferred, sold or surrendered to anyone other than the crown” (the content of aboriginal title section, para. 2), “right of possession is based on the continued occupation and use of traditional tribal lands since the assertion of crown sovereignty” (content of aboriginal title section, para. 18), and “constitutionally recognized aboriginal rights are not absolute and may be infringed by the federal and provincial governments” (infringements on aboriginal title section, para. 1). these criteria, among others, fail to consider the problematic legality and legitimacy of the settler colonial occupation of cemānáhuac. in tsilhqot’in nation v. british columbia (2014), the supreme court of canada held that “(t)he claimant group, here the tsilhqot’in, bears the onus of establishing aboriginal title” (on appeal from the court of appeal for british columbia section, para. 6). this illustrates a reversal of a fundamental legal principle, insofar as it is typically the acquirer— in this case the settler colonial state—who carriers the onus of proving the legal acquisition of land. in chippewas of the thames first nation v. enbridge pipelines inc. (2017), the supreme court of canada refused to recognize an indigenous veto. these cases reveal a systemic problem that could be remedied through the recognition of the sovereignty of indigenous cemānáhuacan nations for all of cemānáhuac. when power dynamics that favour the contributions and roles of different stakeholders are translated to interactions between multinational enterprises and indigenous nations (karam & jamali, 2017), it is often to the detriment of indigenous cemānáhuacan nations. indeed, the distribution and dynamics of power in settler colonial states effectively determines the nature of these interactions before they materialize. banerjee (2010) has emphasized the power aspect in which legitimacy criteria are determined by discursive, institutional, and material forms of power. furthermore, miéville (2005) has concluded that decisions by settler colonial courts benefitting indigenous cemānáhuacans are tenuous and unstable because international law is characterized by imperialism-related violence—this does not constitute a stable jurisprudential foundation from the standpoint of cemānáhuacans. moreover, settler colonists are neither authorized nor able to assess indigenous laws (nursoo, 2018). this means that even if they were inclined to do so, settler colonial courts would not necessarily be able to enforce and interpret indigenous cemānáhuacan laws. the widespread poverty among indigenous cemānáhuacans has been seen a result of poor education and racism (hall & patrinos, 2012), but the negation of indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty and the related ownership of the lands and resources in addition to taxation power has not been addressed. writing from a canadian perspective, schouls (2003) has averred that a key issue is the recognition of equivalence between indigenous cemānáhuacan nations and the settler colonial states— a somewhat modest stance. international law includes ius cogens [peremptory norm], which offers an ethical underpinning for international law through established norms that cannot be derogated (o’connell, 2012). the recognition of indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty throughout all of cemānáhuac, in combination with ius cogens, create an institutional foundation to solve the predicaments indigenous cemānáhuacan nations are facing as a result of settler colonialism. 5 in the civil law family, legal positivism recognizes only statutory (legal) norms as the foundation of jurisprudence and therefore rejects considerations relating to ethics and morals. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3, art. 4 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8251 4 in the resurgence of non-occidental cultures, identity is a point of conflict (yah kabran, 2016). identity is a complex phenomenon that has been influenced by colonialism. for example, some members of the upper class in the aztec empire, such as the early dukes of moctezuma de tultengo, adopted spanish family names in the 16th century (roulet, 2012). cultural and religious differences between societies pertaining to identity-related issues result in misunderstandings, tensions, and conflicts (anoman don, 2016; grunberg, 2012). while some have claimed that culture is inherently unstable (niezen, 2009), it is nonetheless the right of indigenous cemānáhuacan nations to defend their cultures and cultural practices. sovereignty accords the power for this defense, and business ethics dictates that firms should not stand in the way of it. firms abide by settler colonial states’ laws, of course, because of these states’ coercive powers. yet, this does not change the fact that business ethics require that firms abide by indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ laws because of indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty throughout all of cemānáhuac. this article closes a gap in the literature between indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty and business ethics in a settler colonial context. thus, this article contributes to the business ethics-, compliance-, indigenous business-, and sustainability-related scholarship. it consists of six sections. first, it establishes that firms have no legal and legitimate foundation for their operations without assent from indigenous cemānáhuacan nations. second, it determines that there is no foundation in the occidental legal tradition for firms to reject indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty. third, it infers that the recognition of indigenous cemānáhuacan sovereignty gives firms legal certainty. fourth, it notes that firms must abide by settler colonial states’ laws because of the coercive power at their disposal irrespective of their invalidity in the face of indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty. fifth, it presents possible solutions to arrange the relationship between indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ laws and settler colonial laws. sixth, it outlines intrafirm challenges following the recognition of indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty and firms’ liability for past actions. sovereignty the occidental discourse on sovereignty has been employed to legitimize occidental colonialism (anghie, 2012), and this makes the assessment of sovereignty in cemānáhuac a challenging undertaking. doubts regarding the legality and legitimacy of the sovereignty of settler colonial states of occidental provenance in cemānáhuac weigh heavily. it is necessary to start at the beginning—history. indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty has been usurped by settler colonial states (turner, 2006). a key element of the westphalian sovereignty concept—devised at the end of the thirty years' war—is the exclusion of external actors from internal institutions and policies (krasner, 1999). the westphalian sovereignty concept was preceded by a sovereignty concept in which the sovereign had the duty to safeguard the wellbeing of subjects, who in turn were required to support the sovereign (johnson, 2014). mcneil (2012) has maintained that the sovereignty concept developed by jean bodin in the 16th century was specific to the situation in europe at the time. it was developed to legitimize political aspirations in europe in the 15th century (gilli, 2009), instead of binding societal power to law. using bodin’s work to determine the sovereignty of indigenous cemānáhuacan nations is thus problematic. poesche: business ethics and sovereignty published by scholarship@western, 2019 5 the refusal of settler colonial states to recognize unrestricted and effective sovereignty of indigenous cemānáhuacan nations, and the reduction of indigenous cemānáhuacan rights to unequal treaties (clavero, 2005; kontos, 2005), is ethically troubling. granting autonomy to indigenous cemānáhuacan nations (anaya muñoz, 2005; nahmad sitton, 1999; osorio calvo, 2017), acknowledging indigenous cemānáhuacan treaty rights constitutionally (otis, 2014), or recognizing the existence of indigenous cemānáhuacan jurisdictions (jaramillo pérez, 2012; jiménez bartlett, 2008; lajoie, 2008) is ethically and legally dubious because the findings of alonso de la vera cruz (1553/2007) support the indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ continued sovereignty throughout all of cemānáhuac even after 1492. the term sovereignty has a double meaning—one of law and another of facticity (kurtulus, 2005). does the factual settler colonial states’ sovereignty in cemānáhuac extinguish the indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty on currently non-indigenous territories? the current situation can be compared to illegal and illegitimate occupation from an indigenous cemānáhuacan perspective. as the sovereignty of belgium, france, and poland did not cease as the result of nazi german occupation during the second world war, the occupation of indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ territories by settler colonial states has not impacted the indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty. in view of the decisive role territoriality plays in international law (castellino, 2005), indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ continued sovereignty throughout all of cemānáhuac means they are the sole owners of the area’s land and natural resources. particularly for firms engaged in natural resource extraction, this point is important because of the legal concept of nemo plus iuris ad alium transferre potest quam ipse habet [no one can transfer more rights to another than he himself has]. despite their dubiousness, it is necessary to address the validity of treaties signed by indigenous cemānáhuacan nations with settler colonial states. as indigenous cemānáhuacan nations were coerced into signing treaties surrendering some of indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ rights and resources, settler colonial states cannot found any claims and rights on them. some treaties are less problematic than others: for example, la grande paix de montréal [the great peace of montreal] of 1701 exemplifies one of the less problematic ones, but the number of less problematic treaties is small. in order to determine the limits of realizable institutional arrangements between indigenous cemānáhuacan nations and settler colonial states, it is also necessary to consider the limitations in indigenous cemānáhuacan cultures and laws. in some indigenous cemānáhuacan cultures, a separation of an individual from a place is impossible (povinelli, 2012). generally, indigenous peoples of cemānáhuacan did not separate between the sacred and the secular (wenger, 2015). these observations raise the issue of the validity of any cessation of sovereignty by at least some indigenous cemānáhuacan nations. thus, indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty needs to be maintained throughout all of cemānáhuac. beyond these limitations, settler colonial states’ sovereignty claims are unethically founded on various manifestations of racism. the negation of statehood on racist grounds is obvious in bluntschli (1875/2000): no doubt before the colonization of america by europeans there were larger states there, with a considerable and respectable civilisatiom (sic). but the theocratic monarchies of pew and mexico were probably not the work of indigenous races, but were founded by immigrants from eastern and southern asia. the name of “white children of the sun” given to the incas in peru, the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3, art. 4 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8251 6 and the honour paid to white men as “sons of the gods,” point unmistakably to an aryan origin. where the indians were left to themselves, they again relapsed into the state of wild hunters, and fell into small groups. (p. 75) the ethical case for the settler colonial states’ claimed sovereignty is further weakened by the spurious excuses used to legitimize the settler colonial states’ aggression against indigenous cemānáhuacan nations. for example, after settler colonists invaded indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ territory that had been recognized as such by settler colonial states, these states used the defense of the lands by indigenous cemānáhuacan nations as an excuse to attack the defenders (carlson, 2004). settler colonial states have striven to undermine indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty. an example involves the concept of indigenous title. settler colonial states have devised the concept of indigenous title (curthoys, genovese, & reilly, 2008; yarrow, 2011), but this concept is tantamount to entrapment on two counts. first, the concept entails that indigenous cemānáhuacan nations recognize—on the foundation of alonso de la vera cruz’ (1553/2007) findings— the illegal and illegitimate settler colonial states’ sovereignty. second, the settler colonial states would, in exchange, graciously give the indigenous cemānáhuacan nations a small fraction of cemānáhuac when the indigenous cemānáhuacan nations have inalienable sovereignty throughout and own all of cemānáhuac. the settler colonial states’ chutzpah is breathtaking and undermines any trust in settler colonial states’ ethical integrity. in discussing michel foucault’s concept of bio-power, moretonrobinson (2015) has noted that settler colonial right and power should not be confused with legitimacy in the context of landownership. similarly, the coercive power of settler colonial states does not create a legitimate ground for sovereignty in cemānáhuac. historiography changes over time (lowenthal, 2015), making ethical and legal reassessments necessary. the historical substantiation of indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ continued sovereignty even after 1492 means that indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty supersedes settler colonial states’ claims of sovereignty—this flows from alonso de la vera cruz’ findings. the work of carlos and lewis (2004) hints at the need to rethink the legal implications that would follow the recognition of indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty. a clarification thereof would also reduce the legal uncertainty encountered by firms. shortcomings in occidental thinking erect barriers to nuanced legal assessments. two issues are of concern here. first, the original concept of self-determination—and sovereignty as an extension6— assumes that there is only one people in a state (anaya, 2000). this is clearly not true in settler colonial states, where there are numerous indigenous nations, often operating in confederacies or affiliated groupings. second, equating indigenous cemānáhuacan nations with ethnic, religious, or linguistic minorities is not accurate (schabas, 2005). 6 the term self-determination is ambiguous because it might be interpreted as sovereignty or some form of autonomy. in the latin american neoconstitucionalismo [neoconstitutionalism], the settler colonial states have opted to interpret the term as limited autonomy. considering the problems associated with the settler colonial states’ sovereignty claims in view of the scholarship of francisco de vitoria and alonso de la vera cruz, the term should rather be interpreted as sovereignty. poesche: business ethics and sovereignty published by scholarship@western, 2019 7 meaningful consultations between indigenous cemānáhuacan nations and firms are rare in the settler colonial states (whiteman, 2009)—a deficiency that can be attributed to the power asymmetry between indigenous cemānáhuacan nations and settler colonial states. firms’ behavior in the context of consultations underlines the need to recognize the indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty, particularly if they wish to act ethically and legally. the lack of autonomy or simultaneous sovereignty of settler colonial states granted by indigenous cemānáhuacan nations means that firms have no valid legal and legitimate foundation for their operations in cemānáhuac if they do not have assent from indigenous cemānáhuacan nations. this is particularly troubling in the case of resource extraction, as resource extraction without permits from indigenous cemānáhuacan nations is tantamount to theft. firms are thus confronted with serious problems vis-à-vis business ethics and compliance. legitimacy of pluralism of sovereignty is there anything in the occidental legal tradition that would categorically rule out the recognition of indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty throughout all of cemānáhuac? the answer is decidedly no. the reported opposition to plurisovereignty7 (fernández de rota irimia, 2016) is based on the fact that it is incompatible with the occidental legal tradition. the legitimacy of legal pluralism8 is deeply ingrained in the dna of occidental law, as evidenced by its existence in the classical roman empire (humfress, 2013) and charlemagne’s empire (hoppenbrouwers, 2013). in legal theory, the occident has accepted legal pluralism in bodin (1577)9, and vitoria and pereña (1539/1967)10, but occidental universalism11 has taken over (rech, 2013). the spanish empire was characterized by imperial courts applying a mixture of indigenous cemānáhuacan and occidental laws when adjudicating cases between indigenous cemānáhuacans, but 7 plurisovereignty is understood to refer to a situation characterized by a territory with more than one legally recognized sovereign. 8 effectively and efficiently working legal pluralism in cemānáhuac is predicated on legal anthropology. settler colonialism has had detrimental effects on the indigenous cemānáhuacan cultures and epistemes, including indigenous cemānáhuacan sources of law. it is therefore necessary to rebuild and revitalize the indigenous cemānáhuacan laws. this needs to be undertaken on the indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ terms. valuable work in this respect has been carried out by, for example, the colectivo de estudios poscoloniales / decoloniales en américa latina (universidad nacional de colombia), the indigenous law research unit (university of victoria), and the instituto de investigaciones jurídicas (universidad nacional autónoma de méxico). 9 the book les six livres de la république [the six books of the commonwealth] (1577) was written in the context of the french wars of religion. the argument for strengthening the crown was seen as a way to counteract the societal centrifugal forces that were on display during the french wars of religion. the concept of sovereignty represented a key component in strengthening the crown. based on les six livres de la république, jean bodin may be considered the father of the concept of sovereignty in the occident. 10 francisco de vitoria presented relectio de indis in 1539. in this work, the crown’s right to wage war against indigenous cemānáhuacan nations and deprive them of their possessions is rejected based on his application of theological and philosophical principles. 11 in this article, occidental universality is understood to mean that non-occidental knowledge is rejected by the occident irrespective of its merits. in the case of cemānáhuacan, occidental universality may have been facilitated by religious fanaticism associated with the iberian reconquista [the reconquest] (valdeón, pérez, & santos, 2011)— coincidentally completed in 1492— and connections between the crusades and the occidental age of exploration (loução, 1998). the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3, art. 4 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8251 8 settler colonists were under occidental law in the 16th century (benton, 2012). in this context, the change in the occidental and settler colonial states’ views on indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty is noteworthy: indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty was overwhelmingly recognized in the 16th, 17th, and 18th centuries, but this changed in the 19th century (morin, 1997). interestingly, pluralism was sometimes accepted outside of cemānáhuac (for example, in colonial nigeria; silverstein, 2012). legal pluralism means that there is more than one legal order in one social field (griffiths, 1986). in a multicultural context, pluralism can be seen as a side-by-side of non-hierarchical and incommensurable cultures and legal outputs (olson & toddington, 2008). discussing john rawls’ views on religion in politics, baxter (2011) has noted that there needs to be restraint and reasonable pluralism. this contains two problems. first, it overlooks that the occident is a product of occidental christianity and, thus, occidental cultural and legal concepts often contain opaque occidental christian undercurrents. second, reasonableness is in the eyes of the beholder, which raises the issue of whether occidental laws can be considered reasonable from an indigenous cemānáhuacan perspective. hitherto, indigenous nations have adapted, ignored, and resisted the intrusion of settler colonial states instead of accepting their supposedly superior occidental laws (bunn-livingstone, 2002). the behaviour of the settler colonial states makes it necessary to recognize the indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty throughout all of cemānáhuac, but a caveat is warranted at this point. the k’iche constitutionalism, which entails the replacement of oral tradition with written statutes (ekern, 2018), is problematic because written statutes may effectively mean a further settler colonial encroachment on maya sovereignty by introducing occidental concepts. it is doubtful that written statutes are sufficient to overcome coloniality. what does this mean for firms with operations in cemānáhuac? there is no settler colonial ethical or legal reason that firms can use to justify not abiding by indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ laws. indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ lack of coercive power means that abiding by the indigenous cemānáhuacan laws is a business ethical choice that firms need to make. precedence in pluralism of sovereignty postulating that indigenous cemānáhuacan nations and settler colonial states hold sovereignty over the same territory, their equality or precedence needs to be resolved. establishing equality or precedence would assist firms in safeguarding compliance. because pluriversality involves intercultural dialogue (dunford, 2017), it is susceptible to being discriminatory in the context of the asymmetrical societal power structures of settler colonial states. in settler colonial states, it is assumed that indigenous cemānáhuacan nations are not sovereign. this runs counter to the finding that not only are indigenous cemānáhuacan nations sovereign throughout all of cemānáhuac, but that their sovereignty may take precedence over the claimed settler colonial states’ sovereignty. moreover, the lack of clarity vis-à-vis equality versus precedence calls into question the legality of, for example, landownership, operating permits, and taxation authority. the pitfalls of the lack of clarity are epitomized by contemporary negotiations between indigenous cemānáhuacan nations and settler colonial states to resolve indigenous land claims (anker, 2014). such negotiations poesche: business ethics and sovereignty published by scholarship@western, 2019 9 are fundamentally flawed for two reasons. first, they occur against the backdrop of inequality and even coercion and corruption (gilbert, 2006)—this calls into question the ethicality and legality of any resulting agreement. second, the validity of negotiated solutions within the conceptual confines of apocryphal settler colonial sovereignty are questionable. an issue not addressed in dorobantu and odziemkowska (2017) is the role settler colonial states play in compelling indigenous cemānáhuacan nations to sign community benefits agreements with occidental firms by pauperizing indigenous cemānáhuacan nations—something made possible by settler colonial states’ refusal to recognize indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty. this demonstrates the point that the status quo of settler colonial states’ unfettered sovereignty is unsound from a business ethics perspective. an uncertain number of sovereigns on a particular territory also raises the issue ambiguousness of legal status (kurtulus, 2005). indigenous cemānáhuacan nations may require some time to establish the geographical boundaries of the territories where they exercise sovereignty. firms need to exhibit flexibility during this transitional period. the result of clarifying equality or precedence may be that firms lose some of the privileges and rights awarded them by settler colonial states. the benefit of the clarification for firms is that the recognition of indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty settles uncertainties regarding privileges and rights. validity of legal norms power uses law, but law needs to be perceived as legitimate by society (rocher, 2016). submission to societal history and traditions establishes legitimacy and validity. roman law is the foundation of the civil law branch of occidental law (bix, 2012; mousourakis, 2015). roman law has also influenced the common law branch of occidental law, particularly via ecclesiastical law (bix, 2012; samuel, 2003). as a result, submission to roman law confers legitimacy and validity to settler colonial states’ laws. because of differing histories and traditions, roman law does not confer any legitimacy and validity in indigenous cemānáhuacan nations. the roman law-based stance is not always shared in the occidental literature on legal theory. from the standpoint of the validity of indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ laws, legal positivism, the realist theory, and the historical school of law are particularly interesting. georg henrik von wright has argued that a legal norm is valid if a higher-level norm authorizes its creation, but the higher norm needs to only exist instead of being valid in itself (cited in falcón y tella, 2010). this would effectively validate laws even if settler colonial higher-level norms are illegal and illegitimate—as in the case of cemānáhuac. whereas an illegal and illegitimate norm cannot establish legality and legitimacy, such a claim of validity is clearly untenable. based on a de jure [lawful, legitimate] instead of a de facto [in fact]12 assessment, legal positivist georg jellinek (1905) has tied the validity of norms to the continuity of sources in a state as defined as the 12 the difference of de jure and de facto can be observed in the occupation of cemānáhuac. although the military and other forms of violence perpetrated against the cemānáhuacans factually (de facto) established colonial and settler colonial societal the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3, art. 4 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8251 10 people, the sovereign power, and the territory (see also falcón y tella, 2010). unquestionably, settler colonial states exercise sovereign power over cemānáhuacan territories, and this would propound that settler colonial states’ laws are valid. implicitly, this stance would suggest that indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty has extinguished in the aftermath of 1492. yet, this is an untenable suggestion as the continued sovereignty of belgium, france, and poland during the nazi german occupation demonstrates. hans kelsen13 has offered a legal positivist view of mutually independent concepts of validity and membership. hans kelsen’s (1934/2008) reine rechtslehre: einleitung in die rechtswissenschaftliche problematik [pure theory of law] is a classic in legal theory: analogously, the work of émile durkheim and max weber are classics in sociology. any assessment of legal positivism needs to consider kelsen’s work. for legal positivism, legal norms enacted according to the relevant constitutional norms constitute a coherent and complete legal system. external sources epitomized by occidental natural law are invalid. if the legality of the settler colonial states is questionable since 1492, then the legality of the positive legal systems of settler colonial states is equally questionable. attempts to legalize the status quo on the basis of legal positivism therefore undermines such attempts. whereas axioms are assumed to be valid, and serve as the foundation of assessments, an invalid axiom results in an invalid outcome. in natural science, an invalid axiom may be identified when the outcome contradicts with observable natural phenomena. in law, such a validation of axioms is only partially available. it is available within the positive legal system, but it is not available when the legality—validity—of the entire positive legal system needs to be validated. this is a result of kelsen’s coherence and completeness axiom. kelsen’s work is a foundation for falcón y tella. falcón y tella (2010) has written: “(a) a norm is valid when it derives from another valid norm; (b) a norm belongs to a legal system when it derives from another norm derived from the same system” (p. 238). this creates a problem in the settler colonial context in cemānáhuac. hans kelsen’s criterion of systematic coherence (cited in falcón y tella, 2010) aggravates the problem. hans kelsen’s criterion of the completeness of the system (falcón y tella, 2010) further aggravates the problem. kelsen’s conceptualizations would prevent attempts to incorporate and even recognize settler colonial states’ laws in indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ laws. considering the sovereignty-related challenges facing settler colonial states’ laws in cemānáhuac, kelsen’s arguments render the validity of settler colonial states’ laws at the very least questionable. martin diego farrell’s realist theory of axioms as the foundation of a legal system (cited in falcón y tella, 2010) is of also interest for the assessment of the respective validity of indigenous cemānáhuacan and settler colonial legal systems and the respective validity of their laws. farrell’s axioms are unverifiable within the legal system itself (falcón y tella, 2010). hence, the validity of the axioms underpinning settler colonial states’ laws vis-à-vis indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ legal systems cannot be verified within settler colonial legal systems. therefore, the validity of settler colonial states’ laws can only be power structures in cemānáhuac, the doubts raised by francisco de vitoria and alonso de la vera cruz about the legality (de jure) of this occupation remain. 13 hans kelsen can be considered the founder of german legal positivism. german law belongs to the civil law family. hans kelsen rejected any ethical or moral consideration in jurisprudence. a key work outlining his thinking is hauptprobleme der staatsrechtslehre, originally published in 1911. poesche: business ethics and sovereignty published by scholarship@western, 2019 11 determined on the basis of indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ laws because of the questionable sovereignty of the settler colonial states in cemānáhuac. in the footsteps of friedrich karl von savigny (1840), the historical school of law sees the validity of norms as resulting from their existence as a result of historical societal processes (see also falcón y tella, 2010). this creates precedence for indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ laws because the introduction of settler colonial nations’ laws created a discontinuity that would have needed to be legitimized on the foundation of indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ laws. as this did not occur, settler colonial states’ laws are not valid in indigenous cemānáhuacan nations per the historical school of law. the concurrent existence of several legal systems in cemānáhuac makes cosmopolitalism14 a way to assess the situation. jackson (2016) has described cosmopolitan jurisprudence thusly: “law is the principled justification (scheme of rights and responsibilities) for authoritative conduct: policymaking, decision making, and action (or forbearance) on behalf of global economic participants qua members of domestic, international, and global communities” (p. 282). by emphasizing principled justifications, this description rules out political convenience as a foundation of justifications. indeed, arguing in favour of the validity of settler colonial states’ laws would be a convenient argument for settler colonial states’ courts and lawmakers in view of extant societal power structures. additionally, cosmopolitalism emphasizes the individual over groups and states, as shown in rabkin (2012): “the ultimate units of moral concern are individual human beings, not states or other particular forms of human association. humankind belongs to a single moral realm in which each person is regarded as equally worthy of consideration and respect” (p. 166). this is ethically troubling because individualism may be used as a smokescreen for legitimizing colonialism perpetrated by the occident. an occident-focussed cosmopolitalism could thus be used to undermine indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty over all of cemānáhuac. yet, some warning words are warranted. the politics of philosophy is hidden in language, and this politics can be identified by linguistic deconstruction (ward, 2004). the same holds true for law. language can be used to effectively undermine the meaning of indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ laws in the context of codifications and translations into occidental languages. the validity of codifications and translations must thus be considered critically. where does this leave firms with operations in cemānáhuac? the validity of indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ laws is certain, but the validity of settler colonial states’ laws is questionable. firms are well advised to abide by settler colonial states’ laws because of the coercive power at the disposal of settler colonial states. however, firms should not confuse the possession of coercive power with validity. 14 the kantian universal cosmopolitism entails the simultaneous respect of human rights and sovereignty (jiménez solares, 2018). whereas sovereignty has been denied to indigenous cemānáhuacans, and human rights are understood against their occidental connotation, cosmopolitism contains coloniality. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3, art. 4 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8251 12 international law international law refers to law regulating relations between political entities not recognizing a higher authority (lesaffer, 2007). institutions—like international law and the concept of sovereignty—are the result of historical evolution (mutch, 2018). there is a clear nexus between colonialism and international law (anghie, 2012). therefore, current procedural and substantive international law needs to be applied decolonially in the settler colonial context. the case of settler colonial states’ exclusive sovereignty is not feasible in light of alonso de la vera cruz’s finding that the subjugation of cemānáhuac was illegal from the start. if rule of law is considered an ideal in international law (sampford, 2004), then the issue of which substantive law is applied arises in cemānáhuac. this brings three solutions into play that are relevant for firms in the settler colonial context: a. indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ exclusive sovereignty: firms need to solely abide by indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ laws; all settler colonial states’ laws are null and void ipso facto [by the fact itself]. b. indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ superseding sovereignty: firms need to always abide by indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ laws and are allowed to abide by settler colonial laws only when they do not contradict the former. c. indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ and settler colonial states simultaneous sovereignty: firms need to abide by all stipulations in indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ laws and settler colonial states’ laws. procedural justice has been proposed as a way to deal with identity-related misunderstandings, tensions, and conflicts (anoman don, 2016). this proposition relating to procedural law is equally problematic as the one relating to substantive law. it cannot be assumed that procedures defined by settler colonial states are legal and legitimate from the perspective of indigenous cemānáhuacan nations. in light of this, the three solutions presented for substantive law can be applied to identify the proper procedures, if desired. the lack of an enforcement mechanism in international law is a challenge, however (hathaway, 2012). the situation is similar in cemānáhuac. whereas indigenous cemānáhuacan nations lack enforcement mechanisms in settler colonial states, compliance is predicated on firms’ commitment to business ethics. this lack of enforcement mechanisms is clearly unsatisfactory and needs to be addressed, because it can entice firms to act illegally and unethically. plurality of sovereignty and business ethics the recognition of indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty across all of cemānáhuac does not only call into question the implicit assumption of unfettered settler colonial states’ sovereignty in cemānáhuac that underpins much of the scholarship on business ethics, compliance, indigenous business, and sustainability. it also fundamentally changes business management in cemānáhuac. indigenous cemānáhuacan nations have existed before and since 1492, but this has usually been in poesche: business ethics and sovereignty published by scholarship@western, 2019 13 obscurity—even in business ethical scholarship. this is epitomized by jones, harrison, and felps’s (2018) discussion of firms’ relational ethical strategy concepts—in this discussion, the authors address the direct relationship with settler colonial states, but they disregard the often indirect relationship with indigenous cemānáhuacan nations via the settler colonial states. building on antonetti and maklan (2016), firms can attempt to pretend that the interest of indigenous cemānáhuacan nations are the same as those of settler colonial states to minimize opposition to their operations and projects. the use of occidental (business) ethics by firms does not translate into satisfactory results from the perspective of indigenous nations (kepore, higgins & goddard, 2013)— this should not come as a surprise. since indigenous cemānáhuacan nations are sovereign throughout all of cemānáhuac, calibrating the expectations of indigenous cemānáhuacan nations vis-à-vis settler colonial states and firms (as suggested in ali, 2016) is not ideal—indeed, the calibration should be the other way around. firms accustomed to believing in the chimera of settler colonial states’ sovereignty may find their mental rigidity to be detrimental to their activities. risk discourages capital investments (toko ngalani, 2010), but the perception of increased risk as the result a recognition of indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty throughout cemānáhuac may be clouded by a racist and thus unethical ideology presuming occidental superiority. to be blunt, recognizing indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty may be beneficial for firms desiring to safeguard the supply of raw materials because, as fisher, kotha, and lahiri (2016) have argued, accepting pluralism is helpful in the acquisition of resources. indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty means that this safeguarding must happen on the indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ terms. the united nations general assembly (2018) has reported about the disregard for the land rights and territorial rights, in addition to racism directed against the indigenous garifuna, maya, and xinka nations in guatemala. minera san rafael—owned by a canadian firm—is highlighted in the report. the un rapporteur has noted that there may have been attempts to deny the xinka identity, that there was a failure to consult the xinca, and that the xinca nation’s defense of their rights had been criminalized by settler colonists. what would business ethics recognizing plurality of sovereignty have changed? the firm owning minera san rafael would have filed an application for the proposed mine with the xinca nation prior to starting any measures at the site. the firm would not have supported in any way paramilitary or other groups attempting to influence the decision-making process of the xinca nation. the firm would have accepted whatever decision the xinca nation would have arrived at. the firm would have respected all conditions—including royalty and tax payments—imposed by the xinca nation. all of this would have been in addition to the regulatory approvals and conditions determined by the settler colonial state. yet, gaining intrafirm acceptance for and compliance with indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty may prove challenging. newark’s (2018) view that the impact of leadership is minimal raises the issue of whether the required changes in mentality can be implemented from the top down. settler colonial attitudes may persist in spite of a firm’s management efforts to the contrary, but shame may be a catalyst of change (creed, hudson, okhuysen, & smith-crowe, 2014)—including shame for the treatment of indigenous cemānáhuacans. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3, art. 4 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8251 14 indigenous cemānáhuacan nations and settler colonial states cannot rely on firms’ codes of conduct in the recognition of indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty throughout cemānáhuac. the problem is the lack of effective enforcement mechanisms for codes of conduct (arthurs, 1999). increased regulation might therefore be needed, at least for a transitional period. the increase in regulatory complexity as the result of the recognition of indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty requires more ambidexterity from firms. deharo (2018) has proposed a nexus between agility and law. the need for legal ambidexterity may facilitate a broader change in mentality within firms. to the degree that ambidexterity is a competitive advantage, the recognition of indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty may have favourable effects for firms. these favourable effects may include more innovation as a result of a broadening of the cultural and epistemic foundations of innovation, and an emergence of new market segments opening new business opportunities. the argument that firms may be held responsible for their past actions (schrempf-stirling, palazzo, & phillips, 2016) raises the issue of whether firms can be held responsible for past actions of the societies they hail from. states can attempt to respond to historical injustices (gordon, 2009), and firms can try do the same and abstain from supporting a continuation of historical injustices. in reality, however, firms have shown their ability to receive damages when states have set limits to firms’ destructive behaviour (byrne, 2014; kobrin, 2009). this ability suggests that indigenous cemānáhuacan nations will encounter challenges if they seek damages via settler colonial courts. the avenue via indigenous cemānáhuacan jurisprudence may offer remedies after the recognition of indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty. in closing, legal pluralism and a plurality of sovereignty have significant implications for ethical and legal compliance in cemānáhuac, which impact and encompass all aspects of firms’ activities. conclusion this conceptual article makes the case that indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty is valid throughout all of cemānáhuac, thus rendering settler colonial laws illegitimate and illegal. consequently, firms need to abide by indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ laws when conducting business with indigenous nations. this article contains three key contributions. first, it argues that settler colonial states are not sovereign in any part of cemānáhuac. aggression and occupation have not extinguished or limited indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty. alonso de la vera cruz’ finding that the conquest of cemānáhuac was illegal according to occidental law provides the basis for this interpretation. per cruz’s findings, later occidental assessments need to be discounted because of their susceptibility to political expediency. second, settler colonial states need to find a way of living with the sole holders of sovereignty in cemānáhuac. this may take the shape of simultaneous sovereignty by indigenous cemānáhuacan nations and settler colonial states, settler colonial states’ autonomy under indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty, or comprehensive and sole sovereignty by indigenous cemānáhuacan nations. any coercion or corruption undertaken against indigenous cemānáhuacan nations in finding this new way of living would be entirely illegal and illegitimate. poesche: business ethics and sovereignty published by scholarship@western, 2019 15 third, without a coercionand corruption-free assent by indigenous cemānáhuacan nations, any privilege or right granted by a settler colonial state is ethically and legally invalid. this includes natural resource extraction permits, operating permits, and ownership of immovables. to safeguard compliance, firms need to obtain coercionand corruption-free assent for any privilege or right from indigenous cemānáhuacan nations. in some cases, this might be impossible because of fundamental tenets found in indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ laws. further research is needed on four key questions. first, this article operates mainly within the confines of occidental conceptualizations, instead of indigenous cemānáhuacan concepts of law and sovereignty. legal anthropology needs to explore such concepts. second, three institutional alternatives to organize sovereignty in cemānáhuac have been presented in this article, but the mechanisms in the case of ethical conflict and legal conflict still pose complex challenges. third, the territories of indigenous cemānáhuacan nations may overlap, thus making it necessary to establish norms dealing with joint sovereignty by several indigenous cemānáhuacan nations. fourth, legal anthropology is needed to recreate indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ ethics and law vitiated by coloniality. this article has three key takeaways for firms with operations in cemānáhuac. first, firms need to admit that indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ rights are ethically and legally normative, and these rights can therefore not be considered voluntary niceties that can be dealt with, for example, in corporate social responsibility statements. second, firms need to assist and cooperate with indigenous cemānáhuacan nations in obviating the illegal and illegitimate activities of settler colonial groups and ideologies aiming to deny or limit indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty. third, until settler colonial states recognize the sovereignty of indigenous cemānáhuacan nations for all of cemānáhuac, firms need to seek indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ approval for their operations and projects in addition to and separately from settler colonial states’ regulatory processes. recognizing indigenous cemānáhuacan nations’ sovereignty throughout all of cemānáhuac rectifies an ethical and legal wrong. firms will experience challenges when they need to bring their business ethics and compliance up to the standards required by indigenous cemānáhuacan nations. throughout this process, a quotation might provide motivation: “but let justice run down as waters, and righteousness as a mighty stream” (amos 5:24, the new king james version). references ali, s. 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(2014). equity of the law. in e. koops, & w. j. zwalve (eds.), law and equity: approaches in roman law and common law (pp. 17-38). leiden, be: nijhoff. microsoft word 8204+coverpage.docx the international indigenous policy journal volume 12 | issue 3 august 2021 san’yas indigenous cultural safety training as an educational intervention: promoting anti-racism and equity in health systems, policies, and practices annette j. browne the university of british columbia, canada, annette.browne@ubc.ca colleen varcoe the university of british columbia, canada, colleen.varcoe@ubc.ca cheryl ward* indigenous health, provincial health services authority, british columbia, canada, cward-02@phsa.ca recommended citation browne, a., varcoe, c., & ward, c. (2021). san’yas indigenous cultural safety training as an educational intervention: promoting anti-racism and equity in health systems, policies, and practices. the international indigenous policy journal, 12(3). https://10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.8204 san’yas indigenous cultural safety training as an educational intervention: promoting anti-racism and equity in health systems, policies, and practices abstract the san’yas indigenous cultural safety training program is an indigenous-led, policy-driven, and systems-level educational intervention to foster health equity and mitigate the effects of systemic racism experienced by indigenous people in health and other sectors. currently, san’yas is being scaled-up across canada. this article focuses on the following: (a) the pedagogical underpinnings of san’yas grounded in transformational learning principles and indigenous knowledges; (b) the scope, reach, and scale-up of san’yas as an explicit anti-racism educational intervention; (c) its unique program delivery approaches; and (d) program evaluation trends. we discuss the insights gained from implementing san’yas over the past decade, which will be relevant for leaders and policy-makers concerned with implementing anti-racism educational interventions as part of broader system transformation. keywords indigenous people, cultural safety, racism, inequities, health care, health equity, discrimination author note * dr. ward is intentionally positioned as the last author to signal her leadership regarding strategies to counteract anti-indigenous racism in health systems and other sectors. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. 1 browne et al.: san’yas indigenous cultural safety training published by scholarship@western, 2021 san’yas indigenous cultural safety training as an educational intervention: promoting antiracism and equity in health systems, policies, and practices structural and interpersonal forms of racism, and other forms of discrimination, continue to shape the health and well-being of indigenous1 peoples in canada and globally (allan & smylie, 2015; bourassa et al., 2004; browne, 2017; r. henry et al., 2018; mackean et al., 2019; mccallum & perry, 2018; national inquiry into missing and murdered indigenous women and girls, 2019a; paradies, 2018; paradies & cunningham, 2009; public health agency of canada, 2019; united nations, 2016). inequitable power relations, colonial assumptions, stereotyping, and negative social attitudes toward indigenous people endure as influential forces shaping access to care, people’s experiences of care, and health outcomes, despite calls and efforts to address health and social inequities (browne et al., 2016; dell et al., 2016; greenwood et al., 2018; hole et al., 2015; nelson et al., 2016; varcoe, browne, & blanchet garneau, 2019). the recent events in canada surrounding the tragic death of ms. joyce echaquan (chadha, 2020; “joyce echaquan: outcry in canada,” 2020; kirkup, 2020), the investigation into emergency department staff playing “games” in which they would guess blood alcohol levels of indigenous patients (turpel-lafond, 2020), and the decades-long investigation into the death of mr. brian sinclair (brian sinclair working group, 2017; mccallum & perry, 2018) have brought renewed attention to the harms of indigenous-specific racism. it is within this context that the truth and reconciliation commission of canada’s (trc) final report (2015) issued a set of 94 calls to action for renewed commitments to the process of reconciliation, defined as necessitating mutually respectful relationships between indigenous peoples and nonindigenous peoples, awareness of the past, acknowledgment of the harms incurred, atonement for the causes, and actions to transform relationships, practices, and policies. most recently, reclaiming power and place: the final report of the national inquiry into missing and murdered indigenous women and girls (national inquiry into missing and murdered indigenous women and girls, 2019b) reinforced the urgent need for indigenous and non-indigenous people to work together to mitigate the ongoing effects of canada’s colonial context. in the context of these calls and realities, the san’yas2 indigenous cultural safety training program, an indigenous-led, policy-driven, and systems-level educational intervention, aims to foster health equity and mitigate the intersecting forms of interpersonal and structural racism experienced by indigenous people in the health care system in canada. rooted in critical anti-racist pedagogy, transformative learning theory, and evidence-based strategies, san’yas is an educational intervention that aims to do the following: (a) build the knowledge, selfawareness, and skills of participants to work more safely and effectively with indigenous people; and (b) 1 consistent with accepted terminology used in landmark international reports, the term indigenous peoples is used to refer to the diversity of populations throughout the world. in canada, over 1.7 million people of the total population of approximately 34.5 million (4.9%) identify as indigenous (statistics canada, 2019), including first nations, métis, and inuit. the term aboriginal is also commonly used, and the colonial term indian is still used in federal government policy documents such as the indian act. the indian act is a canadian federal law that governs in matters pertaining to indian status, indian bands, and indian reserves (indian act, 1985). this authority has ranged from overarching political control, such as imposing governing structures on indigenous communities in the form of band councils, to control over the rights of indigenous peoples to practice their culture and traditions. while the indian act has undergone numerous amendments since it was first passed in 1876, today it largely retains its original form. 2 san’yas is a kwak’wala word meaning “to know” or “knowing.” 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.8204 support broader organizational and systemic change. san’yas offers both online training and consultation services designed to actively attune participants to the root causes of inequitable power relations and health outcomes affecting indigenous people, the health and social impacts of antiindigenous racism, stigma and stereotyping, and strategies for creating more equitable systems of care for indigenous people in service delivery contexts. san’yas is currently offered in health authorities and other government agencies in british columbia (bc) since 2010, in ontario (on) since 2013, and in manitoba (mb) since 2016. table 1 outlines the range of online, facilitated, interactive training programs, each of which are delivered via an innovative platform of multi-media modules tailored for diverse contexts and participants. participants are guided through the training programs through a process of facilitated engagement with highly trained educators, learning activities, individual and group discussions, and access to indigenous elders and knowledge keepers, and are provided with facilitated opportunities to generate strategies for implementing cultural safety in ways that align with participants’ varied work and service sector contexts. to date, over 126,000 people across canada have completed at least one of the online san’yas training programs, and san’yas continues to be adapted for widespread scale-up in diverse sectors, including the public service sector, child welfare services, correctional services, and elsewhere. the purpose of this article is to describe the evolution and aims of san’yas, its theoretical grounding in critical anti-racist pedagogy and transformative learning, and the impacts and policy implications of its uptake in canada. this analysis provides background and context regarding the development of san’yas for those undergoing the training, and for policyand decision-makers in health authorities, institutions, organizations, and health profession regulatory bodies who are considering scale-up and adaptations of anti-racism training in various jurisdictions nationally and internationally. our aim is to contribute to the ongoing dialogue in canada and internationally regarding system-level efforts to integrate cultural safety within organizations with the explicit aim of promoting anti-racism and health equity in systems, policies, and practices. the article begins with a discussion of the effects of interpersonal and systemic racism on first nations, métis, and inuit. our analysis focuses on: (a) the pedagogical underpinnings of san’yas grounded in transformational learning principles and indigenous knowledges, (b) the scope, reach and scale-up of san’yas as an explicit anti-racism educational intervention, (c) its unique program delivery approaches, and (d) program evaluation trends. the article ends with a discussion of the insights gained from implementing san’yas over the past decade, which will be relevant for leaders and policymakers concerned with implementing anti-racism educational interventions as part of broader system transformation. 3 browne et al.: san’yas indigenous cultural safety training published by scholarship@western, 2021 table 1. san’yas core indigenous cultural safety (ics) online training and advanced training programs core training primary audiences foundations explores foundational issues related to cultural safety, including topics such as culture and indigenous people in canada, colonization and its legacies, images of indigenous people, and engaging in cultural safety at work people working in non-health-related fields such as justice, child and family services, education, business, and government health builds on the foundational aspects of cultural safety described above with a specific focus on health care issues for health care professionals working with indigenous people; not intended to teach individual nation-specific content but rather be a foundation for understanding the broader issues impacting services for indigenous people people working in health care fields; intended as introductory training and is supplemented by the nationand region-specific training provided by regional health authorities or indigenous groups mental health builds on the foundation provided in core health with a specific focus on mental health issues for professionals working with indigenous people; the goal is to improve access to mental health services and mental health outcomes for indigenous people; intended as introductory training and is supplemented by the nation and region-specific training provided by regional health authorities or indigenous groups people working in the mental health field child welfare focuses specifically on child welfare issues for professionals working with indigenous children and families; intended as introductory training to be supplemented by the nationand region-specific training provided by indigenous communities or groups professionals working with indigenous children and families; relevant to those who work in child and family services justice focuses on core components of cultural safety that apply across diverse justice settings; intended as an introductory training and is supplemented by the nationand region-specific training provided by indigenous groups people working within the justice system (law clinics, police, court houses, sheriff's office, judiciary, and correctional facilities) who work with indigenous people or others who wish to increase their knowledge, awareness, and skills 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.8204 table 1. san’yas core indigenous cultural safety (ics) online training and advanced training programs (continued) advanced training primary audiences from bystander to ally designed to help participants explore how to become an effective ally when racism, bias, or stereotyping is impacting the service an indigenous person is receiving; participants learn about ways to assess situations that may have elements of bias or racism and then develop strategies to use that can be effective in the participants’ local context people who have completed one of the core training programs at least six months prior note. adapted from san’yas indigenous cultural safety training (n.d.). the tailored modules for all programs vary in length depending on target audience, service sector, and workplace context. learning is self-paced, and typically occurs over an 8-week period. depending on participants’ learning styles, the program requires approximately 8 to 10 hours to complete. in addition, indigenous-only core health and mental health training programs are offered for participants who self-identify as indigenous. background in recent decades, there has been an expanding body of evidence demonstrating how persistent assumptions about “race”3 as a social category and racism as a social process have profound harmful effects on health, access to health care, and quality of life (bailey et al., 2017; krieger, 2020; williams et al., 2019). research continues to deepen understandings of the pathways by which racial discrimination negatively impacts health, including, for example, through longstanding and entrenched inequities within child welfare and criminal justice systems; ongoing economic and social deprivation; explicit and inexplicit constraints on access to resources such as health care, housing, and related social determinants of health; the direct physiological and psychological effects of stress arising from interactions that are perceived to be discriminatory; and the tense social dynamics that can result from the vigilance required 3 race is conceptualized as a: a socially constructed category used to classify humankind according to common ancestry and reliant on differentiation by such physical characteristics such as color of skin, hair texture, stature, and facial characteristics. the concept of race has no basis in biological reality and, as such, has no meaning independent of its social definitions. (f. henry et al., 2010, p. 351) krieger (2014) defines discrimination as “a socially structured and sanctioned phenomenon, justified by ideology and expressed in interactions among and between individuals and institutions that maintains privileges for members of dominant groups at the cost of deprivation for others” (p. 650), with racial discrimination being enacted on the basis of race. the notion of democratic racism is useful for explaining how canadians can hold negative views about particular groups of people, while at the same time espousing liberal democratic principles of equality, tolerance, fairness, and the existence of an equal playing field, epitomized in the phrase, “we treat everyone equally” (f. henry et al., 2010). racialization refers to the social process by which people are labeled according to particular physical characteristics or arbitrary ethnocultural or racial categories, and then dealt with in accordance with beliefs related to those labels. racialization is not synonymous with racist but relates to the discourses that are drawn on to interpret the behaviors or characteristics of people who are seen as being from a “different” so-called racial or ethnocultural group (browne et al., 2009, p. 168). these discourses assume “that ‘race’ is the primary, natural, and neutral means of categorization, and that the groups are distinct also in behavioral characteristics, which result from their ‘race’” (ahmad, 1993, pp. 18-19). racializing processes, policies, and practices have been central to the colonial project of defining, categorizing, and managing indigenous peoples (browne, 2005). 5 browne et al.: san’yas indigenous cultural safety training published by scholarship@western, 2021 in anticipation of racial discrimination (bailey et al., 2017; hansen & metzl, 2019; krieger, 2014, 2020). these applications of eco-social theory and life course perspectives to analyses of the embodiment of racial inequity help to illuminate the complex intergenerational health and social impacts on families, communities, and populations, including the long-term adverse effects of racialized traumatic experiences on the well-being of future generations (krieger, 2014; williams et al., 2019). the pathways between racism and health illustrate how interpersonal and structural or systemic racism intersect. interpersonal racism refers to “directly perceived discriminatory interactions between individuals—whether in their institutional roles (e.g., employer/employee) or as public or private individuals (e.g., shopkeeper/shopper)” (krieger, 2014, p. 650). structural racism, often used interchangeably with systemic or institutional racism: refers to the totality of ways in which societies foster racial discrimination through mutually reinforcing systems of housing, education, employment, earnings, benefits, credit, media, health care, and criminal justice. these patterns and practices in turn reinforce discriminatory beliefs, values, and distribution of resources. (bailey et al., 2017, p. 1453) the intersections between interpersonal and structural racism have important implications in the canadian context. canada’s colonial structure, initiated historically and continually operating through dominant institutions and legislative frameworks such as the indian act, has generated and perpetuated widely held stigmatizing and pejorative ideas about indigenous people, resulting in negative normative beliefs (stereotypes) and attitudes (prejudice), and the differential treatment of indigenous people at an individual level and within social institutions. the evidence-based literature continues to elucidate the extent to which racialized assumptions about indigenous people actually organize health care providers’ practices, as well as organizational and institutional policies, discourses, and norms (allan & smylie, 2015; browne et al., 2016; dion stout & downey, 2006; fiske & browne, 2006; greenwood et al., 2018; kelm, 1998; kirmayer et al., 2014; maxwell, 2014; national inquiry into missing and murdered indigenous women and girls, 2019; o’neil et al., 1998; razack, 2015). for example, one of the most ubiquitous and harmful stereotypes pervading canadian social consciousness is founded on colonizing images of indigenous people as being more prone to alcohol use than other canadians, despite the body of evidence refuting this myth and pointing to the use of alcohol as a tool of colonization (british columbia provincial health officer, 2002; razack, 2015; tait, 2009). stereotypes about indigenous people “getting everything for free” continue to shape perceptions within the health care sector about indigenous people as being undeserving recipients of care (browne, 2017; firestone et al., 2019; kitching et al., 2019; mccallum & perry, 2018; monchalin et al., 2019). enduring colonizing images and discourses about indigenous women as irresponsible and incompetent parents continue to underpin the state’s widespread removal of indigenous children from their families and communities (anaya, 2014; national inquiry into missing and murdered indigenous women and girls, 2019a, 2019b; sinha & kozlowski, 2013; trc, 2015). these sociopolitical dynamics have had profoundly disruptive effects on social and intergenerational relations, as evidenced through the disenfranchisement of indigenous 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.8204 women, substandard and overcrowded living conditions on reserves,4 lack of affordable housing in urban areas, and everyday experiences of gender-based racist violence (maxwell, 2014; national inquiry into missing and murdered indigenous women and girls, 2019a, 2019b; varcoe, ford-gilboe, et al., 2019). despite efforts toward enhancing cultural sensitivity in health care, negative social attitudes toward indigenous people continue to shape experiences within the health system (mccallum & perry, 2018; turpel-lafond, 2020). experiences of discrimination are further amplified in the context of stigmatizing conditions such as chronic pain, arthritis, diabetes, and hiv (craig et al., 2020; public health agency of canada, 2019). life expectancy continues to be consistently lower among first nations and inuit, the health status of off-reserve indigenous populations across canada is shown to be declining, and indigenous families and communities continue to live with disproportionately high rates of infant mortality, diabetes, violence against indigenous women, and exposure to environmental contaminants (greenwood et al., 2018; national inquiry into missing and murdered indigenous women and girls, 2019a, 2019b; public health agency of canada, 2019; public health agency of canada & pancanadian public health network, 2018; wrathall et al., 2020). poorer cancer-related health outcomes for indigenous people in canada reflect both barriers to screening and longer time to diagnosis and treatment, representing one of myriad ways in which inequities become further entrenched with profound impacts on the health of individuals, communities, and populations (horrill et al., 2019; lavoie et al., 2016). this has prompted calls for national cancer control plans to enhance their focus on cultural safety where the sociopolitical lived realities of generations of indigenous people have led to the cancer inequities which are deepening today (sayani, 2019). these indicators, while useful for highlighting health and social inequities, are largely deficit-based and tend to inadequately incorporate indigenous people’s experiences of health and wellness or their experiences within the health care system (public health agency of canada & pan-canadian public health network, 2018). moreover, these indicators have the potential to contribute to pathologizing stereotypes and to reinforcing discriminatory attitudes toward indigenous people if they are presented without adequate explanatory context about the structural factors that impact indigenous communities and populations (dion stout, 2012). thus, for health system responses to be effective, programs, planning, and actions must be indigenous-specific and community-driven, taking into consideration the ways in which indigenous knowledges, cultural revitalization, self-determination, and political mobilization are operating to support indigenous people’s health and well-being (dion stout, 2012; greenwood et al., 2018). more specifically, in relation to indigenous people’s health and the need for enhanced professional development and training, the trc call to action #57 states: we call upon the federal, provincial, territorial and municipal governments to provide education to public servants on the history of aboriginal peoples, including the history and legacy of residentials schools, the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples, treaties and aboriginal rights, indigenous law, and aboriginal–crown relations. this will 4 in canada, the reserve system is governed by the indian act, which designates first nations bands and people, referred to in the context of the indian act as “indians.” according to the indian act, an indian reserve is a tract of land set aside under the act and treaty agreements for the exclusive use of an indian band. band members possess the right to live on reserve lands, and band administrative and political structures are frequently located there. reserve lands are not strictly “owned” by bands, rather they are held in trust for bands by the crown. the indian act grants the federal minister of indigenous services (formerly, part of indigenous and northern affairs canada) authority over much of the activity on reserves. 7 browne et al.: san’yas indigenous cultural safety training published by scholarship@western, 2021 require skills-based training in intercultural competency, conflict resolution, human rights, and anti-racism. (trc, 2015, p. 218) san’yas is explicitly designed and is currently being taken up across canada as a systems-level response to countering systemic racism and other forms of discrimination as one pathway to fostering health equity in relation to indigenous people. analysis: embedding cultural safety in health systems transformation theoretical orientation—critical and indigenous perspectives cultural safety, as taken up in san’yas as a health system and policy response, is firmly positioned within the paradigms of critically oriented theoretical perspectives, notably critical race theories and postcolonial theoretical perspectives, and indigenous epistemologies. critical theoretical perspectives are fundamentally concerned with issues of power and social justice, and, more specifically, with the pervasiveness of inequitable power relations and structures within society (varcoe, browne, & blanchet garneau, 2019). more specifically, the san’yas curriculum is informed by critical race theories, which are inclusive of a diverse range of disciplinary perspectives including those used by legal scholars to focus on racist discourses and expressions embedded in and reflective of differing historical eras and their ongoing manifestations, and strategies for counteracting their influence in social systems and practices (donnor & ladson-billings, 2018; essed, 2002; f. henry et al., 2010; van de kleut, 2011). postcolonial theoretical perspectives draw attention to the importance of critically interrogating the colonial past and its ongoing impact in today’s context, including examining the experiences of colonialism and their continuing manifestations. postcolonial theories offer the deliberate decentering of dominant culture, centering the perspectives of those who have been marginalized by political and social forces, and understandings of how conceptualizations of race, racialization, and culture are constructed within particular historical and current neocolonial contexts (browne et al., 2005, 2007; gandhi, 1998; mcconaghy, 2000; reimer-kirkham & anderson, 2002). indigenous epistemologies and perspectives provide an essential vantage point from which to understand issues of racism and discrimination in canada, and the salience of history, identity, and indigenous–state relations in shaping ongoing policy and system-level responses (coulthard, 2014; ermine, 2007; mcivor, 2004; monture-angus & turpel, 1995). indigenous knowledges tend to be grounded in relational epistemologies emphasizing the intersections among historical, economic, social, and cultural contexts, as well as issues of identity, agency, and self-determination, and they are intended to counterbalance the fragmented and individualistic approaches to analyses of racism and discrimination that often dominate western thinking (battiste, 2000; battiste et al., 2002; kovach, 2018). critical pedagogy, framed in relation to critical theoretical perspectives, is an approach to teachinglearning-curricular design founded on certain basic assumptions, such as all thought is fundamentally mediated by power relations that are social and historically constituted, and facts cannot be isolated from the domain of values or understood apart from their ideological inscription (kincheloe et al., 2018). anti-racist pedagogy, conceptualized as one approach or application of critical pedagogy, implies the need to teach with a specific social and political intent, and with a transformative impetus, which is to act upon individual and systemic discrimination (blanchet garneau et al., 2017). in the context of antiracist pedagogy, the aim toward transformative learning refers to supporting learners to explicitly 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.8204 identify, challenge, and change the structures that perpetuate and keep systemic racism in place (calliste & dei, 2000). in the canadian context, for example, the ontario human rights commission (2005) described anti-racist training as focused on “producing an understanding of what racism is and how it can be challenged. anti-racism training aims to achieve not only a change in individual attitudes, but also a transformation of individual and collective practices” (p. 51). these perspectives have guided how san’yas has been scaled up, taken up, and embedded into provincial anti-racist policy initiatives. indigenous knowledges and perspectives are foundational to san’yas as an indigenous-led program developed in partnership with indigenous leaders, academics, curriculum writers, and editors. the development of san’yas as a health systems initiative started in 2009 in response to two major national commissions in canada: the royal commission on aboriginal peoples (1996) and the landmark transformative change accord in british columbia5 (british columbia assembly of first nations et al., 2005). led by cheryl ward (kwakwaka’wakw), executive director of indigenous health at the bc provincial health services authority (phsa), and leslie varley (nisga’a), former director of indigenous health at the bc phsa, extensive community engagement with indigenous elders, leaders, and community members provided the basis for the pedagogical orientation, curriculum design, and learning approaches used in san’yas. throughout its evolution, san’yas has been oriented around the central concept of cultural safety because of its explicit focus on power imbalances and inequitable social relationships in health care, the inter-related problems of culturalism6 and racialization, the strength and resilience of indigenous people, and commitment to mitigating the negative impacts of health and social inequities (ramsden, 1993, 2000). originally conceptualized in new zealand in the early 1990s by māori nurse-leaders and educators, cultural safety was developed as an organizing concept “to reorient the training of health professionals towards a more critical understanding of colonial structures and their impacts on contemporary māori” (dyck & kearns, 1995, p. 141). as a policy orientation for health care that has broad applications across sectors and as a concept that is legislated as a basic requirement in nursing and medical professional education in new zealand, cultural safety has continued to evolve as a health systems directive, not only in relation to māori people, but as a political discourse that shapes health care design and delivery (curtis et al., 2019; vernon & papps, 2015). in the canadian context, as a pluralist society that legislates multiculturalism in all aspects of policy, cultural safety has been taken up as a pragmatic tool for moving health care practices and policies 5 british columbia assembly of first nations et al. (2005) reported: in november 2005, the province of british columbia, the first nations leadership council, and the government of canada signed a historic agreement entitled the transformative change accord. the accord recognizes the need to strengthen relationships on a government-to-government basis, and affirms the parties’ commitment to achieve three goals: 1. close the gaps between first nations and other british columbians in the areas of education, health, housing and economic opportunities over the next 10 years; 2. reconcile aboriginal rights and title with those of the crown; and 3. establish a new relationship based on mutual respect and recognition. (p. 2) 6 culturalism refers to the process of viewing people through the lens of culture, defined narrowly as shared values, beliefs, and practices, and often conflated with ethnicity. in this process, “culture,” thus defined, operates as the primary explanation for why certain people or groups experience various health, social, or economic problems, such as poverty, substance use, or low birth weight (browne & varcoe, 2006; browne et al., 2009; varcoe et al., 2013). 9 browne et al.: san’yas indigenous cultural safety training published by scholarship@western, 2021 beyond a focus on cultural sensitivity in order to address inequitable power relations, indigenousspecific and other forms of racism and stigma, and the ongoing effects of historical injustices more actively on health and health care (first nations health authority, 2016). as we have discussed elsewhere, the analytical leverage of cultural safety lies in its potential to shift attention away from presumed cultural differences as barriers to effective health care so as to refocus attention on the culture of health care as the site for transformation (browne, 2017; browne et al., 2016; varcoe, browne, & kang, 2019). these applications of cultural safety are in no way intended to diminish the value of indigenous cultural practices, worldviews, or knowledges as key determinants of health. rather, from the vantage point of cultural safety, culturally specific knowledges and practices, including connections to identity, community, elders,7 and language, are framed as fundamental to health and healing, and as central to the project of achieving more equitable health policy and system transformations (first nations health authority, 2016; hadjipavlou et al., 2018; trc, 2015; varcoe, ford-gilboe, et al., 2019). given these features of cultural safety, and in response to the trc’s calls to action, all health authorities and regulatory bodies in british columbia have committed to “hardwire” cultural safety into health policies and systems by signing onto a declaration of commitment on cultural safety and humility in health services for first nations and indigenous people in british columbia (first nations health authority, 2017). this initiative, co-led by the first nations health authority8 in partnership with all bc health authority chief executive officers and all bc health profession regulatory leaders, includes resources designated to supporting large proportions of the health, social, and public service workforce to complete san’yas; various organizations either mandate or strongly encourage their employees to complete san’yas, which is accredited by numerous organizations.9 scope, reach, and scale-up of san’yas as an educational intervention originally designed as an educational intervention to foster health equity within the health care sector, over the past decade, provincial governments, ministries, and health authorities across canada have embedded san’yas as an essential component of their overall health and social service system transformations. the scope of san’yas is now expanded beyond its initial mandate as a health workforce initiative; san’yas delivers consultations and tailored learning modules created and adapted for implementation in a wide range of health and social service sectors across canada, including child welfare, people working in the justice system including correctional and police services, and mental health. to date, large proportions of the health, social service, and public sector workforce members in bc and ontario have completed the san’yas training programs—including policymakers, executive leaders, administrative staff, and all levels of workers involved in direct service delivery. for example, since its initial implementation in bc in 2010, over 56,000 people have completed at least one of the san’yas training programs, including those working in health, mental health, child welfare, and justice 7 elders are recognized by their communities for possessing common qualities that are highly valued—leadership, accumulated wisdom, compassion, community devotion, and dedication to personal healing (hadjipavlou et al., 2018; royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996). 8 the first nations health authority, created in 2014, is the only indigenous province-wide health authority in canada. 9 for example, the bc college of nurses and midwives encourages all nurses to complete the core health training part of a broader strategy for making the health system more culturally safe for indigenous peoples. the core health and mental health training programs meet the accreditation criteria of the college of family physicians of canada, the royal college of physicians and surgeons of canada, and the canadian counselling and psychotherapy association, among others. the programs are also certified for credits required by the canadian college of health leaders. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.8204 sectors. starting in 2013 in ontario, indigenous leaders and educators partnered with san’yas to develop ontario-specific online training courses, with over 70,000 people having completed courses. in july 2016, the ontario ministry of child and youth services launched a tailored san’yas training program for all ministry employees after customizing the program through extensive engagement with the indigenous advisory circles and ontario indigenous partners. currently, san’yas is being implemented as a highly accessed online anti-racism training platform in the ontario public service (ops). the extensive scale-up of san’yas in ontario reflects a province-wide anti-racism policy “to build a more inclusive society, and work to identify, address and prevent systemic racism in government policy, legislation, programs and services” (government of ontario, 2016, para. 1). the ontario anti-racist policy directive intersected with two other policy directives: the ontario government’s response to the trc’s call to action #57, and the ontario government’s long-term strategy to address violence against indigenous women (government of ontario, 2018). san’yas was selected as the ops training platform “because it addresses the pervasive effects of colonization, how racist attitudes and biases contribute to low socio-economic and health indicators across indigenous populations, and how the same prejudices perpetuate high rates of violence against indigenous women and girls” (government of ontario, 2018, p. 13). as a result, the san’yas core foundations course is currently being delivered as a mandatory cultural safety and anti-racist training program10 across the ops, inclusive of over 60,000 public servants working in areas as wide-ranging as correctional services, long-term care, child welfare, and community and social services. adaptations to the san’yas curriculum to optimize relevancy in ontario and manitoba have been designed in partnership with local indigenous advisory committees to reflect region-specific sociopolitical and geographical contexts and diverse workplace settings. this has required adaptations, vetting, and customizations of san’yas to be relevant to local contexts through the involvement of indigenous advisory circles including community and advocacy organizations; first nations, métis, inuit, elder, and youth representatives; policy leaders; academics; and public servants. these strategies have evolved as best practices for adaptations in other sectors and jurisdictions and serve as foundational to integration and scale-up efforts. the successes in implementation are attributable to the extensive network of relations and partnerships the san’yas program leads have developed, the adaptability of the approaches, the systematic approaches to content and process development, and the program delivery approaches described below. program delivery approaches the san’yas online training programs (shown in table 1) utilize a unique platform that offers a blended model of learning, including facilitated, interactive, self-paced modules delivered via an online classroom environment with active engagement of participants within cohorts; asynchronous discussion board activities; reflective journaling; and other activities. participants are guided through the modules by 10 san’yas core training has been accredited by professional organizations in ontario, including the law society of ontario’s (lso) continuing professional development requirement for professionalism hours that focus on advancing “equality, diversity and inclusion” (edi). the lso grants accreditation to edi training that focuses on, inter alia, “understanding power and privilege, unconscious bias or cultural homophily,” the “impact of daily verbal, behavioral and environmental indignities,” and “how to prevent and address discrimination and harassment” (law society of ontario, n.d., section 6.0). 11 browne et al.: san’yas indigenous cultural safety training published by scholarship@western, 2021 specialized teams of indigenous and non-indigenous educators,11 who have expertise in adult learning principles, anti-racist pedagogy, cultural safety, and indigenous people’s health. the facilitators work in teams to provide both standardized learning activities and personalized, tailored, one-to-one engagement with learners. in the process, individualized learning opportunities are created to explore and hold up for scrutiny deeply held beliefs and attitudes, pervasive public discourses pertaining to indigenous people, the current impact of health and social policies on indigenous people’s health and well-being, and the health and social impacts of structural and interpersonal racism and other forms of discrimination. in alignment with anti-racism educational principles, the san’yas facilitation model is aimed at specific learners positioned and acting within systems, institutions, and structures. in keeping with the dominance of culturalism as an ideology and in partial consequence of embedding the word “cultural” in cultural safety, san’yas participants frequently report that they expect to learn primarily about indigenous cultures, practices, and differences from the dominant euro-canadian culture. even in the new zealand context, where cultural safety is part of the lexicon in basic nursing education, it has been challenging to maintain the critical theoretical origins that gave rise to the concept of cultural safety (downing & kowal, 2011; downing et al., 2011; ramsden, 2000, 2002; vernon & papps, 2015). as ramsden (2000) explained in the new zealand context, “the name remained a source of confusion to many. the popular understanding of culture as ethnicity only led to simplistic notions of cultural checklists avoiding the complex power relationships which the safety factor was intended to address” (p. 173). while san’yas includes content and learning activities, and sensitizes participants to culturally specific content, the goal is to contextualize culturally specific content within the overall critical foundation of san’yas. facilitators actively and intentionally shift learners’ attention away from presumed differences between indigenous cultures and the dominant euro-canadian culture as a barrier or source of the problem. instead, facilitators refocus attention on power dynamics and inequities and on the dominant organizational characteristics of the health, social service, and government sectors in which they work as the site for critical reflection and transformation. mounting an anti-racism educational intervention such as san’yas is inherently challenging because it requires engagement in dialogues regarding racialization; race-based privilege; systemic racism; power inequities; and the role of public institutions, policies, and practices in sustaining inequities. the potential for learners to experience discomfort, guilt, defensiveness, and resistance when asked to explore the implications of relative privilege and disadvantage is widely recognized in the educational literature. in health profession education contexts, for example, research shows that drawing attention to the assumptions and misconceptions that contribute to racializing discourses can sometimes incite resentment toward the very people who are vulnerable to these discourses (browne, 2005; browne & varcoe, 2006; fernando & bennett, 2019; franklin et al., 2014; sukhera et al., 2020; tang & browne, 2008; varcoe, 2006). this potential for reactivity presents significant challenges from a program delivery perspective and requires intentional, expert strategies to pre-empt harms that can arise from backlash or heightened resentments, or from feeling potentially powerless in the face of ongoing structural forces (calliste & dei, 2000; dei & mcdermott, 2014; newton & soltani, 2017; roman, 1993; vallianatos, 2018; varcoe & mccormick, 2007). for example, as participants move through the 11 a ratio of 3 facilitators per 25 learners is maintained for all core training; for the bystander to ally advanced training, the ratio is 5:25. facilitators are specialized: each focuses their facilitation on different aspects of the curriculum. learners have opportunities to dialogue with facilitators who identify as indigenous, or as white or racialized settlers. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.8204 learning modules and engage with discussion board activities, a myriad of examples of the oftendisturbing harms experienced by indigenous people are discussed. san’yas facilitators are highly skilled in responding constructively to discussions, with the explicit aim of framing context-specific examples in relation to broader systemic issues and preempting the secondary harms that can occur for some learners, including the potential for the content and postings on discussion boards to trigger strong emotional reactions. however, one of the most significant challenges in delivering san’yas as an educational intervention continues to be managing the often-triggering impacts of learning about racism and the ongoing impacts of colonial structures in canadian society, and the potential for indigenous participants to experience specific harms related to their personal, family, or community histories. san’yas aims to create safe learning environments for all learners. diverse learners undertake san’yas, including those with prior commitments to anti-racism and those without; those who have thought about race-based privilege and those who have not; those who identify as indigenous and those who identify in a diverse range of other ways, including the many who align with dominant euro-canadian culture, often identifying as “not having a culture.” the training is designed using strengths-based, traumaand violence-informed12 and culturally respectful approaches. although educational scholars emphasize that the risk of re-traumatization for non-indigenous students is often minimal because they are less likely to identify with the traumatic experiences of indigenous people, and may even develop resistance and denial to the trauma narratives (duthie, 2019; fernando & bennett, 2019), san’yas includes triggering warnings for all participants, encourages self-care activities throughout participants’ engagement with the program, and promotes the availability of local employee assistance programs for additional supports. given that indigenous participants are most likely to identify with the traumatic experiences of indigenous people, additional contextual explanations are provided to advise that aspects of the content focus on explicit manifestations of anti-indigenous racism and stereotypes, and that defensiveness, skepticism, and resistance are often visible in the discussion boards in which non-indigenous participants are engaged. indigenous participants are cautioned that the examples and content used in san’yas may reflect their own or their families’ life experiences. efforts to alert indigenous participants to the potential for re-traumatization are integrated with efforts to ensure ongoing access to indigenous facilitators, who connect individually with participants during regular check-in sessions. indigenous participants are also informed of the opportunity to access indigenous elders who are available free of charge to provide specific, individualized supports. the option of indigenous-specific cohorts is also provided. 12 traumaand violence-informed approaches are based on understanding that people disadvantaged by systemic inequities (including those resulting from system and interpersonal racism) often experience multiple forms of violence that have ongoing traumatic impacts; recognizing the effects of interpersonal and structural (e.g., poverty, racism) forms of violence as intersecting, with compounding impacts on health; shifting the emphasis from disclosures of traumatic experiences to creating a safe environment, including for those most traumatized (browne et al., 2018). 13 browne et al.: san’yas indigenous cultural safety training published by scholarship@western, 2021 supports, resources, and ongoing training for san’yas facilitators are essential to the overall program delivery to ensure that learners are expertly and supportively guided. facilitators are particularly skilled at multiple learning approaches to move participants beyond narrow preoccupations with individual prejudices and discriminatory actions to examining the ways in which racist discourses, policies, and practices, as well as individual actions, are entrenched and supported (consciously and unconsciously) in institutional structures. importantly, facilitators are supported with “scripts” that help them identify and respond to the range of common narratives with which people respond in anti-racist training. these purposeful, planned program delivery strategies are critical to ensuring that participants engaging with san’yas experience an overall sense of safety when provided with opportunities to explore individual and institutional racism, and actions aimed at mitigating inequities. evaluating effectiveness the outcome of cultural safety has been defined by health authorities, policymakers, and system leaders as an “outcome based on respectful engagement that recognizes and strives to address power imbalances in the health care system, resulting in an environment free of racism and discrimination—where people feel safe when receiving health services” (oetter & johansen, 2017, para. 3). this long-term vision is the horizon toward which san’yas is oriented. as an educational intervention, however, evaluating the effectiveness of san’yas necessarily involves assessments of individuals nested within organizations, systems, and policy-sectors—and requires multiple approaches (coly & parry, 2017; schierhout et al., 2013). for example, assessing trends in individual-level knowledge, attitudes, and behaviours is important to gauge short-term effectiveness, and must be complemented with ongoing monitoring and adaptations to support effective scale-up in diverse organizational settings, including “whole of government” initiatives. san’yas has been evaluated both internally (i.e., for reporting and quality improvement purposes) and externally (i.e., by consultants and research groups). these evaluations, inclusive of its pedagogy, curricula, facilitation model, and day-to-day processes and structures, highlight trends regarding the extent to which san’yas, as an educational intervention, is meeting its aims. evaluation approaches include analyses of de-identified, aggregated, and anonymized participation metrics (i.e., quantitative data, such as rates of completion and engagement); preand post-training questionnaire scores (i.e., qualitative and quantitative survey data, which can be linked to participant demographics); and analyses of themes reflected in participant entries on discussion boards or journals (i.e., qualitative data). prior to commencing any training programs, san’yas participants consent to the use of their anonymized data for the purpose of ongoing program and performance evaluation. evaluation data reveal high levels of overall satisfaction and high likelihood of recommending the training. for example, among the more than 28,000 ops employees who recently completed at least one of the core training programs, 93.4% either agreed or strongly agreed13 that “i would recommend this course to my colleagues in other professional settings,” and 92.8% agreed or strongly agreed that “i will use what i have learned in this course in my day-to-day work.” the approximately 5% of participants who indicated overall dissatisfaction described, as the two main trends underpinning their ratings, a strong preference for more content on indigenous cultures and cultural practices, and lack of support 13 using a five-point likert scale with response options: strongly disagree, disagree, neither agree nor disagree, agree, or strongly agree. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.8204 within their workplaces to address cultural safety. from the perspective of san’yas program leaders, this points to a need to signal the anti-racism underpinnings of san’yas more clearly, and the fact that education alone is insufficient. efforts to address organizational support are needed. across provinces, evaluation data show that san’yas participants demonstrate increased knowledge, awareness, and skills (e.g., enhanced knowledge of colonization; increased awareness of policies, laws, and programs that perpetuate colonialism) and increased ability to identify strategies to integrate their new understanding into their actions and work functions (e.g., enhanced understanding of the importance of ongoing co-development and co-implementation processes; increased ability to identify strategies to enhance inclusion of indigenous perspectives in their workplaces). among the indigenousonly cohorts, many people report that the training supports a connection or deeper understanding of personal, family, and community history, and that revisiting learnings about the history of colonization supports their sense of collective resilience and strength. among the non-indigenous participants, a high proportion indicated that they would commit to ongoing learning and to identifying and speaking up against harmful stereotypes at their workplaces, and they identified skills and mechanisms to be able to do so safely. a recurrent pattern is the extent to which participants credit the program with enabling their own critical reflexivity, confidence, and ability to address interpersonal and systemic forms of racism in their respective workplaces (churchill et al., 2017; government of ontario, 2018; ward, 2018). for example, participants frequently comment on how completing the program helped them to identify and challenge assumptions about indigenous people in their work settings; respond to inappropriate comments or discriminatory decisions made by colleagues; and re-examine policies or aspects of workplace culture that seem to discriminate against indigenous people, as reflected in this response: i can say that in most situations, when i hear negative, stereotyping comments, i’ve been a passive witness, and as [the facilitator] said, sometimes i do not speak out because i don’t know exactly what to say or how it will be received. i think courses like this will empower me to speak up more. thematic analyses of narrative responses reflected in learning activities, discussion boards, and posttraining evaluations provide san’yas program leaders, curriculum designers, and facilitators a window into the context of participants’ workplace cultures, and the challenges they experience when attempting to work in culturally safe ways. these data show that predictable resistance discourses arise, reflecting broader societal discourses pervasive in health systems and other sectors in canada. for example, discourses of egalitarianism are commonly reflected in participants’ responses, exemplified in statements such as, “i treat everyone the same”; “systemic racism doesn’t occur in my setting”; or “we are completely color-blind in my organization.” facilitators are skilled at surfacing and responding to these commentaries, and the interplay between resistance and opportunity. evaluations of discussion board entries also reveal patterns with regard to regional variations in the types of harms experienced by indigenous people, including “hot spots” for harms such as emergency departments (turpel-lafond, 2020). trends in learners’ responses point to ongoing policy and systemlevel changes required. these patterns of responses highlight the need for organization-wide strategies to address anti-indigenous racism and discrimination, including the often-hostile work environments impacting indigenous employees (churchill et al., 2017; herring et al., 2013; ward, 2018). ongoing 15 browne et al.: san’yas indigenous cultural safety training published by scholarship@western, 2021 evaluations will be needed to understand the role of anti-racism education interventions more fully as part of broader system transformations. discussion ongoing evaluations of san’yas show that reactions to the program reflect a predictable continuum from deep appreciation of the insights gained to a high degree of resistance and sometimes negative reactions to key messages (ward, 2018). these patterns are not unique to san’yas; they reflect a spectrum of responses that tend to follow predictable patterns whenever racism or colonization are addressed in educational training programs (dei & mcdermott, 2014; franklin et al., 2014; newton & soltani, 2017; okun, 2010; sukhera et al., 2020; ward, 2018). the key insights gained from evaluating the scale-up of san’yas over the past decade are relevant to anyone in policy or leadership positions who is considering implementing anti-racism educational interventions. one of the key features of racism is that its structure and ideology can persist in government and institutional policies, shaping and organizing practices and policies within health and social service sectors, even in the absence of individual actors who are explicitly racially prejudiced (williams et al., 2019). the rich evidence-base conceptualizing systemic racism and its impacts within health systems has yet to be adequately integrated into responsive health-related policies, health system-level responses, or health professional education (bailey et al., 2017; williams et al., 2019; wyatt et al., 2016). policy and system-level responses, including educational interventions, therefore continue to be needed regardless of the whether people “accept” the inseparability of interpersonal and institutional racism or not. educational interventions alone, however, cannot transform systems, and shifting knowledge, attitudes, and behaviours of individuals is not sustainable without organizational supports, policy directives, accountability mechanisms, and whole-system actions. health authorities, government sectors, organizations, and institutions cannot, therefore, view san’yas as a stand-alone program; commitments to addressing anti-indigenous racism and improving health care for indigenous people will require fullscale policy and organizational transformations. the current trend of writing cultural safety into provincial policies and strategic plans represents an important beginning step toward the broader goal of enhancing health, health care, and social equity for indigenous peoples. for example, procuring san’yas for scale-up in the public service sector has allowed the ontario government to leverage existing investments made by various ministries, and by the bc government, to avoid duplication of effort by enabling the use of a pre-existing online platform, and to ensure educational consistency. locally tailored guidelines will be needed to support the integration, tailoring, and evaluation of cultural safety initiatives and actions, including minimum requirements for maintaining ongoing integration and tailoring within agencies, organizations, institutions, and sectors. organizational integration and tailoring refer to the processes that can be put in place to support participatory approaches among all levels of staff in an organization to foster shifts in practices and policies to address the aims of cultural safety—tailored to local community contexts, populations served, and organizational priorities (browne et al., 2015, 2018). the notion of integration, for example, might include ongoing discussions at multiple levels—including executive, leadership, administrative, and direct care staff—to consider implications and accountability mechanisms for enacting cultural safety and countering discrimination in local 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.8204 contexts. tailoring refers to the creation of locally relevant structures and processes to support shifts, actions, or change initiatives. resources must be devoted to developing guidelines and strategies to assist leaders within organizations to address and respond to the inevitable discomforts, disruptions, and often secondary traumas that can result when engaging with issues regarding racism and other forms of discrimination, the root causes of health and social inequities, and policies and practices that shape indigenous people’s experiences and outcomes. the “live” facilitation aspect of program delivery will require adequate resourcing as scale-up of san’yas continues in various contexts. participants will need to be continually assessed with regard to triggering, secondary traumas, backlash, and moral distress—and strategies will need to be implemented to support participants in constructive ways (turpel-lafond, 2020). also needed are robust evaluation strategies that can account for the complexities of measuring the contributions of san’yas as one component of broader system responses. these might include locally relevant benchmarks; equity-oriented surveys of patients’ experiences of care (beyond conventional patient satisfaction measures); measures of everyday experiences of discrimination and discrimination in health care settings, adapted for diverse settings; policy document review processes; observational methods within health care settings; surveys of staff confidence levels related to anti-racist approaches; and analyses of existing administrative data using a health equity lens (browne et al., 2018; ford-gilboe et al., 2018; varcoe, bungay, et al., 2019). recently, the effectiveness of san’yas as a component embedded within a larger multi-component organizational health equity intervention was studied as part of implementation research conducted in primary health care clinics in canada. in that study, staff reported an overall increase in confidence related to their ability to deal with biases, racism, and other forms of discrimination in clinical settings (browne et al., 2018). the research also showed that equityoriented care, with cultural safety being a key dimension, predicted better health outcomes among patients impacted by significant intersecting inequities (ford-gilboe et al., 2018). further research is needed to continue to generate evidence regarding the efficacy of anti-racism educational programs, such as san’yas, that are embedded within complex, multi-level interventions. future evaluation strategies must also consider the influence of corporate, managerial, and efficiency pressures, and their influence on anticipated outcomes, and consider the length of time that may be required to fully assess effectiveness. recognizing the known limitations of anti-racism educational interventions in affecting sustained behaviour and policy change, and in the face of continued system-level factors and social determinants that significantly impact the health of indigenous populations, educational efforts must be integrated within larger, multi-level change processes. redressing racism as it pertains to indigenous people will continue to require multiple approaches, organizationaland institutional-policy directives, accountability mechanisms, and interventions that can be maximally disruptive of systemic racism and stigmatizing discourses about indigenous people. 17 browne et al.: san’yas indigenous cultural safety training published by scholarship@western, 2021 references ahmad, w. i.-u. 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(2016). achieving health equity: a guide for health care organizations. http://www.ihi.org/resources/pages/ihiwhitepapers/ achieving-health-equity.aspx 8204+coverpage.pdf 8204 browne sanyas proof.pdf economic recovery in response to worldwide crises: fiduciary responsibility and the legislative consultative process with respect to bill 150 (green energy and green economy act, 2009) and bill 197 (covid-19 economic recovery act 2020) in ontario, canada the international indigenous policy journal volume 13 | issue 3 december 2022 economic recovery in response to worldwide crises: fiduciary responsibility and the legislative consultative process with respect to bill 150 (green energy and green economy act, 2009) and bill 197 (covid-19 economic recovery act 2020) in ontario, canada stephen r. j. tsuji university of waterloo, canada, srjtsuji@uwaterloo.ca recommended citation tsuji, s. (2022). economic recovery in response to worldwide crises: fiduciary responsibility and the legislative consultative process with respect to bill 150 (green energy and green economy act, 2009) and bill 197 (covid-19 economic recovery act, 2020) in ontario, canada. the international indigenous policy journal, 13(3). https://10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.10696 economic recovery in response to worldwide crises: fiduciary responsibility and the legislative consultative process with respect to bill 150 (green energy and green economy act, 2009) and bill 197 (covid-19 economic recovery act, 2020) in ontario, canada abstract the green energy and green economy act was quickly passed in 2009. due to the breadth of the act, it should have received a rigorous legislative review-and-consultation process, but did not due to green-labeling. ontario did not meet their ethical fiduciary responsibility to consult with indigenous peoples. with the covid-19 economic recovery act, 2020, there were no public hearings even though changes to the environmental assessment act would allow for the exemption or streamlining of projects from the process. if a project was exempted, there would be no environmental assessment, and no legal fiduciary responsibility to consult with indigenous peoples; the legal duty to consult would not be triggered even though indigenous peoples would potentially be impacted. rather than noting an improvement in the legislative consultative process since 2009, there has been a regression. keywords first nations, green energy act (2009), ontario, canada, green energy, consultation, hydroelectric acknowledgments i thank the social sciences and humanities research council of canada for their support during my research. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ 1 tsuji: economic recovery in response to worldwide crises published by scholarship@western, 2022 economic recovery in response to worldwide crises: fiduciary responsibility and the legislative consultative process with respect to bill 150 (green energy and green economy act, 2009) and bill 197 (covid-19 economic recovery act, 2020) in ontario, canada in just over a decade, green energy has become internationally relevant. green energy advocates believe that its methods are congruent with responsible energy production in line with surrounding environmental discourse. the rhetoric presented by green energy proponents emphasizes the low environmental impact of modes of production such as hydroelectric power and other forms of renewable energy. however, the research conducted to date has laid a strong foundation for the critique of such rhetoric. critics cite the environmental impacts of green energy projects, especially in indigenous communities, which are typically in close proximity of hydroelectric projects (e.g., armstrong, 2000; macfarlane & kitay, 2016; macfarlane et al., 2017). the aim of this paper is not to address the environmental impacts further; i discuss the reason for these missteps. as previously stated, many indigenous communities live in close proximity to green energy projects. as such, they are typically bear the brunt of detrimental impacts due to their profound interrelationship with the environment. many parts of the world have policies that govern interactions with indigenous peoples to protect them in these circumstances. yet, these precautions are not always effective in limiting threats because of flaws within the policies and governments’ ability to navigate around them. this article will explore bill 150, the green energy and green economy act, 2009, in ontario, canada, as a case study demonstrating the canadian government maneuvering threats to the consultative process, in particular consultation during the legislative process whereby a bill becomes an act. to grant a broader perspective, bills 173 and 191 will be used as markers for measurement due to their proximity to bill 150 with respect to context. to provide additional context, bill 197, the covid-19 economic recovery act, 2020, will also be examined, as well as other comparative acts. through these analyses and comparisons, i will identify the pitfalls, missteps, and specific points that require additional caution. through the identification of these points, i will draw inferences and lessons which can provide cautionary suggestions for future endeavours on the topics of both green energy and indigenous peoples, on both a local and international scale. background canada employs a centralized federal government and regional provincial governments, as detailed in the canadian constitution act, 1867. at the federal and provincial levels, there are three separate parts of the government—the judicial, executive, and legislative branches. the judiciary branch is an independent system of courts whose role is to interpret and apply laws. the executive branch is composed of the lieutenant governor (the british monarchy’s representative), the premier of ontario, and the executive council (members of provincial parliament, mpps, appointed as cabinet ministers)—also known as the government—sets priorities and policies (legislative assembly of 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.10696 ontario, 2020a). the executive council reviews and recommends orders-in-council1 for formal approval by the lieutenant governor to bring into force laws or parts of laws (legislature of ontario [lo], 2020). thus, the crown holds supreme power but acts upon the formal advice of the executive council, and the executive council is responsible to the legislative assembly for its advice (lo, 2020). in ontario, the unicameral legislative branch2 is composed of elected representatives, mpps that make up the legislature. the canadian constitution granted the legislative assembly the power and fiduciary responsibility to debate bills, and to pass and amend acts (also known as statutes or laws) (lao, 2020a). fiduciary responsibility is both a legal and ethical concept implying that one party has a duty to another, to act in the other’s best interests (tsuji, 2020). therefore, the legislature and constituent mpps have an ethical fiduciary responsibility to act in the best interests and consult with the people that elected them—all ontarians, including indigenous peoples—on matters that directly or indirectly impact them. for example, consultation should occur during the parliamentary process whereby a bill becomes an act (hynes & johnston, 2011; lao, 2020b). how a bill becomes an act: the parliamentary consultative process a bill is a proposed act that is before the legislature for consideration (government of ontario [go], 2020a). there are three types of public bills: government bills are introduced to the legislature by cabinet ministers; private members’ public bills are introduced by mpps; and committee bills are introduced by standing committee chairs (hynes & johnston, 2011). government bills will be the focus of the following discussion. in canada and ontario, the stages of the process from government bill-to-act are based on the westminister model (hynes & johnston, 2010; parliament of canada, 2020; figure 1). standing orders give a detailed account of the rules (house of commons, 2020a, b; lao, 2020b) throughout the various stages of the legislative process (house of commons, 2020a, b; lao, 2020b; figure 1) whereby consultation with the public can be realized through public hearings. additionally, during parliamentary debates, mpps that have held consultation at the constituent level, can speak on behalf of their constituents. the pre-legislative stages are protected by conventions of confidentiality—thus, typically outside the public eye—and the complex processes change from government-to-government (hynes & johnston, 2011). once a bill has been approved by the executive council, the government bill can be 1 an order-in-council in ontario “is a legal order made by the lieutenant governor, on the advice of the premier or a minister” (go, 2020f). similarly, a canadian federal “order-in-council is a legal instrument made by the governor in council pursuant to a statutory authority . . . made on the recommendation of the responsible minister of the crown and take[s] legal effect only when signed by the governor general” (library and archives canada [lac], 2020). 2 the government of canada is a bicameral legislature: the elected house of common and the appointed senate. bills can originate from either assembly (parliament of canada, 2020). to be enacted, a bill must be passed by both chambers and receive royal assent from the monarchy’s representative, the governor general of canada (parliament of canada, 2020). 3 tsuji: economic recovery in response to worldwide crises published by scholarship@western, 2022 introduced to the legislature (figure 1). figure 1. the legislative process in ontario representing how a bill becomes an act (based on hynes & johnston, 2011). green cells and solid green arrows represent the typical sequence of the process. the green-outlined-white cell and arrows represents a less typical sequence. meanwhile, the red-solid arrow represents an atypical sequence for an important bill, because the committee stage is bypassed altogether. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.10696 typically, a minster introduces the bill to the legislature at first reading (hynes & johnston, 2011). the bill is not debated at this stage, but the bill is posted on the legislature’s website (hynes & johnston, 2011). infrequently, at any time before second reading, the bill is referred to a standing committee for public hearings, debate, and consideration of amendments to the bill (hynes & johnston, 2011; figure 1). usually after first reading, the bill is referred to second reading where the bill is debated in principle by the legislature, and then referred to a standing (or select) committee for consideration3 (hynes & johnston, 2011). at the committee stage, public hearings take place at different locations across ontario so that committee members can hear first-hand from individuals, groups, organizations, and ministry officials about various aspects of the bill under consideration (hynes & johnston, 2011). a clause-by-clause examination of the bill is conducted, and because the committee proceedings are less formal than the legislature, more in-depth and meaningful discussion occurs (hynes & johnston, 2011). thus, amendments to a bill may be made; if amended, the amended bill is reported back to the legislature by the committee chair, and if the committee report is adopted, the bill is ordered for third reading (hynes & johnston, 2011). at third reading, debate on the bill will conclude and a vote will be taken on whether to pass the bill, and if the bill passes, the bill is presented to the lieutenant governor for royal assent (hynes & johnston, 2011). when assent is given, the bill becomes an act which comes into force immediately after assent or at a time specified in the act (hynes & johnston, 2011). in the following sections, using the parliamentary-consultative framework presented in figure 1, the green energy act will be examined to identify both the presence and quality of the consultation process involving indigenous and non-indigenous people with respect to defining green energy in ontario. the period of importance is identified as prior to the introduction of bill 150 in the legislature, and during the committee hearings. through investigation of hansard verbatim transcripts of the legislature debates and the standing committee hearings, the definition of green energy in bill 150 will be detailed, and it will be shown how it impacted the consultative process with respect to the green energy act and indigenous people. my analysis of the debates identifies whether party affiliation of mpps impacted the way green energy was defined and viewed, and through my reading of the committee hearing transcripts, i assess how the public defined and viewed green energy and perceived the green energy act. this section is followed by a comparison between the consultative processes for bill 150 (the green energy act), bill 173 (mining amendment act, 2009), and bill 191 (far north act, 2010) using hansard transcripts. to end this section, i discuss the ramifications of labelling hydroelectric-power generation green energy in the context of the green energy act, with the purpose of providing cautionary insight into the challenges of its association with green energy. 3 it is atypical, but a bill can be referred to the committee of the whole house that has different rules of debate (hynes & johnston, 2011; lao, 2020b). the committee of the whole house examines amendments to a bill after second reading or after the amended bill has been reported from a committee or on a discharge order during the third reading stage (hynes & johnston, 2011; lao, 2020b; not represented in figure 1 for simplicity sake). 5 tsuji: economic recovery in response to worldwide crises published by scholarship@western, 2022 however, prior to proceeding, it should be emphasized that the “duty to consult” is never triggered during the process of bill-to-act. because the bill-to-act process occurs in the legislative branch of the government (supreme court of canada [scc], 2018) and does not directly emphasize the duty to consult, there only exists an ethical fiduciary responsibility to consult with indigenous people. the recent supreme court of canada (scc) decision (mikisew cree first nation v. canada) has indicated that the legislative branch does not need to consult with indigenous people during the law-making process, as will be briefly discussed in the following section prior to the discussion of our cases. it is important to note that the legal fiduciary responsibility to consult (i.e. duty to consult) only applies after an act becomes law, which is outside the framework described in figure 1. duty to consult in canada, aboriginal4 and treaty rights were entrenched in section 35(1) of the repatriated constitution act, 1982. since this time, case law at the canadian provincial and federal levels have started to clarify the extent of these rights, and the duty to consult doctrine has emerged (gardner et al., 2015). lawrence & macklem (2000, p. 252) state, “the nature and scope of the duty of consultation will vary with the circumstances.” further, the duty to consult doctrine continues to evolve and parameters continue to be set. as pointed out by bankes (2016), the scc declined to answer the important question of whether the duty to consult doctrine was applicable to legislative activities in citing the rio tinto alcan inc. v carrier sekani tribal council (2010). bankes noted that while the majority of justices for the canada v. mikisew cree first nation (2016 fca 311) case ruled that the duty to consult was not applicable to legislative action due to the separation of power 5 and parliamentary privilege, 6 justice pelletier suggested that in some cases, duty to consult would be appropriate. more clarity on the 4 the term aboriginal refers to first nations, metis, and inuit peoples as defined in the canadian constitution act, 1982. aboriginal and treaty rights were constitutionalized, while crown treaty rights were not (macklem, 1997). 5 according to the supreme court of canada, “separation of powers means that different branches of the state have different roles in canada’s democracy. the executive (which includes the prime minister and cabinet) [or premier and minsters in ontario] decides policy and implements laws (for example, by passing regulations). the legislature (parliament) makes and passes laws. the judiciary (the courts) interprets and applies laws once they are passed. (2018, unnumbered). however, the separation of power is more of an ideology than a reality in canada. for example, there is the dual role of the minister of justice and the attorney general of canada (department of justice act, 1985; department of justice canada, 2020c); this is in contrast to the separated roles of the attorney general’s office (2020) and the ministry of justice (2020) in the u.k. the dual role in canada has led to some high-profile cases. for example, the snc-lavalin affair questioned the ethical behaviour of prime minister, justin trudeau with respect to his dealings with jody wilson-raybould (at the time attorney general of canada and the minister of justice) (center for the advancement of public integrity, 2020). 6 parliamentary privilege (immunity) is “the set of powers and privileges possessed by the federal houses of parliament and provincial legislative assemblies that are necessary to their capacity to function as legislative bodies” (abella & martin, 2018, p. 813 [83], judges scc). parliamentary privilege is “essential to allowing parliament to perform its constitutional functions by giving it the right to exercise unfettered freedom in the formulation, tabling, amendment, and passage of legislation” (brown, 2018, p. 772, judge scc) meanwhile, parliamentary sovereignty “mandates that the legislature can make or unmake any law it wishes, within the confines of its constitutional authority” (wagner et al., 2018, p. 794 [36], judges scc). 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.10696 duty to consult and its application to the legislative process would be forthcoming in the recent scc decision with respect to the mikisew cree first nation v. canada (2018). in 2012, canada passed two omnibus bills (bills c-38 and c-45) that fundamentally changed environmental assessment at the federal level7 (doelle, 2012; gibson, 2012). the canadian environmental assessment act, 2012, part of bill c-38, and streamlined the environmental assessment process by exempting many projects, thus reducing or eliminating opportunities for consultation with indigenous people (kirchhoff et al., 2013). in this political context, the mikisew cree made an application for judicial review in the federal court asserting that the crown had a duty to consult with the mikisew during the development of the bills and prior to royal assent (mikisew cree first nation v. canada, 2018). the reason put forward by mikisew cree first nation was that there was the potential for the enacted legislation to adversely affect mikisew’s treaty no. 8 rights to hunt, trap, and fish. although the federal court ruled that the crown should have consulted with the mikisew when developing the bill, the federal court of appeal disagreed, stating that the federal court should not have heard the mikisew’s application in the first place because the federal court lacked the jurisdictional power (scc, 2018). in addition, the federal court of appeal asserted that the judiciary should only hear challenges to statutes, since “parliament, not the crown, develops and passes law, according to the ‘separation of powers’ in the canadian constitution” (scc, 2018). at the highest court, the scc, the mikisew appeal was dismissed (mikisew cree first nation v. canada 2018). all nine judges agreed that the federal court did not have jurisdictional authority to review the activities of the federal ministers who developed bill c-38 and bill c-45 (mikisew cree first nation v. canada, 2018). however, the judges were not in agreement with respect to the issues of the honour of the crown and the duty to consult: “five [of nine] judges said the honour of the crown was involved at the lawmaking stage. but a total of seven said there was no binding duty to consult before a law was passed” (scc, 2018). in brief, brown (2018, 832 [124], judge scc) takes a very reductionist view with respect to consultation during the legislative process: and, as this court said . . . “the only procedure due any citizen of canada is that proposed legislation receive three readings in the senate and house of commons and that it receive royal assent.” although it is true that the process brown (2018) described is the very basic framework from bill-to-act, in reality, the sequence described above for the bill-to-act process is one of the least followed in practice, except for the most simplistic of bills (figure 1). house of commons committees regularly invite and 7 since the environment was not mentioned in the canadian constitution, the responsibility for the environment is shared between the federal and the provincial governments of canada (kirchhoff et al., 2013). hence, there are federal and provincial environmental assessment processes. 7 tsuji: economic recovery in response to worldwide crises published by scholarship@western, 2022 host witnesses (e.g., experts, indigenous organizations) that appear before the committee to present evidence relevant to the bill under consideration (house of commons, 2020c). while canada does not have a legal duty to consult, utilizing consultation with committees in the bill-to-act process allows the government to fulfil its ethical fiduciary responsibility. as noted by scc judges abella & martin (2018, p. 818 [92]): “commonly observed duties of consultation such as notice to affected parties and the opportunity to make submissions are hardly foreign to the law-making process.” scc judges moldaver, cote, and rowe (2018, pp. 854–855 [166–168]) added: as a matter of practice and in furtherance of good public administration, consultation on policy options in the preparation of legislation is very often undertaken. but, it is not constitutionally required . . . if parliament or a provincial legislature wishes to bind itself to a manner and form requirement incorporating the duty to consult indigenous peoples before the passing of legislation, it is free to do so . . . but the courts will not infringe. therefore, the crown needs to act honourably with respect to dealings with indigenous peoples, but there is no legal fiduciary responsibility to consult with them during the law-making procedure. lastly, on 3 december 2020, bill c-15, an act respecting the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples was introduced to the house of commons of canada, and assented to on june 21, 2021. bill c-15 was introduced to implement the united nations declaration and provide a way forward for canada and its indigenous peoples by working together to bring the declaration into force (department of justice canada, 2020a). in particular, bill c-15 would: inform how the government approaches the implementation of its legal duties [i.e., duty to consult] going forward . . . that provides greater clarity . . . for indigenous groups and all canadians. (department of justice canada, 2020b, p. 5) thus, the legal dimensions of the fiduciary responsibility of duty to consult continue to evolve in canada. the green energy and green economy act, 2009 economic context in 2008, the world experienced its largest financial crisis since the great depression (barrell & davis, 2008). in 2009, ontario became a have-not province, qualifying for a federal-equalization payment from the government of canada (roy-cesar, 2013). ontario was no longer the economic giant that drove canadian prosperity. equalization payments are issued by the canadian-federal government to “poorer” provinces with the intent to “ensure that canadians residing in provinces have access to a reasonably similar level of . . . services . . . taxation, regardless of which province they call home” (roy-cesar, 2013, p. 1). in this economic climate, ontario introduced bill 150–the green energy and green economy act (also known as the green energy act), bill 173–the mining amendment act, 2009, and bill 191– 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.10696 the far north act, 2010 (table 1). ontario turned to green energy (mcrobert et al., 2016), mining, and ontario’s far north (gardner et al., 2012) with the promise for economic salvation in the dire financial straits of the time. 9 tsuji: economic recovery in response to worldwide crises published by scholarship@western, 2022 table 1. descriptive information on the legislative consultative process with respect to the green energy act,a the mining amendment act,b the far north act,c and the covid-19 economic recovery act.d consultative activity bill 150 green energy and green economy act, 2009 bill 173 mining amendment act, 2009 bill 191 far north act, 2010 bill 197 covid-19 economic recovery act, 2020 time from first reading to royal assent 23 february to 14 may 2009 ~3 months 30 april to 28 october 2009 ~6 months 2 june 2009 to 25 october 2010 ~16 months 8 july to 21 july 2020 ~14 days standing committeee hearings after first reading no no 6-–13 august 2009 five hearings in the south and near-north no standing committee consideration of a bill after first reading no no 19-21 october 2009 no bill reported as amended and ordered for second reading no no 22 october 2009 no second reading debate 24 february to 11 march 2009 4-27 may 2009 18 may to 3 june 2010 15-21 july 2020 standing committee hearings after second reading 6–22 april 2009 7 hearings 6–13 august 2009 5 hearings week of 14 june 2020 five hearings cancelled in the far north no standing committee consideration of a bill after second reading 27–29 april 2009 14 september to 7 october 2009 13–15 september 2010 no bill reported as amended and ordered for third reading 30 april 2009 8 october 2009 16 september 2010 no third reading debate 5–13 may 2009 21 october 2009 22–23 september 2010 21 july 2020 a lao. (2020j, k). b lao. (2020l, m) c lao. (2020n, o) d lao. (2020p, q). e the standing committee on general government exists for the duration of parliament (lao, 2020h). a person can present at public hearings of the standing committee as a “witness,” “if you are chosen to present” (lao, 2020i). 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.10696 policy and politics smitherman, the liberal (lib) party8 minister of energy and infrastructure, 9 introduced the green energy act to the legislature and stated that it would: make this province north america’s green energy leader . . . making it easier to bring renewable energy projects to life [by streamlining the application and approval process] . . . help[ing to] create sustainable green employment for ontarians . . . [and] an attractive price for renewable power, including wind . . .solar, hydro . . . ontario would join the ranks of global green power leaders like denmark, germany and spain. (smitherman, 2009a, p. 4951–4952) mcguinty, the lib premier, 10 added: “it’s fundamentally about new jobs, it’s about clean, green electricity and it’s about fighting climate change” (mcgiunty, 2009a, p. 5027–5028). these statements consolidate the stance presented by the lib party on the topic of green energy; however, it should be recognized that this is only what was publicly presented. it should also be noted that the minister of energy and infrastructure was given sweeping powers to expedite green energy projects through the green energy act at the expense of removing or modifying existing checks and balances in other pieces of legislation. moreover, bill 150 was an omnibus bill11 that once enacted affected 20 acts.12 due to its purview and breadth, the pre-consultative process prior to bill 150 being introduced to parliament should have been extensive. these consultations should have been an ongoing process during the hearings of the standing committee for the purpose of addressing the critiques raised during these discussions. given the context of hydroelectric development in ontario and how it has sordidly impacted indigenous communities in the past, this is an important and necessary step. 13 due to the scale and nature of bill 150 and ontario’s ethical fiduciary responsibility there should have been more meaningful consultation with indigenous leadership. this is especially true when one 8 there are three major parties in ontario: liberal, conservative, and new democratic party. other political parties include the green party (grn) and bloc quebecois each constituency elects a mpp. 9 the premier of ontario recommends ministers to lead ministries, such as energy and infrastructure; the crown representative, in this case the lieutenant general, approves the appointment. the premier and cabinet ministers form an executive (also known as the cabinet). 10 the leader of the government of ontario is called the premier. in the situation under discussion, the premier was leading a lib-majority government. that is, the lib party had the majority of the seats in the unicameral legislative chamber or house for the 39th parliament and could ram any bill through the legislature even if opposition parties joined together (lao, 2020f). 11 an omnibus bill seeks to amend, repeal and/or enact several mostly unrelated acts (bedard, 2012; parliament of canada, 2021). 12 acts affected included the ministry of natural resources act, and the ontario water resources act (lao, 2020g). 13 flooding, methyl mercury contamination issues, desecration of cultural sites, relocation of communities, and impacts on subsistence activities have been reported (e.g. armstrong, 2000). 11 tsuji: economic recovery in response to worldwide crises published by scholarship@western, 2022 considers that after bill 150 received royal assent, ontario would be bound by their legal fiduciary responsibility of duty to consult because of the potential infringement on aboriginal and treaty rights being triggered by the environmental assessment process linked to green energy projects (gardner et al., 2015). geographical and cultural scope with more than 1 million km2 of land in its borders, ontario is the second largest province in canada (go, 2019a). the economy is based on a mixture of sectors: natural resources (e.g. mining, forestry), energy production, agriculture, manufacturing, services, and high-tech innovation (go, 2019a). on a population count basis, there are more indigenous people in ontario than any other province in canada (spotton, 2006). there are 133 first nations located in the province (chiefs of ontario, 2020), and the people belong to 13 distinct groups (spotton, 2006). located in northern ontario (figure 2), nishnawbe aski nation (nan) has a membership of 49 first nations and has a traditionalland base of 543,898 km2 (beardy s., grand chief nan, 2009). 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.10696 figure 2. ontario, canada, and the far north of ontario (stippled area) 13 tsuji: economic recovery in response to worldwide crises published by scholarship@western, 2022 defining green energy in part 1, definitions 1(1), green energy was not defined; nor was it defined anywhere else in the green energy act. the national democratic party (ndp) mpp, tabuns (2009) put forward an amendment to bill 150 defining green energy, but his motion was defeated. the progressive conservative (pc) and lib parties all voted against his green energy definition amendment but offered no other definition. this resulted in green energy remaining undefined in the green energy act throughout its lifetime (tsuji, 2020), and to its repeal in 2019 (go, 2019b). it is possible that the lib government purposively left the term green energy undefined, so that they, and the general public, could define green energy flexibly to meet various needs. while green energy was never defined in the green energy act, renewable energy was defined: “renewable energy source” means an energy source that is renewed by natural processes and includes wind, water, biomass, biogas, biofuel, solar energy, geothermal energy, tidal forces and such other energy sources (lao, 2020k) in the legislature deliberations, renewable energy was described as being equivalent and interchangeable with green energy: “renewable energy, so-called green energy.” (moridi, 2009, p. 5338) importantly, nuclear power generation was never mentioned in the green energy act; however, mpps mentioned during their deliberations that nuclear power was part of the lib’s green energy strategy: it [nuclear power] is part of a green energy strategy going forward. (broten, 2009, p. 5072) i’m very proud of the green energy act. i’m very proud that nuclear is an important component of it (mitchell, 2009, p. 6725). these assertions were confirmed by lib minister smitherman (2009b, p. 5831) when he stated: 75% of all of ontario’s. . . needs last year were met by a combination of emission-free nuclear and emission-free hydroelectric power . . . tremendous opportunities to integrate a greater degree of renewable energy. that’s what the green energy act is all about. with no mention of the nuclear power agenda in the green energy act, the lib party was able to avoid a difficult discussion with both the public and the legislature. green energy: green environment in temperate climates, such as in canada, the colour green has positive connotations. these associations include the greening of spring after the frigid winter, to growth of vegetation, and green being an 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.10696 indicator of plant health. a green light means everything is okay, or to go. green is a positive colour and has always been associated with a healthy environment. the connotations afforded to the colour green did not go unnoticed in the committee hearings with the public. this relationship was mentioned: if bill 150 is to provide the impetus for green energy and . . . a green environment—and that’s the purpose for green energy, to ensure a green environment—the time to act is now. (tenebaum, 2009, p. 644) in the legislature deliberations over the green energy green act, the positive feelings associated with the colour green were discussed: it alludes to the terms “innovation” and “creativity.” the word “green” is an optimistic colour. (o’toole, 2009, p. 5171–5172) the title is a really good one. it . . . makes me feel warm and fuzzy inside. (bisson, 2009a, p. 6761) i would submit that what we have is a feel-good act that sounds good. (elliot, 2009, p. 5158) however, the debates in the legislature were also critical of the title, and how it was deceptive with respect to the content of the act; words such as “greenwashing” (marchese, 2009, p. 5030; miller, 2009, p. 5070) and “green rhetoric” (marchese, 2009, p. 5030) were used to call attention to these concerns. mpps asserted that: the only thing that is green about the green energy act is its title. (shurman, 2009, p. 5066) it is not what we expect. this is an act of camouflage . . . co-opting that green label. (hillier, 2009a, p. 5438 wilson (2009, p. 6766) rightfully notes that: a green energy act sounds like it will score points, sounds like it will be popular [regardless] of what it says inside the bill. other than scoring political points in the polls, they [lib] can’t tell you what their real purpose is in doing this act. polls indicated “overwhelming” public support for the green energy act in ontario with 87% of respondents supporting it (smitherman, 2009c, p. 6268). it appears that the titling of bill 150 as the green energy act was a strategic move made by the lib party. whenever the opposition parties wanted to criticize the green energy act, mpps would have to first make a disclaimer that they were not against green energy and/or a green environment, before they could level any type of criticism against bill 150. for example: 15 tsuji: economic recovery in response to worldwide crises published by scholarship@western, 2022 [the pc] party are not against the concept of green energy. it’s sort of a motherhood statement…so that any criticisms that we have should not be taken as criticisms of the premise of the act (elliot, 2009, p. 5158). i want to start off by making it very clear that i support green energy. every member of this legislature would acknowledge the importance of protecting our environment, and i agree that clean energy and green energy are an important part of that goal. however, we need to look at how we get there. (hardeman, 2009, p. 5359) first of all, we support green energy. we support green energy and conservation . . . here’s why i’m having difficulty with supporting it overtly: i want . . . thorough public hearings around the province. (o’toole, 2009, p. 5174) consultation and the first reading of bill 150 normally there is a pre-consultative process prior to bills being written and presented in the legislature (yakabuski, 2009a; figure 1). with bill 150, major stakeholders were not consulted prior to the hearings (quinney, 2009). moreover, there was no written record that indigenous peoples were pre-consulted about bill 150, even though ontario has an ethical fiduciary responsibility to consult with the indigenous people due to the potential infringement on aboriginal and treaty rights after bill 150 would become law. pre-consultation with stakeholders was inconsistent; there was some testimony that pre-consultation did occur with at least one stakeholder (hope, 2009). similarly, the opposition mpps noted that bill 150 was introduced to the legislature without proper briefings (shurman, 2009). they further stated that there was a departure from parliamentary tradition of introducing a bill, then allowing the opposition several days to consult with potentially impacted stakeholders and the general public (arnott, 2009). the expediency with which bill 150 was being processed caused concern: although i support green energy, i am concerned . . . [about] the haste to pass this bill . . . without extensive consultation with stakeholders and the public. (witmer, 2009, p. 5330) bill 150 went from first reading to royal assent in less than three months, while bill 173 and bill 191, introduced the same year as bill 150, took approximately six and 16 months, respectively (table 1). also, both bill 173 and bill 191 had lengthy pre-consultation processes with first nations communityelected governing leadership, while bill 150 had none (see table 2). 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.10696 table 2. the legislative-consultative process with respect to first nations and the green energy and green economy act, the mining amendment act, the far north act, and the covid-19 economic recovery act. consultativef activity bill 150 green energy and green economy act, 2009 bill 173 mining amendment act, 2009 bill 191 far north act, 2010 bill 197 covid-19 economic recovery act, 2020 pre-consultation with first nations communityelected governing leadership no yesg yes noh consultation with nonelected first nations representative during committee hearings yes yes yes no consultation with first nations-elected governing designate during committee hearings yes yes yes no consultation with first nations communityelected governing leadership during committee hearings no yes yes no f this is a checklist type of approach—yes or no response—typically used by government officials and development proponents to address duty-to-consult requirements. here, the checklist is applied to the legislative process. g this type of checklist approach makes no distinction of whether there was meaningful consultation from an indigenous perspective or just contact. h although pre-consultation was reported by mpps, specifics were never given (yurek, 2020) to substantiate claims. nevertheless, lib minister smitherman (2009d) reported that he visited >20 communities on his green energy act tour (levac, 2009). although his tour could be considered disseminative in nature, it is not consultation. moreover, he did not visit the far north, which is noteworthy because the lib government would shortly after introduce the far north act. since there was no real pre-consultation 17 tsuji: economic recovery in response to worldwide crises published by scholarship@western, 2022 with respect to bill 150, the consultation for this bill would have to occur through the committee hearings. any ontarian can present at a committee public hearing as a “witness.” to present, individuals or organizations must register with the clerk of the committee, hand in any material they wish to present, and, finally, be selected to present. 14 for bill 150, presentation time was set at 10 minutes with five minutes for questions from the committee (orazietti, 2009). at first glance, the procedure to present has the illusion of being democratic. however, because organizations are chosen to present based on the materials they provide, the government can pre-select presenters who strengthen their agenda (e.g., green energy act alliance; eyamie, 2009; yakabuski, 2009b), and refuse others who challenge the government’s position (jones, 2009). another barrier to the general public presenting before the committee was the distance needed to be travelled to reach the locations of the hearings: “this effectively silences many who oppose aspects of the green energy act” (eyamie, 2009, p. 571). there were many barriers to stakeholders participating in the hearings. consultation with first nations it should be emphasized that indigenous people are much more than a stakeholder, but ontario’s legal fiduciary responsibility of duty to consult is not triggered during the legislative process of bill-to-act. ontario has a higher ethical fiduciary responsibility for consultation with first nations during the legislative process than with the general public because once a bill becomes law, there is a legal duty to consult with indigenous people when indigenous and treaty rights are infringed upon. during a committee hearing for bill 173 and 191, grand chief stan beardy of nan spoke about consultation more generally. his words are also relevant for bill 150: just because i have appeared here today does not mean you have consulted with the first nations in nishnawbe aski nation. nan, the organization i represent, a political organization, does not have any aboriginal and treaty rights. this hearing is not consultation . . . each first nation should be consulted without artificial timelines . . . it’s the rights-holders, the people on the land, the first nations level, the leadership at the community level who hold those aboriginal and treaty rights, and they are the ones who need to be consulted. nan’s role, basically, is to facilitate that process to ensure that they are being heard, that the people who need to talk to them do consult with them. (beardy s., 2009, p. 828–831) 14 the standing committee on the general government exists for the duration of the parliamentary term (lao, 2020h) and consists of a working group of mpps (lao, 2020i). ontario citizens and organizations can participate in standing committees public hearings as witnesses (lao, 2020i). 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.10696 it is clear that consultation—whether the ethical fiduciary responsibility or the legal fiduciary responsibility of duty to consult—must be held with communities and their elected leadership (i.e. chiefs & councils). during the green energy act hearings (table 2), no elected first nations representatives was present. only one designate appeared on behalf of an elected first nations official (kopperson, 2009). there was first nations representation at the hearings (e.g., director of economic development, pic river nation; leclair, 2009), but no community-elected officials.15 the first nations organizations that were present at the hearings were there to influence economic opportunities. these opportunities were related to transmission lines (five nations energy inc.; chilton, 2009) and allowing hydroelectric development in provincial parks to benefit first nations (leclair, 2009). changes to existing policy, such as the waterpower site release policy limiting hydroelectric development to 25 megawatts and the northern rivers commitment limiting hydro-electric development in northern ontario (brant, 2009), were sought to better exploit hydroelectric opportunities in the far north. while premier mcguinty (2009b, p. 5944) purported that the green energy act “is designed to stimulate construction of new renewable sources of electricity, everywhere from remote parts of northern ontario to farms in the south-west,” not one of the committee hearings was scheduled in the far north (table 1). titling bill 150 the green energy act made it appear innocuous; thus, consultation was very limited and the time to royal assent expedited. the quick passage of the green energy act sharply contrasts bill 173 and bill 191, which were also introduced in 2009 (table 1). this demonstrates that titling of a bill is important to how it is perceived and received. comparing the consultative process: bill 150 to bill 173 and bill 191 the lib government described a lengthy pre-consultation process for bill 173 to meet its ethical fiduciary responsibility to consult with indigenous people. in february 2007, a discussion paper was released to initiate relationship building and consultation about mining act amendments (brown, 2009). there were some successful pre-consultation efforts at the first nations level: i’m the elected chief of the sagamok anishnawbek . . . we’ve had opportunities to speak to government with respect to the discussions around the mining act. (eshkakogan, 2009, p. 858). however, the responses at the tribal-council level were all critical: when the revisions of the mining act came about . . . we went in the tent, so to speak . . .every time we came to a clause that we would like to see enacted as law, we were told, “we will deal with that at the policy level.” we did not enter into these discussions to influence policy. we 15 chief robert corbiere was the president of the first nations energy alliance at the time of their involvement with the green energy act, but his role and stance was not explicitly described; nor was it stated whether corbiere participated as an elected representative of wikwemikong unceded indian reserve (canada forum, 2009; cooper, 2007). 19 tsuji: economic recovery in response to worldwide crises published by scholarship@western, 2022 went . . . to influence what the wording of the law should be. (beardy, f. 2009, p. 960, nan envoy) matawa first nations . . . participated in several mining amendment act forums. they were very clear in what kinds of changes they would like to see in the legislation . . . regrettably, most of those recommendations were not included . . . this is not a question of consultation but rather, were our people listened to? consultation is only as good as the accommodation that arises. (moore, 2009, p. 963) we have been involved right from the outset not in our terms of what we desired to be consultation. ontario has attempted to have discussions by bringing people together in urban centres and thereby calling it consultation . . . we’ve told the province from day one that it is the people in our home communities who need to have the discussion and need to have input into the process. that has fallen on deaf ears. (louttit, 2009, p. 985) in developing bill 191 in 2007, ontario put forward the northern table idea to create a new working relationship with the first nations of northern ontario (solomon, 2009; babin, 2009). for two years, first nations worked with ontario to establish a new relationship and create a land-use planning law that would be first nation-led (beardy, f. 2009, nan envoy). unfortunately, the two years of preconsultation in regard to the far north act was all for naught: we started out with land use planning being first-nations-led. by the time we got to the legislation, that had been watered down to “significant involvement” for first nations, as determined by the minister at her unilateral discretion. (beardy, f. nan envoy, 2009, p. 952) ontario . . . they’ve gone on the record as wanting to work with us, and then making arbitrary decisions like that without talking to us was very, very shocking. (louttit, 2009, p. 985) it is unusual that bill 173 and bill 191 were bundled together for committee hearings, especially taking into account the significant impact each bill would have on first nations (slipperjack, 2009). first nation leadership stated that, “the bills should be considered separately” (beardy s., 2009, p. 828). a lib mpp tried to placate first nations’ leadership by insisting “that this is first reading only” (mauro, 2009, p. 830). however, as pointed out by bisson (2009b, p. 831): let’s be clear there are two bills here. there’s bill 191 and bill 173 . . . for those who are interested . . . the mining act is at second reading and this is your only kick at the can as first nations . . . to be able to have an effect on what this final bill will look like. 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.10696 when the committee hearings did occur for bill 173 and bill 191, they were located in toronto in southern ontario, and some mid-northern towns, but not on first nations territories (slipperjack, 2009). even the committee hearing scheduled for chapleau, a mid-northern town, was controversial: today is election day for nishnawbe aski . . . the committee is here in chapleau and expecting to hear from nan first nations on . . . bills 191 and 173 . . . so why did you schedule this committee hearing today, of all days . . . it was a huge mistake on your part, and one that has set the relationship back . . . an opportunity lost, a promise broken. (beardy, f. 2009, p. 952, nan envoy) an additional round of hearings for the far north act were scheduled for june 2010 in several of the far north communities (table 1). these were cancelled by nan resolution 10/36 (levac, 2010, p. 99)16 because ontario arbitrarily set the day and time. first nations were not given any latitude for accommodation of day or time of the hearings: “this was just a complete disregard for everybody . . . i guess there’s one thing that the liberals have learned over the last seven years, that there are more votes in southern ontario than there are in northern ontario, with the way they’re ramming this bill [bill 191] through” (hillier, 2010b, p. 100). overview by not defining green energy in the green energy act, green energy could be anything to anyone, although it was typically interpreted in a positive light. the labelling of bill 150 as the green energy act pressured any critics to carefully choose their words, lest they be accused of being an opponent of green energy and the environment. this helped bill 150 to obtain royal assent in record time. however, ontario did not meet their ethical fiduciary responsibility for meaningful consultation during the bill-toact parliamentary process (table 1 and 2). the process of bill 150 is in sharp contrast to the consultative processes for both bill 173 and bill 191, which involved a relatively extensive preconsultative and consultative phases; however, the quality of these consultative processes is questionable at best. bill 150 was also an omnibus bill, which is either accepted or rejected in its entirety through a single vote in the legislature (kirchhoff & tsuji, 2014). omnibus bills are not viewed as being conducive to democratic participation because of the complexity of the changes to be made to a variety of laws (mcrobert et al.,2016). in canada, omnibus bills and the acts they become have been used to streamline environmental protection by limiting opportunities for both public and indigenous participation in development projects throughout the environmental assessment process (kirchhoff & tsuji, 2014). the fact that no elected first nations representatives were at the committee meetings for 16 according to nan, “this resolution was forwarded to the standing committee . . . requesting an amended date. no formal response was provided by the committee and they did not hold public meetings in these first nations during the week of june 14, 2010” (2011, p. 83). 21 tsuji: economic recovery in response to worldwide crises published by scholarship@western, 2022 bill 150 was an anomaly, while numerous elected first nations representatives attended the joint bill 173 and 191 committee hearings. if bill 150 was named differently, perhaps there would have been more involvement from elected first nations representatives. since renewable energy was prominent in the green energy act, hydroelectric power-generation projects would be streamlined under this act and barriers to development would be removed. on the premise that most of the hydroelectric potential is located in northern ontario, this should have been acknowledged as a potential concern for the first nations and their political organizations. this point was raised in the legislature by o’toole who noted: “i would say that hydroelectric—that’s water dams—would be green energy, with the exception that often, to create a dam, you have to flood property . . . [flooding] has been affecting first nations for hundreds of years. it’s a huge issue” (2009, p. 5171–5172). in addition, there would be impacts on fishing (quinney, 2009). further expansion of hydroelectric power in this manner also impacts wildlife and traditional activities, as has been reported in the far north. in closing this section, while it should be recognized that there were numerous factors at work that contributed to the misgivings with the act-creation process associated with bill 150, one of the most identifiable components was the labeling of bill 150 as the green energy act. it is this sort of rhetoric that one must be wary of; the wording seeks to obfuscate the intent and meaning of the act through relying on the positive connotations of the word “green.” this is an example of the kind of deception that people should be vigilant against to protect against hidden agendas that can negatively affect indigenous communities (kirchhoff & tsuji, 2014). these concerns are not only relevant to canada. worldwide, there are other countries that have followed suit in the adoption of a green energy strategy, such as, but not limited to, the united kingdom (green energy act, 2009) and the united states of america (united states environmental protection agency, 2020). as exemplified with the green energy act, rhetoric can play a large role in policy discussion and development. covid-19 economic recovery act, 2020 economic context in 2020, the world was again plunged into a worldwide financial crisis as the result of the emergence of covid-19 (manjili et al., 2020; mckibbin & fernando, 2020; who, 2020). in canada, there has been unprecedented disruption in the social and economic lives of canadians, and the economic impacts have disproportionately affected indigenous peoples because of greater pre-existing vulnerabilities resulting from colonialism (statistics canada, 2020). during the covid-19 pandemic, there have been historic declines in economic indicators in canada, such as consumer spending, investment, and international trade (statistics canada, 2020). after the initial downturn of the economy with the first wave of covid-19 (pho, 2020a), there was an increase in economic outputs, but the economic recovery was 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.10696 uneven across sectors (statistics canada, 2020). in ontario, may 2020 signaled the start of phase 1 of ontario’s action plan in response to covid-19 (i.e., $17 billion cad in targeted support) (go, 2020b). in june 2020, phase 2 of the economic restart began, and phase 3, the recovery phase, was initiated july 2020 (go, 2020c). in july 2020, bill 197 was introduced and enacted as the covid-19 economic recovery act (table 1) months before the start of the second wave of the covid-19 pandemic, which again, forced ontario into “lockdown” (i.e., the closing of everything except for essential services; go, 2020d; go, 2021). the lockdown also severely impacted the economy (pho, 2020b). policy and politics in july 2020, clark (2020a, p. 8491,) introduced bill 197 to the legislature (table 1) and stated that the covid-19 economic recovery act: is part of our government’s plan to get ontario back on track . . . to get key infrastructure projects built faster, attract new jobs and investment, and adjust regulations17 . . . to restart jobs and development. thompson (2020, p. 8799–8800), the pc minister of government and consumer services, added: “bill 197 would . . . streamline processes for some infrastructure projects, create jobs, help boost our economy.” these statements are in keeping with the pc-majority government’s slogan “open for business” and their pronouncement that “we’re cutting red tape” to create jobs (go, 2020c). with bill 197, to help facilitate this agenda, the lieutenant governor in council, which includes the minister of municipal affairs and housing, was given sweeping powers to designate which projects would require an environmental assessment and which would be exempt, removing “red tape.” opposition mpps took exception to this removal of environmental oversight, calling the amendments “reckless” (vanthof, 2020, p. 8770) and stating that they did not follow “due diligence” (arthur, 2020, p. 8892) or the “precautionary approach” (schreiner, 2020a, p. 8799). this is emphasized by schreiner): the minister has the power to decide which projects will receive an ea [environmental assessment] and which will not. that shouldn’t be decided by the minister. that should be 17 as is explained in archives of ontario, “a regulation is law that is created under the authority of a statute or act . . . they make it possible for the government to act expeditiously in providing for additional rules or procedures without having to enact new statutes . . . regulations are made by the ontario government ministry that is responsible for administering a statute, and are passed by order-in-council. they do not need the approval of the legislature” (unnumbered). 23 tsuji: economic recovery in response to worldwide crises published by scholarship@western, 2022 decided by the threat of a project, the scale and scope of a project, and, most of all, by science. (2020, p. 8797) as noted by bell (2020) and schreiner (2020b), when the majority of projects are exempt from the environmental assessment process, some exempted projects, such as forestry projects, will have devastating effects on waterways with respect to mercury contamination (porvari et al. 2003; kronberg et al. 2016). further, by sidestepping the environmental assessment process, public consultation would be precluded and voices from the communities impacted by these projects would be silenced (begum, 2020; hunter, 2020; karpoche, 2020) consultation and the first reading of bill 197 bill 197 was an omnibus bill that when enacted as the covid-19 economic recovery act affected 43 acts (lao, 2020c). due to its breadth in coverage, the consultative process for bill 197 should have been extensive, but it was not (fraser, 2020a; sattler, 2020). the expediency with which bill 197 was rushed “at the speed of light” (west, 2020, p. 8931) through the legislature concerned opposition mpps (fraser, 2020b; karpoche, 2020). with respect to stakeholders, although the pcs asserted that they “consulted extensively” (clark, 2020b, p. 8492), including with indigenous communities (yurek, 2020, p. 8779), no specifics were given to validate their claim. fife’s (2020, p. 8779–8780) comments on this topic were quite pointed: i sit on . . . the finance and economic recovery special committee that has been set up by this government . . . i heard the minister . . . talk earlier at length about how they have been listening and taking action, and so i was wondering, who have they listened to? . . . they certainly did not listen to first nations, métis and inuit folks in this province. bill 197 went from first reading to royal assent in ~14 days (table 1). similar to bill 150, bill 197 had no documented pre-consultation with first nations community-elected governing leadership (table 2). the fast-tracking of bill 197 is noteworthy; it did not go to committee after first or second reading and followed an atypical sequence of bill-to-act (table 1). the legislative consultative process for bill 197 the legislature deliberations revealed the frustration of opposition mpps. sattler (2020) refers to the mpps democratic right to debate being ignored, and other mpps specifically mentioned the use of time allocation to limit debate in the legislature (west, 2020). while the use of time allocation is not an unusual practice in parliamentary deliberations, time allocations were often used after the committee phase, which is uncommon. the lack of a committee stage was atypical, as other pieces of legislation that went from bills-to-acts during the same time period were sent to committee (e.g., bill 175, bill 184). the opposition mpps 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.10696 were critical of the lack of a committee stage, as there would be no consultation with the public or indigenous people, who would be the most impacted by the amended environmental assessment process (bell, 2020; schreiner, 2020b). several mpps commented that the lack of consultation during the committee stage was an attack on the democratic process because of its “eradication” of any public input by concerned citizens, experts, and stakeholders. they stated that without this consultation, an opportunity to create better bills and better laws would be missed (bisson, 2020; fraser, 2020b; vanthof, 2020). arthur (2020) gave an example using bill 66 of why the committee stage is of utmost importance, especially when discussing schedule 6 (environmental assessment act) of bill 197. bill 66, restoring ontario’s competitiveness act, 2019, the context for bill 197 bill 66 was an omnibus bill that, once enacted, affected 18 acts (lao, 2020d). bill 66 was referred to committee in 2019 (lao, 2020e). during the committee stage, schedule 10 of bill 66 was discussed extensively, and a coordinated response to bill 66 was mounted by ontarians. bill 66 was amended by removing the whole of schedule 10. schedule 10 was very controversial because it would allow municipalities to pass open-for-business planning bylaws that would be exempted from the greenbelt act, 2005, and clean water act, 2006, allowing for development on environmentally sensitive land. although amendments to sections of schedules in proposed bills are typical occurrences, the removal of a whole schedule in a proposed bill is very rare, especially with a majority government. the removal of schedule 10 was possible because the legislature followed the typical bill-to-act legislative process, fulfilling their ethical fiduciary responsibility to meaningfully consult with their fellow mpps and ontarians in general. in addition, outside of the legislative process proper (figure 1), ontario met their legal procedural obligations (lindgren, 2011) under the environmental bill of rights, 1993 with respect to the environmental registry. the environmental registry gives the right to all ontarians to participate in government decision making with respect to government proposals and the potential impacts on the biophysical environment (environmental registry of ontario [ero], 2020a, b). after first reading of a bill, a notice will be posted on the environmental registry for a minimum 30-days-comment period. in the case of bill 66, a total of 26,032 comments were received (ero, 2020c). for comparison, bill 150 received a total of 1,348 comments (ero, 2020d), bill 173 tallied 750 responses (ero, 2020e) and 128 comments were made for bill 191 (ero, 2020f). additionally, through the efforts of 24 organizations (stop bill 66, 2020a), a website was established entitled “stop bill 66” that provided resources, such as a citizen toolkit on how to interact with your mpp and organizing tools (stop bill 66, 2020b). although the environmental registry and online action groups are external to the bill-to-act legislative process, they can serve as an important avenue of discussion and may impact government actions. ontario learnt their lessons from the failure of bill 66 (arthur, 2020). for bill 197 there would therefore be no committee stage, and, as discussed earlier, legislative debate would be limited through time allocation. there would also be no external legislative consultation through the environmental registry. to circumvent the environmental registry, ontario amended the environmental bill of rights in bill 197 to exempt the covid-19 economic recovery act.. nevertheless, ontario posted on the 25 tsuji: economic recovery in response to worldwide crises published by scholarship@western, 2022 environmental registry a bulletin with the date of first reading of bill 197 (table 1) which they stated was “for informational purposes only.” they included a summary of the changes to the environmental assessment act pertaining to the covid-19 economic recovery act and detailed why consultation was not required (ero, 2020g). however, the legality of the above-described section of bill 197 was questioned (ontario superior court of justice, 2020); and, under judicial review, it was ruled “that the minister [of the environment] acted lawfully respecting the posting of schedule 6 [environmental assessment act]” (greenpeace canada v. ontario, p. 12) overview similar to the labelling of the green energy act, the naming of the covid-19 economic recovery act put critics on the defensive. proponents asserted, “i’d like to know why the liberals are against creating jobs” (hogarth, 2020, p. 8787). meanwhile, critics contended, “it makes it hard for people to have confidence when you call it an economic recovery act when everything is not about economic recovery” (fraser, 2020a, p. 8494). as evident in legislative debates for bill 197, opposition mpps asserted that the bills had little to do with economic recovery (fraser, 2020c) and did “not help first nations communities” (karpoche, 2020, p. 8919). bill 197 was described as more of “a pre-pandemic wish list from the government” (schreiner, 2020a, p. 8796). bill 197 was granted royal assent in ~14 days. this contracted time period was achieved by ontario shirking their ethical fiduciary responsibility for meaningful consultation throughout the parliamentary process of bill-to-act, limiting parliamentary debate, and, more importantly, bypassing the committee stage (table 1). this process is in sharp contrast to other somewhat less complex bills passed during the covid-19 pandemic that had committee stages.. in ontario, the acts that originated with bills 150 and 197 have been brought into force to exempt and streamline the environmental assessment process, thus eliminating or limiting the opportunities for both public and indigenous participation with respect to consultation in development projects. ontario did not meet their ethical fiduciary responsibility to consult with the public, and especially with the people potentially most impacted by development, indigenous people. it is interesting to note that minister yurek (2020) tried to justify the lack of consultation during the bill-to-act process by reiterating that consultation will occur once bill 197 becomes law at the regulatory phase. however, as development projects are exempt from environmental assessment, duty to consult would not be triggered. as such, indigenous communities would not be consulted. similar to the recently repealed green energy act, hydroelectric power-generation projects would be streamlined under the covid-19 economic recovery act, as detailed by minister yurek (2020, p. 8775–8776): “we . . . will speed up projects, such as . . . water power generators . . . to modernize ontario’s environmental assessment program.” it should be again stressed that hydroelectric power generation has severe negative effects at the local environmental level, and this has been well documented for indigenous communities (tsuji et al., 2021). 26 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.10696 recently, there has been a trend in canada to use the term “clean power” to refer to non-emitting and renewable energy sources, and hydroelectric power generation has been included in this category (government of canada, 2020; tsuji et al., 2021). further, statistics canada (2020) identified clean technology jobs and, in particular, clean energy production as important during the covid-19 pandemic and as an important avenue for growth. likewise, ontario recently released a discussion paper detailing how clean technologies can help support a speedy economic recovery from covid-19 while helping to reduce greenhouse gas emissions (go, 2020e). thus, terminology may have changed, and the crises may be fundamentally different, but green energy and clean energy are still being touted as a way to economic recovery, and the path forward for hydroelectric projects is being streamlined. in closing, the issues with the bill-to-act consultative process for bill 150 are also relevant for bill 197 in the covid-19 pandemic context. the green energy rhetoric has evolved into discussions about clean power; thus, one must be wary of this type of rhetoric, especially during economic crises that result in bills quickly becoming acts with little legislative and public consultation. moreover, bill 197 contained limited details, so ontarians were left wondering what the new environmental assessment process would look like (lindgren, 2020). lastly, there has been a legislative call for a green economic recovery in ontario: there’s a growing global consensus that now is the time for a green economic recovery from covid-19 . . . if you listen to the experts and the economists, they are saying that we need to align our covid-19 recovery with climate action. this is a chance . . . to flatten the curve on climate pollution like we’re working so hard to flatten the curve on covid-19. (schreiner, 2020b, p. 8927) lessons learned the green energy act and the covid-19 economic recovery act were passed in the context of worldwide crises. both acts were omnibus bills with economic recovery being touted as the primary driver, but they also included a focus on green/clean energy (“emission free”). bill 150 explicitly mentioned green energy, and bill 197 included it in a later discussion paper (go, 2020e). both acts streamlined the environmental assessment process for projects, including green energy and clean energy developments, thereby, eliminating or severely impacting the integrity of the environmental assessment and consultation processes. if a green/clean energy project is exempt from an environmental assessment, the legal fiduciary responsibility of duty to consult with indigenous peoples will never be triggered in ontario or canada. in canada, more meaningful use of the bill-to-act parliamentary process needs to occur to hold governments accountable for meeting their ethical fiduciary responsibility to consult on legislative matters that can have far-reaching effects on the environment and indigenous peoples. in ontario, there are four opportunities (not including pre-consultation) in the bill-to-act process where consultation can have an impact. within the legislative process, consultation can occur in debates within the legislature 27 tsuji: economic recovery in response to worldwide crises published by scholarship@western, 2022 and public hearings and debates within committees. outside of the legislature, the environmental registry and grassroots movements also offer opportunities for meaningful public influence on proposed bills. bill 150 and especially bill 197 exemplify ontario’s problematic acceleration of the bill-to-act process through eliminating opportunities for consultation and shirking ethical fiduciary responsibility to consult with indigenous people on matters that potentially impact their constitutionally embedded aboriginal and treaty rights. by contrast, bill 66 is a positive example of how public consultation on a bill can significantly alter it before it becomes law. there are several lessons that we—as analysts and stakeholders—can glean from the cases presented, especially considering that there will be more bills on the horizon related to economic recovery from the covid-19 pandemic in canada and worldwide. first and foremost, it must be established who has the authority to represent indigenous communities in consultations. the impacts of colonialism have sometimes made this more difficult to ascertain than it may seem. for example, in some first nations communities there are hereditary leaders and elected leaders (clogg et al. 2016; harper et al. 2018; voyageur, 2011). this raises the question: who speaks on the community’s behalf in what instances? ideally, this issue needs to be resolved prior to any consultation. second, do not judge a bill by its title. the green energy act, and the covid-19 economic recovery act sound positive, but the titles of both acts hid major issues including the streamlining (or exemption) of hydroelectric projects from the environmental assessment process. third, always be vigilant of the introduction of bills during emergencies. as mentioned in relation to the covid-19 pandemic, indigenous people are often hit the hardest due to pre-existing vulnerabilities, and it is at these times that governments often put forward economic recovery acts to exploit untapped resources typically located in indigenous homelands worldwide. fourth, the covid-19 pandemic has demonstrated that, even during contracted timelines, public consultation could occur through online-committee meetings with relatively little cost. the covid-19 economic recovery act allowed for electronic participation of council or committees to meet quorum opens the possibility that during the bill-to-act process, public hearings can be held remotely in ontario. 18 although in-person deputations are best, electronic participation would allow indigenous people the chance to participate without the costs of travel and accommodation and help to alleviate the time factor. connectivity issues in remote regions of canada could be a concern, but asynchronous meetings could also be planned. virtual meetings have become a reality in the covid-19 pandemic world, and there are many platforms that are known to work well. fifth, develop a list of people and organizations (including mpps) that have similar concerns and values as your community, and keep this information on hand in the event that a coalition of organizations is needed to combat a bill, as with bill 66. lastly, be aware that majority governments feel less responsible for public consultation, especially during crises; examples include the lib-majority government passing the green energy act and pc-majority government passing the covid-19 economic recovery act. 18 the house of commons in canada currently uses a video-conferencing platform for public virtual proceedings (sahota, 2020). other countries (e.g., new zealand) around the world also use videoconferencing for some government committees to meet remotely (sahota, 2020). 28 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.10696 however, even with a majority government, significant amendments can be made to a bill before it becomes an act, such as the case of bill 66 when ontario met their ethical fiduciary responsibility for consultation. thus, in ontario, the legislative process from bill-to-act does allow for meaningful public input if, and only if, the government honours their ethical fiduciary responsibility for meaningful consultation. references abella, j., & martin, j. 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(2020). origin of sars-cov-2. https://www.who.int/publications/i/item/origin-of-sars-cov-2 yakabuski, j. (2009a, april 6). ontario, standing committee on general government [hansard], 39th parliament, 1st session, g20. yakabuski, j. (2009b, april 8). ontario, standing committee on general government [hansard], 39th parliament, 1st session, g21. yurek, j. (2020, july 15). ontario, official report of debates of the legislative assembly [hansard], 42nd parliament, 1st session, meeting no. 176b at 8779 and 8821. http://doi.org/10.1089/env.2020.0017 https://doi.org/10.17953/aicr.35.3.tx7pth12527049p7 https://www.who.int/publications/i/item/origin-of-sars-cov-2 microsoft word ms 1442 barriers and stategies neufeld final.docx the international indigenous policy journal volume 10 | issue 3 september 2019 barriers to and strategies for engaging non-indigenous canadians in first nations water rights: a qualitative inquiry katelin h. s. neufeld university of manitoba, katelin.neufeld@umanitoba.ca laura m. funk university of manitoba, laura.funk@umanitoba.ca katherine b. starzyk university of manitoba, katherine.starzyk@umanitoba.ca michelle i. gorea queen’s university, 14mg21@queensu.ca lisette dansereau university of manitoba, lisette.dansereau@umanitoba.ca recommended citation neufeld, k. h. s., funk, l. m., starzyk, k. b., gorea, m. i., & dansereau, l. (2019). barriers to and strategies for engaging non-indigenous canadians in first nations water rights: a qualitative inquiry. the international indigenous policy journal, 10(3). doi: https://10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8291 barriers to and strategies for engaging non-indigenous canadians in first nations water rights: a qualitative inquiry abstract many first nations homes lack adequate water and sanitation services. one way to address these conditions is to develop effective public engagement strategies. thus, in this qualitative interview study, we explored how 22 nonindigenous canadians from one city interpreted this issue and their interest in it. we analyzed the transcribed data using thematic coding and constant comparison. though most participants were aware of the issue and expressed sadness or anger, understandings were relatively shallow and rarely translated into active involvement. barriers to engagement included racism and a lack of resources, capacity, and personal responsibility. based on these findings and social psychological literature on social action, we provide recommendations for public advocacy strategies to engage non-indigenous canadians on the issue. keywords first nations, water rights, advocacy, public engagement acknowledgments this research was primarily funded by a partnership development grant, social sciences and humanities research council of canada (890-2012-0048). additional funding came from the rh institute foundation of winnipeg. we would like to thank the participants in this research study, as well as the advice and guidance of karen busby, helen fallding, danielle gaucher, jacquie vorauer, colin bonnycastle, kathi kinew, inez vistril-spence, craig benjamin, and our indigenous partner organizations, the assembly of manitoba chiefs and manitoba keewatinowi okimakanak. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. neufeld et al.: barriers and strategies for engaging non-indigenous canadians published by scholarship@western, 2019 1 barriers to and strategies for engaging non-indigenous canadians in first nations water rights: a qualitative inquiry although canada is one of the world’s wealthier countries (international monetary fund, 2018), systematically impoverished material and social conditions in some first nations communities1 mean that too many first nations people are struggling to simply survive. the main narrative of contemporary canada is that of a cultural mosaic that is strengthened by its differences (office of the prime minister of canada, 2015). yet, anti-racist and indigenous scholars contend that portraying canada in this way may reproduce dominant ways of knowing and further silence indigenous voices because it ignores ongoing racial discrimination and privilege (mascarenhas, 2007; schick & st. denis, 2005). this narrative also erases the inequities experienced by indigenous peoples in canada, such as the lack of clean running water in many first nations. not having safe water and sanitation services causes economic, physical, psychological, and cultural harm (craft, 2014; gregory & trousdale, 2009; o'gorman & penner, 2018); nonetheless, thousands of on-reserve homes do not have adequate access to clean running water and flush toilets (indigenous services canada, 2019). in 2009, the united nations found that indigenous people are 90 times more likely to not have piped water compared to non-indigenous people in canada. some first nations have running water, but the water is not potable. as of march 11, 2019, 3,031 homes and 175 community buildings in first nations communities were impacted by long-term drinking water advisories—that is, an advisory that has lasted more than one year (indigenous services canada, 2019). one of the longest standing water advisories (21 years) is in shoal lake #40 first nation in northern ontario. part of the reason that shoal lake #40 does not have drinking water is that the creation of an aqueduct in 1919 resulted in flooding that transformed the reserve into an island (perry, 2016). importantly, the aqueduct was not for shoal lake #40 residents; rather, it provided drinking water to the city of winnipeg over 275 km away. a lack of government action, among other factors, has long prohibited the construction of a proper water treatment plant. due to the strategic advocacy and resilience of shoal lake #40, all levels of government have committed to making clean running water a reality in this community. although the liberal government has made some progress in addressing this and other water challenges in first nations, there is still much work to be done (mason, 2019; mcclaren, 2019). resolving this important issue requires a multi-faceted approach that engages multiple stakeholders and knowledges. towards this goal, an interdisciplinary partnership of indigenous and non-indigenous people sought to develop methods of advocating for clean drinking water in first nations. organized by professor karen busby and helen fallding of the centre for human rights research, representatives for partner indigenous political organizations in manitoba (e.g., the assembly of manitoba chiefs and the non-profit organization manitoba keewatinowi okimakanak), and various university of manitoba faculty members came together to brainstorm possible projects. those at the initial meeting discussed what research would be useful to our indigenous partners and how that research should proceed. 1 in canada, the terms indigenous and aboriginal refer to first nations, inuit, and métis peoples, whereas the terms non-indigenous or non-aboriginal refer to people with settler or immigrant heritage. the term indigenous is preferred to aboriginal. the indian act (1985) applies to first nations people who meet its criteria for indian status. the indian act stipulates that reserves are “to be held for use and benefit of indians” (reserves section, para. 1). the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3, art. 5 doi: https://10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8291 2 ultimately, there was consensus that we should aim to focus on water and sanitation on first nations. to further understand the specific questions we should address, one of us (starzyk) and fallding then traveled to a remote community deeply affected by poor water and sanitation services. with the understanding gained from spending time in the community, a small group then applied for grant funding to support our work. the principal partner throughout the project was the assembly of manitoba chiefs. other partners, in alphabetical order, included amnesty international canada, brock university, the centre for indigenous environmental resources, manitoba keewatinowi okimakanak, the public interest law centre, and the university of winnipeg. finally, but certainly not least of all, individual communities partnered for some projects. the partnership consisted of three main research clusters: legal, including perspectives from international law (busby, 2016) and anishinaabe water law (craft, 2014); economic (o’gorman & penner, 2018); and public engagement (bonnycastle, 2015; starzyk et al., 2019). the three clusters worked independently but communicated frequently. a goal was to have an indigenous co-lead for each cluster, but this was not consistently possible for all clusters. through busby, fallding, the create h20 program, the centre for human rights research, and others, everyone met at least yearly through a free local conference. the goals of these meetings were to learn how we should work together (e.g., one session focused on respectful research practices; first nations information governance centre, 2019); to communicate findings to our partners, both across clusters and throughout the broader community; and to exchange other knowledges. elders, academics, and community partners presented at each conference. we made efforts to continuously include partners in decisions about the project, though this was often challenging due to both the very large size of the water rights team and the increasing pressures on our partners as they faced funding cuts. generally, such collaborations worked better when the groups were smaller. two of us (starzyk and funk) were faculty co-investigators of the public engagement research cluster, which at one point included nearly 30 members. our cluster developed three interrelated projects. one project, led by professor colin bonnycastle, worked with youth in a northern manitoba community to develop a photovoice project that documented the effects of living with threatened water services. another project (starzyk et al., 2019) used a quantitative approach to understand how best to “frame” the issue in order to increase support for government action among non-indigenous peoples in canada. in this article, we describe the third project. taking a qualitative approach, the goal of the third project was to understand how people think about first nations water and sanitation services and why they have not helped to fix things. we hoped to develop this understanding before beginning the quantitative project, but our research projects did not come together in the order we expected. nonetheless, our projects developed complementary knowledges. context canada was built upon territorial expropriation and the signing of treaties, which gave first nations specific title to reserve lands and other entitlements from the federal government (indigenous and northern affairs canada, 2010). the formerly titled department of indian affairs claimed a position of power and governance over first nations, placing themselves responsible for the welfare of first nations people who have indian status. for generations, the federal government has operated in accordance with the white-settler agenda—one of assimilation and patriarchal colonialism rather than respect neufeld et al.: barriers and strategies for engaging non-indigenous canadians published by scholarship@western, 2019 3 (white, murphy, & spence, 2012). this long-term approach often operates in a much more limited sense than first nations’ laws and rights and is sometimes at odds with them (borrows, 2017). this is true both generally and regarding water more specifically. many perspectives converge on the idea that all first nations homes should have clean running water. international law asserts that water is a human right (united nations general assembly resolution, 2010). canada has implied that it takes this right seriously through not only signing and ratifying this convention in 2011, but also through subsequent actions (busby, 2016). canadian constitutional laws and treaties may also afford first nations other legal rights to water (busby, 2016; phare, 2009). from the perspective of indigenous laws, however, first nations’ rights and responsibilities to water are inherent to their being (craft, 2014; phare, 2009). nonetheless, federal departments continue to enforce paternalistic policies over first nations that directly impact their access to clean running water. according to federal policy, the federal government and first nations share management of drinking water and sanitation in all provinces but b.c. (indigenous and northern affairs canada, 2018). yet the federal role is not straightforward: duties and responsibilities are fragmented across various governing bodies (simeone, 2010; white et al., 2012) and are also negotiated with local and regional regulatory authorities. in negotiating access to safe running water, first nations must also confront budgetary constraints and bureaucratic prioritizing (mascarenhas, 2007); as a result, promised deadlines are often unmet (e.g., porter, 2017). government action on this issue is therefore necessary but may not come without sufficient public pressure. for this reason, indigenous partners in our research group identified the importance of finding ways to increase public engagement. to do so, it is useful to consider known barriers to public engagement in the current context. barriers to public engagement collective action theory (van zomeren, postmes, & spears, 2008) contends that there are three main determinants of whether a person will help to resolve an injustice: efficacy, identity, and perceived injustice. people are unlikely to engage with an issue if they think it is difficult to solve, not “their issue,” and not unjust to begin with. as such, fostering engagement can be particularly challenging when it involves garnering support from people who are not directly impacted by an injustice. this is the case with non-indigenous people in canada and the lack of safe running water in first nations: they may harbour psychological motivations or beliefs that colour their perceptions of these three factors in a way that affects their potential engagement. other social psychological theories (jost & banaji, 1994; lerner, 1980; tajfel & turner, 1979) predict that people are motivated to believe that overarching social systems (e.g., the canadian government) are legitimate, that their social groups (e.g., white canadians) are benevolent and good, and that people get what they deserve. information that threatens these beliefs, such as learning that not everyone in your country has safe running water, can be psychologically uncomfortable. instead of acting to resolve such injustice, people will sometimes engage in mental gymnastics to remedy their discomfort. for instance, they might minimize or deny the injustice or blame the victims. relatedly, racism towards indigenous peoples may also erode non-indigenous canadians’ potential for engagement. in this article, we construe racism as a multi-faceted construct that operates at both a the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3, art. 5 doi: https://10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8291 4 societal and a personal level. at the societal level, racism is reflected in policies or other practices that systematically deny intergroup equality or equity (allport, 1954); the disproportionately high rates of first nations homes without clean running water is only one such example. racism also occurs at the individual level and takes many forms, including overt hostility or antipathy (allport, 1954). furthermore, sometimes racism manifests in subtler ways, such as “othering” (zevallos, 2011). in canadian contexts, indigenous peoples are often constructed as the “other” in relation to dominant white/canadian culture (clark, walsh, & de costa, 2012; schick & st. denis, 2005). positioning seemingly “natural” categories of social identities as binary opposites maintains existing social hierarchies (bauman, 1991; de beauvoir, 1949), which perpetuates ongoing systemic inequalities. another form of racism is victim blaming (schick & st. denis, 2005). indigenous peoples are routinely seen as accountable for the systemic effects of racism and colonialism (satzewich, 2011; schick & st. denis, 2005). even among allies, sympathizers, and would-be collaborators, such unexamined “common sense understandings” of the status quo can be racist and hegemonic at their root, further perpetuating inequality and privilege (denis & bailey, 2016; quayle & sonn, 2013). in sum, in this article, we define racism as consisting of systemic inequality at the societal level and practices, including othering, victim blaming, and antipathy, at the individual level. the current research our overarching goal was an applied one: to learn how to better engage the public on the issue of access to safe running water in first nations in canada. a more substantive focus of the inquiry was learning about how everyday practices of “othering” manifest in how non-indigenous people in canada interpret access to safe running water in first nations. given our exploratory and context-specific research questions, we used a constructivist qualitative approach. in-depth inquiry into how non-indigenous people interpret these and similar issues impacting indigenous peoples in canada may help identify instances of buy-in or disengagement among the general public. method participants and recruitment we recruited a purposive participant group of 22 non-indigenous canadians in winnipeg, manitoba, canada, through advertisements on social media, in local classifieds, and in public spaces such as coffee shops. as winnipeg has the highest urban population density of indigenous peoples of all major canadian cities (statistics canada, 2017), we expected the non-indigenous population would have some awareness of issues impacting first nations. as the study progressed, we made a theoretical sampling decision to further recruit self-identified allies of indigenous communities (n = 3) through word-of-mouth. our initial recruitment postings stated our desire to speak with non-indigenous adults about challenges faced by first nations. interested participants contacted the second author directly, from whom they learned more about the nature of the study. if they were eligible and still wanted to participate, they contacted the interviewer (the fourth author), who arranged the interview at a private, convenient location (either a private library study room or a university office). neufeld et al.: barriers and strategies for engaging non-indigenous canadians published by scholarship@western, 2019 5 on average, participants were 42 years old (range = 20-72 years). nine were men and 13 were women. three participants’ highest level of formal education was high school; 14 had completed some university or possessed an undergraduate degree, and five had graduate level training at university. five reported their current occupation as a university or college student, and four were not in the paid labour force (retired, unemployed, or full-time parent). the remaining 13 participants worked in education, administration, or communications and marketing. most (n = 18) identified as white or european (or with the vaguer term “canadian”), and four identified as visible minorities (south asian, east asian, or african). procedure participants gave informed consent before each interview and received a small honorarium (gift card) at the end. the fourth author conducted the interviews between december 2013 and may 2014 using the same semi-structured qualitative question guide (see the appendix at the end of this article). the second and fourth authors created and revised the guide based on input from the broader research team (expert scholars in social psychology as well as representatives from first nations organizations and a non-governmental organization). the fourth author also digitally recorded and transcribed each interview. we analyzed the data after each interview and ended recruitment after reaching theoretical saturation in the themes identified in the data. the human ethics review board at the university of manitoba approved this research. analytic approach analytic steps included multiple transcript readings by the second and fourth authors; sifting and sorting data within interviews, through identifying and grouping text segments into similar descriptive topics; and the development, refinement, and application of thematic codes (gibbs, 2007) to all interviews (individually conducted each using word software). after these steps, we generated further insights and came to a consensus on a refined set of thematic codes. we arrived at this consensus by comparing independently generated thematic codes as well as by comparing and contrasting data within each code across analysts and across participants. for example, one code was developed to reflect participants’ descriptions of their own levels and types of engagement (action) with the issue of indigenous water rights; another code focused on participants’ explanations for their level and type of engagement. a constructivist approach drawn from interpretive inquiry (gubrium & holstein, 2000) and symbolic interactionism prompted us to move beyond an examination of the explicit, substantive information participants described (“what” was said), to what remained “unsaid” as well as “how” it was said. that is, our approach pushed us towards engaging the symbolic meanings or broader ideas invoked by participants as they make sense of their worlds and behaviours (including their own level or type of engagement with indigenous water rights) through language. this approach helped us develop theoretical insights and highlight the complexity of participants’ interpretations. results we identified three main themes through this analysis process: understanding water in first nations, engagement with issues impacting indigenous peoples in canada, and barriers to public engagement. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3, art. 5 doi: https://10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8291 6 understanding water in first nations participants had a limited understanding of the water issues facing many first nations. for instance, the opening interview question asked participants to identify issues of concern for first nations: only five of the 22 participants spontaneously mentioned safe water. when asked directly about the issue, it seemed that while most participants were aware of the issue, their knowledge was limited. many participants incorrectly believed that water issues are confined to isolated northern communities, as in this example: i know that up north they have a lot of problems maintaining water. and for my limited knowledge, it’s lack of funding and construction costs and frozen, like the permafrost shifting, which breaks the pipes and then they can’t afford to fix the pipes. and they were talking about doing above ground water systems but they had to figure out insulation . . . so it’s like an engineering puzzle as well as lack of funding to get them clean water. however, there was greater knowledge among allies who spoke about current water issues as indicative, at least in part, of dislocation and colonization: it’s an expression of an underlying problem . . . as we so-called “modernize,” we pull people and disconnect them from their own land base. and so we create water systems that are westernized water systems, which are appropriate for large concentrations of people but then therefore, because we always do these things on the cheap, create water and sanitation problems and e. coli and all of that. as a means of understanding the problem (and potentially to present an empathetic stance), some participants drew parallels between on-reserve water issues and their own urban experiences of occasional discolored tap water or frozen water supply pipes: they just asked that we boil it [our tap water] for a while. and, if it was brown or discolored then we would just abstain from using it for a couple of hours. but obviously it’s frustrating and it hinders what you’re doing that day. so i guess for them to not have it . . . is kind of like a panicky feeling. and what do they do? [in the news i saw] people going down and breaking the ice and getting water out by pails and drinking bottled water and trying to keep their children and babies clean. i can’t imagine. we are getting a little taste of that with frozen water pipes in winnipeg and having to bring water in. imagine that being your way of life. approximately midway through the interview and after the interviewer asked participants about their awareness of first nations water issues, she presented them with prevalence statistics. in response to hearing this information, participants expressed a variety of emotions. most expressed concern and described emotions such as confusion, disbelief, and surprise. the overriding emotional theme was shock, frustration, and anger that any people in canada would have problems accessing safe drinking water. this is an encouraging sign, as perceiving a situation as unjust is a potent predictor of social action (van zomeren et al., 2008). many employed social comparisons, indicating that they believed that a lack of access to clean running water is a problem of poor, developing, or “third world” countries. however, neufeld et al.: barriers and strategies for engaging non-indigenous canadians published by scholarship@western, 2019 7 this interpretation also represents a form of “othering” of “third world” countries and implies a reluctance to admit or accept that canada or “first world” countries might have such problems: coming from my background, having african roots, i wouldn’t expect to hear this. so it’s shocking that this is happening in canada. it’s not nigeria or somalia, you know? . . . why is this happening here, why? it just makes you angry because there’s not a reason with all the money and everything that we have in canada, and calling ourselves a first world country, people should be living without [safe drinking water] . . . i think it’s horrible because i never thought that people in canada would not [have] access to clean water. usually they would talk about people in the developing countries not having access to clean water and things like that. there should be no . . . community anywhere in canada without proper water pipes and indoor plumbing and heating and sanitation. that’s just third world. shame was another common emotional reaction to learning about the lack of safe running water in first nations. for instance, one participant described feeling “embarrassed as a canadian citizen” and another stated, “it’s disgraceful and embarrassing.” the following quotes highlight the disconnect between an idealized reputation of canada and the reality of conditions in first nations: it’s canada’s dirty little secret, you could say a skeleton that’s in our closet. our country can be very critical of other developing nations and their infrastructure in terms of providing basic needs and in the meantime canada is dropping the ball for their own aboriginal people. it’s hugely embarrassing as a canadian . . . [there are] other countries in the world where canada would say that “that’s against human rights!” but then we’ve done these things . . . shame such as this, which stems from some negative association with one’s group identity (e.g., “canadian”), can promote prosocial intergroup behaviours including support for reparations (brown & čehajić, 2008; brown, gonzalez, zagefka, manzi, & čehajić, 2008) and collective action to resolve an injustice (iyer, schmader, & lickel, 2007; shepherd, spears, & manstead, 2013). as above, participants often couched their understandings of first nations water supply and sanitation issues within a human rights framework: i have a postcard or two on my fridge that’s very vivid . . . with a first nations child, saying “water is a human right.” and i do believe it is. human rights on a very basic level. people need clean water to survive . . . clean drinking water has to be a human right because you can’t survive without it. it’s something that the government should address. it may be costly, i don’t know, but i think it is a basic need, a basic human need. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3, art. 5 doi: https://10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8291 8 self-identified allies also brought up the framework of indigenous rights as important when grappling with issues of concern for indigenous peoples, as in: if we look at the water issue through the lens of aboriginal rights, we would say if the communities controlled their traditional territories, they would be able to access better water supplies and find much more creative culturally based ways of dealing with all of their problems, including the water problem. so i would say . . . the systemic problems . . . are mostly best addressed through an aboriginal rights perspective rather than a human rights perspective. in sum, most participants knew little about the lack of safe running water in first nations. though some participants drew parallels between access to safe running water on reserves and their own urban experiences, many indicated that they believed that a lack of access to clean running water is a problem that should not exist in canada and expressed feelings of shame and anger. the majority of participants drew on a human rights framework to express their opinions about the issue, whereas allies used the framework of indigenous rights. engagement in issues impacting indigenous peoples in canada in general, participants were not very engaged in issues impacting indigenous peoples in canada. perhaps unsurprisingly, the three allies were active in advocacy efforts, including grass-roots organizations and academic research. one ally explained that he has dedicated his life to issues important to first nations but was uncertain about the extent of his impact. some other participants, who did not identify as allies, indicated that they engaged with issues impacting indigenous peoples through attending or volunteering at indigenous events, or volunteering with social organizations targeting urban homelessness and poverty. for example, one participant explained that she sees her volunteer work at a core-area soup kitchen as a first step. she indicated that the work was exposing her to the fact that indigenous peoples face a great number of challenges, and she expected her increasing awareness to lead to greater involvement in the future. in comparison, other non-allies indicated relatively passive or subtle forms of engagement with indigenous issues: their expressions of concern rarely translated into involvement that was as active or sustained. many of these participants indicated that they raised awareness of the issue through discussions and debates with friends, family, and acquaintances. similarly, a participant with a teaching position indicated that they felt engaged through educating their students in the hopes of changing their opinions. others felt engaged through expressing their opinions on social and mainstream media and through participating in this research study. barriers to public engagement our analyses suggested a range of factors that may serve as barriers to public engagement regarding safe running water in first nations, as well as other issues impacting indigenous peoples in canada. the findings presented below draw on what participants said to explain their own levels of involvement, participants’ perceptions about barriers to public engagement more broadly, and our interpretations of their (spoken or unspoken) words that implied barriers to their personal engagement. participant explanations of personal and public non-engagement tended to focus on a lack of capacity as well as a lack of knowledge and awareness. participants additionally identified racism when striving to explain neufeld et al.: barriers and strategies for engaging non-indigenous canadians published by scholarship@western, 2019 9 public complacency more broadly. given that participants’ own talk also included racism (sometimes explicitly but more often implicitly), and no participants articulated a sense of personal responsibility, we advance these as additional barriers to public engagement. claims of (in)capacity. social psychological literature on collective action finds that people are unlikely to act to resolve injustice when they view doing so as unfeasible (starzyk & ross, 2008; van zomeren et al., 2008). one way in which feasibility concerns manifested here was perceived (in)capacity. when explaining barriers to the public’s engagement, participants sometimes suggested a lack of capacity, such as feeling powerless to make a real difference and a lack of belief in the efficacy of action: [people] don’t want to take the time to become aware because they don’t feel that they can do anything about it. more often, however, participants provided specific reasons that they were personally unable to take appropriate action, often centering upon financial capacity or political clout: i don’t have money so i can’t do anything money-wise. i don’t have any connections or political power, so i don’t know what i would be able to do. a more unconventional rationale for non-involvement was advanced by one participant, who suggested his individual personality traits would in fact hinder any attempt to help: i tend not to get involved in anything political because . . . i lack a lot of patience. so i would be the person just standing up and screaming, “are you guys fucking morons?” (laughing), which isn’t going to do anybody any good and i know that. so for my sanity and for the benefit of everybody else involved it’s better for me to just do the informal things that i do. participants who were active in social justice issues indicated that people might lose interest or “burn out” if their efforts appear to be ineffective. for a few participants and allies this was a significant personal issue: i think the people that know the problem are just so fed up of it that they just sort of wash their hands of it . . . it’s just like how do you do anything? i don’t think my efforts have made any difference whatsoever, zero. participants suggested that the scope of issues impacting indigenous peoples in canada was a significant barrier for both personal and public engagement, and some indicated this was overwhelming, leading to a sense of helplessness: i’m pretty concerned but i have no idea . . . what needs to be changed, you know? . . . how daunting this task of change is, where do you start with a problem like this? the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3, art. 5 doi: https://10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8291 10 time and energy were barriers both for participants personally and for others. they cited responsibilities such as studies, work, children, and other social causes. they also communicated a general sense that people can only do so much: how thinly do you spread yourself? i almost feel that you need to choose your issues . . . it would be energy and time. those active in social justice issues also noted that people’s level of involvement in issues they care about may be significantly impacted by their personal capacity, including personal stability, family and work responsibilities, and the flexibility to respond when action is needed: i’m able to do some of that work to a large extent because my life is fairly uncomplicated. i don’t have children so i don’t have a lot of family obligations . . . my income level and housing situation is a lot more stable than many of the people that i work with . . . it makes it easier to get some work that needs to be done quickly if asked. [if something is happening] you want to be able to pull that together and help and either get stuff out to the site where it’s needed, and you can’t because you have to be at work. sometimes if there is enough notice and we know that there’s going to be a demonstration or a round dance call during the day you can move a vacation day around and that kind of thing. knowledge and awareness. a lack of knowledge and awareness was another way in which feasibility concerns posed barriers to engagement: participants overwhelmingly cited not knowing what to do and not knowing enough about a given issue as a barrier, both for themselves and others. this applied to involvement in issues impacting indigenous peoples generally: it’s hard to even volunteer and help out if you don’t know what, or who you are working with, or what issues there are that people are facing. when it comes to like specific reserves or specific treaties i’m totally ignorant . . . i know of the reserves but i don’t know specifically what each reserve’s issues are . . . i have an idea of what’s wrong, but . . . when asked specifically about the issue of safe running water, participants similarly claimed that their own personal lack of knowledge and awareness was a primary reason they did nothing: if i knew something that i could do then i would do it. but i don’t know what to do. [i’m not involved] just because i don’t know about it. i don’t really know how long they have been dealing with this problem or how long this problem is going to continue for and what they are doing about it. so . . . on one hand, it is understandable that people cannot take action without knowing a solution or being aware of a problem. on the other hand, claims of not knowing may justify disengagement motivated by other factors, such as the racist attitudes and stereotypes these participants revealed elsewhere in their interviews. claims of ignorance can be a means of avoiding an uncomfortable truth, as we discuss later. neufeld et al.: barriers and strategies for engaging non-indigenous canadians published by scholarship@western, 2019 11 ignorance was also cited as a barrier to public engagement on indigenous matters beyond water, and participants identified various sources of this ignorance. first, a number of participants linked ignorance to the fragmented and overwhelming nature of communication in modern society: they blamed information overload for creating a situation where it is challenging to engage people’s attention on any given issue: there’s so much information out there these days, and it’s coming at us so quickly, through the internet and all these different methods that people see one news item and then the next minute they forget it and move on to something else. there’s just so many things that . . . it’s almost like you’re desensitized because there’s so much. they also frequently stated that issues impacting indigenous peoples are misreported or unreported in traditional sources of information: i don’t think that the general public knows of these things. they just hear what the media is telling them, and that’s not really what the problems are. participants applied similar logic in explaining ignorance around safe running water in first nations specifically. many felt the traditional news media were not covering the issue frequently enough: the fact that it hits the media very, very sporadically, and then usually not some sort of longer term in-depth research piece, is a big problem. there’s not enough information about it. it can’t just be a [news] special every couple of years. some participants also felt that when mainstream media do cover issues impacting indigenous peoples, they often do so in ways that perpetuate stereotypes. participants further suggested that part of the reason mainstream media do not inform the public about indigenous “issues” is because of a lack of indigenous representation among the ranks of those who decide what is newsworthy. thus, participants saw traditional news media as a source of the ignorance and misinformation that pose barriers to public engagement. another source of ignorance that participants identified was the lack of interaction between the rural north and the urban south, which is where participants lived. as one participant said: i think it’s sort of “out of sight, out of mind” for northern communities. a lot of people don’t make those links because they don’t know people; they have never travelled there. participants offered another explanation for public ignorance: a desire to deny and ignore. as noted above, several social psychological theories suggest that people are often motivated to ignore information that reflects poorly on their group memberships or government (jost & banaji, 1994; tajfel & turner, 1979). given that canadians pride ourselves in being egalitarian, multicultural, and not racist, they (and white canadians in particular) can become quite uncomfortable when presented with evidence of their racially-based privilege (schick & st. denis, 2005). consequently, they may ignore or the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3, art. 5 doi: https://10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8291 12 rationalize injustice to minimize their discomfort. several participants described a tendency for canadians to do so: it’s like this weird . . . denial or it’s like a place where people don’t want to go, almost, in their head. people don’t want to acknowledge it because . . . i mean it’s out of sight, out of mind. i do talk about [indigenous issues], but people really don’t want to hear unpleasant things. white people in canada are kind of programmed, trained, to get a bit defensive when things are brought up. because it’s probably a way of dealing with the guilt, it’s a way of . . . feeling like part of us is being threatened because of something else and so it’s a way of reacting. finally, a few participants seemed to believe that the systemic exclusion of indigenous people from mainstream society has played a significant part in public ignorance about issues impacting indigenous people. for example, some implicitly tied a lack of knowledge to an education system that does not impart students with knowledge of indigenous perspectives, but largely “remains reflective of white, western, or eurocentric interests” (schick & st. denis, 2005, p. 298). racism: the indigenous “other,” misinformation, and victim-blaming. when participants talked about a lack of public awareness about issues impacting indigenous peoples, they placed a great deal of the blame on the public’s racism and ignorance: there’s a negative stereotype towards first nations people. that cultural barrier thing, i think it turns a lot of people off, actually. more specifically, participants identified that the public harbours stereotypes of first nations’ incompetence and corruption, especially regarding financial matters: the broader public’s understanding, you hear so much . . . “well, we came over from whichever country and we look after ourselves, why can’t they?” there’s probably still a lot of discrimination. even my parents, they haven’t got a lot of nice things to say. and like, “when are we going to stop paying for them?” “they have so much money but nobody uses it properly.” all of that kind of stuff. so there is a lot of ignorance. every time you turn around people are saying, “it’s got to be the fault somehow of first nations people,” or “well, we give them all this money.” you hear that all the time, “they are given all this money, they’re given enough money and why don’t they . . . work with that?” although many participants agreed that other canadians’ general racism and ignorance are a barrier to public engagement, we found that their own talk occasionally contained racist attitudes and misinformed assumptions. what participants said likely contained other manifestations of racism that we, the authors, as white people of privilege ourselves, were unable to perceive. nevertheless, we neufeld et al.: barriers and strategies for engaging non-indigenous canadians published by scholarship@western, 2019 13 identified racism in varying degrees of subtlety (neely & samura, 2011; quayle & sonn, 2013). for instance, we contend that racism underlies this participant’s words: i’m starting to get apathetic. look, if they don’t care, why should i? further, euphemisms for racist beliefs, such as “cultural differences,” were sometimes employed, perhaps reflecting a sense of discomfort with the idea that canada is a racist society (schick & st. denis, 2005), and aligning oneself instead with the dominant narrative of respecting cultural differences. subtler forms of racism also manifested, for instance in the words of another participant. although couched in terms of concern with paternalism and power, this participant positioned their “whiteness” as a justification for inaction: i would love to help, but i don’t know if it’s my place to be one more white person to come in and say, “i’ve got the solution!” because i clearly don’t. but if native people came and said, “this is what we need,” i would do anything to help them, absolutely. aligning with collective action theory (van zomeren et al., 2008), this participant used their identity to distance themselves from the “indigenous other” and responsibility for engaging the issue. we also identified several misconceptions, often intertwined with subtle racism, in what most participants—all except those who self-identified as allies—said. for instance, participants frequently framed colonization as something that happened historically or in the past, without acknowledging that it is ongoing and embedded in the nature of canadian society. the following examples are illustrative: i don’t think everybody, the general public will be that concerned because it has a long past . . . issues that happened a long time back. i see them . . . protesting and stuff, it irks me because really technically speaking some of those issues are treaty rights which go back to 1870/71 where it’s completely different, like 200 years, it’s different and let’s revamp it, things have to change. the second example shows an evident lack of sympathy for indigenous perspectives regarding treaty rights. other participants expressed suspicion about the motives of indigenous groups who were asking for help or employing rights-based arguments. again, money appeared to be an important factor for some participants: in general, when i hear on the news when they talk about money and stuff and wanting to get money, that kind of irks me a bit. sometimes i wonder about that, and a lot of other people do. is that a legitimate complaint, or are first nations just after more money? i mean people get cynical, and i do too sometimes . . . this same participant later expressed uncertainty about whether or not the news is biased. he also explained that his non-indigenous friends describe first nations as “complaining all the time about something,” to which he rather hesitantly responds, “well yeah, maybe that’s true, there is a lot of complaining, but it’s probably legitimate, it could be legitimate reasons.” this participant expressed a the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3, art. 5 doi: https://10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8291 14 high level of ambivalence regarding issues impacting indigenous peoples in canada and seemed to be trying to combat personally held stereotypes where he recognized them. racism also manifested as victim blaming. in discussing the inadequacies of first nations water systems, some participants held first nations responsible rather than blaming underfunding of on-reserve services. this corroborates anti-racist scholars’ assertions that indigenous people are routinely subjected to victim blaming and held accountable for the systemic effects of racism and colonialism (satzewich, 2011; schick & st. denis, 2005); it also aligns with the social psychological theories (jost & banaji, 1994; lerner, 1980; tajfel & turner, 1979) that predict, when faced with an uncomfortable injustice, people may engage in victim blaming instead of resolving the issue. three participants suggested that first nations people were part of “the problem” by behaving in non-constructive ways, such as being resentful or stubborn. in another form of victim blaming, some participants interpreted self-government as responsible for inequities. one particular topic of contention was the idea that monies are often squandered or misused through first nations governance structures: the federal government provides money to the administration, the people who run the reserves, the chiefs. and some of us have the opinion, i tend to lean towards this too in particular situations, is that they get the money and they basically spend it on themselves . . . there has been more than one scandal where the money has been spent on cruises when it should have been going to things that it was rightfully meant for, and it wasn’t. further, some participants explicitly linked incompetency and corruption to the lack of safe running water in first nations: to me, from day one they have been getting infrastructure money. and what have they done with it? absolutely nothing. some of those reserves don’t even have running water? so . . . is it the chief and council that is responsible? . . . and i think it is. so . . . that tends to make me feel negative about the whole situation, and about the people who are receiving the money and should be using it for what it is properly meant for. if [a water and sanitation system] was established . . . and then they didn’t take care of it and ruined it, that would put me off because you have to have maintenance. you have to care about it. so that would put me off. the above quotation also demonstrates how racial stereotypes can contribute to (or justify) disengagement. absence of personal responsibility. participants had many ideas about both who was responsible for the lack of safe drinking water in first nations and how to remedy the issue. overwhelmingly, participants assigned responsibility through delegation to others (decosta & clark, 2016). as evidenced above, some placed responsibility on first nations. sometimes participants named systems, such as capitalism and the canadian government, accountable. in some attributions of government responsibility, though, we again inferred a subtle subtext of the incompetence stereotype: some participants suggested that the federal government holds the authority for oversight while implying that first nations are incapable of self-governance. for example, one participant said: neufeld et al.: barriers and strategies for engaging non-indigenous canadians published by scholarship@western, 2019 15 sometimes i think, well, is it the government’s fault because they’re not monitoring it? notably absent from participants’ talk, however, were mentions of their personal or group responsibility for rectifying the lack of safe running water in first nations. clearly, an absent sense of responsibility is a barrier to public engagement. one participant even alluded to non-responsibility, implying that because many issues facing indigenous peoples today are rooted in the past, non-indigenous peoples today should not be held accountable: i’m not the one who took their land away, the people who are living now are not the ones. and should we have to be responsible for what happened in the past? to a certain extent yes. and to a certain extent no. these words are yet another example of how perceiving an issue as not linked to one’s identity—of being “their” issue and “in the past”—is a barrier to engagement (van zomeren et al., 2008). general discussion the goal of this research project was to learn how to better engage non-indigenous people in canada on the issue of access to safe running water in first nations. toward that goal, we used a constructivist qualitative approach to interview 22 non-indigenous canadians living in winnipeg, manitoba. three main themes emerged from these interviews. the first theme was understandings about the lack of safe running water in first nations. many participants were aware of this issue; yet, few could speak about it in much detail, and a handful claimed to not know much at all. though most expressed concern about access to safe running water in first nations, this rarely translated into active involvement in creating change. whereas the three self-identified allies were quite involved in working alongside indigenous people, other participants’ involvement was minimal. the second theme was a relative lack of participant involvement. this theme helped shed light on the third theme: barriers to public engagement. listening to what participants did and did not say, we identified the following barriers: a lack of awareness and knowledge, racism (both that participants perceived of the public and revealed in their own talk), and an absence of personal feelings of responsibility. policy recommendations our indigenous partners hoped our research would result in useful recommendations for engaging nonindigenous canadians on matters including providing safe running water in all first nations. drawing from (a) social psychological research on (overcoming) psychological barriers to engagement and (b) our current analyses, we make six policy recommendations for public engagement strategies. although we present them separately, we suggest combining them into one approach when appropriate. these strategies may be deployed by people or groups in various spheres, including those in all levels of government and non-governmental organizations, journalists, educators, social marketers, and activists. as relationships and mutual understanding are widely considered central aspects of reconciliation in canada (e.g., truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015), we encourage collaboration between non-indigenous and indigenous peoples when creating and executing these strategies. such strategies can also be useful beyond the policy level, as anyone could incorporate many of the recommendations in their daily lives and conversations. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3, art. 5 doi: https://10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8291 16 strategy a. provide information about the issue and tie it to systemic discrimination. people cannot take action on an issue if they are unaware of or misinformed about it. although non-indigenous people in canada may not know a lot about the lack of safe running water in first nations, they may have some knowledge about other challenges facing indigenous peoples, the history of colonization, and the systemic nature of oppression and racism. it is possible that this other, broader knowledge could contextualize and develop greater awareness about water in particular. for those unaware of these systemic forces, such a campaign may work to address stereotypes that contribute to victim blaming. of course, it is important to educate in a way that does not counterproductively elicit the psychological threats discussed earlier; see strategies c and d below for suggestions. strategy b. provide concrete suggestions for active involvement. without the resources to fix an issue, mass injustice and suffering are simply too psychologically uncomfortable for people who are motivated to view their social systems as legitimate and just (jost & hunyady, 2005; kay & jost, 2003). when a solution to an issue seems feasible, however, people are more inclined to engage in its resolution (starzyk & ross, 2008; van zomeren et al., 2008). thus, public engagement strategies cannot only educate non-indigenous canadians about violations of first nations water rights; they must also educate people about ways to make a difference that align with the strategy’s exact goal. examples include participating in or donating to existing campaigns (e.g., amnesty international canada, 2019; blue dot, 2019; council for canadians, 2019). people can also purchase products from indigenousowned companies committed to improving access to clean running water: birch bark coffee company (2019), for example, uses profits to install water purification kits in first nation homes, and her braids (2019) raises awareness through workshops and donates 10% of pendant sales to the blue dot, a grassroots campaign promoting a healthy environment that includes clean water. strategy c. use frames that increase feelings of responsibility. people are more likely to engage in an issue when they feel it is their place to do so (ratner & miller, 2001; van zomeren et al., 2008). but when discussing the lack of safe running water in first nations, many participants used “othering” language and none expressed feeling personal responsibility. public engagement strategies such as using inclusive frames can foster these feelings. calls to action that explicitly state all canadians have a role to play may work, as might framing the issue as a “canadian issue” or its resolution as “part of the canadian way.” the latter suggestions may also harness peoples’ motivation to view the government as just (see feygina, jost, & goldsmith, 2010; gaucher, friesen, neufeld, & esses, 2017; jost, 2015). such frames may help to shift the observed mindset of delegating responsibility to a mindset of embodying responsibility (de costa & clark, 2016). strategy d. use rights frames. participants naturally used human rights frames when speaking about the lack of safe running water in first nations, suggesting that this frame resonated with them. other work by our research group has found evidence that this strategy is indeed effective for increasing public support for fulfilling first nations water rights (starzyk et al., 2019). although the indigenous community members interviewed in that project deemed this frame an appropriate one, we acknowledge that the concept of human rights does not always sit comfortably with conceptions of indigenous rights (kulchyski, 2013), and so may not always be appropriate. all three self-identified allies used indigenous rights frames in their interviews, which suggests that this frame may be effective either among those who are already knowledgeable about the issue or when used alongside efforts to educate people about indigenous rights. neufeld et al.: barriers and strategies for engaging non-indigenous canadians published by scholarship@western, 2019 17 strategy e. promote positive interaction between indigenous and non-indigenous peoples in canada. intergroup contact is one of the most effective ways to reduce prejudice, especially when that contact involves cooperation towards a common goal (allport, 1954; pettigrew & tropp, 2006). engagement strategies would do well, then, to bring together these groups with the expressed purpose of working together to find solutions to the lack of safe running water in first nations. for white canadians in particular, contact with indigenous peoples could also increase their feelings of personal responsibility around this issue (tropp & barlow, 2018). as contact alone sometimes only decreases overt hostile prejudice but not subtler forms (e.g., paternalism; see denis, 2015), it is important to combine contact with critical educational efforts that illuminate systemic racism (e.g., strategy a). potential limitations to varying degrees, people are often consciously or subconsciously motivated to present themselves in a positive light (paulhus, 1984); as such, participants may have expressed support for access to safe running water in first nations because to do otherwise might seem ignorant or racist. although such motivations were likely at play, we do not believe that they invalidate the current results. first, to really understand participants’ support for any one specific issue, we attempted to interpret their comments within the context of the interview as a whole, including their understanding of colonization, attributions of responsibility, and subtle racism; doing so arguably provides a more accurate and nuanced representation of their views. second, documenting how people construct their ideas about first nations water rights is crucial to the process of creating a public engagement strategy. participants’ social desirability concerns around issues impacting indigenous peoples in this study were also likely present throughout their daily lives; thus, how participants spoke about these issues here likely reflects how they, and perhaps other non-indigenous canadians, sometimes speak in other interactions. another potential limitation pertains to our sample. the 22 non-indigenous canadians were not representative of the non-indigenous public. this makes it difficult to infer generalizations about the level or extent of particular attitudes to the population whose engagement barriers we seek to reduce. for example, people who decided to participate in a study about challenges facing first nations might be more informed and engaged than the general public. aside from the three allies, however, participants had relatively low awareness and engagement and often expressed racist sentiments. given that larger national surveys have reported similar trends (environics institute for survey research, 2016; starzyk et al., 2019; trudeau foundation, 2013), it is reasonable to surmise that our attitudinal findings reflect those perceptions present, potentially to a greater extent, among the larger canadian population. more importantly, as statistical generalization is not the goal of qualitative methods, the theoretical insights of this analysis (i.e., the nuances and complexity of participants’ interpretations) may be transferable to other contexts and settings. conclusion compared to other homes in canada, on-reserve homes are systematically less likely have adequate water and sanitation services (neegan burnside, 2011; united nations, 2009). public pressure from non-indigenous canadians is one important route to resolving this inequity; yet, many canadians are not taking action. this article provides insights into potential barriers to public engagement, on water specifically and broader inequities facing indigenous peoples; it also offers suggestions to overcome the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3, art. 5 doi: https://10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8291 18 these barriers. we hope that those with the responsibility to effect change will integrate these findings into their policy, programming, or advocacy efforts to fulfill first nations’ right to water. references allport, g. w. 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(2011, october 14) “what is otherness?” the other sociologist. retrieved from https://othersociologist.com/otherness-resources/ appendix interview guide during this interview, i will use the term “first nations.” this group belongs to a larger group that people sometimes called “aboriginal.” there are no right or wrong responses to any of my questions. what matters is that you feel comfortable providing your honest opinion, so please tell me what you truly think and how you really feel. we are not interested in your personal views, but those of canadians in general. your responses are confidential and will not be associated with your name in any way. 1. tell me about your understanding of some of the key issues faced by first nations communities in canada today? probes if needed: • can you tell me more about that? • how much of an issue do you think this is, and why? • can you think of an example of this? • can you think of any other issues? • how do you know this? 2. what is your understanding of water or sanitation issues faced by first nations communities, if any? probes if needed: • how much of an issue do you think this is, and why? • how do you know this? • can you think of an example of this? • do you have any understanding of possible solutions to this issue? could you tell me more? the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3, art. 5 doi: https://10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8291 24 3. a 2011 report indicated that approximately 28% of homes in first nations communities in canada do not have access to clean running water.2 in hearing this, what are your first thoughts? probes if needed: • how does hearing this make you feel? • can you tell me more? 4. how would you describe your own level of concern about these issues? (probes: water in particular, or other issues affecting first nations communities) 5. how would you describe your own involvement in these issues? (probes: nature and form of the involvement – how they seek change) a. if involved: can you tell me about how you became involved (what convinced you, etc.)? how do you think it will make a difference? what are the greatest barriers to action a) for you personally and b) for others? b. if not involved: explain why/why not (involved in other areas but not this, etc.)? what would convince you to support better water services on first nations, if anything? what would put you off from supporting better water services on first nations? 6. a. can you tell me about your understanding of the meaning of “human rights”? b. do you think human rights are relevant to the issue of first nations’ access to water? why/why not? tell me more. 7. a. can you tell me about your understanding of the meaning of “public health”? b. do you think public health is relevant to the issue of first nations’ access to water? why/why not? tell me more. 8. a. have you had personal experience interacting one on one with first nations persons? can you tell me more about this? b. is there anything you want to tell me about your interactions with or impressions of first nations persons? 9. is there anything else you’d like to add? anything that you’ve told me that you wish to clarify? 2 this estimate may be incorrect. a more accurate estimate is approximately 3,000 homes (h. fallding, personal communication, june 24, 2014). development of a decolonising framework for aboriginal and torres strait islander health policy analysis in australia the international indigenous policy journal volume 13 | issue 3 december 2022 development of a decolonising framework for aboriginal and torres strait islander health policy analysis in australia helen kehoe the australian national university, australia, helen.kehoe@anu.edu.au heike schütze unsw sydney, australia, h.schutze@unsw.edu.au geoffrey spurling the university of queensland, australia, g.spurling@uq.edu.au raymond lovett the australian national university, australia, raymond.lovett@anu.edu.au recommended citation kehoe et al., (2022). development of a decolonising framework for aboriginal and torres straight islander health policy analysis in australia. the international indigenous policy journal, 13(3). https://10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.11269 development of a decolonising framework for aboriginal and torres strait islander health policy analysis in australia abstract analysis of policies relevant to aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples could help improve health outcomes—a critical challenge in australia. while there are many health policy analysis frameworks, we did not find one which supported decolonising approaches across stages of the policy cycle. generic frameworks were not based on decolonising approaches, and so risk perpetuating structural inequalities underpinning health disparities. aboriginal and torres strait islander specific frameworks articulated ways of working rather than addressing policy stages. we devised a new policy analysis framework by drawing upon aboriginal and torres strait islander specific and other policy analysis frameworks. the new framework can help critically analyse existing aboriginal and torres strait islander health policy and guide future policy making. acknowledgments hk is in receipt of australian government research training program fee-offset scholarship and australian government research training program domestic scholarship keywords decolonising health policy, healthy policy frameworks, approaches to health policy analysis creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ 1 kehoe et al.: development of a decolonising framework published by scholarsip@western, 2022 development of a decolonising framework for aboriginal and torres strait islander health policy analysis policies operationalise government agendas (coveney, 2010), direct efforts, and allocate resources and therefore have far-reaching impacts in the health system (lattimore et al., 2008). at a whole of population level, analysis of health policies can help build effectiveness, promote continuous improvement, ensure government accountability, and, ultimately, improve health outcomes (cheung et al., 2010; gilson et al., 2018; phulkerd et al., 2016). there is limited guidance about conducting health policy analysis, and resources and theoretical foundations are scarce (browne et al., 2018; casey et al., 2019; cheung et al., 2010; walt et al., 2008). the range of analytical approaches reflects different theories about the nature of policy making itself (browne et al., 2018; gilson & raphaely, 2008; walt et al., 2008). as explained by enserink et al., (2013) one theory suggests that policy arises from logical, rational, and “objective” processes undertaken by a single source of authority; another, the “garbage can” approach, sees policy developing through more chaotic processes which coincide through the input of multiple organisations and actors; while a third conceptualises policy as being generated through political and strategic gaming processes characterised by bargaining and power plays between networked stakeholders (enserink et al., 2013). while no single theory is fully explanatory, different theories help understand different aspects of policy making. similarly, different policy analysis approaches support different types of research questions (browne et al., 2018), and no single approach is appropriate in all settings (gilson et al., 2018). analysing health policy in an aboriginal and torres strait islander setting is both situated within this complex policy analysis environment and uniquely informed by the context of settler colonialism. applying aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples’ world views and values to health policy analysis is needed to critique and reform the colonialism underpinning the majority of australia’s policies affecting aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples’ health. examples of these policies include the forced removal of aboriginal and torres strait islander children from their families (human rights and equal opportunity commission, 1997); compulsory income management and other interventions specific to aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples’ introduced through the northern territory emergency response (australian indigenous doctors’ association and centre for health equity training research and evaluation unsw, 2010); and australia’s minimum age of criminal responsibility of 10 years (compared to the worldwide median age of 14) which leads to 70% of children aged 10-13 years in custody being aboriginal and torres strait islander (aboriginal legal service (nsw/act) limited, 2020). such policies, and the colonialism on which they are based, underlie intersecting political, economic, and social inequalities faced by first nations peoples (czyzewski, 2011; mackean et al., 2020; sherwood, 2013). these inequalities are demonstrated, for example, in the present-day disproportionate burden of disease among aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples (estimated at 2.3 times greater than non-indigenous australians) (australian institute of health and welfare, 2020), and the persistent gap in life expectancies between aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples’ and non-indigenous australians (8.6 years for males and 7.8 years for females) (australian institute of health and welfare, 2020). ongoing colonisation is operationalised partly through “epistemological racism” (larkin, 2006, p. 22), defined as the uncritical application of non-indigenous world views (rigney, 2001). such factors underly the establishment and maintenance of the australian state. they are epitomised by the lack of a treaty between aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples and non-indigenous settler 2 the international indigenous policy journal, 13. 3. doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.11269 colonial society (couzos & murray, 2008), and expressed through the constitution, under which “indigenous peoples in australia are…largely at the mercy of parliament and government in decisions made about their rights” (morris, 2018 p. 2). this power imbalance is reflected in policy processes affecting aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples. aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples and organisations, as well as some nonindigenous voices, have consistently called for aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples to have control of the development of policies that affect them (altman, 2009; calma, 2007; couzos & murray, 2008; national congress of australia's first peoples, 2016; yunupiŋu, 1988). despite this, the involvement of aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples is typically sought at implementation—rather than design and development—phases of policy making, if at all (couzos and murray, 2008). decolonisation approaches, or the “privileging of indigenous voices and epistemologies” (bainbridge et al., 2015, p. 4) have provided approaches to critique colonial hegemony in areas including research (prior, 2007), journalism (sweet et al., 2014), and education (shahjahan, 2011); however decolonisation approaches to policy analysis are not well described in the literature. we aimed to develop a decolonising policy analysis framework informed by existing frameworks and associated literature, that could be used to both retrospectively assess existing policies and prospectively guide the development of new policies. bridgman and davis described the policy cycle model, and delineated policy stages as: consultation, coordination, decision, implementation, evaluation, identification of issues, policy analysis and policy instruments (bridgman & davis, 2004). although the model has limitations, we drew upon this concept because it supports comprehensive analysis of all key features of public policy processes (coveney, 2010). our study focusses on analysis of the validity, alignment and quality of policies, as opposed, for example, to their effectiveness or impact (cheung et al., 2010; ellahi & zaka, 2015). materials and method we conducted two separate literature searches to identify 1. generic policy analysis frameworks and, 2. decolonising policy analysis frameworks. we drew upon the frameworks identified through these searches, as well as other relevant literature that adds to or critiques them, to form a decolonised and comprehensive policy analysis framework and indicators for assessment. search method, inclusion criteria and screening generic policy analysis frameworks: authors hk and hs searched five electronic databases (informit health, informit humanities, medline, scopus, and socindex) for generic policy analysis frameworks. the search terms, developed using a modified version of the pico framework (population, interest, comparison and outcome) (schardt et al., 2007), were: policy analysis and (tool or framework or guideline) and health. the following limits were applied: subject policy, policy making, policy analysis and health policy; published in english between 2000 and 2020; peerreviewed; and available in full text online. first the titles and abstracts of papers were screened against the inclusion criteria and papers that did not meet the criteria were excluded. the remaining papers were retrieved in full and further screened against the inclusion criteria. the search was supplemented using google scholar, by scanning the reference lists of included articles, and through expert input. articles were included if they used or proposed a health policy analysis framework which: incorporated a set of validated assessment 3 kehoe et al.: development of a decolonising framework published by scholarsip@western, 2022 criteria; supported identification of optimal policy solutions; was designed for application by examining content through policy document analysis; supported the consideration of policy stages from problem identification to evaluation; articulated a theoretical basis and, as we saw these as more likely to be directly applicable, had been used in practice. there were no additional exclusion criteria. australian decolonising policy analysis material: authors hs and hk searched seven electronic databases (humanities international complete, informit health, informit humanities and social sciences collection, informit indigenous collection, medline, scopus, and socindex). a wide search for policy analysis in any context was undertaken and included grey literature. the pico search terms were: (policy or framework or evaluation framework or guideline or reform) and (self-determination or human rights or cultural safety or decolonising) and australia and (aboriginal or torres strait islander or indigenous). limits applied were: published in english between 2010 and 2020 and available in full text online. first the titles and abstracts of papers were screened against the inclusion criteria and papers that did not meet the criteria were excluded. the remaining papers were retrieved in full and further screened against the inclusion criteria. the search was supplemented by using the lowitja literature search engine and google scholar, by hand searching, and through expert input. papers were included if they addressed culturally safe, decolonising approaches to health policy analysis in an aboriginal and torres strait islander context. there were no additional exclusion criteria. analysis the frameworks identified in both searches, which became the “parent” frameworks for the development of a new framework, were studied to identify their analytical criteria and assessment indicators, if any. to reduce duplication, we developed a new framework by combining elements from existing frameworks (bowen et al., 2010; tuah et al., 2011) rather than either applying them in series as separate processes (cairney, 2007) or by doing part of the analysis with one framework and a second part with another framework (hodge & davies, 2006). we systematically analysed each parent framework’s criteria to identify similarities and differences, then grouped criteria thematically into areas of commonality to develop principles for the new framework. we then developed corresponding indicators and ratings, drawing upon both the parent frameworks and the articles dealing with culturally safe, decolonising approaches to health policy analysis identified in the second literature search. the new framework was then piloted on a sub-set of existing policies specific to aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples health, and further refined. results literature search results generic policy analysis frameworks: the search yielded 668 results after duplicates were removed and limits were applied. the titles and abstracts of these papers were screened and resulted in 588 papers being removed leaving 80 papers. a further 78 papers were excluded after screening the full text against the inclusion criteria. the remaining two papers described or used a framework proposed by cheung et al. (cheung et al., 2010; jackson et al., 2016) which met the inclusion criteria. no additional papers were identified through supplementary searching or expert input. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, 13. 3. doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.11269 australian decolonising policy analysis material: the search yielded 424 results after duplicates were removed. the titles and abstracts were screened and resulted in 368 being removed. the remaining 56 items were retrieved in full. consistent with our broad search terms, we identified considerable literature which addressed decolonising approaches among these items (anderson, 2008; arnstein, 2019; bruhn, 2014; cairney and oliver, 2017; calma, 2007; couzos and murray, 2008; czyzewski, 2011; dudgeon et al., 2014; gilroy et al., 2013; hunt, 2013; larkin, 2006; lovett et al., 2019; mitchell et al., 2019; national constitutional convention, 2017; pahlman, 2014; productivity commission, 2013; productivity commission, 2019; sherwood, 2013; swan and raphael, 1995; thorpe et al., 2016; vujcich et al., 2016; yu, 2012). we also identified two explicit analytical frameworks: the framework to assess cultural safety in australian public policy authored by mackean et al. (2020), and the evaluation framework to improve aboriginal and torres strait islander health authored by kelaher et al. (2018). subsequent hand searching did not find examples of where either had been applied in practice. description and analysis of parent frameworks generic policy analysis framework: the cheung et al. (2010) framework, which was designed to support the analysis of policy content through assessment of policy documentation, used a three-tier rating structure to grade policies against each criterion, and used and recommended a process of document mapping to identify linkages across policies. the framework was developed by adapting previously validated criteria based on von wright’s “logic of events” theory (rutten et al., 2003, p. 295). it suggests the analysis of seven criteria: accessibility of policy documentation; policy background or source; goals; resources; monitoring and evaluation; stakeholder involvement; and obligations of various implementers; and proposes indicators for each criterion, as well as a rating structure (cheung et al., 2010). australian decolonising policy analysis frameworks: the frameworks by mackean et al. (2020) and kelaher et al. (2018) critiqued and sought to improve policy processes affecting aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples. the mackean et al. framework is applicable to all policies (not just health policies) and comprises five main criteria: reflexivity, dialogue, power differences, decolonisation and regardful care. each criterion is supported by three to five sub-criteria. the framework does not describe indicators for assessment (mackean et al., 2020). while focussed on health policy evaluation, the kelaher et al. framework is applicable to all stages of policy processes. it proposes 11 main criteria comprising: partnerships with aboriginal and torres strait islander organisations and communities; shared responsibility; engagement with aboriginal and torres strait islander people and communities; capacity building; equity; accountability; evidence based; holistic concept of health; cultural competence; data governance and intellectual property; and capitalising on indigenous strengths. each criterion has a description, outcomes, and indicators. the kelaher et al. framework does not include a rating structure to grade policies (kelaher et al., 2018). results overview and new framework no single framework we identified was sufficient on its own to undertake comprehensive decolonising analysis of all policy stages described by bridgeman & davis, that is: consultation, coordination, decision, implementation, evaluation, identification of issues, policy analysis and policy instruments (2004). the generic framework was not based on decolonising approaches, and so risked perpetuating structural inequalities underpinning health disparities. aboriginal and torres 5 kehoe et al.: development of a decolonising framework published by scholarsip@western, 2022 strait islander specific frameworks articulated ways of working rather than addressing policy stages. therefore, we drew upon all three parent frameworks, as well as other literature addressing policy analysis in a decolonising context, to develop the principles and indicators for our new analytical framework (table 1). this process is detailed separately for each principle in the following section. while only two of the parent frameworks (cheung et al., 2010; kelaher et al., 2018) included indicators, we found that a clear articulation of the principle in practice made indicators obvious. for example, when we determined that accessibility of policy documentation was a necessary element of accountability, it was clear that the extent to which policy documentation was accessible was a correspondingly necessary indicator. once the new framework was drafted, we piloted it by applying it to five health policies regarding aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples access to the australian pharmaceutical benefits scheme. the testing consisted of assessing policy documentation on each of the five policies against the seven principles described in the draft framework. this process showed that the 29 indicators initially considered could be reduced to a final set of 21, as in practice we found that very similar indicators had been included under more than one principle. for example, the initial indicator set included an indicator regarding responses to emerging monitoring and evaluation findings under three principles, and this was streamlined to appear under just one principle. new decolonising framework our decolonising analytical framework comprises seven inter-related principles. two key principles (power sharing; and transparency and accountability) inform all phases of policy making and five additional principles relate to specific policy stages and processes: defensible policy basis; legitimate policy content and logic; ways of working that advance decolonisation; responsible policy implementation; and monitoring and evaluation. a model of our framework (see figure 1) shows power sharing at the centre, as all other principles depend upon this. the principle of transparency and accountability encircles other principles as it detects and addresses any deficits in the policy process. the principles and their relationship to the three existing parent frameworks are described in table 1. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, 13. 3. doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.11269 figure 1. decolonising policy analysis framework model 7 kehoe et al.: development of a decolonising framework published by scholarsip@western, 2022 table 1. relationship between proposed principles and existing frameworks principle cheung et al. (cheung et al., 2010) mackean et al. framework (mackean et al., 2020) kelaher et al. framework (kelaher et al., 2018) power sharing stakeholder involvement dialogue power differences partnerships with aboriginal and torres strait islander organisations and communities shared responsibility engagement with aboriginal and torres strait islander people and communities transparency and accountability accessibility of policy documentation accountability: (for) e.g., effects of policy inconsistency accountability ensure program documentation, evaluation briefs, request for tender documentation and evaluation reports are publicly available in perpetuity defensible policy basis policy background or source recognition: (of) e.g., impacts of colonisation; respect for cultures equity evidence based legitimate policy content and logic goals regardful care holistic concept of health ways of working that advance decolonisation reflexivity decolonisation capacity building of aboriginal and torres strait islander communities cultural competence data governance and intellectual property capitalising on indigenous strengths responsible policy implementation resources obligations of various implementers implementation should be reviewed regularly against indicators and be revised in response to findings monitoring and evaluation monitoring and evaluation monitoring and evaluation are the focus of the whole framework 8 the international indigenous policy journal, 13. 3. doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.11269 power sharing while not using this terminology, all three existing frameworks included concepts relevant to power sharing in their main criteria. these comprised: stakeholder involvement (cheung et al., 2010); dialogue and power differences (mackean et al., 2020); and partnerships, shared responsibility, and engagement (kelaher et al., 2018). the mackean et al. (2020) and kelaher et al. (2018) frameworks describe the role of aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples affected by policies using nouns such as involvement, recognition, partnership, acknowledgement, engagement, and participation; and verbs such as understood, consulted, listened to, and have input to. other key decolonising sources place greater emphasis on the impact of the underlying power imbalance between non-indigenous australians and institutions on the one hand, and aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples on the other, and seek to address this through more formalised processes. this imbalance, characterised by noel pearson as the “elephant and the mouse problem” (pearson, 2014, p. 8), has been described by aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples as the “torment of powerlessness” (national constitutional convention, 2017, para. 7). literature focussed on relations between government and aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples underpinning policy processes (calma, 2007; hunt, 2013; thorpe et al., 2016) is grounded on principles enshrined in the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous people (united nations general assembly, 2007) and focussed on the declaration’s requirement to obtain aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples free, prior and informed consent about matters affecting them. in this literature, power sharing is described in terms of sovereignty, treaty, citizen control, delegated power and partnership; and is enacted through legal or contractual mechanisms which incorporate independent monitoring and reporting processes (calma, 2007; hunt, 2013; thorpe et al., 2016). our principle of power sharing is defined as policy environments where aboriginal and torres strait islander control and partnership is supported by legal or contractual requirements; aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples and organisations are sufficiently resourced to participate in policy processes on an equal footing with government; and where their rights to free prior and informed consent are upheld. transparency and accountability the kelaher et al. framework includes accountability as a main criterion, and the mackean et al. framework includes this as a sub-criterion. both highlight the need for processes to support continuous improvement: for example, the need to address policy failures (mackean et al., 2020); and the importance of responding to evaluation findings (kelaher et al., 2018). in addition, the cheung et al. framework includes continued access to policy documents over time as a main criterion, and this is also articulated in the kelaher et al. framework as a sub-criteria, as barriers to accessing materials and in mapping relationships between multiple components compromise analysis and accountability (cheung et al., 2010; kelaher et al., 2018). other decolonising sources echo the need for greater transparency and accountability, and place this within the context of historic and ongoing policy failure. failures include elements of incrementalism, failure to learn from previous experience resulting in cyclical processes and policy churn, and policy development processes which exclude aboriginal and torres strait islander 9 kehoe et al.: development of a decolonising framework published by scholarsip@western, 2022 peoples (calma, 2007; couzos & murray, 2008). policy churn, where change is made without identifying problems with existing policy and how the changes address them, allows governments to avoid public scrutiny for policy failures (monios, 2017). our principle of transparency and accountability is defined as policy processes: where complete documentation detailing all policy stages is publicly available; and which incorporate strong accountability structures and processes embedded within all policy stages. defensible policy basis the cheung et al. and kelaher et al. frameworks identify the basis on which policies are founded as a key criterion, while the mackean et al. framework notes the importance of recognising the impacts of colonisation in policy bases as a sub-criterion. the cheung et al. framework notes various sources of health policy (cheung et al., 2010); while the kelaher et al. framework describes the need to advance equity and make use of both established evidence and emerging evaluation outcomes in policy design (kelaher et al., 2018). both general policy and decolonising literature address the basis of policies. while evidence-based policy making is sometimes seen as best practice (bowman et al., 2012; productivity commission, 2013), uncritical adoption of evidence-based medicine principles in the policy sphere is problematic. this is due to three main factors: policymaking is a judgement-based political process; the production of “evidence” itself is subjective (cairney & oliver, 2017; pahlman, 2014; vujcich et al., 2016); and policy making of substance may involve novel approaches where impacts are not fully predictable (banks, 2009). these limitations have particular application in population health policy (kemm, 2006). an overreliance on evidence of effectiveness risks skewing the development of public health policy away from a social determinants focus and towards medical, individual-based solutions (banta, 2003). in addition, evidence may be least available in relation to population sub-groups who are most in need of health interventions (vujcich et al., 2016). an absolute requirement for evidence before action risks widening the gaps between advantaged and disadvantaged groups. from a decolonising perspective, these challenges have additional dimensions for health policy addressing the needs of aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples. while aboriginal and torres strait islander representative bodies support evidence-based action (national aboriginal community controlled health organisation, 2013), they do not do so uncritically (couzos, 2008). for example, decolonising approaches highlight that understandings of what constitutes evidence are embedded in unequal power structures between non-indigenous and aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples (larkin, 2006; pahlman, 2014). aboriginal health advocates have also underscored the risks of policy makers requiring “proof” that treatments shown to work elsewhere will be effective before extending them to aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples (couzos, 2008; kelaher et al., 2018). in aboriginal and torres strait islander health, it may be “both necessary and justifiable” to develop policies despite a lack of strong evidence (vujcich et al., 2016, p. 10), with the proviso that standard requirements for monitoring and review become of even greater importance (banks, 2009). 10 the international indigenous policy journal, 13. 3. doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.11269 our principle of defensible policy basis is defined as policy processes where: the basis of the policy is clear, explicit and consistent; and the policy recognises knowledge gaps and establishes processes to address them. legitimate policy content and logic while the cheung et al. framework does not address policy content, both the mackean et al. and kelaher et al. frameworks address the requirements of legitimate policy content in their main criteria and highlight the importance of the adoption of indigenous knowledges. the only framework to address policy logic, the cheung et al. framework, notes that policies should include clear goals, and be based on external consistency (the policy logic is supported by experience in other settings) and internal validity (the extent of alignment between policy logic and intended outcomes) (cheung et al., 2010). from a decolonising perspective, legitimate policy content begins with recognising and responding to structural exclusion, access and racism; prioritising community-identified health priorities; and acknowledging the continuing impact of colonisation on aboriginal and torres strait islander health (dudgeon et al., 2014; gilroy et al., 2013; swan & raphael, 1995). aboriginal and torres strait islander knowledge, culture and history should be recognised and incorporated in policy content (black & mcbean, 2016). policy content issues also include flexibility and eligibility criteria. policies should be sufficiently flexible to meet local priorities (gilroy et al., 2013; hunt, 2013; jackson et al., 2012), and eligibility criteria, whether for providers or recipients, should be carefully considered as these can limit coverage of the population intended to benefit (lattimore et al., 2008). general policy analysis literature supports the concept of policy logic advanced in the cheung et al. framework. policies are intended to effect change through mechanisms based on inferences about causation, described as “if-then” links between each policy component (langer et al., 2011, p. 1632). however, policies rarely make explicit their underlying theory of change, chains of policy logic or the assumptions which underpin them. the logical construction of these elements is of greatest importance when evidence is weak (haby & bowen, 2010). examining the coherence, consistency and logic of policies is an important aspect of overall policy analysis (howlett, 2017; palmer & short, 2000). policy logic also involves locating new or revised policies within the existing policy landscape. where policies are related, mapping connections between them is needed (cheung et al., 2010) to ensure that policy “layering” (where new policies are added on top of existing similar policies) avoids creating conflict (rudoler et al., 2019). from a decolonising perspective, aboriginal and torres strait islander policies have been weakened by policy fragmentation (anderson, 2008; browne et al., 2014), and by a failure to learn from existing evaluations (bailie et al., 2019). our principle of legitimate policy content and logic is defined as policy processes which: recognise and respond to the indigenous social determinants of health and aboriginal and torres strait islander knowledge, culture and history; respond to aboriginal and torres strait islander-identified health priorities; allow for flexible adoption at local levels; are logically coherent; identify existing related policies and demonstrate integration with these; and maximise coverage of aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples by minimising eligibility criteria for participants and health providers. 11 kehoe et al.: development of a decolonising framework published by scholarsip@western, 2022 ways of working to advance decolonisation ways of working to advance decolonisation are not addressed in the cheung et al. framework, but are included as main criteria in both the mackean et al. and kelaher et al. frameworks. relevant criteria are reflexivity, power differences and decolonisation in the mackean et al. framework and cultural competence, data governance and intellectual property in the kelaher et al. framework. themes identified in key decolonising literature relate to governance processes, data, and the realisation of capability. the importance of effective governance has been recognised for both government and aboriginal and torres strait islander organisations (hunt, 2013). government has responsibilities to provide sufficiently senior and culturally competent staff, to be transparent about limitations, and to improve coordination between different government agencies before seeking engagement with aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples (thorpe et al., 2016). effective governance processes help support knowledge translation, and capture benefits for aboriginal and torres strait islander people (mackean et al., 2020). data regarding aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples are intrinsically political (bruhn, 2014; walter & suina, 2018; yu, 2012). as part of self-determination, processes of collection and use of aboriginal and torres strait islander data currently controlled by governments must be transferred to aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples to inform priorities and to monitor change, which will add to accountability (davis, 2016; lovett, 2016). given entrenched power differentials between government and aboriginal and torres strait islander organisations, the realisation of capability is of critical importance (hunt, 2013). policy processes must support the leadership of aboriginal and torres strait islander people, communities and organisations to engage in all policy processes, and incorporate recognition of aboriginal and torres strait islander strengths (swan & raphael, 1995). likewise, capacity building within government systems, to recognise limitations and engage in decolonising approaches, is also needed (thorpe et al., 2016). our principle of ways of working to advance decolonisation is defined as policy processes in which: government governance processes support decolonisation; resourcing of the realisation of capability throughout policy stages is adequate; and data governance agreements promote and maintain aboriginal and torres strait islander data sovereignty and intellectual property rights. responsible policy implementation policy implementation is not given high priority in the three source frameworks. the cheung et al. framework includes limited recognition of this issue as a component of its main criterion of “obligations,” the kelaher et al. framework refers to implementation as a sub-criterion, and the mackean et al. framework does not address implementation. other key sources note that implementation is an essential part of policy making and should be considered from policy inception (bhuyan et al.,2010; kennedy et al., 2019). from a decolonising perspective, ineffective implementation is characteristic of aboriginal and torres strait islander health policies (australian human rights commission, 2005; calma, 2007). implementation requires sufficient resourcing, including funding, timing and workforce (baeza et al., 2009; couzos & murray, 2008; dudgeon et al., 2014; kalisch & al-yaman, 2013; matthews et al., 2008) and time 12 the international indigenous policy journal, 13. 3. doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.11269 limited policies are inherently limited in impact (kalisch & al-yaman, 2013). workforce constraints present particular challenges for aboriginal and torres strait islander health policies: addressing these is integral to policy implementation (cox, 2014). our principle of responsible policy implementation is defined as policy processes in which: resourcing is adequate to achieve policy goals; and implementation issues are identified and addressed as they arise. monitoring and evaluation while the mackean et al. framework does not address monitoring and evaluation issues, these are embedded throughout the kelaher et al. framework, and are identified as a main criterion in the cheung et al. framework. despite consensus in the general policy analysis literature that strong monitoring and evaluation processes are essential to both deliver the potential of current policies and improve the design of future policies (productivity commission, 2013, 2019), evaluations of public health policies are rare (wharam & daniels, 2007) and face particular challenges (banta, 2003; germov, 2009; lattimore et al., 2008). such challenges include the breadth of public health interventions across social determinants of health; the context-specific nature of health impacts which can limit generalisability; the time lag, or latency period, between intervention and outcome and, given the complexity of factors influencing health, the difficulties in attributing causation to particular interventions. from a decolonising viewpoint, evaluation is critical to monitor processes and outcomes “especially when evidence bases are weak” (banks, 2009), and to ensure a human rights-based approach (calma, 2007). monitoring and evaluation should strengthen information systems to ensure availability of relevant data; guarantee government accountability to aboriginal and torres strait islander communities and the australian public; and include pre-agreed targets. however, only a minority of aboriginal and torres strait islander policies are evaluated, and even when undertaken, evaluations are often not publicly released (kelaher et al., 2018; lokuge et al., 2017) or considered in either revising existing policies or developing new ones (calma, 2007). our principle of monitoring and evaluation is defined as policy processes in which: explicit monitoring and evaluation mechanisms are included from the outset; monitoring and evaluation findings are provided publicly and in formats accessible to aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples; and evaluation and review findings are incorporated in policy improvements. indicators and rating scale to assess if policy processes are decolonising, indicators for each of the framework’s principles were developed to help apply the framework in practice. these indicators guide assessment of the extent to which principles are embodied in existing or proposed policies, and, as used in the cheung et al. framework, we applied a three-tier rating structure for this assessment (table 2). 13 kehoe et al.: development of a decolonising framework published by scholarsip@western, 2022 table 2. principles, indicators and rating scale indicators rating scale high medium low principle 1. power sharing 1a) what power sharing arrangements are in place? aboriginal and torres strait islander control and partnership is supported by legal or contractual requirements. consultation, information, or advisory processes are in place. power sharing processes are non-participatory or no relevant material found. 1b) are aboriginal and torres strait islander organisations sufficiently resourced to enable equality of participation at all policy stages*? aboriginal and torres strait islander representative organisations are sufficiently resourced to enable equality of participation at all policy stages. * aboriginal and torres strait islander representative organisations are insufficiently resourced to enable an equal level of participation and or not at all policy stages*. aboriginal and torres strait islander representative organisations are not resourced to enable participation or no relevant material found. 1c) are aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples’ rights to free prior and informed consent to policy implementation upheld? aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples’ rights to free prior and informed consent are fully upheld. aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples’ rights to free prior and informed consent are partially upheld. aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples’ rights to free prior and informed consent are contravened or no relevant material found. principle 2. transparency and accountability 2a) is policy documentation detailing all policy stages* available? complete policy documentation detailing all policy stages* is available. partial policy documentation detailing some policy stages* is available. policy documentation is scant, or unavailable or no relevant material found. 2b) what accountability structures and processes support the policy? strong accountability structures and processes are embedded within all policy stages*. some accountability structures and processes are associated with the policy and or at some policy stages*. accountability structures and processes are absent or no relevant material found. principle 3. defensible policy basis 3a) how is the basis of the policy presented? the basis of the policy (including the connection between policy basis and available evidence) is clear, explicit and consistent. the basis of the policy (including the connection between policy basis and available evidence) is partially clear, explicit and consistent. the basis of the policy (including the connection between policy basis and available evidence) is not clear, explicit and consistent. or no relevant material found. 3b) how does the policy recognise knowledge gaps and respond to them? the policy explicitly recognises knowledge gaps and establishes processes to address them. the policy partially recognises knowledge gaps and/or processes to address these are unclear. knowledge gaps and/or plans to address them are not acknowledged or no relevant material found. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, 13. 3. doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.11269 indicators rating scale high medium low principle 4. legitimate policy content and logic 4a) how does the policy recognise and respond to indigenous social determinants of health (including structural exclusion, access, racism, and the continuing impact of colonisation), and aboriginal and torres strait islander knowledge, culture, and history? the policy explicitly recognises and responds to the indigenous social determinants of health, and aboriginal and torres strait islander knowledge, culture, and history. the policy includes aspects indicating an implicit recognition of and/or response to the indigenous social determinants of health, and aboriginal and torres strait islander knowledge, culture, and history. the policy does not refer to the indigenous social determinants of health; and/or aboriginal and torres strait islander knowledge, culture and history or no relevant material found. 4b) does the policy respond to aboriginal and torres strait islander identified health priorities? the policy explicitly responds to aboriginal and torres strait islander identified health priorities. the policy implicitly and partially responds to aboriginal and torres strait islander identified health priorities. the policy does not respond to aboriginal and torres strait islander identified health priorities or no relevant material found. 4c) does the policy allow for flexible adoption at local levels? the policy has a high level of local flexibility. the policy has limited local flexibility. the policy does not have local flexibility or no relevant material found. 4d) is the policy logically coherent (that is, is the underlying theory of change clear; is policy logic supported by experience in other settings; and is policy structure logically consistent with policy goals?) policy logic is coherent. , policy logic is partially coherent. policy logic is not coherent or no relevant material found. 4e) how is the policy integrated with related policies? policy identifies existing related policies and demonstrates full integration with these. policy partially identifies existing related policies and/or is partially integrated with them. policy does not identify existing related policies and/or is not integrated with them or no relevant material found. 4f) does the policy incorporate eligibility criteria or restrictions which impact on potential benefit? all aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples and their health providers are eligible. there are minor eligibility criteria or restrictions which partially restrict access by aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples and or their health providers. there are major eligibility criteria or restrictions which considerably restrict access by aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples and or their health providers or no relevant material found. principle 5. ways of working that advance decolonisation 5a) do government governance processes (including provision of appropriately senior and culturally competent staff, transparency about limitations; and coordination between different government agencies) support decolonisation? government governance processes advance decolonisation throughout all policy stages*. government governance advance decolonisation to a lesser extent and/or at some points. government governance processes do not advance decolonisation or no relevant material found. 15 kehoe et al.: development of a decolonising framework published by scholarsip@western, 2022 indicators rating scale high medium low 5b) does the policy include resourcing that promotes the realisation of capability (for both government and aboriginal and torres strait islander partners) throughout all policy stages*. the policy includes adequate resourcing that promotes the realisation of capability throughout all policy stages*. the policy includes some resourcing that promotes the realisation of capability at some policy stages*. the policy does not include resourcing that promotes the realisation of capability or no relevant material found. 5c) are data governance agreements in place that promote and maintain aboriginal and torres strait islander data sovereignty and intellectual property rights (including ensuring proper storage of, and access to, data for aboriginal and torres strait islander communities)? clear written data governance agreements are in place that promote and maintain aboriginal and torres strait islander data sovereignty and intellectual property rights. data governance agreements are weak, unclear, or incomplete. data governance agreements are absent or no relevant material found. principle 6. responsible policy implementation 6a) is the policy adequately resourced (including funding, timing and workforce) to achieve its goals? resourcing is fully adequate. resourcing is partially adequate. resourcing is inadequate or no relevant material found. 6b) how does the policy respond to emerging implementation issues? implementation issues are identified and addressed as they arise. processes to identify and respond to implementation issues are unclear and/or inadequate. implementation issues are not identified or responded to, or no relevant material found. principle 7. monitoring and evaluation 7b) how are monitoring and evaluation findings communicated? monitoring and evaluation findings are both publicly available and provided in formats accessible to aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples including at the community level. monitoring and evaluation findings are either not publicly available or provided only in general publicly available formats, with no aboriginal and torres strait islander specific communication. monitoring and evaluation findings neither publicly available or provided in aboriginal and torres strait islander specific communication or no relevant material found. 7c) how are policy improvements made in response to evaluation and review findings? evaluation and review findings are incorporated in making policy improvements. evaluation and review findings are partially considered in making policy improvements. evaluation findings and review are not used to make policy improvements or no relevant material found. *policy stages are defined as: consultation, coordination, decision, implementation, evaluation, identification of issues, policy analysis, policy instruments (bridgman & davis, 2004). 16 the international indigenous policy journal, 13. 3. doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.11269 discussion our study did not find a framework which supported a decolonising approach to the analysis of health policy content concerning aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples across all policy stages. we integrated principles advanced by aboriginal and torres strait islander specific frameworks and associated literature on decolonising policy with a generic analytical framework to create a new framework to address this gap. the key strength of this study is the integration of aboriginal and torres strait islander analytical frameworks with an established, generic health policy analysis framework in the context of general policy analysis material and decolonising specific literature in particular. the major contribution of this study, the new decolonising framework, can be used to both retrospectively assess existing policies, and prospectively to guide the development of new policies. the framework’s seven principles and supporting rating matrix can assess the quality of policy design and development. based on aboriginal and torres strait islander principles and practice, the framework provides an important tool in combatting implicit bias, or “mental associations that can lead to unintentional discrimination” (payne & vuletich, 2017, p. 49). without such support for the conscious adoption of decolonising perspectives, policy analysis processes risk maintaining the implicit biases embedded in policy processes under review. similar studies have developed analytical approaches to address the needs of other specific populations. for example, equiframe, which assesses the extent to which health policies advance the human rights of vulnerable groups (amin et al., 2011), has been applied in a health literacy study (trezona et al., 2018). similarly, the he pikinga waiora implementation framework, which aimed to improve health programs for māori communities, gauged policies against four culturally-based elements (oetzel et al., 2017). in contrast to our decolonising framework, neither the equiframe or he pikinga waiora framework support consideration of all policy stages. however, both highlight the importance of criteria specifically focussed on the needs of minorities affected by policy processes. one limitation of this review is that the validity and utility of the framework are yet to established through practical application. the new framework, especially the proposed indicators, may require modification in light of these processes. an associated potential limitation is that the determination of ratings for policy attributes are necessarily at least partially subjective. a further limitation is that policy analysis is a highly contested field (enserink et al., 2013). particularly in regard to selection of an appropriate generic health policy analysis framework, we purposively drew upon theoretical foundations and analytical processes relevant to our research focus: that is, those that supported identification of optimal policy solutions; focussed on policy content; were designed for document analysis; and considered all policy stages. while we attempted to ensure our framework was informed by a breadth of related literature on policy and policy analysis, selecting one approach necessarily deselects others. different research aims would require the use of different analytical approaches and may draw upon theories and frameworks not included in this review or incorporated in the framework. 17 kehoe et al.: development of a decolonising framework published by scholarsip@western, 2022 conclusion analysis of aboriginal and torres strait islander health policy is needed to enable reflection, debate and learning (couzos & murray, 2008) but must be undertaken from a decolonising perspective to ensure such policy centres on aboriginal and torres strait islander principles. our new policy analysis framework gives a structure in which a range of policy failures, such as the exclusion of aboriginal and torres strait 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(2007). toward evidence-based policy making and standardized assessment of health policy reform. journal of the american medical association, 298(6), 676-679. https://doi.org/10.1080/13645579.2018.1531228 yu, p. (2012). the power of data in aboriginal hands. centre for aboriginal economic policy research anu college of arts & social sciences. https://caepr.cass.anu.edu.au/research/publications/power-data-aboriginal-hands yunupiŋu, g. (1988). barunga statement. barunga northern territory: northern land council and central land council. https://aiatsis.gov.au/explore/articles/barunga-statement https://doi.org/10.1080/13645579.2018.1531228 https://aiatsis.gov.au/explore/articles/barunga-statement “i'll struggle, and i'll fall…i'll have my days, but it's okay”: indigenous women surviving the sixties scoop the international indigenous policy journal volume 13 | issue 1 june 2022 “i'll struggle, and i'll fall…i'll have my days, but it's okay”: indigenous women surviving the sixties scoop janani kodeeswaran university of toronto, canada, janani.kodeeswaran@mail.utoronto.ca maggie campaigne ywca, toronto, canada, mcampaigne@ywcatoronto.org anita c. benoit university of toronto, canada, anita.benoit@utoronto.ca recommended citation kodeeswaran, j., & campaigne, m., benoit, a. c. (2022). “i’ll struggle, and i’ll fall . . . i’ll have my days, but it’s okay”: indigenous women surviving the sixties scoop. the international indigenous policy journal, 13(1). https://10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.13570 “i'll struggle, and i'll fall…i'll have my days, but it's okay”: indigenous women surviving the sixties scoop abstract sixties scoop survivors possess different levels of cultural knowledge. our objectives were for indigenous women 1) to increase their cultural knowledge through teachings and engagement with knowledge carriers, 2) to have other supports and resources they require identified, and 3) to participate in a full moon ceremony. community-based research principles were used to establish the study design and research process. teaching circles and full moon ceremonies were held and experiences in the study collected through focus group discussions. five themes were identified which included the manifestations of the sixties scoop, longing for culture, (re)connecting to culture, the impacts of culture, and barriers to practicing culture. important recommendations emerged regarding the practice of culture in ceremony and in programs. keywords indigenous people, culture, sixties scoop, survivors, ceremonies acknowledgments we acknowledge and thank the stewards of the land on which our research project was conducted, on the traditional territory of the wendat, the anishnaabeg, haudenosaunee, métis, and the mississaugas of the new credit first nation. we want to recognize our ancestors, all those that share their cultural wisdom, and our connections to all aspects of the environment such as the water, land, animals, and plants. our deepest gratitude to the indigenous women who dedicated their time to our project. their insights, personal stories, and contributions have been invaluable in understanding how the full moon ceremony and teachings may contribute to the wellbeing journeys of sixties scoop survivors. we would like to thank the grandmothers, elders, cultural teacher, grandfathers, and fire keepers for facilitating the weekly teaching circles and monthly ceremonies. a special thanks to patricia schuyler who was the former community engagement worker in indigenous arts & cultures at the elm centre, ywca toronto. she conceptualized the project idea in her continued dedication to promoting cultural programming. our sincere appreciation goes to maggie campaigne for ensuring the project was carried out in a good way by organizing and co-facilitating the teaching circles and full moon ceremony. we also want to acknowledge danielle nakouz, manager of the elm centre at the ywca toronto, for supporting this project and for in-kind support. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ 1 kodeeswaran et al.: indigenous women surviving the sixties scoop published by scholarship@western, 2019 “i'll struggle, and i'll fall…i'll have my days, but it's okay”: indigenous women surviving the sixties scoop the sixties scoop and indigeneity in canada, historical and current day colonial policies and practices exercise control over the lives of first nations and métis peoples and inuit (collectively referred to as indigenous peoples within the canadian constitution 1982) (cardinal, 2016; lewis, 2015; mckenzie et al., 2016; woolford & benvenuto, 2015). the “sixties scoop,” which took place from the 1950s to 1980s, is an example of policies and practices that displaced and disrupted indigenous peoples and their families from connecting to culture and community (cardinal, 2016; mckenzie et al., 2016). at least 20,000 indigenous children were forcibly removed from their birth families and communities and placed into non-indigenous foster care or adoptive homes in canada, the united states, and overseas (cardinal, 2016; johnston, 1983; sinclair, 2007). as an extension of the political agenda of residential schools, the sixties scoop promoted cultural genocide and forced assimilation into european culture (kirmayer et al., 2014; spencer, 2017). consequently, sixties scoop survivors removed from their families, communities, and nations do not readily have access to the teachings and ceremonies of their nations (cardinal, 2016). also, many sixties scoop survivors experience adverse determinants of health while searching for their cultural narratives (alston-o’connor, 2010; fachinger, 2019). destabilization of indigeneity, including its attempted erasure from the canadian cultural landscape, has led to identity struggles for sixties scoop survivors. although, there are diverse understandings of indigeneity, it may be characterized for indigenous persons as “intergenerational system[s] of their place-based relationships connecting humans and nonhuman beings (e.g., plants and animals), entities (e.g., spirits and sacred shrines), and systems,” an ancestral connection to the first inhabitants of a geographic location, as colonized peoples, or as peoples with no other homeland then the one they occupy (gregg, 2019, pp. 828-829; kobayashi & de leeuw, 2010; smith, 1999). sixties scoop survivors were forced to acculturate into a middle-class, white western society while being denied exposure to their indigenous cultural and ancestral roots (cardinal, 2016; fournier & crey, 1997; kulusic, 2005; milner, 2001; nuttgens, 2013; sinclair, 2007; spencer, 2017). some survivors were torn from their culture by their adoptive parents through physical, sexual, or psychological abuse (choate et al., 2019; milner, 2001; spencer, 2017). predominantly white adoptive parents were unable to provide indigenous children with the resources, support, and ethnic identity role modelling to cope with discrimination and prejudices experienced outside the home (bagley et al., 1993; bensen, 2001; nuttgens, 2013; sinclair, 2007). even if survivors adopted the culture of their non-indigenous families, they still grappled with multiple forms of discrimination and identity conflicts occurring from being unable to envision what being indigenous meant (mckenzie et al., 2016; nuttgens, 2013; sinclair, 2007). some survivors also experienced “native shame,” which led to internalized racism (cardinal, 2016; nuttgens, 2013). sixties scoop survivors have expressed how significantly their health and wellbeing has been compromised, resulting for some in poor mental health, substance use, or lowered social connectedness (blackstock et al., 2004; choate et al., 2019; fournier & crey, 1997; johnston, 1983; mckenzie et al., 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.13570 2016; sinclair, 2007; spencer, 2017). low connectedness has been associated with experiences of loneliness, anxiety, anger, depression, poor coping behaviours, and low self-esteem (carriere, 2005; spencer, 2017). adverse health outcomes and poor coping strategies resulting from low social connectedness was found among indigenous peoples (lee et al., 2000; mccormick, 2000; spencer, 2017). a sixties scoop survivor attributed his drug use to being taken away from his family as a child, being constantly moved around while in foster care, and not having contact with his parents (spencer, 2017). to cope with the negative emotions and trauma associated with their experiences, some sixties scoop survivors have reported substance use as well as dropping out of school and even attempting suicide (choate et al., 2019; sinclair, 2007). (re)connecting with indigeneity (re)connecting with indigeneity as a sixties scoop survivor has not been fully explored in the literature (cardinal, 2016; nuttgens, 2013). survivors’ journeys of reconnecting with their culture through their birth families, communities, and the land are distinct, varied, complex, and often a continuous process (cardinal, 2016; varley, 2016). (re)connecting has been described as a reawakening of their spiritual selves (carriere, 2005; varley, 2016). however, many survivors were hesitant to reconnect due to their unfamiliarity with the language, traditions, and customs (carriere, 2005; sinclair, 2007). reconnecting was also difficult for those who were unable to identify their birth families and communities, and without a clear path were unable to envision how to reconnect and the significance of doing so (carriere, 2005; nuttgens, 2013). (re)connecting with indigeneity has been described as protective against adverse health outcomes and useful for a holistic sense of wellbeing, which may be beneficial to sixties scoop survivors (brown et al., 2016; carriere, 2005). information on the process of cultural reconnection and its implications for wellbeing is limited. cultural knowledge for achieving wellbeing from the intergenerational trauma of the sixties scoop and other colonial practices is an important resource (black et al., 2019; kirmayer et al., 2003; kulusic, 2005; menzies, 2008). cultural activities have included sweat lodges, vision quests, fasting, and engaging with various knowledge carriers (e.g., elders, cultural teachers, grandmothers) to restore or reinforce ties to the larger dimensions of indigenous cultures such as history, ceremony, land, family, and community (lavallée & poole, 2010; menzies, 2008; roy, 2014). cultural knowledge presents an opportunity for survivors to reconnect to their indigeneity (lavallée & poole, 2010; sinclair, 2007). indigenous healing practices have been beneficial to health for many indigenous peoples compared to solely relying on the biomedical model of health (benoit et al., 2003; marsh et al., 2015; mccormick, 2000). indigenous healing models recognizes that healing, particularly for intergenerational trauma, occurs at the individual, family, and community levels, and allows the individual to work through their memories of painful experiences more deeply (menzies, 2008; roy, 2014). carriere (2005) reviewed the significance of connectedness to indigenous cultures as a resource for health and wellbeing, as well as a form of affirmation through discussions with sixties scoop survivors (carriere, 2005). cultural knowledge and indigenous healing approaches nurture and support the reconnection to indigeneity, an integral part of the healing process for intergenerational trauma (kirmayer et al., 2003). previous literature has focused on understanding the perspectives of sixties scoop survivors and has yet to engage with them on how indigenous healing models and practices can benefit survivors (carriere, 3 kodeeswaran et al.: indigenous women surviving the sixties scoop published by scholarship@western, 2019 2005; milner, 2001; nuttgens, 2013; spencer, 2017). while there may be overlapping experiences of the sixties scoop, different gender experiences and implications on health and wellbeing may arise, due to unique experiences of discrimination for indigenous women, girls, and 2slgbtqqia+ people compared to indigenous men and boys (allan & smylie, 2015; halseth, 2013). applying an intersectional lens highlights the idea that indigenous women, girls, and 2slgbtqqia+ people are vulnerable to multiple systems of oppression compared to their male and non-indigenous counterparts (allan & smylie, 2015; crenshaw, 1989, 1991; maddison & partridge, 2014; mmiwg, 2019). they are significantly more likely to experience multiple systems of violence and poorer health outcomes, such as physical and psychological violence and abuse, hiv, and depression resulting in part from racialized gender violence (bingham et al., 2019; chmielowska & fuhr, 2017; garcia-del moral, 2018). the overall purpose of our qualitative research project was to establish an environment where reconnecting to culture was facilitated. teaching circles were held culminating in a full moon ceremony for indigenous women who are sixties scoop survivors. our objectives were for indigenous women to 1) increase their cultural knowledge through teachings and engagement with knowledge carriers, 2) have other supports and resources they require identified, and 3) participate in a full moon ceremony. methodology community-based research principles project concept. community-based research (cbr) principles were followed in developing and facilitating this research project (israel et al., 1998). the project idea stemmed from the community partner’s indigenous community engagement worker, who noted that many women she supported were also sixties scoop survivors. she worked in an urban housing facility in toronto, ontario, that provided housing to indigenous women and their children and delivered mental health and wellbeing programs including cultural programming. the women shared with the community engagement worker their differing levels of connection to their communities, families, and their cultures, which sometimes led to tension between the women. the community engagement worker suggested that creating a space for sharing cultural knowledges through teachings and working with knowledge carriers could build individual and collective cultural knowledges, leading to cultural bridges between the women with shared information. through several in-person meetings between the academic researcher with the community engagement worker, a research proposal was written, submitted, and successfully funded. during the time between submitting the proposal and receiving funding, a new community engagement worker in indigenous health and wellness was hired while the original worker had to go on leave. the new community engagement worker agreed to engage in all aspects of the research process from determining the recruitment strategy, designing the study, and facilitating research activities with the support of her employer, the community partner. the research team consisted of the principal investigator (academic researcher), research assistant, and the indigenous community engagement worker. study design. using flyers, participants were recruited from an urban housing facility for indigenous women in toronto, ontario. eligible participants wanting to learn more about the project were directed 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.13570 to either contact the principal investigator or to attend an information session with the research team held in the building’s communal kitchen. once participants were enrolled in the project, a meeting with them was held prior to initiating study activities. the purpose of the project was reiterated, a general outline of the anticipated study activities was presented, and any questions or concerns participants raised were addressed. the women also provided feedback on the study activities by for example recommending knowledge carriers and by requesting the study design include alone time with the knowledge carriers without the presence of the research team. also, to promote a safer, comfortable, and mutually understanding space during the teaching circles, the women established a series of statements outlining how they would function as a group in the circles. these statements also ensured that every participant was honoured, individual voices respected, and encouraged solidarity (kirmayer et al., 2003). prior to initiating study activities, the indigenous community engagement worker made requests to knowledge carriers to facilitate teaching circles or full moon ceremonies. her requests were made with tobacco and gift offerings in-person and by phone. she shared the purpose of our project and who the project was intended to benefit. she also asked the knowledge carriers what she could prepare for them once they accepted the request. some knowledge carriers also shared their protocols which aided the research team in preparing for their visit. the teachings that were shared were determined by nine knowledge carriers (e.g., grandmothers, elders, firekeepers, cultural teachers, and grandfathers) with the overall purpose of the project in mind. six knowledge carriers were anishinaabeg, one of the knowledge carriers identified as tahltan and cree, another as mushkego cree, and one was poptí. study facilitation. the project consisted of two 8-week cycles of sessions with each cycle including six 2-hour teaching circles, one full moon ceremony, and finally a focus group for the participants to discuss their experience in the project. one cycle was conducted from june 2019 to july 2019, and the other cycle was conducted between september 2019 to october 2019. women in the first cycle were welcome to participate in the second cycle and some did. the sessions were delivered in the communal kitchen space. a session began by the women sharing a meal prepared by the research team with a participant or research team member smudging the food and preparing a spirit plate. a study participant who identified as ojibwe requested that we smudge the food and prepare a spirit plate prior to eating and other participants agreed with the idea. several participants also requested that a smudge bowl be prepared and available for women to use upon entering the room if they chose to smudge. the knowledge carrier arrived during the meal and was introduced to the participants. the women had the option to smudge prior to eating, but frequently smudged prior to beginning the teaching circle with the knowledge carrier. the research team prepared the circle by arranging chairs in a circle and placing a medicine bundle next to the knowledge carrier along with other items requested by the knowledge carrier. the community engagement worker opened the teaching circle by once again introducing the knowledge carrier and inviting them to lead the circle. each knowledge carrier came with their own sets of teachings, stories, and approaches to wellbeing. the first hour of the circle consisted of sharing teachings which research team members also attended. before a break, the community engagement worker presented each participant with a gift (e.g., copper goblet, abalone shell, feast bundle, medicines, 5 kodeeswaran et al.: indigenous women surviving the sixties scoop published by scholarship@western, 2019 long skirt) to add to their bundles along with the cultural significance of the item. the contents of the bundles were intended to support them on their wellbeing journeys as well as participate in ceremony for our study and in the wider community. after a short break, the circle continued with the knowledge carrier and only the study participants for an additional hour. members of the research team stepped out for this portion of the circle so that participants could have personal discussions with the knowledge carrier. the two sessions focusing on full moon ceremonies were hosted by a knowledge carrier, the indigenous community engagement worker, and other members of the research team. a firekeeper was essential to the full moon ceremony and was present to start and close the fire. firekeepers protect the sacred nature of the fire within the ceremony by following specific cultural protocols and teachings (m. campaigne, 2019 personal communication). study population eligible study participants self-identified as first nations, métis, or inuk sixties scoop survivors. as previously mentioned, participants lived in an urban housing facility for indigenous women and their children in toronto, ontario. the housing facility is serviced largely by non-indigenous staff for health and social support as well as housing concerns. data collection and analysis data was collected from the participants through focus groups at the end of each cycle. one-on-one interviews were conducted for women unable to attend the focus group. the duration of each focus group was between 1 ½ hour to 2 hours and the interviews lasted between 30-minutes to 1-hour. the discussions were audio-recorded and facilitated by the research assistant. participants reflected on their experiences. they described what they learned during the teaching circles, their plans to maintain the teachings, and how the teachings prepared them for ceremony. they also discussed how they felt after attending the teaching circles and ceremony, the impact of culture on their wellbeing, and the importance of cultural exposure as sixties scoop survivors. other questions focused on areas of improvement in the study. focus group discussions were analyzed using inductive thematic analysis, which consists of coding the transcript line by line to formulate descriptive themes (braun & clarke, 2006). two authors separately coded the transcripts and compared their codes. codes were grouped under themes in a table of findings and relevant quotes were derived from the transcripts. similar codes were compared and grouped under the same theme if applicable. relevant quotes were also discussed with participants who read the manuscript to provide feedback. reliability was established by both the research assistant and principal investigator finalizing and re-evaluating themes with confirmation from the study participants and the community engagement worker during in-person meetings. our study was reviewed by the women’s college hospital research ethics board and the university of toronto research ethics board in toronto, ontario. study participants provided verbal and written informed consent prior to beginning any research activities. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.13570 findings characteristics of study participants a total of 8 indigenous women participated in our project with half attending all sessions from both the first and second cycle. all the women self-identified as being sixties scoop survivors. no additional personal identifying information was collected from the study participants. qualitative results five main themes emerged from the data. the women shared their thoughts on the impacts of the sixties scoop, their longing for culture as sixties scoop survivors, (re)connecting to culture, and the positive impacts of culture. in addition, several recommendations emerged from discussions on restrictions to practicing culture. culture meant engaging in ceremonies, working with elders or healers; smudging; having tobacco, sage, and other medicines; speaking the language; having specific food and certain items or clothing present. impacts of the sixties scoop the women described several symptoms of the sixties scoop. poor health, specifically mental health, was the most frequent concern raised. other conversations were on their heightened awareness of the intergenerational impacts and traumas of the sixties scoop such as the millennial scoop, a present threat in their lives either from their personal experiences or that of family members’ involvement in the canadian child welfare system. the millennial scoop is the current overrepresentation of indigenous children in the canadian child welfare system beginning in the 1980s. various traumas and hardships extended beyond the women’s childhoods and played a role in their lives. a few women discussed substance use, including alcohol, as a way of coping with challenges in their lives and their mental health concerns such as anxiety, depression, and post-traumatic stress disorder. also, hardships associated with being indigenous in a society that marginalizes them, were some of the reasons for their ongoing mental health issues. i feel that it’s really, really hard to be an indian . . . alone, you know, trying to accept everything, uh traumas that you have gone through or, you know, community has gone through . . . um . . . you just gotta keep strong . . . right? –respect [participant pseudonym] the women shared that managing their mental health concerns, including trauma and substance use, is an iterative and ongoing process in which there had to be room for setbacks since the process of walking in a good way was not linear. these setbacks were also framed as essential learning opportunities. the women also described that working towards their wellbeing included focusing on the medicines, living in the present, openly expressing their emotions, acknowledging, and shifting negative thoughts and attitudes, and not judging themselves for past events. one woman described her feelings on experiencing setbacks, and that hiding from society was not an option neither was wanting to relive past actions to get things ‘right’. pushing forward and focusing on the medicines were critical for her. 7 kodeeswaran et al.: indigenous women surviving the sixties scoop published by scholarship@western, 2019 i can’t shelter myself from society even though i wish i could. i wouldn’t have enough uh sowing material or *laughter* everything like i would wanna just . . . to do the whole part over and over again right. but i can’t do that here, so i just focus on this: try to do the good walk and i’ll struggle, and i’ll fall . . . and i’ll have my days but it’s okay, you know, but i can’t keep it . . . but i can keep picking up the medicines, picking it up, picking it up. if i don’t touch them [medicines] that’s okay, cause i can’t judge myself anymore. i’ve judged myself for so many years now and it’s like, i can’t do that anymore. –wisdom [participant pseudonym] although the women had various experiences of the sixties scoop and mental health concerns, the impacts of the millennial scoop weighed on them quite heavily. some women described that regardless of the changes and progress made in their lives, they continuously had to revisit their sixties scoop experiences because of the millennial scoop. this included conversations around being involved in the canadian child welfare system and resulting childhood trauma, as well as the thousands of other indigenous children that have, and continue to be, negatively impacted by the canadian child welfare system. despite having been forcibly discouraged from learning more about their indigeneity and culture through their upbringings, all the women believed that this project was an opportunity to immerse themselves in culture and learn more. longing for culture the desire to learn more about and engage in culture was unanimous among the women. they also discussed learning from the ceremonies and teachings in a way that was different from mainstream approaches. anishinaabe and cree teachings were shared with the women along with personal stories of the sixties scoop. anishinaabeg knowledge carriers shared teachings on the four medicines, strawberry teachings and other plant teachings including their use in ceremonies, the female life cycle and rites of passage teachings and discussed related ceremonies, and full moon teachings including all phases of the moon. a cree knowledge carrier discussed the role of the firekeeper, provided water teachings, and discussed the roles and responsibilities of cree men and boys. a poptí cultural teacher discussed spirituality and the haudenosaunee creation story that she had learned from her mother who was from that nation. also, several grandmothers and a grandfather discussed how they came to know and became a source of knowledge and support to their communities. many of the knowledge carriers weaved their teachings into their respective life journeys along with valuable lessons, such as communication and ways to express emotions. these examples permitted the women to envision how the teachings could also be part of their life journeys. the desire to learn more about culture and the newfound knowledge through the project motivated some of the women to attend other ceremonies taking place in the community. the women were so eager to learn more about their cultures that there was almost a sense of urgency expressed. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.13570 and um but it’s not enough i want more, i just want a lot more, i just . . . its wet my appetite and it’s just, it’s it is just so dang healing . . . um it, but i need more. –bravery [participant pseudonym] i went to full moon ceremonies before i really understood a lot, and, and so the more, the more i came here, the more i understood. the more knowledge i got you know from all the teachings: the water teachings, the berries, the medicines, the firekeeper um . . . especially the water teachings. –bravery [participant pseudonym] learning more about culture was critical for the women, but they also expressed that the indigenous men in their communities likewise had cultural responsibilities and teachings that could be beneficial in assisting them to address the pain from intergenerational trauma. some women wanted to learn more about the role of the fire keepers, a role which they often associated with men. in general, teachings for men were important to learn given they could play a role in passing down this knowledge as well. although, gender spectrums have long existed among indigenous peoples (robinson, 2020; tharp, 2016), the women in our study only discussed the role and responsibilities of women and men. this is unsurprising given we did not focus on this in our study or have questions about gender. in addition, our study participants all identified as women and were focused on teachings specific to their own gender. one grandfather and a fire keeper provided teachings that were related to their roles and responsibilities as men and boys, and this may be why the women shared some of their thoughts on teachings specific to men or boys. i like the way she um… the way she explained the, the life cycle of people . . . and uh like the way she talked about the moon and our connectedness to it and our water, like i wanna learn two more water songs. –truth [participant pseudonym] we wanna stay indigenous, i wanna stay indigenous. i wanna stay ojibwe, i want my grandchildren to stay ojibwe and have our teachings. cause that other way doesn’t work.” –wisdom [participant pseudonym] men, our men have to be reached out too and i know they have different ceremonies but like i don’t know much about what they do. i know they have . . . there are some firekeepers or have someone teach our young men who are out here in pain, you know. –wisdom [participant pseudonym] according to the women, the ways in which they were learning were unique and a significant aspect of the process. unlike mainstream approaches to learning and understanding, the women describe the process of learning through the circles as “taking things in,” “shifting perceptions,” as well as having experiences feeling akin to “skin to skin” contact. i’m just kinda taking things in, in like . . . kinda like osmosis. it’s not intellectual it’s just uh, it’s a different way of learning and knowing, i guess. its leading me into you know different kind of um . . . whereas before like . . . where do i start now. i have a kind of like a, oh! a pathway. –bravery [participant pseudonym] 9 kodeeswaran et al.: indigenous women surviving the sixties scoop published by scholarship@western, 2019 for the women, the teachings brought about a new sense of awareness and understanding of not only the world around them, but also themselves. they expressed taking away different life lessons that they connected back to their lives. they also expressed learning a lot about themselves spiritually and mentally and were able to better understand their path and readiness for ceremony. teachings through the circles, ceremonies and storytelling in our project were expressed by the women as being useful in their journeys in walking for a good life. (re)connecting to cultures attending the teaching circles and full moon ceremonies provided an opportunity for the women to fulfill their desires to (re)connect to culture. through the process of (re)connection, the women began to remember aspects of their culture, and were even more adamant about cultural renewal, and passing down cultural knowledge to others including their children and grandchildren. more specifically, some women described being better equipped to connect to culture outside of the project and the study site because they had established relationships with the visiting knowledge carriers. community connection was not restricted to their blood relatives, but also to the community of indigenous women living at the housing facility. despite leading different lives, the women shared similar traumas that brought them closer together. we can relate and interact about it, we don’t hold onto this we just go *phew* it’s gone, that’s how i feel when i’m here . . . for me i see myself going back and forth to different parts of my life and i feel more . . . i guess loved by this community. i feel part of the community and when i go to different parts of trauma like with, love [participant pseudonym] went through hers i could see what happened to her and i just wanted to get up and grab her and hold her . . . –bravery [participant pseudonym] they were also encouraged to connect to their specific clans and communities to further explore their indigeneity. one woman shared her thoughts on connecting to her community, which she was inspired to do during the project: “lot to learn about my own particular culture, you know um mohawk, and uh so i’m gonna travel there to that reserve to that land and try to. so, i would say that, that inspiration has come from these 8 weeks and so its just lighting the fire and i’m so grateful.” –bravery [participant pseudonym] renewing and remembering their connection to culture looked different for every woman. while some women were able to more immediately identify with aspects of culture, others were not able to do so. sometimes, this created hesitancy with engaging in certain aspects of the ceremony, indigenous languages, and teachings. below are two quotes, one from a participant feeling strongly about her cultural skills, and another describing hesitancy due to an inability to communicate in her ancestral language. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.13570 there’s some teachings that come along from different people, from knowledge carriers and wisdom keep-, keepers that it’s . . . renewing i guess my ojibway language to the whole process, and like in the medicine for the women to it’s, like i’m sharing that knowledge with my relatives like to use it . . . and some of it has come back to me from, from my mother’s use and my uh, relatives back home, and about the sacred fire when you use it . . . that’s still um reaffirming how my dad taught me with that, when we do uh ceremony and honouring their, i guess their feasts of when they passed on. –wisdom [participant pseudonym] i liked it when, when the elders came, i, i sat there although i don’t keep eye contact with anybody, it’s just me and my upbringing, but um, i hear . . . and i like when, people start out with their name and their anishnaabe name and where they’re from. i wish i could say that, so i say nothing at all... cause if i say it, i might say it wrong . . . but i guess there’s no right or wrong? truth [participant pseudonym] the teachings and stories shared by the knowledge carriers and the participants themselves were valuable to the women. each woman gained different messages from the teachings that they could apply to their lives and that allowed them to connect or deepen their cultural connections. impact of cultures engagement with the knowledge carriers and learning from the teachings had a tremendous impact on the women. there were multiple uses for medicines and teachings which included coping with their health concerns, decision-making, and general guidance. the study participants discussed their use of each of the four medicines for dealing with difficult circumstances and giving them strength. the women learned that it was necessary to stop judging themselves, and that using the medicines even if they were not ‘in a good way’ was acceptable. one participant described how she incorporated cedar in her life: cedar helped me quite a bit ‘cause i know that with the different teachings, for myself, that i’ve been given, and through different groups that there’s just so many ways that you can use the cedar for uh, from smudging a home, for sacred fires, along with your tobacco, but also, for, for protection from energies. –wisdom [participant pseudonym] another participant described how medicines aided her in decision-making. i forgot to mention the medicines how much i learned about the medicines like learning about the sweet grass for clear mind and good decisions, so i’ve been using that when i needed to make decisions. just lighting the sweet grass, it really helps it does help . . . –bravery [participant pseudonym] the women felt that they could let go of their emotions, cry, and openly express their sadness or frustration in the presence of others in the circles. two women described how the medicines and teachings were used to ‘release’ their trauma and deal with mental health concerns. 11 kodeeswaran et al.: indigenous women surviving the sixties scoop published by scholarship@western, 2019 i gotta release that trauma . . . myself, ‘cause i can’t keep it in my . . . i gotta give it away and let the creator take care of it, using the medicines. –respect [participant pseudonym] ptsd is really a hard one. i remember that because at any moment you can be anywhere. you can be right back to wherever and you can really try to think you know, trying to grab onto those medicines and you know what, i get really angry with them at times, i still get angry with them. but i think, as long as i have them present, they’re there and acknowledging them that they’re there, its okay, i’m doing okay. –wisdom [participant pseudonym] recovery and staying strong was not only important for themselves, but also for their children, grandchildren, and other people in their lives. one participant touched upon the seventh generations principle as she discusses her reasons for maintaining her wellbeing. have to think, okay i need to be clean and sober so long. i have to think about the next seven generations ahead of me. that could be anybody, my relatives, niece, nephews, cousins whoever right? i have to think about them and how our young people are gonna need that help. –wisdom [participant pseudonym] one participant also highlighted the importance of staying strong with the help of the medicines for the children impacted by the millennial scoop today. concerning the sixties scoop it’s still happening no matter what they . . . no matter how it comes out it’s still sixties scoop no matter what we do. the children they are taking away. i’m still scared for my sister’s family, taking their children, so scared that . . . that we’re so judged that it’s gonna happen no matter what. and this is where i need to stay grounded and being an aunty, mother, sister, but especially being a grandmother that this is still gonna affect future generations but as long as i keep sober and keep clean, use these medicines, it’ll be okay. love [participant pseudonym] project strengths in addition to the overall benefits of culture, the women described that the project created a positive space for engaging with culture meaningfully. overall, the women described participating in the teaching circles and full moon ceremony to be a “joyful,” and “uplifting” experience that allowed them to fully immerse themselves in their sessions. participating in this study was an important step in their walks of a good life and furthering their connections to the knowledge carriers in the study, who are leaders in the community. with these connections, the women felt more comfortable solidifying their relationships with the knowledge carriers, approaching them for teachings, and attending their ceremonies. . . . every group [attendance at teaching circles] . . . i felt uplifted. i felt full. i felt joy. i really, i really had a lightness in being and even when there was commotion or um you know, turbulent waters, it all settled finally um . . . i, again it’s really hard to put into words it’s uh . . . it’s, it’s very filling and it feels good. it’s grounding. it’s direction it’s guidance it’s . . . and things make sense. uh, they begin to make sense, to make more and more sense. –bravery [participant pseudonym] 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.13570 a critical aspect of our project was that it provided the women with a sense of safety in the teaching circles and full moon ceremony. this allowed the women to better immerse themselves in the sessions, express their thoughts, and prepare to explore ways of understanding their various circumstances and approaches to self-care. there was comfort being in the session knowing that everyone in the circles valued confidentiality, a judgement-free zone, and holistic space. allowing for time alone with the knowledge carriers without the research team was also a strength of our study, as it provided them with the opportunity to openly connect with the knowledge carriers and other women in the circles— specifically indigenous women. the latter contributed to creating a safer space for the women to discuss experiences unique to indigenous women. listening to the stories of other participants allowed them to feel connected to one another and created a sense of unity for sixties scoop survivors. coming together as sixties scoop survivors, sixties scoop and beyond because it’s still going on now, coming together with those experiences, and knowing you know that’s what brought us together, even though we didn’t talk a lot about it. i don’t know, there’s something strong about that too, there’s some strength in that, there’s resilience, and strength and i’m getting goosebumps over that just that everybody’s here. bravery [participant pseudonym] the women would often compare the effectiveness of mainstream programming to indigenous cultural practices. unlike most programs that they had previously attended, the teaching circles and full moon ceremonies were described as holistic and “complete,” with one participant expressing that she would “rather have a circle with drums and singing than an antidepressant.” some of the women discussed that mainstream mental health services, such as counselling or therapy, were not able to support them in dealing with their trauma and other stressors in their lives in a comprehensive manner. barriers and facilitators to practicing cultural activities study participants described several factors that were involved in shaping how they engaged in indigenous cultural practices which included the space in which teachings and ceremonies were delivered, how it was delivered and who was delivering it. we also noted that some participants described self-imposed restrictions to engaging with medicines which was related to their own wellbeing. the medicines are there like i do have my uh, vault of my medicines out… and i used to put them away, i used to um, put everything away. i’m not special, i didn’t see everything, but i found out that i need to have my items out, right? but it’s not you know bad to have them out, when i’m not in a good way… right? and i want that part of me to disappear because i disappear, so man, uh that’s what i’ve learned anyways… i just can’t touch the feather. respect [participant pseudonym] the women also discussed institutional restrictions related to access to and use of the medicines. i have to ask to get the medicine. this…, these medicines should be, to my, to my way of thinking… an open cupboard here, with these sitting in there, with the, with their bowls, sitting there so if someone came down and didn’t have any upstairs, that we should have actual access 13 kodeeswaran et al.: indigenous women surviving the sixties scoop published by scholarship@western, 2019 to this, and availability no matter what they were having or what part of the evening . . . –wisdom [participant pseudonym] it is important to note that during the project, the organization increased access to the medicines by placing them in cupboards in the communal kitchen space. the space in which cultural practices took place was very important to the women. one participant stated that the organization’s housing facility space was not always right for practicing their cultural activities because of the negative connotation of being within an institution. some of the women also discussed how ceremonies and circles would often be re-formatted and modelled to resemble the format of westernized programming. the inclusion of westernized concepts with indigenous cultural practices often diluted and took away the focus from indigenous cultural practices. although the reformatting of cultural practices into programming was often done to allow for the participation of non-indigenous people, this could take away from indigenous women’s experiences in (re)connecting to knowledge shared by knowledge carriers. . . . there’s just certain things that just, it’s not the women, or you know my neighbours or anything like that it’s just, it’s very triggering um, being part of the sixties scoop to live in an institution so to speak, where um, much is done to us rather than with us, and so it triggers me, and um, and it’s too big for me to take on it’s not my place to do that, um, and so my decision is to um carry on as a tenant because that’s how i see myself? um so yeah personally, i, i um things like ceremony and um to me, they just feel really, they feel sacred and i, and i would like, i would need to do that outside of here? –bravery [participant pseudonym] several women stated it was important to have a better divide between cultural content in programs, including for education versus culture as a meaningful and sacred practice within spiritual spaces. a ‘better divide’ involved clearly communicating the intentions of the gatherings and physically setting up the space for programs or ceremonies. according to the women, programs had a more rigid structure particularly as it concerned the learning goals with expectations that these goals should have the same level of importance to the participants. in some cases, programs also involved observation or even surveillance where a staff member would take notes on individual’s actions or words which could then be inserted in their client charts. for our study, many programs occurred in the kitchen, a communal and large space which is a colonial space in contrast to longhouses and lodges which are inherently ceremonial. therefore, we had to intentionally set up the space for ceremonial purposes. smudging, setting up the chairs in a circle with openings in the east and west directions, having a table set up next to the knowledge carrier with the medicines, strawberries, a glass of water, candles, and laying out some cloth for example. the set up also required verifying with the knowledge carrier if they had any protocols to share with the women prior to working with them. although there was structure during the ceremony, the participants could take what they needed from the teachings which in part is why notetaking was not permitted from anyone in the group. in addition to how culture was included within programming, the selection of individuals included was important to the women. the ‘audience’ for any program shapes the message so that the content of the program is accessible, and in this case to non-indigenous women. some participants discussed how it 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.13570 was once illegal for their ancestors to practice and now cultural practices are developed to be accessible to non-indigenous people. she stated: i’m all for inclusion but somehow it waters down, it makes it different. the dynamics, the dynamics are different. these are teachings and ways that we have lost, that have been systematically ripped from us. it was illegal for us to even do and practice, and i just think it, if you know so going forward, i don’t know what the balance is because, you know it’s good if everybody learns of course. –bravery [participant pseudonym] of course, you want everybody to learn, but in what setting should that teaching take place as opposed to what we’re doing here. can it be mixed, should it be mixed? and how do we achieve the balance. i think those are important questions because i think for me it would be very different if there were non-indigenous people in this group well then then it wouldn’t be a sixties scoop group. –bravery [participant pseudonym] inclusion was important to the participants. the women also discussed that when including culture into spaces whether it is for programming, education or to increase cultural connectedness, it was also important to consider the diversity within indigenous groups and their respective cultural practices to avoid being pan-indigenous while recognizing that some indigenous people hold multiple identities. the study participants suggested that different worldviews contributed to conflict or misunderstandings with non-indigenous people or service providers and that it was important to consider how nonindigenous worldviews were indeed shaping how indigenous cultures were part of programming and how it was delivered. the two worldviews will…will not come together. i think this [project] was a lot better than the . . . like we do have another circle that’s done by um . . . a therapist psychologist once a month . . . i do not use the word for myself . . . she to me is on the borderline of having too much western views, that’s why it’s tough to go into that circle but here [project] it’s so open and understanding ‘cause we sit with the medicines. –wisdom [participant pseudonym] . . . i guess having regular sessions, regular teachings like actual teaching and healing circles and not something that dissolves into some kind of semi-social work healing circle . . . and it just becomes this kind of you know, beige kind of thing, but it’s called a healing circle or a teaching circle and what, so i saw the difference [between culture in the project and cultural in programming]. –bravery [participant pseudonym] in addition to the differing worldviews between the participants and the non-indigenous staff, lived experiences were extremely important to the women. the women participating in the study believed that those working within non-indigenous institutions and systems (e.g., legal, medical, and education systems, housing support, and social services) were not aware of the impact that acts of colonization, such as the sixties scoop and residential schools, has had on indigenous peoples. lack of awareness has resulted in miscommunication among service providers and the women. this has resulted in fueling traumatic experiences for the women, feeling unsafe in practicing culture, difficulties in openly 15 kodeeswaran et al.: indigenous women surviving the sixties scoop published by scholarship@western, 2019 expressing themselves, and creating further disconnect from not only the indigenous community, but others around them. common lived experiences, as was discussed in earlier quotes, connects people. being survivors of the sixties scoop allowed the women to better connect with one another. . . . very hard to get the staff to understand where we are coming from. um . . . it can’t be put in a book or be um . . . if you didn’t go to residential school then you have very little knowledge about it unless your parents went there, but you ask the generation i’m in and anybody over 50 or 45 and up well what do you think about the 60s scoop. –truth [participant pseudonym] the women also discussed that staff attending cultural activities also had to follow the knowledge carrier protocols and maintain their boundaries. everyone in the circle is equal and listens to the knowledge carrier. despite not sharing the same lived experiences, making a connection between service provider and client was important. i think staff need to take as much of a risk as anybody else in those circles. they need to be sharing shit about themselves. just like we have to or we do, we choose to, but to have a staff member sit in there and sit with the protection of being of this status of being staff, i’m not safe there. i wouldn’t do that i wouldn’t expect to see that in any community out there like at a uhm, uhm [other organization]. i don’t see that you know there’s uh there’s a, there’s a knowledge keeper or you know and they [other organization] conduct it but it’s not therapy, like it’s not, i don’t know how to say the diffthere’s something . . . yeah there’s something sacred about it. –bravery [participant pseudonym] no one’s gonna do a social work trip on me [in this project] or uh you know and analyze like there’s always this veil of uh you’re this client, you’re this according to their books, according to their mandate according to the work that they’re doing. it’s very difficult to have a human one on one, it’s very hard to make that connection. i feel that what i say is gonna be thrown back at me but in this . . . circle [project], i feel safe. that i can say what i have to say, and i’m not gonna be judged. –truth [participant pseudonym] some women described difficulties accessing cultural activities in the community at large. the women suggested that the challenges of balancing the indigenous (i.e., community) and non-indigenous (housing facility) worldviews had impacted their ways of absorbing culture. worldviews which consist of a set of attitudes, values, stories, and expectations of the world around us does shape how people function (gray, 2011; hart, 2010); the women became aware of the differing worldviews when describing ‘clashes’ or different views on how issues were addressed (e.g., accessibility and availability of medicines, mental health care). in addition, some participants felt that there were not always enough details when accessing cultural activities. during our project, several knowledge carriers were explicit to those attending the teaching circles about not taking notes. they stated that the participants will absorb the knowledge they are ready to absorb and each of the participants might get something different from the teachings. it was important to be fully engaged in the sessions which was not possible while taking notes. the participants 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.13570 heard that they had to consistently attend cultural activities and learn from the teachings. all the answers were not going to be obtained through one session. discussion summary of findings we examined how facilitating cultural connection through the wisdom of knowledge carriers impacted indigenous women who are sixties scoop survivors within a space usually dedicated to programming. five major themes were identified which we will expand upon in our discussion. the women described the wider implications of the sixties scoop on their lives and that of their communities. two other important themes that arose were their longing for culture and the significance of (re)connecting to culture which included sharing and passing down knowledge. the impact and use of culture for their health and for providing guidance was a theme as was the project strengths discussed throughout. finally, barriers and facilitators to practicing culture were discussed by the women. implications of the sixties scoop on the women’s lives and their communities in line with previous work, our study participants reported poor mental health outcomes that were attributed to their experiences as sixties scoop survivors (fachinger, 2019; kenny, 2018; nuttgens, 2013; spencer, 2017). some women spoke of the enduring pain of having their childhood torn away from them. however, instead of speaking more about this, they diverted the conversation to focus on what concerned them the most, the millennial scoop. the deep cuts of the sixties scoop would remain open for as long as indigenous children continued to be removed from their families and communities. this concern speaks to the legacies of historical policies and practices and its permeation into presentday society (de leeuw et al., 2009; mckenzie et al., 2016). mckenzie et al (2016) explored the continuities of past colonial discourses, such as the sixties scoop and the residential schools, and their roles in contemporary discourses on pathologizing indigenous peoples. the connection between such policies and practices has contributed to the state’s over-involvement in indigenous families’ lives, as well as on the number of indigenous children in the canadian child welfare system (mckenzie et al., 2016). de leeuw, greenwood and cameron (2009) have argued that the contextualization of indigenous peoples through historical policies and practices continues to inform current policies supporting the canadian child welfare system. the current over-representation of indigenous children in the canadian child welfare system, referred to as the “millennial scoop,” exemplifies the continued legitimizing of “government destruction of indigenous families” (halseth & greenwood, 2019; kenny, 2018, p. 305). as of 2010, approximately 27,000 indigenous children were in foster care in canada, a number that is continuing to grow and may one day surpass the number of children taken into residential schools and the sixties scoop (vowel, 2016). the millennial scoop is an extension of the sixties scoop which further exacerbate the collective and intergenerational traumas of indigenous peoples (kenny, 2018). the varying levels of traumas and hardships expressed by the women were also discussed as extending beyond the self and that intergenerational trauma is also experienced at the community level whether it be in rural and remote communities or in the urban setting where the women in our study live (bombay 17 kodeeswaran et al.: indigenous women surviving the sixties scoop published by scholarship@western, 2019 et al., 2014; hoffart & jones, 2018; roy, 2014). one participant stated how being indigenous was difficult and coming to terms with the traumas that both herself and her community faced required her to ‘keep strong’. being indigenous was hard because she felt alone. as previously discussed, loneliness is associated with low connectedness (carriere, 2005; spencer, 2017) which some of the women clearly articulated at the onset of our study. the women never referenced their traumas without also acknowledging the traumas and hardships of the community. the connections between the impacts of colonization to contemporary hardships that indigenous people face is not a novel finding (dodgson & struthers, 2005). referred to as the historical traumas of lived marginalization, struthers explains that their participants discussed the impact of historical events on the “current welfare of their families and tribes” (dodgson & struthers, 2005, p. 341). the interrelated effects of the women’s traumatic experiences highlighted the importance of considering the “larger context in which these traumatic events rest” that look beyond the individual effects of trauma (aguiar & halseth, 2015; bombay et al., 2014, p. 321; menzies, 2008). acknowledging the historical and contemporary traumas of indigenous peoples, particularly for those directly involved in the sixties scoop or residential schools, can provide a comprehensive understanding of the complex interplay of traumas (aguiar & halseth, 2015; hadjipavlou et al., 2018). if it is important to recognize the sixties scoop as historical trauma with intergenerational and ongoing effects, it is also important to recognize the millennial scoop as contemporary trauma with lasting effects (bombay et al., 2014; cunneen & libesman, 2000; frideres, 2008; kreig, 2009). longing for and (re)connecting to indigenous cultures the longing for culture was undeniable for all the women and something noteworthy was the innate aspects some women possessed for absorbing cultural knowledge. they appeared to be reconnecting to something they had within themselves. our project was able to facilitate survivors’ (re)connection to indigenous cultures whose experiences were part of a broader agenda of cultural genocide by the canadian government (cardinal, 2016; sinclair, 2007). some women in our study initially expressed feeling hesitant around engaging in ceremony and not knowing how or where to start their journeys in connecting to culture. nevertheless, their willingness and interest in learning more about culture reflects the broader interests expressed by the indigenous community in previous work (hadjipavlou et al., 2018; morcom, 2017). as ann m. r. states, quoted in the final report of the national inquiry into missing and murdered indigenous women and girls (2019): “our people, our community want to heal, they want to learn their culture. they want to go on the land. that’s where they want to be. that’s where they want to heal… culture has to be lived.” (ann, 2019, p. 146). meeting knowledge carriers was a critical step for some of the women in our study to enhance their connection to their cultures and to further their journeys in (re)connection. hadjipavlou et al. (2018) showed that patients accessing services including elders for their mental health and wellbeing viewed their interactions with the elders as not only important in providing a “sense of belonging,” but also an opportunity to bridge them to other communities and relationships (hadjipavlou et al., 2018, p. e611). in fact, in our study, women described how they were made to feel more comfortable accessing cultural events such as ceremonies in the community at large by being introduced to knowledge carriers in our study. the connection to various grandmothers, grandfathers, elder, and a cultural teacher were invaluable to the women. opportunities to connect must be understood as being a long-term goal as opposed to short-term and 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.13570 temporary given that the process of (re)connection is a lifelong journey which was shared by the women (black et al., 2019; cardinal, 2016; carriere, 2005; carriere & richardson, 2009). lavallée and poole (2010) have argued that work around cultural identity is crucial for healing, as colonization and identity disruption are at the root of adverse health outcomes among indigenous people. from an attachment theory perspective, carriere and richardson (2009) discuss the importance of culture, identity preservation, and spiritual transformation for the wellbeing of indigenous children, families, and its importance in assisting survivors in dealing with social challenges such as racism. one study participant’s reclamation of herself and the community wanting to stay indigenous can be an act of resistance to the dominant colonial structures that worked towards assimilating indigenous peoples. gregg (2019) has discussed how indigeneity can be a political tool to work against advancing the “particular interests of a range of different self-identifying groups” (p. 836). the reclamation of indigeneity is not simply an important aspect of individual identity, but rather a collective call for reclaiming what has been stolen from indigenous peoples – identity, culture, language, community, and landand protecting and revitalizing what has been stolen (gregg, 2019). given canada’s history of delegitimizing the practice of indigenous cultures and ceremonies through the indian act, and thus disrupting the “transmission of intergenerational knowledge” necessary for developing a positive cultural identity, establishing spaces and opportunities for (re)connection must be taken up as a responsibility at all levels of government (frideres, 2008; goulet & mcleod, 2002, p. 355). the importance of cultural practices for health and healing the women’s experiences with the full moon ceremony and teaching circles highlighted the significance of indigenous cultures, teachings, and healing approaches for working through trauma and other mental health issues. our findings are in line with previous research that found that cultural knowledge and indigenous healing approaches were beneficial for indigenous peoples in promoting wellbeing (ghislaine et al., 2013; hadjipavlou et al., 2018; maar et al., 2009). as in other studies, our participants described the sessions as being holistic, complete, and leaving them with feeling hopeful about the future (hadjipavlou et al., 2018; hunter et al., 2006; struthers et al., 2004). previous work focusing on indigenous healing, indigenous knowledge systems, as well as spirituality have also demonstrated their importance for indigenous people to work through intergenerational trauma, addiction, and other mental health concerns (hunter et al., 2006; maar & shawande, 2013; robbins & dewar, 2011). in our study, the knowledge carriers modeled how the teachings guided them in their lives. this was important for some women who needed more assistance in understanding how the teachings could translate to their lives. the various teachings were able to assist the women in working through personal struggles and challenging situations. furthering our understanding and a wider acceptance of how indigenous teachings and storytelling can be used to address mental health situations simultaneously enabling women to connect to their cultures and walk in a good way. some of the participants also discussed that mainstream health services (e.g., psychologists, therapists) were not always as effective in addressing their mental health concerns and how this project seemed to be more beneficial in navigating their mental health concerns and discussing their trauma in a supportive space. previous work has also suggested that western therapeutic projects and behavioural change frameworks are inconsistent and incongruent with many indigenous cultures and can serve as a form of colonization 19 kodeeswaran et al.: indigenous women surviving the sixties scoop published by scholarship@western, 2019 (barker et al., 2017; hodge et al., 2009; mundel & chapman, 2010). mainstream services can be limited in understanding and addressing the realities of indigenous peoples, the role of colonization in impacting the health and wellbeing of indigenous peoples, and collectivism as an underpinning in indigenous cultures (chino & debruyn, 2006; rosile et al., 2016). for example, some studies that have explored the inclusion of indigenous healing and culture practices with mainstream mental health services and showed a benefit to their combined use, as opposed to mainstream approaches alone when addressing mental health for indigenous peoples (eagle, 1998; marsh et al., 2015; marsh et al., 2016). while using both western and indigenous views in addressing mental health and healing has been shown to be effective in previous work and for health service providers when working with indigenous communities, our participants signaled the importance in the exclusive focus on ceremony and culture as being sufficient for some to work through trauma and strengthen their identity (marsh et al., 2015; marsh et al., 2016). given a history of actively suppressing indigenous cultures through colonial structures and practices in canada, establishing a setting that had an exclusive focus on indigenous teachings and ceremonies is important to consider (maar et al., 2009; robbins & dewar, 2011). as discussed in the truth and reconciliation act (2015), “the preservation, revitalization, and strengthening of aboriginal languages and cultures are best managed by aboriginal people and communities” (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015, p. 2). this signals the importance of indigenous-led and indigenous-exclusive spaces, and the responsibilities of nonindigenous peoples and organizations to recognize, respect, and support such spaces. facilitators and barriers to engaging in cultural practices there is an overall lack of culturally relevant and safe services for indigenous peoples which has been discussed in previous literature (boksa et al., 2015; wexler & gone, 2012). this works against addressing the needs of indigenous women, but also reinforces the divide between indigenous peoples and services that further marginalizes the community (boksa et al., 2015; wilson, 2008). different worldviews may also reinforce the divide. despite having several descriptions, indigenous worldviews have commonalities specifically as it relates to the environment. importantly, distinct nations do have relationships with distinct aspects of the environment (hart, 2010; mckenzie et al., 2016; simpson, 2000). simpson (2000) specifically has described seven principles that encompasses indigenous worldviews. she states the following: ‘first, knowledge is holistic, cyclic, and dependent upon relationships and connections to living and non-living beings and entities. second, there are many truths, and these truths are dependent upon individual experiences. third, everything is alive. fourth, all things are equal. fifth, the land is sacred. sixth, the relationship between people and the spiritual world is important. seventh, human beings are least important in the world.’ the spiritual world is for many indigenous peoples a critical feature of holding indigenous worldviews which is often experienced through cultural practices such as in ceremony and teachings. spirituality is part of everyday life and everything has spirit. spirit has been referenced in many situations. for example, during purification ceremonies participant in a circle will open with a smudge and call upon the spiritual grandmothers and grandfathers (lavallée & poole, 2010). the medicine wheel teachings for many indigenous peoples reflects the balance between four interconnected ‘realms’: spirit, mind, body, and emotion (lavallée & poole, 2010). many indigenous cultures involve thanking the spirit of animals and its relationships to it and the land during a hunt (cunsolo et al., 2020; prosper et al., 2011). 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.13570 in our study, some women may simultaneously hold different sets of competing values arising from being sixties scoop survivors which causes them to shift between non-indigenous and indigenous values or even worldviews depending on context to fit in or to placate others (gray, 2011; hong et al., 2000) that could result in fatigue for the women and some communication challenges with the staff (mccluney et al., 2019). nevertheless, conversations that the women had around resources they needed to encourage their walk of a good life indicated the importance of centering indigenous worldviews in health literacy and promotion programming, social gatherings, and community building activities (e.g., diabetes and food preparation, parenting and childcare, healing through the arts, mental health support). it also requires that professionals ranging from frontline to policy work to understand the historical and contemporary systems of oppression against indigenous peoples, requiring them to actively interrogate mainstream practices and ways of ‘knowing’ that can perpetuate and reinforce systemic inequities (hunting & browne, 2012). multiple approaches can be taken to centre indigenous worldviews in health service and support practices and programming at various levels particularly with people recognized as allies by indigenous peoples. provided that individuals and communities take ownership and control over their own health, it is reasonable to conclude that indigenous communities identify what is needed in their walk of a good life and non-indigenous peoples, communities, and institutions respond to and support that space (kickbusch, 2002; mundel & chapman, 2010). in addition, service providers must be transparent about their roles and responsibilities when culture is being used in specific settings given that this may impact whether clients are stepping into a space of ceremony or a program. during our project on several occasions, the knowledge carriers expressed that note taking was not permitted because the teachings the women retain will reflect what they are able to retain or what they need to retain. oral traditions were important. also, in a circle everyone becomes equal, and thus service providers part-taking in ceremony must join as participants as opposed to workers. workers taking notes may appear to be conducting surveillance and are going directly against the request of knowledge carriers at least in the case of the nine knowledge carriers in our study. culture in ceremony and in programming are important but lead to different levels of engagement and respond to different needs of the user. relationship building is critical for working with indigenous peoples, including for service providers. locating oneself and forming connections has been included in several health service processes including in mental health care interventions for maori people in new zealand whereby service providers connection to people and places to establish trust and relationships are critical (kopua, 2019; mathieson et al., 2012). introducing oneself through family name or origins as opposed to professional and academic credentials can foster a stronger relationship and alleviate power dynamics at play. further, connectedness, an essential value for many indigenous peoples, can be observed among several mental health interventions and programs for maori, american indians in the us, first nations youth, as well as in a conceptual nursing framework in native american culture in the us (bennett et al., 2014; kopua, 2019; lowe, 2002; mathieson et al., 2012; sabbioni et al., 2018; snowshoe et al., 2017). it is also important to highlight that we ask people seeking care to let their guard down and become vulnerable in such instances and therefore a reciprocal act of trust is needed by service providers. in fact, sharing stories has been described as gifting treasures (kopua, 2019). similarly, among guiding principles shaping culturally informed health practices in australia with aboriginal youth, was the importance of 21 kodeeswaran et al.: indigenous women surviving the sixties scoop published by scholarship@western, 2019 centering family and kinship in health services because of their role in contributing to wellbeing and being a source of strength (sabbioni et al., 2018). at the organizational level, there is a responsibility to create spaces and opportunities for service providers and other staff to learn about historical and current colonial acts such as the sixties scoop and the millennial scoop to achieve a growing understanding of its ongoing impact on their clients and indigenous communities at large. moreover, anti-oppression, anti-racism, and cultural safety workshops and trainings for example should be part of onboarding and even having spaces for residential school and sixties scoop survivors to share their experiences may contribute to the ongoing learning and reflection process required by those working with indigenous peoples. furthermore, there is a requirement for organizational and institutional leaders to understand and explore how their policies and programming reinforce colonization and how they can dismantle colonial structures and center the voices and perspectives of indigenous peoples to alleviate systemic forms of oppression, particularly for indigenous women (kubik et al., 2009). other important questions for organizational and institutional leadership are: who are we making indigenous cultures accessible to and is it to the detriment of indigenous clients? how can indigenous cultures be made accessible to non-indigenous clients and meet the expectations of indigenous clients? historically and in many current spaces, there are limitations on the extent to which indigenous people can practice their cultural activities for healing and teaching for example. today in many nonindigenous spaces or spaces under non-indigenous leadership, the importance of making culture accessible to non-indigenous people supersedes the needs of indigenous people. having a space for healing that is exclusive to indigenous peoples and the community is critical. non-indigenous peoples need to recognize, respect, and support the creation of these spaces. another way non-indigenous peoples may support indigenous peoples is to ensure there are opportunities for indigenous peoples to develop their own solutions as opposed to imposing or providing those solutions (king et al., 2009). this can include indigenous leadership from service users on projects and programs. moreover, it is important for culture within program or services to recognize the diversity of their indigenous clients. this diversity should be reflected in the leadership as well as in the delivery of services. although it may be beneficial to establish a relationship with a knowledge carrier this may be more useful to the organization itself in contrast to the clients. the clients would benefit from knowledge carriers with diverse skills representing different first nations, métis, and inuit nations who possess different worldviews some of which may align with the client’s worldviews. in our project, each knowledge carrier brought with them stories of where they come from and their nations and frequently work with women from different nations in urban settings. it is important to note that our study in an urban setting included women from several nations. as sixties scoop survivors, they access more diasporic communities learning from different nations which contributes to their own identity. part of the reclamation journey may not immediately or always involve their specific nations because they may not know from which community they are from, have access to indigenous communities, or even nationspecific knowledge carriers (m. campaigne, 2019 personal communication). 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.1.13570 study limitations finally, there are limitations in our study. although eight women participated throughout the two cycles, four women consistently attended all the weekly circles and full moon ceremony. the women’s attendance throughout the sessions can possibly speak to their perceived preparedness to part-take in ceremony and be in a space where discussions around the sixties scoop are present. since every woman had different levels of preparedness with engaging in ceremony, the perspectives of those who were more prepared to engage in (re)connection to indigenous cultures could have been more represented in the data. while the focus groups were an opportunity to facilitate deeper discussion on certain topics and ideas, the dynamics of the group as well as preparedness to engage in discussions could have allowed for certain participants to elaborate more on their ideas compared to others. conclusion our study has provided insight into the experiences of urban indigenous women in reconnecting to culture. it is important to note that our work took place in an institutional setting where cultural programming is available. throughout our study, the women shared several differences between culture as ceremony and culture as programming which we believe are critical to further describe as actionable items for future consideration focusing on the roles and responsibilities of service providers and recognizing differences in the spaces for services and programs versus ceremony. these considerations are necessary to meet the needs of indigenous clients, to avoid further colonization of indigenous cultural practices or even dampening the impacts of culture on individual and community health and connectedness which shapes cultural identity. 23 kodeeswaran et al.: indigenous women surviving the sixties scoop published by scholarship@western, 2019 references aguiar, w., & halseth, r. 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(2015). canada and colonial genocide. journal of genocide research, 17(4), 373-390. https://doi.org/10.1080/14623528.2015.1096580 https://doi.org/10.7202/1082339ar https://doi.org/10.2105/ajph.2011.300432 https://doi.org/10.1080/14623528.2015.1096580 ms13570benoiti'llstruggleandi'llfall final māori linked administrative data: te hao nui—a novel indigenous data infrastructure and longitudinal study the international indigenous policy journal volume 14 | issue 1 april 2023 māori linked administrative data: te hao nui—a novel indigenous data infrastructure and longitudinal study reremoana theodore university of otago, new zealand. moana.theodore@otago.ac.nz amohia boulton whakauae research for māori health and development, new zealand. amohia@whakauae.co.nz andrew sporle university of auckland, new zealand. a.sporle@auckland.ac.nz recommended citation theodore, r., boulton, a., & sporle, a. (2023). māori linked administrative data: te hao nui—a novel indigenous data infrastructure and longitudinal study. the international indigenous policy journal, 14(1). https://10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.13412 māori linked administrative data: te hao nui—a novel indigenous data infrastructure and longitudinal study abstract worldwide, large amounts of administrative data are collected within official statistics systems on indigenous peoples. these data are primarily used for government and state policy purposes as opposed to by indigenous peoples to support indigenous agendas (taylor & kukutai, 2017). in aotearoa me te waipounamu new zealand, māori need high quality data to develop evidence-based policies and programs and to monitor government policies that impact on māori. in this methodological paper, we describe uses of administrative data for māori and current barriers to its use. we outline the development of a novel administrative data infrastructure and future longitudinal study. by explicating our indigenous initiated, designed and controlled data project, we make a methodological contribution to indigenous data sovereignty and kaupapa māori (māori worldview) epidemiology. keywords indigenous data sovereignty, māori, wellbeing, policy, youth, administrative data acknowledgments the te hao nui project is supported by the new zealand health research council (hrc) [grant number 18/489]. dr reremoana theodore is supported by a hrc māori health research emerging leadership fellowship [grant number 18/664]. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ 1 theodore et al.: māori linked administrative data published by scholarsip@western, 2023 worldwide, indigenous peoples are asserting their rights to fully participate in evidence-based policy-making and programs that impact their peoples and lands (walter et al., 2020). indigenous peoples require good quality data to inform decision-making and program development and to monitor government and state policies and practices. in aotearoa me te waipounamu new zealand, there is an abundance of administrative data collected within the official statistics system on māori individuals, whānau (families), households, iwi (tribes) and māori collectives. to date, these data have been primarily used for governmental purposes as opposed to supporting māori development aspirations and agendas (taylor & kukutai, 2017). the new zealand government, however, has a responsibility to ensure data resources are accessible and useful for māori in accordance with its obligations as a partner to te tiriti o waitangi (the treaty of waitangi: new zealand’s founding document). moreover, greater levels of research funding and investment in training and capacity building are necessary in order for māori to become authentic partners in producing and using official statistics (statistics new zealand, 2014a). in this methodological paper, we briefly describe new zealand’s administrative data and outline several challenges affecting the ability of māori collectives to access, analyse, and use their own administrative data. we discuss the growing indigenous data sovereignty movement, principles, and practices and their impact on indigenous policy development. we then outline the creation of a novel, permanent, administrative data infrastructure and longitudinal study called te hao nui. we highlight the importance of the infrastructure and future study, its alignment with indigenous data sovereignty principles, and ability to monitor māori wellbeing over time and contribute to the strategic aspirations of iwi/māori. administrative data and the integrated data infrastructure (idi) in this section we describe administrative data and, in particular, new zealand’s integrated data infrastructure (idi). these are powerful tools currently used by the new zealand government to try to address “wicked” problems (problems, in planning and policy, that are difficult to solve, like reducing poverty) (boston & gill, 2017; sepuloni, 2018). we also discuss how administrative data have been used by the new zealand government to try to address tiriti (treaty) obligation failures, using the 2018 census failure as an example. administrative data are routinely collected data that are primarily gathered as a result of operational activities rather than for a specific research purpose (e.g., health service delivery information). in aotearoa me te waipounamu new zealand, government-funded policy agencies and service providers hold their own data in secure data environments, about their own services and operational transactions. in addition, there is a research database of linked data called the integrated data infrastructure (idi) which holds linked administrative data about people and households (statistics new zealand, 2018b). these data are collected by a range of government agencies, statistics new zealand (stats nz) surveys, and non-government organisations (statistics new zealand, 2017), and collated into a single database within a secure stats nz data environment. some datasets are merged directly using common unique identifiers while other datasets that do not have common unique identifiers are linked using demographic information (statistics new zealand, 2014b). after data from separate datasets are linked via reference to a separate individual identity dataset, information that can identify a person (e.g., names, addresses) are removed to create de-identified data. for further information on the linking methodology used in the idi, see statistics new zealand (2014b). the idi contains longitudinal data (information on the same people at different time points) from over sixty different data sources including data on justice, health, accident 2 the international indigenous policy journal, 14.1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.13412 compensation, education, taxes, social welfare and social services, data on people and communities, population (e.g., census), income and work, and housing (figure 1). the idi is regularly being refreshed with updated source data and extended with new datasets (for more information see statistics new zealand, 2020a). figure 1: data in statistics new zealand’s integrated data infrastructure (idi). image taken from statistics new zealand the idi is used heavily by government agencies for a range of purposes including social investment analyses. social investment applies “rigorous and evidence-based investment practices to social services” (treasury new zealand, 2017). while the concept of social investment is not a new idea, over the last decade it has gained increasing traction in new zealand, becoming a key focus of policy work (boston & gill, 2017; sepuloni, 2018). more recent and intensive approaches to social investment were led by the fifth national government (2008-2017) and drew on big data approaches and data analytics to inform evidence-based policy interventions (boston & gill, 2017; sepuloni, 2018). in an effort to stimulate innovative solutions to enduring or “wicked” social problems, this government also made linked administrative data more open and accessible to users outside of public policy processes (e.g., academics) (teng et al., 2017). 3 theodore et al.: māori linked administrative data published by scholarsip@western, 2023 the idi is considered to be a world-leading resource that can be used to analyse data about complete populations. it provides an alternative approach to researching social issues alongside the usual sample survey research which has been the more common way of conducting policy research in new zealand. the idi allows for the investigation of the impacts of services, interventions, and programs (social investment agency, 2017). it enables researchers to examine compounding and inter-related factors that can impact what happens to people’s lives over time. the longitudinal nature of the idi also allows researchers to investigate the impacts of cumulative advantage and disadvantage. these types of data can help to identify critical points in the lifecourse to intervene with programs that support health and wellbeing. the data can therefore inform long-term policy, planning, and monitoring of services and programs by and for māori collectives. the large number of records involved also enables research on the māori population with enough statistical power to produce results with high levels of precision. smaller population studies in new zealand often have numbers of māori participants in their sample that are inadequate for robust research that focuses on the māori population within the research. this means that, to date, quantitative research with māori has not had the same depth and breadth as research with non-māori in new zealand. recently the idi and administrative data were used extensively by stats nz to supplement the 2018 census of the new zealand population (statistics new zealand, 2019). as described in the independent review of new zealand’s 2018 census, this “backfilling” activity was necessary due to a significant under-count which resulted from lower-than-expected response rates to census 2018. in particular, poor response rates disproportionately affected māori compared to non-māori, requiring 23% of information on the māori ethnic group to be taken from administrative data. the comparable rate for pākehā (new zealander of european descent) was only 8%. administrative data has its limitations however, and could not be used to fill the gaps in the census for measures like iwi affiliation and language because there were no comprehensive sources for that information at a population level (statistics new zealand, 2019). the independent review stated that in the future, stats nz needed to improve engagement with māori organisations in the community and with key iwi groups given the relationship with māori as tiriti partners (statistics new zealand, 2019). the review highlighted the need to invest in training, governance, and operational arrangements to facilitate better collaboration with māori as tiriti partners throughout the census and more broadly in stats nz’s broader survey work. overall, the poorly executed and underfunded census has been recognised as a significant failing on the part of the government in upholding their tiriti obligations (statistics new zealand, 2019). issues affecting administrative data use and access for māori in this section, we describe accessibility and usability issues that impact on māori use of administrative data. administrative data in new zealand, discussed thus far, can be analysed through stats nz’s standalone datasets, confidential unit record files (curfs), and by using linked data within the idi. in order to access the idi, individuals and groups apply to stats nz for access to a secure idi data lab. stats nz evaluates applications on a set of criteria which include whether the research is for a statistical purpose, for the public good, is conducted by a credible team, whether suitable data are available, and that stats nz can enforce an agreement (social investment agency, 2017). only approved researchers can access microdata in secure data labs. microdata are anonymised unit record datasets (individual response data in surveys and censuses) (statistics, new 4 the international indigenous policy journal, 14.1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.13412 zealand, 2020b). microdata information cannot be removed from the secure idi data lab environment (statistics, new zealand, 2020b). only aggregated data, results, tables, and graphs, that are approved by stats nz, can be exported from the secure data lab environment. aggregation is a method of protecting sensitive information by collapsing categories (e.g., where the count is “too small”). stats nz uses a risk management framework to protect against the disclosure of confidential information (statistics new zealand, 2020b). researchers currently need high levels of technical, programming, and statistical skills to use idi data in data labs. data are stored in an inconsistent format (e.g., hundreds of tables) which also make the datasets difficult to use and there is a need for easier user interfaces. a person or group’s ability to use the idi is also increasingly being affected by user demand in particular requests to add new datasets. this creates challenges to the current infrastructure because the idi was originally designed as an experimental prototype and it now requires scaling up (e.g., increasing its processing capabilities) in order to meet current and future demand (o'neill, 2019). this would involve changing the idi from a prototype to a data warehouse model to enable increases in datasets (e.g., data volume) (o’neill, 2019). māori collectives need analysts and researchers who are technically proficient to be able to manipulate the data via access to microdata. a medium to long-term strategy to improve administrative data use for māori is to build statistical and research capabilities by training more māori data scientists and statisticians (kukutai et al., 2020). this requires a focus on increasing the number of māori who study and use statistics. māori graduates, however, are currently less likely to graduate with a science degree compared to non-māori graduates (theodore et al., 2016) and it takes at least seven years of post-high school education to attain a phd. at present, māori scientists are severely under-represented, compared to non-māori, in new zealand universities and in crown research institutes (science research businesses owned by the crown (i.e., the new zealand government)) (mcallister et al., 2020). in aotearoa me te waipounamu new zealand, the government—as a tiriti partner—has a responsibility to correct current asymmetries in data use capabilities between māori and non-māori. this would help to enable partnership and more equitable benefits in line with indigenous data sovereignty principles (described in the following section) and also help address societal “wicked problems” (e.g., reducing inequities, poverty). indigenous data sovereignty despite indigenous peoples using data throughout time, indigenous data sovereignty as a concept is relatively new (kukutai & taylor, 2016). indigenous data sovereignty is defined as “the rights of indigenous peoples to control the collection, access, analysis, interpretation, management, dissemination, and reuse of indigenous data” (walter & carroll, 2020, p. 2). indigenous data sovereignty, the rights to self-determination and the governance of data about indigenous peoples, lands, resources, knowledges, and ways of being, is affirmed in the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip) (walter & carroll, 2020). walter and carroll (2020) state that indigenous data sovereignty is fundamentally about indigenous leadership (walter & carroll, 2020). as such, indigenous data sovereignty includes the understanding that data are subject to the laws of the nation where it is stored and collected, and not only supports tribal sovereignty but also the realisation of indigenous aspirations (te mana raraunga: māori data 5 theodore et al.: māori linked administrative data published by scholarsip@western, 2023 sovereignty network, n.d.). kukutai et al. (2020) have described four core principles of indigenous data sovereignty which together form the care framework, namely (i) collective benefit—data ecosystems are designed to enable indigenous peoples to benefit from data; (ii) authority to control—indigenous rights and interests in indigenous data should be recognised and their authority should be empowered to control these data; (iii) responsibility—people working with indigenous data are responsible for sharing those data to support the self-determination and collective benefit of indigenous peoples; (iv) ethics—the rights and wellbeing of indigenous peoples is the primary concern through data life cycles and across the data ecosystem. in aotearoa me te waipounamu new zealand, māori could and should be able to use their own administrative data, including their data in the idi, as a tiriti (treaty) right. yet, as described previously, māori are less able to use their own data compared to other groups (e.g., government departments) which is unacceptable and counter to indigenous data sovereignty goals (kukutai & cormack, 2020). these goals include ensuring data for and about māori are protected and safeguarded, māori involvement in the governance of data repositories, and supporting the establishment of māori data infrastructure, including security systems. moreover, many iwi are moving into a post-treaty settlement era, using governance entities to manage resources and fund programs and services. therefore, they require good quality data to support their planning for future pathways and forward-focused development agendas. the ngā tikanga paihere framework, developed in 2018, provides a guide to appropriate use of the idi particularly data about māori and other under-represented groups (new zealand government, 2018). the framework outlines the need for researchers to: have appropriate expertise, skills, and relationships with communities; be accountable and transparent to communities of interest; have good data standards and practice kaitiakitanga (data stewardship and governance); ensure communities are involved in research decisions as early as possible; make certain that community objectives align with research objectives; and ensure that benefits are balanced with risks, including the identification of sensitivities in the use of data (e.g., privacy issues for māori collectives). ngā tikanga paihere guidelines also describe the importance of development opportunities with communities (e.g., improving data literacy, capability, and resource sharing). overall, iwi and other māori collectives are taking an increasing interest in the data sovereignty space, as evidenced by the establishment of te mana raraunga, the māori data sovereignty network in 2015 and the establishment by the national iwi chairs’ forum of a specific data iwi leaders group. similar groups have formed in other countries. for example, the first nations information governance centre was established in 2010 in canada. in 2016, the united states indigenous data sovereignty network was founded, followed by the maiam nayri wingara aboriginal and torres strait islander data sovereignty collective in australia in 2017 (walter & carroll, 2020). worldwide, the indigenous data sovereignty movement has become a network of indigenous-led advocacy, education and research networks that aim to transform the data landscape to support the development, aspirations and wellbeing of indigenous peoples, including the global indigenous data alliance (gida) that was founded at a meeting in the basque country in 2019 (walter & carroll, 2020). there is a huge cache of administrative data related to indigenous peoples that have the potential to bring about a new era in policy development and delivery for indigenous communities worldwide (kukutai et al., 2020). rapidly changing data ecosystems, big data, and open data, however, can create serious issues for indigenous peoples. they increase the ability for non-indigenous users to 6 the international indigenous policy journal, 14.1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.13412 analyse indigenous data at greater distances from where the data have been collected (walter & carroll, 2020). this means that data use, analyses, and interpretations occur away from the lived realities of indigenous peoples, and are often informed by non-indigenous worldviews and values (walter & carroll, 2020). even worse, algorithms and big data may result in outcomes that racialise and increase the surveillance of indigenous communities (kukutai et al., 2020). te hao nui one way of realising the potential of data for indigenous peoples that is consistent with indigenous data sovereignty principles and practices is to create innovative indigenous-led studies. in this section, we describe the development and initial stages of a novel data infrastructure and longitudinal study called te hao nui. the overall aim of te hao nui is to help improve policy and service interventions at local and national levels in aotearoa me te waipounamu new zealand that support wellbeing. the project will leverage off pre-existing state investment in official statistical resources. as a team, we are designing te hao nui in response to the expressed need of māori collectives for high quality information to inform and monitor programs to improve māori wellbeing. the information produced by this research is intended to not only identify intervention targets but, through the creation of a permanent data infrastructure, act as a monitor of māori outcomes and interventions into the future. the new māori knowledge infrastructure within the idi will then be made available for future research. our work aligns with findings from a recent publication that highlighted the current limitations of the idi for māori data and māori users (greaves et al., 2023). in particular, the need for significant improvements to be made to, or rebuilding of, the idi, to ensure that it becomes a safer and more effective tool for māori self-determination (greaves et al., 2023). by creating a new māori infrastructure, we hope to transform the availability of research results, resources, and the existing official statistics system to māori collectives. this will not only enable māori-led research using current statistical resources, it will inform the improvement of those resources, as well as the creation of māori data resources, by highlighting the limitations of existing official statistics to inform the achievement of māori aspirations. the te hao nui project is indigenous-led. te hao nui research leaders (the authors of this paper) have extensive experience and expertise working in and with indigenous-led organisations and undertaking indigenous research. moreover, one author and research-lead (sporle) is a founding member of the global indigenous data alliance and te mana raraunga—the māori data sovereignty network. the co-design approach with key stakeholders is described in detail in the following section. te hao nui research leaders are also working with a number of technical advisors and data analytics experts. a number of features of the te hao nui study require explanation, as the study takes a novel approach to combining existing government survey data with the expressed needs and aspirations of māori communities. the long term plan for the te hao nui project is to use linked data from te kupenga 2013 and te kupenga 2018 (see information below) with the idi and the longitudinal census database (lcd). this will enable researchers to create the world’s largest and most comprehensive indigenous longitudinal study using existing data, which will be capable of following individual pathways forward and backward in time (figure 2). 7 theodore et al.: māori linked administrative data published by scholarsip@western, 2023 figure 2: overall structure of the linked new zealand data resources for the te hao nui project 8 the international indigenous policy journal, 14.1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.13412 the lcd contains data from six censuses (1981, 1986, 1991, 1996, 2001, and 2006) and has been described in detail previously (statistics new zealand, 2014b). in brief, the lcd is a longitudinal data source to enhance understandings on population change over time. the lcd is not currently within the idi. if stats nz do not add the lcd to the idi in the near future, we plan to undertake initial analyses using the two census datasets that are currently within the idi (2013 and 2018). future work will then use data from the 1981-2013 censuses that are available in the lcd. the te kupenga surveys have been described elsewhere in detail (statistics new zealand, 2014c; statistics new zealand, 2018). in brief, te kupenga 2013 was the inaugural nationally representative survey of māori wellbeing undertaken by stats nz following the 2013 census. te kupenga participants were a sample of the resident māori population aged 15 years or older who identified as having māori ethnicity or descent in the 2013 census (n=5549). the survey involved a complex sampling strategy and used sample weights to create a nationally representative sample. te kupenga was the first official survey in aotearoa new zealand to include culturally informed variables, including information about the cultural, social, and economic wellbeing of individuals. as such, it was a significant step forward for stats nz in terms of responding to māori requests for highquality data (kukutai & walter, 2015). following the 2018 census, te kupenga was repeated with some question changes, (statistics new zealand, 2018a). a key difference between the 2013 and 2018 surveys was an increased sample size to approximately n=8,500. te kupenga 2018 has suffered from delays, particularly with regard to the dissemination of results, due to the issues with the 2018 census. provisional information was released in april 2020 (statistics new zealand, 2020c). initial te hao nui analyses will be undertaken using te kupenga 2013 data. when te kupenga 2018 data are added to the idi and quality assessed, we will then link and use the 2018 data. to date, members of the te hao nui team and technical advisors have been working with stats nz to support this work. te kupenga are post-census surveys and the censuses are the sampling frame meaning that the surveys are automatically linked to census data. te kupenga 2013 is an official statistics survey, therefore its administration is determined by legislation covered by the statistics act 1975 including limiting data access to public good projects (new zealand government, 1975). the key focus of initial te hao nui analyses and research projects will be on the wellbeing of rangatahi or young people aged between 15 to 24 years. māori make up 16.5% of the new zealand population (n=775,836) according to the 2018 census. māori are a youthful population, with more than half the population aged 25 years or younger. research has demonstrated that adolescence is a life stage where many health-determining behaviours are established (clark et al., 2013). currently rangatahi outcomes are measured periodically and in a cross sectional (measured at one time point) manner. this prevents the identification of the determinants of wellbeing and the timely assessment of changes in the population level outcomes—including the impact of interventions. the te hao nui research team will initially examine the wellbeing of rangatahi based on the information that they provided when they took part in the te kupenga 2013 survey. exposure measures/predictors in the censuses and the idi will be associated with various forms of selfreported wellbeing outcomes in the te kupenga surveys. initial analyses will focus on the following variables in the te kupenga dataset: housing issues; experienced discrimination; employment; knowing one’s iwi; knowing one’s ancestral marae (the courtyard of a māori meeting house used for social or ceremonial purposes and often includes the buildings around the marae); iwi registration; having been to ancestral marae; speaking te reo; importance of culture; and whānau wellbeing. data 9 theodore et al.: māori linked administrative data published by scholarsip@western, 2023 on key influencing factors from the census will likely include household income, nz deprivation (an area-based socioeconomic measure), occupational socio-economic position, education, housing tenure, and household overcrowding. data from the idi will likely include education qualifications, years at school, number of schools, enrolled in a primary health (primary care) organisation, and household mobility. we will calculate the prevalence of key influencing factors for the whole country and then for specific regions based on stakeholder needs, which we describe in the next section. given the unique nature of the te hao nui project, including the need to develop the data infrastructure to make it fit for purpose, it is difficult to outline exact timelines for the project. moreover, issues with the availability of 2018 census data and related administrative datasets have meant that it has taken substantial time to fix these infrastructure issues and undertake quality assessments. our research team had planned to have all major infrastructure issues addressed by the end of 2021 but the extensive covid-19 lockdowns in auckland prevented access to the stats nz data access portals for 18 months. this work will be completed by early 2023. planned training workshops with key stakeholders will take place throughout 2023, as well as the documentation of the research processes. analyses and report-writing on research examining the wellbeing of rangatahi (described above) will also take place in 2023. future topics of interest will be identified with key stakeholders in 2024. designing a project to align with indigenous data sovereignty principles and practices the design of the te hao nui project can illustrate how to initiate research using administrative data by māori for māori in a way that upholds indigenous data sovereignty principles and practices. key aspects of the project include working with māori collectives from the initiation of the project to enable them to access their own administrative data, the design of māori data governance models, and the building of māori community research and analytic capability. as described previously the concept of indigenous data sovereignty is relatively new. the global indigenous data alliance (gida), formed in 2019, endorsed and host the care framework for indigenous data governance (described previously). in addition to international best practice, gida note that national indigenous data sovereignty groups are best placed to respond to the needs of their communities. as described previously, the ngā tikanga paihere framework, developed in 2018, provides a guide to appropriate use of the idi particularly data about māori (new zealand government, 2018). in this section, we will describe how key aspects of the study align with the care and ngā tikanga paihere frameworks. a number of māori collectives will be key stakeholders in the te hao nui project. since the conception of the project, the research team have worked with māori collectives who were interested in being named key stakeholders and with whom they have strong existing working relationships. discussions to date have informed the initial selection of te hao nui research questions. in particular, the focus on rangatahi wellbeing pathways and the identification of modifiable risk and protective factors. this includes the need to identify variables that can inform locally-based interventions and resource allocation, are amenable to policy or program intervention, allow stakeholders to monitor change over time, and enable them to lobby for resources. other stakeholders will include a range of service providers such as iwi-mandated social services, primary health service providers and other health entities. having a diverse range of stakeholders means that the project is designed to meet the needs of urban, regional and rural stakeholders/providers. information on te hao nui key stakeholders is not publicly available yet. in 2023, memorandums of 10 the international indigenous policy journal, 14.1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.13412 understanding (mous) will be signed. signing was delayed due to the unplanned need for detailed data quality assessments of census data and related datasets, then by the extensive covid-19 related lockdowns and travel restrictions in 2020-21. the te hao nui co-design approach aligns with the ngā tikanga paihere framework of ensuring communities are involved in research as early as possible and in accordance with care principles of being responsible for sharing data to support the self-determination and collective benefit of indigenous peoples. previous research has highlighted the importance of working with and understanding the needs of stakeholders to improve health and wellbeing services for māori (e.g., port et al., 2008). studies have also shown the importance of co-design processes for māori given that programs and interventions designed for the general population tend to be less effective for māori and may even increase inequities (te morenga et al., 2018). an indigenous quantitative methodological advisory group (members still to be named) will guide the te hao nui project. this advisory group will include leading international indigenous researchers who are members of gida. with support from international advisors, we are developing a māori data governance model. governance processes must be in place to ensure that iwi have control over their identified data within the official data system – consistent with indigenous data sovereignty practice. in particular, māori stakeholders will have control over their data that they aggregate (i.e., a data resource), from the design to the dissemination stages. as already negotiated with stats nz, these stakeholders will also determine the protocol and processes regarding who can then use that aggregated data (data resource). for example, if a māori collective are interested in aggregating data about a particular geographical area that is not a standard stats nz aggregation, then that collective will be able to determine who can access and re-use that information. the foundation of the te hao nui project is to create new information processes that enhance rangatiratanga (sovereignty) over data resources. our māori stakeholders will therefore maintain control over their intellectual property. this work aligns with the ngā tikanga paihere framework in relation to the need for good data standards and practice kaitiakitanga (data stewardship and governance) and care principles, including having data ecosystems designed to enable indigenous peoples to benefit from data. the ngā tikanga paihere framework outlines the importance of development opportunities with communities (e.g., building capability, improving data literacy). building māori capability to access and apply data resources is an important goal of the te hao nui project. this goal will be achieved through the combination of a more accessible data infrastructure and workforce development initiatives. workshops will be run with key stakeholders and tailored to meet local needs. these workshops will cover issues such as finding data, data quality, data ownership and governance, using data to monitor change and creating graphs using inzight (described below). these workshops will be a “stepping stone” for non-statistically trained stakeholder members toward further training, should they wish. the creation of a new data infrastructure with standardised methods of reporting and access will lower the currently very high technical barrier to accessing official data. stakeholders will have training on how to access the idi system to view results. idi portals (secure access networked computers) will be set up with our regional stakeholders so there will be a permanent and local resource for further training and research projects (all current data portals are currently in main centres). the research team will produce a technical users’ guide to assist new users to use the longitudinal data infrastructure. all code other than that governed by iwi/māori organisations will be put in the public domain via stats nz’s metadata repository for others to use and adapt for future 11 theodore et al.: māori linked administrative data published by scholarsip@western, 2023 research. there will also be post-graduate opportunities for tertiary students to work in the te hao nui project. to date, three summer students (students who undertake a small research project over the university break) and one honours student have worked on the project. more opportunities, including phd and post-doctoral projects will become available in 2023 and beyond. the research team will create new data visualisation tools to produce national level data and data for regions associated with our key stakeholders. this aligns with care principles, for example, ensuring data ecosystems are designed to enable indigenous peoples to benefit from data. the new tools will be adapted from current visualisation tools and geographical information system mapping (gis) add-ons in the free inzight software (insight.nz). the inzight software is a point and click version of r (one of the world’s leading statistical software packages). inzight is easy to learn and was initiated in collaboration with the university of auckland and stats nz with support from new zealand’s ministry of education. the use of inzight has been taught in the new zealand secondary school maths curriculum to children as young as year 9 (approximately 13 years of age) making the software familiar to most new zealand secondary school students who were at school in the last decade (the university of auckland, n.d.). inzight will be used to visualise and analyse data. datasets for stakeholders will be stored in the idi. inzight will then be used visualise and analyse those data. inzight is currently being piloted within the secure stats nz data environment, with the intention that it will be made available to idi users in 2022. aggregated data, however, will still need to go through the stats nz protocol to be released, as described previously. an iwi-specific capability using rohe (region) maps will also be created if requested by iwi stakeholders and there are strong data governance processes over the reuse of any mapping resources provided by iwi. over time, for variables sourced from the idi, regional prevalence rates will be updated and compared with baseline prevalence, to identify change over time. these methods can then be reused as an outcome monitoring tool. importantly, the co-design process will inform research design, analyses and dissemination strategies over time. this is important for the translation of research findings and resources into māori health and wellbeing gains at a local and national level. this aligns with the ngā tikanga paihere framework including ensuring community objectives align with research objectives. this work also aligns with the care principles including supporting the selfdetermination and collective benefit of indigenous peoples. previous research has shown the importance of having knowledge users working alongside researchers to lead research in order to make research relevant and useful (canadian institutes of health research, 2012; oetzel et al., 2017). importantly, te hao nui stakeholder partners will be resourced from the project’s budget to enable stakeholder staff to work directly on the project aligning with the ngā tikanga paihere framework of resource sharing with communities. like all studies, there are a number of strengths and limitations of our proposed study. as described previously, using administrative data enables our team to undertake research at a population level and we can provide information to inform long-term policy, planning and monitoring of services and programs by and for māori collectives. moreover, using data in the idi allows us to examine information collected across a wide range of sectors (e.g., health, education). working with māori collectives we are able to focus the research on areas of importance to māori communities as well as support them to have control over the analysis, interpretation, management and use of their own data for their own benefit. conversely, there have been and will be a number of challenges to undertaking this project. as a team we have already experienced delays due to the poorly executed 2018 census. moreover, we are restricted to using administrative data collected to date. fortunately, 12 the international indigenous policy journal, 14.1 the te kupenga surveys does enable us to examine culturally informed variables such as cultural and social wellbeing. moreover, as variables of interest are identified by māori collectives, we will be able to inform future official surveys. as further lessons are learned within the te hao nui project, we will share these in future research papers with other indigenous peoples to help inform best practice in regards to administrative data use by indigenous peoples for indigenous peoples in line with indigenous data sovereignty. policy relevance and lessons learned for indigenous peoples internationally indigenous peoples globally have experienced colonisation and repeated breaches of local treaties that resulted in widespread land confiscations, loss of indigenous knowleges and resources, the destabilisation of indigenous socio-political organisations, racism, and discrimination. colonisation led to high levels of poverty and poor health, education, and social outcomes affecting generations of indigenous peoples (anderson et al., 2006; reid & robson, 1998). to date, data have been used to define and make sense of indigenous peoples and their circumstances, often describing their differences to non-indigenous people and their levels of disadvantage (walter & carroll, 2020). a lack of connection between often well-meaning primarily non-indigenous policy makers and indigenous peoples has resulted in the imposition of policies to “fix” these issues (walter & carroll, 2020). that is, policy makers who diagnose indigenous problems and create policy solutions have often created policies that fail across nation states. walter and carroll (2020) note that these policy failures that result in poor indigenous policy outcomes have often come to be viewed as inevitable. or these policy failures are explained as only perceived failures by indigenous peoples. that is, indigenous peoples are perceived as not taking advantage of the opportunities presented within policy programs. therefore, the outcomes may be viewed as poor behaviour or choices made by indigenous peoples. data informs policy from the problem through to strategies to resolve the policy problem (walter & carroll, 2020). traditionally, indigenous data are used by primarily non-indigenous policy makers to make sense of indigenous peoples. walter and carroll (2020) describe indigenous data sovereignty as having the ability to invert the standard indigenous data/policy nexus with indigenous peoples’ own “governance of data and data for governance” (walter & carroll, 2020, p. 11). this means indigenous peoples govern and use their own data to inform their own policies and programs, and to monitor government and state policies that affect their communities. it therefore focuses the policy question(s) and subsequent analyses on the aspirations and goals of indigenous peoples. this requires indigenous leadership. in this paper we have described the development of a project, te hao nui, that is undertaken by māori for māori, that has relevance for indigenous peoples internationally. in order to support the work of other indigenous communities, our research team is committed to sharing information about the development, design and the inevitable results of this indigenous-led data project. in this methodological paper, we have discussed the potential uses of linked administrative data in aotearoa me te waipounamu new zealand for māori and some current issues that affect its use. we have described the growing indigenous data sovereignty movement. we then outlined the development phase of a novel indigenous-led and designed permanent data infrastructure and longitudinal study—te hao nui—which is being created using existing administrative data. the inevitable goal of te hao nui is to improve local and national level policies and services to support doi: 10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.13412 13 theodore et al.: māori linked administrative data published by scholarsip@western, 2023 long-term indigenous wellbeing and development. using indigenous data sovereignty principles and practices, other 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(2020). indigenous data sovereignty and policy. routledge. http://www.treasury.govt.nz/statesector/socialinvestment towards "good" native land governance: an evaluation in sarawak, malaysia the international indigenous policy journal volume 14 | issue 1 april 2023 towards "good" native land governance: an evaluation in sarawak, malaysia tan liat choon universiti teknologi malaysia, malaysia, tlchoon@utm.my toh ming liang universiti teknologi malaysia, malaysia, mltoh217@gmail.com looi kam seng department of survey and mapping malaysia, malaysia, looi@jupem.gov.my tan wee vern universiti teknologi malaysia, malaysia, wvtan2@live.utm.my muhamad uznir bin ujang universiti teknologi malaysia, malaysia, mduznir@utm.my thoo ai chin universiti teknologi malaysia, malaysia, acthoo@utm.my nor suhaibah binti azri universiti teknologi malaysia, malaysia, suhaibah@utm.my shanmugapathy a. l. kathitasapathy universiti teknologi malaysia, malaysia, pathyjr@hotmail.com recommended citation auger, j., nath, n., & greene, c. (2023). “wisdom seeking together”: circling around research ethics. the international indigenous policy journal, 14(1). https://10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.13873 towards "good" native land governance: an evaluation in sarawak, malaysia abstract sarawak is the largest state in malaysia, where two-thirds of the population are indigenous. this study aims to evaluate, through the lens of good governance principles, the current practice of the sarawak state’s formal land governance of lands associated with native customary rights (hereafter known as native land governance). being quantitative in nature, this study conceptualises an evaluation framework for good governance principles as applied to native land governance. next, this study empirically tests out the framework by adopting a multi-criteria decision-making tool known as the technique for order of preference by similarity to ideal solution (topsis). topsis analysis enables the integration of perceptions between state/private groups and indigenous groups. the output of the topsis analysis is summarised in a strength, weakness, opportunity, and threat (swot) format according to the topsis closeness value. unfortunately, results show that the weaknesses outnumber the strengths in sarawak’s native land governance. among these issues, indigenous respondents highlight major issues with the sarawak land registry’s efficiency in delivering outcomes that are equitable for indigenous land rights. this study ends with recommendations on how the state of sarawak can move towards compliance with good governance principles in relation to lands associated with native customary rights. keywords native, native customary rights, land governance, good governance, topsis acknowledgments our sincere gratitude to all who have participated in the study, particularly the respondents from land and survey department sarawak, various licensed land surveyors, community leaders, indigenous communities, as well as various ngos. also, we appreciate the constructive comments & critiques from the peer reviewers and journal editorial staff in making this publication a success. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ 1 liang et al: native land governance practice and performance in sarawak, malaysia indigenous peoples from the interior of sarawak typically dwell in longhouses and practise their own unique customary law, also known as the native customary rights (ncr). of course, not all indigenous peoples in sarawak live in rural areas; they are scattered across the state, where some live in urban areas, and some still live in those traditional ways of life associated with ncr. in these traditional ways, land is sacred, land is life, and land is a crucial part of indigenous lifestyles. for the indigenous people in sarawak living traditional lifestyles, land can be a space to dwell, to farm, to collect forest products, to hunt, to bury the dead, and something to be inherited (nasser & salleh, 2011; fong, 2011). ncr entails the norms perceived as traditionally correct social behaviour, rules for ceremonies and religious rites, lands, and methods of dispute resolution (bulan, 2007). sarawak is the largest state in malaysia, and two-thirds of its population are indigenous (department of statistics malaysia (dosm), 2010). in malaysian governmental language and policy, the term “native” is used interchangeably with indigenous people, or bumiputera of sarawak.1 generally, “native” refers to certain races in malaysia as specified in article 161a clause (7) of the federal constitution of malaysia 1957. malaysia is a multi-ethnic, multi-religious, and multi-cultural country with a total of thirteen states. according to the federal constitution of malaysia 1957, land matters fall under the jurisdiction of state government. as such, sarawak exercises its own jurisdiction over land matters, including governance on indigenous lands. this study focuses on sarawak’s context because it is the largest state with the highest population of indigenous people in malaysia. in this study, native land governance refers to the formal governance of land which is associated with ncr. simply put, it refers to the practical implementation of land policies by the malaysian government on lands where ncr has been established by indigenous communities prior to the formation of the country. some of the common grievances expressed by indigenous community leaders during visits by the authors to their longhouses include indigenous lands being continuously encroached upon by outside companies, multiple levels of government not listening to indigenous communities, and the government’s failure to issue land title to indigenous villagers even though they applied long ago. as reflected by these narratives, there are many issues faced by indigenous communities in sarawak which pose enormous threats to them, especially in terms of their land rights. various publications have shed light on the violation of ncr on land, causing insecurity of customary land tenure (sahabat alam malaysia (sam), 2019), ineffective development on indigenous land (ngidang, 2002), lack of indigenous title (azima, sivapalan, et al., 2015; bian, 2007), and inadequate compensation during land acquisition (suruhanjaya hak asasi manusia malaysia (suhakam), 2013). the failure of statutory law in protecting ncr over land gave way to the encroachment of customary land in sarawak (sam, 2019). as stated by ngidang (2002) and andersen et al. (2016), the lack of transparency and participation processes for state and private dealings with indigenous land has victimised indigenous communities. in addition, indigenous communities who are not willing to be involved in a development scheme, or who have tried to protect their rights, may be labelled as “anti-development” or “anti-government” (andersen et al., 2016; ngidang, 2002; saccess, 2012). critical to rectifying indigenous land disputes is the issuance of indigenous titles that guarantee customary land ownership (azima, sivapalan, et al., 2015). however, sarawak state government claims they are not issuing titles due to a lack of funds to survey these lands (bian, 1 the term “native” can be found in the federal constitution of malaysia 1957. section 161a (6) of the constitution reads: “in this article ‘native’ means: (a) in relation to sarawak, a person who is a citizen and either belongs to one of the races specified in clause (7) as indigenous to the state or is of mixed blood deriving exclusively from those races.” 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 2007). also, there were cases reported by suhakam (2013) on cases where either no compensation or insufficient compensation was paid to the indigenous people in the event of land acquisition for development purposes. the issue pertaining to ncr over land is not new in sarawak. it has always been a debated issue since the private colony of the brooke’s family settled in 1841. in simplified terms, indigenous peoples in sarawak traditionally viewed land as a gift from the almighty, which contrasted with an encroaching view that all untitled land belongs to the government. formalisation of customary tenure seems to be inevitable in malaysia, especially in this era where the superimposition of statutory laws on customary laws is common. a formalisation process is described as a process to identify, adjudicate, and register interests in land for whoever owns the land (meinzen-dick & mwangi, 2009). the formalisation process of customary land tenure is not simple task due to the contradictory nature of statutory and customary law (freudenberger et al., 2013; williamson, 2001). this formalisation process is also extremely complicated for a country like malaysia, with a diverse population of multiple ethnic, cultural, social, and religious backgrounds. the formalisation process is still ongoing to this day, and it remains a part of the land governance in sarawak. good governance is the key to a successful formalisation process that is equitable to indigenous peoples. here, our research question arises: to what extent does native land governance in sarawak meet good governance principles? good governance principles for our purposes refers to governance that is well managed through the principles of equity, efficiency, transparency, accountability, sustainability, subsidiarity, civic engagement, security, and results in desirable outcomes (food and agriculture organization of the united nations (fao), 2007). this research question is crucial in understanding the current status of native land governance in sarawak through comprehensive evaluation, especially with the aim to improve native land governance and to protect the rights of indigenous peoples. this study is crucial since the issues pertaining to ncr over land in sarawak are not getting any better based on the data collected on the ground, various published news, articles, as well as informal interviews and talks with indigenous community leaders. steps must be taken to rectify the root issues in ncr land. the study addresses knowledge gaps in native land governance in three aspects. first, it provides an evaluation framework to appraise native land governance through the lens of good governance principles. second, it applies that framework to native land governance in sarawak. third, it enables the prioritising of issues and solutions though the unique methodology adopted. the authors believe that the findings of this study are useful for sarawak’s context specifically and also for postulating further research to be done in the field of native land governance in malaysia and internationally. to achieve that aim, this study advances with the following discussions: first, the conceptualising of an evaluation framework to assess native land governance. second, the methodology to implement the evaluation framework in the context of sarawak. third, the empirical findings on the ground. fourth, the lessons learnt. native customary rights and land governance native customary rights (ncr) is linked with the culture, traditions, and beliefs of indigenous communities. in sarawak, ncr are the customary laws that encompass the norms perceived as correct social behaviour, rules for ceremonies and religious rites, lands, and method of dispute resolutions (bulan, 2007). notably, customary laws become an integral part of malaysia legal system when they were formally codified by the statutory body in sarawak known as the council for native 3 liang et al: native land governance practice and performance in sarawak, malaysia customs & traditions. the rights derived from customary laws are to maintain the cohesiveness of the society, to seek balance and justice, and to ensure life goes on. among these rights, the one related to land is known as “ncr over land” or “native customary tenure,” which is the most problematic area for malaysian government’s land administration. this is mainly due to the different perceptions of land held by the indigenous communities and the formal malaysian government. the concept of ncr is more comprehensible by providing the historical context of customary land tenure in sarawak. a chronological evolution of native customary tenure in sarawak the historical categories of indigenous land legislation in sarawak can be divided into three eras for our purposes: pre-brooke sarawak era, the brooke era (1841-1946), and the british crown colony era (1946-1963). the era of pre-brooke sarawak refers to the sovereignty of brunei, which is before the year 1841. ncr over land is a traditional system of land tenure that existed prior to the arrival of the first of the british brooke family, james brooke. as noted by porter (1967), prior to the arrival of james brooke in sarawak, the pre-existing system of land tenure was based on native customary laws. such laws confer ownership to whoever cultivates “virgin land” (richard, 1961). in 1841 the sultan of brunei, pangeran muda hashim, handed the government of sarawak to sir james brooke by an instrument of transfer. this event marks the beginning of the brooke era. at first, the brookes did not interfere with the customary tenure system (osman and kueh, 2010). instead, the brookes allowed the dayaks and malays to govern their own customary land in accordance with their own customary laws (nasser and salleh, 2011). with the increasing value of land and rampant land disputes caused by the settlers, the brookes had promulgated a series of land legislations, ostensibly to administrate the land efficiently. in short, the laws restricted the practice of shifting cultivation and the movement of dayak communities from one district to another. if an indigenous person moved from one river system to another, their rights over indigenous land would be lost (fong, 2011; nasser & salleh, 2011). also, the laws classified land into different categories, including “native holdings” to formally recognise the customary land rights, and most importantly, the plan to formal codify customary laws to record and protect these customary rights. however, these legislative plans were interrupted by the outbreak of world war ii (ngidang, 2005), and records of boundaries were lost because of the japanese occupation (richards, 1961). after the cession of sarawak to the british crown, land administration in sarawak continued reform. land ordinance no.3 had been introduced by the british crown to control and prohibit the creation of ncr (nasser & salleh, 2011). this marked the first time the rajah exercised his power to rebuke the creation of customary rights on state land (ngidang, 2005). to date, as inherited by the previous land legislations, the sarawak land code 1958 continues to recognise ncr to an extent. specifically, the government only acknowledges farmed areas (temuda) instead of the territorial domains (pemakai menoa) and communal forests (pulau galau). according to bulan (2007), pemakai menoa is defined as the geographical location of the long house community within a garis menoa (territorial boundaries between villages). temuda includes the farming land within a pemakai menoa and is divided by the boundary called antara umai; meanwhile pulau galau refers to the jungle or land that is left uncultivated for the purposes of communal use such as hunting, collecting natural resources, fishing, and burial. initially, the land code inherited the land claim systems which are rooted in customary law traditions. however, the various amendments of the land code continuously weakened the customary-oriented rights (ngidang, 2005). the land code 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 was drafted by a new zealander, j. caradus in 1954 (nasser & salleh, 2011). to date, it has been amended several times and functions as the primary land legislation to govern all land matters, including ncr in sarawak. native land governance: a conceptual evaluation framework to develop a firm grasp on this topic, this section reviews various publications involving the assessment frameworks, recommendations for improvement, or the development of best-practices in the field of native land governance. an evaluation framework was drafted based on some previous studies from both indigenous and non-indigenous perspectives, namely, arko-adjei et al. (2010), deininger et al. (2012), fao (2012), freudenberger et al. (2013), hull & whittal (2018), sam (2019), and suhakam (2013). generally, these inputs to draft the framework emanated from three broad categories. the first category is individual or personal studies from regional contexts outside malaysia. arkoadjei et al. (2010) present a framework for assessing customary tenure institutions in ghana based on good governance principles. customary tenure institutions involve both customary institutions and statutory institutions which deal with land administration. unlike ghana, the power to administrate land in sarawak, including indigenous land, is vested sorely under the formal government via statutory institutions. however, some indicators were adopted by this study despite the different context, especially in matters to improve tenure security. next, through the lens of human rights, good governance, and pro-poor policy, hull & whittal (2018) proposed a conceptual framework to assist in land reform projects, especially for customary land tenure in mozambique, southern african. the framework encompasses four levels of specificity which covers five evaluation areas: (i) underlying theory, (ii) change drivers, (iii) change process, (iv) land administration system (las), and (v) review process. this study provides the insights to draft the evaluation framework for sarawak, especially in terms of the review process. notably, both above studies adopted good governance as the guiding principle in developing the framework. the second category is studies from international organisations such as the world bank (wb), united states agency for international development (usaid), and the food and agriculture organisation of the united nations (fao). deininger et al. (2012) developed a diagnostic tool known as the land governance assessment framework (lgaf) to monitor and evaluate governance in land sectors from five aspects: (i) legal and institutional frameworks; (ii) land use planning, management, and taxation; (iii) management of public land; (iv) public provision of land information; and (v) dispute resolution and conflict management. despite the fact that the lgaf is developed to cater for modern land administration systems, some indicators are still relevant and applicable in the field of native land governance. next, freudenberger et al. (2013) discussed the lessons learned from recognising, formalising, and transforming customary tenure systems, which is insightful for drafting the evaluation framework. these lessons emanated from the past usaid projects which deal and work with customary tenure systems around the world (freudenberger et al., 2013). lastly, fao (2012) published voluntary guidelines to improve tenure governance of land, fisheries, and forests, which is applicable to all countries for all forms of tenure, including public, private, communal, indigenous, and customary. most of the principles used in the guidelines are directly related to good governance principles. 5 liang et al: native land governance practice and performance in sarawak, malaysia the third category is studies from local malaysian organisations. national human rights commission of malaysia (suhakam) and sahabat alam malaysia (sam) are the organisations in malaysia which support the indigenous rights in malaysia and deal with complaints launched by indigenous communities. the findings and recommendations by suhakam (2012) and sam (2019) were incorporated into the evaluation framework. through theoretical analysis and coding process, the key findings from the above publications were grouped and categorised into five main themes with ten sub-themes. coding enables the central issues of the publications to be identified and described with short phrases. similar codes are grouped together to form concepts, and similar concepts are grouped into categories. these themes serve as the foundation for the evaluation framework. on top of that, the evaluation framework was established based on six good governance dimensions: (i) efficiency and effectiveness, (ii) transparency and access to information, (iii) accountability, (iv) equity and fairness, (v) participation, and (vi) rule of law. these principles are interconnected and act as a whole. good governance means that the process of governance is associated with the principles of equity, efficiency, transparency, accountability, sustainability, subsidiarity, civic engagement, and security, which resulted in desirable outcomes (fao, 2007). it forms the core of good land administration (williamson et al. 2008). we believe that the principle of good governance should not be merely confined to the context of modern land administration. instead, it is also a crucial guiding principle for traditional land administration (the governance of indigenous land). one of the perceptible effects of good governance is the protection of vulnerable groups such as indigenous people through proper land registration and tenure security (fao, 2007; sam, 2019. arko-adjei et al. (2010) argue that good governance principles are needed to assess customary land institutions. the key to rectify problems in customary land governance, such as abuse of power by customary authorities, fluidity of customary laws, customary tenure insecurity, land-grabbing by outsiders, and unfair distribution of land resources by customary authorities. said otherwise, the problems associated with native land governance could be significantly reduced with proper implementation of good governance principles in native land governance. hence, these principles are embedded into the evaluation framework. table 1 describes the evaluation aspects used in this study. further explanations on the content for each theme are provided in the following sub-subsections. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 table 1. conceptualised evaluation framework theme sub-theme (item) items associated good governance principle policy and legal framework comprehensive land policy (1.1) land institutional reports on land policy implementation are publicly accessible transparency and access to information comprehensive land policy (1.2) collaboration between statutory land agencies and the customary authorities participation recognition of rights (2.1) existing legal framework recognises native customary land rights rule of law recognition of rights (2.2) minimal overlapping rights and contradiction rules between customary law and statutory land law rule of law recognition of rights (2.3) clear definitions on the concepts of customary tenure. rule of law enforcement and safeguard of rights (3.1) existing of documentation that register communal land rights and map the boundaries of native communal lands efficiency and effectiveness enforcement and safeguard of rights (3.2) existing of documentations that register and map the boundaries of individual native land. efficiency and effectiveness enforcement and safeguard of rights (3.3) initiative to avoid infringing on native customary land rights accountability customary land development joint venture/ investment (4.1) detail investigation into the status of the land before any alienation, reservation or issuance of licence take place. accountability joint venture/ investment (4.2) transparency in all forms of transactions in tenure rights as a result of investments in native customary land transparency and access to information joint venture/ investment (4.3) agreements are documented and understood by all who are affected participation joint venture/ investment (4.4) there are measures to ensure the fairness of profit distribution according to the agreement. equity and fairness 7 liang et al: native land governance practice and performance in sarawak, malaysia theme sub-theme (item) items associated good governance principle other land development scheme (5.1) appropriate consultation with native landholders before initiating any investment project participation customary land information and survey practice completeness of the land registry (6.1) the procedure of service delivering adopts simplified and locally suitable technology to reduce the costs and time. efficiency and effectiveness completeness of the land registry (6.2) records in the registry such as information on customary land are accessible to community members transparency and access to information effectiveness of cadastral survey practice (7.1) the survey of native customary tenure involves indigenous land owners. participation effectiveness of cadastral survey practice (7.2) strict key performance indicators for monitoring the survey process. accountability dispute resolution and conflict management judicial system (8.1) clear assignment of responsibility for conflict resolution between the communities efficiency and effectiveness judicial system (8.2) conflict resolution mechanisms are adequate for handling native land related issues. efficiency and effectiveness judicial system (8.3) there is an informal or communitybased system that resolves disputes in an equitable manner. equity and fairness judicial system (8.4) there is a process for appealing dispute rulings equity and fairness compensation from land acquisition (9.1) fair valuation and prompt compensation in accordance with national law and land policy equity and fairness compensation from land acquisition (9.2) legal provision of the right to appeal for any unfair compensation equity and fairness review process improvement (10.1) appropriate educational and training programs for indigenous peoples to enhance their management skill on land. accountability 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 theme 1: policy and legal framework. as stated by williamson et al. (2010), land policy is the main mechanism in a land administration system for setting the objectives of land tenure, land value, land use, and land development. likewise, in native land governance, land policy shapes the legal outcomes and political decisions which may affect the indigenous communities directly or indirectly. a total of three sub-themes are placed under the first theme. the first sub-theme focuses on the comprehensiveness of the land policy. it is imperative to ensure the land policy objectives are aiming to eradicate poverty and supporting indigenous peoples' own goals and action (enemark & molen, 2008). good governance indicators like participation as well as transparency and access to information are mandatory in the formulation of a land policy that can accommodate the needs of the indigenous communities. the second sub-theme shed light on the formal recognition of native customary rights though the codification of customary laws into the statutory framework. the legal recognition of native customary land rights according to the customs of indigenous people is the ideal outcome. smith & mitchell (2020) categorised this indicator under land and natural resources as one of the indicators to measure the state compliance with the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip). hence, the principle of rule of law shall be the guiding principle for the second sub-theme. next, the third sub-theme evaluates native land governance in terms of the practical enforcement and safeguarding of such rights. it is unfortunate to have strong legal provisions in the statute but weak implementations on the ground. in light of this, the existence of documentation that registers indigenous land rights and map the boundaries of indigenous lands are vital (deininger et al., 2011, fao, 2012). at the same time, such efforts to safeguard indigenous land rights must be done in an efficient and effective way. theme 2: native land development. based on the aforementioned theoretical analysis, land development is a crucial aspect and shall be included in the evaluation framework for native land governance. in sarawak, it is the government’s goal to bring indigenous people into development for the sake of the national economy (osman & kueh, 2010, cramb, 2011). the government seeks to convert “idle” land into agricultural land. every land development involves land dealings, and it is pertinent to have at least three principles of good governance reflected in every land dealing involving indigenous people. first, accountability to reduce corruption in every land transaction. second, transparency and access to information so that indigenous people have full understanding of any projects they are involved in. third, participation and consultation to ensure the consensus between the involving parties in every land development on native land. there are two sub-themes that can be placed under the second theme: first, the joint venture or investment scheme between third parties and indigenous communities; second, other land development schemes on native land. as stated by hull & whittal (2018), every project involving native land must be accompanied by a detailed investigation into the status of the land before any alienation, reservation, or issuance of licence takes place. similarly, there shall be appropriate consultation with indigenous communities before initiating any investment project which may override their rights to the land (arko-adjei et al, 2010; fao, 2012; smith & mitchell, 2020). theme 3: customary land information and land survey practice. cadastre is the core of a land administration system, registering land rights and mapping the land boundaries through cadastral surveying (williamson, 2001). despite the fact that cadastre is constantly undergoing changes, its basic function as “bookkeeping” for land records is important, especially in the context of native land administration. in light of this, the third theme focuses on the land registry and survey practice of native land with two sub-themes. the first sub-theme evaluates the completeness and reliability of the land registry, while the second sub-theme sheds light on the effectiveness of land survey 9 liang et al: native land governance practice and performance in sarawak, malaysia practice. service delivery shall adopt simplified and locally suitable technology to reduce costs and time (arko-adjei et al., 2010; foa, 2012). in other words, the principle of efficiency and effectiveness must be embedded in every land registry. as for the land survey practice, the principle of participation is vital to ensure the survey process involves indigenous land owners. very often, the lack of inclusion for indigenous people impedes the survey process, causing disputes to happen (sam, 2019). the issuance of native title through the appropriate survey method is the remedy to the rampant native land disputes in sarawak (azima, sivapalan, et al., 2015; bian, 2007). this reflects the need to incorporate the functionality of the land registry in the evaluation framework. theme 4: dispute resolution and conflict management. dispute resolution is an indispensable aspect of native land governance to restore justice and balance through both formal legal institutions and informal customary justice systems (bulan, 2014). in general, native land disputes in sarawak can be categorised as either internal disputes or external disputes. internal disputes happen among indigenous family members or the neighbors next to their land; external disputes involve the encroachment of native land by outside companies (azima, sivapalan, et al., 2015). there are minor disputes which could be resolved by a village headman, and major land disputes involving multiple villages and private companies which could only be solved by the formal court system. as stated by fao (2011), dispute resolution mechanism should be accessible in terms of location, language and procedures. as stated by bulan (2014), effective dispute resolution and conflict management are catalysts for social cohesion and harmony between indigenous communities and the state government. hence, the fourth theme evaluates native land governance from the perspective of dispute resolution and conflict management with two sub-themes: (i) the judicial system and (ii) compensation from land acquisition. the first sub-theme assesses the functionality of the dispute resolution system while the second sub-theme focuses on the remedial action, i.e. adequate compensation. the principle of equity and fairness is the guiding principle for the fourth theme. theme 5: review process. review processes are pertinent for any system to ensure the objectives of the system are either met or need to be adapted (steudler, 2004). one of the notable issues in native land governance is the different interpretation or understanding of ncr between the malaysian government and indigenous people (bian, 2007). also, native customary system are dynamic in nature and adaptable to changes as society evolves (arko-adjei et al, 2010; bulan, 2007). thus, modern land administration and traditional customary systems have to be reviewed from time to time to possibly bridge the gap between the two. thus, this fifth theme is drafted to incorporate all the items related to review processes, and thus encompass a very wide scope. for the purpose of this study, only one sub-theme is placed under the fifth theme, focusing on improvement in these processes. methodology in sarawak, ncr naturally involves political institutions, and it is presumed a sensitive issue by some of the respondents in governmental departments. hence, to ensure comprehensiveness, our evaluation encompasses the perceptions of various actors such as community leaders (tuai rumah, penghulu), indigenous groups (iban, bidayuh, melanau, melayu, and orang ulu), officers from the land and survey department sarawak (l&s), and licensed land surveyors (lls). l&s is the main government agency for dealing with all the land matters in sarawak, while lls consists of private firms which provide surveying and mapping services. being quantitative in nature, a questionnaire 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 with three different languages (english, malay, and an indigenous dialect, iban) was distributed to the mentioned respondent groups. the questionnaire was drafted according to the five themes as conceptualised by the study (table 1). it was based on a 5-point likert scale, with 1 as “strongly disagree” and 5 as “strongly agree.” as listed in table 1, each of the indicators is associated with a good governance principle. in short, these indicators were translated into questions to be answered by the respondents as discussed in the next paragraph. thus, the questionnaire was designed to evaluate the implementation of good governance principles in the native land governance. sampling technique this study utilises different sampling techniques for different respondent groups. simple random sampling is adopted for the state and private organization group (l&s and lls), while a quota sampling method is adopted for indigenous group. in terms of precision, this study complies with ±5% precision level and 95% confidence level in calculating the sample size based on the formula by krejcie & morgan (1970). with the increasing population, the sample size increases at a stable rate, slightly higher than 380 cases (krejcie & morgan, 1970). a total of twenty-two officers from l&s (43% response rate) and fifteen lls (42% response rate) participated in this study through simple random sampling methods. the sampling frame was based on the listed contacts available at the official website of the department as shown in figure 1. on the other hand, a total of five hundred and twelve indigenous respondents participated in the study through quota sampling methods. the quota for each of the indigenous groups (iban, bidayuh, melanau, melayu, and orang ulu) are selected based on their respective populations against the total indigenous population in sarawak. this resulted in 42% of iban, 11% of bidayuh, 7% of malanau, 32% of melayu and 8% of orang ulu (dosm, 2010). additionally, indigenous respondents are categorised into “district” and “sub-district,” with the quota of 50% each. aforementioned indigenous communities dwell in both town areas (district) and rural areas (subdistrict). undoubtably, their perceptions on land have been shaped by their environment. thus, the main reason of quota sampling is to ensure the comprehensiveness of the evaluation by incorporating different respondents with different background. notably, consents were obtained from the indigenous communities prior to any visitation. also, clear clarification is stated on the questionnaires where the information gathered is strictly confidential and only for the purposes of academic study. 11 liang et al: native land governance practice and performance in sarawak, malaysia figure 1. sampling method data analysis this study adopts the multi-criteria decision-making tool known as the technique for order of preference by similarity to ideal solution (topsis). topsis utilises quantitative data and consists of seven steps. first, the creation of a decision matrix made up of alternatives and criteria. to put it simply, the alternatives refer to the measurement of good governance principles according to the themes whilst the deciding criteria are based on the arithmetic mean of feedback gathered from each of the groups. said otherwise, the ranking of the alternatives (a1 to a24) is determined based on the criteria (c1 to c7). the decision matrix is a 24x7 matrix as shown in table 2. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 table 2 . mean ratings of governance principles by group land & survey department licensed land surveyor iban bidayuh melayu melanau orang ulu theme 1: policy and legal framework aspect 1.1: publicly accessible reports 3.545 3.267 2.841 3.000 3.127 3.200 2.103 aspect 1.2: land agencies’ collaboration 4.000 3.200 2.864 3.259 3.343 3.286 2.333 aspect 2.1: recognition of rights 4.545 3.933 3.140 3.466 3.548 3.400 2.538 aspect2.2: non-overlapping of rights 2.864 2.400 3.093 3.121 3.542 3.171 2.000 aspect 2.3: clear concepts of rights 4.273 3.333 2.598 2.690 3.054 2.914 1.667 aspect 3.1: safeguard of communal land rights 4.000 3.133 2.785 2.776 3.048 3.114 2.282 aspect 3.2: safeguard of individual land rights 3.864 3.200 2.743 2.862 2.795 2.914 1.846 aspect 3.3: infringing prevention 3.273 3.733 2.322 2.000 1.825 2.571 2.897 theme 2: customary land development aspect 4.1: land status investigation 4.227 3.600 3.051 3.741 3.488 3.000 3.026 aspect 4.2: transparency of tenure transaction 4.000 3.467 2.785 3.052 2.873 2.857 2.308 aspect4.3: apprehensible agreement 4.045 3.600 2.748 3.034 3.060 2.857 2.026 aspect 4.4: fair profit distribution 3.762 3.600 2.724 3.172 3.205 2.829 2.077 aspect 5.1: proper consultation process 3.773 3.600 2.958 3.345 3.175 2.657 2.436 theme 3: customary land information and survey practice aspect 6.1: effective service delivering 3.762 3.333 2.238 2.379 2.608 2.457 1.538 aspect 6.2: accessible records 3.364 3.333 2.991 2.966 3.319 3.314 2.077 alternatives (refer table 1) criteria 13 liang et al: native land governance practice and performance in sarawak, malaysia land & survey department licensed land surveyor iban bidayuh melayu melanau orang ulu aspect 7.1: participatory survey practice 4.182 3.733 3.388 3.690 3.446 3.229 2.692 aspect 7.2: key performance indicators 4.227 3.533 2.575 2.621 2.777 2.886 1.641 theme 4: dispute resolution and conflict management aspect 8.1: responsibility of conflict resolution 4.000 3.600 3.061 3.414 3.151 2.943 2.359 aspect 8.2: adequate conflict resolution mechanisms 3.273 3.533 2.612 2.828 3.169 2.943 1.872 aspect 8.3: informal conflict resolution system 4.045 3.200 2.519 2.897 3.102 2.571 2.385 aspect 8.4: appeal of dispute rulings 4.000 3.333 3.290 3.569 3.771 3.057 3.231 aspect 9.1: fair compensation 4.227 3.600 2.631 2.690 3.030 2.800 2.000 aspect 9.2: appeal of unfair compensation 4.182 3.467 3.196 3.448 3.398 3.171 2.615 theme 5: review process aspect 10.1: education and training programs 3.500 3.333 2.607 2.552 3.157 2.686 1.718 average (mean) 3.872 3.419 2.823 3.023 2.951 3.126 2.236 note: this table provides the data input for topsis analysis we divided each of the elements by the sum of all the elements to form a normalised decision matrix. entropy weight is employed to derive the weights for each criterion. huang (2008) concludes that the method of combining entropy weight and topsis analysis provides a more flexible and practical way to determine the weight vector of the criteria. next, the fourth step is to compute the positive ideal solution (pis) and negative ideal solution (nis). pis is the maximum value in the weighted normalised decision matrix, while nis represents the minimum value. after that, the distance of each alternative from pis and nis is computed respectively in step five. we calculate the closeness coefficient of each alternative by using the inputs from pis and nis values. closeness coefficient ranges between 0 (worst condition) to 1 (best condition). lastly, the alternatives are ranked based on their respective closeness coefficient value. alternatives (refer table 1) criteria 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 topsis analysis is utilised for the integration of different perspectives regardless of the degree of acceptancy. there is a lack of quantitative study in this field of research, and topsis analysis utilises quantitative data, is able to address the huge perception gap between indigenous communities and the state and private groups, and enables the ranking of problems based on their seriousness. topsis analysis is processed by using matlab 2019, which yielded the final output as the ranking of alternatives with their respective closeness coefficient value. the ranking of the alternatives indicates the seriousness of a particular issue in native land governance. ultimately, root issues in native land governance can be identified based on the lowest ranking of the alternatives. results and discussions the output of the topsis analysis is summarised as strength, weakness, opportunity, and threat (swot) format according to the topsis closeness coefficient value as shown in figure 2. the combination of topsis and swot analysis enables a better interpretation of the evaluation. each of the swot category is explained in the following section. closeness value ranking 15 liang et al: native land governance practice and performance in sarawak, malaysia  there is a process for appealing dispute rulings. 0.9286 1  detail investigation into the status of the land before any alienation, reservation or issuance of licence takes place. 0.8741 2  the survey of native customary tenure involves native land owners. 0.7276 3  legal provision of the right to appeal for any unfair compensation. 0.6780 4  existing legal framework recognises native customary land rights. 0.6546 5 closeness value ranking  fair valuation and prompt compensation are not always implemented. 0.3489 18  conflict resolution mechanisms are inadequate for handling native land related issues. 0.3118 19  lack of effort in documenting, registering, and mapping of the boundaries of individual native land. 0.2876 20  unclear definitions on the concepts of customary tenure. 0.2538 21  lack of appropriate educational and training programs for indigenous people to enhance their management of land. 0.2474 22  lack of strict key performance indicators for monitoring the survey process. 0.2242 23  the procedure of service delivering does not adopt simplified and locally suitable technology to reduce costs and time. 0.1574 24 closeness value ranking  appropriate consultation with native landholders before initiating any investment project. 0.5749 6  initiative to avoid infringing on native customary land. 0.5720 7  clear assignment of responsibility for conflict resolution between the communities. 0.5504 8  collaboration between statutory land agencies and the customary authorities. 0.5348 9  there is an informal or community-based system that resolves disputes in an equitable manner, and decisions made by this system have some recognition in the formal judicial system. 0.5141 10 closeness value ranking  lack of transparency in all forms of transactions in tenure rights as a result of investments in native customary land. 0.4876 11  lack of effort in documenting, registering, and mapping of the boundaries of communal native land. 0.4651 12  lack of measures to ensure the fairness of profit distribution according to the agreement. 0.4170 13  records in the registry such as information on customary land are inaccessible to community members. 0.4086 14  land institutional reports on land policy implementation are not publicly accessible. 0.4085 15  overlapping rights and contradiction rules between customary law and statutory land law. 0.3967 16  agreements are not documented and obscure to those who are affected. 0.3842 17 figure 2. topsis-swot analysis strength weakness opportunity threat 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 strength of native land governance in sarawak in this study, items that fall within the top 35% range of the highest closeness value is categorised as a strength. in other words, the items with closeness value of more than 0.65 are defined as a strength in the native land governance. ranked first in our evaluation is the existence of processes for appealing dispute rulings. the judgements and decisions for land disputes involving indigenous communities among each other or between third parties are appealable. indeed, the civil courts of malaysia and the native courts of sarawak are hierarchical systems, with federal court as the highest court for civil courts and native court of appeal as the highest court for native courts. in sarawak, native courts ordinance 1992 is the statutory framework for the establishment of native courts. under section 13 of that ordinance, an appeal shall go from the headman’s court to the chief’s court, from the chief’s court to the chief’s superior court, and subsequently to district native court, resident’s native court, and finally, the native court of appeal. likewise, for the case of malaysian civil courts, all the appeals from the subordinate courts undergo final verdict at the superior courts. ranked second is the implementation of detailed investigations into the status of the land before any alienation takes place. however, an issue of debate is that the government only acknowledges farmed areas (temuda) instead of territorial domains (pemakai menoa) and communal forests (pulau galau) (bian, 2007). this resulted in the issuance of provisional lease (pl) for companies to utilise the land which is associated with ncr. in fact, the issue of the concept and coverage of ncr land is commonly found in court cases. ranked third is the participation of indigenous landholders in the process of surveying and mapping of customary tenure. although the principle of free, prior, and informed consent (fpic) is not legally required (sarawak, 1958), the state is seemingly practising effective communication with the affected indigenous landholders through dialogue sessions. as stipulated in section 5.1 of the survey circular 3/2010, it is mandatory to conduct dialogue sessions with indigenous communities before the commencement of any cadastral field work to facilitate the survey process. fpic is a relational process where government agencies must first become aware of the indigenous rights, cultures, and their responsibilities in ensuring proper communications with the indigenous communities and obtaining consent from them prior to any activities which may affect their rights (mitchell et al., 2019). ranked fourth is the right to appeal for any unfair compensation in the event of extinguishment of ncr. the provisions related to adequate compensation is clearly stated in section 212 of the land code and section 5(3)(a) of the native courts ordinance 1992. last but not least, ranked fifth is the formal recognition of ncr land under the statutory framework. for instance, section 5 of the land code articulates the method for creating ncr over interior area land after january 1958. however, such recognition is argued to be vague because most of the ncr land owners without any documentary title are merely perceived as a licensee by the state (sam, 2019). in this case, there is a lack of recognition that ncr is a form of proprietary interest in the land itself. therefore, many respondents in the study preferred recognition under section 18 of the land code instead of section 6. section 18 of the land code confers individual native title, while section 6 confers communal land rights under native communal reserve. similar phenomena happens in peninsular malaysia, where despite the existence of the aboriginal peoples act 1954 which provides for the protection of indigenous peoples (orang asli) of peninsular malaysia, the orang asli communities are facing huge challenges in defending their customary land (mohd et al., 2021). 17 liang et al: native land governance practice and performance in sarawak, malaysia weakness of native land governance in sarawak we define a weakness in this evaluation as the bottom 35% range of the closeness value. this is to say, the items with closeness value of less than 0.35 are defined as a weakness in native land governance. unfortunately, weaknesses outnumber the strengths. ranked eighteen is the fairness of compensation given to the indigenous landholders in the event of land acquisition. as much as 45% of the indigenous respondents claimed the compensation is unfair. the unfairness can be seen from a de jure perspective. based on section 47 of the land code, land value is determined on the date where the authorised surveyors enter the land for preliminary surveys. however, this process may take up to 20 years for the government to finalise the project and impose section 48 for the compensation. thus, the value of the acquired land lags far behind the market value after 20 years. also, existing literatures have shed light on the unfair compensation given to indigenous people ( azima, sivapalan, et al., 2015; colchester et al., 2007; holland, 2013; phoa, 2009; sam, 2019; suhakam, 2013; weinlein, 2017). this perspective perhaps illustrates the gap between the stance of the indigenous groups and the state and private groups. the next weakness is the inadequateness of conflict resolution mechanisms in handling disputes on native land, especially for the external disputes which involve the third parties. in this case, 41% of the indigenous people said the dispute resolution mechanisms are inadequate. the efficiency and effectiveness of such mechanisms are questionable with the serious backlog of ncr cases being filled in the court (colchester et al., 2007; saccess, 2012). with the further decline in the closeness value, the existence of documentations that register and map the boundaries of individual native land is ranked at the 20th place. only 33% of the indigenous respondents agreed that their lands are documented, registered, and issued with individual native titles. azima, sivapalan, et al., (2015) concludes that issuance of individual native titles that guarantee customary land ownership is a key to rectify land disputes. similar in peninsular malaysia, the granting of land ownership is the key to resolve land disputes among indigenous communities (samsudin et al., 2021). in fact, the issuance of native title in perpetuity for residential or agricultural purposes is stipulated under section 18 of the land code. however, the sarawak state is reluctant to survey and issue title, ostensibly due to lack of funding (bian, 2007). another weakness in native land governance is the vague and unclear definition of the concepts of customary tenure. as much as 44% of the indigenous respondents claimed that the definition and concept of ncr given by the government is unclear. contrastingly, up to 65% of the respondents from the state and private group assert that the definition and concept are clear. apparently, a mutual understanding between the indigenous people, private groups, and the state is lacking in this important policy relating to indigenous rights. in most cases, the interpretation of customary tenure by the state is limited to the farmed land only, but indigenous people believe ncr claims should or do go beyond the farmed land to include territorial domains and communal forests. one finding our evaluation produces is that the state should be accountable to indigenous people’s knowledge building. more than half of the indigenous respondents had never attended any knowledge building activities on land matters, which suggests educational and training programs to equip indigenous people with essential skills on land management is missing. the educational programs may also bridge the perception gap between the state and indigenous people. ranked last and second last are the items from the third theme, which is related to the customary land information and survey practice. in terms of agreement percentage, only 24% of the indigenous respondents believe that the survey process is done in a timely matter, and only 16% believe the 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 procedure of title application is simple. the lack of strict key performance indicators to monitor the survey process and ineffective service delivering procedure have resulted in delays processing the applications for native title (suhakam, 2013). the absence of native title causes tenure insecurity and leave indigenous people vulnerable to the encroachment of land by outside interests (sam, 2019, azima, sivapalan, et al., 2015; bian, 2007). encroachment of land resulted in land disputes and a backlog of ncr cases pending in the courts (saccess, 2012, colchester et al., 2007). therefore, this paper learned that the root issue in native land governance lies with the capability of the land registry in delivering titles. opportunity of native land governance in sarawak this study defines “opportunities” as items with closeness value that fall in between 0.5 and 0.65. opportunity can be used to determine whether a measurement is on the right track and the potential to be converted into a strength of sarawak native land governance. ranked sixth is the existence of consultation with indigenous landholders before the commencement of any investing project. as much as 38% of the indigenous respondents and 65% of the state and private organization respondents agreed that proper explanations are given to the affected indigenous landholders together with their consents before initiating any projects on their land. appropriate consultation and participation are remedies for encroachment on ncr land, and clearly, more indigenous landholders seek better consultation. ranked next is the initiative to avoid infringing ncr over land. in fact, this item shared a similar closeness value with the previous item; both relate to encroachment on ncr land. initiatives to avoid infringing on ncr can be determined by the number of encroachments on the ground. 64% of the indigenous respondents claimed that there is encroachment of ncr land by plantation companies. aforementioned in the introduction, during informal interviews conducted at their longhouses, some indigenous community leaders emphasized their concerns regarding the encroachment of land. it is worth noting that different places have different experiences in encountering encroachment on ncr land; community leaders in some of the villages visited by the authors say they are free from any land encroachment. nevertheless, the principle of participation and fairness are mandatory for good native land governance. ranked eighth is the clear assignment of conflict resolution between indigenous communities. around 39% of the indigenous respondents know who to seek during an internal dispute on land matters. they acknowledged the roles of the community leader or headman in solving their problems. next, the collaboration between statutory land agencies and the customary authorities is ranked nineth. in sarawak, customary authorities refer to the community leader, headman, or chief appointed by the head of state as stipulated in the community chiefs and headmen ordinance, 2004 (cap. 60). additionally, the village security and development committee (jkkk) is established under the resident and district office in every village and longhouse with the involvement of headmen and the village communities. jkkk and the headmen are known as the “eyes and ears” of the government at the grassroots level (ngidang, 1995). only 34% of the indigenous respondents and 54% of the state and private respondents agreed that the statutory land agencies and customary authorities collaborate well. apparently, the principle of participation needs to be more effectively implemented. ranked tenth is the opportunity to establish an informal or community-based system to resolve land disputes with some recognition in the formal judicial system. currently, a land dispute can either be solved informally through the help of a mediator or formally through the civil or native court. 42% of the indigenous respondents believe that most of the land disputes need to be solved with the formal court. it seems formally recognised decisions are 19 liang et al: native land governance practice and performance in sarawak, malaysia the only way to conclusively solve disputes. however, due to the effectiveness and accessibility of the formal court, a community-based system to resolve land disputes which is supported by the formal judicial system is needed. threats in native land governance in sarawak items with closeness value ranged from 0.35 to 0.5 are categorised as a threat in native land governance. a threat is perceived as the grey zone that might be positively turned into an opportunity or negatively deteriorate into a weakness. we identified a total of seven threats based on the results from our topsis analysis. first is the lack of transparency in all forms of transaction involving customary tenure in an investment project. only 27% of the indigenous respondents claimed that the agreement contract is accessible by those who participated in a development project. here, the principle of transparency and accessibility to information is missing, leading to more misunderstandings amongst indigenous landholders. the second threat is the lack of effort in documenting, registering, and mapping of communal rights. despite the latest amendment of the land code which enables the issuance of native communal title over a native territorial domain, only 28% of indigenous respondents and 59% of state and private respondents claimed that the communal boundaries are well surveyed and mapped. a respondent from l&s stated that the registration of native land is problematic especially with the new section 6a on native territorial domain (sarawak land code cap. 81). this new initiative is hopefully beneficial to indigenous people, but more efforts are required to boost its efficiency. third, in relation to joint venture projects, there is a lack of measures to ensure fairness of the profit distribution to involved indigenous landholders. for instance, in a konsep baru (new concept) scheme, sam (2019) stated that despite the pre-determined rate of the dividends, the final rate of dividend paid to indigenous landholders is subjected to factors like the market value of the native land, ratio of debt and equity, and the cost associated with the plantations. human rights commission of malaysia (suhakam) has been receiving many complaints from indigenous landholders on matters pertaining to nonpayment of dividends by companies (suhakam, 2013). also, there was a case in kanowit where unfair dividends have led to protests and blockades by indigenous landholders (cramb, 2011). the fourth threat is how customary land-related records in the registry are inaccessible to indigenous communities. less than half of the indigenous respondents (41%) and state and private respondents (49%) agreed that the information on customary land is accessible by indigenous people. in sarawak, the “under one roof” principle enables the public to get all the land-related information from the sarawak land and survey department. in this information era, the records are also accessible via the land and survey information system (lasis) by using internet and mobile application platforms (liang et al., 2019). however, certain information on customary land is confidential. also, there must be consideration for multiple aspects in serving the needs of different communities, especially for those who live in rural areas with no access to internet. the fifth threat is that land institutional reports on land policy implementation are not publicly accessible. an indigenous community leader claims that formal reports on progress of land policy implementation pertaining to ncr are not readily available, but that there is regular verbal reporting mainly by politicians. the sixth threat is the degree of overlap and contradiction between customary land law and statutory land law. as mentioned earlier, one of the critical issues in native land governance is the different perceptions between indigenous people and the state on the extent of customary land. harmonising of customary law and statutory law is not a simple task. codification of customary law is an on-going process in sarawak, and this process is impeded by numerous court cases on ncr 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 land remaining unresolved. lastly, the agreement contracts from an investment project are not understandable by the participating indigenous landholders. only 25% of the indigenous people are aware of the terms and conditions in a contract agreement. this threat has similar impacts as the first and third threat, causing confusion, despair, anger, and worry amongst indigenous landholders. as discussed by andersen et al. (2016), villagers often have no access to a contract document as it was read and signed only by a community leader and the temenggong (head of community leader). clearly, this violates the principle of participation. good governance implementation gap: lesson learnt based on the results obtained, it is clear that the weaknesses outnumber the strengths in context of sarawak native land governance. the authors believe that the problematic areas in native land governance could be significantly rectified through the proper implementation of good governance principles. the following paragraphs provide recommendations to achieve good native land governance. most of the lessons learnt are applicable to an international context. first, we emphasize the principle of rule of law. it is found that the land code does not explicitly recognise ncr land, especially the land including territorial domains and communal forests. compared to the status of recognition, it is more vital to achieve mutual understanding between the state and indigenous people. as noted by azima, lyndon, et al., (2015) indigenous communities in sarawak want their rights to be understood in line with their culture and customs, instead of a way that is defined by the government. thus, steps must be taken to increase the efforts in harmonising the statutory framework with customary land law by providing clear definitions on the concepts of customary tenure, types of customary tenure that are recognised, and the current way to legally form these rights. the second principle we recommend receive greater focus by policymakers is the principle of equity and fairness. in line with the existing literature (azima, sivapalan, et al., 2015; colchester et al., 2007; holland, 2013; phoa, 2009; sam, 2019; suhakam, 2013; weinlein, 2017), one of the weaknesses of native land governance is the unfairness of the compensation given to indigenous landholders in the event of land acquisition. as one l&s respondent claimed there are cases where a second compensation was demanded, aside from the critical importance of paying adequate compensation, there must be proper documentation of compensation paid to the indigenous communities to both prevent demands of additional compensation demand, as well as records for that compensation’s appeal or review. the third important principle of good governance relevant to this study is accountability. the government is tasked with the protection, education, and welfare of indigenous communities. there must be strict procedures in issuing permits or licences to any companies that operate on native land. logging and oil palm plantation licences were issued on indigenous territories without proper investigation on the status of the land (sam, 2019). also, we recommend that regular campaigns, seminars, and workshops should be conducted to train and educate indigenous communities on matters pertaining to farming techniques, land management, leadership development, and protection of their own rights in formal processes. for instance, in indonesia, a neighboring country of malaysia, there were workshops conducted by the indigenous people alliance of the archipelago (aman) to train and educate indigenous communities on the rights of fpic (aman, 2014a) and community mapping processes to protect their land (aman, 2013; 2014b). the fourth important principle we highlight for policymakers is transparency and access to information. there are cases where the information about a development project is inaccessible to 21 liang et al: native land governance practice and performance in sarawak, malaysia indigenous landholders. indigenous peoples are often unaware of the procedures and fully depend on their representatives (usually the headmen). there were cases in the philippines where information provided regarding the development project over-emphasised the potential benefits and was not in a language comprehendible to the community members (castillo & alvarez-castillo, 2009). thus, there must be measures to ensure the accessibility of agreement contracts by all participating indigenous communities. it is the mandate of private companies to draft the contract in appropriate languages, and to aid further explanation by customary leaders to the rest of the community members. similarly, there is still plenty of ncr land that remains unrecorded in the land registry. efforts must be taken towards the establishment of an online system to record native land transactions, and information related to native land development at district and sub-district level. the fifth principle that is important to our evaluation is that of participation. many indigenous respondents claimed that the government has been turning a deaf ear to their complaints, opinions, and suggestions. most of the decisions are made without the direct participation of the affected. it is recommended that the principle of free, prior, and informed consent (fpic) should be fully implemented in native land governance. the concept of fpic has emerged and as a means of protecting the territories of indigenous people (mitchell et al., 2019). the sixth and final principle important to improving good governance in sarawak is the principle of efficiency and effectiveness. many respondents complained about delays in the issuance of native title. the absence of native title leads to disputes among indigenous communities, disputes between the indigenous communities and private companies, as well as disputes between indigenous communities and the government (azima, sivapalan, et al., 2015). this reflects the need to expedite the survey process by the land registry by imposing strict key performance indicators (kpi) for the survey of native land. also, more funds must be allocated to expedite the titling process of native land. instead of being stand-alone, the principles of good governance are interconnected and come together as a whole. conclusion good native land governance is defined as a process to govern the land associated with native customary right through the lens of good governance principles, particularly in respect to (i) policy and legal framework, (ii) customary land development, (iii) customary land information and survey practice, (iv) dispute resolution and conflict management and, (v) review process. to date, there are limited evaluation frameworks to monitor native land governance. in sarawak, malaysia, native land governance is an under-researched area, and there is lack of study on this particular matter, especially studies that are quantitative in nature. in light of this, this study aims to evaluate the native land governance in sarawak through the lens of good governance principles. however, this research did not take into account the political malaise of native land governance. we are aware that this subject is highly influenced by several different agendas. thus, the findings were constructed merely from an academic perspective which might not fully represent the actual scenario on the ground. we recommend that further research be conducted specifically on any one of the themes as conceptualised by this study, particularly with indigenous participation. further research should include the anthropological and historical perspectives of indigenous communities. also, input from political science is needed for a better description of this subject. in achieving the designated aim, this study concludes that the good governance principles are not fully implemented in the native land governance of sarawak. however, the findings from this study could be a stepping-stone to rectify problematic areas in sarawak’s native land governance, and at the same time postulate more research to be done in the field of indigenous land governance more broadly. 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 references aman. 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(2010). land administration for sustainable development (1st ed.). esri press. https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2020.11.2.10713 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.landusepol.2003.05.001 http://www.suhakam.org.my/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/report-of-the-national-inquiry-into-the-land-rights-of-indigenous-peoples-in-malaysia_5-aug-2013.pdf http://www.suhakam.org.my/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/report-of-the-national-inquiry-into-the-land-rights-of-indigenous-peoples-in-malaysia_5-aug-2013.pdf http://www.suhakam.org.my/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/report-of-the-national-inquiry-into-the-land-rights-of-indigenous-peoples-in-malaysia_5-aug-2013.pdf https://doi.org/10.5642/envirolabasia.20170101.06 https://doi.org/10.1016/s0264-8377(01)00021-7 https://doi.org/10.1016/s0264-8377(01)00021-7 the sweat lodge ceremony: a healing intervention for intergenerational trauma and substance use the international indigenous policy journal volume 9 | issue 2 article 2 april 2018 the sweat lodge ceremony: a healing intervention for intergenerational trauma and substance use teresa naseba marsh northern ontario school of medicine, thunzi@me.com david c. marsh northern ontario school of medicine, dmarsh@nosm.ca julie ozawagosh atikameksheng anishnawbek first nation, ozawagosh@sympatico.ca frank ozawagosh atikameksheng anishnawbek first nation recommended citation marsh, t. n. , marsh, d. c. , ozawagosh, j. , ozawagosh, f. (2018). the sweat lodge ceremony: a healing intervention for intergenerational trauma and substance use. the international indigenous policy journal, 9(2). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.2 the sweat lodge ceremony: a healing intervention for intergenerational trauma and substance use abstract many traditional healers and elders agree that strengthening cultural identity, incorporating traditional healing practices, and encouraging community integration can enhance and improve mental health and reduce substance use disorders (sud) in indigenous populations. despite the fact that traditional healing practices have always been valued by indigenous peoples, there is very little research on efficacy. recent research by one of the authors in this group (t. marsh) has shown that the blending of indigenous traditional healing practices and a western treatment model, seeking safety, resulted in a reduction in intergenerational trauma (igt) symptoms and substance use disorders (sud). this article focuses on the qualitative evidence concerning the impact of the traditional healing practices, specifically the sweat lodge ceremony. participants reported an increase in spiritual and emotional well-being that they said was directly attributable to the ceremony. this study demonstrates that it would be beneficial to incorporate indigenous traditional healing practices, including the sweat lodge ceremony, into seeking safety to enhance the health and well-being of indigenous peoples with igt and sud. keywords post-traumatic stress disorder, ptsd, substance use disorder, intergenerational trauma, two-eyed seeing, seeking safety, traditional healing practices, decolonizing methodologies, indigenous worldviews, sweat lodge, sharing circles, elders creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ t h e s w e a t l o d g e c e r e m o n y : a h e a l i n g i n t e r v e n t i o n f o r i n t e r g e n e r a t i o n a l t r a u m a a n d s u b s t a n c e u s e the contemporary challenges of violence, substance use, intergenerational trauma symptomology, and mental health problems in indigenous communities are an indication of the impact of colonization, including residential schooling and other factors, on individuals, families, communities, and nations (aguiar & halseth, 2015; bombay, matheson, & anisman, 2014; miller et al., 2011; spittal et al., 2007). barman (1996) stated, “the high rates of impoverishment, incarceration, suicide and alcoholism in canadian indigenous peoples, can be traced back to the abuse received at residential schools” (p. 273). familial fragmentation and disintegration are evident in indigenous communities where interpersonal, individual, and familial violence, as well as drug and alcohol dependence are pervasive (bombay et al., 2014; chansonneuve, 2007; kerr et al., 2009; spittal et al., 2007; wood et al., 2003). the blending of western approaches and traditional healing (or attention to culture) has been reported as a successful element in substance use disorder (sud) programs designed for indigenous peoples (jane & glodedesrochers, 2014; tousignant & sioui, 2009; whitbeck, adams, hoyt, & chen, 2004). a few case studies report the incorporation of healing rituals into conventional counselling and treatment interventions (bombay et al., 2014; brave heart, 1998; duran, 2006b; robbins & dewar, 2011). scholars, traditional healers, and elders encourage and utilize integration; however, some feel that these approaches require additional scientific evidence to support their use (hill, 2003; poonwassie & charter, 2005; stubley & rojas, 2014). currently, indigenous peoples and communities are challenged by the huge service gaps in areas such as withdrawal management, trauma treatment, aftercare, and psychiatric care (hart, 2007; jane & glodedesrochers, 2014; spittal et al., 2007). recent studies demonstrate that it could be beneficial to incorporate indigenous-healing practices into the western treatment model seeking safety (marsh, young, meek, najavits, & toulouse, 2016; marsh, cote-meek, young, najavits, & toulouse, 2016; najavits, 2002). furthermore, this integration could enhance the health and well-being of indigenous people with intergenerational trauma (igt) and sud (marsh, cotemeek, et al., 2016; marsh, young, et al., 2016). one of the key components of the indigenous healing and seeking safety (ihss) intervention was the sweat lodge ceremony. while the broad set of indigenous healing practices utilized in the previous study of ihss are discussed elsewhere (marsh, coholic, cote-meek, & najavits, 2015; marsh, cote-meek, toulouse, najavits, & young, 2015; marsh, cote-meek, et al., 2016), this article explores in-depth the application of the sweat lodge ceremony as a component of ihss. l i t e r a t u r e r e v i e w the key to healing following the experience of residential school abuse and its intergenerational effects lies in the area of reclaiming identity (bombay et al., 2014; kovach, 2010; smith, 1999; waldram, 1997). reclaiming indigenous identity means recovering traditional values, beliefs, philosophies, ideologies, and approaches, and adapting them to the needs of today (brave heart, 1999; chansonneuve, 2007; duran & duran, 1995; evans-campbell, 2008; kovach, 2010; marsh, coholic, et al., 2015). this reclamation process encompasses both individual and collective identity, and it can be sought by way of traditional healing methods. 1 marsh et al.: sweat lodge ceremony for addiction and trauma published by scholarship@western, 2018 according to the world health organization (2000), the term traditional medicine refers to: the sum total of knowledge, skills, and practices based on the theories, beliefs, and experiences indigenous to different cultures, whether explicable or not, used in the maintenance of health as well as in the prevention, diagnosis, improvement of treatment of physical and mental illness. (p. 1) the report of the royal commission on aboriginal peoples (1996) defined traditional healing as: practices designed to promote mental, physical, and spiritual well-being that are based on beliefs which go back to the time before the spread of western ‘scientific’ biomedicine. when indigenous peoples in canada talk about traditional healing, they include a wide range of activities, from physical cures using herbal medicines and other remedies, to the promotion of psychological and spiritual well-being using ceremony, counselling and the accumulated wisdom of elders. (p. 348) there appears to be a consensus amongst researchers and practitioners that restoring traditional healing practices and knowledge is a pathway to both empowerment and health for indigenous peoples and communities (brave heart, 2003; duran, 2006; hill, 2009; menzies, 2014). however, in order to achieve this goal, the traditional knowledge once practiced in historical indigenous societies needs to be restored and included in the interventions aimed at addiction, trauma, and the epidemics facing indigenous peoples (duran, 2006; thatcher, 2004). while it is a common indigenous belief that traditional culture and knowledge are important for promoting community health and well-being, little effort has been made to investigate the healing benefits that indigenous people have always acknowledged (duran & duran, 1995; mussell, 2005; royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996; warry, 2008). although sweat lodge ceremonies have historically been an important part of indigenous cultures throughout north america, little evidence supports the efficacy of this intervention. however, there is now a revival of traditional indigenous ceremonies, and both indigenous and non-indigenous peoples have increasingly utilized the sweat lodge ceremony as a means of healing in multiple dimensions of body, mind, emotion, and spirit (moodley & west, 2005; royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996; walkingstick & larry-osborne, 1995). also, sweat lodge ceremonies are now offered in prisons and substance use treatment centers, and treatment providers agree to its recognition and growing acceptance as an important aspect of healing for indigenous peoples (colmant, eason, winterowd, jacobs, & cashel, 2005; gone & waldram, 2008; kovach, 2010; stewart, 2008). the universality of the sweat lodge ceremony among indigenous peoples—including american indian tribes from coast to coast, in alaska, across canada, and in mexico—is well documented (colmant et al., 2005; colmant & merta, 2000). furthermore, evidence of north american indigenous peoples using the sweat lodge ceremony can be found as early as 400 b.c. (abdullah & stringer, 1999; brave heart, 1998; colmant et al., 2005). there are differences in rituals and traditions associated with the sweat lodge ceremonies. these differences are dependent on 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 2 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.2 location, territory, and cultural practices. for example, some ceremonies may include drumming and gift offerings to the ancient ones, while in other cases it could be part of a sun dance. colmant et al. (2005) found that use of the sweat lodge supported the building of group cohesion, which many indigenous peoples in north america have also reported. many elders and traditional healers teach about the connections to spirit, family, and friends that are shared and cultivated in a sweat lodge ceremony (marsh, cote-meek, et al., 2016; menzies, bodnar, & harper, 2010). furthermore, elder rolling thunder, in his teachings, highlights the importance of laughter, presence, and support to others in the sweat lodge (cited in crow, mails, & means, 2001). elders teach that the sweat lodge ceremony serves a sacred purpose through the ritual healing or cleansing of body, mind, and spirit while bringing people together to honour the energy of life (personal communication elders julie and frank ozawagosh, january 5, 2013). the elders teach that each person enters the lodge with his or her own challenges, suffering, conflicts, addiction, and concerns. this sitting together brings connection, truth, harmony, and peace through sweating, praying, drumming, sharing, stories, and singing. there appears to be a scarcity in the research literature reporting the effectiveness of the use of the sweat lodge in contemporary settings. schiff and moore (2006) examined the impact of the sweat lodge, examining the outcomes in the spiritual, emotional, mental, and physical realms by interviewing 42 indigenous and non-indigenous individuals with experience of sweat lodge ceremonies over a period of 4 months. changes in quality of life, health, and spiritual and emotional well-being were measured using the sf-36 quality of life measure, the heroic myth index, and a multipurpose health index. results showed a significant increase in spiritual and emotional well-being. they concluded that this outcome was directly attributable to participation in the ceremony (schiff & moore, 2006). over a three-year period, gossage et al. (2003) explored the impact of sweat lodge ceremonies on inmates at the dine' center for substance abuse treatment. participants included 123 inmates ranging in age from 18 to 64 years, and all were included in the sweat lodge ceremonies. four self-administered questionnaires were developed to gather data from the inmates. results showed significant improvement in several cultural, social, and physical variables, including increases in the participants' relationship to the mineral, animal, and human world; increases in the level of social and family support; decreases in violent acts; decreases in medical problems and the degree to which participants were bothered by those medical problems, along with increases in feelings of overall physical wellness; and substantial improvement in marital relationships (gossage et al., 2003). in another study, the authors reported that they observed sweat lodge participants were less worried and had a higher level of self-esteem (ross & ross, 1992). in a review of the literature, colmant and merta (1999) found that many american indians spoke about the importance of socialization and friendship and the healing properties that come with laughter in a sweat lodge. in a recent study that reviewed the literature on interventions to treat suds in indigenous populations, rowan et al. (2014) reported: seventeen types of cultural interventions were found, with sweat lodge ceremonies the most commonly (68%) enacted. study samples ranged from 11 to 2,685 clients. just 3 marsh et al.: sweat lodge ceremony for addiction and trauma published by scholarship@western, 2018 over half of studies involved quasi-experimental designs (53%). most articles (90%) measured physical wellness, with fewer (37%) examining spiritual health. results show benefits in all areas of wellness, particularly by reducing or eliminating substance use problems in 74% of studies. (abstract, results section, para. 1) while many of the studies on sweat lodge ceremonies support the effectiveness of the intervention and blending western and indigenous approaches to healing from sud, none addressed the integrated treatment of igt and sud. m e t h o d s this study seeks to explore in detail the sweat lodge ceremony as a component of the indigenous healing practices utilized during najavits’ study (2002), which demonstrated the integration of indigenous traditional healing practices into the seeking safety model produced a feasible, suitable, and beneficial group treatment for igt and sud in indigenous women and men (see also marsh, young, et al., 2016; marsh, cote-meek, et al., 2016). a qualitative, indigenous decolonizing methodology was used during this project. the two-eyed seeing approach was used to guide this research process. this approach was selected because it aligns with decolonizing and indigenous research methodologies (kovach, 2010; smith, 1999; wilson, 2008). many indigenous scholars agree that the process of decolonization requires ethically and culturally acceptable approaches when research involves indigenous peoples (menzies et al., 2010; smith, 1999; wilson, 2008). the two-eyed seeing approach is consistent with aboriginal governance, research as ceremony, and self-determination. in other words, it is consistent with the principles of ownership, control, access, and possession (ocap® ; first nations information governance centre, 2007; national aboriginal health organization [naho], 2008; wilson, 2008). a previous study by marsh, cote-meek, et al. (2015) utilized a mixed-methods approach, which includes both quantitative and qualitative methods, guided by cultural ethics and protocols. the qualitative findings for this article are drawn from this study. it was also critical to conduct this research in a honourable, honest, respectful, and humble manner. cultural knowledge carriers, including elders, an indigenous advisory group, indigenous scholars, and clinicians, were invited into this process as consultants. the presence of an elder in the sharing circles and sweat lodge ceremony was an important healing practice within the two-eyed seeing approach. aboriginal peoples have long recognized the role of the elder as integral in the healing process. elders’ skills, knowledge, and their ability to help individuals restore balance in their lives have earned them a significant place within aboriginal communities (menzies et al., 2010). the elder’s presence in the sharing circles was reflexive and culturally adaptive. the elder taught about two-eyed seeing, while also focusing on the positive identity of each person in the circle. they also helped to develop a connection to the spiritual world through their teachings. the teachings, wisdom, guidance and feedback of these knowledge carriers were critical to the success of this research. the results of the qualitative and quantitative outcomes of the ihss intervention are discussed in separate articles (marsh, young, et al., 2016; marsh, cote-meek, et al., 2016). the purpose of this article is to give a more detailed description of one of the cultural interventions, the sweat lodge ceremony, drawn from the qualitative data. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 2 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.2 m e t h o d o l o g i c a l o v e r v i e w while the detailed methodology of the ihss study has been reported elsewhere (marsh, cotemeek, et al., 2015), the approach utilized to generate the qualitative data on sweat lodge ceremonies is briefly described below. four facilitators and two students were selected to lead the seeking safety groups, which for our purposes were called sharing circles. the elders advised that these individuals should be indigenous and have experience working with indigenous peoples. all four facilitators had previous experience working with women and men who have experienced igt and sud. as a competent practitioner in the western seeking safety model, the first author trained the facilitators in group facilitation and delivery of the sharing circles. the training lasted for 1 week, 8 hours per day, and consisted of didactical, experiential, small-group learning, and practice sessions. the training was video recorded so that facilitators could critically reflect on their techniques. furthermore, discourse on group methods, group process, therapeutic use of self, and expectations were included. the facilitators offered tobacco bundles to participants, which had been prepared ahead of time. the facilitators took time to explain the respectful rules for the sharing circles. the first author remained mainly in the background, but was always present to help and support. since the first author interviewed all the participants, they welcomed her presence and at times would invite her into the circle to give a teaching. participants were recruited by counsellors and healthcare workers from the following locations: n’swakamok native friendship centre, iris addiction recovery for women, salvation army addiction treatment centre, waters of change counselling centre, rockhaven recovery home for men, shkagamik-kwe health centre, and ontario addiction treatment centers (oatc) sudbury. in addition, participants were also recruited via workers on reserve in the area surrounding sudbury. referrals were sent to the first author who held appointments with prospective participants. a convenience sampling approach was used to recruit 24 participants (12 women and 12 men) who self-identified as indigenous. all participants were willing to accept a method of treatment that incorporated indigenous traditional healing practices. in addition, all participants resided off reserve in northern ontario and were between the ages of 24 and 68 years (with an average age of 35 years). of the 24 participants, 16 identified as ojibway, 2 as cree, and 6 as métis. furthermore, all participants self-reported that they had igt and sud (actively using or not), no active psychosis, no acute withdrawal, and no current suicidality or homocidality. the cultural informants deemed self-reporting culturally appropriate for identifying substance use and trauma symptoms. the laurentian university research ethics board approved this study in may 2013. written informed consent was obtained from all participants. i h s s i n t e r v e n t i o n an initial 90-minute meeting was conducted with each of the participants. during these meetings, participants received information about seeking safety, traditional healing, sharing circles, sweat lodge ceremonies, and the program details. the men’s sharing circles (n = 12 participants) took place at the rockhaven addiction recovery home for men, located in 5 marsh et al.: sweat lodge ceremony for addiction and trauma published by scholarship@western, 2018 sudbury, ontario. the female sharing circles (n = 12 participants) took place at the n’swakamok native friendship centre in the same city. each of the sharing circles were cofacilitated by two indigenous healthcare workers and one student and included both seeking safety material and approaches. these facilitators organized and led sharing circles twice a week for both the male and female circles for 13 weeks. each weekly sharing circle was 2 hours long. to encourage a holistic view of mental health and substance use (which includes connection to community), many indigenous protocols were incorporated into the sharing circles. each sharing circle was opened and closed with smudging, ceremonial drumming, and singing. tobacco, a plant recognized in indigenous culture for its sacred and healing powers, was prepared in bundles in advance of the sharing circles. it was offered to each participant for protection and healing. participants were also invited to participate in three sweat lodge ceremonies held in weeks 3, 9, and 12 of the intervention period. d a t a a n a l y s i s the data analysis approach and results have been published in an earlier paper (marsh, cotemeek, et al., 2016). all discussions from the sharing circles and the semi-structured interviews were audiotaped and transcribed verbatim in microsoft word using numbers to maintain participant confidentiality. after transcription, a qualitative thematic analysis was performed to search for themes that emerged from the text of each individual post-treatment semi-structured interview, and the end-of-treatment sharing circles. themes were identified via careful reading and re-reading of the data by the primary author. the identified themes were then categorized as pattern recognition occurred. the following four core themes were identified: a. healing through traditional aboriginal healing methods; b. education and knowledge about seeking safety and material; c. awareness and understanding of the link between trauma, substance use, and the impact of colonization; and d. integration and application of knowledge. during data analysis, the elders explored the four core themes and decided that these themes connected with the teachings in the medicine wheel. based on the recommendation of the elders, the results were depicted through the lens of the medicine wheel (marsh, young, et al., 2016; marsh, cote-meek, et al., 2016), in order to authenticate the indigenous decolonizing methodology of two-eyed seeing (marsh, young, et al., 2016; marsh, cote-meek, et al., 2016). next, member statements that corresponded to a specific theme were identified and transformed into meaningful units, and then coded into subthemes. t h e s w e a t l o d g e c e r e m o n i e s the sweat lodge ceremonies were conducted by elders julie and frank ozawagosh from the atikameksheng anishnawbek (whitefish lake) community. these sweat lodge ceremonies were offered in the above-mentioned community and the lodge was built by elder frank ozawagosh. elder julie taught that the sweat ceremonies helped repair the damage done to the spirits, minds, and bodies of the participants. during the sweat ceremonies, elder julie gave 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 2 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.2 teachings about indigenous traditional healing and its restorative power. participants were also invited to share their stories and experiences. three sweats were offered for each of the groups over the period of three months. the elders and the advisory group recommended that sharing circles and sweat lodge ceremonies be offered separately to male and female participants. the elders advised that gender division was important to ensure that participants felt comfortable and safe during the sharing circle sessions. however, the male and female facilitators attended both sets of ceremonies to offer additional support. not all participants were able to attend the ceremonies; on average, 8 of 12 participants were present. consent from participants was obtained for the sweats. the sweats were conducted in a dome-shaped and circular lodge, built low to the ground. t e a c h i n g s , p r e p a r a t i o n s , a n d p r o t o c o l s all the participants and facilitators received teachings from elders julie and frank before they participated in a sweat lodge ceremony. the elders taught that even people that are experienced with sweats, and attending a ceremony led by a properly trained ceremonial leader, could suddenly experience problems due to underlying health issues. they recommended that people only attend lodges with traditional spiritual leaders who are recognized by their community to conduct ceremonies. elder frank also gave a powerful teaching about the preparations before the sweat lodge ceremony. for example, the collection of the rocks (grandfathers) and the wood for the fire, as well as the cleaning of the lodge is a sacred ritual that is performed weeks before the sweat ceremony. this teaching helped the participants to appreciate and respect the creation and hard work of elder frank. furthermore, elder julie talked about the physical risks related to the reports of lodge-related deaths resulting from overexposure to heat, dehydration, smoke inhalation, or improper lodge construction leading to suffocation. she assured us that she and her helpers were trained and well aware of risks, and that they took precautions to avoid these kinds of accidents by using proper technique. the lodge was properly constructed with great care, and with respect for the environment, and for the materials being used. elder julie also talked about the precautions with regards to heat exposure and explained that it gets very hot in the sweat lodge. the rocks used to heat it are glowing red and water is poured on them to create steam that is at least as hot as the boiling point of water. participants were also taught to leave the lodge if they experience discomfort. simple garments were recommended: men wore shorts and women wore a loose dress or skirt. participants were asked to bring two towels into the lodge with them: one with a wet corner to help with breathing at hotter moments and to wipe the sweat, if desired, and the other for use for personal waste: for example, if the participant felt the urge to spit. two persons remained outside the sweat lodge to protect the ceremony, assist the participants, and aid with lodge etiquette. some of the participants who could not tolerate being inside the sweat lodge had the option to sit outside of the lodge with elder frank and could still receive the benefits of the ceremony. the facilitators, students, and the first author attended all the sweats and provided support to the participants. the duration of each of the sweat ceremonies was about one and a half hours. many of the participants shared that they never had a sweat before and some stated that it has been years since their last sweat (see garrett & garrett, 2002; marsh, young, et al., 2016; marsh, coholic, et al., 2015; marsh, cote-meek, et al., 2015). elder julie continued the teachings with 7 marsh et al.: sweat lodge ceremony for addiction and trauma published by scholarship@western, 2018 the sweat lodge itself as a return to the womb of mother earth. the rock pit was in the center of the lodge and the participants sat along the sides of the pit facing the four directions: east, south, west, and north. elder frank, the fire keeper, had the responsibility of tending the sacred fire in which the ceremonial rocks were being heated. participants entered one by one, on their hands and knees to show humility and respect for the earth. next, the rocks were brought into the lodge, arranged to represent the four directions, and the flap or door opening was sealed shut. the darkness in the lodge brings forth and symbolizes the darkness of the spirit, our ignorance, and indicates the healing and cleansing needed so that the light can come in (garrett, brubaker, torres-rivera, west-olatunji, & conwill, 2008; personal communication elder julie and frank ozawagosh, october 5, 2013). the ceremony began with elder julie drumming and encouraging those with drums and shakers to join her. after the drumming, the elder initiated the ceremony with prayers in her ojibway mother tongue, thanking the creator, ancestors, and spirit guides and animals. this was followed by a vocation to the great spirit, mother earth, the four directions, and the spirits by the pouring of special water and an herbal mixture (sage and cedar) over the heated rocks producing a purifying steam that fills the lodge. the elder then asked the participants to share starting in the west and proceeding around to the east side of the lodge. this was repeated several times in cycles known as rounds. participants first shared their needs and cried and/or prayed for themselves, their families, friends, each other, and asked for wisdom, forgiveness, and healing from their igt and sud. after each sharing, the elder and participants would thank the creator, and the grandmothers and fathers for the healing. more songs were sung, and rites and rituals performed, until the elder closed the round. after the ceremony had been completed, the elder gave permission for the participants to leave the lodge. in the meantime, a volunteer and some of the participants who could not participate in the sweat ceremony prepared a feast of beef, chicken, moose meat, vegetables, wild rice, and berries. during this feast, the elders with participants and facilitators shared and reflected on the experiences through laughter and tears. afterward, the participants took time to reflect with one another on their experience (garrett et al., 2008; personal communication elder julie and frank ozawagosh, october 5, 2013). r e s u l t s t h e a n a l y s i s o f p a r t i c i p a n t s ’ q u a l i t a t i v e r e s p o n s e s many of the participants reported that the inclusion of traditional healing approaches and the sweat lodge ceremony helped with their healing spiritually, emotionally, and physically. some participants lamented that they had lost their traditions by growing up off reserve, or that their family did not follow the traditional way. for example, one female participant (p 1) explained: what i found most helpful was the sweat lodge. trying to connect, to find myself, to know me. it was really helpful to go in there. it helped me a lot. many of the participants felt this connection with creator, the elders, and spirit helpers during the sweat lodge ceremonies. as male p 16 stated: 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 2 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.2 i found that going to, incorporating the sweat lodge, having that time with the creator, and having our elders come in, and cultural resource people come in, were beneficial for me, being aboriginal. there were people of our culture who were there to support us, encourage us, give us insight on how we were doing as native people. to have them there was very beneficial. to have them be more with us would be a better component to the seeking safety. trauma destroys the bonds and connections individuals have with themselves, others, and the world. this disconnection affects their sense of community and belonging, moving them further into isolation, shame, guilt, and self-blame (bombay et al., 2014; evans-campbell, 2008; haskell & randall, 2009; hatala, desjardins, & bombay, 2016; herman, 2015; marsh, coholic, et al., 2015). throughout the ceremonies, participants expressed that they experienced a sense of connection, release, and peace through the presence of ritual and healing practices, including the sweat lodge ceremonies (colmant et al., 2005; duran, 2006; marsh, cote-meek, et al., 2016; menzies et al., 2010). another male (p 24) noted: in the sweat lodge ceremonies, we received teachings, and that was something that . . . for me it was really good because i’ve known julie for some time now, and reconnecting with her and frank was really good. during one of the sweats, i had the chance to go see one of my friends and healer, brian, too. he was a very important part of my recovery. the spiritual component of having the sweat lodges, and teachings, and the feast, was so important. i’ve always believed that native tradition, for me, it was the way to go when dealing with child and sexual abuse, and i did that before i started going to the 12-step groups. i think it was about 12 or 13 years i was working on that stuff, but it was a great turning point in my own life, having that spiritual component, the native spiritual component. the women and men had separate sweat lodge ceremonies and some clients commented on this. one of the males (p 15) said: oh yes, that’s one thing i feel too. i know that in some cases, it’s not appropriate to have men and women together in this kind of setting, but on certain days—like, say we had sweats or something—it could be good to have men and women in a sweat. have that balanced energy. one female (p 5) stated: the sweat lodge was very powerful for all the women. learning about the sweat lodge, because it was my first sweat. the first sweat i did was in this program, and it was good. the first sweat i did was so good. i felt so good. i felt so light after the first sweat. i didn’t know that’s how sweats were. just wow. that’s when i wanted to keep doing that. i wanted to keep going to sweats. that’s something i’m still going to do now. and doing the smudging, and all that stuff with everything, yeah. to me, i’m used to that stuff, like 9 marsh et al.: sweat lodge ceremony for addiction and trauma published by scholarship@western, 2018 when i do circles, so i like that. i’m comfortable with all that. i expected that healing to happen, so it was good. one of the facilitators said: the sweats were incredibly powerful, and so healing on so many levels. i can’t even articulate with words what it meant for the men. it really just added to the healing process. and the traditional healing piece in general, again, added a spiritual component that maybe otherwise wouldn’t be nurtured as much. beginning with the smudge really just framed, set the stage, for every session. most of the participants identified that the information in the ihss program helped them understand why they acted and behaved in a way that isolated them from themselves, family, and community. they equally applaud the western seeking safety knowledge as they did the traditional healing practices, including the sweat lodge ceremony. also, throughout the feedback and testimonies, the participants valued the facilitators for bringing this wisdom. many articulated in such a profound way the role the addiction played in their lives and how they needed to self-medicate so not to feel the pain of the trauma. they clearly indicated the role of the trauma and how it kept them in frozen states. there was a general consensus amongst the participants about how the sweat lodge ceremony and the teachings enlightened and changed them. as female (p 1) so clearly stated: the women sharing in the circles brought so much knowledge. the topics informed us. laughing helped us. the traditional approach brought wisdom. eating helped us heal. going to the sweat lodge was healing. yes, all of those things were what i most remember. and the thinking and noticing brain information also really helped. another male (p 16) said: our facilitators were great. they allowed discussion. if we needed to debrief or talk about different things, the facilitators allowed that to happen. they were a part of the group. they shared their own experiences, strengths, and hopes with us. they participated in the sweat ceremonies. everything we’ve done, the facilitators were there as well. a deep understanding of the igt, the function of trauma symptoms, and the role of the substances emerged in the sweat ceremonies and the discussions after the sweat ceremonies. for example, one female (p 12) shared: it was life changing for me. this happened from the time that i started to the time that i finished this program. i’m no longer reliant on medications to make it through a day. i am not in panic mode without it. every time i went into a panic attack, i didn’t know how to stop it. now i know how to stop it before it even gets to that heightened . . . it doesn’t get to a peak anymore where i’m out of control. i can actually figure out my triggers, and even if something hits me, that i was not expecting, i know my body. it was 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 2 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.2 the same with the sweats, smudging, and meditation. i also got a lot out of the native teachings that we learned. and the medicine wheel (was as powerful). to this day, i still do smudging and meditation. i know when i do it consistently, it really helps me. it keeps me positive. once traumatized, people often report that they are plagued by intrusive thoughts, emotions, and behaviours that are destructive to themselves and others. consequently, they often lose the meaning of life, feel hopeless, and have times in which they feel de-humanized. some authors refer to that condition as a spiritual crisis or soul wound (aguiar & halseth, 2015; brave heart, 1998; duran, 2006; marsh, 2010; mcquaid, bombay, mcinnis, matheson, & anisman, 2015). it was clear that many of the participants regained their trust in themselves and experienced a greater awareness about their thoughts and feelings during the ceremonies. another female (p 2) noted: i found a calmness, as we got there, from my regular life, so i think leaving there with peace and not anxiety . . . which didn’t happen very often, but if there was a triggering topic then maybe the checkout should be a focus. other than that, i think everything was perfect. and of course, i would like to see more sweats. i feel like three sweats wasn’t enough. the third sweat was probably the best sweat, but i’d like to see maybe a final sweat, after we graduate. a sweat before we get in, maybe and having elders in the circle. both male and female groups reported that more sweats could have been offered. they felt that they could let go of all the pain, hurt and trauma during the sweats. another male (p 15) indicated: i found the sweat lodges amazing. for me, it was the smudging at the beginning, and the sweat lodges, because when i was in those sweat lodges, it gave me time to reflect on everything that we’ve been talking about the month before, to cry out what i needed to cry out, to let go of what i needed to, and just to want to be strong and move on with my life in a more healthy, positive way. it’s been really great. this theme emerged very powerfully in both male and female sharing circles, as well as during the semi-structured interviews. this connection to their culture, rituals, land, and healers was both healing and revealing (marsh, cote-meek, et al., 2016). when participants were asked about their experience in the sweat lodge ceremonies, both men and women shared so many powerful experiences. many indicated that the sweat lodge ceremony was a spiritually connecting experience. as one female (p 5) described it: the sweat lodges were just an amazing experience as well. it gave me that spiritual connection, and the chance to process my thoughts and what i’ve learned. female (p 12) concurred: this is a cleansing for the spirit along with the sweats. i don’t know what else to say. 11 marsh et al.: sweat lodge ceremony for addiction and trauma published by scholarship@western, 2018 one of the males (p 16) stated: again, like (p 24) said, the sweat lodges, and having our elders on board from time to time, when they were able to attend and share their teachings with us. that was helpful for me, to have them here. another male (p 18) stated: i really liked the teepee at laurentian, and the sweat lodges. i really liked the story . . . when elder julie came as a visiting elder . . . about the medicine wheel and everything. i’m métis myself, and i always wanted to learn about the aboriginal culture and traditions. participants expressed how safe they felt in the sweat lodge ceremonies. as so eloquently expressed by male (p 24): the sweats were wonderful. elder julie is very recognizable in this community as an elder, a good teacher. she’s safe. she’s a very good woman. she is a good teacher. i’ve known her for a long time. having the sweat at her and elder frank’s place, that was really good. i thought it was a good choice. being in the lodge was really healing and safe. there were times i remember going in there, and it was just at the right time, being a part of that sweat lodge. this was a theme that emerged throughout. participants felt this deep sense of connection with both elders. the elders brought forth this safety and enactment as mother and father during the ceremonies. yalom and leszez (2005) also write about individuals in groups that mirror the action of others. in this way, they further explain, the survivor recognizes and claims a lost part of him or herself. in that moment, the survivor begins to re-join the human community (marsh, 2010; yalom & leszcz, 2005). many traumatized individuals lose their sense of connection and often move into isolation. therefore, communal connection, as was displayed in the sweat lodge ceremonies, was highly effective in reducing trauma symptom scores for the participants (marsh, cote-meek, et al., 2016). many of the participants talked about the social time after the sweat when we would have our meals together. they further stated: it gave us a chance to debrief even more or learn more about this program. this aspect of therapy and healing is an important component and was palpable and visible throughout all the sweat ceremonies. yalom and leszez (2005) concur about the power of shared testimonies of traumatized individuals. they specifically refer to the moment when two people compassionately respond to the needs of the other. the power of the sweat ceremony resulted in a reawakening that can occur through common altruism by others and the presence of the elders (aguiar & halseth, 2015; brave heart, 2003; daly, 2008; drake, 2009; duran, 2006; marsh, cote-meek, et al., 2016). 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 2 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.2 d i s c u s s i o n this study set out to identify whether or not it would be feasible, suitable, and beneficial to incorporate traditional indigenous healing practices into the seeking safety treatment model for the group treatment of igt and sud in indigenous women and men (marsh, young, et al., 2016; marsh, coholic, et al., 2015; marsh, cote-meek, et al., 2015; marsh, cote-meek, et al., 2016). within the context of this study, this article explores in depth the impact of the sweat lodge ceremony as a component of the ihss intervention. the teachings and healing that occurred in the sweat lodge were a key contributing factor in the benefits of the ihss implementation project. sweat lodge ceremonies represent a return to the womb of mother earth. in doing so, participants were encouraged to release the pain of the past and present and claim back the spirit (drake, 2009; duran, 2006; menzies et al., 2010; nabigon, 2006; nabigon, hagey, webster, & mackay, 1999). through the presence of the elders, the creator, and the ancestors, all participants reported deep-level healing. the hallmark of the western model, seeking safety, is to encourage safety and self-care, so that a space can be created for healing from both igt and sud (najavits, 2007). all the core content in the sweat lodge ceremonies was delivered to promote knowledge and understanding, as well as to create a space and place of healing. these ceremonies were offered to help participants to heal from internalized oppression, which represent one of the long-term effects of intergenerational trauma. once oppression is internalized, it can only be played out in two ways: people self-harm, and they hurt others, including children and family members (aguiar & halseth, 2015; gone, 2013; hill, 2009; kovach, 2010; najavits & hien, 2013; patitz, 2011). the studies that exhibited evidence of the impact of sweat lodge ceremonies includes studies by colmant et al. (2005), as well as the work of colmant and merta (1999, 2000). colmant et al. (2005) confirmed changes in health and wellness after the participation in a sweat lodge or sauna. furthermore, they showed that the use of sweat lodge and sauna stimulated and enhanced immunity, helped with sleep problems and pain management, and increased relaxation. furthermore, the authors noted neurological sweating that positively impacted the sympathetic nervous system as well as the hormonal system (colmant et al., 2005). other evidence was found in the studies conducted by gossage et al. (2003) and schiff and moore (2006). there has been little research on the indigenous sweat lodge, but stories and feedback from participants and elders affirms that it has restorative and healing power. many scholars have written about the support that members bring to each other in a group setting, and the healing quality of this group support (see for example brave heart, 1999; duran, 2006; jane & glodedesrochers, 2014; menzies et al., 2010; nabigon, 2006; nabigon et al., 1999; yalom & leszcz, 2005). similarly, the sweat lodge ceremony creates this same kind of group setting wherein many participants described the connection to others and the support they received (marsh, cote-meek, et al., 2016). participation in the sweat lodge ceremony was shown to provide a deeply moving and truly spiritual experience that has been reported by some as having physical, mental, and spiritual benefits. colmant and merta (1999) described how “the sweating process in the ceremony requires mental and physical fortitude, bringing with it a strong sense of 13 marsh et al.: sweat lodge ceremony for addiction and trauma published by scholarship@western, 2018 accomplishment, thus providing an ideal vehicle for those who want to commit to change” (p. 69). the elders teach that the connection and the sacredness of this ceremony could be restored during the sweat lodge ceremony, and several participants in the study reported this experience. also, many indigenous researchers and clinicians concur that the rocks used during the sweat lodge ceremony are spirits that work for the people to reveal fears, suffering, and stories so that healing can come and be received (beck & spielmann, 2006; brave heart, 1999, 2003; duran, 2006; menzies et al., 2010; nabigon, 2006; nabigon et al., 1999). other evidence comes from the work of beck and spielman (2006), who shared the teachings of the anishnaabe peoples about the sweat lodge, and benton-banai (1988), the head of the medewewin lodge. he teaches that the sweat lodge depicts the womb of mother earth. once in the womb, the prayers and ceremony help with the release of deep pain and trauma through the sweating, lamenting, and crying. grandfather stones in the centre of the lodge are used for spiritual renewal. “the earth as mother is the nurturer of life and purifies those who enter the lodge for healing” (beck & spielman, 2006, p. 198). in another example, counsellors taking part in traditional healing practices with indigenous men reported an increased openness to treatment, an enhanced level of self-disclosure, and a greater sense of grounding or stability after these men attended a sweat lodge ceremony (lane, bopp, bopp, & norris, 2002). as one therapist suggested, “having attended sweats, i do know that during the ceremony people are able to talk about their own victimization because of the safe and secure nature of the sweat” (lane et al., 2002, p. 16). the seminal work of levine (2002) on trauma healing supports these findings about sweat lodges. levine (2002) taught that trauma resides in the nervous system and not in the events. while he did not explore the impact of sweat lodge ceremonies, his concepts and theories about trauma treatment are similar to the responses of participants who attended sweat lodge ceremonies. these changes, such as a physical and emotional well-being during and after trauma treatment as described by levine (2002), are similar to the changes experienced and reported during the sweat lodge ceremonies (marsh, cote-meek, et al., 2016). furthermore, levine (2002) wrote that when people resource, meaning they receive or reach out for support from safety, some regulation of the nervous system is restored. levine (2002) also agreed that people have the ability to discharge some of the gross traumatic energy that gets stuck in the body through movement, vibrations, sweating, crying, and shaking. during the sweat ceremonies, many participants reported this sense of letting go and releasing through the heat and sweating (bombay et al., 2014; levine, 2002; marsh, cote-meek, et al., 2016). l i m i t a t i o n s the findings in this study has been very positive and healing in an holistic way as reported by the quotes and viewpoints of the participants; yet, some of the limitations in offering sweat lodge ceremonies should be noted. first, the experiences of participants were all self-reported. second, the participants might not have been representative of all indigenous peoples living in northern ontario, canada. this limitation could be remedied by future research with a larger sample size and participants from a broader range of settings. finally, the attribution of the benefits identified by the participants to the sweat lodge ceremonies does not prove causality, which 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 2 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.2 would require a different methodology. therefore, future studies with comparison treatment and non-treatment groups would be useful. c o n c l u s i o n the participants who attended the sweat lodge ceremonies reported remarkable and moving experiences, including spiritual, emotional, and physical relief of painful experiences related to igt and sud. furthermore, the sweat lodge experiences allowed a deep connection among the participants to themselves and others. this was eloquently described and reported by participants. sweat lodge ceremonies as discussed by many authors and healers sustained and brought healing to indigenous peoples and this wisdom dates back as early as 400 b.c. (abdullah & stringer, 1999; brave heart, 1998; colmant et al., 2005; hatala et al., 2016; menzies et al., 2010; nabigon, 2006; nabigon et al., 1999). while the participants in this study saw the sweat lodge ceremony as helpful, in part because it is one of their traditional practices, among other indigenous populations traditional healing practices vary. reclaiming indigenous identity means recovering traditional values, beliefs, philosophies, ideologies, and approaches, and adapting them to the needs of today (bombay et al., 2014; brave heart, 1999; chansonneuve, 2007; duran & duran, 1995; evans-campbell, 2008; marsh, coholic, et al., 2015). this reclamation process was clearly seen and reported by participants throughout the sweat lodge ceremonies. what stood out and was very significant in these findings were changes in spirituality, because such changes are a fundamental component of healing within an indigenous paradigm. in order to confirm these findings for future studies a larger sample and the use of multiple sweat lodge sites would allow the findings to be generalized beyond the current study population. an extended study could also examine if these effects are cumulative over several sweat lodge ceremonies. this article has presented qualitative findings of the sweat lodge ceremony experiences and indicated powerful changes in the health and well-being of this group. future research is encouraged to replicate this work with other indigenous populations to add evidence to the benefits of such an approach (gone, 2013; hatala et al., 2016; hill, 2009; kovach, 2010; marsh, cote-meek, et al., 2016; mehl-madrona, 2009; menzies et al., 2010). as indigenous people, the authors appreciate the complexities and dynamics in health policy and research. given the complexity of the impact of intergenerational trauma on the lives and wellness of indigenous peoples, future treatment interventions must be holistic and multifaceted with the inclusion of cultural safety models in policy and legislation, and with research being key to making those strides and changes and elevating the health of a nation who have suffered due to the exclusion of these concepts in the past (czyzewski, 2011; duran, 2006; gone, 2013; marsh, cote-meek, et al., 2016). our position remains that self-determination in aboriginal communities can only be enhanced if the principles of cultural safety can be inclusive in decision-making, because cultural safety brings the critical lens in which unequal power relations can be explored. holistic approaches to treatment and cultural safety prompt a moral and political discourse and dialogue that is directly linked to particular moral ends with social justice implications (bombay et al., 2014; czyzewski, 2011; macaulay, 2009; marsh, cote-meek, et al., 2016). 15 marsh et al.: sweat lodge ceremony for addiction and trauma published by scholarship@western, 2018 r e f e r e n c e s abdullah, j., & stringer, e. 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(2005). theory and practice of group psychotherapy. new york: basic books. 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 2 [2018], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.2.2 the international indigenous policy journal april 2018 the sweat lodge ceremony: a healing intervention for intergenerational trauma and substance use teresa naseba marsh david c. marsh julie ozawagosh frank ozawagosh recommended citation the sweat lodge ceremony: a healing intervention for intergenerational trauma and substance use abstract keywords creative commons license the sweat lodge ceremony: a healing intervention for intergenerational trauma and substance use conservation controversy: sparrow, marshall, and the mi’kmaq of esgenoôpetitj the international indigenous policy journal volume 2 issue 4 traditional knowledge, spirituality, and lands article 5 october 2011 conservation controversy: sparrow, marshall, and the mi’kmaq of esgenoôpetitj sarah j. king queen's university kingston, ontario, dr.sarah.king@gmail.com recommended citation king, s. j. (2011). conservation controversy: sparrow, marshall, and the mi’kmaq of esgenoôpetitj. the international indigenous policy journal, 2(4) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.5 this research is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. conservation controversy: sparrow, marshall, and the mi’kmaq of esgenoôpetitj abstract this paper explores the interplay between the sparrow and marshall decisions of the supreme court of canada, and the sovereigntist and traditionalist convictions of the mi’kmaq of the esgenoôpetitj/burnt church first nation, as expressed in the conservationist language of the draft for the esgenoopotitj first nations (efn) fishery act (fisheries policy). with the supreme court of canada’s decision in sparrow, conservation became an important justification available to the canadian government to support its regulatory infringement on aboriginal and treaty rights. ten years later, in marshall, the court recognized the treaty rights of the mi’kmaq to a limited commercial fishery. the efn fishery act, written to govern the controversial post-marshall fishery in esgenoôpetitj (also known as the burnt church first nation) demonstrates that for the mi’kmaq, scientific management, traditional knowledge, sovereignty and spirituality are understood in a holistic philosophy. the focus placed on conservation by the courts, and the managementfocused approach taken by the government at esgenoôpetitj have led to government policy which treats conservation simply as a resource access and management problem. conservation, which the court deems “uncontroversial” in sparrow, is a politically loaded ideal in post-marshall burnt church. keywords esgenopetitj, burnt church, mi'kmaq, conservation, sparrow, marshall, van der peet, indigenous, sovereignty, traditional kinowledge acknowledgments my thanks to the people of esgenoôpetitj for welcoming me into their community so soon after the dispute, and for sharing some of their experiences and insights with me. thanks to the anonymous reviewers for their comments, and to an anonymous reviewer of another manuscript, whose comment sparked the idea for this paper. thanks to nick shrubsole and marc fonda for the aar-eir panel where this paper began, and to mona lafosse and chris klassen for commenting on drafts. responsibility for errors is mine alone. this research was supported by a sshrc doctoral fellowship, the arthur and sonia labatt fellowship in environmental studies at the university of toronto, and the e. w. nuffield graduate travel award (university of toronto). creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ conservation has become a critical issue in the recognition of aboriginal and treaty rights in canada, and in the development of related policies. the sparrow and marshall decisions of the supreme court of canada reinforced the political power of conservation as one of the only reasons the federal government can justify infringing upon the rights of indigenous peoples, according to the court’s interpretation of the canadian constitution. in the fishing dispute that erupted at esgenoôpetitj nb (the burnt church first nation) after marshall, the conservation credentials of the government and the mi’kmaq were hotly contested. this paper explores the role and meaning of conservation at burnt church in the context of sparrow and marshall. the mi’kmaq at esgenoôpetitj authored their own postmarshall fisheries policy, draft for the esgenoopotitj first nations (efn) fishery act (fisheries policy) (ward & augustine, 2000), which provides important insight into the issues motivating the community during the dispute. political sovereignty, traditional knowledge and spirituality, and conservation were all important concerns articulated in the efn fishery act and within the community during the dispute. post-sparrow and post-marshall, conservation has become the language in which many indigenous issues are expressed, since conservation is one of the primary justifications the federal government can use to limit aboriginal and treaty rights. this paper explores the interplay between the sparrow and marshall decisions of the supreme court and the sovereigntist and traditionalist convictions of the mi’kmaq, as expressed in the conservationist language of the efn fishery act. this discussion of conservation develops out of a larger project investigating the taken-forgranted values and assumptions at play in the fishing dispute at burnt church/esgenoôpetitj, nb. this larger project is phenomenological and ethnographic, in that it seeks to understand people’s motivations and lived experiences during the dispute and its aftermath.1 for 12 months in 2004-2005 i lived in the communities of burnt church, carrying out ethnographic research in the mi’kmaw2 and english communities. i was a participant observer in both communities, attending community groups, events and meetings, and talking informally with people in all these contexts. i carried out interviews with activists, community members and fishers in both the english and mi’kmaw communities. this type of research seeks to understand the nature of people’s lives in their depth and quality, in the hopes of generating questions and insights which can open up new directions of exploration. in this paper i draw upon ethnographic research to inform my analysis of the published conservation debates that arose in the dispute, including policy documents written at esgenoôpetitj, political and academic writings published by two mi’kmaw activists who gave leadership in the dispute, and policy statements and documents of the canadian government. conservation and sparrow in the canadian context, the power of conservation as a legal and political tool in the negotiation of relationships with aboriginal people emerged out of the supreme court’s decision in sparrow and was reinforced by the supreme court a decade later in marshall. in the late spring of 1984 ronald sparrow, a member of the musqueam indian band of british columbia, was charged for fishing with a net longer than those allowed within the terms of his band’s fishing licence. sparrow appealed his subsequent conviction to the supreme court, arguing that his aboriginal right to fish was protected 1 for a more detailed discussion of these methods, jw creswell’s qualitative inquiry and research design: choosing among five approaches 2nd ed (2007, thousand oaks: sage) provides an excellent overview. margaret kovach’s indigenous methodology: characteristics, conversations and contexts (2010, toronto: university of toronto press) also provides important discussion on these methods, as well as on questions particular to research in indigenous communities, and research by indigenous and non-indigenous peoples. 2 mi’kmaq is a noun; mi’kmaw an adjective. 1 king: conservation controversy published by scholarship@western, 2011 under section 35(1) of the constitution act, which recognizes and affirms the existing aboriginal and treaty rights of aboriginal peoples in canada, and that the regulations imposed in the licence granted to his band were therefore inconsistent with the constitution. in their 1990 decision, the supreme court recognized sparrow’s aboriginal right to participate in a food fishery; the court declined to consider the question of aboriginal rights to a commercial fishery. the court held that the constitution act protects existing aboriginal rights, and that “section 35(1) does not promise immunity from government regulation in contemporary society, but it does hold the crown to a substantive promise” (1990, 4). that is, the crown bears the burden of justifying any regulations it imposes that limit rights protected under 35(1). in this case, the justification framework laid out by the court relies primarily upon conservation. in sparrow, the supreme court provides guidelines by which the crown can assess the legitimacy of its regulation of aboriginal rights. the crown cannot justify infringement on aboriginal rights simply by appealing to the public good. the court clearly states that the primary acceptable justification for regulatory infringement on aboriginal rights is conservation: “the justification of conservation and resource management, [however,] is uncontroversial” (1990, 5). further, the next management priority after conservation must be the indian food fishery, that is fishing for consumption by the community, not for commercial sale. only after these two priorities have been adequately addressed can the remaining resources be allocated among other interested parties, including (native and non-native) commercial fishers. the court’s decision in sparrow sets out a management framework in which the only priority more important than the subsistence of aboriginal communities is the continued existence of the stocks themselves. conservation has become the government’s best justification for infringement on aboriginal rights, both in fisheries management and in natural resource management more generally. academic discussions of sparrow tend to highlight and critique the court’s affirmation of aboriginal rights. isaac (1993) explores the significance of the court’s reliance on section 35(1) of the constitution act in their decision, calling sparrow “the single most important judicial decision on aboriginal rights in canada to date” (213). asch and macklem (1991) argue that the court in fact relies on two different understandings of aboriginal rights, as contingent on state action and as inherent in the nature of aboriginality, and suggest that this undermines aboriginal sovereignty and the constitutional right to aboriginal self-government. sharma (1998) suggests that although the court’s recognition of aboriginal rights seems positive, in practice it offers little practical leverage for aboriginal communities wanting to build a sustainable livelihood from the fishery. binnie (1990) suggests that the great weight the court has given to 35(1) will now necessarily limit the breadth of rights that can be recognized under it. binnie also criticizes the court’s unwillingness to address the thorny question of musqueam commercial fishing rights. in binnie’s view, the court’s purpose in sparrow is to encourage the government and native people back into political negotiation: “having shown that section 35 has a real if limited bite, the court sets out to force a better accommodation by governments of aboriginal peoples in modern canada, and a political settlement of ancient grievances” (241). for binnie, the most pressing question arising out of sparrow is whether government can be so motivated, and whether aboriginal groups will be willing to recognize “the economic and political constraints imposed on the federal and provincial governments” (242). within two years of sparrow, the federal department responsible for fisheries management, the department of fisheries and oceans (dfo), began to implement the aboriginal fisheries strategy (afs) as its primary response to sparrow. the afs engaged individual indigenous communities in negotiation with the dfo over their participation in fisheries management and enforcement, and access to fisheries for food, ceremonial and social purposes (dfo, 2008a; 2008b; 2010). in practice, this means that indigenous people can eat and preserve the fish they catch, share it in the context of traditional celebrations, such as pow-wows and in ceremonies, and share their catch with other members of their 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.5 communities, such as elders and family members. the aboriginal fisheries strategy focused on negotiating aboriginal agreement to catch limits, terms and conditions of licences and arrangements for fisheries management and research. in esgenoôpetitj/burnt church, the aboriginal fisheries strategy resulted in a fall lobster fishery for food, ceremonial and social purposes. mi’kmaq fishers were allowed to fish on a small scale, without selling their catch. the meanings of conservation after sparrow, as conservation became a more powerful factor in indigenous fisheries policy, differences about what, exactly, conservation entails became critical to the developing conflicts and relationships between the canadian government and the mi’kmaq at esgenoôpetitj/burnt church. for the government, the court’s decisions reinforce their obligation to involve indigenous people within the existing management framework, working towards the conservation of fish stocks as a common goal.3 among the mi’kmaq, conservation is understood to be connected not only to the wellbeing of the fish stocks, but also to the economic, political and spiritual wellbeing of the larger community. netukulimk, the traditional mi’kmaq idea of conservation, is described by the unama’ki institute of natural resources as: with the aboriginal fisheries strategy (afs), the government includes aboriginal communities among the communities it must consider as it manages fish. fisheries conservation is a question of scientific resource management, and the afs was developed in order to “contribute substantially to enhancing …[fish] stocks” (2008b, 1) and “to improve the economies and social structure of aboriginal communities” (2010, 1). the ends of conservation, in this view, are the management of fish in order to improve the material lives of people. the government’s approach echoes pinchot’s classic utilitarian view of conservation as “the art of producing from the forest [or ocean] whatever it can yield for the service of man” (1914, 13). the use of the natural bounty provided by the creator for the self-support and well-being of the individual and the community. netukulimk is achieving adequate standards of community nutrition and economic well-being without jeopardizing the integrity, diversity, or productivity of our environment. (2009) elsewhere in this issue of the international indigenous policy journal, prosper, mcmillan & davis provide a valuable discussion of netukulimk and its relevance to contemporary mi’mkaw life (2011; see also doyle-bedwell & cohen 2001, and berneshawi 1997). in esgenoôpetitj, miigama’gan is a former band councilor and one of those who provided leadership during the dispute. for her, “cultural, spiritual and economic wellness” are central to the “vision of a healthy native community.” these holistic views of conservation, which emphasize relationship with human and non-human beings across many generations, are common to the traditional philosophies of indigenous peoples (see for example belanger, 2010; sefa dei, hall & goldin rosenberg, eds. 2000; subramanian & pisupati, eds. 2010). 3 while the canadian government has worked with some indigenous communities in an attempt to integrate traditional ecological knowledge into its management processes, such efforts were not made at burnt church. 3 king: conservation controversy published by scholarship@western, 2011 van der peet and stereotypes throughout the 1990s, the nature of an aboriginal right to fish for commercial purposes continued to be litigated. in 1996, in r. v. van der peet, the supreme court of canada ruled that “(t)o be an aboriginal right an activity must be an element of a practice, custom or tradition integral to the distinctive culture of the aboriginal group claiming the right”. to decide whether an indigenous people (in this case, the stó:lō) hold an aboriginal right to fish for commercial purposes under section 35(1) of the canadian constitution, the court devised a series of ten tests aimed “at identifying the practices, traditions and customs central to the aboriginal societies that existed in north america prior to contact with europeans” (1996, 47).4 in effect, as justice l’heureux-dubé points out in her dissent to this ruling, this has the effect of freezing aboriginal rights at a particular moment in time. constitutional scholar john borrows suggests that this test has the potential to reinforce stereotypes about indians. in order to claim an aboriginal right, these determinations of aboriginal will become more important that what it means to be aboriginal today. the notion of what was integral to aboriginal societies is steeped in questionable north american cultural images (1997, 43-4). the court’s decision to define aboriginality in pre-contact terms engages and reinforces stereotypes of the “imaginary indian”, which daniel francis had described four years earlier in his book of the same name. the romantic appeal of the mythic indian, and the myriad related stereotypes, shape much engagement with indigenous people across north america (parkhill 1997, king 2003). krech’s controversial work the ecological indian takes up the particular ways that indigenous environmental attitudes have been made both mythic and trivial as they are reinvented in western discourse (1999; see also harkin & lewis, ed., 2007). as mcgregor points out, while aboriginal environmental knowledge can offer much to contemporary management and decision making, this cannot happen until the perpetual stereotyping of indigenous people (as noble conservationists, and as dissolute and greedy) is overcome (1997, 325). in this context, the charge that the court reinforces these stereotypes and perhaps even relies upon them seems especially potent. in esgenoôpetitj/burnt church, the conflict that erupted after marshall illustrates the challenges that arise when holistic concerns for conservation are read simply as fisheries management problems. marshall and the burnt church controversy in 1993, three years after ronald sparrow was acquitted by the supreme court for his actions on the pacific coast, donald marshall jr, a mi’kmaq man, was arrested for fishing and selling eels without a licence on the atlantic coast. marshall was convicted, appealed and eventually argued before the supreme court that he had a treaty right to catch and sell fish, under the treaties of 1760-61.5 4 in r. v. gladstone, and r. v. n.t.c. smokehouse, issued simultaneously with van der peet, the court applied the van der peet tests in its decisions. in september of 1999, the supreme court acquitted marshall and held that all mi’kmaw had the right to earn a moderate livelihood by fishing, according to the terms of the peace & friendship treaties their ancestors had signed with the crown. as in sparrow, the court recognized the canadian government’s responsibility to regulate the fisheries, and held that the government can regulate the mi’kmaw fishery 5 see wicken (2002) and wildsmith (2001) for accounts of the case by those involved in marshall’s defense, and coates (2000) for a chronicle of the early years of the dispute in burnt church. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.5 without infringing upon treaty rights. binnie, now appointed to the supreme court, writes for the majority: the accused caught and sold the eels to support himself and his wife. his treaty right to fish and trade was exercisable only at the absolute discretion of the minister. accordingly, the close season and the imposition of a discretionary licencing system would, if enforced, interfere with the accused’s treaty right to fish for trading purposes, and the ban on sales would, if enforced, infringe his right to trade for sustenance. in the absence of any justification of the regulatory prohibitions, the accused is entitled to an acquittal (1999, 5-6; emphasis added). the ruling recognized the right of the mi’kmaq to earn a “moderate livelihood” from the fishery, to fish and sell the catch. the court found that the imposition of the department of fisheries and ocean (dfo)’s system of seasons and licences on the mi’kmaq was an unreasonable interference on the rights of mi’kmaw fishers, given that the government provided no justification for these infringements on their treaty rights. sparrow allowed the community to harvest (and preserve) lobster for a few weeks in the fall, but did not allow people sell their catch and, therefore, to earn a livelihood from the aboriginal fishery. in a community with 85% unemployment (dharamsi, 2000), where only one person among the 1500 residents held a commercial fishing license6 marshall provoked anger among non-native commercial fishers and their families. the nonnative neighbours of esgenoôpetitj were convinced that the mi’kmaw fishery would decimate commercial lobster stocks. they were frustrated that federal fishing regulations were not being enforced in the mi’kmaw fishery. as the mi’kmaw fishery grew, so did the anger of these neighbouring fishers. by early october, violence erupted on the wharf at burnt church. some of those involved in a non-native protest against the fishery destroyed native fishing gear. natives occupied the wharf, making a stand in support of their fishery. native youth raided the gear shed of a nearby non-native fisher, in an attempt to replace their gear, and were rebuffed with baseball bats. the truck of a non-native fisher was burnt, as was a cottage, and the sacred arbour on the reserve. , the creation of opportunities to earn a livelihood was tremendously important. across mi’kma’ki, people greeted marshall’s affirmation of their treaty rights to earn a livelihood from the fishery with joy. in esgenoôpetitj, after the court’s decision, people celebrated: “it was like time slowed down. that’s how intense and wonderful it was” (miigam’agan). some mi’kmaq people began to fish lobster out of season from small dories with refurbished traps, and to sell their catch without federal licences to local dealers. the dealers would, in turn, sell the lobster to regional canning plants, and the fish became a part of the commercial market. 7 across the region, members of the (commercial, non-native) maritime fisherman’s union worked to find ways to shut down the mi’kmaw fishery. while local groups of non-native fishers engaged in protests on the waters and at nearby canning plants, regional fisheries organizations8 the west nova fisherman’s coalition, an intervener in the marshall appeal, applied to the supreme court for a rehearing and stay of marshall. the court did not grant the rehearing, but, in an unprecedented move, gave reasons for their refusal in what amounted to a clarification of their earlier went back to court. 6 this is compared to at least 4 licences in the neighbouring english village of approximately 85 residents, and tens more in surrounding non-native communities. 7 while charges were laid in relation to the altercation over “replacement” traps, no one has been charged with any of the fires mentioned here. 8 these organizations are largely non-native in membership, reflecting the fact that atlantic commercial fishers were largely non-native before marshall. 5 king: conservation controversy published by scholarship@western, 2011 decision.9 with this ruling, the court has reinforced the legal position of conservation, and the social and political power of the conservation discourse. for the federal government, conservation continues to be the most powerful reason that the government can give for limiting treaty and aboriginal rights. in esgenoôpetitj, where community concerns about rights and sovereignty found little purchase in the public debate, the discourse of conservation became the framework within which political positions were articulated and contested, allies were sought and opponents were challenged. while the mi’kmaw community recognized the importance of conservation as stated by the court, they argued that they were in a far better position than the government to enact conservationist policies. in this document, which has come to be known as marshall ii, the court revisits the question of the justification of government regulation, essentially reminding all parties of the reasons upon which the government can justify its infringement on treaty rights (though the government did not elect to provide such a justification at trial). the court affirmed that for aboriginal and commercial fisheries, the “paramount regulatory objective is conservation” (1999b, 3). responsibility for conservation “is placed squarely on the minister responsible, and not on the aboriginal or non-aboriginal users of the resource,” though aboriginal communities must be consulted on such matters (3-4). “the minister has available for regulatory purposes the full range of resource management tools and techniques, provided their use to limit the exercise of a treaty right can be justified on conservation or other grounds” (4). conservation policy and politics at esgenoôpetitj after the supreme court’s clarification in the late fall of 1999, as miramichi bay froze over for the winter, the people of esgenoôpetitj began to consider together how to move forward. the community asked two men, sakej (james ward) and kwegsi (lloyd augustine), to undertake a community consultation process. ward was the head of a key faction of the warrior society in burnt church. augustine was the traditional chief, or keptin, the community’s representative at the sante mawi’omi (mi’kmaw grand council). many of those involved in the leadership of the community fishery understood the court’s decision as upholding not only their treaty rights, but also the treaties themselves, treaties which affirm the status of the mi’kmaq as a sovereign people. the disputed mi’kmaw fishery represented the exercise of aboriginal rights and sovereignty in their own lands and waters, as affirmed in the treaties and by canadian courts. it also represented an attempt to enact the traditional mi’kmaw philosophies and governance practices, which are the foundation of this sovereignty. for example, miigam’agan emphasized the importance of community decision making processes, and in particular the roles of women and elders within these processes: the community organizers facilitated, and worked around the clock to support the community demonstrations and the development of the fishery management plan. we were always at the forefront, organizing groups and meetings, because we felt that if the women and the elders were present at the forefront that the people would be more respectful. because in the big picture it’s all about a collective – you know, the women and elders’ responses are being observed by their community. so their presence was important, and it wasn’t a trick. it was to offer the support of the medicine, because we’re such a social culture. …community relationships are very important (capitalization by miigam’agan). 9 wildsmith argues that this was an elaboration of the earlier decision which went beyond the original, and in which “the two dissenting judges in marshall (no.1) were in fact purporting to explain what the majority meant in the september 17th majority decision” (2001, 229). 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.5 the consultation process led to the release of two new policy documents in the spring of 2000, the draft for the esgenoopotitj first nations (efn) fishery act (fisheries policy) and the draft for efn management plan, both prepared by ward and augustine. conservation, so prized by the courts, became the way in which traditional knowledge and sovereigntist politics were articulated in the community’s selfrepresentations through these documents. they employ conservation to challenge the competence of the canadian government, to highlight the importance of mi’kmaw sovereignty and to reaffirm the importance of traditional mi’kmaw knowledge and philosophies. since, according to the court rulings, conservation trumps all other rights, it has become the way in which the mi’kmaw bid for attention to their central concerns. in the fishery act and the management plan the mi’kmaq frame the fishery in burnt church as a conservationist response to colonialism and to the incompetence of the canadian government’s management of fish stocks through the department of fisheries and oceans (dfo). in the fishery act, the people of esgenoôpetitj claim a fishery as their traditional right, within their traditional territories, based on the authority of the treaties and their inherent rights as indigenous people. the authors of the act position the mi’kmaq as a sovereign nation, entitled to a nation-to-nation relationship with canada. in the context of ongoing crises in the atlantic fisheries, including the collapse of the atlantic salmon fishery (which had been central to local and traditional life all along the miramichi) and of the cod fishery, and given the systematic exclusion of indigenous people from commercial fisheries on the atlantic coast, the act is highly critical of the practices and policies of the canadian government. the focus of the fishery management by the dfo was not to protect and preserve the fisheries and it’s supporting ecosystem. dfos focus was to satisfy the non native fishing industry and ravish the fisheries for the sake of profit. this policy has been at the expense of the mi’kmaq, maliseet and passamaquoddy fishery. the dfo have historically forced the mi’kmaq, maliseet and passamaquoddy people out of their own waters and denied them their inherent rights so the dfo could selfishly take over the fishery and make non native fishermen wealthy (ward & augustine 2000, vii; punctuation as in original). the act suggests that even though the government purports to prioritize conservation, the dfo itself has not historically honoured conservation as its priority. the act states that the overall intent of the mi’kmaq fishery policy is to restore habitat degraded by dfo mismanagement. conservation is a political framework here, one which members of the first nation use to contest the government’s position on their fishery. it is also recognized as a tool that may be used by the government to drive a wedge between local communities with interests in the fishery. the political nature of the conservation question is acknowledged within the management plan itself. we are very concerned that the dfo will attempt to politicize the current conflict between efn and dfo. instead of immediately complying with the scc marshall decision and providing “access” for members of efn, we believe the dfo will try to use our management plan as a means of creating a “conservation scare” amongst non-native fishermen (ward & augustine 2000, xxv). the authors are suggesting that the dfo and the government are likely to use conservation to create conflict between native and non-native fishers, in order to reinforce their own legitimacy and undermine the mi’kmaq. however, “conservation” is also the realm within which the mi’kmaq have sought alliances with non-natives against the canadian government. the policy extends an explicit invitation to create alliances with those who “share the same conservationist principles” (xxiv). the members of the burnt church/esgenoôpetitj first nation, through their management plan, are engaged 7 king: conservation controversy published by scholarship@western, 2011 in a political contest over who is the most able to implement sustainable management of the fisheries. like any policy document, the efn management policy as laid out in the fishery act is a political document. the act articulates issues of rights and conservation, in an attempt to discredit the canadian government’s management of fisheries, and position the mi’kmaq fishery as conservationist in principle and in practice. in 2000, as the efn prepared to implement its own fishery policy, the canadian government continued to express concerns about the integrity of the stocks and also of the mi’kmaw system of fisheries management. while in 1999 the rcmp and the department of fisheries and oceans had been involved in policing the fishery and the related violence between fishers, in 2000 they began to intervene more directly. the dfo attempted to halt the mi’kmaw fishery altogether, relying on the rcmp and the coast guard for enforcement support. the behaviour of all three of these agencies toward the mi’kmaq subsequently became violent. video images of government boats ramming and capsizing mi’kmaw fishing dories drew attention from around the world, as did images of the mi’kmaw occupation of the burnt church wharf. during much of its dealings with communities involved in the dispute, in its public positions and in the parameters it set for mediators, the canadian government persisted in defining the dispute as “about fish.” the government positioned access to and management of the lobster fishery as the key issue to be negotiated and discussed, and disallowed other topics from the conversation. this is illustrated by the challenges that arose in attempts to resolve the dispute. in august 2000, the government made a settlement offer to the first nation (reportedly valued at $2.5 million) which was rejected in a community referendum. many in the community wanted to be able to continue to fish on their own terms, according to their own policy and philosophy. in september of that same year, bob rae arrived in the community as a mediator, jointly agreed-upon by the government and the band council. people within the community of esgenoôpetitj report that he seemed uninterested in their concerns; a dfo press release (2000) suggested that rae was unable to move forward, given the unreasonable demands of the first nation. the sets of issues upon which the first nation wanted to mediate included rights, sovereignty and governance, while the canadian government wanted to talk about resource management and fisheries access. throughout the years 2000 and 2001, all attempts at mediation came to similarly unsuccessful ends. for the authors of the act in esgenoôpetitj, the political nature of the government’s conservation claims in the burnt church dispute was very clear. this understanding was echoed by others in the community in 2005, as my conversation with mi’kmaw activists dalton and cindy10 that’s the biggest word that they [the federal government] can use is conservation. “we have to look at the conservation of this stock, and we have to control them, and we have to turn around and regulate it,” and stuff like that. where we already had our own conservation [plan] and we were following it. indicates: the efn fishery act represents the position of the community as conservationist, sovereigntist, and anticolonial: due to the consistent mismanagement by dfo, it’s biased and racist policy making, it’s overpolicing of mi’kmaq fishermen, it’s adversarial nature and relationship with the mi’kmaq, it’s paternalistic and condescending attitude towards first nations people, the mi’kmaq of efn [esgenoôpetitj first nation] will be reasserting it’s control over the fisheries in it’s traditional territories. …the efn will exercise its inherent right to self determine it’s own political, social and economic future and it’s inherent right to self government which will include the ability as a self governing people to legislate policy (ward & augustine, 2000, vii; punctuation as in original). 10 these are pseudonyms. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.5 through this document, the community argues that the federal government and its agencies pursued policies intended to separate them from their lands and resources and that the mi’kmaw protest (through the native fishery) is a reasonable response, an attempt to reclaim what is rightfully theirs under the treaties. meeting the concerns of livelihood and conservation in the government’s terms is not enough; the act calls for mi’kmaw conservation on mi’kmaw territories. mi’kmaw conservation philosophy within the efn fisheries act, mi’kmaq management of the fishery is understood as a necessary condition of effective conservation: effective conservation arises through mi’kmaw sovereignty, the governance of mi’kmaw philosophy over mi’kmaw territory. it’s not simply that the mi’kmaq should make decisions about mik’maw territory; mi’kmaw sovereigntists understand decisions made within a mi’kmaw framework to be politically, spiritually and environmentally unique. the act suggests that the fishery will be guided by a developing “mi’kmaq conservation philosophy”, based on scientific data, traditional environmental knowledge from mi’kmaq fishers, and traditional philosophy from elders and community members (ward & augustine 2000, xxiii). mi’kmaw conservation philosophy is understood, in this case, to be inextricable from the quest for sovereignty. traditional indigenous knowledge “derives from multiple sources, including traditional teachings, empirical observation, and revelation” (brant castellano 2000, 23). it is a holistic and integrated way of thinking and doing, where divisions traditional in the west (such as those between science and religion) have little import. brant castellano quotes couture’s anonymous mentor, who said, “there are only two things you have to remember about being indian. one is that everything is alive, and the second is that we are all related” (29). in his discussion of indigenous philosophies, yale belanger (2010) suggests that they begin with the land and that their meaning is therefore contextual. in indigenous communities, traditional knowledge is an integral part of the social and cultural lives of the community; it cannot be separated from it (berkes 2005). traditional practices, including the ceremonies, are ways in which people can honour and maintain their connections to their (human and non-human) relations. indigenous philosophies are dynamic and changing; as berkes points out, they are also politically volatile. both within indigenous communities and in indigenous relationships to others, these ideas shape political positions and motivate community practice. this is precisely because of their holistic and contextual nature – these philosophies are not removed from the social and cultural lives of the people, but exist only within and among them. in this context, for many of the people of esgenoôpetitj, conservation of lobster stocks is inseparable from the larger context of community life, from livelihood, sovereignty and spirituality. while the efn fisheries act might seem to be a document of natural resources policy, it is also a political and religious statement of conviction, since such policy emerges within the context of mi’kmaq relationships with human and non-human beings over many generations. in ćelánen: a journal of indigenous governance, efn fishery act co-author sakej (james ward) argues for the mi’kmaw right to self-determination (2004). in his view, the status of the mi’kmaq as a people with the right to self-determination can be demonstrated by their interwoven and unifying language, sacred history, religion and homeland. ward begins his article with a teaching that his elders shared with him, which illustrates the spiritual nature of his political struggle: at the dawn of man, the creator (kisulk) granted the mi’kmaq life and the right to freewill (right to self-determination). the mi’kmaq were to live on mother earth and enjoy the gifts of her lands and waters. in exchange the mi’kmaq were to protect and preserve mother earth. it was a 9 king: conservation controversy published by scholarship@western, 2011 divine obligation delegated to the mi’kmaq, kisulk gave us these rights and responsibilities and no government can take them away. (2004, 1) in ward’s view, sovereignty comes to the people from the creator. mi’kmaq responsibility for the lands and waters of their traditional homeland, mi’kma’ki, is a divine charge. this understanding of traditional teachings is echoed by augustine, who articulates that mi’kma’ki “belongs to the creator and cannot be sold or given up.” in this context, the conservation philosophy suggested by the efn fisheries act is an attempt to (re)unite the traditional, political, scientific and spiritual within the practices of the community. the conservation philosophy that the mi’kmaq at esgenoôpetitj articulated in their community consultation process, and which was reflected in the efn fisheries act, embodies traditional knowledge as it is described in academic discussions engaging indigenous people. yet, as borrows has pointed out in his criticism of van der peet, “like others, aboriginal people are traditional, modern and postmodern” (1997, 63). what’s interesting about this mi’kmaq policy is not that it is brand new, but that it is in fact an old way of thinking and doing rearticulated and re-understood in a modern context. in her discussion of traditional knowledge in the contemporary canadian context, marlene brant castellano (2000) points out that “culture is dynamic, and adjusts to changing conditions, and that a particular practice that embodies a timeless truth may need to be adapted if it is to remain effective” (24). the “conservation policy” of the mi’kmaq is precisely such an adaptation, an attempt to make the dynamic historic philosophies of the mi’kmaq relevant in the contemporary context, where prominent political rhetoric of and public concerns for conservation rule the day. conservation is designated by the court as the major justification available for infringing upon treaty and aboriginal rights. thus conservation becomes a site of political contest, which both the mi’kmaq and the government attempt to turn to their own advantage. 11 in sparrow, the court suggests that “the justification of conservation and resource management, however, is uncontroversial” (1990, 5). in practice, conservation justifications operate as highly controversial and politicized claims which governments and first nations use to invoke a variety of needs and concerns. conservation is a politically loaded ideal. the canadian government insisted on a narrow definition of conservation, focusing on licences and catch. this is a conservation framework that they already define and control, having set the terms of the act themselves. in arguing for an alternative approach to conservation, the mi’kmaq saw an opportunity to set new terms, based not only on modern science, but also on traditional mi’kmaw forms of knowledge. in a 2002 opinion piece, kwegsi (lloyd augustine) suggests that for the federal government “conservation became a just cause to stop indians from exercising our right to fish” (2). like cindy, he argues that the community’s fisheries act presented a stronger alternative to the federal government’s plan. for kwegsi, the act is, “a plan based on conservation to protect the species for the seventh generation of yet unborn” (2002, 2). the end(s) of the dispute the dispute in esgenoôpetitj came to a close in 2002 with the signing of an agreement-inprinciple. this agreement resolved questions of fisheries management and access, as the band council agreed to abide by the rules and regulations of federal government, in return for fishing boats, licences, quota in all regional fisheries (including lucrative snow crab quota) and research money. this agreement didn’t address other issues at play in the dispute, such as indigenous rights and sovereignty or the role 11 non-native commercial fishers and their families, residents of the english village of burnt church, also employ conservation as a key political category in their stories of the dispute. see my (forthcoming) for discussion of this. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.5 of traditional knowledge and philosophy in mi’kmaq communities. what had changed in the community of esgenoôpetitj? the community was exhausted, after years of violence and confrontation. in the band council election of august 2001, the balance of power had shifted in the elected (indian act) band council, with long-standing chief wilbur dedam regaining his majority. while the band council did reject the next government settlement offer later that fall, dedam was more willing to work with the federal government than the sovereigntist activists at the forefront of the dispute. after the bombing of the world trade centre on sept 11, 2001, mi’kmaq activists found themselves increasingly vulnerable to the security powers of the federal government. on august 1, 2002, dedam and fisheries minister robert nault announced that they had signed the agreement-in-principle, and the band temporarily turned over regulation of the fishery to the federal government. the agreement, signed for an initial period of two years, continues to be renewed by dedam and the dfo today. the signing of the agreement-in-principle returned oversight of the fishery to the government, alleviating the government’s concerns about conservation. it put boats, licences, quota and money into the community of esgenoôpetitj, allowing them to establish themselves within the existing commercial fishery. it reestablished fishing as a livelihood for some families. some mi’kmaq, whose goal was participation in the commercial fishery, feel that the agreement is an adequate recognition of their treaty right to fish, and sell their catch. however, the agreement did not recognize the traditional values of the people of esgenoôpetitj, their sovereignty and spirituality, or the principles that motivated some to risk their lives in the lobster fishery. the leaders who had been at the forefront of the dispute, most of them supporters of mi’kmaq sovereignty and traditional culture, were frustrated by dedam’s decision to sign an agreement, and deeply disappointed that they had not achieved a mi’kmaq-governed fishery. after the signing of the agreement, kwegsi wrote: the government’s approach, as before, had been to “negotiate” agreements with poverty stricken indian communities, and by carefully wording the agreements and offering monies, they devised a way to deceitfully take away the rights of the mi’kmaq people. the latest agreement was signed by a small number of band council people, its indian agents, in a room without even a lawyer present to advise them. … the united nations human rights committee has ruled that the extinguishment of our aboriginal and treaty rights is a violation of fundamental human rights. history will show this present injustice and it will be said that the mi’kmaq people signed under great duress (2002, 2). in the burnt church first nation, most people believe that the federal government and its agencies (the dfo, rcmp and coast guard) were not motivated to do what was best for their communities. some argue that the government’s concern for conservation is a convenient excuse for maintaining control over the community and its resources. local concerns about mi’kmaq culture and identity, traditional knowledge, sovereignty and rights are not privileged – sometimes not even allowed12 12 in 2002, after many months of consultation, the report of the miramichi bay community relations panel’s investigation of the conflict in burnt church was released. this report documented many of the concerns that local natives and settlers had had about the dispute. it was this report that prompted the chief official of the department of fisheries and oceans in the region to comment, “perhaps it never really was about fish” (cbc 2002). and yet the terms of appointment of the community relations panel, “specifically excluded any dealings with aboriginal rights” (augustine & richard 2002, 7). – in public conversations about the dispute. the government insists that its primary concerns are conservation and law and order. conservation then becomes a key issue and framework in the dispute, as locals both use and critique the government’s conservation discourse in an attempt to articulate conservation in terms that reflect mi’kmaq values and concerns. 11 king: conservation controversy published by scholarship@western, 2011 in burnt church, the sparrow and marshall decisions have played a part in focusing the debate on the question of conservation, the result of which is that other community concerns (political, spiritual, economic and relational concerns) are expressed and framed in ecological terms. but all conservations are not the same. the holistic concerns of the mi’kmaq entail distinctive goals much broader than access to fish, money, and fisheries management. as so many have pointed out, the stereotype of the ecological indian is a potent one in the contemporary world, as is its related opposite, the indian as greedy and pathetic misfit (francis, 1992; king, 2003; mcgregor, 1997). the experiences of the dispute in esgenoôpetitj bear out borrows’ suggestion that recent supreme court decisions reinforce the role of ecological stereotypes in contemporary aboriginal politics and policy. after sparrow, binnie suggested that the court hoped to encourage “a political settlement of ancient grievances” (1990, 241). the events in esgenoôpetitj suggest that political settlements will remain fraught, so long as the decisions of the court are used to exclude the political concerns of indigenous people. conservation is certainly one of the key issues of our century, as the collapse of fisheries, deforestation and climate change all demonstrate. in this context, conservation is a critical concern in the development of natural resource policy, for indigenous people and the canadian government. but how effective can such policy development be, if people are talking about resource management and access when they really need to be talking about such issues as human rights and self-determination? 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.5 references asch, m., & macklem, p. (1991). aboriginal rights and canadian sovereignty: an essay on r. v. sparrow. alberta law review, 29(2), 498-517. augustine, r. j., & justice g. r. (2002). executive summary. miramichi bay community relations panel. building bridges: miramichi fishing communities at a crossroad. department of fisheries and oceans, government of canada. retrieved from http://www.dfo-mpo.gc.ca/communic/marshall/related/miramichi/miramichiexe_e.htm augustine, k. l. (2002). going once. retrieved from http://www.thepeoplespaths.net/news2002/0208/augustinekwegsi020816goingonce.htm belanger, y. (2010). ways of knowing: an introduction to native studies in canada. scarborough: nelson education. berkes, f. (2005.) traditional ecological knowledge. in b. taylor (ed.) encyclopedia of religion and nature. new york: continuum. berneshawi, s. (1997.) resource management and the mi’kmaq nation. canadian journal of native studies, 17(1), 115-48. binnie, w. i. c. (1990). the sparrow doctrine: beginning of the end or end of the beginning? queen’s law journal, 15, 217-253. borrows, j. (1997) frozen rights in canada: constitutional interpretation and the trickster. american indian law review, 22, 37-64. brant castellano, m. (2000). updating aboriginal traditions of knowledge. in g. j. sefa dei, b. l. hall, & d. goldinrosenberg (eds.), indigenous knowledges in global contexts (pp. 38 – 53). toronto: university of toronto press. coates, k. (2000). the marshall decision and native rights. montreal: mcgill-queen’s university press. department of fisheries and oceans. (2000, september 21). statement by herb dhaliwal, minister of fisheries and oceans. update on fisheries affected by the supreme court’s marshall decision. retrieved from http://www.dfo-mpo.gc.ca/media/statem/2000/20000921_e.htm department of fisheries and oceans. (2008a, july 7). aboriginal fisheries strategy. retrieved from http://www.dfompo.gc.ca/fm-gp/aboriginal-autochtones/afs-srapa-eng.htm department of fisheries and oceans. (2008b, december 7). strengthening our relationship – the aboriginal fisheries strategy and beyond – executive summary. retrieved from http://www.dfo-mpo.gc.ca/fmgp/aboriginal-autochtones/afs/afsoct03ex-eng.htm department of fisheries and oceans. (2010, october 8). aboriginal fisheries strategy. retrieved from http://www.glf.dfo-mpo.gc.ca/e0004687 dharamsi, t. (2000, september 20). no retreat from burnt church. national post. retrieved from http://www.tc.columbia.edu/centers/cifas/socialdisparity/news/bc_np_20000920_2.htm doyle-bedwell, p., & cohen, f. g. (2001). aboriginal peoples in canada: their role in shaping environmental trends in the twenty-first century. in e. a. parson (ed.), governing the environment: persistent challenges, uncertain innovations. toronto: university of toronto press. francis, d. (1992). the imaginary indian: the image of the indian in canadian culture. vancouver: arsenal pulp. harkin, m. e., & lewis, d. r. (2007). native americans and the environment: perspectives on the ecological indian. lincoln: university of nebraska press. isaac, t. (1993). balancing rights: the supreme court of canada, r. v. sparrow, and the future of aboriginal rights. canadian journal of native studies, 13(2) 199-219. 13 king: conservation controversy published by scholarship@western, 2011 king, s. (in press). burnt church: religion, culture and politics in a contested place. toronto: university of toronto press. king, t. (2003). the truth about stories: a native narrative. toronto: house of anansi press. krech iii, s. the ecological indian: myth and history. new york: norton. mcgregor, d. (1997). exploring aboriginal environmental ethics. in a. wellington, a. greenbaum,& w. cragg (eds.), canadian issues in environmental ethics. peterborough: broadview press. parkhill, t. c. (1997). weaving ourselves into the land: charles godfrey leland, “indians,” and the study of native american religions. albany: state university of new york press. pinchot, g. (1914). the training of a forester. philadelphia: j.b. lippincott. prosper, k., mcmillan, l. j., & davis, a. a. (2011). returning to netukulimk: mi’kmaq cultural and spiritual connections with resource stewardship and self-governance. international indigenous policy journal, 2(4). r. v. marshall. (sept. 17, 1999). supreme court of canada (docket 26014). retrieved from http://www.lexum.umontreal.ca/csc-scc/en/pub/1999/vol3/html/1999scr3_0456.html r. v. marshall (nov. 17, 1999). supreme court of canada (docket 26014). retrieved from http://www.lexum.umontreal.ca/csc-scc/en/pub/1999/vol3/html/1999scr3_0533.html r. v. sparrow (may 31, 1990). supreme court of canada (docket 20311). retrieved from http://csc.lexum.umontreal.ca/en/1990/1990scr1-1075/1990scr1-1075.html sefa dei, g. j., hall, b. l., & goldin rosenberg, d. (eds.). (2000). indigenous knowledges in global contexts. toronto: university of toronto press. sharma, p. (1998). aboriginal fishing rights: laws, courts, politics. halifax: fernwood. subramanian, s. m., & pisupati, b. (2010). traditional knowledge in policy and practice: approaches to development and human well-being. new york: united nations university press. unama’ki institute of natural resources. (2009, january 27). netukulimk. retrieved from http://www.uinr.ca/2009/01/netukulimk/ ward, j. s. (2004). the mi’kmaq and the right to self determination. ćelánen: a journal of indigenous governance, 1(1). retrieved from http://web.uvic.ca/igov/research/journal/articles_ward_p.htm ward, j., & augustine, l. (2000a). draft for efn [esgenoôpetitj first nation] fishery act. retrieved from http://www.nben.ca/aboutus/caucus/archived_caucuses/ffa_archive/00/actf.htm ward, j., & augustine, l. (2000b). draft for efn management plan. retrieved from http://www.nben.ca/aboutus/caucus/archived_caucuses/ffa_archive/00/mplan.htm wicken, w. c. (2002). mi’kmaq treaties on trial: history, land and donald marshall junior. toronto: university of toronto press. wildsmith, b. (2001). vindicating mi’kmaq rights: the struggle before, during and after marshall. windsor yearbook of access to justice, 19, 203-240. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.5 the international indigenous policy journal october 2011 conservation controversy: sparrow, marshall, and the mi’kmaq of esgenoôpetitj sarah j. king recommended citation conservation controversy: sparrow, marshall, and the mi’kmaq of esgenoôpetitj abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license conservation controversy: sparrow, marshall, and the miâ•žkmaq of esgenoã´petitj the importance of culture in alcohol care: listening to first nations staff in australian aboriginal community controlled health services the international indigenous policy journal volume 13 | issue 3 december 2022 the importance of culture in alcohol care: listening to first nations staff in australian aboriginal community controlled health services gemma purcell-khodr university of sydney, australia, gemma.khodr@sydney.edu.au emma webster university of sydney, australia, emma.webster@sydney.edu.au kristie harrison university of sydney, australia, kristie.harrison@sydney.edu.au angela dawson university of technology sydney, australia, angela.dawson@uts.edu.au k. s. kylie lee university of sydney, curtin university, and latrobe university, australia, kylie.lee@sydney.edu.au kate conigrave university of sydney and sydney local health district, australia, kate.conigrave@sydney.edu.au recommended citation purcell-khodr et al., (2022). the importance of culture in alcohol care: listening to first nations staff in australian aboriginal community controlled health services. the international indigenous policy journal, 13(3). https://10.18584/iipj.2022.3.13.14030 the importance of culture in alcohol care: listening to first nations staff in australian aboriginal community controlled health services abstract integration of cultural knowledges and healing practices with western medical approaches to alcohol care has been reported for residential and community settings. however, there is little evidence on how culture features in alcohol care in primary health settings. we analysed data from semi-structured interviews (from a broader study) with 17 first nations australian staff (n=8 men, n=9 women) from 11 aboriginal and torres strait islander community controlled health services. we used grounded theory and the 8-ways aboriginal pedagogy in analysis. we describe three key themes: 1) interpersonal processes; 2) a both-ways approach to healing and alcohol care; and 3) servicewide strategies to achieving both-ways healing. we discuss policy implications of facilitating bicultural alcohol care in primary health settings. keywords indigenous peoples and alcohol care, cultural healing, alcohol use disorder acknowledgments this work was supported by the nhmrc through a project grant (app1105339), the centre of research excellence in indigenous health and alcohol (app1117198), and a practitioner fellowship for kc (app1117582). we are also grateful to the services who took part in this study, the first nations health professionals who took part in the interviews, kaylie harrison who conducted/transcribed interviews alongside, the support from mustafa al ansari in preparing data for analysis, invaluable lessons learnt from allan hall and yvonne hill on 8-ways aboriginal pedagogy, and mennatallah alnaqa for thoughtful graphic design work on the figures. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ 1 purcell-khodr et al.: the importance of culture in alcohol care published by scholarship@western, 2022 the importance of culture in alcohol care: listening to first nations staff in australian aboriginal community controlled health services while alcohol harms are a universal concern (world health organisation, 2018), they disproportionately affect colonised indigenous peoples worldwide (australian institute of health and welfare, 2015; health canada, 2014; health promotion agency, 2017). in australia, a higher proportion (29.3%) of indigenous peoples (aboriginal and torres strait islander) are non-drinkers compared with non-indigenous australians (23.8%) (australian institute of health and welfare, 2020). despite this, at a population level, indigenous australians experience twice as many alcoholrelated hospitalisations as their non-indigenous counterparts (australian institute of health and welfare, 2011; gray et al., 2018). similar patterns are seen with indigenous peoples in new zealand (health promotion agency, 2017), the united states of america (usa) (substance abuse and mental health services administration, 2019) and canada (health canada, 2015). disproportionate rates of harm are in part due to episodic heavy drinking (australian institute of health and welfare, 2020; shore et al., 2006; zheng et al., 2022). this drinking pattern is linked to a colonial legacy of dispossession (gracey & king, 2009), where indigenous peoples continue to be socially and economically marginalised, experience intergenerational trauma, racism and have poorer opportunities for sharing traditional cultural values and practices with younger generations (dudgeon et al., 2016; king et al., 2009; wynne-jones et al., 2016). indigenous australians have used their culture, including traditional healing techniques, to maintain wellbeing for over 60,000 years. this cultural knowledge has been suppressed due to colonisation during the last 230 years. reconnection to culture is an essential part of healing. therefore, supporting services to reinstitute indigenous knowledges and healing traditions in health care is needed to promote good health and wellbeing post-colonisation (department of the prime minister and cabinet, 2020). primary care is a critical setting for incorporating culture into care for unhealthy alcohol use (including hazardous use through to dependence). this setting is crucial to engage clients as it is the gateway to the broader healthcare system. there can be cultural, financial, institutional, and stigmarelated barriers with referral to specialist alcohol treatment services. the primary care setting allows for a range of treatment across the spectrum of unhealthy alcohol use. for example, brief interventions for hazardous and harmful use, motivational interviewing, home detoxification (for carefully selected clients), and relapse prevention medicines are available for clients with alcohol dependence (rombouts et al., 2020). primary care is especially important for rural and remote communities that are less likely to have access to specialist care. in australia, there are more than 140 aboriginal and torres strait islander community controlled health services (acchss). acchss are primary care services controlled by the local indigenous community via elected boards of management (national aboriginal community controlled health organisation, 2020). volunteers initially developed these services to provide free, holistic healthcare to under-served indigenous communities. today these services have government funding and often employ local indigenous staff, provide community transport, home visits and (generally) flexible consultation practices compared to mainstream services (australian institute of health and welfare, 2016). culturally appropriate and safe care has been shown to increase access by indigenous australians (campbell et al., 2018). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14030 literature review peer-reviewed literature on alcohol care in primary healthcare settings for indigenous communities is scarce. a recent systematic review of literature on alcohol treatment approaches suited to primary care from australia, new zealand, the usa, and canada identified just 28 studies published between 1968 and 2018 (purcell-khodr et al., 2020). of all the studies, over half (n=16) were set in primary care services. the remaining studies (n=12) featured various forms of ambulatory treatment (outpatient programs) or care in settings feasible for primary care delivery (e.g., at home or community-based). of the studies in primary care settings, all but one (n=14/16) featured treatment approaches set in or facilitated by australian acchss. these studies almost exclusively focused on assessing staff and client perceptions of western treatments (n=13). they often they investigated the accessibility and acceptability of brief interventions or counselling techniques. one study trailed a model of ambulatory detoxification (‘home detox’) facilitated by an acchs with at-home care and clinical supports (e.g., dispensing of relapse prevention medicines at home or at the service). only two of the australian studies in this setting were classified as bicultural (indigenous and western). however, neither discussed the cultural treatment elements in detail. for example, the study ‘walan giri’ described a culturally-influenced form of brief intervention—introduced by questions on traditional homelands and kinship connections. details of the development or implementation were not provided. the one study set in a primary care setting outside australia, was based in the usa (hirchak et al., 2018). this study documented the acceptability and cultural tailoring of contingency management (‘reinforcers’ to support and promote abstinence) with elders and indigenous community members. the other 12 studies featuring ambulatory treatment (n=12/28) were most frequently based in residential services with outpatient programs and supports. community-based settings also featured in several studies. almost half of the studies in ambulatory care settings (n=5/13) documented bicultural treatment approaches and another three studies documented a solely cultural (indigenous) approach to treatment. sweat-lodge use was widespread in the usa and canada, facilitated by residential services with outpatient and general community access. numerous other healing techniques were also documented (e.g., pipe ceremonies, fasting camps, sacred chanting, group prayer, and administration of traditional medicines). while approaches varied by location and country, core themes were reiterated several times, including in survey responses from clients and service providers in new zealand (huriwai et al., 2000a; robertson et al., 2001). common themes were the importance of employing local indigenous staff, incorporating indigenous languages and language speakers; practicing traditional medicine, healing ceremonies and traditional arts; following cultural protocols; instilling pride in client heritage; and providing access to genealogical services (e.g., to reconnect families and understand the impact of colonisation on family displacement). western treatment approaches included three us trials of alcohol relapse prevention medicines, and two australian studies on counselling approaches. among the peer-reviewed literature in this field, there are clues to the rich nature of cultural and bicultural alcohol care in publications going back 50 years. given the limited evidence on integrating these approaches in primary care, we examine how indigenous staff incorporate culture into the delivery of alcohol care in acchss. in particular, we explore the strengths and challenges involved in doing so. 3 purcell-khodr et al.: the importance of culture in alcohol care published by scholarship@western, 2022 methods overview this qualitative data was collected at baseline in a large cluster randomised, wait-control trial1 (conigrave et al., 2021). that trial was designed to test the effectiveness of tailored support for acchss to enhance the uptake of alcohol screening, brief intervention, and treatment approaches. the primary aim of the qualitative interviews conducted with indigenous and non-indigenous staff (collected by kristie harrison [khh] and kaylie harrison [kbh]) was to inform the development of the multipronged model of training and support (harrison et al., 2019). the resulting support model has been published (dzidowska et al., 2021) and included a national workshop, on-site training, regular data feedback, practice software assistance, a private online platform with resources and financial support for purchasing alcohol education tools. this paper draws on the indigenous participant interviews and presents a deeper analysis of the meta-theme of culture (identified in that work), and how it informs alcohol care in acchss. ethics ethical approval was obtained from eight ethics committees: the aboriginal health and medical research council of new south wales (nsw; 1217/16); central australian human research ethics committee (ca-17-2842); northern territory department of health and menzies school of health research (20172737); central queensland hospital and health service (17/qcq/9); far north queensland human research ethics committee (17/qch/45-1143); aboriginal health research ethics committee, south australia (sa; 04-16-694); st vincent’s hospital (melbourne) human research ethics committee (lrr 036/17); and western australian aboriginal health ethics committee (779). indigenous contributions and community participation the overarching trial has significant contributions by australian indigenous researchers, services, and communities (conigrave et al., 2021). indigenous staff of two state-wide umbrella agencies for acchss (in sa and nsw) were involved in formulating the research question and design of that study. khh is a wiradjuri woman who played a key role in recruiting services, conducting face-toface training, and interviews with service staff. the present study is led by a gundungurra author gemma purcell-khodr (gk). setting participants were comprised of staff from 11 acchss across four states and territories of australia (new south wales [nsw], south australia [sa], queensland [qld], and northern territory [nt]). 1 registration number: actrn12618001892202 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14030 recruitment services were eligible for inclusion in the trial if they were an acchs, serviced at least 1000 unique clients per year and used communicare patient software (harrison et al., 2019). a total of 132 services were assessed for eligibility, and the first 22 services who agreed to participate were recruited. services were then stratified into one of three remoteness categories (urban, regional, remote) using the australian statistical geography standard remoteness structure (australian bureau of statistics, 2016). the services were then randomly assigned by stratum into a trial arm (early support [‘intervention’] or late support [waiting-list control]). interview participants were nominated by the participating services in the early support trial arm. at each service, these included two nominated service ‘champions’ for the project and up to three other staff members (n=44). services were encouraged to include indigenous staff members in the study. only data from the n=17 indigenous participants have been included in this analysis. data collection semi-structured phone interviews were conducted with 17 indigenous (aboriginal) australian staff. interviews were conducted by two wiradjuri (indigenous) aboriginal health professionals (khh and kbh) with past work experience in the acchs sector and conducting research interviews. khh and kbh were aware of the potential sensitivities around discussion of alcohol, and cultural protocols which may impact on interactions. khh interviewed the majority of participants, with kbh acting as the live transcriber. the transcription was typed near verbatim, with any gaps filled in immediately after the interview. at other times these roles were reversed. in addition to the transcript the interviewer made a memo immediately after the interview concluded. khh and kbh cross-checked both documents after each interview. informed written consent was provided prior to the interviews. interviews were conducted between july and december 2017 (approximate duration: 40-90 minutes). the majority of interviews (65%; n=11/17) occurred before the two-day national workshop that marked the start of the first service support phase (intervention) of the project (august 29, 2017). the workshop included training for service champions on screening, brief intervention and treatment for the range of unhealthy alcohol use. there were opportunities for small group discussion where staff who had already been interviewed may have talked with those who were yet to be interviewed. the remaining six interviews were held after the workshop. the model of training and support was refined after all interviews were completed. interview framework interviews employed a strengths-based approach in asking about alcohol care (gibson et al., 2020). staff were asked about: approaches that they or their service use to make it easier to talk to clients about their drinking; ways that more people could be asked about alcohol; what their service offers regarding alcohol care; what skills and knowledge were needed for themselves and other staff to provide the best alcohol care at their services; innovative ways they or their services may have 5 purcell-khodr et al.: the importance of culture in alcohol care published by scholarship@western, 2022 worked out to help people who may be at risk because of their alcohol use; other successful programs which may give insight on how best to help with alcohol; and any other ideas staff may have to improve the way their services work with clients around alcohol. as the interviews were conducted to inform a model of support for the trial, participants were not explicitly asked about culture in care and probing questions were not posed. this study analyses the content on culture that was raised spontaneously by indigenous staff during interviews. theoretical perspective underpinning analysis the analysis was informed by the pluralistic notion that both ‘western’ scientific knowledge and indigenous knowledge systems co-exist. each have unique beliefs (ontology), value systems (axiology) and ways of knowing what truth is (epistemology) that guide study methodology and ultimately knowledge validation (gone, 2012; teffo, 2011). in acknowledging these divergent knowledge systems, value is given to the experiential, therapeutic approaches rooted in indigenous cultural knowledge. this approach was chosen to capture conceptual nuances which may be overlooked using only western-based analysis methods (webster et al., 2017). from a western lens, grounded theory (corbin & strauss, 2014) and inductive coding techniques (open, axial, and selective) were applied to synthesise the data. theoretical sampling was not applied, as the lead researcher (gk) entered the project after the data had been collected. that approach also may not have been desirable or feasible due to the busy health care settings in which staff worked. grounded theory methods were selected to provide a structured process to aid the construction of a theory based on participants’ views and practices. this was necessary because an australian perspective on this topic has not yet documented in the literature. the analysis was underpinned by 8-ways aboriginal pedagogy, a unique indigenous australian lens (yunkaporta, 2009). the 8-ways pedagogy resulted from collective cultural knowledge built over tens of thousands of years and passed on by aboriginal elders. the 8-ways provide a framework for learning which focuses on the culturally acceptable processes or ways of doing. using this framework as a lens to analyse data does two things. firstly, it ensures processes described by participants (consciously or unconsciously) are respected and considered whilst systematically engaging with all data. secondly, the framework provides a unique aboriginal australian method to identify, examine and interpret patterns and themes in the data. a summary of the results and penultimate versions of the diagrams were shown for feedback and ratification to two aboriginal educators who were part of the original team who had constructed the 8-ways pedagogy. the educators hold respected positions within aboriginal communities of western new south wales, and as such their opinion rates highly in the indigenous knowledge system of this area. data analysis grounded theory analytic techniques and aboriginal pedagogical processes were applied in cycles of coding and theme refinement using the process of constant comparison. discrepancies were highlighted for further reflection. transcripts and memos were first printed, read several times, and inductively open coded. data were then imported into nvivo, and a final set of open codes were assigned. gk then applied the 8-ways 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14030 aboriginal pedagogical processes to construct a sense of the ‘whole’ or conceptual understanding of a cultural approach to alcohol care described by participants. perceived core elements of the whole were written on paper cards and grouped on a cork board (these cards were then referred back to in the axial and selective rounds of coding). a visual learning map (composed of three figures) was drafted to represent the macro-level emergent concepts. nvivo coding resumed and as data were recategorized and simplified, codes were assigned to different levels of processes represented in the diagrams. the final stage of analysis, informed by the aboriginal pedagogy, involved the visual representation of the emergent meta-themes, themes and sub-themes in symbolic form. all transcripts were analysed by gk. one-third of transcripts (n=5/17) were analysed independently (by ew), then discussed with gk. no major discrepancies were identified, although nuances resulting from an indigenous and western perspective were discussed. a larger group then discussed findings from all 17 transcripts (all authors except khh). kylie lee (kl) reviewed all drafts of the diagrams and final versions of diagrams were discussed with all authors. results summary of the 17 staff interviewed, most (n=15/17) were aged 35 years or over, with almost equal male and female participants (males n=8/17). staff held a range of professions, including a doctor, patient transport driver, frontline workers, managers, and a research coordinator. all participants had a clinical background regardless of their current role. there was an almost even spread of staff across geographical remoteness (table 1). 7 purcell-khodr et al.: the importance of culture in alcohol care published by scholarship@western, 2022 table 1. aboriginal community controlled health service interview participant characteristics (n=17) remoteness gender age role* urban (n=6) female <35 other female >35 other male >35 aod** male >35 general clinical*** male >35 general clinical female <35 general clinical regional (n=6) male >35 general clinical female >35 general clinical female >35 general clinical male >35 aod female >35 aod male >35 other remote (n=5) female >35 aod male >35 aod female >35 other male >35 aod female >35 general clinical *we have used broad occupation categories to disguise the identity of participants. all participants, regardless of role titles, were providing or had experience in providing frontline clinical care. a number of staff with clinical duties were also listed as managers or team leaders. **aod = alcohol and other drug worker. ***the ‘general clinical’ category included staff such as a doctor, aboriginal health workers, and other frontline workers providing alcohol care in the service and or community setting 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14030 three themes encompassed the participants’ perspectives on how alcohol care was delivered in a culturally safe and respectful way: 1) interpersonal processes; 2) a both-ways approach to healing and alcohol care; and 3) service-wide strategies to achieving both-ways healing. each is described in detail below. interpersonal processes five interpersonal processes were identified as being central to establishing a connection with clients, making clients comfortable, and building a trusting therapeutic partnership to work on alcohol care and wellbeing goals. these processes were yarning (conversations), humour, making time to connect, establishing a comfortable common ground, and sharing lived experiences. the dynamic between the five elements is depicted in figure 1. figure 1. interpersonal processes used by aboriginal staff to build therapeutic partnerships for alcohol care and wellbeing with aboriginal clients in acchs settings *any personal story could be used to connect with clients. some health professionals may choose to share their own healing journey, where applicable. this was seen as sharing ‘authentic knowledge’ and helped clients feel comfortable and understood this diagram is adapted from 8-ways aboriginal pedagogy, originally developed with knowledges from traditional owners across western new south wales, australia (yunkaporta & mcginty, 2009). the returning boomerang diagram illustrates the process of a health professional and a client, sharing information two-ways. together they build a relationship and ultimately a therapeutic partnership to discuss the client’s alcohol care and wellbeing goals. to do this, both parties have yarns (conversations) while following cultural protocols and try to go from low to high knowledge of one another. 9 purcell-khodr et al.: the importance of culture in alcohol care published by scholarship@western, 2022 yarning yarning was mentioned by nearly all participants as a friendly and relaxed way to talk with clients about alcohol and to build rapport: it’s gotta be a friendly approach. i’ve seen people do an assessment, they are so abrupt and straight forward and it’s not on. (male, remote, aod) two-way sharing between clients and staff was an essential element of yarning: they do need to get to know me. they haven’t seen me around here before, so i suppose i am learning from them as much as they are giving back to me. we share a lot of information. i give them as much as i can and friendships are starting to build up. it’s just easing your way in. you need to speak to them and gain trust. if they don’t know you, they don’t trust you. but once they get to know you, that’s good. (male, urban, aod) all participants described the importance of following cultural (gender) protocols when yarning about alcohol or taking on a new client: [if] i’m showing them respect and speaking to an older lady i will step back and ask if i can speak to her, not just walk right up to her. and i’ll say that i can put this forth to a female worker if they want. (male, remote, aod) humour participants found humour a useful and natural way to put their clients at ease: at first i sorta joke about it, it helps drop their guard. (male, regional, other) while humour felt intuitive to most staff, there appeared to be tension between what is considered “professional” communication and a cultural approach to communicating and connection building: if i was doing it with a friend or something i would probably lighten things with humour and approach it softly. it’s bit different at work; you’re meant to be a health professional – but you can always bring a bit of humour into it – they feel more comfortable. (female, regional, general clinical) making time to connect making time to work with clients and community in the ‘right way’ (e.g., yarning to get to know one another and taking clients outside clinic) was perceived as a cultural obligation. it was also seen as best practice when engaging with indigenous clients. this sometimes was at odds with management’s expectations on time management: one thing i found working in [state/territory], they [management] don’t have really good understanding of time…you have to be careful about amount of work you can do with a client. (male, remote, aod) 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14030 developing a comfortable common ground developing a mutual sense of comfort was perceived as a necessary step in building rapport. this sense of comfort was related to the health professional or other staff member “being on the same level” as the client: they are more relaxed when in the car, they are more comfortable, feel like we’re on the same level. i’m not some trained-up person sitting in front of them. i think that helps. (male, regional, other) this theme was strongly intertwined with yarning: start a general conversation is easiest. so, you’re at their level, so they don’t think you’re intimidating them. (female, regional, general clinical) having the service flexibility to take clients out of the clinic (or meet them outside, planned or by chance), sit at the park or river or other culturally appropriate location was also helpful in relaxing clients and staff (i.e., helping health professionals to feel comfortable to do their best work). this was seen as creating a relaxed, culturally safe dynamic: we go sit down with them and discuss where we want to meet, doesn’t have to be at service, can be outside, at the beach, wherever community feel safe. (female, remote, other) participants from one remote service mentioned a trial of community-based workers, who also described delivering health promotion and support outside the clinic in a natural environment: the ladies and the men like to walk around communities and some of our community-based workers go pick people up and take them fishing and we take flipcharts and information to talk to people. (male, remote, aod) one participant described facing structural constraints within their service when conducting ‘meetn-greets’ in the community (i.e., outreach and or initial consultation with new clients): i had a bit of a disagreement with management, i was going out to meet someone for the first time and they wanted me to take paperwork out with me and i said that wasn’t going to, it was gonna turn them off right away. (male, remote, aod) to navigate around these service requirements that same participant took mental notes and transcribed them post-consultation. instead of going out with lots of paperwork, we have to sign confidentiality report and that, but i go out and make notes in my head and i come back and write them down later. (male, remote aod) sharing lived experiences several participants described using their lived experiences with alcohol use disorders to connect with clients. for some, this meant sharing their own journey, and for others it was being known in 11 purcell-khodr et al.: the importance of culture in alcohol care published by scholarship@western, 2022 the community to have moved past this issue in their lives. these participants described being perceived as having credibility and authentic knowledge in community: talking to clients is the easiest part for us coz [because] it just comes naturally coz we’ve been there. drug and alcohol clients don’t value you if you haven’t lived a life… you don’t know. they don’t find them credible. (male, regional, aod) everyone knows what i used to do, i can’t hide it, it’s a positive for people coming to talk to me. (male, regional, general clinical) a both-ways approach to healing and alcohol care the philosophy all participants described practices and treatment approaches which involved bicultural elements. this was described as blending scientific (western) medical knowledge with local indigenous (cultural) knowledges, healing techniques or delivery according to local cultural protocols: i think [our service] have got it right. management have put trust into local indigenous staff to run with it, and know we know our people and they acknowledge we know what’s best for our people, because it’s both-ways. we acknowledge strength of mainstream ways and [the local aboriginal people’s] ways and bringing them together. (female, remote, other) to deliver bicultural care, it was considered important to have strong foundations in both spheres of knowledge. for cultural aspects, this was seen as involving strong links with the local community and elders. strong relationships with non-indigenous clinicians gave indigenous frontline workers confidence in their clinical knowledge of alcohol and related harms. this enabled staff to translate their knowledge of a western treatment approach into a cultural program, or deliver health information in a culturally appropriate manner: we do cultural training. it is very important, need to have an understanding of how culture works here in [state] if they don’t understand they won’t be able to work with community. (male, remote, aod) the aboriginal health workers are the middle person between client and [non-indigenous] doctor … if you miss this opportunity…you won’t see them again. (female, urban, general clinical) urban, regional, and remote service participants described bicultural care in similar language. a universal experience was described in navigating ‘two-ways’, though contextualising (tailor to local ‘ways’) your approach was emphasised: if you get the right validated scientific tools and as well as a cultural view, our patients listen to us. (male, urban, general clinical) you need to get stuff but adapt it locally…with us we integrate with mainstream. it’s tough but i think you just have to get that one standard model and everyone from their own area [cultural perspective] can add to it. (male, regional, other) 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14030 overall, participants described seeing their clients not as individuals, but part of a family and community: you are not just working with one person you are working with the family. (male, remote, aod) finding balance and the space for cultural care one participant described the struggles their service had in retaining indigenous health workers due to how dominant the western approach was in providing care: the lady [aboriginal health professional] i started with, she ended up leaving because cbt [cognitive behavioural therapy] was pushed so much. she was narrative, sit in the dirt with our mob. but now it’s like they have to have an appointment to come see us and that is frustrating. (female, remote, aod) culturally-informed approaches to healing four main therapeutic approaches were discussed by participants in working with clients. these are gendered group activities; cultural days and barbeques; camps; and culture as treatment. a graphic summary of both the care philosophy and the four specific therapeutic approaches is presented in figure 2. figure 2. a both-ways approach to healing and alcohol care 13 purcell-khodr et al.: the importance of culture in alcohol care published by scholarship@western, 2022 figure 2 depicts the bicultural philosophy implemented at some acchss as described by participants. the two concentric lines represent the two knowledge bases working side-by-side, with dots intersecting at varying points (first nations, fn; western culture). the treatment or healing approaches in black type had a strong bicultural focus, whilst those in grey are examples of predominantly western approaches that can be delivered in a culturally inclusive model. the interpersonal processes, represented by the returning boomerang at the centre, facilitate delivery of these western treatments in a trusting partnership. similarly, the therapeutic partnerships developed (in the inner layer) may be impacted by what treatments staff can offer clients. gendered groups gendered group activities were talked about by almost all participants. men’s and women’s groups were the most common. this was followed by culturally-modified smart recovery (dale et al., 2021), ‘mums and bubs’ groups, and a men’s shed (domestic violence-focused yarning circles with alcohol focus): if you can engage a small group, cousins and sisters they can support each other. (female, remote, aod) gender segregation in groups was seen positively: we try keep it culturally appropriate, so women with women [separately]…i work with some partners, but mostly keep separate. (female, remote, aod) groups were run at the service and off-site for daytrips, and longer overnight camps: we had a ‘walk-the-talk’ program, go out bush and walk around and the old fulla’s [men] would start pointing out trees or plants and we yarn up about anything and everything and sometimes it brings back memories. especially the lads that know about it, but don’t want to talk about… we never talk about negative stuff, always positive stuff, to keep our spirit strong and our mind healthy. (male, urban, aod) cultural days and barbeques (for staff and clients) these therapeutic activities were described as popular events, giving clinicians or health workers an opportunity to present a short talk on a health issue followed by a barbeque and yarn: sometimes we might go have an all-men’s things barbeque, we’ll put on movies about dialysis, chronic liver disease, domestic violence and how drinking impacts on it, and then we talk about all of it. (male, remote, aod) cultural days and barbeques were also used to prevent worker burnout while bonding with clients and celebrating culture: we used to go on cultural days and go hunting for half a day...they love it. it works out both-ways, we don’t want to lose it [the culture]. (male, urban, aod) 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14030 cultural days for women were described by one participant as a positive group activity, but offering these was hindered by a lack of car seats for children: we used to do cultural days with women. it would be hard coz [because] you say “you can’t bring the kids”, but we’d say “no, it’s a break for you” and we didn’t have car seats, so it’s a safety thing… but i’d like to see more work with family. (female, remote, aod) camps on country this approach was mentioned exclusively by participants from remote services. camps for men and women were typically held in the bush, away from the distractions of day-to-day worries: we go out camping where mobile phones don’t work. (male, remote, aod) could be on homelands or somewhere local. (female, remote, aod) when organising camps, staff would screen interested clients with tools such as iris (indigenous risk impact screen) (schlesinger et al., 2007) and a general health check: before people come to camps (men’s, women’s) they have to go and do a full screen and health check...most of our questions on alcohol come from communities themselves. we go yarn and they choose the topics that they want to talk about. it’s usually grog [alcohol], gunja [cannabis], and dv [domestic violence]. it works way better than us trying to jam things down their throat. (male, remote, aod) camps were typically run for existing social support groups by the acchs: our team identifies a target group for camp, a lot of time the group has issues with alcohol and other drugs, we meet with them and invite to attend. (female, remote, aod) the health goals for camps varied but all involved bicultural approaches. cultural elements such as reconnecting to country were intertwined with health promotion messages, positive reinforcement of healthy behaviours, counselling, and health education: there’s group discussions and opportunities to sit around fire, share what’s going on with them and their communities, we can invite other stakeholders to attend, chat about effects of alcohol etc. and there’s hunting and fishing and allowing guys to connect to land, cultural activities, education and re-connecting to country is definitely a big one. (female, remote, aod) two interviewees emphasised the direct healing (therapeutic) benefits of connecting to country: my higher power are my people and my country, getting back to culture, that’s what saved me. (male, regional, aod) 15 purcell-khodr et al.: the importance of culture in alcohol care published by scholarship@western, 2022 culture as treatment (and ceremony in the healing process) one participant described a smoking healing ceremony conducted at their acchs and at a local festival (facilitated by staff and an elder): a man doing traditional song with clapsticks, they go under the sheet and inhale the steam and can bite on bark…it depends on what they want to get out of it, it’s a time to reflect on any wrong doings, find respect for self or community or for people suffering illness. done in complete silence, apart from song and clapsticks. they are under there for probably 2-3 minutes then go on their way and continue journey as cleansed. we talk before about ceremony, what it is about, time to reflect on life, where they want to go, what person you want to be. (female, remote, other) western treatment approaches perceived as culturally appropriate a range of standard treatment approaches were perceived as culturally acceptable and effective in alcohol care. prominent approaches discussed by participants included narrative therapy and cbt. culturally appropriate residential rehabilitation services were seen as highly desirable to clients (in their treatment approach and being located on country) but difficult to access or not available: people what to go to rehab, but people don’t want to leave [local area or country]. we did have facility here, it got shut down. (female, remote, other) we support 1-2 options for detox/dry out and they can go to aa [alcoholics anonymous] which is mainstream. 1 or 2 rehabs for blackfulla’s, there is nothing apart from that. (male, urban, general clinical) there was a shared interest (between staff across service remoteness) in alcohol relapse-prevention medicines and desire to implement ‘home-detox’ (ambulatory withdrawal) more frequently: i haven’t referred anyone [to in-patient detox at hospital] for over 2 years, first of all it’s seen as part of health department, and a lot of stigma and distrust. they [clients] would trust us to help them detox at home. i believe, we could have good system to support them, gps, health workers, nurses, they would trust us. (male, urban, general clinical) service-wide strategies to achieving both-ways to healing participants discussed three broad approaches which they perceived their services have used to satisfy the bicultural expectations of staff and community members. these are: employing local indigenous staff, home visits, and ‘social advocacy’ as a cultural responsibility (figure 3). 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 figure 3. service-wide strategies to achieving both-ways healing figure 3 depicts the service-wide strategies employed by achhss to meet the bicultural expectations of staff and community. all factors in the outer layer can impact on the specific therapeutic approaches available at the service, as well as the interpersonal relationships between staff and their clients. employing local indigenous staff the benefits of employing local indigenous staff were mentioned by several participants for the reasons set out below. increasing client comfort generally, having local people employed at the acchs was seen to make clients more comfortable. the ability to talk with clients outside work hours in the community (chance meetings) was also perceived as a positive, putting people at ease to yarn honestly: they feel more comfortable with aboriginal staff, they really open up and are honest, even after hours, a lot of them want to talk then, i don’t know if they feel more comfortable with us out of uniform. at work, coz [because] they know us they come in. (male, regional, general clinical) although there was overwhelming recognition for the positives associated with employing locals with family connections to the area, issues around shame and privacy were raised: 17 purcell-khodr et al.: the importance of culture in alcohol care when they come in, they walk into the ams and think they don’t want to talk here, there’s too many people or too much family work there, they get shy. (male, urban, aod) kinship (family ties) in remote sites when kinship ties were mentioned, the ability to talk frankly with clients, knowing the context of all that was going on for clients in their lives was perceived positively, particularly at a point of crisis (e.g., where justice system may be involved with alcohol-related issues): also, at times we are family… that’s the benefit, local people working with community and being family, we can have a strong talk with them. (female, remote, other) connecting the right people (cultural practice) connection to the local area allowed workers to identify the right family or community members to be involved in supporting a client’s care. family ties to the area were not a prerequisite for strong connections with clients, though were seen as very helpful: [after receiving referral] …decide who is most appropriate to sit down with that person, consider authority of clan, someone [related] through kinship, will identify the best person to sit with them and initiate discussion. (female, remote, aod) for workers in remote services, communication with elders and other appropriate people when the client was away from their home country was essential. this involved staff contacting with the right people in the homeland and getting the ‘ok’ for someone to be transported home; it included negotiating an agreement as to who would support the client once back. the role of local indigenous workers is vital as these conversations can only be conducted with the right people, at the right time, in culturally appropriately terms, and potentially in the traditional language: furthest homeland from here is three hours there and back. big deal to be able to offer them that option, to head back out. wouldn’t just be transport, it would be contacting elders: “this person wants to come back would you support them?” (female, remote, other) the cultural practice of connecting people was also expressed by staff in regional and urban services: it’s about finding someone in the area that has networks in their area, connecting people. (male, regional, aod) one staff member discussed supporting non-indigenous colleagues to make these connections: we can do the introductions so that the [non-indigenous] workers can see there is so much more behind the scenes… (male, urban, aod) language and cultural interpreters in remote sites, locals who are bilingual (english and indigenous languages) were seen as an essential asset to the team. they were able to act as translators, as well as being culturally appropriate 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 workers for specific clan groups. barriers to their recruitment and retention (in remote sites) included social pressures and responsibilities to large extended families: to get someone good and with language they probably have lots going on at home, lots of people going on. we need aboriginal people, local people with language. (female, remote, aod) home visits offering home visits was seen as important to several participants. home visits reduced clients’ worry over shame and privacy associated with coming into the clinic: it’s important that their business is their business, so they don’t think the whole service is going to be judging them; that’s for the privacy of the client, make them feel comfortable. (female, regional, general clinical) social support and advocacy as a cultural responsibility staff understood that clients can have a lot going on in their lives. providing social supports (e.g., assistance with housing and food) and advocacy (e.g., with child welfare services) was perceived as a cultural responsibility. in one instance a doctor described supporting family of a client as part of culturally appropriate caring: i pick up kids and take them to school in the van and that’s not formalised and other parts of the service may not know we do that but if you are doing holistic care, this is why i signed up…we need to be better at getting out, being in the community, we are part of the community. (male, urban, general clinical) at times this balance between attending to social needs and focusing on alcohol use can be difficult for health workers to navigate. setting personal boundaries was also important to strike the right balance between meeting community and service management expectations: my boundaries need to get a bit tighter; i feel like i’m not getting into the alcohol stuff as i’m dealing a lot with the social stuff and trying to build rapport but trying to be a boss and that scares people away. sometimes i feel like taxi driver and i’m not empowering them. (female, remote, aod) drawing the three themes together the findings of staff interviews cover three interconnected levels of alcohol care: interpersonal processes, a both-ways approach to healing (philosophy and treatments), and service-wide strategies to achieving both-ways to healing (figures 1-3). if one considers all three figures as a whole, they form a meta-theme, a comprehensive model of alcohol care as described by participants. an overview of that model of care is depicted in figure 4. 19 purcell-khodr et al.: the importance of culture in alcohol care figure 4. comprehensive bicultural model of alcohol care described by acchs staff discussion this is the first study to comprehensively examine the importance of culture in alcohol treatment in primary care settings for indigenous peoples of either australia, new zealand, the usa, or canada. the study gives insight into culturally-influenced care, routinely delivered by indigenous australian clinical and other staff from 11 independent community-controlled services. these service locations represent a range of geographical areas, from urban to remote, in four australian states and territories. we identified common themes and described approaches of care which were consistent across service remoteness, with local cultural nuances also noted. building partnerships to address alcohol care key to delivering alcohol care on the frontline are interpersonal relationships between the health professional or other staff members and their client. yarning is a core part of these relationships. this narrative style communication philosophy is common throughout australia’s indigenous communities (fredericks et al., 2011). the best-known aspect of yarning is the social yarn (bessarab & ng'andu, 2010). social yarning serves as the introduction to a conversation and is an important way to build common ground. between australian indigenous peoples social yarning commonly involves a conversation about ‘country’ (traditional homelands) and ‘mob’ (what family you come from, and possible shared connections) (lin et al., 2016; lovett et al., 2014). however common ground could be established through discussion of any topic, for example, family, sports, or local community matters (bessarab & ng'andu, 2010). the ability to establish meaningful connections through yarning has been recognised in the broader health literature (bacon, 2007; lin et al., 2016). 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 in this study, indigenous staff used the two-way sharing principle of yarning to build rapport and ultimately a therapeutic partnership with their clients. this contrasts with communication techniques taught in western medicine, which stem from a biomedical model of care and paternalistic culture (kaba & sooriakumaran, 2007). in that model, information is elicited from the client by the clinician using probing and direct questioning (kaba & sooriakumaran, 2007). the lack of sharing by the clinician can result in them appearing aloof. research suggests personal and interactive communication, like that described by participants, is important to peoples of all ethnic backgrounds, and relational processes are central to improved client outcomes (rocque & leanza, 2015). the interpersonal processes described by study participants share many similarities with western models of patient-centred care (australian college of nursing, 2020; barry & edgman-levitan, 2012; epstein & street, 2011; pelzang, 2010; stewart, 2001). what sets the present findings apart is the depth of two-way sharing, and the elements of cultural humility, such as the process of selfreflection and openness to learn about other cultures (for staff not from the local community). for non-indigenous health professionals working with indigenous clients this two-way sharing and cultural humility may be even more important given racism experienced by many indigenous people in healthcare settings (awofeso, 2011; taylor & guerin, 2019). in this study the connectedness of client, staff, and the whole service to family and community was also seen as central. a bicultural philosophy in alcohol care at the core of participants' approaches to alcohol care was a bicultural treatment philosophy. the philosophy takes into account western and local indigenous ways of knowing (including cultural protocols and healing techniques, both traditional and contemporary). a bicultural approach (often termed ‘two-ways’ or ‘both-ways’ by participants) has not previously been investigated in the australian or international literature on alcohol care in primary healthcare settings (purcell-khodr et al., 2020). indeed, descriptions of any cultural elements of care in these settings have been minimal (d'abbs et al., 2013; lovett et al., 2014) despite widespread use in other addiction treatment settings (berry, 2013; brady, 1995; gone, 2011; huriwai et al., 2000b; james et al., 2018; legha & novins, 2012; munro et al., 2017). while international studies suggest a desire of indigenous communities to incorporate indigenous knowledges and healing alongside western medicine, there has sometimes been opposition by mainstream providers, where institutional racism and scepticism can remain challenging (bourke et al., 2019; deverteuil & wilson, 2010). gendered groups and cultural reclamation in this study, the most common therapeutic approach facilitated by the ‘both-ways’ (bicultural) philosophy were gendered groups (e.g., men’s and women’s groups). while gender-specific roles often have a negative association in modern western societies, they still play an important part in many australian indigenous communities and have been associated with the movement to reclaim cultural practices and traditional identities (fredericks et al., 2017). the presence of cultural protocols and content described in gendered groups in this study differentiate these from peer-topeer models in mainstream services. sharing of personal stories of addiction is also part of western approaches to mutual support groups (e.g., alcoholics anonymous, smart recovery). however, the group dynamic described in this study was typically freer in nature rather than following a set structure, and settings were flexible. this was illustrated in the discussion of informal barbeques with 21 purcell-khodr et al.: the importance of culture in alcohol care staff and clients and camping trips on country. such activities were also noted as a time for staff to connect to culture and reduce stress. as alcohol and other drug worker burnout rates for indigenous staff have been described as an issue (deroy & schütze, 2019; roche, duraisingam, trifonoff, battams, et al., 2013; roche, duraisingam, trifonoff, & tovell, 2013) such initiatives may also aid in the retention of the indigenous aod workforce. service strategies a key element at this macro level was creating a culturally safe work environment. this allowed staff to have open conversations about client needs and communities’ cultural expectations and preferences. this environment facilitated the formation of partnerships within the clinic (e.g., between management and staff, between clinicians and other frontline staff) which contributed to delivering a pragmatic bicultural service and treatment philosophy. a tension was seen between satisfying management whilst upholding the staff member’s obligations to clients and community. thus, factors at the macro level have the ability to help or hinder frontline staff in delivering care according to their sense of best practice (roche, duraisingam, trifonoff, battams, et al., 2013). ongoing tensions are likely to damage trust in relationships between the service and community, and further strain workers who have responsibilities to both parties. a bicultural model of alcohol care in the acchs sector considering the three major themes discussed by acchs staff, a comprehensive model of alcohol care emerged (figure 4). each level of care is connected and somewhat interdependent. for example, to abandon or devalue indigenous staff members’ cultural duty of care at level 1 (interpersonal processes) or 3 (service strategies) would jeopardise client and community relationships. meanwhile insensitive or inflexible service practices (level 3) could inhibit staff from delivering cultural and bicultural treatments (level 2). likewise, from a western medical perspective, failing to uphold principles of evidence-based practice would not be in the best interests of clients, nor would it meet community expectations. policy implications the principle of merging indigenous and western knowledges in a healthcare setting is in line with the world health organization’s (who) policy directives going back almost twenty years (zhang & world health organization, 2002). who advocates for the integration of traditional healing practices with national health care systems, particularly in primary care settings (world health organization, 2013). indigenous traditional knowledges from australia, new zealand, canada, or the usa have not been a major focus in this who strategy compared to better known systems such as chinese medicine, naturopathy or ayurveda medicine. future research into australian indigenous cultural approaches to healing should focus on a bicultural framework, given the existing global support for pluralism in primary care settings. the principles of care described by staff can be incorporated into policy and practice in a clinical setting where staff and management wish to optimise their engagement with australian indigenous clients. the findings on interpersonal processes and the associated model of partnership building identified in this research may be relevant to clients of any ethnic and cultural background, but especially for other minority groups. in applying these principles of care, it is important to consider 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 3 all levels of care, including structural and system-level, service-wide factors, and broader policy and funding. without attention to these factors undue strain may be placed on frontline workers (roche, duraisingam, trifonoff, battams, et al., 2013), and ultimately on retention of staff. government funding for acchss into siloed areas of need (e.g., drug and alcohol, mental health, diabetes, kidneys) (commonwealth of australia department of health, 2020) may be a barrier to services in tailoring of holistic treatments to local needs. similarly, key performance indicators for services are typically focused on individual elements of mainstream western practice (australian institute of health and welfare, 2019). more research is needed on the full scope of alcohol care discussed in this paper. a culturally focused qualitative study could further investigate the role of culture and bicultural treatment philosophies and therapies being practised. effectiveness studies would also be valuable. positive findings would encourage such cultural approaches to be incorporated into national alcohol treatment guidelines and may enhance funding for such approaches. these findings are likely to be relevant to primary care service providers in new zealand, canada, and the usa where similar bicultural models are being called for. future research could also investigate the model of care and theories described in this study to see if they hold in other treatment areas and mainstream healthcare settings. limitations interviewees were not asked specifically about culture in alcohol care. however, this study is in keeping with the original goal of the service interviews, which was to document the strengths of the services in alcohol care. as probing questions were not asked when cultural elements were discussed it is possible that culturally relevant information could have been missed in this study. additionally, although interviewees were selected by services, their views may not be representative of the whole service, or of all acchss. however, they give valuable insights into a broad picture of alcohol care provided by frontline staff in a range of independent services. conclusion this study describes a holistic system of bicultural alcohol care delivered by indigenous staff in australian acchs primary care settings. core principles of the approach are mirrored in addiction treatment models in residential and community settings internationally. the few existing studies of bicultural approaches in primary care also hint at similar themes, however this is the first study to present an in-depth analysis. extension of bicultural models from residential and community settings into primary care is logical as barriers to alcohol treatment are enduring despite government and service efforts. integrating a bicultural model of care may increase treatment accessibility and acceptability to indigenous clients, and in turn may increase treatment effectiveness. however, implementing such a model may require some restructuring of clinical consultation times, settings, treatment options, and hiring of indigenous staff, where these are not already in place. widespread adoption of a bicultural model of care would be facilitated by policy changes at national and state levels to afford service flexibility. the framework described here could potentially be tailored to mainstream as well as indigenous health services and to other health conditions. consultation with 23 purcell-khodr et al.: the importance of culture in alcohol care health professionals and community members would be required implement this framework effectively. references australian bureau of statistics. 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(2022). patterns of drinking in aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples as selfreported on the grog survey app: a representative urban and remote sample. drug and alcohol review, 41(1), 114-124. https://doi.org/10.1111/dar.13333 https://www.who.int/medicines/publications/traditional/trm_strategy14_23/en/ https://apo.org.au/node/67488 https://researchonline.jcu.edu.au/10974/2/01thesis.pdf https://doi.org/10.1007/bf03216899 https://apps.who.int/iris/handle/10665/67163 https://doi.org/10.1111/dar.13333 microsoft word 10959+cover+page (1).docx the international indigenous policy journal volume 12 | issue 2 july 2021 combining first nations research methods with a world health organization guide to understand low childhood immunisation coverage in children in tamworth, australia susan thomas university of newcastle, australia susan.thomas@newcastle.edu.au natalie allan hunter new england local health district, australia natalie.allan@health.nsw.gov.au paula taylor hunter new england local health district, australia paula.taylor@health.nsw.gov.au carla mcgrady hunter new england local health district, australia carla.mcgrady@health.nsw.gov.au kasia bolsewicz university of newcastle, australia katarzyna.bolsewicz@health.nsw.gov.au fakhrul islam hunter new england local health district, australia fakhrul.islam@health.nsw.gov.au patrick cashman hunter new england local health district, australia patrick.cashman@health.nsw.gov.au david durrheim university of newcastle, australia david.durrheim@newcastle.edu.au amy creighton hunter new england local health district, australia amy.creighton@health.nsw.gov.au recommended citation thomas, s., allan, n., taylor, p., mcgrady, c., bolsewicz, k., islam, f., cashman, p., durrheim, d., & creighton, a. (2021). combining first nations research methods with a world health organization guide to understand low childhood immunisation coverage in children in tamworth, australia. the international indigenous policy journal, 12(2). https://doi.org/10.18584/ iipj.2021.12.2.10959 combining first nations research methods with a world health organization guide to understand low childhood immunisation coverage in children in tamworth, australia abstract in australia, we used the world health organization’s tailoring immunization programmes to identify areas of low immunisation coverage in first nations children. the qualitative study was led by first nations researchers using a strength-based approach. in 2019, tamworth had 179 (23%) children who were overdue for immunisations. yarning sessions were conducted with 50 parents and health providers. themes that emerged from this research included: (a) cultural safety in immunisation services provides a supportive place for families, (b) service access could be improved by removing physical and cost barriers, (c) positive stories promote immunisation confidence among parents, (d) immunisation data can be used to increase coverage rates for first nations children. knowledge of these factors and their impact on families helps ensure services are flexible and culturally safe. keywords first nations, children, immunisation, vaccine, primary health care, australia, world health organization acknowledgments we thank parents and service providers for sharing their knowledge and experiences and acknowledge the contribution of belinda tully from hnelhd population health, who facilitated one small group discussion. all authors were involved in the study design and developing the methods. quantitative data analysis was performed by fi. interviews and small group discussion were conducted by st, na, pt, cm, and ac. qualitative analysis was performed by st, na, pt, cm, kb, and ac. discussion and conclusions were developed by all authors. overall governance of the study was provided by ac. funding this is a nsw regional health partners project. this project was supported by the australian government’s medical research future fund (mrff) as part of the rapid applied research translation program and by the prevention research support program funded by the new south wales ministry of health. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. thomas et al.: combining first nations research methods published by scholarship@western, 2021 1 combining first nations research methods with a world health organization guide to understand low childhood immunisation coverage in children in tamworth, australia in australia, immunisation coverage rates for aboriginal and torres strait islander (hereafter first nations) children are generally high. immunisation is well accepted and promoted in both first nations and government strategic health plans. despite this, previous studies have identified gaps in immunisation coverage between first nations and other children (lovie-toon et al., 2016). while this gap has been closing (ioannides et al., 2019), timeliness remains a challenge (hendry et al., 2018). timeliness is defined as being more than one month overdue for at least one scheduled vaccination (lovie-toon et al., 2016). pockets of low immunisation coverage put children and communities at risk. first nations children experience higher notifications and hospitalisation rates for vaccine preventable diseases than other children (hendry et al., 2018; lovie-toon et al., 2016). first nations infants have higher rates of haemophilus influenza b disease, rotavirus disease, mumps, meningococcal disease, invasive pneumococcal disease, and hepatitis b infection than non-indigenous infants (cashman et al., 2016). this highlights the importance of improving timeliness and vaccine coverage to protect children and strengthen herd immunity (cashman et al., 2016; lovie-toon et al., 2016). the national immunisation strategy for australia 2019 to 2024 aims to achieve 95% coverage for first nations children who are recognised to be at increased risk of vaccine preventable diseases, particularly in areas where coverage is low (australian government department of health, 2019b). there is little evidence to indicate that first nations people are reluctant to immunise their children. one study reported first nations parents were less likely to be hesitant than other parents (abbott et al., 2013). other factors affecting timeliness include having other children and a mother who is unemployed, most likely indicating inadequate finances, transport, and social support (lovie-toon et al., 2016). lack of access to culturally appropriate health services was also identified as a factor (ioannides et al., 2019). system-level barriers exist including inaccurate recording of aboriginal and torres strait islander status at birth (hendry et al., 2018), leading to incorrect estimates of the true burden of vaccine preventable diseases (ioannides et al., 2019). a skilled workforce including first nations health practitioners and the implementation of follow-up programs to encourage timely vaccination are among the strategies used to facilitate access to immunisation services for first nations children (australian government department of health, 2019b). personalised calendars were found to be both an effective and culturally appropriate way to improve timeliness at low cost and with the flexibility to adapt to local needs (abbott et al., 2013). there have been improvements in timeliness and immunisation coverage in first nations children. national data from the australian immunisation register (air) showed the proportion of first nations children fully immunised for their age compared to all children as of september 2020 as follows: 1-yearolds (93.5% vs. 94.7%), 2-year-olds (91.2% vs. 92.4%), and 5-year-olds (97.0% vs. 94.9%; australian government department of health, 2019a). in 2020, in new south wales (nsw), rates were even higher: 1-year-olds (94.5% vs. 94.6%), 2-year-olds (93.3% vs. 92.1%), and 5-year-olds (97.6% vs. 94.8%; nsw government, 2020). the 2019 hunter new england local health district (hnelhd) in nsw, where this study took place, had rates that were similar: 1-year-olds (94.9% vs. 95.6%), 2-year-olds (92.0% vs. 93.4%) and 5-year-olds (98.1% vs. 96.7%; nsw government, 2020). despite high coverage rates overall and a focus on first nations children in strategic plans, pockets of low coverage exist, putting these children and communities at risk (australian government department of health, 2019b). the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10959 2 first nations people often face greater barriers when accessing health services. nsw health’s commitment to closing the gap, outlined in the nsw aboriginal health plan 2013–2023, acknowledges health disparities between first nations people and other australians, and it recognises the profound impact of colonisation and social determinants, including racism and socio-economic factors, on health outcomes (nsw ministry of health, 2012). in 2012, nsw health funded the aboriginal immunisation healthcare worker (aihw) program with positions, proportionate to the first nations birth cohort, based in public health units across the state. their role is to reduce the gap in coverage and timeliness between first nations and other children by improving use of existing services, pre-calling parents whose children are due for scheduled immunisation, using the air to identify overdue children and follow-up, and promoting immunisation in their communities. between 2008 and 2016, this approach helped reduce the gap from 4.6% to 2.2% for those aged 15 months, and 8.5% to 0.6% for those aged 51 months (hendry et al., 2018). to identify and understand previously unknown pockets of low childhood immunisation coverage in the hnelhd, we used the world health organization’s (2019) tailoring immunization programmes guide (tip). tip uses social science and community engagement and is underpinned by the com-b (capability, opportunity, and motivation) model of behaviour change, adapted for vaccination and the tip approach. com-b encompasses individual factors that influence behaviour, including capability and motivation, and contextual factors, including opportunity, which may be social (cultural norms, demands, support) or physical (access to services; brewer et al., 2017). tip uses quantitative methods in a situational analysis to identify areas of low coverage within a population, and qualitative methods in a research phase to determine barriers and drivers to vaccination in that community. the final intervention design phase uses new insights to co-design an evidence-based strategy to achieve high and equitable vaccination uptake, equivalent to the general population regardless of factors such as income, education, geography, and cultural background (world health organization, 2019). this is followed by monitoring and evaluation of the new strategy. this article reports on the situational analysis and the research phase in the first nations community in tamworth, a regional town in nsw, australia. the study aim was to identify a pocket of low immunisation coverage in hnelhd and to gain a deeper understanding of the barriers to timely immunisation for first nations children in that community. methods quantitative data from the air were analysed from 2015 to 2019 to identify areas in hnelhd with a high number of children less than 5 years of age who were 30 days or more overdue for at least one vaccine by sa2 areas (statistical area 2). population census data (2012 and 2016) from the australian bureau of statistics (abs) were used to calculate the rate of overdue children in sa2 areas. data were analysed for aboriginal and/or torres strait islander status. areas were sorted by number and rate of overdue children. immunisation team members reviewed the data and identified the community that had the greatest need and agreed to collaborate. the sa2 areas comprising tamworth with 240 (30%) first nations children overdue were chosen (see results section). tamworth is a rural town located in the northwestern region of nsw, 420 kilometres north of sydney. it has a diverse economy based on agriculture, education, and thomas et al.: combining first nations research methods published by scholarship@western, 2021 3 services for the larger region. it is a popular tourist destination, well known for an annual country music festival. the 2016 census recorded a population of 41,000 people, of which 11.3% identified as aboriginal and/or torres strait islander (abs, 2016). tamworth is home to the gomeroi people of the gomeroi nation, who are the traditional custodians of the land, caring for country and places of cultural significance. qualitative we used qualitative methods to gain a deeper understanding of why first nations children in tamworth were behind schedule for their immunisations and what might be done to improve coverage. a participatory action research (par) approach was used, which has been acknowledged as a collaborative and culturally appropriate methodology to use with first nations communities as it recognises both community members’ expertise and researchers’ technical skills (miller et al., 2015). par seeks change through planning, acting, observing, and reflecting, which respects cultural ways of working and promotes culturally safe and meaningful engagement (crane & o’regan, 2010). prior to commencing the study, three capacity building workshops were held where first nations and other researchers shared knowledge, experience, and skills to build capacity to conduct qualitative research with cultural sensitivity. the workshops provided a space for two-way learning where mainstream researchers shared knowledge, experience, and skills in designing and conducting qualitative research, and first nations researchers shared cultural knowledge and community ways of working together. potential participants with experience, knowledge, or insight into childhood immunisation for first nations children in tamworth were identified by members of the research team and invited to take part in the study. they included first nations parents or carers of young children, and health service providers from aboriginal community controlled health services (acchs), aboriginal maternal and infant health services, community health services, general practice, and population health. health services were identified by first nations public health team members na, cm, pt, and ac, who have well-established links with tamworth’s health services. parents and carers were identified by first nations team members through their close connections with the community. health service providers were approached by email and invited to take part in the study. parents and carers were approached by first nations staff members who personally invited them using email, sms (short message service), or telephone. a snowballing technique was used where participants were encouraged to suggest other potential participants who may provide valuable insights. potential participants were invited to take part in either an individual interview or a small group discussion. first nations researchers invited parents or carers and first nations health service providers. other team members invited the remaining government health service providers. a participant information statement was provided at the time of invitation with a consent form. time was allowed for potential participants to decide if they would like to participate before following up. an aud$30 (aud$1 = usd$0.70) gift card was offered to parents and carers as a token of appreciation for their time and for sharing cultural knowledge. written, informed consent was obtained at the time of interview. all discussions were held at times and places that were convenient to participants and were recorded with notes taken. first nations researchers ac, na, and cm conducted interviews and yarning sessions the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10959 4 with first nations participants. yarning refers to conversations involving the sharing of stories and the development of knowledge, prioritising first nations ways of communicating that are culturally prescribed, cooperative, and respectful (walker et al., 2014). settings were informal and comfortable. one researcher led the discussions while a co-facilitator took notes, observing and asking additional probing or clarifying questions. researcher st led discussions with non-first nations health service providers, with a first nations researcher co-facilitating whenever possible. due to distance and time constraints, one interview with a key government health service provider was held by telephone. all recordings were transcribed verbatim for analysis. transcripts were analysed manually (without use of software) by members of the research team. at least two researchers read each interview with at least one being a first nations researcher. the transcripts were read by the researchers individually, with key words, phrases, ideas, and concepts highlighted. these were then shared with the other researcher and then with the larger team. with team discussion, the key words, phrases, ideas, and concepts were then grouped into similar categories. categories were loosely mapped against the com-b factors of capability, opportunity, and motivation. with ongoing reflection and back and forth discussion, themes were developed that captured the essence of the categories. data analysis adopted a strength-based approach, avoiding a deficit discourse (fogarty et al., 2018). this approach moves from problem-based interpretation to one of identifying solutions or opportunities that challenge negative thinking and ethnocentric assumptions. first nations researchers applied an aboriginal lens to interpreting data that incorporated cultural values, lived experience, and aboriginal ways of knowing, being, and doing (bobba, 2019). the research methods were congruent with the aboriginal and torres strait islander quality appraisal tool, designed to ensure values of first nations people are reflected in research aims, methods, analysis, interpretation of results, and knowledge translation. this tool helps ensure research is beneficial to first nations communities and that first nations researchers provide leadership and governance over the process (harfield et al., 2020). ethics approval for the study was obtained from the hunter new england human research ethics committee (hnehrec 18/06/20/5.03) and the aboriginal health and medical research council (ah&mrc 1449/18). results quantitative analysis identified tamworth east and tamworth west as sa2 areas with a high number and rate of first nations children who were not fully immunised. despite high numbers and rates in other children, first nations children were more likely to be overdue. data was consistent from 2015 to 2019, with high numbers and rates of first nations children who were overdue: 179 (23%) in 2019, 240 (30%) in 2018, 202 (26%) in 2017, 186 (24%) in 2016, and 212 (27%) in 2015. reasons for the high numbers and rates were unknown (table 1). thomas et al.: combining first nations research methods published by scholarship@western, 2021 5 table 1. number and rate of children aged 0 to 4 years not fully immunised in tamworth, 2015 to 2019 non-aboriginal children aboriginal children indigenous status unknown total under immunised sa2 tamworth not fully immunised n not fully immunised for age % population 0–4 yearsa n not fully immunised n not fully immunised for age % population 0–4 yearsa n n n 2019 east 136 14 975 48 17 279 9 193 north 145 18 788 38 24 160 10 193 west 50 19 265 72 35 208 1 123 region 102 13 781 21 15 142 0 123 tamworth total 433 15 2,809 179 23 789 20 632 2018 east 164 17 975 60 22 279 8 232 north 155 20 788 51 32 160 2 208 west 61 23 265 94 45 208 1 156 region 129 17 781 35 25 142 1 165 tamworth total 509 18 2,809 240 30 789 12 761 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10959 6 table 1. number and rate of children aged 0 to 4 years not fully immunised in tamworth, 2015 to 2019 (continued) non-aboriginal children aboriginal children indigenous status unknown total under immunised sa2 tamworth not fully immunised n not fully immunised for age % population 0–4 yearsa n not fully immunised n not fully immunised for age % population 0–4 yearsa n n n 2017 east 161 17 975 62 22 279 8 231 north 116 15 788 45 28 160 2 163 west 38 14 265 62 30 208 1 101 region 135 17 781 33 23 142 1 169 tamworth total 450 16 2,809 202 26 789 12 664 2016 east 101 10 975 52 19 279 6 159 north 88 11 788 35 22 160 3 126 west 28 11 265 71 34 208 2 101 region 103 13 781 28 20 142 3 134 tamworth total 320 11 2,809 186 24 789 14 520 thomas et al.: combining first nations research methods published by scholarship@western, 2021 7 table 1. number and rate of children aged 0 to 4 years not fully immunised in tamworth, 2015 to 2019 (continued) non-aboriginal children aboriginal children indigenous status unknown total under immunised sa2 tamworth not fully immunised n not fully immunised for age % population 0–4 yearsa n not fully immunised n not fully immunised for age % population 0–4 yearsa n n n 2015 east 163 17 975 65 23 279 10 238 north 125 16 788 32 20 160 3 160 west 58 22 265 82 39 208 2 142 region 131 17 781 33 23 142 4 168 tamworth total 477 17 2,809 212 27 789 19 708 note. source: australian immunisation register (air) data. a 2016 abs census data. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10959 8 in total, 53 participants were invited to take part in the interviews and yarning sessions and 50 agreed, including 12 parents and 38 health service providers. three parents were not able to attend due to work commitments, a sick child, and for reasons not given. three individual interviews and 10 small yarning sessions were conducted between july 2019 and may 2020. four themes emerged: cultural safety in immunisation services provides a welcoming and supportive place for first nations families and health staff. a. existing immunisation services could be better accessed if physical and cost barriers were removed. b. positive stories and accurate information about immunisation can promote confidence for parents who are unsure. c. routinely available immunisation data can be used to help increase coverage rates for first nations children. each theme is discussed below. cultural safety in immunisation services provides a welcoming and supportive place for first nations families and health staff many participants talked about the importance of services that are culturally safe and welcoming. most often these were the acchss, but some participants also mentioned their general practitioner or other services. parents and health service providers said that families are more likely to use services where they feel comfortable; there are friendly, familiar faces; and there is an atmosphere of trust and respect where they will not be judged. parents appreciated a welcome reception from staff and receiving good care from providers. what i like about being through the ams [aboriginal medical services] is i know the people there, so i can get through and explain my story and be more comfortable about it. i feel more comfortable, i think, going to the aboriginal services and being aboriginal. (parent, group 2) i first went to the ams once it opened because it was you know “blackfullas support blackfullas”—you’ve got to keep those services open by, you know, using them. (parent, group 2)1 i’m big on trust. i want to know that my child’s important, so they’re not just somebody else coming in and getting jabbed. that’s the sort of service i like. (parent, group 3) if you create a clinic for mums to bring their kids in, they’ve got to have people there that they know. family members that they know and people that they know from the street, so they sit there, have a yarn, get real comfortable and feel safe because there’s people there doing the same thing, they are looking to get the same outcomes. (health service provider group) 1 blackfella or blackfulla is an informal term sometimes used by australian aboriginal people to refer to themselves as black people. thomas et al.: combining first nations research methods published by scholarship@western, 2021 9 these culturally safe services used more flexible models that supported families and helped with arranging transport or making appointments. they understood first nation families may have other priorities, related to family and community, and that children’s immunisation may have fallen behind as a result. they also understood that most families wanted to catch up on their children’s immunisations. they were more “family centred,” encouraging extended family members to come into the consultation room, not only one parent and the child. we don’t make it feel like a hospital setting. they come to the front desk and i’ll get up and make them a coffee, give them a biscuit and i’ll have a yarn to them ... and then the nurse will have a yarn with them and make them feel comfortable. same with the doctors. it’s their centre as well. everyone just feels at home here. (health service provider group) if there’s sorry business [a period of cultural practices following the death of a community member] or other things happening in the family, that’s a priority ... immunisation will be put off because they know it can be done next week or the week after. it’s about family being the priority and community being the priority. (health service provider group) the way we do clinics is white medicine clinics, so it’s a room like this with a door, a desk and an office, and you sit down on those chairs, and you behave yourself, answer my questions and fill in forms. again, it’s not family focused. it’s not aboriginal culturally appropriate, whereas different types of care are more inclusive, engaging, and more accepting. (health service provider group) some service providers observed a lack of cultural safety at some government health services where there were no aboriginal health workers who could support the nurses to provide a positive experience for families. they felt the role of the aboriginal health workers was undervalued and that racism and a lack of cultural awareness meant families may avoid those services. participants spoke about the importance of having more first nations people in the health workforce and that this was connected to feeling welcome and safe in health services. some spoke about the importance of having more first nations nurses who can immunise children, especially in first nations specific programs, and that this was a way of building trust and safety within services. some service providers commented on vacant aboriginal health worker positions and the impact that might have on services for first nations people. we know historically with a lot of aboriginal people; they have a deep mistrust of any government organisation. they’ve got that choice to say, “no. i don’t want to see any of these services.” (health service provider group) i think if there were a place with a bit more of an aboriginal presence it would be better than the crazy busy environment in some settings. (health service provider group) we don’t have an aboriginal worker with us in the clinics. maybe if you’re interviewing clients, maybe that’s something that might make them feel more comfortable if we had an aboriginal worker do that. that might be an option. (health service provider group) another part of that is down the future with aboriginal health practitioners who can immunise. that’s a clinician who’s connected with community, whether it’s a nurse or a practitioner, and can see a list of 10 kids who are overdue, go around and get them immunised. not just that but the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10959 10 helping connect mums with other services and help problem solve a bunch of other things. (health service provider group) existing immunisation services could be better accessed if physical and cost barriers were removed in addition to concerns about cultural safety, participants discussed physical and cost barriers to accessing immunisation. physical barriers included lack of public or private transportation, inconvenient locations, closed books, limited clinic times, and excessive time spent in the waiting room. transport is a big thing, they always say. (health service provider group) i now go to [acchs]. they’re fantastic. very welcoming, just approachable people. ... the only thing i notice with [them] i mean i personally do drive but i know that a few of my friends and stuff like that if they have children, if they don’t live there there’s no transport. (parent, group 1) when we first started here ... transport wasn’t a big issue, as we’re getting bigger, yes, now transport is an issue. (health service provider group) you’ve got two places [acchss] to pick from. it takes a good 4 weeks to get an appointment. (health service provider group) who’s got a spare 2 hours to sit there and wait with a screaming kid as well? it’s hungry. doesn’t want to sit still. you’ve got to get to work. (parent, group 1) several participants commented that appointment-based clinics were unhelpful, especially for busy working parents and parents with many children. concerns were raised about plans to change the only drop-in clinic to an appointment-based one. the clinic was an evening clinic to allow working people to come later. they’re going to change that to a morning clinic and make it booked appointments. i find that’s another barrier. (health service provider group) in addition to physical barriers, cost barriers to accessing services were also raised. apart from acchss, where consultations are provided free of charge, free general practitioner clinics were said to be limited in tamworth, with a standard appointment costing up to aud$81. some parents could not afford the out-of-pocket costs, even with two parents working. even for working families, that’s a fair chunk of my budget with five children. if i wanted to get all five taken in, and to be seen at a doctor, i’m sorry, we’d be probably eating toast and noodles for the next fortnight. (parent, group 1) participants identified ways that service access could be improved including removing cost barriers, providing transport, having more convenient locations and hours, and offering immunisation as part of outreach including home visiting. one general practitioner practice discussed including immunisation under an aboriginal health check to remove costs. thomas et al.: combining first nations research methods published by scholarship@western, 2021 11 i think a lot of people, and our aboriginal community, are accessing the aboriginal health service because it’s a free service. (health service provider group) we find that if you can go to the house and you can immunise the children in the house, you’ve got a captive audience. even if there’s other things happening in their life, usually or even 100% of the time they will say, “yes. let’s get the child immunised.” they want the child immunised. they just can’t always get there. (health service provider group) if there was an immunisation day and whether that’s once a month, it’s walk-in immunisation day. so, if you’re available then, it minimises the time. it could work. (parent, group 2) positive stories and trusted information about immunisation can promote confidence for parents who are unsure parents were generally very supportive of immunisation, and some reported experiencing vaccine preventable disease firsthand or hearing about benefits of childhood vaccination. they recognised the value of immunisation as protective of their child’s health and that of the community. we do know with aboriginal families they want their children immunised. that’s one thing i definitely know. they just can’t always get there. (health service provider interview) i think the biggest majority, as we know, especially in this tamworth area ... want their kids vaccinated. that’s not the issue. (health service provider interview) some participants felt that support for childhood immunisation in the community was influenced by negative messages on tv and social media about bad reactions or side effects. negative messaging was thought to influence young mothers who are isolated, not well supported or who grew up in a family where immunisation was not important. those parents who lacked information about benefits of vaccinating were also vulnerable to negative messages in the media. you always see in the media of the anti-vaxxers, “they’re doing this to your kid. they don’t need that.” again death, autism, paralysed. as a mother it’s a natural instinct of “i’m not going to infect my kid with something that they don’t need and it’s going to make them sick.” (parent, group 1) sometimes you get lost and caught up in facebook, the information that may not be necessarily true around immunisation. you only ever hear the negative stories. i understand the importance of immunisation, especially for young aboriginal kids who are so vulnerable as it is. (parent, group 2) but there’s a lot of mums, especially first-time mums ... who haven’t had positive role models, who don’t have the education. there’s just that lack of knowledge or positive role models or influences that help you make those decisions [about immunisation]. (parent, group 2) we’re hearing stuff on sunrise and on today [two morning news programs on commercial television], and it’s always this debate about how immunisation is linked with childhood the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10959 12 behavioural issues and autism. we got these white people on the news every morning talking about it. it must be true. (health service provider interview) it was not always easy to get trusted information about vaccine preventable diseases and vaccinations in ways that were understood by the community. some parents consented without understanding why vaccinations are needed and how safe they are. poor communication between providers and parents was reported as commonplace, with mainstream health service providers mistakenly assuming parents were not interested in childhood immunisation. you see time and time again when the mother or whoever comes in and brings the child in for their immunisation, the health provider, whether it be a doctor, nurse, or whatever, sometimes can explain things to the parents about the immunisations, and because they don’t understand, they think that the parents aren’t interested ... but in actual fact, they are interested. it’s just they don’t understand what’s being said to them. (health service provider group) or they’re too ashamed to ask what it is and why it is, because they think ... they should know this, but they don’t, so they’re not going to ask. “just give my kid a needle so i can go home.” (health service provider group) you [want to] know what to expect and why you’re having the needle. ... you’re going to need that support or that education prior. (parent, group 3) you’d ask family members for advice because you don’t know. (parent, group 3) many participants agreed that families need to receive more factual information about immunisation and that positive stories about immunisation need to be shared more widely. information should be delivered in culturally appropriate ways. that means written information should be short, clear, and in plain language. visual displays were suggested as being more effective than only written words. information could be shared during individual or group meetings and at cultural events. weighing up the risks versus the benefits. i think putting it in simple language as well. so, people understand and that way it educates them. ... you’re doing it because we don’t want your child to end up with x, y, and z. (health service provider group) especially the stuff that comes from the ministry. their pamphlets are very much filled with words, aren’t they? if you had that more visual thing with pictures on it compared to a ministry pamphlet, you know which one yourself that you want to take. (health service provider group) like, i know i’ve said to people, “do you want your kid crying for 3 minutes or do you want them in hospital for 3 weeks?” so, it’s that metaphor that blackfellas like and relate to. ... give them some familiar analogies, break it down like that. (health service provider group) you’ve also got your community-based groups where you can actually sit down and invite people in to talk on that sort of stuff. get them in an environment where they feel comfortable. (health service provider group) thomas et al.: combining first nations research methods published by scholarship@western, 2021 13 a working group composed of first nations people and health providers was proposed as a trusted source of information, and a group that should be consulted in designing and disseminating culturally appropriate health information. having a consistent message on immunisation across government, health services, and the community was further discussed as building trust with families. i think a working group, which then has a health doctor on there. then, you’ve got your aboriginal health workers and practitioners, and all of them in there, so that the clients will see the aboriginal people are on board. ... they’ll see bob on there. “i look up to bob, i’ll listen to that message,” type of thing. (health service provider group) i think it should be filtered down from all tiers so then it’s got a stronger approach. it’s the same united message ... from our individual service providers here on the ground, like our community health, linking in with our amss, and then having that united approach and coming together, and all sharing the same messages, i think that will look better. (health service provider group) routinely available immunisation data can be used to help increase coverage rates for first nations children many health service providers reported errors and delays when using practice software and entering air data including incorrect entry of the provider or vaccine dose number. these errors could remain undetected until parents received a government notice that their child was overdue, with cuts to parent support payments as a result. it is another time-consuming job. it takes a while but we find it very important because if that data doesn’t go in, your client’s payments are stopped. (health service provider group) i actually got cut off because if your immunisations aren’t done, you can’t actually get childcare subsidy ... and it was cut off for 6 weeks before i even noticed. i rang up the doctors and i said, “you know he did get his immunisations;” and they’re like, “oh i’m so sorry.” left me $800 short so that’s quite significant. ... next time, i stayed there until they put it into the computer system. (parent, group 2) some health service providers thought that immunisation data could be better shared to inform them of low coverage with some being surprised to hear that first nations children were falling behind. a few expressed a desire to know which children were falling behind and whether they were registered with their service, so that they could follow-up with them. some noted that good data is available and needs to be shared with all immunisation service providers to inform them of local trends. immunisation data analysis was said to be time-consuming for public health staff who had many other public health priorities in the large geographic area of hnelhd. it really surprises me. ... we’ve always been told 95% for tamworth, we’ve been the top of australia for i don’t know how long. have we become complacent? we’re not really sure where it’s falling down. (health service provider group) the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10959 14 we actually have no idea, at present, of who’s behind. if they don’t re-present, we don’t have any capacity to follow them up. i’m sure someone would still be getting those reports at public health or some follow-up must be done on someone’s level. to me, that’s a big issue. (health service provider group) we’ve got really good systems to get the data out to people, but it’s just a scale problem. that’s a big problem. (health service provider group) some services used practice software to generate reminders, and many parents commented this was really helpful, especially if reminders were sent more than one day in advance; many parents stated that without reminders, they would forget. parents also liked reminders that allowed them to book appointments at the same time. health service providers liked printed monthly lists that they could use to follow-up by phone or letter but admitted if they were busy with urgent health needs, then reminders were not always a priority. maybe a fortnightly reminder, then a day before reminder. i do like the day before reminder. but in some situations, it catches you off-guard and you’re like, “oh i’m not going to make it.” (parent, group 2) some service providers recalled how data available from air was previously used to plan and evaluate immunisation services. meetings at an executive level in hnelhd used to take place with acchss where data was shared, highlighting areas that were doing well and advocating for groups who may have needed additional support. some changes to service delivery were made without the use of data or consultation, but rather based on individual observations, assumptions, or other ad hoc methods. service evaluation was seen as something that only happened if budget cuts were planned. we used to go regularly and present our immunisation data and they’d all talk about it and go, “that’s good, keep going,” or “you need to talk to these people,” or “you’ve forgotten about these people over there.” that doesn’t happen anymore. (health service provider group) they’re not evaluated until someone wants to save some money and they come under critical evaluation. health outcomes are not part of the picture. (health service provider group) discussion tamworth has two acchss providing culturally appropriate care to families, including childhood immunisation. we found that community members used both services. a framework synthesis exploring access to primary health care for first nations people in australia found evidence that access to care can be improved when services are owned and managed by first nations communities and are tailored to meet local needs. such services are more likely to be free of racism and more culturally appropriate (davy et al., 2016) because they are based on an understanding of community values and beliefs related to respect, equality, access, social justice, and collaboration. important characteristics of access include employing culturally knowledgeable staff, preferably first nations people, who understand and respect cultural and community values. other characteristics included using a broader model of care that included transport, use of outreach services, drop-in clinics, and extended hours. davy et al. (2016) also described the importance of a physical environment that was welcoming, where people felt comfortable thomas et al.: combining first nations research methods published by scholarship@western, 2021 15 and at ease. these factors related to access to primary health care were raised by participants in our study. health policies and practices that are culturally appropriate require funding that is both adequate and ongoing (davy et al., 2016). it is important that acchss in tamworth are well-resourced and accessible to encourage their use. there is scope for more specific community participation in planning immunisation services to ensure they meet the needs of local families, including assistance with transport and flexible service models. not all families in our study used acchs and having a choice of provider was important. strengthening the first nations primary health care workforce is one way of improving cultural safety in government health services. the national aboriginal and torres strait islander health workforce strategic framework 2016–2023 identifies priorities including improving recruitment and retention, improving skills and capacity, and ensuring a culturally safe workplace (aboriginal and torres strait islander health workforce working group, 2016). one study identified opportunities to develop the first nations primary health care workforce, particularly in regional areas, including professional development, mentorship, potential for promotion, fostering a harmonious workplace with strong teamwork, supportive colleagues with a shared purpose, strong leadership with effective supervision and support, and competitive remuneration. the study found it was important to tailor workforce strategies to meet local needs (jongen et al., 2019). bond et al. (2019) critiqued the discourse surrounding the first nations workforce and noted that ahws frequently have to defend the legitimacy of their role and the value of their community knowledge, which is essential in providing culturally safe healthcare. this justification is not required of other health professionals, whose knowledge and legitimacy are not questioned (bond et al., 2019). in light of this, general practice and community health services in tamworth could be improved by having more first nations primary health care workers, which would help to ensure more services are culturally safe and appropriate and increase the availability of first nations nurses who can immunise children. the role of aihws emerged as an important one in encouraging timely vaccination in first nations communities (cashman et al., 2016; tashani et al., 2017). the aihws use telephone “pre-calls” (before immunisations are due), sms reminders, follow-ups for overdue children, and promote immunisation in their communities (hendry et al., 2018). their impact has been impressive; however, pockets of low coverage persist not only in tamworth but in other first nation communities in nsw (unpublished data). the aihw program was evaluated in 2015 and 2017. key strengths included having a first nations person, who was valued and well-received in the community and who developed a close collaborative relationship with community groups, providing immunisation services. ongoing challenges included a lack of culturally appropriate services to which parents could be referred, cost and transport barriers, and errors in air data. the evaluations identified scope for further development including tailoring the role to meet local needs, developing aboriginal immunisation taskforces within public health units, and more effective use of air data by generating and sharing timely reports of due and overdue children (menzies et al., 2015; tashani et al., 2017). our study found that despite the benefits of the program, it is unrealistic to expect one aihw to overcome the many structural barriers families face in tamworth. the role itself does not include providing immunisation or transport to services. closing the gap in immunisation is not one person’s responsibility but one that belongs to all partners. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10959 16 participants suggested ways in which physical and cost barriers could be addressed, such as ensuring immunisation services have available appointments and are free of charge, transportation support, and more flexible options including outreach and home visiting (davy et al., 2016). some barriers may be associated with social determinants of health, including unemployment and low levels of education (davy et al., 2016; thomas et al., 2018). while acchss are well placed to address these access barriers, they need to be supported with policy and secure funding to ensure sustainability. tamworth’s acchss may find ways to reduce waiting times, assist with transport, and to offer outreach or home-visiting services for those most in need. general practice can work towards easier access to appointments that are free of charge, and community clinics can increase flexibility with hours and locations. participants reported sensationalised anti-vax stories on social media and some negative experiences with immunisation, leading to some hesitancy about immunisation. hesitancy has not been reported in previous studies with first nations communities, and little is found on the impact of social media on immunisation decision-making. this emerged as an area where further study is needed, particularly for first-time single mothers who may lack family support and encouragement to vaccinate their child, and who may be influenced by negative messages in the media. some participants recommended providing information that is culturally appropriate, which means clear, factual messages to groups or individuals, using visual or story-based formats. these views resonate with earlier studies with first nations communities in nsw (massey et al., 2009, 2011). first nations culture is rich in storytelling, artwork, and analogies, and these can provide an effective way to disseminate health messages, especially when tailored to the local community, rather than relying on written words in pamphlets or fact sheets (peake et al., 2019). storytelling has been found to serve as an effective traditional way to convey customs and values and to share knowledge and experiences. this can assist in finding common ground, learning about health concepts, and making decisions. visual representation of a story (the use of art, words, pictures, photographs, and film) can provide innovative and culturally appropriate ways of learning. yarning groups are another way for community voices to be heard, helping to ensure that health messages are provided in a culturally sensitive way. when community leaders are included in the process, cultural values are respected. importantly, these ways of learning link culture to health messages in respectful and meaningful ways, empowering communities to improve health outcomes (peake et al., 2019; tough, 2007). our study reported that use of technical jargon by doctors is not understood by some families. this finding is not unique to our study. minnican and o’toole (2020) also found that community members reported health providers used complicated or patronising tones. non-first nations health service providers must learn to listen, speak without jargon, clarify misunderstandings, and acknowledge and accommodate the expertise of community members as ways to improve cross-cultural understanding (minnican & o’toole, 2020). many service providers were surprised to learn that a relatively large number of first nations children in tamworth were not fully immunised for their age. this lack of awareness was found in previous tip studies in nsw (bolsewicz et al., 2020; thomas et al., 2018). in australia, good quality immunisation data is available from the air and from medical software used in acchss and general practice. in highincome countries, the who recognises the need for reliable, timely data as an integral part of immunisation programs, identifying overdue children for follow-up, monitoring coverage, and thomas et al.: combining first nations research methods published by scholarship@western, 2021 17 evaluating service performance (crowcroft & levy-bruhl, 2017). this data can help reduce inequity by identifying areas of low coverage and enabling tailored strategies to be developed. it can also help inform health policy and guide public health decision-making by providing an indirect measure of population immunity levels (european centre for disease prevention and control, 2018). data can also be used to generate reminders or recalls, which are known to help increase immunisation uptake and are appreciated by parents (brewer et al., 2017; vann et al., 2018). all immunisation providers can request reports from air to identify children who are due or overdue, correct errors, and send reminder messages. australian standards for general practice recommend using clinical software rather than existing registers to manage reminders as part of preventative care required for accreditation (the royal australian college of general practitioners, 2017). historically, air data had been analysed and shared widely in tamworth and across the health district for the follow-ups of overdue children and to guide service delivery. there is potential to reinstate some of those practices, prioritising areas of low coverage, and increasing the use of both air and medical software data to plan, monitor, and evaluate immunisation services in tamworth. the tip process proved useful in identifying an area of low childhood immunisation coverage in tamworth. for the first time, we incorporated first nations’ ways of knowing and doing into tip’s methodology. community engagement, par, and a process led by first nations researchers helped create a trusting environment where information was shared and findings were genuine. our study results were interpreted in a way that was culturally relevant to first nations community members, service providers, and researchers, building on strengths and identifying opportunities for improvement. using the com-b model of behaviour change, our study found that capability factors (parent’s knowledge, communication from health service providers) and motivation factors (parental attitudes and confidence in vaccination) are contributing to low immunisation coverage in tamworth. we also found that opportunity factors (cultural appropriateness of services, physical access and use of data) were important. the third phase of tip will develop an evidence-based, tailored strategy to increase the number and rate of first nations children who are fully immunised for their age. first nations methods, participation, and governance will play a central role. there are some limitations in the reliability of air data that can be attributed to delays in entering data, records not being updated, as well as children moving, and their address not being updated in medicare. this means some children who appear to be overdue may actually be up to date. analysis of the data found a high number and rate of non-first nations children were also overdue for vaccinations. it was outside the scope of our study to investigate contributing factors for that group of children; however, these data have been shared widely with all immunisation providers and public health staff. our qualitative data collection and analysis was spread over 12 months, which may be considered a long time. our diverse team had many workplace and community priorities, which meant some data collection and analysis were delayed. the emergence of covid-19 and its impact on families and communities meant some researchers were less available for data analysis. our study results are relevant to the local community of tamworth and may not be generalisable to other settings; however, we believe the concepts are likely to be applicable in other australian first nations communities. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10959 18 conclusion the study has highlighted a number of factors contributing to lower coverage, including service access barriers, negative messages, and suboptimal use of coverage data. while some factors are beyond the control of individuals and local health services, knowledge of these factors and their impact on families can help ensure services are flexible and culturally safe. strengthening the first nations workforce, using language that families understand, linking culture to immunisation health messages in a way that empowers families, and improving use of data to plan and evaluate immunisation services are also strategies within reach of both public and private health services in tamworth. using first nations research methods was essential in providing deep understanding of the reasons why some children may be falling behind in their immunisations and what might be done to improve coverage rates. these methods should be considered in all research with first nations communities. references abbott, p., menzies, r., davison, j., moore, l., & wang, h. 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(2019). tailoring immunization programmes (tip). who regional office for europe. 10959+cover+page (1).pdf ms10959+thomas+combining+first+nations+resarch+methods+rce.pdf ms 1435 adewusi ose dudu final.pdf the international indigenous policy journal volume 11 | issue 1 march 2020 !s" dúdú: exploring the benefits of yoruba indigenous black soap in southwest, nigeria adedeji oluwaseun adewusi department of sociology, university of ibadan, nigeria, adewusi4success@yahoo.co.uk olayinka akanle department of sociology, university of ibadan, nigeria, yakanle@yahoo.com recommended citation adewusi, a. o., & akanle, o. (2020). !s" dúdú: exploring the benefits of yoruba indigenous black soap in southwest, nigeria. the international indigenous policy journal, 11(1). https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.10258 !s" dúdú: exploring the benefits of yoruba indigenous black soap in southwest, nigeria abstract this study explored the benefits of the production, sale, and consumption of indigenous black soap (!s" dúdú) in southwest nigeria. a multistage sampling technique was used to select 71 participants from oyo, ogun, and lagos states. participants were extensively interviewed, and their responses were analyzed and placed into themes. the study found certain economicand health-related benefits attached to the production, sale, and consumption of black soap. these benefits could help drive sustainable development in indigenous communities in nigeria and the model could be used in indigenous communities in other countries. #s" dúdú was also a major ingredient, in conjunction with other herbs, in medicines that were perceived to have important health benefits. policy recommendations are suggested. keywords indigenous knowledge, entrepreneurship, nigeria, yoruba, sustainable development, black soap (!s" dúdú) acknowledgments the authors would like to acknowledge the founder of lift above poverty organization (lapo), dr. godwin ehigiamuso, and the entire staff at lapo for the small grant awarded for the purpose of this study. disclaimer the purpose of this study was to explore how yoruba indigenous communities use the production, sale, and consumption of the indigenous black soap to drive sustainable development. while the medicinal uses of the soap by the yoruba are a central part of this article, the article is not intended to give medical treatment advice. no medical treatment should be undertaken without consulting a qualified health practitioner. the black soap producers requested that details about the production of black soap be kept confidential. the authors have honoured this request and have only shared details that were approved by the producers who participated in the research. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. 1 adewusi & akanle: !s" dúdú: exploring the benefits published by scholarship@western, 2020 !s" dúdú: exploring the benefits of yoruba indigenous black soap in southwest, nigeria the interaction of indigenous people with their lands, territories, and natural resources produces knowledge that is not only community-based but also capable of providing the social, cultural, and economic information necessary for growth and survival (kalafatic, 2007; tharakan, 2015). to a large extent, indigenous peoples also have collective rights recognized by international law, which include the right to retain their own languages and other cultural foundations such as their traditional forms of livelihood via biocultural rights1 arrangements (bavikatte & bennett, 2015). the ability of the indigenous people to identify and utilize context-based solutions has, thus, led many authors, national policymakers, and foreign development donors to either direct their attention to or renew their interest in the potentiality of indigenous livelihoods in propagating development (dube & musi, 2002; olutayo & akanle, 2009), especially for a sustainable one (aluko, 2018; olutayo et al., 2017; rist et al., 2011). however, despite the evidence and recognition of the potentiality of indigenous knowledge in societal development, there persists a notion that the producers of this local knowledge wield little power (ostberg, 1995; world bank, 2004), especially because, from a colonial perspective, the knowledge is considered to be inferior to that of the west (eriksen, 2007; riseth, 2007; world bank, 2004). as a result of this presumed inferiority, experts are still divided over the usefulness of indigenous knowledge partly because of its epistemology and an assumed lack of rigour in the observations and “experimentation” involved in its production (kolawole, 2001) and partly because of its practicality, which is based on trial and error (briggs, 2005). yet, scholars have demonstrated that these bits of western and indigenous knowledge exist side by side and form part of each other’s knowledge (chambers, 1983; peters, 2002; sinclair & walker, 1999). for instance, chambers (1983) demonstrated how indigenous knowledge has contributed to the advancement of science: for example, farmers disovered, based on their observations, that the sprouting of potatoes in storage was inhibited by diffused light. scientists learnt from farmers on this occasion and disseminated their findings worldwide. based on the foregoing argument, it is not surprising that western knowledge systems have been criticized for an inability to holistically address the socio-economic and cultural challenges in meeting basic human needs (tharakan, 2015, olutayo et al., 2017). this is because the solutions offered by foreign knowledge frameworks do not fit well into local knowledge systems, lack autonomy, and are inappropriately incorporated into development plans (akanle et al., 2017). several authors and experts have stressed that societal growth and development will be achieved if, and only if, the development plans of less-developed nations acknowledge the prevailing indigenous knowledge systems in these societies (aluko, 2018; breidlid, 2009; briggs, 2005; hoppers, 2002; kothari, 2007; magni, 2016; olutayo et al., 2017; sillitoe, 2006; rist et al., 2011; tharakan, 2015). nigeria is enormously blessed with both natural and human resources (kalejaiye et al., 2015). in terms of natural resources, waziri (2017) noted that nigeria could as well be the biblical promised land: a land endowed with large deposits of 44 different minerals spread across the country, with a favourable topographical terrain. in a country of over 180 million persons (national bureau of statistics, 2015), nigeria is still faced with developmental challenges despite these enormous human and material endowments (kalejaiye et al., 2015). some of these endowments, especially forest resources, have been 1 these are collective rights of communities to carry out traditional stewardship roles vis-à-vis nature, as conceived of by indigenous ontologies (bavikatte & bennett, 2015). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.10258 found to have a close association with rural economic and health activities (oluyole & adeogun, 2005). hence, they can only realize their full potential when their development is integrated into that of agriculture, large forest industries, natural resources development, rural manufacturing, and healthbased enterprises (oluyole & adeogun, 2005). for instance, researchers have identified that non-timber forest products, such as firewood and sawdust ash, are being used, alongside agro-processing waste from agro-processing enterprises, by small-scale industries to produce consumer products such as black soap (oluyole & adeogun, 2005; yusuf & okoruwa, 1995). the major aim of this study was to examine the developmental benefits attached to the production, sale, and consumption of #s" dúdú in selected states in southwest nigeria. this is mainly predicated on the fact that #s" dúdú is an important indigenous resource that is used for cutaneous bodily adornment and as a medical supplement in the southwestern region of nigeria (george et al., 2006). the soap occupies a critical place within the web of indigenous knowledge of the yoruba people. it creates a means of livelihood and is used as a health supplement in the western part of africa in age-old yoruba communities. !s" dúdú is an essential tool for social and economic development in nigeria due to its ability to cater to local development needs (olatokun & ayanbode, 2008). the next section of this article is aimed at familiarizing readers with the history, production, and uses of #s" dúdú. the history, production, and use of !s" dúdú: a review of literature historically, black soap production constitutes one of the major occupations of the yoruba people (adewusi, 2018). as of 2006, the yoruba population was approximately 42 million, which was about 35% of the entire nigerian population (ogundele, 2007). some yoruba are also located in the modernday republic of benin and republic of togo in west africa, as well as in cuba and some caribbean countries (abimbola, 2006). !s" dúdú originated from age-old yoruba communities in the western part of africa. however, the knowledge of how to produce this soap was not kept within the founding communities: women in other countries in west africa were taught how to make it. for instance, the ghanaians named the soap alata samina. this nomenclature originated from a yoruba sub-group in what is now the republic of benin (ogunbor, 2016). it is believed that the yoruba women introduced #s" dúdú recipes to the ghanaians whilst trading pepper (ogunbor, 2016). pepper in one yoruba dialect is called ata and those who sell pepper are called alata (i.e., pepper traders) and soap is called samina by ghanaians. this formed the origin of the ghanaian’s black soap nomenclature that is referred to as alata samina, which in a ghanaian dialect means “the pepper traders’ soap.” largely produced by women (alo et al., 2012; oluwalana et al., 2012), the making of #s" dúdú from agro-based wastes, such as ash-derived alkali, has been an age-old craft in nigeria and other west african countries. the production of the soap can be done with ease because it requires little capital and simple technology (ukwendu, 2019). the resource is produced using wholesome ingredients that are essentially considered by the indigenous peoples as the “fruits of the earth,” making black soap production very different than western soaps. for instance, kathy (2009) revealed that soap contains different ingredients such as palm oil, coconut oil, palm kernel oil, ash from various plants (including shea tree bark, cocoa pods, banana husk, and plantain leaves), and water. also significant is the fact that indigenous soap is used to prevent and/or treat health-related issues. soaps produced from wood ash, 3 adewusi & akanle: !s" dúdú: exploring the benefits published by scholarship@western, 2020 such as #s" dúdú, are recognized and used in many different cultures around the world due to its efficient bactericidal and dermatological properties. of utmost importance here is the study by yusuf and okoruwa (1995) who reported that the local manufacturing of #s" dúdú increases the capacity of entrepreneurs to profit from it, which contributes to the productivity of the country and generates employment opportunities. despite the criticality of this small enterprise for socio-economic development and the small amount of capital required for #s" dúdú enterprise start-ups, it is most appalling that this enterprise has been hijacked by industrialists who exploit these resources to produce a more refined packaged black soap for the consumption of nigerians. indigenous black soap is well known in african cultures as an ancient remedy for healthy skin. !s" dúdú enjoys a reputation for improving or eliminating uneven skin tone and reducing razor bumps caused by ingrown hairs and skin rashes (ukwendu, 2019; lin et al., 2017) better than the modern industrial-made soaps (oyekanmi et al., 2014). the soap is also used in the treatment of many infectious diseases caused by microorganisms (ikpoh et al., 2012). in traditional medicine, the soap is a very common vehicle for the application of medicinal plants and also for the treatment of skin diseases (ahmed et al., 2005; ajaiyeoba et al., 2003; ajose, 2007; erinoso et al., 2016). furthermore, the affordable price of #s" dúdú, as a traditionally produced commodity, enables people from different tribes and economic statuses to buy and use it; it is a commodity that supports local economies in poor communities. additionally, folklore medicine in nigeria, particularly skin-associated therapies, rely on #s" dúdú as a medium for applying traditional medicines (anyakoha, 2011). despite its widespread availability, medicinal benefits, and “almost free” prices, nearly all the traditional methods of bodily adornment and indigenous medical remedies in southwestern nigeria are facing competition from more expensive alternatives that are either produced by foreign industrialists in nigeria or imported from other countries (george et al., 2006). locally produced black soap is natural and organic with high medicinal value; yet, fewer people are purchasing or marketing it (olayide & heady, 1982). it is against this backdrop that this study explored how the production, sale, and consumption of #s" dúdú could help contribute to sustainable development in indigenous communities in southwest nigeria. in broad terms, the insights provided by this article will stress the importance of indigenous knowledge as a pathway to achieve sustainable development in local economies. methods recruitment of participants a total of 2 producers, 24 sellers, and 45 consumers of black soap participated in this study. the study adopted a multistage sampling technique to recruit participants. first, nigeria was clustered into the six major geopolitical zones. the southwest zone was purposively selected because the study was interested in #s" dúdú, which is largely produced by the yoruba in this region. more so, the yoruba are known to be domiciled in the southwestern part of the country (olutayo, 2014). the southwest region was further clustered into manageable units (states) out of which oyo, ogun, and lagos were purposively selected. at this stage, major production sites and markets for yoruba-made black soap were selected through purposive and snowball sampling techniques in order to locate producers and sellers of black soap. however, only 2 producers out of the 12 that were contacted were willing to participate in the study. a major reason for non-participation, according to the producers, was to safeguard the knowledge of black 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.10258 soap production from knowledge scavengers. in order to locate consumers, the selected states were further clustered into senatorial districts. three senatorial districts within each state were selected, totalling to nine senatorial districts. within each district, five black soap consumers were identified via purposive and snowball sampling techniques. data collection and analysis qualitative methods were used to gather data from the field. the adoption of qualitative methods was predicated on the fact that little is known on the subject matter, and qualitative methods allow research participants to express themselves in an unrestricted manner, which allows the research to gain new insights into the subject of interest. furthermore, qualitative methods have the major strength of incorporating richness, depth, nuance, multi-dimensionality, and complexity into the research, which are needed for exploratory research of this nature (mason, 2002; ritchie & lewis, 2003). the instrument for data collection was an in-depth interview guide. the guide was examined by three yoruba experts within the field of social anthropology and indigenous livelihoods to ensure the suitability of the interview questions. their suggestions were incorporated into the guide. also, a pilot study was conducted to identify and correct and/or remove ambiguous items in the interview guide. the interviews with producers and sellers of indigenous black soap were mainly conducted in the yoruba language by research assistants who were highly proficient in the language. this is because #s" dúdú entrepreneurs in this geographical area had little or no formal education; thus, they were more comfortable conversing in their local language. in addition to the yoruba language, the research assistants made use of pidgin english to conduct interviews among black soap consumers. interviews took place in july of 2018. interview sessions were tape recorded and transcribed into the english language by experts proficient in all three languages (i.e., yoruba, english, and pidgin). these transcripts were rechecked by language experts to ensure that the original meaning was retained. using a grounded theory approach, data were reduced; that is, they were selected, simplified, classified, and connected. a key element of this stage is coding the data and organizing the codes around the emerging themes of the study. in order to code the data, the researchers familiarized themselves with the transcripts and reflected on the meaning in order to identify the structure of the data’s themes (mason, 2002). recurring themes and ideas about the benefits of #s" dúdú were searched for and identified. this coding process was done using atlas.ti version 6.2. ethical considerations such as anonymity, privacy, voluntariness, and non-maleficence were adhered to during the research work. these were discussed with participants as part of the introduction to the study and oral consent was obtained from all participants. however, data on the production process of the black soap was kept confidential due to its importance to the producers of the soap. this, according to the participants, was to prevent knowledge scavenging. results and discussion producers in order to understand the role of #s" dúdú and various nuances in its production, sale, and utilization, it is pertinent to examine the sociodemographic distribution of participants (table 1). 5 adewusi & akanle: !s" dúdú: exploring the benefits published by scholarship@western, 2020 table 1. socio-demographic characteristics of yoruba producers of !s" dúdú in the study variables responses participant 1 participant 2 sex female female age 41 years 85 years highest level of education primary education no formal education duration in business 32 years 47 years net worth of business ₦25,000 (us$69.40) ₦17,000 (us$47.20) frequency of production per month 6 3 average income per production ₦2,200 (us$6.10) ₦2,000 (us$5.60) in this study, both participants who were producers in black soap were yoruba women. among producers of #s" dúdú in nigeria, the majority are women (alo et al., 2012; oluwalana et al., 2012) because it has historically been perceived as a feminine occupation (ogunbor, 2016); hence, it is seen by many yoruba as an occupation meant only for women in the context of their traditional beliefs (osunwole, 2018). the #s" dúdú producers in this study had relatively low levels of education (see table 1). the average age of producers in the study was 63 years, indicating that #s" dúdú is predominantly produced by older women. meanwhile, the average worth of the particpants’ businesses was ₦21,000 (us$58.30). ukwendu (2019) found that the production of black soap requires little capital, which means it is accessible to people who have fewer resources with which to start a business. in addition, the #s" dúdú producers in this study made an average of ₦2,100 (us$5.80) per production, totalling an average of ₦9,600 (us$26.70) per month, which is 53.3% of the country’s statutory minimum wage. the profits from the production and sale of #s" dúdú are largely dependent on the frequency of production. therefore, higher production frequency attracts higher profit. sellers similar to the producers, the vast majority of sellers of #s" dúdú in this study were female (96%, table 2). however, this is not to say that the males were not found engaging in the business, but they were far fewer in number. in probing this finding, we asked the only male participant to describe his motivation for venturing into a business that was presumed by many to be feminine in nature. he stated that the business was initially run by his mother. he decided to venture into the business after his mother’s death because she had established a sizable customer base. he said: . . . my mum sold these kinds of stuff at a point in time and i would usually assist her at the market whenever i returned from school during my childhood days. it was after her demise that i decided to venture into the business since we still had some of those that patronize her business coming around . . . i've been doing it ever since then. (male, seller, 54 years, lagos state) 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.10258 table 2. socio-demographic characteristics of yoruba sellers of !s" dúdú in the study variables and categories frequency percentage sex male female 1 23 4.2 95.8 age (m = 65) less than 50 years 50 years or more 3 21 12.5 87.5 highest level of education no formal education primary education secondary education 18 1 5 75.0 4.2 20.8 marital status single married separated or divorced widowed 1 4 2 17 4.2 16.7 8.3 70.8 position held business owner apprentice or employee 22 2 91.7 8.3 number of years in business less than 10 years 10 to 20 years more than 20 years 1 2 21 4.2 8.3 87.5 n 24 the majority of participants (approximately 88%) were aged 50 years or more (see table 2), which has been found in other studies (olaolorun & lawoyin, 2009). hence, the majority of #s" dúdú sellers in the study were older women. the domination of older women selling #s" dúdú was explained by the use of the soap by indigenous health and spiritual experts, such as babalawo, alfa, onisegun, and pastors, who prefer to purchase #s" dúdú from women who are post-menopausal: when any babalawo, alfa, onisegun, or pastor wants to buy #s" dúdú, they prefer to buy it from an elderly woman because they would not want to patronize a woman that still observes her menstrual cycle. this is because buying the soap from the latter will adversely affect the functionality of what they intend to use it for. (female, seller, 75 years, lagos state) it is, therefore, likely that the purchasing preferences of the experts may have influenced the proportion of older women in the #s" dúdú selling business. however, it is worthwhile to note that, just like the 7 adewusi & akanle: !s" dúdú: exploring the benefits published by scholarship@western, 2020 producers, the majority of black soap sellers (about 75%) had no formal education. furthermore, the majority (70.8%) of sellers were widows, which indicates that the sale of #s" dúdú constitutes an important economic opportunity for widows in southwestern nigeria (see table 2). also, of note is that, based on our findings, the #s" dúdú selling business is dominated by the yoruba. this may be linked to the fact that the study was conducted in a geographical space that is considered to be part of the yoruba nation (olutayo, 2014). the majority of business owners in this study were against the idea of engaging apprentices or employees in their businesses (91.7%) because candidates were perceived to lack sufficient knowledge on the subject matter due to the fact that they were generally quite young. lastly, table 2 shows that the majority of participants have been in the black soap business for more than two decades. this buttresses the point that the #s" dúdú business is a form of indigenous entrepreneurship that is often passed from one generation to the other (ogunbor, 2016). consumers as shown in table 3, the majority of #s" dúdú consumers were male. consumers also tended to dwell in urban settlements and were relatively young. the data show that 40.0% of consumers had a secondary school-level of education. it is interesting to note that, while producers and sellers of #s" dúdú are largely older, rural women with relatively low levels of education, the soap is largely consumed by young, moderately educated urban dwellers. the #s" dúdú entrepreneurs in the study were still working beyond the mandatory working age for the private and public sectors, which is 55 and 60 years respectively. in addition, they possessed relatively low levels of formal education, which is often a requirement to secure decent employment. when asked if they would consider starting an #s" dúdú business, most consumers perceived it as being incongruent with the identity of urban millennials and felt that the profits would not be sufficient to meet their material needs. in fact, many consumers viewed the soap business as “crude”; hence, it did not fit with their level of educational attainment and social status. !s" dúdú consumers were primarily yoruba and more than half were married. finally, the majority (73.1%) of respondents earned ₦18,000 (us$50) or more. this implies that few in the consumer group earned less than the statutory wage in nigeria. the foregoing suggests that #s" dúdú is in demand among (a) males, (b) those who are married, (c) those who identify as yoruba, (d) those who were born between the 1960s and 2000s, and (e) those with a secondary level of education. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.10258 table 3. socio-demographic characteristics of consumers of !s" dúdú in the study variables and categories frequency percentage sex male female 24 21 53.3 46.7 place of residence rural urban 14 31 31.1 68.9 age (m = 43) less than 50 years 50 years old or more 30 15 66.7 33.3 highest level of education no formal education primary education secondary education tertiary education 1 9 18 17 2.2 20.0 40.0 37.8 ethnic affiliation yoruba igbo hausa edo 35 4 1 5 77.8 8.9 2.2 11.1 marital status single married divorced or separated widowed 12 28 2 3 26.7 62.2 4.4 6.7 average monthly income less than ₦18,000 (>us$50) ₦18,000 or more ($us$50) 12 33 26.7 73.3 n 45 100.0 9 adewusi & akanle: !s" dúdú: exploring the benefits published by scholarship@western, 2020 the benefits of !s" dúdú production and sale profitability producers of #s" dúdú emphasized the profitability of the business. however, one participant stressed that substantial knowledge was required to make a good income from selling #s" dúdú. people may want to invest in the black soap business because of its potential profits, but without sufficient knowledge the result can be an outright collapse of the venture: the #s" dúdú business is a very profitable venture if, and only if, one is very knowledgeable about the whole business. if you invest ₦2,500 in the black soap business, you should expect a minimum of ₦7,500 in profits. but, if it were to be those that buy for use or those that want to resell, they can make up to ₦14,000. however, you must not venture into it without having good knowledge about the business. (female, producer, 41 years, oyo state) similarly, a participant asserted that #s" dúdú businesses must be very profitable because a woman she knew who ran a black soup business out of her home had built a new house within a short period of time: . . . it was the business she did that she was able to build a house for herself. she produces and sells #s" dúdú. occasionally, i usually help her sell whenever she goes out to collect money from other customers. (female, consumer, 23 years, ogun state) furthermore, a participant argued that her engagement in the #s" dúdú business had given her the financial means to send her children to school abroad. however, while stressing her achievement as an #s" dúdú entrepreneur, she also stated that the income generated from the business was largely dependent on the amount of money that was invested in it: i generate a lot of income from the #s" dúdú business to the extent that i am rich enough to send some of my children to study abroad. however, the quantum of profit gained from this soap business is dependent on the amount invested in it. when you invest a lot, it tends to draw large customers to you who you sell to at lower prices. for instance, when you gain ₦50 in a stock of soaps you sell for ₦1,000 to 500 customers each, you already gain ₦25,000. but when you buy in small quantities, you can’t expect large volume buyers to patronize your business because the quantity you sell is not much. besides, those who buy in small quantities sell their soap at higher prices than those who buy in large quantities. (female, seller, 61 years, lagos state) another participant explained that the #s" dúdú business was a lucrative one. this participant stated that she restocks her shop every 9 days, which is an indication that selling #s" dúdú is a fast-moving business: all the people you see here have been engaging in the business full-time since 1965. nine days cannot pass by without travelling to oyo state, specifically oja oba, oja boode, and one new market they just created, to buy at least a basket [of black soap]. (female, seller, 70 years, ogun state) 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.10258 source of employment in addition to large profits, another set of participants stated that #s" dúdú businesses created employment opportunities for interested persons. specifically, one of the participants stated that the processing of the soap involved a number of different stages, which required a number of people with the requisite skill to successfully make it: !s" dúdú creates employment opportunities for people that are interested in learning and being their own boss because soap is an essential commodity that is used on daily basis; we cannot do anything without using soap for healthy living and for perfect cleanliness. also, the production of black soap has a lot of processes in it, so it cannot be done by one person. it needs many hands for it to come out perfectly; in this case, it creates employment opportunities. (female, producer, 85 years, oyo state) participants stressed that businesses selling #s" dúdú also created employment opportunities. one participant shared that, in her experience, #s" dúdú is a business venture that creates employment opportunities and is also very profitable: it is a good product and a product that can create employment for the unemployed . . . i am happy to tell you that the income from #s" dúdú sales made at my mother's shop has made her a landlady. therefore, the business is highly profitable. imagine a business from which my mother could build a house and also she used it to send her children to tertiary institutions. that tells you that is a profitable product. (female, seller, 60 years, ogun state) one of the consumers of #s" dúdú, who had close contacts in the #s" dúdú business and was quite knowledgeable about it, supported the assertion that it was profitable. in particular, he stated that #s" dúdú sellers tend to make more money than producers. based on this fact, he stressed that many women from villages and towns in osun state had abandoned other handiwork to venture into the #s" dúdú business: those selling black soap gain more profits than those producing it. before a black soap producer builds one house, a black soap wholesaler or retailer would have built two houses. the majority of the ladies in ikirun and ada have their respective handiwork. however, they now abandon their handiwork for #s" dúdú because the selling aspect of the business is very profitable. (male, consumer, 73 years, ogun state) the foregoing showed that the production of #s" dúdú has two major economic benefits: high profitability and the creation of employment opportunities across all stages of the production process. however, the profitability of the business is dependent on the investor’s knowledge of #s" dúdú. job opportunities were often related to producing the components used in making #s" dúdú, as well as making the product itself. for instance, making eyin aro (mordant water), which is one of the main ingredients in #s" dúdú production, created jobs for local people. furthermore, the same benefits, profitability, and employment creation, were attached to the sale of #s" dúdú. selling was considered to be more profitable than producing #s" dúdú. the level of profitability of #s" dúdú selling business was seen as being largely dependent on the amount of money invested in it. 11 adewusi & akanle: !s" dúdú: exploring the benefits published by scholarship@western, 2020 entrepreneurs with relatively large investments in their #s" dúdú business often obtained the funds from a cooperative organization and/or thrift society. proximity to consumers also determines profitability, with wholesalers and retailers that were closer to consumers profiting more. these findings corroborate those of yusuf and okoruwa (1995) who reported that locally manufactured #s" dúdú was capable of financially supporting black soap entrepreneurs, generating employment opportunities for local people, and contributing to the revenue of countries. the benefits of !s" dúdú utilization health benefits participants described how they used #s" dúdú for its perceived health benefits during the in-depth interview sessions. one of the participants, who is a producer, stated that #s" dúdú can be used for what is known as first child syndrome. specifically, it involves the belief in yorubaland that, when a mother becomes pregnant, the pregnancy will affect the health of her other children, which could manifest in the form of a fever. several participants believed that #s" dúdú could be used to treat first child syndrome and similar conditions. however, one participant stated that the soap must be used in conjunction with certain herbs before the purported benefit can be derived: when a woman is not only pregnant but has already borne children in addition to the pregnancy, it is believed that the pregnancy can affect one or more of the woman’s children’s health and can manifest in the form of several illnesses. all one needs to do is to meet local herb sellers (i.e., eleweomo) and explain to them as they are very knowledgeable about the herbs needed to add to black soap for this purpose. (female, producer, 85 years, oyo state) participants stressed that #s" dúdú had curative and preventive benefits. they specifically argued that the soap could be used for curative purposes such as fever, jedijedi (haemorrhoids), and colds during harmattan2 season. a participant also stated that the soap was believed to play a role in purification and was used to treat infections in the blood: !s" dúdú can be used for several curative purposes including, but not limited to, treating fever and high body temperature, skin toning, and can be used as a coping tool during harmattan. for instance, in the olden days, our mothers would take a very small portion of #s" dúdú and add it to water. when the water foams, they then removed the remaining particles of the soap. the foamy water is what made the elderly of those days healthy. this is because it kills all infections in the blood. during this period, when our mothers want to take this mixture, they probably just had sexual intercourse. the portion of #s" dúdú that has been added to water will never melt. (female, seller, 75 years, oyo state) participants also described using #s" dúdú for opa eyin (i.e, back pain) and stomach pain. among the hausa, sabulun salo, which translates as “drinking soap,” is a central health practice: it cures stomach pain. that’s why we mallams [hausa men] use it. we cannot do without drinking it. that’s the reason we call them sabulun salo’ and sabulun wunka. sabulun salo means 2 harmattan is an atmospheric condition characterized by cool, dry wind that usually carries a large amount of dust. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.10258 “soap for drinking.” sabulun wunka means “soap for bathing.” (male, consumer, 50 years, lagos state) furthermore, in the study, more than half of the participants agreed that #s" dúdú is the best bathing soap; hence, must be used for every newborn’s first bath irrespective of the parents’ socioeconomic status. the practice of bathing newborns with black soap was to prevent the child from developing body odour later in life: this is the soap that is used on a newly born baby. other soaps can be used afterward but this is what they use first. this soap is used to wash the body, so the child won’t have body odour in years to come. (female, seller, 60 years, lagos state) another participant had this to say: yoruba call it oyi, a pungent odour that comes out from someone that sweats. at this point, the child is said to have developed oyi. this implies that the day the person was given birth to, was the day the person contacted that ailment because they didn’t bath him or her thoroughly as a newborn. that’s the reason we are expected to bath our children ourselves when we finish the hospital bathing. all this is to prevent the child from contacting oyi. (female, seller, 75 years, lagos state) another participant stated that #s" dúdú mixed with other herbs or fruits was used to treat teething issues and measles among children: it can serve many functions at a time. it can be used to prepare medicinal concoction for measles and teething among children et cetera. for instance, if you want to prepare a herbal cure for measles, the first thing you need is black soap with ewe arere [leaf of triplochiton scleroxylon and ewe eso [leaf of lagenaria breviflora]. for teething, you can use ewe arika [leaf of lecaniodiscus cupanioides], especially the roasted species, with black soap. (female, seller, 70 years, lagos state) for a teething pain treatment, another participant said: you can make use of coconut water with #s" dúdú to prepare a teething concoction for children. this concoction is to be used for bathing the child and you have to make sure that no one eats the coconut; the ailment will be transferred to anyone that eats the coconut. to prepare the teething concoction for children, you can also make use of corn tassels. (male, consumer, 73 years, ogun state) a participant described how it was used for measles by saying: for measles, we can use tagiri gbigbe [dried leaf of lagenaria breviflora] and ewe ririn [leaf of peperoma pellucida], with #s" dúdú; we will mix everything together and use it to bathe the child and the child will be alright. (female, seller, 30 years, ogun state) 13 adewusi & akanle: !s" dúdú: exploring the benefits published by scholarship@western, 2020 instead of a mixture of herbs and #s" dúdú, another participant stated a different method used for measles: measles can be cured when one buys #s" dúdú and mixes it with alcohol or warm water. the liquid is then applied to the affected person's body and a little teaspoon is given to the same person. the person will defecate and thereafter regain his or her health status. by doing this, the measles element within the bloodstreams will be pulled out by drinking the concoction and those on the skin will dry off. this will work when you buy original. (female, seller, 60 years, ogun state) the participant believed that #s" dúdú would only perform the aforementioned “wonders” if, and only if, authentic, unadulterated #s" dúdú is purchased. many participants prescribed several curative functions that #s" dúdú was said to have. a participant, who is a herb seller (i.e., eleweomo), stated that one can take #s" dúdú with a herb to cure feeling excessively cold. in addition, she also stated that the #s" dúdú, in addition to several roasted herbs, can be used to cure leg pains that are often experienced by the elderly, especially among women: there are so many things you can mix with #s" dúdú. for instance, if one is cold, you take ibon eta [part of a civet, a mammal, located around its anus and testicles], mix it with black soap, bathe with it, and one will feel alright. also, if something goes wrong with your leg, like arun ese [i.e., leg issues], we roast many things, mix it with soap, and package it in a plastic plate and one will use it to bathe. it will cure it. (female, seller, 70 years, ogun state) a seller of #s" dúdú in lagos state described what she believed to be a novel medicinal benefit in which #s" dúdú and lime water was used to treat fibroids. fibroids are abnormal growths that develop in or on a woman's uterus. sometimes these tumours become quite large and cause severe abdominal pain and heavy periods. the seller said that, in order to achieve a high level of functionality, the lime for the mixture must not be sourced from within the person’s vicinity. she mentioned two major methods that could be used: it can be used to cure fibroids. as it is, if you want to use it for fibroids, you’ll take a little morsel and squeeze the lime. this lime must not be bought outside; you can either get it from your backyard or from someone’s farm that is close to you with permission. you can swallow some portion of #s" dúdú and wash it down with the lime water. by going through this procedure, it is expected that the soap dissolves inside your stomach and correspondingly dissolve the fibroids gradually. for those that cannot go through the aforementioned process, the soap and lime water can be burnt to ashes and mixed with pap thereafter. (female, seller, 50 years, lagos state) a young participant stated that #s" dúdú was used in the treatment of open wounds. she specifically said that the use of methylated spirits and disinfectants proved to be ineffective when she had an open wound on her feet, and she decided to give #s" dúdú a try. she described two benefits of this method: her wound dried quickly, which had the secondary benefit of sparing her the pain from chemical-made disinfectants: 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.10258 i had an accident where i sustained several wounds. after a series of treatments, such as normal washing with spirits and disinfectants, the wound still maintained its freshness and it subjected me to serious pain. then, i remembered what i learned in class about #s" dúdú and i decided to give it a try. lo and behold, the wound dried the next day. (female, consumer, 25 years, lagos state) among the yoruba in southwest nigeria, #s" dúdú was seen as a critical medical supplement that was used to treat a wide range of conditions, including those commonly experienced by children, women, and the aged. black soap was important part of their health practices because it was affordable. it was seen as being effective and efficient in terms of treatment time. a number of scholars who have studied traditional medicine have found that soaps are a very common vehicles for the application of medicinal plants, particularly for the treatment of skin conditions (ahmed et al., 2005; ajaiyeoba et al., 2003; ajose, 2007; anyakoha, 2011; erinoso et al., 2016). according to participants, #s" dúdú is used for health issues such as first child syndrome, fever, cold, stomach pain, body odour, measles, teething, fibroid, and as a disinfectant and drying agent. ajaiyeoba et al. (2003) also found that black soap was used to treat a wide range of illnesses. oyakanmi et al. (2014) examined the quality of #s" dúdú with that of industrial-made soap and found the former to be of higher quality. however, the participants stressed the importance of using authentic #s" dúdú, given the recent rise in knock-off black soap on the market. the benefits of #s" dúdú were linked to its quality, which required that the proper procedures and rules were strictly followed and adhered to by the producer. skin benefits participants also stressed that black soap has many skin benefits, particularly if a person uses black soap for regular bathing. a black soap seller stated that #s" dúdú is chemical free with a natural and pleasant fragrance that is suitable for all skin types. this respondent stated that the soap was known to make the skin glow and could be used by people with rashes and acne. in her words: it has several benefits because it has no chemicals added to it, it is so natural and ancient, and it does have a natural and pleasant fragrance that won’t irritate even the most sensitive skin types. it smells nice and it contains some natural ingredients that make the skin beautiful and glowing. it contains no chemicals and is a valuable rashes fighter; it is also good for people with black acne. such a person with body rashes and acne should use the #s" dúdú at least twice a day to cleanse the body and face both in the morning and at night before bed for the best results. (female, seller, 61 years oyo state) a consumer of black soap said: . . . without mixing any [chemical] substance with black soap, when used, it makes the skin glow. the interesting part is that it works immediately on the skin because of the natural ingredients when compared to western or modern soap. black soap is used for all skin complexions. however, some people complain that, when they use black soap, they get darker; these people might have purchased the adulterated ones. the original #s" dúdú enhances your natural complexion. (male, consumer, 41 years, lagos state) additionally, #s" dúdú had a number of beauty applications: 15 adewusi & akanle: !s" dúdú: exploring the benefits published by scholarship@western, 2020 another thing is that there are some people using it as a bleaching condiment after they might have added osun (i.e., camwood) to #s" dúdú. it can also be used to remove stretch marks. i also heard that ladies mix #s" dúdú with indian hemp to grow their hair. being a local soap, one can mix other herbal condiments with it. (male, consumer, 50 years, ogun state) one could say that #s" dúdú not only performs as a medical treatment, but it also plays a role in skin cleansing and beautification, especially when other natural substances were added to it. ukwendu (2019) also found that #s" dúdú was used in the treatment of rashes and black acne on the face and body. lin et al. (2017) found that black soap was used for a wide range of dermatologic conditions, including acne, dark spots, razor bumps, eczema, and fine lines. ikpoh et al. (2012) compared the efficacy of different types of soap in treating skin conditions and found black soap worked significantly better than dettol, dudu osun, and zee and tura soap. as in its medicinal uses, the skin benefits were linked to the use of authentic #s" dúdú used in conjunction with other ingredients. although, western-based knowledge could inform these health-related treatments, it does not fit well into the belief system of yoruba; hence, they consider it to be inappropriate (akanle et al., 2017). therefore, the use of #s" dúdú is perceived by the yoruba as a culturally appropriate intervention that meets the health, hygiene, and beauty needs of people living in yoruba communities (see also erinoso et al., 2016). conclusion this article explored the benefits associated with the production, sale, and use of #s" dúdú in southwest nigeria. !s" dúdú is a profitable business for producers and sellers that contributes to their livelihoods. !s" dúdú is also used to treat a number of health conditions, such as first child syndrome, fever, cold, haemorrhoids, stomach pain, body odour, measles, teething, fibroid, and as a disinfectant and drying agent. however, #s" dúdú required extensive knowledge to use properly because it often had to be combined with other herbs in order to have the desired effect. !s" dúdú provides income and employment for people who have fewer opportunities in the society, such as people with lower levels of education, widows, and older women, and enables people to address health-related issues using an accessible and affordable resource. !s" dúdú and the indigenous knowledge associated with it could help indigenous people and communities improve their socio-economic conditions and health. therefore, the use of #s" dúdú can help drive the un’s sustainable development goals, especially goal 1 (no poverty) and goal 3 (good health), if they are well integrated into the sustainable development policy and programmes in indigenous communities in southwestern nigeria. policy recommendations the study shows that the sale and production of #s" dúdú is a critical indigenous livelihood, particularly for older, widowed women with lower levels of education. at the production stage, there were entrepreneurial opportunities that could conveniently accommodate four value chain actors, which include: the supply of raw materials and agro wastes such as cocoa pod, locus bean pod, corn cob, and sawdust that forms the ash used in the production stage; direct supply of ash to be used in #s" dúdú production; building and supply of technical equipment used in the production process; and the production and supply of authentic eyin or omi aro (i.e., mordant water). in addition, there were at least two business opportunities at the market stage as #s" dúdú beauty experts or soap sellers, which was 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.10258 found to be highly profitable. in achieving this, there is a need for interventions that will incorporate #s" dúdú into policies and programmes aimed at yoruba communities. for instance, vocational centres could be established to support entrepreneurs by teaching business and marketing skills. this study calls for an expansion of entrepreneurship curricula in order to accommodate indigenous entrepreneurship praxis, especially among the economically vulnerable women across africa. based on health-related benefits attached to the use of #s" dúdú, the soap could also be integrated into health policies to improve health, particularly among children, nursing mothers, and the elderly. in achieving this, further research in partnership with indigenous communities is required to understand the health remedies and their uses, their place within the culture, and how they can be incorporated into the economic and health policies of the nigerian nation. this could help achieve sustainable development in indigenous yoruba communities in southwest nigeria. references abimbola, k. 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(1995). transforming wastes into money: the case of black soap making using cocoa pod husks. in a.j. agegeye, & w.o. ajayi (eds.), cocoa revolution in nigeria: proceedings of a national seminar on revolutionizing nigeria’s cocoa industry (pp. 101-112). adaptive research group. traditional indigenous approaches to healing and the modern welfare of traditional knowledge, spirituality and lands: a critical reflection on practices and policies taken from the canadian indigenous example the international indigenous policy journal volume 2 issue 4 traditional knowledge, spirituality, and lands article 2 october 2011 traditional indigenous approaches to healing and the modern welfare of traditional knowledge, spirituality and lands: a critical reflection on practices and policies taken from the canadian indigenous example julian a. robbins trent university, jrobbins@trentu.ca jonathan dewar jdewar@ahf.ca recommended citation robbins, j. a. , dewar, j. (2011). traditional indigenous approaches to healing and the modern welfare of traditional knowledge, spirituality and lands: a critical reflection on practices and policies taken from the canadian indigenous example. the international indigenous policy journal, 2(4) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.2 this research is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. traditional indigenous approaches to healing and the modern welfare of traditional knowledge, spirituality and lands: a critical reflection on practices and policies taken from the canadian indigenous example abstract traditional indigenous approaches to healing and the modern welfare of traditional knowledge, spirituality and lands: a critical reflection on practices and policies taken from the canadian indigenous example in order for traditional knowledge to be maintained and to develop, it has to be practiced. traditional healing provides a vehicle for this to occur. in canada, the spiritual revitalization of indigenous communities and individuals often involves the use numerous components of traditional healing. these elements are reflected most clearly at the grassroots level, however, current indigenous programs delivered by indigenous and governmental agencies have made some accommodating efforts as well. perhaps most importantly, traditional knowledge and indigenous spirituality hinges on the maintenance and renewal of relationships to the land. indigenous land bases and the environment as a whole remain vitally important to the practice of traditional healing. a focus on indigenous healing, when discussing indigenous knowledge systems and spirituality, is paramount today due to the large scale suppression of indigenous cultural expressions during the process of colonization. with respect to policy, there appears to be a historical progression of perception or attitude towards indigenous traditional healing in canada from one of disfavour to one favour. there are nevertheless continuing challenges for traditional healing. mainstream perceptions and subsequent policy implementations sometimes still reflect attitudes that were formulated during the decline of traditional healing practice during colonization processes. as a consequence the ability for particular communities to maintain and use their specific understandings of indigenous knowledge continues encounter obstacles. indigenous knowledge systems are living entities and not relics of the past. today, these knowledge systems are still greatly being applied to help indigenous communities and indigenous people recover from intergenerational pain and suffering endured during the colonization process. future policy development and implementation should aim to support indigenous peoples and communities when they decide to learn about, maintain and build upon the knowledge amassed by their ancestors. acknowledgments julian robbins recently returned to his studies and is currently a phd candidate in indigenous studies at trent university. during a hiatus from his studies he was employed as a research officer with the first nations centre (fnc) of the national aboriginal health organization (naho) (august2005-august 2009). since august, 2005, mr. robbins focused on work at the fnc to support and communicate the role that traditional knowledge plays in first nations health (through the inclusion of the perspectives of first nations elders and healers in the fnc’s research agendas). julian robbins is mixed race with mi’kmaq ancestry. jonathan dewar is director of research at the aboriginal healing foundation and is a former director of the métis centre at the national aboriginal health organization. he has several years of first nations-, inuit-, and métis-specific policy and research experience in a variety of areas in both government and non-government organizations and was the founding executive director of the qaggiq theatre company in iqaluit. jonathan is completing a doctorate in canadian studies, specializing in the role of art and artists in healing and reconciliation. he is descended from huron-wendat, french, and scottish canadian grandparents. this article is dedicated to the elders and traditional healers who continue to be of service to indigenous communities and to the memory and teachings of mi'kmaq healer david gehue. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. this research is available in the international indigenous policy journal: http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/2 http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/2?utm_source=ir.lib.uwo.ca%2fiipj%2fvol2%2fiss4%2f2&utm_medium=pdf&utm_campaign=pdfcoverpages introduction in a context of indigenous approaches to healing, this paper examines some of the impacts that a renewed focus on indigenous spirituality and traditional knowledge is having, primarily in indigenous canada. in order for traditional knowledge to be maintained and to develop, it has to be practiced. traditional healing is a vehicle that can be used for fulfilling these objectives. in north america at least, the spiritual revitalization of indigenous communities and individuals involves the engagement of numerous components of traditional healing. these elements are reflected at the grassroots level, in current indigenous programs delivered by indigenous and governmental agencies and in governmental policies. perhaps most importantly, traditional knowledge and indigenous spirituality hinges on the maintenance and renewal of relationships to the land. indigenous land bases, and the environment as a whole, remain vitally important to the practice of traditional healing. in essence, indigenous traditional healing involves direct practical application of indigenous knowledge systems and spirituality. this article commences with a preliminary discussion of some complications that exist in trying to define indigenous traditional healing in an academic context. subsequently, it is explained why it is important to frame a contemporary discussion about indigenous knowledge and spirituality within a context of traditional healing. this is followed by an examination of indigenous traditional healing that speaks to some of the key issues that are unfolding on indigenous lands in canada – particularly the relationship to land, indigenous languages and the importance of grassroots movements. next, the article provides a reflection on past and present policies around traditional healing in canada. finally, using the aboriginal healing foundation as a case study and primary example, some future policy directions are suggested alongside the concluding remarks. congruent with the recent indigenous spiritual revitalization, indigenous communities are employing elements of their traditional healing systems to deal with modern day mental, physical and spiritual illnesses. through the analysis offered in this paper, however, it will become evident that there are still many existing tensions and barriers that do not allow indigenous knowledge systems – and, as a result, indigenous traditional healing – to fully flourish. what is indigenous traditional healing? providing some overview of indigenous traditional healing is essential in order to set the stage for the rest of the discussion offered in this paper. often, there are mainstream misconceptions and false labelling associated with indigenous traditional healing because of a general disagreement as to where exactly it should be placed on the broad spectrum of western sciences and religions. many mainstream institutions that have developed out of these eurocentric knowledge paradigms have examined traditional healing – and the tools and remedies associated with it – through the lenses of their own disciplines (e.g., university departments, self-help/new-age communities, governmental departments and others). relatively speaking, these institutions represent external lenses of interpretation that alter how traditional indigenous healing is both perceived and interpreted. there are at least three other general reasons as to why all-purpose definitions of indigenous traditional healing are difficult to formulate: first, indigenous cultures are noted for their oral tradition. knowledge of healing and medicine is passed orally from one generation to the next. this means that direct experience with healers and traditional healing is one of the most important factors in being able to grasp the nature of traditional healing. often, an examination of research literature only allows one to formulate concepts and opinions about traditional healing. thus, analysis and presentation of these concepts and opinions can reflect different levels of ‘rootedness’ with respect to the true nature of 1 robbins and dewar: traditional indigenous approaches to healing and the modern welfare of traditional knowledge, spirituality and lands: a critical reflection on practices and policies taken from the canadian indigenous example published by scholarship@western, 2011 traditional healing. in part, the accuracy of this reflection depends upon the personal experience of the individual author(s) /researcher(s). second, indigenous languages and cultures are different and extremely diverse across the globe. a definition of traditional healing in a respective indigenous language may not be directly translatable into english, or across indigenous languages and cultures. for example, in canada, métis elders indicated the importance of their language (michif) to métis health because it offers a different world view of how you see yourself in relationship to the earth. speaking michif and living michif are never described separately. to live michif means showing respect to elders and children; and the need to work to earn the respect of others. the elders’ memories of speaking michif are drawn from a time when their parents and grandparents were still alive and their communities and homes were filled with michif... use of michif language kinship terms (nohkom,mataant,mon nohk,mon kozin) should be recognized as a widely used method of identifying one’s métis identity. michif kinship terms were often used with great affection, and retaining the use of these terms is critical to the continued use of michif. the names and terms described important relationships in the métis community. importance of the extended family in métis communities was, and continues to be, key to the health of métis. (métis centre, naho, 2008) in the cree language, kihteayak describes an old or mature individual who does ceremonies whereas otsapahcikewenaw are people who do ceremonies. an otsapaheak is one who sees into the future or helps with things; a maskikiweniow is like a medicine person who deals with medicine (edge and mccallum, 2006). while there is sometimes no literal translation for medicine in many native american cultures (hershman and campion, 1985), there are often several words which identify people who function in a healing capacity within the community. furthermore, with respect to culture, there are significant regional differences – for instance, among canadian, american and south american tribes – and, thus, there are many different points of divergence among tribes (martin-hill, 2009a). thirdly, the term traditional is a british colonial concept disliked by many indigenous groups and it is a term that scholars have introduced to indigenous peoples in english speaking parts of the world. most indigenous healing practitioners would have referenced a complex set of medical practices and beliefs as simply medicine. in addition, specialized fields exist within the practice of traditional healing/medicine. for example, one could consult with a spiritualist, herbalist, diagnosis specialist, and medicine man/woman. it is also possible that a person may possess one, some or all of these gifts (martin-hill, 2003). elders and healers who dawn martin-hill spoke with in the development of her paper “traditional medicine in contemporary contexts: protecting and respecting indigenous knowledge and medicine” (2003) were uncomfortable with the term traditional medicine because it is not an indigenous concept. therefore, it becomes a rather nebulous term that does not engage the full spectrum of knowledge interpretation that elders and healers have to offer. further illustrative of these types of difficulties are evident in the response of one inuit elder who was asked about the nature of traditional healing. her response indicated that she was taught that old time inuit shamanism is different from traditional healing (arn’arnaaq, 2010). reasons for this response might include: the possibility that traditional healing evolves over time; the influences of other religious traditions like christianity; or the fact that in the literature, the practice of inuit healers was often referred to as shamanism – for example as depicted in some of the works of the danish-inuit ethnologist and explorer kund rasmussen (1929). nonetheless, at least conceptually, there are some commonalities in approaches to indigenous traditional healing that are worth mentioning. the definition of traditional healing developed by 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.2 velimirovic (1990) and modified by royal commission on aboriginal peoples (rcap) (1996) describes traditional healing as “practices designed to promote mental, physical and spiritual well being that are based on beliefs[,] which go back to the time before the spread of western scientific bio-medicine” (wagemakers-schiff, 2003, velimirovic, 1990 and rcap 1996). when indigenous people refer to traditional healing, they are speaking of the use of herbal remedies as well as specific ceremonies and rituals to promote spiritual, mental, physical and psychological well-being (rcap, 1996). the fact that indigenous traditional healing can address several different areas of health means that it is a holistic concept. the physical, mental, emotional and spiritual aspects of the human being are all interrelated; weakness in any of these areas causes a person to become unbalanced. for example, physical manifestations of illness may continue to appear until the individual accepts the teaching of how their illness ties into the laws of the universe or natural law (lee, 1996). healers may use certain traditional medicines and/or ceremonies in their work to keep away illnesses and/or improve physical, mental or spiritual health (cooke, 2010). as well, indigenous traditional healing does not occur in isolation. willie ermine, a cree scholar and ethicist thinks about indigenous knowledge and traditional healing through a lens he calls “community mind and thought” (ermine, 2009). traditional medicine and traditional healing come from this community mind. furthermore, working to maintain and understand traditional healing and medicine is not for us, but for our children because they are the future (2009). there is an emphasis in indigenous traditional healing that centres on the connection that a human being has to the planet itself. arvol looking horse emphasizes that indigenous health systems “view the earth as a source of life rather than a resource” (looking horse, 2009). the earth’s health is very much connected to human health. the diversity of this connection may be expressed through intricate relationships to the land. for example, the hopi may have snake medicine but indigenous people in the north west territory would have medicine for frost bite (martin-hill, 2003). indeed, heterogeneity is an issue that should be mentioned in discussions of traditional healing. communities often have different understandings of traditional healing as well as different needs. therefore, a healing program in an urban centre, for example, might require different solutions than a healing program in a remote northern setting.1 1 for example, building a nation (ban) inc. is located in downtown saskatoon, saskatchewan. like many urban aboriginal health centres, ban caters to many aboriginals from different nations and many clients are troubled individuals who have been down-pressed by their interactions with the mainstream system. (waldram, innes, kaweski and redman, 2008). although not a substitute for nature, the creation and maintenance of safe spaces, like ban (to do aboriginal healing work) can be seen as particularly important for aboriginal populations in urban environments. as well, since there may be many different indigenous cultures represented, especially in the larger urban centres, indigenous spaces may take on different dynamics to respond to various needs. in contrast, in one inuit case study (fletcher and denham 2008), it was found that the distinctions around traditional and non-traditional practices were not particularly evident and that the notion of tradition becomes complex when linked to healing objectives. one person suggested that a reason for this non-distinction between traditional and non-traditional practices was that because in this community (like most in nunavut), inuktitut is the language of everyday life. thus, through dialogue in their language, people are engaging in cultural continuity and tradition at every moment. 3 robbins and dewar: traditional indigenous approaches to healing and the modern welfare of traditional knowledge, spirituality and lands: a critical reflection on practices and policies taken from the canadian indigenous example published by scholarship@western, 2011 traditional healing as a discussion context for the well being of contemporary indigenous spirituality and knowledge systems framing a discussion about indigenous spirituality, traditional knowledge and lands in a context of indigenous traditional healing makes sense, if one attends to the historical happenings linked to colonization. community and individual healing work is sometimes required so that the pain and suffering indigenous peoples endured, as a result of these colonizing forces, can be appropriately dealt with and released. in canada, the integrity of existing indigenous healing systems was interrupted when the government outlawed first nations traditional medical practices and ceremonies. this interruption was mirrored in policies like the amendment to the indian act2 in 1884, which banned ceremonies, such as the sundance and the potlatch: the act was amended to ban the "sun dance" an important ritual among the lakota and other plains aboriginal cultures. on the west coast the "pot latch", an elaborate ceremony of feasting and gift giving was also banned. with an eye to forced assimilation, the act authorized the forced removal of children to residential schools and stripped any indian who obtained a university education or ordination of his rights under the act. (canada’s first peoples, n.d.) first nations traditional healing was practiced in these events and others but they were often deemed as unholy or witchcraft by christians. some first nations people were sent to prison if they were caught practicing or using traditional healing (assembly of manitoba chiefs, n.d.). this ban on indigenous healing in canada was reinforced through initiatives by people like duncan campbell scott who served as deputy superintendent of the department of indian affairs in canada from 1913 to 1932. on december 15th, 1921, scott wrote a letter to his indian agents across the country stating that “it is observed with alarm that the holding of dances [healing ceremonies] by the indians on their reserves is on the increase, and that these practices tend to disorganize the efforts with the department is putting forth to make them self-supporting” (campbell-scott, 1921). the letter goes on to instruct the indian agents to use their utmost endeavours to “dissuade the indians from excessive indulgence in the practice of dancing” and equates first nations healing ceremonies to “demoralizing amusements” (1921). this ban lasted until 1951, during which time some elders and medicine people took their medicines and community ceremonies underground. adding to this, indian residential schools in north america, which operated for a significant time, are now viewed as a devastating period when children were separated from their parents to be educated in the ways of the colonizer. in 1920, campbell-scott made attendance to residential school mandatory for first nations children in canada. in these schools, reports of physical, sexual and mental abuse were not at all uncommon. it was not until 1958 that indian affairs inspectors recommended the abolition of the schools (residential schools time line, 2008). thus, when discussing indigenous knowledge systems and spirituality, a focus on indigenous healing is paramount because of the large scale suppression of indigenous cultural expression during this the colonization process. consequently, there are at least two important reasons as to why, at present, a significant amount of indigenous spirituality seems to be closely linked with traditional healing. first, indigenous communities have recently reclaimed the right to be able to practice traditional healing in the open. second, there is a need for traditional healing in indigenous communities due to pain and suffering endured during colonization (e.g., residential schools). 2 the indian act is a document that attempts to regulate the majority of activities in the lives of first nations people in canada. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.2 the literature validates these reasons as it suggests that for optimum health outcomes, use of traditional indigenous health perspectives (indigenous knowledge) is paramount to the planning and development of contemporary healing for indigenous communities (rcap, 1996; chandler and lalonde, 1998; roué, 2006; baker et. al., 1987). furthermore, as aboriginal communities and individuals continue to accept both traditional and modern roles and responsibilities in health and healing, sustaining these efforts is critical to ensure distinction from mainstream health and social systems (nwac, 2005). the well-being of indigenous lands and languages indigenous lands and languages provide the foundation for indigenous traditional healing, spirituality and knowledge systems. traditional perceptions of indigenous lands and languages are two key elements in the indigenous consciousness that are connected to concepts and ways of being that existed in pre-contact environments. for indigenous peoples, accumulated knowledge of the land and the universe as well as the subsequent expression of these concepts through indigenous languages were key factors in maintaining the continuity of indigenous knowledge systems. these knowledge systems have been passed down inter-generationally through respective oral traditions. lands factors such as loss of land, resource mining, urbanization and others have resulted in traditional healing playing a part in contemporary expressions of indigenous knowledge systems and spiritualities. there is a modern day need to protect natural healing spaces (such as sacred sites used by indigenous communities) due to large scale industrial development projects. ultimately, indigenous traditional healing acknowledges the importance of balance in the relationship to one’s self, family, community, nation, earth and universe. this is not a relationship in the abstract sense but it is one based in the reality of authentic relationships. for example, by relationship to earth we are not speaking about an abstract romanticized concept. relationship to earth involves some discussion of the very concrete and sometimes politically charged issue of land use. as a foundation, indigenous access and control over land is central to indigenous knowledge and the protection and use of indigenous healing methodologies. even in contemporary times, grassroots indigenous peoples are being persecuted for trying to maintain their connection to the vital ‘medicine base’ of land and territory. thus, while much of the literature speaks to significance of protecting, creating, maintaining and finding indigenous healing spaces in contemporary times – natural and other (fletcher, christopher and aaron denham, 2008; waldram, 2008; fiske et. al, 2008; williams, 2001; nwac 2007), distinctions should be made between a physical ‘healing space’ that exists as a result of organizational or governmental programming versus a connection to indigenous lands and territories. consider the case of the tahltan people, who were engaged in a heated battle with government forces and mining corporations during a period beginning in 2005. tahltan territory is located in northern british columbia (bc), canada, and encompasses about 93,500 square kilometres. the northwestern border runs parallel to the alaskan/canadian border, and includes part of the yukon territory. the south/eastern border includes the upper nass tributaries and western half of the stikine plateau, including what tahltan refer to as the sacred headwaters of the stikine, nass and skeena rivers. tahltans currently make up over half of the residents in tahltan territory and are dispersed between three main villages: telegraph creek, dease lake and iskut (tahltan central council, n.d.). 5 robbins and dewar: traditional indigenous approaches to healing and the modern welfare of traditional knowledge, spirituality and lands: a critical reflection on practices and policies taken from the canadian indigenous example published by scholarship@western, 2011 the staking and claiming boom in tahltan territories was due to record-breaking global mineral prices and to development incentives by the bc government. climate change has also played a role. glaciers are fast disappearing and mining companies are rushing to claim newly available mineral deposits that were previously hidden under thick layers of ice. as a result of the rapid surge in large scale mining projects, the three tahltan communities are facing major social, economic and environmental upheavals. this stress on tahltan and other indigenous communities is magnified by unethical resource development (wonder, n.d.). such an aggressive approach to resource discovery and development sharp contrast the value systems of the traditional tahltan. the tahltan relationship between the people and the land, as with many indigenous peoples, is marked by a deep respect for the land as provider and a strongly held belief that the people are keepers of the land. this prevailing attitude has led to a reciprocal relationship in which the tahltan people look to the land for sustenance, guidance and healing (tahltan central council, n.d.) like a mother, our land provided food, medicine, and shelter ... people needed a good knowledge base and a set of skills which enabled them to live on the land. knowledge and skills were taught by our relatives and our elders. so, everyone learned about the land in detail ... (wonder, n.d.) in continued efforts to protect this symbiotic relationship with the earth, tahltan elders used a blockade to stop the heavy equipment and excavators belonging to contractors of fortune minerals. in retaliation, the mining corporation brought about a court-ordered injunction giving royal canadian mounted police (rcmp) authority to arrest the tahltan elders. in another example from north-western alaska, a study suggested that the therapeutic value of a natural hot springs used by the maniilaq inuit was complemented and/or enhanced by the integration of inuit cultural, social and spiritual components. the authors of the study argued that simple heat treatments or whirlpool therapy lack important cultural contexts. as a result, a program was sponsored at the serpentine hot springs in the maniilaq area. this program allowed western-trained physicians to refer patients for physical therapy in an environment that was, contextually, more culturally appropriate and spiritually significant. local elders recalled the hot springs being used for both healing and recreational purposes (book, dixson and kerchner, 1983). importantly, this modern healing space utilized the natural environment in concert with a program that supported and validated the traditional healing context of a local inuit community. nonetheless, a tradition such as this that has been adapted to modern times would not be able to continue if, for example, a mining company or the tourist industry gained control over the land where the hot springs are located. what good would this natural hot spring be if it became polluted or if its use was affected in other ways by those who claim a stake on it primarily in the name of financial gain? examples such as this are found all across indigenous territories. indigenous people across the globe are busy trying to protect such natural healing spaces. in canada, while indigenous ceremonies and healing traditions are no longer outlawed, many indigenous communities are still persecuted or viewed in a negative light by governments and corporations, when they attempt to defend their relationship to the land. indigenous desires to protect and preserve the environment arise from traditional concepts that support the maintenance of healthy relationships to the land. languages although there does not appear to be a significant amount of literature specifically written on the importance of indigenous languages to traditional healing (mcivor, 2010), it is something that 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.2 requires some attention in a discussion that addresses the wellbeing of indigenous knowledge systems. language is how knowledge is encoded and a belief among many elders is that indigenous languages developed organically from the land (lamouche, 2010). for indigenous populations, language is a strong indicator of cultural continuity and community health. in a 2007 study, hallet, chandler and lalonde correlated knowledge of indigenous language with incidents of youth suicide. the data from the study indicated that, in british columbia, those indigenous communities where a majority of members reported conversational knowledge of an indigenous language experienced low to absent youth suicide rates. by contrast, in those communities where less than half of the members reported conversational knowledge, suicide rates were six times greater. furthermore, the authors’ findings indicated that language was a far more accurate predictive factor for health compared to several other predictors that the authors examined in previous studies (2007). arguably, since indigenous languages contain encoded specifics about traditional healing methodologies, knowledge of these languages allows one to more effectively access and transmit this healing knowledge to those that need it. thus, one could hypothesize that the continuity of indigenous healing knowledge may be at least one contributing factor to the low rates of indigenous youth suicide, where language retention was high. knowledge of indigenous languages can contribute greatly to the overall holistic health of individuals and communities. traditional healing and grassroots movements central to the revitalization of indigenous spirituality and use of indigenous knowledge systems has been grassroots endeavours that begin on the land and occur from within indigenous communities. with or without a healing program, indigenous peoples continue to find meaning in their traditional cultures. they also are aware of the role that traditional knowledge plays in healing (rcap roundtable, 1993). arvol looking horse, the lakota 19th generation keeper of the white buffalo calf sacred pipe, is known worldwide for his work on the promotion of peace and continues to maintain his connection to the grassroots. growing up with traditional healing, he likens indigenous sacred sites to the equivalent of hospitals and educational institutions (looking horse, 2009). an accomplished horseman, looking horse was also a leader in the unity ride healing movement that, in 1986, began to retrace the journey of chief sitanka, which ended in the 1892 massacre at wounded knee, south dakota. subsequent rides journeyed through other parts of the united states and canada. the unity ride has continued to grow out of the grassroots and a recent ride in the summer of 2010 brought the unity riders to winnipeg, manitoba, canada for the first of seven national gatherings of the indian residential schools truth and reconciliation commission of canada. a catalyst for healing is a strong will to help the people. for example, take the story of elder joe jacobs who wanted to shed some light on the all too common devastation that diabetes brings to indigenous communities. jacobs had a dream more than a decade ago and created a wampum belt as a result of his vision. the story of the teiakonekwenisatsikhe:tare — meaning ‘our blood is sweet’–– involved the designing of a wampum belt that travelled through numerous indigenous communities delivering a message about living a healthy lifestyle. jacobs’ travels and message proved to be a catalyst for diabetes awareness programs that sprouted up in numerous indigenous communities. for jacobs, many inspirational and spiritual events also happened along the way. this is an example of how people and communities can begin to return to a good state of health through the work of compassionate and gifted individuals that have a strong will to help (jacobs and gibson, 2003). there are undoubtedly many more of these types of healing stories that go unwritten, yet continue to take place at the grassroots level. although the majority of the traditional healing literature does not discuss the grassroots level, awareness of the grassroots does affect how one might interpret 7 robbins and dewar: traditional indigenous approaches to healing and the modern welfare of traditional knowledge, spirituality and lands: a critical reflection on practices and policies taken from the canadian indigenous example published by scholarship@western, 2011 this literature – particularly some of the earlier writings. for example, in 1968, a detailed study was conducted by the indian health service on the papago indians in arizona. the question asked was: "what do you think of the primary medical service you received?" it is proclaimed that in a survey of 5,372 indians respondents, only 8% referenced the medicine man as their primary source of medical attention (crockett, 1971). what crockett refuses to acknowledge, however, is that several ceremonies associated with traditional healing were outlawed by north american governments and were only officially allowed again in canada through the 1951 revision to the indian act and 1934 in the usa with the ratification of the indian reorganization act. unfortunately, however, the real impact of these policy changes most likely did not appear until the 1960’s to early 70’s and, in some cases, the residual effects of banning traditional spiritual practices have lingered to the present. therefore, it is fair to suggest that indigenous people, who responded to such surveys at the time, might choose not to mention or detail any of their personal experiences with traditional healing. these attitudes have carried over into the present and many elders are still very cautious about bringing traditional teachings into the open. some, however, are starting to reach out cautiously to the health professions community, in order to build collaborative relationships (tillson, 2002). dolchok (2003) indicates that when some healers were asked about traditional healing, they said that it was disturbing to be called a healer because that is not what they are. affirming and acknowledging the existence of grassroots involvement with indigenous traditional healing offers an important perspective, particularly for academics and researchers. that is, there is an existing research gap between the community practice of traditional healing and the few cases that are available for review in the traditional healing literature. in order to close this research gap, it is important for researchers to develop and nurture meaningful long term relationships with indigenous communities and healers. (martin-hill, 2009b). indigenous traditional healing policy: past and present even with the arrival of settler societies in north america and subsequent conflicts, indigenous communities have managed, to varying degrees, to maintain continuity of their relationships to their lands, languages and knowledge systems. as a result, settler governments have had to negotiate with indigenous communities. these negotiations, which have been ongoing almost since the time of arrival of settler societies, have resulted in policies that, depending on the time period, intended to inhibit or enhance indigenous spiritualities and knowledge systems. there appears to be a historical progression of perceptions or attitudes towards indigenous traditional healing in north america, from one of disfavour (and something that does not have a place in modern society) to one of favour (and one that has a place in contemporary indigenous communities and mainstream society). nonetheless, there are ongoing challenges for traditional healing. for instance, mainstream perceptions and subsequent policies with respect to traditional healing require further development (martin-hill, 2009c; anderson, 2010; anderson et al., 2003; bakx, 1991). many policies still residually reflect outdated views that were formulated during the decline of traditional healing practices, through colonization (nwac, 2007). in examining some of the earlier writings on indigenous traditional healing, one is acutely aware of biases that favour modern western medicine while relegating indigenous traditional healing methodologies to a thing of the past. during this time, a powerful scientific-biological narrative on evolution (as developed by charles darwin) was inappropriately applied to cultural and social interactions. for example, david crocket (1971), who worked in the office of program planning and evaluation, indian health service, usa, asserted that cultural barriers had been broken and indians were becoming more assimilated into the so called ‘american way of life’. crocket supports this claim with the 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.2 statistic that at the time 97% of native american births occurred in hospitals, as opposed to 88% in 1955. he further argued that in the united states, there were more native american visits to the indian health service not because of greater frequency of illness but rather because of a greater acceptance of the western medical model (1971). in another example from earlier literature it is stated that “many indian therapies appear so bizarre that it is difficult to believe that they were effective, for example, the use of tobacco smoke blown into aching ears” (hershman and campion, 1985). the authors go on to state that: today, indians use white doctors and if the indian medicine man eventually disappears he will nevertheless have left mankind an important store of remedies and curing methods which however irrational his notions about them have often proved useful to the conquerors and will stand as his enduring monument (1985). in the earlier literature, indigenous traditional healing is, especially, relegated to a realm of magic or spoken of as something necessary to salvage, because it’s something “which will only be available to us for a very short time” (webber, 1973). traditional healing is spoken about primarily in the past tense as an occurrence on a continuum that is moving towards extinction. these types of attitudes mirror historical policies of governmental indian affairs departments (such as those of duncan campbell-scott’s) mentioned earlier in this paper. while since the 1970s there has been policy developments that reflect changes to legislation outlawing the practice of traditional ceremonies of north america’s indigenous people (martin-hill, 2003), the traditional healing literature seems to take a while to reflect these types of changes because writings from the 1970’s and even the 1980’s tended to speak about indigenous healing traditions as a thing of the past and approaching extinction (crockett, 1971; webber, 1973; hershman and campion, 1985). more contemporary literature, starting in the mid 1990’s, illustrates a general attitude that affirms the important role traditional indigenous healing approaches play in maintaining the good health of indigenous peoples (rcap, 1996; attagutsiaq et al., 2003; roué, 2006; williams, 2001; edge and mccallum, 2006). recognition and affirmation of the importance of traditional healing practices for indigenous peoples in canada by the report of the royal commission on aboriginal peoples (rcap) (1996) helped accelerate a reversal of the historic efforts to eradicate indigenous traditions and created an upsurge in interest in traditional healing practices (wagemakers-schiff, 2003). in contrast, the third volume of the report, gathering strength (1998), which proposes some solid policy recommendations around traditional healing (and was strongly supported by canada’s indigenous community), has been referred to also as gathering dust, due to the failure of the canadian government to implement a good portion of its recommendations (land, 2001). socio-political landscapes have also been a necessary consideration in the creation of policies and programs that involve some aspect of traditional healing. this is particularly true in canada because of its relative uniqueness in the world with respect to the way it defines and relates to its housed indigenous populations. in canada indigenous people are grouped as first nations3 3 to further confuse the issue first nations are further grouped into those having indian status and non-status. “in canada historically, entitlement to indian status and indian band membership have been complex and controversial issues. the legal definition of the term “indian” has brought with it certain benefits and eligibility for federal programs, as well as a history of limitations on rights. over the years, disputes over the definition of indian status, the authority to determine band membership, and access to rights tied to status and membership have given rise to conflicts between indian bands and governments, and within indian communities” (furi and wherrett, 1996). , inuit and métis. 9 robbins and dewar: traditional indigenous approaches to healing and the modern welfare of traditional knowledge, spirituality and lands: a critical reflection on practices and policies taken from the canadian indigenous example published by scholarship@western, 2011 although they are indeed three distinct populations in a general sense, they are also grouped this way for economic and political purposes. as a result of these broad groupings, specific needs of individual indigenous communities in canada are sometimes not met. as a consequence, the ability of some communities to maintain and use specific expressions of indigenous knowledge continues to suffer. this point is confirmed by anderson and smylie’s analysis of canada’s health system’s performance in first nations, métis and inuit contexts. they argue that aboriginal-specific health indicators were available primarily at the national level; and these were deemed either aboriginal or status first nations. what anderson and smylie suggest is that national level specific health indicators may not be all that applicable to aboriginal people at the more local level. in other words, there may not yet be enough data to accurately formulate canadian aboriginal health indicators that are all inclusive for all aboriginal identity groups. furthermore, there is a lack of population specifics whether for local tribes, inuit or métis (anderson and smylie, 2009). in general there is a health service gap for smaller populations (métis and inuit) and at the more local (tribal) community level. in the international context, the right to health is mentioned in multiple human rights treaties, all of which have been ratified by canada. the international covenant on economic, social and cultural rights asserts the right to the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health. thus, people have the right to be involved in how their health care system operates. further, the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (article 24) indicates that indigenous people have the right to access their traditional medicines and maintain their health practices and this includes the environment where the medicines might come from (anderson, 2010). at the same time, however, there remain questions as to whether or not these international agreements will be reflected effectively in the policies and practices of nation-state governments. the fact that the united states, canada, australia and new zealand were reluctant signatories of the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (2007) fuels such worries. a panel entitled ‘indigenous philosophies and ceremonies as the basis for action’, which took place took place at a national conference on indigenous health facilitated by the national aboriginal health organization of canada (november 24-26, 2009), indicated healers are treated poorly, while western knowledge is still privileged and promoted in mainstream society. members of the panel also noted that, with respect to inter-nation north/south learning in particular, there is no funding available for projects that suggest indigenous people in the north can learn from their indigenous brothers and sisters in the south. international funding is usually geared only one way – towards technologically based development in the south from the more ‘developed’ north. in the context of projects that focus on indigenous knowledge, the meaning of development with respect to international funding is highly nebulous and there seems to be a general underlying assumption among international funders that euro-centric knowledge is better. similarly, rcap (vol. 3, chapter 3, 1996) notes that, while global health organizations, such as the world health organization and the pan american health organization, recognize that traditional medicine and healing are the main means of providing care to the majority (80-90%) of the world, their policy documents tend to treat such services as a stop-gap transitional measure until adequate, modern medical services can be provided to disadvantaged populations in developing countries. conclusions and implications for future policy development developers of indigenous policy in the future might think about helping to support environments that would allow indigenous populations to maintain their connections to the land in ways that are congruent with their indigenous systems of knowledge. in canada, a new awareness could be cultivated by articulating that indigenous traditional healing is not important only for addressing past 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.2 wrongs, such as residential schools. just like in mainstream societies, indigenous people encounter difficulties and illnesses (mental, emotional, spiritual and physical) in everyday life that sometimes require the attention of a healer. for indigenous people, having the choice of accessing healing methods that are rooted in their own community’s accumulated traditional knowledge is often important. with a goal of enhancing rather than suppressing these efforts, indigenous policy around traditional healing could mirror this need by addressing the following two points: the significance of indigenous people’s relationships to lands and languages; and, the retrieval, maintenance and continued development of indigenous knowledge systems. writers and researchers can help to reflect the perspectives and expertise of indigenous health practitioners by focusing as much on the practice of traditional healing as on the related theory. it would then become more evident when the literature primarily sources other literature. discussion of traditional knowledge ought to be rooted in the practices of those who possess it and are willing to share it. the risk, however, is that this focus does not adequately serve the needs of communities, but rather becomes a self-perpetuating intellectual pursuit (perhaps even colonizing in that sense). thinking about future policy: the case of the aboriginal healing foundation as discussed above, there have been recent, positive formal policy directions, an example of which that might aid in gauging future policy directions is that of the aboriginal healing foundation. the aboriginal healing foundation (ahf) was established in canada through a $350 million fund on march 31, 1998. it was mandated to deliver funding to support inuit, métis, and first nations community-based healing services and activities that address the intergenerational legacy of physical and sexual abuse in canada’s indian residential school system. this was a formal policy direction by the government of the day, as articulated in gathering strength: canada’s aboriginal action plan (1998). while it is important to note the unprecedented support for community-based approaches to healing and the willingness to flow funds through an arms-length aborignal-run organization, well outside of existing delivery model such as health canada's decades old national native alcohol and drug abuse program, an essential counter point is the insistence on a one-time, time-limited mandate given that the reality was also that such an arrangement was wholly new, untried, and untested. it was daunting, to say the least, for the parties who first began the process to consider precisely how the ahf would be set up and how it would carry out the business of managing a lump sum, inviting calls for proposals, adjudicating applications, awarding and managing grants, and reporting, both financially and with regard to effectiveness, through research and evaluation. add to that the fact that the five-year funding timeline to support this initial set-up, in the eyes of some, meant that this was all but an unachievable goal, a possible set up for failure. of course, this is not what happened. the ahf was largely successful in creating the necessary policies and procedures to allow its board of directors and growing staff component to consult communities, while building a model for its operations and the mechanisms through which it would record, measure and report.4 there were challenges given the potential barriers described in this paper, but, the impact was felt almost immediately within the communities. this occurred largely because communities were afforded the opportunity to choose to incorporate or focus entirely on approaches that reflected their respective cultures and/or traditional approach to healing.5 4 see the final report of the aboriginal healing foundation: volume i – a healing journey: reclaiming wellness for a detailed description the ahf’s early years. 5 the final report details at length the ahf's efforts to "respond to the expectation from communities that funding should start flowing without prolonged delay" (20) and also the initial "storm of protest" at the strategies 11 robbins and dewar: traditional indigenous approaches to healing and the modern welfare of traditional knowledge, spirituality and lands: a critical reflection on practices and policies taken from the canadian indigenous example published by scholarship@western, 2011 nonetheless, the time-limited nature of the ahf loomed large and was a reminder that the ahf’s departure from government-run-only programming was not permanent – even though in 2005 the government of canada committed an additional $40 million for a two-year period to the ahf to march 31, 2007, enabling the ahf to extend eighty-eight projects for thirty-six months. this funding augmented the initial $350 million but did not extend the timing of the ahf mandate. therefore, no new projects were funded. these additional funds did carry the ahf and its funded projects through to the implementation of the indian residential school settlement agreement (irssa) in 2007, which committed a further $125 million to the ahf, extending the mandate by five years, to 2012. however, this cannot be characterized as a formal policy direction in the same manner as the initial decision to create the ahf: the settlement agreement is its own beast – the result of a multi-party, out-of-court settlement between the government of canada, the churches and representatives of survivors. the $125 million committed to the healing fund within the irssa, with the ahf as the body to manage those funds but not a party itself to the settlement agreement, extended the timeframe of the ahf as follows: in 2007, the ahf extended 134 funded projects to march 31, 2010 and 12 healing centres to march 31, 2012 – a total of 146 funded projects. moreover, when a government evaluation of ahf programs was completed in 2010, as required by the settlement agreement, it recommended ongoing funding. nonetheless, there was no further funding for the ahf announced in the 2010 federal budget and it was learned that the government of canada will hence forth provide mental health supports to residential school survivors through the mandate of health canada. thus, with no further government funds coming to the ahf, a wind-down strategy was implemented for the period of 201012. this means that, canada-wide, 134 community-based programs funded by the ahf shut down their operations on march 31, 2010. in 2011-2012, there will be a final audit, and final reporting to the government of canada as ahf’s mandate under the settlement agreement ends. this will be followed by a significant contraction of the ahf’s operations as the foundation moves into a period of operation without government support. the ahf is tentatively scheduled to continue funding the twelve healing centres until 2013-14. health canada’s resolution health support program, which ran alongside ahffunded projects and was lauded as complementary to these services in the government’s 2009 evaluation of the ahf (inac, 2009), is also set to lapse in 2013. many who opposed the government’s decision to decline to augment or extend funding to the ahf argued that what would be lost with the closure of the ahf was the community’s ability to choose tradition. the ahf and its network of funded projects are unique. in the case of the ahf unlike other funding mechanisms, project proponents were invited to tell the funder – the ahf – what survivors and communities needed and wanted. this was not a top-down approach. rather, communities determined what they wanted to address and how they wanted to do so. in order to further support these community-based initiatives, the ahf developed reporting tools that allowed it to study both the ahf model and the effectiveness of the approaches taken by individual projects to the extent possible under the limited scope of its evaluation and research mandate. what the ahf has been able to communicate is the extent to which projects across the country, representing the vast diversity across and within first nations, inuit and métis communities, have contributed to the development of a deeper understanding employed and timelines set out. the ahf was forced to adapt in response to these concerns as it ramped up. nonetheless, there was a flood of 1,066 applications within those first deadlines (21) in large part, the ahf notes, because communities have struggled historically due to the fact that "[p]rograms introduced from outside agencies [i.e. government] are fragmented and most often have narrow mandates that frustrate efforts to implement holistic healing. the most striking example is the exclusion of cultural activities from health and healing program funding, with few exceptions...the term 'cultural interventions' is used intentionally to stress the point that cultural activities are not supplementary to the healing process. rather, they are integral to it" (147-8). 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.2 of what healing means in the context of the legacy of residential schools as well as individual and historic trauma. much of the literature spawned by the work of the ahf and its partners shows that, when given the freedom to choose, community-based healing initiatives overwhelmingly include some facet of traditional practices. this is further evidence that the model works and serves as a significant step toward the development of promising practice(s). it is entirely questionable now whether many of these promising practices can find a home outside of an ahf-like model or within government-run programming. that is surely a loss to communities and service providers. indeed, it is a lost opportunity to continue researching and evaluating the effectiveness of choices to incorporate traditional knowledge and practices within various types of programming. in retrospect, a way that nation-states might support promising practices is through permanently funded operational agreements that allow indigenous organizations the capacity and space to transform themselves as community needs change transform over time. also applicable to future policy making could be a more comprehensive sense of ethics, when agreements are reached between indigenous and non-indigenous parties. work such as willie ermine’s focuses on the ethical practices of research involving indigenous peoples, with particular interest in the ethical space – a term coined by roger poole in 1972. for ermine, this space creates a contrast by dislocating and isolating two disparate knowledge systems and cultures. there have been lots of good attempts by sincere people who have tried to build bridges, but these undercurrents are powerful and keep washing away good intentions ... when we have had breaches and ruptures in the past, it is because we have failed to look at the area in between our two worlds. (ermine in ford, 2010) it is through this ethical space that we can begin to understand one another's knowledge systems. part of the problem seems to be that often people equate ethical procedure as constituting something that is universally good. just because governments have ethical protocols in place, however, does not mean that they will be beneficial to a different community (lamouche, 2010). for canadian governments, this suggests that health policy referring to some aspect of indigenous knowledge should start to demonstrate an understanding that expressions of indigenous knowledge and healing are contingent on such variables as land, language and relationships. james lamouche, a research officer with the national aboriginal health organization in canada explains: with respect to the land, knowledge flows from the land and this is expressed in differences and diversity throughout aboriginal groups. in contemporary society, this break with the land is the single most important factor in health problems among aboriginal people. language is how the knowledge is encoded. the belief among elders is that aboriginal languages developed organically from the land. relationships need to be strengthened (whether it is relationships between people and the land or people and institutions). it is difficult to enter into a healthy relationship with others if you are not strong in your own identity, language, medicine[,] etc. (lamouche, 2010) indigenous knowledge systems are living entities and not relics of the past. traditional healing has always been a vehicle for the practice of indigenous spiritualities and the use of indigenous knowledge systems. today, these knowledge systems are still being applied to help indigenous communities and indigenous people recover from intergenerational pain and suffering endured during colonization. in addition, many aboriginal peoples continue to use aspects of these knowledge systems 13 robbins and dewar: traditional indigenous approaches to healing and the modern welfare of traditional knowledge, spirituality and lands: a critical reflection on practices and policies taken from the canadian indigenous example published by scholarship@western, 2011 in their everyday lives. something to work towards in the future might involve nurturing the presence of a certain level of trust – in policy and program implementation – that supports indigenous peoples and communities, when they decide to learn about, maintain and build upon the accumulated knowledge of their ancestors. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.2 references anderson, j., perry, j., blue, c., browne, a., henderson, a., khan, k. b., . . . kirkham, s. r (2003). rewriting cultural safety within a postcolonial and postnational feminist project: towards new epistemologies of healing. advances in nursing science, 26(3), 196-214. anderson, m. j., (2010, february). aboriginal peoples health within the health sciences: a métis, inuit & first nations specific health series. in m. j. anderson (keynote speaker), first nations health session. mcmaster university, hamilton, ontario. anderson, m. j., smylie, j. k. 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(n.d.). indian act. retrieved from http://firstpeoplesofcanada.com/fp_treaties/john_fp33_indianact.html 15 robbins and dewar: traditional indigenous approaches to healing and the modern welfare of traditional knowledge, spirituality and lands: a critical reflection on practices and policies taken from the canadian indigenous example published by scholarship@western, 2011 fiske, j. (2008). making the intangible manifest: healing practices of the qul-aun trauma program. in j. b. waldram (ed.), aboriginal healing in canada, studies in therapeutic meaning and practice. ottawa: aboriginal healing foundation. fletcher, c., & denham, a. (2008). moving towards healing: a nunavut case study. in j. b. waldram (ed.), aboriginal healing in canada, studies in therapeutic meaning and practice. ottawa: aboriginal healing foundation. ford, d. 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(2009, november). indigenous philosophies and ceremonies as the basis for action. conference session at the national aboriginal health organization: our people, our health conference, ottawa. martin-hill, d. (2003). traditional medicine in contemporary contexts: protecting and respecting indigenous knowledge and medicine. ottawa: national aboriginal health organization. martin-hill, d. (2009a, november). indigenous philosophies and ceremonies as the basis for action. conference session at the national aboriginal health organization: our people, our health conference, ottawa. martin-hill, d. (2009b, november). ethical standards for research involving traditional healing. conference session at the national aboriginal health organization: our people, our health conference, ottawa. martin-hill, d. (2009c, november). traditional medicine in contemporary contexts: new directions. conference session at the national aboriginal health organization: our people, our health conference, ottawa. mcivor, o. (2010). language and culture as protective factors, resilience in indigenous communities. brown bag speaker series on aboriginal health [power point presentation]. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.2 métis centre, national aboriginal health organization. (2008). in the words of our ancestors: métis health and healing. ottawa: national aboriginal health organization. native women’s association of canada. (2007, june). aboriginal women and traditional healing. an issue paper prepared for the national aboriginal women’s summit, corner brook, newfoundland. rasmussen, k. 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(2008, june). residential schools time line. retrieved from http://www.canada.com/story.html?id=171cc0a7-3790-4b30-ab29-d70e69bf0be5 velimirovic, b. (1990). is integration of traditional and western medicine really possible? in j. coreil, & j. d. mull (eds.), anthropology and primary health care. boulder, co: westview press. wagemakers schiff, j., & moore, k. (2003). the impact of the sweat lodge ceremony on dimensions of well-being. american indian and alaska native mental health research: the journal of the national centre american indian and alaska native programs, 13(3), 48-69. waldram, j. b. (2008). the models and metaphors of healing: introduction. in j. b. waldram (ed.), aboriginal healing in canada,studies in therapeutic meaning and practice. ottawa: aboriginal healing foundation. waldram, j. b., innes, r., kaweski, m., & redman, c. (2008). building a nation: healing in an urban context. in j. b. waldram (ed.), aboriginal healing in canada, studies in therapeutic meaning and practice. ottawa: aboriginal healing foundation. webber, a .(1973). research in indian medicine. canadian medical association journal, 108, 1120. williams, a. (2001). a place for healing: achieving health for aboriginal women in an urban context. canadian journal of native studies, 21, 1-25. wonders, k. (n.d). first nations land rights and environmentalism in british columbia: mining. goettingen, germany. retrieved from http://www.firstnations.eu/ 17 robbins and dewar: traditional indigenous approaches to healing and the modern welfare of traditional knowledge, spirituality and lands: a critical reflection on practices and policies taken from the canadian indigenous example published by scholarship@western, 2011 the international indigenous policy journal october 2011 traditional indigenous approaches to healing and the modern welfare of traditional knowledge, spirituality and lands: a critical reflection on practices and policies taken from the canadian indigenous example julian a. robbins jonathan dewar recommended citation traditional indigenous approaches to healing and the modern welfare of traditional knowledge, spirituality and lands: a critical reflection on practices and policies taken from the canadian indigenous example abstract acknowledgments creative commons license references velimirovic, b. (1990). is integration of traditional and western medicine really possible? in j. coreil, & j. d. mull (eds.), anthropology and primary health care. boulder, co: westview press. microsoft word ms 10820 cover page.docx the international indigenous policy journal volume 12 | issue 2 may 2021 mental health interventions for first nations, inuit, and métis peoples in canada: a systematic review simon graham office of the chief medical officer, first nations health authority, canada, grahams1@unimelb.edu.au department of infectious diseases, melbourne medical school, university of melbourne, australia krista stelkia faculty of health sciences, simon fraser university, burnaby, british columbia, canada, krista_stelkia@sfu.ca cornelia wieman office of the chief medical officer, first nations health authority, west vancouver, british columbia, canada, nel.wieman@fnha.ca evan adams chief medical officer first nations health authority, west vancouver, british columbia, canada, evan.adams@canada.ca recommended citation graham, s., stelkia, k., wieman, c., & adams, e. (2021). mental health interventions for first nations, inuit, and métis peoples in canada: a systematic review. the international indigenous policy journal, 12(2). https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2. 10820 mental health interventions for first nations, inuit, and métis peoples in canada: a systematic review abstract higher rates of anxiety, depression, and attempted suicide are reported among first nations, inuit, and métis people compared with non-indigenous people in canada. this systematic review summarises the key components of mental health interventions among indigenous peoples in canada. we searched medline, pubmed, psycinfo, and web of science between january 1,1970, and august 30, 2019. studies needed to be an intervention addressing suicide, depression, or anxiety. there were 14 studies included in the analysis: 8 quantitative, 2 qualitative, and 4 mixed methods. by geographical location, 5 were urban, 5 non-urban, and 4 included multiple areas. beneficial interventions included ceremony, being on the land, engaging in traditional food gathering, culturally grounded indoor and outdoor activities, and the sharing of indigenous knowledge by elders. keywords indigenous, aboriginal, first nations, métis, inuit, anxiety, depression, suicide, elders, culture as treatment acknowledgments all of the authors are indigenous people. simon graham’s salary was supported by the australian government department of education and training through an endeavour research leadership fellowship and an australian national health & medical research council fellowship. disclaimer the content of this article is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not reflect the views of the first nations health authority, the australian department of education and training, or the university of melbourne. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. 1 graham et al.: indigenous mental health interventions published by scholarship@western, 2021 mental health interventions for first nations, inuit, and métis peoples in canada: a systematic review mental health is a major health priority for first nations, inuit, and métis peoples in canada, collectively called indigenous peoples (alianait inuit-specific mental wellness task group, 2007; anderson, 2015; first nations health authority, 2019; wieman, 2006). indigenous peoples in canada are estimated to comprise 4.9% of the total population (statistics canada, 2017). indigenous people have a strong connection to community and land and have a holistic view of health that includes the physical, emotional, and spiritual well-being of a person and their community. although the health and well-being of indigenous people in canada has improved significantly, indigenous people continue to have higher rates of poor mental health, suicide, infant mortality, diabetes, obesity, food insecurity, and lower life expectancy (gionet & roshanafshar, 2016; public health agency of canada, 2018; ring & brown, 2003). the government of canada has released strategies to reduce these disparities and acknowledged that culture may play a role in improving well-being, including mental health. from 2019 to 2020, the government of canada invested $425 million to address mental health and well-being among first nations and inuit populations through culturally grounded prevention services, supports, and treatment programming (indigenous services canada, 2019). considering the increased demand and investment in indigenous-specific mental health interventions and programming, it is imperative to understand what components of mental health interventions are effective at improving mental health and well-being of indigenous peoples. therefore, this review aims to summarize mental health interventions that were specifically designed by or for indigenous peoples in canada. literature review first nations, inuit, and métis peoples in canada in canada, there are three distinct indigenous groups: first nations, inuit, and métis (government of canada, 1982). while recognized as comprising the indigenous population in canada, each nation is culturally distinct with unique histories, cultural practices, and beliefs (assembly of first nations, 2020; métis nation, 2020; tungasuvvingat inuit, 2020). first nations have for millennia lived across the land that is now canada and are the only indigenous group in canada subject to the indian act (government of canada, 2020). first nation people who are formally recognized under the indian act are designated as a “status indian” and are subject to its race-based legislation and eligible to access services provided by the federal government (government of canada, 2020). however, while 697,510 people (49.8% of the total indigenous population) are status first nations, approximately 214,000 (15.3%) are “non-status” first nations: people who self-identify as first nations but are not formally recognized by the government of canada under the indian act (government of canada, 2011). inuit are the indigenous inhabitants of northern canada, but they are not formally recognized as “indians” under canadian law (tungasuvvingat inuit, 2020). the intermarriage of european men and first nation women during the 17th century led the founding of a distinct group called the métis (métis nation, 2020; smylie, 2009). as each indigenous nation in canada is unique, it is important to consider each group’s diverse experiences when examining programs and services to better meet the needs of each indigenous population. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10820 indigenous peoples have poorer mental health outcomes, including anxiety, depression, and suicide, compared to non-indigenous peoples in canada (kumar & tjepkema, 2019; statistics canada, 2017). while indigenous peoples overall experience poorer mental health outcomes, there are differences in mental health outcomes among first nations, inuit, and métis peoples (statistics canada, 2020). for example, compared to non-indigenous people in canada, suicide rates were 3 times higher among first nations, 9 times higher among inuit, and 2 times higher among métis people (statistics canada, 2020). suicide rates were highest among 15to 24-year-old inuit males and females and first nations males (kumar & tjepkema, 2019). geographical location also seems to play a role, with first nation people living on reserve having twice the suicide rate of those living off reserve (kumar & tjepkema, 2019). on reserve, approximately 1 in 4 first nations youth and 1 in 5 first nations adults report psychological distress that have been linked to moderate to severe mental health disorders (first nations information governance centre, 2018). to address mental health disparities that exist within indigenous populations, effective components of mental health interventions for indigenous peoples need to be identified. given the historical and intergenerational trauma brought on by settler colonialism, mental health interventions designed and led by indigenous people and communities in canada hold greater promise at improving overall mental health and well-being compared to western-based approaches (aguiar & halseth, 2015; bartram & chodos, 2013). as culture and identity are central to one’s mental health and well-being, interventions which focus on “culture as treatment” may reduce trauma and advance overall mental health and wellbeing (gone, 2013). there has been an increased demand for decolonizing mental health programming to focus on culturally specific interventions that are holistic, grounded in indigenous knowledges and ways of being, trauma-informed, and center around culture (ansloos et al., 2019; thunderbird partnership foundation, 2011). the impact of colonization on the mental health of indigenous peoples in canada the ongoing impacts of colonization continue to have detrimental effects on the mental, emotional, physical, and spiritual health and well-being of indigenous peoples (allan & smylie, 2015; gracey & king, 2009). the impact of canada’s colonial history plays a central role in understanding the disproportionate rates of mental health outcomes within indigenous communities (wilk et al., 2017). the truth and reconciliation commission of canada (2015a) declared, “for over a century, the central goals of canada’s aboriginal policy were to eliminate aboriginal governments; ignore aboriginal rights; terminate the treaties; and, through a process of assimilation, cause aboriginal peoples to cease to exist” (p. 3). the harmful impacts of colonial policies continue to have long-term and intergenerational effects on health (mckenzie et al., 2014; truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015b). survivors of the canadian residential school system have poorer physical, mental, and emotional health, including higher rates of depression, mental distress, substance misuse, stress, and suicidal behaviours (first nations information governance centre, 2018; hackett et al., 2016; wilk et al., 2017). a study in british columbia examined the mental health profiles of 127 survivors of the residential school system and found that only two were not diagnosed with a mental disorder (corrado & cohen, 2003). the most prevalent disorders included post-traumatic stress disorder, substance abuse disorder, and depression (corrado & cohen, 2003). residential school survivors have reported isolation from family; verbal, emotional, and physical abuse; loss of cultural identity; and harsh discipline as the most common factors that contributed to their negative health and well-being (first nations information governance 3 graham et al.: indigenous mental health interventions published by scholarship@western, 2021 centre, 2018; truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015b). the harm and trauma perpetrated on survivors has also been found to have intergenerational mental health impacts on their children and grandchildren, such as an increased risk of depression and higher rates of suicidal thoughts or attempts (bombay et al., 2011; elias et al., 2012). therefore, the harmful impacts of these colonial policies and practices continue to play a role in undermining indigenous mental health and well-being today (king et al., 2009; nelson & wilson, 2017). mental health interventions among first nations, inuit, and métis peoples in canada there is a critical need to address the mental health and well-being of indigenous peoples in canada. mental health continues to be identified as a key priority area by first nations, inuit, and métis organizations and communities across canada (alianait inuit-specific mental wellness task group, 2007; first nations health authority, 2019; métis nation, 2018). the need to address the growing mental health disparities in indigenous peoples compared with non-indigenous peoples in canada was emphasized in the findings of the truth and reconciliation commission of canada. the truth and reconciliation commission of canada call to action #19 called upon the federal government to “close the gap in health outcomes between aboriginal and non-aboriginal communities,” including mental health, suicide, and addiction (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015c, pp. 2-3). this was further highlighted by the national inquiry into missing and murdered indigenous women and girls (2019), which focused on increasing funding and support for holistic services and programming in areas including trauma, addictions treatment, and mental health services. this review will summarise indigenous interventions that have improved the mental health of first nations, inuit, and métis peoples in canada. methods this review was conducted according to the preferred reporting items for systematic reviews and meta-analyses: the prisma statement (moher et al., 2009). rationale the rationale for this study was to highlight the work indigenous communities were doing to improve the mental health of their communities through designing local culturally based interventions that could provide additional benefits for indigenous people in canada. primary and secondary outcomes the primary outcome was: • to summarize the interventions that improved mental health (anxiety, depression, and suicide or attempted suicide) outcomes among indigenous peoples in canada. the secondary outcome was: • to identify what components within these interventions improved the mental health of indigenous peoples in canada. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10820 eligibility criteria study design we included qualitative, quantitative, and mixed method studies that evaluated an intervention and was published in the peer review literature. grey literature, letters, books, reviews, editorials, conference abstracts, and theses and dissertations were excluded. inclusion and exclusion criteria. studies were included if they reported anxiety, depression, or suicidal thoughts or attempts among indigenous people in canada and included an intervention. we included studies that focused on status first nations, non-status first nations, inuit, and/or métis peoples. only publications in english were included. we excluded studies of indigenous people outside of canada, studies of non-indigenous people, or studies that reported results by combining indigenous and nonindigenous people, unless indigenous people from canada made up more than 50% of the sample. studies were excluded if they were reviews, guidelines, or commentaries, or were not in english (figure 1). if only the abstract or presentation was available, we contacted the corresponding author of the study to assess the published paper or presentation. the reference lists of included studies were examined for additional studies. search strategy on august 26, 2019, the first and second authors discussed which electronic databases would be used. they also developed the medical subject headings (mesh) and truncation of the mesh words. on august 27, 2019, the first author searched the electronic database pubmed and then adapted the search terms for medline, web of science, and psycinfo. the time period for the search was from january 1, 1960, to august 25, 2019. the below mesh words were used, and appendix a provides a breakdown of the mesh words, truncation, and combinations used in each electronic database. 1. mental health or mental wellness or addiction or anxiety or depression or suicide or resilience or trauma; and 2. intervention or community-based or client centered or patient centered or wrap around; and 3. aboriginal or indigenous or first nations or inuit or métis or native; and 4. canada the studies that met the inclusion criteria were imported into endnote. the first author then reviewed the full text against the inclusion criteria and the second author reviewed these studies for inclusion. the first and second authors met and discussed the studies until a consensus was reached. 5 graham et al.: indigenous mental health interventions published by scholarship@western, 2021 figure 1. flow diagram of included studies duplicates removed (n = 5) studies included (n = 14) studies screened (n = 995) studies screened (n = 290) studies removed based on abstract (n = 700) reasons: 1. not in canada (n = 10) 2. not mental health related (n = 231) 3. not indigenous (n = 89) 4. not an intervention (n = 370) id en tif ic at io n sc re en in g el ig ib ili ty in cl ud ed electronic library databases: 1. medline (n = 127) 2. pubmed (n = 316) 3. web of science (n = 414) 4. psycinfo (n = 138) total (n = 995) studies screened (n = 990) studies removed based on review of full paper reason: 1. not an intervention (n = 276) 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10820 data extraction data from each study were extracted by the first author and placed in a microsoft excel 2016 table to ensure consistency of the extraction and that all data were entered in the same format. for each study, information was extracted on author, year the study was published, year(s) the study was conducted, the location of the study, the indigenous group (first nations, inuit, and/or métis), population group (youth, adults, women), sex, age, sample size, study design, incentives provided, the goal of the study, assessment tools used to measure the participants’ mental health status (appendix c), information about the intervention, and the outcomes or benefits of the intervention. if a study did not report the specific indigenous group (first nations, inuit, or métis) or provide enough information, the authors used the label “indigenous.” while we acknowledge and respect the cultural differences between first nations, inuit, and métis peoples, we wanted to include all three indigenous groups due to the small numbers of studies published within each identity group, to learn the strengths of interventions used by each group, to improve the breadth and depth of understanding, and to highlight any unique approaches used by one group that could be adapted by another. young people were defined as being 18 years or younger and adults as 19 years or older. a mental health intervention was defined as a process or activity introduced that aimed to reduce anxiety, depression, or suicidal thoughts or attempts. this study did not search grey literature. we used already published studies and as a result did not require ethical approval. results included studies overall, 14 studies were included (table 1). eight were quantitative (dewit et al., 2017; fox et al., 1984; hardt, 2012; miller et al., 2011; ritchie et al., 2014; thomas et al., 2013; tu et al., 2019; varcoe et al., 2017), two were qualitative (cooper & driedger, 2019; hadjipavlou et al., 2018), and four were mixed method studies (crooks et al., 2017; gross et al., 2016; harder et al., 2015; varcoe et al., 2019). in total, 11 were cross-sectional studies that compared before versus after an intervention (crooks et al., 2017; dewit et al., 2017; fox et al., 1984; gross et al., 2016; harder et al., 2015; hardt, 2012; miller et al., 2011; ritchie et al., 2014; thomas et al., 2013; varcoe et al., 2017, 2019), one was a prospective cohort study (tu et al., 2019), four conducted one-on-one interviews (crooks et al., 2017; hadjipavlou et al., 2018; harder et al., 2015; varcoe et al., 2019), one conducted focus groups (gross et al., 2016), and one used snowball sampling methods to recruit the participants (hadjipavlou et al., 2018). 7 graham et al.: indigenous mental health interventions published by scholarship@western, 2021 table 1. summary of mental health intervention studies among first nations, inuit, and métis peoples in canada author, year published when the study occurred location indigenous groupa population group sample size study design, methods incentives provided study goals / aims / objectives cooper, 2019 september 2015march 2016 winnipeg, manitoba first nations, métis adult women and young girls (8-12 years old) 60 qualitative: weekly workshops for 7 weeks 877 photographs, 3 hours of video recordings, 19 hours of audio recordings, 60 hours of notes not reported what does it mean to be happy, healthy and safe? what is needed to actualise these goals? crooks, 2017 2011, 2012, 2013 southwestern, ontario first nations, métis, inuit young people (grades 7 & 8) 105 mixed methods: semistructured interviews surveys each year $10 gift card what are the effects of a culturally relevant school-based mentoring program for indigenous youth? dewit, 2017 not reported all provinces first nations, métis, inuit young people (6-17 years old) 125 quantitative: 2 crosssectional surveys (before vs. after) $5 gift card 2 movie passes the mentoring relationship experiences of aboriginal youth the impact of being mentored on behavioural, psychological, and social functioning 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10820 table 1. summary of mental health intervention studies among first nations, inuit, and métis peoples in canada (continued) author, year published when the study occurred location indigenous groupa population, ages sample size study design, methods incentives provided goals / aims / objectives fox, 1984 1971-1974 vs. 1976-1980 manitoulin island, ontario first nations young people 200 quantitative: data from the coroner’s office reports from the ontario provincial police clinical contacts of the native health team and psychiatric facility none given to decrease the suicide rate among first nations youth gross, 2016 august 2014 may 2015 vancouver, prince george, smithers, & moricetown, british columbia first nations vulnerable indigenous men 95 mixed methods: two crosssectional surveys (before vs. after) focus-groups cooking and cleaning services to build brotherhood between members to promote men’s health through education, dialogue, health screening to build pride and fulfilment in their lives hadjipavlou, 2018 december 2015 march 2016 vancouver, british columbia first nations, métis, inuit patients (25-61 years old) with mental health & substance abuse history 37 qualitative: semi-structured interviews at 1, 3, & 6 months none given to examine the impact of indigenous elders program on the mental health of indigenous patients 9 graham et al.: indigenous mental health interventions published by scholarship@western, 2021 table 1. summary of mental health intervention studies among first nations, inuit, and métis peoples in canada (continued) author, year published when the study occurred location indigenous groupa population, ages sample size study design, methods incentives provided goals / aims / objectives harder, 2015 2007 northern british columbia first nations individuals aged 13-25 years 130 mixed methods: two crosssectional surveys (before vs. after) one-on-one interviews not reported to determine if youth participation would reduce levels of depression, hopelessness, and suicide hardt, 2012 not reported victoria, british columbia first nations, inuit, métis adults (25-60 years) 40 quantitative: two crosssectional (before vs. after) none given to determine if alpha brainwave neurofeedback training can have positive psychological results miller, 2011 not reported western canada indigenous school students in grades 2-7 192 quantitative: three crosssectional surveys not reported to enrich culturally the friends for life program to prevent and reduce anxiety symptoms by offering the enriched program in public schools ritchie, 2014 not reported northern ontario first nations individuals aged 12-18 years 73 quantitative: two crosssectional surveys (before vs. after) not reported to evaluate the impact of an outdoor adventure leadership experience over 2 years on the resilience of adolescents on reserve 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10820 table 1. summary of mental health intervention studies among first nations, inuit, and métis peoples in canada (continued) author, year published when the study occurred location indigenous groupa population sample size study design incentives provided goals / aims / objectives thomas, 2013 june 2011 rural areas of british columbia first nations adults 12 quantitative: two crosssectional surveys (before vs. after) not reported to assess the impact of ayahuasca assisted group therapy on mental and behavioural health tu, 2019 20142016 western canada first nations adults attending a primary health care clinic 45 quantitative: prospective cohort none given to determine whether including indigenous elders into routine primary care improved depressive symptoms and suicidal ideation varcoe, 2017 not reported urban area of canada first nations adult women 21 quantitative: two crosssectional timeperiods not reported to determine whether a health promotion intervention for indigenous women who have experienced intimate partner violence (intervention for health enhancement after leaving) improves women’s mental and physical health varcoe, 2019 not reported urban area in western canada first nations adult women 89 mixed methods: quantitative: pre vs. post vs. sixmonths after the intervention qualitative: oneon-one interviews $25 for each interview childcare can an intimate partner violence health promotion intervention (intervention for health enhancement after leaving) improve women’s mental and physical health? note. a indigenous group: the indigenous group name reported by each study is used; however, if the study did not report an indigenous group, it was labelled as indigenous. 11 graham et al.: indigenous mental health interventions published by scholarship@western, 2021 mental health assessment tools used by the different studies a total of 29 different tools were used by the studies to measure the mental health status of participants (table 2 and appendix c). there were a range of tools used to measure anxiety (e.g., revised social anxiety scale for children), depression (e.g., beck depression inventory-ii) and suicidal thoughts (e.g., beck scale for suicidal ideation). there were assessment tools that were broader in scope, such as the 11-item cultural connectedness scale, the mcgill quality of life survey, and sullivan’s quality of life scale. none of the studies used the same assessment tool to measure anxiety or depression or attempted suicide and, as a result, we were not able to group the assessment tools or compare scores of anxiety or depression in one study to another study. summary of interventions used each study used a range of similar components that have been summarised into three categories: culturally grounded indoor and outdoor activities; elder or peer-to-peer mentorship; and group activities with other indigenous people and an elder (appendix b). culturally grounded indoor and outdoor activities culturally grounded indoor and outdoor activities included retreats, camps, ceremonies, and indigenous language study. as highlighted by the outcomes in table 2, cultural activities that had a strong indigenous component seemed to provide some benefits in reducing anxiety, depression, or suicidal thoughts. one study conducted culture camps that included traditional food gathering techniques, language, survival techniques, and clan affiliation (harder et al., 2015). these camps produced positive quantitative outcomes, including a decrease in average depression scores from 10 before compared to 7 after, a decrease in average hopelessness scores from 4 to 3.1, and increases in language skills, connectedness of culture, and connection to community elders. qualitative results also support the benefits of an intervention that involves engaging in culturally grounded activities together, with one participant saying, “after the camp i felt very good, like i learned more about what culture is and who i actually am” (harder et al., 2015, p. 27). another participant said, “i used to be ashamed of being native and now i’m not…so yeah, it made me happy for who i am and where i come from” (harder et al., 2015, p. 27). elder or peer-to-peer mentorship some studies paired an indigenous elder with a young person. for example, a study by crooks et al. (2017) compared one group of young people who were mentored by an indigenous elder compared to another group who were not. over a two-year period, the group who were mentored had better mental health scores (on average 61.6 compared to 52.0 for those without a mentor). this study also examined the impact mentorship had on cultural identity; two years of mentoring resulted in an increased cultural identity score of 36.7 in the mentored group compared to 33.2 for those without a mentor (crooks et al., 2017). qualitative results support this with one young participant saying, “we can talk about more open things and they are our cultural background too so it seems like we can open up to them more than we can to our teachers” (crooks et al., 2017, p. 98). 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10820 table 2. mental health interventions used by studies and outcomes among first nations, métis, and inuit peoples in canada author, year published study goals / aims / objectives tools used to measure mental health status intervention / activities quantitative outcomes qualitative outcomes cooper, 2019 to what does it mean to be happy, healthy and safe? what is needed to actualise these goals? none used self-reported mental health status métis specific arts-based workshops non-competitive games, walks, crafts, shared meals jewellery making, sports, drawing, discussion circles, storytelling, scavenger hunts, medicine wheel qualitative only after 7 weeks, “the women began to characterise themselves as strong, capable caregivers who guide their girls as they made decisions.” crooks, 2017 what are the effects of a culturally relevant schoolbased mentoring program for indigenous youth? 14-item mental health continuum—short form (mhc) 11-item cultural connectedness scale using a 4-point likert scale youth received mentoring for 1 year vs. 2 years average mental health scores: 2 years of mentoring = 61.6 vs. 1 year of no mentoring = 52.0 average positive cultural identity scores: 2 years of mentoring = 36.7 vs. 1 year of no mentoring = 33.2 “we can open up to them more than we can to our teacher.” “it feels like they understand what i am trying to say.” “when you don’t feel comfortable it’s okay . . . you can tell them.” dewit, 2017 the mentoring relationship experiences of aboriginal youth the impact of being mentored on behavioural, psychological, and social functioning strengths and difficulties questionnaire (sdq) revised social anxiety scale for children (sasc-r) big brother, big sister program mentoring of aboriginal youth 2-4 hours per week with mentor for 1 year mentored youth had significantly less emotional problems 18-months after meeting their mentor mentored youth had significantly fewer symptoms of social anxiety and distress in new situations with unfamiliar peers quantitative only 13 graham et al.: indigenous mental health interventions published by scholarship@western, 2021 table 2. mental health interventions used by studies and outcomes among first nations, métis, and inuit peoples in canada (continued) author, year published study goals / aims / objectives tools used to measure mental health status intervention / activities quantitative outcomes qualitative outcomes fox, 1984 to decrease the suicide rate among youth confirmed death from coroner’s office confirmed patient record at the psychiatric facility suicide response team: 2 indigenous mental health workers a travelling mental health clinic rainbow lodge recovery centre suicide rate decreased from 27.7 to 23.4 per 100,000 quantitative only gross, 2016 to build brotherhood between members to promote men’s health through education, dialogue, health screening clinics to build pride and fulfilment in their lives none used survey asked about improvements in their quality of life, mental, emotional, physical, and spiritual health weekly men’s group shared meal health programs with doctors and nurses linking first nation elders with vulnerable men 90% of the men’s scores improved in quality of life, and mental, emotional, physical, and spiritual health higher attendance increased feelings of connectedness increased feelings of trust, trusting others with their health, and connectedness to culture hadjipavlou, 2018 to examine the impact of indigenous elders program on the mental health of indigenous patients none reported regular meetings with an indigenous elder elders provided a safe “place for healing,” they could “laugh” with, receive “gentle guidance,” and they were “respected” compared to previous health care experiences qualitative only decreased depression decreased suicidal thoughts 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10820 table 2. mental health interventions used by studies and outcomes among first nations, métis, and inuit peoples in canada (continued) author, year published study goals / aims / objectives tools used to measure mental health status intervention / activities quantitative outcomes qualitative outcomes harder, 2015 to determine if youth participation would reduce levels of depression, hopelessness, and suicide beck depression inventory-ii beck scale for suicide ideation beck hopelessness scale culture camps traditional food gathering techniques language, survival techniques clan affiliation, bah’iats system change in average score: depression score before 10.0 vs. 7.4 after suicide score before 2.3 vs. 1.2 after hopelessness score before 4.0 vs 3.1 after 90% reported an increase in their opinion of themselves 87% reported an increase in their carrier language skills 96% reported an increase in traditional culture 92% reported an increase in their connection to community elders “i used to ashamed of being native and now i’m not.” “after the camp i felt very good, like i learned more about what culture is and who i actually am.” “friends are complimenting me on stuff, and it’s making me feel better about myself.” “if i hadn’t done any camps, i would probably have ended up going down the wrong path.” hardt, 2012 to determine if alpha brainwave neurofeedback training can have positive psychological results multiple affect adjective check list clyde mood scale profile of mood states for 7 days, each participant spent 10 hours at the training centre doing activities plus neurofeedback training improvements when comparing before and after quantitative only 15 graham et al.: indigenous mental health interventions published by scholarship@western, 2021 table 2. mental health interventions used by studies and outcomes among first nations, métis, and inuit peoples in canada (continued) author, year published study goals / aims / objectives tools used to measure mental health status intervention / activities quantitative outcomes qualitative outcomes miller, 2011 to culturally enrich the friends for life program to prevent and reduce anxiety symptoms by offering the enriched program in public schools 39-item self-reported multidimensional anxiety scale for children (masc) friends for life program classroom-based intervention individual and group activities that teach children to identify anxiety signals, physical bodily symptoms, worried thoughts, and maladaptive behaviours mean anxiety score reduced from 45.4 at time 1 to 43.3 at time 2 to 41.1 at time 3 quantitative only ritchie, 2014 to evaluate the impact of an outdoor adventure leadership experience over 2 years on the resilience of adolescents on reserve health and well-being questionnaire outward bound process model mental component score (mcs) scale of positive and negative emotion— balance (spane) self-esteem scale (ses) outdoor adventure leadership experience wilderness canoe expedition medicine wheel outward bound process model small group activities 8 experiences with 3 each summer increase in resilience scores (73.6 to 77.0) increase in mental component scores (1.2 to 3.5) positive change from the beginning to the end for mental health, balance of emotion, and satisfaction with life quantitative only 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10820 table 2. mental health interventions used by studies and outcomes among first nations, métis, and inuit peoples in canada (continued) author, year published study goals / aims / objectives tools used to measure mental health status intervention / activities quantitative outcomes qualitative outcomes thomas, 2013 to assess the impact of ayahuasca-assisted group therapy may have on mental health and behavioural health the difficulty in emotion regulation scale the philadelphia mindfulness scale the empowerment scale the hope scale the mcgill quality of life survey the 4-week substance abuse scale ayahuasca ceremonies retreats focussed on addressing issues of addiction improvements in mindfulness, empowerment, hopefulness, quality of life-meaning, and quality of life-outlook interviews indicated that the retreats had a positive influence on their lives (average score of 7.9 out of 10) “i wish i was introduced to this retreat 20 years ago as it would have saved me a lot of time and trouble.” quantitative only tu, 2019 to determine whether including indigenous elders in routine primary care improved depressive symptoms and suicidal ideation patient health questionnaire suicidal behaviors questionnaire indigenous elders meeting with individuals experiencing depression and suicidal thoughts in a primary health care clinic a 5-point decrease in depressive symptoms a 2-point decrease in suicidal risk sustained over 6 months 56% decrease in mental healthrelated emergency department visits quantitative only 17 graham et al.: indigenous mental health interventions published by scholarship@western, 2021 table 2. mental health interventions used by studies and outcomes among first nations, métis, and inuit peoples in canada (continued) author, year published study goals / aims / objectives tools used to measure mental health status intervention / activities quantitative outcomes qualitative outcomes varcoe, 2017 to develop and pilot test the reclaiming our spirits health promotion intervention, which provides services to indigenous women who have experienced intimate partner violence sullivan’s quality of life scale • ptsd checklist civilian version • centre for epidemiologic studies depression scale the intervention for health enhancement after leaving (iheal) health promotion after leaving an abusive partner 14 face-to-face meetings with a nurse over 6months average reduction in depressive symptoms (from 10 to 8) average reduction in trauma symptoms (from 8 to 6) increase in control of their lives quantitative only varcoe, 2019 can an intimate partner violence health promotion intervention (intervention for health enhancement after leaving) improve women’s mental and physical health? • sullivan’s quality of life scale • ptsd checklist civilian version • centre for epidemiologic studies depression scale (cesd-r) weekly workshops led by an indigenous elder iheal program (10-18 sessions over 6 months) average decrease in depressive symptoms (28 to 22) average decrease in trauma score (49 to 43) average increase in quality-of-life score (38 to 42) “i feel i’m more open now with like doctors, nurses.” “i feel l have more confidence.” “i feel like i am better able to start friendships now. that’s always been a problem.” 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10820 group activities with other indigenous people and an elder group activities with other indigenous people and an elder included non-competitive games, sharing a meal, discussion circles, and the medicine wheel. one study provided indigenous elders as mentors, and this had positive results with participants saying, “it feels like they understand what i am trying to say” (crooks et al., 2017, p. 98), and “when you don’t feel comfortable it’s okay . . . you can tell them [elders]” (crooks et al., 2017, p. 99). mentorship with indigenous elders seemed to provide a safe space to talk, be heard, and feel like someone was listening. by having an elder to connect with, participants seemed to not feel alone, and they valued the added cultural connection. this connection with elders, other indigenous people, and their shared culture seemed to interrupt the participants’ negative mental health state and made them feel included and wanted. further information within each study only 1 of the 14 studies did not recruit participants and instead used a large dataset for the analysis (fox et al., 1984). overall, four studies provided incentives to participants (crooks et al., 2017; dewit et al., 2017; gross et al., 2016; varcoe et al., 2019), which included one or a combination of the following: cash (varcoe et al., 2019), movie passes (dewit et al., 2017), gift cards (crooks et al., 2017; dewit et al., 2017), cleaning services (gross et al., 2016), and childcare (varcoe et al., 2019). providing incentives may have influenced participants’ decision to participate. one study aimed to recruit people who identified as métis so they could build a specific intervention for métis peoples and avoid panindigenous results in their study (cooper & driedger, 2019). however, the community wanted this study to expand the inclusion criteria to include métis and first nations peoples because some young people in the study highlighted that they had one parent who identified as métis and the other parent who identified as first nations (cooper & driedger, 2019). discussion despite the urgent need to address mental health and well-being in indigenous communities, we only found 14 studies that assessed an intervention for indigenous peoples in canada. our findings support the concept of culture as treatment, with the three main interventions centered around culturally grounded indoor and outdoor activities, elder and peer mentorship, or participating in collective activities with other indigenous peers and an elder. although these are not new concepts for indigenous peoples, our study highlights that these interventions can play a role in reducing anxiety, depression, and suicidal thoughts. although the authors acknowledge that western approaches can help to reduce poor mental health outcomes, our review highlights that adding culture as treatment has additional benefits to reduce poor mental health outcomes especially with indigenous peoples in canada. out of the 14 studies, 8 included first nations peoples and 5 included a mix of first nations, inuit, and métis people (fox et al., 1984; gross et al., 2016; harder et al., 2015; ritchie et al., 2014; thomas et al., 2013; tu et al., 2019; varcoe et al., 2017, 2019). studies found it challenging to recruit inuit and métis participants, so they often recruited first nations people to reach their sample size targets or at the request of the community. this suggests that groundwork is needed early in the project to connect with communities in order to understand the community’s needs and expectations, and to set up an effective recruitment approach with the community’s involvement. despite the large disparities that exist within inuit and métis communities, the findings demonstrate there is a lack of mental health interventions 19 graham et al.: indigenous mental health interventions published by scholarship@western, 2021 developed by and for inuit and métis peoples. considering the demand for mental health interventions that respect and honour indigenous ways of knowing, it is integral that mental health interventions do the groundwork to establish relationships with communities that they hope to work with to deliver an intervention, whether it be first nations or inuit or métis or a combination thereof. the findings from this review suggest that mental health interventions that include culturally grounded indoor and outdoor activities, elder and peer mentorship, or participating in collective activities with other indigenous peers and an elder can provide mental health benefits among indigenous peoples in canada. these activities include ceremony, being on the land, the medicine wheel, engaging in traditional food gathering, and being connected with an elder for conversation and guidance; elders sharing indigenous knowledge throughout the participants’ treatment was also found to be beneficial in improving mental health among the studies reviewed. these findings align with other reviews that have found that culturally adapted mental health interventions resulted in a significant improvement in at least one symptom of mental illness (leske et al., 2016). the specific activities and interventions are listed in appendix b. most of these interventions did not reject western approaches to mental health but instead highlighted the benefits of also having an indigenous-grounded approach. perhaps combining both approaches could have increased benefits to improve mental health outcomes. a promising finding of this study was that 6 out of the 14 studies were for young people (cooper & driedger, 2019; crooks et al., 2017; dewit et al., 2017; fox et al., 1984; harder et al., 2015; miller et al., 2011). this is a positive result as recent household surveys of indigenous people highlighted that young indigenous people are at significantly higher risk of suicide compared to non-indigenous young people (first nations information governance centre, 2018; kumar & tjepkema, 2019). this report also highlighted that other factors could play a role in the elevated risk of suicide, including living on reserve, having lower household income, living in poverty, having lower levels of education, and being divorced, separated, or widowed (kumar & tjepkema, 2019). mentoring young people with indigenous elders and adapting the cultural activities to be more youth-focussed could be beneficial. our study also found that there is a limited number of gender-specific mental health interventions. overall, two interventions recruited women (varcoe et al., 2017, 2019), one recruited adult women and young girls (cooper & driedger, 2019), and one recruited men (gross et al., 2016). given the unique needs of addressing mental distress and trauma for each gender, there might be a need to create more gender-specific mental health interventions. one of the qualitative studies included in this review, included traditional hunting trips with men, which had some benefits as the men hunted and learned together, and these activities allowed a more open dialogue to occur when talking about their struggles (gross et al., 2016). lessons for future research and recommendations future research on effective indigenous design and led mental health interventions are required. as increases in community-led and driven mental health initiatives occur across canada, future reviews should examine grey literature to capture interventions and initiatives taking place in communities. this may increase the number of interventions, which can be reviewed to provide a richer analysis of mental health interventions that improve the mental health and well-being among indigenous peoples in 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10820 canada. given that many community-based initiatives often lack funding or interest in publishing in western-based academic journals, the grey literature may provide a promising space to learn more about culture-based interventions. it is recommended that future studies on indigenous mental health interventions be as specific as possible when discussing their study population. future research should focus on examining the needs of subpopulations within indigenous communities, including urban or offreserve populations, young people, women and girls, men, and inuit and métis communities. this will result in more context-specific findings that will contribute towards a greater understanding of components of mental health interventions. it is also clear that more groundwork is needed in building relationships with communities before researchers build their recruitment strategies and interventions. implications for indigenous peoples in other countries the interventions mentioned in this review could be useful for indigenous people in other countries. in australia, aboriginal and torres strait islander people were found to have incidence rates for anxiety and any mental disorder that are 3 times and 4 times higher, respectively, than the non-indigenous population (nasir et al., 2018). in 2020, a randomized controlled trial of a mental health intervention in four aboriginal communities produced promising results that could inform future guidelines and treatment and care programs (toombs et al., 2020). in new zealand, m!ori peoples also experience higher rates of poor mental health compared to non-m!ori people in new zealand (baxter et al., 2006). a recent study in new zealand highlighted that having a strong m!ori cultural identity was associated with positive benefits for m!ori youth in terms of improved well-being scores and fewer depressive symptoms (williams et al., 2018). designing indigenous-led and implemented interventions and programs also support the principles of the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (united nations, 2007). our results from canada could provide some useful information about the benefits of community-designed interventions that could be used by indigenous people in other countries. policy implications our review provides some policy implications for mental health practice. our study shows that existing mental health policy and practice could incorporate an indigenous lens to achieve better mental health outcomes. if the indigenous-based approaches summarised in our study were combined with existing western-based mental health approaches, perhaps this could have further benefits. our review provides the canadian government’s advancing the mental health strategy for canada: a framework for action (2017-2022) with information about specific indigenous programs that have provided benefits (mental health commission of canada, 2016). it suggests that these indigenous approaches, which fit under the broad term of culture as treatment can have benefits and should receive funding and policy support to strengthen the evidence base of possible interventions to improve the mental health of indigenous and non-indigenous people in canada. limitations there are some limitations to be considered when interpreting the results. overall, 11 of the 14 studies were cross-sectional before and after study designs, limiting the ability to measure the impact of the interventions. out of the 14 studies, 8 included first nations peoples and 5 included a mix of first nations, inuit, and métis peoples (fox et al., 1984; gross et al., 2016; harder et al., 2015; ritchie et al., 21 graham et al.: indigenous mental health interventions published by scholarship@western, 2021 2014; thomas et al., 2013; tu et al., 2019; varcoe et al., 2017, 2019). therefore, studies were not able to provide results specific to métis or inuit peoples. overall, five studies had a sample size less than 100 (crooks et al., 2017; dewit et al., 2017; fox et al., 1984; harder et al., 2015; miller et al., 2011), reducing the statistical power of these studies to show a decrease in the three main outcomes (anxiety, depression, and suicidal thoughts and attempts). in total, 8 of the 14 studies were conducted in western canada, particularly british columbia (gross et al., 2016; hadjipavlou et al., 2018; harder et al., 2015; hardt, 2012; miller et al., 2011; thomas et al., 2013; tu et al., 2019; varcoe et al., 2019), so our results may not be generalisable to indigenous people living in other areas of canada. among the 10 studies that reported the geographical location where the study was conducted, 6 were conducted in remote areas (crooks et al., 2017; fox et al., 1984; harder et al., 2015; miller et al., 2011; ritchie et al., 2014; thomas et al., 2013). this suggests that our results may not be relatable to indigenous people living in urban areas. this is unfortunate, as statistics canada has reported that the indigenous population in canada has slowly become more urbanised over the past two decades due to employment and economic reasons, with an estimated 52% of indigenous people living in urban areas (statistics canada, 2011). also, we did not include grey literature in our review, which may have resulted in the exclusion of local online project reports or government programs. conclusion this review identified three key components that improved the mental health outcomes of first nations, inuit, and métis peoples. these were culturally grounded indoor and outdoor activities, elder and peer mentorship, and participating in collective activities with other indigenous peers and an elder. while culture as treatment remains a promising component to address mental health for indigenous peoples, there is a great need for mental health interventions designed specifically and distinctly for first nations, inuit, and métis peoples. the list of different culturally based activities in appendix b could help future interventions to advance the development and delivery of mental health interventions for first nations, inuit, and métis peoples in canada. our study has policy implications particularly for the canadian government’s advancing the mental health strategy for canada: a framework for action (2017-2022). our summary of indigenous interventions provides examples of how existing mental health programs could incorporate indigenous ways of addressing poor mental health. our results could have some useful information for indigenous people in other countries in designing culturally based programs that reduce poor mental 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(2015a). canada’s residential schools: the history, part i origins to 1939 (vol. 1). government of canada. http://www.trc.ca/assets/pdf/ volume_1_history_part_1_english_web.pdf truth and reconciliation commission of canada. (2015b). honouring the truth, reconciling for the future: summary of the final report of the truth and reconciliation commission of canada. http://publications.gc.ca/collections/collection_2015/trc/ir4-7-2015-eng.pdf truth and reconciliation commission of canada. (2015c). truth and reconciliation commission of canada: calls to action. http://www.trc.ca/assets/pdf/calls_to_action_english2.pdf tu, d., hadjipavlou, g., dehoney, j., price, e. r., dusdal, c., browne, a. j., & varcoe, c. (2019). partnering with indigenous elders in primary care improves mental health outcomes of innercity indigenous patients: prospective cohort study. canadian family physician, 65(4), 274-281. tungasuvvingat inuit. (2020). tungasuvvingat inuit. https://tiontario.ca/ 27 graham et al.: indigenous mental health interventions published by scholarship@western, 2021 united nations. (2007). united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples. https://www.un.org/development/desa/indigenouspeoples/wp-content/uploads/sites/19/ 2018/11/undrip_e_web.pdf varcoe, c., browne, a. j., ford-gilboe, m., dion stout, m., mckenzie, h., price, r., bungay, v., smye, v., inyallie, j., day, l., khan, k., heino, a., & merritt-gray, m. (2017). reclaiming our spirits: development and pilot testing of a health promotion intervention for indigenous women who have experienced intimate partner violence. research in nursing & health, 40(3), 237-254. https://doi.org/10.1002/nur.21795 varcoe, c., ford-gilboe, m., browne, a. j., perrin, n., bungay, v., mckenzie, h., smye, v., price elder, r., inyallie, j., khan, k., & dion stout, m. (2019). the efficacy of a health promotion intervention for indigenous women: reclaiming our spirits. journal of interpersonal violence. https://doi.org//10.1177/0886260518820818 wieman, c. (2006). improving the mental health status of canada’s aboriginal youth. journal of the canadian academy of child and adolescent psychiatry, 15(4), 157-158. wilk, p., maltby, a., & cooke, m. (2017). residential schools and the effects on indigenous health and well-being in canada—a scoping review. public health reviews, 38(1). https://doi.org/ 10.1186/s40985-017-0055-6 williams, a. d., clark, t. c., & lewycka, s. (2018). the associations between cultural identity and mental health outcomes for indigenous m!ori youth in new zealand. frontiers in public health, 6(319). https://doi.org/10.3389/fpubh.2018.00319 28 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10820 appendices appendix a. search strategy database search strategy pubmed 1. (((((((((((((((mental health) or mental-health) or mental wellness) or mental-wellness) or addict*) or anciet*) or depression) or suicid*) or resilien*) or wrap-around) or client-centered) or patient-centered) or trauma*[mesh terms]))) and 2. ((((intervention) or community-based) or community based) or patientcentered) or patient centered) or wrap-around) or program[mesh terms])))) and 3. ((((((((aborigin*) or first nation*) or native) or indians) or métis) or inuit) and 4. canad*[mesh terms])) 5. 1 and 2 6. 3 and 4 7. 5 and 6 medline 1. ((((((((aborigin*.mp) or first nation*.mp) or native.mp) or métis.mp) or inuit.mp) or indigenous.mp) [mesh terms]))) and 2. canad*.mp[mesh terms])) 3. (((((((((((((((mental health.mp) or mental-health.mp) or mental wellness.mp) or mental-wellness.mp) or addict*.mp) or anciet*.mp) or depress*.mp) or suicid*.mp) or resilien*.mp) or wrap-around.mp) or clientcentered.mp) or patient-centered.mp) or trauma*.mp[mesh terms]))) and 4. ((((intervention.mp) or community-based.mp) or community based.mp) or client-centered.mp) or client centered.mp) or patient-centered.mp) or patient centered.mp) or program.mp[mesh terms])))) 5. 1 and 2 6. 3 and 4 7. 5 and 6 29 graham et al.: indigenous mental health interventions published by scholarship@western, 2021 appendix a. search strategy (continued) web of science 1. ts=(aborigin*) or ts=(first nation*) or ts=(native) or ts=(métis) or ts=(inuit) or ts=(indigenous) indexes=sci-expanded, ssci, a&hci, cpci-s, cpci-ssh, bkci-s, bkci-ssh, esci, ccr-expanded, ic timespan=all years 2. ts=(mental-health) or ts=(mental health) or ts=(mental-wellness) or ts=(mental wellness) or ts=(addict*) or ts=(anxi*) or ts=(depress*) or ts=(suicid*) or ts=(resilien*) or ts=(trauma) or ts=(resilien*) or ts=(trauma) indexes=sci-expanded, ssci, a&hci, cpci-s, cpci-ssh, bkci-s, bkci-ssh, esci, ccr-expanded, ic timespan=all years 3. ts=(intervent*) or ts=(community-based) or ts=(community based) or ts=(client-centered) or ts=(client centered) or ts=(patient-centered) or ts=(patient centered) or ts=(wrap-around) or ts=(wrap around) indexes=sciexpanded, ssci, a&hci, cpci-s, cpci-ssh, bkci-s, bkci-ssh, esci, ccr-expanded, ic timespan=all years 4. ts=(canad*) indexes=sci-expanded, ssci, a&hci, cpci-s, cpci-ssh, bkci-s, bkci-ssh, esci, ccr-expanded, ic timespan=all years 5. #4 and #1 6. #3 and #2 7. #6 and #5 psycinfo 1. aborigin$.tw or first nation$.tw or native.tw or métis.tw or inuit.tw or indigenous.tw 2. canad$.tw 3. mental-health.tw or mental health.tw or mental-wellness.tw or mental wellness.tw or addict$.tw or anxi$.tw or depress$.tw or suicid$.tw or resilien$.tw or trauma.tw or resilien$.tw or trauma.tw 4. intervent$.tw or community-based.tw or community based.tw or clientcentered.tw or client centered.tw or patient-centered.tw or patient centered.tw or wrap-around.tw or wrap around.tw 5. 1 and 2 6. 3 and 4 7. 5 and 6 30 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10820 appendix b. list of activities used to improve indigenous people’s mental health 1. non-competitive games, walks, crafts, shared meals 2. jewellery making, sports, drawing 3. discussion circles, storytelling, scavenger hunts, medicine wheel 4. youth received mentoring for 1 year vs. 2 years 5. big brother, big sister program 6. mentoring of aboriginal youth 7. 2-4 hours per week with mentor for 1 year 8. suicide response team: 2 indigenous mental health workers, and travelling mental health clinic 9. rainbow lodge recovery centre 10. weekly men’s group 11. shared meal 12. health programs with doctors and nurses 13. linking first nation elders with vulnerable men 14. regular meetings with an indigenous elder 15. elders provided a safe “place for healing,” they could “laugh,” and receive “gentle guidance,” and they were “respected” compared to previous health care experiences 16. culture camps 17. traditional food gathering techniques 18. language, survival techniques 19. clan affiliation, bah’iats system 20. friends for life program classroom-based intervention 21. individual and group activities that teach children to identify anxiety signals, physical bodily symptoms, worried thoughts and maladaptive behaviours 22. outdoor adventure leadership experience 23. wilderness canoe expedition 24. medicine wheel 25. outward bound process model 26. small group activities 27. 8 experiences with 3 each summer 28. ayahuasca ceremonies 29. retreats focussed on addressing issues of addiction 30. indigenous elders meeting with individuals with depression and suicidal thoughts in a primary health care clinic 31. weekly workshops led by an indigenous elder 32. iheal program (10-18 sessions over 6 months) 31 graham et al.: indigenous mental health interventions published by scholarship@western, 2021 appendix c. tools used to measure participants mental health status 1. 11-item cultural connectedness scale (ccs) 2. 14-item mental health continuum—short form (mhc-sf) 3. 6-point likert scale (1 = never, 6 = everyday) 4. strengths and difficulties questionnaire (sdq) 5. revised social anxiety scale for children (sasc-r) 6. confirmed patient record at the psychiatric facility 7. beck depression inventory-ii 8. beck scale for suicide ideation 9. beck hopelessness scale 10. multiple affect adjective check list 11. clyde mood scale 12. profile of mood states 13. 39-item self-reported multidimensional anxiety scale for children (masc) 14. health and well-being questionnaire 15. outward bound process model 16. mental component score (mcs) 17. scale of positive and negative emotion—balance (spane) 18. self-esteem scale (ses) 19. the difficulty in emotion regulation scale 20. the philadelphia mindfulness scale 21. the empowerment scale 22. the hope scale 23. the mcgill quality of life survey 24. the 4 week substance abuse scale 25. patient health questionnaire 26. suicidal behaviours questionnaire 27. sullivan’s quality of life scale 28. ptsd checklist civilian version 29. centre for epidemiologic studies depression scale ms 10820 cover page.pdf ms 10820 graham mental health interventions rce.pdf the canadian crown's duty to consult indigenous nations' knowledge systems in federal environmental assessments the international indigenous policy journal volume 9 issue 3 special issue: indigenous peoples, climate change, and environmental stewardship article 4 july 2018 the canadian crown's duty to consult indigenous nations' knowledge systems in federal environmental assessments stephen s. crawford university of guelph, scrawfor@uoguelph.ca recommended citation crawford, s. s. (2018). the canadian crown's duty to consult indigenous nations' knowledge systems in federal environmental assessments. the international indigenous policy journal, 9(3). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.4 the canadian crown's duty to consult indigenous nations' knowledge systems in federal environmental assessments abstract in 2016, the government of canada undertook a review of regulatory processes for federal environmental assessments (eas) in preparation for replacing the canadian environmental assessment act. an ea expert panel was appointed to review numerous oral and written submissions from indigenous nations, government agencies, and the public. the panel's final report included recommendations that were considered by canada in the development of its currently proposed new legislation regarding federal eas: bill c-69. the goal of this analysis is to evaluate the extent to which canada’s review and proposed legislation actually addressed the crown’s duty to consult indigenous nations' knowledge systems. detailed examination of the panel's review and canada's response shows clearly that the crown's duty has not been fulfilled by the proposed legislation, in either spirit or practice. keywords duty to consult, indigenous, science, knowledge systems, environmental assessment acknowledgments this work was supported by the chippewas of nawash unceded first nation–university of guelph faculty partnership, in conjunction with the environment office of the saugeen ojibway nation, and canadian social sciences and humanities research council grant 410-2006-0405. i am greatly indebted to the inspiration and scholarly guidance of lorraine land, john borrows, and roronhiake:wen (he clears the sky) dan longboat, and bruce morito—all of whom shared ideas in the development of this article. my thanks to three anonymous reviewers who offered suggestions that improved an earlier version of this manuscript. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ the canadian crown's duty to consult indigenous nations' knowledge systems in federal environmental assessments in canada, most federal environmental assessments (eas) have been governed by the canadian environmental assessment act (ceaa) 2012 to "inform government decision-making and support sustainable development by identifying opportunities to avoid, eliminate or reduce potential adverse impacts on the environment and by ensuring that mitigation measures are applied” (canada, 2016, para. 1).when a majority liberal government was elected in fall 2015, one of its principal commitments was a thorough review and modernization of ceaa 2012, which had been severely weakened by previous conservative governments. for example, the conservatives narrowed the scope to eliminate any federal involvement in the majority of eas, severely reduced breadth of remaining assessments, and increased role of political lobbying and “ministerial discretion” in final decision making (gibson, 2012). on november 13, 2015, prime minister justin trudeau issued a mandate letter to the newly appointed minister of environment and climate change (hereafter referred to as the minister), catherine mckenna, charging her to: immediately review canada’s environmental assessment processes to regain public trust and help get resources to market and introduce new, fair processes that [would]: • restore robust oversight and thorough environmental assessments of areas under federal jurisdiction, while also working with provinces and territories to avoid duplication; • ensure that decisions are based on science, facts, and evidence [emphasis added], and serve the public’s interest; • provide ways for canadians to express their views and opportunities for experts to meaningfully participate; and • require project advocates to choose the best technologies available to reduce environmental impacts. (canada, 2015, paras. 23-27) the prime minister’s charge to the minister did not include any reference to the canadian crown's duty to consult and accommodate (hereafter referred to as the duty to consult) indigenous1 nations and their respective knowledge systems2,3 in federal eas (newman, 2014b). however, the prime minister’s charge also stated that “no relationship is more important to me and to canada than the one with indigenous peoples. it is time for a renewed, nation-to-nation relationship with indigenous peoples, 1 the term indigenous rather than aboriginal is used in this report (with the exception of direct quotations) to refer to the first nations, inuit, and métis peoples in canada. while the term aboriginal is significant under the constitution act of 1982, not all indigenous peoples identify with the term. readers should be aware that there is no single term to describe all indigenous peoples, and every effort should be made to use the name preferred by the specific group being referred to. 2 for this analysis, i adopt the definition of cultural knowledge system provided by varghese and crawford (in press): "a social network of individuals, that exhibits structure and function in the use of specific processes to understand the conditions and causal mechanisms of nature" (para. 26). 3as an anonymous reviewer correctly noted, the phrase "indigenous nations and their respective knowledge systems” is an atypical, yet essential, expression in this analysis. the crown's duty to consult and accommodate indigenous nations applies in a wide variety of cultural, legal, political, and economic contexts. however, when it comes to federal science-based environmental assessments of a proposed activity, the knowledge system (defined in previous footnote) of the indigenous nation becomes a focal point for what that nation knows about the predicted effects (conditions and/or causes) of the proposed activity. 1 crawford: indigenous knowledge systems in eas published by scholarship@western, 2018 based on recognition of rights, respect, co-operation, and partnership”(canada, 2015, para. 8). thus, even at the highest levels of organization, canada’s review of ceaa 2012 was confronted with a dilemma. on the one hand, there was an explicit, a priori commitment by canada to the science knowledge system in future federal ea regulatory processes. on the other hand, canada had also explicitly recognized the essential role of indigenous nations in federal eas (without any mention of their knowledge systems). it remained to be seen how canada’s review would reconcile this dilemma, especially in the newly drafted house of commons of canada bill c-69 an act to enact the impact assessment act and the canadian energy regulator act, to amend the navigation protection act and to make consequential amendments to other acts. at the time of submitting this analysis, bill c-69 had proceeded through three readings and had been passed by the house of commons on june 20, 2018, and it was headed for debate in the senate. the goal of this analysis is to evaluate the extent to which canada’s 2016-2017 review of federal ea regulatory processes and proposed legislation in bill c-69 actually addressed the crown’s duty to consult indigenous nations' knowledge systems. in order to achieve this goal, it will be necessary to satisfy the following specific objectives: a. review canadian proclamations, acts, policies, and guidelines regarding the crown’s duty to consult indigenous nations' knowledge systems, especially in regard to ea regulatory processes; b. survey canadian case law for arguments and decisions regarding the crown’s duty to consult indigenous nations' knowledge systems in ea regulatory processes; c. search for provisions of existing international treaties and agreements for which canada is a party, specifically regarding consultation of indigenous nations' knowledge systems; d. identify aspects of the ea expert panel’s mandate, scope, and processes regarding the role of the crown’s duty to consult indigenous nations' knowledge systems in ea regulatory processes; e. assess submissions to the panel regarding the crown’s duty to consult indigenous nations' knowledge systems in ea regulatory processes; and f. evaluate the degree to which the panel and canada incorporated the crown’s duty to consult indigenous nations' knowledge systems in ea regulatory processes, for incorporation into canada’s bill c-69 as a proposed replacement of the canadian environmental assessment act and associated policies and guidelines. in this manner, it is hoped that the government of canada and its indigenous and non-indigenous peoples will have a clearer understanding of how the crown’s duty to consult indigenous nations' knowledge systems can be meaningfully translated into effective provisions of ea law, policies, and guidelines for the future. proclamations, acts, policies, and guidelines the canadian crown’s duty to consult is a complex idea that emerges from the reconciliation of crown sovereignty with indigenous occupation in canada prior to colonization (stevenson, 2017; townshend & mcclurg, 2014).there is a long and often difficult history of crown–indigenous relationships in canadian law, policies, and regulations (mcfadgen, 2013). in a legal sense, the honour of the crown in dealing with indigenous nations traces back in time—past recent supreme court decisions, past the 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.4 constitution act of 1867, and even past the royal proclamation of 1763, which was itself a critical development in the relationship between indigenous nations and the colonial government of what was then british north america (coates & favel, 2016; favel & coates, 2016). arnot (1996) provided a very interesting commentary on the source of the crown's duty of honourable dealing, typically abbreviated to the honour of the crown: long before we agreed, as an increasingly ethnically complex and contested nation, on a formal charter of rights, we had inherited the british tradition of acting honourably for the sake of the sovereign. this is a very ancient convention with roots in pre-norman england, a time when every yeoman swore personal allegiance to his chieftain or king—whether he be celt or saxon. anyone who was charged with speaking or acting on behalf of the king bore an absolute personal responsibility to lend credit to his master's good name. should he fail in this responsibility or cause embarrassment, he was required to answer personally to the king with his life and fortune. (p. 340) it is very interesting to juxtapose these ancient english sovereign values with modern interpretations regarding the honour of canada as a constitutional monarchy. specifically, to what extent does the individual currently serving as canada's prime minister—and the people currently serving as associated cabinet ministers in the federal government—bear personal responsibility to ensure that indigenous nations are treated in a respectful and just manner that the current monarch would personally accept as lending credit to her good name? see for example haida nation v. british columbia [minister of forests] (2004). while part of the contemporary operationalization of the duty to consult is guided by canadian law, the actual history of developing and implementing such policies has been decided outside the law by both political and administrative agents in government (newman, 2015; nosek, 2017). the common law basis for the duty to consult arises from the crown's fiduciary obligations toward indigenous peoples, manifest via their inherent and treaty rights as outlined in §35(1) of the 1982 constitution act, which (a) recognizes and affirms indigenous rights and titles, and (b) places special emphasis on reconciliation between the parties. in 1992, the government of canada passed the canadian environmental assessment act with the following stated purposes: (a) to ensure that projects are considered in a careful and precautionary manner before federal authorities take action in connection with them, in order to ensure that such projects do not cause significant adverse environmental effects; (b) to encourage responsible authorities to take actions that promote sustainable development and thereby achieve or maintain a healthy environment and a healthy economy; (b.1) to ensure that responsible authorities carry out their responsibilities in a coordinated manner with a view to eliminating unnecessary duplication in the environmental assessment process; (b.2) to promote cooperation and coordinated action between federal and provincial governments with respect to environmental assessment processes for projects; (b.3) to promote communication and cooperation between responsible authorities and aboriginal peoples with respect to environmental assessment; 3 crawford: indigenous knowledge systems in eas published by scholarship@western, 2018 (c) to ensure that projects that are to be carried out in canada or on federal lands do not cause significant adverse environmental effects outside the jurisdictions in which the projects are carried out; and (d) to ensure that there be opportunities for timely and meaningful public participation throughout the environmental assessment process. (canada, 1992, §4.1) in the entire body of the canadian environmental assessment act, there was only a single mention of potential engagement with indigenous nations' knowledge systems in eas: “community knowledge and aboriginal traditional knowledge may [emphasis added] be considered in conducting an environmental assessment” (canada, 1992, §16.1). thus, based on this wording in the 1992 version of the act, canada may or may not consider indigenous knowledge systems in eas. at face value, this was effectively equivalent to saying nothing at all on the issue.4 in 1996, the royal commission on aboriginal peoples investigated the troubled relationship between canada and indigenous nations. it provided more than 400 recommendations for substantial legislative and administrative reforms, including meaningful consultation regarding eas and resource management (mcfadgen, 2013; usher, 2000). in 2011, canada published a guidance document for federal officials and others regarding what were seen as the crown's obligations: aboriginal consultation and accommodation: updated guidelines for federal officials to fulfill the duty to consult (canada, 2011). in these guidelines, canada (2011) made four incidental references to indigenous knowledge (and no references whatsoever to an indigenous–science knowledge system interaction): a. “determine whether there are any statutes or regulations that require the department or agency to consult with aboriginal groups in relation to their activities or consider traditional knowledge (such as provisions in the species at risk act, canada national parks act)” (p. 21). b. “beyond the duty to consult, there are other reasons for including aboriginal groups in the environmental assessment process. these include obligations under the canadian environmental assessment act to consider ‘environmental effects,’ including any change in the environment that affects the current use of lands and resources for traditional purposes by aboriginal persons (s.2 of the act). also, s.16.1 of the act provides the opportunity to include aboriginal traditional knowledge in the environmental assessment” (p. 26). c. “documents that may alert the crown to the existence of a claim or contain historical information in support of a claim include[ing] . . . traditional knowledge and use studies prepared by aboriginal groups for an environmental assessment process” (p. 42). d. “the following provides a list of capacity areas for which financial support has been provided to aboriginal groups in the context of consultation and accommodation processes: . . . land use, traditional knowledge and use or targeted resource planning, management and implementation” (p. 49). the guideline's glossary definition of engagement was also ambiguous. “engagement: examples of engagement include discussion groups and formal dialogue, sharing knowledge and seeking input on 4 to be fair, some have suggested informally that the term may was used to express the idea that canada would consider indigenous knowledge if an indigenous nation shared it for the ea. if so, the expression in the act remained incomplete, vague, and inherently problematic. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.4 activities such as policy, legislation, program development or renewal” (canada, 2011, p. 61). taken as a whole, canada's (2011) guidelines on its duty to consult were highly inadequate for anyone interested in the practical engagement of indigenous and science knowledge systems for eas or natural resource management. it should also be noted that when the guidelines stated, “also, s.16.1 of the act provides the opportunity to include aboriginal traditional knowledge in the environmental assessment” (canada, 2011, p. 26), they were actually referring to that ineffective statement in the 1992 canadian environmental assessment act (1992): “community knowledge and aboriginal traditional knowledge may [emphasis added] be considered in conducting an environmental assessment” (canada, 1992, §16.1). to be clear, in 2012 canada reworded this statement in its revision of the canadian environmental assessment act: “the environmental assessment of a designated project may [emphasis added] take into account community knowledge and aboriginal traditional knowledge” (canada, 2012, §19.3). the reality is that there was no explicit recognition whatsoever of the legislative requirements for the crown to fulfill its duty to consult indigenous nations' knowledge systems in federal eas even though canada's guidelines said that the act provides the opportunity to include aboriginal traditional knowledge. canadian case law this component of the analysis is by no means a legal commentary, but rather an attempt to understand the origin and development of the crown’s duty to consult indigenous nations' knowledge systems in federal eas. however, as dwight newman (2014a) succinctly stated: "to come to an understanding of the duty to consult, there is no alternative than to grapple with the case law" (p. 37). after passing the 1982 constitution act into law, canada did not effectively reconfigure its relationships with indigenous nations generally, or with regard to its duty to consult specifically. this lack of progress led to a situation where the supreme court of canada was required to rule on a series of pivotal cases, and in the process gradually develop and clarify a doctrine for the crown's duty to consult (glass, 2015; townshend & mcclurg, 2014). in r v. sparrow (1990) and delgamuukw v. british columbia (1997), the supreme court formally recognized and affirmed the crown's fiduciary duty to consult indigenous nations, stemming from section 35(1) of the constitution act (manley-casimir, 2016; valverde, 2011). however, it was not until a trilogy of canadian supreme court decisions between 2004 and 2005 that modern, procedural consultation obligations became more clearly defined (mcleod et al., 2015; newman & ortega pineda, 2016; peach, 2016). these cases include haida nation v. british columbia [minister of forests] (2004), taku river tlingit first nation v. british columbia [project assessment director] (2004), and mikisew cree first nation v. canada [minister of canadian heritage] (2005). in these cases, the supreme court of canada started to explicitly describe a framework for the crown’s consultation activities with indigenous nations (anaya, 2014; booth & skelton, 2011; coates & favel, 2016; newman, 2014b; ritchie, 2013), including the following requirements: • the duty to consult rests with the crown, and is not a responsibility that can be completely delegated to a third party; 5 crawford: indigenous knowledge systems in eas published by scholarship@western, 2018 • the crown must initiate (trigger) consultations with indigenous nations prior to government decisions that could affect their aboriginal and treaty rights, even if those rights are asserted yet not fully established; • consultations must be a meaningful process undertaken in good faith, based on procedural fairness and genuine efforts to achieve reconciliation with the indigenous nations; and • the scale (spectrum) of consultation must be determined by the evidence and support for the asserted and established rights and the nature of the contemplated infringement, where cases with stronger claims and a greater adverse impact on the claim would warrant more extensive consultation and accommodation. since this trilogy of landmark supreme court decisions, numerous cases have progressed through the provincial and territorial judicial systems—many of which hinged in one way or another on the crown's duty to consult indigenous nations and their knowledge systems for eas and natural resource management. one general conclusion clearly emerged from this longstanding parade of cases working its way to the supreme court of canada for final decision making: the crown seems to have been as determined to minimize the breadth and depth of its responsibilities under its duty to consult indigenous nations' knowledge systems, as the indigenous nations themselves have been determined to maximize those responsibilities (manley-casimir, 2016; moore, von der porten, & castleden, 2017). it is highly likely that this intense struggle will continue indefinitely until the crown starts to develop effective solutions with its indigenous partners in the true sense of fairness and reconciliation. in 2012, the honourable lance finch (then chief justice of british columbia) wrote an insightful article in which he argued that the honour of the crown actually requires not only a duty to consult, but also a duty to learn. in the context of his article, justice finch was specifically referring to learning from indigenous legal orders that have histories predating european colonization: through all stages of this process, we must retain a sense of humility. for non-indigenous lawyers, judges, and students, this awareness is not restricted to recognizing simply that there is much we don’t know. it is that we don’t know just how much we don’t know. in principle, we must always admit a measure of uncertainty in our approach, as non-indigenous practitioners, to another culture’s narratives and laws; the more so in our conclusions. bearing in mind this last cautionary standard, we as canadian legal practitioners, the strangers in the landscape, may find ourselves ready to begin. (finch, 2012, p. 20) to be clear, justice finch did not explicitly associate the crown's duty to consult with indigenous nations' knowledge systems in eas. however, if we now take a minute to re-read justice finch's passage and insert ea scientists and ea resource managers at the appropriate locations, we can see how the crown's duty to learn about indigenous knowledge systems starts to take on a very different meaning in federal science-based eas. the duty to learn directs the motivation to actually disengage from legal battles and to start working on effective solutions in genuine partnership. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.4 international treaties and agreements over the past 30 years, canada has endorsed and committed itself to several international agreements that state indigenous knowledge systems must be respected in resource management decisions affecting indigenous rights and interests (coates & favel, 2016; croal, 2015; favel & coates, 2016; lightfoot, 2016; newman, 2014a; newman, 2014b; richardson, 2017), including: • report of world commission on environment and development: our common future (also known as the brundtland report; united nations [un], 1987); • convention on biological diversity (un, 1992b); • akwé:kon voluntary guidelines for the conduct of cultural, environmental and social impact assessments regarding developments proposed to take place on, or which are likely to impact on, sacred sites and on lands and waters traditionally occupied or used by indigenous and local communities (secretariat of the convention on biological diversity, 2004); • statement on principles of forests (un, 1992c); • agenda 21 (un, 1992a); and • the future we want (also known as the rio declaration; un, 2012). in 2016, canada finally issued full support—without its previously issued qualifications—for the un declaration of rights of indigenous peoples, a non-legally-binding document that was originally passed by the un in 2007 (favel & coates, 2016; lightfoot, 2016). specifically, the declaration made several powerful statements endorsing states’ duty to consult their indigenous nations' knowledge systems in environmental and resource management. specific articles include: • recognizing that respect for indigenous knowledge, cultures and traditional practices contributes to sustainable and equitable development and proper management of the environment. (un, 2008, p. 2) • article 31.1 indigenous peoples have the right to maintain, control, protect and develop their cultural heritage, traditional knowledge and traditional cultural expressions, as well as the manifestations of their sciences, technologies and cultures, including human and genetic resources, seeds, medicines, knowledge of the properties of fauna and flora, oral traditions, literatures, designs, sports and traditional games and visual and performing arts. they also have the right to maintain, control, protect and develop their intellectual property over such cultural heritage, traditional knowledge, and traditional cultural expressions. (p. 11) • article 31.2 in conjunction with indigenous peoples, states shall take effective measures to recognize and protect the exercise of these rights. (p. 11) • article 32.1 indigenous peoples have the right to determine and develop priorities and strategies for the development or use of their lands or territories and other resources. (p. 12) • article 32.2 states shall consult and cooperate in good faith with the indigenous peoples concerned through their own representative institutions in order to obtain their free and informed consent prior to the approval of any project affecting their lands or territories and other resources, particularly in connection with the development, utilization or exploitation of mineral, water or other resources. (p. 12) 7 crawford: indigenous knowledge systems in eas published by scholarship@western, 2018 • article 32.3 states shall provide effective mechanisms for just and fair redress for any such activities, and appropriate measures shall be taken to mitigate adverse environmental, economic, social, cultural or spiritual impact. (p. 12) it is this last stipulation that is especially important with regard to how canada will develop its duty to consult indigenous nations' knowledge systems in federal science-based eas and natural resource management. canada has formally agreed that free, prior, and informed consent (fpic) needs to be secured when indigenous peoples are potentially affected by resource development projects on or near their traditional territories (boutilier, 2017; coates & favel, 2016; damstra, 2015; imai, 2016; international association for impact assessment [iaia], 2012; land, 2016; miller, 2015). for this article, the principle of informed consent from indigenous nations is critical. in order to satisfy this principle, it seems logically necessary that the crown will be required to: a. ensure information about all aspects of the project is provided to the indigenous nation, including the environmental impact evaluations (created by the proponent or the crown) on the basis of the crown's science knowledge system; b. ensure sufficient time and opportunity is provided to the indigenous nation to understand, access, and evaluate the science knowledge received; and c. ensure appropriate opportunity and capacity for the indigenous nation to engage in reciprocal and meaningful engagement between the indigenous and science knowledge systems for the purpose of effectively communicating the indigenous nation’s knowledge regarding the predicted effects of the project. when the trudeau government made the explicit decision in 2016 to fully endorse the united nation’s declaration of rights of indigenous peoples, it had to know there would be very important implications for the crown’s duty to consult indigenous nations' knowledge systems in federal science-based eas and resource management decision-making(favel & coates, 2016). canada would now be required to walk the talk in this regard. ea expert panel’s mandate, scope, and processes on august 15, 2016, the minister established an ea expert panel (hereafter referred to as the panel), with terms of reference to conduct a review of federal ea processes, including explicit reference to inclusion of indigenous nations: the minister is establishing an expert panel (the panel) to conduct a review of environmental assessment processes. the panel will engage and consult with canadians, indigenous people, provinces and territories and key stakeholders to develop recommendations on ways to strengthen and improve federal environmental assessment processes.(canada, 2016, context section, para. 6) the terms of reference for the panel provided information on the mandate, scope, and process of review. the panel’s mandate was explicitly stated as follows: the panel’s review shall consider the goals and purpose of modern-day environmental assessment and be conducted in a manner that is consistent with these terms of reference. the panel shall prepare a report that sets out: 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.4 • the conclusions, recommendations and rationale for the conclusions and recommendations of the panel; and • a summary of the input received and how it was considered, including that from the multiinterest advisory committee or other experts(canada, 2016, mandate section, paras. 1-3) the panel’s terms of reference made no mention at all of the crown’s duty to consult in a reciprocal and meaningful manner with indigenous nations and their knowledge systems in federal eas. the panel's mandate did, however, restate the prime minister’s charge to the minister, including the culturally biased commitment to “ensure decisions are based on science, facts and evidence” (canada, 2016, scope of review section, question 2). although the panel members were not bound by the crown's legal and political positions on the duty to consult, it is important to recognize that the crown omitted (intentionally or otherwise) this duty as an explicit cornerstone of the panel's mission. it is revealing to note that the context section of the panel’s terms explicitly stated that “in carrying out this review, the minister is to be supported by the minister of fisheries, oceans and the canadian coast guard, the minister of natural resources, the minister of indigenous and northern affairs and the minister of science” (canada, 2016, context section, para. 5). this statement is important because the prime minister’s original mandate letter to the minister had explicitly referenced support in the ea review by the minister of fisheries and oceans and the minister of natural resources—but had not referenced support by either the minister of indigenous and northern affairs or the minister of science. even more curious in the panel’s terms of reference is the following: environmental assessment is one part of a broader regulatory framework. in addition to the minister’s mandate to review federal environmental assessment processes, other ministers have also been mandated to carry out reviews and propose reforms to matters that intersect with environmental assessment. these include: • minister of fisheries and oceans and the canadian coast guard—review changes to the fisheries act, restore lost protections and incorporate modern safeguards; • minister of natural resources—modernize the national energy board to ensure that its composition reflects regional views and has sufficient expertise in fields such as environmental science, community development and indigenous traditional knowledge; and • minister of transport— review changes to the navigable waters protection act, restore lost protections and incorporate modern safeguards.(canada, 2016, complementary mandates section, paras. 1-2) note specifically that the minister of natural resources was explicitly charged to “modernize” the national energy board to ensure that it had “sufficient expertise” in “indigenous traditional knowledge.” why was this explicit condition not also included in the minister’s mandate or the terms of reference for the ea expert panel? further along in the panel’s terms of reference, the panel’s mandate was described as follows: consider the goals and purpose of modern-day environmental assessment and be conducted in a manner that is consistent with these terms of reference. 9 crawford: indigenous knowledge systems in eas published by scholarship@western, 2018 the panel shall prepare a report that sets out: • the conclusions, recommendations and rationale for the conclusions and recommendations of the panel; and • a summary of the input received and how it was considered, including that from the multiinterest advisory committee or other experts.(canada, 2016, mandate section, paras. 1-3) the panel’s specific scope of review stated that: in carrying out the review, the panel shall consider the following matters raised in the minister’s mandate letter and the mandate letter of the minister of indigenous and northern affairs: • how to restore robust oversight and thorough environmental assessments of areas under federal jurisdiction, while working with the provinces and territories to avoid duplication? • how to ensure decisions are based on science, facts and evidence and serve the public’s interest? • how to provide ways for canadians to express their views and opportunities for experts to meaningfully participate? • how to require project advocates to choose the best technologies available to reduce environmental impacts? • how to ensure that environmental assessment legislation is amended to enhance the consultation, engagement and participatory capacity of indigenous groups in reviewing and monitoring major resource development projects [emphasis added]?” (canada, 2016, paras. 1-2) thus, it can be seen that a priori dominance of the science knowledge system was carried forward from the minister’s mandate received from the prime minister, down to the panel’s terms of reference. in contrast, there was only a vague requirement to consider “enhancing” the role of indigenous nations generally— not necessarily their knowledge systems, specifically— in federal science-based eas. the panel’s scope was not finished. it concluded by providing a few very interesting “examples” of issues the panel needed to consider and reflect in its work: • how environmental assessment processes are conducted under the canadian environmental assessment act, 2012, including practices and procedures, such as indigenous engagement and consultation [emphasis added], public participation, the role of science and indigenous knowledge [emphasis added], cumulative effects assessment and harmonization and coordination with other orders of government; • practices and approaches within canada and internationally; • relationship between environmental assessment and other elements of the regulatory framework; and • alignment of various jurisdictional processes. (canada, 2016, scope of review section, para. 4) to recognize the objectives of the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples, the panel shall reflect the principles of the declaration in its recommendations [emphasis added], as appropriate, especially with respect to the manner in which environmental 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.4 assessment processes can be used to address potential impacts to potential or established aboriginal and treaty rights.(canada, 2016, scope of review section, para. 5) thus, even though the panel’s mandate and scope made no explicit reference to the crown’s duty to consult indigenous nations or their knowledge systems in federal science-based eas, it was obvious that the minister realized these engagements would be a critical factor in the panel's review. one final note should be made specifically regarding the minister’s appointment of members to the ea expert panel that were going to work within the mandate, scope, and processes described above. the panel’s terms of reference stated: “the minister will appoint individuals to the panel that have knowledge or experience relevant to environmental assessment processes” (canada, 2016, the panel section, para. 1). while each of the four panel members did in fact possess expertise relevant to canadian eas (they were a management consultant, an industry executive, an environmental lawyer, and an indigenous lawyer), the minister did not see fit to appoint any panel members with expertise in either indigenous or science knowledge systems in ea processes. it is difficult to imagine how this selection process could reasonably omit such essential expertise. submissions to the ea expert panel the panel established a highly compressed schedule of three months (october-december 2016, inclusive) during which the panel conducted a coast-to-coast tour of canada, receiving oral and written submissions for its consideration in preparation of a final report. a total of 39 in-person sessions with oral presentations were convened across the provinces: 21 open and public sessions, and 18 indigenous sessions. a survey of the transcripts from these in-person sessions shows that the crown’s duty to consult was explicitly raised in 14 out of 18 (77.7%) of the indigenous sessions and in 11 out of 21 (52.3%) of the public sessions. closer inspection of the transcripts demonstrates a high degree of consistency with concepts raised in the written submissions; therefore, a more detailed analysis is provided here on the latter only. a total of 580 written submissions were received from indigenous nations, government agencies, industry and business organizations, as well as a mix of consultants, non-governmental organizations (ngos) and individuals (expert panel, n.d.). table 1 presents a frequency distribution of these written submissions, showing that the majority of submissions originated from indigenous nations (n = 165, 28.4%), then individuals (n = 136, 23.4%), and then non-governmental organizations (n = 98, 16.9%). taken as a whole, there were 46 submissions from crown agencies (7.9%), with roughly equal representation among federal, provincial and territorial, and regional and municipal levels of government. of the 580 submissions to the panel, 190 (32.8%) made explicit reference to the crown's duty to consult with indigenous nations as an essential part of eas (table 1). the federal crown submissions exhibited the highest relative frequency (12/15, 80.0%) of reference to duty to consult generally, then submissions by indigenous organizations (105/165, 63.6%), legal organizations (8/13, 61.5%), and industry and business (16/48, 33.3%). this comes as little surprise, given that the duty with regard to the rights and interests of indigenous nations must be carried by the crown and that the process emerged within a legal context, typically in response to development proposals raised by industry and businesses. 11 crawford: indigenous knowledge systems in eas published by scholarship@western, 2018 table 1. references to duty to consult in submissions to ea expert panel submitter category submissions to ea expert panel duty to consult duty to consult indigenous knowledge systems total % of submissions total % within category total % within category indigenous 165 28.4 105 63.6 17 10.3 crowna federal 15 2.6 12 80.0 0 0 provincial/ territorial 16 2.8 3 18.8 0 0 regional/ municipal 15 2.6 2 13.3 0 0 crownsubtotal 46 7.9 17 37 0 0 industry/ business 48 8.3 16 33.3 0 0 legal 13 2.2 8 61.5 0 0 consultant 23 4.0 3 13.0 0 0 ngo 98 16.9 14 14.3 0 0 academia 51 8.8 11 21.6 0 0 individual 136 23.4 16 11.8 1 .007 total 580 100 190 32.8 19 10.37 note. a where the crown is the state in all its aspects and sub-divisions including federal, provincial and territorial, and under certain circumstances municipal governments (imai & stacey, 2014). 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.4 one insightful example of a non-indigenous submission to the panel was provided by the canadian chamber of commerce (ccc, 2016), which included a 2016 focus document entitled seizing six opportunities for more clarity in the duty to consult and accommodate process. in a footnote expanding on the dynamic nature of the duty to consult indigenous nations in canada, the ccc (2016) wrote, “as one indication, the foundational supreme court of canada case for the duty to consult and accommodate doctrine, haida . . . has been cited by subsequent courts over 320 times in just over a decade. this means almost three court decisions every month for eleven years” (p. 28). as we have seen above, case law in canada continues to have a profound effect on how the crown’s duty to consult indigenous nations—and their respective knowledge systems—is being conceived and executed. what does come as a major surprise from the panel submissions is that while 17 indigenous organizations made specific reference to the crown's duty to consult their indigenous knowledge systems as part of the ea process, recognition of this requirement was completely absent from any of the crown or legal, industry, and business submissions (see table 1). the single largest indigenous submission to the ea expert panel was provided by the saugeen ojibway nation (son, 2016), including five reports regarding the essential role of indigenous knowledge systems in canadian sciencebased eas. in the duty to consult component of their knowledge system submission, son provided the panel with their analysis of proclamations, acts, policies, guidelines, case law, and international treaties and agreements. on the basis of their analysis, son provided strategic recommendations to the ea expert panel regarding the new legislation, including the need to explicitly and appropriately incorporate a requirement under the crown’s duty to consult for reciprocal and meaningful consultation with indigenous nations' knowledge systems on federal science-based eas in their traditional territories. there were also 16 other indigenous written submissions to the panel that explicitly discussed the crown's duty to consult their indigenous nations' knowledge systems as part of ea decision making. the duty to include indigenous knowledge when evaluating seriousness of the potential adverse effects of proposed activities was discussed in written submissions by the british columbia métis federation, chiefs of ontario, ditidaht first nation, gitga’at first nation, heiltsuk first nation and kitasoo/xai’xais first nation, maliseet nation of new brunswick, métis nation of ontario, mikisew cree first nation, mohawks of the bay of quinte, opaskwayak cree nation, six nations of the grand river territory, and te’mexw treaty association. the written submissions of grand council treaty #3, innu nation, mi’gmawe’l tplu’tagnn inc., and wabun tribal council added specific reference to canada’s existing commitment to consider their knowledge systems under undrip and the associated principles of free, prior, and informed consent (as discussed above). mi’gmawe’l tplu’tagnn inc. also provided additional insights by referring to protocols they had specifically developed to assist the crown in the fulfilment of its duty to engage with their knowledge system. taken together, it would be fair to say that these numerous indigenous written submissions repeatedly and effectively made the case that both the panel and the minister were required to recognize the crown’s duty to consult indigenous nations' knowledge systems in canadian science-based eas. responses by the ea expert panel and canada on april 5, 2017, the minister released the panel's final report building common ground— a new vision for impact assessment in canada: the final report of the expert panel for the review of environmental assessment processes (gélinas, horswill, northey, & pelletier, 2017). the panel's report did not make a single, explicit reference to the crown’s duty to consult indigenous nations' 13 crawford: indigenous knowledge systems in eas published by scholarship@western, 2018 knowledge systems in canadian federal eas, despite referencing the general duty on 36 different occasions in the text. the closest consideration of indigenous nations' knowledge systems in the panel’s report came in section 2.4.1 “meaningful participation-what we heard” where the panel wrote: further, the principles of undrip— including requirements for free, prior and informed consent of indigenous peoples, the requirements of the duty to consult [emphasis added], and the objective of reconciliation—require appropriate participation processes for indigenous peoples. (gélinas et al., 2017, p. 38) but, how did the panel take “what they heard” about the crown’s duty, and explicitly translate it into recommendations for canada to revise the ceaa? the only reference to the crown’s duty to consult indigenous nations' knowledge systems in the panel's final report appeared in section 3 “implementing the vision,” subsection 3.1.2 “envisioning the new federal impact assessment authority” under the heading “required functions and capacities-science and knowledge,” in which the panel recommended: [the new federal ia authority—the impact assessment commission] would be in charge of vetting all analyses for adequacy related to the five pillars of sustainability, through the conduct, co-ordination or oversight of studies conducted throughout the assessment. it would be equipped with expertise in western science as well as in indigenous knowledge and community knowledge. it would validate monitoring and follow-up data and create and maintain a public database of baseline and monitoring data, as well as other data sets, for potential use in future assessments. because all ia decisions must be evidence-based, the commission must have a chief science officer to head the science and knowledge function. by legislation, this officer would have the authority and duty [emphasis added] to verify the adequacy of studies used in the assessment, as well as the impact statement. as set out in legislation, the chief science officer would be responsible for issuing a certificate of independent validation for each ia. the purpose of these measures is to safeguard the use of the best science in assessment processes. (gélinas et al., 2017, p. 53) a close reading of this critical recommendation shows that, while indigenous knowledge (rather than the indigenous knowledge systems that generate that knowledge) would likely be somehow involved, the proposed impact assessment commission would not be explicitly required to fulfill the crown’s duty to consult indigenous nations' knowledge systems in federal science-based eas. in contrast, the panel’s vision for the proposed iac explicitly indicates that the science knowledge system would continue to serve in its culturally dominant capacity. on june 29 , 2017, the government of canada released its discussion paper, environmental and regulatory reviews: discussion paper (canada, 2017), in response to the panel’s final report (among other federal initiatives). this discussion paper included a variety of motherhood statements about science knowledge and indigenous knowledge; however, it completely avoided the crown’s duty to consult indigenous nations' knowledge systems in federal eas. the specific phrase duty to consult appeared only once in the entire 23-page document —in a banner graphic that vaguely stated “indigenous participation in reviews driven by duty to consult➡ cooperation and partnership based on recognition of indigenous rights throughout processes” (canada, 2017, p. 15). there was nothing else regarding the crown’s duty. interestingly, when the graphic is examined more closely, the statement 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.4 “indigenous participation in reviews driven by duty to consult” appears on the left side of the graphic, along with the general statement, “our current system can be improved” (p. 15). canada's proposed bill c-69 (2018) in february 2018 canada introduced draft legislation to replace ceaa (2012), based in large part on the report and recommendations from its ea expert panel (gélinas et al., 2017) and the associated government discussion paper (canada, 2017). at the time of submission for the present analysis, house of commons of canada bill c-69 (2018; hereafter referred to as c-69) an act to enact the impact assessment act and the canadian energy regulator act, to amend the navigation protection act and to make consequential amendments to other acts has proceeded through three readings, been passed by the house of commons on june 20, 2018, and is headed for debate in the senate. this analysis focuses specifically on part 1 of c-69 subtitled an act respecting a federal process for impact assessments and the prevention of significant adverse environmental effects. the crown's duty to consult was not mentioned explicitly at any point in c-69. there were several instances where the duty of the crown (identified as “federal authority” in the bill) was recognized, including the §6(1d) preamble which stated: the purposes of this act are . . . to ensure that designated projects that require the exercise of a power or performance of a duty or function by a federal authority under any act of parliament other than this act to be carried out, are considered in a careful and precautionary manner to avoid adverse effects within federal jurisdiction and adverse direct or incidental effects. (bill c69, 2018, p. 9) other references to the crown's duty were similarly focused on the phrase “exercise of power or performance of duty or function” (bill c-69, 2018, § 64.3). given that neither the ea expert panel's final report nor canada's discussion paper explicitly recognized the crown's duty to consult, perhaps it should come as no surprise that the duty was completely absent from c-69. in the preamble of bill c-69 (2018), there are three key statements relating directly to the crown's responsibility to consult indigenous nations' knowledge systems in federal eas: • whereas the government of canada recognizes that impact assessments provide an effective means of integrating scientific information and indigenous knowledge into decision-making processes related to designated projects. (p. 2) • whereas the government of canada is committed, in the course of exercising its powers and performing its duties and functions in relation to impact, regional and strategic assessments, to ensuring respect for the rights of the indigenous peoples of canada recognized and affirmed by section 35 of the constitution act, 1982, and to fostering reconciliation and working in partnership with them. (p. 2) • whereas the government of canada is committed to implementing the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples. (p. 2) overlooking obvious noun mismatch issues between “scientific information and indigenous knowledge” (see below), it is more important to focus on the critical concepts of (a) effective “integration” of the two knowledge systems (rather than their knowledge per se) in a single decision-making system in a 15 crawford: indigenous knowledge systems in eas published by scholarship@western, 2018 manner that (b) fulfills the crown's duty to consult indigenous nations' knowledge systems, while (c) satisfying the undrip requirement for reciprocal and meaningful exchange between the knowledge systems (i.e., full prior and informed consent). we now proceed to the purposes of c-69 as stated in §6(1), and in particular §6(1j): "the purposes of the act are . . . (j) to ensure that an impact assessment takes into account scientific information, indigenous knowledge and community knowledge" (bill c-69, 2018, p. 10). the phrase “take into account” is key here, since the processes by which these three qualitatively different knowledge systems are taken into account will largely determine the extent to which c-69 actually fulfills the commitments established in the preamble (see above). this section of the bill continues by providing important statements regarding the mandate of canada, its ministers and agents: §6(2): the government of canada, the minister, the agency and federal authorities, in the administration of this act, must exercise their powers in a manner that fosters sustainability, respects the government’s commitments with respect to the rights of the indigenous peoples of canada and applies the precautionary principle. (bill c-69, 2018, p. 10) once again, general reference is made to rights of indigenous nations without explicitly acknowledging the crown's duty to consult. but note also how the undefined “precautionary principle” of the science knowledge system is explicitly recognized and adopted as a priori requirement. no such principles of the indigenous knowledge systems are even recognized, leading to the first clear indication that c-69 still holds the science knowledge system in a culturally dominant role over the indigenous nations' knowledge systems. this exhibition of cultural dominance in c-69 continues in §6(3) application of principles to powers: the government of canada, the minister, the agency and federal authorities must, in the administration of this act, exercise their powers in a manner that adheres to the principles of scientific integrity, honesty, objectivity, thoroughness and accuracy. (bill c-69, 2018, p. 10) note the strength of commitment to these (undefined) principles of the science knowledge system, in stark contrast to the complete omission of any such principles from indigenous knowledge systems. the issue here is not that there are any major objections to the science principles identified as requirements; they appear at face value to be decent candidates. the issue here is the obvious, continued cultural dominance of the western science knowledge system over indigenous knowledge systems, which do not even rate recognition, much less explicit consideration. all of this amounts to cultural dominance— despite all the honourable commitments explicitly stated in the preamble and purpose of c-69. although the crown's duty to consult was not to be found anywhere in c-69, several components of the bill did make explicit reference to the need for “consultation,” including §12 planning phase; obligations subheading under agency’s obligation-offer to consult: for the purpose of preparing for a possible impact assessment of a designated project, the agency must offer to consult with any jurisdiction that has powers, duties or functions in relation to an assessment of the environmental effects of the designated project and any indigenous group that may be affected by the carrying out of the designated project. (bill c-69, 2018, p. 14) 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.4 in this way, c-69 attempts to transform the crown's duty to consult into an “offer to consult.” this effectively narrows the scope of conditional consultation to an “indigenous group that may be affected,” rather than constitutionally protected indigenous nations in whose traditional territory the designated project would exist—regardless of whether that nation would be considered by canada to be “affected.” given c-69's highly constrained definition of consultation with an indigenous nation, it remains to be seen exactly how the knowledge system of that nation would actually be involved in assessment decision making. in §16(2) decisions regarding impact assessments within subheading agency's decision under factors, c-69 identifies the role of a “consulted” indigenous nation in the crown's decision making about whether an ea would even take place to begin with: . . . the agency must decide whether an impact assessment of the designated project is required. in making its decision, the agency must take into account the following factors: . . . (d) any comments received within the time period specified by the agency from the public and from any jurisdiction or indigenous group that is consulted under section 12. (bill c-69, 2018, p. 16) thus, the crown would be required to “take into account” the “comments” that a “consulted” indigenous nation provides within the constrained time period. there are obvious problems with the process as described, including (a) lack of explicit recognition of the knowledge provided by the indigenous knowledge system, (b) lack of requirement for a transparent and accountable process by which the crown would “take into account” that knowledge, and (c) lack of requirement for reciprocal and meaningful consultation between the indigenous and science knowledge systems on the predicted effects of the proposed activity. similarly, bill c-69 (2018) §22(1g), under the heading factors to be considered and subheading factors—impact assessment, identifies the role of a “consulted” indigenous nation in the crown's final decision making about an impact assessment: the impact assessment of a designated project, whether it is conducted by the agency or a review panel, must take into account the following factors: . . . (g) indigenous knowledge provided with respect to the designated project. (p. 20) here, the crown would be required to explicitly consider “knowledge” from an indigenous nation's knowledge system (in contrast to its “comments,” see above) in its final decision making for the ea. however, the assessment process as described still suffers from the same critical weaknesses: (a) lack of requirement for a transparent and accountable process by which the crown would “take into account” that knowledge, and (b) lack of requirement for reciprocal and meaningful consultation between the indigenous and science knowledge systems on the predicted effects of the proposed activity. given the inconsistent yet essential role of knowledge from the indigenous nation's knowledge system in the processes described by c-69, it becomes important to consider if and how the crown characterizes what it means by knowledge, from the perspective of both the indigenous and science knowledge systems. unfortunately, c-69 is highly inconsistent and ambiguous with its language in this regard. the bill makes no reference whatsoever to the concept of knowledge systems (indigenous, local, or science) that create the knowledge, thus creating great confusion between whether knowledge is associated with individuals, communities, and/or cultures. in contrast, c-69 makes repeated use of the phrases “indigenous knowledge” (n = 24) and “community knowledge” (n = 3). bizarrely, c-69 makes no 17 crawford: indigenous knowledge systems in eas published by scholarship@western, 2018 reference at all to science knowledge or scientific knowledge, choosing instead to use unclear phrases such as “scientific information” (n = 7) or “scientific information and data” (n = 1). given this lack of clarity and consistency in knowledge system terminology, perhaps it comes as no surprise that c-69 provides no definitions or explanations for any of these critical terms, except an obviously circular definition in §2 'interpretation–definitions, which states that "indigenous knowledge means the indigenous knowledge of the indigenous peoples of canada" (bill c-69, 2018, p. 7). canada did not see fit to define the counterparts “science knowledge” or “community knowledge.” given all of these issues with terminological and conceptual clarity, it still remains to be seen how effectively c-69 describes the processes by which canada would satisfy its stated requirement to “take into account” any “comments” that a “consulted” indigenous nation might provide within the constrained time period for an assessment. unfortunately, c-69 does not provide any specific processes in this regard, nor does it provide any specific obligations for transparency or accountability to fully demonstrate that there has indeed been reciprocal and meaningful engagement between the indigenous and science knowledge systems for a given assessment. to be clear, there were some excellent ideas that came from the ea expert panel that were incorporated into c-69, not the least of which is the expert committee for the impact assessment agency of canada, as described in §157: (1) to advise it on issues related to impact assessments and regional and strategic assessments, including scientific, environmental, health, social or economic issues. (2) the agency may appoint any person with relevant knowledge or experience as a member of the expert committee. the membership of the committee must include at least one indigenous person. (bill c-69, 2018, p. 83) it is difficult to understand why canada decided to explicitly identify expertise in scientific knowledge systems in this list but failed to explicitly include any expertise in indigenous knowledge systems in the mandate of the agency's expert committee. simply having at least one indigenous person on the expert committee does not eliminate cultural dominance in this regard because, as was the case with the ea expert panel, it is quite possible to have an indigenous expert on the committee with no great expertise on indigenous knowledge systems (see membership of expert panel above). c-69 seems to try to manage expectations in this regard by creating another separate indigenous advisory committee for the agency: §158(1): "to advise it with respect to the interests and concerns of the indigenous peoples of canada in relation to assessments to be conducted under this act" (bill c-69, 2018, p. 83). there was not even mention of “indigenous knowledge” in the committee's poorly defined mandate. subsequent sections of c-69 do not provide much additional information on any requirements that would ensure reciprocal and meaningful engagement between the crown's science knowledge system and an indigenous nation's knowledge system regarding the environmental and ecological effects of a proposed activity. in terms of the two-way reciprocity between these knowledge systems under the concept of free, prior, and informed consent, there was no mention of any requirements that the crown ensure its science knowledge system evaluation of predicted effects (scientific hypotheses, methods, evidence, and probabilities of effects) has been disclosed to the indigenous nation in a manner that indigenous expert knowledge holders are satisfied they understand (not necessarily agree with). similarly, there were no requirements in c-69 that the crown ensure its science expert knowledge 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.4 holders are satisfied they understand (not necessarily agree with) the indigenous nation's knowledge system evaluation of predicted effects (using whatever knowledge processes it has developed and implemented). with regard to the meaningfulness of engagement between the crown's science knowledge system and the indigenous nation's knowledge system, c-69 similarly has no such requirement. this stands in stark contrast to the repeated, explicit requirements in c-69 that the general public must be provided with an opportunity for “meaningful” (yet undefined) participation in decision making as part of the environmental assessment. strangely, there are no such explicit statements regarding the crown's requirement of meaningful inclusion of indigenous nations' knowledge systems in assessment decision making. taken together, it should be clear that without satisfaction of these requirements, the crown cannot claim that it has effectively engaged in reciprocal and meaningful consultation between the knowledge systems. according to c-69, the impact assessment agency of canada would ultimately be required to produce a report that "must set out how the agency, in determining the effects that are likely to be caused by the carrying out of the designated project, took into account and used any indigenous knowledge provided with respect to the designated project" (bill c-69, 2018, §28(3.1), p. 23). there is nothing in c-69 that requires this final report to actually demonstrate that the crown's duty to consult an indigenous nation has been effectively fulfilled through reciprocal and meaningful engagement between the crown's science knowledge system and that of the indigenous nation. in this regard, c-69 is effectively no different than the grossly inadequate standard that was previously adopted by the canadian environmental assessment act: “the environmental assessment of a designated project may [emphasis added] take into account . . . aboriginal traditional knowledge” (canada, 2012, §19.3). to be clear, nothing in c-69 precludes the crown from fulfilling its duty to consult indigenous nations and their knowledge systems in federal science-based eas. it just means there is nothing in the new act that would require fulfillment of the crown's duty in this regard. bill c-69 documentation in association with tabling of bill c-69 in early 2018, the government of canada also released a set of 16 public accessory documents that made various statements regarding the crown's duty to consult indigenous nations and their associated knowledge systems generally, as well as the role of indigenous and scientific knowledge systems in the legislative processes specifically described by c-69: • bill c-69 (1 document) • general information (4 documents) • guides (3 documents) • promotional materials (8 documents) a detailed search of these documents revealed that the vast majority of references to science and indigenous knowledge systems reiterated or paraphrased statements made in bill c-69 and discussed in detail above. however, there were several new and important issues raised by canada in these c-69 documents. first, it should be noted that the documents used terminology reflecting a vague and often inconsistent understanding of key concepts related to indigenous–science knowledge system structure and function. for example, there were many bewildering references to different factors involved in proposed 19 crawford: indigenous knowledge systems in eas published by scholarship@western, 2018 assessment decision making: "science and data" (canada, 2018d), "science and knowledge" (canada, 2018d), "science, knowledge and data" (canada, 2018j), "science and evidence" (canada, 2018b, 2018c, 2018j), "information or knowledge" (canada, 2018f), "scientific information, evidence, community knowledge, and indigenous traditional knowledge" (canada, 2018j), and "science, evidence, and indigenous traditional knowledge" (canada, 2018a, 2018d). in some cases, a specific cultural knowledge system (e.g., science) was confused with the knowledge created by that knowledge system (e.g., the science on a particular issue). in other cases, canada failed to recognize important within-knowledge system distinctions between the different units of human understanding, including the established data– information–knowledge–wisdom hierarchy used in western knowledge systems(varghese & crawford, 2018). clearly, canada will have to invest significant effort to clearly explain what it means by these knowledge system concepts before its legislation can be used to ensure reciprocal and meaningful engagement between indigenous and science knowledge systems in federal science-based eas. second, the c-69 documents were equally vague and inconsistent in how they characterized direct engagements that might take place between indigenous and science knowledge systems in federal eas. throughout all associated c-69 documents, canada referred exclusively to consideration of “indigenous traditional knowledge,” which of course is necessary, but not sufficient.5 the duty to consult indigenous nations and their knowledge systems is not limited to their traditional knowledge (i.e., passed down from previous generations), but also includes the indigenous nations’ contemporary knowledge. canada's highly inappropriate narrow scope could simply be a reflection of its underdeveloped understanding of knowledge system structure and function. broadening this understanding would enable it to distinguish between the different types of knowledge within indigenous, local, and science knowledge systems (varghese & crawford, 2018). keeping this issue in mind, we proceed to what is one of the most frequently made misstatements in the set of c-69 documents: “under the new legislation, there would be mandatory [emphasis added] consideration of indigenous traditional knowledge" (canada 2018d, p. 7). as we have seen above, this statement is imprecise at best (and highly misleading at worst) because canada's non-binding “consideration” of indigenous knowledge in federal science-based eas would only take place (a) if canada recognized the traditional territorial rights associated with a given indigenous nation, and (b) if canada extended an “offer to consult” (bill c-69, 2018, §12) to that indigenous nation, and (c) if that indigenous nation considered the knowledge system engagement process offered by canada to be sufficiently reciprocal and meaningful that it would agree to share its knowledge. canada actually does refer to the last of these implementation caveats in a few instances with the c-69 documents when it uses the phrase “indigenous traditional knowledge, if provided” (canada, 2018d, 2018j); however, the vast majority of instances in the c-69 documents identify no such provision caveats (canada, 2018b, 2018c, 2018d, 2018e, 2018f, 2018j). these misstatements lead the naive reader to actually believe there actually 5 it is important to acknowledge that the parliamentary committees did in fact identify and correct this overly constrained condition of indigenous traditional knowledge, which existed throughout the first draft of c-69. it was edited to correctly read “indigenous knowledge” in the amended third draft that was passed. or, as the government described it, "clarify that indigenous knowledge would be considered and not limited to ‘traditional’ knowledge, but include the evolving knowledge of indigenous peoples” (canada, 2018i, indigenous knowledge use and protection section, para. 2). 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.4 will be “mandatory consideration of indigenous traditional knowledge,” when this could easily be the exception rather than the rule. the c-69 documents also make many vague and highly inconsistent statements about the characteristics of indigenous–science knowledge system engagement in federal eas, none of which are actually specified or required by c-69. in dozens of instances, canada claims that decisions will be based on “robust [or rigorous] science, evidence and indigenous traditional knowledge” (canada, 2018d, p. 11), despite that fact that neither “robust” nor “rigour” appear in c-69, and thus this condition of knowledge systems are not actually required. in fact, canada provides no operational definitions of what constitutes robust or rigorous knowledge in either indigenous or science knowledge systems. there is nothing in either c-69 or the supporting documents that explains how canada would be required to determine the weighted role of an indigenous nation's knowledge system and the crown's own science knowledge system in federal ea decision making. depending on which c-69 document you read, canada will advise that decision making will be "evidence-based" (canada, 2018g, 2018h), "science-based" (canada, 2018d, 2018h), "based on robust science, evidence and indigenous traditional knowledge" (canada, 2018d, p. 11; see also canada, 2018h), or "based on robust science and evidence, and the public interest" (canada, 2018d, p.5). if "science-based" decision making is too extreme or transparent, canada also states that ea decisions will be "guided by robust science, evidence and indigenous traditional knowledge"(canada, 2018d, p. 10; see also canada, 2018h, 2018f, 2018e), or perhaps "informed by sound science and indigenous traditional knowledge" (canada, 2018f, p. 10). likewise, canada variously tells us that under c-69, indigenous traditional knowledge will be “considered alongside [emphasis added] science and other evidence” (canada, 2018d, p.13; see also 2018d, 2018j, 2018f, 2018b, 2018c), or somehow "incorporated" (canada, 2018h, 2018d) or "integrated" (canada, 2018f) into a western culturally dominant form of decision making. this analysis of canada's terminology might seem like trivial semantics, especially when you consider that none of these knowledge “considerations” are actually required by c-69. however, the reality is that powerful differences between the concepts within indigenous and science knowledge systems will actually determine the admissibility, precedence, and weighting of each in canada's ea decision making. finally, and perhaps most importantly for the purposes of this analysis, the crown's duty to consult indigenous nations is almost as absent from the informational documents about c-69 as it was from c-69 itself. the lone exception comes from one of the promotional documents better rules for major project reviews to protect canada's environment and grow the economy: impact assessment system (canada, 2018f), which simply states, "indigenous participation in reviews driven by duty to consult" (p. 1). the irony of this lone observation is particularly rich. as discussed above, this truth about the importance of the crown's duty to consult necessarily flows from the foundations of the canadian constitution, canadian law, and the nature of indigenous–crown relationships in this country. notwithstanding the complete absence of this driving truth in the minister's mandate, scope, and processes for the ea expert panel, many of the indigenous nations' formal submissions to the panel still emphasized the crown's duty as the principle driver for their required participation in federal sciencebased eas. bizarrely, this requirement was also omitted in the panel's final report to the minister gélinas et al., 2017), ignored in canada's discussion paper (canada, 2017), and completely absent from bill c-69 (2018) itself. yet, somehow the government of canada still saw fit to restate this driving truth in its promotional materials for c-69—as if the duty was actually addressed in that proposed legislation— which clearly it was not. 21 crawford: indigenous knowledge systems in eas published by scholarship@western, 2018 conclusions and recommendations logically, the canadian crown’s duty to consult cannot be fulfilled without reciprocal and meaningful engagement between the crown and the indigenous nation(s) in question. in a federal science-based ea context, reciprocal and meaningful consultation necessarily requires effective, direct engagement of the indigenous and science knowledge systems regarding predicted consequences of the proposed activity—not because it is a good idea (which it is) or because it is the right thing to do (which it also is)—but because it is required by the foundations of law in this country (stevenson, 2017; udofia, noble, & poelzer, 2016). it is clear that canada failed to explicitly recognize and effectively respond to this requirement in its review of federal science-based ea regulatory processes and the proposed c-69 legislation. the current situation really is as simple as that. on the basis of this analysis, i offer the following recommendations for redress of this crucial issue: a. canada should not pass bill c-69 into law, as currently drafted. b. canada should revise its legislation to incorporate the crown's duty to consult in order to ensure reciprocal and meaningful consultation of indigenous nations' knowledge systems in federal eas is an explicit requirement that must be demonstrated to have been fulfilled. c. canada should work with expert indigenous, local, and science knowledge holders to develop a clearly defined and pragmatic framework for fundamental concepts regarding the structure, function, and engagement of these knowledge systems in federal eas. once defined, this framework should be included in the legislation as an explicit requirement that must be demonstrated to have been appropriately implemented. d. canada should undertake a comprehensive review and removal of implicit and explicit cultural dominance regarding the role of indigenous, local, and science knowledge systems in all aspects of federal ea decision making. if the government of canada were to accept and fully execute these recommendations, it would save the people of canada from countless preventable ea conflicts, and allow the country to truly progress toward satisfying its constitutional, national, and international commitments. 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 9, iss. 3 [2018], art. 4 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol9/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2018.9.3.4 references anaya, j. 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(2017). environmental and regulatory reviews: discussion paper. retrieved from https://www.canaa.ca/content/dam/themes/environment/conservation/environmentalreviews/share-your-views/proposed-approach/discussion-paper-june-2017-eng.pdf canada. (2018a). a proposed new impact assessment system. retrieved from government of canada website: https://www.canada.ca/en/services/environment/conservation/assessments/environmentalreviews/environmental-assessment-processes.html canada. (2018b). backgrounder: benefits for indigenous peoples. ottawa: author. canada. (2018c). benefits for indigenous peoples: better rules to protect canada's environment and grow the economy. retrieved from government of canada website: https://www.canada.ca/content/dam/themes/environment/conservation/environmentalreviews/indigenous-e.pdf canada. 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(in press). a cultural framework for engagement of indigenous, local and science knowledge systems in natural resource management. ecological monographs. 29 crawford: indigenous knowledge systems in eas published by scholarship@western, 2018 the international indigenous policy journal july 2018 the canadian crown's duty to consult indigenous nations' knowledge systems in federal environmental assessments stephen s. crawford recommended citation the canadian crown's duty to consult indigenous nations' knowledge systems in federal environmental assessments abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license the canadian crown's duty to consult indigenous nations' knowledge systems in federal environmental assessments community-led recovery from the opioid crisis through culturally-based programs and community-based data governance the international indigenous policy journal volume 13 | issue 2 september 2022 community-led recovery from the opioid crisis through culturally-based programs and community-based data governance marion maar northern ontario school of medicine, canada, marion.maar@nosm.ca tim ominika canada, tominika@live.com darrel manitowabi northern ontario school of medicine, canada, dmanitowabi@nosm.ca recommended citation maar, m., ominika, t., & manitowabi, d. (2022). community-led recovery from the opioid crisis through culturally-based programs and community-based data governance. the international indigenous policy journal, 13(2). https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2022.13.2.13792 community-led recovery from the opioid crisis through culturally-based programs and community-based data governance abstract the opioid crisis is disproportionately impacting indigenous communities in canada. there is a need to evaluate practical approaches to recovery that include community-based opioid agonist treatment (oat) and integration of cultural treatment models. naandwe miikan, translated as the healing path, is an oat program that blends clinical and indigenous healing concepts and providers in a community-based setting. aside from oat pharmaceutical treatment, clients work with indigenous counsellors that integrate culture with treatment, such as land-based activities, that reconnect the community to indigenous teachings and harvesting. in this paper, we present a case study showcasing community advocacy in creating innovative funding models and engaging with clinicians to provide a shared care oat model with traditional indigenous counselling, cultural programs, and data sovereignty. policy needs are identified. keywords addictions, opioids, indigenous, culture-based treatment, data sovereignty, first nations mental wellness continuum framework acknowledgments this project would not be possible without the collaborations established with wiikwemkoong unceded territory, the naandwe miikan leadership team, and the chief and council. we are very grateful for their support. we are also grateful to the staff and health care providers who created space for this research despite their very busy schedules. we are especially grateful to the clients who accepted us to partake in their land-based activities and allowed us to learn about their healing journey during long conversations. we thank lisa boesch for her support of the development of this manuscript. this research was funded through a cihr grant (#393353). creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ 1 maar et al.: community-led recovery from the opioid crisis published by scholarship@western, 2022 community-led recovery from the opioid crisis through culturally-based programs and community-based data governance honestly, like maybe over a year ago, i was really bad. like just over a year, i was really, really bad. i didn't care about if i lived or died. i must have od'ed three times in one week. i still kept going when i got up. i got up after just od'ing, and i'd just do some more. i was bad. i'm trying to get over that life, and this program has helped me lots. not only the methadone but the counselling . . . every day when i started smudging, that really helped too. . . . i think that's when i really started opening my eyes. —naandwe miikan oat client since health canada approved the opioid pain medication oxycontin in 2000, communities in canada have been affected by rapidly increasing trends in problematic prescription and illicit opioid use leading to growing opioid-related poisoning, first responder calls, emergency department visits, and deaths (belzak & halverson, 2018; jones et al., 2020). all of canada is affected by the opioid crisis, but there are regional inequities, including access to treatment services and rates of overdose deaths (belzak & halverson, 2018). many first nations communities are among those disproportionately affected, and some have experienced dramatic increases in opioid use disorder (oud) rates, opioid-related crimes, negative social consequences, and overdoses (carriere et al., 2018). the opioid crisis has sharply escalated during the covid-19 pandemic as covid-19 containment measures have increased opioid-related poisonings (the ontario drug policy research network et al., 2020). innovative, indigenous led, culturally safe treatment approaches are urgently required to support the health, well-being, and recovery of indigenous people living with oud. using a multi-year case study approach, we examine the phenomenon and complexities of the development of a culturally-based opioid agonist therapy (oat) clinic in a first nations community in canada. we provide insights into why effective first nations community-based oat clinics are needed and how they can be established. in the study of the dynamics of complex health systems, “the world moves quickly” (greenhalgh & papoutsi, 2018, p. 2) and health services are moving targets (cohn et al., 2013). this is particularly true at the time of writing, as health services rapidly transform in response to the covid-19 pandemic. background and literature review it is important to discuss our work within the literature of the epidemiology of oud and culturallybased oat in indigenous communities in canada. we also situate our research within the emergent literature of the intersection of pressing current events and their policy implications: the covid-19 pandemic and the locating of unmarked children’s graves at former indian residential school (irs) sites. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.2.13792 opioid misuse, oud and treatment provincial statistics have consistently shown higher rates of opioid-related harms among first nations people and the “higher rates of substance use in indigenous communities have been associated with the effects of colonization, racism, intergenerational trauma, and reduced access to mental health services” (carriere et al., 2018, pp. 25–26). the nishnawbe aski nation in northern ontario declared a state of emergency in 2010 due to widespread prescription opioid misuse (i.e.: use of prescription opioids in other ways than prescribed) (crism ontario, 2016). in 2015, the highest opioid-related deaths per capita in the world were reported in manitoulin island, northern ontario, where our research is situated (erskine, 2017). first nations in british columbia and alberta had five times the rate of opioid-related overdoses compared with non-first nations counterparts (belzak & halverson, 2018). rates of hospitalizations for on-reserve first nations populations were 5.6 times higher compared with the general population (carriere et al., 2018). oat is a harm reduction treatment for people living with oud that includes a prescribed daily dose of a long-acting opioid (such as methadone or buprenorphine) to reduce withdrawal symptoms and cravings without a "high." by eliminating withdrawal symptoms, oat can assist individuals to address areas of their lives that have been negatively affected by addiction (centre for addiction and mental health, 2016). in canada, oat has been used since 1959 in the form of methadone treatment for opioid dependence (eibl et al., 2017). each province in canada maintains oversight of methadone programming, and physicians require an exemption from section 56 of the controlled drugs and substances act to administer it (eibl et al., 2017). buprenorphine (marketed as suboxone) has been available since 2008. it is considered a safer alternative to methadone indicated for most clients except those with high-intensity oud, including high tolerance and frequent use of opioids (bruneau et al., 2018). in ontario, both physicians and pharmacists require training in addiction medicine before prescribing or dispensing these medications (kalvik et al., 2014). oat patients receive a daily dose of liquid methadone or sublingual buprenorphine-naloxone (suboxone) under observation at a physician's office or pharmacy. there are three settings where oat is provided: 1) in a specialized clinic with staff that may include physicians, counsellors, pharmacists, social workers, and case managers; 2) in a doctor's office; or 3) in federal or provincial correctional facilities (eibl et al., 2017). in canada, registered first nations and recognized inuit people receive coverage for a range of select health benefits. first nations people accessing oat receive financial coverage of methadone and suboxone included in their benefit plan (government of canada, 2021). indigenous culturally-based oat in canada there is emerging research on indigenous culture-based oat interventions. in 2011, the cedar project examined variables in methadone maintenance treatment (mmt) of 605 indigenous participants in vancouver and prince george, british columbia. results revealed that less than half of those reporting daily injection of opioids were ever on mmt, and those who had used mmt were more likely to be older adults, female, and had hepatitis c antibody positivity (yang et al., 2011). in 2014, rowan et al. 3 maar et al.: community-led recovery from the opioid crisis published by scholarship@western, 2022 reviewed 4,518 research articles that integrated western and culture-based treatments, 42% based in canada. in total, 17 types of cultural interventions were identified, with sweat lodge ceremonies being the most frequent (68%), followed by smudging with sage, cedar, and sweetgrass (63%), and social, cultural, and family-based activities (58%) (rowan et al., 2014). the authors found that 74% of the studies showed a benefit in reducing or eliminating substance abuse through these programs. community members of eabametoong (fort hope) in northern ontario explained their reasons for starting a community oat program was the growing sense of loss in family and community life and a particular concern over the effect of addictions on children. those seeking treatment often did so to bring families back together. the physician researcher believed that "the success is rooted in the community's ownership of the program" and "in eabametoong, there is an understanding that the addiction epidemic is undermining the physical, mental, spiritual, and emotional well-being of the people and that [therefore] the healing must also be physical, mental, spiritual, and emotional" (uddin, 2013, p. 392). however, information needed to create similar holistic healing services elsewhere, such as a description of services and explanation of how they are structured, financed, and supported by policy locally and nationally, was not reported. currie et al. (2013) examined "aboriginal enculturation" defined as how aboriginal1 peoples identify with their culture and engage in cultural behaviours and found it to be a protective factor against illicit drug problems. kanate et al. (2015) examined a community-developed opioid dependence treatment program inclusive of first nations healing, addiction treatment, and substitution therapy in remote northwestern ontario first nations communities. the study measured changes in the number of criminal charges, addiction-related evacuations, child protection, school attendance, and attendance at community events. one year after the development of the program, changes in the community included: overall criminal charges dropped by 61.1%, child protection cases decreased by 58.3%, school attendance increased by 33.3%, and attendance at community events increased by 20% (kanate et al., 2015). though it is a promising study supporting the effectiveness of culture-based treatments, there was no information about the traditional healing and land-based activity components and their integration or funding. mamakwa et al. (2017) conducted a retrospective study of six northwestern ontario first nations with 526 participants in opioid dependence programs, buprenorphine-naloxone substitution therapy, and first nations healing programming. each community designed its own program with staff and consultants with oversight by political and community leaders and health directors. furthermore, "a ‘land’ aftercare program has been developed in some communities, with organized days of fishing, hunting, traditional walks for memorial events, and community gardening programs. elders and experienced first nations counselors provide individual and group healing sessions where possible" (mamakwa et al., 2017, p. 140). results indicated a high retention rate with negative drug screening, and the authors conclude, “first nations communities in other provinces should establish their own buprenorphine-naloxone programs, using local primary care physicians as prescribers. sustainable core 1 the term “aboriginal peoples of canada” is defined in section 35 of the constitution act of canada, 1982 as including indian, inuit and métis peoples of canada. the term “indigenous” is used internationally to describe original people of an area and is increasingly replacing the term aboriginal in canada. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.2.13792 funding is needed for programming, long-term aftercare, and trauma recovery for such initiatives” (mamakwa et al., 2017, p. 137). the authors recommend that medical providers and provincial and federal governments support cultural, community-based programs. impact of the covid-19 pandemic on people living with oud opioid-related deaths increased by 38% in ontario within just the first three months of the declaration of emergency measures to slow the spread of covid-19 on march 16, 2020 (gomes, murray, et al., 2021). morin and colleagues (2021) reported a 108% increase in fentanyl use among ontario oat clients and attribute this to the increased stress and reduced monitoring and support for oat clients. more recently, drug supply chains have been disrupted, resulting in the street drug supply being increasingly contaminated by newly created extremely potent synthetic opioids (cribb, 2021; gomes, murray, et al., 2021). gomes, murray et al. (2021) stated that by december 2020, “the absolute number of opioid-related deaths increased considerably across geographic regions of all population densities, with numbers nearly doubling in rural areas” (p. 20). a geographical analysis revealed that the top five largest increases in opioid-related death rates per public health region were located in northern ontario, with the highest in sudbury and districts (gomes, murray, et al., 2021), the region that includes our study location of manitoulin. covid-19 containment measures introduced additional hardships for people who use drugs, including reduced access to pharmacies and outpatient clinics as well as harm reduction services such as oat clinics and supervised consumption sites (gomes, kitchen, & murray, 2021). the authors also noted increases in death rates of younger people and increased presence of fentanyl and stimulants in those who overdose. they emphasize an “urgent need for low-barrier access to evidence-based harm reduction services and treatment for oud in all jurisdictions grappling with the overdose–covid-19 syndemic” (gomes, kitchen, & murray, 2021, p. 3). clearly, it is critical to situate policy implications related to oat within the covid-19 pandemic as the impact on health and health services will linger for years to come. an intersection of multiple crises in indigenous communities: opioid misuse, covid-19, and undocumented irs burial sites many indigenous leaders have leveraged self-determination for community lockdowns and monitoring infection rates in the community to respond very successfully to the pandemic (richardson & crawford, 2020). however, distancing measures have resulted in isolation and reduction in access to cultural, spiritual, and land-based activities (mashford-pringle et al., 2021). further, wendt and colleagues (2021) state that covid-19 containment measures have “exacerbated opioid use problems among indigenous communities [in canada and the usa], especially for individuals with acute distress or comorbid mental illness, or who are in need of withdrawal management or residential services” (p. 2). further increases in acute stress, depression, and anxiety in many indigenous clients were also observed by mental health service providers when the first indian residential school unmarked gravesite of indigenous children was found in may 2021 (taylor & neustaeter, 2021). the revelation of the gravesites has caused deep grief and re-traumatization for many indigenous and non-indigenous people, but especially for irs survivors and the families of missing children (sound & jones, 2021). indigenous service agencies have been overwhelmed with requests for trauma support services. in an interview, jason mercredi, of prairie harm reduction in saskatoon, explained the discoveries are triggering 5 maar et al.: community-led recovery from the opioid crisis published by scholarship@western, 2022 "troublesome memories" for irs survivors and have resulted in more visits to the local supervised (drug) consumption sites, where clients are seeking mental-health support. "we can't really keep up, and it's tough because some of these folks have been successfully coping for a number of years" (hobson, 2021, para. 5). front line workers are also noting that individuals who have been in long-term recovery are being triggered and are struggling with their recovery. the indigenous health system is simply insufficiently resourced to meet the need for support. adequate resourcing commitments informed by research on effective indigenous community-based oud treatment models are needed. methodology and setting our case study methodology follows a community-based participatory approach that invites citizens of wiikwemkoong2 unceded territory to collaborate as partners with the academic team (holkup et al., 2004; manitowabi & maar, 2018). specifically, community leadership collaborated on setting the research objectives, and a community advisory committee (cac) with representation from community members and organizations guides all aspects of the research process and ensures that the work meets the needs of the community. a case study involves qualitative research in which “the investigator explores a real-life, contemporary bounded system (a case) . . . over time, through detailed, in-depth data collection involving multiple sources of information (e.g., observations, interviews, audiovisual material, and documents and reports), and reports a case description and case themes” (creswell, 2013, p. 97). in this case study, we explore the development of culturally-based oat services congruent with the restoration of mino-bimaadiziwin (anishinabe holistic health) among people with addictions and more broadly within the first nation of wiikwemkoong unceded territory. we chose this methodology because it is useful when little is known about a phenomenon, and case studies can “generate an in-depth, multi-faceted understanding of a complex issue in its real-life context” (crowe et al., 2011, p. 1). data collection and analysis in line with the case study tradition (creswell, 2013; cronin, 2014), our methodology included multiple methods, including intensive field research, review of program documents and electronic records systems, deep observational research (see flyvbjerg, 2006), informal group discussions with advisory committees and service providers, as well as formal interviews with oat clients and service providers (see brogan et al., 2019). the questions we ask were focused on why a community-based oat clinic was needed, the community development required to establish it, and the participants’ current experiences. the interviews with direct service providers and clients at the naandwe miikan clinic explored these topics in an open-ended format (see table 1). participants were recruited through fliers posted in the clinic. those who were interested were provided with more information by the community researcher and case manager (to), who scheduled the interview with one of the academic researchers (mm). participants often recounted traumatic events, and support was offered during and after each interview by a traditional healer. all interviews were recorded, transcribed, and thematically analyzed 2 the people of wiikwemkoong self-identify as anishinabe (variously translated as "original person" or "good person") of the three fires confederacy (ojibwa, odawa and pottawatomi tribal groups). 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.2.13792 using nvivo 12 qualitative research software. all authors reviewed the themes individually, shared their findings, and came to consensus though discussion. table 1. method and number of participants method date number client interviews nov. 2017 16 service provider interviews nov. 2017 5 community agency interview july 2018 1 land-based activities (7 in total) may 2019–nov. 2022 104 total 126 we also engaged in participant observation to experience the land-based experiences in situ, to observe community participation, and better understand the significance of land-based healing. we purposely offered research specific land-based activities in addition to those regularly scheduled, and we advertised our sessions as being part of the research project. for example, naandwe miikan generally holds 2–3 hunts, and we sponsored an additional one to avoid interfering with the customarily scheduled community hunts. we furthermore collected audiovisual footage for a forthcoming video ethnography (maar & msheekehn trudeau, 2019). participation was voluntary, and at the start of each activity, we explained the purpose of our research and received consent from participants. finally, we observed administrative practices, including community access to clients’ electronic medical records (emr) and aggregated electronic data for reporting on the effectiveness of the naandwe miikan approach for quality improvement purposes. we reviewed access to aggregated emr data coded as intake data, dosing data, access/referral to supportive services, and traditional indigenous support services and how these indicators might be related to clients’ recovery based on the community goal of holistic health and well-being. iterative design yin (2013) reminds us that “to arrive at a sound understanding of the case, a case study should not be limited to the case in isolation but should examine the likely interaction between the case and its context” (p. 321). therefore, case studies use a flexible and iterative approach that allows for continuous data collation and analysis (cronin, 2014). this feature of our methodology allowed us to integrate emergent evidence of the impact of covid-19 on oat and its policy implications based on our ongoing co-research and member checking with the cac into 2022. the laurentian university research ethics board and the manitoulin anishinaabek research review committee granted ethics approval for this research project, and the wiikwemkoong chief and council provided approval through a band council resolution. 7 maar et al.: community-led recovery from the opioid crisis published by scholarship@western, 2022 results description and history of the naandwe miikan oat services naandwe miikan oat clinic is situated in wiikwemkoong unceded territory on manitoulin island, ontario, canada. its goal is to offer oat with a culturally safe, community-based integrated approach designed to connect clients to indigenous culture and inspire hope, belonging, and connections. the naandwe miikan approach is focused on cultural and community safety by incorporating the holistic health and well-being concept of mino-bimaadiziwin; the program strives to build collaboration across community sectors including health, social services, justice, policing, and employment. staff create safe policies, such as rigorous criteria for take-home doses that go beyond oat clinical practice guidelines. in 2014, when the naandwe miikan services began, many members of this tight-knit community had been directly or indirectly touched by social consequences of the rising rates of opioid addictions. deterioration of community relationships, increases in family violence, break-ins, and human trafficking were significantly affecting community life. many people with opioid addictions had long burned bridges with families and friends. interviews revealed that the notion of using scarce community resources to create oat and supportive services for “drug users” [sic] was contentious and frustrated many community members who were not familiar with harm reduction approaches (see also narbonnefortin et al., 2001). the community hosts a well-known abstinence-based treatment program with cultural components of healing through a medicine wheel framework and seven grandfather teachings combined with positive psychology (downton et al., 2019; manitowabi, 2017). this abstinence-based approach was seen by many as preferable over oat because the community lacked confidence in relying on drugs for the treatment of an addiction. one provider explained: harm reduction is totally different from an abstinence-based program. our community members are accustomed to abstinence-based programs . . . [but at naandwe miikan] success is not abstinence, instead success is when the clients walk through the door. (service provider) some considered the oat approach as incompatible with living a good life or minobimaadiziwin, the anishinabe worldview of health and healing. from this perspective, to return to an ideal living state, people focus on healing from a physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual perspective and become free from depending on substances. in contrast, oat focuses only on the physical aspects of recovery. for oat to become accepted in this community, the model needed to focus on a holistic approach to recovery, integrating cultural approaches, educating the community on harm reduction, and maintaining a long-term recovery goal of eliminating drug therapy when this can be done safely. thematic analysis from 2017 to 2018, we conducted 22 interviews with naandwe miikan clients (16), service providers (5) and community agency staff (1). during the year 2018–2022, we attended seven land-based naandwe miikan activities that included trapping, fishing, traditional medicine harvesting, and deer and goose hunts with 9–20 participants (see table 1). 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.2.13792 the thematic analysis of the transcripts revealed several themes related to the development of oat in the community: recognizing an urgent need for community-based services, focusing on the specific needs of clients and the community, and anchoring anishinabe knowledge and culture in recovery. we expand on these themes and their subthemes and showcase selected quotes from this qualitative analysis. recognizing an urgent need for community-based services this theme explores the reasons why a community-based oat clinic needed to be established in wiikwemkoong. social effects of the opioid crisis naandwe miikan arose from the inescapable effects of opioid addiction and its devastating communitywide impact. there was a huge opiate problem here before this clinic was here. and i do think that maybe there’s some people that wouldn’t be here today. (c7) i think people aren’t realizing the impact . . . this little place, it reverberates throughout the entire community. we are cousins, uncles, aunts to all these other people in the community. we’re entrenched in a community and we need more help. (c14) for example, before naandwe miikan, oud often translated into criminal behaviour to obtain opioids. in one poignant incident in the community’s reckoning with the opioid crisis, a home invasion theft of prescription opioids led to homicide. [t]here [are] a lot of individuals affected by our criminal justice system. either it was through whichever trouble they’ve gotten into, that is decreased because they don’t have to go and do home invasions as what was occurring in our community before. robbing people, stealing off their parents or their grandparents for their medication. so that’s discontinued now. so that’s how the program works also. it eliminates – it decreases the amount of criminal activity in our community. (s1) at that time, there were a lot of home invasions, there was a murder based on opiates, there were people—parents getting their medication stolen. all of this stuff was happening without this clinic being in the community. (s1) inaccessibility of oat services located “in town” originally, methadone treatment was not available in the community and patients were required to travel 45 minutes one-way to a clinic to a nearby town off-reserve, an all-consuming daily experience factoring in return transportation and wait times at the clinic. the community health services provided transportation offering several trips back-and-forth daily, however, due to public pressure in opposition to the clinic’s location in the town’s central business section and its perceived negative impact on 9 maar et al.: community-led recovery from the opioid crisis published by scholarship@western, 2022 businesses, the town council re-zoned the location. this led to the closure of the clinic. the prescribing physician invited wiikwemkoong clients to an oat clinic in a more distant town, thus increasing travel time to over 2 hours. this created the impetus for wiikwemkoong to take control and offer localized oat (manitoulin expositor, 2013). this development was well received by clients: [w]hen i heard about [this program], i was happy. i was like that’s good, then people won’t have to leave their kids everyday. it was really bad though when the methadone office in little current closed and then everybody had to travel to espanola. and then, when that didn’t work out, we all had to go to sudbury. so, we were gone all day away from our kids, you know. (c7) you can do a lot more with your day. you feel more productive and all that. it’s a lot better. like more people can access it, that are struggling and all that. it makes it a lot easier [than] to have everything in town where some of us can’t even access stuff like that. (c9) focusing on the specific needs of clients and the community this theme explores the community, organizational, and policy development required to establish community-based oat in wiikwemkoong. community-based oat policy development initially, oat in wiikwemkoong was based on a mainstream model with little accountability by the visiting providers to the community or collaborative practice with first nations services. ultimately, the community terminated its relationship with those service providers and recruited another physician, with the understanding of increased local control over the clinic and collaborative program development, the integration of traditional healing approaches, active involvement of local staff in the treatment, and more robust reporting and communication with political leadership. this led to the creation of the naandwe miikan clinic. the ultimate goal was to support clients’ healing from an anishinabe perspective, with the ultimate goal of safely reducing reliance on medication when possible. the clinic was brand new and what i did was develop policies in which we wanted to make the program successful and to assist individual wellness to slowly get off of this medication or decrease their doses. so, what i did was create policies where i would advocate for the client; if they feel that they have to get their doses lowered, we would make sure that the worker sits with them, with the physician, and requests for that dose to get lowered. and if the doctor said no, that worker would advocate for them to decrease that dose. (s1) take-home doses (carries) were provided to clients after initial stabilization had occurred. take home doses could threaten the community if given to clients who are not yet well enough to use them as prescribed. stringent guidelines with oversight were developed to ensure that clients met communityidentified indicators of participation in community life and demonstrated being stable in their healing journey. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.2.13792 carry agreement contracts that we developed [are] nowhere in any other treatment facility in ontario. . . . our policy from the community, states you have to be abstinent [from illicit drugs] for two months. you have to be doing two urine screening deposits a week. you have to do one toxicology test a month because that’s more accurate than the urine screening. and you also have to be taking part in counselling, be employed in the community, [or] volunteering. . . . so those are the criteria which have to be followed in order to get a carry. . . . [so] making it very structured [so that clients] have to earn those carries and not just [be] given this medication that could be sold on the street. (s1) increasing interprofessional collaboration for effective case management the opportunity for local and integrated community service involvement in oat presented challenges. it required advocacy for improved care and sufficient resources. initially, this posed a challenge of heavy caseloads for the community clinic manager with no additional resources. it further required collaboration with other social service providers since clients needed access to these support services. oat clients require coordinated access to social services such as employment and training and child and family services to facilitate positive treatment outcomes. during our research, additional investments in naandwe miikan addressed the issue of human resource needs: not enough case managers is the biggest thing because what i’m encountering here is i can’t do all of that. i’m supposed to be doing the case management for clients for 132 people which is kind of impossible. but i’m still trying to reach out to the [community] programs to tell them this is how this has to go. this is how we have to make this run smoothly. if you want our clients to be successful, and you know, to stay out of the justice system or get their children back, we all have to work together and we all have to sit down together. not leave one organization out when you’re having these case conferences. (s1) offering a holistic approach to care from the perspective of the indigenous knowledge of mino-bimaadiziwin, clients require more than pharmacological substances to be well supported in their healing journey; instead, the whole person requires attention. this approach is the core of naandwe miikan and significantly different from mainstream oat programs. whenever we give any medication; we always say take this medication along with other things. . . .so along with other things is his emotional situation, how he’s feeling, financial problems, actual problems whether he’s depressed or not, whether the person has limitations, how the children are doing. . . . i mean if you don’t do the other things then medicine will not work. so those are the things that are the social things, financial things, your emotional things, spiritual things. so, these are important, and these cannot be given by doctors, they cannot be given by pharmacists; it can be given only with the teamwork. (s2) [w]hen we dispense our medicine, this is a routine, we always say “along with.” if i give a pill, i say take this medicine along with other things, meaning that this medication will be effective if 11 maar et al.: community-led recovery from the opioid crisis published by scholarship@western, 2022 you will take it with other things. what other things means that you have to take care of your education, you have to take care of exercise, you have to—if somebody doesn’t do anything, then taking simply a medicine is not an effective thing. . . . the personal care is very important. somebody should feel that somebody is there to take care of them. [s2] anchoring anishinabe knowledge and culture in recovery this theme explores the programs and experiences that naandwe miikan offers by integrating indigenous knowledge and recovery. integrating oat with mental health and traditional indigenous counselling a unique component of the naandwe miikan program is the integration of oat with mental health and traditional indigenous counselling. clients are encouraged to seek mental health services in the community as well as to speak with traditional counsellors. natural helpers 3 are also part of the program. community leadership advocated successfully for funding of natural helpers as legitimate indigenous healing providers in addiction treatment with government funders (first nations and inuit health branch). i’ve learned these teachings about having that flame inside of us. so a lot of individuals we are assisting, dealing with this substance use, that flame is very low in them. so when they come in, we’re just helping them, give them tools and motivating them and encouraging them to how to stoke that little fire inside of them. and as they start to stoke it and we start to give them some tools, not showing them how to do it but giving them those tools, how to do it themselves and they rebuild that fire inside them themselves, and they start to feel more empowerment within the individual and start to regain their motivation again and purpose. (s1) natural helpers are also integrated in land-based activities, and this encourages clients to socialize with community members. land-based activities, i guess would be close to normalizing them, grounding them with mother earth. a lot of times, [clients]—they don’t go out except among with other friends that have addictions. they don’t have that time to find out—you could associate in public normally without having that addiction. so, when we have these land-based activities, either we’re harvesting medicine, or we’re going for fish, or we’re hunting. (s4) applying a family-based approach to land-based activities the naandwe miikan approach recognizes clients are not isolated individuals but instead they need to be part of a family and belong in the community, connected to a network of social relations. thus, 3 “natural helpers are indigenous peoples who already live in the community and are already well known as a reliable support person for anyone to reach out to during a time of crisis” (dudgeon et al., 2018, p. 13). 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.2.13792 activities that are land-based incorporate a significant social element to rebuild relationships with family members and rectify the hurt caused by past addictive behaviours. and it’s grounding the clients individually, and their families. so, in order to take their families out, it’s just as important they’re going out. because they’re the witness to their mother, to their father, in their addictions. so, it’s starting that rippling effect. so, these children actually view that. they’re viewing what their parents are doing. (s4) exploring land-based healing in land-based activities such as community hunts or medicine harvesting sponsored by naandwe miikan, community members come together with oat clients. experienced hunters, trappers, and harvesters guide community participation in these events. we observed participants having the opportunity to learn and engage in traditional activities that they had not learned due to the cultural disruption of colonialism. everyone here has a different story . . . [but] they’re here for one reason. it’s to find that healing journey. so, this is really important for these people to attend these medicine harvesting. and we showed them the protocols and what to do and how to prepare it, what it helps. and teaching those kids that, they teach their friends, they’ll teach their family, they’ll teach their kids. and now these kids are coming along and they’re going “wow, we’ve never done this before, this is cool!” then they’re seeing mom or dad all of a sudden, like wow. there is another side of life besides being in addictions or being an alcoholic. (s4) we observed young children learning how to skin a harvested beaver, taking part in cleaning fish, and accompanying hunters on the land. the land-based activities functioned similar to a family outing, bringing clients together to cook and eat together, sharing stories and local land-based histories of traditional use of the land. experienced hunters mentor community members in this indigenous knowledge while teaching fishing, hunting, and trapping skills. a strong sense of acceptance and belonging was evident among participants. self determination and data sovereignty this theme provides insights into how much self-determination the community has to access quality data to monitor the effectiveness of naandwe miikan services and make informed decisions about ongoing service development needs. we found that clients typically had many separate electronic medical records, including an oat record, a local health clinic record, family physician health record, a mental health services record, and perhaps other records with off-reserve providers. exactly how many different health records each client had is unknown. at the time of the research, there was no capacity to link client records to determine health service use patterns, such as the level of support clients received from primary care or mental health services. only one case manager had access to individual health records with clinical information such as intake data, doses, and toxicology screens. however, clients’ participation at cultural events and traditional or mental health counselling were missing in this record system. furthermore, the manager did not have access to the emr system’s query section and, 13 maar et al.: community-led recovery from the opioid crisis published by scholarship@western, 2022 therefore, could not run aggregate data for individuals or statistics for the whole clinic. the ability to explore summary statistics and trends over time was not made accessible to community staff, which indicates a poor usability of the vast electronic data to support informed decision making. accordingly, there was minimal capacity to track the program’s effectiveness using quantitative evidence within the oat health records system or other community health or mental health records. the records of a single client at different service agencies were not linked, and that precluded a bird’s eye view (let alone analysis) of care pathways or value of cultural supports for oat clients. the principles for indigenous data governance such as collective benefit, authority to control, and responsibility to support community data capabilities are therefore not well realized in the oat program. it limits the community’s ability to analyze services, conduct evaluations, and base program decisions on documented treatment outcomes. discussion this case study was designed to shed light on why a community-based oat clinic was needed, the community development required to establish it, the client and staff experiences, and related policy implications. the original access to oat services for community members of wiikwemkoong was offreserve, providing an “out of sight, out of mind” approach. however, several health and political leaders were adamantly advocating that addictions must be addressed by the community, and the approach must be community-driven and incorporate a community vision for healing. in this section, we discuss the policy development needed to support indigenous self-determination to facilitate minobimaadiziwin in oat with the backdrop of current events. implications for first nations-led oat working towards restoring of mino-bimaadiziwin in line with findings in the literature (kanate et al., 2015; mamakwa et al., 2017; rowan et al., 2014; uddin, 2013), our case study shows that a community-led approach to oat can lead to more culturally safe experiences in clients’ recovery; however, there are complex barriers that have to be overcome. a core requirement for the implementation of this model to succeed was the ability of community staff to advocate for clients with the prescribing physician and dispensing pharmacist to integrate oat services within the community service and cultural context. while there is cooperation between providers, power structures in the health system provide a challenge for true service collaboration. funding models for physicians and pharmacists do not incentivise the high level of interprofessional and cultural integration that the community is seeking, and collaborative care with community providers is not a requirement of their professions. conceptual barriers to a first nations community-based collaborative model had to be overcome, and this required significant advocacy and commitment by community leaders. in fact, prior to the first nations leaders’ advocacy work, the precursor to naandwe miikan, the wiikwemkoong oat clinic’s operational structure focused exclusively on drug prescribing and dispensing. based on community perception, clients would enter the clinic, acquire their medication, and leave, arguably without any healing taking place. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.2.13792 that model was incompatible with the concept of mino-bimaadiziwin because it only addressed the physical aspects of addiction. ultimately, this model was opposed by the community leadership and the clinic was terminated. then, after comprehensive community consultation with social services, police, political leadership, health, education, and elders, naandwe miikan was born. this engagement of relevant community agencies was critical in naandwe miikan becoming a community oat clinic and is symbolized by its anishinabe name and increased community oversight. from the perspective of wiikwemkoong clients, oat prescribing physicians and dispensing pharmacists come and go, but naandwe miikan is in the community to stay. hence, the clinic’s spirit and intent will remain in the community to support clients’ recovery in a culturally congruent model as long as there are opioid addictions to address (ominika, 2018). despite their often-tenuous relationship with the community, physicians and pharmacists have tremendous power and influence in providing health care, and current health policy ensures that most of the financial resources that cover oat are allocated to their services. this authority is exercised within a biomedical framework that does not create space for the concept of mino-bimaadiziwin or other indigenous community-based holistic healing models. we have not found this problematized in the literature thus far; however, it was not acceptable at naandwe miikan. another core component of the community-led approach was to allocate resources for culturally informed counselling, treatment, and support for reintegration into community life. to achieve this, the community required that the pharmacy provide suitable clinic space that included several office rooms for counselling and case conferencing. to improve equity, the private medical clinic is required to apply some of its profits to cost share traditional indigenous counsellors and cultural and land-based activities with the existing community programs. the naandwe miikan staff supports clients in their healing journeys by reuniting families in land-based activities; this integrates anishinabe knowledge in the recovery process. advocacy for families also takes place with child protective services or assisting with housing, employment and job training, and staff providing personalized support for each client’s unique healing journey. this is a crucial element for clients to recover and requires policies for interagency collaboration. clients become hopeful for the future when they experience caring support and a renewed sense of belonging in the community. physicians and pharmacists simply cannot fulfil this time-consuming, stabilizing, supportive role that is often the cornerstone of clients’ recovery journey; nor do they understand the indigenous client sufficiently to identify their cultural needs and their position in the community to provide personalized support. the collaborative care model involving community staff in clinical discussions on dosing, tapering, and take-home doses is, therefore, essential for clients to achieve their wellness goals. policy environment of indigenous data sovereignty culturally-based innovations in oud require accurate personal health records to support informed decision-making in treatment plans. therefore, indigenous sovereignty in access to usable electronic health data is central to indigenous self-determination to develop effective culturally-based services (loutfi, et al., 2018; maar, 2006; mcbride, n.d.; mcrae-williams et al., 2018; schultz & rainie, 2014; trevethan, 2019; walker et al., 2017). from a policy perspective, most of this literature focuses on large15 maar et al.: community-led recovery from the opioid crisis published by scholarship@western, 2022 scale, global, national, or provincial approaches to indigenous data sovereignty. there are significant global calls for indigenous data sovereignty as well. data sovereignty is embedded in the united nations declaration for the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip), which stipulates indigenous peoples have the right to improvements over "their economic and social conditions, including . . . health and social security" (united nations, 2007, p. 17). in canada there are further linkages with the truth and reconciliation commission’s (trc) calls to action, specifically call 53.iii, to, "develop and implement a multi-year national action plan for reconciliation, which includes research and policy development, public education programs, and resources" (trc, 2015, p. 6). on a national level, there have been formal positions on indigenous data sovereignty for several decades. these include the royal commission on aboriginal peoples (rcap, 1996) and the first nations information governance centre (fnigc, 2021). the rcap recommended: first nations, inuit and métis leaders establish a working group, funded by the federal government, with a two-year mandate to plan a statistical clearinghouse controlled by aboriginal people to (a) work in collaboration with aboriginal governments and organizations to establish and update statistical databases; and (b) promote common strategies across nations and communities for collecting and analyzing data relevant to aboriginal development goals. (1996, p. 218) however, in the same year (1996), canada's federal government excluded on-reserve first nations from three major canadian population surveys. the assembly of first nations responded by forming a national steering committee to undertake a first nations health survey (fnigc, 2021). this action resulted in the creation of the first nations and inuit regional longitudinal health survey (1997), the first indigenous-governed national health survey (fnigc, 2021). a year later, the steering group released a position paper on data sovereignty known by the acronym ocap, referring to first nations ownership, control, access, and possession of their collective data. in 2000, the committee transitioned to the first nations information governance committee. ten years later, it incorporated into an independent non-profit entity, the first nations information governance centre (fnigc, 2021). the fnigc continues to advocate for data sovereignty, given that it concerns a resource used in policy development, decision making, and to leverage funding. in this context, it is data holders, most often non-indigenous researchers, who acquire and hold prestige rooted in the control of indigenous data (fnigc, 2016). according to the fnigc, "first nations themselves are the only ones who have the knowledge and authority to balance the potential benefits and harms associated with the collection and use of their information" (2016, p. 141). given this circumstance, there is a need to establish indigenous jurisdiction over data by enacting privacy and access to information laws, to define relationships, and if applicable, repatriate data back to first nations or engage in sharing agreements (fnigc, 2016). researchers are also responding to the global declaration of indigenous self-determination and the trc calls to action. for instance, a consortium of international researchers is advancing the care principles for indigenous data governance for research to be of collective benefit to indigenous peoples, to extend authority to control data, to exercise responsibility, and to engage in ethical research (carroll et al., 2020). certainly, indigenous peoples' data are diverse. they comprise knowledge of the 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.2.13792 land and non-human beings, administrative data about indigenous persons, oral histories, and indigenous knowledge (carroll et al., 2020), and thus the implications of care are complex: when working with indigenous data, there is a responsibility to nurture respectful relationships with indigenous peoples from whom the data originate. aspects of the relationship include investing in capacity development, increasing community data capabilities, and embedding data within indigenous languages and cultures. pursuing these goals fulfills the ultimate responsibility of supporting indigenous data that advances indigenous peoples' self-determination and collective benefit. (carroll et al., 2020, p. 6) in canada, several indigenous data sovereignty frameworks have been implemented. the institute for clinical evaluative sciences (ices) is a provincial research institute home to researchers who have access to the province’s administrative health services records (ices, 2021a, 2021b). ices recognizes that indigenous peoples' have a right to access data about their communities and to determine the use of these data (pyper et al., 2018). ices has partnered with the chiefs of ontario, an indigenous political advocacy organization, with a framework to advance ethical relationships, engage in data governance and collaborative methodologies and approaches, and seek evidence to build policies and programs (pyper et al., 2018). however, there is also a need for community-specific access and analysis of local data to support decision making. walker and colleagues (2017) stated: indigenous peoples have long claimed sovereignty over their culture and lands and are now making this claim over health data, believing this will empower communities and guide them in advocating for better health and health care . . . greater efforts are needed to track the health of indigenous peoples, and address concerns about the ways in which data are gathered and the political ends to which they might be used. (p. 2022) based on our case study, we argue there is an urgent need for policy development to support community-based sovereignty over usable health and social service data related to opioid recovery. this will empower communities to integrate indigenous healing approaches and to evaluate the effectiveness of these services based on indigenous criteria such as the restoration of mino-bimaadiziwin. policy requirements for indigenous community data sovereignty if a core element of a successful community-led oat approach is community oversight of the effectiveness of culturally-based programs, then health services data must be accessible for analysis at the community level. first, comprehensive individual client health information, including their oat records linked to other health and mental health records and cultural program participation, must be accessible to a case manager to support informed decisions with the client concerning their recovery journey. second, the community requires the capacity to de-identify and aggregate health services data, to track statistical trends in treatment outcomes, and to analyze how these outcomes coincide and relate to cultural and clinical supports. ultimately, this should include the ability to track communityidentified, culturally-based indictors of wellness. however, in our case, access to individual oat health records was restricted to one community staff member, and the many different client chart data could not be linked to understand clients’ recovery from the holistic perspective of living a good life. data 17 maar et al.: community-led recovery from the opioid crisis published by scholarship@western, 2022 sovereignty policies urgently require further development so that data can become accessible to the community to track what cultural approaches work best to support clients at naandwe miikan. data usability is an important aspect to consider for all community-led oat services. the convergence of the covid-19 pandemic and the opioid crisis prior to the covid-19 pandemic, there was already an urgent need to improve access to opioid treatment in first nations communities. barriers to treatment included structural disparities such as geographic isolation, jurisdictional divides, and lack of evidence-informed, culturally-based or culturally congruent services (eibl et al., 2017). with the onset of the covid-19 pandemic, some first nations experienced a doubling of already elevated opioid and particularly fentanyl-related overdose-deaths (mashford-pringle et al., 2021). as a covid-19 containment measure, many first nations restricted community access, which reduced transmission of covid-19. for now, the unintended consequences of physical distancing policies have resulted in reduced access to monitoring of oat, naloxone kits to counteract overdoses, clinical and traditional indigenous counselling, and support for land-based healing activities (mashford-pringle et al., 2021). further, and perhaps less predictably, there has been an interruption of supply chains of street drugs, as well as a subsequent increasing trend of mixing illicit drugs with fentanyl and other even more potent synthetic drugs, that trigger increased rates of overdosing (sutherland & maar, 2019). our local observations during covid-19 suggest that opioid-related overdoses, resulting in deaths of people with concurrent disorders, have increased since the start of the covid-19 pandemic (maar et al., 2020), a finding that is also supported by other research (wendt et al. 2021). specifically, in a survey completed in june 2020, community leaders and primary care providers identified people living with mental health and substance use issues as being disproportionately affected by consequences of covid-19, including physical distancing and self-isolation. those who are on opioid replacement therapies have had decreased access to virtual and remote care options. during the pandemic, care providers were often unable to properly integrate anishinabe cultural and land-based practices, traditional medicine, anishinabe language, and worldview into care (maar et al., 2020). the impact of covid-19 containment measures on indigenous healing practices social distancing has limited the size of gatherings and physical proximity between people. access to traditional indigenous cultural and healing practices and ceremonies that might support addiction recovery has therefore been greatly reduced (first nations health authority, 2020). in some cases, conducting ceremonies during times of government applied distancing measures has become highly politicized in the colonial state. in may 2020, rcmp arrived in cruisers to interrupt sun dance ceremonies in beardy’s and okemasis cree nation in saskatchewan, despite indigenous organizers’ insistence that “they limited the number of people at the event, [and] practised physical distancing” (shield & martell, 2020, para. 1). the conductor of the ceremony, sun dance chief clay sutherland emphasized that the pandemic exposed existing structural racism: "this took us back to 150 years ago when all of our people had to go underground. they had to hide. they had to hide who they were" (shield & martell, 2020, para. 13). prime minster trudeau later responded that the decision for 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.2.13792 ceremonies would be at the discretion of indigenous leadership (bridges, 2020a), although the sask. premier continued to disagree with that position (bridges, 2020b). the intersection of the covid-19 pandemic with the trauma of the uncovering of the unmarked graves at residential schools in may 2021, just over a year after the onset of the covid-19 pandemic, unmarked children’s graves were first officially discovered at irs sites. these tragic revelations are currently reverberating in indigenous communities and likely contributing to the negative effects of the covid-19 pandemic on people who live with oud and their families. these triggers highlight the need for culturally and familybased healing approaches that respond to the complex trauma that people with oud may have experienced as the multi-generational consequences of colonial policies (brave heart et al., 2011; fiedeldey-van dijk et al., 2017; pomerville & gone, 2019; restoule et al., 2015; ritland et al., 2020; rowan et al., 2014). colonial policies have facilitated multi-generational mental, physical, and sexual abuse in residential and day schools, which are the root causes of high addictions rates today (dell et al., 2011; health canada, 2015; marsh et al., 2015). clearly, an affirmation of traditional, cultural, and clinical support for the escalating needs of indigenous people living with oud are urgently needed at this time. according to the first nations mental wellness continuum framework, “culture as a foundation means starting from the point of indigenous knowledge and culture and then integrating current policies, strategies, and frameworks” (health canada, 2015, p. 6). the implementation of an indigenous framework for recovery, undisturbed by colonial polices, and the creation of a continuum of mental health and social services based on culture is the next step in that direction (dumont, 2005; heilbron & guttman, 2000; mccormick, 2000). the development of effective, culturally safe, community-led models for oat are needed more than ever (crism ontario, 2016; mamakwa et al., 2017). however, to facilitate sustainable, culturally safe, community-designed indigenous practice models, the legitimacy of indigenous knowledge and science alongside western approaches to recovery needs to be acknowledged. first nations should be able to access and monitor the data pertained from integrated approaches, so that the communities can decide if their visions for healing and wellness are being met. therefore, a focus on data usability and data sovereignty should not be lost despite the need for front line services. we provide several policy recommendations to help move towards knowledge translation of our findings. recommendations 1. recommendations to improve community-based data sovereignty mainstream indicators of oat programs, such as retention and reduced criminal activity, while useful, are not sufficient to determine culturally-based effectiveness. instead, indigenous perspectives of wellness such as mino-bimaadiziwin may guide a community's vision of success. this requires data that describes the whole person, their family, their community, and their reconnection with indigenous knowledge, culture and the land. therefore, oat and health records need to be available for analysis and linked with other relevant service data so that communities have the evidence for informed 19 maar et al.: community-led recovery from the opioid crisis published by scholarship@western, 2022 decisions. privacy and confidentially issues in small communities should be considered and addressed to facilitate safe use of health information data. specific steps of implementation that apply to this case study include: 1.1 increase data usability by identifying community staff to become meaningful operators of the electronic records system and to run regular queries on individual client and aggregated clinic outcomes, such as: 1.1.1 monitor tapering trends and its relationship to clients' history with drugs, past trauma, and comorbidities. 1.1.2 track buprenorphine (sublocade and suboxone) versus methadone use for oat to determine safety profiles and overdose risk in the community. 1.1.3 monitor take-home dose data closely during crises, including the covid-19 pandemic, to keep the clients safe from unintended uses, as well as keeping the community safe from diversion of methadone to the streets; take home dose data should be linked and cross referenced with toxicology screens as well as indicators of integration into community and culture, such as accessing counselling and/or cultural programs, education programs, community programs, and volunteering. 1.2 develop data sharing agreements within the community health and social services network, which might include: 1.2.1 data linking agreements with health, mental health, and social services sector in order to facilitate multi-community agency wrap-around and case management support for clients. 1.2.2 create privacy policies that provide safeguards for linking of health data in small communities. 1.3 develop holistic indictors of success that can be tracked, such as uptake of mental health and traditional counselling: many clients are affected by intergenerational trauma where painkillers assist in escaping from unresolved grief and pain of traumatic experiences. tracking the level of success of various services for different clients will allow clinics to offer the most reliable services for recovery. 1.4 track cultural activities and indicators of connectedness to better understand the role of indigenous culture and knowledge in recovery. 1.5 track community-identified indicators of success that may include oat clients enrolling in education, volunteering, gaining employment, reducing the level of involvement of child protective services, and participation in traditional activities. qualitative approaches and 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 13, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2022.13.2.13792 indigenous research methods to evaluation should be explored. 1.5.1. track aggregated data on prescribed opioids in the community in collaboration with the primary care teams. 1.5.2. track police statistics such as changes in drug-related calls and crime rates. 2. recommendations for health transformation to improve equity in the funding model for oat currently, funding of oat strongly privileges compensation for the prescribing physician and pharmacist. however, case management, wrap around services, and especially trauma-informed counselling and cultural support are urgently needed for clients to recover from opioid addictions. yet, funding models almost exclusively recognize drug therapy, while clinical therapy, traditional indigenous counseling, healing, comprehensive case management, and cultural support services are nearly completely neglected. health transformation requires "expanding health systems to include practices that meet the unique needs of first nations" (government of canada 2021). we recommend the following policy improvements to support health transformation: 2.1 position recovery from opioids as part of health transformation as a “health system or model that responds to the needs of the anishinabek, that is holistic and culturally relevant” (anishinabek nation, 2020, para 1). 2.2 funding models for oat should support community self-determination and indigenous recovery models, such as the mental wellness continuum framework (health canada, 2015). 2.3 funding models for oat must include culturally-based mental health and addictions and case management services. given the high rate of complex trauma experienced by first nations community members, the disproportionate impact of the covid-19 pandemic on indigenous people living with oud, and the current re-traumatization related to the uncovering of unmarked graves of children at irs, a continuum of culturally based services from prevention to aftercare must be developed. 2.4 respectful collaborative practice rooted in culture and involving prescribing or dispensing professionals, community-based health care providers and traditional indigenous providers should be considered an essential component of truth and reconciliation and health transformation (maar et al., 2022). conclusion naandwe miikan's success in developing community-led and culturally-based oat services was predicated on the community leaders’ persistence to advocate for their community. at this point, equitable funding models for culturally-based oat services in first nations do not exist. 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(2012). sense of belonging in the urban school environments of aboriginal youth. th e international indigenous policy journal, 3(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.1 his research is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in he international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. sense of belonging in the urban school environments of aboriginal youth abstract it is well established that educational attainment and social support are critical social determinants of health among aboriginal canadians. still, the gap in educational attainment with non-aboriginal canadians continues to grow, and little is known about the role of social support as a health determinant among aboriginal youth. in collaboration with the wabano centre for aboriginal health (ottawa, canada), we undertook focus groups with urban aboriginal youth at-risk to examine perceptions of their urban school environments, including access to social support. data were analyzed using a general inductive approach. results indicate that youths’ perceived level of trust is key to the uptake of social support and vital to fostering sense of belonging. youth identified social support as both structural and functional; the former being a symbol of the ‘potential to help’ and the latter representing ‘actual help.’ the unique challenges endured in the home environments of aboriginal youth at-risk means that teachers and staff must be prepared to provide forms of support that are responsive to these realities. part of the solution will come from implementing measures of cultural safety that support the resources needed for aboriginal youth at-risk to experience sense of belonging, thereby making urban schools places where youth will achieve their educational goals. keywords youth, aboriginal health, school environment, social support, sense of belonging, urban, community-based research, cultural safety acknowledgments we gratefully acknowledge the support of our research assistants lauren coyle and conrad prince. we also thank elder paul skanks, and wabano's wolf pack team. dr. chantelle richmond holds a cihr new investigator award in aboriginal health. dr. dawn smith holds a loyer-dasilva research chair in public health nursing creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ sense of belonging in the urban school environments of aboriginal youth in canada, rates of educational success are significantly lower among aboriginal youth than their nonaboriginal counterpart (hull, 1996; mendelson, 2006). though measures of educational success indicate positive change more recently, particularly among aboriginal youth in urban settings, the auditor general’s (2010) report suggests that educational success in the non-aboriginal population is significantly outpacing gains made by the aboriginal population, thereby leading to a widening gap in educational outcomes. this gap is a troubling one, as there is a great deal of evidence demonstrating that the health of populations is directly related to educational attainment, among other social determinants (marmot, 2005). the gap in educational attainment experienced by the aboriginal population is shaped by systemic inequalities related to canada’s colonial legacy, including the intergenerational impacts of the residential school legacy, and various other barriers related to curriculum design, geographic isolation, and the unique social support and infrastructure needs of aboriginal youth (battiste, 2000; battiste & barman, 1985; silver & mallett, 2002). the factors that explain educational attainment among aboriginal youth are numerous and complex. yet few studies have examined youth perceptions of their urban school environments, and to our knowledge, no studies have explored aboriginal youth perceptions of social supports in their school environments. given contemporary patterns of urbanization among aboriginal canadians, and the educational challenges we see in the aboriginal context, this is particularly troubling (statistics canada, 2008). in this paper, we draw from focus group discussions held with a group of at-risk aboriginal youth regarding their urban school environments, including their access to social support in these places. we draw from the hypothesis that increased access to high quality social supports facilitates better learning and improved educational attainment. our research addresses three objectives: 1) to explore at-risk youths’ perceptions of their urban school environments; 2) to describe at-risk youths’ perceptions of social supports in their schools; and 3) to examine the factors that shape at-risk youths’ uptake of social support in their school environments. before moving into a description of our methods and analyses, we provide a summary of aboriginal education in canada, and a review of the factors that shape educational opportunities in school environments. aboriginal education in 2006, 40% of aboriginal people in canada aged 20 to 24 did not have a high school diploma, compared to 13% among non-aboriginal canadians. the rate was considerably higher for first nations living on-reserve (61%) and inuit living in arctic communities (68%) (canadian council on learning, 2009). in general, non-registered indians who live off-reserve, especially those in urban centres, tend to have higher educational attainment than other aboriginal groups (hull, 2005; statistics canada, 2008). among first nations aged 25 to 64, those living off-reserve had higher rates of high school and post-secondary completion compared to their on-reserve counterparts (statistics canada, 2008). young aboriginal people living in large cities are the most likely to have a university degree (tait, 1999). while there appears to be some diversity in educational attainment within the aboriginal population, and across geographic contexts, the reality is that the gap in attainment between aboriginal and non-aboriginal peoples is widening. one need not look far for explanations about these discrepancies. one of the darkest chapters in canadian history relates to the residential school system, legislated in the 1880’s by the federal government to assimilate indian children to canadian values. supported by canada’s colonial agenda, the primary objective of the residential school system was to remove and isolate aboriginal children from the influence of their homes, families, traditions, and cultures (furniss, 1 richmond et al.: sense of belonging in urban school environments published by scholarship@western, 2012 1992). the residential school system was supported by the assumption that aboriginal cultures and spiritual beliefs were inferior and unequal. for over a century, 150,000 aboriginal children aged 7 to 15 were forcibly taken to residential schools, wherein they suffered various forms of sexual, physical, and mental abuse, as well as subordinate living conditions including insufficient food and shelter. the historic trauma and intergenerational impact of residential schools extends this legacy into contemporary contexts, and strongly shapes sense of belonging and wellbeing of children and grandchildren of residential school survivors (aboriginal healing foundation, 2005; smith, varcoe, & edwards, 2005). there is also evidence to suggest that the intergenerational impact of residential schools has affected access to, and the quality of, social determinants of first nation health; in particular, that relating to provision and seeking of social support (richmond, 2007; richmond & ross, 2009). defining social support in the most basic sense, social support refers to the supportive behaviours and resources of our social ties, including emotional support, intimacy, positive interaction, and tangible support (house, 1981). these supportive behaviours operate at the levels of individual and community (felton & shinn, 1992; thoits, 1995). since the late 1970s an expansive literature has grown to describe the connection between social support and health, the basic argument being that the care, respect, and resulting sense of satisfaction and well-being related to our social ties can buffer against health problems (berkman, glass, brisette, & seeman, 2000; cohen & syme, 1985). within the literature on indigenous health, few authors have examined the connections between social support and health outcomes. iwasaki, bartlett, and o’neil (2005) drew from a series of focus group interviews to better understand the ways in which aboriginal peoples with diabetes cope with stress. a key emerging theme was that of interdependence/connectedness. their results indicate that social supports provide opportunity for “sharing” problems and feelings, and for gaining encouragement and strength. in the context of youth suicide among first nations in british columbia (n = 196), chandler & lalonde (1998) demonstrate the protective role of cultural continuity upon prevalence of youth suicide. they found rates of youth suicide to be significantly lower, and in some cases non-existent, in communities that shared such markers of cultural continuity. chong and lopez (2005) assessed the relationship of social networks and social support to the psychosocial functioning (i.e., self-efficacy, self-esteem, anxiety, depression, and hostility) of 159 american indian women undergoing residential substance abuse treatment. their results indicated that social support and active participation by clients’ families during treatment was significantly related to improved psychosocial functioning. chong and lopez (2005) concluded that interventions for substance abuse should aim to include family and friends in clients’ treatment, and they also identified the need for further research to study other types of social networks (i.e., beyond family), and explore how different positive social networks can be developed to counteract the impact of negative social networks that represent the client’s real world. another american study evaluated the efficacy of 15 years of a public health–oriented suicidalbehavior prevention program among youths living on an american indian reservation (may, serna, hurt & debruyn, 2005). over the years, the program evolved into a broad, community-wide systems suicide prevention model that solicited active involvement from key constituencies (i.e., tribal leadership, health care providers, parents, elders, youths, and clients) in its design and implementation. results indicated a substantial drop in suicidal gestures and attempts. the authors claim that community involvement in the program was critical for developing strategies through which to address issues identified in a culturally, environmentally, and clinically appropriate manner (may et al., 2005). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.1 combined, these studies make the point that connections between the individual, family, and greater community – and the resources implicated by, and shared within, this social network – appear to have important protective properties for health. notably, only two of these studies were focused on youth access to social support, and none examined the ways the school environment can foster or diminish aboriginal youth’s sense of belonging. aboriginal sense of belonging in urban school environments compared with non-aboriginal youth, aboriginal youth are more likely to dropout, face grade repetition and failure, and they are also most likely to experience violence and bullying in their school environments (chiefs of ontario, n.d.; statistics canada, 2008). combined with factors such as poverty, family break-down, racism and violence, the marginalization of urban aboriginal youth from the school environment has had significant consequences on their educational attainment (schissel & wotherspoon, 2003; silver & mallett, 2002). many urban schools suffer from systemic racism and colonial imperatives that linger from decades past. battiste (2000) asserts that “no force has been more effective at oppressing first nations culture than the education system” (p. 163). she goes on to describe the school environment as places that are fraught with feelings of marginalization, oppression, and cultural loss, and lacking social support for first nations. these feelings can be intensified by the lack of aboriginal teachers, aboriginal content in curricula, and awareness of the life experiences and cultural values of aboriginal students and their families (kitchen, cherubini, trudeau, & hodson, 2009). urban schools tend to endure other educational equity and social justice challenges as well, including exclusion of aboriginal knowledges and languages from curricula, failure to include parents and community in school decision-making, and an overrepresentation of youth from low-income families who are highly mobile and more likely to be headed by single parents (silver & mallett, 2002; statistics canada, 2008). because government funding and educational policy directives have traditionally focused on first nations living on-reserve, urban-based schools serving first nations, métis, and inuit peoples endure significant demands, but too often with inadequate funding, training and human resources (hanselmann, 2001). as the proportion of aboriginal people in urban places continues to grow, there is great need for schools to become places that meet these growing cultural demands, educational priorities, and social support needs of this shifting demographic. unlike youth in northern, rural, and remotely located aboriginal communities, urban youth are much less likely to benefit from extended family support, informal sharing networks, and wider community support systems that may act to protect and improve health and social realities (e.g., through food sharing networks, closeness of communities, etc.) (richmond & ross, 2009). these social networks are vital for sustaining aboriginal cultures and identities in ways that build positive self-esteem and creating spaces that encourage learning (hill & redwing saunders, 2008). further, it is known that students who feel the safest, most comfortable, and most enthused are those who receive some form of cultural education in school (schissel & wotherspoon, 2003). the factors that explain educational attainment among aboriginal youth are numerous and complex; yet few studies have examined youth perceptions of their school environments and the social support processes that shape sense of belonging in these environments. here, we draw from focus groups with aboriginal youth (n=14) aged 13 to 17 years old at the wabano centre for aboriginal health in ottawa, ontario. we now move on to describe the methods and analyses of our study. we begin with a description of our community partner, the wabano centre for aboriginal health. 3 richmond et al.: sense of belonging in urban school environments published by scholarship@western, 2012 the wabano centre for aboriginal health recognizing the health and social service needs of urban aboriginal peoples, in 1994, the ontario aboriginal healing and wellness strategy developed aboriginal health centres across nine major urban centres in the province of ontario. the wabano centre for aboriginal health is located in ottawa, canada’s capital city, which is home to a diverse group of aboriginal peoples including inuit, métis, and a number of first nations groups. currently, the aboriginal population residing in the ottawa region is estimated at 43,000 (statistics canada, 2008). it is the fastest growing and most culturally diverse urban aboriginal population, with the highest concentration of urban inuit in canada. similar to health and social conditions that plague aboriginal populations in other major canadian cities (canadian institute for health information, 2003), ottawa’s aboriginal population endure high proportions of unemployment (9.2%, compared with 5.9% among ottawa’s non-aboriginal residents), incidence of lone-parent status (7.2%), frequent mobility (25% moved in the last year, compared with 14% in the general ottawa population), lower completion rates of university/degree (18% versus 32%), and significantly lower incomes ($59,345 versus $69,743). another key characteristic of ottawa’s aboriginal population is a high percentage of families who do not live in census families, defined as a married couple and their children (22.1% versus 16.8% in the general ottawa population) (schnarch, 2008). wabano’s mandate is to create and deliver culturally relevant health services that are rooted in clinical, social, economic, and cultural initiatives that promote the health of urban first nations, métis, and inuit people in the city of ottawa. wabano functions as a health centre with both clinical and traditional healers, and it also provides a vast array of health promotion and social programming for people across the lifespan. given the special socioeconomic and family-related challenges presented by ottawa’s aboriginal population, one of wabano’s key areas of concentration is on healthy youth development. this youth programming is centred on the “wolf pack” program, which provides a host of socially and culturally relevant activities. the involvement of elders and other culturally based activities (e.g., language, land-based learning) have been incorporated into wolf pack programming. wabano’s wolf pack programming services a diversity of first nation, inuit, and métis youth, but a special concentration is targeted to at-risk youth, defined as alienated and marginalized youth who are characterized by: adopting the street lifestyle, academic failure or dropping out of school, involvement in alcohol and/or other drug use, and involvement in illegal behaviour (anderson, 1993). methods and approach our relationship with the wabano centre for aboriginal health began in spring 2008, when the lead author approached wabano’s executive director to inquire about the development of a research partnership between wabano and academic partners at the university of western ontario (uwo) (london, ontario) and ottawa university (ottawa, ontario). what began as a simple telephone call quickly evolved into a larger community process that involved wabano’s wolf pack staff, community elders, university researchers, and summer students in the design, implementation, and analysis of this research. as has been noted elsewhere (castellano, 2004 edwards, lund, mitchell, & andersson, 2008; schnarch, 2004), the use of such a participatory approach is important for ensuring that research with aboriginal communities promotes a process of capacity-building and knowledge formation that benefits both researcher and the researched. embracing these principles ensured that the research was conducted with wabano in a culturally appropriate way to develop locally relevant data and tangible research outcomes on youth educational attainment. despite the growing size and risk of this 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.1 population in canadian cities, available funding for youth services is scant. as such, the pairing of university resources and an urgent community issue meant that this study was conceptualized, from the very start, through an approach designed to create a mutually beneficial outcome. the focus groups our research design drew from a participatory approach that was centred on focus group discussions with 14 aboriginal youth, aged 13 to 17. the cultural background of these youth represented 10 first nation and 4 inuit, all of whom had lived in the city of ottawa for at least the past five years. as mentioned above, wabano’s wolf-pack programming centres its efforts on at-risk youth, and the participants in our study well characterized this definition. ten out of 14 study participants were in, or had recently been in, foster care. ten out of 14 were living below the poverty line. all 14 youth came from homes with complex family dynamics, including conflict with family, mental health issues, violence, and addictions. seven out of 14 participants were in conflict with the law. focus group discussions involve concurrent questioning among a group to explore participant perceptions on specific issues. this method, as opposed to one-on-one interviews, was chosen for various reasons. first, when undertaking research with youth, the power disparity between researchers and underage youth must be acknowledged and minimized (cameron, 2005); these discussions can work to empower youth, thereby lessening this inequality. second, in the group setting, the security of one’s peers can work to increase participant confidence as well as generate new ideas and common insights (goss & leinbach, 1996; hyde, howlett, brady, & drennan, 2005). finally, many youth at wabano had previously participated in focus group discussions. by working with wolf pack staff, this method enabled us to tap into pre-established social networks, trust and partnerships that had developed in this cohort of youth. the focus groups took place on an afternoon in summer 2008. the day began with a welcome lunch and an opening prayer by one of wabano’s elder. the youth were arranged into three groups, which were developed by wolf pack employees to provide a balanced representation of age, grade level, and gender across the three groups. it was also important to arrange the groups in such a way that maximized on the social dynamics of the group; for example, a brother and sister were assigned to separate groups. wolf pack employees, who were most knowledgeable about the characteristics of the youth participants, arranged these groups. to maximize youth confidence and to minimize the power dynamics that can result between researchers and researched – particularly in this case, with this group of at-risk youth at least one wolf pack employee was assigned to each group. the close, trusting nature of the relationship between the youth and wolf pack employees was a strength that we benefitted from greatly in terms of co-developing this study with wabano, and it was critical for the success of the focus groups that we integrated these employees into all stages of the day’s activities. the groups were seated in a circle formation. each group had a moderator whose role was to initiate the topics of discussion and engage youth about their ideas and perceptions of their schools. we asked youth a series of sub-questions that related more generally to: a) their feelings about their schools, including impactful experiences; and b) sources, and uptake of, social support available to them in their schools. this tool was pre-tested twice: first with undergraduate students at uwo; and second, with wolf pack employees. ethical approval for the study was provided by uwo’s non-medical research ethics board. during the focus groups, it was critical to be mindful of participation by all members of the group in the discussion. the moderator called upon those whose ideas were not being heard. the moderator also remained aware of the comfort level of youth participants as they discussed various topics. group discussions were tape-recorded (with permission). to encourage a safe sharing environment, our elder 5 richmond et al.: sense of belonging in urban school environments published by scholarship@western, 2012 circulated from room to room during the course of the group discussions, and remained present once the focus groups had ended; the purpose of this was to provide the youth, and/or any members of the research team with space for debriefing. at closing, the moderator briefly overviewed the group’s discussion. youth were provided opportunity to share any new or pertinent information and/or provide closing remarks they may wish to share. the elder closed the day with a prayer. analyses of the data once transcribed, the focus group data were analyzed in microsoft word using a general inductive approach (silverman, 2000). the primary purposes of the inductive approach are three-fold: to identify significant themes inherent in the raw data; to establish links between the research objectives and the main thematic findings; and to develop a model or theory about the underlying structure of the processes described in the data (thomas, 2006). the first step of our analytical approach involved extensive readings of the focus group transcripts. this ensured a thorough familiarity with the data, which enabled the primary author to identify a number of main categories or themes present within the discussions. once these general categories had been established, they were presented to, and discussed by the research team. once a general set of categories had been agreed upon by the research team, the analysis proceeded through the coding of the focus group data. coding is a data organization technique used to connect data, issues, interpretations, data sources, and report writing (miles & huberman, 1994). the goal of the coding process was to condense the various pages of text data into a more concise summary format (thomas, 2006), and to establish clear links between the study objectives and the thematic categories derived from the focus group discussions (thomas, 2003). during the coding process, various sections of text that corresponded with these themes and objectives were highlighted. the sections of text represent components or fragments of ideas or experiences, which often are meaningless when viewed alone (miles & huberman, 1994). together, these pieces of text formed the basis of the main thematic findings, which when pieced together, form a comprehensive picture of the youths’ experiences of belonging. as a means of establishing rigour in our research findings, significant dialogue between the first and second authors, and the community partner ensued. this process enabled meaningful participation by the full study team on the identification and interpretation of key themes. in the section that follows, a number of unedited phrases from the focus group discussions are organized around the study’s main themes to highlight youths’ perceptions of their schools, their access to social support, and the social processes that tie these larger themes together. pseudonyms have been assigned to protect the confidentiality of youth participants. main findings youth perceptions of their school environments one of the first questions we asked youth was “what is the first thing that comes to mind when you think about school?” youth responses could be organized as being negative or positive. the majority of the negative school perceptions related to being bored (n =10). almost half of the participants described school as an uninspiring place. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.1 i think of cubicles… i think of being stuck in cubicles and tired. sometimes [i] feel isolated. i am always looking at the same walls. they teach same stuff over and over. (stephanie) in terms of the positive responses about school, three youth noted that they liked their teachers; two noted they enjoyed the subject matter, and, surprisingly, two respondents noted that they enjoyed wearing of uniforms. i think of uniforms. i don't really like uniforms. because you have to wear the same thing everyday. but it's also good. sometimes… 'cause then no one is like, um, excluding anyone based on the way they dress. (danielle) we then asked the youth to think more specifically about what they like and dislike about their schools. regarding what students like about their schools, the most common response related to their enjoyment of learning and particular subjects (n=6): i like my school 'cause you can you learn new things about other people and about subjects...yeah. (katherine) four students indicate liking their schools because of their friends, while others enjoy sports and other after-school activities. what is more telling about student perceptions of their schools is what they dislike. for example, what the youth most frequently mentioned disliking about school relates to ‘feeling excluded’ and ‘teacher quality,’ followed narrowly by ‘violence/ bullying.’ when responding to why he does not like his school, for example, steven states that he feels excluded as an aboriginal person: i don't like school period so...no 'cause i find that what they'll teach me is what they want… look, i’m not trying to be racist or anything so don't take this [the wrong way] but the white people are just trying to make us learn what they want me to learn. if we went to a school without any others and we learn – as greg was saying – a lot of stuff about natives… but [at my school] we went over it for like two days and then we switched to a different topic… (steven) tori, from a different focus group, speaks about feeling marginalized as one of only a few aboriginal youth in her school: do i like school? yeah and no because um… i was like the only aboriginal – me and my sister were the only aboriginals in our whole school… so we were always feeling different, like left out. (tori) one of the major themes that recurred across youth focus groups relates to common experiences of violence (n=10). experiences of violence can have long-lasting effects on student perceptions of belonging even if the violence only occurs once: i don’t like school because i was kicked out when i beat up a girl and she snitched on me. i was frustrated and i got mad at her. the people at my school like to gossip. things go around the school and people get to know your secrets. no one can keep stuff to themselves. (michelle) 7 richmond et al.: sense of belonging in urban school environments published by scholarship@western, 2012 as illustrated in the quote above, michelle’s experience of violence at school was related to feelings of marginalization, which were compounded by lack of trust in her peers and classmates. best and worst school experiences as another means of understanding youth’s perceptions of their school environments, we asked them to describe their best and worst experiences at school. while some youth spoke about particular events or moments that defined their best and worst experiences, others focused on long-term systemic issues affecting their everyday school realities. in terms of best school experiences, three main themes emerged: travel/out-of-class activities, academic achievement, and having other aboriginal students at their school. youth spoke very positively about extra-curricular activities that occurred outside of the classroom, particularly those that provided experiential learning experiences. almost half of the focus group participants identified these activities as their best school experience. in the various examples provided, youth spoke about the excitement of travelling to a new city, the importance of meeting new people, and the sense of confidence that these out-of-school activities instilled within them. for example, michelle speaks about a field trip to another city: my best experience was when we went to montreal. we visited la ronde [an amusement park]. the roller coasters were really fun and exciting. i can also remember that we went to the science centre and we all sat on a chair that had thousands of little nails sticking out of it. it was fun because we learned something new and fun. (rebecca) greg mentions participation in the school talent show as his best student experience: my um best experience was actually last year. we had a talent show at the end of the year, and me and two other – no – one other friend, her name was sylvia and we lipsynced to grease. and, uh, yeah we had this whole dance thing and it was really fun. so we got to dress up and it was awesome. (greg) academic achievements were also mentioned as positive experiences for youth. katherine talks about how she won a flag-design competition and what it meant to her: in grade 4 we had this competition we had to create a new flag for the school. so a lot of people tried out, and i'm the one who got their flag chosen! so, now it’s the second one [flag] that hangs below the canadian flag. it made me feel really good. (katherine) students’ ideas about best school experiences also related to cultural connections with other aboriginal students at their school; the opportunity to feel sense of belonging through their shared aboriginal identity was highlighted: well we just felt like they [teachers] were so racist because they didn’t teach us anything about our culture or language. but we were so happy to be with each other ‘cause that meant we didn’t have to go there alone every day. but we still didn’t get to learn anything aboriginal. (tori) 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.1 students’ perceptions about worst school experience detailed three key themes: ‘violence and bullying,’ ‘failure,’ and negative ‘altercations with their teachers.’ one of the most troubling results of this research is that greater than half of the youth indicated that their worst student experience revolved around incidents of violence and/or bullying (n=10). in most cases, the bullying experienced by youth extended over long periods of time. in alex’s experience, he was bullied for a full school year: there was this kid in my class, and for some reason he just didn't like me. and he used to like bug me and tease me all the time. and there were a couple occasions where i tried to get back at him but he always got a teacher involved so – so like he would tease me and then when i wanna get back he would run away from me. it was like probably my worst school year… (alex) greg describes a similar experience of long-term bullying by peers at school: last year there was this group of girls who really didn't like me 'cause i was always really happy and i'm was able to say stuff that was on my mind. and they just didn't like me so they kept on calling me fat. then i really got that in my mind and i thought that i was fat so i stopped eating for a really long time. (greg) when prompted about how their experiences of violence and bullying were resolved, most indicated feeling quite helpless, not knowing whom to turn to for help. youth specified that the issue was often resolved with the help of friends. when asked if they sought help from teachers or other staff, youth revealed that they would not disclose the issues to their teachers because they did not trust them. this is detailed further in the next section on social support. failure in school was another common response for worst school experience (n=5). in the quote below, steven explains the long-term effects on his self-esteem by being held back in his kindergarten year: i lost my kindergarten year because my parents moved us around so much…i had to re-do it. now this means that i'm always with younger kids…i keep running into my old classmates and i know they are ahead and where i should [be]. like that really sucks for me. (steven) the final common theme concerning worst student experiences related to verbal and physical altercations with teachers. these experiences were described as arguments between teachers and students, the result being that the youth would get kicked out of class, sent for detention, or expelled. in one case, however, an altercation between a female student and her teacher escalated to the point where charges were laid against the student: lynn: my worst experience was the day i was charged at school. all i can tell you is that the teacher deserved what she got. moderator: do you think this situation could have been prevented? lynn: yeah, maybe… but [i] wasn’t gonna try and be nice to that teacher. she wouldn’t listen anyway. moderator: what do you mean by that? lynn: well ‘cause like others have said, they [teachers] just hear what they want to hear and the rest just gets thrown out. 9 richmond et al.: sense of belonging in urban school environments published by scholarship@western, 2012 lynn reflects that this experience might have been resolved with a better outcome, however, she expresses that her teacher was incapable of listening to, and understanding, her frustrations. sources, meanings, and access to social support the third section of the focus group directed youth to think about sources of social support in their school environments, and to think about to whom they turn when they need help. youth identified a number of key sources of social support: friends, family, teachers, principals, and guidance counselors. in describing what social support means, youth spoke about three key characteristics: guidance/help, belonging, and trust. the most important characteristic of social support was the ability to receive guidance or help when needed. all 14 participants spoke about the importance of having someone to talk to when needing help making decisions, or trying to solve a problem. for youth, the most important source of support comes from their peers: friends are there to listen and they can help with problems and to provide guidance. the can understand where you are coming from because most have been in the same situation before so they know how to see your problem and help you out…(rebecca) rebecca continues to discuss how teachers and other staff can also offer help and guidance at school. however, she qualifies that this help is not always enough, as teachers cannot fully appreciate the unique support needs of aboriginal youth: teachers listen, and they try to help in any way they can, like if you don’t understand your work, or if you are having another problem. the guidance counselor is also an important support… but we [aboriginal youth] just need more support all around. and we need people who are more sensitive to the issues that we are facing. most teachers just don’t get it. (rebecca) youth also articulated the significance of social supports for fostering sense of belonging in the school environment (n=8). not only does having a supportive friend help one to feel included, but the act of providing social support can also improve an individual’s self-esteem and confidence in the quality of their friendships. this means that both giving and receiving social support can make one feel better. the most significant quality of a social support is level of trust youth have in the person providing help: well, yes i know they [teachers and staff] are there to turn to, but if i don’t trust them, i am not going to go. and most of them, i don’t trust. (sarah) as sarah illustrates, while social supports may be in place, youth may actively choose not to use them because they are not perceived to be appropriate sources of support for the sort of help they need. sadly, this means that when youth are in need of help, they may find that there are no adults to whom they can turn for help. help in time of need the final question of our focus group asked youth who they turn to for help in their schools. the most common response was their teachers (n=6), followed by their friends (n=3), and family (n=2). three youth indicated they had no one to whom to turn. there was an important difference in the 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.1 sorts of help that youth identified seeking from each of these sources. for example, only one youth identified that she would speak with a teacher about a personal issue she was experiencing. for the most part, teachers were identified as important sources of academic help. this is elucidated in the following example; greg speaks about how he turns to his drama teacher for help because he perceives his drama teacher can understand youth issues: most of my teachers, i can turn to them for help. but i won’t go to them for personal reasons. well it’s like they are people i don’t know, that i’m not friends with. but my drama teacher… he has worked with kids all his life and he's like a very trusting person. and he knows how to like talk to kids. he knows that, like, we feel different than adults. (greg) in terms of more personal forms of help, youth spoke about their friends as their preferred sources: i guess that i can rely on my friends to listen to what i have to say and not go out and like tell other people. ‘cause there are some things i can only tell my friends that i can’t say to my parents. ‘cause i know my parents are gonna like flip out and try to do whatever they can to solve the problem when it won’t be solved. so yeah basically that i can tell my friends when i can’t tell my parents. (alex) as alex hints at above, friends provide different forms of help than parents or teachers do. while youth can speak openly with their friends about a number of very personal issues (e.g., break-ups, bullying), most youth indicated that they do not feel comfortable asking their parents for help on these particular issues. tori raises a similar point: i feel i can tell my friends stuff that i… well, ‘cause i don’t think.. well if i have an issue with a girl at school, and i tell my mom about things, i don’t think she will listen to what i have to say. (tori) clearly, the sources of help that youth turn to are very context-specific, meaning that different sources of support serve different functions depending on the situation. for example, while teachers are identified as important potential sources of social support for academic-related issues, our results seem to indicate most youth are uncomfortable seeking help from their teachers for personal issues because of a lack of trust in them. in this case, youth often turn instead to their friends, who they perceive to have a better appreciation of the personal issues they are facing. as mentioned above, three students indicated that there was no one they could turn to for help. as articulated in the previous section, these three youth contend that they prefer to solve problems by themselves. while all three of these youth previously indicated that they do perceive they have social supports they could turn to for help, they will not seek out these sources because they have not built trusting relationships: i do know why. it's just a complicated answer… well as i was growing up i realized who i can and can't trust. well most of the time i tried to trust them but then they just – stuff just happened and they i really got mad and got in trouble. so i only tried trusting people that i've known my whole life not people i just met…like every one at my school gives support but i just don’t accept it. i like my self as alone in school, it's usually not to hang out with anyone… i just block everyone else out, except for the people that i like – that i trust. i choose not to accept it, but i guess it's there if i need it. (steven, italics added) 11 richmond et al.: sense of belonging in urban school environments published by scholarship@western, 2012 discussion the main objective of this study was to understand the perceptions of a group of at-risk aboriginal youth regarding their urban school environments, including their access to social support. as a means of understanding these factors, we conducted culturally tailored focus group discussions with 14 youth and asked them a number of questions relating to their general perceptions of and experiences in their schools. we also asked them questions related to sources of social support in their schools, and more specifically, to whom they turn when they need help. perhaps the most compelling, and overwhelmingly troublesome narrative, of these results is that the aboriginal youth involved in this study indicated that they are disproportionately affected by violence and other negative experiences in their urban schools; yet, almost all participants stated that they do not seek help from social supports available in their schools, such as teachers and other support staff, because they lack trust in them. youth participants detailed feelings of segregation across various social, cultural, and curricular lines; the outcome being that their school environments overwhelmingly foster experiences of marginalization, not belonging. a wider literature on school belonging among similar youth-aged populations regarding their reluctance to seek help indicate however, that these findings are not unique (cairns, cairns, & neckerman, 1989; collins & coleman, 2008; osterman, 2000). rather, what makes these findings unique relates to the “distal” (historic, political, social and economic contexts) and “intermediate” (community infrastructure, resources, systems and capacities) social determinants of health (loppie-reading & wien, 2009) that influences sense of belonging among this group of “at-risk” aboriginal youth in their school environments, and disproportionately affects the quality of their home environments as well. in a recent review of the health of aboriginal children, postl, cook, and moffatt (2010) describe the various social, economic, historical, political and geographic processes that disproportionately disadvantage the health, life chances, and home environments of aboriginal children. in the context of our own study, we argue that it is precisely this colonial past, and the ways this past has interacted to shape the current social, home and school realities, that makes their experiences unique. in the urban context, school environments must do more to foster sense of belonging among aboriginal learners, in particular those who come from complex home environments such as the youth-at-risk who participated in this study. as detailed here, the social supports that youth reported reaching out to vary depending on the context of their situations. perceived level of trust in available social supports is a key factor underlying youth uptake of support. for example, youth indicated that there are various available sources of social support to whom they could potentially turn for help if needed; however, the reality is that youth will not seek help from these supports if they do not trust them, nor do they believe that these supports are capable of listening to, or empathizing with the unique daily challenges and needs they have, as aboriginal youth. the sentiment that resounded from these results was “why would i ask for help from someone who does not understand me?” in their descriptions of social support, youth made an important distinction between the types of social support available in their schools, and the factors that determine their uptake of these supports. more specifically, youth differentiated between two types of support: structural supports and functional supports. while the distinction between these two types of support may seem trivial, our results indicate that distinction in type of support is key to understanding youth uptake of support. structural support refers to the nature and structure of one’s interpersonal relationships or social networks (house, landis, & umberson, 1988), for example the number of friends one has, or level of social integration. social integration can provide individuals with a high level of perceived support. functional 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.1 support, on the other hand, represents the functions that a relationship or network actually serves the individual (cohen & syme, 1985), for example by providing feelings of love and belonging, advice on an issue, or material aid (cohen & syme, 1985). in our study, the distinction between structural and functional supports is significant as these particular aboriginal youth identified a need for supports who can understand the daily challenges they face, and are able to provide the social, cultural and curricular resources congruent with these realities. put another way, the mere existence of a social support (e.g., “my teacher”) is not good enough if/when the person hired to do the work of ‘supporting’ cannot appreciate the distinct socio-economic context within which many urban aboriginal youth navigate their daily lives, nor of the complex historical context (e.g., residential school legacy) that strongly figures in their contemporary health and social realities (adelson, 2005). the lacking appreciation of the youth’s social and cultural context means that such supports are merely symbolic and not functional. we perceive this deficiency in the social context of the school environment to make them culturally unsafe places for aboriginal learners such as those who participated in this study, and we recommend that by engaging with the notion of cultural safety, urban schools can become places that are supportive for all learners to thrive. making schools culturally safe places for aboriginal learners cultural safety is a concept that emerged from the transcultural nursing literature. it involves the recognition that each individual has a cultural identity and that in order to provide safe patient care, one must recognize the “social, economic and political positioning of certain groups within society” (browne & smye, 2002, p. 43). as a concept, cultural safety extends well beyond more familiar concepts such as “cultural sensitivity, or the recognition of the importance of respecting difference; and cultural competence, which focuses on skills, knowledge, and attitudes of practitioners” (aboriginal nurses association of canada, 2009, p. 24). cultural safety is predicated on understanding the power differentials inherent in institutional contexts, such as health services or schools, and redressing these inequities through educational processes. in the context of our study with urban aboriginal youth at-risk, the gap between structural and functional supports cannot be accounted for solely at the individual level, but must be addressed through a widespread examination of the wider systemic discourses of oppression and discrimination that shape educational policies and school environments (kitchen et al., 2009) and thereby reduce access to functional support for certain marginalized populations. as the national aboriginal health organization (2008) describes: developing culturally safe learning environments benefit students, educators, educational institutions, and education systems. students are more likely to respond positively to the learning encounter when they feel safe, respected and able to voice their perspective… high retention rates of an aboriginal population can be interpreted as a reflection of an educational institute’s commitment to such an environment, as well as their commitment to human rights and race relations. such institutions produce more graduates, which attracts more students and thereby increases enrolment. (p. 13) in the context of making school environments places wherein all students can find a sense of belonging, there is a need to ensure that culturally safe social supports are in place for use by aboriginal students if and when they choose to draw upon them. in canadian cities, such as ottawa, wherein the number of aboriginal people continue to grow, there is a responsibility for schools to 13 richmond et al.: sense of belonging in urban school environments published by scholarship@western, 2012 ensure that the demographics of their own teaching and support staff are keeping pace. clearly, the training, hiring and retention of greater numbers of aboriginal teachers and support staff will be significant for making urban schools more culturally safe. however, greater efforts must also be made to ensure that curriculum is inclusive of aboriginal ways of knowing (archibald, pidgeon, janvier, commodore, & mccormick, 2002). across the board, indigenous education experts agree that the inclusion of indigenous or aboriginal histories, languages, and knowledges is another way to foster, and improve upon, the development of urban schools as places of belonging (bear nicholas, 2001; schissel & wotherspoon, 2003). in meeting these recruitment and curriculum-building efforts, urban schools may find that they need to reach to the greater aboriginal community for help. in the canadian context, this may mean building partnerships between schools and urban aboriginal organizations, such as aboriginal health access centres, or indian friendship centres. these partnerships will be vital to the development of culturally appropriate programs, such as elder-in-residence programs, which bring aboriginal elders into primary and secondary schools, or after-school programming. in many urban, rural, and reserve schools across canada, specialized programs such as these are being incorporated into mainstream schools, and showing promising results (bell, 2004). a note of caution must be heeded however – given the tremendous demands already placed on urban aboriginal organizations, and the scant resources available for youth programming, additional pressures cannot be expected without coinciding material investments. conclusion this research drew from the hypothesis that increased access to high quality social supports facilitates better learning and improved educational attainment. educational success is a well-established determinant of aboriginal well-being. it has been stated time and again by local, regional, and national aboriginal organizations that educational attainment is the pathway to improved health and economic success. results of this community-based study indicate that aboriginal youth face high rates of violence and bullying, yet most do not seek help from teachers or other school staff because they do not trust these social supports, and/or they believe that available supports will not understand their support needs as aboriginal youth. while these findings are echoed in the wider literature on youth bullying, what makes them unique relates to the distinct colonial past that has shaped the social realities of these particular at-risk youth, and the general absence of a strong safety net at home. the youth in this study were able to articulate the important differences between structural and functional supports, with the distinction being that structural supports are symbolic of the ‘potential to help,’ while functional supports refer to ‘actual help.’ given the particular social and historical contexts underlying the everyday realities of the aboriginal youth who participated in this study, and the growing number of aboriginal youth in urban areas of canada, our results suggest that urban schools must be better prepared to provide the social supports and, cultural and curricular resources that many aboriginal learners require to succeed. we recommend that at least part of the solution will come from adopting the notion of cultural safety in the development of socially supportive school programs, and further, that the involvement of aboriginal teachers, parents and organizations will also be critical. the need for urban schools to become places that foster the academic and social resources required for aboriginal students to succeed is critical not only for the health and social benefit of canada’s aboriginal population, but for the social and economic success of canada as a whole. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.1 references aboriginal healing foundation. 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(2003). a general inductive approach for qualitative data analysis. retrieved from university of auckland, school of population health website: http://www.fmhs.auckland.ac.nz/soph/centres/hrmas/_docs/inductive2003.pdf 17 richmond et al.: sense of belonging in urban school environments published by scholarship@western, 2012 the international indigenous policy journal march 2012 sense of belonging in the urban school environments of aboriginal youth chantelle am richmond dawn smith * the wabano centre for aboriginal health recommended citation sense of belonging in the urban school environments of aboriginal youth abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license microsoft word 286751-text.native.1331056360.docx locating a theoretical framework for the canadian truth and reconciliation commission: charles taylor or nancy fraser? the international indigenous policy journal volume 3 | issue 2 article 4 august 2012 locating a theoretical framework for the canadian truth and reconciliation commission: charles taylor or nancy fraser? konstantin s. petoukhov carleton university, kpetoukhov@live.ca recommended citation petoukhov, k. s. (2012). locating a theoretical framework for the canadian truth and reconciliation commission: charles taylor or nancy fraser?. th e international indigenous policy journal, 3(2) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.4 this policy is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. locating a theoretical framework for the canadian truth and reconciliation commission: charles taylor or nancy fraser? abstract the truth and reconciliation commission (trc) of canada was established to uncover and acknowledge the injustices that took place in indian residential schools and, in doing so, to pave the way to reconciliation. however, the trc does not define reconciliation or how we would know it when (and if ) we get there, thus stirring a debate about what it could mean. this article examines two theories that may potentially be relevant to the trc’s work: charles taylor’s theory of recognition and nancy fraser’s tripartite theory of justice. the goal is to discover what each theory contributes to our understanding of the harms that indigenous peoples suffered in residential schools, as well as in the broader colonial project, and how to address these harms appropriately. keywords nancy fraser, charles taylor, truth and reconciliation commission, indian residential schools acknowledgments i would like to thank professor andrew woolford (department of sociology, university of manitoba) for the valuable feedback on the initial draft of this paper. i would also like to thank the reviewers for their comments and hard work. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ locating a theoretical framework for the canadian truth and reconciliation commission: charles taylor or nancy fraser? the indian residential school (irs) system was established by the canadian government in the late 19th century and was operated by united, roman catholic, presbyterian, and anglican churches. the primary objectives of irs were to provide indigenous children with religious training, to teach them english or french, and to help them develop the necessary skills that would allow them to function successfully in a settler society (miller, 1996; milloy, 1999). to accomplish these objectives, the schools were designed to function as total institutions and sought to dispossess indigenous children of their cultures, languages, and traditions, while forcing them to adopt euro-canadian identities, values, and lifestyles. while attending the schools, children were often subjected to physical and sexual abuse perpetrated by school staff (teachers, nuns, priests, doctors, and others), and many children died of neglect and diseases. although the last school closed its doors in 1996, the irs legacy extends to the present day. the harms associated with irs include, but are not limited to: the extinction of many indigenous languages; development of psychological, emotional, and behavioural disorders among indigenous children who spent time in residential schools; community and family dysfunction; inability to parent; high suicide rates among the indigenous population; and increased violence and substance abuse among former students (miller, 2000; smith, 2009). survivors of irs began to launch lawsuits against the federal government and churches in the early 1990s to seek compensation for the damage done by residential schooling. in response to the lawsuits, the government offered a statement of regret in 1998 and set up an alternative dispute resolution (adr) process in 2002 as a means to redress irs claims. however, the apology and the adr process failed to satisfy the justice needs of survivors for various reasons. many survivors viewed the apology as an insincere and incomplete acknowledgement of irs experiences, while many claimants considered the adr process complicated, burdensome, and alienating, and further contributed to revictimizing survivors (stout & harp, 2007). the government saw the apparent failure of these strategies and sought to negotiate a new agreement, the 2006 indian residential schools settlement agreement (irssa) that included the provision of an official government apology to survivors, the establishment of a truth and reconciliation commission (trc), and the creation of a monetary compensation system for former students (indian residential schools resolution canada [irsrc], 2006). the trc began its work in june 2008 with the mandate to discover the truth about the injustices that took place in residential schools and to acknowledge the harm done to former students (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, n.d.). by doing so, the trc plans to advance canadians towards reconciliation and to help “establish new relationships” between indigenous and non-indigenous peoples, which are “embedded in mutual recognition and respect that will forge a brighter future” (trc, n.d., introduction, para. 1). however, as the standing senate committee on aboriginal peoples’ (2010) the journey ahead report points out, the trc’s mandate leaves reconciliation undefined, which raises both theoretical and substantive questions regarding the trc’s proceedings (see, for example, corntassel, chaw-win-is, & t’lakwadzi, 2009; rice & snyder, 2008). furthermore, scholars 1 petoukhov: locating a theoretical framework published by scholarship@western, 2012 such as nelund (2011) assert that the trc does not operate “from a clear theory of justice” and it is therefore necessary to consider the options that the trc may explore in reaching its objectives of healing and reconciliation (p.57). in the context of the canadian trc, a theoretical framework may help to guide the work of the trc and thus serve as a tool for conceptualizing the stated goals of truth, healing, and reconciliation. the necessity of using a theory of justice in the context of truth commissions is demonstrated by andré du toit (2000), who reflects on the progress made by the south african trc and argues that truth commissions are “eminently political projects” that do not automatically inherit moral foundations when receiving their mandates (p. 122). he goes on to note that truth commissions’ moral conceptions of “‘truth and reconciliation’ may be explicated...in terms of truth as acknowledgement and justice as recognition” (du toit, 2000, p. 123; see also kiss, 2000). accordingly, this paper examines charles taylor’s theory of recognition and nancy fraser’s tripartite theory of justice with the goal to assess their applicability to the trc’s work. charles taylor’s theory of recognition charles taylor’s theory views recognition as an essential component of repairing the harm done in the process of restoring victims’ identities, dignity, and self-respect (abbey, 1999). more precisely, his theory examines the foundations of recognition and offers a philosophical rationale for why acts such as acknowledgment, apology, and compensation are morally necessary. in this sense, taylor’s theory offers a deeper and richer theoretical basis for the principles and values that guide reparative processes. taylor’s (1992) central argument is that recognition of identity is “a vital human need” that is essential to the group survival (p. 26). however, his concern is for more than cultural survival, as he calls for “reciprocal recognition among equals” and the acknowledgement of cultures’ worth (p. 64). he asserts that the various cultures need to adequately recognize each other’s identities in order for social equality to exist. for example, because indigenous peoples were subordinated during the colonial era through institutions such as residential schools, the social equality that should ideally exist between indigenous and non-indigenous peoples was decreased. taylor (1992) argues that every member of society is entitled to adequate recognition and withholding recognition constitutes a form of oppression, which leads to self-depreciation and creation of destructive identity, as evident in the legacy of residential schools. in the broader colonial context, the canadian government perceived indigenous cultures as less valuable than euro-canadian cultures, and has since continued to measure the worth of indigenous cultures against euro-canadian standards, while failing to recognize the uniqueness and originality of indigenous cultural identities. in this manner, euro-canadian society was able to “entrench [its] hegemony by inculcating an image of inferiority in the subjugated” (taylor, 1992, p. 66). as a result of such profound misconceptions, indigenous identities were devalued in worth and intrinsic significance, which led to the diminishment of respect and dignity for indigenous cultures. as taylor (1992) explains: “nonrecognition or misrecognition can inflict harm [by] imprisoning someone in a false, distorted, and reduced mode of being” (p. 25). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.4 cultural values and identities, as taylor argues, must never be negotiated through social processes with “outsiders” such as colonizers, but instead must originate by way of dialogue within self-identified groups. these relationships, according to taylor (1992), occur in intimate spheres and serve as “the key loci of self-discovery and self-affirmation,” while the public sphere serves as a site where recognition among equals may take place (p. 36). an important part of this self-identification process is language as a form of cultural expression, which is transmitted via intra-group interaction. during the residential school era, indigenous children were partly, and often fully, dispossessed of their ability to speak native languages. by separating children from their parents and home communities and by forbidding them to speak native languages in many schools, the residential school system promoted the loss of this important cultural element. arguably, the termination of the residential school system may, among other factors, signify the recognition that the assimilation of indigenous peoples is an injustice. however, miller (1996) and milloy (1999) argue that the recognition of the injustices did not emerge exclusively from the government’s realization that the system itself was morally wrong. instead, other factors, such as the schools’ inability to assimilate children and parental resistance to residential schools, compelled the government to abandon the residential school experiment. given its potential to explain recognition-related injustices, taylor’s theory has come under some criticism. for example, glenn coulthard (2007) raises several issues with taylor’s theory. first is that taylor’s approach fails to address the root causes of misrecognition. coulthard (2007) argues that taylor’s theory may be instrumental in explaining “redistribution schemes like granting certain rights and concessions to indigenous communities via self-government and land claims process,” while leaving intact colonialcapitalist exploitation (p. 446). to coulthard, taylor ignores the economic dimension of capitalism, which in his view is responsible for perpetuating racial inequality. the residential school system was, indeed, a product of a broader structural force – colonialism – and in order to provide recognition to indigenous peoples, this force would need to be dismantled. coulthard also criticizes the lack of attention to the struggle for recognition in taylor’s theory. he argues that without a struggle, recognition is imposed on “subjects” who are passive in accepting it from the dominant society. as a result, these “subjects” do not challenge the power of entities, such as the state. in coulthard’s view, drawing on the work of franz fanon, it is necessary for the “subjects” to win recognition on their own terms. finally, coulthard (2007) challenges the applicability of taylor’s use of the hegelian notion of “reciprocal recognition among equals” in the context of colonial domination (p. 450). he explains that in hegel’s master/slave dialectic, both parties rely on each other for recognition of their respective statuses as either the master or the slave. however, drawing on frantz fanon’s work, coulthard (2007) demonstrates that in the colonial reality, “the mutual character of dependency rarely exists” (p. 450), for the master (the state) does not require recognition from the slave (the colonized) and is able to force the recognition of its hegemony and supremacy upon the slave. 3 petoukhov: locating a theoretical framework published by scholarship@western, 2012 while i believe that coulthard’s criticisms of taylor’s theory are accurate and valid, it is necessary to apply taylor’s theory to trc processes in order to assess the ability of the theory to promote the recognition of indigenous cultural identities and to account for the injustices indigenous children suffered in residential schools. the theory can be applied in the trc’s context in two distinct ways. first, it can be used to account for the origins of injustices perpetrated by the canadian government and churches against indigenous peoples, which stem from the misrecognition. second, the theory of recognition offers a deeper understanding of the need to restore indigenous identities. more specifically, taylor’s theory possesses a recognitive meta-theoretical dimension by emphasizing and advocating the importance of respect, dignity, and “universal human potential that all humans share,” all of which are crucial elements in establishing or re-establishing human identity and promoting social equality (taylor, 1992, p. 41). incorporation of the theory of recognition in the evaluation of canada’s trc allows for a more advanced understanding about what needs to be done in order to restore the cultural identities of survivors. trc and recognition of indigenous identities this section explores the potential of the trc to remedy the injustices associated with misrecognition by challenging and eradicating the stereotypes of racism and superiority that has historically served as the basis for misrecognition of indigenous cultural identities. accordingly, i seek to examine the potential of the trc to promote the recognition of indigenous cultural identities as unique and distinct, as envisioned by charles taylor. more specifically, the focus here is to assess the trc’s ability to educate the public about indigenous cultures. one of trc’s strategies for educating the public about residential schools includes a partnership between the trc and the canadian museum for human rights (cmhr) to house survivors’ stories of residential school experiences. stuart murray, the museum’s chief executive officer, suggests that through the museum exhibit “canadians and visitors from around the world will gain a better understanding about the schools and their impact” (as cited in sison, 2010, para. 12). the collection of survivors’ experiences will also help to represent indigenous resiliency in the face of assimilation and to assert their presence as distinct and unique cultural groups. similarly, the national research centre (nrc) will be established by the trc to contain survivor testimonies. the nrc’s mandate is to facilitate access for “former students, their families and communities, the general public, researchers and educators who wish to include this historic material in curricula” (trc, n.d., national research centre, para. 1). by incorporating residential school experiences into the collective memory, the nrc and cmhr could play an important role in promoting public awareness about residential schools and, as trc chair murray sinclair optimistically states, “the truth, eventually, will heal us all” (as cited in turenne, 2010, para. 21). the public’s exposure to the truth about residential schools may bring about the recognition and understanding that the schools constituted an injustice, which has had a profound negative impact on indigenous people. one problem with the nrc is that it falls under legal constraints of privacy legislation, which dictates what type of truth is to be included in its archives. by complying with privacy legislation, the 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.4 nrc’s archives may incorporate truth that is inherently limited. for example, the names of the perpetrators who are still alive and who have not been convicted in the court of law will be excluded from its records (canadian broadcasting corporation, 2010a). in addition to promoting the recognition of the harm done, it is also important to consider the ways in which the trc may be able to repair indigenous identities through affirming their equality and worth. in order to do so, it is necessary to examine trc’s national and community events. the national events typically take place in major cities across canada and, according to the trc’s mandate, serve as a “mechanism through which the truth and reconciliation process will engage the canadian public and provide education about the irs system, the experience of former students and their families, and the ongoing legacies of the institutions” (trc n.d., events, para. 2). in contrast, the community events take place in or near former locations of irs and are “designed by communities [to] respond to the needs of the former students, their families and those affected by the irs legacy” (trc n.d., events, para. 5). in essence, both national and community events are public gatherings that strive to engage indigenous and non-indigenous public to come together and learn about the injustices that took place in irs and to share the truth about the past. many survivors during the trc first national event, which took place june 2010 in winnipeg, spoke of the need to restore their cultural and social identities. for example, one survivor shared his identity confusion by saying “i’m not white, not indian, i don’t know what i am” (commissioners’ sharing circles, personal communication, june 18, 2010). to others, the recognition and acceptance of indigenous spirituality, languages, and traditions play an important role in healing the past. as sam achneepineskum relates, “[the public] need[s] to acknowledge where people come from and what happened to us” (as cited in romain, 2010, para. 7). by bringing indigenous and non-indigenous people together, the trc attempts to combat stereotypes of “otherness” that indigenous people have suffered for centuries. as rupert ross (2008) notes, one of trc’s challenges is to foster the recognition through “correcting historical misperceptions of cultural inferiority” (p. 20). similarly, murray sinclair, chair of the trc, notes that the process of “sharing of survivors’ experiences will [allow us] to truly understand them, and in the process, help future generations move forward with respect" (as cited in turtle island, 2010a, para. 5). by learning about the past and beginning to understand the diversity of indigenous cultures, settler canadians may come to understand the misrecognition that indigenous people have suffered. as trc commissioner marie wilson points out, “something amazing can happen when indigenous and non-indigenous perspectives are brought together” (sison, 2009a, para. 13). indirect public participation in trc’s proceedings is facilitated mainly through media coverage, including news and television. according to murray sinclair, the “national media attention generated by the winnipeg event was outstanding and [the] coverage was energetic and analytical” (sinclair, 2010, p. 5). while attending sharing circles, i noted the presence of news media outlets such as ctv, cbc, and aptn. however, there was no live coverage of the event on the radio or television, which would have allowed those who were unable to attend the event to watch it or listen to it in their communities. also, after the completion of the event, the media coverage dissipated and, as a result, many canadians stopped receiving 5 petoukhov: locating a theoretical framework published by scholarship@western, 2012 up-to-date information on the trc’s work. an additional problem with media coverage is that the community events tend to be smaller than the national events and thus often do not receive adequate coverage, which limits the trc’s ability to achieve its goal of public engagement. this lack of coverage could be due to the remoteness of communities to which the trc travels and results in selective media coverage of trc’s activities. through countering racist stereotypes and attitudes, the trc may be able to lay the groundwork that could serve as a basis for teaching future generations of canadians about indigenous languages, traditions, customs, and the importance of these cultural aspects and their role in creating diverse nations that are characterized by equality rather than dominance of one group over another. in other words, the trc’s objective seems to be aimed at eliminating the perceived inferiority of indigenous people and eradicating the selfproclaimed superiority of european canadians, while fostering a dialogue based on mutual respect and celebrating cultural diversity. according to former national chief of assembly of first nations (afn), phil fontaine, there needs to be widespread acceptance of the past, and without mutual respect based upon recognition, reconciliation is not possible (as cited in macleod, 2009). to accomplish this task, the trc would need to boost its public education initiatives. however, it is unreasonable to expect that the trc, in its five-year lifespan, will right all the wrongs perpetrated within residential schools. instead, it may be able to advance the public understanding of the past and promoting a human rights culture, through which new relationships can be formed. it is now appropriate to return to coulthard’s critiques of charles taylor’s theory of recognition as it relates to the trc. in his work, coulthard (2007) argues that the colonizer often grants concessions, such as recognition of cultural identities, to the oppressed groups as surface remedies for injustices, while leaving colonial structures undisturbed. more specifically, coulthard argues that taylor’s theory fails to account for the necessity of a struggle for recognition. he emphasizes the importance of “conflict and struggles, [without which] the terms of recognition tend to remain in the possession of those in power to bestow on their ‘inferiors’ in ways that they deem appropriate” (p. 449). in the context of residential schools, this criticism would mean that the trc is merely a gesture of assent by the federal government that dispenses recognition for the damage done by residential schools and affirms cultural identities of indigenous groups and survivors’ status as victims. following this logic, the trc can hardly be considered survivors’ “struggle for recognition,” because its vision and mandate are set within the boundaries defined by the government and yield recognition on the government’s terms. given the above critique, it is important not to underestimate survivors’ agency and struggle for recognition. while coulthard points to the lack of struggle in taylor’s theory of recognition, the question becomes: can the trc be considered a space within which a struggle for recognition could occur? to answer this question, it is worthwhile to consider what gerald vizenor (2008) refers to as “survivance,” a concept that signifies indigenous people’s narratives of asserting their presence in the colonized society, resisting the colonizer, enduring attempts of the colonizer to eradicate indigenous cultures, and adapting to societal changes. to vizenor, indigenous identities are not stable, but instead dynamic and responsive to colonizer’s assimilation efforts. in other words, the narratives of 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.4 survivance help to keep indigenous cultures alive in the face of destruction. during the trc national event in winnipeg, a number of survivors exhibited a struggle for recognition by asserting their cultural identities (commissioners’ sharing circles, personal communication, june 17, 2010). these resistance strategies included narratives about survival of indigenous cultures, traditions, and spiritualties in the post-residential school era, sharing stories in indigenous languages or withholding stories altogether, and naming names of the perpetrators of the residential school abuse despite having been instructed against doing so. some survivors, such as peter yellowquill and chantelle devillier, chose to boycott the event and urged others to do the same. to them, the trc was a government’s creation that would fail to bring justice and recognition to survivors (“usefulness of commission,” 2010). coulthard (2007) also argues that taylor’s theory ignores the subjective dimension of colonialism. he refers to an inferiority complex that emerges from the capitalist exploitation and subsequent internalization of racism and unequal power relations by the oppressed groups. in order to dismantle colonialism, it is essential to wage war on the racial and economic basis of inequality1. if this argument is applied to the trc, it is apparent that even though the trc may be effective in applying the label of “survivor” to residential school victims, it locks them in these colonial identities and the “subjectivity of the colonized remains the same – they become ‘emancipated slaves’” (p. 449). according to coulthard, only struggle against the colonizers, as opposed to compliance with their terms of recognition, may help survivors shed their colonial identities. coulthard is also pessimistic about the applicability of hegel’s notion of “reciprocal recognition among equals” in the context of reconciliation efforts between canada’s indigenous and settler peoples. in his argument, this type of recognition is not realistic because the colonizer is not seeking recognition from the colonized. following this view, the trc, which seeks to reaffirm equality and worth of cultural identities of survivors and promote the recognition of the damage done by residential schools, is an inadequate tool for challenging the existing power dynamics between indigenous and canadian governments and fostering recognition among equals. the type of recognition that the canadian government is granting through the trc is not mutual, but is imposed on survivors and survivors’ identities become reified as colonial subjects. upon considering charles taylor’s theory of recognition and its relevance to the trc’s work, it is now appropriate to consider nancy fraser’s tripartite theory of social justice, its applicability to the trc’s work, and its potential to promote decolonization. nancy fraser and decolonizing potential of the trc although the trc meets some of the criteria of charles taylor’s theory of recognition, the question remains as to what the trc could do to help trigger decolonization. in this section, i draw on nancy fraser’s (1995, 2003, 2005, 2008) tripartite theory of social justice to assess the potential of the trc to frame the indian residential school system as a product of colonialism that has not yet been fully eradicated. more precisely, this section of the paper deals with addressing the broader issue of the colonial project: does the trc have the 1 i address the material basis of colonialism in the following section. 7 petoukhov: locating a theoretical framework published by scholarship@western, 2012 potential to address the underlying causes of the residential school system, look beyond the harm done, and frame it as a systemic issue? in resolving injustices of residential schools, it would be necessary to examine the precursors that led to the subordination of indigenous people that ensured the continued dominance of european settlers. nancy fraser proposes a theoretical framework that is drastically different from charles taylor’s and could be used to assess the trc in terms of its potential to contribute to the process of decolonization2 (as cited in dahl, stolz, & willig, 2004). in fact, fraser dismisses taylor’s approach by arguing that “he effectively ignores distributive injustice altogether, by focusing exclusively on recognition” (dahl et al., 2004, p. 376). in turn, fraser argues that groups may suffer from three distinct types of injustices: socioeconomic, cultural-symbolic, and political. socioeconomic injustices include maldistribution of material resources, which are manifested in exploitation, economic marginalization, and deprivation (fraser, 1995). cultural-symbolic injustices, on the other hand, are those associated with misrecognition and include cultural domination, non-recognition, and disrespect. to fraser, socioeconomic injustices can be remedied through redistribution, while cultural-symbolic injustices can be remedied through providing due recognition. in her later work, fraser has added a third pillar to her model of justice – representation (fraser, 2008; 2009). she argues that representation is becoming increasingly important in light of current struggles for justice and democracy (as cited in dahl et al., 2004). this status model, as she calls it, highlights the importance of transnational politics and governance structures that must be taken into account when considering economic and cultural injustices. representation-related injustices are linked to social inequality and, more specifically, social status, which, in fraser’s terms, can be resolved by providing “recognition of people’s standing as full partners in social interaction [who are] able to participate as peers with others in social life” by ensuring participatory parity in political claims-making (dahl et al., 2004, p. 377). certain groups may suffer from all three types of injustices simultaneously.3 in fraser’s work, remedies to the three categories of injustices may be of two types: transformative and affirmative. transformative remedies, in fraser’s (2005) view, are associated with “correcting inequitable outcomes precisely by restructuring the underlying generative framework” (p. 73). by contrast, affirmative remedies to an injustice are those that attempt to correct “inequalities that arise from the organization of social relations without challenging these relations” (woolford, 2005, p. 31). to begin the discussion about nancy fraser’s theory and how it could be applied to the trc, let us first consider affirmative remedies and their roles in addressing systemic injustices suffered by indigenous people. in the case of redistributive affirmative remedies, the goal is to correct income inequality, which inevitably leaves undisturbed the capitalist mode of production. affirmative redistribution includes corrective measures, such as direct money transfers to the maligned groups, but serves only as a temporary and, therefore, inadequate means for improving their economic situation. more specifically, without challenging the underlying framework, 2 coulthard (2007) also criticizes fraser, but also explains the strengths of her approach. 3 in her earlier work, fraser (1995, 2003) uses examples of gender and “race.” 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.4 economic injustice will recur. to be sure, when addressing economic injustices, affirmative redistribution does little beyond providing concessions to the disadvantaged groups, because it does not “challenge the deep structures that generate class disadvantage” (fraser, 1995, p. 85). fraser’s (1995) transformative redistribution, on the other hand, relates to the economic changes that seek to promote equality through measures such as “redistributing income, reorganizing the division of labour, subjecting investment to democratic decision-making, or transforming other basic economic structures” (p. 73). economic empowerment, in her view, enhances social equality through not only transfers of wealth, but also through the restructuring of social institutions. fraser draws on the work of karl marx and john rawls in justifying her position with respect to the importance of the distribution of resources. in examining the trc through the lens of transformative redistribution, i employ fraser’s conceptualization of the economic redistribution rather broadly. in my analysis, it includes not only the material wealth represented by capital, but also lands and rights to natural resources, among others. with respect to recognition, affirmative remedies tend to promote the revaluing and differentiation of group identities, while leaving intact the elements that led to misrecognition. with regard to indigenous people, affirmative recognition could include an: acknowledgment that [indigenous] peoples represent a distinct ethnic group within the canadian mosaic and that they deserve status equal to other ethnic groups within the nation. the underlying assumption of such an approach is that ethnic identities are primordial categories of difference and that, to get along, we must recognize group differences. (woolford, 2005, p. 33) by increasing the differentiation of the groups’ identities, affirmative remedies tend to promote reification, which, in fraser’s terms, results in “repressive communitarianism” and leads to “right-wing nationalism, religious fundamentalism, and anti-immigrant movements” (dahl et al., 2004, p. 377). transformative recognition, on the other hand, “consists in anti-racist deconstruction aimed at dismantling eurocentrism by destabilizing racial dichotomies” (fraser, 1995, p. 91). the goal of remedies associated with transformative recognition is not to promote essentialized group differentiations, but rather to acknowledge the dynamic and ongoing processes of collective identification that are part and parcel of what it means to be a group. in her earlier work, fraser (1995) argued that transformative recognition required the destabilization of cultural identities, but she later moved to argue that the specific socio-historical circumstances of misrecognition and status denial have a crucial bearing on the form that transformative recognition should take. groups in society may suffer two types of representation-related injustices, according to fraser (2003, 2008). fraser (2009) refers to first type of these injustices as “ordinary-political misrepresentation” (p. 18). these typically take forms of unequal political participation, “intra-frame representation, [and] debates over the relative merits of alternative electoral 9 petoukhov: locating a theoretical framework published by scholarship@western, 2012 systems” (fraser, 2008, p. 408). affirmative remedies for these injustices include protection of groups’ political rights and ensuring “a fair and equal voice for everyone” (nelund, 2011, p. 65). in the case of residential schools, affirmative remedies for ordinary-political misrepresentation of indigenous people in the canadian political system would seek to remedy surface-level injustices, such as reinstating their right to vote and, to a certain degree, increasing their political decision-making capabilities, with both remedies seeking to establish participatory parity. what these affirmative remedies neglect is the global scale of injustices “in which the international system of supposedly equal sovereign states gerrymanders political space at the expense of the global poor” (fraser, 2008, p. 408). the second level of representation-related injustices is metapolitical injustice, which fraser refers to as “misframing.” these injustices are less obvious and occur when “polity’s boundaries are drawn in such a way as to wrongly deny some people the chance to participate at all in its authorized contests over justice” (fraser, 2008, p. 408). these injustices require transformative remedies that go beyond addressing ordinary-political representation. to remedy injustices of misframing, groups must be invested with power to participate as equal partners in nation-to-nation decision-making and international affairs. woolford (2009), in turn, points out that transformative remedies for representation “would seek to critique systems of representation that deny participation to certain groups and individuals in our societies” (p. 152). trc and transformative change the need for employing a framework that combines transformative recognition, redistribution, and representation in the context of canada’s colonialism is accurately presented in the argument made by robyn green (2010), who observes that without addressing the broader implication of colonialism: there is a risk that a truth commission will only emphasize the necessity for cultural recognition and/or remembrance through the language of a “rights” that could ultimately lead to the (re)construction of indigenous peoples as “minority subjects” (mackey, 1999) within the nation-state. (p. 27) by assessing the trc’s potential to promote recognition, redistribution, and representation, this section seeks to explore the ways in which the trc could promote systemic change (and act as a transformative remedy) or simply serve to affirm the injustices associated with residential schooling and bracket the legacy of colonialism (affirmative remedy). the trc focuses exclusively on discovering the truth about residential schools and their legacy, thus casting itself into the category of affirmative recognitive remedy. more specifically, it tends to promote the recognition of the wrongness of the residential school system and the equality and respect for indigenous cultures, while excluding the discussion of the foundations of the misrecognition. as such, affirmative recognition could reinforce colonialism by reifying indigenous cultural identities. therefore, there needs to be another method of conceptualizing recognition, one that does not rely on the essentializing the notion of “identity.” fraser’s transformative recognition could be applied to the trc in a 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.4 way that does not seek to define identity. more specifically, the trc could promote transformative change and challenge the basis of colonial relationships between indigenous and non-indigenous peoples through the recognition of indigenous rights to selfdetermination in areas such as governance, justice, child welfare, education, and health, among others. in other words, the trc would promote the process that invests indigenous people with control of their destinies. as kathleen mahoney4 (personal communication, november 29, 2010) notes, in order for transformative recognition occur, the trc would have to support the process of: recognition of first nations as one of the founding nations of canada than the french and the english [is important] because that would reflect respect for the first inhabitants of this land. one would hope that there will be recognition with respect to language, making indigenous languages more mainstream in canada so that nonindigenous people could learn and … connect the two cultures. similarly, graydon nicholas, new brunswick’s first lieutenant governor of indigenous descent, argues that indigenous voices must be taken into account when reforming social institutions that were the cause of centuries of oppression of indigenous people. namely, nicholas refers to: all aspects of [aboriginal] life. we're talking about spirituality, the churches. we're talking about the political process at the federal and provincial level. we're talking about our democratic institutions, for example, the military as well as the police forces who were all part of ... removing the spirit of the aboriginal people in this country. (canadian broadcasting corporation, 2010b, para. 9) in his statement, national chief of the afn, shawn atleo, calls for the canadian government to “understand that reconciliation today requires significant changes in the relationship between first nations and governments” (turtle island, 2010b, para. 5). in his view, indigenous people must be supported by the canadian government in their goal of “achieving equitable outcomes and opportunities for first nations students” (turtle island, 2010b, para. 8). in terms of redistribution, the trc also tends to be more affirmative than transformative. for example, it offers reparations, such as the missing children project (with the mandate to locate the children who have not returned from residential schools), commemoration initiative (to memorialize the children who perished in residential schools), and the elimination of certain sections of the indian act (that allowed the government to forcibly place children in residential schools)(klowak, 2010). all of these could be considered measures with the goal to acknowledge residential school experiences. however, the trc falls short of possessing the power to order a more profound restructuring of material relations between indigenous and non-indigenous nations. given indigenous peoples’ interdependence and the special relationship with their lands, in order to exhibit 4 kathleen mahoney is a professor of law at the university of calgary. she was chief negotiator for the assembly of first nations for the indian residential school settlement agreement. 11 petoukhov: locating a theoretical framework published by scholarship@western, 2012 transformative potential, the trc would need to reach beyond reparations for residential school experiences (ross 2008). according to taiaiake alfred (2009), for example, structural material change would include: massive restitution made to indigenous peoples, collectively and as individuals, including land, transfers of federal and provincial funds, and other forms of compensation for past harms and continuing injustices committed against the land and indigenous peoples, [without which] reconciliation will permanently absolve colonial injustices and is itself a further injustice. (p. 181) alfred speaks of transformative redistributive change that would allow indigenous peoples to regain power, to take control of their lands and resources, and to become self-sufficient groups. survivors who participated in a conference at the geneva park conference centre in november 2009 also expressed their desire for examining indian residential schools from a wider perspective: by reviewing indigenous people’s access to lands and resources (sison, 2009b). waziyatawin (2009) argues that in addition to the lands, other forms of restitution are required to combat colonial structures. these non-land based restitution measures could include “environmental clean up, infrastructure development for sustainable living, educational opportunities, healing centres, resources for language and culture revitalization, relocation expenses for displaced indigenous peoples, and debt relief” (p. 196). in the trc’s context, this could mean restoring funding for the aboriginal healing foundation, which ran out in 2011(thompson, 2010), and including indigenous people who were affected by residential schooling, but did not attend them, in the monetary compensation schemes under the irssa. given these calls for extensive reparations, transformative redistribution will not be an easy task. an example of difficulties that may be encountered in the process of transformative redistribution includes the government’s reluctance to provide restitution to indigenous people, as demonstrated in its resistance and the eventual refusal to sign the $5 billion dollar kelowna accord, a “social justice package with major new funding for indigenous housing, health and education” (de costa, 2009, p. 4). with respect to representation, the trc tends to act as an affirmative solution to residential school experiences as opposed to attempting to remedy injustices of political misframing. more specifically, even though survivor groups have been consulted with regard to what the trc’s design and activities should include, the scope of the debate is quite narrow and does not seem to advance indigenous peoples’ political interests and power outside the trc. therefore, the question becomes: what could the trc do to promote transformative representation? one could argue that this would entail a move toward power sharing in the intergovernmental relations between indigenous and non-indigenous political entities. this, in turn, would provide indigenous people a degree of control over the issues that concern canada domestically. in addition, the trc would be part of the power shift that could create opportunities for indigenous people’s political participation on an international level and in decision-making in the context of canada’s role in the global world. in concrete terms, some of the areas in which indigenous people could gain greater control include canada’s economic and social development, global trade, and international relations. equal 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.4 participation in these spheres may contribute to the empowerment of indigenous people in their struggle for transformative recognition and redistribution. even though the trc represents an affirmative remedy for resolving colonial injustices, it could be considered a step toward promoting broader social change and reforming colonial structures. as de costa (2009) suggests, by addressing residential school experiences, the trc is potentially transformative because it could serve as a “starting point to make connections with indigenous claims, for lands and rights, especially rights to govern and hold jurisdiction over those lands” (p. 1). summary and conclusions this paper assessed the relevance of charles taylor’s and nancy fraser’s theories to the trc’s work by considering their potential to provide the adequate recognition of indigenous cultural identities and to address deeper harms stemming from colonialism. the significance of taylor’s theory lies in its impetus for the recognition of identities, which supersedes any other type of remedy. however, in doing so, its pathology becomes apparent in its disregard for other important types of injustices that indigenous people in canada suffer, namely political and economic. the application of fraser’s theory, on the other hand, provides a more holistic approach to addressing colonial harms and thus carries more relevance to the trc. more precisely, fraser’s theory tends to view the residential school system as a product of colonialism and, in order to resolve the injustices associated with it, call for the deconstruction of the colonial project by instituting transformative change in the economic, cultural, and political spheres. in other words, reconciliation will not be possible until indigenous people become settlers’ equal partners in all aspects of social life. a search for a theory of justice for the canadian trc yields potential policy implications for truth commissions worldwide. a theory of justice may help to strengthen truth commissions’ mandates by clearly conceptualizing their goals and objectives in concrete terms (defining “healing” and “reconciliation,” for example) and identifying the potential strategies to attain them. with regard to the recognition of cultural identities, truth commissions may benefit by first addressing the unequal power relations that originally led to the subjugation of the victims and hegemony of the perpetrators. this could serve as the foundation for the various cultures to come together and, through an open dialogue, begin to build new (or rebuild old) relationships based on mutual respect and recognition. it could also be beneficial for truth commissions to adopt a holistic approach to addressing the harm done to the victims by considering not only the offense(s) that they suffered, but the underlying systemic factors that played a role in creating the conditions (for example, racial discrimination, maldistribution of material resources, and political marginalization of groups) for such offenses to occur. doing so may help to ensure that similar offenses will never again be inflicted. 13 petoukhov: locating a theoretical framework published by scholarship@western, 2012 references abbey, r. 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(2009b, december 8). new canadians need to understand the first nations’ story, too. anglican journal. retrieved from http://www.anglicanjournal.com/nc/other/newsitems/archive/2009/12/article/new-canadians-need-to-understand-the-firstnations-story-too-8848//abp/167.html sison, m. (2010, june 18). school survivors share stories of pain, abuse. anglican journal. retrieved from http://www.anglicanjournal.com/nc/other/newsitems/archive/2010/06/article/special-report-truth-and-reconciliation-commissiontrc-9241//abp/167.html smith, a. (2009, may). indigenous peoples and boarding schools: a comparative study. paper presented at the eighth session of the united nations permanent forum on indigenous issues, new york. standing senate committee on aboriginal peoples. (2010). the journey ahead. ottawa: senate canada. stout, m., & harp, r. (2007). lump sum compensation payments research project. ottawa: aboriginal healing foundation. taylor, c. (1992). the politics of recognition. in a. guttmann & c. taylor (eds.), multiculturalism and the “politics of recognition” (pp. 25-73). princeton: princeton university press. thompson, j. (2010, march 30). churchill mp frustrated by cuts to aboriginal healing foundation. kenora daily. retrieved from http://www.kenoradailyminerandnews.com/2010/05/04/churchill-mp-frustratedby-cuts-to-aboriginal-healing-foundation 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.4 turenne, p. (2010, june 16). commission starts residential school healing. toronto sun. retrieved from http://www.torontosun.com/news/canada/2010/06/16/14417636.html turtle island. (2010a, october 26). public education initiative – moving beyond the apology. turtle island news. retrieved from http://www.turtleisland.org/discussion/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=7937 turtle island. (2010b, june 11). government of canada's apology. turtle island news. retrieved from http://www.turtleisland.org/discussion/viewtopic.php?t=7601 truth and reconciliation commission of canada. (n.d.). our mandate. retrieved from http://www.trc.ca/websites/trcinstitution/index.php?p=7 usefulness of commission questioned by protesters. (2010, june 16). brandon sun. retrieved from http://www.brandonsun.com/breaking-news/usefulness-of-commissionquestioned-by-protesters-96387054.html vizenor, g. (2008). survivance: narratives of native presence. nebraska: university of nebraska press. waziyatawin. (2009). you can’t un-ring a bell: demonstrating contrition through action. in g. younging, j. dewar, & m. degagné (eds.), response, responsibility, and renewal. (pp. 191-199). ottawa: aboriginal healing foundation. woolford, a. (2005). between justice and certainty: treaty making in british columbia. vancouver: ubc press. woolford, a. (2009). the politics of restorative justice: a critical introduction. halifax: fernwood publishing. 17 petoukhov: locating a theoretical framework published by scholarship@western, 2012 the international indigenous policy journal august 2012 locating a theoretical framework for the canadian truth and reconciliation commission: charles taylor or nancy fraser? konstantin s. petoukhov recommended citation locating a theoretical framework for the canadian truth and reconciliation commission: charles taylor or nancy fraser? abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license microsoft word 309427-text.native.1346175603.doc mãori customary law: a relational approach to justice the international indigenous policy journal volume 3 | issue 1 article 4 march 2012 mãori customary law: a relational approach to justice stephanie vieille the university of western ontario, vieille.sa@gmail.com recommended citation vieille, s. (2012). mãori customary law: a relational approach to justice. th e international indigenous policy journal, 3(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.4 his research is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in he international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. mãori customary law: a relational approach to justice abstract this research paper examines the philosophy of justice embodied in tikanga mãori, the mãori traditional mechanism and approach to doing justice. based on several months of fieldwork in new zealand, this study contends that the mãori approach to justice adopts a holistic and relational lens, which requires that justice be seen in the context of relationships and crimes dealt with in terms of the relationships they have affected. as a result, justice must be carried out within the community and the process owned by community members. further discussion draws attention to the response of mãori communities to the new zealand government’s attempt to accommodate their traditions and warns against the global tendency to render traditional indigenous approaches to justice ahistorical through their representation as restorative justice mechanisms. keywords indigenous knowledge, mãori, restorative justice, relationships acknowledgments the author would like to acknowledge funding from the social science and humanities research council of canada, as well as thank all the persons who have accepted to answer questions and share the mãori culture with the author during the summer of 2010. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ mãori customary law: a relational approach to justice early european explorers of new zealand ignored the existence of mãori customary law and often viewed the mãori as a violent people (thompson, 1997). in captain cook’s words, war was considered to be the mãori’s “principal profession” (cited in reed & reed, 1969, p. 252). eldon best (1934), one of the first european explorers and observers, described the mãori as “uncultured,” “savage,” “neolithic folk” with a “barbaric society” (pp. 86-89). his work was reflective of the ethnocentric bias of early explorers and anthropologists. the idea that there were no or few social norms and laws in indigenous and pre-contact societies was a common and persistent one in european jurisprudence (frame & meredith, 2004). quince (2007a) explains that europeans brought with them a different system of laws “centered around strongly defined notions of individuality” and visible legal institutions (p. 13). what they failed to see, and later to recognize, was the existence of a complete system of beliefs and values regulating social interaction. tikanga mãori, or the mãori way of doing things, (k. hohaia1, personal communication, may 10, 2010) became marginalized as the state’s judicial system strengthened its hold and mãori principles and practices were considered “quaint custom, belittled, or ignored” (quince, 2007a, p. 15). the tumultuous relationship between the mãori and european explorers, and tikanga mãori, are explored below. this article is important for two reasons. first, there have been very few recent and systematic examinations of the mãori conception of justice and the state of tikanga mãori today. second, this article uses field research findings to substantiate the argument that tikanga mãori, like a number of indigenous traditions (see bopp, 1989; ross, 2006), adopts a view of justice that is often at odds with existing adversarial criminal justice systems. note on method kaupapa māori, a mãori methodology committed to the promotion of mãori knowledge from a mãori point of view, guided the author’s approach to this research. this research project received ethical approval from the university of western ontario’s research ethics board. during several months of fieldwork and ethnographic research conducted in new zealand, 33 mãori were interviewed. the questions asked were open-ended to accommodate a diversity of responses. the author wanted to know about the respondents’ level of activity within their community, knowledge of the mãori language, cultural beliefs, and practices, as well as their experience and knowledge of customary mechanisms of justice. in some cases, participants asked that their identity remain confidential. in accordance with the values of kaupapa mãori, the author purposefully chose to only interview mãori individuals in order to get a glimpse of the mãori culture and conception of ‘justice’ from a mãori perspective. all participants expressed great pride in being mãori. in total, nine participants were under the age of 30, and four were older than 60 (two of whom were community elders). the majority of participants were between the ages of 30 and 60 and were active in a number of sectors, such as academia, judiciary, parliament, and tourism. the author talked to individuals belonging to 20 different iwi2, with a majority from nga puhi, ngati porou, ngati whatua, te arawa, and tuhoe. these iwis are located in the northern and north-eastern region of the north island. direct quotations from these personal communications (for complete interview list see appendix) are used throughout this article. mãori history and customary law while early explorers to new zealand did not recognize the existence of a value-based system of social control, the treaty of waitangi, new zealand’s founding document, did guarantee the protection of mãori culture and customs. mãori customary law was also, to a certain extent, tolerated under the native exemption ordinance of 1844, which stipulated that the crown was not required to intervene in mãori affairs and in crimes committed against mãori by mãori (government of new zealand, 2001). in an a poor adaptation of 1 resource management student at the university of auckland. 2 iwi is the largest mãori community. 1 vieille: mãori customary law published by scholarship@western, 2012 the principle of utu3, and exclusively for cases of crimes committed against pakeha4, the crown allowed any mãori convicted of theft to pay four times the value of the stolen good in lieu of punishment (robert & bennion, 2002). the 1852 new zealand constitution further specified that mãori laws and customs were to be preserved so long as these were not “repugnant to the principles of humanity” (government of new zealand, 2001). latent to all these legislative acts was the belief that “english law and culture were innately superior” and customary practices were to be subsumed to the dominant culture (government of new zealand, 2001, p. 22). as a result, a mixed measure of “denial, suppression, assimilation and co-option put mãori customs, values, and practices under great stress” (government of new zealand, 2001, p. 22). this was particularly visible through land tenure disputes between the mãori and the crown, which ignored customary land titles in favor of its own statutory claims. despite years of oppression and policies aimed at cultural assimilation, tikanga mãori did not die out. adherence to this system helped preserve a social system based on mutual expectations and collective responsibility with the goal of avoiding dispute (rumbles, n.d.). the strength of tikanga mãori comes from the fact that it is not a separate set of laws, but rather a worldview and set of beliefs sustained through “the interaction and arrangement of the people that are to be the subjects of the law” (frame, 2002, p. 5). it survived “outside of formalized structures” (tauri & morris, 2003, p. 23) and in “mãori controlled environments such as marae5 and hui6, in a significant number of mãori homes” where the state could not meddle (tauri & morris, 2003, p. 45). in the words of quince (2007b), new zealand ended up with a “kind of accidental pluralism,” whereby the traditional mãori legal system continued to operate in non-urban areas without the knowledge and sanction of the state (p. 10). throughout the years, the relationship between mãori customary law and the new zealand legal system has remained ambiguous with the possibility of giving full and formal recognition to tikanga mãori only ever half-heartedly considered (belgrave, 2001). the most significant recognition of the value of tikanga and its principles in terms of justice, came in 1989 with the creation of family group conferencing (fgc) under the children, young persons, and their families act and, later on, with the sentencing act in 2002 (mcelrea, 1998). the purpose of setting up fgcs and the sentencing act was twofold: first, the new zealand government sought to address the high number of young, usually mãori, offenders in the legal system and limit recidivism (henwood, 1997). second, the government saw the restorative conferencing model as a way to reform the existing judicial system into “a modern system of justice, which is culturally appropriate,” and thereby incorporate some of the values of new zealand’s indigenous population in the legal system (youth court of new zealand, n.d., integration of indigenous and western approaches, ¶ 2). a report published by the new zealand law commission (2001) stated that, in accordance with the spirit and terms of the waitangi treaty, “the law and legal and political institutions should reflect the values underlying tikanga” (p. 88). in many ways, the creation of fgcs and the derived restorative initiatives proved to be “a test case of the ability of the present justice system to adapt to the needs of indigenous peoples” (tauri & morris, 2003, p. 48). tikanga mãori while tikanga corresponds to a widely shared set of beliefs as to what is right and wrong, its application or kawa may differ from iwi to iwi (frame, 2002; tauri & morris, 2003). one must abide by the kawa or protocol of the iwi whose land on which one is standing (l. chant7, personal communication, may 10, 2010). the protocol may affect practical aspects of community life (metge, 1996); including, for instance, when it is proper to call for a hui (k. hohaia, personal communication, may 10, 2010) or when and whether women can 3 utu can be translated as the principle of reciprocity. 4 pakeha is a mãori word used to designate the white, non-mãori population of new zealand. 5 a marae is a communal gathering house. 6 a hui is a community gathering. 7 professor of mãori studies at the university of auckland. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.4 talk during hui (a. williams8, personal communication, may 10, 2010). as a result, while the ideals and values that make up tikanga are vastly similar from iwi to iwi, mead (2003) notes that “what we see happening when tikanga is put into practice is not necessarily the ideal manifestation of that tikanga” (p. 18). this variety in protocols between iwis, however, does not preclude the existence of common, fundamental values that underpin tikanga mãori (new zealand commission, 2001). when asked, 25 out of the 33 mãori interviewed agreed that tikanga is important in thinking about justice in a mãori way. i was told that tikanga was “absolutely essential in thinking about mãori justice” (anonymous9, personal communication, may 14, 2010) or simply that tikanga was justice (anonymous10, personal communication, july 22, 2010). judge e. durie (1994) adds that tikanga mãori can be defined a body of “mãori principles for determining justice” (p. 331). not abiding by tikanga would have severe consequences in communal life and would result in oneself, and one’s community, “being hurt” (r. kãtene11, personal communication, may 31, 2010). in fact, tikanga mãori is a normative system that prescribes ways of behaving and processes to use for correcting problematic behaviour (mead, 2003). it can be seen as a set of principles determining right from wrong and prescribing actions on how to deal with it (government of new zealand, 2001). tikanga also includes “measures to deal firmly with actions causing a serious disequilibrium within the community” (new zealand law commission, 2001, p. 16). burrows (2002) explains that indigenous peoples around the world have developed various sets of spiritual, economic, political, and social principles in order to foster their relationships with one another and the environment. these principles and conventions, he adds, “became the foundation for many complex systems of governance and laws” (p. 46). tikanga mãori can be seen as a set of principles to determine justice, and is, therefore, generally referred to as mãori customary law (m. durie, 1993; metge, 1996). metge (1996) explains that the failure of europeans to recognize the existence of a system of law in mãori society was the result of a “defect in the way of observation rather than any actual absence of law” (p. 3). they could not see tikanga mãori, an orally transmitted code of conduct and set of beliefs, because they were looking for written records of law, duties, and rights sustained through formal institutions such as courts of law (rumbles, n.d.). the system of social control implied in tikanga “was interwoven with the deep spiritual and religious underpinnings of mãori society so that the mãori people did not so much live under the law, as with it” (jackson, 1988, p. 36). hibbitts’ (1992) research on what he calls “performance law” is useful in understanding the difficulty encountered by western legal observers when studying mãori society and customary law. he writes: as a culture that can physically separate contracts, judgments, and statutes from their proponents, we consider law to exist apart from, and indeed above, human individuals. this attitude is perhaps best captured in the aspirational phrase “a government of laws and not of men.” in performance cultures, however, laws and men are virtually coincident. finding the law generally means finding someone who can perform or remember it. (p. 873) in other words, the law and its practice are inseparable from those who practice it. it does not, and cannot, exist separate from everyday life and is not captured in any one institution or document. the law reform commission of western australia (2006), for instance, found that aboriginal customary law could not be dissociated from aboriginal culture and way of life. it governed “all aspects of aboriginal life, establishing a person’s rights and responsibilities to others, as well as to the land and natural resources” (p. 62). in the context of the mãori, tikanga guides interpersonal relationships but cannot be located in one place. indeed, when it comes to indigenous beliefs and laws, there are no tangible written resources to which we can refer for study; and “there is sharp caution from the people within the communities against the collection and 8 law student at university of auckland. 9 member of auckland’s mãori regional tourism organization. 10 social worker. 11 member of new zealand parliament and mãori party. 3 vieille: mãori customary law published by scholarship@western, 2012 codification” of these beliefs (burrows, 2002, p. 15). the strength of these conventions and norms, as well as their survival, is largely due to their fluidity and adaptability. tikanga mãori “has been receptive to change while maintaining its basic beliefs” (government of new zealand, 2001, p. 5). this value-based, ancestral set of beliefs guide everyday action and life in the community. as such, it is extremely flexible and, while relying on ancestral beliefs, always adapts and reinvents itself to suit the circumstances. it is the adherence to principles rather than rules, which allowed tikanga to maintain its cultural integrity and survive (metge, 1995). in the words of one of my respondents, the values that make up tikanga “give us our identity” (a. naera12, personal communication, june 30, 2010). in part, what renders tikanga mãori difficult to observe and translate into western legal thinking is precisely its flexibility and the fact that it is not a “technical, standalone system: rather it is part of culture” (frame, 2002, p. 25). in other words, it is a “way of life that makes law a living concept that one comes to know and understand through experience” (melton, 2005, p. 109). in this respect, it is strongly reminiscent of bourdieu’s (2009) habitus, which can be described as a system of cognitive dispositions acquired through social interaction and guiding individual action. the precepts of customary law, and in this case tikanga, “have nothing in common with the transcendental rules of a judicial code: everyone is able, not so much to cite and recite them from memory, as to reproduce them (fairly accurately)” (bourdieu, 2009, p. 17). tikanga mãori is an integral part of the culture, way of life, and identity of mãori. “the traditional system of tikanga for resolving dispute still exists” and is routinely used in some areas of the country (quince, 2007a, p. 16). mãori generally prefer to deal with offenses and crimes amongst themselves, without any external state intervention (anonymous13, personal communication, june 13, 2010a; m. papa14, personal communication, june 28, 2010). only a few decades ago, the police rarely got involved or intervened in mãori communities (anonymous, personal communication, june 13, 2010a). today, while the police are sometimes called, they still do not always come to the aid of mãori living in rural communities (l. chant, personal communication, may 10, 2010). as noted by stafford (1995), “historical legacies of indigenous peoples and police interaction have resulted in… feelings of mutual suspicions held by both parties” (p. 233). mãori often feel disempowered and disadvantaged by the judicial system. they are also often distrustful of the police forces, which they see as “amplifiers of crimes” (stafford, 1995, p. 233); that is the police are often perceived as being more severe towards the indigenous population than the white population (stafford, 1995). moreover, there exists a shared belief amongst mãori that new zealand laws and judicial procedures are foreign and impose legal norms. these imposed pakeha laws and mechanisms are considered “part of the mechanism of colonization” that has “shaped and helped create the circumstances which lead to much contemporary mãori offending” (jackson, 1995, p. 253). and so, as a result of a combination of factors, including the police’s attitude towards mãori communities, the remoteness of some communities, as well as their “know-how,” non-urban mãori communities will generally deal with disputes and offenses themselves (anonymous15, personal communication, may 17, 2010; anonymous16, personal communication, may 20, 2010; anonymous17, personal communication, june 30, 2010; k. jones18, personal communication, july 1, 2010; m. papa, personal communication, june 28, 2010). traditional mãori dispute resolution “is still happening but it is not entrenched in the new zealand legal system. it’s like a parallel thing that we do not want to say too much about because it is outside of the legal system and could attract the wrong kind of attention” (k. jones, personal communication, july 1, 2010). it 12 programme director, department of equity, kaiwhakahaere kaupapa mãori, auckland university of technology (aut). 13 community member. 14 south auckland community member. 15 school teacher. 16 former lawyer and law professor. 17 member of staff, auckland university of technology. 18 professor in management, auckland university of technology. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.4 would be inaccurate, however, to say that all mãori communities and all crimes are dealt with the traditional ways of tikanga. each iwi may deal with crimes differently. the type and severity of offences committed often determine whether mãori community members choose to use the traditional mãori ways or resort to police intervention. for the “everyday type of offending, people do not even consider calling the police” (anonymous, personal communication, may 20, 2010). mãori community members often deal with offences, such as theft, youth misbehaviour, and domestic violence, through the marae and tikanga (anonymous19, personal communication, may 16, 2010; anonymous, personal communication, june 13, 2010a; anonymous, personal communication, july 22, 2010; k. jones, personal communication, july 1, 2010; m. papa, personal communication, june 28, 2010; a. williams, personal communication, may 10, 2010). in some cases, sexual offences are also dealt with at the community level without external judicial or police involvement (anonymous, personal communication, may 17, 2010; anonymous, personal communication, may 20, 2010; anonymous, personal communication, june 30, 2010). mãori community members, however, do tend to reach toward more formal legal authorities to deal with severe offences, including murder, that they do not feel appropriately equipped to deal (l. chant, personal communication, may 10, 2010). the kawa of the community, as well as the number of people involved in a dispute or crime, will also affect the location and participation of community members in the dispute resolution process (h. williams20, personal communication, june 18, 2010). for instance, dispute resolution may take place in the marae when more than one family is involved in the dispute. holding a hui in the marae allows all community members to attend. when a crime or dispute is confined to a family, the hui may take place in a home, where the process remains more private. belgrave (2001) explains that “an understanding of the nature of customary law has become a matter of growing urgency” because the mãori have continued to demand their sovereignty under the treaty of waitangi (p. 1). moreover, the rights of indigenous peoples have been recognized under a number of international documents, including the international covenant on economic, social, and political rights and, more recently, the un declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples. under article 34 it specifies: indigenous peoples have the right to promote, develop and maintain their institutional structures and their distinctive customs, spirituality, traditions, procedures, practices and, in the cases where they exist, juridical systems or customs, in accordance with international human rights standard. (united nations, 2007, p. 12) understanding the principles that underpin indigenous customary law and, in this particular case, tikanga mãori is therefore of paramount importance. to understand tikanga mãori, we must approach the body of thought, sets of beliefs, and principles that define it (e. durie, 2006). the existing scholarship surrounding the existence of mãori customary law and the traditional system of tikanga for dealing with offences and dispute, however, is sparse. the work of anthropologists, legal philosophers, lawyers, and judges, such as joan metge, justice eddie durie, hirini moko mead, khylee quince, and moana jackson provide the few discussions of the concepts and values that make up tikanga. the following section identifies some of the core principles of tikanga mãori in order to gain an understanding of the mãori approach to justice. relational justice customary and indigenous law is said to originate in social values “expressed through the teachings and behavior of knowledgeable and respected individuals and elders” (burrows, 2002, p. 13). the principles and beliefs that underpin tikanga mãori are themselves transmitted from generation to generation through korero tawhito, which are a collection of myths and stories that “reflect the philosophies, ideals, and norms” of the mãori world (government of new zealand, 2001, p. 9). central to these mãori norms and ideals is the primacy of kinship. relationships are of paramount importance to the mãori (new zealand law 19 member of the united nations forum on indigenous issues 20 kaumatua and manukau city councillor. 5 vieille: mãori customary law published by scholarship@western, 2012 commission, 2001). no discussion of the principles that underpin tikanga mãori can bypass the primacy of relationships, which in turn influence and affect the mãori practice and approach to justice. in fact, tikanga mãori is fundamentally relational and, just like other indigenous traditions, is centered on the primacy of kinship (monture okanee, 1994). the importance of relationships is visible through a number of principles by which mãori abide, including whakapapa (genealogical connection) and whanaungatanga (human connection). both point to the strength and importance of connections between people and their communities (williams, 2001). while whakapapa is concerned with the spiritual, whanaungatanga deals with present relationships and is not restricted to the genealogical order (anonymous21, personal communication, june 27, 2010). in other words, both whanaungatanga and whakapapa remind each person of the centrality of relationships, both past and present, and his or her responsibility towards these. these values, which resonate in a number of other traditions found throughout the south pacific, remind individuals of “the importance of group unity and of maintaining relationships” (new zealand law commission, 2006, p. 51). they provide the understanding that all mãori are related to one another and their environment (anonymous22, personal communication, june 9, 2010). as a result, it is in the interest of all to act in ways that strengthen and sustain relationships, whether they be with other human beings or with the natural world (m. papa, personal communication, june 28, 2010). the whanau,23 to mãori, is “a pivotal social and cultural force” that gives its members a sense of identity and safety (ministry of health, 1998, p. 1). to many, the whanau is everything (anonymous, personal communication, june 13, 2010a; anonymous24, personal communication, june 13, 2010b; anonymous25, personal communication, june 28, 2010a; anonymous26, personal communication, june 29, 2010; k. jones, personal communication, july 1, 2010; m. papa, personal communication, june 28, 2010). it is “what we are made of” (anonymous, personal communication, june 13, 2010b) and “makes us the way we are” (anonymous, personal communication, june 28, 2010a). to a mãori “you are nobody unless you belong to a community, to some land, and some people” (anonymous, personal communication, may 20, 2010). mãori identity is defined by community membership and the relationships that comprise it. according to huffer and so’o (2005), “pacific values must be seen in the context of a network of social relationships” (p. 311). indeed, to mãori and other pacific islanders, society is seen as a “collective unit meaning everyone within that unit has the responsibility of working together” (government of new zealand, 2001, p. 128). as a result, “connections…must be respected and fostered” (patterson, 1992, p. 88). mane (2009) notes that for mãori the creation and maintenance of relationships “is a matter of considerable significance highlighting the required sense of reciprocity, accountability, and mutual respect” (p. 3). this emphasis on relationships has important consequences on the mãori practice and approach to justice and requires rethinking our approach to criminal behavior. crime is no longer seen as breach of contract and law, but rather as a “breakdown in relationships” (burnside & baker, 2004, p. 24). it must, therefore, be treated as such (schuler, 2004). implicit in the centrality of the whanau and relationships to mãori is the sense of collective social responsibility (anonymous, personal communication, june 27, 2010; new zealand law commission, 2001). in turn, this sense of interconnectedness and collective responsibility begets active involvement and participation of all community members for the well-being of the collective. 21 representative from the ngati whatua trust. 22 former offender. 23 the whanau is the family, but in a wider sense than its western counterpart. 24 a kaumatua is an elder who plays a leading role in the organization of the community. they usually belong to the oldest generation of the community. 25 community member. 26 marae trustee. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.4 interconnectedness and collective responsibility the mãori approach to justice is built around “fundamental values such as collectivism and interconnectedness” (robert, 1999, p. 3). mãori “collective identity lends itself to collective responsibility” (anonymous, personal communication, may 20, 2010), which has important consequences for justice and how it is viewed and carried out in mãori communities. relationships, the most valued element of mãori social life and worldview, are the focus of justice (mead, 2003). justice becomes a way to nurture and sustain relationships, which is strongly reminiscent of ross’ (2010) “relational lens” that exemplifies ubuntu27 and aboriginal healing justice. an emphasis on relationships, interdependence, and collective responsibility encourages us to think of wrongdoing as a “relational event” (ross, 2010, p. 8). a crime becomes the symptom of “disharmonies within the offender’s relational life” (ross, 2010, p. 8). it is, therefore, the relational life of the offender that must explored and restored. accordingly, for mãori, one of the first steps in dealing with offences is to uncover the relational ties each of the parties in the dispute has with other community members (jackson, 1988). many indigenous traditions, such as those of the navajo, view a person who harms another as a person who “has no relatives” (sawatsky, 2009, p. 69). accordingly, justice is very much about reinstating these relationships. it is concerned with “retaining, teaching, and maintaining relationships” (monture okanee, 1994, p. 227). once the relationships between the parties in the dispute have been explored, discussions about why a dispute took place and how it can be solved begin (anonymous, personal communication, july 22, 2010). exposing the relational ties between the whanau, the offender, and the victim lifts the veil of anonymity and contributes to accountability. “you know your victims and they know you. that puts more of an onus on you for your actions” (anonymous, personal communication, june 27, 2010). by the same token, highlighting the connections and kinship between all community members serves to demonstrate how the wrong and the pain it caused “reverberates through the individual and the community” (drummond, 1997, p. 107). the outcome of this exploration, in turn, directly influences how justice is carried out and who is involved in the process. “offenders and victims must be seen in the context of extended family” (anonymous28, personal communication, june 28, 2010b). after a crime or dispute, people come together in the marae or in a home, depending on the severity of the crime, to discuss what has been done and what needs to be done. according to the mãori way, “it is all about the collective, rather than the individual” (anonymous, personal communication, may 18, 2010). individuals and their communities share a co-dependent and almost symbiotic relationship. this means that when a crime takes place, everyone in the community is affected to some degree because the harmony of the community is threatened (guest, 1999). the focus of the process of justice is more than just the offender and the individual wronged. both are “inextricably linked to family, clan and culture,” thereby giving a kind of derivative responsibility to the individuals’ whanau and the wider community (penal reform international, 2000, p. 23). traditionally, the system of tikanga simply attributed “responsibility for wrongdoing on the family of the offender” (jackson, 1988, p. 43). the entire whanau is equally liable to redress the harm caused if an individual member is wronged or hurt because mãori society is largely based on collective responsibility (government of new zealand, 2001). “when you hurt one member, you hurt the rest of the whanau” (anonymous, personal communication, june 13, 2010b). each member of a community will “either feel some sense of having being wronged or some sense of responsibility for the wrong” (penal reform international, 2000, p. 22). it is, therefore, in the interest of all to contribute to the process of justice (anonymous, personal communication, may 18, 2010; a. naera, personal communication, june 30, 2010). this sense of collective responsibility “does not resonate quite so strongly in non-mãori communities” (l. chant, personal communication, may 10, 2010). it requires providing support to those who have been 27 ubuntu, generally speaking, is a form of african humanism that relates to a way of being, a human trait or quality, or a view of the self in relationship to others. it has been popularized by archbishop desmond tutu who used the concept within the context of the south african truth and reconciliation commission. 28 probations officer. 7 vieille: mãori customary law published by scholarship@western, 2012 wronged as well as to those who have wronged (m. brewin29, personal communication, june 4, 2010). one is never alone in the mãori world, which means everyone has to look after one another to sustain the community (k. jones, personal communication, july 1, 2010). this principle of collective responsibility also influences everyday life in contemporary new zealand. “as children, we grow to learn the importance of the community and involvement and responsibility” (a. naera, personal communication, june 30, 2010). a significant number of my respondents appeared to be socially aware and responsible, in that many actively contributed, and in some ways supported, community life (for instance, l. chant, personal communication, may 10, 2010; k. hohaia, personal communication, may 10, 2010; a. williams, personal communication, may 10, 2010). some individuals admitted to having taken into their homes and raised another family’s child (anonymous, personal communication, july 22, 2010; l. chant, personal communication, may 10, 2010), periodically chairing or attending marae meetings (anonymous, personal communication, may 18, 2010; k. hohaia, personal communication, may 10, 2010), or working on the construction of a marae for their iwi (anonymous, personal communication, may 17, 2010; anonymous, personal communication, june 29, 2010). a schoolteacher explained, “these are our kids. they’re not that family’s or that family’s; they’re all our kids. and all, whoever they are, belong to our whanau and we have a social responsibility as a community to help them” (anonymous, personal communication, may 17, 2010). this sense of collective identity and responsibility urges community members to take part in communal matters and decision-making. as a result, the participation by and consultation of community members becomes a central element in doing justice within mãori communities according to tikanga. this stems from the “very real sense that a conflict belongs to the community itself” (holleman, 1949, p. 43) and constitutes a violation of the community’s interwoven relationships and harmony (schuler, 2004). community participation and engagement mãori processes to carry out justice are not a “formal court sitting that a lawyer would recognize” (r. kãtene, personal communication, may 31, 2010). when a hui is organized, it is open to all who wish to contribute (anonymous, personal communication, may 20, 2010; k. hohaia, personal communication, may 10, 2010; a. williams, personal communication, may 10, 2010). “whoever may feel that they have an interest” is included (anonymous, personal communication, may 18, 2010). there is no audience per se since everyone is encouraged to participate and share their views (drummond, 1997). hearings usually take place in the marae because it is inclusive of all and represents a neutral “place to reconcile difference” (h. williams, personal communication, june 18, 2010). during a hui, community members talk through things in an attempt explain what happened, why it happened, and to solve the issues at hand (anonymous, personal communication, june 13, 2010b; r. kãtene, personal communication, may 31, 2010; robert, 1999). customary mechanisms of justice use a “talking-out process among relatives (by blood and clan)” to reach a practical solution to the problem (zion, 2005, p. 70). justice is the result of “what the society…considers to be fair and just” (wanitzek, 1990, p. 258). both parties to the dispute must be present to exchange their views and opinions (anonymous30, personal communication, may 12, 2010; anonymous, personal communication, may 17, 2010; l. chant, personal communication, may 10, 2010; k. hohaia, personal communication, may 10 2010; k. jones, personal communication, july 1, 2010; h. williams, personal communication, june 18, 2010). their participation and the expression of their interests are central to a process that relies on voluntariness (robert, 1999). the active participation and contribution of community members to the process is an inherent element of a worldview based on the centrality of relationships. “justice has to be done with the families” (anonymous, personal communication, june 13 2010a). the inclusion of community members in the process, however, also serves to reinforce the community’s values and “generates a more compelling sense of justice” (drummond, 29 research programming leader, the national institute of research excellence for mãori development and advancement. 30 executive member of nga tauira mãori auckland mãori student association. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.4 1997, p. 108). holding offenders verbally accountable for their wrongdoing is “essential to expressing remorse to the victims,” and facilitate the communication of suffering and possibly apologies (melton, 2005, p. 115). by participating, the community shows its commitment to social stability and harmony. it emphasizes the “solidarity of the collective” towards upholding communal well-being and empowers community members to make decisions (hazlehurst, 1995, p. xxii). justice, then, becomes a “communal asset” to be safeguarded by all (thomas, 2005, p. 135). on top of regenerating communal values of respect and care, the presence of community members in the process contributes to what braithwaite (1989) calls “reintegrative shaming” (p. 84). the purpose of reintegrative shaming is not to exclude, but rather to reintroduce offenders within a supportive network of relationships and discourage further misbehaving (braithwaite, 1989). shaming helps produce compliance with the values upheld by the community and limits potential deviance (weitekamp, 2003). the process of tikanga, a form of relational justice, creates a venue where “offenders, the victims, and their support system get to see how the crime has affected each of them” (anonymous, personal communication, june 27, 2010). offenders get to experience justice that it is not handed down to them, but requires their participation, commitment, and agreement. participation is also entirely voluntary (penal reform international, 2000). the strength of relational justice lies in the fact that community participation lends authority to the process and decision reached (rumbles, n.d.). in horizontal and acephalous societies, communities tend to take a very active role in the process (guest, 1999). “consensus development for the resolution of disputes or grievances between or within communities” is an important element of these processes (new zealand law commission, 2006, p. 54). parties to the dispute have to own up to the decision and carry out what has been decided collectively because all are held accountable by their whanau (anonymous, personal communication, may 17, 2010; a. naera, personal communication, june 30, 2010; a. williams, personal communication, may 10, 2010). moreover, relational justice is about showing aroha, which is love, support, and care, to both offenders and victims regardless of their actions. indeed, the “methods of justice reflect the virtues of justice: respect, love, engaging family and community, land, elders, and the creator” (sawatsky, 2009, p. 70). these values “bind the individual to the group and the group to supporting the individual” (zion, 2005, p. 70). the exploration of the crime, truth-telling, and confrontation between offenders and victims can be emotionally trying, but also contributes to the acknowledgment of their experiences (borer, 2006). the support and presence of the community also serves to alleviate pain and contributes to collective healing (lundy & mcgovern, 2005). the sense of interconnectedness and collective responsibility discussed previously requires all to engage in the restoration and rehabilitation of those affected by injustice. well-being and rehabilitation to mãori, justice is a way of life not simply a response to crime. it is houhou rongo, literally sewing the seeds for peace (h. williams, personal communication, june 18, 2010). justice is “a conversation around living” (l. chant, personal communication, may 10, 2010). it is an “everyday thing, so you don’t have a special courtroom, special lawyers or special language” (anonymous, personal communication, may 20, 2010). the way justice is carried out, as a public space for all to participate, very much reflects that. in fact, it is argued that justice in indigenous communities is “inseparable from issues of social well-being” (hazlehurst, 1995, p. xii). the occurrence of a crime causes a serious imbalance in the community and reflects the community’s failure to set favorable living conditions for all. implicit in the sense of collective responsibility that underpins relational justice is the belief that all community members are responsible for sustaining community wellbeing. justice, therefore, serves as a means of maintaining or redressing that harmony and balance within the community (thomas, 2005). the mãori approach to justice is essentially holistic and oriented towards the maintenance of mutually supportive relationships (anonymous, personal communication, may 17, 2010; k. jones, personal 9 vieille: mãori customary law published by scholarship@western, 2012 communication, july 1, 2010). it is based on the belief that justice is about healing the person who has wronged, the person who has been wronged, and the entire network of relationships affected by the harm caused. as such, it seeks to deal with harm in its entirety, while recognizing the centrality of emotions (sawatsky, 2009). the emphasis on healing is the “necessary manifestation of a [indigenous] world-view” (ross, 2010, p. 13). zion (2005) notes that indigenous justice “attempts to reach into the mind” (p. 69). justice cannot succeed and heal without dealing with the person in his or her entirety (lee, 2005). justice is about healing the spiritual, emotional, physical, or mental imbalance in the person. it goes beyond the legal sphere by striving to “fix one’s spirit” (anonymous, personal communication, june 28, 2010b). this means that justice is not simply about redressing a wrong and restoring a balance, but it is also about healing those involved (r. kãtene, personal communication, may 31, 2010). it can only be successfully achieved if it restores the “spiritual, emotional, and physical balance within the social, environmental, and cosmic sphere” (benton, 2001, p. 6). relational justice requires working “collectively in a manner to help rebuild the person that has done wrong. it is a daily process of doing things together and surrounding that person with normality. to show them caring and aroha” (m. papa, personal communication, june 28, 2010). in turn, healing those directly affected by wrongdoing contributes to the well-being of the entire community (anonymous, personal communication, may 20, 2010; benton, 2001). healing the harm provides the opportunity to “transform suffering and root causes of harm… to cultivate conditions of respectful living within the interrelated aspects of the self, other, communities, social structures, environment, and spirit” (sawatsky, 2009, p. 39). viewing justice through a mãori lens leads us to focus on relationships as the source of restoration and rehabilitation for individuals affected by a dispute or crime. mãori justice is not about retribution, but about restoration and rehabilitation (pratt, 1992). this “derives from long held indigenous customs in which kin…seek to meet the need if all involved in a harm situation” (sullivan & tifft, 2006, p. 1). at a hui, “the basic question asked is what happened and how can we fix it” (anonymous, personal communication, may 20, 2010)? the discussion at a hui helps to identify the reasons that led a community member to wrong another member (anonymous, personal communication, may 18, 2010). it provides a space for exploring and “understanding what made offenders do what they did, who they are, where they come from” (m. papa, personal communication, june 28, 2010). justice, therefore, is sought when the community tries “to restore that balance within them and between the individuals involved in what happened” (anonymous, personal communication, may 18, 2010). this is done in accordance with the principle of utu, which emphasizes reciprocity and the maintenance of harmonious relationships between members of society (anonymous, personal communication, june 27, 2010; government of new zealand, 2001). whatever harm has been caused by an item being stolen or damaged, for instance, must be returned or repaired (anonymous, personal communication, may 12, 2010; anonymous, personal communication, may 18, 2010; anonymous, personal communication, july 22, 2010). the kind of reparations must fit the circumstances and needs of all parties; keeping in mind the collective concern for harmony and balance (government of new zealand, 2001; robert, 1999). because all community members are considered integral and essential parts of a collective, “it is not as simple as just removing [offenders]” (a. naera, personal communication, june 30, 2010). the emphasis remains on restorative penalties, such as community service (penal reform international, 2000). this approach is based on the understanding that removing someone from the community, by sending him or her through the penitentiary system for example, does not mend relationships or contribute to healing the harm. it is, on the contrary, more likely to cause further suffering and victimization for all involved (anonymous, personal communication, july 22, 2010). removing someone from the community would also signal a break in communal relationships and result in additional imbalance. it would absolve the mãori notion of collective responsibility, which bestows responsibility on all community members for the wrong committed by one. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.4 concluding thoughts and caution the mãori approach to justice is clearly embedded within a kinship-based tradition that highly values principles of collective responsibility, social harmony, and well-being. dyhrberg (1994) argues, “central to mãoridom is the right and the responsibility of a community to care for its own, and to seek… solutions to its social problem” (p. 6). over the years, mãori have remained critical of new zealand’s formal legal apparatus, which many viewed as a “system imposed upon them by an aggressive colonizer” (kesley, 1984, p. 21), and which incessantly worked against indigenous communities and their rights (behrendt, 1995). the existing legal system never fully empowered mãori communities to take care of their own according to their own traditions and beliefs (consedine, 1995). despite the increasing number of mãori going through the criminal justice system, new zealand’s formal legal system continued to uphold western judicial values and to adjust to the needs of the pakeha society (jackson, 1988). upon mounting criticism from mãori communities that the existing legal system “was wholly foreign to its traditional values and destructive of the kinship networks essential to mãori society,” fgc was set up (luna, 2000, ¶ 52). the fgc model put in place by the new zealand government is often said to epitomize the restorative justice approach (maxwell & morris, 2006). it is also frequently presented as a mãori process (anonymous, personal communication, may 20, 2010). judge mcelrea (2004) goes as far as to claim that the restorative model employed by fgcs is the “direct descendant of the whanau conference long employed by mãori people” (p. 98). in fact, part of the debate surrounding restorative practices and traditions concerns the “claims that restorative justice draws on traditional processes for resolving disputes among indigenous peoples” (cunneen, 2008, p. 1). daly (2003) has coined this the “myth of origin” according to which restorative justice “uses indigenous justice practices and was the dominant form of pre-modern justice” (p. 195). restorative justice practices and indigenous approaches to justice are often seen as one and the same. as mentioned earlier, a common assumption in the case of the new zealand restorative conferencing model is that the practice is rooted in mãori culture. (consedine, 1995). this belief is particularly striking in that it reveals a lack of understanding of the cultural, social, and spiritual principles that underpin mãori society and its approach to justice. hakiaha (2004) expresses concern at the new zealand government’s use of mãori principles, which in his view may result in “the dilution, bastardization and disenfranchisement of these revered and sacred principles” (p. 358). this amalgamation of restorative justice practices and indigenous approaches illustrates the worrisome propensity to romanticize and homogenize indigenous philosophies and practices (see for instance cain, 2000). the ongoing attempt to include and represent mãori values in the legal system, according to jackson (1995), only serves to “capture, redefine and use mãori concepts to freeze mãori cultural and political expression within parameters acceptable to the state” (p. 254). the tendency to equate the fgc restorative model with the mãori approach to justice is simply part of the continuing history of colonization and co-option of mãoridom (jackson, 1995). indigenous and customary mechanisms of justice around the world have faced similar challenges and attempts at conforming traditional approaches to justice to the legalist paradigm. the un secretary general’s report on the rule of law and transitional justice, for instance, talks about conforming indigenous and traditional processes with international standards (united nations security council, 2004). this means that customary mechanisms are to be tolerated so long as they can be judicialized to correspond to international legal norms and expectations. according to macginty (2008), the relationship between the law and local traditional justice practices is more often one of “co-option rather than a co-existence of equals” (p. 158). rwanda’s gacaca31 courts are a prime example of how the international interest and support of customary mechanisms led to their co-option. drumbl (2000), for instance, argues that the call for gacaca courts to become “as legal as possible” is intended to force them to emulate the trial model and thereby conform to the international law paradigm (p. 16). the overall coordination and organization of gacaca courts was in the hands of the rwandan state and its department of gacaca jurisdiction within the ministry of justice (amnesty international, 2002). the intervention of the state and the international community has, in fact, 31 gacaca is a customary mechanism of justice used in rwanda. 11 vieille: mãori customary law published by scholarship@western, 2012 radically altered the traditional rwandan process of doing justice by removing the voluntary and grassroots aspects of the process (kerrigan, 2002). this has resulted in gacaca courts having little authenticity in the eyes of those who knew how these processes were traditionally conducted pre-genocide (oomen, 2005). a similar conclusion can be drawn in the case of new zealand; the government’s ongoing attempt to include mãori practices within its judicial framework has produced, at best, mixed results. to a large extent, many mãori remain suspicious of the government’s attempts, which they view as mere tokenism. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.4 references amnesty international. 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(2005). punishment versus healing: how does traditional indian law work? in a. mccaslin (ed.), justice as healing: indigenous ways (pp. 68-72). minnesota: living justice press. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.4 appendix: list of fieldwork interviews name date of interview title or description institutional affiliation or location anonymous may 7, 2010 student university of auckland anonymous may 12, 2010 executive member of nga tauira mãori, mãori students association university of auckland anonymous may 13, 2010 member of mãori students association university of auckland anonymous may 13, 2010 student university of auckland anonymous may 13, 2010 student and member of the mãori students association university of auckland anonymous may 14, 2010 member auckland mãori regional tourism association anonymous may 14, 2010 professor of mãori studies university of auckland anonymous may 17, 2010 schoolteacher otara anonymous may 17, 2010 schoolteacher and head of mãori department otara anonymous may 18, 2010 member united nations (un) forum on indigenous issues, auckland anonymous may 20, 2010 former lawyer and professor of law auckland anonymous may 26, 2010 student university of auckland anonymous may 28, 2010 court worker auckland anonymous june 9, 2010 former offender auckland anonymous june 13, 2010 community member rotorua anonymous june 13, 2010 kaumatua rotorua anonymous june 27, 2010 representative ngati whatua trust, auckland anonymous june 28, 2010 community member auckland anonymous june 28, 2010 probations officer auckland anonymous june 28, 2010 student university of auckland anonymous june 29, 2010 marae trustee auckland 17 vieille: mãori customary law published by scholarship@western, 2012 name date of interview title or description institutional affiliation or location anonymous june 30, 2010 staff member auckland university of technology anonymous july 22, 2010 social worker auckland brewin, marilyn june 4, 2010 research programming leader national institute of research excellence for mãori development and advancement, auckland chant, lisa may 10, 2010 professor of mãori studies university of auckland hohaia, kim-sara may 10, 2010 resource management student university of auckland jones, katherine july 1, 2010 professor in management auckland university of technology kãtene, rãhui may 31, 2010 member of the new zealand parliament and mãori party wellington naera, agnes june 30, 2010 programme director, department of equity, kaiwhakahaere kaupapa mãori auckland unviersity of technology papa, moana june 28, 2010 south auckland community member auckland royal, charles may 11, 2010 director national institute of research excellence for mãori and advancement, auckland williams, arena may 10, 2010 law student university of auckland williams, haare june 18, 2010 kaumatua and manukau city councillor auckland 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.4 the international indigenous policy journal march 2012 mãori customary law: a relational approach to justice stephanie vieille recommended citation mãori customary law: a relational approach to justice abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license microsoft word 289881-text.native.1332956330.doc a comparative analysis of indigenous research guidelines to inform genomic research in indigenous communities the international indigenous policy journal volume 3 | issue 1 article 6 march 2012 a comparative analysis of indigenous research guidelines to inform genomic research in indigenous communities nicole k . taniguchi native hawaiian epidemiology center, papa ola lokahi, n.tani11@gmail.com maile taualii native hawaiian epidemiology center, papa ola lokahi, mtaualii@papaolalokahi.org jay maddock university of hawaii, office of public health studies, jmaddock@hawaii.edu recommended citation taniguchi, n. k. , taualii, m. , maddock, j. (2012). a comparative analysis of indigenous research guidelines to inform genomic research in indigenous communities. the international indigenous policy journal, 3(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.6 this research is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. a comparative analysis of indigenous research guidelines to inform genomic research in indigenous communities abstract background: genetic research has potential benefits for improving health, such as identifying molecular characteristics of a disease, understanding disease prevalence and treatment, and developing treatments tailored to patients based on individual genetic characteristics of their disease. indigenous people are often targeted for genetic research because genes are easier to study in communities that practice endogamy. therefore, populations perceived to be more homogenous, such as indigenous peoples, are ideal for genetic studies. while indigenous communities remain the focal point of many genomic studies, some result in harm and unethical practice. unfortunately, the harms of poorly formulated and unethical research involving indigenous people have created barriers to participation that prevent critical and lifesaving research. these harms have led a number of indigenous communities to develop guidelines for engaging with researchers to assist in safely bridging the gap between genetic research and indigenous peoples. specific aims: the specific aims of this study were: (1) to conduct an international review and comparison of indigenous research guidelines that highlight topics regarding genetics and use of biological samples and identify commonalities and differences among ethical principles of concern to indigenous peoples; and (2) develop policy recommendations for indigenous populations interested in creating formal policies around the use of genetic information and protection of biological samples using data from specific aim 1. methods: a comparative analysis was performed to identify best research practices and recommendations for indigenous groups from four countries: canada, new zealand, australia, and the united states. the analysis examined commonalities in political relationships, which support self-determination among these indigenous communities to control their data. current international indigenous guidelines were analyzed to review processes of how genetic research is conducted and the use of biological samples is handled with indigenous peoples. results: results suggest the need for genetic and genomic research policies for the world’s indigenous people. indigenous groups are most vulnerable to research exploitation and harm; therefore, identifying principles that work for indigenous people will lead to best practices for all populations. conclusions: development and implementation of best practices informed by research guidelines in canada, new zealand, australia, and the u.s. may be helpful to advise indigenous leaders, policy makers, and researchers to the proper conduction of genetic research within indigenous communities. comparative analyses are a useful tool for identifying areas for further work in developing genetic research policy for indigenous communities. outcome: the outcomes of this analysis are relevant and useful to indigenous communities and inform the development of community-based genetic research guidelines. the recommendations can be used in designing appropriate policies for future genomic research with indigenous peoples. keywords genetic research, genomic research, indigenous communities acknowledgments partial funding support was provided by the national institutes of health, national cancer institute: knowledge, attitudes, and practices on biobanking among native hawaiians, u54 ca 153459-01 (chong). i would like to thank dr. maile taualii and dr. jay maddock for their direction, assistance, and guidance. in particular, dr. taualii's recommendations and suggestions have been invaluable for this research. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ a comparative analysis of indigenous research guidelines to inform genomic research in indigenous communities population-based research attempts to address the unknown causes of health disparities among population groups by assessing risk factors and identifying interventions to prevent or treat disease and, ultimately, lead to the development of methods for protecting a community’s health (taylor & johnson, 2007). genetic information has been significant in identifying at-risk groups; for example, some groups have increased disease incidence due to a genetic predisposition with or without a definable environmental exposure (khoury et al., 2000; knoppers & brand, 2008). genetic research is generally disease-specific, which has implications for both rare genetic conditions and common diseases (hawkins, 2010). it is crucial to gain a better understanding of interactions between the genes that make up the human genome and the role of the environment on those genes to more clearly assess reasons for health versus susceptibility to disease (knoppers, et al., 2010). genetic research among population groups must not only provide health benefits, but must also serve develop strategies and create policies to protect historically disadvantaged groups from harm inherent in this type of research. currently, there is a high level of anxiety surrounding genetic research in indigenous and minority communities (freimuth et al., 2001; humphery, 2001; smith, 1999). the history and ongoing exploitive relationships between indigenous and non-indigenous peoples have severely damaged indigenous peoples’ trust in non-indigenous societies. this lack of trust affects all research initiated by non-indigenous people, including research that aims to improve indigenous health. as roderick mcinnes (2011), president of the american society of human genetics, noted in his 2010 presidential address, indigenous peoples have “been left with a sense of mistrust, stigmatization, or weakened political authority” (p. 254). consequently, many indigenous people relate genetic research to their experiences of colonization, which makes genetic research a most controversial type of health research. the extent to which existing research guidelines are successful at minimizing harms inherent in genetic research remains an issue among indigenous groups. a comparative analysis of four countries (canada, new zealand, australia, and the united states) was carried out to understand and identify ethical concerns surrounding genetic research with indigenous peoples. this understanding will help to inform formal policy making around the use of genetic information and protection of biological samples for indigenous communities. genetic research indigenous people are most strongly opposed to population genetics, a category within genetic research. some indigenous groups believe that genetic research into human population history threatens their cultural beliefs. for example, evolutionary accounts of history stated that native americans migrated to north america through the bering strait 15,000 to 45,000 years ago. this caused uproar among native americans because they believed their ancestors had always been in north american and did not “arrive” from somewhere else (foster & sharp, 2000). native americans have also refused dna research on ancestral remains found on their lands (tallbear, 2003). in 2005, the national geographic society and international business machines (ibm) launched the “genographic project”, a genetics research project targeting indigenous populations (national geographic, n.d.; indigenous peoples council on biocolonialism, 2000). the public was invited to send their dna to national geographic in order to study human migrations. this initiative attracted negative press very quickly, as the headline of a new york times article read “dna gatherers hit snag: tribes don’t trust them” (cited in mcinnes, 2011). pullman and arbour (2009) suggested that findings from this project could “undermine cultural narratives about a people’s origins that have been held for generations or centuries and could alter perceptions of who’s in and who’s out of particular cultural groups” (p. 257). 1 taniguchi et al.: genomic research in indigenous communities published by scholarship@western, 2012 further, two projects preceding the genographic project were the human genome diversity project (the hgdp) and the international hapmap, which were explicitly involved in genetic testing of indigenous peoples for medical research. the aim of the hgdp was to record genetic profiles of endogamous populations to help explain why certain ethnic populations are vulnerable or resistant to certain diseases (cavalli-sforza, 2005). the hapmap project was designed to study haplotypes, genetic markers that consist of closely linked groups of alleles that tend to be inherited together, and then develop a haplotype map of the human genome (international hapmap project, n.d.). the hapmap intended to describe the common patterns of human dna sequence variations in order to search for genes affecting health, disease, and responses to environmental factors. indigenous groups voiced their opposition towards both of these projects because they felt as though they were being seen as mere sources of useful information. in these instances, researchers failed to recognize the legal, ethical, and socio-cultural implications of genetic testing among their target research populations. the participatory research approach was not upheld. a common complaint among indigenous peoples regarding research is that it benefits the researchers but not the population being studied. laura abour (2008) at the university of british columbia stated that within our world’s investigator-driven biomedical research model “the subjects have little voice in the research process, they waive rights of benefit sharing in general, the data and samples are ‘owned’ by the researcher, and the results go to journals and are not specifically ever directed back to or shared with the research subjects.” because indigenous communities are often targets of genetic research, indigenous peoples are becoming more cautious about data interpretation, data ownership, and involvement in research design. biobanks, essential to genetic research, collect human biological tissue specimens and related health data to answer research questions or test hypotheses (hawkins, 2010). banked tissue samples are used to help scientists and researchers identify diseases or conditions, to measure a patient’s response to therapy, or to find appropriate treatments (national cancer institute, 2010). the main purpose of storing specimens for research is to identify genetic and environmental factors that predispose individuals to common diseases, such as heart disease, cancer, and mental illness. these storage banks are becoming increasingly valuable in health research. their possibilities are numerous, and many remain unrealized (research advocacy network, 2005). time magazine recently named biobanks as one of the “top ten ideas changing the world right now” (park, 2009, p. 1). however, several concerns arise around the storage of specimens, including issues of confidentiality, transparency, and donors’ rights to access and control over their own data (godard, marshall, laberge, & knoppers, 2004), which raises additional issues in the process of engaging in genetic research with indigenous populations. these issues have been addressed to varying degrees among comparison countries. importance of genomic and genetic research with indigenous peoples genetic research can provide significant health-related benefits for indigenous peoples. it is the homogeneity due to endogamy, norms that encourage reproduction within the group, among many indigenous groups that is valuable in genetic studies (mgbeoji, 2007). increased homogeneity allows researchers to readily study a particular gene or loci of interest among affected and non-affected participants. for example, studies show greater prevalence rates of diabetes among indigenous communities worldwide (maple-brown, sinha, & davis, 2010; moy, sallis, & david, 2010; white, wong, sureshkumur, & singh, 2010). by looking at the dna of particular groups, researchers hope to find genes that are relevant for understanding ailments, such as diabetes, heart disease, and infectious diseases. finding these genes may lead to the development of new treatments or vaccines that will benefit the whole population. it may also allow for those at higher risk of contracting these diseases to be identified as targets for prevention and health promotion (davey-smith, 2007; khoury, 2009). methods a comparative analysis of four countries – canada, new zealand, australia, and the united states – was 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.6 conducted to synthesize research guidelines affecting indigenous people. the research aims were to review existing international guidelines concerning genetic research; conduct a comparative analysis of the research guidelines in each of the four countries; and identify top priority concerns and topics within each country to further provide policy recommendations for indigenous communities interested in creating formal policies around the use of genetic information and protection of biological samples. countries with significant research guideline development specific to genetic research and a history of involvement in genetic research issues were chosen for analysis. specific aim 1: comprehensive international review and comparative analysis a comprehensive international review of indigenous research guidelines related to genetic research was conducted. existing guidelines for indigenous groups across the four countries – canada, new zealand, australia, and the united states – were analyzed for this project. this research was carried out in partnership with the native hawaiian epidemiology centre, which provided relevant library resources. a critical analysis of research guidelines was conducted to look at common themes and identify notable voids in the four countries studied. specific aim 2: matrix based on the guideline analysis in specific aim 1, a matrix was created highlighting top ethical concerns and priorities across the four countries to provide a framework for other indigenous communities interested in developing formal policies around the use of genetic information and protection of biological samples. results aim 1: comprehensive international review and comparative analysis the following section outlines research guidelines developed in canada, new zealand, australia, and the us. table 1 illustrates a historical timeline of indigenous research guidelines developed in each country. table 1. timeline of indigenous research guidelines in comparison countries country title date author united states indigenous research protection act 2000 indigenous peoples council on biocolonialism (ipcb) australia values and ethics: guidelines for ethical conduct in aboriginal and torres strait islander health research 2003 national health and medical research council (nhmrc) canada guidelines for health research involving aboriginal people 2007 canadian institutes of health research (cihr) new zealand guidelines for researchers on health research 2008 health research council of new zealand (hrcnz) canada: tri-council policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans and guidelines for health research involving aboriginal people. the nuu-chah-nulth, a tribe on the west coast of vancouver island in british columbia, made significant contributions to the development of canadian guidelines on research with indigenous populations (dalton, 2002; canadian institutes of health research, 2007; pullman & arbour, 2009). in the early 1980s, dr. r. h. ward at the university of british columbia approached tribal leaders to undertake a search for hla alleles that may have been linked to arthritis in this tribe (mcinnes, 2011). leaders and all individuals in the community gave informed consent for the study. after 900 participants failed to demonstrate a linkage, the dna was moved to other research 3 taniguchi et al.: genomic research in indigenous communities published by scholarship@western, 2012 centers without the tribe’s consent and was used for research that had not been authorized in the original agreement. the nuu-chah-nulth were particularly concerned that samples would be used for genetic ancestry studies, an area of genetic research that is controversial for a number of culturally specific reasons, including spiritual beliefs about the manipulation of biological materials, oral traditions of origins or population history, and issues surrounding race and identity (bolnick et al., 2007; royal et al., 2010). genetic ancestry studies, such as the genographic project, utilize five problematic narratives: (1) "we are all african"; (2) "genetic science can end racism"; (3) "indigenous peoples are vanishing"; (4) “we are all related"; and (5) the genographic project "collaborates" with indigenous peoples (tallbear, 2007). further, the dna was not returned to the nuu-chah-nulth until 20 years after the samples were collected. as a result, the tribe felt betrayed and mistrusted researchers. the elected chief formed a committee to establish conditions that researchers would be required to follow if they wished to conduct future research with their community members. consequently, canada’s three federal agencies, known as “the agencies” – the canadian institutes of health research (cihr), the natural sciences and engineering research council of canada (nserc), and the social sciences and humanities research council of canada (sshrc) – created the tri-council policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans (tcps) (cihr, nserc, & sshrc, 1998). this policy was created to guide canadian researchers in the ethical conduct of research involving humans. section 6 of the tcps states: there is growing recognition that some research involving aboriginal individuals may also involve the communities or groups to which they belong. the agencies affirm that in developing ethical standards and practices, aboriginal peoples have rights and interests that deserve recognition and respect by the research community. (cihr, nserc, & sshrc, 1998, p. 6.1) unfortunately, section 6 was left incomplete due to the agencies’ lack of consultation with the aboriginal people, organizations, and researchers involved. to redress this, the ethics office of cihr prepared the guidelines for health research involving aboriginal people to assist researchers and institutions in conducting ethical and culturally sound research involving aboriginal people (cihr, 2007). these guidelines are outlined in chapter 9 of the second edition of the tcps (tcps2) (cihr. nserc, & sshrc, 2010). chapter 13 of the tcps2 (containing articles 13.1 to 13.7 inclusive, which are reproduced in appendix a) concerns the use of genetic information for research. genetic information has implications that extend beyond the individual since it may reveal facts about biological relatives and others with whom the individual shares genetic ancestry. researchers may sometimes seek to conduct genetic research with family members or communities to look further into the social and cultural contexts in which participants live. as a result, concerns arise around participant recruitment, the consent process, privacy, and confidentiality. cihr’s (2007) guidelines for health research involving aboriginal people considers the use and storage of biological samples in sections 2.12 (containing articles 12.1 to 12.5 inclusive) and 2.13 (article 13). these sections are relevant to genetic research, as the guidelines set forth basic principles for the collection, disclosure, use, and transfer of data and biological samples (see appendix b). much of the criticism directed towards research involving aboriginal populations relates to the loss of control over data or biological samples collected from aboriginal people. in addition, serious concern has been raised over the inappropriate use of stored biological samples, including dna and cell lines, for unauthorized research. it is crucial for researchers to understand that ownership of traditional and sacred knowledge should always remain with the community. safeguards protecting the privacy and confidentiality of data and biological samples should be specified in a research agreement. if there is to be a transfer of the data or biological samples to a third party, consent must be obtained by researchers from the individual participants and community. if the third party wishes to 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.6 engage in secondary use of the transferred data or samples, then further consent must be obtained. in every case, secondary use of the data or biological samples requires new consent unless specified in the research agreement. lastly, individuals have the right to access data about themselves (cihr, 2007). the following section introduces the concept of “dna on loan”, which enables research to be carried out yet protects the interests of the individuals, families, and communities involved (arbour & cook, 2006). biological samples on loan. article 13 states that “biological samples should be considered ‘on loan’ to the researcher unless otherwise specified in the research agreement” (cihr, 2007, p. 6). according to kowal, rouhani, and anderson (2011), article 13 reflects aboriginal philosophies regarding “full embodiment” whereby every part and product of the body is sacred and constitutes an essential part of the person. most canadian aboriginal communities prefer a participatory approach to the collection, use, storage, and potential future use of human biological samples; hence, this should be negotiated as part of the research agreement. researchers must have respect for the beliefs of the aboriginal community being studied and realize that they are to be considered the stewards, rather than the owners, of any samples. the research agreement and consent process should address the conditions of collection, place of storage, research lab or researcher involvement, industry roles, plans for governance, and potential future use of any samples collected. unless samples have been destroyed or de-identified, requests by an individual to withdraw, return, or dispose of samples should be accommodated in accordance with the terms of the research agreement and any applicable law. in the case of existing tissue banks, the community and the individuals should be consulted to determine under what circumstances the samples could be used for future research (cihr, 2007). new zealand: guidelines for researchers on health research involving maori. new zealand has been the site of an incredible amount of research ranging from genetic engineering to genetically modified foods and crops to genetic testing and research. with genetic research technology becoming more widespread, there is an increasing demand to conduct genetic research on maori populations; however, such research has become an extremely controversial issue amongst maori. a number of maori critiques, such as those concerning intellectual property rights, provide examples of how genetic research impacts maori and indigenous peoples. maori are being subjected to a form of colonization through the control over their cultural and intellectual property. although maori have long argued strongly against the erosion of their cultural values, knowledge and rights, the misappropriation of indigenous knowledge and resources is an ongoing issue (gardiner, 1997; gillett & mckergow, 2007; hudson, annabel, ahuriri-driscoll, marino, & lea, 2007; mead & mead, 2003). in wellington, new zealand, genetic epidemiologist, rod lea, at the institute of environmental science and research, told a genetics conference in australia that maori men were twice as likely as european men to carry monoamine oxidase (moa), the warrior gene (lea, 2006). the epidemiologist stated that the gene had been linked to risk-taking behaviors, such as smoking and gambling, and his remarks highlighted the overrepresentation of maoris in violence statistics. maori leaders were outraged and proclaimed that the statement only served to reinforce cultural stereotypes. further, a maori academic argued that linking the moa allele with high levels of violence among maori is scientifically unsound, effectively making being maori a “disease” and possibly leading to genetic and racial discrimination by insurance companies (hook, 2009). the health research council of new zealand (hrcnz) prepared the guidelines for researchers on health research involving maori (hrcnz, 2008), which includes a section on genetic studies involving maori participants. these guidelines enhance the research process by framing maori ethical issues in a way that meets expectations of maori communities. as summarized by kowal and colleagues’ (2011) in their review of international guidelines for indigenous genetic research, the maori guidelines propose the following: • research within paradigms of a maori worldview: genetic research sparks debate amongst many maori. researchers should become familiar with the issues outlined in the 1995 hrcnz consensus development conference report, whose genes are they anyway? (baird, geering, 5 taniguchi et al.: genomic research in indigenous communities published by scholarship@western, 2012 saville-smith, thompson, & tuhipa, 1995). at the conference, maori expressed “support for genetic research that enhances quality of life for maori as defined by maori…[if that research occurs] within the paradigms of a maori worldview” (p. 3). • community engagement: genetic studies require access to both whakapapa (genealogical) knowledge and blood or tissue samples. such studies require cooperation between the research team and participating whanau (family) along with consultation with the iwi (clan) to which the whanau belong. thorough consultation will ensure commitment of all parties to the project and minimize potential difficulties. genetic research projects involving maori require the approval of the iwi or hapu (sub-clan) organizations representing the whanau involved. this approval can be obtained in a hui (meeting) of the representative body following discussion of the project and should be documented in writing. • collective consent: informed consent for research should, in many cases, be obtained from more than just an individual. it is also important for researchers to be aware that, even though they may have received consent to gather whakapapa knowledge and/or blood, hair, saliva, tissue, or other human samples from a whanau member, whanau, or even hapu, the resulting findings from research are not generalizable to the maori population at large (hrcnz, 2008, p. 19). australia: values and ethics: guidelines for ethical conduct in aboriginal and torres strait islander health research. there have not been significant levels of controversy surrounding indigenous genetic research in aboriginal and torres strait islander communities. however, this may be due to fewer genetic research studies taking place with indigenous populations in australia. both the values and ethics: guidelines for ethical conduct in aboriginal and torres strait islander health research and the national statement on ethical conduct in research involving humans, produced by the national health and medical research council (nhmrc, 2003, 2007), apply to all health research involving aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples. the guidelines for ethical conduct document (nhmrc, 2003) does not address genetic research or provide guidance on the use and handling of biological samples; however, it does highlight it as an issue that needs to be discussed. on the other hand, the national statement, to which all genetic research in australia must comply, specifically addresses human genetic research in section 3.5 (also relevant are sections on databanks, also known as biobanks, in section 3.2 and human tissue samples in section 3.4) (nhmrc, 2007). the national statement proposes that ethical issues arise in genetic research for two reasons: 1) many genes are shared with close genetic relatives (commonly called “blood relatives”) and with unrelated people in the population, and 2) genetic research can reveal information about predispositions to disease. although people with such a predisposition may not develop the disease, the information may have implications for individuals and blood relatives when accessing employment, education, benefits, or services, including financial services, such as banking, insurance, and superannuation (nhmrc, 2007). to manage the risks inherent in genetic research, the national statement advises that researchers follow certain measures: 1) construct a plan for researchers to manage a situation where previously unknown paternity or maternity or non-blood relationships to siblings is detected in the course of the research; 2) ensure that data is held securely and participants are made aware of any statutory requirements to disclose information; and 3) ascertain that only personnel qualified in clinical genetics and/or genetic counseling provide genetic information to research participants (nhmrc, 2007). several aspects of the national statement are particularly relevant to indigenous research (kowal et al., 2011). firstly, “when complex socially significant characteristics or the genetic characteristics of communities are being investigated, there is a risk that the research may be misrepresented or misused in ways that lead to prejudice, disrespect, or other harm to participants or communities” (nhmrc, 2007, p. 43). secondly, “genetic information can sometimes be misused to stigmatize people or to discriminate against them unfairly” (nhmrc, 2007, p. 43). lastly, researchers must seek community, as well as individual, consent where: a) researchers propose to collect genetic material and information from individuals who are chosen because of their membership in a particular community; b) the research involves sensitivities for that community; and c) 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.6 there is known to be a culturally relevant community structure involved in such matters (nhmrc, 2007). the national statement also outlines how researchers should clearly describe their processes for data collection, storage, usage, and disclosure when planning a databank. these considerations include the following: ensuring that identifiers are removed from the data when used in the research; deciding how to make data results available to participants, taking into consideration the participant’s wellbeing; denying or restricting access to some or all of the data for uses that may be detrimental to those to whom the data relate; and ensuring that researchers seek specific, extended, or unspecified consent for future research (nhmrc, 2007). united states: indigenous research protection act. american indian and alaska native (ai/an) communities have an extensive history of research involvement, which unfortunately includes instances of group harm. one example of harmful research in indian country is described in the 2004 havasupai tribe lawsuit brought against researchers at arizona state university when discovering that samples donated for diabetes research were used for other purposes (dalton, 2004). researchers were using the tribe members’ samples to look at human migration patterns, inbreeding, and genes related to schizophrenia without their permission. the court case ended in a large settlement for tribal members and resulted in many ai/an communities seeking new ways of regulating research in their communities. native hawaiians also have a long history of being “subjects of research.” in the 1800s, citizens of the kingdom of hawai’i who had hansen’s disease were exiled to kalaupapa, a remote peninsula on the northern island of moloka’i. dr. edward arning, a government physician, conducted unethical studies on this population looking for the mode of transmission of leprosy (arning, 1886). the negative research experiences encountered by native hawaiians have continued into the 21st century. in one case, a family in a rural island community submitted blood samples for research hoping to obtain findings regarding a rare genetic condition (santos, 2008). however, informed consent was not upheld and follow-up was not provided to participants. a native hawaiian health organization advocated on the family’s behalf and required researchers to confirm their findings of the rare genetic disease. researchers did not provide any means for genetic counseling, treatment, or testing for the family. the burden of care was instead left to local health providers who had limited capability to address this rare disease (chang & lowenthal, 2001). in 2003, the university of hawaii proposed patenting the native hawaiian genome to provide both economic and health-related benefits for the native hawaiian people (singeo, 2007). in another instance, the university also intended to genetically modify kalo (taro), a traditional staple food of the hawaiian diet, culturally recognized by native hawaiians as being an ancestor (malo, 2006). the native hawaiian community strongly opposed these intentions (azambuja, 2008; niesse, 2007) and viewed these activities as acts of biopiracy and biocolonialism (paoakalani declaration, 2005). unfortunately, there are no formal u.s. research policies that exist for the conduct of health research in native american communities; although the indigenous peoples council on biocolonialism (ipcb) has developed a model research code known as the indigenous research protection act (irpa) (ipcb, 2000). the ipcb seeks to help ai/an communities protect themselves from harm in genetic research. the act intends to foster collaboration and sets the groundwork for tribes to allow some research to be done with their discretion. section 5 of the irpa (containing principles a-l inclusive, which are reproduced in appendix c) details the guiding principles for the research review committee (rrc) established under this act. section 11 (containing articles 11.1 to 11.7 inclusive in appendix c) concerns the use of biological samples. aim 2: comparative analysis canada, new zealand, australia, and the united states have developed specific processes regarding research conducted in their countries. a comparative analysis characterizing specific commonalities and differences among guidelines from each of the four countries is presented in table 2. in addition to outlining the specific findings for aim 1, table 2 also provides a foundation to meet the specific requirements of aim 2, which are to highlight top ethical concerns and priorities across indigenous research guidelines in the four countries and 7 taniguchi et al.: genomic research in indigenous communities published by scholarship@western, 2012 to provide a framework for indigenous communities interested in creating formal policies around the use of genetic information and protection of biological samples. standards have been developed by national and international organizations to assist researchers when consulting with communities about research. table 2 has been constructed based on principles outlined by richard sharp and morris foster (2002) in an analysis of research guidelines on the collection and use of human biological materials from american indian and alaskan native communities. these principles were chosen to guide this analysis because sharp and foster have been widely cited throughout discussions addressing genomic research among indigenous communities. the categories in table 2 are divided into five principles: community consultation, sample collection and informed consent, use and storage of biological materials, prioritization of research uses, and post-research obligations. guidelines are individually coded based on their inclusion or exclusion of 15 sub-principles. one axis of the table represents the 15 sub-principles, and the other represents research guidelines listed by country. this matrix applies sharp and foster’s existing framework to the most recent guidelines developed for ethical research around the use of genetic information and protection of biological samples among indigenous peoples. table 2. comparative analysis of indigenous research guidelines concerning genomic research across countries. canada new zealand australia united states community consultation in protocol development � before collection of samples � � � respect for cultural differences embodied � � � � formal community approval required � � � sample collection and informed consent done in a culturally sensitive manner � � � � possible collective harm (e.g. group discrimination) discussed as part of inform consent process � � � � use and storage of biological materials potential uses defined prior to sample collection � � � provision for withdrawal of samples (iw or cw) iw, cw cw discussion of secondary uses with contributors (di or dc) di, dc dc secondary uses require community approval � � prioritization of research uses should benefit contributing population � � clear position on commercial applications � � post-research obligations ongoing research updates to participating communities � � community review of study findings before release � � � need to develop local capacities � � bolded terms = leading principles of concern to indigenous peoples regarding genetic research � = identifies a sub-principle within a country’s guideline iw = individual withdrawal cw = community withdrawal di = discussion held with individual dc = discussion held with community 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.6 canada’s tri-council policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans (cihr, sshrc, & nserc, 2010) and guidelines for health research involving aboriginal people (cihr, 2007) encompass all sub-principles included in the table and, therefore, serve as the models for genomic research in indigenous communities. the canadian guidelines provided by cihr (2007) includes a checklist of what researchers should understand when conducting research with indigenous peoples. the guidelines address many of the concerns posed by indigenous groups, such as re-consent for secondary or multiple uses of samples, protection of indigenous rights, appreciation for intellectual property rights, and recognition of ownership and stewardship of biological samples (cihr, 2007). canada, alone, addresses the principle of community consultation during the design of research protocols. from principles of respect and cultural sensitivity to ensuring community participation throughout all stages of the research process, canada has demonstrated a successful participatory approach to working with its indigenous peoples and guiding health researchers in the values and ethics concerning genetic research within their communities. new zealand’s guidelines for researchers on health research involving maori (hrcnz, 2008) addressed principles of community consultation and informed consent specific to indigenous peoples. these guidelines provide no direction on the use and storage of biological materials or priorities regarding research use; yet, they do require a community review of study findings prior to information release. similarly, australia’s national statement on ethical conduct in research involving humans (nhmrc, 2003), with its minor provisions specific to indigenous research, acknowledges respect for cultural differences and addresses the principle of informed consent. it does not meet principles regarding the use and storage of biological materials; however, it does address that any potential use of samples needs to be defined prior to collection. the united states’ indigenous research protection act (ipcb, 2000) does not lag far behind canada in addressing the concerns of indigenous peoples; however, this act functions more as a proposal than an official act. it states that it “should be seen more as a cookbook than as a model to be adopted outright” (ipcb, 2000). the act addresses provisions for community withdrawal of samples and discussions with communities regarding secondary uses of biological materials; yet, fails to consider the individual in both cases. this is unlike canada’s cihr guidelines, which recognize that community consent often precedes individual consent when conducting research with indigenous peoples. limitations there are a few limitations to this study. one major challenge of the study was to extract key points from the guidelines of each of the countries. it is possible that this analysis fails to recognize significant crossovers due to wording and labeling differences. the formation of best practices of genomic research in indigenous communities may be aided by coalescing the information from different countries and forming a homogenous set of basic genetic research guidelines. this study is also limited due to the difficulty in assessing the relevancy and merit of guidelines within each country. only indigenous peoples can determine the effectiveness and appropriateness of principles presented in each of the guidelines. this comparative analysis is only able to review publicly accessible materials and highlight principles of concern that have long been identified by indigenous groups. further, the selection criteria for the guidelines included is limited to those created by english-speaking countries that specifically address genetic research with indigenous populations. discussion and policy implications this review uses a comparative analysis to examine the development of community-based research guidelines concerning genetic research in indigenous communities throughout canada, new zealand, australia, and the united states. genomic research is a growing field; one that involves collaboration between research communities and indigenous groups. indigenous communities have previous experience with abuse by researchers, which makes it important to develop ways of regulating research conducted with their people. 9 taniguchi et al.: genomic research in indigenous communities published by scholarship@western, 2012 unfortunately, regardless of established guidelines, indigenous peoples continue to experience the negative impacts of research, giving these groups reason not to trust researchers or the research process. in addition, there are limitations in the guidelines of each country because they are merely guides without any repercussions when the terms are violated. the havasupai, for example, still experienced deceit about the purposes of the research conducted, which led ai/an groups to seek new ways of protecting themselves and controlling research that is performed in their communities (dalton, 2004). in the mid-1990s, guidelines rarely recommended community consultation as a leading principle for conducting research with indigenous peoples; however, today’s current guidelines published by governmentrun organizations highlight the need for individual and community approval on issues such as secondary uses of data and withdrawal of samples (jacobs et al., 2010). an increasing number of guidelines also consider how to benefit participating indigenous communities when research tends to commercialize data (jacobs et al., 2010). there are on-going concern over data sharing agreements, the use of biospecimens for commercial purposes, and the return of research results to the participating community. another issue is whether there should be benefits provided to indigenous communities for their participation in genomic and biobank research. benefits of genetic research tend to be long-term, but more immediate benefits, such as providing health services and employment, should be provided to participating communities. benefit sharing arrangements should be in place prior to the decision of whether or not to participate in a study. if provisions are made for benefit sharing prior to the research being conducted, patterns of harm experienced by indigenous communities may be eliminated. community-based institutional review boards (irbs) and community advisory boards are formal boards that function to oversee research performed in communities; however, they may be limited in their ability to enforce violations. identifying best practices of indigenous guidelines across four countries may help to inform the development of policies that could be implemented to protect indigenous peoples from harm associated with genetic research. furthermore, this is crucial to building trust, preventing future harm, and addressing the negative impacts experienced by indigenous people. the results of the analysis suggest the importance of establishing research principles that apply to genetics, as identified by indigenous peoples in countries who share a long history of involvement with research issues. providing a clearinghouse of guidelines and resources may help simplify the creation of formal genomic research policies for indigenous communities. the comparative analysis comprises principles necessary to meet: 1) the ethical requirements of the research process and 2) the utilization and governance over information obtained from research. upholding all the principles may assist indigenous peoples in determining their own course in research. the use and storage of biological materials is a leading principle that, if addressed throughout all indigenous research guidelines, ensures indigenous peoples’ governance over their data. this, in addition to principles of informed consent, risks, benefits, and confidentiality are critical components to not only genomic research, but to the biobanking process as well. as research moves forward into the realm of genomic and biobank research, it is impossible to ignore the ethical and legal ramifications posed by informed consent requirements. for example, informed consent requires participants to have a thorough understanding of the research being conducted, but finding participants capable of providing this consent may be difficult given that it is a highly specialize and technical field of study. another daunting task to genomic research and the emergence of biobanks is informing participants of the risks and benefits of participation. while research findings may be linked back to the individual or community, the misuse of this information can still occur, as in the case of the havasupai and the “warrior gene” controversy in new zealand. since genetic material can provide information beyond individual participants, it is crucial to obtain community consent and establish provisions of control over how research will be reported back to the community. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.6 the comparative analysis suggests that principles established for the use and storage of biological materials need to ensure that: 1) research is first carried out ethically; and 2) research participants are not harmed by involvement in a biobank. unfortunately, many established biobank systems do not involve research participants in the decision-making process (kaye & stranger, 2009). for this reason, aboriginal communities in canada have proposed that blood and tissue accepted for research in their communities must be considered property of the donor or community involved. this essentially means that the samples are considered “on loan” to the researcher. the researcher becomes the warden holding dna (or other biological samples) for the purpose of research, while ownership remains with the participant or community. the concept of “dna on loan” enables research to be carried out, yet protects the interests of individuals, families, and communities involved (arbour & cook, 2006). it is critical that all principles addressing research processes and ethics become an integral part of the utilization and governance of information obtained from research. the principles outlined in table 2 are vital not only to genetic and genomic research, but to the overall governance structure of biobanks. a biobank governed by policies and guidelines that are engaged in ongoing dialogue with participants and the public stands the best chance for successful operation by maintaining public trust and support (kaye & stranger, 2009). raising awareness and interest is crucial to advancing the capacity for future research that can improve population and community health in indigenous peoples. recommendations indigenous research guidelines of canada, new zealand, australia, and the u.s. showcase common similarities and address present gaps that contribute to the research needs and concerns of indigenous communities. while indigenous communities in each country differ in numerous ways, the ethical principles outlined in table 2 demonstrate a common concern voiced by all indigenous groups – a need for principles regarding the use of genetic information and protection of biological samples. to provide a framework for other indigenous communities interested in creating formal policies around these research issues, recommendations include the following: 1. development of indigenous research guidelines concerning the use of genetic information and protection of biological samples throughout new zealand, australia, and the u.s. new zealand, australia, and the u.s. have developed valuable research documents; however, each is missing vital components to ensure that genetic research is conducted properly within their indigenous communities. separate guidelines need to be created to specifically address the unique issues of genetic research among indigenous peoples. within these guidelines, the use and protection of biological samples should also be addressed. in this case, canadian guidelines are helpful and may be used as a model. the organization for economic co-operation and development’s (oecd) document, guidelines on human biobanks and genetic research databases, was established through an international consortium, of which canada, new zealand, australia, and the u.s. are member countries (oecd, 2009). this document established the importance of community engagement prior to conducting research with these groups. the guidelines also provide direction for the development of human biobanks and genetic research databases (hbgrd). genetic research inevitably involves the collection of biological materials and the use and storage of this data; therefore, governance should be established early to ensure indigenous peoples share in the decisionmaking process and have control over their collective data. canada, once again, has addressed this need in their concept of “dna on loan.” 2. recognition of “trust” as a principle within indigenous research guidelines. the concept of trust is vital to genetic research and has been discussed in the development of biobanking guidelines. social, cultural, religious, and spiritual values and practices of indigenous peoples should be recognized and protected. if a trust relationship has been established between 11 taniguchi et al.: genomic research in indigenous communities published by scholarship@western, 2012 indigenous groups and researchers, this may warrant greater participation by indigenous peoples in genetic research. researchers can achieve a high level of trust with other communities by studying and upholding the principles addressed within table 2. trust is a key element addressed in the uk biobank ethics and governance framework (uk biobank, 2007). the oecd guidelines on human biobanks and genetic research databases also make reference to this concept (oecd, 2009). 3. implementation of a policy or law to enforce repercussive actions on those who violate the rights of indigenous peoples through research. consent is necessary in research and must ensure the respect and protection of research participants; however, providing informed consent has always been problematic with regard to biobanking. indigenous populations may be unwilling to consent to future research that is unspecified for fear that research done would stigmatize their community. in the case of the havasupai, a number of violations occurred, but failure of tribal members to provide informed consent was the one count charged since the law was upheld. enforcing actions of repercussion will ensure that research communities conduct research in a way that is ethical and, also, prevent harm done to indigenous groups. the research environment continues to evolve as genomic research and biobanks emerge; however, these types of research may be unsuccessful if they fail to address the principles that indigenous communities have identified as concerns. canada’s success in indigenous research guideline development should be studied when considering the development of guidelines in other indigenous communities. research communities should apply the current knowledge and uphold the principles that concern indigenous groups. mahatma ghandi states, “the measure of a country’s greatness should be based on how well it cares for its most vulnerable populations.” by identifying principles that work for indigenous people, this will lead to best practices for all people. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.6 references arbour, l. 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(2007). uk biobank ethics and governance framework. london: uk biobank ethics and governance council. retrieved from www.ukbiobank.ac.uk/docs/egflatestjan20082.pdf. white, a., wong, w., sureshkumur, p., & singh, g. (2010). the burden of kidney disease in indigenous children of australia and new zealand, epidemiology, antecedent factors and progression to chronic kidney disease. journal of paediatrics and child health, 46(9), 504-509. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.6 appendix a tri-council policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans a. application of core principles to genetic research article 13.1 – guidance regarding a proportionate approach to research ethics review, consent, privacy, confidentiality, research with human biological materials, and other ethical guidance described in earlier chapters of this policy apply equally to human genetic research b. plans for managing information revealed through genetic research article 13.2 – researchers conducting genetic research shall (a) in their research proposal, develop a plan for managing information that may be revealed through their genetic research; (b) submit their plan to the reb; and (c) advise prospective participants of the plan for managing information revealed through the research. article 13.3 – where researchers plan to share findings with individuals, researchers shall provide participants with an opportunity to (a) make informed choices about whether they wish to receive information about themselves; and (b) express preferences about whether information will be shared with biological relatives or others with whom the participants have a family, community, or group relationship. c. genetic counseling article 13.4 – where researchers plan to share results of genetic research with participants, the research proposal should make genetic counseling available at that time, where appropriate. d. genetic research involving families article 13.5 – researchers who seek to recruit members of a family to participate in genetic research shall (a) ensure recruitment processes respect privacy and other personal interests of family members; and (b) seek consent from individual family members. e. genetic research involving communities and groups article 13.6 – where researchers intend to recruit participants for genetic research based on their membership in specific communities or groups, it may be appropriate for researchers to discuss the research with community or group members, and /or their leaders, in addition to seeking consent from individual participants. in these cases, researchers shall provide details to the reb about their proposed methods for engaging in discussion. f. genetic material banks article 13.7 (a) researchers who propose research involving the collection and banking of genetic material shall indicate in their research proposal, and in the information they provide to prospective participants, how they plan to address the associated ethical issues, including confidentiality, privacy, storage, use of the data and results, possibility of commercialization of research findings, and withdrawal by participants, as well as future contact of participants, families, communities, and groups. (b) researchers who propose research involving the secondary use of previously collected and banked genetic material shall, likewise, indicate in their research proposal how they plan to address associated ethical issues. original source: canadian institutes of health research, national sciences and engineering research council of canada, & social sciences and humanities research council of canada. (2010). tri-council policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans. ottawa: authors. 17 taniguchi et al.: genomic research in indigenous communities published by scholarship@western, 2012 appendix b guidelines for health research involving aboriginal people 2.12 initial and secondary use, proprietary interest, and storage and transfer of data and biological samples article 12.1 – a researcher should recognize and respect the rights and proprietary interests of individuals and the community in data and biological samples generated or taken in the course of the research article 12.2 – transfer of data and biological samples from one of the original parties to a research agreement, to a third party, requires consent of the other original party(ies). article 12.3 – secondary use of data or biological samples requires specific consent from the individual donor and, where appropriate, the community. however, if the research data or biological samples cannot be traced back to the individual donor then consent for secondary use need not be obtained from the individual. similarly, if research data or biological samples cannot be traced back to the community, then its consent for secondary use is not required. article 12.4 – where the data or biological samples are known to have originated with aboriginal people, the researcher should consult with the appropriate aboriginal organizations before initiating secondary use. article 12.5 – secondary use requires reb (research ethics board) review. original source: canadian institutes of health research. (2007). cihr guidelines for health research involving aboriginal people. retrieved from http://www.cihr-irsc.gc.ca/e/29134.html. 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.6 appendix c indigenous research protection act (irpa) section 5. guiding principles for rrc (a) principle of fully informed consent after full disclosure and consultation research should not be conducted until there has been full consultation with all potentially affected tribal communities and individuals, and each such community and individual has approved the research after full disclosure. full disclosure is of the full range of potential benefits and harms of the research, all relevant affiliations of the person(s) or organization(s) seeking to undertake the research, and all sponsors of researcher(s). (b) principle of immediate risks and benefits to the tribal community the research should be of immediate benefit to the tribal community, and the risks associated with the research should be less significant than the benefits to be gained. (c) principle of confidentiality this principle recognizes that the tribe and local communities, at their sole discretion, have the right to exclude from publication and/or to have kept confidential any information concerning their culture, traditions, mythologies, or spiritual beliefs. furthermore, researchers and other potential users shall guarantee such confidentiality. (d) principle of respect this principle recognizes the necessity for researchers to respect the integrity, morality, and spirituality of the culture, traditions, and relationships of tribal members with the world, and to avoid the imposition of external conceptions and standards. (e) principle of communication this principle recognizes that communications should be carried out in the local language, using translators as necessary. (f) principle of empowerment this principle recognizes that empowerment is the sharing of power and is premised on mutual respect. empowerment means that each affected party feels that their needs are being met through a fair and equitable manner. empowerment also means that research authorship must be shared between the tribal community and the researcher. (g) principle of equity this principle recognizes that equity is a sharing of resources. both the researchers and the tribe must bring equity to any research contract, agreement, or understanding. each of the participants in a good research agreement must evaluate such equity in relation to the research. finance or money is only one form of equity. community knowledge, networks, personnel, and political or social power are other forms of equity useful to the project. each of these commodities has value and must be shared between the researchers and the tribe if a good agreement is to be formulated. the parties must continuously review equity over the duration of a research agreement. (h) principle of mutual respect this principle recognizes that, in order to develop a good research agreement, the researchers and the tribe must generate respect for each other. respect is generated by understanding the social, political, and cultural structures of the other party. the researchers and the tribes cannot assume that they believe in the same things or share the same goals and expectations. good communication is required if a proper research agreement is to be generated. cultural sensitivity training for the researchers and tribal awareness presentations will help develop a mutual understanding in conducting the research project. definitions and assumptions must be clarified and questioned by each side and set forth in an agreement. the tribes and the researchers must listen to each other with open minds. (i) principle of prior rights this principle recognizes that indigenous peoples, traditional societies, and local communities 19 taniguchi et al.: genomic research in indigenous communities published by scholarship@western, 2012 have prior, proprietary rights and interests over all air, land, and waterways, and the natural resources within them that these peoples have traditionally inhabited or used, together with all knowledge, and intellectual property, and traditional resource rights associated with such resources and their use. (j) principle of self-determination this principle recognizes that indigenous peoples, traditional societies, and local communities have a right to self determination and that researchers and associated organizations will acknowledge and respect such rights in their dealings with these peoples and their communities. (k) principle of inalienability this principle recognizes the inalienable rights of indigenous peoples in relation to their traditional territories, and the natural resources within them, and associated traditional knowledge. these rights are collective by nature but can include individual rights. it shall be for indigenous peoples to determine for themselves the nature and scope of their resource rights regimes. (l) principle of traditional guardianship this principle recognizes the holistic interconnectedness of humanity with the ecosystems of our sacred earth and the obligation and responsibility of indigenous peoples to preserve and maintain their role as traditional guardians of these ecosystems through the maintenance of their cultures, mythologies, spiritual beliefs, and customary practices. section 11. regulation of biological samples article 11.1 – any researcher who seeks to collect, acquire, or analyze any biological samples must agree and abide by the following conditions with regard to research with biological materials. article 11.2 – the tribe may, at any time, decide to withdraw from the research project, or any portion thereof, and request the return of all biological samples. the researcher, and any other parties, must comply. article 11.3 – upon completion of the research project, or termination or cancellation of the project at any time prior to completion, the biological samples must be completely and fully returned to the possession of the tribe. article 11.4 – no biological samples from this study may be released to, or used by, any other researcher(s), research institution, or any other entity, whether public or private, without the prior and fully informed written approval of the tribe. article 11.5 – if the tribe permits any biological samples to be stored in any other locations, the researcher shall maintain at all times a complete list thereof. the list shall include a description of the sample or data, source, specific use or purpose of each item, responsible person(s) at the location, where the item is housed (e.g., in a “gene bank” or on a specific computer), and any relevant timelines with regard to use, disposition, return, or destruction of the samples or data. the researcher shall provide an updated copy of the list to the tribe whenever changes are made. the updated list shall include identification of changes made since the last copy of the list was provided to the tribe. article 11.6 – any situation where biological samples will leave the possession or control of the researcher will require a separate agreement between the tribe and the external party in accordance with this act. article 11.7 – no entity may seek to patent or commercialize any biological materials obtained from the tribe, from the tribe’s jurisdiction, or under the authority of the tribe. this includes genetic samples, any copies of the original genetic samples, any cell lines containing copies of the original genetic samples, and data derived from these samples. original source: indigenous peoples council on biocolonialism. (2000). indigenous research protection act. retrieved from http://www.ipcb.org/publications/policy/files/irpa.html. 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.6 the international indigenous policy journal march 2012 a comparative analysis of indigenous research guidelines to inform genomic research in indigenous communities nicole k. taniguchi maile taualii jay maddock recommended citation a comparative analysis of indigenous research guidelines to inform genomic research in indigenous communities abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license microsoft word 297066-text.native.1337262021.doc scientific certainty in a time of uncertainty: predicting vulnerability of canada's first nations to pandemic h1n1/09 the international indigenous policy journal volume 1 | issue 1 article 1 may 2010 scientific certainty in a time of uncertainty: predicting vulnerability of canada's first nations to pandemic h1n1/09 nicholas spence university of western ontario, nspence@uwo.ca jerry p. w hite university of western ontario, white@uwo.ca recommended citation spence, n. , white, j. p. (2010). scientific certainty in a time of uncertainty: predicting vulnerability of canada's first nations to pandemic h1n1/09. th e international indigenous policy journal, 1(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.1 this editorial is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. scientific certainty in a time of uncertainty: predicting vulnerability of canada's first nations to pandemic h1n1/09 abstract on june 11, 2009, the director general of the world health organization, dr. margaret chan, announced that the scientific evidence indicated that the criteria for an influenza pandemic had been met: pandemic h1n1/09 virus, the first in nearly 40 years, was officially upon us. the world health organization has estimated that as many as 2 billion or between 15 and 45 percent of the population globally will be infected by the h1n1/09 virus. scientists and governments have been careful to walk a line between causing mass public fear and ensuring people take the risks seriously. the latest information indicates that the majority of individuals infected with the h1n1/09 virus thus far have suffered mild illness, although very severe and fatal illness have been observed in a small number of cases, even in young and healthy people (world health organization 2009c). there is no evidence to date that the virus has mutated to a more virulent or lethal form; however, as we enter the second wave of the pandemic, a significant number of people in countries across the world are susceptible to infection. most importantly, certain subgroups have been categorized as high risk given the clinical evidence to date. one of these subgroups is indigenous populations (world health organization 2009c). keywords pandemic h1n1/09 virus, swine-origin influenza, access to care, indigenous population, health creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/     introduction on june 11, 2009, the director general of the world health organization, dr. margaret chan, announced that the scientific evidence indicated that the criteria for an influenza pandemic had been met: pandemic h1n1/09 virus, the first in nearly 40 years, was officially upon us. the world health organization has estimated that as many as 2 billion or between 15 and 45 percent of the population globally will be infected by the h1n1/09 virus. scientists and governments have been careful to walk a line between causing mass public fear and ensuring people take the risks seriously. the latest information indicates that the majority of individuals infected with the h1n1/09 virus thus far have suffered mild illness, although very severe and fatal illness have been observed in a small number of cases, even in young and healthy people (world health organization 2009c).i there is no evidence to date that the virus has mutated to a more virulentii or lethal form; however, as we enter the second wave of the pandemic, a significant number of people in countries across the world are susceptible to infection. most importantly, certain subgroups have been categorized as high risk given the clinical evidence to date. one of these subgroups is indigenous populations (world health organization 2009c). in canada, one of the world’s best countries to live, a nation with great health care, an educated populace, and a high standard of living, pandemic h1n1/09 has made its mark already. poor outcomes have been observed disproportionately in the aboriginal population. the events that transpired over the last few months in st. theresa point and garden hill, both remote communities in northern manitoba, where h1n1/09 virus outbreaks occurred, reminded us once again of the plight of our first people. at the national level, the public health agency of canada (2009b) released the most recent data to date on the pandemic h1n1/09 for the week ending august 22, 2009, illustrating 1 spence and white: scientific certainty in a time of uncertainty published by scholarship@western, 2010   the disproportionate impact of the pandemic. aboriginals constitute 3 percent of the national population yet they represent 12.6 percent of confirmed cases of the h1n1/09 virus, 17 percent of associated hospitalizations and 14 percent of cases admitted to icu (public health agency of canada 2009b). the rate of infection among aboriginals has not gone unnoticed. the related decisions of policy makers have been subject to much debate and scrutiny over the last few months, where major breakdowns in the provision of service by the government, including a shortage of pandemic supplies, inadequate health care, and insufficient training, were experienced. dr. kim barker, the public health physician with the assembly of first nations warns, “we’re talking about a handful of communities right now…if they can’t shift a few masks onto an airplane right now, what will it be like when we’re dealing with dozens and dozens of first nations communities this fall and winter?” (white 2009b). overall, a survey of the coverage on this issue has centered on a recurring theme for those versed in aboriginal issues, including the social determinants of health (access to health care, water, socioeconomic status, and housing). of pressing concern is how aboriginal peoples will fare as we enter the second wave of pandemic h1n/09?iii on may 8, 2009, dr. margaret chan, director general of the world health organization, was quoted as saying, “this is a time of great uncertainty for all countries, and great pressure on ministers and ministries of health. the only certain thing that can be said about influenza viruses is that their behavior is entirely unpredictable. no one can say how the current situation will evolve” (world health organization 2009f). although we know more than back in may, we are still in a state of uncertainty in many respects as we enter the fall flu season. as scientists, our main objective is to bring attention to this matter and develop ways to assist in mitigating the effects of the pandemic. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.1   our work starts with a review of the factors most likely to increase susceptibility to h1n1/09 infection, with the goal of understanding the vulnerability of aboriginal people while focusing on first nations in canada.iv next, we outline some of the main issues that have surfaced since the initial h1n1/09 virus outbreak earlier this spring and, in light of these events, we suggest a model for predicting outbreaks in first nations communities, identifying those communities lacking the capacity to adequately deal with the burden of a pandemic. in a time of fiscal restraint such information is important in allocating resources strategically. the world health organization warns that capacity will be tested as countries face outbreaks and tough decisions are forced to be made (world health organization 2009a). background: the context of susceptibility let us begin by exploring what we currently know about the pandemic h1n1/09. the virus responsible for the pandemic is novel swine-origin influenza virus 2009 a(h1n1).v it is deemed novel due to its never-before-seen physical characteristics acquired by a reassortment of genes with swine, avian, and human viruses (chang et al., 2009; maines et al., 2009). however, this is not the only novel aspect of this h1n1 virus. its infection patterns are proving to be quite interesting and unexpected as well. as dr. donald low, chief microbiologist at mount sinai hospital in toronto, says, “this thing has not followed any of the rules. it obviously didn’t read the pandemic plan that we had formulated” (alphonso and galloway 2009). specifically interesting about this virus is how it targets young persons, pregnant women, and aboriginal populations (dawood et al., 2009; jamieson et al., 2009; kermode-scott 2009). all of these warrant further investigation, but the focus here is on aboriginals. the implications for this group are easy to see when one considers that although aboriginal people compose one tenth of the population in manitoba, they make up approximately one third of all documented cases of the 3 spence and white: scientific certainty in a time of uncertainty published by scholarship@western, 2010   h1n1/09 virus in the province (barber 2009a). why? we will show that this disproportionate burden of infection can most likely be explained by the social characteristics of the aboriginal population that is “at risk.” this task is perhaps more difficult than it seems as the virus’s recent emergence means that data on at risk populations is still in the collection stage (chang et al., 2009). a solution to this shortcoming is to look at data from seasonal influenza and past pandemics, specifically the 1918 influenza pandemic. comparison to seasonal influenza is not an oversimplification as it has been shown that although the h1n1/09 virus has produced elevated respiratory disease compared with seasonal influenza viruses, it had less efficient respiratory droplet transmission while efficient direct contact transmission was retained (maines et al., 2009). thus, it can be reasonably expected that those most at risk for seasonal influenza will also be at risk for contracting pandemic influenza (chang et al., 2009). moreover, observations and lessons learned from the 1918 spanish influenza pandemic can be applied to pandemic h1n1/09, as there are many similarities between the two viruses. that being said, there are many more mechanisms to mitigate the disastrous outcomes associated with the 1918 pandemic, which killed 20-50 million people worldwide and decimated indigenous communities. our comparison is not unique; the pandemic h1n1/09 has been compared to the 1918 pandemic by others. dr. ethan rubinstein, a professor of infectious diseases at the university of manitoba, argues that the h1n1/09 virus will follow the pattern of the 1918 pandemic and the spread of the disease will likely be similar (skerritt 2009b). these similarities are fairly complex and are deserving of their own review, but to put it very briefly, both viruses are novel influenza a(h1n1) viruses with high transmission rates (reid and taubenberger 2003). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.1   impairment of host defense any characteristic of a population or community that impairs the ability of people to produce a sufficient immune response will result in an elevated infection rate. one such characteristic would be high malnutrition rates. deficiencies in micronutrients, such as vitamin e or selenium, have been tied to compromised immune response and increased susceptibility to infection (louria 2007). high rates of smoking will also exaggerate the infection rate as smokers are more likely to contract influenza than non-smokers (arcavi and benowitz 2004). particularly relevant to today’s pandemic is a strain of influenza a(h1n1) that circulated in the 1980s and was shown to infect smokers more often than non-smokers (kark, lebiush, and rannon 1982). furthermore, existing chronic disease impairs immune functioning, resulting in an increased likelihood of influenza infection and an elevated mortality rate (barker and mullooly 1982; szucs 1999). therefore, it can be assumed that populations with increased incidence of chronic disease will have an increased risk of infection. exposure to virus factors that increase exposure to any form of influenza will also result in elevated infection rates of the h1n1/09 virus. an obvious contributor to this is housing conditions. overcrowding of households not only increases frequency of exposure but also causes larger doses of infecting virus (mathews et al., 2009). larger virus dose is associated with increased illness severity and infection rate (conenello et al., 2007), as it overwhelms the immune system before it can produce an immune response (matthews et al., 2009). education has also been shown to be associated with the rate of respiratory infection. in fact, the respiratory infection rate in children of mothers with primary and vocational education was more than twice that of those in children of mothers with university education, even when economic variables were held 5 spence and white: scientific certainty in a time of uncertainty published by scholarship@western, 2010   constant (pawlinska-chmara and wronka 2007). presumably, these mothers, in comparison to mothers with higher education, were deficient in teaching proper techniques to avoid exposure to illness (such as hand washing) and less likely to seek out proper medical care. thus, individuals with less education can be expected to be at higher risk of contracting influenza. access to care inadequate access to quality care will no doubt influence complications associated with contracting the h1n1/09 virus, particularly in severe cases. isolated rural communities are particularly vulnerable as, in general, they: have “local health care systems” that are smaller; a greater distance from patients; and, are under-resourced in comparison to those in urban areas (rowland and lyons 1989). furthermore, children from low income families have limited access to care, as shown by the increased likelihood of having unmet health care needs, no regular health care provider, and less prescription medicine use as compared to their high socioeconomic status counterparts (larson and halfon 2009). compounded effects it is important to note that the above categories are not mutually exclusive or exhaustive. many factors have compounded effects that make the population possessing these characteristics even more vulnerable to the h1n1/09 virus. take for instance overcrowded housing conditions. under normal circumstances, isolation or reduced contact with those individuals who are severely ill and possess a highly virulent strain of a virus can have a negative selection effect on the viral genes, as fitness and transmission of the genes are decreased. however, in overcrowded conditions where exposure to the virus cannot be mitigated, there is no environmental or behavioral negative selection process at work, which means that any mutation resulting in 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.1   increased reproduction will have a selective advantage that may be more virulent in nature as well (mathews et al., 2009). isolation, discussed earlier in its effects on access to care, also plays a very important role in immunity. new variants arise from, and subsequently replace, ancestor strains (nelson and holmes 2007). this relatedness results in significant cross-immunity between variants with a specific subtype, such as within h1n1 types (ferguson, galvani, and bush 2003). thus, those populations in isolation, with no past exposure to many forms of influenza are not protected by any prior immunity; in other words, they are immunologically naïve, which likely results in higher viral multiplication, burden and transmitted dose as well as increased virulence (mathews et al., 2009). even malnutrition has further effects other than its impairment of host defense. in fact, it has been shown that malnutrition causes genomic changes in the virus that make it more virulent although the exact mechanism is unknown (louria 2007). socioeconomic status it should be noted that the overarching cause of many of the problems mentioned is low socioeconomic status. not only is it responsible for creating these conditions through material/social deprivation, but low relative socioeconomic status has been associated with a greater likelihood of influenza infection as well (cohen et al., 2008). deviation from seasonal influenza many individuals have compared the seasonal influenza to the h1n1/09 virus. according to the world health organization (2009d), there are four major differences between the h1n1/09 virus and seasonal influenza based on observations to date: a) h1n1/09 virus infects more people in affected areas; b) seasonal influenza infects people of all ages, but the vast 7 spence and white: scientific certainty in a time of uncertainty published by scholarship@western, 2010   majority of h1n1/09 virus cases have been under the age of 50; c) seasonal influenza is most likely to cause severe illness in the very young and elderly, but the h1n1/09 virus has caused such symptoms in healthy people between 25 and 44. in seasonal influenza, the elderly are more likely to contract respiratory infections due to a weakening immune system (meyer 2001). however, during pandemic influenza, as seen in the 1918 pandemic, the elderly may display partial immunity having been exposed to a previous related virus at some point in their lives and very young children are still protected by innate immunity (ahmed, oldstone, and palese 2007; mathews et al., 2009). these factors mean that the burden of disease falls on young adults (murray et al., 2006). this phenomenon is being observed once again in canada where the median infection age is 21 years of age (alphonso and galloway 2009); d) unlike the seasonal flu, 40-50% of cases with the h1n1/09 virus have suffered from diarrhea.vi are aboriginals “at risk?” having identified the conditions or variables which may increase susceptibility to the h1n1/09 virus, we provide a brief overview of the distribution of these variables among aboriginals and the general canadian population, in order to assess the relative risk of the former. always keep in mind that influenza pandemics develop based on three sets of factors: the characteristics of the virus; the characteristics of the population under attack; and, the environment. the 2002/2003 first nations regional longitudinal health survey revealed that first nations adults have four times the canadian diabetes rate and 40 percent are overweight, suggesting malnutrition and inadequate physical activity (assembly of first nations 2007). furthermore, nearly half of all individuals who are first nations are daily smokers and adults have a higher frequency of various chronic diseases, when compared to the general canadian 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.1   population (assembly of first nations 2007). in 2006, the number of first nations living in overcrowded conditions was four times greater than the rate for all of canada (macaulay 2009). the first nations regional longitudinal health survey also reported socioeconomic conditions: over 50 percent of first nations adults living in first nations communities did not graduate high school, compared to just one third in the canadian population (assembly of first nations 2007; white et al., 2009); approximately 50 percent of first nations adults reported working for pay compared to 57 percent of the canadian population (assembly of first nations 2007). in terms of geography, just over half of first nations people live either on reserves or in rural non-reserve areas (assembly of first nations 2007), whereas approximately only 20 percent of the general canadian population resides in rural areas (statistics canada 2005). according to the first nations regional longitudinal health survey, access to care was associated with residing in reserve and rural non-reserve areas, with one in five adults reporting having no doctor or nurse available in his or her area (assembly of first nations 2007). all these characteristics would contribute to increased risk of h1n1/09 virus infection rates in first nations. however, first nations people have additional unique characteristics beyond the conditions just mentioned that make them particularly vulnerable. for example, demographically one fifth of first nations are under the age of nineteen, double the proportion of canadians in that age group, as well as having higher fertility rates, indicating high pregnancy rates (assembly of first nations 2007). as discussed earlier, pandemic influenza targets young adults and pregnant women which would, once again, result in a disproportionately high infection rate among this relatively young group with high fertility rates. in assessing risk, it is important to note the drawbacks of the research. first of all, homogeneity of aboriginals and canadians is typically assumed, when in fact these populations 9 spence and white: scientific certainty in a time of uncertainty published by scholarship@western, 2010   are incredibly varied (groom et al., 2009). although the comparison of pandemic h1n1/09 and seasonal influenza viruses is well recognized, deviation has been noted earlier in this paper. this raises the issue of whether further deviations will be observed. at this point, it can be concluded that the elevated risk of infection among first nations can be attributed, at least partially, to poor social conditions. out of necessity, most studies we looked at related either to what makes a population vulnerable to infection or to the current state of first nations conditions. references used in this review were, for the most part, not a direct investigation of the effects of social conditions in first nation populations on pandemic influenza susceptibility and transmission. in fact, despite its importance, there is a limited body of research investigating the direct effect of social conditions on pandemic influenza transmission in aboriginal and non-aboriginal communities. although it will never be argued that efforts should not be focused on reducing the negative effects of current pandemics, we must remember that future pandemics are not a question of if, but when (reid and taubenberger 2003). in order to best prepare for this pandemic and the inevitable ones in the future, especially among vulnerable populations, studies must be developed that will fill the existing void in the literature. only then, with a better understanding of the importance of social determinants in the control of the spread of infectious disease, can certain social health issues be prioritized and brought to the forefront of public policy to better the health of vulnerable populations and the world as a whole. indigenous populations at risk: patterns across the globe what is the global picture? international data on the links between indigenous socioeconomic conditions and health are noteworthy given the global nature of pandemic h1n1/09. as seen in table 1, there is a pattern of inequality between indigenous peoples and the 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.1   respective general populations of different countries. the correspondence between low socioeconomic conditions and health is beyond shocking. the relative standard of living of the indigenous segment of the populations across the world, including australia, canada, new zealand, and the united states is well below what we would expect in these highly developed countries. for example, in an adaptationvii of the united nations human development index (hdi) to measure aboriginal conditions in canada in 2000/2001, it was found that as a country, canada scored near the top of the international hdi rankings, but registered indians living on-reserve ranked at the 54th level in the world, with significantly lower income, education, and life expectancy (cooke et al., 2007). congruent with this data, reports of indigenous populations being infected with the pandemic h1n1/09 virus at a much higher rate than the general population have been documented globally. for example, in australia, as of late july, the highest per capita h1n1/09 flu outbreak had occurred in the northern territory where 30 per cent of the population is indigenous. furthermore, it has been reported that the indigenous people are five times more likely to be hospitalized than the general population when infected with the h1n1/09 virus (ryan 2009). dr. paul bauert, who serves as the president of the nt branch of the australian medical association explains that “many (indigenous people) are living in conditions of poverty and there is a lot of crowding in houses so that this infection, which is spread very easily, tends to run very quickly” (ryan 2009). sadly, this is the norm worldwide. another issue has arisen in south america, where reports have confirmed that members of the matsigenka ethnic group in the peruvian amazon have tested positive for the h1n1/09 virus. the tribe makes its home along the urubamba river, near a reserve set aside for so-called uncontacted tribes. human rights groups fear the h1n1/09 virus could spread to the more 11 spence and white: scientific certainty in a time of uncertainty published by scholarship@western, 2010   isolated people. there is some worry that some indigenous communities living in voluntary isolation have historically been vulnerable to diseases brought by outsiders, with indigenous populations in the americas having suffered centuries of losses after europeans arrived (cuthand 2009). as mentioned earlier, these immunologically naive populations are at risk of high attack rates and mortality (mathews et al., 2009). world health organization senior influenza expert dr. keji fukuda commented in early june that reports from manitoba on the aboriginal population were troubling since these vulnerable populations have been struck quite heavily during previous pandemics (skerritt 2009a). for example, the spanish flu pandemic of 1918 decimated aboriginal populations, with the death rate up to 600 per 1000 population in remote areas of alaska, and 42 per 1000 population for the maori in new zealand. to put these figures into perspective, worldwide the approximate deaths per 1000 population was 2-25 (mathews et al., 2009). health authorities have attributed this to the social conditions of this population. the infection of indigenous people is particularly troubling in poorer countries, lacking the capacity to adequately care for the majority of the population, much less the relatively impoverished indigenous peoples (world health organization 2009a). 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.1   australia non-aboriginal aboriginal and torres strait islander aboriginal-non-aboriginal gap life expectancy 82.8 59.6 23.2 median income (2000 ppp$) 21767 12268 9499 education* 0.69 0.31 0.38 hdi rank 4 104 100 canada non-aboriginal canadian registered indian gap life expectancy 78.7 72.9 5.8 median income (2000 ppp$) 27617 14824 12793 educationt 0.79 0.44 0.35 hdi rank 8 54 46 new zealand non aboriginal maori gap life expectancy 79.6 71.1 8.5 income (2000 ppp$) 29756 23024 6732 educationl 0.63 0.37 0.27 hdi rank 20 74 54 united states nonaboriginal american indian and alaska native gap life expectancy 76.6 70.6 6.0 13 spence and white: scientific certainty in a time of uncertainty published by scholarship@western, 2010   *proportion 18-24 still in school or with highest educational qualification year 12 or equivalent t proportion 18-24 with secondary school certificate, some college, trades or technical, or university l proportion 18-24 with sixth form or higher qualification rproportion 18-24 with high school graduation, ged, or higher educational attainment table 1: 2000/2001 international comparison of human development indicators for indigenous and general populations across four countries (adapted from cooke et al., 2007) income (2000 ppp$) 21050 16000 5050 educationr 0.75 0.67 0.08 hdi rank 7 31 24 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.1     early outbreaks of pandemic h1n1/09 in manitoba, canada: a sign of things to come? with growing public concern about the h1n1 virus in canada, prime minister stephen harper was quoted on april 30, 2009 as saying, “i think we are doing everything that is necessary to respond to this situation at this time” (cbc news 2009). this reassurance was far from comforting given the events that would eventually transpire in first nations communities in northern manitoba. the end of the flu season tends to coincide with early spring; however, the h1n1/09 virus had begun wreaking havoc over the summer months, with aboriginal communities being afflicted at a disproportionate rate than the general population (canwest news service 2009). most notably, in manitoba, by mid july, while aboriginals constituted 14 percent of the population, they accounted for one third of all cases and two thirds of the cases in intensive care for the h1n1/09 virus (alphonso 2009a, 2009b; lang 2009).viii two reserve communities in the island lake area (st. theresa point and garden hill), approximately 600 km northeast of winnipeg, accessible by plane only, were hit hard.ix first nations leaders in manitoba have stated that reserves do not possess the capacity to handle large scale outbreaks given the social conditions of their communities, which include inadequate access to quality health care and safe drinking water as well as overcrowded and poor housing conditions (skerritt 2009a). indeed, reports of inadequate basic medical resources and treatment as well as delays in responding to the situation in first nations communities have been documented (godbout 2009; white 2009a). for example, nursing stations were inadequate in treating cases in many cases with patients having to be medivaced to hospitals in urban centers such as winnipeg (godbout 2009). the effects on the health care system had been a cause of 15 spence and white: scientific certainty in a time of uncertainty published by scholarship@western, 2010     concern with reported strains on emergency rooms and intensive care units (canwest news service 2009). in the midst of an outbreak, in mid june, chief david harper of the garden hill first nation indicated that the band had spent $15,000 for basic pandemic supplies, such as hand sanitizers, surgical masks and other medical supplies which were supposed to be supplied by the federal government as per the canadian pandemic influenza plan (canadian newspapers 2009; white 2009a, 2009b). the money came from the community’s education fund which was going to be used for laptops and rewarding students with perfect school attendance (engelhart 2009). antiviral medication was pretty much absent from garden hill and st. theresa point; and, chiefs have expressed doubts regarding its availability in the near future (santin 2009a; skerritt and santin 2009). the situation had become so severe that community leaders from the island lake area requested a personal meeting with federal health minister aglukkaq and indian affairs minister strahl to outline the serious concerns of their communities. they made calls for an emergency field hospital in the island lake region to provide surrounding communities with a more appropriate level of care. this proposal was rejected on the basis that it would slow down efforts to prevent the outbreak in their respective communities (barrera 2009a, 2009b). federal health officials have stated that they are committed to protecting the health and well-being of first nations across the country but critics, such as senators, aboriginal leaders, and opposition politicians, have expressed deep concerns with the response by the federal government. for example, ndp mp niki ashton has argued that the pandemic plan is full of paper but thin on resources (barrera 2009b). in a similar vein, manitoba senator sharon carstairs described the situation as not gaining the attention it deserves given the lack of 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.1     planning before the outbreak, including medivac flights with improper infection control in place, a lack of hand sanitizers, and inadequate pandemic training of chiefs (rabson 2009c). the situation in the canadian province of manitoba showed that the provincial and federal governments have had their share of problems during the earlier stages of the crisis. this is evidenced by some of the issues that have arisen: (1) health canada and the province of manitoba have not reached an agreement on how to deal with pandemics on reserves. provincial health minister theresa oswald expressed frustration with jurisdictional issues preventing the province from contributing more in response to the h1n1/09 virus. concretely, the federal government turned down the province of manitoba’s offer to assist ottawa with pandemic planning on first nations thirteen times over a four week period this last spring until the flu outbreak had occurred in st. theresa point (three confirmed cases of the h1n1/09 virus and hundreds more reporting flu like symptoms as of early june); and, (2) a lack of leadership in disseminating key information on pandemics to first nations, including communication issues related to provincial privacy laws, which were prohibiting authorities from sharing confirmed or suspected cases on reserves with aboriginal leaders (huber and rabson 2009; rabson and kusch 2009). in june 2009, a senate probe of the federal government’s response to the h1n1/09 virus outbreak on remote reserves in manitoba was conducted. it was revealed that the government had made several controversial decisions, including delaying sending hand sanitizers to communities in the early stages of the outbreak reportedly because of fears that individuals would ingest the high alcohol based gel. masks, respirators and hand sanitizers were not delivered to the region even as conditions had deteriorated. the federal government eventually delivered 2500 bottles of alcohol based sanitizer to garden hill first nation as the community 17 spence and white: scientific certainty in a time of uncertainty published by scholarship@western, 2010     waited for two and a half weeks despite community leaders pleading with officials in ottawa for these supplies (kirbyson 2009; white 2009a). this was a problem since nearly 4000 people in the community do not have running water and are unable to wash their hands frequently. critics have called the reason cited for inaction paternalistic, racist, and ignorant, given the small number of individuals who might abuse such substances in the entire community (fitzpatrick 2009). essentially, while the government discussed the merits of alcohol based sanitizer, major outbreaks were occurring. it was also disclosed that some communities requested alcohol free hand sanitizer given the “dry” policy of the reserves but the government did not have any, according to deputy minister anne-marie robinson of the first nations and inuit branch of health canada (goar 2009). by late june, aboriginal leaders around manitoba declared states of emergency, which would facilitate freeing funds for federal assistance (barber 2009b). the private sector has rushed in to help fill gaps by the government, with cibc donating $10,000 to the assembly of manitoba chiefs to assist in purchasing 15,000 swine flu kits for northern communities, which have been impacted greatly by pandemic h1n1/09. the assembly of manitoba chiefs hopes to raise $1.5 million to cover the costs of the kits (welch 2009). by mid-august, the province of manitoba announced that it would provide outstanding funds for the kits, with the federal government refusing involvement and even problematizing some aspects of the kits (preprost 2009; rabson 2009a). we draw attention to these problems not to be critical of the government, but to clearly point out that canada is a country that is not fully prepared for the pandemic, and we have structural jurisdictional, resource, and planning problems. 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.1     in sum, it appears that the $1 billion canadian pandemic influenza plan has failed in the early stages of the outbreak in protecting one of our most vulnerable groups in society— aboriginals. inaction, a lack of coordination and planning/readiness, a failure to translate policy into reality and, particularly, preexisting poor socioeconomic conditions contributed to the events observed. have we learned our lesson? only time will tell. things may end up getting worse as there have been reports that medical stations in remote communities of northern manitoba may have to close, because health canada is having problems recruiting and retaining nurses to work in isolated areas (puxley 2009). there is, however, hope as some mistakes have already been identified and corrected. for example, in ontario, an outbreak in the isolated reserve community sandy lake, three weeks after the outbreaks in manitoba reserve communities, resulted in an aggressive response by the government resulting in hundreds of doses of antiviral medication being brought into the community, with 160 patients administered the drugs. as a result, no residents had to be flown out of the community for treatment (santin 2009b). according to manitoba’s and ontario’s chief medical officers of health, if an outbreak occurs again in the fall, any aboriginal showing flu like symptoms will be prescribed the antiviral drugs (santin 2009b). we will later propose a model which may be a policy planning tool to aid in preventing further negative outcomes associated with pandemic h1n1/09. as evidenced by the events over the summer in manitoba, canada, the ability to provide acute health care service to aboriginals in remote communities is essential given their vulnerability during this pandemic; however, this is a difficult task, given the very high associated costs. many infected individuals may end up being transported to larger centers; social support networks, which have been associated with positive health outcomes will be 19 spence and white: scientific certainty in a time of uncertainty published by scholarship@western, 2010     disrupted; and, absenteeism from work and productive endeavors could severely cripple these impoverished communities. the world health organization warns that a high proportion of people becoming infected could put serious strains on health care systems, increasing demands on emergency rooms and icus. this could result in a diminished capacity to treat other serious health ailments (world health organization 2009a). in canada, we certainly saw this in the province of manitoba. dr. bruce martin, a doctor sent to lead up work in st. teresa point, put it clearly: “just keeping the building open under this kind of workload is very difficult,” and the 50 cases that came out of the small 2000 person community had an overwhelming effect on the large modern winnipeg hospital system (patterson 2009). prevention: vaccination in canada we are fortunate that the issue is not whether we will have enough vaccines for everyone, it is how quickly everyone will be get vaccinated (public health agency of canada 2009a). as we enter the second wave of the pandemic in coming months, questions surrounding the availability of the vaccine have been receiving much attention. an editorial appearing in the canadian medical association journal (cmaj) on august 31 was highly critical of health canada’s vaccination plan. essentially, health canada was criticized for its plan to use an adjuvant vaccine.x cmaj suggested that this decision would delay the introduction of the vaccine to the public by about one month (beginning in mid november) due to the greater regulatory guidelines. they reasoned that the virus is not highly virulent for most of the population; therefore, vaccinating high risk groups with the non-adjuvanated vaccine before the epidemic season peaks would be the best strategy, while the rest of the population at lower risk 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.1     waits for the adjuvant vaccine (hebert and macdonald 2009). this claim was quickly disregarded by health canada, which stated that adjuvanted and non-adjuvanted vaccine would be received at about the same time.xi it was suggested that any delays in receiving the vaccine compared to other countries, such as the united states and australia, was a product of canada placing their order at a later date (white and alphonso 2009). of concern are the gaps in communication being observed. if the largest association of medical doctors is unclear of the government’s plans, how will ordinary citizens, particularly the vulnerable, including first nations, fare? interestingly, as of september 2, 2009, in a news release by the public health agency of canada (2009a), the government of canada had yet to identify those people who should receive the vaccine first although news reports indicate that aboriginals will be one of those groups. moving forward: a predictive model in discussing the risk on reserves, dr. david butler jones, canada’s chief public health officer, commented any influenza outbreak will affect some communities more than others. he further stated on june 12, 2009, “we’ve never been able to understand why that is…to make conclusions based on a couple of communities…it’s way too early” (rabson 2009b). while dr. butler-jones was trying not to be alarmist and was being cautious based on the observations at that time, we argue that the literature does indicate that the social determinants of health, including poverty, a lack of capacity, and access to health resources would be a powerful predictor of vulnerability, regardless of the health issue in question. as indicated earlier, there is a body of research suggesting that those populations with poor socioeconomic outcomes are most vulnerable to the seasonal influenza and pandemic h1n1/09. we suggest an implementation of this information to predict vulnerability would be useful. 21 spence and white: scientific certainty in a time of uncertainty published by scholarship@western, 2010     in addressing the complexity of the situation, dr. margaret chan, director general, world health organization remarks, “the emergence of the h1n1 virus creates great pressure on governments, ministries of health, and world health organization to make the right decisions and take the right actions at a time of great scientific uncertainty” (world health organization 2009a). with this in mind, we remind readers that researchers and policy makers have a social responsibility to mitigate potential harm and catastrophe. how can this be accomplished? 1) removing as much uncertainty from the situation as possible; and, 2) policy and planning based on informed decision making. although there are debates on the projected severity of pandemic h1n1/09, few experts doubt that vulnerable communities, particularly first nations, will be impacted most by the pandemic. this begs the question, which communities are vulnerable? in canada, we have a potential model. work originating from the work of researchers attached to the aboriginal policy research consortium (international), housed at the university of western ontario, and the strategic research and analysis directorate, indian affairs canada, has produced and refined the community well-being (cwb) index. the cwb index measures well-being at the community level using data from the census of canada. it is composed of four variables identified in the literature as key social determinants of health: income, housing, education, labor force status.xii it assesses differences between first nations communities themselves and between first nations communities and other canadian communities over time. no doubt, on average, first nations communities fare worse than other canadian communities; for example, only 1 of the top 100 canadian communities is a first nation, and 92 of the lowest scoring communities are first nations (o'sullivan and mchardy 2007). perhaps less well known is the differences between first nations communities are great; in some cases the intra first nations 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.1     differences are larger than between first nations and the canadian population (o'sullivan and mchardy 2007; spence 2007).xiii this coincides with many news reports which have found that some communities have been hit much harder than others by the h1n1/09 virus. we have been unable to secure data to examine the relationship between the cwb index and pandemic h1n1/09 outbreaks across canada’s first nations communities. however, the cwb index is probably the best tool for predicting those communities which will be at greatest risk of being affected by pandemic h1n1. we do not wish to over state the effectiveness of the cwb index’s predictive power. however, in the absence of extensive empirical testing, the sites of early h1n1/09 virus outbreaks, st. theresa point, garden hill and sandy lake, all have relatively low cwb index scores. st theresa point and garden hill are in the bottom 10% among first nations communities and sandy lake around the 25th percentile. increased surveillance and resource allocation are considerations given this data. the impact of h1n1/09 virus will be seen in coming months. the manner in which the story of this pandemic will play out will be a product of decisions and (in)actions of key stakeholders. targeted use of interventions will be important. this pandemic has centered attention on the inequalities first nations experience in canada. given the importance of the social determinants of health (world health organization 2008), health outcomes are inseparable from the inequality we observe across all domains of the social sphere, including education, housing, income, and labor force participation. one feature of pandemics is that they strive to survive; we, as humans, must work to ensure we do the same. conclusion we are defined by how we deal with adversity. the coming months will test policy makers and citizens worldwide, and the future will challenge researchers and policy workers to 23 spence and white: scientific certainty in a time of uncertainty published by scholarship@western, 2010     become more effective. how will the story of pandemic h1n1/09 play out? we know indigenous populations across the globe will face a disproportionate degree of illness, suffering, and devastation, just as they have in the past from first contact through the spring 2009 outbreaks. efforts to mitigate the impact of the pandemic are underway; however, many of these solutions, while noteworthy given the current crisis, fail to address the underlying social factors, which leave many communities “at risk.” until these social factors are ameliorated, we will continue to witness disastrous outcomes with many faces for years to come. the international data captures the systematic inequality of indigenous peoples worldwide. international reports have indicated that indigenous people will continue to endure an inordinate amount of anguish resulting from this pandemic. we have proposed a model for predicting the differential vulnerability of first nations communities in canada. we believe the cwb index could also be very useful as a tool in other countries.xiv the main strength of the cwb index is that it is a theoretically rooted measure, composed of basic social determinants of health. we see the cwb index approach as a potentially useful tool for identifying the state of aboriginal communities along the continuum of disadvantage, allowing policy makers to plan accordingly. while two of the three communities we examined that had outbreaks in the spring fell in the bottom 10% of first nations communities, and the third fell in the bottom 25%, we would likely say that the bottom one third of any measured communities would be at greatest risk. this is a working hypothesis at this point. overall, we wish to continue our investigations on this important issue as we feel it a duty incumbent upon us to contribute to understanding during this time of great scientific uncertainty. 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.1     endnotes                                                              i the severity of a pandemic is typically assessed based on two criteria: 1) the “attack rate,” which is the proportion of people who become ill over the course of the pandemic; and, 2) the “mortality rate,” which is the proportion of the people who die over the course of the pandemic (mathews et al., 2009).   ii virulence is defined as a quantitative measure of the degree of pathogenicity (i.e., the ability to inflict damage) of a parasite; it is usually measured as the dose or cell number that will produce a pathological response over a given time period (brock et al., 1994).   iii according to the world health organization (world health organization 2009b), the historical record of influenza pandemics indicates that they strike in two and sometimes three waves. during the previous century, the 1918 pandemic, the most deadly of them all, began with a mild wave and then returned in a far more deadly one. in fact, the first wave was so mild that its significance as a warning signal was missed. iv we focus on first nations and their communities for three reasons: 1) the first true test of pandemic preparedness occurred in canada’s first nations communities; 2) we argue that first nations communities are unique social spaces given their historical, cultural, political, and socioeconomic attributes. they are geographically meaningful places in which first nations people live. reserves can be host to a variety of initiatives and policies that impact on the day-to-day lives of its constituents, for example, building of schools, and the creation of health projects. these social spaces are historically important locations for first nations of canada. there is a distinct set of social networks, norms, and attitudes, which are formed within these geographical spaces (mignone 2003; white, spence, and maxim 2005). a similar argument was put forth by the royal commission on aboriginal people (royal commission on aboriginal peoples 1996), which suggested that an understanding of community norms and broad social conditions is necessary for positive outcomes to occur; de facto crime, alcoholism, sexual abuse, and suicide are merely symptoms of a structural problem. the importance of this context is also strategic given the demographic characteristics of the communities. according to the 2001 census data (statistics canada 2004), there were about 1.32 million people who self-identified as having aboriginal ancestry. according to departmental data from indian affairs, the registered indian population is numbered at 703,800 in over 600 bands, with approximately 419,800 (60%) on-reserve (indian and northern affairs canada 2004). if the migration assumption is correct, the proportion of registered indians living on-reserve is projected to increase from an estimated 60% in 2001 to 75% in 2021. 25 spence and white: scientific certainty in a time of uncertainty published by scholarship@western, 2010                                                                                                                                                                                                      thus, our understanding of the dynamics surrounding aboriginals and their communities would be profitable as the future on-reserve population increases substantially (indian and northern affairs canada 2004) and we try to curb the threat of potential disasters in the future, including pandemics; 3) first nations, living “on reserve” (in home communities), are the most disadvantaged subgroup of aboriginals in canada; and, 4) there is an application to other countries where indigenous peoples live in their own communities and have measurable disadvantage.  v we have adopted the world health organization’s terminology of the pandemic virus: h1n1/09.  vi if virus shedding is detected in fecal matter, this would introduce an additional route of transmission (world health organization 2009a). the significance could be especially great in areas with inadequate sanitation, such as some first nation communities in canada and some indigenous communities worldwide. vii see white, beavon and spence (2007) for a description of the development and importance of the first nations human development index.   viii the disproportionate rates of illness have not gone unnoticed by other residents. in early june, residents from st. theresa point first nation, where a few cases had been documented, staying at a winnipeg hotel for health checks unrelated to influenza were asked to leave the hotel for fear they had h1n1/09 given their home community (godbout, kusch, and rollason 2009).  ix the degree of isolation of these communities is troubling given the previous discussion on “immunologically naïve populations.”   x adjuvant vaccine allows more vaccine to be produced (dosage sparing) and it provides better cross protection in the case of mutating virus strains; in fact, the world health organization advocates use of the adjuvant vaccine based on its merits (public health agency of canada 2009c; world health organization 2009e).   xi in an interview with the canadian press, dr. david butler-jones, chief public health officer, stated that canada would purchase 1.2 million doses of unadjuvanted vaccine for pregnant women given the lack of data on its use in this demographic. this strategy is meant to improve rates of immunization among pregnant women who typically are less likely to be vaccinated yet are at high risk (branswell 2009).  xii for extensive coverage of the community well-being index, methodological issues, and trends across canada over time, see white, beavon, and spence (2007).   26 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.1                                                                                                                                                                                                      xiii all too often, the diversity of aboriginal people tends to be missed in discussions across a variety of audiences and arenas. this simplification of the aboriginal condition is sometimes based on pragmatic grounds, but the danger of this process is far from benign. it is imperative to highlight the diversity of histories, cultures, and socio-economic circumstances of the aboriginal population to adequately address the various needs of these people. young (young 2003) states in his review of aboriginal research that intra group differences are often overlooked, homogenizing the geographic, cultural, socioeconomic, and health status of aboriginal people. waldram, herring, and young (1995) voice similar concerns in their work: beyond the obvious and well-known need to understand the historico-cultural context of health, it is vital to appreciate that the concept of “aboriginal health” is itself a convenient but ultimately false representation of the problem at hand. it masks the rich diversity of social, economic, and political circumstances that give rise to variation in health problems and healing strategies in aboriginal communities. if nothing else, this [work] should make it clear that health and health care patterns show extensive variation across the country, despite the tendency for national, regional, and provincial databases to create the impression of widespread trends and homogeneity of experience (258-9).  xiv it should be noted that some work has attempted to capture the relative disadvantage of indigenous peoples in a number of countries, including australia, new zealand, and australia (e.g., cooke et al., 2007). moreover, in the spring of 2009, aboriginal policy research consortium researchers (martin cooke of the university of waterloo, erin o’sullivan of mcmaster university, jerry white of the university of western ontario, and dan beavon of indian affairs and northern development) conducted a training institute for scientists and indigenous peoples from moscow and novasibirsk. the delegation was shown how to construct and use the cwb so they could start developing it at home.             27 spence and white: scientific certainty in a time of uncertainty published by scholarship@western, 2010                                                                                                                                                                                                      references ahmed, r., m. b. oldstone, and p. palese. 2007. 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(http://terrance.who.int/mediacentre/audio/press_briefings/vpc_06aug2009_ influenza_a_h1n1.mp3) ———. 2009f. "world is better prepared for influenza pandemic." world health organization, may 8, retrieved august 20, 2009. (http://www.who.int/dg/speeches/2009/asean_ influenza _ah1n1_20090508/en/index.html). young, t k. 2003. "review of research on aboriginal populations in canada: relevance to their health needs." bmj 327, 419-422.  36 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 1, iss. 1 [2010], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol1/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2010.1.1.1 the international indigenous policy journal may 2010 scientific certainty in a time of uncertainty: predicting vulnerability of canada's first nations to pandemic h1n1/09 nicholas spence jerry p. white recommended citation scientific certainty in a time of uncertainty: predicting vulnerability of canada's first nations to pandemic h1n1/09 abstract keywords creative commons license scientific certainty in a time of uncertainty: predicting vulnerability of canada's first nations to pandemic h1n1/09 microsoft word 10896 cover page.docx the international indigenous policy journal volume 12 | issue 2 june 2021 the power of connections: how a novel canadian men’s wellness program is improving the health and well-being of indigenous and non-indigenous men iloradanon efimoff * university of manitoba, canada, efimoffi@myumanitoba.ca lyana patrick * simon fraser university, canada, lyana_patrick@sfu.ca viviane josewski university of british columbia, okanagan, canada, viviane.josewski@ubc.ca paul gross university of british columbia, canada, paul@dudesclub.ca sandy lambert dudes club elder and external liaison, canada, sandy@dudesclub.ca victoria smye western university, canada, vsmye@uwo.ca recommended citation efimoff, i., patrick, l., josewski, v., gross, p., lambert, s., & smye, v. (2021). the power of connections: how a novel canadian men’s wellness program is improving the health and well-being of indigenous and non-indigenous men? the international indigenous policy journal, 12(2). https://10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.10896 the power of connections: how a novel canadian men’s wellness program is improving the health and well-being of indigenous and non-indigenous men abstract the dudes club is a novel men’s health and wellness organization founded in 2010 in vancouver, bc. since 2017, the dudes club has rapidly expanded in northern bc and, with the help of a partnership with the first nations health authority, has grown to include 40 sites in british columbia and 2 sites nationally. in this study, we analyze data from interviews (n = 5) and 15 focus groups (n = 101) conducted as part of a program evaluation with dudes club members, elders, providers, and health care professionals. we focus on men’s experiences with the dudes club to identify four main themes in the data: brotherhood and community, accessible health care information, disrupting colonial constructions of masculinity, and systemic and structural challenges. we conclude with policy recommendations. keywords indigenous men, community-based health promotion programming, men’s health, qualitative program evaluation, social support author note * these authors contributed equally to this work. acknowledgments we would like to dedicate this article to the late mr. richard johnson and the late mr. henry charles. mr. richard johnson co-founded the dudes club and was an outreach worker for the positive outlook program at vancouver native health society. he laid the strong foundation on which the dudes club was built. henry charles was our elder from 2011 to 2017 and joined the spirit world on a very sad and tragic rainy friday night in late january 2017. he was a source of comfort, culture, humour, and knowledge for all members. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. 1 efimoff, patrick et al.: the power of connections published by scholarship@western, 2021 the power of connections: how a novel canadian men’s wellness program is improving the health and well-being of indigenous and non-indigenous men every two weeks in vancouver’s downtown eastside (dtes) neighbourhood, a group of men gather together for a few hours in the evening to share food and ideas, to learn and have fun, and to take a break from their often-difficult daily realities. this unlikely gathering started 10 years ago when frontline workers recognized the need for a safe and supportive space for men to gather. what started as a support group organized around the positive living outreach program at the vancouver native health society has blossomed into a national model for men’s health and well-being. this group is called the dudes1 club. indigenous peoples in canada experience a disproportionate burden of both mental and physical health issues (nelson & wilson, 2017; rotenberg, 2016). these health inequities must be understood in light of colonialist and neo-colonialist practices (such as residential schools, the sixties scoop, and the overrepresentation of indigenous children in care), widespread poverty, homelessness, and racism (currie et al., 2012; patrick, 2014; press, 2019; spence et al., 2016). in healing from past and ongoing effects of colonization, culture is a key source of strength for many indigenous communities (assembly of first nations & health canada, 2015; gone, 2013). an emerging body of evidence for “culture as treatment” points to the significance of interconnectedness in healing and underscores the need to incorporate indigenous cultural practices into health programming (barker et al., 2017). generally, men are less likely to seek medical attention with regards to their mental well-being. this tendency can have tragic consequences: men are 3 times more likely to die by suicide than women (goldenberg, 2014; statistics canada, 2019). indigenous men are at an even higher risk for suicide (kumar & tjepkema, 2019). men’s high rates of suicide might, in part, be due to inadequate diagnosis and treatment of men’s mental health issues (oliffe et al., 2010; wide et al., 2011). to this end, the american psychological association issued its first guidelines for practice with men and boys (pappas, 2019). conformity to dominant ideas of masculinity that stress male independence and fearlessness (“the strong silent type”) may further lead men to disregard their health and avoid seeking timely health care (goldenberg, 2014, p. s142), which is a concern that is particularly pressing for older men (tannenbaum & frank, 2011). despite the disproportionate burden of poor health outcomes in indigenous communities and the low likelihood of men seeking medical care, there is a dearth of research on indigenous men’s health services in canada (e.g., hackett et al., 2021). internationally, men’s sheds are a successful men’s health promotion program, with research indicating that effective health programming for men has unique features (wilson & cordier, 2013). however, more research is needed to fully and rigorously evaluate men’s sheds (milligan et al., 2016). one important factor is peer support. peer support groups can increase social support, resilience (robinson et al., 2015), and health (heisler et al., 2010; richmond et al., 2007). the dudes club, founded in british columbia, canada, in 2010, is another promising men’s health promotion program with an indigenous focus. in 2016, a quantitative evaluation of the dudes club showcased the club’s ability to promote overall well-being through culturally safe health services (gross 1 dudes is an acronym for dudes united defending equality and solidarity. 2 the indigenous international policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi: 10.1858/iipj2021.12.2.10896 et al., 2016): compared to infrequent attenders, frequent attenders experienced improved quality of life, mental health, physical health, health confidence, peer support, spiritual wellness, and social support. furthermore, compared to non-indigenous members, indigenous members felt more trust and support with the group and felt that the club helped them connect to their cultural heritage (gross et al., 2016). the purpose of this study is to investigate indigenous and non-indigenous men’s experiences with the dudes club and how the model could be extended to other communities. we conclude with five policy recommendations for those interested in creating their own dudes club. in this article, we discuss interconnecting and mutually informative themes identified in our qualitative findings from our evaluation of the dudes club. program background: how the dudes club began the dudes club is a grassroots initiative that formed in 2010 in response to community concerns about the relative lack of men’s health programming in the dtes of vancouver. the dtes forms part of the traditional territories of the squamish, tsleil-waututh, and musqueam first nations. as one of vancouver’s earliest neighbourhoods, the dtes was a vibrant working-class area that provided a social, cultural, and retail hub for the growing city. in the 1980s, intersecting factors contributed to increasing social problems including homelessness, an open drug market, poverty, crime, and mental illness. these factors disproportionately impact indigenous people who in 2016 made up 2.2% of the population in vancouver, but 14% in some areas of the dtes (huang, 2019). in 2013, two pilot sites were established (one in smithers and one in prince george, bc). to date, there are 40 partner sites throughout bc (dudes club, n.d.). the objectives of the club are threefold: (a) to build solidarity, brotherhood, trust, and positive role models together with men; (b) to promote holistic, cost-effective men’s health through accessible dialogue, education, and health screening opportunities; and (c) to enable men to regain a sense of pride, purpose, and fulfillment in their lives. in carrying out these objectives, the club adheres to the values of holistic health, inclusivity, and non-judgment (anyone identifying as male is welcome). the club’s motto, “leave your armour at the door,” sets the groundwork: men may wear “armour” to protect themselves on the street, but in the dudes club, there is no need for it. the men share openly with each other on a variety of topics, ranging from diet to sexual abuse. members are always welcome regardless of their physical or mental state as long as they are respectful during the gatherings. the three different clubs discussed in this article are held in a cultural drop-in centre, an hiv outreach office, and alongside a health clinic. the vancouver site hosts 50 to 60 members regularly. in contrast, the gatherings at the pilot sites are smaller with 10 to 12 men attending each meeting. each site has an indigenous framework, which includes elders, the medicine wheel, and health care practitioners with cultural safety training, in order to provide a culturally safe space for the mostly indigenous members attending the dudes club. sites routinely incorporate bonding activities, such as bingo or ice fishing. all sites share a meal and engage men in a health discussion. if a health care provider is present, it may be a technical conversation; if only the members and the elders are present, discussions are much more anecdotal and personal. some club members are extensively involved in governing the club through “think tank meetings,” planning activities, meals, and discussion topics. those who formally volunteer at the club receive modest financial compensation for their time. 3 efimoff, patrick et al.: the power of connections published by scholarship@western, 2021 method indigenous and critical theoretical perspectives this research was informed by indigenous and critical theoretical perspectives (e.g., battiste, 2009; collins, 2015; innes & anderson, 2015) that emphasize indigenous voices and narratives and draw attention to the intersecting contexts that shape men’s experiences of health and health care. thus positioned, we use intersectionality as an analytical lens for gaining a rich and complex understanding of how and why the dudes club improved men’s quality of life, mental health, and physical health. data collection this article draws on data from 15 focus groups (n = 101)2 and five individual interviews with club members, elders, providers (e.g., site managers), and health care professionals (e.g., doctors and nurses at the club). we conducted six focus groups and three individual interviews at the vancouver site, three focus groups and one individual interview at the smithers site, four focus groups and one individual interview at the prince george site, and two focus groups at a gathering of all three sites. there were 3 to 10 participants at each focus group and a few participants attended more than one focus group. we interviewed providers and club members separately from focus group members to avoid any influence on member input. overall, we include data collected from approximately 30 club members, four elders, one provider, and six health care professionals. all of the focus groups and interviews but one were audio-recorded (one interviewee opted not to be recorded). focus groups lasted between approximately two and two-and-a-half hours, and individual interviews ranged from approximately 15 to 60 minutes. we used semi-structured interviews with a set of prompt questions to guide each focus group and interview. our questions focused on the men’s experiences in the dudes club (both positive and negative), how the club impacted their health and well-being, how the club compared to other local groups, and how to improve the club and their experience. all focus group members were asked for their input, and all participants received a $30.00 honorarium. our research procedures were approved by the university of british columbia research ethics board. all the men in our study came from a context of disenfranchisement, such as unstable housing, unemployment, and poverty (gross et al., 2016), and many lived with complex histories of trauma, mental health, and/or substance use issues, as well as other comorbid conditions. for example, based on a survey conducted at the vancouver site by gross et al. (2016), more than 80% of men reported living in the dtes of vancouver, a neighbourhood widely known as one of the poorest neighbourhoods in north america, and more than 60% reported experiencing unstable housing. the majority of participants in this survey self-identified as indigenous (63.3%) and most reported being in their middle years of life. lastly, although almost 75% of participants reported being single at the time of the study, nearly 60% had children, but fewer than 5% lived with their children. notably, these characteristics only describe the membership at the vancouver site, as this demographic information was collected as part of the larger program evaluation survey. 2 we could not obtain the exact number of participants for four of the focus groups due to data recording errors. we used the average number of participants in the 11 focus groups where we had the exact number of participants to estimate the number of participants for these four focus groups. we then added these four estimated values to the actual values to calculate the n. 4 the indigenous international policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi: 10.1858/iipj2021.12.2.10896 data analysis we undertook an interpretive thematic analysis using procedures described in the literature for qualitatively derived data (thorne, 2016). we began by transcribing all audio recordings of the interviews. once transcribed, we cleaned and anonymized the transcripts (to correct any transcriber errors and protect participant and organizational privacy) and then uploaded them into nvivo (qualitative analysis software). our team, consisting of indigenous and non-indigenous members, then analyzed the data in a multi-step process. first, we looked at the data inductively, systematically, and reflectively, reading and re-reading the transcripts and discussing initial impressions and ideas. second, we independently coded all transcripts based on an evolving coding structure. the purpose of the coding was to identify key concepts that we noted in the data, as well as conceptual linkages and patterns of relationships. throughout the coding process, we created, combined, and discarded codes in an iterative process to further refine the codes. this involved creating hierarchical models through nvivo to see the codes from a macro perspective and concept maps to further identify connections between codes. as our coding became less descriptive and more interpretive, we began to reflect on the theoretical constructs behind key codes by drawing on our theoretical perspectives and making linkages between the literature and the data. specifically, we drew on intersectionality as an analytical lens for examining and developing a better understanding of how becoming members of the dudes club shaped indigenous men’s experiences of health and well-being. we situated participants’ experiences within the intersecting contexts of past and ongoing colonialism, dominant gender norms, poverty, racism, class, and other forms of stigma and discrimination. furthermore, indigenous elders mr. sandy lambert and the late mr. henry charles were key members of the research team, guiding our analysis by speaking to what they thought were the most important aspects of the dudes club, based on their years of experience with the group. this helped focus our analysis and ensure that our conclusions were grounded in indigenous perspectives. through this analysis and our research team’s years of experience with the dudes club, we created the policy recommendations at the end of this article. we based these policy recommendations on members’ experiences and our perceptions of what was most effective in facilitating the creation of a dudes club. results club members, elders, providers, and health care professionals shared detailed accounts of their experiences with the dudes club. in this section, we present four themes that we identified in participants’ stories: a feeling of brotherhood and community, accessible health care information, disruptions of colonial masculinities, and the systemic and structural challenges the club helped participants face. feeling of brotherhood and community one of the largest themes identified in all focus groups and interviews was feeling a sense of brotherhood and community. the members, elders, service providers, and health care professionals all described this as one of the most powerful and effective aspects of the club. one way the club seemed to create feelings of brotherhood and community is by making the members comfortable enough to share their 5 efimoff, patrick et al.: the power of connections published by scholarship@western, 2021 experiences. there was consensus among the men that members respect each other in part by respecting the rules of confidentiality. as such, several dudes club members described how they openly shared many emotionally sensitive parts of their histories, including residential school experiences, sexual abuse, anger issues, mental health concerns like post-traumatic stress disorder (ptsd) and suicidal ideation, historical trauma, loneliness, and experiences with hiv. for example, one member described: we’ve had issues discussing like big issues, prostate, we’ve had issues like male sexual abuse where people actually came out in the room and said they had been abused. men don’t talk about this to other men. …they feel safe enough here they can, this is a safe haven. it’s a sanctuary they can come in, it doesn’t matter what that medical problem is, discuss it and we don’t talk about it on the street. because if it does the person who takes it out is no longer coming here. the fact that some members were able to share these types of stories highlights the safe and trusting relationship they had with each other. while such relationships take time to develop, a similar atmosphere of safety and trust is characteristic in each of the clubs. the safe space created at dudes club gatherings seems to allow some members to be vulnerable: to open up and share stories, cry, ask for help, discuss mental health issues, and simply be comfortable in a safe space. some members also explained that they felt comfortable in the group because a non-judgmental atmosphere was maintained, and because the group actively attempts to decrease the stigma around the men involved in the club. one group challenged stereotypes about their members by playing horseshoes in public with friends. an elder explained that the presence of celebrities in the club (such as famous football players) helped to de-stigmatize low-income areas. as one of the members said: you can come in here and even if you are using drugs you talk about all kinds of stuff, it’s nonjudgmental. that’s the big thing, because you walk into most places and i’m an addict and this is a problem. part of the non-judgmental atmosphere is maintained because it is a men-only club, as one member explained: a place to feel safe to share in, issues that, you know, we confront. as a man it might be different than what women would confront. this sense of brotherhood and community seemed to be connected to the sense of ownership some members had around their clubs. through the creation of their own club, in their own space, with their own rules, many of the members described an increased sense of personal empowerment and agency. members routinely decide on speakers, topics, activities, and food for meetings. discussing issues and making these decisions together seems to create a sense of community felt by many of the men, as well as a sense of solidarity around their experiences with the dudes club and as men in general. this sense of ownership and self-determination over the club appeared to lead to an increased sense of pride in some men, which, in turn, seemed to allow for greater solidarity and brotherhood. furthermore, many of the members volunteer for their clubs, describing a sense of purpose and meaningful occupation, which seemed to increase their self-worth and self-esteem, further investing them in the program. these positives associations are, in part, where members’ sense of “brotherhood” came from: 6 the indigenous international policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi: 10.1858/iipj2021.12.2.10896 the majority of my time spent here is volunteering so it gives me a sense of purpose so i feel like i did a good job and i’m good to people and later on they remember that and they come up to me later on and say, “hey dude.” some dudes club members even took it upon themselves to engage the community in their activities, building a wider community for members. they described seeking out lawyers, town councillors, church members, legal aides, politicians, and people they met on the street to get involved with the dudes club—and they were often successful. some members attended town meetings with council members to voice concerns, connect with politicians, and brainstorm ways to connect with the community to showcase the club and share resources. a few members have even talked about different public relations opportunities and were actively involved in a globe and mail article about the dudes club (barton, 2016). the sense of ownership over the club, our findings suggest, solidifies feelings of brotherhood and community, which in turn encourages members to work together to improve their club and experiences. in neighbourhoods where the focus groups were conducted, men—often indigenous men—appeared to feel especially disempowered by the structural inequities and violence they faced daily. in the flattened hierarchy of the dudes club, one member described how many members found a place where their voice mattered: you know i get the sense that for a lot of men, i think it—they come to the dudes club, i think to finally get a better picture just how important men are in our society, especially in the society of the downtown eastside. that our voice is just as important as anybody else’s, you know, we all have a voice and it gets heard at the dudes club, you know, everybody is willing to listen and start acting on what our participants share, okay. the sense of brotherhood and community was linked to some members’ discussions of the importance of strength in numbers. members sometimes used their club and their connections to advocate for themselves and others. attendance at the dudes club appeared to help many members understand that their voice was as important as any other voice in society. some explained that their voices were often not heard in other arenas and it was empowering to have their voices heard at the dudes club. beyond advocacy, members, elders, providers, and health care workers discussed being strong together as peer support: member: just to chat and be friendly, get to know people—if you’re running through people downtown you know they’re with the men’s club or whatever, and if you get in trouble, you know the men you run into—they will help you out in other situations—it’s just mostly the friendship. elder: and if they’re drugged, under the influence of drugs or anything, everybody knows to, they watch for each other. basically what did i say, [word in musqueam language] means to pick up somebody that’s fallen, right? health care professional: i could see dudes clubs popping up all over, and not necessarily talking about men’s health, but being a place of community and a place of brotherhood and a place of joy and a place of sadness, and a place of bonding … after i watched the [dudes club 7 efimoff, patrick et al.: the power of connections published by scholarship@western, 2021 documentary], i said, “wow, that kind of healing is so far beyond what i’m offering on a medical model.” ... i can help people with their medical stuff in my 10 minutes. ... but i can’t do that ... that connection with other men and people. ... it’s just really compelling. some men also discussed the ways in which providing peer support was empowering. it provides a sense of purpose as well as building community. peer support also seemed to help many members feel less lonely and more connected to other people. some discussed being able to ask for help when they need it. in fact, many men indicated that they attended the dudes club because of the friendship and community they experienced. the support gained from other men is a vital component of men’s health in general and, as indicated by the health care professional’s quote above, health care professionals cannot help with social connection. furthermore, some members discussed how the connection with other people at the dudes club reduced their stress levels, as they socialized and sought sanctuary from their “street identity.” thus, the dudes club provides a safe and accepting social environment, which aids in the improvement of members’ health and wellness. the cultural and personal senses of identity and resilience as well as the individual healing journeys of dudes club members were important outcomes, which are related to their shared experiences of brotherhood and community. for example, one member described his journey through mental illness and overcoming barriers to being in the community and around others. his words revealed how the dudes club helped him build resiliency: being in a large group, building confidence and overcoming anxiety and stuff like that. that’s the—i get a lot out of dudes club—like, you know it’s helped me to be—to overcome anxiety and being in a large group. many members discussed how challenges they face on the street, such as the inaccessibility of appropriate services and concerns about comfort and safety, occasionally prevented them from attending programs, including the dudes club. by establishing a support network and structure, the dudes club has helped to create a sense of safety in the community. this sense of safety has facilitated participation because feeling unsafe prevents many men in these communities from moving and travelling at certain times. therefore, this fellowship creates long-term connections, fosters a sense of safety on the streets, and encourages resiliency in how some members face day-to-day challenges. one member described how this created an essential lifeline of information in what, for some, felt like a vacuum: amongst one another we can talk, we can explore, we can see if other people suffer the same things, you can share ideas—perhaps somebody did suffer that and they can let us know how they overcame it. many members also described how resiliency was built through ongoing participation in the club. they extended the values nurtured and promoted within the group onto the street where they could put the things they had learned into action. one member explained: part of the reason i come [to the dudes club] is for friendship, but also there’s problems on the street that for me ... if they see me and there’s a problem, they will help me out, because ... there’s some places where you go downtown aren’t safe. 8 the indigenous international policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi: 10.1858/iipj2021.12.2.10896 lastly, the presence of elders and others to guide, build confidence, and provide support for the members was a vital aspect of the dudes club and a key component in developing cultural identity, particularly for indigenous men. for example, indigenous members discussed the value of elders speaking their language and sharing cultural teachings. one explained that the dudes club was a good way to connect with indigenous culture and that most people have to go to prison to find that cultural connection. by having indigenous elders and ensuring indigenous cultural teachings are central, the club provides another avenue for indigenous men to connect with their culture. owing to the club’s men-only and non-judgmental atmosphere, and the peer support provided, many members felt comfortable in building authentic relationships with other club members. members’ sense of ownership over the club contributed to feelings of responsibility and engagement. this, in turn, reinforced the sense of brotherhood and community. this experience of brotherhood, community, and ownership further facilitated resiliency, healing, and identity development within members. in addition, the dudes club also facilitated observable health changes, as we will discuss next. accessible health care information facilitates reconnection to body and mind the majority of dudes club members are above 40 years of age (gross et al., 2016). in one focus group, providers explained that, when men were young, they could ignore the doctor and feel invincible; however, as they approach age 50, they become more health conscious. some members explained that they attended the club because men’s health information is more important as men age. however, accessing health care was not always easy. members shared stories of avoiding medical care because of poor treatment, such as being denied painkillers because they were stereotyped as being addicts, being hung up on by 911 operators, and feeling rushed in the doctor’s office. some reported receiving better treatment with an advocate present. furthermore, some were unable to seek health care because of accessibility issues. for example, some members did not have a vehicle to attend doctor’s appointments. poor treatment, accessibility issues, and constructions of masculinity have made many of the men in the group very reluctant to seek health care services, even when urgently needed. the dudes club provides highly accessible, low-barrier care: the men do not have to sit in a waiting room and feel rushed when seeing a doctor. they appear relaxed and comfortable, ready to learn about their health. they are allowed to participate if intoxicated, as long as they are not disrespectful. many members described the dudes club health care providers as approachable, and there is no hierarchy; the men all call each other by their first name (including the doctor and lawyer). as one member explained: when we go in there we’re equals. got nurses, they show up. [name of elder] shows up. [name of elder] shows up, you show up, it doesn’t matter. we’re all the same. it’s not an us and them thing. some of the members turned to the dudes club for help when typical health care settings were unsuccessful. nurses have noted that some men who would not come into the clinic would still attend the dudes club for health information. a health care professional explained: an example is a patient that had a lot of conflict coming to the clinic, because of ... many factors ... it just wouldn’t work well sticking with the typical appointments and waiting because it would 9 efimoff, patrick et al.: the power of connections published by scholarship@western, 2021 lead to escalated behaviour in the waiting room ... his needs not being met. ... i stopped providing care for him. but he still found sort of that fraternity in the dudes club. ... i feel like the dudes club was almost like a safety net in some way. the health information provided at dudes club is also accessible. the members explained that the health care professionals welcomed any questions and explained things clearly. this is evidenced by the fact that members recited health advice during the focus groups: yes he tells us about medication, what’s new, what’s coming out and what to take and don’t go take the one because it will give you nightmares there are better ones he says. so for hiv he gives us that, he tells us everything about the medication when it comes in and then what new ones are coming out. the accessibility of health information is broadened because the information does not remain only in the group. many members of the dudes club share this information and have pointed out that their knowledge may “save a life.” one particularly salient example was told by a health care professional: i had a really young guy, who was in his early to mid-twenties ... he’s vomiting blood. so he’s already got a lot of damage done to his liver and he’s talked about, “yeah, there’s these guys out in the community and they’ve got these dudes shirts and it’s like some sort of dudes club thing. ... yeah a few of them have talked to me,” and i’m like, “oh yeah, i know some of those guys.” so they are getting out, they are talking to people in the community. ... so the information is going beyond the group and getting out into the community. the physical location of the dudes clubs is also important for accessibility. two of the sites are welllocated, and one site has a slightly less desirable location. bus schedules tie into this accessibility, with some members living in more remote locations missing meetings due to inconsistent or non-existent bus service. overall, many members expressed their satisfaction with the health care they received at the dudes club. many of the men considered the doctor at the dudes club their family doctor and this seemed to increase the likelihood of them seeking health care services. one health care professional explained that the dudes club was the preferred means of accessing health care services for many men. the members appeared happy with the dudes club doctor: [the doctor] explains everything to everyone ... the doctor is a really great doctor like you can ask any question about any disease and he tells you the best way to deal with it. in particular, it is important for health care professionals involved in the clubs to understand the members’ experiences. for example, one member explained that it was important to have a doctor who was aware of health issues related to their neighbourhood. others indicated the importance of being able to voice their concerns about “housing, health, [and] support.” the outcomes of such accessible health care are evident in members’ reconnections to their body and mind. the men in this study shared many stories highlighting how the dudes club facilitated increases in physical well-being. they expressed a variety of different ways they coped with everyday stressors. 10 the indigenous international policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi: 10.1858/iipj2021.12.2.10896 one member said, “a bottle of whisky, a bag of dope ... it makes me feel great,” and another said meditation is one of the ways he deals with pain and stress. many of the men discussed a wide range of coping mechanisms to deal with grief, loss, and low self-worth and self-esteem. sharing coping methods can help members learn about different ways to deal with stress, and how that influences their physical health. being involved in the dudes club appears to have led the men to take a variety of actions to improve their health. some members indicated that they got blood tests and liver tests, followed through with suggested tests, and participated in preventative screening such as prostate exams during the annual dudes club health fair. some attributed this improvement in health-seeking behaviours explicitly to the dudes club: member: you know what, i never had a prostate exam before i came to the dudes club, one year i wasn’t going to do it, then the second health fair the doc said you’re getting over 50 this time we’ll check ... i actually went for a prostate exam. now i do it every six months because there’s no shame in it. i’m at the age where prostate is a serious thing. some members even brought substances in for identification: health care professional: a member of dudes coming in and saying, “what is this?,” before they take it, which is like, phenomenal. because when i was using i didn’t care what it was, you know? i’ve never tried that one before. and i mean, just, being conscientious enough to know that there’s nurses in the building that they can go talk to. which was awesome. the men also talked about the importance of emotional, spiritual, and holistic health. in particular, many members discussed mental health as another issue they faced. some members explained that they were first helped with mental health issues at the dudes club because they felt no other doctors wanted to help them. one member discussed other doctors as uncaring compared to the dudes club physician. however, mental health care can be much harder to obtain for low-income individuals, many of whom do not have access to a counsellor when they need one. some members seemed to view the struggle of getting help as too much of a burden to bear: for myself like if i were to deal with my mental health issues i’ve been battling for a couple of years. and if i was to deal with it i’d be fighting like a whole system right? the dudes club in vancouver temporarily provided a counsellor for the men and some members greatly appreciated the service: when [the counsellor] first started it was rough. and my dad had died. richard died. he carried me through it. and i’ll tell you i was really rough. fourteen people [died] in the next twelve and a half months, 17 people [died] in 15 [months]. i was done. [the counsellor] was good to have here. many of the members struggled with addictions, an issue intricately connected with historical and intergenerational trauma and continued systemic discrimination and violence. through the club, they safely discussed strategies and resources, often with a health care provider present to provide accurate information. many of the men have friends who have died from substance use, and many have abstained from substance use for years. many shared their stories and supported other members to heal from 11 efimoff, patrick et al.: the power of connections published by scholarship@western, 2021 addictions. the sharing of stories of addiction with men at all different levels of substance use can help everyone to reconnect with their physical and mental health. the dudes club also helped the men to try to make their lives better despite addictions: and if i’m going here all the time concentrating on the dudes club, i’m an addict too eh, i’m an alcoholic and an addict, it makes me not think about booze and alcohol, wanting to make my life better. the dudes club offers a safe space where men can learn about health in an accessible way. the lowbarrier and non-hierarchical environment is unique for men impacted by structural and systemic violence. many of the men have had negative experiences with standard health care, and the unique approach offered by the dudes club is particularly effective for both physical and mental health. the information the men learn in the club propagates in the community as well, as the men share their knowledge and work to bring more men into the club. the accessibility of health care is, of course, linked to constructions of masculinity. disrupting colonial constructions of masculinity the men in this study explained that they attended the dudes club to make friends, share their experiences and feelings, and seek health care—thus challenging colonial constructions of masculinity that paint men as strong, stoic, independent, dominant, and invincible. many members also disrupted socially constructed gender norms by asserting the importance of family and creating a new family when they were estranged from their home communities. many of the men discussed how social constructions of masculinity appeared to prevent them from being mentally, physically, emotionally, and spiritually healthy. some members expressed opinions that rigid notions of masculinity were a barrier to accessing health care, in line with the cultural stereotype that men do not go to the doctor: “i’m not going to get [a prostate exam], i’d rather die, forget it.” in this case, death is described as preferable to a preventative screening procedure. some of the members were explicitly aware of these stereotypes but appeared to still endorse them. some of the anecdotes were more extreme; one provider indicated that if certain men had gone to the doctor, then they would still be alive. the parents in the group pushed gender boundaries by talking about their roles as nurturers or primary caregivers. one member is a grandfather with sole custody of his grandson, who he brings to every dudes club meeting. another member is a father, and he has brought his son to several meetings and is openly affectionate with him. one member even described how the club helped him to know himself better as a father and a son. further, when children are around, the rest of the men seem to want to be around them, perhaps because they crave the father–son relationship that they lack. one research team member brought her young son to a vancouver dudes club meeting. he was treated so well by the members that after his initial hesitation at being there, by the end of the meeting he begged to come back to the next one. being able to identify as a father and talk with other men about what that means is an important function of the dudes club. 12 the indigenous international policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi: 10.1858/iipj2021.12.2.10896 lastly, the many discussions of the importance of men’s only spaces revealed that these spaces enabled the deconstruction of colonial constructions of masculinity. through this desire for men’s only spaces, members seemingly voiced their need to connect with other men: i’m going through a lot of rough stuff right now and i really wanted a men’s group in this town. others talked about the lack of men’s self-care opportunities compared to women. another member explained how men’s extracurricular activities problematically conform to masculine expectations: but for men, we literally have nothing in terms of extracurricular activities or places where we can chill with other guys, there’s nothing, where do you go? to the bar. where do you go? to the park and drink, drink whatever rub, you know, just get in trouble. despite working to challenge colonial constructions of masculinity, there were potentially problematic discussions in some of the clubs. for example, in one focus group with club members, a member shared that he felt women now had it “easy” compared to men. however, in addition to modelling respectful behaviour toward women, men in leadership positions in the club often redirected conversations to become learning moments. the club’s late co-founder, richard johnson, used to say, “we have ladies present,” to cue club members to be respectful to the honorary “dudettes” who occasionally attended meetings. other opportunities to change unhealthy norms around gender were created through guest speakers. for example, in 2015, a player from the bc lions football team visited the club to increase awareness and understanding about the impact of men’s violence against women as part of the be more than a bystander campaign—a groundbreaking initiative between the ending violence association of bc (eva bc, n.d.) and the bc lions football team (n.d.). overall, members expressed how they strived for connection: to create family, to embrace fatherhood, and to build relationships with other men. in a way, the dudes club facilitates the men’s push against traditional masculinity as part of their healing journey. however, patriarchy and colonial constructions of masculinity are only part of the systemic challenges members face. the impact of structural and systemic challenges on members’ experiences at the core of many of the dudes club members’ experiences, and intimately connected to themes discussed above, were structural and systemic challenges. most members experienced a range of structural barriers including access to paid work and educational opportunities, decent food, nonjudgmental spaces, as well as ongoing experiences of trauma and racism. as one member at a northern pilot site described: there’s a lot of horrible racism in this town. horrible, horrible racism. and that has to stop. we gotta change it, it’s unsafe for any person of colour in this town. doesn’t matter whether you’re first nations or black or chinese or whatever. part of that unfortunately is because of the systemic racism in the canadian government, and the british columbian government. and i can’t do too much about the whole canadian government, but i can make a change in my community. so, that’s why i’m here. 13 efimoff, patrick et al.: the power of connections published by scholarship@western, 2021 structural barriers often prevented many members from seeking the social and emotional supports they needed as well as health services that could improve quality of life: member 1: i think the way the downtown eastside [of vancouver] operates—and i think a lot of people would probably agree—when they talk, especially like the health care professionals, they don’t listen to you. they hear you. member 2: they hear you but they think they know all the answers. they don’t listen to what your real problems are. and i think that men get a better sense of the dudes club, that their actually, their real concerns are actually being heard by people. these members’ words speak to the power of belonging and ownership that they experienced at the dudes club in contrast to the barriers they experience every day. the dudes club is a space where they know they will be listened to and heard. it is a space of belonging that creates trust and willingness to engage with health structures as both patients and advocates: member: i’m a volunteer associated with here and the dudes club and all the other organizations like it actually puts you in a position where you’re—like a delegate for, for your brothers on the street like they can approach you and you’ve got to connect right? and it’s easier sometimes because a lot of people have issues dealing with health care, they’re oppressed by the health care system and they can’t, they just can’t function to deal with health care professionals; they just shut down. and that’s why advocates are necessary but sometimes advocates are difficult to obtain. persistent social and health inequities can have serious consequences for mental, physical, spiritual, and emotional well-being, making it a challenge to address health issues. the dudes club mitigates some of these stressors by providing a space where men can advocate for one another and feel that their voices will be heard. members frequently discussed housing as a structural and systemic challenge: okay so to get decent housing, i mean you’re, you’re better off to be homeless or in a shelter. because if he’s got a room, he’s in sro [single-room occupancy hotel], okay, he’s got a roof, he’s okay. the sros where many of the men live are often in deplorable conditions, and many men appeared to struggle with the idea that you have to be homeless or in crisis to get decent housing. many participants discussed the lack of resources for men compared to women, and some described the restrictions that some housing providers place on overnight guests and visitors as more limiting than being in prison. for example, some members explained that shelters have check-in times that may interfere with work schedules and dehumanize patrons. finally, yet another health challenge that impacted many members was accessing food in neighbourhoods often characterized as “food deserts,” geographic areas with a need for, but limited access to, healthy and affordable food options (lu & qiu, 2015): 14 the indigenous international policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi: 10.1858/iipj2021.12.2.10896 down here food access is a hard thing. i’m hiv, some of us are, and you need to eat a proper diet. you don’t. we eat a lot of crap because of what our budget is. we get good balance meals [at the dudes club]. balance is a big thing for my health. the dudes club is one place where the men know they will be nourished in all realms—physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual. discussion in this article, we have presented results showcasing the impacts of the dudes club on its members. the dudes club facilitates feelings of brotherhood and community, produces tangible health benefits by providing accessible health information, challenges colonial constructions of masculinity, and addresses the structural and systemic challenges the members face. a strength of this work is the triangulation of the findings (tracy, 2010), whereby members, elders, providers, and health care professionals all discussed the benefits of the club. we feel this is a strong assessment of the positive impacts of the dudes club. the dudes club uniquely addressed members’ health in multiple ways. the focus on social connection at the dudes club goes beyond a western medical model of health, in which health care is conceptualized as a response to narrowly identified bio-medical problems. as many members discussed, they felt there was no place for men to go to connect with each other in their communities. the power of authentic social connections to impact health should not be underestimated. the founders saw the need for social connections and support for the many men who came to vancouver native health because they were tired of sitting alone in their single-room occupancy hotels. strong social support networks have been shown to reduce physiological responses to stress and, in communities with little social and emotional support, people are more likely to suffer from poor mental and physical health (wilkinson & marmot, 2003). the dudes club also helped indigenous men reconnect with their indigenous culture, which can have potent impacts on well-being. several studies have shown that a sense of belonging and connection to community are important aspects of urban indigenous health and wellbeing (cardinal, 2006; environics institute, 2010; smylie et al., 2011). furthermore, indigenous connection to culture and community can buffer against the negative impacts of discrimination (e.g., bombay et al., 2010; spence et al., 2016). culture is frequently the foundation of interventions designed by and for indigenous peoples (e.g., fiedeldey-van dijk et al., 2017). participant experiences in the dudes club confirmed the importance of a sense of belonging and connection to the community as key to (indigenous and other) men’s health and well-being. the dudes club addresses men’s health by providing accessible health information. members described this as a unique part of the dudes club, as many members described how current and common health information practices are inaccessible. men’s groups are desperately needed to address men’s health and well-being, including the high burden of health disparities experienced by men, such as death by suicide (goldenberg, 2014; kumar & tjepkema, 2019; statistics canada, 2019). members identified low-barrier and non-hierarchical health care spaces as important to efforts to learn about and improve their health. this research demonstrated that the dudes club offers a safe and accessible space to access health information, which is crucial for men who experience ongoing structural and systemic violence within health settings. in our discussions with members, it was evident that 15 efimoff, patrick et al.: the power of connections published by scholarship@western, 2021 participation in the dudes club helped them to better access health care, follow-through on medical appointments, and to better understand what they should do to take care of themselves. doctors and nurses that we interviewed had similar conclusions. there also appears to be a ripple effect in which health information gained within the club is disseminated in the community, which brings more men to the club drawn by the promise of respectful and positive interactions. multiple intersecting factors influence how and when men access health care services. participants in this study clearly expressed the need for safe, accessible health care settings in which they feel their voice is truly heard. groups, such as the dudes club, may also help to address some of the systemic and structural challenges that men, and in particular indigenous men, face. these challenges are inextricably linked to health. many members discussed how the club helped them navigate these systemic and structural challenges through access to advocates, another unique way the dudes club contributed to their health and well-being. for example, men and indigenous people are much more likely to experience homelessness than women or non-indigenous people in canada (gaetz et al., 2013). in some cities, indigenous people make up 90% of the homeless population (cbc news, 2014), despite research showing safe, stable housing produces better long-term outcomes for vulnerable and marginalized populations (goering et al., 2011). homelessness has undeniable negative impacts on health (e.g., guirguis-younger et al., 2014). indigenous men’s groups like the dudes club may help members escape homelessness by providing help in navigating social service systems. the dudes club also works to challenge the negative health impacts of toxic constructions of masculinity. masculinity is essential to any discussion of a men’s club. some people are uncomfortable with the idea of a men’s club and, indeed, people have expressed concerns at various community forums and online about how patriarchal structures continue to legitimize men’s dominant position in society and justify unequal power relations between men, women, and people of different genders. what we have to say is this: gender is a powerful determinant of health, shaping people’s lives in many different ways. too narrow of a focus on gender fails to capture the complexities embedded in these men’s lives, such as the systemic and structural challenges that the members of this club face, including the impact of toxic definitions of masculinity. the findings of this study challenge socially constructed gender norms and call for a more nuanced understanding of indigenous men’s experiences of health and well-being. the existence of the dudes club, in and of itself, contributes to decolonizing notions of masculinity. healthy indigenous masculinities and communities require understanding how race and gender intersect to disadvantage indigenous men and the associated negative ramifications for indigenous communities (innes & anderson, 2015). decolonizing masculinity, to us, means supporting healthy ways for men to express masculinity to counter harmful paternalistic expressions of western masculinity that differentially impact indigenous men. this is not to say, of course, that male privilege does not exist, but to say that acknowledging the impact of patriarchy on people of all genders, and working to create healthier communities, will be for the betterment of everyone. indeed, hegemonic constructions of masculinity may be part of why men’s mental health has been largely overlooked by health authorities and policymakers and thus an inhibiting factor for men seeking health information (seidler et al., 2016). rather than considering systems of oppression and discrimination in isolation, our findings call for an intersectional understanding of gender in relation to other axes of oppression and how this shapes the needs, concerns, and priorities of particular groups of men (e.g., collins, 2015). acknowledging the intersectionality of gender does not devalue the rights of any particular gender-based or non-binary group but provides space to validate and understand diverse experiences. 16 the indigenous international policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi: 10.1858/iipj2021.12.2.10896 though the dudes club has benefited those involved, it is not a cure-all. disproportionate burdens of health on men—particularly indigenous men—are based in deep-rooted colonial and patriarchal systems; one men’s club cannot “solve” these issues. furthermore, the dudes club in and of itself is not perfect. for example, some men have indicated they felt intimidated at the dudes club due to the size of the gathering. clubs might work to include different formats to make all members comfortable. however, the dudes club is one very promising way to improve men’s health and challenge colonial and patriarchal systems that exist to the detriment of people of all genders. next, we turn to policy recommendations that may do the same. policy recommendations evidence-based policy is paramount for feasible and tangible change to occur at the community level. in this section, we provide five policy recommendations for multiple levels of government, health care professionals, and communities interested in starting their own dudes club. following some of the recommendations, we outline further policy considerations. there already exist many policy calls and recommendations for indigenous health; as such, we connect some of our policy recommendations to concrete commitments already made in the truth and reconciliation commission’s (trc, 2015) calls to action and the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip; united nations, 2007). honour indigenous practices and traditions in keeping with the trc’s calls to action in sections 18, 19, 20, 21, and particularly section 22, indigenous healing practices are to be recognized, valued, and used within the canadian health care system, communities, and health and social service organizations, which can: • ensure club members are able to determine what indigenous practices and traditions are appropriate for their social, cultural, and geographic context; and • provide funding for culturally appropriate supports and services that honour indigenous healing practices. policy considerations for health care for indigenous peoples to be effective, it must be situated in indigenous culture. this can mean many different things for different indigenous peoples. readers should not mistake this as an indulgence of pan-indianism. appropriate cultural practices should be determined by the club members. in our case, the presence of elders was fundamental. members also talked about the healing power of nature and, since this data was collected, the dudes club has organized annual living-on-the-land retreats. clubs also incorporate various cultural activities and ceremonies. importantly, some of these cultural activities (like beading, drum-making, and sharing circles) challenge colonial constructions of masculinity. 17 efimoff, patrick et al.: the power of connections published by scholarship@western, 2021 create a sense of ownership over the club in keeping with article 3 (the right to self-determination) and article 18 (rights to decision-making) of undrip (united nations, 2007), funders (including all levels of government), health care professionals, and community organizations can: • provide funding and support for dudes clubs that ensure members are able to determine activities, meals, health topics, and make other decisions about the club’s function and purpose. policy considerations dudes clubs should not be another avenue for others to make decisions for the members. many of the members live in intense manifestations of systemic and structural inequities that routinely strip them of their agency and autonomy. the sense of ownership that the members feel over the dudes club creates a sense of purpose and pride in the members and instills a sense of solidarity. deciding on activities, meals, and health topics provides a sense of control. lack of a sense of control can have tangible effects on health and well-being (e.g., lachman et al., 2011). in this way, the dudes club may help to buffer the negative health ramifications of feeling powerless. ground the club in social connection funders, health care providers, community organizations, and host communities can: • provide funding for clubs that ensure space for social connections. for example, make sure that time for building relationships is built into the club, whether as part of a simple social activity (e.g., playing bingo) or something more formal (e.g., a talking or sharing circle). policy considerations club members, club providers, and health care workers all discussed the importance of social connections and bonding that the club provides. social support is linked to a variety of benefits, such as good mental health, positive affect, and lower rates of depression and ptsd symptomology (lakey & orehek, 2011). as doctors often struggle to prescribe social support, providing space for creating relationships is a fundamental part of a functioning men’s group. in the dudes club, relationships were created between the members, between the members and elders, and between the members and the health care workers. this lack of hierarchy in the social support system was also important, as members see the doctor as another “dude,” and thus feel a social connection with other members, regardless of their position. ultimately, creating men’s only spaces that are safe and trusted is a costeffective investment for the health care system by providing a model to successfully address upstream determinants of men’s health. take an intersectional approach to health and well-being in keeping with the trc’s (2015) call to action 23 for cultural competency training for all health care professionals, all levels of government can work together to: 18 the indigenous international policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi: 10.1858/iipj2021.12.2.10896 • provide funding to train health care professionals and other frontline workers involved with dudes clubs in culturally safe practices and how to connect with individuals deeply impacted by structural and systemic inequities; and • health care professionals involved in the clubs should provide accessible health information. policy considerations cultural safety training must be intersectional. it must include training to ensure providers and health care workers have a good understanding of the members’ lived experiences to be able to provide space and information that is appropriate for the members’ current lived realities, which are shaped by racism, socioeconomic circumstances, gender norms, and historical factors that continue to impact indigenous peoples today. support for indigenous-driven grassroots initiatives like the dudes club in keeping with undrip article 5 (affirming the right of indigenous people to maintain and strengthen their own political, legal, economic, social, and cultural institutions; united nations, 2007), all levels of government can work together to: • increase funding for grassroots initiatives grounded in indigenous cultural practices, and support the work already being done to promote holistic healing in communities, particularly in the area of indigenous men’s health; and • provide funding for culturally responsive evaluation of grassroots, community, and indigenous-led initiatives. policy recommendations the dudes club emphasizes indigenous practices and traditions, ownership, social connection, and intersectional approaches. this results in somewhat uncommon funding costs. for example, it can be difficult to secure funding to pay elders and counsellors, purchase food, and purchase materials for engaging in cultural activities. all of these components are fundamental to the success of the dudes club, and funders should consider them just as important as other associated costs. conclusion the dudes club is an innovative model for addressing men’s well-being, and physical, spiritual, emotional, and mental health. in the last five years, with the help of the first nations health authority and canadian men’s health foundation, the club has expanded rapidly to dozens of locations across british columbia. the model offers a unique way for men to engage with their health by providing a space where members can build brotherhood, challenge colonial constructions of masculinity, reconnect with their identities, access health care, and stand in solidarity to challenge structural and systemic barriers. through holistic and non-judgmental approaches, the club has successfully facilitated tangible health benefits for its members. it is an innovative model for policymakers to address upstream 19 efimoff, patrick et al.: the power of connections published by scholarship@western, 2021 determinants of health, particularly socio-structural determinants, for the benefit of everyone in the community. references assembly of first nations, & health canada. 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(2007). united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples. http://www.un.org/development/desa/indigenouspeoples/wp-content/uploads/ sites/19/2018/11/undrip_e_web.pdf wide, j., mok, h., mckenna, m., & ogrodniczuk, j. s. (2011). effect of gender socialization on the presentation of depression among men: a pilot study. canadian family physician, 57, e74-e78. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/pmc3038836/ wilkinson, r., & marmot, m. (eds.). (2003). social determinants of health: the solid facts (2nd ed.). world health organization. wilson, n. j., & cordier, r. (2013). a narrative review of men’s sheds literature: reducing social isolation and promoting men’s health and well‐being. health and social care in the community, 21(5), 451-463. https://doi.org/10.1111/hsc.12019 10896 cover page.pdf ms 10896 efimoff the power of connections rce.pdf ms #1447 barry being neighbourly final.pdf the international indigenous policy journal volume 10|issue 5 november 2019 being neighbourly: urban reserves, treaty settlement lands, and the discursive construction of municipal–first nation relations janice barry university of waterloo, janice.barry@uwaterloo.ca recommended citation barry, j. (2019). being neighbourly: urban reserves, treaty settlement lands, and the discursive construction of municipal– first nation relations. the international indigenous policy journal, 10(5). doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.8515 being neighbourly: urban reserves, treaty settlement lands, and the discursive construction of municipal–first nation relations abstract ongoing land claim negotiations are creating areas of first nation authority within and adjacent to many urban centres. several government agencies and lobby groups have responded to these changes with discussion papers and toolkits, all implicitly or explicitly intended to help municipal and first nation governments become better "neighbours." using the theoretical and methodological insights found in critical discourse and interpretive policy analysis, this article examines the prevalence of this "neighbour-to-neighbour" discourse in municipal and other non-indigenous policy, placing a particular focus on how it is used in land use planning. i explore how these policy documents discursively construct and articulate a distinctly and deeply settler-colonial perspective on the desired relationship between first nations and municipalities: one that has clear antecedents in liberaleconomic notions of property, and that serves to conceal key aspects of indigenous authority. keywords indigenous peoples, urban reserves, municipalities, neighbours, discourse analysis acknowledgments this project was partially supported by the university research grants program at the university of manitoba and by an insight development grant from the social science and humanities research council. a special thanks to madeleine koch and adam fiss for their adept research assistance. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0license. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 published by scholarship@western 1 being neighbourly: urban reserves, treaty settlement lands, and the discursive construction of municipal–first nation relations for many north americans (myself included), the normative values of “being neighbourly” were first introduced through an enduring and well-loved staple of children’s television programming. running from 1968 to 2001 (internet movie database [imdb], 2014), mister rogers’ neighborhood spoke about the importance of developing a sense of community and ensuring that all the “neighbours” in this community are treated with respect, dignity, and compassion. other norms and values that were explored throughout the program included ideas of cooperation and the ability to live within rules and limits (pbs parents, 2004). such explorations of the characteristics of being neighbourly is, of course, not limited to children’s television. the relationship between neighbours is, in many respects, a fundamental characteristic of urban life; it is a physical relationship that arises when different properties, and different households and organizational entities (including governments) exist in close proximity. yet, it is also a social—if not political, economic, and legal—relationship that shapes how diverse peoples and organizations live together in our built environments. in this article, i explore one emerging element of urban “neighbourliness”: the changing relationship between municipalities and nearby first nations.1 as canada’s population has grown, and as cities have sprawled, the physical separation between urban and first nation settlements is not as great as it once was—or was designed to be, with indian reserves as the cornerstone of a colonial spatial policy that sought to separate first nation peoples from the social, political, and economic life of canadian cities (harris, 2002). many of these cities have now grown right up to and, in some cases, completely around indian reserves. yet, urban expansion is not the only mechanism through which municipalities and first nations are brought physically closer together. ongoing land claim negotiations and the subsequent establishment of treaty settlement lands (alcantara & nelles, 2009) and/or “urban reserves” (tomiak, 2017; walker, 2008) immediately adjacent to or directly within an urban (or urbanizing) area have placed municipalities in the new and largely unfamiliar situation of needing to collaborate with first nations on a wide range of land management issues. as this article will show, the idea of “neighbour-to-neighbour” relationships has emerged as a key discourse amongst municipal and other non-indigenous actors, with land use planning as an important part of this relationship. planning, as both a field of professional practice and an area of scholarly inquiry, is concerned with “the scientific, aesthetic, and orderly disposition of land, resources, facilities and services” (canadian institute of planners [cip], 2019, para. 2)—questions that have very much to do with how neighbouring parcels of land, neighbouring parts of a city or town, and/or neighbouring jurisdictional authorities (including indigenous authorities) sit in relation to one another. but planning is not just about the arrangement of various land uses; it also seeks to contribute to community well-being, quality of life, and citizen engagement (cip, 2019). these are the elements of planning theory and practice that have engaged most directly with the ideal of being neighbourly. for 1 first nations are one of three recognized indigenous groups in canada, inuit and métis peoples being the two others. while this article focuses on the specific experiences of first nations that hold and seek to develop land within urban and urbanizing areas, the term indigenous is occasionally used in an effort to draw out the connections to wider global struggles for sovereignty and self-determination. the word aboriginal is also used when referring to government documents that use this terminology. barry: the discursive construction of municipal-first nation relations doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.8515 2 example, sandercock’s influential work on multicultural planning (attili & sandercock, 2007; sandercock, 2000; sandercock & attili, 2009) asks us to consider how “strangers” might “become neighbours.” not unlike mister rogers, sandercock’s call to become better neighbours is underlain by a belief in the power of intercultural relationships, cooperation, learning, and exchange. these are important social and political values, ones that echo through much of the literature on community engagement and collaborative planning, particularly in cross-cultural settings (see, for example, forester, 2009; umemoto, 2001). in sandercock’s work, neighbourly behaviour is conceived as a way of being in and responding to planning situations shaped by cultural and socio-economic difference. neighbourly relations are seen as the opposite of relationships shaped by strangeness, unfamiliarity, and fear; they instead hold open the possibilities of social learning and social capital development. this article speaks to the tensions that emerge out of the planning profession’s potential to facilitate conversations across lines of difference and its foundational role in managing land use across the physical and material lines of property and political jurisdiction. these tensions are particularly pronounced in settler-colonial contexts like canada, where urban and regional planning has and continues to play a significant role in dispossessing indigenous peoples of their lands and governance authorities (porter, 2010; porter & barry, 2016; ugarte, 2014). the planning profession’s ability to create and enforce these lines of property and jurisdiction needs to be understood as a key part of these ongoing colonial processes (dorries, 2017). in this article, i use the literature on liberal-economic notions of property to open up a new line of questioning about the limitations of using the language of neighbours to craft new governance relationships with first nation peoples. notably, the focus of this article is not on how these first nation–municipal relationships are performed and experienced on the ground, but rather how this way of seeing first nation–municipal relations as one between neighbours is produced and reproduced in municipal and other related non-indigenous policy texts. i begin by introducing the policy contexts for negotiating treaty settlement lands in british columbia and establishing urban reserves in manitoba, before outlining the conceptual and methodological approach that is used to guide my analysis. after presenting the key tenets of interpretative policy analysis (yanow, 1996, 2000) and critical discourse analysis (chouliaraki & fairclough, 1999; fairclough, 2005), i then move to an analysis of the various policy notes and practice guides that have been created to encourage greater first nation– municipal collaboration. the latter half of the article presents a more critical reading of these documents and questions the usefulness of the neighbour-to-neighbour relationship as a normative guide for creating and sustaining a respectful, dignified, and compassionate relationship with self-determining first nations. i find that these documents construct and articulate a distinctly and deeply settler-colonial perspective on the desired relationship between first nations and municipalities, one that has clear antecedents in liberal-economic notions of property and conceals key aspects of indigenous authority. policy context: the emergence of new first nation–municipal relations indigenous peoples are not just living in and adjacent to cities, they are also acquiring urban lands—or more aptly re-acquiring lands since all canadian cities sit on the homelands or territories of one or more indigenous nations. for many first nations, this process of acquiring urban lands is directly tied to modern treaty-making processes (alcantara & nelles, 2009). for example, the lengthy and politically the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 published by scholarship@western 3 fraught british columbia (bc) treaty process (woolford, 2005) allows participating first nations to acquire land on a willing-seller/willing-buyer basis in areas of the province where crown land is limited due to extensive land privatization (british columbia treaty commission [bctc], 2018a). in the prairie provinces (where there are numerous post-confederation numbered treaties), unfulfilled treaty obligations are leading to the creation of entirely new urban reserves. as discussed below, both processes have the potential to generate new areas of first nation self-government within or immediately adjacent to existing towns and cities. these changes are intended to allow first nations to pursue new forms of economic and housing development, using regulatory tools that are completely separate from those that guide planning and development in the adjacent municipalities. the following sub-sections provide additional details on the nature and intent of the negotiation of treaty settlement lands in bc and urban reserves in manitoba, identifying a common lack of statutory direction on the overall relationship between first nations and municipalities in both provinces. negotiating treaty settlement lands in british columbia officially established in september 1992, the bc treaty commission was designed to facilitate a modern treaty-making process between interested first nations and both the bc and federal governments. there are currently 65 different negotiations underway or recently settled in the province (bctc, 2018b). all of these negotiations follow a six-stage negotiation process, progressing from the preparation of a simple statement of intent to long-term implementation plans. aboriginal governance, lands, resources, and financial compensation were identified as some of the issues that the parties would likely want to address. although private property is not up for negotiation, many of the claim areas include large towns and cities, with a large concentration of overlapping land claim areas in both the lower mainland (the most densely populated area of bc) and the capital regional district on the southern tip of vancouver island. although the intention is for most treaty settlement lands to come from public or crown lands, it is recognized that this may be difficult to achieve in urban areas, and the acquisition of lands that are currently in private ownership on a willing-buyer/willing-seller basis is seen as a “critical” component of the bc treaty process (bctc, 2018a, para. 12). once a treaty is finalized, the first nation self-governs all of its existing reserves, as well as any additional treaty settlement lands (both former crown lands and those acquired on the open market). treaty first nations will manage these lands completely independently from the laws and regulations that exist under the indian act and will have the ability to create their own land use bylaws and collect property taxes. importantly, these lands will not be subject to the provisions of the local government act, the main statute that governs municipal planning in british columbia. the act does allow treaty first nations to voluntarily join the regional district board, enabling collaboration with other municipalities on regional planning concerns. many bc first nations and municipalities have also developed other types of intergovernmental agreements to affirm a desire to work together (alcantara & nelles, 2016). many first nations may also require some sort of economic arrangement with the adjacent municipality to purchase services (water, sewer, fire protection, etc.) for their urban lands (alcantara & nelles, 2016). addressing outstanding treaty land entitlements in manitoba although manitoba is not engaged in modern treaty negotiations like those currently underway in bc, the ongoing treaty land entitlement (tle) process is having a similar effect on municipal–first barry: the discursive construction of municipal-first nation relations doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.8515 4 nation relations. since the mid-1990s, the province of manitoba, the government of canada, and nearly 30 different first nation bands have been officially involved in a process to address a historic “land debt” (treaty and aboriginal research centre of manitoba, 1994, p 1). when the treaties were negotiated in the late 1800s, the population of each first nation signatory was used to determine the total amount of land to be set apart as indian reserves. however, not all first nations received their full land entitlement (treaty and aboriginal research centre of manitoba, 1994) and, between 1994 and 2009, the federal and provincial governments entered into eight individual tle settlement agreements with affected first nations. they also signed the 1997 manitoba framework agreement with the 21 first nations involved in the treaty land entitlement commission (aboriginal affairs and northern development canada [aandc], 2011). the net impact of these agreements is that these 29 entitlement first nations (efns) are collectively entitled to 1.4 million additional acres of reserve land. of that amount, over 1.1 million will be selected from unoccupied crown land (aandc, 2011). the remainder will be purchased on a willingbuyer/willing-seller basis, using funds provided by the canadian government according to the terms of the settlement agreements. although most of the lands will be selected from within an efn’s treaty area (meaning that the more northern first nations will likely be selecting lands far away from major urban areas), provisions do exist for first nations to select lands outside of their treaty areas if they can demonstrate clear social or economic objectives (framework agreement, 1997). once the lands are selected (for crown lands) or purchased (for private lands), the parties will then go through the process of formally adding them to the efn’s existing reserve lands. when that process is complete, lands in incorporated areas will be formally removed from the municipal boundaries and will no longer be subject to the provincial municipal act and planning act. the lands will either be managed under the statuary authority of the indian act or according to the first nation’s own land code, for those nations that have extricated themselves from the land-related sections of the indian act as per the process laid out in the first nation land management act. like the situation that exists in bc, first nations who have selected lands that were formerly within or in close proximity to an existing municipality will likely be looking to purchase those services off the municipality. the infrastructure to support these services may already be in place, especially if the land is in an urban area and already has buildings on the site. indeed, many first nations in manitoba very explicitly chose urban reserves that have the potential for commercial development (ashton et al., 2018). the development of service agreements will often be a key component of the establishment of urban reserves. in 2001, the then ministry of aboriginal and northern affairs responded to this emerging governance issue by developing a reference manual for municipal development and service agreements (government of manitoba, 2004). this manual extended well beyond the payment for services and sought to provide guidance on a wide range of first nation-municipal issues—including planning. one of the most significant issues was how the parties might work together to ensure some level of land use compatibility so that the urban plans and policies of one party would not adversely affect the other. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 published by scholarship@western 5 underlying context for municipal–first nation planning while both the bc treaty process and the manitoban treaty land entitlement process clearly present tremendous potential for the formation of new planning relationships between first nation and municipal governments, there is a noticeable absence of provincial statutes and policy direction. this absence is significant, given that lands (and, as result, land-use planning) are an area of provincial authority according to the canadian constitution (with indian reserves, national parks, and military lands as some notable exceptions). in incorporated areas, this authority is delegated to municipalities, which do not exist constitutionally and are often referred to as “creatures of the province.” therefore, municipalities cannot exercise any powers other than those that have been expressly granted to them from the provincial government (levi & valverde, 2006). this situation means that the provincial statutes governing these spheres of municipal authority are potentially of great importance in terms of understanding how the land-use planning relationship between municipalities and first nations is conceived and enacted. in contrast, indigenous⁠—and, in the context of this article, first nation—authority neither arises through the canadian constitution (although there is clear constitutional recognition) nor through a delegation from the crown. it arises out of the simple fact that indigenous peoples existed and continue to exist as sovereign, self-determining nations with rich legal traditions (see, for example, borrows, 2002) and with political authority that is derived from their respective lands and territory, “from thousands of years of occupying its waterways and forests” (pasternak, 2014, p. 146). the crown has consistently failed to recognize these authorities and has imposed its law and asserted its jurisdiction over indigenous territories (l. ford, 2010; pasternak, 2014). and when attempts have been made to recognize indigenous authority, it has been done within the context of an ongoing structure of settler colonialism that serves to limit and contain indigenous authority to the structures and parameters laid out by the settler state (coulthard, 2014). urban and regional planning, as the primary structure for defining the use of land and for claiming settler jurisdiction over these decision-making activities, therefore, needs to be critically examined for its role in this ongoing conflict between indigenous and municipal authority. as noted in previous work (porter & barry, 2015, 2016), first nations are listed in the bc local government act as a potential party to consult during the preparation of an official community plan (bc’s primary strategic planning document) and a mandatory party to consult during the preparation of a regional growth strategy. however, these directions are rather imprecise, giving no clear sense as to whether first nations need to be engaged as a stakeholder or as an adjacent and, indeed, overlapping government since there are likely aboriginal rights and interests within the municipal area. in manitoba, aboriginal and treaty rights, as well as the resultant duty to consult aboriginal peoples, are part of the provincial land use policies [plups] that municipal development plans “must be generally consistent [emphasis added] with the plups” (provincial planning regulation, 2011, p. 9). however, it is entirely unclear how municipalities are expected to uphold these rights, as there is no direction on the breadth and depth of the intergovernmental relationship with all aboriginal peoples, including but not limited to those efns engaged in urban reserve development. there is also no direction on the process through which aboriginal peoples should be engaged in planning decisions and how this engagement might be designed to create an ongoing relationship between municipal and aboriginal governments. barry: the discursive construction of municipal-first nation relations doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.8515 6 the remainder of this paper examines how, facing this lack of strong statutory and formal policy direction, municipalities and other related crown actors have relied on the idea of a neighbour-toneighbour relationship and the normative framework of being neighbourly to help them make sense of their changing relationship with nearby first nations. perhaps, more significantly, i argue that the focus on being better neighbours is a repurposing of well-worn modes of inter-municipal collaboration and is, therefore, an entirely inappropriate way of framing the relationship with a self-determining first nation whose authority is not delegated, but arises out of prior occupation of the lands currently known as canada. conceptual and methodological approach my analysis is guided by interpretative and discourse-based approaches to policy analysis (see, for example, hajer, 2003; wagenaar, 2012; yanow, 2000), which explore the role of informal and formal texts for shaping the grounded processes of policy formation and implementation. more specifically, the article takes inspiration from and seeks to apply key concepts from critical discourse analysis (chouliaraki & fairclough, 1999; fairclough, 2005), with a particular focus on the idea of nodal discourses and the processes of discursive recontextualization. nodal discourses are a particular “order of discourse” (chouliaraki & fairclough, 1999), a kind of discursive shorthand that is able to “articulate and subsume” (fairclough, jessop, & sayer 2004) other ways of being, acting, and representing complex policy problems. in simpler terms, nodal discourses are the elements of a planning or policy document that draw together but also powerfully inform other discursive elements, often taking on an unquestioned “common sense-” like quality. whereas nodal discourses describe a particular textual outcome or effect, the processes of discursive recontextualization provide a potential window into how nodal discourses come into being. as critical discourse analysts stress (chouliaraki & fairclough, 1999; fairclough, 2005), policy discourses change and evolve as new ways of being, acting, and representing are introduced to the social field. however, policy texts do not simply reproduce ideas and concepts drawn from elsewhere; they appropriate and transform them to make them more meaningful to the policy sector, scale, and/or structure at hand. critical discourse analysts conceive of these processes of discursive change as recontextualization. using these ideas from critical discourse analysis as my conceptual guide, i ask whether, how, and to what degree the neighbour-to-neighbour approach to first nation–municipal relations that is being advocated in many planning and policy documents has begun to function as a nodal discourse. perhaps more importantly, i ask whether this way of framing effective first nation–municipal relations may, in fact, be a recontextualization of well-established ways of conceiving and responding to the conflicts that between two municipalities and whether this recontextualization may, in fact, foreclose possibilities for attending to the unique characteristics of first nation governance. given that my interest is in discourse and the overall framing of the relationship, rather than the statutory requirements, i did not discount documents that were produced by influential municipal lobby groups (e.g., the canadian federation of municipalities and the provincial equivalents). for as the growing fields of interpretive policy and critical discourse analysis illustrate, substantive laws and regulations are only one way that policies gain traction and influence. language and discourse are key to understanding how policy shapes human behaviour. as the interpretive policy analyst yanow (1996) the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 published by scholarship@western 7 observed, “even purely instrumental [policy] intentions are communicated and perceived through symbolic means” (p. 12). this focus on the ways that policy influences action beyond tangible rules and directions makes the distinction between formal policies produced by governance and the informal guidance developed by lobby groups less important. the discourses presented in these latter documents are just as important in terms of understanding the values, beliefs, and feelings that shape first nation– municipal relations. to complete my analysis, i drew on previous case study work on first nation–municipal relations in british columbia (porter & barry, 2015, 2016), as well as an ongoing research program on similar issues in manitoba. in both provinces, i started with policy documents, guidance notes, and position papers that were specific to the first nation–municipal relationship and developed in response to each land claim process. in bc, i looked for documents that were written after the initiation of the bc treaty process in 1991 and, in manitoba, i looked for documents that were written after the first treaty land entitlement agreement was signed in 1994. in order to identify any potential recontextualization of discourses, my final task was to look at these documents in relation to the policies and statutes that guide land use planning in each respective province. as will become apparent, the corpus of texts that guides this relationship is relatively small, which has allowed for a far more narrative treatment of the relationships between the different policy documents. neighbour-to-neighbour relations: a new nodal discourse drawing on insights and experiences from local initiatives across the country, the work of federation of canadian municipalities (fcm) arguably presents the most comprehensive view of how first nation– municipal relations have been conceived at the national scale. the federation works to advocate for the needs of municipalities at the federal level and to provide policy advice to its over 2,000 membermunicipalities. with the financial support of indigenous and northern affairs canada (inac), one of its goals has been to encourage municipalities and first nations to work together through the development of tools and resources that can be applied across canada. one of the cornerstones of this work is the first nations–municipal community infrastructure partnership program service agreement toolkit (fcm, 2011). although the document is fundamentally about how neighbouring municipalities and first nations might achieve certain economic efficiencies through service sharing agreements and joint infrastructure projects, it also hints at the possibilities for a broader planning relationship. the toolkit clearly and consistently positions first nation–municipal relationships as ways to “bind communities together in a positive way and encourage collaboration and development and help ensure potential conflict is resolved more effectively” (fcm, 2011, p. 13) with the development of a “harmonious co-existence” (fcm, 2011, p. 107) as a clear normative goal. however, beyond the development of some very broad recommendations related to cultivating cross-cultural awareness, attentiveness to differences in each other’s administrative structures, and clear communication protocol, there is little indication of how exactly this co-existence is conceived and how it might translate into concrete planning practices. the policy statements and planning guides directed at municipalities in individual provinces are much more instructive in this regard. in manitoba, the processes for negotiating this “harmonious co-existence" are more formal and specific than the collaborative relationships envisioned by fcm. given that the tle sites will be formally added barry: the discursive construction of municipal-first nation relations doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.8515 8 to each first nation's reserve-base, the municipal–first nation relationship is partially guided by the federal additions to reserves policy (indian and northern affairs canada, 2003; indigenous and northern affairs canada, 2016). that policy includes a requirement that the first nation work with the municipality to develop a separate agreement outlining their mutual expectations and commitments. since tle selections are often some distance away from the original reserve and since many first nations will look to purchase services (e.g., water, sewer, emergency services) from the adjacent municipality, these agreements tend to focus on service delivery. once the tle lands are officially designated as a reserve, they will no longer be subject to municipal taxes, which creates a need for the development a new financial arrangement that considers the level of service required and the property taxes that would have been previously levied on the site. the additions to reserves policy also suggests that the content of these negotiations be expanded to include other issues, including the harmonization of municipal planning by-laws and the mechanisms for resolving any disputes between the two parties. not unlike the fcm toolkit, the additions to reserve policy recommendations are very clearly couched in and justified by a need to develop a good neighbour approach, which is defined as “first nations and municipalities sitting down together to discuss issues of mutual interest and/or concern in the same way neighbouring municipalities must do in relation to one another” (indian and northern affairs canada, 2003, p. 16). although this particular sentence was dropped from the 2016 revision to the federal additions to reserve policy, it continues to stress the importance of a good neighbour approach (indigenous and northern affairs canada, 2016, p. 11). this goal is also echoed in the province of manitoba’s 2001 publication, a reference manual for municipal development and services agreements, which notes: when an entitlement first nation selects or acquires land within a municipality, after the land is set apart as reserve, the entitlement first nation and municipality will be neighbours, if they are not already neighbours. as with other neighbours, the entitlement first nation and municipality will be continually impacted by the actions of the other party and, as such, will have a continuing need to interact with the other party to resolve their concerns. as such, it is important for the entitlement first nation and municipality to maintain a healthy and respectful relationship with one another. (manitoba aboriginal and northern affairs, 2001, p. 7) in all these documents, the neighbour-to-neighbour relationship is clearly defined as something that is analogous to the relationship that already exists between two adjacent municipalities and as a very practical response to the realities of living in close proximity—points that will be critically interrogated in the next section. not entirely unlike manitoba's tle process, the ongoing bc treaty process has prompted various municipal organizations to consider how their members might better engage with first nations. in fact, the union of bc municipalities successfully lobbied to have affected municipalities involved in the treaty process. as per a 2003 memorandum of understanding, municipalities have been given the opportunity to participate in treaty negotiations as part of the provincial negotiating team. many municipalities across bc have also banded together to form their own regional treaty advisory committees, with the recently disbanded lower mainland treaty advisory committee (lmtac) the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 published by scholarship@western 9 arguably being the most active. from 1993 to 2012, lmtac produced a number of policy position papers and guidance notes that have deployed and further refined municipal understanding of the neighbour-to-neighbour discourse found in the manitoba and national policy documents. the lmtac's own handbook, building relations with first nations, which was first released in 2003 and has had three subsequent editions, strikes a very similar tone to the fcm document by stressing the importance of mutual understanding, communication, respect, and trust (lmtac, 2010). however, lmtac’s articulation of 43 first principles is much more revealing in terms of its conception of neighbourly relations with adjacent first nations. the ideal relationship between first nations and municipalities is seen as one that is based on certainty, both in terms of clearly delineating the exact nature and scope of aboriginal right and title through the signing of a treaty and in terms of adherence to a common, well-articulated regulatory framework. the principles express a clear preference for upholding existing statutes and regulation and stress that the “law making authorities granted to first nations under treaty must be consistent with the law-making authorities exercised by local government” (lmtac, 2005, p. 13). in doing so, they discursively bind indigenous authority to something that is analogous to that of a municipality. these ideas about collaborating, but only within a common and largely pre-existing regulatory framework, are further refined and begin to take on additional meaning when evoked in lmtac’s response to proposed changes to the management of indian reserves. for example, when responding to the first nation land management act (which creates an opportunity for first nation self-government over reserves lands), lmtac representatives stress that first nations should be required to consult adjacent municipalities on their proposed land codes through a referral process that parallels the provisions that exist under the local government act. in another policy paper, jointly written with staff from the greater vancouver regional district (gvrd, now metro vancouver), lmtac is very explicit in laying out its vision for well-regulated neighbourly relations, arguing that “good rules make good neighbors” (lmtac & gvrd, 2000, p. 28). in making this very obvious and direct reference to the old adage of “good fences make good neighbours,” the lmtac is not only making an argument for policy certainty but also quite clearly working to re-enforce the spatial and political boundaries that give rise to municipalities’ distinct areas of authority and jurisdiction. as previous research has shown, almost exactly the same language about the need to work within existing rules and structures is used at the provincial scale (porter & barry 2015, 2016). the union of bc municipalities (ubcm), who offer policy advice to municipalities at the provincial scale, also assert that first nation authority should be spatially and politically well-defined, and that it should be exercised within the context of pre-existing statutory direction (ubcm, 2003a, 2003b). perhaps most significantly, ubcm has taken the position that municipalities should also have the opportunity to comment on a first nation’s plan to develop its treaty settlement lands and that such a plan ought to be “compatible or harmonized with those of local government beside or around the settlement lands” (ubcm, 2004, p. 3). while the discourses presented in these british columbia documents are arguably more pointed and well developed than what exists in the manitoban context, the core ideas are the same. neighbour-toneighbour relations are about pursuing more advanced modes of intergovernmental dialogue and barry: the discursive construction of municipal-first nation relations doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.8515 10 communication, but also about establishing a clear regulatory context for those discussions—including the establishment of clear spatial and political limits. the ideas and policy guidance that are emerging in both provinces also hint at the recontextualization of discourses from other spheres of land use governance. for example, the reference to the old adage about neighbours and fences most certainly links to well-worn ideas about property and the desired relationship between property owners, whereas the processes that are envisioned for facilitating dialogue between first nation and municipal actors are clearly borrowing from the approaches that are already used between municipalities. the next section further develops these observations about the origins of the neighbour-to-neighbour discourse and its recontextualization of other ways of thinking. it also interrogates the appropriateness as a way of conceiving the urban planning relationships between first nations and municipalities. recontextualization and the territoriality of property and jurisdiction before embarking on this line of questioning, it needs to be acknowledged that these policy documents’ call for increased dialogue and cooperation between two levels of government that have historically had very little to do with one another is a positive step forward. but what does this idea of a neighbour-toneighbour relationship evoke and—perhaps more importantly—what does it obscure? asking these same questions in more theoretical terms, what kinds of discursive relationships are present in these documents and what other discourses are being recontextualized to address the particularities of first nation–municipal relations? for although the policy-guidance notes that shape first nation–municipal relations in both bc and manitoba make frequent references to a need for “improved communication and relationship building” (fcm, 2011, p. 4), it is quite clear that collaboration is not the only discourse that has shaped the normative development of the planning relationships that are beginning to emerge between first nations and municipalities. in fact, the conception of neighbourly first nation–municipal relations that is being advanced in these policy documents bears only a passing resemblance to how neighbourly relations have been discussed in the planning theory literature. as the previous section illustrated, any discussion of first nation– municipal collaboration is quickly tempered by discussions of the need to ensure and enforce clear rules, as well as clear spatial and jurisdictional boundaries between the two forms of government—a phenomenon that has been referred to as “bounded recognition” (porter & barry, 2015). in this way, these planning and policy documents clearly deploy a much more basic notion of neighbours, one that arises out of the etymological origins of the word or the idea of persons dwelling in close proximity with one another (canadian oxford dictionary, 2004). this idea of neighbours as individuals (or groups of individuals) inhabiting spaces that are near to—but distinctly separate from—one another is inextricably linked to western conceptions of property. as critical legal geographer blomley (2016b) observed, there is a distinct “territory” within western notions of property, one that has particular significance for urban planning and, yet, is a rarely discussed aspect (blomley, 2016a; jacobs & paulsen, 2009; krueckeberg, 1995). under the liberal-economic model of property, this territory provides a geographically and temporally bounded system of rights, with the owner being afforded uniform and exclusive rights for as long as they hold the land title. this territoriality, as blomley (2004) noted, is only an ideal type, with the actual practice of property relations being far more “relational, porous, and ambiguous” (p. 96). in other words, it is the boundaries created the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 published by scholarship@western 11 by property that separate one dwelling space from another, but that also demand some sort of respectful interaction between adjacent property owners. for example, being neighbourly often entails keeping the limbs of your branches trimmed to avoid spilling over onto a neighbour’s yard or keeping your stereo turned down to not adversely affect the quiet enjoyment of adjacent properties. good neighbourly relationships, therefore, seek to affirm existing property rights while also recognizing that there is a certain permeability to those boundaries, which often requires open dialogue and a willingness to adjust behaviour. notably, the planning and policy documents that frame and guide the formation of municipal–first nation relationships do not concern the relationship between individuals, but rather two levels of government. more recent work in critical legal geography has observed a similar territoriality in government relations and has defined jurisdiction as both a “spatial and legal concept” that serves to consolidate and maintain universal power over a defined geography (pasternak, 2014, p. 152; see also l. ford, 2010; r. t. ford, 1999). while these works were responding to the territorialized jurisdiction of the entire settler state, the territorialized approach to jurisdiction can also be applied to local governments, given the well-defined boundaries that separate one municipality from another. municipal jurisdiction is, of course, far less universal than that of the central state; not only are municipalities “creatures of the province,” but in many canadian provinces (bc and manitoba included) they are encouraged—and in some instances required—to establish the intergovernmental relationships needed to attend to the inevitable permeability of these territorial boundaries. this permeability has particular implications for land use planning. for just as an individual property owner (or tenant) is compelled to ensure that her actions do not have an undue negative impact on neighbouring property users, neighbouring municipalities are bound to various institutional structures and processes that seek to ensure that their land use plans and urban development proposals do not have undue negative impact on one another. in british columbia, for example, municipalities in urban growth areas are required to participate in a regional district board. one of its primary functions is to prepare a regional growth strategy that all the member municipalities must attend to when developing their own long-range plans (bish & clemens, 2008; see also porter & barry, 2016), an approach that is intended to maintain common and shared interests in the sustainability and vitality of the entire region. in manitoba, there are provisions that allow for the formation of a regional planning district, but this form of intergovernmental collaboration has more to do with the small size and limited planning capacities of many municipalities than the need to develop institutions to address the permeability of jurisdictional boundaries. municipalities in both provinces do, however, rely on well-worn systems of referring their draft plans to one another to identify and hopefully resolve any potential land use conflicts. in bc, these referrals are encouraged rather than explicitly mandated by the local government act, whereas in manitoba the local or regional planning authority “must consider . . . the development plans for the areas within the same region as the planning authority, and in particular the development plans for the areas adjacent to the planning area” (provincial planning regulation, 2011, p. 43). referrals and regional planning bodies both offer at least partial recognition of the permeability of jurisdictional boundaries and the resultant need to some develop a certain level of awareness of (or even a more direct form of collaboration regarding) adjacent land interests. when the statements and barry: the discursive construction of municipal-first nation relations doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.8515 12 positions outlined in the previous section are interpreted in the context of these inter-municipal processes, it becomes apparent that calls for a neighbour-to-neighbour relationships are not only a recontextualization and re-scaling of the norms and discourses that guide the relationships between property owners, but also a subsuming of indigenous governance authority so that it is framed as being akin to and guided by the same priorities of that of a municipality. while these discursive recontextualizations may be sound and justifiable from a regional planning perspective, its appropriateness for the first nation–municipal relationship needs to be called into serious question. as porter and barry (2015) noted, these ways of conceptualizing the planning relationship treat first nations as an adjacent government whose authority ends at the geographic limits of the indian reserve or treaty settlement land, as opposed to one that may continue to occupy, have interests in, and exercise customary stewardship responsibilities over the parts of its territory that are now within an incorporated municipality. perhaps more significantly, and as many first nation leaders have been actively advocating against (see, for example, king & pasternak, 2018), these discourses have the potential to reduce the complexity of indigenous authority to something that exists on the same level as and can be exercised through the delegated authority that exists for municipalities. conclusions by calling attention to the ways in which calls for increased neighbourliness are conceptually tied to property relations, this article sought to expand but also problematize the ways in which these discourses are applied to and circulate within land use planning. although these calls to become better neighbours are linked to a general push towards increased collaboration and intergovernmental dialogue at the regional scale, the main driver behind these initiatives is not social learning and cooperation envisioned by sandercock (2000) and others. rather, the neighbourly relationship is an attempt to enact the far more conventional planning role of managing land use across the physical and material lines of property and political jurisdiction—two concepts that in settler colonial contexts, like canada, are deeply implicated in ongoing acts of indigenous dispossession. by focusing on the material, spatial, and jurisdictional realities of neighbourly relations, this article encourages a more nuanced understanding of “neighbourly” behaviour than what currently exists in the planning literature: one that can still hold open the potential for a relationship that is built around the ideals of respect, dignity, and compassion, but that is highly attuned to questions of power and territoriality. yet, by focusing its exploration of the discursive construction and inherent tensions within the idea of a neighbour-to-neighbour relationship between first nations and municipalities, the potential contributions of this article extend beyond the field of urban and regional planning and into the wider body of theories and practices related to indigenous reconciliation at the local scale. as this article has shown, the neighbour-to-neighbour discourse is present in several policy documents and guidance notes which serve to link together a number of concepts, including a perceived need to improve dialogue and cooperation while also maintaining the political and spatial boundaries laid out by the various levels of the settler state. these discursive tendencies are positioned as an entirely inappropriate recontextualization of a) existing models of municipal-to-municipal collaboration, and b) more general concepts of property and property relations. in making this argument, the article has begun to trace the ways in which the legal and social relations that are derived from property and property rights are mirrored in the relations that arise between different government authorities through the the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 published by scholarship@western 13 delineation of distinct areas of political jurisdiction. critical legal geographers are most certainly aware of the unifying logic between the “territory of property” (blomley 1994; 2016b) and the “territory of jurisdiction” (pasternak, 2014). this article extends this work by connecting the construction and inevitable permeability of these territorialities to the specific challenges that are beginning to arise as first nations acquire and then seek to develop urban lands. in terms of these very particular intergovernmental and intercultural relations, this article does not simply note the ways in which notions of neighbourly behaviour, property, and jurisdiction are discursively recontextualized within the context of intergovernmental planning. rather, it contributes to the growing conversation about indigenous reconciliation by raising questions about the appropriateness of such discursive constructions, arguing that the neighbour-to-neighbour discourse fails to address key aspects of first nation–settler relations. this discourse simplifies and actively conceals key aspects of indigenous authority so that the complex, contested, and multi-dimensional relationships that exist with first nations are reduced to something that is akin to the relationship that exist between municipalities. neighbourly relations, therefore, emerge as a recontextualization of a wellestablished and deeply colonial discursive order. more work clearly needs to be done to construct an alternate way of framing the first nation–municipal relationship, with recent work on the spirit and contemporary meaning of the treaty relationship and on the possibilities for a co-existence of indigenous and non-indigenous legal orders (see, for example, borrows, 2002; borrows & coyle, 2017) as one promising way forward. this potential has not yet penetrated municipal policy. despite some high-level statements about the desire for a “harmonious co-existence” (fcm, 2011, p. 107) with first nation governments, municipal and other non-indigenous actors have failed to create policies and guidance that respect indigenous authority. by inviting first nations and municipalities to respond to their newfound relationship through a discourse of neighbourly behaviour, government agencies and lobby groups may, in fact, be presenting entirely the wrong question. they may also be foreclosing opportunities for a more robust and meaningful discussion of the possible co-existence of indigenous and non-indigenous governance systems, one where both systems are able to exist and be defined on their own terms. references aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc). 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(2000). conducting interpretive policy analysis. thousand oaks, ca: sage. doi: https://doi.org/10.4135/9781412983747 mapping approaches to decolonizing and indigenizing the curriculum at canadian universities: critical reflections on current practices, challenges, and possibilities the international indigenous policy journal volume 13 | issue 3 december 2022 mapping approaches to decolonizing and indigenizing the curriculum at canadian universities: critical reflections on current practices, challenges, and possibilities candace brunette debassige western university , canada, cbrune2@uwo.ca pauline wakeham western university, canada, pwakeham@uwo.ca cindy smithers-graeme western university, canada, csmithe3@uwo.ca aisha haque western university, canada, ahaque23@uwo.ca sara mai chitty western university, canada, saramai.chitty@uwo.ca recommended citation brunette-debassige et al., (2022). mapping approaches to decolonizing and indigenizing the curriculum at canadian universities: critical reflections on current practices, challenges, and possibilities. the international indigenous policy journal, 13(3). https://10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14109 mapping approaches to decolonizing and indigenizing the curriculum at canadian universities: critical reflections on current practices, challenges, and possibilities abstract this article identifies five predominant approaches to indigenizing the curriculum occurring within canadian universities today. examining these approaches in relation to theories of change articulated by gaudry and lorenz (2018) and stein (2020), the article considers the possibilities and limits of each approach as well as the degree to which they challenge the colonial and eurocentric edifices of canadian universities. while many of the current approaches to curricular change involve minor reforms that focus on individual transformation rather than substantive structural shifts, the authors also identify promising initiatives that push toward greater indigenous intellectual sovereignty and institutional autonomy. the article concludes by calling on academic institutions to better center indigenous peoples, lands and knowledges in curricular change, and more specifically, to embrace structural revision that ensures indigenous leadership and autonomy. keywords indigenizing, decolonizing, curriculum reform, higher education creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ 1 brunette-debassige et al.: mapping approaches published by scholarship@western, 2022 mapping approaches to decolonizing and indigenizing the curriculum at canadian universities: critical reflections on current practices, challenges, and possibilities since the release of the truth and reconciliation commission (trc) of canada’s final reports in 2015, post-secondary institutions increasingly sought to “indigenize” their campuses. this institutional work has involved a range of initiatives including recruiting indigenous faculty, staff, and students, creating new indigenous spaces, supporting curricular transformation, and developing broad-based institutional policies about indigenizing campuses. in response, a growing body of scholarship has emerged, outlining the possibilities and limits of movements to indigenize the academy (andreotti et al., 2015; gaudy & lorenz, 2018a; pidgeon, 2016; stein, 2019; tuck & yang, 2012). in this article, we focus on how indigenization is being implemented specifically with regard to curricular change at canadian universities. given that teaching and learning is one of the core missions of universities, the question of how indigenization is being pursued at the curricular level is of utmost importance. recent research in this area has provided significant insights into initiatives such as the establishment of new indigenous course requirements (icr) (gaudry & lorenz, 2018b; tanchuk, et al., 2018) as well as the integration of indigenous perspectives across disciplines (pete, 2015, 2018; steele et al., 2020) and within fieldspecific curricula in education (anuik & gillies, 2012; bissel & kortewag, 2016; cannon, 2012; csontos, 2019; pewewardy et al., 2019; takanak, 2016), geography (hunt & stevenson, 2017; moorman et al., 2021), journalism (todorova, 2016), law (drake, 2017; hewitt, 2016), library and information studies (ball & lar-son, 2021), literary studies (brunette-debassige & wakeham, 2020; styres, 2018), medicine (the indigenous physicians association of canada and the royal college of physicians and surgeons of canada, 2009; lewis & prunuske, 2017), natural sciences (michie et al., 2018), nursing (harder et. al., 2018; sanderson et al., 2020), pharmacy (swidrovich, 2020), psychology, (schmidt, 2019), social work (sinclair, 2004, 2019), and stem fields (friesen & herrmann, 2018). having surveyed this body of work as a whole, it is now possible to take a step back and consider what this scholarship collectively tells us about the approaches to indigenous-related curricular changes that are emerging across canadian universities in the post-trc era. methodology this paper emerges from the work of the indigenous curriculum and learning committee at western university located on the territory of the anishinaabek, haudenosaunee, lunapéewak, and chonnonton peoples. the authors of this paper all played critical roles as either initiators and/or active members of the committee assembled in 2019–20. recognizing the significance of introducing oneself in indigenous research and life, the authors of this paper came together from diverse intersectional positionalities and experiences with a shared commitment to advancing decolonizing and indigenization efforts in the academy. candace brunette-debassige is a member of the mushkego cree nation in treaty 9 with mixed cree and french white settler ancestry. she is an assistant professor and longstanding leader in indigenous education. pauline wakeham is an associate professor in the department of english and writing studies and a settler scholar of english and german descent. cindy smithers graeme is a settler scholar of european descent. aisha haque is a second-generation pakistani settler and the director of the centre for teaching and learning. sara mai chitty (she/her) is mixed michi sagig anishinaabekwe and white british settler. a member of alderville first nation, she is a curriculum and pedagogy advisor 2 the international indigenous policy journal vol. 13, iss. 3, art. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14109 in indigenous initiatives at western university, with a background in media and curriculum development. over the course of nearly two years, the committee, co-chaired by candace brunette-debassige and aisha haque led discussion across broad campus and community partners to mobilize indigenous curricular changes. as part of the committee’s planning process, we sought to learn from existing indigenization scholarship by tracing the broader picture emerging across canada and considering the successes and challenges experienced by teachers, administrators, and students elsewhere. to do so, we conducted a comprehensive literature review of scholarship on decolonizing and indigenizing teaching and learning at universities across the settler states of canada, the united states, australia, and new zealand. we searched over 30 databases representing the arts and humanities, social sciences, law, medicine, sciences, and education using the key terms “indigenization,” “decolonization,” and “reconciliation.” this approach resulted in a list of thousands of citations published over several decades, thereby reinforcing the vital recognition that efforts to decolonize and indigenize the academy began long before the trc, thanks to the foundational work of indigenous and decolonial intellectuals across the globe (battiste, 2000a, 2000b, 2013a, 2013b; cupples & grosfoguel, 2018; grande, 2015; kirkness & barnhardt, 1991; mignolo, 2009; mihesuah & wilson, 2004; smith 1999). while drawing upon this rich tradition of scholarship, in order to map post-trc developments, we honed in on a short list of approximately 50 peer-reviewed publications focusing on the recent canadian context. mindful of the fact that academic publishing can be hampered by time lags and colonial norms that may occlude important insights and marginalize indigenous voices (battiste 2002, p. 2), we combined our review of published scholarship with a survey of “grey literature”—institutional policy documents, as well as online reports and blogs by indigenous support staff and academics—to provide an up-to-date and multiperspectival understanding of institutional changes in recent years. in analyzing the indigenous curricular landscape, we noted recurring themes that surfaced in the academic and grey literature and combined these themes with our own professional experiences and observations working with the indigenous curriculum committee at our university. through this process, we discerned several patterns in the ways universities across canada have approached curricular transformation in light of the trc’s calls to action. in this paper, we identify what we view as five emerging approaches to curricular transformation and discuss the resultant challenges and possibilities. these approaches are: 1) including indigenous knowledges and perspectives across the disciplines; 2) capacity building through curriculum support and informal learning/unlearning opportunities; 3) mandatory indigenous course requirements; 4) increasing indigenous autonomy by elevating and creating indigenous programs and offices; and 5) creating partnerships with indigenous organizations. in theory and practice, these five approaches are not necessarily mutually exclusive; in fact, they can coexist and intersect within a single institution. however, each approach deserves specific attention to better understand the possibilities and constraints that educators are encountering as they implement them. through mapping these approaches, we also identified that there has been little formal academic discussion of the “theories of change” (tuck, 2018) informing different curriculum transformation initiatives. in other words, while existing scholarship and grey literature reveals discernible trends in decolonizing and indigenizing the curriculum across canadian universities, the rationales informing these approaches have yet to be considered in detail. what kinds of change are each of these approaches 3 brunette-debassige et al.: mapping approaches published by scholarship@western, 2022 designed to effect? in what ways might such changes leave the eurocentric logics and structures of the university largely intact or push toward more radical decolonial transformation? as we outline the five emerging approaches to indigenizing the curriculum at canadian universities, we will take up these questions by analyzing what these approaches might tell us about the theories of change that underpin them. how to transform a university: diagnosing the problem, imagining solutions in their article, “doing indigenous work: decolonizing and transforming the academy,” linda tuhiwai smith and graham hingangaroa smith (2018) offer a compelling diagnosis of the problems with the colonial academy in terms of its historical exclusion and oppression of indigenous peoples and knowledges. recognizing that these colonial structures and norms continue in universities today, smith and smith call on scholars committed to decolonizing the university to continually ask themselves: “what changes as a result of what we are doing?” (p. 24). with this question, smith and smith highlight the need for decolonial theory and scholarship to be put into transformative action in ways that are accountable and positively contribute to indigenous communities and futurities. smith and smith’s insights resonate with eve tuck’s (2018) recent call to examine underlying theories of change at play in the larger movement to indigenize the university. put succinctly, theories of change shape “[h]ow we conceive of a problem,” what its root causes are, and “what we propose” as solutions (stein 2020, p. 672). such theories may be conscious and explicit, but other times they may take the form of implicit assumptions and normalized practices that can unintentionally reproduce colonial structures, logics, and power asymmetries. for example, a university might seek to “indigenize” itself by wanting to hire more indigenous scholars. however, if such hiring processes proceed without proactively educating and preparing departments and appointment committees regarding indigenous peoples and scholarship, unequal power dynamics can be reproduced via processes that fail to adequately recognize the time and energy involved in community-based research or the validity of indigenous research methodologies (sensoy & diangelo, 2017). this example is consistent with sharon stein’s (2020) assertion that too often universities’ approaches to change tend to hinge upon solutions that do not radically challenge the colonial and eurocentric edifices of these institutions—or what stein calls “the house modernity built”—founded on three building blocks: “[t]he wall of enlightenment humanist knowledge,” “[t]he wall of the nation-state,’ and “the roof of global capital” (p. 669, 671-672). drawing upon previous collaborative work (andreotti et. al. 2015), stein outlines three theories of change. as andreotti, stein, ahenakew, and hunt stress, these categories are “pedagogical rather than normative”— they are meant “to provide a visual representation of complex and juxtaposed spaces that we inhabit” rather than definitively capturing all possible nuances or setting the terms for how change might occur in the world (p. 22). the first category, which stein denotes as “minor reform theories of change,” do not substantially question the foundations of the euro-western university. the approach to problems that arise, therefore, is not to fundamentally “change the system, but [to] change individuals to ensure that the system runs more fairly and efficiently” (p. 675). the second category—what stein calls “major reform” theories of change—“identify deep structural flaws” in universities “and advocate for more drastic changes” (p. 675). major reform theories thus call for changes in practice as well as in the epistemological foundations of universities, seeking to disrupt ways of knowing and to create spaces of “epistemological diversity” (p. 675). major reform theories may also entail “radically reimagining 4 the international indigenous policy journal vol. 13, iss. 3, art. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14109 existing universities, including not only diversifying representation within curriculum and the makeup of the student body and faculty, but also “redistributing … resources …to support” marginalized members and potentially engaging in some degree of institutional re-structuring (p. 676). finally, the “beyond reform theory of change” views “the foundations of the modern university” as being “deeply entangled with racial and colonial violence” (p. 678). after all, racism is structurally embedded in educational systems and curriculum, often accompanied by violent consequences for indigenous and racialized groups, thus feeding enduring processes of colonization (henry & tator, 2009; henry et al., 2017). indeed, many indigenous scholars have exposed these interconnections of institutional racism and colonialism in universities (henry, 2012; monture, 2009; st. denis, 2007). in light of this, the beyond reform theory of change accordingly questions and recognizes that “even radical efforts to include different ways of knowing, being, and relating into the institution will risk decontextualizing” and appropriating them (p. 678). as a result, the beyond reform theory understands “that the institution itself may not be salvageable and that something new may need to arise in its place if we seek to cease its harms” (p. 678). one of the key problems that has emerged in the post-trc movement to indigenize the academy is that the concept of “indigenizing” has been used too capaciously to refer to a range of initiatives, some of which are informed by minor theories of change that reinforce the status quo and some of which are shaped by a recognition of the need to radically alter and unravel the colonial university system. adam gaudry and danielle lorenz (2018a) have identified three different visions of indigenization emerging in and beyond canadian universities that exist on a “spectrum” and that resonate with (but are not identical to) stein’s minor, major, and beyond reform theories of change (p. 218). like stein’s minor reform theories of change, gaudry and lorenz’s first category—that of “indigenous inclusion”—is an approach to indigenization that largely confines change to the level of individuals rather than interrogating institutional structures. in this approach, indigenizing the academy “is conceived of primarily [as] a matter of inclusion and access” (p. 218). the solution, therefore, is to “increase[] indigenous students, faculty, and staff in the canadian academy” (p. 218). while stein’s examples of minor reforms focus on changing non-indigenous peoples through “cultural competency” or anti-racism training (p. 10), gaudry and lorenz’s term “indigenous inclusion” denotes an approach that “expects indigenous people to bear the burden of change” (p. 220). in practice, most canadian universities seem to be focusing on both non-indigenous and indigenous university community members, though the overwhelming power differential between a largely white euro-western majority and a very small indigenous minority within these institutions means that the burden of fitting into the institution continues to rest upon indigenous peoples. the second category that gaudry and lorenz identify as “reconciliation indigenization” locates indigenization on common ground between indigenous and canadian ideals, creating a new, broader consensus on debates such as what counts as knowledge, how should indigenous knowledges and european-derived knowledges be reconciled, and what types of relationships academic institutions should have with indigenous communities” (p. 218-19). reconciliation indigenization thus shares with stein’s major reform category the emphasis not only on changes in practice but also in epistemological orientation and possible structural reform. finally, the third category identified by gaudry and lorenz is “decolonial indigenization,” which “envisions the wholesale overhaul of the academy to fundamentally reorient knowledge production based on balancing power relations between indigenous peoples and canadians, transforming the academy into something 5 brunette-debassige et al.: mapping approaches published by scholarship@western, 2022 dynamic and new” (p. 219). while gaudry and lorenz’s idea of decolonial indigenization asserts the political sovereignty of indigenous nationhood in education and the need for an “overhauling” of the university, it does not appear to go as far as stein’s “beyond reform” theory of change, which recognizes that the university may not in fact be salvageable. similar to stein, gaudry and lorenz contend that, unfortunately, in post-trc canada, the changes currently being implemented by most universities have remained at the level of minor reforms rather than embracing deep epistemological and structural change. in this vein, the “academy has rhetorically adopted an aspirational vision of reconciliation indigenization” but, thus far, “the changes at most universities amount only to bolstering indigenous inclusion” (p. 219). this engenders many challenges for indigenous students, staff, and faculty who continually encounter ignorance of, or disregard for, their knowledges while being asked to perform immense amounts of labour on behalf of the university’s token indigenization initiatives (greenwood et al., 2008). the idea of decolonial indigenization, therefore, still remains far beyond what canadian universities’ indigenous strategic plans’ can achieve in practice. given the fact that the term “indigenization” has been used too loosely to describe a range of projects, it is important to establish definitional clarity before proceeding. in its best form, we understand indigenization “[a]s a process of resurgence” and re-centering of … indigenous ways of knowing” (grafton & melançon, 2020, p. 135). as grafton and melançon note, indigenization should therefore be led by indigenous peoples and should respect indigenous intellectual sovereignty—namely, indigenous leadership and self-determination—regarding the teaching and study of indigenous knowledges, languages, and methodologies. to emphasize that indigenization must be led by indigenous peoples, we use the capitalized “i” throughout this essay. in order to create respectful spaces in which indigenous peoples, knowledges, methodologies, and pedagogies can thrive throughout the academy, we argue that indigenization must be accompanied by decolonizing processes, which involve rigorous analysis and dismantling of eurocentric and colonial ideologies embedded in disciplinary structures and canons as well as university governance, policy and practice. we remain mindful, however, of eve tuck and k. wayne yang’s powerful caution that decolonization is not a process that can be limited to the university; in its most robust, sense, decolonization involves nothing less than the dismantling of colonial power structures and “the repatriation of indigenous land and life” (tuck & yang, 2012, p. 1). some scholars have argued that before eurocentric institutions can begin to become respectful environments for engaging with indigenous knowledges and methodologies, these institutions must first decolonize (george, 2019). without specifying a sequential order, we agree that decolonization and indigenization are distinct but complementary projects. mapping emerging institutional approaches to indigenizing the curriculum now that we have outlined three broad visions of indigenization for canadian universities and related them to a spectrum of minor, major, and beyond reform theories of change, we can turn to the particular ways that indigenization is being approached with regard to curricular transformation. to do so, we have mapped the five approaches we have discerned from our literature review onto this spectrum and analyzed the theories of change informing them. our preliminary survey of the literature study reveals that, unfortunately but not surprisingly, many of the approaches to indigenizing the curriculum currently pursued by canadian universities remain in the category of minor reforms. in making this contention, we 6 the international indigenous policy journal vol. 13, iss. 3, art. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14109 recognize that we are tracing unfolding transformations in the post-secondary education landscape at broad institutional levels. within each university there may be particular programs or specific units in which more radical transformation is occurring. moreover, the examples we will soon discuss demonstrate that there are gradations within the minor reform category itself; many of the approaches have great potential as well as challenges within current institutional contexts. additionally, such approaches are not uniformly implemented or homogeneous from institution to institution nor are they necessarily static. thus, even as we chart these different approaches, we recognize that it is important to remain attentive to nuance and change over time. 1.) including indigenous knowledges and perspectives across the disciplines perhaps the most common approach universities have taken to indigenize the curriculum in the posttrc era is to expand engagement with indigenous knowledges and perspectives across the disciplines, rather than isolating the teaching of indigenous content within indigenous studies programs alone. this approach tends to be premised on the belief that indigenous knowledges have interdisciplinary application across a range of subject areas, which can help foster more widespread transformation across campus. to effect this widespread indigenizing of the curriculum, universities are engaging in two strategies which are often pursued in conjunction with each other: hiring more indigenous faculty across the disciplines and encouraging non-indigenous faculty to include indigenous content in their courses. we view these strategies as minor reforms given that institutional change is largely focused upon the level of individual transformation, either through including new individuals within the university or encouraging existing individuals to undertake new learning and professional development. the word “inclusion” that we use to describe this approach references gaudry and lorenz’s “indigenous inclusion” category and signals a process in which indigenous knowledges are conditionally incorporated into the existing euro-western university, often at the expense of a more thorough interrogation of the institution’s foundational assumptions, norms, and structures. although hiring indigenous faculty is absolutely essential to indigenizing the academy, when indigenous scholars are tasked with introducing indigenous knowledges and pedagogies into traditional eurowestern disciplines and university departments, they are often marginalized and isolated, left to challenge entrenched and “‘invisibilized’ dynamics of settler colonial power” without the resources necessary for such work (tuck & yang, 2012). on the other hand, in an era of so-called austerity in public education, limited opportunities to hire new faculty has also meant that universities seek to indigenize the academy by relying on the benevolence of existing faculty members who are predominantly non-indigenous and not based in indigenous and/or decolonial studies to incorporate indigenous content into their courses on their own terms. this anyone can ‘add and stir’ approach to indigenous curriculum change (battiste, 1998) not only undermines the integrity of the fields of indigenous and decolonial studies; the approach undermines indigenous intellectual sovereignty and by assuming that anyone can pick up indigenous knowledge and teach it, as though indigenous studies and indigenous knowledges are not rigorous enough to require scholarly specialization. non-indigenous scholars do have important roles to play in decolonizing the university—namely, studying and teaching the history of settler colonialism in canada and encouraging reflexivity regarding privilege, power, and perspective amongst themselves and their students. however, the work of indigenizing the curriculum requires substantial specialized education and experience. even well-intentioned efforts by non7 brunette-debassige et al.: mapping approaches published by scholarship@western, 2022 indigenous faculty lacking a foundation in indigenous and/or decolonial studies can end up reinterpreting indigenous knowledges through western liberal and multicultural lenses that reify colonial norms. for example, indigenous knowledges can easily get decontextualized and taken out of context, overgeneralized and often oversimplified by failing to understand linguistic and indigenous national specificities. moreover, such approaches can “risk … usurping indigenous knowledge from its basis in aboriginal communities, elders, and native studies departments and de-contextualizing it into various objects of western knowledge expansion” (fitzmaurice, 2011, p. 72). increasing concerns about non-indigenous faculty members’ rush to indigenize their syllabi suggest that gaudry and lorenz’s category of “indigenous inclusion” depicts only one half of the problem with such minor reform approaches to indigenizing the curriculum. the flip-side to “indigenous inclusion” can become, in its worst forms, what erica violet lee has called “’indigenizing the academy’ without indigenous people”— a movement that re-centres colonialism and whiteness by ostensibly attending to indigenous knowledges, yet divorcing that process from indigenous leadership and expertise.1 when efforts to indigenize the curriculum take this wrong turn, an initiative underpinned by a minor reform theory of change ends up detrimentally reinforcing rather than altering the status quo. 2.) capacity building through curriculum support and informal learning/unlearning opportunities in conjunction with the post-trc interest in encouraging widespread engagement with indigenous knowledges across the disciplines, some universities have invested in indigenous-led support for capacity-building and decolonial learning and unlearning amongst leadership, faculty, and staff. this approach seeks to address the problems that can arise when non-indigenous faculty members lacking the necessary scholarly foundations attempt to incorporate indigenous content in their classrooms. it does so by teaching the teachers, so to speak, providing instructional resources and indigenous-led expertise and support for curricular transformation and professional development for faculty and staff lacking background knowledge and experience. one such initiative involves the creation of shared curriculum resources for instructors who do not have subject-matter expertise. an example is carleton university’s collaborative indigenous learning bundles program created in 2018. the idea was conceived of by mohawk scholar kahente horn-miller based on her own online teaching experiences where she developed a series of online modules based on broad level themes with interdisciplinary relevance. at carleton, the bundles (steele et. al., 2020) became a way to digitize some indigenous faculty members’ lectures for other instructors to use without overwhelming the limited indigenous scholars and community members in repetitively delivering the same presentations in university classes. moreover, the bundles reciprocally partner with indigenous knowledge holders (ikh) to bring their perspectives into teaching materials in respectful ways. these are remarkably generous offerings provided by indigenous intellectuals that can reach many faculty and students. at the same time, such initiatives leave the labour of decolonizing and indigenizing the 1 lee used this phrase in a blog post titled “‘indigenizing the academy’ without indigenous people: who can teach our stories?” this article was posted on lee’s blog, moontime warrior, on november 9, 2015 at the following url: https://moontimewarrior.com/2015/11/09/who-can-teach-indigenous-philosophy. unfortunately, this post is no longer available online. https://moontimewarrior.com/2015/11/09/who-can-teach-indigenous-philosophy 8 the international indigenous policy journal vol. 13, iss. 3, art. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14109 curriculum largely to indigenous faculty and community partners and share their intellectual and cultural property for a wide range of courses. another related initiative is bc campus’ open education resource pulling together: a guide for indigenization of post-secondary institutions; a professional learning series (bc campus, n.d.-a) which provides a comprehensive framework to participate in indigenizing curriculum. the guide includes self-reflection exercises and may be adapted and localized to respect indigenous knowledges, languages, and practices in other regions and territories. moreover, the bc campus indigenization project: environmental scan summary highlights the importance of educational program design features such as collaboration (both across universities and with local indigenous communities), face-to-face interactions (to support transformational learning), co-teaching opportunities (in partnership with local knowledge keepers and facilitators), and safe spaces (to encourage respectful practice and reflection). while this environmental scan is specific to postsecondary institutions in the province of british columbia, it provides several valuable insights and references to nation-wide resources (bc campus (n.d.-b). increasingly, canadian universities have also been hiring indigenous curriculum advisors (see table 1) housed within centres for teaching and learning or sometimes within new offices of indigenous initiatives (as we have done at western university). these academic development roles are often tasked with the responsibility to advise faculty and staff members in indigenizing their curriculum, and mentor them on how to work ethically and respectfully with indigenous knowledges and communities. in addition to supporting faculty in developing their academic courses, indigenous curriculum advisors also often lead professional development opportunities for staff and leadership that encourage critical selfreflection and relationship building with indigenous communities and peoples. yet as raffoul et al. (forthcoming) suggest, the “institutional rhetoric focused on indigenization” lacks a “willingness to adequately resource” this work. in their review of canadian university websites, the authors found only 31 indigenization-focused education developer (ed) positions across 26 institutions, with the majority (77%) having a singular ed position responsible for curriculum across the entire university. the authors further note that this data does not account for the indigenous faculty and staff who continue to take on the indigenization of curriculum off the sides of their desks, and in addition to their other responsibilities. certainly, indigenous curriculum advisors play integral roles in preparing academics to teach; however, their status as staff members and “advisors” indicates the power differential that exists when they engage with faculty members who have the security of tenure and academic freedom, not to mention the authority of disciplinary expertise. the challenges of navigating these power asymmetries as well as entrenched euro-western norms is often very onerous work. 9 brunette-debassige et al.: mapping approaches published by scholarship@western, 2022 table 1. u15 senior indigenous leadership positions u15 university indigenous leadership roles curriculum and pedagogy support roles university of alberta • vice-provost (indigenous programming & research) (2019) • lead educational developer, indigenous focus university of calgary • vice-provost (indigenous engagement) (2018) • director, indigenous strategy (2017) • educational development consultant (indigenous ways of knowing) university of manitoba • vice-president (indigenous) (2019) (previously vice provost (indigenous) (2017) • indigenous initiatives educator (2 positions) mcmaster university • director (indigenous research institute) (2021) queen’s university • associate vice principal (indigenous initiatives & reconciliation) (2018) • educational developer, indigenous pedagogies and ways of knowing university of saskatchewan • vice provost (indigenous engagement) (2017) • edu. development specialist • cultural advisor • manager, indigenous edu. initiatives 10 the international indigenous policy journal vol. 13, iss. 3, art. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14109 table 1. u15 senior indigenous leadership positions (continued) u15 university indigenous leadership roles curriculum and pedagogy support roles ubc • senior advisor to the deputy vice-chancellor on indigenous affairs (2019) • senior strategist, indigenous initiatives • educational resource developer: indigenous initiatives • educational consultant, curriculum and student development • educational consultant, indigenous initiatives • senior educational consultant, indigenous initiatives • education consultant, staff training • educational consultant, classroom and campus climate mcgill university • special advisor (indigenous initiatives) (2017) western university • special advisor (2018-2020) • vice-provost/ associate vicepresident (indigenous initiatives) (2020) • indigenous curriculum and pedagogy advisor university of toronto • director, indigenous initiatives • academic advisor on indigenous curriculum and education • academic advisor on indigenous research dalhousie university • director of indigenous community engagement (2020) • educational developer (indigenization) université de montréal • senior advisor for relations with the first nations university of ottawa • director of indigenous affairs • academic delegate for indigenous engagement waterloo university • senior director, indigenous initiatives (2020) 11 brunette-debassige et al.: mapping approaches published by scholarship@western, 2022 other universities have created funding envelops that invest in indigenous curriculum development at both the individual faculty member and programmatic levels. for instance, the university of manitoba, university of victoria, and western university have created funding mechanisms that support proactive indigenous curriculum planning. these funds are distributed annually on a competitive basis and were institutionalized with the support of indigenous strategic leadership. such funding can support indigenous and non-indigenous faculty who require time and resources in order to engage with indigenous knowledges in deep and reflexive, rather than superficial, ways. as part of these institutional investments in capacity building, some universities have addressed indigenizing and decolonizing curricula beyond academic programs, creating learning and unlearning opportunities within the walls of academic institutions and beyond. we view the extension of indigenizing and decolonizing work into these realms of “informal curriculum” as vital for effecting change throughout the university and society as a whole. one example of such an initiative is mount royal university’s faculty learning community (flc), developed and offered in partnership with treaty 7 indigenous community members. flcs offered seminar-style discussions of assigned readings, guest speakers and media, and experiential learning opportunities including inˆıbi (sweat lodge) ceremony hosted by the ˆiyarhe nakoda nation and a 2-day workshop hosted by old sun community college on the siksika nation (yeo et al., 2019). seeking to educate beyond the walls of the institution, other universities have undertaken the creation of massive online open courses (mooc) available widely and to the public. perhaps the best-known example is indigenous canada, originally curated by nehiyaw’ iskwew instructor dr. tracey bear during her time at the faculty of native studies at the university of alberta. this free online course explores indigenous histories and contemporary issues in canada and offers critical perspectives regarding national and local indigenous-settler relations. on a smaller scale, cape breton university has offered the online open course learning from the knowledge keepers of mi’kmaki, (also known as “mi’kmaw mondays”). co-facilitated by a mi'kmaw hereditary chief (stephen augustine), and a former faculty member (dr. ashlee cunsolo), the objective of this course was to teach mi’kmaw knowledge, history, culture, identity, and contemporary issues. a subsequent evaluation of the course found that a key strength was its grounding in traditional ceremony and opportunities for relationship building and collaborative learning between instructors and community members (root et al., 2019). yet despite the success and high level of engagement with such initiatives, very few universities have dedicated time and resources to create such broad-based opportunities. moreover, learning opportunities such as those described above are rarely mandated for employees working within higher education. while it is clear that indigenous faculty and staff have led generous and innovative curriculum change initiatives in canadian universities, we argue that these initiatives are largely minor reforms as they focus on changing individuals through consciousness-raising rather than radically challenging and altering euro-western institutional structures and system. that said, many of these initiatives are vital steps toward greater transformation, courageously initiating much-needed education and unlearning for academic leaders, staff, faculty, and the broader public. without such a starting place, it would be difficult to catalyze more systemic change. these initiatives also highlight indigenous voices and expertise as 12 the international indigenous policy journal vol. 13, iss. 3, art. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14109 necessary elements of any attempt to indigenize the curriculum. at the same time, these initiatives often do not provide sufficient amounts of institutional authority and resources necessary to adequately support and compensate indigenous experts who give their time and knowledge to this work, thereby often continuing to place indigenous people in vulnerable positions. more needs to be done to ensure that indigenous faculty and staff at the heart of these programs are granted the power and autonomy they need to do their work. 3.) mandatory indigenous course requirements an increasingly common approach taken by universities to indigenizing curriculum is the development of indigenous course requirements (icrs). icrs require that students at undergraduate or professional levels complete a prescribed amount of indigenous-focused content or service courses that provide foundational information and context regarding settler colonialism in canada as well as indigenous nations, languages, and knowledges. some disciplines, including social work and education, have instituted icrs for many years, often as a strategy to improve professional practice and cultural competency (gaudry & lorenz, 2018b; goerke & kickett, 2014). more recently, the trc’s calls to action have prompted other disciplines—specifically healthcare, journalism, and law programs—to embrace icrs. to date, few universities have mandated icrs as a general undergraduate degree requirement. notable exceptions include lakehead university, laurentian university, trent university, the university of saskatchewan, and the university of winnipeg, all of which require incoming undergraduate students to complete an icr. more recently, the university of manitoba and ubc okanagan announced that undergraduate students in the faculty of arts will be required to complete an indigenous content requirement effective sept. 1, 2021. while these are bold institutional commitments, there continues to be no uniform requirements at higher education quality council levels. moreover, their implementation is not always accompanied by adequate funding, resources, and communication strategies necessary to support positive and meaningful engagement. as such, the implementation of icrs continues to be controversial, with much of this debate taking place on social media and in the press (dehaas, 2012; gaudry, 2016; sohail, 2016). proponents of icrs argue that they have the potential to provide a foundational knowledge of colonial injustices and indigenouscanadian relations (gaudry & lorenz, 2018b; tanchuk, et al., 2018). critics of icrs often assume that these content requirements would somehow infringe upon individual faculty members’ academic freedom by mandating learning outcomes in every course. yet, many universities are not mandating indigenous content to be included in every university course; they have instead created policies that require academic programs to embed a specific amount of indigenous content in certain courses at the program level. moreover, it is important to recognize that the academic system has epistemic biases already built into it where mandatory science and/or humanities credits are part of existing undergraduate degree requirements and do not get interrogated, thus raising questions as to what is deemed essential knowledge at programmatic or degree levels. beyond these matters, some scholars worry that icrs can too easily become box-checking exercises or an “easy way out” of the greater decolonizing work and structural transformation that needs to be done across post-secondary institutions (kuokkanen, 2016). 13 brunette-debassige et al.: mapping approaches published by scholarship@western, 2022 to date, only a few academic publications have analyzed icrs in more systematic ways (friesen, 2018; fiola & mackinnon, 2020; gaudry & lorenz, 2018b; tanchuk et al., 2018, university of winnipeg, 2020). moreover, as icrs are fairly new initiatives, there is little data regarding their long-term impact. gaudry and lorenz (2018b) surveyed canadian faculty, university administrators, graduate students, and instructors to explore perceptions of the purpose of icrs, their transformative potential within the academy, and whether these policies were effective in addressing the needs of indigenous peoples in a university context. their findings revealed that a vast majority of respondents expressed great optimism and positive experiences with icrs. similarly, a study by australian scholars aberdeen, carter, grogan, and hollinsworth (2013) concluded that foundational courses resulted in significant shifts in nonindigenous students’ views of indigenous australians as well as an increased commitment to social justice. certainly, icrs draw on institutional power to take bold policy steps toward mandating indigenous curriculum at the student level. from a theory of change perspective, icrs recognize that colonialism is structurally embedded in the curriculum and that policy mandating learning in this area is necessary to shift these hegemonic norms. despite bold policy efforts. however, we argue that icrs still sit on the cusp of minor and major reform as they face several limitations when putting them into practice. gaudry and lorenz (2018b) have identified a number of structural, pedagogical and ideological barriers associated with icrs. at a structural level, they point to the challenges that many indigenous studies units face when instituting icrs as they are often administratively marginalized, poorly funded, and face a chronic under-representation of indigenous faculty members (aberdeen et al., 2013; deer, 2020; fiola & mackinnon, 2020). pedagogically, the faculty members who teach icr’s tend to be employed in precarious positions (e.g., sessional or pre-tenure roles), and face student resistance to taking mandatory courses, often in the form of negative teaching evaluations. as such, the impact of early icr implementation on indigenous faculty members has at times bordered on exploitative and marginalizing. for these reasons, while icrs demonstrate important potential, they require much greater levels of institutional security and support for the instructors and programs that develop them. 4.) increasing indigenous autonomy by elevating and creating indigenous programs and offices the fourth approach to indigenizing the curriculum in the post-trc era hearkens back to but also expands upon a previous moment of institutional change. prior to the 1960s and 1970s, if indigenous perspectives were studied within universities at all, they were often relegated to the fields of anthropology, archaeology, and folklore. under the guise of purported scientific objectivity, racist discourses were perpetuated by examining indigenous peoples and ways of knowing as atavistic objects of fascination. the american indian movement in the united states and the indian control of indian education movement in canada (newhouse, 2008) during the 1960s and 1970s propelled the development of native studies programs in universities across turtle island as a way of wresting primary jurisdiction over the study of indigenous peoples from disciplines like anthropology and archaeology. native studies (now often referred to as indigenous studies) programs became vital spaces in which indigenous scholars could begin to establish intellectual sovereignty—namely, indigenous leadership and self-determination over the study and teaching of indigenous epistemologies, knowledges, and languages (newhouse, 2008; teuton, 2008, p. 10-11). in contrast to the euro-western tradition of segmenting knowledge into academic disciplines, indigenous studies departments foster wholistic 14 the international indigenous policy journal vol. 13, iss. 3, art. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14109 approaches to indigenous knowledges based on indigenous methods and pedagogies that are embodied, relational, and land-based (andersen & o’brian, 2016; fitzmaurice, 2011; pidgeon, 2014; pidgeon 2016). since the trc, universities have increasingly established indigenous studies programs where they did not previously exist or have elevated those programs to the status of departments rather than subprograms run within larger academic units. as a result, these programs have expanded their long-term role in the flourishment of indigenous knowledges and intellectual perspectives as well as the recruitment and retention of indigenous students and faculty members (andersen & o’brien, 2016; fitzmaurice, 2011; pidgeon, 2016).2 fitzmaurice and others have advocated for centering indigenous studies programs as sites of leadership for academic indigenization initiatives. we view this recommendation as resonant with a major reform theory of change because it pushes toward a structural transformation whereby indigenous people are not merely included within the institution but are accorded some degree of intellectual sovereignty over the teaching and learning of indigenous knowledges. of course, the level of decision-making authority these programs are able to exercise varies from institution to institution. at the university of alberta, native studies is a faculty unto itself rather than a department; this model might be one way to create more autonomous spaces for indigenous academic programs. in practice, however, the possibilities for such programs to weigh in on broader decolonial and indigenous curricular change across campus or even to develop their own programs is often constrained by under-staffing and insufficient funding as well as through academic marginalization as units within the university (daigle, 2019; gaudry & lorenz, 2018b; henry & kobayashi, 2017; mercier et al., 2011, pidgeon, 2016).3 since fitzmaurice wrote his article in 2011, the practice of developing indigenous-led autonomous programs within the university has expanded beyond indigenous studies undergraduate programs. many universities are now recognizing indigenous academic programs’ autonomy at both the undergraduate and graduate levels, often led by faculties of education and law. both the university of victoria and the university of british columbia’s faculties of education structurally recognize indigenous education as departments. 4 additionally, many institutions have recently created senior administrative positions such as vice-provosts of indigenous affairs who lead offices of indigenous initiatives. to document this trend, we have created a chart listing current positions at the u15 institutions (research intensive universities) in canada (table 1). indigenous senior leaders are increasingly influencing academic visioning by having a voice at the table of centralized administration from which to guide institutional processes of decolonizing and indigenizing the university, rather than relegating this work to indigenous studies programs that do not necessarily have the resources and administrative authority to oversee university-wide change. while establishing these senior administrative positions and offices opens the possibility for further structural change towards sites of indigenous leadership, in practice, these vice 2 while beyond the scope of this paper, we feel it is important to acknowledge there exists a wealth of scholarship pertaining to indigenous studies programs globally, including their origins, trajectories, and aspirations. for further reading in this regard, we suggest andersen and o’brien’s (2016) sources and methods in indigenous studies (see also andersen, 2009; nakata et. al., 2012) 3 for this reason, some scholars have suggested that indigenous studies programs remain “ghettoized” at the margins of the academy, and isolated from other disciplines (henry & kobayashi, 2017, p. 121) 4 https://www.uvic.ca/education/indigenous/index.php 15 brunette-debassige et al.: mapping approaches published by scholarship@western, 2022 provost and vice-president roles often do not have voting privileges in academic senate. moreover, when it comes to curricular change, most senior indigenous administrative roles do not have direct academic oversight; rather, their influence is limited to playing a role in facilitating strategic policy and curriculum change initiatives. nevertheless, indigenous administrators in these positions can serve as a central connecting force that coordinates networks of indigenous leadership across the university, engaging indigenous faculty members and communities to work together toward a common goal of developing academic frameworks that advance indigenous perspectives and support across disciplines and professional programs. collectively, what this cluster of approaches share is the glimmer of a recognition that indigenizing the academy requires at least some institutional restructuring to create spaces of indigenous leadership and, ultimately, intellectual sovereignty. for these reasons, we view these approaches as attempting to move toward reconciliation indigenization. what existing scholarship illuminates, however, is that the tangible exercise of institutional power and autonomy by indigenous faculty and staff is still often an aspiration rather than a reality. 5.) partnerships with autonomous indigenous organizations a fifth approach to indigenizing curriculum involves developing academic partnerships with indigenous communities and organizations. a compelling example of an indigenous-led educational organization is the dechinta centre for research and learning on akaitcho territory. as “the only fully land-based university accredited program in the world, and the only program explicitly mandated to serve indigenous people,” dechinta works “[i]n collaboration with the university of british columbia and the university of alberta” to deliver courses and whole semesters of “accredited post-secondary academic programming” (dechinta, 2018). universities are also increasingly partnering with aboriginal institutes (ais). ais are indigenous owned and controlled community-based educational institutes that develop and deliver culturally enriched, accredited post-secondary certificate, diploma, degree, and post-graduate programs to indigenous students in partnership with colleges and universities. ais provide an alternative pathway for indigenous learners to pursue culturally enriched academic learning developed and delivered in partnership with mainstream colleges and universities to serve indigenous capacity-building and nation-building efforts in indigenous communities. the academic focus of these partnerships vary and are often governed by memorandums of understandings (mou) and articulation agreements between indigenous institutes and universities. as an example, six nations polytechnic (snp) has formed a consortium agreement with mcmaster university, brock university, the university of guelph, the university of waterloo, western university, and wilfrid laurier university. this agreement allows students to remain in community and complete the first year of their university studies at the six nations native university access program. in addition, snp has developed newer partnerships with many universities and colleges to offer post-secondary education programs to six nations of the grand river and surrounding communities. while some of the initiatives discussed above pre-date the trc, in the current movement to indigenize the academy, universities are seeking to expand their partnerships or to develop new ones. we view such initiatives as resonating with major reform theories of change in the sense that they have the potential to shift the terrain of universities’ engagement with indigenous communities by moving towards a more 16 the international indigenous policy journal vol. 13, iss. 3, art. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2022.13.3.14109 equal balance of power between the colonial academy and indigenous knowledge holders (ikh). certainly, constraints remain given the fact that ai’s typically negotiate provincial funding and educational regulations. that said, such university-ai agreements move towards modes of cross-cultural and cross-institutional engagement between partners. rather than being enfolded within the university, ais remain distinct from it, able to engage in respectful relations from a position of indigenous intellectual sovereignty. increasing funding for, and the autonomy of, ai’s might be one way of moving towards gaudry and lorenz’s idea of decolonial indigenization--or possibly beyond it. possibilities & limitations of curriculum change approaches by mapping these five approaches to indigenizing the curriculum within canadian universities, we have sought to better understand their challenges and possibilities. moreover, we have endeavoured to analyze the theories of change that inform these approaches in order to clarify the horizons of possibility that each approach opens and alternatives that they may foreclose. our preliminary survey of the literature suggests that many of the dominant approaches to indigenizing the curriculum pursued by canadian universities in the post-trc era are informed by minor reform theories of change that do not view the university’s foundational euro-western logics, norms, and assumptions as needing to be overhauled. minor reform approaches are firmly rooted in structural functional epistemologies that assume organizations exist to achieve specific educational aims and, with the appropriate coordination and division of labour, these goals can be achieved. moreover, the educational aims and epistemological underpinnings themselves are rarely critically interrogated. as such, these approaches seek only to “enhance” the institution by including (adding) indigenous faculty, student, and staff to their demographics. indigenous inclusion without structural change creates a paradox for these individuals, by not necessarily acknowledging, or accounting for, collective cultural and intellectual sovereignty, community accountability, or the additional emotional and intellectual labour of doing indigenizing and decolonizing work while living with the intergenerational impacts of ongoing settler-colonial violence, of which the academy is a part. that said, our research also suggests that not all minor reforms are created equal or homogeneous—some are indeed valuable first steps for exposing hidden colonial ideologies and facilitating unlearning. those initiatives that are led by and that amplify indigenous voices and expertise grounded in indigenous ways of knowing, thinking, and doing are the ones we believe hold the most transformative potential. additionally, our survey of approaches to indigenizing the curriculum suggests that the key to moving toward deeper reform—or what gaudry and lorenz refer to as “reconciliation indigenization”—is the active creation and protection of indigenous autonomy and leadership within post-secondary institutions. in emerging discourses, scholars have outlined deeper levels of change yet to be realized such as gaudry and lorenz’s “decolonial indigenization” and sharon stein and other scholars’ “beyond reform” theory of change. in the latter, the author asserts the value of navigating different theories of change (e.g., minor, major, and beyond) simultaneously while remaining open to relinquishing attachments to misguided institutional promises that have proven to be unsustainable and even violent for marginalized groups. in this beyond reform space, stein and other scholars invite practitioners to avoid imposing a particular goal, but rather to learn how to be answerable to our various colonial complicities, engage in collective experimentation, and to learn from the institutions’ successes and failures. sandy grande (2015) has long advocated for exposing the deep structures of colonial consciousness in curriculum, she also asserts 17 brunette-debassige et al.: mapping approaches published by scholarship@western, 2022 the value of indigenous survivance narratives in relation to land as a basis for what she calls a “red pedagogy” (2005). similarly, mik’maq scholar marie battiste has asserted how “place-based knowledge systems are part of the interrelations of living entities” within indigenous knowledge frameworks (2016; p. 11). within all of these indigenous ontological frames, pedagogies of land (simpson, 2014; styres et al., 2013) are paramount. after all, land is kin; a mother figure, land is a teacher. in this transformative curriculum change work, we return to indigenous people and land relationality by inviting curriculum change practitioners to cyclically ask ourselves; how are indigenous peoples, lands, and knowledges centered in our curriculum change processes? do institutional approaches simply try and fit indigenous people and knowledges into the university, or is the university and its agents actively supporting the resurgence of indigenous knowledges grounded in the places within which universities are located? moreover, how might curricular change be envisioned in ways that do not reduce decolonization yet again to a metaphor and, instead, pursue institutional transform with a view toward supporting “the repatriation of indigenous land and life” (tuck & yang, 2012, p. 1)? references aberdeen, l., carter, j., grogan, j., & hollinsworth, d. 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(2019). towards an indigenous-informed relational approach to free, prior, and informed consent (fpic). the international indigenous policy journal, 10(4). doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/ iipj.2019.10.4.8372 towards an indigenous-informed relational approach to free, prior, and informed consent (fpic) abstract international and domestic rights frameworks are setting the stage for the full recognition of indigenous peoples’ rights in canada. however, current political promises to restore indigenous relations, to reconcile historic wrongs, and to foster mutual prosperity and well-being for all people within canada remain woefully unfulfilled. indigenous peoples continue to call for full engagement with emerging indigenous rights frameworks such as the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip) and its principles of free, prior, and informed consent (fpic). this article discusses the key findings from a multi-year university–community research partnership with matawa first nations in which we collaboratively seek to advance understanding of consultation processes and indigenous experiences of and perspectives on fpic. the article, based on several years of dialogue and interviews and a two-day workshop on fpic, offers insight into indigenous perspectives on fpic advancing an indigenous-informed relational approach to consultation and consent seeking. keywords indigenous peoples, united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples, undrip, fpic, consent, consultation, relational approach acknowledgments we wish to acknowledge the leadership role played in the development of this article by the matawa chiefs with the support of the regional priorities and jurisdiction team. although all nine matawa chiefs and the numerous matawa staff are not listed as co-authors, they guided the results in this article through their facilitation of meetings with matawa community members and by reviewing and making constructive suggestions for improvements to the article. we thank them for their guidance, support, and contributions to understanding and knowledge. the authors have sole responsibility for the final content. we also thank the social sciences and humanities research council, canada for generous funding from grant (grn-435-2015-1302: mitchell) and laurier university's research ethics board for their review of this research project. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. 1 mitchell et al.: towards an indigenous-informed relational approach published by scholarship@western, 2019 towards an indigenous-informed relational approach to free, prior, and informed consent (fpic) i think the issue is really: how do we strengthen ourselves so that we will be able to assert a course of our own self-determined development as well as our right to control, manage, and own our own lands and territories? (victoria tauli-corpuz, united nations special rapporteur on the rights of indigenous peoples; tauli-corpuz, 2018) internationally, the rights of indigenous peoples are increasingly being recognized since the signing of the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip; un, 2007). in the past decade, pressure has intensified on the canadian government to fulfill the crown’s duty to honour indigenous peoples’ aboriginal and treaty rights. in addition to the declaration, the government of canada is tasked with addressing the 94 calls to action in the final report of the truth and reconciliation commission of canada (trc, 2015). these include the call to “commit to meaningful consultation, building respectful relationships, and obtaining the free, prior, and informed consent of indigenous peoples before proceeding with economic development projects” (call no. 92i; trc, 2015, p. 1). international and domestic rights frameworks are setting the stage for the full recognition of indigenous peoples’ rights in canada. however, current political promises to restore indigenous relations, to reconcile historic wrongs, and to foster mutual prosperity and well-being for all people within canada remain woefully unfulfilled. indigenous peoples and allies continue to call for full engagement with emerging indigenous rights frameworks such as undrip and its principles of free, prior, and informed consent (fpic) as outlined in articles 10, 11.2, 19, 28, 29.2, and 32.2. this article will examine the fpic principles from the perspectives of indigenous peoples from northern ontario who participated in a workshop about consultation and consent. we will advance conceptualizations of the principles of free, prior, and informed, and the concept of consent, arguing that the lessons learned from community voices contribute to understandings of fpic beyond that which is currently represented in technical and legal documents. we will expand our analysis of these findings by comparing them to existing definitions of fpic and will propose an indigenous-informed relational approach to understanding processes of free, prior, and informed consent seeking. literature review this literature review will explore fpic within the international human rights system; definitions of free, prior, and informed consent; canada’s shifting position on fpic; and indigenous perspectives on fpic. fpic within the international human rights system indigenous rights to land and resources are inherent rights within an indigenous ontology. these inherent rights are, however, increasingly elaborated in international indigenous rights frameworks. undrip (un, 2007), for example, requires fpic for “relocation” (article 10); “disposal of hazardous materials” (article 29.2); “military activities” (article 30), and “before adopting and implementing legislative or administrative measures” that may affect indigenous peoples (article 19). fpic is also required in relation to the much broader issue of “land and resources” with the necessity of governments 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 4 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.4.8372 and industry obtaining fpic “prior to the approval of any project affecting their [indigenous] lands or territories and other resources, particularly in connection with the development, utilization or exploitation of mineral, water or other resource” (article 32.2). undrip also calls for redress for “cultural, intellectual, religious and spiritual property taken without fpic” (article 11.2), as well as “redress for lands, territories or resources which have been confiscated, taken occupied, used or damaged without fpic” (article 28). while declarations such as undrip are not legally binding instruments, conventions such as the international labour organization’s (ilo, 1989) indigenous and tribal peoples convention no. 169 (ilo#169) are. consent in ilo 169 is required only in article 16 on relocation. article 6, on the other hand, speaks of the objective of “achieving” rather than requiring consent, a critical issue of distinction that has led some legal scholars to conclude that undrip advances a higher standard by requiring governments and proponents not only to seek but also to secure consent as illustrated in the text of articles 19 and 32 of undrip (boutilier, 2017). article 19 of undrip (un, 2007), for example, requires states to consult in good faith with indigenous peoples “through their own representative institutions in order to obtain their free, prior and informed consent before adoption and implementing legislative or administrative measures that may affect them.” article 32 of undrip also obliges states to meet with potentially affected communities to obtain their “free prior and informed consent prior to the approval of any project affecting their lands or territories and other resources.” ten years prior to the signing of undrip, the committee on the elimination of racial discrimination (cerd, 1997) of the office of the high commissioner for human rights (ohchr) included reference to the rights to free and informed consent and reparation. indigenous rights to free and informed consent were identified in terms of both lands and resources. prior was mentioned in regard to the need for reparation when consent was not sought and obtained in advance of incursion onto indigenous territories. ohchr (1997) directed states to: recognize and protect the rights of indigenous peoples to own, develop, control and use their communal lands, territories and resources and, where they have been deprived of their lands and territories traditionally owned or otherwise inhabited or used without their free and informed consent, to take steps to return those lands and territories. (no. 23, part 5) two years before the un general assembly adopted undrip, a comprehensive legal commentary on the concept of fpic was prepared for the un sub-commission on the promotion and protection of human rights working group on indigenous populations. it summarized the essential and immutable qualities of the principles of fpic that are still illusive in practice today. the report provides a clear understanding of indigenous peoples’ inherent rights and the right to self-determination, with attention to the significance of treaty-based relationships in supporting meaningful self-determined development, which necessitates the full expression of the right to fpic. in this early definition of fpic, the authors had already indicated the indigenous perspective on the importance of equal and respectful relationships: the right to free, prior and informed consent is grounded in and is a function of indigenous peoples’ inherent rights to freely determine their political status, freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development and freely dispose of their natural wealth and resources—a 3 mitchell et al.: towards an indigenous-informed relational approach published by scholarship@western, 2019 complex of inextricably related and interdependent rights encapsulated in the right of selfdetermination, to their lands, territories and resources, where applicable, from their treaty-based relationships, and their legitimate authority to require that third parties enter into an equal and respectful relationships [sic] with them based on the principle of informed consent. procedurally, free, prior and informed consent requires processes that allow and support meaningful and authoritative choices by indigenous peoples about their development paths. (motoc & tebtebba foundation, 2005, p. 15) all of these rights frameworks, some of which constitute international law, articulate consent seeking as a non-coercive process that ensures both adequate time and transparent information in an accessible format to the rights holders. significantly, consent to access and develop indigenous lands and resources is premised on the fundamental indigenous right of self-determination, a foundational principle confirmed in undrip and in articles 1 and 3 of the charter of the united nations. the declaration on the granting of independence to colonial countries and states (un general assembly, 1960) stated: “all peoples have the right to self-determination. by virtue of that right they freely determine their political status and freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development” (article 2). the right of self-determination necessarily then presumes fpic and the right of indigenous peoples to grant or provide consent to development on their lands and territories and those that will affect their resources (ward, 2011). defining free, prior, and informed consent reviewing the literature on fpic reveals that there is no one commonly accepted definition of fpic. in particular, there is little to no consensus on what the individual terms free, prior, informed, or the word consent mean, nor how these rights would be implemented or monitored. non-governmental organizations such as oxfam (2015) have, however, defined fpic in relation to proposed development as the “principle that indigenous peoples and local communities must be adequately informed about projects that affect their lands in a timely manner, free of coercion and manipulation, and should be given the opportunity to approve or reject a project prior to the commencement of all activities” (p. 6). the right to give or withhold consent was further elaborated by weitzner (2011) as the “right to agree to or to reject activities or plans affecting their ancestral territories, and in cases of agreement, to determine the conditions and terms for proceeding” (p. 2). in looking across the literature, there are in fact very few attempts to provide definitions, excluding oxfam, the boreal leadership council (blc, 2012), the office of the high commissioner of human rights (ohchr, 2013), and the food and agricultural organization (fao, 2016) of the united nations, which have provided definitions for some of the terms. documents by the few organizations that have begun to define the independent terms within fpic were, therefore, used to determine how these non-indigenous un agencies and nongovernmental organizations are attempting to operationalize the concept of fpic and the individual components of free, prior, informed, and consent. free. the office of the high commissioner of human rights (ohchr, 2013) and the boreal leadership council (blc, 2012) have articulated free to mean no coercion, bribery, rewards, intimidation, or manipulation. the fao (2016) elaborated that free means not being rushed by external timelines and that decisions are made voluntarily, with the rights holders determining the process, timelines, and decision-making structure. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 4 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.4.8372 prior. the blc (2012) stated that consent should be sought before governments grant land tenure and associated permits for exploration with time for early identification of environmentally or culturally sensitive areas. the importance of respecting time requirements for indigenous consultation and consensus processes and the necessity of seeking consent before any authorization of any activities was emphasized in the definition of prior by ohchr (2013). the fao (2016) further articulated the need to consult prior to each phase of the project and that “the decision-making timeline established by the rights holders must be respected, as it reflects the time needed to understand, analyze and evaluate activities under consideration in accordance with their own customs” (p. 15). informed. informed was defined by ohchr (2013) as a process that requires understanding the nature, size, pace, reversibility, scope, purpose, duration, and locality of the proposed project, as well as a preliminary assessment of the likely economic, social, cultural, and environmental impacts and risks. the blc (2012) report discussed the importance of access to information that is understandable and adequate in order to make informed decisions “based on balanced information from multiple sources” (p. 8). they emphasized “the development of an open, mutually respectful relationship between developers and aboriginal communities” (p. 9) that recognizes traditional and cultural knowledge in identifying impacts and benefits. significantly, they indicate that information should be provided not only about the proposed project but also about the proponent, including “the company’s policies, performance and reputation” (p. 9). the fao (2016) emphasized the importance of providing information “in the local language” in culturally appropriate formats which may include radio, traditional and new media, video, graphics, photos, and oral presentations (p. 15). consent. the fao discussed the importance of access to information in the context of consent; that is, being fully informed “may include the option of withholding consent” (p. 2). although consent was, interestingly, not defined by ohchr (2013), the blc (2012) defined consent as “the option of supporting or rejecting development that has significant impacts on aboriginal lands or culture” (p. 4). the fao (2016) provided a more elaborate definition of consent within fpic as a collective right to make decisions in a cultural manner appropriate to each community: consent refers to the collective decision made by the rights holders and reached through the customary decision-making processes of the affected indigenous people or communities. consent must be sought and granted or withheld according to the unique formal or informal political-administrative dynamic of each community. (p. 16) the fao (2016) further defined consent as a freely given decision that may be a “yes,” a “no,” or a “yes with conditions” (p. 16). significantly, the fao articulates that consent is a collective decision (e.g., through consensus or majority) determined by the affected peoples in accordance with their own customs and traditions. a review of the definitions and descriptions of the various component terms free, prior, informed, and consent by these three organizations reveals some consistency of meaning for fpic. fpic is characterized as a set of rights that enable decision making, which is realized free from coercion, within a community’s own cultural framework, and with adequate time to review and assess all information necessary to make an informed judgement on the long-term risks and benefits of proposals. the information and processes supporting collective community decision making as described would enable 5 mitchell et al.: towards an indigenous-informed relational approach published by scholarship@western, 2019 communities to provide or withhold consent, to say “yes” or “no” or “yes with conditions,” and to pursue further discussion and action regarding proposed developments. in looking at the industry standard for implementing fpic set out in 2013 by the international council on mining and metals (icmm, 2013), we can see congruency in the industry definition of fpic with that of the fao, blc, and ohchr in their articulation of a consent seeking process that is (i) free, (ii) prior, and (iii) fully informed: through this process indigenous peoples are: (i) able to freely make decisions without coercion, intimidation or manipulation; (ii) given sufficient time to be involved in project decisionmaking before key decisions are made and impacts occur; and (iii) fully informed about the project and its potential impacts and benefits. (p. 3) furthermore, the icmm’s (2013) definition of consent clearly states that indigenous peoples can give or withhold consent to a project: the outcome is that indigenous peoples can give or withhold their consent to a project through a process that strives to be consistent with their traditional decision-making processes while respecting internationally recognised human rights and is based on good faith negotiation. (icmm, 2013, p. 3) the icmm’s (2013) report on indigenous peoples and mining requires all icmm-affiliated companies to respect and implement fpic. the report articulates that all member companies are to meaningfully engage communities and seek their definition of what would constitute consent. furthermore, the engagement plan should define what would constitute consent from indigenous communities. this progressive stance on seeking indigenous perspectives and understandings is an important element that has been lacking in the canadian state’s shifting relationship with fpic consistent with a conspicuous absence in the general operationalization of consent seeking by both industry and governments. cerd, in responding to canada’s periodic reviews of its implementation of undrip, recommended canada “incorporate the free, prior and informed consent principle in the canadian regulatory system” (ohchr, 2017, para. 20d). canada’s shifting position on fpic despite canada’s central role in advancing human rights generally through the formation of the united nations, canada is not a signatory to ilo convention 169 and refused to endorse undrip at its adoption in 2007, raising objections to articles that address the principles of fpic on the basis that they were incompatible with canadian law (land, 2016). the canadian government eventually issued a “statement of support” to undrip in 2010, with qualifications, referring to the declaration as an “aspirational document” (indigenous and northern affairs canada, 2010, para. 3). significant to this discussion on fpic, in 2014, canada was the only un member to refuse to adopt the outcome document of the indigenous world conference citing objections to article 20 that called upon states to implement fpic (united nations general assembly, 2014). 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 4 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.4.8372 despite canada’s resistance to the use of fpic, both domestically and internationally, the government’s final report of the truth and reconciliation commission (trc, 2015) calls for the full implementation of undrip in calls to action 43 and 44. 43. we call upon federal, provincial, territorial, and municipal governments to fully adopt and implement the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples as the framework for reconciliation. 44. we call upon the government of canada to develop a national action plan, strategies, and other concrete measures to achieve the goals of the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples. in response to both domestic and international pressures, and under a newly elected liberal government in 2015, canada announced the removal of its permanent objector status to undrip to a standing ovation at the united nations permanent forum on indigenous issues in may 2016. however, characteristic of canada’s contradictory relationship to undrip, in july of the same year, minister of justice jody wilson-raybould stated, “simplistic approaches such as adopting the united nations declaration as being canadian law are unworkable” (“justice minister jody wilson-raybould says,” 2016, para. 3). in another contradictory turn, the government of canada advanced the concept of fpic in principle 6 of their newly formulated principles respecting the government of canada’s relationship with indigenous peoples (department of justice, 2018). however, the language is weak and refers to “aiming” to secure rather than requiring consent: the government of canada recognizes that meaningful engagement with indigenous peoples aims to secure their free, prior, and informed consent when canada proposes to take actions which impact them and their rights, including their lands, territories and resources. (p. 12) understanding the implementation of fpic in canada involves complex legal, ethical, and economic considerations, as well as an awareness of the ways fpic is applied across different jurisdictions. jurisdiction is particularly important when it comes to natural resource development and management because, although the federal government has constitutional responsibility for “indians and lands reserved for the indians” (constitution act, 1867, s. 91(24)), the provinces have constitutional authority over natural resources within their boundaries (constitution act, 1867, s. 92a). the definition of fpic and consent within fpic, therefore, becomes even more important, particularly from an indigenous perspective. following the affirmation of canada’s duty to consult indigenous peoples to avoid infringement of their aboriginal and treaty rights (constitution act, 1982, s. 35), a number of supreme court of canada (scc) cases have helped to clarify what the elements of meaningful consultation are, some of which mirror fpic principles. the court has reiterated the crown’s (both federal and provincial governments) duty to consult and accommodate in any matter that may impact potential or established aboriginal or treaty rights (haida first nation v. british columbia, 2004; mikisew cree first nation v. canada, 2005) and, in some cases, compensate for infringements on their rights (delgamuukw v. british columbia, 1997). the clyde river decision (clyde river (hamlet) v. petroleum geo-services inc., 2017) articulates the ways in which the territory and the proponent did not meet the standards of consultation. the scc found that the national energy board (neb) did not address the treaty rights of 7 mitchell et al.: towards an indigenous-informed relational approach published by scholarship@western, 2019 the clyde river people to hunt marine animals nor development’s potential impact on their rights, the crown did not adequately explain how the neb would fulfill its duty to consult, and the crown failed in its duty to conduct “deep consultation” (introduction section, para. 7). the scc explained that deep consultation “may entail the opportunity to make submissions for consideration, formal participation in the decision-making process, and provision of written reasons to show that aboriginal concerns were considered and to reveal the impact they had on the decision (haida, at para. 44)” (clyde river (hamlet) v. petroleum geo-services inc., 2017, para. 47). further, a lengthy and complex ruling of the federal court of appeal (tsleil-waututh nation v. canada (attorney general), 2018) concluded that the federal government failed in its duty to engage in meaningful consultation with first nations and that the neb’s report was so flawed that it could not be used as a basis for government decision making regarding approval of the expansion of the trans mountain pipeline. central to our argument on the importance of a relational approach to engaging in appropriate consultation processes that recognize and respect fpic, the federal court of appeals determined that the crown’s consultation process was “missing a genuine and sustained effort to pursue meaningful twoway dialogue” (tsilhqot’in first nation v. british columbia, 2014, para. 756). additional case law has affirmed that consent must be obtained from aboriginal titleholders (a unique form of ownership of land) and that title may be proven by demonstrating ongoing, exclusive occupation and use of territory. significantly, within matawa first nations, a recent ontario superior court (onsc) ruling eabametoong first nation v. minister of northern development (2018) revealed that the ontario ministry of northern development and mines failed to properly consult with eabametoong first nation before granting a gold mining permit to industry. the ruling issued by three judges stated: “the ministry's conduct cannot reasonably be considered to be the type of conduct that would promote reconciliation between the crown and indigenous peoples” (para. 121). the decision further clarified that proper consultation would require “managing the consultation process in a way that fosters trust as opposed to misunderstanding and betrayal” (para. 121). advancing indigenous perspectives on fpic the repeated failure of government and industry to adequately consult indigenous communities has raised debate about the legitimacy of undrip and the usefulness of fpic in practice (craft et al., 2018; hewitt, 2018; morales, 2017). concerns have also been raised that “. . . the concept of fpic will be undermined and divorced from the right to self-determination if actors other than indigenous peoples themselves attempt to define it and control its operationalization” (doyle & cariño, 2013, p. 3). canadian indigenous legal scholar, john borrows (2018), however, asserts the importance of fpic as outlined in undrip: undrip changes canada’s relationship with indigenous peoples in terms of the duty to consult by saying that the honour of the crown, which is part of the legal duty to consult, must involve the free, prior and informed consent of indigenous peoples. what that means is that when the crown is exercising its powers to develop, that is has to ensure that honour involves the free will, or the participatory actions of indigenous peoples in that goal. (para. 5) many indigenous leaders have embraced fpic as a means of protecting their territories from proposed extractive projects even as they critique current government practices of consultation and consent 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 4 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.4.8372 seeking. arthur manuel (2017), in his book the reconciliation manifesto: recovering the land rebuilding the economy, wrote of the significant contributions of undrip with particular reference to fpic. in advancing six steps to decolonization, manuel (2017) included the importance of honouring fpic in all matters related to indigenous lands and territories: anything we agree to in access and benefits must also include clear jurisdictional lines of authority based on the standard of free, prior, and informed consent of indigenous peoples and decision making that incorporates environmental reviews and oversight in accordance with indigenous laws. (p. 277) however, as a member of the secwepemc first nation, manuel decried the canadian state’s violation of fpic in ongoing developments surrounding the trans mountain pipeline on his traditional territory. in response to the government of british columbia’s commitment to fully implement undrip, made by the newly elected new democratic party (ndp) in 2017, the union of bc indian chiefs (ubcic) with the canadian centre for policy alternatives (cppa) published a road map with recommendations on how to achieve “true, lasting reconciliation” (ubcic & ccpa, 2018). again, self-determination is a driving principle and fpic the mechanism for achieving it: implementation requires a focus on indigenous self-determination. this means that implementation will look different in different places. efforts of governments or other actors cannot prescribe, define or determine indigenous peoples’ own priorities. crown governments must create the space that ensures they can be appropriately responsive to paths determined by indigenous peoples. (p. 8) focused on meaningful consultation in environmental assessment, udofia, noble, and poelzer (2017) explored northern saskatchewan first nations’ frustration regarding the effectiveness of consultation. while not focussed on consent, the authors reflected first nations’ experience with early or “prior” engagement, noting that a lack of full information hampers “informed” consultation. the canadian indigenous bar association advances the meaning of fpic by referencing definitions of fpic provided by the international indian treaty council (iitc, 2013). free necessarily includes the absence of coercion and outside pressure, including monetary inducements (unless they are mutually agreed on as part of a settlement process), and “divide and conquer” tactics. indigenous peoples must be able to say “no,” and not be threatened with or suffer retaliation if they do so. (p. 1) prior means that there must be sufficient lead time to allow information-gathering and sharing processes to take place, including translations into traditional languages and verbal dissemination as needed, according to the decision-making processes of the indigenous peoples in question. this process must take place without time pressure or time constraints. a plan or project must not begin before this process is fully completed and an agreement with the indigenous peoples concerned is reached. (p. 1) 9 mitchell et al.: towards an indigenous-informed relational approach published by scholarship@western, 2019 informed means that all relevant information reflecting all views and positions must be available for consideration by the indigenous peoples concerned. this includes the input of traditional elders, spiritual leaders, traditional subsistence practitioners, and traditional knowledge holders. the decision-making process must allow adequate time and resources for indigenous peoples to find and consider impartial, balanced information as to the potential risks and benefits of the proposal under consideration. (p. 1) consent involves the clear and compelling demonstration by the indigenous peoples concerned of their agreement to the proposal under consideration. the mechanism used to reach agreement must itself be agreed to by the indigenous peoples concerned, and must be consistent with their decisionmaking structures and criteria (for example, traditional consensus procedures). agreements must be reached with the full and effective participation of the leaders, representatives, or decision-making institutions authorized by the indigenous peoples themselves. (p. 1) there is a need to advance indigenous perspectives on implementing fpic in order to ensure that any attempt to operationalize fpic functionally protects the rights of indigenous peoples and the environment in accordance with indigenous laws. this is where our article begins. we will discuss indigenous perspectives provided through visits and workshops with matawa first nations in order to extend the currently limited definitions and operationalization of fpic by non-indigenous governments, industry, and un bodies and non-governmental organizations. current study this study explores indigenous rights and resource governance within matawa first nations with attention to proposed mining developments in the ring of fire (rof) in northern ontario. the entire matawa region is a mineral-rich environment with numerous active claims. significant deposits have been identified in the region, including copper, zinc, nickel, platinum, vanadium, and gold (ontario chamber of commerce [occ], 2014). notably, the rof includes a large chromite deposit with a value estimated at over $60 billion (chong, 2014). the rof is located approximately 540 kilometers northeast of thunder bay, ontario (occ, 2014). this area is within the treaty 9 (1905-1906, adhesions 1929-1930) boundaries and is the ancestral home of anishinaabe (ojibway), mushkegowuk (cree), and oji-cree nations. matawa first nations management is a tribal council formed in 1988 to support nine first nation member communities in the region: aroland, constance lake, eabametoong, ginoogaming, long lake #58, nibinamik, marten falls, neskantaga, and webequie. with a total membership population of 9,500, matawa first nations have unique sets of needs and priorities—with some communities accessible by road (aroland, constance lake, ginoogaming, and long lake #58) and others accessible by air or winter roads (eabametoong, nibinamik, marten falls, neskantaga, and webequie). several matawa first nations are familiar with forestry and some may have benefitted from employment opportunities in the forest sector. with the amendment of the mining act (1990) beginning in 2009 and 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 4 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.4.8372 the implementation of the far north act in 2010,1 the province of ontario developed protocols for actively engaging indigenous communities to consider resource extraction as an economic strategy to enhance their infrastructure development. matawa first nations are engaged in a process of discussing scientific reports, full of complex technical language, in their efforts to develop a common understanding and collective decision-making process on whether or not to proceed with the proposed development in their territories. research partnership this study is the result of an ongoing research partnership with matawa first nations to better understand indigenous peoples’ experiences of consultation and consent during their negotiations around resource development. the research partnership aims to advance understanding of fpic principles from a local indigenous perspective while also promoting fpic as a valuable tool for asserting indigenous peoples’ rights globally. this research, funded by the social sciences and humanities research council of canada (sshrc), was approved by our university research ethics board in alignment with a research protocol that was established with matawa first nations tribal council support staff and endorsed by the matawa chiefs council. the findings reflect our learning from 3 years of meeting and visiting with the chiefs, support staff, and community members of matawa first nations, with specific concepts derived from a two-day meeting about fpic co-organized by matawa first nations management and our research team. the meeting, which involved a public talk and a private consultation with the united nations special rapporteur on the rights of indigenous peoples, victoria tauli-corpuz, provided an opportunity for participants to share their experiences of consultation and fpic processes in resource development across three regions: northern ontario (matawa), the northwest territories, and chile. although attendees from all regions participated in all events, for the purpose of the current study, the data reported here draws largely from matawa participants. methods participants over 30 people participated in the fpic workshop. of these participants, 17 represented matawa first nations, 7 were invited guests from other indigenous communities, and the rest were members of the research team. participants were invited to the workshop based on their traditional and professional roles in resource governance matters in their own communities. recruitment was facilitated by management and staff at the tribal council and the workshop was hosted at the matawa regional office in thunder bay, ontario. 1 in february 2019, the progressive conservative government under premier doug ford, elected in june 2018, announced a review of the far north act and proposed to repeal the act to reduce red tape and promote economic development in the region (mckenzie, 2019). 11 mitchell et al.: towards an indigenous-informed relational approach published by scholarship@western, 2019 materials audio recorders were used with permission throughout the meetings. for the structured workshop on the second day, conversation guides were prepared for each facilitator. open-ended questions guided participants in considering what each fpic principle meant to them in the context of their communities. for example, participants were asked, “what does it mean for consent to be free?” “what kinds of things make a decision not free?” “what has your experience been so far around free consent?” similar questions were asked about the principles of prior and informed. a simple presentation slide was projected in the room with basic definitions of each fpic principle to provide a starting point for the conversation. the definitions were drawn from a report written by the sustainable development institute (2015) that was selected for its community-friendly, accessible language. for example, in advance of a dialogue about free consent, we proposed this definition: “free means no coercion, intimidation, inducement, or manipulation” (p. 6). procedure following a traditional welcome, the research team introduced themselves and discussed the purpose of the fpic meeting. the team then explained the details of the consent forms, which participants signed. while every effort was made to remove any potential identifiers of individual participants, the researchers discussed that anonymity could not be fully guaranteed because of the nature of the case study. the team also obtained permission to audio record the two-day event and to use quotations in our research reports and deliverables. the first meeting day created space for open dialogue (in both large and small groups) about community experiences with resource development. the second day concluded with a structured workshop on fpic. following the two-day meeting, all audio recordings were transcribed. all transcripts were reviewed independently by three coders who thematically analyzed the data for conceptualizations of “free,” “prior,” “informed,” and “consent.” the coders met frequently to debrief and dialogue about emerging key themes and ideas, which are presented below. in compiling a synthesis of the results, the research team prepared a report for matawa first nations management and chiefs council. findings below is a summary of workshop participants’ perspectives on the meaning of fpic. in a facilitated workshop, we sought community-based definitions of fpic by asking participants to describe from their experiences what free, prior, and informed consent seeking processes would look like from their perspectives and how they would define or describe each of the individual components of fpic. the following descriptions from the workshop provide insight into indigenous perspectives in our efforts to expand upon current conceptualizations of fpic found in technical documents and to address the significant lack of indigenous voice in the literature. free consent participants discussed free consent in terms of meaningful, equal partnerships between first nations and the provincial or territorial governments that respect and honour their inherent and treaty rights. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 4 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.4.8372 free consent was believed to be a process for consultation and decision making determined by first nations free from coercion, on their own terms, with respect for time and community capacity and recognition of inherent rights. free from coercion. some participants stated that current consultation processes do not respect the right to free consent, often involving forms of intimidation, inducement, manipulation, and misrepresentation of consultation and consent. no we didn’t give, we didn’t give any, we didn’t give [indigenous language] we didn’t give approval, you know? they just came in and talked about the project and someone translated. from a first nation’s perspective, it’s not free. it’s imposed on us; you’re manipulated. force, intimidation, inducement, manipulation—it’s all there. how [do] you deal with it . . . i think you pretty much have to stand up, but you stand up collectively and have to do it in unison. you know that question about getting consent, there’s a check mark. so we went around asking people in the territory, they said “no, we don’t even know what they look like.” so sometimes they’ll sneak in a check mark, so you know it’s a go ahead. like i said, free, prior, and informed, we’re informed, but they don’t want to use traditional knowledge. they don’t want to hear. free from financial ties. other participants noted that while coercion may not always be intentional, they were concerned with indirect forms of intimidation such as communities feeling pressured to make a decision associated with government-funded consultation processes. at what price are we doing that free, prior and informed consent? and i’m talking about the ring of fire. we are being consulted, we are given this information. but at what cost? . . . for me i’m scared ‘cause . . . they’re paying for our free, prior, and informed consent process. at what cost are we doing it? at the end of the day, they say, “well we’ve told you what we want. we informed you. we came to see you. we were in your community, we made presentations. ok what are you gonna do for us?” and when that comes, we’re gonna be obligated to say, “let’s go.” and our land is gonna be destroyed ‘cause it wasn’t our money. that’s what i’m afraid of. there is no free, until the day we make our own money, have our own set of language . . . we’re always trying to adapt to something. and we’re always trying to fit our triangle into that circle. it should be the other way around. it is our triangle, ok you guys fit into it [. . .] so free is lost. it’s the language. it’s where your money is coming from. it’s who’s pulling the strings. participants spoke about how first nations cannot give consent freely without being equal in their relationship with the provincial government. for example, participants said that first nations are expected to respond and provide their input on proposed plans without having adequate resources, staff, and time to do so. communities quickly become inundated with an overwhelming amount of work to do and participants discussed feeling as though first nations are always having to catch up to the timelines and agendas imposed by the provincial government. you know there’s pressure even in our own local government to produce. right now i got an email from the ring of fire. they’re setting up another table. but yet our people haven’t even 13 mitchell et al.: towards an indigenous-informed relational approach published by scholarship@western, 2019 gotten that far yet. so how can the chiefs present to the government, to the negotiators what our people are saying? so, the free will never be there until we are equal partners ‘cause we’re always behind. we’re always behind. adding to this pressure, participants pointed to the need for communities to quickly learn specialized technical knowledge about development and the mining cycle. to have an equal partnership between first nations and the provincial government, participants stressed that the imbalance in resources and capacity must be addressed—this is required before consent can be freely sought. the government has beefed up their staff to comply, to make sure that this follows through. on the other hand, first nations are understaffed because they don’t control the money. so, they [government] beef up their staff, but on the other hand they expect first nations to comply with inadequacy of funds or skills or the time. respect for indigenous rights. participants pointed out that free consent would require honouring the inherent and treaty rights of indigenous peoples in making decisions about their traditional lands and territories. indigenous peoples’ right to protect the land and its resources is an inherent responsibility that cannot be taken away or given up. we have inherent responsibilities about what the community does. we have to learn that if we inherit something, we have to follow through with those principles [. . .]. when they signed the treaty, they didn’t give up their inherent right, they didn’t give up their land. there’s no such thing as surrender. how can you give someone what is your inherent [right]? it’s just not possible. but that’s why the laws are different. their ideology is different; our ideology is sharing. participants discussed how the process of providing fpic is not free if indigenous communities continually have to “prove” their inherent rights and to repeatedly assert their jurisdiction over their territories prior to exploration and staking of their lands. prior consent matawa first nations have considerable experience with prospecting and development happening prior to authentic consultation rather than consultation happening prior to incursions into their territories. participants shared many examples of trespassing on their lands and their earlier recommendations for consultation prior to exploration. matawa communities, 10 years ago or so, we made some recommendations about mining and one of them was that we felt that consultation starts very early in terms of even before exploration happens. it should happen at a time when there is prospecting or even before that. and that was one of our recommendations. and that recommendation was never honoured . . . some mining companies don’t have no idea how to do consultation at all. traditional community consensus processes. an elder spoke in oji-cree to explain what “prior” meant to him. it meant having the information that is needed for a community to consider an issue, problem, or opportunity, to engage in discussion, and to seek a decision through a collective process of 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 4 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.4.8372 consensus building. he described a process of asking and agreeing with respect, saying that decisions that arise from a consensus building process are needed for community stability. prior means information. it means the information is given to you in advance . . . so you could say yes or no. you’re acting to reach that consensus, that’s an activity. consensus processes are respected [. . .] to ask and agree with respect. respecting your decisions. consensus is a unified decision. everybody agrees. well, everybody is asked and everybody agrees. consensus we’re trying to bring something together so that the community can have respect. if you don’t do something together you have a hard time with stability. [translated from oji cree] capacity building. participants were very clear that greater amounts of time must be invested in meeting with community members, providing information, and building community capacity to understand the various components necessary for informed participation and decision making prior to all phases in the mining cycle, from exploration to mine decommissioning. with the lack of the capacity in the communities, you’ll never ever get prior consent. the ministry of mines in ontario is loading up on their side with qualified people that go against other people . . . where’s the capacity building? there’s no funding left for that. you’ll never, ever get free, prior, and informed consent as long as there is no capacity. informed consent we learned from participants that the capacity required for analyzing and understanding highly scientific, technical, economic, environmental, social, financial, and legal analyses is demanding and burdensome for communities. community members confirmed, in many cases, a lack of knowledge of their rights to fpic and the government’s duty to consult and accommodate. there were many reported instances of consultation being conducted without community members and elders knowing that their presence was being viewed as consultation or presumed approval of industry proposals. awareness and knowledge of rights standards. indigenous community members and matawa participants stated that international indigenous rights standards and legally protected indigenous rights within canada are not well known to first nations. community leaders and technical support experts have had to spend significant time learning about these issues: we didn’t understand when companies started to contact us, call us, have meetings with us, or come to our community, that they counted this as “consultation.” we began to understand that we needed more deep consultation for us to be able to understand what is taking place in our territory. our elders have always said that we need to be part of the development in our area. we have to be able to be part of the processes, be part of the work that is going to come in from our lands and resources, our territories. so we needed to find out more about what we want as consultation in order for us to better understand that. we are working with government in developing that relation and we are talking about what we mean, what we want as consultation for our communities and our members. the average person in the community does not know what fpic is. not just an acronym but the idea—free, prior, and informed consent. when you talk to them and ask them, they don’t know. 15 mitchell et al.: towards an indigenous-informed relational approach published by scholarship@western, 2019 everything that we talked about all day here, that’s specialized knowledge for edos [economic development officers] and for technical people in the band. the lack of translation of highly technical language. participants pointed out that informed consent means all information must be accessible to the entire community. scientific information must not only be translated into plain english, but also into indigenous languages for elders and traditional knowledge holders: it’s supposed to be a community driven process, and when you’re looking at, as i explained, the perspectives of mining, when you’re looking for a community input . . . it seems to be unfair to the community members because if they don’t know anything about the mining perspectives, or the business side, or anything; or anything about how they will be socially impacted, they don’t completely understand. and a lot of the people in the matawa communities . . . english is their second language, they speak ojibwe as their first language, so you’re trying to translate further . . . yeah, there’s that barrier of the language and then even the actual perspectives of mining . . . and putting the onus on the input from community members. they carried with them english presentations but the community provided a local translator. however, from my experience in terms of the understanding the terminology that the mining companies use, as well as, there’s many words that you cannot really put into our dialect, so a lot of times when i hear translators, i question what they’re saying. and i think, i don’t think that’s a very appropriate process. provincial jurisdiction over indigenous lands. jurisdiction over lands and resources is the most significant barrier identified by participants to overcome in terms of informed consent. one example participants shared was that the concept of “free entry” in the ontario mining act remains a problem for indigenous communities because first nation communities are not notified when prospectors are coming into their lands to stake. once prospectors make a claim and start the planning and permitting processes, the timeline demands are unrealistic for first nation communities to respond. participants explained that further compromising the standard of consultation and consent seeking is the fact that first nation communities, as a whole, have limited capacity to respond to the numerous requests that are made, which can be upwards of 300 a year. participants said the volume of requests does not allow the principle of “prior” to be met, and it does not give power to communities to be fully informed about who, where, when, and why a prospector or company might be entering into lands to which aboriginal and treaty rights apply. participants also discussed the far north act (2010) and concluded the act is not much better at protecting indigenous inherent rights because the development of community-based land use planning, enabled by the act, is controlled by the provincial government and is not a true act of self-determination as long as a community’s land use plan can be vetoed by the ontario minister of natural resources and forestry. right now currently i think there are four matawa first nations that have controversies with mining companies . . . so there is some sense of uncertainty about the legislation piece of plans 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 4 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.4.8372 and permits that it’s not working right for first nations. and it’s a third-party designated consultation piece designed by the ministry of northern development and mines. so the proponents of the mining companies have to do the consultation. and there’s no assurance of how they have to prove that they did that meaningful consultation and turn around issue permits. somewhere around 2001 to 2007, that’s the time they tried to stake out the whole territory out there; there was no prior, informed, consent, consultation, to even consult at all. so there was a lot of activity in our area, in our backyard, a lot of disturbance in our fishing and hunting activities in that area in that time. and there was no respect at all from the industry or the governments. that’s how they divide, divide and conquer. you know? no unity. when you speak about jurisdiction, jurisdiction is your mentality, european mentality. since time immemorial, there’s no jurisdiction. that’s what he’s saying, no jurisdiction. there needs to be this, he [referring to elder] calls it the [indigenous language] which is understanding. we have to have the equilibrium of our cultures. you cannot try to make me your culture or white man, it has to be this equilibrium. industry needs education on indigenous values, laws, and philosophy. participants said they want to share and assist others in understanding their traditional knowledge and relationships to land, but they stated that many non-indigenous communities do not wish to learn from them. or when they do, they find a way to exploit that knowledge. when you talk to the elders about past time, who are still here with us, they always talk about to be careful, be careful how you’re negotiating, what you do with your land. ‘cause no matter what, whatever money you make, whatever result that is coming into your territory, you’re anishinaabe. the blood that’s running through your vein is anishinaabe blood and it always wants to be in alignment. and that’s very important. without land, you’re nothing, no matter how much money comes into your territory. so in negotiating, you have to be very careful how, not what. and that’s why, in the ring of fire, you know people say what’s wrong with you guys, you got really good potential coming to your territory. no, that’s not how anishinaabe looks at it, it’s your environment, if you don’t protect your environment, then you’re nothing. that’s where you’re from, the water, the land, the trees. the chief of our community always says the elders are our most valuable, they’re more valuable than any technologist, any researcher, any specialist; they should be the highest paid, higher paid than any consultant or researcher that comes in to the community because they got the tek [traditional ecological knowledge], they’ve got the knowledge. without them, he’s saying, you lose all of that and a lot of them are dying . . . seeking consent through the principles and processes of fpic participants spoke of the elders’ experience of intrusion on their lands, the lack of benefits and lack of revenue sharing, as well as the tremendous costs to their territories—to their lands, waters, and cultures. 17 mitchell et al.: towards an indigenous-informed relational approach published by scholarship@western, 2019 this points to the critical need to balance risks and benefits in informed decision making and the collective consideration of providing consent for proposed development. it’s interesting to speak with them [the elders] because their attitudes are still ,“they can’t do that here” [. . .] they’ve seen it [development] come and go and they’ve seen the lack of opportunities and the lack of revenue sharing . . . there’s zero revenue sharing or division of resources or any benefits to the first nations communities, so they’re very sceptical a lot of the time. they think that there could be no good coming out of it and it’s just interesting because they have that experience. they watched it. they watched everything change, they watched the water get damned, to change even the directions of the river. they’ve seen rivers that were just a creek to now it’s a river, the flooding, the hydro flooding, the land erosion. they’ve seen the decimation of the forests, and they’ve seen the gold mining projects, every single project in the area, so now they’re, “ok again? it’s going to happen again. what’s going to be done to make sure that the communities benefit?” collective decision making. matawa participants’ definition of consent is premised on the practice of indigenous collective and consensual decision making before their lands are accessed, and well before any political, technical, mechanical, environmental, industrial or financial decisions are made about exploring or extracting resources from their territories. consent building was described as being contingent upon relationship, respect, and mutual benefit derived through power sharing throughout the processes of consultation at any and all stages of development: (we) need some clear definitions for consent and consult. and the combinations, like the word, what is it? a lot of community members and others have their different definitions. but it seems like if there’s a process that 100% benefits the industry . . . if there was a way to codify fpic or something so that you could see the first nations deriving just as much if not more benefit than mainstream canada, than industry proponent, then why not? why not share power? i think a lot of it is refusal, denying the sharing of power. they just don’t want to share benefit and share power. we have a large say in what happens. so even socio-economic wise, it will enhance our involvement as an equity partner in whatever development happens in our territory, that consent is giving by our people, in our community, in our nations . . . so right now it appears that the ontario government is dictating whatever is going to happen in ontario, so that’s why our chiefs are saying, our people are saying, that’s not going to happen. many participants spoke about the risks of not being seen as equal partners and the absence of government-to-government relationships that respect indigenous peoples’ rights to engage in community-determined consultation processes. while consensus building among community members is the first step in information seeking and decision making, there was a clear consensus across all of the data and community meetings that understanding, developing, and sustaining respectful relationships is an essential beginning to any and all consultation and consent seeking processes. 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 4 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.4.8372 a relational approach to consultation and consent seeking matawa first nation members spoke of an indigenous-informed, relational understanding of free, prior, and informed consent. in reflecting on their experiences of consultation and consent-seeking processes in their traditional territories, participants not only indicated that external governments and proponents have failed to adequately engage in meaningful relationship-building, they also clarified important criteria for what a relational approach to fpic might look like. we learned from the communities that the implementation and fulfillment of fpic will require further understanding of an indigenous perspective on the importance of developing and sustaining relationships between communities and between matawa first nations, various levels of government, industry proponents, and the earth. the central nature of relationships. matawa participants saw connections between all things, including the land, as being central to their worldview: when i go to work, or when i attend a meeting, i know to at least acknowledge people regardless of their race, regardless of their creed, regardless of their belief. i have to acknowledge people because we’re all one and equal. that’s one thing i always live by is that we’re all one and equal. i just wanted to share that message because it is really important to be reminded at times of that . . . sometimes we have to be pulled back to the same level, to the ground, to the earth. my understanding as an anishinaabe is that we have sacred connection to the land, we are connected to everything, and that is my belief. that’s something that i cherish, that is something that i carry with me every day. we are connected to the land. and like one of my colleagues said, money will run out. but our connection to the land as well as our stewardship to the land is something that we really need to look at when making our decisions in the future because we’re only borrowing the land. we’re only using it temporarily because we have to leave the rest to our children, for those that are going to live in the future. working relationships require all parties to be informed and to respect treaty rights. matawa members stated that they wanted to build a relationship with industry and external governments as part of their decision-making process and exercise of their inherent rights of stewardship of their lands. relationship building was discussed as a process that would start early in the mining cycle, before any development related activity and described as the “prior to the prior,” requiring a large time commitment as well as attention to ensuring that all parties are informed and respect treaty rights. we have to safeguard our aboriginal and treaty rights, things that are within us. our culture has to be safeguarded and protected. but it has to be protected in a way that everything will work in harmony. so that’s how we view it. and that’s how we want to move forward in our relationship with industry and also with government. sometimes for consultation and accommodation, they come to see you, shake hands with you and have a coffee. that’s not a true consultation process. if you want to truly create a working relationship for development, you have to know the concepts and teachings of how the important pieces of the development will occur, and when and how. 19 mitchell et al.: towards an indigenous-informed relational approach published by scholarship@western, 2019 some of our communities have developed consultation protocols. whenever mining companies enter into their territory, they advise the mining company that here is our protocol, here is how we want you to consult with us. we want you to build a relationship with us . . . as the chief mentioned, we believe that relationship building is a must [. . .] certainly we would like to hear from these prospectors coming into our territory. and then once exploration starts, when staking is done. i believe there isn’t a lot of consultation taking place prior to that. and what happens sometimes is the property changes hands [between exploration companies], and that leaves first nations with a broken relationship of consultation. we believe that the actions of the government do not honour what we agreed upon in the treaty. it doesn’t honour the inherent right of our peoples on the land. we’re dealing with trying to recognize what they mean by consultation. and our viewpoints are different in our first nations. we’re trying to build back relationships; we’re trying to understand each other. and that’s going to take some time. significant demands upon communities to understand mainstream government and industry information, policy, and laws were detailed. matawa members recounted how they were required to develop various capacities to understand the perspectives of provincial and territorial governments and industry proponents. on the other hand, these members pointed out that governments and industry were not building their own capacity to understand indigenous laws, protocols, and languages, and meanings attributed to relationships, nor were these proponents building their capacity to apply the principles of free, prior, and informed consent. discussion from our communication with case study participants, it is evident that despite canada’s endorsement of undrip, indigenous communities have not experienced processes of engagement aligned with their understanding of undrip and the meanings they attribute to fpic regarding proposed development on their territories. there remains a growing chasm between the interpretation and application of fpic of indigenous peoples and that of both governments and industry despite some congruence in textual definitions. in the absence of sufficient time and resources for communities to understand the complex technical information and related implications for each community’s social, cultural, environmental, and economic wellness, development will continue to occur without meaningful prior consultation or the consent of indigenous peoples. consultation and consent seeking processes create strains on first nation communities demanding their time and tremendous amounts of both financial and human resources. indigenous communities are challenged to engage with industrial technical knowledge, while following their own indigenous laws and protecting the inherent rights of future generations. jurisdiction was a most significant barrier to achieving consent. the province of ontario asserted jurisdiction over treaty 9 lands and developed the legislative power (e.g., mining act; far north act) to support and strengthen its jurisdiction. this was done under a cloud of criticism about the failure of the crown to adequately consult with first nations about these strategic decisions (drake, 2016; gardner, tsuji, mccarthy, whitelaw, & tsuji, 2012). aspects of this legislation seem to actively dismiss constitutionally protected indigenous rights. the communities have minimal influence over setting 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 4 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.4.8372 timelines of consultation and decision making and are subjected to the unreasonable demands to respond to western timelines, languages, and decision-making processes, rather than government and proponents learning, respecting, and working within the framework of various cultural protocols and indigenous law and philosophy. prior consent requires sufficient time to review all relevant resources in order to fully understand the potential, known, and probable impacts and benefits of the proposed development. relationship development, the prior to the prior consent, is required to demonstrate respect for indigenous nations’ jurisdictions, cultures, and collective decision-making processes. communities require time to arrange community information sessions and community consensus-building processes that promote agreement and unity amongst community members. historically, the lack of prior fpic has resulted in trespassing on indigenous traditional territories with minimal benefit to communities. in this regard, some matawa residents are wondering if the past will be repeated. growing conflicts amid the increased coercion and incursion on indigenous territories reveals the current failure of governments and industry to recognize, understand, and respect fpic. indigenous peoples, however, continue to understand and assert their rights to decision making free from coercion, prior to permitting or development, based on full information and a full understanding of the risks and benefits of proposed developments to their culture, land, water, animals, birds, fish, forest, and community. it is evident that indigenous peoples have a more fulsome understanding of fpic that challenges the limited, isolated, and contradictory applications of fpic principles by the canadian government in which indigenous worldviews are largely absent. the discussions, reflections, and contributions of matawa first nations in advancing an indigenous understanding of the meanings they attribute to the principles of free, prior, informed, and consent within undrip fit well with those presented by the international indian treaty council (iitc, 2013). the conversations and workshops with matawa first nations supported an indigenous perspective of fpic, emerging within an indigenous worldview, as a relational concept, in contrast to the fragmented western interpretation and application of fpic. taking a relational approach is critical as it includes indigenous law, knowledge, and philosophy. an indigenous cosmology is what many indigenous nations refer to as their “original instructions,” part of indigenous legal traditions (borrows, 2005; coyle, 2017). although these philosophies are diverse amongst indigenous peoples, they are similar in articulating indigenous peoples’ sophisticated relationship with all elements of the universe. indigenous philosophy is based upon a sacred duty and responsibility to live in a harmonious manner with the natural world. indigenous philosophy is the necessary foundation for weighing the benefits or harms central to consent seeking and the crafting of an impact benefit agreement. this means that indigenous communities will be considering their sacred duty and responsibility to protect the land and ecosystems for future generations, as they attempt to balance the impacts of development upon mother earth. this means that achieving a successful consultation and consent process will not simply involve a western conventional economic lens that will demonstrate financial compensation within a benefit agreement. the consultation and consent seeking processes must reflect indigenous peoples’ duty to their ongoing responsibilities that will ensure their ultimate survivability and sustainability as indigenous peoples. 21 mitchell et al.: towards an indigenous-informed relational approach published by scholarship@western, 2019 the nature of these processes is a vital consideration for extractive industries when they are proposing development in remote areas of indigenous territories, which most of the matawa territory is. in many of these areas, there is a limited opportunity for indigenous people to participate in a modern market economy; many make their livelihood from their traditional lands. effectively, when these lands are remote and indigenous people have an active relationship with the land by means of hunting, trapping, and gathering as a primary source of their sustenance, they are still very much a part of their ecosystems. an extractive industry coming into an ecosystem in which indigenous peoples are living in such a relationship with the land must consider the sacredness of this relationship to the land and the nation’s cultural activities. when there is disruption in an ecosystem, the potential exists to disrupt the relationship that indigenous peoples have with their lands. this then disrupts their ability to fulfill their sacred duty to live this relationship to land, thereby denying their ability to live their indigeneity without constraint. indigenous communities will not simply use a western conventional economic philosophy that teaches that the duty of the human race is to gain control over the environment, to utilize its resources, and to assert dominance as a species, as this directly contravenes indigenous philosophies that commonly centre on seeking a relationship of perfect balance with all things in the universe (loomis, 2000). the need for a relational approach to fpic has been identified by others who suggest that doing so would help to shift away from the consent-as-veto discourse towards one which engages indigenous peoples as full partners where the goal is to reach a mutually agreeable outcome (papillon & rodon, 2016). however, essential to this relational position is the reality that “the possibility that the indigenous group may withhold its consent has to remain on the table throughout the process” (p. 3). by recognizing an indigenous relational approach to the principles and practices of fpic, we strive to advance the full utility and implementation of fpic as a rights framework that can advance positive relationships of co-existence and mutually beneficial economic partnerships and/or protected indigenous territories. advancing indigenous philosophies and understanding of the meaning and processes of free, prior, and informed consent will allow the principles of fpic to become increasingly aligned with indigenous peoples’ duties and responsibilities to the land and future generations, along with international rights frameworks and indigenous inherent and legal rights. a relational approach to consultation and consent seeking, informed by indigenous knowledge and worldviews, will be a more fully informed process without which industrial and extraction activities threaten indigenous peoples, their rights, and their freedom to practice their indigeneity. the relational approach to fpic reveals the ontological divide between indigenous and non-indigenous worldviews and relationships to land, as well as the very meaning of relationship itself. in developing a relational approach to fpic, non-indigenous individuals, whether government or industry representatives, need to be able to acknowledge the deeper meaning of indigenous worldviews and the essential cultural meaning of relationship. non-indigenous participants need to recognize that there is a plurality of legal frameworks in which both western and indigenous laws exist and inform decisionmaking processes. the idea, however, is not to focus on the differences, but to respect one another and to work towards decision-making processes regarding land and resource stewardship and “development” founded on respectful relationships. indigenous communities are asking for a return to relationships that are respectful of an indigenous worldview, meaning a return to equal relations, to the respect for selfdetermination, and acknowledgement of one another as sovereign beings, each as part of the larger 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 4 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.4.8372 ecosystem and universe. the importance of relationship within fpic has been indicated for some time; however, as participants described in this study, fpic principles are not being fulfilled as requisites of a relational, consent-seeking process in the practices of governments and industry on indigenous territories. the recent federal court of appeal decision on the inadequacy of the crown’s consultation process in the matter of the trans mountain pipeline (tsleil-waututh nation v. canada (attorney general), 2018) speaks to the importance and necessity of a “two-way dialogue” rooted in respectful relationships. the crown’s failure to understand the relational aspect of the right to fpic has proven costly to industry, governments, and indigenous communities. it has been suggested that indigenous peoples have the right to withhold consent, but exercising this right should be subject to tests of necessity and proportionality (anaya, 2013). in the tsilhqot’in first nation v. british columbia (2014) case, the supreme court of canada determined that consent is not absolute and that the crown may still infringe on indigenous rights for compelling reasons. the issue of consent, therefore, remains unclear and contested under canada’s current duty to consult and accommodate guidelines. in advancing a relational approach to fpic, we agree with the notion of working together towards considering the needs of the larger community to promote peaceful coexistence; however, we question the current discourse that assumes indigenous peoples do not have jurisdiction over their territories. this assumption implies that the “good of all” is a potentially limiting factor to indigenous peoples’ inherent rights to live as they choose on their lands, especially when the greater good is defined by those with a vested interest in development. in this case, indigenous peoples are calculated into the body of the “all.” the power and potential of fpic lies in the right to exercise self-determination by collectively exercising the authority to make deliberations and decisions about one’s own territory and lifeways. a mutual understanding of what consent means within fpic is essential to the advancement of indigenous rights and a necessary tool for indigenous peoples to exercise in order to “diminish coercion in relations of deep asymmetry” (leydet, 2019, p. 1). conclusion understanding the fpic principles from an indigenous perspective goes well beyond the basic definitions currently provided in the technical and legal literature. one of the most important insights gained from our conversations with matawa first nations is that fpic is relational. in other words, the principle of fpic is one that depends on meaningful relationships between first nations, government, industry, and the land. fpic requires that relationships are established in which the self-determination of first nations is respected and honoured. this means that representatives of government and industry must become aware of indigenous rights and cultures, as well and their respective relational responsibilities in their roles while fulfilling the duty to consult. a relational process of fpic would require that government representatives and industry proponents are informed about canadian law, treaties, and international law, as well as the cultures, worldviews, histories, languages, and rights of the indigenous peoples they seek to communicate with, prior to processes of consultation and consent seeking. the development of respectful relationships by those who are seeking access to resources on indigenous lands is a reasonable first step that would begin to offset the deep asymmetry of power that has been exercised between 23 mitchell et al.: towards an indigenous-informed relational approach published by scholarship@western, 2019 government, industry, and indigenous communities. relationship building would involve meeting where the indigenous community leaders choose, communicating in their preferred language, and respecting local protocols well in advance of any prospecting or permitting in relation to proposed developments affecting indigenous lands and resources. we have seen a bold and promising shift towards recognizing indigenous rights and the importance of relationships by the current prime minister of canada, justin trudeau, in such statements as: no relationship is more important to canada than the relationship with indigenous peoples. our government is working together with indigenous peoples to build a nation-to-nation, inuit-crown, government-to-government relationship—one based on respect, partnership, and recognition of rights. (trudeau, 2017, para. 3) despite the rhetorical emphasis on relationship in recent federal announcements, the natural resource relationship is, however, still very one sided and the words have begun to ring hollow. matawa first nations’ observations about current consultation processes and the need for consent based on selfdetermination reflect a pervasive frustration about inadequate consultation processes experienced by first nations across canada. relationships are a two-way street. while the federal government is speaking about the importance of a nation-to-nation relationship, the provinces and territories are still directing the processes of consultation and consent seeking. the lack of international standards for the interpretation, implementation, and monitoring of fpic is at issue in this article. further barriers are presented by federal–provincial jurisdiction confusion, where the federal government is responsible for exercising its fiduciary obligation to “indians and lands reserved for the indians” (constitution act, 1867), while the provinces, through separate and varied provincial and territorial government policies and processes, assert jurisdiction over indigenous lands and resources, subject to the duty to consult. there is a tremendous irony in consent seeking, which is arguably, at this point in time, seen by government and industry as a process of securing agreement versus a legitimate process of free, prior, and informed consent seeking. if consent cannot be withheld after reviewing information, community consultation, and collective decision making, then free consent cannot, for all intents and purposes, be sought or given. upholding the inherent and international rights of fpic will require a focus on renewed relationships based on mutual respect and trust, a shifting of power, attention to and a deeper understanding of indigenous worldviews. the full realization of fpic in canada, as an expression of indigenous selfdetermination, fostered through the “building of respectful relationships,” as outlined in the trc’s (2015) calls to action 92, will therefore be an essential step towards reconciliation in canada. references anaya, j. 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(2011). the rights to free, prior and informed consent: indigenous peoples’ participation in rights within international law. northwestern journal of international human rights, 10(2), 5484. retrieved from http://scholarlycommons.law.northwestern.edu/njihr/vol10/iss2/2 weitzner, v. (2011). tipping the power balance: making free, prior and informed consent work. ottawa, canada: the north-south institute. retrieved from http://www.nsi-ins.ca/wpcontent/uploads/2012/10/2011-tipping-the-power-balance-making-free-prior-andinformed-consent-work.pdf ms 1464 brooks-cleator a postcolonial discourse analysis final.pdf the international indigenous policy journal volume 11|issue1 january 2020 a postcolonial discourse analysis of community stakeholders’ perspectives on supporting urban indigenous older adults to age well in ottawa, canada lauren a. brooks-cleator carleton university, laurenbrookscleator@cunet.carleton.ca audrey r. giles university of ottawa, agiles@uottawa.ca recommended citation brooks-cleator, l. a., & giles, r. a.(2020). a postcolonial discourse analysis of community stakeholders’ perspectives on supporting urban indigenous older adults to age well in ottawa, canada. the international indigenous policy journal, 11(1). doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.9443 a postcolonial discourse analysis of community stakeholders’ perspectives on supporting urban indigenous older adults to age well in ottawa, canada abstract the urban indigenous older adult population in canada continues to grow; however, there is a lack of understanding of how non-indigenous health and social services and indigenous-specific organizations are responding to and addressing the growth of this population. therefore, in this research, we conducted a postcolonial discourse analysis of semi-structured interviews with six decision-makers (e.g., managers and directors of health and social services organizations) and seven service providers (e.g., program coordinators and social workers) from indigenous and non-indigenous health and social service organizations in ottawa, canada, to examine how they produce understandings of supporting urban indigenous older adults to age well. the participants produced three main discourses: (a) non-indigenous organizations have a responsibility to support indigenous older adults, (b) culturally specific programs and services are important for supporting indigenous older adults to age well, and (c) it is difficult for community stakeholders to support indigenous older adults to age well because this population is hard to reach. the results demonstrate the complexities and tensions that community stakeholders face in supporting indigenous older adults to age well within a sociopolitical environment informed by reconciliation and a sociodemographic trend of an aging population. keywords discourse analysis, aging well, indigenous older adults, community stakeholders, community support, postcolonial theory acknowledgments the authors would like to thank all of the participants for their involvement in this project and for sharing their knowledge and time with us. this work was supported by the canadian institutes of health research (funding reference number gsd-146297). creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0license. 1 brooks-cleator & giles: perspectives on supporting urban indigenous older adults to age well published by scholarship@western, 2020 a postcolonial discourse analysis of community stakeholders’ perspectives on supporting urban indigenous older adults to age well in ottawa, canada the urban indigenous older adult population in canada continues to grow (o’donnell, wendt, & the national association of friendship centres, 2017); however, there is a general lack of understanding of how non-indigenous health and social services and indigenous-specific organizations are responding to and addressing the growth of this population (deverteuil & wilson, 2010). historically, support for urban indigenous peoples has been provided by indigenous-specific organizations, such as friendship centres (ouart & saskatoon indian and métis friendship centre [simfc], 2013). in the current sociopolitical environment in canada, the impacts of colonialism are beginning to be recognized by multiple levels of government and society as a whole. as a result, there is an increasing demand for nonindigenous organizations to make efforts towards reconciliation with indigenous peoples, including providing services to indigenous populations (truth and reconciliation commission [trc], 2015c). at the same time, indigenous and non-indigenous health and social service organizations are facing increasing pressure to respond to the growing demographic of older adults (buffel & phillipson, 2018). consequently, understandings about how to support indigenous older adults in aging well are constructed alongside these two societal shifts in canada. in this research, aging well is related to active aging (walker, 2002) and successful aging (rowe & kahn, 1987), in which older adults prioritize taking responsibility for their independence, good physical and mental health, and social engagement as they reach the later years of life. in comparison, existing research related to indigenous older adults and aging well in canada and the united states has found that aging well means having good friendships (baskin & davey, 2015); being involved in and contributing to the community (baskin & davey, 2015; ginn & kulig, 2015; lewis, 2014); managing physical health and transmitting wisdom and knowledge (collings, 2001; ginn & kulig, 2015; lewis, 2011); participating in subsistence activities and caring for others (hopkins, kwachka, lardon & mohatt, 2007); engaging in spiritual practices (lewis, 2011); and being in good physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual health (ginn & kulig, 2015). in this article, when discussing aging well, we are referring to dominant understandings of aging well that are prevalent in western (and settler) societies, as these stem from the same neoliberal political environment (polivka & longino, 2004) in which decision-makers and service providers work and develop policy and programs in urban communities. we understand, however, that by using the term and western understanding of aging well in our research, we risk further normalizing western concepts that have historically excluded indigenous peoples; however, we use this term in our research for two reasons. first, we engaged in discussions with members of the community advisory committee1 about terminology and which concept or word would be the best to use in the research in order to understand experiences of being supported throughout the process of aging. the community advisory committee members felt that aging well would be an appropriate term to use. second, our intent was to undertake research that critiques, but also informs, current policies and services that are developed to support various populations of older adults. we were 1 the community advisory committee was developed as part of the community-based participatory research (cbpr) process to help guide the research design, process, and dissemination, and to ensure that the research addressed the community’s interests and was appropriate and respectful. it consisted of five indigenous members: two from each organization we engaged with for this research and one older adult community member. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1, art. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.9443 hesitant to completely avoid using the language of these policies because we were concerned that the results would be disregarded or deemed irrelevant by policymakers. indeed, sometimes one must takeup the term that one seeks to critique in order to critique it (hutcheon, 1989). even with these understandings, however, we are still cognizant of the potential drawbacks of our use of the term aging well. since decision-makers and service providers who work for these organizations play key roles in supporting indigenous older adults as they age (davy et al., 2015), it is important to understand how they produce and utilize discourses related to community support for urban indigenous peoples to age well. therefore, in this research, we conducted discourse analysis, informed by postcolonial theory, of semi-structured interviews with six decision-makers (e.g., managers and directors of health and social services organizations) and seven service providers (e.g., program coordinators and social workers) from indigenous and non-indigenous health and social service organizations in ottawa, canada, to examine how they produce understandings of supporting urban indigenous older adults to age well. the participants produced three main discourses: (a) non-indigenous organizations have a responsibility to support indigenous older adults, (b) culturally specific programs and services are important for supporting indigenous older adults to age well, and (c) it is difficult for community stakeholders to support indigenous older adults to age well because this population is hard to reach. the results demonstrate the complexities and tensions that community stakeholders face in supporting indigenous older adults to age well within a sociopolitical environment informed by reconciliation and a sociodemographic trend of an aging population. literature review in canada, the federal government has made recent efforts to address colonial and unequal relationships with indigenous peoples living in what is now known as canada. the truth and reconciliation commission (trc, 2015c) began in canada in 2008 as a result of the indian residential schools settlement agreement.2 the trc’s goals were to document and reveal the truths about the history, abuse, harms, and ongoing impacts of residential schools from the perspectives of survivors and their families, and to guide a process of healing and building new relationships between indigenous peoples and non-indigenous peoples, churches, and governments. the trc concluded its work in 2015 with 94 calls to action aimed at federal, provincial, and municipal governments; churches; non-government organizations; and canadians in general to address the legacy of residential schools (trc, 2015b). gebhard (2017) argued that these events produced discourses of reconciliation and responsibility that position non-indigenous peoples who take up these discourses as supportive and historically conscious members of society. organizations that have been historically responsible for policies, services, and programs to support health and well-being of the general canadian population (e.g., municipalities, local 2 resulting from the growing number of class-action lawsuits filed against the government of canada by residential school survivors, the indian residential schools settlement agreement was reached in 2006. there were five components to it: (a) a common experience payment for former residential school students, (b) an independent assessment process to determine additional payments for students who suffered physical and sexual abuse, (c) funding to support the aboriginal healing foundation for initiatives addressing the legacy of residential schools, (d) funding from the federal government to commemorate the experiences of residential school survivors, and (e) the creation of the truth and reconciliation commission of canada (trc, 2015c). 3 brooks-cleator & giles: perspectives on supporting urban indigenous older adults to age well published by scholarship@western, 2020 non-profits, community resource centres, hospitals, etc.) are now being encouraged to reflect on how they can better support indigenous peoples (trc, 2015b), which has consequences for how indigenous older adults are supported to age well. indigenous older adults do not age in isolation; they are influenced by the community in which they live and the support that they receive in their community (brooks-cleator, giles, & flaherty, 2019). the supports and services that indigenous older adults receive in urban communities are influenced by community stakeholders, including decision-makers and service providers from both indigenous and non-indigenous organizations. thus, it is important to examine their role in supporting older adults to age well and also how organizations respond to and address the needs of urban indigenous populations. community stakeholders and support for older adults numerous researchers have highlighted the significant role service providers and other community stakeholders play in facilitating aging well initiatives and support for older adults (garon, paris, beaulieu, veil, & laliberté, 2014; hewson, kwan, shaw, & lai, 2018). given that a wide range of factors, such as housing, health services, transportation, social support, etc., contribute to aging well, lui, everingham, warburton, cuthill, and bartlett (2009) argued that there is a need for broad-based collaboration among multiple community stakeholders from a variety of sectors to facilitate this support for older adults. successful aging-well initiatives, such as age-friendly community initiatives, have been shown to be comprised of “a core group of individuals rooted in the community—mainly stakeholders from the municipal apparatus, political representation, and public and community organizations” (garon et al., 2014, p. 79). it is also not just researchers and policy makers who have identified the importance of collaboration. hewson et al. (2018) found that service providers also noted the importance of collaboration among various organizations to support current and future older adults to age well. collaboration efforts should be led by local governments, as they are in a unique position to create supportive environments for older adults and have long been involved in planning and managing initiatives across a variety of sectors (lui et al., 2009). an important aspect of community-level planning to support older adults, in addition to learning from older adults themselves (brooks-cleator et al., 2019), is identifying how service providers come to recognize and understand the needs of current and future generations of older adults, and service providers’ readiness to address these needs (hewson et al., 2018). despite their significant role in developing health and well-being initiatives for older adults, there is a lack of understanding of how community service providers and decision-makers understand their role in supporting older adults to age well, specifically as it relates to indigenous older adults in urban communities. indigenous-specific organizations in urban communities in the 1950s and 1960s, when the urban indigenous population in canada was much smaller than it is now, there were few services for indigenous people in urban communities. consequently, indigenous peoples advocated for organizations to be created with services that were specifically tailored to their needs, and thus were indigenous-specific (ouart & simfc, 2013). services and programs specifically tailored to meet the needs of urban indigenous peoples are often funded by federal, provincial, and/or municipal governments, but are delivered by indigenous-specific non-profit organizations (hanselmann, 2003). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1, art. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.9443 there are numerous benefits that these organizations bring to urban indigenous community members, such as embracing indigenous cultural values and traditions, employing indigenous urban community members, and providing safe and supportive spaces for the urban indigenous community (ouart & simfc, 2013). they can also help to mitigate family, culture, and language disruptions when indigenous peoples relocate to an urban community (morris, 2016). these organizations play significant, and often leading, roles in developing indigenous communities in urban areas, resisting discourses that suggest urban indigenous peoples lack indigeneity (anderson, 2013), empowering urban indigenous community members, and responding to the often forgotten needs of urban indigenous community members who are ineligible for many programs and services that are only available on-reserve or within land claim settlement regions (ouart & simfc, 2013). newhouse (2003) argued that urban indigenous organizations are discursively produced as manifestations of indigenous peoples’ inherent stewardship of programs and services and as being “closer, more responsive to, and accountable to, aboriginal communities” (p. 249) than non-indigenous organizations; however, these organizations should not be solely responsible for supporting urban indigenous peoples, especially considering the continued growth of the urban indigenous population. further, urban indigenous peoples should not be limited to only seeking support from indigenous organizations, as they should be able to choose whether they seek support from indigenous or nonindigenous organizations, or a combination of both. increasingly, non-indigenous organizations are called upon to seek ways to provide safe, supportive, accessible, and appropriate care and service to indigenous peoples (trc, 2015c). limited research has explored how services, both indigenousspecific and non-indigenous, in urban communities are responding to this call, particularly from the perspective of service providers and decision-makers within these organizations. services and support for indigenous peoples in urban communities while it is important for non-indigenous organizations to support urban indigenous community members, historically and presently, indigenous peoples have faced significant barriers to accessing health and social services from non-indigenous organizations. historically, federal and provincial governments viewed non-indigenous organizations as ways to assimilate urban indigenous peoples into the canadian (euro-centric) mainstream (ouart & simfc, 2013). this was particularly the case as dominant colonial discourses have suggested and currently suggest that indigenous peoples, and their cultures and traditions, were and are out of place within urban spaces and within non-indigenous health and social service organizations (peters & anderson, 2013). in addition to these discourses, historically, there have been direct mechanisms by which indigenous peoples have been excluded from urban spaces; this is particularly problematic given that most cities are located on sites traditionally used by indigenous peoples (peters & anderson, 2013). for example, first nations have been subjected to the relocation of reserves when cities expanded; the changing of reserve boundaries away from potential new or expanding city boundaries; illegal surrender of reserve lands near city boundaries, resulting in loss of indian status or relocation to other reserves; and the pass system, which mandated that they had to receive permission to leave their reserve (peters & anderson, 2013; wilson & peters, 2005). undoubtedly, indigenous peoples in canada have experienced conceptual and physical removal from urban spaces, leading to their exclusion and isolation from many aspects of cities (morris, 2016; peters & anderson, 2013; wilson & peters, 2005). 5 brooks-cleator & giles: perspectives on supporting urban indigenous older adults to age well published by scholarship@western, 2020 another way in which politics affects the lives of urban indigenous peoples is through the complexity of public policy for urban indigenous populations and the trend toward the federal government only being responsible for those residing on reserve (peters, 2011) or within a land claim settlement region (bonesteel, 2006). simply, first nations who move off reserve or inuit who move outside of their land claim settlement region, which includes urban first nations and inuit older adults, are ineligible for many federal programs and services, which results in further marginalization (bonesteel, 2006; snyder, wilson, & whitford, 2015). the federal government pushed many responsibilities to provincial and municipal governments; however, they have been reluctant to develop policies that adequately support urban indigenous populations (deverteuil & wilson, 2010; snyder et al., 2015). municipal policy thus comes up against a legacy of federal policy that inadequately supports indigenous peoples and, for this article, particularly indigenous older adults in urban communities. in addition to these harmful colonial discourses and policies that legitimize a lack of support specifically for urban indigenous peoples, deverteuil and wilson (2010) also noted that there is often “a deep reluctance, indifference and lack of explicit accommodation/creation of aboriginal spaces across most services” (p. 499). as such, this population continues to face barriers in accessing support from the nonindigenous health and social services sector, including barriers related to poverty, social exclusion, and discrimination (place, 2012). place (2012) noted that one of the most significant barriers indigenous peoples face in accessing non-indigenous-specific services is a lack of recognition among many service providers of the historical and ongoing impacts of colonialism and the harms it has caused. as a result, many gaps in services for indigenous peoples remain in urban communities, including culturally safe services that consider the ongoing trauma and exclusion that they face as a result of colonialism (browne et al., 2011; hole et al., 2015); consistent and sufficient funding for indigenous services in urban communities (morris, 2016); and non-indigenous-specific services that effectively attend to indigenous peoples’ diverse cultural beliefs, traditions, and values (deverteuil & wilson, 2010). furthermore, these gaps and the lack of services that support indigenous peoples’ health and well-being lead to “feelings of fear, disrespect, and alienation among aboriginal peoples” (hole et al., 2015, p. 2). this type of care and support is typically facilitated by the engagement of indigenous community members in service and program planning and delivery and often results in more effective and relevant service for indigenous peoples (deverteuil & wilson, 2010). non-indigenous organizations, however, have historically been unable, or unwilling, to engage in and co-produce services with indigenous peoples in response to the growing urban indigenous population (deverteuil & wilson, 2010; snyder et al., 2015). as a result, many indigenous people lack trust in nonindigenous service providers and decision-makers, which contributes to a lack of interest in accessing these services (ouart & simfc, 2013). the result is that these non-indigenous services typically normalize white, settler discourses of health and well-being and exclude indigenous approaches (deverteuil & wilson, 2010). indeed, researchers have shown that indigenous peoples living in urban communities are well supported by indigenous-specific organizations (morris, 2016; ouart & simfc, 2013), but still face challenges in being supported in ways that are reflective of and respectful to their cultures by non-indigenous organizations. research has also demonstrated, however, that nonindigenous health and social services can also play a large role in supporting older adults to age well (garon et al., 2014; hewson et al., 2018; lui et al., 2009). thus, it is important to understand if—in light of shifting demographics and discourses pertaining to reconciliation—service providers and 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1, art. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.9443 decision-makers from both non-indigenous and indigenous-specific organizations support indigenous older adults to age well and, if so, how. theoretical framework our research was informed by a postcolonial theoretical framework. key strategies of postcolonial theory include (a) identifying and deconstructing discourses that potentially perpetuate, or resist, colonialism (mcewan, 2009; young, 2001); and (b) examining “the nature of colonized subjectivity and the various forms of cultural and political resistance” (reimer kirkham, & anderson, 2002, p. 3). macdonald, abbott, and jenkins (2012) described how “postcolonial theorists seek to disrupt linear and hierarchical views of power . . . and look for the multidirectionality of power” (p. 41). within postcolonial theory, therefore, power is not viewed as something that is solely exercised by the colonizer over the colonized; it is in constant flux and negotiation through acts of resistance and dominance (bhabha, 1994). as hayhurst (2009) stated, “social relations and process of power are constituted through frameworks of knowledge and ‘discursive practices’” (p. 209). thus, analyzed through a postcolonial theoretical lens, the discursive practices of the colonizer and the colonized can reinforce and resist colonial practices. the institutions from which urban indigenous older adults receive support, particularly non-indigenous organizations, are deeply rooted in colonial practices (loppie, reading, & de leeuw, 2014; reading & wein, 2009), and indigenous organizations have also been influenced by colonialism (hanselmann, 2003). within all of these organizations, decision-makers and service providers are the ones who influence what and how services, programs, and supports are delivered and made available to indigenous older adults. as such, postcolonial theory allowed us to grasp how community stakeholders take-up and use certain discourses to exercise power and reinforce or resist colonialism within the current sociopolitical environment in which they work (darroch & giles, 2016). as a result, we were able to identify the tensions, sites of struggle, and power relations portrayed by community stakeholders in their understandings of supporting indigenous older adults to age well. ultimately, this allowed us to better understand how power is exercised by decision-makers and service providers from non-indigenous and indigenous health and social service organizations to justify support given to indigenous older adults to age well through an analysis of the discursive (re)production of this support. methodology for this research, we used a community-based participatory research (cbpr) approach. the first author (brooks-cleator) volunteered with older adult programs at indigenous organizations in ottawa for over two years. consequently, she was able to build relationships with indigenous community partners, which led to us conducting this research with two indigenous organizations in ottawa: tungasuvvingat inuit and the odawa native friendship centre. in order to adhere to the principles of cbpr, we worked with a community advisory committee whose members played pivotal roles in shaping the research questions, methodology, methods, and knowledge mobilization efforts. the advisory committee consisted of five indigenous community members, including two inuit representatives from tungasuvvingat inuit, one inuk older adult community member, and two first nations representatives from the odawa native friendship centre (including one older adult representative). methods 7 brooks-cleator & giles: perspectives on supporting urban indigenous older adults to age well published by scholarship@western, 2020 the advisory committee identified semi-structured interviews as the most effective method of data collection. we recruited participants for the semi-structured interviews from a variety of sectors, and from indigenous and non-indigenous organizations, which reflected literature that recommends broadbased collaboration among multiple community stakeholders from a variety of sectors to support older adults to age well (garon et al., 2014; hewson et al., 2018; lui et al., 2009). to do this, we used a maximum variation form of purposeful sampling, which “aims at capturing and describing the central themes or principal outcomes that cut across a great deal of participant or program variation” (patton, 1990, p. 172). given that supporting indigenous older adults to age well involves a variety of stakeholders, this proved to be the most effective sampling strategy for our research question. as such, the broad inclusion criteria included (a) health and social service providers who work with indigenous older adults in ottawa, or (b) decision-makers involved in developing health and well-being initiatives for older adults and/or indigenous peoples in ottawa. we also supplemented participant recruitment with snowball sampling (marshall, 1996), as community stakeholders helped us to identify other potential research participants. this research received ethics approval from the university of ottawa research ethics board. we conducted 13 in-person semi-structured interviews with research participants (see table 1 for the breakdown of participants). each participant provided informed consent to take part in the research. we assigned all participants a pseudonym so as not to identify the organizations that they represent. to begin the interviews, we discussed how “aging well” was being used in the research to mean dominant western understandings. the interview questions explored the role of the community in supporting indigenous older adults to age well, the participants’ perspectives on aging well, what they felt were the barriers and supports for indigenous older adults to age well in ottawa, the challenges the organizations faced in supporting indigenous older adults, and how organizations that are focused on the health and well-being of older adults could better include and support indigenous older adults. we conducted the interviews in ottawa at participants’ workplaces or in public locations (e.g., coffee shops, parks). the interviews ranged from 40 minutes to 1 hour in length. with the participants’ consent, we audiorecorded all interviews; we then transcribed all interviews verbatim. all participants had the opportunity to review their transcript. only one participant requested changes: small clarifications and corrections to her transcript. all transcripts were uploaded to nvivo, a qualitative data analysis software, for data management and analysis. participant characteristics in total, 13 community stakeholders (3 men, 10 women) participated in this research (see table 1 for participant characteristics). decision-makers’ roles with non-indigenous organizations included directors, managers, and officers in health and social service organizations who provide programs and services, and those who were involved in planning and developing initiatives for older adults in ottawa. service providers’ roles with both indigenous and non-indigenous organizations included physicians, social workers, community health nurses, and program coordinators from health and social service organizations in ottawa. notably, none of the participants were decision-makers from indigenous organizations. the reason is that, during the recruitment process, the indigenous community advisory committee members indicated that service providers from indigenous organizations would be more relevant for us to interview because service providers would be better able to address the research questions. service providers were working closely with indigenous older adults in the community and so 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1, art. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.9443 could better speak to barriers and supports to aging well in the community. at the same time, they felt that the service providers would also be in a position to address the research questions from the organizational perspective, given their involvement with program-based decisions and coordination. table 1. research participant characteristics participant type of position position type of organization sandra decision-maker manager non-indigenous beth decision-maker director non-indigenous lisa decision-maker officer non-indigenous michael decision-maker director non-indigenous paul decision-maker director non-indigenous elizabeth decision-maker manager non-indigenous patricia service provider program coordinator indigenous cynthia service provider program coordinator indigenous marc service provider program coordinator indigenous melanie service provider community health nurse non-indigenous ruth service provider social worker non-indigenous christine service provider social worker non-indigenous sara service provider physician indigenous note. participants are identified by their pseudonym. 9 brooks-cleator & giles: perspectives on supporting urban indigenous older adults to age well published by scholarship@western, 2020 analysis to identify how community stakeholders produce understandings of supporting indigenous older adults to age well, we analyzed the interview transcripts using critical discourse analysis, which is “concerned with the role of discourse in wider social process of legitimation and power” (willig, 2008, p. 172). researchers using critical discourse analysis seek to gain “more insight into the crucial role of discourse in the reproduction of dominance and inequality . . . [through] an account of intricate relationships between text, talk, social, cognition, power, society, and culture” (van dijk, 1993, p. 253). critical discourse analysis helps researchers understand how discourses legitimate existing social and institutional structures, while at the same time, these structures also validate certain discursive constructions (willig, 2008). as such, this form of analysis was particularly fitting given our use of a postcolonial theoretical lens to guide our research. it allowed us to understand how discourses related to supporting indigenous older adults to age well are used to reinforce, and resist, colonial structures, but also how colonial structures validate the discourses being produced. to begin, we coded the transcripts systematically and identified key codes within the data: reconciliation, culturally specific services, collaboration, and isolated older adults. we then used willig’s (2008) approach to critical discourse analysis to further analyze the data. in the first stage, we re-listened to all the audio recordings and re-read the transcripts to familiarize ourselves with the data and to understand how support for indigenous older adults was constructed in the transcripts. in the second stage, we located these discursive constructions within the wider discourses identified in our literature review (e.g., how is responsibility constructed in relation to the wider discursive production of reconciliation in canada). in the third stage, we examined what these discourses achieved in terms of support for indigenous older adults to age well. next, in the fourth stage, we analyzed the subject positions resulting from how certain discourses were taken up by the participants. within discourse analysis, discourses construct subjects and “make available positions within networks of meanings which speakers can take up” (willig, 2008, p. 176). subject positions are taken up by participants based on how they use certain discourses. this involves examining the position of each participant relative to each discourse (willig, 2008). furthermore, subject positions allow participants the possibilities and limitations of action with a certain discourse (davies & harré, 1990). for example, how do participants use certain discourses, such as a discourse related to responsibility, to position themselves and what are the effects of the participant taking up this subject position through the use of the specific discourse? in the fifth stage, we analyzed participants’ actions and their ability to exercise power in relation to support for indigenous older adults (e.g., how participants from both indigenous and non-indigenous organizations exercised their power within a historically and present-day colonial society). finally, in the sixth stage, we examined the connections between the discursive constructions and the implications for subjective experience based on subject positions. results and discussion the results of the critical discourse analysis show that there are three main discourses related to community stakeholders’ (i.e., decision-makers and service providers from indigenous and nonindigenous health and social service organizations in ottawa) perspectives on supporting urban indigenous older adults in ottawa to age well: (a) non-indigenous organizations have a responsibility to support indigenous older adults; (b) culturally specific programs and services are important for 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1, art. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.9443 supporting indigenous older adults to age well; and (c) it is difficult for community stakeholders to support indigenous older adults to age well because this population is hard to reach. these discourses demonstrate the complexities and tensions that both indigenous and non-indigenous organizations face when trying to support indigenous older adults to age well, particularly in the context of the discursive production of the need for reconciliation by the canadian government, historical and present-day colonial relations of power, and in an environment in which there are competing interests and competition for access to resources. below, we further analyze each of these discourses, their implications, the resulting subject positions, and how they are produced differently depending on the participants’ type of organization (i.e., indigenous or non-indigenous) and position (i.e., decision-maker or service provider), where applicable. non-indigenous organizations have a responsibility to support indigenous older adults the first discourse that emerged from our analysis was that non-indigenous organizations in the health and social services sector have a responsibility to support indigenous older adults to age well. decisionmakers were most likely to draw upon this discourse; however, it was also evident in interviews with service providers from indigenous and non-indigenous organizations. participants asserted that this responsibility stemmed from the historical and ongoing impacts of colonialism on indigenous peoples and the pressure from different levels of government for non-indigenous organizations to comply with discourses of reconciliation. this is evident in the following example when paul, a decision-maker at a non-indigenous organization, described the need to address some of the truth and reconciliation commission’s calls to action: “[based on the trc,] we have a duty as an organization to meet some of the special opportunities that we have to better service this group [indigenous peoples].” michael, a decision-maker at a non-indigenous organization, discussed the pressure that organizations face in addressing reconciliation: i know when we were going through the vision, mission, and value statements [of the board], there was a value statement built in, one specifically around truth and reconciliation, so that . . . kind of held almost our feet to the fire in terms of ensuring that that’s being integrated into our initiatives, deliverables as we move forward. beyond addressing calls to action from the trc, participants also identified that this responsibility to support indigenous older adults also comes out of the need to show respect for indigenous peoples in canada, which they have not always received. in considering why non-indigenous organizations need to support indigenous older adults to age well, beth, a decision-maker at a non-indigenous organization, stated, “well, their life matters, and if we're serious [about supporting indigenous peoples], they are the founding nation. they're founding people.” some participants, particularly service providers, identified the complexities of having a responsibility to support indigenous older adults to age well. marc, a service provider at an indigenous organization, stated how, given the history of colonial institutions and practices that created some indigenous peoples’ “dependency” on non-indigenous organizations, support should not just be tokenistic and with little meaning; it should be from a place of empowerment and respect that moves away from colonial relations of power: 11 brooks-cleator & giles: perspectives on supporting urban indigenous older adults to age well published by scholarship@western, 2020 i think [to support indigenous older adults to age well] we need to avoid continuing the wardship of people and doing it merely from a place of handout but rather to empower communities . . . [indigenous communities] do need help financially, morally and ethically, probably, from the stance of the governments, to, in truth, recognize the damage that has been done and to move forward in reconciliatory ways. however, the community needs to be empowered. the community needs to support [the empowerment of indigenous communities], as a whole. when i say, “the community,” i mean not just indigenous folks, but the whole community. christine, a service provider at a non-indigenous organization, discussed how there was more focus on getting funding to advance reconciliation efforts than on finding ways to actually put reconciliation into action, including in ways that enabled the organization to support indigenous older adults: i think especially after everything happened with reconciliation and all of that, i think more focus could have been made on “how do we best support [indigenous peoples] now?” rather than saying, “sorry. we'll apologize and give some money” . . . when the government started giving money [to us], it was “okay now what happens? we don't have things set up to support [indigenous peoples] now we've got some money in hand. what's going to happen next?” and i think that's where, as a community, we sort of dropped the ball. through taking up a discourse of responsibility, the staff from non-indigenous organizations endorsed the need to better respond to and address the needs of indigenous older adults; however, they also experienced significant pressure in carrying out these reconciliation responsibilities while trying to support indigenous older adults to age well. on the one hand, multiple levels of government have created a mandate and provided funding to non-indigenous organizations to address reconciliation and the ongoing impacts of colonialism. particularly in the accounts from decision-makers, the responsibility to support indigenous older adults was discursively produced through language about directly responding to the trc’s (2015a) calls to action. by responding to this call, staff at non-indigenous organizations are then positioned as helpers and conscious supporters of reconciliation (gebhard, 2017). on the other hand, there is a risk that reproducing discourses of having a responsibility to support indigenous older adults to age well as a result of colonialism can operate as a “check box” for nonindigenous organizations to fulfill their mandate and receive funding. as indicated by some participants, non-indigenous organizations have little guidance or accountability when it comes to actually fulfilling this responsibility to support indigenous older adults, despite receiving additional resources to address it. one of the aims of reconciliation is the empowerment of indigenous peoples (trc, 2015c). as a result of the discursive production of responsibility and the subjective positioning of staff from nonindigenous organizations as helpers and conscious supporters, power is being exercised by nonindigenous organizations. they are the ones to determine how this responsibility is actualized and what reconciliation is for the non-indigenous organization, which reifies colonialism. by using resources differently and being accountable to advance reconciliation efforts—including working in partnership with indigenous organizations—non-indigenous organizations could be better positioned to advance efforts toward reconciliation and create meaningful change. this could also lead to a more balanced 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1, art. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.9443 power dynamic in which indigenous peoples and staff from non-indigenous organizations can make decisions together. the discourse that non-indigenous organizations have a responsibility to support indigenous older adults to age well is not without its complexities and tensions. without critically reflecting upon how non-indigenous organizations have historically not supported nor respectfully engaged with urban indigenous peoples, there is a risk that these organizations could perpetuate colonial tendencies of tokenism, dependency, and superficial engagement, which then deny indigenous communities their rights to self-determination (peters, 2011). culturally specific programs and services are important beyond recognizing that non-indigenous organizations have a responsibility to support indigenous older adults, a prominent discourse produced by the participants was that culturally specific programs and services are important for supporting indigenous older adults to age well. multiple service providers from indigenous organizations noted the importance of having culturally specific programs and services. cynthia, a service provider in an indigenous organization, reported that these types of programs and services are particularly effective in supporting indigenous older adults to age well because “you’re still around the same culture. you’re still around that familiar-ness.” patricia stated that indigenous older adults “learn extra stuff about their culture that they might not have been brought up with. art might bring back something—a lost memory . . . now they get to learn through cultural programs [through indigenous organizations].” participants from indigenous organizations exercised power through affirming their subject position as experts in offering culturally specific services and programs (ouart & simfc, 2013) and thus justified their existence and necessity in the community to support indigenous older adults to age well. participants from non-indigenous organizations also took up the discourse that culturally specific programs and services are important for supporting indigenous older adults through culture and identity, thus resisting the dominant colonial discourse that suggests urban indigenous people are “less indigenous” (anderson, 2013) and thus do not require indigenous-specific supports. as lisa, a decision-maker, indicated: i think more has to be done to really look at what are the fundamental supports that seniors are going to need across diverse communities [including indigenous communities] and do something about it. that supportive housing, that aging in place or that aging in a supportive, culturally appropriate environment has to be something we start talking about [to support indigenous older adults to age well]. paul stated, “i think it’s those types of steps [offering culturally appropriate services] that allow us to build the foundation to then be able to better serve [indigenous] people.” it is interesting that nonindigenous organizations reproduced the discourse of the importance of culturally specific services and programs to support indigenous older adults to age well when indigenous cultural practices and traditions within urban non-indigenous spaces have been historically marginalized (peters, 2011). it is possible that participants utilized this discourse as a way to create a more favourable appearance during the interview, given the topic of our research. it seems, however, that when this discourse is examined in relation to the first discourse about responsibility, the importance placed on culturally specific services 13 brooks-cleator & giles: perspectives on supporting urban indigenous older adults to age well published by scholarship@western, 2020 and programs may in fact reflect a shift toward recognizing the harms caused by colonialism and the importance of indigenous cultures to the well-being of indigenous older adults. it is likely that federal government initiatives and the trc influenced these shifts. despite the discursive production of the importance of providing culturally appropriate services and programs, however, the majority of the participants from non-indigenous organizations appeared reluctant to offer these types of services, which leads to an interesting power dynamic between them and indigenous organizations that offer these services and programs. by drawing on this discourse, participants from non-indigenous organizations positioned indigenous organizations as “experts” in supporting indigenous older adults to age well and themselves as “non-experts,” thus actively deflecting their responsibility to provide culturally specific programs and services and depending upon indigenous organizations to do so. as christine described, indigenous organizations “sort of become the link to the [indigenous] community, so it's a primary referral centre for us in terms of ‘okay, you know this population better than we do and how can you help?’” lisa stated that “because [an indigenous organization] is there to address the health needs, then there isn’t maybe necessarily a need for us to include an initiative in [our organization’s work] at this time.” through positioning indigenous organizations as experts and themselves as non-experts, community stakeholders at non-indigenous organizations have the ability to exercise power in a way that enables them to choose whether they offer culturally relevant services and programs to support indigenous older adults to age well or to deflect this responsibility to indigenous organizations that are already under-resourced (hanselmann, 2003). while indigenous organizations may be more likely to have a better understanding of the indigenous community they serve and thus possess greater expertise, the reluctance of non-indigenous organizations to offer culturally specific programs and services results in indigenous organizations being more and more pressed to support their community members and more dependent on government resources to be able to provide this support. there are numerous benefits that indigenous organizations can provide to indigenous community members (morris, 2016; ouart & simfc, 2013); however, reinforcing the discourse that culturally specific programs and services must be offered by only indigenous organizations, without non-indigenous organizations meaningfully engaging indigenous peoples in their organizations to offer such services, results in indigenous people being limited in the places they can go to access culturally specific services and programs. indeed, responsibility for addressing the marginalized needs of urban indigenous peoples (peters & anderson, 2013) should not fall exclusively on indigenous organizations. positioning staff at indigenous organizations as experts in offering culturally specific services presents an opportunity for non-indigenous organizations to draw on their expertise and work in collaboration to support indigenous older adults to age well. indigenous older adults are hard to reach the third discourse we identified was that it is difficult for community stakeholders to support indigenous older adults to age well because they are often hard to reach. this discourse was taken up by service providers and decision-makers from both indigenous and non-indigenous organizations. for the decision-makers, this discourse was produced through the language they used about reaching indigenous older adults to engage them in the planning and development of programs and services, which subjectively positioned the indigenous older adults as “challenging cases.” as sandra described: 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1, art. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.9443 the big challenge is just to find [older adults who are marginalized] . . . to engage with the really marginalized groups. they won't come to you, so you have to go to them, especially if there is a language barrier or issues with transportation or they don't have the means. similarly, lisa identified that “the challenge is engaging those groups that aren’t part of the mainstream networks that we work with [such as indigenous older adults].” michael described how, “when there’s planning, there’s townhall sessions and so forth . . . they’re [indigenous older adults] also underrepresented at those discussions.” for service providers, this discourse was produced through the language they used about reaching indigenous older adults to be able to offer support and services, which also subjectively positioned them as “challenging cases.” as ruth indicated, “i think one of the biggest roles that we’re missing is finding those [indigenous] seniors who are isolated in their homes and in their apartments and don’t really know what to do or how to access the help.” service providers from indigenous organizations shared similar concerns. as patricia argued, “unfortunately, there are many people in the city who don't know about our [indigenous organization] and don't know about their culture and don't know if they fit [in with the services we provide].” it is not surprising that indigenous older adults can be hard to reach for non-indigenous organizations. indigenous older adults, and particularly the current cohort, have directly experienced significant loss, trauma, and discrimination as a result of the colonial policies and practices that inform western institutions (loppie et al., 2014). consequently, indigenous older adults may be resisting colonial institutions by making themselves unreachable to non-indigenous organizations. on the other hand, however, it may not be their choice as to whether or not they can be reached. indigenous older adults have aged in an environment where they are marginalized and have lower levels of access to information and fewer resources available (brooks-cleator & giles, 2019) to access consultations, community townhalls, and services, which can lead to isolation and fewer opportunities to age well (ranzijn, 2010). it is paradoxical that indigenous older adults who have historically been intentionally excluded from supports offered by settler society and its institutions are now being viewed as difficult to reach and subjectively positioned as challenging cases and unwilling beneficiaries by the very same institutions. without understanding these complexities, these discourses result in indigenous older adults being blamed for their own exclusion, with little critical reflection as to why this may be the case. as illustrated by the participants from indigenous organizations, even though indigenous organizations are viewed as being fully connected to the indigenous community (morris, 2016), inequalities related to access to information and resources still permeate the community and marginalize the indigenous older adults who most need support to age well. as such, these organizations may need to do more to reach this population; however, they are limited in their ability to do this as there is significant competition for resources between indigenous organizations and between non-indigenous and indigenous organizations to support urban indigenous people (morris, 2016). it may also be, however, that some indigenous older adults simply are exercising power by choosing not to access services at indigenous organizations. as such, it cannot be assumed that all indigenous older adults want to access services at indigenous organizations, which means non-indigenous organizations should make efforts to ensure they too can support them to age well. 15 brooks-cleator & giles: perspectives on supporting urban indigenous older adults to age well published by scholarship@western, 2020 conclusion stemming from this research, future research should explore how decision-makers and service providers could support indigenous older adults to age well based on indigenous understandings of aging well, not through the use of dominant western understandings of aging well. additionally, on the advice of our advisory committee, we did not interview decision-makers from indigenous organizations. as such, it is important for future research to include their perspectives, given that they have a role in shaping initiatives that support indigenous older adults to age well and may have a different perspective than service providers who are more focused on program delivery than program and policy development. our research demonstrates the complexities and tensions that community stakeholders from indigenous and non-indigenous organizations face in supporting indigenous older adults to age well within a sociopolitical environment informed by reconciliation and the sociodemographic trend of an aging population. using postcolonial theory to guide our discourse analysis of the interviews helped to reveal the relations of power between indigenous and non-indigenous organizations, but also the ways in which power is constantly in flux, not static, and how it can be used by and against the same actor at one time. for example, indigenous organizations were sometimes positioned as experts in supporting indigenous older adults to age well. this position of power, however, was also used against them in a way that legitimized non-indigenous organizations’ potential evasion of responsibility to support indigenous older adults, in spite of the fact that they had the power and financial and other resources to provide these services. in light of these complexities, tensions, and relations of power, efforts to support indigenous older adults to age well require accountability to create organizational change related to reconciliation, meaningful collaboration between indigenous and non-indigenous organizations, and critical reflection on who accesses and/or receives support to age well and why this may be the case. as many of the participants from non-indigenous organizations shared, they felt a sense of responsibility to support indigenous older adults through their work. by discursively producing their work as a response to reconciliation efforts, they were positioned as helpers and conscious supporters, but helpers and supporters who could choose when and how, and even if, this position was taken up. it is promising that these participants acknowledged and felt a responsibility to respond to historical and ongoing impacts of colonialism on indigenous peoples, which perhaps is a catalyst for positive change within their organizations. these results suggest, however, that there is a need for greater accountability to be built into efforts towards reconciliation, which should also include the involvement of and evaluation of these efforts by indigenous peoples. challenges remain in identifying what this accountability would look like, but our research suggests that it may help non-indigenous organizations be more impactful, respectful, and responsible in their work to support indigenous older adults to age well. this research also illustrates that supporting indigenous older adults to age well is something that cannot be accomplished by individual organizations; it will require indigenous and non-indigenous organizations to work together through the development of collaborative relationships and meaningful partnerships. these collaborations will inevitably lead to tensions and power dynamics that will need to be addressed. given the expertise of indigenous organizations in providing culturally specific services and programs, it would make sense for non-indigenous organizations to engage them in a partnership 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1, art. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.9443 role in relation to service design and delivery. it is important that this does not turn into token, “check box” involvement so that non-indigenous organizations can say they have engaged with indigenous organizations and, therefore, are sufficiently providing culturally specific services and programs. furthermore, there needs to be recognition of the increased demand that this partnership would place on indigenous organizations offering their knowledge and expertise, while also continuing to offer their own services and programs. it is important for the organizations to reflect on the ways in which meaningful, reciprocal, and respectful relationships could be created between indigenous and nonindigenous organizations in order to address potential capacity and funding issues, and to attend to the potential power imbalance that may emerge and perpetuate colonial tendencies where non-indigenous organizations are the ones in control and reaping the benefits. consequently, we argue that, in urban communities, community stakeholders in the health and social services sector from indigenous and non-indigenous organizations play a role, both large and small, in supporting indigenous older adults to age well and it is important to consider their perspectives as critical contributions to aging well research. as the urban indigenous older adult population continues to grow, it will become increasingly important to understand how organizations respond to and support this population to age well. references anderson, c. 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(2001). postcolonialism: an historical introduction. malden, usa: blackwell publishing. ms 8262 bargh voting in maori rce.pdf the international indigenous policy journal volume 11|issue3 july 2020 voting in m!ori governance entities maria bargh victoria university of wellington, new zealand, maria.bargh@vuw.ac.nz arama rata university of waikato, new zealand, arama.rata@waikato.ac.nz recommended citation bargh, m., & rata, a. (2020). voting in m!ori governance entities. the international indigenous policy journal, 11(3). https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8262 voting in m!ori governance entities abstract internationally, declining voter turnout is a topic of considerable concern in many liberal democracies. in this article, we investigate whether these similar trends can be discerned in the voter turnout for m!ori governance entities. we first explore some of the demographic contexts within which m!ori governance entities operate with a specific focus on population, residence, and age. we then provide a detailed descriptive analysis of voting data from one particular entity: te r"nanga o ng!ti awa, with whom we worked to understand how their elections inform their aspirations for continuing connectedness with tribal members. in the final section of the article, we present findings from an analysis of publicly available tribal voting data to see whether the trend of declining voter turnout is observable and whether online voting is shown to impact turnout. keywords m!ori voting, online voting, self-determination, kaupapa m!ori research, iwi elections, post-settlement governance entities creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0license. bargh & rata: voting in m!ori governance entities published by scholarship@western, 2020 1 voting in m!ori governance entities internationally declining voter turnout is a topic of considerable concern in many liberal democracies (franklin, 2004; parvin, 2018). various causes of declining voter turnout have been hypothesized, including electoral systems, age, ethnicity, and costs (blais, 2006; blais et al., 2004). in new zealand (aotearoa), the voter turnout of the indigenous peoples, m!ori, is already significantly lower than nonindigenous new zealanders in general and local government elections (bargh, 2016; bargh, 2017). in this article, we investigate whether these similar trends can be discerned in the voter turnout for m!ori governance entities. there are more than 100 different m!ori iwi (tribes) in aotearoa. the structure and form of iwi governance entities varies. some are charitable trusts and others a mix of commercial and charitable entities. nearly 80 percent of iwi have completed settlements with the crown regarding crown breaches of the treaty of waitangi or te tiriti o waitangi in m!ori.1 these iwi have established post-settlement governance entities to politically represent their people. post-settlement governance entities also vary in form from each other, given they are established under different legislation.2 there is no central database of iwi election data and they are not under any obligation to share their data with anyone other than their members, and even then that responsibility varies according to iwi constitutions or trust deeds. the collection of data about iwi voter turnout and methods is therefore quite a manual and challenging task. in this article, we first explore some of the demographic contexts within which iwi governance entities operate with a specific focus on population, residence, and age. we then provide a detailed descriptive analysis of voting data from one particular entity, te r"nanga o ng!ti awa, with whom we worked to understand how their elections inform their aspirations for continuing connectedness with iwi members. in the final section of the article, we present findings from an analysis of publicly available iwi voting data to see whether the trend of declining voter turnout is observable and whether online voting is shown to impact turnout. literature review iwi electoral systems and influences most iwi hold regular elections, usually every three years, and most follow a first-past-the-post system where electors have one vote and the candidate with the most votes wins. there are a few variations in which voters have as many votes as there are vacancies, but the candidate with the most votes still wins. there are two examples that do not conform to this model, which deserve specific mention because of their uniqueness: te uru taumatua (t"hoe) and te r"nanganui o ng!ti porou. te uru taumatua is the governance entity for the t"hoe people with their traditional lands based in the eastern bay of plenty region in the north island of new zealand. te uru taumatua is comprised of 1 signed between the british and m!ori representatives in 1840, the treaty reaffirmed m!ori self-determination and allowed for british government. 2 the m!ori fisheries act 2004 sets out the criteria for m!nadated iwi organisations, which distribute assets and monies owed to iwi from the treaty settlement related to the fisheries industry. individual iwi entities have their own specific legislation, such as te r"nanga o ng!ti awa act 2005. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3, art. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8262 2 seven representatives from four “tribal” groupings. three tribal groupings are multi-member constituencies (two representatives each) and one tribal grouping has one representative. appointments are made regularly every year with representatives serving “staggered” terms (ngai t"hoe, 2018a). there is no ballot, but rather a system of “collective consensus” (ngai t"hoe, n.d). the collective consensus system typically involves discussion amongst members at a meeting. they then reach an agreement on which candidates the whole group supports. collective consensus enables t"hoe members to engage at their sub-tribe (hap") level when candidates are first seeking nominations. thereafter the tribal authority “appoints the highest ranked candidates to the t"hoete uru taumatua board” (ngai t"hoe, 2018b). eligibility to stand as a candidate follows common guidelines around age, registration, and membership.3 in addition, candidates are encouraged to hold a number of other attributes, including being strong in the m!ori language and the culture of t"hoe, alongside accountability and governance skills (ngai t"hoe, 2018a). there is no residence requirement and t"hoe members who live away from the area may be nominated (ngai t"hoe, 2018b). the unique process of te uru taumatua foregrounds the importance of t"hoe values and expressing a “legitimate t"hoe view” (ngai t"hoe, 2018b). te r"nanganui o ng!ti porou is the governance entity for the ng!ti porou people, and their traditional lands are based in the east coast region of the north island of new zealand. te r"nanganui o ng!ti porou are one of the few iwi with a system where members receive two votes (te r"nanganui o ng!ti porou, 2015). for each of the seven rohenga tipuna (electorates), two representatives are elected, at least one of whom must be noho kaenga (someone who lives within the tribal boundaries). in addition, the chair must be noho kaenga, thereby ensuring that the unique viewpoint of those living within the ng!ti porou rohe (the geographical area where the iwi has a traditional connection) is not only represented but also held by the majority of elected representatives. we now consider a number of features that influence the context within which iwi governance entity elections occur. iwi demographic variability looking at the top five largest iwi from new zealand’s census 2013 (see table 1), the pattern of regionally based iwi having a high proportion of members living “away from home” is clear. along with ng!ti porou (discussed above), ng!puhi and ng!ti t"wharetoa also had less than a quarter of their affiliates living within the region most closely aligned with their iwi territory. in contrast, over one-third of waikato affiliates and over one-half of ng!i tahu affiliates resided within the region(s) most closely approximating their tribal territories, due in no small part to the fact that these territories encompass major cities. 3 in order to be eligible to stand, candidates must be 18 or older and registered with te uru taumatua, belong to the hap" from which they seek a nomination, have two other hap" members verify them as a hap" member, and they must agree to abide by the rules and values of te uru taumatua (ngai t"hoe, 2018a). bargh & rata: voting in m!ori governance entities published by scholarship@western, 2020 3 table 1. population of top five largest iwi and percentage living in area approximating their tribal rohe top 5 largest iwi area approximating tribal rohe population percentage living in area approximating tribal rohe ng! puhi northland region 125,601 19.93% ng!ti porou gisborne region 71,049 16.86% ng!i tahu south island 54,819 54.30% waikato waikato region 40,083 34.86% ng!ti t"wharetoa waikato region 35,874 22.42% note. source: data from new zealand census 2013. the distinct point of view and authority of those living “at home” is valued and prioritised within many iwi (mead, 2003). the electoral system of te r"nanganui o ng!ti porou ensures that at least 8 out of 15 (57.14%) of representatives reside within the iwi rohe. however, the rapid urbanisation of m!ori in the twentieth century, along with the continuing emptying of new zealand’s regions, has resulted in only 16.86% of those who affiliated with ng!ti porou residing within the gisborne region, according to census 2013. the boundaries of the gisborne region do not map perfectly onto the tribal boundaries of ng!ti porou, and those who affiliated with ng!ti porou through the census will differ from those registered with te r"nanganui o ng!ti porou. however, these figures are indicative of a common scenario: iwi entities are strongly rooted in the regions, while the majority of registered members live outside the tribal rohe. it is worth noting that, despite only 1 in 6 affiliates of ng!ti porou living in the gisborne region, a motion to remove the noho kaenga distinction from the trust deed was lost when put to the vote in 2018 (te runanganui o ngati porou, 2018), and in reality the share of elected representatives living at home often exceeds the 8 out of 15 (57.14%) minimum. in 2017, for example, 12 out of 15 (80%) representatives resided within the ng!ti porou rohe (te runanganui o ngati porou, 2017). nevertheless, the “home and away divide” presents an issue for many iwi, particularly those distal to major cities. those living at home may differ from those living away from home in terms of their access to and engagement with their iwi governance entity. to explore this further, we present data from a case study with te r"nanga o ng!ti awa below to examine how residential location may be associated with voter turnout. in addition to proximity to major cities and geographic spread, iwi differ in their size. as presented in table 1, ng!puhi, the largest iwi recorded in census 2013, had 125,601 affiliates. in stark contrast, 13 iwi the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3, art. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8262 4 listed in the census had less than 500 affiliates (out of the 100 possible responses listed in the iwi statistical standard, when both iwi and region are recorded). iwi size likely influences turnout, which has been observed in local government elections where “as councils become larger, turnout declines on average” (local government new zealand, 2019, p. 2). iwi size likely influences the number of constituents elected members represent, which has been found in local government elections to be inversely correlated to voter turnout (drage, 2018). in our analysis of publicly available iwi voting data, we explore a possible association between iwi register size and voter turnout. iwi also differ in age structure. the median age of the total m!ori descent population was 24.4 years. however, waikato iwi (located in an area where the total population is relatively young) had a median age of 22.3 years, while ng!ti maru in hauraki (an area with a relatively old total population) had a median age 27.2 years. the age structure of registered members is likely to vary even more between iwi because registration is not mandatory and benefits of registration tied to particular age groups (e.g., provisions for newborns, education scholarships) differ from iwi to iwi. in local and general elections, voter turnout tends to increase with age (local government new zealand, 2019).4 while data on iwi register age structure was not publicly available, in our case study with te r"nanga o ng!ti awa, we assess the effect of age on voter turnout in the elections of a specific iwi. voting methods the final feature influencing iwi elections is the voting method. the conduct of iwi elections tends to be outsourced by iwi to private companies that specialise in election services. most iwi use postal voting for their elections or a combination of postal and online voting. while the new zealand department of internal affairs and local authorities continue to debate the risks and benefits of online voting, such as increasing voter turnout, many m!ori governance entities have been using a combination of postal and online voting for many years.5 the use of online voting has been increasing because iwi see it as an option to reduce costs, particularly for large iwi and those with a high portion of members living overseas (bargh, 2016). many iwi lack the resources to actively manage their tribal registers and out-of-date physical address details pose an issue when only postal voting is offered. this is particularly true for younger adults who move more often than older adults (statistics new zealand, 2017). important to the discussion here is the suggestion that the use of online voting is a strategy to increase voter turnout (goodman, 2019). the results of trials and experiences internationally are mixed on whether online voting does increase turnout. goodman and stokes (2018) argued that local election results in ontario, canada, show that “internet voting can increase turnout by 3.5 percentage points” (p. 1155). however, goodman and smith (2017) argued that online voting does not guarantee increased voter turnout, and molineaux (2018) explained that it may simply make voting more convenient for those who already tend to vote: older, wealthier, already engaged constituents. to further complicate the discussion, research on estonian elections, where there exists perhaps the most longstanding experience 4 general elections are held every three years to elect the new zealand parliament. 5 by online or internet voting, we are referring to a vote that is cast using a personal computer and over the internet. we note that in some jurisdictions the term online voting is also used to define voting using a machine at a polling booth. bargh & rata: voting in m!ori governance entities published by scholarship@western, 2020 5 of online voting, shows that the use of online voting changes over time, possibly making online voting more inclusive than initial studies suggested (vassil et al., 2016). the other issue around online voting is whether it is more or less effective on its own or in combination with other options. goodman et al. (2018) recommended caution around using only online voting methods. their research from locations in canada where the option for paper ballot voting has been removed showed that a “digital divide” potentially replicates societal inequalities. they argued: absent a paper option, there is evidence that some electors with poor access and digital literacy might be less likely to vote, though the effect is delayed until after the first election after paper is eliminated. after the “newness” of online voting dissipates, the segment of the population that would normally be drawn to paper voting, on the basis of digital access and literacy, forms a smaller portion of the voting population. our results suggest that the elimination of paper ballots may indeed be disenfranchising some electors on the basis of the digital divide. (p. 178) research with first nations communities in canada has shown an appetite for online voting (gabel et al., 2016). more than 100 first nations and métis communities now use online voting and see key benefits to “enhance local participation, self-determination, and governance,” suggesting that online voting is “a tool to improve voting accessibility and engagement for members living off-reserve” (gabel & goodman, 2019a, p. 5). however, while online voting promises potential benefits, its implementation does not always yield the intended results (gabel et al., 2016). concerns also exist around the cultural appropriateness of online voting, “whether the technology is consistent with community visions of selfdetermination and local decision-making” (gabel & goodman, 2019a, p. 5), internet access, digital literacy, security, and the impact on culture (gabel et al., 2016). as exploratory first steps towards understanding iwi voting and whether declining turnout trends exist, in this article, we present findings from a case study of iwi voting within te r"nanga o ng!ti awa based in the bay of plenty region of the north island, before turning to an analysis of publicly available iwi voting data. methodology and methods the methodology and methods for this research were mixed but interconnected. we used kaupapa m!ori methodology and directly met with iwi representatives to ensure our research objectives were complementary and analysed previously collected election results with their permission. underpinning the research is a kaupapa m!ori methodology, which advocates research by m!ori, for m!ori (bishop, 1999). a second key element of kaupapa m!ori research is ensuring that research supports iwi aspirations and is mutually beneficial rather than extractive, with strong similarities to community-engaged research conducted with other indigenous communities (gabel & goodman 2019b; gaudry, 2011; smith, 1999). we used existing connections with te r"nanga o ng!ti awa (one of co-authors is a member and previously worked for the iwi) to collaborate with them to consider what sorts of research about their elections and governance might prove mutually beneficial. funding from the ministry of business, innovation and employment allowed us to connect with the iwi and supported the data analysis phase. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3, art. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8262 6 over a period of two years, we collected iwi election data from publicly available sources and collated it in an evolving database. this involved creating a list of all iwi organisations across the country and checking their websites for election data. unfortunately, this project did not have the resources to enable the research team to engage with all iwi on a more personal basis, as we would have liked. the aim therefore of this dimension of the research was to collate some baseline data, which could then be used to begin discussions with iwi at a regional and a national level about the ways research about electoral systems and processes might support iwi aspirations for self-determination and greater connectedness with their people. case study: te r"nanga o ng!ti awa te r"nanga o ng!ti awa was first established in the 1980s but re-formed with the te r"nanga o ng!ti awa act 2005 as the mandated entity managing the affairs of ng!ti awa. there are 22 representatives on the r"nanga representing hap" located in the whakatane district and bay of plenty, as well as one in auckland and one in wellington. we studied the r"nanga’s official documents, including their constitution, then met several times with the chief executive of the r"nanga over the course of the research. we agreed on research aims that would complement their aspiration to foster greater connection with their members and our aspiration to know more about how and why people are voting. we provided the r"nanga with a summary report and an infographic briefing of our findings. the results from several elections of te r"nanga o ng!ti awa provide insights into iwi voting methods and turnout. we examined data from the 2010, 2013, and 2016 elections. data collected by electionz ltd. in their role as returning officer was requested by te r"nanga o ng!ti awa and supplied to us. the number of votingaged registered members was 1,531 in 2010; 2,341 in 2013; and 4,590 in 2016. the individual-level data included the following variables: unique identifier, residential region, voted (yes or no), voting method for those who voted (postal or online), and age. as age was not normally distributed, we chose to analyse age by fiveand ten-year categories using non-parametric tests. descriptive statistics are presented in table 2 below and described in the following sections. residential location at all three time points, the regions with the largest share of ng!ti awa registered members were the bay of plenty (the region most closely approximating the tribal rohe, 51.0% to 57.8%), auckland (13.4% to 18.8%), wellington (5.4% to 11.5%), and the waikato (8.0% to 9.8%). over half of registered members lived in the bay of plenty at all time points, and the share of those living in the bay of plenty tended to increase over time. however, the share of registered members living in auckland tended to decrease, the share living in wellington almost halved, and the share living in the waikato was relatively stable. voter turnout voter turnout in ng!ti awa elections dropped from over one-third (36.3%) in 2010 to just over a quarter (27.4%) in 2013; it remained stable in 2016 (26.9%). bargh & rata: voting in m!ori governance entities published by scholarship@western, 2020 7 table 2. descriptive statistics for te r"nanga o ng!ti awa elections, 2010-2016 variable 2010 2013 2016 voting-aged registered members 1,531 2,341 4,590 age (years) minimum maximum mean standard deviation 18 89 40.10 15.29 18 92 40.19 15.95 18 93 40.59 16.29 proportion of members in top 4 residential regions (%) bay of plenty auckland wellington waikato 50.65 18.76 11.50 9.80 57.81 17.55 5.36 8.03 56.88 13.35 6.94 9.01 voter turnout (%) 36.29 27.39 26.95 voting method, for those who voted (%) postal online 85.04 14.96 83.78 16.22 72.92 27.08 voting method out of those who voted, online voting grew from just over 1 in 7 (15.0%) in 2010 to over one-quarter (27.1%) in 2016. this equated to an 80.7% increase in online voting over the six-year period. the increase in the share of votes cast online coincided with a decrease in voter turnout over this period. however, the decrease in voter turnout may have been related to other factors, such as the campaigns that were run in the lead up to the election, the register size at the time of the election, or the proportion of newly registered members (which will be discussed below). voter turnout by age associations between variables were assessed using chi-square (#2) tests, where p values less than .05 indicate a significant association. an association between age and voter turnout was detected at all three time points. older registered members of ng!ti awa were more likely to vote than younger members in 2010 (#2(9) = 58.43, p < .001), 2013 (#2(9) = 73.87, p < .001), and 2016 (#2(9) = 54.01, p < .001). the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3, art. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8262 8 voting method by age there was no significant difference in voting method (online vs. postal) across age groups in 2010 and in 2013. however, in 2016, there was a marginally significant association between age and voting method (#2(9) = 16.06, p = .07), suggesting that older registered members may have been slightly less likely to vote online than younger members. voter turnout by residential region voter turnout was significantly different across residential regions (bay of plenty, auckland, waikato, wellington, other; 2010: #2(7) = 73.62, p < .001; 2013: #2(4) = 85.61, p < .001; 2016: #2(4) = 154.41, p < .001). the bay of plenty consistently had a higher voter turnout than other regions, despite voter turnout dropping there from 45.2% in 2010 to 33.4% in 2016. the decrease in voter turnout between 2010 and 2016 was evident across the four regions with the largest share of the ng!ti awa members, with turnout dropping steadily from one election to the next in auckland and fluctuating from election to election but trending downwards in wellington and the waikato. voter turnout tended to be lower outside of the four main regions but remained relatively stable across elections. the lower turnout in other residential locations could suggest that engagement with ng!ti awa (as indicated by voting behaviour) is stronger in regions where large populations of ng!ti awa reside. voting method by residential region voting method (online vs. postal) varied significantly across regions in 2010 (#2(4) = 12.65, p < .05), as auckland voters were most likely to have voted online. however, a significant association between residential region and voting method was not detected for subsequent elections. online voting in most regions increased between 2010 and 2016, but did not increase in auckland, suggesting ng!ti awa members in auckland may have been early to adopt online voting, but were not more likely than other ng!ti awa populations to vote online once the method had been adopted in those regions. voter turnout, register size, and duration of registration the drop in voter turnout from 2010 to 2016 coincided with a rapid increase in register size. this decreased turnout may have been due to the absolute register size (see drage, 2018), or to low participation from the large share of newly registered members: over half of those registered for the 2016 election (56.0%) had not been registered for the 2013 election. data from new zealand general elections shows that newly arrived migrants are less likely than others to vote (statistics new zealand, 2018). it is possible that newly registered members of iwi have low voter turnout, as they take time to engage with iwi politics and familiarise themselves with candidates. bargh & rata: voting in m!ori governance entities published by scholarship@western, 2020 9 figure 1. percentage of eligible registered members who voted by age 2010-2016. to test this assumption, we used register identification numbers to link data from the 2013 election to the 2016 dataset. we then compared the voting behaviour of newly registered members (i.e., those registered in 2016 but not 2013) with those who were registered for both elections. there was no association between duration of registration (whether or not a person was new to the register) and voting method for the 2016 election. however, duration of registration was associated with voter turnout (#2(1) = 14.48, p < .001). newly registered members in 2016 had a lower turnout (24.9%) than previously registered members (29.9%). voter turnout and subsequent voting we also tested whether voting in 2013 was associated with subsequent voting in 2016. taking only those registered for both elections, we found that voter turnout in 2016 was much higher for those who had voted in 2013 (61.6%) than for those who had not voted in 2013 (17.7%; #2(1) = 347.88, p < .001). voting method and subsequent voting behaviour finally, we tested for associations between voting method and subsequent voting behaviour. there was no association between voting method (online vs. postal) in 2013 and whether or not a person voted in the subsequent election. however, an association was detected between voting method in 2013 and 0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 18-24 25-29 30-34 35-39 40-44 45-49 50-54 55-59 60-64 65+ 2010 2013 2016 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3, art. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8262 10 voting method in 2016 (#2(1) = 67.33, p < .001). taking only those who had voted in both elections, online voting in 2016 was higher for those who had used online voting in 2013 (64.0%), than for those who had used postal voting in 2013 (12.8%), suggesting some degree of stability in voting method preferences over time. regression analyses we conducted logistic regressions to determine the effect of each predictor variable on voter turnout, having partialled out the effect of the other predictor variables identified the bivariate analyses above. voting in 2013 and being new to the register in 2016 were both associated with voting in 2016 (as outlined above). as these variables could not be included in the same regression (as a person could not have voted in 2013 if they were new to the register in 2016), two separate logistic regressions were run. for both regressions, missing values were handled using listwise deletion. for the first logistic regression, we considered the effects of age (using dummy variables for each 10-year age category), region (whether or not someone lived in the bay of plenty), and being newly registered (whether or not the 2016 election was the first election they had been registered for) on whether or not someone voted in 2016. all three predictor variables were associated with voting in 2016 (#2(7) = 156.85, p < .001, n = 4,319). a pearson goodness-of-fit test showed good overall model fit (#2(16) = 7.93, p = .95). as outlined in table 3, the likelihood of voting increased with age. in addition, those who were registered for the previous election were approximately 18% more likely to vote than those who were new to the register. the strongest effect, however, was for region. those who lived in the bay of plenty were more than twice as likely to vote as those who lived outside of the region. for the second logistic regression, we considered the effects of age, region, and voting in 2013 on whether or not someone voted in 2016. this time only region and voting in 2013 were associated with voting in 2016 (#2(7) = 359.62, p < .001, n = 1,872). a pearson goodness-of-fit test showed good overall model fit (#2(16) =15.88, p = .46). as outlined in table 4, once the effects of previous voting behaviour and residential region had been partialled out, age was no longer associated with voting. those who lived in the bay of plenty were approximately 74% more likely to vote than those who lived outside of the region. the strongest association was for previous voting behaviour. those who voted in 2013 were almost 7 times more likely to vote in 2016 than those who had not voted in 2013. bargh & rata: voting in m!ori governance entities published by scholarship@western, 2020 11 table 3. logistic regression model 1 to predict voting in the 2016 te r"nanga o ng!ta awa election voted 2016 odds ratio p 95% confidence interval age (under 30 years base) 30 39 years 40 49 years 50 59 years 60 69 years 70+ years 1.26 1.35 1.37 1.87 2.12 .022 .006 .004 .000 .000 1.03 1.09 1.11 1.46 1.56 1.54 1.66 1.70 2.41 2.88 region (outside bay of plenty base) within bay of plenty 2.05 .000 1.77 2.37 newly registered (no base) yes .82 .006 .71 .95 constant .24 .000 .18 .32 table 4. logistic regression model 2 to predict voting in the 2016 te r"nanga o ng!ta awa election voted 2016 odds ratio p 95% confidence interval age (under 30 years base) 30 39 years 40 49 years 50 59 years 60 69 years 70+ years 1.06 1.13 1.24 1.14 1.10 .735 .475 .221 .516 .721 .76 .80 .88 .76 .66 1.47 1.60 1.76 1.71 1.82 region (outside bay of plenty base) within bay of plenty 1.74 .000 1.37 2.22 voted in 2013 (no base) yes 6.97 .000 5.53 8.79 constant .14 .000 .10 .18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3, art. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8262 12 discussion of case study results our case study on te r"nanga o ng!ti awa using data from the 2010, 2013, and 2016 elections revealed a rapid increase in registered members over the period, which coincided with a decrease in voter turnout and an increase in the proportion of votes being cast online. older registered members were consistently more likely to vote than younger members over this period. however, age was not significantly associated with voting method (online vs. postal voting). over half of registered members lived in the bay of plenty region, which loosely approximates ng!ti awa tribal territories. those living in the bay of plenty had a consistently higher voter turnout than those outside the region, suggesting an association between proximity to the centres of tribal authority and political engagement. while auckland voters were more likely to vote online than others in 2010, residential region was not associated with voting method in subsequent elections. our analyses using linked data across the 2013 and 2016 elections showed that registration duration, and previous voting behaviour was also associated with subsequent voting behaviour. those who were registered for both elections were more likely to vote in 2016 than those who had not been registered in 2013, possibly because newer members were taking time to fully engage with iwi political processes. in addition, for those who were registered for both elections, those who voted in 2013 were much more likely to vote in 2016 than those who had not voted in 2013. finally, our logistic regressions showed that age, residential region, and registration duration all contributed uniquely to predict whether or not members voted in 2016. however, when voting in 2013 was included, age no longer significantly predicted voting in 2016. what cannot be ascertained from the case study data is whether the decrease in voter turnout and increase in online voting from 2010 to 2016 was due to a time effect, due to the corresponding increase in register size, or due to some other factor or factors. in order to begin placing the ng!ti awa data in a broader context, we now turn to considering data we collected from publicly available sources. publicly available voting data method we searched iwi entity websites for data on voting in iwi elections, collating data from the most recent election for which entities had listed both the number of votes cast, and the number of eligible registered members at the time of voting. this resulted in the inclusion of data from 37 iwi entities spanning an 11year period (2007-2018). election processes differ across iwi entities. some entities elect entire boards every three years, while other entities use a staggered system, voting to replace exiting members every year. in some instances, the number of candidates is equal to the number of available seats, in which case voting may not be required. as we collected data in early 2018, most of the data were from elections held in 2018 (n = 6) and 2017 (n = 18). only one observation was from 2007, and the next oldest observations were from 2013 (n = 2). bargh & rata: voting in m!ori governance entities published by scholarship@western, 2020 13 the entities with older data may well have held more recent elections without making the voting data publicly available. results voter turnout there was considerable variation in voter turnout across entities. voter turnout ranged from 9.46% (for a fisheries trust) to 51.9% (for a small tribal trust). the mean voter turnout across the 37 entities was 29.64% (m = 0.30, sd = 0.09). voter turnout by register size we found a strong, negative correlation between register size and voter turnout (r = -.62, p < .001), despite our relatively small sample size. the larger the iwi register, the more likely the voter turnout was to be low (see figure 2). data on the percentage of votes cast online was available from 25 entities, which ranged from 18.2% (for an election held in 2015) to 64.8% (also for an election held in 2015). the mean percentage of votes cast online across these observations was 43.6% (m = 0.44, sd = 0.12). there was no linear relationship between register size and online voting, or between online voting and voter turnout. discussion of publicly available data our results from the analysis of publicly available data on iwi voting showed that voter turnout varied substantially. some of the variability in voter turnout that we observed may be explained by entity type (e.g. fisheries trusts, preand post-settlement entities), and by election type (e.g. by-election, annual voting, triennial voting). however, we did not collect data on these variables. at a national level, voter turnout results for by-elections in new zealand has tended to be much lower than for general elections. voter turnout in general elections in new zealand sits at around 80%. in the 2017 general election, voter turnout was 79% (new zealand electoral commission 2017b); in 2014 turnout was 76.7% (new zealand electoral commission, 2014). the voter turnout for m!ori electorates is significantly lower at 66.7% in the 2017 general election and 65.1% in the 2014 general election (new zealand electoral commission, 2017b; parliamentary library, 2015). over the past 10 years, byelections averaged less than 45% voter turnout. voter turnout for the mt albert by-election in 2017 was 30% (new zealand electoral commission, 2017a), while the mt roskill by-election in 2016 was 38.5% (new zealand electoral commission, 2016). the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3, art. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8262 14 figure 2. percentage of eligible registered members who voted by iwi register size. size matters we found evidence that voter turnout tends to decrease the larger the iwi entity. while it is not clear what the driver of this correlation is, it may be the case that smaller iwi are better connected. members of smaller iwi may be more likely to have relationships with those campaigning, making them more invested in elections, and therefore more likely to vote. it could also be a feature of m!ori political organisation, which tends to still consolidate at a hap" level where members are all whanaunga (family; mead, 2016). hap" tend to have numbers of members in the hundreds rather than the thousands of some iwi alliances and therefore are in many ways closer-knit than iwi units (mead, 2016). the inverse correlation between register size and voter turnout suggests larger entities may benefit from tailored strategies to enhance members’ engagement with and participation in iwi elections. there is some comparability here with voting in local government elections where “rural councils have a higher turnout than provincial ones, which in turn have a higher turnout than metropolitan councils” (molineaux, 2018, p. 8). jean drage (2018) cited department of internal affairs data, which consistently shows “increased voter participation in local authorities where councillors represent fewer voters” (p. 6). she argued, “it is clear that knowing one’s local representatives is an incentive for those registered to vote, to actually do so” (p. 6). she reasoned that there is a “widening gap between councillors and the growing number of constituents” (p. 6), and this represents ultimately an erosion of local democracy. online voting we also found evidence suggesting that online voting is common in more than 50% of iwi elections. what is unclear is whether the use of online voting is being driven by voter preference or the iwi entities themselves (who may use particular strategies to encourage voting by various means). 0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 2,000 4,000 6,000 8,000 10,000 12,000 14,000 16,000 18,000 20,000 v ot er tu rn ou t eligible registered members bargh & rata: voting in m!ori governance entities published by scholarship@western, 2020 15 the move towards online voting raises potential challenges and opportunities for iwi to consider. online voting would likely reduce the costs of running an election and may increase the participation of iwi members who move frequently (and may therefore have inaccurate residential address information stored in the iwi register but the same email). however, as our results indicate, a large proportion of votes are still being cast via post. a thorough assessment of the impacts of moving to an online-only voting process would be advisable before iwi entities make such moves. the 2018 new zealand census was held solely online and the turnout results were so low that te mana raraunga (the m!ori data sovereignty network) raised concerns about their validity (te mana raraunga, 2018). the other issue around online voting is whether it is more or less effective on its own or in combination with other options. goodman et al. (2018) recommended caution around online-only voting methods based on their study. where the option for paper ballot voting has been removed, the research shows that a “digital divide” replicates societal inequalities, as mentioned above. in canada, research about online voting indicates two main reasons why people prefer online voting: accessibility and convenience. in a study of online voting in the whitefish river first nation, chelsea gabel and others (2016) found that, while only a small number of votes were cast online in 2016, exit polling found that 60% of paper voters said they would make use of online voting in future. in a comparative analysis of canada and australia, goodman and smith (2017) concluded: given the high rates of reported satisfaction with remote online voting in both contexts, the trend to more government and non-government services moving online, and increased internet penetration, there is good reason to believe that voters themselves will support policy shifts toward online voting. (p. 175) the same preference for accessibility and convenience may be true for m!ori voters too and, if so, presents an opportunity for iwi to encourage political participation. security serious consideration should be given to the security of online voting. in 2014, the norwegian government ended its online voting trials because of privacy concerns and a failure to increase voter turnout (goodman & smith, 2017). a 2019 online voting trial in new zealand was halted, with local government new zealand citing “rising costs” as the central reason (radio new zealand, 2018). at consultations throughout 2018, however, concerns were also raised about the rationale for online voting, the ongoing need for a postal option, security, and equity for m!ori (molineaux, 2018). these reservations about internet voting reflect international experiences: many jurisdictions that trialled online voting in the early 2000s have now suspended it because anticipated results were not achieved (goodman & smith, 2017). research in canada, which examined a possible correlation between online voting and higher voter turnout, concluded, “[it] encourages a certain proportion of nonvoters to partake electorally . . . yet, there are also distinctive issues in first nations communities that may influence the adoption and effectiveness of digital technologies” ( gabel et al., 2017, pp. 115-116). in some first nations communities in canada, concerns were raised about trust, privacy, and a digital divide amongst electors with regards to internet access and quality (gabel et al., 2017). the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3, art. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8262 16 analysis of data from ontario by goodman and stokes (2017) indicated that “internet voters were typically older, wealthier and better educated” (p. 4), which, as molineaux (2019) points out, makes internet voting more convenient for those already engaged. conclusion the case study of te r"nanga o ng!ti awa voting, coupled with the analysis of publicly available data, has provided a glimpse into voter behaviour in iwi elections. taken together, our analyses suggest that voter turnout is associated with register size, as well as individual level variables such as age, residence within tribal territories, previous voting behaviour, and length of time registered. these findings have implications for other indigenous communities that may be seeking to increase their voter turnout, including by using internet voting. many variables that may influence voter behaviour in iwi elections at the individual level (such as gender) and at the entity level (such as the stage of the treaty settlement process the organisation is in) have not been captured here. more research is needed to better understand iwi voting behaviour, which could include case studies of particularly entities (coupling qualitative insights into organisational practice and quantitative data on voter turnout over successive elections) and quantitative analysis of voting data obtained from a larger number of iwi entities over successive elections. while the data available for analysis, and therefore our findings, are modest, we have highlighted important considerations for iwi around engagement, particularly for larger organisations, and challenges and opportunities that online voting present. these findings also have implications for the new zealand government and electoral commission as it seeks to better understand how to encourage greater levels of m!ori voting in local and general elections. given iwi m!ori already have extensive experiences with managing their own elections and engaging in online voting, they should be central to the co-design of policy around election data collection and electoral system change. references bargh, m. 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(2018). 2018 special resolutions to amend the te runanganui o ngati porou trust deed: certified official results. https://ngatiporou.com/sites/default/files/ uploads/tronpnui%20certification%20of%20election%20results_2018%20sgm_%28ame nded%29.pdf vassil, k., slovak, m., vinkel, p., trechsel, a. h., & alvarez, r. m. (2016). the diffusion of internet voting. usage patterns of internet voting in estonia between 2005 and 2015. government information technology, 33(3), 453-459. managing the sacred lands of native america the international indigenous policy journal volume 2 issue 4 traditional knowledge, spirituality, and lands article 6 october 2011 managing the sacred lands of native america roxanne t. ornelas miami university, ohio, ornelart@muohio.edu recommended citation ornelas, r. t. (2011). managing the sacred lands of native america. the international indigenous policy journal, 2(4) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.6 this research is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. managing the sacred lands of native america abstract this research paper is a review of ten years of sacred lands management and policy in the united states. the author reports from the unique position of having been involved in national and international meetings with communities of indigenous peoples and intergovernmental stakeholders during this time. discussion includes an historical overview of such topics as environmental justice and the 2001 native american sacred lands forum, one of the first national meetings in the united states to specifically address the sacred lands of native americans. further discussion draws attention to the adoption of the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples in 2007 as a gateway to better sacred lands management and policy for native americans in the future. keywords environmental justice, freedom of religious expression, human rights, indigenous peoples, native american, policy, sacred lands creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ “the grandmothers tell us that in the beginning, there was only one creator—one divine intelligence—and so all things created since the beginning of time are suffused with the same sacred essence. thus, our very existence on earth implies a profound spiritual connection to the earth, to all nature, and to the spirit world, as everything is a part of the one divine intelligence inherent in all of creation. an invisible bond exists among all humanity and to all of our ancestors, a continuous thread running through space and time.” ~ grandmothers counsel the world (schaeffer, 2006, pp.146-147) introduction on february 11, 1994, then-president clinton signed executive order (eo) 12898. the intent of the order was to focus on “federal actions to address environmental justice in minority populations and low-income populations” (usepa, 2010). this was a monumental signing as the eo would instruct all federal governmental agencies in the united states to address the issue of environmental justice within their policies and regulations. environmental justice is a term used to describe the disproportionate number of minority populations, low income and indigenous peoples, who are at a higher risk of toxic exposure to environmental pollution and subsequent poor health due to degraded environments where they live, work, and play (adamson, evans, & stein, 2002; bullard, 2000 [1990]; cole & foster, 2001; rechtschaffen & gauna, 2002). the eo was in answer to grassroots movements that grew out of the early 1980s in the united states that claimed “environmental racism” was at the root of what many saw as disparate treatment when marginalized minority groups were compared to white communities (rechtschaffe & gauna, 2002). this point was highlighted in the 1987 united church of christ’s, commission for racial justice’s report “toxic wastes and race in the united states.” this was the first report to illustrate that race is often one of the determining factors for industries deciding where toxic waste facilities are eventually located (bullard, 2000 [1990]). two years after signing eo 12898, on may 24, 1996, president clinton signed eo 13007. this eo was a directly specific governmental mandate regarding “indian sacred sites” (achp, 2010). this eo was signed “in order to protect and preserve indian religious practices.” the eo instructed all federal agencies to (1) accommodate access to and ceremonial use of indian sacred sites by indian religious practitioners, and (2) avoid adversely affecting the physical integrity of such sacred sites. where appropriate, agencies shall maintain the confidentiality of sacred sites (achp, 2010, sec. i). while both eo 12898 and eo 13007 seemed to address important concerns for indigenous peoples in terms of recognizing issues relating to social and environmental justice, historically, the true “management” of sacred lands policy has generally been disregarded by the united states government. in my experience, and from conversations i have had with them, tribes often feel disregarded by governmental entities when they speak out for the protection of sacred lands that they believe to be threatened and require protection for their community’s ongoing spiritual and cultural well-being. on january 31, 2001, the federal interagency working group issued their final report on the american indian & alaskan native environmental justice roundtable meeting (aianejr) that was held in albuquerque, new mexico on august 3-4, 2000 (rivers & constable, 2001, p. vii). the aianejr was convened to address the interpretation and meaning of environmental justice for indigenous 1 ornelas: managing sacred lands published by scholarship@western, 2011 communities, as it was described in eo 12898. most importantly, indigenous peoples in the contiguous united states and alaska were “concerned about the interpretation of ‘environmental justice communities’ by the u.s. federal government in relation to tribes” (rivers & constable, 2001, p. vii). in the eo 12898, tribes had been included under the definition of what entails a minority group without regard to their unique status. the eo did not 1. recognize tribes’ sovereign nation-state status, 2. identify the federal trust responsibility to tribes, 3. promote economic and social development, 4. protect the treaty and statutory rights of american indians and alaskan natives. (rivers & constable, 2001, p. vii) in response to tribal concerns about the eo, the aianejr planning committee found that there were five prominent issues that emerged to be discussed at the aianejr meeting in new mexico. the issues were outlined as follows issue 1: what is the federal government’s responsibility for environmental justice in indian country? issue 2: what are the tribal governments’ responsibilities in addressing environmental justice in indian country? issue 3: what are the state governments’ responsibilities in address [sic] environmental justice in indian country? issue 4: what are the implications of environmental justice for industrial development in indian country? issue 5: how should and are tribal, federal and state governments collaborating to address human health and environmental justice in indian country? (rivers & constable, 2001, p. v) invitations to the aianejr were sent out to elected tribal officials and governments, federal and state agency representatives, national and state tribal organizations, universities and tribal community based organizations from all parts of the united states. the invitation described the five issues to be addressed and the organizing committee requested additional input from the various groups. over the two days that the aianejr took place, participants identified eight other issues of concern that arose. the open forum, with invited speakers and break out sessions, created an atmosphere of productive collaboration. critical attention was placed on the true meaning of what environmental justice meant for the tribes. interestingly, the most pressing issue that surfaced at the top of the list in importance was the very first one, describing the following american indian and alaskan natives value the environment differently than non-natives. american indian and alaskan natives use and manage the environment holistically; everything is living and has a spirit. thus, many federal and state environmental laws and regulations designed to protect the environment do not address the needs and concerns of american indian and alaskan natives. land-based resources are the most important assets to tribes spiritually, culturally and economically. (rivers & constable, 2001, p. vii) this was a significant result considering that the other issues were also extremely important and deemed critical to the health and welfare of tribes. other important issues included: cultural awareness and respect, the federal trust responsibility, environmental laws and regulations needing to be enforced, capacity building for health, sustainability, sustainable development, self-determination, consultation 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.6 being essential for building relationships with trust and cultural understanding, and finally, that all actions need to be taken in consideration of “the seven generations to follow” (rivers & constable, 2001, p. vii). while working as a post graduate research assistant1 based on the issues that had evolved at the aianejr in new mexico, it was clear that the main issue of sacred lands protection was of paramount concern among the various tribes that had participated in the roundtable discussions in new mexico. guided by the format and findings contained within the alanejr report, planning for the naslf evolved with a specific focus on what and how sacred lands are defined among the various tribes. it is from these early beginnings of my historic work on what became sacred lands policy development in the united states that this paper is structured. with the u.s. environmental protection agency’s (usepa) office of environmental justice (oej), tribal affairs, in june 2001, i was involved initially in sacred lands discussions when the impact and the potential of the aianejr results were being reviewed. i was invited to meetings about the report and i became a member of the native american sacred lands forum planning committee. the committee began work on planning for what would result in the october 2001 native american sacred lands forum (naslf) in denver, colorado. in this paper i will to some extent describe and review definitions of native american sacred lands. discussion will include an overview of consultation and other processes related to the naslf, and other national laws and policies relating to the management and regulation of native american religious practice, including providing narrative examples of ongoing struggles that continue today for the protection of native american sacred lands in the united states. the native american sacred lands forum in the report that followed the naslf october 9-10, 2001 meeting, the purpose of the meeting was described as follows sacred landscapes, large and small, are a central concern to native american nations, communities, spiritual leaders and activists. sacred places embody values, beliefs, spirits, history, ceremonies, relationships and secrets. sacred sites are at the core of cultural identity and health. their protection and care is an ancient mandate and life-giving covenant . . . the native american sacred lands forum was called because of a voiced need by native americans to find solutions to the very serious lack of protection given to sites and issues considered sacred by tribes. (sherman, 2003, p. ix) included in the october naslf program were two early screenings of the film in the light of reverence (mcleod, 2002). the film highlights the struggles of three indigenous communities in the united states working to protect the sacred lands of the lakota on the great plains, the hopi of the four corners region in the southwest and the winnemem wintu of northern california. showing the film was an important part of the naslf since it brought another level of awareness to some of the real life concerns that tribes have about their sacred lands by allowing the audience to observe the reality of ongoing struggles. over the two days of the naslf, panelists and attendees spoke of their concern about the loss of sacred lands and the impact this was having on the spiritual life and cultural well-being of many tribes 1 i worked in this post graduate research position throughout the year following the completion of my masters degree in 2001 and before entering my ph.d. program in the fall of 2002. 3 ornelas: managing sacred lands published by scholarship@western, 2011 within the united states. panelists included native american leaders, legal and academic scholars and various governmental representatives. the daily sessions were designed as open forums with panelists offering their expertise and experience followed by open discussion, similar to the alanejr structure. at other times participants would break out into groups to discuss strategies for the future and to tell their personal stories. tribal elders listened attentively or participated in many of the discussions as invited speakers. they talked about why the protection of sacred lands is essentially an environmental justice and human rights issue and important to the future welfare of their tribes. in addition, elder elaine quiver of the grey eagle society suggested that we all keep in mind that some adults living on reservations only have a third grade education. while they might not be able to read and write above that grade level, their life experience is a valuable asset not to be overlooked (sherman, 2003, p. 52). such elders have been privy to great environmental, social, and political change over their lifetimes. the wisdom and experience they shared was viewed as an important contribution to the discussions. as one unidentified participant observed we are the people of the knowledge of this earth. our strength is in this knowledge. it is the gift that we have for non-natives. our elders are caretakers of that knowledge, and because of their wealth of knowledge and their values as educators, in euro-american terms our elders should all have ph.d.’s. (sherman, 2003, p. xiii) these words would come back to speak to me during the time that i worked on my own ph.d. and on through today as a university professor who teaches a course about understanding the sacred lands of indigenous peoples. it is ultimately through the voices of the elders that my comprehension has grown to find new ways of perceiving the beliefs and different knowledge systems of indigenous peoples and their concern for the protection of their sacred lands. native american sacred lands and environmental justice the religious practices and spiritualities of indigenous peoples are quite often shrouded in mystery and misunderstanding by many non-indigenous peoples. this misunderstanding has been compounded by the appropriation of various indigenous religious practices by new age practitioners and others who have romanticized and misused indigenous ceremonial practices. many do not fully understand the deeper spiritual and cultural values that are associated with legitimate indigenous ceremonial observance. the spirituality of native americans in many instances, for example, is tied directly to the places where they live and where the stories and the histories of their peoples have evolved. native american religious and spiritual practice is not just about “playing indian,” as new age practitioners often demonstrate in exoticized reenactments of indigenous ceremonies. the result of their misconstrued prognostications might also prove deadly for those who are not properly trained and initiated as indigenous spiritual leaders, as the infamous 2009 sweat lodge deaths in the state of arizona demonstrated. the sweat lodge participants were being led by a non-indigenous self help guru, james arthur ray. ray has since been convicted of negligent homicide for those deaths (lacey, 2011). in 1978, with the passage of the american indian religious freedom act (airfa), the federal government formally and legally recognized the religious freedom of tribes in the united states to practice their religions without interference or hindrance. airfa was initially viewed as a significant protection for indigenous peoples to practice their religions freely. however, since that time, airfa has proven to be ineffective in protecting the sacred lands of indigenous peoples to which their religious freedom is integrally associated and an important part of their freedom to religious expression. and 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.6 when it comes to understanding the importance of the right of indigenous peoples to have free access to their sacred lands, peoples from other faiths, such as christians, jews, and muslims might try to imagine what life would be like if there were suddenly restrictions in place preventing them from attending their places of worship. the difference being that the indigenous person’s “church” might likely be a mountain or a river. within the united states, the federal and state park systems have management protections for historic architecture, including places of worship. for example, there are the famed old north church in boston, massachusetts and the mission san diego de alcala in san diego, california. it would never occur to governmental managers to allow bulldozers to plow them under for access to gravel, as has been done in the southwest of hopi prayer shrines (beggs & mcleod, 2003). nor will they allow rock climbers to hook and scale the face of george washington on mount rushmore in the black hills of south dakota; but the national park service will allow groups of rock climbers to scale mato tipila (aka devils tower national monument) despite knowing it is a sacred site for prayer and vision quest among many tribes living on the great plains of north america. this double standard of sacred land management practice needs to be revised in order to guarantee the freedom of religious expression for native america. this issue is at the center of the debate about sacred lands protections. it is a cultural clash that continues unresolved at all levels of government within the united states. when we consider the intention of eo 12898 as a means to specifically address environmental justice concerns in the united states, clearly the unique circumstances of native americans were not fully considered when president clinton signed it. the destruction of the integrity and sanctity of sacred lands was overlooked as disproportionate risk on a minority group. an example of disproportionate risk to exposure to toxic waste can be found in the pollution left behind by irresponsible uranium, silver and gold mining practices on western shoshone tribal lands. we find that the people living there are suffering from the compound effects of documented related health challenges as well as emotional and spiritual trauma suffered due to the loss of their sacred lands (uaws, 2008). much has been reported in the news in the united states in recent years about the government’s interest in storing radioactive waste in the yucca mountains. these mountains are sacred to the western shoshone and other tribes in this region of the southwestern united states. however, in response to decades of protests by the western shoshone defense project and others, the plan to store radioactive waste in the mountains has been halted by the obama administration (bedard, 2009). but there remains tremendous concern about the toxic and ruined environment that is already being suffered on a daily basis by the tribes who are living there. this case demonstrates the complicated nature of addressing the need to protect native american sacred lands as an extension of an environmental justice concern. in native america, there can be no separating of the two issues. research methods over more than a decade, i have been in the unique position of having been involved in some of the first national intergovernmental meetings and processes conducted to address the nature and definition of what indigenous sacred lands are in the united states, as well as globally. i have had the opportunity to be a participant not only in formal intergovernmental meetings, but i have been invited also to participate in indigenous religious ceremonies that have made a profound impact on me personally, as well as professionally. unquestionably, my early post-graduate work with the u.s. environmental protection agency’s division of tribal affairs influenced my decision to continue into a ph.d. program with a research emphasis in indigenous geographies and sacred lands. through the course of my professional work, i have found that there continues to be a great divide among policymakers and various other stakeholders, including the general public, regarding their 5 ornelas: managing sacred lands published by scholarship@western, 2011 understanding or misunderstanding about what sacred lands are. time and experience have shown me that an inclusive intertribal and intergovernmental management and decision-making process, with a focus on sacred lands, is of critical importance for the preservation of the spiritual, cultural, and social values of the many indigenous tribes living in the united states, and globally. the land is at the core of tribal identity. it is a part of who they are. these places are where many are able to freely observe and honor their religious and spiritual life. there is no question that the sacred lands of native america and other jurisdictions must be better protected, often with better laws and policies. this has to be done with the active involvement and the voices of indigenous peoples the world over, who can speak their truth about their own experience and values. they need to be invited to contribute in collaborative meetings about land management decisions that may impact their future quality of life. in my attempt to understand and to bring meaning to the different epistemologies and ontologies of indigenous peoples regarding their sacred lands in the united states, i have grappled with theoretical and epistemological concepts of feminist theory and adaptive management techniques to expand my understanding of the consultation process within the public sector. as a person with an indigenous identity, i have broadened my comprehension of the belief systems and earth knowledges in which indigenous peoples engage, through personal observation and experience. there is a quality and sense of reverence that cannot necessarily be expressed through words when one is in a place that is identified as a sacred site. it is this sense of reverence that is the most difficult to communicate to nonindigenous peoples who may not be willing to open up their minds to the possibility that there is something there to be honored and protected; that not everything we do in life requires a cartesian explanation. for many, such acceptance is a difficult bridge to cross. people want “proof.” and proving something that is not tangible can be complicated and inherently problematic, especially when its cultural expression is unfamiliar. by listening to the voices of the many elders and spiritual leaders who have spoken out at the meetings i have attended over the years, i have had exceptional opportunities to learn firsthand of the depth of concern for, and the critical importance of, native american sacred lands and their significance in the lives and well-being of indigenous peoples. i have come to understand the essence of the power that sacred lands hold by actually walking or sleeping on those lands known to be sacred. by trying to experience the sacredness of a place, i have gained a greater understanding and allowed myself to consider the possibility that there is something more there. and, based on my personal experience, i can state with certainty that there is an inexplicable energy present in those sacred lands i have visited. the quality is not something that should require any more proof or explanation by tribes, if they believe that those sacred lands exist. in general, most people accept the fact that churches, synagogues and mosques are sacred places for those who practice their religions and spirituality in them. we accept that they hold special meaning. we do not ask for proof. so, why, then, do we continue to press for proof from indigenous peoples regarding the management and protection of their sacred lands? are not those sacred lands the equivalent of churches, synagogues and mosques? based on my participant observer placement within my research, this paper is an important snap shot in time that i want to share. not only is this paper a contribution to the field of indigenous studies with regard to the management of sacred lands, this paper contributes to the disciplines of geography, public policy and others. there is a lack of scholarship that specifically addresses sacred lands as an environmental justice issue. ultimately, it is a subject that needs to be understood to help guarantee the recognition of human rights for native americans on a broader scale. unless we broaden the discussion to learn more information about the sacred lands of indigenous peoples, how will we ever be moved to protect them with better policies and land management practices? 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.6 sacred lands and human rights the management of the sacred lands of native americans is a complex matter for federal and state land managers and others. the definition of what constitutes sacred lands can usually be described depending on the context or tribal nation. generally speaking, the sacred lands of native americans can be described as “isolated sanctuaries to pray, receive guidance from the spirits, and train younger people in the ceremonies that constitute the spiritual life of the tribal community” (deloria, 2003). the geographies of sacred lands are as varied as is the landscape of the united states from coast to coast, including mountains and rivers, and every other type of land feature in-between. for the purposes of the federal government, eo 13007 describes sacred sites as [any] specific, discrete, narrowly delineated location on federal land that is identified by an indian tribe, or indian individual determined to be an appropriately authoritative representative of an indian religion, as sacred by virtue of its established religious significance to, or ceremonial use by, an indian religion; provided that the tribe or appropriately authoritative representative of an indian religion has informed the agency of the existence of such a site. (achp, 2010, sec. i (b) (iii)) one of the more thorny issues regarding sacred lands is the fact that many of the lands under the “management” of the federal government are located on public lands or in national parks. additionally, over the centuries, as tribes in the united states have been displaced and relocated away from their historic homelands, areas known to be sacred lands have become dispersed and fragmented over time. it is important to note that not only landforms are considered sacred lands or sites. sacred lands can constitute historic homelands, graves or architectural structures, such as an altar for prayer. thus, when a tribe’s gravesite is discovered during an excavation, for example, it is necessary that tribal leaders be notified in order to handle the remains according to tribal custom and tradition. this was a topic that was discussed with great emotion and concern at the naslf. according to many who spoke there, and at other meetings over the years, these sacred sites are not to be disturbed at all. for example, pemina yellow bird, a native american graves protection and repatriation act (nagpra) and cultural resources consultant for the mandan, hidatsa, arikara nation in north dakota, stated that our sacred sites belong to us . . . we indigenous peoples are the only ones, the only ones, who can claim association with those sites. our elders, our spiritual leaders, our teachers are the only ones who know the true facts about those sites. not archaeologists, not anthropologists, not historians. (sherman, 2003, p. 4) in personal conversations i have had with yellow bird, she has talked about the pain that grave desecration has caused her personally, as well as to her tribe. beginning in the mid-1980s, when she discovered that hundreds of boxes of her ancestor’s bones and sacred objects from burial sites were kept in vaults at the state historical society of north dakota, she was catapulted into action to have them reburied on her reservation. by the early 1990s, most of the remains had been returned to her tribe and reburied (bammer, 1994). yellow bird’s work ultimately led to a change in state handling procedures for indigenous remains found in north dakota. with the passage of the nagpra in 1990, native american burial sites were recognized and safeguarded under federal law. included in the description of burial sites, there are other criteria described as having protected status. these include items known to have cultural affiliation, unassociated funerary objects, sacred objects and cultural patrimony (nps, 2010). 7 ornelas: managing sacred lands published by scholarship@western, 2011 on september 13, 2007, the general assembly of the united nations voted to adopt the declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (un, 2008), hereafter “the declaration.” at the time of the vote, 143 countries voted to endorse the resolution, 11 abstained and 4 countries voted against it. the united states was one of the four countries to vote against adoption of the declaration, including the countries of australia, canada and new zealand. in the years since 2007, the 4 countries have made public statements proclaiming their support of the declaration. the united states was the last to endorse it when president obama announced on december 16, 2010 that the united states would now support the declaration (usdos, 2011a). in his comments of support, president obama said that the aspirations it affirms – including the respect for the institutions and rich cultures of native peoples – are one we must always seek to fulfill . . . what matters far more than words – what matters far more than any resolution or declaration – are actions to match those words. (usdos, 2011b) the principle concept of human rights was broadly defined for the international community at the united nations following world war ii, through the issuance of the universal declaration on human rights on december 10, 1948 (glendon, 2001). it describes human rights as “the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world” (hrrc, no date). the recently adopted declaration lists 46 articles that describe the specific requirements that are needed to achieve and guarantee the human rights of indigenous peoples globally. included among the articles in the declaration are several that discuss land and spirituality. for example, article 12 states “indigenous peoples have the right to manifest, practise, develop and teach their spiritual and religious traditions, customs and ceremonies; the right to maintain, protect, and have access in privacy to their religious and cultural sites” (un, 2008). article 25 expands on the right to access sacred lands by describing that “indigenous peoples have the right to maintain and strengthen their distinctive spiritual relationship with their traditionally owned or otherwise occupied and used lands, territories, waters and coastal seas and other resources” (un, 2008). some indigenous leaders believe that the adoption of the declaration adds another layer of support in their quest to protect sacred lands. and it lays out a basic framework from which to launch future protections for sacred lands in the united states. time will certainly tell if this, in fact, will lead to a positive result. native american sacred lands and conflict debates surrounding the recognition and the protection of native american sacred lands in the united states continue to rage on in virtual silence without the benefit of media attention. most of the population in the united states has never heard of the san francisco peaks in arizona, where tribes have been battling the arizona snowbowl ski resort for decades. over 13 tribes, including the apache, hopi and navajo, have objected to plans for large scale development and expansion of the resort that indigenous spiritual leaders claim will impact the sanctity of these sacred mountains (stpc, 2010). but more importantly, since the early 2000s, the resort has presented their expansion plans that include a proposal to use reclaimed sewage water for snowmaking. the tribes are strongly opposed to this, as they believe this is another desecration of these sacred lands. and, their opposition is also based on the unknown potential environmental risks that the reclaimed sewage water may pose over time. in south dakota, the battle for mato paha (bear butte) continues in and around sturgis, the location of the annual world-famed bike rally. tribes in the region continue to be opposed to a campsite and bar that has been given permission to build near the base of mato paha. additionally, the state has recently granted a license to nakota energy, llc to allow oil drilling in the area. according to a native 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.6 american website “protect bear butte,” opposing tribes are urgently calling for the public to contact the state department of natural resources in south dakota to oppose oil drilling in the area because bear butte is a sacred site located in the black hills and has been subjected to continual development and encroachment which violates the sacredness of the mountain. exploitation of mother earth it’s minerals, oil and other natural resources is another violation of encroachment against bear butte. (pbb, 2011) these examples are but a few of such infringements taking place at or near the sacred lands of indigenous peoples globally. other sites include the bighorn medicine wheel in wyoming, the lands of the penan in malaysia, the holy island of lindisfarne in the united kingdom and others (slfp, 2011). many of the sites are being compromised by development and natural resource extraction efforts without regard to the significance that these places hold for indigenous populations. in a recent interview with charlotte loonsfoot (keweenaw bay chippewa) her frustration was palpable, as she described her struggle to protect eagle rock (migiziwasin), an anishinaabe (ojibwa) sacred site in the upper peninsula region of michigan. she and others in the region are protesting against the rio tinto mining/kennecott eagle minerals company that is planning to destroy the site to expand their mining efforts there. the company plans to demolish and level the sacred stream that pours from the rock promontory in order to expand nickel and copper mining in the area. according to loonsfoot, this sacred site and its waters is a place where both women and men go to conduct ceremonies and prayer. but despite the protests surrounding the now fenced-off site, and at the time of this writing in late august, loonsfoot and her fellow protestors are continuing to be ignored by the mining operators who are moving forward with their plans to demolish the site on september 14, 2011. it appears that president obama’s promise for the government to have “respect for the institutions and rich cultures of native peoples” still leaves the sacred lands of native americans unprotected. the devastating effects of the lost history that many tribes have already experienced, through the colonizing of their historic homelands by non-indigenous settlers, are what compel many indigenous communities to fight for their future. they hope to continue to protect the spiritual and cultural welfare of their communities by fighting for what is environmentally just. and, they will continue to fight for what is at the core of it all, their basic human rights and dignity. into the future in my participation at the international indigenous treaty council conference that was held on the florida independent seminole nation reservation in february 2006, i had an opportunity to help in the drafting of the “resolution of the protection of indigenous sacred places, burial and spiritual rights” as a member of the commission on the protection of sacred places, burial, cultural and spiritual rights. the resolution resolved to [s]upport the adoption of indigenous regional, national, and international legislation designed to strengthen and/or enforce laws for the absolute protection and preservation of sacred places, sites, burials, cultural property and spiritual rights in perpetuity so that all sacred places will be further protected and preserved for indigenous peoples and their descendents. (iitc, 2006) today, on august 27, 2011, there have been some successes but far too many failures in the battle to protect the sacred lands of indigenous peoples in the united states. too many conflicts continue in 9 ornelas: managing sacred lands published by scholarship@western, 2011 places that are vitally important to the religious freedom of tribes. for the moment, the state of south dakota has decided to limit the number of licenses to drill for oil and gas near mato paha. the fact that the licenses have been granted at all shines a blinding light on the fact that the federal and state governments in the united states do not value or respect the religious freedom of its indigenous peoples. one voice in opposition should be enough to halt what many tribes describe as a desecration of a sacred site. it is clear that the protection and holistic management of sacred lands is integrally linked to the long-term survival and well-being of tribes in this country. with the recent announcement made by the national trust for historic preservation, which listed mato paha as one of 11 threatened historic sites in the united states (nthp, 2011), there is a glimmer of hope that there eventually will be some type of change in law that will offer protections to the sacred lands of native america. in the foreword to the naslf report (2003), editor marlon sherman of the indian dispute resolution services wrote if we are to be truly successful in any effort to change legislation and policy, we must change the way we perceive and react to cultures other than our own. we must learn how and why each culture believes and acts in a certain way and we must make room for (or accommodate, as some would say) the differences by crafting laws that allow for the different beliefs, avoiding harmful impacts on groups most likely to be affected—in this case, native peoples, and our sacred places. protecting the sacred from harm requires education, thoughtfulness and constant vigilance to be sure that we are accurate in our assumptions, and appropriate in our actions (p. iiv). at the same meeting, dean suagee of the first nations law clinic stated that “the voices of tribal storytellers have power which can be used to make federal agency officials do the right thing” (sherman, 2003, p.xv). but the hopes and aspirations of many of those who attended the 2001 native american sacred lands forum have faded over time. the best strategy for managing the sacred lands of native america is for congress to once and for all pass legislation that will require federal, state and local governments to enact and implement policies that will guarantee protections for native american sacred lands. this almost happened in 2002 during the 107th congress when the bill h.r. 5155 was submitted to congress as the “native american sacred lands act” (govtrack, 2011a). the bill languished in committee and eventually landed “dead on arrival” at the 108th congress the following year (govtrack, 2011b). as of now there is no major law in the united states designed to effectively protect the sacred lands of native americans and, as such, there are no legal safeguards to protect their freedom of religious expression. might a first step toward sacred lands protection in the united states be a reconsideration and possible integration of both eo 12898 and eo 13007 as a starting point? by using the declaration as a framework to a new beginning to this reconsideration, there is a lot more information on the table to work with than what was available in 2001 at the naslf. i have listened to hundreds of stories from elders and others in public meetings about the need to protect their sacred lands in the united states. it appears that nothing has changed much in the past decade. is it ignorance or entrenched racism that continues to hinder progress? is it greed for the natural resources that beckon or simply a complete lack of consideration for the human rights of indigenous peoples? after all, most large populations of indigenous peoples in the united states are out of sight and out of the minds of most americans, so why should we care about them? some may think that there are more important concerns like the slowly recovering global economy and the continuing wars in the middle east. even so, i made a promise to an elder indigenous grandmother some years ago, now deceased, who asked me to “tell them about us.” and, it is through this telling that i aspire to bring greater understanding of and attention to the many different ways of viewing the world that 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.6 policymakers need to consider and envision in order to develop a broader scheme of environmental justice in their policy and decision-making processes. a mountain may be just a mountain to some. but that mountain may be a place of reverence and prayer to others. it is time to move beyond business as usual and to forego what divides us by opening up ourselves to the possibility of more, so much more. to grandmother, i told them. and i will continue to tell them about you. united states bill of rights~amendment i “congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof” (usnara, 2010). 11 ornelas: managing sacred lands published by scholarship@western, 2011 references adamson, j., evans, m. m., & stein,r. (eds.). (2002). the environmental justice reader. tucson, az: the university of arizona press. advisory council on historic preservation. (2011, sept. 13). native american graves protection and repatriation act. retrieved from http://www.achp.gov/eo13007.html bammer, a. (1994). displacements: cultural identities in question. bloomington, in: indiana university press. bedard, p. (2009, february 26). reid celebrates obama's yucca mountain decision. retreived from http://www.usnews.com/news/washington-whispers/articles/2009/02/26/reid-celebrates-obamasyucca-mountain-decision bullard, r. d. (2000 [1990]). dumping in dixie: race, class, and environmental quality (3rd ed.). boulder, co: westview press. deloria, v., jr. (2003). sacred lands and religious freedom. in m. beggs, & c. mcleod (eds.), sacred lands reader. berkeley, ca: earth island institute. glendon, m. a. (2001). a world made new: eleanor roosevelt and the universal declaration of human rights. new york: random house inc. govtrack. (2011a, march 30). h.r. 5155 native american sacred lands act. retrieved from http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=h107-5155 govtrack. (2011b, march 30). h.r. 2419 native american sacred lands act. retrieved from http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=h108-2419&tab=related human rights resource center. (n.d.). universal declaration of human rights: human rights u.s.a. minneapolis, mn: university of minnesota. international indigenous treaty council. (2006). united nations resolution on the protection of indigenous sacred places, burial and spiritual rights. commission on the protection of sacred places, burial, cultural and spiritual rights. geneva, ch: united nations, committee on human rights. lacey, m. (2011, june 22). new age guru guilty in sweat lodge deaths. retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/23/us/23sweat.html mcleod, c. 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(2003). editor’s foreward. in natural resources law center, report of the native american sacred lands forum. boulder, co: university of colorado university of arizona & western shoshone defense project. (2008, february). supplemental shadow report to the committee on the elimination of racial discrimination: in response to united states periodic report early warning and urgent action procedure decision 1(68) (western shoshone). submitted to the united nations by the university of arizona indigenous peoples law & policy program & western shoshone defense project. retrieved from http://www.wsdp.org/uploads/5/3/9/0/5390400/westernshoshone.pdf united nations. (2010, august 24). declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples. retrieved from http://www.un.org/esa/socdev/unpfii/documents/drips_en.pdf u.s. department of state. (2010, oct. 16). un declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples review. retrieved from http://www.state.gov/s/tribalconsultation/declaration/ u.s. department of state. (2011a, february 28). announcement of u.s. support for the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples. retrieved from http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/ps/2010/12/153027.htm u.s. department of state. (2011b, august 1). announcement of u.s. support for the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples. retrieved from http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-pressoffice/2010/12/16/remarks-president-white-house-tribal-nations-conference u.s. environmental protection agency. (2010, september 15). federal actions to address environmental justice in minority populations and low-income populations: executive order 12898. retrieved from http://www.epa.gov/environmentaljustice/resources/policy/exec_order_12898.pdf u.s. national archives & records administration. the bill of rights. (2010, oct. 17). retrieved from http://www.archives.gov/exhibits/charters/bill_of_rights_transcript.html 13 ornelas: managing sacred lands published by scholarship@western, 2011 the international indigenous policy journal october 2011 managing the sacred lands of native america roxanne t. ornelas recommended citation managing the sacred lands of native america abstract keywords creative commons license managing the sacred lands of native america navajo nation brain drain: an exploration of returning college graduates’ perspectives the international indigenous policy journal volume 8 | issue 1 article 7 january 2017 navajo nation brain drain: an exploration of returning college graduates’ perspectives quintina ava bearchief-adolpho brigham young university, qadolpho@gmail.com aaron p. jackson brigham young university, aaron_jackson@byu.edu steven a. smith brigham young university, steve_smith@byu.edu moroni t. benally diné policy institute, moroni.benally@gmail.com recommended citation bearchief-adolpho, q. a. , jackson, a. p. , smith, s. a. , benally, m. t. (2017). navajo nation brain drain: an exploration of returning college graduates’ perspectives. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(1). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.7 navajo nation brain drain: an exploration of returning college graduates’ perspectives abstract american indian tribes face the phenomenon known across the world as the brain drain. they invest millions of dollars in educating their members only to have little return on their investment. many nation members leave reservations to get postsecondary education but never return. those who get education off the reservation and choose to return are the exception to this rule. although there is an abundance of literature regarding brain drain across the world, there has been little research done with american indians. in order to begin to understand the brain drain phenomenon, this study analyzed unstructured qualitative interviews with 17 navajo nation members who left their reservation, obtained a degree, and returned to work on the reservation. themes resulting from the hermeneutic analysis of transcribed interviews were (a) family support, (b) community, (c) cultural identity, (d) the simple life, (e) reservation economy, and (f ) commitment to the reservation. the analysis found that constant, lengthy, and meaningful relationships were motivating factors in drawing participants back to contribute to their reservations. further study is needed to understand how communities and tribes can ensure that these relationships are built and maintained. keywords brain drain, american indian, native american, education, navajo nation acknowledgments this study was funded by the mckay school of education at brigham young university and was conducted in collaboration with the diné policy institute at diné college in tsaile, arizona. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ n a v a j o n a t i o n bra i n d ra i n : a n e x p l o ra t i o n o f r e t u rn i n g c o l l e g e g ra d u a t e s ’ pe rs p e c t i v e s when this study’s first author, a blackfoot first nation woman, was a young girl, her father would often gather his loved ones around a fire and recall legends passed down to him from his grandmother. the creation story he told has been the foundation of the first author’s education. the story goes like this: the creator created this earth, which we live on, and desired to provide food and resources for his children to live. even today, many indigenous people know this earth as mother. after he finished the creation, he called his animal creations to gather around him so he could give names to them. “stah’ tsi’tapi” was the name given to all that live under the ground, or the underground people. “ksah ‘kwi’tapi” was the name given to all that lived on the surface, or earth people. “ohki’tapi” was given to all that live in the water, or water people. “spoomi’tapi” was given to all that flew in the air, or the air people. the creator then asked his animal creations for a volunteer to feed, nourish, clothe, and shelter his children that are down on the earth. a mouse came forward, but he was much too small. a gopher, badger, coyote, and wolf each offered, but were also too small. the bear was too lazy and grouchy for the purpose. just then, they all felt the ground trembling and saw a thick cloud of dust approaching the group. they couldn’t make out the cause. suddenly, they saw a huge buffalo bull with black horns flashing in the sunlight, and all his followers running behind him toward the group. the other animals were scared and quickly cleared a path for them to run through to the creator. the bull ran directly at him and stopped just short. with his chest out, and snorting and pawing the earth he said to the creator, “my people and i will give ourselves as your children’s food, clothing, shelter, and anything else they need to live.” the creator was pleased and the plan was complete. the creator announced that they were ready to make the journey to earth. it was night when the buffalo began their journey. the old people tell us that on a clear moonless night if you look straight up at the night sky you can still see the buffalo’s path. white people call it the milky way. the buffalo had a significant role in supporting many american indians for many years by providing clothing, shelter, tools, food, and trade. however, we are now in an era that requires different resources to provide our economic necessities. many tribal elders consider education to be the new economic hub around which quality of life turns. they say, “education is the buffalo of today.” many tribes have come to see education as central to their survival and success. they have seen that education can be correlated to economic growth (office of navajo nation scholarship and financial support, 2011). the navajo nation, for example, spends millions of dollars to develop their human capital; however, it has not realized a return in economic growth for the reservation because tribal members leave the reservation to obtain their education in areas with developed economies. their experiences with postsecondary education often prompt a personal dilemma for members—the difficult decision about whether or not they will return to work and live on the reservation. a similar dilemma exists for many from developing economies around the world. 1 bearchief-adolpho et al.: navajo brain drain: returners' perspectives published by scholarship@western, 2017 g l o b a l pe rs p e c t i v e human capital, the collective set of skills individuals possess that add economic value to a population (human capital, n. d.), is ranked as one of the top four factors that determines a nation’s economic development (berry & haklev, 2005). the literature consistently points to raising the level of human capital through education as a primary means to resolve a nation’s poverty concerns and produce economic growth, thereby providing its citizens with a higher quality of life. citizens from nations with developing economies have little access to higher education and are dependent on primary education and basic literacy as sources of raising the level of human capital (mckenzie et al., 2013). as developing economies struggle to improve their education systems, their best and brightest citizens migrate from their native lands to developed receiving countries, searching for education as a solution to their economic welfare. as berry and haklev (2005) have stated, in many developing countries, the value of knowledge is in its capacity to save and enhance human lives. the absence, loss or restriction of such knowledge impacts at the lowest levels of disadvantage and poverty, in death and disease. (p. 2) temporary migration for education is important to the welfare of developing nations. however, permanent or long-term migration of skilled human capital produces a negative effect on the native sending countries when educated, human capital fails to return—a phenomenon called brain drain (kwok & leland, 1982; zweig, 1997). brain drain causes developing countries to lose precious human resources and thereby indirectly subsidize developed countries’ labor forces (ahmad, 2004). berry and haklev (2005) found that individuals participating in brain drain chose to emigrate for reasons such as security threats, political unrest, discrimination, economic necessity, or professional opportunities. these are what berry and haklev (2005) have called push and pull factors, indicating that push factors repel students from their native countries and pull factors attract students to host countries. push factors include a lack of employment opportunities, lower comparative salaries, and political unrest and instability (gibson & mckenzie, 2011; kupfer, hofman, jarawan, mcdermott, & bridbord, 2004; kwok & leland, 1982). common examples of pull factors include significant increases in annual income, comfortable living conditions and lifestyles, opportunities for career advancement, better working facilities, educational opportunities and safety for families, and opportunities to learn from the top professionals in the field (gibson & mckenzie, 2011; zweig, 1997). skilled individuals tend to look for the greatest opportunities afforded to them. skilled individuals who desire to maximize their returns will generally migrate in search of the highest paid opportunities or the best living conditions (iredale, 1999). such individuals, according to iredale (1999), choose a location “where they feel they will be better able to use their capabilities and enjoy superior conditions of work and existence” (p. 90). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.7 n a v a j o n a t i o n bra i n d ra i n the navajo nation has struggled for decades to raise the level of human capital on its reservation by spending millions of dollars to facilitate the education of tribal members. however, the direct economic returns on such financial investments are low (office of navajo nation scholarship and financial support, 2011). navajo nation-funded scholarships have produced an educated tribal membership; however, scholarship recipients graduate from college and fail to return to the reservation in significant numbers. therefore, the communities of the navajo nation are failing to forward their economic objectives. not only is the navajo nation failing to realize the benefits of an increase in educated and skilled human capital, but it is also experiencing loss of capital by indirectly subsidizing other economies. brain drain in many developing countries has been examined, but very little has been done to study the effects of brain drain with respect to the navajo nation or other indigenous communities. a navajo nation brain drain study, conducted by mckenzie et al. (2013) identified some of the reasons collegeeducated tribal members leave the reservation and do not return. participants provided personal accounts of why they did not return to the reservation after receiving a college education. the research identified some common push factors, such as no job opportunities, no housing, and few conveniences. this study also found that tribal members desire to return to the reservation to live and to work, but many members experience economic and social barriers that prevent them from doing so (mckenzie et al., 2013). research has not been done to identify pull factors that attract educated navajos to permanently return to work on the reservation. we determined that a study examining the reasons that college-educated navajo members might return to the reservation after receiving education would prove beneficial for the navajo nation and other indigenous communities. the intention of this study was to explore those reasons and to help the navajo nation realize a better return on their educational investments by contributing to the development of policies that produce systematic solutions to overcoming poverty and promoting economic growth. the primary research question for this study was: what are the perspectives of college-educated navajo nation members on why they chose to return to the nation? m e t h o d denzin and lincoln (1994) have stated, “qualitative researchers study things in their natural settings, attempting to make sense of, or to interpret, phenomena in terms of the meanings people bring to them” (p. 3). this study utilized qualitative interviews to understand, in depth, the experiences of participants (evely, fazey, pinard, & lambin, 2008). this study incorporated a hermeneutic qualitative method to explore the perspectives of participants. this method is based in a relational ontology. the fundamental assumption of relational ontology is the belief that relationships are primary and necessary to understanding human experience (gergen, 2009; mckenzie, et al., 2013). the philosophical foundation underlying this method appears to fit well with the american indian belief that relationships provide meaning and understanding. american indians traditionally believe that relationships with their family members, extended family, tribal members, and surrounding environment all contribute to who they become (trusty, looby, & sandhu, 2002). the epistemological foundation for this method is based on hermeneutic modes of understanding (gadamer, 3 bearchief-adolpho et al.: navajo brain drain: returners' perspectives published by scholarship@western, 2017 2004). broadly, hermeneutic inquiry refers to the process of interpreting human experiences as texts with the intention of finding deeper meaning and understanding (kvale & brinkmann, 2009). pa rt i c i p a n t s a team of investigators, composed of members of the diné policy institute and faculty and graduate students from a nearby university, conducted semi-structured, face-to-face, one-on-one qualitative interviews with members of the navajo nation who met the following criteria: a. they had lived on the navajo nation for the majority of their childhood years, which was defined as having spent at least one-half of their school years (k–12) attending reservation schools; b. they had left the navajo nation to pursue and complete a post-secondary degree; and c. they had returned to the navajo nation to live and work. we conducted interviews with 24 potential participants. this study only 17 analyzed interviews. seven of the interviews were excluded because either (a) it was determined the participant did not actually meet inclusion criteria, or (b) the recording was inaudible. kvale and brinkmann (2009) suggested that an interview-based qualitative study should incorporate 15 interviews, plus or minus 10. the final determination of the number of participants comes from whether or not the collected interviews provide sufficient saturation of the topic of interest. based on this criterion, we determined that the 17 interviews provided sufficient depth and breadth of responses for the purposes of the study. pro c e d u re participants were recruited in 2012 at the gathering of nations, one of the largest north american pow wows, held in albuquerque, new mexico. this site was selected for recruitment because it allowed efficient access to a diverse set of navajo tribal members. the diné policy institute and diné college set up a booth and allowed the research team to use the space for interviews. the research team posted a sign that asked participants to take part in the research study if they met the criteria for inclusion. those potential participants who said they met the inclusionary criteria were asked to complete a brief demographic questionnaire and an informed consent form. the study had approval from the brigham young university (byu) institutional review board (irb) and was supported by the diné policy institute. it did not require navajo nation irb approval because the study was not done one tribal land. researchers participating in this study were trained in qualitative interviewing. a list of interview topics with guidelines and sample questions (see appendix) were used to help interviewers maximize the depth and breadth of the interviewee responses (kvale & brinkmann, 2009). interviewers conducted the interviews in person and one at a time. the interviews ranged anywhere from 20 to 50 minutes, with interviews typically lasting approximately 40 minutes. each interview was recorded and transcribed by members of the research team. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.7 d a t a a n a l y s i s the same philosophical and theoretical assumptions that were utilized when conducting the interviews formed the foundation of the study’s analysis. the principal investigator analyzed the transcribed interviews using a hermeneutic interpretive method, as outlined by kvale and brinkmann (2009). the hermeneutic circle can be described as a cyclical approach to looking at both the whole and the parts of the whole and allowing them each to inform the analysis of the other. this cycle or spiral of going from whole to parts, moving back and forth, ultimately leads to a meaningful and comprehensible analysis that goes beyond the initial interpretation of either the whole or the parts of the experience. the following describes the process the research team followed to analyze data. 1. the text of all the interviews was read and reread to ensure overall understanding. this was done to carefully study the interviews in order to identify overarching meanings set forward by participants in the interview dialogue (kvale & brinkmann, 2009). 2. the data were analyzed, using the hermeneutic circle, as described below: a. the text was read and reread to determine and clarify interpretations and meanings. b. each paragraph and sentence was read and analyzed. c. the whole text was reread to discover further meaning. d. notes were taken for each interview and summarized. 3. the summaries of each interview were read to determine existing patterns. this process is referred to as the hermeneutic circle, and has been described as a spiral or reflexive process through which investigators seek to uncover progressively deeper levels of meaning in a text (hoshmand, 1989; kvale & brinkmann, 2009; polkinghorne, 1984). 4. common themes from across all of the interviews were identified at this stage and consolidated in summary form. this process reflects an effort to identify the meanings articulated in the text (jackson & patton, 1992; kvale & brinkmann, 2009). furthermore, at this stage the primary investigator focused on emerging sub-themes that were associated with and categorized under broader common themes between interviews. 5. an experienced auditor helped validate the primary researcher’s interpretations (kvale & brinkmann, 2009). once the auditor supported interpretations, the primary investigator worked to organize and effectively communicate the findings. the main intention of the researchers was to communicate uncovered meanings and themes in such a way as to be true to the participants’ experiences and perspectives. i n v e s t i g a t o r a s s u m p t i o n s there were several assumptions made in this study. first, it was assumed that the participants attending gathering of nations were representative of the educated population on the navajo nation. second, it was assumed that participants felt comfortable enough in the interview setting to be open and frank in 5 bearchief-adolpho et al.: navajo brain drain: returners' perspectives published by scholarship@western, 2017 their comments. third, it was assumed that the hermeneutic method of interviewing is an effective way of obtaining meaning and themes that communicate the experience of these navajo nation members. furthermore, the principal investigator recognizes that the study’s research question and the themes that emerged from the data were influenced by her experience as a blackfoot first nation woman who graduated from post-secondary education, returned to her nation to work, and then left again to pursue further education. it was assumed that through the hermeneutic process and the use of auditors, the researchers’ biases and assumptions would not harm the trustworthiness of the results. r e s u l t s primary themes and sub-themes were identified through the study’s hermeneutic analysis. six primary themes were prominent concerning participants’ reasons for returning to the navajo nation. four of the primary themes required greater clarity, utilizing additional levels of sub-themes. primary themes included the following: 1. family: family support and traditional upbringing; 2. community: giving back and positive community role model; 3. cultural identity: cultural traditions (songs, stories, customs, etc.); 4. the simple life: livestock, mountains, and environment; 5. reservation economy: networking, social circles, job availability; and 6. commitment to the reservation. f a m i l y family relationships and familial connections were significant reasons for participants returning to and residing on the navajo nation. reasons for desiring family and familial connections varied, and continued analysis led to sub-themes of family support and traditional upbringing. f a m i l y s u p p o rt . the participants received or gave familial support in specific and identifiable ways, which will be discussed below. this theme was divided into sub-themes of family needs, giving back to family, and role models. f a m i l y n e e d s . participants described wanting to return to the reservation to support family members during difficult life situations. one female participant noted that she felt the need to return to help both an aged relative, who was unable to care for herself, and a parent who was dealing with this circumstance alone: my grandma’s like 92. and that’s the reason why. and also my mom, she’s kind of like by herself and all her kids are grown up and she needs some extra help and that’s why i’m there now. (participant 9) 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.7 another participant expressed similar sentiments, concerning the death of his partner’s family member: the reason why i ended up going back was because of the person i ended up with, because her kids were situated back in the reservation. at the same time i lost my mom. and for my grandmother, that was her only daughter, so she took it pretty hard. that kind of made my decision just to go back. (participant 7) g i v i n g b a c k t o f a m i l y . many participants spoke about their desire to offer support by giving back to their families. because they had left the reservation to gain life experience, they desired to come home afterwards and give their family members greater opportunities. participants wanted to enrich their families’ lives by giving back. one female participant indicated that she felt a need to give back because she was the oldest child: yes, definitely. the decision i made, you know, got me a job. because i come from a large family, i was also able to help my parents. since i’m the oldest of the family basically helping with my brothers and sisters, being there for them as well—kind of like a second mother, having to go to their interviews for like parent teacher conference. so i would go to those types of things, athletics, up in the mountains stuff, and their studies, helping them and guiding them—things that my parents didn’t necessarily know about, and so i was always constantly pushing them, as well. (participant 5) another participant was taught the importance of giving back to family, and that was why he sought to move back: i grew up on the reservation. i guess a part of the way i was raised was to … give back to your hometown and to give back to your family and to be around them and to move back to your land. (participant 12) r o l e m o d e l s f o r o t h e r f a m i l y m e m b e rs . many of the participants spoke about offering family support by returning as role models. one female participant spoke about how she was told that her brothers and sisters looked up to her. yes. i was always told growing up that my brothers and sisters are looking to me and i needed to be an example and for a long time, you know, i was doing what i needed to do—which was no problem. i took on that responsibility. and i didn’t, you know, my personality is not to cause any problems or really fight too much and argue. so that’s what kept me on that path. (participant 5) t ra d i t i o n a l u p b ri n g i n g . the theme of traditional upbringing was divided into sub-themes— family expectations and family connection—that conveyed clearer reasons why participants chose to return to navajo nation. 7 bearchief-adolpho et al.: navajo brain drain: returners' perspectives published by scholarship@western, 2017 f a m i l y e x p e c t a t i o n s . some participants were expected to come home after they were done with their schooling. one female participant commented: i think that had to do with a lot with my family upbringing with my parents. my father was a traditional practitioner and i still had my grandparents and my great grandparents. and they always said, “this is home and you can go out and do stuff but always don’t forget your language. always come home and there’s going to be a time when we will no longer be here and you need to carry on.” and i’ve always taken that to heart. it’s driven me all along. (participant 14) f a m i l y c o n n e c t i o n s . participants also noted a sense of connection to their families, with one male participant expressing a desire to just be around his family: i wouldn’t say really, it was for culture; it mainly was just to be there with family, as far as family goes. (participant 7) another participant expressed that her family was very close and thus it was hard to be away from them: well mainly because of my family. i came from like a really close, close family where my grandparents, my aunts, my uncles, my brothers, everyone was always coming back every weekend for something. (participant 17) c o m m u n i t y participants in the study expressed a sense of community as one reason for returning, insofar as they both valued their community experience growing up and wanted to use their education to give back to that community. by contrast, others noted that they had had rough experiences growing up and sought to use their education to give back and thereby improve their community. sub-themes within the primary theme of community include giving back and positive community role model. g i v i n g b a c k. many participants expressed a desire to give back to their nation by returning and finding employment in industries such as teaching, athletics, or community services. they shared a strong sense of desire to return to the reservation and utilize their educations to help others. one participant expressed this desire clearly, stating: because i feel that, you know, a lot of our own people do not go back to our reservation once they get their degree, their education. they go elsewhere and give services, you know, outside the reservation. so i thought maybe going back to the reservation, and helping our own people will help, you know—benefit from my knowledge and skills that i have learned—and put that back to my people. (participant 2) another participant indicated that many american indians have a hard time living away from the reservation because they are not well prepared, and so they do not complete their postsecondary education. this recognition prompted his desire to go back to the reservation after graduation to help 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.7 youth in the community learn how to survive living outside of the community until they complete their degree, rather than returning before they had finished the program: the biggest influence was when i started school, i made a promise that i would go back, you know. so after i finished teaching, i wanted to coach and help the american indian students because it’s a big, big, different world out there. coming from [the town] where i came from and being you know all in one place and never travelling and going out and meeting all the other cultures and meeting all the different people and religions, it was quite a difference. and now i understand why a lot of american indians don’t survive out in the world because they are not used to it at all. when i played [college] basketball you know i questioned my coach, “why don’t you get native girls? they are good enough to play here.” and she told me that, “i would love to have them here but they don’t stay. they never stay. they get lonesome and homesick. we give them full ride scholarships. we give them everything they want and they won’t stay.” which i can understand, because it is a lonely place when you are not used to living in the white world. so that was my main goal, my main promise was to come home and work with the american indian kids and so that’s why i went back. (participant 6) another participant indicated that when she was younger, she would see others leave the reservation and come back, and she wanted to do the same: the key issue is that when i was growing up in my community there were a lot of improvements that needed to be done. and there’re even some people that went on to college and came back, but didn’t have all the resources. and i thought i might be one of them to go off and learn as much as i can and bring a lot back to my community. this same participant expressed a great desire to help the younger people: . . . i’m proud to be navajo, and i want to help my navajo people. i want to reach down to the grassroots. and i want to reach down to the young people . . . and all the way to this generation now . . . that’s what made me to come back. because i explained to my younger generation that school is very important. you have to learn something and bring it back and help us. (participant 11) another participant expressed that she felt obligated to give back because she was given the navajo nation scholarship: well, i feel that way because i took the navajo nation’s scholarship money and i feel like i should do my part. i should be able to come back and give a little bit of myself back and, not in a way of money, but in a way of time. (participant 15) po s i t i v e c o m m u n i t y ro l e m o d e l s . participants also desired to give back by being a positive role model for younger generations. for example, one female participant indicated that she wanted to inspire kids: like i said, you know, i want to be here for the native kids and some way, somehow inspire them and even down to my own kids. (participant 13) 9 bearchief-adolpho et al.: navajo brain drain: returners' perspectives published by scholarship@western, 2017 c u l t u ra l i d e n t i t y some participants were raised in families that were traditionally based. to them, cultural identity was high among their reasons for returning. in this context, cultural identity was tied to songs, stories, customs, etc. their cultural beliefs and teachings were very important to their identities and to their children’s identities. one female participant noted that the reason why she did not want to leave the reservation was that she wanted to stay connected to her traditional beliefs. these same beliefs drew her back after she completed her degree: yeah, that’s where our traditional beliefs, our traditional culture—that’s where—that’s why we don’t want to move from the reservation. (participant 2) several participants indicated similar beliefs. they expressed that they were raised traditionally and had a deep respect for their elders and their teachings: well i’m very raised traditionally and i respect my elders. my paternal grandparent and also my maternal grandparents were still alive at the time. and so there’s a lot of teaching—once you go off the reservation you have to know some songs, once you pass your boundaries of the secret mountains. and that was how much respect i had for my elders. (participant 4) another participant connected the importance of carrying on cultural traditions by returning to the reservation to improving their homeland and to helping people in the community: we were pretty much really traditional. we grew up on traditional teachings and the majority of what we learned, or what we were brought up on, was kind of like getting taught through our elders. so pretty much that’s how we were growing up. my grandpa always used to tell me that you can’t just leave and forget where you came from. you have to come back. and you have to either try to make things better or try and help your people. so that’s just the way i was taught. (participant 17) culture plays a significant role in the lives of some participants, causing them to return so that their children will not miss the opportunity to know their culture. several participants conveyed the importance of passing on cultural traditions to their children, and the sense of responsibility that accompanied this process. one participant emphasized the importance of giving his children the culture of reservation life: because i have a lot of friends that gained degrees and live off the reservation, their children don’t really understand reservation life. i raised my children on the reservation; they know what reservation life is . . . but i just wanted them to know what it’s like to be on the reservation, culture wise. it’s part of our identity. it is who we are. that’s why it is important. (participant 1) another participant expressed her desire to teach her child her culture: so when i graduated, my idea was that i wanted to come closer to home so that i could be around my family. and i also had a desire for my daughter to know something about her culture 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.7 because we were around hispanic people all the time, but she never was around native people. so i wanted to live close to home. (participant 8) t h e s i m p l e l i f e participants identified that they returned to the reservation for a simpler lifestyle outside of the city. indeed, participants were passionate about leading a lifestyle that fit with their desire to live a less complicated life than the one they encountered in the city. one participant noted, for example: part of me still likes the simplicity and living the simple life, and having livestock and being around family all the time. and so i moved back and just started working on the reservation and started a career there. (participant 12) another echoed this desire, stating: mainly my love for livestock. i mean i lived in [city] for almost a year, and i couldn’t do it without having some kind of responsibility for livestock. so i had to go back and eventually just started taking care of my horses again. (participant 17) another participant also returned to raise livestock, but added that another reason for returning was to have the rodeo lifestyle, which was difficult to enjoy when living in a city: yeah, so my kids are into lifestyle; they’re into rodeo. so if we move to city there’s nowhere to put our cows and horses and all that. (participant 2) another participant tied lifestyle to living in the mountains. she could not place her finger on exactly what drew her back, but her love of the mountains kept her residing on the navajo nation: oh, yeah definitely. i love the navajo nation that was something that i already knew i was going to do, right getting out of the college. [college] didn’t necessarily have anything, a career set for me or anything like that. so i just kind of went home. but since i love [town] and like i said the mountains and it’s so cool up there, i wanted to stay on the navajo nation. (participant 5) r e s e rv a t i o n e c o n o m y many participants indirectly identified the reservation economy as a motivating factor for returning to the navajo nation. within that broader theme, the analysis identified job availability and networking, and social circles as secondary themes. j o b a v a i l a b i l i t y . one female participant came back to the reservation because there was work for her in her field of employment. she noted that having a job that fit the reservation economy provided great security for her: 11 bearchief-adolpho et al.: navajo brain drain: returners' perspectives published by scholarship@western, 2017 they called me because i was a nurse. it’s like i told my kids; i feel really bad because i got into nursing and at that time it was like a need, so i never had any problems getting a job, never. i mean i was unemployed maybe about a month and that’s about it. (participant 3) n e t w o rki n g a n d s o c i a l c i rc l e s . participants indirectly identified that successful integration into the reservation economy had a lot to do with whom you knew and who your family members were. one female participant directly identified that she returned to utilize this advantage. in this instance, the participant indicated that a relative’s connections in the community were beneficial to her in getting a job, even though the subject was not well known: my grandpa knew a lot of people. a lot of people knew him as a rancher. and he was a code talker. he had a lot of contacts. even today i’m able to use those contacts and help. like i said he was a rancher . . . i’m able to work some work for them. (participant 5) this same participant reported utilizing her connection with her father’s hunting buddy, who was employed in a government position, to quickly get employment and move up in rank: after i graduated . . . i actually was recommended by my father’s friend who we used to go hunting with all the time. he worked at [government agency] and mentioned to my dad the [government agency] was looking to hire a [specific profession]. and so . . . put in my application and within two weeks i had a job with [government agency] as a [specific occupation]. and from there i moved up to [specific occupation]. (participant 5) c o m m i t m e n t t o t h e r e s e rv a t i o n participants expressed a number of obstacles that individuals many encounter upon returning to the reservation, but noted that they were able to overcome them because of their deep commitment to returning. when we asked participants to make suggestions about how they thought the tribe could encourage college graduates to return to the reservation, they did not hesitate with their responses. this indicated that these topics were already on participants’ minds before they were even considered candidates for this study. the participants recommended that the navajo government make improvements in the areas of employment, housing, and conveniences. e m p l o y m e n t . given the economic challenges of living on the navajo nation, it was not surprising that employment was a salient issue for the participants. this proved to be a complex and nuanced theme and included the following subthemes: hiring systems, wages, job availability, and future career growth. these topics are described in the following sections. within the sub-theme of employment, participants suggested the following areas required improvement: hiring systems, wages, job availability, and future career growth. these topics are described in the following sections. h i ri n g s y s t e m s . participants implied an inconsistency in the hiring process as a place for improvement. participants stated that some are hired simply because of whom they know, others implied the presence of nepotism, and yet others identified a problem with utilizing a non-native workforce: 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.7 it just kind of depends what kind of degree you got, and yeah there are a lot of limitations. but yeah there are a lot of barriers, and i guess you just need to know the right people and be in the right place in order to get a job on the reservation. (participant 13) participants also indicated that finding a job depends both on one’s institutional connections and whom you know. um, because of the traveling and the distance i think the job that he has it’s like it’s sustainable for him. he tried traveling back and forth but the kind of job that he has, there’s no way he’s going to find that kind of a job on the reservation and a lot of it has to do with what i call lateral [indiscernible]. you know you go in and apply for a job and how you look and whom you’re related to and how . . . i mean there’s been jobs where you can apply for and if you belong to a certain family they won’t hire you. (participant 3) start early. there are a lot of connections you can make with people that have been in that similar situation. use your relatives, your connections. in the native world there’s no such thing as seven degrees of separation. there’s one or two. so you’re always able to find someone somewhere, someway, somehow. (participant 5) well one of the key issues—you know how they say navajo preferences? it would have been nice if they’d keep it like that, instead of bringing in all these anglos. and i know with the school system we have a lot of teachers for america, and i think that’s really inappropriate because they didn’t go to school, it’s just like an on-the-job training type of deal. and yeah there are a lot of coming in from different places and that’s why there’s a lack of jobs for the people that really went to school, that got the degree you know. (participant 13) w a g e s . another common area recommended for improvement was wages for workers on the reservation. participants identified low wages as a reason why many educated navajos do not return to the reservation following graduation. they link the role of tribal government with low wages because the tribal government is a primary employer and because the tribal government is responsible for negotiating contracts with many other employers. i think it’s the tribe itself; they need to look into—nowadays it’s money. it’s a moneymaking thing, you know, to support a family and everything. so i think that the navajo nation needs to up their salary wages for a lot of these people that have degrees to come back to our reservation and to get these jobs. (participant 2) i travel a lot in my job and i find a lot of these highly qualified navajo people out there working in the world. and they express they’re coming back, but they express also that the pay is not there on the reservation. but definitely it’s all coming back to our government. it’s our own fault, too. if we really want our kids back, then do something and improve a lot of things in our government. (participant 11) 13 bearchief-adolpho et al.: navajo brain drain: returners' perspectives published by scholarship@western, 2017 j o b a v a i l a b i l i t y . participants also noted the lack of available jobs on the reservation. participants assumed that as the tribe provides more jobs, more educated navajos will return: the recommendation i would make is provide more jobs and maybe provide more houses you know; just pretty much provide more stuff for the navajo people to come back instead of leaving the reservation. i guess basically just helping them out with their scholarships like that, so they can proceed even more with their education. (participant 13) i noticed that a lot of kids, a lot of students have graduated, but there’s no job for them, so they stay in town or they go to [large city]. there’s a classmate that i had. she’s an engineer and she went to [large city] and got a job out there and hasn’t returned. i mean she comes once in a while, but she’s not here anymore. that makes me sad to see our own people go off like that and not have to be here anymore because of jobs. (participant 15) f u t u re c a re e r g ro w t h . participants noted that a significant reason many do not return is the lack of career growth opportunities on the reservation. one participant recommended the tribe make arrangements to promote greater career growth for returning educated navajos by only offering scholarships that are strategically aligned with reservation needs. i think it all starts from the scholarship. to me, i think the scholarships should list some career titles—what i’m trying to say is do what the china people do. they tell you, you’re going into social work. so, the money’s there for social work. you’re going to go into engineering; the money’s there for engineering. something like that should be set up for the navajo scholarship in this case. it’s not people just want to have that money and they just go off to and want to be whatever they want to please. (participant 11) other participants recommend that youth find a way to observe what career they want to do in the future on the reservation, and then choose a degree that naturally fits that availability, thereby promoting future career growth within navajo nation. participants’ suggestions relied upon a proactive approach by navajo citizens to consciously choose careers that grow with the reservation, as a means of career growth security. i really think that a lot of students from high school should make a decision on what they want to do in their future careers to do for their future careers or their future lives. and that’s what i did you know—observe what i wanted to do when i was younger and i observed what kind of jobs they have on the reservation and what there is a demand for and how i could be a part of the network on the reservation rather than finding something that isn’t made available to you on the reservation . . . i think a lot of people i know choose careers that are not available on the reservation. they choose careers that are only available in the city, you know places like that. and i think it would have been nice if they would choose something that would benefit them and benefit the people of the navajo nation, as well. (participant 12) 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.7 h o u s i n g . some participants noted that they returned because they qualified for housing, but they recognized that there is a housing shortage on the reservation, and that current housing policies favor low-income candidates. they recognized that their peers would return if housing were made available, but will continue to reside in cities since it is not. these participants recommend that tribal government provide housing so people can return, affirming: you know what, it was hard to find a job on the reservation. it’s tough even for those who want to do, which i wanted to do. you have to find a place that will hire you. it’s really hard to find a good place to live on the reservation—that’s nice, some places you want to raise a family. i was lucky with the place i got hired because housing was part of the employment. if you are low income you can find a place easy, if you are not, guess what. if they are going to require that, they need to make accommodations for people to live, not just low income. (participant 1) i was in one of those little cubbyholes, studio apartments. it was good. it was really exciting. i applied at nha [navajo housing authority], checked on their prices—but it was very high— and being a single person, you don’t want a three-bedroom home for yourself. it’s not very good. but i eventually did move to [place] and got me an apartment over there. so the issue for me was just, where am i going to live? . . . i have a cousin that’s an architect. i have a cousin that’s a pharmacist. but they all left. they didn’t come back but they’re needed. they want to but there are really no housing opportunities as far as ownership—being able to go through that whole process. so they’re living comfortably in the city. big house, you know, nice car. they could come back with their knowledge that they’ve gained and really do some good. (participant 5) c o n v e n i e n c e s . participants expressed their opinions that reservation life did not provide the conveniences of a city lifestyle, and recommended that the tribe provide conveniences that are similar to that of cities. one participant noted, for example: i have one friend who is a doctor and one who is a lawyer, and they chose to live off the reservation. so that was their choice, they are happy and productive people, but it’s not easy to live on the reservation; you give up a lot of the conveniences. (participant 1) d i s c u s s i o n as mentioned previously, there has been little research done to date on brain drain on american indian nations, with even less research concerning the question of how to stop the brain drain effect for these nations. the purpose of this study was to obtain the perspectives of college-educated navajo tribal members who returned to reside on the reservation after obtaining their education to discover what motivated their decisions. prominent themes included: • family, • community, • cultural identity, • the simple life, 15 bearchief-adolpho et al.: navajo brain drain: returners' perspectives published by scholarship@western, 2017 • reservation economy, and • participant commitments to the reservation. in considering these prominent themes and previous studies, we found that relationships were the most important reason for return—these relationships were tied to family, community, culture, the simple life, and/or the reservation economy. our analysis found that the relationships that motivated participants to return were created through constant, lengthy, and meaningful contact (cf. mckenzie et al., 2013). the themes, sub-themes, and sub-topics discussed in the findings allow us to identify different areas in the lives of each participant where they have developed these kinds of relationships. for example, a participant expressed having consistent experience with family and cultural traditions growing up. their family participated in traditions of songs, stories, and sacred mountains regularly. such experiences were frequently repeated year after year, over a long time, and thus became integrated into their self-identity. as a result, the participant identified family and cultural traditions as the motivating factor for returning to the reservation after getting their education (for parallel findings related to college retention, see heavyrunner & decelles, 2002). other studies show that, to the navajo, identity and relationships are developed from gestation, when the individual’s clan is announced, and in different ceremonies throughout one’s life. ceremonies are the tools used to teach individuals that they are unique and special to family, community, environment, and spirits (white, 1998). it is precisely because these relationships are deeply rooted in and based on constant, lengthy, and meaningful contact that navajos who leave the reservation seeking education are willing to go to extreme lengths to regularly return in order to maintain them. a participant in the study by mckenzie et al. (2013) reported that even though he lived off the reservation, he would drive 5 hours each way at least twice a month to visit his parents and return for ceremonies and family events. participants from the same study also indicated that connections to their culture and to reservation life acted as a sort of magnet, constantly on their minds, pulling them to return. participants indicated that they wanted their children to learn their culture. another expressed a deep connection to the reservation, indicating that there is no other place like it in the world. according to mckenzie et al. (2013), participants unable to permanently return to the reservation were often able to preserve their self-identity while away at school, even after being integrated into dominant society, through cultural practices and the aid of other cultural tools. similarly, haskie (2002) developed a grounded theory, which proposed that individuals from different cultures and backgrounds can preserve the foundation of their cultures even though they may integrate into the dominant society. she stated: in order to survive the integration with a dominant culture, the secondary culture must meet certain conditions. when these conditions are met, people successfully preserve their culture. these conditions include practicing hozho doo k’é, becoming educated, utilizing tools (products of preservation, such as customs that have been recorded on tape and in books), practicing leadership, changing, and adapting. (p. 81) 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.7 even when tribal members leave the reservation, those with strong relationships back home continue to seek ways to maintain constant, lengthy, and meaningful contact, even when they were not easily available. maintaining previously cultivated relationships produced a greater ability for participants to stay focused on returning once they completed their education. lee (2006) reported that navajos believe it is important to know who one’s relatives are and how each human being is connected with all relations on earth and in the universe. the participants of this study reported that these strong and enduring cultural ties were responsible for cultivating navajo self-identity, and this study found that such a self-identity, tied to the reservation, promotes return. a s u rp ri s i n g pa ra d o x the principal investigator was raised a member of the blackfoot nation, a first nation in canada. she, like many of the study’s participants, had a traditional upbringing with tribal songs, dances, stories, and ceremonies, but left the reserve (the word used in canada in place of reservation) seeking higher education, eventually returning to reside on the reserve and serve in tribal political office as a member of chief and council. the themes that have emerged both in this study and in other research concerning the navajo nation’s brain drain surprisingly mirrored many of her own experiences as a member the blackfoot nation. the principal investigator’s experience as a political leader helped her recognize an underlying paradox in the participants’ suggestions about how to increase the number of people returning to the reservation. when asked if participants could offer recommendations that would encourage educated navajos to return, their responses implicated tribal politics in their proposed solutions. participants suggested that if the tribal government could offer better jobs, housing, or other conveniences, then highly educated navajos would return. however, the political experience of the principal investigator suggests that governmental programs are short-term solutions and do little to mitigate the barriers to economic success and political agency. indeed, when the principal investigator won a council position in her nation, it was her turn to make a difference. initially, familiarizing herself with governmental processes proved challenging. in her efforts to be creative, however, she found that her hands were tied, and she was unable to productively direct her tribe’s affairs. further investigation revealed that temporary government programs did not remove barriers, but rather perpetuated them. for example, her research revealed federal tax distributions valued first nation members at 25% less per-capita than non-first nation members. calculations revealed that on-reserve public programs were significantly underfunded but were held to the same standards of expectation as off-reserve programs. moreover, funds that filter through to the tribe were distributed through highly regulated channels, leaving very little room for tribal leaders to use creativity in designing progressive projects. as a last effort, at the end of her term, the principal investigator traveled to ottawa to make her case to the federal government of canada, only to discover even more bureaucratic processes impeding potential change. she concluded that seeking solutions through tribal politics and government policies does little to mitigate economic barriers. in some ways, these policies can hinder constant, lengthy, and meaningful contact, weaken relationships, impede the return of educated members, and perpetuate the brain drain. rather than approaching the problem by focusing on government policy solutions, we see value in a relationship-focused approach, an approach that utilizes constant, lengthy, and meaningful contact as its foundational point of emphasis. 17 bearchief-adolpho et al.: navajo brain drain: returners' perspectives published by scholarship@western, 2017 i m p l i c a t i o n s this study explored an important aspect of the navajo experience in order to uncover why educated navajos chose to return to reside on the reservation. we anticipate that our findings will inform the navajo nation’s efforts to produce a brain gain by suggesting ways in which tribal policy makers may create an environment for strengthening relationships through constant, lengthy, and meaningful contact. this study also has implications beneficial to other indigenous nations and communities that suffer a similar loss of human capital. we see a need for a two-pronged approach to addressing brain drain. while short-term needs must be fulfilled, we believe a long-term vision will produce greater stability and growth, thereby promoting stronger relationships. we believe a long-term nation-building approach holds the greatest promise. a nation-building approach is consistent with the findings of cornell and kalt (2006): “we have called this the ‘nation-building’ approach, thanks to its dual focus—conscious or unconscious—on asserting tribal sovereignty and building the foundational, institutional capacity to exercise sovereignty effectively, thereby providing a positive environment for sustained economic development” (p. 11). cornell and kalt (2006) have suggested that the foundation of such an environment is based upon five attributes, which can be easily customized to a specific tribe’s cultural values. they are: a. real sovereignty, in which self-governance places the development agenda in american indian hands, and decisions and consequences work together to produce efficiency; b. effective governing institutions as a fixed constitution through which the american indians agree upon the “rules of the game”; c. cultural match, in which the “rules of the game” are navajo rules, and based on navajo values; d. strategic compass, referring to a plan of strategy that resists quick fixes in exchange for longterm, visionary rewards; and e. nation-building leadership, referring to a system of leadership that is not primarily focused on redistributing government funds, but rather utilizes a model based on efficiency and success, both in politics and within the community. a strategic long-term approach fashioned in this manner holds the promise of a positive environment and a sturdy foundation upon which economic growth, cultural preservation, and deep relationships can be built. a new mentality, which is free of the hegemony of colonial regulatory ideals and emphasizes bringing the political battle to familiar terrain in which decision-making is done on the reservation, for the reservation, and by the reservation, would place the residents of a reservation both in control of their destiny and hold them fully accountable for their decisions. rather than waiting for the lengthy, bureaucratic processes tied to government latency, tribal leaders who make decisions can be held accountable for the choices they have made and the programs they have implemented. accountability on the part of tribal 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.7 leadership would produce a strategy involving the input of the nation (insofar as tribal leaders would depend on members of the nation for re-election), thus tying the choices of tribal leaders to the ideals of tribal members, making both leaders and members directly accountable for all decisions made. moreover, accountability would necessitate better communication on the reservation and require that nation members increase their awareness of how the mechanisms work and their role in the process. this would restore the tribe’s reliance upon constant, lengthy, and meaningful contact—upon which its survival and future depend for the strength of its relationships. changing the nation’s approach to emphasize constant, lengthy, meaningful relationships will affect the mindset of the people. this approach would align with what naturally draws navajos to return to the reservation, and would produce an even greater attraction for educated navajos to return in future. regarding the second aspect of a two-pronged approach, in the short-term, policy makers might find a higher yield on their investment in human capital through education by awarding more scholarships to students studying in fields that align with long-term tribal growth. converging the growth of the nation with the growth of its citizens encourages hope for both a returning educated population and greater economic stability. in addition, prioritized scholarships have the potential to improve return on investment in educated human capital by fitting current tribal needs with available skilled human capital. however, without the foundation of the long-term strategic thinking outlined above, even policies such as this may have no impact or even contribute to further brain drain. l i m i t a t i o n s as with any study, limitations were inevitable. one limitation of the study is the place from which participants were drawn (a cultural gathering in albuquerque, new mexico), insofar as the study assumed that those attending this cultural gathering offered a good representation of college-educated navajos who had returned to live on the reservation. however, the opinions of participants in the findings may not represent the opinions of the navajo population as a whole. perhaps less social or less politically involved individuals on the reservation would have had different perspectives and reasons for returning. a second limitation is the inherent biases of the interviewers, which have been outlined above. much was done in the study to design questions and employ a method that allowed participants to express their ideas freely. likewise, the hermeneutic method is aimed at articulating and exposing bias. however, interviewers came from different disciplines and backgrounds, which may have produced a tendency to conduct interviews or make interpretations based in their own assumptions, which, in turn, may have distorted some of the findings. r e c o m m e n d a t i o n s f o r f u t u re r e s e a rc h throughout the study, we recognized a strong tie between the tribe, on a macro-scale, and individual families, on a micro-scale. this study suggests relationships could inform tribal governance. participants suggested that relationships were the main factor in their decisions to return to the reservation, with family relationships mentioned most often. further research that focuses specifically on the principles and teachings that were taught in the families of returners may be beneficial to identify the reasons why individuals have a desire to return. a study on families who have a high rate of returning members versus families with a low rate of return may also provide new insights—such a study would 19 bearchief-adolpho et al.: navajo brain drain: returners' perspectives published by scholarship@western, 2017 require a method that allows for a sustained relationship between investigators and participants to get a deeper and more personal view into the matter. moreover, collaborative studies conducted by indigenous investigators and non-american indian investigators may uncover greater detail about the causes of brain drain. an outsider’s view and an insider’s view, together, could produce a better view of the whole situation, thereby providing better recommendations and a greater justification for implementing recommendations. we suggest that if a relationship-based approach would produce greater brain gain on the reservation then it might also prove productive in the investigative work aimed at uncovering solutions. such a collaborative approach would enhance non-american indian investigators’ understandings of the difficulties of the reservation, and could provide a more sophisticated approach to issues affecting american indians on the reservation by uncovering ideas that may have been missed by the cultural insiders. c o n c l u s i o n for decades, developed economies have recruited the brightest educated navajos, while the navajo nation has financed its members’ education and realized little benefit. since 1863, when navajos lost their autonomy and were politically subjugated, the u.s. federal government has heavily influenced the navajo nation, and it has in many ways perpetuated the trail of tears1 (ruffing, 1979). tribal sovereignty has gradually evolved and is slowly returning agency to american indian people, but it has not done so quickly enough (cornell & kalt, 2006). the price of the navajo diaspora exceeds calculation in dollars lost, especially when considering the effects on quality of life of navajo nation residents and their limited potential for future economic prosperity. despite heavy losses, however, the persistence and resilience of members of the navajo nation is evident in this study and elsewhere. the experiences shared by participants of this study echo a call from the past for fundamental navajo values to return to the navajo nation. participants shared one of more of the following reasons for their return after getting an education: family, community, cultural identity, the simple life, reservation economy, and/or commitment to the reservation. the overarching theme that was present across respondents’ reasons for returning was relationships built on constant, lengthy, meaningful contact. given this, the degree to which the navajo nation can cultivate relationships built on such contact is the degree to which the navajo nation can experience brain gain. however, in order to create an environment that will cultivate such constant, lengthy, meaningful contact, we recommend a renovation in response to the subjugation of the navajo by and to a foreign government. we recommend that the foreign foundation be replaced by a two-pronged approach toward self-governance (cornell & kalt, 2006). from the beginning, navajo values have stood in contrast to the purposes of the colonizing government’s principles. the principles behind the colonizer’s government have created a harsh environment that negatively affects navajo relationships. however, uprooting the foundation of colonizing government policies, and replacing them with a sovereign nation-building approach (cornell & kalt, 2006), will perpetuate the return of college 1 the trail of tears refers to the journey taken by the cherokee people who were forced to leave their lands by the u.s. government (see cherokee nation, 2017; national park service, n.d.; wgbh educational foundation, 2010). 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.7 educated members to the navajo nation. we hope that this study will have implications that are beneficial to other indigenous nations and communities that have suffered a similar loss of human capital. 21 bearchief-adolpho et al.: navajo brain drain: returners' perspectives published by scholarship@western, 2017 r e f e re n c e s ahmad, o. b. 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(n.d.). the trail of tears and the forced relocation of the cherokee nation. retrieved from https://www.nps.gov/nr/twhp/wwwlps/lessons/118trail/118trail.htm office of navajo nation scholarship and financial support (2011). 2010 annual report. retrieved from www.onnsfa.org/portals/0/docs/onnsfa%202010%20annual%20rpt.pdf polkinghorne, d. e. (1984). further extensions of methodological diversity for counseling psychology. journal of counseling psychology, 31(4), 416-429. https://doi.org/10.1037/00220167.31.4.416 ruffing, t. (1979). the navajo nation: a history of dependence and underdevelopment. review of radical political economics, 11(2), 25-43. doi: https://doi.org/10.1177/048661347901100203 trusty, j., looby, e. j., & sandhu, d. s. (2002). multicultural counseling: context, theory and practice, and competence. huntington, ny: nova. wgbh educational foundation (producer). (2010). trail of tears [streaming video]. available from https://utah.pbslearningmedia.org/resource/akh10.socst.ush.exp.trail/trail-oftears/#.wmq6bbc_ex white, k. (1998). navajo adolescent cultural identity and depression. (unpublished doctoral dissertation). university of utah, salt lake city. 23 bearchief-adolpho et al.: navajo brain drain: returners' perspectives published by scholarship@western, 2017 zweig, d. (1997). to return or not to return? politics vs. economics in china’s brain drain. studies in comparative international development, 32(1), 92-12. doi: https://doi.org/10.1007/bf02696307 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.7 a p p e n d i x g u i d i n g q u e s t i o n s 1. can you tell me a bit about your life growing up on the navajo nation? where did you live? where did you go to school? what activities were you involved in? what did you want to be when you grew up?) 2. after you graduated from high school, you began attending college. can you tell me a bit about your experience in college? what colleges did you attend? what did you study? whom did you live with or spend time with? what extracurricular activities were you involved in? 3. what were your career plans as you were working on your college degree? how did these change over time? 4. what thoughts did you have while you were in college about returning to live on the navajo nation? 5. as you considered your plans after graduation from college, what were your thoughts about returning to live on the navajo nation? what were the key issues as you considered this possibility? as you consider your future, what thoughts do you have about living on the navajo nation? what are the key factors you will consider as you make future plans? 6. what advice would you give to others who are considering the question of whether to live on the navajo nation after they graduate from college? how do you see the issues involved in the decision changing over time? 25 bearchief-adolpho et al.: navajo brain drain: returners' perspectives published by scholarship@western, 2017 the international indigenous policy journal january 2017 navajo nation brain drain: an exploration of returning college graduates’ perspectives quintina ava bearchief-adolpho aaron p. jackson steven a. smith moroni t. benally recommended citation navajo nation brain drain: an exploration of returning college graduates’ perspectives abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license navajo nation brain drain: an exploration of returning college graduatesâ•ž perspectives ensuring equitable distribution of land in ghana: spirituality or policy? a case study from the forest-savanna agroecological zone of ghana the international indigenous policy journal volume 2 issue 4 traditional knowledge, spirituality, and lands article 9 october 2011 ensuring equitable distribution of land in ghana: spirituality or policy? a case study from the forest-savanna agroecological zone of ghana samuel awuah-nyamekye university of leeds, united kingdom, kwasi.nyamekye@yahoo.com paul sarfo-mensah dr. kwame nkrumah university of science & technology (knust) kumasi ghana,, pksm01@yahoo.com recommended citation awuah-nyamekye, s. , sarfo-mensah, p. (2011). ensuring equitable distribution of land in ghana: spirituality or policy? a case study from the forest-savanna agroecological zone of ghana. the international indigenous policy journal, 2(4) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.9 this research is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. ensuring equitable distribution of land in ghana: spirituality or policy? a case study from the forest-savanna agroecological zone of ghana abstract this article explores the pent-up question of equitable distribution of land in ghana using the forest-savanna agroecological zone as a case study. it focuses on the dichotomy of policy versus indigenous spirituality in contemporary distribution of land in ghana. after independence several attempts have been made to restructure land title holding in ghana by way of land registration. the effectiveness of these attempts is also examined. the paper concludes that ghana needs pragmatic steps (policies) to confront the challenges of land distribution. and in taking these pragmatic policies, the religio-cultural underpinnings (the people`s worldview) of land issues in ghana should be factored into the policy that will result. anything short of this will make the implementation of any land policy in ghana ineffective. keywords land distribution, customary laws, spirituality of land, indigenous people, policy reforms acknowledgments 1. the term ‘indigenous’ is liable to shade of connotations. in view of this no a mean institution like the un is reluctant to use it due to the unpleasant connotation that the term has assumed today. in this paper, however, the term ‘indigenous’ refers to original or aboriginal. therefore, any reference to indigenous people in this paper should be understood as those people whose forebears founded settlements where they are found today and are glued to the customs and traditions of their forebears. in other words, they are the people who can lay legitimate claim to the land they are occupying today through ancestry. in this way, one may also refer to indigenous people as traditional people. for that reason, the two terms are used interchangeable in this discourse. by extension, the term ‘indigenous’ or’ traditional’ religion should also be understood as the religion of the people of ghana before their encounter with western european civilisation and religions like christianity and islam. 2. by tribal societies, we simply mean societies that are organised mainly on the kinship lines and may trace their origin or ancestry from one source. they are not directly comparable with reference groups or psychographic segments. they concentrate on the bonding or linking elements that keep individuals in the group. 3.earth yaa, yaa is a name given by the twi-speaking akan to a baby girl born on a thursday. therefore, the earth goddess was believed to have been created on a thursday. 4.among the fantespeaking akan, however, the earth goddess was believed to have been created on a friday, naming it efua, a name given to a friday born baby girl. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ introduction in ghana, land is one of the most contentious development assets in terms of ownership and distribution (goldstein and udry, 2008; amanor, 2001). during colonial and post colonial eras, policies on land have been aimed at making ownership less litigious to enhance rapid socio-economic development of the country. this has been done with tacit reference to customary land regulations i.e. the “original” laws of the people or body of rules governing personal status, communal resources, and local organisation in many parts of africa (ghai, 1987; whitehead and tsikata, 2003; joireman, 2008). central to customary regime of land distribution, is the institution of chieftaincy (or traditional authority), which comprise the chief, elders or lineage heads and its supporting systems of indigenous1 perceptions of many ghanaians about land transcend its productive and resource endowment capacity (amanor, 2001). ownership is often tied to the living, the dead and unborn (parrinder, 1961; danquah, 1968; opoku, 1978; mccaskey, 1995). in the various tribal religion, beliefs and taboos (goldstein and udry, 2008:5; aldashev, et al. 2009). in this paper, we seek to draw attention to one intrinsic attribute of customary law: the spirituality of land. that is the reverence for land as a deity in many traditional societies in ghana, which although recognised, has not been considered to enhance policy effectiveness (konadu-agyemang, 1991). 2 with independence and constitutional governance, land reforms in ghana are increasingly fashioned through pluralism and consensus building (amanor, 2001; larbi, 2006). for example, since 2004 the land administration project has been used by governments as a platform to elicit public participation in re-engineering the land administration system and to develop a system that is fair, efficient, transparent and cost effective. this is a comprehensive reform programme that affects the entire continuum of land administration including policy and legal regimes and institutional reforms i.e. public and customary (larbi, 2006, 1). government and its development partners have provided resources to enable traditional authorities to effectively participate in the land reform processes. this has included the setting up of land secretariats within traditional councils, whose functions include boundary demarcations, documentation of land sales and providing avenue for alternative land dispute societies, which constitute the traditional areas, the living with the chiefs as the principal trustees is said to be holding the land in care for their ancestors and the unborn (busia, 1951; konadu-agyeman, 1991; sarfo-mensah and oduro, 2010). this spiritual connectedness may invoke extreme conservatism to protection and management of land (mufeme, 1999). arguably, the distribution, ownership and management of land in the country is significantly influenced by traditional institutions, especially chieftaincy and its related belief systems (appiah-opoku and hyma, 1999) and their authority to allocate land rights and the entitlements to the proceeds from such allocations (ubink and quan, 2008). 1 the term ‘indigenous’ is liable to shade of connotations. in view of this no a mean institution like the un is reluctant to use it due to the unpleasant connotation that the term has assumed today. in this paper, however, the term ‘indigenous’ refers to original or aboriginal. therefore, any reference to indigenous people in this paper should be understood as those people whose forebears founded settlements where they are found today and are glued to the customs and traditions of their forebears. in other words, they are the people who can lay legitimate claim to the land they are occupying today through ancestry. in this way, one may also refer to indigenous people as traditional people. for that reason, the two terms are used interchangeable in this discourse. by extension, the term ‘indigenous’ or’ traditional’ religion should also be understood as the religion of the people of ghana before their encounter with western european civilisation and religions like christianity and islam. 2 by tribal societies, we simply mean societies that are organised mainly on the kinship lines and may trace their origin or ancestry from one source. they are not directly comparable with reference groups or psychographic segments. they concentrate on the bonding or linking elements that keep individuals in the group. 1 awuah-nyamekye and sarfo-mensah: ensuring equitable distribution of land in ghana:spirituality or policy? published by scholarship@western, 2011 resolution (ubink and quan, 2008). many land cases that have crowded the law courts and grounded in protracted litigations have been settled. in spite of increased public participation in land reforms and government collaboration with traditional authorities in land administration, the country is still beset with major challenges in land distribution and management. for example, government interests in public and vested lands have been clouded in political interference and weak management (kasanga, 2001). this has often led to collision of interests between the state and traditional authorities, particularly where the former had applied the compulsory acquisition instrument to acquire such lands (larbi, et al., 2004). the credibility of land markets have also been undermined by insecurity of tenure (kanji, et al., 2005; ubink, 2008). several scholarly works identify policy weakness as a major problem (kasanga, 2001; whitehead and tsikata, 2003; larbi, et al., 2004; goldstein and udry, 2008). however, policy recommendations have been varied and there is no consensus on policy aspects that need to be enhanced. we posit that land policies in ghana have not adequately integrated traditional belief systems to enhance equitable distribution and optimal use of land. in this paper, we aim to examine how the concept of spirituality of land, which revolves around reverence of land as deity and is a central pillar of the customary land management, can be used to enhance land policy effectiveness. our reference point is the transitional ecological zone in the brong ahafo. the paper is organised into five sections. this first part deals with the background. in the second section we give a background to the study area. the third section deals with the study methodology. in the next main section we discuss the concept of land in the study area and pre–colonial, colonial and post-colonial land administration in ghana and how they relate to the study area. in section four, we discuss the nexus of spirituality and policy. we finally present the conclusion in section five. the study area the forest-savanna agro-ecological zone spreads across several regions in ghana but predominately found in the brong ahafo region, which is the study area (see fig 1). brong ahafo region is located in the central part of ghana. it covers an area of 39,557 km², which constitutes about 17 % of the total land area of ghana and is ranked second in terms of land expanse. the region is characterised by a low elevation not exceeding 152 metres above sea level in the southern and eastern areas and rises to a height of 643 metres in other areas (fargey, 1991). the forest-savanna agroecological zone of ghana typifies changes in social, economic, cultural and biophysical conditions, which can be used to assess change and sustainability of natural resources management including land. it also exemplifies conditions which can be used to investigate the effects of changes in the environment and livelihood systems. as in the other parts of west africa, the zone has often been delineated into four types: forest, savanna, farmland and fallow (hopkins, 1992). however, most of the zone is made up of a mosaic of forest and savanna species, and is characterised by a rainfall regime of 1,300-1,500 mm, bimodally distributed (gyasi, 1997). the rainfall is adequate to support two crops a year and the prevalence of ochrosols makes the zone suitable both for perennial tree crops and annual food crops (soil research institute, 1971). the zone covers about 11% of the total land area of ghana (sarris and shams, 1991). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.9 # # # # # # # # ## # # buabeng fiemabofie nkyeraa dotobaa savannah transitional zone d eciduous forest deciduous forest coa stal sa van nah wa ho accra tamale kumasi sunyani bolgatanga sekondi takoradi #koforidua 30 0 30 kilometers n agroecological zone study sites# districts nkoranza wenchi legend figure 1. the forest-savanna transitional agro-ecological zone of ghana. sarfo-mensah, 2001. 3 awuah-nyamekye and sarfo-mensah: ensuring equitable distribution of land in ghana:spirituality or policy? published by scholarship@western, 2011 in several areas of the zone, changes in ethnic composition and accompanying variations in resource utilisation (amanor, 1994), increasing human population pressures and commercialisation of agriculture are altering the conditions for natural resources management including access to and management of land (benneh and agyapong, 1990; amanor, 1994). methodology this study is based on a research carried out between 2009 and 2011 in the transitional agroecological zone in the brong ahafo region of ghana to assess local people’s perceptions on land ownership and management. it was a follow up to our earlier study in the region on traditional natural resources management practices in 2000. field data gathering were in two forms. firstly, semi-structured interviews were conducted with heads of four relevant regional government departments (lands, forestry, food and agriculture, and town and country planning). open-ended questions were used to engage with these senior officers on a wide range of issues on land management in including statutory and customary laws and land policies. a total of eight senior government officials were interviewed. secondly, key informant interviews and field observations were carried out in four previously studied communities (buabeng fiema, dotabaa, bofie and nchiraa) to assess changes in land tenure and their local interpretations. our respondents were local chiefs, community elders and opinion leaders. we also conducted focus group discussions with social groups (migrants, women, youth and commercial farmers) in these communities, in order to triangulate information gathered from our two earlier interview series on issues relating to access to land, current government policies on land, local perceptions and beliefs on land. a total of 100 respondents, comprising 50 females and 50 males were purposively selected for the interviews in the four communities. the interviews were also complemented by a literature review on land use and natural resources management. our data were analysed qualitatively using in-depth assessment of the various thematic areas. conception of land in the study area the concept of land among indigenous ghanaians and the people of the study area derive from their overall worldview, which is hugely theistic (mccaskie, 1995; abayie boaten, 1998). and, by worldview of the local people, we refer to the set of basic assumptions of the people developed in order to explain reality and their place and purpose in this world (mkhize, 2004). in other words, and to borrow elkins’ words, worldview is “a view of nature and life, of the universe and man, which unites them with nature’s activities and species’ in bond ‘of mutual life-giving” (elkin, 1938,133, quoted in rose, et al. 2003, 59). the worldview of a people shapes their attitudes, values and opinions as well as the way they think and behave (mkhize, 2004). in our study communities, as elsewhere in ghana, local people’s conception of the universe and whatever therein is believed to be the creation of a supernatural being that is variously known in their respective cultural milieu (rattray, 1923; frazer, 1926; mcleod, 1981; mccaskie, 1995). the local people as typical of the akan group of ghana call the creator nyame (goody, 1959; pashington obeng, 1996; sarbah, 2010). within the study communities, and as it is the case in many parts of ghana and of course across indigenous or traditional societies in africa, the universe is seen in a dualistic way, the physical and the spiritual (mbiti,1991; ejizu, 2000; mkhize, 2004). it is important to note that this division is artificial, for the two are paradoxically one entity, for one is not independent of the other but the two must be in harmony for life to become meaningful (awuahnyamekye, 2009). however, the spiritual takes precedence over the physical due to the belief that it is the spiritual that created the physical. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.9 this theistic worldview influences actions of the people`s activities including their relationship with nature, especially land. for scholars like byers et al. (2001) and opuni asiama (2007), the african in many cases see their relationship to the land as a matter of spiritual concern. under this worldview, the indigenous ghanaians view land and its resources as divine gift to the social group or communal property which the living must hold in trust for their ancestors and the future generations (omari, 1990; byers, et al., 2001; opuni asiama, 2007). and indeed in greater part of the transitional agroecological zone, it is embedded in the arrangement that allows indigenous people usufructual rights to land for farming and other subsistence needs (asenso-okyere, et al., 1993; kuntu-mensah, 2000). as typical of most akan societies (benneh, 1965; goldstein and udry, 2008), individual members of the study communities obtain rights to land through the extended family (abusua), whose head (abusua panin) supervises the allocation of the land of the extended family (abusua asase). our respondents, both government official and local people, attested to the fact that communal property is still the predominant form of land distribution in the study area. for example, all the 100 respondents interviewed in the four communities agreed that the customary land arrangement ensured that indigenous people had easy access to land, at least family land. however, 60 percent of women respondents indicated that they were comparatively disadvantaged as against men in terms of access to quality land. this is not peculiar to the study area as goldstein and udry (2008), found similar situation, among the akan in akwapim, southern ghana. in the literature, we found generally similar beliefs in land and their influences in land distribution and ownership in other parts of the country. fortes’ 1945 studies among the tallensi of northern ghana revealed similar findings of belief systems that inform land ownership and distribution. braimoh (2005) found that land ownership and tenure in northern ghana are entrenched in the traditional common property: ”in these parts of ghana, the various tribes all stand in awe of the earth and speak of it as a ‘living thing’ which they believe can intervene mystically in human affairs as the ancestral spirits do” (p.176). danquah (1928) outlines the akyim of ghana conception of land as; land is the property of the ancestors, it is not the property of the living but belongs to the future generation. timberlake and cunliffe (2007) study among the zambezi society and that of nwosu (2010) among the okonko society of nigeria produce similar findings. this means that living persons only hold the land in trust for posterity and thus cannot sell it. we must also point out that, in the study communities, as common among the akan and many traditional societies in ghana, land is viewed as one of their important deities (parrinder, 1961; opoku, 1978; sarfo-mensah and oduro, 2007; sarfo-mensah et al., 2010). among the twi speaking akan, who are the biggest ethnic group in our study area, land (earth) is seen as a goddess and it is known as asase yaa3 (see nkansa kyeremateng, 1999) and asase efua4 3 earth yaa, yaa is a name given by the twi-speaking akan to a baby girl born on a thursday. therefore, the earth goddess was believed to have been created on a thursday. by the fante speaking akan. in view of this, certain things are considered as hateful to the land. such actions may include: tilling the land on its natal day, murder (spilling innocent blood on the land), having sexual intercourse in the bush, giving birth in the bush, burying a pregnant woman without removing the foetus and digging a grave without offering libation to the land first, etc. all these acts are taboos to the land, for the commission of any of them is deemed to have polluted the land. consequently, the land has to be propitiated or else, it may result in a drought or infertility in the soil (all our key informants stressed this. see also frazer, 1926; sarfo-mensah and oduro, 2007). 4 among the fante-speaking akan, however, the earth goddess was believed to have been created on a friday, naming it efua, a name given to a friday born baby girl. 5 awuah-nyamekye and sarfo-mensah: ensuring equitable distribution of land in ghana:spirituality or policy? published by scholarship@western, 2011 this belief was found among all our respondents, including christians, muslims and adherents of african traditional religion. consequently, local people have put in place laws and other measures that revolved around this common belief of land as goddess to regulate the interactions with the land, particularly in order to ensure its sustainable use (gyasi, 1977; abayie boaten, 1998; appiah-opoku and hyma, 1999). in all the four communities there was a day that is designated as “non-farming day” (tuesday and thursdays). according to some of our respondents these days were used by the land goddess to visit and fertilise the soils. land tenure system in the pre-colonial ghana by land tenure system we simply mean how right to land is obtained and distributed in a particular society. during the pre-colonial time, the population of ghana was small and land was in abundance. hunters were the major link in founding new settlements. this was the results of the hamlets they pitched during their hunting expeditions, which later developed into big settlements (kyeame donkor, bofie, pers. comm., 2010). this means that the first settler or settlers in an area has/have a large portion of land to himself or themselves. according rawlings (2009), the former president of ghana, individual families in any given village usually possesses land through clearing the virgin bush. any portion of land that an individual acquired in this way, the community respected or protected his or her right to use it for life. this meant that land title holding in the pre-colonial era was the ability to clear it for farming purposes. also, other individuals who were able to establish farms deep in the forests had right to such lands. the people always believed that the thickets of the forests harbour spirits of all kinds including dangerous animals so for someone to be able to do that meant the courageous nature of the individual and thus is given the right to own that land for his bravely (sarfomensah, 2001). land title at that time could also be acquired through either transfer or inheritance negotiation and conquest. our respondents in the communities, especially among the chiefs and elders also referred to the bravery of many past chiefs in fighting wars that won their communities large tracts of conquered lands. this confirms berry’s (1992:1) suggestion that since pre-colonial times africans have attached both material and symbolic significance to land; and, rights in land have been exchanged, negotiated and fought over in the course of political and religious as well as demographic and economic change. an individual, who is not an indigene of an area, could also acquire land if, and only if, he or she is socially and politically acceptable in the community. one would do this by officially consulting the chief of the village, expressing the desire. here, the usufructuary’s continuous right to the land depended on his or her loyalty and obedience to the leadership of the community concerned. on his death, the land reverted back to the community. at times, his or her immediate dependants may be allowed to continue to use the land but again, they must continue to demonstrate respect and loyalty to the community (kwaku akowua, buabeng, per. comm., 2000). the above shows that land tenure system in ghana, like that of other forms of land ownership is seated in antiquity (acquaye and murphy, 1973). it is important to stress that although the individual may acquire land and have right to its usage even for life, the truth is that the individual did not own the land as such but enjoyed its usufruct. this is because as noted earlier on, the real owners of the land in any traditional community in ghana are the ancestors on whose stead the chief stands. that is, the chief has the custody of all land in his jurisdiction. this implies that land in ghana and in most of africa has economic, religious and political connotations (kuntu-mensah, 2000). 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.9 land distribution during the pre-colonial era, the main means of getting access to agricultural land was through lineage (joireman, 2007). usually the land was shared among those who trace their lineage through a common female ancestor (berry, 1988, 5). this means the basis of transfer was between matrilineal relatives and the land rights of a deceased person transferred to the living matrilineal relative (kasanga and kotey, 2001; quisumbing, 2007; rawlings, 2009). there was no discrimination against either gender for land use under this system. however, because it was the men’s duty to feed their respective family members, they cultivated more land than women but the women controlled the produce in their granaries. in fact, there was no marked differentiation under this system of land tenure. one may, therefore, describe the distribution of land among the people in the forest-savanna agroecological zone of ghana as egalitarian. this is because there was the fear that the ancestors would deal ruthlessly with anyone who tried to cheat the other in the distribution of land. the reason for this is that land is the source of livelihood and, therefore, preventing a member of the community from getting his or her fair share of land use means that one is to starve to death. the above description generally constituted the ghanaian land tenure system before her colonial experience. this general pattern notwithstanding, women were often prevented from inheriting land from their parents. women’s inheritance rights, according to tribal customs, were underlined by the fear that ancestral lands may fall into stranger hands or be excessively split, especially when marriage practices follow the rule of virilocal exogamy (goody, 1976 cited by aldashev, et al., 2009, 18). but women were insured against various contingencies, in particular the prospects of separation/divorce, widowhood, and unwed motherhood. in such circumstances, they typically enjoy the right to return to their father’s land where they are allowed to work and subsist till they find a new husband (aldashev et al., 2009, 18). colonial experience and its effects on land administration in ghana ghana is now an independent state with a republican status yet the legacy of colonisation is still influential in many policy-decisions including that of land tenure in the country. the arrival of the europeans in ghana (previously gold coast) altered the face of the land tenure system. the indirect rule strategy adopted by the british was instrumental in the change. the key factor of indirect rule was controlling the people through the chiefs. but this system of administration weakened the authority of the chiefs over their people. for instance, from 1878 to 1910, the british governors introduced a series of laws called native jurisdiction ordinances. a common feature of these laws was that the indigenous rulers (chiefs) were granted only limited powers to preside over cases (buah, 1998). the result of this encounter was the gradual replacement of traditional systems of government with the western liberal democracy with its christian biases and, thus, weakening the chiefs authority (parrinder, 1961). for instance, the british delegated the administration of land to the paramount and divisional chiefs, thus minimizing the powers of the of village chiefs. northern ghana was set up as a protectorate and the land and native acts rights ordinance of 1927 declared all lands public and vested in the colonial governor (lund, 2008, 19; (kuntu-mensah, 2000). what this meant was that religion and culture which formed the basis of land acquisition and distribution was being replaced by imperial policy. in other words, this development created two different legal systems, the long established customary land law based on religious considerations and that of english law (rawlings, 2009). following from this colonial legacy, today, the government of ghana reserves the right to acquire any piece of land that it considers strategic for either economic or other reason(s) for fair compensation. but arguably the compensation is often not fair yet the land owner has 7 awuah-nyamekye and sarfo-mensah: ensuring equitable distribution of land in ghana:spirituality or policy? published by scholarship@western, 2011 to wait for a long time before this compensation is paid (see for example kasanga, 2001). at times, it is not paid at all. due to a population increase, land shortages began to be experienced and particularly so in the forest-savanna agroecological zone. this, coupled with secular land laws resulting from colonisation, led to the commercialisation of land as a saleable commodity in certain areas in ghana, particularly our study area where cash crops plantations such as cocoa, coffee and oil palm started to spring up. this attracted mass movement of people, particularly from the south and the northern areas. what became a permanent feature of this was that, instead of ‘lending’, outright sale of land became possible. this produced what became known as ‘company lands’, when a group of non-kinsmen associated together for the sole purpose of purchasing land from a vendor chief for commercial farming (hill, 1970). another land acquisition arrangement which resulted from the changes to land title holding in ghana is what gyasi (1994) describes as being done (a) through leasing for a fee for 25-50 years (b) through a combination of lease and share cropping and (c) through pure share cropping. the category (c) arrangement falls under three main forms. these are: abunu (the ratio is 1:1, that is, the produce from the farm or the farming itself is divided into two, one half to the land owner and the other half to the farmer (tenant); abusa (where the ratio is 1:2), that is one-third to the landlord and two-thirds to the tenant; and, the abunan arrangement which is not normally done. this is where the ratio is 1:3 where one-quarter to the landlord and three-quarters to the tenant). one serious effect resulting from the changes in land acquisition resulting from colonial legacy and increase in population is the fact that access to land is now not easy in ghana and women bear the greater brunt of the situation. this is because rural women inherited a situation where their rights and access to cultivable lands have decreased and the open forest woodland and bush from which they gather such vital necessities as fodder, fuel wood and water have grown scarce or have disappeared (berry, 1988; nyantakyi, 2006). post–independence land policy after independence several attempts were made to restructure land title holding in ghana by way of land registration. the pillars of the restructuring, which were to ensure equitable distribution and sustainable management of land resources and its related natural resources, revolved around: the land development act of 1960; the farm lands protection act of 1962; and, the land registration act 1962 (act 122) (ministry of lands and forestry, mlf, 1999). but it is important to mention that these acts were not comprehensive enough to address the land litigation and other problems related to land administration in ghana. this is because either the policies are ad hoc or not comprehensive enough to deal with the problem (agbosu, 1990). for instance, the 1962 act failed to require the attachment of accurate plans to the registrable instrument (kuntu-mensah, 2000). it was in 1986 that a comprehensive attempt was made to put structures in place for land title registration in ghana. this culminated in the land title registration law, 1986 pndcl 152 (kuntu-mensah, 2000). this has been the framework for the land registration policy in the country ever since. in acknowledging the many challenges in land administration and the policy gaps, a more participatory process was initiated to develop a more comprehensive land policy. the formulation processes were started in 1994 as a sequel to the land title registration law, 1986 pndcl 152. the process culminated in a national workshop in april 1997 the outcome of which is the premier national land policy document (nlp), which was approved by government on 21st january 1999. this policy is the current framework by which land is managed in ghana today. the authors of the policy recognised that the fundamental problems associated with land management in ghana persisted, and included general indiscipline in the land market, characterized by land encroachments, multiple land sales, use of 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.9 unapproved development schemes, haphazard development, indeterminate boundaries of customaryowned land resulting by government control of large tracts of land which have not been utilized. it also responded to a weak land administration system and conflicting land uses, such as the activities of mining companies, which have large tracts of land denuded against farming, which is the mainstay of the rural economy. there is also the time-consuming land litigation, which have crowded out other cases in the law courts. the 1999 national land policy, therefore, aims at the judicious use of the nation’s land and all its natural resources by all sections of the ghanaian society in support of various socio-economic activities undertaken in accordance with sustainable resource management principles and in maintaining viable ecosystems (mlf, 1999). the major pillars intended to guide policy action and execution are the following: • securing ghana’s international boundaries and shared water resources • facilitating equitable access to land • security of tenure and protection of land rights • ensuring sustainable land use • enhancing land capability and land conservation. these pillars are so well elaborated that one would have thought they would have led to smooth policy implementation and significant reduction in the incidence of litigation (see ghana land policy, 1999 section four (4)). one of the major reasons cited for the persistence of high levels of litigation is the difficulty in harmonising customary land practices and enacted legislation (kuntu-mensah, 2000), the two domains governing land administration in the country. this, in our view, presents one of the major challenges to land administration in the country and underpins the insecurity of tenure and protection of land rights. in fact, the lack of respect for land laws and regulations has partly been attributed to the over emphasis on enacted legislations to the detriment of customary practices. arguably, in many ghanaian communities, respect for customary laws because of their spirituality, was found to be more compelling than statutory laws (nkosi, 1999; sarbah, 2010). such religious beliefs and practices are pervasive and deeply entrenched among significant proportion of the populations in ghana, especially in the rural areas were about 60 percent of the national population resides and where major economic activities, especially agriculture and mining, take place (sarfo-mensah, 2002). we would, therefore, like to state that in spite of the changes in land policies and, of course, the land tenure system in ghana, we found that customary law, which has religious underpinnings, is still strong and especially in rural ghana where our study area is located. however, what we found baffling is that although the present administrative arrangement in ghana recognises customary land tenure as a valid system, past and present governments have not yet adequately taken advantage of it to enhance policy effectiveness. the nexus between policy and spirituality to this point we have outlined the evolution of land polices in ghana and their core challenges. in this section we discuss further the issue of traditional spirituality and religion in land policies. we explored the subject during our interviews through a simplified comparison between “traditional authority” and “local administration or the district assembly”. the former represented the chieftaincy, customary land management system and their associated religious beliefs; and, the latter represented state or the local government system, which is in charge of local administration including land policy 9 awuah-nyamekye and sarfo-mensah: ensuring equitable distribution of land in ghana:spirituality or policy? published by scholarship@western, 2011 implementation. we encouraged respondents to assess the strengths and weakness of the two institutions on a wide range of issues on natural resources management focusing the discussions on land policy and spirituality of land. we found that, among our respondents at the community level (chiefs, elders, women, men, youth, children and migrants), a general perception had arisen; the role of state institutions in natural resources management was regarded with suspicion and mistrust, as has been observed in several parts of africa (drijver, et al., 1995). this was well-summarized in a statement by an elderly female informant: these people [district assemblymen/women] are not able to deal with offenders of land management rules and regulation as the gods used to. people fear to die so they obeyed the taboos that regulated management of natural resources. the assemblyman will only send you to court where you will be fined or at worst imprisoned for a period. but as for death nobody wants to die. (akua dwamena, dotobaa pers. comm., 2010) the perception expressed above of assemblymen and women, who are local representatives in the district administration, underlie the suspicion that officials may not be fair in their dealing with local people on issues that relate to district by-laws on resource use and management including land. kasanga (2001, 1) made similar reference with the land commission as below: the lands commission, as constituted under 1994 legislation, currently manages all public and vested lands and gives consent and concurrence to transactions of land held under customary or community tenure and managed by the chieftaincy (‘stool land’). working through regional offices, it is supposed to plan land use in the region, develop a registration programme and manage public lands. but political interference and weak management have turned the commission into an instrument of centralised patronage for the wealthy and those with official connections. it has also used its powers to expropriate community lands without proper compensation. it is now regarded with suspicion by the bulk of customary landholders and poor urban dwellers as the agent of a state-led centralization of land rights. the traditional authority, on the contrary, was regarded by most of our respondents at the community level as generally fair in their judgment on matters relating to natural resource use. this may be attributed to the central pillar of the chieftaincy institution where chiefs and their elders would face severe retribution from ancestral spirits and numerous spirits (of local gods) believed to be the real owners of land and other natural resources, if they did not distribute land fairly (frazer, 1926; abayie boaten, 1998; kuntu-mensah, 2000). this differentiation of traditional and local government authority, and the apparent preference for the traditional authority in terms of natural resources use and management, confirms what cleaver (2000, 44) has described as "the principle of collective action and authority, and proximate compliance strongly practiced in relation to the dictates of gods and spirits". it was also observed during the fieldwork that externally-imposed and controlled rules and regulations on resource use, especially sanctions on trees, forests and river corridor management, were not working due to the lack of confidence in the system by the local people. these observations were corroborated by our respondents at the decentralized government departments, who underscored that interventions enjoying the support of traditional authorities, had better chances of compliance by local people due to their reverence for traditional leaders’ tumi, the spiritual power believed to be suffused in chiefs and elders. in ghana and west africa generally, chiefs and elders act as intermediaries between state institutions and the local people, and are often used as instruments for local mobilisation and development by government institutions (lebbie and freudenberger, 1996; inkoom, 1999). 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.9 we also observed among our respondents, especially women, that chiefs and elders were considered impartial, because they ensured that any member of the community who breaks any taboo that regulates natural resources use and management performs the required propitiation and rituals. a female respondent at bofie emphasized that: our chiefs ensure that our family heads make land available to each member of the family regardless of their gender. i have my own farm which i crop with my children and my husband also has his own land from his family. i only help my husband on his land and he also does the same for me. in this we are able to take care of our children (adwoa pokua, bofie pers. comm., 2010). this observation was confirmed by many of our respondents who emphasized that the customary land laws, because of their “spiritual underpinnings”, ensured some level of fairness in the land distribution within the communities. researchers have made similar observations in other parts of southern ghana. for instance, in the akwapim area goldstein and udry (2008, 27) made the following observation about customary land tenure: we interpret the resilience of this system of land tenure to its crucial and flexible role in redistributing resources in the face of unobserved variations in need. similar processes of land reallocation through corporate groups exist in most societies in west africa; as a consequence, the region is distinguished by the almost complete absence of a rural landless class. this system may provide important insurance in times of need, and a remarkable degree of social stability due to the redistribution of land within rural communities. the reference to the resilience of the customary law and its contribution in reducing landless in the akwapim area, as in other parts of ghana, is noteworthy. in our study communities, most people have access to land regardless of gender, a situation which they attributed to the egalitarian nature of customary laws. in spite of the positive comments that the majority of our respondents made about traditional land distribution systems, we wish to emphasize also that some respondents acknowledged that the power of traditional authorities was waning. this was made more empathically among our christian, muslim and the youth respondents. we observed, for instance, that many of the youth in the study communities, who had exposure to urban communities, have the propensity to ignore some of the traditional rules, especially those that are strongly underlined by taboos such as “non-farming days” that are supposed to reduce human contact with land. we also found our christian and muslim respondents were less inclined to follow the belief systems that enforce traditional customary laws on land and natural resources management, especially where they use lesser gods and ancestral sprits – even though a good number of them were syncretic. we also found that some of our respondents were suspicious of traditional authorities and referred to inner political circles that existed within the communities that, sometimes with the connivance of the traditional authorities, usurped and appropriated land that was not theirs. several instances of local land litigation were cited to support this argument. indeed, inherent weaknesses in the traditional customary systems have been observed in the literature. for example, whitehead and tsikata (2003, 1) had this to say about the customary system of land tenure: we agree that there are considerable problems with so–called customary systems of land tenure and administration for achieving gender justice with respect to women's land claims. insufficient attention is being paid to power relations in the countryside and their implications for social 11 awuah-nyamekye and sarfo-mensah: ensuring equitable distribution of land in ghana:spirituality or policy? published by scholarship@western, 2011 groups, such as women, who are not well positioned and represented in local level power structures. but considerable changes to political and legal practices and cultures will be needed before african states can begin to deliver gender justice with respect to land. we take special notice of the authors’ recommendation that changes need to be made in the political, legal and cultural practices of african states in order to better women’s access to land. this emphasizes the importance of traditional institutions and their related belief systems, which are the core of ghanaian culture (sarpong, 1975; kondor, 1993; newell, 2006). this is confirmed also by our respondents in the communities, who mostly perceived state institutions as public and secular and are driven mainly by a political agenda, while traditional authorities operate mainly under the auspices of ancestral sprits and local gods, i.e. mainly driven by spirituality. it must be mentioned that our respondents also acknowledged changes in the traditional institutions. for instance, the weakening of the tumi of the chiefs and elders was partly attributed to the partial usurping of decision-making powers by assemblymen and the unit committees, community representatives of the local levels government structures (nana dotobaahene pers. comm., 2010). in ghana, this situation has been observed as a major contributing factor to the growing ambiguity and lack of confidence among local people over the power of either state institutions or traditional authorities in natural resources management in ghana (kasanga and kotey, 2001, 1). in the foregoing section, we have shown the distinction our study communities make between traditional and public authorities in terms of power. we also demonstrated an apparent preference for indigenous institutions in terms of natural resources management. the data from our study area supports our argument that spiritual issues ought to be considered in natural resources management, including land policies formulation and implementation. our data also demonstrated that traditional institutions and their associated religious beliefs enjoy patronage at the local level. however, the data also pointed out that traditional institutions are undergoing changes and are threatened by modernization, including competition from public administrative institutions, christianity and islam as well as market forces. this supports the proposition found in several scholarly works including schlager and ostrom (1992), world bank (2003), and cronkleton et al. (2010) that models of land policy formulation and implementation take these two domains (customary and statutory laws) into consideration. for instance, cronkleton et al. (2010, 70) citing several sources including world bank (2003) and tahamana (2007) states the following: customary tenure systems by definition have evolved over long periods of time in response to local specific conditions. and in the process of recognition, such customary systems have been ignored, subordinated or, at times, effectively accommodated. the scholarly debate on whether to accept one legal system over the others, or what their respective weights should be, continues. there is a call for a paradigm shift from legal pluralism, which recognizes parallel systems to legal integration which would mesh them. integration would require understanding of the major constituents of each other. we draw particular attention to the emphasis the authors’ place on the need for in-depth understanding of the various constituents of the two domains. and, in our study area, traditional regulations and the statutory laws are put into “two different boxes” as our respondents made clear distinction between them, with one (statutory land laws) being secular and the other (customary land regulations) being spiritually based. and as observed by von benda-beckman (2002) cited by cronkleton et al. (2010, 71) “the normative construction of sub-state political organizations contradict that of the state and such normative orders may be based on so-called folk, customary or religious systems”. in the study area as across the ghanaian society, traditional beliefs and practices still run parallel with modernity (sarbah, 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.9 2010). however, syncretic beliefs and practices, including revere for traditional chiefs and customary laws, are common in the study communities (busia, 1951; parkin, 1970; blakely et al., 1994; bonsu and belk, 2003; sarbah, 2010). conclusion the foregoing indicates that the land tenure system in ghana can be described as a dual system. that is, it involves the communal system that dates back to antiquity and the recent title registration system, resulting from colonisation and other factors. this means that land distribution in the study area, in particular, and ghana, in general, may be described as containing both religio-cultural and policy elements. it is therefore logical that efforts be made to integrate statutory land policy with customary rules and regulations. the non-exploitation of the rich diversity of traditional institutional arrangements, including customary laws on land, kinship and religion, for environmental development in ghana by policy makers, for instance, has been noted as a major contributing factor to the unsustainable management of natural resources (leach, et al., 1999; kasanga and kotey, 2001). in fact, indigenous institutions in ghana, although complex, are very important for the management of natural resources. the ambiguous relationship between them has the potential to undermine both the authority of the nascent local governments and the performance of customary institutions (benjamin, 2008; ubink and quan, 2008). data from our study suggest that it may help ghana to explore the possibility of a new system of land tenure that is fashioned along models which strongly integrate indigenous technical knowledge and belief systems embedded in the customary system. this may require pragmatic steps (policies) to confront some of the challenges in the predominantly statutory land policies. in taking these pragmatic policies, however, the religio-cultural underpinnings of land issues in ghana should be factored into policy development. in other words, the land administration policies in ghana should be based on arrangement that recognise the worldview of its indigenous peoples. this may enhance effectiveness of land policy implementation in ghana. this conclusion is in line with rawlings’(2009) admonition that in designing any land policy in ghana and anywhere in africa, the poor, hungry and deprived people should be placed at the top of the pyramid to ensure that their rights of access to land are fully protected within whatever structure that is designed. by implication, there is need for further study to understand the religious constituents of customary laws and how they can be used to enhance the effectiveness of the two systems for agricultural and industrial development in the study area and in ghana in general. but, in suggesting the integration of religio-cultural perspectives into policy formulation, we are mindful of the fact traditional institutions and their belief systems are dynamic. they change over time and they are subject to contemporary threats from modernisation, christianity and islam. and this, too, should be taken into consideration in tapping the potential of customary beliefs and systems for ghanaian land policy development and implementation. 13 awuah-nyamekye and sarfo-mensah: ensuring equitable distribution of land in ghana:spirituality or policy? published by scholarship@western, 2011 references abayie, b. a. 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(1967).the historical roots of our ecological crisis. science, 155(3767), 12051207. world bank (2003). natural resources and violent confl ict: options and actions. washington: world bank 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.9 http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/journal/02648377� http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=publicationurl&_hubeid=1-s2.0-s0264837708x01024&_cid=271740&_pubtype=jl&view=c&_auth=y&_acct=c000228598&_version=1&_urlversion=0&_userid=10&md5=975ffcff492c728d5fc507e1e51ab428� http://books.google.co.za/books?hl=en&lr=&id=034pfzrjwvic&oi=fnd&pg=pr9&dq=world+bank+(2003)&ots=esmlk_zyu3&sig=pn5zoxi-nxrzhdikgta7ztjntzm� the international indigenous policy journal october 2011 ensuring equitable distribution of land in ghana: spirituality or policy? a case study from the forest-savanna agroecological zone of ghana samuel awuah-nyamekye paul sarfo-mensah dr. recommended citation ensuring equitable distribution of land in ghana: spirituality or policy? a case study from the forest-savanna agroecological zone of ghana abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license cronkleton, p., barry, d., pulhin, j. m., & saigal, s. (2010). the devolution of management rights and co-management of community forests. in a. m. larson, d. barry, g. r. dahal, & c. j. p. colfer (eds.), forests for people:ccommunity rights and forest tenure reform. london: earthscan publishers. ejizu, e. i. (2000). african traditional religions and the promotion of community-living in africa. in c. d. isizoh, (ed.), african traditional religion: special topical issues. africaworld. ghai, y. (1987). law, development and african scholarship. the modern law review, 50(6), 750-776. pashington obeng, j. (1996). asante catholicism: religious and cultural reproduction among the akan of ghana. leiden, koln, new york: brill. sarpong, p. (1975). ghana in retrospect: some aspects of ghanaian culture. tema: ghana pub. corp.   the far north act (2010) consultative process: a new beginning or the reinforcement of an unacceptable relationship in northern ontario, canada? the international indigenous policy journal volume 3 | issue 2 article 7 august 2012 the far north act (2010) consultative process: a new beginning or the reinforcement of an unacceptable relationship in northern ontario, canada? holly l. gardner university of waterloo, hologardner@gmail.com stephen r . j. tsuji university of waterloo, stephen.tsuji@utoronto.ca daniel d. mccarthy university of waterloo, dmccarthy@uwaterloo.ca graham s. w hitelaw queen's university, graham.whitelaw@queensu.ca leonard j.s. tsuji university of waterloo, ljtsuji@uwaterloo.ca recommended citation gardner, h. l. , tsuji, s. r . , mccarthy, d. d. , whitelaw, g. s. , tsuji, l. j. (2012). the far north act (2010) consultative process: a new beginning or the reinforcement of an unacceptable relationship in northern ontario, canada?. th e international indigenous policy journal, 3(2) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.7 this policy is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. the far north act (2010) consultative process: a new beginning or the reinforcement of an unacceptable relationship in northern ontario, canada? abstract in northern ontario, canada, there have been two “negotiated” documents that required consultation between first nations and the federated government of the land: treaty no. 9 signed in 1905-1906 (dominion of canada, with the concurrence of the province of ontario) and ontario’s far north act (2010). treaty no. 9 has defined the relationship between first nations and canada; while, the far north act will define the relationship with ontario. this article evaluated whether the far north act marked a new beginning or the reinforcement of an unacceptable relationship, using primary and secondary data analyses. analyses revealed that the passing of the far north act was not a new beginning, but the continuation of an unacceptable relationship. keywords first nations, consultation, land use planning, ontario, canada, economic devleopment acknowledgments the authors would like to thank the social sciences and humanities research council of canada for their financial support. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/   the far north act (2010) consultative process: a new beginning or the reinforcement of an unacceptable relationship in northern ontario, canada? in 1867, the provinces of ontario, quebec, new brunswick, and nova scotia were united under a federated system of government, known as the dominion of canada (figure 1). the country of canada would be formed through land acquisitions – rupert’s land and the north-western territory – and the partitioning of these land acquisitions to create new provinces, as well as to extend the boundaries of existing provinces. in keeping with the british crown’s belief that indians1 held rights to land in north america, indian lands had to be ceded or purchased (henry, 2006; royal proclamation of 1763). compensation for indian lands had to be resolved equitably through indian consent (cauchon & cockburn, 1867), which would require consultation and a negotiated settlement between the federal government and said indians. since this time, numerous treaties have been signed between the government of canada and the indian groups of canada (figure 2) (inac, 2007). typically, the extinction of indian title only acquired importance after indian land was recognized for its economic importance by the dominant society (long, 1978a; titley, 1986). the case of the james bay treaty or treaty no. 9 of 1905 to 1906 (1964) was not atypical, in that, prior to 1905, the economic potential (e.g., hydroelectrical, logging, mining, and agricultural) had been recognized, with railway construction opening up the near north region of northern ontario to settlement and resource exploitation2 (dragland, 1994; long, 1978b; macklem, 1997; titley, 1986). however, treaty no. 9 was unique with respect to the numbered treaties because treaty no. 9 required the concurrence of a provincial government3 – the government of ontario had to concur with the terms that had been set (james bay treaty, 1964). as a result, the terms of treaty no. 9 were fixed by the government of canada and the government of ontario prior to the commissioners’ treaty expedition into northern ontario to garner indian approval. indeed, in the report of the treaty no. 9 expedition by the treaty commissioners, it is clearly stated “the terms of the treaty were fixed by the governments of the dominion and ontario; the commissioners were empowered to offer certain conditions, but were not allowed to alter or add to them in the event of their not being acceptable to the indians” (james bay treaty, 1964, p. 4). thus, there was a consultative process leading to a negotiated treaty no. 9 agreement; however, all the consultation and negotiations were between the government of canada and the government of ontario (james bay treaty, 1964; long, 1978a; morrison, 1986; titley, 1986). there exists no documented evidence that indians or their                                                                                                                 1 historically, the term “indian” was inappropriately used to designate the first people inhabiting north america because european explorers believed that they had landed in india. in canada, first nations or native is now used to designate people once designated as indian. the term “indian” is used throughout the paper to designate first nations groups when appropriate (e.g., when the term was used in historical documents). 2 petitions made by indian leaders in northern ontario did indicate that some indian groups desired to enter into treaty with the government of canada to protect their traditional way of life (i.e., living off the land) because railway construction (and other development activities), as well as an increase in non-indian hunting and trapping, negatively impacted their way of life (long 1978a, 1978b; macklem 1997). however, the main reason, according to the commissioners of treaty no. 9, “increasing settlement, activity in mining and railway construction in that large section of the province of ontario north of the height of land and south of the albany river rendered it advisable to extinguish the indian title” (james bay treaty, 1964, p. 3). 3  the agreement between the dominion of canada and the province of ontario (james bay treaty, 1964) set forth the following: “and whereas, by the agreement made the 16th day of april, 1894 … entered into between the government of the dominion of canada … and the government of the province of ontario … in pursuance of the statute[s] of canada … [and] ontario [both] passed [in 1891] … [similarly entitled] ‘an act for the settlement of certain questions between the governments of canada and ontario respecting indian lands,’ and by the sixth clause of the said agreement [of 1894] it is provided, ‘that any future treaties with the indians in respect of territory in ontario to which they have not before the passing of the said statutes surrendered their claim aforesaid, shall be deemed to require the concurrence of the government of ontario’” (p. 26).   1 gardner et al.: the far north act (2010) published by scholarship@western, 2012   ! "!!!#$ !"#$%& '() (*+(&*,%-.(& /(-,0,%-.(& ! " # $ % &'''''( $ ) $ % ( 123 4566' 27 "892:2 '27 *+,-./0 123435 "36'7.2+86/59 "0:-'(50,/;-+/,04<)")&)'#"'=>?@ "0.,a638,' $3../,0./38 b2c3.,d8'e-+f "0.,agh38,3.+ $3../,0.i figure 1. in 1867, canada at confederation only consisted of the provinces of ontario, quebec, new brunswick, and nova scotia. three years later, rupert’s land and the north-western territory (1870) were acquired by canada, and these two territories formed the northwest territories. this figure is based on the maps hc1867trty_e and hc1870trty_e (inac, 2007). ! "!!!#$ !"#$%& '() (*+(&*,%-.(& /(-,0,%-.(& ! " # $ % &''''( $ ) $ % ( 123 4566' 27 "892:2 '27 *)")&)'#"'+,,, (-./-01234-5 673831 "34'9:75.4;1/ <%# "=>-'(1=0;"=:0243.0'$3::;0=:;3. "75->70 )?83:0@-5;0=8a50-:;= ' b7/=5 9:;0;.2'*=?7c8;"34d=75e?-5e'f g-8:-e=: $:3-0h'++ +,i+ $:3-0h'j +j,, $:3-0h'k +jlk $:3-0h'k +jj, $:3-0h'l +jll $:3-0h'm +jlm $:3-0h'n +jln $:3-0h'+ +jl+ $:3-0h'o +jlo $:3-0h', +,i,'p'oq $:3-0h', +,qn'p'qk $:3-0h'i +jl+ $:3-0h'+q +,qk $:3-0h'n +,qj !rr3:'*-5-e-'g-5e'(7::35e3:. !rr3:'*-5-e-'g-5e'(7::35e3:. s;??;-c.' $:3-0;3. <3-13'-5e't:;35e.2;r $:3-0;3. &=7u?-.' $:3-0;3. &=7u?-.' $:3-0;3. &=7u?-.' $:3-0;3. v=8;5.=5wx7:=5 +jnq v=8;5.=5w(7r3:;=: +jnq figure 2. canada in 1999 showing the historical treaties. this figure is based on the maps hc1999trty_e, and htoc_e (inac, 2007). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.7   representatives were consulted and/or involved in these government deliberations (titley, 1986). it is no wonder that historians (e.g., dragland, 1994; long, 1978b; long, 1989; morrison, 1988) and first nation leaders (e.g., louttit, 2011) have asserted that there was no meaningful consultation and negotiation with respect to treaty no. 9, as the treaty was basically a “take-it or leave-it” proposition (long, 1978a). it should also be emphasized that the indian signatories of treaty no. 9 could not read the terms of the agreement, as the english text had not been translated into the ojibway or cree syllabics (long, 1989, 1993; louttit, 2010a). thus, the oral translation of the terms of treaty no. 9 was crucial. as the commissioners did not travel with translators (james bay treaty, 1964), the translation was not consistent. when hudson’s bay company’s employees acted as translators – as they often did because treaties were typically signed at hudson’s bay posts (james bay treaty, 1964) – there was a clear conflict of interest, as indians upon signing the treaty, would spend their treaty money at the hudson’s bay post (dragland, 1994). d.c. scott, one of the treaty no. 9 commissioners, suggests that the contents of the treaty were not properly translated and explained:4 they were to make certain promises and we were to make certain promises, but our purpose and our reasons were alike unknowable. what could they grasp of the pronouncement on indian tenure which had been delivered by the law lords of the crown, what of the elaborate negotiations between a dominion and a province which had the treaty possible, what of the sense of traditional policy which brooded over the whole? nothing. so there is no basis for argument. the simpler facts had to be stated, and the parental idea developed that the king is the great father of the indians, watchful over their interest, and ever compassionate. (scott, 1947, p. 115) clearly, the treaty no. 9 consultative and negotiation process was wanting in all respects. it has been over one hundred years since treaty no. 9 was signed, and since this time (i.e., 1905) the near north region of ontario (below the forest management line/cut line/far north line, figure 3) has been extensively developed with little consultation with first nations groups (james bay cree society, 1979; rickard, 1977). recently, the far north region5 of northern ontario has been recognized for its mineral rich areas and potential sites for hydro-electric development. in addition, persistent development pressure in the far north region has led to the identification of communitybased land use planning as a potential means to ensure informed decision-making, shared benefits resulting from development, and adequate protection of social, cultural, and environmental conditions (hibbard, lane, & rasmussen, 2008). on june 2, 2009, the government of ontario introduced bill 191 (2009) for first reading. bill 191 (2010), also known as an act with respect to land use planning and protection in the far north, underwent second reading on june 3, 2010. on september 23, 2010, the province of ontario passed bill 191; once bill 191 had received royal assent (october 25, 2010), it was referred to as the far north act (2010). the legislation outlines an approach that government of ontario officials purport will allow first nations of the far north region to play a more significant role in development through community-based land use planning (far north act, 2010, s.5.(1)).                                                                                                                 4 it should be noted that even when clergy acted as translators, such as, the adhesion to treaty no. 9, 19291930, in winisk (cain & awrey, 1930), there is some evidence that “its [adhesions to treaty no. 9] meaning was not made clear or comprehended …” (bird, 2005, note 1). 5 ontario’s far north region covers approximately 43% of the province and is home to a number of first nations (office of the premier, 2008).   3 gardner et al.: the far north act (2010) published by scholarship@western, 2012   !"#$%&'()*)+$,$*&'-.*$ !)#'/"#&0'1#$) (2%3$+"423'5#)6.&."*)7'5$##.&"#8 9 :99 ;993, !"#$%&''()* +),-$ ()* ./0 )& *''1 234' 5% %$''''1 23-4 ' ''' ''' 634& '''' 12 34' 72&2$8'12 3-4 ' .99):);2$8)9''''123-4' <)8-''6";-42%4 <)8-''=&9)42% <)8 -''> 42<)8-''! "4%& <) 8''5 2? @2 a) & < / 51 = > < ? @ a b a c ( 1 / >5 < b 1 !"#&'d$e$#* f$)4)*2g3 !""#$#%&'(#" h)%0$g0$4)* !"#&'17i)*8 (""%$'!)g&"#8' )**'*+,,./#",-0#//' .#+12-3#(, 4,5,67&, h.&g0$*20,)83""%.i'>**.*242+'' j)k$3$3) h)%)i"*.3)'-)3$ h.*+l.%0$#'-)3$ j2**2,.*'-)3$ /.i.*),.3 m$$#'-)3$ f"k7)#'n.77 c)&'-)3$ ()gm"4$77'-)3$ /"#&0'dk.#.&'-)3$ /"#&0' c)#.i""'-)3$ j)4)3)k$4.* (2%3#)&'m), d)g0.+"'-)3$ h$$4)84.* b$)#%3.*' -)3$ f.3)*+.32, (.%03$$+"+),)*+ /$%3)*&)+) ()#&$*'!)77%a)i),$&""*+ 5<=</5< 5>((>/d cn1f-a1@ 5n@/ma='b1o d><@p'-<<h<@5 ( )* .&" i) <*&)#." ?2$i$g !bc6=d (.e c 1 / 1 m 1 @ d 1 figure 3. the first nations of the far north region are illustrated. the first nations and the one community (moosonee) in the far north – where hearings were scheduled by the government of ontario, but later cancelled – are bolded and in italics. the names of cities where far north hearings were actually conducted – all were outside the far north region – are presented graphically with all letters in capitals. the figure is based on the far north map of the ontario ministry of natural resources (2010). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.7   the development of community-based land use plans in ontario’s far north is a response to two related issues: (a) the current desire of local first nation communities to preserve their traditional territories in a way that ensures that the land and resources will support future generations; and (b) a government initiative to address a number of planning and management issues, including orderly resource development, natural heritage protection, climate policy, and improved relations with first nations. in addition, one issue that is never specifically mentioned in the far north act (2010), but must be taken into account in the present context is that ontario is no longer one of the economic engines of canada. in 2009, for the first time ontario received a federal government equalization payment6 as a “have not” province (holden, 2008) and will continue to receive equalization payments (department of finance, 2011). in other words, ontario’s economic growth and prosperity is intimately tied to developing the far north region of northern ontario, and there appears to be a sense of urgency tied to this development. this article retrospectively explores the progression of bill 191 from its introduction in june 2009 to october 2010 when it received royal assent and became known as the far north act of 2010, paying particular attention to the consultative activities that occurred (or did not occur) throughout the process. the far north consultative process is also examined in the context of guidelines put forward by various aboriginal7 political organizations in canada and the global standard set for indigenous rights through the united nations [un] declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (2007).8 the article begins with a presentation of what consultation means in the canadian (and international) context. this section is followed by information on the study area, the far north act (2010), the far north consultative process, research methods employed, results, and discussion based on the primary and secondary data analyses pertinent to the research question and the conclusions. background duty to consult the judiciary [supreme court of canada] has, … held that the crown is under a duty to consult [in order to reach a negotiated settlement] with a first nation when it proposes to engage in an action that threatens to interfere with                                                                                                                 6 equalization payments are part of a government of canada transfer payment program that compensates poorer (“have-not”) provinces “for their relatively weak tax bases or resource endowments, equalization works to ensure that all canadians have access to a reasonably similar level of provincial government services at reasonably similar levels of taxation regardless of where in the country they live” (holden, 2008, p. 1). equalization payments are entirely financed from federal government revenues (holden, 2008) and given unconditionally, to be spent according to provincial priorities (department of finance canada, 2011). 7 the term “aboriginal” is used in canada to refer to first nations (also known as indians), inuit, and métis groups. the term “indigenous” will also be used throughout this article and refers to all groups who originally come from an area and currently live within a dominant state. 8 in 1982, the un working group on indigenous populations was established and mandated to create a minimum standard of rights to contribute to the improvement with respect to issues (e.g., discrimination, exploitation, marginalization, and exploitation) impacting indigenous people worldwide (un, 2006, 2007). the first draft of the declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples was introduced in 1993 (un, 2007). after extensive negotiation and revision the un declaration on rights of indigenous peoples was adopted by the general assembly on september 13, 2007. initially, canada, the united states, australia, and new zealand opposed the declaration based on concerns with several articles related to indigenous rights and governmental obligations (inac, 2010). on november 12, 2010, canada reversed its position and endorsed this non-binding agreement (“canada endorses,” 2010). although the original declaration had not been revised to address existing concerns, the canadian government identified flexibility in the way canada interpreted the agreement to better align with its obligations under the canadian constitution (inac, 2009). 5 gardner et al.: the far north act (2010) published by scholarship@western, 2012   existing aboriginal or treaty rights recognized and affirmed by s. 35(1) of the constitution act, 19829 … the duty to consult requires the crown, in most cases, to make good faith efforts to negotiate an agreement specifying the rights of the parties when it seeks to engage in an action that adversely affects aboriginal interests. (lawrence & macklem, 2000, p. 252) as stated by mr. justice finch of the b.c. court of appeal, the crown’s duty to consult imposes on it a positive obligation to reasonably ensure that aboriginal peoples are provided with all necessary information in a timely way so that their representatives are seriously considered and, wherever possible, demonstratably integrated into the proposed plan of action … (supreme court of canada, 1999, para. 160). in addition, the degree of consultation can vary from case to case.10 in canada, several aboriginal-based consultation guidelines have been developed at the community, regional, provincial, and national levels (métis national council, 2007; meyers norris, 2009; northern secwepemc te quelmucw leadership, 2009; union of ontario indians, 2003). for example, the union of ontario indians11 developed a consultation guide to deal with interactions with the ontario ministry of natural resources (union of ontario indians, 2003).12 in general, the guidelines describe an open process that emphasizes the rationale of the project and roles that each “stakeholder” plays in the advancement of the proposed activities. the consideration of the spirit of treaties, comprehensive land claims, and the constitution act of 1982 all frame the form that consultation should take. the importance of full communication of all material relevant to the project is a shared characteristic. finally, inclusion of adequate funding to facilitate participation and                                                                                                                 9 the constitution of canada was repatriated in 1982 so that the british crown would no longer hold legal power to amend the constitution of canada (feldstein, 2001). in addition, the repatriation of the constitution of canada, entrenched indian treaty rights, in that “section 35(1) [of the constitution of canada] recognizes and affirms the treaty rights ‘of the aboriginal peoples,’ not the treaty rights of the crown. in other words, treaty rights of the aboriginal peoples are constitutionalized, while the treaty rights of the crown are not. the sparrow decision held that, because aboriginal rights are constitutional, they take priority over other rights which are not constitutional” (macklem, 1997, p. 31). 10 “the nature and scope of the duty of consultation will vary with the circumstances. in occasional cases, when the breach is less serious or relatively minor, it will be no more than a duty to discuss important decisions …. of course, even in these rare cases when the minimum acceptable standard is consultation, this consultation must be in good faith and with the intention of substantially addressing the concerns of the aboriginal peoples whose lands are at issue. in most cases, it will be significantly deeper than mere consultation. some cases may even require the full consent of an aboriginal nation, particularly when provinces enact hunting and fishing regulations in relation to aboriginal lands” (lawrence & macklem, 2000, p. 252). 11 the union of ontario indians, incorporated in 1949, advocates for 40 first nations throughout ontario with a combined population of approximately 55,000 people (union of ontario indians, 2008). 12 this guide defines consultation as “a process that facilitates the provision and receipt of natural resource information, between the parties, to assist in making informed decisions” (union of ontario indians, 2003, p. 3). the union of ontario indians (2003) guide outlines the necessary criteria to help ensure adequate consultation and includes features shared among other protocols developed nationally. consultation should include the following: “be initiated at the early on in the process; include exchange of relevant information (proposal, rational, timelines, emerging issues); provide adequate means for representative participation; be flexible to adjust the process to individual circumstances, with agreed upon timelines; and participation should be in ‘good faith’ (defined as including the disclosure of relevant information, respectful communication and timely response to questions” (p. 11). additional principles have been suggested by several aboriginal organizations: recognizing aboriginal rights; acknowledging mutual respect; recognizing the role of the aboriginal group in establishing the framework for consultation; ensuring the exchange of knowledge is reciprocal; ensuring consultation and negotiation be done in the spirit of reconciliation; and making sure the process is transparent (métis national council, 2007; northern secwepemc te quelmucw leadership, 2009). 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.7   timelines that promote full understanding within involved communities and organizations is a shared characteristic of several guidelines (métis national council, 2007; northern sechwepemc te quelmucw leadership, 2009; union of ontario indians, 2003). un declaration on rights of indigenous peoples although declarations lack legal status there is an expectation that their provisions will be followed by signatories (posey & dutfield, 1996). the un declaration on rights of indigenous peoples (2007) includes a number of articles relevant to the consideration of interactions between indigenous groups and dominant states with respect to the present study. for example, article 37 mentions that, indigenous peoples have the right to the recognition, observance and enforcement of treaties, agreements and other constructive arrangements concluded with state or their successors and to have states honour and respect such treaties, agreements and other constructive arrangements. further, the development of state legislation having a direct bearing on the development and protection of traditional territories requires a consultative process with regards to the impacted people: states shall consult and cooperate in good faith with the indigenous peoples concerned through their own representative institutions in order to obtain their free, prior and informed consent before adopting and implementing legislative or administrative measures that may affect them. (un declaration on rights of indigenous peoples, 2007, article 19) lastly, the way that indigenous people are to participate in the decision-making process is included in the declaration: indigenous peoples have the right to participate in decision-making in matters which would affect their rights, through representatives chosen by themselves in accordance with their own procedure, as well as to maintain and develop their own indigenous decision-making institutions. (un declaration on rights of indigenous peoples, 2007, article 18) states shall consult and cooperate in good faith with the indigenous peoples concerned through their own representative institutions in order to obtain their free and informed consent prior to the approval of any project affecting their lands or territories and other resources, particularly in connection with the development, utilization or exploitation of mineral, water or other resources. (un declaration on rights of indigenous peoples, 2007, article 32(2)) in summary, the un declaration on rights of indigenous peoples (2007) emphasizes greater authority and control related to development, as indigenous groups deal with social, environmental, and economic challenges (eversole, 2010). the far north act (2010) in june 2009, the government of ontario released bill 191 for first reading. in the summer of 2009, following the first reading, a series of senate committee hearings were held to provide an opportunity for the public and stakeholders to comment on the bill (table 1). in october 2009, a clause-by-clause review was held in the ontario legislative assembly, toronto, ontario. further debate on the bill was held in the spring of 2010, and a second reading occurred on june 3, 2010. a second round of hearings to receive comments from stakeholders and the public, scheduled for june 7 gardner et al.: the far north act (2010) published by scholarship@western, 2012   table 1. chronology of event type, location, and date related to the introduction, amendment, debate, and royal assent of the far north act (2010) (formerly bill 191). activity location date bill 1911st reading ontario legislative assembly, toronto, ontario june, 2, 20091 standing committee hearings sioux lookout, ontario august 6, 20091 standing committee hearings thunder bay, ontario august, 11, 20091 standing committee hearings chapleau, ontario august 12, 20091 standing committee hearings timmins, ontario august 13, 20091 clause-by-clause reading ontario legislative assembly, toronto, ontario october 19, 20091 bill 191 official debate ontario legislative assembly, toronto, ontario may 18, 19, 20101 bill 191 – time allocation ontario legislative assembly, toronto, ontario june 1, 20101 bill 1912nd reading ontario legislative assembly, toronto, ontario june, 3, 20101 standing committee hearings slate falls first nation, ontario week of june 14, 2010 – cancelled2 standing committee hearings webequie first nation, ontario week of june 14, 2010 – cancelled2 standing committee hearings sandy lake first nation, ontario week of june 14, 2010 – cancelled2 standing committee hearings attawapiskat first nation, ontario week of june 14, 2010 – cancelled2 standing committee hearings moosonee, ontario (moosonee is on the mainland, while, moose factory island, the home of moose cree first nation, is in the moose river across from moosonee) week of june 14, 2010 cancelled2 clause-by-clause reading ontario legislative assembly, toronto, ontario september 13-15, 20101 bill 191 official debate ontario legislative assembly, toronto, ontario september 22, 20101 bill 191 3rd reading ontario legislative assembly, toronto, ontario september 23, 2010 royal assent ontario legislative assembly, toronto, ontario october 25, 2010 1 ontario legislative assembly (n.d). 2 legislative assembly of ontario (2010, p. g-99). 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.7   2010, was cancelled (see figure 3). third reading took place on september 23, 2010 and ended in a vote of 46 ayes and 26 nays to pass the far north act, 2010 (legislative assembly of ontario, 2010e). the far north act, 2010, received royal assent on october 25, 2010. the far north act (2010) applies to areas in ontario currently regulated as public lands by the provincial government and excludes reserve lands13 (far north act, 2010, 3, figure 3). four expected outcomes of the far north act (2010, s. 5.(1)(2)(3)(4)) are as follows: (a) a significant role for first nations in the planning. (b) the protection of areas of cultural value in the far north and the protection of ecological systems in the far north by including 225,000 square kilometers of the far north in an interconnected network of protected areas designated in community-based land use plans. (c) the maintenance of biological diversity, ecological processes, and ecological functions, including the storage and sequestration of carbon in the far north. (d) the assurance of sustainable economic development that benefits the first nations. the far north land use plan[ning] process is designed to include terms of reference to be prepared by each community with an interest in participating (far north act, 2010, s. 9(1)). once they have been approved by the community through a band council resolution14 (far north act, 2010, s. 9(14)(b)), the minister of natural resources approves and designates a planning area (far north act, 2010, s. 9.(4)(a)(b)(c)). each plan must include a determination of the land use designations, approved activities within each designation, and at least one protected area throughout the planning area. the designation of the protected area(s) must also include a description of the type of protected area as “prescribed” in regulations (far north act, 2010, s. 9(9)(c)(d)). the ontario minister of natural resources also examines the plan to ensure that the four objectives of the act (listed above) have been included. once satisfied, the minister approves the plan (far north act, 2010, s.9 (16)). methods primary data analysis was employed, and the primary sources used included verbatim transcripts of the standing committee on general government and the verbatim transcripts of the ontario legislative debate on the subject of the far north act (2010) in the weeks prior to third reading and, ultimately, royal assent of the act. secondary data in the form of documents, reports, media releases, correspondence, powerpoint presentations, and policy documents created by the nishnawbe aski nation (nan), muskegowuk tribal council, and its member communities were also analyzed. ontario’s far north area is represented politically by the nan, which represents 49 communities that fall under treaties 5 and 9. the nan membership includes a number of independent bands, the independent first nations alliance, keewaytinook okimakanak, mattawa first nations, shibogama first nation council, wabun tribal council, windigo first nations council, and muskegowuk tribal council (nan, 2010a). it should be noted that we will be limiting our analyses to first nations signatories of treaty no. 9 (e.g., mushkegowuk tribal council, also known as mushkegowuk council), as treaty no. 9 is the only numbered treaty that had a provincial                                                                                                                 13 reserve lands were typically created during the treaty making process and were for exclusive use by indian signatories. indian reserve lands are now known as first nations and are under the jurisdiction of the government of canada. 14 band council resolutions are typically passed by a band council – the locally-elected first nations’ government – and are enforceable laws on the first nation passing the resolution.   9 gardner et al.: the far north act (2010) published by scholarship@western, 2012   government (ontario) as a signatory, which is of particular importance in the present analyses, as the province of ontario passed the far north act (2010). the framework we used to guide our evaluation of the far north act (2010) consultative process to determine whether this piece of legislation marked a new beginning or the reinforcement of an unacceptable relationship in northern ontario, canada were taken directly from the james bay treaty – treaty no. 9 (1964) and from scholarly interpretations of the treaty no. 9 consultative and negotiation processes. table 2 shows the framework derived from treaty no. 9 (and scholarly interpretations of the process) used to inform our evaluation on whether the governmental consultative process with first nations of the mushkegowuk territory has improved over the 100 years since the signing of treaty no. 9 in 1905-1906. data were coded and analyzed based on a deductive approach by the primary author and validated by one other author. data coding and analysis were performed manually. results and discussion community consultation and accommodation in 2007, the province of ontario and nan signed a letter of political agreement establishing “oski-machiitawin” (or new beginnings, formerly known as “the northern table”) to create a forum to discuss a number of issues flowing from development pressure within treaties no. 5 and 9 traditional lands (nan, 2010b). the mandate of the group was to discuss the implementation of the provincial parks and conservation reserves act in the territory, create an ontario ministry of natural resources’ resource development protocol, and discuss the approach to land use planning that would integrate traditional and conventional activities in the region (ontario ministry of aboriginal affairs, 2007). the overarching goal of the forum from a first nations’ perspective was to initiate a bilateral consultative process between the province of ontario and nan with respect to first nations traditional land and to discuss and negotiate development and protection protocol (nan, 2010b). activities leading towards community-based land use planning were also concurrently taking place within nan’s member tribal councils. for example, in 2008, in response to growing development pressure, the mushkegowuk tribal council passed three tribal council resolutions;15 mining activities in muskegowuk first nations homeland (mushkegowuk council, 2008a); resource development activities in muskegowuk first nations (mushkegowuk council, 2008b); and mapping and land use planning (mushkegowuk council, 2008c). the resolutions outlined criteria for future development in the mushkegowuk territory: first nation consent was required; a land use plan needed to be completed and approved in the area under consideration; and all necessary regulatory requirements had to be fulfilled and agreed upon by each party. in addition, current and future projects would require the development of impact benefit agreements.16 the mushkegowuk council in outlining this strategic plan also requested that the province of ontario fund both mapping and the development of community-based land use plans.                                                                                                                 15 when tribal council resolutions are made by tribal councils (regional first nations organizations) the resolutions are not enforceable at the community level. 16 impact benefit agreements are private agreements between proponents of resource development and affected groups. the impact benefit agreements offer monetary and/or other forms of compensation to affected groups in compensation for development. essentially, impact benefit agreements are a form of mitigation – within the context of the environment impact assessment process in canada – as not all effects of development can be mitigated, so a mechanism is needed to deal with these environmental effects. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.7   table 2. framework derived from treaty no. 9. 1. community consultation and accommodation p 21 “signed at [location] on the [date], by his majesty's commissioners and the chiefs and headmen in the presence of the undersigned witnesses, after having been first interpreted and explained” (the james bay treaty – treaty no. 9, 1964, p. 21). the treaty no. 9 commissioners made “community” visits, but, in reality, these excursions were to hudson’s bay company trading posts. as the text of treaty no. 9 was in the english language, which indian groups could neither read nor write, there have been questions raised whether the terms of the treaty were actually or accurately translated. 2. fixed terms of agreement “this agreement made on the third day of july, in the year of our lord, 1905, between … the government of canada of the one part … [and] the government of ontario on the other part … the government of the province of ontario hereby gives consent and upon the following conditions concurs in the terms proposed to be entered into, made and agreed by the said treaty … and the government of ontario, subject to the conditions, aforesaid, further concurs … (agreement between the dominion of canada and the province of ontario july 3, 1905, pp. 25-27). the terms of treaty no. 9 were fixed prior to negotiations with the indian groups residing in the area covered in treaty no. 9, so there was no chance for true consultation and negotiation, as there was nothing to negotiate. 3. taken up clause “and his majesty the king hereby agrees with the said indians that they shall have the right to pursue their usual vocations of hunting, trapping and fishing throughout the tract surrendered as heretofore described, subject to such regulations as may from time to time be made by the government of the country, acting under the authority of his majesty, and saving and excepting such tracts as may be required or taken up from time to time for settlement, mining, lumbering, trading or other purposes” (the james bay treaty – treaty no. 9, 1964, p. 20). the terms of treaty no. 9 were not immutable in that land could be “taken up” for the greater good of canada, but treaty rights became entrenched when the constitution of canada was repatriated in 1982.17 thus, the nan chiefs felt betrayed by the province of ontario and viewed the 2009 announcement of bill 191 to have occurred despite the recommendations and concerns voiced through the forum provided by oski-machiitawin (nan, 2009b). nan has been at the table for two years working on a framework agreement that mnr [ontario ministry of natural resources] claimed would guide the legislation. we didn’t agree on the [the exact] framework due to lack of time, and when we saw the legislation, it                                                                                                                 17 the constitution of canada was repatriated in 1982 so that the british crown would no longer hold legal power to amend the constitution of canada (feldstein, 2001). in addition, the repatriation of the constitution of canada, entrenched indian treaty rights, in that “section 35(1) [of the constitution of canada] recognizes and affirms the treaty rights ‘of the aboriginal peoples,’ not the treaty rights of the crown. in other words, treaty rights of the aboriginal peoples are constitutionalized, while the treaty rights of the crown are not. the sparrow decision held that, because aboriginal rights are constitutional, they take priority over other rights which are not constitutional” (macklem, 1997, p. 31). 11 gardner et al.: the far north act (2010) published by scholarship@western, 2012   was clearly not guided by the framework [issues discussed]. (grand chief stan beardy, legislative assembly of ontario, 2009b, p. g-952) in this climate of distrust, first nations of the region demanded that, as bill 191 moved forward, it must include adequate community consultation (nan, 2009a). in response, the government of ontario described the greater opportunity for consultation that would occur throughout the development of this legislation, beginning with standing committee hearings following the first reading. michael brown, mpp algoma-manitoulin, described it as: [a]n unusual but not totally unique process, but we usually as a legislature do not conduct public hearings after first reading. (legislative assembly of ontario, 2009a, p. g-960) mr. brown further added, [t]his consultation is the consultation before the consultation, in other words, because after second reading it is common practice to have a set of public hearings on bill 191. we understand the important ramifications of this bill and we want to, as much as possible, get that right. (legislative assembly of ontario, 2009a, p. g-936) the nan delegation appeared before the standing committee on august 12, 2009 (see table 2), under protest, because the hearing date fell during the nan elections, which occur every three years. frank beardy, grand chief of nan, expressed on behalf of nan leadership a hope that this scheduling conflict was a result of a clerical error, rather than an attempt to disrespect or undermine the first nation political process (legislative assembly of ontario, 2009a). the nan delegation used the opportunity to outline the expected approach to consultation in the region: [f]or the government to meet their legal obligation to consult with our people, they have to consult with our individual communities in the north. that is the position that we’ve come forward with, and we expect that consultation to take place with our individual communities. (grand chief frank beardy of nan, legislative assembly of ontario, 2009a, p. g-957) ontario has attempted to have discussions by bringing people together in urban centers [see figure 3] thereby calling it consultation… we feel we have not been fully consulted, as we have put forward to the premier [of ontario] and to the various ministers right from day one – and that is for discussions to take place right in the community. (grand chief stan louttit of mushkegowuk tribal council, legislative assembly of ontario, 2009c, p. g-985) following the first clause-by-clause reading of bill 191, the bill was then debated on may 18 to 19, 2010, in the ontario legislative assembly (table 2). the government of ontario’s position remained the same as it had been following the introduction of the bill: the government is working hard on this bill, as has been stated this afternoon during debate. there’s been a lot of consultation. my understanding is that this bill went out right after first reading, which is rather unique for this place, and will no doubt go out for more consultation after second reading. i think that’s only helpful to all concerned: the opposition, the government and especially those people who would be affected by this bill…first nations people need to be consulted, and will be consulted and listened to. (pat hoy, mpp chatamkent-essex, legislative assembly of ontario, 2010a, p. g-1703) 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.7   on june 1, 2010, the legislative assembly of ontario passed a motion allocating four days in the week of june 14, 2010 for hearings to be carried out in slate falls first nation, webequie first nation, sandy lake first nation, attawapiskat first nation, and moosonee (across from moose cree first nation). final clause-by-clause reading was scheduled for september 13 and 15, 2010 (see table 2). it should be emphasized that these community consultations were scheduled despite being informed that the mushkegowuk and mattawa tribal councils would be holding their general assembly in chapleau, ontario, during that period of time (legislative assembly of ontario, 2010b). alternately, the first nation leadership suggested that a day before or a day after the nan general assembly – scheduled for june 8 and 9 in sandy lake, ontario – would be a more appropriate date for community consultation. this suggestion was not considered in discussions in the public record (legislative assembly of ontario, 2010b). bill 191 passed second reading on june 3, 2010 (see table 2). the community-based meetings in the first nations (and moosonee) of the far north region were cancelled and not rescheduled (see table 2). thus, on september 23, 2010, the bill was advanced for third and final reading without community-based consultation in the actual first nations to be impacted by the legislation. the government outlined its position following the failure to undertake formal community-based consultation as follows: after second reading of the bill, plans were made to travel again, only this time to slate falls [first nation], sandy lake [first nation], attawapiskat [first nation], moosonee [community across from moose cree first nation] and webequie [first nation]. unfortunately, we learned shortly after the house rose that these first nations were not able to host standing committee hearings on the dates set out by the legislature. at first, i was disappointed by the news, but soon i saw this setback as a golden opportunity to personally visit more communities in the far north and to engage community leaders on their own terms [no other communities were visited; table 2], without time constraints, to carry out these in-depth discussions. (ms. jeffrey, ontario minister of natural resources, legislative assembly of ontario, 2010c, p. g-2214) the process outlined here shows a willingness by the province of ontario to undertake consultation as long as it follows an approach that is designed and carried out by the province. the province of ontario clearly considers the opportunity to participate in public hearings, as representing adequate consultation. in fact, all venues for consultation were outside the region to be affected (see figure 3). it should be noted that even the treaty no. 9 commissioners made “community”18 visits and they had to travel by canoe to the communities (james bay treaty, 1964). in the limited opportunity provided for first nations to participate in the consultative process for bill 191, the expected form that effective consultation should take was clearly communicated. first, consultation would occur in communities that would be affected; second, adequate time would be provided to ensure that community members could be adequately informed and prepared to participate. these requests are consistent with the requirements that have been outlined in consultation guidelines across canada (métis national council, 2007; northern secwepemc te quelmucw leadership, 2009; union of ontario indians, 2003). the unwillingness to allow additional time to accommodate adequate consultation has meant that “free, prior, and informed consent before adopting and implementing legislation or administrative measures …”(un, 2007, article 19) has not been carried out in this process, contrary to the un declaration on rights of indigenous peoples (2007).                                                                                                                 18 the treaty no. 9 commissioners had to visit each community – which was, in reality, a hudson’s bay company trading post as the first nation people were nomadic at this time with no permanent community – to obtain signatures on the treaty document. 13 gardner et al.: the far north act (2010) published by scholarship@western, 2012   fixed terms of agreement my team listened to first nation leaders, elders, and youths from every corner of the far north. they spoke of their fears and the dreams they had for their communities, and we used these discussions to guide the way we crafted the amendments to this bill. i’m proud to say that, as a result of this outreach with first nation communities, resource development stakeholders and environmental organizations, our government presented 43 amendments for the committee’s consideration. these amendments, i believe, make bill 191 a stronger, more inclusive piece of legislation. (ms. jeffrey, minister of natural resources, legislative assembly of ontario, 2010c, p. g-2214) despite great effort to contribute throughout the consultative process, and, contrary to the minister of natural resources’ assertion above, inclusion of recommendations provided by first nations groups is difficult to identify in the far north act (2010). to the point, there was concern voiced with the way first nations’ recommendations were treated: at the end of the day, if the acts go through, will things that have been most commonly heard and the various positions put forward by people, not only us as leaders – will it be heard and will it change things? or is there, as we feel a lot of times, some preconceived notion by ontario that in fact these things are already there; they’re drafted by your technicians and you’re going through this process for public perception … so, i have concerns … if, in fact, we are heard and there are legitimate changes based on our cries for help and input, then we will be satisfied, but right now i have questions. (chief stan louttit of muskegowuk tribal council, legislative assembly of ontario, 2009c, p. g-985) nevertheless, final amendments to bill 191 included the addition of “joint bodies”; this amendment at first glance appears to reflect an effort to incorporate greater participation of first nation representatives into the process at the regional level (far north act, 2010, s.7.1(a)(b)): any first nation having one or more reserves in the far north and any first nation with whom the minister has agreed to work to prepare terms of reference under subsection 9(2) may indicate an interest to the minister to initiate discussions with respect to establishing a joint body to a) advise on the development, implementation and coordination of land use planning in the far north in accordance with this act and b) perform the other advisory functions to which the [ontario] minister [of natural resources] and the first nations participate in the discussion agree. the “joint body” as described can advance recommendations to the minister of natural resources regarding land use strategies and policy statements and introduce a funding framework to support land use planning and processes to approach dispute resolution within the planning process (far north act, 2010, s. 7(4)). the “joint body” is to be composed of equal first nation and government of ontario representation. this amendment aligns well with the requirements of the un declaration on rights of indigenous peoples (2007, article 18) that outlines the “right to participate in decision-making in matters which would affect them, through representatives chosen by themselves in accordance with their own procedure …” however, the government of ontario retains ultimate decision-making power related to amendments, policy documents, and, in particular, exemption orders (see the taken up clause section). the government of ontario’s ability to override community-based land use plans to permit various types of development is contrary to the un declaration on rights of indigenous peoples (2007). article 32 (2) stipulates, 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.7   that states shall consult and cooperate in good faith … through their own representative institutions in order to obtain their free, prior, and informed consent … particularly in connection with development, utilization, or exploitation of minerals, water, or other resources. (un declaration on rights of indigenous peoples, 2007, article 32(2)) following the assent of the far north act (2010), the feelings relating to the degree that recommendations were incorporated into the legislation were expressed in a statement by the deputy grand chief of nan mike metatawabin: the passing of bill 191 today indeed shows how little regard the mcguinty government [government of ontario] gives to the concerns of first nations and other northern ontarians when it comes to decision making. it is a disappointing day for all of us who spent tireless hours opposing bill 191 as our opposition was obviously ignored. as we have stated time and time again, nan first nations and tribal councils do not and will not recognize this legislation on our homelands. we will continue to uphold our aboriginal and treaty rights and jurisdiction over our land. the real fight is just beginning. (nan, 2010c, para. 2) in summary, the far north act (2010) was not informed by first nations recommendations, and, even though “joint bodies” were added as an amendment to the act, the “joint body” could be neutered by ministerial power. in present day ontario, canada, it would be politically unwise to push through a bill with no amendments, especially a bill as controversial as bill 191; therefore, it was expected that amendments would be made. amendments were made to bill 191; however, any amendments made were merely paying lip service, in that government of ontario could push through any type of development. although the terms of bill 191 were not fixed – as with the terms of treaty no. 9 – from one viewpoint, the terms need not be fixed in the far north act (2010), as the legislation accorded power to the government of ontario to do as it sees fits for the greater good of ontarians. taken up clause as briefly mentioned above, the far north act (2010) gives ultimate power to the government of ontario to describe, amend, and overrule the planning process through exemption orders and final decisions related to land use strategies: exemption orders (12 (4)): a person may undertake a development described in subsection (1) (opening a mine, commercial timber harvest, oil and gas exploration, construction expansion of electrical generation facilities, associated infrastructure, all weather transportation infrastructure, other infrastructure, or any other activity that is prescribed) if the lieutenant governor [of ontario] in council, after taking into account the objectives set out in section 5, by order determines that the development is in the social and economic interests of ontario. the similarity between the taken up clause of treaty no. 9 (table 1) and exemption orders of the far north act (2010) is undeniable: both agreements allow the government (“the government of the country” in the case of treaty no. 9 [the james bay treaty – treaty no. 9, 1964, p. 20] and “the lieutenant governor in council” [far north act, 2010, exemption orders (12(4))]) to override terms of the document in question, when in the best interest of the general public (i.e., non-native people). although treaty no. 9 is not as explicit as the exemption orders (12(4)) of the far north act (2010), the government of canada’s position on this issue was clearly articulated by frank oliver, minister of the interior and superintendent general of indian affairs, when queried about the integrity of indian lands: 15 gardner et al.: the far north act (2010) published by scholarship@western, 2012   when pressed in march 1906 by opposition leader robert borden on the question of large “unused” reserves [i.e., treaty lands] which were hindering development in the prairie provinces. oliver responded sympathetically. he conceded that, while indians rights ought to be protected, they should not be allowed to interfere with those of whites – “and if it becomes a question between the indians and the whites, the interests of the whites will have to be provided for.” (titley, 1986, pp. 20-21) a point that has been missed in all the discussions of the far north act (2010) is that only “the government of the country” (i.e., the government of canada, not the government of ontario19) has the authority to interfere with “hunting, trapping, and fishing” with respect to development and the “taken up” clause of treaty no. 9 (the james bay treaty – treaty no. 9, 1964, p. 20; see table 1). moreover, section 35(1) of the constitution act, 1982, recognizes and affirms existing treaty rights of the aboriginal peoples living in the area covered by treaty 9. according to the sparrow decision, such rights can be infringed only by legislative enactments and regulations which meet certain justificatory standards. accordingly, governments and third parties cannot undertake economic development in the area which would infringe treaty rights without specific legislative authority to do so. such legislation would have to be federal due to the fact that treaty rights are shielded from provincial legislation by section 88 of the indian act. moreover, such legislative initiatives would only be valid if it passed the justifactory test established by the court in sparrow and badger. the party seeking to meet this test would have to prove that the particular proposal for economic development at issue is a valid legislative objective, and that there are no other viable alternatives for meeting that objective without infringing treaty rights. if other alternatives exist, the party in question must pursue them first so that treaty rights are given the priority to which they are entitled under the constitution. (macklem, 1997, p. 132) nevertheless, the government of ontario’s position on bill 191, prior to passing, narrowly defined their intent to include only the activities directly associated with community-based land use planning: i would like to take some time today to set the record straight about what bill 191 will and will not do. first and foremost, bill 191 is about land use planning in the far north. the subject matter of the bill is not about first nations’ jurisdiction over the land, nor does the bill address treaty interpretation. these issues are substantial in nature and are clearly part of a much larger conversation outside the scope of this bill and would more properly require the involvement of the federal government (minister of natural resources, linda jeffrey, legislative assembly of ontario, 2010c, p. 2215).                                                                                                                 19 “the term ‘the government’ obviously refers to only one body. had the words ‘a government’ been used then the meaning would have been different. furthermore, i have not been directed to any authority, historical or otherwise, where any province after confederation was referred to as a “country.” in 1905 the only government of the country was the federal government, and this distinction between federal and provincial authorities was well known to all including the indians. indeed, the very fact that the federal government was referred to in two other non-identical terms confirms my view that the drafters of the treaty were not very careful with the technical terms used throughout the document. if the makers of the treaty intended to delegate authority to regulate the indian hunting and fishing rights to the government of the province of ontario, they would have specifically said so. i note, for example, that in the agreement between the provincial and federal government (to which the treaty specifically referred), there was no hesitation in using the term ‘the government of the province of ontario’ when referring to that body" (r v. batisse, 1978, p. 383).   16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.7   clearly, minister jeffrey is erroneous in her assessment; the far north act (2010) will impact treaty no. 9 traditional pursuits, hunting, trapping and fishing (among other things), which are constitutionally entrenched rights. these issues should have been addressed concurrently, not sequentially, because any development that could impact treaty rights should have been addressed prior to the passing of bill 191. it appears that by being a “have-not” province, expediency with respect to resource development is now a priority in ontario. treaty context perspective the discourse that surrounds first nations’ opposition to the far north act (2010) relates to its potential impact on treaty and indigenous rights and a lack of acknowledgement of jurisdictional responsibility related to traditional territories. the far north act (2010) includes a clause that provides for a “joint planning process” between the province and first nations. the objective is to carry out community-based land use planning based on “environmental, social, and economic objectives for the people of ontario” and ensure that it “is done in a manner consistent with the recognition and affirmation of existing aboriginal and treaty rights in section 35 of the constitution act, 1982, including the duty to consult” (far north act, 2010, s.1(a),(b),(c)). in contrast to the official government of ontario’s position, as voiced by minster jeffrey in the taken up clause section, first nation representatives believe that historical and contemporary policy documents should be used to inform the process. in the view of nan leadership, historic documents (treaties) and the un declaration on the rights of indigenous people (2007) form the basis of consideration related to bill 191, as described by chief randy kapashesit of the mocreebec council (legislative assembly of ontario, 2009b): the reality is many of us are actually coming at this from a totally different perspective – it’s like we’re speaking two different languages – on the indigenous viewpoint on development and how we should be seeing the future. there is a great opportunity for you [government of ontario] to actually lead the world and show that you understand that, by becoming familiar with that piece of legislation [un declaration on the rights of indigenous people], by indicating that you’re willing to recognize, there are, in fact, human rights that are being violated here and you are concerned about that. it’s a dialogue and principle that i’m sure you probably haven’t even heard before this committee ... the key point is, we have that right to choose. in the course of developing this document, the far north act, i’ve seen no initiative to actually be engaged with our communities, to say, “what is it that you’re interested in?” i see this more as an imposition, a continuation of a higher power at work, if you will, telling us that this is the way it has to be. “never mind your human rights, never mind your historical rights; we’re not interested in that”: that’s what you’re saying by producing this kind of document and expecting us to participate, meaning that you haven’t actually spent any time to even develop an approach that achieves free, prior and informed consent. (p. g-957) treaties form the cornerstone of the relationship between fist nations and the government, especially in the case of treaty no. 9, where both the provincial and federal governments were signatories of the agreement. an exercise that outlines the way traditional territories will be developed and preserved requires a consideration of the treaties, policy documents, and case law20 that has defined and characterized aboriginal rights. however, in this case, the province of ontario presents a position that considers historic agreements, like treaties, to be outside the scope of this exercise. this position is at odds with the canadian constitution act (1982) and the un declaration on the rights of indigenous people (un declaration on the rights of indigenous people, 2007,                                                                                                                 20 for example, delgamuukw v. british columbia (1997). 17 gardner et al.: the far north act (2010) published by scholarship@western, 2012   article 37) by failing to consider the interpretation of the treaty, the province of ontario cannot have effectively ensured that the treaties or the rights of aboriginal peoples have been respected. conclusions the lack of adequate consultation with first nations people with respect to the far north act (2010) has contributed to ongoing opposition to the legislation as a whole. the expected form of consultation described by first nations’ representatives throughout the consultative process represents a minimum standard when compared to national and international protocols, yet the province of ontario failed to meet that standard. the requirements to consult is further limited, within the legislation, through the exemption order that provides the government of ontario with power to override community-based land use plans and permit development with no mention of the consultation that would typically be required. according to the government of ontario, the creation of the far north act (2010) was to mark the beginning of a new and improved relationship with first nations of northern ontario. the passing of this piece of legislation, however, was not a new beginning, but rather the continuation of an unacceptable relationship. even though more than 100 years have passed since treaty no. 9 was signed, there has been little improvement in the relationship between the government of ontario and the first nations of northern ontario. the similarities between consultative and negotiation process for the treaty no. 9 (james bay treaty, 1964) and the far north act (2010) are striking: there was inadequate community consultation and accommodation; the terms of both agreements were essentially fixed (although some amendments were made to the far north act (2010)); and clauses were built into both agreements whereby first nations’ rights to a traditional lifestyle (e.g., hunting and fishing) could be compromised for the greater good of canadians, as a whole. indeed, the frustration of first nations leaders with the consultation and negotiation process is understandable. grand chief stan beardy of nan clearly indicated the position of his people on the then proposed far north legislation during the province of ontario’s standing committee meeting on bill 191: as it is with this committee’s process, so it is with these pieces of legislation – a fiasco, an utter failure, an opportunity lost, a promise broken. the plan from the start, as directed by the premier [leader of the government of ontario], was that this would be a true partnership, a new relationship, creating a land use planning law that would put first nations in the driver’s seat on a government-to-government basis. we keep repeating this context to you because it is fundamentally important. it is the key to everything that has gone wrong … what did we get instead? the same old thing, the old relationship; not a partnership but a wardship. (legislative assembly of ontario, 2009a, p. 952) adding further, grand chief louttitt (2010b) of mushkegowuk tribal council states, at every omushkego mamohitowin [gathering] in recent times and as well as at chiefs meetings, the matter of resource development in our territories is almost always a topic of discussion … bill 191, the far north act … unless, things change between the period of writing of this report and this week, we will have a law that basically will have government largely control our lands and will largely dictate the manner in which our territory is developed. as well, there is very little in the act that will respect the omuhshkego [cree] and our unique status as treaty people. at a recent meeting of nan chiefs, the chiefs were united in their opposition to this bill … i say we develop our own laws, we stand by them, we stand in unity and we ignore this law and we do things our way. does this sound impossible? i don’t think so. it will mean strategizing, using our treaty as the tool to create 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.7   the vision and implementing in unity, our collective rights in our territories. nation building, creating laws, being united, speaking with one voice, helping one another; these are all elements of a strong cree nation. 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(2007). united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples. retrieved from http://daccess-dds-ny.un.org/doc/undoc/gen/n06/512/07/ pdf/n0651207.pdf?open element 23 gardner et al.: the far north act (2010) published by scholarship@western, 2012 the international indigenous policy journal august 2012 the far north act (2010) consultative process: a new beginning or the reinforcement of an unacceptable relationship in northern ontario, canada? holly l. gardner stephen r. j. tsuji daniel d. mccarthy graham s. whitelaw leonard j.s. tsuji recommended citation the far north act (2010) consultative process: a new beginning or the reinforcement of an unacceptable relationship in northern ontario, canada? abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license the far north act (2010) consultative process: a new beginning or the reinforcement of an unacceptable relationship in northern ontario, canada? lessons learned through community-engaged planning the international indigenous policy journal manuscript 1338 lessons learned through community-engaged planning robert j. patrick laura machial kendra quinney len quinney lessons learned through community-engaged planning abstract this article explores the potential for community-engaged planning to empower indigenous communities to take ownership of planning and plan-making. we do this through a source water protection planning process with a first nation community in alberta, canada. access to safe drinking water for many first nation communities in canada remains problematic. source water protection planning seeks to better integrate land and water management to prevent contamination of the drinking water supply. we employ a communitybased planning initiative to develop a source water protection plan. while the planning initiative developed a successful drinking water protection plan it also served to built trust between the participants, respected traditional and western values, as well as empowered the community. lessons learned from this initiative are shared. keywords community-engaged planning, canada, indigenous, first nations, source water protection creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ l e s s o n s l e a rn e d t h ro u g h c o m m u n i t y e n g a g e d pl a n n i n g state-forces once organized to assimilate, colonize, and commit genocide in order to deface and eradicate the indigenous peoples of what became canada (truth and reconciliation commission [trc], 2015). the collective response of indigenous peoples to overcome those forces exemplifies human resilience. today, the instruments of colonization remain embedded in state-led policies and other institutional arrangements of government—and yet the resolve of indigenous peoples to resist and flourish has not diminished. one such instrument is the practice of western planning, which continues to play a significant role in the colonization process by upholding the apparent value of private land ownership, individual property rights, and state-led laws and regulations. for indigenous peoples, western planning has largely consisted of usurping indigenous sovereignty to service the interests of non-indigenous peoples (lane & hibbard, 2005). in this article, we explore the benefits of, and lessons learned from, a different form of planning—a form that engages with communities in the plan-making process. this form of community-engaged planning, we argue, empowers indigenous people as active participants in what smith (1999) described as an emancipatory process. of course, a communityengaged land use planning process alone will never remove the overburden of colonization but it may empower communities and help to facilitate reconciliation. here we describe and reflect upon a community-engaged planning process undertaken at frog lake first nation (flfn) in alberta, canada. this plan-making process focused on the protection of that nation’s drinking water supply. using this plan-making process as an example, we illustrate that community-engaged indigenous planning contributes not only to community resilience but also to community empowerment. the colonial system of “indian reserves” imposed elements of state-controlled infrastructure services, including housing, waste disposal, and water distribution services. the inadequacy of these services has been well documented in both academic and government literature. in terms of water distribution services specifically, the literature has noted a lack of piped water distribution and community sanitation sewers, as well as frequent boil water advisories and inappropriate or antiquated water treatment infrastructure. in response, the prime minister justin trudeau has proclaimed his new government will “fix” the first nation water problem in the next 5 years (canadian press, 2015). while many are hopeful that the canadian government will act on this claim, there is also significant skepticism regarding its feasibility: can such widespread water problems on first nations, the result of systemic colonial oversight, be “fixed” in such short order? furthermore, the commitment to fix the water problem implies that technology and infrastructure investment alone can undo the complex drinking water problem facing first nations communities. we argue that a possible “fix” will not be found in science and technology alone, but rather that engagement of first nations in community-based planning, specifically source water protection planning, will provide the presently missing, yet critical, “fix.” initiatives based on such efforts do not exclude the federal government or the research community; instead, they redefine the roles of those parties to ensure that indigenous voices are present at all stages of the process: from framing the problem to exploring solutions that are both culturally appropriate and context specific. t h e w a t e r pro b l e m despite ongoing commitments by the federal government to resolve problems of water quality, the contamination of drinking water in first nations reserves remains high. in fact, as of april 30, 2016, 1 patrick et al.: community-engaged planning published by scholarship@western, there were 131 drinking water advisories in effect in 88 first nations communities across canada (south of the 60th parallel), excluding british columbia (health canada, 2016). a drinking water advisory is a preventative measure to protect public health from confirmed or suspected microbial or chemical contamination in waters designated for human use and consumption (health canada, 2009). more problematic than a drinking water advisory is a boil water advisory, which is issued after the contamination of a water supply with fecal pollution indicator organisms has been confirmed (health canada, 2009). boil water advisories are 2.5 times more frequent for first nations communities than for non-first nations communities (eggerton, 2006; patrick, 2014). in addition, approximately 30% of water systems in first nations communities in canada are classified as high risk, and the number of waterborne infections in first nations communities is an alarming 26 times higher than the canadian national average (eggerton 2008; patrick, 2011). in alberta alone, there were 16 boil water advisories in effect in first nations communities in november 2016; the longest was in effect for over 8 years with the average being 2.5 years (health canada, 2016). it is beyond the scope of a single study to account for all of the factors that contribute to water contamination in first nations communities. similarly, possible solutions to such water-related issues are multi-faceted and vary between first nations communities. however, the protection of drinking water sources from contamination has been identified as a critical first step toward ensuring the provision of safe drinking water (canadian council of ministers of the environment [ccme], 2004; o’connor, 2002; patrick, 2011). the safe drinking water for first nations act (2013) has required all first nations in canada to develop source water protections plans. this is a considerable undertaking for the 634 first nations governments spread across canada, many of which are in isolated rural areas, and who may have never participated in a modern plan-making process. in addition, the level of technical, human, and financial capacity that is necessary to undertake plan-making and plan implementation is geographically uneven and often lacking—not all first nations have the capacity to develop the source water protection plans that the act requires (wang & patrick, 2014). in the past, first nations communities have been given little guidance—let alone any practical tools—that would help them assist in the development of a source water protection plan. in 2013, the federal government released a source water protectionplanning framework for use by first nations (aboriginal affairs and northern development canada [aandc], 2013). the government’s intent was that first nations would use this planning framework to develop their own source water protection plans. while well intended, this framework never explained how a first nation might engage in the planning process. this article describes and reflects upon a community-engaged planning process that makes use of the aandc (2013) framework. we see the community-based planning process as essential not only to source water protection plan making but also to fostering community empowerment and resiliency. s o u rc e w a t e r pro t e c t i o n source water is untreated water from groundwater or surface water sources that supplies drinking water for human consumption. source water protection is a vital first step in the protection of water supplies and is often referred to as the first step in the multi-barrier approach to safe drinking water (ccme 2004). the multi-barrier approach (mba) to clean drinking water is “an integrated system of procedures, processes and tools that collectively prevent or reduce the contamination of drinking water from source to tap in order to reduce risks to public health” (ccme, 2004, p. 15). in the context of drinking water management, the goal of the mba is to reduce the risk of drinking water contamination 2 submission to the international indigenous policy journal http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.7 through the presence of system redundancies, or barriers, that are built into the water system. ccme (2004) has described three main barriers of the mba. the first is protecting the source water from the threat of contamination. the second is the treatment of drinking water through various methods, including chlorination, filtration, and other chemical and mechanical treatments. the third is maintaining, monitoring, and testing the water distribution system. source water protection (swp) gained global media attention following the walkerton, ontario, water contamination crisis of may 2000, which resulted in 7 deaths and 2,300 cases of serious illness. academic literature in the aftermath of the walkerton crisis initially focused on capacity building to support swp at a local scale of inquiry. this was much needed at the time, given the downloading of responsibility by government, de-regulation of provincial policies, and limited resources at the local level (patrick, kreutzwiser, & deloë, 2008). small and rural communities were, and remain, particularly vulnerable to a broad range of financial, human resource, technical, and administrative capacity limitations. while walkerton will forever remain a tragic event in canadian history, the persistent water quality issues that continue to plague first nations communities in this country show that there has been little sign of improvement since 2000. arguably, source water protection planning offers one means of improving drinking water quality on first nations (patrick, 2014). c o m m u n i t y e n g a g e d pl a n n i n g this and other contemporary planning processes should not be construed as a first attempt at planning by first nations communities. we acknowledge that planning and plan making both have a long tradition in first nations communities. settlement planning, hunting and food gathering, transportation and trade routes, and migration and seasonal settlement all depended upon indigenous peoples’ prolonged planning. beginning in the late 1800, the canadian state’s forced assimilation policies—for example, the indian residential school system and other state apparatuses—interfered with indigenous peoples’ traditional planning practices. it is important at this point to pause and reflect on the role and consequences of western planning on indigenous communities on a global scale. lane (2006) has noted that modern planning has served to strip indigenous peoples of their inherent right to access their lands. non-indigenous planners in australia and elsewhere have used state-led planning to eradicate indigenous sovereignty over land and resources (lane & hibbard, 2005). in canada, state-led planning operated similarly, supporting land parcelization, private land ownership, exclusionary zoning, and private land sales, which served to remove indigenous title, rights, and sovereignty over access to land and resources. such planning effectively aided colonial seizure of and control over land and resources by facilitating practices such as the damming of rivers, flooding indigenous settlements, establishing indian reserves, disrupting indigenous peoples’ livelihoods, extracting natural resources, and denying access to traditional food and medicinal supplies. even indigenous beliefs, expression of thought, and ceremonial practices were controlled through government policies, bylaws, regulations, and legislation—themselves examples of western planning practices. in this article, we look to the role of community-based planning as a means of reclaiming indigenous planning (jojola, 2013). indigenous planning comes from a different place, wherein a collective vision is centered on land stewardship, where the benefits of plan making are distributed evenly across space and where the planning horizon is multigenerational. we argue that community-engaged planning is one means of moving toward indigenous planning. community-based approaches to resource planning and management can lead to positive results by reducing conflict and solving complex problems (ostrom, 2009). 3 patrick et al.: community-engaged planning published by scholarship@western, here we report the lessons learned from the application of a planning framework designed around community-engaged planning in order to develop a source water protection plan for frog lake first nation (flfn). flfn is a cree community located in treaty 6, alberta, approximately 200 km east of edmonton, canada (see figure 1). it is located 11 km northeast of the hamlet of heinsburg and 13 km southwest of the fishing lake métis settlement on secondary highway 897. the community is easily accessible by paved roads. the on-reserve population of flfn is approximately 1,400 to 1,500 persons. as of may 2014, there were approximately 310 existing homes plus an additional 70 houses and trailers under construction (flfn, personal communication, may 2014). pl a n n i n g f ra m e w o rk the plan-making process at flfn adopted aandc’s (2013) five-stage source water protection planning framework. this planning framework was developed by the lead author for use by first nations in canada, with the specific purpose of ensuring the protection of drinking water (see figure 2). the planning framework, in its current form, makes no specific mention of adopting a community-based approach. instead, a deliberate effort was made to engage with community members early in the process of developing the flfn source water protection plan. during the plan-making process, members of the community with related experience and knowledge (the working committee) offered perspectives on, opinions about, and stories concerning the condition of the nation’s water and land. this was done to promote a community-centered approach to planning, as opposed to one that privileged and was controlled by the interests of people from outside the community. the following section will describe the five stages of the planning framework. s t a g e 1 : e s t a b l i s h w o rki n g c o m m i t t e e . prior to the inaugural swp meeting in may 2014, directors from flfn appointed members to the source water protection plan working committee (the working committee) to lead the development of a source water protection plan. in total, 11 community members and three technical support personnel contributed to the development of the source water protection plan. the community members included an elder, two students, an elected councilor, as well as representatives from key departments from the first nation’s government, including the health centre, lands, and public works. these representatives included three water treatment plant operators and a water truck driver. the technical personnel on the working committee included a water treatment circuit rider1 from technical services advisory group (tsag), a tsag biologist, and a plan facilitator from the university of saskatchewan. 1 the circuit rider training program is a long-term capacity building program operated by indigenous and northern affairs canada (inac, formerly aandc) to provide training and mentoring services to operators of first nations drinking water systems and wastewater systems. qualified experts rotate through a circuit of first nations communities training the people responsible for operating, monitoring, and maintaining drinking water and wastewater systems. 4 submission to the international indigenous policy journal http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.7 f i g u re 1 . f i rs t n a t i o n s i n a l b e rt a , c a n a d a . 5 patrick et al.: community-engaged planning published by scholarship@western, f i g u re 2 . s o u rc e w a t e r p ro t e c t i o n p l a n n i n g f ra m e w o rk ( a a n d c , 2 0 1 3 , p . 8 ) . at the working committee’s inaugural meeting, the plan facilitator shared the planning framework with the working committee and the technical committee, and the planning process began immediately thereafter. the purpose of the working committee was to provide knowledge about local water conditions generally including, but not limited to local drainage, drinking water quality, water quantity, wastewater management, and natural and human induced threats to local water sources. using the planning framework outlined in figure 2, the working committee was tasked with overseeing development of the plan in collaboration with the technical members and community rights-holders who possess knowledge of past and present land uses as well as local hydrological conditions. meetings were conducted over consecutive days to help focus the work effort. specific tasks for each meeting were identified in an agenda consistent with the planning framework outlined in figure 2. meetings were held in chief and council chambers of flfn, and a working committee member acted as chairperson for each. as is custom when working with many first nations, lunch was provided. this meal sharing enabled informal discussion, which, in turn, led to a general sense of trust and camaraderie between participants. all meetings opened and closed with a cree prayer offered by the elder. an honorarium was paid to the elder for each meeting attended. as well, a gift of tobacco was offered to the elder at the start of each meeting. in addition to respecting cultural tradition and protocol, these practices also served to build a trusting relationship. following these preliminary meetings, a total of 5 full-day meetings were held to draft the source water protection plan between may and september of 2014. following the initial draft of the plan, a series of open house sessions were scheduled over 2 days in december of 2014 at four locations in the community: the health centre, the frog lake energy resources corporation, the band office, and the stage 1 establish working committee stage 2 complete source water assessment stage 3 identify risk management actions stage 4 develop implementation strategy stage 5 review and update swpp 1 2 3 4 5 6 submission to the international indigenous policy journal http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.7 chief napeweaw comprehensive school. following the open house sessions, the working committee met in june 2015 to reflect on the community’s input and to make final revisions to the draft plan. a consensus-based approach to decision making was employed throughout the plan-making process. the plan facilitator encouraged this approach based on the qualitative nature of the data collected. capturing general perceptions of risk was more important to the plan-making process than precise measurement. for this reason, the consensus-based approach was most appropriate. s t a g e 2 : s o u rc e w a t e r a s s e s s m e n t . the second stage of the planning framework involved the completion of a source water assessment of the local water system and water supply area. the assessment included the collection of information relating to: • the source of water, • the location of water intake, • the type of water treatment and distribution system, • the extent of the service area, and • the number of residential units, commercial users, and institutional users served by the water system. the source water protection area was decided to be the boundary of the first nation. however, areas outside of the reserve boundary were also given consideration in this planning exercise because activities in those areas may have negative impacts on the quality of water in flfn. following the description of the water system, an inventory of potential contaminant sources was taken. using local knowledge, the working committee developed an inventory of all known and perceived land uses and activities that could potentially degrade water quality. this inventory included all humangenerated sources (e.g., point source and non-point source2) as well as natural sources (e.g., erosion, turbidity3). 2 point source pollution enters the environment at a specific place or “point” from an identifiable source. examples of point source pollution are landfill site leachate, on-site septic systems, leaking oil and gas storage tanks, and industrial pipe effluent discharge. unlike point source pollutants, non-point source pollutants come from a wide area of sources. non-point source pollution comes from natural and human-made sources that are transported by water running over the land that enters surface water or groundwater through percolation. examples include agricultural runoff and urban runoff. 3 erosion is the process of eroding, or the wearing down, of natural material such as rock or soil by wind action, water, or other natural agents. turbidity is a measure of the clarity of a liquid. large numbers of suspended microscopic particles in water cause cloudiness of the water. turbidity is a key test of water quality: the higher the turbidity, the greater the cloudiness of a water sample. 7 patrick et al.: community-engaged planning published by scholarship@western, the final component of the source water assessment was a risk assessment of known and perceived threats to the water source. in this context, risk refers to the likelihood of an occurrence multiplied by its potential impact. both the likelihood and impact of occurrence range in numeric value from 1 (most unlikely and insignificant) to 5 (almost certain and catastrophic). the likelihood of an occurrence may be low (e.g., a train derailment), but the impact of such an occurrence very high (e.g., long-term groundwater contamination). conversely, the likelihood of contamination may be very high (e.g., from stream bank erosion) but the corresponding impact may be very low (e.g., increased turbidity of raw water). the drinking water system at flfn has many components, including a lake water intake at frog lake proper (i.e., the body of water named frog lake), a water treatment plant, water delivery trucks, and approximately 300 households with individual water cisterns. in addition, approximately 40 homes are connected to a piped water distribution system from the water treatment plant. this type of “blended” water distribution system is common on first nations in canada. as such, there was a need for various community members to make presentations to the working committee to explain potential threats to the water supply system. information from water treatment plant staff, water truck drivers, well drillers, and local health authority personnel was made readily available to the working committee members. the purpose of such information was to better inform the working committee on key questions relating to the land and water use that would ultimately lead to a better informed source water protection plan. contaminant sources were identified based on the working committee members’ local knowledge. indeed, this stage of planning depended heavily on the experience and knowledge of the working committee members. land and resource managers provided information about current land management practices that could potentially impact water quality, and the water truck operators shared their experiences working with water cisterns (i.e., their conditions) and cistern filling procedures. treatment plant operators were important participants too, as they held key knowledge of raw water quality and are often the first to report spikes in raw water turbidity. the elder on the committee provided knowledge about past land use activities that may affect water quality, as well as the location of private wells, traditional food gathering places, and lake conditions. one observation was that the water level in frog lake had been dropping for several decades, potentially as a result of directional drilling for oil and gas deposits under the lakebed. beyond identifying potential threats to the water source, it is essential to quantify such threats via a risk assessment process. thus for each threat identified, committee members assigned a value for both likelihood and consequence. this process generated healthy discussion and, almost always, a clear consensus. working committee members were reminded that the numbers on the risk assessment scale are merely relative values and are not intended to reflect an accurate assessment. what the values do provide is a means of ranking one activity or event higher or lower in comparison to another, thereby allowing a relative risk ranking for each threat. this is helpful in stage 3 (see figure 1), wherein the identified risks become prioritized leading to identification of management actions. at least 3 full-day meetings were committed to completion of stage 2, which was the most time-consuming stage in the plan-making process. 8 submission to the international indigenous policy journal http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.7 in this community-based planning process, members of flfn became engaged in plan making and also empowered in plan implementation through action-oriented research (smith, 1999). a more in-depth household survey would potentially reveal a different set of concerns with water. for example, if the study were to incorporate a feminist perspective, then it would be possible to identify concerns with water safety at the household level, particularly surrounding how water quality impacts food preparation, hygiene, sanitation, and children’s health. such an approach could help deconstruct relationships between place, gender, health, and water (smith, 1999). s t a g e 3 : i d e n t i f y ri s k m a n a g e m e n t a c t i o n s . after ranking the identified threats (i.e., after stage 2 of the process), the working committee focused on the different management actions that could address the potential risks to source water. management actions are intended to reduce or eliminate identified risks to source water. for most risks, a single management action is not sufficient to address and rectify potential risks. as such, local knowledge and the experience of the working committee were critical during this stage. the working committee proposed management actions that were desired, workable, and based on the technical expertise of the committee members. generally, there are two types of management actions: structural and non-structural. structural management actions include land alteration and building infrastructure, while non-structural management actions include communication and education. blending these two types provides the greatest opportunity for effective, broad-ranging management actions. again, in the context of the planning process at flfn, the working committee members’ breadth of knowledge and experience contributed to creative, yet effective, management actions that are capable of reducing the risk to source water. discussion during this stage typically emphasized the necessity of rejecting both past and present management practices in favour of suggestions regarding new practices or management actions that should be considered going forward. in all instances, committee members agreed on which management actions would be most effective and suitable for the planning process. s t a g e 4 : d e v e l o p a n i m p l e m e n t a t i o n s t ra t e g y . next, the working committee developed a strategy to implement the chosen management actions. this involved creating timelines for executing the chosen management actions and identifying potential partnerships. implementation is critical to plan making and is the factor that most often determines the success or failure of a plan. in addition, implementation allowed the working committee to see the results of their efforts and to celebrate the early success of the planning process. the working committee noted that certain management activities could be initiated almost immediately, while other activities would take considerably longer to implement. as a result, the working committee decided to specify a timeline to completion for each management action: short term actions were to be completed within 1 year, medium term actions within 3 years, and longer term actions within 5 years. another critical aspect of developing an implementation strategy is the identification of key partners to assist with each management action. in most instances, flfn needed cooperation between several departments within the local government to accomplish the management actions. for example, some homes in the community use “shoot-outs” (raw sewage discharge to the ground surface) as their primary method of disposing of wastewater; in order to deal with the “shoot-out” issue, the public works department, lands department, health centre, and school would all need to coordinate 9 patrick et al.: community-engaged planning published by scholarship@western, implementation. in other instances, outside partnerships may be required from adjacent landowners, businesses, and various levels of government. s t a g e 5 : r e v i e w a n d u p d a t e o f t h e s w pp. on an annual basis, the plan should undergo a full review for the purposes of: • reporting on the progress of implementing the plan, particularly with reference to water quality monitoring results; • re-evaluating the chosen management actions; and • re-engaging the working committee and the broader community about the planning progress and the next steps. given the recent (2015) completion of the flfn source water protection plan and the ongoing implementation of many management actions included in the plan, it would be prudent to begin regular reviews of the plan. planning and plan making is time consuming. those engaged in plan making at the community level are likely to invest hundreds of hours of their time into plans, and these people are essential to the success of a plan, giving their experiences in community. despite this, however, they are unlikely to be paid for their services. community members serving on working committees for planning processes more than likely already hold permanent jobs—elected officials, land managers, treatment plant operators, and school principals. it is important for the external plan facilitators, researchers, and/or consultants to recognize and acknowledge that new planning projects place an additional workload onto participants. while plan-making processes are relatively short—typically lasting between days and weeks—the implementation of these plans may take years. identifying a person (often called a “plan champion”) to assist in early plan development is crucial to ensuring the success of the plan. in the context of the planning process at flfn, a plan champion emerged from the community, and the implementation of this plan began almost immediately. without a plan champion or group of plan champions, implementing any plan will be challenging at best. as such, an assessment by the community may help identify the readiness of that community to move forward in plan making prior to actual commencement of a plan. such an assessment could seek out a plan champion and assess a community’s human, financial, political, and technical capacity to undertake not only the plan-making process but also the implementation of a plan. d i s c u s s i o n the lead author of this article made an initial visit to flfn to begin building a working relationship and to tour selected sites within the community. during this visit, the lead author took time to provide an overview of the plan-making process with key staff members and managers within the community. at about the same time, tsag was undertaking water quality monitoring with youth in the community. it was decided that a combined effort between tsag, the researcher, and flfn would most effectively guide the source water protection planning process. 10 submission to the international indigenous policy journal http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.7 as mentioned above, the working committee for this project was made up of individuals representing different interests within flfn. these interests ranged from industry to environment and from housing to road infrastructure. it was expected that working committee members could participate in a way that would protect their respective interests; however, this did not materialize. instead, the working committee focused on ensuring safe drinking water and the importance of protecting a drinking water source for all community members immediately overtook any competing interests of the working committee members. indeed, the fact that all of the working committee members were from the same community, drinking the same water, and shared the same concerns about the health of community members, helps explain the members’ immediate commitment to the plan-making process. this might not be the case in other planning processes wherein participants work outside the communities in which they live. we argue that planning—especially the ability of a community to actively engage in a planning process—is a tremendously empowering process. planning and the process of plan making at the community level is essentially about future seeking. realizing the collective potential of engaging in and with decision making about the future of one’s community is empowering on all levels, and this is magnified in indigenous communities wherein community members have long been written out of the plan-making process. as with any plan-making process, building trust between and among the working committee and plan facilitators at the start of the planning process was critical. building trust has a special meaning when working with any first nations community: the impacts of colonization, residential schools, and racism toward first nations in canada have the potential to produce uneasy relations. in addition, the legacy of much of the academic work “on” first nations has produced a general suspicion towards researchers intent on extracting information for personal benefit. in this project, the positive working relationship between the technical advisors, plan facilitator, and the members of the working committee provided a friendly and trusting platform from which to commence the plan-making process. research with indigenous communities requires personal contact and the development of lasting relationships. making multiple site visits to a community and investing time to meet with the membership and leadership is necessary; trust cannot be built through telephone or email alone. at flfn, preliminary community visits enabled relationship building, open discussion around community events, and visits to various water-related infrastructure sites in the community. very few of the working committee members had been involved with a plan-making process before the beginning of this project. while there was a degree of excitement among members, there was also some apprehension and uncertainty about the planning outcomes and the expectations of the working committee members. it was important, therefore, to remind the working committee of the limitations of the plan-making process. one limitation, for example, was that the plan-making process would not guarantee immediate action. that said all members saw the value of a community-based planning initiative. the identification of a “plan champion” from the community was helpful in terms of logistics (e.g., scheduling meetings), but it was also helpful in terms of ensuring there was a spokesperson for the project within the community. the plan champion may also serve as liaison between department heads, the general membership, and the leadership in the first nation. moving forward, a major challenge for community-based planning is plan implementation. we see this as a challenge of human capacity more than anything else. making a plan is one thing, but implementing a plan is quite another. existing staff 11 patrick et al.: community-engaged planning published by scholarship@western, and management are busy with their existing workloads and the addition of long-term plan implementation is not normally a task people can easily “add-on.” plan implementation requires a dedicated person—a “plan implementation champion”—to coordinate, oversee, and document plan implementation activities. this work entails fundraising, grant writing, information coordination, industry and government collaboration, project management, and outreach to youth, elders, leadership, and members. threat identification was the first group exercise and the information generated was based on local knowledge and experience. the plan facilitators believed that any perceived threat should be identified and recorded for the source water protection plan. confirmation of the threat, in terms of impact on water quality, would come later if a management action called for water monitoring or contaminant testing. the identification of threats was facilitated through the use of a large wall map of the entire lake and surrounding community. individual members of the working committee marked specific threats on the map and then discussed them. the map was a helpful visual aid for all participants in the planmaking process, as some members of the working committee were not aware of the location of certain land features that posed a threat to their source water. similarly, not all working committee members were familiar with the location of the community water system infrastructure. the risk ranking exercise continued to generate discussion and allowed the working committee to determine what constituted a risk (likelihood multiplied by impact). it was surprising to see how much consensus there was within the working committee when determining the risk rank value. this had been similarly observed in other community planning exercises. the open, iterative discussion of risks to source water made working committee members aware of additional threats that they had initially missed in the previous exercise. for many participants, this became a learning exercise—a history lesson for some younger members who were unaware of past land use activities within their own community. in addition, elder knowledge played a large role in the identification of past and present threats to the water source. next, management actions were identified and listed for each risk. working committee members were encouraged not to think of financial considerations, but rather to creatively imagine what action(s) would be necessary to eliminate or at least reduce each identified risk. the implementation strategy (stage 4) required the working committee to consider key partners (funders) and stakeholders (interested or concerned groups) that could become involved with each management action. the timeline to completion of each management action was also identified in the implementation strategy. at this time in the plan-making process, the facilitators emphasized the importance of early plan implementation. any early successes in plan implementation would normally come from those threats with a lower risk rank. in this plan, for example, submerged fuel tanks and other debris were noted to exist close to the shores of frog lake. these were extracted almost immediately after completion of the plan at a very low cost. the rationale for early successes in plan implementation is meant to offer encouragement and provide a sense of accomplishment to the working committee while also showing planning progress to the community. in the wake of this and other plans, financial resources to support plan implementation is an ongoing issue and concern. smaller amounts of funding are available from a variety of sources including 12 submission to the international indigenous policy journal http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.7 individual first nations and provincial and federal sources. however, large infrastructure investments—such as a new landfill or sewage lagoon—are not likely to be initiated from a single source water protection plan. rather, the purpose of the plan is to “flag” concerns, gain community input, and alert external agencies and stakeholders. follow-up studies and assessments can, and should, arise from this initial planning process. c o n c l u s i o n at the time of publication, source water protection planning with first nations in canada is in its infancy. the flfn case study provided an early application of a source water protection planning process (aandc, 2013). overall, the template was very useful to both the working committee and the plan facilitators. the five-stage-planning framework provided sufficient structure to guide the planmaking process, yet it was flexible enough to record the complexity and uniqueness of the community’s water system and the potential threats to its source water. while this template helped to guide the plan-making process, the community-engaged planning approach also facilitated a mutually beneficial partnership, which, in turn, supported the development of a planning document and enabled a critique of the aandc (2013) planning framework. the aandc planning framework does have its limitations. the first and perhaps most obvious limitation is that the framework is stored on a government website and therefore not accessible to indigenous communities without internet access or where such websites are not frequently visited. in addition, this document is written largely in western science language that adheres to a rational, positivist, planning process, none of which are culturally appropriate in most indigenous communities. finally, many indigenous groups are less familiar with the western mode of planning and thus may not engage with such a planning framework independently. by centering the plan-making process on the working committee, we experienced a collaborative process that placed community members in an empowering position. through the planning process, it became clear that much more than a plan was being developed. the planning process enabled knowledge sharing, reinforced the importance of protocol by including elders and youth, and empowered the working committee to take control over the plan-making process. from these observations, we conclude with five lessons that we learned from this community-based planning project, offering them as suggestions to other planners, researchers, and consultants who are interested in exploring community-engaged planning with indigenous communities. 1 . bu i l d a f o u n d a t i o n o f t ru s t modern planning, as well as western research more generally, has not always worked to the benefit of indigenous communities (lane, 2006; schnarch, 2004). as a result, a long history of distrust has paralleled the conventional forms of planning and research in many indigenous communities. a core principle of community-engaged planning is trust building between and among communities and researchers. for this reason, it is critical to build trust early in any community-based planning project or initiative. this requires sensitivity, awareness, and commitment on the part of planners and/or researchers. a single phone call or email is not the pathway to building trust with indigenous communities. multiple visits to the community, meeting with first nations staff and management, as well as field trips and engaging with teachers and other community institutions will help to build trust between planners, researchers, or consultants and indigenous communities. 13 patrick et al.: community-engaged planning published by scholarship@western, 2 . w o rk i n a c o n s e n s u s m o d e l a consensus format for decision making encourages respectful discussion, sharing experiences on the land, and open dialogue. consensus was especially important for this plan-making process given that many of the threats to water quality were based on perception, local experience, and place-based history. free discussion versus majority rule facilitated the sharing of experiences in a way that helped soften differing viewpoints, promote open mindedness, and offer new perspectives. in all our deliberations, consensus was successfully achieved. 3 . r e s p e c t t ra d i t i o n a l pro t o c o l s the presence of an elder on the working committee helped to ensure respectful dialogue. at the opening and closing of each meeting, there was a cree prayer followed by a tobacco gift to the elder. the elder was encouraged to share stories and traditional knowledge with the youth and other committee members. youth membership on the committee was also beneficial because it allowed us to document their perspectives on the health of the community—particularly regarding recreation opportunities, litter, and housing. further opportunity to involve youth and local schools should be pursued particularly where opportunities exist for expanded water-based environmental education. furthermore, sharing a meal at each meeting contributed to the plan-making experience, as it made time for informal discussion, as well as sharing stories and laughter. the importance of informal discussion often unrelated to the plan-making process was integral to the overall experience. 4 . be pa t i e n t a n d f l e x i b l e researchers trained in the western university system are largely driven by timelines whereby any disruption in a schedule is interpreted as inefficiency. this attitude must be relaxed when working with indigenous communities. non-indigenous planners and researchers visiting indigenous communities may experience meeting delays, cancellations, or lower than expected attendance. a death in the community, for example, may result in multi-day office closures and broad cancellation of meetings. researchers trained in western science must recognize this cultural shift when working with indigenous communities. in addition, planners and researchers must be mindful of the demands they often place on these communities. heavy workloads and multi-tasking seems to be the norm rather than the exception in indigenous communities. these conditions are often not the fault of communities themselves, but are rather symptoms of service downloading and underfunding by the state. 5 . d o n ’ t be a n “e x p e rt ” the privileged space of western science and enlightenment thinking has long prioritized colonial knowledge over indigenous knowledge (lane, 2006). positivist science built the stage from which “expert” knowledge was both created and disseminated. through the lens of western science, researchers have long surveyed, interviewed, photographed, and sampled indigenous peoples and their communities. under this colonial model, indigenous peoples were the subjects of research, and western “expert” researchers were the beneficiaries. the notion of the “expert” researcher must be discarded. both western and indigenous knowledge are valuable contributors to research questions. thus, the language incorporated into plans must be inclusive, jargon free, and appropriate for the 14 submission to the international indigenous policy journal http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.7 community members. the use of legal terms and planner talk is not helpful to the process. above all, provide space to hear voices long silenced. 15 patrick et al.: community-engaged planning published by scholarship@western, r e f e re n c e s aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc). (2013). first nations on-reserve source water protection plan: guide and template. retrieved from https://www.aadncaandc.gc.ca/dam/dam-inter-hq-enr/staging/textetext/source_1398366907537_eng.pdf canadian council of ministers of the environment (ccme). (2004). from source to tap. guidance on the multi-barrier approach to safe drinking water. retrieved from www.ccme.ca/files/resources/water/source_tap/mba_guidance_doc_e.pdf canadian press, the. (2015, october 5). justin trudeau vows to end first nations reserve boil-water advisories within 5 years. cbc news. retrieved from http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/canada-election-2015-justin-trudeau-first-nations-boilwater-advisories-1.3258058 eggerton, l. (2006). safe drinking water standards for first nations communities. canadian medical association journal, 174(9), 1248. doi: 10.1503/cmaj.060399 eggerton, l. (2008). despite federal promises, first nations’ water problems persist. canadian medical association journal, 178(8), 985. doi: 10.1503/cmaj.080429 health canada. (2009). drinking water advisories in first nations communities in canada. a national overview 1995-2007. ottawa, on: health canada. retrieved from http://www.hcsc.gc.ca/fniah-spnia/pubs/promotion/_environ/2009_water-qualit-eau-canada/indexeng.php health canada. (2016). first nations and inuit health. ottawa, on: health canada. retrieved from http://www.hc-sc.gc.ca/fniah-spnia/promotion/public-publique/water-dwa-eau-aqepeng.php jojola, t. (2013). indigenous planning: towards a seven generations model. in r. walker, d. natcher, & t. jojola (eds.), reclaiming indigenous planning (pp. 457-472). montréal, qc: mcgill queens university press. lane, m. (2006). the role of planning in achieving indigenous land justice and community goals. land use policy, 23(4), 385-394. doi: 10.1016/j.landusepol.2005.05.001 lane, m., & hibbard, m. (2005). doing it for themselves: transformative planning by indigenous peoples. journal of planning education and research, 25(2), 172-184. doi: 10.1177/0739456x05278983 o’connor, d. r. (2002). report of the walkerton inquiry: part two, a strategy for safe drinking water. toronto, on: ontario ministry of the attorney general, queen's printer for ontario. ostrom, e. (2009). a general framework for analyzing sustainability of social-ecological systems. science, 325(5939), 419-422. doi: 10.1126/science.1172133 16 submission to the international indigenous policy journal http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.7 patrick, r. (2011). uneven access to safe drinking water for first nations in canada: connecting health and place through source water protection. health and place, 17(1), 386-389. patrick, r. (2014). source water protection planning: a role for planners. alberta professional planners institute journal, 13, 12-15. patrick, r., kreutzwiser, r., & deloë, r. (2008). factors facilitating and source water protection in the okanagan valley, british columbia. canadian water resources journal, 33(1), 39-54. doi: 10.1016/j.healthplace.2010.10.005 safe drinking water for first nations act. (s.c. 2013, c. 21). retrieved from http://lawslois.justice.gc.ca/eng/acts/s-1.04/index.html schnarch, b. (2004). ownership, control, access, and possession (ocap™ ) or self-determination applied to research: a critical analysis of contemporary first nations research and some options for first nations communities. journal of aboriginal health, 1(1), 80-95. doi: 10.4296/cwrj3301039 smith, l. t. (1999). decolonizing methodologies: research and indigenous peoples. new york: zed books. truth and reconciliation commission (trc). (2015). honouring the truth, reconciling for the future: summary of the final report of the truth and reconciliation commission of canada. retrieved from http://nctr.ca/assets/reports/final%20reports/executive_summary_english_web.pdf wang, h., & patrick, r. (2014). implementing source water protection plans in saskatchewan: local watershed perceptions. prairie perspectives, 17, 1-10. 17 patrick et al.: community-engaged planning published by scholarship@western, the international indigenous policy journal lessons learned through community-engaged planning robert j. patrick laura machial kendra quinney len quinney lessons learned through community-engaged planning abstract keywords creative commons license lessons learned through community-engaged planning biocultural rights: a new paradigm for protecting natural and cultural resources of indigenous communities the international indigenous policy journal volume 6 | issue 3 article 3 june 2015 biocultural rights: a new paradigm for protecting natural and cultural resources of indigenous communities cher weixia chen george mason university, wchen12@gmu.edu michael gilmore george mason university, mgilmor1@gmu.edu recommended citation chen, c. , gilmore, m. (2015). biocultural rights: a new paradigm for protecting natural and cultural resources of indigenous communities. the international indigenous policy journal, 6(3). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.3 biocultural rights: a new paradigm for protecting natural and cultural resources of indigenous communities abstract this article proposes a new concept of “biocultural rights” that justly reflects a broader intellectual and policy trend to holistically address the protection of indigenous natural and cultural resources. the concept of biocultural rights combines nature with culture; takes into consideration the past, the present, and the future; and values “special” indigenous elements that are indispensable to the diversity of our universe. it aims at protecting indigenous resources holistically and more effectively. keywords indigenous rights, biodiversity, cultural diversity acknowledgments we would like to thank the editor and the reviewers for their time and valuable remarks. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ b i o c u l t u r a l r i g h t s : a n e w p a r a d i g m f o r p r o t e c t i n g n a t u r a l a n d c u l t u r a l r e s o u r c e s o f i n d i g e n o u s c o m m u n i t i e s i n t r o d u c t i o n : t h e m a i j u n a c o m m u n i t y throughout the world, the natural and cultural resources of indigenous communities are under threat. the resources of the maijuna indigenous group of the northeastern peruvian amazon are no exception. the maijuna, also known as the orejón, are a western tucanoan people (bellier, 1994; steward, 1946). there are approximately 400 maijuna individuals living in four communities: sucusari along the sucusari river, san pablo de totolla along the algodón river, and puerto huamán and nueva vida along the yanayacu river. these three river basins are part of the ancestral territory of the maijuna (gilmore, 2010). the four maijuna communities are recognized as comunidades nativas (native communities) by the peruvian government and each has been granted title to the land surrounding their community (brackegg, 1998). unfortunately, the titled land that the maijuna communities have received is a small portion of their ancestral territory. therefore, hundreds of thousands of hectares of maijuna ancestral land, the vast majority of which is intact primary rain forest, currently remains outside of direct maijuna control and is unprotected. notably, maijuna ancestral territory is incredibly biologically rich and culturally important. for example, maijuna traditional lands contain a complex of high terraces—an extremely unique and previously unknown habitat—that shelters a flora and fauna with new, rare, and specialized species. additionally, this area also contains critically important hunting, fishing, and plant collecting sites as well as historical and sacred areas that help to sustain and nourish the maijuna culture (gilmore, 2010). there are currently a wide variety of threats and challenges to maijuna natural and cultural resources. for example, they are now under threat from loggers and poachers from outside communities. even more serious, the peruvian government is planning to build a 130 km long road, with a 5 km development corridor on either side of it focusing on biofuels production (e.g., oil palms), directly through the heart of maijuna ancestral territory (gilmore, 2010). the direct effects of highway construction and the associated impacts from an influx of colonists and subsequent deforestation would irreversibly alter the ecological fabric of this currently roadless area. furthermore, given that the maijuna are a forest dwelling people who rely on the forest for sustenance and survival, building this road would negatively impact their livelihood and traditional culture. regrettably, the peruvian government has not properly consulted the maijuna on the construction of the road nor has it accurately described both its biological and cultural ramifications (gilmore, 2010). perhaps not surprisingly, the maijuna are adamantly against the construction of this road and its associated development corridor and are asking the peruvian government to alter its path. they are also calling on the government to create a regional conservation area that would formally and legally protect over 391,000 hectares of their ancestral lands and the critically important biological and cultural diversity found there. as stated, the maijuna “strongly feel that their survival as a people and the survival and maintenance of their cultural practices, unique traditions, and traditional subsistence strategies depend on a healthy, intact, and protected ecosystem” (gilmore, 2010, p. 233). in short, the maijuna are fighting for their ancestral lands, natural and cultural resources, and the survival of their traditional 1 chen and gilmore: biocultural rights published by scholarship@western, 2015   culture, all of which are interlinked and interdependent, and they are looking for mechanisms to make this happen. the vital role of natural and cultural resources1 to the well-being and survival of the maijuna and other indigenous communities has gained increasing notice among academics and international organizations (tennant, 1994).2 over the past several decades, various mechanisms have been proposed and employed to safeguard and protect both the natural and cultural resources of indigenous peoples. the text below first evaluates these frameworks and offers critiques, followed by an analysis of the emerging recognition of the interconnections between indigenous natural and cultural resources. this then leads to our proposed new concept—"biocultural rights"—that attempts to solidify an approach to protecting indigenous resources in a more holistic manner. e x i s t i n g f r a m e w o r k s p r o t e c t i n g i n d i g e n o u s r e s o u r c e s the current system that is in place to protect indigenous resources treats the land and other natural resources separately from cultural resources. there are two major mechanisms to protect natural resources of indigenous groups: historical sovereignty and treaty rights. the concept of “historical sovereignty” was developed during the decolonization movement after world war ii and then was adopted by the global indigenous rights movement in the 1970s. in 2007, “historical sovereignty” became more than just a political claim, the united nations (2007) declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (hereinafter the 2007 u.n. declaration) affirmed such concept as “the right to the lands, territories and resources which they have traditionally owned, occupied or otherwise used or acquired” (article 26). however, it remains to be seen whether the soft law principle (as in the 2007 u.n. declaration) of “historical sovereignty” could in the end become hard law or “permanent sovereignty” (daes, 2005, p. 87). the other mechanism is treaty rights (goodin, 2000). a large number of treaties were created between indigenous groups and their colonial governments during the 1700s and 1800s. however, the power imbalance between those two parties has resulted in significantly different interpretations of these treaties, which are largely detrimental to indigenous peoples. indigenous peoples have since lost much of their lands and natural resources. the 2007 u.n. declaration in article 37 has formally recognized                                                                                                                 1 both natural resources and cultural resources are broadly defined. natural resources are defined as those resources (actual and potential) that are derived or part of nature. they refer to an ecological system that includes biotic resources such as forests, animals, birds, fish, and abiotic resources such as land, water, ores, and air, as well as species and genes. cultural resources are defined as cultural manifestations such as languages, oral traditions, philosophies, writing systems, archaeological and historical sites, artifacts, designs, ceremonies, sports and traditional games, and visual and performing arts and literature; spiritual and religious manifestations such as spiritual and religious traditions, customs and ceremonies, religious and cultural sites, ceremonial objects, and their human remains; and scientific and technological manifestations such as traditional medicines, human and genetic resources, seeds, traditional knowledge of the properties of fauna and flora, health practices, and sustenance practices such as hunting and fishing. 2 there was little literature about indigenous peoples in us legal journals until the year 1972 when the un subcommission on discrimination and protection of minorities commissioned the study on the problem of discrimination against indigenous populations (united nations commission on human rights, 1986). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.3   the treaty rights of indigenous peoples; yet, recent attempts to revive treaty rights by indigenous peoples have not been very successful (tsosie, 2000). the protection of cultural and intellectual resources of indigenous people was generally missing from the conversation prior to the 1980s. in 1984, the world council of indigenous peoples (1984) declared that “indigenous peoples will reassume original rights over material culture” in its declaration of principles (article 14). in 1988, the first international conference of ethnobiology announced in its declaration of belem, “procedures should be developed to compensate native peoples for their knowledge” (cited in hayden, 2003, p. 35). later, the kari-oca declaration addressed “culture, science and intellectual property” (world conference of indigenous peoples, 1992, introduction). and in 1993, the international legal arena witnessed its first document that is fully dedicated to the protection of cultural and intellectual property of indigenous peoples: mataatua declaration on cultural and intellectual property rights of indigenous peoples (united nations, 1993). subsequently, indigenous cultural and intellectual property emerged as an essential topic of international law, which is evinced by the rising number of regional declarations on indigenous cultural and intellectual property.3 the international community came to an agreement as to the importance of indigenous cultural and intellectual property during the deliberation of the 1994 draft declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (gray, 1996). the world intellectual property organization (wipo) intergovernmental committee on intellectual property and genetic resources, traditional knowledge, and folklore has been undertaking negotiations for a potential international legal instrument on the effective protection of indigenous cultural resources. indigenous communities have also been placed at the center stage of the international environmental movement, during which the debates have touched on various parts of the lives of indigenous communities, such as cultural autonomy, traditional hunting and fishing practices, and traditional knowledge (firestone, lilley & noronha, 2005). for example, the importance of traditional ecological knowledge (tek) has been widely acknowledged, as evidenced by the 2010 nagoya protocol, a supplementary agreement to the convention on biological diversity that covers traditional knowledge associated with genetic resources (bavikatte & robinson, 2011; mcgregor, 2012). the first mechanism commonly used to protect indigenous peoples’ cultural heritage utilizes the existing intellectual property (ip) laws. the commodification of intangible cultural and intellectual property such as music, motifs, prayers, ceremonies, and traditional knowledge as well as the alarming issue of “biopiracy”4 has been frustrating to many indigenous communities (daes, 1995; robinson, 2010). the current legal frameworks have been inadequate in protecting indigenous cultural and intellectual property (paterson & karjala, 2003). the modes of classification, identification, and                                                                                                                 3 such as, the julayinbul statement on indigenous intellectual property rights, australia, november 1993; the santa cruz de la sierra statement on intellectual property, bolivia, september 1994; the tambunan statement on the protection and conservation of indigenous knowledge, malaysia, february 1995; the suva statement on indigenous peoples knowledge and intellectual property rights, fiji, april 1995; and, the kimberley declaration, south africa, august 2002. 4 “biopiracy” was first defined by pat mooney and made well-known by other scholars such as vandana shiva. it refers to the “robbery of the biological raw materials” such as genetic resources and “the knowledge about the use of such resources”. it is further defined as “the appropriation of the knowledge and genetic resources of farming and indigenous communities by individuals or institutions who seek exclusive monopoly control (patents and intellectual property) over this knowledge and resources” (martinez-alier, 2003, p. 132). 3 chen and gilmore: biocultural rights published by scholarship@western, 2015   operation used under the current ip system of european origins (deazley, 2004) are not compatible with indigenous peoples’ understanding of their knowledge and cultural practices (bell & napolean, 2008). furthermore, the present ip system that is mainly concerned with the protection of individual intellectual property does not take the interests of indigenous communities into account, as indigenous intellectual property is largely communal based and connects to indigenous land and other natural resources (davis, 1996/1997). therefore, indigenous peoples need to play a much bigger role in the decision-making process (goldberg & badua, 2008). some scholars have pushed to modify the current system to incorporate communal and collective ownership (carpenter, 2004), to include more creative contractual provisions (rubin & fish, 1994), to replace traditional intellectual property with “traditional resource rights” (posey, dutfield, plenderleith, da costa e silva, & argumedo, 1996), and to have a “globally harmonized ip regime” (sundaram, 2005, p. 577). others have proposed abandoning all together the application of intellectual property rights (ipr) to the protection of cultural resources of indigenous peoples (heald, 2003). the second mechanism employed by indigenous peoples to protect their cultural resources is the claim of cultural rights. the most commonly accepted legally binding provision on cultural rights of indigenous peoples is article 27 of the international covenant on civil and political rights (iccpr, 1967), which stipulates that minorities “shall not be denied the right to enjoy their own culture.” however, this article has been a source of controversy since its inception. one issue is whether article 27 only confers cultural rights as negative rights. that is, the wording of article 27 holds a passive stance (“shall not be denied”) with regard to such rights. is a “passive” protection adequate to safeguard cultural rights? nowak (1993) argued that currently the protection of cultural rights relies heavily on the active support of states because minority cultures are vulnerable to assimilation imposed by the majority group. through its general comment no. 23 issued in 2004 and various cases, the human rights committee has implicitly interpreted cultural rights provided in article 27 as a positive right (kingsbury, 2001; thornberry, 2001). nevertheless, article 27 has largely been interpreted as an individual right only; hence, it is limited in its ability to afford protection for indigenous communal rights to their culture (thornberry, 1991). all of these mechanisms have both strengths and weaknesses in terms of protecting indigenous natural and cultural resources. each was developed out of its unique historical context and has its own theoretical support and institutional adherents. however, each can only solve one small fraction of the issue. under these frameworks, the right of indigenous peoples to their natural and cultural resources is viewed as two separate and independent issues; that is, the right to natural resources is separated from the right to cultural resources. the maijuna case demonstrates that natural and cultural resources are inseparable, especially to indigenous groups. as elizabeth burleson (2007) eloquently puts, “chippewa cultural heritage is interwoven with the harvest of ancient wild rice. pueblo ceremonial rights to clean water are equally central to retaining cultural heritage” (p. 252). nature and culture are equally important to indigenous peoples (prosper, mcmillan, davis & moffitt, 2011). they are indivisible. any damage to one will inevitably harm the other, threatening the very survival of indigenous groups (fonda, 2011; robbins & dewar, 2011). therefore a new concept—biocultural rights—ought to be established to unify all of these frameworks. the historical development of international legal instruments on the rights of indigenous peoples reveals a growing understanding of the intrinsic interdependence between the right to natural resources 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.3   and the right to cultural resources. the following text examines the major international instruments on the rights of indigenous peoples and argues that the mere fact that most of these documents address both natural resources and cultural resources (even though in separate articles) is indicative of the necessity of creating an inclusive right to protect both natural and cultural resources of indigenous communities. the 2007 un declaration exhibits the very first step of this effort to holistically look at the protection of indigenous peoples’ resources as a whole. t h e i n t e r n a t i o n a l l e g a l d e v e l o p m e n t o n t h e p r o t e c t i o n o f i n d i g e n o u s r e s o u r c e s i l o c o n v e n t i o n s 1 0 7 ( 1 9 5 7 ) a n d 1 6 9 ( 1 9 8 9 ) the indigenous and tribal populations convention of 1957 (ilo no. 107) was the first attempt under international law to codify nation states’ obligations to indigenous and tribal groups. national judiciary and international bodies have invoked it when dealing with issues such as indigenous land rights (morse & berger, 1992). however, its integrationist approach has been frequently criticized. finally in 1989, convention 169 replaced convention 107 (blaser, feit & mcrae, 2004). convention 169 changed the title from “population” to “peoples” and demonstrated a greater extent of respect for indigenous groups as permanent entities rather than some temporary societies that would fade away under modernization. however, both conventions did not engage indigenous peoples in their drafting process. moreover, even though the newer convention 169 did emphasize the importance of land and other natural resources to indigenous people in part ii, it did not specifically address the issue of the protection of their cultural and intellectual property, which reflected the dominant discourse on the protection of indigenous rights of the time. u n c o n f e r e n c e o n e n v i r o n m e n t a n d d e v e l o p m e n t ( u n c e d ) : a g e n d a 2 1 agenda 21 (united nations, 1992) is an action plan that came out of the 1992 un rio conference on environment and development. in this conference, indigenous peoples were actively involved and fought to be a part of the agenda and conversation. chapter 26 of agenda 21 explicitly aimed to strengthen the role of indigenous people and their communities in sustainable development. it recognized the importance of indigenous lands and other natural resources as well as their traditional knowledge, and intellectual and cultural property. more specifically, chapter 26 emphasizes “the interrelationship between the natural environment and its sustainable development and the cultural, social, economic and physical well-being of indigenous people” (united nations, 1992, sec. 26.1). this is a major development in the international indigenous movement, as the “interrelationship” between nature and culture for the first time was formally recognized in an important international document. c o n v e n t i o n o n b i o l o g i c a l d i v e r s i t y ( 1 9 9 3 ) another important international legal document that developed out of the rio conference is the convention on biological diversity (united nations environment programme, 1993). it recognized the importance of traditional knowledge and methods conducive to biodiversity conservation. it urged their generalization, dissemination, and compensation, and obliged contracting parties to provide reasonable access to genetic resources in their sovereign territories on the basis of prior informed consent (pic) 5 chen and gilmore: biocultural rights published by scholarship@western, 2015   and equitable sharing of benefits (un, 1993, article 8 & article 15). the convention also stresses the importance of protecting and encouraging the use of “biological resources in accordance with traditional cultural practices that are compatible with conservation or sustainable use requirements” (un, 1993, article 10). u n d e c l a r a t i o n o n t h e r i g h t s o f i n d i g e n o u s p e o p l e s ( 2 0 0 7 ) this 2007 un declaration represented a dynamic and significant development in the indigenous rights movement and sets a new international standard on the treatment of indigenous peoples. it recognized the rights of indigenous people to natural resources as well as their right to cultural resources. in article 8, it establishes the interdependence between indigenous land and other natural resources and their cultural survival. specifically, article 8.1 stated, “indigenous peoples and individuals have the right not to be subjected to forced assimilation or destruction of their culture” (un, 2007). and in the ensuing article 8.2 it stipulated that “states shall provide effective mechanisms for prevention of, and redress for: any action which has the aim or effect of dispossessing them of their lands, territories or resources…” (un, 2007). that is, the dispossession of indigenous lands, territories, or resources may lead to “destruction of their culture.” in this way, the declaration formally stresses the integrative value of indigenous lands and other natural resources to the endurance of indigenous cultures (article 8). and, in article 25, the declaration further elaborates on the intricate spiritual relationship between indigenous peoples and their natural resources (un, 2007). d e c l a r a t i o n o f i n d i g e n o u s p e o p l e s o f a f r i c a o n s u s t a i n a b l e d e v e l o p m e n t a n d r i o + 2 0 ( 2 0 1 2 ) in 2012, indigenous groups of africa emerged in the international environmental movement and issued their own declaration on sustainable development (united nations, 2012). they appealed to the international community to be included in sustainable development and called for the recognition of the contributions indigenous peoples could make in finding sustainable solutions by employing their “traditional knowledge.” the declaration also stressed the significance of indigenous knowledge to sustainable development policy formulation (article 13). it specifically emphasized that their right to access and manage indigenous lands and territories is key to promoting the “conservation of ecosystems” (article 12). later, the indigenous peoples international declaration on selfdetermination and sustainable development (rio +20, 2012) further underscored the fundamental role of indigenous cultures to sustainable development. o t h e r r e c e n t d e v e l o p m e n t s all of these international documents have played an essential role in setting norms and providing justifications that have served and will continue to serve as a shared reference to and source of validation for better treatment of indigenous peoples. from no reference to indigenous cultural resources in early documents to the highlighted interrelationship between nature and culture in more recent ones, they have collectively indicated an emerging tendency within the international community towards a more holistic and inclusive approach to indigenous rights. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.3   more international organizations are calling for such an approach. for instance, the un permanent forum on indigenous peoples has repeatedly stressed the crucial inclusion of indigenous peoples in biodiversity discussions. biodiversity erosion is a serious concern for us—indigenous peoples—because the loss of flora, fauna, and microorganisms and the destruction of ecosystems are not just physical losses. this also means the loss of indigenous knowledge systems, cultures, languages, and our identities. (tauli-corpuz, 2009, p. 6) indigenous peoples have long recognized the ingrained interdependence of biodiversity and cultural diversity, both of which are considered by indigenous communities as invaluable (matsui, 2012; sarma & barpujari, 2011). other international organizations such as the united nations development program (undp) have also advocated for more research on the intimate relationship and connection between cultural diversity and biodiversity and more collaboration between organizations committed to promoting and conserving either cultural diversity or biodiversity (fourmile, 1996). the united nations educational, scientific and cultural organization (unesco) and the international union for the conservation of nature (iucn) have made similar policy initiatives. there also has been the emergence of “biocultural community protocols” developed by ngos such as natural justice and the compass network, and national policy initiatives such as the indigenous people’s rights act of the philippines (section 35) that acknowledge the interrelationship between biodiversity and cultural diversity (maffi, 2010). by the same token, several relatively recent legal cases also suggest that some supranational adjudicatory bodies have been willing to embrace a more inclusive approach to indigenous rights. the interamerican court on human rights in the case community mayagna (sumo) awas tingni v nicaragua (2001) ruled against the government-approved logging operations that violated the mayagna indian community’s land rights. the court acknowledged the culturally and environmentally destructive nature of commercial logging and upheld the customary rights of the indigenous community to their ancestral lands and traditional way of life such as hunting. it held that “for indigenous communities, relations to the land are not merely a matter of possession and production but a material and spiritual element which they must fully enjoy, even to preserve their cultural legacy and transmit it to future generations” (community mayagna (sumo) awas tingni v nicaragua, 2001). the court also pointed out in yakye axa v. paraguay (2005) that “it is necessary to take into account that the land is closely linked to their oral expressions and traditions, their customs and languages, their arts and rituals, their knowledge and practices in connection with nature, culinary art, customary law, dress, philosophy, and values” (yakye axa v. paraguay, 2005, para. 154). similarly, the inter-american commission on human rights in another well-publicized case, comunidad yanomami (1985), held that the construction of a highway by brazil through the ancestral lands of the yanomami had threatened the survival of the indigenous community and violated their right to life, liberty and personal security. in particular, the commission considered “all the negative consequences for their culture, traditions and customs resulting from displacing the indians from their ancestral lands” (comunidad yanomami, 1985). that is, the commission acknowledged the detrimental effects of losing their lands on yanomami culture. 7 chen and gilmore: biocultural rights published by scholarship@western, 2015   the human rights committee has also acknowledged the importance of land to the culture of indigenous peoples (anaya, 1996). in the case of lubicon lake band v. canada (1990), the committee found that the devastating environmental impact, which resulted from oil and gas extraction on indigenous lands, constituted a violation of indigenous right to culture under article 27 of iccpr. even the dissenting opinion by mr. nisuke ando conceded that “it is not impossible that a certain culture is closely linked to a particular way of life and that industrial exploration of natural resources may affect the band's traditional way of life, including hunting and fishing” (lubicon lake band v. canada, 1990, appendix i). these cases, in conjunction with the emergence of norm-setting international documents, signify a developing international commitment to the rights of indigenous peoples to both their natural and cultural resources. they indicate an increasing respect for indigenous communities that is long overdue. one way to further this movement in indigenous rights is to develop a more holistic approach to protecting natural and cultural resources of indigenous peoples. here this article advocates a new concept: “biocultural rights.” b i o c u l t u r a l r i g h t s as indicated above, international law is moving towards a broader and more holistic approach in regards to indigenous rights. however, it seriously lacks a discussion of the exact content of this approach (gillespie, 2000). as a response, the concept of biocultural rights attempts to address the content of such a holistic approach. the current approach to protecting indigenous resources treats the right to natural resources and the right to cultural resources separately and neglects the important interconnectedness between the two. in contrast, here we define biocultural rights (see figure 1) as a set of substantive indigenous resource rights that simultaneously protect both indigenous natural and cultural resources, realizing that they are inextricably linked and interconnected. the concept of biocultural rights emphasizes the interdependent and interlinked nature of indigenous resources; that is, the existence of indigenous cultural resources is dependent on indigenous natural resources and vice versa. as a legal concept, biocultural rights would integrate the current fragmented and separate systems of substantive indigenous rights to natural and cultural resources. there has been ample literature calling for caution to proceed with the creation of new rights (heald & sherry, 2000). however, biocultural rights are not additional new rights for indigenous groups; instead, they are rights that unify the existing resource rights of indigenous peoples. in terms of interpretation, the concept of biocultural rights should be broad enough to allow interpretation variation. a homogenizing model imposed on all nation states with widely different biological, cultural, political and economic contexts can only lead to resistance. the interpretation ought to take greater consideration of indigenous peoples and effectively engage indigenous communities. certainly a pro-indigenous perspective is necessary considering the struggles indigenous peoples are facing (gray, 2009). 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.3   figure 1. conceptualization of biocultural rights. the ultimate philosophical foundation for the concept of biocultural rights lies in its “holistic” feature. this holistic feature is embodied in three aspects. first, the concept combines nature with culture. biodiversity and cultural diversity are interdependent and inextricably linked. second, the concept connects the past, the present and the future. it is a concept that takes into consideration of the past, the present and the future in the sense that it is premised on the distinctive histories and wrongs that indigenous groups have experienced, the examination of the present system, and the very need to help and empower these groups to conserve their distinct biocultural diversity for future generations. third, this concept considers the “special” element of indigenous communities and the “universal” interest. the concept of biocultural rights assumes that indigenous peoples ought to have the right to maintain their distinct biocultural heritage, which is essential to the maintenance of biodiversity and cultural diversity worldwide. it is the concern to conserve, respect, and protect special indigenous elements (both biological and cultural) that are indispensable to the diversity of our universe that is behind biocultural rights. in this sense, it is both special and universal. the idea of biocultural rights is more than a legal notion. it is a new paradigm. lack of a common indigenous agenda has been listed as one of the key obstacles to the successful protection of indigenous rights (preston, vinding, & garcia-alix, 2007). therefore, this concept could provide a fresh overall guiding principle to further solidify and strengthen the indigenous rights movement. at the un level, the norm of biocultural rights, if accepted and diffused, could help legitimize the holistic protection of indigenous resources as a shared commitment among its operational agencies, with the ultimate goal of being codified in a legally binding international document. when it comes to national policy-making and academic discourse on indigenous issues, this concept could offer a new perspective on how to approach the protection of indigenous resources holistically. 9 chen and gilmore: biocultural rights published by scholarship@western, 2015   the concept of biocultural rights justly reflects a broader intellectual and policy trend to holistically address the protection of indigenous natural and cultural resources and to realize “freedom and equality through rights accorded to human individuals or collectivities” (kingsbury, 2001, pp. 239-240). this right is much needed and is justified by several reasons outlined below. first, practically speaking, many indigenous communities throughout the world have been forcibly removed from their lands for a wide variety of ill-conceived reasons, including in the aftermath of tourism expansion (oei a & shepherd, 2010). the not-so-rare instances of ethnocide further suggest that indigenous peoples are struggling everyday to maintain their very existence. the zapatista in mexico and the yanomami in brazil are indicative of the horrifying effects of ethnocide (maybury-lewis, 2002). raphael lemkin first coined the term “ethnocide” as an alternative to genocide. he referred to it as the physical, biological, and cultural dimensions of genocide (jacobs, 2002). therefore, to combat ethnocide that encompasses physical, biological, and cultural elements, we will have to use an approach that addresses all these elements simultaneously. the concept of biocultural rights justly provides such an approach. second, as mentioned above, international governing bodies and non-governmental organizations as well as national governments have started to integrate biodiversity and cultural diversity debates. the various international documents and the growing body of legal practice are beginning to establish some common understandings on the necessary convergence of both debates. the concept of biocultural rights is hence crucial in order to take advantage of this convergence to ensure policy coherence. third, it is important to note that the legal convergence and integration of debates on the protection of biodiversity and cultural diversity have been at least partially driven and strengthened by the existence and continued development of a relatively new field (since the early 1990s) of academic inquiry, research, and action that centers on the notion of biocultural diversity. as defined by maffi (2010), a leader in this burgeoning field, “biocultural diversity comprises the diversity of life in all of its manifestations—biological, cultural, and linguistic—which are interrelated (and likely co-evolved) within a complex socio-ecological adaptive system” (p. 5). importantly, the inextricable link that exists between biological (which in this essay is largely interchangeable with natural), cultural, and linguistic diversity is recognized not only by studying global, regional, and national level correlations but also via causal relationships between cultures and biodiversity on a local level (maffi, 2010). in short, this lends further credence to the push to more holistically address the protection of indigenous natural and cultural resources via the concept of biocultural rights. and, fourth, the absence of a single unifying concept in the existing international legal framework has created enormous challenges for both indigenous peoples and states (kingsbury, 2001). the concept of biocultural rights will be of fundamental importance in addressing indigenous issues that commonly intersect with complicated histories, cultures, and politics. biocultural rights will provide a linkage between the relevant mechanisms on protecting indigenous resources that have been fragmented in the human rights, intellectual property, and environmental legal frameworks (bavikatte & robinson, 2011). then, what would biocultural rights mean for the maijuna? to bring us back to our opening discussion concerning the maijuna, biocultural rights could be used and harnessed in a variety of ways. first, if codified as a legal tool, biocultural rights would provide them with a much stronger and more holistic 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.3   legal framework to fight against the construction of the proposed road and development corridor that is threatening their ancestral lands, biological resources, and cultural traditions. instead of having to fight for their natural and cultural resources through disjunct and separate legal mechanisms, which would be problematic and challenging, biocultural rights would unify their legal challenge under one framework. second, from a policy perspective, in order to better and more holistically protect the rights and resources of the maijuna, biocultural rights could provide a guiding principle or framework for the peruvian government to follow as they design a policy regarding the maijuna. third, from the perspective of the indigenous rights movement, biocultural rights could become the goal for nongovernmental organizations (ngos) and activists working with the maijuna, as it would help to focus and unite their efforts. and, fourth, biocultural rights would provide a new paradigm for academic discourse and research on the maijuna. in short, biocultural rights would help to recognize and push what the maijuna have known and stated all along: their long-term health, vitality, and survival as a people are not only dependent on the recognition of their rights to cultural resources but also their rights to biological resources as well. that is, without a stable, intact, and protected ecosystem and homeland, their survival as a people and the survival of their language, cultural traditions, and traditional subsistence strategies would be in danger. in the end, biological and cultural diversity is interconnected and interdependent, which should not only be legally recognized but also operationalized on the ground as well. c o n c l u s i o n biocultural rights are not only justifiable, but also necessary. it is justifiable as they can help to begin to right past injustices that have been carried out against indigenous peoples, which have served to deny them of their rights to land, territory, means of livelihood, language, cultural identity, and ways of life, among others. however, the appeal is also to the future. indigenous peoples have special characteristics and their very existence adds tremendously to the biocultural diversity of our world (guruswamy, roberts, & drywater, 1999). to have a holistic framework that helps protect their rights, we will have to pay close attention to the protection of their natural and cultural resources, both of which are inextricably linked to each other and both of which are essential to the survival of indigenous peoples. that is, biocultural rights are to help right past wrongs that have been perpetuated on indigenous peoples and to protect their communities for future generations. there are multiple dimensions of policy implications with biocultural rights. for the un and its operational agencies, it is time to use a new paradigm of biocultural rights to integrate the existing programs on indigenous rights and strive towards a more holistic legal document that codifies this claim. the ngos and activists working on indigenous rights may utilize biocultural rights as a shared commitment to harmonize their efforts to better protect indigenous communities. as for national policy-makers, biocultural rights could guide them in designing a more inclusive policy with regard to indigenous peoples. to have a distinct framework that is dedicated to the protection of indigenous peoples has been one of the aspirations of the international indigenous movement (kingsbury, 2001). with the advent of an umbrella right—biocultural rights—a new and exciting energy could move us forward to a better and more just future for indigenous peoples and for humankind. as the un (2007) declaration justly states, 11 chen and gilmore: biocultural rights published by scholarship@western, 2015   “all peoples contribute to the diversity and 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(1984). world council of indigenous peoples declaration of principles. the center for world indigenous studies. retrieved from http://cwis.org yakye axa v paraguay (merits, reparations and costs), 17 june 2005, ser. c, no. 125. 17 chen and gilmore: biocultural rights published by scholarship@western, 2015 the international indigenous policy journal june 2015 biocultural rights: a new paradigm for protecting natural and cultural resources of indigenous communities cher weixia chen michael gilmore recommended citation biocultural rights: a new paradigm for protecting natural and cultural resources of indigenous communities abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license biocultural rights: a new paradigm for protecting natural and cultural resources of indigenous communities more research needed! the international indigenous policy journal volume 3 | issue 2 article 2 august 2012 more research needed! jerry p. w hite university of western ontario, white@uwo.ca recommended citation white, j. p. (2012). more research needed!. th e international indigenous policy journal, 3(2) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.2 his letter from the editor is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in he international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. more research needed! abstract we feel it is important to identify research areas that are understudied. certainly, the impact of economic development on or near indigenous lands is one such area. in this issue, we have three feature articles that approach the issue of economic development in terms of policies, impacts, and benefits. what is clear is that we need a much better understanding of the benefits and perils that come with development. we also need better cooperation between governments, corporations, and indigenous communities in order to develop effective legislation and fair land use and resource agreements. iipj wishes to encourage those who have studied development issues to submit their work. we will shortly be announcing our intent to create an international database of quality research across a wide range of important subjects. the purpose will be to create an ever expanding, open-access source of research. this database may also contain examples of agreements and rigorous assessments of the projects in order to advance our understanding of the challenges that come with economic development. keywords economic development, resource development, policy, legislation, community consultation creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ in this issue, we have articles that approach the issue of economic development in terms of policies, impacts, and benefits. wright and white (see “developing oil and gas”) take a look at the regulatory framework in canada how it developed and, specifically, the oil and gas regulations and policy. they conclude that we need more research on the whole policy and regulatory approach. as well, we need to come to a much better understanding of the benefits and perils that come with development. at present, the agreements that are being developed and implemented around the globe are largely confidential because they are private agreements. in canada, for example, the impact and benefit agreements are between companies and indigenous communities. it is difficult for people to learn from the past experience of others. it is difficult to know if the agreements are successfully implemented. it is difficult to determine if they are actually benefitting the communities. there are very few studies that use baseline data to measure the change that comes with development. essentially, we have few to no methods available, and in use, that measure impacts and benefits. as the articles point out, we have a situation where even more simple guarantees of employment become difficult to implement and even harder to monitor. in addition, as ehrlich (see “culturally sensitive areas”) points out, more tangible and quantifiable impacts, such as changes in physical geography, are easier to assess than human impacts, such as those that affect culture and traditional lifestyles. on the policy evaluation side, there are gaps in legislation that need to be explored. gardner, tsuji, mccarthy, whitelaw, and tsuji’s (see “the far north act”) analysis of the consultative process involved in legislating the far north act (2010) demonstrates the importance of meaningful consultation, negotiation, and accommodation in ensuring that the interests of indigenous communities are adequately protected by laws. what is the role of governments regional or national in promoting fair agreements? for example, should the state be leveling the playing field to make sure that indigenous groups have access to the expertise that would permit true partnerships? how can indigenous traditional knowledge be incorporated into the process? how can that knowledge be protected? can we ever ensure that indigenous peoples are true equal partners in the environmental assessments, contracts, and impacts and benefits agreements? is it possible for corporations, with their capital and largely western worldview, to appreciate the position of indigenous peoples? this problem exists if both come from the same country, but can become even more complex across national boundaries. recently in canada, enbridge (an oil, gas, and pipeline company) representatives accused indigenous elders of attacking them and threatening the company before being seated to start talks. the wet’suwet’en nation elder had blown eagle feathers down on the enbridge negotiator. to wet’suwet’en people, the blowing of eagle down is symbolic of starting a peace process and it is respectful (vanderklippe, 2012). this simple incident illustrates the complexity of inter-cultural respect. iipj wishes to encourage those who have studied development issues to submit their work. we will shortly be announcing our intent to create an international database of quality research across a wide range of important subjects. the purpose will be to create an ever expanding, open-access source of research. this database may also contain examples of agreements and rigorous assessments of the projects. we feel it is important to identify research areas that are understudied. certainly, the impact of economic development on or near indigenous lands is one such area. we know there are many projects underway across the globe. an example is a project underway that combines both basic research and policy development. the institute of economics and industrial engineering (novosibirsk), the siberian scientific analytical center (tyumen), and the aboriginal policy research consortium (international) at western university, canada aim to develop advanced forms of cooperation between oil and gas companies and indigenous people of the north of russia. local indigenous peoples will be partners in this project. the project aims to develop a regulatory and policy framework that will ensure benefits for the russian indigenous peoples of the region. the resulting model could be generalized. 1 white: more research needed! published by scholarship@western, 2012 projects like this are going to be helpful in understanding the issues and complexities, but there needs to be a lot more research work done across many locations. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.2 references far north act. (2010). bill 191 an act with respect to land use planning and protection in the far north. legislative assembly of ontario, 39th legislature, 2nd session. vanderklippe, n. (2012, august 7). feather dust-up highlights enbridge’s culture clash with first nations. the globe and mail. retrieved from www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/feather-dust-uphighlights-enbridges-culture-clash-with-first-nations/article4468736/?cmpid=rss1 3 white: more research needed! published by scholarship@western, 2012 the international indigenous policy journal august 2012 more research needed! jerry p. white recommended citation more research needed! abstract keywords creative commons license more research needed! implementing the tri-council policy on ethical research involving indigenous peoples in canada: so, how’s that going in mi’kma’ki? the international indigenous policy journal volume 8 issue 2 reconciling research: perspectives on research involving indigenous peoples—part 1 article 4 april 2017 implementing the tri-council policy on ethical research involving indigenous peoples in canada: so, how ’s that going in mi’kma’ki? carla moore dalhousie university, carla.moore@dal.ca heather e. castleden queen's university kingston, ontario, heather.castleden@queensu.ca susan tirone dalhousie university, susan.tirone@dal.ca debbie martin dalhousie university, debbie.martin@dal.ca recommended citation moore, c. , castleden, h. e. , tirone, s. , martin, d. (2017). implementing the tri-council policy on ethical research involving indigenous peoples in canada: so, how’s that going in mi’kma’ki?. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(2). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.4 implementing the tri-council policy on ethical research involving indigenous peoples in canada: so, how ’s that going in mi’kma’ki? abstract the 2010 edition of the tri-council policy statement on ethical conduct for research involving humans introduced a new chapter, titled "research involving the first nations, inuit and métis peoples of canada." the goal of our study was to explore how this chapter is being implemented in research involving mi’kmaw communities in nova scotia. qualitative data from four groups—health researchers, research ethics board representatives, financial services administrators, and mi’kmaw community health directors—revealed that while the chapter is useful in navigating this ethical space, there is room for improvement. the challenges they encountered were not insurmountable; with political will from the academy and with guidance from indigenous community health and research leaders solutions to these barriers can be achieved. keywords indigenous health, research ethics, tcps2, decolonizing methodologies, community-based participatory research, canada acknowledgments we thank all of those who volunteered to participate in this study, the anonymous peer reviewers, professor emeritus fred wien for his insightful comments on earlier drafts of this work, as well as paul sylvestre and rob stefanelli of the hec lab for their editorial assistance. our research protocol was reviewed by the mi’kmaw ethics watch and the dalhousie university research ethics board. funding for the research was provided through a scholarship from the atlantic aboriginal health research program (moore) and through a catalyst grant in ethics (application #246507) from the canadian institutes of health research (castleden & martin). creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ i m p l e m e n t i n g t h e t r i c o u n c i l p o l i c y o n e t h i c a l r e s e a r c h i n v o l v i n g i n d i g e n o u s p e o p l e s i n c a n a d a : s o , h o w ’ s t h a t g o i n g i n m i ’ k m a ’ k i ? in canada and other similarly colonized states (e.g., the united states, australia, and new zealand), the framework for ethical academic research involving indigenous1 communities2 now includes an overarching guiding principle that such research must advance the goals and priorities of indigenous communities, encourage community participation, produce knowledge that is useful to them and their members, and support mutual capacity building (ball & janyst, 2008; brunger & wall, 2016; bull, 2010). ethical research in the context of indigenous communities includes more than just respect for persons, concern for welfare and justice, or informing participants about their rights in the research process—rather, it is also about ensuring reciprocity in the research process (canadian institutes of health research [cihr], natural sciences and engineering research council of canada [nserc], & social sciences and humanities research council of canada [sshrc], 2010). that is, indigenous peoples participating in research are not to be “passive givers of knowledge that is somehow to be extracted by the researchers from their memories, but active partners in the research” (piquemal, 2000, p. 51). this has not always been the case, but it has now become policy in canada. in line with this evolving ethical landscape, in 2010 the canadian institutes of health research (cihr), together with the other two canadian federal research agencies, the natural sciences and engineering research council of canada (nserc), and the social sciences and humanities research council of canada (sshrc), revised its original (1998) joint policy, called the tri-council policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans (tcps) and introduced a new chapter, chapter 9: “research involving the first nations, inuit and métis peoples of canada.” however, policies often have unintended consequences (chace, 2013; ebenstein, 2010; kot, castleden, & gagnon, 2011). thus, the overarching goal of our study was to explore how health researchers, institutionally-based research ethics boards (rebs), and financial service administrators, as well as community-based health directors in one region of mi’kma’ki (specifically, nova scotia), operationalized the chapter 9 articles of the tri-council 1 we use “indigenous” when referring to first peoples in canada and beyond; in canada, we mean this to include first nations, inuit, and métis peoples, who are often referred to collectively using the “umbrella term” aboriginal. 2 we recognize the contested nature of “community” in academia; here, we use “communities” to denote “community(s)/organization(s)/group(s),” as indigenous research can involve any or all of these designations. 1 moore et al.: implementing the tcps2 in mi’kma’ki published by scholarship@western, 2017 policy statement (colloquially known as tcps2)3 in health research involving mi’kmaw communities on the east coast of canada.4 b a c k g r o u n d historically, we know that research involving indigenous peoples in canada and other indigenous peoples worldwide has often exploited, misrepresented, and pathologized them (ball & janyst, 2008; castleden, sloan morgan, & lamb, 2012). for example, the colonization of indigenous peoples was justified by research produced by eurocentric scientific theories, which argued that because indigenous people were “uncivilized,” colonizers had the right to “conquer them, dispossess them of their lands, language and traditions, and even to kill them outright” (namaste & jauffret, 2006, p. 65). not only has academic research of the past been, at best, largely immaterial to indigenous communities, it has also not reflected their respective systems of knowledge (brant castellano, 2004). the result of exploitative, culturally insensitive, and frequently one-sided research is that indigenous communities tend to regard academic research with a certain degree of mistrust or apprehension (bharadwaj, 2014; castleden, garvin, & huu-ay-aht first nation, 2008; cochran et al., 2008; smith, 1999). indigenous-led research has been happening for hundreds of generations, but its legitimacy has been silenced by both the professionalization of western science in the academy, and the double burden of colonialism and racism (smith, 1999). to date, most academic research that has involved indigenous peoples and communities in canada has been designed and implemented by non-indigenous researchers and continues to be led mainly by non-indigenous investigators (ball & janyst, 2008; castleden et al., 2012; cihr et al., 2010). in many cases, such research has done more to support the academic career advancement of the primary investigators than to support the needs of the indigenous communities with whom the research was concerned. this has perpetuated western society’s view that it alone is the center of legitimate knowledge (blodgett, schinke, smith, peltier, & pheasant, 2011; castleden, sylvestre, martin, & mcnally, 2015). 3 tcps2 was updated in 2014 primarily to define terms and clarify specific points in the document. at the time of writing, this is the version in use. it is still referred to as tcps2 since there were no substantive changes. 4 carla moore is mi’kmaq from unama’ki. she coordinates indigenous-focused research through dalhousie university. her involvement in indigenous health research follows from her work in health promotion involving indigenous communities in atlantic canada. during the study period, carla was the director of the atlantic aboriginal health research program (aahrp); at the time of this publication, she is the director of health services at millbrook first nation. heather castleden is a white settler scholar-ally who holds a canada research chair in reconciling relations for health, environments, and communities at queen's university. she undertakes community-based participatory research projects in partnership with indigenous peoples in canada and has a long-standing research trajectory regarding the ethical challenges of such research. susan tirone retired in 2016 after serving as the associate director of dalhousie university’s college of sustainability and holding a faculty position in the school of health and human performance for more than 15 years. her academic endeavours included research with youth and families who identify with non-eurocentric ethnic groups and people who live in rural and urban adjacent communities. debbie martin is an inuk scholar and an associate professor of health promotion in the school of health and human performance at dalhousie university. her research involves working with indigenous communities to identify health research needs and priorities, and capacity building in the area of indigenous health research, particularly in relation to the indigenous determinants of health. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.4 academic research involving indigenous peoples has, however, changed in recent years. in response to the refrain “we’ve been researched to death,” indigenous peoples who recognize that the potential utility of research now often say that they need to be “researching ourselves back to life” (brant castellano & reading, 2010). indigenous communities are also becoming better informed about the risks and benefits of participating in academic research projects (cihr et al., 2010); today, the willingness of many communities to participate in such projects is dependent on the extent to which their communities will directly benefit from them (ball & janyst, 2008). in this vein, philosophical and methodological approaches that are compatible with indigenous ways of knowing— for example, community-based participatory research, whereby research participants are partners with academic researchers in all stages of the research process from concept to conclusion—are gaining traction (castleden et al., 2012). the original tri-council policy statement (cihr et al., 1998) was viewed as inadequate by researchers and indigenous peoples (taniguchi, taualii, & maddock, 2012) and made only brief mention of ethical considerations for research involving indigenous peoples. when chapter 9 was introduced in 2010, it served as a broad framework for the ethical conduct of research involving indigenous peoples and communities. its aim was to ensure that such research would always be premised on respectful relationships, collaboration, engagement, and reciprocity between researchers and participants (cihr et al., 2010). chapter 9 also replaced an established pan-canadian ethics protocol for health research that was developed in 2007: the cihr guidelines for health research involving aboriginal people (cihr, 2007). these guidelines were widely regarded for both their rigor and the collaborative approach taken in their development. at the time, health researchers were becoming increasingly aware that research collaborations were necessary to enhance the impact of research on public health (colquhoun et al., 2013). there was also a growing awareness among some researchers of a need to be supportive of indigenous communities’ desire to take control of research that was affecting them (patterson, jackson, & edwards, 2006) and to respect the cultural norms and ethical obligations of knowledge sharing, such as gifts or honoraria for elders or knowledge holders who participated in research (brant castellano, 2004; castleden et al., 2012). while such ethical awareness was present amongst those who engaged in health-related (and other) research, this awareness is still a work in progress throughout the research community, and it has not always translated across jurisdictional borders within the academy and beyond. to achieve our research goal, we collected qualitative data from nova scotia-based health researchers, reb representatives, financial service administrators, and health directors from mi’kmaw communities in nova scotia to both explore how the policies contained in chapter 9 were moving from theory to practice in their work and to identify any obstacles or challenges they faced when applying chapter 9 to research involving mi’kmaw communities. ultimately, the guiding principle of our study was to propose recommendations that could be used by mi’kmaw communities, university rebs, university administrators, and researchers to support the uptake of ethical research practices in mi’kmaw communities. the importance and timeliness of this study in terms of its contribution to existing literature, which is emerging from other jurisdictions in this country (see for example brunger & russell, 2015), lies in its aim to convey the necessity of avoiding “one size fits all” approaches to research involving indigenous peoples and to caution against unintended consequences of policy implementation. 3 moore et al.: implementing the tcps2 in mi’kma’ki published by scholarship@western, 2017 m e t h o d s to collect institutional data, we targeted four universities in nova scotia with relatively high numbers5 of researchers who had received competitive funding to conduct indigenous health research, as their high numbers of recipients indicated that the universities’ reb representatives and financial services administrators would have experience with (a) reviewing ethical protocols and (b) research accounting oversight. data were collected over four months (between june and september of 2014) using two methods: semi-structured interviews and a focus group. we held semi-structured interviews with nine health researchers, four reb representatives, and three university-based financial services administrators. the semi-structured nature of the interviews provided participants with the opportunity to raise issues that they felt were relevant (see agnew & pyke, 2007). our open-ended questions helped to ensure that all topics were covered so as to address the study’s research objectives (neuman & robson, 2009). data saturation became evident after six interviews with the health researchers, but we continued to interview those who had agreed to participate in case new themes or concepts emerged, although none did. while we attempted to reach data saturation with both the reb representatives and the financial service administrators, we were restricted to the four targeted institutions and experienced some difficulty recruiting sufficient numbers of participants; however, we were able to draw important insights from our dataset, which are shared here and could be explored further in future research. in addition to the semi-structured interviews, we held a focus group with seven health directors working in mi’kmaw communities, six of whom were mi’kmaq. they were responsible for overseeing health research in their community. the focus group was used to explore the participants’ views on chapter 9; to develop an understanding of how the policy was being interpreted, applied, and experienced in research across several mi’kmaw communities; and to create an opportunity for participants to interact with each other’s perspectives on ethical research relationships. interviews and the focus group were audio recorded and transcribed verbatim. these data were manually coded and thematically analyzed (creswell, 2009). from this analysis, three key themes emerged: relationships are critical to enacting chapter 9 articles, community control and the challenge of capacity, and understanding each others’ lived realities. to increase the validity of the analysis, these themes were reviewed and vetted by participants (baxter & eyles, 1997; neuman & robson, 2009). each theme is discussed below and representative participant quotes are provided to enhance and contextualize these findings. f i n d i n g s t h e m e 1 : r e l a t i o n s h i p s s u p p o r t r e s e a r c h e r c o m p l i a n c e w i t h c h a p t e r 9 a r t i c l e s our data revealed that health researchers who have established partnerships with nova scotia mi’kmaw communities largely adhere to the principles laid out in chapter 9 of the tcps2. health directors provided concrete examples of how those researchers with whom they have good relationships adhere to 5 we say “relatively” high numbers because this is still a field with limited institutional capacity in canada (see richmond, martin, dean, castleden, & marsden, 2013). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.4 the chapter 9 articles. the health researchers, when discussing their own research practices, also indicated that they believed they were generally in compliance with chapter 9. the health directors noted that although some researchers continue to initiate contact with the communities about research ideas, they said that the communities agree to participate in the research only if the topic is relevant to them. as one health director said: a researcher contacted me and . . . we chatted around research and so we began a research study around [the topic] because that was a big issue for our nurses. (hd#1) the health directors elaborated that of those researchers with whom they have good working relationships, their relationships were developed over time, and the attitudes of the researchers were important. once the relationships were developed, health directors tended to return to those same researchers with research ideas that were of importance to their communities. they said that the researchers they worked with: a. supported mi’kmaw community control of the research, b. supported research partnerships without burdening the communities, c. submitted their proposals to the local community research boards or indigenous ethics committees, d. supported community research capacity (via, for example, advisory committees), e. supported the involvement of the community in developing proposals, f. signed a research agreement if they were asked, g. were respectful in their approaches, h. were trustworthy, i. shared their analyses with the communities to confirm their soundness (i.e., they sought the community’s feedback), and j. ensured that the community was given credit in published reports that resulted from the research (i.e., they provided co-authorship credit or acknowledgement where appropriate). one health director summed up this part of the discussion by saying: you have to have that relationship and build trust with the community and involve the community through the whole process. (hd#1) health researcher data revealed that they were well aware of the articles in chapter 9 and most said that they followed them. that is, when describing their relationships with mi’kmaw communities, they referred to them as collaborative partnerships and emphasized that relationship building was an important aspect of those partnerships. one researcher described these research relationships as: 5 moore et al.: implementing the tcps2 in mi’kma’ki published by scholarship@western, 2017 definitely partnerships, collaborative partnerships. so i wouldn’t do research in a community unless i was invited into the community by the community, and all research is designed collaboratively and agreed upon collaboratively. and that’s a continuous process. (hr#6) when asked whether their mi’kmaw community partners were involved with all stages of the research process, most researchers said that their partners were involved in developing research proposals, collecting and analyzing data, and disseminating the research results. they noted, too, that this level of community involvement would be difficult to achieve without partnerships. one researcher said: the majority of the work is community initiated. so it’s people coming to me saying, “[researcher name], i’ve got this idea. could you help me with it?” that’s how it generally works. (hr#2) these participants also noted that cultivating and maintaining such relationships helped them to understand what it means to behave ethically in the community. in the context of their roles as researchers, being taught by community partners about community customs and protocols was something they identified as an important aspect of conducting ethical research. discussing key ethical considerations, one researcher reflected: it’s knowing the protocols, knowing when to offer tobacco, knowing when to offer gifts, knowing to respect sacred knowledge that should not necessarily be exposed. (hr#3) the health directors and researchers who participated in this study indicated that ethical research with indigenous communities was supported by long-term, well-established partnerships, and both the directors and the researchers agreed that these partnerships adhered to the guidelines of chapter 9 in particular and of ethical research in general. t h e m e 2 : c o m m u n i t y c o n t r o l a n d t h e c h a l l e n g e o f c a p a c i t y t o o p e r a t i o n a l i z e c h a p t e r 9 the health directors and health researchers participating in this study noted that the mi’kmaq of nova scotia wanted more control in research involving their communities, which continues to have implications for institutional rebs, financial services, and researchers. participants noted that mi’kmaw communities are taking a more active role in research, particularly in health-related research, mainly because they had more experience with research and more awareness of the value of data. as one health director put it: we all have a better understanding . . . on how data can be useful and not so useful . . . and whether or not research can be useful. (hd#1) the health directors also spoke about how equal control over and an equal say in the research process could be a way to prevent data from being manipulated by researchers, and that it was important that the expectations of both parties—researchers and community partners—were addressed in research agreements. one health director said: 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.4 you want to know what’s going on, and so we’ve learned that. previously it was like it was done, fine, go ahead. but now . . . let’s say we value it more and we want to be part of it because we want to have the control. we don’t want other parties to dictate what comes out of the data. we want to be there from the start so we can see and if they’re doing something that’s straying from what was agreed to, they can be called upon to set it right again. it’s like we’re not passive anymore. (hd#7) additionally, the health directors noted that community aspirations were important, and it was not acceptable for others, such as government departments, to prescribe what should be important for them. the same health director said: we want to be in control. we want to be heard, not just seen, and we don’t want to see, let’s say, higher departments controlling what our needs are supposed to be, what we should have, what’s needed in the community . . . you should be listening from the ground up, not from the top down. (hd#7) researchers, they explained, need to partner with their communities rather than conduct research on the communities, as had been done in the past. the health directors shared stories during the focus group of researchers contacting communities about prospective research projects without communities initiating the request. i think that if there’s a researcher that comes off as arrogant or whatever . . . or comes off as a know-it-all, then it already creates a barrier from day one, and communities will not participate in research. (hd#1) health directors and researchers noted that refusing to participate was one mechanism that communities and community members employed to maintain control over research that would have an impact them. as much as community involvement in research is essential, health directors were quick to note that communities should not be overburdened by research engagement. they urged researchers to avoid overloading community professionals and leaders with the research process itself, as they were generally already working at or over capacity. one health director put it this way: it was her [i.e., the researcher’s] approach, i guess. she was very good with the women. she listened to the women. she passed everything by them. she wasn’t bugging us all the time, which is important. (hd#5) health researchers shared similar perspectives. one researcher noted: service providers, health care professionals or teachers, who just completely are carrying caseloads that are far beyond what’s actually manageable, what can you reasonably expect in terms of their involvement? so you make sure you’re optimizing the knowledge they bring to the study, but your study doesn’t become another burden in this person’s life. (hr#6) 7 moore et al.: implementing the tcps2 in mi’kma’ki published by scholarship@western, 2017 as much as health directors valued the notion of engagement and the importance of having meaningful collaborative partnerships (as per the tcps articles), they often lacked the time to participate fully in the research process as such activities, including relationship building, are time consuming. one health director explained: we don’t have a lot of time. we have limited resources in a community. so we don’t have a lot of time to devote to researchers. (hd#5) the health directors were not just referring to their own time but also that of their staff members, indicating they, too, had limited resources to devote to research. [research is] a big commitment . . . you do need staff that can work on the ground whether it’s coordinating a focus group or contacting people . . . so there is a big time commitment. (hd#1) health directors were concerned about the overall challenges associated with the capacities of their communities to participate in research. some of the challenges that they noted included not understanding the value or benefit of a particular research project or not understanding why they were asked to participate in a particular study. again, time was a factor in determining whether individual community members agreed to participate in research projects. as one health director put it: time is precious when you have five or six kids. do you want to sit there for two hours with a researcher, or do you want to clean your house or take care of your kids or go to the beach? (hd#5) in short, health directors identified a lack of both research capacity and understanding about how to use research data to their benefit, as well as time constraints, as key factors hampering the ability of mi’kmaw communities to participate more fully in research projects. as such, these factors pose a significant impediment to communities’ efforts at taking greater control over the research process. t h e m e 3 : u n d e r s t a n d i n g e a c h o t h e r ’ s l i v e d r e a l i t i e s i n t h e a p p l i c a t i o n o f t c p s 2 across the board, the data revealed a general unfamiliarity across jurisdictions, particularly between the workings of mi’kmaw communities (and researchers in communities) and the workings of institutionally-based rebs and financial administrations with respect to the tcps2 and the lived realities of both contexts. for example, while health directors noted that they had seen improvements in the ways in which researchers were approaching their communities to do research, they, along with financial service administrators, were not familiar with the specific contents of the tcps2 in general or chapter 9 in particular. when asked if they had heard of the tcps2 and chapter 9, one health director responded: well, i’m aware of it but i’ve never actually read it. (hd#1) another health director disclosed: i just became aware of it when you sent the [inquiry and request for participation] email. (hd#4) 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.4 in response to the same question, a financial service administrator revealed: that’s not my area, ethics . . . i don’t know the details of research involving human participants. (fsa#3) both groups said that they had not heard much about the tcps2 before we contacted them about our proposed study. they also indicated that they knew very little about what constituted an ethical review at a university. one health director found the entire process confusing, and noted: i still don’t get a clue on that whole thing really . . . i’m not sure what [the universities] use, what mi’kmaw ethics watch uses. do they use the tri-council guidelines? i doubt it . . . so i don’t know, i just think that . . . i don’t know. (hd#1) similarly, interviews with financial service administrators and reb representatives revealed both a general lack of knowledge about the life circumstances of people in mi’kmaw communities and a lack of understanding of what is typically involved in community-based participatory indigenous research. at the same time, however, these participants acknowledged that they are called upon to make decisions about the ethical conduct of such research projects and the expenditures that enable the studies to be conducted. for example, an reb representative, when discussing ethics reviews of projects involving mi’kmaw communities, considered the communities an example of “vulnerable” populations (i.e., a designation typically used with reference to children, seniors, prisoners, and individuals with diminished capacity), but factored neither culture nor language in her or his reviews. this representative stated: you know, there are multiple groups who self-identify in a particular way or signal their desire to be treated as high-risk or highly vulnerable . . . i don’t see the first nation population as radically different from many other populations. (reb#1) this perspective was not the view of all reb representative participants, however; others indicated that accommodations (e.g., including someone with indigenous research experience on rebs) should be made when reviewing proposals for research involving mi’kmaw participants. interviews with researchers revealed a general belief that reb representatives did not fully appreciate the tenets of community-based participatory indigenous research. when discussing the tension around conducting ethical indigenous research, one researcher said that the reb wanted a detailed timeframe of activities related to the research, without recognizing that a community-based participatory approach to the project should be organic, fluid, and respectful of the community’s timeframes—not those of the researcher or the university. the researcher said who received this reb feedback noted: the real tension . . . is the tension between being able to do an emergent process and just really being kind of frustrated with the exercise of having to spell out the minutiae for the . . . research ethics board, who in their line of questioning, i felt was really kind of undermining the power of the community to make decisions over the evolution of the project. it felt as though i was being left with a process where the community had a leash that was two inches long, and every decision that they wanted to make of any significance, [the university] had to okay before they could go ahead moving forward on the project. (hr#4) 9 moore et al.: implementing the tcps2 in mi’kma’ki published by scholarship@western, 2017 additionally, researchers expressed doubts that financial services administrators understood the socioeconomic conditions of some of the community research participants. as noted by one researcher: there is some inflexibility and lack of recognition that not everybody has a [credit card], and the people that you hire to work in the communities don’t have the resources to be able to do what other people do. and that’s the expectation . . . “book your travel, and we’ll reimburse you.” well, it just doesn’t work that way [in] the community. they may not have those kinds of resources. (hr#9) another researcher expressed frustration with financial services administrators not grasping the costs associated with doing community-based participatory research: [they] need to be more aware that the process of doing [indigenous] research is not cut and dry like a survey or a quick interview. it’s much more engaging and it’s much more involving the participants. (hr#3) finally, when discussing some of the problems they encountered with privacy, researchers spoke of the lack of understanding from financial services administrators about what constitutes ethical research. one researcher said: [financial services] wanted the names of participants . . . the name of who you gave the honorarium to, which breaches confidentiality. (hr#3) on the other hand, however, was the fact that financial services administrators and their staff members were also bound to the same confidentiality requirements as researchers; thus, the above researcher’s comments that financial services staff members had requested privileged information signaled a lack of understanding and communication about the responsibilities of different parties involved in research projects. in sum, what these findings point to are significant gaps between how differently situated groups within the research enterprise understand one another’s lived realities. as a result, the misunderstandings that are likely to arise from these gaps create barriers to carrying out ethical research with mi’kmaw communities. d i s c u s s i o n our findings suggest that the principles of chapter 9 of the tcps2 are being borne out in positive ways for research involving nova scotia mi’kmaw communities and that the policy itself has contributed to cultivating a relational approach to ethical research in these communities. mi’kmaq in nova scotia are seeking more control over research that impacts their communities and the articles in chapter 9 support such increased control. additionally, established relationships between mi’kmaw communities and health researchers support researchers’ adherence to the articles in chapter 9. at the same time, our findings also show that there are barriers to undertaking ethical research in mi’kmaw communities. despite a desire to participate fully, lack of community capacity, lack of resources, limited resources to establish community-researcher partnerships, and a lack of institutional understanding about how research is carried out in mi’kmaw communities pose challenges. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.4 s u p p o r t i n g e t h i c a l r e s e a r c h i n m i ’ k m a w c o m m u n i t i e s t h r o u g h r e l a t i o n s h i p s mi’kmaw communities are seeking more control in research projects that impact them; this is consistent with the literature, which illustrates that other indigenous communities in canada and elsewhere are seeking more control in similarly impactful research projects (e.g., ball & janyst, 2008; castleden et al., 2012; schnarch, 2004; smith, 1999; weir & wuttunee, 2004). the tcps2 also acknowledges that indigenous peoples in canada are more widely engaging in initiatives to assume leadership roles in research (cihr et al., 2010). in our study, health directors spoke about how communities are taking more dynamic roles in research, ranging from deciding when to participate in a project (or opting out of a project) to leading or co-leading projects. this, they said, was due in part to a better understanding of, and more experience with, research, but it is also due to a clearer understanding of their collective community rights in the research process. they made clear that as health leaders for their communities, they were no longer passive participants in research; as such, these health directors were inclined to support only projects that were important to their communities. health directors and researchers in this study also revealed how important respectful partnerships were to their communities, and that researcher attitudes—particularly humility—were instrumental to the development of strong partnerships. the notion that well-established relationships between researchers and communities create the space for ethical research is well supported in existing literature (see for example ball & janyst, 2008; brant castellano, 2004; bull, 2010). without them, it would be difficult to move forward. however, building these relationships requires time, understanding of local ways, and skilled leadership. factoring time into developing respectful relationships is an important consideration for both funding agencies (e.g., the time between issuing a funding opportunity and the deadline to submit an application is often very short) and academic institutions (e.g., the time needed to undertake community-based indigenous research is longer than most conventional research, but this is not well understood in either annual reviews or tenure and promotion contexts). by recognizing the need for this relational ethic, research collaborations that result from these relationships can help to support capacity building, generate new research questions, and broaden understanding and knowledge for all involved (colquhoun et al., 2013). moreover, well-established research partnerships can result in research that helps to eliminate health disparities that may exist in the communities, as partnerships can both facilitate the use of culturally relevant research designs and methodologies, and be more responsive to the concerns of the community (cochran et al., 2008). health directors and researchers in this study cited limited financial resources as another obstacle to operationalizing the relationships they wanted. meadows et al. (2003), writing about the challenges of conducting ethical research with indigenous communities, have argued that it is important for researchers to budget adequate funds to allow this relational approach to emerge. funding is needed, for example, to support engagement with the community, to hire community members to support data collection and analysis, to report findings to the communities, and to provide honoraria to participants and advisory committees. brant castellano and reading (2010) have noted that, while the tcps2 is not principally concerned with funding, it has been adopted by the tri-council and thus canada’s three research-funding agencies must ensure that their funding policies align with tcps2’s ethical requirements. furthermore, they have argued that, while academic institutions receive “indirect” 11 moore et al.: implementing the tcps2 in mi’kma’ki published by scholarship@western, 2017 funding to alleviate the administrative costs of research, indigenous communities do not see even a portion of these resources. as such, brant castellano and reading recommend that researchers (indigenous and non-indigenous), institutional leaders, and professional organizations push the tricouncil to make available funding that would allow for ethical research that is in accordance with the tcps2. from our findings, we would add that it is critical to ensure not only that funding policies fit the tri-council’s ethical requirements, but also that those policies are operationalized and understood by reb members and financial services administrators in ways commensurate with ethical approaches to research involving indigenous communities. indeed, such understanding—between researchers, institutional leaders and employees, and the indigenous communities with whom they work—is necessary to achieving ethical programs of research that include indigenous control and participation. c a p a c i t y a s a b a r r i e r t o e t h i c a l r e s e a r c h i n m i ’ k m a w c o m m u n i t i e s challenges accompany the positive aspects of these research collaborations. limited capacity in mi’kmaw communities to fully engage in research processes is problematic in the context of operationalizing the tcps2. our findings show that, although communities want more control of research, they are not always able to achieve an appropriate level of control. health directors noted that either they did not have the specialized (i.e., western) knowledge or skills necessary to be meaningfully involved, or they had too many other demands on their time to be fully engaged. capacity building was a key concern for them, and they explained that ways to support such capacity building needed to be available (e.g., through community training in health professions and health research, hiring community members as research staff through researchers’ funding awards, and integrative health knowledge translation). indeed, research training for community health staff, for example, can build communities’ capacities to undertake projects of their own in the future, but it can also ensure an ongoing awareness of ethical research practices and thereby create environments wherein communities are more likely to recognize and intervene in unethical research practices that they see occurring in their communities. while capacity building does not guarantee that research projects will achieve their stated goals (bull, 2010), it does increase the likelihood that research will provide meaningful benefits for communities. although mi’kmaw communities want to initiate research projects and have more control over them, our data from researchers and health directors revealed that much research continues to be conducted by non-indigenous researchers working with communities. in canada, initiatives such as the aboriginal capacity and developmental research environments (acadre) and the network environments for aboriginal health research (neahr) programs,6 both of which have now ended, were introduced in part to increase the number of indigenous researchers in academia; yet in nova scotia (and canada more broadly), there remains a shortage of university-trained indigenous researchers who are available to participate in or co-lead research with communities (richmond et al., 2013). a re-organized focus on supporting the capacity of mi’kmaw and other indigenous communities in research is needed so that communities can participate in and control research in their communities. in order to build that capacity at the regional and national levels, additional funding is needed (richmond et al., 2013) and, 6 acadre centers were established across canada in 2001 by the institute of aboriginal peoples health of cihr to facilitate aboriginal capacity in health research. the program ended in 2007, and the neahr program was launched in 2007 to sustain the momentum of the acadre program. its funding was cut in 2014. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.4 while cihr is in the process of developing new indigenous mentorship network programs in canada, it has less financial resources than its predecessors did. u n d e r s t a n d i n g e a c h o t h e r ’ s l i v e d r e a l i t i e s i n t h e c o n t e x t o f t c p s 2 in canada, bull (2010), brunger and russell (2015), brunger and wall (2016), stiegman and castleden (2015), and others have begun to explore the unintended consequences of operationalizing the tcps2 in indigenous research; collectively, their findings point to the risk of potentially perpetuating colonial relationships. as brunger and wall (2016) have stated, “community engagement—if done uncritically and in the service of ethical guidelines rather than in service to ethical research—can itself cause harm” (p. 1862). to counteract this, indigenous communities and organizations have created their own policies to guide the ethical conduct of research in their communities or territories (e.g., the mi’kmaw ethics watch, the nunatukavut community council research advisory committee, the kahnawake schools diabetes prevention project’s code of research ethics, and the first nations information governance centre’s ocap® principles7). however, even with these checks and balances, our findings indicate that understandings between communities and campuses, and within and across campus jurisdictions, are necessary to better understand the nuances of ethical indigenous research and the disconnects between policy(ies) and practice(s). the focus group with health directors revealed that they have a limited understanding of the universitybased policies and procedures that inform academic research practice, and this limited understanding was mirrored by reb representatives and financial service administrators interviewees, who noted that they did not understand the realities of being a part of, or working with, mi’kmaw communities. this was further evidenced by the interviews with researchers, wherein they shared the common perception that many reb members did not fully understand the tenets of community-based participatory indigenous research and that financial services administrators had neither sufficient awareness of mi’kmaw communities nor understanding what ethical research meant in the context of working with indigenous communities. if financial services administrators who are responsible for ensuring appropriate spending on research grants at the universities do not understand what ethical research in indigenous spaces entails, then they may be less likely to approve requests that support ethical research. for instance, the tri-council’s financial policy indicates that “costs of entertainment, hospitality and gifts, other than those specified above such as regular interactions with colleagues from the institution and personnel meetings” are ineligible expenses (cihr et al., 2016, non-eligible expenses section, para. 2). yet, chapter 9 recognizes that there is a “need to respect a community’s cultural traditions, customs and codes of practice [in] first nations, inuit and métis communities” (cihr et al., 2014, p. 110) and it “is not intended to override or replace ethical guidance offered by aboriginal peoples themselves” (p. 109). thus, a researcher purchasing tobacco for ceremonial purposes or providing door prizes at a community dinner would be acting in accordance with the latter policy, but not the former. chapter 9 also states, “development and participation costs incurred by the community and the researcher should be factored into proposals to the extent possible within funding guidelines [emphasis added]” (cihr et al., 2014, p. 127). the practice of gift-giving, whether for ceremony or for community events, is 7 ocap®, which stands for ownership, control, access, and possession, is a registered trademark of the first nations information governance centre (fnigc) (for details see www.fnigc.ca/ocap). 13 moore et al.: implementing the tcps2 in mi’kma’ki published by scholarship@western, 2017 common in mi’kmaw and other indigenous communities and explicit acknowledgement of such practices by funding guidelines, universities, and the policies that regulate how researchers’ grant funds are spent would support ethical indigenous research. the financial services administrators who participated in this study indicated that one of the main reasons why they were inflexible regarding grant administration was that they were apprehensive about being audited by the tri-council and that being in “good standing” with the tri-council was very important to them. therefore, there could be a problem with the institutional relationship between financial services administrators and researchers, insofar as both parties appear to misunderstand what the other does, what motivates them, and what their ethics protocols are. in terms of the reb process, requiring detailed work plans before research begins (i.e., the reb review) could also dissuade mi’kmaw participation because, if plans are pre-determined, then their ability to have more control over the research is immediately diminished. moreover, they might regard their lack of involvement in decision-making as disrespectful and certainly not indicative of collaborative research (stiegman & castleden, 2015). notwithstanding reb reviews or the chapter 9 articles about community engagement, the degree of a community’s involvement with a given research project should be decided by the participating community, and “forcing” community engagement can reduce the effectiveness of research, create an unethical space, and result in barriers to future research with the community. finally, and perhaps most importantly, not providing accommodations in ethics reviews—by, for example, including someone on the reb with lived indigenous experience or with a good understanding of indigenous issues and concerns and relevant methodologies—could jeopardize the ethical conduct of research in mi’kmaw (and other indigenous) communities. for instance, approving ethics applications without an understanding of the complexities of life in a particular mi’kmaw community could result in harm to that community. likewise, there could be political ramifications for those partnering in research in some of the communities. chapter 9 recommends that when ethics applications regularly involve indigenous communities, the reb membership should be modified to ensure that someone on the board has a strong understanding of indigenous cultures and customs; our recommendations below suggest going beyond such token representation. in any case, this general lack of knowledge about the life circumstances of those living in mi’kmaw communities and/or about community-based participatory indigenous research could limit the participation of mi’kmaw people in research projects. they may not agree to partner on a project because they do not want to or are unable to complete lengthy and complicated procedures that do not align with their cultural protocols. p o l i c y r e c o m m e n d a t i o n s in light of our findings, we offer six modest recommendations to continue expanding on the gains that have been made in reconciling academic approaches to indigenous research: 1. additional time and financial resources should be written into tri-council and other funding opportunities and project timelines and budgets to account for relational approaches to ethical indigenous research practice; 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.4 2. institutions should receive training on chapter 9 of the tcps2 that targets reb members, financial service administrators, faculty, and students who have no lived experience in indigenous communities but are interested in developing research programs in the area; 3. creation of institutionally-based standing sub-committees of knowledge holders to advise rebs when proposals involving indigenous communities are being reviewed; 4. clarify text and provide substantive examples of how chapter 9 articles could be applied in indigenous research (beyond those provided in the tcps2 course on research ethics’ tutorial); 5. the tri-council should review their financial policies (e.g., allowable expenses) to ensure that they are compliant with chapter 9; and 6. the tri-council should make funding available to support capacity building and mentorship so that indigenous communities can participate in and control the research undertaken in their communities and throughout their traditional territories (see kershaw, castleden, & laroque, 2014). c o n c l u d i n g c o m m e n t s chapter 9 of the tcps2 has contributed to positive change in how academic research in nova scotia mi’kmaw communities is undertaken. on the one hand, these communities and others like them are seeking more control over research that is relevant to and done in their communities, and the chapter 9 articles support that increased control. on the other hand, however, the implementation of a relational approach to ethical research is dependent upon pre-existing relationships between researchers and these communities (whether the parties were intimately familiar with the tcps2 or not). our study revealed several institutional and community-based challenges related to chapter 9 and noted some of the barriers that could impact ethical research in mi’kmaw communities: limited community capacity, limited community resources, and limited awareness and clarity regarding the articles themselves among researchers and within universities. our findings contribute to the literature on the ethics of academic research involving indigenous peoples by highlighting the gains and unintended consequences of this national policy. for those researchers, health directors, and others working with 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(2015). leashes and lies: navigating the colonial tensions of institutional ethics of research involving indigenous peoples in canada. the international indigenous policy journal, 6(3). doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.2 taniguchi, n. k., taualii, m., & maddock, j. (2012). a comparative analysis of indigenous research guidelines to inform genomic research in indigenous communities. the international indigenous policy journal, 3(1), 1-23. doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.6 weir, w. & wuttunee, w. (2004). respectful research in aboriginal communities and institutions in canada. in b. fairburn & n. russell (eds.), cooperative membership and globalization (pp. 207-236). saskatoon: centre for the study of co-operatives, university of saskatchewan. 19 moore et al.: implementing the tcps2 in mi’kma’ki published by scholarship@western, 2017 the international indigenous policy journal april 2017 implementing the tri-council policy on ethical research involving indigenous peoples in canada: so, how’s that going in mi’kma’ki? carla moore heather e. castleden susan tirone debbie martin recommended citation implementing the tri-council policy on ethical research involving indigenous peoples in canada: so, how’s that going in mi’kma’ki? abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license implementing the tri-council policy on ethical research involving indigenous peoples in canada: so, howâ•žs that going in miâ•žkmaâ•žki? microsoft word 8641 cover page.docx the international indigenous policy journal volume 12 | issue 2 april 2021 new discourses on energy transition as an opportunity for reconciliation? analyzing indigenous and non-indigenous communications in media and policy documents carelle mang-benza university of western ontario, canada, cmangben@uwo.ca jamie baxter university of western ontario, canada, jamie.baxter@uwo.ca romayne smith fullerton university of western ontario, canada, romayne.smithfullerton@uwo.ca recommended citation mang-benza, c., baxter, j., & smith fullerton, r. (2021). new discourses on energy transition as an opportunity for reconciliation? analyzing indigenous and non-indigenous communications in media and policy documents. the international indigenous policy journal, 12(2). https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.8641 new discourses on energy transition as an opportunity for reconciliation? analyzing indigenous and non-indigenous communications in media and policy documents abstract this article examines energy issues articulated by indigenous and non-indigenous people in canada and analyzes the energy transition as a locus of reconciliation therein. using content and discourse analysis of policy documents, white papers, and news media articles, we draw attention to reconciliation and energy discourses before and after 2015, the year that marked the release of the truth and reconciliation commission of canada (trc) report and the paris agreement on climate change. after 2015, we find a three-fold expansion of those discourses, which encompass issues of inclusion and exclusion, dependency, and autonomy, as well as colonial representations of indigenous people,. we also find that non-indigenous voices are more prominent in those conversations. we suggest that the prospects of mutual benefits could turn the energy transition into an opportunity to bring together indigenous and non-indigenous people in canada. keywords reconciliation, energy transition, discourse analysis, indigenous people, canada, policy, media creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. 1 mang-benza et al.: energy transition and reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2021 new discourses on energy transition as an opportunity for reconciliation? analyzing indigenous and non-indigenous communications in media and policy documents in 2017, the canadian federal government launched generation energy, a country-wide public consultation on the future of the energy sector that involved interactions with over 380,000 canadians. among the conclusions, the government website includes the statement: “the energy transition is an opportunity for reconciliation with indigenous peoples” (natural resources canada [nrcan], 2018, our energy future section, para. 5). this splicing of energy transition and reconciliation prompted us to explore how a potential new discourse developing along these two national imperatives. the first imperative is reconciliation, which the canadian federal government has ostensibly embraced as a pathway for addressing colonial legacies, recognizing that colonization undermined indigenous peoples’ self-determination on their own lands (adelson, 2005; kekinusuqs, 2005). the truth and reconciliation commission of canada (trc), established to address the legacy of residential schools, defines reconciliation as “establishing and maintaining a mutually respectful relationship between aboriginal and non-aboriginal peoples” (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015, p. 6). the trc affirms that centuries of colonization severely damaged that relationship and brought adverse social, political, economic, and ecological impacts on indigenous communities. the second national imperative is to transition to less carbon-intensive economic activities, especially in the energy sector. an energy transition involves structural changes aiming at “reshaping not only the technologies and economics of energy but also physical and social geographies, social meanings, and the political organization of energy production, distribution, and consumption” (meadowcroft, 2009, p. 324). according to the generation energy report, canada’s energy transition follows two tracks. the first track aims to make the production, distribution, and consumption of energy clean and efficient while the second track is about boosting low-carbon technologies in the oil and gas sector (generation energy council, 2018). the report acknowledges the complexity of navigating this dual-track transition, yet states that it will “involve many and varied energy projects nationwide, and these offer new opportunities to build real, durable partnerships with indigenous and rural communities by investing directly in their energy future” (generation energy council, 2018, p. 7). for the sake of scoping, we focus specifically on the first track, looking at renewable energy production in the current transition and how it connects to reconciliation. we do so through the lens of public communication. in their work on decolonization, mcfarlane and schabus (2017) warn that, when the canadian government and mainstream communication channels acknowledge colonial harms, they often do so while urging us to move on and forget. indigenous assimilation in a pluralist canadian society remains the cornerstone of reconciliation in some political agendas. this article probes whether and to what extent there is a melding of discourses of energy transition and reconciliation in public policy documents and select news media—two influential and powerful sources for the propagation of discourses. in this sense, discourse is defined as “an ensemble of ideas, concepts and categories through which meaning is given to social and physical phenomena, and which is produced and reproduced through an identifiable set of practices” (hajer & versteeg, 2005, p. 175). we specifically address two questions: (a) in what ways do indigenous and non-indigenous public sources communicate about the energy transition and reconciliation? and (b) how have their communications evolved over time, especially in relation to two landmark moments of 2015: the paris agreement on climate change and the final report of the truth and reconciliation commission of canada? by comparing published texts from select news media, 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.8641 government, and non-governmental organizations, we outline how indigenous and non-indigenous voices have been speaking about reconciliation and energy transition in the 2007 to 2018 period, and we consider whether these two groups have been speaking the same language. by bringing insights from indigenous studies into the energy transition literature, which typically lacks attention to colonial impacts, our work offers a unique contribution to research. this exploration is also relevant for indigenous and non-indigenous policy observers as the energy transition is enshrined in federal and provincial governments’ plans about carbon pricing, oil and gas, nuclear waste, and renewable energy development. finally, we hope some of the article’s insights might be transferable to other countries bearing a similar history of settler colonialism. in the next section, we provide some context around reconciliation and energy transition to illuminate the ways in which the latter connects to the former. to that end, we begin by describing how colonization damaged the relationship between indigenous people and settlers and how indigenous and non-indigenous people in canada have been addressing colonial legacies ever since. next, we introduce how scholars attending to energy and indigenous issues engage with the involvement of indigenous communities in renewable energy. then, subsequent sections outline the analytical approach, summarize the findings, and offer a fulsome discussion. context around reconciliation and energy transition in canada the problem: colonization the root cause of the broken relationship between indigenous and non-indigenous people is colonization, which has had lasting social, political, economic, and ecological impacts on canada (adelson, 2005). between the england-commissioned expedition of john cabot in 1497 and that of france’s jacques cartier in 1541, the mandate to identify a route to the pacific ocean morphed into a colonization project (allaire, 2019; hunter, 2019). colonization involves the physical movement of an imperialist power across geographical and/or national space to establish domination and supplant the traditional order in a foreign site (veracini, 2011). settler colonization is a distinct form of colonization in that, in order to turn the foreign site into a new home, settlers constrain, erase, and extinguish the original inhabitants (veracini, 2011). settler colonization “covers its tracks” (veracini, 2011, p. 3) by engineering structures of dispossession, which in canada ranged from legislation—for example, the 1857 gradual civilization act and the consolidated 1876 indian act—to assimilation projects such as residential schools (tobias & richmond, 2014). early settlers made extensive and intentional use of binary language to justify, establish, and rationalize a society of deserving “haves” and undeserving “have-nots” (harding, 2006). in addition, they routinely used racial semantics that condoned the exclusion of indigenous voices from public life (the national inquiry into murdered and missing indigenous women and girls, 2019a). the vision of the two row wampum belt, used as early as 1613 to document the treaty between the haudenosaunee and the dutch, symbolized as interdependence and independence of both people sharing land and resources, quickly faded away (hallenbeck, 2015). settler colonialism dispossessed sovereign indigenous nations of their lands and they were methodically pushed to the margins of society (alfred, 2015). 3 mang-benza et al.: energy transition and reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2021 addressing colonial legacies: resurgence and reconciliation there have been numerous attempts to address colonial wrongs that can be broadly encapsulated under the terms “resurgence” and “reconciliation.” resurgence refers to indigenous people’s efforts to assert their identities and reclaim their territories, while reconciliation is perceived as a settler initiative (asch et al., 2018). the former term acknowledges that indigenous peoples were not passive witnesses to the deployment of egregious colonial policies (canning, 2018). for example, between the 1870s and the 1930s, indigenous leaders mobilized and engaged in discussions with the federal administration, requesting that the british crown honor existing treaties (dyck & sadik, 2016; wilmer, 1993). in the 1940s, indigenous organizations, such as the north american indian brotherhood, entered the public sphere and demanded political recognition (dyck & sadik, 2016). in the 1960s and 1970s, indigenous peoples advocated for autonomy and self-determination with regard to health, well-being, land rights, and environmental stewardship (manuel & derrickson, 2017; wilmer, 1993). in the 1980s, indigenous people used the patriation of the constitution as an opportunity to safeguard their traditional land titles by enshrining them in what became section 35 of the constitution act (green, 2003). through section 35, canada recognizes the existence of indigenous nations and their practices prior to the arrival of settlers, thus unsettling the colonial project of constraint and erasure of indigenous nations (stanton, 2017). as highly visible acts of resurgence multiplied, the pressure mounted on the colonial establishment to publicly consider the root causes of the broken relationship between indigenous and non-indigenous people in canada. the wrongful incarceration of a mi’kmaw youth from the province of nova scotia led to the appointment of the royal commission on the donald marshall jr. prosecution in 1986, which exposed the systemic racism plaguing the criminal justice system (rymhs, 2006). in 1990, a real estate development proposal on land claimed by the mohawk of kahnesatake escalated into what became known as the oka crisis (marshall, 2019). later in 1990, another shockwave ran across the country when first nations leader phil fontaine made stunning revelations about abuses he had experienced in residential school (nagy, 2014). these events formed the substrate of the royal commission on aboriginal peoples (rcap, 1996), tasked to examine the relationships between indigenous people and the canadian government and society. the voluminous rcap report chipped at the colonial edifice, outlining a pathway to improve the relationship between indigenous peoples and settler canadians, including a recommendation to address one of the most damaging colonial institutions, the residential school system. parallel to the rcap public hearings, residential school survivors launched class action lawsuits supported by the newly elected national chief of the assembly of first nations (afn), phil fontaine (stanton, 2011). in 2007, they reached the largest class action settlement in national history, the indian residential schools settlement agreement (irssa), which set aside funding for the establishment of the truth and reconciliation commission of canada (trc; nagy, 2014; stanton, 2011). the federal government set up the trc with a five-year mandate to compile the accounts of residential school survivors into a public record. the trc chose truth telling as a central feature of its investigation of colonial injustices, and reconciliation as the ultimate goal. many aspects of the settler-led reconciliation project are contested: from the concept as a legitimate means to address colonial legacies to the process and outcome. some indigenous authors who are 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.8641 opposed to the idea of a process framed by colonial structures call reconciliation “the invitation from canada to share in the spoils of our nations’ subjugation and dispossession,” a “false promise,” and an act of recolonization “telling indigenous children that the problem of history is fixed” (mcfarlane & schabus, 2017, p. 11). coulthard (2010) contended that the political, legal, and economic approaches taken by the state to accommodate indigenous people always bear the risk of reproducing colonial structures by reconciling “indigenous claims to nationhood with crown sovereignty . . . in some form of renewed relationship” (p. 6). reconciliation invites “the dispossessed to see themselves solely as contemporary people, bearing historical (but not contemporary) wounds from misguided state policy that is now remediated by recognition and apology” (green, 2016, p. 327). recalling the checkered history of commissions meant to address colonial harms, rymhs (2006) viewed the trc process as a “substitute for action” or “discursive balm” (p. 107). stanton (2011) echoed that perspective, stating “were it not for the enormous financial cost to the government of continuing to defend against the class actions, the trc would not exist in canada” (p. 4). the activists arthur manuel and grand chief ronald derrickson (2017) emphasized restitution of land and resources as the central outcome of true reconciliation, arguing, “anything less than recognizing and affirming aboriginal rights and treaty rights on the ground is not to seek reconciliation, but surrender” (p. 200). king and pasternak (2018) analyzed the indigenous rights, recognition and implementation framework, announced in early 2018 by the liberal federal government, and they similarly doubted the effectiveness of legal instruments to bring an acceptable outcome (king & pasternak, 2018). they noted that the intended outcome of the legislative transformation under the framework remains unclear, including the fate of the indian act and the treatment of indigenous title and treaties (king & pasternak, 2018). other authors, while not oblivious to its inherent risks, are less adamantly opposed to reconciliation. asch and borrows (2018) acknowledged the risks of perpetuating colonial patterns in a settler-led initiative; yet they envisioned the possibility that the reconciliation project might lead to real improvements in the lives of indigenous people. likewise, quinn (2011) commended the trc for making the acknowledgment of wrongs possible, but doubted the inclination of the settler apparatus to substantially address colonial legacies. some scholars promote a more individual approach to reconciliation. observing that none of the trc calls to action are addressed to the general public, ferrara (2015) posited that reconciliation should start with individuals rather than institutions, as a reflexive exercise whereby one would replace colonial dehumanization with “empathic rehumanization” (p. 87). finegan (2018) referred to such an exercise as “a humbling act,” one that asks settlers to “turn a critical eye on themselves and . . . relinquish their privilege” (p. 20). highlighting the inherent challenge to this idea, chambers (2011) saw reconciliation as a “dangerous opportunity to settler peoples” as it compels them genuinely to examine their “complicity in maintaining the status quo” (p. 260). while reconciliation is a contested idea, it seems to be taking hold in public narratives. varied assessments transpire about reconciliation across economic sectors, including in the energy sector—site of recurrent conflicts between indigenous communities and mainstream energy stakeholders over costs and benefits of extraction activities (mccreary et al., 2014). the 2017 generation energy (2018) report stated that the country wants to “ensure that indigenous communities benefit more directly from energy development” and that “this transition is an opportunity for indigenous peoples and communities to 5 mang-benza et al.: energy transition and reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2021 take their place at the table and help drive the evolution of canada’s energy sector” (p. 8). we are aware that colonialism in the energy sector has been challenged in canada through court cases when energy initiatives have threatened indigenous rights to traditional territories. unlike the fossil fuel industry, the renewable energy sector is increasingly appealing to indigenous communities who have a growing presence and influence therein (campbell, 2011; cook et al., 2017; stefanelli et al., 2019). it is to this category of energy projects that we turn next, as we examine the academic literature on energy and indigenous people. energy transition, indigenous people, and reconciliation while the generation energy report links reconciliation with the energy transition, it is not clear which stakeholders are adopting such terminology. a few authors attend to the motivations of indigenous communities engaging in renewable energy. these motivations include aspirations to sovereignty, selfdetermination, and financial autonomy, as observed by lowan-trudeau (2017) and ozog (2012). dreveskracht (2011) noted that renewable energy projects often align with indigenous values and ways of living on the land but are also opportunities to generate revenues. karanasios and parker (2018) argued that indigenous communities relying on federal financial transfers and land-based employment are increasingly challenged to meet the needs of a growing population with static federal assistance. this combination may motivate indigenous nations to engage, on their own or with external partners, in profit-making ventures, including renewable energy production. karanasios and parker (2018) also noted that some communities engaged in renewable energy felt tension between sustainable land stewardship and economic development. they had to juggle the urgent concerns of the present generation with the welfare of future generations. karanasios (2018) quoted shawn batise, executive director of the wabun tribal council, who said he values renewable energy projects because “the revenue generated provides a regular flow of income over time, rather than mining, which is over once the ore is depleted” (p. 3). some authors observed the external and internal barriers constraining indigenous energy projects. krupa et al. (2012, 2015) asserted that, with perpetual patterns of colonial domination, indigenous communities must overcome rigid bureaucracy, financial limitations, and even the legacy of mistrust between indigenous and non-indigenous stakeholders. rodman (2013) argued that indigenous leaders initiating renewable energy projects often face internal resistance when their community opposes the idea of participating in the western economy, even when the activities are touted as ecological, due to the colonial history of dispossession. there are only a handful of authors to date who have explicitly connected renewable energy and reconciliation. jaffar (2015) offered a comparison between narratives of environmentalists and those of indigenous people. she quoted former band chief judith sayers of the hupa!asath first nation, who “described sustainable energy development as a game changer for first nations” (p. 62). however, jaffar noted tension rooted in enduring colonial views among environmentalists who often fall into the trap of the “ecological indian” stereotype. jaffar concluded that a strengthened alliance between the two groups might propel reconciliation, provided colonial views are addressed. in their review of indigenous participation in renewable energy, stefanelli and colleagues (2019) posited that the low-carbon transition provides a dual opportunity for canada to decarbonize and for indigenous communities to promote economic development, but stressed the risk of perpetuating colonial injustices. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.8641 despite analyses of indigenous communities’ involvement in renewable energy, the energy transition literature has not yet integrated the dimensions of colonization in studies of energy systems. this emerging body of literature examines structural changes in energy systems over time. it is organized around three main schools of thought: the technico-economic school stemming from economics and engineering, the socio-technico approach that considers energy as a social phenomenon, and the sociopolitical school that draws on political ecology and political science (cherp & jewell, 2011). to our knowledge, none of these approaches pay explicit attention to indigenous worldviews. as suggested by sovacool (2014), energy scholars should be wary of the subtle ways “discourses of energy and climate may erase [i]ndigenous or alternative forms of knowledge, or hide the particular history or assumptions underlying them” (p. 14). prompted by the gap in the transition literature and the conclusions of the 2017 generation energy consultation, we examined indigenous and non-indigenous media and policy communication about renewable energy and reconciliation to understand the evenness (or not) of the uptake of reconciliation discourses in this domain and pinpoint areas of convergence and divergence. any probe into the energy transition in canada requires a close look at the provinces since they have primary jurisdiction over their energy systems. while we recognize that one province is not representative of the whole country, we focus on ontario because it is a leader in the energy sector, and it was also the site of the country’s first residential school and is now home to the largest population of first nations and métis people in canada (carney, 1995; statistics canada, 2017). methods we used content and discourse analysis to explore publicly available statements from both indigenous and non-indigenous sources about renewable energy and reconciliation in a selection of media, policy documents, and press releases. we acknowledge that comparing opinion pieces, columns, and news stories with policy papers is challenging because the intents of those documents are different. nonetheless, together these documents constitute a coherent ensemble of narratives that allow for rich connections and critical interdisciplinary textual analyses drawing from geography, media studies, history, and indigenous studies. we also acknowledge that indigenous authors may publish in mainstream newspapers and that nonindigenous writers may contribute to indigenous news pieces. however, we are focused on the origin of the sources more so than the author’s identity, recognizing that readership is largely source dependent. that is, we expect that indigenous readers are the main consumers of indigenous media and nonindigenous peoples are more likely to consume mainstream media pieces. though the lines are permeable, the social reproduction of knowledge through discourse is likely to influence audiences through such alignments. in a settler society, mainstream news media and public policy statements tend to sanction power asymmetry and convey certain representations of the colonized group in their writings (fullerton & patterson, 2008; harding, 2006). indigenous sources would generally counter those representations and offer counter narratives on issues of public interest. combining content and discourse analysis provides “a critical contrast in representing quantitative and qualitative approaches to the study of textual data” (tonkiss, 2004, p. 368). it is useful to elucidate the complexity of meanings in language and enrich the exploration of social constructs (feltham-king & macleod, 2016). content analysis involves counting words or lines and analyzing frequencies of terms, 7 mang-benza et al.: energy transition and reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2021 allowing for comparison of texts and some level of generalization (tonkiss, 2004). discourse analysis is an interpretative study of language in use, which “puts emphasis on the communications through which knowledge is exchanged” and holds the “capacity to illuminate the central role of language in politics” (hajer & versteeg, 2005, pp. 176-177). speaking to the appeal of discourse analysis in sustainability research, hajer and versteeg (2005) added, “the fact that actors debate nature in shared terms does not mean that they understand each other” (p. 177). we posit the same is true here in canada: although indigenous and non-indigenous people may debate using shared vocabulary, mutual understanding is not guaranteed. we defined our analysis timeframe to account for significant events related to renewable energy and reconciliation in the country and in ontario specifically. we selected the window between january 1, 2007, and june 30, 2018, a period that starts two years before the ontario green energy and green economy act (2009), includes the trc’s (2015) final report and paris agreement on climate change, and ends two years after the pan-canadian framework on clean growth and climate change (government of canada, 2016). the 2009 green energy and green economy act, now repealed, was a significant piece of legislation because it boosted renewable energy production in ontario and provided premium electricity tariffs to projects with indigenous participation. the 2016 pan-canadian framework, a statement of national ambition on climate change, was adopted alongside representatives of first nations, inuit, and métis peoples as one of the post-trc symbols of canada’s commitment to engage with indigenous peoples in the low-carbon transition and natural resource management. though the impacts of the trc and the paris agreement will not be fully understood for several years, our goal is to take stock of the current trajectory. in order to capture what indigenous and non-indigenous sources say about renewable energy and reconciliation, we looked into news media, reports, and documents from political institutions. using the indigenous studies websites of the university of british columbia (n.d.) and dalhousie university (n.d.) of nova scotia, we identified indigenous newspapers with both national (e.g., first nations drum, windspeaker) and provincial or regional coverage (e.g., alberta sweetgrass, saskatchewan sage, wawatay news covering ontario first nations, nunatsiaq news in nunavut). we also gathered documents from three political organizations, namely the afn, inuit tapiriit kanatami, and the chiefs of ontario. we used these organizations as proxies for indigenous policy makers because they represent a large number of indigenous communities and take part in political debates. the afn represents most first nation communities in canada (white et al., 2012); inuit tapiriit kanatami (itk) advances the rights of inuit communities, while the chiefs of ontario advocate for issues relevant to first nations in the province. we used the corporate press releases from their websites as statements of their political stances. we did not include any métis organizations because there was insufficient data at the time of analysis. among non-indigenous sources, we examined four categories of documents: news media articles, reports and position papers, policy papers, and bills. we collected news media pieces from the “canadian major dailies” database to retrieve newspapers from as many provinces as possible. the reports and position papers were taken from the 97 submissions to the generation energy consultation (natural resources canada, n.d.). we discarded submissions that did not reference indigenous communities and those that did not focus on renewable energy. policy papers came from the federal and 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.8641 provincial (ontario) governments and bills from the legislative assembly of ontario. we selected policy documents and bills with a direct relation to energy policy. we searched the website of each indigenous source using the following strings: “renewable energy,” “clean energy,” and “reconciliation.” we added the terms “indigenous or aboriginal” in searching nonindigenous news media. we also used french equivalent terms: “autochtone” and “énergie renouvelable,” and “énergie” and “reconciliation.” our final data set is described below and presented in more detail in table 1. findings content analysis based on a first reading of the documents, we derived the themes of autonomy, inclusion, exclusion, and economic development. we then reviewed each document line by line and inductively added emerging themes using the nvivo software (version 12). at the end of the analysis, we had a list of six main themes, 21 sub-themes, and 1,501 sections of text (hereafter referred to as statements) coded under the various themes. table 2 displays the number of occurrences of each theme, namely inclusion, dependency, representations of indigenous assets, exclusion, autonomy, and indigenous people as afterthought, by time period and source. the theme inclusion points to various ways of bringing together indigenous and non-indigenous people in canada, including through energy development, climate change, economic development, land access, and cultural exchange. statements of dependency describe indigenous people as needing support, as vulnerable people, and even as liabilities for canada in energy development. representations of indigenous assets depict indigenous people as political voices, business partners, holders of valuable knowledge, stewards of the land, workforce, and political stooges. the sub-theme of political stooges carries negative connotations related to political gaming. it was attributed to quotes conveying the impression that the federal government feigned concern for indigenous peoples in search of good press, international recognition, or stability for corporate actors. the theme of exclusion refers either to language of opposition that positions indigenous people and non-indigenous people as antagonists, or to language of negation that disregards any difference between the two, casting the colonial legacy into oblivion. autonomy involves indigenous control over land and economic development. finally, we attributed the theme of indigenous people as after-thought to statements based on either the position of a mention to indigenous people (e.g., at the end of a paragraph) or the apparent importance of a particular mention. the postor pre-trc ratio is an indicator of the frequency of those themes before and from 2015. the non-indigenous to indigenous ratio indicates the number of statements from non-indigenous sources relative to indigenous sources under each theme. table 3 presents the 21 sub-themes composing the six main themes. as visual illustrations of our findings, figure 1 compares the occurrence of the six themes in indigenous and non-indigenous sources while figure 2 illustrates the evolution of those themes before and after 2015. 9 mang-benza et al.: energy transition and reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2021 table 1. overview of documents included in the data set indigenous sources non-indigenous sources category corporate news releases newspaper articles country-wide ontario federal and provincial governments submissions to generation energy newspaper articles bills examples assembly of first nations. (2017, november 6). assembly of first nations national chief perry bellegarde says first nations must be fully involved in the canadian council of ministers of the environment [press release]. ball, d. (2014, january 1). harper’s b.c. energy envoy urges more aboriginal consultation. windspeaker. government of canada. (2017). pan-canadian framework on clean growth and climate change, first annual synthesis report on the status of implementation. government of ontario. (2013). achieving balance— ontario’s longterm energy plan. clean energy canada. (2016). a canadian opportunity: tackling climate change by switching to clean power. barretto, j. (2018, january 1). how alberta achieved canada’s lowest renewableelectricity prices. the globe and mail. climate change mitigation and lowcarbon economy act, 2016, s.o. 2016, c. 7. n 123 38 8 18 22 3 note. n = 212 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.8641 table 2. distribution of themes between indigenous and non-indigenous sources before and after the trc report themes number of statements per theme pre-trc (2009-2014) post-trc (2015-2018) ratios indigenous sources (%)a nonindigenous sources (%)a indigenous sources (%)a nonindigenous sources (%)a post/pre trc total non-indigenous statements/ total indigenous statements inclusion 484 8% 9% 29% 54% 4.8 1.7 dependency 291 9% 15% 20% 56% 3.2 2.4 representations of indigenous assets 265 13% 12% 26% 49% 3.0 1.6 exclusion 258 16% 23% 31% 30% 1.6 1.2 autonomy 161 11% 19% 32% 39% 2.4 1.3 indigenous peoples as afterthought 42 0% 33% 5% 62% 2.0 20.0 total number of coded statements 1,501 159 224 401 717 2.9 1.7 note. a percentages pertain to the themes in each row. 11 mang-benza et al.: energy transition and reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2021 table 3. distribution of sub-themes under each theme over the study period 2007-2018 main themes inclusion dependency representations of indigenous people exclusion autonomy sub-themes inclusion through energy (48%) indigenous peoples need support (53%) indigenous peoples as political voice (34%) discourse of opposition and separation (41%) autonomy through land (44%) together against climate change (18%) indigenous peoples are vulnerable (43%) indigenous peoples as business partners (28%) opposition related to energy issues (37%) autonomy through economic development (40%) meaning of reconciliation (18%) indigenous peoples as liabilities (4%) indigenous knowledge as valuable for canada (16%) discourse of negation (22%) autonomy through equity (16%) inclusion through economic development (11%) indigenous peoples as stewards of the land (15%) inclusion through land use (4%) indigenous peoples as workforce (5%) inclusion through cultural exchange (1%) indigenous peoples as political stooges (2%) note. the theme indigenous peoples as after-thought has no sub-theme. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.8641 figure 1. comparison of themes in indigenous and non-indigenous sources 0 50 100 150 200 250 300 350 inclusion dependency representations of indigenous assets exclusion autonomy indigenous peoples as after-thought indigenous non-indigenous 13 mang-benza et al.: energy transition and reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2021 figure 2. occurrence of themes before and after 2015 temporally, table 2 and figure 2 show that all themes have become more prevalent post-trc, while at the extremes, the theme of inclusion has increased the most (4.8 times), while the theme of exclusion has expanded the least 1.6 times). while the move away from exclusion towards inclusion suggests an improvement of relationships, other aspects point to serious disconnects. non-indigenous voices dominate all themes, which may be an artefact of the data collection strategy. it can also reflect the fact that non-indigenous media are ubiquitous and indigenous voices have historically been absent and continue to be underrepresented in mainstream media. discourse analysis now we provide a qualitative analysis of each theme, navigating between types of document to show how the same themes are reproduced in various public spaces and how those spaces echo and respond to each other. 0 50 100 150 200 250 300 350 400 450 inclusion dependency representations of indigenous assets exclusion autonomy indigenous peoples as after-thought 2007-2014 2015-2018 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.8641 inclusion this is by far the most prominent theme, with 484 supporting statements, originating mainly from nonindigenous sources. the theme increased almost 4-fold after the trc, which suggests that the settler sources are increasingly diffusing messages about energy development in indigenous communities. table 3 shows that, out of the six sub-themes pertaining to inclusion, the three most common are inclusion through energy, meanings of reconciliation, and together against climate change. the nuances in the statements also matter: indigenous and non-indigenous sources do not speak to the same themes in the same way nor for the same reasons. for example, in the following statement coded under the theme inclusion through energy, afn chief bellegarde spoke to full involvement of indigenous people as essential for meaningful reforms in energy decision-making processes. this view aligns with the resurgence approach that challenges colonial structures. national chief bellegarde also urged premiers to ensure first nations are fully included in the development of any national energy strategy, stating that regulatory approvals for major projects will only truly be reformed and improved if first nations are fully involved. (afn, 2015b, para. 5) non-indigenous communication about inclusion through energy sounds less adamant. the following statement from the first synthesis report of the pan-canadian framework on clean growth and climate change presents provincial initiatives on renewable energy benefiting indigenous and non-indigenous communities: alberta proclaimed the renewable electricity act and launched the renewable electricity program to support the development of 5,000 megawatts of renewable electricity capacity by 2030. the province also announced $35 million to fund indigenous climate leadership initiatives, including renewable and solar energy projects in first nation and metis communities. (government of canada, 2017, p. 7) without using the word “reconciliation,” the above excerpt sits well with western imaginaries of a pluralist society awarding equal opportunities to all, oblivious to the fact that many indigenous communities struggle with technical capacities to develop projects and are still constrained by indian act provisions regarding on-reserve investments. for these communities, the mere existence of a climate fund is not sufficient to overcome the structural barriers to resource development. indigenous voices demand a form of inclusion that confronts the inertia of colonial structures. the newspaper anishinabek news reports comments made by cynthia wesley-esquimaux, chair of truth and reconciliation at lakehead university in ontario, in which she calls for concrete action, demanding that indigenous people gain authority and decision-making power (garrick, 2017). the indian residential schools became an industry, reconciliation is becoming an industry, everything we touch turns to gold. except it never touches us, and that is really the biggest issue that we have . . . you need to hire indigenous people in administrative positions where they have the authority to make decisions and actually implement change. if you do not do that, you are not doing your job and you are not doing reconciliation. (garrick, 2017, para. 2) 15 mang-benza et al.: energy transition and reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2021 within these sources, indigenous people were not ready to pare down their demands to have a meaningful role in discussions and at decision-making tables. they wanted equitable sharing of benefits in resource development. indigenous people who subscribe to the idea of inclusion seek to veer away from old ways of thinking and doing. however, those old ways persist, as illustrated by the discourse of dependency found in many forms of public communications. dependency this theme covers 291 sections of text in our data set, about 1 in 5, as shown in table 3. the sources mainly originate from non-indigenous media and also significantly increased after 2015. one of the common themes relates to living conditions among indigenous people and their perceived vulnerability to climate change, as reflected in the following quote from the pan-canadian framework on clean growth and climate change (2016). indigenous peoples, northern and coastal regions and communities in canada are particularly vulnerable and disproportionately affected. geographic location, socio-economic challenges, and for indigenous peoples, the reliance on wild food sources, often converge with climate change to put pressure on these communities. (government of canada, 2016, p. 1) indigenous leaders, like national chief of the afn perry bellegarde also use the language of dependency, but from a different standpoint. in the following excerpt from an afn news release, bellegarde reminds the federal government of its financial obligations and its historic role in institutionalizing indigenous poverty and dependency as part of his demand for fundamental change. there are two basic problems: first the status quo of chronic, conscious underfunding regardless of need or equity; and second, first nations governments are funded like ngos rather than governments that are part of the constitutional fabric of this country. (afn, 2015a, p. 4) under the theme of dependency, a small number of excerpts refer to indigenous people as liabilities, often in a very subtle way. a 2013 newspaper article from la presse (baril & journet, 2013), a major daily in quebec, reported mixed reactions among energy stakeholders in the province following the release of market allocations to wind energy producers, including indigenous producers. the news article subtly weaves together public discontent over rising electricity costs and a complaint that an overaccommodating process allocated generous energy production contracts (150 of the total 800 mw production capacity) to mi’gmaq communities. words such as “aberration” (non-sense), “déploré” (lamented), and “déçu” (disappointed) stand out because these sentiments directed toward indigenous people, though few, speak loudly to the enduring patterns within the settler mentality. thankfully, alternative representations of indigenous people were also found within public communications, a hopeful sign of changing times. indigenous representations this third theme, with 265 statements, tripled after the trc. until 2014, we found an almost equal number of indigenous representations in indigenous and non-indigenous sources (see table 2). from 2015 onward, non-indigenous voices dominate this category, which could point to the trc’s impact on a nation suddenly more aware of patterns that historically besmirched indigenous people and now 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.8641 seeking to make amends. the occurrences of the sub-theme indigenous people as political voices could also be indicative of a shifting power dynamic. the following statement from the 2013 long-term energy plan of ontario reflects the role of indigenous people as business partners in the energy sector (government of ontario, 2013): the ring of fire, 540 km northeast of thunder bay, has the potential to become a significant economic development driver for northern ontario and first nation communities. to help realize this potential, ontario has announced its intention to partner with industry, first nations and the federal government to create an infrastructure development corporation. (government of ontario, 2013, p. 49) the recognition of indigenous communities as business partners is necessitated by the abundance of natural resources on traditional lands. this idea connects to the marginal sub-theme of political stooges, representing a small 2% of the statements categorized as indigenous representations. the political stooge representation, though very rare, is nevertheless problematic because it could indicate that indigenous people’s voices are included in substantial policy discussions in a tokenistic manner. this sub-theme carries the negative connotation of political gaming, conveying the impression that indigenous people might be stooges to the federal government in search of good press, international recognition, or stability for corporate actors. the very small but continued prevalence of the political stooge representation is problematic because it likely will persist if indigenous people’s voices are excluded from substantial policy discussions. exclusion the theme of exclusion represents 258 of the 1,501 statements, or 1 in 6. the following excerpt, taken from a submission from the university of ottawa to the generation energy consultation, sets the tone of the energy-reconciliation conversation in the post-trc era, stressing its challenges and the likelihood of controversial outcomes. first of all, big unresolved policy—decarbonisation and reconciliation with canada’s indigenous peoples—will not be solved by institutional changes. it will still be chaotic, politically messy and expensive. it will require human resource capabilities far greater than canada devotes today to managing energy policy and regulation. decisions eventually have to be made and there will be winners and losers. (cleland & gattinger, 2017, p. 38) cleland et al. (2017) recognize the limitations of institutions in addressing the joint imperatives of energy transition and reconciliation and draw attention to canada’s “underlying value conflicts and divergent interests left unresolved” (p. 4). their reference to divergent interests is premised on a 2015 national survey that illustrates the challenges of decarbonisation and reconciliation. to a question about support to “canadian governments working to negotiate an energy accord with canada’s aboriginal peoples to reduce conflict and uncertainty in the development of energy projects” (university of ottawa 2015, p. 4), 49% of the survey participants responded that they would support such negotiations and 32% that they would somewhat support them. such response evinces a general placatory attitude towards indigenous people. however, when asked, “what is more important in a proposed energy 17 mang-benza et al.: energy transition and reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2021 project moving forward?,” 54% of respondents selected the national interest while 36% prioritized the rights of indigenous people: overall canadians generally believe that it is possible to develop resources while protecting the environment and are supportive of investments in the renewable energy sector. they also clearly expect the federal government to take the lead and think the national interest is more important than local, provincial or aboriginal views. (university of ottawa, 2015, p. 2) the very formulation of the survey question could put respondents in a mindset of dichotomous choice between energy and reconciliation. this survey construction is revealing as it suggests the dilemmas that canadians face at the crossroads of energy transition and reconciliation. at that crossroads also lies the issue of indigenous autonomy. autonomy we coded just over 1 in 10 excerpts (161 out of 1,501 in table 2) under the autonomy theme and found statements originate from non-indigenous voices almost as often as from indigenous voices (ratio of 1.3). however, when these two demographics talk about autonomy, they do not mean the same thing. in its 2017 long term energy plan, the government of ontario (2017) provided several examples of what it calls indigenous leadership in the energy sector: in june 2017, the wikwemikong first nation launched its ignite energy and infrastructure project. . . it is estimated this will save the community more than $157,000 per year in energy costs, a 58 per cent savings in the energy used for lighting. the $1.1 million project will be financed with a contribution of $127,900 from the ieso’s save on energy program and private debt financing. (p. 131) in the following excerpt from a newspaper article published in anishinabek news, chief denise restoule of dokis first nation in ontario conveyed her pride in her community’s engagement in hydroelectric development and assertion of political autonomy: she pointed out that dokis was proud to contribute to creating green energy and assisting in climate change while world leaders were discussing this topic and challenged canadians to recognize the importance of environmental stewardship . . . dokis first nation membership voted to opt out of the sections of the indian act dealing with land issues and ratified their own land code in 2013. by ratifying their own land code, dokis membership took a bold step to manage their own lands, resources and environment as enabled through the first nations land management act. (cited in krackle, 2015, paras. 2 & 7) behind the ecological engagement of dokis first nation is a bold assertion of autonomy. the dokis first nation went beyond merely implementing an energy project; instead, they ratified their own land code outside of the indian act. this granted them a seat at the decision-making table in a new government-to-government relationship. speaking about closing the development gap between indigenous and non-indigenous communities, national chief perry bellegarde demanded a new form of relationship: 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.8641 we are not a third order of government or a municipal form of government . . . shared sovereignty means we will no longer tolerate being treated as “claimants” in our own lands. what we hold is what the creator gave us. we do not hold “grievances,” we hold this land . . . we are resuming control. we are re-asserting jurisdiction over our lands and resources . . . first nations are no longer willing to sit on the side of the road watching rocks, minerals, forests, and other natural resources taken from our territories while our communities struggle. (afn, 2015a, p. 8) the notion of “third order” connects with the theme of after-thought, a position in public debates that indigenous communities adamantly reject. after-thought relatively few statements, only 42, were coded under this theme. two of them were taken from indigenous newspapers reporting government action and the others from non-indigenous sources. the following excerpt taken from a white paper submitted to the generation energy consultation fits in the former category. it focuses on the intergovernmental policy space on climate change and energy, describing areas of collaboration between federal, provincial, and territorial jurisdictions. the federal government cannot own a comprehensive canadian energy strategy; the provincial and territorial governments are too constitutionally empowered and too important practically to be overlooked . . . the challenge is to find a strategic language that acknowledges both the autonomy and co-dependence of the federal and provincial governments, and for that matter, municipal and indigenous governments. (gibbins, 2017, p. 15) the context of this statement is the jurisdictional split on energy issues among federal, provincial, and territorial governments, a constitutional challenge that is compounded when discussions extend to indigenous governments. the excerpt lists the provincial and territorial governments as entities too important to be overlooked, while indigenous governments are listed at the end of the paragraph, alongside municipal governments. the following example, taken from ontario’s climate change action plan for 2016-2020, illustrates an inherent contradiction between stated political intent of a program and actual program content: action area: collaboration with indigenous communities action intended ggra funding (total): $85,000,000 to $96,000,000 est. ghg reduction in 2020*: tbd est. cost per tonne: tbd timetable action start: 2017/18 (government of ontario, 2016, p. 73) this text was taken from a section on collaboration with indigenous communities; it consists of two rows at the bottom of a page, between two pages on collaboration with industry and business and two pages about research and development. the section outlines in detail the challenges and opportunities 19 mang-benza et al.: energy transition and reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2021 attached to the collaboration with indigenous communities; however, the quantitative tables corresponding to the narrative send a different message. as we note, there is a stated funding allocation, but no estimate of the greenhouse gas emission reduction nor estimated cost of action. with many of the attributes of a recipe for failure, the government’s plan of action encapsulates the idea of indigenous people as an after-thought. there are few such examples in our data set, but the ones there are do illustrate the ingrained patterns of thinking in settler society and policy circles. we elaborate in the following section the implications of our findings. discussion and conclusion we examined the ways in which indigenous and non-indigenous sources communicate about reconciliation within the energy transition to understand if reconciliation is accepted as a concept, by whom, and with what potential effect. our findings show antithetical issues of inclusion and exclusion, and of autonomy and dependency, interlaced in public communications. overall, non-indigenous voices dominate those communications where empowering representations of indigenous people coexist alongside prejudiced ones. the texts examined rarely reflect the differences in indigenous and western imaginaries about development and well-being, which is symptomatic of canada’s historical context where, even when indigenous voices and views are included in news media, they are “diluted through techniques of deflection, decontextualization, misrepresentation and tokenization” (harding, 2006, p. 225). one of the common tropes noted by harding (2006), “[a]boriginal as victim” (p. 225), is reflected in our findings through themes such as indigenous people need support and indigenous people are vulnerable, with both tropes recurring in non-indigenous communications. in contrast, discourses of autonomy and exclusion are only slightly dominated by non-indigenous voices. this may indicate that both indigenous and non-indigenous canadians similarly aspire to see higher levels of indigenous autonomy, even though autonomy may take on different meanings for each group. for settlers, indigenous autonomy may mean equality, an “inherent feature of liberal democracy” (alfred, 2011, p. 167), which does not grant special treatment to any category of people. the national survey cited earlier indicates that settlers are not ready to sacrifice their interests to benefit indigenous people (university of ottawa, 2015). this perspective gives credence to indigenous critics who argue that the underlying intention of reconciliation is to maintain the status quo (alfred, 2015) and that settlers are willing only to accommodate indigenous claims that do not threaten colonial privileges (davine et al., 2017; lowan-trudeau, 2017). our analysis also illustrates that resurgence is alive and well, as evidenced by examples of indigenous people refusing to bend to colonial pressures. one such instance is inuit leadership engaging in a “david and goliath style communication struggle” (inuit tapiriit kanatami, 2015, para. 52) to confront the eurocentric imaginaries of life in the arctic and assert their rights to traditional hunting practices. in connection to our second question about the evolution of discourses between 2009 and 2018, we highlighted the significant expansion of the theme inclusion that brings together indigenous and nonindigenous people in canada and the marginal expansion of the theme exclusion that juxtaposes the two groups as antagonists. this finding suggests that indigenous and non-indigenous people increasingly discuss the convergence of reconciliation and decarbonisation imperatives as they both share significant interest in the development of energy resources (dreveskracht, 2011; krupa, 2012). however, the shared interest in the energy sector may not be sufficient to topple the colonial edifice because 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 2 doi:10.18584/iipj.2021.12.2.8641 “something was stolen, lies were told and they have never been made right” (alfred, 2011, p. 166). this is one of the reasons why indigenous leaders insist on fully participating in energy decision-making processes in the post-trc era. in direct response to the generation energy statement, we posit that there is neither evidence nor guarantee that the current energy transition will improve the relationship between indigenous and nonindigenous people. at its worst, it may sustain the status quo by reinforcing current colonial structures. at the same time, rather than utterly discarding the conclusions of the generation energy consultation, we argue that there is a possibility of cross-fertilization between the energy transition and reconciliation journeys. on the one hand, the energy transition could improve relationships by forcing settler society to address unresolved issues related to indigenous lands and resource development. building on this idea, the theme together against climate change is the second most prominent theme under the inclusion discourse. fighting climate change is a national imperative and also ranks at the top of priorities listed in the document, honouring promises, released by the afn (2019) ahead of the 2019 federal elections. the afn priorities were quickly endorsed by the green party of canada (2019), which also pledged to put in place a framework for indigenous people to opt out of the “racist and oppressive” indian act as part of their reconciliation strategy (para. 3). however, some observers note that opting out of the indian act does not appear on the afn list of priorities, and this is an indication that consensus on climate change may hide divergent views on the format and outcome of reconciliation. on the other hand, the reconciliation journey could provide an opportunity to revisit energy transition pathways by bringing indigenous worldviews in energy debates, including canada’s conversation on a dual-track energy transition aiming for both clean energy production and low-carbon oil and gas production. asch and borrows (2018), alluding to a form of ecological reconciliation, underscored the unique relationship that indigenous people have with the water, wind, sun, rocks, and land. this perspective is also reflected in our findings through the sub-theme related to indigenous people as land stewards. they make it clear that, while indigenous people are neither inherently more ecologically focused, nor more destructive to the environment, yet indigenous people generally hold in respect the notion of natural “inherent limits.” this is a notion with which eurocentric societies still struggle to align and if energy transition is to succeed, it is an approach that is much needed. we argue, alongside senator murray sinclair, that canada might be “on the cusp of something special” as it gradually shakes its colonial “cloak of pain and shame” (cited in mcfarlane & schabus, 2017, p. 71) while dealing with its fossil fuel addiction. in 2008, speaking at the united nations climate conference in poland, the federal environment minister stated that the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip) had “nothing whatsoever to do with climate change” (cited in curry & mittelstaedt, 2008). the political messaging has evolved a great deal since then. in direct response to the trc calls to action, canada fully adopted undrip in 2016, which opened new opportunities for indigenous people in canada to voice their positions about natural resource development and climate change. the trc report also provided the foundation for the national inquiry into missing and murdered indigenous women and girls (mmiwg, 2019b), which in its final report outlines 231 calls for justice, includes an executive summary in an indigenous language (inuktitut), and provides a legal analysis on colonial genocide. as these and other accounts of colonial harms and injustices come to the 21 mang-benza et al.: energy transition and reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2021 surface, they bring opportunities to renegotiate the relationship between indigenous and nonindigenous people in canada in more fundamental ways than the contested “apologize-and-beabsolved” approach to reconciliation (alfred, 2011, p. 167). therein resides the opportunity to reduce both carbon emissions and entrenched colonial patterns by engaging in an energy transition that does not name winners and losers along racial lines. as the concept of reconciliation is challenged and evolves over time, there might appear opportunities to rise to the vision of the two row wampum. references adelson, n. 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(1993). the indigenous voice in world politics: since time immemorial. sage publications. 8641 cover page.pdf 8641 mang-benza energy transition rce.pdf applying a critical policy lens to contracting in indigenous mental health care: an ethnographic study with urban indigenous providers the international indigenous policy journal volume 14 | issue 1 april 2023 applying a critical policy lens to contracting in indigenous mental health care: an ethnographic study with urban indigenous providers viviane josewski university of british columbia, canada, viviane.josewski@unbc.ca marina morrow york university, canada, mmmorrow@york.a victoria smye university of western ontario, canada, vsmye@uwo.ca josée lavoie university of manitoba, canada, josee.lavoie@umanitoba.ca john o’neil simon fraser university, canada, joneil@sfu.ca william mussell salishan institute, canada, bill@salishan.ca recommended citation josewski, v., morrow, m., smye, v., lavoie, j., o'neil, j., & mussell, w. (2032). applying a critical policy lens to contracting in indigenous mental health care: an ethnographic study with urban indigenous providers. the international indigenous policy journal, 14 (1). https://10.18584/iipj.2023.14.14480 applying a critical policy lens to contracting in indigenous mental health care: an ethnographic study with urban indigenous providers abstract this article reports on the findings of a larger study that explored urban indigenous providers’ experiences with contracting in mental health and addictions care. the study was undertaken with seven indigenous and one non-indigenous non-profit organizations based in diverse large and mid-size cities (off reserve) in british columbia, canada. indigenous and critical theoretical perspectives provided the lens for this ethnographic inquiry. in-depth interviews were the primary data source. participants’ narratives provide an account of the ideological embeddedness of contracting and how a new public management operates to perpetuate colonial power imbalances and structural barriers to culturally safe and equity-oriented care within urban indigenous communities. policy and practice implications for government funders are discussed. keywords indigenous health services, canada, mental health, cultural safety, contracting acknowledgments we extend our sincere appreciation to the members of the indigenous advisory committee members, the community research partners and all the participants in this study for their intellectual generosity, time, and enthusiasm for this research. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ 1 josewski: applying a critical policy lens to contracting in indigenous mental health care published by scholarship@western, 2023 applying a critical policy lens to contracting in indigenous mental health care: an ethnographic study with urban indigenous providers in many settler states, such as canada, new zealand and australia, governments contract1 with local indigenous agencies and organizations to provide a range of health services and programs to their respective communities (dwyer et al., 2014). contracting for indigenous health care creates space for increased indigenous self-determination in health service delivery and “by indigenous for indigenous” models of care, and thus, has been advocated for as a means to improve access to culturally safe care and health outcomes for indigenous populations (dwyer et al., 2014; lavoie, 2004). in canada, urban indigenous peoples2 continue to face significant inequities in mental health and well-being (allan & smylie, 2015; gone, 2013; nelson & wilson, 2017; public health agency of canada, 2018). the causes of these inequities are a direct result of past and ongoing colonial practices, racism, discrimination, and structural violence, including a lack of culturally safe care (allan & smylie, 2015; truth & reconciliation commission [trc] of canada, 2015; turpel-lafond et al., 2021). colonial policies, such as the imposition of state-defined indigenous identities under the indian act (1985), the residential school system, the appropriation of indigenous land, and the prohibition and/or criminalization of traditional practices severely disrupted indigenous ways of life with direct implications for indigenous peoples’ mental health (czyzewski, 2011; nelson, 2012). the lasting and intergenerational effects of the trauma caused by colonial violence continue to be evident in the disproportionate rates of post-traumatic stress disorder, suicide, violence, and other mental health concerns prevalent in many indigenous communities in canada (kirmayer et al., 2014; national inquiry into missing and murdered indigenous women and girls [mmiwg], 2019; trc, 2015). these inequities are perpetuated by a chronically underfunded mental health care system (morrow, 2017), and a general lack of culturally safe care (allan & smylie, 2015; national inquiry into mmiwg, 2019; nelson, 2012). although canada has a publicly funded health care system, dedicated funding for comprehensive mental health services has been lacking (morrow, 2017). under the current legislation, universal coverage only extends to medically necessary health services provided by physicians or in a hospital, making psychiatric services the default form of treatment for the majority of people in canada (chodos, 2017). this concentration of state resources on biomedical and clinical rather than community-based forms of mental health care persists despite a shift from a highly centralized in-patient psychiatric model to a more decentralized and regionalized model of health care in most provinces, and 1 in this paper, contracting for indigenous health care refers to the process of governments engaging indigenous providers for the delivery of publicly funded health services and programs to a primarily indigenous constituency. 2 in the canadian context, urban indigenous peoples include métis, inuit, non-status first nations and status first nations living in urban (off-reserve) areas. while canada’s constitution recognizes that metis, inuit, and first nations peoples as the indigenous peoples of canada have distinct cultural origins and rights, “status” first nations is a state-identified identity under the indian act. under the current legislation, the federal government only extends its fiduciary duty to first nations whose status is recognized under the indian act (1985). this includes a limited number of mental health services and benefits. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.14480 is largely a reflection of biomedicine’s ideological embeddedness in public and policy discourses around mental health (morrow, 2017). even when available, mental health services that are aligned with biomedical traditions of psychiatry are often ineffective for and underused by indigenous populations (gone, 2013; rowan et al., 2014). the longstanding marginalization of alternative, more holistic models of mental health care within the canadian mental health care system, including indigenous approaches to healing, and the systemic failure to account for the historic and ongoing impacts of colonization are barriers to accessible and culturally safe mental health services for many indigenous peoples (tait, 2008; turpel-lafond et al., 2021). these barriers are compounded even further for indigenous peoples living in urban areas because of the continuing jurisdictional divide between provincial and federal governments regarding the provision of indigenous health services (dinsdale, 2014). despite increasing efforts to address jurisdictional barriers over the past ten years, many urban indigenous peoples still have limited or no access to indigenous-led approaches to mental wellness, such as land-based or traditional healing activities (auger et al, 2016; british columbia aboriginal association of friendship centres [bcaafc], 2020; snyder et al., 2015). the pervasiveness of racism and other forms of discrimination against indigenous peoples and other racialized groups within the health care system exacerbate access barriers to culturally safe mental health care further (browne, 2017). there is no question that indigenous-specific3 racism and discrimination remain deeply entrenched within canada’s healthcare system (allan & smylie, 2015; browne, 2017; browne et al., 2021; turpel-lafond et al., 2021). the troubling death of a 37-year-old woman from the atikamekw firstnation, a woman who died not long after recording the racist and abusive treatment she received from hospital staff, is only the most recent incident of a long list of unjust and avoidable deaths that indigenous individuals have suffered in the care of hospital staff (shingler, 2020). a recent government-issued independent investigation into accusations of racism within british columbia’s (bc) healthcare system (turpel, 2020) found that 84% of all indigenous respondents reported experiencing discriminatory treatment when accessing care based in racist assumptions and/or cultural disrespect. these findings are consistent with the wider research literature documenting indigenous peoples’ experiences of healthcare across a wide range of settings, including mental health care (allan & smylie, 2015; browne, 2017; browne et al., 2011; kurtz et al., 2008; mccallum & perry, 2018). given these socio-historical and political realities, it is not surprising that many indigenous peoples are reluctant to seek mainstream care, and if care is accessed, often perceive that their needs are not fully met (auger et al. 2016; smye et al. 2020; turpel-lafond et al., 2021). improved access to culturally safe care is key to enhancing mental health and mental health care equity for indigenous peoples (assembly of first nations & health canada, 2015; browne et al., 2016; first nations health authority et al., 2013; 3 as defined by turpel-lafond et al. (2021), “indigenous-specific racism refers to the unique nature of stereotyping, bias, and prejudice about indigenous peoples in canada that is rooted in the history of settler colonialism. stereotyping and profiling of indigenous peoples springs from the historic beliefs cultivated about indigenous peoples’ genetic, cultural, and intellectual inferiority that enabled settlers and their governments to expropriate indigenous lands and resources” (p. 84). 3 josewski: applying a critical policy lens to contracting in indigenous mental health care published by scholarship@western, 2023 mental health commission of canada, 2009). while the concept of cultural safety has its origins in the māori nursing context of new zealand/aotearoa (papps & ramsden, 1996), the concept has since been taken up internationally where it continues to evolve. the canadian literature (auger et al. 2019; browne et al., 2016; greenwood et al., 2017; fast et al., 2017; smye et al., 2010) identifies several key features of culturally safe mental health care involving indigenous peoples that include strengths-based and relational approaches to care that are informed by a wholistic understanding of mental health (i.e., wellness perspective) and responsive to the unique needs, priorities and wider historical and social contexts that shape indigenous peoples’ and communities’ mental health and wellness. to increase cultural safety in health service delivery, governments in canada, australia, and new zealand contract with indigenous providers for the provision of indigenous health and mental health services (dwyer et al., 2011; josewski, 2012; lavoie, 2004; lavoie et al., 2018). many indigenous communities have seized the opportunity to become contractors to develop and administer their own health programs through their own organizations (dwyer et al., 2011). in canada, friendship centres, among other indigenous organizations, have taken leading roles in providing a wide range of community-based culturally informed mental health and wellness programs and services to off-reserve and urban indigenous peoples (bcaafc, 2020). empirical evidence on state-indigenous contracting as a mechanism for improving cultural safety and equity in mental health services delivery is lacking. informed by neo-classical contract theory, contractual analyses have “generally side-stepped the context in which purchasers and providers operate,” and have focused instead on examining single contracts from the perspective of funders (lavoie et al., 2010, p. 667). this analytic reduction limits our understanding of the factors that influence contracting, and how different “contractual arrangements may favour or impede the implementation of indigenous models of health service delivery” (lavoie, 2004, p. 20). conceiving of contracting in indigenous health as divorced from its contexts not only ignores the past and ongoing impacts of colonialism on indigenous-state relations, including health care, but also fails to consider concerns about the exigencies of contract reform influenced by neo-liberalism. ideologically speaking, neo-liberalism implies “new forms of political-economic governance” (larner, 2000, p. 5) premised on a set of beliefs and values which emphasize the adoption of the efficiency of the free market, individualism, free choice, autonomy, and the idea of a minimalist state (evans et al., 2005). the pursuit of these values in the public sector through new public management (npm) reforms is linked to the adoption of market-based technologies into the public sector (evans & fanelli, 2018; lorenz, 2012), and the creation of social structures and inequities that contribute to the social suffering of individuals and communities (rylko-bauer & farmer, 2016). given the effects of structural violence and inequities on indigenous peoples’ health (browne et al., 2016; hole et al., 2015; jacklin et al., 2017; kurtz et al., 2008; smye et al., 2020), this is a considerable oversight. to account for the contextual embeddedness of contracting in indigenous health and to better understand how these contextual factors enable and hinder culturally safe mental health care, we 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.14480 conducted a community-based ethnographic study grounded in the experiences and perspectives of urban indigenous non-profit providers and policy decision-makers across bc. our research aimed to move beyond a neo-classical analysis of contractual relations by examining contracting for indigenous mental health care through a critical policy lens informed by indigenous and critical theoretical perspectives and constructs. in this paper, we are reporting on the findings of this community-based ethnographic study. “we” are a small team of settler and indigenous researchers, all of whom are involved in anti-colonial scholarship and activism in lands known to many as canada. contextualizing contracting for culturally safe mental health care in bc indigenous and non-indigenous scholars who work with and through anti-oppressive and decolonizing theories have consistently shown that colonialism continues to structure indigenous-state relations within and beyond health care, materializing in access barriers, health care encounters, and treatment approaches that are unsafe and ineffective (browne et al., 2016; hole et al., 2015; jacklin et al., 2017; kurtz et al., 2008). for this reason, health researchers, health care administrators, and decision-makers “must grapple with and firmly understand the workings of colonialism, both historically and into the present” (de leeuw et al., 2010, p. 286). raising critical consciousness of the ongoing impacts of colonialism on health and health care must begin with a recognition that health care has been instrumental to the process of colonization in canada (o’neil et al., 1999). by fostering racist and sexist stereotypes of indigenous peoples as naturally “diseased” (kelm, 1998), “inferior,” and “incapable” (turpel-lafond et al., 2021), colonial health care served to provide the “moral” and “scientific” justifications for subjecting indigenous peoples to policies of assimilation and unethical, inhumane medical treatment (e.g., forced sterilization and medical experimentation) (allan & smylie, 2015). in addition, the model of colonial health care was expressly paternalistic and authoritarian, cultivating and entrenching lasting relationships of disempowerment and dependency on a regime of colonial medicine intent on establishing euro-canadian medical superiority (greenwood et al., 2017; smye, 2004). the continued dominance of western biomedical knowledge and marginalization of traditional indigenous health knowledge and healing practices within canada’s contemporary mental health care system serves as another manifestation of the legacy of colonial health care (allan & smylie, 2015; allen et al., 2020; nelson, 2012). to redress this legacy and improve health and health care equity for indigenous peoples, the 2015 calls to action of the trc of canada underscore the urgent need “to recognize the value of aboriginal healing practices and use them in the treatment of aboriginal patients in collaboration with aboriginal healers and elders” (p. 210). repeated calls for a deliberate decentering of the dominant culture of the mental health system are supported by a growing evidence base suggesting that indigenous-led traditional approaches to health care can play an important role in improving access and wellness outcomes for indigenous peoples (allen et al., 2020; efimoff et al. 2021, firestone et al, 2019; graham et al., 2021; greenwood et al. 2022; hole et al., 2015; kirmayer et al., 2014; rowan et al., 2014; tu et al., 2019; venugopal et al., 2021). an important theme emerging from this literature is “culture as intervention,” which posits indigenous traditional culture as a treatment for 5 josewski: applying a critical policy lens to contracting in indigenous mental health care published by scholarship@western, 2023 addressing the mental health concerns experienced by indigenous peoples as a result of colonialism (gone, 2013; rowan et al., 2014). a central feature of indigenous cultural interventions is that they address mental wellness in a wholistic sense (inclusive of social, emotional, physical, and spiritual), in contrast to the individualistic and mind/body dualism that underpins western psychiatric treatment approaches to mental health and addictions issues (rowan et al., 2014). this reductionism means that western treatment approaches fail to address the historical and ongoing root causes that underpin indigenous peoples’ mental health experiences (allan & smylie, 2015). over the last decade, some relevant efforts toward reconciliation and transformative change with indigenous peoples, including a canada-wide commitment to implement the trc calls to action as well as several noteworthy canadian examples of indigenous-led health service partnerships, have emerged. unique to bc are the creation of a first nations health authority (fnha) in 2010 and, more recently, the adoption of a declaration of commitment (2015) to advance cultural safety and humility by all health authorities and the bc ministry of health, and legislation to implement the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (2007) in 2019.4 these developments have led to the formation of new cross-jurisdictional partnerships as well as the adoption of a first nations wellness framework, which aims to ensure that cultural knowledge, values and traditional health practices and medicines are emphasized in health care planning, programming and service delivery (o’neil et al., 2016). in january 2021, fnha released a new framework specifically for and addressing the health care needs and rights of the urban first nations population in bc. the urban and away-from-home health and wellness framework (fnha, 2021) expands the narrow scope of fnha’s inherited federal service mandate by moving beyond the jurisdictional divide between onand off-reserve first nations health service delivery. with few exceptions, health care for indigenous peoples living in urban environments has been treated as falling outside of the federally defined mandate of fnihb (lavoie et al., 2015). instead, within canada’s decentralized model of health care, the responsibility for addressing the mental health needs of a growing urban indigenous population has historically been under the purview of provinces, which have largely overlooked the distinct needs and rights of indigenous peoples (bcaafc, 2020). regionalization of healthcare, a process that began in bc in the 1990s and ultimately resulted in the creation of one provincial and five regional health authorities, created new pathways for indigenous delivery of mental health care within urban indigenous communities through government/health authority contracting with urban indigenous service organizations (josewski, 2012; lavoie et al. 2015). urban indigenous communities in bc seized the opportunity to become service providers of community-based mental health and wellness services. however, given the absence of self-government 4 of particular relevance is united nations declaration article 24, which sets out that indigenous peoples must access health and social services without discrimination. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.14480 pathways for urban (off-reserve) indigenous communities in bc,5 government/health authority contracting with urban indigenous service organizations has so far remained the only pathway for urban indigenous self-governance in healthcare (lavoie et al., 2015). increased opportunities for contracting in health are not merely a response to indigenous demands for increased control over health service delivery but are also a hallmark of the global rise of neo-liberalism (macdonald, 2011). however, while npm-inspired practices continue to pass as best practices within north america and elsewhere (simonet, 2008; siltala, 2013), the adverse impacts of npm reforms on non-profit and public sector organizations, labour force, quality of public services, and equity are well documented (evans et al., 2005; lapuente & van de walle, 2020; siltala, 2013; tenbensel et al., 2013). npm’s ideological commitment to individualism, managerialism, and free-market capitalism is fundamentally at odds with substantiating indigenous individual and collective rights and other social justice claims. rather than advancing indigenous health care rights, neo-liberalism, it is argued, fosters relationships based on principal-agency thinking (dwyer et al., 2014; josewski, 2012) while promoting the “marketization of indigenous citizenship” (altamirano‐jiménez, 2004, p. 349) along with “a politics of privatization” (macdonald, 2011, p. 258), “blame” or “responsibilization” (orsini, 2007, p. 354). adding to these relational concerns are critiques that show how neoliberalism’s propensity for individualism promotes depoliticized (i.e., biomedical) understandings of and responses to complex social and health inequities (morrow, 2013; morrow, 2017). the juxtaposition of the ascension of neoliberalism within canada and bc’s neo-colonial context provides therefore a crucial point of inquiry into indigenous contracting for mental health service delivery. while recent developments in bc indicate renewed public commitments to advance reconciliation, cultural safety, and health equity for indigenous peoples, it is also an example of a jurisdiction that has followed closely the political doctrine of neoliberalism (morrow, 2017). without further exploration, it remains unclear to what extent current approaches to contracting may hinder the delivery of culturally safe mental health programs and services within urban indigenous communities. methodology and methods the research aimed to (1) examine indigenous providers’ experiences with contracting in relation to mental health and/or addictions care; (2) analyze the sociopolitical, economic, historical, and institutional contexts that mediate these experiences; (3) explicate the specific institutional structures, policies, and practices that support and/or impede the delivery of culturally safe mental health and addictions services and equity; and (4) generate recommendations for the promotion of culturally safe 5 with the exception of ontario, which is the only province with a comprehensive policy framework for ensuring engagement of urban indigenous communities in health care planning and delivery, formal mechanisms for self-government in canadian provinces only exist for first nations on-reserve (lavoie et al., 2015). 7 josewski: applying a critical policy lens to contracting in indigenous mental health care published by scholarship@western, 2023 and equity-oriented practice in contracting with urban indigenous providers of mental health and addictions care. indigenous and critical theoretical perspectives indigenous and critical theoretical perspectives, and the constructs of cultural safety and equity informed our approach to research and analysis. these theoretical perspectives and lenses were chosen to foster an intersectional, multi-level, and praxis-oriented approach to inquiry that is grounded in the everyday realities of community life, from the perspective of urban indigenous peoples. aimed at disrupting the inequitable social and power relations that organize health and healthcare experiences within contemporary settler states (papps & ramsden, 1996), the concept of cultural safety fits well with indigenous decolonizing perspectives (e.g., tuhiwai smith, 2012) and postcolonial and feminist theorizing (e.g., battiste, 2009; reimer-kirkham & browne, 2006). indigenist and decolonizing perspectives advance an indigenous social justice agenda that supports indigenous self-determination and seeks to disrupt the dominance of eurocentric systems of knowledge production by foregrounding indigenous knowledges, voices, and experiences (battiste, 2009; grande, 2004; larocque, 1996; tuhiwai smith, 2012). the centrality of relational epistemologies represents a significant point of convergence between indigenous and feminist thought that is particularly salient in the scholarship on intersectionality (dhamoon & hankivsky, 2011). rooted in black feminist thought (collins, 2002, 2004; crenshaw, 1989), intersectionality offers a powerful analytical framework that has been effectively used by both indigenous and non-indigenous researchers to advance the operationalization of equity in health services and policy (clark et al., 2017; de leeuw et al., 2011; smye et al., 2020). however, as an analytical framework intersectionality does not necessarily include a critique of colonial power (clark, 2012). to address this concern, post-colonial scholarship as informed by indigenous (e.g., battiste, 2009; larocque, 1996) and non-indigenous feminist (e.g., browne et al., 2007; reimer kirkham & anderson, 2002) thought also provided direction for analyzing contractual relationships as extensions of wider social and structural relations, including past and ongoing colonial and neo-liberal relation. data collection in keeping with this theoretical framework, the study was conducted in partnership with eight urban non-profit organizations (seven indigenous and one non-indigenous) using a participatory design and ethnographic in-depth interviews. the research team was guided by an indigenous advisory committee including leaders in indigenous mental health, one of whom is a co-author on this paper. the research ethics board at simon fraser university and the two partnering health authorities provided ethical approval. in addition, research agreements were sought with the participating community partners. using purposive sampling, we conducted in-depth, semi-structured individual interviews with a total of 33 participants. of these, 23 were conducted with “community-based provider participants” (cpp) 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.14480 representing: (1) community-based providers of mental health and addictions services and programs (e.g., peer support workers, drug & alcohol counsellors, professionally trained mental health clinicians, and indigenous elders), (2) mental health program managers, and (3) senior administrators (e.g., executive directors and board members). in line with the wholistic and contextualized conceptualizations of mental health that underpin indigenous worldviews, the operational definition of “mental health and addictions” services and supports was deliberately broad, ranging from preventative medicine and health-promotion-based programming to group and individual interventions and support services. the nature of identified “mental health and addictions” services and supports also included cultural programming and circle work, mental health and addictions counselling, elder support programs, peer support, psychological and psychiatric care, outreach support, and community-building. in addition, we interviewed 10 “policy participants” (pp)—individuals with past and/or present experiences pertaining to indigenous mental health and addictions policy and funding decision-making and programming. this group was sampled for the purpose of contextualizing cpps' interviews. for the purposes of this research, an indigenous non-profit organization [npo] was defined as an organization governed by a predominantly indigenous board, which self-identified as indigenous and served a primarily indigenous constituency. the non-indigenous npo was included because it served a large proportion of the local indigenous community and had a high proportion of indigenous employees. while npos were primarily selected on the basis of researcher pre-existing relationships, in keeping with the requirements of one of the research agreements, the researchers took pains to sample organizations from three different health regions. overall, just over half of all participants self-identified as indigenous (n = 18) including 11 out of 23 cpps. almost three-quarters of cpps self-identified as female, highlighting the significant role gender plays in the indigenous non-profit sector in bc. across cpps, senior administrators had been in their positions for the longest with an average of 15 years and a mean of 20 years. mental health providers had been in their current position between two and 15 years with a mean time of four years—yet all had extensive working experience in their area, with an average of 19 years. this compared to an average of 4.7 years and a mean of 1.75 years for program managers. data analysis after obtaining informed consent, participants were invited to interviews that lasted between 60 and 90 minutes and focused on exploring participants' experiences with contracting within the context of their everyday work. with permission, interviews were audio-recorded and later transcribed. cleaned and anonymized interviews were then uploaded into nvivo®, a qualitative software program for data management, organizing, and coding. analysis followed an iterative and nonlinear approach to interpretive thematic analysis (thorne, 2016) moving back and forth between interviews, coding, and analysis. we coded data using cultural safety as an ethical/interpretative lens (smye & browne, 2002) identifying both social and structural barriers and enablers to the delivery of culturally safe mental health and addictions care. guided by multi-level, intersectional frameworks for policy analysis (hankivsky et 9 josewski: applying a critical policy lens to contracting in indigenous mental health care published by scholarship@western, 2023 al., 2012), we mapped emerging themes across the macro, meso and micro levels of indigenous health contracting. analytically, this process helped us to explore relationships and interactions within and between different system levels (i.e., macro, meso, and micro) and data sets (e.g., interview data from pps versus cpps), and identify inconsistencies, contradictions as well as commonalities. at the macrolevel, analysis focused particularly on the everyday experiences of pps, while analysis at the meso-level and micro-levels centered predominantly on cpps’ accounts and examined communityand organizational-level factors as well as day-to-day practice relating to, for example, securing program funding, contract management, programming, and care. to foreground indigenous voices, we paid particular attention to the accounts of indigenous participants and brought emerging themes and findings back to community partners that had expressed interest, as well as to members of the indigenous advisory team. through this process, several higherlevel themes and broader conceptual propositions were generated, which we further explored in relation to the literature and indigenous scholarship. this step also helped to ensure authenticity and credibility of the findings (thorne, 2016) and provided guidance on when to terminate data collection. we then continued the analysis until there was a compelling basis for drawing the conclusion that the findings generated did justice to the research questions. results results are presented using a multi-level framework to shed light on some of the key structural and social barriers and enablers across the macro-, mesoand micro-levels of contracting in indigenous mental health care within urban indigenous communities in bc. to help contextualize participant quotes, excerpts from interviews held with cpps and pps are marked accordingly; quotes that are from participants who identified as indigenous are indicated by the additional letter “i” (i.e., icpp and ipp). macro-level factors analysis at the macro-level illustrates how ideologies central to contemporary health policy and the culture of health care, organize pps experiences of health policy and funding decision-making and contracting, and provide a contextual foregrounding for the findings at the mesoand micro-levels. neo-liberal dynamics regionalization, although accomplished in the early 2000s, had an ongoing impact on contracting. referring to the way regionalization unfolded in bc, one indigenous pp observed that healthcare reform and government’s approach to contracting often takes the form of “a political dance” adding that during their 30 plus years of working with government, “i’ve gone through several cycles where . . . everything is contracted out, everything is pulled back” (ipp-05). rather than evidence-based policymaking, from the perspective of this participant, it is the prevailing political ideology of the” particular government in 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.14480 power” that shapes “whether they want to have community services provided or they want to centralize community services” (ipp-05). as the following excerpt from an interview with an indigenous pp highlights, participants at the policy level were also highly critical of neoliberal-inspired policy and practices changes: [w]e have to have a zero budget at the end of the fiscal year . . . population health outcomes are twenty-five years long; why are we tied to this crazy service industry? i understand why a hospital does or whatever but we . . . have to fit into the same mold. (ipp-02) as suggested by ipp-02, the narrow concern of npm with achieving fiscal accountability is at odds with a population health approach which emphasizes long-term goals and upstream investments in primary prevention to address the determinants of indigenous mental health and well-being. unsurprisingly perhaps, many indigenous pps criticized the equity work undertaken by government funders as superficial and falling short of addressing those structures, policies, and practices that produce and reproduce colonial and neo-colonial relations within health care institutions. as ipp-02 noted: i know the population public health peoples at [health authority] and the ministry of health are very interested in doing equity work but their equity work is quite superficial. they always want to go for the easy win like “oh let’s just put a training thing up on the pod, it takes half an hour and then peoples know more about equity.” (ipp-02) colonial and neo-colonial dynamics pps offered multiple examples of how colonial and neo-colonial relations continue to shape institutional structures, policies, and everyday practices including their day-to-day struggle of gaining recognition and funding for indigenous approaches to mental health. one indigenous pp recalled developing a culturebased mental wellness program that “was integrating sewing, . . . button work, [and] weaving” and being told by mental health & addictions, “oh well you’re just paying for crafts” (ipp-05). for ipp-05, this interaction was indicative of how the ongoing dominance of western biomedicine within mental health continues to discredit and de-value indigenous approaches. as ipp-05 explained, the program was “welldesigned” and yet, it never received the necessary structural support and resources to evolve into what ipp-05 had “hoped the . . . program to be." lacking support for and recognition of the value of indigenous approaches to mental health and healing led this participant to conclude that “we don’t have a health system, we have an illness system, an illness management system and anyone who thinks it’s anything other than that doesn’t understand the system” (ipp-05). another indigenous pp stated, indigenous peoples “don’t want to fit in the same old government model . . . we are trying hard to focus on wellness, which is a . . . major paradigm shift in the way we imagine, think and do” (ipp-06). to change the way “mental health and addictions” care is delivered, this and 11 josewski: applying a critical policy lens to contracting in indigenous mental health care published by scholarship@western, 2023 several other indigenous participants emphasized “a big part of that public narrative . . . [has] to come from the indigenous peoples themselves.” accounts of how paternalistic governance structures within government and health authorities contributed to the marginalization and subjugation of indigenous voices and expertise were also woven through the interviews. as one indigenous pp reflected, within the policy making process indigenous health is “never at the forefront, it’s never at the beginning of anything, it’s always been an afterthought” because “it is not hard wired” into the system: hard wiring it would mean changing the way we do business, changing the way we make decisions . . . at least put me in a position where . . . when these decisions and thoughts are being first discussed i can go [and say] “hey, hold on, this applies to the aboriginal population and i would recommend you to do this, this and that” . . . but it’s not that way right now. (ipp-07) lacking support for indigenous issues and authority assigned to indigenous peoples’ voices within the health care system was intrinsically linked to an institutional culture in which racism and discrimination towards indigenous peoples remained prevalent. many indigenous participants recounted confronting racist and colonial attitudes in their day-to-day interactions, describing how their efforts to apply an indigenous lens or advocate for more resources are commonly met with responses ranging from “contempt” (ipp-01) to “resistance and backlash" (ipp-02). this indigenous pp recalled how one person responded to their plans of rolling-out cultural competency training in the health authority with such irritation that “she started banging her head on the table” based on what she seemed to perceive was a misplaced priority setting, stating: “are you kidding me? we can’t even get . . . this . . . emergency skills training out and you’re going to make them take cultural competency?” (ipp-01). these types of responses are reflective of implicit yet “prevalent attitudes in canadian society where aboriginal peoples are sort of a subspecies of humanity . . . we don’t really count” (ipp01). meso-level factors: at the meso-level, pps’ and cpps’ accounts provided important insights into how funding structures, contractual policies, practices, and relationships mediate between these dominant ideologies and the micro-level of care. findings are discussed in relation to the three intersecting dimensions of social justice: participation, recognition, and redistribution (reimer kirkham & browne, 2006). issues of redistribution: “we have to beg and fight for every single dollar” (icpp-09) while a comparative analysis of public investment in indigenous versus non-indigenous mental health care was beyond the scope of this study, both cpps and pps in this study strongly believed the funding distribution of mental health care resources to be inequitable. there was consensus among participants that the level of funding continued to fall short of meeting the communities’ needs, and that mainstream mental health services were significantly better resourced than indigenous providers of community12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.14480 based mental health programs even though, they argued, the need for mental health related services and support in urban indigenous communities was significantly higher. while most organizations, though not all, had been successful in “protecting” what they considered their “core services,” participants described how the “clawing back of money” by government funders had led to a dismantling of programs as well as organizational and administrative infrastructure. one cpp who was working for a smaller indigenous npo observed that program funding used to be “stable” and comprehensive “enough to pay for the staffing, . . . location” and “admin fees which covered the overhead” so that the organization “didn’t have to worry about . . . getting funding from someplace else” whereas “now it seems like you’re getting little pieces” (cpp-19). other cpps recounted similar experiences. as their accounts revealed, government funders’ increasingly compartmentalized and instituted competitive approaches to contracting, within an already jurisdictionally complex and siloed policy and funding environment, meant that the finding, obtaining, and administering of program funding had become increasingly more difficult and taxing for indigenous npos. this reality led some to question whether the distribution of resources was more a function of organizations’ administrative capacity than a reflection of communities’ needs. as many participants explained, the administrative burden imposed by this funding regime simply surpassed their organizations’ existing administrative capacities. this, they argued, created differential access to funding, especially for smaller organizations and when indigenous and non-indigenous npos had to compete for the same funding. these tensions were compounded further by a perceived lack of transparency and inconsistencies in how funding decisions were reached, as one cpp who worked for an indigenous npo remarked, “where it becomes frustrating is how to kind of break into these pools and try and do new things when the funders have basically already established, or it seems like they’ve already established, who their funding is going to” (cpp-19). another source of tension described by cpps was the prevalent use of short-term contracts, which created significant liabilities for npos, their staff and the communities they served. as one participant noted, often “what happens [is] we get some of the programs up and running and then the . . . funding would [be discontinued].” many indigenous health funding programs were structured so that organizations could not receive contract renewals that would provide continuity of the service they provided. this taken-for-granted practice led to the paradoxical situation in which indigenous npos saw their programs terminated even though their success had been demonstrated, as one indigenous cpp shared: it’s really tough to get any money and so they cut the [name of program]. . . . they just said that they don’t have the dollars . . . but yet it was very successful. we were just getting off the ground and momentum was going. so . . . maybe they didn’t want us to become successful [laughing].” (icpp-17) interactions with funders whose approach to contracting was governed by abstract rules, arbitrary funding caps and unanticipated funding cuts provoked not only feelings of frustration but also reinforced 13 josewski: applying a critical policy lens to contracting in indigenous mental health care published by scholarship@western, 2023 historical mistrust towards government among indigenous npos. as one icpp put it, “clawing the money back and then giving it back, the same money” may serve funders “making themselves look good” but we want to stop violence and poverty . . . and . . . substance misuse and so how are we going to make that work in regard to offering programs when the systems keep going back and forth? (icpp21) even where the funding terms allowed for the possibility of renewal, the uncertainty associated with the constant churning of short-term contracts created numerous structural barriers for indigenous npos that undermined their ability to ensure high-quality mental health services and relational accountability to clients, staff, other community partners, and the communities at large. this included obstacles to recruitment, training, and maintenance of high-quality staff as one indigenous community-based senior administrator explained, it’s really, really challenging to recruit and retain staff, you know, because we’re not able to pay them the same kind of money that they might get if they’re working for a mainstream organization or a union organization . . . and when you’re recruiting you’re having to say to staff members that this is an annual contract . . . so that impacts the quality of staff that you get in the organization as well. (icp09) as the same participant pointed out, what funders don’t seem to realize is that “there’s a cost to close down programs just like there is to start programs.” to a large extent, this cost was borne by staff, who faced the stress of potential and real “layoffs” and the challenge of scaling down of client caseload to ensure continuity of care to the extent possible all the while being paid less than what would be expected in the public sector. as participants reported, these costs were often exacerbated further by unduly delays in the approval of funding renewals, which kept organizations and providers in a perpetual state of “trying to catch up” in terms of staffing levels and “client caseload.” issues of participation: “i’ve yet to really negotiate a contract” (icpp-10) another potent theme across participants was connected to the ways in which current approaches to contracting enabled and constrained opportunities for urban indigenous self-governance and meaningful urban indigenous involvement in policy and funding decision-making. at a fundamental level, cpps noted a significant power imbalance between indigenous npos and their funders. speaking to issues of resource allocation and priority settings, one indigenous cpp with twenty plus years working in the indigenous non-profit sector remarked, the problem is there’s never any real negotiation in contracting when it comes to government funding. . . . contracting usually comes out of a process where people . . . at some level of government have decided they’re going to make a certain amount of money available to, to tackle a certain problem . . . and so left 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.14480 out of that process is the discussion . . . with people who are on the ground trying to deal with problems. (icpp-10) most cpps concurred that contracting typically followed a top-down process with rfps that too often reflected funders’ rather than local needs and priorities. as they argued, funders “don’t . . . know what happens . . . [at] the grass roots levels, they just work from an ivory tower and wield their power” (icpp17) and so “they don't have any firm notion or firm understanding of what the problems actually are” (icpp-10). focusing the discussion on the power dynamics within contractual relationships, one indigenous pp described government funding of community-led programs as a “double-edged sword” noting that once “they’ll start funding” all too often indigenous npos are “co-opted by government” (ipp-06). this perception was shared by many other indigenous participants in this study who described how government funders and contract managers retained an increasingly large degree of control over indigenous npos’ internal operations through increasingly stricter financial and program-related performance monitoring and regulations. as the following account highlights: their rules are too strict or they have never been in the trenches themselves or got their hands dirty; they just sit at the table and decide. that’s for the most part what happens that i’ve seen . . . “this is how it’s done” and there’s no ifs, ands, or buts . . . and on top of that . . . they want the whole ten yards to every penny . . . which is their right but they’re so strict they want pages and pages of everything. (icpp-21). while participants understood the importance of being accountable, many cpps found this approach to accountability to be counterproductive and interfering with their ability to effectively deliver services because it constrained them in their ability to be responsive to communities’ changing needs and priorities and required excessive documentation, which tied up already scarce human resources. moreover, they were critical of the presumed authority of government funders over them, with one indigenous cpp identifying this approach to accountability as a re-enactment of paternalistic policies of the past: “it’s like ottawa running aboriginal people for all those years” (icpp-21). while the relations of control and surveillance enacted under performance management triggered a deep sense of un-safety and mistrust among some participants, not all experiences with funding relationships were negative. this study confirms that long-term funding relationships, contractual flexibility and comprehensive block-funding can play a positive role in overcoming historical mistrust and enhancing indigenous npos’ ability to respond safely and effectively to the needs and priorities of communities. 15 josewski: applying a critical policy lens to contracting in indigenous mental health care published by scholarship@western, 2023 issues of recognition: "culturally appropriate kind of services . . . is a right for first nations people, . . . it’s not a gift that non-native people are giving us" (icpp-04) cpps described many different ways in which their mental health and wellness programming blended indigenous and western ways of healing and emphasized the difference these programs made in peoples’ lives. at the same time, cpps repeatedly voiced concern that their efforts and achievements were not adequately supported through their contracts, even when rfps and contractual agreements explicitly stated “culturally appropriate” programming as a key deliverable. recounting an all-toocommon experience, one cpp who was working for an indigenous npo shared that while the organization used to have an elder on site, the funding for this position and other things "indigenous" had been lost in the process of continual program cuts: we try and do the canning of the salmon, we do berry canning, we do different types of things like that . . . [but] those are things that are the first to get cut back when there’s no funding. so, the programs would still be able to maintain themselves, [but] . . . [w]hat is the quality of the programs . . . going to be like? (cpp-19). indigenous npos were left to fill the resulting gaps and often relied on volunteer labour and contributions by their staff, including elders, to ensure their programs integrated indigenous cultural traditions and healing knowledge. another source of tensions that cpps discussed arose from the challenge of reconciling indigenous understandings and approaches to mental wellness with funders’ piecemeal approach to contracting for indigenous mental health and addictions care. several cpps described a process of attempting to create a collage of mental health and addictions services by piecing together different contracts with multiple government funders in an effort to sustain and/or create wholistic care that is responsive to the unique cultural, social, and mental wellness needs and priorities of the populations they served. as participants reported, the transaction costs of weaving together multiple separate contracts from various funders were high, sometimes higher than the value of the contract. yet another pertinent subtheme that emerged from across interviews was the notion of accountability, which conveys cpps’ concern with the often too narrow scope of performance measures, which failed to account for those program aspects and outcomes that participants considered culturally meaningful and relevant, such as building new connections with family, culture, land, and community and across generations, or involving elders and spiritual advisors in designing their programs. as a non-indigenous administrator with an indigenous npo pointed out, “it’s not about quality, it’s about quantity” . . . “the numbers don’t reflect a lot for us: we just hit the quota and do our own thing” (cpp-04). the majority of performance-based indicators and targets, participants argued, were skewed towards achieving gains in cost-efficiency, constraining their ability to provide funders with an authentic and meaningful account of their work and the impact this had on individuals, families, and communities. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.14480 participants also provided several illustrative examples demonstrating that funding arrangements often have paradoxical and potentially harmful consequences for urban indigenous npos, staff, and community members accessing these services with one indigenous pp observing, the mcfd [ministry of children and family development] process in managing those contracts—it’s kind of a catch 22. for child and family service agencies the federal funding formula is that the more children you apprehend the more money you get. aboriginal agencies don’t want to apprehend children, they want to prevent them from being apprehended but there’s no money there for their services. (ipp-01) this example demonstrates how models of performance contracting can create a serious ethical doublebind for indigenous providers when they are not aligned with the principles of cultural safety and equityoriented care. micro-level: “so . . . we still need to be providing our own services but . . . we’re not really supported to be successful at that” (ipp-01) at the micro level of care, cpps discussed how neo-liberal contracting and accountability policies and practices mediated their ability to deliver culturally safe care that is responsive to the unique mental health needs, concerns, and contexts of the indigenous clients, families, and communities they served. one source of tension was bound up with diverging funders’ and providers’ approaches to accountability as evident in the following comment by one non-indigenous mental health provider: it’s always cost efficiency . . . and that’s not always the best way to look at things . . . we deal with peoples here [and] that’s not what we’re thinking about. . . . we’re thinking about how we can best serve the client. (cpp-08) providers repeatedly contrasted funders’ narrow understanding of accountability in terms of costefficiency with what they described as their relational accountability to clients, families, and communities. for providers, enacting culturally safe practice involved working the spaces in between their accountabilities to the funder and the clients and community, and navigating the ethical tensions and paradoxes that arose within and between these spaces. this often led to the acceptance of compromises that did not always feel "right." in the voice of one indigenous provider: i have to meet a certain number of clients, a certain amount of hours, [and] do a certain amount of programming . . . which can also be helpful for keeping on track . . . [but it] . . . doesn’t feel good . . . like for me i’d want to give priority to clients but if there’s certain objectives i need to meet how do i achieve that? (icpp-22) operating under these divergent accountability obligations, many reported feeling pressured by funders to prioritize administrative needs over those of clients. rather than investing their time in relationship17 josewski: applying a critical policy lens to contracting in indigenous mental health care published by scholarship@western, 2023 building with clients, providers reported having to ration the time they could spend with each client in order to meet and report on their contractually defined performance targets. the intrusive impact of performance-based accountability mechanisms on how to provide care distressed many providers, who consistently asserted the need to “slow it down and build relationships” (cpp-05) to create emotionally and culturally safe health care encounters. there was consensus among providers that the pace of care needed to reflect an understanding that most of their clients lived with past and ongoing experiences of trauma, violence, racism, and other forms of discrimination. as one provider remarked, “most . . . of the women we work with have concurrent disorders, most of them have trauma histories. and so . . . you’re not going to get anywhere if they don’t trust or feel safe . . . so what we’re trying to do is just engage with the client to get them to a place where they feel safe, where they can start making the changes that they want to make, that takes time” (cpp-07). practices that fostered safety and a sense of empowerment included creating warm and welcoming spaces where clients can talk to somebody and can have a cup of coffee without feeling ostracized. creating culturally safe and trusting environments also involved being able to connect indigenous clients with elders, medicines for smudging, and ceremony. others described how respectful engagement and empowerment of clients was fostered by “using more non-directive approaches where you assume the client is the expert on their experience” (cpp-04), and a pragmatic approach to care focused on addressing those concerns that are taking priority in clients’ lives. as one provider reflected, “so many times people aren’t ready for counseling because there’s poverty-based issues, they haven’t had any nutrition, . . . they don’t have a good place to stay” (cpp-05). based on their experiences, providers in this study agreed that to successfully engage clients in programs, clients’ most immediate needs and concerns had to be attended to first, which included taking the time to build relationships of trust and addressing basic social determinants of mental health. as a result, cpps described investing extensive amounts of time focused on building trust with clients, often over the course months and even years as one administrative leader explained, “some kids . . . we’ve been working with . . . for five years since the program started . . . they’ve had their trust broken so many times” (cpp-04). yet, under the current contracting and accountability regime, participants argued that the needs, rights, and social suffering of those most marginalized by social and structural inequities are often rendered invisible and left unaccounted for. while cpps stressed the positive benefits of stable program funding on providers’ capacities to successfully engage clients in the long-term and support healing and recovery in mental health and addictions, funding arrangements even for three to five years were the exception rather than the norm. in particular, cpps were critical of funders’ failure to provide adequate funding for elders’ involvements, ceremony, and other cultural interventions, as well as the narrowness of funders’ concern with quantitative assessments of care utilization and imposed eligibility criteria that governed program accessibility. underpinning cpps’ expressed concern was a view that these practices objectified clients and clients’ needs rather than promoting care informed by understanding that, as one provider put it, “this is a real person with a real issue with real family members . . . with real trauma” (cpp-05). reflecting the impact of the jurisdictionally complex and fragmented nature of the funding environment 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.14480 in which indigenous providers of mental health operated, another participant described how, out of four mental health and addictions contracts that the organization held, only one did not require indigenous people "to fit into . . . [a] box to get service" while the other three were “very specific . . . [to] child youth, mental health or . . . addictions” (cpp-04). the resulting practice tensions were compounded by the “increasingly astronomical . . . reporting” requirements (icpp-09) that participants across all interviews described, and the predominance of short-term, multi-funder contractual arrangements as demonstrated in the organizational scenario described by cpp-04 above. while piecing together a range of different mental health contracts can be an effective strategy to fill the gaps in mental health programming and promote equitable access, the attendant increase in administrative burden weighed heavily on the organization and individual providers. this kind of experience contrasted starkly with that of another organization that received block-funding under the terms of one comprehensive contract and consequently, experienced a much higher degree of flexibility in program design and delivery without the attendant administrative burden. as expected, funders’ increasing unwillingness to cover costs not considered directly related to the delivery of care, such as “administrative costs” and “food,” magnified these tensions even further. the cumulative effect of these changes in funding and contractual arrangements was that providers reported finding themselves in an ethical double-bind whereby they were held accountable to provide culturally safe and responsive care under contractual conditions that made it increasingly difficult to do so. discussion the research presented in this paper provides new evidence on the contextual factors that support and hinder the implementation of government contracting with urban indigenous npos as a mechanism for promoting equity and cultural safety in mental health care. our analysis highlights the centrality of the local and wider socio-cultural, political, historical, economic, and institutional contexts in shaping government contracting in indigenous mental health. specifically, our findings suggest that taken-forgranted npm-inspired policies and practices serve to reinforce, perpetuate, and obscure ideologically and historically mediated colonial relations with potentially harmful and unintended consequences for urban indigenous npos, providers, and recipients of care. as this study demonstrates, conceptualizing contracting in indigenous mental health from such a cultural safety lens informed by a relational conception of social justice draws attention to the relational and ethical dimensions of contracting, and is useful for making linkages between indigenous cpps’ experiences, and the micro, meso and macro structures, policies and practices of government contracting in indigenous mental health. the findings described in this article fill an important gap in the literature concerning the lack of evidence on contracting in indigenous mental health with the expressed purpose of enhancing equitable access to culturally safe care. while there are analyses of the impact of neo-liberal reforms on contracting with the non-profit sector (evans et al., 2005; hasenfeld & garrow, 2012; smith & smyth, 2010), few studies have considered the 19 josewski: applying a critical policy lens to contracting in indigenous mental health care published by scholarship@western, 2023 intersections of neo-liberalism, racism, colonial power relations, and other axis of discrimination and their implications for contracting in indigenous health care. this is especially true within the canadian context, and in relation to mental health and urban indigenous communities. bringing a cultural safety and critical social justice lens to the analysis of contracting in indigenous mental health broadens the analytical focus in ways that extend beyond the political economy of contracting and thus helps healthcare decision-makers and administrators in funding institutions to more fully understand the complexities embedded in contracting as reflected in the contradictory experiences of participants. participants' accounts reveal that rather than promoting contractual relationships based on mutual respect, responsibility, reciprocity, and local relevance, performance-based contracting promotes paternalistic relations of governance and a culture of compliance with performance measures. the normalization of performance-based accountability mechanisms pressures and, in some cases, might silence urban indigenous providers and presumably clients, through its narrow focus on efficiency and cost-effectiveness. as a result, evidence of those aspects of care that made a difference in peoples’ lives as well as those that placed indigenous peoples at continued risk of harm tend to remain largely unrecognized. for example, consistent with the literature on culturally safe and equity-oriented care involving indigenous peoples whose lives are shaped by structural inequities (browne et al., 2015; browne et al., 2016; browne et al., 2012; ford‐gilboe et al., 2018), cpps emphasized the need to foster trust and long-term relationships with their clients, to provide care that is responsive to clients’ selfidentified priorities (e.g., ceremony, housing, or access to food) rather than those defined within their contracts, and to work with families and in community-based settings rather than providing individualized care during traditional office hours. yet, contractually defined parameters, such as volume-based performance targets, short-term contracts, and cuts to administrative expenses and food budgets, often produced ethical practice tensions for providers who felt that they had to choose between their accountabilities to the clients and the funders. for example, long-term and trust-based providerclient relationships are central to culturally safe care (browne et al., 2015; browne et al., 2016; smye et al., 2010), yet, ill-supported by short-term contractual arrangements. the same body of literature (browne et al., 2015; browne et al., 2016) also highlights the need for flexible approaches to program delivery to ensure programs and care are responsive to the most salient and emerging needs and priorities of clients and communities. the impacts of recent events on indigenous communities in canada, such as the covid-pandemic or the shocking discovery of the hundreds of unmarked and undocumented graves in bc and other former residential schools, serve to magnify the significance of supporting the capacity of indigenous organizations to contextually adapt and tailor their programs and services. however, rather than enhancing organizational and program flexibility, cpps’ accounts highlight the extent to which neoliberal approaches to contracting obstruct indigenous self-determination and ability to respond to communities’ needs. performance management practices and monitoring extend funders’ and contract managers’ regulatory power and reach far into the internal operations of urban indigenous organizations. increasingly stricter rules and regulations on how organizations are allowed to spend their funding, tight monitoring, along with efficiency-focused 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.14480 performance targets have created a culture of compliance that serves to reinforce and perpetuate the embeddedness of assimilationist ethos. while further research is needed to more fully understand the role and effects of colonial beliefs and racism in shaping the uptake and implementation of contracting in indigenous health, the findings of this study echo other research evidence (de leeuw et al., 2010; mckenzie et al., 2016; turpel-lafond et al., 2021) of how colonial and racist assumptions and stereotypes about indigenous inferiority and incapability continue to be (perhaps unwittingly) enacted within health care, including health care policy and funding. considering the evidence of ongoing racism and historical mistrust that shape indigenous-state relations, it was not surprising that several participants in this study interpreted funders’ increased concern with monitoring and performance regulation as discriminatory and a continuation of paternalistic and colonial approaches to policy and health service administration. colonial power relationships and culturally unsafe conditions were also reinforced in more subtle ways through the embeddedness of a deep-seated ethnocentrism that was reflected in the dominant influence of biomedicine in shaping contractual arrangements in indigenous mental health. participants’ accounts of the changes in funding, including funders’ reluctance to cover costs that are not directly related to the delivery of the service being contracted out, as well as the increasingly fragmented nature of contracts, imply that biomedicine continues to serve as the dominant lens for funders when faced with the questions of what counts as care and what services they are willing to pay for (and which are considered expendable). the consequences of this “continued legacy of epistemic racism” (allan & smylie, 2015, p. 5) are evident in community-based provider participants’ reports of the difficulty of finding adequate funding for comprehensive mental health programming, and, in particular, mental health program aspects that were culture-specific or oriented to address the social inequities shaping community members’ everyday lives. in keeping with the literature (browne et al., 2016; fast et al., 2017; graham et al., 2021; rowan et al., 2014), integrating indigenous knowledge and cultural practices into program design and delivery was considered an essential feature of culturally safe and equity-promoting health care involving indigenous peoples. while many of the observed tensions are consistent with international literature (chouinard & milley, 2015; lapuente & van de walle, 2020; siltala, 2013), the findings take on a particular meaning within the wider historical, political, and social and local context shaping indigenous health contracting in bc. as previously mentioned, indigenous self-determination, racism, and ongoing colonialism are increasingly recognized as distal determinants of indigenous mental health and wellbeing (allan & smylie, 2015; fast et al., 2017; greenwood et al., 2015; greenwood et al., 2022). indigenous peoples have the right to exercise self-determination over health programs affecting them, and maintain and strengthen their own institutions, cultures, and approaches to healing (undrip, 2007). bc is the first jurisdiction in canada to formally adopt undrip through legislation, and committing its government to work with indigenous peoples to align its institutions, laws, policies, and practices with indigenous peoples’ rights to advance reconciliation and address the legacy and harms of colonialism. bringing contracting in alignment with these rights is thus not only an ethical but also a legal imperative. 21 josewski: applying a critical policy lens to contracting in indigenous mental health care published by scholarship@western, 2023 moving towards cultural safety and equity in contracting the evidence produced in this study is not meant to inform an argument against government contracting in indigenous mental health; it does, however, underscore the urgency for structural and systemic change. while contracting has created opportunities for urban indigenous communities to reclaim control over how mental health programs are designed and delivered, indigenous npos and providers cannot fully operationalize their commitment to culturally safe and equity-oriented mental health programs and care without better alignment of contractual arrangements, policies, and funding environments. further attention to the structural and cultural dimensions of contracting and the implications this has for indigenous peoples at individual, community and system-levels is therefore needed. while political neutrality is a purported core value of public administration (chouinard & milley, 2015), the findings of this study make it clear that administrative policies and practices cannot be deemed neutral technocratic processes but, rather, must be understood as social practices that both mediate and support historical power-laden relations within health care and beyond. by remaining impervious to how npm approaches to contracting colludes with ongoing colonial policies and practices and forms of racism, government funders and health authorities will continue to unwittingly place indigenous peoples at harm, most notably through compounding access issues to mental health services for urban indigenous peoples. to mitigate these inequitable power relationships that permeate contractual relationships and ultimately relationships of care, we argue that contracting needs to be embedded in an administrative policy framework that is politicized and oriented to “hardwire” cultural safety and health equity through action at the micro, meso, and macro levels of the system. bringing a macro-, meso-, and micro-level framework to contracting provides important considerations for how and where to intervene in the contracting process to create policy and funding environments and contractual approaches that are aligned with the principles of cultural safety and equity. references allan, b., & smylie, d. 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(2012). pilot of te tomokanga: a child and adolescent mental health service evaluation tool for an indigenous population. the international indigenous policy journal, 3(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.5 this research is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. pilot of te tomokanga: a child and adolescent mental health service evaluation tool for an indigenous population abstract background the acceptability of child and adolescent mental health services (camhs) to indigenous peoples is little studied. there has been a lack of evaluation tools able to take account of the more holistic approach to the attainment of mental health that characterises māori, the indigenous population of aotearoa (new zealand). this study aimed to develop such an instrument and establish some of its psychometric properties. then, to use the measure to establish whānau (family or caregiver) views on desirable camhs characteristics. method a self-administered survey, te tomokanga, was developed by modifying a north american questionnaire, the youth services survey for families (yss-f). the intent of the tool was to record whānau experiences and views on service acceptability. the te tomokanga survey is unique in that it incorporates questions designed to examine camhs delivery in light of the whare tapa whā[1], a māori comprehensive model of health with a focus on whānau involvement and culturally responsive services. this mail or telephone survey was completed by a cohort of 168 māori whānau. their children had been referred to one of the three types of camhs, mainstream, bicultural, and kaupapa māori[2], of the district health board (dhbs) in the midland health region, aotearoa. the midland health region is an area with a large māori population with high levels of social deprivation. results the te tomokanga instrument was shown to have a similar factor structure to the north american questionnaire from which it had been derived. it identified issues relevant to māori whānau satisfaction with camhs. the work supports the concept that māori desire therapeutic methods consistent with the whare tapa whā, such as whānau involvement and the importance of recognising culture and spirituality. the participants were generally positive about the services they received from the three different camhs types, which shows good acceptability of camhs for māori. results found satisfaction with camhs was related to whānau involvement and culturally delivered services. conclusion the te tomokanga instrument should prove useful in aotearoa or other similar cultural settings. it is a means of determining the cultural acceptability or improving camhs delivery for indigenous populations. [1] the whare tapa whā framework relies on a māori worldview of health, a holistic approach advocating a balance between the four dimensions of the taha whānau (family), the taha tinana (physical), the taha hinengaro (cognitive or intellectual) and the taha wairua (spiritual). it is believed if one aspect is in distress then it impacts on the others causing tension and increased risk of poor health. optimal health requires balance between all four dimensions. [2] kaupapa māori mental health services provide māori dedicated clinical and cultural workforce for māori service users. keywords indigenous, child and adolescent mental health, service measurement acknowledgments the authors wish to acknowledge the funders of this study, the health research council of aotearoa and the six participating camhs taranaki, waikato, te au o hinetai, te puna hauora kaupapa māori services, voyagers, and te whare o te rito of the dhbs in midland health region, aotearoa. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ pilot of te tomokanga: a child and adolescent mental health service evaluation tool for an indigenous population in aotearoa or new zealand, access to effective mental health services for māori, the indigenous population, is a priority (baxter, kingi, tapsell, durie, & mcgee, 2006; ramage, bir, towns, vague, cargo, & niumatafaleafa, 2005). it is, therefore, important to assess whether these services are addressing the issues crucial to whānau (family or caregivers). the development of a culturally attuned tool would play a significant role in developing and refining such services (world health organisation, 2005). measuring satisfaction with mental health services by identifying service users’ concerns and issues is essential in assessing effectiveness (merry et al., 2004). the lack of an appropriate tool for examining satisfaction with the child and adolescent mental health services (camhs) among māori has been an impediment to this process. developing a specific tool for camhs would provide the opportunity to support caregivers, children, and adolescents from indigenous and/or colonised populations. it is expected that if parents have positive experiences it will likely influence ongoing dealings with camhs and, thus, contribute to better mental health outcomes for their children. māori may well desire a different style of therapeutic service particularly given that the whare tapa whā conceptual model of health (durie, 1994) has wide currency within the health sector in aotearoa. the framework relies on a māori worldview of health, a holistic approach, and advocates for a balance between the four dimensions of the taha whānau (family), the taha tinana (physical), the taha hinengaro (cognitive or intellectual), and the taha wairua (spiritual) (durie, 1994). it is believed that if one aspect is in distress then this anguish impacts on the others causing tension and increased risk of poor health. optimal health requires balance between all four dimensions (durie, 1994). the first aim of this study was to develop a measure that focuses on the caregivers’ perceptions of whether the camhs delivery to māori supports the inclusion of a māori identity and māori cultural beliefs (mcclintock, 2010). the resulting survey instrument is the te tomokanga (see appendix). our second aim was to conduct a pilot survey to sample the perceptions of māori caregivers who accessed the support of three camhs types. the study hypotheses are as follows: hypothesis 1: there are significant differences in perceptions of the extent to which whānau are involved among the three camhs types (mainstream, bicultural, and kaupapa māori 1) among māori in the midland health region of aotearoa. hypothesis 2: māori desire therapeutic methods consistent with the whare tapa whā, such as involvement of the whānau and recognition of the importance of culture and spirituality. method study protocols a kaupapa māori philosophy, consistent with māori aspirations and development, guided the methodology (mcclintock, mellsop, merry, & moeke-maxwell, 2010). this approach is founded on self-determination and the legitimisation of māori knowledge and processes, such as the traditional pōwhiri process of engagement and participation (durie, 2003; mcclintock, et al., 2010; smith, 1999). this process relies on mutual respect and reciprocity where the researcher is dependant on the participant to consent to the research process. māori control over involvement in research of māori issues is also integral to a kaupapa māori research 1 mainstream (waikato, taranaki) camhs in this study had no dedicated māori staff positions available. bicultural (voyagers, te au o hinetai, te whare o te rito) camhss had a or some dedicated māori staff positions available. kaupapa māori camhs (te puna hauora) had dedicated māori staff positions available. 1 mcclintock et al.: pilot of te tomokanga published by scholarship@western, 2012 approach. ultimately, māori health research outcomes must benefit māori by providing solutions that address māori health issues (durie, 2003; smith, 1999). development of te tomokanga the youth services survey for families (yss-f) is an instrument utilised in north america to gauge parental satisfaction with camhs (brunk, liao, santiago, & ewell, 1998; riley & stromberg, 2001; riley, stromberg, & clark. 2005). slight modifications were made to the wording of this instrument, based on the author’s views, and questions 9, 19, and 20 were added to construct the te tomokanga (appendix). question 9 relates to the cultural background of the client’s interviewer, which was added to address the issue of camhs delivery in light of the whare tapa whā and focus on the importance of services to support a māori cultural identity for māori clients (durie, gillies, kingi, & waldon, 1995). questions 19 and 20 relate to inter-sector collaboration and imply that mental health services will, at times, need to work collaboratively with other health services and sectors, such as education and social development, to increase effectiveness (ramage et al., 2005). a likert scale was used for all questions scored from 1 – strongly disagree to 5 – strongly agree. a purposive sample of māori caregivers had an opportunity to respond to questions on camhs acceptability with the 21 item te tomokanga survey (mcclintock, 2010). all analyses were undertaken using spss v17. recruitment the te tomokanga, a self-administered survey, was distributed by mail or telephone if services provided telephone contacts. the recruitment process, in line with the ethical approval, was administered by the lead investigator to all māori whānau who had accessed one of the three camhs types in the midland health region of aotearoa from 2003 to 2005. the recruitment process aligned with the pōwhiri process of engagement and participation, which included the karanga or invitation and consent to complete the survey; mihimihi or information sheet explaining the study; whaikōrero or completion of the survey; and koha or payment of a $10 voucher in acknowledgement of each participant’s commitment to complete the survey (mcclintock et al., 2010). ethics the multi-region ethics committee (mec), ministry of health, aotearoa approved the study (mec 06/02/0101). district health board (dhb) locality approval from all six participating sites was gained to conduct this project. analysis tests that do not make assumptions about the normal population distribution are referred to as nonparametric tests. the handling of rank-ordered data is considered a technique of non-parametric tests as evident in the study analysis. non-parametric rank order statistics (spearman’s rho) were applied to the corelational data. aim one: tomokanga survey validity. the validity of the survey instrument was assessed by relating the survey results to those from an existing, validated tool , the yss-f (myers & winter, 2002). establishing the construct validity of the tool relied on an exploratory factor analysis of the survey questions utilising varimax rotation. results from the te tomokanga based on a māori sample are compared to the factor structure identified using the yss-f with a north american sample (brunk et al., 1998; riley & stromberg, 2001; riley et al., 2005). the assessing the robustness of domains relied on quantifying internal consistency using 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.5 cronbach’s alpha, which indicates the extent to which the individual items of a domain are related to each other (myers & winter, 2002). aim two: tomokanga survey results: experiences and acceptability. hypothesis 1: the analysis compared the responses to the seven whānau involvement questions (#10, 11, 12, 15, 16, 17, and 21 in appendix) across the three service types (mainstream, bicultural, and kaupapa māori). the test process involved calculating the mean2 of the responses to these seven questions for each of the three distinctive service types and then comparing these statistically with pair-wise comparisons using independent sample t-tests (armitage, berry, & mathews, 2002). pairwise comparisons using independent t-tests were used as it was thought that different questions would have different relevance to each of the three service types. hypothesis 2.: this analysis sought to identify the aspects of whānau involvement and cultural relevancy that related most to the acceptability of the service. the associations between the key acceptability question (#11 in appendix), my child received services that were right for him or her, and the items in the survey relating to whānau involvement and cultural relevancy were tested using spearman’s rank correlation coefficient (r). no correction for multiple testing was applied and a twotailed p-value <0.05 was taken to indicate statistical significance (armitage et al., 2002). this approach is justified because of the study’s exploratory nature and the fact that it focuses on identifying a consistent pattern of associations among correlations. results the questionnaire was distributed by mail or telephone to 400 caregivers from participating camhs and resulted in 168 study participants. this represented a 42% response rate. the participants were evenly distributed amongst the three camhs types. two percent were under 4 years of age, 36% were under 14 years, and 62% were under 19 years. the ratio of males to females was 4:1. the demographics show a response bias from caregivers of males over 14 years of age. aim one: validity and reliability the factor analysis to establish construct validity produced five factors with eigen values greater than one, collectively explaining 60% of the variance (table 1). the five factors are: • whānau involvement included seven items (questions 10, 11, 12, 15, 16, 17, and 21) and explained 21% of the variation). • satisfaction with services explained 12% of the variation and included five items (questions 1, 2, 7, 8, and 18). • access (convenience) explained 11% of the variation and included four items (questions 3, 4, 5, and 6). • cultural sensitivity included two items (questions 13 and 14) and explained 9% of the variation. • satisfaction with inter-sector collaboration explained 7% of the variation and included two items (questions 19 and 20). question 9, it is important to be interviewed by a staff member of the same race or culture, remained on its own explaining less than 5% of the variation, but did not warrant being included as a single variable domain because the eigen value was less than 1.0 (mcclintock, 2010). the cronbach’s alpha reliability results were good for all factors apart from the fifth factor, which describes inter-sector collaboration (table 2). the focus on inter-sector support is a developing initiative, which may 2 the mean is calculated from the responses to the questions, which range from 1 strongly disagree to 5 strongly agree. 3 mcclintock et al.: pilot of te tomokanga published by scholarship@western, 2012 table 1 summary of exploratory factor analysis for te tomokanga survey instrument factor loadings 1 2 3 4 5 6 item whānau involvement satisfaction with services access (convenience) cultural sensitivity satisfaction with inter-sector collaboration services support māori cultural identity 1. information about the camhs was easy to obtain. 0.406 2. the location of the camhs was simple to find. 0.666 3. an appointment was given when my child needed it. 0.563 4. allocated appointment times were convenient. 0.757 5. the clinic venue for the appointment was convenient. 0.593 6. transport cost to the camhs appointment was affordable. 0.761 7. camhs consultation cost was affordable. 0.673 8. medication was affordable. 0.772 9. it is important to be interviewed by a staff member of the same race or culture 0.868 10. staff asked important questions about my child. 0.659 11. my child received services that were right for him or her. 0.727 12. staff asked important questions about my whānau or 0.726 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.5 factor loadings 1 2 3 4 5 6 item whānau involvement satisfaction with services access (convenience) cultural sensitivity satisfaction with inter-sector collaboration services support māori cultural identity family. 13. staff respected my spiritual beliefs. 0.788 14. staff was sensitive to my cultural beliefs. 0.862 15. 15. my whānau or family received support that was right for us. 0.708 16. i felt i had a say in the assessment process. 0.732 17. i understood the treatment options for my child. 0.740 18. i understood that medication would help. 0.611 19. the involvement of group special education was important in helping my child. 0.608 20. the involvement of child youth family was important to helping my child. 0.778 21. the involvement of camhs was important to helping my child. 0.705 eigen value 4.5 2.5 2.3 1.9 1.5 0.8 % of variance 21% 12% 11% 9% 7% < 5% note. factor loadings with an absolute value greater than 0.40 reported. 5 mcclintock et al.: pilot of te tomokanga published by scholarship@western, 2012 account for the outcome. the remaining results were very similar to those of the parent instrument, yss-f (brunk et al., 1998), as indicated in table 2. table 2 comparison of cronbach’s alpha for factors in te tomokanga and yss-f survey te tomokanga yss-f whānau involvement 0.88 0.79 satisfaction with services 0.69 0.94 access (convenience) 0.71 0.66 cultural sensitivity 0.84 0.89 satisfaction with inter-sector collaboration 0.38 not included aim two: experiences and acceptability hypothesis 1. the participants in this study were mostly positive about the services they received from the three different service types (table 3). the mean ratings were greater than a score of 3.5, indicating that on average participants agreed or strongly agreed that the three camhs types offered these aspects of whānau involvement. hypothesis 2. the key acceptability question in the te tomokanga survey – question 11, my child received services that were right for him or her – correlated positively (p < .001) with the te tomokanga items identified in table 4, including whānau involvement and cultural factors. most t-tests were not significant with the exception of question 17, i understood the treatment options for my child, which suggests that those who accessed bicultural services had higher satisfaction ratings than those who accessed kaupapa or mainstream services. bicultural services had the highest number of participants who completed the survey. discussion the first aim of the study was to develop and test a measure that focused on whānau perceptions of the acceptability of camhs delivery to māori. the result was the development of the te tomokanga survey by adapting the yss-f, which has demonstrated construct validity and reliability. the second aim was to use this survey to sample the perceptions of māori caregivers who accessed the support of the three camhs types. two study hypotheses were tested. the first hypothesis focused on the significant differences for māori in their perceptions of the extent of whānau involvement between the three camhs types, mainstream, bicultural, and kaupapa māori, in the midland health region of aotearoa. the second hypothesis tested the assertion that māori desire therapeutic methods consistent with the whare tapa whā, such as involving the whānau and recognising the importance of culture and spirituality. the results suggest a general satisfaction from the respondents with the camhs delivery from the three service types. the data collected from māori caregivers revealed five factors, whānau involvement, satisfaction with services received, access or convenience, cultural sensitivity, and satisfaction with inter-sector collaboration, that contributed to responsive camhs for māori. whether or not camhs services were perceived to be acceptable was related to whānau involvement and service delivery that takes into account cultural differences. this study sample supports the concept that māori desire therapeutic methods consistent 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.5 table 3 mean ratings of camhs service types across whānau involvement questions q: whānau involvement bicultural (b) kaupapa (k) mainstream (m) overall a b vs k p values b vs m p values k vs m p values 10. staff asked important questions about my child. mean 4.34 4.27 4.26 4.31 0.79 0.672 0.79 n 93 22 50 163 std. deviation 1.068 1.032 1.275 1.124 11. my child received services that were right for him or her. mean 4.09 4.29 3.72 4.01 0.521 0.127 0.094 n 89 24 50 165 std. deviation 1.302 1.083 1.578 1.372 12. staff asked important questions about my whānau or family. mean 4.15 4.00 3.81 4.03 0.63 0.165 0.582 n 84 23 47 154 std. deviation 1.275 1.477 1.454 1.362 15. my whānau or family received support that was right for us. mean 4.03 3.91 3.7 3.91 0.744 0.221 0.557 n 80 23 46 149 std. deviation 1.359 1.535 1.547 1.444 16. i felt i had a say in the assessment process. mean 4.03 4.04 3.74 3.95 0.929 0.255 0.405 n 91 24 50 165 std. deviation 1.394 1.301 1.626 1.454 17. i understood the treatment options for my child. mean 4.43 3.82 4.1 4.24 0.037* 0.0124* 0.372 n 88 22 51 161 std. deviation 0.98 1.622 1.404 1.239 7 mcclintock et al.: pilot of te tomokanga published by scholarship@western, 2012 q: whānau involvement bicultural (b) kaupapa (k) mainstream (m) overall a b vs k p values b vs m p values k vs m p values 21. the involvement of camhs was important to helping my child. mean 4.31 4.37 3.92 4.2 0.837 0.096* 0.173 n 93 24 51 168 std. deviation 1.26 1.06 1.57 1.34 a in this column mean and standard deviations are overall averages and n indicates the total number of participants from each camhs type. * p < .05. table 4. significant positive correlations between factors and acceptability question factor r values p values 10. staff asked important questions about my child. whānau involvement 0.561 <.001 12. staff asked important questions about my whānau or family. whānau involvement 0.581 <.001 13. staff respected my spiritual beliefs. cultural sensitivity 0.587 <.001 14. staff were sensitive to my cultural beliefs. cultural sensitivity 0.547 <.001 15. my whānau or family received support that was right for us. whānau involvement 0.694 <.001 16. i felt i had a say in the assessment process. whānau involvement 0.586 <.001 17. i understood the treatment options for my child. whānau involvement 0.525 <.001 21. the involvement of camhs was important to helping my child. whānau involvement 0.625 <.001 note. the acceptability question refers to question 11, my child received services that were right for him or her. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.5 with the whare tapa whā, such as whānau involvement and the importance of recognising culture and spirituality. if these components are delivered, māori caregivers tend to be satisfied with camhs. the qualitative phase that followed the survey testing reported similar results (mcclintock, moeke-maxwell, & mellsop, 2011). two cohorts participated in this stage: cohort one completed the survey and an interview and were generally positive about what camhs offered. cohort two chose not to complete the survey and wanted only to be interviewed. this cohort was dissatisfied and demanded that more cultural recognition and support be delivered by a māori-specific camhs workforce. a camhs cultural framework aligned to the pōwhiri process of engagement and participation was developed as a result of the qualitative phase. this can be utilised by camhs to specifically support māori cultural processes (mcclintock et al., 2011). limitations the 42% response rate limits the confidence and generalizability of the results. the participants in the te tomokanga survey were generally positive about the camhs. the qualitative phase uncovered the presence of a less-than-satisfied cohort whose views were not included in the survey and, therefore, revealed a survey bias. considering this was an initial study of the instrument, the tool warrants further investigation for inclusion as part of camhs in aotearoa. even though the testing results reveal that reliability is poor for the three added items – question 9, it is important to be interviewed by a staff member of the same race or culture, and questions 19 and 20 regarding inter-sector collaboration – they will remain in future applications of the survey because they are relevant to the aotearoa camhs context. conclusion accessing culturally responsive camhs is a priority for all, but especially for indigenous, colonised populations such as māori. this is the first study in aotearoa to attempt an investigation that supports this important issue. it has been valuable in determining the appropriateness of these services using a culturally attuned tool to assess details of māori whānau satisfaction with camhs. the results of the study can contribute to ongoing service improvement and quality camhs provision. it is suggested that the instrument can be utilised in conjunction with the cultural framework of engagement and participation developed from the qualitative phase and embedded as a camhs best practice with māori clients. this can play a significant role in developing and refining māori culturally responsive camhs in aotearoa. with future modifications to the instrument, it may be appropriate for other indigenous cultures. 9 mcclintock et al.: pilot of te tomokanga published by scholarship@western, 2012 references armitage, p., berry, g., & mathews, j. (2002). statistical methods in medical research.(4th ed). oxford: blackwell. baxter, j., kingi, t. k., tapsell, r., durie, m., & mcgee, m. a. (2006). prevalence of mental disorders amongst māori in te rau hinengaro: the new zealand mental health survey. australian and new zealand journal of psychiatry, 40, 914-913. brunk, m., liao, q., santiago, r., & ewell, k. (1998). psychometric properties of the revised family satisfaction scale. in j. willis, c. liberton, k. kutash, & r. friedman (eds.), the 11th annual research conference proceedings, a system of care for children’s mental health: expanding the research base. tampa, fl: university of south florida. durie, m. h. (1994). whaiora. auckland: oxford university press. durie, m. h. (2003)). ngā kahui pou: launching māori futures. wellington, new zealand: huia. durie, m. h., gillies, a., kingi, t., & waldon, j. 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(2005). assessing parent satisfaction with children’s mental health services with the youth services survey for families. journal of child and family studies, 14(1), 87-99. smith, l.t. (1999). decolonizing methodologies: research and indigenous peoples. new york: zed books. world health organisation. (2005). atlas child and adolescent mental health resources gobal concerns: implications for the future. geneva: author. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.5 appendix te tomokanga: acceptable child and adolescent mental health services (camhs) for māori in aotearoa survey this survey contains a list of statements asking for your view of the camhs that your child was referred to. beside each statement there is a scale which ranges from 1 (‘strongly disagree’) to 5 (‘strongly agree’) or 6 (‘not applicable’). for each item please circle the number that represents the extent to which you agree with the statement. please answer every item and make only one choice per item. please respond as honestly as you can remember. q u e s ti o n name of the service s tr o n g ly d is a g re e d is a g re e u n c e rt a in a g re e s tr o n g ly a g re e n o t a p p li c a b le 1. information about the camhs was easy to obtain. 1 2 3 4 5 6 2. the location of the camhs was simple to find. 1 2 3 4 5 6 3. an appointment was given when my child needed it. 1 2 3 4 5 6 4. allocated appointment times were convenient. 1 2 3 4 5 6 5. the clinic venue for the appointment was convenient. 1 2 3 4 5 6 6. transport cost to the camhs appointment was affordable. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7. camhs consultation cost was affordable. 1 2 3 4 5 6 8. medication was affordable. 1 2 3 4 5 6 9. it is important to be interviewed by a staff member of the same race/culture. 1 2 3 4 5 6 10. staff asked important questions about my child. 1 2 3 4 5 6 11. my child received services that were right for him/her. 1 2 3 4 5 6 12. staff asked important questions about my whānau/family. 1 2 3 4 5 6 13. staff respected my spiritual beliefs. 1 2 3 4 5 6 14. staff were sensitive to my cultural beliefs. 1 2 3 4 5 6 15. my whānau/family received support that was right for us. 1 2 3 4 5 6 16. i felt i had a say in the assessment process. 1 2 3 4 5 6 17. i understood the treatment options for my child. 1 2 3 4 5 6 18. i understood that medication would help. 1 2 3 4 5 6 19. the involvement of group special education was important to helping my child. 1 2 3 4 5 6 20. the involvement of child youth family was important to helping my child. 1 2 3 4 5 6 21. the involvement of camhs was important to helping my child. 1 2 3 4 5 6 11 mcclintock et al.: pilot of te tomokanga published by scholarship@western, 2012 the international indigenous policy journal march 2012 pilot of te tomokanga: a child and adolescent mental health service evaluation tool for an indigenous population kahu mcclintock graham mellsop tess moeke-maxwell chris frampton recommended citation pilot of te tomokanga: a child and adolescent mental health service evaluation tool for an indigenous population abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license microsoft word 291798-text.native.1334104951.doc ms#1431 fridkin the ripples of meaningful final.pdf the international indigenous policy journal volume 10 | issue 3 september 2019 the ripples of meaningful involvement: a framework for meaningfully involving indigenous peoples in health policy decisionmaking alycia j. fridkin university of british columbia, alycia.fridkin@alumni.ubc.ca annette j. browne university of british columbia school of nursing, annette.browne@ubc.ca madeleine kétéskw!w dion stout university of british columbia, madeleine_dion@hotmail.com recommended citation fridkin, a. j., browne, a. j., & dion stout, m. k. (2019). the ripples of meaningful involvement: a framework for meaningfully involving indigenous peoples in health policy decision-making. the international indigenous policy journal, 10(3). doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8309 the ripples of meaningful involvement: a framework for meaningfully involving indigenous peoples in health policy decisionmaking abstract indigenous peoples experience the greatest health inequities in canada and other colonized countries; yet, they are routinely excluded from health-related policy decisions. those advocating for indigenous health equity are often left wrestling with the question: what constitutes, and what can foster, meaningful involvement of indigenous peoples in the contemporary health policy climate? twenty (n = 20) in-depth, open-ended interviews with indigenous and non-indigenous leaders in health and health policy were conducted with a view to understanding what constitutes meaningful involvement of indigenous peoples in health policy decision-making. the analysis suggests meaningful involvement requires attuning to underlying power dynamics inherent in policy making and taking action to decolonize and transform the policy system itself. based on these findings, the authors offer a framework for meaningful involvement. keywords indigenous, aboriginal, first nations, indigenous health, aboriginal health, health inequities, health, meaningful involvement, engagement, participation, policy, decolonization acknowledgments the authors gratefully acknowledge the contributions of jim frankish, the research support from the critical research in health and healthcare inequities unit at the university of british columbia’s school of nursing, and the funding received from the canadian institutes of health research’s institute of indigenous peoples’ health. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. fridkin et al.: the ripples of meaningful involvement published by scholarship@western, 2019 1 the ripples of meaningful involvement: a framework for meaningfully involving indigenous peoples in health policy decision-making health and social inequities affecting indigenous peoples in canada—namely, first nations, métis, and inuit—have been consistently documented in key public health reports over the last several decades. disparities exist across virtually every health indicator, including chronic disease, hiv, injuries, disabilities, mental health, problematic substance use, suicide, as well as social determinants of health such as housing, poverty, and employment (browne et al., 2016; brownridge, 2008; nelson & wilson, 2017). these same disparities occur in other colonized countries, including australia (australian institute of health and welfare, 2015; dwyer, o'donnell, willis, & kelly, 2016) and new zealand (mitrou et al., 2014). the literature suggests the consistency of these health inequities is hardly coincidental; it is the result of a history of colonial policies imposed on indigenous peoples from the moment of contact with european settlers. wien (1999) argued that the history of indigenous policy in canada “is full of misguided policy choices,” which have contributed to key factors affecting indigenous peoples’ health, including the erosion of indigenous economies and subsequent widespread poverty and starvation (p. 102). for example, the indian act confined first nations peoples to reserves, where infectious diseases thrived due to isolation and poor living conditions (kelm, 1999). the residential school system played an equally traumatic role on the health of indigenous peoples. high rates of tuberculosis and untreated illness resulted in the death of many children, and the overall neglect, abuse, malnutrition, and detachment from families, language, and culture additionally contributed to the poor health of residents (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015a). the separation of children from their families also had a devastating impact on indigenous communities and continues to have traumatic intergenerational effects (nelson & wilson, 2017). the indian act and residential school system, two policies that were made in isolation of indigenous peoples’ perspectives or involvement, are examples of how a top-down approach to indigenous health policy has contributed to health inequities between indigenous peoples and non-indigenous peoples in canada. in the contemporary policy climate in canada and globally, indigenous peoples have become more vocal about being involved in addressing health inequities; yet, health policy decisions are largely still made without involvement of indigenous peoples, and indigenous women in particular (dion stout & kipling, 1998; oliver et al., 2015), which contributes to ongoing health and social inequities (fiske & browne, 2008; howse & dwyer, 2016; lavoie et al., 2016; loppie reading & wien, 2009). some scholars argue that indigenous peoples’ health and quality of life can only be improved if addressed on indigenous peoples’ own terms, and there is a growing body of evidence showing that policies coproduced with indigenous communities have better outcomes (walker, moore, & linklater, 2011). for example, in the canadian context, the transformative change accord in bc, a legal agreement between the provincial and federal governments and the first nations leadership council, led to the creation of a first nations health authority, where first nations peoples are able to provide health services based on a first nations perspective of wellness (gallagher, mendez, & kehoe, 2015). in ottawa and winnipeg, municipal governments have worked with indigenous communities in policy and planning co-production, which has been successful in fostering community acceptance and implementation (belanger & walker, 2009). indigenous peoples’ involvement in health policy has additionally been the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3, art. 6 doi: https://10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8309 2 shown to improve indigenous peoples’ health (lavoie et al., 2010; matthews, pulver, & ring, 2008; reading & nowgesic, 2002) as well as policy-making processes (quantz & thurston, 2006). when it comes to decision-making impacting indigenous peoples’ health, there can also be value in including non-indigenous peoples in the process. regan (2005) argued that decolonization cannot be a project for indigenous peoples alone, as this is essentially asking indigenous peoples to take sole responsibility for healing themselves from the impacts of colonization. aside from the ethical responsibility to address inequities created by their own governments, non-indigenous peoples are appropriately positioned to disrupt their own colonial processes and may be key influencers in changing the status quo. non-indigenous people often occupy influential positions in government and/or act as gatekeepers, and when working in alignment with indigenous peoples, they may be an asset in overcoming systemic barriers. in the canadian context, indigenous health policy is a complex environment. historically, the federal government is responsible for providing health services and benefits to first nations who are registered with the federal government as a “status” first nations person. for all other indigenous peoples, including non-status first nations, métis, and inuit, health services are provided in the same way as they are for the rest of the non-indigenous population: financed by the national health insurance plan and administered by the provinces or territories. in addition, there are numerous policies, legislation, and agreements between different levels of governments, including indigenous government organizations, in different parts of the country. this jurisdictional complexity has created many gaps and ambiguities in relation to who is responsible for indigenous peoples’ health, and further contributes to the complexity of decision-making (national collaborating centre for aboriginal health, 2013). there have been significant efforts and initiatives to involve indigenous peoples in health policy decision-making in canada, including the indian health transfer policy in the 1980s (o'neil, 1993), the royal commission on aboriginal peoples in the 1990s (royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996; wien, 1999), the kelowna accord in the 2000s (dipenta, 2006; durbin, 2009; patterson, 2006), and the truth and reconciliation commission in 2015 (2015b). each of these policy initiatives resulted in recommendations or calls to action, which include involving indigenous peoples in health policy decisions; yet, it is not clear what such involvement might look like nor what steps are needed to get there. furthermore, indigenous peoples are becoming increasingly involved at high levels of decisionmaking (i.e., being engaged as a partner at senior government tables). what is not clear is how indigenous leaders see these experiences and if they believe the nature of their involvement is actually meaningful or influential. as indigenous peoples continue to become more prominent in mainstream policy systems, there is a need to explore indigenous involvement from the perspectives of both indigenous and non-indigenous peoples with lived experience at health policy decision-making tables. recognizing the need for clarity on what meaningful involvement looks like in the specific context of indigenous health, the purpose of this article is to offer a framework and practical insights for meaningfully involving indigenous peoples in health policy decision-making. drawing on findings from a qualitative study that explored indigenous and non-indigenous policy leaders’ perspectives on what constitutes, and what can inform, meaningful involvement of indigenous peoples in health policy decision-making, we articulate a new conceptualization of meaningful involvement rooted in seven key fridkin et al.: the ripples of meaningful involvement published by scholarship@western, 2019 3 elements. these findings have implications for policy making in other sectors and jurisdictions internationally. literature review: indigenous involvement in health policy for hundreds of years, indigenous peoples have been engaged in conversation with governments in order to resist oppressive policies and practices. however, throughout history and to the present day, the nature of engagement has remained largely colonial. indigenous–government relationships are characterized by the domination of eurocentric systems, whereby structural relations of power permeate engagement efforts (coulthard, 2014). in policy domains such as treaty negotiations, land claims, natural resource extraction, and child welfare, indigenous leaders have consistently demonstrated how inequitable power relationships restrict and define the terms of engagement, resulting in a widespread skepticism about the effectiveness of government engagements (blackstock, 2011; coulthard, 2014; diabo, 2014; palmater, 2014). even when indigenous peoples are engaged with the explicit aim of autonomous decision-making or self-determination, such as self-government negotiations, the end result is often another iteration of colonialism and forced government dependence (irlbacher-fox, 2009). in the context of health policy, indigenous peoples’ involvement often occurs through processes that further perpetuate indigenous peoples’ exclusion from decision-making. for example, governments commonly use community consultations as a method for gathering indigenous peoples’ input on health issues, and in doing so tend to construct indigenous peoples as empowered and engaged citizens on one hand, while simultaneously undermining their power to make decisions on the other (fiske & browne, 2008). community consultations have resulted in the frequent failure of governments to include community input into policy decisions, which can devalue and delegitimize indigenous peoples’ perspectives and foster cynicism about the false promises of inclusion (fiske & browne, 2008; howse & dwyer, 2016; lavoie et al. 2015; mcconaghy, 2000; smye & browne, 2002). government-initiated engagement processes have also been found to have harmful effects on indigenous peoples. these include misinterpretation of the priority issues (mcconaghy, 2000; smye & browne, 2002), misappropriation of indigenous knowledges (rains, archibald, & deyhle, 2000), and political manipulation of indigenous peoples’ input for solutions that may not align with community priorities (larocque, 2010). these critiques expose how discourses on involvement, such as “consultation,” can become rhetoric that promotes the self-interests of governments and fails to address community issues of concern (davidson, 2008; mcwilliams, 2004). considering the ways indigenous peoples are typically involved in policy decision-making, indigenous leaders have called for new terms of engagement. the united nations declaration of the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip; united nations, 2007) outlines a vision for indigenous peoples’ engagement on issues that affect them, including indigenous peoples’ rights to determine their own priorities and to be actively involved in developing health and social programmes. countries such as canada have since endorsed the undrip and have mandated implementation (indigenous and northern affairs canada, 2017). in the realm of research, indigenous scholars have also developed policies and guidelines for involving indigenous peoples, such the ocap® principles, which declare the need for indigenous ownership, control, access and possession of data, and were developed as an expression of indigenous self-determination in research (first nations information governance centre, the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3, art. 6 doi: https://10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8309 4 2019). initiatives such as undrip and ocap® are relevant for thinking about how indigenous peoples could be more meaningfully involved in research and policy. research design and methods in response to indigenous peoples’ repeated calls to be meaningfully involved in health policy decisionmaking (coulthard, 2014; lavoie, boulton, & gervais, 2012; matthews et al., 2008) and the gaps in the literature on how this can be achieved, this study aimed to provide further clarity into how meaningful involvement of indigenous peoples in health policy decision-making might be conceptualized, and further, how this could be achieved. the specific research objectives were: a. to explore, from the perspectives of leaders and decision-makers in indigenous health and other areas of canadian health policy, what constitutes meaningful involvement of indigenous peoples in health policy decision-making; and b. to develop recommendations for meaningfully involving indigenous peoples in health policy and decision-making processes in canada and beyond. to address these objectives, 20 in-depth, open-ended interviews with leaders and decision-makers in indigenous health and other health policy areas in canada were conducted. the study was qualitative and exploratory in nature, and the focus of the interviews was on exploring participants’ experiences in health policy decision-making related to indigenous peoples’ health as well as these leaders’ perspectives on what constitutes meaningful involvement. the study received ethical approval through the university of british columbia’s behavioral research ethics board (breb). in accordance with current canadian guidelines on research involving indigenous peoples (government of canada, 2017), this research was designed to focus on an issue of major priority to indigenous peoples, and the lead investigators included indigenous (dion stout) and non-indigenous (fridkin & browne) scholars with extensive experience on the research topic. fridkin was the primary researcher and lead the data collection, analysis, and writing, and dion stout and browne provided direction on the overall research study, including participant recruitment, data analysis, and interpretation of findings. the analysis and research design were informed by a theoretical framework rooted in perspectives that are attuned to issues of equity and relations of power within social and political structures. we included indigenous and decolonizing perspectives, which focus on disrupting the dominance of eurocentric perspectives, foregrounding indigenous histories and narratives, and advancing indigenous justice agendas (battiste, 2009; battiste & youngblood henderson, 2000; denizen, lincoln, & smith, 2008; ermine, 1999, 2007; regan, 2005; rigney, 1999; smith, 1999; turner, 2006). we further developed our analysis from critical theoretical perspectives such as postcolonial feminism, which focuses on disrupting “race-thinking” and drawing attention to how colonialism, race, ethnicity, culture, and gender shape inclusion, exclusion, and inequities (anderson, 2000; asher, 2017; browne, smye, & varcoe, 2007). these theoretical perspectives shaped every aspect of the research, including the development of the research questions and methodology. for example, decolonizing perspectives were used to orient the research objectives towards issues of relevance and interest to indigenous peoples, and critical perspectives such as postcolonial feminism, intersectionality, and cultural safety were used to focus the analysis on the underlying power inequities that shape policy processes and indigenous peoples’ inclusion, as well as indigenous peoples’ experiences of safety at the policy decision-making table. fridkin et al.: the ripples of meaningful involvement published by scholarship@western, 2019 5 to capture a range of perspectives and insights on meaningful involvement in various policy contexts, we recruited participants who were working in positions related to indigenous health across a range of governmental, organizational, and policy levels, paying attention to gender diversity. both indigenous and non-indigenous participants were interviewed for two reasons: a. to explore a range of perspectives and experiences related to indigenous peoples’ involvement in policy, based on the recognition that socio-political positioning influences a person’s experiences and perspectives; and b. to include a sample that was somewhat reflective of the population of people working in indigenous health policy settings, which includes both indigenous peoples and nonindigenous peoples. the sampling strategy involved a combination of purposive and convenience sampling (see barbour, 2001; thorne, 2008). the research team identified people in their social networks who met the inclusion criteria, would have good insight on the research topic, and were positioned to provide insight on “what is happening and why it is happening” in the context of indigenous health policy (thorne, 2008, pp. 89-91). these individuals were invited to participate in an interview. the study participants were leaders, decision-makers, or experts with significant experience working in indigenous health or public health policy. participants were located in geographic locations across canada and held a range of leadership positions, including directors (n = 11), senior leaders (n = 6), managers or team leads (n = 2), and professors in health disciplines (n = 1). half of the participants (n = 10) self-identified as indigenous, approximately half self-identified as white, euro-canadian, and/or european (n = 9), and one (n = 1) self-identified as having mixed indigenous and european ancestry. approximately half of participants self-identified as women (n = 11) and half identified as men (n = 9). the age range of participants was between 47 and 76 years, with a mean age of 57 years. participants were highly educated with many participants (n = 15) who had completed a graduate degree at the time of the interview and approximately half (n = 9) who had professional designations in nursing, medicine, dentistry, or law. the interview guide was developed at the outset and further refined in response to emerging themes and insights gained from conducting the interviews. the questions were open-ended and exploratory in nature and sequenced with the intent of evolving from an information-based conversation to an in-depth discussion. data collection and analysis were guided by a research team comprised of indigenous and nonindigenous researchers with extensive experience in indigenous health policy research in canada. the study was conducted between 2012 and 2015 and ethical approval was provided throughout this time period. the interview and field note transcripts were organized using nvivo qualitative data analysis software, which included coding each transcript based on a codebook of topic-based codes developed from an analysis of initial reflections and subsequent readings of the data. a thematic analysis involving an inductive process of systematically reading and re-reading the data alongside the development of an evolving coding structure supported a more in-depth thematic analysis of emerging themes and insights. subsequent levels of analysis involved articulating new conceptualizations arising from the data, which the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3, art. 6 doi: https://10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8309 6 were informed by the guiding theoretical perspectives and research questions (richards & morse, 2007; thorne, 2008). to establish trustworthiness of the data, two participants were invited to dialogue with the primary researcher with respect to the analysis and the key elements of meaningful involvement identified through the research. since the purpose of these follow-up discussions was to get an overall sense of the relevance of the analysis and the representation of the findings, and whether or not they resonated with participants, as opposed to assessing the accuracy of how each participant’s views were captured in the analysis, efforts were made to solicit meaningful feedback from a few select participants rather than systematically reviewing the findings with each participant. in particular, two indigenous participants with extensive policy experience who were working in indigenous health leadership roles within a large organization provided critical feedback and indicated that the overall thrust of the findings resonated with their experiences and represented a coherent account of the complexity of meaningful involvement in policy making. findings the findings are organized into three sections: a. wrestling with uncertainty, describing participants’ questioning on how to involve indigenous peoples in various settings; b. attuning to power dynamics, drawing on participants’ lived experiences at the decisionmaking table to illustrate the ways power inequities play out in policy and decision-making processes; and c. perspectives on meaningful involvement, outlining participants’ insights on what has worked, what has not, and what is needed for involving indigenous peoples in more meaningful ways. wrestling with uncertainty: immobilized by sensitivity to “doing the wrong thing” participants recognized the need to meaningfully involve indigenous peoples and reflected on the challenges. many non-indigenous participants wrestled with the question of how to meaningfully involve indigenous peoples in the face of historical and ongoing colonization. one non-indigenous participant explains: well i think that one of the big issues, of course, is the whole issue of [colonization] . . . how it also shapes the policies that we have in this country . . . [h]ow do you back away from a colonial sort of attitude . . . in relationships and build a trusting relationship between the aboriginal and non-aboriginal communities so that we can be working together on these public health issues? (p08) in wrestling with questions such as these, the participants echoed larocque’s (2010) stated belief, “the majority of non-native peoples in our country want to be fair and caring, not just replicating a history full of mistakes and some malefaction . . . nevertheless, our encounter is informed by colonization” (p. 14). some indigenous participants discussed the good intentions on the part of non-indigenous people working in policy to find ways of involving indigenous peoples in more meaningful ways; yet, despite fridkin et al.: the ripples of meaningful involvement published by scholarship@western, 2019 7 such intentions, the historical and ongoing nature of colonialism was identified by both indigenous and non-indigenous participants as a significant stumbling block to working together. although the participants displayed an acute awareness of the impact of colonialism on indigenous and non-indigenous encounters in policy decision-making, their interviews reflected an uncertainty about how to navigate these dynamics. this is illustrated in a debate within a health policy advisory group, which one non-indigenous participant describes: [w]hen the [group] first formed, one of its goals was to pay special attention to aboriginal peoples’ health. that was part of their mandate from the beginning and they never did it. there were endless arguments about, how are we going to incorporate that? would we have aboriginal representation in the [group]? if we did that, do we need it at all levels of the [group], not only at the general [group’s] table but at the expert groups as well? who would you choose? who’s credible? how would you keep this from being political? this argument went on and on and on and no-one could come to a conclusion. (p19) p19 continues to share an analysis of what underlies such debates: [i]n canada people who work in health who haven’t worked with first nations people aren’t comfortable working with first nations people . . . [they] are very reluctant to make decisions because they want to be very sensitive that they don’t do the wrong thing. and in being so sensitive to doing the wrong thing, they never do the right thing. because they feel so timid and cautious. (p19) like p19, other indigenous and non-indigenous participants explained how there is often a hesitancy to include indigenous peoples in decision-making that arises from a variety of fears, including making the wrong decisions, crossing jurisdictional boundaries, and receiving backlash from indigenous communities. several participants discussed the tendency for decision-making between indigenous peoples and non-indigenous peoples to be uncomfortable, and some participants explain that this discomfort stems from the legacy of colonialism and the history of tensions between indigenous peoples and governments. these discussions illustrate how the “psychology of colonialism lingers” in policy settings, (larocque, 2010, p. 6), and how policy decision-making environments may be illustrative of what larocque (2010) described as “the contested ground upon which we, the canadian colonizer– colonialist and native colonized, have built our troubled discourse” (p. 3). although non-indigenous participants wrestled with these uncertainties of knowing how to include indigenous peoples, some indigenous participants reiterated the need to find ways of working through these challenges. as one indigenous participant asserts, “aboriginal representation . . . [is] extremely difficult to do . . . at a policy meeting table, but it has to be [done]” (p17). in referring to indigenous representation as “extremely difficult to do,” this participant may be reflecting some of the challenges with representation that the non-indigenous participants described above, such as trying to determine who should be included and how, and considering the colonial context that continues to permeate indigenous and non-indigenous relationships. drawing from larocque’s (2010) assertion that both indigenous peoples and non-indigenous peoples “are challenged to attend to decolonization while keeping with our respective legacies,” and that ending indigenous peoples’ marginalization in society must be a “collective aspiration” (p. 14), the interviews highlight the need for insight on how to foster an the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3, art. 6 doi: https://10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8309 8 environment where indigenous peoples and non-indigenous peoples can work together within the colonial context towards a common policy goal. elbows up, shutting down: attuning to power dynamics participants’ lived experiences at policy decision-making tables revealed several ways underlying power dynamics play out at the decision-making table. one example of this is the inherent clash of paradigms that can be experienced when indigenous peoples participate in eurocentric decision-making processes. the interviews illustrate how decision-making tables are often more suited to dominant norms operating in government about how meetings ought to proceed. one indigenous participant (p09) explains, “it’s pretty common in the aboriginal community to find people . . . [who] are reflective. we want time to think about . . . things. but we’re against the clock.” p09 further explains: [t]he way that the meetings are run . . . you’ve got two hours, you’ve got this much agenda . . . you have to butt in and interrupt if you want to get something said. i’m so uncomfortable doing that . . . [i]t completely goes against my nature and i think this is a cultural nature that i have . . . i use that expression “elbows up” . . . [a]nd it’s so against my nature to be able to do it. so that is really, really difficult. (p09) indigenous participants also discussed how common it was for them to be the only indigenous person in the room and how this posed significant challenges when discussing indigenous issues. p09 describes being repeatedly asked to participate in meetings and speak to issues from an indigenous person’s perspective: i have to have a little bit of their knowledge plus aboriginal knowledge, right? . . . it’s hard to be an expert in everything, which is their expectation of me. and so it’s easy for them [the people at the table] to shut me down because they have more specific knowledge in their specific area than i do. (p09) these dynamics create a situation where even though an indigenous person is invited to participate in meetings to provide expertise on indigenous health, a hierarchy of knowledge systems creates an environment that makes it easy for indigenous individuals to be shut down at the table. the interviews further suggest that indigenous peoples are uniquely implicated when participating in decision-making on indigenous health issues, in that they are socially and politically located in the centre of the policy problem. indigenous participants explained how they often have to actively strategize on ways of bringing up the tough issues, such as racism, and how this can be exhausting, isolating and painful. reflecting on some participants’ observations that indigenous individuals will stop coming to meetings, p09 suggests, “maybe [indigenous people] don’t come because it’s . . . so uncomfortable. and maybe they’re just not feeling strong enough to be the conveyor of that message today.” these data illustrate how indigenous peoples are inequitably positioned at policy decision-making tables, and how these dynamics can create situations that push indigenous individuals away from participating in the process altogether. these findings may shed light on recent situations in canadian politics where indigenous leaders have resigned or stepped down from leadership positions due to intense public and political pressures, fridkin et al.: the ripples of meaningful involvement published by scholarship@western, 2019 9 bullying, or government refusal to adhere to their recommendations (see atleo, 2014; scott, 2019). when examining such situations in light of the analysis discussed in this article, indigenous leaders’ resignations can be understood within the context of policy environments that are often uniquely violent towards indigenous peoples who participate in them. considering these effects, a key factor enabling meaningful and sustainable involvement of indigenous peoples in health policy decision-making, is the way in which processes of involvement mitigate the effects of underlying power inequities. this includes recognizing and addressing power dynamics that contribute to indigenous peoples’ withdrawal and resignation from decision-making, and that ultimately foster indigenous peoples’ exclusion. the tokenism paradox: perspectives on meaningful involvement in sharing their perspectives on what constitutes meaningful involvement, participants provided many insights on how to involve indigenous peoples in meaningful ways. for example, several participants described how there was a tendency for indigenous individuals to be involved in decision-making in tokenizing ways, which some participants described as problematic. one indigenous participant (p12) explains how indigenous involvement often takes the form of “someone holding a feather or having an elder come to do an opening prayer,” which can have, “deep spiritual meaning [for indigenous peoples], but have very superficial effects on white people.” while commenting on the tendency for indigenous peoples to be primarily included in cultural ways, another indigenous participant shares: i worry that there’s a danger of us [indigenous people] tokenizing ourselves by putting [culture] as the number one thing that you can do. it’s easy to do, it costs you five minutes at your meeting, you don’t have to spend any money and, “oh there we’re done. we included aboriginal people.” (p09) dion stout (2008) suggests although indigenous cultural practices are often important to indigenous peoples’ identities, “this view becomes too narrow when it suggests that no one has to work hard on the non-cultural (social, political, economic) aspects of our lives” (p. 11). inviting indigenous peoples to participate solely in cultural ways may thus perpetuate the construction of indigenous peoples as primarily cultural beings and undermines the broad range of perspectives and knowledges indigenous peoples may contribute to policy development and decision-making. despite participants’ criticisms of the tendency for indigenous individuals to be involved as, in one indigenous participant’s words, “token indians” who are “not allowed to do anything” (p16), the interviews also suggest tokenism may present an opportunity for involvement. one indigenous participant explains: we cannot become . . . complicit with the appetite for tolerance . . . [but] in some spaces, that tokenism is a giant step forward. however . . . we can’t stop there . . . [y]ou’ve got to start where they’re at, but it doesn’t mean you’ve got to expect less. like prayer today, [but] how about next year we do something really radical, you know, besides a prayer. (p12) the perspective shared by this participant seems paradoxical: on the one hand, tokenism is problematic in that it can perpetuate the view that simply inviting an indigenous person to the table is enough, or that indigenous peoples only need to be included for the purpose of fulfilling presumed ideas about infusing meetings with a cultural element; yet, on the other, tokenism can be viewed as a potential opportunity the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3, art. 6 doi: https://10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8309 10 for indigenous peoples to have a seat at the table, especially when indigenous peoples have not been involved at all. when the fear of tokenism is used as justification to not include indigenous peoples at all, the tokenism paradox can be a helpful perspective in weighing the costs of tokenism versus the status quo of zero involvement. importantly, several participants spoke about the need to move beyond tokenism in order to involve indigenous peoples in more influential ways. one participant who identified as being of mixed indigenous and european ancestry explains: [y]ou can’t just think that in some kind of band aid way you get an indigenous person to the table and it’s gonna have any kind of influence. because there’s such a risk of tokenism and such a risk of [thinking], now we’ve included aboriginal people so therefore this . . . must be a better policy, not necessarily . . . [j]ust because you’re aboriginal doesn’t mean that you think outside of the dominant way of thinking. you know you can have somebody at the table that’s just as capable of saying, “oh, aboriginal people should just pull up their socks as their euro canadian counterparts.” (p01) in addition to critiquing the assumption that including one indigenous person will lead to better decisions, the findings highlight the need to involve indigenous individuals who view indigenous issues with an analytical lens that challenges dominant ways of thinking, and who are attuned to the structural forces that shape health and health inequities. the interviews also emphasized the need to focus on relationships between indigenous and nonindigenous parties involved in decision-making. participants spoke about tensions that exist as a result of colonial dynamics and shared examples of what has helped to build trust and good working relationships. one non-indigenous participant (p06) explained how this process incited a shift in relationship between the parties, which resulted in the indigenous group moving from an advisory role to becoming a partner in decision-making. other participants talked about the nature of partnership required for indigenous peoples and non-indigenous peoples to work together effectively. as this participant, who identified as indigenous, describes: [y]our players also have to be [engaged in] reciprocity [which] is very much . . . about personality. it’s the notion that you are true partners. when i talk about reciprocity . . . i mean very much the notion of having the right attitude, being committed to it, knowing that each are giving something and . . . both [government and indigenous] partners are winning in this. (p20) these findings point to the attitudes and sense of commitment among those involved as a significant factor in overcoming the stumbling block of historical and ongoing colonialism, reconciling relationships, and working together in ways that are different from the past. in their discussions on what enables meaningful involvement, several participants spoke about the impact of formalized agreements between indigenous and non-indigenous parties. one indigenous participant explains: we are attached to the [provincial agreement], if we didn’t have that we would have flat burnt out, we never would have gone anywhere . . . the business case [is] not good enough when it fridkin et al.: the ripples of meaningful involvement published by scholarship@western, 2019 11 comes to aboriginal issues. you have to have something really powerful to force people because if we didn’t have that, it wouldn’t happen. (p12) as in the example above, several indigenous participants talked about the importance of formalized agreements as key documents that held governments accountable to including indigenous peoples and confirming that indigenous peoples’ voices were heard. another indigenous participant shares: we’re not advisors in our own health, we are decision-makers . . . that's in the principles of the agreement. so whenever someone at the table says something like “we’re not allowed to change the form, we’re not allowed to change the policy, [or] we can’t do it like that,” the principles of the agreement [allow us]. (p17) the participants explained that effective formal agreements are not merely symbolic gestures of government commitments to including indigenous peoples and addressing indigenous health issues; they are legal documents that hold governments accountable to fulfilling their commitments. both indigenous and non-indigenous participants also shared how agreements have often led to establishing protocols and ways of working together that enable better participation. these findings resonate with the findings in cheema’s (2007) study, which show that “multi-directional accountability relationships” are a key factor in supporting the meaningful participation of indigenous peoples in health policy and planning (p. 29). indigenous participants explained how the agreements enable access to high-level decision-making tables that are typically inaccessible, which create situations where indigenous peoples have the ear of decision-makers. similarly, a non-indigenous participant explained that the influence of “champions” at senior levels of government has been helpful in pushing forward indigenous health agendas (p06). these data suggest that the involvement of high-level decision-makers may not only have an impact on the potential of decision-making processes to effectively change policy, but that this can facilitate indigenous issues getting on the policy agenda. in this way, the interviews reveal how legislating indigenous involvement can be a way of leveraging power: it compels those in power to take indigenous peoples’ agendas seriously. the data demonstrate that involving indigenous peoples in policy decision-making in more meaningful ways requires change at a deep structural level. one indigenous participant explains, “really what we’re talking about is change,” and further clarifies, “i’m talking about change that goes to the guts of the organization [in] how they think and how they act, and that requires doing things in a different way” (p12). although participants emphasized the challenges of trying to achieve this kind of structural change, they also reiterated the necessity for working towards this goal, as one indigenous participant asserts, “this change has to come . . . we can no longer say it can’t be done” (p16). the findings emphasize the need to articulate ways of disrupting the status quo approach of policy decision-making and achieving structural change, as this is needed to foster indigenous peoples’ involvement at a more meaningful and influential level. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3, art. 6 doi: https://10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8309 12 discussion: what constitutes meaningful involvement? there are several significant key findings that emerged from this research: a. even when the importance of involving indigenous peoples in decision-making is realized, the lack of clarity on what involvement should look like can prohibit any kind of involvement at all. b. when indigenous peoples are involved in a decision-making process, the inherent power imbalances between indigenous peoples and non-indigenous peoples and ongoing colonial dynamics shape the experience of indigenous peoples participating in the process and limit the extent of involvement. c. while involving indigenous peoples in ways that may be viewed as tokenizing can serve as a significant first step towards more meaningful involvement, there is a clear need to move beyond tokenism. meaningful involvement requires including indigenous peoples in more than only cultural ways (e.g., providing a cultural opening to a meeting), a commitment by all parties to reconcile relationships and work together in new ways, and formal agreements that mandate the inclusion of indigenous peoples and assert a mutual responsibility for decisions made. a critical analysis of the data reveals that meaningful involvement is often experienced as a paradox where indigenous peoples are excluded via processes of inclusion, and that fostering meaningful involvement requires attuning to the underlying power dynamics inherent in policymaking and taking action to decolonize and transform the policy system itself. this research provides insight into smye and browne’s (2002) question of whether or not indigenous peoples are involved in processes that “espouse the benefits of reform, in the absence of real material gains for aboriginal people” (p. 52). in order to inform thinking on how decision-making processes can become more meaningful, less harmful, and more beneficial to indigenous peoples, we need to conceptualize meaningful involvement in a way that considers how colonial dynamics shape the experience of indigenous peoples who are involved. in light of this consideration, we draw on the research findings to articulate a new conceptualization of meaningful involvement. the interviews point to the importance of involving indigenous peoples in ways that are not harmful and do not subsequently lead to withdrawal from process, but instead mitigate the multiple and sometimes covert ways racism and inequitable power dynamics play out at decisionmaking tables and throughout decision-making processes. in this sense, meaningful involvement means challenging and disrupting the status quo; it connotes an approach to decision-making that is transformative and decolonizing in its aim to disrupt the systemic exclusion of indigenous peoples from policy processes. these insights gained from the research as a whole inform thinking on what constitutes the key elements of meaningful involvement. the key elements of meaningful involvement to articulate a new conceptualization of meaningful involvement that is attuned to underlying power inequities and disrupting the status quo, we describe seven evidence-informed key elements of meaningful involvement based on a thematic analysis of the data: fridkin et al.: the ripples of meaningful involvement published by scholarship@western, 2019 13 a. recognizing and representing indigenous peoples— recognizing or acknowledging indigenous peoples and/or territories and taking efforts to have indigenous peoples represented at decision-making tables, even if tokenism seems like a false start and not a head start; b. interrupting and re-imagining relationships— actively interrupting the ways indigenous peoples and governments have historically worked together and re-defining working relationships based on a process of reconciliation; c. preparing agreements— establishing formal, written agreements between parties that articulate the nature of working relationships, mandate indigenous involvement in the process, commit both parties to sharing responsibility for addressing indigenous health issues, and hold parties jointly accountable for the decisions made in the process; d. practicing protocols—developing and implementing rules for indigenous peoples’ engagement in the process, as well as protocols to guide how the parties will work together and enact the relationships set out in formal agreements; e. leveraging power— taking efforts to foster a process that has the necessary power and sufficient capacity to make and implement health policy decisions, such as engaging the highest-level decision-makers in the process; f. exerting community authority— taking explicit efforts to foster a process that is being driven by indigenous community members, namely, indigenous individuals who are most connected to and familiar with the issues being addressed and who solely represent a community perspective; and g. shifting social structures— taking efforts towards addressing the systemic barriers impeding indigenous peoples’ involvement in policy, such as explicit efforts to incorporate indigenous paradigms and include, support and protect indigenous individuals in high-level positions in the mainstream policy system. while each of these key elements is rooted in the data collected for this project, they also align with perspectives in the literature. for example, the writings of indigenous and non-indigenous activists serve as a reminder that indigenous peoples’ attempts to engage with governments are still often ignored (the kino-nda-niimi collective, 2014), which highlights the importance of recognizing and representing indigenous peoples. reconciling and rebuilding relationships between indigenous peoples and nonindigenous peoples have been shown to play a critical role in the way indigenous peoples are involved in decision-making (cheema, 2007), which supports interrupting and re-imagining relationships. walia (2015) and regan (2005), among others, argue that non-indigenous peoples have a responsibility for decolonizing themselves and taking action to address indigenous justice issues, which underscore the emphasis on non-indigenous peoples’ responsibility and accountability in preparing agreements. ermine (2007) describes the need for clear rules of engagement to guide ethical interactions between indigenous peoples and non-indigenous peoples, which is reflected in practicing protocols. lessons learned from the creation of indigenous health institutions have demonstrated the importance of working with senior government partners (gallagher et al., 2015), which supports the ideas within leveraging power. turner (2006) and others assert that indigenous peoples need to determine who participates in processes or dialogues, which supports the goals of exerting community authority. finally, indigenous and non-indigenous scholars have called for the inclusion of indigenous peoples and knowledges in mainstream institutions as a way of decolonizing policy systems (fridkin, 2012; turner, 2006), which aligns with the objectives of shifting social structures. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3, art. 6 doi: https://10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8309 14 each of these elements may be understood as existing along a continuum, where each element builds on the previous one so that indigenous peoples are increasingly influential in the process. conceptualizing meaningful involvement as a continuum may help draw attention to the ways in which indigenous peoples are, and could be, more meaningfully and influentially involved. we also caution that these elements are not intended to represent a prescriptive list of criteria for what meaningful involvement will look like at every stage of every decision-making process, rather they are intended to inform thinking on how decision-making processes could involve indigenous peoples in more meaningful and influential ways. table 1 further articulates what each element entails and illustrates how each could be enacted in a policy decision-making process. ripples: a framework for meaningful involvement to facilitate an understanding of how enacting these elements of meaningful involvement could contribute to transforming and decolonizing health policy decision-making processes, we illustrate these elements in relation to each in figure 1. we refer to this framework as the ripples of meaningful involvement, with ripples being an acronym for the seven key elements described above: recognizing and representing indigenous peoples, interrupting and re-imagining relationships, preparing agreements, practicing protocols, leveraging power, exerting community authority, and shifting social structures. this framework illustrates the key elements of meaningful involvement along a continuum, which is represented by a series of concentric ripples. each “ripple” radiating outwards represents a key element of meaningful involvement in which indigenous peoples are increasingly more influential. the progression of ripples further illustrates how a single effort towards increasing indigenous representation could be seen an important first step towards more influential involvement. for example, if an indigenous person is involved in a tokenizing way, although problematic, this could be a first drop in creating a series of ripples toward including indigenous peoples in ways that are non-tokenizing and, eventually, in ways where inclusion is at a deeper, structural level. this is the ripple effect of meaningful involvement; as indigenous peoples become increasingly influential in policy decision-making, the policy system itself becomes increasingly effective in addressing indigenous health and social inequities. the ripples are set against a backdrop of decolonization to illustrate how the enactment of each element from one ripple to the next may represent a transformative shift towards decolonization of the wider policy system. each effort to include indigenous peoples in increasingly influential ways may work towards disrupting a eurocentric and colonial policy system and contribute to the advancement of indigenous peoples’ agendas and efforts towards sovereignty and self-determination. drawing on ritskes’ (2012) construction of decolonization as a goal rather an endpoint, meaningful involvement may be a goal to work towards rather than an endpoint to be achieved. it is a process of ongoing reflection and taking action to deepen the ways in which indigenous peoples are involved, and subsequently deepening the extent to which policy processes can improve indigenous peoples’ health and address health and social inequities. fridkin et al.: t he r ipples of m eaningful involvem ent published by scholarship@ w estern, 2019 1 t able 1. e nacting the k ey e lem ents of m eaningful involvem ent r ecognizing and r epresenting indigenous peoples interrupting and r e-im agining r elationships preparing a greem ents practicing protocols leveraging pow er exerting c om m unity a uthority shifting social structures purpose ● r ecognize indigenous peoples and/or indigenous territories and have indigenous individuals represented in the decisionm aking process ● c ritically exam ine the historical relationship betw een indigenous peoples and governm ents ● r econcile relationships betw een parties ● r e-im agine and re-define relationships based on reconciliation ● a rticulate and agree on the nature of the w orking relationship betw een parties ● establish a shared responsibility for addressing indigenous health ● a rticulate specifically how parties w ill w ork together in a w ay that honours the agreed upon relationship betw een parties and other com m itm ents outlined in agreem ents ● foster a process that has the pow er and capacity to m ake policy decisions ● foster a process that has sufficient capacity to fully im plem ent decisions m ade ● foster a process that has the capacity to develop good decisions and is effective in im proving indigenous health ● foster a process that is driven by indigenous com m unity m em bers w ho are im pacted by decisions ● a ddress system ic barriers im peding indigenous peoples' involvem ent in the m ainstream policy system o bjectives ● include indigenous peoples in the process, even if representation is tokenistic and like a false start, not a head start ● include or incorporate aspects of indigenous cerem ony or culture ● establish a new process for indigenous and governm ent groups to w ork together based on reconciled relationships ● a rticulate or define the nature of relationships betw een parties ● establish form al, legal agreem ents betw een parties that m andate indigenous involvem ent in decision-m aking and hold both parties jointly accountable to the process and to decisions reached ● establish rules of engagem ent or protocols to guide how the parties w ill w ork together ● include highlevel decisionm akers w ho have the pow er to m ake decisions at the sam e tables in w hich indigenous peoples are involved ● involve indigenous peoples at the outset and throughout the entire process ● foster a process that uses input from indigenous peoples and com m unities to drive the process and decisions ● incorporate indigenous paradigm s into indigenous policy decisionm aking ● include, support, and protect indigenous individuals in high-level policy positions in the m ainstream policy system t he international indigenous policy journal, v ol. 10, iss. 3, a rt. 6 d o i: https://10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8309 2 r ecognizing and r epresenting indigenous peoples interrupting and r e-im agining r elationships preparing a greem ents practicing protocols leveraging pow er exerting c om m unity a uthority shifting social structures exam ples of enacting m eaningful involvem ent ● r ecognize or acknow ledge indigenous peoples or traditional territory ● include opening or closing prayers or other traditional practices ● involve indigenous elders in decisionm aking or to lead traditional practices ● include at least one indigenous person w ho can represent the broad perspectives of indigenous peoples or the perspectives of a specific indigenous group at decisionm aking tables ● each party m eets on their ow n prior to discussions ● d esignate a bridge person to facilitate com m unication betw een parties ● o penly discuss each party’s interests, roles, and decisionm aking capacities ● w ork together on developing a process for indigenous engagem ent ● both parties w ork together to develop w ritten agreem ents that articulate relationships betw een parties and outline m utual com m itm ents ● form alize or legalize agreem ents to m andate or legislate indigenous involvem ent and hold all parties accountable to the process and to decisions m ade through the process ● d evelop and im plem ent protocols for com m unication w ith m edia or external groups ● d evelop and im plem ent ground rules to guide m eetings or discussions in w ays that m itigate silencing and dism issal of indigenous individuals, such as designating a leader to identify and address racism and/or racialized sexism at the table ● sign agreem ents betw een parties by the highest levels of all parties, such as m inisters, c eo s, or chiefs ● include the highest-level decision-m akers at the sam e tables as indigenous peoples and/or leaders ● include the highest-level decision-m akers from governm ents or policy institutions that have access to a large pool of resources ● a llocate sufficient resources for a full com m unity engagem ent process ● establish and im plem ent a rigorous process for using com m unity input to set priorities and drive the process ● include com m unity m em bers at every stage of the decision-m aking process and at the highest levels of decisionm aking ● u ndertake efforts to build indigenous policy decisionm aking capacity and experience (e.g., internships/ m entorships) ● t ake efforts to build governm ent capacity and experience in w orking w ith indigenous peoples and paradigm s (e.g., cultural safety training) ● c reate high-level policy positions for indigenous peoples ● c reate structures to support and retain indigenous leaders ● r ecognize indigenous peoples’ know ledge, experience, and expertise in hiring criteria fridkin et al.: t he r ipples of m eaningful involvem ent published by scholarship@ w estern, 2019 3 r ecognizing and r epresenting indigenous peoples interrupting and r e-im agining r elationships preparing a greem ents practicing protocols leveraging pow er exerting c om m unity a uthority shifting social structures r ole of indigenous peoples ● bring indigenous traditional or cultural perspectives to the process ● a dvise, provide input, or inform the discussion even if not participating in the actual decisionm aking (e.g., advisory com m ittee m em ber) ● provide input into developing new relationships and processes for w orking in partnership w ith governm ents ● d evelop agreem ents in partnership w ith governm ents ● share responsibility for decision-m aking as per agreem ents ● d evelop protocols in partnership w ith governm ents ● fully participate in discussions and processes as per agreem ents and protocols ● influence and participate in decision-m aking at the highest levels of governm ent, including decisions on spending or resource allocation ● d rive the process, including setting the agenda and determ ining w ho is involved in the process ● d eterm ine the policy issues and decide on policy solutions ● integrate indigenous paradigm s into policy discourses ● influence policy through taking on high-level positions in the m ainstream policy system w hile m aintaining autonom y in decision-m aking a spirational o utcom es ● indigenous peoples are present and involved in the process and have som e input into decisionm aking ● indigenous peoples are seen as partners in decision-m aking and recognized as respected, legitim ate leaders and contributors to the process ● indigenous people’s rights to be included in the process are recognized, protected, and upheld by all those involved in decision-m aking ● indigenous peoples feel safe, heard, and “em pow ered” through participating in decision-m aking; harm ful, stressful, or painful experiences associated w ith participating are reduced ● indigenous peoples have increased influence and control over policy decisions im pacting indigenous peoples’ health ● indigenous com m unity m em bers are valorized as experts in their ow n health and w ellness ● indigenous peoples’ experiential know ledge is valued and seen as integral to the decision-m aking process ● indigenous peoples are seen as integral and respected leaders and have increased access to health policy decision-m aking positions ● indigenous know ledge is recognized as a legitim ate form of know ledge and valued as an integral part of health policy decision-m aking the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3, art. 6 doi: https://10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8309 4 figure 1. the ripples of meaningful involvement the ripples of meaningful involvement is offered as framework to inform policy, research, and other decision-making processes with respect to how indigenous peoples could be more meaningfully and influentially involved in a policy or decision-making process. this framework is not intended to be a “one-size-fits-all” model for how indigenous peoples should ideally be involved in every process. instead, it is intended to be a heuristic device to stimulate further thinking and discussion on ways of meaningfully involving indigenous peoples in policy decision-making. we explicitly note that the intention of the ripples framework is not to introduce a new dominant discourse or way of thinking about meaningful involvement that should remain unchallenged, unmodified, or withheld from further refinement, but to offer a starting place, or perhaps in some contexts a continuing place, for thinking about how more meaningful involvement could be realized and fostered. limitations of the research consistent with the aims of qualitative inquiry, this study aims to make sense of and provide insight into a complex social problem (leung, 2015). this has implications for the generalizability of the findings, in that the perspectives gleaned from the data are not intended to make inferences about meaningfully involving indigenous peoples in every health policy decision-making context; rather, the findings aim to fridkin et al.: the ripples of meaningful involvement published by scholarship@western, 2019 5 provide insight into the broader question of how to foster meaningful involvement. in addition, while aligned with the overall paradigm of research in which all knowledge is considered to be socially constructed and imbued with inherent bias, the purposive sampling strategy may have contributed to recruitment of participants who share a similar set of experiences or perspectives, which could limit the range of experiences and perspectives that inform the findings. conclusion to continue moving towards decolonization and more meaningful and influential involvement of indigenous peoples in health policy, efforts are needed to confirm that attention is paid to assessing and improving processes of involvement. this 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(2015). decolonizing together: moving beyond a politics of solidarity toward a practice of decolonization. in the kino-nda-niima collective (ed.), the winter we danced: voices from the past, the future, and the idle no more movement (pp. 44-51). winnipeg, mb: arbeiter ring publishing. walker, r., moore, j., & linklater, m. (2011). more than stakeholders, voices and tables: towards coproduction of urban aboriginal policy in manitoba. in e. j. peters (ed.), urban aboriginal policy making in canadian municipalities (pp. 160-201). montreal, qc: mcgill-queen's university press. fridkin et al.: the ripples of meaningful involvement published by scholarship@western, 2019 11 wien, f. (1999). the royal commission report: nine steps to rebuild aboriginal economies. journal of aboriginal economic development, 1(1), 102-119. digital data management as indigenous resurgence in kahnawà:ke the international indigenous policy journal volume 6 | issue 3 article 6 june 2015 digital data management as indigenous resurgence in kahnawà:ke rob mcmahon university of alberta, rdmcmaho@ualberta.ca tim lahache kahnawà:ke education center, timothy.lahache@kec.qc.com tim w hiteduck first nations education council, twhiteduck@cepn-fnec.com recommended citation mcmahon, r. , lahache, t. , whiteduck, t. (2015). digital data management as indigenous resurgence in kahnawà:ke. the international indigenous policy journal, 6(3). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.6 digital data management as indigenous resurgence in kahnawà:ke abstract indigenous peoples are addressing the ongoing impacts of settler colonialism through a variety of expressions of community resurgence. among these initiatives are those leveraging digital technologies. in the emergent network society, digital infrastructures, and information and communication technologies are powerful tools that can support self-government. in this context, we document the development of digital data management in the mohawk community of kahnawà:ke. data is the digital information generated by a community, encompassing areas like research, education, finance, health, membership, housing, lands, and resources. as self-determining political entities, each first nation determines how this data is interpreted and used, supported by tools like data management platforms and information-sharing protocols. in this article, we show how local practices regarding the collection, use, and sharing of digital data in kahnawà:ke provides a clear example of indigenous resurgence. keywords first nations, digital data management, kahnawake, first mile, community information and communication technology (ict) development, data management policy, policy frameworks, broadband networks, community networks acknowledgments we want to acknowledge and thank the mohawk community of kahnawà:ke for supporting this research, and the interview participants who helped with this project. those people who consented to include their names are: tracey alfred, janice beauvais, natalie beauvais, jason calvert, joyce diabo, tyler diabo, rhonda kirby, chris leclaire, jackie leclaire, petal mccomber, and terry white. the kahnawà:ke education council provided administrative support for this research. the authors also thank their colleagues at the first nations innovation (fni) project at the university of new brunswick, and in particular primary investigator, dr. susan o’donnell, who provided detailed feedback in an earlier version of this article. the fni project has been funded since 2006 by the social sciences and humanities research council of canada (sshrc), with in-kind contributions from the project partners. for more information, please visit: http://fn-innovationpn.com the authors thank the anonymous reviewers for their helpful feedback. an earlier version of this paper was presented at the annual conference of the canadian sociological association in st. catherines, ontario, may 25–30, 2014. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ d i g i t a l d a t a m a n a g e m e n t a s i n d i g e n o u s r e s u r g e n c e i n k a h n a w à : k e indigenous peoples in canada are addressing the ongoing impacts of settler colonialism through diverse expressions of everyday community resurgence (alfred, 2009; corntassel, 2012; simpson, 2011), including developing strategies of interaction with the network society (beaton & campbell, 2014; o’donnell, kakekaspan, beaton, walmark, & gibson, 2011). in this context, digital infrastructures and information and communication technologies (icts) are powerful tools that can support selfgovernment and nation rebuilding. one element of these expressions of indigenous resurgence through icts is the control and ownership of digital data. our article explores how the mohawk community of kahnawà:ke is setting up and using ict systems to manage their community data to support selfdetermination. in this context, community data encompasses research, education, finance, health, membership, housing, lands and resources, and other areas. across canada, first nations and their community intermediary support organizations (mcmahon, gurstein, beaton, o’donnell, & whiteduck, 2014) are establishing a range of projects to retain and use community data. kahnawà:ke is working with its partners in the first nations education council (fnec) to set up a data management system. their work is guided by the assembly of first nations’ e-community strategy, a holistic planning approach to ict development created and adopted by first nations (whiteduck, 2010; whiteduck, beaton, burton, & o’donnell, 2012). the e-community strategy suggests that data and data management tools, competencies, and capacities help with planning and decision-making, which support the goals of indigenous resurgence and strengthened first nations communities. as a component of its e-community work, fnec partnered with the kahnawà:ke education council (kec) to develop and implement a customized digital data management system called cano, now being rolled out to other first nations across the province of québec. the cano initiative is part of a larger struggle to rebuild first nations’ education systems in the context of settler colonialism. this process involves negotiations with provincial and federal levels of government regarding the jurisdiction, administration, and funding of first nations data. this work is linked to the first nations student success program (fnssp), which is managed by aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc). a requirement for fnssp funding is that first nations provide reports on community educational results for the purposes of accountability. the indigenous organizations discussed in our article set up their own data management system to address these requirements. this work on data management began at the start of fnssp, when fnec and its partners proposed creating both a data management system specific to first nations schools in québec, and a set of formal protocols to guide its use. as an early-stage adopter of this process and technology, kahnawà:ke’s experience demonstrates how community data management consists of interactions between governance decisions (policies and protocols), technical architectures (infrastructure, connectivity, and devices), data management platforms (cano), and human resource capacities (including training). our community-based research project was designed in partnership with fnec and kec over a period of several months. fnec and kec have worked together for many years and, since 2008, fnec has been part of the first nations innovation (http://fn-innovation-pn.com/) and first mile (http://firstmile.ca) projects based at the university of new brunswick. research was approved by kec and the mohawk council of kahnawà:ke, and was supported through a formal memorandum of 1 mcmahon et al.: digital data management published by scholarship@western, 2015 understanding (mou) between the university researchers and the mohawk council. the research ethics board at the researchers’ home university reviewed the research protocol. our research triangulates data from interviews, documentary research (proposals, reports, and presentations), and community site visits. these visits took place in two phases: initial planning in september 2013, and two weeks of community interviews in february 2014. kec staff set up meetings, assisted with interviews, and provided background information. the research team conducted semistructured interviews with 22 community members involved in data management in several community organizations, including the step-by-step early childhood program, two elementary schools (kateri school and karihwanoron mohawk immersion school), the high school (kahnawà:ke survival school), a social service organization (kahnawà:ke shakotiia'takenhas community services, or kscs), and a health organization (onkwata’karitáhtshera). questions focused on how employees of community service organizations (primarily in the education sector) conceive of and use data, and sought to identify both opportunities as well as challenges regarding the role that data management plays in supporting self-government and indigenous resurgence. d i g i t a l d a t a m a n a g e m e n t a n d i n d i g e n o u s r e s u r g e n c e i n c a n a d a in the past decade, indigenous scholars have articulated new ways to think about self-determination and decolonization in the context of settler colonialism. this literature of indigenous resurgence has foregrounded the fundamental role of land, place-based identities, resistance to colonization, and everyday practices (alfred & corntassel, 2005). its proponents have emphatically stressed that “decolonization is not a metaphor,” but rather a historically constituted process rooted in struggles over land and requiring material change (tuck & yang, 2012.). from this perspective, the existence and persistence of indigenous peoples “is in large part lived as determined acts of survival against colonizing states’ efforts to eradicate them culturally, politically and physically” (alfred & corntassel, 2005, p. 598; see also palmater, 2011). these “acts of survival” reflect lived experiences that take place across a variety of fields, encompassing the many ways that indigenous peoples are connecting to their communities, cultures, and homelands. as hunt (2014) has written: “indigeneity is not just an idea. it is not just words on a screen, theorizations, discourse analysis or a series of case studies. indigeneity is also lived, practiced, and relational” (p. 29). from this perspective, decolonization and resurgence are expressed in everyday acts that continually resist the structures and effects of colonialism and support the political and cultural renewal of indigenous communities (alfred & corntassel, 2005). everyday acts of resurgence can be difficult for many indigenous communities given the political and socio-economic challenges they face. their challenges are compounded due to the efforts of powerful economic and political entities to gain access to resources located on indigenous lands. in some cases, compensation is provided and consultations take place but such activities do not always result in sustainable and positive outcomes for communities. as waziyatawin (2012) has pointed out, “with promises of job training, education, and services, indigenous people are baited into abandoning the struggle to defend the land and to actually participate in or help facilitate the destruction [of it]” (p. 73). these conflicts present deep challenges to decolonization efforts, but they do not prevent them. indigenous communities and individuals engage in everyday practices that counteract the ongoing effects of settler colonialism on a continual basis. this frames indigenous pathways to decolonization 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.6 and self-determination through the continual renewal of responsibilities, activities, and relationships taking place inside communities (corntassel, 2012). in this article, we suggest that community-based data management is an everyday practice of indigenous resurgence. in building and utilizing the resources, capacities, and tools that support their management of community data, indigenous peoples are establishing infrastructures and relationships to help sustain and grow their communities. put differently, community data management provides another tool that indigenous peoples are using to counter settler colonialism and enact self-determination. we are conscious of the potential of this argument to slide into technological determinism—that digital tools are assumed to automatically support indigenous efforts to decolonize and rebuild their nations. the development and use of icts is fraught with uncertainty, and can in fact exacerbate the effects of settler colonialism, such as when digital infrastructures accelerate centralizing processes of control and extraction into indigenous territories. however, icts can also be shaped to decentralize power to communities. indigenous peoples have always developed and used technologies to support their selfdetermined needs, as innovators and inventors. as wane (2013) has written, regardless of the mediums they take shape in or the tools they employ, activities of indigenous resurgence hold potential to support and reflect indigenous cultures and traditions. [t]he politics of reclamation is about taking something old and making it new again. it is about recognizing that culture shifts with time, location, and the social and political challenges that we face as communities. but, perhaps more than anything else, reclamation is about rediscovering the central tenants of our indigenous cultures and applying them to our present context. (p. 94) an important part of indigenous resurgence is the ability of indigenous peoples to retain control over their knowledge. however, in the context of settler colonialism the collection and use of information— or data—held by indigenous peoples has become troubled. external organizations and individuals extracted informational resources held by indigenous communities to use for their own purposes (menzies, 2004; tuhiwai smith, 1999). as bruhn (2014) wrote, in canada these challenges continue today, given “long-standing colonial relationships, experiences of vulnerability to decision-makers, claims of jurisdiction, and concerns about collective privacy” (p. 1). in recent decades, these challenges have continued as federal government agencies have increased the accountability requirements for reporting and funding proposals that are associated with the services that first nations organizations are responsible for delivering (see gibson, o'donnell & rideout, 2007). at the same time, indigenous peoples in canada have explored ways to retain the information generated by their communities. the report of the royal commission on aboriginal peoples (rcap, 1996), published in 1996 but involving a process that began in 1991, stipulates the need for indigenous communities to have complete control of information pertaining to different aspects of community life, including health, education, and culture. these data management practices reflect the goals and focus of indigenous resurgence. over time, this focus was expressed in four principles: ownership, control, access, and possession (ocap™ ). in 1998, first nations formally articulated the four principles of ocap™ for data management (assembly of first nations [afn], 2007). the first formal application of these principles was through the national aboriginal health organization (naho) to protect aboriginal control over health data: the steering committee of the first nations regional longitudinal 3 mcmahon et al.: digital data management published by scholarship@western, 2015 health survey expressed this control as an application of self-determination in research (schnarch, 2004).1 since then, the four ocap™ principles “have become the de facto ethical standard not only for conducting research using first nations data, but also for the collection and management of first nations information in general” (fnigc, 2014, p. 1). an afn (2007) document has outlined the four principles in detail (see p. 5). ownership refers to the relationship of a first nation to its knowledge, data, and information. control reflects the aspirations and inherent rights of first nations, including in areas associated with data management. access refers to the right of first nations to gain access to, manage, and make decisions regarding information and data about their communities—wherever it is held. finally, possession refers to the need for first nations to retain their data, rather than it being housed in external organizations. building on the ocap principles, first nations have developed protocols pertaining to the collection, use, and sharing of community data. these protocols serve as guidelines for indigenous resurgence. for example, indigenous oral traditions include a complex set of rights and responsibilities concerning the use of community-held information (afn, 2007). these traditions, undertaken by indigenous communities on a continual basis, have served as a means to support social, economic, political, and cultural renewal at a time before settler colonialism (culhane, 1998). through these traditions, indigenous peoples organized how their information was managed. jurisdiction rested with individual communities, with each autonomous first nation holding the right to determine how its information was interpreted and shared with external groups. according to the afn (2007), the principles of ocap™ emerged as a means to adopt and adapt these traditional practices in the contemporary context of settler colonialism and self-government. they provided a formal means for first nations to assert control over their data that also recognized and respected their traditional practices. in the contemporary context, when engaging with groups like government agencies or academic institutions, ocap™ provides a basis for legislative and policy protection of indigenous knowledge. ocap™ principles also remain rooted in the lived realities of people and communities: since each first nation is unique, it decides how community information is collected, managed, analyzed, and disseminated. but, as noted earlier, due to the ongoing effects of settler colonialism many structural and operational barriers limit the application of ocap™ in practice. for example, federal and provincial legislation like the access to information act and the library and archives of canada act compels first nations to share information with third-party organizations and the public (see fnigc, 2014). another challenge relates to access: first nations often cannot access administrative data and records about their citizens in the possession of third parties such as government agencies (bruhn, 2014). many people in first nations also lack information about or knowledge of ocap™ principles (fnigc, 2014). 1 naho, set up to address the needs of first nations, inuit, and mé tis peoples, closed in june 2012 after the federal government, through health canada, cut its funding. although naho’s funding has ended, ocap™ remains in place, and today is associated with (and trademarked by) the first nations information governance centre (fnigc), and also tied to the work of the assembly of first nations. in the past, the first nations statistical institute was also tied to this work, but in 2012 the federal government also cut this organization’s funding. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.6 given these challenges, first nations are undertaking various strategies to raise awareness of and implement ocap™ principles. these diverse initiatives, which we position as expressions of indigenous resurgence, are taking place inside local communities, at regional levels, and through national groups (mi'kmaw kina'matnewey, first nations education council [fnec], & keewaytinook okimakanak, 2013). they involve first nations advocating for policy and regulatory supports for ocap™ principles, for example through first nation privacy laws (fnigc, 2014). first nations are also working with third party organizations to develop protocols regarding the collection, management, and sharing of information among stakeholders. for example, chapter 9 of the 2nd edition of the tri-council policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans (tcps2) (research involving the first nations, inuit, and métis peoples of canada) outlines specific guidelines for first nations' control of data associated with research projects (canadian institutes of health research, national sciences and engineering research council of canada, & social sciences and humanities research council of canada, 2010).2 another example of such protocols are the regional and local agreements worked out between first nations and third parties that restrict data sharing to minimal levels required by law or contract. one well-known example is the first nations regional health survey (rhs) administered by the fnigc (fnigc, 2014). in the past, large numbers of first nations people living on-reserve were not included in major national health surveys due both to the difficulties of accessing remote communities as well as resistance among some first nations people in participating in research carried out by external parties like federal agencies. health authorities therefore lacked basic information, such as the number of first nations people with diabetes. the first nations rhs sought to address this challenge through working with health canada and other health authorities, regional first nations organizations, and local communities to collect information about the physical, emotional, spiritual, mental, environmental, economic, and social factors that determine health. ownership, control, access, and possession of this data remained with the participating first nations. local community members carried out fieldwork and political leaders provided consent to this process, while data is housed at the fnigc and first nation data centers (bruhn, 2014). along with establishing protocols, first nations are also building internal capacities to control their data assets. this work involves various partners who engage first nations in the research process and support their ownership and control over data. partners also benefit, since the knowledge they draw on is collected, interpreted, and validated in cooperation with the people and communities involved. some first nations are setting up data management platforms in local communities, often in partnership with regional community intermediary organizations. for example, the membertou data centre in the province of nova scotia houses community data, manages network connectivity, and provides technical support services to its first nations members. the specifics of these activities are outlined in formal agreements between the data centre and its indigenous member communities.3 2 read chapter 9 here: http://www.ethics.gc.ca/eng/policy-politique/initiatives/tcps2-eptc2/chapter9chapitre9/ 3 for more information about the data centre, see http://membertoucorporate.com/data-centre or to watch a short video visit: https://vimeo.com/23907575 or http://firstnationhelp.com/fibre 5 mcmahon et al.: digital data management published by scholarship@western, 2015 these various data management initiatives are also informed by the e-community strategy developed by first nations and ratified by the chiefs-in-council of the afn (whiteduck, 2010). this strategy outlined how the federal government can support community technology development, and includes data management as a component of this process (o’donnell, milliken, chong & walmark, 2010). in the context of data management, the e-community strategy has supported the efforts of first nations and their partners to house data, generate customized products and services, offer relevant training, support staff, provide technical support, manage partnerships and protocols, and develop common indicators for data analysis. in the remaining sections, we provide a case study of how this e-community data management process emerged in the mohawk community of kahnawà:ke, positioning it as a concrete example of indigenous resurgence. our discussion illustrates how staff in these organizations manage and use community data in partnership and negotiation with both internal as well as external organizations. c o m m u n i t y b a s e d d a t a m a n a g e m e n t i n k a h n a w à : k e t h e f i r s t n a t i o n s e d u c a t i o n c o u n c i l : a n i n t e r m e d i a r y o r g a n i z a t i o n s u p p o r t i n g k a h n a w à : k e ’ s d a t a m a n a g e m e n t s t r a t e g y a holistic e-community environment includes several components: technical architectures (infrastructure, connectivity), data management systems, governance (policies and practices), and personnel (skills and capacities). among first nations in québec, efforts to establish this environment are guided through partnerships with the first nations education council (fnec). founded over two decades ago, fnec represents 22 member communities4 from eight nations in the province: abenaki, algonquin, atikamekw, huron, malecite, mi’gmaq, mohawk, and the innu community of mashteulash (see figure 1). mandated by its member communities to advocate first nations control of education, the fnec provides many services that include programs in education, special education, technology, youth training and employment, and aboriginal languages. it works with federal agencies and first nations to manage funding and programs to support educational initiatives in its member schools and communities. fnec currently provides education services to an approximate combined student enrollment of 7,000. as a first nation community intermediary organization, fnec’s mission includes developing, implementing, and executing technology initiatives in ways that realize the needs and priorities of its members. authority for decision-making rests with member communities, who engage fnec to support local initiatives. since its inception, the chiefs of fnec’s member first nations have tasked the organization to undertake consultation, support, and advocacy activities. inside member communities, fnec’s technology division helps establish broadband connections distributed across public sector organizations. key regional initiatives include deploying a network of videoconference systems and an initiative to install fibre optic infrastructure in all member communities (whiteduck & beaton, 2014). 4 cacouna, kipawa, gesgapegiaq, gespeg, kahnawà:ke, kanesatake, kitcisakik, kitigan zibi, lac barriere, lac simon, listuguj, manawan, mashteuiatsh, odanak, opitciwan, pikogan, timiskaming, wemotaci, wendake, winneway, wolf lake, and wôlinak. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.6 f i g u r e 1 . map of fnec member communities. both projects involve partnerships with government agencies including aandc, health canada, and the province of québec. fnec offers technology services including connectivity, equipment, training, web and email hosting, and technical support. cost-effective high-speed internet and videoconferencing services are secured through agreements that outline special rates and interconnection options with three private sector telecommunications carriers in québec. by pooling technical and financial resources and supporting economies of scale, fnec can achieve significant cost savings for member communities. for data management, fnec supports its member first nations to adopt the cano (student information system) platform—which is available in both official languages—and makes it available free of charge to schools that are part of aandc’s first nations student success program (fnssp). local education authorities use the web-based cano application to manage educational data and produce reports. first introduced in 2010 as a pilot project, by 2013 all of fnec’s member communities with schools adopted the cano system for attendance and report card management (fnec, 2014). fnssp provides supports to first nations educators in literacy, numeracy, and student retention (aandc, 2014) such as resources to develop and implement student learning assessments, performance measurements, and school success plans—all of which involve data management between regional organizations like fnec and their partner communities. this work involves demonstrating how data can help measure student achievement and progress. teachers can save time on tasks like tracking attendance, calculating grades, writing report records, searching for student information, and supporting behavioral plans. administrators use cano to manage finances, budgets, and human resources. the system can also track staff, and is used to allocate staffing resources. it supports strategic planning, allowing administrators to distribute resources and funds to various service areas according to evidence-based planning. to track this work, fnssp established a series of indicators for things such as data collection, analysis, and reporting. first nations use a school data management system like cano to complete these assessment activities, which are mandatory to receive federal funding for education. 7 mcmahon et al.: digital data management published by scholarship@western, 2015 fnec has technically modified cano to support indigenous data and information management protocols and practices, and to reflect ocap principles. the cano system provides first nations with a means to share community data with third-party organizations like government agencies in ways that allow them to retain ownership, control, access, and possession of their information. fnec, as an intermediary organization between first nations communities and government agencies, provides resources to assist with this work, including policies outlining data management responsibilities and requirements, and forms to guide privacy and confidentiality standards. fnec also provides support in the implementation of cano to help it meet the needs of diverse communities. the organization provides training for staff in communities who manage local data collection and use. as the cano system is rolled out, fnec has been working to streamline this process. as one of the first communities to utilize the system, kahnawà:ke provides valuable lessons for others engaged in this work. fnec’s member communities are at different levels of data management capacity, and so the regional organization is working with them to assess readiness and assist in the transition to the system. in the following sections, we outline how educational organizations in kahnawà:ke set up and use cano for their community data management practices in order to help inform this work in other first nations. the following discussion draws from interviews with people working on data management in community service organizations. to protect their privacy, we use an anonymous code (k1, k2, etc.) when citing these individuals. k a h n a w à : k e ’ s t e c h n i c a l a r c h i t e c t u r e f o r c o m m u n i t y d a t a m a n a g e m e n t adequate digital infrastructure and connectivity are key to supporting and sustaining community data management. this technical infrastructure must be secure, scalable, customizable, and interoperable. once in place, it supports data transfer both inside and outside a community and allows system users to access various applications, including data management tools such as cano. a technical infrastructure includes physical networks, connectivity, devices, and software and applications. kahnawà:ke has secured ownership and control over its physical networks and facilities, with the result that community organizations are now leveraging them for various broadband-enabled applications, including digital data management. over time, the community has set up a secure network called tewatati that interconnects several community institutions, including three schools, emergency services (fire hall and police station), the hospital, an economic development organization, and the mohawk council.5 more recently, in 2011, the fnec supported the community to complete fiber optic expansion of the tewatati network across 14 public sectors. inside kahnawà:ke’s education sector, tewatati greatly improved connectivity in the schools and administrative offices of the kahnawà:ke education centre. today, staff and students can access a 100mb connection set up in partnership with fnec. this infrastructure enabled full wi-fi coverage, smart board diffusion, videoconferencing, and consideration of a voice-over-ip telephone system in the education sector. while this system provides technical supports for community data management, it also involves the social relationships that are described in the next section. 5 for a more detailed description of the network’s development, please see mcmahon, lahache, & whiteduck (2014). 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.6 d a t a g o v e r n a n c e i n k a h n a w à : k e ( p o l i c i e s a n d p r o c e s s e s ) technical infrastructure is a key enabling factor for community data management. however, its effective use is contingent on a corresponding social infrastructure that outlines the rights and responsibilities of different stakeholders. this includes the development and application of standards, data sharing agreements, and privacy and security policies (fnigc, 2014). such arrangements outline roles, responsibilities, and accountabilities, and clarify details on the planning, delivery, and evaluation of communication data (bruhn, 2014). they address the balance between local control over the process and a regional or “community aggregate” approach that leverages economies of scale. understandably, concerns can sometimes arise over these agreements, which involve many considerations around ocap™ principles. communities, organizations, and individuals hold different values and approaches to the management of data. for this reason, the arrangements described in this section reflect the careful negotiation of boundaries and agreements among parties. they seek to balance the diverse needs of the people and organizations involved in community data governance. as a component of its work on the cano system, fnec and its member communities jointly established protocols guiding data management practices after several rounds of discussion and feedback (fnec, 2014). fnec identified the need for these protocols during the early stages of the fnssp program, when it proposed the creation of community-managed data systems in first nations schools in québec. the organization worked with its member communities to establish a draft protocol to guide the data management process associated with these systems. after circulating a discussion document to communities, fnec incorporated feedback and formally presented the protocol during a general assembly of first nations in québec. guided by a data management committee that includes three fnec community representatives, the protocol addressed the collection and use of community data as well as privacy and confidentiality. modeled on ocap principles, it outlined procedures regarding the assignment of role-based access to cano, and how community educational data is housed and managed by fnec. the draft protocol was ratified at a general assembly in september 2014, and was subsequently distributed to first nations for review and signing. at time of writing (november, 2014) nine first nations had formally signed this agreement. several others proposed changes that fnec will incorporate in a new version of this document. this process reveals the importance of ensuring community input in each stage of establishing a protocol for community data management. in the following section, we describe three forms of data governance in kahnawà:ke among organizations in the educational sector, between different community organizations in kahnawà:ke, and between kahnawà:ke educational organizations and external organizations (specifically government agencies). figure 2 provides a conceptual model of this process. d a t a m a n a g e m e n t i n s i d e k a h n a w à : k e ’ s e d u c a t i o n a l s e c t o r as noted above, educational organizations in kahnawà:ke interconnect through a shared technical infrastructure used to transfer data among the three community schools and the kec administrative offices. for example, starting in 2013, elementary and high schools began using cano to support the transfer of student files and records. kec supports this work through an on-staff registrar, with fnec acting as a regional data steward and support organization. kec and fnec developed formal policies as guidelines for staff in these data management processes. 9 mcmahon et al.: digital data management published by scholarship@western, 2015 f i g u r e 2 . data management in kahnawà:ke. this work is encoded in the technical design of the cano system (see mcmahon, lahache & whiteduck, 2014). cano was designed to provide a user-friendly, customized interface. school staff and administrators use different applications to manage data in areas like finances, budgets, and human resources. during our interviews with staff in kahnawà:ke’s educational sector, everyone involved felt that the cano system met their needs. however, some people also pointed out challenges regarding its reliability at certain times. for example, several noted that during past report card times, when many people are using the system simultaneously, it was unstable and prone to crash. that said, some participants noted that this issue was resolved when the database servers were moved from kec to fnec. others noted that attendance tracking does not always work properly. interview participants felt confident in cano and expressed trust that data housed with fnec were secure and managed properly; however, not everyone interviewed was aware where data was stored. most interview participants also stressed the importance of privacy and confidentiality regarding the data with which they work. this was particularly the case with student data, and especially for students with special needs. one way that privacy and confidentiality is maintained in cano is through kec managing user roles and access to different parts of the system. while some participants noted glitches 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.6 (such as not being able to access required information, or being able to access more information than was needed) most people expressed satisfaction with this arrangement. s h a r i n g d a t a b e t w e e n c o m m u n i t y o r g a n i z a t i o n s i n k a h n a w à : k e while data sharing inside kahnawà:ke’s educational institutions (schools and kec) is relatively open, the process is more controlled for sharing educational data with the broader community. this is partly due to a perception among some staff that some community members are critical of kahnawà:ke’s educational system. several interview participants noted that in the past the schools were very popular, but in recent years this has declined, and many community members now send their children to attend schools in montréal. some staff members believed this was due to a lack of information and public awareness about school programs and successes. one person stated, “we have the greatest schools and no one knows it” (k22). this perception has led to a protective stance among community education staff regarding data sharing with community members in general: our own community is our own worst enemy. . . so we’re very protective of everything all the time. . . [data] only stays with us. i wouldn’t want that information at council, community services, anywhere. that information has to stay within education. (k22) other research about first nations data management revealed similar tensions regarding data sharing among community organizations. for example, bruhn (2014) interviewed a number of data management professionals in regional first nations organizations and government agencies like health canada and aandc. these people explained the need to integrate disparate data sources—now dispersed in siloed programs and jurisdictions—around individual first nation citizens in a more holistic way. however, it is challenging to do so given a lack of trust among involved parties. this approach is similar to the e-community strategy, which proposed a cross-sectoral approach to community data management and technology development more generally (whiteduck, 2010). several interview participants in kahnawà:ke expressed their support for holistic data sharing among community organizations. however, they also recognized the silos in place today. community services are band council programs but administered independently; they also manage data independently and do not generally engage in data sharing. several people felt that sharing data among these organizations would require major administrative shifts. for example, at present step-by-step’s6 databases are neither technically nor socially integrated with the cano system used in local elementary schools, which raises challenges for students transitioning between schools after early childhood education. in one person’s words: “in theory, we are all supposed to share and be open about what we have. we’re all part of this group. but in practice, we’re kind of protective to a certain extent” (k11). local politics are also a challenge, particularly in small, tight-knit communities like kahnawà:ke. at the same time, some people said they “absolutely” share data with other community organizations through a blend of formal 6 the step-by-step child and family centre (tsi ionterihwaienhstahkwa ne kahwatsiranór:ron) was founded 25 years ago as an inclusive centre for young children in kahnawà:ke. at that time, seven mothers who had children with disabilities set up the centre since there was no school in the community that could accommodate their children. according to the program’s website, step-by-step provides “inclusive early intervention and preventive educational and training programs to ‘multi-handicapped, developmentally delayed and ‘at risk’ preschoolers and their families within their own community” (step-by-step, n.d., para. 1). 11 mcmahon et al.: digital data management published by scholarship@western, 2015 protocols and informal relationships. however, several interview participants noted that the process has not been easy. in one person’s words: it’s taken a lot of time for anyone to be able to give up any information that they’ve had. especially when it comes to community services . . . but i think that over the years all of the organizations are starting to realize that they need to work together in order to have, you know, productive, healthy community members.” (k13) trust-building as well as frequent contact among parties can help address this issue (bruhn, 2014). in kahnawà:ke, several community organizations established a formal mechanism to do this in the 1990s through the quality improvement accountability framework.7 this framework led to the creation of the executive directors’ committee (edc), composed of the executive directors of the nine major community service organizations. although two organizations (including kec) are no longer part of the edc group, it continues to meet on a monthly basis to discuss common issues, such as gaps and overlaps in service delivery, and to streamline and pool resources and secure cost savings. the edc develops mou’s outlining roles and responsibilities to guide how different community organizations work together. it is moving towards establishing common data sharing protocols. s h a r i n g d a t a w i t h e x t e r n a l o r g a n i z a t i o n s kahnawà:ke community organizations also share data with third-party entities like federal government agencies. bruhn (2014) noted that program and service delivery depends on productive partnerships between federal agencies and first nations communities. in the case of kahnawà:ke, fnec acts as an intermediary between community organizations and government agencies like aandc. it does not share any kahnawà:ke data directly with external government agencies (or other groups). to ensure that this process does not undermine community control over data, as discussed earlier, fnec has developed an information management policy that includes guidelines around the creation, development, access and delivery, monitoring, and measurement of community educational data. to implement this policy in their reporting to aandc, fnec staff work with a kec staff member designated as the fnssp coordinator. this individual generates a report from community data that fnec sends to aandc. this work is guided by a protocol established by fnec called the fnec program and submission report deadlines for communities (currently being ratified by communities). data is entered into the cano system from various collection points in the school system and organized according to classifications hard-coded in cano. schools then use cano to generate reports from this data according to requirements set by government funding agencies. these reports are collated by the fnssp coordinator and filed according to a set of protocols established by fnec and kec. every month the fnssp coordinator meets with a group of around 10 administrators, resource teachers, and teachers from all grade levels to discuss these reports, go over the school success plan, and identify any additional resources that may be needed. finally, the reports are sent to fnec, which then transmits them to aandc. 7 the quality improvement accountability framework is open to the public and community members by contacting the kahnawà:ke education centre office. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.6 trust is a clear challenge with regards to community organizations sharing their data with external organizations like aandc. the 1996 report of the royal commission on aboriginal peoples noted that “data gathering has frequently been imposed by outside authorities, [and so] it has met with resistance in many quarters” (rcap, 1996, p. 4; also cited in bruhn, 2014). several interview participants expressed concerns that community data can be used by third-party organizations in ways that lack context or are detrimental to their needs (k10). a clear example of a trust challenge regarding community data in kahnawà:ke is the potential impacts of the proposed first nations education act. many people in kahnawà:ke strongly resisted the act, as was evidenced in public demonstrations and opposition letters written by local leadership to the federal government.8 no one interviewed was in support of the act, though some people were more specific in their criticisms than others. some people saw the proposed act as a means for external organizations to increase their access to community educational data. in one person’s words: “to me it’s a concern if it’s [data] going directly into the hands of government or someone else that we don’t know” (k21). others felt that the act might undermine the community’s ability to manage the schools and educational system. some felt it would impact funding and budgets, which limits the ability of community organizations to plan and manage their resources. others felt it would increase monitoring. for example, one person noted that the proposed act required the community to hire a school inspector, and, if they did not reach their fnssp goals, the government could appoint a third-party manager. another concern was the lack of provisions for culture and education in the proposed act, which some felt might affect the viability of the mohawk immersion school. a related concern was about the potential impact of the proposed act on staffing, since teachers at the immersion school are sometimes hired for their mohawk language abilities, rather than for their formal provincial accreditation. these concerns were also held by people in organizations not directly affected, such as step-by-step. as a feeder system for schools in kahnawà:ke, staff at this organization remained concerned about issues around the professional accreditation of teachers, postsecondary funding, and culture and language support. in one person’s words: i think the [proposed] education act is looking at data. looking at data, at some communities that are poor. i think that’s the way government is using data to say look these schools are inadequate. and because of that, the kids going to school, we need to demolish the schools in the community and they need to go to the mainstream schools. using data for the wrong reasons. instead of looking at data and saying look how can we use the data in the schools to improve the situation that you’re in. (k5) given these challenges, community data management is seen as a tool to support kahnawà:ke’s position vis-à-vis external evaluations. for example, cano enables community organizations to make “evidencebased” arguments on issues such as accountability, reporting, and funding proposals. by collecting and analyzing their own data, and then presenting a report to aandc, community organizations have more control over their data. in one person’s words: 8 that said, not everyone is against the act and interview participants noted that some people in the community support it. 13 mcmahon et al.: digital data management published by scholarship@western, 2015 i think the fact that we have so much data through cano is going to be to our benefit, because we can show that we have a successful educational system here. and we have the data to prove it. so i think that will be a testament to our success. (k4) as a final point, staff in kahnawà:ke organizations are interested in sharing data management strategies with other first nations. several community organizations already have staff who belong to provincial or regional associations that meet periodically to discuss technical issues and share knowledge and resources. this helps staff learn what other communities are doing, see what resources and support regional intermediaries like fnec are providing, and share information about funding opportunities. some felt that cano might benefit from a section in which schools in different first nations can share resources such as school success plans. fnec supports this work through organizing workshops and conferences, and providing webinars and remote connections over skype or videoconferencing. d a t a m a n a g e m e n t c a p a c i t i e s finally, community data management includes the roles, responsibilities, and accountabilities of the staff involved in this work. data can be used to design, plan, and manage first nations government functions and operations. data can show how political, demographic, social, and economic changes affect communities, consolidating information from multiple existing sources to introduce efficiencies, reduce reporting burdens, and improve compliance. but while the goal of this work is local data management by first nations, communities are at different levels of readiness and capacity. overwhelmingly, interview participants in kahnawà:ke identified the need for designated staff to support data management and provide on-site technical support. kec has a systems administrator who manages networks and services for all three of the community’s schools, and another who is a resource for cano. this it team was extremely busy given that they provide support for the different schools in the community. several interview participants noted that dedicated staffing is a challenge, given the size of the community and the amount of data used by local organizations. it staff support is supplemented by training and workshops to general staff, provided by request and through scheduled training events run both by in-house staff (kec) as well as fnec. teachers and other staff are trained as cano “gurus” or champions. those who had not received formal training on the system requested it, and several pointed to the necessity of some level of data management literacy. training can help staff use cano to more effectively manage day-to-day operations inside schools. c o n c l u s i o n in this article, we have traced how the mohawk community of kahnawà:ke is leveraging its data resources to support self-government in the educational sector. we described how technical infrastructures, social relationships, policies and procedures, and human resource capacities combine to support community data management. we outlined the roles that local organizations, regional support institutions, and government agencies play in this process. we also described some of the tensions and challenges embedded in this work, as well as some of the successes achieved by the community. we positioned kahnawà:ke’s data management work as an example of indigenous resurgence, as described by corntassel (2012), simpson (2011), alfred (2009), and others. this focus provides some 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.6 points that might support the work of indigenous peoples in other contexts. first, we stressed the important role that community ownership and control play in data management. this work, as practiced by people every day, supports a continual renewal of indigenous values, institutions, and practices, and serves to counteract the effects of settler colonialism. as corntassel (2012) wrote: “by focusing on ‘everyday’ acts of resurgence, one disrupts the colonial physical, social and political boundaries designed to impede our actions to restore our nationhood” (p. 88). people working in the area of data management are actively engaged in the production, curation, and sharing of the community data assets that support nation rebuilding and resurgence. our study demonstrates this point. faced with a challenging situation rooted in the long-term and ongoing impacts of settler colonialism, indigenous educators in kahnawà:ke are engaged in the difficult work of rebuilding their educational system. data management and digital icts provide important tools to support this work—if they are adequately owned, controlled, accessed and possessed by communitybased organizations. in the coming years, efforts to build and develop data management systems and capacities will be key to these efforts, particularly as more aspects of society move online. second, to support this focus, we suggested that people working in this area envision community data management as a socio-technical process that encompasses both technologies—such as a fibre optic network like tewatati and a data management platform like cano—as well as social relations among the individuals and organizations using them. a successful community data management system consists of the interactions among these elements on a continual basis. further to this point, we emphasized the importance of data management protocols to guide these relationships and practices. these protocols must be clearly articulated, developed over time in consultation with all involved parties, and formally binding. as demonstrated in this article, the development of such protocols is a long-term process. it includes multiple changes and adjustments over time, and must adhere to community requirements as well as those of external agencies such as government programs like fnssp. if developed properly, these protocols embody one of the core enabling factors for community data management: trust. without trust among all parties, it is unlikely that data management will adequately support broader efforts of community resurgence. the hard work of data management staff in kahnawà:ke’s educational sector shows us how individuals and groups are taking ownership and control of this process in an incremental but steadily growing manner. it demonstrates that this is not an easy task, but rather one that faces many tensions and setbacks. it is these kinds of activities—in the decolonization processes that many first nations people are engaged in every day—that best illustrate the key lessons we learned during our research. we hope that this article is of use to other communities engaging in similar efforts from their own diverse and locally rooted contexts. 15 mcmahon et al.: digital data management published by scholarship@western, 2015 r e f e r e n c e s aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc). 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[re]claiming my indigenous knowledge: challenges, resistance, and opportunities. decolonization: indigeneity, education & society, 2(1), 93-107. 17 mcmahon et al.: digital data management published by scholarship@western, 2015 waziyatawin. (2012). the paradox of indigenous resurgence at the end of empire. decolonization: indigeneity, education & society, 1(1), 68-85. whiteduck, j. (2010). building the first nation e-community. in j. p. white, j. peters, d. beavon, & p. dinsdale (eds.), aboriginal policy research: learning, technology and traditions (vol. 6, pp. 95-103). toronto: thompson educational publishing. whiteduck, t., & beaton, b. (2014). building first nation owned and managed fibre networks across québec. journal of community informatics , 10(2). retrieved from http://cijournal.net/index.php/ciej/article/view/1107/0 whiteduck, t., beaton, b., burton, k., & o’donnell, s. (2012, november). democratic ideals meet reality: developing locally owned and managed broadband networks and ict services in rural and remote first nations in québec and canada. keynote paper presented at the meeting for the community informatics research network (cirn) conference, prato, italy. 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.6 a p p e n d i x : a c r o n y m s a c r o n y m d e s c r i p t i o n aandc aboriginal affairs and northern development canada afn assembly of first nations edc executive directors’ committee fnec first nations education council fnigc first nations information governance centre fnssp first nations student success program ict information and communication technologies kec kahnawà:ke education council kscs kahnawà:ke shakotiia'takenhas community services mou memorandum of understanding ocap four principles of ownership, control, access, and possession of data rhs regional health survey tcps2 tri-council policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans (2nd ed.). 19 mcmahon et al.: digital data management published by scholarship@western, 2015 the international indigenous policy journal june 2015 digital data management as indigenous resurgence in kahnawà:ke rob mcmahon tim lahache tim whiteduck recommended citation digital data management as indigenous resurgence in kahnawà:ke abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license digital data management as indigenous resurgence in kahnawã€:ke microsoft word ms+9342+title+page.docx the international indigenous policy journal volume 12|issue 3 september 2021 “is water a human right?”: priming water as a human right increases support for government action katherine b. starzyk university of manitoba, canada, katherine.starzyk@umanitoba.ca katelin h. s. neufeld university of manitoba, canada, katelin.neufeld@umanitoba.ca danielle gaucher university of manitoba, canada, danielle.gaucher@umanitoba.ca jacquie d. vorauer university of manitoba, canada, jacquie.vorauer@umanitoba.ca aleah s. m. fontaine university of manitoba, canada, fontaina@myumanitoba.ca matthew s. quesnel university of manitoba, canada, umquesne@myumanitoba.ca alexa r. yakubovich st. michael’s hospital and university of toronto, canada, alexa.yakubovich@utoronto.ca recommended citation starzyk, k. b., neufeld, k. h. s., gaucher, d., vorauer, j. d., fontaine, a. s. m., quesnel, m. s., & yakubovich, a. r. “is water a human right?”: priming water as a human right increases support for government action. the international indigenous policy journal, 12(3). https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.9342 “is water a human right?”: priming water as a human right increases support for government action abstract many first nations homes in canada do not have adequate water services. this issue is unlikely to be resolved without public pressure on the government. thus, we investigated one strategy to increase nonindigenous canadians’ support for government action: framing water as a human right. informed by a partnership with indigenous community members and multidisciplinary collaborators, we conducted seven experiments that sampled non-indigenous canadian community members (n = 584) and university undergraduates (n = 274). overall, framing water as a human right increased public support, relative to control conditions. further, the human rights frame indirectly increased support for government action through increases in perceived suffering (physical and financial) and empathy. we discuss policy implications and end with a call for action. keywords human rights, support for government action, empathy, suffering author note katelin neufeld is now at the canadian centre for child protection and alexa yakubovich is now at dalhousie university, canada, alexa.yakubovich@dal.ca. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0license. 1 starzyk et al.: “is water a human right?” published by scholarship@western, 2021 “is water a human right?”: priming water as a human right increases support for government action in 2010, the united nations (2010) general assembly declared that all people should have water and sanitation services1 that are sufficient, safe, acceptable, physically accessible, and affordable (see also busby, 2016). soon after, in a report commissioned by the government of canada sampling 97% of first nations,2 indigenous consulting firm neegan burnside (2011) reported that 73% of water systems and 65% of wastewater systems had deficiencies that posed a medium or high risk to water quality that may lead to health, safety, or environmental issues. the firm also reported that 1,880 homes (1.5%) had no water service, and 1,777 homes (2%) had no wastewater service. relatedly, over 117 communities (approximately 18%) were under a boil water advisory, some for more than a decade, because the water was unsafe (troian, 2011). after visiting several northern manitoba communities, a journalist reported that residents without water in their homes had to haul it in buckets from a communal tap or nearby lake. they would do so even in the winter, when the lake is frozen and temperatures dip below -30°c (-22°f; fallding, 2010a). people who hauled water in this way sometimes had only 15 l of clean water a day (fallding, 2010b), far below the standard recommended by the world health organization of 50 l per person per day (as cited in united nations human rights council, 2010). thus, while canada is resource rich in water and many canadians take turning on a tap or flushing a toilet for granted, first nations have historically had less access to water and wastewater services, or they have had services that are less safe to use (human rights watch, 2016). further, while communities remain without safe water services, multinational beverage companies such as nestlé extract millions of litres of water daily from indigenous territories (shimo, 2018). in effect, the human right to water has been commodified while weak public infrastructure persists (pacheco-vega, 2019). in this context, in 2010, the water advocacy group came together to understand how to solve the problem of inadequate and uncertain water and wastewater services on first nations. the water advocacy group the water advocacy group’s overarching goal was to increase the capacity of first nations and their allies to advocate for access to clean running water, what one elder called “the most precious gift.” organized through the centre for human rights research at the university of manitoba, this group was a multidisciplinary indigenous and non-indigenous research partnership that included academics, other professionals, community members, and organizational partners. the principal organizational partner was the assembly of manitoba chiefs. others, in alphabetical order, were amnesty international canada, brock university, the centre for indigenous environmental resources, manitoba keewatinowi okimakanak, the public interest law centre, and the university of winnipeg. individual communities also partnered for some projects. the partnership worked collaboratively, valued academic, traditional, and experiential knowledges, and translated the findings to academic and non-academic audiences. members co-developed a successful social sciences and humanities research council partnership development grant and research 1 we use the terms sanitation and wastewater interchangeably. 2 first nations is one of three superordinate categories of indigenous peoples in canada; the other two are métis and inuit. there is much diversity within these categories. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.9342 strategies for three research clusters: legal, including international law (busby, 2016) and anishinaabe water law (craft, 2014); economic (o’gorman & penner, 2018); and public engagement (bonnycastle, 2015; neufeld et al., 2019). cluster leads met or emailed several times each year, exchanging knowledges and providing feedback on projects, and once a year elders, academics, and community partners co-presented at a conference on the topic. all clusters also co-presented at an international conference (starzyk, 2016) and collaborated on knowledge mobilization, such as through a webinar hosted by the first nations health and social secretariat of manitoba (starzyk & fontaine, 2017). in this article, we report some of the public engagement research cluster findings. as decided by our partners, our goal was to co-develop an evidence-based public advocacy strategy to increase nonindigenous canadians’ support for government action to provide clean running water and wastewater services to all first nations. we also wanted our strategy to be acceptable to first nations peoples and relatively easy and flexible for the average person to use, as we describe later. for more information about how our research team came to be, see neufeld et al. (2019). toward these goals, we investigated whether framing water as a human right might increase non-indigenous canadians’ support for providing clean running water to all first nations. contributions of other clusters and our partners the work of all clusters and community partners informed our focus on water as a human right. we first began to think about this approach when, in 2010, the assembly of manitoba chiefs described their postcard campaign. the postcard featured a child and asked, “water is a human right. do you have running water? i don’t … and i live in canada, and i need your help” (assembly of manitoba chiefs, 2010, p. 1). what we learned through consultations with two first nations communities in manitoba also affirmed studying the human right frame. considering our own social locations as community outsiders, and the need to ensure first nations’ priorities are met and lived realities are represented ethically (liamputtong, 2011; pacheco-vega & parizeau, 2018), we travelled to st. theresa’s point first nation to learn what our research should focus on. katherine starzyk and journalist helen fallding met with chief and council, participated in a call-in radio program with residents who voiced their opinions, and visited with community members. from this consultation, we learned how our research might be useful to first nations and the importance of not stigmatizing communities in the process. with this community perspective and following discussions among more than 30 water advocacy group members, all clusters started to develop research programs that could translate into practical strategies to address the issue of clean running water in first nations communities. later, team members from our public engagement (katelin neufeld and colin bonnycastle) and economics (melanie o’gorman) clusters travelled to nisichiwayasihk cree nation, located in northern manitoba, to get feedback on a few possible strategies, one of which would emphasize water as a human right. they met with chief and council and the public works director, and they conducted two focus groups, one with health representatives and another with other community members. the issues facing this community were very different than that of st. theresa’s point,3 but residents here also favoured framing water as a 3 there is a great deal of diversity in the specific challenges that first nations face in water and wastewater services. 3 starzyk et al.: “is water a human right?” published by scholarship@western, 2021 human right. additionally, residents said we should emphasize—in a way that is not stigmatizing—that not having access to or having to worry about the safety of water and wastewater services causes suffering. we were humbled by the resilience and warmth of these communities. we acknowledge that there were many more communities we could have consulted with, and that was our original intention, but further trips became unfeasible because of timing. fortunately, we were also able to exchange information with others who did complimentary work, such as human rights watch (2016), and get feedback on our approach from community members in our yearly conference. today, those familiar with canadian politics may wonder if this research is still relevant. sadly, a decade since the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples, we believe the answer is yes. yes, it’s 2021, and water is still a concern on march 22, 2016, the government of canada, led by prime minister justin trudeau and the liberal party, announced a commitment to end boil water advisories by march 2021. to date, 98 boil water advisories have been lifted. thus, this government has made progress; certainly, more than past governments have on this issue. yet, dozens of communities continue to have boil water advisories (indigenous services canada, 2021). further, the covid-19 pandemic has halted water infrastructure construction in several first nations. on one hand, doing so protects the communities against potential transmission from outsiders, but, on the other hand, it renders them more vulnerable to the virus by making hand washing more difficult (allen, 2020). in december 2020, the liberal government confirmed it will not fulfill its promise to end boil water advisories in all first nations communities (stefanovich, 2020). others have argued that, as a benchmark for success, ending boil water advisories is “woefully inadequate” (mcclearn, 2019). they have suggested that the standard for water and wastewater services in first nations should be equivalent to the rest of canada. a coalition of first nations has come together to sue the government of canada for failing to achieve this standard (chatta, 2019).4 we now proceed to an overview of our experimental studies, hypotheses, and theoretical rationale. overview of experimental studies to assess the effects of framing water as a human right, we conducted seven experimental studies with national community samples of non-indigenous canadian adults (n = 584) and university students (n = 274; appendices a and b of the online supplemental materials [osm] detail the study and participant characteristics, respectively). we sampled only non-indigenous participants at our indigenous partners’ request. others in our public engagement cluster conducted complementary qualitative work, including interviews with non-indigenous participants that informed our experimental work (neufeld et al., 2019), and a photovoice project with indigenous participants (bonnycastle, 2015). we chose the experimental method so that we could understand whether framing water as a human right increases support for government action. this method involved randomly assigning participants to one 4 members of the water advocacy group provided advice to this group based on our research. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.9342 of two experimental groups or “conditions,” meaning participants had an equal chance of being in either condition. half of the participants were in the control condition, which serves as a baseline, and the other half of the participants were in the human right condition; we detail these conditions below. importantly, if any differences in support emerged between these groups, we could attribute these differences to our frame because random assignment typically ensures groups are equivalent in all respects and thereby excludes alternative explanations. in designing our human right frame, we considered how our organizational partners and others might use the results in advocacy work. it is often easier to get big effects with big interventions, but our experience is that, given practical constraints of time, money, and other resources, it is often more useful to develop advocacy frames that are easy to use and flexible. our goal was to develop frames that can be embedded in any kind of media, advertising, or conversation. for these reasons, we chose to frame water as a human right through a question or brief two-sentence statement. across all experiments, participants in the human right condition started by reading the human right frame. after, they read a brief description of the issue. in contrast, control participants read the description first—without the human right frame. after they read the brief description, all participants completed self-report questions about their attitudes toward the issue. some questions asked about support for federal government action (our main dependent variable). other questions aimed to understand whether the human right frame may be effective in increasing support for equitable water and wastewater standards in first nations. as we describe in more detail below, we included perceived suffering and empathy as possible mediators or explanations of why the human right frame would increase support for government action. we describe two of our seven experimental studies in detail to showcase our methods and main findings. study 1 demonstrates the effects of the human right frame on non-indigenous participants’ attitudes. study 2 demonstrates that this frame is effective because it leads people to judge the situation as causing more suffering and, in response, they feel more empathy. we then use an internal meta-analysis to statistically summarize findings of seven experimental studies (cumming, 2012; 2014); included in this seven are the first two studies we have just described. in taking this approach, we assessed the average effect of our manipulation across the studies. relative to presenting each study individually, this method is more parsimonious, statistically powerful (because of the increased sample size for analysis), precise, and transparent (because we aggregate the results across all the studies we conducted; cumming, 2008, 2012, 2014; rosenthal, 1979; ueno et al., 2016). in all but one of the experimental studies, we also assessed the efficacy of other approaches.5 to isolate the effects of the human right frame in this article, we excluded any participants exposed to those other experimental approaches. ethics boards of the university of manitoba (um) and the university of winnipeg (uw) approved this research. the protocols were #p2013:064 for study 1 (um); p2015:009 for study 2 (um); #p2016:123-4 (um) and #04294 (uw) for the other studies in the meta-analysis. 5 in two studies, we manipulated whether participants considered how affected community members might suffer because of the state of water and wastewater services. in another study, we manipulated who participants thought about when they considered the effects of not having access to water and wastewater services. in addition to the control condition, we randomly assigned participants into conditions where they were to think of either children or elderly community members. 5 starzyk et al.: “is water a human right?” published by scholarship@western, 2021 below we first describe our hypotheses and the rationale for them. we then describe the first two experimental studies. next, we include a meta-analysis of the results of all the studies we conducted in which we used the human right frame. finally, we conclude with a general discussion. hypotheses and rationale we hypothesized the human right frame would increase support for federal government action (hypothesis 1) for several reasons. first, people tend to support human rights. there are country-tocountry variations and individual differences, but people tend to support the diverse human rights that the united nations has identified (mcfarland, 2015; scruggs, 2018). second, relatively brief educational interventions have increased both knowledge of and support for human rights (see for example stellmacher & sommer, 2008). though such research has not assessed the efficacy of a question or brief statement, the idea of a brief intervention is consistent with our approach. third, there is widespread public consensus in canada that access to water is a human right:6 in a large national survey, 96% of respondents agreed the government should guarantee water as a human right (trudeau foundation, 2010). any “water as a human right” frame should therefore typically remind people of an opinion they already agree with. fourth, advocates frequently use the human right frame to increase public support for issues. thus, there seems to be consensus among those “on the ground” that this approach is effective, though few social psychological studies have examined how to increase support for human rights (carriere, 2019a) or the effect of human right frames generally (for notable exceptions, see carriere, 2019b; djupe et al., 2014, 2016; shnabel et al., 2016). specifically, there is a “lack of psychological research focusing on right to water and individuals’ commitment to defend it” (mazzoni et al., 2015, p. 316). indeed, we believe this is the first empirical research to assess whether framing water as a human right may increase public support for addressing that right. we had several hypotheses about the relationships among the human right frame, suffering, empathy, and support for federal government action. specifically, we hypothesized participants exposed to the human right frame (vs. control) would perceive more suffering among people in first nations communities affected by the issue (hypothesis 2). as people tend to believe water is a human right, they should agree that water is a basic ingredient for a good life. indeed, we cannot think of a human right so fundamental to life. given this special “human right” status, participants primed with the idea that water is a human right, who then also learn that the right is not met, should judge the situation as more harmful—that is, as causing more suffering. further, though people can react to injustice in several ways, there is a motivation to eliminate it when people are able to (lerner & simmons, 1966; starzyk & ross, 2008). they are more likely to do so when they perceive the harmed group continues to suffer and they can do something about it. this is also true for those who do not primarily stand to benefit from the action; that is, outgroup members. for example, starzyk and ross (2008) assessed non-blacks’ support for government action to compensate members of a once vibrant black community called africville. in 1962, this community was forcibly relocated by the city of halifax (clairmont & magill, 1999). participants who thought the outgroup members were still suffering were more supportive of government action. 6 for other perspectives on the consequences of framing water as a human right, see sultana and loftus (2012). 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.9342 we also hypothesized that perceptions of suffering should positively predict feelings of empathy toward people on first nations affected by the issue (hypothesis 3); we did not examine the role of trait empathy. people who endorse human rights also tend to feel more empathy (mcfarland, 2010; mcfarland & matthews, 2005; mcfarland et al., 2012), but more importantly experimental evidence demonstrates that perceptions of suffering can cause feelings of empathy. for example, in experiments by starzyk and ross (2008), participants who thought the outgroup members were still suffering experienced more empathy. as well, we hypothesized that feelings of empathy would drive support for government action (hypothesis 4). the argument for this is simple: empathy is a very good predictor of prosocial behaviour (amato, 1986; batson et al., 1981, 1987). empathy is powerful because it is an emotion that binds people together and motivates those who may have nothing to gain from acting to ease the suffering of others. in support, starzyk and ross (2008) also found sympathy (a component of empathy) was one explanation for the effect of perceived suffering on support for government reparations for former africville residents. empathy has also predicted israelis’ support for humanitarian aid for palestinians (roth et al., 2017), psychology students’ support for employment equity for education students (harth et al., 2008), and greater tolerance of stigmatized outgroups such as murderers (batson et al., 1997, 2002; for a review, see batson & ahmad, 2009; stephan & finlay, 1999). most importantly, as figure 1 illustrates, we hypothesized the human right frame would have a significant indirect effect on support for federal government action in the following way: framing water as a human right increases a people’s perceptions of suffering within first nations that do not have clean running water, which leads to greater empathy and greater support for government action to provide clean running water to all first nations (hypothesis 5). thus, we expected this frame would be effective because it would increase perceptions of suffering and, in turn, feelings of empathy, which consistently drive support for action on social issues. we conceptualized perceived suffering and empathy as sequential mediators. note that this path of course does not preclude the validity of other possible indirect paths. finally, we also explored whether certain types of suffering might be more effective in increasing empathy and support. we chose three types of suffering that are documented consequences of not having clean running water and wastewater services in first nations (bharadwaj & bradford, 2018; bradford et al., 2016; fallding, 2010c; o’gorman & penner, 2018): physical suffering (e.g., waterborne illness, skin rashes), psychological suffering (e.g., stigma, stress), and financial suffering (e.g., the increased costs of paying for bottled or trucked water, missing work because of water-related illness or having to haul water). we hypothesized that people would be most easily able to imagine how not having clean running water and sanitation services would cause physical suffering, and therefore expected that perceived physical suffering would be effective in generating empathy and support (hypothesis 6). we did not, however, have predictions about whether psychological suffering and financial suffering would also be effective: we were not confident that participants would agree that these are consequences of not having access to or having threatened water and wastewater services. 7 starzyk et al.: “is water a human right?” published by scholarship@western, 2021 figure 1. sequential mediation model of effects of the human right frame on support for government action through suffering and empathy note. x is the independent variable; y is the dependent variable; m1 and m2 = mediators 1 and 2, respectively. a1, b2, d21 = direct pathways; c’ refers to the indirect pathway; em1, em2, and ey = errors in estimation for the first mediator, the second mediator, and the dependent variable, respectively. study 1: effects on attitudes and action intentions in a community sample in study 1 we conducted an experiment to test whether framing water as a human right affects reactions toward the issue. reflecting our goal to create a brief and portable intervention, we primed the idea that water is a human right with the question, “should, or should not, the ‘right to clean water’ be guaranteed as a human right for all canadians?” community participants answered this question at the beginning of our survey if they were in the human right condition and after the dependent variables if they were in the control condition. our dependent variables were support for federal government action on the issue and intentions to take personal action. we thought our frame may affect intentions to act because prior research suggests a link between the endorsement of human rights and intentions to act in a way that protects them (cohrs et al., 2007). for example, hertel et al. (2009) found that people are willing to pay more for ethically produced products if they endorse human rights. participants participants were 372 non-indigenous community respondents (50% men, 50% women) from across canada. they ranged in age from 18 to 84 years (the average age was 43.38 years) and typically identified “white” as their ethnicity (84%; see osm appendix b for more details). we recruited this sample through qualtrics panels, a survey panel provider, in july 2014. procedure qualtrics invited panel participants to the online study through an email link. on accessing the website, participants first read an information and consent form. those who agreed to participate were then randomly assigned by the qualtrics platform to either the human right condition or the control condition. consequently, any participant had an equal chance of being in either condition; the two 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.9342 groups would be equivalent except for what experimental condition they were in, and the human right frame would be the cause of any differences in support for government action or personal intentions to act. we asked human right frame participants to first consider the following question: the term “human right” refers to rights and freedoms that everyone in society is entitled to and are guaranteed under the law. should, or should not, the “right to clean water” be guaranteed as a human right for all canadians? the possible response options were “yes, it should” and “no, it should not.” after, human right frame participants read a brief passage describing the issue and answered questions about their support for government action and personal intentions to act. in contrast, control participants answered the human right frame question after reading the passage and answering questions about support and intentions to act. the human right frame and control groups therefore only varied in the order in which participants completed the questions. materials passage describing the issue we included this passage so that participants would know some basic facts about the situation and the subsequent questions would make sense: in 2011, minister of aboriginal affairs and northern development john duncan released the findings of the national assessment of first nations’ water and wastewater systems. describing the state of household running water and wastewater (sanitation, sewage) services across 97% of first nations (571 of 589) in canada, this report is the largest and most rigorous assessment of its kind ever conducted in canada. according to the report, about 39% of water and 14% of wastewater systems in first nations communities have major deficiencies. today, approximately 3,000 first nations homes do not have indoor plumbing for drinking water, bathing, laundry, dishes, or toilets. support for government action we asked participants to self-report the extent to which they agreed or disagreed with two statements: (a) “the government should provide running water and wastewater services to all first nations homes,” and (b) “the government should provide running water and wastewater services to first nations homes comparable to that available in non-first nation communities.” possible response options were 1 = strongly disagree, 2 = disagree, 3 = slightly disagree, 4 = neutral, 5 = slightly agree, 6 = agree, and 7 = strongly agree. we represent support for government action as the mean agreement with these two statements (spearman’s r = .74). support for government action scores could therefore range from 1 to 7. 9 starzyk et al.: “is water a human right?” published by scholarship@western, 2021 interest in taking personal action we presented participants with an opportunity to take seven actions. participants read, “learning about first nations water and wastewater issues may have made you interested to learn or do more about the issue.” stating we would provide more information on how to take such actions at the end of the study, we then asked participants to indicate which (if any) of the following actions they would like to take: (a) read a newspaper article describing the issue, (b) sign an online petition, (c) raise awareness: email a petition link to friends, (d) raise awareness: share a petition link on facebook, (e) raise awareness: speak to a family member or friend about the issue, (f) write a letter to the government, and (g) attend a public rally. we presented these actions in random order. participants could choose any combination of the seven options. we coded unchosen actions as 0 and chosen actions as 1 and computed a total number of chosen options, meaning total scores could range from 0 to 7. in doing so, we created a dependent variable that gauged peoples’ intentions to take these sorts of actions, which also represent actions our partners hope people may take and those common in the collective action literature (van zomeren et al., 2008).7 results preliminary analyses osm appendix c contains the descriptive statistics. as per osm appendix d, participants in the two conditions were equivalent in gender, age, and ethnic majority or minority status. thus, random assignment was successful across these indices. effects of the human right frame the human right frame affected many of the dependent variables. compared to the control group, participants in the human right condition more strongly agreed that the government should take action to provide clean water and wastewater services to all first nations (mcontrol = 5.50, sd = 1.61, vs. mhuman right = 5.83, sd = 1.57), t(370) = 2.02, p = .045, 95% ci [0.01, 0.66], cohen’s d = 0.21). to determine the effects of the frame on participants’ overall interest in acting (see table 1), we conducted a poisson regression.8 relative to the control condition, the human right frame increased the number of actions participants were interested in taking by 32%. to determine the degree to which the human right frame increased participants’ interest in taking each action, we conducted a series of log-binomial models in which the experimental condition was the independent variable, and each action was the dependent variable; we report the risk ratios from these models in table 1. the risk ratios indicate that the human right frame did not impact participants’ interest to “read a newspaper article,” likely because interest in this was so high and this action is so easy to take, but it did affect participants’ intentions to take the remaining, more effortful actions. relative to the control condition, the human right frame increased participants’ interest to “sign an online petition” by 20%, “email a petition link to friends” by 95%, “share 7 to honor our instructions and encourage more action on the issue, we provided participants with information on how to take each action at the end of the study. 8 this regression method is appropriate when data are counts. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.9342 a petition link on facebook” by 126%, “speak to a family member or friend about the issue” by 77%, “write a letter to the government” by 64%, and “attend a public rally” by 122%. table 1. study 1: effects of the human right frame on interest in acting items observed response control vs. human right comparison outcome control human right absolute difference relative risk 95% ci number of actionsa 1.40 (1.15) 1.85 (1.60) -1.32 [1.12, 1.55] specific actionsb read newspaper article 62.6 60.0 -2.6 0.96 [0.82, 1.13] sign online petition 34.2 41.1 +6.9 1.20 [0.92, 1.56] email petition to friends 7.5 14.6 +7.1 1.95* [1.06, 3.60] share petition on facebook 9.1 20.5 +11.4 2.26* [1.32, 3.86] speak to family or friend 12.8 22.7 +9.9 1.77* [1.12, 2.80] write a letter to the government 8.6 14.1 +5.5 1.64 [0.91, 2.96] attend a public rally 5.3 11.9 +6.6 2.22* [1.08, 4.57] note. participants indicated the actions they would like to take by selecting the options they were interested in. a values are m (sd). model is a poisson regression, where the total score on the number of actions participants were willing to take was regressed onto the experimental condition (0 = control; 1 = human right frame). the relative risk estimate is the incidence rate ratio. the likelihood ratio test for the poisson model was 1.11, suggesting that a poisson distribution was a better fit for the data than a negative binomial distribution. b values are percentage of respondents who indicated they would take this action. models are log-binomial regressions, where each action was regressed onto the experimental condition. the relative risk estimate is the risk ratio. * p < .05. 11 starzyk et al.: “is water a human right?” published by scholarship@western, 2021 discussion we experimentally varied whether participants thought about water as a human right before or after they indicated their support for government action and interest in taking personal action. this subtle frame had relatively consistent effects: those primed with the human right frame (vs. not) supported government action significantly more and were also more likely to want to take personal action. these effects are noteworthy because this strategy nudged already high support for government action even higher and motivated interest in taking effortful or public actions. for example, only 5% in the control condition said they would attend a public rally compared to 12% in the human right condition. if such intentions translate to action, asking this question has the potential to lead to over double the attendance at public rallies. thus, this flexible, portable, and subtle approach has potential to spark positive realworld consequences. future research should seek to replicate these effects on intentions and extend them to behaviour. study 2: the mediating roles of perceived suffering and empathy in a student sample study 2 was an experiment that tested why the human right frame increased support for government action in a student sample. as we describe earlier, we expected this frame would be effective because it would increase perceptions of suffering and, in turn, feelings of empathy, which consistently drive support for action on social issues. thus, we conceptualized perceived suffering and empathy as sequential mediators. we also explored the effect of type of perceived suffering—physical, financial, or psychological. although we expected physical suffering would be effective, we did not have hypotheses regarding the other types of suffering. though we could readily imagine the economic and psychological consequences of such a situation, we were not sure participants could as well. participants in winter 2015, 69 non-indigenous university students from a university located in winnipeg, manitoba, completed this study in exchange for partial credit in an introductory psychology course. our analyses, including for demographic information (see osm appendix b), are based on 68 participants (one participant asked us to exclude their data). participants in this final sample were 18.96 years old on average (sd = 1.65). more than half identified as women (57.4%) and as white (57.4%). procedure after providing consent, participants read the passage from study 1 describing the issue. we framed the issue as a human right with two sentences: above the paragraph, we added the title, “is water a human right?” and, below the paragraph, we added the rhetorical question, “ask yourself: is access to water and wastewater services a human right?” thus, in this study participants did not answer the question as participants did in study 1. control condition participants only read the paragraph—they did not see a title or rhetorical question. after, all participants completed the following dependent measures. measures except where noted, as in study 1, the response options were: 1 = strongly disagree, 2 = disagree, 3 = slightly disagree, 4 = neutral, 5 = slightly agree, 6 = agree, and 7 = strongly agree. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.9342 support for government action we asked participants to self-report their agreement with the statement, “the government should ensure first nations communities have access to clean running water.” this question is different than the questions we used in study 1, but conceptually similar. how we assessed support varied slightly like this across studies. an advantage of varying the support questions is that we unintentionally assessed the generalizability of the effects across different support questions. a disadvantage is that the averages for these questions are not directly comparable. perceived suffering participants rated their agreement with three statements that began with “first nations without access to water and wastewater services are suffering…” and respectively ended with “physically, “psychologically,” or “financially.” we analyzed these items individually. empathy participants reported their empathy for first nations without clean running water and sanitation services by indicating the extent to which they felt six emotions (e.g., “compassionate”; batson et al., 1997) on a 7-point scale with three labelled response options (1 = not at all, 4 = somewhat, and 7 = extremely). as the items were highly internally consistent (cronbach’s α = .91), we took their mean score to create a composite that could range from 1 to 7. results preliminary analyses all variables positively correlated, and the effect sizes were moderate to large (cohen, 1988). as per appendix d, participants in the two conditions were equivalent in gender, age, and ethnic majority or minority status. thus, random assignment was successful (see osm appendix e for descriptive statistics and correlations). effects of the human right frame as t-test results in table 2 indicate, this frame had a positive and statistically significant effect on perceived physical suffering. the effect was also positive, but not significant, for the remaining variables. as measured by cohen’s d, the effect size for physical suffering was 0.49 whereas the median effect size for all variables was 0.25; this median effect size is similar to the 0.21 effect size for support for government action in study 1. 13 starzyk et al.: “is water a human right?” published by scholarship@western, 2021 table 2. study 2: effects of the human right frame measure condition comparisons control human right m (sd) m (sd) ta 95% ci cohen’s d support for government action 6.20 (0.99) 6.52 (0.67) 1.53 [0.10, 0.73] 0.37 physical suffering 5.59 (1.02) 6.06 (0.90) 2.01 * [0.003, 0.94] 0.49 psychological suffering 5.09 (1.49) 5.45 (1.37) 1.05 [-0.33, 1.06] 0.25 financial suffering 4.91 (1.83) 5.15 (1.58) 0.57 [0.60, 1.08] 0.14 empathy 4.34 (1.13) 4.85 (1.40) 1.67 [0.10, 1.14] 0.40 note. a for the control condition, n = 35 for all measures. for the human right condition, n = 33 for support and empathy; n = 34 for the suffering items. * p < .05 mediation analyses with suffering and empathy using process 3.0 (hayes, 2018), a spss macro for testing mediation, we assessed whether the human right frame had an indirect effect on support for government action through perceived suffering and empathy. that is, this pathway: human right frame à greater perceived suffering à greater empathy à greater support for government action. in each analysis, we specified the human right frame as the independent variable (x), one type of perceived suffering (either physical, psychological, or financial) as the first mediator (m1), empathy as the second mediator (m2), and support for government action as the dependent variable (y). as per recommendations, we requested 10,000 percentile bootstrapped samples to estimate our effects. figure 1, above, illustrates this model and osm appendix f provides the full results. the human right frame had an indirect effect on support through physical suffering and empathy: framing water as a human right led participants to support government action more because they perceived more physical suffering due to the lack of clean running water, which led them to feel empathy for those without water, and this feeling motivated support (partially standardized ß = 0.04, se = 0.02, 95% ci [0.003, 0.09]). in contrast, the human right frame did not indirectly affect support through financial suffering and empathy (partially standardized ß = 0.01, se = 0.03, 95% ci [-0.04, 0.07]) or through psychological suffering and empathy (partially standardized ß = 0.03, se = 0.03, 95% ci [-0.02, 0.10]). 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.9342 discussion the direct effect of the human right frame on non-indigenous canadians’ support for government action was positive and similar in effect size to what we report in study 1. this effect was not statistically significant, likely due to the smaller sample size of this study. as expected, however, the hypothesized indirect effect of the human right frame was significant for physical suffering and empathy. in comparison, this effect was still positive, but weaker and not significant for financial and psychological suffering and empathy. internal meta-analyses to determine the aggregate effect of the human right frame on support for government action, we metaanalyzed the seven experimental studies in which we investigated the effects of the human right frame versus a control condition on support for government action. in four of these experimental studies, we assessed perceived suffering and empathy as potential sequential mediators by including a set of metaanalyses of these indirect effects. the internal meta-analyses include all the relevant studies we conducted. osm appendix a summarizes these study characteristics. given the differences among the studies, including the frame specifics and the samples, we used random effects models (viechtbauer, 2010). participants across the seven experimental studies, the total number of respondents was 858 non-indigenous canadian citizens. qualtrics panels recruited and compensated participants in studies 1, 6, and 7 (n = 584). we recruited the remaining participants (n = 274) through the undergraduate psychology participation pools at two universities in winnipeg, manitoba. participants received partial course credit. osm appendix b provides demographic information. method all studies were online experimental surveys that began with informed consent and ended with a debriefing, though what followed consent differed across studies. study 1 and 2 descriptions are above. for studies 3 to 5, we followed the same procedure as study 2. in studies 6 and 7, participants in the human right condition first completed a thought-listing task titled, “is water a human right?” the instructions prompted them to list their thoughts about whether access to water and wastewater services is a human right. in comparison, control condition participants did not complete this task. next, participants read the passage describing the issue and then completed the dependent measures (see osm appendix g for the text of each frame).9 9 some studies included other experimental interventions not relevant to our research questions (e.g., testing the effects of a canadian values frame). we only report the results from participants who did not complete additional experimental interventions (i.e., they were in the control condition). the sample sizes we report for each study are therefore smaller than the sample sizes we collected for each study. 15 starzyk et al.: “is water a human right?” published by scholarship@western, 2021 measures osm appendix a summarizes the meta-analyzed measures in each experimental study. support for government action across studies, we assessed support for government action with variants of four items that we created.10 response options ranged from 1 = strongly disagree to 7 = strongly agree; we labelled each point. perceived suffering in studies 2, 5, 6, and 7, participants completed the measure we describe in study 2. in studies 5 to 7, however, we used the word “emotionally” instead of “psychologically.” empathy in studies 2, 5, 6, and 7, participants reported their empathy for affected first nations using the scale we describe in study 2. results and discussion descriptive statistics osm appendix i displays the descriptive statistics across all studies. for all, the average level of support for government action was above the scale midpoint. aggregate effects of the human right frame on support for government action to identify the average effect size and statistical significance of the human right frame across all the studies, we conducted a meta-analysis with the metafor package (viechtbauer, 2010) in r (r core team, 2017). we weighted studies by sample size and used the restricted maximum likelihood estimator to estimate between-study variance (τ2) and the average standardized mean difference (cohen’s d). table 3 provides the data we analyzed, and figure 2 is a forest plot of the results. the findings support our hypothesis: relative to the control condition, the human right frame increased support for government action to provide clean running water and wastewater services to first nations, d = 0.22, se = 0.07, 95% ci [0.08, 0.35], p < .01. this difference is small by cohen’s (1988) conventions, but statistically significant. the effects were quite homogenous across studies (between-study variance: τ2 = 0.00, se = 0.02; percentage of total variation due to heterogeneity: i 2 = 0.00%). 10 in some of the studies, we assessed support for government action with other items not listed in osm appendix a (see osm appendix h for all items in all studies). upon reflection, we decided the additional items do not assess support but instead assess other constructs such as moral outrage or prejudice. for this reason, we excluded these items in our analyses. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.9342 figure 2. forest plot for the internal meta-analysis of the direct effects of the human right frame on support for government action note. the plotted bars represent 95% confidence intervals. the squares and polygon represent weighted effect sizes (cohen’s d). table 3. effects of the human right frame on support for government action across experimental studies condition study control human right n m (sd) n m (sd) 1 187 5.50 (1.61) 185 5.83 (1.57) 2 35 6.20 (0.99) 33 6.52 (0.67) 3 40 5.40 (1.19) 43 5.73 (1.05) 4 30 5.18 (1.44) 34 5.41 (1.24) 5 29 5.55 (1.27) 29 5.67 (1.20) 6 54 5.42 (1.96) 50 5.89 (1.56) 7 52 5.56 (1.71) 56 5.79 (1.84) 17 starzyk et al.: “is water a human right?” published by scholarship@western, 2021 aggregate mediating roles of suffering and empathy we hypothesized that the human right frame would indirectly increase support for government action through increasing perceptions of suffering and consequently empathy. we also explored whether the type of suffering (physical, psychological, or financial) mattered. across the four experimental studies that contained these potential mediators, following the same procedure from study 2, we used the process macro (version 3.4; hayes, 2018) to obtain the partially standardized indirect effects of interest, once for each type of suffering, using 10,000 bootstrapped samples (percentile method). next, using the metafor (viechtbauer, 2010) and boot (canty & ripley, 2019; davison & hinkley, 1997) packages in r (r core team, 2017), we conducted three internal meta-analyses. all examined the hypothesized mediational chain, but each examined a different type of suffering. we weighted studies by sample size and used the restricted maximum likelihood estimator to estimate between-study variance (τ2) and the average sequential indirect effect size (b); we requested 10,000 bootstraps (percentile method) for the point estimate confidence interval. figure 3 provides forest plots of the results. across the four studies, the aggregate sequential indirect effect of physical suffering and empathy helped explain the relationship between the human right frame and increased support for government action, b = 0.08, se = 0.03, bootstrapped 95% ci [0.01, 0.12], p = .02. there was minimal between-study variance, τ2 = 0.002, se = 0.003, with a moderate (approximately half) amount of the variability of between-study effect sizes caused by chance, i 2 = 52.95%. likewise, there was a small aggregate sequential indirect effect of the human right frame on increased support for government action via financial suffering and empathy, b = 0.06, se = 0.03, bootstrapped 95% ci [0.02, 0.08], p = .04; the between-study variance was minimal, τ2 = 0.00, se = 0.002, as was the percentage of total variation in study effects due to heterogeneity rather than chance, i 2 = 0.00%. there was relatively weaker metaanalytic evidence for a sequential indirect effect of the human right frame on support through psychological suffering and empathy, b = 0.04, se = 0.03, bootstrapped 95% ci [-0.002, 0.09], p = .08. again, both the between-study variance, τ2 = 0.00, se = 0.002, and percentage of total variation in study effects due to heterogeneity rather than chance, i 2 = 0.17%, were minimal. 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.9342 figure 3. forest plot for the internal meta-analysis of the indirect effects of the human right frame on support for government action through suffering and empathy note. the plotted bars represent 95% confidence intervals. the squares and polygons represent weighted effect sizes (partially standardized sequential indirect effects). 19 starzyk et al.: “is water a human right?” published by scholarship@western, 2021 general discussion the goal of this research was to investigate whether and why framing water as a human right could increase non-indigenous canadians’ support for government action to provide clean running water and wastewater services to all first nations. although participant support was already high (ms = 5.30–6.35 on a 7-point scale), simply having participants reflect on whether water is a human right increased their support for government action. given that the effect emerged across diverse samples of community members and students, as well as variants of the support measure and human right frame, the effect appears to be reliable. importantly, the human right frame did not only impact attitudes: in study 1, exposure to the human right frame also increased participants’ interest in taking actions—ones our indigenous partners hoped non-indigenous peoples would engage in. our internal meta-analyses also provided evidence for explanations of the relationship between the human right frame and support for government action. when people thought about water as a human right, they were more supportive of government action because they perceived greater physical suffering among first nations peoples and thus felt more empathy for them. the same pattern also emerged for financial suffering. both effects were small and statistically significant. a similar but non-significant pattern emerged for psychological suffering. implications this research contributes to the growing body of literature and practice on support for human rights. to our knowledge, this is the first work to show that merely asking people to consider whether water is a human right can influence their attitudes and behavioural intentions regarding water rights. we aim to provide strategies that may increase public engagement to address water access so these same principles may be promoted in support of indigenous peoples in canada and others experiencing ongoing violation of their rights. a related strength of this work is the frame’s simplicity and real-world utility. as a quick internet search will reveal, advocates commonly use the question, “is water a human right?,” in their messages, likely because it is short and simple. unlike in-depth informational interventions, which are of course valuable for different reasons, this frame can be easily used in newspaper headlines and social media posts or be printed on items such as stickers and t-shirts. the frame is also easy for people to use in everyday conversations. as the canadian government continues to invest in providing water infrastructure to first nations, embedding the human right frame within their announcements may help to increase public support and “buy-in” of their actions. other theoretical and applied contributions stem from our novel investigation into the roles of three types of suffering (financial, physical, and emotional). on a methodological note, these findings suggest that because not all forms of outgroup suffering are perceived equally, researchers should separately measure specific types of suffering when they exist. these findings also complement prior work demonstrating the link between perceiving that a group continues to suffer from a past harm (i.e., privity) and support for addressing that harm. it is possible that using the human right frame alongside descriptions of physical and financial suffering may further boost support beyond the levels observed here; however, care must be taken to not make the suffering seem impossible to address (starzyk & ross, 2008). 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.9342 limitations and directions for future research we hypothesized a causal relationship between the three types of perceived outgroup suffering and support for government action. however, we did not experimentally vary these mediator variables. the relationship reported here is correlational and is thus a limitation of this work; future work should address this limitation. in addition to perceived outgroup suffering and empathy for an outgroup, it is likely that there exist other mechanisms that contribute to the effect of the human right frame on support for government action, particularly given the small indirect effect sizes observed. two candidate mechanisms are lowered reactance (brehm, 1966; steindl et al., 2015) and cognitive dissonance (bruneau et al., 2018; drolet, 2018; festinger, 1962). we drew on these literatures when creating our human right frame, all versions of which allowed participants to decide for themselves whether water is a human right. we did not state that water was a human right, nor did we explicitly try to convince them of this fact. this choice was an intentional one: we reasoned that having people come up with their own answer to whether water is a human right, relative to these more forceful approaches, might promote supportive responding by minimizing defensiveness and having them act in alignment with their assumed values of human right. as we did not directly compare the effects of our frame with more assertive or persuasive ones, we encourage others to test these theoretical propositions in the future. to do so would also have important applied implications, as advocacy campaigns often assert that their cause is a human right (e.g., “water is a human right”; assembly of manitoba chiefs, 2010). although framing water as a human right garnered support for government action from non-indigenous participants in the current research, we do not purport that this strategy will always be effective. some demographic characteristics may be relevant. consistent with this, starzyk et al. (2019) found that racial majority (i.e., white) participants are less likely to support reparations for indigenous peoples in canada than are non-indigenous racial minority participants in canada. as well, we would expect that the human right frame would be less effective or perhaps backfire when people feel psychologically threatened (for a review, see carriere, 2019a); testing the power of the human right frame in conjunction with psychological threat would be a valuable next step. for instance, in the context of support for water rights, the water as a human right frame might be less effective when people feel that water is scarce, and thus experience realistic threats to water security (stephan et al., 1999). researchers could experimentally induce this threat with (real or ostensible) information about increasing water scarcity, or the threat could be naturally occurring in places facing water scarcity or states of emergency. the human right frame might also be less effective under conditions of system threat (jost et al., 2010; kay et al., 2009). to test this proposition, researchers could use existing experimental inductions of system threat (for a review, see friesen et al., 2019). alternatively, researchers could induce system threat by explicitly framing the matter as a human rights violation caused by the government (shnabel et al., 2016). the rights violation frame might be especially threatening to racial majority outgroup members who are not impacted by the injustice, perhaps because it suggests that their group is failing others. in partial support, prior work has found that perceptions of rights violations positively associated with activism for ingroup issues (mazzoni et al., 2015), whereas the rights violation frame (relative to distress frames or no frames) decreased support for a minority outgroup issue (shnabel et al., 2016). given the inherent priorities of our water advocacy group, we only tested the human right strategy in 21 starzyk et al.: “is water a human right?” published by scholarship@western, 2021 the context of water rights; future work may wish to investigate whether this strategy is effective for both positive and negative human rights, as well as other rights, such as indigenous rights. we recognize our research focused on support for government action to provide access to safe water, which some argue is an inherent shortcoming in traditional human rights approaches to water security (see jepson et al., 2020). this focus was decided through consultations with our indigenous partners and indigenous community members. however, other forms of direct action taken by non-state actors are also important (meehan, 2020), as is promoting holistic views of water rights that recognize cultural and ecological issues associated with water insecurity (jepson, 2014; jepson et al., 2017). future research should examine the implications of the water as a human right frame for other forms of action including those that address cultural and ecological issues. finally, at the request of our indigenous partners, we limited our sample to non-indigenous participants. they felt (and we, the authors, agreed) it was important to focus on shifting the attitudes of nonindigenous peoples, as they represent a large section of the population and public opinion can influence government action (herle, 2007; page & shapiro, 1983). we collectively assumed that indigenous peoples would have quite strong support for government action, rendering the human right frame either less effective or perhaps ineffective for indigenous peoples, relative to the non-indigenous participants we sampled here. nonetheless, a consequence of this sampling decision is that we could not assess these possibilities, which represent an important direction for future work. a call to action given the severe consequences of not having access to potable water, we would be remiss without ending on a call for action. we first speak to those who directly influence and enact policies to ensure equal access to potable water, such as elected officials responsible for onboarding these services. it is essential to work in partnership with those who do not have access to potable water. in many cases, true partnership was likely a pathway to success that was absent in previous attempts to “fix” these problems. each affected community has its own characteristics (e.g., population size and density, available training, governing structure, motivations and attitudes toward change, differing features of the terrain) that could influence the ultimate success of any specific action; likely, the community will know these features best. working alongside community members will help to ensure that the characteristics unique to each community are acknowledged and implemented by water infrastructure experts as part of planning the solution; what works well for one community may not work for another. in canada, it is necessary to implement the united nations declaration of rights of indigenous peoples and the truth and reconciliation commission of canada’s calls to action. those who have less direct influence on systems capable of changing water infrastructure also have a role to play. through in-person or online conversations, they may tell others about the lack of clean running water in first nations (or other relevant contexts) while asking the question, “is water a human right?” in these ways, we may work toward a world wherein the human right to water—the “most precious gift”—is fulfilled. 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2021.12.3.9342 references allen, s. w. 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(2016). meta-analysis to integrate effect sizes within an article: possible misuse and type i error inflation. journal of experimental psychology: general, 145(5), 643–654. https://doi.org/10.1037/xge0000159 united nations, the human right to water and sanitation, resolution a/res/64/292, general assembly, 64th session, 2010, august 3. http://daccessods.un.org/access.nsf/get?open&ds=a/res/64/292&lang=e united nations human rights council. (2010). human right and access to safe drinking water and sanitation. un general assembly. van zomeren, m., postmes, t., & spears, r. (2008). toward an integrative social identity model of collective action: a quantitative research synthesis of three socio-psychological perspectives. psychological bulletin, 134(4), 504–535. https://doi.org/10.1037/0033-2909.134.4.504 viechtbauer, w. (2010). conducting meta-analyses in r with the metafor package. journal of statistical software, 36(3), 1–48. https://www.jstatsoft.org/article/view/v036i03 ms+9342+title+page.pdf ms+9342+-+starzyk+-+is+water+a+human+right rce.pdf keynote address for western journal day the international indigenous policy journal volume 8 | issue 1 article 8 january 2017 keynote address for western journal day jerry p. w hite western university, white@uwo.ca susan wingert western university, swingert@uwo.ca recommended citation white, j. p. , wingert, s. (2017). keynote address for western journal day. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(1). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.8 keynote address for western journal day abstract today, i want to look at three interconnected things. the first is the importance of open access and what it really means. the second is the role of scholarship@western in supporting our open access journals from the perspective of the international indigenous policy journal (iipj). lastly, we want to talk about some of the actions that we have taken to enhance our journal’s readership and rankings. keywords open access, publishing, dissemination creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ keynote address for western journal day western university london, on canada march 31, 2017 thank you for the invitation to speak. today, i want to look at three interconnected things. the first is the importance of open access and what it really means. the second is the role of scholarship@western1 in supporting our open access journals from the perspective of the international indigenous policy journal (iipj). lastly, we want to talk about some of the actions that we have taken to enhance our journal’s readership and rankings. before we do, thanks are due to some of those who have made our journal a success—two of the working copy-editors, meghan o’hara and emily kring. we have an advisory board of 10 and an editorial board that stands at 32 senior academics, policy makers, and civil servants from canada and around the world. also thanks to the social sciences and humanities research council of canada (sshrc), indigenous and northern affairs canada (inac), the aboriginal policy research consortium (international) (aprc(i)), and individual donors. as well, thank you to scholarship@western and western libraries for their kind support. what is open access? in the simplest terms, open access is about returning scholarly publishing to its original purpose: knowledge dissemination and allowing that knowledge to be built upon. it makes little sense that price barriers would prevent researchers, governments, students, non-governmental organizations (ngos), or anyone else from accessing research that they need. by open access we mean that there is no cost to access or read publications. ideally, we also believe there should be no cost for researchers to publish. we will come back to that point. iipj is a completely open access journal. no one engaged with the journal, from researchers to readers, confront any impediments related to a price tag. why does open access make sense? why is it necessary? there are three basic reasons: a. anything less than open access means we are harming the research and teaching enterprise. we maintain that research unshared is of no social value. without access, research dollars and some programs are a waste of time (for example when research is duplicated). also, 1 scholarship@western (n.d.) is “a multi-functional portal that collects, showcases, archives, and preserves a variety of materials created or sponsored by the university of western ontario community (hereinafter called western). it aims to facilitate knowledge sharing and broaden the international recognition of western’s academic excellence by providing open access to western’s intellectual output and professional achievements. it also serves as a platform to support western's scholarly communication needs and provides an avenue for the compliance of research funding agencies' open access policies” (para. 1). 1 white and wingert: keynote address published by scholarship@western, 2017 research is a cornerstone of the best teaching programs—not every teacher, lecturer, and professor can pay the fees associated with keeping abreast of the latest work in the field. b. non-open access inadvertently perpetuates colonial relations because it is disproportionately the developing world that is impacted by cost barriers. this means that developing countries have a harder time building quality education institutions and better curricula. c. lastly, the general public, communities, businesses, and others deserve to have access to the knowledge that they, in one way or another, have invested in. if democratic reasons, or the furthering of scientific knowledge, or the building of the developing world, or paying back taxpayers who cover the costs, or helping students get a better education, or helping professors to teach don’t move us to embrace open access then self interest should. in a study of eight fields, sociology being one, the citation rate of articles in non-open access journals was only 48% of the citation rate for open access journals (swan, 2010). so there is a direct benefit to university researchers seeking higher h-indexes. charging fees to publish the recent trend toward charging publishing fees is, to me, a travesty. traditional journals in some disciplines commonly charged per page (often $100-250 each) and/or per color figure ($150-1,000 each). open access journals typically charge a flat processing fee that can range from $8 to as much as $5,000 (cell reports) (nassi-calò, 2013). this is nothing but a shift of the pay system from subscribers and libraries to researchers. but it raises the issue of where the hell do we get the money to do our work? we propose that the state and institutions that are engaged in funding and/or knowledge dissemination split the advantage with us—that research councils build competitive funding for quality open access journals into knowledge dissemination activities. and libraries, as they can reduce costs associated with high cost subscription and print journals, also make funding available for open access journals. and this is actually a segue. scholarship@western platforms like scholarship@western are precisely the kind of support that has helped my journal become as successful as it is. make no mistake—this is a tangible, in-kind support that makes it possible to do what we do. scholarship@western is already in the forefront. they are splitting the difference with us by shifting resources to help open access journals. let me talk for just five more minutes on the attributes of this online journal publication system, which is hosted by the berkley electronic press (bepress) in california. the scholarship@western platform has saved us an enormous amount of time and money compared with developing and maintaining our own platform. in particular, we have found: 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 8 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.8 a. it is very user friendly for both authors and editors. b. it maintains a paper trail through the publication process, which would also be time consuming to do manually. c. it synchronizes access among different stakeholders (e.g., editors, copy editors, peer reviewers, authors) so there are not multiple files floating around in different hands where they might be lost or mixed up. in this way, it helps with quality control. d. it streamlines communication by putting those tools into the system. e. it is optimized for search engines, crawlers, rankings, etc. f. it has tools for tracking dissemination built in (e.g., altmetrics, download counts). g. it adds credibility to online journals by giving them a professional platform. h. we get access to expert technical support and, since it is shared, it is more cost effective than hiring our own. i. and, finally, it enables us to track various statistics for funding and promotion. but while having a wonderful technology platform is critical, there are things that journal teams have to do. let me list a few that have resulted in what we feel is a real success for iipj2: a. you need to work hard to ensure those organizations that measure impact are measuring your journal. b. you need to establish a network of advisors and associate editors that buy into the journal and help build it. this is difficult but the rewards are enormous, particularly the reputational ones. we have 40 people from canada, the us, russia, turkey, india, northern europe, southern europe, central and south america, australia, and new zealand. c. you need to actively build a reviewer database. ours has over 400 at this point. these are reviewers that we hunted down by specialty. note that you keep reviewers who perform, while you cut those who leave you hanging. d. you need to know where you are going. i believe it was lewis carroll who said, “if you don’t know where you are going, any road will get you there.” that will not work. we have an annual strategic plan and a tactical plan we review every six months to update the strategy on how to achieve it. e. you need to start knowing you are no one. you have no status. no reputation. you have to earn it. that comes with quality reviews and quick turnaround: we set 21 days as the 2 in 2016, iipj had approximately 73,000 full text downloads and its lifetime count is 230,000. it is ranked #1 in the world by google scholar (h-5 index) among journals with an indigenous focus. 3 white and wingert: keynote address published by scholarship@western, 2017 timeframe for reviewers to complete their reports so we can get back to authors within two months from the time of submission and typically publish within three to six months of final acceptance on resubmission. achieving that takes work and capital. i would be happy to discuss the issues that we feel work together to create success. i am pleased to say we reached 70,000 verified full text downloads this past year. we are ranked #1 by google scholar in their h-5 index for journals with indigenous or aboriginal content. i would say we are proud of our collective achievement but a better descriptor is “pretty tired.” so in closing, i believe we are working at the forefront of a needed sea-change in knowledge dissemination. it will be tough, but it was only 15 years ago when i was told that i would never amount to anything if i published in online journals. as nobel laurate bob dylan says, “times they are a changing.” thank you. jerry p. white, editor-in-chief susan wingert, managing editor 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 8 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.8 references nassi-calò, l. (2013). how much does it cost to publish in open access? scielo in perspective. retrieved from http://blog.scielo.org/en/2013/09/18/how-much-does-it-cost-to-publish-inopen-access/ scholarship@western. (n.d.). about scholarship@western and its policy. retrieved from http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/about.html swan, a. (2010). the open access citation advantage: studies and results to date. retrieved from https://eprints.soton.ac.uk/268516/ 5 white and wingert: keynote address published by scholarship@western, 2017 the international indigenous policy journal january 2017 keynote address for western journal day jerry p. white susan wingert recommended citation keynote address for western journal day abstract keywords creative commons license keynote address for western journal day introductory essay: traditional knowledge, spirituality and lands the international indigenous policy journal volume 2 issue 4 traditional knowledge, spirituality, and lands article 1 october 2011 introductory essay: traditional knowledge, spirituality and lands marc fonda aboriginal affairs and northern development canada, marc.fonda@aandc.gc.ca recommended citation fonda, m. (2011). introductory essay: traditional knowledge, spirituality and lands. the international indigenous policy journal, 2(4) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.1 this letter from the editor is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. introductory essay: traditional knowledge, spirituality and lands abstract in times like ours, when people are inundated with notions of consumerist identities, culture is often seen mainly as a resource to be tapped into for economic development. this certainly is true of blatant consumerist culture produced by such economic behemoths as hollywood, but it is a narrow view on the importance and functions of culture. the objective of this issue of the international indigenous policy journal is to demonstrate the radical importance of culture and spirituality in not only defining a people and their society but also in affecting their well-being and how these things are all interrelated. keywords traditional knowledge, spirituality, lands creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ letter from the guest editor marc fonda introductory essay traditional knowledge, spirituality and lands in times like ours, when people are inundated with notions of consumerist identities, culture is often seen mainly as a resource to be tapped into for economic development. this certainly is true of blatant consumerist culture produced by such economic behemoths as hollywood, but it is a narrow view on the importance and functions of culture. the objective of this issue of the international indigenous policy journal is to demonstrate the radical importance of culture and spirituality in not only defining a people and their society but also in affecting their well-being and how these things are all interrelated. the impacts of culture on wellbeing is demonstrated by chandler and colleagues (2004; 2006; 2007) whose work on suicide among first nations communities in british columbia, canada, shows that those communities engaging in activities relating to ‘cultural continuity’ had lower suicide rates than those communities not so engaging. what was interesting is the 2004 addendum to their work where they looked at these communities’ relative retention and use of traditional languages. what was found was astonishing: those communities with higher retention and use of traditional language who were also engaged in any one of the eight self-governance activities (e.g., engaged in land-claims, some control over policing, fire and health services, some control over education, a degree of self-governance, institutions for cultural preservation, on reserve child protection services) had near to zero suicides; and those communities further afield from such activities often had dramatically higher instances of suicide, in some instances many times higher than the national average (chandler and lalonde 2004). in many cases, those communities able to retain traditional languages have also been able to maintain traditional spiritualities. could the impacts of so doing also lead to improved well-being? similar impacts at the individual level have also been observed. the work of james waldram (2008; 1994; 1993) and others (cf., brass 2008) detail how ‘pan-indian’ spirituality has brought about significant healing among incarcerated aboriginals in north america. in addition, pan-aboriginal spirituality has been found to be a protective factor with respect to substance abuse and not only among indigenous prison populations (cf., mcivor 2009). and, traditional (often revitalized) spiritualities that remain closely tied to specific places demonstrate similar well-being effects (tanner, 2008; adelson, 2008). in most contexts, culture/spirituality and well-being are clearly interrelated. in the indigenous context, however, land must be included as part of this nexus, since a great deal of identity and well-being comes from that sense of relationship to land and to the creatures and objects within the environment. as kirkmayer, fletcher and watt (2008) point out, the inuit concept of person has been called the ecocentric self in that it gives a central role to connections among individuals to place in the health and well-being of the person. one is in constant transaction with the environment via subsistence activities and through the act of eating. this is 1 fonda: traditional knowledge, spirituality and lands published by scholarship@western, 2011 to say that the land is a constant reminder of cultural history. in addition, there is broad agreement that being out of the community and on the land has a rejuvenating effect on mind and body. people use hunting, camping and fishing as ways to regain a sense of well-being. lack of access to the land may cause feelings of distress, disorientation and anxiety. to the inuit of canada’s north, the environment is not an impersonal, inanimate landscape. rather, it is alive and closely linked to personal memories. what was said above about the interrelationship of culture and spirituality, identity and relationship to the land also applies to many indigenous peoples and communities the world over. these considerations were at the roots of the decision to propose this special issue of the international indigenous policy journal. i am very pleased to report that the call for papers resulted in a number of solid papers and one editorial, helping to show how complex and varied such relationships are. in what follows you will find a series of articles that mainly deal with north america but also one article each on the indigenous people of ghana and india. an additional happy coincidence is that several of the following articles compliment one another, allowing them to be organized according to two general theme areas: 1) issues impacting on or relating to religious freedom and healing as access to land (robbins & dewar; shrubsole; and, fonda); and, 2) resource management as intimately tied to traditional spirituality and practices (king; ornelas; propser, mcmillian & davis; reo; sarfo-mensah & awuah-nyamekye; and, sarma and barpujari); the first group of articles, on issues impacting on or relating to religious freedom and healing as access to land, starts with robbins and dewar’s article “traditional indigenous approaches to healing and the modern welfare of traditional knowledge, spirituality and lands”. robbins and dewar discuss that, in canada at least, the spiritual revitalization of indigenous communities and individuals often involves the use of traditional healing. such elements are reflected most clearly at the grassroots level, yet, programs currently delivered by indigenous and governmental agencies have made some accommodating efforts. perhaps most importantly, indigenous land bases and the environment as a whole remain vitally important to the practice of traditional healing. with respect to policy, there appears to be a historical progression towards an increasingly more favourable perception of indigenous traditional healing in canada. there are, nevertheless, continuing challenges for traditional healing. mainstream perceptions and subsequent policy implementation sometimes reflect attitudes that were formulated during colonization processes. as a consequence the ability for particular communities to maintain and use their specific understandings of indigenous knowledge continues to be problematic. the authors conclude that future policy development and implementation should aim to support indigenous peoples and communities, when they decide to learn about, maintain and build upon the knowledge amassed by their ancestors. shrubsole’s interesting piece on “the sun dance and the gustafsen lake standoff”, discusses how the revitalization and renewal of traditional indigenous spiritual practices have produced new forms of indigenous religiosity rooted in experience, contact and combination. shrubsole examines the contemporary sun dance, a traditional native american or first nations healing ritual, which seeks to address pain and sickness in indigenous communities. however, when a 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.1 highly politicized form of the ritual emerged in the non-traditional region of gustafsen lake in british columbia, it led the media, the state and locally elected first nations leadership to dismiss the ritual as fraudulent. as the paper demonstrates, failure to protect sacred sites and ceremonies and to understand the embodied spiritualities that accompany them can lead to violence between religious communities and the state. fonda’s submission, “are they like us, yet? some thoughts on why religious freedom remains elusive for aboriginals in north america”, proposes that despite the fact that both aboriginal and european worldviews regarding the relationship to land are tied to spiritual or religious trajectories and relative jurisprudence, historically the state-indigenous legal dialogue in this area has been mostly one sided, favouring the interests of the state over those of aboriginal peoples. this paper reviews some of the religious freedom challenges facing indigenous communities in north america in their attempts to access and use off reserve lands for spiritual purposes. sarah king leads off on the section group of articles that generally addresses how resource management is intimately tied to traditional spirituality and practices. her article, “conservation controversy: sparrow, marshall, and the mi’kmaq of esgenoôpetitj”, explores the interplay between the sparrow and marshall decisions of the supreme court of canada, and the sovereigntist and traditionalist convictions of the mi’kmaq of the esgenoôpetitj/burnt church first nation, as expressed in the conservationist language of the draft for the esgenoopotitj first nations (efn) fishery act (fisheries policy). the efn fishery act demonstrates that, for the mi’kmaq, scientific management, traditional knowledge, sovereignty and spirituality are understood in a holistic philosophy. the focus placed on conservation by the courts, and the management-focused approach taken by the government at esgenoôpetitj, have led to government policy that treats conservation simply as a resource access and management problem. conservation, which the court deems “uncontroversial” in sparrow, is a politically loaded ideal in post-marshall burnt church. ornelas’ “managing the sacred lands of native america”, reviews ten years of sacred lands management and policy in the united states. the author reports from the unique position of having been involved in national and international meetings with communities of indigenous peoples and intergovernmental stakeholders during this time. discussion includes an historical overview of such topics as environmental justice and the 2001 native american sacred lands forum, one of the first national meetings in the united states to specifically address the sacred lands of native americans. further discussion draws attention to the adoption of the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples in 2007 as a gateway to better sacred lands management and policy for native americans in the future. propser, macmillian and davis consider a second conservation approach among the mi’kmaq. their “returning to netukulimk: mi’kmaq cultural and spiritual connections with resource stewardship and self-governance” shows how the mi’kmaq, of maritime canada, capture and express their holistic understanding through the concept of netukulimk. this essay reviews core attributes of netukulimk and key moments in the colonialization assault on netukulimk as a primary means for subordinating and marginalizing the mi’kmaq. the essay closes with an overview and discussion of recent developments wherein the mi’kmaq are working to revitalize 3 fonda: traditional knowledge, spirituality and lands published by scholarship@western, 2011 the place of netukulimk in treaty-based rights and mi’kmaq law-ways, particularly within selfgovernance and resource stewardship initiatives. reo’s editorial “the importance of belief systems in traditional ecological knowledge initiatives” looks at how resource managers are increasingly engaging with tribes and first nations in developing methods to incorporate their perspectives, priorities and traditional ecological knowledge (tek) into public land and resource management. many initiatives that engage tribes and their tek holders only seek tribal input, such as biological data, that is most easily integrated into existing management structures. increasing attention on tribal belief systems would provide a more holistic understanding that could benefit tek-related initiatives. such a shift could reduce misunderstandings about tribal natural resource perspectives and may lead to insights valuable for society at large. leaving north america for africa, sarfo-mensah and awuah-nyamekye’s “ensuring equitable distribution of land in ghana: spirituality or policy? a case study from the forest-savanna agroecological zone of ghana” explores the question of equitable distribution of land in subsahara africa using ghana as a case study. this article focuses on the dichotomy of policy versus indigenous spirituality in contemporary distribution of land in ghana. after ghana’s independence, there were several attempts to restructure land title holding by way of land registration. the paper concludes that ghana needs pragmatic steps to confront the challenges of land distribution and that the religio-cultural underpinnings of land issues in ghana should be factored into the resulting policy. anything short of this will make the implementation of any land policy in ghana ineffective. finally, sarma and barpujari’s “eco-cosmologies and biodiversity conservation: continuity and change among the karbis of assam” examines how the culture, particularly the cosmologies and religious beliefs of a indigenous tribal group-the karbis living near kaziranga national park, assam, india have implications for the conservation of natural resources. the paper is on fieldwork conducted in two karbi villages, one still adhering to the traditional religion with a deep seated reverence for nature and all life forms and a second that has converted to a new religion. the paper throws light on the changes and challenges to the indigenous ecological ethos in the context of contemporary india. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.1 references: adelson, n. (2008). towards a recuperation of souls and bodies: community healing and the complex interplay of faith and history. in l. j. kirmayer, & g. g. valaskakis (eds.), healing traditions: the mental health of aboriginal peoples in canada (pp. 272-288). vancouver: ubc press. brass, g. m. (2008). respecting the medicines: narrating on aboriginal identity. in l. j. kirmayer, & g. g. valaskakis (eds.), healing traditions: the mental health of aboriginal peoples in canada (pp. 355-380). vancouver: ubc press. chandler, m., & lalonde, c. (2004). transferring whose knowledge? exchanging whose best practices? on knowing about indigenous knowledge and aboriginal suicide. in j. while, p. maxim, & d. beavon (eds.), aboriginal policy research: setting the agenda and change. (vol. 2, pp. 111-123). toronto: thompson educational publishing. chandler, m., & proulx, t. (2006b). on committing the psychologist’s fallacy and getting away with it: bridging personal and cultural identities. in p. k. oles, & h. j. m. hermans (eds.),the dialogical self: theory and research. lublin, poland: wydawnictwo kul. hallett, d., chandler, m. j., & lalonde, c. (2007) aboriginal language knowledge and youth suicide. cognitive development, 22 (3), 392-399. kirmayer, l. k., fletcher, c., & watt, r. (2008). locating the ecocentric self: inuit concepts of mental health and illness. in l. j. kirmayer, & g. g. valaskakis (eds.), healing traditions: the mental health of aboriginal peoples in canada (pp. 289-312). vancouver: ubc press. mcivor, o. (2009). language and culture as protective factors for at-risk communities. journal of aboriginal health, november, 6-25. tanner, a. (2008). the origins of northern aboriginal social pathologies and the quebec cree healing movement. in l. j. kirmayer, & g. g. valaskakis (eds.) healing traditions: the mental health of aboriginal peoples in canada (pp. 249-269). vancouver: ubc press. waldram, j. b. (1993). aboriginal spirituality: symbolic healing in canadian prisons. culture, medicine and psychiatry, 17, 345-362. waldram, j. b. ( 1994). aboriginal spirituality in corrections: a canadian case study in religion and therapy. american indian quarterly, spring, 18(2). waldram, j. b. (2008). culture and aboriginality in the study of mental health. in l. j. kirmayer, & g. g. valaskakis (eds.) healing traditions: the mental health of aboriginal peoples in canada (pp. 56-74). vancouver: ubc press. 5 fonda: traditional knowledge, spirituality and lands published by scholarship@western, 2011 the international indigenous policy journal october 2011 introductory essay: traditional knowledge, spirituality and lands marc fonda recommended citation introductory essay: traditional knowledge, spirituality and lands abstract keywords creative commons license introductory essay: traditional knowledge, spirituality and lands microsoft word 8206-supplementary files-21668-1-18-20200615.docx the international indigenous policy journal volume 11|issue3 september 2020 applying lessons from the u.s. indian child welfare act to recently passed federal child protection legislation in canada hayley hahn university of virginia school of law, united states, hah4gn@virginia.edu johanna caldwell mcgill university, centre for research on children & families, canada, johanna.caldwell@mail.mcgill.ca vandna sinha university of colorado (boulder) school of education, united states, vandna.sinha@colorado.edu recommended citation hahn, h., caldwell, j., & sinha, v. (2020). applying lessons from the u.s. indian child welfare act to recently passed federal child protection legislation in canada. the international indigenous policy journal, 11(3). https://10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8206 applying lessons from the u.s. indian child welfare act to recently passed federal child protection legislation in canada abstract indigenous children are overrepresented in child protection systems in the united states and to an even greater degree in canada. canada has recently passed federal child welfare legislation, bill c-92, with the goal of affirming the rights of indigenous peoples and establishing guidelines with respect to child and family services for indigenous children. the aim of this article is to contribute to ongoing discussions about the recently passed canadian legislation, drawing on lessons learned in the united states context. the indian child welfare act (icwa), passed in the united states in 1978, has created a legislative paradigm, which in some cases has been bolstered by statelevel provisions. the icwa can provide helpful lessons to consider in canada as the new legislation is implemented and amended over time. specifically, we examine elements of the icwa related to accessibility and compliance with the law, along with deeper analysis of state-level statutes related to adoption provisions in light of the phenomenon of transracial adoption of indigenous children. as reactions to the canadian federal law have been mixed, this policy analysis may be supportive of conversations regarding its further development, particularly related to funding and enforcement. on a broader level, considerations of indigenous community jurisdiction over child and family policies within our discussion are relevant to various settler-colonial contexts. keywords american indian, native american, indigenous peoples, canada, united states, child welfare, child protection, indian child welfare act (icwa), cultural continuity creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0license. 1 hahn et al.: applying lessons from the u.s. indian child welfare act published by scholarship@western, 2020 applying lessons from the u.s. indian child welfare act to recently passed federal child protection legislation in canada in june of 2019, the canadian federal government passed bill c-92, an act respecting first nations, inuit and métis children, youth and families. the bill included principles of “cultural continuity” and defined the best interests of children according to not only physical, emotional, and psychological safety, but cultural and linguistic ties as well (bill c-92, 2019). the act partially responds to recent public testimony regarding the significant impacts of colonization on indigenous1 communities in canada. this testimony and related advocacy efforts have resulted in calls for reconciliation, or a “coming to terms with events of the past in a manner that overcomes conflict and establishes a respectful and healthy relationship among people going forward” (truth and reconciliation commission of canada [trc], 2015b, p. 3). reactions to this new canadian federal legislation have been mixed. while some groups, such as the assembly of first nations, have argued that the bill will strengthen indigenous families (assembly of first nations, 2019), others have been critical of the legislation citing concerns about it not prioritizing indigenous communities’ self-determination (“first nations chiefs call for protests,” 2019). additional concerns raised by some first nations include the delegation of funding to the provinces and “a perceived lack of consultation by the federal government during its drafting” (isaac, 2019, para. 5). prominent first nations children’s advocate dr. cindy blackstock noted that the bill “offers indigenous children a colonial faustian bargain: accept the flawed bill in its current state or get nothing” (metallic, friedland, & morales, 2019, p. 4). in its present form, bill c-92 fails to provide mechanisms to fully realize the aims of reconciliation or remediation, particularly regarding indigenous self-determination in child protection proceedings. prior to the bill’s introduction, the former indigenous services minister jane philpott announced a sixpart plan to improve first nations child welfare in canada, raising the possibility of developing federal indigenous child welfare legislation (tasker, 2018). in doing so, she referred to the relative success of the u.s. federal indian child welfare act (icwa, 1978). similarly, advocates and academics calling for federal indigenous child welfare legislation in canada have also cited the icwa (see for example grammond, 2018). bill c-92 presents a more modest proposal than the icwa. while both federal laws attempt to improve outcomes for indigenous families regarding child protection involvement, the new canadian federal legislation is distinct from the longstanding u.s. federal law both in the way it treats indigenous communities’ sovereignty in child protection decisions and the judicial context in which these decisions are made. in this article, we examine the icwa to identify lessons that may be relevant in the canadian context today. we focus primarily on the relevance of the icwa to federal legislation in canada. through analyzing the icwa’s history and implementation in the united states, we underscore the value of federal indigenous child welfare legislation, while emphasizing the key provisions that may prove most useful in the canadian context. we also examine lessons from the united states regarding the 1 many different terms, including aboriginal, indian, native, and indigenous, are used to refer to the indigenous peoples of north america. in this article, when discussing a particular piece of legislation, the terminology mirrors the language of the law. when no term is specified, indigenous is used in this article. 2 the international indigenous policy journal vol. 11, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8206 coordination of state and federal indigenous child welfare legislation in order to provide a nuanced analysis that might be applicable to the relationship between provincial and territorial jurisdictions in indigenous child welfare in canada. we focus on the adoption protections for indigenous children passed by state governments in order to highlight the potential benefits and challenges of implementing indigenous child welfare legislation at multiple levels of government. to provide background for this analysis, we draw on work that centres the voices of indigenous individuals adopted as children into non-indigenous families. testimony of these transracial indigenous adoptees demonstrates the need for legislation that provides indigenous children with access to their extended families, communities, and cultures. after analyzing federaland state-level indigenous child welfare provisions in the united states context, we discuss the icwa in relation to the federal legislation recently passed in canada and earlier proposals for federal indigenous child welfare legislation advanced by scholars, attorneys, and activists in the canadian context. we examine the applicability of the icwa to the new canadian legislation, and highlight the key lessons emerging from our analysis of icwa implementation that seem relevant to the canadian context. while the newly introduced canadian legislation is a good first step, ongoing revision of the legislative framework will be necessary. the intent of this article is to contribute to discussions of how this federal legislation in canada could be further bolstered in order to support and formally protect self-determination in child welfare by indigenous communities. background residential and boarding schools in the u.s. and canada throughout the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries, government officials from both the united states and canada forced indigenous children to attend boarding or residential schools, institutions that functioned as sites of forcible assimilation (national council of juvenile and family court judges, 2012; task force on federal, state, and tribal jurisdiction, 1976; trc, 2015a). the schools were part of a broader regime of u.s. and canadian settler colonial practices and policies that fractured indigenous communities by destroying the traditional economies and governance, and restricted indigenous peoples to reserves with inadequate access to traditional land and poor sanitation and shelter (trc, 2015a). the residential schools aimed to eradicate indigenous peoples and cultures through cultural genocide, “the destruction of those structures and practices that allow the group to continue as a group,” by fully assimilating indigenous peoples into mainstream, white, anglo-canadian culture (trc, 2015a, p. 1). teachers and administrators in these schools facilitated the process of cultural genocide by preventing indigenous children from speaking their languages, practicing their religions, or contacting their families; many indigenous children were physically or sexually abused and neglected in the schools (national council of juvenile and family court judges, 2012; trc, 2015a). the residential schools were also inadequately funded, leading to malnutrition, poor student supervision, and high rates of student illness and death (national council of juvenile and family court judges, 2012; trc, 2015a). documents and testimony from the time show that school administrators and government officials were aware of poor conditions of the institutions, including student deaths (bryce, 1907; task force on federal, state, and tribal jurisdiction, 1976; trc, 2015a). 3 hahn et al.: applying lessons from the u.s. indian child welfare act published by scholarship@western, 2020 in response to these inhumane conditions, many indigenous people and communities resisted the residential schools (milloy, 1999; subcommittee on indian affairs, 1974; trc, 2015a). as a result of indigenous resistance and advocacy efforts, the canadian and u.s. governments began closing the schools after the second world war, but some remained in operation until the late twentieth century (milloy, 1999; subcommittee on indian affairs, 1974). the sixties scoop and the era of child welfare as residential schools were closing from the 1950s to the 1980s, child welfare workers began to apprehend indigenous children at disproportionately high rates, placing the vast majority of these children in non-indigenous foster and adoptive homes (johnston, 1983; national council of juvenile and family court judges, 2012; nichols, 2017; task force on federal, state, and tribal jurisdiction, 1976). this period of time is referred to in canada as the “sixties scoop,” a name coined after an employee of the ministry of human resources in british columbia regretfully “admitted that provincial social workers would, quite literally, scoop children from reserves on the slightest pretext” (johnston, 1983, p. 23). a parallel mass removal of indigenous children by child welfare authorities in the united states took place during the same time period (johnston, 1983). united states senate hearings on indigenous child welfare held in 1974 demonstrated that many social service agents and agencies were deeply biased against indigenous people, prompting agencies to “literally stea[l] children,” and that the vast majority of indian children taken from their families were removed on the basis of neglect, rather than physical abuse (subcommittee on indian affairs, 1974, pp. 2, 4). indigenous children adopted and raised by non-indigenous families in the 1950s and 1960s have emphasized the adverse effects of growing up separated from their indigenous communities and cultures (carrière, 2010; simon & hernandez, 2008). for example, interviews with 20 native american transracial adoptees in the united states revealed that, although 55% believed that it was better for white or non-indigenous families to adopt an indigenous child than for the child to languish in residential facilities, 95% expressed a desire for indigenous children to remain connected to their culture, and the majority expressed that adoption placement with other indigenous families best served this purpose (simon & hernandez, 2008). likewise, carrière (2008) conducted interviews with 18 indigenous transracial adult adoptees and found that “each adoptee experienced loss in several areas of her or his life” (p. 64). in subsequent writing on indigenous children and adoption, she emphasized the need for building and maintaining an indigenous child’s connection to her or his indigenous community and culture in order to foster resiliency and positive identity formation (carrière, 2010). difficulties related to being disconnected from indigenous culture—such as difficulties related to identity formation and racism—can lead to challenges later on in life (sinclair, 2009). in a literature review and series of interviews with adult transracial indigenous adoptees, sinclair (2007) found adults expressed that contact with their immediate and extended birth family “might have helped alleviate the sense of difference and cultural isolation” that they experienced throughout their lives (p. 77). additionally, research suggests that many indigenous transracial adoptions breakdown for these same reasons. one study analyzed the outcomes for 37 families in canada who adopted indigenous children, finding that almost half of these adoptions broke down by the time the child was 15 years old (bagley, 4 the international indigenous policy journal vol. 11, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8206 1991). available evidence suggests that providing indigenous children in care with culturally safe permanent placements is paramount not just for their wellbeing as children, but for their transition into adolescence and health in adulthood (di tomasso & de finney, 2015; sinclair, 2009). overrepresentation of indigenous children in child welfare indigenous children continue to be overrepresented in child welfare systems in both canada (sinha et al., 2011; trocmé et al., 2010) and the united states (national council of juvenile and family court judges, 2017; national indian child welfare association, 2017). data from the canadian 2016 national household survey indicated that indigenous children aged 0 to 14 are placed in care at 13 times the rate of non-indigenous children (statistics canada, 2016). a more detailed analysis of data from 2011 indicated that indigenous children in canada face disproportionate rates of placement in foster care: although aboriginal children make up less than 10% of canada’s population of children aged 0 to 15, they comprise nearly half of the total foster child population (sinha & wray, 2015). more specifically, first nations, métis, and inuit children were placed in foster care at 15.3, 5.8, and 9.6 times the rate of non-indigenous children, respectively (sinha & wray, 2015). the overrepresentation of indigenous children in care is driven primarily by cases involving neglect. results from the 2008 first nations child incidence study revealed that neglect investigations were substantiated at a rate 8 times higher for first nations children than for non-indigenous children (sinha et al., 2011). indigenous children are also overrepresented in the child welfare system in the united states, although at a significantly lower rate than in canada. the rate of american indian and alaska native children who experience foster care is 2.6 times higher than the rate of foster care and adoption for the general child population (national council of juvenile and family court judges, 2017). the lower level of indigenous overrepresentation in the u.s. compared to canada may to a certain extent reflect the 1978 enactment of the federal icwa, which was explicitly intended to curb the rate of indigenous child apprehension. though issues with accessibility, compliance, and funding hamper the complete realization of goals articulated in the icwa, the act still marks a significant advancement in indigenous child welfare in the u.s., as it provides a tool for addressing the continued disproportionate placement of indigenous children in care (casey family programs, 2015; kern, 2009; national indian child welfare association, 2015; watt & kim, 2019). similarities across the u.s. and canada suggest that lessons from the icwa may be relevant in the canadian context. indeed, the icwa supports indigenous communities’ sovereignty over their children, and by extension may be a mechanism of decolonizing child welfare (jaffke, 2006). however, important distinctions between the two are needed to situate our analysis. though bill c-92 and the icwa share a similar purpose, differences in scope and procedural and substantive provisions distinguish the icwa as a more ambitious and comprehensive piece of legislation. analyzing the successes and shortcomings of the icwa and understanding how this federal legislation operates alongside state forms of indigenous child welfare protection statutes in the u.s. may help to advance ongoing discussions regarding indigenous child welfare policy in canada. 5 hahn et al.: applying lessons from the u.s. indian child welfare act published by scholarship@western, 2020 analysis history of the icwa’s enactment following world war ii, as federal boarding schools began closing, indigenous children in the united states faced high rates of apprehension and transracial adoption (graham, 2008). indigenous peoples continually resisted the removal of their children. for example, in the 1960s, parents from the devils lake sioux reservation—now called the spirit lake sioux—traveled to the bureau of indian affairs in washington, d.c., as part of an effort to prevent child welfare workers from apprehending their children (subcommittee on indian affairs, 1974, p. 38). the advocacy efforts of these and other indigenous peoples forced the united states congress to address the disproportionate apprehension of indigenous children (subcommittee on indian affairs, 1974). in 1974, the u.s. senate, led by indian affairs subcommittee chairman senator james abourezk of south dakota, held hearings to address the decades-long forcible removal of indigenous children from their families (subcommittee on indian affairs,1974). through the hearings, the subcommittee sought to acknowledge the deleterious effects of the indian boarding school system, as well as address the alarmingly high rate at which social services removed indigenous children from their homes and placed them with non-indigenous families (subcommittee on indian affairs, 1974). following the senate hearings, the united states congress commissioned a task force to examine jurisdictional issues arising from the relationships between federal, state, and tribal authorities. in 1976, this task force released its findings in the report on federal, state, and tribal jurisdiction, which analyzed the ways in which existing legislation hampered the safety and prosperity of tribal communities (task force on federal, state, and tribal jurisdiction, 1976). in particular, the report detailed the ways in which public law 280 (pl-280, 1953) worked “to end the unique relationship that existed between the federal government and tribal governments since the formation of the federal government” through empowering states to exercise jurisdiction over vast categories of criminal and civil cases in indigenous communities, including child welfare cases (task force on federal, state and tribal jurisdiction, 1976, p. 4).2 the report found that indian children were being placed in care “at rates far out of proportion to their percentage population” (task force on federal, state, and tribal jurisdiction, 1976, p. 179). furthermore, the task force found that state oversight of indian child welfare directly contributed to the disproportionate placement of indian children in care. the task force identified the tribes’ lack of standing in court cases involving indian children as a major impediment to the preservation of indian families and communities. in response to these observations, the task force urged the united states government “to do all within its power to ensure indian children remain in indian homes” (task force on federal, state, and tribal jurisdiction, 1976, p. 87). 2 to note, public law 280 only applies in select states, specifically alaska, california, minnesota, nebraska, oregon, and wisconsin (“mandatory pl-280” states), and some reservations in florida, idaho, and washington (“optional pl-280” jurisdictions; the united states attorney’s office district of minnesota, 2015). 6 the international indigenous policy journal vol. 11, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8206 the passage and successes of the icwa in 1978, the u.s. congress heeded the task force’s call to action by passing the indian child welfare act (the icwa). this federal legislation stated, “there is no resource that is more vital to the continued existence and integrity of indian tribes than their children” (icwa, 1978, § 1901(3)). recognized by many national child advocacy organizations as the “gold standard” of indigenous child welfare, the icwa was designed to prevent the breakup of indigenous families and communities (national indian child welfare association, 2015). in the united states, tribes never formally ceded their jurisdiction over child welfare to the federal or state governments. partly in recognition of this reality, the icwa (1978) does the following: • affirms tribes’ jurisdiction over indian child custody proceedings (§§ 1911-2, 1918); • affirms that indian children who live on a reservation are under the exclusive jurisdiction of the tribal court for that reservation (§ 1911; see also bureau of indian affairs, 2016b; jones et al., 2008); • grants tribes standing in foster care proceedings, termination of parental rights proceedings, pre-adoptive placement, and adoption proceedings involving indian children (§ 1903); • defines indian child status (§ 1903); • provides recourse for indian tribes and parents in cases where a child subject to icwa’s protections is improperly removed (§§ 1914, 1920); • outlines placement for indian children in care, emphasizing that the court must prioritize, whenever possible, the placement preferences of indian families and tribes (§ 1915); • enshrines active efforts—a higher standard than the reasonable efforts typically required by child welfare legislation— “to provide remedial services and rehabilitative programs designed to prevent the breakup of the indian family and that these efforts have proved unsuccessful” (§ 1912); • provides for the testimony of “qualified expert witnesses” in determining foster care placement orders and parental rights termination orders (§§ 1912e-f); • provides funding schemes for social services for indian children living onand offreservation (§§ 1931-3); • contains other provisions aimed at safeguarding indian children’s access to their families and tribes (§§ 1913, 1916, 1919, 1934, 1951-1952); and • ensures that tribes must be contacted when parental rights are potentially terminated in cases of both voluntary and involuntary adoptions (§ 1912; see also jones et al., 2008). taken together, these elements of the icwa are intended to support the preservation of indigenous ways of life and to function as a mechanism to support indigenous communities in asserting their inherent sovereignty over their children. in practical terms, the u.s. law provides indigenous families and communities with a mandate and a tool for contesting the unwarranted removal of their children. though the elements of the icwa itself have remained consistent over time, the context of, complements to, and interpretation of the icwa have changed over the years. u.s. federal legislation impacting the child welfare landscape has expanded, affecting administration and regulation of local child welfare proceedings (child welfare information gateway, 2019). legislation such as the adoption 7 hahn et al.: applying lessons from the u.s. indian child welfare act published by scholarship@western, 2020 and safe families act (1997) and the multiethnic placement act (mepa, 1994 amended 1996) have posed challenges to icwa implementation. more recently, the fostering connections to success and increasing adoptions act (2008) and the family first prevention and services act (2018) have moved child welfare policies in directions that are more supportive of icwa implementation. these shifts in the federal legislative and regulatory landscape have implications for states, which administrate child welfare systems in the u.s. the jurisprudential landscape also shapes the context in which the icwa is implemented. though there have been many cases heard by lower courts, as of 2019, the united states supreme court has only heard two icwa cases: mississippi band of choctaw indians v. holyfield (1989) and adoptive couple v. baby girl (2013).3 the court did not overturn icwa in either case. however, partially in response to the backlash from adoptive couple v. baby girl (see for example trowbridge, 2017), the federal government began the process of developing clearer federal guidelines for icwa, culminating in the adoption of new 2016 guidelines for implementing the indian child welfare act and 2016 bureau of indian affairs final rule, 25 cfr part 23 (bureau of indian affairs, 2016a, 2016b). the new guidelines are binding as federal regulation, replacing a 2015 version, which was not binding. the revised icwa guidelines emphasized that in every child custody proceeding, agencies must determine whether the icwa applies (bureau of indian affairs, 2016a). additionally, the 2016 guidelines clarified the procedures for notifying relevant parties, such as an indigenous child’s tribe and parents, regarding child custody proceedings (bureau of indian affairs, 2016a). moreover, in emphasizing other provisions that recognize tribal sovereignty, such as the right to petition for a transfer of child custody proceedings to a tribal court, the 2016 guidelines articulate the importance of the wellbeing of indigenous children while recognizing the inherent sovereignty and self-determination of tribes (bureau of indian affairs, 2016a). these guidelines reinforced the ways in which federal settlercolonial governments could support reconciliation efforts through recognizing indigenous communities’ right to keep their children, as well as safeguarding indigenous children’s connections with their families, communities, and cultures. ongoing indigenous child welfare concerns: accessibility and compliance implementation of the icwa has faced challenges related to accessibility and compliance due to the interrelated factors of funding, awareness and knowledge of the law, and enforceability. at the most basic level, accurate and timely identification of children to whom the icwa applies presents a major obstacle to icwa’s successful implementation. existing research demonstrates that child welfare workers have great difficulty identifying indigenous children (fluke et al., 2011). the current presidential administration recently proposed to delay implementation of federal regulations that might motivate child welfare systems to improve identification by requiring states to track and report indian children and icwa cases (rin: 0970-ac72 adoption and foster care analysis and reporting system: advance notice of proposed rulemaking; children and families administration, 2018). 3 thousands of icwa cases have been advanced in state courts since the statute’s adoption; however, the paucity of icwa cases heard by the united states supreme court is consistent with the court’s “traditional preference that state law and state courts handle family law matters” (halibi, 2014, p. 144). 8 the international indigenous policy journal vol. 11, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8206 access to protections for indigenous children and communities may also be limited by the ways in which icwa is interpreted in legal proceedings. for example, some scholars have argued that reliance on the “existing indian family (eif) exception” has the potential to threaten the broad application of icwa (sandefur, 2017; zug, 2014). the eif exception is a legal argument wherein the icwa is interpreted as applying only in cases involving a child “removed from an ‘existing indian family unit’ or ‘indian home or culture’” (jaffke, 2006, pp. 741-742). under this interpretation, icwa would not apply in cases involving an indigenous child who never lived within an indigenous family unit—for instance, if the child was apprehended at birth or if the court finds that the child’s indigenous family had inadequate ties to an indigenous community or culture (jaffke, 2006; see also baby boy c. v. tohono o'odham nation, 2005). moreover, the determination of whether a child’s indigenous family has adequate ties to an indigenous community or culture would rest with state or federal court judges rather than indigenous authorities (jaffke, 2006). though the eif remains prominent in existing literature about icwa, it has rarely been used in jurisdictions with significant indian populations, and judicial decisions over the past several decades indicate decreased reliance on the eif exception (wilson, 2007). the eif does not figure prominently in state court proceedings and where state courts have referred to the eif, the outcomes directly contravene the 2016 federal guidelines (bureau of indian affairs, 2016a). compliance with the icwa is also compromised by a lack of funding for its implementation (wahl, 2010). awareness of the law on the part of judges and attorneys is limited due to insufficient federal funds dedicated to icwa education across jurisdictions (fort, 2010). across the country, child welfare and advocacy groups, along with some state legal organizations, are allocating their own funding to improve icwa awareness and implementation (casey family programs, 2015). for example, to address these issues, some state legal organizations such as the michigan state court administrative office have devoted funds to educating attorneys on icwa’s requirements (fort, 2012). while these initiatives speak to the potential of states and other legal and social bodies to promote icwa implementation and compliance, they are ad hoc endeavours whose longevity is tenuous due to a lack of federal mandate and funding for awareness of icwa provisions. more specifically, implementation of the icwa is complicated by a lack of resources for tribal implementation of the law (icwa compliance task force, 2017). this problem is particularly detrimental to icwa compliance in states such as california, where many indigenous people come from tribes located outside of the state (icwa compliance task force, 2017). although tribes can apply for some funding under title iv-e of the social security act, this funding is limited and sharing funds is complicated (icwa compliance task force, 2017; see also government accountability office, 2005; bureau of indian affairs, 2016a). indeed, though tribes receive federal funds for the provision of social services on reservation, these funds are not icwa-specific and thus remote and rural tribes may lack the designated funds to fully support the icwa (children’s bureau, 2009; national child welfare resource center for tribes, 2014). further, there is currently no designated federal agency with the explicit mandate of monitoring state compliance with the icwa (casey family programs, 2015). moreover, although the revised federal guidelines help to clarify icwa standards, general child welfare standards vary across states, so ensuring standardized application of icwa is challenging (casey family programs, 2015). the absence of federal oversight has also meant a lack of guidance for state jurisdictions regarding implementation of and compliance with the icwa (kern, 2009). although the 2015 federal guidelines provided some 9 hahn et al.: applying lessons from the u.s. indian child welfare act published by scholarship@western, 2020 clarification regarding federal icwa standards, instituting a single federal agency to monitor icwa compliance would likely improve icwa enforcement (indian affairs bureau, 2015). state-level icwa provisions state-level child welfare legislation in the u.s. is implemented in tandem with federal provisions, including the icwa and other federal statutes, which determine some nationwide child welfare regulations and protections. as of 2019, 33 u.s. states had passed some form of child welfare legislation designed to protect indigenous children. in some cases, these protections serve to explicitly reinforce the federal icwa provisions. many of these state-level protections were passed to address the persistently high rate at which indigenous children in some states are placed in out of home care (national council of juvenile and family court judges, 2017). critically, as reflected in tables 1 and 2, eight states—washington, minnesota, michigan, wisconsin, california, nebraska, oklahoma, and iowa—provide for state forms of the icwa, which explicitly reinforce provisions of the federal law (turtle talk, 2015). the 2015 guidelines developed by the federal government took a great deal from these and other state-level forms of icwa. thus, the development of the 2015 guidelines and subsequent 2016 guidelines and bureau of indian affairs final ruling reflect the potential benefits of allowing state or provincial governments to serve as policy laboratories for the federal government. tables 1 and 2 build on a list of state-level icwa provisions produced by the national conference of state legislatures’ (ncsl, 2018) state statutes related to the indian child welfare act. the ncsl lists statutes broadly related to icwa, but consideration of this full range of statutes is beyond the scope of this article. we focus on adoption protections in order to illustrate the breadth of state protections in the context of one form of child placement. in the tables below, we have identified provisions pertaining specifically to adoption and grouped them thematically. our intent is for these tables to provide an example of some of the ways in which state laws may augment federal indigenous child welfare legislation by providing clarity and additional mechanisms for implementation and enforcement. granular analysis of state statutes with attention to non-adoption forms of placement (e.g., kinship or foster care), in addition to other child protection practice domains (e.g., family preservation, risk assessment, etc.), would further illustrate the ways in which these issues are dealt with at various jurisdictional levels in the u.s. table 1 shows state-level icwa provisions, indicating the following: (a) name(s) and sections of state statute with provisions for indian children: this column identifies the names and numerical designations of state statutes containing adoption provisions for indian children. (b) state versions of icwa and indian family preservation acts: as of 2019, eight states have passed their own versions of icwa and indian family preservation acts. in california, these provisions are incorporated into the state’s family code. (c) citation of federal icwa: indicates whether the state statutes cite the icwa. (d) recognition of tribal authority: these forms of recognition include the responsibility to contact or consult with the indian child’s tribe, recognition of tribal jurisdiction, right of the tribe to intervene in or be party to proceedings, and protection against the existing indian family (“eif”) defence. 10 the international indigenous policy journal vol. 11, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8206 table 1. state-level icwa provisions jurisdiction name of law(s)/ section of state statute with provisions for indigenous children state version of icwa cites icwa tribal authority alabama alabama code, title 12: courts, § 12-15-314 (2016) ✕ ✔"# ✕ alaska alaska statutes, title 25: marital and domestic relations, § 25.23.060 execution of consent; consent as power of attorney (2008) ✕ ✔"# ✕ arizona arizona revised statute, title 8: child safety, §§ 8105.01, 8-106, 8-515.05, 8-535 (2018) ✕ ✔"# ✔"# california california family code, §§ 170-185 indian children; california welfare and institutions code, §§ 360-371; california probate code, §§ 1449, 1459, 1460.2, 1500.1 ✔"# ✔"# ✔"# colorado colorado children’s code, colorado revised statutes, § 19-1-126 administrative organization act of 1968, § 24-60-1803 (2017) ✕ ✔"# ✔"# delaware delaware annotated code, title 31: welfare, §§ 381382 interstate compact on the placement of children ✕ ✔"# ✔"# florida florida statutes, §§ 39; 409 (2018) ✕ ✔"# ✔"# idaho uniform child custody jurisdiction and enforcement act, idaho statutes, § 32-11-101 (2017) de facto custodian act, idaho statutes, § 32-1701 (2017) ✕ ✔"# ✔"# indiana indiana code, title 31: family law and juvenile law, § 28-6-1 interstate compact for the placement of children (2017) ✕ ✕ ✔"# iowa iowa indian child welfare act, iowa code, § 232b.1 (2016) ✔"# ✔"# ✔"# kansas kansas statutes annotated, title 38: minors ✕ ✔"# ✕ louisiana louisiana children's code, louisiana revised statutes, § 13-1629 (2017) ✕ ✔"# ✕ maine maine revised statutes annotated, title 22: health and welfare (2017) ✕ ✔"# ✕ michigan michigan indian family preservation act, michigan compiled laws, §§ 712b.1-41 (2012) ✔"# ✔"# ✔"# 11 hahn et al.: applying lessons from the u.s. indian child welfare act published by scholarship@western, 2020 table 1. state-level icwa provisions (continued) jurisdiction name of law(s)/ section of state statute with provisions for indigenous children state version of icwa cites icwa tribal authority minnesota minnesota statutes, § 256.01 commissioner of human services, powers, duties; § 257c de factor custodian and interested third party; § 259 change of name, adoption; § 260.012 duty to ensure placement prevention and family reunification, reasonable efforts; §§ 260.851-260.92 minnesota interstate compact on the placement of children (2017) minnesota indian family preservation act, minnesota statutes, §§ 260.751-260.835 (2017) ✔"# ✔"# ✔"# mississippi uniform child custody jurisdiction and enforcement act, mississippi code annotated, § 93-27-104 application to indian tribes (2010) ✕ ✔"# ✔"# missouri uniform child custody jurisdiction and enforcement act, missouri revised statutes, § 452.715 application to indian tribes (2009) ✕ ✔"# ✔"# montana montana safe haven newborn protection act, montana code annotated, § 40-6-405 (2019) montana code annotated, title 41: minors, chapter 3: child abuse and neglect; title 42: adoption, chapter 2: adoption of child, part 6: petition to terminate parental rights § 42-2-604; title 42: adoption, chapter 4: placements for adoption § 42-4; title 52: family services, chapter 2: children’s services, part 1: child welfare services, § 52-2-117 indian child welfare specialist (2019) ✕ ✔"# ✔"# nebraska nebraska indian child welfare act, nebraska revised statutes, §§ 43-1501 to 1517 (2015) nebraska statutes, § 43-1103 interstate compact for the placement of children ✔"# ✔"# ✔"# 12 the international indigenous policy journal vol. 11, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8206 table 1. state-level icwa provisions (continued) jurisdiction name of law(s)/ section of state statute with provisions for indigenous children state version of icwa cites icwa tribal authority new mexico safe haven for infants act, new mexico statutes, § 24-22 (2018) children's code, new mexico statutes, §§ 32a-18, 32a-1-14 (2018) adoption act, new mexico statutes, § 32a-5 (2018) kinship guardianship act, new mexico statutes, § 40-10b (2018) ✕ ✔"# ✔"# nevada nevada revised statutes, protection of children from abuse and neglect, § 432b.397 (2015) ✕ ✔"# ✕ north carolina north carolina general statutes, § 48 adoptions (2017) ✕ ✔"# ✕ north dakota uniform child custody jurisdiction and enforcement act, north dakota century code, § 14-14.1 (2017) uniform juvenile court act, north dakota century code § 27-20 ✕ ✔"# ✕ oklahoma oklahoma indian child welfare act, oklahoma statute, §§ 40.1-40.9 (2017) ✔"# ✔"# ✔"# oregon oregon revised statutes, §§ 109.309, 312, 350 adoption—petition, consent, decree; § 125.025 protective proceedings—court authority; § 418.627 child welfare services—placement consistent with icwa; §§ 419a, 419b juvenile code ✕ ✔"# ✔"# south carolina catawba indian claims settlement act, south carolina code of laws annotated, § 27-16-80 ✕ ✔"# ✕ south dakota south dakota codified laws annotated, §§ 255a voluntary termination of parental relation; 26-7a juvenile court; 26-8a protection of children from abuse and neglect (2018) ✕ ✔"# ✔"# tennessee tennessee code annotated, § 36-1 adoption (2017) ✕ ✔"# ✕ utah utah code annotated, § 62a4a child welfare services (2017) ✕ ✔"# ✕ vermont adoption act, vermont statutes annotated, title 15a (2017) vermont statutes annotated, title 33: human services, §§ 51-53 juvenile proceedings ✕ ✔"# ✕ 13 hahn et al.: applying lessons from the u.s. indian child welfare act published by scholarship@western, 2020 table 1. state-level icwa provisions (continued) jurisdiction name of law(s)/ section of state statute with provisions for indigenous children state version of icwa cites icwa tribal authority washington washington revised code, §§ 13.34 dependency and termination of parent-child relationship; 13.36 guardianship; 26.10 non-parental action for child custody; 26.33 adoption; 74.13 child welfare service (2017) washington state indian child welfare act, revised code of washington, § 13.38.010 et seq. (2017) ✔"# ✔"# ✔"# wisconsin uniform child custody jurisdiction and enforcement act, wisconsin statutes, § 822 (2018) wisconsin statutes, § 938 juvenile justice code (2018) ✔"# ✔"# ✔"# wyoming child protection act, wyoming statutes, § 14-3412 (2018) ✕ ✔"# ✕ table 2 shows forms of adoption protections for indigenous children in the u.s. by state. it indicates: (a) rights and responsibilities of indian parents: these include consent to adoption procedures specific to indian children, including withdrawal of consent to adoption; duty of parents to disclose indigenous heritage for the purposes of determining applicability of icwa; and termination of parental rights and procedures. (b) cultural protections: these include provisions for culturally appropriate services; provisions to maintain cultural connections, kinship care, customary care, or custom adoption; and postadoption agreements.(c) administrative concerns: these include reference to icwa provisions for interstate placement; agreements between state social services directors and tribes; mention of state responsibility for icwa compliance; provisions on information collection, access to records, confidentiality, and disclosure of records; specific funds for adoption; and icwa grants. (d) provisions from the 2015 icwa federal guidelines: specifically, this section indicates whether the state statutes include provisions pertaining to the “active efforts” standard and qualified expert witness requirement. 14 the international indigenous policy journal vol. 11, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8206 table 2. state forms of adoption protections for indigenous children in the united states jurisdiction rights and responsibilities of indigenous parents cultural protections administrative concerns provisions mirrored in the 2016 guidelines alabama ✕ ✔"# ✕ ✕ alaska ✔"# ✕ ✕ ✕ arizona ✕ ✕ ✕ ✕ california ✕ ✔"# ✔"# ✕ colorado ✕ ✕ ✔"# ✕ delaware ✕ ✕ ✔"# ✕ florida ✕ ✕ ✔"# ✕ idaho ✕ ✕ ✕ ✕ indiana ✕ ✕ ✕ ✕ iowa ✔"# ✔"# ✔"# ✔"# kansas ✕ ✔"# ✕ ✕ louisiana ✕ ✕ ✔"# ✕ maine ✕ ✔"# ✔"# ✕ michigan ✔"# ✔"# ✔"# ✔"# minnesota ✕ ✔"# ✔"# ✔"# mississippi ✕ ✕ ✕ ✕ missouri ✕ ✕ ✕ ✕ montana ✔"# ✕ ✔"# ✔"# nebraska ✔"# ✔"# ✔"# ✔"# new mexico ✔"# ✔"# ✔"# ✕ nevada ✕ ✕ ✕ ✕ north carolina ✔"# ✕ ✕ ✕ north dakota ✕ ✕ ✕ ✔"# oklahoma ✕ ✔"# ✔"# ✕ oregon ✔"# ✔"# ✔"# ✔"# south carolina ✕ ✕ ✕ ✕ south dakota ✕ ✕ ✔"# ✕ tennessee ✕ ✕ ✔"# ✕ utah ✕ ✕ ✕ ✕ vermont ✔"# ✕ ✕ ✕ washington ✔"# ✔"# ✔"# ✔"# wisconsin ✔"# ✕ ✔"# ✔"# wyoming ✕ ✕ ✕ ✕ 15 hahn et al.: applying lessons from the u.s. indian child welfare act published by scholarship@western, 2020 together, the tables demonstrate a broad scope of state indigenous child welfare protections pertaining to adoption. these protections generally complement and bolster federal icwa provisions. for instance, including icwa-related provisions in state legal codes can help guard against the eif defence (fort, 2012). moreover, state laws can provide mandates for states “to properly educate caseworkers regarding the correct application of icwa standards” as they directly transfer some of the responsibility for icwa compliance from the federal government to state governments (kern, 2009, p. 51). importantly, states’ support of efforts by tribes and other indigenous organizations to enshrine indigenous child welfare provisions into state law often enhances the effectiveness of federal laws. the success of this approach in the context of california’s custom adoption law speaks to the potency of state level laws to undergird reconciliation and legal innovation (administrative office of the courts, 2013). while state laws hold promise for alleviating some of the challenges of implementing the icwa, certain challenges still remain. in at least one case (in re j. l., 2009), courts have struck down state indigenous child welfare provisions for going too far in granting exceptional status to indigenous children and families (fort, 2012). additionally, even in states with enhanced welfare protections for indigenous children, fully implementing indigenous child welfare provisions can prove challenging. for example, although california has incorporated the federal icwa directly into its family code, a 2017 task force found that “neither the letter nor the spirit of the law [of federal icwa or the cal-icwa] has been fully implemented” (icwa compliance task force, 2017, p. v). this finding is particularly significant, given that a large proportion of recognized native american tribes are in california and that california is home to the most native american-identified individuals of any state (icwa compliance task force, 2017, p. 30). issues pertaining to enforcement of the icwa at the federal level, such as lack of awareness regarding indigenous child welfare provisions and inadequate funding, also hamper the efficacy of indigenous child welfare legislation at the state level. discussion and policy recommendations the decades-long history of the icwa has been cited in discussion advocating federal child welfare legislation in canada (tasker, 2018). with the recent passage of the act respecting first nations, inuit and métis children, youth and families (bill c-92, 2019), canada embarks on a new era in indigenous child welfare. several lessons learned from the experience with the icwa (1978) in the united states may be helpful as canada moves towards implementation of the federal legislation. as is the case with all complex legislation, the approach to implementation of the new federal legislation will evolve over time, and the legislation itself may be amended as it is implemented. accordingly, in applying the lessons learned from our examination of icwa, we also reference earlier proposals put forward by academics and advocates for indigenous rights (e.g., grammond, 2018). in so doing, we seek to help keep the conversation about alternate and additional proposals alive in the hopes of supporting ongoing critical evaluation of and innovation in the approach to indigenous child welfare in canada. given the long history and rich context of legislative protections for indigenous child welfare in the u.s., there are many lessons that may be helpful to consider in canada. however, any application of these lessons to the canadian context must be grounded in an understanding of the differences between bill c-92 and the icwa. though the two pieces of legislation share a similar purpose, the icwa is a more ambitious and comprehensive piece of legislation, implemented in a more complex policy context than 16 the international indigenous policy journal vol. 11, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8206 bill c-92. important differences shape the ways federal indigenous child welfare legislation can be implemented in these two countries: • while the passage of the act respecting first nations, inuit and métis children, youth and families marks canada’s first piece of federal indigenous child welfare legislation, over the decades, the united states has adopted several federal child welfare laws, some of which have enhanced and others which have inhibited effective implementation of the icwa. • bill c-92 will be implemented in a canadian context in which there is no tribal court system; this contrasts strongly with the u.s. situation in which the icwa provides for jurisdiction of tribal courts over child welfare proceedings involving an indigenous child (icwa, 1978, §1911; see also borrows, 2005). • bill c-92 limits the application of indigenous laws, excluding situations in which “if the application of the provision would be contrary to the best interests of the child” (bill c-92, 2019, § 23). this contrasts with the icwa’s consistent affirmation of tribal sovereignty. • standards for keeping indigenous children in their families are different in the two pieces of legislation: bill c-92 (2019) has a “reasonable efforts” standard (§ 15.1), whereas the icwa (1978) requires heightened “active efforts” to preserve the indian family (§ 1912d). • bill c-92 does not make any provision for the delivery of stable and equitable child and family services funding. in contrast, the icwa (1978) does provide some limited funding for tribes and other indian organizations “to establish and operate off-reservation indian child and family service programs” (§ 1932). despite these important differences, several lessons from implementation of the icwa do seem applicable to bill c-92. we discuss four key lessons, which we find important for federal child welfare legislation. these lessons relate to: (a) notifying indigenous communities of children involved with child welfare, (b) formally protecting indigenous self-determination, (c) the importance of promoting and monitoring compliance mechanisms, and (d) the crucial role of states, provinces, and territories in reinforcing federal legislation. community notification is essential notifying a child’s indigenous community of any child welfare proceedings is an important element of federal indigenous child welfare legislation, but careful attention to implementation and enforcement is required to ensure notification routinely occurs. the icwa (1978) contains several key provisions which refer to the importance of a child’s tribe being notified and included in child welfare proceedings (§§ 1911, 1912). however, review of icwa implementation demonstrates many enforcement issues regarding tribal notification and participation. inadequate funding, administrative and geographic barriers, and lack of awareness of the icwa, have all hampered full application of provisions for tribal notification in the united states (icwa compliance task force, 2017). similar to the icwa, the recently passed legislation in canada specifically includes the rights of a child’s family member and indigenous governing body to have their views and preferences considered in decisions affecting them (bill c-92, 2019, §§ 3b-c). the act additionally notes the right of a child’s family and indigenous governing body to make representations in the case of a civil proceeding arising related to child and family services involvement (§§ 13a-b). in order for the new legislative provisions to 17 hahn et al.: applying lessons from the u.s. indian child welfare act published by scholarship@western, 2020 be meaningfully implemented in canada, there is a need for greater attention to administration and enforcement. for example, grammond (2018) suggested the federal government in canada ought to provide equitable funding that accounts for factors like geographic location and size of the band or indigenous authority, and that takes into consideration how these factors affect the responsiveness of the organizations (grammond, 2018). further revision of the new canadian legislation could explicitly provide adequate funding for education and administration to create a mandate for federal oversight and provincialor territorial-level compliance. this could ensure tribal involvement when indigenous children are involved with child welfare proceedings. indigenous self-determination must be formally protected indigenous communities’ jurisdiction over child welfare-related proceedings—and clear, legally binding mechanisms for operationalizing that jurisdiction—is an important element for effective federal indigenous child welfare legislation. the icwa (1978) recognizes tribal jurisdiction over child custody proceedings affecting children within indigenous communities (§ 1911) to “protect the best interests of indian children and to promote the stability and security of indian tribes and families” (§1903). the lack of tribal courts in canadian contexts significantly limits the extent to which indigenous jurisdiction may be exercised in canada. an additional way in which the icwa (1978) attempts to ensure that the interests and expertise of tribes and indigenous organizations inform the determination of the best interests of an indigenous child is through recognizing expert witnesses (§ 1912(f)). under the icwa guidelines, a qualified expert witness, in descending order of preference, is (1) someone knowledgeable about the customs or cultural standards of the child’s tribe [band], (2) someone knowledgeable about an issue pertinent to the case (e.g., in cases involving sexual abuse, an expert on child sexual abuse), or (3) someone knowledgeable about the child (bureau of indian affairs, 2016b). ideally, the qualified expert witness would be an “expert” in the eyes of the relevant band or indigenous organization, such as a respected elder in the child’s indigenous community (wakeham, 2015). tribal court jurisdiction being the context in which these “expert witnesses” are determined and heard reinforces acknowledgment of the importance of centering indigenous communities within child welfare proceedings in the united states. the new canadian legislation affirms the rights of indigenous self-determination and self-government, including in areas related to child and family services (e.g., bill c-92, 2019, preamble, § 18(1-2)) and notes that it should be interpreted according to the best interests of the child (§§ 9(1), 12(1)). further, the act recognizes that the interests of indigenous peoples and indigenous children are often aligned, providing for indigenous customs and practices to prevail when a conflict exists between these practices and provincial or territorial laws. however, this provision applies only when there is a child welfare coordination agreement between an indigenous governing body and the provincial government (metallic, friedland, morales, heitt, & craft, 2019). in addition, the absence of a tribal court system in canada limits the possibilities for self-governance and self-determination. further, the rights of selfdetermination in bill c-92 only apply if the indigenous custom or practice is in keeping with the “best interests of the child,” a concept that is difficult to capture in legalistic language of broad federal legislation. accordingly, ultimate decision-making power lies in the hands of non-indigenous courts (metallic, friedland, morales, heitt, & craft, 2019), which have historically interpreted the best interest of the child standard as being at odds with the interests of indigenous peoples (e.g., wakeham, 2015). 18 the international indigenous policy journal vol. 11, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8206 indeed, advocates in canada have recently argued that federal legislation should incorporate consideration of the rights and interests of a child’s band or indigenous authority in determining the placement that meets the child’s best interests (grammond, 2018; wakeham, 2015). while language in the icwa (1978) emphasizes the importance of supporting children’s best interests in order to preserve indian tribes and families (§§ 1901-1903), it does not explicitly mention the collective best interests of indigenous groups. incorporation of this concept into federal canadian legislation would go beyond the lessons learned from the icwa and set a higher standard for recognizing indigenous communities’ wellbeing as a worthy goal for legislation as well. mechanisms for promoting and monitoring compliance with legislation are necessary strong guidelines and practices, along with concomitant funding, are crucial for the successful implementation of federal indigenous child welfare legislation. the united states continues to struggle to ensure uniform implementation and compliance with the icwa across states (casey family programs, 2015), which has led to difficulty detecting and correcting incompliance with the law (kern, 2009). the new canadian legislation provides for coordination agreements—among the minister, the provincial governments, and indigenous governing bodies—which could improve coordination among governments and, by extension, enhance compliance (bill c-92, 2019, § 20). however, aside from articulating that a federal minister should undertake a review of the statute every five years (§ 31), there is not a provision for a federal body to monitor compliance with the law. the bill falls short of grammond’s (2018) recent call for “[a]n independent, adequately resourced commissioner” joined by “the government and the fncfcs [first nations child and family caring society]” to support and ensure compliance with indigenous federal child welfare legislation (p. 150). likewise, the creation of such legislation in canada would allow for the standardization of child welfare proceedings across provincial and territorial jurisdictions. such compliance provisions would hold the federal government accountable, one of the most serious shortcomings of the icwa in the united states. funding to support full and proper implementation of indigenous federal child welfare legislation, including monitoring and compliance, is essential. challenges in icwa implementation demonstrate the importance of sufficient, stable, and comprehensive funding. adequate funding to enforce federal legislation would cover educating child welfare agencies, judges, lawyers, and community members about the details and implications of the new legislation. it would also include stable funding for development of guidelines for implementation of the legislation and for monitoring compliance. it would further require notification and engagement of indigenous communities in child welfare proceedings. it is unclear what resources might be available to support the new bill c-92 in canada as it currently does not include language providing for funding to support its implementation. addition of a funding provision in bill c-92 would considerably bolster its potential for meaningful implementation. states, provinces, and territories must reinforce federal legislation non-federal jurisdictional bodies (i.e., states, provinces, or territories) can bolster indigenous child welfare legislation at the federal level. the u.s. experience with the icwa demonstrates that a federalist system of government provides opportunity for state governments to expand and strengthen the protections of federal legislation. as examined above, in the u.s. context, state statutes pertaining to indigenous child welfare appear to bolster federal icwa protections through reinforcing and clarifying 19 hahn et al.: applying lessons from the u.s. indian child welfare act published by scholarship@western, 2020 federal provisions (fort, 2012; kern, 2009). the canadian legislation notes briefly the potential for provincial governments to participate, along with indigenous governing bodies, in periodic review of the act (bill c-92, 2019, § 31(2)), and there is additional brief mention of the possibility of provincial governments to have input into transitional aspects of the act being implemented (§ 34(2)). however, it does not fully address the role of existing provincial legislation aimed at protecting indigenous children. provincial and territorial governments in canada can build on the federal legislation in order to draft statutes that more specifically address the distinct characteristics and needs of local indigenous communities. further development of the new federal law in canada might provide language intended to support enshrining local indigenous practices and customs directly in provincial and territorial codes. every canadian province or territory, including prince edward island as of june of 2019 (child protection act, 1988), has passed child welfare laws with some specific provisions for indigenous children (hahn & sinha, 2018). these provisions, which vary widely in scope, illustrate the potential for improving indigenous child welfare through complementary legislative responses from the federal and provincial or territorial governments. though the new canadian legislation marks an important step in improving indigenous child welfare in canada, it need not preclude innovation at the provincial and territorial levels. as demonstrated by the u.s. context, effectively implementing and enforcing indigenous child welfare legislation requires the harmonization of three levels of government: tribal or band, territorial or provincial, and federal. as state-level indigenous child welfare provisions have generally enhanced icwa enforcement and compliance in the u.s., further study of and engagement with existing provincial and territorial provisions for indigenous children in canada may serve to support child welfare protections in the new canadian legislation. conclusion as canada moves towards implementing the newly passed federal bill c-92 (2019), an act respecting first nations, inuit and métis children, youth and families, lessons from implementation of the icwa (1978) in the u.s. may prove useful. though the icwa, bolstered by other key elements of the u.s. policy landscape, is stronger and more far reaching than the new canadian legislation, many of the icwa provisions mirror those advanced by child welfare advocates and policy analysts in canada (e.g., first nations child and family caring society [fncfcs], 2019; grammond, 2018). canadian policy makers can also learn from the icwa’s shortcomings, namely the lack of comprehensive access to services, inadequate funding, and a need for greater respect for indigenous sovereignty and selfdetermination. as emphasized by the fncfcs (2019), “[a]bsent affirmation of, and funding for, first nations legal systems and courts, it appears mainstream courts will interpret the act,” resulting in nonindigenous definitions of terms such as the “best interests” of indigenous children (p. 3). bill c-92’s failure to affirm indigenous peoples’ jurisdiction over laws affecting their children and communities, coupled with the lack of a direct funding stream to these communities, raises serious concerns regarding the efficacy and ethics of the federal canadian legislation (fncfcs, 2019). though the recently passed bill c-92 in canada contains some promising provisions, it also has shortcomings regarding compliance and enforcement. drawing from the united states context, turning 20 the international indigenous policy journal vol. 11, iss. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8206 to provincial and territorial legislation may help address some of these concerns. true reconciliation, as articulated in canada’s trc report (2015b), would require the divestment of power, resources, and control from mainstream child protection bodies to create space for indigenous communities’ selfdetermination. although the new federal canadian legislation marks a step in a possibly more meaningful direction, it fails to fully embody these reconciliation principles. in general, indigenous child welfare protections passed by u.s. states appear to bolster the federal icwa’s protections in that context. as such, development of complementary provincial and territorial legislation may further enhance the efficacy of federal indigenous child welfare in canada. such efforts may support a process of reconciliation that not only honours the inherent sovereignty and dignity of indigenous peoples, but also provides for the security and wellbeing of all people living in canada. our discussion here is an initial attempt to analyze the icwa in the united states with the goal of understanding how its implementation over 40 years might inform implementation of the nascent bill c-92 in canada. our approach is limited in part due to the broad scope of possible implications related to the icwa for child welfare legislation, only some of which we have attempted to address in this piece. we have narrowed our focus to the implications for canada in particular domains (e.g., adoption) to enable more granular analysis. we hope that this piece can prompt further research aimed at bolstering implementation of bill c-92 in ways that are meaningful for indigenous communities across canada. for example, looking further at conceptualization of national sovereignty in international adoption practices might indicate gaps in full acknowledgment of indigenous communities’ self-determination in canada. our writing soon after the passage of bill c-92, before it has been meaningfully implemented, is a further limitation. it is our hope that this discussion will be part of ongoing attempts to understand the implications of legislative decisions and practices for indigenous children and communities. references administrative office of the courts. 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(2005). indigenous legal traditions in canada. washington university journal of law, 19, 167-220. https://openscholarship.wustl.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1380&context= law_journal_law_policy bryce, p. h. (1907). report on the indian schools of manitoba and the north-west territories. government printing bureau. http://peel.library.ualberta.ca/bibliography/3024.html bureau of indian affairs. (2016a). guidelines for implementing the indian child welfare act. https://www.bia.gov/sites/bia.gov/files/assets/bia/ois/pdf/idc2-056831.pdf bureau of indian affairs. 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(2010). maintaining identities: the soul work of adoption and aboriginal children. in j. carrière (ed.), askiawasis/ children of the earth: first peoples speaking on adoption (pp.1215). fernwood publishing. casey family programs. (2015). a research and practice brief: measuring compliance with the indian child welfare act. http://www.casey.org/media/measuring-compliance-icwa.pdf catawba indian claims settlement act, south carolina code of laws annotated, § 27-16-80. https://www.scstatehouse.gov/code/t27c016.php child protection act, rspei 1988, c c-5.1. https://www.canlii.org/en/pe/laws/stat/rspei-1988-c-c5.1/latest/rspei-1988-c-c-5.1.html child protection act, wyoming statutes, § 14-3-412 (2018). https://law.justia.com/codes/ wyoming/2018/title-14/chapter-3/article-4/section-14-3-412/ child welfare information gateway. 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(2009). considerations for indian tribes, indian tribal organizations or tribal consortia seeking to operate a tribal title iv-e program. u.s. department of health and human services. http://www.acf.hhs.gov/sites/default/files/cb/tribal_considerations.pdf children’s code, new mexico statutes, §§ 32a-1-8, 32-1-14 (2018). https://law.justia.com/ codes/new-mexico/2018/chapter-32a/ colorado children’s code, colorado revised statutes, § 19-1-126 (2017). https://leg.colorado.gov/sites/default/files/images/olls/crs2017-title-19.pdf de facto custodian act, idaho statutes, § 32-17-1701 (2017). https://legislature.idaho.gov/ statutesrules/idstat/title32/t32ch17/ 23 hahn et al.: applying lessons from the u.s. indian child welfare act published by scholarship@western, 2020 delaware annotated code, title 31: welfare, §§ 381-382 interstate compact for the placement of children. https://delcode.delaware.gov/title31/c003/sc06/index.shtml di tomasso, l., & de finney, s. 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(2007). tribal consequences of urban indian relocation: case examination of the existing indian family exception & adoptive placement under the indian child welfare act. http://law.msu.edu/indigenous/papers/2007-04.pdf wisconsin statutes, § 938 juvenile justice code (2018). https://docs.legis.wisconsin.gov/statutes/ statutes/938 zug, m. a. (2014). the real impact of adoptive couple v. baby girl: the existing indian family doctrine is not affirmed, but the future of icwa’s placement preferences is jeopardized. capital university law review, 42. https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2333797 8206 hahn cover page.pdf 8206 hahn applying lessons final.pdf hunter-gatherers’ self-governance: untying the traditional authority of chiefs from the western toba civil association the international indigenous policy journal volume 6 | issue 4 article 1 september 2015 hunter-gatherers’ self-governance: untying the traditional authority of chiefs from the western toba civil association marcela mendoza university of oregon, mmendoza@uoregon.edu recommended citation mendoza, m. (2015). hunter-gatherers’ self-governance: untying the traditional authority of chiefs from the western toba civil association. the international indigenous policy journal, 6(4). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.1 hunter-gatherers’ self-governance: untying the traditional authority of chiefs from the western toba civil association abstract the integral law for aborigines (426/84) was the first legal instrument in argentina systematically addressing indigenous peoples’ rights. it was modeled on the paraguayan law for indigenous communities (901/81). both granted collective property rights. i discuss article 9 of decree 574/85 in law 426, requiring that former hunter-gatherer bands would form civil associations, like those in the non-profit sector. the policymakers later amended the clause on governance inserting the authority of chiefs along that of democratically elected delegates. i describe the western toba’s journey to obtaining collective land title by introducing characteristics of traditional leadership, discussing local antecedents leading to the law, comparing it to the paraguayan law, and analyzing the process through which the toba complied with legal requirements. keywords hunter-gatherers, self-governance, western toba, gran chaco, argentina, paraguay, law 426/84, law 901/81 acknowledgments i would like to thank to the editors and two anonymous reviewers for their comments on previous versions of this paper. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ h u n t e r g a t h e r e r s ’ s e l f g o v e r n a n c e : u n t y i n g t h e t r a d i t i o n a l a u t h o r i t y o f c h i e f s f r o m t h e w e s t e r n t o b a c i v i l a s s o c i a t i o n a rare video documenting an event that happened on july 11, 1984, was uploaded on youtube in 2009 (audienciadigital, 2009). the video shows hundreds of indigenous people in front of the provincial house of representatives in formosa, argentina. many participants are carrying signs; some are dressed in traditional attire; others are beating drums. governor dr. floro bogadois addresses the crowd. after his discourse, the representative of the indigenous people hand-delivers a paper with proposed revisions to the draft bill for the integral law for aborigines (ley integral del aborígen) (ley 426, 1984). the person receiving the paper is the head of the house of representatives of the province of formosa and the individual who delivers the paper is the president of the indigenous committee of 21 (comisión de los 21)—a working group formed by seven wichí, seven toba, and seven pilagá representing the largest indigenous groups in the province. among the signs held by the people on the street, a hand-written one identifies the presence of tobas del pilcomayo sombrero negro, who are also represented in the committee of 21. the sign names the villages of churcal, rinconada, and vaca perdida. immediately after the head of the provincial house of representatives receives the paper with the proposed revisions, someone in the crowd shouts in spanish: “¡el pensamiento indígena!” (the indigenous thought!). listening to such an impromptu statement when i watched the video for the first time in 2014 inspired me to write this article. passing the integral law for aborigines (ley integral del aborígen) in the provincial legislature was a momentous achievement for indigenous peoples. the law was published in boletín oficial, the legislative journal of formosa, on november 20, 1984. it became the first legal instrument in the country addressing indigenous peoples’ rights in a coherent and forceful manner (inter-american development bank, 2010). law 426 (1984)—as it has been known since then—granted indigenous people access to judicial power so they could obtain property rights over land, as well as access to education, healthcare, and welfare benefits. law 426 specified that giving “public” land back to the communities was an act of reparación histórica (historical reparation, redress, or compensation). the indigenous peoples, who were all former hunter-gatherers, wanted to have the land in collective property—a model of land ownership different from individual property—sometimes called customary or consuetudinary law (derecho consuetudinario). customary law regarding collective property rights had been endorsed for indigenous peoples in neighboring paraguay as well (chase sardi, 1990). because the argentinean legal system did not contemplate collective property rights, law 426 required that indigenous groups first obtain legal status (personería jurídica) as civil associations. the law also mandated that the provincial administration should create a new institutional framework to implement the transference of land to indigenous associations. the video of the historical event described above documents the political influence exerted on lawmakers by the toba, pilagá, and wichí people, and their allies who were able to stage a massive public event on the stairs of the provincial legislature, with the participation of the governor and the legislators. in this article, i introduce some qualities of the traditional leadership among the western toba (to give a measure of the extent to which these people have changed and adapted to current political circumstances), discuss some of the immediate antecedents of the law for indigenous people (describing the political milieu in which the indigenous people’s vote made a difference), and compare the provincial law to the paraguayan law 904 for indigenous communities—both policies were the 1 mendoza: hunter-gatherers’ self-governance published by scholarship@western, 2015   product of local populism and indigenismo (supporting or promoting indigenous cultures) that gradually displaced militarized conservatism in paraguay and argentina (foote & horst, 2010; stunnenberg, 1993). i also analyze the steps taken by the western toba to comply with the governance requirements in law 426, show how they formed a civil association and were able to obtain title over a considerable parcel of land—larger than the pieces of land secured by other groups. until the early twentieth century, the western toba trekked over the same ranges—reduced in size and impoverished in resources—that they had foraged since before the arrival of european colonization. threatened by settlers and by the nation’s military forces, in 1929 the western toba asked anglican missionaries from england to establish a mission with them. in 1975, after an extraordinary flood of the pilcomayo river destroyed the buildings of el toba mission, the missionary staff relocated to the town of ingeniero juárez (about 25 miles south of toba land). most of the people who were living in hamlets and still trekking the land, resettled in three main villages. a number of extended families also moved to the outskirts of ingeniero juárez, forming a barrio. in 1984, the western toba population numbered about 1,200 individuals. the prospects of obtaining collective property title, and also getting access to elementary schools, public health services, and other welfare benefits, excited everyone. extended families began splitting from the main villages and forming new hamlets on land they had trekked before. as an ethnographer, i worked on and off with the western toba between 1984 and 1995. i witnessed some of the actions described here. however, at that time, i was unable to grasp the ripple effect that untying the traditional authority of the chief from the new system of governance would have on the toba association. by re-examining the process today from the privileged position of a retrospective observer, i am amazed by, as marshall sahlins (2013) has said, “how small issues are turned into big events” (p. 161). i will focus on what may appear as a small issue, the amendment of article 9 of decree 574/85 in law 426, which regulates the election of delegates (similar to board members in non-profit organizations). article 9 includes traditional chiefs in the governance of civil associations along with delegates elected for fixed-term positions. i argue that by separating the traditional (culturally embedded) authority of chiefs from that of other representatives, the toba of western formosa province set the basis for a civil association adapted to their time and place. the toba case study demonstrates once more that indigenous self-governance is “contingent, conditional, and dependent on the particular contexts in which indigenous peoples act in the real world” (borrows, 2010, p. vii). to illustrate the differences between democratically elected officers in a civil association and caciques in hunting-gathering bands, i will discuss below some characteristics of traditional leadership among the western toba. as far as adult toba could remember, in the early 1990s all their caciques (jaliaganacá) had those qualifications in the recent past. a n i n d i g e n o u s t h e o r y o f l e a d e r s h i p the indigenous inhabitants of formosa are former hunter-gatherers who trekked the land moving seasonally across overlapping territories. distinct toba, pilagá, and wichí bands trekked territories delineated by shifting buffer zones. these groups made alliances, traded, and fought one another, with colonists and with the army of the state. anthropological discussions of band societies underscore collective behaviors that—operating as levelling devices—contribute to give people equal access to resources. people also use fission and mobility to resolve disputes. these behaviors appear to have the 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.1   effect of minimizing differences of wealth and power among individuals, thus avoiding one another’s “exploitation” (kelly, 2013, p. 243). for example, people in band societies often (a) secure unrestricted access to land for everyone in the group, (b) make food and goods available to wide networks of kin through sharing and distribution, and (c) work to build consensus in decisions that concern the wellbeing of the group. egalitarian band societies have been described as societies in which each person is his or her own boss. individuals who showed wisdom usually enjoyed prestige and influence but they would not use their prestige to gain power over another member of the band. band members were attracted to individuals who had talent and charisma, leading people by persuasion. power worked by attraction, and the slightest tip in the balance from trust to coercion caused contention. leaders of bands (male and female) not only excelled in some particular skills, but they also articulated moral attributes appreciated by the people, such as laboriousness, generosity, reliability, and prudence. the leader or chief was expected to mediate in internal disputes of his group, be an arbitrator between antagonistic parties, and make alliances with other indigenous groups as well as with the nonindigenous. in the old times, the western toba leader was expected to help organize revenge parties when such alliances or negotiations failed. the old leaders did not take a large share of the goods and commodities otherwise available to them. the authority of traditional western toba leaders was grounded in the hunting and gathering subsistence of the past and in a particular cosmology that viewed the world as animated by moral and mystical forces. the jaliaganacá (chiefs or caciques) would incorporate the same kind of spiritual power that defined the role of shamans, yet the jaliaganacá did not practice curing. they were chosen to protect and defend people from human enemies, much the same as shamans were expected to protect and defend people from supernatural beings and from the spirits of the dead. moreover, the jaliaganec (male singular of jaliaganacá) was carefully chosen from among morally good individuals who had shown personal courage and commitment to the welfare of the people. the toba said during ethnographic interviews (mendoza, 2002) that old leaders were (a) qualified and moral individuals with a companion spirit (whenever the person sang in solitude, the people said that he or she had “a song,” or “a secret”); (b) with charisma, courage, and commitment (“the jaliaganec loved his people”); and (c) male leaders were warriors who had obtained a human scalp. other indigenous groups in the gran chaco region, such as the eastern toba, pilagá, mocoví, nivaclé, and macá held notions of leadership similar to that of the western toba and were described by their neighbors as warlike (altamirano, 1993). yet, some other chacoans, such as the chorote, wichí, and enxet, instead of highlighting the strength of their chiefs as warriors would emphasize the charisma of caciques as mediators and seekers of compromise (kidd, 1995; palmer, 2008; siffredi, 1984). particularly among the wichí, a group that places great value on reaching consensus and avoiding open confrontation, meeting the terms of the policies in law 426, and organizing the extended families in civil associations turned to be a highly disruptive process. for example, in a study of land tenure and governance among the wichí of western formosa, anthropologist sergio braticevic said that infighting for power and resources weakened the heads of 3 mendoza: hunter-gatherers’ self-governance published by scholarship@western, 2015   families that otherwise would have preferred to show goodwill and avoid confrontation. braticevic (2009) said: this [the amendment of article 9 of law 426] opened the doors to the possibility of collision among the members of the group; while at the same time, it created optimal conditions for coopting, and later fracturing the leadership of various subgroups within the community. (pp. 100101, my translation from spanish) thus, after the 1985 protocol for the law 426 for aborigines was completed, the indigenous communities in the province of formosa struggled to find ways to meet the governance requirements. many communities found it as challenging to self-organize as associations because they had difficulty establishing long-term national and international alliances with other indigenous peoples in the region (braticevic, 2009; combes, villar, & lowrey, 2009; matarrese, 2011; salamanca, 2011; spadafora, gómez, & matarrese, 2010). l a w 4 2 6 f o r a b o r i g i n e s i n f o r m o s a , a r g e n t i n a following the grassroots event documented in the video described above, the provincial legislature in formosa sanctioned the integral law for aborigines, the first indigenist land act in argentina (stunnenberg, 1993). empowered by their recently obtained electoral strength after years of military dictatorship (1976-1983), distinct hunting and gathering toba, wichí, and pilagá communities across the province participated in political mobilizations demanding legal property titles on the lands where they lived. although argentinian settlers and ranch owners occupied some lands, most were considered public or fiscal lands, owned by the state. in 1983, indigenous people obtained national identification cards that enabled them to participate in the democratic process and vote along with other citizens to elect new federal and provincial administrations. after the elections, the people suddenly found eager bargaining partners in elected officials genuinely interested in advancing indigenous rights in the province, as well as in politicians who were nurturing future electoral gains—aiming at keeping seats for their political parties in the legislature and also in municipal councils. the politicians were aware that the year before hundreds of indigenous youth had been recruited as soldiers to fight in the malvinas/falklands war (april to june 1982). the young men who returned to their communities, and those who died in the islands, were honored as patriotic warriors. the malvinas/falklands war also prompted the abrupt exit of british anglican missionaries from the region. they temporarily resettled in paraguay and bolivia, leaving their advocacy work in the hands of argentinian mission staff. the anglican mission staff, as well as personnel affiliated with the catholic church, played key roles as allies in the local movement towards indigenous autonomy and land rights (horst, 2007). during the 1984 to 1985 legislative sessions, empowered by newfound opportunities for exercising democratic rights, wichí, toba, and pilagá leaders engaged in lobbying and activism. the leaders in the so called committee of 21 got together frequently to discuss the proposed statute, met with the governor and with influential members of the civil society, and lobbied provincial legislators at the capital. indigenous people and their supporters organized public assemblies that kept the momentum 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.1   alive, aiming at infusing in the new policies the point of view that people called “the indigenous way” of thinking (stechina, 2012). after five months of intense negotiations, the policymakers completed the protocols of law 426 (decree 574/85), which were published on may 6, 1985 in the official journal. this decree spelled out the terms and conditions for the implementation of substantive indigenous rights in the province, including land ownership, access to health care services, public education, and welfare benefits. however, instead of proposing models of self-determining autonomy, the legislators ultimately exercised administrative convenience and used a “one-size-fits all approach to governance that in the end ensured bureaucratic control and managerial efficiency” (maaka & fleras, 2008, p.73). the policymakers decided that indigenous communities had to self-organize following the pre-existing legal model of civil associations (asociaciones civiles). civil associations are neither private companies (working for profit) nor public organizations (e.g. part of local or national government). today, with a much more strengthened civil society, numerous non-indigenous voluntary associations in formosa provide human and social services to low-income families, and also promote the arts, sports, and recreational activities. some are faith-based associations; others are created by groups of friends and neighbors. citizens who form non-commercial or non-governmental associations register their organization with the provincial inspectorate of legal entities (inspección general de personas jurídicas), and periodically update the records on officers and membership. the guidelines for the provincial inspectorate of legal entities, which are still current, were established during the military rule in decreto ley 564/77 signed in 1977 by then governor general j. c. colombo. to comply with law 426, the provincial agency for the colonization of public lands (instituto provincial de colonización y tierras fiscales de formosa) was authorized to act ex-officio when handling uncertain matters pertaining to land titles for communities, and was commissioned to survey the stateowned lands claimed by the indigenous associations (carrasco, 2000). law 426 also created a new governmental agency for native communities (instituto de comunidades aborígenes [ica]), with one executive director for each of the three major ethnic groups and an additional non-indigenous executive director appointed by the provincial administration. the main purpose of this agency was managing all the issues related to the implementation of the policies in the bill. thus, law 426 secured some measure of self-determination for ethnic communities that in the 1980s were, almost ubiquitously across the region, conglomerates of different hunter-gatherer bands. except for the mandate that indigenous communities had to self-organize following the pre-existing model of civil associations, the argentinean law 426 followed closely the text of the paraguayan law 904 (ley no. 904/81, 1981) for indigenous communities, sanctioned three years earlier. l a w 4 2 6 i n a r g e n t i n a c o m p a r e d t o l a w 9 0 4 / 8 1 f o r i n d i g e n o u s c o m m u n i t i e s i n p a r a g u a y the statute of indigenous communities, also known as law 904, sanctioned in 1981 by the regime of then president general alfredo stroessner (1954 to1989), was called a watershed victory for the movement towards indigenous people’s rights, which came to dominate every issue affecting indigenous people in paraguay (duckworth, 2011; renshaw, 2002). its deeper significance, said rené h. horst 5 mendoza: hunter-gatherers’ self-governance published by scholarship@western, 2015   (2007) “. . . was the extent to which indigenous communities began to use it to focus their resistance” (p. 119). law 904 asserted land and cultural rights that were later included in the integral law for aborigines in formosa. in fact, the entire first chapter on general principles in the argentinean law reproduces almost word by word the first chapter of the paraguayan law, except that the argentinean text refers to “aborigines” instead of “indigenous” people, and avoids defining an indigenous community—which in the paraguayan law 904/81 (ley no. 904/81, 1981, chapter 1, article 2) is defined as a group of extended families, a clan or group of clans with their own culture and system of authority, that speak their own language, and live together in their habitat; additionally, two or more communities with the same characteristics may encompass an ethnic or tribal group (parcialidad). significantly, however, the argentinean legislators (a) made it clear that only state-owned lands would be granted to the indigenous communities (in the paraguayan law, the communities were entitled to the lands where they lived, even if those were privately owned by non-indigenous settlers); (b) avoided replicating the paraguayan model that relied on indigenous leaders to adjudicate land rights—a model that had no safeguards to ensure accountability and representativeness; and (c) adopted the pre-existing model of civil association to grant collective land rights. specifically, where the paraguayan law (ley no. 904/81, 1981, chapter 1, article 9) said that any person identified as indigenous leader could request legal status for a community, the argentinean law (ley 426, 1984, chapter 1, article 7) spelled out that “caciques” and “delegates” could request legal status for their communities—something later operationalized with the model of civil association. thus, indigenous communities in paraguay could obtain legal status (personería jurídica) by registering their leaders in the national register of indigenous communities held at the instituto nacional del indígena (indi), then a dependency of the ministry of defense. this process usually involved one visit to the community by indi’s staff, during which the staff person collected information about the location and composition of the population, and organized a meeting to approve the names of the leaders. there were no limits on the number of leaders who could be nominated, although communities were usually represented by at least three or four individuals (renshaw, 2002). these individuals then became the legal representatives, and the community could solicit legal status from the office of the president of the nation, a step previous to obtaining collective land title. this title was inalienable, and could not be used as collateral for loans. by ruling that an indigenous community could only claim land rights through leaders registered by the newly created instituto paraguayo del indígena (but retained the acronym indi), the government, in fact, assured that these indigenous leaders would establish friendly relations with state bureaucrats. “some critical indigenistas,” said anthropologist mario blaser (2010), “thought that the state had in this way retained its capacity to promote leaders who, in order to obtain land, would comply with the state’s goal of integration” (p. 98). at the same time, various sectors of church-affiliated and civil society advocates seemed to compete with one another to gain the favor of indigenous leaders in order to impose their own development agendas in the communities. this led to factionalisms, where different indigenous leaders were working with separate non-governmental organizations or with different christian missionaries, something that effectively expanded existing relations of political and economic dependence. analyzing a similar process in the province of formosa, anthropologist gastón gordillo 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.1   (2008) called the outcome of factionalisms competing for indigenous political subjectivities as clientelization of ethnicity. in the months after the protocols of the law (decree 574/85) were published in the legislative journal of formosa, the wording of article 9 on governance of the civil association, especially the required 2-year minimum period of residence in the community for elected representatives, became a topic of contention among indigenous people and their allies. as a result of political pressure and lobbying, the wording of the article was modified. on january 4, 1986, a legal amendment to article 9 of decree 574/85 in law 426 was published in the boletín oficial. according to this amendment, each indigenous community loosely considered to be one village or one settlement should elect its delegates (one incumbent and one alternate) by simple majority, after counting the votes of members older than 18 years of age, gathered in assembly. the legal representatives should be of the same ethnic group as the people they represented. the representatives’ terms lasted 1 year, though they could be re-elected. the residency requirement was removed. the amendment also stated that, if the representatives were already chiefs or caciques, they should hold their positions in the civil association for the duration of their lives. it said: the legal representative of the community is the delegate or cacique as an alternate. the chieftainship does not have to go through annual elections, since it is a title role for life, an ancient indigenous tradition. the delegates will be appointed for one year; can be re-elected; have to belong to the ethnic group and to the community they represent. (decreto 574, 1985, article 9; my translation from spanish) from the privileged position of a retrospective observer who was also working with the western toba at the time of the events, i contend that provincial lawmakers inserted this amendment to acknowledge people’s ideas about traditional self-government, conceding some measure of indigenous thought in an otherwise bureaucratic one-size-fits-all system of rules. upholding the customary authority of chiefs in the governance of indigenous civil associations seemed a good idea at the time. in fact, the inclusion of traditional chiefs in a policy designed to guarantee accountability and democratic representativeness unleashed unintended consequences. the communities have had to deal with that policy requirement ever since. i n d i g e n o u s g o v e r n a n c e : i m a g i n e d a n d r e a l policymakers who drafted the law following the text of the paraguayan law 904/81 consulted with politicians, social workers, clergy, and anthropologists during the process of finalizing the protocols. they sanctioned a complex legal instrument designed to provide recognition and historical redress (reconocimiento y reivindicación histórica) for the indigenous peoples living within the boundaries of the province. these elected officials and administrators, genuinely interested in re-examining the value of indigenous cultures (revalorización de la cultura indígena), aimed at redressing injustice (reparación de unaantigua injusticia). they were inspired by visions of self-reliance, autonomy, and selfdetermination for indigenous communities that were widespread in latin america at that time (machuca, 1986). 7 mendoza: hunter-gatherers’ self-governance published by scholarship@western, 2015   for example, guillermo magrassi (1985, 1989), an engaged anthropologist who advised the committee of 21, would often talk on radio and television about the importance of recovering el pensamiento indígena (the indigenous thought), a theoretical concept that could translate as the indigenous understanding or thinking about reality. magrassi (1985) advocated for a search into the soul of the nation to bring back the indigenous knowledge, the suppressed collective consciousness that is “ours” (truly argentine). he had the idea that: it will be very difficult to build a country, even more difficult to build a nation, if we continue raising monuments only to those who came from afar. the roots are still outside the pot [. . .] whatever the origin of our individual ancestors, today our historical forebears as a people, a nation, can only be those who were already here when others arrived. (p. 5, my translation from spanish) magrassi’s activism was inspired by the work of argentinean philosopher rodolfo kusch (2010), an author often cited by local intellectuals during the 1970s and 1980s. kusch’s view is distinctive in south america because it thoroughly considers indigenous thinking as philosophy—that is, as a serious contribution to truth (derbyshire, 2010). other local authors such as enrique dussel (1973), adolfo colombres, miguel chase-sardi, and those authors included in a compilation by grünberg (1972) were equally known to activists and intellectuals. there were few legal precedents for law 426 in argentina. the federal government had sanctioned a federal statute to protect indigenous communities and give them land titles, and created in 1958 the directorate of indigenous affairs (dirección nacional de asuntos indígenas [dnai]); although, the procedures for transferring land remained extremely vague and tentative. also in 1959, the country ratified the treaty of the confederation of international labor organization (ilo) regarding indigenous peoples’ rights (stunnenberg, 1993). thus, with limited legal precedent for their actions, the provincial policymakers’ attempt at celebrating and protecting indigenous cultures resulted in imposing on the communities the model for civil associations. moreover, the policymakers introduced an ad hoc interpretation of indigenous way of thinking in a model designed to provide checks-and-balances, and fair decision-making in volunteer non-commercial or non-governmental associations. by bringing caciques into the text of the law, they attached two different notions of authority—one ascribed to democratically elected delegates, and the other held by traditional leaders. t h e w e s t e r n t o b a ’ s j o u r n e y t o s e l f g o v e r n a n c e , 1 9 8 5 1 9 9 5 in late 1985, soon after the provincial administration—in compliance with law 426— created instituto de comunidades aborígenes (ica), and commissioned instituto provincial de colonización y tierras fiscales de formosa to handle land titles for indigenous associations, the surveyors began surveying the public lands in western formosa where the communities lived. by then, the western toba had already started the process of self-organizing. in the early 1980s, a handful of western toba men—all bilingual in spanish, experienced in dealing with labor contractors, government officials, and clergy affiliated to the local mission of the anglican church—had become 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.1   active in the movement that resulted in land rights for indigenous peoples. these bilingual western toba, along with eastern toba, pilagá, and wichí participated in the meetings of the committee of 21conducted in the provincial capital (some 350 miles away from the villages). they would reach the town of ingeniero juárez walking, biking, riding in the back of tractor-trailers and trucks; then they would hitch rides in trucks or somehow pay for bus tickets to the capital. they were present at the memorable event that took place in front of the legislature on july 11, 1984, and were recorded on video. because of their active engagement and advanced knowledge of the content of the bill, the toba leaders were able to convene an assembly of the people in the communities in mid-may 1985. the leaders of the families living in the barrio at the outskirts of ingeniero juárez were invited to participate, but declined the invitation, saying that they would form an association of their own at a later time. t h e t o b a c r e a t e a c i v i l a s s o c i a t i o n to gain access to collective property title, the toba created an organization that included all the communities—which by then numbered seven. they named their administrative body as general council (consejo general), and gave it by-laws (estatuto orgánico) written in collaboration with luis de la cruz, a trusted advisor then affiliated to the local anglican mission, a missionary church that supported native peoples in their quest for land rights in argentina and paraguay (de la cruz, 1989; de la cruz & mendoza, 1989). the signatures of 212 adults appear in the original document or “act of constitution” of the first general council. the participating individuals (men and women) either wrote their names or affixed their fingerprints on the pages, ratifying the collective agreement. according to the by-laws, the general council would consist of two delegates (one incumbent and one alternate) for each community, and two officers (secretary and treasurer) who were to be appointed from the pull of delegates. at the time, the toba could not fully visualize incumbencies for the roles of secretary and treasurer, but they understood that councils had to have these types of officers. people in the villages would elect their delegates in a traditional way. instead of counting individual votes (one person-one vote), they would reach consensus though concurrent and subsequent public discussions, taking into consideration each one’s personal preferences and skills. as stated in the by-laws, community delegates were to be confirmed during assemblies, and would hold their positions for life. if for any reason the delegates decided not to continue representing others, they would simply stop acting as representatives, and such a decision would not have diminished their esteem in the community. the people wanted to create a kind of self-governance that could “respect toba way of thinking.” they chose for their association the name comunidades aborígenes cacique sombrero negro comlajepi naleua, which can be loosely translated as “indigenous communities of cacique sombrero negro that are in charge of this land.” in choosing that designation, the toba wanted to convey an idea of custodianship rather than ownership, meaning that they were living on the land, but the true owners of that territory were non-human beings situated in the spiritual realm. the main purpose of the general council was negotiating collective title of property on the land. the toba claimed property rights over 100,000 hectares in northwest formosa province on the right side of pilcomayo river, and also claimed land ownership on the opposite side of the river, in an area situated in the republic of paraguay. the people were so focused on obtaining property title that they called this council the “land committee” (comisión de tierras). 9 mendoza: hunter-gatherers’ self-governance published by scholarship@western, 2015   during the organizing process, people would get together and remember old stories of inter-tribal raids, and violent encounters with the argentinean, bolivian, and paraguayan armies. the elders recounted memories of seasonal treks, and long forgotten seasonal campsites. all of that affirmed their collective sense of belonging and their ethnic identity. meanwhile, the families settled in the barrio near the town of ingeniero juárez—expecting to receive property title over a parcel of public land—had their own assembly, created by-laws, and named their association comunidad aborígen comleec barrio toba— which loosely translates as “indigenous community of us, the toba people in the barrio.” when the western toba (organized under the name of comunidades aborígenes cacique sombrero negro comlajepi naleua) submitted their paperwork to the inspectorate of legal entities in the state capital, the administrators rejected part of their proposal. the form of governance they had chosen for themselves did not meet the requirements spelled out in decree 574/85. legal advisers with the inspectorate of legal entities told the western toba that they should elect at least three officers (president, secretary, and treasurer), and also elect delegates for each community, but instead of doing by consensus, they had to elect those who had received the majority of votes. these appointees would then be in charge of managing the internal affairs of the association during one year. after the representatives completed their term, the people would have to elect new officers for the same positions. despite knowing that this form of governance was strange to the indigenous experience, the administrators made it clear that if the toba people wanted to obtain legal title to their land, they had to find a way to adjust to those rules. in 1986, land surveyors with the agency for colonization of public lands were already surveying the land in wichí and toba communities in western formosa (stechina, 2012). while the surveyors were measuring the terrain, members of the communities rushed to put together revised paperwork for the civil association. the agency for colonization of public lands, and the newly created institute for aboriginal communities indicated that each indigenous community that met the guidelines would be granted collective property title over 5,000 hectares of land. the likely prospect of securing shared ownership prompted extended families to fission even further away from the main villages into new locations. early in 1987, the toba convened a second general assembly in la rinconada to fill out the positions required by the provincial administration, and also to acknowledge the existence of recently formed hamlets. the people revised the by-laws. they re-elected delegates (one incumbent and one alternate) for each settlement. these delegates were to be members-at-large in the council. they retained the appointees for secretary and treasurer, but added to the general council the positions of president and cacique. the position of president was required by law. the administrative office dealing with legal entities could not accept an association without an office holder authorized to make decisions on behalf of the group. the toba president would occupy the position for the period of one year, the same term duration as for secretary and treasurer. furthermore, since caciques were also mentioned in the law, the assembly appointed a cacique or chief to avoid falling short of approval at the inspectorate. the people designated emilio as overall cacique (cacique general). this position was "for life." with these organizational changes, the toba people thought, their by-laws could qualify to form a civil association. emilio had been an enthusiast supporter of the committee of 21, traveling with the others to the capital city, and participating in meetings and public assemblies. at the time, he was helping the 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.1   land surveyors to locate markers that would define the boundaries of toba land. emilio was fluent in spanish, held in great esteem by the anglican missionaries. he self-identified as member of the maingodipi band through his mother’s line (the toba trace descent bilaterally and practice uxorilocal residency) (mendoza, 2002). after long negotiations, and many trips back and forth between the communities and the provincial capital—travels and negotiations that almost wore out the confidence of the delegates— the toba accomplished their goal. in may 1989, during a well-publicized official act, the seven communities were granted collective property title to 35,000 hectares of the land they had occupied since before the province was configured as an administrative jurisdiction in the country. this was a remarkable achievement for the western toba. a few months later, the designated cacique resigned his position. emilio’s resignation was unexpected, although his nomination had been unusual since having a chief (cacique general) representing all the people was not in the most recent indigenous tradition. as long as people could remember, the jaliaganacá of the past have been life-long leaders only of their own bands. even cacique sombrero negro, the charismatic jaliaganec of the kedocopi near la rinconada, whose memory was honored in the name of the association, would have not represented all the western toba of his time. according to the appointed cacique general, he was disappointed by the behavior of some members of the council during the long negotiation process. emilio complained that some of his peers would “turn their backs to the people in the communities, and act for their own good.” he had also expected that his advice would be taken more into consideration that it actually was. emilio said: “my uncle quedoc [sombrero negro] told me once: the people will not respect you as a jaliaganec if you have not killed a man” (mendoza, 2002, p. 91) nonetheless, once the charter for the association was approved by the provincial administration, the toba found themselves in the situation of having to elect new officers periodically to fill out the spots included in their by-laws. in december 1989, the people met in assembly for the third time to elect delegates for recently formed hamlets. some incumbent officers exchanged positions in the council. at the time, the toba saw no real difference between the role of president, secretary, and treasurer. to fill out the position of cacique, the toba picked martin, the jaliaganec of the piogodipi. martin embodied to an extent the traditional concept of authority. he had received spiritual companions from his father, a former jaliaganec of the piogodipi band, and was a skilled hunter, considered honest, humble, and committed to the service of his people. however, all the individuals interviewed about the subject agreed that martin had no influence outside his own village. when the other delegates were unable to attend important meetings at the provincial capital, martin agreed to travel alone; although, as he said, he felt uncomfortable dealing with argentinean officers and politicians, and felt awkward because he was not fluent in spanish. during this time, more families split from the main villages and formed small settlements on sites suitable for planting and keeping animals. the families’ access to land was unrestricted. by the early 1990s, the number of settlements or communities doubled from the initial seven. the general council gathered in assembly for the fourth time to designate representatives for all the new communities. 11 mendoza: hunter-gatherers’ self-governance published by scholarship@western, 2015   meanwhile, the people in the toba barrio received property title on a parcel of land that had been previously occupied by wichí bands. these toba families had frequent interactions with administrators, social workers, health care workers, and town residents. possibly due to their quotidian experiences, the toba in the barrio were comfortable adopting a comparatively more hierarchical organization. their association was managed by an executive council (president, secretary, and treasurer), but the president had the last word when consensus could not be reached. the officers were elected for a two-year term. in december 1993, the general council met in la rinconada. the people’s assembly acknowledged the existence of 12 toba communities and two other small temporary camps that had formed since the meeting of the assembly in december 1989. they incorporated in the council two delegates—chosen by the people in the places that they represented—for each one of those new communities. the people revised the by-laws of the association. to provide oversight for the treasurer, the toba decided to include in the by-laws the role of account reviewer (revisor de cuentas). by this time, they had learned that the provincial government and the political parties viewed the officeholders of the general council as legitimate representatives of the association and were funnelling through those officeholders money and goods intended for the communities at large; so the people wanted to supervise the behavior of the officers by focusing on the treasurer. three individuals from different villages were designated as account reviewers. at the same time, the assembly of the people decided to void the role of overall cacique. the toba decided that their association did not need a life-long cacique after all. martin, the cacique who had replaced emilio, appeared relieved. he agreed to participate in the council as an alternate delegate on behalf of his village instead. from 1993 to 1995, the toba council remained so attached to the domain of land rights that people still called it the "land committee." during this period, the council made decisions concerning the following situations: (a) negotiating with a private company that was extracting lumber from their land without authorization, as if it still were public land, (b) coming to an agreement with a non-indigenous neighbor who was asking for permission to pasture his cattle on toba land during the rainy season, (c) expressing disapproval with the actions of a non-indigenous neighbor who was taking timber from toba land without authorization, and (d) negotiating with a non-governmental organization that was willing to give a grant to buy wire to fence the perimeter of the property that was most exposed to trespassing. to address these and other situations affecting the business of the association, the decision-making process started in the villages. when a group of individuals felt moved or interested in something (for example, when a group of men wanted to ask for government funds to build corrals and to buy cattle, or women wanted to obtain vaccines for the sheep and goats), they meet to discuss their ideas in a central place, a designated place where people conducted meetings on days and times previously agreed upon by word-of-mouth. community meetings were open to everyone. although, in practice, only adults expressed their ideas and opinions aloud during the meetings. young (unmarried) individuals would speak only if an adult requested their opinion. it was understood that decisions made at public meetings could only be changed by the same people gathered in another open meeting, where anyone could express an opinion. the meetings of the council followed the same dynamics as the local meetings. the council met at a designated place in the most populated toba village on a day previously agreed upon. a comparison of all the documents jointly produced by the toba over the period 1984 to 1995 shows that the same individuals held different leadership positions in the general council. these documents 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.1   also provide evidence that the people began dispersing from the three main villages as soon as they became empowered by the prospect of land rights. the clusters of families who chose to live together in new hamlets were often related by kinship, either members of the same band, or members of bands that used to be allied. although the toba initially managed the business of the association in a fairly egalitarian and consensual manner, people were expanding their views on the extent to which they would be willing to (a) delegate power onto representatives, and (b) entitle these representatives to make decisions on behalf of the group—thus implicitly accepting political inequality. people were also expanding the scope of tolerance for economic inequality, voicing less intense disapproval against those families who accumulated wealth after dealings with politicians and non-profit organizations, articulating consent for widespread sociopolitical processes that have been described by anthropologists across the region (iñigo carrera, 2012; salamanca & tola, 2008). since then, the toba population has continued to grow and expand over their land. in the late 1990s, for example, the people numbered about 1,500 (gordillo, 1999). in 2005, the number of delegates to the association grew to almost 30 (córdoba & fernández, 2006). a few years later, córdoba (2008) reported on as many as 18 villages. by 2010, a public health report (programa de participación de pueblos indígenas, 2010) counted 1,766 individuals in the communities. they were settled in 22 villages (spadafora, gómez, & matarrese, 2010). the people in barrio toba numbered 220. tallying the people in all the settlements, 1,966 individuals self-identified as toba in western formosa in 2010. i n d i g e n o u s c i v i l a s s o c i a t i o n s a n d l o c a l p o l i t i c s in the 2010 demographic census of formosa, the indigenous population accounted for 7.2 percent of the total population (38,039 individuals). so far the provincial administration has registered 193 indigenous civil associations (116 wichí, 50 toba, and 26 pilagá), and has granted to those associations property title on 300,000 hectares of land that were previously state-owned lands (gobierno de la provincia de formosa, 2014). most of the associations hold the land titles in collective property. the titles are legally unalienable, indefeasible, and immune to seizure and taxation (inalienable, inembargable e imprescriptible). table 1 below shows how many indigenous communities obtained land title in the paraguayan chaco and the province of formosa between 1981 and 1991, the period most relevant to this discussion. table 1 also shows the estimated total land area (in hectares) received by the communities during that period. gordillo (2008) argued that the movement to grant land titles and welfare benefits to indigenous communities created loyal clienteles among indigenous people. the justicialista party has consistently captured the majority of democratic votes in the province since 1983, and has consolidated party hegemony among the indigenous population, actually neutralizing many sources of conflict. similarly, sautu et al. (2006) defined as clientele the relationship between indigenous leaders and the political apparatus of the justicialista party. the communities—implicitly or explicitly—participate in quid pro quo receiving favors, goods, and services in exchange for electoral votes and political support. this relationship, in fact, perpetuates the staying power of the political party. indigenous people participate in the production and reproduction of clientelism—their criticisms of the government and their resistances to its policies are handled from within the party (gordillo 2008). 13 mendoza: hunter-gatherers’ self-governance published by scholarship@western, 2015   t a b l e 1 . n u m b e r o f i n d i g e n o u s c o m m u n i t i e s t h a t o b t a i n e d l a n d t i t l e a n d e s t i m a t e d t o t a l l a n d a r e a ( h a ) g r a n t e d i n t h e p a r a g u a y a n c h a c o a n d t h e a r g e n t i n e a n p r o v i n c e o f f o r m o s a , 1 9 8 1 1 9 9 1 p a r a g u a y , c h a c o r e g i o n a r g e n t i n a , f o r m o s a p r o v i n c e t o t a l number of indigenous communities 96 99 195 number of indigenous communities with collective land title 13 65 78 total estimated land area (ha) granted 94,687 206,012 300,699 note. source: adapted from stunnenberg, 1993, table 9.1, p. 219. for example, discussing favoritism in the provincial administration, anthropologist carlos salamanca (2011) argued that several eastern toba and pilagá communities denounced the modus operandi of the dirección de personerías jurídicas (formerly inspectorate of legal entities). the bureaucracy of this agency almost guarantees that “friendly” associations would have their documents approved faster and more easily than associations that are viewed as “oppositional” to the partisan government. discussing the significant burden imposed on indigenous groups wanting to obtain property title over land, anthropologists argue that civil associations are now the only form of indigenous organization to which the provincial administrators would pay attention, effectively marginalizing those communities that are unable to self-organize. elected positions required for civil associations—such as president, treasurer, and secretary—are superimposed and sometimes appear opposed to forms of indigenous organization centered on kin ties, consensual decision-making, and charismatic leadership. salamanca (2011) said, “. . . after several decades of experience, indigenous people, in many cases, have combined their traditional forms of political action and decision-making with non-indigenous practices and logics, and they even privilege the later over the first” (p. 31, my translation from spanish). civil associations are so ubiquitous that it is impossible to gain recognition for alternative forms of governance, such as federations or confederations. the pilagá federation, for example, formed in 2003, has not been able to achieve the status of civil association, in part, because it is viewed as “unfriendly” and “uncooperative” by the party ruling the provincial administration (matarrese, 2012). smaller communities who have yet to access collective land title under the current policies are asking for a sweeping revision of the legal status requirement for indigenous peoples (stechina, 2012). c o n c l u s i o n in 1983, the social and political climate in the province of formosa, argentina (located across the river from the republic of paraguay) was ripe for passing legislation acknowledging indigenous peoples’ rights. newly elected legislators, administrators at the governor’s office, indigenous people and their 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.1   advocates, all agreed that it was time for indigenous people to have property titles over land, and also access to education, healthcare, and welfare benefits otherwise available to citizens. law 426, the integral law for aborigines (ley integral del aborígen) was published in boletín oficial on november 20, 1984, and the policymakers completed the protocols of law 426 (decree 574/85) on may 6th, 1985. it became the first legal instrument in argentina addressing indigenous peoples’ rights in a coherent and forceful manner. preparing the law, provincial policymakers followed closely the text of the 1981 paraguayan law 904, the statute of indigenous communities, sanctioned by the regime of president general alfredo stroessner. in the paraguayan law 904, an indigenous community could obtain collective land title by registering its leaders with the instituto nacional del indígena (indi). these individuals then became the legal representatives and could request legal status (personería jurídica) for the community, a step previous to accessing land title. individuals identified as leaders in the paraguayan chaco were given political power and much latitude for decision-making, a fact that the policymakers in formosa may have wanted to avoid. nonetheless, to include some measure of customary or consuetudinary law (derecho consuetudinario) in the spirit of the new policies, provincial policymakers upheld “the indigenous way of thinking” by granting collective property rights to the indigenous communities. this type of property right was unprecedented in the legal system, so the policymakers found a way around the notion of collective property by using the pre-existent one-size-fits all model for civil associations. this model not only gave legal status (personería jurídica) to the communities, but it also fostered accountability and democratic representativeness in the governance of the association—two characteristics that may have been seen as advantageous and desirable. yet still under pressure from indigenous peoples and their allies, the provincial policymakers introduced an amendment to article 9 of decree 574/85 in law 426, published in boletín oficial on january 4, 1986. this amendment eliminated the 2-year residency term for delegates, and inserted into the governance of civil associations the authority of life-long caciques. by modifying the model of governance for civil associations, well-meaning lawmakers created an incongruity difficult to disentangle. indigenous groups in formosa today continue to struggle to meet these legal requirements. the western toba reacted immediately to take advantage of law 426. in the fall of 1985, they convened an assembly in the communities, elaborated an act of constitution and by-laws, and chose a name for their association. however, the form of organization that they chose did not match all the requirements for civil associations. the toba assembly, thus, met again in 1987, adjusted its by-laws to the actual requirements, and to avoid falling short of administrative approval (because caciques were included in the text of the law) they designated an overall cacique for the association. before long, the toba realized the practical convenience of keeping the role of overall cacique separate from the type of self-governance they were trying to achieve, so they bypassed life-long caciques in executive positions of the council, focusing instead on providing additional supervision for the officeholders representing the communities. i argued that, by untying the authority of the jaliaganacá, the toba showed pragmatism. they kept their customary leaders out of political dealings, as much as they have suppressed and held back the memory of stories of state terror and collective suffering (gordillo, 2002) that would have hindered the forward-oriented entrepreneurism of the association. 15 mendoza: hunter-gatherers’ self-governance published by scholarship@western, 2015   through political actions, the western toba built a resilient organization, characterized by anthropologists as the strongest in the area (gordillo & hirsch, 2010). thus, the toba case study underscores the unintended effects of policies that enmesh roles designed to provide representativeness and checks and balances in civil associations with individual roles originating in indigenous cultures. this case also reminds us that land rights are so important to communities that they are willing to do what it takes to access those rights. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.1   r e f e r e n c e s altamirano, m. 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(2008). contesting indigenous peoples governance: the politics of statedetermination vs. self-government. in y. d. belanger (ed.), aboriginal self-government in canada: current trends and issues (pp. 69-101). saskatoon, canada: purich publishing. machuca, f. p. (1986). ley aborigen: reparación histórica de una antigua injusticia. salta, argentina: ministerio de bienestar social de salta. magrassi, g. e. (1985). preámbulo. in l. wolfson (ed.), indio te llevamos dentro (pp. 4-6). buenos aires: editorial uno mismo. magrassi, g. e. (1989). los aborígenes de la argentina: ensayo socio-histórico-cultural. buenos aires: editorial búsqueda. matarrese, m. (2011). disputas y negociaciones en torno al territorio pilagá (provincia de formosa) (unpublished doctoral dissertation). universidad de buenos aires, argentina. matarrese, m. (2012). dimensiones estéticas de la política artesanal en formosa: el caso de los pilagá. claroscuro, 11, 90-107. mendoza, m. (2002). band mobility and leadership among the western toba hunter-gatherers of gran chaco in argentina. ny: edwin mellen press. palmer, j. (2008). carisma: ¿un nuevo atributo del niyát wichí? in j. braunstein & n. meichtry (eds.), liderazgo, representatividad y control social en el gran chaco (pp. 215-124). corrientes, argentina: universidad nacional del nordeste. 19 mendoza: hunter-gatherers’ self-governance published by scholarship@western, 2015   programa de participación de pueblos indígenas. (2010). proyecto funciones esenciales de salud pública. plan para poblaciones indígenas año 2009-2010, provincia de formosa. buenos aires: secretaria de desarrollo social de la nación. renshaw, j. (2002). the indians of the paraguayan chaco: identity and economy. lincoln, ne: university of nebraska press. sahlins, m. (2013). structural work: how microhistories become macrohistories and vice versa. in f. aulino, m. goheen, & s. j. tambiah (eds.), radical egalitarianism: local realities, global relations (pp. 161-190). ny: fordham university press. salamanca, c. (2011). movilizaciones indígenas, mapas e historias por la propiedad de la tierra en el chaco argentino. agencia nacional de promoción científica y tecnológica, iwigia y flacso. buenos aires: ennio ayosa impresores salamanca, c., & tola, f. (2008). formas contemporáneas de la acción política toba a partir del análisis de las estrategias relacionales qom y de la capacidad de acción. in j. braunstein & n. meichtry (eds.), liderazgo, representatividad y control social en el gran chaco (pp. 149-158). corrientes, argentina: universidad nacional del nordeste. sautu, r., vega, l., boniolo, p., borghini, m., casalis, a., dalle, p., ferrero, j. p., guerrero, s. l., lizitza, n., mantilla, m. j., macaudier, v., & molinaro, v. (2006). relatos y miradas de prácticas electorales en el norte argentino: el caso de ingeniero juárez, provincia de formosa. documentos de investigadores jóvenes (no. 12). buenos aires: instituto de investigaciones gino germani, universidad de buenos aires. siffredi, a. (1984). the semantic levels of the chorote cosmic vision. journal of latin american lore, 10, 87-110. spadafora, a. m., gómez m., & matarrese, m. (2010). rumbos y laberintos de la política étnica: organizaciones unificadas y faccionalismos indígenas en la provincia de formosa (pilagá y toba). in g. gordillo & s. hirsch (eds.), movilizaciones indígenas e identidades en disputa en la argentina (pp. 237-57).buenos aires: la crujía ediciones. stechina, e. l. (2012). caminos de lucha por la defensa y recuperación de la tierra. ingeniero juárez, formosa: asociación civil el amanecer. retrieved from http://www.elamanecer.org.ar stunnenberg, p. w. (1993). entitled to land: incorporation of the paraguayan and argentinean gran chaco and the spatial marginalization of the indian people. fort lauderdale, usa: verlagbreitenbach publishers. 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.1 the international indigenous policy journal september 2015 hunter-gatherers’ self-governance: untying the traditional authority of chiefs from the western toba civil association marcela mendoza recommended citation hunter-gatherers’ self-governance: untying the traditional authority of chiefs from the western toba civil association abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license hunter-gatherersâ•ž self-governance: untying the traditional authority of chiefs from the western toba civil association. a library matter of genocide: the library of congress and the historiography of the native american holocaust the international indigenous policy journal volume 8 issue 2 reconciling research: perspectives on research involving indigenous peoples—part 1 article 9 april 2017 a library matter of genocide: the library of congress and the historiography of the native american holocaust michael q. dudley university of winnipeg, m.dudley@uwinnipeg.ca recommended citation dudley, m. q. (2017). a library matter of genocide: the library of congress and the historiography of the native american holocaust. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(2). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.9 a library matter of genocide: the library of congress and the historiography of the native american holocaust abstract for decades, indigenous experiences of mass killings, atrocities, ethnic cleansing, and assimilation have been marginalized from genocide studies due to the ways in which knowledge is constructed in the field, specifically in terms of its focus on definitions and prototype-based conceptions. this article argues that these exclusions are not merely owed to discourses internal to genocide studies, but are affirmed by conventional library terminologies for the purposes of knowledge organization and information retrieval in the form of library of congress subject headings (lcsh) and classification, as applied to books regarding genocidal colonial encounters with indigenous peoples. these headings largely exhibit euphemistic tendencies and omissions that often fail to reflect the contents of the materials they seek to describe, not only impeding retrieval of books on this subject, but also their incorporation into current scholarship. to determine the extent to which the assignment of lcsh and call numbers corresponded reasonably to the stated intent of the authors, searches in oclc’s global worldcat catalogue were conducted for books related to the library of congress subject “indians of north america” and some variation of the keywords genocide, holocaust, or extermination, yielding a list of 34 titles. the subject headings and classification designations assigned to these books were then analyzed, with particular attention paid to euphemisms for genocide, colonial narratives, the exercise of double standards when compared to non-indigenous genocides, or outright erasure of genocide-related content. the article argues that western epistemologies in both genocide studies and library science have marginalized indigenous genocides, reproducing barriers to discovery and scholarship, and contributing to a social discourse of native american holocaust denial. instead a pragmatic view in library science is proposed, in which claims of genocide on the part of authors are taken as given and which would recognize the legitimacy of indigenous perspectives concerning their relationship to land and how processes of assimilation (such as canada’s residential school system) were consistent with raphael lemkin’s original definition of genocide. it argues that enabling our ability to name and discuss genocide in north america can contribute to a more honest reckoning with our history and hence the basis for reconciliation and social justice. keywords genocide, indigenous research, library science, historiography, knowledge construction, bias acknowledgments the author would like to thank and acknowledge lorena fontaine of the university of winnipeg’s department of indigenous studies for her comments, suggestions, and advice in the preparation of this paper, as well as deidra wallace, the university library’s data and discovery librarian, for her technical assistance concerning metadata and the library of congress. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ a l i b r a r y m a t t e r o f g e n o c i d e : t h e l i b r a r y o f c o n g r e s s a n d t h e h i s t o r i o g r a p h y o f t h e n a t i v e a m e r i c a n h o l o c a u s t the nationalist not only does not disapprove of atrocities committed by his own side, he has a remarkable capacity to not even hear about them. (orwell, 1945, para. 13) who control[s] language and its values . . . controls . . . history and its interpretation. (daniel moody cited in wright, moody, & petchkovsky, 1987, p. 359) i n t r o d u c t i o n : d e n y i n g t h e n o r t h a m e r i c a n h o l o c a u s t following six years of often emotionally devastating work, the truth and reconciliation commission of canada released its summary report on what it called canada’s “cultural genocide” of indigenous peoples in the form of indian residential schools in june 2015. coming days after supreme court justice beverley mclachlan became the highest ranking government official to use this phrase, the report ignited debate not just about canada’s history but about the nature of genocide, with some arguing that the residential school system was not “merely” cultural genocide, while others strongly disapproved of the use of the term at all (roy, 2015). a similar national debate also made headlines in the united states that fall. in early september 2015, a navajo and maidu university student at cal state sacramento university named chiitaanibah johnson confronted her history professor over his refusal to concede that native americans had been subjected to a genocide; whereupon the professor grew so angry he accused her of “hijacking” his class, and told her he had “disenrolled” her (schilling, 2015). later that month pope francis—celebrated around the world by liberals and progressives for his stances on climate change and other social causes —canonized father junípero serra (1713-1784) for establishing california’s mission system, despite native american activists and other critics pointing out that the missions were essentially “concentration camps” (rubenstein, 2015). within days of serra’s canonization, his statue at the carmel mission where he is buried was vandalized and “saint of genocide” written on the stones (holson, 2015). these events served to illustrate the longstanding lack of recognition on the part of north americans in general—and the intelligentsia in particular—of the reality of genocide in the americas. for decades, indigenous experiences of mass killings, atrocities, ethnic cleansing, and assimilation have been marginalized or excluded from the “border lines” of genocide studies due to the ways in which knowledge is constructed in the field, specifically in terms of its focus on definitions and prototype-based conceptions (bischoping & fingerhut, 1996; rensink, 2011). in his book a little matter of genocide, american historian ward churchill (1997) confirmed this condition by arguing that many orthodox american historians across the ideological spectrum resist applying the term “genocide” to the catastrophic loss of life native americans suffered over the past 500 years, either by denying, minimizing, or even justifying the nature and scale of the killings that took place (see pp. 4 & 7). noam chomsky also observes that a widely-shared imperial culture among america’s intelligentsia has resulted in a consensus view on genocides rooted in american exceptionalism such that both historic and contemporary atrocities wrought by america or her allies are by definition not genocides, but are viewed 1 dudley: a library matter of genocide published by scholarship@western, 2017 as “merely unfortunate lapses that do not tarnish the essential nobility of america's ‘transcendent purpose’” (chomsky, 2010, p. 18). these processes of exclusionary knowledge construction, i will argue, have been reinforced and perpetuated at least in part by an additional layer of western knowledge construction: that of library-based access to the genocide literature via the library of congress subject headings (lcsh) and classification schemes, with material consequences for both native american historiography and the interested researcher. in its capacity as a “node of governance” (woolford, 2013) of the united states government, the library of congress has contributed to this “ideological matrix” of denial (churchill, 1997) by minimizing, sanitizing, or erasing historical reality through the assignment of euphemistic, misleading, and colonial subject headings. this article examines how the library of congress describes and classifies books related to indigenous genocides in the united states and canada, via its structures of knowledge organization (ko) and information retrieval (ir), and it finds that most are assigned terms and classification numbers that serve to downplay or misrepresent authorial intent. i argue that the library’s ideologically-situated “power to name” (olson, 2002) has both reflected and reinforced not only neglect by the field of genocide studies but politically convenient yet unjust narratives regarding historical and contemporary genocides in north american culture generally. in contradicting the intent of the authors of these books such headings and call numbers actually comprise a barrier to discovery and a form of holocaust denial (churchill, 1997). further, this article suggests that the establishment of dedicated headings (or at the very least a more accurate application of existing subject headings) would facilitate retrieval of and, more importantly, an honest engagement with indigenous genocide literature. c o n t e x t s a n d m e t h o d s the purpose of this analysis is to analyze discrepancies between the stated authorial intent in books related to indigenous genocides in north america and the ways in which they are described and made accessible through the lcsh and call numbers, with a view to identifying structural barriers to conducting research in this field. subject headings and call numbers are generated several ways and from a variety of sources. primarily they are assigned though the library of congress’ cataloging-in-publication program (cip) through which publishers submit applications for this information regarding their forthcoming books to the library of congress, for inclusion on their copyright pages, while the library makes available electronic records about the book to libraries and book vendors around the world (library of congress, 2015). similar services are also available from library and archives canada (2017) and the british library (n.d.). in addition, libraries can obtain records through oclc’s worldshare metadata services as well as contribute them by generating and uploading records for books not previously listed on worldcat. it should be acknowledged that, strictly speaking, sufficient (if generic) library of congress terminology already exists to describe indigenous genocides in north america: the subject heading genocide can be simply subdivided geographically i.e., genocide–united states or genocide–canada. since lcsh is premised on “literary warrant” (what is actually published), the extent of publishing in this area as demonstrated by the sample examined below explicitly about genocide in the americas, combined with 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.9 the library of congress’ own rules (cataloguers are to “avoid assigning headings that label topics or express personal value judgment [and] consider the intent of the author”), might suggest that these headings would be applied liberally (“assigning and constructing subject headings,” 2016, p. 7). this analysis shows that this is far from the case and is at dramatic variance with books on other genocides, notably the jewish holocaust. for comparative purposes, the lcsh for other recognized genocides are as follows: • armenian massacres • collectivization of agriculture -ukraine -history • famines – ukraine • genocide ukraine history 20th century • genocide -bosnia and hercegovina -history -20th century • genocide -namibia • genocide – timor-leste • holocaust, jewish -1939-1945 • political atrocities • rwanda -genocide • rwanda -history -civil war, 1994 -atrocities • yugoslav war, 1991-atrocities we see unambiguous acknowledgement of historical genocide in the cases of bosnia and hercegovina, ukraine, rwanda, and against europe’s jews—all stateor politically-driven genocides with varying levels of non-state support. the holocaust is named as holocaust, jewish -1939-1945, while the holodomor in ukraine is recognized by the library of congress as genocide but is designated according to its geographic location, rather than this title (which means “death by hunger” in ukrainian). however, the geographical orientation of the standard heading construction (name of country – genocide) sometimes imposes significant limitations on historical content: for example, the heading genocide - namibia would seem to suggest that the government of namibia was responsible for a genocide, when in fact the heading refers to the genocide of the herero and nama peoples at the hands of german colonizers in the early years of the 20th century. that this slaughter occurred in response to a “revolt” appears to be the colonizer-friendly subtext of the heading namibia--history--herero revolt, 1904-1907. 3 dudley: a library matter of genocide published by scholarship@western, 2017 yet not all genocides are treated equally by the library of congress, some are instead described euphemistically. the armenian genocide—widely (though not universally) acknowledged as such—is only considered a “massacre” by the library of congress. the horrific population collapse in the congo free state under the personal rule of king leopold the ii of belgium, which may have seen as many as 15 million congolese perish (as recounted in king leopold’s ghost [hochschild, 1998]) is described by the library of congress as forced labor—congo (democratic republic). similarly, a search for "ethnic cleansing" (which while not synonymous with genocide is often associated with it [clark, 2008]) will lead the researcher to a see reference to forced migration; population transfers; and ethnic conflict—rather passive terms, the first two of which may also pertain to cases of natural disasters, removing a sense of causative agency. headings such as these exhibit a troubling tendency toward what psychologist robert j. lifton refers to as deamplifying and derealizing language, or the use of euphemisms by an institution to intellectually distance those within it from the reality with which they are engaged. in his book 1986 the nazi doctors, he writes, bureaucracy helps render genocide unreal. it further diffuses the impact of murderous events that, to begin with, are difficult to believe. in this sense we may say that the bureaucracy deamplifies genocide: diminishes the emotional and intellectual tones associated with the killing, primarily for perpetrator but also for bystanders and victims. central to the process is the dampening of language, [including the use of] euphemisms (“resettlement” or “deportation” for killing) . . . with its attendant numbing, denial, and derealisation. (lifton, 1986, pp. 495-496) lifton’s focus is on the use of language by a bureaucracy actively committing genocide, while our concern is somewhat different: an institution of memory integral to a government that was also engaged in its own genocidal enterprise in the elimination of indigenous americans as a means to enabling european settlement. following woolford (2013), we therefore need to conceptualize the library of congress as a colonial node of governance within a larger outcome generating system geared towards that end. woolford (2013), in describing canada’s indian residential school system as one such node, stated: node[s] exhibit[] a specific way of thinking about and set of methods for dealing with a matter of governance, as well as a set of resources and an institutional structure that allow the node to carry out its tasks . . . within a broader network of colonial relations. . . (p. 70) in this model, we can situate the library of congress classification and subject headings in their historical context: established in 1897—7 years after the wounded knee massacre and 4 years after historian frederick jackson turner declared america’s frontier closed—they are a manifestation of its “way of thinking” and “set of methods” of colonial governance and, as they concerned indigenous americans, were designed from the beginning to relegate them to history (the e class) while at the same time disguising (or derealizing) the cause of their presumed passage. as recounted by such writers as churchill (1997) and stannard (1992) the genocides of indigenous north americans—and the use of the plural is deliberate, for there were multiple acts—involved a hideous catalogue of atrocities, from massacres and scorched-earth tactics intended to drive indigenous 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.9 peoples to starvation; to mass incarceration and forced marches; to enslavement, torture and mutilation; biological warfare; dispossession; environmental degradation; and the deliberate destruction of cultures and language through enforced colonial education in residential schools. yet all of this dedicated, ruthless murderousness has been minimized through skewed population data, glossed over as the tragic but unintended consequences of america’s manifest destiny, and imbued by historians with virtue thanks to the all-purpose final cause of american exceptionalism (churchill, 1997; stannard, 1992). given this horrific history and the potential for it to be deamplified by library terminology, this research was guided by the following questions: a. to what extent do the lcsh and classifications and their assignment accurately represent authorial intent for books concerning the genocides of indigenous north americans? b. to what extent do these headings and classification numbers represent a barrier to discovery? c. to what extent do these headings and classification numbers contribute to the discourse marginalizing indigenous genocides within genocide studies? to determine the extent to which the assignment of lcsh diminish and disguise genocide-related content rather than correspond reasonably to the stated intent of the authors, searches in oclc’s global worldcat catalogue were conducted for books the records of which featured the library of congress’ subject “indians of north america” or “indians” and variation of the keywords genocide, holocaust, or extermination, yielding an initial list of 45 titles. as would a cataloguer, the researcher confirmed authorial intent (in terms of recognition of or arguments for the historical reality of genocide against native americans) by consulting either the book itself or—when that was not possible—publisher blurbs about or reviews of the book. if none of these could be obtained then the book was removed from the sample, resulting in a final pool of 34 english-language monographs. the english language subject headings and classification designations assigned to these books were then analyzed, with particular attention paid to euphemisms for genocide and to geographic subdivision. relevant literature from mexico, central and south america, and australia, while extremely germane, was excluded in the interest of maintaining a focus on anglo-american governance and intellectual contexts. the occurrence of euphemistic and misleading headings was quantified not only for each record, but the repetition and iteration of these terms within each record. for example, a title might have been assigned both “indians of north america, treatment of” and “indians, treatment of.” the repetition within a given record of a euphemistic term and not just the presence term itself is therefore also considered rhetorically significant. these occurrences are compared to the total sample and according to geographic subdivisions. titles for which the lcsh represented particularly egregious violations of authorial intent were analyzed in depth as exemplars of the extent to which euphemisms for genocide promote colonial narratives, a double standard when compared to non-indigenous genocides, or outright erasure. all available library of congress classification numbers were identified. finally, searches were conducted in the worldcat catalogue using the most precise existing subject headings 5 dudley: a library matter of genocide published by scholarship@western, 2017 (genocide–united states or genocide–canada) to demonstrate their almost complete absence and therefore negligible utility (for a complete list of sample titles see appendix1). the study was limited to monographs: commercial, small press, and self-published books as well as government documents or those produced by non-governmental organizations. excluded from the study were archival material, book chapters, journal offprints, student theses or dissertations, and multimedia. the intention was to generate a representative sample and not a comprehensive list. the only criteria was that the book needed to be principally concerned with genocide in north america, not an overview of genocides globally, and that concepts related to genocide needed to appear in the book’s title. for this reason, james daschuk’s (2013) book, clearing the plains: disease, politics of starvation, and the loss of aboriginal life —which details prime minister john a. macdonald’s deliberate policy of starving indigenous peoples to compel them to sign treaties but does not actually contain the word genocide in either its title or its text—is not included, despite its immediate influence on public discourse on genocide in canada (mosby, 2015). it should also be stressed that the analysis was confined to those headings specifically addressing or related to the outcomes of violent and assimilationist colonization on indigenous populations, rather than all the assigned subject headings in the sample: for example, generic topical and geographic headings (i.e., north america – history; california, northern) or occurrences of the standard indians of north america heading are not discussed. bearing in mind that subject and class assignments can originate at the library of congress (or other cip programs around the world), oclc, book vendors, or any of the over 16,000 member libraries accessing worldcat, the researcher has not scoped the metadata for each record to identify the source of the original cataloguing. the purpose is to critique the nature of and use of the current terminology, not to comment on, compare, or contrast the institutions that make use of them. the reader should understand that the terms under discussion are not employed in a mutually exclusive way; that they can coexist in a given record with perhaps 20 others. this limits the ability to undertake “either–or” types of analysis and instead requires more nuanced approaches that consider the occurrences of terms and the records in which they appear, both of which can be expressed as percentages or absolute numbers. the identification of library of congress call numbers was undertaken using a combination of worldcat and oclc classify to determine the extent to which the identified titles might be potentially co-located, facilitating browsing and thereby constituting a “discursive formation” within an academic library setting (radford, 2003). it should be noted that the researcher has not read or even physically accessed every book in the sample, and therefore makes no claim as to the quality, scholarship, or accuracy of the books in question. this means that works of certain authors who may be the subject of some controversy are included in the sample without comment or qualification, including four by ward churchill (an historian of contested indian ancestry who infamously referred to the world trade center workers killed in the 9/11 attacks as 1 available at http://hdl.handle.net/10680/1289 and http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?filename=0&article=1335&context=iipj&type=additional 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.9 “little eichmanns”) and one by independent canadian genocide researcher kevin annett (whom some have called a fraud [international tribunal into crimes of church and state, n.d.]). all that is of interest here is the ability to discover relevant monographs in the worldcat catalogue. the other limitation concerning the sample is that the author did not seek to determine the extent of the potential pool of titles of which the sample represents—that is, all monographs ever published concerning the subject of genocide in north america. the intention behind the sample was to demonstrate “literary warrant” for topical treatment of these histories, rather than represent a percentage of a known, quantifiable total. because the scope of the study was limited to existing library of congress terminology and classification for monographs in worldcat, no effort was made to investigate headings and results for the journal literature in online databases, nor was the investigation pursued in terms of representations of genocide in indigenized alternative taxonomies, such as the brian deere classification, which is in use at the university of british columbia’s (n.d.) xwi7xwa library. this research interrogates dominant western paradigms of knowledge construction in two distinct disciplines, but emphasizes their transactional interrelationships: that the knowledge organization structures developed and used by the library of congress—by which historians, students, and researchers are able to access scholarship related to genocide in north america—are both informed by and reflect historiographic tensions and omissions in the genocide literature itself. situating this analysis therefore requires a consideration of two literatures concerning description and classification: that of bias in library science, as well as the struggle on the part of the international community and genocide studies to define and classify genocide. l i t e r a t u r e r e v i e w b i a s i n l i b r a r y t e r m i n o l o g y library knowledge organization (ko) and information retrieval (ir) in the form of classification and subject headings terminology are powerful—and problematic—forms of representation. as tatiana de la tierra (2008) in her chapter in radical cataloging puts it: subject headings carry a lot of weight. the right ones help a researcher find books on the topic he or she is looking for; the wrong ones, or none at all, can cut off all access to them . . . to name, to categorize and classify, to label and brand, to make linguistic determination, to signal, to define, to say, “this is the word, these are the words that will represent you”—this is a powerful thing. (p. 95) the library of congress classification system, which physically organizes books in the library, dates to 1897 and is intended to represent the universe of knowledge regardless of what is published; the subject headings, by contrast, are premised on “literary warrant” (i.e., what’s being written and published). that these schemes are rife with euro-, christian-, hetero-, and ethnocentric biases and sexism is well established in a significant body of library literature dating back to the early 1970s. critics argue that this supposed “neutrality” disguises and facilitates the neglect, misrepresentation, and omission of topics 7 dudley: a library matter of genocide published by scholarship@western, 2017 falling outside the “mainstream” (e.g., berman, 1971, olson, 2002). sanford berman (1971), in his groundbreaking prejudices and antipathies pointed out the regressive and pejorative terms applied to non-white, non-christian, and non-heterosexual peoples. as he famously put it: in the realm of headings that deal with people and cultures—in short, with humanity—the lc [library of congress] list can only “satisfy” parochial, jingoistic europeans and north americans, white-hued, at least nominally christian (and preferably protestant) in faith, comfortably situated in the middle-and higher-income brackets, largely domiciled in suburbia, fundamentally loyal to the established order, and heavily imbued with the transcendent, incomparable glory of western civilization. (p. xi) under an assumption of “neutrality,” subject headings and classification numbers are applied in a positivistic fashion that assumes that they are (and should be) passive reflections of an external reality, rather than subjective and prone to preconceived interpretation (hjorland, 2004). in reality, critics argue, these schemes are overwhelmingly euroand christian-centric in nature, and exhibit many examples of sexism, heterosexism, racism, and american exceptionalism, as well as pejorative language to describe, exclude, or misrepresent marginalized knowledge domains (berman, 1971; olson, 2002). as ann doyle (2013) noted, “dominant classification and subject representation systems entrench what is ‘taken for granted’ as legitimate knowledge, and how socially marginalized groups and their knowledge domains are excluded” (p. 3). olson and schlegl (2001), in their systematic analysis of the literature on bias in library of congress description, observe that certain topics can become marginalized because the schemes treat them as an exception to the presumed norm; physically ghettoize them away from the materials with which they should be associated; depict them with an inappropriate structure that misrepresents the field; assign them biased terminology, often with pejorative overtones; or omit them altogether. topics related to indigenous history in america are particularly affected. they note: ghettoization is the problem of gathering and then isolating a topic rather than integrating it. a classic instance is the treatment of aboriginal north americans in classification [which is] separated from mainstream north american culture and . . . largely relegated to history as though there were no contemporary aboriginal cultures. this circumstance might be viewed as effective gathering, but it might also be indicative of the practice of considering disturbing ideas as other to be set aside, outside of the mainstream. (pp. 67-69) this assumption on the part of the library of congress of a “singular public” or “majority” (i.e., straight, white, and male) user is troubling, de la tierra (2008) said, because erasure and misrepresentation through classification and subject assignment are not limited to existing inappropriate headings, but the outright lack of headings as well: in these cases, if titles don’t contain magical keywords, the books are effectively erased from the catalogs. to not name is to eradicate, to make invisible. it is like banning a book that no one ever knew existed to begin with. (p. 100) 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.9 as problematic and prone to bias as controlled vocabulary such as lcsh may be, the alternative—their elimination and relying solely on web-based keyword searching drawn from publication titles, abstracts, or chapter headings—is equally fraught with the potential for erasure and “bibliocide.” in their research, gross and taylor (2005; see also gross, taylor, & joudrey, 2015) determined that more than a third of potential results will be missed if searches rely solely on keywords, rather than controlled vocabulary. similarly, mann (2003) argued that an absence of subject headings and reliance instead on keyword searching depends on the searcher knowing what terms to use, meaning “the mere fact that the terms may exist on the catalog records does not by itself give us any formal and predictable means of discovering their existence” (p. 53). in a later article, mann (2008) also sharply criticized the reliance on ranked keywords on the part of google print on the grounds that it: does not accomplish any of the tasks necessary for scholarly control of book literature: standardization of search terms (authority control), systematic linkage of related concepts, creation of overview browse displays in opacs, and creation of categories of full texts related by concept (no matter what their keywords) in limited and manageably browsable groupings. it utterly destroys the recognition access required by scholarship in exchange for a very low level of prior-specification access appropriate only to quick information-seeking, devoid of context, connection, focus, or comprehensiveness. (p. 166) berman (2013) concurred, noting that without an intuitive subject heading, unless the desired term actually appears in the title, it may not be discoverable at all. before proceeding with our investigation of subject headings and classification of books related to indigenous genocides in north america, it should be stressed that the literature has long recognized that indigenous people are, in general, poorly served by the library of congress. littletree and metoyer (2015) summarized it this way: existing subject headings have not been designed with the perspectives of indigenous people in mind . . . the cataloging language silences native american history. it disregards the sovereignty of native nations, as well as historicizes and stereotypes native people and cultures. additionally, researchers have found that lcsh and other mainstream knowledge organization systems severely limit the retrieval of native language materials and native american topics. for example, the library of congress authority files for north american indian personal names are often inaccurate, and it has only been since 2005 that the library of congress began using a standard authority list for the names of tribal governments. (p. 642) the library literature has also noted that this neglect and bias of native american topics extends to the matter of genocide, but only in the contexts of discussing other genocides. in his article “whose holocaust is it anyway,” sanford berman (1998) proposed new headings to recognize the genocides committed against a number of groups (such as gays and the romani at the hand of the nazis during world war ii) and set out 18 alternative headings that he proposed for use at the hennepin county library in minnesota (pp. 223-224), including: • native american holocaust (1492-1900) 9 dudley: a library matter of genocide published by scholarship@western, 2017 • american indian genocide (1492-1900) • american indian holocaust (1492-1900) • amerindian holocaust (1492-1900) • first nations holocaust (1492-1900) • genocide, american indian (1492-1900) • genocide, indian (1492-1900) • genocide, native american (1492-1900) • holocaust, american indian (1492-1900) • holocaust, indian (1492-1900) • holocaust, native american (1492-1900) • indian holocaust (1492-1900) • indians of north america -holocaust (1492-1900) • native american genocide (1492-1900) since these were offered as part of a more inclusive and general discussion about genocide and lcsh, berman does not go into any detail describing the extent of the issue as it concerns native americans. as well intentioned as these are, however, one could also easily critique berman’s decision to put an end date of 1900 on genocides in the americas—especially in regards american indian boarding schools (which continue to exist in the 21st century [bear, 2008]) and the canadian indian residential school system, the last school of which closed in 1996 (cbc news, 2008). the reason that these headings were never adopted by the library of congress (and are in fact no longer available on the hennepin county public library catalogue) may be related at least in part to the historic and ongoing absence, neglect, and exclusion of indigenous genocide in the field of genocide studies. d e f i n i n g a n d c l a s s i f y i n g g e n o c i d e like library science, genocide studies is itself intimately concerned with naming concepts and with schemes of classification and, as is the case with any such act, these can direct and constrain our thinking. it must be stressed at the outset however that the very use of the term genocide is freighted with problematic political and legal controversies that contributes to a general reluctance to apply it to historic and contemporary acts of mass violence (glanville, 2009; minow, 2007; scheffer, 2006). 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.9 the ideological contexts and situatedness of knowledge construction concerning genocide must, therefore, be front of mind as we consider the manifestation of these definitions in library catalogues. like cataloguing and classification conventions themselves, all “definitions [of genocide] are social conventions, not empirical truths about the world” (moshman, 2001, p. 445). efforts to define “genocide” begin during world war ii when polish-american lawyer raphael lemkin, reporting on the industrialized slaughter being perpetrated by nazi germany in occupied countries, first proposed that: [genocide is] a coordinated plan aimed at destruction of the essential foundations of the life of national groups so that these groups wither and die like plants that have suffered a blight. the end may be accomplished by the forced disintegration of political and social institutions, of the culture of the people, of their language, their national feelings and their religion. it may be accomplished by wiping out all basis of personal security, liberty, health and dignity. when these means fail the machine gun can always be utilized as a last resort. (lemkin, 1945, para. 5) note that his definition is premised on the destruction of the foundations of group identity, in the form of social institutions and culture, with outright mass killing entering as a “last resort.” such a definition, had it been internationally recognized, would have clearly encompassed the historical and ongoing treatment of indigenous peoples around the world, and certainly the experience of the first peoples of north america. as it is, the united nations, in its convention on the prevention and punishment of the crime of genocide (cppcg), which was approved on december 9th, 1948, excluded cultural and social consideration, and it limited the definition to physical aspects only: in the present convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such: a. killing members of the group; b. causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; c. deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; d. imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; e. forcibly transferring children of the group to another group (united nations, 1948, article ii). dissatisfaction over the limitations in this focus on killing and biological continuity has led to many alternative definitions of genocide over the decades. these efforts have been guided by a range of fundamental questions: should groups encompassed by definitions of genocide be limited to national, ethnic, racial, or religious groups or should political, economic, and other groups be included as well? should such targeted groups be self-defined or as perceived by the perpetrator? does genocide only refer to mass killing or does it include some non-lethal acts including cultural extermination? can genocide only be perpetrated by governments or are non-state actors also culpable? finally, what is the role and 11 dudley: a library matter of genocide published by scholarship@western, 2017 importance of intention—must it be part of a deliberate plan or can it involve “degrees of intentionality” by different parties (moshman, 2001)? unfortunately, much of the discourse surrounding these questions tends to preclude the inclusion of indigenous victims (moses, 2002; moshman, 2001; rensink, 2011). many definitions—including the united nation’s official statement issued in 1948—exclude ethnocide, or the deliberate destruction of culture, making “cultural genocide” a distinct phenomenon (united nations, 1948). definitions of genocide that look solely at massacres and dismiss or reject indigenous worldviews concerning the fundamental nature of access to land and language will also fail to recognize the reality of indigenous genocides (bischoping & fingerhut, 1996). unfortunately, the diverse causes, forces, agents, possible intentions, and mechanisms involved in colonial encounters in north america—played out across vast geographies over 500 years with thousands of cultures and eight euro-american governments—have often mediated against inclusion in conventional classifications and definitions. chief among these criteria is documented evidence of political intent to commit genocide, which was met in only a few circumstances (e.g., the sand creek massacre) and jurisdictions, such as california (rensink, 2011). debate over the place of indigenous genocide in the literature is made more controversial still by the reliance on prototype-based definitions, considering all historical and contemporary genocide through the lens of a single genocide—namely, the jewish holocaust. churchill (1997) classes the orthodox interpretations as ranging from “exclusivist” and minimalizing explanations, to efforts at contextualizing the mass killings as typical of civilizational clashes and conventions of warfare in a more violent past. he criticizes historian and philosopher steven katz, for example, for his assertion that what occurred was not a genocide but a “demographic collapse” caused overwhelmingly by disease, and that deaths owing to the violence of the so-called “indian wars” only amounted to some tens of thousands—that is, that the extermination of the indians was “unintended,” mostly as a result of “unwittingly” spreading pathogens (p. 138). some of the so-called “exclusivists” (such as yehuda bauer) carry their argument so far, churchill observed, that they accuse “comparativists” of antisemitism. churchill in particular criticizes historian deborah lipstadt for her conflating historians seeking to compare genocides with outright holocaust deniers, such as david duke. moshman (2001) argued that since every genocide is unique, using the holocaust as definitional distorts our thinking and allows nations and peoples to (naturally) distinguish themselves from the nazis and therefore exonerate themselves from the crime of genocide. he wrote: the european conquest of the americas has involved deliberate mass killings of countless millions of individuals and has eliminated hundreds of cultures on two continents over more than five centuries, [yet] the absence of death camps enables the nations of the americas to deny that they were founded on genocide and that, in many cases, these genocides are still in progress. (p. 436) moses (2002) added that “uniqueness” is not a useful category for historical research; it is a philosophical and metaphysical consideration. instead, he proposes classifying the theories themselves as either liberal or post-liberal, by which he means the extent to which they privilege the primacy of the 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.9 state over non-state actors and account for larger cultural contexts and structures. liberal theories, he argues, exclude social forces and culture from consideration, such that indigenous peoples were killed owing to the “unintended consequences” of colonization as settlers sought lands and resources—through so-called “developmental” and “utilitarian” genocides. moses pointed out that this view, in focusing on the decisions and actions of states, deliberately avoids saying anything about colonial societies themselves. in sharp contrast, post-liberal theories do examine the social and cultural structures that make genocidal actions on the part of colonists more likely and, according to moses (2002), equate colonialism with genocide. the cultural dimensions of genocide are so fundamental to the post-liberal view that there is “no qualitative difference between mass murder and cultural genocide, because the latter destroys the indigenous systems of meaning and ultimately the survivors’ will to live, resulting ultimately in widespread death” (p. 23). the cultural dimensions of genocide are the predominant theme in the literature concerning genocide in canada, which was characterized by assimilation and the destruction of languages, cultures, traditions and attachment to the land through oppressive legislation (the indian act and the reserve system) and residential schools, constituting a “matrix of destructive forces” emerging from a “genocidal ethos” rather than a centrally-organized campaign of deliberate, intentional killing (woolford & thomas, 2010, pp. 71, 73-74). however, the liberal view of intentional, targeted mass killings of identifiable groups dominates international law in the form of the u.n. convention, a politically expedient decision made “for the benefit of nation-states, a limitation they instituted because they regularly utilize technologies of governance that post-liberals would define as genocidal” (moses, 2002, p. 23). this is particularly the case for the political culture in the united states, where as moses (2002) observed “public leaders and intellectuals are happy to pontificate about genocide in every country but their own” (p. 16). as chomsky (2010) observed: [these] practices are deeply rooted in prevailing intellectual culture, so much so that they will not be easy to eradicate. we can see this by considering the most unambiguous cases of genocide and its debasement, those in which the crime is acknowledged by the perpetrators, and passed over as insignificant or even denied in retrospect by the beneficiaries, right to the present. (p. 16) what concerns us now is the extent to which the historiographic functions of the academic library in the form of knowledge organization and information retrieval terminology may have contributed to this discourse. f i n d i n g s a critical examination of the library of congress headings in a sample of 34 monographs concerning indigenous genocides in north america reveals a number of highly problematic approaches to subject description and classification that present potential barriers to both the researcher and to historical understanding. 13 dudley: a library matter of genocide published by scholarship@western, 2017 the heading genocide is represented in the sample, appearing 25 times as a subject heading in 14 records, or 41% of the sample—meaning of course that 59% of the titles bear no such heading (figure 1). the use of genocide as a heading shall be considered below in terms of the total sample (figure 2), its geopolitical application (figure 3 & figure 4), its absence (figure 5), and its association with related terms (figure 6). f i g u r e 1 . r e c o r d s c o n t a i n i n g l c s h “ g e n o c i d e ” ( % ) . f i g u r e 2 . i n s t a n c e s o f k e y l c s h t e r m s i n s a m p l e , e x p r e s s e d a s % ( n = 3 4 ) . 64 41 38 32 29 29 23 15 12 9 3 3 3 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 41% 59% genocide other headings 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.9 f i g u r e 3 . l c s h f o r " g e n o c i d e [ g e o g r a p h y ] ” ( n = 1 4 ) . d a t a a r e l a b e l l e d : r e g i o n , n , % . f i g u r e 4 . g e o g r a p h i e s a c t u a l l y r e p r e s e n t e d i n s a m p l e b o o k s ( n = 3 4 ) . d a t a a r e l a b e l l e d : r e g i o n , n , % . united states, 2, 14% states or regions, 5, 36% canada, 1, 7% north america, 5, 36% other geography, 1, 7% united states, 22, 65% canada, 7, 20% north america, 5, 15% 15 dudley: a library matter of genocide published by scholarship@western, 2017 f i g u r e 5 . e u p h e m i s m s i n r e c o r d s e x c l u d i n g h e a d i n g f o r g e n o c i d e ( r e c o r d s n = 2 0 ) . f i g u r e 6 . h e a d i n g s a s s o c i a t e d w i t h t h e l i b r a r y o f c o n g r e s s h e a d i n g g e n o c i d e ( r e c o r d s n = 1 4 ) . 0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 occurences records 0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 occurrences records 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.9 we see here a number of approaches to describing this violent and contested history, ranging from the vague (social conditions) to the neutral (government relations) to the apparently beneficial (education). while it would appear at first glance that the term genocide is well represented, appearing in 41% of the sample, on closer examination a number of inadequacies emerge—several of which concern geographies. in 11 of these instances, the use of genocide is generic and attached to no geography, while others are geographically vague, indicating north america when the united states is the actual focus (3 times) or overly specific (5 headings attached to individual states). in one instance, kakel (2013), the use applies to the book’s partial focus on eastern europe and not north america at all. however, where the united states is concerned, geographic subdivisions are rarely applied: even though 22 out of 34 titles in the sample pertain to genocide in the united states (65%), there are only 2 explicit instances (9%) of the heading genocide -united states. by contrast, of the 7 titles relating specifically to canada, all of them recognize relevant geographies, although 2 include the term genocide in their records, and only 1 makes explicit genocide – canada (figures 3 & 4). conversely, 20 books (59% of the sample) bore no genocide-related heading anywhere in their catalogue records (figure 5). instead, cataloguers employ a wide range of descriptions for other aspects of the books while depending on several euphemisms, notably geographic variants of indians of north america -treatment of (13 iterations in 7 titles), social conditions (8 occurrences in 6 records) or government relations (10 in 5 records) in association with the relevant geography. generally, however, the books are described as some aspect of history (31 instances in 11 records). the strongest euphemism, occurring 6 times in the sample exclusive of genocide is the heading [indians or variant] – crimes against, while less frequent ones include assimilation (6 times in 2 records), race relations (6 in 4), and wars (6 in 2). especially noteworthy is the frequency of the benign term education (9 occurrences for 3 books) to describe residential schools, when most critics would challenge the notion that what these institutions actually provided was an education (national centre for truth and reconciliation and the truth and reconciliation commission, 2016). in those records that do include genocide as a subject heading (n = 14), other issues arise (figure 6). aspects of history dominate, used repeatedly 38 times in only 11 records, largely in generic or geographic contexts (i.e., california – history). massacres is used to describe carroll kakel’s the american west and the nazi east, but could easily be seen to pertain to the portions of the book related to eastern europe. the association of the library of congress heading genocide with such euphemistic headings is no less problematic. the government relations and . . . treatment of concepts appear 11 times each alongside genocide, with race relations showing up 9 times, presenting a particularly ghastly rhetorical positioning: genocide—when committed in the americas—is not a crime against humanity but merely a form of treatment, or an aspect of government relations or race relations. these headings also suggest some sort of power parity—that the books deal with forms of governance or how races get along with one another, not deliberate campaigns of extermination. when taken together as a sample in this way, the general rhetorical effect of these library of congress headings is that what occurred was either not actually genocide or if it did occur in certain places is (a) a general topic divorced of causation or attributable agency; (b) occurred continent-wide and can’t be associated with a particular national government; or (c) localized and confined in one state, devoid of 17 dudley: a library matter of genocide published by scholarship@western, 2017 broader, structural implications for the nation. that these positions are mutually incompatible only adds to the problematic positioning of these histories. this de-amplification is reinforced further when we consider how euphemistic headings are applied to specific titles, and how they illustrate patterns of colonial narratives, double standards, and erasure. colonial narratives figure prominently in the case of david stannard’s (1992) damning book american holocaust: the conquest of the new world, which is assigned the following astonishing headings: • columbus, christopher -influence • indians, treatment of • indians -first contact with europeans • america -discovery and exploration -spanish the library of congress would seem in this case to be situating genocide as a form of “influence,” and a natural outcome of america’s “discovery and exploration.” one would hardly guess from these headings that the book’s author asserts his work is in fact about “the most massive act of genocide in the history of the world” (stannard ,1992, p. x). such deliberateness attains a kind of perfection in the double standard applied to the american west and the nazi east: a comparative and interpretive perspective by carol p. kakel (2013), which meticulously compares and contrasts hitler’s genocide campaigns in eastern europe with the united states’ slaughter of native americans. as kakel (2013) states in the book’s introduction: this study aims to illuminate both the specific national histories of the ‘american west’ and the ‘nazi east,’ as well as the intimate relations between the larger historical phenomena of imperialism, colonialism and genocide. like all comparative history, it is concerned with similarities and differences between the two cases (giving equal attention to each). (p. 7) the cataloguers who analyzed this book systematically analyzed the content and balanced the initial headings accordingly: • united states -territorial expansion -history -19th century • germany -territorial expansion -history -20th century we see that both countries carried out campaigns of “territorial expansion” and with ideological justifications: • manifest destiny • lebensraum 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.9 so far, so equivalent. however, when subject populations are directly affected, a remarkable divergence occurs: • indians, treatment of -united states • holocaust, jewish (1939-1945) -europe, eastern • massacres -west (u.s.) -history -19th century • genocide -europe, eastern -history -20th century • indians of north america -wars • world war, 1939-1945 -atrocities -europe, eastern indians experience treatment while jews are exterminated in the holocaust; massacres happen in the u.s., but not genocide, which only occurred in eastern europe. finally, the indians fought a series of wars as (presumably equal) combatants, while those in nazi-occupied countries suffered atrocities. the cognitive dissonance on display is impressive: for here is a book that sets out in the starkest possible terms the reality of america’s genocides and compares them frankly to those of the nazis. yet, even this was, apparently, not enough to dislodge the cataloguers’ apparently bottomless enculturation in american exceptionalism. finally, the sample also illustrates outright erasure through subject headings: titles for which no attempt whatsoever has been made to account for a book’s actual contents and instead an entirely new narrative is imposed. this is the case for the genocide machine in canada: the pacification of the north by robert davis and mark zannis. according to the authors, their book examines “. . . the arctic area—the native peoples, and the southern institutions which have invaded the north—[as a] principal example of modern genocide” (davis & zannis, 1973, p. 13). shelved at hc 117 (economic development), this book is, surprisingly, about: • environmental policy -canada, northern • canada, northern -economic policy • economic policy • environmental policy • canada, northern in this example there is a vertiginous gulf between the book’s thesis and its subject analysis. all authorial intent has been erased, and no interested researcher could expect to discover this title through a subject search or by browsing the shelves. 19 dudley: a library matter of genocide published by scholarship@western, 2017 which brings us to our final point of analysis: classification and the ability to browse the shelves within a physical discursive formation (radford, 2003). for most topics, bias or absence in subject access can at least be overcome to some extent by co-location. not in the case of indigenous genocides in north america: an examination of the call numbers in our sample confirms that the library of congress classification places books on this topic in a bewildering variety of locations: • e 59 – pre-columbian american, special topics • e 76 – indians of north america • e 77 – comprehensive works • e 78 – by state, province or region (7) • e 83 – “indian wars” (2) • e 91 – general works (2) • e 92 – general works, canada (2) • e 93 – general works, united states (4) • e 96 – education (2) • e 97 – education, united states, general works • e 98 – other topics, a-z (4) • e 99 – by tribe • e112 – “discovery of america” – christopher columbus • e 179.5 – united states history “general special” • f 868 – california, regions • hc 117 – economic history, canada • hq 767.7 – sterilization as birth control • ke 7709 – native peoples, treaties even for those classes at which multiple titles are located, the colonial structure of the library of congress (e.g., organizing tribes and cultures by alien political borders imposed upon them in e 78) combined with the rather complex construction of cutter numbers regarding theme and author’s 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.9 surname ensures that none of these will likely be near each other. for example, ward churchill’s (1993) indians are us? culture and genocide in native north america is shelved at e 98 p99—with books regarding public opinion or attitudes about indians of north america—while conquest: sexual violence and american indian genocide (smith, 2015) is housed shelves away at e 98 w8—with books on indigenous women’s issues. between inaccurate and disingenuous subject access and scattered shelf locations, we can see how the library of congress schemes both reflect and reinforce the problematic place of the history of indigenous north americans in genocide studies literature: that what transpired on this continent falls outside mainstream genocide discourse, and, when it is considered at all, it is only within very narrow circumstances or geographies with no generalizable implications. d i s c u s s i o n a n d r e c o m m e n d a t i o n s the ko and ir structures of the library of congress treat the history of indigenous genocides in north america quite differently from any other historical or contemporary genocides, making it challenging for the researcher to not only gather comprehensive results, but to identify literature adopting indigenous and critical perspectives that challenge self-aggrandizing notions of western exceptionalism. recall the research pointing to the significant risk of losing access to relevant results in the absence of controlled vocabulary (gross & taylor, 2005; gross et al. 2015): this possibility was borne out in the current study, which revealed that nearly 60% of the sampled books were not assigned subject access to the concept genocide and were only discovered because their authors included it or a related term in the title—begging the question, what books on the subject were missed because their titles were not explicit? furthermore, the lack of appropriate headings combined with the inability to browse subject headings in worldcat removes the possibility of serendipitous discovery. to use terms such as genocide, holocaust, or extermination in a search, the researcher would first need to be intellectually predisposed to accept a native american holocaust had occurred. if, on the other hand, one rejects these terms as applied to north america, they will not be entered and this literature would remain largely undiscovered. because worldcat searches are based on identifying keywords anywhere in the record, entering the terms “genocide united states” or “genocide canada” yields thousands of mostly irrelevant hits, the terms simply showing up somewhere in the catalogue record, including place of publication. despite the presence and validity of the term genocide-united states and genocide-canada, it is actually impossible to retrieve any monographs in worldcat by entering these terms as subject headings.2 utilizing olson and schlegl’s (2001) taxonomy, we see that this literature is: 2 search format: su:"genocide [country]". the u.s. search yields one article, the canada search a dissertation. when asked by the author as to why this should be the case, oclc staff could offer no explanation (personal communication). 21 dudley: a library matter of genocide published by scholarship@western, 2017 • treated as an exception to the presumed norm: books related to other genocides are indicated with dedicated subject headings (e.g., holocaust, jewish) and classification numbers (e.g., d 810 j4 . . .); indigenous american genocides have neither. • physically ghettoized away from the materials with which they should be associated: titles are assigned a wide variety of library of congress numbers, dispersing them throughout the collection. • depicted with an inappropriate structure that misrepresents the field: the lack of any topical treatment for indigenous genocide dissolves its ability to form a discursive formation. • assigned biased terminology, often with pejorative overtones: subject headings are euphemistic, colonial, passive, and misleading. • omitted altogether: the omission of the subject heading genocide for nearly 60% the sample titles results in this concept being potentially lost to researchers. when dozens of books are written featuring terms like “genocide” and “holocaust” in their titles, thereby establishing a substantial and reputable literature on indigenous genocides in north america, then clearly there is sufficient “literary warrant” for establishing an appropriate subject heading, one that names the genocide in terms of the population affected and situating it geographically. while these biases, omissions, narratives, and erasures may have persisted in our libraries for over a century, i believe the library profession must now revisit them in light of new moral obligations and mandates in the form of the truth and reconciliation commission of canada (trc, 2015) and the united nations’ 2005 adoption of joinet-orentlicher principles, which sets out the obligations of states to investigate, prosecute and thereby prevent the recurrence of human rights violations. in call to action 69, the trc calls on libraries and archives canada to: 1. fully adopt and implement the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples and the united nations joinet-orentlicher principles, as related to aboriginal peoples’ inalienable right to know [emphasis added] the truth about what happened and why, with regard to human rights violations committed against them in the residential schools [through history books]. 2. ensure that its record holdings related to residential schools are accessible to the public. (national centre for truth and reconciliation, 2015, p. 8) the joinet-orentlicher principles referred to by the trc is a non-binding normative framework that any country having experienced crimes against humanity or genocide can use to move from conflict to reconciliation. in the upper left corner of this diagram (figure 7), we see the element of the “right to know,” which includes access to history books (sisson, 2010, p. 15). 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.9 f i g u r e 7 . t h e j o i n e t o r e n t l i c h e r p r i n c i p l e s ( s i s s o n , 2 0 1 0 , p . 1 5 ) . this article has demonstrated that the presence of 34 books available on library shelves and indexed in a global library catalogue was not the same thing as making them “accessible” as intended by these recommendations; instead, what is apparent in the treatment of indigenous genocide literature is a seemingly deliberate and studied obfuscation that both reflects and reinforces the exclusion of this history from what bischoping and fingerhut (1996) called the “border lines” of genocide studies. the assignment of subject headings to the literature on this topic frequently erects significant barriers to discovery on the part of the interested researcher, and therefore they fail even on a practical level. more broadly, such headings are part of the status quo-enforcing power—well-recognized in the literature—of the library’s “power to name” (olson, 2002). as daniel martínez-ávila and josé guimarães (2013) in their article in the journal scire: library schemes both reflect and create opinion at the same time . . . it is well known that a very effective way to eradicate a certain group or a people from history is by in no way naming it. an effective way to defame a thing and put an end to its aspirations is to change its meaning to the worst possible one or place it in the wrong context . . . all these biases were introduced with the unconscious or intentional purpose of reinforcing the power discourses and the status quo. (p. 22) inasmuch as historiography concerns the methodologies used by historians, and the work of the historian involves the identification, interpretation, and synthesis of sources, then historiography must include a discussion of how these sources are collected, organized, and made available to the historian. 23 dudley: a library matter of genocide published by scholarship@western, 2017 libraries—physical collections of books, manuscripts, and periodicals as well as their online resources— afford the historian opportunities for discovery, serendipity, linkages, analysis, and synthesis. yet these opportunities may be constrained or negated by the language used by libraries to structure and index these materials—language, rooted in western ideological assumptions or political conventions, which can render some material invisible. in so doing, the library, in effect, passes judgment on the very validity of that subject matter, which in turn contributes to the reproduction of these biases and invisibilities in subsequent scholarship. according to terrorism studies scholar richard jackson (2012), the dominant discourses of a given discipline are constructed by its practitioners in such a way as to exclude and close off alternative meanings, with the result that some ideas while technically “known” to the “experts” of that field are considered off-limits and hence “unknowable” because of the exclusive manner in which discourse is constructed (jackson, 2012). structures of knowledge organization and information retrieval are both informed by these constructions and reinforce them. to rectify these transactional barriers to alternative epistemologies, information science scholar birger hjorland (2004) argued that knowledge organization should be undertaken as a means to describe and evaluate various knowledge claims in such a way as to be meaningful for users, rather than employing positivist assumptions about monolithic knowledge per se and ko schemes representing a single, external reality. the difference between these paradigms, he argued, is that the pragmatic view allows to flourish “the most important function of libraries and information systems [which] is to enable critical users to question established knowledge and investigate alternative views” (p. 500). the 18 headings devised by sanford berman (1998, listed above) (native american holocaust [1492-1900], etc.), for example, would do this by accepting the claims of genocide made by the authors as a given. another promising existing opportunity lies in the social tagging feature of worldcat, in which users can, using their personal worldcat accounts, create and add their own headings to records if they feel the existing headings are inadequate.3 however, such tagging would lack the control, consistency, and legitimacy of formal subject headings. as things currently stand however, indigenous genocide scholarship has—contrary to the library congress’ own guidelines—been disguised by biased, normative, and ideologically loaded terminologies and assumptions, which have served to delegitimize and destabilize this body of knowledge. thus the nature and extent of indigenous genocides are rendered essentially unknowable not only by the construction of knowledge in the literature of genocide studies, but by extension the knowledge organization structures layered onto this literature in the form of lcsh and classification. c o n c l u s i o n the imperative to devise and institute more honest subject and classificatory access is not only a matter of historiography but of social justice: the ability of indigenous students and researchers to name and access the truth about their own history can contribute to breaking the silence surrounding genocide within the academy, as well as in indigenous communities, where for decades many survivors of the residential school system kept their painful experiences to themselves (staniforth, 2015). denying or 3 see https://www.oclc.org/worldcat-org/features.en.html 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.9 preventing this access is another form and layer of oppression. the language used by libraries to obfuscate authorial intent in the relevant literature has helped perpetuate and exacerbate the general ignorance about indigenous genocides in the united states and canada. it may accord with the interests of power on both sides of the 49th parallel (i.e., the canada–u.s. border) to avoid facing the reality of the genocide of indigenous north americans; unfortunately for those interested in researching this history, it is necessary to navigate the codified, formalized language of this avoidance. the western structures of the library of congress impede research and pedagogical development in one of the darkest and most significant aspects of north american history. more troublingly, they have contributed to the “disappearance” of the history of north american genocide more generally such that it can be so easily forgotten, dismissed, and denied even by otherwise educated people. marisa duarte (pasqua yaqui) and miranda belarde-lewis (tlingit and zuni) (2015) added: colonialism is subtle, insidious, and nearly invisible to privileged citizens of a settler state. it is most visible to those who suffer the worst of its inner workings. while knowledge organization researchers and practitioners may not be able to overhaul generations of social inequalities, adopting and including terms that reflect the experiences and perspectives of the marginalized is a step toward the redress of colonial power. (p. 682) adopting a pragmatic view on ko and the genocide of indigenous north americans would involve both recognizing the legitimacy of indigenous perspectives, particularly concerning their relationship to land and how processes of assimilation (such as the residential school system) were consistent with lemkin’s original definition of genocide. it makes a difference both ontologically and epistemologically whether we call something genocide or a crime or treatment. it also changes the conversation: if for example chiitaanibah johnson had been able to open her laptop and go to the cal tech library catalogue to show her professor all the dozens of books with the subject heading “genocide -united states,” it would have undermined his confident genocide denial. furthermore, the library of congress needs to honour its own principles of “literary warrant” and the intent of authors writing in this area by establishing appropriate subject headings to describe this quite substantial literature. this would not only contribute to changing and opening up the discourse around genocide in the americas but would also facilitate the ability to compare genocides, the study of which can help us prevent them from happening again. if genocide is only conceived in terms of prototypes—namely the holocaust against the jews of europe—it grants the historian license to mischaracterize many other historical atrocities and campaigns of extermination, most notably those that took place in north america. it is, in short, a form of holocaust denial that fails to recognize that genocide can happen anywhere, at any time, and any one of us could potentially become participants in it, given sufficient enculturation. enabling our ability to name and discuss genocide in north america can contribute to a more honest reckoning with our history and hence the basis for reconciliation and social justice. 25 dudley: a library matter of genocide published by scholarship@western, 2017 r e f e r e n c e s assigning and constructing subject headings h 180. subject headings manual 2016. washington, d.c.: library of congress. retrieved from https://www.loc.gov/aba/publications/freeshm/h0180.pdf bear, c. 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(1987, october). contemporary issues in aboriginal studies 2: proceedings of the second national conference on aboriginal studies, nepean college of advanced education. sydney: firebird press. 30 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.9 the international indigenous policy journal april 2017 a library matter of genocide: the library of congress and the historiography of the native american holocaust michael q. dudley recommended citation a library matter of genocide: the library of congress and the historiography of the native american holocaust abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license a library matter of genocide: the library of congress and the historiography of the native american holocaust the indigenous experience of work in a health research organisation: are there wider inferences? the international indigenous policy journal volume 8 | issue 3 article 1 july 2017 the indigenous experience of work in a health research organisation: are there wider inferences? sharon k . chirgwin menzies school of health research, sharon.chirgwin@menzies.edu.au adrienne farago menzies school of health research heather d'antione menzies school of health research trish nagle menzies school of health research recommended citation chirgwin, s. k. , farago, a. , d'antione, h. , nagle, t. (2017). the indigenous experience of work in a health research organisation: are there wider inferences?. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(3). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.1 the indigenous experience of work in a health research organisation: are there wider inferences? abstract the purpose of this study was to identify the factors that positively and negatively impacted on the employment experiences and trajectories of indigenous australians who are currently or were formerly employed by a research organisation in both remote and urban settings. the study design was an embedded mixed-methods approach. the first phase quantified staff uptake, continued employment, and attrition. then interviews were conducted with 42 former and 51 current indigenous staff members to obtain qualitative data. the results showed that the quality of supervision, the work flexibility to enable employees to respond to family and community priorities, and training and other forms of career support were all identified as important factors in the workplace. the most common reasons for leaving were that research projects ended, or to pursue a career change or further study. the authors use the findings to make recommendations pertinent to policy formation for both government and organisations seeking to attract and nurture indigenous staff. keywords indigenous australian, work satisfaction, culture of work, training and education acknowledgments the survey was designed by adrienne farago and heather d’antoine and was administered by seven research assistants over the life of the project, advised by a project steering committee comprising ms. farago, ms. d’antoine, ms. linda ward (statistical support team), and associate professor tricia nagel. the principal researcher was adrienne farago, who also conducted a number of interviews and the research assistants (in chronological order) were tammy fernandez, luke mayo, cyan earnshaw, jess spargo, leeann ramsamy and andrew vodic (together, masha friderichs. tegan harris designed and built the database and assisted with data manipulation. no external research funding was used in this research. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ t h e i n d i g e n o u s e x p e ri e n c e o f w o rk i n a h e a l t h r e s e a rc h o rg a n i s a t i o n : a re t h e re w i d e r i n f e re n c e s ? in colonised countries like canada, new zealand, and australia, the employment rates for indigenous citizens of working age are significantly lower than those of their non-indigenous counterparts (australian bureau of statistics [abs], 2014a; employment and social development canada, 2014; ministry of business, innovation, and employment, 2013). the national governments of all three countries, irrespective of their political ideologies, see this disparity along with differences in specific indicators of income, social welfare, education, and health as unacceptable “gaps” that not only perpetuate cycles of poverty and its attendant problems but also, in the case of employment, negatively impact on gross domestic product (gdp), requiring greater government expenditure in areas such as social services and health and representing lost tax revenue (calver, 2015; deloitte access economics, 2014). in the 1990s, the new zealand government introduced the term “closing the gaps” to refer to several programs that sought to address the identified disadvantages experienced by māori and pacific islander groups. though “statistical equality” in income, education, health, and quality of life (collins et al., 2014) had previously been used to refer to the same issues (altman, biddle, & hunter, 2008), the governments of australia and canada eventually adopted “closing the gaps.” it is now commonly used in all three countries to describe both the intents of policies and strategies that seek to address the statistical differences between indigenous and non-indigenous citizens with respect to various socioeconomic indicators and the quantifiable targets that such policies and strategies seek to achieve within specific timeframes. however, none of the three countries have witnessed a narrowing of the employment gap, thus presenting an ongoing challenge to policy makers (australian government, 2016; calver, 2015; collins et al., 2014). for example, calver (2015) has noted that the relative gap in employment in canada was 17.5% in 2011, and the most recent report from australia reveals that the employment rate for indigenous australians between 2014 and 2015 was 48.4% down from 53.8% in 2008 (commonwealth of australia, department of the prime minister and cabinet, 2017). in australia, people who identify as indigenous make up approximately 3% of the population (abs, 2014b), but, like indigenous peoples in canada, they are not a single, homogenous group. instead, they live across a vast landmass, speak many different languages, and hold many different worldviews. just like in canada, many indigenous peoples now live in major cities or regional towns, while others prefer to live on their traditional territories, where there are variable and often limited opportunities for education and employment (calver, 2015). in the more remote areas of australia, 1 in 5 indigenous adults of workforce age receive income support payments, which are generally accessed from a younger age and for a longer time than the non-indigenous australian population (australian government, 2016). this heavy reliance on income support has created another gap between indigenous and nonindigenous citizens similar to the one that exists in new zealand (collins et al., 2014). in australia, some indigenous leaders have identified that supported training can help those who can participate in the workforce so they no longer have to rely on these payments, which, in turn, is essential in order to address not only the economic and income gaps but also “the process of recovery and strengthening” within indigenous communities (collins et al., 2014, p. 133). supported training has been considered a strategy to replace despair with hope, to remove fear of the unknown, and to build confidence, thereby helping people who have relied on income support for prolonged periods of time take their first, tentative steps up “the staircase of opportunity” (pearson, 2008, p. 1). although the need for both 1 chirgwin et al.: the indigenous experience of work published by scholarship@western, 2017 education and training has been identified in employment policies of successive national governments since 1975 (australian government commission of inquiry into poverty, 1975; daly, 1993; gray & hunter, 2002; hunter, 1977) and has been reinforced by some indigenous leaders, the employment gap has neither narrowed nor closed. however, the most recent australian prime minister’s closing the gap report identified that for those indigenous australians with higher levels of education there is virtually no employment gap (australian government, 2016). over the last three decades, the complex issue of indigenous employment in australia has been quantitatively audited and analysed using census data (biddle, 2010), statistical modelling (biddle, taylor, & yap, 2009) and comprehensive reviews of all available evaluations and analyses (gray, hunter, & lohoar, 2012). however, as gray et al. (2012) have noted, the bulk of available research has merely identified and quantified the reasons for low employment rates, exposed what is not known, and exposed what needs to be known. in terms of what is qualitatively known about indigenous employment, researchers have collected opinions from non-indigenous employers in business and mining (business council of australia, 2012; sammartino, o’flynn, & nicholas, 2003). in addition, there is limited research indicating how traditional indigenous australians in remote areas perceive the western construct of work (mccraewilliams & gerritsen, 2010). qualitative feedback has also been regularly obtained from indigenous australians employed in the public service sector (australian public service commission [apsc], 2010, 2013), but feedback from other sectors, in which there are smaller proportions of indigenous employees, is much more limited. as such, this article provides context regarding the limited success of mainstream government policies that have sought to encourage indigenous employment in australia. specifically, by providing the perspectives of a group of indigenous australians who have been employed at an organisation specialising in indigenous health research, this article adds to the existing pool of qualitative data on this topic. a u s t ra l i a n po l i c y f ra m e w o rks : a bri e f l i t e ra t u re r e v i e w when the first european colonists arrived in australia between 1788 and 1850, they interacted with only a small portion of the many different indigenous language groups living across the land. while each group had well-organised social structures, knowledges, and responsibilities that enabled them to survive in their traditional lands, the european colonists’ first assessment was that their own ways of life were far superior to those of indigenous peoples (broome, 2011). but as the theory of social darwinism permeated the colonies, it resulted in a more racist attitude: indigenous australians were generally perceived as inferior, primitive peoples who did not engage in anything that equated to the european concept of work. the theory also led to the common belief that indigenous australians were doomed to die out because of their “inability to evolve into civilised people” (norris, 2010, p. 37). importantly, the european concept of “work” was rather alien to the ways of life that had sustained indigenous peoples for thousands of years (kocka, 2010). the next policy era, which relied on the false “doomed race” theory as justification, was the protection or missionary era, which ran from the 1890s to the 1950s and overlapped with several other approaches to policy. during the early period of this era, laws were passed in the colonies to force indigenous australians onto reserves and missions for their own “protection” (elston & dade smith, 2016). even 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.1 though the missions and reserves were supposed to be refuges of “protection,” the need for labour in the developing colonies led to the coercive persuasion of indigenous australians to work as shepherds, stockmen, boundary riders, and domestics—particularly in areas where european labour was not available (foster, 2000; grimshaw, 2008). while the developing colony of south australia eventually provided training and monetary compensation to indigenous australians for their european-style work, indigenous australians who were itinerant workers were paid in food rations (foster, 2000). the result of this was that the introduction to the european concept of work that many indigenous australians received was one that bore a conceptual similarity to slavery (thorpe, 1992). irrespective of colony, legislation controlled what work indigenous australians could do, the duration of their employment, and what portion of their wages they would receive. it also required employers to obtain permits in order to employ indigenous australians. such controlling legislation reflected government opinion at the time—indigenous australians were seen as inferior and had limited ability to look after their own affairs (norris, 2010). although the “doomed race” theory remained popular well into the 1930s (mitchell, 2007), assimilation became the official national policy in 1937, some 36 years after federation and lasted until the late 1960s (elston & dade smith, 2016). it is now widely believed that the intent of this policy was to transform indigenous australians into europeans with black skin (broome, 1982). however, in some states, such as queensland, this promoted further segregation and control rather than gradual assimilation. it was not until the 1965 northern territory cattle industry case that the exploitation of indigenous australians as a cheap source of largely unskilled labour was challenged and there was a move toward equality (norris, 2010). after the national referendum of 1967, indigenous australians were given similar human rights to those enjoyed by the rest of the population and responsibility for policies impacting on indigenous australians was transferred to the federal government, thereby marking the beginning of the “integration” policy era. this era ended in 1972 when the policy was changed to “self-determination,” and the department of aboriginal affairs was established to, theoretically, give indigenous australians the ability to make their own decisions about oversight and intervention in indigenous affairs (elston & dade smith, 2016). since 1975, further policy changes have occurred with slightly different emphases, including “selfmanagement,” “shared responsibility,” and “indigenous advancement,” each of which attempted to increase the involvement of indigenous australians in the policy making process (elston & dade smith, 2016). the “closing the gap” approach was introduced by the rudd federal government in 2007 (altman et al., 2008) and has remained in the policies of successive governments (australian government, 2016). as noted above, this policy seeks to narrow and eliminate the statistical differences between indigenous and non-indigenous citizens with respect to various socioeconomic indicators of health, education, employment, and income, while recognizing their interrelatedness and intractability. the broader policies impacting the employment of indigenous australians have, like the policies that have determined education and health, been subject to considerable change over the last fifty years, such that some academics have noted a “cycle of endless consultation, policy and strategy formulation and measurement” that has contributed to widening gaps (ring & brown, 2002, p. 631). though there have been attempts to redress past policy mistakes, the racist discrimination and economic disadvantages experienced by many older indigenous australians (who were employed pre-referendum) have no doubt left emotional scars that continue to impact recent generations of indigenous australians. 3 chirgwin et al.: the indigenous experience of work published by scholarship@western, 2017 as indigenous australians have become more politically influential and aired their feelings about the wrongs done to them, it has been suggested by some that the more recent emphasis on closing gaps in areas such as employment is not a sound basis for developing policy and is reliant on symbolic attempts to atone for past wrongs (altman et al., p. v). echoing norris’ (2010) suggestion that little has changed in approaches to policy over the last 50 years, others have proposed that employment policy has been continually framed from an “anglo-centric” view, with successive governments using indigenous communities as policy “experiments” (leroy-dyer, 2015). the resulting policies have been failures at all “shades and levels of government” because they have been made far from the people they are intended to serve, with little attention to their economic circumstances (cutliffe, 2006, p. 19). successive censuses since 1971 have indicated that the number of australians identifying as indigenous has gradually increased and will likely continue to increase (abs, 2007). beyond disproving the racist “doomed race” theory, this population growth highlights the need for employment policies that are flexible and realistic (biddle et al., 2009). w h a t t h e l i t e ra t u re r e v e a l s a b o u t i n d i g e n o u s a u s t ra l i a n pe rs p e c t i v e s o n w o rk anderson (2011) found that, relative to the overall total for the professional sector, indigenous australians are proportionally overrepresented in the public, health care, and social assistance sectors and to a lesser extent in mining, food and accommodation, arts, recreational, educational, and training sectors. these findings are supported by 2011 census data, which showed that among indigenous australians who were employed 13% worked in clerical and administrative jobs, professionals (unspecified) represented 13.1%, and people working in the fields of health and welfare made up 16.6%, with 69.7% of workers in the latter category identifying as female (abs, 2013). therefore, it might be expected that these would be the sectors from which there has been considerable qualitative feedback. however, only the national public service has been consistent in its collection of employee feedback. since 2005, the australian public service commission (apsc, 2013) has conducted three audits. its report, the 2009 census report: aboriginal and torres strait islander aps employees, identified that indigenous australian public servants ranked, in order of descending importance, positive working relationships, flexible working arrangements, salary, the chance to make a useful contribution to society and indigenous australians, and having a good supervisor as the factors affecting job satisfaction (apsc, 2010). two of the most commonly cited reasons for leaving or intending to leave their jobs were (a) lack of job satisfaction, and (b) feeling undervalued. the identified factors that could lead to workplace improvement were: • providing effective supervisors, • creating and sustaining an environment in which there is more sensitive and effective engagement with indigenous australians, and • creating and sustaining an environment in which discrimination, harassment, and/or bullying are reduced. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.1 the 2012 census reiterated the findings of the 2009 census, but it highlighted that over half of all indigenous employees had spent at least 3 days in formal training in the past 12 months, and 52% were satisfied with their access to learning and development opportunities (apsc, 2013). while discrimination had been mentioned in the apsc 2009 census, larkin (2013), an indigenous researcher who examined the importance of race in the public service, concluded that there was a “social distance” between indigenous and white public servants—with many white executives demonstrating little if any knowledge about indigenous australians, their cultures, interests, and aspirations—and a “silent” type of racism prevalent in the public sector. racism also emerged in the results of the most recent survey of 34 current and former indigenous public servants (biddle & lahn, 2016): when asked what would compel them to leave their jobs, indigenous employees indicated, albeit not consistently, that they expected to encounter racism in the workplace. indigenous australian researcher fredericks (2009) has provided one of the few sources of feedback from indigenous health workers. she found that, although more indigenous australian women were being educated, trained, and employed, they felt that they were in danger of becoming marginalised and overworked because they were frequently required to assume responsibility for all indigenous australian clients. they also emphasized the importance of workforce support and identified clashes that could occur between what the employer and their fellow indigenous australians wanted—usually with respect to the wishes of the family of indigenous australians (fredericks, 2009). further, she noted that some of her participants perceived that indigenous australians who aligned themselves with the framework of “whiteness,” in both appearance and outlook, were more likely to be employed as health workers. many indigenous australians in remote areas—both with and without school certificates or higher education—have been employed in the mining industry, particularly when there is a mine near or on their traditional lands and government policy requires the mine to employ a certain number of locals. although this workplace is quite different from the service sector, feedback, such as that gathered from the argyle mine in western australia (centre for social responsibility in mining, 2007), has also highlighted the importance of cultural sensitivity and support. the report noted that indigenous australians considered learning new skills, meeting new people, and onsite services and facilities examples of positive aspects of work (centre for social responsibility in mining, 2007). negative aspects of work included the high cost of commuting, problems with management, and workplacerelated tensions. the primary reasons given for leaving their jobs at the argyle mine were family reasons, high commuting expenses, lack of cultural awareness from managers and other employees, personnel management issues, and a general lack of prospects for further career development. the importance of training, career pathway opportunities, and cultural awareness were also identified by mcrae-williams (2012) in an exploratory project that sought to identify positive aspects of the workplace among 50 employed indigenous australians living in urban areas of northern australia. this study also highlighted the importance of personal relationships and socially comfortable environments. in one of the few studies that tried to capture how remote indigenous australians viewed work, mcraewilliams and gerritsen (2010) concluded that for the residents of ngukurr, a small town east of katherine in the northern territory, the western concept of work was diametrically opposed to what the community members surveyed felt was most important in their lives, that is managing social 5 chirgwin et al.: the indigenous experience of work published by scholarship@western, 2017 relatedness and autonomy. the implication of this finding was that these differing worldviews may “present a formidable challenge to well-meaning state employment and economic development agendas” (mcrae-williams & gerritsen, 2010, p. 19). from this limited literature review, it is clear that while indigenous australians may have many similar workplace issues to those of their non-indigenous colleagues (such as flexibility to allow attending to family concerns and demands and the need for career development opportunities), some important differences are the need for more supportive relationships with managers and other employees, the need for cultural sensitivity, the opportunity for training, and the opportunity to develop a career pathway. while indigenous australians did not consistently identify racism and discrimination as barriers, both factors were mentioned either directly (larkin, 2013) or indirectly (fredericks, 2009) when the researchers were indigenous. m e t h o d s t h e c h a ra c t e ri s t i c s o f t h e o rg a n i s a t i o n w i t h w h i c h t h i s r e s e a rc h w a s c o n d u c t e d this research study was conducted with a not-for-profit organisation whose mandate is to improve the overall health and well-being of indigenous australians and other disadvantaged people. while its main centre of operations is in darwin, the largest city in australia’s northern territory, it also has branches in alice springs and brisbane, and it employs local staff for various projects in remote areas. it has a division of global health, as well as an education and training section, that provides both postgraduate training and a certificate level award, both of which are designed to build the skills and capacity of staff working in remote areas and the communities. approximately half of the indigenous staff members employed by this organisation work in an urban setting where they have a variety of roles from laboratory technicians to principal researchers. the rest of the indigenous staff members are employed as community-based researchers in remote communities and/or small towns according to specific project needs. in remote communities, there are very few employment opportunities and, even though the employment offered by the organisation may be parttime and of limited tenure, the skills obtained during the project can be of benefit to employees because they are useful to and desired by other prospective employers, such as health services, other research organisations, and the australian bureau of statistics. within the organisation, there is a small section specifically dedicated to building the capacity of its own indigenous staff and the indigenous communities with which it interacts. accordingly, one might expect the workplace culture that this organisation seeks to engender to be quite different from those of profitseeking businesses (such as those in the mining industry), which employ indigenous australians solely because of memoranda of understanding with the government or because they seek to present an image of good corporate citizenship. as part of its work, research is conducted across a range of indigenous australian clinical and public health issues so to minimise cultural misunderstandings and stress, optimise results, and ensure that resulting research meets the highest ethical standards incorporating respect, responsible conduct, and reciprocity, indigenous people manage, participate in, and advise on relevant projects. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.1 r e s e a rc h a i m s as indicated above, policies seeking to improve indigenous australians’ participation in the workforce have developed from racist, controlling beginnings and, while current national employment policy seeks to address statistically demonstrable inequities, the lack of qualitative evidence from indigenous australians to inform that policy is in and of itself a definite “gap.” the broad aims of this study were to find out what factors were impacting, both positively and negatively, current and former indigenous australians employed by this not-for-profit organisation. the specific research questions were: • what work factors were most and least liked within the work environment? • what impact did employment in the organization have on work opportunities and practices? • what strategies might lead to the recruitment of more indigenous australians? • what could be done to ensure retention of indigenous employees? • what form of workplace support would best meet the needs of indigenous australian staff? examining workplace likes and dislikes from the perspective of indigenous employees may help narrow this knowledge gap, even though the findings were procured from a specialised workplace. the reason the research was carried out in a specialised workplace was due to the organisation’s need to devise an employment and retention strategy for their indigenous australian staff, which prompted them to seek evidence that could provide direction for such a strategy. after the analysis, the findings were evaluated in terms of their implications for devising more effective employment policies in the broader context. r e s e a rc h d e s i g n the need for the research was identified at the executive level of the organization and a small research committee was formed to develop the research protocol. the organisation’s associate director of aboriginal programs, a bard1 woman from northwestern australia, guided the committee. the research used embedded mixed-methods2 (creswell, 2014). participants agreed to participate in semi-structured interviews intended to gather their opinions and perceptions. following the completion of the qualitative questions, specific demographic data was collected and crosschecked where possible (and 1 the bard (or bardi) people are the traditional owners of a small peninsular (the dampier peninsular) north of the western australian pearling and tourist town of broome. since their traditional lands are nearly surrounded by the sea, the sea has always been an integral part of their culture. 2 as the name suggests, in embedded mixed-methods a particular, often smaller, research design is embedded in another larger overarching piece of research. while the larger piece of research can be either qualitative or quantitative, in an embedded design if the original research is quantitative, the researcher may add a qualitative strand within it. if the original larger piece of research is qualitative, the researcher may add a quantitative strand (creswell, 2014). 7 chirgwin et al.: the indigenous experience of work published by scholarship@western, 2017 with the permission of the those involved) against records kept by the institution. the participants— current and former indigenous australian staff members of the organization—were initially identified either through word of mouth or from previous annual reports, and then as many as possible were contacted for participation in interviews. once a participant identified that he or she was willing to participate, semi-structured interviews were organised and then conducted face-to -ace, via email, or over the telephone (depending on the interviewee’s location). to ensure that interview techniques were consistent and referenced the organisation’s interview guide, the interviewers were both indigenous and non-indigenous employees of the organization who had been trained by the principal researcher. after first contacting the participants, the average time spent with each interviewee was 1 hour. interviewees’ responses were manually recorded on a response form specifically designed for the study. after the interviews, the raw data was transferred to large spreadsheets and then stored electronically by a member of the research team who specialises in data handling. next, the interviews were printed out and crosschecked for omissions and accuracy by two other team members. finally, the printed interviews were sent to another member of the team, who specialises in qualitative data analysis. responses to specific qualitative questions were coded using the open coding method, and the codes were condensed into specific themes and characteristics, which were then checked by other research team members. the themes and characteristics were then compared with the themes of other earlier studies. r e s u l t s r e s p o n s e r a t e a n d d e m o g ra p h i c s three hundred and six former employees and 54 current employees were identified as potential participants. of these, 42 former employees and 51 current employees agreed to participate (n = 93). among former employees who did not participate, 16 did not want to participate, 10 were confirmed to have died, and the remainder could not be reached. the response rate was thus 13.7% for former employees and 94.4% for current employees. when individual respondents were given the choice to identify as aboriginal, aboriginal and torres strait islander, and/or torres strait islander, 80 identified as aboriginal, 9 as aboriginal and torres strait islander, and 4 as torres strait islander. at the time this research was conducted, the total number of employees working in the organisation was 412. indigenous australians made up 10% of employees, although many were part-time. it should be noted that while the respondents could identify in any of the three categories for the research, this article will use the term indigenous, in keeping with the policy of the organization. the demographic characteristics of all respondents, both present and past, are summarised in table 1. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.1 t a b l e 1 . d e m o g ra p h i c c h a ra c t e ri s t i c s o f r e s p o n d e n t s d e m o g ra p h i c n ( % ) l o c a t i o n darwin & alice springs 49 (52) remote northern territory 21 (22) interstate 23 (24) g e n d e r male 18 (19.4) female 75 (80.6) a g e 18-24 7 (7.5) 25-34 12 (12.9) 35-44 30 (32.2) 45-54 23 (24.7) 55-64 15 (16.1) >64 2 (2.1) not given 4 (4.3) total n 93 (100) 9 chirgwin et al.: the indigenous experience of work published by scholarship@western, 2017 pre s e n t a t i o n o f r e s u l t s all data from this research, both quantitative and qualitative, have been coded and presented in tables. the quantitative data presented in tables 2 and 6 are demographic, and thus have been presented as percentages, which are directly comparable. in all other tables, coded responses to specific interview questions have been aggregated into specific themes, with the total number for each theme presented as a raw score. these raw scores offer the most effective representation, given that respondents would often provide up to four responses to one question without ranking them, while other respondents gave no response. adjacent to each raw score in a theme are specific examples of rich data, which illustrate both the respondent’s language and the range of responses under a specific theme. the response “nothing” (in table 4) was included as a theme because it identified a positive response (that was there was nothing wrong), as opposed to the category “no response” where there was no answer to a question. r e s p o n d e n t q u a l i f i c a t i o n s a n d e m p l o y m e n t h i s t o ri e s of the respondents employed in urban areas or interstate3, 62 possessed qualifications in terms of education and/or relevant job experience prior to commencing employment (89%), ranging from experience as an aboriginal health worker to bachelor’s degrees and master’s degrees in various disciplines. in contrast, only 11 (52%) of the employees working in remote areas of the northern territory possessed such qualifications prior to beginning work with the organisation. the latter group of employees most frequently possessed vocational education training (vet) certificates—one employee possessed a master’s degree. among employees from urban areas, 29 (41%) had studied to gain further qualifications while employed by the organization (at the bachelor’s, master’s [by coursework], and doctoral degree levels), whereas 13 (56%) of the remote employees began a program of study after gaining employment. the remote employees often pursued the organisation’s certificate in community health research, which was designed to be completed while employed in order to build capacity in remote communities. while most (63.4%) respondents had only been employed by the organisation once, the remainder had been employed between two and nine times, as summarised in table 2. the latter figure reflects the short-term nature of the work for many employees, particularly those in remote areas where several projects may start and finish over a 10-year period. m o s t l i ke d w o rkp l a c e f a c t o rs table 3 summarises the thematic responses obtained from the question: “what did you most like about working for this organisation?” it should be noted that, in some cases, participants gave multiple answers that could be assigned to different themes. in other cases, responses related to least-liked factors and so were added to table 4. while the organisation’s staff and their characteristics was the highest ranked response to the question, an unexpectedly high-ranking response was the vision of the organization. 3 the term interstate refers to any other state or territory of australia outside of the northern territory. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.1 t a b l e 2 . n u m b e r o f t i m e s r e s p o n d e n t s w e re e m p l o y e d b y t h e o rg a n i s a t i o n n u m b e r o f s e p a ra t e t i m e s r e s p o n d e n t s w e re e m p l o y e d b y t h e o rg a n i s a t i o n n % one 59 63.4 two 20 21.5 three to six 13 14.0 seven to nine 1 1.1 n 93 100 11 chirgwin et al.: the indigenous experience of work published by scholarship@western, 2017 t a b l e 3 . c h a ra c t e ri s t i c s o f t h e o rg a n i z a t i o n r e s p o n d e n t s l i ke d m o s t c h a ra c t e ri s t i c n u m b e r o f r e s p o n s e s e x a m p l e s o f s p e c i f i c c o m m e n t s the staff 30 • welcoming • accommodating • approachable • supportive • staff had integrity the work tasks 18 • top job • i wished that i could do it forever • looked forward to going to work each day the vision of the organisation 15 • they were trying to make a difference • they helped me to help my community unspecified positive 9 • interesting • gooda • fantastic learned new skills 7 flexible work hours 4 cultural sensitivity 2 • allowed to do family business • allowed to attend funerals how they dealt with complaints 2 opportunity to work with children 2 good pay 1 not applicableb 14 total responses 104 note. respondents were allowed to give more than one response to the question. a several “good” responses were given in the local language by community workers. b refers to negative answers or stories that are not applicable, but specific dislikes were coded and added to table 4. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.1 t a b l e 4 . c h a ra c t e ri s t i c s o f t h e o rg a n i s a t i o n r e s p o n d e n t s l i ke d l e a s t c h a ra c t e ri s t i c n u m b e r o f r e s p o n s e s e x a m p l e s o f s p e c i f i c c o m m e n t s work conditions 33a • working in hot sun in communities • open plan office • i worked in isolation a lot • being part-time • no desk or computer • hospital campus clinical and stuffy nothing 16 • nothing was difficult or frustrating • nothing, i enjoyed my job cultural issues 16a • organisational racism • who takes responsibility for cultural issues? • too many conflicting priorities on my time • workers are treated differently • lack of obvious effort to get and keep indigenous people • being told i only had the job because i was aboriginal • no indigenous managers • lack of cultural understanding difficulty of work tasks 13a • taking blood was difficult • time frames were pressing • had difficulty understanding medical terms • doing research on my own people • work was stressful • the difficult it programs note. a indicates that answers to “most liked” question were incorporated because they related to “least liked” aspects. 13 chirgwin et al.: the indigenous experience of work published by scholarship@western, 2017 c h a ra c t e ri s t i c n u m b e r o f r e s p o n s e s e x a m p l e s o f s p e c i f i c c o m m e n t s the organisational structure 9a • i didn’t understand the structure • in house politics • some managers have individual agendas • there were silos • the place went through 3 re-structures • higher-ups were “pushy” • i was looked down on by people higher up • need stronger commitment to central australia the way the organisation is funded 8 when the funding ends the job ends little notice is given when job ends the short-term contracts are frustrating the sudden loss of 3 leading indigenous researchers because of funding lack of training 7a orientation consisted of someone reading from a manual in the tearoom my roles and responsibilities needed to be defined not being appreciated or listened to 6 i didn’t have the opportunity to show case my skills, knowledge, and abilities lack of career pathway 5a no comment /incomplete 4 resentment from my own people 1 having to pull the knives from my back all the time in the communities how i was paid changed 1 it changed from weekly to fortnightly not getting to see the final results of the project that i worked on 1 total responses 156 note. a indicates that answers to “most liked” question were incorporated because they related to “least liked” aspects. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.1 l e a s t l i ke d w o rkp l a c e f a c t o rs table 4 summarises the responses to the question: “what did you least like about your job?” in some instances, participants indicated what they least liked in the most liked category and so their answers were recorded in the interest of research integrity, but subsequently transferred to the appropriate code and theme when analysed. it should be noted that the response “nothing” means that nothing was disliked, rather than that no response was given. in table 4, dislike with the highest ranking was physical work conditions. validating the high score for staff as a most-liked factor was the limited mention of staff as a dislike (not being appreciated or listened to was mentioned by 6 respondents). inclusion of work tasks as both dislikes in table 4 and high-scoring likes in table 3 may seem contradictory, but is likely related to the diversity of work tasks required by employees of the organization and the fact that work tasks are carried out under a range of physical and environmental conditions. the data presented in tables 5 and 6 refers to information pertaining to former employees only. as table 5 indicates, 64.3 % of those who have left the organisation are currently employed, which is relatively high given the proportion who responded from remote communities where employment is limited. if those who are in school are included, then 76.2% of those who have left the organisation are engaged in work or receiving education and training specific to future employment. table 5 indicates that 9.5% of respondents not engaged in the workforce due to age or illness and the remaining 14.2% are unemployed or non-committal about their employment status. the small proportion with illnesses that prevented them from engaging in paid work was not unexpected given the age of some respondents (table 1). the small number (4/42) who have positions such as professors, general practitioners, and policy officers was one of the most positive outcomes emerging from the study (table 6), particularly when taken with the number who indicated that they were studying medicine (table 5). responses regarding how the organisation impacted future employment are summarised in table 7; this question received the highest number of answers in the “no response” category, with over 50% of respondents offering no response. the immediate inference from this is that the question may not have been understood, even though interviewers were encouraged to replace words like “impact” with more culturally appropriate terms. all other responses to this question did, however, indicate understanding with most responses (except those recorded in the “other”) indicating a positive impact. table 8 demonstrates that, even though there were only seven respondents who did not give an answer when asked to suggest what the organisation might do to attract more indigenous australian staff, 43 of the responses did not directly relate to the question. several of these answers have been included in table 8. overall, the indication was that the organisation should advertise more widely and in a format that is easier to understand. table 9 indicates that respondents noted that providing support was most important to retaining staff, and table 10 lists the type of support that was identified in more detail, with education and training most frequently mentioned. 15 chirgwin et al.: the indigenous experience of work published by scholarship@western, 2017 t a b l e 5 . s u m m a ry o f l a b o u r m a rke t pa rt i c i p a t i o n o f r e s p o n d e n t s w h o h a v e l e f t t h e o rg a n i s a t i o n a re a n % employed health sector 14 33.3 education and training sector 7 16.7 other, non-health sector 6 14.3 studying medicine 5 11.9 unemployed 3 7.1 unable to work for health reasons 3 7.1 retired 1 2.4 no response 3 7.1 total 42 100 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.1 t a b l e 6 . c u rre n t o c c u p a t i o n s o f e m p l o y e d r e s p o n d e n t s w h o h a v e l e f t t h e o rg a n i s a t i o n o c c u p a t i o n n c o m m e n t s academic 5 2 are professors community health worker 4 indigenous health worker 3 trainers (for public health programs delivered in communities) 2 indigenous interpreter at clinic 1 community development employment projects (cdep) 1 recycling health project officer 1 health policy officer for government 1 health administrator 1 aged care worker 1 gardener 1 general practitioner (medical doctor) 1 library assistant 1 gas industry worker 1 ranger 1 health researcher 1 self-employed as consultant 1 n 27 17 chirgwin et al.: the indigenous experience of work published by scholarship@western, 2017 t a b l e 7 . h o w r e s p o n d e n t s be l i e v e d t h e o rg a n i s a t i o n i m p a c t e d f u t u re w o rk o p p o rt u n i t i e s i m p a c t n u m b e r o f re s p o n s e s e x a m p l e s o f s p e c i f i c c o m m e n t s no response 57 provided transferable skills & knowledge 27 • rounded me off • helped me become a better practitioner • enhanced my skills rather than developed them • i became a better worker in general • the occupational health and safety (ohs) training provided helped me step into next job good for the curriculum vitae 3 • the organisation has a good reputation • i was offered a job because i worked at this organisation other 3 • i already had all the skills that i needed • 3 weeks was too short to gain any skills i made good contacts 2 it motivated me to study medicine 1 total 93 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.1 t a b l e 8 . s u g g e s t e d s t ra t e g i e s t o a t t ra c t m o re i n d i g e n o u s s t a f f s t ra t e g y pro p o s e d n u m b e r o f r e s p o n s e s e x a m p l e s o f s p e c i f i c c o m m e n t s response not a recruitment strategy 43 • doing a good job as is • not a problem attracting, its keeping them • more part-time and full-time work • let people work after their contracts finish • have career pathways • not sure • build capacity • time too short in communities advertise in a wider range of places using a wider range of ways 19 • advertise in aboriginal-specific print and nonprint places • use different types of media • advertise in the clinic • a common perception is that this organisation is closed and you can only get a job there if you are recommended by someone establish school based trainee-ships and advertise in schools 10 no response 7 make job descriptions easier to understand 7 • don’t use too much jargon • make wording in advertisements easier to understand • advertise in indigenous language (e.g., yonglu) • have a place on the web make job descriptions easier to understand • site that explains what to do with job descriptions and how to apply create more identified positions 5 • all they have to do is get an exemption from the racial discrimination act pay better salaries 4 19 chirgwin et al.: the indigenous experience of work published by scholarship@western, 2017 s t ra t e g y pro p o s e d n u m b e r o f r e s p o n s e s e x a m p l e s o f s p e c i f i c c o m m e n t s create networks in communities 3 better explain how the place works to indigenous people 1 allow people to address selection criteria for jobs orally rather than in written form 1 seek people out 1 note. respondents gave between one and four responses to the question. 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.1 t a b l e 9 . s u g g e s t e d s t ra t e g i e s t o i m p ro v e e m p l o y e e r e t e n t i o n s t ra t e g y n u m b e r o f r e s p o n s e s e x a m p l e s o f s p e c i f i c c o m m e n t s improve support 64 • a breakdown of the type of support is provided in table 10 no response 17 cultural awareness for all staff 9 • do cultural awareness regularly not just at beginning of the year • academic staff need grassroots training • need to understand the pressures from community as well as the work pressures having a safe place for indigenous staff to go 8 • ensure that there is a central hub that people can go to and discuss things change the nature of the projects 7 • make projects continue • not letting people go when projects finish • people need stability • keep projects running longer • treat people better at the end of projects offer permanent positions rather than contract 6 offer more money 3 other 3 • the organisation should prove itself with good wages and outcomes • make work more flexible, rather than 9-5 • explain work better note. respondents could give more than one answer. 21 chirgwin et al.: the indigenous experience of work published by scholarship@western, 2017 t a b l e 1 0 . f o rm s o f w o rkp l a c e s u p p o rt t h a t be s t m e e t t h e n e e d s o f i n d i g e n o u s a u s t ra l i a n s t a f f f o rm o f s u p p o rt n u m b e r o f r e s p o n s e s e x a m p l e s o f s p e c i f i c c o m m e n t s professional development/further training/support for higher education 26 • train them for stuff that may be coming up • ask them what they want to learn and then help them to learn it. • send them to uni (university) so they can continue to work afterwards • get us to a level where we can get a degree should we want one • with training people can work their way up follow up career aspirations 12 • we need a career pathway focus on support for the first few months 7 • this is crucial • there were so many things that i didn’t know that would have helped me put mentors in place 7 better support from supervisor 7 • this person is often the key to what support you get foster networks and relationships in a formal way 5 • create a peer support model. • we should have someone who we can go to, to discuss things in a non-threatening environment 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.1 d i s c u s s i o n pa rt i c i p a t i o n r a t e a n d d e m o g ra p h i c i n f o rm a t i o n only 14% (42 out of 306) of former employees provided feedback, which was largely due to the mobile telephone numbers listed as the primary means of contact for former employees being out of date. overall, females made up 80% of the respondents, a number both proportionate to employment in the organisation and reflective of the participation in the health workplace for indigenous females across australia (abs, 2013). m o s t l i ke d w o rkp l a c e f a c t o rs relationships are central to the lives of indigenous australians (wilson, 2008), so it is not surprising that working with approachable and supportive staff (and thereby developing good working relationships) was identified as the factor most liked about the organisation. this reiterates the findings of the apsc (2010) employees census report and fredericks’ (2009) survey of health workers. the organisation’s mandatory cultural awareness training, which presents both indigenous and non-indigenous perspectives and protocols, may have contributed to the perception that staff are approachable and supportive. on the other hand, it may also be postulated that the organisation’s vision to address the health inequities of indigenous australians may have attracted ethno-culturally empathetic staff. while the indigenous capacity building unit seeks to influence attitudes and culturally safe practices, cultural issues were still referenced as one of the least-liked workplace factors, with respondents identifying a wide variety of issues. for example, a general “lack of cultural understanding” was an issue for two respondents. moreover, ensuring cultural awareness for all staff was identified as a strategy to improve retention (table 9). while there was acknowledgement that measures to achieve this awareness were already in place, respondents suggested that these measures needed to be strengthened. suggestions included delivering cultural awareness training more than once per year and the inclusion of workplace-specific examples that could make other staff more empathetic to the emotional struggles and pressures experienced by indigenous australians. respondents’ feedback to various questions indicated that the organisation’s reputation and how it worked with indigenous australians attracted employees, something not identified in previous australian studies. for example, respondents noted: • “i knew that the place had a high level of integrity.” • “it had a reputation of working with indigenous people in a holistic way.” • “because i had heard about it and what they do for communities.” • “thought it was a good place to work.” • “they are recognised throughout australia and internationally.” • “it was a culturally safe workplace.” 23 chirgwin et al.: the indigenous experience of work published by scholarship@western, 2017 failure to live up to the vision of the organization was not identified as a reason for leaving in a recent exit poll of public servants (biddle & lahn, 2016). the vision of the organisation and the work tasks assigned to employees were ranked highly in this study, as they were in an earlier aboriginal public service survey (apsc, 2010)—although other studies have not mentioned either. the role of an organisation’s vision in attracting indigenous australian employees is an area that warrants further investigation, due to its apparent impact. it could also be argued that the “make a difference” emphasis of both the public service generally and the organisation with which this study was conducted more specifically would attract potential employees with different personal goals than those who are attracted to non-service, for-profit organisations. in a survey of indigenous australians employed across a range of workplaces in northern australia, mcrae-williams (2012) identified that training and career pathway opportunities were highly valued, and these factors were ranked highly in this study as well. the importance placed on training and career pathway opportunities is also evident in the respondents’ identification of a lack of these opportunities as a least-liked workplace factor (table 4), as well as in the high rating of skills training and enhancement provided by the organisation (table 7) in terms of future employment opportunities. l e a s t l i ke d w o rkp l a c e f a c t o rs the finding that the organisation generates strong positive feelings because of its people, what they aim to do, and how they manage the organization (table 3) is consistent with other data from the study, which indicates that a substantial number of respondents said that there was little that they did not like about their workplace (table 4). indeed, respondents were more likely to cite non-personnel factors as the aspect of their workplace that they liked the least. for example, respondents noted that they disliked their physical working conditions, either in the office or in hot, difficult outdoor conditions in remote areas. in contrast, earlier studies—such as those from the public service (apsc, 2010)—found management, supervisors, and interpersonal tensions were listed as negative aspects of employment. it is possible that relationships are so important to indigenous australians that, in contexts where they are not satisfactory, they will have a larger impact than discomforts or deficiencies related to the physical conditions of the workplace. a dislike of “organisational structure” is a workplace factor that has not been identified by indigenous australians before, even in the hierarchical federal public service (apsc, 2010). the responses in this study expressed a lack of knowledge about how individual sections related to each other and who was responsible for an area or department. respondents also disliked the continual restructuring of the organization and the silos created by the organisation’s structure. in addition, some respondents repeatedly mentioned their perception that “higher–ups” in the organisation were pushy or arrogant. despite the structural overview provided to employees during their orientation periods, the noted lack of understanding indicates the need for a more comprehensive introduction to western workplace culture, its organization, and the responsibilities that the “higher–ups” in the organisation have as part of their job. although only a few respondents identified not being appreciated or listened to as their least-liked workplace factor, it is nonetheless worthy of attention because feeling undervalued was one of the most commonly cited reasons given for leaving the aps (apsc, 2010). in the organisation with which this 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.1 study was conducted, respect for indigenous australians and appreciation for their views are considered crucial to ethical and relevant research. while non-indigenous australians may also feel undervalued in the workplace, among indigenous australian employees, this perception is bolstered by other factors, such as mismatched expectations compared to their managers and/or barriers to developing relationships that facilitate communication. respondents also disliked the temporary nature of many of the jobs within the organisation: they cited not seeing the final outcomes of work projects or tasks and the limited term of employment as a result of project-specific research funding. the latter was not only mentioned as a least-liked workplace factor, but was also mentioned as a strategy to attract and retain more indigenous australian employees (see table 8 comments in the “response not a strategy” category; table 9 “change the nature of the projects”). while the duration of employment is clearly explained in job advertisements and during orientation, it is not difficult to understand why it was raised in this study, particularly since indigenous australians in remote communities may have few other job opportunities. many business managers, who control individual projects and associated staff, hold informal sessions to help those whose contracts have ended find employment, but the high rating of this factor demonstrates the need for targeted sessions about how to transition into a new job. t h e pe rc e i v e d i m p a c t o f t h e o rg a n i s a t i o n o n f u t u re e m p l o y m e n t while approximately 60% of those surveyed did not provide an answer regarding how their employment with the organization impacted their future work opportunities, the highest ranked answer from those who did respond was that the organisation provided skills and knowledge that helped them find employment after leaving. a review of the employment destinations of those who left (tables 5 and 6) shows that 64.6% of respondents continue to be employed, with a third employed in the field of health. when the lower ranked impacts of employment in the organization, such as “good for the curriculum vitae” and “made contacts,” are added, it appears that the majority of those who responded perceived positive impacts. s t ra t e g i e s t h a t m i g h t l e a d t o m o re i n d i g e n o u s a u s t ra l i a n s be i n g e m p l o y e d forty percent of responses to the question “what might attract more indigenous australians to employment?” indicated that respondents either did not understand the question or were unable to provide an answer. the second highest response was that job advertisements should be distributed in a wider range of physical places and forms, suggesting that the wording of job advertisements and the jargon therein may negatively impact the recruitment of indigenous australian applicants. s t ra t e g i e s t h a t m i g h t i m p ro v e r e t e n t i o n the highest ranked strategy to improve the retention of indigenous australian staff was to improve support. the types of assistance most frequently identified as necessary (see table 10) included professional development, specific job or task training, and providing support for university education by designating time for studying during the working week. again, it could be argued that those who already value professional development, training, and qualifications are more likely to be attracted to an organisation in which knowledge and skills are highly valued—although, as indicated above, it has been identified as important in earlier studies (mcrae-williams, 2012). 25 chirgwin et al.: the indigenous experience of work published by scholarship@western, 2017 l i m i t a t i o n s o f t h e s t u d y a major limitation of this study is that the workplace is a not-for-profit organisation with a stated vision to improve the overall health and well-being of indigenous australians and other disadvantaged people. this vision not only directs external priorities but also those internally via the targets it sets for employment of indigenous staff at various levels and the nurturing and support it seeks to provide, priorities that will not be present to the same extent in many other organisations. accordingly, applicability of the study’s findings may be less applicable to other sectors and organisations. moreover, the study’s sample was predominantly female, and many identified that they were specifically attracted to a service area in which they would have an opportunity to “make a difference.” a more gender balanced, diverse sample might produce different results. indeed, the organisation’s specific vision to “make a difference” might further limit the applicability of the findings because it attracts not only indigenous employees but also non-indigenous employees who are empathetic toward indigenous australians and their cultural perspectives. however, even though this research was conducted in a specialist setting, it provides a starting point for other sectors in which there is genuine interest in using indigenous perspectives as the basis for developing employment policies. furthermore, irrespective of sector, every piece of feedback of this nature has the potential to gradually erode the paternalistic approach to policy making that still impacts on indigenous australians at all levels. another limitation is that, despite interviewer training and the fact that many interviewers were indigenous, there were questions with a significant number of non-responses (most commonly silences) and responses that did not answer the question that had been posed. while some respondents may have adhered to cultural protocols and deliberately chosen not to answer some questions in order to avoid causing offense, the answers from others indicate that some questions were difficult to understand and/or answer within the time provided. while the interview questions were practiced and revised, this was only done with urban employees. a wider pilot should have been conducted with representatives from a wider range of language groups. however, as part of using a culturally appropriate protocol, the organisation accepted and respected the silences of respondents. o rg a n i s a t i o n a l c h a n g e s r e s u l t i n g f ro m t h i s r e s e a rc h the findings of this research were reviewed by the director of the organisation involved in this study and presented to the aboriginal and torres strait islander employment and development strategy working group. the findings were then used to revise the aboriginal and torres strait islander employment and career development strategy. the revised goals of this strategy were to: • increase the number of indigenous staff from 10% to 25%, and • achieve retention rates among indigenous staff that are equal to those for non-indigenous staff. the strategies that were identified to assist in recruiting, nurturing, and retaining indigenous employees emphasized: 26 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.1 • employing five more indigenous staff members in project management positions, • requiring indigenous employees to construct a career development plan as part of a formal performance management program, and • identifying specific career transition points and putting strategies in place to assist with job transitions. direct actions outside the strategy revision included: • introducing a biennial indigenous staff network forum to provide a culturally safe environment for full-time indigenous staff to discuss their career pathways, training, and education; • increasing the number of indigenous mentors and mentees completing mentoring training; • providing formal mentoring training for community-based researchers; • constructing a database that community-based researchers could use to construct their curriculum vitaes (cvs). c o n c l u s i o n s this research was conducted in a specialised workplace in australia that endeavours to redress some of the impacts of colonization. although the findings present the opinions of a specific cohort of indigenous employees, considering their feedback in a broader context provides valuable information for those making policy at the organisational or governmental level. first, organisations should appreciate that their indigenous employees may highly value western training and education, but may require mentoring to identify what will suit them and assist in their present and future work. second, while relationships in the workplace are important for all employees, this study indicates that they may be crucial to indigenous employees’ job satisfaction and by extension their retention. in order to build these relationships, indigenous employees need empathetic supervisors, trained mentors, and formal opportunities to meet and network with indigenous colleagues. at the organisational level, it is frequently non-indigenous managerial staff members who make policy, so it is crucial that they understand indigenous cultural values and protocols; similarly, they must provide indigenous employees with the opportunity to learn about the specific work culture and protocols of their organisation. in addition, the policy formulation or review process should have indigenous input—either directly, from face-to-face involvement, or indirectly, from regular formal feedback. the resultant feedback should inform cultural awareness training, which should be sufficiently flexible so as to respond to issues as they arise. structurally, an organisation should also ensure that there is an identified staff role (or section, as appropriate) to oversee the implementation of both employment policy and strategies to address support and retention. 27 chirgwin et al.: the indigenous experience of work published by scholarship@western, 2017 at the government level, qualitative input into policy appears to be largely limited to the opinions of public servants, employers, and managers, and the non-evidential perceptions of politicians, all of whom receive little input from indigenous people who have been employees. given the lack of indigenous input and the paucity of data like that presented in this article, what is required is a far broader range of qualitative feedback from indigenous employees across a range of sectors and sites, and a less blinkered approach from politicians. with greater political will, policy incentives could encourage collection of the required qualitative data, shifting priority from what has not worked in the past to what indigenous employees in specific areas and locations of employment feel has worked. if government monies are to be better spent and gaps are to be closed then feedback from indigenous australians who are employed and who have made 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(2008). research is ceremony: indigenous research methods. halifax, n. s.: fernwood publishing. 32 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.1 the international indigenous policy journal july 2017 the indigenous experience of work in a health research organisation: are there wider inferences? sharon k. chirgwin adrienne farago heather d'antione trish nagle recommended citation the indigenous experience of work in a health research organisation: are there wider inferences? abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license the indigenous experience of work in a health research organisation: are there wider inferences? the sun dance and the gustafsen lake standoff: healing through resistance and the danger of dismissing religion the international indigenous policy journal volume 2 issue 4 traditional knowledge, spirituality, and lands article 3 october 2011 the sun dance and the gustafsen lake standoff: healing through resistance and the danger of dismissing religion nicholas d. shrubsole university of waterloo, nshrubso@uwaterloo.ca recommended citation shrubsole, n. d. (2011). the sun dance and the gustafsen lake standoff: healing through resistance and the danger of dismissing religion. the international indigenous policy journal, 2(4) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.3 this research is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. the sun dance and the gustafsen lake standoff: healing through resistance and the danger of dismissing religion abstract the revitalization and renewal of traditional indigenous spiritual practices have produced new forms of indigenous religiosity rooted in experience, contact and combination. this paper examines the contemporary sun dance, a traditional healing ritual that seeks to address pain and sickness in indigenous communities through religious practice. for some sun dancers in both the united states and canada who seek freedom for indigenous peoples through radical political activism, the sun dance has provided courage, validity and deeper meaning in their endeavours. however, when a highly politicized form of the ritual emerged in the non-traditional region of the british columbia interior at gustafsen lake, it led the media, the state, and local elected first nations leadership to dismiss the ritual as fraudulent. as demonstrated below, a failure to protect sacred sites and ceremonies and to understand the embodied spiritualities that accompany them can lead to violence between religious communities and the state. keywords indigenous, sun dance, religion, spiritualities, resistance, sacred sites, politics, sovereignty, canada, united states; gustafsen lake; american indian movement acknowledgments this paper stems from a panel convened at the 2010 american academy of religion eastern international regional meeting in ottawa, ontario, canada, concerning "aboriginal peoples, religion, and public dialogue." creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ introduction in british columbia during the summer of 1995 a small group of indigenous peoples from both canada and the united states gathered for a sun dance, which they had been participating in at gustafsen lake for the previous five years. the leaders of the sun dance were not only deeply committed to the religious ceremony on what they perceived to be sacred space but they also held the belief that their sun dance site and much of canada had been unlawfully seized by the federal government. tensions grew when the property owner served an eviction notice to the sun dancers who, with their supporters, refused to leave the site, calling for the protection of their sacred space and an international inquiry into the subject of unceded indigenous lands. eventually, the perception on the part of the occupiers of an impending police invasion, and encroachment on the camp by the royal canadian mounted police (rcmp), led to a standoff beginning 18 august and ending 17 september. the rcmp operation, with support from the canadian military, would be the most costly of its kind in canadian history. no one was killed in the confrontation but eighteen people were charged in a trial that would last just over ten months. religion was marginalized and dismissed during the standoff. as the political arguments for sovereignty became more public it was believed that political militants were using religion to advance their agenda. at the same time, local elected indigenous leadership publically challenged the occupiers’ claim that gustafsen lake was sacred space. and as the standoff came to a close the perception that the peaceful religious members of the occupation finally succeeded over the militants became the narrative employed by outside observers to understand why violence erupted and how it was quelled. this paper examines the sun dance ceremony and its relationship to political action as found at gustafsen lake, contextualizing it within the broader development of the religious ceremony in north america and its connection to violent uprisings against the state. i argue that while the religious tradition is not inherently violent and subversive, the healing nature of the ceremony in the face of colonial oppression has, in both canada and the united states, provided courage, validity and deeper meaning for some indigenous peoples who believe they, and those they collectively identify with under the unifying experience of colonialism, need to secure sovereignty for themselves and future generations. theoretical considerations how we understand “religion” has real world consequences. with the protection of religion in constitutional frameworks, such as those in canada and the united states, multicultural liberal democracies must, at times, decide what warrants inclusion under such protection and what does not. there can be no universal definition of religion because its constitutive elements are often the product of historical, social and cultural processes. complicating this fact, as talal asad (1993) argues, is that universal (standardized) conceptions of religion are often those of the social and political elite. unlike in academia where the long-standing debate over the definition of religion persists, neither canada nor the united states have offered a working definition of the concept. avigail eisenberg (2006) argues that the result is that individuals with the authority of the state end up applying normative values as to what constitutes “religion” based on their own specific knowledge and experiences. indigenous spiritualities have faced specific problems regarding the definition of religion in the public arena. scholars such as michael lee ross (2005), lori g. beaman (2006) and tracy leavelle (2010) have inferred that both canada and the united states ought to have more self-awareness regarding the treatment of indigenous spirituality in indigenous-state disputes. the failure on the part of the state, as noted by these scholars, is the preconception that religion has a certain form, resulting in the dismissal 1 shrubsole: the sun dance and the gustafsen lake standoff published by scholarship@western, 2011 of religious beliefs that do not meet certain criteria. this failure results in the destruction of indigenous spiritualities and, more generally, communication barriers between disputing parties. michael lee ross (2005) echoes the concerns of eisenberg, with specific reference to the experience of first nations communities seeking the protection of their off-reserve sacred sites in canada’s courts. he argues that a translation barrier and the application of non-indigenous normative values regarding religion are highly probable given the very few first nations members of the judiciary. generally, courts have proceeded with inadequate information regarding the ethic of sacred space and “they have failed to exhibit a good understanding of the perspectives of first nations on the particular significance of their sacred sites” (p. 160). in particular, ross points to the failure on the part of the courts to recognize holistic perspectives of space. the result has been a virtually incomprehensible indigenous-state dialogue, which most often results in the predominantly non-indigenous state destroying the indigenous sacred site. lori beaman (2006) argues that the religious landscape of both canada and the united states is dominated by mainstream christianity, resulting in a narrow interpretation of indigenous religions that places them outside the constitutional protection of religion. she writes, “[d]espite much ado about religious pluralism, there is a christian hegemony that largely determines the manner and extent to which religious minorities are able to express their beliefs” (p. 230). these restrictions manifest themselves in how the state conceives of sacred space and, more specifically, its ability to conceptualize a spiritual relationship with land and animals. tracy leavelle (2010) adds that while authenticity has been granted to indigenous religions of the past, contemporary forms of these religion traditions, altered by what she calls “contact and combination”, have been left in limbo between historically-decontextualized traditions and contemporary mainstream christian religious forms. those practices that do not conform to these two categories have for the most part been ignored, marginalized or dismissed by the state. citing vine deloria jr. (1999), leavelle explains that a major difference between christianity and native american religions is that the former’s canon is closed and the latter is influenced by revelation and experience. the expectation placed upon native american religions is that ceremonies, beliefs and spaces must be historically legitimated and presented in a state of purity. the very nature of indigenous spiritualities and the experience of colonialism have greatly affected native american religions but the courts still insist on models fit for a museum. as with ross and beaman, preconceived notions of religion result in barriers in the ability of indigenous peoples and the state to communicate. at the level of law enforcement, preconceived notions of religion can manifest themselves in very different ways than in the courts. miscommunication may still result in the violation of sacred space, but it may also result in violence. gustafsen lake demonstrates the real dangers of dismissing indigenous religious practices as fraudulent, incorrect or false. generally speaking, recognizing the role religion may play both implicitly and explicitly in indigenous-state disagreements may foster a better understanding of positions and motivations, facilitate effective negotiations and possibly even lead to swifter and more just resolutions. this process begins, as eisenberg (2006) argues, with an acknowledgement of the inherent difficulties and biases involved in conceptualizing “religion.” this involves not only recognizing the biases of individuals, but the institutional constraints that persist in countries such as canada and the united states. finally, it involves a better understanding of indigenous spiritualities as experiential traditions that may not always conform to historical forms. although the focus of this paper is on the experience of indigenous peoples in canada and the united states, the examples here of fluid, adaptive and renewed indigenous spiritualities may provide valuable insight into other post-colonial states as they struggle with the arduous task of defining religion in order that it may be acknowledged and protected. there is a possibility that these concerns and experiences could be extended to other states with indigenous populations living under similar systems. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.3 contemporary forms of the sun dance ceremony dale stover (2001) points to a specific problem regarding the study of the contemporary lakota sun dance. he writes for traditional lakota people the contemporary sun dance signifies the continuation of and identification with the traditional ways of ancestral generations, whereas for european american culture it represents the epitome of “otherness,” the imagined “primitive” world of indigenous america before european contact. lakota sun dancing carries this double marking because it emphatically represents an embodied spirituality that is, on the one hand, deeply characteristic of indigenous traditions and is, on the other hand, at profound odds with a eurocentric modernism that dualistically segregates the religious experience of the subjective self from the objective, embodied realities of the world. european american descriptions of lakota sun dancing typically manifest the predilection of the metropole for assigning to indigenous rituals only those meanings that conform to modernist categories of thought. (p. 823) stover goes on to examine three studies of the sun dance, which focus on the authenticity of the ritual as opposed to the aspects that make up its contemporary forms. for this latter reason, there is an inherent difficulty in any general examination of the sun dance ceremony given the fluid, adaptive nature of indigenous spiritualities. a historical study of the ceremony does provide evidence of the adaptive and experiential nature of the sun dance, but it does not dictate its modern forms. within the region where the sun dance originated, great plains communities such as the cheyenne and lakota have oral traditions that trace the ceremony to time immemorial. while western scholarship acknowledges that the origins of the sun dance certainly extend deep into the unwritten histories of north american civilizations, it is typically argued that the ritual first emerged among the plains algonquians at the turn of the eighteenth century. the ceremony then spread throughout the great plains to communities in contemporary canada and the united states including the arapaho, ankara, assiniboine, blackfeet, cheyenne, comanche, crow, eastern dakota, gros ventre, hidatsa, kiowa, lakota, mandan, ponca, plains cree, plains ojibway, sarsi, shoshone and ute (hirschfelder & molin 2001). although the well-being of a community was always the focus of the early sun dance, the experience of colonialism and reserve life implemented what joseph jorgensen (1985) calls a contemporary form of the sun dance “born of misery and oppression” and persisting in a context of misery and oppression (p. 117). although it cannot be broadened to include all communities, jorgensen does point to a significant change among the wind river shoshone that saw the meaning of the sun dance move away from the purposes of “insuring successful bison hunts and warfare to an increased concern over illness and community misery” (p. 114). he argues that similar patterns emerged among the ute. legislation banning the ritual in both canada and the united states over the first half of the twentieth century meant that further changes were required of the ceremony. thomas mails (1998) explains that for the sioux, maintenance of an illegal ceremony meant changing the time of the ritual (to blend with american holidays such as independence day) and the hiding of the piercing ritual, which had, in part, initiated the ban of the ceremony in both countries. the components of the sun dance vary from community to community. the most prominent aspect of the sun dance has been the piercing ritual which involves the tearing of flesh as an act of selfsacrifice, embodiment of pain and suffering, the dismantlement of egos, the initiation of visions and the attainment of power among other things. but some groups, such as the kiowa, did not include the piercing practice within their sun dance ceremony (hirschfelder & molin 2001). generally speaking, the 3 shrubsole: the sun dance and the gustafsen lake standoff published by scholarship@western, 2011 ceremony involves a sweat lodge, pledges or prayers, fasting, singing and dancing with the intention of healing (people, communities, planet, and cosmos) and giving thanks. the sun dance has for a long time been associated with political change. in 1884, in response to new reserve conditions and the onset of famine a sun dance was called at a reserve in saskatchewan by cree leader big bear. the ceremony gathered 2000 people together. big bear’s purpose was to secure land for the cree, determine leadership in dealing with canada, and protest treaty abuses by the federal government (dickason, 2009). in the united states, one sioux leader suggested to mails (1998) that the “sun dance effects change” (p. 2). and the (public) re-emergence of the sun dance and its ritual components in the 1960s demonstrated yet another important political focus for sun dance practitioners. among the shoshone, ute and sioux, sun dance leaders were actively participating in local political affairs, often acting as powerful voices of dissent towards the federally established tribal governments (jorgenson, 1985; mails, 1998). generally speaking, the sun dance has always been connected to the well-being of communities and for the most part it has been associated with political change. amidst the 1995 sun dance at gustafsen lake, jorgenson explained to vancouver sun readers that it should not be surprising to see the ritual – which originated and developed among plains communities – emerge in places where it had not historically been part of indigenous religious practice. making reference to the navajo of arizona and the paiutes in nevada and oregon, jorgenson contends that following the standoff at wounded knee in 1973, a new religious movement began to spread across north america, emphasizing redemption through spirituality; and, it was traditional practices such as the ghost dance and sun dance that young indigenous peoples were embracing (hume, 1995). splitting the sky, the leader of the 1995 gustafsen lake sun dance and member of american indian movement (aim) in the 1980s, identified the sioux sun dance as one of the primary means by which aim was able to establish a unified pan-indigenous community. within a year of becoming involved with aim, splitting the sky was on his way to south dakota to participate in his first sun dance. the ceremony at gustafsen lake would be his sixteenth. this particular manifestation of the sun dance, that jorgenson alludes to in the vancouver news, is a form of the sun dance that understands healing and self-sacrifice on a grander scheme that could involve martyrdom. in 1973 aim was involved in a 71-day standoff at wounded knee, south dakota, resulting in the trial of two prominent aim leaders, including dennis banks, an anishinabe from minnesota. at his trial banks articulated the following about his experience as a sun dancer and the standoff: the piercing of the skin is a reminder to me that i truly owe myself to mother earth and to all the female things of this planet ... wounded knee represented a last pint or a last blood transfusion. it was unfortunate that three indians have died but they died knowing, and all of us who were at wounded knee, and those people who called us to wounded knee will go the spirit world knowing that the unborn generation will be given the opportunity to live the life that they choose and not the life that somebody else dictates. (sayer, 1997, p. 98) when aim was called to wounded knee they were requested for a number of reasons, including the mismanagement of tribal funds, the continued loss of land and the refusal on the part of local leadership to allow for the 1973 traditional sun dance to take place (sayer, 1997). five years later, leonard peltier, an aim participant at wounded knee and a native of north dakota, was convicted of killing two federal bureau of investigation (fbi) agents during a 1975 shootout at pine ridge, south dakota. in peltier’s autobiography prison writings: my life is my sun dance (1999), chief arvol looking horse, an internationally recognized dakota spiritual leader and spokesperson for 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.3 the religious rights of indigenous peoples, said that, as a sun dancer, peltier “sacrificed his life to the people seeking justice for all our relatives. he offered himself to wakan tanka so that the people might have peace and happiness once again” (p. ix).1 peltier describes the power, revelation, and responsibility of sacrifice that his experience of the sun dance has revealed to him: as the white-hot sun pours molten through your eyes into your inner being, as the skewers implanted in your chest pull and yank and rip at your screaming flesh, a strange and powerful lucidity gradually expands within your mind. the pain explodes into a bright white light, into revelation. you are given a wordless vision of what it is to be in touch with all being and all beings. and for the rest of your life, once you have made the sacrifice of your flesh to the great mystery, you will never forget that greater reality of which we are each an intimate and essential part and which holds each of us in an embrace as loving as a mother’s arms. every time a pin pricks your finger from then on, that little pain will be but a tiny reminder of that larger pain and of the still greater reality that exists within each of us, an infinite realm beyond reach of all pain. (pp. 11-12) those who have participated in the sun dance can provide a cosmologically contextualized legitimacy to violent, albeit defensive, confrontations. for peltier and banks the sun dance created warriors, who could perceive the suffering of all indigenous peoples, cope with the pain and use that knowledge to relieve such suffering. many sun dancers have not interpreted the ceremony in the same way as banks, peltier or, later, as those at gustafsen lake. for example, participants of the dakota eagle sun dance in manitoba incorporate the ideals of the sun dance by helping the elderly and responding to community requests (ruml 2009). given the adaptive nature of the ceremony, however, interpretations of the ritual that involve violence cannot be dismissed as an anomaly or rejected from the tradition altogether. to do so inhibits one’s ability to understand the motivations and support structures of a particular group. the gustafsen lake sun dance the first sun dance at gustafsen lake was held in 1990. the location of the sun dance and the burial grounds believed to be near it were discovered through visions by percy rosette, a shuswap from the region, and others. the discovery of sacred sites through visions was not unique to gustafsen lake. mark ruml (2009) explains the sacredness of a site grows as a community establishes their connection to the space. in ruml’s case study, a sun dance site was discovered in 1999 at birds hill provincial park in manitoba by a member of the sioux valley dakota nation. ruml contends that from the moment the site was chosen to the first dance, there is “a process of increasing sanctification” (p. 196). after eight years of performing the ceremony at the site (2000-2007), the community is seeking to protect the area of the provincial park as sacred space. rosette approached the owner of the area at gustafsen lake to ask for permission to hold a sun dance at the site. lyle james, an american rancher who held title over the land for his cattle company (since 1972) made a verbal agreement with rosette that he could use the area for a period of four years under the condition that no permanent structures were erected on the site. gustafsen lake (or ts’peten 1 it is widely believed that leonard peltier was convicted based on falsified testimony. looking horse’s comments here should not be understood as a glorification of violence. rather it should be understood as a standard interpretation of self-sacrifice that has manifested itself in violent ways (i.e., wounded knee). 5 shrubsole: the sun dance and the gustafsen lake standoff published by scholarship@western, 2011 for local indigenous communities) was a popular camping and fishing area for indigenous and nonindigenous peoples alike, so allowing the ritual to take place was of little consequence to james. the sun dance drew participants from both canada and the united states, attracting between 400 and 500 people in the first two years. rosette would take the title “faith keeper”, responsible for protecting the sacred sun dance site. members of the local elected shuswap leadership admitted that they were not familiar with the ceremony before rosette and stevens brought it to the b.c. interior (lambertus 2004; switlo, 1997). in 1994 the sun dance continued as usual despite the fact that rosette’s initial agreement with lyle james had ended in the previous year. james visited the site after the completion of the ceremony to find that rosette and his partner mary pena had taken up residence at the lake. unknown to james at the time rosette and stevens had enlisted the aid of lawyer and veteran activist for indigenous land rights, dr. bruce clark. rosette had been involved in researching land claims for the shuswap nation and had discovered that the land on which the sun dance grounds was revealed was part of a larger tract of land whose rightful owner, in rosette’s view, was the shuswap nation and not the james cattle company. rosette claimed that local elected leadership had intentionally lost the evidence he had collected.2 it was clark’s 3 january 1995 petition to queen elizabeth ii, signed by both rosette and stevens, which would become central to the standoff to occur later that year. clark’s petition is an exercise in canadian and british jurisprudence and international law, arguing for third-party adjudication over unceded indigenous lands within the contemporary boundaries of the canadian state. the petitioners attested that because of the illegal usurpation of land by the federal government, indigenous peoples, under the current tribal system, were facing “serious mental harm”, as defined under the united nations’ convention on genocide (1948), leading to “prejudiced rates of mortality” (cited in splitting the sky, 2001, p. 83). as early as 1992, local elected shuswap leadership had been having problems with the sun dancers. one member of the cariboo tribal council commented that he was concerned with the fact that the sun dancers were “mixing religion and politics” in their preparatory meetings (lambertus 2004, p. 30). 3 the rcmp was involved early in 1995 to mediate what they had determined to be a civil matter. after chasing grazing cattle from the sun dance site in the previous year, occupiers erected a fence around the sacred arbour to protect the space from defecating cattle (lambertus, 2004). on 13 june, out of fear that the sun dancers were trying to stake out territory, james presented the sun dancers with an eviction notice. although james would argue that the serving of the notice was quite formal, sun dancers would contend that a number of violations towards their religious beliefs were undertaken in the plaintiffs identify themselves as “the tribal system natives of the sun-dance (central), the potlatch (western), and the feast of the dead (eastern) traditions.” restitution from the queen was sought not from representatives of particular nations nor by grassroots organizations but by representatives of indigenous religious traditions. the petition would not be forwarded to ottawa, having been stopped at the attorney general’s office in british columbia. 2 the sun dance site did fall under the land claim of the cariboo tribal council but negotiations, under the new procedures of the b.c. treaty commission (established in 1993), had yet to begin. ten days after the standoff, the council would enter into stage two of the six stage process. the claim remains unresolved (as of july 2011). for more information on the b.c. treaty process see mckee (2000). 3 splitting the sky’s autobiography (2001) was written in part to provide access to the position of the defenders in a confrontation which saw the orchestrated suppression of that perspective by the rcmp. splitting the sky’s autobiography along with the electronic database provided by settlers in support of indigenous sovereignty (sisis) has helped to promote the dissemination of the defenders’ perspectives. these sources will be used for that purpose. for more information regarding the orchestrated “smear campaign” and suppression of occupiers’ perspectives by the rcmp see susan lambertus’ wartime images, peacetime wounds: the media and the gustafsen lake standoff (2004). 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.3 the exchange, including the interruption of ritual preparation, the photographing of sun dancers in preparation and the desecration of a sacred spear on which the eviction notice was impaled. the violation of sacred objects and religious practice was complicated by the fact that the ranch workers were allegedly brandishing weapons and stated it would “be a good day to string up some red niggers” (lambertus, 2004, p. 32). although rosette and splitting the sky, the 1995 sun dance leader, were away from the camp at the time the eviction notice was served the accounts were enough that they felt they were under attack and splitting the sky made the decision to mount an “armed defensive stance” (2001, p. 94). as mentioned above, splitting the sky was introduced to the sun dance by aim in 1980. his childhood memories are mostly filled with his experiences in foster homes and various state-sponsored housing and correction facilities. he was taken from his mother at a very young age and only briefly remembers spending some time with his grandmother on a reservation just outside of buffalo, new york. he spent most of his early life partying and getting into trouble without any real sense of identity or direction. he spent the 1970s in prison following an attempted robbery conviction and the subsequent conviction of killing a prison guard during the 1971 attica prison riot. during this time he began to come “into awareness historically of [his] own roots as an indigenous person, as a mohawk native” (interview, march 31, 2011). literature rather than first-hand accounts provided splitting the sky with the foundations of his identity. his studies began with dee brown’s bury my heart at wounded knee (1970). and his knowledge of the sun dance was first informed by lame deer: seeker of visions (1972), black elk speaks (1932), and, through american cinema, elliot silverstein’s a man called horse (1970). following a prison-cell revelation in the mid-1970s, which he interpreted through eastern philosophy, he became more fascinated with the power and strength that could be attained through religious belief and experience. his interpretation of the lakota origin of the sun dance and black elk’s teachings is that indigenous ceremonies, in general, are sources of community strength that can help to unify indigenous peoples and combat the genocide brought on by the colonial experience. during his fifth sun dance ceremony, while suspended in the sacred arbour, he articulated that a vision and journey to the spirit world gave him an understanding of how strength, unity, and freedom could be attained. he recounted: i started crying, in my heart it felt like i was crying. and then i could see, i looked into the sky and the whole sky was this face of this great powerful thunder and lightning being. and i said to him, ‘spiritual father, are you the power, the thunder and the lightning being? and it just smiled at me, this beautiful smile, almost like a mona lisa smile on a great powerful warrior in the sky …i began to sob, not through my face but my heart was sobbing and i wept like a child and i totally broke down, my ego was broke down. i had a momentary vision that said ‘prepare for hard times to come’ but don’t worry, the powers are with you and then there was just these thousands of eagles that were flying in the spiritual realm, all around … [it] helped me see, at that point, on physical levels, that this world does not stop here. (interview, march 31, 2011) through the sun dance he was able to establish a connection between past, present and future generations. he was also able to transcend a fear of death that would give him the courage to engage in defensive stances with those who threatened “his nation, his extended family.” in response to a question regarding the 1995 gustafsen lake sun dance, he would admit that sovereignty was a means for freedom and that freedom was a means of healing. a 17 june 1995 press release, signed by the self-proclaimed “defenders of the shuswap nation,” outlined the events of 13 june and the various violations to their sacred site that took place at the hands of the james cattle company. fearing the suppression of their religious ceremony, they 7 shrubsole: the sun dance and the gustafsen lake standoff published by scholarship@western, 2011 offered an open invitation to all sun dancers “to come to gustafson lake and ensure that this sun dance [would] be held as planned to sustain [original peoples’] inheritance and religious freedom” (cited in splitting the sky, 2001, p. 97). conceptualized within the context of the colonial experience, the attempted eviction on the part of james and the passive response of the rcmp to engage as anything more than mediator at this early juncture contributed to the perception that indigenous spirituality on the whole was under attack. on 17 june a meeting would be held between representatives of the james cattle company, the sun dancers and local elected leadership from the cariboo tribal council. at the meeting an agreement was supposedly reached that would allow the sun dance to occur in early july, at which point occupiers would vacate the site. the sun dancers, who would reject the resolution, issued a press release on 18 june – for the moment changing their identification from “defenders of the shuswap nation” to the “defenders of the gustafsen lake sacred grounds” – affirming that the space was non-negotiable and articulated that “[i]t is our belief that the presence of the ancestral powers on this land will ensure that our struggle will be victorious” (cited in splitting the sky 2001, p. 104). asserting their belief in the spiritual significance of the sun dance site the defenders again confirmed their intention to ensure that the ritual take place, despite the perceived attempts being made to suppress the ceremony. in the early stages of the occupation, three indigenous rcmp constables were involved in the mediation of the civil dispute between james and the sun dancers. they were responsible for maintaining some form of security for the site and they were active in setting up meetings between the competing parties. constable wood was invited by splitting the sky in mid-june to attend the ceremony. constable andrew attended the opening day of the ceremony and reported that there were no problems at the site. constable findley was taken on a tour of the burial grounds and sacred arbour before he was invited to participate in prayer and a cleansing sweat with the sun dancers. findley expressed in his notes that he had established a good rapport with the occupiers and that the presence of eagles upon their concluding handshakes was considered a good sign (switlo 1997). wood, andrew, and findley believed that a meeting established for late august would have resolved the situation if not for the emergency response team (ert) that was discovered by occupiers on 18 august. after the incident, the indigenous officers, who had been mediating the situation since june and who were familiar with many of the occupiers, were taken off the case. wood would eventually quit the rcmp. andrew and findley would express their frustrations over being ignored during the later stages of the occupation (pemberton 1997).4 one of the greatest detriments to recognizing the important role religion played at gustafsen lake was the combined efforts of local shuswap leadership and the media, who helped to dismiss the validity of religious beliefs altogether. the early introduction of mixing politics and religion, which upset shuswap chief antoine archie, led him to research the sun dance practice that had begun occurring in shuswap territory in 1990. archie explained in a july 1997 interview that the elected shuswap leadership challenged those at gustafsen lake, articulating that the "real sun dancers” told them they need to take a break (lambertus, 2004, p. 31). newspapers picked up the story of the sun dance as a ‘modified import’, which challenged the occupiers’ right to stand in defence of the land. additionally, the assertion by local leadership that there were no burial sites on the premise (‘chiefs condemn’, 1995) and that the land held no specific spiritual significance (platiel, 1995) were some of the most damaging statements in understanding the important role religion played in the dispute. the sun dance began on 2 july but not without controversy and criticism. the strong political nature of the occupation led many to believe that the religious beliefs at gustafsen lake were less than 4 findley would express his frustrations during the trial for those from gustafsen lake but would later recant his concerns in lieu of the evidence of weapon caches, articulating that he was not sure if they did the right or wrong thing (pemberton 1997). 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.3 genuine. on the day the sun dance began a news article in the 100 mile house free press reported a local sun dance elder as condemning the militancy of the 1995 sun dancers, arguing the occupiers were “part and parcel of the confederacy movement for sovereignty under the umbrella of the sun dance” (‘sun dancer denounce’, 1995). when local media, which had been covering the sun dance since 1993, were invited into the camp in late june to view the site, steven frasher noted that the things splitting the sky spoke to them about were “entirely different than anything [they’d] heard associated with gustafsen lake before.” he explained that despite the speech they received on jurisdiction and rightful ownership of the land, there was no evidence provided to support their claims, and interpreted the tour of the sun dance grounds and alleged burial site as a ploy to “create their spin on the situation.” while observing splitting the sky and rosette speaking during the tour he recalled that rosette was uncomfortable because “for him it was a native spiritual thing.” frasher also noted that splitting the sky and the militant faction of the group “would have to latch [their] cause to take whatever legitimacy they could from what percy was doing,” a claim he and other reporters had been asserting since the beginning of the occupation (2004, pp. 35-36). the ceremony, which was dedicated to the healing of the pain of women, children and men, concluded on 12 july. since june it had been clear that the sun dancers felt that the site was spiritually protected, but the sanctity of the grounds grew with the performance of the ceremony. this ‘increasing sanctification’ took on a particular meaning in the face of confrontations with local elected indigenous leadership and ranch hands, and the fear of an impending police raid. splitting the sky (2001) recounts the opening of the sun dance: the shrill of the eagle bone whistle screech cut the atoms in half and a clasp of thunder and lightning blasted the entire sky. the powers of creation, had stepped through the crack in the veil of dimensions announcing the presence of the thunderers, communion had been made ... most of the people jumped at the sound and sight of the power. taking a survey of people’s eyes, i concluded they understood man’s meagre armies couldn’t penetrate the field of protection that had just engulfed the grounds (p. 110). he continues that the “sacred arbour became a vortex between two worlds and we could feel no pain, bullets simply could not and would not touch those who were of the sun dance family” (p. 111). occupiers would put down their weapons and take off their fatigues for the ceremony but splitting the sky (2001) would admit that it was not easy to organize a sun dance and simultaneously prepare participants to be vision seekers and soldiers. deriving from motifs of self-sacrifice and community healing so central to the modern sun dance, practitioners can incorporate a purpose in political action with the power they acquire that aims at relieving the suffering of generations, present and future. after a 19 july meeting where local shuswap elders had expressed concerns that they were being mistreated and disrespected, splitting the sky noted that his delegation of sun dancers was “concerned for the people, territories and for the future generations. what form of security would the people have if left in the hands of government puppets and brainwashed peoples who willingly allow the roots of assimilation to hold steadfast” (2001, p. 117). similar testimonies from the dancers would reveal a common perception of what exactly it was they were doing at gustafsen lake. mary pena, at a benefit in the summer of 1996, explained that it was not for self-interest, “not for glory, not for money, not for any kind of recognition. we were doing this for our children and our grandchildren and our future generations to come. we figured that this would help our people along in waking up” (pena, 1996). james pitawanakwat (also known as oj), a young anishinabe from ontario, who was pierced during the 1995 sun dance, expressed similar sentiments, articulating that relief for indigenous peoples could only be ascertained through sovereignty and a 9 shrubsole: the sun dance and the gustafsen lake standoff published by scholarship@western, 2011 return to traditional ways of life, which had historically been suppressed by the federal government. in his statement to the court prior to being found guilty of “mischief causing danger to life”, oj would defend his stand at gustafsen lake: “ceremonies like the sun dance need to be protected from cultural genocide. this is the basis for my resistance. we are not militants or terrorists. we are warriors to our people. our families. our generations yet to come” (2001, p. 38). pitawanakwat understood that religion and politics at gustafsen lake – or, as he would contend, for all indigenous peoples – were inseparable. in addition, pitawanakwat’s statement emphasizes a concern that was made explicit in pre-ceremony press releases: indigenous spirituality was under attack at gustafsen lake. the ceremony was both a means for defence and a reason for defending. following the conclusion of the sun dance, fighting for the right to practice the religious ritual became less explicit in the attempt to begin the healing process of indigenous peoples in canada by securing legal recognition of the claims made in the 3 january 1995 petition. splitting the sky recalls that when rcmp staff sergeant martin sarich asked him if the occupiers would leave if they were given the sun dance grounds, he told him that the “sun dance grounds by itself is insignificant as a claim in lieu of the fact that the whole province is unceded indian land” (2001, p. 113). by the 18 july press release the occupiers identified themselves as “defenders of unceded shuswap territory containing sacred sun dance grounds and burial sites at gustafsen lake.” the release outlines the events of 13 june where a number of aspects of the sun dance ritual were violated, but unlike in earlier releases, the focus is on the jurisdiction argument. the gustafsen lake standoff tensions had been building at the occupation site well before the eviction incident in june. altercations had occurred between the occupiers and campers at the lake as early as 1993. the reason for those confrontations, given to the media, was that campers were being rowdy and disturbing the ceremony. following the armament that proceeded 13 june, shots were allegedly fired near two british columbia forestry workers inspecting timber near the area. in mid-july, an employee of james went into the camp to retrieve stolen materials and shots were fired in his direction as he left. finally, on 18 august a group of ert officers conducting reconnaissance was discovered and shot at by occupiers, transforming the occupation into a standoff. all incidents were related to the disruption of ceremony, violation of sacred space or the encroachment of outsiders onto sacred grounds. four hundred rcmp officers and four armoured personnel carriers (apcs) supplied by the canadian military (under operation wallaby) would converge on the small piece of land outside of 100 mile house in the b.c. interior to confront less than two dozen people. three violent episodes would occur after the initial confrontation, which began the standoff. the first, on 27 august, took place when two ert officers sustained minor wounds when struck by gunfire in their bullet-proof vests. second, on 11 september an “early warning device” planted in an access road to the camp was detonated by rcmp, when a vehicle with occupiers driving to pick up food and water drove over it. the incident set off a gun battle, which involved the use of the apcs. finally, after ordering more apcs, more ammunition and requesting more troops following the firefight, on 12 september a sharpshooter shot at and missed a native man walking through an established no-shoot zone – a mistake they would admit to making during the trial. during the standoff a divide was distinguished between “hawks” and “doves”, which sought to explain violence in the camp as the result of militant factions manipulating the situation in support of their political agenda. news media perpetuated the perception that religious believers in the camp were standing in peaceful defence of perceived religious space and were at odds with sovereigntist militants in the camp (lambertus, 2004). in a 31 august vancouver sun article where national chief ovide 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.3 mercredi confirmed a divide between “hawks and doves”. rosette was depicted as a spiritual man with ties to pacifist organizations, while the other side, represented through another leader of the standoff, william ignace, was depicted as conspiracy theorists and militants (crawley, 1995). during the trial this division continued to perpetuate that religion had no role in the violent confrontation at gustafsen lake. these assertions require further examination. for a number of years william ignace had been actively participating in blockades and occupations in support of indigenous sovereignty. he had also been working with bruce clark in the courts since 1990 trying to have the subject of jurisdiction officially addressed. he was asked by rosette to join them at the lake to ensure that the sun dance took place and told that they would not be removed from the land, which he believed was rightfully that of the shuswap nation (mahony 1997). he was brought to the site for the protection of sacred space and a religious ceremony but he was not an outwardly religious man. splitting the sky (2001) claims that ignace was a man of no religion because of his experiences in residential schools. however, he would also contend that a certain level of power was achieved when ignace joined in dancing and helped to suspend splitting the sky in the sacred arbour. even if ignace’s participation in the ceremony is ignored, he was called to gustafsen lake to protect the sun dance ceremony, which its leaders felt was under threat. four non-indigenous supporters were arrested following the standoff, including videographer trond halle. the sun dance is a ritual strictly for indigenous peoples (at least in this particular case), so non-indigenous participation was forbidden.5 after the 12 september incident a shift in the approach by the rcmp turned their attention back to the religious aspect of gustafsen lake. up until this point negotiation had been attempted primarily through local elected leadership and then, in the early days of the standoff, through the national chief of the assembly of first nations, ovide mercredi. both parties were understood by the occupiers as components of colonial oppression and their involvement was unsurprisingly ineffective. on 13 september, on the same day a spiritual leader from the local penticton band was able to bring someone out of the camp, the rcmp arranged for dakota spiritual leader arvol looking horse to enter the site. looking horse explained to the occupiers that “you can’t have a gun in one hand and a pipe in the other,” implying that violence was not part of the sun dance. while performing a religious ceremony the occupiers agreed to leave the camp after three days. however, this progressive meeting was stifled by the rcmp orchestrated broadcast on cbc radio of a promise of safety from local shuswap leadership, an halle was called to the site by rosette to provide documentation of the occupation as a deterrent against police action. he was not directly involved with the sun dance but he thanked the great spirit for his protection during the occupation and was deeply influenced by rosette’s teachings. in a statement, entitled “the spiritual stand at gustafsen lake” published on the settlers in support of indigenous sovereignty website, he recalled that rosette continually reminded him that “it wasn’t us making the stand at ts’peten – it was the spirit of the ancestors working through us. without our prayers and the prayers of medicine people from all over turtle island, the outcome would have been vastly different” (halle). all those at gustafsen lake were not there necessarily to participate in the sun dance but they were there because of the tense environment surrounding the start of the ceremony. 5 non-indigenous supporter suniva bronson was allowed to observe the sun dance despite splitting the sky’s objections. bronson would be the only person wounded in the standoff, suffering a gunshot wound to the arm during the 11 september firefight. in his autobiography, splitting the sky (2001) would assert that bronson was the only one struck by a bullet in the occupation because she did not have the same spiritual protection as the sun dancers. 11 shrubsole: the sun dance and the gustafsen lake standoff published by scholarship@western, 2011 action to which looking horse (who was unaware of the rcmp plan) criticized the police for not giving him enough time (lee, 1995, p. b2).6 on 17 september it was medicine man john stevens who was able to lead the twelve remaining occupiers out of the camp, ending the standoff. two days afterwards it was discovered that at least three weeks earlier splitting the sky had provided two names to the rcmp regarding mediators for the conflict, looking horse and stevens. rcmp corporal john ward confirmed the list of mediators from splitting the sky, denied that they ignored the importance of spirituality in the conflict and told reporters it was “not a big deal. we knew about these people. we had a list of them. it was a matter of when we were going to use them, plain and simple” (lee, 1995, p. b2). but even in the post-standoff period, even as the importance of religion in resolving the conflict was acknowledged, the promotion of a divide in the camp between a peaceful religious group and a militant political group was embraced to explain the standoff. implications for future policy and action religion was marginalized and excluded by the media, local indigenous leadership and the state due in part to preconceived notions of religion and, in particular, what constitutes indigenous religiosity. while the sun dance is traditionally peaceful, the embodied experience of practitioners in socio-political contexts where they feel oppressed and threatened may provide support for armament, self-sacrifice and defensive violence. this experience and interpretation of the sun dance is one that has emerged in both the united states and canada, playing a role in violent standoffs with the state in both countries, as demonstrated in british columbia and referenced to in south dakota. violence potentially could have been avoided at gustafsen lake. this concluding section provides four suggestions for future policy. 1. a first-step protection of sacred space the primary reason why occupiers converged on the site and armed themselves was the persistent violations towards the space they believed to be sacred, and interruptions to the preparations for the sun dance ceremony. the definition of the dispute as a civil matter and the passive response of the rcmp to violations of the sacred space greatly contributed to the rising tensions at the site. interim measures agreements have been one of the primary methods by which first nations communities have been able, in the short term, to protect their off-reserve sacred sites. ross (2005) explains that these agreements move negotiations toward a more comprehensive understanding of the importance of particular sacred sites. one of the primary issues with the handling of sacred space in canada’s courts, according to ross, is their failure to properly understand the ethic of a site. interim agreements, which provide protection until the conclusion of legal proceedings on a case, provide for the initial and outright protection of sacred sites. ross argues that the religious significance of the space and potential damage to the site should be addressed during this period (although it rarely is) before any action is taken. at the law enforcement level, it is even more important to ensure these sites are protected, not only because of the potential damage they can bring to a religious community, but also 6 arvol looking horse is a respected authority of the lakota sun dance. but, from a sociological perspective, it should not be inferred that he has the only true understanding of the ceremony. in my interview with splitting the sky on march 31, 2011, i asked him what he thought of chief looking horse’s message to the occupiers. he dismissed looking horse’s comments and exclaimed that john stevens was their authority. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.3 the potential violence that could erupt upon the violation of a particular space or the hindrance of a particular ceremony. 2. the prioritization of a more comprehensive understanding of religious traditions the first-step protection is fairly consistent with first nations court proceedings regarding offreserve sacred space – a step gustafsen lake was not afforded. but what is evident in both ross’s study and the one presented here is a failure to utilize a temporary protection in order to ascertain a better understanding of the sacred site and its components. at the lake, comprehensive knowledge of religion in general and this version of the sun dance in particular in the occupation was never adequately sought by the state or local elected leadership. confrontations between the cariboo tribal council and occupiers regarding authority over the space translated into public arguments regarding the authenticity of their religious beliefs. implicitly, the public condemnation of sun dancers applied a particular conception of religion that separated religion from politics and dictated that it should not be associated with violence. the first step in understanding the complexities of religious communities outside of one’s own personal conception of religion involves recognition of the inherent difficulties in such a task. eisenberg (2006) suggests that effectively protecting religious freedom and, in turn, eliminating the prioritization of some religious beliefs over others begins with an acknowledgment of the normative values that are often unknowingly imposed by one person onto another. ross (2005) concurs that this process begins with distinguishing between ‘what is believed’ and ‘what i believe.’ these changes are, in part, a responsibility of the state. canada has yet to adequately address the long-standing relationship between christianity and the state. david seljak (2009) argues that policy makers and most of the canadian public have been content with the de-christianization and subsequent removal of all religion in public schools in its push toward a multicultural polity. he argues that a multicultural canada “lacks credibility when its school system, an important state-controlled vehicle of socialization into a common canadian culture, values, and social institutions for young people, ignores or suppresses a key element in the identity of so many citizens.” canada has “raised a generation of religiously illiterate students” (p. 179). although teaching indigenous spiritualities contains its own set of difficulties,7 a commitment to a diverse religious education program may help to provide the socially and political elite with different conceptual frameworks. this may allow for those in places of authority to perform the necessary “cultural relocation” as ross (2005) calls it. a more complex understanding of religions could help to decrease the application of particular normative forms of religion such as those which occurred at gustafsen lake. 3. the prioritization of the analysis of religion in the long-term, the second suggestion listed above may be very helpful, but in the short-term there have been demonstrated effective methods in avoiding violent confrontations with religious communities, who feel under threat by the state. the rcmp praised their own acts following the standoff arguing that “patience, psychology, and overwhelming firepower” helped to avoid an incident such as that at waco, texas in 1993 between mount carmel davidians and federal authorities which 7 two examples of these difficulties include (1) the pedagogical methods of teaching diverse experiential religious traditions such as those of indigenous spiritualities, and (2) the debate on who has the authority to teach indigenous religious traditions. 13 shrubsole: the sun dance and the gustafsen lake standoff published by scholarship@western, 2011 resulted in the deaths of over 75 people (howard 1996). their efforts may have ensured that no one died at gustafsen lake, but it was not simply a result of psychology and certainly not a result of patience or excessive firepower. the standoff came to a close because the rcmp began to accept the role of religion in the standoff. one of the primary downfalls at waco was that there was no proper analysis conducted of the religious beliefs of david koresh and his new religious movement. following the siege at waco, the u.s. attorney general and federal bureau of investigation (fbi) director, developed a “critical response management policy” to effectively manage situations such as those at waco. this policy included three components: (1) actions should be predicated on known facts; (2) negotiations should dictate strategy; and (3) “the fbi must never hesitate to go outside of government to seek other experts or other people who might help [them] peacefully [resolve] a crisis situation” (rosenfeld 2000, p. 325). in compliance with the third component of this policy, three scholars were called in to provide aid to the fbi during the justus freeman standoff in montana in 1996. jean e. rosenfeld was one of the three scholars contacted by the fbi. she argues that it was the fbi’s willingness to better understand the religious motivations of the group that resulted in a peaceful end to the 81-day standoff. in an article detailing her role in the confrontation, rosenfeld (2000) explains that one of the first tasks she was asked to complete was to divide the freeman into religious and non-religious groups. the fbi assumed that those with criminal records were not religious, but she was able to provide evidence that all the members of the group were in fact religious and they were most likely willing to die for their beliefs. she explains that the fbi’s assumptions regarding those with criminal records were “based on the conventional wisdom that religion is intrinsically good” (p. 330). the assembled scholars informed the fbi that any breach of the perimeter of the site would most likely result in violence. the support provided by rosenfeld and two other scholars established a context in which meaningful dialogue could take place. it can be inferred from the means by which the standoff at gustafsen lake ended that a closer attention to the role of religion may have helped to establish (1) a more suitable environment for effective negotiations and (2) more effective methods of mediation in the early stages of the occupation. 4. the participation of indigenous peoples finally, it has historically been a regrettable choice to make decisions for indigenous peoples when they should be active participants in the legal and political decisions that affect their lives. despite the political differences among indigenous scholars, the overwhelming consensus is that indigenous voices, perspectives and frameworks need to be brought into the legal and political structures that dictate a significant portion of indigenous lives. the socio-economic condition of indigenous communities, and the failure of indigenous schooling that harold cardinal identified over four decades ago, continues to restrict the ability of indigenous peoples to reach significant levels of political and legal influence. an integration of indigenous perspectives such as those proposed by borrows (2002) could help to avoid the need for cultural relocation and promote the broadening of the existing dominant canadian culture. at gustafsen lake, mediators such as the rcmp first nations constables who were able to understand cultural symbolism (such as the presence of eagles) and who were also invited to participate in the sun dance are valuable assets to a state in bridging the perceived disconnect between occupiers and the government. it does not follow that this will quell all dissent or conflict. just as indigenous spiritualities cannot be reduced to the singular, indigenous communities contain many voices. but it has been demonstrated in other cases that possessing the proper knowledge and conceptual frameworks can help to ensure that these situations do not turn violent. continued efforts to address the effects of 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.3 colonialism and the embrace (and comprehension) of indigenous perspectives will undoubtedly help to reduce some of the tensions 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(2000). treaty talks in british columbia. vancouver: ubc press. peltier, l. (1999). prison writings: my life is my sun dance. new york: st. martin’s press. pemberton, k. (1997, july 11). botched siege prompts a native mountie to quit. the vancouver sun, b4. pena, m. (1996). speech by mary pena at la quena coffeehouse (vancouver). settlers in support of indigenous sovereignty. retrieved from http://sisis.nativeweb.org/gustlake/mary.html pitawanakwat, j. (2001). james pitawanakwat’s statement to the court. in the gustafsen lake crisis: statements from the ts’peten defenders (pp. 30-38). montreal: solidarity. platiel, r. (1995, august 29). significant differences between native standoffs. the vancouver sun, p. a4. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.3 rosenfeld, j. a. (2000). the justus freeman standoff: the importance of the analysis of religion in avoiding violent outcomes. in c. wessinger (ed.), millennialism, persecution, & violence (pp. 323-344). syracuse: syracuse university press. ross, m. lee. (2005). first nations’ sacred sites in canada’s courts. vancouver: ubc press. ruml, m. (2009). birds hill park, the dakota eagle sundance, and the sweatlodge: establishing a sacred site in a provincial park. religious studies and theology, 28(2), 189-206. sayer, j. w. (1997). ghost dancing the law: the wounded knee trials. cambridge: harvard university press. seljak, d. (2009). education, multiculturalism, and religion. in p. bramadat, & d. seljak (eds.), religion and ethnicity in canada (pp. 178-200). toronto: university of toronto press. splitting the sky. (2001). the autobiography of splitting the sky: from attica to gustafsen lake. chase, b.c.: john pasquale boncore. stover, d. (2001). postcolonial sun dancing at wakpamni lake. journal of the american academy of religion, 69(4), 817-36. sun dancers denounce militant action. (1995, july 5). 100 mile free press, p. 3. switlo, j. (1997). gustafsen lake under siege: exposing the truth behind the gustafsen lake stand-off. peachland, b.c.: tiac communications. 17 shrubsole: the sun dance and the gustafsen lake standoff published by scholarship@western, 2011 the international indigenous policy journal october 2011 the sun dance and the gustafsen lake standoff: healing through resistance and the danger of dismissing religion nicholas d. shrubsole recommended citation the sun dance and the gustafsen lake standoff: healing through resistance and the danger of dismissing religion abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license the sun dance and the gustafsen lake standoff: healing through resistance and the danger of dismissing religion social determinants of indigenous health and indigenous rights in policy: a scoping review and analysis of problem representation the international indigenous policy journal volume 10 | issue 2 article 4 april 2019 social determinants of indigenous health and indigenous rights in policy: a scoping review and analysis of problem representation emma george flinders university, emma.george@flinders.edu.au tamara mackean flinders university, tamara.mackean@flinders.edu.au fran baum flinders university, fran.baum@flinders.edu.au matt fisher flinders university, matt.fisher@flinders.edu.au recommended citation george, e. , mackean, t. , baum, f. , fisher, m. (2019). social determinants of indigenous health and indigenous rights in policy: a scoping review and analysis of problem representation. th e international indigenous policy journal, 10(2) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.4 social determinants of indigenous health and indigenous rights in policy: a scoping review and analysis of problem representation abstract despite evidence showing the importance of social determinants of indigenous health and indigenous rights for health and equity, they are not always recognised within policy. this scoping review identified research on public policy and indigenous health through a systematic search. key themes identified included the impact of ongoing colonisation; the central role of government in realising rights; and the difficulties associated with the provision of mainstream services for indigenous peoples, including tokenism towards indigenous issues and the legacy of past policies of assimilation. our approach to problem representation was guided by bacchi (2009). findings from the review show social determinants of indigenous health and indigenous rights may be acknowledged in policy rhetoric, but they are not always a priority for action within policy implementation. keywords social determinants of indigenous health, rights, self-determination, problem representation acknowledgments this work was supported by the nhmrc centre of research excellence on the social determinants of health equity: policy research on the social determinants of health equity (app1078046). the authors acknowledge the contribution of peer reviewers and thank them for their feedback and recommendations, which enhanced the quality of the article. disclaimer the authors of this article acknowledge that we live and work on the traditional lands of the kaurna people of the adelaide plains. creative commons license creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ social determinants of indigenous health and indigenous rights in policy: a scoping review and analysis of problem representation according to the commission on the social determinants of health (2008), the social determinants of health are the conditions in which people are born, grow, live, work, and age. inequalities in health are caused by the unfair distribution of power, income, goods, and services, and consequences are evident in limited access to health care, education, work, leisure, and healthy communities. in addition, there is growing recognition of the social determinants of indigenous health, which recognise the adverse health impacts of issues such as racism, and the health benefits of strong cultural identity, connection to country, sovereignty, and indigenous knowledges (anderson, baum, & bentley, 2007; carson, dunbar, chenhall, & bailie, 2007). these perspectives reflect an australian aboriginal and torres strait islander definition of health, which is: not just [about] the physical well-being of an individual but refers to the social, emotional, and cultural well-being of the whole community, in which each individual is able to achieve their full potential as a human being, thereby bringing about the total well-being of their community. (national aboriginal community controlled health organisation, 2006, aboriginal health section, para. 1) similarly, durie (1985) described a maori definition of health founded upon spiritual, psychic, and family dimensions, rather than just a physical biomedical approach to health. he emphasised the importance of cultural factors that affect the health of communities as a whole. in addition, canadian research on health as defined by first nations people showed that health transcends an individual perspective to include family, community, and the environment (levesque & li, 2014; levesque, li, & bohemier, 2013). research has shown there are significant deficits in conceptualisation and implementation of social determinants of health in policy. carter, hooker, and davey (2009) analysed the way that social determinants were acknowledged, audited, recommended, or linked with aims in cancer policy. in their view, where social determinants were acknowledged, the naming of social determinants appeared to be ritualistic, “an incantation to be said before the policy or plan got on with the real business of reducing risk” (p. 1451). they explained that inclusion of social determinants in a policy’s aims did not necessarily lead to recommendations for action. another study by phillips et al. (2016) explored social determinants in australian child and youth health policies. they found that all of the policies analysed acknowledged social determinants to some extent; however, the strategies proposed to address these issues were few and limited in scope. they concluded that the broader determinants of health are either considered outside the scope of the health sector, or not a priority. a third study by fisher, baum, macdougall, newman, and mcdermott (2016) found that, although social determinants were generally acknowledged in australian health policy documents, “policies generally did not recognise broader policy settings affecting the overall distribution of socioeconomic resources as determinants of health inequities” (p. 553). in addition, key determinants of indigenous health such as racism, cultural identify, or strong community governance structures were very rarely identified in policies (carson et al., 2007). the lack of social determinants in policy is prevalent across colonised countries and indigenous peoples globally have experienced health inequity and lower life expectancy than non-indigenous people. policy research can advance understanding of more effective ways to address social determinants of health and 1 george et al.: social determinants of indigenous health and rights in policy published by scholarship@western, 2019 promote the fair distribution of health in society (baum & friel, 2014). however, research has shown that the implementation of policy does not always result in effective action on health inequities affecting indigenous peoples (comino, knight, & webster, 2012; dwyer, kelly, willis, & mackean, 2011; osborne, baum, & brown, 2013; ziersch, gallaher, baum, & bentley, 2011). this may be in part because policy implementation fails to support self-determination (tynan, 2013) and does not attend to social determinants of indigenous health (carson et al., 2007). in this article, we recognise similar experiences of discrimination and inequality across high-income colonised countries; therefore, we have focused our research on policy and social determinants of health in australia, new zealand, canada, and the united states of america. collectively, we acknowledge there are indigenous peoples within each nation with shared experiences of inequity but with diverse cultural identities. the united nations (2007) adopted the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip) in 2007. this affirmed the dignity and rights of the world’s indigenous peoples. the declaration addressed both individual and collective rights including equality and freedom from discrimination, self-determination, and the maintenance and strengthening of indigenous institutions (healey, 2014). self-determination is the right to freely determine political status and to pursue economic, social, and cultural development (australian human rights commission, n.d.). the declaration has been described as important because it opposes discrimination and assimilation policies; however, davis (2007) acknowledged it is a non-binding human rights instrument, and it was not initially endorsed by the australian, new zealand, canadian, or american governments. in order to understand what does and does not work to improve indigenous health, we must examine the extent to which indigenous knowledge, a vital component, is incorporated into action on social determinants of health. durie (2005) described indigenous knowledge as dynamic and based on collective and holistic principles, rather than individual or reductionist ones (hart, 2010). indigenous knowledge is shared and communicated orally and through culture. it is stored in “people’s memories and activities and is expressed in stories, songs, folklore, proverbs, dances, myths, cultural values, beliefs, rituals, community laws, local language and taxonomy, agricultural practices, equipment, materials, plant species and animal breeds” (grenier, 1998, p. 2). sherwood (2010) and hart (2010) both described indigenous knowledge as relational and communally oriented, as well as founded on notions of respect, responsibility, and reciprocity. hernandez (2012) explained that indigenous knowledge is fundamentally different than western scientific knowledge, and that research has most often taken power and legitimacy away from indigenous knowledge. however, indigenous knowledge is important in understanding social determinants of indigenous health. it is necessary in promoting policy implementation and action aligned with broader definitions of health and well-being. focus of literature review bacchi (2009) proposed that policy analysis should explore the ways particular issues are conceived as “problems,” how problems are represented in policy, and how we are governed by these problem representations. we began with a literature review to scope and analyse the literature that focuses on policy relevant to indigenous people globally, the social determinants of health, and indigenous rights. this review sought to answer the question: in what ways are social determinants of indigenous health and indigenous rights recognised in public policy? then we drew on a bacchian approach to analyse problem representation in order to identify the ways in which problems have been framed. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.4 methods search strategy a scoping review of the literature allows synthesis of research evidence to map existing literature, summarise knowledge gaps, and make recommendations for future research (peters et al., 2015). our search strategy was designed to identify literature addressing themes of indigenous rights and social determinants of indigenous health in policy relevant to the last decade. the authors’ knowledge and experience with australian policy informed the search; however, we sought literature from comparable colonised countries: new zealand, canada, and the united states. we recognise that indigenous peoples in these countries are subject to health inequities similar to those affecting aboriginal and torres strait islander people in australia (jackson pulver et al., 2010). therefore, the search strategy was not limited to literature only in the australian context. in collaboration with a university librarian, subject categories and key search terms (shown in table 1) were identified and the search was initially run through these databases: medline, scopus, informit, proquest, and australian policy online. sources that were not in english were excluded. table 1. literature search categories and terms categories search terms health health* or wellbeing or "well-being" policy policy or policies or "self determin*" or decoloni* or colonis* or coloniz* or assimilat* or power* or empower* social determinants of health social* or socio* or determinant* or marginali* or poverty or welfare or cultur* or acculturat* or psychosocial* or family* or families or medicali* or urbani* or network* or support or literate or literacy or education* or employment or unemploy* indigenous indigenous or indigeneit* or aborigin* or "torres strait*" or "first nation*" or "first people*" or maori or "american indian*" or inuit* or métis 3 george et al.: social determinants of indigenous health and rights in policy published by scholarship@western, 2019 alerts were created through the databases to identify any new records as they were published. additional searches were run through the closing the gap clearinghouse website and australian indigenous healthinfonet to identify australian records that may have been missed by the larger databases. in order to search for further literature related to new zealand, canada, and the united states, we included a targeted search within two relevant international peer-reviewed journals. the peer review of this article led to suggestions for additional sources, which were included in the results. records were excluded if they focused on program evaluation and outcomes rather than on policy, or if the literature focused on recommendations for policy in the future, rather than research on current policy. this narrowed the results to focus on policy and implementation rather than service evaluation. grey literature from a variety of sources was included to add critical commentary and insight on policy implementation. all records were imported into nvivo11 qualitative analysis software and coded using thematic analysis. the process and results of the search strategy are shown in figure 1. thematic analysis an initial thematic analysis of the literature was done using nvivo software. a coding framework was developed that allowed for flexibility and development of additional codes to capture new concepts as they emerged. themes that were specifically sought from the literature included social determinants of indigenous health, indigenous rights, and self-determination. other themes on colonisation, the role of government, and the provision of mainstream services emerged from the data. in addition, records were cross-examined to explore themes that were missing or clustered in only certain types of literature (e.g., peer-reviewed literature, government and non-government reports, policy audits, commentaries, etc.). the analysis enabled identification of gaps in the literature. we then used bacchi’s “what’s the problem represented to be” approach to critically analyse results from the thematic analysis and to identify the ways in which problems have been framed (bacchi, 2009). problem representation can be explicit or implicit, and it can be underpinned by assumptions that lead some things being problematized and others not. therefore, analysis was both an inductive data driven approach to identify themes that emerged from the literature, and deductive where preconceived themes were sought from the literature as recommended by multiple authors (dixon-woods, agarwal, jones, young, & sutton, 2005; saks & allsop, 2007). bacchi’s (2009) approach allowed us to explore the following questions: • how are indigenous peoples, health, and rights represented as policy problems? • how have such problem representations come about? • what are the effects produced by such problem representation in limiting policy goals and strategies, or silencing other alternatives? 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.4 figure 1. scoping review search strategy and results. records identified through database search (n): medline (137), scopus (217), informit (372), proquest (125), australian policy online (220), ctg clearinghouse (58), australian indigenous healthinfonet (433) (n = 1,130) records identified through journal search (n): the international indigenous policy journal (45), journal for health policy and management (49) (n = 94) records screened by title (n): medline (31), scopus (29), informit (41), proquest (26), australian policy online (43), ctg clearinghouse (13), australian indigenous healthinfonet (20) (n = 183 ) records screened by title (n): the international indigenous policy journal (14), journal for health policy and management (3) (n = 17) duplicates removed (n = 141) records after duplicates removed (n = 59) records excluded by abstract (n = 19) records after being screened by abstract (n = 40) records from search alerts (n = 3) records identified through peer review (n = 9) records excluded by full text (n = 18) records included for review (n = 34) 5 george et al.: social determinants of indigenous health and rights in policy published by scholarship@western, 2019 results a total of 34 records were included in this scoping review (figure 1). records included an edited book chapter, peer-reviewed journal articles, government and non-government reports, commentaries, conference papers, and a public lecture. the diverse genres provide alternate perspectives on policy and implementation with regard to social determinants and indigenous populations. among the records, 19 were primarily focused on an australian context, 10 canadian (one of these included a comparison with norway, and two others compared the canadian context with other colonised countries), three from new zealand (one of these included a comparison to social policy in fiji), and two from the united states. the included sources are provided in table 2. overview as expected, themes of social determinants of health, indigenous rights, and self-determination were discussed throughout the literature. our results showed that the ways that social determinants of indigenous health and indigenous rights are recognised in policy are contested. much of the literature recognised social determinants of indigenous health, especially the importance of culture. however, even when social determinants and rights are written into policy, this does not always result in action in these areas (australian institute of health and welfare, 2016; cooper, 2011; klein, 2015; robertson, conigrave, ivers, usher, & clough, 2012; d. smith, 2007). in addition, the ongoing impact of colonisation emerged as a central theme. the literature highlighted a contrast between a colonising deficit-based approach to policy and one that stresses the value and strength of indigenous cultures and individual or community capabilities (carter et al., 2009; klein, 2015; sullivan, 2011). even though cultural inheritance and maintenance may be acknowledged in policy as important for individuals (australian institute of health and welfare, 2016), cooper (2011) argued that indigenous expression of culture through language and use of traditional lands “are not generally considered indicators of ‘progress’ by governments” (p. 14). he went on to suggest that culture in this sense has been seen as a problem, rather than part of the solution, and therefore has been excluded from policy. other themes that emerged from the data analysis focused on the role of the government and on the provision of mainstream services for indigenous peoples. within both themes, the literature reviewed emphasised a need for commitment across governments and communities to working together (bishop, vicary, browne, & guard, 2009; cooper, 2011; kelaher et al., 2015; meo-sewabu & walsh-tapiata, 2012; victorian council of social service, 2016). however, there was also a consistent view that the depth or quality of collaboration, consultation, engagement, involvement, partnership, or participation reported was variable. browne et al. (2017) highlighted that policy actors in their study advocated for “genuine” or “meaningful” partnerships, suggesting that previous partnerships had not reflected these characteristics. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.4 table 2. summary of sources included in the analysis author date country source type themes identified 1. anderson 2007 australia commentary • colonisation • indigenous rights and selfdetermination 2. australian institute of health and welfare 2016 australia government report • role of government • social determinants of indigenous health • indigenous rights and selfdetermination 3. bishop, vicary, browne, & guard 2009 australia peer-reviewed case study • colonisation • indigenous rights and selfdetermination 4. black & mcbean 2016 canada peer-reviewed policy analysis • colonisation • social determinants of indigenous health • indigenous rights and selfdetermination 5. brown 2009 australia peer-reviewed policy literature review • colonisation • mainstream services • indigenous rights and selfdetermination 6. browne, de leeuw, gleeson, adams, atkinson, & hayes 2017 australia peer-reviewed policy analysis • colonisation • mainstream services • social determinants of indigenous health 7. cooke & mcwhirter 2011 canada peer-reviewed policy analysis • colonisation • mainstream services 8. cooper 2011 australia nongovernment report • colonisation • role of government • mainstream services • social determinants of indigenous health • indigenous rights and selfdetermination 7 george et al.: social determinants of indigenous health and rights in policy published by scholarship@western, 2019 table 2. summary of sources included in the analysis (continued) author date country source type themes identified 9. cox 2011 australia commentary • colonisation • role of government 10. dwyer, boulton, lavoie, tenbensel, & cumming 2014 canada, new zealand, and australia peer-reviewed policy analysis • colonisation • role of government • mainstream services 11. fisher, battams, mcdermott, baum, & macdougall 2018 australia peer-reviewed policy analysis • role of government • social determinants of health • indigenous rights and selfdetermination 12. hill 2008 united states peer-reviewed policy literature review • colonisation 13. hudson 2009 australia nongovernment report • role of government 14. kelaher, sabanovic, la brooy, lock, uddin, & brown 2015 australia nongovernment report • role of government • indigenous rights and selfdetermination 15. kelly 2011 canada peer-reviewed policy analysis • colonisation • role of government • indigenous rights and selfdetermination 16. klein 2015 australia nongovernment report • colonisation • mainstream services • social determinants of indigenous health • indigenous rights and selfdetermination 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.4 table 2. summary of sources included in the analysis (continued) author date country source type themes identified 17. lavoie, boulton, & gervais 2012 canada & new zealand peer-reviewed policy analysis • colonisation • indigenous rights and selfdetermination 18. lavoie 2014 canada and norway peer-reviewed policy analysis • colonisation • mainstream services • indigenous rights and selfdetermination 19. lavoie & dwyer 2016 canada and australia peer-reviewed policy analysis • colonisation • role of government • indigenous rights and selfdetermination 20. lawrence 2013 australia commentary • colonisation 21. lindstedt, moellersaxone, black, herrman, & szwarc 2017 australia peer-reviewed policy analysis • colonisation • social determinants of indigenous health 22. meo-sewabu & walsh-tapiata 2012 new zealand & fiji peer-reviewed policy analysis • colonisation • indigenous rights and selfdetermination 23. mitchell & macleod 2014 canada peer-reviewed policy analysis • colonisation • indigenous rights and selfdetermination 24. munshi, kurian, morrison, & morrison 2016 new zealand peer-reviewed policy analysis • colonisation 25. robertson, conigrave, ivers, usher, & clough 2012 australia peer-reviewed qualitative research • colonisation • social determinants of indigenous health • indigenous rights and selfdetermination 9 george et al.: social determinants of indigenous health and rights in policy published by scholarship@western, 2019 table 2. summary of sources included in the analysis (continued) author date country source type themes identified 26. ronald & koea 2013 new zealand edited book chapter • colonisation • mainstream services • social determinants of indigenous health • indigenous rights and selfdetermination 27. russell 2010 australia commentary • colonisation 28. shewell 2016 canada peer-reviewed policy analysis • colonisation • indigenous rights and selfdetermination 29. smith 2007 australia conference paper • colonisation • role of government • mainstream services • social determinants of indigenous health • indigenous rights and selfdetermination 30. stanley 2011 australia public lecture • colonisation • indigenous rights and selfdetermination 31. sullivan 2011 australia nongovernment report • role of government • mainstream services • indigenous rights and selfdetermination 32. unal 2018 united states peer-reviewed policy analysis • colonisation • role of government • mainstream services • social determinants of indigenous health • indigenous rights and selfdetermination 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.4 table 2. summary of sources included in the analysis (continued) author date country source type themes identified 33. victorian council of social service (vcoss) 2016 australia nongovernment report • role of government • mainstream services • social determinants of indigenous health • indigenous rights and selfdetermination 34. wilmot 2018 canada peer-reviewed policy analysis • colonisation • role of government • mainstream services • social determinants of indigenous health • indigenous rights and selfdetermination theme 1: colonisation past and present multiple authors viewed colonisation as a determinant of the health of indigenous peoples with multiple adverse impacts (brown, 2009; klein, 2015; lavoie, 2014; lavoie & dwyer, 2016; munshi, kurian, morrison, & morrison, 2016; wilmot, 2018). unal (2018) explained that colonisers to the united states of america drew on doctrines of discovery and conquest to dispossess indigenous peoples from land and to challenge sovereign rights. cooper (2011) argued that colonial policies that dislocate indigenous peoples from their homelands, prevent indigenous self-determination, undermine economic and social development, and fragment families are directly linked to the poor health of indigenous children globally. following from this, he surmised that australian policies have assumed control of the lives of aboriginal people, resulting in “increased feelings of frustration, disempowerment, stress and anxiety and the associated incidence of chronic illness” (p. 11). in addition, black and mcbean (2016) described colonisation as destructive, with far reaching consequences for aboriginal peoples in canada. peer-reviewed literature from both australia (bishop et al., 2009; brown, 2009; browne et al., 2017; lindstedt, moeller-saxone, black, herrman, & szwarc, 2017; robertson et al., 2012; stanley, 2008) and canada (cooke & mcwhirter, 2011; mitchell & macleod, 2014; shewell, 2016) described the damage caused by past policies of segregation, marginalisation, and assimilation. one particularly damaging characteristic of colonisation described was the forced removal of indigenous children from families in australia, the united states, and canada (black & mcbean, 2016; brown, 2009; hill, 2008; lavoie, 2014; mitchell & macleod, 2014; shewell, 2016; unal, 2018). bishop et al. (2009) argued that aboriginal children are still removed from families in australia, but in a more sophisticated manner through the welfare system, noting that while current policies are written to focus on “child welfare” rather than forced removal, aboriginal children are “still 11 george et al.: social determinants of indigenous health and rights in policy published by scholarship@western, 2019 removed at a rate over six times more than non-aboriginal children” (p. 113). lindstedt et al. (2017) stated that in 2015 aboriginal and torres strait islander children were living in out of home care at a rate of 52.5 per 1000 children, compared to 8.1 per 1000 children for the total population, indicating the rate of removal was 9 times more likely for indigenous children. the grey literature from the non-government sector also recognised ongoing impacts of colonisation. klein (2015) described australian policies as paternalistic, directive, and deficit based. d. smith (2007) argued coercion is a policy instrument to enable government control over aboriginal people, and this has disempowered indigenous peoples since colonisation. she argued that “the history of indigenous affairs in australia shows that coercion rarely leads to sustained positive outcomes. on the contrary, often it has led to unintended consequences that have exacerbated problems and created profound misery on the ground” (p. 7). an example of “failed policy” (russell, 2010) attributed to ongoing colonisation was the australian government’s northern territory emergency response (anderson, 2007; cooper, 2011; cox, 2011; lawrence, 2013; d. smith, 2007), about which brown (2009) stated that “developments in the northern territory demonstrate that governments are still willing to exercise strict and punitive controls over aboriginal individuals and communities” (p. 1563). black and mcbean (2016) argued that decolonisation in policy would reflect a more holistic approach to addressing the health concerns of indigenous communities. there were five sources that drew attention to decolonisation in policy through the treaty of waitangi in new zealand; this included the three sources that focused on policy in new zealand and two other comparative studies (dwyer, boulton, lavoie, tenbensel, & cumming, 2014; lavoie, boulton, & gervais, 2012; meo-sewabu & walshtapiata, 2012; munshi et al., 2016; ronald & koea, 2013). lavoie (2014) explained that new zealand was the final british colony to be settled and this government was committed to avoiding the complex and violent experiences of other colonies, and maori people were able to exert their sovereign rights (ronald & koea, 2013). as a result, integration was prioritised over marginalisation or containment, and this led to the treaty of waitangi. this treaty helps incorporate maori values and ideology into social and health policies. the maori concept of whanau ora (family health) has become a priority for health services promoting a focus on well-being more aligned with an indigenous definition of health (dwyer et al., 2014). the treaty of waitangi provides an example of policy that does not represent indigenous peoples as a policy problem. while the policy implications of the treaty remain contested (ronald & koea, 2013), it has been shown to provide a framework for collaboration (carter et al., 2009) because consultation with maori on policy matters is required by law (munshi et al., 2016). ronald and koea (2013) explained, “any discussion concerning the health of maori in modern society must consider the historical, cultural and social context in which maori have arrived in the 21st century” (p. 173). maori people have fought for their right to self-determination since the treaty was first signed in 1840. meosewabu and walsh-tapiata (2012) highlighted that there are lessons to be learned from maori advocates who have “determinedly reclaimed and revitalised many aspects of their culture in order to preserve and transfer these to future generations” (p. 306). they argued that cultural preservation is essential, and policy must incorporate a commitment to human rights and an indigenous concept of health and well-being. unal (2018) described treaties with indigenous people in the united states as a cornerstone of policy, but further explained that they have been limited in reach and time. these treaties do not carry the same weight as the new zealand treaty of waitangi because implementation is discretionary and shaped by funding rather than community need. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.4 the canadian policy context is built upon treaty obligations; whereby the government has an obligation to assume responsibility for the health of first nations people (lavoie & dwyer, 2016). in addition, canadian constitutional recognition acknowledges the rights of first nations, inuit, and métis to selfgovernment. wilmot (2018) explained that this provides a foundation for decolonisation with the potential to improve cultural sensitivity with the health care system and include more holistic and collective approaches to health and well-being. kelly (2011), lavoie and dwyer (2016), and wilmot (2018) all recognised that there has been a shift in canadian policy from assimilation towards advocacy and self-governance, especially in the province of british columbia. however, wilmot (2018) argued that the legacy of colonialism remains a barrier to implementing decolonising policy because first nations people continue to be perceived as “inferior and exotic” and “health care for first nations people has been seen as a separate, marginal matter” (p. 13). theme 2: role of government in addition to criticism of colonial policies and their enduring effects, there was also criticism of contemporary policy implementation and the role of government, which added to our understanding of how problem representations have come about. unal (2018) explained indigenous health policy has a “long, complicated and often turbulent history… resulting in complicated interactions between federal, state, tribal, and other programs with various funding sources and systems of governance” (p. 267). kelly (2011) attributed jurisdictional gaps and longstanding debate between levels of government to the uncoordinated and fragmented health system. cooper (2011) argued that policy created in “silos” leads to poorly coordinated objectives and outcomes across government departments. cox (2011) suggested that australian policies have been ineffective and not often evaluated. kelaher et al. (2015) maintained that policy evaluations have concentrated on the achievement of defined outcomes at the expense of process. more specifically, sullivan (2011) described national australian policies such as the national indigenous reform agreement as bound by “political shackles” (p. 19). he argued that the structure of these agreements, which tie federal and state governments to each other, has resulted in “solutions” that cannot respond to local problems. fisher, battams, mcdermott, baum, and macdougall (2018) highlighted an exception to this in australia in the national aboriginal and torres strait islander health plan. in this policy, community control and partnership between indigenous leaders and the government was seen as a priority, which contrasted indigenous leaders’ assessment of past policy processes (including the national indigenous reform agreement) in which attempts to form partnerships were inadequate. fisher et al. (2018) argued that this leadership and advocacy was cruicial in the successul intergration of social determinants of indigneous health into national health policy. d. smith (2007) noted that government has a role in creating broader complex policy processes that are reflected in the unnecessary multiplication of programs and onerous funding processes. she argued that governments have not recognised the “extent to which government funding arrangements have exacerbated community and organisational dysfunction and poor governance” (p. 11). hudson (2009) suggested that these funding complexities make accountability impossible and that “fewer than half of the aboriginal health services file annual reports or complete their financial reporting requirements” (p. 1). in addition, accountability was described in the literature as primarily one-way where recipients of funding are accountable for the spending and outcomes. however, dwyer et al. (2014) argued that tensions concerning accountability have deep roots in perspectives that problematize indigenous peoples. they advocated for an alternative understanding of accountability where identity is negotiated, and obligations and commitments are reciprocal. wilmot (2018) agreed that reciprocal accountability 13 george et al.: social determinants of indigenous health and rights in policy published by scholarship@western, 2019 would support collaboration and a transformation agenda away from colonising policy. other literature highlighted a call for long-term funding (anderson, 2007; australian institute of health and welfare, 2016; cooper, 2011; dwyer et al., 2014; kelly, 2011; lavoie & dwyer, 2016) that would incorporate sustained and consistent effort across government (victorian council of social service, 2016) and reflect a stronger commitment to action on social determinants of health, which in turn would address issues of health inequity. theme 3: mainstream services the literature described an expectation from the australian, new zealand, and canadian governments that mainstream health services respond to the needs of indigenous peoples (brown, 2009; browne et al., 2017; ronald & koea, 2013; victorian council of social service, 2016) and the assumption that if this occurred indigenous peoples would then be more likely to use these services (cooke & mcwhirter, 2011; cooper, 2011; klein, 2015; sullivan, 2011). many discussions from “mainstream services” continue to contest both of these ideas and represent indigenous people as a policy problem. even when mainstream services adopt targeted strategies to meet needs of the indigenous community, it can reflect a cheap, underfunded version of welfare that does not meet expectations of the community or the organisations (lavoie, 2014). in an example from new zealand, maori people had concerns that mainstream services offered superficial appeasement, or at worst appropriation, of traditional customs, protocol, and culture (ronald & koea, 2013). lavoie (2014) and unal (2018) described mainstream services as a western model of health care that excludes traditional health practices. wilmot (2018) recognised the provision of services in canada within a mainstream system as having the potential for greater indigenous participation and closer coordination with community; however, the impact on health and well-being is difficult to quantify. the literature showed that, in the provision of mainstream services, the government decides what the most effective health care is without considering indigenous knowledge, beliefs, traditions, or customs. this “undermines self-determination, self-government, and the sovereignty of [indigenous] people” (unal, 2018, p. 266). in addition, expectations that indigenous health and well-being is best achieved by integrating people into mainstream services (klein, 2015) is criticised by sullivan (2011) as “normalisation.” on one hand, normalisation can reflect a commitment to equality whereby all people have equal access to services. on the other hand, however, the process of normalisation undermines diversity and cultural practices and does not take account of how accessible services are to different groups. sullivan (2011) and lavoie (2014) both connected this process of normalisation to assimilation. sullivan (2011) argued that current australian policies reflect this type of normalisation. cooper (2011) argued that requiring aboriginal peoples to access mainstream services subjects them “to increased levels of government control, surveillance and intervention in the name of addressing disadvantage and community dysfunction” (p. 19). in addition, dwyer et al. (2014) explained that mainstream service providers are bound by complex funding and report requirements that are subject to increased monitoring by funding bodies. this is another example of how indigenous peoples are represented as a problem. d. smith (2007) suggested that while people may have to access mainstream services, “indigenous people will never leave their culture to one side; they will not be assimilated” (p. 12). despite access to mainstream services, indigenous health and disadvantage has shown little improvement in australia. cooper (2011) concluded that the model needs reassessment because there is a silence in policy about alternatives, such as community-controlled health services. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.4 theme 4: social determinants of indigenous health action on social determinants, including cultural determinants, were identified as essential components to improve health in this review (australian institute of health and welfare, 2016; black & mcbean, 2016; cooper, 2011; klein, 2015; lindstedt et al., 2017; robertson et al., 2012; d. smith, 2007; sullivan, 2011). ronald and koea (2013) described a maori definition of health that is connected to relationships with one another, community, and the land, which, in their view, is consistent with global indigenous orientation towards holistic views of health and well-being. both the article by browne et al. (2017) and the report by the victorian council of social service (2016) recognised a holistic view of health and the importance of the social determinants of indigenous health. however, browne et al. (2017) highlighted that even though an aboriginal definition of health may be quoted in policy documents, it does not always lead to holistic approaches to health in policy implementation. unal (2018) explained that united states federal government acts may have laid a foundation for wideranging community-based health approaches, including social determinants of indigenous health and self-determination, but implementation is lacking, and there has been no assurance of action on social determinants of indigenous health. a specific example of policy that has recognised social determinants of indigenous health is the australian national aboriginal and torres strait islander health plan. fisher et al. (2018) described the way that policy actors responded to a window of opportunity to challenge conventional problem definitions and to place social determinants of indigenous health at the centre of health policy for the first time. their analysis showed that despite a commitment to partnership and collaboration, this policy was unclear in implementation and was not fully funded. these findings suggest that the representation of indigenous peoples as the policy problem overshadows evidence supporting action on social determinants of indigenous health. when indigenous knowledge and understanding of health are identified in policy but not acted on, the position of “other” is maintained as interesting but not worthy of action. wilmot (2018) argued that the devaluing of indigenous knowledge in the health care system has had a negative impact on health and well-being. theme 5: indigenous rights and self-determination there was consensus in the reviewed documents that undrip should call on governments to account for the support of indigenous rights in policy and practice. black and mcbean (2016) argued that the recognition of indigenous rights and commitment to self-determination are essential for the health of aboriginal peoples. however, existing policies on indigenous rights appear to be at best incompatible with the declaration and at worst a violation of rights (australian institute of health and welfare, 2016; cooper, 2011; klein, 2015; meo-sewabu & walsh-tapiata, 2012; mitchell & macleod, 2014; shewell, 2016). cooper (2011) argued that the australian government’s actions within current policy breech many articles of the declaration, such as those that refer to control and “indigenous rights to selfdetermination, participation in policy development and implementation, and the ability to practise and maintain their unique cultures” (p. 2). shewell (2016) suggested the initial resistance by australia, new zealand, canada, and the united states governments to adopt the declaration reveals “an inherent, ideological aversion to collective rights” (p. 188). brown (2009) described self-determination as implemented in australia as a “failed experiment” (p. 1562). she argued in general terms, without referring to the content of specific policies, that the move to embrace self-determination in australian policy was conceived without infrastructure or resources to ensure sustainability. as a result, policy makers have continued to view aboriginal and torres strait islander people from a deficit perspective 15 george et al.: social determinants of indigenous health and rights in policy published by scholarship@western, 2019 and represent them as policy problems. the outcome of these processes is often policies that contain hollow promises of indigenous equality and that lack indigenous political representation. d. smith (2007) argued that successive australian governments have fundamentally failed to invest in indigenous self-governance despite cases in which indigenous communities successfully “establish[ed] good governance” and thereby “secur[ed] important social, cultural and economic outcomes” (p. 9) using a strengths-based approach. the limited implementation and lack of funding for the national aboriginal and torres strait islander health plan, which included culture at the centre of health policy, is further evidence of the lack of action on policy that promotes social determinants of indigenous health (fisher et al., 2018). lavoie and dwyer (2016) highlighted that, without a treaty with indigenous peoples in australia, self-determination is not a priority for the australian government and constitutional reform may be required to fully address issues of governance and health equity. on balance, the literature suggested that self-determination was lacking in policy. however, there were many examples of policy discussed in the literature that involved forms of engagement between policy makers and indigenous peoples. these were described in terms of consultation, collaboration, community engagement, partnership, or participation (australian institute of health and welfare, 2016; bishop et al., 2009; kelaher et al., 2015; kelly, 2011; meo-sewabu & walsh-tapiata, 2012; robertson et al., 2012; ronald & koea, 2013; sullivan, 2011; victorian council of social service, 2016). some considered indigenous “voice” in policy as essential for improving health equity, especially given the history of marginalisation (kelaher et al., 2015; victorian council of social service, 2016). however, we found in this review that the depth, quality, and purpose of indigenous engagement in policy are contested and not the same as a commitment to self-determination. black and mcbean (2016) described consultation as a primarily “western approach to indigenous involvement” (p. 14) that actually disempowers aboriginal people, resulting in negative outcomes for health and the environment. for example, anderson (2007) described past australian policy as “paternalistic,” and it did not demonstrate a true commitment to working collaboratively. similarly, lavoie (2014) argued that few health services in canada include aboriginal input in decision making, service planning, or design. strategies described in the literature used to engage with indigenous peoples and communities are varied and can be tokenistic (kelaher et al., 2015). consultation is a concept that appears to be understood differently by different parties (australian institute of health and welfare, 2016). mitchell and macleod (2014) argued that there is a rhetoric of consultation but a lack of subsequent action. an example from klein (2015) suggested that consultation has been “more to convince local people of the merit of preconceived policies and principles than to inform the policies themselves, and allow deliberation and community participation” (p. 7). fisher et al. (2018) also found that, even when policy is driven by consultation and a strength-based approach, action on social determinants of indigenous health is often left unimplemented or unfunded. another approach to policy described in the literature, which would alter the representation of indigenous peoples and cultures to a strengths-based view, is the embedding of indigenous knowledge into policy and action. this is described by black and mcbean (2016) as an important foundation for decolonisation and improving health. they proposed that the inclusion of indigenous knowledge in policy ensures “the recognition of inherent rights, the ability of indigenous communities to participate fully and meaningfully in decisions that affect their people, and the transition to self-determination” (p. 7). they advocated for a bottom-up approach to policy; whereby, indigenous knowledge is respected and sought out by policy makers, which would shift the problem representation away from indigenous 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.4 peoples. wilmot (2018) described the integration of knowledges as an overlapping of boundaries where two cultural worlds interface, are mutually identifiable and reinforced, but also interact. respecting indigenous knowledge in this way supports local indigenous participation in policy making, and implementation can move beyond tokenistic consultation (kelaher et al., 2015; klein, 2015; mitchell & macleod, 2014) and paternalistic approaches to policy design and action (anderson et al., 2007). discussion the literature in this review showed barriers and limitations to recognising social determinants of indigenous health and indigenous rights in policy. the treaty of waitangi in new zealand provided evidence of the way that maori people have withstood the forces of colonisation and had this recognised in policy. the national aboriginal and torres strait islander health plan in australia reframed policy problems and deficits and positioned culture at the centre of the policy. however, policy implementation has been inconsistent or tokenistic. the failure of policy action on social determinants of indigenous health is not a result of a lack of advocacy and resistance to colonisation; rather, it highlights the lack of indigenous rights and sovereignty in policy, which would support social determinants of indigenous health. the themes identified in the results of this review all contribute to answering the following questions: • how are indigenous peoples, health, and rights represented as policy problems? • how have such problem representations come about? • what are the effects produced by such problem representation in limiting policy goals and strategies, or silencing other alternatives? the way that problems are framed and represented within policy determines the way that some problem solutions are actioned, and other possibilities are ignored or avoided (bacchi, 2009). policies that are paternalistic, directive, and deficit based (klein, 2015) reflect a position of privilege and power held by policy makers or governments over their constituents. the policy focus on mainstream services for indigenous people (brown, 2009; browne et al., 2017; cooke & mcwhirter, 2011; cooper, 2011; ronald & koea, 2013; unal, 2018) represents the problem as a failure of indigenous peoples to fit in with dominant, white social norms and institutions. with a solution that focuses on normalisation (sullivan, 2011), indigenous peoples themselves are represented as the problem. for example, pholi, black, and richards (2009) suggested that the australian government’s closing the gap strategy addressing health inequity reduces aboriginal and torres strait islander people to a set of indicators of deficits monitored by government-set targets where evidence may not be reliable or valid. they explained that the targets measure what is “wrong,” what is “known,” and how to “fix” aboriginal and torres strait islander people. this deficit discourse in policy was strongly criticised by klein (2015) and sullivan (2011) who explain that indigenous peoples and communities are represented as “other.” this worldview that sees indigenous peoples and cultures as “other” is reflected in health care (goodman et al., 2017) and in policy (schofield & gilroy, 2015). the exclusion of traditional healers from policy in the united states demonstrates the power of a western worldview of health in positioning indigenous knowledge outside of health. unal (2018) explained that the lack of integration of traditional healers into health policy and service provision resulted in fear and distrust of government run services. the 17 george et al.: social determinants of indigenous health and rights in policy published by scholarship@western, 2019 systemic racism leading to indigenous peoples being represented as “other” is also deeply engrained in society in colonial countries like australia (baum, 2015) and canada (elliott & de leeuw, 2009). from our bacchian analysis, we conclude that both historical colonial policies and ongoing policy failings predominantly represent indigenous peoples as policy problems that require government intervention to solve. this deficit approach is likely to reduce effectiveness of policy because it silences potential policy actions focused on building resilience and strength within indigenous cultures (chandler & lalonde, 1998; victorian health promotion foundation, 2011), which are essential social determinants of indigenous health. when considering the history of colonisation and the impact on indigenous peoples, it becomes clear that this representation of indigenous peoples as the problem has been a dominant theme in past policies (brown, 2009), along with the struggle for self-determination (kelaher et al., 2015; klein, 2015; meo-sewabu & walsh-tapiata, 2012; mitchell & macleod, 2014; sullivan, 2011). colonial policies of segregation, marginalisation, and assimilation have had lasting effects on indigenous peoples and the policy environment (bishop et al., 2009; brown, 2009; browne et al., 2017; cooke & mcwhirter, 2011; kelly, 2011; mitchell & macleod, 2014; robertson et al., 2012; shewell, 2016; stanley, 2008; unal, 2018; wilmot, 2018). this colonial foundation supports the siloed structure of governments (cooper, 2011; sullivan, 2011) and ineffective policy (cox, 2011). historically, the dominance of a western-centric approach has restricted sharing and influence of indigenous knowledge outside of indigenous communities, elevating colonial powers to a superior position (goodman et al., 2017; schofield & gilroy, 2015; l. t. smith, 2012; wilmot, 2018). this power and ongoing nature of colonisation means the representation of indigenous people as “other” or as a problem that needs to be fixed continues into current policy without consideration of the strength and importance of indigenous knowledge. sherwood (2010) argued that denying indigenous knowledge further exacerbates the pain and injury caused by colonisation. even though the literature revealed that collaboration and consultation with indigenous peoples is commonly mentioned in policy, the quality of this engagement is inconsistent and a does not constitute self-determination (black & mcbean, 2016; klein, 2015; lavoie, 2014). the process of participation in policy was described as primarily “western” and as continuing to isolate or marginalise indigenous peoples. the examples of top-down policy, where governments hold power over indigenous peoples, can result in implementation that does not respond to the needs or strengths of indigenous peoples themselves. government control over the lives of indigenous peoples (cooper, 2011) and use of coercion as a policy instrument (d. smith, 2007) have a negative impact on health and well-being. on the question of alternative perspectives missing from policy and policy silences, the inconsistent value placed on an indigenous view of health and the lack of self-determination suggests that indigenous rights are missing from policy. incorporation of rights would provide a normative basis for more effective policy approaches to address indigenous health inequities within the countries covered by this review. the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (2007) could have been a catalyst for empowerment and recognition; however, australia, new zealand, canada, and the united states all initially voted against it. their opposition was in response to the term “self-determination” (talbot & verrinder, 2014), as well as resistance to the recognition of rights as part of current policy. the australian human rights commission (n.d.) stated that the loss of indigenous rights is at the heart of indigenous disadvantage and that “without self-determination it is not possible for indigenous australians to fully overcome the legacy of colonisation and dispossession” (self determination and australia’s first peoples section, para. 5). 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.4 mitchell and macleod (2014) maintain that policies have often been developed and implemented in ways that are contradictory to the worldview of aboriginal peoples. in response to policies that are silent on indigenous knowledge, meo-sewabu and walsh-tapiata (2012) in new zealand called on indigenous peoples to look for solutions from “within” that reflect social determinants of indigenous health. they advocated for policy with meanings, words, and ways of knowing that reflect indigenous knowledge. in addition, wilmot (2018) promoted policy at the boundaries of knowledge where different understandings of health can be used to reform health service delivery. inevitably, this review of the literature may not have captured all of the relevant literature. the additional sources included through targeted searches in international policy journals, together with sources suggested through peer review, support the comprehensive critique of the literature and problem representation in policy. conclusion this scoping review of research literature, public policy, and indigenous health has explored the ways that social determinants of indigenous health and indigenous rights are recognised and not recognised in policy. our analysis showed that policies represent colonial approaches to power and that, while selfdetermination may be included in policy rhetoric, implementation of this principle is inconsistent or non-existent. the themes that emerged from the literature highlighted that colonisation in policy is ongoing. the structure of mainstream service provision in health and encouragement of indigenous peoples to use mainstream services was described as problematic for the health of indigenous peoples and restrictive of self-determination. the literature supported the important role of government in policy implementation but called for a stronger commitment to indigenous rights. collaboration across sectors was shown as an essential component in policy implementation; however, policy actors face challenges working together. the inclusion of social determinants of health in policy has been researched by carter et al. 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(2012). regionalization as an opportunity for meaningful indigenous participation in healthcare: comparing canada and new zealand. the international indigenous policy journal, 3(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.2 his research is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in he international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. regionalization as an opportunity for meaningful indigenous participation in healthcare: comparing canada and new zealand abstract in canada and new zealand, policies support indigenous participation in the planning and delivery of community-based primary health services. however, these services represent only a fraction of the health services accessed by indigenous peoples. in new zealand, legislation enacted in 2000 introduced mechanisms to ensure that māori have a voice in the decisions made by health boards. in canada, neither policies nor legislation currently ensure that aboriginal communities are represented in provincial health systems or regional health boards. the new zealand experience shows that adding mechanisms of participation to legislation and policies creates opportunities for māori and health boards to engage in discussions about how to best allocate resources to reduce disparities between māori and non-māori health outcomes. in canada, this dialogue may not occur. requiring that such mechanisms be created in all canadian jurisdictions would establish meeting places for dialogue, and assist in closing policy and access gaps that remain. keywords indigenous, health care, canada, new zealand, governance, participation acknowledgments the authors would like to express their gratitude to the national collaborating centre for aboriginal health (nccah) for the support it provided for the canadian study. the nccah is one of six national collaborating centres established by the public health agency of canada to renew and strengthen public health in canada. this project has been made possible through a financial contribution from the public health agency of canada. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ regionalization as an opportunity for meaningful indigenous participation in healthcare: comparing canada and new zealand recent reports on the health of indigenous peoples have shown that inequalities remain worldwide (bristow, stephens, & nettleton, 2003). in recognition of the importance of cultural safety (ramsden, 2002), cultural appropriateness (wilson, 2008), and participation by indigenous peoples in primary healthcare, both canada and new zealand have adopted policies supporting indigenous participation as one key mechanism to address health inequalities. this has resulted in the emergence of indigenous health providers, who contribute a broad range of valuable community-based, culturally appropriate, primary healthcare services (boulton, 2005; lavoie, 2003). these community-based services nevertheless represent only part of the health services accessed by indigenous people in both canada and new zealand (crengle, lay-yee, & davis, 2004; lavoie & forget, 2006) . further, numerous studies have shown that so-called “mainstream” services demonstrate limited responsiveness to indigenous needs and that racism continues to limit their effectiveness (browne, 2005, 2007; culhane, 2003; harris et al., 2006; smith, edwards, varcoe, martens, & davies, 2006; varcoe & dick, 2008). although provincial variations exist in canada, both canada and new zealand have adopted a regionalized health system with health boards responsible for functions previously assigned to local (municipal, regional, or provincial) or central (provincial or national) structures. the health authorities or boards that resulted share a number of characteristics. they are responsible for the health of a population in a geographically defined area and provide a broad range of services, from communitybased healthcare to small regional hospitals and specialized care in larger hospitals. finally, they have been created with the objective of consolidating the authority previously distributed to multiple providers and organizations (lewis & kouri, 2004). in new zealand, legislation introduced in 2000 contained requirements to ensure māori have a voice in regional and local healthcare planning and decision-making with a view to improving māori health outcomes (boulton, simonsen, walker, cumming, & cunningham, 2004). these innovations align with the literature on public engagement (bruni, laupacis, & martin, 2008). in contrast, regionalized systems in canada have been implemented without assurances of aboriginal participation. this paper explores opportunities for indigenous participation in regionalized healthcare structures in both canada and new zealand. specifically, the paper answers three broad questions: a) what mechanisms has new zealand embedded in its legislative and policy framework to facilitate māori engagement, and what have been the benefits of these? b) what opportunities to have a voice in provincial healthcare systems have been extended to canadian aboriginal peoples? and finally c) what lessons may canada and other countries learn from the new zealand experience? a note on terminology the word māori came to be used as a collective noun to distinguish the indigenous population of new zealand after the period of colonisation by the english, french, and others from the late 1700s. the term was adopted by missionaries, tasked with translating the treaty of waitangi in 1840 (described below), to designate the more than 70 distinct tribes of indigenous residents at the time of colonisation. the term māori has since come to mean the indigenous people of new zealand. while recognizing that this suggests cultural and experiential uniformity that does not in fact exist, this paper nevertheless utilizes the collective māori for simplicity. 1 lavoie et al.: regionalization as an opportunity for meaningful participation in healthcare published by scholarship@western, 2012 in canada, the collective aboriginal people is an umbrella term encompassing first nations, inuit, and métis, and is entrenched in the constitution as amended in 1982. the term, however, glosses over cultural, legislative, and administrative complexities. first nations is the preferred self-referent used by the peoples of canada who were historically known as indians. the collective term first nations veils a multiplicity of nations; for administrative purposes, there are currently over 700 first nations recognised by the federal government. inuit is also a collective self-referent that refers to the arctic people who were historically known as eskimos. inuit, themselves, recognise local groups with different names (pallurmiut, inuvialuit, etc.), reflecting the complexity of arctic history and a subtlety in cultural differences of which outsiders are often unaware. finally, métis refers to the descendants of french or scottish traders and cree and ojibway women who settled in the red river area, north of what is now winnipeg, manitoba. they developed their own blended culture and language, metchif. after confederation, the métis were not entitled to sign treaties and do not benefit from the special provisions made by the federal government for a number of programs, including community-based health services. throughout this paper, the term aboriginal will be used when statements apply to first nations living onand off-reserve, inuit, and métis. elsewhere, the terms first nations, inuit, and métis will be used. finally, the term indigenous will only be used when speaking in international terms. framework over the past decades, health policies in canada and new zealand have spoken to the need to support indigenous engagement in health policy design, primary healthcare planning, and delivery. participation by indigenous people is promoted in the hope that this will necessarily yield more responsive and accessible services and, in the long run, improve health outcomes. this commitment echoes principles initially entrenched in the alma-ata declaration on primary healthcare (world health organisation & unicef, 1978), and subsequent world health organization-endorsed resolutions and reports (people's health movement, 2000; world health organisation, 1986, 2008). researchers involved in indigenous health research have wholeheartedly endorsed this principle (adelson, 2005; harris et al., 2006; howden chapman & tobias, 2000; kunitz, 1994; robson & harris, 2007), which echoes current debates on the importance of broader community engagement in the pursuit of equity (mitton, smith, peacock, evoy, & abelson, 2009). for indigenous people, securing increased control over the delivery of services to their constituency is also a crucial step towards self-determination (durie, 1998b; o'neil, reading, & leader, 1998). a recent study showed that increased indigenous control over primary healthcare services results in lower rates of avoidable hospitalization (lavoie et al., 2010a). according to bruni and colleagues (2008), there are at least four reasons that public participation in setting healthcare priorities has value. first, as funders (through taxation and payment) and users, citizens are the most important stakeholders of the healthcare system. thus, legitimacy and fairness demand that users be represented at the priority-setting table. second, greater public involvement in policy-making is in keeping with the principles of democracy. third, empowering people to provide input in decisions that affect their lives encourages support for those decisions, which, in turn, improves the public’s trust and confidence in the healthcare system. fourth, public involvement provides a crucial perspective about the values and priorities of the community, which should lead to higher quality, or at least greater acceptance of priority-setting decisions. similar arguments can be made for increasing indigenous participation in policy and priority setting. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.2 in the indigenous context, a history of oppressive policies (havemann, 1999; reid & robson, 2007), continued reports of racism and discrimination in both comparator countries (browne, 2007; browne & varcoe, 2006; harris et al., 2006; paradies, harris, & anderson, 2008; walker. signal, russell, smiler, & tuhiwai-ruru, 2008), and documented health inequities (adelson, 2005; harris et al., 2006; howden-chapman & tobias, 2000; kunitz, 1994; robson & harris, 2007) not only add weight to the argument for greater participation, but also a sense of urgency among indigenous communities that such participation must occur. building on the continuum of community participation developed by brager and specht (1973), we suggest that mechanisms of community participation in healthcare are best represented by a tridimensional diagram (figure 1), where: • the x axis reflects the scope of community participation with health promotion and community services at one end of the spectrum, and all health services, policies, and legislation at the other end; • the y axis relates to the level of community participation, with decisions being made without indigenous input at one end of the spectrum, and engagement at all levels at the other; and • the z axis reflects the extent to which the mechanisms in place are ad hoc or institutionalized. canada’s focus so far has been almost exclusively on the implementation of formal mechanisms focused on improving the responsiveness of community-based primary healthcare delivered to (and by) indigenous peoples living in their traditional territory (or its current proxy: on-reserve for first figure 1. tri-dimensional framework for community engagement in health z axis: formality of mechanisms y a x is : l e v e l o f c o m m u n it y e n g a g e m e n t indigenous health services only (phc) all health services, policies and legislation x axis: scope of engagement participatory mechanisms are informal participatory mechanisms are entrenches in policy, legislation decisions made without input community identifies issues, sets priorities and is assisted in implementation 3 lavoie et al.: regionalization as an opportunity for meaningful participation in healthcare published by scholarship@western, 2012 nations and the far north for inuit) with little attention paid to ensuring that the overall healthcare system is responsive and culturally safe. neither policies nor legislation currently ensure that aboriginal communities are represented in provincial health systems or regional health authorities (rhas) (lavoie, gervais, toner, bergeron, & thomas, 2010b). this stands in sharp contrast to new zealand where legislated provisions require the district health boards (dhbs) to: negotiate formal agreements with māori communities, have māori representation on the board, and ensure all providers within the healthcare system demonstrate responsiveness to māori clients. methods this paper highlights selected findings from two large and independent policy review studies. the first study, the health reforms 2001 research project, was undertaken to monitor the progress of, and evaluate, the impact of the health reforms enacted by the new zealand public health and disability act 2000 (nzphd act), as they were implemented (boulton et al., 2004). the research was conducted between 2001 and 2005 and investigated themes such as governance in dhbs; strategic decision-making; financing, purchasing, and contracting for health services; devolution; workforce capacity and capability; māori health; and pacific health (mays, cumming, & tenbensel, 2007). all of new zealand’s then 21 dhbs participated in the study with detailed case studies undertaken in five dhbs. there were two rounds of interviews and postal surveys in 2002 and 2003, and 2004 and 2005. the dhb-wide data collection covered the expectations and experiences of those involved in implementing and working with the nzphd act 2000 model, and data was collected through: documentary analyses; key informant interviews with ministers, ministerial advisors, officials, and national stakeholders; a postal survey of dhb members; interviews with dhb chief executive officers and chairs; and interviews with dhb planning and funding managers. the experiences and expectations of māori was a particular feature of the research (mays et al., 2007). the second study was a review of aboriginal health policies and legislation in canada. this study was conducted on behalf of the national collaborating centre for aboriginal health between march 2007 and april 2008 (lavoie et al., 2010b). the overall objective was to develop a comparative inventory of public and community health policies and legislation impacting or relevant to aboriginal health in canada from the late 1960s onward. for each jurisdiction (aboriginal, federal, provincial, and territorial), internet searches were used to locate primary documents (legislation, policies, regulations) produced by ministries or departments of health. we acknowledge that the canadian data is not as in-depth as the new zealand; however, we contend that both datasets are sufficiently robust to support the objectives of this paper. māori engagement in new zealand health services as the last colony to be settled, new zealand followed a different path from that of other “new world” countries with a colonial heritage. the colonial government was committed to avoiding the complexities of the reserve system established in canada and the united states, and the violence experienced in australia. integration, rather than marginalization and containment, became the objective. as a result, the colonial government required that a treaty, the treaty of waitangi, be signed in 1840 between the crown and around 500 māori chiefs as a condition for home rule. from then on, the government adopted a policy of "racial amalgamation” (ward, 1995) and assimilation. māori received some tangible benefits, such as the guarantee of four māori seats in parliament, forums for 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.2 māori participation in healthcare, and educational opportunities (durie, 1998a, 1998b). these provisions have no real equivalent in canada. critiques have suggested that the provisions nevertheless fell short of māori expectations because they were policy-based rather than treaty-based (ward, 1999). the treaty of waitangi remained largely ignored for many years. then in 1975, the treaty of waitangi act was adopted by parliament, thereby removing the implementation of the treaty from the realm of policy and providing a formal mechanism to resolve disputes. at the time, māori were becoming increasingly more vocal about the need to link culture and health. while māori argued that health could be described as taonga [treasure], and therefore protected under article two of the treaty, this interpretation was rejected by the new zealand government, which argued that its responsibility in matters of healthcare was the same for all citizens. following the refocused attention on the treaty of waitangi, the 1988 royal commission on social policy recommended that three treaty-based principles become the basis of all social policy dealing with māori. in the health sector, these principles are articulated in the following manner: • partnership: working together with iwi [tribe], hapū [sub-tribe], whānau [family], and māori communities to develop strategies for māori health gain and appropriate health and disability services. • participation: involving māori at all levels of the sector in planning, development, and delivery of health and disability services. • protection: ensuring māori enjoy at least the same level of health as non-māori and safeguarding māori cultural concepts, values, and practices (new zealand national health committee on health and disability, 2002). in the last two decades, the new zealand health system has undergone a series of reforms (gauld, 2001). the latest of these reforms, instituted with the passing of the nzphd act 2000, has sought to improve the planning, funding, and organization of health services. the nzphd act 2000 model is based on overarching health strategies reflecting national priorities. the 201 dhbs purchase and/or provide services for geographically defined populations. local communities provide input into dhb decisions through elected representation and consultation in the development of health needs assessments. the current nzphd act 2000 requires the dhbs to: (1) establish and maintain processes to enable māori to participate in, and contribute to, strategies for māori health improvement; (2) continue to foster the development of māori capacity for participating in the health and disability sector and for providing for the needs of māori; and (3) provide relevant information to māori for the above purposes (new zealand government, 2000). these three requirements reflect the treaty of waitangi principles. however, the interpretation of these provisions and ability to give effect to the requirements varies considerably across the dhbs. enabling māori participation at the governance level, the legislation requires that each board consist of seven elected members and up to four members appointed by the minister. when appointing, the minister of health must ensure that the māori membership of the board is proportional to the number of māori in the dhb’s resident population, and there are at least two māori members on the board. the experience of māori board members on dhbs has been varied. for many, their experience was influenced by the degree to which 1 two dhbs, southland and otago, were merged forming southern dhb on may 1, 2010. 5 lavoie et al.: regionalization as an opportunity for meaningful participation in healthcare published by scholarship@western, 2012 they were able to negotiate the issues of representation and accountability. the legislation creating the dhb structure does not distinguish between, on the one hand, māori board members and, on the other, board members who happen to be māori. respondents in the health reforms 2001 study noted that the distinction was very real and problematic. it gave members cause to carefully consider the decisions and advice offered at the board table since it could be regarded as partisan and, therefore, easily discounted or ignored. a number of respondents in the health reforms 2001 study commented on the unease they felt with regard to whether the views of all māori were adequately represented at the board table. further, they noted the subtle distinction between whether a board’s māori members comprised those who identified as a “māori board member” or board members who “happened to be māori” had implications in terms of whether the public regarded the board to be truly representative of its māori constituents and able to provide an effective māori voice at the decision-making table. despite the legislative silence on the issue of māori representation, māori board members identified a range of ways in which they, as board members, were able to contribute to the work of the dhb in considering māori health. māori board members: provided strategic advice and input into strategic documents; acted as advocates on behalf of māori, māori communities, and māori units within the dhb itself; articulated community concerns at a strategic level; monitored the work programme of the dhb; and acted to uphold the relationship between the crown and iwi [tribes]. in acting in these various roles, māori board members were cognisant of the multiple accountabilities they had to manage (pere, boulton, smiler, walker, & kingi, 2007). in addition to ensuring adequate māori membership, dhbs must ensure that all their members, not only those who identify as māori, “are skilled and knowledgeable about the treaty of waitangi and māori health issues and about their local communities” (new zealand ministry of health, 2002b, p. 6). from the crown’s perspective, the responsibility for improving the health status of māori in their geographically defined area clearly rests with the board as a whole, not simply the few māori board members. the view that improvements in māori health are the responsibility of all those who participate in the health sector, not simply māori, is reiterated again and again in the government’s health policies and strategy documents requiring greater levels of collaboration, cooperation, and integration from the health sector than ever before. partnership arrangements most dhbs have interpreted the act to mean that alongside the board, a māori governance group is required to advise on how proposed funding and planning decisions may affect the māori population and the achievement of māori health outcomes. giving effect to the principle of partnership has compelled the dhbs to consider how they work with two very distinct māori populations: manawhenua and mataawaka. manawhenua comprise local iwi whose traditional territory coincides with the territory covered by the dhb. mataawaka groups are predominantly found in large urban settings and comprise māori who hail from other tribal areas. the māori health policy, he korowai oranga, states that dhbs should work together with “iwi, hapū, whanau and māori communities to develop strategies for māori health gain and appropriate health and disability services” (new zealand ministry of health, 2002a, p. 2). implementation efforts have resulted in a multiplicity of governance arrangements between dhbs and local māori who represent both manawhenua and mataawaka. often entities that were already in existence prior to the reforms were adapted to fulfill the need for a consultative or advisory body for the dhb board. in other instances, new entities were created (pere et al., 2007). the establishment and composition of these groups is as varied as the dhbs in which 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.2 they reside; however, all have the function of representing the māori population in decisions affecting health and health services to that population. māori representation in decision-making at the regional level (i.e. on dhb boards) is mirrored in primary health, at the level of the primary healthcare organisations (phos). phos are funded by dhbs to provide essential primary healthcare services in the community to an enrolled population. the range of services provided varies from pho to pho but may include doctors, nurses, and other health professionals (such as māori health workers, health promotion workers, dietitians, pharmacists, physiotherapists, psychologists, and midwives). phos are not-for-profit organisations, providing services either directly by employing staff or through their provider members and vary widely in size and scope. a set of minimum requirements guided the establishment of phos, setting out the standards that phos must meet. while not overly prescriptive, the minimum standards do include the provision that phos will give communities, iwi, and enrolled people the opportunity to have their say about the services phos provide (new zealand minister of health, 2001). consequently, most phos, if not already so-called māori-led phos, will also include māori representation at the governance level. the protection principle the nzphd act charges dhbs with improving, promoting, and protecting the health of all new zealanders and, in recognition of the principles of the treaty of waitangi, improving māori health outcomes. the two key aims driving he korowai oranga are: to affirm māori models, approaches, and initiatives to improve the health of whānau, hapū, and iwi; and to improve māori health outcomes through the gradual reorientation of the way that māori health and disability services are planned, funded, and delivered (new zealand ministry of health, 2002a). the protection principle as articulated requires the health sector to consolidate the gains achieved to date in māori health service provision (particularly in the field of traditional healing) and in workforce development. comparatively, māori capacity in the health sector has reached a strong point in “by māori for māori” health services, which deliver predominantly primary care services and have grown from 20 in 1993 to 240 in 2005. rongoa or traditional healing services that employ the use of traditional practices, such as mirimiri (a form of massage) and traditional medicines, are a unique feature of the new zealand healthcare sector. dhbs have a responsibility to ensure that the gains that have been made in providing alternative and culturally appropriate service provision are not lost. summary on the whole, formal policy innovations in new zealand have created opportunities for māori and dhbs to cooperate in the pursuit of improved māori health outcomes (z axis in figure 1). although some mechanisms facilitating active engagement predated the he korowai oranga policy, the policy itself provided an impetus to strengthen existing mechanisms and create new ones. while a policy-driven approach may not necessarily translate into consensus over the process, and in terms of outcomes, at least in the short term (y axis), it nevertheless provides māori with a broader range of opportunities to ensure responsiveness (x axis) and provides dhbs with opportunities to dialogue on how to best plan and deliver health, medical, and hospital services to achieve health gains. 7 lavoie et al.: regionalization as an opportunity for meaningful participation in healthcare published by scholarship@western, 2012 policies supporting aboriginal engagement in mainstream health systems in canada the canadian context is considerably more complex, involving ten provincial and three territorial healthcare systems that all dovetail with a federally-funded community-based healthcare system for first nations and inuit if living in their traditional territory and their current proxy (the reserves, the north). first nations and inuit living outside of these areas and métis are considered a provincial responsibility, and remain largely invisible. the following section broadly summarizes the situation. table 1 provides a demographic breakdown of the aboriginal population in canada. roughly speaking, first nations are found in the yukon territory and the provinces. the inuit inhabit the territories of the far north: nunavut, the northwest territories, nunavik in the province of quebec, and nunatsiavut in labrador. the majority of métis are found in ontario, manitoba, saskatchewan, and alberta. in the canadian context, primary healthcare services for on-reserve first nations are a matter of federal jurisdiction; whereas primary healthcare for other canadians, as well as secondary and tertiary health services, are a matter of provincial jurisdiction. this historical separation, which is based on two documents, the royal proclamation of 1763 and the constitutional act of 1867, was reaffirmed in the constitution act 1982. this continues to create challenges in the coordination of primary, secondary, and tertiary care, public health, and discharge planning between onand offreserve services (hawthorn, 1966; romanow, 2002; national advisory committee on sars and public health, 2003; lavoie et al., 2005; assembly of first nations, 2006). currently, most on-reserve health funding comes from federal public funding. some first nations may secure funding through agreements with their respective provincial health services or regional health authority (rha) (for example, diabetes prevention or urban health services); but this is still public funding and minor in terms of total investments (lavoie et al., 2005). services accessed on-reserve are largely under some measure of control by first nation communities, thus ensuring responsiveness to local needs and culturally appropriate interventions. the commitment to first nations’ participation in the planning and delivery of on-reserve primary healthcare services is entrenched in the 1979 indian health policy (health canada, 1979). services accessed off-reserve operate outside the reach of this policy. they are delivered by the provinces or funded by the provinces and delivered by practitioners in private practice under the purview of rhas. although service agreements have been struck between first nations and some rhas, no province has developed a policy framework to facilitate first nations participation in provincial services planning (lavoie et al., 2010b). two provinces, british columbia and nova scotia, appear to be moving in that direction (british columbia assembly of first nations et al., 2007; mi'kmaq et al., 2005). canada recognizes four inuit regions: inuvialuit in the northwest territories; the territory of nunavut; nunavik, which is the northern third of the province of québec; and nunatsiavut in the province of newfoundland and labrador. health services for inuit, if delivered in the northwest territories or nunavut, are provided by departments with meaningful inuit participation in governance. this is largely the result of history, isolation, and demographics that ensure a prominence of inuit voices in government. services provided to inuit living in quebec and labrador are co-funded by federal and provincial governments. in nunatsiavut and nunavik, modern treaties (land claim agreements) have been signed by inuit and both levels of government to clarify issues of jurisdiction. services for métis, first nations living off-reserve, and inuit living outside of their traditional areas are provided by the provinces or territories. in the territories, the yukon, northwest territories, and nunavut, the predominance of aboriginal peoples ensures representation. this is not the case in the 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.2 table 1 canadian aboriginal population per provinces and territories 2006 (statistics canada 2008) total population aboriginal identity population aboriginal population as % of the national, provincial, or territorial population north american indian métis inuit canada 31,241,030 1,172,785 3.8% 698,025 389,780 50,480 p ro v in ce s newfoundland and labrador 500,610 23,455 4.7% 7,765 6,470 4,715 prince edward island 134,205 1,730 1.3% 1,225 385 30 nova scotia 903,090 24,175 2.7% 15,240 7,680 325 new brunswick 719,650 17,650 2.5% 12,385 4,270 185 quebec 7,435,905 108,425 1.5% 65,085 27,980 10,950 ontario 12,028,895 242,495 2.0% 158,395 73,605 2,035 manitoba 1,133,515 175,395 15.5% 100,640 71,805 565 saskatchewan 953,850 141,890 14.9% 91,400 48,120 215 alberta 3,256,355 188,365 5.8% 97,275 85,495 1,610 british columbia 4,074,385 196,075 4.8% 129,580 59,445 795 t er ri to ri es yukon territory 30,190 7,580 25.1% 6,280 800 255 northwest territories 41,060 20,635 50.3% 12,640 3,580 4,160 nunavut 29,325 24,915 85.0% 100 130 24,635 9 lavoie et al.: regionalization as an opportunity for meaningful participation in healthcare published by scholarship@western, 2012 provinces where aboriginal groups remain largely invisible in the provincial healthcare landscape (lavoie, o'neil, & reading, 2007). only ontario and british columbia have developed policies to fund urban health centres to serve the unique needs of urban aboriginal peoples. these centres are generally managed by an aboriginal board and offer a range of primary healthcare services. the invisibility of aboriginal peoples in provincial healthcare systems is the result of two inter-related factors. first, with the exception of the territories and the north, the aboriginal population is relatively small and sparsely distributed. second, and perhaps more importantly, entrenched in the canadian policy landscape are practices rooted in the past that positioned aboriginal peoples at the margin of the settler society. until 1956, full citizenship was to be secured only through enfranchisement afforded through: • an individual being forced or choosing to enfranchise (examples include first nations who opted to serve in the canadian army in both world wars, secured higher education, wanted access to hospital care, women who married non-aboriginal men); • non-admission, as in the case of the métis who were denied the opportunity to sign treaties and other benefits extended to first nations and inuit because they were, historically, deemed “westernized” enough to be enfranchised. this is now slowly changing (lavoie et al., 2010b). although enfranchisement came with the right of full citizenship, including the right to vote, it did not guarantee full participation in canadian society (royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996). today, policies provide entrenched mechanisms to ensure that first nations and inuit living in their traditional territories or their proxies have a voice in shaping the delivery of primary healthcare services in their communities and territories. first nations living on-reserve also have a policy-entrenched mechanism to ensure that local services are responsive. provincial healthcare systems that serve all aboriginal groups have not entrenched mechanisms to ensure representation. only british columbia, ontario, and nova scotia have policies that stipulate the make-up of the board of directors must reflect the population the rhas it is set up to serve. aboriginal peoples are not specifically mentioned. ontario is the only province to have established a council composed of aboriginal peoples to advise on regional priority setting in healthcare, which is provided through the local health integration networks (lavoie et al., 2010b). kelly (2011) has argued that the transformative change accord, which was signed in 2005 between the government of british columbia, the government of canada, and the leadership council representing the first nations of british columbia, may be signalling a new era in aboriginal health policy. an offspring of the kelowna accord discussions, this accord is a commitment to close the gap that exists between british columbia first nations and other british columbia residents in health, education, and housing, and to settle issues of aboriginal rights and title. to close the health gap, the accord proposes the transfer of the policy and service delivery role currently undertaken by the federal government to bc first nations (first nations health council et al., 2010). although operational details lie beyond the scope of this paper, current discussions suggest the formation of a first nations health authority to fulfill this mandate. while the plan holds promises, this project remains largely at the planning stage and sizable challenges remain (kelly, 2011). 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.2 summary in the canadian context, policies have focused on aboriginal participation in the planning and delivery of community-based primary healthcare services located in first nations and inuit territories (figure 1, x and y axes). aboriginal peoples who do not live in the north or on-reserve, approximately one half of the overall aboriginal population (statistics canada, 2008), remain largely unaffected by these innovations. as a result, few health services accessed by aboriginal peoples actually include aboriginal input into decision-making, service planning, or service configuration. policies and legislation (z axis) are silent on this issue (lavoie et al., 2010b). discussion: policy lessons while new zealand has opted to formalize its commitment to engaging māori through legislation and policy (the z axis in figure 1), canada and the provinces continue to favour ad hoc and informal approaches. the question then is: what might be gained by adopting national and provincial legislation and policies that provide clear direction on, at least, minimal levels of engagement? mitton and colleagues recently completed a scoping review of the literature on public participation and priority setting in healthcare. they concluded that there is a lack of evaluation of public participation engagement processes (mitton et al., 2009; world health organisation, 2008). we argue that an appropriate framework has been lacking and propose a tri-dimensional framework to assist in reflections on the focus of engagement mechanisms. we recognize that legislation and policies do not necessarily end debates related to governance and participation, nor does a commitment to include indigenous people at the decision-making table automatically lead to a greater investment in indigenous people’s health. in the new zealand context, at least, pressure remains to ensure adequate funding for improving māori health is allocated in the central government’s annual budget to support efforts being undertaken by dhbs to reduce health inequalities (health budget, 2011). our analysis of the new zealand context clearly shows that a “cookie cutter” approach to engagement may be counter-productive. the benefit of adopting a formalized approach is that it has created an impetus for māori, dhbs, and even phos to meet and engage in discussions on how to best allocate resources to close the health gap that remains, thereby potentially increasing transparency and the credibility and quality of decision-making processes. in the context of competing demands and priorities, this dialogue may not otherwise occur. in the canadian context, opportunities for dialogue between aboriginal communities and the healthcare system is ad hoc. dialogue occurs in some provinces or parts of provinces, but it is often inadequately resourced and subject to shifting priorities and personalities. entrenching a requirement to create these mechanisms in all jurisdictions would, as it did in new zealand, establish space for an evolving dialogue that aligns with the principles of democracy and transparent decision-making, and promotes confidence and trust. from such discussion, opportunities and practical solutions for addressing the inequalities that continue to exist for aboriginal peoples may be identified. at the very least, a level of engagement may emerge that will assist in making healthcare systems more seamless for aboriginal peoples and address both systemic barriers and institutional racism. this, in itself, is a worthwhile pursuit. 11 lavoie et al.: regionalization as an opportunity for meaningful participation in healthcare published by scholarship@western, 2012 references adelson, n. 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(2007). health reforms 2001 research project: māori health and the 2001 health reforms (rep. no. 6). wellington, new zealand: health services research centre. ramsden, i. (2002). cultural safety and nursing education in aotearoa and te waipounamu. unpublished doctoral dissertation. wellington, new zealand: victoria university of wellington. reid, p. & robson, b. (2007). understanding health inequities. in b. robson, & b. harris (eds.), hauora: māori standards of health iv. a study of the years 2000-2005 (pp. 3-10). wellington, new zealand: te ropu rangahau a eru pomare. robson, b. & harris, r. (eds.) (2007). hauora: māori standards of health iv. a study of the years 2000-2005. wellington, new zealand: te ropu rangahau a eru pomare. romanow, c. r. j. (2002). building on values: the future of health care in canada (final report). ottawa, on: commission on the future of health care in canada: the romanow commission. royal commission on aboriginal peoples. (1996). people to people, nation to nation: highlights from the report of the royal commission on aboriginal peoples. ottawa, on: minister of supply and services canada. smith, d., edwards, n., varcoe, c., martens, p. j., & davies, b. (2006). bringing safety and responsiveness into the forefront of care for pregnant and parenting aboriginal people. advances in nursing science, 29, e27e44. statistics canada. (2008, january 15). aboriginal peoples in canada in 2006: inuit, métis and first nations, 2006 census. the daily. varcoe, c., & dick, s. (2008). intersecting risks of violence and hiv for rural and aboriginal women in a neocolonial canadian context. journal of aboriginal health, 4, 42-52. walker, t., signal, l., russell, m., smiler, k., & tuhiwai-ruru, r. (2008). the road we travel: māori experience of cancer. new zealand medical journal, 121, 27-35. ward, a. (1995). a show of justice: racial `amalgamation' in nineteenth century new zealand. auckland, new zealand: auckland university press. ward, a. (1999). an unsettled history: treaty claims in new zealand today. wellington: bridget williams books. wilson, d. (2008). the significance of a culturally appropriate health service for indigenous mâori women. contemporary nurse, 28, 173-188. world health organisation. (1986, november 21). ottawa charter for health promotion. adopted at the first international conference on health promotion, ottawa, on. world health organisation. (2008). primary health care: now more than ever. retrieved november 10, 2011, from http://www.who.int/topics/primary_health_care/en/ world health organisation & unicef. (1978). primary health care: international conference on primary health care 1978 alma-ata, kazakhstan. geneva, switzerland. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.2 the international indigenous policy journal march 2012 regionalization as an opportunity for meaningful indigenous participation in healthcare: comparing canada and new zealand josée g. lavoie amohia frances boulton laverne gervais recommended citation regionalization as an opportunity for meaningful indigenous participation in healthcare: comparing canada and new zealand abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license microsoft word 286758-text.native.1331059972.docx book review: lerma, m. (2014). indigenous sovereignty in the 21st century: knowledge for the indigenous spring the international indigenous policy journal volume 7 | issue 1 article 4 january 2016 book review: lerma, m. (2014). indigenous sovereignty in the 21st century: knowledge for the indigenous spring danielle hiraldo university of arizona, hiraldo@email.arizona.edu recommended citation hiraldo, d. (2016). book review: lerma, m. (2014). indigenous sovereignty in the 21st century: knowledge for the indigenous spring. the international indigenous policy journal, 7(1). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.1.4 book review: lerma, m. (2014). indigenous sovereignty in the 21st century: knowledge for the indigenous spring abstract this article provides a review of michael lerma's book, indigenous sovereignty in the 21st century: knowledge for the indigenous spring. keywords native american, peoplehood, sovereignty, federal indian law and policy, u.s. supreme court creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ b o o k r e v i e w m i c h a e l l e r m a . ( 2 0 1 4 ) . i n d i g e n o u s s o v e r e i g n t y i n t h e 2 1 s t c e n t u r y : k n o w l e d g e f o r t h e i n d i g e n o u s s p r i n g . g a i n e s v i l l e , f l : f l o r i d a a c a d e m i c p r e s s . 1 6 7 p p . $ 4 8 . 0 0 ( p a p e r b a c k ) . i s b n 1 0 : 1 8 9 0 3 5 7 4 9 9 . in his book, michael lerma provides an historical overview of how u.s. federal indian law and policies, and supreme court cases have sought to impact indigenous sovereignty. typically, federal indian policy is classified in thematic eras, but dr. lerma posits another theoretical model to analyze federal indian law and policy as “functional creep” zones. lerma explains, “bureaucracy has a tendency to creep away from its original intent” (p. 26). thus, it is no longer accurate to organize federal indian law and policy around a thematic timeframe. creep provides a different perspective on how these policies and practices sought to expand or constrain indigenous sovereignty whenever it affirmed or threatened u.s. federalism (p. 42). lerma argues, “interestingly, we find that indigenous rights tend to be defended insofar as they simultaneously maintain and bolster the superiority of federalism over state sovereignty” (p. 42). in addition, lerma contends that land and access to resources was the root of international relationships with native nations; these nations were not passive actors in this development. according to lerma, we should continue to view indigenous peoples as international actors who negotiated international agreements with european countries and later the united states. k. tsianina lomawaima and teresa l. mccarty (2006) also employ a theoretical model to describe federal indian policies and practices known as “safety zones.” according to lomawaima and mccarty (2006), the safety zones represent “an ongoing struggle over cultural difference and its perceived threat, or benefit, to a sense of shared american identity” (p. 6). simply put, through policy, the federal government has differentiated safe and dangerous native peoples’ ways of life and redefined those boundaries over time through federal policies. using indigenous educational policy as evidence, the authors posit that safety zones were instances where indigenous customs were permitted to be a part of american life, such as incorporating basket weaving and other variations of arts and crafts, and at other times using indigenous language in educational materials to teach “american” values to native children. by contrast, the dangerous zones threatened american nationalism—such as, challenges to federal control of native education, displays of culture diversity counter to american culture, and the assertion of self-determination rights—thus, policies were adopted to marginalize indigenous peoples. however, native peoples challenged those safety zones in a variety of ways to impact change. lerma’s functional creep zones model is insightful, but resembles the “safety zone” model. more accurately, the author’s discussion of federalist versus state rights best describes the u.s. approach to indigenous sovereignty as a reinforcement mechanism for the federalist structure and, thus, upholds the supremacy of the national government. the rehnquist court, as lerma describes, challenges such authority by consistently providing supreme court decisions that threatened and sought to diminish indigenous sovereignty. the concept that the federal government “creeps” from its original intent may become problematic. the reader should conclude that the original intent of the u.s. government was to gain resources (i.e., land). access to land provides boundaries—a prescribed territory—which one would assert jurisdiction and sovereign authority over. i do not believe the u.s. is trying to creep from its original intent, but rather is attempting to redefine indigenous sovereignty through these zones for its own benefit. this is where lomawaima and mccarty’s safety zone model is applicable because it 1 hiraldo: hiraldo: book review published by scholarship@western, 2016 demonstrates how national educational policy sought to assimilate native peoples into the “american” culture. in addition, lerma argues that indigenous sovereignty “does still exist but in diminished capacity and varying from indigenous nation to indigenous nation” (p. 25). then the author cautions readers not to articulate indigenous sovereignty as unique to other sovereigns. the diminished explanation suggests that other sovereigns maintain their sovereignty intact or whole. just as we should be cautious at explaining indigenous sovereignty as unique, we should be cautious in suggesting that indigenous sovereignty is less than (i.e., diminished) in relation to other sovereigns. international agreements, treaties, and so on, bind other sovereigns, just as native nations have established a government-to-government relationship with the u.s. national government. the author’s audience is scholars, practitioners, elected officials, and youth researching indigenous sovereignty and examining federal indian law and policy. there is one component of this book, included in chapter 3, which is probably the most compelling for native practitioners and native leaders alike, wherein lerma employs his students to discuss indigenous sovereignty in a contemporary context around traditional ways of knowing and understanding the concept. this chapter seems to be the heart of the author’s argument, which is: sovereignty is not a superficial word for indigenous peoples because oral stories, traditions, and customs—the peoplehood model—have always and continue to inform how native peoples govern themselves. section ii, which includes chapters on the marshall court, the rehnquist court, and the rehnquist legacy cloud this insightful argument. indigenous sovereignty in the 21st century: knowledge for the indigenous spring provides an indigenous perspective on sovereignty and its importance in today’s society. moreover, it serves as a reminder for native youth and elders to begin or continue a dialogue around traditional governance practices and how they apply in today’s context.   2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 1 [2016], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss1/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.1.4 r e f e r e n c e s lomawaima, k. t., & teresa l. m. (2006). to remain an indian: lessons in democracy from a century of native american education. new york: teachers college press. 3 hiraldo: hiraldo: book review published by scholarship@western, 2016 the international indigenous policy journal january 2016 book review: lerma, m. (2014). indigenous sovereignty in the 21st century: knowledge for the indigenous spring danielle hiraldo recommended citation book review: lerma, m. (2014). indigenous sovereignty in the 21st century: knowledge for the indigenous spring abstract keywords creative commons license book review: lerma, m. (2014). indigenous sovereignty in the 21st century: knowledge for the indigenous spring “wisdom seeking together”: circling around research ethics the international indigenous policy journal volume 14 | issue 1 april 2023 “wisdom seeking together”: circling around research ethics josie c. auger athabasca university, canada, jauger@athabascau.ca nisha nath athabasca university, canada, nnath@athabascau.ca carolyn greene athabasca university, canada, carolyng@athabascau.ca recommended citation auger, j., nath, n., & greene, c. (2023). “wisdom seeking together”: circling around research ethics. the international indigenous policy journal, 14 (1). https://10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.13606 “wisdom seeking together”: circling around research ethics abstract before indigenous scholars engage in decolonial research with human participants, canadian universities must grant them ethics approval. grounded by the experiences of the nehiyaw researcher and the chair of the research ethics board who reviewed the research, we explore the experience of reb review with research exploring self-determination and sovereignty with nehiyaw iskwewak (cree females) as knowledge holders. in accordance with iyiniwak (indigenous peoples) beliefs, the co-creators and authors positioned themselves in the centre of a circle with natural law teachings of kindness, honesty, caring, strength, and determination. in this shared space, we brought together dialogues connected to thematics grounded in ceremony, natural law (iyiniwak teachings), and cyclical process. through four directions, we examine colonial processes and identify reb accountabilities. keywords research ethics boards, wisdom seeking, indigenous research methodology, invasion of sexual boundaries, self-determination, international research policy, sovereignty acknowledgments we wish to acknowledge all of the co-creators involved in dr. auger’s research. your courage, honesty, humility, respect, and love supported the work that will help other people on their journey. we would also like to acknowledge and express our gratitude three nehiyaw iskwewak: lorraine cardinal, sharon loonskin, and angela james for honouring us with your truthful expressions and wisdom. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ 1 auger et al.: “wisdom seeking together”: circling around research ethics published by scholarship@western, 2023 “wisdom seeking together”: circling around research ethics just days prior to the declaration of a global pandemic that dramatically separated so many of us, we— josie auger, carolyn greene, and nisha nath—came together, bumping elbows in a coffee shop. our convergence was initiated by auger, who noted the multiple ways our work on research ethics intersected. in 2019, auger’s qualitative research examining the relationship between the invasion of indigenous women’s sexual boundaries and their views of government, their past, their way of life, and their relationship to the earth and environment, had gone through athabasca university’s research ethics board (reb) approval process, of which greene sat as chair. at another juncture, greene and nath were part of a working group revising a graduate research methodologies course, of which nath was drafting a course unit for students on research ethics. amidst this, auger and nath’s institutional paths crossed during conversations about anti-racist and decolonial work while working briefly on a university equity committee. in this paper, we came together in a series of conversations alongside three of auger’s nehiyaw iskwewak1 co-creators—sharon, lorraine, and angela. these discussions centered on auger’s experience moving through the research ethics application process, greene’s experience on the other end of that process as chair of the institutional reb, and the co-creators’ experiences and thoughts on research ethics and the concerns animating the reb. in what emerged from our discussions, we found a disjuncture between the concerns of the reb in terms of risk and harm to the co-creators, and the deep and existing relational accountability between auger and the co-creators, and amongst the co-creators themselves. here, cora weber-pillwax describes relational accountability as a researcher maintaining “respect, reciprocity, and responsibility” to the community, which in this case are the nehiyaw iskwewak (wilson, 2008, p. 77). this relational accountability did not appear legible to the reb. this paper represents an amalgamation of our conversations reflecting on the institutionalization of western research ethics, decolonization, and how research ethics boards are oriented to the research of an indigenous scholar using indigenous research methodology (irm). is research treated as a question of neoliberal, bureaucratic, and colonial procedure, or is research conceptualized as invoking ethical relationalities? moreover, what accountabilities do rebs themselves have in the work of decolonization? reflecting our distinct social locations in coming together, we take auger’s guidance and map our 1 when using roman orthography, cree words are not capitalized as it is not an english language (okimasis & wolvengrey, 2008). according to the oxford english dictionary (2019) and the canadian encyclopedia (2018), the word “cree” originally was a french word “kiristinon,” and the word was shortened by the english to cree. it is not the original word used by cree to describe themselves as four-dimensional people with a mind, body, spirit, and feelings. the words we introduce below are ordered as they appear in the paper, as follows: nehiyaw (a cree person); nehiyaw iskwewak (cree females); iyiniwak (indigenous peoples); nehiyaw iskwew (cree female); nehiywak (cree people); iyiniw (indigenous person). as per nêhiyawêwin (cree language) conventions, we do not use capital letters for nêhiyawêwin words. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.13606 discussions onto the natural law teachings of the four directions (east, south, west, and north), following the order of kindness, honesty, caring, and strength/determination. we argue that relational accountability between rebs and iyiniwak should abide by a treaty relationship, raising important questions and implications with respect to the scale and scope of renewed treaty discussions, what settler accountabilities to this relationship are within post-secondary contexts, and how parallel pathways provide a generative space to engage in ongoing policy discussions. we close by locating these considerations within an international policy context, considering research ethics policy and treaty contexts in aotearoa—new zealand—and australia. situating our work internationally, we conclude with a discussion of treaties within turtle island and aotearoa, as well as the national guidelines in australia pertaining to research involving indigenous peoples, to reflect on possible decolonial learnings for canadian research ethics boards when they embrace indigenous legal traditions like other “multi-juridical countries” with settler colonial origins (borrows, 2010, p. 23). background while the specificities of auger’s original research have been elaborated elsewhere (see auger et al., 2020),2 in this context we note that bringing auger and greene into conversation was distinctive given auger’s use of indigenous research methodology (irm) to explore self-determination and sovereignty with nehiyaw iskwewak as knowledge holders. conducted within treaty 8, the canadian part of turtle island that also includes the united states and mexico, auger’s project needed to be assessed by a canadian university reb because her research involved indigenous people. in the canadian context, the tri-council refers to the three major canadian government research funding agencies: canadian institutes of health research (cihr), natural sciences and engineering research council (nserc), and social sciences and humanities research council (sshrc). all researchers at canadian postsecondary institutions are bound to the tri-council policy statement on “ethical conduct for research involving humans,” also known as the tcps2. notably, chapter 9 of the tcps2 pertains specifically to “research involving the first nations, inuit and métis peoples of canada” [hereafter chapter 9]. before submitting her ethics application to the reb, auger had already presented protocol at a sweatlodge, and asked for blessings for this research according to indigenous sacred and natural law teachings. moreover, auger’s use of irm also included plans for: an initial meeting (to determine if all eleven co-creators would participate in group meetings and individual interviews), a sweatlodge ceremony, the co-creator review of transcripts, a fire ceremony, and ongoing participation in public presentations with those co-creators who chose not to remain anonymous. 2 the purpose of the research was to identify how rape or unconsented sex impacted indigenous women’s understanding of themselves as self-determining and sovereign people and affected their historical political, social, cultural, psychological, and environmental relationships and wellbeing. 3 auger et al.: “wisdom seeking together”: circling around research ethics published by scholarship@western, 2023 however, in seeking ethics approval, the reb did not understand the roles of co-creators as per irm, nor did they understand the meaning of ceremony, protocol, vis-à-vis honorarium. the importance and meaning of each of these had to be explained and justified to the reb members, moreover, auger had to resolve questions surrounding the roles of co-creators and the reb’s perception of heightened risk. without ethics approval to do the research initially, auger was “detained” at the online research portal. this was despite chapter 9 of the tri-council policy statement which states that it is not “intended to override or replace ethical guidance offered by indigenous peoples themselves” (tri-council policy statement 2, 2018, ch.9). indeed, scholars have noted racial, gender, and cultural inequities, within and outside of research ethics boards, create a gatekeeping effect in research (see jonker et al., 2021). there are at least three things to note about the context in which auger moved through these research ethics processes. first, auger’s research required a complex negotiation of the demands of a reb grounded in western ethical norms—norms that in many ways stand in contradistinction to the relational accountabilities informing irm. in this, auger explained to her co-creators the requirements of the university’s ethics approach for informed consent, confidentiality, anonymity, and honorarium. as a nehiyaw iskwew (cree female), auger worked and acted within an epistemic space in between western and indigenous research as she reconciled irm with the reb recommendations, concerns and presumptions. put differently, while the project was partially developed by indigenous co-creators and auger (who is indigenous to the traditional territory where the research occurred), the research was also shaped by the reb’s perception of the risk of discussing sexual violence, the reb’s perception of undue influence through gifts/honorarium, and through their presumption about the risks for participants in identifying themselves. traversing these two spaces, auger brought the informed consent letter to the first foundational meeting with each co-creator and they collectively decided on the use of fake names, individual interviews, recording, group meetings, and the recognition of co-creators on documents. second, one inclination in discussions of institutional reform is the presumption that greater inclusivity—in this case on rebs—will be transformative. our discussion of rebs is both local and contextual, grounded in our own institutional location. as academics our role is “shaping the discourse around ethics through discussion and practice,” (patterson, 2008, p. 24). critically, however, our discussion is also systemic and structural. in that, while this iteration of the reb did have indigenous representation amidst its representation across faculties (e.g., business, science and technology, humanities, and social sciences),3 we gesture towards the structural and systemic to consider the rebs’ location and implication within post-secondary institutions in which the colonial and neoliberal are 3 our institutional reb also has one volunteer spot for an external public member. there are no specific criteria with respect to social location or indigeneity for this member. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.13606 intrinsically entwined. even in the face of institutional commitments to decolonization and indigenization, transformation has tended to reside within inclusion frameworks (gaudry & lorenz 2018, p. 219). here, the mere addition of indigenous people into already existing structures relies on the assumption that the inclusion of indigenous people evades the “need to rethink the university's underlying structure” (gaudry and lorenz, 2018, p. 219). in considering parallel pathways, our conversation pushes towards what gaudry and lorenz (2018) describe as decolonial indigenization. this kind of radical revisioning of the institution involves a treaty-based model of university governance, and ongoing support for indigenous resurgence (gaudry & lorenz 2018, p. 223). as whetung and wakefield (2018) noted in their brilliant dialogue on decolonizing research ethics, research ethics processes are continually reproducing their own embededness in “colonial understandings of relationship, respect, and responsibility,” and these understandings establish and normalize “the university as the arbiter of what is ethical in creating knowledge” (pp. 149-150). third, research ethics processes pertaining to research with first nations, inuit and métis people in canada vary across provincial contexts, and also across institutional contexts given the composition of institutional rebs, and the processes adopted by institutional rebs, which can also include professional development and training, or the lack thereof. for example, in the province of ontario, the jane finch community research partnership was created in 2016, bringing together york university faculty and librarians and members of the jane finch community in the greater toronto area. the group has a threefold focus on: 1) creating a community procedure for reviewing and approving research; 2) establishing a process and open-access database to make research easily accessible to members of the community; and 3) developing resources for researchers looking to conduct research in the jane finch community, including principles for conducting research within the community (jane finch community research partnership, n.d). more recently, york university developed an indigenous research ethics board, “the first for a post-secondary institution in canada,” (york university, 2023). or, within the province of manitoba, kishaadigeh (the manitoba network environment for indigenous health research) is funded by the cihr and promotes “indigenous self-determination in research through the development of community-based research lodges in partnership with five manitoba indigenous organizations” (manitoba network environment for indigenous health research, n.d.)4 reflecting these accountabilities, the faculty of health sciences at the university of manitoba has adopted a comprehensive “framework for research engagement with first nations, métis, and inuit peoples” (first nations, metis, and inuit health research strategic planning committee, n.d.). specific parallels do not exist at our institution, nor in our home province of alberta which is covered by treaties 6, 7, and 8. 4 these include the first nations health and social secretariat of manitoba (fnhssm), the manitoba association of friendship centres (mac), the manitoba inuit association (mia), aboriginal health and wellness centre (ahwc), and fearless r2w. 5 auger et al.: “wisdom seeking together”: circling around research ethics published by scholarship@western, 2023 however, reflecting the multiple colonial provincial and federal jurisdictions, and the distinctive nationto-nation constitutional status of first nations, métis and inuit peoples, as noted earlier, research with indigenous people across all canadian universities must comply with chapter 9 of the tcps2. while drafted as a response to the ongoing concerns of indigenous people regarding unethical research practices by non-indigenous scholars within indigenous communities, criticisms remain of chapter 9, arguing that it is bureaucratic, reinforces the university’s power over research, and relies on colonially determined standards, nature, or evidence for what constitutes harm in research with indigenous peoples (whetung and wakefield, 2018 p. 146). alongside this, researchers at canadian post-secondary institutions are meant to be accountable to the first nations principles of ocap (ownership, control, access and possession) in their research. the ocap principles are meant to entrench “strong information governance on the path to first nations data sovereignty.”5 finally, researchers— indigenous or settler—are also accountable to the indigenous communities with whom they are undertaking research. these communities or nations will have their own protocols rooted in their own legal and governance systems, which can also intersect and bump up against colonially imposed governance models such as the band council system. moreover, in some jurisdictions, research accountabilities may be shaped by treaty accountabilities, which can be complex given purposeful exclusions by white settlers of some indigenous peoples from treaties, and in other jurisdictions, the reality of vast swaths of untreatied lands. not only do indigenous researchers navigate these multiple and oftentimes conflicting spaces of jurisdiction, but indigenous researchers engaged in irm with their own nations are assessed by reb members who often have little to no knowledge of any of these complexities and accountabilities. methods this paper departs from traditional academic discussions of policy by intentionally writing a dialogue piece. in offering this dialogue as a way to bring forward our own social location and relationality, this format follows from a lineage of published discussions and roundtables between and amongst black, indigenous, and other people of colour (bipoc) on complex and fraught issues of intersecting social locations and structures of power, and of complicity and accountability (see for example lawrence & dua, 2005;, patel, moussa & upadhyay, 2015; patel & nath 2022; snelgrove et al., 2014; whetung & wakefield, 2018). our coming together here is not only cross-cultural, but also reflects our different institutional and disciplinary positions, and our distinctive social locations as faculty members within a canadian settler colonial context—auger, a nehiyaw mother and grandmother from treaty 8, a tenured associate professor, cultural practitioner, elected first nation leader (2014-2018), senior administrator of a non-profit organization and first nations government (2008-2013), and first-generation survivor of the indian residential schools in canada; greene a white, privileged settler woman and criminologist; 5 see https://fnigc.ca/ocap-training/. https://fnigc.ca/ocap-training/ 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.13606 and, nath, an assistant professor of equity studies, a political scientist, and a woman of colour and racialized settler whose parents immigrated from india with the “liberalization” of canadian immigration policy. second, in the initial conversations grounding the written dialogue that follows, the co-creators of auger’s original research were integral. drawing from nader’s (1972) call to study up (see also armenta, 2016, p. 3; marker, 2003, p. 369; tallbear, 2014, p. 4), auger, greene, and nath posed two questions to the co-creators: 1) how did you feel about being offered the choice to use a fake name or a real name?; and 2) how did you feel about the offer of an honorarium? 6 while the co-creators did not want to formally co-author this piece, they did invite auger, greene, and nath to take up their interventions and insights in the context of this dialogue. this is reflected in the paper’s structure and the incorporation of their words. auger, greene, and nath were mindful of the relational accountabilities to those impacted most by the processes of the reb. hence, in engaging in this written dialogue, the authors of this paper worked to be accountable to the learnings from the co-creators, drawing from and centring their words, analysis, and experiences, as is evident below. part of this process also included sending a final copy of this paper to all the co-creators involved in the discussion for their input and revisions. third, this paper represents the outcome of a series of deeply iterative discussions that were recorded, where auger, greene, and nath grappled with two issues that were central to the reb’s concerns about auger’s project, specifically the value of the research incentive/honorarium, and the potential risk to participants in discussing experiences of sexual violence. returning to those transcripts sparked further conversation, and auger mapped the nehiyaw natural law teachings (to be discussed below) onto the four sections of the paper that were emerging through our discussions. with this framework in place, auger, greene, and nath began again, this time engaging in a written dialogue, of which this paper was the outcome. through multiple discussions that invited a continuous circling back, we experienced how these discussions occurred in this epistemic space in between western and indigenous research. finally, the framing of this paper considers the following four thematics which auger intentionally grounded in the context of natural law teachings (figure 1): a) how do social locations and positionalities shape how we enter into this conversation; b) what do ethical conversations look like within the context of unethical spaces; c) how does colonial power circulate through the reb’s risk designation; and d) how does the relational accountability within irm disrupt western ethical frames? the teachings, known and practiced by iyiniwak and grounded in creation stories, move through the four directions (east, south, west and north), and follow the order of kindness, honesty, caring, and strength/determination. 7 the creation stories identify the elements, and the teachings 6 while these questions were posed to the co-creators, the conversation proceeded organically. 7 borrows (2010) explains that natural law from an indigenous perspective is “an intimate knowledge of how to read the world.” it is not “the natural law theories within western jurisprudence” (p. 29). the teachings of kindness, honesty, caring, and strength/determination were applied in the indigenous iterative web analysis of another research project conducted by auger (auger, 2014). 7 auger et al.: “wisdom seeking together”: circling around research ethics published by scholarship@western, 2023 provide spiritual guidance. this grounding in sacred and natural law teachings was intentional by auger, given that constructing and conducting indigenous research in accordance with indigenous worldviews reflects the values and beliefs of indigenous peoples (kenny, 2000). these teachings as told by elders are practiced daily and through ceremony. in this conversation, we position ourselves and the co-creators in the centre. examining ethics within the context of how nehiyawak live their lives as well as conducting research as ceremony, as described by wilson (2008), is relational and “at the heart of what it means to be indigenous” (p. 80). this was disruptive to the colonial order of reb ethical reviews. figure 1. circling around research ethics 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.13606 natural law findings the eastern door and the teaching of kindness how do social locations and positionalities shape conversation entry? first, we must note we are situated in a social and institutional context where academic credentials are valued, while indigenous women are not. consequently, the presentation of the co-creator's academic credentials is not simply reactive, it also acknowledges their experience working within western institutions. critically, these western credentials do not capture the full breadth of their knowledge. they are knowledge keepers who practice their spirituality and beliefs. in that light, sharon (b.ed.), lorraine (b.ed. and social work diploma), and angela (m.ed., and b.ed.) participated in the dialogue. they co-created the original research on the invasion of sexual boundaries at the first foundational meeting to determine whether group meetings would be held so they could speak together about selfdetermination and sovereignty from their perspective as educated, culturally grounded, nehiyaw iskwewak. they were not helpless, nor without agency in their work, and helped answer the research question of inquiry: as indigenous people, can we have healthy sovereignty if we have not selfdetermined our sexual experiences? eleven knowledge holders were asked to participate in the study to discuss the issue of and/or experience of rape as one of the worst crimes. they were asked to give their input into the development of all phases of the research, including content, process, and design. they were asked to discuss how the invasion of sexual boundaries affects political, historical, cultural, psychological, sociological, and environmental views. writing up the research was less about the “settler colonial gaze” (tuck & yang, 2014, p. 232) and “settler futurity” (tuck & yang, 2012, p. 1) but more about perspectives of how educated, culturally grounded nehiyaw iskwewak,8 offer a unique collective difference expressed through cree culture, language, and connection to mother earth. this research aligns with tuck and yang’s (2012) question: what is it decolonization wants? collectively, as researchers examining the impact of institutional policies and practices, we centred indigenous voices and discussed how ethical approval for research occurs. this work was not a study of vulnerability. angela, lorraine, and sharon helped to open-up space and discuss their perspective on research ethics. nath: josie, thank you for opening space for us to come together, but also for us to critically reflect on how coming together can constitute an ethical encounter. one practice with a long lineage amongst critical race feminists and indigenous people is to start with self-location. while snelgrove, dhamoon, and corntassel (2014), amongst others, have cautioned against the sometimes performative nature of self-location exercises, they also describe this as “a political practice,” a way to “anchor our power 8 patrick macklem (2001) states sovereignty permits the legal collective difference (p. 111). 9 auger et al.: “wisdom seeking together”: circling around research ethics published by scholarship@western, 2023 differentials,” and a way to name how we enter this conversation in different ways (p. 4). in the spirit of modelling ethical praxis within these different traditions, how do you locate yourself socially and culturally, and why does this matter for entering a discussion of research ethics? auger: my hope is we work in solidarity, and i refer to tuck and yang because we do not know how this paper concludes nor where this work will take us: “solidarity is an uneasy, reserved, and unsettled matter that neither reconciles present grievances nor forecloses future conflict” (tuck & yang, 2012, p. 3). it is unsettling because we are talking about research ethics boards as power structures. indigenous scholars have advanced indigenous legal traditions, but the power of authority is not recognized by the state, yet indigenous people practice it, and why should universities be any different? having said that, i recognize this is a discussion of power struggles that we as indigenous people live as sovereign nations not only within western academic institutions but the nation state itself. when we had the conversation to introduce ourselves carolyn introduced herself as a privileged white settler woman. at first these words created a barrier in relating to carolyn. at the time, i was an untenured assistant professor seeking ethics approval. i wondered what i was up against. afterwards, i started to see this as a first step towards decolonization, and a powerful gesture. carolyn, how did you come to choose those words to introduce yourself to the readership? greene: truthfully, the possibility of producing a barrier had not occurred to me. instead, my description was meant to communicate that i understand my position within this system of white supremacy and to acknowledge the history of violence and cultural genocide my people have and continue to inflict on indigenous peoples. my experiences have given me a profound sense of the privilege i am afforded because of my skin colour which is an unearned privilege. this acknowledgement is important for developing new relationships and maintaining older relationships with the people i have grown up with and love. i feel profoundly responsible for this. rather than alienating, my intention was to make room for dialogue. can i ask if you both felt similar about this? and what about this description felt like a barrier? nath: in the full breadth of my work, i have adopted the praxis of socially locating myself as both a woman of colour and a south asian settler of colour. i do this to acknowledge that how we enter these spaces is structured in and through relationships of power. i am simply not targeted in the same way as indigenous and black colleagues. moreover, the canadian settler colonial state is always inviting me in to be complicit in settler colonialism and anti-blackness, all under the weight of whiteness. not naming this is too risky, hence it must shape how i conduct research, enter a classroom, or enter this project with you both. there is more to name—i am a political scientist, i am non-tenured, i am a cis-woman, i own property, i have secure citizenship status, i have a full-time job, my partner is a cis-white male, i present as able10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.13606 bodied. this shapes how i circulate in the world, but also maps out my accountabilities. for me, the social location of others shapes how i step into collaboration with them. carolyn, if you were not able to recognize white supremacy and reflect on your complicity, i would have been cautious travelling this road with you. but i have other kinds of accountabilities and relationships too. i act through these relationalities even when unnamed. i am a daughter, mother, and sister. i also locate myself as a woman of colour to acknowledge the expertise and knowledge derived from a lineage of embodied experiences of radical communities of colour. this knowledge is often institutionally dismissed as partial, biased, or parochial. this lineage is important to me given the fracturing of relationships that often accompanies migration histories like those of my family’s. with that said, as you both are signalling, identifying these social locations is partial, contingent, and contested. even my identification as a south asian settler of colour risks profound evasions regarding caste—this is something that i have learned from muslim feminist scholar, shaista patel, and something i am still trying to understand with respect to my own location (patel & nath, 2022). moreover, despite some “discomfort,” there can be an ease in focusing on the declarative politics of social location, particularly if the “concern over complicity directs theorizing of one’s place and placemaking,” ultimately eclipsing “the tangible dynamics of land and labour in reproducing settler colonial property” (chatterjee & das gupta, 2020, p. 260). our interpellation—or how we are “hailed” as subjects into these structured positions—is never what makes us fully whole. in our work together, we are carving out other ways of relating to and caring for each other, particularly as we make new and personal disclosures to each other in this process. i appreciate your mention of solidarity, josie, because it reminds me of the “constellations of coresistance” that michi saagiig nishnaabeg scholar and artist leanne betasamosake simpson writes of (see 2016, p. 30). this positioning work is inextricable from a discussion of research ethics in more complex ways than settler rebs address. auger: in this context, i think about what decolonization wants, and it reminds me of parallel pathways (hill, 2008, p. 30). when treaties were made, iyiniwak used their natural laws. treaties are parallel pathways, and i use kindness, honesty, caring, and strength/determination as ethical teachings along with respect, reciprocity and responsibility for future generations. declaring self-determination and restoring our civilization is in accordance with the (1996) saskatoon declaration of indigenous cultural restoration and policy recommendations on cultural restoration developed at the saskatoon summer institute (battiste, 2000). by using indigenous research methodology as “a distinct body of knowledge, research practice, and wisdom-seeking with its own truth and meanings” we are restoring our ways (makokis et al., 2020, p. 14). i will use the term wisdom seeking to be clear about the research hereafter. wisdom seeking involves protocol, ceremony, and teachings to develop ways of knowing, and 11 auger et al.: “wisdom seeking together”: circling around research ethics published by scholarship@western, 2023 the colonizing act of subsuming it under western research must be avoided. the significance of what rebs can address is different from how it should be addressed. makokis et al., note the “ceremonial process could be thought of as parallel, in some ways, to the western process of seeking ethics approval from a review board” (2020, p. 24). the reb was concerned i might cause harm to the nehiyaw iskwewak by asking my research questions, but i did not intend harm, nor did i cause harm to the co-creators; instead, the research prompted healing within the context of wisdom seeking. at the beginning i asked each person how they would like to proceed and if they felt a need to talk to someone; they identified their choices. the focus of this paper is to provide a unique opportunity to discuss the power rebs have where wisdom seeking is applied. my academic research allowed nehiyaw iskwewak the opportunity to discuss their experiences and give voice to self-determination and sovereignty, since patriarchy and colonialism oppressed the sacred positions they held. when carolyn asked if being a white settler was a barrier, did you consider how indigenous people seldom have authority and power to be self-governing? greene: our stories and positions matter. reflecting on this and what has brought us together, i wonder about the extent to which rebs, as colonial institutions, perpetuate structural racism and inequality. to be sure, rebs have a key role in guiding ethical research practices, such as on issues of anonymity and confidentiality. as angela recounts the choice of using real and fictitious names in the project: “if they're [participants are] willing to share but they're not comfortable enough to . . . use their real name, having the opportunity to use a fictitious name, created that space that was needed.” angela’s statement reminds us that this choice is important, and that rebs must ensure researchers respect the needs of participants in creating these spaces. yet, rebs must also understand their positions within this larger colonial system of white supremacy; this understanding is critical for decolonizing reb work. in this way, the stories, and social locations of reb members matter. only by acknowledging these can rebs themselves create the ethical space needed to decolonize reb processes. the southern door and the teaching of honesty what do ethical conversations look like within the context of unethical spaces? nath: the same institution making ethical demands of researchers is also one structured and sustained by profound inequity. consider the organizing logic of whiteness structuring the academe, where the knowledge and expertise of black, indigenous, and other people of colour [bipoc] are devalued, where whiteness is reinscribed through hiring practices and governance, where funding and grant applications require a “recoding of insurgent, insurrectionary, and decolonial work,” where the financial security of the institution relies on imperialism, occupation, and racial capitalism, and ultimately where “risk 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.13606 management” manifests in multiple ways to surveil and target bipoc (patel & nath, forthcoming). rebs are not immune to these intersecting structured power relations. normalized skepticism of the work of bipoc researchers manifests particularly when research challenges dominant western frameworks, and when the research itself is grounded in community. lorraine spoke to narrow research ethics frameworks in her assertion that “research from a western perspective . . . separates people,” in this case, researcher from participants, and that western research frameworks “want to find solutions to their question” (emphasis added). lorraine clearly distinguished between research as ceremony, and the extractive work of non-indigenous researchers who “come in, they get what they want, and they don’t care how they leave you or where you’re at emotionally, mentally, spiritually or physically when they walk away from you.” sabati (2019) describes these enmeshed circuits of power by evoking the concept of “colonial unknowing” to ask “how the reb and its connected discourses of research ethics are sites through which the racial-colonial entanglements of universities are actively reproduced and erased” (p. 1060). given this context, who and what is being disciplined and/or nurtured by these reb processes of normalization and regulation? are researchers engaged in critical work with marginalized communities susceptible to a particular kind of reb policing? josie, from your experience, do you think reb process places qualitatively and quantitatively different labour demands on bipoc researchers, particularly as researchers try to be institutionally legible? carolyn, were these kinds of questions explored in assessing josie’s application? auger: surveillance is contrary to the academic goal of producing critically reflexive work. the surveillance of indigenous people has a distinctive history in canada. historically, the ancestors experienced broken treaty promises, and their parallel pathways disrespected, such as how reserves were carved out of the numbered treaty areas, and we were corralled onto reserves while our land was taken away. my research with indigenous people on self-determination and sovereignty explored the political, historical, cultural, social, psychological, and environmental impacts of this history. the research was exploratory and did not directly involve “repatriation of indigenous land and life,” instead it began discussion about the connections between the experience of rape on indigenous women’s bodies and the rape of mother earth (tuck & yang, 2012, p. 36). the historical actions of church and state in canada resulted in intergenerational trauma: why would this type of research be under surveillance if there has been a national apology and a truth and reconciliation commission9 report? it took three 9 sovereignty is separate from reconciliation. if we consider the truth and reconciliation commission 46th call to action whereby the royal proclamation of 1763 and the treaty of niagara of 1764 would be used to re-affirm the nation-to-nation relationship between aboriginal peoples and the crown, this would mean that euro-canadian sovereignty over indigenous lands and peoples would be repudiated and treaty relationships would be renewed based on principles of mutual recognition, respect, and shared responsibility (4-5). the trc point is highlighted to recognize sovereignty and to remember that only sovereign nations make treaties. 13 auger et al.: “wisdom seeking together”: circling around research ethics published by scholarship@western, 2023 ethics submissions to the reb before approval was granted. the co-creators who signed up were on a healing journey prior to this research. their healing path was the criteria for participant inclusion. the reb has the authority to decide what and when research can proceed. the reb was in a situation where they did not fully understand cultural teachings and protocols nor indigenous research methodology. wisdom seeking is a ceremony and follows cultural protocols with respect to relationality (wilson, 2008). honorarium was based on my experience as a senior administrator working with elders and in ceremonies spanning thirty-five years. i chose this research topic because indigenous people must express how historic and intergenerational trauma shapes their lives and how they are self-determining and sovereign. this was not an easy topic nor is this discussion of power imbalance. the work was stressful and required trust, courage, respect, understanding, and caring from the start. plus, i had to be extremely accountable for every dollar and avoid every stereotype of financial mismanagement because i had a “cop in the head” (boal & epstein, 1990, p. 35). augusto boal built on the work of paulo freire in reference to internalized colonialism where, in this case, the “oppressors” scrutinizing labels of financial mismanagement is in my mind, hence the term. the protocol included an honorarium of two hundred fifty dollars. this was distributed fairly. so, to answer your question nisha, yes, there is a tremendous burden in addition to the regular workload of course coordination and marking assignments while doing sensitive yet empowering research. here, i turn to the co-creators' words, who share a more complex articulation of honorarium than that which is recognized by the reb. angela describes her view and experience of receiving an honorarium: i took it [honorarium] as a gift. but i did not want to take it if it was from her personally because my concern was for her well-being and her family, but i also realized that . . . it was coming from a good place and it was equal for everybody. to be given that gift to be honoured for my time and my experience throughout the sessions that we had, i ended up giving it back to the community to help somebody else out . . . and i do not think it is too much. i do not think it is too little. it is hard to gauge what is too much and too little. all people can do is give what they can and that is a gift in itself. there is no measurement. for lorraine, sometimes when western institutions are giving honorarium as per protocol this creates conflict: it has always been a conflict, this honorarium. when i went to seek out knowledge from the elders, even if i had nothing, i took whatever i could . . . you do it because it is out of the goodness of your heart, so, my advice is, if this honorarium is not coming as a gift from the heart, then don't bother giving it because you are wasting the creator's time, you are wasting the elder's time. and i rarely think that an elder would take an honorarium because they feel obligated because of hard times at home . . . when tobacco or an honorarium is presented to an 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.13606 elder, they will tell you whether they can or cannot help you. they do not have to pretend to know everything. so, if there is hesitation as to, should they or shouldn't they take the honorarium, then it is probably more of a spiritual struggle because, you know, they want to help, they could help a little bit, or they could help a lot. and it is very rare that an elder will say no, because sitting with each other conversing with each other is an education in itself. in addition to explaining cultural protocol to obtaining a culturally relevant education from an elder, loraine highlights trust and the significance of tobacco. the honorarium that is discussed from organizations is basically to save themselves some money. so, they make this a conflictual thing, and it should not be. if you want information from an elder, then do it appropriately. do it first of all with tobacco and then always take a gift, you are not giving a gift to that elder, you are giving a gift to the creator and to the spirit world in hopes that what you give is enough so that the answers will come to the elder. wisdom seeking requires a minimum understanding of cultural protocols, but this was not a requirement of the reb. using the example of healing addictions, lorraine considered the resilience of elders who have endured throughout colonialism and stated she would rather go to them for advice than a person with a phd. so, for me, i always give honorarium whether it is in the form of finance or money . . . i have seen . . . a long time ago, when you relied on the elders [for healing] . . . people bring up their tipi to an elder asking for help. and i have seen miracles happen. today, what does a tipi cost? $1500? and people complain that they have to give 100 or 200 dollars to elders! just because they do not get paid that much for the education they have. lorraine’s example of offering a tipi clarifies the relevancy of cultural protocols and wisdom seeking. the tipi is also a metaphor of a skirt where education happens (anderson, 2000). when a tipi leans too far in one direction it is off balance. reciprocity, respect, and responsibility are foundational principles when conducting indigenous research (weber-pillwax, 2001) and maintaining balance. as we question protocol and gift giving, the tipi is off balance. sharon identifies her discomfort with the honorarium, she responded: i agreed with it [honorarium], but i was not comfortable with it at the same time. and the reason was because of the subject matter, and . . . ceremonial aspects of it, because when someone gives you tobacco to participate in something, and you take that tobacco, and you say you are going to participate, you participate. and traditionally if you were going to participate, then you get yourself there, with whatever means you must get yourself there, but i understand why it would be a part of the research because the financial situation for the individuals that were participating were not all equal. 15 auger et al.: “wisdom seeking together”: circling around research ethics published by scholarship@western, 2023 sharon highlights the internal conflict she felt between her cultural teachings and its application in this research. she recognized her own responsibility to josie and the project upon acceptance of the tobacco offering, and after having read and signed the informed consent that outlined the honorarium which was approved by the review board. sharon said that the money enabled the women to attend the meetings by travelling from one community to the other. at that point in our conversation, nisha pressed further and raised a question to carolyn: “i am wondering carolyn . . . when the reb was talking about honorarium, were similar kinds of conversations happening, or did they look quite different?” in response, carolyn highlights the general focus of reb questions on incentives: “it typically comes down to . . . how much money is being offered and asking is this creating undue influence? . . . the board does not want a researcher to offer ‘a lot’ of money… [because there is belief that participants will consent] only because they need that money.” carolyn further explained: “the issue of undue influence is central which is sometimes problematic as it leaves . . . privileged persons sitting on a board determining amounts they believe introduce undue influence, [thereby]taking away the agency of those deemed to be in ‘need.’” conducting indigenous research within a western setting often leaves indigenous cultural protocols, such as gifting, to be debated among privileged people sitting on rebs. sharon explained her reason for taking part and clarified her reason for participating: “for me, it was not about the honorarium. it was about sharing what i was asked to share. the honorarium was like a gift . . . because for me, it was the purpose of her [auger’s] research that brought me there.” after reflecting on these issues, nisha asked sharon if there were any issues she wanted to discuss. sharon responded: “yes, why is the topic and subject of ethics and the purpose of honorarium important?” greene: josie, when you spoke of nehiyaw cultural protocols as they relate to honorarium, i realized i know very little about these. this reflection makes me wonder how much reb members—specifically non-indigenous members—understand about diverse indigenous cultures and practices, and further, how this lack of understanding impacts ethical review of indigenous research. returning to sharon’s question, a discussion of honorarium is important because it highlights, as lorraine alludes to, the “conflict” that arises in determining “appropriate” honorariums (financial value balanced between undue influence and voluntary participation in research). these central reb concerns may create conflict with nehiyaw cultural protocols when honourarium is narrowly understood. for example, at the beginning of this process, my view of honourarium held that ethical research must provide sufficient compensation for participants’ time and knowledge. yet, i have learned my understanding—limited by colonial influence—prevented me from seeing honorarium beyond fair exchange between researchers and participants at one point in time. perhaps, unsurprisingly, the work of rebs typically reflects the individualistic nature of western research practices which typically do not account for the “collective” (kovach, 2005, p. 30), leaving the collective and spiritual significance of honourariums 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.13606 unacknowledged. lorraine’s critical point drew my attention to something deeper that is exemplified by the conflict surrounding reb determinations of the “appropriate” value of honourarium. josie, lorraine, angela, and sharon taught me honourarium transcends a single event or point in time. it is something larger, an intrinsic part of personal and collective relationships, grounded in reciprocity and accountability to one another. in this context, rebs must begin to understand honourarium as ethically imperative. auger: the top-down approach of decision making is not in alignment with what indigenous people have been saying for decades. by giving and sharing these teachings, the aspect of protocol is missing. if we were to think back to the days when people rode horses, imagine that the reb was sitting on a horse while examining this situation, the right thing to do after learning these teachings would be to give that horse to the people teaching them. it might hurt a little to give something so valuable, but it is respectful protocol. after having gone through the research ethics portal three times, the proposal and budget were approved, and the research followed an ethical process. at the time, i thought i was being treated the same as other researchers. what is the review board’s approach now to indigenous researchers? greene: while the work conducted by rebs is well intended—as is the 2018 tri-council policy statement (tcps-2) guiding their decisions10 —josie’s experience is common for researchers doing similar work. as research design moves away from traditional, experimental, and quantitative forms, the more complex, and burdensome, the ethics review process typically becomes. the tcps-2 is meant to reduce harms and provide greater power to first nations, métis, and inuit peoples in deciding what research they need and prevent the types of research lorraine described. obviously, preventing such unethical work is important. yet, this policy seems to have had the unintended consequence of creating heavier workloads for researchers and resulted in increased policing of indigenous focussed research by institutions often dominated by settler researchers. indeed, scholars have noted that qualitative researchers are most prone to having their research designs questioned by rebs (ells, 2011), and while the wisdom seeking work of josie is different from western qualitative methodologies, the nature of both challenges traditional approaches. the western door and the teaching of caring how does colonial power circulate through reb’s designation of risk? greene: arguably, rebs operate as colonial institutions, expanding their reach over time. this expansion—termed “ethics creep” —is “a dual process whereby the regulatory structure of the ethics bureaucracy is expanding outward, colonizing new groups, practices, and institutions, while at the same time intensifying the regulation of practices deemed to fall within its official ambit (haggerty, 2004, p. 10 in canada, rebs are guided by and follow the 2018 tri-council policy statement: ethical conduct for research on humans (tcps-2). adherence to this policy is required of all institutions in order to hold external funding from the tricouncil agencies. it is through this policy that rebs assess potential harms and benefits of proposed research. 17 auger et al.: “wisdom seeking together”: circling around research ethics published by scholarship@western, 2023 394). this expansion is, in part, propelled by rebs’ power in assessing research risks. national policy instructs us that risk levels are a “function of the magnitude or seriousness of the harm, and the probability that it [harm] will occur, whether to participants or to third parties (tri-council policy statement 2, 2018, p. 21). further, “a proper ethical analysis of research should consider both the foreseeable risk and the available methods of eliminating or mitigating the risk” (tri-council policy statement 2, 2018, ch. 2). while few would disagree rebs should prevent harm, perceptions of what constitutes harm and how those harms might be prevented within the context of social science research varies, leaving space for multiple, at times conflicting, interpretations of risk constitution. for reb members “interpretive questions arise as to what denotes serious harm and the real likelihood of such harm ever materializing” (haggerty, 2004, p. 399). in this way, assessments of potential risk in qualitative social science research are shaped by who reviews the application, and how they are interpreting risk. the inherent subjectivity associated with defining risk creates a space for researchers engaged with qualitative work that is difficult to navigate and requires more work of applicants (haggerty, in press). as such, rebs’ work must be interrogated: do you think such risk prevention reinforces structural inequalities and racism through the replication of existing power imbalances? nath: thinking of our conversations about honorariums and the question, “when does an honorarium become a risk?,” let’s pause on this word “risk.” “risk” is powerful because in the context of a neoliberal university, risk and liability are constantly being managed through an array of surveillance technologies. even when applied universally, we know that technologies of surveillance are not neutral—they are inflected with dominance and have a disproportionate impact on marginalized folks. as part of the infrastructure of universities, rebs are embedded in this. balfour and martel (2018) have noted there is a good deal of scholarship exploring how rebs are “more aligned with institutional risk management concerns than as advocates for academic freedom” (p. 231). but, of course, that binary does not capture the complexities here given academic freedom has often been mobilized against queer, bipoc scholars, and/or scholars doing transgressive or insurrectionary political work (chatterjee & sunaina, 2014).11 in that sense, i think a binary between ethics creep and academic freedom is partial in accounting for these complexities. put differently, is there a temporal presumption of “ethics creep” that there was a time when these kinds of assertions of power were not implicated? for me, what is interesting is how risk is deployed and the role rebs play in interpolating participants (or in this case co-creators) and researchers as “risky rather than at-risk subjects” (balfour & martel, 2018, p. 236). exercising this kind of 11 the canadian association of university teachers (caut) recognizes this intimate tie between inequity and systemic discrimination and the scope of academic freedom in their policy statement on equity. see: https://www.caut.ca/aboutus/caut-policy/lists/caut-policy-statements/policy-statement-on-equity 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.13606 interpretative authority, rebs have the power to reframe—researchers, participants, methodologies, and even projects themselves (balfour & martel, 2018, p. 236). angela described not wanting to take an honorarium directly from josie because her “concern was for [josie’s] well-being and [josie’s] family,” but that she also realized that “it was coming from a good place . . . and it was for everybody.” angela describes honoraria as a gift honouring time and experience, and how the honoraria received was ultimately returned back to the community. lorraine spoke of giving gifts to elders and how in bringing tobacco, “you’re not giving a gift to that elder, you’re giving a gift to the creator and to the spirit world in hopes that what you give is enough so that the answers will come to the elder. no book will ever give you the answer that you need.” the reb’s approach in discussing the honorarium was not just different, but also not benign. what forms of settler violence, oftentimes enacted through rebs themselves, are not considered to be a source of risk or harm? we must also explore reb presumptions around consent, confidentiality, privacy, and anonymity. the question about colonial power circulating through rebs is important, as presumptions around consent and confidentiality may pathologize some subjects as risky and reinscribe damage-centred research. for example, tuck (2009) has described how, “damage-centered researchers may operate, even benevolently, within a theory of change in which harm must be recorded or proven in order to convince an outside adjudicator that reparations are deserved” (tuck & yang, 2014, p. 227). further, hooks (1990) argued that marginalized and oppressed people are only invited to “speak from that space in the margin that is a sign of deprivation, a wound, an unfulfilled longing. only speak your pain” (p. 52). this leads me to reflect on josie’s thoughts on how important it was in her research to come from a positive and empowering place, and how this orientation emerged from a “shared sacred place.” josie’s question of inquiry was not a study of vulnerability, rather it was: as indigenous peoples, can we have healthy sovereignty if we do not really self-determine our sexuality? angela’s comments are also integral in terms of whether and how rebs can recognize when participants/co-creators are going to be speaking from a space of strength and experience. angela challenges a static understanding of risk, by choosing to disclose her name after being empowered by other women in the group: “i also am kind of curious . . . if it’s too strict, or if it’s not fluid enough . . . i’m just kind of curious . . . at the same time, is it part of the problem at some points, you know, or upholding the patriarchy? reinforcing . . . these systems that we work in. you know . . . they’re designed to uphold people in power to uphold that hierarchy, to uphold the patriarchy.” josie describes her research as being “almost like treaty making . . . we have to go back to the spirit and intent of what the research was intended to do. and it was to illuminate . . . to talk about having . . . selfdetermination over our bodies to be sovereign people.” in this context, the research does not begin and end in harm. how do rebs recognize this? would the conversations amongst reb members look 19 auger et al.: “wisdom seeking together”: circling around research ethics published by scholarship@western, 2023 different if the rebs began their assessment in that context? does it matter if josie is centring selfdetermination in her research, but the reb is centring harm? here, we might note that bipoc researchers are often “at-risk” subjects vis-à-vis harm perpetuated by rebs. this raises fundamental questions about the accountability frameworks guiding rebs. greene: in general, rebs are individualistically focused on direct risks to participants. however, rebs reach has expanded, risk has increasingly become a matter of interpretation (haggerty, 2004, in press) and potentially found in the most innocuous research situations. so, unless broader contextual factors are perceived as potentially causing harm to participants, this is unlikely to be the focus of a review. the starting points of an reb versus josie’s are fundamentally different. josie describes coming from a deeply ethical place, with work broadly focused on self-determination and sovereignty, while rebs central function is policing researcher ethicality. in this way, josie’s experience of coming from a place of positivity and good intent, and feeling these intentions were displaced by reb scrutiny of the risk her research might pose to participants reflects these different starting points. there is troubling irony in requiring that indigenous researchers, engaged in decolonial work, secure approval from a colonial institution. auger: regrettably, i agree. to clarify the research question was: as indigenous peoples, can we have healthy sovereignty if we have not self-determined our sexual experiences? not having the power to make our decisions affects us in multiple ways. colonial power circulates when colonizers make decisions over the lives of sovereign peoples; colonialism is perpetuated through the indian act and that mentality is ongoing within institutions and indigenous communities. in the western direction we apply caring to colonial power for iyiniwak researchers engaged in wisdom seeking. it is not enough to cast blame; if i point one finger, three point back at me. i have known elders who showed through their examples multiple approaches of self-determination and that includes being sovereign; they work around and within systems. so, i consider multiple approaches to empowering iyiniwak in their wisdom seeking. the rebs considered this research potentially victimizing nehiyaw iskwewak which was never the intent. rebs must be assured of minimal risk and prevent harm, but only after extensive explanation. i provided explanations across three submissions. i informed them of my reasons, and i asked no more of them than i would respond to. it was then, the reb granted approval for wisdom seeking. as a nehiyaw iskwew researcher engaging in decolonizing work, i answered a litany of questions. i faced myself. i faced unknown reb members who remained anonymous apart from carolyn. my research proposal was on trial. i suffered bouts of insomnia starting and completing this research; these were the experiences i faced. wisdom seeking should be a spiritual, healing research movement that educates people about 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.13606 why this type of research is important in the era of truth and reconciliation and nation-to-nation treaty talks. when there is harmony, a positive intention has a positive outcome. a positive intention must not have a negative consequence. achieving harmony is complicated in the colonized world. one of the findings from my research was the avoidance and unwillingness of elected leadership to respond to my request to present the proposed research. when a colonial system of elected indian act leaders denies or refuses to listen to their own people, it replicates western power structures and upholds patriarchy. to complete this research, i applied my treaty right to livelihood, and my work was spiritually blessed in ceremony. this is sovereignty in action. it was not intended to be disrespectful to the elected leadership. for this reason, iyiniwak laws and legal traditions must inform educational research relationships and action must be taken in accordance with their treaties, worldviews, languages, traditions, ceremonies, customs, heritage, and knowledges (battiste, 2000). while “the last residential school in canada closed its doors in 1996” (frideres & gadacz, 2012, p. 111), individuals, families, communities, and nations are still unravelling the well-documented intergenerational traumas caused by canada’s ‘education’ system. my research offered a caring space for indigenous women to use their language and culture to discuss how rape and unconsented sex impacted self-determination and sovereignty, and resulted in the development of an indigenous trauma informed model. this paper on ethics empowers me to support treaty talks using indigenous laws to guide the process (regan, 2018). the reb created layers of questions and procedures to add to the scrutiny of future research applications by me and other indigenous researchers at the university. my research revealed disharmony when following cultural protocols that do not align with western values. decolonizing research using wisdom seeking and honorarium as part of the cultural protocols face scrutiny. rebs must decolonize themselves. indigenous people have the right to effective participation in decision making in order to sustain their freedom of spiritual practices and sacred worldview (battiste, 2000). a reciprocal educational relationship based on treaty making principles and practices includes kinship, responsibility, reciprocity, and gift-exchange (regan, 2018). the elders are who we go to for advice; this is the way it has and always will be. the indian act leadership may not have a research ethics body to review proposals. their roles and responsibilities are extensive, and they may not have the time or desire to listen to researchers explain their research or read their proposals, so an idea based on parallel pathways that respects the researcher, leadership, and iyiniwak laws and legal traditions is offered. we must demonstrate caring to all. 21 auger et al.: “wisdom seeking together”: circling around research ethics published by scholarship@western, 2023 the northern door and the teaching of strength and determination how does the relational accountability within irm disrupt western ethical frames? auger: we face the northern direction with strength/determination to discuss relational accountability of wisdom seeking. there are many educated people within indigenous communities, and we are healing and trustworthy. relational accountability of researchers to their research builds trust in multiple ways, between researcher and co-creators, amongst co-creators, and between researcher and reb. from a nehiyaw worldview, relational accountability is about our relationships to ourselves, to one another, to the lakes, rivers, oceans, earth, and cosmos. within our worldview, we relate holistically using our mind, body, spirit, and emotions to these beings. we are accountable not only to human beings but to all living beings because we are guided by spirit. we are accountable to all living beings out of respect, and we carry our responsibilities carefully, because we know the universe is reciprocal; we share an understanding of natural law with humility. ceremonies help connect people to their ancestral identity. indigenous teachings specific to each tribe exist, and are culturally inherent, guiding one to be ethical and lawful. traditional tribal laws exist. positive thinking and doing are required to overcome the damaging effects of colonialism. as lorraine shared, helping one another heal is necessary so people feel good. it is by practicing relational accountability with others that trust, safety, and acceptance, allow people whose boundaries have been sexually invaded to have cultural safety. in this way, wisdom seeking is culturally appropriate for nehiyawak engaged in research with their people. nisha and carolyn, from a place of strength and determination, what western ethical frames stand in the way of relational accountability? nath: in the time that we have been in conversation with each other, i’ve agreed to sit on a student research ethics committee. in the orientation, i received the messaging that the ethics process was to support research participants, students’ learning, and my own learning as a committee member. as a member, my responsibility was not to put up barriers, but to support and cultivate good, ethical work. while i appreciated this framing, i am mindful of what we have talked about, specifically, that good intentions have historically been carriers of deep forms of oppression. for example, rose (1996) has described deep colonizing as a process in which “conquest [is] embedded within institutions and practices which are aimed towards reversing the effects of colonization” (cited in veracini 2011, p. 179). in what ways does colonial harm continue, even amidst the good intentions of individual reb members? how you have framed this question as being about western ethical frames and relational accountability is critical because these are ways of seeing and being that do not simply reside in the individual. 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.13606 you have already named one of those western frames in your response—objectivity and distance between researcher and participants. i have learned a good deal from how you, angela, lorraine, and sharon talked about your relationship as one of co-creation. in describing settler researchers who approached her grandmother to do research, angela recounted: “and they asked her . . . what’s the best way we could . . . learn? and she said, ‘well, you come here, you learn here. you learn from the land, you learn from us, you learn with us.” from the outset, angela offers a framing of research that completely disrupts a whole range of normative commitments. she offers an understanding of the researcher as not just someone who creates and disseminates knowledge, but someone who learns. she offers an understanding of the process where expertise and knowledge travel on a horizontal plane—where “you learn from us and you learn with us.” and she shares an understanding of the process as one that is active and grounded in space— “you learn off the land.” in this one sentence, through her grandmother’s words, angela disrupts extractive research and invokes relationality from the outset. i also wonder what to make of the correspondence between relationality and relationships. does the former reference a way of being in relationship and the latter focus more on individuals vis-a-vis each other? moreton-robinson (2017) identifies relationality as “the core presupposition of the indigenous social research paradigm” (p. 71), describing it as socially interconnected, and as premised on culturally embodied knowledges connected to land. of importance here, she writes that relationality informs an indigenous “epistemological and ethical premise that social research should begin with an awareness of our proper relationships with the world we inhabit, and is conducted with respect, responsibility, generosity, obligation, and reciprocity” (moreton-robinson, 2017, p. 71). donald (2012) offers an understanding of ethical relationality, as “an ecological understanding of human relationality that does not deny difference, but rather seeks to understand more deeply how our different histories and experiences position us in relation to each other” (p. 535). the ethical imperative here is that we “acknowledge and honour” how our “histories and experiences position us in relation to each other, and how our futures as people in the world are tied together” (donald, 2012, p. 536). wilson (2008) further explains relational accountability is grounded in respect, reciprocity, and responsibility (p. 77). outside of this framing by indigenous scholars, dhamoon (2019) offers a critical intervention that speaks to power; she describes relational othering as “the interactive processes of re/making, re/organizing, and managing subjugating formations of difference which operate not only in contexts of dominance but in relation to one another as well” (p. 2). i bring together these commentaries on relationality as an invitation for us to consider why relational accountability is ethically distinctive and why this should matter to rebs. the starting point for the reb seems to be one in which relationships are framed as sites of potential conflict of interest, risk, and bias. as you noted, carolyn, naming co-creators in reb review invoked some difficulty of understanding amongst members because the de facto starting point was to presume an “inherent sort of power imbalance . . . between researchers and participants . . . to try and ensure participants are not adversely 23 auger et al.: “wisdom seeking together”: circling around research ethics published by scholarship@western, 2023 impacted by researchers.” to my mind, this is not an unimportant consideration, but it does raise questions about whether it matters if rebs shifted to consider relationality more broadly, but relational accountability more specifically. lorraine spoke about research as ceremony, stating that in: using the prayer, we became equal and that’s the biggest thing about indigenous people is equality . . . we were always taught that nobody is better than you and you’re no better than anyone. so, when we look at people, and going back to what i said about education, it does not matter how much education you have. i am not going to put anybody on a pedestal because spiritually, mentally, emotionally, and physically, they are no better than me and i am not better than them. so, when josie opened up the research using the circle perspective it put us all on an equal playing field moreover, lorraine cemented relationality and accountability together, noting co-creators had accountability to each other rooted in care. angela reinforced this when she spoke about personal accountability and accountability to family and community. here she described relationality and kinship as working together. i think there is a learning here for non-indigenous scholars and researchers for broadening ethical frames to consider these other dimensions of accountability. given all of this, what becomes the intervention or the relational accountabilities of reb members? returning to the assertion that “relationality is an inextricable part of [indigenous] sovereign knowledges” (moreton-robinson, 2017, p. 71), is it helpful to think through rebs’ accountabilities as part of a treaty relationship? greene: currently, chapter 9 of the tcps-2 provides the foundation for the ethical review of research with indigenous persons in canada. however, we must remain vigilant to ensure this framework does not unintentionally result in expansion of colonial power over indigenous researchers working within indigenous communities. with this preface, i do see space to begin considering how rebs do their work and the role of relational accountabilities. typically, rebs regard researcher-participant relationships with some level of distrust, in part, because of western emphasis on objectivity. here i do not mean total objectivity—few things, if any, are purely objective. in our work, josie voiced concern about the value western ethics places on objectivity and how this results in a devaluation of wisdom seeking and dealignment with relational accountability. as current practices go, i tend to agree with josie’s assessment. however, practices can change and there is room for relational accountability in reb work. i would suggest emphasis on some level of objectivity is both important for research and consistent with wisdom seeking. for example, when josie conducted her research, she did not go into interviews having pre-determined what would be shared. josie provided 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.13606 opportunities for women to speak and share their experiences without judgement, letting them shape the trajectory of the research findings. this is the objectivity i refer to and believe is critical for ethical research. josie demonstrates ethical research can be both “objective” and relationally accountable. the rebs’ challenge is in recognizing: 1) researcher-participant relationships do not preclude ethical (and “objective”) work; and 2) positive, trusting relationships are intrinsically connected to conducting ethical research. the importance of research-participant relationships is reflected in the profoundly ethical, relational space created by josie in her work and is captured by lorraine: “she [josie] was able to hear us, hear out our concerns. and she deeply and genuinely listened to our concerns and that's where the relationship came in. she took the time to do that.” lorraine highlights the importance of trusting research relationships. yet, rebs have not historically considered the importance of positive, trusting relationships nor relationality in shaping ethical research. for practice to change, rebs must themselves be relationally accountable. discussion of indigenous laws and legal traditions auger: historically, indigenous researchers “bear the weight” of research done badly (kenny, 2000, p. 141). despite the imposition of colonial power on indigenous peoples, nehiyaw iskwewak are not passive research vessels even though colonial power imposes its will on them. as angela reminded us, colonial power never conquers: the power of healing is stronger and moves us toward self-determination and sovereignty. resurgence and reconciliation research on the invasion of sexual boundaries research identified the need for balance in society. resurgence and transformative forms of reconciliation are theoretical and practical processes of “intergenerational trial and error apprenticeship,” (borrows & tully, 2018, p. 9). to find balance requires understanding the treaty relationship and relational accountability between partners. resurgence is to regenerate and renew: “the treaty relationship needs to be recollected, re-proclaimed, and renewed” (borrows & tully, 2018, p. 15; nichols, 2017). within western systems, “indigenous philosophies of relationality are increasingly being sought to inform strategies of resurgence and reconciliation with one another and the environment,” (borrows & tully, 2018, p. 17). yet, canadian research ethics policy and reb practices governing indigenous research are not based on a treaty partnership. taken as a whole, tri-council ethics policy situates ethical review and decision making within a western colonial frame that, despite good intentions and the inclusion of chapter 9, may interfere with decolonizing research, and, importantly, the decolonization of research itself. in this way, canadian ethics policy, specifically as it relates to the social sciences, must address the specific policy mechanisms (e.g., determinations of risk) that continue to reinforce and perpetuate colonial power over indigenous lives and research. while this research focussed on two reb concerns (risk and honourarium), there are other areas of policy which must be considered. for example, while we acknowledge the importance of 25 auger et al.: “wisdom seeking together”: circling around research ethics published by scholarship@western, 2023 informed consent, we also recognize that this process is critical to research; however, one cannot ignore the relationship between requiring signed consent and colonial power as it can “evoke colonial histories . . . or may be a culturally inappropriate way of documenting and constructing a relationship” (wynn and israel, 2018, p. 800). in comparison the treaty of waitangi and research ethics in aeotearoa, identifies “respect for . . . indigenous rights, control over research processes and reciprocity within research relationships to ensure that equitable benefits are realised within indigenous groups,” (hudson & russell, 2009, p. 61). māori treaty rights were breached. the treaty of waitangi is recognised as an integral part of new zealand’s ethical research framework in response to māori treaty rights. like the māori, indigenous people in canada must renew the treaty relationship to provide a current interpretation “to reflect the ethical understandings of both parties” in research (hudson & russell, 2009, p. 62). research, and the policies that guide it, can address inequalities, which is why māori express the need for reb representation to review research proposals according to principles embedded in their treaty. yet, ethics goes beyond reb inclusion because justice and social and cultural responsibility needs remain unmet; the roles of both treaty partners must be understood (european and māori) (hudson & russell, 2009). since research funding can benefit communities, it was suggested the principle of “beneficence” be included (hudson & russell, 2020, p. 62). a treaty-based framework for engaging with māori in research identifies their “sovereignty” respectfully (hudson & russell, 2009, p. 66). the māori position to ethical research is based on signing the treaty of waitangi. however, treaties have not been signed by all indigenous peoples. research involving australian and torres strait islanders is guided by a national framework informed by the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples [undrip] which means they “have the right to be fully engaged in any processes, projects, and activities that may impact them” (australian institute of aboriginal and torres strait islanders, 2020, p. 2). developing a new code positions aboriginal peoples and torres strait islanders from research subjects to research partners (australian institute of aboriginal and torres strait islanders, 2020, p. 4). the undrip articulates the right to self-determination (australian institute of aboriginal and torres strait islanders, 2020, p. 12). researchers are required to engage not consult. research must protect and recognize individual, group, and collective rights “where the current law falls short” (australian institute of aboriginal and torres strait islanders, 2020, p. 12). undrip (2007) promotes equality for collective and individual human rights and recognizes, promotes, and protects the rights and freedoms of indigenous peoples worldwide. the undrip (2007) recognizes treaty affirmed rights as “in some situations, matters of international concern,” and that treaty is the basis for “strengthened partnership” (p. 14). the treaty relationship in canada involves two treaty partners, where “conversations” typically occur in courts as a result of government(s)’ failures to abide by treaty commitments. research ethics in canada currently follow national guidelines and are not reflective of a treaty relationship. the natural law teachings, and four 26 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.13606 directions teachings of kindness, honesty, caring, and strength/determination, are integral to treaty teachings. the iyiniw laws and legal traditions were integrated in this paper to show how they help frame negotiation and implementation of renewed ethical discussions. these iyiniw laws must continue to shape legal traditions. while it can be discomforting to emerge from our discussion without a singular set of policy recommendations, this is in part a reflection of the ethos of decolonization animating our discussion, and by implication the conception of relational accountability embedded therein. the significance of what rebs can address is different from how they should be addressed. mindful of both of these dimensions, we centre the idea of parallel pathways as a grounds for kikapekiskwewin or future conversation. this minimally includes a sharing circle and ceremony; they work together. iyiniwak have laws and legal traditions requiring cultural protocols be followed with elders for wisdom seeking. recognizing traditional knowledge informs wise practices and creates cultural safety. 12a sharing circle would allow the researcher to explain what they are wisdom seeking to co-creators; and the researcher could use national guidelines to raise their own questions and ask for guidance from the elders. the elders would inform their decisions after a sweatlodge or other ceremony based on iyiniwak laws and legal traditions. communication with the university via letter would ensure wise practices were followed. power should not rest with patriarchal forms of governance on indigenous protocols and ceremonies as per the tcps-2. co-existence is necessary, and this would give freedom of choice to indigenous peoples to take this parallel path. we also acknowledge that invoking conceptions of treaty and parallel pathways raises many critical questions. what are the precise implications for rebs? what would parallel pathways or treaties have to delineate for rebs to be effective and accountable in supporting ethical research with indigenous communities and nations? what would indigenous representation look like on an institutional reb? or, would there be indigenous-specific rebs, and, if so, how would members be accountable to the territories on which they reside if they are indigenous to other parts of turtle island? what forms of knowledge do reb members need to enact relational accountabilities, and how might those processes of learning and exchange be non-extractive? all of these questions, and more, constitute a generative space for kikapekiskwewin, particularly given that treaty-based frameworks for parallel pathways represent “diplomatic processes for negotiating relations of non-violent and generative co-existence between living beings in shared geographies” (starblanket, 2019, p. 444). critically, these relationship agreements are “living” because they are relational, and hence subject to ongoing updating and renegotiation. in this, while the distinctive focus on parallel pathways in the context of post-secondary rebs is meant to centre indigenous self-determination and sovereignty, settler and non-indigenous accountabilities, and relational accountabilities, our scope is necessary delimited in that future conversations are needed. 12 cultural safety in this context refers to reb policy practices that meet the needs and expectations of culturally diverse, indigenous scholars. 27 auger et al.: “wisdom seeking together”: circling around research ethics published by scholarship@western, 2023 moreover, this paper is limited as it represents one experience at one location and time, and is therefore not representative of all canadian reb operations. however, our work does suggest current tri-council policy guiding rebs in canada leaves room for colonial power over how research is conducted, and shows the need to release this colonial power and control. we argue that iyiniwak should not be interfered with by a western body when wisdom seeking. indeed, our research has shown that wisdom seeking is decolonizing. conclusion when we first met in 2020, our hearts warmed to the idea of working together. it took one year to complete this work. the timing was unintentional, but by allowing the cycle of four seasons to change, we reflected deeply on how decolonization can take place. it happened that way. it took this long to write about ethics concerning the invasion of sexual boundaries, anonymity, and whether co-creators were unduly influenced into participating. it took this long to acknowledge the powerful healing effect stemming from the research and writing about colonial power structures standing in the way of needed institutional changes. parallel pathways respect tribal protocols espoused by the elders and iyiniwak scholars. constructive agreements must be culturally safe for the indigenous researcher and indigenous people involved in research so that they may be free to practice cultural protocols and ceremony in research. indigenous women who have been on a cultural path and who have used their culture to support their recovery from trauma feel supported in ceremony. tri-council guidelines pertaining to researchers conducting research with first nations, metis, and inuit peoples were intended for researchers researching indigenous peoples. this policy is supposed to be “offered in a spirit of respect. it is not intended to override or replace ethical guidance offered by indigenous peoples themselves” (tri-council policy statement 2, 2018, ch. 9). as such, a sharing circle hosted by the indigenous researcher with co-creators and elders would enable a discussion and understanding of wisdom seeking followed by a ceremony. creating a collaborative network empowers educated iyiniwak to listen to changes wanted by their cocreators through wisdom seeking, thereby undoing the damage of patriarchal colonial systems. whether such fundamental changes to western rebs will occur is yet unknown. however, the insights offered here suggest a first step toward decolonizing university reb review processes is recognizing they cannot be entirely separated from the colonial system enveloping them, but this acknowledgement may serve as the starting point for changing harmful practices. rebs must bring together greater knowledge and work alongside first nations, metis, and inuit persons to ensure reb processes do not result in harm, nor undermine or supplant the ethical guidance offered by indigenous communities themselves. one way to achieve this may be requiring indigenous people who are learning about their indigeneity and non-indigenous reb members to complete courses focussed on indigenous cultures, practices, and research methodologies as indigenization. as we have noted in this paper, the university is a settler 28 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 14, iss. 1 doi:10.18584/iipj.2023.14.1.13606 colonial institution, meaning that decolonizing work is fraught. even the principles of ocap— ownership, control, access, and possession of research data within indigenous communities (see first nations information governance centre, 2021)—which gesture towards self-determination and sovereignty, give elected band leaders authority over any research in their nations. this, in turn, reinforces colonial administrative structures set out by the indian act. it is not a completely ideal situation because it can marginalize and prevent researchers from wisdom seeking. decolonial change within the parameters of settler colonial and western frameworks cannot be the pathway forward. while relational accountabilities can bring us together for deep meaningful 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(2014). standing with and speaking as faith: a feminist-indigenous approach to inquiry. journal of research practice, 10(2), 17. truth and reconciliation commission of canada (2015). truth and reconciliation commission of canada: calls to action. truth and reconciliation commission of canada 2012. 4–5 https://publications.gc.ca/site/eng/9.801236/publication.html tuck, e. (2009). suspending damage: a letter to communities. harvard educational review, 79(3), 409–428. https://doi.org/10.17763/haer.79.3.n0016675661t3n15 tuck, e., & yang, k., w. (2014). r-words: refusing research. in d. paris & m. t. winn (eds.), humanizing research: decolonizing qualitative inquiry with youth and communities (pp. 223249). sage. https://doi.org/10.4135/9781544329611.n12 tuck, e., & yang, k. w. (2012). decolonization is not a metaphor. decolonization: indigeneity, education and society, 1(1), 1-40. un general assembly. 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(2018) the fetishes of consent: signatures, paper, and writing in research ethics review. american anthropologist, 120(4), 795– 806. https://doi.org/10.1111/aman.13148 york university (2023, march 21). indigenous research ethics board sets nationwide precedent – yfile. yorku.ca https://doi.org/10.1111/aman.13148 developing oil and gas resources on or near indigenous lands in canada: an overview of laws, treaties, regulations and agreements the international indigenous policy journal volume 3 | issue 2 article 5 august 2012 developing oil and gas resources on or near indigenous lands in canada: an overview of laws, treaties, regulations and agreements laura wright university of western ontario, lwrigh56@uwo.ca jerry p. w hite university of western ontario, white@uwo.ca recommended citation wright, l. , white, j. p. (2012). developing oil and gas resources on or near indigenous lands in canada: an overview of laws, treaties, regulations and agreements. th e international indigenous policy journal, 3(2) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.5 this policy is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. developing oil and gas resources on or near indigenous lands in canada: an overview of laws, treaties, regulations and agreements abstract the development of resources on and near indigenous territories has many potential benefits including employment creation, wealth sharing, and improved service delivery. however, the development of oil and gas resources can also lead to economic inequality, displacement, loss of traditional lifestyles, and significant environmental damage. this paper is a review of the how oil and gas development on indigenous lands and traditional territories has been regulated in canada to balance these benefits and risks. some of the legislation discussed include the indian oil and gas act, the first nations oil and gas and moneys management act, the umbrella final agreement in the canadian north, as well as unregulated impact benefit agreements between first nations and industry. these regimes and others are examined in terms of their provisions for environmental protection and meaningful aboriginal consultation, and is intended to inform discussions on how to improve the policy approach to resource development. keywords economic development, resource development, environmental impacts, social impacts, policy, treaties creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ developing oil and gas resources on or near indigenous lands in canada: an overview of laws, treaties, regulations and agreements canada’s potential crude oil reserve is one of the largest in the world, second only to saudi arabia. likewise, canada is also the second largest exporter of natural gas, trailing behind russia (davis, 2005). thus, it is projected that oil and gas activities, including exploration and exploitation, will increase dramatically in canada (van hinte, gunton, & day, 2007). these activities may provide immense benefits to local communities and canada as a whole, but also pose great social, cultural, and environmental risks. potential benefits include increased employment, as well as stimulation and diversification of the local economy through the establishment and development of local businesses, potentially leading to sustainable economic development (van hinte et al., 2007; sosa & keenan, 2001). however, the development of oil and gas resources can also lead to economic inequality, inflation, social upheaval, displacement, housing shortages, social tensions, loss of traditional lifestyles, and significant environmental damage (van hinte et al., 2007; sosa & keenan, 2001). the relative weight of the potential benefits and risks of oil and gas exploitation is balanced through federal and provincial legislation that both facilitate and constrain economic and social development for the communities affected. jurisdiction over natural resources in canada canada is a federal state with a complex division of jurisdictional power between the federal government and the ten provincial governments. the constitution act, 1867, divides powers between these jurisdictions. pursuant to section 109, the provinces have ownership and jurisdiction over the natural resources within their borders. section 109 reads: all lands, mines, minerals, and royalties belonging to the several provinces of canada, nova scotia and new brunswick at the union, and all sums then due or payable for such lands, mines, minerals, or royalties, shall belong to the several provinces of ontario, quebec, nova scotia, and new brunswick, in which the same are situate or arise, subject to any trust existing in respect thereof, and to any interest other than that of the province. (constitution act, 1867) thus, provinces can enact laws governing the management, control, and exploitation of natural resources. however, the federal government does retain authority over natural resources in some of the territories, the continental margin, national parks, and on indian reservations (black, 2008). the federal government also has regulatory power through the national energy board (neb), the mandate of which is to regulate international and interprovincial aspects of oil, gas, and electric utilities in the interest of the canadian public (national energy board, 2011). while, in general, the provinces have jurisdiction over natural resources within their borders, the web of jurisdictional power is complicated in the special case of resource development on first nations lands. by virtue of the constitution act (1867), the federal government has responsibility for legislation concerning “indians and lands reserved for the indians.” reserve lands are set apart for first nations bands and are held by the federal crown for the collective use and benefit of the entire band. while this is the case for most of canada, relatively recent land claim settlements in the canadian north have significantly shifted jurisdictional power over land and resources from the canadian crown to first nations governments. given the complexity of the jurisdictional web surrounding canada’s aboriginal peoples, in general, and resource development on aboriginal land, specifically, a brief discussion of the legal status of aboriginal rights, title, and treaties is needed to provide the backdrop for a discussion of the shifting relationship between first nations, government, and industry. this will be taken up in the following section. 1 wright and white: developing oil and gas published by scholarship@western, 2012 aboriginal rights: title and treaties1 section 35(1) of the constitution act, 1982, provides recognition of aboriginal rights and affirms aboriginal peoples’ interests in traditional lands: the existing aboriginal and treaty rights of the aboriginal peoples of canada are hereby recognized and affirmed. (constitution act, 1982) the constitutional recognition of aboriginal rights secures their supremacy over any inconsistency in common law, federal legislation, or provincial legislation (barring any limits established by the courts). however, while the constitution act (1982) secures aboriginal rights, it does not create them; aboriginal rights are inherent, collective rights based on their original occupancy of the land. aboriginal rights to land and resources are also intertwined with the notion of aboriginal title. the royal proclamation of 1763 effectively consolidated great britain’s rule over north america, while recognizing the right of aboriginal people to occupy their traditional lands. exclusive jurisdiction over the newly acquired territories in north america was claimed by imperial authorities, which gave the crown a monopoly on the land transactions between aboriginal nations. the royal proclamation (1763) effectively gave the crown the sole right of acquiring land from aboriginal people. an aboriginal band is prohibited from directly transferring its interest in land to a third party; sales or leases can only be carried out after land has been surrendered to the crown, with the crown then acting on the band’s behalf. the inalienability of aboriginal land, except to the crown, has dramatic implications for resource development on reserve lands, which will be discussed more thoroughly in subsequent pages. the exclusive right of acquisition given to the federal crown by the constitution act, 1982, and the canadian charter of rights and freedoms (1982) continues today. the constitution act, 1982, is the supreme law of canada and cannot be overridden by other legislation. section 35 of the constitution act guarantees aboriginal and treaty rights. likewise, section 25 of the charter guarantees that the rights and freedoms contained within are not to construed as to abrogate or derogate from aboriginal, treaty, or other rights and freedoms, including those that were recognized by the royal proclamation (canadian charter of rights and freedoms, 1982). until the charter and the constitution act, 1982, came into effect, the royal proclamation merely had the force of any other federal act, and as such the rights and guarantees contained within it could be limited, altered, or overridden by any subsequent federal legislation. aboriginal title, a specific class of aboriginal right, also exists independent of canadian legislation. calder v. british columbia (1973) confirmed that aboriginal title is a legal right derived from traditional occupation and use of tribal lands. moreover, aboriginal title to land cannot be understood under traditional property laws. it is not like fee simple, but is instead a sui generis interest in land. in delgamuukw v. british columbia (1997), the court identified the basic characteristics of this interest: (1) the inalienability of title, except to the crown in right of canada; (2) the origin of that interest stemming from prior occupation; (3) the collective, not individual, aboriginal interest in land. generally speaking, the issue of aboriginal title only arises where land has not been the subject of a treaty signed between aboriginal peoples and the crown, or where the issue of extinguishment is still a matter of contention. lands that are not covered by an existing treaty remain open to aboriginal title claims. on the basis of the methodology adopted in r. v. van der peet (1996), the court held that the right of aboriginal title 1 this section relies heavily on permission to develop: aboriginal treaties, case law and regulations (2004) by the present author, jerry p. white, along with paul maxim and nicholas spence. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.5 must be established by proof of land occupation prior to the assertion of sovereignty by the crown. aboriginal title is also an underlying burden on the provincial proprietary interest in lands and resources under section 109 of the constitution act, 1867, discussed above. once aboriginal title has been established, the aboriginal nation concerned is not constrained to practice solely those activities on which their title was established, but are free to use their land, including all resources pertaining to it, on an exclusive basis for any purpose that is not completely incompatible with their traditional practices. in other words, activities that would sever the relationship of aboriginal people to their land would not be justified by aboriginal title. in practical terms, it is not absolutely clear what this means or how this restriction on aboriginal title may hinder oil and gas development in the future. case law is still developing in this area. claims of aboriginal title are generally not an issue when the crown and an aboriginal nation have signed treaties, which are treated as legal instruments, and corresponding treaty rights have been established. treaty rights have also been given constitutional recognition and affirmation in section 35(1) of the constitution act, 1982 (see above). moreover, treaty rights are also protected from the application of provincial legislation by section 88 of the indian act (1985). the canadian courts have held that each treaty is to be treated as unique and is to be governed by public law rules. treaties are to be interpreted as solemn exchanges of promises between the crown and the aboriginal societies, and the crown is obligated to fulfill its side of the agreement. r. v. simon (1985) established a need for treaties to be interpreted in an evolutionary way. for example, aboriginals are not limited to using traditional weapons when exercising their hunting and fishing treaty rights; technological innovations can be used. this principle of interpretation, recently recognized, may have drastic implications for the reinterpretation of treaties, especially in relation to resource rights. many of the pre-confederation treaties make no mention of natural resources, let alone oil and gas specifically, because, at the time of signing, oil and gas were not being developed in canada. thus, it is possible that various treaties may be litigated for the purpose of re-interpretation. however, while litigation is still a possibility for pre-confederation treaties, aboriginal rights to oil and gas on reserve lands have been legislated and regulated without treaty reinterpretation. the exploration of these legislative and regulatory regimes, and how they have developed, will be the focus of the next section. in more recent years, settled land claims have created a number of modern day treaties, also called final agreements, which explicitly address issues surrounding resource development on settlement land, including first nation control over land and resources. modern day treaties, like the umbrella final agreement (1993) in the yukon and the inuvialuit final agreement (inuvialuit regional corporation, 1987) in the northwest territories, give aboriginal communities jurisdiction over selected lands and guarantee aboriginal communities meaningful participation in decision-making related to other tracts of land. these agreements represent an exchange of undefined aboriginal rights, including aboriginal title to land outside the agreement, for specific treaty rights (executive council office, 2008), which are constitutionally protected under section 35 of the constitution act, 1982. while aboriginal peoples party to these agreements cede their aboriginal right and title to non-settlement land, if aboriginal rights are found to be expanded in the future, these newly recognized rights will also be enjoyed by these northern peoples. in addition to fulfilling the terms of treaties, the federal government also has a fiduciary obligation to aboriginal peoples. this fiduciary obligation is not extinguished in the case of modern treaties and stems from the crown’s monopoly on transactions involving land held by aboriginal peoples and has roots in the claims of aboriginal title and the royal proclamation (1763) discussed above. where the crown assumes or exercises discretionary power over the rights or interests of aboriginal peoples, it is under an obligation to protect them in the enjoyment of their aboriginal rights. in certain circumstances, the provincial crown is held to the same fiduciary obligations. this relationship is fiduciary when the province places itself in the 3 wright and white: developing oil and gas published by scholarship@western, 2012 position of the federal crown. this may occur, for example, where the provincial crown assumes undertakings in a treaty or attempts to infringe on aboriginal or treaty rights. aboriginal and treaty rights are not absolute and may be infringed by both federal and provincial governments if the infringement furthers a “compelling and substantial” legislative objective and is consistent with the special fiduciary relationship between the crown and the aboriginal peoples. interestingly, conservation and management of a natural resource has been found to be a valid justification for infringing on aboriginal and treaty rights as it is argued to address both aboriginal and legislative interests. generally, the crown has a duty to consult with the aboriginal peoples to be affected before aboriginal or treaty rights can be infringed. the supreme court of canada has recognized and defined the crown’s legal duty to consult aboriginal groups in a series of decisions and has become an increasingly significant catalyst for change in the relationship between the state and the indigenous peoples of canada. the supreme court ruling on the haida nation v. british columbia/taku (2004) case further defined the legal duty to consult, which was found to exist when there is contemplated crown conduct and a possible adverse impact on a potential or established aboriginal or treaty right. the court set out that, much like the crown’s fiduciary duty, the duty to consult and accommodate flows from the crown’s assumption of lands and resources formerly held by first nations and further affirmed that the crown must act honorably in its dealings with first nations. this decision also established that, while procedural aspects of consultation can be delegated to third parties such as industry project proponents, the ultimate legal duty of consultation and accommodation still rests with the crown. subsequent decisions2 on the legal duty to consult have provided further clarification. in some circumstances, boards or tribunals can carry out consultation activities, but they do not fulfill the crown’s obligation. treaties, including modern day treaties, do not negate the crown’s obligation to consult, and strategic, higher level decisions, not just individual project applications, may be subject to consultation. the duty to consult can be a burden on either the federal or provincial crown, depending on which jurisdiction is contemplating the action. some provinces, including british columbia and alberta3, have formal policies and procedures established for consulting with aboriginal groups on issues of land management and resource development on crown land. in alberta, the legal duty to consult is more easily triggered because all of alberta is subject to treaty; where a treaty right or aboriginal title is established, a first nation does not need to establish the initial burden of proof that their rights may be affected. conversely, in british columbia, where there is a lack of treaties, and thus a lack of established and clearly recognized aboriginal rights, the burden of proving that an aboriginal right or title is potentially being infringed upon is placed on the first nation. as the above discussion reveals, resource development on reserve and settlement lands and lands subject to aboriginal title claims is legislatively much more complicated than development on other lands. the straightforward provincial jurisdiction over natural resources is not tenable for natural resources found on aboriginal lands for the following reasons: (a) reserve lands fall under federal jurisdiction; 2 these decisions include west moberly first nations v. british columbia (2011), little salmon/carmack first nation v. yukon (2008), halalt first nation v. british columbia (2011). 3 british columbia’s consultation policy can be accessed at http://www.gov.bc.ca/arr/treaty/negotiating/public.html alberta’s consultation policy can be accessed at http://www.aboriginal.alberta.ca /574.cfm 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.5 (b) aboriginal and treaty rights, including those established through modern day treaties are recognized in the canadian constitution act, 1982, and are, therefore, protected from conflicting provincial legislation; (c) the federal government has a fiduciary relationship and a duty to consult with aboriginal peoples. consequently, the federal government has passed specific legislation and regulations regarding oil and gas development on aboriginal lands. the following section will examine this federal regime and how it has evolved to include more first nation participation. in the final section, suggestions for further legislative developments will be discussed. federal legislation and regulation of oil and gas development on aboriginal lands the indian oil and gas act the indian oil and gas act (iog act, 1985) vests the department of indian affairs and northern development with the power to regulate and manage exploitation of oil and gas on “land reserved for the indians” (s.2). the iog act first came into force in april 1977 and, after consultation with oil producing first nations and the indian resource council (irc)4, was amended to reflect the needs of the modern oil and gas industry and to fill existing regulatory gaps (indian oil and gas canada, 2010). however, while the new iog act was passed on may 14, 2009, it will not come into force until the indian oil and gas regulations (iog regulations, 1995) are also amended. at the time of publication, the 1995 iog regulations and the 1985 iog act are still in effect. section 3 of the current iog act (1985) provides the governor in council with the power to make regulations that (a) respect the granting of leases, permits, and licenses for the exploitation of oil and gas in indian lands, and the terms and conditions thereof; (b) respect the disposition of any interest in indian lands necessarily incidental to the exploitation of oil and gas in those lands, and the terms and conditions thereof; (c) provide for the seizure and forfeiture of any oil or gas taken in contravention of any regulation made under this section or any lease, license, or permit granted under such regulation; and (d) prescribe the royalties on oil and gas obtained from indian lands. furthermore, section 4 of the iog act (1985) prescribes “all oil and gas obtained from indian lands … is subject to payment to her majesty in right of canada, in trust for the indian bands concerned, of the royalties prescribed from time to time by the regulations.” however, section 4(2) allows the minister to adjust the royalties payable in consultation with council of the band affected. the minister also has a general duty to consult, on an ongoing basis, the affected first nations regarding the administration of the iog act. although not currently in force, several amendments to the iog act (“an act to amend,” 2009) are worthy of comment as they directly relate to the potential for aboriginal economic development, the applicability of provincial legislation, environmental protections, and the requirement of aboriginal consultation. as with the current iog act, royalties due to the first nation band are to be paid to her majesty in right of canada in trust. however, the amended iog act (“an act to amend,” 2009) provides more regulatory power to the minister in council, specifically power to determine the value of payable royalties, assess the interest to be 4 the indian resource council is made up of first nations across canada with oil and gas production on their land (irc, 2008). 5 wright and white: developing oil and gas published by scholarship@western, 2012 charged on royalties, and establish administrative fees. since the iog regulations, which are required to put the iog act into force, are currently being negotiated, it is not known how the minister in council’s legislative power over royalty payment will affect the ability of first nations to benefit economically from oil and gas development. the amended iog act (“an act to amend,” 2009) also requires to the extent that it is practicable and reasonably efficient, safe, and economical to do so, an operator to employ persons who are resident on reserves that include first nations lands on which the exploration and exploitation is being conducted. (s. 4.1(1)(v)) thus, the new iog act has the potential to lead to more sustainable economic development for the first nations involved through expanded employment. however, without the establishment of effective training programs and culturally sensitive employment practices, the goal of increased aboriginal employment in the sector is more difficult to achieve. yet, the need for tertiary services for oil and gas development can support additional employment opportunities and aboriginal business development. for example, the fort nelson first nation has established construction, catering and other service based businesses in partnership with the black diamond group limited, providing direct benefits to the community (waterman, 2011). the new iog act (“an act to amend,” 2009) also allows for regulations to vary across provinces so that provincial legislation can be replicated at the federal level, and laws and regulations can be harmonized without affecting the jurisdictional spheres of the two governments. however, section 4.2 (4) provides that “regulations made under another act of parliament prevail over laws of a province that are incorporated by the regulations made under this act…” the newly amended iog act (“an act to amend,” 2009) also gives the governor in council (the minister of aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc) and his or her delegates) the power to make regulations “respecting the protection of the environment from the effects of exploration for or exploitation of oil and gas situated in first nations lands…” (s4.1(1)(x)). finally, although section 6(1) of the current iog act requires the minister to consult with the affected indian bands on an ongoing basis, the first nations people to whom this act may apply have little control over oil and gas exploitation on their lands because the minister of indian oil and gas is vested with immense discretionary power in this regard. in the amended iog act (“an act to amend,” 2009), section 6 (1.1) is modified by the following stipulations: the governor in council5 may, by regulation, (a) require that a power of the minister … be exercised only if prior approval of the council of the first nation is obtained, if the council is first consulted, or if prior notice is given to the council, as the case may be; (b) require that any such power of the minister be exercised only if prior consent is given by any first nation member who is in lawful possession of the first nations lands; and (c) require that notice be given to the council of the first nation after the minister exercises such power. thus, depending on the iog regulations currently being negotiated, the duty to consult described within the iog regulations may be more reflective of the court’s new definition of the crown’s duty to consult with first nations. 5 for further clarity, the governor in council of indian oil and gas is the minister of aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc) and his or her delegates. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.5 the indian oil and gas regulations the indian oil and gas regulations (iog regulations, 1995) set out the procedures that must be followed by any person seeking to develop oil and gas on land reserved for aboriginal people. the iog regulations provide for exploratory licenses, permits, leases, royalties, drilling monitoring and regulation, surface rights, and other activities related to resource exploitation. the iog regulations are administered by the executive director of indian oil and gas canada (iog canada, 2010), which is one sector of aandc. the power bestowed to the executive director to grant licenses, permits, or leases in respect of oil and gas on reserve lands is fettered by an obligation to seek the consent of the first nation council who will be affected by activity on its lands. relatively comprehensive consultation guidelines are established in the current iog regulations6; however, aboriginal people are still denied substantial control of oil and gas operations on reserve land. as stated above, amendments to the iog regulations are currently being negotiated and may potentially mandate more comprehensive consultation requirements and control for first nations. canadian environmental assessment act under the canadian environmental assessment act (cea act, 1992), an environmental assessment is required before a federal authority carries out a project or assists in one. owing to the crown’s fiduciary duty to aboriginal peoples and because the federal government administers aboriginal lands, the exercise of indian oil and gas canada (iog canada, 2010) powers, duties, or functions are subject to the application of the cea act. these functions include the granting of exploratory licenses, surface rights leases, right of entry, and crude bitumen leases, as well as the amendments to crude bitumen permits or leases. assessments carried out under the cea act (1992) determine the environmental impact that a project may have. potential effects include the following: (a) any change that the project may cause in the environment, including any change it may cause to a listed wildlife species, its critical habitat, or the residences of individuals of that species; (b) any effect of any change referred to in paragraph (a) on a. health and socio-economic conditions, b. physical and cultural heritage, c. the current use of lands and resources for traditional purposes by aboriginal persons, or d. any structure, site, or thing that is of historical, archaeological, paleontological, or architectural significance. the cea act (1992) also explicitly states that one of the purposes of the act is to “promote communication and cooperation between responsible authorities and aboriginal peoples with respect to environmental assessment” (s.4.1.3). it also requires that the minister consult with affected first nations. moreover, it establishes that aboriginal traditional knowledge can be considered in assessments. when both the federal and provincial governments are involved in a project both the cea act and the respective provincial environmental assessment acts apply. cooperation between various provinces and the federal government has also been encouraged through the development of harmonization agreements with the provinces of manitoba, saskatchewan, alberta, and british columbia. 6 to review the indian oil and gas regulations, please visit the department of justice canada at http://laws-lois. justice. gc.ca/eng/regulations/sor-94-753/ 7 wright and white: developing oil and gas published by scholarship@western, 2012 regulated aboriginal control over oil and gas development first nations land management act the first nations land management act (fnlm act, 1999) was enacted to secure control by first nations over first nations lands and the right to govern those lands, communities, and resources. one stated purpose of the fnlm act is to facilitate economic development in first nations communities. the fnlm act only applies to those first nations who have signed the framework agreement7 and have subsequently established land codes to regulate land use. land codes establish rules and regulations to follow when managing aboriginal land through resource development, land transfers between community members, marital breakdown, etc. to date, 29 first nations are operating under their own land codes (aandc, 2011). section 18 of the fnlm act (1999) gives a range of land management powers to the first nation signatory, including the powers, rights, and privileges of a landowner. these powers include the following: • the right to grant interests and licenses in relation to that land; • the right to manage the natural resources of that land; • the right to receive all revenue acquired under its land code on behalf of the entire first nation. while the establishment of a land code and the subsequent application of the fnlm act grant the powers of land ownership to the first nation, the fnlm act does not alter aboriginal title to first nation land, which continues to be set apart for the use and benefit of the first nation. that is, the land still falls within federal jurisdiction as established in the constitution act, 1867. the iog act (1985) still applies to any first nation that was subject to the iog act prior to the relevant land code enactment, irrespective of any interest in first nation land that was granted to the crown for the exploitation of oil and gas pursuant to a land code. in the case of inconsistencies between a law established by a first nation under the fnlm act and a federal law, the federal law is supreme. the fnlm act was one of the first pieces of legislation to establish sectoral self-government for first nations (black, 2008). in this capacity, the fnlm act can be seen as a step toward increased first nation control over lands and natural resources when legislation and regulations are considered successively. this recognized need for first nation control over land and resources arguably facilitated the creation of the first nations oil and gas and moneys management act (fnogmm act, 2005), which provides first nations with further control over land and moneys and replaces the iog act for those nations who are signatories. the fnogmm act is an additional step towards first nation control in this progression of legislation. first nations oil and gas and moneys management act the first nations oil and gas and moneys management act (fnogmm act, 2005) has two major purposes. the first is to allow participating first nations to manage and control moneys that would otherwise be held by her majesty in right of canada on the first nations’ behalf. the second is to provide participating first nations with the power to manage and control oil and gas resources on reserve land. there are two separate processes required for the transfer of the respective powers from the federal government to the first nation. both processes begin with a first nations council submitting a written resolution to the minister requesting accession into one or both regimes. the blood first nation is a signatory to the land management regime of the fnogmm act, but has not ratified a moneys management resolution. 7 to review the framework agreement in its entirety visit the first nations land management resource centre website at http://www.fafnlm.com/documents/text-of-the-framework-agreement-on-first-nation-land-management.pdf 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.5 the process to accede to the moneys management regime is initiated when the council of the first nation, in a written resolution to the minister, requests payment of the moneys currently held and any future moneys that would be held, on its behalf by her majesty for the use and benefit of the first nation. the first nation has the ability to amend the financial code, but it must prepare a financial code specifying how the moneys are to be held and expended and also provide for accountability and procedures in case of a conflict of interest. transferred moneys can either be held at a financial institution or placed in a trust. provincial laws will apply to a trust established to hold transferred moneys. the next step in the process entails gaining the approval of the majority of band members to accede to the regime. once approval is obtained, the first nation can be added to schedule 2 of the fnogmm act (2005), after which “the moneys held by her majesty for its use and benefit shall be paid to the first nation out of the consolidated revenue fund …” (s. 30 (1)). for the transfer of power over oil and gas development, the first nation is required to submit a written resolution indicating interest in acceding to the regime. then an oil and gas code must be prepared that delineates the procedures to be followed after the transfer, including issues regarding ensuring accountability, addressing possible conflicts of interest, coordinating with other first nations, and allowing for the code to be amended. once these codes have been prepared, a transfer agreement may be finalized between the first nation and the minister, but this agreement may be subject to approval by the majority of the band affected by the application. after an affirmative vote, the governor in council may add the first nation’s name to schedule 1, effectively transferring the first nation from the current iog act and fnlma act regime into the fnogmm act regime. that is, when a first nation assumes control over land and moneys under the fnogmm act, the iog act and the fnlm act no longer apply. thus, the federal government’s explicit power over oil and gas development on first nations land in the iog act, (albeit with the requirement to consult with first nations) is replaced by first nation control over such development by the fnogmm act, which provides power to the nation involved to make regulations. after the transfer date, “any designations made under the indian act in respect of oil and gas cease to have effect, and the rights and obligations of her majesty… are superseded by the rights and obligations of the first nation …” (fnogmm act, 2005, s. 23(3)). while accession to the fnogmm act does provide first nations with increased managerial powers over oil and gas development, the act does not affect her majesty’s title to any indian lands. that is, the lands continue to be set apart for the use and benefit of the first nation and remain inalienable. nor does the fnogmm act affect the application of the indian act as it relates to areas other than oil and gas. the fnogmm act (2005) grants the participating first nation the powers, rights, and privileges of an owner in relation to oil and gas on the managed lands (s. 34 (1)). it has the powers to enact laws relating to oil and gas exploration, exploitation, and payable royalties with a few important caveats. first, these laws must not be related to matters “coming within the exclusive jurisdiction of a provincial legislature…” (s. 35 (1)). second, while the first nation is vested with the power to protect the environment and to conduct the required environmental assessments, these laws must “provide protection for the environment that is at least equal to that provided by the laws of the province” (s. 38) and first nation conservation laws must not be inconsistent with provincial conservation laws. moreover, section 56 also states that “in the event of a conflict between a first nation’s oil and gas laws and any federal law providing for the environmental assessments … the federal law prevails.” to date, three first nations have acceded to the fnogmm act: the white bear, the blood, and siksika first nations. the act was officially described as “a key step in building stronger and more self-reliant communities” (indian and northern affairs canada (inac), 2005). 9 wright and white: developing oil and gas published by scholarship@western, 2012 unregulated aboriginal control over oil and gas development impact benefit agreements while the fnlm act and the fnogmm act provide first nations with increased control over oil and gas development through formal legislation, unregulated agreements between various first nations and oil and gas companies are becoming more prevalent. these agreements are variously called impact benefit agreements (ibas), community agreements, or protocol agreements8, and they serve to create a formal contract between the parties to facilitate economic benefits for the first nation, as well as to mitigate the negative consequences of resource development, including adverse environmental, social, cultural, and economic effects. ibas typically provide a structure for the negotiation of issues, such as royalty and lease payments, aboriginal employment, business development, environmental management, and the maintenance of culture and cultural heritage. ibas are not regulated and, thus, can vary greatly from case to case. these agreements can be seen as a form of consultation and accommodation between industry and the affected first nations. they can be beneficial for both parties. for industry, local support for a project can ease regulatory processes; agreements can create cost certainty regarding community investment funds; and companies can benefit from the recognition that comes from being socially responsible. benefits for first nation communities can include, among other things, upfront financing for businesses and infrastructure, employment and contract opportunities, and increased participation in decision-making. the terms included in an iba may result in more opportunities for economic development than would be provided by existing legislation, especially under the iog regime. however, since ibas are not regulated and are kept confidential; individual first nations are largely unaware of the potential benefits that could be included or those that have been included in other agreements with different first nations. thus, industry may be in a more advantageous bargaining position. ibas are a form of consultation between industry and the affected first nation; however, the creation of an agreement does not negate the crown’s duty to consult with the first nation. the crown may delegate the procedural aspects of consultation to industry, which may be fulfilled through the negotiation of an iba, but the crown is still responsible for the substantive duty of consultation. since the crown is not party to these bilateral agreements, it is currently difficult to determine when or if the crown’s duty to consult has been fulfilled. essentially, ibas represent accommodation without official crown consultation. thus, while ibas hold great potential to increase the benefits of economic development for first nations involved in oil and gas development, increased crown involvement, including potentially regulating ibas or providing first nations with access to existing agreements, would increase this potential. capacity is another factor that may limit the ability of a first nation to benefit from an iba or other form of consultation. limited financial and human resources, as well as a potential lack of familiarity with the process, can hinder meaningful consultation. ibas may include capacity development funds, but ensuring that first nations have the capacity to consult in a meaningful way is a major component of the crown’s duty to consult. therefore, opportunities for capacity building should be ensured either through bilateral agreements between first nations and industry or federally funded programs. 8 there are a variety of different titles for various agreements between industry and first nations. the nomenclature is not standardized across the industry or canada. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.5 oil and gas development in the canadian north as previously stated, canada is a federal state with a complex division of jurisdictional power between the federal government and the ten provincial governments, as well as territorial governments. there are three territories in canada: the yukon, the northwest territories, and nunavut. this paper will discuss oil and gas development in the northwest territories and the yukon, specifically, to illustrate the complexities of arctic hydrocarbon development. an examination of the northwest territories is particularly pertinent because recent discoveries of oil and gas have necessitated a reconsideration of the legislative and regulatory frameworks governing development. northwest territories unlike provincial governments who own provincial land, public land in the northwest territories is vested in the crown in right of canada for the benefit of canada, not for the benefit of the territory (bankes, 2000). moreover, the government of the northwest territories has more limited lawmaking powers than the provinces. these powers in practice can be very broad, but they are not exclusive powers of the territory. the government of the northwest territories, however, does have policy interests in protecting the environment and ensuring that development activities benefit the residents of the northwest territories economically and socially (erlanson & associates, 2002). what makes this jurisdictional division more complicated are the three settled land claim agreements in the territory that are constitutionally protected. these include the inuvialuit final agreement, 1984 (ifa), the gwich’in final agreement, 1992, and the sahtu dene and métis agreement, 1993 (bankes, 2000). the inuvialuit final agreement and on-shore development. the ifa was signed by the federal government and the committee for original people’s entitlement representing the 2,500 inuvialuit of the western arctic in 1984 (inuvialuit regional corporation, 2007). under the agreement, the inuvialuit gave up any claim to the lands in the western arctic in exchange for legal title to selected lands, financial compensation, and a variety of other rights. the agreement was given the force of law by the western arctic (inuvialiut) claims settlement act (1984). the ifa established the inuvialuit settlement region (isr), which extends into the marine waters in the beaufort sea and stretches from the alaska and yukon border north to the 80th parallel of latitude and sound on longitude 110° to the northwest territories and nunavut border (erlanson & associates, 2002). there are several different land classifications within the isr, each with separate regulatory regimes. lands classified as 7(1)(a) are owned by the inuvialuit fee simple and include absolute rights to subsurface resources, including oil and gas. lands classified as 7(1)(b) are also owned by the inuvialuit fee simple, but do not include rights to subsurface resources (sloan, sloan, & associates, 2001). there are also crown lands within the isr that are not owned by the inuvialuit, but are still subject to the ifa. parts of the inland area of the isr and all of the off-shore areas are classified as crown land. in terms of resource activities, significant features of the ifa include9 the following: (a) a role for inuvialuit in environmental screening and review of development proposals in the isr that are likely to cause a negative environmental impact (although the cea act still applies to the isr); (b) assured opportunities for inuvialuit to participate in economic activity in the isr; (c) a high priority for protection of wildlife, habitat, and the environment, and a requirement for compensation for any damage caused. 9 this list is adapted from erlanson and associates (2002). 11 wright and white: developing oil and gas published by scholarship@western, 2012 gas and oil rights in lands classified as 7(1)(a) are granted through the inuvialuit regional corporation (irc), which is the institutional representative of the inuvialuit people (sloan et al., 2001). before any rights are granted, the irc requires developers to enter into a participation and access agreement that ensures the protection of wildlife, the promotion of education, training and employment of the local people, an obligation to share information, a provision for the costs of ila inspections, and fair compensation for access to the land and rental fees (sloan et al., 2001). however, there has been little development in these lands since these regulations were enacted, so there are few examples to date. oil and gas rights in lands classified as 7(1)(b) and in crown lands are granted though the canadian petroleum resources act (1985), which is administered through aandc and given final authorization by the neb through the canada oil and gas operations act (1985) (sloan et al., 2001). however, the neb requires developers to enter into a benefits plan before development can occur. a benefits plan is intended to ensure that the developers consult with the inuvialuit, maximize employment, training, and secondary business opportunities, and provide compensation for any damages to wildlife (sloan et al., 2001). a guideline provided by the neb suggests that developers (a) support regional business to maximize the short and long term benefits for the north, and (b) remove barriers to employment by granting local residents top priority in hiring and by identifying and optimizing training opportunities (sloan et al., 2001). regardless of how the land in question is classified, developers are mandated through the ifa to undergo extensive consultation with the inuvialuit people, in general, and either the irc or the neb, in particular. this consultation process is beneficial for both the inuvialuit and the developers. the inuvialuit largely view oil and gas development as a promising source of economic development that can create primary and secondary employment opportunities; thus, many are supportive of development. however, risks posed by development to harvesting, culture, traditional land use, wildlife, and the environment are also of concern. from the inuvialuit perspective, having consultations between concerned parties and establishing agreements can help ensure that the benefits and risks of development are balanced (sloan et al., 2001). from the developers’ perspective, consultation is beneficial because building a good working relationship with the community can facilitate development. that is, communities can be a source of labor, services, and information. moreover, establishing a relationship with mutual trust and respect can lead to smoother and timelier authorization processes (sloan et al., 2001). the consultation process required in the canadian north is being implemented increasingly on a voluntary basis in the rest of canada through ibas – another indication that these kinds of agreements have the potential to be beneficial to all parties involved. yukon: the umbrella final agreement in 1993, the yukon first nations, represented by the council for yukon first nations, entered into an agreement with the federal and yukon governments. the umbrella final agreement (ufa, 1993) provides a template for the negotiation of final agreements for the 14 individual first nations in the yukon. much like the ifa, the ufa represents an exchange of undefined aboriginal rights and title for defined treaty rights on selected portions of land within the yukon. all first nations final agreements include the provisions of the ufa, but they may also include specific provisions related to the unique circumstances of individual first nations. once signed, final agreements are considered land claims agreements and are thus constitutionally protected. the total amount of settlement land subject to the ufa to be divided among 14 first nations is nearly 41,500 square kilometers, or roughly 9% of the yukon (ufa, 1993). settlement land was selected in consultation with the yukon first nations and is representative of the geography and resource potential within each first nation’s traditional territory (ufa, 1993). this land is further divided into category a 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.5 settlement land and category b settlement land. in the case of the former, the first nation has “the rights, obligations and liabilities equivalent to fee simple…” (ufa, 1993, s.5.4.1.1) with fee simple title to subsurface resources including oil and gas. in the case of the latter, the first nation enjoys the equivalent of fee simple ownership over the surface of the land only; the yukon government retains subsurface rights. in category a lands, the first nation has management powers similar to those of the yukon government; the first nation is responsible for granting leases and permits and collects the royalty payments for the resources exploited in this area. the jurisdictional breakdown on category b lands is more complicated, since there is potential for conflicts of interest between surface uses (enjoyed by the first nation) and subsurface uses (enjoyed by the yukon government). in anticipation of this potential conflict, chapter 8 of the ufa established a surface rights board composed of an equal number of persons nominated by the yukon and by the yukon first nations to solve disputes over access and land use. another feature that makes the ufa particularly efficient is the call for the establishment of a comprehensive environmental assessment process that applies to all lands in the yukon. the yukon environmental and socio-economic assessment act (yesa act, 2003) is the product of consultation between the yukon government and the council of yukon first nations. this act has functionally replaced the cea act in the yukon and provides a high level of transparency, guaranteed opportunities for first nation participation, first nation representation on the assessment board, the inclusion of traditional and local knowledge in assessments, and provision for a broad consideration of socio-economic factors (yesa act, 2003). for projects based on category a or b settlement land, the first nation is explicitly recognized as the decisionmaking body. even when not on settlement land, consultation between industry and the affected first nation is required for projects on crown land (yesa act, 2003). thus, the yesa act provides yukon first nations with a major influence on developments both within and outside settlement land and traditional territory. it can also be seen as an effective apparatus through which the crown can fulfill its legal duty to consult. the collaboration between the yukon government and the council of yukon first nations is continuing with negotiations concerning the establishment of a common regulatory regime for oil and gas development. since the yukon first nations own the oil and gas resources on category a settlement land they are recognized as key players in the formulation of these regulations. the yukon oil and gas act (yog act, 2002) is the nucleus of this regime, and it applies to all operations in the yukon, both settlement land and non-settlement land. if an oil or gas development project is to be conducted exclusively on yukon first nation settlement land, specific legislation passed by the first nation can be applied to that activity; however, to date, no yukon first nation has done so. this may be an indication of first nation satisfaction with the existing regime, but this may change in the future as oil and gas projects develop in the area. the yog act (2002) requires a benefits agreement for all projects with estimated costs over $1 million in the yukon. unlike benefits agreements in the provinces, which are entered into voluntarily and are unregulated, benefits agreements in the yukon are required to identify employment, training, and business opportunities for yukon first nations and other residents of the yukon affected by the oil and gas activity. also, unlike benefits agreements in the provinces, agreements in the yukon include the yukon government in negotiations, which creates confusion over whether the agreements fulfill the crown’s duty to consult. the legislative and regulatory regime related to oil and gas in the yukon seems to be the most effective when compared to the other regimes discussed in this paper. however, the yukon regime is relatively recent and the practical outcomes have yet to be fully assessed. analyses of the economic and social benefits reaped by the yukon first nations should be conducted as oil and gas projects develop. this paper will conclude with a discussion of the progression evident in the series of oil and gas regimes discussed earlier. 13 wright and white: developing oil and gas published by scholarship@western, 2012 conclusion: the evolution of oil and gas regimes and suggestions for the future the iog act (1985) is by far the least evolved of the regimes discussed in terms of guarantees for aboriginal participation and control over oil and gas activities. in this regime, the federal government is responsible for granting licenses and interests to resources on aboriginal lands, and the federal government holds any monies generated from such development in trust for the band. in its original formulation the iog act was largely inconsistent with the crown’s duty to consult, which has been established and clarified by the courts since the original legislation came into force. the amended iog act (2009) appears to be a better conduit for the crown’s duty to consult and also has the potential to increase the economic benefits reaped by first nations through the explicit promotion of aboriginal employment opportunities in oil and gas projects. however, until the new iog regulations are passed, it is unknown how effective this regime will be at balancing the risks and benefits of development for first nations and how much control they will be able to exercise in decisions relating to the exploitation of their reserve land. the fnlm act (1999) represents a step towards first nation control over lands and resources. in general, first nation signatories to the act have the same privileges over their reserve lands as landowners, including the ability to grant licenses, collect rent, and manage most natural resources. however, in terms of oil and gas specifically, the iog act still applies to reserve lands. thus, while recognizing the need for increased first nation control over land and resources for economic development, the fnlm act still denies first nations strong decision-making power over oil and gas developments. the fnlm act does not facilitate the crown’s duty to consult any further than the iog act does. the cea act (1992) applies to projects proposed under the iog act. the cea act allows for the inclusion of traditional knowledge in assessments, considers not only environmental but social-economic effects of development, and promotes consultation with affected first nations. however, first nations do not have decision-making authority; they are not guaranteed representation on the assessment board. the fnogmm act (2005) can be considered the most progressive regime in the canadian provinces. under the fnogmm act, first nations are empowered to create their own environmental assessment protocols. signatory first nations can hold their own moneys, have the privileges of landowners over their reserve land, and have the ability to meaningfully control their land and resources, including oil and gas. a participating first nation can establish its own legislation and regulations regarding oil and gas development and environmental assessment and, thus, can decide for itself if the balance of benefits and risks of oil and gas development is favorable. the oil and gas regimes in the territories are slightly different from those in the provinces by virtue of the more complicated jurisdictional web that includes the federal government, the territorial governments, and the final agreements settled in the region. however, it appears that the territories have turned this potential challenge into an opportunity for increased aboriginal control over resources on and off settlement lands. the ifa in the northwest territories (irc, 1987) and the ufa (1993) in the yukon both establish aboriginal ownership of specified lands that is equivalent to fee simple, including the subsurface resources, such as oil and gas. on these lands, the aboriginal groups have nearly complete control over development decisions, which has the potential to promote economic development while also allowing the group affected to determine if the risks posed by development are offset by the benefits. consultation is guaranteed by both final agreements through mandatory benefits agreements and participation in environmental assessments; however, the extent of the consultation varies between the two regions. while the ifa guarantees a role for the inuvialuit in the environmental screening process, the ufa provides a stronger guarantee of meaningful consultation because the yukon first nations have played a key 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.5 role in the development, and not just the execution, of the yesa act (2003) and the yog act (2002). moreover, both final agreements require benefits agreements for large-scale projects. in the northwest territories, these agreements are bilateral, involving the aboriginal group and industry; whereas, in the yukon, these agreements are trilateral and also include the yukon government. as such, it appears that the latter may be a better vehicle for the fulfillment of the crown’s duty to consult. increased aboriginal control over decisions relating to oil and gas development on reserve, settlement, and traditional lands has the potential to lead to more sustainable economic development through increased primary and secondary employment opportunities and royalty payments. moreover, the negotiation of ibas has the potential to strengthen communities through industry funding of various programs, such as youthelder connection projects, the building of community centers, and the creation of language revitalization programs. however, while aboriginal communities may benefit from oil and gas development, there are potentially great environmental risks and adverse impacts on their ability to exercise their aboriginal and treaty rights. increased aboriginal control over development decisions, combined with appropriate structures to facilitate meaningful trilateral consultation among aboriginal groups, the crown, and industry, will allow communities to weigh these risks and benefits and make decisions appropriate for their unique circumstances, histories, values, and goals. 15 wright and white: developing oil and gas published by scholarship@western, 2012 references aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc). (2011). first nations land management act. retrieved from http://www.pgic-iogc.gc.ca/eng/ 1319053916846 an act to amend the indian oil and gas act (iog act). s.c. 2009, c.7. bankes, n. (2000,november). oil and gas rights regimes and related access and benefits issues in yukon and the northwest territories. paper prepared for the conference on oil and gas law: selected topics convened by the legal education society of alberta, calgary. black, a. j. (2008). devolution of oil and gas jurisdiction to first nations in canada. alberta law review, 45(3), 537-583. calder v. british columbia (attorney general). (1973). s.c.r. 313, 4 w.w.r. 1. canada oil and gas operations act. (1985). r.s.c., 1985, c. o-7. canada petroleum resources act. (1985). r.s.c., 1985, c. 36 (2nd supp.). canadian charter of rights and freedoms. (1982). enacted by the canada act (u.k.) c.11. canadian environmental assessment act (cea act). (1992). s.c., c. 37. constitution act, 1867. (1985). 30 & 31 victoria, c. 3 (u.k.), r.s.c. constitution act, 1982. (1982). schedule b to the canada act, 1982 (uk), c 11. davis, j. d. (2005). north american oil and natural gas: current trends, future problems? international journal, 60(2), 429-436. delgamuukw v. british columbia. (1997). 3 s.c.r. 1010. erlandson & associates. (2002). oil and gas approvals in the beaufort sea: a guide to regulatory approval processes for oil and natural gas production on canada’s frontier lands in the beaufort sea. ottawa: northern oil and gas directorate. executive council office. (2008). the umbrella final agreement, first nation final agreements and treaty rights. retrieved from http://www.eco.gov.yk.ca/landclaims/about.html first nations land management act (fnlma). s.c. 1999, c. 24. first nations oil and gas and moneys management act (fnogmm act). s.c. 2005, c. 48. haida nation v. british columbia/taku (minister of forests). (2004). 3 s.c.r. 511. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.5 halalt first nation v. british columbia (environment). (2011). bcsc 945. indian act. (1985). r.s.c., c. i-5 indian and northern affairs canada (inac). (2005). creating self-reliant communities first nations oil and gas and moneys management act receives royal assent. retrieved from http://www.aadncaandc.gc.ca/aiarch/mr/nr/s-d2005/2-02745-en.gasp indian oil and gas act (iog act). (1985). r.s.c., c. i-7. indian oil and gas canada (iog canada). (2010). who we are and what we do? retrieved from http://www.iogc-pgic.gc.ca/eng/1100110010458/1100110010464 indian oil and gas regulations (iog regulations). (1995). sor/94-753. indian resource council. (2008). the indian resource council: representing the oil and gas producing first nations. retrieved from http://www.indianresourcecouncil.ca inuvialuit regional corporation (irc). (1987). the western arctic claim: inuvialuit final agreement as amended. retrieved from http://www.inuvialuitland.com/resources/inuvialuit_final_agreement.pdf inuvialuit regional corporation (irc). (2007). inuvialuit final agreement. retrieved from http://www.irc.inuvialuit.com/about/finalagreement.html little salmon/carmacks first nation v. yukon (minister of energy, mines and resources. (2008). ykca 13. national energy board. (2011). who we are & our governance? retrieved from http://www.neb-one.gc.ca/ clfnsi/rthnb/whwrndrgvrnnc/whwrndrgvrnnc-eng.html r. v. simon. (1985). 2 s.c.r. 387. r. v. van der peet. (1996). 2 s.c.r. 507. royal proclamation. (1763). r.s.c. 1985, app. ii no. 1. sloan, j., sloan, a. & associates. (2001). oil and gas approvals in the northwest territories-inuvialuit settlement region: a guide to regulatory approval process for oil and natural gas exploration and production in the inuvialuit settlement region. ottawa: northern oil and gas directorate. sosa, i. & keenan, k. (2001). impact benefit agreements between aboriginal communities and mining companies: their use in canada. retrieved from the canadian environmental law association website: http://metisportals.ca/metisrights/wp/wp-admin/images/impact%20benefit%20agreements%20%20mining.pdf umbrella final agreement (ufa) between the government of canada, the council for yukon indians and the government of the yukon. (1993). ottawa: minister of indian affairs and northern development. 17 wright and white: developing oil and gas published by scholarship@western, 2012 van hinte, t., gunton, t. i. & day, j. c. (2007). evaluation of the assessment process for major projects: a case study of oil and gas pipelines in canada. impact assessment and project appraisal, 25(2), 123-137. waterman, j. (2011, march 25). first nations involvement in the oil and gas industry. pipeline news north. retrieved from http://www.pipelinenewsnorth.ca west moberly first nations v. british columbia (chief inspector of mines). (2011). bcsc 359. western arctic (inuvialuit) claims settlement act. (1984). s.c. 1984, c. 24). white, j., maxim, p. & spence, n. (2004). permission to develop: aboriginal treaties, case law and regulations. toronto: thompson educational publishing. yukon environmental and socio-economic assessment act (yesa act). (2003). s.c., c. 7. yukon oil and gas act (yog act). (2002). r.s.y., c.162. 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.5 the international indigenous policy journal august 2012 developing oil and gas resources on or near indigenous lands in canada: an overview of laws, treaties, regulations and agreements laura wright jerry p. white recommended citation developing oil and gas resources on or near indigenous lands in canada: an overview of laws, treaties, regulations and agreements abstract keywords creative commons license microsoft word 311489-text.native.1347892566.docx dealing with culturally sensitive areas in industrial project design the international indigenous policy journal volume 3 | issue 2 article 3 august 2012 dealing with culturally sensitive areas in industrial project design alan ehrlich mackenzie valley environmental impact review board, aehrlich@reviewboard.ca recommended citation ehrlich, a. (2012). dealing with culturally sensitive areas in industrial project design. th e international indigenous policy journal, 3(2) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.3 this policy is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. dealing with culturally sensitive areas in industrial project design abstract potential cultural impacts from proposed industrial developments can affect culturally sensitive areas that are important to aboriginal peoples. these cultural impacts are important for legal, political, and moral reasons and can have a major influence on project approval or rejection during environmental impact assessment. it is in the interest of developers to identify and consider potential impacts on culturally sensitive areas early in the project proposal process in order to design projects that minimize or avoid these impacts. a key strategy is to engage communities effectively in the process. different types of mitigation measures, including off-site cultural mitigation, may be appropriate for different types of culturally sensitive areas, but avoidance may be the only option for certain non-negotiable areas. keywords culturally sensitive areas, cultural impacts, aboriginal peoples, environmental impact assessment, eia, project design, impact mitigation, off-site mitigation, aboriginal community engagement, mackenzie valley acknowledgments acknowledgements: the author is grateful to darha philpot for her insightful input. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ dealing with culturally sensitive areas in industrial project design major projects in canada are typically required to undergo some form of environmental impact assessment (eia) prior to regulatory approvals. virtually all the regulatory authorizations focus on managing a proposed project’s potential impacts on biophysical elements, such as on water, land, fish, and wildlife. few, if any, regulatory authorizations deal as directly with potential impacts on people. however, for many aboriginal groups, the impacts of a proposed economic development on people may be at least as important as the biophysical impacts. impacts on people can be grouped into various categories that relate to people’s wellness, such as social impacts, economic impacts, and cultural impacts. this paper focuses on addressing a particular subset of impacts that have proven to be both very important and challenging: impacts on culturally sensitive areas, specifically areas that are culturally important to aboriginal peoples.1 this paper is structured to provide an overview of issues and solutions based on the author’s experiences at the mackenzie valley environmental impact review board (mveirb; referred to below as the review board). in the review board’s experience, developers are often prepared to identify and deal with biophysical matters, but struggle more when dealing with potential impacts on culturally sensitive areas. at the same time, these are often the most important issues to local aboriginal communities2 and to eia decisions about project approval. this paper will examine why industry should recognize that this is an important consideration. it will examine different types of culturally sensitive areas and identify different approaches to project design that are appropriate for each. it will also discuss various ways of reducing or avoiding these cultural impacts. about the review board the review board is a federally legislated quasi-judicial tribunal that conducts eia in canada’s northwest territories. it is authorized by the mackenzie valley resource management act (mvrma), which supersedes canada’s national eia legislation (government of canada, 1998). the review board is the primary agent for eia in the mackenzie valley, which includes most of the northwest territories. in area, it is comparable to germany, great britain, and japan combined. the review board is an independent co-management body that arose as a result of aboriginal land claims, and it includes equal numbers of members nominated by aboriginal organizations as it does members nominated jointly by the federal and territorial governments. the review board is required to consider the impacts of proposed developments on the biophysical, socioeconomic, and cultural environment. this includes both direct and indirect impacts on people (mveirb, 2003). the statutory framework under which the review board operates gives it a clear authority to consider impacts to culturally sensitive areas. section 115(b) of the mvrma states that the review board is required to consider the social and cultural well-being of the residents and communities of the mackenzie valley (government of canada, 1998). subsection 115(c) states that the review board is required to consider “the importance of conservation to the well-being and way of life” of aboriginal peoples (p. 24). further, the review board’s guidelines for incorporating traditional knowledge in eia explicitly refer to the consideration of aboriginal cultures and values, specifying that “(i)n order to ensure that aboriginal cultures, values, and knowledge play an appropriate role in its determinations, the review board is committed to fully consider any traditional knowledge brought forward in its proceedings” (mveirb, 2005, p. 4). this authority has resulted in the review board deliberating on issues related to culturally sensitive areas in several eias. 1 in this paper, the term “culturally sensitive area” is used interchangeably with “culturally important area.” the term “aboriginal peoples” is used to include first nation and métis groups, and is interchangeable with the term “indigenous peoples” as it is applied in the international context. 2 the term “aboriginal communities” here applies generally to communities with primarily aboriginal residents. in the mackenzie valley, this includes dene first nations and métis groups. 1 ehrlich: culturally sensitive areas published by scholarship@western, 2012 the review board’s process in international context to provide a context for international readers, certain strengths and weaknesses of the review board’s eia process may be compared to those of other countries and jurisdictions as follows: • the review board considers alternatives to a proposed project and alternatives within a proposed project (mveirb, 2003), but does not typically consider alternatives to the proposed project in the same depth as the national environmental protection act requires in the united states (u.s. ceq, 1970). • the review board’s process has a stronger focus on early participatory scoping of the issues (ehrlich, 2011); in contrast with the approach of the european union (european union, 2011, article 5(1)(a)) where this is optional and often not done. • unlike the approach followed in much of europe (european union, 2001), the review board’s process does not include strategic environmental assessments of policies, plans, and programmes. in contrast, the review board is limited to project-specific environmental assessments and the consideration of regional issues only within cumulative impact assessments. • the review board’s inclusion of both direct and indirect impacts on people (mveirb, 2003) extends beyond the social and cultural requirements of the canadian environmental assessment act, which requires consideration of only the indirect impacts on people that arise from a change to the biophysical environment (government of canada, 1992, s2(1)). overall, the review board’s process provides a thorough project-specific impact assessment that includes, in an integrated way, the broad inclusion of impacts on the environment and on people. the fundamental importance of culturally sensitive areas it can be challenging for industrial developers, who may lack understanding of the relationship between aboriginal peoples and the land, to internalize the fundamental importance of culturally sensitive places. the importance is examined here in the legal, moral, political, and practical contexts. legal and moral importance the importance of culturally sensitive areas to aboriginal peoples has been described by the courts in the platinex inc. v. kitchenuhmaykoosib inninuwug first nation decision (ontario superior court of justice, 2006). in this decision, the ontario superior court stated: it is critical to consider the nature of the potential loss from an aboriginal perspective. the relationship that aboriginal peoples have with the land cannot be understated. the land is the very essence of their being. it is their very heart and soul. no amount of money can compensate for its loss. aboriginal identity, spirituality, laws, traditions, culture, and rights are connected to and often arise from this relationship to the land. (p. 80) the subject carries an implicit moral importance because of the pressing threats facing aboriginal cultures worldwide. language use is a powerful indicator because of its close ties to culture. approximately half of the world’s languages are maintained by only 0.2 percent of the world’s population and are in imminent danger of disappearing (davis, 2009). this is an indicator of the current crisis of extinction facing aboriginal cultures worldwide. part of keeping indigenous cultures alive, particularly those with close ties to the land, is to avoid harming their most important places. this has been reflected in the review board’s hearings when aboriginal leaders have framed impacts on spiritually sensitive areas as “a matter of cultural survival” (łutsël k’e dene first nation, 2010). to aboriginal peoples, culture matters as much as the biophysical environment. a loss of identity, of that which makes you who you are, is a loss of profound importance. this is the exact threat that aboriginal 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.3 peoples recognize when development threatens the areas that are culturally vital to them. the review board has heard this many times from aboriginal parties in hearings describing how changes in certain culturally important areas would affect them. the opportunity to pass their culture on to future generations through youth in the experientially authentic setting is gone, and the incremental loss of identity results (e.g., mveirb, 2004, 2008a, 2008b, 2008c, 2010b). impacts to cultural areas can be of further legal importance because of the legal weight of crown consultation obligations associated with potential infringements on aboriginal rights in these areas. in canada, section 35 of canada’s constitution describes a legal duty of meaningful consultation and accommodation with respect to potential infringements on aboriginal rights (government of canada, 1982). practically, it is in culturally important areas where such potential infringements are more likely to actually happen on the ground because these areas are often where traditional hunting, fishing, trapping, other harvesting, and travelling take place and are most vulnerable. this brings important legal implications that require consideration of potential impacts on culturally sensitive areas and accommodation in order to mitigate associated impacts. this is emphasized when one considers that, as a constitutionally enshrined right, section 35 consultation and accommodation rights supersede any law of canada. political importance there can also be powerful political reasons why developers need to recognize the importance of culturally sensitive areas. this has been recently illustrated in a neighbouring jurisdiction by the enormous demonstrations related to the enbridge northern gateway pipeline, which has been opposed by over 130 different first nations in british columbia (b.c.), canada (west coast environmental law, 2011). as kitimat village chief, dolores pollard, described it: “we have a sacred bond with the land that demands that we be unrelenting in this protection” (dogwood initiative, 2010). the hearings, which are underway at the time of writing, include over 200 formal intervenors plus over 4000 individuals each providing oral statements at the joint review panel hearings (national energy board, 2012). neither industry nor regulators could have likely anticipated the degree of political relevance of the culturally sensitive areas in question. implications for project approval another practical reason why potential impacts on culturally sensitive areas should be important to developers is that they can be showstoppers that lead to project rejection, one of the potential outcomes of eia. it is noteworthy that, where the review board has recommended the rejection of proposed developments, it has been exclusively due to unacceptable impacts on culturally sensitive areas (mveirb, 2004, 2008a, 2008b, 2008c). experiences in other parts of canada suggest a similar importance to eia decision makers. for example, a joint federal-provincial review panel in british columbia identified impacts on spiritual values in culturally sensitive areas as an important factor in the 2007 rejection of the kemess copper-gold mine in b.c. (kemess north mine joint review panel, 2007). another example from british columbia is the 2010 rejection of the prosperity gold-copper mine by a federal review panel. the report of the panel cited impacts on a particular lake that is “integral to tsilhqot’in culture… a place of spiritual power and healing for the tsilhqot’in” as a reason for rejection (canadian environmental assessment agency, 2010, p. iii). these experiences suggest that it is in the developer’s interest to be particularly mindful when dealing with potential impacts on culturally sensitive areas. even though all rejections recommended by the review board were on the basis of impacts on culturally sensitive areas, it has been the review board’s experience that developers are usually more thorough in predicting and mitigating biophysical impacts than cultural ones. for example, of the 11,000 page de beers canada (2010) developer’s assessment report for the gahcho kue diamond project, 20 pages deal directly with potential impacts to culturally sensitive areas. the project is upstream of a site that was the subject of cultural concern in a previous environmental assessment. the panel’s terms of reference identified cultural effects as 3 ehrlich: culturally sensitive areas published by scholarship@western, 2012 part of a key line of inquiry (gahcho kue panel, 2007). the review of the gahcho kue diamond mine was not complete at the time of writing. one may speculate on various reasons why developers pay more attention to biophysical matters despite the cultural basis for rejections. this may be partially due to the structure of the regulatory environment. once a project is approved by the review board, there are many regulatory agencies that will issue authorizations with strict conditions about land, water, fish, and so on. there are, however, no equivalent agencies or authorizations to deal with social or cultural impacts. in addition, predicting and mitigating physical impacts is simpler in some ways because it depends less directly on the cooperation of aboriginal parties and can be done by environmental consultants independently. properly assessing cultural impacts, on the other hand, requires the potentially challenging engagement of those likely to be affected. whatever the underlying cause, in the review board’s experience developers have not made the assessment and mitigation of cultural impacts their main focus, despite this being the major cause of rejections of proposed developments. different kinds of culturally sensitive areas in the review board’s eias, aboriginal parties have described a variety of different types of culturally sensitive areas. in many cases, the type of cultural setting may make the difference between local aboriginal support or opposition, and it has a direct bearing on the most appropriate project design to reduce or avoid impacts. the different types of culturally sensitive sites include the following: • physical heritage areas include places with certain tangible resources, such as notable densities of archaeological sites or burial grounds. • harvesting areas are those where traditional lifestyles are practiced through activities, such as hunting, trapping, fishing, and harvesting. • sacred sites are areas of particular spiritual importance. • cultural landscapes are areas of interconnected heritage sites, including the travel routes and spaces between them. these types of areas are not mutually exclusive. for example, a particularly good harvesting area may have a high density of archaeological sites because it has been used for a long time. a burial ground can be of particular spiritual importance even though it includes physical heritage. similarly, a cultural landscape may contain all of the above, in a recognized relationship with one another. it is noteworthy that the above include tangible and intangible elements. for example, andrews and buggey (2008) note that memory, history, and shared knowledge may be embedded, non-physical elements in a cultural landscape. spiritual elements may be the most important part of a sacred site. in the cultural assessments that the review board has considered, there is a tendency for developers to focus on archaeological sites, the “bones and stones” that can be documented by archaeological field work. however, the non-physical values of an area can be what matter most to an aboriginal group (ehrlich, 2010). both are important considerations when examining potential cultural impacts. principles for project design two principles described in an earlier paper by the author are relevant considerations with respect to designing projects in the vicinity of culturally sensitive areas. first, some of the most challenging and complex eias conducted by the review board have not always been for the biggest projects. with respect to cultural impacts, the project setting can be much more important than the scale of the project. what matters is the scale of the issues, not the scale of the development (ehrlich, 2010). some eias of large projects have been relatively easy, but even small projects in culturally sensitive areas can be complex and fraught with 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.3 challenging issues. location is very important: a small sliver is usually not a serious matter, but the same sliver can be very important if it is in your eye. second, developers often propose mitigation measures to reduce or avoid undesirable impacts. these measures are typically physical in nature, such as a change to project timing, noise suppression, or improved water treatment. however, in culturally sensitive areas, such as spiritual sites, intangible values may be of primary importance. physical mitigations can be poorly suited to addressing a cultural impact of a spiritual nature (ehrlich, 2010). identifying culturally sensitive areas an important first step in designing projects to avoid impacts on culturally sensitive areas is to identify where these areas are. many factors make this more challenging than it may seem. one issue is that contemporary geographic boundaries do not necessarily match culturally sensitive areas. for example, the provincial boundary between the province of alberta and the northwest territories is based on latitude and does not reflect the limits of aboriginal land use or culturally sensitive areas. from this perspective, it is simply a political line on a map. further, aboriginal communities may be located great distances from their traditional territories and culturally sensitive areas. this can be due to historical seasonal travel patterns followed when hunting wide-ranging wildlife, to community relocation in response to historical epidemics, or even to forced relocation. distance from a community does not necessarily indicate the cultural importance of an area to that community. more useful indicators of culturally sensitive areas reflect the factors affecting traditional practices. traditional travel routes can be indicators of culturally sensitive areas, as can watershed boundaries. migration routes and ranges of culturally important species can indicate historical use patterns that relate to culturally important areas. any other areas of historical use may also be culturally important. land use plans are another useful resource to help developers identify possible culturally sensitive areas when designing projects. part 2 of the mvrma provides for land use planning. it specifies as a guiding principle of land use planning that “(s)pecial attention shall be devoted to… protecting and promoting (first nations) social, cultural and economic well-being and to the lands used by them for wildlife harvesting and other resource uses” (government of canada, 1998, s.35 (b)). in the review board’s eias most conflicts between development and cultural areas have occurred in regions without settled land claims and land use plans. these plans are the product of dozens or even hundreds of meetings in communities and are a credible way to recognize the most culturally important areas to the aboriginal communities involved. preparing land use plans and getting them approved is a lengthy and often difficult process for aboriginal groups and government. the mvrma was enacted over fourteen years ago, and the majority of the mackenzie valley remains without finalized land use plans. however, land use planning is a vital component of providing industry with greater certainty in the development process. even where land use plans are not finalized and legally binding, draft land use plans should still reflect extensive community involvement and should be treated as strong indicators of where culturally important areas are located. in some cases, where there is no legal structure for formal land use plans, communities have designed and released their own plans to promote protection of areas they care about most deeply. because of the importance of recognizing culturally sensitive areas in project design, and the value of land use plans in doing so, it is in industry’s best interest to actively encourage government to complete land use planning as a way of increasing certainty. past eias are another source of information that can help developers identify culturally sensitive areas when they are designing projects. eias have publically available, often readily searchable, public registries. aboriginal participation in eias results in public registries that may contain maps and descriptions of the areas that are culturally important. developers should also talk with people familiar with past eias in the 5 ehrlich: culturally sensitive areas published by scholarship@western, 2012 vicinity of proposed project locations to find out if there were any issues involving areas of cultural sensitivity. engaging communities early although the above may provide helpful clues, the single most effective way to identify areas of cultural sensitivity is by engaging aboriginal community members directly. the people that hold the culture and value the area are also the best judges of how they may be affected by a proposed development. developers should engage communities at an early point in the project planning process. when fewer major decisions have been made, project design alternatives are plentiful and changes are easier and less expensive. engagement of aboriginal communities by industrial developers is not a simple affair. developers engaging aboriginal communities should remember that they are involved in a cross-cultural process. one of the most productive approaches is to have the communities themselves define the most culturally appropriate way to engage them. by doing this early in the project planning process, developers should be able to engage communities at a pace that works for the community and give the community members and leadership time to process and discuss proposed developments amongst themselves. developers should also allow for seasonal variability, particularly for communities that practice traditional subsistence activities. planning meetings at times of the year when many traditional land users are trapping muskrat or hunting caribou harms the relationships between developers and aboriginal communities. communities may be able and willing to provide traditional knowledge (tk) maps showing historical usage or other cultural features. traditional knowledge about the relationship between people and the environment is rarely shared with outsiders or revealed in a written document to be circulated outside the community (huntington & fernandez-gimenez, 1999). fear that this traditional knowledge information will be taken out of its meaningful context, misunderstood, or misused is common among aboriginal groups (ehrlich & sian, 2004). as a result, tk submissions may require confidential handling, and agreements can be made to specify how they may be used. like any other types of experts, some tk holders may be more knowledgeable about certain aspects of tk than about others. developers should ask community members which people (usually elders) are particularly knowledgeable about culturally sensitive areas to be sure that they are talking to the right people (ehrlich & o’neil, 2004). archeological records archaeological records are often kept by governments and are another source of information that can help indicate the location of culturally sensitive areas. although the specific locations of archaeological sites may be confidential to prevent disturbance, developers can find out from the government if general areas around a proposed project have particularly high densities of archeological sites. this can be a useful indicator, but developers should be careful not to read too much into the archaeological records. although areas with many archaeological sites are more likely to be culturally sensitive, not all culturally sensitive areas necessarily have physical heritage. the presence of many documented heritage sites, therefore, suggests a culturally sensitive site, but the absence does not necessarily mean the opposite. further, archaeological field research in the northwest territories is largely driven by development applications and is, therefore, focussed on the areas where industrial activities have already been proposed. this means that there are no “recorded” archaeological sites in large areas where there have not been development proposals, but this obviously does not mean that there are no archaeological sites in those areas. the same may be true in other regions. mitigating impacts in culturally sensitive areas just as there are several types of culturally sensitive areas, there are also several strategies for mitigating the impacts on them. the right strategy to use depends on the type of area and its cultural use. some types of 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.3 culturally sensitive areas may be more valuable than others; accordingly, some areas may be negotiable, while others are not. physical mitigations for areas that are particularly important because of traditional practices, such as hunting, fishing, trapping, or harvesting, the concern may relate to physical disturbance, such as noise scaring away wildlife, pollution affecting fish, or increased access leading to greater competition for resources by non-aboriginal people. in these cases, physical mitigations, such as measures to reduce sensory disturbance or limit or avoid the creation of new access, may be enough to mitigate potential impacts. for example, to prevent increased access in one such area the review board has recommended that developers be permitted to access the sites by helicopter only (mveirb, 2007d). for areas that are especially important because of physical heritage, careful studies on the ground, accompanied by cautious buffer zones around sites, may be enough to mitigate impacts, particularly if the aboriginal group in question is meaningfully involved. an example of this can be found in the review board’s recommendations for a diamond exploration activity, which was proposed in an area with a high density of heritage sites (mveirb, 2004). the review board concluded that the project could proceed only after a detailed archaeological study conducted with the developers, their archaeologist, an aboriginal elder, and a translator. in the same eia, the review board recommended using a buffer zone around any identified heritage sites three times larger than required by law. non-negotiables for sacred sites, where impacts are primarily intangible, any industrial activities in the area may be entirely non-negotiable. for such sites, aboriginal groups may have no interest in further discussion, and there may be no room for mutual concession, financial or otherwise. in some cases, avoidance of the area or other major project changes may be the only viable options. an example of this in the review board’s practice led to a measure preventing an aerial transmission line from crossing a sacred site (mveirb, 2010a) with the developer later identifying an alternative route around that site with submarine cable to further reduce the potential for disturbance. off-site cultural impact mitigation avoidance of a culturally sensitive area is always the approach with the least chance of causing significant and undesirable impacts to the culturally sensitive area. however, in some cases, avoidance is not achievable because of the nature of the project. in these cases, assuming the area is not one of those described above as being non-negotiable, then off-site mitigation may be a way to avoid a significant net cultural impact. this involves offsetting a cultural impact with a greater cultural benefit. the principle of off-site mitigation is a familiar one in the management of impacts on fish habitat, described in chapter five of the department of fisheries and ocean’s no net loss policy (department of fisheries and oceans canada, 1986). the same principle may be applied to deal with certain cultural impacts in sensitive areas. for example, if elders are passing away faster than tk is being transmitted across generations, a developer could investigate compensating for certain impacts on culturally sensitive sites by funding the capture of tk through elder interviews or by funding a certain number of youth and elder camps on the land for each year the project is operating. if off-site cultural mitigation is being considered, it should be done in close discussion with the aboriginal community to ensure that: • the impact is not on a non-negotiable; • the cultural benefit of the mitigation measure is being accurately evaluated; 7 ehrlich: culturally sensitive areas published by scholarship@western, 2012 • the mitigation is of true cultural value to the community; • it can be practically done by both developer and community; and • no other forms of mitigation are practically feasible. developers should clearly describe the off-site mitigations in their eia submissions. this will enable decision makers to consider and weigh the beneficial and undesirable cultural impacts in their deliberations. the above examples describe providing a cultural benefit for an impact on some types of culturally sensitive sites. this should not be confused with a cash settlement. trade-offs are only effective mitigation within the same category of impact (morrison-saunders & pope, in press). it is not reasonable to expect that an economic benefit would mitigate a serious cultural impact. in some cases, the suggestion may only further emphasize to aboriginal community members involved how different the developer’s worldview is from their own. on a practical basis, as gibson (2006) noted, it can be very difficult to reasonably evaluate trade-offs between social impacts and economic benefits. with respect to many culturally sensitive areas, it is easy to foresee how this could well be the case. conclusion the challenges of mitigating impacts to culturally sensitive areas and the meaningful community engagement it entails may seem daunting to a prospective developer. however, developers should remember that mitigations are not just commitments in the project application phase for the purpose of securing project approval in the eia. working together with potentially affected communities to identify the right mitigations that deal with impacts to culturally sensitive areas and reporting back to the community on their progress and implementation can serve as a foundation for building a relationship with an aboriginal community for the long term. this can result in the broad social acceptance that forms the social license to operate (lassonde, 2003). this acceptance can help a project through its operating life and can offer developers major benefits with respect to future renewals and applications. in summary, this paper has presented several lessons for developers regarding culturally sensitive areas. although these impacts are not subject to the regulatory authorizations of biophysical impacts, they may be the impacts that matter most to aboriginal stakeholders; that is the people that may be most directly affected. it is crucial to consider potential effects on culturally sensitive areas early in the development process, while changes in project design are relatively inexpensive and plentiful, to avoid potentially major procedural, legal, political, and moral issues. a variety of different mitigation measures exist to deal with impacts on different types of cultural areas. done wrong, this can poison a developer’s relationship with those closest to the project. done right, this can lay the foundation for a mutually beneficial relationship between aboriginal communities and industry. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.3 references andrews, t. d., & buggey, s. 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(2008c). report of environmental assessment and reasons for decision on bayswater uranium corp. el lake mineral exploration project (ea 0607-004). yellowknife, nt: author. retrieved from http://www.reviewboard.ca/upload/project_document/1221232709_el_lake_rea_sept_11_200 8.pdf . mackenzie valley environmental impact review board (mveirb). (2010a). report of environmental assessment and reasons for decision: deze energy corporation ltd. taltson hydroelectric expansion project (ea 0708-007). yellowknife, nt. retrieved from http://www.reviewboard.ca/upload/project_document/1180455989_ur_energy_ report_of_ea%20final.pdf. mackenzie valley environmental impact review board (mveirb). (2010b). deze energy environmental assessment public hearing transcriptsjanuary 14, 2010. retrieved from http://reviewboard.ca/upload/project_document/ea0708-007_public_ hearing_transcripts_for_jan_14__2010_1263834638.pdf. morrison-saunders, a., & pope, j. (in press). conceptualising and managing trade-offs in sustainability assessment. environmental impact assessment review. national energy board. (2012). northern gateway pipelines regulatory documents requests to make an oral statement. retrieved from https://www.neb-one.gc.ca/ll-eng/livelink. exe?func=ll&objid=624799&objaction=browse&sort=name. ontario superior court of justice. (2006). platinex inc. v. kitchenuhmaykoosib inninuwug first nation et al. 2006 court file no. 06-0271. u.s. council on environmental quality (u.s. ceq). (1970). national environmental protection act, 1970. sec. 1505.1(e). washington, d.c: author. west coast environmental law. (2011). first nations that have declared opposition to proposed enbridge tanker & pipeline project. retrieved from www.wcel.org. 11 ehrlich: culturally sensitive areas published by scholarship@western, 2012 the international indigenous policy journal august 2012 dealing with culturally sensitive areas in industrial project design alan ehrlich recommended citation dealing with culturally sensitive areas in industrial project design abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license microsoft word 308001-text.native.1345036824.doc racism experiences of urban indigenous women in ontario, canada: “we all have that story that will break your heart” the international indigenous policy journal volume 10 | issue 2 article 1 april 2019 racism experiences of urban indigenous women in ontario, canada: “ we all have that story that will break your heart” anita c. benoit dalla lana school of public health, university of toronto and women's college research institute, women's college hospital, toronto, ontario, anita.benoit@utoronto.ca jasmine cotnam women's college research institute, women's college hospital, toronto, ontario, jasmine.cotnam@wchospital.ca doe o'brien-teengs ontario aboriginal hiv/aids strategy and educational studies, lakehead university, thunder bay, ontario, dmobrie1@lakeheadu.ca saara greene faculty of social sciences, mcmaster university, hamilton, ontario, greenes@mcmaster.ca see next page for additional authors recommended citation benoit, a. c. , cotnam, j. , o'brien-teengs, d. , greene, s. , beaver, k. , zoccole, a. , loutfy, m. (2019). racism experiences of urban indigenous women in ontario, canada: “we all have that story that will break your heart”. the international indigenous policy journal, 10(2) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.1 racism experiences of urban indigenous women in ontario, canada: “ we all have that story that will break your heart” abstract the objective of our mixed-methods research study was to present the discourse on racism experiences of indigenous women living in two urban canadian cities. a failure to recognize the impacts of racism on indigenous women in canada has emerged from the literature. sharing circles, interviews, and a questionnaire including validated scales were used to collect data. the findings demonstrated that urban indigenous women experience a number of racism events that span individual, collective and institutional, and cultural racism. the diversity of racist events was better captured in the questionnaire, whereas the roots of racism were understood more clearly in the qualitative findings to be an extension of historical colonial events to current day manifestations. keywords racism, indigenous women, determinant of health, two-eyed seeing acknowledgments the authors of this manuscript would like to thank all the study participants who shared information and told part of their stories around racism. acb was supported by canadian institutes of health research (cihr) aboriginal research methodologies, institute of aboriginal peoples’ health quantitative research, and canadian hiv trials network postdoctoral fellowships. this study was supported by alternative funding plans innovation fund and cihr social research centre in hiv prevention—laverne monette award, and it was in part supported by the cihr fellowships. we would also like to thank staff at the ontario aboriginal hiv/aids strategy and 2-spirited peoples of the 1st nations for feedback on the research process and study participant recruitment. furthermore, the first author would like to acknowledge the support by staff of the canadian aboriginal aids network research and policy unit in dartmouth, nova scotia, canada. creative commons license creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. authors anita c. benoit, jasmine cotnam, doe o'brien-teengs, saara greene, kerrigan beaver, art zoccole, and mona loutfy http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ racism experiences of urban indigenous women in ontario, canada: “we all have that story that will break your heart” in canada, first nations, métis and inuit peoples collectively referred to as the indigenous peoples of canada are racialized groups having life experiences shaped by their indigenous identity and the perceptions of such an identity by others (poonwassie, 2006; reading & wien, 2009). this perception can be traced back to persisting colonial views and actions, and their intergenerational impact (poonwassie, 2006; reading & wien, 2009). historical and modern-day events have resulted in many indigenous women experiencing trauma due to discrimination and structural barriers within legal, health, and education systems that affect their health and wellness, security, and self-actualization (poonwassie, 2006; reading & wien, 2009). “systemic discrimination reflects a pattern of behaviours, policies, or practices embedded in the structures of an organization creating or perpetuating disadvantages for racialized persons” (ontario human rights commission [ohrc], 2018, para. 2). achieving one’s full potential is difficult when basic needs are not satisfied, resources are inadequate and do not promote sustainable wellness, and chronic life stressors persist. racism gives rise to these systemic and structural inequities experienced by indigenous peoples living in canada and other countries (browne & fiske, 2001; cunningham & paradies, 2013). racism has been defined as the beliefs, attitudes, arrangements, and acts held by or perpetuated by members of a race (i.e., characterized by physical traits, ancestry, genetics, or social relations) who accept as true that they possess specific characteristics or abilities that distinguish them as superior to another race or races (clark, anderson, clark, & williams, 1999; hoyt, 2012; paradies, harris, & anderson, 2008). this belief unfairly disadvantages racialized groups and advantages groups with power (hoyt, 2012; paradies et al., 2008). the invisibility of indigenous cultures and knowledge systems, the visibility of negative stereotypes promoted through mainstream society, and the lack of knowledge about who indigenous peoples are fuels racism and discrimination in canada (goodman et al., 2017). research studies often fail to recognize the different systemic levels of racism experienced by indigenous peoples in canada and internationally—for example native americans in the us, maori in new zealand, and aboriginal and torres strait islanders in australia. instead, studies largely focus on health service systems (goodman et al., 2017; green, 1995; johnson et al., 2004; neville, awad, brooks, flores, & bluemel, 2013; phillips, 2011). a systematic review by allan and smylie (2015) described the pervasiveness of racism in health service systems that contribute to inequities in health service access and use and health status for indigenous peoples in canada. first nations women have described racism and invalidating encounters within mainstream health services (browne & fiske, 2001). participants described having their health concerns dismissed or trivialized by nurses and doctors, at times even before being assessed (browne & fiske, 2001). some women attributed this response to negative stereotypes. they also described service providers’ lack of regard for the women’s socio-economic challenges (e.g., charging for missed appointments, which may be due to factors such as the absence of public transportation on reserves). they also found that some women were reluctant to disclose concerning health symptoms, and others felt that they were not being listened to and should not speak up because, when they did, they were made to feel less knowledgeable or credible. they perceived that health care providers interpreted their reticence as passivity and viewed it negatively. health care providers did not seem to understand that, for some, residential school experiences engrained in them that they should not question authority, while for others it was a sign of respect within the cultural 1 benoit et al.: racism experiences of urban indigenous women published by scholarship@western, 2019 practice of consulting someone for assistance. similarly, indigenous mothers delayed accessing health services due to experiences of racism and discrimination, and the fear of child apprehension (denison, varcoe, & browne, 2014). indigenous women living in rural communities often have limited options for maternity care, which forces them to access mainstream birthing services (varcoe, brown, calam, harvey, & tallio, 2013). some birthing options included low-risk care by fullor part-time physicians with varied intrapartum skills. women often had to give birth in nearby hospitals or health centres outside of their community or re-locate to an urban setting several weeks before delivery. in these settings, the women found being cared for by unfamiliar doctors who were often dismissive was distressing. delivery options requiring travel were also often resource intensive and stressful without the support of family and community. the women felt that they had less control and fewer options in decision-making due to financial constraints. the destruction of traditional birthing practices through colonization, along with having few or no elders with knowledge of cultural birthing customs, including indigenous midwifery, hindered communities from passing on culture-specific birthing practices and teachings to the women (varcoe et al., 2013). in another study, indigenous women completing breast cancer treatment believed that the absence of their traditional beliefs and recognition of indigenous identity within health services made it difficult to address racism (poudrier & mac-lean, 2009). in addition to indigenous health seekers, indigenous health service providers experience racism. indigenous nurses in atlantic canada discussed the importance of understanding the interplay between race, racism, and the health service system. they believed that system-wide changes were needed to address the racism experienced by indigenous nurses and patients (vukic, jesty, mathews, & etowa, 2012). they point to a lack of resources and policies to integrate cultural safety1 into nursing training and practice, which made them afraid to speak up when they experienced or witnessed racism (vukic et al., 2012). the deliberate and systematic erasure of indigenous health and wellness practices and beliefs within health services has been critical in shaping racism (denison et al., 2014; varcoe et al., 2013; vukic et al., 2012). similar to canada, qualitative studies in the us have focused on health services use and access (canales, 2004a; canales, 2004b; thackrah & thompson, 2013; vernon, 2007). indigenous peoples in the us are referred to as american indian or native american and we will use these terms to reflect the literature. a qualitative study of health service use and access by american indian women living with hiv demonstrated a culture of treatment malpractice, poor treatment ethics, genderism, and racism (vernon, 2007). an association between american indian identity, health, and health service decisionmaking was shown to impact women’s decisions about whether or not to access mammography and how to manage potential recurrences of breast cancer (canales, 2004b; canales & geller, 2004). for example, their views on self-care and cultural practices influenced their decision to access cancer 1 cultural safety was developed as an outcome of nursing and midwifery education. dr. irihapeti m. ramsden, a ngai tahupotiki and rangitane (maori of aotearoa [new zealand]) registered general and obstetric nurse in the 1960s, first conceptualized and defined the term. the concept of cultural safety asks: “how safe did the service recipient experience a service encounter in terms of being respected and assisted in having their cultural location, values, and preferences taken into account in the service encounter?” (brascoupé & waters, 2009, p. 9). being culturally safe means going beyond cultural sensitivity and competency to include layers of commitment by a service provider, which includes self-reflection, taking a health advocacy role, and an awareness that the client has multiple realities that may conflict with a service providers’ interventions (brascoupé & waters, 2009; spence, 2001). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.1 screening and cancer treatment. in some cases, their connection to culture increased their health service options and, as such, they engaged in both cultural and mainstream approaches without dilemma. selfcare was also critical in their decision to make the most of resources available to them. however, for some women, belief in both systems brought about confusion about how and whether to engage in both approaches. there were women who were adamant that only cultural healing approaches were required because of their belief in teachings and the toxicity associated with mainstream treatments. financing health care was also an issue for women without health insurance; some women did not access health services for any health issue, others took care of minor health problems on their own to avoid medical bills, and some women incurred costs when more serious health concerns arose. experiences of discrimination including classism and racism, as well as the experiences of friends and family, contributed to mistrust of the health service system, which impacted whether women followed the advice of their service providers (canales, 2004a; canales, 2004b; canales & geller, 2004). racism also negatively affected indigenous professionals who work in health service. racism and a lack of understanding of native american cultural practices and values were among the barriers to the retention and recruitment of american indian and alaska native students in social work programs (cross, day, gogliotti, & pung, 2013). experiences of racism among indigenous peoples in new zealand and australia have been studied in the health service system and more broadly in society. when referring to these populations, the terms from the cited studies will be used. quantitative population-based studies among aboriginal australians described self-reported racial discrimination (27%, n = 7,000) in the past year (2008-2009) (cunningham & paradies, 2013). among people reporting any racial discrimination, 41 percent had experienced racist events in public settings, 40 percent in legal settings, and 30 percent in work settings. self-reported racial discrimination was more frequently reported by respondents who had experienced forced removal from their family as a child, indicated low trust based on the statement “most people can be trusted,” were unemployed, and had a university degree (cunningham & paradies, 2013, p. 4). respondents indicating indigenous identity and engaging in indigenous cultural activities reported more frequent racial discrimination (cunningham & paradies, 2013). similarly, the new zealand health survey administered to maori people demonstrated that racism was a determinant of health (harris, cormack, & stanley, 2013). maori people who, based on their appearance, were identified by others as being maori-only or another non-european ethnicity, either alone or in combination with european ancestry, had worse self-rated health and higher exposure to racial discrimination than those classified as european-only (harris et al., 2013). qualitative studies have found that racism negatively impacts the mental health of aboriginal australians (paradies & cunningham, 2012a, 2012b), and their access to and use of health services (digiacomo et al., 2013). in addition, some research has shown that investments in changing aspects of the health service system were ineffective in improving cultural safety. for example, a midwifery training program integrating an aboriginal culture unit was largely unsuccessful in changing racist attitudes among first year students (thackrah & thompson, 2013). for maori nurses, incidents of institutional racism occurred during training when their maori beliefs were marginalized, and, in nursing practice, they were expected to answer all culture-based questions and justify cultural safety training (huria, cuddy, lacey, & pitama, 2014). interpersonal racism also occurred. for example, clients undervalued their clinical skill because they were maori, and their cultural skills were often seen as ineffective in delivering health services (huria et al., 2014). 3 benoit et al.: racism experiences of urban indigenous women published by scholarship@western, 2019 given the historical similarities between canada, the us, australia, and new zealand with regards to colonization, processes of devaluing indigenous cultures, and the current state of indigenous people’s health and wellness, it is incomprehensible why racism outside of health service systems has not been described as a determinant of health. the literature on racism towards indigenous people is sparse in canada compared to the us, and even more so compared to australia and new zealand. our research aimed to describe perceived and experienced individual, collective and institutional, and cultural racism in all societal systems (including, but not limited to, health services) as stressors in the lives of indigenous women from two urban cities in ontario, canada. methodology study design our findings are from of a larger three-phase study entitled: linking social and basic science to understand stress as a social indicator for the lived experiences of indigenous women and a biological indicator for the physiological impact of stress on hiv pathogenesis. phase 1 consisted of defining stress among indigenous women living with and without hiv; discussing and measuring stressors, including hiv; and discussing stress management and stress biomarkers. phase 2 involved piloting stress-reducing strategies, including culturally grounded approaches. the last phase, which is in progress, involves measuring stress through scales and stress biomarkers in women engaging in a culturally grounded stress-reducing intervention. this article presents phase 1 findings where racism was frequently discussed as a stressor. a convergent transformative mixed-method research design was used to describe the discourse on racism as a stressor. our qualitative research question was: “can you describe stressful life experiences?” experiences pertaining to racism were captured. our quantitative research question was: “what are participants’ racism scores on validated scales?” we focused on the index of race-related stress (irrs)— brief version (b) (irrs-b) and the perceptions of racism scale (prs). our mixed-methods research question was: “how do indigenous women’s experiences of racism in canada support or contrast racism scores measured by validated scales?” in this design, qualitative and quantitative data are provided equal value, collected in parallel, analyzed separately, and then merged to gain greater insight into racism experiences than would be obtained by either data type separately (creswell & plano, 2011). our research process followed a two-eyed seeing approach, which “refers to learning to see from one eye with the strengths of indigenous ways of knowing and doing, and from the other eye with the strengths of western ways of knowing and doing . . . and learning to use both these eyes together, for the benefit of all” (bartlett, marshall, & marshall, 2012, p. 5; see also martin, 2012). two-eyed seeing is a guiding principle shaping in a meaningful way how we think about the work we are doing, as well as a way to approach communication by continuously evaluating our assumptions and values (martin, 2012). it is important to note that two-eyed seeing is not a research methodology (personal communication elder albert marshall), but it has been difficult to define outside of this academic terminology. over time, continuous assessment of two-eyed seeing has led to an evolution in our understanding of it as a profound guiding principle. it encourages self-reflection and recognizes that knowledge, which is alive spiritually and physically, is transformative (personal communication elder albert marshall). each research team member may describe their experiences with two-eyed seeing 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.1 differently, as such, what follows are a few examples to reflect these differences. some have viewed twoeyed seeing as a methodology that uses western and indigenous research methods together. others engaged in two-eyed seeing by holding meetings with leaders from indigenous hiv/aids service organizations to ensure the potential study outcomes are impactful to indigenous women through continuous engagement among research team members and study participants. research processes needed to serve the dual purpose of data collection and healing as well. for example, sharing circles (described below as a data collection method) were held to enable healing, growth, and transformation for study participants and discussion facilitators. two-eyed seeing emphasizes the transformative nature of knowledge and our individual and collective roles in this transformation. community-based research principles were also followed to engage communities throughout all research phases (israel, schulz, parker, & becker, 1998). our indigenous stakeholders were asked to be research team members because of their national and provincial leadership roles in indigenous health and hiv/aids research and services. from the project’s conception, indigenous stakeholders were involved in envisioning a three-phase research study. indigenous community members were hired to work on the project to mentor other team members, recruit study participants, administer questionnaires, facilitate focus groups, and conduct interviews. all study members were asked to contribute to data analysis and to the preparation of this manuscript as co-authors. sampling and study population we followed purposive criterion sampling. flyers were used to recruit study participants. research assistants and community partners also assisted in recruiting participants through introducing the study in a safe space. safe spaces were created by including reflections of indigeneity (e.g., cultural activities were practiced and indigenous staff with diverse identities were present), using private rooms, and not permitting any violence, including discrimination. eligible participants were: (a) cisor trans-women; (b) first nation, métis, or inuk; (c) aged 18 or over; and (d) could read and/or write in french or english and (e) from toronto or thunder bay, ontario. both cities were selected because one of the community partners has sites in both cities, and we have indigenous and non-indigenous research team members who live and conduct indigenous health research in toronto and thunder bay. it is important to note that thunder bay has the highest proportion of indigenous people in canada (statistics canada, 2017b) and has been reported to have the highest rates of hate crimes in canada (statistics canada, 2017a). women living with and without hiv were recruited. our study was reviewed by the women’s college research institute ethics review board, toronto, ontario. participants provided verbal and written informed consent prior to beginning study procedures. data collection all study participants completed an interviewer-administered questionnaire and were asked to participate in sharing circles or interviews; a third of the participants accepted. sharing circles were held separately for women living with hiv and one-on-one interviews were also conducted for those requesting more confidentiality and privacy. quantitative data was collected from 90 women (30 women living with and 60 without hiv) using a socio-demographic questionnaire and two racism scales. the sample size was selected to ensure subsequent phases of the project were feasible. stress related to racism was measured with the irrs-b 5 benoit et al.: racism experiences of urban indigenous women published by scholarship@western, 2019 (utsey, 1999; utsey & ponterotto, 1996). the irrs-b is a 22-item multidimensional scale of four subscales (cultural, collective, institutional, and individual). cultural racism reflects experiences of one’s culture being denigrated or maligned. collective racism includes the organized efforts of white people to restrict the rights of ethnic minorities. institutional racism is embedded in the discriminatory policies and practices of a given institution. individual racism measures racism on an interpersonal level. each item is rated on a 5-point scale ranging from 0 to 88 where 0 indicates this has never happened to me and 4 indicates this happened and i was extremely upset (utsey, 1999; utsey & ponterotto, 1996). high total scores representing global racism indicate greater experiences of racism. the scale’s strong psychometric properties have been assessed in african american women and the authors have stated it can be adapted to other non-white populations (greb et al., 2012; utsey, 1999; utsey & ponterotto, 1996). we calculated a cronbach’s alpha of 0.90 for global racism. the cronbach alphas were: 0.83 for cultural, 0.82 for individual, and 0.89 for the collective and institutional racism domains. the prs was used to assess racism from health service providers and society in general (green, 1995). racism perceptions are divided into affective, behavioural, and cognitive categories and measured using a 20item scale rating. participants rated each item on a 4-point scale with 1 indicating strongly agree and 4 strongly disagree (green, 1995). the score ranges from 20 to 80 with high scores indicating stronger perceptions of racism. the scale was developed to assess racism perceptions by african american women and its psychometric properties were strong (greb et al., 2012; green, 1995). we calculated a cronbach’s alpha of 0.75. in order to maintain rigor in the quantitative data analysis, the scales selected have been evaluated for their psychometric properties in women (greb et al., 2012; green, 1995; utsey, 1999; utsey & ponterotto, 1996). qualitative data was collected through in-depth semi-structured interviews and sharing circles, with interviews lasting one and a half hours and sharing circles lasting two hours. sharing circles engage women in discussions similar to focus groups, but with ceremony and other indigenous practices determined by a knowledge keeper (lavallee, 2009; rothe, ozegovic, & carroll, 2009). four circles were held. two were with hiv-negative women (n = 6 and n = 11,respectively) and two were with women living with hiv (n = 4 and n = 2, respectively). seven interviews were held with women living with hiv. our study yielded 11 transcripts (277 pages). the sample size was based on data saturation and suggested sizes from the literature (creswell, 1998; weiss, 1994). data analysis for the quantitative data analysis, baseline socio-demographic characteristics were presented as frequencies and proportions for categorical variables. the p values for the comparisons between women living with hiv and without hiv were determined using the fischer’s exact test. rows with frequencies less than five were suppressed. medians and interquartile ranges (iqr) described continuous variables and the p values for the comparisons between each group of women were calculated using the wilcoxon rank test. for all scales, items were summed and presented as continuous and p values calculated for the comparisons between each group of women for each racism category using wilcoxon rank test. we conducted linear regression analysis to calculate unadjusted estimates (ue) and adjusted estimates (ae) along with 95% confidence intervals (ci) to identify covariates of the irss-b domains. significant covariates (p < 0.1) in the unadjusted models and the a priori variables: hiv, age, and income (cunningham & paradies, 2013) were candidates for multiple regression analysis. statistical analyses were performed using sas statistical software (version 9.4). 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.1 for qualitative data, discussions were audio-recorded and transcribed with personal identifying information removed, while information relevant to experiences of racism was preserved. the data were analyzed through thematic analysis (braun & clarke, 2006). multiple coders finalized and re-evaluated the themes to establish reliability of the qualitative strand. a validity check of the phase 1 findings was conducted in phase 2 through sharing circles. one sharing circle was conducted for study participants living with hiv, and another for hiv-negative women, generating two transcripts. data integration the quantitative data from the irrs-b and the qualitative data from the sharing circles and interviews were compared and integrated (li, marquart, & zercher, 2000). this form of integration reflects triangulation for corroboration between the sets of data (creswell & plano, 2011; o'cathain, murphy, & nicholl, 2010). irrs-b cultural, individual, and collective and institutional racism domains were used to categorize themes. the percentage of individuals experiencing racist events from each domain was also described. also, covariates identified in the regression analysis were compared and contrasted to the themes and keywords from the qualitative data. results participant characteristics of the 90 women (including trans women, n < 5) enrolled in the study, 60 women were hiv-negative and 30 were living with hiv. we did not conduct a separate analysis for the trans women because of the small sample size, which raises confidentiality issues and makes it difficult to conduct descriptive statistical analyses. the median age at interview was 40 [iqr: 29 46] for hiv-negative women and 42 [iqr: 38 49] for women living with hiv. overall, 92 percent (n = 55) of hiv-negative women and 73 percent (n = 22) of women living with hiv identified as first nations (p = 0.02). participant characteristics are summarized in table 1. quantitative analysis: irrs-b and prs out of the 90 women who were asked to complete the irrs-b scale, 83 (92%) responded to all questions. of the 60 hiv-negative women, two women did not complete any of the questions so they were excluded from the analysis. five women did not complete all of the questions: two women had seven missing questions, one had three, and two had one missing question. the 30 women living with hiv completed all of the questions. irrs-b scores were imputed for unanswered questions by calculating the mean value of non-missing answers.the median irrs-b score for hiv-negative women was 55.5 [iqr: 42.9 71.2] and 50.0 [iqr: 405 56.5] for women living with hiv (p = 0.08; table 2). 7 benoit et al.: racism experiences of urban indigenous women published by scholarship@western, 2019 table 1. characteristics of study participants and group comparisons by hiv status all (n = 90) without hiv (n = 60) with hiv (n = 30) n (%) n (%) n (%) p age at interview ≤ 35 years 31(33) 26 (44) 5 (17) 0.03 36 45 years 28 (30) 15 (25) 13 (43) > 45 years 30 (37) 18 (30) 12 (40) indigenous group first nations 77 (86) 55 (92) 22 (73) 0.02 inuit, métis, or other 13 (14) 5 (8) 8 (27) education grade 1 8 n (10) n (7) n (17) 0.13 grade 9 12/13 45 (51) 28 (47) 17 (57) some college or university 35 (39) 27 (45) 8 (27) employment employed n (22) n (27) n (13) 0.15 unemployed 70 (78) 44 (73) 26 (87) annual income < $20,000 70 (80) 46 (79) 24 (83) 0.70 > $20,000 17 (20) 12 (21) 5 (17) living status alone 28 (31) 13 (22) 15 (50) 0.01 family, friend, or partner 46 (51) 33 (55) 13 (43) no permanent residencea n (18) n (23) n (7) sexual orientation heterosexual 68 (76) 46 (78) 22 (73) 0.63 bisexual or two-spiritb 21 (24) 13 (22) 8 (27) cultural or spiritual practices no 34 (40) 26 (43) 14 (47) 0.76 yes 51 (60) 34 (57) 16 (53) marijuana use no 39 (44) 28 (47) 11 (37) 0.21 < 2 joints/day 30 (34) 21 (36) 9 (30) > 2 joints/day 20 (22) 10 (17) 10 (33) injection drug use never 41 (48) 34 (58) 7 (25) 0.01 < 1 month ago 16 (19) 9 (16) 7 (25) > 1 year ago 29 (34) 15 (26) 14 (50) 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.1 table 1. characteristics of study participants (continued) note. n = value suppressed because the frequency in the category is less than 5. statistical comparisons between hiv status groups were calculated using fischer’s exact test for categorical variables and the wilcoxon rank test for continuous variables. a no permanent residence includes living in supportive housing, shelter, or temporarily with family, a partner, a friend, or a roommate. b two-spirit was an answer to the “other, please specify” option for sexual orientation. twospirit refers to the gender of indigenous people carrying a male and female spirit who historically were visionaries, healers, and medicine people. although contemporary practice is to consider two-spirit as a gender, some people occasionally use it to describe their sexual identity (robinson, 2017). c other illicit drug use includes smoking, inhaling, or orally taking drugs. d other co-morbidities includes bipolar disorder, asthma, cancer, diabetes, hypertension, or post-traumatic stress disorder. all (n = 90) without hiv (n = 60) with hiv (n = 30) n (%) n (%) n (%) p other illicit drug usec never 21 (33) 14 (33) 7 (33) 0.91 < 1 month ago 22 (35) 14 (33) 8 (38) > 1 year ago 20 (32) 14 (33) 6 (29) alcohol use (past 30 days) never 28 (31) 19 (32) 9 (30) 0.66 1 7 times a week 25 (28) 18 (31) 7 (23) 1 3 times a month 36 (40) 22 (37) 14 (47) co-morbidities hepatitis c 21 (28) 9 (18) 12 (52) <0.01 depression 52 (70) 36 (70) 16 (70) 0.93 anxiety 52 (70) 36 (70) 16 (70) 0.93 otherd 34 (46) 26 (51) 8 (35) 0.19 9 benoit et al.: racism experiences of urban indigenous women published by scholarship@western, 2019 table 2. overview of racism scale scores all without hiv with hiv median (iqr) median (iqr) median (iqr) p perceptions of racism scale (prs) 45.0 (40.0 49.5) 44.5 (40.0 48.0) 47.5 (41.0 50.0) 0.08 index of race-related stress (irrs-b) individual racism 15.0 (10.0 20.0) 15.0 (10.0 20.2) 14.5 (9.0 20.0) 0.53 collective and institutional racism 14.0 (9.0 19.8) 13.0 (8.8 19.2) 14.0 (9.0 22.0) 0.38 cultural racism 24.5 (19.0 32.8) 28.5 (21.0 34.0) 22.0 (18.8 27.2) 0.003 global racism 51.0 (42.0 68.5) 55.5 (42.9 71.2) 50.0 (40.5 56.5) 0.08 note. irrs-b scores range between 0 and 88 where high scores indicate greater experiences of racism. prs scores range from 20 to 80 where high scores indicate higher perceptions of racism. the individual racism domain score was 15.0 [iqr: 10.0 20.2] and 14.5 [iqr: 9.0 20.0] for women living without and with hiv, respectively (p = 0.53). the collective and institutional racism domain score was 13.0 [iqr: 8.8 19.2] and 14.0 [iqr: 9.0 22.0] for women living without and with hiv, respectively (p = 0.38). the cultural racism score was 28.5 [iqr: 21.0 34.0] for hiv-negative women and 22.0 [iqr: 18.8 27.2] for women living with hiv (p = 0.003). all women experienced at least one racist event, which resulted in at least one item on the irrs-b scale having a score greater than 0 (table not shown). of the 90 women completing the prs, 88 (98%) completed some or all of the questions. the majority of women, 78 (87%) responded to all questions. of the 60 hiv-negative women, two did not complete any questions and were excluded from the analysis. among the 58 remaining women, 10 had less than complete data. one woman had nine missing questions, one had five, two had two, and six had one question missing. of the 30 women living with hiv, 28 completed all questions and two had one missing question each. prs scores were imputed for missing questions as previously described. the median prs score for hiv-negative women was 44.5 [iqr: 40.0 48.0] and 47.5 [iqr: 41.0 50.0] for women living with hiv (p = 0.08; table 2). all women had at least one perceived racism experience (table not shown). linear regression analysis the variable associated with individual racism, injection drug use equal to or more than one year ago (ue 2.91, 95% ci: 0.13 5.70), was not significant after adjustment (table 3). correlates associated with collective and institutional racism (injection drug use ≥1 year ago, ue 5.03, 95% ci: 2.05 8.01) and cultural racism (hiv-negative, ue 5.32, 95% ci: 1.86 8.78) remained significant after adjustment (injection drug use ≥1 year, ae 3.64, 95% ci: 0.21 7.06; hiv-negative, ae 5.23, 95% ci: 0.96 9.50). 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.1 table 3. unadjusted (ue) and adjusted linear regression estimates (ae) of variables associated with individual, collective and institutional, and cultural racism individual collective and institutional cultural ue (95% ci) p ae (95% ci) p ue (95% ci) p ae (95% ci) p ue (95% ci) p ae (95% ci) p hiv (ref. = positive) negative 0.83 (-1.77, 3.43) p = 0.53 1.72 (-1.33, 4.77) p = 0.26 -1.26 (-4.13, 1.61) p = 0.38 -0.29 (-3.70, 3.12) p = 0.86 5.32 (1.86, 8.78) p = 0.003 5.23 (0.96, 9.50) p = 0.02 cultural practices (ref. = no) yes 2.31 (-0.14, 4.75) p = 0.06 1.62 (-1.00, 4.24) p = 0.22 2.03 (-0.69, 4.76) p = 0.14 2.26 (-0.67, 5.19) p = 0.13 1.92 (-1.53, 5.39) p = 0.27 1.03 (-2.64, 4.70) p = 0.58 marijuana use (ref. = no) ≤ 2 joints/day 2.19 (-0.59, 4.07) p = 0.12 2.08 (-0.91, 5.08) p = 0.17 2.57 (-0.53, 5.67) p = 0.10 2.42 (-0.93, 5.76) p = 0.15 3.60 (-0.29, 7.50) p = 0.07 4.04 (-0.15, 8.22) p = 0.06 > 2 joints/day -1.20 (-4.31, 1.92) p = 0.45 -1.68 (-5.28, 1.92) p = 0.35 -0.40 (-3.87, 3.08) p = 0.82 -0.11 (-4.14, 3.91) p = 0.96 -0.52 (-4.89, 3.84) p = 0.81 -0.90 (-5.94, 4.14) p = 0.72 injection drug use (ref. = never) < 1 month ago 2.94 (-0.43, 6.32) p = 0.09 1.41 (-2.26, 5.07) p = 0.44 3.05 (-0.56, 6.66) p = 0.10 2.13 (-1.96, 6.23) p = 0.30 1.71 (-3.12, 6.54) p = 0.48 1.58 (-3.55, 6.72) p = 0.54 > 1 year ago 2.91 (0.13, 5.70) p = 0.04 2.09 (-0.98, 5.16) p = 0.18 5.03 (2.05, 8.01) p = 0.001 3.64 (0.21, 7.06) p = 0.04 1.78 (-2.20, 5.77) p = 0.38 1.63 (-2.67, 5.92) p = 0.45 11 benoit et al.: racism experiences of urban indigenous women published by scholarship@western, 2019 table 3. unadjusted (ue) and adjusted linear regression estimates (ae) of variables associated with individual, collective and institutional, and cultural racism (continued) individual collective and institutional cultural ue (95% ci) p ae (95% ci) p ue (95% ci) p ae (95% ci) p ue (95% ci) p ae (95% ci) p co-morbidities (ref. = no) depression 1.91 (-0.91, 4.72) p = 0.18 1.47 (-1.43, 4.38) p = 0.31 1.99 (-1.24, 5.22) p = 0.22 1.48 (-1.76, 4.72) p = 0.36 3.89 (-0.12, 7.90) p = 0.06 2.96 (-1.10, 7.02) p = 0.15 anxiety 1.61 (-1.22, 4.44) p = 0.26 1.29 (-1.56, 4.14) p = 0.37 2.93 (-0.26, 6.11) p = 0.07 2.91 (-0.27, 6.09) p = 0.07 2.21 (-1.86, 6.30) p = 0.28 1.67 (-2.31, 5.66) p = 0.40 note. unadjusted models included hiv status, age at interview, indigenous group, income, sexual orientation, cultural practices, marijuana use, injection drug use, other illicit drug use, alcohol use last 30 days, and co-morbidities. variables of interest (hiv, age at interview, and income) and those with a p value < 0.1 in the unadjusted models were included in the adjusted model. education, employment, and living status were not included in the analysis due to small sample sizes (< 5) in some categories. statistically significant values are in bold. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.1 qualitative analysis: sharing circles and interviews several themes around racism concerning past and current events were described. past events were directly linked to colonial activities and policies such as the sixties scoop, the indian act, and indian residential schools. current events related to the inherited outcomes of colonialism that focused on inadequate health services, socio-economic insecurity, negative stereotypes and judgements, and a lack of recognition of indigenous knowledge systems. we further categorized and described these racism events based on the irrs-b domains. individual racism. the individual racism domain assessed racism on an interpersonal level. while shopping, one woman described being treated like a thief by a store employee: and then going shopping, people just watching you. and i’m like, one day i said, listen, i’m going into aisle 5 right now, if somebody wants to follow me. another woman described harassment and violence as a consequence of being indigenous: when i was growing up, i got beat a lot from other kids just because of how i looked. i didn’t look like the other kids. i used to get picked on, especially, more in the summertime when i got really dark. individual perceived racism was lower when surrounded by individuals that were also non-white: yeah ‘cause i live around lots of black people, lots of latinos and i feel like nobody bothers me anyway because i’m native, but let’s say i was living in [location] or [location], i would be really stereotyped, really bothered and probably not even served as much as i am down there. it is important to acknowledge that some participants also expressed anger or discriminatory attitudes toward individuals presenting as white and non-white. the participants perceived that these individuals felt superior to indigenous people. collective and institutional racism: the collective and institutional racism domain is a combined measure of racism. institutional racism is embedded in the policies and practices of a given institution. collective racism reflected the organized efforts of white people to restrict the rights of indigenous people. a major concern for participants was housing security. overcoming barriers to secure housing seemed to be insurmountable, as was employment security. feelings of anger, frustration, and worry were common. below are quotes from four individuals: i’ve gone looking for housing, and because of who i am, an aboriginal, they say, “oh, we just gave the apartment away.” and meanwhile i go back and they say, “still apartment available, vacancy available.” and that pisses me off . . . right now, i’m kind of angry about it because one day i went to 10 different buildings and 10 different doors were slammed in my face. yeah, and that really angered me. 13 benoit et al.: racism experiences of urban indigenous women published by scholarship@western, 2019 [referring to finding a home because the participant will soon be homeless.] yeah, a nice little house or an apartment. that stresses me out because a lot of landlords or owners have so much racism towards aboriginals or inuit, métis, all nations, and are racist towards us. this is what stresses me out is to find a home, to find a home or an apartment to try to live alone and not get stressed out by other issues that we’re going through. when you’re out looking for work and you’re competing against younger women and, in particular white younger women, there’s a lot of judgement. racism in the health service setting was also described. one woman explained how she felt ignored: i was at the doctor’s office, i dislocated my arm, and they kept putting my chart down, and my son was waiting for me at home, at his place, and it was like, oh my god, my son is waiting for me, why are these people putting my chart down to the bottom? i’ve been waiting like everybody else, how come they keep putting my chart down? that pissed me off. i put my arm back into place and i walked out. that’s crazy, i shouldn’t have had to do that. although some experiences can be considered perceived racism, many discussions highlighted overt racist experiences, particularly for cultural racism. cultural racism. cultural racism describes experiences in which one’s culture is denigrated or maligned and believed to be inferior to other cultures by both individuals and institutions. the quotes below focused on experiences related to the sixties scoop, indian act, indian residential schools, and the outcomes of colonization. the quote below described the invisibility of some indigenous people in the city and how acknowledgement can assist them by being perceived as valuable and estimable. the undertone of the discussion alluded to their lower perceived worth compared to members of the dominant society. strategies to move on from racist events were also described: just being an aboriginal woman, especially in canada, i’ve never experienced racism or anything like that . . . i noticed it. well, maybe as a little kid. i grew up in a white community because i was part of the sixties scoop and got adopted by a white family. so i was discriminated earlier, but it didn’t really bother me too much because of how i grew up and what i experienced. i learned to shut down. i learned to shut down and not deal with nothing. so if anything did happen to me, i just took that attitude. and then when i came here and i seen what was happening with the natives and how they were treated. and one of the teachings i got from the elder he said, “you know what? when you see your brother and sister on the street, acknowledge them even if they’re lying on the ground or they’re drunk, acknowledge them.” i don’t care. i acknowledge all the time. you never walk by them and act like they don’t exist because that’s what’s been happening for our whole existence that we don’t exist. and if you acknowledge everybody, then it makes that person say, “hey, i am somebody.” and i do this to help people because it helps me. stories similar to the one above about being adopted and placed in non-indigenous families or being removed and placed in foster care were common. the sixties scoop, a widespread policy in canada of removing indigenous children from their families and communities and placing them with nonindigenous families, was discontinued in the mid-eighties and contributed to the loss of cultural 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.1 knowledge and cultural practices within communities and families. it also exposed many indigenous children to abuse and violence. one woman recounted how she was not only removed from her family, but also how her mother lost her indian status2 by marrying a white man: i was put into care very young, having a father that was scottish and aboriginal, a mother that was aboriginal, and him being military and her [indian] status being taken and us being taken. another woman alluded to culture loss due to her grandmother attending an indian residential school. throughout much of canada’s history, indigenous teachings and cultural practices were outlawed and were not valued for their role in indigenous peoples’ wellbeing: there’s a lot of things like from my past that i need to forgive myself or others for and i feel like that has uhmm i guess created a loss in some ways of my culture because i’m just getting back into a lot of traditional stuff and because my life was impacted by my grandmother going to residential school so we missed out on a lot of traditional teachings. participants expressed their distrust of children’s aid societies, and their belief that children’s aid societies implement a different set of rules for indigenous mothers than for white mothers. these concerns are expressed in the following quotation: she still has her kids, she’s white and she still has her [expletive] kids, excuse my language. it just set me right off, thinking, she’s been an ongoing addict for like seven years. these children all look like under the age of eight, she had three, she still had them. finally, indigenous women recognized that when they were not treated as if they were invisible, they were working to undo the negative stereotypes about indigenous women. the lack of knowledge about indigenous peoples and their knowledge systems in mainstream society has allowed negative beliefs about indigenous women to persist. many settlers, as well as some indigenous people, are ignorant of the important roles, including as mothers and bearers of children, many indigenous women once held in their communities: [being the ideal mother] i was too busy trying to be perfect because all i had heard was that native women were whores and drunks so i went out of my way to make sure my children were well dressed and i did whatever i had to do to make sure they got what they wanted, but i didn’t do things the right way you know teaching and stuff like that so i screwed up a lot as a mother . . . when i see kids doing normal things and even though the kids don’t look happy, they’re going to soccer and the moms are driving them. mother is present . . . to get over something you have to be able to forgive yourself. right? i did so many things with my children i can’t forgive. my children say, “mom don’t worry about it.” 2 the term status indian refers to a first nations individual who is registered with the federal government or a band that has signed a treaty with the crown. first nations women were discriminated against by having their indian status removed if they married a man without indian status, which also resulted in their descendants losing their status. this process occurred from 1951 to 1985. 15 benoit et al.: racism experiences of urban indigenous women published by scholarship@western, 2019 another woman recounted how as a young child any behaviour deemed unacceptable, referred to as “stupid things,” was due to her indigenous ancestry, whereas her european ancestry was associated with “good things”: my foster mother used to put me down all the time, if i did what like she called stupid things, that was the indian in me and, when i did really good things, that was the french in me. data integration the qualitative and quantitative data strands were integrated. individual racism from the qualitative data included experiences of being harassed and abused. a greater diversity of racist events were reflected in the quantitative irrs-b data. overall, 73 percent of the women living with and 78 percent living without hiv stated that they had been treated with a lack of respect in multiple spaces (e.g., store, restaurant), which included being treated like they did not belong, were not intelligent enough to understand information, and could not afford certain items. collective and institutional racism was reflected in the qualitative and quantitative data. racist events linked to employment and housing were found in both strands; in contrast to health services, which was reflected in the qualitative data only. however, questions around health services were not specifically asked. key words captured in the quantitative data related to persons of authority (e.g., police, employers) treating indigenous females poorly. diverse racist events were captured through the quantitative data with 65 percent of women living with and without hiv having been assaulted or threatened with violence, denied opportunities, and/or told they should accept crimes as part of being indigenous. in assessing cultural racism, the qualitative data was supported by the quantitative data. cultural racism was the most salient form of racism experienced. stereotypes and associated behaviours regarding indigenous ethnicity and indigenous female identity were described in the qualitative data. the data focused on the intergenerational impact of the sixties scoop, indian act, and indian residential schools. a greater diversity of key words were captured in the quantitative data, including how society portrayed indigenous peoples and the judgement associated with this portrayal. cultural racism was described by 70 percent and 86 percent of the women living with and without hiv, respectively. although hivnegative women had a higher frequency of cultural racism, similar racism themes were identified in the qualitative data for both groups of participants. the prs is a single-dimensional racism measure useful for assessing perceptions of racism in health services (green, 1995). given the limited accounts of racist events in health services in the qualitative data, we did not complete a comparison with the prs items. discussion we found that indigenous women experience challenges in securing socio-economic stability and are frequently exposed to interpersonal racism. the intergenerational impact of colonialism through cultural racism has a crucial impact on these women’s life stories as they navigate systemic barriers. racism research regarding indigenous women in canada has largely focused on health status, particularly health service access, through qualitative research (allan & smylie, 2015; browne, 2017; 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.1 browne & fiske, 2001; denison et al., 2014; poudrier & mac-lean, 2009; varcoe et al., 2013; vukic et al., 2012). there has been limited use of quantitative research tools, such as validated racism scales. a mixed methods research approach for describing racist events experienced by indigenous women in thunder bay and toronto, ontario, has enabled us to explore racism in different contexts. in an effort to engage in meaningful discussions about racist events, a scale describing multiple acts of racial discrimination has been valuable in providing a broader representation of these experiences. the scale also highlighted experiences of racism that were not reported during qualitative discussions. in contrast, the qualitative data provided context for the women’s experiences of racism, which was linked to colonialism and policies that define and control indigenous populations in canada. individual racism, which is also called interpersonal racism, has largely been neglected in the literature as part of the discourse on what perpetuates inequities at the macro level. a study showed that chronic and persistent everyday exposure to negative race-based treatment adversely impacted physical health even more so than overt acts of discrimination (williams, yu, jackson, & anderson, 1997). more recently, a study with aboriginal australians showed that racially based treatment was not different when adjusting for sex, employment, or education status, suggesting racism was part of their daily interactions (larson, gillies, howard, & coffin, 2007). this was similar to findings for african americans who also experienced daily interpersonal racism (barnes et al., 2004; deitch et al., 2004). larson et al. (2007) stated that physical health was associated with interpersonal racism and cautioned that measures of chronic racism, not acute racism, were more consistently associated with health. a study with a cree first nation community showed that interpersonal racism was associated with diagnoses of depression after adjusting for confounders, and the odds of having depression increased with more incidences of interpersonal racism (janzen et al., 2017). a study in kettle and stony point first nation, ontario, determined that perceived stress was positively associated with interpersonal racism, which was modestly impacted by cultural resilience (spence, wells, graham, & george, 2016). in our study, most participants reported poor health outcomes, but we did not find associations between health outcomes or health behaviours, including cultural practices, with individual racism. our sample size may not have allowed us to assess small but meaningful differences, even if our population was homogenous in terms of their characteristics, with the exception of hiv diagnosis. we did not investigate an exhaustive list of health behaviours and outcomes or do a longitudinal analysis. we only captured racism experiences through respondents’ recollection of events. as such, measuring experiences of chronic racism and health status at a single point in time may not lead to the same findings as repeatedly measuring racism over time and observing associated variations in health. individual racism experienced within relationships or communications between people can be captured in the other irrs-b domains, particularly collective and institutional racism. racism at the micro-level would be more limited in its impact or more challenging to perpetuate if racist beliefs were not ingrained in and supported by the macro-level. for example, interpersonal racism is perpetuated by health service providers who dismiss indigenous peoples’ chronic pain because of racial stereotypes that say indigenous people misuse pain medication, for example. in the absence of institution-wide policies on cultural safety training, institutional racism enables these stereotypes to persist. institutional and collective racism often focuses on differences in socio-economic status between groups, which is consistent with some of the discourse in our study. we focused on exploring racism within an indigenous context, not in comparison to other racialized groupings, so we cannot say how indigenous people’s experiences compare to other racial minority groups. racist events discussed in the sharing 17 benoit et al.: racism experiences of urban indigenous women published by scholarship@western, 2019 circles and interviews were largely related to housing and employment. the validity check discussions further emphasized racism as a barrier to achieving socio-economic stability. in the qualitative component of our study, accessing health services was only mentioned once. this may be because our questions did not focus specifically on health service systems or were too broad, or it could be that health service systems were not the most pressing concern for the participants. alternatively, the lack of discussion on this topic during sharing circles could be because participants may have mainly elaborated and built on topics discussed by other participants, and the issue of health services was not raised. it is important to note that perceived racism was high in the prs, which measures racism experiences in health services. the literature suggests that racism experiences largely occur in hospital settings, a finding which has been supported in the case of first nations women (browne & fiske, 2001; shah, gunraj, & hux, 2003; wood & kerr, 2006). another topic not discussed in our sharing circles was injection drug use and its impact on accessing services or attaining socio-economic stability. our linear regression analysis showed that past injection drug use (at least a year ago) was associated with collective and institutional racism, and our descriptive table showed a higher frequency of injection drug use among study participants living with hiv. injection drug use may have been avoided as a topic because of stigma related to it and the socio-economic challenges it can generate. it may also have been a past activity that they wanted to leave in the past. from a qualitative perspective, themes around cultural racism were not different for women living with and without hiv. unlike the irss-b cultural racism items, the qualitative data captured the depth of the women’s racism experiences, including the systematic and systemic devaluation of indigenous cultures in canada. however, cultural racism in the irss-b was statistically significant for hiv-negative indigenous women compared to women living with hiv. it may be that women living with hiv were being discriminated against for other reasons (e.g., injection drugs use, co-morbidities) that may have a profound effect on their lives. a study suggested that being indigenous, using illicit substances, and living in poverty were associated with stereotypes and stigmas that shaped indigenous peoples’ negative interactions with health service providers (goodman et al., 2017). goodman et al. (2017) also highlighted the exclusion of indigenous healing approaches and the lack of historical knowledge about the roots of indigenous health inequities within health service settings as significant in shaping cultural racism. cultural racism, in turn, contributed to indigenous people avoiding or having invalidating health service encounters. our study further suggests that hiv-negative women may be more likely to be racially socialized, a process through which people come to identify as a member of a particular racial group. as a result, they may have developed higher levels of cultural pride, but may also see their community as having less strength. in either case, hiv-negative women have been found to be more likely to perceive racial discrimination (boykin & toms, 1985). internalized racism was not explicitly measured in the scales, but it was captured in the participants’ comments regarding stereotypes. some participants appeared to have internalized negative racial stereotypes as a result of the individual racism and institutional and collective racism they experienced (wyatt et al., 2003). these internalized stereotypes may also cause adverse mental health outcomes, including low self-esteem, depression, and hostility (wyatt et al., 2003). in our study, women reported poor mental health outcomes (see also benoit et al., 2016) but, in our analysis, we did not examine pathways between mental health outcomes and forms of racial discrimination. 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.1 racism impacts individual and community development, including the social position and acceptance of individuals in their communities and society; opportunities for self-determination in achieving socioeconomic stability and health and wellness; and freedom of cultural expression. clark et al. (1999) noted that interand intra-ethnic group racism are significant stressors for african americans that may exert significant influence on wellbeing (clark et al., 1999). if racism is a stressor, then biopsychosocial sequelae and coping responses may in part contribute to inequitable health outcome status. thus, for indigenous peoples, racism as a stressor and its expression while living with chronic and acute stressful life experiences also needs consideration as an immediate biological determinant of health. racism is a learned behaviour that is passed down through social stereotypes; as such, it is a determinant of health that we can collectively work to eliminate for the improvement of indigenous peoples’ and other racialized groups’ health. there are other considerations that we did not include in our data interpretation. some of the racist events were layered with other simultaneously occurring events; therefore, at times, events could have been categorized differently. we categorized events via the general message of the event, group discussions, and co-author feedback. intersecting identities, although not discussed in our manuscript, were mentioned by multiple women, and the discrimination that accompanies some of those identities did contribute to the different layers in the racist events. goodman et al. (2017) showed that indigenous peoples’ intersecting identities (i.e., race, socio-economic status, and substance use) shaped their health service experiences, and racialized stereotypes influenced health service provider perceptions (goodman et al., 2017). therefore, intersecting identities that are associated with negative labels may have similarly impacted, for example, housing security. in our study, intersecting identities included gender (e.g., trans woman, two-spirited) and sexual identities (e.g., bisexual, gay), living in poverty with socio-economic barriers, being a sex worker, being a substance user (including alcohol consumption), and being judged for these past or present statuses. hiv stigma was described by many women living with hiv, and hiv testing was stigmatizing for those not living with hiv. interestingly, whether or not the women had control over their identities, they still carried the weight of changing the discourse around these identities for indigenous women. we could have applied the intersectionality concept to our study. in crenshaw’s (1989) essay, intersectionality described a situation and an experience, a view on complexity and marginalization, and finally a solution to the challenges experienced by black women. she strived for increased awareness and attention to black women’s lives and experiences. intersectionality could also put a spotlight on indigenous women’s lives and experiences. another important factor in our study is that women’s relationships were defined by the labels and identities they held. for example, mothers could be viewed as providers and teachers and being an indigenous mother placed emphasis on their indigenous identity, which speaks to a relationship with culture. although these associations were positive, they could still be as burdensome as the negative stereotypes because achieving and maintaining these identities does not always leave room for setbacks. our study had several limitations. the socio-demographic characteristics were not generalizable; they specifically speak to women who experience several forms of discrimination and access urban resource centres and organizations for indigenous peoples or indigenous women. a high percentage of our participants were first nations, and indigenous groupings may influence the types of racist events experienced. also, qualitative data and the demographics do not display the full range of variables that may reflect the women’s strengths. moreover, our quantitative findings reflect a cross-sectional analysis, which does not allow for cause-and-effect conclusions to be drawn. finally, our sample size was small 19 benoit et al.: racism experiences of urban indigenous women published by scholarship@western, 2019 (n = 90), which meant that some frequencies could not be reported, and it limited the types of analysis we could complete and which variables could be included in our regression analysis. conclusions our findings will contribute to the ongoing dialogue between indigenous women and the service providers who engage with them, as well as the broader communities in which they live. it is important to note that, given that differences were observed between women living with and without hiv, further work is required to understand the impact of cultural racism. the data indicates that racism is a determinant of health: it is incumbent that systems beyond health services respond. it has been suggested that to address racism we must eliminate the term “race” in order to subsequently eliminate racial categorization. in contrast, others have suggested that possessing a strong racial identity and awareness of racism could shield individuals from the adverse effects of racism on health (boykin & toms, 1985; harrell, 2000). this is reflected in our earlier discussion concerning the possibility that hiv negative women who were racially socialized and had high levels of cultural pride, or who saw the strength of being indigenous as low, being more likely to perceive racial discrimination. eliminating racial ideologies may be a near impossibility as these ideas have existed long before 1876 (i.e., establishment of the indian act in canada), and will likely continue to exist for the foreseeable future. in the meantime, it is crucial to address discriminatory laws, policies, and practices that adversely affect indigenous peoples. current strategies to confront racism in canada respond to the truth and reconciliation commission of canada’s (trc, 2015) calls to action, many of which require long-term strategies and huge investments that support and promote indigenous worldviews. our study focuses on numerous situations (e.g., housing, employment, violence, assault, child apprehension, and adoption), which makes it difficult to focus on a single policy to challenge, shift, develop, or even critique. however, drawing on reading (2014), we argue that it is critical that those in social policy development roles across these areas detail policy processes aimed at addressing indigenous racism more broadly. in reading’s (2014) report on indigenous racism, she described three anti-racist social models that could be useful in developing policies that attempt to address indigenous racism (allport, 1954; duckitt, 2001; guerin, 2003). these include the contact hypothesis, racial socialization, and racial decategorization (allport, 1954; duckitt, 2001; guerin, 2003; reading, 2014).the contact hypothesis aims to increase engagement between indigenous and non-indigenous persons to work towards common goals. the expectation is that they will eventually come to understand, or at the very least appreciate, each other’s perspectives (allport, 1954). guerin’s (2003) definition of racial socialization, which differs from the one described by boykin and toms (1985), involves being able to identify and understand experiences of racism as well as respond to racists events in ways that are commensurate with its seriousness. this may be achieved through inter-cultural education strategies including antiracism, anti-oppression, cross-cultural, cultural competency, or cultural safety training for decisionmakers and the general population through their employment or education. racial decategorization is a process by which individuals come together, form connections, and create a category based on a shared identity; this leads to altered beliefs about race-based stereotypes (duckitt, 2001). the latter may be achieved when working together to achieve common goals (i.e., contact hypothesis) and through cultural training (i.e., racial socialization) prior to beginning the work. in addition, a mi’kmaq guiding principle, two-eyed seeing, implores us to be open to multiple perspectives in order to obtain the most beneficial outcomes for those involved (bartlett et al., 2012). this perspective involves a life-long reflective learning process that could be used to address racism. opportunities for increased 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.1 conversations about racism have also been shown to reduce the potential for miscommunications and racial tensions (devine & vasquez, 1998; reading, 2014). social media might play a role in opening such conversations to a wider audience, but a strategy would be needed to determine the impact of this method. there is evidence to suggest that subtle non-confrontational messaging delivered by respected individuals is effective against racism (donovan & leivers, 1993). finally, addressing racism requires multiple policy-based strategies that permeate a range of institutions (e.g., housing, health services). to implement these policies, it is necessary to increase exposure to and reach of indigenous worldviews at different system levels. references allan, b., & smylie, j. 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(1997). racial differences in physical and mental health: socioeconomic status, stress and discrimination. journal of health psychology,2, 335351. doi: https://doi.org/10.1177/135910539700200305 wood, e., & kerr, t. (2006). what do you do when you hit rock bottom? responding to drugs in the city of vancouver. international journal of drug policy, 17(2), 55-66. doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.drugpo.2005.12.007 wyatt, s. b., williams, d. r., calvin, r., henderson, f. c., walker, e. r., & winters, k. (2003). racism and cardiovascular disease in african americans. the american journal of the medical sciences, 325(6), 315-331. doi: https://doi.org/10.1097/00000441-200306000-00003 27 benoit et al.: racism experiences of urban indigenous women published by scholarship@western, 2019 the international indigenous policy journal april 2019 racism experiences of urban indigenous women in ontario, canada: “we all have that story that will break your heart” anita c. benoit jasmine cotnam doe o'brien-teengs saara greene see next page for additional authors recommended citation racism experiences of urban indigenous women in ontario, canada: “we all have that story that will break your heart” abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license authors racism experiences of urban indigenous women in ontario, canada: â•œwe all have that story that will break your heartâ•š eco-cosmologies and biodiversity conservation: continuity and change among the karbis of assam the international indigenous policy journal volume 2 issue 4 traditional knowledge, spirituality, and lands article 10 october 2011 eco-cosmologies and biodiversity conservation: continuity and change among the karbis of assam ujjal kumar sarma indian institute of forest management (iifm), uks_wildlife@yahoo.co.in indrani barpujari t e energy and resources institute (teri), indrani.barpujari@teri.res.in recommended citation sarma, u. k. , barpujari, i. (2011). eco-cosmologies and biodiversity conservation: continuity and change among the karbis of assam. the international indigenous policy journal, 2(4) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.10 this research is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. eco-cosmologies and biodiversity conservation: continuity and change among the karbis of assam abstract eco-cosmologies of indigenous communities which regard the world of humans and the world of nature as closely related to each other, and rites and rituals based on such belief systems are important for the conservation of nature. the objective of this paper is to examine how the culture, particularly the cosmologies and religious beliefs of a indigenous tribal group-the karbis living near kaziranga national park, assam, india have insinuations for the conservation of natural resources. based on fieldwork conducted in two karbi villages, one still adhering to the traditional religion with a deep seated reverence for nature and all life forms, and the other which has converted to a new religion, the paper throws light on the changes and challenges to the indigenous ecological ethos in the present context. keywords eco-cosmology, biodiversity conservation, karbis, kaziranga national park creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ introduction: nature-culture-religion in indigenous communities the world view and religious beliefs of many indigenous communities living in close communion with nature are often rooted in nature and speak of affinity with the plant and animal world, which in turn leads to sustainable use and conservation of nature (western and wright, 1994). parajuli (2001) uses the term ecological ethnicity to denote such cultures and communities that maintain the rhythm of circularly appropriate cosmovisions, observing related rituals and practicing prudence in the ways they care about nature, harvest from nature, nurture nature and are nurtured in turn. in the context of india, home to innumerable indigenous and tribal communities living near protected areas, roy burman (1992) observes that tribal people possess an ‘indigenous wisdom’, having respect for all living creatures – a wisdom that, among other things offers other communities in india a vision of future survival based on a lifestyle of harmony with nature. arguing for their rights to live in conservation enclaves, he has proposed a definition of the ‘indigenous’ as those whose livelihoods are tied up with the land in a system of mutual reinforcement – as a moral contract in which social living and negotiation with human and non-human animate beings are basically attuned to the sonic and sensual rhythms of the earth (ibid.,4). among most simple societies, as observed by anthropologists across the world, the perception of nature is contiguous with that of society. together they constitute an integrated order, alternatively represented as a grand society or a cosmic nature. humankind is, thus, seen as a particular form of life participating in a wider community of living beings regulated by a single and totalizing set of rules of conduct (arhem, 1996). a similar sentiment has been echoed by sinha (1957) when he says that like many indigenous traditions, the religious practices of tribal societies indicate a belief that the natural universe is continuous with the human world of interactions and sentiments. the human, nature, and the supernatural are all bound in a mutual relationship (p. 46). to cite an illustration from the world view of the santals living in the chotanagpur region of india, the basic assumption is that like the rest of the material world, man is made up of elements that disintegrate at death and dissolve into nature. man is not even considered unique as regards to possession of knowledge; it is believed that primordial knowledge came to him from birds and animals and that cosmic intelligence is the selfexistent source of all knowledge (saraswati, 2001). according to descola and pálsson (1996) the concept of eco-cosmology may be adopted to refer to such integral models of human-nature relatedness; they have further pointed out that this new concept is also related to the classical anthropological notions of totemism and animism. levi-strauss (1963) has suggested that totemism is not necessarily a religious phenomenon, but rather a classificatory one. according to him, totemism is a label for certain kind of logic by which people employ the distinctions found in nature for the purpose of imposing distinctions between categories of people. totemic designations do more then merely label persons and groups; they also establish a certain structure of relation between them. animism, according to descola (1992), may be considered as the symmetrical inverse of totemism: a mode of conceptually organizing the relationship between human beings and natural species on the basis of the system of social classification. animistic systems endow natural beings with human dispositions and social attributes; sometimes animals are attributed with ‘culture’habits, rituals, songs and dances of their own. if totemic systems model society after nature, animistic systems model nature after society. however, according to arhem (op.cit.), despite the differences, both have fundamental properties in common: implying a relationship of continuity between nature and society. 1 sarma and barpujari: eco-cosmologies and biodiversity conservation: continuity and change published by scholarship@western, 2011 thus, they may be regarded as forming part of totalizing eco-cosmologies, integrating practical knowledge and moral values. although the nature-society divide is meaningless for most simple societies, many cultures attribute, explicitly or implicitly, the quality of wilderness to certain portions of their environment. they thus identify a particular space beyond the direct control of humans (oelschlaeger, 1991). sacred spaces and sacred groves are examples of this. it would perhaps be pertinent to start the discussion with an awareness of the pitfalls involved in taking a too romanticized perspective to the issue or a belief in an ideal ‘indigenous ecological ethos’. as the only constant in the world is ‘change’ and as indigenous communities the world over are exposed to the various forces of the modern world, levels of ecological consciousness vary significantly with the material conditions, the nature of livelihoods, the level of technological development in which different tribal communities live and the market forces. objectives and methodology eco-cosmologies regard the world of humans and the world of nature as closely related to each other. rituals based on such belief systems are important for the conservation of nature and wildlife, even as they undergo considerable changes. the objective of this paper is to establish the linkage between nature and culture and show how the culture, particularly the cosmologies and religious beliefs of an indigenous tribal group – the karbis living near kaziranga national park, assam, have implications for the conservation of natural resources. at the same time, the paper also dwells on the forces of change that have led to the gradual erosion of traditional belief systems, and which have had an unfavourable impact on conservation. the scope of the paper extends the study of karbi cosmologies, belief systems, myths, concept of sacred spaces as well as rites and rituals, which have a direct or indirect relationship with biodiversity conservation. it is based on fieldwork conducted over a period of two years in 2004-05 in the villages of inglepathar and chandrasingh rongpi gaon, situated near the world-famous kaziranga national park. situated in the north-eastern state of assam, india; the park is also renowned as the habitat of the one horned rhinoceros. the karbis who belong to the tibeto-burman linguistic stock constitute one of the oldest groups of inhabitants of assam. the karbis have been residing in and around the national park for ages, much prior to its designation as a protected area. in fact, the very word ‘kaziranga’ is believed to have karbi origin, derived from two words ‘kazir’, referring to a popular karbi name for a girl, and ‘rong’, meaning village in karbi, literally meaning the village where the karbi girl kazir resides. it is also believed that there were karbi villages inside the forest that was later declared as kaziranga national park. the locals believe that these karbis went to the southern hills in different waves. inglepathar is the oldest karbi village in the fringe of kaziranga national park. it is inhabited by 32 karbi households, with the total population being 247 persons (128 males and 119 females). the worldview of the inhabitants of inglepathar is largely still animistic, though in recent times there has been the growth of new religious sects, inspired by hinduism, particularly the assamese vaishnavite stream. the primary economic bases of the people of inglepathar are agriculture and daily wage labour. a small percentage (about 20% of the total working population), mainly young men in the agegroups of 20-24 and 25-29 years, have taken to business as their primary occupation (including supply of bamboo, petty trade, etc.). of the total population of 247 people, 39.68% have no formal education (the proportion of people with no formal education being highest in the age groups beyond 40 years which is 38%). the number of persons who have pursued education beyond class x is very few (15 persons or 6.07%), and the number of graduates even fewer (2 persons or 0.8%). chandrasingh rongpi gaon is also a small village quite close to inglepathar, with a population of 232 persons divided into 39 households. the people of chandrasingh rongpi gaon are relatively recent 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 10 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/10 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.10 converts to christianity. both the roman catholic and baptist church have a presence in the village, with about 60 % of the population affiliated to the baptist church and the remaining 40% are associated to the roman catholic church. majority of the people of chandrasing rongpigaon depend on agriculture for subsistence. in addition to agriculture, a large percentage of both men and women (75 males constituting 32.33% of the total population and 56 females comprising 24.14% of the total population) engage in secondary occupations of selling firewood and rice beer (mainly by women) and the supply of bamboo (mainly by the young men) to meet their need for ready cash. of 232 people 25.43% (persons in the age groups beyond 40 years constituting about 23 %) have no formal education. data on the religious beliefs, world view and cosmologies of the karbis have been collected using the anthropological techniques such as observation, interview and case study. care was exercised to judiciously select key informants. it was found that the village elders, particularly the religious officiates, were knowledgeable about the traditional belief systems, while the younger generation was more interested in talking about change and the need for the community to keep pace with the recent developments. care was taken to ensure that women informants were adequately represented in the study. karbi religion and worldview and the place of nature the karbi inhabitants of village inglepathar largely follow the traditional karbi religion of their forefathers, with its belief in innumerable supernatural powers both benevolent and malevolent and a deep reverence for nature and all life forms to please these supernatural powers, they hold rituals throughout the year where the sacrifice of fowls, and sometimes even goat or pig, and offerings of harlang (rice beer) are indispensable. most of them were proud of such current practices and imagined themselves as the true custodians of the karbi tradition, often considering the inhabitants of chandrasingh rongpi gaon as ‘contaminated’ owing to their conversion to christianity and the change to their world view. though christianity has not been able to make its presence felt in the village like the neighbouring karbi village chandrasingh rongpi gaon, karbi religion here has been influenced to a great extent by hinduism. hinduism has found its manifestation in the village in the form of worship of gods of the hindu pantheon like durga, lakshmi, shiva and vishnu and these deities are worshipped in a temple located inside the village. this is a new phenomenon considering the fact that temples were never part of karbi religion. also, strong influence of vaishnavism (a form of hinduism; adherents of which believe in vishnu, as the one god) is noticed in the form of devotion of a large section of the villagers to a sect based on vaishnavite principles – the lakhiman sangha. in contrast, in the case of chandrasingh rongpi gaon’s conversion to christianity, the community no longer propitiates supernatural powers, both benevolent and malevolent, as done by their ancestors through offerings of harlang and animal sacrifices. concepts like sacred trees, sacred forests, sacred animals and sacred streams, as prevalent as they are among the neighbouring karbis of inglepathar, are fast fading away in chandrasing rongpi gaon. nevertheless, remnants of the old religion are still found in their midst, especially among the older generation, particularly in instances like avoiding the forests where malevolent deities are believed to reside, or relying on the traditional medicine man’s incantations to ward off illness or misfortune. at the same time, some youths exhibited a condescending attitude towards the traditional karbi beliefs and displayed a sense of superiority in being part of a much ‘modern’ religious belief system. contemporary indian anthropologists like das (2006), srivastava (2010) have empirically observed a similar process of religious syncretism or the synthesis of different religious forms among the tribal people of india. according to das (2010), on account of various levels of culture-contact, adoption 3 sarma and barpujari: eco-cosmologies and biodiversity conservation: continuity and change published by scholarship@western, 2011 and interaction, the tribes of india have often borrowed cultural traits and religious practices of various sects and major religions such as buddhism, hinduism and christianity without being completely swallowed up by them. srivastava (2010) observes that this assimilation into the tribal fold is particularly noticed in the case of hindu gods and goddesses, facilitated by the nature of that religion, which is highly moldable and adaptable. in his words, “hindus find no contradiction in believing that god is one and formless and at the same time, for instance, that a pebble or a plant is godly, deserving veneration” (p. 5). this could perhaps provide a tentative explanation of the fact that we observed a higher degree of assimilation of hinduism into the traditional karbi religion. in a way, the educated and the younger generation’s perceived ‘superiority’ of christianity over the traditional religion comes in the form of a dialogue between the two religions, which is discussed later on in this paper. myths and beliefs. traditionally, the karbis believe that there is a karjong (soul) in every living being like humans, animals, birds, fish, insects, trees and the like. this karjong is also present in inanimate objects, such as water, rocks, hills, forests etc. it is due to the presence of karjong, which are regarded as part of the creator residing in all his creations, that the karbis revere all life forms and all objects of supernatural creation as sacred. the karbis believe that it is a crime to take the life of any living creature without purpose, as it possesses a karjong. even when a domestic creature like fowl, goat or pig is killed for food, a small ritual is observed to ask pardon from the gods and to ensure that no sin is attached to humans. to kill such an animal, lo-alun or a banana leaf is spread on the courtyard. aan or rice is sprinkled on the neck before slitting it with a sharp knife. this is to ensure that goddess lakshmi symbolized by the rice takes the blame. this again is a strong reflection of hindu influence where the goddess lakshmi (the goddess of wealth in hindu mythology) has come to be an important deity of the karbi pantheon. the inhabitants of inglepathar believe that death means the absence of karjong from the body. at death chom, who is the soul-giver, takes away the soul from the mortal world to chom-arong. since other creatures except humans are free from sin, chom takes them directly to his abode. however, the karjong of humans, being full of sin, continues to linger around after death. it is for these reasons that elaborate rituals have to be performed on the death of person so that the soul may be bid fare-well. langtuk togbi, the kurusar (priest) narrated a myth as to how the elaborate death ritual of the karbis called chomangkan, originated and the role played by a wild lizard in it. as per this myth, there was an expert karbi hunter tumung chomar. he used to go hunting in the forests of karbi anglong every day with a pack of hunting dogs. one day, in the course of his hunting, he found a female shehang (a kind of big lizard found in the forest, which used to be a delicacy for the karbis). with the help of his dogs, he caught hold of the shehang and when he tried to kill her, she pleaded with the hunter to spare her life. in lieu, she promised to take the hunter to chom arong. the hunter granted her prayer and she took him to chom arong and there he learned all the rules and regulations that were to be observed in the performance of the death ceremony. on returning to earth, he taught these to his fellow karbi men and, as a show of gratitude to the shehang, karbi hunters from then on refrained from killing shehangs. they also have the concept of rebirth or reincarnation of the soul or karjong. karbis believe that human beings take rebirth as human beings and animals as animals. an exception may be there in case the deceased committed grave sins during his life-time meaning he may take rebirth in the form of an animal in his family’s home. if a single puppy, piglet, duckling or chick etc. is born in the house, the karbis believe that an ancestor of the family has taken rebirth in this form due to his past sins. such an animal cannot be sacrificed on ritual occasions. a ritual to seek atonement for the sin of killing has to be performed (but only outside the household premises) before an animal can be killed for food. the karbis 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 10 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/10 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.10 also believe that dead ancestors have the capacity to take the form of other animals and present himself or herself before the members of his family. karbi religious beliefs are also reflected in a number of myths and songs which had been passed on to them by their forefathers through the oral tradition. the study of myths of a society is considered important. though myths are related to given facts, they are not a representation of them. however, the study of myths open the way for other possibilities. by abandoning the search for a constantly accurate picture of ethnographic reality in the myth, we gain on occasion a means of reaching unconscious categories (levi-strauss 1976). as per one karbi myth, at the beginning of creation all the inhabitants of earth, including the different ethnic groups of humankind and all the animals, spoke a common language and were one united whole. on one occasion, the inhabitants of the earth, including humans and animals, tried to build a ladder to aakarang sargat (heaven). since the gods did not want the mortals co-habiting with them, they broke the ladder when the creatures of the earth were resting from their work. undaunted, they started to rebuild it. in the face of their unwavering determination, the gods conspired to create discord among them. through the use of supernatural charms, they made the mortals forget their common language, with each group now starting to speak different languages, unknown to the others. from then on the close relationship between man and animal was irreversibly broken by the conspiracy of the jealous gods. thus, this karbi myth is of great relevance in the sense that it lead us to conclude that the heart of the karbi culture is permeated by a deep sense of oneness with and connection to all earthly creatures. masira kohir is a holy song of the karbis narrating the basic principles of creation. this song can be sung only during the death ritual chomangkan and at no other time. the words of this song are to the effect that the karbis were born under the amara tree (foudiaf mangrifera) from the egg of a mythical bird known as the wo plak pi. the verses run to the effect that the first representatives of tribes like the ahoms, the khasis (whom the karbis refer to as the chomangs) and the karbis were hatched out of eggs laid by this bird. this song, thus, speaks about the common origin of all ethnic groups, referring particularly to the ahom rulers (of assam) and the khasis (mostly living in meghalaya) with whom the karbis were in close contact. again, the song also speaks of all people as tracing their origin to a ssingular bird, indicative, again, of the oneness of humans and animals. sacred spaces. the karbis of inglepathar believe that the nearby hills, streams and forests are the abodes of spirits and gods, both benevolent and malevolent. in addition, the people believe that the souls of their ancestors prior to the performance of the elaborate death rituals linger near to the dwellings of their surviving kin in the bamboo groves. they particularly revere a hillock rang le sai, and no insolent action like spitting, or the use of foul language is permissible once inside the forests of the hill. very few karbis even dare to go to the hill for the fear that they might commit some sin. despite conversion to christianity, elders in chandrasingh rongpi gaon still believe that the forests of central karbi anglong are the abode of many deities and spirits. the story of khenglong-po is still vivid in the popular imagination. khenglong-po is perceived to be a huge, hairy wild-man that lives in the forest of singhason peak (the highest peak of karbi anglong) and has a liking for human flesh. while the younger generation scoffs at such beliefs, nevertheless, they avoid going alone into the forests where he is believed to reside and only venture there in groups. sacred plants and animals. the karbis revere a number of plants and animal species as sacred. the plant garuga pinnata, local name tejhi or timur is believed to possess some miraculous powers. it is believed that god first created human beings under this plant, attested to by the verses of the folk song karbi kaplang. different clans or kurs revere different species as sacred and there are usually beliefs and 5 sarma and barpujari: eco-cosmologies and biodiversity conservation: continuity and change published by scholarship@western, 2011 myths attributing some relationship with the particular plant or animal. for instance, members of the terang clan revere the hornbill, the killing of which is believed to be a grave sin. there is a belief that the terangs were saved from death during a severe flood by this bird. similarly, the rui teron (a particular kind of snake) is sacred for the teron clan, while the togbis revere the eagle. lo teron tree in spite of being good firewood is sacred for the teron kur, and hence, it a taboo for them to use it. the ingsung leaves, which are bitter and taken as a vegetable by the karbis, are sacred to the ingti kur and are thus taboo for consumption. apart from these specific plants and animals, the karbi people of inglepathar also worship the cow, elephant and tiger. again, the killing of a pregnant animal for food is tabooed. however, it is only the karbis practicing the traditional religion who follow these taboos. karbis who have converted to christianity no longer believe in these restrictions and there is no taboo on their eating any plant and animal, if so desired. rituals associated with nature. the people of inglepathar perform many rituals associated with nature. wophong rongker is performed for the well-being of not only the village but for all the neighbouring karbi and non-karbi population as well. it is believed that the performance of wophong rongker protects the agricultural lands from the ravages of floods and ensures timely rain.the venue for the performance of wophong rongker is the wophong rongker than (a stone shrine surrounded by a patch of forest – a sacred grove) situated in the nearby hill just outside the village. it is taboo to even pluck fruits from the trees of the than. to seek protection against the wild animals of the nearby kaziranga national park and its contiguous forests, the karbi inhabitants of inglepathar perform the chinthong arnam. they believe that the soul of a person who has died as a result of attack by a tiger is unredeemable. chinthong is that deity of the karbis who offers protection against the bongkrui (tiger). as such, he commands much awe and reverence in the hearts of the people. he is propitiated through the performance of the ritual chinthong arnam. rong arnam is another ritual observed during the month of matizang (december) for the protection of the whole village against ingnar (elephants) and bongkrui (tigers). during this ritual, the deities are prayed to not only for the protection of human beings but also for the safety of the domestic animals. this ritual is performed in only three households of the village belonging to the priestly kur (clan) of the karbis. it is obligatory for these households to perform rong arnam every year; nonperformance is believed to incur divine wrath upon the village. according to karbi traditional belief, when a tiger or an elephant kills a man, it is believed to be the curse of unteron (the planet saturn). the deceased as well as his village is considered to get polluted and this kind of ritual pollution is known among the karbis as ani or sani kanti. the dead person as well as the people performing the death rites and the whole village needs to be purified through the performance of hemphu kecham puja. this ritual is usually performed by a special priest called the khakre. interestingly, the belief still finds its existence among the older generation of chandrasing rongpigaon. there have been instances where before the burial as per the requirement of christianity, the family members got hemphu kecham puja done in privacy by a khakre. most of the youths, however, were embarrassed when asked about the same and they quickly put it aside as superstitious beliefs of the old and illiteratate generations. the people of chandrasing rongpigaon celebrate with great fervour the christian festival of christmas and they also observe easter. they have given up almost all their earlier, indigenous rituals with one or two exceptions. they still perform, albeit in a modified manner, some of the rituals associated with nature and agriculture. before eating the first bamboo shoots of the season, for instance, the chandrasing rongpigaons still perform the ritual of san-ki-mi-kechu by making offerings of the same to the supernatural deities of the forests that had nurtured the bamboo trees. rongker, the annual karbi harvest festival is still observed, too. however, its celebrations have been reduced mainly 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 10 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/10 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.10 to an event where the people of the village come together for a community feast and participate in cultural events. women take active part in all the events here: this is in sharp contrast to the rongker in inglepathar where women are not allowed to participate. the sacrifices and rituals which mark rongker in inglepathar are no longer performed here. this is an indication of the fact that despite the influence of christianity, remnants of earlier beliefs and worldview still linger on in some way or other. nature-culture relationship in the time of change from the above discussion, it, thus, emerges that the karbis have a deep-feeling of oneness with the natural world; and that regulation of natural resources receives a central focus in eco-cosmologies acknowledging the intimate relationship with man and nature. they, thus, believe in the same, singular soul pervading all life on earth. there is also recognition of symbiotic relationship between various life forms. this explains in part at least why they have strict rules, religious sanctions and taboos to protect these manifestations. all life forms are sacred, and the act of killing for food or for rituals is accompanied by the seeking of pardon for the sin. however, despite the entrenchment of a remarkable conservation ethos in the karbis ecocosmology and world view, there are many changes taking place under the impact of the forces of modernisation, market economy and abandoning traditional religion. the karbis, like most indigenous peoples face an ongoing threat both to the continuity of their culture and to the security of their physical survival. the character of their ‘green’ consciousness is, therefore, materially different from that of their ancestors. despite there being a close connection between nature and religion among the karbis of inglepathar and to some extent in chandrasingh rongigaon, the data on the occupational pattern (dealt with in the methodology) indicate that the youths of both the villages increasingly are being drawn to the lucrative trade of forest produce, such as supplying bamboo to the paper mills, which has resulted in very high levels of deforestation in recent times. the issue is not extraction of bamboo per se, but the way it is extracted which is unsustainable. often, in the process of cutting and transporting bamboo clumps, a large number of herbs, roots, tubers etc. which otherwise have played an extremely important role in traditional medicine systems as well as food are getting lost. the forests that used to be in the backyard have moved away. from being the resource pool, for medicinal plants, nutritious edible wild roots, shoots and vegetables, etc., forests are being considered more and more as a source of money. the dependency on money and market is increasing with each day and soon many more items of daily use will have to be procured from the market with money. at the same time the role of women, who used to collect seasonal herbs, roots, tubers from the nearby forests, is undergoing rapid change. also, traditionally such indigenous were used in their every day diet following precise recipes guarded well by the community (mostly by women). gradually, they are being lost. similarly the role of the traditional medicine men, who used to treat common ailments with a combination of divination, medicinal plants and some sacred chanting, is also changing, owing to a preference for modern medicine. the combined effect is weakening the karbis’ traditional belief system and ecocosmology. further, the unsustainable use of forest resources has also disturbed the ecosystem and modified the landscape, limiting home range of various wild animals. this in turn has led to increased instances of man-animal conflict in recent times (wwf-india, 2004). in addition, the compulsions of a monetized economy have led to changes in perspectives among local communities. there are new demands, challenges and opportunities. the list of items for day to day consumption that could have been acquired without money is decreasing with each day. on one hand, money has opened a new world. on the other hand, it is slowly closing the door to a world that the karbis always trusted and have tested under different circumstances. the money earned from forest produce is used to explore a new world and get a taste of the ‘other culture’. 7 sarma and barpujari: eco-cosmologies and biodiversity conservation: continuity and change published by scholarship@western, 2011 apart from money the sense of alienation from the forests, which was considered common property resource before the advent of the modern conservation movement, is worth considering. with a majority of the population in both villages being mostly illiterate, they have not been able to tap the opportunities following the declaration of kaziranga as a national park. the gaonburha (village headman) who otherwise would have had a say in the common resource (forests in this case), today also works as a daily wage labourer for the forest department. from being custodians of the forest they have become outsiders without any say in its governance. also, as discussed early on in this paper, is recent conversions to christianity, as in the case of the karbis of chandrasing rongpigaon. christina conversion has diluted the karbis traditional belief system and the conservation ethos it supported. the disruptive impact of the proselytizing activities of the christian missionaries on the social and religious ecology of the people of arunachal pradesh has been well documented. rustomji (1988) citing elwin has remarked that the attitude of some missionaries has been completely destructive of the tribal culture. to them everything which is not christian is ‘heathen’ and some of the finest aspects of tribal life have been abandoned… the tribal[… people]s have been taught to despise their past and as a result a strong inferiority complex has been created. (p.25) this is true to some extent in the context of chandrasing rongpi gaon where many young people interviewed tended to dismiss the indigenous practices as mere superstitions of the mostly illiterate, older people. some youths exhibited a sense of shame regarding traditional karbi practices of ritual sacrifices and belief in ‘so many gods’. the way ahead the above findings lead us to conclude that, while in the past, the traditional eco-cosmologies, beliefs and practices of the karbis based on the central idea of man-nature relatedness ensured biodiversity conservation, there are numerous forces or agents of change at work in the modern context that undermine this worldview. it is very difficult to predict whether these rich biocultural traditions will be able to survive and thrive among younger generations, many of whom view these as superstitions propagated by illiterate, older generations. however, despite the erosion of these traditions and other changes, communities like the karbis can still play a substantial part in forest governance which, however, depends critically upon matters apart from the forest itself. hope lies in reviving community ownership, providing increased relevance and powers to traditional karbi socio-economic institutions, responsible ‘eco-tourism’ with tangible benefits to the community, promotion of self help groups, of tribal arts and crafts, linking sacred forests to carbon sequestration and recognition as a repository of biodiversity and areas for enrichment of aquifers all of which provide the community with a legitimate stake in conservation of the park and its surrounding forests (in contrast to the generally exclusionary basis of a protected area). though in very rudimentary stages, isolated karbi social movements working to revitalize the nature-culture link, like lakhiman sangha in ingepathar, have some optimism for the future. while constituting a significant departure from the traditional karbi religion in that they shun the prohibitively expensive traditional rituals involving sacrifice of large number of animals and exhibit strong influence of the vaishnavism practiced by their assamese neighbours, the sect advocates great tolerance and reverence for forests and wildlife. this ecological ethos, in the midst of rapid changes to karbi society, its world view and its aspirations, could be channeled and incorporated into an inclusive conservation strategy for biodiversity and wildlife. a ‘win-win’ or reconciliation ecology policy strategy, in which 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 10 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/10 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.10 humans coexist with nature and accept responsibility for both its use and protection (rosenzweig, 2003; geisler, 2010), might offer some hope for the future of both the kaziranga national park and the karbis. the traditional attachment of the karbis to the park, their intimate knowledge of it as well as their deeprooted conservation ethos could be harnessed to support the conservation of the park, with the park providing economic and other opportunities in turn for the sustenance of the karbis in a modern, monetized economy. 9 sarma and barpujari: eco-cosmologies and biodiversity conservation: continuity and change published by scholarship@western, 2011 references arhem, k. (1996). the cosmic food web: human nature relatedness in the northwest amazon. in p. descola, g. pálsson (eds.), nature and society: anthroplogical perspectives (pp 185-204). london: routledge. das, n. k. (2006). cultural diversity, religious syncretism and people of india: an anthropological interpretation. bangladesh e-journal of sociology, 3(2). retrieved from http://www.bangladeshsociology.org/bejs%203.2%20das.pdf descola, p. (1992). societies of nature and the nature of society. in a. kuper (ed.), conceptualizing society. london and new york: routlege. descola, p., pálsson, g. (1996). introduction. in p. descola, & g. pálsson (eds.), nature and society: anthroplogical perspectives (pp. 1-22). london: routledge. geisler, c. (2010). must biodiversity hot-spots be social not-spots? win-win ecology as sustainable social policy. consilience: the journal of sustainable development, 4(1), 119-133. lévistrauss, c. (1963). totemism. boston: beacon press. levi-strauss, c. (1976). structural anthropology ( vol. 2). new york: basic books. oelschlaeger, m. (1991). the idea of wilderness: from prehistory to the age of ecology. new haven and london: yale university press. parajuli, p. (2001). learning from ecological ethnicities: towards a plural political ecology of knowledge. in j. grim (ed.), indigenous traditions and ecology the interbeing of cosmology and community (pp. 559-590). harvard: harvard university press. rosenzweig, m. l. (2003). win-win ecology: how the earth’s species can survive in the midst of human enterprise. london: oxford university press. roy burman, b. k. (1992). homage to earth. in g. sen (ed.), indigenous vision: people of india, attitudes to environment. new delhi: sage publication. rustomji, n. k. (1988). verrier elwin and india’s north-eastern borderlands. shillong: northeastern hill university publications. saraswati, b. n. (2001). nature as culture: the vision of a tradition. in n. mathur (ed.), santal worldview (pp. 1-7). new delhi: concept publishing company. sinha, s. c. (1957). tribal cultures of peninsular india. man in india, 37, 46. srivastava, v. k. (2010). socio economic characteristics of tribal communities that call themselves hindu (working paper series, vol. 1(3)). indian institute of dalit studies, and religions and development research programme. western, d., & wright, r. m. (1994).the background to community-based conservation. in d. western, & r. m. wright (eds.), natural connections: perspectives in community-based conservation (pp. 1-12). washington d.c.: island press. wwfindia (2004). kazirangakarbi anglong landscape annual report. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 10 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/10 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.10 the international indigenous policy journal october 2011 eco-cosmologies and biodiversity conservation: continuity and change among the karbis of assam ujjal kumar sarma indrani barpujari recommended citation eco-cosmologies and biodiversity conservation: continuity and change among the karbis of assam abstract keywords creative commons license eco-cosmologies and biodiversity conservation: continuity and change among the karbis of assam indigenous student matriculation into medical school: policy and progress the international indigenous policy journal volume 8 | issue 1 article 5 january 2017 indigenous student matriculation into medical school: policy and progress kathy sadler western university, kathy.sadler@schulich.uwo.ca marjorie johnson western university candace brunette western university lorne gula western university mary ann kennard western university see next page for additional authors recommended citation sadler, k. , johnson, m. , brunette, c. , gula, l. , kennard, m. , charland, d. , tithecott, g. , cooper, g. , rieder, m. , watling, c. , herbert, c. p. , garcia, b. , hammond, r. r. (2017). indigenous student matriculation into medical school: policy and progress. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(1). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.5 indigenous student matriculation into medical school: policy and progress abstract access to health care remains suboptimal for indigenous people in canada. one contributing factor is the longstanding undersupply of indigenous physicians. despite awareness of this issue, underrepresentation in medical schools continues. in 2002, schulich school of medicine and dentistry (ssmd) policies were modified to enhance access for indigenous students. this article describes our school’s continuing journey of policy and process revision, formative collaborations, early learner outcomes, and lessons learned towards this goal. in the first 10 years, ssmd matriculated 15 additional indigenous students via this new stream. all candidates were successful in the undergraduate medical curriculum, licensing examinations, and residency match. the majority were attracted to primary care specialties, training programs affiliated with ssmd, and practices in southern ontario. while the process and curriculum have revealed their potential, its capacity is not being maximized. keywords indigenous, medical school, admissions, policy, pipeline acknowledgments this manuscript is submitted in memory of the late dr. francis chan and the late dr. dana winterburn who provided local and national leadership on this issue. the authors also wish to thank debbie dolson, pam bere, matt wannan, matt longstaffe, scott rumas, as well as past and present members of the indigenous subcommittee. we will be known forever by the tracks we leave dakota proverb creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. authors kathy sadler, marjorie johnson, candace brunette, lorne gula, mary ann kennard, david charland, gary tithecott, gerry cooper, michael rieder, chris watling, carol p. herbert, bertha garcia, and robert r . hammond http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ i n d i g e n o u s s t u d e n t m a t ri c u l a t i o n i n t o m e d i c a l s c h o o l : po l i c y a n d pro g re s s the aim of this article is to address the imbalance of indigenous physicians relative to the percentage of indigenous people in canada in general, specifically with respect to medical school admissions and matriculation. the present manuscript describes the rationale and approach taken by our school to optimize admissions processes for indigenous applicants in moving towards a welcoming, supportive, respectful, and culturally safe environment. we have implemented policies and processes to address the issue of indigenous physician shortages based on a number of recommendations, including those of the aboriginal health task group (the indigenous physicians association of canada–aboriginal health recruitment & retention subcommittee [ipac-afmc], 2007; une & chan, 2005), the canadian federation of medical students (arkle et al., 2015), and the future of medical education in canada (association of faculties of medicine canada, 2010; hodges et al., 2011). i n d i g e n o u s ph y s i c i a n s i n c a n a d a in 1996, the royal commission on aboriginal peoples (rcap) presented a series of recommendations to address a wide range of issues for indigenous peoples in canada including health care (government of canada, 2015). the rcap recommendations included training an additional 10,000 health care workers over 10 years—a goal that was actually exceeded (lecompte, 2012). family physician and specialist numbers rose and by 2006, ten years after the report was tabled, 2.1% of all health care providers in canada were indigenous (compared with 1.2% in 1996) (lecompte, 2012). while this represented a substantial increase, the figure remained well below proportional representation. indigenous people in canada represent an estimated 4.3% of the population according to 2011 census data, a steady increase from 2.8% in 1996 (statistics canada, 2011). indigenous people in canada are also relatively young with 46.2% under 25 years of age and 28% under 15 years of age (statistics canada, 2011). by comparison, 29.4% of non-indigenous canadians are under 25 years of age and 16.5% are under 15 years of age. national statistics report a relative shortage of indigenous “professionals” (by defined skill level) in general with lower university attendance (mcmullen, 2013; statistics canada, 2012) as an important factor. in 2011, approximately 3.4 million canadians, or 10.1% of the entire population, were categorized as “professionals” compared with less than 5% (69,645 out of 1.4 million) of the indigenous population. extrapolating a similar ratio for the physician workforce concurs with data reported in lecompte’s (2012) recent canada-wide study of human resources for indigenous health. a study of medical school matriculants (young et al., 2012) suggested that the imbalance may be more extreme, with indigenous ancestry underrepresented more than four-fold, although derived from data drawn from a more restricted sample. g u i d i n g d o c u m e n t s a n d po l i c y g e n e ra t i o n the association of faculties of medicine of canada (afmc) in partnership with the indigenous physicians association of canada (ipac) were influential in guiding national dialogue on the issue of indigenous physician shortages, culminating in a workshop hosted by an aboriginal health task group (ahtg) (une & chan, 2005). in 2005, the following ahtg recommendations were adopted and endorsed by the council of deans, encouraging medical schools to develop: a. strategy and policy to increase enrollment of aboriginal medical students; 1 sadler et al.: indigenous student matriculation into medical school published by scholarship@western, 2017 b. aboriginal student selection sub-committee; c. strategy and policy on aboriginal community partnerships; d. programs to provide support and encouragement to aboriginal students; e. ways to explore and address institutional bias and barriers to aboriginal admissions; and f. linkages to other institutions and aboriginal organizations in order to understand and address barriers to post-secondary education, especially programs leading to health careers, among aboriginal people. universities canada (2015) agreed on an analogous set of principles aimed at improving both access and the learning environment. the canadian federation of medical students (cfms) also recently produced a position paper endorsing many of the same principles related to admissions policies and processes (arkle et al., 2015). the cfms paper underscores the importance of collaboration with local indigenous organizations to optimize communications and recruitment. the paper also emphasizes the need for an equitable and supportive institutional environment, one cornerstone being admissions “pipeline programs” (we prefer the term “stream”) cognizant of cultural and financial barriers. the future of medical education in canada (fmec) (association of faculties of medicine canada, 2010; hodges et al., 2011) crystallized a number of challenges and priorities facing medical schools at a national level. the recommendations have been widely embraced for their relevance and importance to the mandate of canadian medical schools and the public we serve. among the 10 recommendations, several are relevant to the present manuscript. the first recommendation encourages schools to remain mindful of individual and community needs. in this regard, fmec reinvigorated our commitment to social accountability within which there are few if any more pressing (and chronic) issues than indigenous health. while schools have made progress provincially and nationally, indigenous matriculants remain disproportionately underrepresented (young et al., 2012). a component of fmec’s second recommendation—enhance admissions practices—encourages the recruitment of a representative variety of applicants to best serve our diverse population. indigenous health care figures prominently in recommendations iv and vi, which call for schools to enhance exposure to and training in preventative medicine and public health, and for the diversification of learning contexts, respectively. i n d i g e n o u s m a t ri c u l a n t s if a population-appropriate 4.3% of medical students in canada were indigenous, each year, a total of 125 indigenous students would matriculate. unfortunately, canadian annual totals are not routinely collected or published. these totals are estimated to be improving, but are still short of this target. a 2003 survey-based study of canadian medical schools found that indigenous students represented less than 1% of all matriculants (spencer, young, williams, yan, & horsfall, 2005). by 2015, all canadian medical schools had developed admissions policies to enrich their classes with indigenous matriculants (hanson, moineau, kulasegaram, & hammond, 2016). in 2016, at the time of writing, data shared by 10 of 17 canadian medical schools indicated that 2.6% of new matriculants (45 out of 1,755 seats) were indigenous. similarly, ontario medical school application service data indicates that in the past 10 years, 2.3% of new matriculants to ontario medical schools were indigenous (200 out of 8,861 seats). it 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.5 is important to point out that, while 125 matriculants per year would easily eclipse past canadian totals, this would merely create a steady-state going forward, and not address the existing shortage for this demographic. instead, we are below this target and falling further behind each year. one component to the solution lies with medical school admissions where there is a desire to improve access for students of indigenous heritage. l o c a l i n d i g e n o u s c u l t u re a n d s c h o o l h i s t o ry western university is located on the traditional territory of the attawandaron, anishinaabe, lenape, and haudenausaunee peoples in southwestern ontario. southwestern ontario represents a 37,000 square km segment of the province of ontario, with a population of approximately 3.5 million, which includes a large indigenous urban population as well as many first nations communities. the region is home to 12 first nations communities including the chippewas of nawash unceded first nation, saugeen first nation, chippewas of kettle and stony point first nation, delaware nation at moraviantown, six nations of the grand river, aamjiwnaang first nation, caldwell first nation, walpole island first nation, chippewas of the thames first nation, oneida nation of the thames, and the munseedelaware nation (the latter three being in closest proximity to western). western university and its medical school campuses (london and windsor) are centrally located in this region, which is also the geographic home to the medical school’s distributed education network, which facilitates undergraduate and postgraduate training outside our tertiary centers. as such, the school is well positioned for collaborative efforts, outreach, recruitment, and training of indigenous physicians for the region. western is one of the canada’s largest universities, with undergraduate enrollment (including affiliated university colleges) of approximately 37,000 and a graduate enrollment of approximately 5,000. the medical school, the schulich school of medicine and dentistry (ssmd) established in 1881, currently matriculates 171 new students each year into its 4-year curriculum. applicant academic thresholds (medical college admission test [mcat] scores and grade point average) are among the highest in the country. the medical school employs an indigenous liaison who provides outreach to potential applicants, collaborative ties with local indigenous communities, and advises the various educational portfolios on optimizing the environment for indigenous applicants and students. western is also supported by indigenous services, which provides campus-wide indigenous expertise, outreach, student support, and guidance. their offices, programming, events, and common areas also offer an enriched academic environment, culturally safe space on campus, and targeted services for self-identified indigenous students. historical data prior to 2002 are unavailable in part because of legislation to protect privacy, but available evidence suggests that indigenous matriculants were uncommon at our medical school prior to the policy change described herein. the desire to increase applicant and matriculant numbers brought about revisions to our outreach and admissions policies and processes. the present manuscript provides a summary of that experience and outcomes to date which should serve as encouragement for indigenous communities and applicants and as support for similar admissions policy changes in medical and other professional schools. 3 sadler et al.: indigenous student matriculation into medical school published by scholarship@western, 2017 m e t h o d s po l i c y d e v e l o p m e n t : be s t pra c t i c e s in 2002, policies to improve the matriculation of indigenous students were launched at ssmd under the direction of the dean and the associate dean of admissions and student affairs. the decanal team has continued to champion this initiative and the development of other policies to support diversity. in consultation with local and national colleagues as well as the available literature, this strategy’s success was predicted to depend upon three elements in particular: working closely with indigenous services at western university, expanding our relationship with regional indigenous communities, and optimizing the admissions process for indigenous applicants. these efforts were guided by local indigenous leaders and built on culturally safe communication strategies that stressed transparency. website material specific to indigenous candidates was developed and in all forms of communication indigenous applicants were encouraged to report any barriers encountered and to avail themselves of our indigenous liaison and indigenous services on campus. in these ways, our local policies found consensus in the recommendations from the ahtg that followed in 2005 and which were expanded upon in 2007 (ipac-afmc aboriginal health recruitment & retention subcommittee, 2007; une & chan, 2005). bu i l d i n g t i e s w i t h l o c a l i n d i g e n o u s l e a d e rs a n d c o m m u n i t i e s increasing affiliations with the indigenous community at western university was a foundational step in communications, visibility, and cultural safety (national aboriginal health organization [naho], 2009, n.d.). this included the development of programming for high school students interested in health care careers, which in turn led to further partnerships with regional indigenous communities. common themes in these endeavours included consultation and collaboration with regional indigenous stakeholders, convenience, and no or minimal cost. indigenous services on campus and our indigenous liaison facilitated many important connections and synergies. eventually, indigenous matriculants became ambassadors, mentors, and tangible examples of the program’s potential. early steps included organization of the first indigenous community-based initiative, involving youth from local indigenous communities and current medical students as leaders (both indigenous and non-indigenous). in these encounters, indigenous high school students spent time with medical students in hands-on experiences and group discussions about medicine and medical school. the indigenous liaison officer and central indigenous services facilitated further connections to community and spiritual supports for current schulich indigenous learners by a number of means (one-on-one advising, campus events, and a visiting elder program). in addition, mandatory and non-mandatory education sessions were organized on key topics affecting indigenous health and culture to broaden understanding for all members of the medical school community. e n h a n c i n g t h e a d m i s s i o n s pro c e s s f o r a p p l i c a n t s t o t h e i n d i g e n o u s s t re a m in consultation with local partners, as well as national and international colleagues, further modifications were introduced to the admissions process to optimize access for indigenous applicants. these changes included the formation of an indigenous subcommittee to the medical admissions committee, the assembly of a dedicated indigenous interview team, and the recruitment of an indigenous liaison. by enriching each component of the admissions process with the insight and expertise of indigenous staff, 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.5 students, and faculty, our process gained credibility and became better informed in our continued growth towards cultural competence. the indigenous admissions subcommittee of the medical admissions committee was established as a standing committee. it became the subcommittee’s mandate to recommend policies and guidelines related to the design, maintenance, and promotion of a program to increase enrollment of indigenous students and the provision of support and counselling for matriculants. the subcommittee’s structure is standard and includes a strong voice from the indigenous services office, current and former indigenous medical students, and representatives from the indigenous community as follows: • chair of subcommittee: faculty member ssmd and member of the medical admissions committee; • vice chair of medicine admissions committee (or delegate); • medical students (2) preferably of indigenous heritage; • faculty member recommended by western indigenous services; • director, indigenous services, western university; • associate dean, admissions (ex officio); • manager of admissions (ex officio); • ssmd faculty member, appointed by medicine admissions committee; • western university faculty member, appointed by medicine admissions committee (typically the social science representative on the medicine admissions committee); and • southwestern ontario indigenous medical doctor (md) representative. the subcommittee was also tasked with the development of standards for the interview and selection of indigenous candidates most likely to be successful in the undergraduate program at ssmd. the medical admissions committee was instructed to protect up to three seats per year for indigenous candidates (representing 2.3% of the then 132-seat class, proportional to the indigenous population in ontario at that time). furthermore, modest flexibility in academic requirements was introduced for both grade point average (gpa) and mcat score. in addition to academic excellence, suitable candidates were required to demonstrate their indigenous heritage and evidence of their personal connection to an indigenous community. the latter was verified in the form of a testimonial from the applicant’s indigenous community leader. the typical standardized interview for our school was conducted with an interview team composed of indigenous members of faculty, staff, and students. these policies were put in place based on the requirements set by the medical admissions committee. however, the policies are revisited each year based on feedback from the community members, students, and indigenous services regarding such things as appropriate indigenous documentation, 5 sadler et al.: indigenous student matriculation into medical school published by scholarship@western, 2017 assessment of community involvement, and key points to cover in the interview process to better understand candidate connections to indigenous culture and how they see themselves serving the community in the future. it was anticipated that the addition of a strong indigenous voice on the indigenous admissions subcommittee, a liaison officer, and encouraging outreach activities would be viewed as a supportive network for new applicants and translate into more indigenous applications. these improvements to the admissions policy were not made in isolation. the school’s has been cognizant of the need to enhance its approach to indigenous health education for non-indigenous students and physicians as well. furthermore, locally and nationally, continued efforts to enable diversity and social accountability including indigenous health and healthcare resources have become core features in policy development, curriculum redesign, and faculty recruitment. r e s u l t s the first 10 years of the program enjoyed consistent success in attracting highly qualified indigenous applicants averaging 10 per year from across the country. each year, an average of 5 applicants were invited for interview and 4 received offers of admission. the result of the new process was the matriculation of 15 additional students who self-identified as indigenous. the vast majority of applicants who accepted our offer of admission were from ontario. of the 21 matriculants to date (15 graduates, 6 currently in medical school), 19 (90%) were from ontario. this ratio is similar to that for non-indigenous students (91%) over this period. although 15 matriculants in 10 years represented a promising early outcome, despite consistently offering more than 3 positions, it meant that only half of the available seats were filled. with rare exception, students who declined our offer accepted an offer at another canadian medical school with a strong in-province and in-region preference. each year, canadian medical schools saw their collective capacity far outnumber competitive applicants. of our first 15 matriculants, the male-to-female gender ratio was 7:8. all were successful in the undergraduate medical curriculum culminating in a 100% success rate in the medical council of canada evaluating exam (mccee) and the canadian residency match. for comparison, requirement to withdraw (failure beyond remediation) among all matriculants at the school was 0.1%, while failure in the mccee and residency match were 2.1% and 1.1% respectively over the same period of time. graduates revealed a moderate preference for primary care specialties and family medicine in particular. in total, 53% (8 of 15) chose to enter family medicine specialty training (figure 1) compared with 36% for the general pool over the same period of time. residency site selection favoured the home institution with 53% (8 of 15) choosing a residency associated with ssmd (figure 2) compared with 31% of the general pool. eight graduates had entered practice at the time of this review and all for whom data was available (n = 6) launched practices in this region (southern ontario). indigenous students identified a number of factors as important to this program’s early success including academic and personal supports, the credibility of a program that is connected to the indigenous community, and the presence of indigenous peers, members of faculty, and mentors. these factors were perceived as adding relevance, validity, and cultural safety. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.5 f i g u re 1 . i n s t i t u t i o n c h o s e n b y i n d i g e n o u s g ra d u a t e s f o r re s i d e n c y t ra i n i n g . f i g u re 2 . r e s i d e n c y p ro g ra m c h o s e n b y i n d i g e n o u s g ra d u a t e s . 8 (53%) 4 1 1 1 residency institution western u mcmaster u ubc u alberta u calgary 8 (53%) 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 residency program family medicine anaesthesiology general surgery internal medicine obstetrics & gynecology pediatrics psychiatry radiology 7 sadler et al.: indigenous student matriculation into medical school published by scholarship@western, 2017 d i s c u s s i o n the indigenous stream at ssmd was initiated in 2002 in response to chronic medical workforce shortages in local indigenous communities, a move that was echoed at the national level by the afmc, ipac, and the council of deans (une & chan, 2005). mindful of evidence that indigenous graduates would be more likely to provide culturally competent care, ssmd moved to improve access to medical school for academically strong indigenous applicants who also demonstrated a genuine connection to their indigenous culture and community. the present article describes promising early outcomes and confirms that capacity exists to increase matriculation. in the first 10 years following our indigenous stream’s inception, we see promising early trends at each stage: admissions, undergraduate medical education, licensure, residency training, and entry into practice. lessons learned include the value of communications that are transparent, culturally informed, and varied in format to reach indigenous applicants, communities, and educators at all levels. while informed by national and international scholarship, this can be a daunting task without the advice and expertise of local indigenous partners. the establishment of cultural credibility and safety in our relationships, communications, and processes is a gradual process that continues and is guided by indigenous colleagues and our own matriculants, who are our greatest ambassadors. the academic flexibility that was introduced to enrich our school in this manner has not invited academic difficulty in the undergraduate or postgraduate curricula for these trainees. while academic and non-academic aptitudes are important variables, the academic thresholds in the selection process for medical school are extreme and a number of studies have suggested that marginalized populations are particularly disadvantaged by exceedingly high academic thresholds and certain formats of assessment, calling for broader and more culturally-appropriate methodologies in measuring aptitude (eskander, shandling, & hanson, 2013; raghavan et al., 2013). in this regard, pidgeon (2008) reminds us that indigenous and non-indigenous cultural capital, habitus, epistemologies, and perceptions of success in higher education are not the same. she argues that success is embedded and judged more wholistically in indigenous cultures in ways that escape colonial measures of success. indigenous students are also more likely to live in rural settings where limits of distance, internet access, and financial resources can create further disadvantage (mcmullen, 2013; statistics canada, 2010). such issues are not unique to canada (acosta & olsen, 2006; curtis et al., 2015). curtis and colleagues have reported on sources of disadvantage including secondary school preparation among indigenous students in new zealand and the potential of equity-based admissions processes (curtis & reid, 2013; curtis, wikaire, stokes, & reid, 2012). similarly, student affairs deans of u.s. medical schools reported that key barriers to minority recruitment were academic thresholds (mcat scores) and a lack of minority faculty and role models (agrawal, vlaicu, & carrasquillo, 2005). acosta and olsen (2006) identified similar barriers to medical school matriculation for indigenous students and other minorities, emphasizing the importance of processes to optimize entrance, retention, and faculty development. although quantitative data is not available, it is widely recognized that indigenous matriculants were uncommon at our school prior to 2002. canadian legislation prevents the routine collection of information on racial heritage. while this legislation was created in the spirit of protecting applicants 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.5 from potential bias and breaches of privacy, it has hindered canadian medical schools in their understanding of the history and severity of this underrepresentation. while precise data are unavailable, the closest surrogate for the number of indigenous students that would likely have matriculated in the 10 years prior to this study is the number of indigenous matriculants (self-identified) who gained entry through the non-indigenous stream in the period under study. this would have been the only pathway to entrance prior to 2002. these students accounted for less than 0.1% of the matriculant population. the improvements we have seen are associated with policy changes (modified admissions criteria) as well as expanded resources (indigenous liaison officer, peer mentorship) and partnerships (indigenous services on campus, regional indigenous communities). to ensure future success and to determine which factors are most important, ongoing data collection and analysis is imperative. i n s t i t u t i o n s o f h i g h e r l e a rn i n g : t h e w a y f o rw a rd the literature details a number of contributing factors in the realm of education, including inadequate educational resources and negative perceptions of institutions of higher education (curtis et al., 2012; gordon & white, 2014). role models and mentors, early education experiences, and parental involvement in education are influential in creating an atmosphere that values higher education (akmal & larsen, 2004; bempechat, 1990; gorman, 1998; mclaughlin & shields, 1987). many authors have concluded that parental attainment of higher education is the most potent variable in predicting the same in their children (finnie, childs, & wismer, 2011; mcmullen, 2013). indigenous student success in post-secondary education is also shaped by many external factors including inadequate elementary and secondary school resources and financial constraints. early childhood social and emotional experiences connected to colonialism and intergenerational trauma, geographic and cultural dislocation as well as additional family and community responsibilities are also impactful. institutional factors include real and perceived threats of assimilation through inculcation within a western educational environment, anti-indigenous bias embedded in euro-western institutions, programs, and services as well as systemic barriers related to one’s lack of cultural capital in navigating the institution. the paucity or lack of indigenous presence and inclusion in curriculum content, human resources across staff and faculty, and service approaches are also influential (paquette & fallon, 2010). indigenous perceptions of educational institutions in canada are a significant barrier, the nature and extent of which has been definitively examined by the truth and reconciliation commission (government of canada, 2015; truth and reconciliation commission, 2015). in his book the new buffalo: the struggle for aboriginal post-secondary education, blair stonechild (2006) speaks volumes about the past and future in stating, “the role of postsecondary education has evolved from a tool of assimilation to an instrument of empowerment” (p. 2). while this invites a new era, it also acknowledges the multi-generational depth of distrust towards institutions of higher education among indigenous people in canada. the honourable justice murray sinclair (2010) provided further sobering perspective in his address to the senate committee on aboriginal peoples: “there is no shortcut, no quick fix. it has taken generations to get us to this point and it will take generations to make it right” (p. 6). 9 sadler et al.: indigenous student matriculation into medical school published by scholarship@western, 2017 for future generations, these factors must be addressed in order for higher education to become a culturally safe goal and source of empowerment. furthermore, institutions of higher education need to value the diversity of knowledge that various populations bring to their learning platform, which in turn cannot be evaluated by traditional universal yardsticks. gordon and white (2014) concluded that the gap in rates of post-secondary education between indigenous people and non-indigenous canadians persists. this, alongside evidence that indigenous students are further underrepresented in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (stem) programs (ezeife, 2011), should compound concerns of the shortage of indigenous youth tracking toward careers in the health care sector. adding further urgency to the maturation of related policies and solutions is the fact that indigenous youth are the fastest growing sector of canadian society (statistics canada, 2011). t h e i n d i g e n o u s m e d i c a l s t u d e n t a n d t h e f u t u re o f i n d i g e n o u s h e a l t h h u m a n r e s o u rc e s indigenous physicians are critical to canadian health care and addressing the health needs of indigenous communities. they provide cultural credibility, cultural safety, and understanding in health promotion and the delivery of care. the numerical shortage of physicians in indigenous communities is only one facet of the problem. indeed, the very concepts of health and healing among indigenous peoples are informed by a much broader and more wholistic perspective (graham & leesberg stamler, 2010; national aboriginal community controlled health organization [naccho], 2009; richmond, ross, & bernier, 2013). it could be argued that sociocultural aspects of health are best addressed by physicians of similar heritage. not only are such physicians more adept and credible in the direction and provision of culturally competent health care, but patients are also more receptive and therefore more likely to benefit from the advice and care provided (bergen jr., 2000; cantor et al., 1996; cantor et al., 2003; komaromy et al., 1996; lecompte, 2012; mcmullen, 2013; mikkonen & raphael, 2010; rabinowitz, diamond, markham, & santana, 2012; saha, arbelaez, & cooper, 2003; spencer et al., 2005; strasser, 2010). this underscores the importance of working with indigenous matriculants to seek practices that serve their communities. in this environment, indigenous medical school applicants and matriculants find themselves in a pivotal and potentially burdensome position. they influence and are influenced by a large number of factors including their culture, socioeconomic, and rural disadvantages, attitudes towards higher education, imbalances in health care delivery, mentoring, and role modeling. products of this environment, they are also key to shaping its future (figure 3). while they may accept this responsibility connected to their cultural identity, medical schools, and health care institutions have a shared responsibility to recognize indigenous students' needs and barriers and be prepared to support them. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.5 f i g u re 3 . i n d i g e n o u s m e d i c a l s t u d e n t s a n d h e a l t h c a re p ro f e s s i o n a l s : f a c t o rs a n d f a c i l i t a t o rs . the continuing shortage of indigenous physicians in canada calls for concerted national efforts and policy change, supported at all levels of medical education, to shift a chronic shortfall to a point of national pride. at the urging of ipac and the afmc, all canadian medical schools now have a variety of processes in place aimed at improving access for indigenous applicants. these efforts should witness a substantial increase in indigenous matriculants; however, continued data collection is imperative to inform best practices and demonstrate that the goal of enriching the medical profession with indigenous colleagues and improving healthcare delivery to indigenous people in canada is being realized at a level that may lead to long-term balance. the foundation for national (and international) collaboration exists with the potential to accelerate policy development (hanson et al., 2016). in the words of justice sinclair (2010), “much has been accomplished, but there is much left to do” (p. 6). this report adds to the evidence that policy changes that add flexibility at admissions can facilitate the desired outcomes: an increase in matriculants who are successful in undergraduate and postgraduate medical education and graduates who favour in-region practices. our experience also indicates that such policy change is only part of the long-term solution with local, regional, and national implications. it calls for continued efforts upstream to optimize indigenous matriculation through enhanced cultural safety, mentorship, investments in 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(2012). calling for a broader conceptualization of diversity: surface and deep diversity in four canadian medical schools. academic medicine: journal of the association of american medical colleges, 87(11), 1501–1510. doi: http://doi.org/10.1097/acm.0b013e31826daf74; 10.1097/acm.0b013e31826daf74 15 sadler et al.: indigenous student matriculation into medical school published by scholarship@western, 2017 the international indigenous policy journal january 2017 indigenous student matriculation into medical school: policy and progress kathy sadler marjorie johnson candace brunette lorne gula mary ann kennard see next page for additional authors recommended citation indigenous student matriculation into medical school: policy and progress abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license authors indigenous student matriculation into medical school: policy and progress microsoft word ms # 1425 schultz quantification of interplaying rce.docx the international indigenous policy journal volume 10 | issue 3 july 2019 quantification of interplaying relationships between wellbeing priorities of aboriginal peoples in remote australia rosalie schultz flinders university, rosalie.schultz@flinders.edu.au stephen j. quinn swinburne university of technology, melbourne tammy abbott ninti one, alice springs sheree cairney flinders university & crc-rep jessica yamaguchi department of prime minister and cabinet, australian government, canberra recommended citation schultz, r., quinn, s. j., abbott, t., cairney, s., & yamaguchi, j. (2019). quantification of interplaying relationships between wellbeing priorities of aboriginal people in remote australia. the international indigenous policy journal, 10(3). doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8165 quantification of interplaying relationships between wellbeing priorities of aboriginal peoples in remote australia abstract wellbeing is a useful indicator of social progress because its subjectivity accounts for diverse aspirations. the interplay research project developed a wellbeing framework for aboriginal peoples in remote australia comprising government and community wellbeing priorities. this article describes statistical modelling of community priorities based on surveys administered by community researchers to 841 participants from four remote settlements. constructs for aboriginal language literacy, cultural practice, and empowerment were identified through exploratory factor analysis (efa); structural equation modelling (sem) was used to confirm relationships. cultural practice was associated with aboriginal language literacy and empowerment, which were both associated with wellbeing. aboriginal literacy and empowerment mediated negative direct relationships between cultural practice and wellbeing. direct relationships were significant only for females for whom empowerment and aboriginal literacy appear key to enhancing wellbeing. keywords culture, empowerment, gender, indigenous languages, indigenous literacy, wellbeing acknowledgments the interplay research project was supported by funding from the australian government cooperative research centre program through the cooperative research centre for remote economic participation (crc-rep, hosted by ninti one limited). we acknowledge the support and involvement of our key organisational stakeholders: department of prime minister and cabinet, australian bureau of statistics, centre for remote health (flinders university and charles darwin university), flinders nt-katherine, poche centre for indigenous health and wellbeing northern territory, banatjarl strongbala wumin grup, central desert native title services, dhimurru aboriginal corporation, kalano community association, katherine stolen generations group, layhnapuy homelands aboriginal corporation, marthakal homelands resource centre, martu rangers (wiluna), miwatj health aboriginal corporation, muntjiltjarra wurrgumu group, northern star resources, ngangganawili aboriginal health service community, strongbala men's health program, wurli-wurlinjang health service, yalu marŋgithinyaraw aboriginal corporation, and yolngu business enterprises. rosalie schultz received support from a scholarship from vincent fairfax family foundation through the royal australasian college of physicians. jessica yamaguchi is an advisor working for the australian government. disclaimer the views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the authors and do not reflect the views of the department of the prime minister and cabinet, the australian government, or any state or territory governments. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. schultz et al.: quantification of interplaying relationships published by scholarship@western, 2019 1 quantification of interplaying relationships between wellbeing priorities of aboriginal people in remote australia wellbeing is the experience of flourishing and feeling satisfied with life (adler & seligman, 2016). wellbeing is an individual, subjective experience, making it a useful indicator to compare social progress across different cultures and time periods between people and populations who may have different values and goals (oecd, 2017). subjective aspects of wellbeing include experiences and perceptions, and these can be measured only by specifically inquiring, for example about life satisfaction (oecd, 2017). socio-economic indicators are considered objective aspects of wellbeing, since they do not require people to assess themselves (oecd, 2017). however, decisions about which socio-economic indicators to measure and how to measure them reflect culturally influenced values and goals; this means that even if measurement is objective, the indicators themselves reflect subjective assessment about what is important (tov & au, 2013). thus, even notionally objective indicators of wellbeing can reflect cultural bias and negative attitudes towards aboriginal and other minority people (cairney et al., 2017). aboriginal australians1 have occupied australia for over 50,000 years. they identify themselves as distinct from other australians and maintain their diverse cultures, languages, and histories (australian institute of health and welfare, 2015). many aboriginal people maintain strong connections to their country: their “land, sea, sky, rivers, sites, seasons, plants and animals; place of heritage, belonging and spirituality,” and they hold aboriginal knowledge (australian museum, 2017). aboriginal people are less urbanised than other australians, with 21% living in the remote regions which make up 85% of australia’s land area, compared with only 1.7% of all australians (australian institute of health and welfare, 2014; walker, porter, & marsh, 2012). aboriginal people in remote regions of australia may be on their traditional or ancestral lands (altman, 2007). many hold significant land assets or rights; yet, 53% experience income poverty (markham & biddle, 2018). compared with other australians, aboriginal people are considered disadvantaged based on a wide range of indicators, including education, employment, health, housing, income, and criminal justice, with most indicators for aboriginal people in remote regions suggesting greater disadvantage compared with urban aboriginal people (australian institute of health and welfare, 2015; commonwealth of australia: department of prime minister and cabinet, 2018). despite these statistics, aboriginal people in remote regions report high levels of wellbeing, with their mean general life satisfaction at 7.6 on a scale from 0 to 10. this is equivalent to the mean life satisfaction of all australians, while aboriginal people outside of remote regions report lower levels of life satisfaction, with a mean of 7.2 (australian bureau of statistics, 2015, 2016). aboriginal people in remote regions often have stronger connections to country and more opportunities to participate in cultural practices than people in non-remote regions, and these factors may contribute to their higher levels of wellbeing (davies et al., 2010). cultural practices such as art and craft, ceremony, caring for country, and hunting and gathering contribute to the wellbeing of aboriginal 1 indigenous australians include both aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples. this research involved aboriginal communities, where people collectively prefer to be identified as aboriginal, so the term aboriginal is used throughout, except where torres strait islander people are included and in international contexts where we refer to indigenous peoples. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3, art. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8165 2 people throughout australia including in urban regions (burgess et al., 2009; hill et al., 2013; hunt, 2012). analysis of the national aboriginal and torres strait island social survey (natsiss) conducted in 2008 showed that having a cultural identity, speaking aboriginal languages, and participating in traditional economic activities contribute to people’s wellbeing, particularly in remote regions (dockery, 2012). an economic analysis commissioned for australia’s national government quantified social return on investment in cultural practice for aboriginal peoples in remote communities at 29% per year. this analysis identified specific benefits that aboriginal peoples gain from participation in cultural activities, including strengthening their skills, confidence, and health, but these were not quantified (social ventures australia, 2016). a case study from the northern territory identified health, economic, and social wellbeing benefits of cultural practice for participants in aboriginal cultural and natural resource management, and recommended quantification of these relationships (barber, 2015). cultural practices contribute to wellbeing and also to empowerment, which is defined as individuals and groups gaining control over their lives, encompassing both personal development and structural change (wallerstein, 2006). empowerment reflects cultural, social, and environmental contexts; for indigenous australians, spirituality and personal values and strengths are particularly linked to empowerment (whiteside, tsey, & earles, 2010). empowerment has potential to address broad socio-economic inequalities, such as those borne by aboriginal australians, because it enables individuals and communities to participate in and drive structural change (haswell et al., 2010). the process of empowerment is of particular importance for aboriginal peoples because it depends on cultural context and contributes to wellbeing (pease, 2002; wallerstein, 2006). australian aboriginal languages are also linked to wellbeing and empowerment and are important as sources of culture, identity, and knowledge (marmion, obata, & troy, 2014). analysis of the natsiss illustrated how aboriginal languages enable people to communicate cultures and worldviews, providing a connection between culture and wellbeing (biddle & swee, 2012). natsiss showed that australian aboriginal men and women report different cultural strengths. speaking and understanding aboriginal languages varies by age and gender. more men participate in harvesting cultural practices, and more older men speak and understand aboriginal languages, while more women participate in cultural production, including arts and crafts, music, dance, theatre and storytelling. each of these aspects of culture contributes to societal sustainability and wellbeing, and they are stronger for aboriginal peoples in remote regions compared to urban areas (biddle & swee, 2012). wellbeing for aboriginal peoples in remote regions of australia was the focus of the interplay research project, undertaken through the cooperative research centre for remote economic participation (crc-rep) as part of its broad-reaching investigation into economic development and participation of people in remote australia (cooperative research centre for remote economic participation, 2017). government departments responsible for funding programs for indigenous australians, researchers employed by the crc-rep, and community members collaborated in development of the research (cairney & abbott, 2014).the project name interplay was chosen to draw attention to the interplaying relationships between different wellbeing priorities. this article aims to quantify relationships between cultural practice and wellbeing, including through mediating variables (nitzl, roldan, & cepeda, 2016). we hypothesised that cultural practice, literacy in aboriginal languages, and empowerment each contribute to wellbeing for aboriginal peoples in remote communities. alternatively, there may be schultz et al.: quantification of interplaying relationships published by scholarship@western, 2019 3 mediation between variables in their relationships to wellbeing (cairney et al., 2017). understanding relationships between wellbeing priorities can enable services to better address the wellbeing needs of aboriginal peoples in remote regions. methods the interplay research project was conceived and governed through the crc-rep, as part of its exploration of issues surrounding economic participation in remote australia, particularly for aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples (cooperative research centre for remote economic participation, 2017). aboriginal people led governance and management of the project (cooperative research centre for remote economic participation, 2017). researchers and government agencies responsible for services in remote regions worked closely with aboriginal community members in the research development. through a conceptual shared space of knowledge exchange and learning, we aimed to ensure the project met research needs of both government and communities (cairney & abbott, 2014). the shared space is shown diagrammatically in figure 1 (nguyen & cairney, 2013). figure 1. shared space approach represented diagrammatically where areas of knowledge of each research partner group are brought together to overlap. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3, art. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8165 4 ethical considerations the interplay research project prioritised engagement and collaboration with aboriginal community organisations, land councils, and local partner organisations to ensure the project fit with the research interests of aboriginal peoples, particularly participants in the research. this approach aimed to ensure a fundamentally decolonised and ethical approach to the research (smith, 2012). the northern territory department of health/menzies school of health research ethics committee (reference 2013-2125) and the western australian aboriginal health ethics committee formally approved the research (reference 549). all survey participants gave written consent, in addition to the guardians of participants under 16 years. on-going working relationships, including further research projects, contribute to the integrity of the approach, providing cultural feedback and evaluation to non-aboriginal researchers (cairney & abbott, 2014). research population members of aboriginal communities throughout remote regions of australia were the population of interest in the interplay research. communities were invited through the crc-rep to indicate their capacity and interest to be involved, and four communities were selected to ensure inclusion of different geographies, levels of remoteness, population sizes and proportions of aboriginal people, and extent of use of aboriginal languages. geography, demography, and participation in the research by each community are shown in table 1. development of the interplay wellbeing framework and survey aboriginal peoples from the communities in the study collaborated with researchers to develop the interplay wellbeing framework, which emerged through a series of workshops (cairney, abbott, & yamaguchi, 2015). communities’ major priorities for wellbeing, namely community itself, culture, and empowerment, and government priorities of education, employment, and health comprised the basis of the wellbeing framework as shown in figure 2. to explore interrelationships between wellbeing priorities, the interplay wellbeing survey was developed. initially, we conducted a comprehensive search for assessment tools that were statistically and culturally validated to measure aspects of wellbeing for aboriginal australians (cairney et al., 2015). while these tools were broadly suitable, there was concern by aboriginal community researchers about their appropriateness for people in remote communities. all the tools were in english, while many aboriginal peoples in remote regions do not speak english well or at all (biddle, 2012). language issues were compounded by concepts in the assessments that were considered difficult to translate or understand. aboriginal community members and researchers worked with other researchers familiar with the tools to carefully review and refine the words of each question, to ensure a shared understanding of meaning and comprehension across different language groups. working together to refine the survey questions also contributed to shared ownership of and commitment to the final interplay wellbeing survey. this enabled the aboriginal community researchers to administer the interplay survey in their home communities to people from different language groups and levels of english proficiency (cairney et al., 2015). schultz et al.: quantification of interplaying relationships published by scholarship@western, 2019 5 table 1. community geography, remoteness, demography, language, and research participation community 1 2 3 4 geography river island desert coastal distance from major population centre 300 km 500 km 1000 km 650 km remoteness classification remote very remote very remote very remote total population 9,207 2,550 1,158 843 proportion aboriginal 24.2% 88.6% 24.4% 75.3% primary community language kriol djambarrpuyngu martu gumatj proportion of aboriginal peoples who use aboriginal languages at home 25.7% 98.1% 63.5% 84.3% participants in interplay research 545 104 51 141 proportion of 15 to 34-year age group who participated 78.8% 13.6% 46.6% 49.1% note. population data (australian bureau of statistics, 2011). figure 2. interplay wellbeing framework comprising community priorities in amber and government priorities in turquoise. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3, art. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8165 6 data collection aboriginal community researchers administered the survey from ipads in their home communities between june 2014 and july 2015 (cairney et al., 2017). since the research arose from the crc-rep, people aged 15 to 34 were selected because it is typically within this age range that people transition from education to employment. we aimed to include 800 to 1,000 participants to provide a sample large enough for structural equation modelling and to achieve broad representation of the aboriginal peoples in the communities involved in the study (cairney et al., 2015; wolf, harrington, clark, & miller, 2013). statistical methods data analysis was conducted using the statistics packages spss and amos version 25 (arbuckle, 2017; spss inc, 2015). missing data were calculated using multiple imputations, using the median as the most likely value. to reinforce the strength-based approach, items were recoded so that higher response values represented more positive impacts and greater wellbeing. exploratory factor analysis (efa) was performed using maximum likelihood extraction with promax rotation. factors were selected with eigenvalues greater than one, strong loadings (> 0.4), discriminant and face validity, adequate reliability based on cronbach’s alpha > 0.70, and no cross-loading between survey questions (williams, brown, & onsman, 2010). constructs were identified for aboriginal language literacy, cultural practice, and empowerment. table 2 shows the survey items and table 3 descriptive statistics for each construct, while table 4 shows pearson bivariate correlations between the constructs. based on hypothesized relationships between aboriginal language literacy, cultural practice, and empowerment a structural equation model of wellbeing was constructed (arbuckle, 2017; kline, 2016). the model was validated through absolute and incremental fit indices, namely chi-square, rmsea, srmr, cfi, tli, and pnfi (hooper, coughlan, & mullen, 2008). cook’s distance was employed to examine for the presence of influential observations, and variance inflation factors for multicollinearity (kline, 2016). the positive association between cultural practice and wellbeing anticipated from the literature and research development were not confirmed in the statistical models, suggesting a more complex interplay of factors (cairney et al., 2017). to explore this association, mediation analysis of the relationship by aboriginal language literacy and empowerment was conducted. bootstrapping was required in the mediation analysis to determine 95% confidence intervals and statistical significance of direct and indirect relationships (nitzl et al., 2016). from these models, relationships of wellbeing with cultural practice, aboriginal language literacy, and empowerment were calculated. gender and age were considered as possible confounding factors and multigroup analysis was performed. participants were grouped by gender and age group: under 20, 20 to 24, and over 24. age 20 was selected to separate the younger age categories because it often marks the division between education and employment, and 24 years was selected as the dividing line between the older age categories because it is the median age of the research participants. schultz et al.: quantification of interplaying relationships published by scholarship@western, 2019 7 table 2. constructs derived from exploratory factor analysis of survey items construct survey items contributing score aboriginal language literacy reading writing 0 to 4 cultural practice caring for country hunting and gathering 0 to 4 empowerment self-efficacy identity resilience 0 to 4 wellbeing life satisfaction 1 to 10 table 3. descriptive statistics of constructs and wellbeing construct range mean standard deviation skewness kurtosis cronbach’s alpha aboriginal language literacy 0-4 2.33 1.61 -0.31 -1.49 0.96 cultural practice 0-4 2.99 1.27 -1.11 0.081 0.82 empowerment 0-4 3.34 0.82 -1.22 0.98 0.84 wellbeing 1-10 8.07 1.94 -0.65 -0.63 note. n = 841. all calculations used the spss statistics package (spss inc., 2015). the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3, art. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8165 8 results descriptive data from the four communities in the research, 841 aboriginal peoples completed the survey, 45% of the target age range 15 to 34 years, with community coverage ranging from 13.6% to 78.8%, as shown in table 1. mean age of participants was 25.2 years, with standard deviation 5.3 years, while median age was 24 years. all participants identified as either male (n = 352, 42%) or female (n = 489, 58%). participants reported high levels of wellbeing with mean score 8.07 out of 10. males and females reported similar scores (χ2 = 13.0, df = 9, p = 0.16), while younger people reported higher wellbeing (under 20: m = 8.3; 20 to 24 years: m = 8.2; over 24 years: m = 7.9; χ2 = 31.3, df = 18, p = 0.027). exploratory factor analysis identified three constructs, shown in table 2. aboriginal language literacy is comprised of how well people reported they could read and write in their main aboriginal language; cultural practice is comprised of participation in caring for country and hunting and gathering; and empowerment is comprised of resilience, self-efficacy, and identity. all constructs showed a negative skew. table 3 shows means, standard deviations, and cronbach’s alpha (a measure of reliability) for each construct. bivariate relationships aboriginal language literacy, cultural practice, and empowerment were all statistically correlated with one another, while aboriginal language literacy and empowerment were correlated with wellbeing. there was no statistical relationship between cultural practice and wellbeing, as shown in table 4. structural equation modelling based on hypotheses of associations between cultural practice, aboriginal language literacy, empowerment, and wellbeing, structural equation modelling was used to quantify these relationships and develop the model in figure 3. all relationships were statistically significant, and the model showed good fit statistics (χ2 = 49.4, df = 15; χ2/df = 3.29; rmsea = 0.052 (0.037, 0.069); rmr = 0.036; cfi = 0.99; pnfi = 0.53; hooper et al., 2008). cook’s distance maximum was 0.058 indicating that there were no influential outliers, while variance inflation factors showed multicollinearity was not statistically present (vif < 10). schultz et al.: quantification of interplaying relationships published by scholarship@western, 2019 9 table 4. pearson bivariate correlations for constructs of aboriginal literacy, cultural practice, and empowerment aboriginal language literacy cultural practice empowerment cultural practice 0.29*** empowerment 0.19*** 0.20*** wellbeing 0.23*** 0.003 ns 0.14*** note. *** p < 0.001. ns = not significant. figure 3. structural equation model of relationships between cultural practice, aboriginal language literacy, empowerment, and wellbeing for all participants. goodness of fit: χ2 = 49.4, df = 15; χ2/df = 3.29, p < 0.001; rmsea = 0.052 (0.037, 0.069); srmr = 0.036;cfi = 0.99; tli = 0.98; pnfi = 0.53. ** p < 0.01 *** p < 0.001 0.11*** aboriginal literacy practice culture empowerment wellbeing 0.25*** 0.32*** 0.16*** 0.14*** -0.11** the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3, art. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8165 10 there were direct associations between cultural practice and aboriginal language literacy (β = 0.32 [0.24, 0.40], p = 0.005), and between aboriginal language literacy and wellbeing (β = 0.25 [0.17, 0.31], p = 0.020). likewise, cultural practice was associated with empowerment (β = 0.16 [0.01, 0.27, p = 0.035), and empowerment with wellbeing (β = 0.14 [0.05, 0.22], p = 0.007). preliminary analysis identified a statistically significant negative relationship between cultural practice and wellbeing (β = -0.11 [-0.18, -0.031], p = 0.016), inconsistent with literature and community consultations in the development of the interplay research project and suggesting more complex interplay, which was explored through mediation analysis (cairney et al., 2017). cultural practice was indirectly associated with well-being through aboriginal language literacy (β = 0.081 [0.049, 0.12], p = 0.012), and through empowerment (β = 0.033 [0.015, 0.061], p = 0.003), and the total relationship between cultural practice and wellbeing was not statistically significant (β = -0.006 -0.071, 0.058], p = 0.93). thus, the model shows competitive mediation (zhao, lynch, & chen, 2010) whereby positive indirect relationships through both aboriginal language literacy and empowerment mediate the negative direct relationship between cultural practice and wellbeing. the effects of age were considered through multi-group analysis. when the pathway between cultural practice and wellbeing was constrained to be equal for each age group, there was no difference between the models for younger and older research participants (χ2 = 0.90, df = 1, p = 0.34). in the multi-group analysis by gender, the relationship between cultural practice and wellbeing was constrained to be equal for males and females. this demonstrated differences between the relationships for males and females (χ2 = 10.8, df = 1, p = 0.001), so separate models were constructed for female and male participants, as shown in figures 4 and 5. male and female participants showed different statistical relationships between cultural practice and wellbeing, as shown in table 5. for males, there was a positive indirect relationship between cultural practice and wellbeing (β = 0.17 [0.10, 0.27], p = 0.003) with both direct and total relationships nonsignificant; while for females, the direct negative relationship between cultural practice and wellbeing (β = -0.25 [-0.37, -0.11], p = 0.02) was in competitive mediation with indirect positive relationship (β = 0.11 [0.072, 0.15], p = 0.007). the total relationships between cultural practice and wellbeing were nonsignificant for both males and females (β = 0.008 [-0.049, 0.43], p = 0.24; β = -0.078 [-0.18, 0.43], p = 0.23). finally, aboriginal language literacy and empowerment were associated with wellbeing for females (β = 0.39 [0.30, 0.49], p = 0.004; β = 0.17 [0.067, 0.29], p = 0.005), but not males (β = 0.079 [-0.030, 0.16], p = 0.17; β = 0.11 [-0.015, 0.23], p = 0.09), as shown in table 6, leading to the weaker but statistically significant relationships for all participants. schultz et al.: quantification of interplaying relationships published by scholarship@western, 2019 11 figure 4. structural equation model of relationships between cultural practice, aboriginal language literacy, empowerment, and wellbeing for female participants. goodness of fit: χ2 = 65.8, df = 15; χ2/df = 4.38, p < 0.001; rmsea = 0.083 (0.063, 0.104); srmr = 0.067; cfi = 0.97; tli = 0.97; pnfi = 0.52. * p < 0.05 ** p < 0.01 *** p < 0.001 ns = not significant figure 5. structural equation model of relationships between cultural practice, aboriginal language literacy, empowerment, and wellbeing for male participants. goodness of fit: χ 2 = 19.5, df = 15; χ2/d = 1.30, p = 0.19; rmsea = 0.029 (0.00, 0.062); srmr = 0.040; cfi = 0.98; tli = 0.99; pnfi = 0.53 ns = not significant aboriginal literacy practice culture empowerment wellbeing 0.39*** 0.35** 0.20** 0.17*** aboriginal literacy practice culture empowerment wellbeing 0.08 ns 0.16 ns 0.12 ns 0.11 ns 0.07 ns -0.25* 0.16 ns 0.05 ns the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3, art. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8165 12 table 5. relationships between cultural practice and wellbeing for males, females, and all participants wellbeing cultural practice males (n = 352) females (n = 489) all participants (n = 841) direct relationship 0.048 [-0.085, 0.18] p = 0.58 -0.25 [-0.37, -0.11] p = 0.02* -0.11 [-0.18, -0.031] p =0.016* indirect relationship 0.174 [0.105, 0.273] p = 0.003** 0.11 [0.072, 0.15] p =0.007** 0.040 [0.007, 0.105] p =0.004** total relationship 0.008 [-0.049, 0.21] p = 0.24 -0.078 [-0.18, 0.43] p = 0.23 -0.006 [-0.058, 0.071] p = 0.93 note. relationships shown as β [95% ci], p value. * p < 0.05; ** p < 0.01; *** p < 0.001 table 6. relationships between aboriginal language literacy and empowerment, and wellbeing for males, females, and all participants wellbeing males (n = 352) females (n = 489) all participants (n = 841) aboriginal language literacy 0.079 [-0.030, 0.16] p = 0.17 0.39 [0.30, 0.49] p = 0.004** 0.25 [0.17, 0.31] p = 0.020* empowerment 0.11 [-0.015, 0.23] p = 0.09 0.17 [0.067, 0.29] p = 0.005** 0.14 [0.050, 0.22] p = 0.007** note. relationships shown as β [95% ci]; p value * p < 0.05; ** p < 0.01; *** p < 0.001 schultz et al.: quantification of interplaying relationships published by scholarship@western, 2019 13 discussion in the interplay model of wellbeing for young adult aboriginal australians in remote regions, practising culture was associated with both aboriginal language literacy and empowerment, each of which were associated with wellbeing in the model with all participants. however, the effects were significant among women, but not men, in models by gender. cultural practice the interplay structural equation model showed no overall relationship between cultural practice and wellbeing for aboriginal peoples in remote australia. among women, the model identified positive direct relationships between cultural practice and both aboriginal language literacy and empowerment, which in turn had a positive relationship with wellbeing and counterbalanced the negative direct relationship between cultural practice and wellbeing. these relationships highlight the importance of aboriginal language literacy and empowerment, and the complexity of interplaying priorities for wellbeing, including differences between men and women. in the model, relationships between cultural practice and wellbeing, including mediation by aboriginal language literacy and empowerment, were different for male and female participants. gender differences in cultural practices for aboriginal australians are well known and recognised in some service provision: for example, through the practice of separating aboriginal men and women in work teams, planning consultations, networking, and conferences (davies, walker, & maru, 2017). thus, the interplay research involving young aboriginal peoples in remote regions shows that gender should be included as an explanatory variable in future research into wellbeing and related constructs. aboriginal language literacy wellbeing increased by 0.25 for each standard deviation increase in aboriginal language literacy—the strongest relationship to wellbeing identified within the interplay framework, driven by the effects among women (cairney et al., 2017). for women, aboriginal language literacy also mediated the relationship between cultural practice and wellbeing. relationships between wellbeing and aboriginal language literacy, especially for women, highlight the importance of aboriginal languages, which affirm cultural identity, self-efficacy, and resilience of aboriginal australians (fogarty, 2012). the natsiss showed that literacy in aboriginal languages is associated with higher levels of formal education and paid employment, and with participation in cultural activities. these relationships suggest that people who are literate in both aboriginal languages and english, which is more often used in employment, are well integrated in both mainstream and aboriginal societies (biddle & swee, 2012). re-establishing government support for bilingual aboriginal education will contribute to strengthening languages, thus enhancing rights of aboriginal peoples to their language (nicholls, 2005; schultz, abbott, yamaguchi, & cairney, 2018). the relationship between aboriginal literacy and wellbeing identified in the interplay project reflects a global phenomenon in which indigenous language literacy promotes identity, empowerment, and wellbeing (united nations, 2014). efforts to enhance aboriginal language literacy may provide multiple benefits for individuals, communities, and australia’s international reputation. further research is the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3, art. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8165 14 required to explore how aboriginal language literacy impacts aboriginal men, particularly because men have higher overall levels of aboriginal language knowledge than women (biddle & swee, 2012). empowerment for women, increased empowerment had a direct positive relationship with wellbeing and a mediating effect on the relationship between cultural practice and wellbeing. the direct link between empowerment and wellbeing for women in the interplay model suggests that the function of health care, education services, aboriginal organisations, and businesses in contributing to empowerment should be considered (mccalman, 2013; mcewan, tsey, mccalman, & travers, 2010). relationships between gender and empowerment for aboriginal australians reflect how aboriginal men and women hold different spheres of influence and authority, and this is demonstrated through on-going separation of aspects of men’s and women’s lives (fredericks et al., 2017). the findings in the interplay project that relationships with empowerment differed for men and women are important and novel: other studies of empowerment for aboriginal peoples have not published analyses by gender (mccalman, bainbridge, brown, tsey, & clarke, 2018). research on empowerment for aboriginal australians has often arisen from non-aboriginal concepts of power related to male physical and economic power. these differ from aboriginal understandings of power, where power is related to cultural knowledge authority (fredericks et al., 2017). further research is needed to explore constructs of empowerment for aboriginal peoples in relation to gender. programs that have shown success in addressing empowerment among australian aboriginal peoples are available through health, wellbeing, education, and employment service settings; however, political, ideological, and economic conditions have limited program implementation (mccalman et al., 2018). currently, australian health care services are funded to address clinical indicators for aboriginal peoples, rather than to contribute to empowerment, despite demonstrated benefits of empowerment interventions (tsey et al., 2005). addressing empowerment through health services, especially for women, may be a key element in the transformative change in health care needed to improve both health and wellbeing for aboriginal australians (houston, 2016). for aboriginal men, there is a need to address barriers to health service access (canuto, wittert, harfield, & brown, 2018). effective empowerment programs based on aboriginal leadership and relatedness in schools, other educational institutions, and aboriginal organisations can enhance wellbeing. however, aboriginal peoples require greater influence within policy and program circles in order to overcome barriers to the implementation of additional programs that empower aboriginal peoples (mccalman, 2013). australian policy implications australian governments have long sought to reduce measures of socio-economic disadvantage for aboriginal peoples (altman, 2009). the current initiative is entitled closing the gap and has widespread support for its focus on reducing educational, employment, and health disadvantages of aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples, particularly in remote regions (commonwealth of australia: department of prime minister and cabinet, 2017). however, government-defined nationwide targets do not adequately reflect the diversity of aboriginal peoples, and aboriginal peoples’ aspirations are not reflected in government strategies to meet targets. an alternative policy approach schultz et al.: quantification of interplaying relationships published by scholarship@western, 2019 15 would recognise the agency of aboriginal peoples and facilitate the development of targets and strategies that address their own needs (altman, 2009). aboriginal language literacy and empowerment as indicators of education could be considered as additional targets in the close the gap initiative, reflecting aboriginal aspirations and human development in line with findings of the interplay research. australia’s closing the gap initiative makes repeated references to the importance of aboriginal culture (commonwealth of australia: department of prime minister and cabinet, 2018), and culture was a priority of the interplay wellbeing project. however, the complexity of relationships between cultural practice and wellbeing suggests that greater awareness is needed of how policies and services address culture and cultural practice. policy and services focused on empowerment and aboriginal literacy in alignment with cultural practice may be more effective in promoting wellbeing. for aboriginal peoples from remote regions, education, employment, and health are not simply goals, but also the means through which to enhance their wellbeing (cairney et al., 2017). assumptions from government and other non-aboriginal sectors of society that education should lead to employment and thereby contribute to the growth of the wider economy are not relevant to many aboriginal peoples in remote australia. rather, education should support aboriginal languages and culture, affirm connection to country, and strengthen identities in order to promote wellbeing. the notion of direct transition from education to employment was not supported in the interplay project, consistent with other work with aboriginal peoples in remote australia (mcrae-williams, guenther, jacobsen, & lovell, 2016; schultz et al., 2018). bureaucratising aboriginal culture can have negative impacts when culture is built into service plans developed externally, rather than through genuine ongoing engagement and empowerment of the communities involved (fache, 2014). when the underlying bureaucracy is insensitive to key aboriginal relationships and knowledge, using aboriginal peoples’ culture as a tool to promote government policy can disempower people and negatively impact their wellbeing (nadasdy, 2005). implementation of cultural practices in unequal settings can reinforce dominant cultural mores that overrule aboriginal values, methods, and institutions (ens, finlayson, preuss, jackson, & holcombe, 2012).when nonaboriginal peoples do not recognise their own cultural practices and norms, yet remain the dominant service providers, their efforts to promote cultural practice may not contribute to aboriginal wellbeing. refreshment of the closing the gap initiative has highlighted the importance of empowerment and strong connections to country, rather than narrow representations of aboriginal culture (parter, wilson, & hartz, 2019). the fundamental implication for australian policy is that culture is a key component of wellbeing for aboriginal peoples of remote regions, but implementation of programs based on cultural practices must also entail other components. the interplay project demonstrates that for women empowerment and aboriginal language literacy mediate the link from cultural practice to wellbeing, while further research with aboriginal men is required to quantify the insights that emerged in the development of the wellbeing research framework. international implications structural equation modelling enabled quantification and comparison of relationships between constructs such as wellbeing and empowerment that are meaningful across different cultures. this the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3, art. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8165 16 process translates people’s stories into numbers to provide the empirical accountability often required by governments. the interplay structural equation models developed for aboriginal peoples in remote australia showed the importance of aboriginal language literacy for wellbeing. the importance of languages for the health and wellbeing of indigenous peoples globally is increasingly being recognised (flood & rohloff, 2018). loss of indigenous languages is contributing to loss of indigenous knowledge communicated through these languages (nettle & romaine, 2000). international bodies have recommended that all governments recognise, strengthen, and re-vitalise indigenous languages for the benefit of individuals, communities, and nations (united nations, 2014), and this research highlights the association between indigenous language literacy and wellbeing. the interplay model suggests that for aboriginal women in remote australia, empowerment may contribute both directly and indirectly to wellbeing, and this is consistent with international recognition that empowerment for indigenous peoples is a critical tool for building equity in human development (united nations, 2015). however, empowerment strategies must be developed locally for people to be empowered because of the importance of participation in processes of empowerment, which cannot be standardised across populations (wallerstein, 2006). limitations the research was conducted in australian aboriginal communities in regions classified as remote, so generalisation is limited to this aboriginal population (australian bureau of statistics, 2014). for many aboriginal peoples, statistical classifications of remoteness are arbitrary. from their perspective, remoteness can also be seen as a reflection of presence on ancestral lands (rose, 2004). participation was limited to people aged 15 to 34, so results may not be relevant to other age groups, both because of how priorities change over the life course and because of the changing aboriginal policy frameworks that shape people’s lives (altman, biddle, & hunter, 2004). both the communities and individuals involved in the research were self-selected and, although efforts were made to include diverse communities, the distinctiveness of each aboriginal community may limit generalisation. data collection by aboriginal community researchers in their home communities may have led to information bias. further, gender-specific concerns and language and communication issues were potential limitations. the research focussed on positive attributes to counter the pervasive negative representation of aboriginal peoples, and this may have contributed to bias in both collection and interpretation of results. despite efforts to reach common understandings among researchers of each of the questions, translation and interpretation across languages and cultures may have been a limitation. relationships are associations between variables and do not suggest causation. conclusion delivery of effective services can improve people’s wellbeing. as an outcome measure, wellbeing reflects individual aspirations and priorities, overcoming the cultural bias of other outcome measures. the interplay project identified and explored wellbeing priorities for aboriginal peoples in remote regions of schultz et al.: quantification of interplaying relationships published by scholarship@western, 2019 17 australia to guide service provision. for women, aboriginal language literacy and empowerment showed both direct and indirect relationships with wellbeing, suggesting including aboriginal language literacy and empowerment in education, employment, and health policy and services may have farreaching benefits. for men, neither aboriginal language literacy, empowerment, nor cultural practice were statistically associated and wellbeing. overall, relationships between cultural practice and wellbeing are a complex interplay of factors, but empowerment and aboriginal language 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(2020). does a payment-for-outcomes model improve indigenous wellbeing? commissioning agencies and social impact bonds in new zealand. the international indigenous policy journal, 11(4). https://10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.8195 does a payment-for-outcomes model improve indigenous wellbeing? commissioning agencies and social impact bonds in new zealand abstract commissioning agencies and social impact bonds are two examples of new zealand’s shift towards payment-foroutcomes funding mechanisms over the last decade, as the government attempted to improve both policy innovation and social outcomes. this article highlights that although the commissioning agencies have been more successful than social impact bonds, neither has completely achieved these goals of innovation and improved outcomes. this is particularly concerning given indigenous māori are disproportionately impacted by both policies. discussion concludes by highlighting some of the problems associated with applying a payment-foroutcomes model to indigenous peoples, given these funding mechanisms are becoming increasingly popular in other settler nation states. keywords payment-for-outcomes, new zealand, indigenous peoples, social impact bonds, commissioning agencies acknowledgments in addition to the anonymous reviewers who provided helpful comments, the author would like to acknowledge that this research was partially funded by the australian research council and the university of auckland faculty of arts performance-based research fund. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. 1 humpage: does a payment-for-outcomes model improve indigenous wellbeing? published by scholarship@western, 2020 does a payment-for-outcomes model improve indigenous outcomes? commissioning agencies and social impact bonds in new zealand this article examines two new funding mechanisms—commissioning agencies and social impact bonds (sibs)—for social services implemented in new zealand since 2010. many of new zealand’s government services were contracted out to non-government, largely non-profit providers—including many indigenous māori organizations—as part of broader neoliberal market reforms in the 1980s and 1990s (lavoie et al., 2010). social service contracts initially focused on outputs, or the number of social services provided (productivity commission, 2015), but interest in contracting for outcomes grew in the 2000s as rates of poverty, income inequality, benefit receipt, poor health, and domestic violence continued or worsened, particularly amongst māori (lloyd, 2018; ministry of health, 2018). although trialled in new zealand before 2008, the national party-led government (2008-2017) directed a fundamental shift towards a payment-for-outcomes model (pfo, also known as payment-byresults or payment-by-success). commissioning agencies and sibs are two examples of the pfo model, where government does not specify how a service will be delivered but defines an outcome it wishes to purchase. the service provider then designs services to deliver that outcome, with government making performance payments to the provider if set outcome goals are met. in this context, “outcomes” refer to the “longer-term consequences of an intervention or programme in terms of the ends sought (e.g., better health or reduced re-offending)” (productivity commission, 2015, p. xiii). this definition is broad enough to incorporate both the individualistic outcome measures common in social statistics and measures of collective wellbeing—notably a vibrant culture and language, knowledge of tribal genealogy, and power and control over their own lives (lloyd, 2018)—that māori believe are also important. the national party-led government elected in 2008 claimed the pfo model would improve both policy innovation and social outcomes. later discussion highlights that, even if the government was reluctant to use racialized frames, these goals broadly aligned with indigenous calls to address the failure of current government services to meet the needs of indigenous māori: commissioning agencies involved māori gaining greater autonomy over funding for māori services, and sibs targeted—and thus held the potential to improve the wellbeing of— “problem” groups that were disproportionately māori. pfo models have been critiqued internationally (berndt & wirth, 2018; gardner et al., 2016; grimwood et al., 2013). by introducing financial incentives tied to specific performance outcomes, both commissioning agencies and sibs are said to “financialize” social services. this is because performance payments are built on a profit-maximising logic, which frames vulnerable clients seeking social services as sources of profit, rather than citizens with rights, potentially encouraging “providers to ‘cream’ the more tractable cases and ‘park’ the less tractable ones” (grimwood et al., 2013, p. 1; see also cbc, 2019a; dowling, 2017). to ensure the financial viability of the provider, the performance targets negotiated with governments are also rarely ambitious and focus less on what clients need and more on what organizations can produce data about; these are not necessarily the same thing (grimwood et al., 2013). proponents of sibs frequently claim that financial risk is shifted away from the state to private investors (berndt & wirth, 2018). yet, dowling (2017) argued, “on the one hand, the state accesses finance to achieve social policy goals; on the other hand, finance uses the state to accumulate financial profits” (p. 295). in this way, public funds become privatized. while this may align with indigenous peoples’ desire to gain greater control over public funds, both sibs and commissioning agencies blur the 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.8195 government’s responsibility for addressing their rights as citizens and as first peoples. evidence further suggests that claims about pfo models being less expensive, yet encouraging more innovation than government-provided services, are also overstated (berndt & wirth, 2018; cbc, 2019a; grimwood et al., 2013). the extant literature provides no in-depth analysis of pfo models as they relate to indigenous peoples, who have reasons to both benefit from and be concerned by this policy development. although discussion notes how indigenous peoples define both “innovation” and “outcomes” differently than government, this article assesses whether the new zealand government achieved its goals by its own definitions of these terms. it asks: did commissioning agencies and sibs: (a) result in greater levels of innovation, and (b) improve outcomes? following a more detailed discussion of the policy background, the article draws on government documents, evaluations, and other research to qualitatively analyse both examples of the pfo model. the findings are relevant for other settler nation states where poor indigenous outcomes are common, given these states are also experimenting with sibs and commissioning. background: payment-for-outcomes as a solution for indigenous disadvantage there is growing evidence that improving indigenous outcomes within settler nation states requires not just better resources, but a radical mind shift amongst governments. the longstanding harvard project on american indian economic development (cornell & kalt, 1998) stresses that culturally grounded and capable indigenous governance institutions and leaders are crucial, but sovereignty also matters for tribal success. similarly, chandler and lalonde (1998) in canada found a correlation between first nations youth suicide rates and community involvement in securing aboriginal title, self-government, control of police and fire services, establishment of local cultural facilities, youth attendance in bandadministered schools, and control over health services. in sum, cultural continuity is important for health and other social outcomes (auger, 2016; bals et al., 2011; houkamau & sibley, 2011; wexler, 2014). but this alone will never be sufficient to meet the needs and aspirations of indigenous peoples. indigenous control over funding equivalent to that given to government-provided services addressing intergenerational, systemic needs are also necessary (see cbc, 2019b; lavoie et al., 2010). new zealand governments, however, remain reluctant to engage in the kind of power sharing that would facilitate improved māori outcomes. initially recognised in the māori-language version of the treaty of waitangi 1840, māori sovereignty was sidelined as land was bought, confiscated, or stolen and māori language and culture were repressed. since the 1970s, the waitangi tribunal has heard claims from tribal groups, mostly regarding land and resources but increasingly focused on the ongoing failures of the state to meet the needs of māori in regard to education, health, the justice system, citizenship rights and equality, the constitution, electoral system, and self-government (lloyd, 2018). social policy in new zealand is often framed in regard to article 3 of the treaty, which concerns equal citizenship rights. but article 2 of the māori-language version guaranteed māori the continuing possession of tino rangatiratanga [self-determination] in balance with the kāwanatanga [governance] granted to the british crown in article 1. uniquely, the 2014 tūhoe settlement acknowledged the tūhoe tribe’s mana motuhake [autonomy] and included a service management agreement aiming to build tūhoe’s capacity to eventually take over social services (possibly including benefit payments, schools, healthcare, and housing within its tribal area (moore et al., 2014; stephens, 2014). but, despite 29 out of 120 members 3 humpage: does a payment-for-outcomes model improve indigenous wellbeing? published by scholarship@western, 2020 of parliament being of māori descent in 2017 and an indigenous māori party forming part of the government between 2008 and 2017 (humpage, 2017; koti, 2017), discussion of greater devolution of funding and decision-making power to māori is frequently regarded as radical and “separatist” (1newsnow, 2014). indeed, the new zealand national party—a conservative party that has historically alternated with the labour party in leading governments—has tended to support treaty claim settlements because these align with its strong advocacy for property rights but opposes “separate rights” for māori in social policy. regarding “equal citizenship” as the goal, it has even promoted the abolition of all “race-based” social policies (humpage, 2017). it thus came as a surprise when, following the 2008 election, the national party negotiated supply and confidence agreements not only with the act party (which shares similarly conservative views) but also with the māori party, which combines “a drive towards rangatiratanga [selfdetermination], and an attempt to address the socio-economic needs of māori” (smith, 2010, p. 215). the national party’s move aimed to shore up sufficient support for more than one 3-year term in new zealand’s mixed member proportional (mmp) representation environment. but it is also important to acknowledge overlaps between the national party’s neoliberal agenda and the economic interests of tribal and māori businesses with significant financial assets (humpage, 2017). in particular, nationalled governments in the 1990s oversaw the massive shift towards contracting out the provision of social services, particularly in health, to tribal and pan-māori groups wishing to develop and deliver culturally appropriate services (lavoie et al., 2010). by the national party’s return to power in 2008, māori organizations were significant players in the social policy field (smith et al., 2018). more broadly, the national-led government’s strong focus on delivering “better public services” (state services commission, 2017) and “more effective social services” (productivity commission, 2015) coincided with the māori party’s desire for new policy solutions to improve māori outcomes. in particular, both the national and the māori parties viewed the welfare system as part of the “problem” for māori, believing that individuals and families should take greater responsibility for themselves (turia, 2006). the most significant initiative emerging from the māori party’s supply and confidence agreement was the taskforce on whānau-centred initiatives (2010; hereafter taskforce), led by prominent māori psychiatrist sir mason durie. it recommended a culturally anchored, strengths-based whānau ora strategy that empowers the collective entity of whānau, defined as a multi-generational family group made up of many households, supported and strengthened by a wider network of relatives (taskforce on whānau-centred initiatives, 2010). the concept of whānau ora (literally “family wellbeing” but recognising the inter-relationships between mental, physical, and spiritual health) challenges the more individualized “outcomes” with which government is usually concerned. the concept has long driven the work of māori health organizations, many of whom adopt a “by māori, for māori” ethos (smith et al., 2018). the whānau ora strategy established in 2010 applies the whānau ora concept to a wider range of social issues and, importantly, moves beyond individualized notions of “empowerment” by endorsing “a group capacity for self-determination” (taskforce on whānau-centred initiatives, 2010, p. 30). the co-leader of the māori party, tariana turia, was appointed minister for whānau ora and a first phase of the strategy involved funding whānau plans and “navigators” that assist whānau to connect with a range of mainstream services and other agencies and the development of whānau ora provider collectives. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.8195 this article focuses on a second phase of whānau ora, which established non-government commissioning agencies to make funding decisions on behalf of the state starting in 2014. the taskforce on whānau-centred initiatives (2010) had proposed an independent, māori-led whānau ora trust to administer a fund derived from appropriations across a number of portfolios that would report directly to the newly created minister for whānau ora and parliament. cabinet decided in 2013, however, to make te puni kōkiri (ministry of māori development) the lead agency, supported by the ministries of health and social development. challenging the original intention to target only māori, cabinet then established three commissioning agencies: one each for the north and south island, which both have a strong māori focus but are inclusive of all new zealanders, and one focused on pasifika families across new zealand. pasifika peoples have migrated or are descended from islands in the pacific and often experience similarly poor socio-economic outcomes to māori (independent whānau ora review panel, 2018). despite the strategy no longer being an exclusively indigenous initiative, the commissioning agencies offer māori more decision-making power over social service funding than traditional contracting. commissioning involves procurement but also strategic planning, consultation, needs assessment, network development and stakeholder management, and research and evaluation (productivity commission, 2015; rees, 2014; wehipeihana et al., 2016). commissioning agencies “have a high degree of autonomy to determine the nature and quantum of commissioning, provided they meet the targets specified in their contract” (wehipeihana et al., 2016, p. 20), which includes incentive payments that reward the commissioning agencies if they achieve results in priority or hard-to-reach areas above and beyond the outcomes achieved. although there are certain overlaps between commissioning and indigenous desires for greater control over funding (boulton et al., 2018), the focus on commissioning and pfo was not unique to whānau ora but instead part of an international trend towards diversifying the number and type of providers offering services. driven partly by public choice theory’s assumption that public services are shaped by self-interest and thus inhibit innovation and an incentive to improve, and partly by ongoing dissatisfaction with existing contracting models (rees, 2014), the national-led government’s broader interest in applying market principles to social services was evident in the welfare working group (wwg) established in 2010 and the productivity commission created in 2011. both promoted nongovernment commissioning agencies as a way of positioning government agencies as “system stewards,” clearly defining desired outcomes and promoting diverse approaches, monitoring them, and encouraging the spread of successful ones—without having to provide services themselves (productivity commission, 2015; wwg, 2010). sibs were a further funding tool discussed by the productivity commission (2015). they take the pfo model to a new level because for-profit organizations invest the funds needed by a service provider to deliver a certain service, and then the government pays service providers performance payments and funders returns on their investment only if outcomes are significantly improved. sibs were regarded as an innovative way of spreading the risk of investing in new, possibly experimental initiatives (office of the minister of finance and office of the minister of social development, 2016). yet, malcomson (2014) noted that sibs: 5 humpage: does a payment-for-outcomes model improve indigenous wellbeing? published by scholarship@western, 2020 are a new approach to privatization that financializes public service delivery on the basis of profit generation. because government’s role is effectively reduced to paying costs when contract terms are fulfilled, the model effectively outsources not only service delivery but also key elements of policy development, implementation and assessment. (p. 3) like commissioning agencies, sibs thus side-step shortfalls in the levels of funding for social service delivery that impact delivery outcomes, as well as the broader structural factors that shape wellbeing, by framing the state’s failure largely in terms of poor service innovation and effectiveness. two sib pilots were implemented in 2017. unlike sibs in manitoba, canada, and queensland, australia, that directly target indigenous peoples (cbc, 2019c; donaldson, 2017), neither trial specifically targets māori and there is no evidence that tribal entities, many of whom have received significant treaty settlements, were consulted or courted as potential investors. yet both bonds run in an urban location with a high māori population and focus on social issues disproportionally affecting māori. the first pilot aimed to assist 1,700 working-age benefit recipients diagnosed with a mental health condition transition into employment. apm workcare ltd. (hereafter apm), owned by a forprofit australian parent company but providing vocational rehabilitation and disability services in new zealand since 2011, started service delivery in april 2017. four investors contributed the nz$1.5 million needed for the bond, including the provider, wilberforce foundation (a christian philanthropic fund), janssen-cilag (a subsidiary of healthcare giant johnson & johnson), and prospect investment management ltd. that apm took the riskier tranche of bonds (nz$300,000) was said to provide “a tangible incentive to ensure the outcomes are delivered and represents a strong signal of their expectation of success” (mcbeth, 2017). the second sib pilot started in september 2007, aiming to reduce youth reoffending levels in the same urban location. it is delivered by the charitable organization genesis youth trust (2018; hereafter, genesis), which runs the country’s largest police-affiliated youth development programme with a cohort that is 69% māori. it targets young people with a medium or high youth offending risk screening tool score who have committed an offence. the wilberforce foundation chose to also invest in the second pilot, along with mint asset management limited, two charitable trusts (caleb no.2 trust and hosanna charitable trust), and the new zealand superannuation fund (genesis youth trust, 2018). central to both commissioning agencies and sibs is the idea that provider payments should be directly linked to the outcomes they achieve because (a) contracting for an outcome, rather than a specific service, would incentivize providers to be more innovative by offering more freedom to design services suited to local needs; and (b) this innovation would lead to better results for new zealand citizens (productivity commission, 2015). such claims understood innovation as “the process of translating an idea or an invention into a good or service that has value” (productivity commission, 2015, p. xii). references to business innovation and market principles such as competition and choice made clear that the government was largely focused on financial value (productivity commission, 2015). mika (2016), however, argues that māori innovation differs because profit might be important but “how you make money and what you do with the money is what sets the māori business model apart” (para. 7). thus, the kaupapa [agenda or plan] behind innovation matters. there are many historical and contemporary examples of indigenous peoples transforming resources to produce new products or processes (drahos & frankel, 2012) and dynamically responding to new environments both prior to 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.8195 and following colonization. yet indigenous innovation is often concerned with “cultural autonomy, remembrance and retrieval, self-determination, and community-based values linked with the maintenance, preservation, restoration, and revitalization of indigenous knowledge systems that merge episteme with place and cultural practice” (huaman, 2015, p. 4). drahos and frankel (2012) further argue that indigenous innovation is characterized by “the strong presence of uncodified knowledge . . . best transferred by means of personal communication” (p. 18) and “its expression in collective [emphasis added] processes of generating information to reduce uncertainty” (p. 21). indeed, new zealand’s waitangi tribunal (2011) report into claims concerning new zealand law and policy affecting māori culture and identity explores how western understandings regard both innovation and knowledge as being accessible to all unless there is potential profit to be achieved via patents and intellectual property rights. this contrasts with māori desires to protect mātauranga [knowledge] māori by limiting access to only those who earn the right to use it. although drahos and frankel (2012) noted that indigenous innovation is not purely about the protection of indigenous knowledge, it can “include ‘back to the future’ thinking that brings tradition-based approaches into 21st century applicability” (commissioning agency representative cited in wehipeihana et al., 2016, p. 34). this challenges the idea that innovation must be “new” noted in the next section. the productivity commission (2015) acknowledged that “the objectives māori have for social services are broader than just effectiveness and efficiency—social services have an important role to play in ‘māori succeeding as māori’ which, in this context, includes māori being able to exercise duties of care that arise from tikanga [customary practices]” (p. 20). however, it did not specifically discuss what innovation means in an indigenous context or that indigenous outcomes were disproportionately poorer than for the non-indigenous population. within this limited framework, social services innovation was said to involve “introducing new or significantly improved services or business processes, for the purposes of getting better outcomes from available resources” (productivity commission, 2015, p. 177). this latter phrase reflects an emphasis on actuarial modelling for the basis of social investment that was developed under the national-led government, offering a deracialized argument that poor “outcomes . . . tend to occur together for a relatively small number of the most disadvantaged individuals and families,” thus placing a disproportionate financial burden on the state (productivity commission, 2015, p. 3). in this context, the government wanted: to get more from existing resources: the social services system needs to generate more innovation and learn more effectively from successful innovations; and commissioning organisations and providers of social services need to better understand and address the barriers to successful innovation and the spread of innovations. (productivity commission, 2015, p. 180181) non-government providers were thus framed as both saviours and as part of the “problem.” the productivity commission (2015) argued that “government-provided services typically do not provide much room for experimentation” (p. 183), something it suggested was more common amongst nongovernment providers. yet social services in new zealand were slower than other services in adopting “productivity-enhancing business models” (productivity commission, 2015, p. 180). this is because 7 humpage: does a payment-for-outcomes model improve indigenous wellbeing? published by scholarship@western, 2020 social services are small, local, and dependent on a few committed individuals; often work with “bare bones” funding; and are subject to overly prescriptive contracts which do not allow the types of “capital investments, substantial re-organisation of business processes and the re-deployment of staff” that may be required for innovation (productivity commission, 2015, p. 185). thus, new zealand’s “highly centralised approach [with decisions largely made by central government agencies] to commissioning social services . . . poses a barrier to learning and thus innovation” (productivity commission, 2015, p. 179). in contrast, “devolved approaches to commissioning services . . . can support a diversity of providers, which leads naturally to more innovation” and “distances the choice of new approaches from risk-averse central government ministers and officials” by engaging regions, communities, and subsidiary organizations (productivity commission, 2015, p. 180). in promoting pfo, in particular, the productivity commission did acknowledge some of the potential difficulties noted in the international literature (see grimwood et al., 2013). they noted, “many providers are driven by a commitment to a mission rather than financial gain, which makes how they might react to incentives difficult to predict” (productivity commission, 2015, p. 51). it is difficult to set fee structures that would avoid perverse incentives, such as those that encourage providers to focus on clients who are easiest to place while neglecting hard to place clients, or that create a situation where activities that are not financially incentivised are crowded out. in addition, compliance costs can be significant, potentially threatening provider autonomy or demotivating them in other ways (productivity commission, 2015). treasury (2013) also raised a number of practical barriers: the cost and difficulty of research on outcomes; attribution of outcomes to a particular provider when they do not fully control the environment needed for success; and weak cross-government collaboration and information sharing, which cause difficulties in determining actual outcomes for clients. one way to minimize attribution problems and perverse incentives is to have a well-defined cohort (grimwood et al., 2013). although both of the sib pilots fit this bill—focusing on improving employment outcomes for benefit recipients with mental health issues and reducing youth reoffending—whānau ora’s holistic, all-new zealanders focus does not. furthermore, the pilots were tied explicitly to the national-led government’s 10 aspirational better public service (bps) result areas, which from 2012 to 2017 provided specific, measurable, and dated outcome targets, but whānau ora was not tied to these result areas. the most relevant result areas for the bonds were: reducing long-term welfare dependence; reducing the rates of total crime, violent crime, and youth crime; and reducing reoffending (state services commission, 2017). although they provide a basis from which pfo could be implemented, the result areas do not acknowledge that māori are more likely to receive benefits and be convicted of a crime. moreover, they exemplify the national party’s tendency to view social problems as resulting from poor behaviours amongst individuals, rather than shaped by intersecting structural forces (such as colonization or institutional racism), and western, individualized understandings of health and wellbeing (alfred, 2009; czyzewski, 2011). here again, it sits in tension with whānau ora’s collectivist, holistic service model. berndt and wirth (2018) also noted that social bonds and other payment-for-outcomes models tend to render societal issues as more technical problems that can be “corrected” with behavioural engineering. national’s social investment approach, noted earlier, certainly collates data from across sectors for actuarial modelling with the aim of predicting the financial cost of failing to solve social problems. although this approach “questions whether simply spending more on doing the same things is the right 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.8195 answer” (wehipeihana et al., 2016, p. 22), it also means that providers are rewarded for producing data that suggests these risks have decreased, which does not necessarily correlate with supporting people to get what they need or become who they wish to be (grimwood et al., 2013). in the remainder of the article, i assess the limited evidence publicly available to determine whether commissioning agencies and sibs are likely to improve māori outcomes. the two policies are good comparators because they similarly adopt a pfo model and significantly impact māori, even if sibs did not explicitly articulate this focus. my analysis first considers whether the government met its own goals for innovation by assessing whether commissioning agencies or sibs actually involved “introducing new or significantly improved services or business processes, for the purposes of getting better outcomes from available resources” (productivity commission, 2015, p. 177). i then assess whether they led to improved outcomes or “longer-term consequences of an intervention or programme in terms of the ends sought” (productivity commission, 2015, p. xiii). this broad definition enables examination and comparison of the indigenous-led indicators of wellbeing embodied within whānau ora and the more generic—and arguably less useful—outcomes articulated for sibs. in this sense, the two policies together act as an international test case for the ability of a pfo model to improve indigenous wellbeing. whānau ora commissioning agencies in 2014, three consortiums won the tender to be whānau ora commissioning agencies. each differs in makeup, focus, and level of funding: • te pou matakana (later renamed the whānau ora commissioning agency) covers the north island, although its work is heavily focused on the city of auckland, where many māori live. the agency is owned by the national urban māori authority (88%), te whānau o waipareira (9%), and the manukau urban authority (3%), all well-established pan-māori organizations in auckland. te pou matakana received funding of almost nz$43 million over 2018 to 2019 and funds 13 lead partners who sub-contract to over 80 whānau ora partners (independent whānau ora review panel, 2018). • the south island’s te pūtahitanga o te waipounamu is a newly formed limited partnership between nine iwi [tribes] in the south island (including the chatham islands), which each hold equal ownership of 11.11% (independent whānau ora review panel, 2018). it focuses on social enterprises developed by whānau locally and has a shareholders’ council, known as te taumata, responsible for the investment strategy focused on enterprise and job creation, education and leadership, wellbeing, and inspiration and catalysts (productivity commission, 2015). the agency delivers across 16 sites and received just over nz$12 million in 2018 to 2019 (independent whānau ora review panel, 2018). • the third agency, pasifika futures, received almost nz$17 million in the same period and delivers from four largely urban sites across the country to pasifika new zealanders. it builds on the 20-year history of the pasifika medical association, which is the sole owner, but is itself constituted by three equal individual shareholders (independent whānau ora review panel, 2018). 9 humpage: does a payment-for-outcomes model improve indigenous wellbeing? published by scholarship@western, 2020 given this article’s focus on indigenous outcomes, findings relating to pasifika futures are not assessed in the following sections analysing the innovation and outcomes associated with the commissioning agencies. innovation it is tricky distinguishing innovation emerging from the three key aspects of the whānau ora strategy: a unique focus on assisting whānau as a collective, rather than individuals; the navigators used to help whānau mediate different government and non-government services; and the commissioning agency funding mechanism. however, there is some evidence that the commissioning agencies, specifically, are facilitating innovation with funding pools actively aiming to encourage new ideas, such as te pūtahitanga o te waipounamu’s commissioning pipeline open tender and selective procurement process. te pou matakana leaders also describe themselves as “continuously reflecting on evaluative and data-based evidence to spot potential ‘game changers’—approaches that show promise or initiatives that have the potential for transformative scale” (wehipeihana et al., 2016, p. 68). the productivity commission (2015) further comments: the organisational culture within the commissioning agencies appears to be significantly different to the culture within government purchasers, particularly with regards to their attitudes on what can be done, how soon it can be done, how it can be done and how measurable the outcomes would be. this is likely to make the commissioning agencies more responsive than the average government purchaser. (p. 1) this view was supported by the independent whānau ora review panel (2018), which cited a whānau ora partner organization. this organization explained that, while the commissioning agency “buy(s) the outcome, we do the service description. this allows us to do what is actually important to whānau. it allows us to be innovative, and we don’t have to justify or explain being māori” (p. 47). the independent whānau ora review panel (2018) further praised the high level of support, including leadership and capacity building activities, that commissioning agencies provide to partners, providers, and whanau entities, as well as their attempts to encourage collaboration and partnership amongst providers. for example, te pūtahitanga o te waipounamu adopted a social enterprise approach to complement rather than threaten or replicate existing contracts, while te pou matakana introduced collective impact, where a group of partners and organizations from different sectors commit to work to a common agenda to support whānau to achieve specific outcomes. boulton et al.’s (2018) independent research on te pou matakana further reports that this agency works through issues and difficulties when outcomes cannot be achieved or underfunding becomes apparent and a contract has to be renegotiated, providing more room to risk trying something new because “getting it wrong” does not have a catastrophic impact on funding. these comments support lavoie et al.’s (2010) work on contracting processes across settler nation states, which indicates that trying to gain efficiencies through competition is misaligned with the more collaborative and cooperative basis of indigenous social services. many of the funding pools established by the commissioning agencies also differ from those available through mainstream agencies, which tend to require drawn-out application processes and are usually developed with little or no consultation. in particular, the flexible and immediate funding for whānau, 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.8195 often providing same-day support, has been a “key factor in building immediate trust and rapport between participating whānau and navigators” (independent whānau ora review panel, 2018, p. 47). for example, te pou matakana’s whānau direct enables whānau to quickly access up to nz$1,000 in “moments that matter” to respond positively to situations. both agencies also consulted with whānau before developing funding priorities and investment streams, have responded to provider and whānau feedback, and offer opportunities to co-generate contracted milestones and outcomes or co-produce services (boulton et al., 2018; wehipeihana et al., 2016). despite these positive moves, however, there is evidence that the commissioning agencies also replicate, rather than overcome, some of the problems within the traditonal contractually based funding system that hinders innovation. for example, the wide-ranging geographical focus of commissioning agencies means they struggle to be closely connected to all whānau and communities, particularly those living in rural areas or deprived populations (independent whānau ora review panel, 2018). the independent whānau ora review panel (2018) was also concerned that in some areas crisis-focused provider practices “were charactertised as filling gaps in government agency service provision or undertaking the role of agencies that had failed to discharge their responsibilities to whānau” (p. 51). the panel saw this as problematic because (a) in some cases, navigators and other whānau ora staff were attempting to solve problems for which they had no professional training; and (b) it diverted resources away from the long-term goals of capacity and self-reliance building. the independent whānau ora review panel (2018) stressed, “whānau ora is not a substitute for central government inaction” (p. 57). yet, there has been limited buy-in and awareness of whānau ora amongst government agencies. in part this is due to the inherent variation that comes from three commissioning agencies doing different things and the focus on whānau rather than individuals (auditor-general, 2015; independent whānau ora review panel, 2018). awareness and buy-in were supposed to be facilitated when the initial governance group was replaced in 2014 by the whānau ora partnership group, comprising six ministers of the crown and the chairpersons of six iwi to ensure complementary efforts and idenitify opportunities for collaboration across ministerial portfolios (boulton et al., 2018; wehipeihana et al., 2016). this group, however, has not met since 2017 and there are plans to replace it with an independent advisory group to the minister (cabinet social wellbeing committee, 2019). such discontinuity of leadership cannot have facilitated all government agencies knowing what whānau ora involves and how they can become engaged. these problems of reach and poor awareness of whānau ora are associated with lack of funding. the national-led government initially allocated only nz$134 million to whānau ora, instead of the nz$1 billion proposed by the taskforce. smaller allocations followed (new zealand government, 2016). the labour-led government offered nothing in the 2017 budget pending a review of the strategy, although this culminated in a significant funding boost from 2019 (wright, 2019). such uncertainty about funding hardly encourages providers to take the risks that innovation requires (independent whānau ora review panel, 2018). boulton et al. (2018) also note a major discrepancy between expectations and funding: “[te pou matakana] is responsible for delivering whānau ora outcomes to over 80% of the total māori population in new zealand but is only funded at a fraction of the rate of other mainstream government bodies” (p. 51). citing international research that identified sufficient financial sourcing as one of the most important factors influencing the success of commissioning, boulton et al. (2018) thus ask: “is commissioning for whānau ora a genuine attempt to meet the goals and aspirations of the 11 humpage: does a payment-for-outcomes model improve indigenous wellbeing? published by scholarship@western, 2020 whānau ora policy or is it simply risk transfer?” (p. 54). this echoes the experiences of indigenous peoples elsewhere, who have similarly found that greater indigenous control often means less funding than that available to government agencies delivering similar services (see cbc, 2019b). outcomes despite these mixed findings regarding innovation, the commissioning agencies do appear to have made some improvements in māori outcomes, even when taking into account the impact of the first phase of whanau ora was already having before commissioning agencies were introduced. table 1 summarises qualitative and quantitative data collected by te puni kōkiri, which suggests that the combination of culturally specific whānau plans and the integrated service knowledge of navigators was achieving positive outcomes for the 9,408 whānau comprising 49,625 whānau members who had received whanau-centred services in the first four years (te puni kōkiri, 2015). navigators, in fact, were so successful that they continued to be funded, rather than being phased out as planned (auditor-general, 2015). table 2 summarizes outcomes from the two commissioning agencies from 2016 to 2017; data entirely comparable with table 1 is not available but notably a greater number of whānau appear to be achieving positive outcomes. for instance, 84 to 95% of whānau assisted by the two commissioning agencies achieved most healthy eating and exercise outcomes, while table 1 indicates only 46% did so in the first four years of whānau ora. in contrast, improvements in income, employment, and other factors that are influenced by the broader structural context are much weaker across both sets of data. it is also noticeable that te pou matakana’s te ao māori [māori worldview] and whanau or whakapapa [genealogy] knowledge outcomes are extremely low compared to either the early data or that of te pūtahitanga o te waipounamu. the difference between the two agencies is likely linked to te pūtahitanga o te waipounamu being led by tribal organizations while te pou matakana springs from urban, pan-māori organizations often catering to those only just discovering their māori cultural identity. this difference is still concerning given participation in te ao māori is one of the key whānau ora outcome indicators and given the international literature finds cultural continuity a key factor in shaping outcomes. te pou matakana also seems not to have engaged with the environmental stewardship outcome at all. it is difficult to calculate total numbers of clients assisted since the commissioning agencies were introduced but in the 2016 to 2017 financial year over 13,500 whānau received services or support from a whānau ora commissioning agency (te puni kōkiri, 2018), a rate higher than the first four years in total. te pou matakana engaged 9,367 of these whānau, exceeding its pfo targets. moreover, despite being available to all new zealanders, the majority of whānau benefitting from te pou matakana (8589%) and te pūtahitanga o te waipounamu (70%) have been māori (independent whānau ora review panel, 2018). this is compared to only 64% of engaged whānau being māori in the first four years (te puni kōkiri, 2015). 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.8195 table 1. whānau ora outcomes 2010-2014 intermediary outcomes % of whānau indicating improvement higher-level outcomes % of whānau indicating improvement access to services happiness motivation positive whānau relationships mutual respect parenting or caregiving confidence skills cultural confidence whakapapa knowledge 71 71 69 69 69 64 62 54 47 safety education and training early education use housing situation healthy eating and exercise income employment reduced smoking 76 61 53 48 46 44 38 33 on average, whānau experienced more than seven intermediary gains on average, whānau experienced more than three higher-level gains in wellbeing the strongest, statistically significant correlations found between intermediary and higher-level goals were: feelings of connectedness and education and training (r = 0.453, p < .01) parenting confidence and early childhood use (r = 0.428, p < .01) knowledge of whakapapa and reduced smoking (r = 0.428, p < .01) feelings of connectedness and service worker supporting whānau in achieving goals (r = 0.388, p <.01) new skills and service worker supporting whānau to make appointments (r = 0.368, p < .01) note. findings drawn from te puni kōkiri’s (2015) analysis of provider reporting and 895 whānau surveys (see pp. 38-50). table modified from humpage (2017, p. 483), reproduced with permission. 13 humpage: does a payment-for-outcomes model improve indigenous wellbeing? published by scholarship@western, 2020 table 2. achievement of whānau outcomes by māori-led commissioning agencies, 2016-2017 whānau ora outcome indicators te pou matakana te putahitanga o te waipounamu whānau are selfmanaging and empowered leaders 95% of priority whānau engaged through navigators identified their strengths, needs, aspirations 44% of priority whānau engaged through navigators have completed at least some outcomes 100% whānau agreed or really agreed they are better able to make decisions about their future whānau are leading healthy lifestyles 86% of whānau engaged with whānau direct achieved their health outcomes 84% of priority whānau who prioritised health but were not enrolled with doctor or up to date with immunisations now are 99% of whānau eat more fruit and/or vegetables 95% of whānau improved physical fitness as a result of programme whānau are participating fully in society 57% of priority whānau who prioritised community participation are now in organized sport or recreation activities 49% of whānau are more actively engaged in their community whānau and families are confidently participating in te ao māori 2% of those engaged with whānau direct increased engagement in te ao māori [māori world] outcomes 100% increased knowledge and confidence in māori culture and language whānau and families are economically secure and successfully involved in wealth creation 41% engaged with whānau direct achieved standards of living outcomes 79% of priority whānau who prioritised financial literacy are now using a financial plan or budget to make decisions 33% had sufficient income for everyday needs (up from 21% in 2015/2016) 48% whānau working with navigators had gained formal qualifications (up from 31% in 2015/2016) whānau are cohesive, resilient, and nurturing 70% of priority whānau who prioritised whanaungatanga [relationships, kinship, sense of belonging] and who identified domestic violence as a concern now report a reduction in domestic violence 13% of whānau met whānau knowledge outcomes 100% of whānau are more resilient and have more knowledge about tools to help then bounce back from tough times 100% whānau know more about their whakawhanaungatanga [relationships with others, genealogy] whānau and families are responsible stewards of their living and natural environment 81% of whānau are more motivated to act as kaitiaki [guardians] of the wellbeing of their whenua [land] 100% whānau feel more connected to their whenua as a result of gardening note. sources: te puni kōkiri (2018) and independent whānau ora review panel (2018). 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.8195 given such findings, the independent whānau ora review panel (2018) reported: the whānau ora commissioning approach creates positive change for whānau. in all areas we visited, and across all monitoring reports we reviewed, we have seen whānau progress towards achieving their self-identified priorities. however, the approach is relatively new, and we believe it is too early to form a view as to whether or not that positive change will be enduring. (p. 6) this qualification is important given the whānau ora outcomes framework ratified in 2015 defined short-term (1-4 years), medium-term (5-10 years), and long-term (11-25 years) goals for whānau. moreover, given the long-term impacts of colonization and institutional discrimination, it will inevitably take a generation or more to achieve all seven overarching whānau ora outcomes (independent whānau ora review panel, 2018). table 1 and 2 further highlight the difficulty in identifying any aggregate outcomes across whānau ora, either across the commissioning agencies or across time. the flexibility to develop any outcome measures, as long as they broadly fit within the whānau ora outcomes framework, also contributes to difficulties in attributing outcomes to whānau ora, particularly when factors outside the control of whānau or commissioning agencies can impact outcomes (wehipeihana et al., 2016). these issues are common to all pfo contracting (rees, 2014). gardner et al.’s (2016) rapid review of the international literature on commissioning in health found: “there was very limited evidence to assess the impact of commissioning on service use, outcomes or value” (p. 43). te pūtahitanga o te waipounamu suggests that such issues are enhanced when attempting innovative approaches: a lack of relevant academic literature and evaluation tools meant “it has been challenging to identify or develop relevant and appropriate indicators and measures for the social enterprise and social capital approaches” (cited in wehipeihana et al., 2016, p. 57). in this sense, the innovation expected to emerge from whānau ora potentially made it harder for commissioning agencies to achieve performance payments. the controller and auditor-general (2019) reported that, out of a total of nz$3.262 million in incentive payments dispersed between 2014 and 2017, te pou matakana received 98% of incentive payments available to the agency (60% of all such payments) and te pūtahitanga o te waipounamu received none in the first two financial years and then 29% of available payments in the third year. this is surprising given table 2 often reports higher outcomes for te pūtahitanga o te waipounamu than te pou matakana. of course, “success” in a pfo model is what commissioning agencies manage to negotiate as an outcome indicator, and it could be that te pūtahitanga o te waipounamu was initially less agile in this space given its higher level of “innovation” and lesser experience in the social services sector. such difficulties in reporting outcomes are problematic not only because financial incentives depend on proving impact but also because a lack of aggregate reporting across all three agencies has contributed to difficulties promoting and (at times defending) the whānau ora strategy (independent whānau ora review panel, 2018). many providers and partners also felt the outcome measures and reporting tools used by commissioning agencies do not sufficiently account for the work they do (for instance, building the relationships needed to start achieving outcomes) or the extent of effort or change experienced by whānau, while also being unnecessarily time-consuming (independent whānau ora review panel, 2018). some providers were also frustrated that te pou matakana did not fund the administrative costs associated with delivering te 15 humpage: does a payment-for-outcomes model improve indigenous wellbeing? published by scholarship@western, 2020 pou matakana-funded services, for instance, the intensive case-management associated with the whānau direct programme that allows whānau to quickly access a small but significant cash amount (boulton et al., 2018). providers are thus expected to bear costs for the commissioning agencies just as they did when contracting with government via more routine procurement processes. the independent whānau ora review panel (2018) also found that the significant, formal accountability regime focused primarily on process not outcomes. roy et al. (2018) suggested that commissioning for outcomes often comes with increased oversight and administrative burden, something arguably magnified when indigenous peoples are involved: for instance, te pou matakana was accused of despotism in 2018 because incentive payments for 2015 to 2016 and for 2016 to 2017 (worth nz$634,000 and nz$988,000, respectively) were paid out in the following years as dividends to te pou matakana’s three shareholders, all of whom are registered charities (bennett, 2018). the controller and auditor-general (2019) found no irregularities because this arrangement is characteristic of the pfo arrangement. more generally, wehipeihana et al. (2016) reported that commissioning agencies “believe the current reporting expectations do not align with a commissioning model. they describe the reporting requirements as prescriptive and restrictive and not aligned with their view of commissioning which intends to be responsive and innovative” (p. 8). boulton et al.’s (2018) participants also felt that te pou matakana “was over-regulated in comparison to other government entities” (p. 51). noting that the international literature highlights the need for trust and long-term relationships between commissioners and providers, boulton et al. (2018) comment that commissioning for whānau ora outcomes requires a similar level of trust between the government and commissioners. despite these problems and focusing on the positive outcomes gained, the independent whānau ora review panel (2018) concluded that the government should invest in and extend the strategy based on evidence of short-term outcomes and potential for long-term sustainable outcomes. moreover, it recommended embedding whānau-centred approaches into the living standards framework, which was used to develop new zealand’s first wellbeing budget in 2019, as well as other measures of wellbeing. while whānau ora did receive a funding boost and some other programmes focus on whānau, wellbeing is still largely understood either at the individual or national level. adopting the independent whānau ora review panel’s (2018) recommendation would see indigenous-focused, collective outcomes become standard across government, although the wide diversity in outcome indicators already apparent across whānau ora commissioning agencies makes one wonder whether one would ever actually know when progress on indigenous outcomes had been made. social impact bonds the first sib pilot’s focus on reducing welfare dependence and improving mental health outcomes was timely, given the organization for economic cooperation and development (oecd, 2018, para. 6) indicated that new zealanders “with mental health issues are three times more likely to be unemployed. mental health claims also make up around half of all social benefit claims” and “[t]he numbers of people with mental health conditions claiming benefits is gradually increasing.” māori and pasifika peoples account for nearly half of people with mental health disorders in new zealand, helping to explain the urban location of south auckland for the pilot, since many māori and pasifika peoples live there. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.8195 the second pilot focuses on the same urban area but aims to reduce youth reoffending among clients in the 24-month period after enrolment. performance payments are triggered only if genesis youth trust (2017) reduces reoffending levels on average by at least 5% for clients in the first two years and by 10% on average for clients in the last three years, with bigger reductions resulting in larger payments. the pilot contributes to the national party-led government’s desire to reduce the youth offending rate by 25%; this had already fallen by 38% between 2011 and 2015 (state services commission, 2015) before the bond was introduced, but the decline was not as significant for māori (59% for 14-16-year-olds) as for european or pākehā (74% for the same age group; ministry of justice, 2018). clearly, such high rates of mental health, unemployment, and reoffending amongst māori suggest some serious failings in the state policy, indicating why the government hoped “innovation” and improved outcomes would be achieved through sibs. innovation although already implemented or under trial in a small number of countries, sibs were new to new zealand and touted as: an innovative form of contracting for social outcomes, where governments utilise private sector skills to drive innovation in service delivery while . . . shifting the financial risk and reward for service performance to investors [which] means a greater incentive for these groups to apply their resources and expertise to designing and managing services in ways that make a difference. (office of the minister of finance & office of the minister for social development, 2016, p. 1) little publicly available information makes assessing innovation tricky. however, the office of the minister of finance and office of the minister of social development (2016) acknowledged that in the first trial the “degree of service innovation involved is relatively low” (p. 1), being similar to the ministry of social development’s current work-to-wellness contracts. apm, the provider, was also heavily reliant on this ministry to refer most clients for assessment, work placement, support, and other specialized services. this lack of innovation is associated with a haphazard development process that took over four years. an independent evaluation said the pilot was “well-run” (mules, 2016, p. 3), but the lead agency, the ministry of health, had little commercial financial expertise, creating a heavy focus on process diligence as opposed to achieving a successful process outcome—a finding similar to the independent whānau ora review panel’s (2018) comments on whānau ora. there was also confusion about who was developing the sib model since the ministry of health drew heavily on treasury experts. in terms of implementation, the ministry of social development led the first pilot and oranga tamariki (ministry for children) led the second. there is no evidence that te puni kōkiri was ever involved in either pilot, despite māori being likely targets. further problems emerged from cabinet direction to undertake a “market-led” programme asking participants to identify outcomes and target populations they wished to address (mules, 2016). eventually, seven proposals were evaluated, and four topics selected, with mental health and employment prioritized for the first pilot. but the planned provider–investor partnership for this first sib unconditionally withdrew in mid-2016. as a result, the bond negotiated with apm ended up being “more simplified and [having a more] streamlined structure than was envisaged at the 17 humpage: does a payment-for-outcomes model improve indigenous wellbeing? published by scholarship@western, 2020 commencement of the social bonds pilot programme” (office of the minister of finance & office of the minister for social development, 2016, p. 1). asking private sector organizations to define the “problem” to be solved acknowledged that providers working in the community often have a better understanding of the “problem” than government, something indigenous peoples have often argued. however, it also reflects a naivety about the realities of problem definition. most providers and investors cannot access the kind of information governments have available, nor do most have sufficient resources to conduct detailed research prior to a proposal of interest. the second pilot was delayed because “development of a robust value proposition and associated outcome agreement . . . has been more involved than initially expected” (office of the minister of finance & office of the minister for social development, 2016, p. 3). in fact, genesis youth trust (2016) ended up negotiating a new national-level agreement with new zealand police to gain access to the data needed to measure its success and then analysing 2,350 youth offenders in auckland between 2012 and 2015 to demonstrate that only half of its clients reoffended within 18 months, compared to nearly 80% of non-genesis clients. roy et al. (2018) have noted that most non-profit organizations do not have the financial skills or systems to manage and monitor investments, requiring valuable resources going to consultants, and there is some evidence that this is the case with genesis youth trust (2018). in this context, the independent evaluation concluded, “government should lead with the outcome areas in which it has interest in procuring a social bond” (mules, 2016, p. 15). despite these significant pre-pilot efforts, the level of innovation evident in the second pilot is limited. police youth aid refers young people for an “enhanced intervention” that includes a validated psychological assessment using the youth level of service-case management inventory (yls-cmi) to assess their risks, protective factors, and needs and generates key priority areas to focus the work of the social worker, mentor, and counsellor each young person and their family works with for 6 to 24 months. this holistic approach is, however, promoted more broadly in the youth crime action plan (state services commission, 2017). aside from assisting youth offenders over longer periods than before, the key innovation is the yls-cmi tool because “we are much more objective and rigorous in the way we assess clients at their time of entry and in the way we customise their intervention over the subsequent six months” (genesis youth trust, 2018, p. 14). the tool itself, however, was developed in north america and adapted for australia, where genesis received training. it is unclear if and how the tool was adapted to the new zealand context, particularly for māori. outcomes both pilots have experienced difficulties achieving contracted outcomes, especially in attracting sufficient referrals and enrolments. only 269 people were referred to apm between april 2017 and may 2018, with 112 enrolled (against a target of 340 per year) and only 36 were assisted into employment (te tautoko nga tangata, 2018). between april 2017 and march 2018, only 21.9% of apm clients moved into work for the required number of months—anything below 60% of the target was considered non-performance. slow enrolments were initially blamed on the limited time between providers signing the contract and the start of service delivery in order to attract sufficient staff but attempts to encourage more self-referrals were not successful. results were so poor the programme was replaced by a work to wellness contract covering the social bond activity and an existing apm contract in in february 2019 (moffat, 2018). 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.8195 minutes from an apm workcare and te tautoko nga tangata ltd. investor advisory group (2018) meeting suggest that apm was placing around 50% of clients into work by april 2018, above the expected rate of 43%, but the number choosing to enrol was only slightly higher than those declining (moffat, 2018). this suggests many potential clients did not find the focus on employment appropriate or worthwhile; a lack of consultation with and information disseminated to health professionals, as well as the association of psychotherapists’ petition against this “experimental approach to mental-health funding” (rnz, 2015, para. 2) may have added to enrolment problems (brookes, 2015; henrickson et al., 2015). it is likely that a lack of consultation with māori experts about the best solutions for māori young people also contributed to the pilot’s poor outcomes. the second pilot similarly had problems meeting enrolment targets, despite all referrals coming from new zealand police. this was again blamed on the time needed to find new staff, given the programme began only one month after approval was given. however, genesis youth trust (2018) claimed that it was “well ahead of target in reducing client ‘recidivism risk factors’” with: 61 of 65 clients achieving a reduction in their yls-cmi score at their 3-month assessment, and 34 of 36 clients . . . at their 6-month assessment. the vast majority of these reductions (79% and 92% respectively) were greater than 10%, with this achievement being well ahead of target. (p. 16) as a result, an additional incentive payment was paid, despite the enrolment shortfall. overall, genesis achieved a non-reoffending rate for bond clients of 67% between september 2017 and june 2018. genesis annual reports indicate that, in 2016 to 2017, its non-reoffending rate was 58%, suggesting an improvement despite the higher-risk profiles of clients. yet genesis youth trusts’ (2017) non-reoffending rate peaked at 89% between 2007 and 2008 and was at least 71% in most years since 1999 with the exception of some significant fluctuations to much lower rates in 2014 to 2017. these fluctuations likely stem from a significant scaling back of operations due to lack of funding, but they do suggest considerable variation, making one year’s worth of statistics insufficient to assess the real success of the bond. this point reinforces ross philipson consulting’s (2011) early evaluation of social bonds: there are very real difficulties in assessing what projects have the potential to deliver a net benefit for the government, and even greater difficulty in evaluating whether contracts are being successful or not (which is critical for determining the level of payment investors receive). (p. 1) the evaluation cited several studies from the united states where even outcome-based contracts, never mind social bond funding mechanisms, had failed to achieve expected outcomes. indeed, by the time the first new zealand pilot rolled out in 2017, two of the three international examples cited in cabinet papers had been abolished before the contractual period ended for not meeting outcomes (brookes, 2015). in this context, it would be extremely surprising if the new zealand trials met all of the outcome indicators established. this is particularly the case for the first trial: the ministry of social development’s (2016) mental health employment service was abandoned after it was found to achieve poor outcomes compared to ministry-delivered case management. this service aimed to achieve similar outcomes as the first sib bond trial and similarly experimented with pfo but with performance 19 humpage: does a payment-for-outcomes model improve indigenous wellbeing? published by scholarship@western, 2020 payments triggered at a lower rate of success. given its demise, it is not surprising the first sib could not meet the higher target set and was also abandoned in 2019. this is clearly the result of poor policy process because the government ignored strong warnings that new zealand should not “engage in trials or implementation of a sib” at least until it had a “better understanding of the new zealand investor environment, especially the social lender and philanthropic sector” (ross philipson consulting ltd, 2011, p. 1; see also kpmg, 2013). discussion and policy lessons this article has examined two policies demonstrating the new zealand government’s belief that social services would be more innovative and achieve improved outcomes if driven by the financial incentive of pfo. whether explicit or not, indigenous peoples were the key target of these policy experiments in which government ignored expert advice, ultimately leading to problems with implementation and achieving anticipated levels of innovation. although the government’s willingness to ignore policy experts was more evident in the development of sibs, overturning the original intentions that whānau ora should focus only on māori and should offer high levels of self-determination to māori through an independent trust were particularly significant for indigenous peoples. arguably, the government’s desire to shift financial risk and accountability in social policy overrode its interest in improving māori outcomes by drawing on local or international evidence of what works best for indigenous peoples. nonetheless, and despite significant differences in their outcome measures, whānau ora commissioning agencies do appear to be improving indigenous people’s lives, probably above and beyond what was achieved through the whānau-focus funded through traditional contracting processes between 2010 and 2014. they also demonstrate and encourage innovation. yet many of the problems associated with mainstream funding models have been replicated and, as is common in other settler nation states (see fontaine, 2016; lavoie et al., 2010), providers were offered insufficient funding to solve the intergenerational problems associated with indigenous peoples that are shaped by broader structural contexts (such as colonization, employment, housing, and education). the success of sibs in improving indigenous outcomes is more uncertain; while the second pilot is making some headway in reducing youth reoffending and the holistic focus on young lives is encouraging, it is unclear how culturally appropriate the yls-cmi tool is for māori. the first pilot, meanwhile, failed in its attempts to assist unemployed people with mental health issues successfully into work; that a similar ministry of social development service had equally poor outcomes suggests this basic goal was flawed in the first place. at a broader level, both cases indicate that the pfo model is no “silver bullet” for improving indigenous wellbeing because it: • requires a heavy focus on compliance and accountability reporting to ensure performance payments can be met. yet, at the same time, these outcome measures are often insufficient to measure real change in complex indigenous lives. • commodifies indigenous lives by framing their outcomes and wellbeing in terms of “data” that can be used to award performance payments or profit to commissioning agencies and 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.8195 sib providers and investors (macdonald, 2019). not only is profit being made from indigenous suffering but a significant and enhanced collection of data about indigenous peoples may be used for unknown purposes by government, creating issues of indigenous data sovereignty (see bruhn, 2014; kukutai & taylor, 2016). • blurs responsibility for the wellbeing of citizens by devolving responsibility to nongovernment—and, in some cases, for-profit—actors, yet allowing them to walk away when outcomes are not achieved (malcolmson, 2014). ultimate responsibility for service recipients’ wellbeing lies with government; yet these intermediaries weaken the citizen– state relationship and the state–māori relationship emerging from the treaty of waitangi, particularly articles 1 and 2, which indicate that power should be shared. as indicated earlier, there is evidence that devolution of real power and funding makes a difference and—combined with a holistic, culturally appropriate, strengths-based approach—it is this that could significantly improve indigenous lives. the whānau ora commissioning agencies start to go down this path, but do not go far enough. the independent trust that the taskforce on whānau-centred initiatives (2010) proposed would have been a more adequate first step but emerging models such as the service management agreement negotiated in the tūhoe settlement, in the long run, provide more opportunity for radical experiments. any such devolution of power and funding needs to be indigenousled, well-planned and implemented, devoid of political interference, and to de-commodify indigenous peoples and cultures. only then will it be more successful than the two pfo examples discussed here. references 1newsnow. 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(2019, may 30). whānau ora gets $80 million boost. te ao: māori news. https://www.teaomaori.news/whanau-ora-gets-80-million-boost 8195 cover page.pdf 8195 humpage payment for outcomes rce.pdf 8269 sidorova being indigenous in an unlikely place rce.pdf the international indigenous policy journal volume 11|issue3 august 2020 being indigenous in an unlikely place: selfdetermination in the yakut autonomous soviet socialist republic (1920-1991) evgeniia sidorova university of calgary, canada, evgeniia.sidorova@ucalgary.ca roberta rice university of calgary, canada, roberta.rice@ucalgary.ca recommended citation sidorova, e., & rice, r. (2020). being indigenous in an unlikely place: self-determination in the yakut autonomous soviet socialist republic (1920-1991)the international indigenous policy journal, 11(3). https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2020.11. 3.8269 being indigenous in an unlikely place: self-determination in the yakut autonomous soviet socialist republic (1920-1991) abstract how and why is indigeneity expressed differently in different contexts? this article examines the articulation and expression of indigenous rights in one of the most challenging contexts—that of siberia in the soviet union era. based on primary, archival research carried out in the republic of sakha, russia, the review finds that re-claiming and re-defining indigeneity can serve as the first step in crafting an effective challenge to the domination and control exercised by states over indigenous populations. the study of indigeneity in unlikely places has important ramifications for indigenous peoples worldwide who are struggling against colonial-minded governments that have not only deprived indigenous peoples of their lands and resources, but also suppressed their right to selfidentification through imposed administrative definitions of indigeneity. keywords indigeneity, self-identification, self-determination, sakha, russia, soviet union creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0license. 1 siorova & rice: being indigenous in unlikely places published by scholarship@western, 2020 being indigenous in an unlikely place: self-determination in the yakut autonomous soviet socialist republic (1920-1991) self-identification is a fundamental principle in the struggle for indigenous rights worldwide. yet, this principle is frequently denied by governments through their policies and practices. indigenous peoples are not ethnic minorities in need of institutional mechanisms to ensure their political inclusion, but instead are self-determining peoples or nations with unique rights and representational needs as recognized in international conventions, most notably the 1989 international labour organization’s (ilo) convention 169 (c169)—indigenous and tribal peoples (1989), and the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip, 2007). whereas ethnic minorities often seek better integration into state structures and institutions, indigenous groups tend to seek greater autonomy from the state (alfred, 2009; papillon, 2012). despite growing recognition that indigenous political representation should be treated separately from that of ethnic minority representation, many governments continue to conflate the two (bird, 2014; kroeber, 2017; krook & o’brien, 2010; lublin & wright, 2013). as canessa (2018) has pointed out, there are many cases of peoples recognized as indigenous in geneva (ilo headquarters) or new york (un headquarters) but not in their own countries. re-claiming and re-defining indigeneity can serve as the first step in crafting an effective challenge by unrecognized indigenous peoples to the domination and control exercised by state authorities. with this objective in mind, our article addresses the central question: how and why is indigeneity expressed differently in different contexts? it is not enough to simply state that things are different in different countries. we need to understand what drives these differences as a means of bringing about positive change. this article examines the articulation and expression of indigenous identity and rights in one of the most challenging, and perhaps least studied, cases—that of siberia in the soviet union era (1920-1991). in the union of soviet socialist republics (ussr) and contemporary russia, only indigenous groups whose populations are less than 50,000 are recognized by the government as indigenous peoples (consultant plus, 1999; sidorova, 2019). larger indigenous groups, such as the yakut (sakha) people who are the focus of this article, are frequently categorized as ethnic minorities or titular nations (balzer & vinokurova, 1996; laruelle, 2013). however, titular nation and ethnic minority are not legal terms in russia.1 as khazanov (1995) noted, in the soviet union, the status of being an ethnic minority was a matter of arbitrary decision-making by the state (p. 98). the situation of the yakut (sakha) people is especially complex owing to their lack of indigenous recognition within russia as well as the longstanding dispute over the indigeneity criterion of “first occupancy” in this case (okladnikov, 1955). the soviet union era policy of korenizatsiia (nativization) established autonomous republics for large indigenous groups in exchange for their incorporation into the political system along class lines and their commitment to communist principles. nevertheless, as our research reveals, indigenous cultural expressions persist, even in the least likely scenarios. state-controlled definitions of indigeneity are about control and the power to define “others.” they reveal more about the character of the state than they do 1 the terms titular nations and ethnic minorities are, however, commonly used in the academic literature. for example, according to slezkine (1994), the sakha are members of titular nationalities that reside in “their own” republics (p. 450). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8269 about the indigenous peoples living within its borders (forte, 2013). they can also be inflected and reworked by social actors. this study is based on a collaborative research project undertaken by an indigenous-identified scholar, who was born and raised in siberia (sidorova), and a settler-ally scholar from canada who specializes in global indigenous issues (rice). primary, archival research on the yakut autonomous soviet socialist republic (assr) was undertaken by the lead author during the months of february to june 2019. the archival sources analyzed in this article are housed at the national library of the republic of sakha in yakutsk, russia. the sources were selected by way of a purposive sampling technique and analyzed using qualitative content analysis and manual coding techniques. all translations from russian to english were done by the authors. the article employs a historical institutionalist approach to the study of indigenous politics in the yakut assr complemented by a constructivist understanding of how ethnic-based collective identities are shaped by historical struggles and political opportunities or constraints (chandra, 2012; rice, 2012). the central argument of our article is that historic patterns of popular political incorporation shape, to a large extent, the expression and articulation of indigeneity in a given country. while path-dependent patterns of incorporation may set the stage for contemporary political expressions and frameworks for organizing, social actors can influence the direction of the course taken. the article opens with an overview of the concept of indigeneity and its articulation and expression in different contexts of the globe. this section highlights the diversity of indigenous–state relations in the global north and global south and how indigenous peoples, both recognized and unrecognized, are struggling to advance common causes. it also reveals the ways in which governments attempt to avoid their international obligations and responsibilities to indigenous peoples by manipulating official definitions of indigeneity to arbitrarily exclude large portions of the population from self-identifying as indigenous peoples. the article then turns to the case study of the yakut autonomous soviet socialist republic during the period of 1920—which marked the beginning of the soviet union’s “nativization” campaign—until 1991 when the regime collapsed. the case study reveals the ways in which the yakut (sakha) people have attempted to carve out an autonomous space for practicing their culture and traditions in the face of the top-down efforts of the ussr to incorporate them into its political system as workers and peasants and despite their adoption of communist ideology. one of these ways to preserve sakha culture was to share olonkho epics (described below) that emphasized the classless nature of the yakut (sakha) society. the study of indigeneity in an unlikely place has important ramifications for indigenous peoples worldwide who are struggling against colonial-minded governments that have not only deprived indigenous peoples of their lands and resources, but also suppressed their right to selfidentification through imposed administrative definitions of indigeneity. the global politics of indigeneity there is no universal and unambiguous definition of “indigenous peoples.” the work of josé martínez cobo (1986), the former special rapporteur of the sub-commission on prevention of discrimination and protection of minorities, has been especially influential in establishing the principle of selfidentification as the key diagnostic for indigeneity. for example, according to ilo c169 (1989), “selfidentification as indigenous or tribal shall be regarded as a fundamental criterion for determining the groups to which the provisions of this convention apply” (art. 1.2). similarly, undrip (2007) states, 3 siorova & rice: being indigenous in unlikely places published by scholarship@western, 2020 “indigenous peoples have the right to determine their own identity or membership in accordance with their customs and traditions” (art. 33.1). unlike ilo c169, which outlines a working definition of indigenous peoples based on criteria that includes historical continuity, first occupancy of or longstanding connection to lands, colonized condition, and a non-dominant status in society, undrip provides no such definition (samson & gigoux, 2016). in simpson’s (1997) estimation: the diversity of the world’s indigenous communities is such that no single definition is likely to capture the breadth of their experience and their existence, but may in fact exclude particular groups in its efforts to establish a defined category of indigenous peoples. (p. 22) it is our position that a strict definition of indigeneity is neither necessary nor desirable, especially in light of the pressure for a formal definition by governments seeking to manage the recent growth in selfidentified indigenous groups around the world (barume, 2010; forte, 2013). recent years have witnessed growing anxiety on the part of governments over the politicization of indigenous identities and the accompanying demands for greater autonomy from the state (samson & gigoux, 2016). the core demands of indigenous movements across the globe are those of identity, territory, and autonomy. identity-based demands center on the struggle for recognition as distinct peoples with special rights in the constitution and laws of their respective countries. demands for identity include official recognition and protection of indigenous languages, cultures, and traditions as well as special programs such as bilingual intercultural education, indigenous health, and community development (reuque paillalef, 1998). the demand for territory centers on the need for the preservation, protection, and recuperation of previously held indigenous lands. here land represents a space for the spiritual, cultural, and material reproduction of indigenous peoples, as opposed to simply an element of production (ticona alejo, 2000). lastly, the demand for autonomy centers on the call for self-determination and self-government within indigenous territories (díaz polanco, 1998). selfdetermination is a core concept of international customary and treaty law that affirms indigenous peoples’ rights, conventionally associated with statehood, to sovereignty of governance, territorial integrity, and cultural autonomy (anaya, 1996). the broader societal understanding of indigenous identity as ethnic or racial in nature stands in tension with indigenous peoples’ claims to nationhood (barker, 2015; wilkins & stark, 2017). the term “national or ethnic minority” does not capture the unique representational needs of indigenous peoples. for instance, whereas ethnic minorities are often identified with a given state in which they are numerically small, indigenous peoples tend not to identify themselves with a given state but with a given territory. in addition, the rights of minorities are generally framed in individual terms, whereas indigenous peoples’ rights are collective rights, protected by international law (barume, 2010). the passage of undrip marked a watershed moment for the global indigenous rights movement, affirming indigenous peoples’ rights to self-identification and self-determination. governments have responded in a number of ways to offset their responsibilities and obligations under the declaration. the canadian government, for example, initially voted against its adoption, as did australia, new zealand, and the united states. the russian government simply sidestepped this debate by abstaining from voting on the passage of undrip. it has also failed to ratify ilo c169. the russian government classifies the indigenous peoples living within its borders, such as the enets, oroks, nenets, and evenkis, 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8269 as “indigenous small-numbered peoples of the north, siberia, and the far east” whose populations require legal protection (pika, 1999). according to the federal law about indigenous small-numbered peoples, in order to meet the government’s requirements for designation of indigenous status, a group of peoples must number fewer than 50,000, maintain a traditional way of life, inhabit remote areas of the country, and identify as a distinct ethnic group (consultant plus, 1999; first peoples worldwide, 2014). donahoe and habeck (2011) suggested that small people status implies a lower level of social organization in a hierarchy and that it is not a status to be proud of, to maintain, or to nurture. in forte’s (2013) estimation: “the right to measure involves a power to erase, just as the power to speak for indigenous peoples, and to assign their identities, is the power to silence them, permanently” (p. 32). historically, the soviet government had developed the legal concept of indigeneity with the intention of helping “backward” northern communities find their path to communism (slezkine, 1994, p. 421). neither the soviet nor the russian governments have officially recognized the colonization of indigenous lands. as a result, indigenous land claims in the country remain unrecognized (sidorova, 2019). in the global south, governments have adopted a variety of stances toward undrip implementation. while some governments have adopted evasive maneuvers to avoid addressing their indigenous rights obligations, others have acted as global leaders in this area. in africa and asia, governments actively worked to obtain a strict definition of indigenous peoples during the drafting of the declaration that would exclude indigenous peoples in their own countries from becoming beneficiaries (henriksen, 2009). in the absence of such a definition, the indonesian government, for example, has cast all its citizens as indigenous, thereby supporting the undrip without recognizing its applicability within its borders (bertrand, 2011). nigeria and kenya, both of whose economies are heavily dependent upon precious resources that are located in indigenous peoples’ territories, abstained from voting on the declaration (kipuri, 2009). in latin america, indigenous rights to self-identification and selfdetermination are more widely accepted. ecuador, the birthplace of special rapporteur martínez cobo, is regarded as an indigenous rights pioneer (van cott, 2005; yashar, 2005). the country’s 2008 constitution recognized the plurinational character of the state, the historic goal of ecuador’s indigenous movement (rice, 2012). in contrast, in neighboring peru, indigenous peoples have played a limited role in the political life of the country. outside of the amazonian region, appeals to indigenous identity do not resonate in the country (glidden, 2011). such regional variation in the politicization of indigenous identity speaks to the unique history of indigenous–state relations in a given country and its particular pattern of popular political incorporation. constructivism views identities as multiple, fluid, and capable of change depending on economic, social, and political processes (chandra, 2012). in other words, individuals have multiple identities, some of which are privileged or activated over others depending on the situation or context. for constructivists, all identities are socially constructed—they are developed through social relations with others. as canessa (2018) has pointed out: “at the risk of stating the obvious: ‘indigenous’ is not an indigenous concept” (p. 316). a group’s identification as indigenous emerges through particular patterns of engagement and struggle with other social actors (murray li, 2000). although indigenous identities are socially constructed, they are not automatic; historic patterns of popular political incorporation shape and define their political expression and salience (rice, 2012). strong legacies of corporatist or classbased integration, for instance, make the construction of alternative ethnic identities exceedingly 5 siorova & rice: being indigenous in unlikely places published by scholarship@western, 2020 difficult or, at the very least, tend to undermine indigenous peoples’ efforts to generate a common framework for organizing and mobilizing. the comparative historical literature on political development suggests that key historical developments generate legacies or path dependencies that help shape future outcomes (collier & collier, 1991; luebbert, 1991; mahoney, 2002). historical institutionalists argue that institutions themselves profoundly shape not only what policies are possible and what political outcomes are likely, but that their preservation is part of our political socialization (rueschemeyer et al., 1992). in other words, citizens come to accept and value existing institutions and define their own interests and identities in terms of preserving those institutions. in the case of the soviet union, to which we are about to turn, class-based organizational forms and principles may have impeded the articulation and mobilization of indigenous identity for certain groups, but they have not completely precluded this possibility. from the yakut autonomous soviet socialist republic (assr) to the sakha republic the russian empire (1721-1917) was a classic multi-national empire where the de facto dominance of the russian people was established in society and ethnic minorities or inorodtsy (aliens) experienced legal restrictions and were subjected to forced assimilation or “russification” (agalarkhanova, 2013). after the october revolution of 1917 led by the bolshevik party of vladimir lenin, the government eliminated the special status of aliens, making all citizens equal. the 1918 constitution declared, “the establishment of any privileges or advantages on the basis of race and ethnicity, as well as oppression of ethnic minorities and restrictions of their equality to other nations, contradicts primary laws of the russian republic” (cited in agalarkhanova, 2013, p. 20). according to slezkine (1994), the application of marxist-leninist theory to the creation of the ussr in the 1920s was characterized by hostility to individual rights in favor of group rights. lenin viewed the communist state as a communal state, governed by the dictatorship of the new dominant class—the proletariat (kulchickiy, 2014). from the theoretical perspective of marxism-leninism, colonized peoples became equated with the working class. indigenous peoples were only entitled to special treatment until such time that the consequences of imperialism and colonialism had been cured by communism (see table 1). non-working-class groups within the soviet system included the kulaks (bourgeoisie) and shamans (indigenous healers). whereas the soviet government blamed the kulaks for the country’s economic and social problems, they chastised the shamans for being responsible for the “backwardness and ignorance” of indigenous communities (slezkine, 1994, p. 62). thus, as with any religion in the soviet system, shamanism was viewed as supporting relations of oppression and exploitation by sanctifying them with the authority of religious ideology. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8269 table 1. comparison between international legal perspectives and marxist-leninist views of indigenous self-determination international legal interpretation of indigenous self-determination marxist-leninist view of indigenous self-determination origin of the idea of self-determination and self-autonomy social contract theory: the government should be guided by the will of the people governed (anaya, 1996, kly & kly, 2001). this right should be recognized as jus cogens (fundamental principle of international law) to the highest rule of international law. marxism-leninism: the state is a commune governed by the dictatorship of the proletariat (kulchickiy, 2014; slezkine, 1994). the idea of soviet identity in a multiethnic state is “national in form and socialist in content” (wojnowski, 2015, p. 2). justification of the right to selfdetermination by indigenous peoples the need to denounce the politics of destruction and assimilation that indigenous communities have experienced in the past (xanathaki, 2007). indigenous empowerment (cowan, 2013) and resistance against centralizing tendencies of the state (niezen, 2003). creation of the working class competent in marxism-leninism among indigenous peoples in order to cure the wounds of imperialism (liber, 1991; slezkine, 1992, 1994). the need to destruct the power of indigenous bourgeoisie (kulaks) and shamans. the difference between indigenous self-determination and ethnic national self-determination indigenous self-determination does not include the right to secession, and it is limited to internal selfdetermination through the exercise of autonomy and self-government within state borders (anaya, 1996; nordin & witbrodt, 2012). the indigenous right to autonomy was determined by population size. the type of autonomy was also determined hierarchically, where the russians were at the top, and small indigenous nations were at the bottom (kulchickiy, 2014; stammlergossmann, 2009). note. source: authors’ compilation. as head of government of soviet russia (1917-1922) and then of the soviet union (1922-1924), lenin proposed the “great compromise” with non-russian groups that would deliver their incorporation into the revolutionary regime (liber, 1991). the first component of this project of popular political incorporation was to create an indigenous intelligentsia by providing upward mobility to governing party members and by destroying the old cultural elite. the policy of korenizatsiia (nativization or indigenization) sought to fill key management positions with indigenous representatives specifically trained and educated for this purpose (slezkine, 1992). korenizatsiia equated non-russian languages and cultures with the russian language and culture. liber (1991) suggests that this policy provided a 7 siorova & rice: being indigenous in unlikely places published by scholarship@western, 2020 cover of legitimacy for the largely urban-based revolutionary movement in a mostly agricultural, multiethnic country. as the general secretary (1922-1953) of the re-named communist party of the soviet union, joseph stalin, declared in april 1923: in order to familiarize the soviet power to non-russian peasantry, we should make it understandable for them through their native tongues. the schools and government bodies should consist of locals who speak local languages and well-acknowledged with laws, traditions, and lifestyles of non-russian ethnicities. (cited in kulchickiy, 2014, p. 190) despite its efforts to create the “new soviet nation,” the ussr did not attempt to assimilate non-russian groups into russian culture and society to the same extent that the russian empire did. by promoting the official use of indigenous languages within the state, the ussr inadvertently preserved a key cultural resource for indigenous communities. the second major component of lenin’s project of popular political incorporation was the creation of separate republics by dividing the country along ethnic national-territorial lines (liber, 1991). the soviet government declared that all ethnic majorities within non-russian provinces were “titular,” but that a hierarchy defined their administrative-territorial division. the titular nation of the first order was the russians themselves (e.g., the ussr), the union republics (e.g., the ukrainian ssr) were the second order, the autonomous republics (e.g., the yakut assr, the komi assr) were the third order, autonomous okrugs (ethnic regions) were the fourth order, and ethnic districts made up the fifth order (kulchickiy, 2014). for example, in the ukraine, ukrainians were the titular nation, but outside of the ukrainian ssr they were regarded as ethnic minorities by soviet officials. this hierarchy of autonomous units, which was based on ethnographic research, saw territorial boundaries redrawn in accordance with ethnic boundaries (stammler-gossmann, 2009). the vertical integration of ethnic republics, regions and districts not only led to some ethnic groups receiving greater autonomy from the state than others, but it also created the artificial division between small numbered indigenous peoples and large ethnic minorities in the ussr that has continued into present-day russia. self-determination in the yakut assr yakutia is historically part of russian siberia. in 1917, the yakut (sakha) people constituted 87.1% of the province’s total population, with russians (6.2%), evenki (5%), chukchi, yukagirs, lamuts, and other small groups making up the remainder (makarov, 1957). the soviet literature argues that the yakut (sakha) are not native to the land; their ancestors came to siberia from the central asian steppes and assimilated into the local indigenous tribes (okladnikov, 1955). okladnikov (1955) finds that in the xvii century, the yakut used to say that they would rather live in their original homeland than in a very harsh climate. he also compares the yakut language and culture with the languages and cultures of turkic and mongolian ethnicities such as the altai people and concludes that the yakut are not the original inhabitants of eastern siberia. according to soviet author gavriil makarov (1957), due to its harsh climate and remote location, the yakutian province did not attract the attention of russian settlers. instead, the russian empire turned the province into a penal colony. as maintained by soviet authorities, the perceived underdevelopment and political “backwardness” of the yakut (sakha) population was an outcome of the russian empire’s assimilationist policy (makarov, 1957). when the 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8269 bolsheviks established their power in yakutia in december 1922, the province became part of the ussr (argounova-low, 2012). the local indigenous intelligentsia was long aware of the resource potential of the province. gold was discovered in the nineteenth century and the first goldmining operation began in 1908, followed by the opening of soviet gold mines in 1925. by the 1960s, diamond operations had started (argounova-low, 2012). resource extraction in the yakut assr dramatically changed the demographics of the province. by the end of the soviet era, the yakut (sakha) people constituted only 33% of the province’s population, while the russian presence had increased to 51% (makarov, 1959). in 1917, yakut (sakha) intelligentsia established a cultural society named sakha aimakh (sakha kindred). the leaders of the society did not accept the october revolution, declaring that the bolsheviks had sabotaged ethnic relations in russia (argounova-low, 2012). by 1920, sakha aimakh was closed by soviet authorities for being bourgeois, nationalist, and anti-soviet in nature. subsequent attempts of the yakut (sakha) intelligentsia to open similar cultural societies, such as sakha omuk (the sakha people) and manchaary (named for the yakut national hero vasiliy manchaary), also faltered due to government intervention (argounova-low, 2012). throughout the 1920s and 1930s, the yakut (sakha) intelligentsia was persecuted for their “bourgeois nationalism.” according to historians of the soviet era, the term “nationalist” was reserved for those giving anti-soviet, counter-revolutionary speeches as well as those attempting to take over the government with the support of american and japanese imperial powers (zakharov, 2012). the committee for state security (kgb) also severely punished individuals accused of ethnic nationalism. according to article 59-7 of the criminal code of the ussr, ethnic nationalism included: “propaganda and agitation aimed to provoke ethnic and religious hostility and enmity, as well as distribution or production and keeping of literature of the same content” (dalan, 2003, p. 62). for example, dalan (vasiliy yakovlev), a famous sakha writer, was once accused of violating article 59-7 for writing a student paper that argued that yakutia had joined the ussr by force and which was interpreted by authorities as “anti-soviet nationalistic agitation” (dalan, 2003, p. 67). based on joseph stalin’s statement that “capitalist heritage is kept alive in ethnic culture,” numerous sakha writers, including dalan, were accused of being bourgeois nationalists and sent to prison (dalan, 2003, p. 61). in light of these dynamics, there was considerable debate among soviet authorities during the 1920s over whether or not yakutia should be granted the right to become an autonomous republic (national archive of the republic of sakha, n.d.). according to korobeynikov (2017), by the 1920s, the soviet authority had not developed any particular policy toward indigenous peoples. he noted that different governmental bodies held distinct positions on the yakut (sakha) leadership: siberian authorities (sibrevkom) expressed their sympathy toward yakut (sakha) political activists, the administrative center of irkutsk attempted to control them, and moscow did not have any particular opinion on them (korobeynikov, 2017). thus, the policy regarding the yakut (sakha) was determined mostly by circumstance. in 1921, representatives of the yakut (sakha) intelligentsia, platon oyunskiy, isidor barakhov, and a. ageev presented a draft of a resolution on the creation of the yakut assr to the soviet government (national archive of the republic of sakha, n.d.). their project was quickly dismissed. in january 1922, the yakut (sakha) leader m. ammosov declared autonomy for yakutia in the narkomnats (people’s commissariat for nationalities; national archive of the republic of sakha, n.d). the final decision about granting yakutia the right to self-autonomy was made by the politburo (principal policymaking committee of the communist party) with lenin’s approval in february of 1922 (national 9 siorova & rice: being indigenous in unlikely places published by scholarship@western, 2020 archive of the republic of sakha, n.d.). platon sleptsov (oyunskii), the yakut (sakha) political leader and writer, was appointed as head of the first government of the yakut autonomous soviet socialist republic (national archive of the republic of sakha, n.d). the ideas of autonomy and self-government among yakut (sakha) regional leaders were influenced by several political events: the emergence of regionalism in siberia in 1882, the february revolution, and the russian civil war (argounova-low, 2012). one of the main goals of the regionalist movement (oblasnichestvo) was the creation of the siberian federation, which meant much greater autonomy for siberia. the regionalist movement inspired the creation of the confederalist movement in the 1920s (argounova-low, 2012). after the february revolution in 1917, the russian tsar nicholas ii abdicated, and the provisional government replaced the tsar in march of that year. in june 1917, the local authorities in the russian provinces were replaced by local governmental bodies with much wider powers including control over police, education, and other social sectors (argounova-low, 2012). because of this new policy direction, the yakut (sakha) intelligentsia became supportive of and sympathetic to the provisional government. in the aftermath of the october revolution of 1917, the bolsheviks did not immediately seize power in siberia and the far east. to obtain full control over the country, the revolutionaries had to continue to fight the white russians (ruling class) until their defeat in 1923 (argounova-low, 2012). the confederalist group, which was created in the 1920s by the yakut (sakha) leader pavel ksenofontov, promoted the idea of a confederalist state with equal regional units and land use rights (argounova-low, 2012). the confederalists argued that the status of the yakut assr did not provide for sufficient self-determination and constitutional equality and did not prevent the economic exploitation of the region (argounova-low, 2012). in 1928, the confederalist movement was accused of participating in a counter-revolutionary plot and attempting to overthrow soviet power to create a bourgeoisie-democratic state in alliance with japan. in march 1928, all 22 members of the movement were executed (argounova-low, 2012). despite the intentions of regional leaders to have self-government, the yakut assr did not have real authority. according to mironov (2003), even though the idea of self-autonomy was initiated by the local indigenous intelligentsia, the real authority in the decision-making process belonged to the central soviet government and the ruling party. the 1937 constitution of the yakut assr declared that: the political base of the yakut assr is constituted of the unions of workers’ representatives who grew up and thrived because of the defeat of capitalist and feudal power and because of the establishment of a dictatorship of proletariat and the liberation of the yakut nation from oppression of the tsarist and russian imperialist bourgeoisie. (cited in mironov, 2003, p. 21) thus, the yakut autonomous republic was a predominantly class-oriented political organization that did not reflect the yakut (sakha) people as an indigenous nation. the yakut (sakha) people came to be defined by governing authorities as peasants and workers as opposed to the original peoples of yakutia (mironov, 2003). 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8269 sakha resurgence the system of interest group representation in the soviet union has been characterized as that of state corporatism (bunce & echols, 1980; hough, 1983). while corporatism is generally understood as a system in which interest groups become an institutionalized part of the political structure, under state corporatism the state uses interest group structures to control and dominate citizen groups and the interests they are allowed to voice (collier & collier, 1991; oxhorn, 1998). according to the classic work of philippe schmitter (1974): corporatism can be defined as a system of interest representation in which the constituent units are organized into a limited number of singular, compulsory, non-competitive, hierarchically ordered and functionally differentiated categories recognized and licensed (if not created) by the state and granted a deliberate representational monopoly within their respective categories in exchange for observing certain controls on their selection of leaders and articulation of demands and supports. (pp. 93-94) in exchange for nominal rights to autonomy, the yakut (sakha) people were obliged to organize and define themselves as workers and peasants. while the yakut (sakha) people may have assumed classbased identities and interests before the state, our research shows that within their communities they continued to practice their traditional culture and customs, albeit in adapted form. for instance, while the state referred to the sakha people as the “yakut,” they maintained their self-identification as the “sakha.” the influential sakha writer isidor barakhov (1924) once published an essay, “yakutization and the russian language,” that questioned whether the yakut (sakha) people had in fact received the right to autonomy after the revolution. barakhov also suggested that the soviet government promoted the use of indigenous languages as a vehicle to facilitate the building of soviet statehood in the country’s ethnic republics and regions. the soviet government permitted sakha folklore to be published in both the russian and sakha languages. olonkho is the ancient oral tradition of the sakha people that includes epic stories about good and evil, warriors, gods, and demons (urastyrov, 1983). olonkho was told by trained storytellers who recounted their stories from early morning until late at night, sometimes taking up to three days to tell the entire tale (omollon, 2000). according to omollon (2000), olonkho has been performed on the theatre stage since the first russian revolution of 1905. by 1957, plays based on olonkho stories were even performed in moscow. it is impossible to count how many epic stories there are of the sakha. in 1983, the siberian division of the institute of language, literature, and history kept more than 100 records of olonkho (urastyrov, 1983). the preface to the olonkho story, legends and myths of the north, stated that “indigenous literature originated in societies without social classes. the spiritual and esthetic experience of indigenous peoples, collected for thousands of years, became a driving factor in the art of northern writers, who were nurtured by a socialist society” (sangi, 1985, p. 4). similarly, the preface to mighty djaragyma suggested, “the olonkho expressed the eternal people’s dream about a peaceful life laboring under the sky where they belonged . . . olonkho is a memorial to the spiritual culture of the sakha people” (urastyrov, 1983, p. 3). hence, indigenous literature and oral traditions of storytelling survived under the ussr regime, but these traditions had to be adjusted to fit soviet ideology. for this reason, indigenous communities in the past were portrayed as altruistic workers who 11 siorova & rice: being indigenous in unlikely places published by scholarship@western, 2020 enjoyed a life of labor. the classless nature of olonkho stories, which fed the narrative of a pre-capitalist society, contributed to their survival under communist rule. in soviet literature, the russian colonization of yakutia is depicted as a form of deliverance and freedom for the yakut people from the local feudal aristocracy who exploited them. soviet interpretations of the sakha legend of tygyn darkhan, for example, portrayed him as a despotic leader who exploited his people. in their view, “russians saved the yakut people from tygyn’s oppression. the russian people, mighty and hardworking, helped the yakut people start a new life” (okladnikov, 1955, p. 426). according to soviet narrative, the russian colonizers were the “saviors” of the sakha people. hence, the soviet government’s propaganda used indigenous legends not only to promote its own ideology, but also to justify its colonial actions. racism and discrimination against indigenous peoples in the soviet union were viewed by authorities as a remnant of capitalism and bourgeois nationalism that could only be remedied by a proper marxist education. the emphasis on the creation of a homogenous soviet nation under a marxist-leninist regime denied the potential for the emergence of ethnic identification and mobilization (mironov, 2003). an important element of indigenous culture that the soviets did not tolerate was that of shamanism. all religious movements, cults, and churches, including yakutian shamanism, were politically discriminated against in the ussr (vasilieva, 2000). before the october revolution, shamanism peacefully coexisted with the russian orthodox church even though the tsarist government and the church attempted to fight shamanism, which they perceived as an expression of paganism. shamans were considered by the bolsheviks as “exploiters of other people’s labor” and as leisured classes (vasilieva, 2000, p. 69). after the russian civil war of 1924, the persecution of shamanism became more organized and widespread, forcing many shamans to abandon the practice. the yakut (sakha) writers platon oyunskiy and gavril ksenofontov published articles about the struggles over shamanism, noting that the average sakha did not clearly distinguish between their christian and shamanist beliefs, asking for help from both priests and shamans (vasilieva, 2000). nevertheless, soviet propaganda promoted anti-shamanism, calling it a “heritage of dark times, backwardness and ignorance” (vasilieva, 2000, p. 69). as a result of the government’s ban on shamanism, shamanist knowledge of spirituality, traditional medicine, rituals, traditions, moral and ethics was seriously eroded. following the collapse of the ussr, however, shamanism was resurrected as the traditional religion of the sakha people (omollon, 2000). by the end of the 1980s, 95% of the sakha people considered the sakha language to be their first language, while indigenous small-numbered peoples in the yakut assr reported less fluency in their indigenous languages (evenki 8.5%, even 34.7 %, yukagir 35.2%, chukchi 63.2%; sleptsov, 2013, p. 19). by 1986, the percentage of sakha students admitted to the first year of the local university increased to 80% of the student population (“soyuz nerushimyh?” [unbreakable union?], 2001). in that year, a group of officials from the central committee of the ussr and the kgb visited yakutsk, the capital city of yakutia, due to unrest among students at yakutsk state university (ysu). from march 29 to 31, 1986, russian teenagers fought with sakha students near the ysu campus. on april 1, 1986, a large group of sakha students gathered around the nearby lake in protest and to ask the minister of interior affairs to punish the russian teenagers who had provoked the fighting (“soyuz nerushimyh” [unbreakable union?], 2001). the following day, nearly 700 university students demonstrated in the streets shouting, “yakutia is for the yakuts, stop the russians!” the crowd of youth ended up meeting at 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8269 the university hall, where 21 students gave speeches about their view of the situation (“soyuz nerushimyh” [unbreakable union?], 2001). the youth accused the police of being inactive. the central committee of the communist party declared: “the yakut area committee must pay attention to the large failures in interethnic upbringing that led to the nationalistic expressions of the youth of yakutsk city” (“soyuz nerushimyh” [unbreakable union?], 2001, para. 16). according to one kgb official, “the kgb is against anti-soviet, bourgeois nationalism, and it aims to eliminate nationalism in any form” (cited in dalan, 2003, p. 326). the interethnic conflict in yakutsk was the first of its kind between the russians and the yakut (sakha) people. on december 27, 1991, one day after the dissolution of the ussr, the yakut autonomous soviet socialist republic was officially renamed the sakha republic. conclusion this article has sought to explain how and why indigenous organization and mobilization looks different in different places. based on the experiences of the yakut (sakha) people under soviet rule, we found that historic patterns of popular political incorporation shape the articulation and expression of indigeneity in a country. there is a certain amount of “stickiness” or path dependence to initial patterns of political incorporation that influence contemporary political expressions (collier & collier 1991). in the case of the soviet union, the yakut (sakha) people were incorporated into the political system by way of lenin’s so-called great compromise with non-russian groups that saw the creation of autonomous republics for large indigenous groups in exchange for their adoption of communist ideology and assumption of class-based identities and forms of organizing. despite the top-down efforts of the ussr to smother ethnic nationalism, including a formal ban on certain cultural practices, the yakut (sakha) people managed to preserve key elements of their traditional culture and language by actively adjusting them to fit within the soviet system. by the time the ussr collapsed in 1991, signs of an indigenous resurgence among the yakut (sakha) people had become visible. governments play a central role in defining indigenous identity as well as in formulating social policies and allocating resources to priority concerns. indigenous peoples have unique representational needs and governments that continue to cast them as ethnic minorities undermine their rights to selfidentification and self-determination. indigenous rights can only be adequately protected by indigenous control over the issues that influence their lives (xanthaki, 2007). as the case of the yakut (sakha) people of siberia has demonstrated, indigenous sovereignty is resurgent around the globe. indigenous peoples are increasingly searching for ways to shed what lucero (2012) has termed “ventriloquist forms of representation” through peasant and worker unions, political parties, or the state so that they may speak with their own voice (p. 287). the concept of being indigenous in an unlikely place pertains not only to the case of the yakut (sakha) people, but to all indigenous peoples struggling to reclaim and redefine their indigeneity, whether that be in the face of intransigent governments, unwelcoming cities, or even within the dictates of their own households and communities. international indigenous rights instruments, such as ilo c169 and undrip, play an important role in supporting indigenous sovereignty worldwide (lightfoot, 2016). this may especially be the case for non-recognized indigenous peoples in the struggle to advance their rights to self-identification and selfdetermination. even in cases where governments have refused to ratify or endorse indigenous rights 13 siorova & rice: being indigenous in unlikely places published by scholarship@western, 2020 conventions and declarations, indigenous peoples are able to appeal to international norms, laws, and organizations to advance their cause (brysk, 2000). while applying the concept of indigeneity to peoples and contexts where it is not normally used does run the risk of conceptual stretching (collier & mahon, 1993), changing the qualifying conditions of the concept (such as removing the first occupancy criterion) allows it to be taken up in meaningful ways by new groups seeking recognition not only of their rights but of their very existence by reluctant states. references agalarkhanova, a. 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(2005). contesting citizenship in latin america: the rise of indigenous movements and the postliberal challenge. cambridge university press. https://doi.org/10.1017/ cbo9780511790966 zakharov, v. p. (2012). vlast’ i obschestvo: obvinyeniya v burzhuaznom nacionalizme v yakutii v 19201930-h gg. [power and society: charges of bourgeois nationalism in yakutia in the 1920-1930s of the xxth century]. vestnik svfu, 9(2), 89-94. media representations of policies concerning education access and their roles in seven first nations students’ deaths in northern ontario the international indigenous policy journal volume 7 | issue 1 article 1 january 2016 media representations of policies concerning education access and their roles in seven first nations students’ deaths in northern ontario kevin gardam university of ottawa, kgard046@uottawa.ca audrey r . giles university of ottawa, agiles@uottawa.ca recommended citation gardam, k. , giles, a. r. (2016). media representations of policies concerning education access and their roles in seven first nations students’ deaths in northern ontario. the international indigenous policy journal, 7(1). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.1.1 media representations of policies concerning education access and their roles in seven first nations students’ deaths in northern ontario abstract we employed postcolonial theory, a case study methodology, and critical discourse analysis to investigate the ways in which non-first nations and first nations news sources produced understandings of the role(s) that education policies may have played in the deaths of seven first nations students in thunder bay, ontario, canada. we found that national non-first nations media sources produced the discourse that first nations peoples require federal government policy as a form of intervention in their lives. further, we found that though these media sources focused on criticizing the present state of first nations education, they ignored the colonial processes and policies that contributed to a situation that resulted in the students attending high school in thunder bay, rather than their home communities. first nations and local (thunder bay) non-first nations media sources, however, emphasized the need for greater cooperation between the canadian government and first nations peoples to resolve the long-standing policy issues that continue to affect first nations youth and their education in northern ontario. these findings point to important differences in the ways in which various forms of media cover first nations policy issues. keywords media, first nations, education policy, death, northern ontario acknowledgments we would like to thank the two anonymous reviewers and the editor for their very helpful insights. disclaimer trigger warning: the following article discusses cases of accidental death and suicide that some readers may find distressing. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/   m e d i a r e p r e s e n t a t i o n s o f p o l i c i e s c o n c e r n i n g e d u c a t i o n a c c e s s a n d t h e i r r o l e s i n s e v e n f i r s t n a t i o n s s t u d e n t s ’ d e a t h s i n n o r t h e r n o n t a r i o first nations youth in remote areas of northern ontario, canada often lack access to secondary schooling in their home communities. as a result, many students are forced to travel hundreds of kilometres away from home to the city of thunder bay, population 121,596 (statistics canada, 2012). tragically, between 2000 and 2011, seven first nations youths from northern ontario communities died while attending high school in thunder bay. the striking similarities between the circumstances of each death are troubling, as the students who died all shared more than the abrupt end to their young lives. for example, five of the seven students were found drowned in the same river on the outskirts of thunder bay, six of the students were boys, and all of the deaths were attributed to alcohol. while the nature of the deaths is quite similar, so too are their shared demographics. the vast and sparsely populated area of northern ontario in which the students lived forced the seven youth, who were aged 15 to18, to leave their home reserves to attend high school—a situation faced by hundreds of similar first nations youth (leung, 2012). while billeted with residents of thunder bay, none of the seven students were closer than 500 kilometers away from their home reserves, which are only accessible by air or, in the winter months, by ice road. in this article, we argue that policies requiring first nations students to travel farther than 500 kilometers just to attend high school place these youth in situations that can have tragic consequences. previous studies have shown that the media play an important role in determining how indigenous issues are understood (coleby & giles, 2014; furniss, 2001; harding, 2005, 2006; henry & tator, 2002; stoneham, goodman, & daube, 2014). for this study, we employed postcolonial theory, a case study methodology, and critical discourse analysis (cda) to examine the ways in which non-first nations and first nations news sources produced understandings of the role that policies related to education may have played in the seven students’ deaths. due to the profound impact that mass media can have on policy decisions, the purpose of this article is to analyze the media coverage that surrounded the seven students’ deaths and in turn make broader recommendations about how the media can better inform canadians on first nations issues. a well-informed population that better understands first nations issues is essential to garnering support among the canadian public regarding future policy decisions affecting first nations peoples. the news coverage of these seven tragic deaths make an important contribution to understanding how issues pertaining to first nations education are produced differently in a variety of news media, opening up the possibility of encouraging change. l i t e r a t u r e r e v i e w in this section, we provide an overview of canadian media portrayals of first nations peoples and review first nations education policy in canada. importantly, following dye (1978), we take policy as indicating a government’s intentions: “whatever governments choose to do or not to do” (p. 3); we also concur with lawford and giles (2012) that a “government uses policy to rule, exercise a specific will and intent, and influence and control the decisions that people make” (p. 331). f i r s t n a t i o n s e d u c a t i o n p o l i c y : a b r i e f o v e r v i e w since first nations education policy is addressed exhaustively elsewhere (kirkness, 1999; paquette & fallon, 2010), we will provide only a brief overview. the indian act of 1876 as well as treaties between 1 gardam and giles: media representations of policies concerning education published by scholarship@western, 2016   the government and first nations groups formalized the federal government’s responsibility for the delivery of education to first nations peoples living on-reserve. revised in 1985, the indian act requires first nations youth to attend school from ages 6 to16. it also states that the government must “establish, operate and maintain schools for indian children” (indian act, 1985, s 114(2)) and “provide for the transportation of children to and from school” (indian act, 1985, s 115(b)). nowhere, however, does it set standards about how far away a community can be from a school. federal policy regarding education for first nations students on reserves has historically been used as a means to assert the federal government’s paternalistic duties over first nation youth (mcconaghy, 2000) through practices such as forcibly removing students from their homes in order to attend residential schools in often distant locations. this history, compounded by policies that have resulted in profound poverty and unemployment affecting a majority of remote reserves in northern ontario (nishnawbe aski nation, 2007), has created significant educational gaps between provincially run off-reserve schools and the federally run on-reserve schools. statistically, first nations peoples living on-reserve have disproportionately low levels of educational attainment. high school completion rates for first nations peoples on-reserve are low: only 42% of first nations peoples living on-reserve in canada complete high school, a stark contrast to the 90% of non-aboriginal peoples who complete high school (richards, 2014). the first nations education council (2009) has argued that low levels of education attainment are due to the federal government’s systemic underfunding of first nations education. first nations schools on-reserve receive on average $7,101 per student from the federal government, while, for example, schools off-reserve receive on average $10,578 per student from the provinces in which they are situated (assembly of first nations, 2012). this funding shortfall for on-reserve schools results in the federal government having great difficulty in meeting its responsibility to provide first nations students with adequate buildings, equipment, teaching, and transportation, as required by the indian act (1985), and draws into question whether or not the canadian government is in violation of the united nations (un, 2008) declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples, which stated that indigenous peoples have the right to education without discrimination. as a result, the federal government has often been met with vocal opposition from first nations groups (m. kennedy, 2013). despite the federal government’s dismal achievements in the provision of education for first nations peoples, members of the canadian public often lack an understanding of the federal government’s failures—a situation that has been exacerbated by the media. m e d i a r e p r e s e n t a t i o n s o f f i r s t n a t i o n s p e o p l e s i n c a n a d a the royal commission on aboriginal peoples (1996) issued a report that covered a vast range of issues regarding the relationship between aboriginal and non-aboriginal peoples in canada. one of the highlights in this 4,000-page report pertained to representations of aboriginal peoples in the media. the report’s authors argued that mainstream media portrayals do not reflect the realities aboriginal peoples face in canada: “aboriginal people are not well represented by or in the media. many canadians know aboriginal people only as noble environmentalists, angry warriors, or pitiful victims. a full picture of their humanity is simply not available in the media” (royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996, communications section, para. 2). the result of this representation, the authors argued, is the weakening of aboriginal culture in canada. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 1 [2016], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.1.1   misrepresentations of first nations peoples have long been prevalent in news discourses within canadian media. harding (2006) argued that news discourses involving aboriginal peoples have been protecting dominant interests since colonial times and continue to do so today. despite attempts by today’s media to avoid actively reproducing practices of social inequality, passive ethnocentrism continues to pervade canadian media reporting (harding, 2006). newsrooms, for example, are becoming increasingly hegemonic in the sense that a few large corporations own the majority of canadian daily newspapers. mahtani (2008) has maintained that journalists today face a “fear of challenging the status quo” (p. 657), as any reporting that resists newsrooms’ monolithic, colonial style of discourse can result in less job security. the oka crisis in 1990 serves as a recent and important reminder that the “us vs. them” discourse impacts contemporary media, in particular surrounding issues that polarize first nations peoples and non-first nations. anderson and robertson (2011) sought to explore the role that letters to the editor surrounding the oka crisis had in empowering countercolonial discourse. they found that although the letters offered a public forum for resistance, colonialstyle reporting still appeared as the dominant discourse in media across the country. colonial discourses can be found in the media through strategies such as belittling and localizing first nations issues to undermine the credibility of broad-scale first nations concerns (furniss, 2001). negative portrayals of first nations peoples both prevent and detract from progress in reducing racist stereotypes in canadian society, which—within the australian context—stoneham, goodman, and daube (2014) argued can harm the health of indigenous populations. the media representations of first nations peoples throughout canada’s colonial history highlight structural inequalities present in canada’s society. as a result of the need to situate policies and related processes pertaining to first nations peoples’ education within a colonial legacy, we chose to ground our investigation in postcolonial theory. p o s t c o l o n i a l t h e o r y it is important to note that the term “postcolonial” does not refer to a point in time after colonialism; instead, the term signifies a relationship of continuity—it was colonialism’s aftermath that has and continues to have effects on those who were colonized (mcewan, 2009). young (2003) argued that postcolonial theory can be used to frame power relations between colonizers and the colonized, and to show how their respective worlds are represented differently in the postcolonial world. such an approach is particularly relevant to our study due to canada’s enduring relationship with colonialism. although we are ostensibly in a postcolonial state in canada, colonialism’s legacy continues to pervade relations of power throughout the country, most notably through policy and legislation that influence first nations peoples’ access to healthcare, education, land, property ownership, and their very identities, and through accounts that describe first nations peoples as being “at risk” (galipeau & giles, 2014) and essentially pathological (kelm, 1998). critically analysing the representation of indigenous peoples, whether through media sources or otherwise, allows postcolonial theorists to reveal the underlying relations of power evident in postcolonial society. according to postcolonial theorists, historically, language used in discourses produced by the media has formed an important avenue used to help impose on the colonized a nation controlled and dominated by the colonizers (britton, 1999). discourses produced by the powerful elite often describe society as quixotic and free of discrimination or racism (van dijk, 1993). gandhi (1998) 3 gardam and giles: media representations of policies concerning education published by scholarship@western, 2016   noted that such descriptions rely on “postcolonial amnesia” (p. 4). language used by the media is a critical tool employed in attempts at disowning historical wrongs and present-day failures; postcolonial theorists challenge this denial of responsibility and reveal the ethnocentric implications produced by certain dominant discourses. m e t h o d o l o g y for this study, we selected an explanatory case study methodology. according to yin (2009), case study researchers are interested in gaining in-depth understandings of real-life events and processes that enable us to broaden our knowledge of social, political, and cultural phenomena. a case study can take a number of forms, including a social situation, event, program, activity, etc., in single or multiple social settings (bloor & wood, 2006). case study researchers who employ an explanatory approach use “how” and “why” questions to create explanations for certain events and how they can be applied to other situations (yin, 1994). as our research question was “how do non-first nations and first nations media represent the role that education policy played in seven first nations students’ deaths in thunder bay?” such an approach was appropriate. following harding’s (2005) argument that critical discourse analysis (cda) is effective in studying minorities’ treatment in media, we determined that cda was an appropriate methodology to study the treatment of the seven first nations students’ deaths in non-first nations and first nations media in canada. according to phillips and hardy (2002), the purpose of cda is to explore the relationship between discourses and the reality these discourses produce. this relationship is analysed by examining the way a social reality is produced through the constructive effects of texts (hardy, 2001). for example, how the media constructs the issue of first nations education will in turn shape the public’s understanding of the issue and thus the subsequent policy response by the government. throughout our study, we grounded our analysis on the emphasis media sources placed when defining the problem—whether a stereotypical “us vs. them” mentality was apparent or if the media highlighted fundamental inequalities at play affecting these first nations youth. these issues, and more importantly how these issues are framed for the public, play an important role in policy development and highlight the importance discourses can have at helping construct a social reality. as researchers interested in identifying embedded power structures in society, it is important to understand language’s capacity as an agent of oppression or empowerment. cda, therefore, is used to view language as “constitutive and constructive rather than reflective and representative” (phillips & hardy, 2002, p. 13). when language is understood to construct reality as opposed to represent it, it is clear that discourses produced by the media in canada can play important roles in reinforcing or challenging dominant discourses. as such, analysts are able to delineate power relations in news reporting by exploring subtle variations in language used in discourse (furniss, 2001). we employed cda to examine differences in discourses produced by non-first nations and first nations media pertaining to the coverage of the seven first nations students’ deaths in the city of thunder bay and the role that policies related education may have played in them. table 1 outlines the first nations and non-first nations media sources used in this study. we identified articles through the university of ottawa’s library database by searching the names of each student who had died using search terms such as “student’s name,” “student’s name and thunder bay,” 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 1 [2016], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.1.1   or “student’s name and death.” the chronicle journal’s articles were the only ones not available online and were retrieved from the toronto public library’s archives. due to language barriers and resources limitations, the search methods used in this study were limited to english language newspaper articles and press releases. t a b l e 1 . a r t i c l e s b y m e d i a s o u r c e a n d t y p e m e d i a s o u r c e t y p e n u m b e r o f a r t i c l e s f i r s t n a t i o n s n e w s s o u r c e s windspeaker news article 1 wawatay news news article 4 turtle island news news forum 3 aboriginal legal press release 1 n o n f i r s t n a t i o n s n e w s s o u r c e s t h e c h r o n i c l e j o u r n a l ( l o c a l ) news article 9 t o r o n t o s t a r ( n a t i o n a l ) news article 6 t b n e w s w a t c h ( l o c a l ) news article 3 t h e c a n a d i a n p r e s s ( n a t i o n a l ) news article 1 c a n a d i a n n e w s w i r e ( n a t i o n a l ) press release 1 c b c n e w s ( n a t i o n a l ) news article 1 5 gardam and giles: media representations of policies concerning education published by scholarship@western, 2016   it is important to note that we searched for articles in the globe and mail and the national post, two of canada’s national newspapers. neither newspaper included coverage of the students’ deaths. we included the toronto star as a national newspaper, given its broad circulation and focus. the first author coded each article or press release; the second author then verified each code. as we engaged with a postcolonial lens, we paid special attention to discourses pertaining to power, particularly as they related to who (e.g., federal government, provincial government, first nations) was seen to be able to exercise it legitimately and how it was exercised, and to the labels that were applied to first nations peoples. codes that coalesced to form the colonial discourse that “first nations people require federal government policy as a form of intervention in their lives” included “government-prescribed intervention,” “political party blaming,” and “unhealthy or hopeless first nations youth.” this discourse was identified in national non-first nations news sources. a second set of codes, “education as empowerment,” “cultural awareness,” “cooperation,” “resilience,” “healing,” and the “future,” coalesced to create the counter-colonial discourse that “there needs to be greater cooperation between the canadian government and first nations peoples to resolve the long-standing policy issues that continue to affect first nations youth and their education in northern ontario,” which was found in first nations and local non-first nations news sources. r e s u l t s our results indicate that reporting of the role that education policy may have played in the students’ deaths is largely divided between the dominant discourse produced by national non-first nations media, and the dominant discourse produced by local non-first nations thunder bay news sources and first nations media. national non-first nations media’s employment of the discourse, “first nations people require federal government policy as a form of intervention in their lives,” downplayed the effects of canada’s colonial history and policies while promoting government intervention as a necessary response to first nations education. local non-first nations media highlighted structural inequalities at play in first nations education and, like first nations media, supported a collaborative approach with the government that recognizes the need for first nations peoples’ need to have meaningful roles in education decisions and policy, and therefore reaffirming their self-determination. n a t i o n a l n o n f i r s t n a t i o n s m e d i a in their reporting of the seven first nations youths’ deaths, non-first nations media reported that attending secondary school in thunder bay was the only option for first nations youth, as their “remote northern” communities did not have other available options: the students have no choice but to leave their isolated reserves in northern ontario if they want to further their education. (talaga, 2011a, para. 4) the author provided no reasons as to why many first nations youth have no access to secondary school in their communities and consequently must leave to attend school. this sort of reporting was dominant in most national non-first nations media. the reasoning for the lack of secondary school access, however, was often absent or subjugated to a short blurb with no discussion of possible colonial policy decisions that may have played a role in the deaths. the canadian press (maurino, 2011) and the toronto star (talaga, 2011b) did include then assembly of first nations national chief shawn 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 1 [2016], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.1.1   atleo’s explanation that first nations education is a result of policies that render it underfunded and inequitable. concurrently, non-first nations media (re)produced the idea of first nations peoples being “wards of the state” and described the paternalistic duties of the government. examples of this included an article by the canadian press following one student’s death in 2011. the article, entitled “more must be done for safety of native teens after another death: opposition: help native teens now, opposition tells liberals” (maurino, 2011), leads the reader to believe it is solely the government’s responsibility to help not only first nations youth in northern ontario, but first nations youth across canada. in fact, many headlines included references to one political party blaming another for failing to act on the troubling deaths of first nations youth in thunder bay. for example, the headline of an article by talaga (2011c) of the toronto star read, “‘double standard’ for native teen deaths: ndp's howard hampton blasts province over dead and missing youth.” the double standard referred to in the article is government policies and responses for issues affecting first nations youth when compared to issues affecting non-first nations youth in urban areas. only one of the national non-first nations news articles, one by the toronto star (talaga, 2011a), mentioned the need for the government of canada to work with first nations leaders to address the problems affecting first nations education. l o c a l n o n f i r s t n a t i o n s m e d i a the chronicle journal is thunder bay’s most popular daily newspaper and it is circulated throughout many smaller communities in northwestern ontario. unlike the readers of national newspapers in other communities, the chronicle journal’s readers have a stronger relationship to the issues that occur in thunder bay. as such, it is perhaps not surprising that we found key differences between the chronicle journal’s coverage of the first nations students’ deaths and that found in national non-first nations media, particularly in the language its writers used. an editorial ("a life of hope," 2011) in the chronicle journal, written following the death of one student, touched on the struggles newspapers face when covering such tragic—and often political— events. the editorial described the realities faced by writers when trying to include as much detail as possible in a short amount of time. the editorial argued that the humanity of events could sometimes be unintentionally left out of articles and not due to a lack of cultural awareness or empathy on the authors’ parts. the editorial also argued that there are more issues at play than simply funding gaps between first nations and non-first nations students: they involve cultural differences, historical and lasting inequality. (para. 11) while national non-first nations media often included political parties pointing fingers at each other over who is to blame  in their headlines, the chronicle journal chose to focus on cooperation. for example, one headline read, “co-operation key to stop tragedies: mcguinty” (ketonen, 2012). the article highlighted that dalton mcguinty (the then premier of ontario) advocated for increased communication and co-operation between the provincial government, federal government, and first nations leaders, something that would require policy change; as demonstrated below, this discourse is the same as the one produced by first nations media. another article in the chronicle journal (diaczuk, 2011) argued that, while nishnawbe aski nation (the political territorial organization that represents 49 first nation communities within northern ontario) plays a leadership role in addressing 7 gardam and giles: media representations of policies concerning education published by scholarship@western, 2016   the inequalities affecting first nations students, it could not do so alone and needed help and support from the provincial government. the other local source, tb news watch, had limited articles available to review, but still showed signs of producing discourses that supported first nations’ self-determination. for example, after an exhaustive 92-day search for one of the missing teens, the author chose to focus on the incredible determination and support the family received from the community: there were a few volunteers who were there every single day with the grandmother. (dunick, 2011) the article continued by describing the closeness of the community throughout the search and the importance of raising concerns over the lack of support and resources students have when they move to thunder bay, which is a direct reflection of policy failures. the language used by both local news sources and the manner in which details were provided highlight the key differences between the discourses produced by local and national non-first nations media pertaining to policies related to access to education. f i r s t n a t i o n s m e d i a like local non-first nations media, first nations media sources also argued for greater cooperation between the government and first nations peoples to address the lack of educational access affecting first nations youth. instead of arguing for reliance on federal policy to resolve the education issues that resulted in the seven students moving to thunder bay, first nations media supported a cooperative approach that includes first nations community members and affirms their self-determination. turtle island news, a canadian national daily indigenous news service, highlighted nishnawbe aski nation deputy grand chief waboose’s demand: the governments of ontario and canada work with first nation leaders and educators to ensure that adequate support services are in place for students who must travel away from home for secondary school and to work with us to develop education services in all first nations that is on par with the rest of canada. (t. b. kennedy, 2011, para. 54) this article emphasized the desire for first nations peoples to have meaningful input into policies and practices that address education problems persistent in northern ontario. similarly, wawatay news (garrick, 2011) recognized the role that a lack of social support and a lack of access to education could have played in their deaths. the author highlighted that a lack of available social support in this unfamiliar environment was a barrier students face when continuing their education in thunder bay. opening and increasing dialogue and partnerships between first nations peoples and non-first nations peoples, especially concerning the canadian government’s existing policies and their impacts, was the strategy first nations media advocated to address the students’ deaths. along with promoting partnerships with the canadian government, first nations media highlighted that problems in first nations education are part of a long legacy of colonization. for example, aboriginal legal’s (2012) press release drew attention to the fact education problems in first nations communities are not a new problem, but instead a part of a “continuing crisis in education and resources 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 1 [2016], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.1.1   for first nation people in northern communities” (para. 3), which are related to government policies. turtle island news (admin, 2013; t. b. kennedy, 2009) also alluded to the fact that the problems first nations education now faces have longstanding, underlying root causes that are leading to the deaths, and reaffirmed first nations’ self-determination by focussing on the hope and courage of their youth. following the death of a student in 2009, turtle island news stressed that the “strength and resilience” (t. b. kennedy, 2009, para. 25) of first nations youth in northern ontario will help shape their role in the future. further, the same article highlighted then nishnawbe aski nation grand chief stan beardy’s hope that by “encouraging dialogue to increase cultural awareness and understanding among both the aboriginal and non-aboriginal communities, we can better ensure our young people feel safe” (para. 25). d i s c u s s i o n our results demonstrate key differences in the ways that national non-first nations media, local nonfirst nations media, and first nations media reported the deaths of seven first nations students in thunder bay and the role that education policies and associated practices played in them. by ignoring the history of colonial domination and existing relations of power in their reporting, national non-first nations media failed to recognize the damaging impacts that colonial policies and practices have had and continue to have on first nations peoples, a situation that can be described as “postcolonial amnesia” (gandhi, 1998). first nations media, on the other hand, reported the deaths as being part of a colonial legacy that needs to be addressed through policy change that results in meaningful partnerships between first nations and the canadian government. interestingly, the local non-first nations media in thunder bay mirrored that of the first nations media. p o s t c o l o n i a l a m n e s i a based on our analysis, national non-first nations news coverage of the students’ deaths lacked discussion of the colonial processes that have led to the current state of first nations education and, therefore, rendered the role of colonialism in the students’ deaths invisible. as a result, we argue that national non-first nations’ media accounts of the students’ deaths represent a form of postcolonial amnesia (gandhi, 1998). ignoring canada’s history of colonial repression and the current policies reflecting colonialism in education can result in the marginalization of the struggles first nations peoples in canada have endured and which lead to non-first nations peoples justifying racism and social injustice. while the national non-first nations media reports we analyzed demonstrated an understanding of the disparities in education and health between non-first nations and first nations peoples in today’s society, by omitting discussion of the dominant group’s historically damaging roles and continuing perpetuation of inequitable policies in first nations education, non-first nations media reporting both reflected and (re)produced postcolonial amnesia. gandhi (1998) stated that people in positions of power often “attempt to disown the burdens of their colonial inheritance” (p. 4), which can be understood as a failure to take responsibility for past and current wrongdoings. non-first nations media who disregard the past when reporting current problems in education are perpetuating some non-first nations people’s attempts to disown their roles in past and current government-prescribed attempts at control and domination. while literature concerning first nations education illuminates the fact that past approaches by the government 9 gardam and giles: media representations of policies concerning education published by scholarship@western, 2016   continue to have a harmful impact on first nations peoples in canada today (glenn, 2014), not one national non-first nations media source suggested that this history and its current policy legacy could have played a contributing role in the students’ deaths. interestingly, one local news source, the chronicle journal, did allude to cultural differences and historical inequities, which it argued were having an effect on current first nations students. education policy and practices have historically been used as a means to assimilate, institutionalize, and assert government’s paternalistic duties over first nation youth (mcconaghy, 2000). although reporters and others may be quick to point out that residential schools are now closed, first nations education continues to be very much an issue today. many residential schools have been replaced by boarding homes, where first nations youth now have to live, hundreds of miles away from home, simply to attend high school. the physical distance alone exemplifies the need for a policy solution that brings education closer to home for these youth. past successes have shown the potential that initiatives grounded in self-determination may play in addressing first nations’ education needs. s e l f d e t e r m i n a t i o n in contrast to the discourses produced in national mainstream media, first nations media promoted a cooperative solution to the education and health issues that contributed to the deaths of the seven students. as a result, first nations media challenged the non-first nations media portrayal of first nations as child-like and in need of help, which is reflected in the indian act (1985), a piece of legislation that “still rules the personal and collective lives of aboriginal people” (tousignant, vitenti, & morin, 2013, p. 402). the indian act was based on the assumption that there was a need for paternalistic rule over the first nation peoples by the canadian government. by promoting the right of first nations to play an active, self-determined role in education, first nation media challenged the dominant discourse that first nation peoples in canada need government policy intervention. while meaningful partnerships with the canadian government were clearly advocated in the first nations media we reviewed, we argue that partnerships are most effective when they enable first nations’ self-determination, which can be expressed and produced in many forms. hayhurst and giles (2013) argued that the acknowledgement and examination of power relations between first nations and non-first nations is critical if partnerships in economic, social, and cultural development are to succeed. the pursuit of self-determination by first nations peoples in canada does not necessarily always mean the desire to govern independently, but rather to work “through a process of dialogue in which the peoples concerned are participating on equal terms” (henriksen, 2001, p. 14). the first nations media reports we reviewed did not propose that first nations education should be regulated independently from the canadian government; instead, they stated that education initiatives should be approached in cooperation between the two parties and, as a result, should allow for first nations selfdetermination. a policy shift from paternalism to partnership would give first nations peoples input that is more meaningful and control over educational decisions being made on their behalf. indeed, evidence of such policy changes can be seen through the emergence of community-based education, which may (1999) acknowledged as a necessary response to canada’s historic and contemporary paternalistic aboriginal education policies. in northern ontario, the keewaytinook internet high school (kihs) opened in 1999 and now serves 13 remote northern ontario reserves, which allows students to complete high school without having to move away from home. kihs is just one example of a community-based education policy that enables first nations self-determination; the media, when 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 1 [2016], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.1.1   discussing first nations education, need to include these existing cooperative strategies to better inform canadians about issues affecting first nations peoples. i m p l i c a t i o n s f o r m e d i a r e p o r t i n g a n d r e s e a r c h our findings indicate the need for reporters from national non-first nations media sources to become cognizant of the colonial attitudes prevalent in their reporting. however, many challenges exist to changing the discourses produced by mainstream media. it is imperative that reporters who cover issues affecting first nations peoples in ontario, such as disparities in education, have knowledge and understanding of the complicated policy relationships that exist between the government of canada and first nations peoples. the differences in reporting between national and local non-first nations news sources seem to suggest that reporters who live in northern ontario communities (e.g., thunder bay) have such knowledge and thus produce reports that are sensitive to colonial legacies and the ways in which they impact first nations peoples. unfortunately, a gap in knowledge of canada’s colonial history affects more than just the reporters. even those who are extremely knowledgeable of first nations issues cannot atone for the general lack of awareness and/or lack of criticism of canada’s history of colonialism. for example, residential schools—often held as being responsible for the cultural genocide of generations of first nations peoples in canada—was astoundingly not a mandatory part of every province’s school curriculum (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015). ignoring such an essential aspect of canada’s colonial history fails canadian students and limits opportunities to become knowledgeable consumers of media, particularly in relation to first nations issues. it is therefore critical that provincial and territorial education curriculums properly reflect canada’s history with all indigenous peoples to aid the public in better understanding the complex and enormous issues affecting policy development. along with creating knowledgeable reporters and consumers, there must also be a shift in the polarizing and often partisan landscape of public media. the current state of canadian media, with regards to first nations issues, involves policy developers (i.e., the canadian government) and first nations groups who must live by the policy outcomes using the media as a “battleground” for shaping policy decisions by “narrowing, sensationalising or shutting down public debate” (mccallum, waller, & meadows, 2012, p. 101). the hegemonic state of the media favours discourses dominated by colonial attitudes in nonfirst nations media, which results in first nations peoples having a weak or non-existent voice. first nations media play important roles in responding to the marginalization of first nations voices within many non-first nations media sources and in (re)shaping discourses about policy issues and potential solutions. nevertheless, what largely occurs is the segregation of these debates and an “us vs. them” mentality that limits opportunities for insightful discussion from multiple perspectives. creating and supporting media spaces where multiple perspectives are welcome would play an important role in breaking down existing dichotomies. the abovementioned changes to education curricula and media organization will require long-term and fundamental changes to the current system; however, some changes to policy reporting can be implemented immediately. rather than promoting the need for government policy intervention, which has a questionable history of success at best, national non-first nations media could promote community-based strategies to address issues pertaining to first nations education. indeed, national non-first nations media, we argue, should avoid (re)producing colonial discourses by reporting on first 11 gardam and giles: media representations of policies concerning education published by scholarship@western, 2016   nations issues in a manner that reinforces, rather than represses, first nations’ self-determination and by recognizing the counter-productive effects of government policies that fail to engage first nations peoples. small changes such as these are the first steps necessary to start challenging colonial attitudes present in discourses produced by national non-first nations media. l i m i t a t i o n s all studies have their limitations, and ours is no exception. the relatively sparse media attention surrounding the deaths of the seven students led to a small number of newspaper articles available for analysis. this calls into question whether the discourses we identified are representative of the wider population, or just simply the result of individual reporter bias. while this is can be considered a limitation, it is also important to note that the results of our discourse analysis are similar to recent literature surrounding canadian aboriginal media representation (coleby & giles, 2013; graydon, 2008; harding, 2006), and is thus likely to reflect the dominant discourse among non-first nations media. another potential limitation is the “small” number of cases: seven deaths over 10 years (we were unable to learn how many students in total move to thunder bay from northwestern ontario reserves to attend school). we believe that although this may be considered to be a small number of deaths, they are hugely important and illustrative of the larger context of inequity that plagues first nations peoples. the assertion that the number of dead first nations youth needs to be larger to justify concerted scholarly attention is deeply problematic. c o n c l u s i o n harding (2006) argued that discourses produced about aboriginal peoples in the media have “remained constant over the last century and a half" (p. 205). our study’s findings suggest such assertions may not be so clear-cut. both of the local non-first nations news sources we examined produced discourses that included discussions of historical inequities affecting first nations students. the discourses suggest the issue of colonial content in reporting is not readily clear or generalizable to all mainstream media. more research is needed to investigate the discourses produced by local news sources, and if or how these discourses represent first nations policy issues in a manner that differs from other forms of media. it is also important to note that the discourses reviewed in this study were limited to a specific event and region of canada; first nations issues differ greatly in other areas of canada and change with successive political and policy landscapes. focussing on one region in canada, however, is also a strength of this study because we were able to separate local and national news sources and therefore add to the current understanding of colonial attitudes in media. this research can also be used as a building block for future research regarding the role the media plays in shaping policy decisions. for example, a commission of inquest into the seven deaths was announced in 2012; yet, the investigation into potential preventative measures to avoid further deaths was delayed due to issues of aboriginal underrepresentation on the jury. the inquest eventually began in october of 2015 and was still ongoing at time of publication. once the inquest is finally completed, an important question for the future will be how the results of the inquest will shape future education policies and, in particular, how such policy changes will be represented in the media. further research is needed to identify the roles that first 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 1 [2016], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.1.1   nations and non-first nations media can play in addressing legacies of colonialism, particularly as they relate to first nations education. 13 gardam and giles: media representations of policies concerning education published by scholarship@western, 2016   r e f e r e n c e s a life of hope and hopelessness [editorial]. 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(1994). case study research: design and methods (2nd ed.). thousand oaks, ca: sage publications. yin, r. k. (2009). case study research: design and methods (4th ed.). los angeles, ca: sage publications. young, r. j. (2003). postcolonialism: a very short introduction. oxford, uk: university press. doi:10.1093/actrade/9780192801821.001.0001 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 1 [2016], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss1/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.1.1 the international indigenous policy journal january 2016 media representations of policies concerning education access and their roles in seven first nations students’ deaths in northern ontario kevin gardam audrey r. giles recommended citation media representations of policies concerning education access and their roles in seven first nations students’ deaths in northern ontario abstract keywords acknowledgments disclaimer creative commons license media representations of policies concerning education access and their roles in seven first nations studentsâ•ž deaths in northern ontario wâhkôhtowin: the governance of good community–academic research relationships to improve the health and well-being of children in alexander first nation the international indigenous policy journal volume 8 issue 2 reconciling research: perspectives on research involving indigenous peoples—part 1 article 8 april 2017 wâhkôhtowin: the governance of good community–academic research relationships to improve the health and well-being of children in alexander first nation rebecca j. gokiert university of alberta, rgokiert@ualberta.ca noreen d. willows university of alberta, nwillows@ualberta.ca rebecca georgis university of alberta, georgis@ualberta.ca heather stringer university of victoria, heatherdstringer@gmail.com * alexander research committee recommended citation gokiert, r . j. , willows, n. d. , georgis, r . , stringer, h. , alexander research committee, *. (2017). wâhkôhtowin: the governance of good community–academic research relationships to improve the health and well-being of children in alexander first nation. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(2). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.8 wâhkôhtowin: the governance of good community–academic research relationships to improve the health and well-being of children in alexander first nation abstract community-based participatory research (cbpr) is a promising decolonizing approach to health and social sciences research with first nation peoples. in cbpr , the use of a community advisory committee can act as an anchoring site for trusting reciprocal relationships, collaborative decision-making, and co-learning and cocreation. through a qualitative case study, this article illustrates the collective experiences of a wellestablished, multidisciplinary, and intersectoral committee that reviews, monitors, and guides multiple research projects in a first nation community in canada. participants of the alexander research committee (arc) share examples of the value of fostering a high level of commitment to building both positive working relationships and learning spaces that ultimately result in research and policy impacts for their community. keywords community-based participatory research, child health, child well-being, first nation, school, decolonizing research acknowledgments noreen willows has a health scholar award from alberta innovates health solutions. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ wâhkôhtowin: the governance of good community–academic research relationships to improve the health and well-being of children in alexander first nation first nations peoples are often concerned that research findings will stigmatize community members or portray them in a negative way. health research conducted by non-indigenous researchers has, until relatively recently, been a colonial practice resulting in the stigmatization and discrimination of first nations and other indigenous peoples (willows, 2013). historically, health research has advanced negative stereotypes, divorcing health statistics from discussions of the social determinants that underlie health and socio-economic inequities such as poverty, unemployment, low educational attainment, inadequate access to health services, lack of food security, and poor and overcrowded housing conditions (beavis et al., 2015; greenwood & de leeuw, 2012; loppie reading, & wien, 2009; trumper, 2004). however, there has been a justified reluctance on the part of first nations communities to participate in research that purports to address health and socio-economic disparities, as the direct benefits of such research to community members may not be apparent or because communities are skeptical that such disparities can even be addressed by research (edwards, lund, mitchell, & anderson, 2008; willows, 2013). in canada, first nations children, along with other indigenous children (i.e., métis and inuit) experience significant health and social disparities as a result of colonial legacies (greenwood & de leeuw, 2012; smylie & adomako, 2009). colonialism is therefore an important determinant of first nations children’s health (beavis et al., 2015; greenwood & de leeuw, 2012; smylie & adomako, 2009). decolonizing ideologies and practices offer an opportunity for researchers to decenter the existing power structure of neocolonial research paradigms and knowledge production (bermúdez, muruthi, & jordan, 2016). decolonizing research that addresses important health determinants for indigenous peoples, such as culture, family, community and self-determination, can be a powerful tool to improve the health and well-being of first nations children (castleden, morgan, & lamb, 2012; greenwood & de leeuw, 2012; irvine, kitty, & pekeles, 2012; willows, hanley, & delormier, 2012). through a strengths-based orientation, recognition of multiple ways of knowing, and focus on increasing self determination and community determination, decolonizing research also has the potential to reinvigorate and revitalize first nations cultures (brant castellano, 2004; bull, 2010; chandler & lalonde, 1998; greewood & de leeuw, 2012; pigford et al., 2013; willows, 2013). such research requires a shift away from positivistic scientific paradigms to constructionist positions, whereby researchers and community members co-create knowledge by designing and conducting research in collaborative partnerships that are based in respectful, equitable relationships (bull, 2010; kajner, fletcher, & makokis, 2011). in canada, community-based participatory research (cbpr) is an approach to conducting health and social science research with indigenous peoples that is predicated on trusting, reciprocal partner relationships, shared control over research projects, collaborative leadership and decision making, and methods, analysis, and dissemination planning that utilizes multiple forms of knowledge (ball & janyst, 2008; castelden et al., 2012; israel, schulz, parker, & becker, 1998; minkler & wallerstein, 2003). as a promising approach to remove or challenge power injustices faced by vulnerable, disenfranchised, and/or misrepresented people in the creation of knowledge (bull, 2010; kajner et al., 2011; schnarch, 2004), a number of first nation community–academic cbpr partnerships now serve as exemplars for 1 gokiert et al.: wâhkôhtowin: the governance of community–academic research relationships published by scholarship@western, 2017 successful and productive first nation research (e.g., cargo et al., 2008; kakekagumick et al., 2013; oosman, smylie, humbert, henry, & chad, 2016; pigford et al., 2013). in its fullest manifestation as decolonizing research, cbpr could empower indigenous peoples to conduct transformative research that honors the perspectives, voices, and interests of their communities by enabling them to be not merely the researched, but also the researchers (zavala, 2013). for this reason, it is necessary to report the best practices of how community and university co-researchers have come together to conduct sustained, decolonizing cbpr that empowers community members (darroch & giles, 2014). we aim to contribute to existing literature about how community advisory committees can support cbpr research that is decolonizing in its aims, practices, and effects. the committee that serves as our case study is the alexander research committee (arc), which brought together members of a first nation, academics, and non-community members to co-partner on research projects benefitting the education and health of members of alexander first nation (afn) in alberta, canada. we describe how the arc ensured that research resulting from a community–university partnership adopted a decolonizing approach. quotations taken from interviews with arc members are used to highlight how the arc functioned, some of the factors that contributed to its sustainability, and how it benefited both community members and academic researchers. the case study: alexander first nation research committee in 2006, a cbpr partnership aiming to prevent childhood obesity was conceptualized between academic researchers from the university of alberta with expertise in nutrition (author ndw) and pediatric obesity and researchers from the afn in alberta, canada (pigford et al., 2013). in 2007, this partnership created a research steering committee, named the wisdom committee, to oversee a childhood obesity prevention research project. the committee was comprised of two academics and six employees of the health and education departments in afn. the six employees included three community members and one non-community member from the health department, and one community member and one non-community from the education department. for a detailed description of the early years of the partnership and development of the wisdom committee, see pigford et al. (2013). initially, afn’s chief and council provided a band council resolution for the wisdom committee to oversee the research project. over time, the arc, as the wisdom committee came to be named, took on the responsibility of overseeing and participating in all research occurring at kipohtakaw education centre (kec), the community school for students in kindergarten through grade 12. the scope of research at the school included health and education activities related to nutrition education, food security, comprehensive school health, early childhood development, early literacy, and bullying prevention (fehderau, holt, ball, alexander first nation, & willows, 2013; genuis, willows, alexander first nation, & jardine, 2015a, 2015b; gokiert et al., 2014; hanbazaza et al., 2015; triador, farmer, maximova, willows, & kootenay, 2015). the wisdom committee initially developed a document, titled guiding principles, outlining how committee members should function together, the rules of research conduct, and the fact that the community is the primary beneficiary of any and all research. the arc subsequently refined the guiding principles document to reflect the latest edition of the tri-council policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans (tcps 2) (canadian institutes of health research [cihr], natural sciences and engineering research council of canada [nserc], & social sciences and 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 8 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.8 humanities research council of canada [sshrc], 2014). tcps 2, a joint policy from canada’s three federal research agencies, describes and encourages building ethical, reciprocal, and trusting research relationships with first nations, inuit, and métis peoples. the document outlines: • the rules of community membership; • values for working together; • decision making and meeting protocols; • rules for data collection, storage, and use; and • ethical conduct in relation to research. recognizing that a single document cannot address all of the possibilities and eventualities of the arc’s relationships and work, and that research programs are likely to evolve over time, guiding principles is reviewed annually or as necessary to make certain that it remains relevant. in some cases, projectspecific research agreements have been developed and appended to guiding principles to account for different funding and partner requirements, such as reporting, data ownership and stewardship, and knowledge dissemination. the membership of the arc has fluctuated in size and composition over its 10 years of existence, but it has always included at least three co-researchers working at kec (e.g., teachers, a principal) and the community’s education department (e.g., the education director and assistant director, both of whom are members of afn), along with one to three academic co-researchers and their trainees from the various cbpr projects conducted in the community. for decisions to be passed in accordance with guiding principles, the number of voting community members at a meeting must exceed the number of voting non-community members. since 2007, the committee members have met monthly—except for july and august, when school is not in session. each year, the arc collectively assigns two co-chairs, one of whom is always a community member, which together share responsibility for chairing each meeting and responding to any concerns or issues as they arise. arc members remain engaged with the community outside of the monthly meetings through additional meetings, special gatherings, or invitations to participate in community events (e.g., the health fair, events at the school). relational principles are the foundation of the arc; for this reason, arc members have discussed that the cree concept of miyo-wîcêhtowin or “working well together” guides the way committee members make decisions about research that impacts the community. wâhkôhtowin, a cree word spoken by afn community members, means “establishing good relationships.” wâhkôhtowin encompasses more than simply relating to others; it provides the basis for individuals to function well together. wâhkôhtowin can be conceptualized as a methodology for cbpr research that is decolonizing (oreilly-scanlon, crowe, & weenie, 2004). demonstrating that first nations communities and academic researchers can effectively partner to produce decolonizing research through miyo-wîcêhtowin, the arc can be considered an example of one of the “healing winds” (irvine et al., 2012) that contributes to sustaining the winds of positive change in the research landscape. for this reason, we want to share our 3 gokiert et al.: wâhkôhtowin: the governance of community–academic research relationships published by scholarship@western, 2017 collective learning about wâhkôhtowin and miyo-wîcêhtowin to inform other community–university research partnerships working toward sustainable and impactful health, education, or social change. methods this qualitative case study draws on multiple sources of data (interviews, a focus group, meeting minutes, discussions, observations by the authors, and document review) to describe and discuss arc members’ experience working collaboratively across cbpr projects in the afn community. to engage in deeper reflection and capture the voices of the arc members, interviews and a focus group were conducted. the research was reviewed and approved by the arc, afn community members, and the human research ethics boards at the university of victoria and university of alberta, canada. interviews when interviews were conducted in the winter and spring of 2014, the arc was comprised of 15 members, including cultural liaisons, an elder, representatives from the band-operated health and education departments (teachers, a principal, the director of education, and a community health nurse), and university researchers and designated members (project coordinators, graduate students, and research assistants) from three cbpr research projects. nine arc members took part in semistructured one-on-one interviews, lasting approximately 1 hour, which were audio recorded and later transcribed verbatim. the participants’ experiences sitting on the arc ranged between 1 and 7 years (inclusive of experience with the formative work of the wisdom committee that preceded the arc). focus group of the nine individuals interviewed, five took part in the focus group discussion that occurred after individual interviews. the purpose of the focus group discussion was to receive critical feedback on the organization and initial interpretation of the interview data from arc members and to generate more in-depth data through exploring the themes presented to the group. the focus group was held at kec, and was approximately 1.5 hours in length. the focus group was audio recorded and later transcribed. in addition, a graduate student took notes during the focus group. data analysis a series of steps were carried out to analyze the one-on-one interview data (braun & clarke, 2006), including reviewing the data, developing initial codes, searching for and then reviewing the themes, defining and naming the themes, and producing a document outlining the themes that could be reviewed during the focus group. initially, one researcher independently read the interview transcripts and notes and used memoing to document them (mayan, 2009). an initial coding scheme that identified recurring phrases and concepts in the transcripts was developed and shared with two other researchers. using the agreed upon coding scheme, the data was categorized into five themes, which were then presented for discussion during the focus group. the initial analysis procedure was not repeated for the focus group data; rather, the focus group was used to refine the themes and provide a clearer and richer description of them, which then resulted in a reduced number of themes represented by subcategories. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 8 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.8 findings this article will use a combination of qualitative data sources described above and author reflections to illustrate two key themes: a. sustainability of the arc, and b. impacts of the arc through capacity strengthening. discussing the first theme, we will unpack many of the processes that led to an enduring and respectful partnership across the membership of the arc. discussing the second theme, we will highlight the impacts that the arc has had both within and beyond the afn community. sustainability of the arc the arc is an example of a well-established, multidisciplinary, and inter-sectoral committee that reviews, monitors, and guides multiple research projects in a first nation community. the sustainability of the arc can be attributed to working relationally, the existence of community champions, committing time, a general willingness to co-learn, and the creation of a safe learning space. an academic arc member described the uniqueness of the arc’s composition and function: talking multi-sectoral committees in general, in my experience they are just a terribly rich way to work because they offer a space where people can, from those different sectors, can share their own individual viewpoints but it also provides a new space for people to then create a new sort of perspective on this issue that everybody has come to the table for . . . they challenge people’s viewpoints and provide a space that’s not normally there for people to dialogue about their own individual perspectives, the collective perspective and kind of pushing the boundaries sometimes. arc members often described working relationally with others as the foundation of their experiences, with one community arc member stating: we come together as equal partners, with different strengths and this work is predicated on trust. we’ve worked from the bottom up; our foundation is together and our base is on that trusting relationship. another academic arc member described the respect that is inherent in the relationship, noting: of all the committees i sit on, there is more respect expected and received on that committee than any other committee i sit on. and it’s not that other people are disrespectful it’s just that the guiding principle of respect is extremely strong in the arc. members of the arc are committed and truly value the partnership that is central to the committee, noting that they actually want to be at meetings (as opposed to feeling obligated to attend). one academic member of the arc reflected on this, remarking: 5 gokiert et al.: wâhkôhtowin: the governance of community–academic research relationships published by scholarship@western, 2017 making an effort to attend the monthly meetings also reflects on the strong principles of relational principles. i miss meetings all the time, but when i have to miss an arc meeting i don’t view it as just, “oh well, they’ll be fine without me.” i understand that it demonstrates a lack of respect when i do not feel like i have time and i de-prioritize them. and it’s not what i’m doing but it could be perceived as that and it would break my heart because i just have so much respect for that community. in addition, one community arc member described the committee’s relational style of engagement, both in meetings and in the community: there has to be trust; there has to be openness. there has to be a lot of communication; there has to be that willingness to go over and above just the research. i’ll give the example of eric [pseudonym] again, because he had a genuine interest in the community and a genuine interest in the people . . . he was at community events; all outside of work hours and i think that really impressed the people that there was willingness and a genuine interest. that’s so critical in building relationships and wanting to start committees within a community. individuals who influence and promote relationship building in the community, which is critical at the start-up phase of any community-based research committee, are called “champions.” their influence is rooted in using their interpersonal networks to gain support for a project, while holding a clear understanding of the community’s dynamics and needs. one academic arc member commented on this, emphasizing the importance of champions to the research relationship: with the arc, there are some real champions, people who in the community who have been at every single meeting and valuing those people not just so that i can somehow label my research as community-based participatory research but valuing them, just the amount of time they put into something because they perceive that it’s good for their community. the community champion sees the benefit of cbpr to their community, as one academic arc member described: and just like any project you need to have a champion who’s driven by the need to have respectful research done in their community that ties in with helping them in measuring what the goals of their community are. arc members also highlighted the importance of engaging decision makers on the committee, with one member affirming: i think the key is getting those unsaid leaders at the table, or champions, but also some true leadership because they can also make stuff happen financially in a community or through the system. similarly, one community arc member highlighted the advocacy role typical of a community champion: 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 8 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.8 i think more so being an advocate and a voice for first nations community who has had, not just alexander but general first nations research has been research done to them and not with them. so, it was really critical to have good working relationships with the people that we were doing research with to ensure that first nations voice, first nations culture, first nations history; our worldview is represented in that research. our opinions matter and we’re involved in every step of the process. champions are not the only individuals who are critical for engaging and maintaining good relationships within the community and with research partners, the arc has many excellent models who, while attending arc meetings, will say things like “this isn’t working for me,” “we need to make a change,” and/or “here’s what i need from you to be able to help me do my piece of this puzzle better.” these things are all spoken in a space that members have described as “trusting,” “welcoming,” “respectful,” and “caring.” for example, an academic arc member stated: i mean the arc really has been co-created both by the community members and the researchers. it wouldn’t exist in its form today without that co-creation. and it has evolved over time, you know, who chairs it, who takes responsibility of different aspects of the outcomes of those meetings. the research members from the community have made it very clear that they would like built into grants enough money so that they can present at conferences; the community has been included in almost all of my written work where the community will be named as an author, and i’ve had to write editors to say why, explain to them being that i do community-based participatory research. i have to honor the fact that our steering committee would like the community to be named as being responsible for the knowledge that comes out of the community. so, it’s that we’ve really co-created how that committee functions together, we’re sharing the responsibility now of talking to other people about how we work as a team. the arc’s relational ethos cannot be understated in terms of its contribution to the sustainability of the committee; however, the arc’s functionality was also highlighted as a critical characteristic that contributes to the flow and sustainability of the arc and to research in afn. one academic arc member likened it to a well-oiled machine, recognizing that administrative tasks and communication are important to maintaining the committee’s momentum: so, in order to make just our space and time together efficient and useful, we need to be working very diligently in the challenges in the background of communication, organization, administration; things that most people don’t think about but when they’re done well, things flow well and it makes it easier for everybody to work as a group. then you can have that opportunity for richness and innovation and those things that come with having a well-oiled machine. and that’s what the arc has become really, is a well-oiled machine. the ability to share resources across the many cbpr projects that the arc may simultaneously oversee has supported the arc’s ongoing functions. each project, depending on where it is in the research and funding cycle, has supported the co-chairs by identifying a graduate student researcher who takes minutes and circulates them and providing a meal during the meeting. coming together over a meal is important to the relational nature of the arc—as one arc member from the community said: i think one of the things is, well i’m going to be a bit of a humorist, if you offer food they come. 7 gokiert et al.: wâhkôhtowin: the governance of community–academic research relationships published by scholarship@western, 2017 likewise, another community member commented: being together that’s essential. i think without food being there people would be not quite as inclined to come. you know? we break bread together, we share a meal. in addition, the time that arc members commit to the meetings and research-related tasks, as well as contributing to the community and critical events, was described in terms of the importance of time, the use of time, the allotment of time, and time well invested. one arc member noted: giving of yourself and making time is part of the give and take nature of working relationally. we’ll call each other, like, you know, ‘cause it’s that mutual benefit, it’s like, “hey, i need someone to come and do a guest lecture on this particular thing are you available?” the same is true in things like, “we need you to do something related to our school or community, can you make time for that?” right so there is a lot of that give-and-take. co-learning has been identified as a principle and an embodied value of the arc that is shared by all arc members and contributes to the sustainability of the committee. as described by one community member, the arc “is a table of learners, sort of, and everybody is committed and curious.” co-learning is both a process and an outcome of working in partnership. it is about learning together and from each other as equals, recognizing the unique strengths and skills of each member, and being transformed as a result of this reciprocal exchange of knowledge. co-learning is rooted in both cbpr and cree (and other first nations) worldviews, as described by one cree arc member: from a first nation perspective, there’s always an opportunity to learn, any given day from any given person and we see learning as lifelong learning so, it’s not just out of a textbook or it’s not just out of a test that you’ve done or anything like that. every time we have a meeting there’s definitely [an] opportunity to learn . . . through the overseeing of the research committee, there has been ample opportunity both from a researcher perspective and from a community member, on a daily basis. and not just in the research but in getting to know one another. i don’t see learning just as textbook learning. any given day of the year, any moment in a day, there’s an opportunity for learning. this informal learning was further described by another community arc participant as the “unintentional” learning that happens when working in partnership with others: and it is the deciding of the group how we’re going to work with one another to learn from one another. and because there is no step-by-step process that does that; that’s the process you go through to get where you’re going to get. so, every week i co-learn something. some of it is totally unintended learning you know, totally unintentional learning that i’ve learned. at arc meetings, partners openly discuss and negotiate ethical dilemmas, research processes, and mutual benefits, and they celebrate successes together. these conversations are not always easy, but members described the arc as a safe learning space in which concerns can be voiced, questions can be asked, and guidance can be sought. one academic member noted that the arc space allows for “getting advice from people and having that relationship where i could ask them very openly, ‘you know, i don’t actually know what to do in this situation.” 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 8 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.8 a non-cree member of the arc noted that she was honored with the cultural learning she received as an arc member and appreciated how this learning changed her understanding of cree culture: i think culturally i had a huge training/learning in terms of the cree culture from central alberta, and i was very honored to learn how do you show respect for information. what you do with information that is being given to you about the culture, and being mindful of that . . . being mindful of the best responses to indicate that you recognize that the information you’ve just received is for you and that it is unique information. it’s not just a conversation that just happened. there are gold nuggets in there for better understanding of their worldview. at times, conversations may be uncomfortable and difficult, especially when touching on the wounds of colonialism or outsider–insider dynamics. however, the trust and respect that exists between arc members, helped make these tough conversations, which are a necessary part of decolonizing research, opportunities for growth. for example, one community member stated: we may not always agree on what is said. but we had that respect with one another so strongly that if we were uncomfortable with anything that was written [in a manuscript], that was respected and taken out. ultimately, for co-learning to take place in an authentic way, power disparities, which often permeate academic–community relationships, need to be addressed. having a voice and participating in decision making requires all arc members to be comfortable with the participatory research process. one community member emphasized how transparency on behalf of the academic researchers contributed to trust building and participation in the arc: so, we [community members of the arc] felt comfortable. so, everything that they [academic members of arc] said, like at the beginning of meetings, everything that they said was clearly defined and then we went on to the next project. we were never in the dark about anything. one academic member of the arc noted that doing cbpr is about letting go of being the expert on a topic or issue—as academic researchers tend to view themselves in conventional research—and accept their outsider status, remaining humble as they receive rich learning so that they might grow from it. this member affirmed: i’ve become much more humble as a researcher, not just as a part of the arc but just over the course of my career, that i’m not an expert. i come with a certain level of expertise, but i’m not an expert on anyone else’s lives and no matter how often i have worked in aboriginal communities, i will never be able to understand from a first nations perspective what it’s like to be first nations, so really respectful of the fact that i have a lot to learn from other individuals and just the value of community-based research. impact of the arc over its 10-year duration, the arc has impacted the following three areas: research and community capacity strengthening, quality of the research process and products, and school-level practice and policy. 9 gokiert et al.: wâhkôhtowin: the governance of community–academic research relationships published by scholarship@western, 2017 research and community capacity strengthening. through their involvement with the arc, members gain skills and knowledge about research, community, and cultural protocols, and how to work collaboratively. co-developing research questions, selecting participant recruitment strategies, developing and administering surveys, collaboratively interpreting data, reporting back to the community or funders, and reviewing reports or manuscripts are examples of experiences that helped develop arc members’ collective research capacity. in addition, arc community members are coauthors of articles published in academic journals and co-present at conferences. one community participant mentioned that through the experience of participating in research-decision making at the arc meeting—whether about data collection, analysis or dissemination—she, like other community arc members, gained important research skills: i’ve learned a lot and my capacity in that area has really improved and i really am interested in that side of the whole application part and publishing of course, and naming a first nation instead of an individual in publication. so, that was another give-and-take, another way that we had to try and work together because one person doesn’t speak on behalf of the whole nation aside from the chief, and so it’s been an interesting process. just in terms of staffing as well, i think it’s been really critical for department staff. i only speak on behalf of their department, to be familiar with research; to understand focus groups; to understand review of manuscripts; review of developing questions; developing the right types of questions; testing questions, that’s even been really interesting to me as well. another community member highlighted the ripple effect of this capacity strengthening, which transcends the boundaries of the arc and informs each member’s work in a holistic way: but hearing the power of what other researchers find influences our program, so to me that’s transference of knowledge, both directly as we sit in those presentations and as everybody is given that data. but the second transference is what does that mean for my organization. for academic research partners, enhanced research capacity included a deeper understanding of how to implement cbpr, as well as cultural protocols and community engagement. one academic member of the arc noted: i’ve learned methods of engagement that i’m able to apply even within that committee and also to my other work. since more than one research project is active at any given time, researchers and graduate students have had multiple opportunities to learn from each other, capitalize on expertise that does not exist in their teams (e.g., measurement and survey development), and collaborate on other initiatives and work outside of the arc (e.g., providing guest lectures in graduate classes, writing letters of support for scholarships, and providing references for students to gain employment). to support the research process, community members are hired to work on research projects as community coordinators or research assistants. in one project, two community research assistants (cra) were hired to go door-to-door in the community to share information about the project and gather informed consent. the cras received training in cbpr, confidentiality, and informed consent, while providing the research teams with insight on how to adapt the process to increase engagement. in 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 8 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.8 another project, research funding was allocated to hire a full-time community coordinator position that supported health within the school. the school has committed to maintaining this position even after the funding was no longer available. the arc members place special emphasis on supporting youth leadership development in the community. for example, in one project, one of the youth participants was invited to contribute artwork to illustrate the research findings of a photovoice project that included high school students, and to copresent at several conferences about her research experience. in another project, postsecondary students from the community, who were attending a tribal college, took part in a 39-hour cbpr course. the practicum component of this course had the students working alongside graduate students and academics as co-researchers, helping to conduct focus groups and interviews with elders, adults, and youth in the community. three of these students were hired as research assistants to support data analysis and reporting for the project on behalf of the community. quality of the research process and products. quality, also referred to as rigor, is a highly contested concept in cbpr (crooks, snowshoe, chiodo, & brunette-debassige, 2013; kingsley & chapman, 2013). when operating outside the post-positivist realms of rigor and within a cbpr context, social, ethical, and cultural validity become important indicators of research quality in addition to conventional validity indicators (cargo & mercer, 2008). to ensure that the research process is aligned with cultural protocols, arc members offer their input regarding different stages of the research process, including data collection methods, tools and questionnaires, and interpretation of findings. for instance, in one research project, which involved the development of a questionnaire for assessing young children’s learning, elders provided instruction on child development and were involved in co-developing questionnaire items, domains, and interpreting scores. arc and community members’ input into data interpretation ensures that findings are contextualized and interpreted through a community and cultural lens. in addition to arc members, other community members are invited to provide input into the research process through community forums. one community member described this as an asset to the research process: i think, just generally knowing that, every one of the community members has a voice and say and can contribute to that process. i think that has been a benefit to research in alexander. and throughout the process we’ve always encouraged our own community members, not just our staff. at times, the voice of the arc has initiated bigger changes to intervention research projects. the voice of the arc is now sought for advice about projects outside of alexander first nation, thus extending its impact and reach beyond the community. for instance, after consultation with arc members, changes were made to a nutrition survey that was being used as part of a larger provincial project with first nations children. furthermore, members of the arc and those involved with research projects in afn have been highlighted in local newspapers and the provincial health authority magazine, and celebrated on television and through youtube. school-level practice and policy. several practices have shifted at the kec as a result of the knowledge that the arc has gained and created from the many health, nutrition, and education projects it has led in the afn community. one of the projects, which focused on understanding healthy development from a 11 gokiert et al.: wâhkôhtowin: the governance of community–academic research relationships published by scholarship@western, 2017 first nation perspective, developed a questionnaire through focus groups and interviews with youth, adults, and elders in the community. parents and teachers of kindergarten-aged children at kec completed the questionnaire. it highlighted the children’s cultural knowledge, cultural skills, first language fluency, and connections with family and important role models who support their growth and development. developing the questionnaire and reviewing the results reinforced the importance of both the cree immersion program for students in primary grades (kindergarten to grade 3) and the continued support of a fluent cree instructor and educational assistant in each classroom. over the past decade, arc-supported health and nutrition research at kec has led to many integrated learning opportunities for students, such as growing fruits and vegetables in classrooms and eating wild game from traditional hunts for the school’s hot lunch program. a nutrition policy has been implemented in the school that reinforces nutrition and an active living environment. for example, kec has removed all junk food from its canteen, offers a nutritious breakfast and hot lunch program, and will only allow healthy choices for birthdays and other celebrations. as one arc member put it, she is not the only “broccoli police” anymore; staff and students who place emphasis on healthy eating and lifestyle choices join her in patrolling the halls. discussion a research steering committee, sometimes called a community advisory board is common in cbpr (d’alonzo, 2010; jacklin & kinoshameg, 2008). at each stage of a research project, it can function as an anchoring site for engagement between research partners, and it can support strong channels of communication with the community at large (adams & faulkhead, 2012). this article provides an example of the collective experiences of a 10-year-old multidisciplinary research committee operating within a first nation community in canada. through interviews, a focus group, and document review, arc members reflected on the foundations of their working relationship, the sustainability of the committee, and the research impacts of the arc. cbpr has been and continues to be used by academics in canada as a desired ethical approach to research with first nations communities because it facilitates shared leadership, decision making, and ownership over research (ball & janyst, 2008; cargo & merccer, 2008; castelden et al., 2012). ross et al. (2010), for example, have noted: [the] implicit promise of research collaboration between academic and community research partners is that each group has the opportunity and authority to exercise agency—each group has a right to provide input regarding the course of the project and a right that this input be weighed and considered by the partner group. (ross et al., 2010, p. 2) the arc embodies and realizes this promise by acting as a trusted community-based decision-making body for research initiatives conducted at kec. the success of the arc in terms of its impact and ability to sustain its role and function in the community over time has been attributed to many factors, as reflected by the arc members. as zavala (2013) has noted, “decolonizing research strategies are less about the struggle for method and more about the spaces that make decolonizing research possible” (p. 55). through trusting relationships, open dialogue, co-mentoring, and community participation, the arc has been able to establish a 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 8 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.8 transformative and ethical learning space for cbpr partners in afn. trusting relationships amongst cbpr partners take time to develop and need to be nurtured (castleden et al., 2012; israel et al., 1998). the arc takes this very seriously, and seeks to build these relationships by operating within a space of capacity strengthening and co-learning, setting up guiding principles, and having a shared vision for “optimizing the health and well-being of children and families in alexander.” one of the key tenets of cbpr is that research resulting from cbpr frameworks should create knowledge that is actionable and meaningful to communities (castleden et al., 2012; darroch & giles, 2014; israel et al., 1998). several impacts of research have been realized in afn because community champions and academic partners have together committed to the well-being of afn children. the committee takes responsibility for conducting, translating, and mobilizing knowledge within and beyond the community with the goal of influencing practice, program, and policy changes. they do this by sharing knowledge that has been created as a result of research in afn within their own spheres of influence. this sharing may take the form of briefs or presentations to chief and council, school personnel, or at academic and professional conferences. the implicit and explicit capacity strengthening that has happened because of participation in the arc for community members, graduate trainees, youth co-researchers, and academics is profound. each member has increased knowledge and skills around the research process, taken a project from conceptualization to dissemination collaboratively, and deepened cultural knowledge through teachings that have been shared by elders and arc members from the afn community. the infrastructure set in place by projects, which provides opportunities for employment for community members, the capacity to hire graduate ra’s to gather agenda items and take minutes at each meeting, the resources to travel to the community for face-to-face meetings each month, and the resources to offer a meal each time we gather, has been critical in facilitating opportunities for learning and dialogue. this practice is encouraged in cbpr partnerships (e.g., israel et al., 2008) and this article points to the value of these opportunities for maximizing the impact and reach of research. the positive changes in the school environment since the start of the 2006 partnership are noteworthy: a comprehensive school nutrition policy is now part of the fabric of the school and recent funding, made available in 2016, has supported an after school physical education and healthy snack program called the aboriginal youth mentorship program. factors limiting arc’s scope and impact as with all cbpr partnerships, the arc has faced and continues to face some challenges. for instance, sustaining a diverse membership base, with representation from multiple afn community departments and from the community at-large is a prevailing issue for the committee. department directors may be reluctant to have their employees attend meetings that they feel do not directly impact their department’s mandate. efforts to encourage community members to attend meetings have been met with limited success. community members might feel insufficiently qualified to contribute to conversations about research activities. moreover, much of the communication between arc members about meeting dates and times is done using email, which poses a challenge for interested community members who do not have an internet connection or who do not use email. attendance of elders at meetings has also been inconsistent. another challenge is determining when an academic researcher’s membership on the arc ends: is it at the end of a researcher’s project or when that person can no 13 gokiert et al.: wâhkôhtowin: the governance of community–academic research relationships published by scholarship@western, 2017 longer meaningfully contribute to the arc? who determines what is and is not a meaningful contribution? the committee is wrestling with these issues and amending guiding principles to include collective statements about how to handle adding and terminating membership. a deeper examination of these challenges can provide further insights on the strategies that arc members have used and what has been successful or unsuccessful. this could be useful information for other committees or community advisory boards struggling with similar issues. we recognize that not every committee can have the high level of engagement described in this article. indeed, the high level of engagement with the arc has been made possible by both the relatively short travel time between the university of alberta and afn, as well as the continuous funding that brought resources to the projects and the community. cbpr practices are easier to implement when researchers are near a community with which collaborative relationships can be developed and sustained (ritchie et al., 2013). for these reasons, it is important to consider contextual factors that may influence the sustainability and impact of a community research committee. ultimately, cbpr projects must reflect the place, circumstances, and proximity of the collaborating partners (ritchie et al., 2013). conclusions and policy implications recognizing that all communities are unique in their histories, languages, and cultural practices, these conclusions and policy implications are shared as a starting point of conversation. the arc is an example of how decolonizing research can be practiced within a first nations context, given an optimal confluence of supporting circumstances, and how it can lead to impactful knowledge generation and tangible policy changes at the community level. word has spread about the arc through community members’ inclusion on research manuscripts and participation in meetings and conferences related to arc research projects. because of this, community members of the arc have been invited to speak about the committee and their experiences co-leading cbpr projects with researchers. sharing this experience and expertise will hopefully lead to other first nations communities producing research partnerships that are mutually reinforcing and which contribute to the health and well-being of their members. the case of the arc demonstrates the impactful potential of community research committees operating within decolonizing research spaces. as described through this article and reflected in the tcps 2 (cihr, nserc, & sshrc, 2014), the arc ensures a balance of power between researchers and indigenous participants through community-developed and supported guiding principles for research conduct. as one community member stated, referring to guiding principles: it is not a contract for the relationships; it just outlines and writes out how we work and helps to guide the meetings so they can truly be a learning space. in other words, it fosters wâhkôhtowin in research. the report of the truth and reconciliation commission of canada (2015) has called upon all levels of government to acknowledge aboriginal rights and fully adopt and implement the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip, 2007). decolonizing research emanating from the arc shows that research that is respectful and based on true partnership is an act of reconciliation. the arc is a powerful example of why governments must support indigenous peoples to engage in research based on social justice. the recognition that research can be a decolonizing and 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 8 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.8 reconciliatory process is an important first step, however, to do this respectfully in true partnership requires that funding agencies and academic institutions provide academics and communities engaged in cbpr with sufficient resources, time, and flexibility to allow for true participatory and collaborative work to take place. as the case of the arc has shown, trusting relationships take time to develop but can be impactful once established. while not usually the case, favorable circumstances permitted two of the academic authors to have sufficient time and resources to fully engage in cbpr. one of the researchers (ndw) has a health scholar award, which reduces her teaching and administrative responsibilities, and another (rjg) is housed within a faculty that places significant emphasis on community-engaged scholarship. however, current academic and funding institution constraints make it difficult to establish long-term successful community–university partnerships. new policies and reward structures that allow for flexibility and community leadership can go a long way in strengthening the practice of decolonizing cbpr approaches (castleden, sylvestre, martin, & mcnally, 2015). 15 gokiert et al.: wâhkôhtowin: the governance of community–academic research relationships published by scholarship@western, 2017 references adams, k. & faulkhead, s. 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(2013). community-based participatory research with indigenous communities: the proximity paradox. health & place, 24, 183-189. ross, l., loup, a., nelson, r. m., botkin, j. r., kost, r., smith, g. r., & gehlert, s. (2010). the challenge of collaboration for academic and community partners in a research partnership: points to consider. journal of empirical research on human research ethics, 5(1), 19-31. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1525/jer.2010.5.1.19 schnarch, b. (2004). ownership, control, access, and possession (ocap™) or self-determination applied to research: a critical analysis of contemporary first nations research and some options for first nations communities. journal of aboriginal health, 1(1). retrieved from http://www.naho.ca/jah/english/jah01_01/journal_p80-95.pdf smylie, j., & adomako, p. 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(2015). honouring the truth, reconciling for the future: summary of the final report of the truth and reconciliation commission of canada. retrieved from http://www.trc.ca/websites/trcinstitution/index.php?p=890 19 gokiert et al.: wâhkôhtowin: the governance of community–academic research relationships published by scholarship@western, 2017 united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip). (2007). retrieved from http://www.un.org/esa/socdev/unpfii/documents/drips_en.pdf willows, n. (2013). ethical principles of health research involving indigenous peoples. applied physiology, nutrition, and metabolism, 38(11), iii-v. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1139/apnm2013-0381 willows, n., hanley, a. j., & delormier, t. (2012). a socioecological framework to understand weightrelated issues in aboriginal children in canada. applied physiology, nutrition, and metabolism, 37(1), 1-13. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1139/h11-128 zavala, m. (2013). what do we mean by decolonizing research strategies? lessons from decolonizing, indigenous research projects in new zealand and latin america. decolonization: indigeneity, education & society, 2(1), 55-71. retrieved from http://decolonization.org/index.php/des/article/view/19113/16236 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 8 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.8 the international indigenous policy journal april 2017 wâhkôhtowin: the governance of good community–academic research relationships to improve the health and well-being of children in alexander first nation rebecca j. gokiert noreen d. willows rebecca georgis heather stringer * alexander research committee recommended citation wâhkôhtowin: the governance of good community–academic research relationships to improve the health and well-being of children in alexander first nation abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license wã¢hkã´htowin: the governance of good communityâ•fiacademic research relationships to improve the health and well-being of children in alexander first nation insights and opportunities: challenges of canadian first nations drinking water operators the international indigenous policy journal volume 6 | issue 3 article 7 june 2015 insights and opportunities: challenges of canadian first nations drinking water operators heather m. murphy university of guelph, murph.hm@gmail.com elliott corston-pine university of guelph yvonne post university of guelph edward a. mcbean university of guelph recommended citation murphy, h. m. , corston-pine, e. , post, y. , mcbean, e. a. (2015). insights and opportunities: challenges of canadian first nations drinking water operators. the international indigenous policy journal, 6(3). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.7 insights and opportunities: challenges of canadian first nations drinking water operators abstract providing safe drinking water continues to be a challenge in canadian first nations communities. in 2011, in ontario and british columbia, only 45 percent and 51 percent of 143 and 160 first nations had water systems with a fully trained certified operator, respectively. the objective of this research was to investigate the issues of operator training, retention, and job satisfaction through semi-structured interviews and surveys of water system operators in ontario and british columbia. operators reported the lack of funding for operation and maintenance, and a lack of support from band council as challenges in performing their jobs. of those who reported being unsatisfied with their position, wages, hours of work, and lack of funding or support were cited as primary reasons. keywords canadian first nations, drinking water supplies, operators, challenges acknowledgments research funding from the national centre of excellence program through res’eau waternet is gratefully acknowledged. as well, the opportunities for participation in the aandc meeting, including discussions with the operators at the meeting, was extremely important to the results of the research. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ i n s i g h t s a n d o p p o rt u n i t i e s : c h a l l e n g e s o f c a n a d i a n f i rs t n a t i o n s d ri n ki n g w a t e r o p e ra t o rs providing safe drinking water continues to be a challenge for first nations communities in canada despite considerable financial investment from the canadian federal government over the last decade (mccullough & farahbakhsh, 2012). in neegan burnside ltd.’s 2011 national assessment of first nations water and wastewater systems, a project commissioned by the federal government, 807 water systems serving 560 first nations communities were assessed. of these water systems, 315 (39%) were categorized as high risk, 278 (34%) as medium risk, and 215 (27%) as low risk (neegan burnside ltd., 2011a). a high-risk system by definition is one that has major deficiencies that pose a high risk to the quality of water and could require that a drinking water advisory be put in place (neegan burnside ltd., 2011a). the majority of high-risk systems were reported in british columbia (n = 154) and ontario (n = 72). one common theme that continues to be a barrier to ensuring improved access to safe drinking water in first nations communities is the availability and presence of qualified and adequately trained operators (neegan burnside ltd., 2011a; simeone & troniak, 2012; swain, louttit & hrudey, 2006). according to the expert panel on safe drinking water for first nations report (swain et al., 2006), there are several aspects that complicate the issue of ensuring qualified operation of water systems in small communities. these aspects include ensuring that operators are adequately trained and certified, as well as finding people who reside in the communities who meet the requirements and are willing to become operators, and issues of operator retention. bill s-8, the safe drinking water for first nations act echoes some of the same concerns including that there is often “limited local capacity and ability to retain qualified or certified operators and . . . [there is a] lack of resources to properly fund water and waste water system operation and maintenance” in first nations communities (simeone & troniak, 2012, pp. 2-3). according to the neegan burnside ltd. (2011a) assessment, it is projected that approximately $419 million is required annually in order to meet operation and maintenance requirements for all first nations water systems across canada. a significant amount of this projected budget is allocated for salaries and training of certified operators. moreover, as of 2011, only 54 percent of the 572 first nations water systems in canada that require an operator had primary certified operators in place. further, 3 percent of systems did not have a primary operator, and 19 percent of systems did not have a back-up operator on staff (neegan burnside ltd., 2011a). notably, there are significant variations in the percentage of systems with certified primary operators that are located in communities with varying accessibilities as summarized in table 1. these findings suggest that training is less accessible to those operators working in more isolated communities. in ontario, 143 plants require a certified operator. at the time of the neegan burnside ltd. report, only 45 percent had a fully trained certified operator, and 87 percent did not have a fully certified back-up operator (neegan burnside ltd., 2011b). in british columbia, 160 water systems require a certified operator; however, only 51 percent and 20 percent had a primary certified operator and certified backup operator, respectively, at the time of the neegan burnside ltd. assessment (neegan burnside ltd., 2011c). 1 murphy et al.: challenges of first nations drinking water operators published by scholarship@western, 2015 t a b l e 1 . pe rc e n t a g e o f s y s t e m s w i t h c e rt i f i e d pri m a ry w a t e r t re a t m e n t o p e ra t o rs b y z o n e z o n e c h a ra c t e ri s t i c s o f z o n e % o f c e rt i f i e d pri m a ry w a t e r t re a t m e n t o p e ra t o rs 1 communities that are located within 50 km from the nearest service center and have year-round road access 67% 2 communities that are located between 50 and 350 km from the nearest service center and have year-round road access 59% 3 communities located over 350 km from the nearest service center and have year-round road access 47% 4 communities that have n o year-round road access to a service center and experience higher transportation costs 26% note. source: neegan burnside ltd., 2011a. the objective of this research was to investigate the issues of operator training, retention, and job satisfaction through semi-structured interviews and surveys of water system operators in ontario and british columbia first nations communities. to the authors’ knowledge, this is the first time surveys of this nature have been undertaken in canadian first nations communities. m e t h o d s s e m i s t ru c t u re d i n t e rv i e w s i n o n t a ri o f i rs t n a t i o n s c o m m u n i t i e s in order to investigate the issue of operator training and retention, a series of semi-structured interviews were conducted with first nations operators and community leaders on eight southern ontario communities between march and august 2014. the study area extends along the windsor–ottawa corridor, the region between ottawa and sudbury, locations along highway 17 between sudbury and sault ste. marie, and, finally, the range between sault ste. marie and windsor including manitoulin island. this research was approved by the university of guelph review and ethics board protocol (reb# 13nv048). the interviews focused on the following themes: operator retention, job satisfaction, certification, difficulty with operation of the treatment system, funding available for operation, and maintenance and operator challenges. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.7 the ontario communities were selected as follows: 1. a list of first nations communities in the study area were compiled from data provided by aandc. the final list consisted of 45 communities. 2. all of the communities were called to see whether they had a water treatment plant and a water treatment plant operator. we were only able to get in touch with and confirm with 28 communities that they had both a water treatment plant and an operator. 3. from this list of 28 communities, water treatment plant operators were contacted directly to organize interviews. many communities denied requests for interviews or did not return phone calls. 4. for the eight operators that agreed to be interviewed, in person interviews were coordinated where possible and otherwise interviews were conducted by phone. interview responses were recorded on paper questionnaires by the interviewer. both open and closed questions were employed. for open-ended questions, responses were coded and classified during data analysis and key quotes were retained. interviews were not tape recorded because some operators who agreed to participate in the study feared that they could face repercussions for speaking with us and therefore did not want the interviews recorded. establishing trust with the first nations communities that we interviewed was crucial for us to engage fully with the operators we spoke with; therefore, operators' wishes were always respected. s t ru c t u re d i n t e rv i e w s w i t h o p e ra t o rs f ro m bri t i s h c o l u m b i a ( b. c . ) f i rs t n a t i o n s c o m m u n i t i e s to examine the issues of operator retention and job satisfaction in first nations communities in b.c., a structured, closed-answer survey was prepared based on feedback collected from interviews with ontario operators. the surveys included questions regarding level of certification, operator retention, job satisfaction, hours worked, paid vacation, compensation, and challenges faced as an operator. these new surveys were distributed to water treatment plant operators in b.c. at the 7th annual bc first nation water and wastewater operational excellence conference and interactive trade show, which was held from october 8 to 10, 2014. there were 79 operators who responded to the questionnaire and we believe that this group of operators is representative of the population of water system operators in b.c. assuming each operator represented an individual community, the sample collected represents approximately 40% of the population of operators in bc. the operators came from all over the province including remote communities in the bc interior and island communities. the operators were asked to answer the survey questions to the best of their knowledge and were informed that filling out the survey was their choice. moreover, participants were informed that feedback from their participation would generate responses that could be used to compare the results obtained from interviews conducted in ontario. given the relatively small number of communities interviewed in ontario, a predominantly qualitative analysis of the findings is presented. the results from these interviews helped to define the questions 3 murphy et al.: challenges of first nations drinking water operators published by scholarship@western, 2015 posed to b.c. operators in subsequent surveys. a descriptive quantitative analysis of the results from the b.c. surveys is presented. data were analyzed using microsoft excel version 14.4.4. r e s u l t s o n t a ri o f i rs t n a t i o n s o p e ra t o r c e rt i f i c a t i o n a n d w o rki n g c o n d i t i o n s i n o n t a ri o . the operators who were interviewed in the eight ontario communities have been operators from periods ranging from 1 to 23 years, and all are certified. they all work full-time as water treatment operators between 35 and 40 hours a week; however, they are also on call 24/7 for emergencies. they reported receiving anywhere from 3 to 5 weeks of paid vacation per year. in total, 14 full-time operators and four part-time operators were employed in these communities. seven of the eight communities employ at least one full-time and one part-time operator, while one community has no back-up operator on staff to support the full-time operator. the practice of sharing responsibilities and hours between operators varies from plant to plant; for instance, in one community, three operators work full-time, but they are also responsible for any construction in the community and anything to do with public works. in other communities, parttime operators are hired to work weekends. in one community, two operators alternate the weekend shift. for example, during one week, one operator will work monday through friday and the second operator will work monday through wednesday, then saturday and sunday. the following week, they alternate. in general, the operators interviewed reported that they were satisfied and/or enjoyed their job. when asked to elaborate as to why, the following thoughts were shared: • they feel respected within the community. • they have a sense of responsibility. • there is a good working environment. • the system is easy to maintain. there are no large problems. • they are performing a service. • they are close to home or close to family in the community. • their work is interesting, and the potential to learn new things is important interestingly, none of the operators cited compensation as a reason for liking their position. the operators interviewed reported only ever working in their current community, which initially suggested that operator retention might not be a concern in the communities interviewed. however, after further investigation, we discovered that at least 29 different operators have worked in five of these communities since they were commissioned (representing 69 years total). the existing operators were asked why previous operators chose to leave their positions and the following reasons were listed: 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.7 • found higher paid employment; • not prepared for the responsibility of being an operator or not prepared to be on call 24/7; • personal reasons or family reasons; • personal disagreement with chief and council; • the chief and council let operators go because they were not certified; • operators were “unsuitable” for work environment and removed by chief and council. b. c . f i rs t n a t i o n s during the 7th annual bc first nation water & wastewater operational excellence conference & interactive trade show, 79 b.c. first nations water treatment operators completed a survey regarding certification, job satisfaction, and working conditions. o p e ra t o r c e rt i f i c a t i o n , w o rki n g c o n d i t i o n s , a n d c o m p e n s a t i o n . figure 1 illustrates the breakdown of certification levels of the operators interviewed. the majority of operators reported that they had level i (n = 30) or small water system (n = 23) certification. nine operators reported that they were not certified, while one indicated that he or she was a manager and did not specify certification. the remaining reported that they were either operators in training (oit) (n = 3), or certified to levels ii (n = 6), iii (n = 1), or iv (n = 1). five operators did not respond. when asked whether they were certified to the level required by the system in place, of the 76 operators who responded, 44 said “yes” (58%) and 32 (42%) said “no.” of those who stated “no,” 8 were not certified, 2 were oit, 7 were certified only to operate a small water system, 10 were certified to level i, 1 to level ii, and 1 to level iii. three operators did not respond. the respondents reported working actively anywhere from less than 19 hours per week to more than 45 hours a week as a water system operator (figure 2). of the 72 who responded, half answered that they work between 0 and 19 hours per week, while only 11 reported actively working more than 40 hours a week as a water system operator. compensation and the number of paid weeks of vacation are shown in figures 3 and 4, respectively. from figure 3 it seems that there is no consistency in salaries for water treatment operators in b.c. first nations communities. most of the operators surveyed (n = 50) reported making less than $40,000 per year. only 16 reported making greater than $40,000 per year, and the remaining operators (n = 33) chose not to disclose their salaries. fifty operators stated that they get at least two weeks of paid vacation annually, 3 reported they get only one week of paid vacation, and 13 said they get no paid vacation. the remaining operators did not respond. 5 murphy et al.: challenges of first nations drinking water operators published by scholarship@western, 2015 f i g u re 1 . s e l f re p o rt e d c e rt i f i c a t i o n l e v e l s o f w a t e r t re a t m e n t o p e ra t o rs f ro m b. c f i rs t n a t i o n s c o m m u n i t i e s . f i g u re 2 . s e l f re p o rt e d n u m b e r o f h o u rs a w e e k t h e b. c . o p e ra t o rs w o rk o n t h e p ro v i s i o n o f d ri n ki n g w a t e r i n t h e i r c o m m u n i t y . 0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 not certified oit level i level ii level iii level iv small water system fr eq ue nc y responses 0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 0-19 20-29 30-39 40-45 > 45 fr eq ue nc y hours a week 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.7 f i g u re 3 . s e l f re p o rt e d c o m p e n s a t i o n f o r w o rki n g a s a w a t e r s y s t e m o p e ra t o r i n b. c . f i g u re 4 . s e l f re p o rt e d n u m b e r o f w e e ks o f p a i d v a c a t i o n re c e i v e d a n n u a l l y b y b. c . o p e ra t o rs n o t i n c l u d i n g s t a t u t o ry h o l i d a y s . 0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20 fr eq ue nc y responses 0 5 10 15 20 25 30 1 week 2 weeks 3 weeks > 3 weeks no paid vacation fr eq ue nc y responses 7 murphy et al.: challenges of first nations drinking water operators published by scholarship@western, 2015 o p e ra t o r j o b s a t i s f a c t i o n a n d re t e n t i o n. when asked whether or not they were satisfied with their job as a water system operator, 53 responded that they were satisfied, 15 that they were not satisfied, and 3 indicated that they were both satisfied and unsatisfied (they checked both answers). eight surveys were left blank for this question. reasons cited for being satisfied and unsatisfied are presented in tables 2 and 3. responses for being satisfied and unsatisfied with their roles as a water system operators were grouped into categories. sometimes operators cited multiple reasons for why they were satisfied or not satisfied with their roles and therefore the response of one operator may have fallen under multiple categories. the most commonly cited reasons for being satisfied with their positions fell under two categories related to: (a) having a sense of responsibility towards their communities (n = 26), and (b) being interested in their jobs and training (n = 18). the two most cited reasons among those who were unsatisfied with their jobs were (a) wages and hours of work (n = 6), and (b) lack of funding and support (n = 6). using the data collected in the interviews conducted in ontario, a question was developed regarding the challenges faced by first nations operators. the operators surveyed in b.c. were asked to identify which (if any) of the challenges listed in figure 5 they face as water system operators in their communities. the two most frequently cited challenges in the responses were a lack of support from band councils and lack of funding for operation and maintenance. these findings were in line with the information gathered during the ontario interviews. other important challenges listed included limited technical support when needed (n = 19), community complaints (n = 25), difficulty obtaining supplies (n = 14), interpersonal challenges with colleagues or band councils (n = 12), working with plants that are challenging to operate (n = 10), and drinking water advisories (n = 8). figure 6 shows the distribution of reported number of years that the respondents have been water treatment operators. only 70 operators (out of 79) responded to this question. from figure 6 one can see that there was a fairly even distribution of operators with all levels of experience. all but five reported working in the same community once they became an operator. four of the operators who had worked in other communities prior to their current communities reported leaving their prior positions for the following reasons“ politics,” “change of management,” “council not seeing eye to eye,” and “opportunities.” d i s c u s s i o n o p e ra t o r c e rt i f i c a t i o n , w o rki n g c o n d i t i o n s , a n d c o m p e n s a t i o n only 58 percent of the b.c. operators who responded to the survey reported being certified to the required level of their water system in place; the remaining 42 percent were either not certified or their certifications were inadequate for the systems that they were operating. these findings are higher than those presented by neegan burnside ltd. in their 2011 assessment report, whereby 75 of 290 (26%) b.c. systems reported that the operators were not certified or their certifications were inadequate (neegan burnside ltd., 2011c). consequently, it appears little additional progress has been made since the neegan burnside ltd. assessment (which was conducted in 2009 to 2011) to ensure that operators receive the training they need to operate the systems. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.7 t a b l e 2 . r e a s o n s c i t e d b y b. c . o p e ra t o rs f o r be i n g s a t i s f i e d w i t h t h e i r j o b s c a t e g o r y e x a m p l e o f r e s p o n s e s n u m b e r w h o c i t e d r e a s o n f e e l i n g a s e n s e o f r e s p o n s i b i l i t y t o c o m m u n i t y m e m b e r s , a n d / o r t h e i r s a f e t y / h e a l t h “a warrior looking after my community and our people.” “safety. wellbeing of the community.” “i like being able to support my community and make sure the water they have access to is potable and palatable.” “like working with water and people. happy they have good drinking water.” “love to provide safe drinking water to community…” 26 i n t e r e s t e d i n j o b , l e a r n i n g m o r e , t r a i n i n g , a n d b e i n g c h a l l e n g e d . “…interested in water supply, treatment, and delivery.” “job satisfaction through training.” “they invest their money into my training and certification.” “enjoy learning challenges and how to fix things.” 18 s u p p o r t f r o m c o m m u n i t y , c h i e f & c o u n c i l , a n d / o r t h e p e o p l e w i t h w h o m t h e y w o r k . “generally supported by community and administration.” “because of my crew—work as a team.” “have support from chief and council.” 5 s a t i s f i e d w i t h h o u r s , w o r k l o a d , j o b s e c u r i t y , b e n e f i t s , o r l o c a t i o n ( c l o s e t o h o m e ) “work close to home…” “…it’s fun and easy” “benefits…” “steady job…” “live in the community…” “duty is light…” 9 9 murphy et al.: challenges of first nations drinking water operators published by scholarship@western, 2015 t a b l e 3 . r e a s o n s c i t e d b y b. c . o p e ra t o rs f o r n o t be i n g s a t i s f i e d w i t h t h e i r j o b s c a t e g o ry e x a m p l e r e s p o n s e s n u m b e r w h o c i t e d r e a s o n w a g e s / h o u rs “wages.” “even if you’re certified, wages stay the same.” “need better pay for the work you do.” “for being available 24/7, not having weekends, etc. holidays.” 6 l a c k o f t ra i n i n g “need more training.” “certification for myself is below facility level.” 3 l a c k o f f u n d i n g / s u p p o rt “lack of support to purchase equipment, lack of council support.” “water plant is 2.5 years overdue for commissioning/funding issue…” “need more support from upper management to bring water quality up.” “not knowing what (the) funding for the water program (is) annually.” 6 l a c k o f a b a c ku p o p e ra t o r “no back-up operator.” “need back-up operator…” 2 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.7 f i g u re 5 . r e p o rt e d c h a l l e n g e s f a c e d b y b. c . w a t e r o p e ra t o rs i n f i rs t n a t i o n s c o m m u n i t i e s . f i g u re 6 . d i s t ri b u t i o n o f s e l f re p o rt e d y e a rs o f e x p e ri e n c e a c t i n g a s w a t e r t re a t m e n t o p e ra t o rs i n b. c . f i rs t n a t i o n s c o m m u n i t i e s . 0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 fr eq ue nc y challenges 0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 < 1 year 1-3 years 4-5 years 6-10 years 10-15 years > 15 years fr eq ue nc y responses 11 murphy et al.: challenges of first nations drinking water operators published by scholarship@western, 2015 it is essential that those who are responsible for the provision of drinking water are adequately trained, supported, and compensated in line with the consequences of their actions and inactions in protecting the health of their communities (hrudey, 2011). today, over a decade since the walkerton tragedy, small canadian communities—including first nations—still try to get away with employing operators with the lowest level of certification, and providing them with minimal compensation. as a result, these communities may be risking the health of their populations (hrudey, 2011). this is consistent with the findings of the present study. from figures 2 to 4, it is clear that there is a wide variation in the number of hours that operators are required to work as well as how they are compensated in terms of salary and weeks of paid vacation. there were no trends in the data indicating that those who work more hours are compensated more, or vice versa. given the complexity of governance in first nations communities, there is no regulatory body that can establish compensation rates for water system operators to ensure that it is equal across communities. however, it has been suggested that provincial laws could be applied to workers’ compensation in first nations communities. in 1994, “a b.c. court of appeal case held that a provincial workers’ compensation scheme extended to employees of band councils. that case explicitly held that the provincial law did not impair federal jurisdiction or ‘indianness’ by its application to the band council” (kahn, thornton, kamanga, sherry & mcgregor, 2001, p. 36; see also isaac v. british columbia [workers’ compensation board], 1994). consequently, there may be precedent to apply a standard workers compensation scheme across all first nations communities for water operators in british columbia and other provinces. however, even if this precedent could be applied, it is likely that many communities will lack the funds to adequately compensate their operators (smith, guest, syrcek & farahbakhsh, 2006). j o b s a t i s f a c t i o n a n d o p e ra t o r r e t e n t i o n most of the operators interviewed in ontario (n = 8) and british columbia (n = 53) reported being satisfied with their current employment. reasons cited for being satisfied with their jobs fell under four general categories (outlined in table 2): a. feeling a sense of responsibility towards their communities and/or the safety and health of community members; b. interest in the job, learning opportunities, training, and being challenged; c. support from community, chief & council, and/or the people with whom they work; and d. satisfied with hours, workload, job security, benefits, or location (i.e., working close to home). although in both b.c. and ontario most operators reported they were satisfied with their jobs, many of them reported challenges with obtaining support from their chief and council, as well as having funding for the operation and maintenance of their systems (see figure 5). in ontario, one operator explained that he felt stressed at times because he was not sure that he had enough money available to purchase consumables, supplies, and spare parts for the system. council controlled the water treatment plant budget and he needed to obtain approval for all purchases. these concerns were echoed by other 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.7 ontario operators who were also not permitted to make decisions without chief and council approval. moreover, their requests were occasionally not approved, which could have compromised public safety. in one case, an operator reported that he was told he was not allowed to purchase chlorine for the treatment system. these conflicts and political challenges go against the recommendations of the expert panel on safe drinking water for first nations (swain et al., 2006), which states that operators require an “operating, management and governance framework that supports them” (p. 14) so that they can make decisions to prevent risks—as opposed to reacting when dangerous circumstances arise. chief and council must support system operators and managers and must be aware of the obligations of safe water provision, including ensuring that adequate funds are spent on repairs and maintenance (swain et al., 2006). of the b.c. operators who responded to the question regarding job satisfaction, 53 cited that they were satisfied with their position, while 15 said that they were not satisfied. reasons for not being satisfied with their position included concerns around wages and hours (n = 6), training (n = 3), lack of funding or support (n = 6), and lack of a back-up operator (n = 2). operator retention and job satisfaction seem to be closely related to the annual water system operation and maintenance budget available in communities. not only does this budget affect the operators’ compensation, but it also may contribute to their autonomy in terms of decision-making regarding the replacement of equipment and purchase of consumables. in the current funding structure, aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc) contributes 80 percent of funds for the annual operation and maintenance of drinking water systems in first nations communities. the community is required to contribute the remaining 20 percent (simeone, 2010). the communities interviewed in ontario sourced this 20 percent from a variety of income-generating activities, including collection of user fees, collection of land lease fees for businesses and cottage owners, and the “band programming” budget. in 3 of 7 of the communities interviewed in ontario that have full-scale water treatment systems, user fees are collected to help fund the annual operation and maintenance of the water treatment system. households pay between $80 and $85 per year and businesses pay between $500 and $1200 per year. although user fees are collected in these communities, operators still complain of inadequate funds for operation and maintenance, noting that band councils ask them to reduce costs or claim that the budget is in deficit, therefore restricting the flow of funds. mccullough and farahbakhsh (2012) suggested that the 80:20 split in operation and maintenance costs does not reflect economic reality because many communities do not have income-generating activities that can support the collection of user-fees and, as a result, this funding divide sets the stage for two-tier service delivery—communities with higher incomes can afford to pay for more qualified operators and keep up with maintenance needs, in contrast to those whose incomes are lower and must cut salaries and corners in terms of operation and maintenance. nevertheless, the collection of user fees alone does not seem to preclude two-tier service delivery in the ontario communities interviewed. although user fees are collected in some of the communities, it seems as though the fees may be inadequate to support regular operation and maintenance activities, or that these fees are not being used exclusively for the upkeep of the water system. several of the operators interviewed in ontario and b.c. suggested that there may be a lack of transparency between chief and council, and the operators in terms of the budget that is available for the operation and maintenance of the plant, since the operators reported that they are not aware of the annual operating and maintenance costs of the water treatment systems in place. in 13 murphy et al.: challenges of first nations drinking water operators published by scholarship@western, 2015 addition to transparency, band council members may not be adequately trained in water plant operation when compared to a water treatment plant operator or manager. band council members may not be aware first-hand of the annual costs associated with consumables, routine maintenance, and repairs, and may only review the requests that come in for these items. as a result, this knowledge gap may be leading to the inadequate forecasting of annual budgets and/or the withholding of funds as routine preventative maintenance activities may not be seen as a priority by band council over other more immediate needs in communities. the findings reported herein are in line with existing literature regarding operator retention. for instance, smith et al. (2006) reported that the cultural and political environment on first nations communities means that “operators can be chosen because they are related to individuals on band council or because they are already involved in some other aspect of public works on the reserve, not because they are possibly qualified or interested in the work” (p. s13). in some ontario communities interviewed, operators in place were related to members on band council or an employee in the administration offices. though in these particular situations the operators were qualified and interested in their work, the hiring of relatives may lead to numerous issues including the possibility that the operators may not understand or appreciate the high level of responsibility that is associated with their positions (smith et al., 2006). in addition, the selection process of operators in some communities is not structured in a way that might mitigate personal conflicts between operators and band council, and, as a result, band council politics may dictate on a whim which operators are appointed and/or dismissed (smith et al., 2006). many communities make attempts to hire from within their own community. this may be due to the fact that the location of the community is too remote, that the community is unable to attract operators from outside the community due to the economy on the reserve, or, possibly, that the community is trying to create a stability on the reserve by creating job opportunities for residents who already reside there (first nations information governance centre, 2012). the findings of the interviews conducted suggest that hiring from within the community may contribute to improved operator retention. however, information gained from the interviews with operators show that stability in funding is important—in these cases, band councils should ensure that standard processes are in place for hiring in order to mitigate personal conflicts or conflicts of interest between band council, band staff, and operators. of utmost importance is that the high level of responsibility associated with the position is respected (smith et al., 2006). the dismissal of operators because they were not certified suggests that communities may not have had the funds to invest in operator training. this poses other challenges in operator retention: although the community may save money by hiring operators that are fully certified, they may not be able to retain those operators if they cannot adequately compensate them (swain et al., 2006). one of the reasons cited for operator satisfaction was the ability to stay and work in one’s home community (and remain close to family); therefore, investing in training of existing operators from the communities themselves may be worth the training investment—as opposed to hiring operators from the outside who may not want to stay in these communities for the long term. for instance, in two of the ontario communities interviewed, band council and public works are working together to recruit youth from high schools and offering them co-op summer positions at the communities’ water treatment plants. once they finish 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.7 high school, these youths can go on to take their operator in training (oit) certification and become employed by the community. c o n c l u s i o n s although significant investments have been made by the federal government to support first nations communities in the operation and maintenance of their water treatment systems, there are still financial gaps and institutional governance structures that need to be strengthened to ensure the ongoing provision of safe water. eight southern ontario first nations operators were interviewed from relatively affluent and accessible communities, and it was expected that these communities would represent “best case” water systems. yet, the operators in these communities reported that funding and band council intervention are challenges that may interfere with both the operation and maintenance of the system as well as long-term operator retention in these communities. using the findings from ontario, a questionnaire was administered to seventy-nine b.c. water system operators regarding certification, job satisfaction, compensation, and working conditions. the responses from the b.c. operators were in line with those from ontario. operators reported that a lack of support from their band councils and a lack of funding for operation and maintenance are two major challenges in their day-to-day operations. for those who reported being unsatisfied with their jobs, wages and hours of work, and lack of funding and support were cited as reasons. until sustainable funding strategies are conceived and sound governance structures are in place that can adequately compensate operators and provide them the adequate technical and financial support necessary to fulfill their responsibilities, safe water provision will continue to be a challenge in canadian first nations communities. possible policy recommendations that may address these issues include: a. the standardization of operator wages, ensuring that operators with the same training and certification are compensated equally. ensuring, too, that funds provided by aandc to communities are allocated in such a way that sufficient funds are available for operator salaries and that operator salaries are separate from operation and maintenance costs. b. encouraging the training of chief and council in water system operation so that they better understand the role of operators and their day-to-day needs. this may encourage transparency and open dialogue between operators and chief and council regarding operation and maintenance needs and the allocation of funds necessary for the upkeep of water systems. 15 murphy et al.: challenges of first nations drinking water operators published by scholarship@western, 2015 r e f e re n c e s first nations information governance centre. (2012). first nations regional health survey (rhs) phase 2 (2008/10). national report on adults, youth and children living in first nations. retrieved from http://www.fnigc.ca/sites/default/files/first%20nations%20regional%20health%20survey% 20(rhs)%202008-10%20-%20national%20report.pdf hrudey, s. (2011). safe drinking water policy for canada – turning hindsight into foresight (c.d. howe institute commentary-the water series no. 323). retrieved from http://www.cdhowe.org/safe-drinking-water-policy-for-canada-–-turning-hindsight-intoforesight/8585 isaac v. british columbia (workers’ compensation board). (1994) b.c.j. no. 1615 (c.a.). kahn, j. w., thornton, a. a., kamanga, d., sherry, m., & mcgregor, d. (2001). drinking water in ontario first nation communities: present challenges and future directions for on-reserve water treatment in the province of ontario. retrieved from: http://www.chiefs-ofontario.org/node/106 mccullough, j., & farahbakhsh, k. (2012). square peg, round hole: first nations drinking water infrastructure and federal policies, programs, and processes. the international indigenous policy journal, 3(1), 3. retrieved from http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/3/ neegan burnside ltd. (2011a). national assessment of first nations water and wastewater systems— national roll-up report—final. ottawa, canada: department of aboriginal affairs and northern development canada. retrieved from: http://www.aadncaandc.gc.ca/eng/1313770257504/1313770328745 neegan burnside ltd. (2011b). national assessment of first nations water and wastewater systems— ontario regional roll-up report. ottawa, canada: department of aboriginal affairs and northern development canada. retrieved from: https://www.aadncaandc.gc.ca/eng/1314634863253/1314634934122 neegan burnside ltd. (2011c). national assessment of first nations water and wastewater systems– british columbia regional roll-up report. ottawa, canada: department of aboriginal affairs and northern development canada. retrieved from: https://www.aadncaandc.gc.ca/eng/1315615604674/1315615867587 simeone, t. (2010). safe drinking water in first nations communities. ottawa, on: library of parliament. simeone, t., & troniak, s. (2012). bill s-8, the safe drinking water for first nations act (publication no. 41-1-s8-e). ottawa, canada: library of parliament. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.7 smith, d. w., guest, r. k., syrcek, c. p., & farahbakhsh, f. (2006). public health evaluation of drinking water systems for first nations reserves in alberta, canada. journal of environmental engineering and science, 5(suppl 1), s1-s17. swain, h., louttit, s., & hrudey, s. (2006). report of the expert panel on safe drinking water for first nations (volume 1). ottawa, canada: department of indian affairs and northern development. communities. ottawa, canada: the first nations information governance centre. retrieved from: http://fnigc.ca/sites/default/files/first_nations_regional_health_survey_200810_national_report.pdf 17 murphy et al.: challenges of first nations drinking water operators published by scholarship@western, 2015 the international indigenous policy journal june 2015 insights and opportunities: challenges of canadian first nations drinking water operators heather m. murphy elliott corston-pine yvonne post edward a. mcbean recommended citation insights and opportunities: challenges of canadian first nations drinking water operators abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license insights and opportunities: challenges of canadian first nations drinking water operators returning to netukulimk: mi’kmaq cultural and spiritual connections with resource stewardship and self-governance the international indigenous policy journal volume 2 issue 4 traditional knowledge, spirituality, and lands article 7 october 2011 returning to netukulimk: mi’kmaq cultural and spiritual connections with resource stewardship and self-governance kerry prosper paq'tnkek first nation, kerryp@ns.sympatico.ca l. jane mcmillan st. francis xavier university, ljmcmill@stfx.ca anthony a. davis mount saint vincent university, anthony.davis@msvu.ca morgan moffitt university of british columbia, morgan.e.moffitt@gmail.com recommended citation prosper, k. , mcmillan, l. j. , davis, a. a. , moffitt, m. (2011). returning to netukulimk: mi’kmaq cultural and spiritual connections with resource stewardship and self-governance. the international indigenous policy journal, 2(4) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.7 his research is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in he international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. returning to netukulimk: mi’kmaq cultural and spiritual connections with resource stewardship and self-governance abstract recent global initiatives such as the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples have brought the issues facing and needs of indigenous peoples to the forefront of international attention. while underscoring respect for traditional practices, these initiatives have yet to appreciate fully the extent to which indigenous peoples’ practices engage ways of being, living and believing that encompass a holistic understanding of the relations between humans and all facets of their ecosystem. the mi’kmaq, the indigenous people of maritime canada, capture and express their holistic understanding through the concept of netukulimk. in this essay we review core attributes of netukulimk. we also review key moments in the colonialization assault on netukulimk as a primary means for subordinating and marginalizing the mi’kmaq. we close the essay with an overview and discussion of recent developments wherein the mi’kmaq are working to revitalize the place of netukulimk in treaty-based rights and mi’kmaq law-ways, particularly within selfgovernance and resource stewardship initiatives. the mi’kmaq experiences provide insights regarding the challenges and requirements for achieving respect for traditional practices as key to affirming the rights of indigenous peoples. keywords resource stewardship, mi’kmaq, cultural practices and beliefs, netukulimk, aboriginal rights, indigenous sovereignty acknowledgments the research reported herein was supported by funding awarded in the social sciences and humanities research council of canada’s aboriginal research strategy program (grant # 856-2007-0029). we would like to thank the reviewers for their insightful and helpful suggestions. corresponding author is l. jane mcmillan at ljmcmill@stfx.ca creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ introduction netukulimk is a complex cultural concept that encompasses mi’kmaq sovereign law ways and guides individual and collective beliefs and behaviours in resource protection, procurement, and management to ensure and honour sustainability and prosperity for the ancestor, present and future generations. this paper explores the loss and reconstruction of this important mi’kmaq traditional concept. we use the example of mi’kmaq moose hunting to illustrate the impacts and consequences of colonial laws and practices on mi’kmaq ways of being. the case study reveals the obstacles mi’kmaq face resisting systemic discrimination and domination as they struggle to meaningfully reassert their rights against the state and its bureaucracy. moose management is only one strategy for reinvigorating netukulimk practices. compared to lobster fishing or tree harvesting, moose hunting appears to be a modest resource and mi’kmaq use of it is seen as a less threatening expression of aboriginal rights to those in power. this story reveals that even the most modest resources have profound meaning for mi’kmaq livelihoods and nation building, but are an ongoing source of contention for the state when it comes to sorting responsibility in recognizing and facilitating the implementation of indigenous rights. examining the reinvigoration of the cultural significance of netukulimk provides insight into mi’kmaq institution building and nation rebuilding efforts. the early 1990s united nation’s rio declaration signified the re-invigorated interest of world governance fora in and concern with indigenous peoples’ conditions and issues. to date, one of the most tangible outcomes from this is the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip), adopted by 144 member nation states, on september 12, 2007 (undrip, 2007). the united nations in concert with the passing of the declaration has also re-invigorated the un permanent forum on indigenous issues as a means to assess progress on achieving the declaration’s goals as well as to sustain focus and work on realizing the declaration’s key provisions.i the declaration provides an unambiguous assertion of the “...urgent need to respect and promote inherent rights of indigenous peoples...especially their rights to their lands, territories and resources” (undrip, 2007, p.2). many of the rights specified concern the enabling of conditions critical to advancing indigenous peoples determination of their social and economic development. in mcmillan and davis (2010) we argue, for instance, the language in articles 3, 18, 20, 21, 23, 27, and 32 in one way or the other affirms the right of indigenous peoples to self-determination and decision-making with respect to access and use of territories and resources for the purposes of social and economic development. contextualizing and framing the exercise of these rights, the declaration affirms within its preamble that the signatories recognize “...that respect for indigenous knowledge, cultures and traditional practices [as well as affirmation of existing treaties and agreements] contributes to notably, the four nations initially voting against adopting the declaration, i.e., australia, canada, new zealand, and the united states, have a history of extremely troubled relations and legal struggles with their indigenous peoples. australia and new zealand endorsed the declaration in april 2010. the canadian government had argued that the declaration was inconsistent with its constitution and charter of rights and freedoms, the national defense act, supreme court rulings and treaty negotiation policies; but reversed its position in november of 2010, quietly signing the declaration late on a friday afternoon without much fanfare. the united states followed suit in december 2010. at the events, the representatives for each country stated that they signed the declaration because they wanted to improve state relations with indigenous peoples. in canada the harper government wanted to quiet their critics and embark on a “new” relationship with aboriginal peoples. seven months after ratifying the declaration, prime minister harper changed the name of department of indian and northern affairs to aboriginal affairs and northern development during the announcement of his new cabinet on may 18, 2011, but noted that the name change neither impacts the mandate nor alters the statutory responsibilities of the minister (inac, 2011). 1 prosper et al.: returning to netukulimk published by scholarship@western, 2011 sustainable and equitable development and proper management of the environment” (ibid., p. 2). in moving beyond stated intentions, of course, nations must be prepared to take on and resolve considerable challenges. first among these in many settings is the need to change existing resource use and socio-economic development policies and practices so that indigenous peoples are empowered to exercise their rights within a context that enables respect for and expression of traditional knowledge (tk) and culture. in many settings there are conflicts of interest that position the expression of indigenous rights in direct opposition with existing distributions of economic advantage and political power of non-indigenous interests. for instance, the right to self-determine socio-economic development requires access to highly valued land and resources that are already possessed and used by others such as private citizens, public agencies and industrial corporations. in such contexts governments are expected to lead in creating the enabling conditions, for example, the redistribution of land and access to resources critical for indigenous peoples to achieve and express their rights. in 2004 and 2005 the supreme court of canada in the haida (2004, scc 73), taku river tlingit (2004, scc 74) and mikisew cree (2005, scc 69) cases, developed the duty to consult doctrine, which says that governments making decisions that may have an impact on aboriginal rights or treaty rights have a duty to consult the potentially affected aboriginal communities even prior to final proof of the rights in court or a final settlement on the rights in negotiation processes (newman, 2009). yet, governments are enablers for the very entities currently in control of these resources. to date, government resistance to such changes, irrespective of the rhetoric and the privileging of economic and industrial development over aboriginal rights and title, contributes to stalling progress on these issues. perhaps even more challenging than sorting out the legal and material issues is the simple fact that ‘...respect for indigenous knowledge, cultures and traditional practices...’ requires an understanding that for most indigenous peoples, relationship with the land, water, sea and life entails culturally and spiritually rooted sensibilities. theirs is ordinarily a holistic and inter-dependent relationship wherein they are ‘of’ their environmental-ecological context and this context is every bit as much ‘of’ them. consequently, actualizing ‘respect’ will entail, in the first instance, situating and empowering indigenous cultures as critical mediums wherein rights, entitlements and actions are conceptualized and expressed. systemic discrimination across canadian institutions significantly obscures the potentials of equitable co-existence, inclusive knowledge mobilization, collaborative strategies for cultural alignment and, most importantly, indigenous sovereignty. all of which are required to enhance the liberty and capacity of indigenous peoples toward expressing their rights and embracing and transmitting, generationally, the responsibilities associated with indigenous knowledge and wellbeing. while efforts have been made to include traditional knowledge in areas such as resource management through various co-management schemes, as nadasdy (2003) demonstrates, these have often been framed by government priorities and have lead to the increasing bureaucratization of many aboriginal communities (asch, 1997; warry, 2007). thus, rather than respecting and empowering indigenous ways of knowing, many projects that aim to incorporate indigenous knowledge have undermined or ignored aboriginal spiritual relationships with their resources. in canada, the primary contests to date over these matters occur in courtrooms and mainly concern so-called legal clarifications of treaty-based rights. these processes are contentious and divisive. they take years and millions of dollars to arrive at final decisions, often after appeals of lower court decisions to the supreme court of canada (wicken, 2002; coates, 2000; napoleon 2005). yet even unambiguous supreme court affirmations of treaty-based rights and clarifications respecting the scope of treaty provisions are resisted by government bureaucrats through tactics such as questioning interpretations, blurring definitions of adequate consultation and accommodation, stalling on implementation, and/or insisting treaty rights be restricted by existing policies and practices. certainly respect for indigenous knowledge, culture, and traditional practices are far from evident in the approach 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.7 of government administrators working with indigenous peoples’ treaty-based rights and entitlements in canada. one recent example of the latter strategy concerns a recent supreme court decision affirming the mi’kmaq treaty right to harvest marine resources for commercial purposes known as the marshall decision (1999). in response to the marshall decision, the department of fisheries and oceans canada (dfo) insisted that this right be expressed within the existing practice of limited entry access and effort control through allocation management policies such as licenses and quotas, otherwise resource conservation would be jeopardized (coates, 2000; wicken, 2002). to this end, dfo set about negotiating deals with each mi’kmaq band, as well as buying up boats, fishing gear, licenses and quota for distribution to the bands. in the process dfo exacerbated inter mi’kmaq band divisions and intra mi’kmaq community conflicts, as well as fuelled mi’kmaq-non-native suspicions and deepened negative ethnic stereotypes (davis & jentoft, 2001). but against such systemic discrimination, mi’kmaq communities persist and in the face of conflict they produce culturally aligned strategies of survival supported by tools of governance crafted in their customs that will restore their powers of law making. an example of a post-marshall strategy is the fisheries management plan designed by members of the mi’kmaq community of esgenoopetitj (ward and augustine, 2000). the ingenuity of the mi’kmaq is expressed through their spiritual and cultural connections to the land and its resources (henderson, 1997; marshall et al in richardson 1989). these connections have endured and evolved since time immemorial (bourne 2000). in this paper we focus on mi’kmaq relations and connections with moose as a means to illustrate the character and substance of mi’kmaq sustained cultural and spiritual relations to the land and its resources. the mi’kmaq are indigenous to eastern canada, their territory is known as mi’kma’ki and extends across all of atlantic canada and the northeastern united states. they have endured a long history of colonization in which many attempts were made to eradicate mi’kmaq relations to their territory and resources (paul, 2000). however, mi’kmaq resilience and inherent rights could not be erased and today are being reshaped in the reclamation of their own history (mcmillan, 2003, 1997). we explore the mi’kmaq concept of netukulimk as a reference point for illustrating the essential connection of mi’kmaq culture and spirituality in their relations with their changing environments, while ensuring their survivance. this culturally rooted concept operates as a guide to responsible co-existence and interdependence with natural resources, each other and other than human entities. it is considered as a body of living knowledge, which underpins the moral and ethical relationships that explains their world in the past and provides for the present by sustaining the future. netukulimk provides a roadmap to meaningful expressions of rights and entitlements and shapes the governance required to generate sustainable values of interaction and livelihood. to illustrate this concept we examine the culturally significant relations mi’kmaq people have with moose. a note on sources and research methods examining mi’kmaq relations with moose prior to colonization, the impacts of colonization on those relations, and contemporary mi’kmaq perspectives, required a holistic research strategy open to incorporating direct experience and mindful of customary knowledge. central to this process was recognition and assessment of the impacts of centuries of colonization and eurocentric domination on customary knowledge production, transmission and translation and the political environment within which these are articulated today (smith, 1999; tobias, 2000). customary mi’kmaq practices, worldviews, and spirituality, particularly with regard to harvesting resources, are reconstructed from a variety of historical and ethnographic sources such as denys (1672), hoffman (1955), thwaites (1898), upton (1979), and wallis and wallis (1955). the primary 3 prosper et al.: returning to netukulimk published by scholarship@western, 2011 source often referred to as the jesuit relations and allied documents (thwaites, 1898) has been especially central. this source is comprised of the earliest commentaries and descriptions of mi’kmaq culture provided by jesuit missionaries during the 17th and 18th centuries. the content provides a european christian perspective on mi’kmaq customary practices and worldviews, meaning more ethnographic-like descriptions are interwoven with judgmental commentaries representing the mi’kmaq as innocent, simple, uncomplicated and primitive. indeed, these early accounts inaccurately portray mi’kmaq as without law or religion. non-clerical documents such as the accounts provided by denys (1672), an early explorer and entrepreneur, provide similar descriptions. in addition to the early historical record, the mi’kmaq and maliseet nations news, published monthly by the confederacy of mainland mi’kmaq, was scanned for articles pertaining to past and current accounts of mi’kmaq relations to the moose and related mi’kmaq political activities. the articles provide a mi’kmaq contextual view of both past and present social activities and spiritual perspectives. the newspaper also contains articles that express current views on mi’kmaq political and resource issues. mi’kmaq anthropologist kerry prosper conducted fieldwork and participatory observation by attending community forums held by the unama’ki institute of natural resources as they conducted studies in potlotek (oct 25th, 2007), wagmatcook (sept 25th-26th, 2009) and paqtnkek (nov. 15th, 2007). the studies involved open discussions on the topic of moose hunting. community members voiced their concerns about past, present and future moose hunting activities. men and women hunters discussed their anxieties and described their experiences, providing the researchers with their views on current mi’kmaq and moose relationships. from the 1990s to the present, prosper participated in moose hunting excursions each fall on hunters mountain in cape breton island. prosper’s experiences enabled observations on changes in moose hunting activities and attending expressions of netukulimk in practice. for example, these hunting experiences enabled prosper to engage with mi’kmaq customary value systems, the ways and means whereby mi’kmaq hunters show respect for moose and each other. he documented the spiritual and traditional rituals and practices such as sharing meat and communal feasting, which are integral to expressions of netukulimk. interviews were conducted with active mi’kmaq hunters to obtain their perspectives on traditional and spiritual connections to resources. one-on-one, open-ended interviews were completed with seven people. the data identified any continued customary practices and connections to resources expressed by mi’kmaq hunters through their thoughts, understandings and actions. previous research we conducted with the paqtnkek first nation has provided additional insights on the spiritual and cultural connections the mi’kmaq share and express with the land, water and resources. for example, mi’kmaq in paqtnkek still share a special relationship with the american eel to this day. this relationship is similar to the moose as spiritual ties and rituals are expressed through many communal activities that connect mi’kmaq culturally. finally, prosper and mcmillan have engaged in a variety of ways with the mi’kmaq rights initiative, also known as kwilmu'kw maw-klusuaqn [kmk]. among other initiatives, the kmk is focused on the design and conduct of a mi’kmaq moose management initiative (mmi). this initiative is explored through prosper’s and mcmillan’s research, illustrates the necessity for and efforts of mi’kmaq communities and leadership to engage the moral principles of netukulimk as the fulcrum for meaningful expression of mi’kmaq resource treaty rights and governance. in addition, moffitt completed research with the uinr on the mmi initiative during the fall of 2009 and winter of 2010 and her views are interwoven into the text. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.7 netukulimk: a mi’kmaq concept of resource stewardship the mi’kmaq people have inhabited the eastern coast of what is now canada for at least 12,000 years (davis, 1997). during this time, a relationship to the land, water and all wildlife developed. this relationship laid the foundation for how the mi’kmaq interacted with and respected all life within their circle. the relationship was expressed in various ceremonies and rituals that conveyed mi’kmaq respect and gratitude for animals, fish, and all other earthly life forms, which today are called ‘resources’ (martin, 1978). netukulimk is expressed through the performance of rituals and the keeping of customary practices. particular sets of spiritual rules are performed to guide behavior and foster sustainability. their performance may be interpreted as an expression of mi’kmaq law ways, or patterns of interaction that are observed and regulated within communities. special persons in the mi’kmaq community, gifted people, who possess extraordinary abilities, usually led the rituals and practices, which were witnessed and observed by others. the hunters and all other members of the community obeyed the laws of interaction with the animal world; to do otherwise may bring harm to the sustainability of the resource and hence the wellbeing of the community. the rituals of giving thanks for taking a plant or killing large game, like moose, were guided by actions and values intended to keep a respectful co-existence and co-dependence between human and animal (prosper, 2009). the moose was paramount in mi’kmaq culture. their bodies provided the means for shelter, clothing, tools, (handles for tools, knives, hide scrapers, spear and harpoon points), medicine, games and food (hoffman, 1955; martin, 1978; snow, 1968; mcgee and whitehead, 1983). over thousands of years this special dependency, that was both sacred and practical, influenced economic, ceremonial and traditional activities that enhanced the reciprocal relations of survival of both moose and mi’kmaq (prosper, 2009). as martin noted: “the moose and other game animals thus not only furnished food and raiment but were also tied up with the micmac spirit world” (1978, p.36). the mi’kmaq depended on successful hunting to ensure survival particularly during the winter and early spring, the harshest times of the year. to encourage the success of the hunt during this vulnerable period, they developed a spiritual relationship with the moose, and all other forms and processes, in their environment. the mi’kmaq practiced ceremonies and rituals that demonstrated respect and expressed gratitude to the spirits of the animals for their meat, hides and other body parts. the bones of the animals were always treated with great care. it was considered spiritually dangerous to throw them into the fire or to feed them to dogs (denys, 1672; thwaites, 1898; upton, 1979; wallis and wallis, 1955). these acts were considered disrespectful to the animal hunted because they did not allow the spirit of the moose, for example, to regenerate naturally through decomposition and re-absorption into other life forms. burning the bones, for instance, interrupted the perpetual reciprocity of the life and death relationship between humans, animals and other than human worlds. this sacred connection, as expressed in the nature of the hunt and acts of netukulimk, were integral to the belief systems and law ways governing the relations between humans and animal spirits. the success of the hunt and the availability of the moose depended on the maintenance of this connection by respecting the moose during life and death. rituals were carefully constructed to ensure the cycle of regeneration was not interrupted. the indigenous connections to land, water and all life forms were developed as a cyclical and systematic spiritual relationship that is captured in the life and death cycle of all living things (spence, 1927; prosper, 2009). life and death is a continuous cycle as death provides nourishment for the living. thus, when humans die they are recycled by and in the soil and, in turn, provide nourishment to the plants. the plants provide nourishment for animals, which in turn provide nourishment for humans. this cycle includes all forms of life. ‘passing on’ through death expresses constant change and cyclical processes (prosper 2009). 5 prosper et al.: returning to netukulimk published by scholarship@western, 2011 mi’kmaq believe that their ancestors are situated within the circle of life. in the mi’kmaq worldview, consumption of all life forms, such as plants, trees or mammals, is considered as a celebration of their ancestors, as all deceased are integrated into and with the land, water and air. this cycle is a life force that is expressed as mi’kmaq animism. as described by martin: to the micmac manitou was the force that created all things on earth and made all things alive and responsive to man. the micmac world was filled with super human forces and beingsdwarfs, giants, and magicians; animals that could talk to man and had spirits akin to his own; and the magic of mystical and medicinal herbs-a cosmos where even seemingly inanimate objects possessed spirits. (1978, p.35) this life force is represented in and generated by all of the mi’kmaq ancestors who are incorporated within cycles of life and death. resources contain the remnants of the past ancestors and this belief is incorporated and expressed through spiritual understandings, spiritually guided interactions and ceremonial practices intended to demonstrate respect as well as to maintain balance between food, their hunters and all other forms. the primary responsibility of the living mi’kmaq is to take care of and respect past relations that continue to provide wellbeing for the people by following the principles and practices of netukulimk. more than a spiritual connection, cosmology or value system, netukulimk encompasses a complete way of being and sanctions particular types of behavior from its adherents, the mi’kmaq. martin (1978) describes a “control mechanism” that guides the hunter and his actions during the chase. as martin notes “the single most important deterrent to excessive hunting, in the eastern algonquian’s mind at any rate, was the fear of spiritual reprisal for indiscreet slaughter” (1978, p. 18). the “control mechanism” that martin alludes to was the unspoken way of interaction with the animal world, or netukulimk. its principles were embedded in a value system that shaped the interaction between the mi’kmaq and nature as a set of rules and obligations based on respectful gathering from the land and water in a manner that prohibited resource waste. in addition to guiding hunters and gatherers, mi’kmaq law ways like netukulimk assisted in managing their interactions with each other, their territory, and the spirit world. historically, late springs through early winters were busy times for mi’kmaq hunters and fishers as they prepared for the winter to ‘avoid not having enough’, a synonym for netukulimk. the constant need to supply sustenance was managed by the leadership of the mi’kmaq. netukulimk was mobilized as a management structure and guidelines for harvesting. this is evident in the decisions made respecting the distribution and regulation of hunting activities within the seasonal round. the expectation was that respectful resource procurement was to be carried out by taking only enough to satisfy while avoiding waste. the distribution of hunting territories regulated the impact of resource extraction in mi’kmaq lands and allowed for the replenishment of resources in a sustainable manner. the manner in which hunting territories were allocated was a spiritual, economic and political process (chute, 1999). the leaders assured the availability of game and other resources by altering gathering, fishing and hunting territorial allocations. care was taken to assure that hunting territories were not exhausted. thus, through netukulimk a human and animal relationship formed that allowed the survival of both in a sustainable manner (prosper, 2009). this was reinforced by a set of values that expressed mi’kmaq consciousness and which helped mi’kmaq peoples understand their place in the biosphere. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.7 european colonization: netukulimk assailed as experienced at different points in time by most indigenous peoples around the globe, every aspect of mi’kmaq culture and way of being was assailed by western economic and cultural imperialism. for the mi’kmaq, colonization is the process by which the french and english exerted political, economic and cultural domination over mi’kma’ki in an attempt to assimilate the mi’kmaq and their territory into their empires. western imperialism and colonization involved almost immediate theft of indigenous territories and resources as wave upon wave of european ancestry settlers received ‘title’ and cleared ‘grants’ of land (wicken, 2002; wolf, 1982). this played out in different ways in different places. in the case of the mi’kmaq, european colonialism resulted in the alienation of mi’kmaq peoples from traditional resources and hunting, fishing and gathering territories, the marginalization of mi’kmaq peoples, and the criminalization of mi’kmaq spirituality and traditional subsistence activities (mcmillan, 2011). in northeastern north american, the british and the french competed for dominion and, in the process, formed vastly different relationships with the indigenous peoples they encountered. the french never acknowledged indigenous peoples’ title. instead, they mobilized a strategy of colonizing through assimilation. in particular, the french championed the work of catholic missionaries to christianize the ‘natives’, and through conversion, to enmesh indigenous peoples in french culture and imperatives. additionally, the french encouraged the deepening of integration, dependence and assimilation through means such as inter-marriage and mission-centred education (thwaites 1898). until the complete transfer of what is now maritime canada from the french to the british, through the treaty of paris in 1763,, the mi’kmaq had been subjected to over 150 years of french catholic mission colonization and assimilation. this period witnessed the first assault on mi’kmaq culture and way of being, particularly on netukulimk as the basis and framework for their co-dependent relationship with their ecosystem. with the advent of french colonization of mi’kma’ki two ideological worlds came into conflict. in particular, the introduction of catholicism altered ongoing mobilization of netukulimk, thereby severely distorting mi’kmaq relations with the moose and all other life forms. the priests, rejecting animism as profane, coerced the mi’kmaq to sever their connections to the ancestor and animal spiritual worlds in order to receive a new god. the priests used fear as their tool of instruction and used trickery and threats to bring spiritually powerful people into submission. they convinced shamans to give up their medicine bundles and become baptized in order to “save their souls.” intolerant of their practices the missionaries accused the mi’kmaq shamans of being frauds and jugglers in league with the devil (martin, 1978; hoffman, 1955; thwaites, 1898). the mi’kmaq depended upon the shamans for healing their sick and mediating infractions that may have offended the people’s relations in the cycle of life. the missionaries discredited the role of the shamans by demonizing their ceremonies and discrediting their relationship with the people through use of gifts, bribes and fear (thwaites, 1898; hoffman, 1955). the introduction of new diseases strained the confidence and authority the shamans held. their social position eroded, as they were unable to protect the thousands of peoples who became sick and died from european introduced diseases (miller 1976, 1982). this situation of uncertainty and distress opened the way for the jesuits to impress the catholic christian belief systems on the vulnerable. the jesuits both mimicked and undermined the healing practices of the shamans (hoffman, 1955). the jesuits devised a strategy to keep the people from moving around by creating fixed settlements and churches, which supplied food and shelter and offered protection to mi’kmaq during a time when they were being reduced and destabilized from disease. by encouraging sedentary lifestyles, the missionaries were in a better position to proselytize catholic christian tenets while actively disrupting mi’kmaq belief systems, in particular the values and morality of netukulimk and the resource procurement and distributions processes. many of the mi’kmaq rituals and customs were displaced and replaced by christian ceremonies (robinson, 2004). 7 prosper et al.: returning to netukulimk published by scholarship@western, 2011 french european settlement of mi’kmaq territory resulted in land loss, deforestation and resource depletion. the french king was viewed as a father figure by the french and somewhat so by the mi’kmaq. both parties understood the significance of sharing gifts and trade, which helped fortify the relationship. french and mi’kmaq lived with a certain level of accommodation in retrospect a primary means fostering assimilation. as wicken speculates: in the late 1600s and the early 1700s, a dynamic evolved in mi’kmaq relationships with the french similar to the one that developed in canada with the aboriginal communities that were living there. true aboriginal land use patterns in the two regions were not identical. the acadians settled on land that was used and occupied by the mi’kmaq. it isn’t clear why the mi’kmaq did nothing[,] while the acadians settled the land, dyked the marshlands, and expanded their farming activities. perhaps there were too few émigrés to pose a threat to the mi’kmaq, or perhaps the lands the acadians settled were not important fishing or fowling sites. since there were few records from the early 1600s, there are few answers. whatever the reasons why co-existence was possible, by the early 1600s acadians settlement had not resulted in any ongoing hostilities with mi’kmaq communities. thus there was no need for either group to resort to military force. (2002, p. 115) by the late 18th century, when the british assumed complete sovereignty over all acadia, the mi’kmaq were a devastated and changed people. it is almost impossible to relate the depth and consequences of the devastation. capacities to resist, including family and kin support systems, were destroyed by the disease holocaust. a desperate peoples in a desperate situation, the mi’kmaq where left shattered by the dramatic changes. without their customary leadership and confidence in customary understandings, practices such as netukulimk were eroded. with the settlement of the british, the mi’kmaq, powerless, poor and surrounded by eurocentric racism, experienced further colonization, victimization and cultural genocide. it was clear from the outset that they intended to settle the land as the primary means to integrate nova scotia into the empire (wicken, 2002). this strategy seriously restricted and confounded mi’kmaq access to and relations with resources. conflicting land use ideologies of the mi’kmaq and the british farmers caused further upheaval in mi’kmaq relations with moose. the british initially proceeded as if the land was essentially unoccupied in any meaningful way and, therefore, theirs to claim and use (wicken, 2002). during the 17th century ‘indian wars’, many of the region’s indigenous peoples successfully resisted this attempt to steal their territories. consequently, the british colonizers were compelled to negotiate treaties as the means to secure peace and to obtain legal title to land for settlement. the treaty negotiation processes affirmed indigenous occupation and title to their territory, affirmed indigenous nationhood, and specified that indigenous peoples would receive particular benefits and entitlements in return for surrendering their legally recognized title. the british, through the course of their imperial contest with the french for dominion over eastern north america, employed treaty settlements as a means of neutralizing indigenous peoples. following the seizure of mi’kma’ki in the treaty of utrecht, the british completed a variety of ‘peace and friendship’ treaties with various mi’kmaq leaders. these treaties assured the mi’kmaq undisturbed exercise of their hunting, gathering and fishing ways of life, among a variety of other promises (wicken, 2000). in return, the mi’kmaq people were required to declare allegiance to the british crown and to cease supporting the french. these treaties did not explicitly transfer title to territory from the mi’kmaq to the british. the british continued employing treaties of ‘peace and friendship’ with various mi’kmaq communities until the end of the 18th century as a means for expressing the dominion of the british and the obligations of the crown for the care and interests of indigenous peoples. these were the 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.7 conditions and the context wherein the mi’kmaq struggled to retain their cultural and material relations with their ecosystem, and in particular, with the moose. moose: a case in point both animal and human relationships were severely altered by the practices of the british colonization of mi’kma’ki as populations suffered significant declines throughout the settlement onslaught. land clearing and the emergence of an extensive forest harvesting industry destroyed wildlife habitats. the destruction of tracts of land disrupted mi’kmaq ancestor spirits and animals. the netukulimk relationship between mi’kmaq and moose was significantly jeopardized by the alterations in the environment, increasing british regulation of resources and restricted access to traditional hunting grounds. the ability of the mi’kmaq to maintain wellbeing through the practice of netukulimk became increasingly difficult. the mi’kmaq were not passive, but strongly voiced their concerns as they resisted the destruction of their territories and practices. for instance, a petition in 1853 to the colonial government from mi’kmaq leader francis paul noted that: the woods have been cut down; the moose and the caribou, the beaver and the bear, and all the other animals, have in most places nearly disappeared. the streams no longer yield their former supplies of fish. so that is it now utterly impossible for us to on obtain a livelihood in the way our creator trained us (petition of francis paul, gorman paul, louis paul and others to queen victoria, 14 december 1853, c0127/213.ff.8-25,@19, pans m/f 13, 1932 in allen, 2000, p. 111). destruction of the habitat at the hands of the newcomers and increasing exclusion from land, shorelines and water had significant consequences for mi’kmaq capacity to live the way of netukulimk, let alone maintain the integrity of their culture and relations (miller, 1976). the demands of their daily struggle to satisfy the requirements for life placed the mi’kmaq in constant stress. miller stated: this abrupt shift in the seasonal round and the diet was accompanied by changes in all aspects of micmac culture. most relevant here are the changes that physically affected the micmac people. the indians themselves, as well as europeans observers noted the effects of dietary change on healthy and the fact that lung, chest, and intestinal disorders were increasingly common, especially in winter. with then inadequate food supplies, the indians were particularly susceptible to the new disorders. (1976, p.122) the mi’kmaq had no choice in such conditions but to do what they could to survive. in so doing, their culturally netukulimk-mediated relations with moose were under assault and their survival within the colonial economy, an economy which pursued and rewarded the commercial exploitation of wildlife, was marginalized. the moose populations soon fell to critically low levels. as pulsifer and nette note, “by the mid and late 1700’s it was obvious that the provincial moose herd could not accommodate the constantly growing demands for meat and hides by natives, settlers and market hunters” (1995, p. 210). hunting and harvesting moose to satisfy settler demand for meat provided one of the few opportunities to access the cash mi’kmaq required to participate in the new economy to purchase food and other necessities, including ammunition, guns and traps. the conditions compelling mi’kmaq participation in this economy dramatically shifted their relations with the natural environment and ecosystem. netukulimk was compromised as the moral basis framing and guiding mi’kmaq relations with nature 9 prosper et al.: returning to netukulimk published by scholarship@western, 2011 due to the competitive character of the market economy, the decline in communal resource procurement strategies and the subservient position of mi’kmaq within the settler economy. yet some mi’kmaq resisted assimilative forces encouraging them to either join settler society or to cease and desist. throughout the 19th and early 20th centuries mi’kmaq leaders repeatedly petitioned the colonial and provincial governments about the hardships they faced as a result of over-harvesting wildlife, specifically moose, and clearing habitat (allen, 2000). mi’kmaq petitioned to have the moose reserved for them and to protect the resources from settlers from harmful hunting practices that disrupted mi’kmaq abilities to maintain netukulimk strategies. that the occupation and settlement of the country by the white man has left the poor indians of nova scotia but a few and scant means of support, the principal difficulty is the moose, which yet remains to afford sustenance to former lords of the soil. that the gradual destruction of this animal is the subject of deep grief to your petitioners and the final destruction would leave the indian in a very destitute condition…that the hunting in the winter season generally commences about the first of february and continues till about the middle of march, that during the month march, if there is any quantity of snow in the woods, it is impossible for the moose to escape the dogs of the white man but is taken with little difficulty and scarcely any resistance…your petitioners therefore pray that your honorable house will be pleased to pass a law to prevent the killing of this animal during the month of march except for the [sustenance?] of the indians. (petition of joseph gload et al close the march moose hunting season to white men 20 march 1844 (pans rg% series p vol. 8a, m #93,m/f 15,605 as noted in allen 2000, p.17). the final form of the legislation, which received assent on 19 april 1844, contained no exemption for the mi’kmaq food harvest (jla, 19 april 1844, p.175, pans m .f 3532 as noted in allen, 2000, p.18). the first regulations on selling moose meat were introduced in the 1840’s and the “concept of regulated hunting seasons” was imposed on mi’kmaq customary moose hunts. despite their request, the provision of an exemption for the mi’kmaq was left out of the final legislation (prosper 2009). the mi’kmaq people were to abide by imposed rules regarding seasonal use or be charged with legal offenses if they hunted ‘out of season’. the arbitrary imposition of european rules exemplifies the denial of mi’kmaq law ways by settler society and represent an explicit non-recognition of mi’kmaq rights or entitlements in maintaining control over their territories. the management of the moose herd was handed over to the provincial government under the guise of another new and convenient concept, “conservation” without consultation with the mi’kmaq, who were the resource stewards for thousands of years. as the technology for exercising netukulimk changed, so too did the guiding principles of netukulimk. the protections offered by the cultural expression of netukulimk and the exercises of treaty-based access to wellbeing were silenced by colonialism. the mi’kmaq were forced to hunt outside of the established geographic and regulatory boundaries in order to provide for their sustenance. this brought them into direct confrontation with the new regulatory regime. these clashes lead to legal disputes that brought the old peace and friendship treaties to the forefront. the mi’kmaq began to resist by employing their understandings of treaty-based rights, privileges, and provisions as the means to assert access and use, as well as to re-establish netukulimk in their relationship to the land and recourses (prosper, 2009). the mi’kmaq began to talk about their treaties and the promises made by the british crown for friendship, as well as about the capacity of these treaties to enable a revitalization of their connection to and expression of netukulimk. the policies of the state, however, were directed to assimilation rather than accommodation. premised on the assumption that the mi’kmaq needed to be protected from increasing encroachment on their hunting territory by settlers, the federal government established the indian 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.7 reserve system (tanner, 1983). mi’kmaq reserves were established following the 1876 indian statute in the british north american act that brought the mi’kmaq under what has been referred to by tanner (1983) as “wardship policy”. rather than protect and preserve mi’kmaq hunting and fishing territories, reserves were often situated far from traditional harvesting territories. the need for food forced the mi’kmaq to venture off reserve to hunt. the effect of this separation from favoured hunting and fishing regions was two-fold: the mi’kmaq were unable to access lands where resources were located to obtain necessary subsistence resources and, as a result, the mi’kmaq were occasionally unable to hunt altogether. consequently, there was a loss in traditional hunting knowledge and the ability of mi’kmaq hunters to pass on their knowledge to the future generations was restricted. moreover, the concept of netukulimk conflicted with western capitalist ideology, mounting resource competition, increasing sedentism due to federal policy and reliance on european foods. the mi’kmaq began to employ the tools of their oppressors to resist colonial domination. in addition to making petitions to the crown, the mi’kmaq fought for their rights and asserted their identities in courts of law. in one case, grand chief gabriel sylliboy was hunting for food “off” reserve when he was apprehended and charged by the provincial authorities with hunting out of season and without the required licenses. at his defense grand chief sylliboy stated: i am a micmac and was chief for six years. became chief in 1909. heard that according to treaty we had right to hunt & fish at any time. i cannot read. heard it from our grandfathers. heard that king of england made treaty with micmac, with the whole tribe. (objected to.) remember hearing that goods were given-blankets-under treaty. (objected to.) about 65 years ago. in the fall before christmas. big coats and old faction guns& and powder horns also. and some hides to make moccasins. and some food. in the spring potatoes& [?] some for seed. tobacco too. and some spears for spearing eels. where people had little farms they got oats. these goods distributed every six months. where people hunting they were supplied with powder & shot & a guns (whitehead, 1991, p. 327-328). the crown in this case did not acknowledge the authority of the mi’kmaq treaties and had the words removed from the court records. the crown attempted to silence all recognition given to the existence to any treaty between the british crown and the mi’kmaq. the right to hunt was nominally recognized within reserve boundaries, but all hunting activities off reserve were criminalized. while convicted, the chief sylliboy’s experience is considered the first legal case to argue the validity of mi’kmaq hunting rights (inglis, mannette, & sulewski, 1991). from this point forward one can trace the trajectory of mi’kmaq legal entanglements as they fight the laws that criminalize their customary practices, beliefs and ways of life. although the sylliboy case was decided in 1928, it would take close to 50 years before mi’kmaq rights were argued in courts again. the ruling that convicted the late grand chief sylliboy was later reversed in the isaac case. in 1975, stephen isaac was also found guilty of hunting “off” reserve lands. later, in his appeal, the conviction was quashed at the supreme court level. the reversal was contained in a decision brought down by the nova scotia supreme court and delivered by chief justice mackeigan. in the judgment which found in favor of an appeal by stephen isaac, a chapel island mi’kmaw…stephen isaac had been charged under section 150(1) of the nova scotia lands and forest act and was found guilty in magistrates court. the decision by nova scotia supreme court appeal division allowed in favor of isaac’s appeal and quashed his conviction. this decision was also based on the royal proclamation of 1763. in effect in 1975, the royal proclamation was validated by the nova scotia supreme court, meaning that hunting 11 prosper et al.: returning to netukulimk published by scholarship@western, 2011 and fishing rights still existed for mi’kmaq in cape breton (inglis, mannette, & sulewski, 1991, p. 36). the criminalization of mi’kmaq hunting and food security continued into the 1980s, when matthew simon of indian brook first nation was charged for hunting deer “off” reserve. again the mi’kmaq were fighting for their rights in the courts of the dominant society. in the simon case, the mi’kmaq used the 1752 peace and friendship treaty as a defense. the supreme court of canada ruled in simon’s favor and the mi’kmaq the treaties were affirmed as valid. this important case protected mi’kmaq treaty-based rights to hunt anywhere in mi’kma’ki. while the favorable supreme court ruling decriminalized mi’kmaq hunting activity “off” reserve, the provincial government authorities continued to deny the mi’kmaq access to the moose by imposing very narrow limits of recognition of mi’kmaq treaty entitlements. the province expanded their regulatory process by which the mi’kmaq were expected to comply. in response to unreasonable limits to their livelihoods, the mi’kmaq began to conceptualize and implement a holistic approach to the exercise of their treaty rights. in doing this, mi’kmaq and their leadership returned to the concept of netukulimk as the values and moral principles reference base upon which to operate mi’kmaq resource stewardship and governance. discussion and conclusions mi’kmaq today are defining netukulimk as: “...a concept which includes the use of the natural bounty provided by the creator for the self-support and well being of the individual and the community at large” (native council of nova scotia, 1994). presently, the concept is articulated in part, as the right to have enough to be well. russell barsh describes the belief as a process of sustaining wellbeing: netukulimk is the process of supplying ones self or making a living from the land, and netukulimkewe’l refers to the applicable rules or standards. interestingly, the closest homophone is nutqw-(insufficiency) rather than pukw-(abundance); thus netukulimk sounds more like “avoiding not having enough” than like obtaining plenty. the mi’kmaq were gathering to avoid not having enough and not so much as having plenty. the etymological root meaning of “ntuk” would mean to the mi’kmaq the provisions needed for the continuation of ones wellbeing. (barsh, 2002, p.1) mi’kmaq linguist, bernie francis describes the model of netukulimk as an ancient belief that translated into english means, “to seek well being”. francis also states: ...[t]his concept has had to evolve to incorporate economic development including “gathering” berries, shellfish, medicines and hunting that also include the modern day concept of knowledge and money, and we must remind ourselves that our gifts come from the creator (the land, water, and their resources) are sacred gifts. this was built in physically among the mi’kmaq. in other words, it doesn’t have to be spoken of because it is simply understood. (francis, 2008 – unpublished document) the mi’kmaq law ways practiced through the concept of netukulimk are being re-embedded in mi’kmaq hunting and gathering activities as a political strategy. netukulimk has been written into the hunting guidelines that were ratified by the thirteen mi’kmaq chiefs at the annual treaty day celebrations october 1, 1986. with the development of hunting guidelines and the treaty hand book, the thirteen chiefs, under the direction of the grand chief and the grand council, the customary 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.7 government of the mi’kmaq, implemented a set of guidelines that the mi’kmaq were to follow. the guidelines followed the direction and spirit of netukulimk. the concept of netukulimk had not been written into any document until this moment. once an unspoken concept of moral and spiritual guidance, netukulimk is now spoken and written into a document setting out the hunting guidelines framing mi’kmaq practice and intentions (prosper, 2009). the guidelines state: until the mi’kmaq people can come to some agreement with canada and nova scotia on changes to their legislation and regulations, it will be necessary to adopt some interim netukulimkewe`l, (rules and standards) of our own – both for our own protection and the protection of the animals and fish which form part of our inheritance from the creator. (the mi’kmaq treaty handbook, 1987, p.14) the revitalization by the mi’kmaq of netukulimk is intended to reconnect their severed spiritual relations with land, plants, water and animals and to restore respect for the responsibilities inherent in their rights (prosper, 2009). through this, mi’kmaq are reclaiming their customary position in relationship with moose and all other resources in order to build a sustainable future. netukulimk offers a relationship of mutual existence and reciprocity between the human and animal world that is spiritually connected and accountable for a continued sustainable existence of all living things here mi’kma’ki. recently, the mi’kmaq rights initiative, kwilmuk maw’klusuawn (kmk), created the moose management initiative (mmi). the moose management initiative (mmi) was established with the goal of implementing mi’kmaq treaty rights and increasing mi’kmaq autonomy (moffitt 2010). the project has been spearheaded by the unama’ki institute of natural resources (uinr) as a direct result of community working groups established throughout on-going negotiations between the kmk, the government of canada, and the province of nova scotia. the mmi is a community-based project that uses consensus building to develop mi’kmaq guidelines for moose hunting and to expand mi’kmaq jurisdiction over the hunt (moffitt 2010). the program is deeply rooted in the cultural beliefs and practices of the mi’kmaq people and in netukulimk in particular. the mmi program coordinator set up various workshops and discussions in mi’kmaq communities to talk about the moose hunt with community members. this approach was used to generate guidelines that were created and agreed upon by all mi’kmaq community members, rather than guidelines created and imposed by the government of nova scotia or the government of canada. multiple discussions, workshops and drafts were created by the mmi and resulted in the creation of a community-based consensus building mechanism that ensures the guidelines reflect the mi’kmaq conceptualizations of their relationship with the resource and each other. this consultative approach reflects mi’kmaq customary law practices of “talking it out”, and demonstrates an important process in nation rebuilding (jorgensen, 2007; mcmillan, 2011). netukulimk is central to the guidelines created by the uinr and is conceptualized as the traditional method resource management resource extraction. through the application of netukulimk as a key pillar in the development of mi’kmaq jurisdiction over moose, the uinr are creating guidelines that are distinct from those laws that regulate non-mi’kmaq hunters (moffitt, 2010). the struggle is to legitimize mi’kmaq laws against the hegemony of nonaboriginal laws and enforcement and this research has found that the concept of netukulimk is vital in this legitimation process (mcmillan and davis, 2010; prosper, 2009). the moose is the catalyst through which the mi’kmaq implement a sustainable management plan for the moose hunt. the issues of externally imposed regulation verses culturally aligned value system management will be tested. the mi’kmaq hunters may not accept the implementation of a regulation system that resembles or duplicates the provincial system. the challenge will be the ability of the mi’kmaq to widely embrace the concept of netukulimk, the spiritual relationship that the mi’kmaq 13 prosper et al.: returning to netukulimk published by scholarship@western, 2011 once practiced and intersect it with livelihood activities in ways that are meaningful economically and socially. mi’kmaq are faced with the fact that resources are limited and the exercise of their rights to provide a moderate livelihood, as laid out in the marshall decision, may be beyond the capacity of the resource. the “control mechanism” suggested by martin, could act as a moderating force to individual ambitions that threaten communal sustainability efforts. personal responsibility requires that one must be aware of the implications of their activities upon the resource and the spiritual relationship that is meant to guide the individual’s actions (prosper, 2009). the values of netukulimk need to be sewn into the customary fabric that blankets mi’kmaq ways of life. such spirituality may challenge those mi’kmaq who have embraced catholicism. attempting to reestablish the spiritual connection mi’kmaq had to the animal world is a significant undertaking against such a contentious religious history, but this research found that netukulimk remains a vital spiritual connection to the traditional values of mi’kmaq culture to which more and more people are returning (prosper, 2009). netukulimkewe’l guidelines will have to be re-embedded into the value system of the mi’kmaq and spiritually nourished in revitalized customary rituals and practices. the control mechanism of netukulimk may be utilized to control the overwhelming demands of the free market ideology. resources like the moose or any other resource, cannot keep up with the ever-increasing demands of humans, without better stewardship and communal responsibility. the intervention of spiritual laws that are connected to the animal world and that should manage human behavior spiritually is represented in netukulimk for many mi’kmaq (prosper, 2009). mi’kmaq must reposition themselves spiritually and culturally with their resource use and environment. “our youth are reaching out for their culture, our land and resources, like the moose, and for our help. past concepts for a future hold many changes and we need our all of our relations to help us embrace them” (prosper field notes 2009). in conclusion, most indigenous cultures have developed holistic understandings of and relations with their ecosystems. consequently, the ‘...respect for indigenous knowledge, cultures and traditional practices...’ championed within the un declaration on the rights of indigenous people necessarily requires situating the definition and exercise of ‘rights’ with respect to the prerogatives and core attributes of indigenous cultures, including their moral and spiritual qualities. for the mi’kmaq, their concept of netukulimk embodies the spiritual and moral substance that is essential and foundational for relations with ecosystems, as well as the basis for sustainable use of resources. yet, the last centuries of colonization and imperialism, including the imperatives of neoliberalism and globalization, have penetrated and eviscerated much of indigenous peoples’ cultures, including their spiritual and moral worldviews. for many, such as the mi’kmaq, empowering and exercising ‘rights’ can only move forward through revitalization of their customary practices, particularly the moral and spiritual guidance that these practices can provide for responding to the challenges and opportunities of modernity. among the challenges facing the mi’kmaq, as well as other indigenous peoples, is reaffirming the place of customary practices and morality as the necessary means for a sustainable and independent future. respect of and support for indigenous rights requires substantial respect of and support for customary beliefs and moralities, such as netukulimk. such beliefs and moralities are being recast and revitalized as core reference points in the ways and means that indigenous peoples develop to undertake their exercise of ‘rights’ and stewardship in their relations with ecosystems and resources. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.7 references allen, a. 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(1982). europe and the people without history. berkley: university of california press. cases cited: delgamuukw v. british columbia, [1997] 3 s.c.r. 1010 haida nation v. british columbia (minister of forests), [2004] 3 s.c.r. 511, 2004 scc 73 r. v. marshall, [1999] 3 s.c.r. 456 r. v. marshall, [1999] 3 s.c.r. 533 mikisew cree first nation v. canada (minister of canadian heritage), 2005 scc 69, [2005] 3 s.c.r. 388 simon v. the queen, [1985] 2 s.c.r. 387 taku river tlingit first nation v. british columbia (project assessment director), [2004] 3 s.c.r. 550, 2004 scc 74 i http://www.un.org/esa/socdev/unpfii/en/session_ninth.html. 17 prosper et al.: returning to netukulimk published by scholarship@western, 2011 http://www.un.org/esa/socdev/unpfii/en/session_ninth.html� the international indigenous policy journal october 2011 returning to netukulimk: mi’kmaq cultural and spiritual connections with resource stewardship and self-governance kerry prosper l. jane mcmillan anthony a. davis morgan moffitt recommended citation returning to netukulimk: mi’kmaq cultural and spiritual connections with resource stewardship and self-governance abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license introduction a note on sources and research methods netukulimk: a mi’kmaq concept of resource stewardship european colonization: netukulimk assailed as experienced at different points in time by most indigenous peoples around the globe, every aspect of mi’kmaq culture and way of being was assailed by western economic and cultural imperialism. for the mi’kmaq, colonization is the process by which t... the french never acknowledged indigenous peoples’ title. instead, they mobilized a strategy of colonizing through assimilation. in particular, the french championed the work of catholic missionaries to christianize the ‘natives’, and through conversio... with the advent of french colonization of mi’kma’ki two ideological worlds came into conflict. in particular, the introduction of catholicism altered ongoing mobilization of netukulimk, thereby severely distorting mi’kmaq relations with the moose and ... the introduction of new diseases strained the confidence and authority the shamans held. their social position eroded, as they were unable to protect the thousands of peoples who became sick and died from european introduced diseases (miller 1976, 198... french european settlement of mi’kmaq territory resulted in land loss, deforestation and resource depletion. the french king was viewed as a father figure by the french and somewhat so by the mi’kmaq. both parties understood the significance of sharin... the british, through the course of their imperial contest with the french for dominion over eastern north america, employed treaty settlements as a means of neutralizing indigenous peoples. following the seizure of mi’kma’ki in the treaty of utrecht, ... moose: a case in point microsoft word ms 1443 cover page.docx the international indigenous policy journal volume 10 | issue 5 december 2019 indigenous income disparity and resguardo land in colombia rosa evelia sanchez garcia university of manitoba, umsanchr@mail.com recommended citation sanchez garcia, r. e. (2019). indigenous income disparity and resguardo land in colombia. the international indigenous policy journal, 10(5). doi: https://10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.8569 indigenous income disparity and resguardo land in colombia abstract this article examines the association between the resguardo, a colonial land access system similar to the north american reserve and reservation systems, and income inequality among indigenous people in colombia. i regressed the variable income unmet basic needs gap (iubngap) between indigenous people and non-minority people in colombia on a set of regressors that included the mean of resguardo land size per family. i find that more resguardo land per family is associated with a larger iubngap, which is likely due to the fact that resguardos tend to be larger where lands are isolated and where most of the land suitable for economic production is owned by nonindigenous landowners. keywords colombia, indigenous peoples, resguardo, land rights, income disparity, colonialism creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 published by scholarship@western 1 indigenous income disparity and resguardo land in colombia during the first part of the 15th century, the spanish crown expropriated indigenous lands in colombia and granted them to the colonizers as part of the encomienda1system. by the beginning of the 17th century, the encomienda was banned, and the colonial government established limited segments of land called resguardos for indigenous peoples’ exclusive use and dwelling. indigenous people worked the resguardos lands to derive their own sustenance and to pay the crown’s tribute (tirado mejía, 1998; kalmanovitz, 2003). since the establishment of the colombian republic, indigenous people have struggled to defend their resguardos from non-indigenous people’s economic interests. it was not until 1991 that the constitution recognized indigenous land rights (mora vera, 2015). in 2005, colombian provinces with large indigenous populations, such as la guajira and vichada, also had high rates of extreme poverty (47.1% in la guajira and 46.0% in vichada). this is almost 5 times the national rate of 10.6% (programa de naciones unidas para el desarrolo [pnud], 2013). in order to better understand the factors that contribute to the persistent comparative poverty among indigenous people in colombia, this article investigates the impact of resguardo land rights and the factors that influence the economic productivity of the resguardo on the relative rate of poverty among indigenous peoples. in this article, land rights refer exclusively to the lands conferred to indigenous peoples through the resguardos. productive lands, in this context, should be understood as lands whose legal ownership, soil quality, and location allow households to supply their basic material needs. productive land should be accessible for harvesting or producing goods and services for sale at market or for indigenous consumption. this article aims to identify the extent to which resguardo land rights are associated with a perceived monetary income gap between indigenous and non-minority populations in colombia. data collected as part of the 2005 census are used to estimate the income gap. specifically, the question, “is your household income enough to cover basic expenditures?” (departamento administrativo de estadistica , 2005c). basic expenditures are also referred to as basic needs in this article. clearly, the census question is subjective because it does not provide a common definition of basic expenditures. the concept of basic needs and the way in which these needs are met may differ among indigenous people and non-minority populations. therefore, income needs are not directly comparable. for example, rent should not be a basic need in indigenous resguardos because land is collectively owned, but it is a need for households outside of resguardos, the majority of which are non-indigenous households. in some indigenous communities, non-monetary activities, such as harvesting, hunting, bartering, and gathering, meet food and clothing needs. consequently, these households would be able to meet their basic needs with less income compared to non-minority households. however, the data used in this study show that there is still an income gap between indigenous and non-minority people (as measured by the percentage of households in which income is perceived to be inadequate to meet basic needs). as discussed below, indigenous people in colombia supply their income and non-income resources from their lands. therefore, colombian policies should enhance the capacity of the resguardo to satisfy 1 the encomienda was a grant by the spanish crown to a colonist. through this system, the colonist could demand tribute and forced labor from an indigenous chief and his people (tirado mejía, 1998). sanchez garcia: indigenous income disparity doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.8569 2 the needs of indigenous people and address factors that hamper this capability. as a colonial institution, the resguardo is similar to reserves and reservations, which are held by indigenous communities around the world. thus, the findings of this investigation convey relevant lessons for international indigenous policy. literature review resguardo, land access, and income needs in the history of the colombian republic and its policies toward resguardos, there are three key periods. the first period starts with the independence wars when indigenous ownership of the resguardo lands was recognized through the decree of may 20, 1820. during the second period, in spite of national legislation in 1890 that reinstated protection for the resguardos, some resguardo lands were lost. law 55/1905 allows resguardo lands to be legally sold. as well, many indigenous people lost their lands during the 1930s and 1940s because the government contended that indigenous landowners had lost their indigenous identity. by this time, the province of cauca’s law allowed for the division and privatization of resguardos (garzón zabala, 2017; kalmanovitz, 2003; tirado mejía, 1998). this occurred in cauca in spite of resistance from the indigenous nasa people, led by manual quintin lame. quintin lame’s activism inspired the creation of the regional indigenous council of cauca (cric) and the regional indigenous council of tolima (crit), which are indigenous organizations that defend indigenous land and political rights in these provinces (benavides vanegas, 2012). the third period was influenced by law 135/1961, which assigned marginal areas called reservas to indigenous people. later the reservas became resguardos (garzón zabala, 2017). currently, indigenous lands are ruled by the law 160/1994, which recognizes the right of indigenous people to resguardo lands in order to preserve their culture, to exercise their traditional production practices, and to enhance their quality of life. decree 1071/ 2015 allows for the expansion of resguardo lands to accommodate community economic and cultural development or for socio-ecological purposes. from 1966 to 2016, colombia established 750 resguardos with an extension of 32.3 million hectares (garzón zabala, 2017). however, the cric has stated that the government failed to create a proper institutional framework that reflects the actual colombian constitutional mandate regarding indigenous territories and identity (garzón zabala, 2017). according to articles 63 and 329 of the 1991 colombian constitution, the resguardo is collectively owned land that is not subject to embargo or sale. article 21 of decree 2164/1995 defined the resguardo as a socio-political and legal institution constituted by one or more indigenous communities that hold legal collective ownership of a territory. this ownership entitles them to enjoy the privileges of private ownership and to govern and organize their lives within the resguardo according to their autonomous normative system. the establishment of resguardo land requires the possession of a legally registered limited territory with one or more communities self-identifying as indigenous and an internal organization ruled by their own norms (arango ochoa & gutiérrez sanchez, 2008). in indigenous culture, there are spiritual dimensions that connect the people to the land. nonetheless, colombian capitalist modernization has diversified indigenous attitudes toward land. thus, for indigenous people, land can function as a means of production and/or as a community asset with spiritual attributes (ruiz garcia, 2006). land as a means of production is embedded in diverse the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 published by scholarship@western 3 indigenous systems of production, which depend on the natural landscape. in the amazonian and pacific forests, about 22.8% of indigenous people engage in productive systems that generate little or no monetary income. they practice horticulture combined with hunting, fishing, and gathering wild resources. however, illicit cultivation and urbanization limit land availability, which obligates indigenous people to participate in income-generation activities, most often as employees (arango ochoa & gutiérrez sanchez, 2008; de la cruz, bello, acosta, estrada lugo, & montoya, 2016). in other colombian regions, there are indigenous communities whose productive system includes the generation of monetary income. for example, the andean forest indigenous communities’ principal income source is cocoa cultivation, which is complemented with subsistence agriculture and livestock. in regions greatly impacted by colonial expansionism, such as the andean peasant economies,2 the caribbean region, and the inter-andean valleys, communities generate income through minor industries (e.g., handcrafted goods, processed coffee, pearl quinoa, and dehydrated aromatic herbs), plantain cultivations, and salt mining (arango ochoa & gutiérrez sanchez, 2008). the 1991 colombian constitutional recognition of indigenous collective rights to resguardo lands is an achievement in the indigenous struggle to recover ancestral territories and to maintain cultural identity (arango ochoa & gutiérrez sanchez, 2008; benavides vanegas, 2012; garzón zabala, 2017). however, the struggle is ongoing. for example, in the province of cauca the indigenous nasa still conduct communal actions known as minga3 to liberate their ancestral territories from the sugar cane industry. industrial cultivation limits the nasa’s agricultural prospects (watts, 2017). indigenous peoples in colombia have also raised concerns about international agreements under the food and agriculture organization of the united nation’s reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation “plus” conservation (redd+). their concern is that, given the unique ecosystems and biodiversity within indigenous territories, redd+ will lead to territorial appropriations, conservation activities, and resource extraction that deny indigenous community rights (ulloa, 2013). there is a growing body of literature that examines different dimensions of poverty and inequality among indigenous people in colombia. except for the year 2008, extreme poverty and poverty decreased in both rural and urban areas between 2005 and 2011. however, the poverty gap between the rural and urban populations persists. this gap disproportionately affects indigenous groups because 78.62% of indigenous people live in rural areas (pnud, 2013). the human opportunity index4 for the province of guajira, including the wayyuu indigenous community, was calculated using 2005 data from the departamento administrativo de estadistica (dane). the results showed that indigenous people were disproportionately likely to have an inadequate standard of living and fewer social and economic opportunities (cárdenas estupiñán, 2011). the relationship between poverty and health among indigenous peoples has also been investigated. high rates of malnutrition were found in two embera indigenous communities in colombia, tausig and nusido, despite having different geographic locations and cultural features. food insecurity, 2 peasant economies use intensive household labour and limited capital. production is mainly for family sustenance with limited market production (subgerencia de tierras rurales, 2013). 3 minga for the nasa people is a meeting to share happiness or to work (cric, 2017). 4 the human opportunity index measures how equitably children aged 16 and under have access to essential services (world bank, 2016). sanchez garcia: indigenous income disparity doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.8569 4 independent of the community’s particular nutrition habits, were found to be the primary cause of malnutrition (rosique, restrepo, manjarrés, gálvez, & santa, 2010). in the embera katio indigenous community (located in the province of cordoba), the prevalence of malnutrition among children under the age of 7 is 63.3% (restrepo, restrepo, beltrán, rodríguez, & ramírez, 2006). economic inequality between indigenous people and the rest of the population across all regions of colombia was examined through a blinder-oaxaca decomposition, which explains the difference in the means of an explicatory variable between two groups. the findings indicate that the lower average labour income among indigenous people in colombia is related to wage discrimination (romeroprieto, 2010). at the beginning of the spanish colonization, indigenous people were enslaved. in 1517, the spanish crown approved the process to replace indigenous slaves with african slaves in the americas (tirado mejía, 1998). despite the extensive literature on colombian indigenous poverty, inequality, and land rights, there are almost no empirical studies that address the topic within the context of colombian colonial land tenure. one exception examines the influence of extractive colonial institutions, such as the enslavement of indigenous peoples, the african slave trade, and the indigenous encomienda, on the 2005 multidimensional poverty index (mpi).5 the authors found a correlation of 0.67 between the mpi and the provincial proportion of indigenous and afro-colombian persons. all oppressive colonial systems such as slavery and encomienda were characterized by a lack of investment in human capital (cepeda & meisel, 2014). characterization of the colombian regions figure 1 displays the five geographical regions of colombia. in colombia, the regional contributions to gross domestic product (gdp) in 2011 indicate that the economies of the amazon, orinoquia, and pacific are the less prosperous, with the amazon ranked last (centro de investigación económica y social, 2013). interestingly, table 1 shows that these three regions make up about 65.4% of colombian municipalities with resguardo lands. figure 1 indicates that the amazon and the orinoquia regions have the lowest population density, while table 2 shows that, in these regions, the average number of hectares of resguardo land per family (or simply resguardo land size) is the highest among the regions. table 3 shows that, in 2005, the amazonian and orinoquia regions had municipalities with zero kilometers of constructed secondary roads. the prosperity of the caribbean and andean regions contrasts with the other colombian regions. with a regional contribution to the 2011 national gdp of 49.7%, the andean region is the wealthiest in colombia. this region also has the most populated provinces in the nation (figure 1). the andean region contains 26.2% of municipalities with resguardo land, which places this region second within the nation in terms of the presence of resguardos (table 1). the andean region has the second lowest average number of hectares of resguardo land, with the caribbean region having the lowest (table 2). the andean region also has the highest average number of kilometers of secondary roads (table 3). the caribbean region is the second most prosperous colombian region, based on regional contribution to the 2011 national gdp. the caribbean region also has the second highest population density in the 5 the mpi encompasses five poverty dimensions: education, childhood and youth (e.g., mortality, undernourishment, school attendance, and school level), health, shelter (pnud, 2013). the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 published by scholarship@western 5 nation (figure 1). however, the region’s provinces have the lowest proportion of municipalities with resguardo land among the five colombian regions (table 1). figure 1. regions of colombia. gdp data source: centro de investigación económica y social (fedesarrollo, 2013) and departamento administrativo nacional de estadística (dane, 2012). population density data source: rodriguez albor (2011). map source: author. caribbe 2011 provincial participation in the national gdp (2005 cop $) bolivar: 4.0% atlántico: 3.7% cesar: 2.1% guajira: 1.3% magdalena: 1.3% 2007 population density per km2 : 70 orinoquia 2011 provincial participation in the national gdp (2005 cop$) meta: 5.4% casanare: 2.2% arauca: 1.0% vichada: 0.1% 2007 population density per km2 meta: 28 rest of the region: 3 amazon 2011 provincial participation in the national gdp (2005 cop$) amazonas: 0.1% caqueta: 0.4% putumayo:0.5% guaviare 0.1% guania: 0 % vaupes: 0 % 2007 population density per km2: 3 andes 2011 provincial participation in the national gdp (2005 cop $) bogota: 24.5 % antioquia: 13% santander: 7.3% cundinamarca: 4.9% cundinamarca: 4.9 2007 population density per km2 antioquia, risaralda & quindio: 107 bogota city: 3838 norte de santander & santander: 62 rest of the region: 28 pacific 2011 provincial participation in the national gdp (2005 cop $) valle: 9.6% nariño: 1.5% cauca: 1.4% choco: 0.4% 2007 population density per km2: 58 sanchez garcia: indigenous income disparity doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.8569 6 table 1. regional distribution of municipalities with resguardos in colombia region number of municipalities with resguardos percentage amazonian 30 17.8 orinoquia 19 11.3 pacific 61 36.3 caribbean 14 8.3 andean 44 26.2 total 168 100 note. source: author elaboration based on data from instituto colombiano de desarrollo rural (incoder, 2011). table 2. average number of hectares of resguardo land per family number of municipalities with resguardos mean standard deviation min. max. national 168 282.6 734.1 0.19 6,327.4 amazonian 30 846.5 1,508.0 6.60 6,327.4 orinoquia 19 500.2 547.3 55.10 2,176.4 pacific 61 111.5 193.4 0.19 1,079 caribbean 14 78.8 103.3 1.30 291.3 andean 44 106.3 221.4 0.78 1,111.3 note. source: author elaboration based on data from incoder (2011). the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 published by scholarship@western 7 table 3. average number of kilometers of constructed secondary roads in colombia variable number of municipalities with resguardos mean road km per regional km2a min. max. national 168 2,423.0 0 6,097 amazonian 30 2,111.9 0.026 0 4,339 orinoquia 19 1,564.8 0.031 0 3,948 pacific 61 1,872.4 0.066 301 3,944 caribbean 14 1,410.0 0.072 173 2,890 andean 44 4,094.0 0.168 501 6,097 note. source: author elaboration based on 2004 data from comisión económica para américa latina (cepal, 2012). a mean road km per regional km2 was calculated as the sum of the average of road density per km2 within each regional province with resguardo divided by the number of regional provinces with resguardo. data on total provincial roads per km2 area from sociedad geografica de colombia (2011). historical and political factors shape today’s indigenous regional circumstances. in the pacific region, isolation, rurality, climate conditions, and a bellicose indigenous response to first contact with europeans delayed spanish colonization by about 200 years (viloria de la hoz, 2008). the largest percentage of the indigenous population in colombia inhabits the pacific province of cauca. today, cauca’s indigenous families cultivate eroded, steep, and reduced land lots. the cric has been partially successful in recovering indigenous land: it reported that in 2005 the cauca’s resguardo extension was 544,901 hectares from which only 191,237 (35%) were productive (cric, 2007). the pacific province of choco holds 69% of the regional resguardo land (instituto de estudios interculturales, 2016). currently, the government has granted mineral exploitation titles on resguardo lands to non-indigenous companies. most of these companies conduct mineral exploitation in ways that do not respect the social and environmental norms of the indigenous people who live on the land. additionally, in the low atrato area, lumber companies make agreements with indigenous people to cut lumber on resguardo lands and sell it to the company. thus, the companies indirectly exploit the resguardo’s forest resources while also reducing indigenous traditional livelihoods (villa, 2014). spanish colonizers contacted indigenous people in the orinoquia region in 1535. orinoquia’s provinces were isolated from the andean region till mid-20th century due to deteriorated roads (viloria de la hoz, 2008). adjacent to the orinoquia region is the amazon. jesuit missionaries colonized the amazonian region after the spanish crown banned new armed expeditions toward the colombian east in 1573. during the quina and rubber booms in the 18th and 20th centuries, indigenous people were enslaved and used as labourers, which reduced the indigenous population. after 1950, new settlers arrived in the region as illicit crop cultivators or to escape violence. in 1959, the colombian state designated most of the amazonian region as protected areas (indigenous resguardos and natural parks), limiting the new sanchez garcia: indigenous income disparity doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.8569 8 waves of migrants into the region (naciones unidas and comisión económica para américa latina y el caribe [nu & cepal], 2013). the originoquia and the amazonian regions combined have 208 resguardos. the amazonian resguardos represent 24% of colombia’s total resguardo land (instituto colombiano de desarrollo rural [incoder], 2006; see also territorio indigena y gobernanza, 2019). unlike in other regions, when spanish colonizers arrived in the andean region, they found the chibcha and the caribbean indigenous peoples were, in their view, the most culturally, politically, and linguistically “advanced” compared to indigenous peoples in other regions (lopez garcia, 1995). the spanish crown kept the structure of the prosperous indigenous urban settlements intact. the forthcoming colombian state continued to invest in the region (salazar mejía, 2010). this is the origin of andean prosperity and population density. currently, andean indigenous communities are a minority population that is not isolated from urban centres. a larger percentage of the regional indigenous population inhabits the andean provinces of tolima and caldas (salazar mejía, 2010). tolima’s indigenous people compete desperately for territory with non-indigenous economic agents (swissaid colombia, 2012). caldas’ indigenous socio-economic system faces disruption due to macro-projects, such as mining, lumber, and road construction, that overlap with their territories (consejo regional indigena de caldas, 2011). in the caribbean region, law 55 of 1905 legalized the resguardo expropriation in bolivar grande and in the south of barranquilla. beginning in the 20th century, the provincial government decreed that indigenous identity would be revoked upon marriage to a non-indigenous person and that resguardo land be made available for occupation by non-indigenous people (solano & flores, 2011). this explains the region’s low resguardo representation (see table 1). methodology dependent and potential explanatory variables to estimate the association between land rights through the resguardo and income unmet basic needs (iubn) between indigenous and non-indigenous people across colombian municipalities, this investigation uses a series of ordinary least squares (ols) regression models. the dependent variable is the log of the income unmet basic needs gap between indigenous and non-minority people in colombia (iubngap) at the municipal level. this variable was created by subtracting the percentage of nonminority households that reported their income was not enough to meet their basic expenses from the percentage of indigenous households with the same perception in colombian municipalities with resguardos. non-minority people were selected instead of the remainder of the colombian population because the colombian population includes other minority ethnic groups who also face socio-economic disparity when compared to non-minority people (dane, 2005a). thus, the key sociodemographic characteristics associated with the dependent variable are ethnicity and income need. the iubn is a household variable that originated from the 2005 colombian census question, “is your household income enough to cover basic expenses?” as explained above, this variable is clearly a subjective measure of poverty as it asks for the individual’s perception of basic needs (expenses), which could be different within specific cultures that distinguish indigenous people and non-minority people. however, any subjectivity bias, relative to more objective measures, would be that non-minority the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 published by scholarship@western 9 colombian household perception tends to be more influenced by the dominant capitalist system than indigenous households. although this subjectivity exists, the data from this study shows a mean gap of 8.67%. to assess the association between land rights through resguardos and the iubngap, resguardo land size per family in hectares is included as an explanatory variable. resguardo land tenure was selected among other existing forms of land rights because most of the indigenous population resides in resguardos (88.9% of the total population; arango ochoa & gutiérrez sanchez, 2004). other colombian indigenous land tenure forms, such as reservas, communidades, or parcialidades, became resguardos in 1991 (decreto 2001, 1988; riascos de la pena, 2008; ruiz garcía, 2006). the literature identifies limited access to quality land and indigenous land expropriation as some of the principal reasons for indigenous poverty in colombia (gonzález posso, 2011). hence, all else being equal, a larger resguardo land size is expected to decrease the iubngap. however, it is relevant to investigate other factors that may influence the impact of these lands on the dependent variable. to this end, the resguardo land size variable is partitioned based on the presence of protected areas (natural parks and natural reserves) overlapping resguardos, the municipality level of road infrastructure, and the distribution of productive land (as measured by a gini coefficient6) at the municipality level. in colombia, there are several resguardo lands that overlap protected areas (cisneros & mcbreen, 2010). when assessing the effect of municipal protected areas overlapping resguardos lands, it is expected that if the presence of this area reduces the indigenous benefit from resguardo land rights then the resguardo land size effect would differ between those municipalities where protected land areas overlap resguardos and those where they do not. secondary roads are important for connecting indigenous resguardos with urban economic markets and social services. however, these roads could also increase the iubngap if they bring competition for land from non-indigenous people, or by disrupting traditional indigenous sustenance activities. to investigate how road infrastructure influences the effect of resguardo land size on the iubngap, the provincial average number of kilometers of secondary roads were used to estimate the density of secondary road networks. the resguardo land size variable is partitioned to indicate municipalities with high, medium, and low secondary road network densities.7 as a robustness check, the equation was run using various cut-offs for the road network densities to ensure that the results were not purely an artifact of the chosen cut-offs. to determine whether land quality (marginal versus productive) affects the resguardo land size variable, the gini coefficient for the distribution of productive non-resguardo land was used as a proxy. this variable serves as a proxy for the potential marginality of resguardo land because the historical record suggests that past predation of the resguardos occurred where the land was potentially productive and near urban centres. the beneficiaries of that predation were large landowners (garzón zabala, 2017). 6 the land gini coefficient measures landholding inequality. the coefficient can be a minimum of 0, meaning complete equality, or a maximum of 1, meaning complete inequality. 7 the provincial secondary road infrastructure density categories are: (a) high network (more than 0.125 km of road per provincial km2), (b) medium network (between 0.075 and 0.125 km of road per provincial km2), and (c) low network (less than 0.075 km of road per provincial km2). sanchez garcia: indigenous income disparity doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.8569 10 therefore, a high gini coefficient for productive non-resguardo land indicates the predominance of large landowners, which leaves only marginal lands for the indigenous population. the productive land gini coefficient was categorized in low, medium, and high categories.8 the resguardo land size variable was then partitioned to indicate municipalities with high, medium, and low levels of land inequality (based on the gini coefficient measures). for robustness, various category cut-offs were tried to ensure that the results were not dependent on the precise choice of cut-offs. it is expected that the resguardo land size variable will be a weaker indicator of any positive outcome of land rights for municipalities with high gini coefficients because the resguardo lands are likely to be marginal. the resguardo land size in municipalities with low gini coefficients is more likely to be negatively related to the iubngap because such lands may be sufficiently productive to impact indigenous incomes. income gaps between groups can also be explained by factors such as degree of municipal development (municipal economic concentration) in different economic sectors and other socio-demographic variables such as unemployment and human capital (leichenko, 2003). to capture the effect of human capital on the iubngap, the following additional variables were included in the model: the noneducation gap (the percentage of non-minority people with no formal education subtracted from the percentage of indigenous population with no formal education); the university education level gap (the percentage of non-minority population with university education subtracted from the percentage of indigenous population with university education); and the percentage of indigenous people with incomplete education because of financial constraints.9 it is expected that the no formal education gap and the percentage of indigenous people with incomplete studies because of financial constraints will have a positive relationship with the iubngap while the university education level gap has a negative relationship with the iubngap. empirical literature has found a statistical relationship between increasing labour opportunities for minorities and declining income inequality (dixon & maré, 2007; lewin-epstein & semyonov, 1992). to measure this relationship, the percentage of indigenous people who are formally employed, and the percentage of indigenous job seekers, with and without working experience were added to the model. several studies on industrialization and rurality conclude that income inequality stems from increasing industrialization and declining agriculture. this is because industrialization increases the service-based economy, which reduces the number of skilled, well-paid blue-collar jobs available (parrado & kandel, 2010; tickamyer & duncan, 1990). thus, industrial activity, commercial activity, and service sector activity, as a percentage of total economic activity, are also potential explanatory variables. to measure the impact of rurality on the iubngap, the percentage of municipal area covered by forest was included as an explanatory variable. it is expected that higher urbanization levels, as indicated by industrial and service sector activity, will increase the iubngap. although commercial activity is associated with 8 the gini coefficient categories for productive land are: (1) high (more than 0.65), (2) medium (between 0.50 and 0.65), and (3) low (less than 0.50). 9 when the variable incomplete education because of financial reasons was entered into the model as the gap between the indigenous and non-indigenous population, the ovtest decreased from 0.2 to 0.05, indicating misspecification in the model. however, when the variable was coded as the percentage of indigenous people with incomplete education because of financial constraints, the ovtest significantly improved. for this reason, all regression models use the variable incomplete education for financial reasons calculated as the percentage of indigenous people with incomplete education. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 published by scholarship@western 11 increasing urbanization, the academic literature shows that commerce in rural areas decreases income inequality (de janvry, murgai, & sadoulet, 1999; mduma & wobst, 2005). it is expected that the increasing commercial activity will decrease the iubngap. likewise, it is expected that municipalities with proportionally more forested areas (rurality) will have a smaller iubngap. violence from colombia’s political conflict has been identified as a cause of marginalization and economic inequality against indigenous people (alta consejeria presidencial para la mujer, 2012; guevara corral, 2003; rodriguez, orduz, boada, rubiano, & arias, 2010). therefore, data on murders, displacement, and kidnapping of indigenous and non-indigenous people with a municipality were introduced as explanatory variables. speaking indigenous languages and/or spanish are also explanatory variables. according to the theory of institutions, the formal and informal constraints that define a group institutional framework originate from mental models and are embedded in language. those constraints are passed from generation to generation through language (north, 1994). to assess the effect of language preservation (and, in turn, cultural preservation) on the iubngap, this research uses the percentage of the indigenous population in a municipality that are spanish or indigenous language monolingual and the percentage that is indigenous–spanish language bilingual. if indigenous language speakers benefit from greater access to cultural and economic institutions through full community participation, the language retention variables should reduce iubngap, while the variable spanish monolingual should increase the gap. regression analysis the initial regression model to assess the effect of the resguardo land size (rpf) on the iubngap (across the colombian municipalities with indigenous resguardos) includes measures of covariates (x) that the literature suggests should have an effect on the iubngap, as described. this model also includes five dummy variables representing each of the colombian regions (reg) to control for regional effects.10 𝐿𝑜𝑔 𝐼𝑈𝐵𝑁𝑔𝑎𝑝 = 𝛽𝑅!" + 𝛿𝑋 + 𝜃𝑅𝐸𝐺 + 𝜀 the akaike and bayesian information criterion were used to determine the explanatory variables relevant to the colombian experience. using a general-to-specific approach, variables were dropped from the general equation if their absence improved the information criteria. once a parsimonious model was established, tests for misspecification (ovtest) and heteroscedasticity (breusch-pagan/cookweisberg) were used to determine the credibility of the final equation to estimate the main influences on the iubngap. robust models were run to reduce the outliers influence. this model was then extended in the following ways to ask more nuanced versions of the original question: • to determine whether the effect of resguardo land size on the dependent variable varies according to the colombian regions. this model includes five variables that examine the interaction between the resguardo land size and each one of the five regional dummy variables. 10 to include the five regional dummy variables the intercept of the model was dropped. sanchez garcia: indigenous income disparity doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.8569 12 • to determine whether the effect of the resguardo land size on the dependent variable was influenced by the density of provincial secondary road infrastructure. instead of one resguardo land size variable, this model includes three variables originated from partitioning the reguardo land size in municipalities with high, medium, and low road density networks, respectively. for each group, the variables take the value zero when the municipalities did not fulfill the road density criteria. • to determine whether the effect of the resguardo land size on the iubngap was influenced by the existence of protected areas overlapping the resguardo land. instead of one resguardo land size variable, this model includes two variables created by partitioning the reguardo land size in two municipalities with and without protected areas, respectively. for each group, the variables take the value zero when the municipalities did not fulfill the protected area criteria. • to control for the influence of ownership concentration of agriculture-grade land on the effect of the resguardo land size on the iubngap. instead of one resguardo land size variable, this model incudes three variables created by partitioning the resguardo land size in municipalities recording high, medium, and low gini values, respectively. for each group, these variables take the value zero when the municipalities did not meet the respective gini value criteria. data data on resguardo land size in the year 2005 are from incoder (2011). the gini coefficient data are from instituto geografico agustin codazzi et al. (2012). data on kilometers of secondary road constructed are from cepal (2012). data about protected areas overlapping resguardo lands are from parques naturales de colombia (2015). the rest of the data, including that on iubn, are from the 2005 colombia census (dane, 2005a, 2005b). table 4 shows the descriptive statistics of the variables used in the ols regression analysis. in 2005, there were 168 colombian municipalities with indigenous resguardos (whose size could be determined), which allowed for 168 observations in the dataset. the mean of the iubngap is 8.67%, indicating that on average the percentage of colombian indigenous households with income unmet basic needs was 8.67 points higher than those of non-minority households. the iubngap standard deviation is 14.3%, indicating a high dispersion. this is because there are municipalities in which the gap is negative, which means that the iubn for non-minority people is higher than for indigenous people. there are also municipalities in which the iubngap is 68.9, indicating that the income unmet basic needs for indigenous people are very high compared to nonminorities. the most important explanatory variable for answering the question posed in this research is the resguardo land size. the resguardo land size shows a large dispersion with a standard deviation of 734.2 hectares (against a mean of 283) and ranging from 0.2 to 6,327 hectares per family. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 published by scholarship@western 13 data in table 4 shows that, on average, 39.2% of the indigenous population is spanish monolingual. the largest proportion (51.6%) is indigenous language and spanish bilingual while the smallest proportion (4.8%) is indigenous language monolingual indigenous people. the mean percentage of people unable to finish their studies due to insufficient funds is 30.4% and 31.1% for indigenous and non-minority populations, respectively. however, while there are municipalities where 100% of indigenous people lack sufficient funds to study, the maximum that this figure reaches for non-minority people is 62.5%. there is significant variance across regions in colombia with respect to the formal education disparity between indigenous people and the rest of the population. for example, the gap for university education fluctuates between -32.73% and 8.1%. this indicates that when the gap favours indigenous university educational attainment (i.e., the gap is positive) the gap is lower. on the contrary, when the gap favours non-indigenous people (i.e., the gap is negative) the gap is larger. the same is true for the non-education gap (-25.6% and 75.3%, respectively). when the gap favors indigenous people (i.e., the gap is negative) it is about 3 times less than when the gap favours the non-minority population. table 4. descriptive statistics variable mean std. dev. min. max. income unmet basic need gap (iubngap)* 8.672321 14.31478 -39.15 68.31 resguardo land variables resguardo land size per family—national 282.6 734.1 0.19 6,327.4 resguardo land size per family—amazonia 151.2 707.6 0 6,327.4 resguardo land size per family—andes 27.8 121.7 0 1,111.3 resguardo land size per family—caribe 6.5 36.2 0 291.6 resguardo land size per family—orinoquia 56.5 239.8 0 2176.3 resguardo land size per family—pacific 56.6 239.8 0 1,079.0 resguardo with land protected area (lpa) 123.3 501.1 0 4,614.6 resguardo with lpa —amazonia 67.7 461.3 0 4,614.6 resguardo with lpa—andes 12.7 60.3 0 475 resguardo with lpa—caribe 3.71 28.9 0 291.6 resguardo with lpa—orinoquia 27.6 197 0 2,176.4 resguardo with lpa—pacific 11.7 68.4 0 550 sanchez garcia: indigenous income disparity doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.8569 14 table 4. descriptive statistics (continued) variable mean std. dev. min. max. language variables percentage of indigenous people spanish & indigenous language bilingual 51.64 27.71 0 100 percentage of indigenous people spanish language monolingual 39.21 30.66 0 100 percentage of indigenous people indigenous language monolingual 4.81 9.8 0 58.37 municipal forest area 8.8 36 0 447.2 municipal commercial development 43.5 22.3 0 100 no formal education gapa 16.9 18.4 -25.6 75.3 university education gapa -3.6 4.2 -32.73 8.1 indigenous incomplete education for financial reasons 30.4 19.6 0 100 non-minority incomplete education for financial reasons 31.1 12.15 0 62.5 provincial secondary roads 2,423 2,112.4 0 6,097 note. source: author elaboration based on data from dane (2005b), parques naturales nacionales de colombia (2015), incoder (2011). n = 168 municipalities. a gaps are calculated by subtracting the percentage of non-minority households from the percentage of the indigenous households for the variable. results resguardo land size per family the regression model in table 5 shows that the resguardo land size is significant in explaining the iubngap. however, it indicates that increasing resguardo land per family increases the iubngap. this result is contrary to the expected outcome. as noted above, the largest resguardos were allocated to indigenous people in regions with low road networks such as amazonia and orinoquia. also, large parts of these regions are designated as protected areas (cisneros & mcbreen, 2010). therefore, it makes sense to investigate whether the coefficient for the size of resguardo land is: • significantly different across regions • affected by the lack of road networks • affected by the presence of protected areas (natural reserves). the results of this investigation are analyzed in the following subsections. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 published by scholarship@western 15 regression model in table 5 also shows that the effect of municipal commercial development is significant and negatively impacts the iubngap, which is supported by literature that indicates commercial activity decreases rural income inequality (de janvry et al., 1999; mduma & wobst, 2005). the percentage of the municipal area covered in forest (a rurality proxy) has a negative effect on the iubngap, which consistent with previous research that found increasing urbanization increases income inequality (parrado & kandel, 2010; tickamyer & duncan, 1990). urbanization adds to the iubngap because it reduces available land for indigenous traditional economic activities while requiring monetary income to buy goods. this happens to amazonian indigenous people as the expanding urban frontier transforms them into minorities competing with non-indigenous people for their resguardo land and its natural resources. as a result, amazonia’s indigenous people have changed their traditional productive strategies (nu & cepal, 2013). an example of these strategies can be found in the indigenous council of tarapacá, where families trade some cultivated products in local markets. this trade revalues their traditional knowledge and represents an adaption to the socioeconomic changes that require income and the consumption of industrialized goods (de la cruz et al., 2016). the model in table 5 indicates that the variable no formal education gap is significant and increases the iubngap. the university education gap is significant and decreases the iubngap. these results are in line with theory. also, the regional dummies for the pacific and orinoquia regions are positive and significant. this indicates that municipalities in those regions have particular attributes that increase the iubngap. the related language variables appear not significant in explaining the iubngap. with the exception of the language variables, the other variables tested in the model in table 5, which are derived from scholarly literature, were not significant. the information criteria indicated that these non-significant variables were not a good fit for the model. these variables include violence, employment or labour status,11 the municipal industrial development, and the municipal service development. regional differentials on the effect of the resguardo land size the model in table 6 investigates if the resguardo land size effect is regionally specific. the results show that the resguardo land size coefficient is significant and positive for the amazonia and pacific regions, with coefficients of 0.038 and 0.141, respectively. this indicates that an additional hectare of resguardo land in these regions increases the iubngap. however, the coefficient is not significant for any of the other three regions. 11 the 2005 colombian census questionnaire included questions on economic activity designed to identify labour force participation. among people without paid work during the reference period, those who were looking for a job were considered to be in the labour market and those who were not looking for a job were out of the labour market (dane, 2005a, 2005c). this concept of economic activity is not completely applicable to indigenous communities that do not assign monetary value to work. for example, indigenous women are usually in charge of the horticulture production while rearing children. in the census, these women could appear to be non-employed persons doing domestic activities (renshaw & wray, 2004). thus, the differences in the concept of economic activity for indigenous and non-indigenous population may be the reason why labour variables did not appear significant in explaining the iubngap. however, this presumption requires more research. sanchez garcia: indigenous income disparity doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.8569 16 table 5. effect of resguardo land on income unmet basic needs gap (iunbgap) explanatory variables log of iunbgapc resguardo land size per family 0.03** (2.41) spanish language monolingual 0.002 (0.35) indigenous language monolingual -0.007 (-0.52) spanish–indigenous language bilingual 0.0007 (0.09) municipal planted forest area -0.42*** (-4.11) commercial concentration of production -0.01** (-2.15) no formal education gap 0.015** (2.48) university education gap -0.073*** (-2.83) incomplete education for financial reasons (% indigenous population) 0.011 (1.97) dummy andean regiona 1.231 (1.87) dummy caribe regiona 0.821 (1.09) dummy amazon regiona 0.97 (165) dummy orinoquia regiona 1.9*** (2.92) dummy pacific regiona 1.325** (2.04) ovtestb f (3, 152) 1.55 prob > f 0.20 number of observations 168 note. ordinary least squares (ols) regression. a in order to include all dummy regional variables, the intercept was dropped, which eliminates the need to omit a region as the reference category. b ovtest was estimated dropping the dummy variable for the orinoquia region and including the intercept. c unstandardized regression coefficients with standard errors in parentheses. ** p < 0.05, *** p < 0.01 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 published by scholarship@western 17 table 6. regional resguardo land per family effect on the income unmet basic needs gap (iunbgap) explanatory variables log of iunbgapb spanish language monolingual 0.003 (0.40) indigenous language monolingual -0.007 (-0.49) spanish–indigenous language bilingual 0.0002 (0.02) municipal planted forest area -0.44*** (-4.44) municipal commercial development -0.009 (-1.91) no formal education gap 0.017** (2.83) university education gap -0.06** (-2.48) incomplete education for financial reasons (% indigenous population) 0.011 (1.97) resguardo land size per family— andean region -0.0403 (-0.42) resguardo land size per family— orinoquia region -0.064 (-1.02) resguardo land size per family—pacifica region 0.141*** (3.04) resguardo land size per family—caribbean region 0.20 (0.61) resguardo land size per family— amazon region 0.038*** (4.26) dummy andean region 1.22 (1.75) dummy orinoquia region 2.304*** (3.26) dummy pacific region 1.154 (1.67) dummy caribe region 0.614 (0.76) dummy amazonian region 0.873 (1.43) ovtesta f (3, 152) 1.42 prob > f 0.24 number of observations 168 note. ordinary least squares (ols) regression. a ovtest was estimated dropping the dummy variable for the orinoquia region and including the intercept. b unstandardized regression coefficients with standard errors in parentheses. ** p < 0.05, *** p < 0.01 sanchez garcia: indigenous income disparity doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.8569 18 provincial secondary road density and resguardo the model in table 7 tests the hypothesis that road infrastructure influences the effect of the size of resguardo land on iubngap. the resguardo land size for municipalities with low road networks (less than 0.075 km of road per km2) is significant and positive, indicating that, where there are low-density road networks, the size of resguardo land is associated with a higher iubngap. mediumand highdensity road networks were not significantly associated with the resguardo land size effect. protected areas and resguardo land size the model in table 8 investigates the effect of resguardo land with protected areas on the iubngap. the results indicate that the resguardo land size variable is positive and strongly significant for municipalities without protected areas but not significant for municipalities with protected areas. one possible reason for this counter-intuitive result is that resguardos are largest when the land is not a protected area and is of low quality, which makes it less likely to meet the material needs of indigenous households. the following model investigates whether the effect of the size of resguardo land on the dependent variable is related to the best quality land being taken by non-indigenous owners. productive land gini coefficient and resguardo land size per family the model in table 9 tests the hypothesis that the concentration of productive land ownership influences the effect of the size of resguardo land on the iubngap. the results indicate that the effect of the resguardo land size for municipalities with a gini coefficient for productive land beyond 0.64 is positive and significant. this supports the hypothesis that larger resguardo land sizes are assigned to indigenous people where a larger proportion of the land is productively marginal. this finding supports the contention that most of the productive land has been taken by non-indigenous people in these regions. discussion the results of this research indicate that larger resguardo land sizes increase the iubngap in the amazonian and pacific regions (see table 5). this relationship is particular to municipalities with a low density of secondary roads without protected areas and with unequal distribution of productive nonresguardo land. one potential explanation for this pattern is that larger resguardo lands are assigned to indigenous people in colombia in inaccessible areas, where the particular land features leave it free from non-indigenous landowner competition. given the spiritual and cultural value of land, indigenous people may still benefit from marginal lands, but require additional high-quality agricultural land to supply their basic material needs. the data analysis presented in this article support a land-specific conditions hypothesis, although these results are not sufficient to explicitly prove this relationship. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 published by scholarship@western 19 table 7. provincial secondary road infrastructure density and size of resguardo land per family effect on the income unmet basic needs gap (iunbgap) explanatory variables log of iunbgapb spanish language monolingual 0.003 (0.43) indigenous language monolingual -0.005 (-0.36) spanish–indigenous language bilingual 0.0008 (0.10) municipal planted forest area -0.45*** (-4.47) municipal commercial development -0.01** (-2.44) no formal education gap 0.015*** (2.58) university education gap -0.073*** (-2.75) incomplete education for financial reasons (% indigenous population) 0.011 (1.95) resguardo land size per family—low road network density 0.033** (2.6) resguardo land size per family— medium road network density -0.041 (-0.44) resguardo land size per family— high road network density 0.249 (0.77) dummy amazonian region 0.971 (1.64) dummy andean region 1.296** (1.92) dummy pacific region 1.324** (2.01) dummy orinoquia region 1.95*** (2.94) dummy caribe region 0.76 (0.98) ovtesta f (3, 152) 1.7 prob > f 0.17 number of observations 168 note. ordinary least squares (ols) regression. a ovtest was estimated dropping the dummy variable for the orinoquia region and including the intercept. b unstandardized regression coefficients with standard errors in parentheses. ** p < 0.05, *** p < 0.01 sanchez garcia: indigenous income disparity doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.8569 20 table 8. protected area within resguardo land effect on the income unmet basic needs gap (iubngap) explanatory variables log of iunbgapa spanish language monolingual 0.002 (0.36) indigenous language monolingual -0.006 (-0.44) spanish–indigenous language bilingual 0.0006 (0.08) municipal planted forest area -0.419*** (-4.10) municipal commercial development -0.009** (-2.04) no formal education gap 0.015** (2.45) university education gap -0.08*** (-2.78) incomplete education for financial reasons (% indigenous population) 0.011 (1.8) provincial secondary roads -0.01** (-2.5) resguardo land size per family—no protected areas 0.04*** (4.33) resguardo land size per family—protected areas 0.018 (0.86) dummy caribe region 0.78 (1.00) dummy andean region 1.214 (1.82) dummy pacific region 1.31** (1.98) dummy orinoquia region 1.887*** (2.88) dummy amazonian region 0.97 (1.64) ovtest f(3, 149) prob > f 1.76 0.16 number of observations 168 note. ordinary least squares (ols) regression. a unstandardized regression coefficients with standard errors in parentheses. ** p < 0.05, *** p < 0.01 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 published by scholarship@western 21 table 9. productive land gini and resguardo land size per family effect on the income unmet basic needs gap (iubngap) explanatory variables log of iubngapa spanish language monolingual 0.002 (0.34) indigenous language monolingual -0.007 (-0.52) spanish–indigenous language bilingual 0.0006 (0.08) municipal planted forest area -0.42*** (-4.07) municipal commercial development -0.01** (-2.14) no formal education gap 0.0147** (2.46) university education gap -0.07*** (-2.78) incomplete education for financial reasons (% indigenous population) 0.011 (1.96) resguardo land size per family—low gini coefficient for productive land 0.03 (1.59) resguardo land size per family—medium gini coefficient for productive land 0.031 (1.43) resguardo land size per family—high gini coefficient for productive land 0.035** (2.57) dummy caribbean region 0.823 (1.09) dummy andean region 1.23 (1.85) dummy pacific region 1.324** (2.03) dummy amazon region 0.972 (1.65) dummy orinoquia region 1.901*** (2.89) ovtest f(3, 149) prob > f 1.61 0.19 number of observations 168 note. ordinary least squares (ols) regression. a unstandardized regression coefficients with standard errors in parentheses. ** p < 0.05, *** p < 0.01 sanchez garcia: indigenous income disparity doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.8569 22 table 10. regional secondary road network density secondary road network density region percentage of municipalities with low density mean minimum density maximum density pacific 70.4 0.033 0.006 0.068 caribe 64.3 0.028 0.008 0.068 amazon 100 0.036 0 0.052 orinoquia 89.5 0.015 0 0.036 andes 27.3 0.024 0.02 0.044 note. source: author elaboration based on 2004 secondary road data from cepal (2012) and data on provincial territorial extension from sociedad geografica de colombia (2011). the pacific region is characterized by difficult climatic and topographic conditions, and inadequate infrastructure (viloria de la hoz, 2008). these factors have historically limited public investment in the region. table 10 shows that 70.4% of pacific municipalities are located in provinces with a low-density secondary road network. as a result of the lack of access to the region, the government has less control over the illegal exploitation of the choco resguardos by private mineral and lumber companies (villa, 2014). this exploitation depletes resources from resguardo land, which reduces the ability of indigenous households to produce traditional market and non-market items to meet their needs. some indigenous people are employed by these companies, but this employment is temporary because the companies will leave once the resource is depleted. the final result is ecological damage and impoverished communities. future research should further examine the hypothesis that larger resguardo land sizes increase the iubngap in the pacific region because these lands are likely to have larger natural and mineral resources that are subject to illegal private industry exploitation. although the cric (2007) has succeeded in partially recovering cauca’s indigenous ancestral territories, there is still a high regional concentration of non-indigenous productive land ownership. table 11 indicates that 78.7% of the pacific municipalities have a productive land gini coefficient larger than 0.65. the pacific region is home to the colombian municipalities with the highest productive land gini coefficient (0.97). that is why many indigenous families in cauca work small, steep land lots that barely supply their basic needs (cric, 2007). the amazon is the most isolated colombian region. table 10 shows that all amazonian provinces have municipalities with low secondary road network densities, which for some municipalities is 0 km of road per km2. this situation is illustrated by the province of vaupes with 0 km of constructed secondary road in 2004 (cepal, 2012). in 2005, indigenous people made up 58.8% of the total population of vaupes (dane, 2005a). in this province, the municipality of mitu registered 1,635 hectares of resguardo land in 2005 (incoder, 2011), which is more than twice the mean number of hectares of resguardo land for all colombian regions (see table 2). therefore, in the amazonian region where isolation is a regional attribute, larger resguardo lands are allocated to indigenous people. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 published by scholarship@western 23 table 11 indicates that, among all colombian regions, the amazon has the smallest number of municipalities in the high productive land gini coefficient category (33.3% of its municipalities). this is likely due to the government’s policy to protect the region’s biodiversity from economic development (meisel roca, bonilla mejía, & sánchez jabba, 2013). out of 38 million hectares of amazonian protected land, 25 million hectares are indigenous resguardos (65%; nu & cepal, 2013). the fact that most of these resguardos are protected liberates indigenous territories from the negative pressure exercised by mining and lumber companies, but it also limits its use to supply material needs for indigenous people. indigenous communities in colombia have expressed their dissatisfaction with the government imposition of protected areas in their resguardos as the government establishes a special management regime that limits their productive systems and conflicts with traditional indigenous ecological knowledge (correa, 2010; cortes villa & palacios, 2018). further research is needed to examine whether larger resguardo land sizes increases the iubngap in the amazon due to a lack of regional infrastructure and land suitable, from a legal and natural perspective, for productive activities that meet indigenous iubn. table 11. concentration of privately owned highly productive land by region productive land gini coefficient region percentage of municipalities mean minimum value maximum value pacific 78.7 0.78 0.66 0.97 caribe 50.0 0.69 0.65 0.76 amazon 33.3 0.72 0.67 0.77 orinoquia 47.4 0.73 0.65 0.88 andes 37.0 0.77 0.65 0.86 note. source: author based on 2005 data from instituto geográfico agustín codazzi, centro de estudios de desarrollo económico uniades, & universidad de antioquia (2012). research limitations the data did not allow for the creation of an indicator of income inequality that would differentiate household basic needs by the culture between and among indigenous and non-minority populations in colombia. data limitations also did not allow for the inclusion of additional variables that could affect the iubngap, such as illicit cultivation and indigenous political activism. policy implications policies that allocate land rights to indigenous people are not enough to eliminate income inequality. in colombia and around the world, there is a need for policies that allocate and protect indigenous lands in ways that offer indigenous peoples the same opportunities available to the rest of society. consequently, policy makers should reduce the isolation experienced by many indigenous people living on their lands. additional land rights protections are needed, particularly for indigenous people living on high quality and non-isolated land, which is more likely to be targeted by outside companies for resource extraction sanchez garcia: indigenous income disparity doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.8569 24 activities. these policies require enforcement mechanisms to mitigate these threats from non indigenous economic interests such as mineral and lumber companies. this is a common threat to indigenous lands that has been reported in latin america, canada, and australia (united nations, 2009). references alta consejeria presidencial para la equidad de la mujer. 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(2017, october 29). battle for the motherland: indigenous people of colombia fighting for their lands. the guardian. retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/environment/ 2017/oct/28/nasa-colombia-cauca-valley-battle-mother-land world bank.(2016). infographic human opportunity index. retrieved from https://www.worldbank.org/en/news/infographic/2016/10/24/infografia-indice-deoportunidades-humanas ms 1443 cover page.pdf ms 1443 sanchez garcia indigenous income disparity rce.pdf microsoft word 8388+title+page.docx the international indigenous policy journal volume 12 | issue1 december 2021 the centrality of education for indigenous income mobility in canada michael haan university of western ontario, canada, mhaan2@uwo.ca georgina chuatico university of western ontario, canada, georgina.chuatico@uwo.ca jules cornetet ecole normale supérieure, de cachan, france, jules.cornetet@ens-cachan.fr recommended citation haan, m., chuatico, g., & cornetet, j. (2021). the centrality of education for indigenous income mobility in canada. the international indigenous policy journal, 12(1). https://10.18584/iipj.2021.12.1.8388 the centrality of education for indigenous income mobility in canada abstract in this article, we employ a multinomial logistic regression model to determine which factors predict middleand upper income class belonging among indigenous and non-indigenous people. we examine the impact of identity, education, occupation, and urbanization on income status. the positive impact of higher education is captured by the model; however, post-secondary education has a greater impact on some indigenous groups than others. we present interaction terms between education and identity to show that investment in higher education is crucial to indigenous people’s income attainment; however, some identity groups benefit more than others. keywords education, socioeconomic mobility, income, indigenous peoples, canada creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. 1 haan et al.: centrality of education for indigenous income mobility doi:10.18584/iipj.2021/12/1/8388 the centrality of education for indigenous income mobility in canada canada’s history of colonization and state regulation gave rise to social structures that created different socioeconomic opportunities for indigenous peoples and non-indigenous peoples. over time, social class gaps between non-indigenous and indigenous people have persisted; however, the average income disparity decreased slightly between1996 to 2006 (lamb et al., 2018). most of the gains within indigenous populations came from improvements in the position of those who were already higher income earners, while those who were in lower income groups fared worse (lamb, 2013). in general, social class hierarchies are created and reproduced through economic capital, cultural capital, education, and occupation (de graaf, 1991; dimaggio & mukhtar, 2004; katz-gerro, 2002; kraaykamp & nieuwbeerta, 2000; lopéz-sintas & katz-gerro, 2005; peterson & simkus, 1992). the distribution of social class also intersects with canada’s history of colonization and racism, and contemporary social structures. indigenous people have been oppressed by the system set in place through colonization and state control (distasio et al., 2005; menzies, 2006; patrick, 2014). in addition, colonial oppression created an intergenerational legacy of trauma, contributing to higher rates of substance abuse, violence, poverty, and lower educational attainment and economic outcomes. in turn, these factors contribute to a higher risk of social and economic disadvantage (oelke et al., 2016). persistent social and economic inequality between indigenous and non-indigenous populations is a frequent theme in the literature (heisz, 2007; lamb et al., 2018; parriag & chaulk, 2013). parriag and chaulk (2013) found that urban indigenous people had a lower average income compared to nonindigenous people, but they also found evidence of a growing indigenous middle class that demographically resembles middle-income non-indigenous canadians in many ways. a critical finding in their work is that the basic human capital model, which posits that higher levels of education and training lead to better economic returns (becker, 1992), applies to indigenous people, especially in the middle class and among those who are employed. however, the returns on education and training investment are not distributed evenly across indigenous and non-indigenous populations, and it is not clear from parriag and chaulk’s research why this is the case. our study builds on parriag and chaulk’s (2013) research in several important ways. first, we use the 2016 census in order to examine the whole country (rather than just urban centres). second, we use multinomial logistic regression models to look at the comparative effect of socio-demographic, geographic, and human capital characteristics on income level. finally, like parriag and chaulk, we look at indigenous identity groups separately—métis, first nations (status and non-status), and inuit. in this article, we investigate factors that are associated with the likelihood of being in the lower, middle-, or upper income group. in the sections below, we first review the relevant literature on socioeconomic mobility, focusing on the importance of indigenous identity, education, occupation, and urbanization in gaining and maintaining middleand upper income status. then, using the 2016 census, we employ multinomial logistic regression models to determine whether these factors predict income group. we conclude by discussing the implications of our research for policy purposes and for future research. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 1 published by scholarship@western, 2021 literature review indigenous identity groups indigenous identities, which include status and non-status first nations, métis, and inuit, are correlated with income distribution and labour market access and opportunities within the indigenous population in both historical and contemporary contexts (lamb, 2013). paternalistic legislation has shaped legal definitions of identity among indigenous peoples, which has systematically affected their socioeconomic position in canada. the indian act, first enacted in 1876 specified who was an “indian” and therefore entitled to rights under the act. the indian act only recognized first nations who met certain criteria, which gave them “indian status.” it also defined entitlement to reserve lands. the indian act (1985) defines a reserve as a “tract of land, the legal title to which is vested in her majesty, that has been set apart by her majesty for the use and benefit of a band” (section 2(1), reserve, a). at the same time, the indian act placed social and economic barriers on status first nations. colonial government officials chose the location of reserves, which were often selected because they had limited economic potential. for example, many were in isolated locations, which constrained their economic growth (gerber, 2014). historically, first nation women and their children lost their status rights when they married non-indigenous men. it was not until 1985, when bill c-31 was passed, that these rights were restored (coates, 1999). in the late 1800s, first nations who chose to pursue higher education, work in professional occupations, or own land lost their indian status (coates, 1999). an amended version of the indian act is still in effect today. not all indigenous peoples in canada have status rights. non-status first nations, for example, do not have the status rights under the indian act, which includes the right to live on reserve. as a result, they often live in urban centres (coates, 1999). although inuit, indigenous people of the arctic, were classified as “indians” under the royal proclamation of 1763 and constitution act of 1867, they remain distinct from first nations in legislation and governance (bonesteel, 2008). finally, métis people are those who have indigenous and non-indigenous ancestry stemming from the fur trade in the northwest of canada in the 18th century (coates, 1999). they make up a distinct cultural group in canada, who, like non-status first nations people, do not have status rights. the histories of indigenous peoples have shaped their contemporary circumstances. for example, lamb et al. (2018) found métis people had the smallest wage disparity, while first nations living on reserve were found to have the largest disparity. these trends have been identified in other studies (george & kuhn, 1994; lamb, 2013; pendakur & pendakur, 2011). education most studies show that the level of education matters. the traditional human capital model posits that high human capital yields to high economic returns. education and training are forms of human capital that generally place individuals at an advantage in the labour market (becker, 1992). those who have the appropriate credentials can find better opportunities and reach middleand upper class status (goux & maurin, 2012). consequently, investing in education and training can give an individual higher returns in the labour market (fan et al., 2017). 3 haan et al.: centrality of education for indigenous income mobility doi:10.18584/iipj.2021/12/1/8388 the history of indigenous education in canada is filled with stories of horror. at time of writing, 215 children’s bodies had been discovered in a mass grave at kamloops residential school, with widespread expectations to find more, according to first nations national chief perry bellegarde (pruden & kirkup, 2021). even for those who did not attend residential schools, lower quality of education, lack of cultural appropriateness, and underfunding remain issues disproportionately experienced by indigenous students to this day. these issues are systemic across the entire educational spectrum, beginning in elementary schools and continuing all the way to universities (mcmahon, 2014). education is a critical part of indigenous class mobility (gordon & white, 2014). education plays an important role in attaining labour market success and thus higher social class status as well. first and foremost, there is a strong correlation between education and employment. luffman and sussman (2007) found that having post-secondary education increases the likelihood of employment, and that the effect was particularly strong for women with a university degree. bougie et al. (2013) also reported that a lack of educational credentials was a barrier to finding employment among unemployed indigenous people living off reserve. indigenous people who did not complete high school reported significant barriers to furthering their education. yet, gaps persist between indigenous and non-indigenous populations. between 1996 and 2011, a 20percentage point gap existed between indigenous and non-indigenous populations in post-secondary education attainment (white & peters, 2013). white and peters (2013) predicted this gap would remain between indigenous and non-indigenous people and grow wider for status first nations and inuit under the current policy system. differences in average levels of education are also found between indigenous identity groups, which partially explains why some groups have higher labour market outcomes than others (ponting, 2005; wotherspoon & satzewich, 1993). in 2012, among off-reserve indigenous people aged 18 to 44, 23% of first nations had completed post-secondary schooling, compared to 47% of métis and 26% of inuit (bougie et al., 2013). the variations in educational achievement across indigenous groups are an important component to understanding their socioeconomic position, as both human capital and identity go hand-in-hand in determining income. we expect that higher levels of education will positively predict middle-and upper income status and reduce the size of the unexplained differences in class membership. occupation occupation is another important factor that is linked to income and economic mobility between groups (kambourov & manovskii, 2009; zangelidis, 2008). occupation reflects a range of educational qualifications, skills, and attributes that cannot always be fully measured (fan et al., 2017). indigenous people are found in certain occupational sectors more than others, which results in labour market segregation based on skill level and occupational prestige. a large proportion of indigenous people who pursue post-secondary education obtain a trades certificate or college diploma (luffman & sussman, 2007), which corresponds to trades being the second highest occupational category among off-reserve indigenous people in western canada. additionally, indigenous people who have a bachelor’s degree tend to choose different career paths than their similarly educated non-indigenous counterparts. luffman and sussman (2007), for example, found that indigenous people who have a university degree 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 1 published by scholarship@western, 2021 are likely to work in health, as well as in parks, recreation, and fitness; while non-indigenous people with a university degree are more likely to work in fields such as engineering technologies. in turn, indigenous people are underrepresented in knowledge-sector and high-skill occupations. in 2015, there were fewer indigenous people than non-indigenous people working in knowledge sectors such as professional, managerial, and technical occupations (statistics canada, 2017a), as well as in prestigious occupations such as law and medicine (moyser, 2017). on the other hand, more indigenous people work in trades and transport and as equipment operators in natural resources, agriculture, and production, and in sales and services (statistics canada, 2017a). thus, many indigenous people are often found in occupational sectors that do not require a university education. although many indigenous people work in low-income jobs and work fewer hours, there are also those who work in occupations affiliated with higher class status. a growing number of indigenous people, especially those living in cities, work in sales and service, professional, management, and trades and transport sectors, which are associated with middle class status (luffman & sussman, 2007; wotherspoon, 2011). among indigenous people who achieved post-secondary education, 3 out of 5 education found jobs in education, recreation, counselling, social sciences, commerce, management, and administration (wotherspoon, 2011). occupation reflects educational credentials and prestige, and in turn class status is affected by the occupational distribution. knowledge sectors that require university degrees are more likely to lead to employment in occupations that correspond to middleand upper class status. in our modelling, we expect that once we adjust for occupation gaps in the likelihood of being in the middleto upper income group should shrink between non-indigenous and indigenous populations. urbanization more indigenous people are moving into cities, which generally afford greater opportunity for education and employment that contributes to upward income mobility (ponting, 2005). the number of indigenous people residing in a census metropolitan area increased by 59.7% from 2006 to 2016 (statistics canada, 2017b). census results show that there are approximately 92,810 indigenous people in winnipeg, 76,205 in edmonton, 61,46 in vancouver, and 46,315 in toronto (statistics canada, 2017b). métis people were more likely to reside in metropolitan areas compared to other indigenous groups: 62.6% of métis were living in metropolitan areas of 30,000 people or more in 2016 (statistics canada, 2017b). winnipeg has the largest métis population, which was 52,130 in 2016 (statistics canada, 2017b). thus, the larger proportion of métis living in urbanized areas may explain some of their relative advantages compared to other indigenous identity groups. geographical remoteness is one factor that may contribute to disparities between and among indigenous peoples and non-indigenous peoples. additionally, people who reside in rural and smaller populations may be paid less on average than people who live in large urban areas due to fewer high paying occupations being available (beckstead & brown, 2005). also, higher productivity levels in large population centres enable a larger proportion of employers to pay higher wages to workers (beckstead & brown, 2005). thus, social mobility may be more accessible to those who live in larger centres with a greater number of opportunities and resources, compared to those who remain in smaller or more isolated communities, reinforcing a link between urbanization and social position. 5 haan et al.: centrality of education for indigenous income mobility doi:10.18584/iipj.2021/12/1/8388 methods research questions the following research questions will be answered by the analyses in order to determine the predictors of income class among indigenous identity groups: a. how is indigenous identity group linked to income? b. does this relationship differ by indigenous identity? c. to what extent does higher education link to middleand upper income status among indigenous groups? d. how do these trends differ by occupation? e. to what extent does income different between urban and rural areas? data our study relies on the 2016 census, which provides data about demographics, employment, educational background, income, and family structure of the population in canada. the 2016 census includes data on both non-indigenous and indigenous people in canada, which allows the analysis to compare socioeconomic outcomes for both populations. the target population are persons living in private dwellings across the nation. the overall response rate was 98.4%. there were 14 reserves that were incompletely enumerated either because community leaders did not consent to participate, or the enumeration was disrupted. these communities were not included in the analyses. the wide range of social, economic, and demographic information as well as the high response rate makes the 2016 census the most appropriate data for the analysis. analytical sample we include non-indigenous people for comparison and specify four indigenous identity groups based on respondents’ self-identification as status first nation, non-status first nation, métis, or inuit. we exclude other indigenous identities, such as multiple or other indigenous identities due to small sample sizes. we restrict the sample to people who are between 25 and 64 years old, as is commonly done to ensure that we focus on the working age population. since the analysis examines groupings based on income, the analysis excludes individuals whose total census family income was zero or less. the final analytical sample contains 4,677,880 respondents. variables outcome variable our focal outcome of interest is a categorical variable that captures lower, middle-, or upper income group membership. we have chosen a quantitative definition of the middle-income group based on the total income of all persons in a census family. following parriag and chaulk (2013), we define the 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 1 published by scholarship@western, 2021 middle-income group as having a total income that falls between 75% and 150% of median total income of cad$25,500. families with an adjusted income below this 75% threshold are categorized as being in the lower income group, and people who are above the 150% median threshold are considered part of the upper income group. outliers displaying extremely high or low levels of income (+/3 standard deviations from the mean of the z-score) have been removed to avoid undue influence on our regression coefficients. predictor variables we are primarily interested in revealing the factors that predict income group membership across indigenous identity group and in trying to reduce the unexplained differences between these groups. as a result, the analysis focuses primarily on the statistical significance of the indigenous identity variable. non-indigenous people are the reference group in all analyses with dummy variables for status first nations, non-status first nations, métis, and inuit. another focal predictor variable is level of education. we divide education into six categories: no diploma, high school diploma, registered apprenticeship or trades certificate, college diploma, university certificate below a bachelor’s degree, and university degree at the bachelor’s level or higher. those with a high school diploma are the reference group for the education variable. dummy variables for each occupational sector are also included. to determine the occupational sectors, we use the 2011 national occupational classification (noc), which defines the following areas of occupation: (a) management; (b) business, finance, and administration; (c) natural and applied sciences; (d) health occupations; (e) education, law, social, community, and government services; (f) art, culture, recreation, and sport; (g) did not work; (h) trades, transport, and equipment operators; (i) natural resources, agriculture, and related production occupations; and (j) manufacturing and utilities. the reference group for the occupation variable is sales and services sector. we use another set of variables for urbanization in the analysis, which is measured by the size of the population centre. areas with populations of 100,000 people or more are large population centres, areas with populations of 30,000 to 99,999 people are medium population centres, and areas with populations of 1,000 to 29,000 people are small population centres. rural areas are places with a population of 1,000 or fewer people. dummy variables for each population centre size are used and rural area is the reference. control variables control variables were used to avoid biased results. to account for gender differences, we employ a binary dummy variable. in addition, we include age as well as age-squared as continuous variables. we control for marital status using dummy variables for single, married, common-law, separated, divorced, and widowed. single people are the reference group. labour force status was coded as a dummy variable for full-time employment, part-time employment, and no paid employment. no paid employment is the reference group. we include variables for self-employment and retirement using dummy variables where 1 is yes and 0 is no. total income includes government transfers (employment insurance, social assistance, etc.); therefore, we also control for this source of income using a dummy value equal to 1 if the transfers received by the household are higher than the median income level of $25,500. we also apply a control for the number of people in each household, the number of wage earners, and the 7 haan et al.: centrality of education for indigenous income mobility doi:10.18584/iipj.2021/12/1/8388 number of children aged 18 or younger. these variables are continuous. finally, we control for the province of residence in order to take into account biases related to structural factors such as employment opportunities, natural resource availability, cost of living, and governance transfer adequacy across provinces. dummy variables are employed for each province namely ontario, quebec, newfoundland and labrador, prince edward island, nova scotia, new brunswick, manitoba, alberta, saskatchewan, british columbia, nunavut, northwest territories, and the yukon territory. ontario serves as the reference for this variable. statistical model the nature of the outcome variable, an ordinal variable with three categories, generally calls for an ordered logit model, which is designed to model ordinal outcomes with more than two response categories (here we have three). instead, we use multinomial logit regression models to test the likelihood of being in lower, middle-, or upper income categories. as with binomial logit models, a vector of coefficients is fit to maximize the likelihood of ordered logit models, produce one set of regression coefficients, and handle the ordinal nature of the dependent variable by moving the “cut points” of an unobserved latent variable. although multinomial logit is less efficient than ordered logit models, we chose to use it because we wanted to present the differences in coefficients of being in the middle-income versus lower income and the upper income versus the lower income group. with only one set of coefficients, this would not have been possible with an ordered logit model. this article seeks to identify which variables are associated with the attainment of a middleto upper income status and, to facilitate this, the marginal effects of each main predictor variable are produced. in doing so, we are able to measure the likelihood of falling in each income category per unit change of each predictor variable. the following model is estimated: ηi = α + β1identityi + β2educationi + β3occupationi + β4population centrei + ei (1) ηi = α + β1identityi + β2educationi + β3occupationi + β4population centrei + β5identity*educationi + ei (2) where ηi is the class affiliation of every respondent (lower, middle-, and upper income group), α is the intercept and βj represents the coefficients of the main predictors for each individual i, and ej represents an individual-specific error term. the coefficients are estimated relative to the reference category, which is the lower income group. the second equation shows the added interaction terms where β5 represents the coefficients of the interacting effects of identity and education. results sample distribution table 1 shows the sample distribution of the outcome variable as well as the independent variables of the analytical sample. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 1 published by scholarship@western, 2021 table 1. sample distribution across variables variable % income group lower 36.0% middle 36.6% upper 27.4% identity group non-indigenous 95.8% status first nations 1.9% non-status first nations 0.6% métis 1.7% inuit 0.2% education no high school diploma 11.5% high school diploma 23.8% apprenticeship or trades 10.8% college diploma 22.5% below bachelor’s degree 3.1% bachelor’s degree or higher 28.3% occupation sales and service 16.1% management 10.0% business, finance, and administrative 14.0% natural and applied sciences 6.3% health services 6.2% education 10.6% art, culture, and recreation 2.4% no paid work 16.3% trades, transport, and equipment 12.6% natural resources, agriculture, and production 1.7% manufacturing and utilities 3.9% 9 haan et al.: centrality of education for indigenous income mobility doi:10.18584/iipj.2021/12/1/8388 table 1. sample distribution across variables (continued) variable % population size rural 18.3% small urban 12.1% medium urban 8.8% large urban 60.8% gender male 48.9% female 51.1% retired no 95.8% yes 4.2% self-employed no 89.7% yes 10.3% labour status no paid work 18.1% full-time work 69.2% part-time work 12.7% marital status single 20.8% married 52.3% common-law 15.8% separated 3.1% divorced 6.6% widowed 1.4% 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 1 published by scholarship@western, 2021 table 1. sample distribution across variables (continued) variable % province newfoundland and labrador 1.5% prince edward island 0.4% nova scotia 2.6% new brunswick 2.1% quebec 23.2% ontario 38.2% manitoba 3.5% saskatchewan 3.0% alberta 11.8% british columbia 13.4% yukon 0.1% northwest territories 0.1% nunavut 0.1% received government transfers no 50.0% yes 50.0% mean number of wage earners 1.86 number of people in the household 3.057 number of children 1.672 age 45 age-squared 2,139 note. n = 4,677,880. source: 2016 census of canada. 11 haan et al.: centrality of education for indigenous income mobility doi:10.18584/iipj.2021/12/1/8388 sample distribution across classes the distribution across the main predictors for the sample is displayed in figures 1 to 4. figure 1 presents the proportion of people in lower, middle-, and upper income groups among non-indigenous people and indigenous peoples. figure 1. distribution of income group by identity note. source: 2016 census of canada among non-indigenous people, there appears to be an almost even distribution across income groups: there is a slightly higher proportion of individuals in the middle-income group (36.8%), followed by 35.4% in the lower income category, and 27.8% in the upper income group. however, a disproportionate number of indigenous people fall into lower income groups, especially among status first nations. the majority of status first nation people (60.5%) are in the lower income category, while 27.1% are in the middle-income and 12.4% are in the upper income group. among non-status first nation people, 47.9% are in the lower, 33.2% are in the middle-, and 18.9% are in the upper income category, respectively. the income distribution among métis people more closely resembles that of nonindigenous people. among métis people, 35.1% are in the middle-income category, while 40.2% are in the lower income group and 24.7% are in the upper income group. approximately 44.8% of the inuit group fall within the lower, 30.4% are in the middle-, and 24.8% are in the upper income groups. figure 2 shows the proportion of people in the lower, middle-, and upper income groups across each level of education. 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 non-indigenous status first nations non-status first nations métis inuit pr op or tio n identity lower middle upper 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 1 published by scholarship@western, 2021 figure 2. distribution of class by education note. source: 2016 census of canada the majority of people without a high school diploma fall in the lower income group at 58.3%, while 31.4% are in the middle-income group, and only 10.3% fall in the upper income category. most people who have a high school diploma are also in the lower income category, 38.8% are in the middleand 20.2% are in the upper income categories. among those who possess a trades or apprenticeship certificate, a high proportion of individuals fall in the middle-income group at 41.6%, while 36.5% fall in the lower income group and 21.9% are in the upper income category. among people with a college degree, 31.9% are in the lower, 39.4% are in the middle-, and 28.7% are in the upper income group, respectively. further, there is a rise in upper income group membership among those who have a degree below a bachelor’s level at 29.4%, while 34% belong in the lower income group and 36.6% are in the middle-income group. lastly, among those with a university degree at the bachelor’s level or higher, there are more people who belong in the upper income group: 41.3% are in the upper income group, 33.6% are in the middle-income group, and only 25.1% are in the lower income group. indeed, larger proportions of people with higher levels of education are found in middleand upper income levels. 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 no high school diploma high school diploma apprenticeship or trades certificate college diploma certificate below the bachelor's level bachelor's degree or higher pr op ot io n education lower middle upper 13 haan et al.: centrality of education for indigenous income mobility doi:10.18584/iipj.2021/12/1/8388 figure 3. distribution of class by occupational sector note. source: 2016 census of canada people working in the sales and services sector are generally in the lower or middle-income groups, 47.1% and 35.9%, respectively. most people in art, culture, and recreation are also found to have lower incomes (40.5%), while 35.7% are in the middle-income group, and 23.8% are in the upper income group. among those in manufacturing and utilities, 36.5% are in the lower, 43.3% are in the middle-, and 20.2% are in the upper income group. a higher proportion of people in the sample who work in natural resources fall in the lower income group at 40%, 37.1% are in the middle-income group, and 22.9% are in the upper income group. as expected, the majority of people who are not in the paid workforce are overrepresented in the lower income group (62%), and only 26.3% are in the middle-income group and 11.7% are in the upper income group. further, larger proportions of people are found in the middleand upper income groups in some occupational fields. for instance, 33.4% of those in management are in the middle-income group and 44.8% are in the upper income group. about 40% of those in business, finance, and administration are in the middle group and 33.1% are in the upper. among those in natural and applied sciences, 38.7% are in the middle-, 43.1% are in the upper, and only 18.1% are in the lower income group, respectively. about 38% are in the middleand in the upper income groups among those in health services. as well, about 37% of those in education, law, and social, community and government services are in each of the middleand upper income groups. a high proportion of middle-income individuals (44.4%) work in 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 sa les an d s erv ice m an ag em en t bu sin ess , fi na nc e, an d a dm ini str ati on na tur al an d a pp lie d s cie nc es he alt h s erv ice s ed uc ati on ar ts, cu ltu re, an d r ec rea tio n no t in pa id lab ou r m ark et tr ad es, tr an sp or t, a nd eq uip me nt na tur al res ou rce s, a gri cu ltu re, an d r eso ur ce s m an ufa ctu rin g a nd ut ilit ies pr op or tio n occupational sector low middle upper 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 1 published by scholarship@western, 2021 trades, transport, and as equipment operators, while 33.4% are in the lower income group, and only 22.9% are in the upper income group. lastly, the class distribution of population centre size is displayed in figure 4. figure 4. distribution of class by population centre size note. source: 2016 census of canada among those living in rural areas, 34.2% have a lower income level, 39.6% are in the middle, and 26.3% are in the upper group. there is a similar income distribution among those living in small population centres where about 34.3%, 39.1%, and 26.6% are in the lower, middle-, and upper income groups, respectively. among those who live in medium-sized population centres, about 37% fall in the lower and middle-income groups, and 25.8% are in the upper group. lastly, among those living in large population centres, 36.7% fall in the lower income group, 35.1% are in the middle-income group, and 28.1% are in the upper income group. multinomial logistic regression results the likelihood of belonging in the upper and middle-income groups is determined by running multinomial logistic regression models and producing the relative risk ratios of falling in the upper and middle groups compared to the lower income group (table 2). the first model tests the effects of identity, education, occupation, and population centre size. the second model includes interaction effects between identity and education (table 3). in doing so, we can see which factors facilitate higher class status attainment and whether education has varying effects for each identity group. further, a least likelihood ratio test was employed to test the goodness of fit of both models. we compared the likelihood ratio test results, as well as the akaike’s information criterion and the bayesian information criterion, and the models presented were a much better fit in every instance. 0 0.05 0.1 0.15 0.2 0.25 0.3 0.35 0.4 0.45 rural small medium large pr op or tio n population centre size low middle upper 15 haan et al.: centrality of education for indigenous income mobility doi:10.18584/iipj.2021/12/1/8388 table 2. multinomial logit regression predicting income group model 1 middle-income group upper income group predictors rrr p-level se rrr p-level se identity non-indigenous (ref.) status first nations 0.52 *** 0.01 0.37 *** 0.01 non-status first nations 0.88 *** 0.01 0.84 *** 0.02 métis 1.00 0.01 1.13 *** 0.01 inuit 0.68 *** 0.03 0.60 *** 0.03 education no high school diploma 0.69 *** 0.00 0.43 *** 0.00 high school diploma (ref.) apprenticeship or trades certificate 1.14 *** 0.01 1.31 *** 0.01 college diploma 1.22 *** 0.00 1.64 *** 0.01 below bachelor’s degree 1.09 *** 0.01 1.60 *** 0.01 bachelor’s degree or higher 1.37 *** 0.01 3.19 *** 0.01 occupation sales and services (ref.) management 1.81 *** 0.01 4.49 *** 0.03 business, finance, and administration 1.73 *** 0.01 2.83 *** 0.01 natural and applied sciences 2.48 *** 0.02 4.74 *** 0.04 health services 2.21 *** 0.01 4.37 *** 0.03 education 1.93 *** 0.01 3.42 *** 0.02 art, culture, and recreation 1.54 *** 0.01 2.19 *** 0.02 no work 1.79 *** 0.02 3.44 *** 0.05 trades, transport, and equipment 1.71 *** 0.01 2.00 *** 0.01 natural resources, agriculture, and production 1.39 *** 0.01 2.20 *** 0.03 manufacturing and utilities 1.30 *** 0.01 1.28 *** 0.01 population size rural (ref.) small urban 1.05 *** 0.01 1.06 *** 0.01 medium urban 0.95 *** 0.01 0.96 *** 0.01 large urban 0.80 *** 0.00 0.78 *** 0.00 note. source: 2016 census. reference is lower income group. control variables are included. rrr = relative risk ratio. se = standard error. *p < .05, **p < .01, ***p < .001 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 1 published by scholarship@western, 2021 table 3. multinomial logit regression predicting income group using interaction terms model 2 middle-income group upper income group predictors rrr p-level se rrr p-level se identity non-indigenous status first nations 0.52 *** 0.01 0.40 *** 0.01 non-status first nations 0.86 *** 0.03 0.83 *** 0.04 métis 0.97 0.02 1.16 *** 0.03 inuit 0.78 ** 0.06 0.86 0.08 education no high school diploma 0.69 *** 0.00 0.43 *** 0.00 high school diploma apprenticeship or trades certificate 1.14 *** 0.01 1.31 *** 0.01 college diploma 1.23 *** 0.00 1.65 *** 0.01 below bachelor’s degree 1.09 *** 0.01 1.60 *** 0.01 bachelor’s degree or higher 1.36 *** 0.01 3.18 *** 0.01 occupation sales and services management 1.81 *** 0.01 4.48 *** 0.03 business, finance, and administration 1.73 *** 0.01 2.83 *** 0.02 natural and applied sciences 2.48 *** 0.02 4.74 *** 0.04 health services 2.21 *** 0.01 4.37 *** 0.03 education 1.93 *** 0.01 3.42 *** 0.02 art, culture, and recreation 1.54 *** 0.01 2.19 *** 0.02 no work 1.79 *** 0.02 3.43 *** 0.05 trades, transport, and equipment 1.71 *** 0.01 2.00 *** 0.01 natural resources, agriculture, and production 1.39 *** 0.01 2.20 *** 0.03 manufacturing and utilities 1.30 *** 0.01 1.28 *** 0.01 population size rural small urban 1.05 *** 0.01 1.06 *** 0.01 medium urban 0.94 *** 0.01 0.96 *** 0.01 large urban 0.80 *** 0.00 0.78 *** 0.00 17 haan et al.: centrality of education for indigenous income mobility doi:10.18584/iipj.2021/12/1/8388 table 3. multinomial logit regression predicting income group using interaction terms (continued) model 2 middle-income group upper income group predictors rrr plevel se rrr plevel se identity * education status first nations * no high school diploma 0.94 * 0.02 1.01 0.04 status first nations * apprenticeship or trades certificate 0.92 ** 0.03 0.93 0.04 status first nations * college diploma 0.93 ** 0.03 0.78 *** 0.03 status first nations * below bachelor’s degree 1.05 0.06 0.78 ** 0.06 status first nations* bachelor’s degree or higher 1.57 *** 0.06 1.29 *** 0.06 non-status first nations * no high school diploma 1.06 0.05 1.23 ** 0.09 non-status first nations *apprenticeship or trades certificate 0.95 0.05 0.92 0.07 non-status first nations * college diploma 0.91 * 0.04 0.85 ** 0.05 non-status first nations * below bachelor’s degree 1.38 ** 0.16 1.50 ** 0.21 non-status first nations * bachelor’s degree or higher 1.35 *** 0.08 1.31 *** 0.09 métis * no high school diploma 1.06 0.03 1.25 *** 0.05 métis * apprenticeship or trades certificate 1.07 * 0.03 1.04 0.04 métis * college diploma 0.91 ** 0.02 0.80 *** 0.03 métis * below bachelor’s degree 1.14 * 0.07 1.07 0.08 métis * bachelor’s degree or higher 1.31 *** 0.05 1.13 ** 0.05 inuit * no high school diploma 0.78 ** 0.07 0.62 *** 0.07 inuit * apprenticeship or trades certificate 0.75 * 0.09 0.52 *** 0.07 inuit * college diploma 0.81 0.09 0.56 *** 0.07 inuit * below bachelor’s degree 1.91 * 0.63 1.64 0.56 inuit * bachelor’s degree or higher 1.65 ** 0.31 1.43 0.28 note. source: 2016 census. reference is lower income group. control variables are included. rrr = relative risk ratio. se = standard error. *p < .05, **p < .01, ***p < .001 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 1 published by scholarship@western, 2021 the marginal effects at the means show the probability to fall in each income category while holding all variables at their mean. the marginal effects of the main predictor variables, identity, education, occupation, and population centre size are produced in order to present a clear interpretation of how these factors affect the likelihood of falling in lower, middle-, and upper income categories. table 4 shows the chances of being in each income group by identity. the results in table 4 show that status first nations have a higher likelihood of falling in the lower income group (49%), followed by inuit at 41%. non-status first nation people are 34% more likely to be in the lower income group. métis and non-indigenous people have similar likelihoods of being in the lower income group at 30% and 31%, respectively. additionally, non-indigenous, métis and non-status first nation people have similar chances of belonging in the middle-income category (48%, 46%, and 46%, respectively). inuit are 43% and status first nations are 39% more likely to be in the middle-income group. in terms of the likelihood of being in the upper income category, métis are 24% more likely, followed by non-indigenous people at 21%. non-status first nations are 20%, while inuit are 17% more likely to be part of the upper income group, respectively. finally, status first nations appear to be the most disadvantaged—with a lower likelihood of being in the upper income group at 12%. thus, to answer our first and second research questions, we see that there are disparities between the non-indigenous and indigenous identity groups, with status first nation people being more likely to be lower income. the results also show that métis people have a similar likelihood of being in the middleand upper income groups as non-indigenous people. education is critical to middleand upper income attainment, addressing our third research question. having no high school diploma increases the likelihood of occupying a lower economic position by 47%, almost 40 percentage points higher than the likelihood of being in the upper income group. at the other end of the spectrum, the likelihood of being a member of the upper income group is 23% for those with at least a bachelor’s degree, and this probability increases by 10 points with a degree above a bachelor’s level. although education appears to be a strong factor for distributing individuals between lower and upper income groups, it has little effect for middle-income category membership, which was similar across education levels. these findings warrant further investigation in future research. 19 haan et al.: centrality of education for indigenous income mobility doi:10.18584/iipj.2021/12/1/8388 table 4. the marginal effects of the main predictors of income category lower income middle income upper income predictors dy/dxa p-level se dy/dx p-level se dy/dx p-level se identity non-indigenous 0.31 *** 0.00 0.48 *** 0.00 0.21 *** 0.00 status first nations 0.49 *** 0.00 0.39 *** 0.00 0.12 *** 0.00 non-status first nations 0.34 *** 0.00 0.46 *** 0.00 0.20 *** 0.00 métis 0.30 *** 0.00 0.46 *** 0.00 0.24 *** 0.00 inuit 0.41 *** 0.01 0.43 *** 0.01 0.17 *** 0.01 education no high school diploma 0.47 *** 0.00 0.44 *** 0.00 0.09 *** 0.00 high school diploma 0.36 *** 0.00 0.48 *** 0.00 0.16 *** 0.00 apprenticeship or trades certificate 0.32 *** 0.00 0.49 *** 0.00 0.19 *** 0.00 college diploma 0.29 *** 0.00 0.49 *** 0.00 0.22 *** 0.00 below bachelor’s degree 0.31 *** 0.00 0.46 *** 0.00 0.23 *** 0.00 bachelor’s degree or higher 0.23 *** 0.00 0.43 *** 0.00 0.34 *** 0.00 occupation sales and service 0.46 *** 0.00 0.42 *** 0.00 0.12 *** 0.00 management 0.26 *** 0.00 0.43 *** 0.00 0.31 *** 0.00 business, finance, and administrative 0.30 *** 0.00 0.48 *** 0.00 0.22 *** 0.00 natural and applied sciences 0.22 *** 0.00 0.50 *** 0.00 0.28 *** 0.00 health services 0.24 *** 0.00 0.49 *** 0.00 0.27 *** 0.00 education 0.27 *** 0.00 0.48 *** 0.00 0.24 *** 0.00 art, culture, and recreation 0.34 *** 0.00 0.47 *** 0.00 0.19 *** 0.00 no work 0.28 *** 0.00 0.46 *** 0.00 0.25 *** 0.00 trades, transport, and equipment 0.32 *** 0.00 0.51 *** 0.00 0.17 *** 0.00 natural resources, agriculture, and production 0.35 *** 0.00 0.45 *** 0.00 0.20 *** 0.00 manufacturing and utilities 0.40 *** 0.00 0.47 *** 0.00 0.13 *** 0.00 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 1 published by scholarship@western, 2021 table 4. the marginal effects of the main predictors of income category (continued) lower income middle income upper income predictors dy/dxa p-level se dy/dx p-level se dy/dx p-level se population centre size rural 0.29 *** 0.00 0.49 *** 0.00 0.22 *** 0.00 small urban 0.28 *** 0.00 0.50 *** 0.00 0.23 *** 0.00 medium urban 0.30 *** 0.00 0.48 *** 0.00 0.22 *** 0.00 large urban 0.33 *** 0.00 0.46 *** 0.00 0.20 *** 0.00 note. source: 2016 census. marginal effects give the probability of being in each income group, while holding other variables at their mean. control variables are included. a dy/dx indicates the rate of change of y, the outcome, with respect to x, the predictor. *p < .05, **p < .01, ***p < .001 in terms of occupation, we can see in table 4 that some occupational sectors are linked to lower economic standing, while others are linked to higher income status. people working in the sales and service sector are at the greatest risk of having a lower income (46% likelihood). other occupations such as arts, entertainment, and accommodation, as well as trades, natural resources, and manufacturing, carry a 30% likelihood of being in the lower income group. next, across all occupation sectors people have a similar likelihood of being in the middle-income group. most notably, jobs in the natural sciences, health services, education services, and trades have about a 50% likelihood of placing people at the middle-income level. lastly, people who work in management, natural sciences, health services, and education services have a higher chance of being in the upper income group, at almost a 30% likelihood. occupational sectors thus have an impact on class affiliation, wherein working in the sales and service sector carries a higher risk of lower income status, while those working in knowledge and high-skill occupational sectors such as management, sciences, health, and education are more likely to be found to be in a higher income position, answering our fourth research question. regarding the marginal effects of population centre size on class belonging in table 4 (research question 5), we find that those who reside in large urban areas have a lower likelihood of being in the middleand upper income groups. those who are either living in rural areas or medium-sized population centres are more likely to have lower economic status (by about 29%). moreover, those who reside in large population centres are at higher risk of being in the lower income category (33.4% more likely). additionally, the chances of being in the middle-income group is quite similar across the population centres sizes. finally, the likelihood of belonging in the upper income group is 23% for those living in small population centres, 22% for those in rural areas and medium population centres, and 20% for those living in large population centres. there are no stark differences in the marginal effects across the different population centre sizes. however, those in medium and large urban areas are found to be slightly more likely to be in the lower income group. the centrality of education for exiting lower income status the results above demonstrate the importance of several factors for exiting lower income status, but none looks at indigenous populations explicitly. in this section, we turn to this issue more directly, 21 haan et al.: centrality of education for indigenous income mobility doi:10.18584/iipj.2021/12/1/8388 focusing explicitly on how educational attainment shapes income distribution among indigenous identity groups relative to the non-indigenous population. we do this by interacting educational attainment with each of our indigenous and non-indigenous populations. the second multinomial logistic regression (not shown) includes interaction terms between identity and education and finds that some groups indeed benefit more from higher education than others. the marginal effects of the interaction terms in the second model shows the predicted probability of each group to fall in either lower, middle-, or upper income groups at each level of education. figure 5 presents the marginal effects of education on the likelihood to belong in the lower, middle, and upper class for non-indigenous people while holding other variables at their means. figure 5. marginal effects of non-indigenous identity and education on income category note. source: 2016 census of canada. the marginal effects at the means are significant at p < .001. the marginal effects give the probability to fall in each income group while holding other variables at their mean. having less than a high school diploma increases the likelihood that non-indigenous people will be in the lower income category by 46%. the chances of them falling in the lower income group decreases the higher their level of education: those who have at least a bachelor’s degree have a 23% likelihood of being in the lower income group. non-indigenous people are likely to fall in the middle-income group by almost 50% whether they have a high school diploma, apprenticeship or trades certificate, college diploma, or a university certificate below the bachelor-level. they have a slightly lower likelihood, about 43%, of being middle in the middle-income group if they have at least a bachelor’s degree. non0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 no nin dig en ou s*l ess th an hi gh sc ho ol dip lom a no nin dig en ou s*h igh sc ho ol no nin dig en ou s*a pp ren tic es hip / t rad es no nin dig en ou s*c oll eg e no nin dig en ou s*b elo w ba ch elo r's no nin dig en ou s*b ac he lor 's o r a bo ve a ve ra ge m ar gi na l e ffe ct s low middle upper 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 1 published by scholarship@western, 2021 indigenous people with a college or university certificate below the bachelor’s level have a 22% likelihood of being in the income group. lastly, non-indigenous people who have at least a bachelor’s degree are almost 40% more likely to have the highest income level. among indigenous identity groups, status first nation people have a relatively high probability of lower income status despite post-secondary education. figure 6 shows the marginal effects of the interaction term between status first nations identity and education while other variables are at their means. figure 6. marginal effects of status first nations identity and education on income category note. source: 2016 census of canada. the marginal effects at the means are significant at p < .001. the marginal effects give the probability of being in each income group while holding other variables at their mean. status first nation people without a high school diploma are 65% more likely to be in the lower income group. the likelihood of being in the lower income group decreases with higher education but even with an apprenticeship or trades certificate, a college diploma, or a university degree below the bachelor’s level, status first nation people are almost 50% more likely to be in the lower economic status group. additionally, those who have at least a bachelor’s degree are still about 30% more likely to fall in the lower income group. further, the likelihood of falling in the middle-income group is lower among status first nations. those with a high school, apprenticeship or trades certificate, college diploma, or university degree below a bachelor’s level have an approximately 40% chance of having an income at the middle level. status first nation people’s chances of being in the middle-income group increases only slightly with at least a bachelor’s degree. status first nation people are found to have lower chances of 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 st atu s f irs t n ati on s*l es s t ha n h igh sc ho ol dip lom a st atu s f irs t n ati on s*h igh sc ho ol st atu s f irs t n ati on s*a pp ren tic esh ip/ tr ad es st atu s f irs t n ati on s*c oll eg e st atu s f irs t n ati on s*b elo w ba ch elo r's st atu s f irs t n ati on s*b ac he lor 's o r a bo ve a ve ra ge m ar gi na l e ffe ct s lower middle upper 23 haan et al.: centrality of education for indigenous income mobility doi:10.18584/iipj.2021/12/1/8388 being in the upper income group across education levels compared to non-indigenous people. status first nations people who have an apprenticeship or trades certificate, college diploma, or university degree below a bachelor’s level have an 11% probability of being in the upper income group. those who have a bachelor’s degree or higher have only a 23% chance of having an income at the upper level. among non-status first nations, post-secondary education decreases their likelihood of being in the lower income group, which is shown in figure 7. figure 7. the marginal effects of non-status first nations identity and education on income category note. source: 2016 census of canada. the marginal effects at the means are significant at p < .001. the marginal effects give the probability of falling in each income group while holding other variables at their mean. non-status first nation people with a high school diploma have a 39% chance of being in the lower income group, while those who have an apprenticeship or trades certificate have a 36% and those who have a college degree have a 35% likelihood. a university education decreases the chances of falling in the lower income group: the likelihood of being in the lower income group among individuals with a university degree below the bachelor’s level is only 27% and with at least a bachelor’s degree is 21%. like 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 no n-s tat us fi rst n ati on s*l ess th an hi gh sc ho ol dip lom a no n-s tat us fi rst n ati on s*h igh sc ho ol no n-s tat us fi rst n ati on s*a pp ren tic esh ip/ tr ad es no n-s tat us fi rst n ati on s*c oll eg e no n-s tat us fi rst n ati on s*b elo w ba ch elo r's no n-s tat us fi rst n ati on s*b ac he lor 's o r a bo ve a ve ra ge m ar gi na l e ffe ct s lower middle upper 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 1 published by scholarship@western, 2021 non-indigenous people, non-status first nation people have an almost 50% chance of being in the middle-income group with a high school diploma, apprenticeship or trades certificate, college diploma, or below bachelor’s-level university education. those who possess a bachelor’s degree or higher have a 45% chance of being in the middle-income group. lastly, non-status first nation people appear to have a better chance of reaching a higher income standing with higher education—those who have at least a bachelor’s degree have a 33% likelihood of being in the upper income group. with higher education, métis people have slightly better odds of being in the middleor upper income classes compared to first nations. figure 8 shows the marginal effects of the interaction terms for métis identity and education. figure 8. the marginal effects of métis identity and education on income category note. source: 2016 census of canada. the marginal effects at the means are significant at p < .001. the marginal effects give the probability of falling in each income group while holding other variables at their mean. métis people with at least a bachelor’s degree have a 19% chance of being in the lower income group. métis people also follow a similar trend as non-indigenous people and non-status first nation people, wherein those who have at least a high school diploma have an almost 50% chance of reaching the middle-income level. métis people also see an improved income status with higher education. with at least a bachelor’s degree, they have a 36% chance of being upper class, which is slightly higher than nonindigenous people. 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 m éti s*l ess th an hi gh sc ho ol dip lom a m éti s*h igh sc ho ol m éti s*a pp ren tic esh ip/ tr ad es m éti s*c oll eg e m éti s*b elo w ba ch elo r's m éti s*b ac he lor 's o r a bo ve a ve ra ge m ar gi na l e ffe ct s lower middle upper 25 haan et al.: centrality of education for indigenous income mobility doi:10.18584/iipj.2021/12/1/8388 finally, figure 9 shows the marginal effects of the interaction term between inuit identity and education while other variables are at their mean. among inuit, having education attainment below the university degree level is associated with a higher likelihood of falling in the lower income group. however, having at least a bachelor’s degree is associated with a lower chance of being in the lower income group. inuit who have a high school diploma, apprenticeship or trades certificate, or college diploma have a greater than 40% likelihood of being in the middle-income group. moreover, those who have a university certificate below the bachelor’s level have a 52% chance of being in the middle-income group, while those who possess a bachelor’s degree or higher have a 46% likelihood. finally, inuit also have a higher likelihood to reach the upper income level with higher education, particularly college or university education. figure 9. the marginal effects of inuit identity and education on income category note. source: 2016 census of canada. the marginal effects at the means are significant at p < .001. the marginal effects give the probability to fall in each income group while holding other variables at their mean. discussion the class distribution in canada shows that inequalities persist between non-indigenous people and indigenous people, as well as between indigenous identity groups. characteristics examined in this study, such as identity, occupation, and population centre size, uncover where these inequalities lie, and which factors help drive income-based class membership. the results show that indigenous people have lower chances of having a middle-level income than non-indigenous people, all else being equal. additionally, first nations and inuit have a lower likelihood of being at the upper income level. status first nation people had the greatest disadvantage, while métis people were comparatively advantaged. 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 in uit *l ess th an hi gh sc ho ol dip lom a in uit *h igh sc ho ol in uit *a pp ren tic esh ip/ tr ad es in uit *c oll eg e in uit *b elo w ba ch elo r's in uit *b ac he lor 's o r a bo ve a ve ra ge m ar gi na l e ffe ct s lower middle upper 26 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 1 published by scholarship@western, 2021 thus, income disparities persist not only between non-indigenous and indigenous people, but also between indigenous identity groups. these inequalities suggest factors that are specific to or more prevalent among indigenous identity groups, which influence income attainment. for instance, the relative economic disadvantage among status first nations warrants attention to systematic barriers. henceforth, the larger social context, including the history of colonization and state control, must be considered in relation to the socioeconomic position of indigenous peoples. some other factors such as occupation and population centre size are also found be linked to income. compared to the sales and service sector, all other job sectors increased the likelihood of being in the middleand upper income groups. in particular, knowledge sectors, such as the natural and applied sciences, health services, and management, seem to facilitate higher income standing. finally, those who reside in small population centres are better able to reach the middleto upper income levels, whereas living in a medium to large population centre lowers the chances. although larger urban areas may provide more opportunities, there are also higher rates of poverty and homelessness among indigenous people (belanger et al., 2012). thus, there are economic disparities that persist within the structures of people’s geographic residence. for all groups, nothing matters more for class mobility than education, particularly for exiting lower socioeconomic status and joining the upper class1; for most groups, middle-income attainment is largely independent of education. however, educational benefits are not uniformly distributed across identity groups. a curious result is that status first nation people with a college diploma or a university degree below the bachelor’s level have a higher likelihood of being economically disadvantaged. however, having at least a bachelor’s degree increases their likelihood of being in the higher income group. although having at least a bachelor’s degree is an advantage to all groups, some benefit more than others. most notably, a bachelor’s degree or higher makes membership in the middleor upper income groups more likely among status first nations. however, non-indigenous and métis people appear to benefit the most from post-secondary education from the apprenticeship level up to at least a bachelor’s degree. among inuit, having at least a college diploma is an almost a necessary condition for higher income attainment. more research into identity group-specific dynamics and systemic barriers underlying socioeconomic disadvantage is needed, as is targeted investment in education among groups experiencing barriers to education. conclusion this project investigates the demographic composition of membership in the lower, middle-, and upper income classes by identity group. in terms of policy implications, the findings suggest that, while a sizable proportion of indigenous people are in the middleor upper income groups, disparities still exist between indigenous and non-indigenous populations, and between indigenous identity groups. the income segmentations that exist among indigenous people are rooted in canada’s history of paternalistic policy and legislation, which set legal, social, and economic lines that systematically marginalized indigenous peoples. moving forward, policy development must pay more attention to education as it is a critical part of indigenous people’s upward mobility. the basic human capital model, 1 to support this claim, we ran a series of stepwise regressions, and for all groups, the largest gains in model fit came from adding education characteristics. 27 haan et al.: centrality of education for indigenous income mobility doi:10.18584/iipj.2021/12/1/8388 in which higher education and some occupational sectors place people in better positions in the social hierarchy, is supported by the results. education is indeed one of several ways that individuals reach and maintain middleand upper class status (goux & maurin, 2012). for indigenous peoples, this statement is especially true, and has even been called “the new buffalo” (stonechild, 2006). thus, government policy should support educational attainment among indigenous people and address barriers to postsecondary education. the study has some methodological limitations that should be noted. first, as with many studies that look at the impact of education, we have an unknown amount of selectivity across education categories. it is possible that those who attended university, for example, would have done well economically due to pre-existing abilities for which we are incorrectly crediting education for higher standing. second, those who come from a middleor upper class family backgrounds may be more likely to pursue higher education, which would overestimate the true effects of education. the analyses aimed to show the link between these factors and income group belonging in order to point to which areas policy may be targeted in order to improve the socioeconomic position of marginalized groups. third, there are 14 reserves and settlements that were incompletely enumerated and thus not included in the data, so our results may not accurately reflect trends in those locations. fourth, the dataset is cross-sectional, so we are only able to provide a snapshot of social class at the time of data collection. applying the interaction terms of indigenous identity and education allows us to examine how these variables intersect with respect to income class. our findings indeed suggest that 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(1993). first nations: race, class and gender relations. nelson canada. zangelidis, a. (2008). occupational and industry specificity of human capital in the british labour market. scottish journal of political economy, 55(4), 420–443. https://doi.org/10.1111/ j.1467-9485.2008.00460.x 8388+title+page.pdf 8388 part 2 haan the centrality of education rce.pdf the power of legal and historical fiction(s): the daniels decision and the enduring influence of colonial ideology the international indigenous policy journal volume 7 | issue 3 article 1 july 2016 the power of legal and historical fiction(s): the daniels decision and the enduring influence of colonial ideology brenda macdougall university of ottawa, swingert@uwo.ca recommended citation macdougall, b. (2016). the power of legal and historical fiction(s): the daniels decision and the enduring influence of colonial ideology. the international indigenous policy journal, 7(3). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.1 the power of legal and historical fiction(s): the daniels decision and the enduring influence of colonial ideology abstract it’s been several months since the supreme court of canada (scc) rendered its judgment in daniels v. canada (2016), affirming that the term “indian” in s. 91(24) of the constitution act (1867) includes métis and non-status indians. there is a general hope that the decision marks a turning point for métis and nonstatus indians within canada’s colonial structures. i’m not certain this optimism is justified. the judgment was reached based on the types of historical evidence presented and, consequently, there are a couple of statements within the written judgment that give me pause to question how the evidence regarding the histories of métis and non-status indians were presented to, and then interpreted by, the justices. bearing in mind that the crux of the case rested on the linguistic meaning and evolution of the term “indian” in canadian society through law and policy, evidence was introduced about how the term was used at various points in the past, as well as the context of that usage in order to demonstrate the evolution of a canadian legal and historical fiction that increasingly restricted the idea of what an indian was. what the scc did with the daniels decision is reverse that restrictive trend for indians while constructing new problems. keywords daniels v. canada, indian status, métis, non-status, indian act, supreme court of canada, legal rights creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ t h e po w e r o f l e g a l a n d h i s t o ri c a l f i c t i o n ( s ) : t h e d a n i e l s d e c i s i o n a n d t h e e n d u ri n g i n f l u e n c e o f c o l o n i a l i d e o l o g y it’s been several months since the supreme court of canada (scc) rendered its judgment in daniels v. canada (2016), affirming that the term “indian” in s. 91(24) of the constitution act (1867) includes métis and non-status indians. however, the scc declined to respond to two other questions— whether the federal government had a fiduciary duty and, if so, a responsibility to consult and negotiate with these people when their collective rights were potentially compromised by resource development. ruling in favour of métis and non-status indians resolved a substantive issue about federal jurisdictional responsibility, something contested since confederation. while this did not truly break new ground in canadian law, as the inuit were declared to be “indians” in 1939, it effectively reconciled s. 91(24) with s. 35 of the constitution act (1982), which states that that the aboriginal peoples of canada are indian, inuit, and métis.1 it would be a gross understatement to say the ruling sparked an enthusiastic response. you only needed to watch the news coverage on april 14, 2016 to see the jubilant response of the people who gathered in anticipation of a positive ruling. since then, one legal conference has been held and several more are being planned by political leaders, lawyers, and academics to discuss socio-historical, legal, political, and policy implications.2 there is a general hope that the decision marks a turning point for métis and non-status indians within canada’s colonial structures. i’m not certain this optimism is justified, and, as chris andersen (2016) noted, “the important thing to understand about court decisions—especially those written by the supreme court of canada—is that they are beginnings as much as they are endings” (para. 4). i’m not going to focus here on where the daniels decision may take us, but instead on why harry daniels, terry jourdy, and leah gardner brought this case forward in the first place. the answer is rooted in the history of métis and non-status indians, and the creation of colonial legal and historical fictions.3 the judgment was reached based on the types of historical evidence presented and, consequently, there are a couple of statements within the written judgment that give me pause to question how the evidence regarding the histories of métis and non-status indians were presented to, and then interpreted by, the justices. bearing in mind that the crux of the case rested on the linguistic meaning and evolution of the term “indian” in canadian society through law and policy, evidence was introduced about how the term was used at various points in the past, as well as the context of that usage in order to demonstrate the evolution of a canadian legal and historical fiction that increasingly restricted the idea of what an indian was. what the scc did with the daniels decision though is reverse that restrictive trend for indians while constructing new problems. what struck me about the written judgement was the scc’s pre-occupation with defining métis and non-status indians by a new form of legal and historical fiction but in this case based on a criteria of 1 the scc determined that the term "indian" included the "eskimo" (now inuit) (see reference whether 2 the pacific business and law institute (pbli) hosted the first conference on june 23 to 24, 2016 in ottawa, and both osgood law school and the faculty of native studies at the university of alberta are planning others for fall 2016. 3 these three people were all members of the congress of aboriginal people at the time of the initial filing in 1999. harry daniels was métis from western canada and, after his death in 2004, his son, gabriel daniels, was added as a plaintiff. terry jourdy and leah gardner are both non-status indians from nova scotia and northern ontario, respectively. 1 macdougall: the daniels decision published by scholarship@western, 2016 “mixedness.” according to the scc, “there was no need to delineate which mixed-ancestry communities are métis and which are non-status indians. they are all ‘indians’ under s. 91(24) by virtue of the fact they are all aboriginal people” (daniels v. canada, 2016, para. 46). while there’s a certain logic to this statement, it is frustratingly simplistic when historically contextualized. that is, focusing on mixedancestry ignores the history of who the métis and non-status people were therefore misrepresents who they are today. of course there were mixed-blood people in eastern canada as early as the seventeenth century, but equating them with the métis, known historically as la nouvelle nation, is not borne out by historical evidence. canada’s colonial legacy is layered and complex, but distilled. as the crown attempted to gain and control its foothold in british north america, it constructed a series of legal principles that defined its relationship with indigenous nations. over several centuries, legislation was enacted that incrementally diminished the scope of what “indian” meant in canadian law, establishing categories of difference that had nothing to do with who people actually were in relation to one another, but everything to do with the needs of colonial administrators to rid themselves of “the indian problem” by reducing the numbers of indians. as a result, this legislative reality gave the federal government ever-greater powers over the lives and territories of indigenous people. the royal proclamation (1763) first specified that only the crown could treat for land with “nations or tribes of indians.” then, a century later, under s. 91(24) of the constitution act (1867), the federal government assumed jurisdictional authority over “indians, and lands reserved for indians.” neither of these documents defined in practice what or who was an indian. it was the 1876 federal indian act by which canada codified a narrow, patriarchal, legal definition as to who could possess legal status as an “indian” and, just as significantly, who could not.4 as of 1876, an indian was defined as a man with indian blood who belonged to a specific band. women and children were indians only inasmuch as they were the spouse or child of an indian man. so, women and children themselves did not, by law, have independent status as indians. the indian act further identified the métis (or halfbreed in nineteenth-century language), specifying that “no half-breed in manitoba who has shared in the distribution of half-breed lands shall be accounted an indian; and that no half-breed head of a family (except the widow of an indian, or a half-breed who has already been admitted into a treaty), shall . . . be accounted an indian, or entitled to be admitted into any indian treaty.” (indian act, 1867, s. 3(e)).5 so, while the act conferred status on some, it denied it to others, creating a legal fiction that is now enshrined in popular canadian history that cannot now distinguish indigenous cultural identities from colonial machinations. the federal indian registry that recorded those who possessed status, along with their wives and children, was developed over time, but without consistent criteria. in western canada, signatories of the 4 the royal proclamation was issued by king george iii as an administrative document to deal with the acquisition of french canada by the british as a result of the conquest. those portions pertinent to aboriginal people can be found at: http://indigenousfoundations.arts.ubc.ca/home/government-policy/royal-proclamation1763.html. the constitution (1867) can be read online at the government of canada website: http://lawslois.justice.gc.ca/eng/const/page-4.html. the indian act (1876) can be found at https://www.aadncaandc.gc.ca/dam/dam-inter-hq/staging/texte-text/1876c18_1100100010253_eng.pdf. it should be noted that s. 91 contains 29 areas that express what the federal crown has legislative authority, including post offices, copyright, and censuses. 5 camilla augustus (2013), notably, has explored the racialization of métis within the indian act. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.1 numbered treaties automatically became status indians, while in other parts of canada colonial officials developed records that identified indians and the bands to which they belonged, and those became part of the registry. in the process, many indigenous people—sometimes entire communities—were never registered for a variety of reasons, such as being absent when treaties were signed, lack of contact with colonial officials, or because the province in which they lived joined confederation too late.6 it needs to be understood, then, that application of indian status was entirely arbitrary, inconsistent, and based on the decisions of government representatives. there have been small adjustments to the legal definition in the last 140-years—notably the passage of bill c-31 in 1985—but the basic premise that the canadian state, not indigenous societies, control the definition of who is and who isn’t an “indian” remains.7 while there are no official blood-quantum criteria within the legislation, the manner in which status has been defined reflects a defacto bloodquantum system because those who married men without indian status are presumed to have married out of their indianness, and so their children were (and are) considered “mixed-bloods,” even if their fathers were indigenous. so, while prior to 1876 indian was a fairly fluid term applied to a range of indigenous societies, much as the terms aboriginal, native, and indigenous are used today, the indian act constricted its meaning and use. the scc in the daniels decision affirmed this, stating that the term indian within the constitutional context must now be understood as having two meanings: “ a broad meaning as used in s. 91(24), that includes both métis and inuit and can be equated with the term, ‘aboriginal people of canada’ used in s. 35, and a narrower meaning that distinguishes indian bands from other aboriginal peoples. (daniels v. canada, 2016, “on appeal from the federal court of appeal,” para. 7) with this statement the scc reopened the meaning of indian, but then went the other direction with the term métis by stating, “there is no one exclusive métis people in canada,” and that first métis community developed in “le heve [sic] nova scotia in 1650” (daniels v. canada, 2016, para. 17).8 it is here that the court, in attempting to correct one historical and legal fiction, contributes to the creation of new ones. already there is a popular perception that the term métis applies loosely to anyone 6 this was the case of newfoundland, which from the time it joined canada in 1949 until 2009, had no legally recognized indian population, despite being home to a sizeable mi’kmaq population. 7 this amendment restored status to women and/or their children who had been removed from the registries a generation or two earlier. it did not, however, end the discriminatory nature of the indian act. instead s. 6 of the act, "persons entitled to be registered," created two classes of indians: 6(1), those who can pass indian status to their children; and 6(2), those who have indian status, but cannot pass their status to their children unless the other parent also has status. prior to 1985, status indian men could pass their status and today their children are considered 6(1). however, the children of women who had "married out" are today considered 6(2)s, creating a "second-generation cutoff" because 6(2)s cannot pass on status to their children. these revisions have been critiqued for only deferring the termination of indian status by a generation, rather than adequately addressing the legal issues with the ways that legal status is determined and conferred. see bill c-31 (n.d.) for more information regarding this issue. 8 the reference is to lahave, ns, once the acadian capital. 3 macdougall: the daniels decision published by scholarship@western, 2016 with mixed indigenous and non-indigenous heritage. this misperception ignores the culture, history, language, economy, and socio-political structures that were a part of métis societies as, by the early nineteenth century, they forged themselves into a new nation. the error is in presuming that the term métis today means the same as it did in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, failing to account for shifts in linguistic usage as this new nation evolved and as canada responded to that evolution. it is one thing for the average canadian to believe this, but egregious for any government responsible for colonial policies and legal principles to accept such historical inaccuracy as fact. make no mistake, the crown knew who we were long before the daniels case was brought before the courts in 1999. there was no confusion identifying us when we were denied entrance into treaties and instead offered scrip— individual land coupons to “extinguish halfbreed title to land”—or in 1869–1870 and 1885 when canadian soldiers were deployed to fight us at red river and batoche. the history of the métis in canada after 1885 was one of physical diaspora and coerced relocations from traditional homelands, leading to almost complete social, political, and economic marginalization in the twentieth century. for non-status people, the story was different, but the outcome the same—disenfranchisement and marginalization as indigenous peoples even as they continued to live and subsist within their traditional homelands. certainly, all across north america at the time of contact, inter-racial relationships produced children of mixed blood, but who those people became varied based on the larger and more intimate geographic, economic, political, and social realities in which they were raised and lived their lives. so here’s the issue—“mixed blood” does not equal métis any more than “full blood” equals indian. both statements are based on racialized historical fictions, but whereas the latter was codified in colonial law, the former lives on in the minds of so many canadians. métisness arose out of a unique socio-cultural context centred on specific economic activities associated with the fur trade, which then led them to develop a political expression of distinctiveness. métis people saw themselves—and were regarded by others—as different from their paternal and maternal relatives because they enacted their sense of self through a cultural worldview centred on kinship connections spread throughout the historic homeland, a region between the great lakes and the continental divide to the west and from the subarctic regions down through the judith basin to the south (roughly northern ontario, rocky mountains, southern yukon and northwest territories, and montana and north dakota). i realize that many will vehemently disagree with me, but continuing to assert that that the first métis was born nine months after contact is nothing but an historically inaccurate quip that supports a colonial fantasy of benevolent relations. absolutely, there are a range of indigenous people who were the products of historical mixed unions between whites and indians, just as there are people born today from such relationships. and now, as then, some of them are indians, some are white, some are inuit, and some are métis. but, let’s be clear, not all are métis. within a canadian historical context, the term métis evolved from simply meaning “mixed” to referring to a specific nation whose citizens shared a historical and socio-cultural context, political structure, and defined economic niche, and existed within a clearly delineated, albeit expansive, geography. are there rights-bearing people outside this geography or who don’t fit this description who should be recognized as indian for the purposes of law and jurisdictional authority? yes, of course. but the daniels case was not métis-specific. the other parties to this action were non-status indians. contrary to the scc’s statement that “there is no need to delineate which mixed-ancestry communities are métis and which are non-status indians,” (daniels v. canada, 2016, “on appeal from the federal court of appeal,” para. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.1 6) there is every reason to differentiate because, although our experience with the colonial governments of canada have been similar, they are not, in fact, the same. while the courts have affirmed that both are now indians under s. 91(24), we must be careful not to conflate national identities or cultural realities. yet, this is already happening. recently, the canada research chair on métis identity, anthropologist denis gagnon (2016), stated that “the future will tell which self-identification [métis or non-status] will be the better strategic choice [emphasis added],” but that those pursuing aboriginal rights “remain free to give themselves any name they choose” (“looking forward,” para. 1). but for us, being métis has never been a choice, as i’m sure is also true for non-status indians, because we know who we are, we know our history, and so should canada. 5 macdougall: the daniels decision published by scholarship@western, 2016 r e f e re n c e s augustus, c. (2013). mixed race, legal space: official discourse, indigeneity, and racial mixing in canada, the us, and australia, 1850–1950 (unpublished doctoral dissertation). university of saskatchewan, saskatoon. andersen, c. (2016, april 14). the supreme court ruling on métis: a roadmap to nowhere. the globe and mail. retrieved from http://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/the-supreme-courtruling-on-metis-a-roadmap-to-nowhere/article29636204/ bill c-31. (n.d.). retrieved from the indigenous foundations website at: http://indigenousfoundations.arts.ubc.ca/home/government-policy/the-indian-act/bill-c31.html bill c-31: an act to amend the indian act (s.c. 1985, c.27). constitution act, 1867 (uk), 30 & 31 vict, c 3. constitution act, 1982, being schedule b to the canada act 1982 (uk), 1982, c 11. daniels v. canada (indian affairs and northern development), 2016 scc 12. retrieved from https://scc-csc.lexum.com/scc-csc/scc-csc/en/item/15858/index.do gagnon, d. (2016). the other métis. retrieved from http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/the-other-metis/ indian act, 1867. retrieved from https://www.aadnc-aandc.gc.ca/dam/dam-interhq/staging/texte-text/1876c18_1100100010253_eng.pdf reference whether "indians" includes "eskimo", [1939] s.c.r. 104. retrieved from https://scccsc.lexum.com/scc-csc/scc-csc/en/item/8531/index.do royal proclamation, 1763, r.s.c., 1985, app. ii, no. 1. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.1 the international indigenous policy journal july 2016 the power of legal and historical fiction(s): the daniels decision and the enduring influence of colonial ideology brenda macdougall recommended citation the power of legal and historical fiction(s): the daniels decision and the enduring influence of colonial ideology abstract keywords creative commons license the power of legal and historical fiction(s): the daniels decision and the enduring influence of colonial ideology 8064 varcoe healing on both sides rce.pdf the international indigenous policy journal volume 11 | issue 3 september 2020 "healing on both sides": strengthening the effectiveness of prison–indigenous community partnerships through reciprocity and investment colleen varcoe university of british columbia, canada, colleen.varcoe@ubc.ca helen brown university of british columbia, canada, helen.brown@ubc.ca kelsey timler university of british columbia, canada, kelsey.timler@ubc.ca melissa taylor correctional service of canada, pacific region, canada, melissa.taylor@csc-scc.gc.ca elizabeth straus university of british columbia, canada, elizabeth.straus@alumni.ubc.ca recommended citation varcoe, c., & brown, h., timler, k., taylor, m., & straus, e. (2020). "healing on both sides": strengthening the effectiveness of prison–indigenous community partnerships through reciprocity and investment. the international indigenous policy journal, 11(3). https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8064 "healing on both sides": strengthening the effectiveness of prison– indigenous community partnerships through reciprocity and investment abstract this mixed methods study examined the impact of a prison–community partnership, entitled work 2 give. the partnership supports a program in which federally incarcerated men in canada make items to donate to indigenous communities. qualitative interviews were conducted with participating men (n = 32), recipient community members (n = 29), and other prison and community stakeholders (n = 14). selected outcomes (transfers to higher security, successful transfers to lower security, and serious institutional charges) were examined for 60 incarcerated men for whom data were available. findings suggest that the program positively affected the men’s identities and provided opportunities for communities to help incarcerated men to heal; both sets of stakeholders see potential to strengthen the program. whereas the emphasis has been on unidirectional donation, and the impetus for the program has been with correctional staff, findings suggest a bidirectional model with stronger feedback loops between the prison and community to support reciprocity, investment, and visibility would enhance impact. this model has broad implications for strengthening community–prison partnerships. keywords indigenous, indigenous leadership, prison–community partnerships, reciprocity, criminal justice inequalities, mixed methods, criminal justice policy creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. 1 varcoe et al.: “healing on both sides” published by scholarship@western 2020 “healing on both sides”: strengthening the effectiveness of prison–indigenous community partnerships through reciprocity and investment indigenous peoples globally experience acute criminal justice inequities (lockwood et al., 2018; nielsen & robyn, 2003; office of the correctional investigator, 2012). efforts to redress these inequities include supporting relationships between the criminal justice system (cjs) and indigenous communities. although community–prison partnerships have potential to promote successful community reintegration (duncan et al., 2009; hall et al., 2018; public safety canada, 2018b), partnerships are uncommon and, to our knowledge, there is limited evidence for implementation to optimize their potential. in this article, we analyze an innovative partnership, explore its impacts, examine what works, and identify policy directions needed to realize such partnerships. a research collaboration among the correctional service of canada (csc) pacific region, researchers at the university of british columbia (ubc), an indigenous first nation, 1 and a non-profit organization that provides restorative justice services to first nations was formed to study the impact of a prison–community partnership in which federally incarcerated men make and gift items to first nations in the central interior of british columbia (bc). our findings have implications for policy development within correctional settings, other government–indigenous community partnerships, programs that partner indigenous communities with non-profit organizations, and initiatives that use donations to support health and wellbeing for indigenous and other socio-economically marginalized peoples. background the canadian cjs has evolved substantially with changing federal politics (dawe & goodman, 2017; deshman & hannah-moffat, 2015; sangster, 2006). these processes have included “multiple and conflicting goals of punishment, including retribution, deterrence, rehabilitation and increasingly, achievement of restorative justice,” reflecting “complex and contradictory attitudes toward crime” (roach, 2000, p. 251). recent federal governments have been divergent. the harper era conservative government (2006-2015) was characterized by a “tough on crime” stance (doob & webster, 2015). during that time, the federal government introduced over 80 criminal justice, sentencing, and corrections reform bills (deshman & hannah-moffat, 2015). this approach was criticized by some as increasingly punitive, although dawe and goodman (2017) caution that shifts were largely symbolic— politically advantageous yet divorced from evidence about effectiveness (dawe & goodman, 2017; deshman & hannah-moffat, 2015). the current liberal government (2015-present) has taken steps to reverse many harper-era decisions, with specific attention to criminal justice inequities experienced by indigenous peoples. while the extent and impact of these shifts are emergent and not yet fully understood (dawe & goodman, 2017; government of canada, 2018), state–indigenous relationships continue to be strained and many indigenous peoples note ongoing policy-induced marginalization. however, recent shifts in the cjs may offer a window of opportunity for developing more effective partnerships to redress policy impacts, particularly given ongoing calls to reduce cjs inequities (truth and reconciliation commission, 2015a, 2015b). 1 the canadian state has variously named indigenous peoples as “indian,” “aboriginal,” and more recently “indigenous,” and further categorized people as first nations, inuit, and métis. these categories encompass more than 50 language groups (norris, 2008) and diverse peoples, each of whom have their own names for themselves. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8064 the canadian cjs is embedded within wider policy contexts, including ongoing colonialism. the disproportion representation of indigenous peoples in the cjs is due to marginalization produced through numerous policy dynamics, many stemming from the indian act2 (1985); these policies have resulted in poverty, unand under-employment, crowded and unsuitable housing, food insecurity, and substandard educational opportunities (assembly of first nations, 2013; forsyth, 2010; forsyth & giles, 2013; kamal et al., 2015; larcombe et al., 2011; mosby & galloway, 2017). continuous with colonialism, systemic racism has been documented throughout health, social service, education, and child welfare (battiste & youngblood henderson, 2018; boyd et al., 2016; davy et al., 2016; mckenzie et al., 2016; preston et al., 2012; sinclair, 2016). these policy factors have compounded known correlates of crime (forrester et al., 2012; sapers, 2014, 2016), including barriers to education, skills development, and employment. these barriers are linked to widespread state interference, including the indian residential school system, ongoing child apprehension, and related parenting surveillance oversight (mckenzie et al., 2016), resulting in the disruption of families and the transmission of intergenerational knowledge. in this context, indigenous peoples face inequities at each stage of the cjs (office of the correctional investigator, 2012; zinger, 2018). the over-incarceration of indigenous peoples began after world war ii due to diverse political and economic dynamics (jacobs, 2012; milloy, 1999; sangster, 2006), echoing trends in other former colonies (day, 2003; dehaven, 2016; nakhid & shorter, 2014; ward et al., 2006; wildeman & wang, 2017). these increasing rates of incarceration were born from historic linkages and contemporary continuations of linkages between colonization and criminalization (cunneen, 2014; pavlich & unger, 2016). overrepresentation led to increasing numbers of indigenous-focused cjs projects during the late 1980s and 1990s (roach, 2000). despite these attempts, in 1996 the royal commission on aboriginal peoples found that “the justice system has failed aboriginal people” (csc, 2006, p. 5), a problem that continues today and is inextricably linked with ongoing colonialism (hyatt, 2013; zinger, 2018). under the current federal government, multiple efforts are being undertaken, which include a csc corporate priority to provide “effective, culturally appropriate interventions and reintegration support” for indigenous peoples (csc, 2016, para. 4). the auditor general has also called for culturally safe programming within prison and community corrections to address the historical context of indigenous peoples (office of the auditor general of canada, 2016), which can be supported by prison–indigenous community partnerships (public safety canada, 2018a; truth and reconciliation commission, 2015a). generally, community–prison partnerships can support rehabilitation within a social development crime prevention model, which aligns with evidence regarding crime reduction (hawkins & weis, 2017), and offers alternatives to dominant punitive approaches (canadian council on social development, 2010; vogler, 2017). the social development approach works to address the causes—or social determinants—of crime: housing, education, family stability, employment, recreation, and violence and trauma, all of which are linked to wider socio-economic, historic, and structural forces (canadian council on social development, 2010; jamieson & hart, 2003; john howard society of alberta, 1995). crime prevention through this lens emphasizes “investing in individuals, families and communities,” largely through engagement across social, health, and educational contexts (fournier-ruggles, 2011, p. 25), community support, and social bonding post-release (pettus-davis et al., 2017; rocque et al., 2013; 2 the indian act was first enacted in 1876 to govern the indigenous people of what is now canada, and the act remains in force with amendments. 3 varcoe et al.: “healing on both sides” published by scholarship@western 2020 wright & cesar, 2013). this approach also aligns with many pre-colonial indigenous concepts of justice (dickson-gilmore & laprairie, 2005; napoleon & friedland, 2015). for example, studies have highlighted that positive relationships and community engagement can increase parole adherence and reduce substance use (pettus-davis et al., 2017; skeem et al., 2009); relationships with friends, families, and community can improve mental, behavioural and physical health outcomes post-release (binswanger et al., 2012; skeem et al., 2009); and sustained positive social support both within and outside prison walls can reduce recidivism (pettus-davis et al., 2017; rocque et al., 2013; wright & cesar, 2013). the csc currently addresses social bonds and community engagement through contracts with community organizations, such as the elizabeth fry and john howard societies, both of which support justice-involved persons and their families, including indigenous-focused supports (elizabeth fry society of greater vancouver, 2019; john howard society of british columbia, n.d.). there is strong evidence of the impacts of programming and policies in facilitating relationship building in prisons (brown & day, 2008). for example, studies have shown the potential of peer groups to reduce feelings of loneliness and hopelessness (brown & day, 2008), and prison visitation has been shown to improve mental health and reduce recidivism (albertie et al., 2017; de claire & dixon, 2015; duwe & johnson, 2016). for indigenous peoples, ongoing relationships with elders has immense benefits (hadjipavlou et al., 2018; tu et al., 2019; waldram, 1997), including those who are incarcerated (willis & moore, 2008). indigenous youth with previous engagement with the colonial justice system have been found to benefit from youth-specific programming in which they engaged with indigenous knowledge keepers, value systems, and culture, which were found to enhance feelings of pride in cultures and identities (hansen, 2015). more generally, connections with the outside community have been associated with healing both within and outside of indigenous contexts (grangerbrown et al., 2012; halperin et al., 2012; moller, 2011). given this support from the literature, prison– indigenous community partnerships have potential to create and sustain innovative reciprocities, reflecting emerging evidence about the importance of relationships and social cohesion (hall & chong, 2018; lockwood et al., 2018), and aligning with longstanding indigenous concepts of collective health and wellbeing (greenwood et al., 2018; howell et al., 2016; kimmerer, 2013; napoleon & friedland, 2015). partnerships offer the “possibility of using the substance of conflict as a means of exploring options and establishing responses that . . . develop and strengthen relationships” (law commission of canada, 1999, p. 40; see also department of justice, 2015), aligning with ongoing calls for indigenous healing and resurgence (national inquiry into missing and murdered indigenous women and girls, 2017; truth and reconciliation commission, 2015a) through engagement with indigenous knowledges and traditions (borrows, 2005; friedland & napoleon, 2016; napoleon & friedland, 2015). the csc (2008) claims “the role and responsibility of the community in helping to safely reintegrate offenders is one of the most significant challenges in the field of corrections. community programming reduces the risk of recidivism and is a fundamental component of the overall correctional strategy” (para. 2). however, crime prevention is outside the csc funding and policy scope (doob & webster, 2015), and the majority of crime prevention initiatives are run by non-governmental organizations and funded by grants susceptible to market forces and political whims (doob & webster, 2015; webster & doob, 2015). subsequently, crime prevention receives significantly less federal support compared with penal solutions (canadian criminal justice association, 2017). additionally, indigenous-specific cjs programming has long been underfunded and operated on a “pilot project mentality” (public safety canada, 2018a; royal commission on aboriginal people, 1996); this is despite the “effective, culturally 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8064 appropriate interventions and reintegration support for first nations, métis and inuit” peoples being a corporate priority for federal corrections (csc, 2016). while crime prevention is beyond csc policy scope, community programming post-release is a priority focus. while csc “does not control admissions [they have] a role to play in studying the underlying factors leading to crime while offering programs that meet the needs of indigenous people . . . [including] adequately preparing [individuals] for community reintegration” (public safety canada, 2018a, p. 8). while there is support for partnerships at the policy level, the programs offered in correctional facilities are often the result of unidirectional engagement from the community, wherein community members enter the prison and offer support and programs. while csc (2008) “relies on service providers in the community and actively encourages and seeks innovative approaches to community corrections” (p. 1), these in-reach programs, including contracted indigenous elders, are funded year-to-year, leading to fiscal instability (brosnahan, 2012; cbc news, 2018; john howard society of canada, 2018). specific examples of prison–community partnerships in the indigenous context in canada include sections 81 and 84—amendments to the canadian correctional and conditional release act (2017)—which outlines ways for indigenous people to be released into indigenous communities at different points in their sentencing and release (see also office of the correctional investigator, 2012). despite great potential, these initiatives remain underfunded (office of the correctional investigator, 2013b; public safety canada, 2018a), and communities facing colonial barriers to health and wellness may not have resources necessary for community supervision (martel et al., 2011; office of the correctional investigator, 2013a; public safety canada, 2018a; ryan et al., 2006). that being said, these programs highlight that, when done well, increased attention to and support for indigenous community–prison partnerships, with awareness of colonial context, offers the potential to improve health and wellbeing for indigenous peoples and create safe and nurturing communities both within and outside of prison contexts (office of the correctional investigator, 2012; public safety canada, 2018a). yet, little is known about how to optimize prison–indigenous community partnerships, particularly those outside of section 81 and 84 agreements. the indigenous community–prison partnership in bc provides an opportunity to examine partnership impacts and potential, thus identifying the policy implications for prison–indigenous community partnerships that can optimize effectiveness in crime prevention and public safety for both indigenous and non-indigenous people. program background the indigenous community–prison partnership work 2 give, hereinafter called the initiative, was originally conceptualized to provide meaningful employment for incarcerated men and benefit underserved first nations (lang, 2012). men incarcerated in seven federal prisons in bc participated in the initiative, which was open to both indigenous and non-indigenous men across security levels. engagement differs across institutions. for instance, some men engage as part of their formal correctional employment, others volunteer once a week, and others participate as part of indigenousspecific programming. the men make wooden items including toys and furniture, cultural items such as drums, knitted items such as scarves and sock monkeys, and grow organic vegetables. what the men work on is dictated by the security level of the institution, availability of raw materials, and their imaginations and skills. fundraising for the project, the purchasing of raw materials, and the distribution 5 varcoe et al.: “healing on both sides” published by scholarship@western 2020 of goods produced are contracted to a community partner in order to maintain an arm’s length distance for liability insurance purposes. a trucking company donated their services to transport the goods over 500 kilometers north of the prisons to the rural and remote central interior of bc, and band3 staff and community members facilitate distribution. decision-making related to distribution is led by the nonprofit partner, meaning that there was no formal engagement between the men making the goods and the community recipients. in 2015, a research partnership was created among csc and ubc to study the impacts on participating men and recipients. additional information about initiative operations has been published elsewhere (brown et al., 2017). this article reports on findings from both the csc and first nations community contexts to highlight relevant policy implications for this initiative and beyond. methods a mixed methods study was undertaken to (a) examine the impact on the incarcerated men who participated and the first nation receiving and distributing the items, and (b) identify a model to sustain and strengthen the initiative, including the policy potential of the csc–community partnership. selected outcome indicators that had potential for assessing impact (transfers to higher security, successful transfers to lower security, and serious institutional charges) were examined for men for whom data were available (n = 60). of those men for whom data was available, 60% were indigenous. for the selected indicators, data from 2013 to 2015 was gathered. rates over the two-year period were calculated for two of the indicators, transfers to higher security and serious institutional charges while incarcerated, using the number of occurrences and the number of participating men over the same time period. these rates were compared to three-year rates for the general prison population in the institutions in which the initiative was implemented. for the third indicator, successful transfers to lower security, comparable data for the general prison population were not available to support meaningful comparisons. therefore, available data on transfers to lower security for participating men were summarized using descriptive statistics. qualitative interviews were conducted with men engaged in the initiative (n = 32) in four of the participating prisons (selected as being the most active in the program at time of data collection), community members who either received or helped distribute items (n = 29), and other prison stakeholders (n = 14). field notes recorded observations of meetings with staff (e.g., program officers, wardens) and men working on items, and during visits to conduct interviews. these interviews were conducted by the authors, recorded, transcribed, and anonymized. we conducted a thematic analysis of the qualitative data, beginning with reading each transcript in its entirety with related field notes, identifying themes and sub-themes within and across transcripts, and developing a conceptual map of thematic relationships. this article focuses on findings with policy-specific implications. the quantitative data set was limited by several factors. first, the initiative is regional; as a result, the men’s participation is not tracked in the same way as in other federal programs. thus, we were only able to obtain complete data on the selected outcomes for 60 of the approximately 100 men who had participated in the initiative at the time of data collection (2015-2017). second, while the csc collects data across an array of rehabilitation indicators, our in-depth consultation with csc data analysts and staff yielded only three variables deemed adequately sensitive to the impact of participation in light of 3 bands are governing units of first nations peoples in canada, as defined by the indian act. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8064 other influences from the men’s correctional plan. the qualitative findings were limited by the fact that all observations and several interviews with the men were conducted with csc staff present, which may have influenced what the men said and did. findings the initiative was developed to benefit incarcerated men and a first nation comprised of six communities. anticipated benefits for men included changing from an institutional environment “in which [incarcerated people] are largely idle to one which emphasizes work and productivity, and from a culture which is drug based, to one which is transformative (lang, 2012, p. 3). for the first nation, the anticipated benefits included “addressing some of the root causes of crime . . . by assisting children to remain in school” (lang, 2012, p. 4). however, our findings show that, the benefits to the men and communities are broader than initially imagined, contributing to what one participant, a first nations woman with a background in community health, described as “healing on both sides.” men experience positive impacts our preliminary results from initial interviews with men suggested positive impacts (brown et al., 2017), and the quantitative data also suggest benefits. as shown in figure 1, participating men had fewer transfers to higher security and fewer serious charges compared to the general prison population. furthermore, it was notable that, of the 37 men who participated in the initiative over the three-year period who were not already in minimum security at the start of the three-year period, 23 of these men were able to successfully transfer to lower security during that period. although the sample size is small, data suggest that the initiative is at least as positive for indigenous as well as non-indigenous men in terms of correctional measures. importantly, these impacts have been achieved despite the fact that the initiative is relatively new. founded in 2012, it remains operationally outside the scope of core programming and has had limited operational or economic evaluation. this unique positioning impacts csc staff, the men, and the first nations communities in various ways that stem from the policy environment. csc staff sustain work 2 give “off the sides of their desks” because the initiative began within the csc, prison champions—ranging from senior executives to those who directly supervise the men—have primarily sustained momentum. for example, we learned that, since 2012, wardens have pooled small amounts from their institutional budgets to sustain the initiative. as one program officer described: we had almost no supplies, we had limited tools, we literally had [staff] going at lunchtime to get glue to finish off products. that was when csc was funding it, and of course there was only a little amount of money . . . eventually we got the funding from [the non-profit] [and] were able to get more wood supplies, tools, and basically make to order things . . . so basically my motto was, if we can draw it, we can build it. and we’ve done some really amazing things. (csc, program officer) 7 varcoe et al.: “healing on both sides” published by scholarship@western 2020 figure 1. serious charges and transfers to higher security among indigenous and non-indigenous men participating in work 2 give vs. the prison population. work 2 give n = 60, 61% indigenous. serious charges population n = 822. transfers to higher security population n = 1127, 31% indigenous. staff commitment was connected to what they saw as the initiative’s value and impact. most of these individuals, they took and they took and they didn’t give anything back for a long time, until they worked their way into a federal prison sentence. you can’t underestimate that mental and psychological lift, of actually doing something positive. (csc, program officer) as staff observed the men’s initial commitment evolve, staff commitment grew. it may start off as [just something to do], but quickly evolved to “oh i’m actually contributing to a community.” from a restorative justice perspective, the [first nation] is almost a surrogate victim community for some of these guys. and vice versa . . . when i talk to folks up there, they see [the men] as surrogate members of their community, or even surrogate offenders, if they were harmed. so [communities] are contributing to help. (csc, warden) however, because the initiative is not part of core programming, sustainability has depended on individual staff committed to contributing to the program “off the sides of their desks.” accordingly, staff try to accommodate the initiative within their workload and csc resources, policies, and institutional cultural norms. 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100 110 indigenous non-indigenous indigenous non-indigenous serious charges transfers to higher security # of o cc ur re nc es p er 1 00 m en o ve r 3 y ea rs work 2 give population 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8064 the warden may think, “well this person is doing a great job with this side of their desk project plus doing their own work and they’re motivated to make this succeed,” but the peers are thinking you’re a suck up. (csc, staff) we’re at our max, i think, because people are doing it all off the side of their desks, and i think we’ve done a lot off the side of our desks. but for us to deepen it and widen it, it needs to be a bit more formal, but again not necessarily owned by the government, an equal partnership. (csc, warden) overall, the initiative’s momentum has ebbed and flowed depending on staff commitment and the staff members’ capacity to sustain their involvement in light of priorities mandated by their job descriptions, federal policies, and work culture, as well as ongoing personnel changes and related disruptions within the institutions. the appearance of “not csc” enhanced benefit while workload and logistical challenges were created and sustained because the initiative was outside of core programming, this enhanced the reputation of the initiative among the men: people get to learn [from] each other, as humans, not as inmates. ‘cuz they’re doing something else that’s not csc demanded, required, imposed. (métis man, medium security institution, participating for three months). the men saw participation as a choice in an otherwise severely constrained environment. this view was often contrasted with the other programming, which the men saw as required. i have been a csc robot for so long . . . i’ve been told what to do, how to do it, when to do it . . . prison is a different environment than the street, obviously. and for me to exist in the one i had to just shut everything off, that way nothing hurts, right? so having this has sort of, you know, given me a little bit of something that i haven’t felt in a long time. (euro-canadian man, mixedlevel institution, participating for six months) despite this, the men were reluctant to make csc “look good.” i do it because i want to do it. the guys that i’ve worked with do it because they want to do it. the part that scares them off is sometimes upper management taking the credit for everything, as csc, and not so much the guys . . . all they do is they keep getting referred to as “an inmate, a convict, a prisoner, garbage, scum of the earth,” where management gets the credit . . . most of them don’t want the credit, but they also don’t want to see that an upper management person is the person that’s getting all the acknowledgement, when they really didn’t do anything. (eurocanadian man, minimum security institution, participating for four years) further, within a wider culture of distrust, many of the men were apprehensive about whether the initiative was truly benefiting communities. 9 varcoe et al.: “healing on both sides” published by scholarship@western 2020 distrust and the importance of feedback the men’s deep distrust towards csc was evident in the data. specifically, they questioned whether items actually reached the intended participants, and who was actually benefiting. the men repeatedly pointed to a lack of feedback about where the goods were going and how the communities responded. we don’t get much feedback . . . i’m kind of interested to see if the stuff i’m making is really helpful. it’s good to put it in perspective, because it’s good to make all the stuff and send it out, but we don’t know where it goes, and i’m not sure if we’ll ever be told because of confidentiality. (euro-canadian man, mixed level institution, participating for three years) the men’s ability to engage with the project and learn about where items were going was inconsistent across institutions, depending on staff interest in the program and frequency of visits from non-profit staff sharing images of community distribution events. the level of information sharing influenced the impacts on the men. when engagement was consistent, the partnership with the first nation offered potential to build trust and relationships, including the men’s relationships to and trust in the program. this added meaning to the work, which was contrasted with other available correctional employment wherein men rarely see the end results of their labour. what i like about it mostly is to see the younger kids that don’t get very much toys, and to see the expressions on their faces, the pictures. that makes me feel good to see them. and it makes me happy to do it and, because i know it’s going to be enjoyed. (tlingit first nation man, medium security institution, participating for 1.5 years) thus, the extent to which the men received feedback about the first nation shaped their experience of the work and its impact. it’s as important to hear what effects you have on the community as it is for the community to have effects on you. for me . . . had i been told more in my life that i was worth more or i was doing good . . . it motivates you to go above and beyond. i’m old enough where i know the road i took was wrong, i know the things i need to do to change where i was, and i’m implementing those changes now. but it’s still nice to hear as a human being, “hey, you did good. you’re worth more than what you’re letting yourself believe. these people appreciate those things.” (mik’maq first nation man, mixed-level institution, participating for 1.5 years) the level of feedback varied across time, as well as institutions. community feedback was facilitated almost exclusively by the non-profit executive director, who visited the prisons a few times a year with a presentation of images showing where the items the men made went, sometimes with recipient thankyou cards. while critical to enhancing impacts, frequent movement of men across and between institutions meant that individuals could participate for months or even years without seeing the presentation; this, in turn, could increase a sense of distrust regarding the transparency of distribution and undermine perceived benefits to the recipients for the men. csc is notorious for taking something, a situation or something being said, contort it, twist it . . . that this is outside of that, i think is attractive to people, right? and again, i mean, again with the 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8064 photos and the fact that somebody came and did an introduction to let us know that this thing is real . . . so my two cents would be to make sure that there is some steady regularity to the contact. i think that would help inspire and, you know, motivate dudes. (euro-canadian man, mixed-level institution, participating for six months) repeatedly, the men expressed wanting to know more about the communities and the impact of items. indigenous participants with lived experience of colonialism had specific questions about how to move beyond the material impacts of donating items. for two years we’ve got to see a nice little video of the youth group. the [non-profit] thing, the camp, and beds being delivered, right? we have no idea what type of families they’re going . . . i mean, tell me why! i mean are they more needy than average people? are they worse off? it’s like we’re getting half of a story . . . i understand that the bed gets them off the floor, and the sock monkey gives you something to cuddle, right? but are we really making life better? (stó:lō first nation man, minimum security institution, participating for two years) it’s just nice to know a kid doesn’t have to sleep on the floor, but it would be nice to know more . . . maybe we could do more positive things that would actually benefit. like i said, you know, i had a bed [growing up] too, but i didn’t even want to be there. (métis man, minimum security institution, participating for two years) impacts on men were directly enhanced by the partnership the potential for benefit was evident in instances where relationships were well supported. in several institutions where feedback was effectively sustained by the executive director of the non-profit and csc staff, the men experienced the initiative in meaningful ways. when staff and leadership under-delivered on feedback, meaningfulness was undermined. this had the potential to cause harm, as the men felt distrust towards correctional staff and leaders, and many had previous experiences of feeling exploited. in cases where the men had access to information about the initiative, individual impacts were shaped by how the men understood the recipient children and families in relation to their own lives; thus, the men’s personal contexts shaped how they spoke about the profound impacts on their identities (brown et al., 2017). many of the men recounted their adverse childhood experiences: for indigenous men, the impact of these experiences was intensified by racialization and racism, making the partnership with the first nation even more meaningful. i mean i’ve been in [prison] since i was 22, so i had to grow up real quick, real fast. and, i want to do something good when i get out, you know, with what i learned in here. i want to help people. i mean i am helping people, but i want to do more. i want to break that cycle. i want to help people that are suffering from trauma, drug addiction, depression. i know what it’s like out there, you know, it’s almost a war, especially with the drugs and the violence. so working towards that, [and] being on the red road,4 it’s gonna help and enable me to help others, and 4 the red road is a system of indigenous values and beliefs that outline living in a good way, and which can include emotional, spiritual, physical, and mental health and wellness (gone, 2011). while the term is used by indigenous peoples across diverse nations, specific first nations have similar concepts founded in their own language, worldview, and culture. 11 varcoe et al.: “healing on both sides” published by scholarship@western 2020 also help myself. (cree ojibway first nation man, mixed-level institution, participating for three years) the opportunity to “do good” was profoundly important to the men’s evolving identities. the extent to which indigenous teachings were embedded in the initiative varied across institutions; however, for both indigenous and non-indigenous men, the initiative provided opportunities to engage with teachings that supported healing. putting aside the obvious reasons that it’s going to children that need the hand up in life, it hits home for me because of the way i was raised up . . . i wasn’t brought up traditionally, however a lot of my barriers and obstacles in life are mimicked in the aboriginal culture and the aboriginal communities . . . until i came [here] and started getting into my, some of the issues that have caused me to commit the crimes that i’ve committed . . . it’s given me all the more reason to try to make some connections into the community. even if it is behind the door, so to speak, right now, it’s helping me; it’s helping myself heal myself but, in the meantime i’m not focusing in on myself. i’m using the program and the project to give back. (mik’maq man, mixed-level institution, participating for 1.5 years) reciprocity to support healing “on both sides” despite the fact that the incarcerated men participating in the initiative had access to variable levels of information on the impact of their work, our research found the impacts on the first nation went far beyond the gratitude anticipated in the initial charitable model (brown et al., 2020). community members repeatedly described the impact of the initiative as “helping our men inside.” it’s a really good program, and it helps the families and it helps the people, you know, the people that are incarcerated so, it benefits everybody on both sides. it helps with, gives them closure i’m thinking, on both sides and, so a form of healing. (first nations band council member) indeed, community members saw the act of receiving items as a way of supporting the men’s healing. they appreciated the donated items. however, some did not know items were made by men in prison. echoing communication barriers in the institutions, information sharing about the initiative was not consistent across the communities, with more remote communities often receiving fewer items and knowing less about where items came from. those who knew where items originated saw their role as supporting the men’s wellbeing. there was some questions about like, “why are they building it, like how come we can’t do it,” and stuff like that, eh? and i’m going, “it’s just their way of giving back to the people, maybe they want to apologize to the people for what they have done.” so i just kept explaining, “they’re there to help you guys, that they just want to say that we’re sorry, and stuff like that, eh?” so i just kept telling them the positives of what [the men] are feeling. (first nation band office staff member and initiative distributor) 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8064 consistent knowledge sharing and engagement by initiative staff and leadership resulted in deepened impact for communities, and problems arising from communication barriers highlighted the potential to enhance impact through increased reciprocity and relationship. impacts on the communities were peripherally influenced by the initiative the first nation is comprised of six communities, which are at least 500 km from the nearest participating prison. apart from occasional visits by csc program champions, all communication was conducted through the non-profit distribution partner. the initiative was a small component of the executive director’s work, communities were remote and far from one another and the urban centre where the non-profit is based. due to this separation, delivery and updates were not equitable across all six communities. without any direct contact with the men, and with limited contact with csc staff, the communities learned about the men only through infrequent non-profit events within the urban distribution centre. therefore, many members relied on imagined impacts to frame their understanding. there is a goodness in the individuals’ hearts, that they’re making these furniture, picnic tables, benches whatever, you know? maybe that’s one way of telling the community, “this is my apology, this is the way i’m gonna pay the community back, to regain my trust or regain my honesty” . . . and then vice versa for our community members, “okay, there is some good there,” you know? not always see the bad. (first nations band council member) like the men, the communities were hungry for opportunities to engage more directly. for example, during one visit by the research team, several community members were interested in visiting the men immediately. to be honest with you, i’d like to actually be there in, like face to face, and tell them, “you guys are doing amazing, the products are just absolutely amazing,” just to see their energy . . . maybe they’ll say, “wow, the community really does thank us for doing this.” (first nations community initiative distributor) community members saw the impacts of the program extending beyond receiving items. it also affected the wider community and nation through crime prevention beyond incarceration. they imagined ways to connect with the men post-release. to come back into the community . . . if they can continue to do that in some way, if it’s part of their carving, or if it’s build-making. if there’s a facility, either here in the community or at the nation level, somewhere where they can continue that . . . maybe they can mentor or train our youth, or just other people that are wanting to be taught. (first nations chief) discussion and policy implications the impacts of the initiative both achieved and exceeded the goals and expectations for mutual benefit for the men and communities. the initiative provided meaningful employment that occupied the men’s time, while also impacting their identities and positive sense of self. the communities experienced far 13 varcoe et al.: “healing on both sides” published by scholarship@western 2020 more than simple gratitude for the donated items (brown et al., 2020). however, both csc and the first nation are working within a policy context that distances correctional services from crime prevention initiatives (doob & webster, 2015), and indigenous communities from prisons. in this context, “the interests of victim and offender are assumed to be diametrically opposed: the rights of one competing with those of the other in the form of a zero-sum game” (garland, 2001, p. 180). despite csc (2008) claims that community programming is “fundamental” to rehabilitation, a focus on downstream punitive measures, unsustainable funding, policy siloes, and systemic underfunding of indigenous-specific programming continues to undermine partnership potentials (doob & webster, 2015; public safety canada, 2018a; royal commission on aboriginal people, 1996; canadian criminal justice association, 2017; webster & doob, 2015). this allows for the old ideal of “open prison[s] that lower the barrier between custody and the community” (garland, 2001, p. 178) to give way to exclusionary policies that create distance between incarcerated peoples and communities. even in the context of an initiative specifically aimed at connecting incarcerated men and indigenous communities through the giving and receiving of items, a lack of correctional funding limited direct engagement. this meant it was necessary to rely on a non-profit, which lacked clear oversight, to fulfill the distribution outcomes and knowledge sharing, which impacted community benefit. for example, some community members perceived there to be unfairness and inequitable benefit because decisions around distribution were not transparent and information about the initiative was inconsistent. additionally, the initiative continues to exist outside of formal programming and staff job descriptions, resulting in inconsistent staff buy-in and variable benefits for the men. the “economic rationality” underlying funding decisions undermines sustainable institutional support, leading to what garland (2001) calls the “limitations of the sovereign state” to control populations, either through social welfare or penal measures (p. 206). in the initiative, the need for meaningful engagement between men and communities is highlighted by the socio-economic, political, and historic forces of marginalization, oppression, and colonialism, which can be obscured by the distance between them and worsened by widespread stigmatization and popular notions of the “beyond hope” criminal (garland, 2001; maruna, 2001; melossio & pavarini, 1981): community members, unaware of where items came from or the full story of the men and their acts of giving, had less opportunity to address their biases towards incarcerated persons, and the men, unaware of community impacts, were left without opportunities to develop new identities outside of “offender” or “criminal.” these dynamics are deepened by the fact that prisons and communities are embedded within wider historical and ongoing colonial policy contexts, which sustain the disproportionate exposure of indigenous peoples to the determinants of crime (forrester et al., 2012; schissel & wotherspoon, 2003). neoliberal criminological processes increasingly conceptualize crime at the level of the individual, providing spaces for victim input and impact statements that further individualize the crime, while “the offender is rendered more and more abstract, more and more stereotypical, more and more a projected image” (garland, 2001, p. 179). in canada, social determinants of crime result in criminal justice inequities built upon a foundation of ongoing and historical colonial forces that combine with neoliberal individualism to erase context, reduce crime to the interpersonal, and frame reintegration and community engagement within the language of risk and managerialism (garland, 2001). the initiative not only reduces the distance between victim and victimizer, but also provides what one indigenous community recipient called a “surrogate victim” with diverse relationships to crime, criminal justice, forgiveness, and reconciliation. while the participating men are incarcerated in a system that supports “punishment-at-a-distance” (garland, 2001, p. 179), criminal policy is developed far from the realities of being incarcerated. the initiative has potential to support a healing-close-together approach, where the 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8064 men become less abstract and can be seen as individual people impacted by histories and contexts outside of their control. in the context of this study, operational barriers to relationships and communication between the men and the community members had the potential to reduce impact and cause harm; this highlights the importance of strengths-based depictions of incarcerated people and indigenous communities to counteract stereotypes and support community cohesion for individuals leaving prison. in a criminal justice context wherein “the offender’s worth tends towards zero [and] victims’ interests expand to fill the gap,” the initiative offers opportunities for the men to support the interest of the surrogate victim community, while also increasing their feelings of self-worth and opportunities for strengths-based knowledge sharing (garland, 2001, p. 181). in canada, the csc continues to seek community partnerships that address gaps in current programming, and the initiative is currently operating as a model with significant potential. while prison–indigenous community partnerships cannot rectify broad social injustices, with the right policy support, the initiative illustrates that they have great potential for contributing to better outcomes for incarcerated men, and potential for crime prevention in indigenous communities. in addition to the dedicated efforts of many correctional staff and leaders, a shift in government in canada in 2015 brought stronger concerns about crime prevention, the social correlates of crime, and a specific emphasis on incarcerated indigenous peoples created new opportunities for strengthening community–prison partnerships, despite ongoing distrust of state actors by incarcerated indigenous peoples. as “the formal boundaries of the crime control field are no longer marked out by the institutions of the criminal justice state,” expanding to include civil society and a variety of social and economic actors and agencies, governance and control have become increasingly distanced from the lived realities of peoples in prison (garland, 2001, p. 170). this managerial utilitarianism instead relies on social and economic controls outside of the state, offering potential for partnerships while also narrowly focusing on measurable outputs. policy changes are needed to ensure that such partnerships, particularly in the context of indigenous communities dealing with ongoing colonization, are driven by community priorities, and founded in the values of equity, transparency, and cultural safety. policy implications: fostering greater reciprocity and investment in addition to the espoused potential for community–prison partnerships to reduce recidivism (duncan et al., 2009; hall et al., 2018; public safety canada, 2018b), this particular initiative may improve outcomes for men while incarcerated. the findings of this study suggest that these potentials may be optimized for this and other indigenous community–prison partnerships primarily through policies that embed greater reciprocity and investment “on both sides,” while maintaining an awareness of the ongoing influences of colonialism. first, prison–community partnerships should be founded in reciprocity while restorative justice processes focus on greater engagement between people in prison and communities, in both victim–offender and wider societal contexts, there is a clear need for programming and research that specifically can facilitate reciprocal engagement and altruism between inmates and communities (london, 2011), particularly in indigenous contexts where relationships are foundational to culturally safe healing and wellness (dickson-gilmore & laprairie, 2005; hewitt, 2016). in our study, we found that both men and community members were interested in direct connection, and increased 15 varcoe et al.: “healing on both sides” published by scholarship@western 2020 reciprocity would enhance the benefits of indirect knowledge sharing. however, caution is required so that such partnerships are neither token nor developed based on assumptions about indigenous peoples as inherently homogenous across nations and communities, while also accounting for how structural forces, ongoing racism, and colonialism continue to influence state–community relationships (clarysse & moore, 2019; cunneen, 2014). participants highlighted this potential for harm when the non-profit staff inconsistently supported connections. thus, meaningful engagement and local relationships should be fostered with an awareness of these risks. our research found that the work 2 give initiative occupies a unique position in that it is csc-initiated but was seen by the men as on the margins of csc and, in turn, increases positive impacts as the men see their work as outside of the formal and punitive correctional system. based on our findings, it is important to resource partnerships in ways that foster reciprocity without losing unique positioning as a non-mandated nor solely community-focused program. key steps to this balance include (a) recognizing the impacts and contributions of all parties, with a particular focus on indigenous community strengths, and (b) establishing regular communication mechanisms that foster multidirectional communication, including mechanisms for input from indigenous leaders and community members, prison leaders, staff, and incarcerated people. in this case, our study highlighted that current efforts to strengthen opportunities for communication between the men and communities about community needs and priorities, and regarding distribution processes, can increase each party’s investment. listening to the communities’ perspectives regarding their contribution to the men’s healing has led to an exploration of ways to further integrate first nations knowledges, values, and strengths into the operational structure. second, prison–indigenous community partnerships require investment from all parties we found that the current initiative has relied primarily on individual prison staff commitment, dedication within the institutions, and the engagement of the non-profit within the communities. as with any program, success in the prison context will depend on sustained funding, alignment with corporate priorities, and engaged, supportive management-level leadership. similarly, we found that communication with and distribution to communities via the non-profit was uneven and resulted in some community members not knowing where items came from and others feeling that the initiative was unfair. these barriers to success are particularly meaningful in the context of ongoing colonialism and distrust by indigenous peoples towards the canadian state. finally, investment by the participants—in this case incarcerated men and first nations community members—is key, and can be supported through visibility of the initiative, balanced with safety considerations. all aspects of policy and programming must be founded on the concepts of social justice, equity, and cultural safety as a means to counteract the ongoing influences of colonialism. the importance of these concepts was highlighted throughout our study, both by men and community members who experienced the initiative as such—and therefore derived benefit—and by men and community members who experienced the initiative as inequitable, non-transparent, or extractive. third, reciprocity and investment require visibility an unanticipated benefit of this research was the increased visibility of the partnership and program throughout both csc and the communities, bolstered by regular meetings among all parties, photos, 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8064 and a documentary film about the project (macguire et al., 2017). this visibility has been key in supporting increased reciprocity and investment, and underscores the critical importance of regular, effective communication, pre-planned feedback loops, and high-quality and accessible information, including the use of visual methods and narrative formats that align with indigenous ways of knowing and sharing information. however, the circumstances of this initiative are unique because the partnership involves a number of research grants—including one for a documentary. plans for such visibility need to be integrated in all partnerships that extend beyond time-limited research projects. as our analysis shows, the communities wanted to know more about the men, and the men wanted more information about community impacts. at the outset, lines of communication and mechanisms can be planned beyond meetings between partnership leads. in this case, goods could be tagged with the initiative logo and could include a description of the artist or maker, while maintaining anonymity for safety reasons. for instance, the man’s indigenous nation and his intentions for making the items could be included. a description of the initiative could accompany each set of goods. media releases could be planned strategically, in service of countering the harmful stereotypes about, in this case, incarcerated men and indigenous peoples, and prisons and their staff. this is particularly important given ongoing colonialism and histories of misinformation, misleading state–community communication, and the undervaluing of indigenous community strengths and priorities in tackling widespread inequities. visibility is also supported by high quality data and information. at the outset, such partnerships should have resources for tracking participation and outputs. in this case, how many men participate, how many products are produced, and how many individuals receive goods should be tracked. visibility of the partnership within the prison context can be greatly enhanced by directly linking to corporate priorities at the outset and tracking impact using relevant indicators. in this case, our initial research efforts have identified possibilities and limitations for integrating prison–indigenous community partnershipsensitive indicators within routine correction system data collection and monitoring processes; this is particularly important given a recent supreme court case ruling that csc measures are unfairly biased towards indigenous peoples (ewert v. canada, 2018). in this context, policy support in terms of recognition at the most senior levels, financing, and dedicated staff is needed for sustainability and visibility. strong senior level support within correctional organizations will ideally position indigenous community partnerships as policy-mandated and as part of regular and ongoing programming. for example, the sections 81 and 84, amendments to the canadian correctional and conditional release act (2017), outline ways for indigenous people to be released into indigenous communities, which might be directly enhanced by applying these policy recommendations. further, release agreements could be combined with initiatives such as the one described here to potentially deepen the impacts of both. given ongoing priorities to address disproportionate rates of incarceration for indigenous peoples, partnerships with indigenous communities are especially timely. finally, this study has pointed to the importance of research partnerships. funding bodies interested in promoting crime prevention and recidivism reduction should aim to support research regarding prison– community partnerships generally, and partnerships with indigenous communities specifically. this is timely given calls for indigenous community-based research across several national bodies in canada (canadian institutes of health research et al., 2014), as well as the growth of participatory methods and indigenous-led research (allan & smylie, 2015; smylie et al., 2004). further, such research should promote access to institutions and ways for indigenous communities to drive research regarding 17 varcoe et al.: “healing on both sides” published by scholarship@western 2020 corrections, crime, and rehabilitation in their community contexts (truth and reconciliation commission, 2015a). conclusion in this mixed methods study, we examined the impact of a prison–community partnership based in bc, canada. we found that the initiative had great potential to support healing and rehabilitation for incarcerated men participating across federal prisons in bc, as well as potential to support healing, wellbeing, and community priorities in the partnering rural and remote indigenous communities. our study highlighted barriers to positive impact and sustainability and underlined policy requirements needed to sustain and scale impact. we propose that a bidirectional model of engagement, founded on the concepts of equity, social justice, and cultural safety and the indigenous values of relationship and reciprocity, could strengthen impact by supporting more formal engagement between the men and the community members. the importance of reciprocal benefit as a policy goal within this initiative highlights the critical need to confront ongoing colonial dynamics and racism in the canadian context, including pervasive negative stereotypes about indigenous peoples operating both within and beyond prisons. future research will investigate operational changes to support these policy recommendations within the initiative, while also providing insights into challenges and opportunities facing governments, non-profit organizations, and researchers exploring ways to enhance wellbeing for indigenous peoples across colonial and state contexts. extending beyond “economic rationality” towards reciprocity offers the potential to create meaningful shifts in “the problematic institutional terrain upon which new [criminological] strategies and objectives are continually built,” first and foremost by recognizing the canadian terrain as colonial, incarcerated men as human, and indigenous communities as strong partners 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(2015a). honouring the truth, reconciling for the future: summary of the final report of the truth and reconciliation commission. http://www.trc.ca/ assets/pdf/honouring_the_truth_reconciling_for_the_future_july_23_2015.pdf truth and reconciliation commission. (2015b). truth and reconciliation commission of canada: calls to action. http://trc.ca/assets/pdf/calls_to_action_english2.pdf tu, d., hadjipavlou, g., dehoney, j., price, e. r., dusdal, c., browne, a. j., & varcoe, c. (2019). partnering with indigenous elders in primary care improves mental health outcomes of inner 26 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 3 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.3.8064 city indigenous patients. canadian family physician, 65(4), 274-281. https://www.cfp.ca/ content/cfp/65/4/274.full.pdf vogler, r. (2017). a world view of criminal justice. taylor & francis. https://doi.org/10.4324/ 9781315263557 waldram, j. (1997). the way of the pipe: aboriginal spirituality and symbolic healing in canadian prisons. university of toronto press. ward, t., day, a., & casey, s. (2006). offender rehabilitation down under. journal of offender rehabilitation, 43(3), 73-83. https://doi.org/10.1300/j076v43n03_05 webster, c. m., & doob, a. n. (2015). us punitiveness 'canadian style'? cultural values and canadian punishment policy. punishment & society, 17(3), 299-321. https://doi.org/10.1177/ 1462474515590893 wildeman, c., & wang, e. a. (2017). mass incarceration, public health, and widening inequality in the usa. the lancet, 389(10077), 1464-1474. https://doi.org/10.1016/s0140-6736(17)30259-3 willis, m., & moore, j.-p. (2008). reintegration of indigenous prisoners. https://aic.gov.au/ publications/rpp/rpp90 wright, k. a., & cesar, g. t. (2013). toward a more complete model of offender reintegration: linking the individual-, community-, and system-level components of recidivism. victims & offenders, 8(4), 373-398. https://doi.org/10.1080/15564886.2013.803004 zinger, i. (2018). office of the correctional investigator: annual report 2017-2018. http://www.ocibec.gc.ca/cnt/rpt/pdf/annrpt/annrpt20172018-eng.pdf introduction to the future of traditional knowledge research the international indigenous policy journal volume 6 issue 2 the future of traditional knowledge research: building partnership and capacity article 1 may 2015 introduction to the future of traditional knowledge research kenichi matsui university of tsukuba, kenichim@envr.tsukuba.ac.jp recommended citation matsui, k. (2015). introduction to the future of traditional knowledge research. the international indigenous policy journal, 6(2). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.1 introduction to the future of traditional knowledge research abstract this introductory essay to the special issue, "the future of traditional knowledge research: building partnership and capacity," discusses some of the fundamental issues about what researchers and indigenous peoples face in collaborating research. it also discusses how contributing authors have dealt with these problems in the past. keywords traditional knowledge research, partnership, collaboration, decolonisation creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ t h e f u t u r e o f t r a d i t i o n a l k n o w l e d g e r e s e a r c h : b u i l d i n g p a r t n e r s h i p a n d c a p a c i t y since the late twentieth century, academics, non-governmental organizations (ngos), lawyers, and policymakers have become increasingly aware that locally produced historical and contemporary knowledge and wisdom not only sustain in-situ conservation of the environment and biodiversity, but also empower indigenous peoples and local communities. hasty actions to collect knowledge without establishing cross-cultural understanding and secure fair negotiating terms, however, have strained the relationships between researchers (or lawyers, courts, policymakers) and knowledge holders. today, we have a large number of academic studies published on the subject of traditional knowledge, indigenous knowledge, and local knowledge. united nations agencies (e.g., the world intellectual property organization [wipo], the united nations university institute for the advanced study of sustainability [unu-ias], the united nations educational, scientific, and cultural organization [unesco], the united nations environment programme [unep], the united nations development programme [undp]) and ngos (e.g., international union for the conservation of nature [iucn], natural justice) have published independent studies on how researchers and aid workers along with government agents might develop collaborative partnerships in order to better represent and protect traditional (ecological) knowledge in their works. many of these guides stress the need to create respectful and mutually beneficial relationships between researchers and indigenous and local peoples, but no substantial cross-cultural and comparative publication exists that addresses the issue of how researchers and other interested groups may achieve such relationships. young and inexperienced researchers (including consultants) and government agents, therefore, cannot look for guidance in the existing literature about how they may build their capacity to be cross-culturally and ethically competent in generating new knowledge and publicizing the results of their studies on locally produced historical and contemporary knowledge and wisdom. the main objective of this present collection of essays, therefore, is to address the issue of building partnerships and capacity to improve the quality of participatory research and policies involving indigenous communities. it provides readers, especially young academic, government, and ngo researchers, with applied ethical guidelines for cross-cultural and interdisciplinary research. it also aims to facilitate further discussion with a set of case studies and personal experience. the authors represented here have a long and successful experience in working with indigenous peoples and local communities. i also have included president clément chartier, distinguished canadian indigenous leader, to share his insights and experience in working with academic communities. this collection covers topics related to collaborative research on the presentation of historical evidence; legal representation of indigenous knowledge in court; the history of indigenous peoples’ collaboration in anthropological fieldwork; indigenous research paradigms for fishery governance 1 matsui: introduction published by scholarship@western, 2015 and health; indigenous leadership for collaborative research; and indigenous engagement in environmental management. contributors reveal one way or another how the processes of documenting, commercializing, and/or representing traditional knowledge that can influence political, legal, market, and research decisions. these issues have the potential to considerably affect future relationships among academics, lawyers, indigenous peoples, scientists, local communities, ngos, and other stakeholders when faced with indigenous claims, economic developments, and environmental conservation activities. the articles in this special issue, “the future of traditional knowledge research: building partnership and capacity,” demonstrate the potential benefit of traditional knowledge research to both researchers, and indigenous peoples and local communities alike if researchers sufficiently reflect upon the needs and interests of both academic and indigenous communities. michael douglas (aquatic ecologist) and sue jackson (geographer) amply demonstrate this point in their account of ethical public engagement with local aboriginal communities in northern australia using the track environmental research program (2006 to 2011). largely based on an australian “indigenous engagement strategy,” the track program encouraged indigenous leaders to contribute to research activities and strengthened their sense of pride in their traditional culture. jackson and douglas also thoughtfully suggest that respectful and trusting relationships must be the hallmark of all research interactions. laura hall, colleen dell, barb fornssler, carol hopkins, christopher mushquash, and margo rowan who work as part of the university of saskatchewan research chair in substance abuse were engaged in cultural interventions in first nations’ alcohol and drug treatment. believing that “research is inherently beneficial to the healing and wellbeing of indigenous communities,” they adopted the concept of “two-eyed seeing” as a guiding principle in research to bridge cultural gaps between indigenous peoples and western researchers. similar to the track program, hall and her colleagues attempted to empower indigenous people in aboriginal health research; in so doing, their research processes facilitated the decolonization of the past power imbalance, healing from the past wrongs, and cultural renewal. nicole latulippe’s (geographer) article on indigenous fishery governance similarly emphasizes inherent benefits of research and governance for both indigenous peoples and researchers. she proposes that non-indigenous scholars attempt to learn about the “indigenous research paradigm” by maintaining long-term dialogues with indigenous knowledge holders. the effort for “bridging parallel rows” of the two paradigms can be seen as the important bi-cultural processes that the ancestors of canadian representatives and indigenous representative envisioned but left unaccomplished in observing peace and friendship treaties. in northern brazil, noemi miyasaka porro (anthropologist) and joaquim shiraishi neto (legal scholar) helped traditional local communities—“babassu breaker women” and indigenous 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.1 ashaninka—to secure community-based businesses. those local communities have faced increasing competition and encroachment from global commercial interests in the local market. porro and neto discuss how scholars helped local communities to better protect local interests with information and legal support. indigenous leaders in canada have also played important roles in collaborating with researchers in order to secure their rights to land and resources. president clément chartier (lawyer) has successfully led the métis national council and won a number of landmark court cases for métis harvesting and land rights. as he recounts in his article for this edition, his success was partly based on collaboration with historical geographers frank tough and arthur j. ray who worked as expert witnesses in most major métis rights cases since the 1990s. arthur j. ray has appeared in many major court cases for first nations and the métis people since the 1980s. in his article for this edition, he discusses a gap in knowledge recognition between western courts and indigenous peoples in australia, canada, and the united states. ray observed that past litigation experiences have made courts in australia and canada become more culturally sensitive by allowing elders’ testimony in the traditional territory (e.g., chief victor buffalo v. canada) or admitting métis fiddlers to play red river jig (e.g., regina v. belhumeur). traditional elders also have become more flexible to allow judges and lawyers to enter their sacred sites or listen to secret stories and songs. another important point many contributors in this edition emphasize is the importance of de-colonization as the foundation for future reconciliation and collaboration. the de-colonization must be done with a good understanding of past mistakes and successes. in examining the cross-cultural interaction that resulted in seminal publications on indigenous peoples in the late nineteenth century and early twentieth century, dianne c. newell (historian of technology and society) points out that well known ethnographers such as franz boas, marius barbeau, charles f. newcombe, and edward sapir relied heavily on indigenous informants and partners such as george hunt, william beynon, charles james nowell, alex thomas, and often their wives and other female relatives. she argues that the resulting old ethnographies have become integrated into the traditional ecological knowledge (tek) of descendent indigenous communities today in the pacific northwest coast and, therefore, must be taken into account in understanding what tek has survived. matsui’s article also demonstrates that the legacy of early twentieth-century writings about “primitive” traditional culture and knowledge still run through many influential writings on traditional knowledge today. from the early twentieth century to the present, scholars have dealt with traditional knowledge and, to some extent, attempted to define or validate it. however, a large number of academic publications on traditional knowledge have not yet come to the clear understanding about what is traditional knowledge; thus, confusing policymakers and students today. 3 matsui: introduction published by scholarship@western, 2015 the compilation of such disparate research essays into a special issue of the international indigenous policy journal (iipj) contributes to the scholarship of traditional knowledge research in numerous important ways. first, it provides opportunities to compare and contrast a number of case studies and lessons from australia, brazil, and canada. readers can compare and reflect on the conditions and standards of traditional knowledge research in these countries with questions pertinent to pressing current issues for indigenous peoples in mind, such as, for example, the contrast between successful examples of watershed management among indigenous communities in northern australia and indigenous community research in brazil. or whether the procedures that admit oral evidence in australian and canadian courts can provide useful models for other countries such as brazil, where its courts face similar indigenous rights claims. second, this collection informs readers on debates and discussions around cultural differences among wide-ranging stakeholders. although united nations’ agencies have actively produced ethical guidelines for researchers to conduct data collection and environmental impact assessments, these policy statements and directives alone cannot help researchers achieve their goals. the core values and practices that are needed for building ethical relationships will only emerge from a solid cross-cultural understanding and from capacity building efforts by both researchers and their indigenous collaborators. i believe that the strong contribution from the authors in this collection illustrates this point. finally, the present collection of papers uniquely reveals a diversity of disciplinary engagements with traditional knowledge of indigenous peoples and local communities that should prove informative for researchers who conduct policy relevant applied research on indigenous peoples within a global context. in particular, it should appeal to both indigenous and non-indigenous students of anthropology, ecology, environmental sciences, geography, history, indigenous studies, law, philosophy, and community empowerment. as guest editor for this collection, i would like to express my gratitude to not only all the contributors in this issue but also those who showed an interest in the topic. in particular, i would like to thank susan wingert, managing editor of this journal, for generously providing the ideas and editorial assistance to make this special issue on “the future of traditional knowledge research” happen. i also would like to acknowledge that the original idea for this issue grew out of a small seminar on the topic that suneetha m. subramanian and i organized at the united nations university-institute of advanced studies in december 2011. i also organized the follow-up seminars at the university of tsukuba. since then, arthur j. ray, dianne c. newell, and sue jackson have helped me refine my ideas about this special issue to the iipj. all these events were made possible by the generous grants i received from the japan society for the promotion of science. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.1 the international indigenous policy journal may 2015 introduction to the future of traditional knowledge research kenichi matsui recommended citation introduction to the future of traditional knowledge research abstract keywords creative commons license introduction to the future of traditional knowledge research ms 1397 phillips-beck negotiation rce.pdf the international indigenous policy journal volume 10 | issue 4 october 2019 negotiation, reciprocity, and reality: the experience of collaboration in a communitybased primary health care (cbphc) program of research with eight manitoba first nations wanda phillips-beck first nation health and social secretariat of manitoba, wphillips-beck@fnhssm.com grace kyoon-achan university of manitoba, grace.kyoonachan@umanitoba.ca josée g. lavoie university of manitoba, josee.lavoie@umanitoba.ca nicholas krueger university of manitoba, umkruegn@myumanitoba.ca kathi avery kinew first nation health and social secretariat of manitoba, kakinew@fnhssm.com stephanie sinclair first nation health and social secretariat of manitoba, ssinclair@fnhssm.com naser ibrahim university of manitoba, naser.ibrahim@umanitoba.ca alan katz university of manitoba, alan_katz@cpe.umanitoba.ca recommended citation phillips-beck, w., kyoon-achan, g., lavoie, j. g., krueger, n., kinew, k. a., sinclair, s., ibrahim, n., & katz, a. (2019). negotiation, reciprocity, and reality: the experience of collaboration in a community-based primary health care (cbphc) program of research with eight manitoba first nations. the international indigenous policy journal, 10(4). doi: https://10.18584/iipj.2019.10.4.8334 negotiation, reciprocity, and reality: the experience of collaboration in a community-based primary health care (cbphc) program of research with eight manitoba first nations abstract this article shares experiences and lessons learned through a collaboration between the university of manitoba, the first nation health and social secretariat of manitoba (fnhssm), and eight first nation communities in manitoba. we employed a participatory approach from planning the research project, to data collection, and to the analysis, interpretation, and implementation of results. we learned that successful collaborations require: a) investing time and resources into developing respectful research relationships; b) strong leadership and governance; c) clearly defined roles and responsibilities; d) meaningful participation of first nations; e) multiple opportunities for community engagement; and f) commitment to multiple, ongoing, and consistent forms of communication. all factors are integral to creating and maintaining the integrity of the research collaboration. keywords first nations, indigenous research, research, collaboration, participatory research, research partnerships acknowledgments we acknowledge the eight participating first nations in manitoba: fisher river cree nation, pinaymootang, birdtail sioux, ebb and flow, northlands denesuline, cross lake band, berens river, and nisichawayasik. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. 1 phillips-beck et al.: negotiation, reciprocity, and reality scholarship@western, 2019 negotiation, reciprocity, and reality: the experience of collaboration in a community-based primary health care (cbphc) program of research with eight manitoba first nations in this article, we describe the process by which a university–community partnership evolved with eight first nation1 communities and a cadre of community and university-based researchers in manitoba. we share what we have learned through our experience of negotiating and pioneering an innovative research collaboration built on a foundation of trust, respectful relationships, meaningful participation, and community engagement. it has been generally noted in the literature that building relationships is necessary for developing research partnerships (baydala, saylor, & ruttan, 2013; baydala, worrell, et al., 2013; christopher, watts, mccormick, & young, 2008). yet, few studies detail the process by which these relationships are created. it is our intention to contribute an understanding of this process to the literature: the process by which meaningful relationships are built and collaborations are successfully formed with first nation communities in canada. the backdrop for this article is a program of research entitled innovation in community-based primary health care (cbphc) supporting transformation in the health of first nation and rural/remote communities in manitoba (iphit). this study is a 5-year research collaboration between researchers from the university of manitoba, eight manitoba first nation communities, and the first nations health and social secretariat of manitoba (fnhssm), also recognized by the traditional name nanaadawewigamig, which means “a healing place” in the anishinaabe language. fnhssm was established in 2013 by the assembly of manitoba chiefs (amc) chiefs-in-assembly, the political organization representing 63 first nations in manitoba. the goal of fnhssm is to create a unified health system with, and for, first nations in manitoba through research, policy analysis, and advocacy. it is also the home of the manitoba first nations health information research governance committee (mfn hirgc), an ethics review body for all research involving first nation peoples in manitoba. the mfn hirgc reviews and approves research proposals to ensure that all research involving first nation peoples meet four stipulated guiding principles: a) free, prior, and informed consent, both at the individual and collective level; b) first nations ocap® principles that establish first nation ownership, control, access, and possession of their data; c) respect for first nation ethical standards; and d) research must be of benefit to first nations. these principles are essential for the renewal of first nation self-determination in health and governance.2 context the iphit program of study is 1 of 12 teams funded by the canadian institutes of health research (cihr) under the community-based primary health care (cbphc) initiative. lavoie et al. (2010) noted multiple challenges in providing health care in first nation communities, which highlighted a grave need for cbphc transformation. extenuating circumstances include the small size of communities, geographical isolation, and the operation of healthcare services and funding agencies across multiple jurisdictions: federal, provincial, regional health authorities (rhas), private for-profit 1 in this article, we use the accepted term first nation, one of the three recognized indigenous peoples in canada (first nations, métis, and inuit), to describe the partner communities that were directly involved in the project. we use the term indigenous when making broader reference to indigenous people in canada or internationally. 2 the assembly of manitoba chiefs (amc) established mfn hirgc in 1996. it operates to ensure that research benefits first nations through guiding principles established by the amc chiefs-in-assembly. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 4 doi: https://10.18584/iipj.2019.10.4.8334 organizations, and self-governing first nation communities. health care delivery is further compounded by a complex multi-jurisdictional system for cbphc funding and delivery in first nation communities, particularly when the various jurisdictions fail to clearly define their specific responsibilities and neglect to address the impacts of colonization and the residential school system on the health of these communities (lavoie et al., 2010). it is no surprise that lavoie et al. (2010) found first nation communities who exercised greater control over their local health services appeared to be doing better at meeting their community-based health needs. to investigate this phenomenon further, the iphit project focused on the experiences and strengths of community-based primary healthcare in first nation communities, both from a community-based and population health perspective using a holistic and inclusive approach. the iphit team’s principal investigators worked together to develop a common vision of the study. prior to the proposal writing stage, the nominated principal applicant (npi) invited fnhssm staff to an initial meeting to discuss the potential research project and to discuss priorities and process. from then on, fnhssm took on an active role in all decisions related to the design and development of the research project, and each step of the research project was discussed in detail by the university and fnhssm teams. decisions were made by keeping the lines of communication open through regular meetings, open dialogue, and by reaching mutual agreement. this created conditions that ensured meaningful engagement of first nation communities, while respecting the obligations of first nations organizations and the university. academic and first nation partners agreed upon four goals for the overall iphit research project: a) describe cbphc service provision in first nation communities by focusing on the strengths, key factors, and innovations in health care provision that has helped to maintain the wellness of individuals, families, and the community; b) explore perspectives of first nations people living on reserve about cbphc and why mainstream approaches may be failing; c) compare the models of governance, community engagement, strengths, and cbphc service delivery across communities and provide opportunities for communities to learn from each other; and d) build collaborative relationships with communities and decision-makers to support the implementation of cbphc innovation to improve health and wellbeing in first nations in canada. the two primary models of care in first nation communities in manitoba reflect the type of federal government health funding they receive, which dictates the type of health care delivery available. nursing stations are generally located in communities that are either isolated or semi-isolated and are mandated to deliver primary health care services, which are for the most part provided by nurses who work in an expanded scope of practice and by visiting physicians. emergency care is available on a daily basis. the second model of care, found in the majority of first nation communities, is the health centre or health office. these facilities only deliver essential public health services during regular business hours and are not funded to deliver primary health care or emergency care services on a 24-hour basis. the federal government also funds a variety of community-based health services such as the native alcohol and drug addiction program (naadap), home and community care (hcc), brighter futures, aboriginal head start on reserve, strengthening families–maternal child health, and canada prenatal nutrition program. however, some community-based programs are not funded consistently across communities and are not universally accessible. 3 phillips-beck et al.: negotiation, reciprocity, and reality scholarship@western, 2019 establishing the research partnerships and methods to provide a comprehensive and balanced perspective, multiple methods were chosen and four independent research components emerged: a) a qualitative community-based participatory research project exploring community members’ understanding of primary health care and services needed; b) an administrative data analysis of the rates of hospitalizations for ambulatory care sensitive conditions (acsc) utilizing the manitoba population research data repository housed at the manitoba centre for health policy (mchp) within the university of manitoba; c) survey methods, looking at patient, provider, and organizational experiences of primary health care services; and finally, d) more in-depth case studies to further examine those communities that excelled in innovation and wellness through the first three projects. we invited eight first nation communities to participate and all the communities invited agreed. the selection of communities was purposeful, representing different models of service delivery and four of the five linguistic groups in manitoba: ojibway, cree, dene, and dakota. the participating first nations are geographically dispersed throughout manitoba, four northern and four southern, and ranged from small (a few hundred residents) to large (a few thousand residents) communities. two communities are isolated (either fly-in or winter ice roads), two semi-isolated (road access but are far from larger centres), and four of the eight are rural communities with all season road access. half of the communities, all located in southern regions of the province, have health centers, while four of the communities have nursing stations and are in the north. all receive federal funding for health care. all communities contributed some unique perspective or innovation to cbphc. once selected and invitations accepted, health directors in each community approached band leadership and obtained community consent by way of a band council resolution (bcr). a member of the research team was asked to make a presentation to leadership in two of the communities, while the other health directors were provided with information and a summary of the research outlining the potential benefits. the bcrs where subsequently submitted along with the research ethics applications, which received approvals at various intervals in the first year for a total of five sub-projects within the program of research. the study received approval from the university of manitoba health research ethics board, the health information privacy committee (hipc) of manitoba, and the mfn hirgc in the fall of 2013. following ethics approvals, a transfer of funding agreement was signed between the university of manitoba and fnhssm, who then assumed management and coordination of the program of research. research agreements outlining tasks and responsibilities of all parties were also signed by the individual first nation communities. this level of community and first nation involvement in research is relatively new and represents a significant change from the troubled past of research involving indigenous peoples (schnarch, first nations centre, & national aboriginal health organization, 2004). historically, research undertaken by institutions and researchers had little or no benefit to indigenous peoples or their communities (campbell, 2014; schnarch et al., 2004), was undertaken without their knowledge or consent (moodie, 2010), and/or was unlawful because it violated their human rights. in some cases, information and indigenous knowledges were extracted, documented, or disseminated with very little input from the community. this type of research has come to be known as “helicopter research” and “data mining” (campbell, 2014; moodie, 2010; schnarch et al., 2004; smith, 1999). it is no surprise then that indigenous communities resisted research and researchers based on well-founded distrust due to these past experiences. fortunately, community-based participatory 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 4 doi: https://10.18584/iipj.2019.10.4.8334 research approaches that emphasize community involvement are being encouraged and used. the iphit program of research unfolded amidst this growing awareness and recognition of the fundamental rights of indigenous people to determine the direction of research. this new approach to research with indigenous peoples also requires researchers to not only to act respectfully and ethically, but legally as well (moodie, 2010). over the past two decades, the advocacy of first nation leaders and the mfn hirgc and like bodies in canada and internationally provided the impetus for the movement to develop research in partnership with first nations and other indigenous communities (boffa, king, mcmullin, & long, 2011). it is also reflected in the tri-council3 policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans (tcps2), which provides specific ethical guidelines for research involving first nations, inuit, and métis in canada. the tri-council statement emphasizes the importance of collaborating with and engaging indigenous peoples and organizations in research (natural sciences and engineering research council of canada [nserc], the canadian institutes of health research [cihr], & the social sciences and humanities research council of canada [sshrc], 2014). in fact, the past several decades have seen indigenous communities assert their right to not only be engaged in research, but to actually benefit from it and have more control over how research is conducted, including determining the methods that are used (denzin, lincoln, & smith, 2008). this has prompted health researchers, institutions, and research ethics boards to pay attention to the formation of meaningful research partnerships and to the use and benefits of community-based participatory research (nserc, cihr, & sshrc, 2014). community-based participatory research shares characteristics that are compatible with indigenous methods and often make use of community advisory committees that can function as an anchoring site for building trust, reciprocal relationships, collaborative decision-making, co-learning, and co-creation of knowledge (gokiert, willows, georgis, & stringer, 2017). this project came at an ideal time: there was growing recognition that research with indigenous people must be done differently and mounting pressure to explore alternative research governance models. as a first nation organization, fnhssm was well positioned to partner on this project because individuals within the organization had the experience, knowledge, and skills to manage and conduct research respectfully and, more importantly, had existing relationships with first nation communities. both the university-based and indigenous researchers were willing to explore all options, take a leap of faith, and test out an innovative shared-governance model, thus creating a new research landscape in manitoba. this began with building and bridging those foundational research relationships, and thereby creating lasting relationships that extend beyond the traditional roles of researcher and researched. relationship building while paying attention to the formation of meaningful partnerships is relatively easy, actually building and maintaining the relationships that create meaningful partnerships requires concerted effort (kyoonachan, lavoie, et al., 2018). boffa et al. (2011) noted that relationships are necessary at every juncture of the research collaboration including recruiting indigenous researchers, communicating directly with first nations chiefs and councils, obtaining indigenous organizational and community support, and 3 the tri-council is made up of three federal agencies, representing the natural sciences and engineering, the health sciences, and the social sciences and humanities, with the mandate of funding and supporting research in canada. 5 phillips-beck et al.: negotiation, reciprocity, and reality scholarship@western, 2019 bringing together indigenous stakeholders with government (provincial and federal) program planners to work with university-based researchers. others have acknowledged that relationship building requires additional time and energy (abbott, dave, gordon, & reath, 2014; panagiotopoulos, rozmus, gagnon, & macnab, 2007; pyett, waples-crowe, & van der sterren, 2009), but is absolutely critical for establishing trust and confidence in the project and for sustaining partnerships in the long term (panagiotopoulos et al., 2007). building this trust is also important on a deeper level for developing a higher level of cultural safety for the research participants over time (christopher et al., 2008). successful relationship building facilitates a sense of community ownership and control, along with longterm social environmental policy change or improvements (rowley et al., 2000). the process by which a community initiates, develops, and implements an intervention program is critical to achieving improved health outcomes (rowley et al., 2000). further highlighting the need for building relationships with indigenous people, indigenous scholars have called for frameworks that employ indigenous methodologies that incorporate tribal knowledge and allow for meaningful representation in research (kovach, 2009). kovach (2009) contends that indigenous frameworks require researchers to “give back” to communities in a manner that is useful. this begins first with identifying which research is relevant and understanding what is useful. this whole process is not possible without first developing respectful relationships and engaging indigenous communities in the researcher preparation stage (kovach, 2009). project outcomes why collaborate with indigenous populations in health research? immediate positive outcomes are not always the primary goal in collaborating with indigenous communities, as so often the exchange of knowledge and practice is a valuable outcome of communitybased research itself (esler, 2008). however, there was a clear intent on the part of the research team to provide partner communities with findings that could be used to support and enhance innovative solutions to the challenges they face in supporting the health of their populations. we learned early in the research process that community leaders were able to use the information they collected to make immediate improvements or address priority concerns that were within their power to do so. for example, after a community results and feedback session in the first year of the research program, one of our partner communities received confirmation that the community’s priority was to address the mental health needs in their community and proceeded to work on a strategy to train more than 20 employees in applied counselling. part of this strategy was to frame mental health within their own definition of primary healthcare and address it as such. after hearing a presentation on their results, another community leader voiced that he now had the validation he needed to move forward will a full language emersion program in their school, as the results had indicated that language and identity were key to community wellness. both examples have demonstrated that without any further assistance from the research team, benefits were obtained by just hearing the information or having the data to support moving forward on their own priorities. as one health director indicated, “this research and the data had been most valuable in helping us to take our own initiative and look for resources to do what we needed to do” (hd, community b). 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 4 doi: https://10.18584/iipj.2019.10.4.8334 not only does collaborating and sharing knowledge give voice to the diversity of community views, but it also ensures that research that is planned and carried out in an ethical and culturally appropriate way (pyett, waples-crowe, & van der sterren, 2009). this was exemplified in the research collaboration: project elders were present at all yearly gatherings and included in all community workshops ensuring that community specific protocols were followed, and their perspectives were included in interpreting the findings. the findings of the research are the subject of other iphit publications (kyoon-achan, lavoie et al., 2018; kyoon-achan, philips-beck, et al., 2018). it is important to appreciate that the participatory nature of the project resulted in more meaningful and useful data, increased trust in the research process and in the researchers themselves and the benefits of collaborating with first nation and indigenous organizations. it is in this respect that we share what we have learned about the process doing research in a good way in partnership with manitoba first nation communities over our 5-year journey. lessons learned we have distilled our key lessons into six elements of a successful collaboration. these are listed here and discussed in greater detail in the pages that follow. a. investing adequate time and resources (funding for on-site visits, hiring community-based researchers, continuous and ongoing communication) is essential for developing respectful research relationships with indigenous communities; b. strong leadership and sound governance are required throughout the research project; c. roles and responsibilities need to be clearly defined at the onset of the project, but should be flexible and fluid enough to allow the project to evolve and grow over time; d. full and active participation of indigenous people, communities, and/or organizations, which includes coordination of the project and data management, allowing for approaches and protocols that extend beyond university settings and constraints; e. flexibility is critical when engaging indigenous communities and individuals, as indigenous communities and organizations have the right to determine their own scope and level of engagement; and f. ongoing, consistent, and multiple forms of communication are integral to creating and maintaining the integrity of the research collaboration. a. developing the relationship the collaborative work between fnhssm and university-based researchers (i.e., the iphit team, to which eight first nation communities were later added) began with a brief conversation between the university-based npi and the research initiatives manager at fnhssm. both agreed that the cihr call for research in community-based primary health care would be of interest and relevance for first nations in manitoba. the npi initiated building the relationship, which began a full year prior to the proposal’s due date. initial conversations developed into a series of discussions and teleconferences 7 phillips-beck et al.: negotiation, reciprocity, and reality scholarship@western, 2019 between the university and fnhssm-based researchers. both parties planned and mapped out the research project prior to notification of successful funding. it was agreed that fnhssm would take an active role in coordinating the research project through a nurse research manager, which is not usual practice and required trust on the part of the university-based researchers. this arrangement resulted in the annual transfer of grant funding to fnhssm to cover associated costs. we found that the actual transfer of funds was one task accomplished rather seamlessly once the governance model and the underlying principle were understood and accepted by the host university. this decision aligned well with the position of the mfn hirgc that first nations be active participants in research, and it made good sense, as fnhssm had well-established relationships and communication networks with first nations in manitoba. the fnhssm had a wealth of staff who possessed the necessary contextual knowledge and lived experience in working directly with first nation communities and, as an organization, had a vested interest in health system improvement for first nations in manitoba. several meetings took place to refine the proposal and address how first nation communities would be engaged and involved for the duration of the research project. while awaiting the outcome of the funding application, fnhssm drafted a job description, identified office space, sought out interested first nations, and was fully prepared to hire the nurse research manager to commence working directly with the communities. upon receiving notification of funding in the summer of 2013, an agreement was signed between fnhssm and the university of manitoba to transfer a significant portion of the funding to fnhssm to hire a nurse research manager, coordinate the project, and work directly with the first nation communities to hire their own local research assistants. both the fnhssm and the university agreed that a nurse with combined experience working in primary healthcare in first nation communities and in research was necessary to be successful in coordinating the project. the nurse research manager immediately visited the first nations selected to participate in the study to introduce the project and secure the necessary agreements. the nurse research manager and research initiatives manager at fnhssm immediately set follow-up meetings with first nations health directors and leaders in each of the eight participating communities to discuss what the project entailed and to begin to develop a level of trust that would allow the project to move forward. a few communities required more than one visit by fnhssm to come to a common understanding and develop community-specific protocols to guide how they wanted to be engaged. these visits often involved making presentations to health staff and leaders in the community, such as chief and council or elders, and were important for ascertaining or verifying community protocols. these meetings were also instrumental for negotiating resources and finalizing arrangements for the supervision and hiring of locally based research assistants (lras) and honoraria for elders who were willing to share their teachings. the meetings were also used to negotiate resources to arrange feasts to start the research off in a good way and, as research data became available, to gather community members to discuss and validate research findings. these provisions often fell within expenditures allowed by the funding agency, but beyond what the university would allow within their own specific policies. this issue was resolved through the research agreement between the fnhssm and the university of manitoba, which included the transfer of financial resources to the fnhssm to coordinate the research project. fnhssm had more flexibility to cover honorariums and expenditures such as feasts that were directly related to the research and respectful of the communities’ cultural protocols and practices. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 4 doi: https://10.18584/iipj.2019.10.4.8334 community consent was obtained through a band council resolution (bcr) signed by chief and council indicating approval for the health department to participate in the research project. many phone calls and emails took place between fnhssm and the leadership in the communities during the drafting of the community research agreements, which in the end were called statements of participation (sop). positioning the project coordination outside of the university within an organization with staff who were predominantly first nations was perceived to help with establishing trust, elevating the credibility of the research project, and in bridging relationships and facilitating trust between first nation communities and the university-based researchers. it also ensured that first nations ethical protocols were followed. as one elder commented at the 2015 annual gathering, “research used to be a dirty word (but) with our own people heading up the research it is no longer that way, they [fnhssm and university-based researchers] know our ways and know how to do things the proper way. it is important for our ways to be acknowledged and respected such as the giving of sacred medicine—the tobacco” (elder, kt workshop, 2015). b. strong leadership and sound governance the structure of the research project, as shown in figure 1, allowed the relationships and partnerships to form and to continuously evolve. a research advisory committee was formed consisting of indigenous leaders, experts in primary health care, and key decision makers from health canada and the government of manitoba who added high-level insights into the project design, implementation, and its implications. four independent research sub-projects were developed at the start of the project. by the end of year 3, a fifth project had been added. four of the five independent sub-projects were led by a university-based researcher and an indigenous partner with expertise in the subject area. these project co-leads set out an initial plan that included methods, analysis goals, and target data collection completion dates, and they were responsible for the overall completion of the sub-project. participation by iphit team members varied in the sub-projects and depended on the specific project focus, except for the nurse research manager who participated in all groups and documented their progress. as multiple complex projects often occurred concurrently, coordination of the research involved juggling priorities, reviewing policies, and managing agendas of the iphit team’s partners. this required strong leadership and organizational skills, and flexibility, both within fnhssm and the university, in order to operationalize the research plan, as agreed to by all partners. community-based leadership was also required for organizing, planning, and implementing the research project in their respective communities, but that was not their only contribution to the research. they contributed knowledge of indigenous health systems and values, culture, and important contextual information that was reflective of their diverse cultures and community’s history. as one health director commented during one of our annual gatherings: this research was very important for our community, it helped us organize and act on our priorities and did so without telling us what was best for us, we figured it out on our own when we looked at our data. (health director, annual kt workshop, 2016) community leaders contributed ideas that were both innovative and important to them. these leadership roles were sometimes filled by the health directors (hds) in the community, but more often alternated between the lras and other community members who stepped up to the role. as leaders, they organized their own project initiatives, gave direction to the iphit research team on their specific 9 phillips-beck et al.: negotiation, reciprocity, and reality scholarship@western, 2019 community priorities, and kept the research team abreast of their specific contextual environment and needs. a sound governance structure, such as the one described in the iphit project, along with strong leadership is therefore critically important at all junctures, at all levels, and from all partners for an effective collaboration to unfold. this had the added benefit of blending expertise in the creation of the indigenous and university-based research teams. figure 1. organization and governance of project. inner circle: four independent research projects led by university-based and indigenous researchers. outer circle: project partners—university-based researchers, community researchers, local advisory committees, and the overall research advisory team. c. clearly defined, but fluid roles and responsibilities the project structure (as shown in figure 1) and the creation of sub-teams for each study assisted to initially define roles and responsibilities for all partners. team member roles and responsibilities were negotiated and clearly defined at the beginning of the project with input from all partners so that each unit understood where they fit in the project circle. however, as the project unfolded, roles and responsibilities had some fluidity. for example, leadership at times shifted from one team member to another as skills and experience developed and workloads shifted. in addition, lras’ and community leaders’ roles expanded over time as they gained trust in the process, engaged with the project, generated data, and gained confidence in managing their own community-specific research. local advisory committees and/or hds had advisory roles and kept lras on track with community priorities, timelines, ethics, and protocols. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 4 doi: https://10.18584/iipj.2019.10.4.8334 project roles, although clearly defined at the onset, continued to evolve as some team members stepped back, and others stepped up and took on multiple roles. each team member’s strengths were acknowledged, and they could contribute to the project comfortably over time. the lras’ primary role was to coordinate and collect data within the community and to help organize community feedback sessions. later in the research process, they were instrumental in validating and interpreting the results. fnhssm staff travelled into the communities and functioned as data collectors, when an additional four first nations and six non-first nations communities were invited to participate in the survey project. the research advisory committee that had been established at the onset was not involved in the day-today operation of the research beyond the initial kick off meeting in the first months of the project. by years 2 and 3, community health directors took on the role of overall project advisors. all stakeholders were kept abreast of research activities through bi-annual newsletters and invited to provide input into project direction at yearly gatherings and meetings. d. full and active participation of first nation organizational partners, including first nation data management fnhssm was very clear from the initial conversation and planning discussions that they would ensure active participation of first nations partners in the research. university-based researchers supported and welcomed the level of involvement of fnhssm and first nations partners with cautious optimism because a shared governance model had not been tried before on a project of this scale. as a result, fnhssm not only took part in drafting the research plan, finalizing the proposal, selecting first nations partners and negotiating arrangements, developing data collection questions and tools, selecting and training lras, but also provided overall management of the qualitative data and survey data set. fnhssm transferred funding to each participating community to hire the lras who were responsible for collecting data. each community was responsible for recruiting and hiring an lra and establishing a local advisory committee. due to their knowledge about their respective communities, lras were instrumental in the formation of local advisory teams consisting of elders, youth, and leaders. these teams were encouraged to meet periodically to provide direction and support to the community-based research project. lras received training from the project nurse research manager and university-based researchers on basic research concepts, interviewing techniques, the use of recording devices, privacy and confidentiality, field management tools, problem-solving capacities, and general data and information management. they participated in drafting, refining, and translating research questions into their respective local languages for respondents who participated using their own languages. the lras also provided useful feedback on issues of contextual and cultural appropriateness in the framing of questions and interviewing of respondents. they collected qualitative and survey data through the course of the first 3 years of the project. the lras were supported by the nurse research manager and sometimes the research team through weekly or bi-weekly teleconferences and bi-annual visits to the community. first nations ownership of data was fundamental for trust to be maintained among iphit partners. the one exception was the health administrative dataset, which was housed at mchp. for this data set, manitoba health’s information privacy committee requires that all personal health data collected by manitoba health and housed at mchp be analyzed at a secure site at the university of manitoba. this 11 phillips-beck et al.: negotiation, reciprocity, and reality scholarship@western, 2019 requirement was clearly communicated to and understood by the first nation communities and by all academic and indigenous researchers. the analysis of the administrative data was completed by an mchp-employed analyst bound by the mchp confidentiality policy. tables, graphs, and de-identified aggregate data were released to the project researchers and communities for further analysis and interpretation. all other data, such as the interview data, survey data, and focus group data were housed on a secure research server at fnhssm in accordance with ocap® principles. the nurse research manager at fnhssm coordinated the transcription and management of the data for the project. the study transcripts were returned to the communities to be validated. each community kept a copy of their raw data in a secure environment within their community. community partners were involved in the preliminary analysis of data. they helped clarify words, terms, and concepts emerging from interviews and provided context and explanations of ideas and examples where necessary. as qualitative interviews were completed first, members of that team met to discuss and develop an analysis plan for the data and to decide how best to ensure and maintain community involvement in the study with fnhssm maintaining coordination of all units and personnel. e. acknowledge multiple layers and levels of community engagement both indigenous and university researchers were very aware early on in the research that engaging first nations may take many forms, which required nuancing the ideal concept of “full and active participation” and acknowledging that not all first nations communities may participate equally, nor desire to participate equally. the level of participation by each community shifted over time, depending on community priorities and other contextual factors. understanding this difference was critical for developing effective research partnerships in the iphit collaboration. it also respected each community’s diversity. community engagement required initiating contact with first nation communities early in the process, even prior to developing the final research protocol. in at least one case, it meant multiple face-to-face meetings with community leadership. it also meant attending community feasts, information sessions, making presentations, and being present in the community long before data collection began. engaging the community was sometimes about building awareness and understanding about the benefits of doing research in the community; other times, it involved making presentations to health staff and community members, answering phone calls, and communicating via email. most consistent for all communities was the necessity of travelling at a minimum of twice a year to provide information and give research results back to the community. it was also important to acknowledge that first nation communities vary in their knowledge about research—some have developed their own research priorities, skills, and ethical standards for research engagement and others were just getting started. most importantly, we learned that meaningful engagement in the research process brings many benefits to both communities and researchers. for example, communities began to take action based on what they learned by participating in data collection and analysis, and researchers were more confident in the data because it went through multiple levels of validation and interpretation by individuals and communities that participated in community and regional forums. health directors became increasingly engaged in the interpretation of preliminary results, allowing them to be more aware of the gaps in their health care delivery as well as their rights. they began outlining ways to close the gaps in health service. lras also gained confidence in presenting and providing education to communities on the benefits of research. there were also many opportunities for 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 4 doi: https://10.18584/iipj.2019.10.4.8334 researchers to learn from communities, which was reflected in a deeper respect and appreciation for indigenous and local knowledge. most importantly, flexibility in allowing communities to decide how and to what extent they wanted to be involved provided an opportunity for them to attend to priorities in their communities, without the pressures of meeting research deadlines or targets. all communities, regardless of the level of involvement, had an opportunity to be co-creators of knowledge, which resulted in more meaningful and applicable information. f. ongoing and consistent communication is essential to the success of the research collaboration the nurse research manager organized monthly meetings for all four team leads to discuss research progress, provide updates, or analyze data. after the first year of the project, the university team leads’ participation waned as other projects, priorities, positions, or suitability changed. she provided frequent updates to team members who took up new roles. eventually, the study settled into two firm groups, affectionately termed the “qualy” and the “quant” teams. over the course of the first 3 years, a core group of seven committed university and indigenous scholars remained and continued to meet monthly. the nurse research manager and npi met bi-weekly to discuss all project coordination and management. the nurse research manager also organized large team meetings and bought together all academic and indigenous research team leads, university based-research associates, and local advisory committees from each community once a year to provide updates, make decisions, share results, and network. the research team learned through this process that communication in many forms and through different media is essential. face-to-face contact between all partners is necessary to maintain focus and enthusiasm and invest in the research relationship. this requires budgeting sufficient resources for travel to the communities and for community members to travel to meetings and annual gatherings. it also meant having weekly teleconferences and publishing and distributing regular research newsletters and updates. it required adjustment for university-based researchers to trust community-driven processes and/or trust indigenous and alternative methods as valid and useful. the reverse was also true. disagreements in perspectives arose periodically on matters of validity or interpretation, but they were all resolved through gathering together and engaging in an open dialogue, which often resulted in coming to some sort of compromise. discussion the partnership model that evolved through the iphit project provides an example of a successful university–community research collaboration and shared governance model. the project focused on the process of establishing relationships with communities, negotiating, and navigating meaningful collaboration between all partners, and keeping two-way lines of communication open throughout the duration of the project (kyoon-achan, lavoie, et al., 2018). the goals of community partners were respected and supported, and communities maintained control over their own community data and research process, which is consistent with seminal work on the subject (schnarch et al., 2004). embedding the project in the community, fostering a sense of community ownership and control over the research process, and enabling the community to direct the project could also potentially lead to long-term policy change or improvement (kyoon-achan, lavoie, et al., 2018; kyoon-achan, philipsbeck, et al., 2018; rowley et al., 2000). the iphit team established a partnership in which there was a 13 phillips-beck et al.: negotiation, reciprocity, and reality scholarship@western, 2019 shared governance structure and methodology that made every attempt to abide by first nations ethical principles. first nations were actively involved in decision-making throughout the entire research process from planning, design, data collection, analysis, and the interpretation of data, which included indigenous methods and relationship building researcher preparation activities as advocated by indigenous scholars (kovach, 2009). the november 2010 report on the third wave of the regional health survey makes an important observation: “we [first nations] recognize that when we have ocap (ownership, control, access & possession) of our own data, it returns the power of our own information to our people” (assembly of manitoba chiefs [amc], 2012, p. 11). the iphit project team can attest that it was successful in returning the power of the data back the first nations who participated in the research project. this undertaking involved respecting a number of ethical standards. these include the first nations principles of free, prior, and informed consent, both at the individual and collective levels, and first nations ethical standards that are in agreement with the requirements of the mfn hirgc (which became a fnhssm bylaw). in addition, there are the obligations set out by the tri-council for research involving indigenous peoples in canada for community engagement, input, and participation (nserc, cihr, & sshrc, 2014). in large projects, such as the iphit program of research, achieving full control, access, and possession of data may not be possible, or even desirable, but where such arrangements are feasible having an indigenous organization, such as fnhssm, house and maintain stewardship over the data goes a long way in building trust and credibility with indigenous communities, given the long history of mistrust between indigenous peoples and research institutions in the past. research projects approved by the mfn hirgc must also be explicit in how they are to benefit the first nation community as a whole. achieving this goal requires that researchers initiate research relationships with indigenous communities or organizations from the very start of the research project, beginning at the idea and proposal writing stage. there must be opportunities for input from indigenous partners in order to increase the likelihood that the research will be of benefit to and have meaning for them. these recommendations are supported by arguments posited by other research teams (christopher et al., 2008; panagiotopoulos et al., 2007). collaborations that truly engage indigenous communities by distributing resources and allowing indigenous organizations, such as fnhssm, or communities to hire experienced research managers and assistants demonstrate true commitment to meaningful engagement and participation. the unique governance structure of the iphit project facilitated the productive discussion and sharing of ideas, bi-directional learning, and balanced perspectives. engaging the communities in a manner and level that was meaningful to them in the form of local advisory teams, consisting of elders, youth, and leadership, also facilitated the cross pollination of knowledge, including indigenous methods of data collection, analysis, and interpretation of the data (kyoon-achan, lavoie, et al., 2018). these collaborations must continue to be supported by funders as new arrangements and partnerships form. we have developed a model of working together by genuinely listening to each other, which allows us to learn and appreciate what institutional and first nations guiding principles mean. by including first nations input at each juncture of the research process, we supported and, in some cases, refined how these guiding principles were applied. flowing investments directly to first nation communities to recruit and hire their own research staff further strengthened the relationship with the first nation communities and was mutually beneficial to all partners. we have demonstrated that it is necessary to 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 4 doi: https://10.18584/iipj.2019.10.4.8334 move beyond principles, such as those recommended by christopher and colleagues (2008), which focused on building trust through acknowledging personal and institutional histories, understanding the historical context of the research, being present in the community and listening to community members, acknowledging the expertise of all partners, and being upfront about expectations. successful models for working with indigenous people and entities also require that academic partners integrate participatory processes that encourage both partners to learn from each other, an essential act in acknowledging and reconciling past abuses inflicted by researchers on tribal communities (christopher et al., 2008). our findings are consistent with previous studies demonstrating that relationship building is essential for community collaboration. this approach requires additional time and energy from researchers (abbott et al., 2014; panagiotopoulos et al., 2007; pyett et al., 2009; sorensen, fowler, nash, & bacon, 2010), but we found it is absolutely critical for obtaining the consent of community residents, establishing confidence in the findings, and for ongoing opportunities to investigate issues and possible solutions for the health of the community. collaborations are not collaborations if there is no opportunity to set project priorities jointly; plan, share in decision-making, and discuss research findings; and occasionally re-evaluate the course of action. these opportunities are created; they do not just happen and coming together requires resources. for the iphit project and other projects purporting to be a collaborative venture, it is necessary to invest time and resources to support first nation participation and active involvement. planning for these opportunities in the proposal writing stage and allocating adequate funds to support these activities must be carried out in the beginning. despite doing a lot of upfront planning and allocating a budget toward engaging first nations communities at the planning stages of the project, we did not anticipate the amount of travel that would be required and found that we did not have adequate amounts budgeted to travel and gather as frequently as we would have liked. we also learned from the first nation communities that maintaining the lras for the entire 5 years of the project would have resulted in better participation for the duration of the project. these are critical factors to achieving high rates of participation, confidence in the findings, and trust among indigenous groups (kyoon-achan, lavoie, et al., 2018). this is where a first nations organization, such as fnhssm, can be a huge benefit. collaborative research can be a learning process for non-indigenous researchers working with indigenous communities. it requires critical reflection on one’s beliefs and acknowledgement of the pervasiveness of colonial thought (isaak, campeau, katz, enns, elias, & sareen, 2010), and the reality of continuing practices and policies of colonization. it has been cautioned that the process of engaging indigenous communities, if done uncritically in service of ethics guidelines rather than in service of ethical research, can cause harm (brunger & wall, 2016). it could lead to community fatigue, undermining the community’s ability to be effectively involved in the research, and restricting the community’s ability to have oversight and control over research. conclusion we have shared sound, but emerging elements of a successful collaboration based on our experience over the course of a 5-year project with eight manitoba first nations. this includes pooling strengths from first nation communities and partner organizations, respecting institutional and community ethics, embracing and collaboratively combating challenges to build respectful, trusting relationships, and creating space for the co-creation of knowledge. we have shared these lessons from our process to assist others in developing strong research collaborations with first nations organizations and with first 15 phillips-beck et al.: negotiation, reciprocity, and reality scholarship@western, 2019 nation communities. we must also emphasize, however, that there are individuals with unique strengths that are often key to building necessary partnerships and bridges. it is critical that strong advocates work to advance first nations self-determination in research. it is also imperative that university-based researchers keep an open mind and a receptive stance to new approaches and arrangements. all partners have to exercise a great deal of 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(2010). addressing the gap in indigenous health: government intervention or community governance? a qualitative review. health sociology review, 19(1), 20-33. doi: https://doi.org/10.5172/hesr.2010.19.1.020 indigenous research methods: a systematic review the international indigenous policy journal volume 8 issue 2 reconciling research: perspectives on research involving indigenous peoples—part 1 article 5 april 2017 indigenous research methods: a systematic review alexandra s. drawson lakehead university, askruse@lakeheadu.ca elaine toombs lakehead university, etoombs@lakeheadu.ca christopher j. mushquash lakehead university, chris.mushquash@lakeheadu.ca recommended citation drawson, a. s. , toombs, e. , mushquash, c. j. (2017). indigenous research methods: a systematic review. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(2). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.5 indigenous research methods: a systematic review abstract indigenous communities and federal funding agencies in canada have developed policy for ethical research with indigenous peoples. indigenous scholars and communities have begun to expand the body of research regarding their peoples, and novel and innovative methods have begun to appear in the published literature. this review attempts to catalogue the wide array of indigenous research methods in the peer-reviewed literature and describe commonalities among methods in order to guide researchers and communities in future method development. a total of 64 articles met inclusionary criteria and five themes emerged: general indigenous frameworks, western methods in an indigenous context, community-based participatory research, storytelling, and culture-specific methods. keywords indigenous research, indigenous methods, indigenous research methods acknowledgments dr. mushquash’s involvement in this work is partially supported by the canada research chairs program. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ i n d i g e n o u s r e s e a r c h m e t h o d s : a s y s t e m a t i c r e v i e w indigenous research has historically been completed on, rather than with (i.e., in collaboration with) indigenous peoples in canada (canadian institutes of health research [cihr], natural sciences and engineering research council of canada [nserc], & social sciences, and humanities research council of canada [sshrc], 2014). researchers have used research methods that do not incorporate indigenous knowledge, or community or cultural values. it can be argued that indigenous peoples have previously been the subjects of research endeavours, rather than consenting participants. as a result, portrayals of indigenous communities in peer-reviewed literature have been problem focused and deficits based. lack of community involvement resulted in data that were unusable by communities. unfamiliarity with and failure to prioritize cultural conceptualizations by the research community has resulted in detrimental practices associated with the acquisition, use, and interpretation of knowledge provided by indigenous communities (the first nations information governance centre [fnigc], 2014). such research practices are no longer acceptable (cihr et al., 2014). the tri-council funding agencies (i.e., cihr, nserc, and sshrc) have provided ethical guidelines and policy documents designed to promote best practices within indigenous research. formalized practices that promote inclusive policies have been implemented federally. such policies include the cihr guidelines for health research involving aboriginal peoples (cihr, 2006), the first nations information governance centre’s ownership, control, access, and possession (ocap™ ) standards (fnigc, 2014), and the tri-council policy statement 2nd edition—chapter 9, entitled “research involving the first nations, inuit, and metis peoples of canada” (cihr et al., 2014). additional polices have been created specifically for research with inuit (inuit tapirit kanatami, 1998, 2005; nickels, shirley, & laidler, 2006) and métis populations (métis centre, 2010). these policies document acceptable research practices when collaborating with indigenous peoples, and prioritize indigenous values, traditions, and knowledge. these policies have also created ethical guidelines for research agreements between the researcher and the knowledge holding communities, including proposed guidelines related to informed consent, community partnership, academic integrity, disclosure, equity and benefit sharing, empowerment, and adherence to ocap™ standards (assembly of first nations, n.d.). ocap™ standards were created to address government and academic self-regulation and to provide guidelines for research that were endorsed by indigenous communities (fnigc, 2014). these standards asserted that first nations communities maintain control over research and recognized community rights as knowledge holders within a research process. such research principles centered indigenous communities within the research process, and promoted strategies that ensured research is determined, controlled, and disseminated by indigenous peoples. adhering to ethical standards and community expectations has become mandatory for any researcher engaging in research with indigenous communities and accessing tri-council agency funding. indigenous communities have increasingly prioritized these approaches (fnigc, 2014). indigenous communities have maintained the right to select their preferred method of data collection. existing research practices have been modified to meet the expressed needs of communities. processes 1 drawson et al.: indigenous research methods published by scholarship@western, 2017 of adapting methods in order to meet indigenous community expectations have produced methods that better incorporate indigenous values, beliefs, and ways of knowing, facilitating research that is respectful, collaborative, and relational (wilson, 2001). the incorporation and prioritization of such indigenous values has resulted in the documentation and dissemination of many indigenous research methods and methodologies (kovach, 2010). many researchers have described these research methods as “indigenous,” although it remains unclear exactly what constitutes an indigenous research method or methodology (wilson, 2001). there is a broad use of such terminology within research communities, with limited generalized agreement regarding what indigenous research is and how such endeavours differ from mainstream research practices. t h e p r e s e n t s t u d y considering the potential misuse (accidental or otherwise) of indigenous research methods and methodologies and lack of cohesive definitions, the purpose of the present study was: a. to catalogue the wide array of indigenous research methods in the peer-reviewed literature, and b. to describe commonalities amongst methods to guide researchers and communities in future method development. this was done through the apparatus of systematic review. m e t h o d s i n c l u s i o n a r y c r i t e r i a the authors did not specify a definition of “indigenous” prior to selecting studies for review; this was purposeful. through this method, we were able to employ an inductive approach and allow the researchers immersed in this work to provide a definition rather than prioritizing the authors’ judgment in terms of which methods were deemed “indigenous” and which were not. the authors are engaged in work with indigenous communities and peoples, and understand that imposing a western deductive lens onto the concept of indigenous research methods may perpetuate colonial ideals that prioritize reductionist science. only articles written in english were considered for inclusion. initially, articles that discussed the theory of specific research methods were to be excluded, as there may not be sufficient evidence to evaluate the application of the method via these articles. however, after reviewing the small selection of studies that did include primary research, the authors concluded that articles that did not include data collection but did outline theory related to indigenous research methods represented important contributions to the literature that should be included in the current review. further, papers that outlined a method or methodology were included. cram (2013) differentiated “method” from “methodology” by specifying that a method refers to the distinct tools and techniques used in data collection or analysis, while methodology refers to the overarching principles that direct a research project. in this article, we use whichever phrase the researchers used in their original work. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.5 the researchers did not implement a quality assessment procedure of studies (e.g., the quality assessment tool for quantitative studies) (thomas, ciliska, dobbins, & micucci, 2004) in this review for two reasons: a. the study purpose was to investigate methods as opposed to results, and b. the majority of studies would have received a “weak” rating and been removed from the review because most quality assessment tools favour randomized controlled trial designs. s e a r c h t e r m s a n d p r o c e d u r e s academic search premier, australian indigenous healthinfonet, bibliography of native north americans, cinahl, eric, indigenous studies portal, native health database, niichro, psycarticles, psycinfo, and web of science databases were utilized to examine the available literature. from december 30, 2015 to february 16, 2016, the following individual keywords were used: indigen* method*, indigen* research*, aborigin* method*, aborigin* research*, first nation* method*, first nation* research*, métis method*, métis research*, inuit method*, inuit research*, tribal method*, tribal research*, native method*, native research*, indian method*, and indian research*. r e s u l t s initial searches, based on the keywords listed above, yielded 2,310 articles and a total of 269 were retained based on brief review of the title and abstract. following a more in-depth review of the article content, 64 were deemed to meet inclusionary criteria (see appendix a for flowchart). following analysis by two researchers, five themes emerged: general indigenous frameworks, western methods in an indigenous context, community-based participatory research (cbpr), storytelling, and culture-specific methods. g e n e r a l i n d i g e n o u s f r a m e w o r k s through the initial analysis, it became clear that the word “method” was being used to embody both a procedure and also a framework. that is, the word was serving as a representation of two differing concepts within research. this distinction forms the basis for the first emergent theme: general indigenous frameworks. a framework is defined by merriam-webster as “the basic structure of something: a set of ideas or facts that provide support for something” (“framework,” n.d.). within a research setting, this framework provides the abstract structure that guides a researcher in their pursuit of knowledge. a framework, however, does not dictate a specific technique for data collection or analysis. with the search criteria being “indigenous research method” (and variations on this phrase), articles that used this exact phrase or a similar phrase as an explanation for their method were returned (cameron, plazas, salas, bearskin, & hungler, 2014; cheng, wang, & huang, 2009; chinn, 2007; cueva, dignan, & kuhnley, 2012; dennis, 2014; dyll-myklebust, 2014; evans, hole, berg, hutchinson, & sookraj, 2009; le & gobert, 2015; makomenaw, 2012; nakamura, 2013; roe, zeitz, & fredericks, 2012; russell-mundine, 2007; smithers-graeme, 2013). for example, dennis (2014) stated, “this study employed indigenous research methodologies,” (p. 34), and detailed the explicit methods including a qualitative approach 3 drawson et al.: indigenous research methods published by scholarship@western, 2017 and inductive data analysis. cameron et al. (2014) indicated, “[i]n indigenous methodology, the process of research is more than the production of new knowledge” (p. e5); the additions can include capacity building as well as community healing (le & gobert, 2015). further, some articles discussed combinations of methods such as indigenous research methods and participatory action research (evans et al., 2009), indigenous research methods and cbpr (cameron et al., 2014), or an indigenous research paradigm and autoethnography (smithers-graeme, 2013). others detailed utilizing an indigenous research method or approach and then utilizing data collection methods that are uniquely indigenous (i.e., yarning) (roe et al., 2012; russell-mundine, 2007). generally, authors did not provide a clear definition of indigenous research methods, with the exception of makomenaw (2012): “one where the researcher understands the role of indigenous history, culture, language, and self-determination in the lives of indigenous peoples” (p. 858). cheng et al. (2009) described a process they termed “full-cycle indigenous research approach” that included five steps: discovery of interesting phenomena, field observations, construction of the theoretical framework, empirical examination, and theory refinement. this article represented one of few that came from an indigenous asian perspective and from a discipline outside of psychology or the health sciences—in this case, business. cheng et al. (2009) noted that they chose an indigenous approach because bringing a western theory into a chinese context may prove challenging and ultimately futile, due to the required incorporation of chinese traditions and social thought. chinn (2007) described utilizing decolonizing methodologies originally laid out by smith (1999) to examine secondary school science curriculum “through the lenses of marginalized (traditional, local, indigenous, sustainable) and dominant cultures (capitalistic, consumer oriented)” (p. 1254). they also engaged participants in five of the critical indigenous research activities proposed by smith (1999): indigenizing, connecting, writing, representing, and discovering. m e t h o d s o f t e n u s e d i n a w e s t e r n c o n t e x t kovach (2010) described a “paradigmatic approach” to research with indigenous peoples as influencing “the choice of methods (i.e. why a particular method is chosen), how those methods are employed (i.e. how data are gathered), and how the data will be analyzed and interpreted” (p. 42). within this indigenous approach to research, she utilized a conversational method to collect data (kovach, 2010). the conversational method originated from storytelling and kovach indicated that this method is found within western research. however, the conversational method in indigenous research differs from its use in western research in several ways: a connection to indigenous knowledge, a location within an indigenous paradigm, a relational nature, a purpose (which is often decolonizing), following a specific protocol that reflects the indigenous knowledge, a flexible nature, collaboration, and reflexivity (kovach, 2010). dennis (2014) also utilized a conversational method and noted one benefit as greater control of disclosure for participants, which is consistent with cultural norms. p h o t o v o i c e . photovoice is a widely used western research method that originated in the early 2000’s (castleden, garvin, & huu-ay-aht first nation, 2008; hurworth, 2003). one advantage of using photovoice is participant engagement—if participants are not engaged in the research by providing the photos or videos and voiceover that serve as data, then the researcher has no data to analyze (castleden et al., 2008). this involvement in the data collection process also promotes a sense of ownership over 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.5 the data, which is important in research with indigenous peoples and particularly cbpr (castleden et al., 2008). jones, ingham, cram, dean, and davies (2013) also indicated that photovoice is useful in traversing the divide that is presented between researchers and the indigenous peoples with whom they collaborate. a u t o e t h n o g r a p h y . autoethnography was also utilized in several research projects with indigenous peoples. mcivor (2010) explicitly noted that her research method was an attempt to blend autoethnography with indigenous research methods and paradigms. the similarities between storytelling (an indigenous research method), autoethnography (which can be understood as telling one’s own story), and the connection between the researcher and the participant(s) served as the rationale for this approach (mcivor, 2010). smithers-graeme (2013) suggested that researchers orient themselves using six questions proposed by wilson (2008). for example, “how do my methods help to build respectful relationships between the topic i am studying and myself as researcher (on multiple levels)” (wilson, 2008, p. 77)? this process results in a combined indigenous research paradigm– authethnographic approach (smithers-graeme, 2013). this method can also be thought of as a form of storytelling in which autobiography (stories about ourselves) and ethnography (stories about cultures) are combined (lashua & fox, 2006). this collaborative approach can facilitate connection between two groups (lashua & fox, 2006). m i x e d m e t h o d s . in western research, the term “mixed methods” typically refers to combining quantitative and qualitative data collection in a single project. botha (2012) has proposed that, within indigenous research, the term reflects a synthesis of the qualitative approaches that typify research with indigenous peoples and also unique indigenous methods or ways of knowing. he argued that while qualitative methods are often utilized to obtain data when working with indigenous peoples, indigenous methods go further (botha, 2012). botha (2012) provided an example of this mixed methods approach. while examining the relationships between western and indigenous peoples in africa, he utilized an ethnographic approach (western) and then went further by re-analyzing the data and writing narratives in a reflexive process. through this reflexive process, botha (2012) considered the values of the indigenous peoples, including “ethical and relational aspects of knowledge making” (p. 317), which allowed for enhanced understanding of the data. hill, pace, and robbins (2010) utilized the western definition of mixed methods research (i.e., quantitative–qualitative) and added an indigenous methodology when evaluating cultural validity of the minnesota multiphasic personality inventory-2. the purpose of this indigenous methodology was to prioritize indigenous values and opinions within the analysis (hill et al., 2010). the researchers also incorporated several elements of a cbpr approach (e.g., seeking community consultation and verification on analysis), but did not explicitly name this approach (hill et al., 2010). elston, saunders, hayes, bainbridge, and mccoy (2013) noted that their mixed methods approach allowed for increased involvement of indigenous peoples in health research concerning themselves. chilisa and tsheko (2014) utilized a mixed methods approach across multiple phases of data collection in a study that examined beliefs about hiv amongst adolescents in botswana. initially, they combined western and indigenous qualitative methods (proverbs, metaphors, stories, myths, and traditional songs) that resonated with the culture in which they were conducting research. their second and third phases were in line with method utilized by hill et al. (2010): quantitative-qualitative-indigenous (chilisa & tsheko, 2014). this process began by utilizing indigenous knowledge on sex and sexuality 5 drawson et al.: indigenous research methods published by scholarship@western, 2017 and the qualitative data generated in the first phase to create a questionnaire. this survey was reviewed by a community advisory board (often suggested within a cbpr framework), distributed to local adolescents, and then the data were analyzed using western quantitative methods. indigenous and quantitative methods were combined in the final phase, which included a control group. the authors noted that imparting helpful knowledge upon all participants was an important value for the indigenous peoples and thus a health promotion intervention (not related to hiv) was provided for control participants (chilisa & tsheko, 2014). s e l f l o c a t i o n . self-location was identified as an indigenous research method in one study (gillies, burleigh, snowshoe, & werner, 2014). the purpose of using this method was to “develop deeper understandings and heightened consciousness of the socio-economic and political conditions of violence with which indigenous youth in canada interact” (gillies et al., 2014, p. 5). the authors noted that there is a relational process required in self-locating and that many indigenous groups hold relationality as an important part of identity. another benefit of self-locating is acknowledging the enmeshed nature of one’s personal and professional lives and identity, which the authors argue cannot be separated. e m i c e t i c a p p r o a c h . two studies explored an emic-etic approach, specifically within the context of personality assessment (fetvadjiev, meiring, van de vijver, nel, & hill, 2015; leong, leung, & cheung, 2010). this method entails the researchers focusing on independently uncovering both universal (emic) and specific indigenous (etic) factors related to the construct in question; this approach ensures that the final data includes both majority culture factors and also indigenous factors. these two categories of constructs have historically been thought of as distinct and somewhat conflicting; however, fetvadjiev et al. (2015) found that indigenous personality factors mapped on to the big five model. leong et al. (2010) also noted similarities across general personality factors and those generated from chinese novels and proverbs. c o m m u n i t y b a s e d p a r t i c i p a t o r y r e s e a r c h ( c b p r ) cbpr is regarded as an acceptable approach to indigenous research. the policy document created by the first nations information governance centre (2014) that outlines principles related to data ownership, control, access, and possession (ocap™) recommended that community-based and participatory approaches be the predominant approaches within indigenous research (fnigc, 2014). cbpr encompasses collaborative research endeavours that prioritize the needs of the community. other forms of such approaches include those labeled as participatory action research, communitybased research, participatory evaluation, collaborative inquiry, and participatory research. although distinctions exist between each of these frameworks, these terms have been used interchangeably as the underlying goal of collaboration, research equality, and community control. reviews of cbpr literature have recommended many components to prioritize within a cbpr approach (laveaux & christopher, 2009). commonly referenced principles include those described by israel, schulz, parker, and becker (1998), which have been found to be moderately applicable to indigenous cbpr principles (laveaux & christopher, 2009; lewis & boyd, 2012). these principles are as follows: a. recognizes community as a unity of identity. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.5 b. builds on strengths and resources of the community. c. facilitates collaborative partnerships in all phases of the research. d. integrates knowledge and action for mutual benefits of all partners. e. promotes a co-learning and empowering process that attends to all social inequalities. f. involves a cyclical and iterative process. g. addresses health from both positive and ecological perspectives. h. disseminates findings and knowledge gained to all partners. cbpr creates necessary partnerships within a research team that prioritizes the needs of those directly affected by the issue of interest. results are derived with direct supervision from those that need the knowledge the most, and those that can make the best use of them. although there are many levels of involvement of the researcher within such cbpr partnerships, the model promoted for indigenous research prioritizes the community’s needs and makes space for the researcher when necessary, recognizing the importance of reciprocity. rather than a researcher addressing their own professional needs within projects, communities control all aspects of the project and assume all decision-making responsibilities. cbpr is often situated as a framework used to complement an indigenous method, as both a philosophy to research and as an approach (castleden et al., 2008). it involves many steps necessary to ensure the collaboration of research participants with the research team. equality is promoted throughout project development, data collection, data analysis, and dissemination of results. methods used within cbpr often begin long before any project development occurs. logistical needs within cbpr involve creation of a research team or research partnerships such as development of a research advisory board, determination of roles within the project, such as project leaderships, and developing research standards (velasquez, knatterud-hubinger, narr, mendenhall, & solheim, 2011). such processes have been described as engaged acclimatization, which was documented as crafting relations, learning, immersion, and activism (grimwood, doubleday, ljubicic, donaldson, & blangy, 2012). this communication is fundamental within a cpbr approach; however, critical issues about authorship or acknowledgement within community-based research have been inconsistently applied (castleden, morgan, & neimanis, 2010). cbpr, as an indigenous research method, is not a form of data collection, but embeds other indigenous methods within it. cbpr has been used to facilitate initiatives related to photovoice (castleden et al., 2008), story-telling (christensen, 2012), multi-method research including focus groups (garakani, 2014), semi-structured interviews (cameron et al., 2014; ivers et al., 2015), web-based surveys (fox et al., 2011), yarning (russell-mundine, 2007), and other mixed-method approaches (le & gobert, 2015). the adaptability of cbpr values has been praised as a way to ensure research is completed in accordance with local norms and customs of communities through their chosen research method (christensen, 2012). 7 drawson et al.: indigenous research methods published by scholarship@western, 2017 s t o r y t e l l i n g story and the act of storytelling are profoundly important in many indigenous societies (mcivor, 2010). storytelling is a qualitative research method, in that participants describe their answers orally rather than on questionnaires, although the relationship and co-creation between the researcher and participant or a group of participants is also considered (dyll-myklebust, 2014; hall et al., 2015; roe et al., 2012; wright et al., 2012). wright et al. (2012) indicated that storytelling was the ideal method for integrating nonhuman elements (e.g., animals, water, wind) into their data collection and analysis. storytelling can also be useful in the dissemination of knowledge uncovered in the data collection and/or analysis phases. christensen (2012) struggled with how to translate the information she collected on homeless individuals in the northwest territories, but found storytelling (situated within a cbpr framework) to be essential in engaging community members. y a r n i n g . yarning is considered by some to be a subtype of storytelling methodology; one research team (geia, hayes, & usher, 2013) used the terms somewhat interchangeably throughout their paper. the name “yarning” is said to come from modern indigenous people, who use the term to describe a culture-specific type of conversation (fredericks et al., 2011). walker, fredericks, mills, and anderson (2014) defined yarning as “a conversational process that involves the sharing of stories and the development of knowledge. it prioritizes indigenous ways of communicating, in that it is culturally prescribed, cooperative, and respectful” (p. 1216). utilizing yarning in data collection can help to ensure that the research paradigm is culturally safe, which may enhance the validity of data (fredericks et al., 2011; roe et al., 2012). yarning equalizes researchers and participants (especially useful when conducting research across cultures) and allows the participants to guide the conversation that serves as data collection (ghys & gray, 2012; walker et al., 2014). the purpose of the yarn also differentiates it: there can be social yarning and more formal research topic yarning (bessarab & ng’andu, 2010). two other types of storytelling were noted: readers’ theatre (cueva et al., 2012) and digital storytelling (willox, harper, & edge, ‘my word’: storytelling and digital media lab, & rigolet inuit community government, 2013). readers’ theatre (reading a written script in a group setting) was also noted as a type of storytelling that can be helpful in the dissemination of research to indigenous peoples (cueva et al., 2012). one benefit of readers’ theatre is the “opportunity to read the voice and feel the emotion of a different gender, age, and life experience” (p. 282). storytelling was also modernized through a digital storytelling method (willox et al., 2013). the purpose of this digitalization was to avoid the limitations of typical interview-based narrative research, mainly that the participants’ narratives are still processed through the lens of the researcher, a process that holds the potential for bias and skewing of the participants’ meaning. this digital process removed the researcher from any step from data collection to dissemination (willox et al., 2013). c u l t u r e s p e c i f i c m e t h o d s a large number of studies utilized a specific indigenous method—one that originates from the indigenous group that is collaborating on the study and is unlikely to be translatable to another context. for the purpose of organization, we have included subheadings regarding the geographic location and/or indigenous group from which the method originated; however, the authors recognize that 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.5 indigenous peoples, even those from the same location or group, are diverse. we have deemed these “culture-specific methods.” māo r i c u l t u r e . many of the māori people of new zealand are involved in research with their communities and, as such, specific māori research methods have been outlined in the literature. kaupapa māori was cited more often than any other culture-specific method uncovered in this review (mccleland, 2011; smith, 1999). this is a method that is “steeped in the principles, culture, and philosophy of being māori” (mccleland, 2011, p. 363) and can be translated as “māori ideology” (brewer, harwood, mccann, crengle, & worrall, 2014, p. 1288). this includes self-determination, cultural aspirations, culturally preferred pedagogy, mediation of socioeconomic impediments, extended family social structures and practice, and a collective vision (mccleland, 2011; smith, 1999). a kaupapa māori approach centralizes māori worldview and beliefs so that each step of the research process is compatible (mccleland, 2011; raerino, macmillan, & jones, 2013; smith, 1999). relationality is also central to a kaupapa māori method (jones et al., 2013). kaupapa māori methodology came from the colonial history of research being done on the māori instead of with these groups and so a central tenet is that the research should benefit the māori people (mclellan, mccann, worrall, & harwood, 2014). elder (2013) also utilized three specific kaupapa māori methods—noho puku (self-reflection), whanaungatanga (connection), and kaitiakitanga (guardianship)—in the data analysis portion of their study, although the entire project was guided by māori principles. a kaupapa māori method was used across a wide variety of health research areas including speech pathology (brewer et al., 2014), nursing (mccleland, 2011), asthma (jones et al., 2013), and traumatic brain injury (elder, 2013). the māori term “whānau” can be translated to mean extended family and additional words can be used to specify if the individual is referring to their genetic family or others with whom they share a familial level of closeness (tomlins-jahnke & gillies, 2012). tomlins-jahnke and gillies (2012) discussed a whānau research method, which operates under several other māori principles, such as whakapapa (genealogy, acknowledging that one has descended from his or her ancestors) and kaitiakitanga (becoming a guardian of data and knowledge revealed in research. this method also included individual community members serving as agents of data collection, who would record whānau in conversations, which were then transcribed by an appointed whānau researcher. next, whānau members listened to some of the conversations and collaborated with researchers on interpretation before coding and developing a model, which was the ultimate goal of the research. several other uniquely māori research methods were documented in this review. marae wānanga (culturally-relevant meetings in traditional locations) were utilized in focus group-like discussions in order to ensure cultural safety and that ceremony would be embedded in the data collection (elder, 2013). “whakawhiti kōrero, literally the exchange of ideas and discussion,” (elder & kersten, 2015, p. 1) was utilized to develop a māori-specific assessment tool (te waka kuaka) to be used with individuals with traumatic brain injuries. i n d i g e n o u s n o r t h a m e r i c a n c u l t u r e s . wilson and restoule (2010) reflected on the changes brought about in research with first nations people of canada when tobacco is offered as part of the process (i.e., tobacco ties). tobacco was used to create relationships and secure a depth of knowledge from elders (wilson & restoule, 2010). the researchers considered that a refusal of tobacco could be interpreted as a refusal to consent in the research process (struthers & hodge, 2004; wilson & restoule, 9 drawson et al.: indigenous research methods published by scholarship@western, 2017 2010). before offering tobacco to elders, the researchers encouraged those utilizing a tobacco ties method to reflect on their research question and purpose when planting and harvesting the medicine (wilson & restoule, 2010). using tobacco for its original, sacred purpose also serves to reclaim this practice and correct misunderstandings from non-indigenous peoples (wilson & restoule, 2010). burchill, lau, pyett, kelly, waples-crowe, and liaw (2011) generated a unique hunting and gathering metaphor for creating focus groups. “the hunting process involved the aboriginal researchers using their community knowledge of cultural protocols to make connections . . . and their understanding of the time needed to build relationships of mutual trust” (p. 32) to identify participants while the gathering portion involved flexibility and the incorporation of cultural practices to create a safe environment for participants (burchill et al., 2011). another indigenous approach to focus groups is the talking circle (haozous, eschiti, lauderdale, hill, & amos, 2010). the talking circle is a tribal method of group information sharing and discussion, with a focus on cooperation within the group. a talisman is often used to denote the speaker at any given time (haozous et al., 2010). lavallée (2009) utilized a sharing circle method, which is similar to a focus group method in that participants are gathered together to discuss the research topic for the purpose of data collection. lavallée (2009) differentiated the more western focus group from the indigenous sharing circle through “the sacred meaning [sharing circles] have in many indigenous cultures and in the growth and transformation bases for the participants” and the “acts of sharing all aspects of the individual—heart, mind, body, and spirit” (p. 29). the sharing circle method also rebalances the power dynamic in the researcher–participant relationship—the participants grant the researcher permission to use the dialogue generated in the circle for research purposes (lavallée, 2009). anishnaabe symbol-based reflection was defined by lavallée (2009) as a participatory action research method, but a culture-specific one. she also noted that the development of this method was influenced by photovoice, a western research method. participants were instructed to create symbolic artwork that reflected their feelings about a program in their community and then describe their symbols within a sharing circle format. the combined symbol as well as description of the symbol served as the data for this project (lavallée, 2009). the anishinaabe mino-bimaadiziwin (the good life) research methodology was presented by debassige (2010). this methodology is spiritual and incorporates “past, present, and future of good and respectful approaches to life” (p. 11) into the research process. debassige (2010) recommended that researchers engaged in anishinaabe mino-bimaadiziwin should seek, do, learn, and live in a spiritcentered way, such that this concept encapsulates their entire research program. o’reilly-scanlon, crowe, and weenie (2004) detailed the inclusion of the cree word “wahkohtowin” (kinship/relatedness) in a research methodology. wahkohtowin represented a combination of the indigenous concept that research is story and the western theory of memory-work. the authors noted the benefits of using wahkohtowin as a research methodology: relationships were formed on the basis of “trust, flexibility, humour, and a willingness to move beyond our personal comfort levels to a place of shared understanding and experience” (o’reilly-scanlon et al., 2004, p. 41). hall et al. (2015) discussed the application of two-eyed seeing in research. this approach aims “to see from one eye with the strengths of indigenous ways of knowing, and to see from the other eye with the 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.5 strengths of western ways of knowing, and to use both of these eyes together” (bartlett, marshall, & marshall, 2012, p. 335), thereby incorporating the benefits from both a western and indigenous lens (hall et al., 2015). i n d i g e n o u s a u s t r a l i a n c u l t u r e . pathway is an indigenous research method and metaphor that was developed with aboriginal peoples of australia. it utilizes concepts of the mountains, winds, and orientation (fredericks, 2007). in this framework, the path provides the structure that the research study will follow and the way refers to the process of carrying out this research (fredericks, 2007). dadirri was also adapted from indigenous australian culture and is defined as “deep and respectful listening” (stronach & adair, 2014, p. 117). in this one study, dadirri was combined with a conversational method of qualitative data collection “to appreciate how and why indigenous people function in their own cultures and environments” (stronach & adair, 2014, p. 123). despite not following a western framework of research methods (e.g., no explicit focus on data collection), the use of dadirri has the potential to enhance the depth of understanding on a topic (stronach & adair, 2014). i n d i g e n o u s f i l i p i n o c u l t u r e . a variety of indigenous research methods rooted in filipino culture also emerged in this review. research in psychology in the philippines has generated the term “sikolohiyang pilipino,” which refers to a uniquely filipino perspective on psychology (enriquez, 1992; protacio-marcelino, 1990). in order to house this entire branch of psychology that is specifically filipino, there is a whole library of indigenous filipino research methods (church & katigbak, 2002; protaciomarcelino, 1990). while we cannot explore the depth of each filipino research method in this review, we have provided a summary. church and katigbak (2002) presented an overview of several filipino research methods: pakapa-kapa (groping), pagmamasid (general scanning or looking around), pakikiramdam (sensing, feeling what is happening), pagtatanung-tanong (unstructured, informal, interactive questioning) (pe-pua, 1989), pagsubok (testing the situation), padalaw-dalaw (occasional visits made to respondents’ homes), pakikisangkot (deeper involvement in barrio activities), paali-aligid (casing), pakikipagkuwentuhan (storytelling), pakikisama (frequent interaction with the research participants), pakikipanuluyan (residing in the research setting), nakikiugaling pagmamasid (adopting the ways of a group one is observing), ginabayang talakayan (guided discussion), and pagninilay or paglilimi (introspection or reflection) (pe-pua, 1989; pe-pua & protacio-marcelino, 2000). both pakapa-kapa (groping) and pagtatanung-tanong (unstructured, informal, interactive questioning) have been explored by many authors (church & katigbak, 2002; pe-pua, 1989; pe-pua & protacio-marcelino, 2000; protacio-marcelino, 1990). pakapa-kapa refers to the investigation of phenomena and data without using a theoretical framework; this practice aids in the development of sikolohiyang pilipino (church & katigbak, 2002; pe-pua & protacio-marcelino, 2000; protacio-marcelino, 1990). pagtatanung-tanong is considered a culturally safe form of qualitative data collection and has been utilized by several filipino researchers (church & katigbak, 2002; pe-pua, 1989; pe-pua & protaciomarcelino, 2000; protacio-marcelino, 1990). most of the filipino methods “involve (1) unstructured (though guided) conversations and discussions, often in a small group context, in lieu of more structured interviews; or (2) various degrees of participant observation” (church & katigbak, 2002, p. 136). these methods also operate from the assumption that the data quality is reliant on the relationship between the researcher and participant and that by utilizing filipino research methods, the power differential between researcher and participant will be negated to some degree (church & katigbak, 2002). 11 drawson et al.: indigenous research methods published by scholarship@western, 2017 i n d i g e n o u s c u l t u r e s o f t h e p a c i f i c i s l a n d s . two research methods unique to the people of the pacific islands (in this case, samoa) were discussed by suaalii-sauni and fulu-aiolupotea (2014): talanoa and faafaletui. talanoa is an oral research method that provides a “cultural synthesis” through participants’ sharing of stories (suaalii-sauni & fulu-aiolupotea, 2014, p. 334). faafaletui is the act of weaving together different stories and pieces of ancestral samoan knowledge. together, these two samoan methods allow researchers to utilize a culturally specific and culturally safe method to elicit information from participants and also analyze this information into a culturally relevant narrative (suaalii-sauni & fulu-aiolupotea, 2014). m u s l i m c u l t u r e . a single muslim research method emerged in this review: halaqah (ahmed, 2014). halaqah was created by prophet muhammad for the purpose of educating early adopters of islam and, although there is considerable variation in modern practices, ultimately refers to group-based narrative generation (ahmed, 2014). ahmed (2014) also proposed a list of islamic research principles, similar to counterparts engaged in kaupapa māori research. these principles are: primacy of qur’an and prophetic sayings, combining classical islamic scholarship and sciences with a range of other research methods, using all human faculties of understanding, intellectual, rational, intuitive, and spiritual, centering the human situation in research, islamic ethics and etiquette, and collaborative, participative, transformative, and useful research. d i s c u s s i o n in western approaches, research is understood as knowledge creation (cihr, 2006)—if a researcher is interested in understanding more about a specific phenomenon, they select an appropriate method to explore with as much scientific rigor as possible. one distinction between western and indigenous research methods lies in this purpose: research done in collaboration with indigenous peoples cannot only reveal knowledge, but also decolonize, rebalance power, and provide healing (brewer et al., 2014; debassige, 2010; ghys & gray, 2012; hall et al., 2015; le & gobert, 2015; walker et al., 2014). mcivor (2010) even argued that self-determination and decolonization serve as the connection amongst all indigenous research methods. broadly, indigenous methods should include methods that are culturally relevant and can serve beyond data collection to create relationships and support autonomy (cueva et al., 2012; lavallée, 2009). developing a positive relationship with the community in which the research is taking place is a requirement for the majority of indigenous research methods laid out in this review (lavallée, 2009). this ensures that the community members are involved in the research in some capacity, whether that be consultation, data collection, analysis, or dissemination of results. the inclusion of indigenous peoples in the research process, a privilege that had historically been denied, was cited by many as a significant benefit (elston et al., 2013; le & gobert, 2015; raerino et al., 2013). “the domain of research and science was mobilised to suit the imperialist agenda” (dyll-myklebust, 2014, p. 524), and by utilizing indigenous research methods, those with formal training can invite marginalized groups and individuals to participate in meaningful ways and also work collaboratively to build capacity. this equalizing can also lead to a culturally safe environment for participants (mccleland, 2011; roe et al., 2012). le and gobert (2015) emphasized, “there is also an implicit assumption that the research is reciprocal—that knowledge and power is shared equitably between the researchers and the community, and that the community can be enriched by the process” (p. 20). 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.5 many of these indigenous research methods can also transform qualitative research from a deficit-based perspective to a resilience perspective (roe et al., 2012). additionally, several articles reinforced the importance of including indigenous peoples in the research process (i.e., in data collection and/or analysis) (cameron et al., 2014; dennis, 2014; evans et al., 2009; geia, 2013; helps & barclay, 2015; nakamura, 2013; russell-mundine, 2007). authors that specifically utilized an indigenous mixed methods approach noted the main benefit was having an opportunity to include marginalized voices in the research (botha, 2012; chilisa & tsheko, 2014; hill et al., 2010). chilisa and tsheko (2014) concluded, “there cannot be an indigenous research without mixed methods” (p. 224); in other words, when indigenous peoples contribute to the research in a meaningful way, this constitutes a mixed methods approach. another theme that emerged in the analysis of the literature was that indigenous research methods prevent the prioritization of western ways of knowing, which is common in most scientific pursuits. this primacy of indigenous ways of knowing was incorporated in a variety of ways from project design (hall et al., 2015), to explicit inclusion of knowledge holders (e.g., elders) (lavallée, 2009; o’reilly-scanlon et al., 2004), to offering of sacred medicines when carrying out data collection or analysis (lavallée, 2009; wilson & restoule, 2010). debassige (2010) presented a research methodology that is centered in anishnaabe spiritual beliefs and ahmed (2014) derived a method from ancient islamic practices— this inclusion of spirituality is virtually absent from western research and, often, western research theories would condemn the contamination of a method with a spiritual undertone. some researchers chose to use only traditional language in their data collection phases, which allowed participants to express culture-specific words and concepts that could not be readily translated into english (elder & kersten, 2015). this practice also prioritizes indigenous knowledge, which can be a decolonizing process (chilisa & tsheko, 2014). naming the research method or methodology using indigenous language is also beneficial for participants and those who will receive the knowledge resulting from the research process (elder & kersten, 2015). one of the explicit benefits of choosing an indigenous research method is that situating yourself in the context is inherent in the process. as cameron et al. (2014) stated, “for non-indigenous researchers, an indigenous methodology allows the researcher to enter into the world alongside indigenous experience rather than framing the indigenous world-view from a distance” (p. e5). by utilizing an indigenous method or framework, researchers aimed to incorporate indigenous knowledge, history, and experiences in the research process (lavallée, 2009; roe et al., 2012; russell-mundine, 2007). a crucial consideration for researchers engaged in indigenous research methods and frameworks is context. the importance of context when working with indigenous peoples and communities has been discussed in the literature before (king, 2015); however, this is amplified when utilizing indigenous research methods and frameworks. an important component of all indigenous research methods is situating the research within the context of the data source(s). this means that the data collection, analysis, and interpretation may vary considerably more in research approached using an indigenous method or framework compared to typically western methods that are often highly standardized and where removing context from the research is paramount. the majority of the research methods presented in this review emphasized the importance of situating the researcher and/or the indigenous group(s) involved in the research. throughout this review, a focus on predominantly canadian indigenous ethical policy, by using explicit search terms of recognized indigenous peoples in canada, 13 drawson et al.: indigenous research methods published by scholarship@western, 2017 generated specific contextual knowledge. despite this prioritization of canadian populations, methods were considered to be indigenous if they were identified as such by the people using them. these methods were included, regardless of the context in which they were used, to reduce the imposition of individual author evaluations of what constitutes as indigenous research. many of the studies that utilized an indigenous research method also employed a qualitative method for data collection (cameron et al., 2014; chinn, 2007; dennis, 2014; dyll-myklebust, 2014; elder & kersten, 2015; evans et al., 2009; graveline, 2000; helps & barclay, 2015; kovach, 2010; lashua & fox, 2006; lavallée, 2009; nakamura, 2013; o’reilly-scanlon et al., 2004; roe, zeitz, & fredericks, 2012; willox et al., 2013). several other researchers chose to combine a variety of indigenous research methods and frameworks within a single study. for example, evans et al. (2009) framed their research within participatory action research and indigenous methods, but then also included a culture-specific method, en’owkinwixw, for a specific element of their data collection. en’owkinwixw is similar to a talking circle; however, the larger group split into four smaller groups at times throughout the sessions and then brought the ideas generated in those smaller groups back to the whole (evans et al., 2009). castleden et al. (2008) also situated their study within a cbpr framework and used photovoice as a data collection method. other specific methods emerged with distinct benefits. storytelling was noted as helpful in decolonizing through the research process. relationality is inherent in storytelling and this component can help to ensure that the participants are respected as equal partners in the uncovering of knowledge (dyllmykelbust, 2014). yarning is also helpful in decolonizing the research process and removing the power imbalance inherent in the researcher–subject relationship (geia et al., 2013). careful listening is inherent in yarning, as one should be fully engaged in the conversation at hand (russell-mundine, 2007). this engagement can result in data that are more valid and also build rapport and respect amongst researchers and participants or collaborators (russell-mundine, 2007). as yarning is already embedded in some indigenous cultures, it can be a familiar and safe tool for research (bessarab & ng’andu, 2010). storytelling was also the only method used in knowledge translation (christensen, 2012). this researcher evaluated her knowledge translation efforts and received positive feedback regarding ease of understanding and relatability (christensen, 2012). many indigenous research methods and methodologies are also marked by innovation. the research team of willox et al. (2013) identified shortcomings with the traditional storytelling method (e.g., perpetuating colonization through the data analysis phase) and engaged in problem solving around these issues, which resulted in the use of a digital storytelling method. this method removed the researcher from the analysis and interpretation of the data to ensure that participants’ output was presented solely through their worldview (willox et al., 2013). the principal benefit in choosing a culture-specific method is that many of the limitations inherent in imposing a western method on an indigenous group are nullified. several of the māori researchers described how a method that adopts māori worldview, beliefs, and principles “fits” better with māori participants (jones et al., 2013; mccleland, 2011; tomlins-jahnke, 2012). this enhanced match between participant and method allows for a more collaborative research process, but may also be important in the healing process of indigenous methods described by many researchers. smith (1999) 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.5 contrasted the general focus on economic gains of most research in new zealand with the focus on reclaiming history and resources, such as land and water, of kaupapa māori. the published literature on indigenous research methods and methodologies can be organized into five themes: general indigenous frameworks, western methods in an indigenous context, communitybased participatory research, storytelling, and culture-specific methods. across all five themes, each indigenous research method had the following components: a. contextual reflection, in that the researchers must situate themselves and the indigenous peoples with whom they are collaborating in the research process. b. inclusion of indigenous peoples in the research process in a way that is respectful and reciprocal as well as decolonizing and preserves self-determination. c. prioritization of indigenous ways of knowing. l e s s o n s l e a r n e d . researchers interested in pursuing a program that includes indigenous research methods should incorporate this perspective in every step of the process—from the conception of the research question through knowledge translation and exchange. unlike western research methods, indigenous research methods require that all components in the process embody the values of the indigenous group involved. after reviewing the methods and methodologies presented in the literature, the authors also concluded that using an indigenous method necessitates an indigenous methodology, but that an indigenous methodology could be utilized with strictly western methods. for example, if a researcher was planning to use a talking circle method, then they must approach the entirety of their research with an indigenous methodology, but a researcher employing an overall indigenous methodology could do so while using western methods, such as surveys. what is important is that the indigenous community involved has the ability to determine the direction and approaches that are preferred. indigenous research methods are as diverse as the communities using them, making an encompassing definition of these methods difficult to obtain. the authors of this article also purposefully did not define “indigenous” prior to the systematic review procedure in order to ensure that the review was comprehensive and inclusive in that any method or framework that an author determined to be indigenous was reviewed. despite this definitional challenge, a researcher interested in pursuing an indigenous approach should begin their process with reflection, both in terms of their place in the research and also the indigenous peoples with whom they are collaborating. this reflection should be combined with conversations with community members and collaborators to determine methods and frameworks that prioritize indigenous ways of knowing throughout all stages of the project. one can utilize various narrative methods, such as storytelling (wright et al., 2012), talking circles (hoazous et al., 2010), the conversational method (kovach, 2010) and yarning (geia et al., 2013). others methods are specific to communities or cultures, and thus difficult to generalize appropriately, such as the anishnaabe symbol-based reflection (lavallée, 2009). researchers have also used western approaches within indigenous communities, such as community-based participatory research (christensen, 2012; 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(2012). telling stories in, through and with country: engaging with indigenous and more-than-human methodologies at bawaka, ne australia. journal of cultural geography, 29(1), 39–60. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/08873631.2012.646890 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.5 a p p e n d i x a f l o w d i a g r a m f o r s e l e c t i o n o f a r t i c l e s f o r t h e s t u d y articles excluded for not meeting inclusion criteria (n = 205) articles that met the inclusion criteria (n = 64) initial search for articles that included any of the search terms (n = 2,310) articles retained based on review of the title and abstract (n = 269) 25 drawson et al.: indigenous research methods published by scholarship@western, 2017 the international indigenous policy journal april 2017 indigenous research methods: a systematic review alexandra s. drawson elaine toombs christopher j. mushquash recommended citation indigenous research methods: a systematic review abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license indigenous research methods: a systematic review microsoft word 8215 cover page.docx the international indigenous policy journal volume 11 | issue 4 november 2020 a journey of doing research “in a good way”: partnership, ceremony, and reflections contributing to the care and wellbeing of indigenous women living with hiv in canada doris peltier canadian aboriginal aids network, canada, dorpeltier@yahoo.ca carrie martin mi’gmaq, canadian aboriginal aids network, canada, carriem@caan.ca renée masching canadian aboriginal aids network, canada, reneem@caan.ca mike standup elder, mohawk nation, mikestandup@hotmail.com claudette cardinal plains cree, faculty of health sciences, simon fraser university, canada, claudette.cardinal@hotmail.com valerie nicholson faculty of health sciences, simon fraser university, canada, vjnicholson@live.ca mina kazemi women's college research institute, women’s college hospital, canada, mina.kazemi@wchospital.ca angela kaida faculty of health sciences, simon fraser university, canada, kangela@sfu.ca laura warren women’s college research institute, women’s college hospital, canada, lawarren@gmail.com denise jaworsky northern medical program, university of northern british columbia, canada, denisewj@gmail.com laverne gervais ka ni kanichihk, canada, lgervais@kanikanichihk.ca alexandra de pokomandy department of family medicine, mcgill university, canada, alexandra.depokomandy@mcgill.ca sharon bruce max rady college of medicine, rady faculty of health sciences, university of manitoba, canada, sharon.bruce@umanitoba.ca saara greene school of social work, mcmaster university, canada, greenes@mcmaster.ca marissa becker centre for global public health, department of community health sciences, university of manitoba, canada, marissa.becker@umanitoba.ca jasmine cotnam canadian aboriginal aids network, canada, jasminec@caan.ca kecia larkin pikanii nation and kwa'kwa'ka'wakw nation, kecialarkin@gmail.com kerrigan beaver women’s college research institute, women’s college hospital, canada, kcbeaver007@yahoo.ca carrie bourassa college of medicine, university of saskatchewan, canada, carrie.bourassa@usask.ca mona loutfy women’s college research institute, women’s college hospital, canada, mona.loutfy@wchospital.ca recommended citation peltier, d., martin c, masching, r., standup, m., cardinal, c., nicholson, v., kazemi, m., kaida, a., warren, l., jaworsky, d., gervais, l., de pokomandy, a., bruce, s., greene, s., becker, m., cotnam, j., larkin, k., beaver, k., bourassa, c., & loutfy m. (2020). a journey of doing research “in a good way”: partnership, ceremony, and reflections contributing to the care and wellbeing of indigenous women living with hiv in canada. the international indigenous policy journal, 11(4). http://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.8215 a journey of doing research “in a good way”: partnership, ceremony, and reflections contributing to the care and wellbeing of indigenous women living with hiv in canada abstract the relationship between the first peoples of canada and researchers is changing as processes of selfdetermination and reconciliation are increasingly implemented. we used storytelling and ceremony to describe a historic event, the indigenous women’s data transfer ceremony, where quantitative data of 318 indigenous women living with hiv were transferred to indigenous academic and community leaders. relationship building, working together with a common vision, the ceremony, and the subsequent activities were summarized as a journey of two boats. the truth and reconciliation commission of canada’s calls to action and indigenous ethical principles were central to the process. the article ends with team members’ reflections and the importance of shifting power to indigenous peoples in regard to data collection, their stories, and the resulting policies. keywords indigenous women, hiv, chiwos, data transfer, ceremony, indigenous ethics, allyship, truth and reconciliation commission of canada, self-determination acknowledgements the canadian hiv women’s sexual and reproductive health cohort study (chiwos) research team would like to especially thank all of the women living with hiv who participated in the research and entrusted chiwos with their experiences of hiv treatment, care, and support. we also thank the entire national team of co investigators, collaborators, and peer research associates. we would like to acknowledge the three provincial community advisory boards, and the national chiwos indigenous advisory board, chiwos african, caribbean and black advisory board, and our partnering organizations for supporting the study. we also acknowledge the bc centre for excellence in hiv for in kind data management and analytic support. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. peltier et al.: a journey of doing research “in a good way” published by scholarship@western, 2020 1 a journey of doing research “in a good way”: partnership, ceremony, and reflections contributing to the care and wellbeing of indigenous women living with hiv in canada creator, i am known as rasennakohe (my mohawk name). bear clan, mohawk being the way of my people. creator, i am asking you in the business we are all working at, that we use a good mind, a one mind. to arrive at peaceful conclusions, using one mind and a good mind. opening prayer, elder mike standup all people need information to understand, help, or solve the issues they are facing individually, collectively, and within their contexts (rainie et al., 2017). sometimes information is generated through formal research activities, and such information is termed “data.” however, historically, there lies a tension when indigenous peoples are involved in research and research data are generated. the tension stems from the harm done by colonizers to the first peoples of many countries, including canada, resulting in distrust of colonial institutions. further, in many cases, research to “collect data” about indigenous peoples has extracted information, often out of context, and offered no benefit to the community. this process article presents how we, as indigenous community leaders and researchers and allied researchers in the field of hiv, came together to manage this research tension by continuously trying our best to do research “in a good way.” doing research in “a good way” has been outlined by our partners at the canadian aboriginal aids network (caan) and the aboriginal hiv/aids community-based research collaborative centre (aha centre) as: (a) research that is done respectfully; (b) that benefits the community; (c) acknowledges that the process is just as, or more important, than the products; and (d) research in which relationship building and relational accountability are at its heart. caan (2011) and aha centre (2018), along with others (see for example ball & janyst, 2008; flicker et al., 2015; kovach, 2005; wilson, 2008), emphasize that doing research “in a good way” uses indigenous ways, ensuring that indigenous peoples reclaim the ownership of their data and stories. drawson et al. (2017) explained that indigenous methods must go beyond data collection to creating relationships, supporting autonomy, facilitating capacity building, and allowing for community healing. specifically, this process article shares and explores the journey that began with collaboration between mona loutfy—an allied researcher—and doris peltier—an indigenous woman, advocate, and now researcher, living with hiv—and the stories of hundreds of women and people who since 2011 have been impacted by this partnership. this journey of indigenous leaders and allied researchers doing research “in a good way” has been guided by and is viewed as a way to enact the national truth and reconciliation commission of canada’s (trc, 2015a) calls to action. using the indigenous research methodology of storytelling, this article describes the journey or process of relationship building, the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.8215 2 working together, a monumental ceremony (i.e., the indigenous women’s data transfer ceremony), reflection, and the continuation together on a path of reconciliation. background and context this journey that we will share with you takes place in canada, from the huron-haudenosaunee [iroquois] word “kanata,” which likely means “village” or “settlement” (government of canada, 2020). prior to colonization, indigenous peoples across turtle island, the name of the land named north america today, lived in independent villages or nations that were self-governed and held collectively. the land was viewed, and is still viewed, as sacred, to be preserved for future generations, and to be lived on according to the teachings from nature. territories were shared by one nation, made up of many families and subgroups; there were alliances between nations and not all nations lived in harmony with one another. the arrival of settlers radically shifted this context, and the resulting introduction of canadian policies, often designed with the intent to destroy indigenous self-governance and individual rights and freedoms by assimilating indigenous peoples into mainstream culture, disrupted precolonial structures. this intentional attack was achieved, in part, by breaking families apart through the establishment of residential schools that were mandated to “kill the indian in the child”; a cultural genocide ensued (trc, 2015b). the horrendous conditions experienced in these schools for more than 150 years resulted in the death of many children, trauma from sexual and physical abuse, loss of language and culture, separation from family, and much more. in 2009, a multi-year process to capture the stories of survivors and those impacted by the residential schools was launched as the trc (2015a). the result was the 2015 release of a collection of reports and 94 calls to action meant to support the process of reconciliation in canada (trc, 2015a). colonialism in canada has been an ongoing, heavily bureaucratic process reliant upon knowledge created about (rather than with and for) indigenous peoples for the purposes of land, economic, and social control. indigenous peoples’ identities have not only been separated by the nations they belonged to, but by the arbitrary, broad terms that the canadian government bestowed on indigenous peoples: first nations (for nations south of the arctic circle), inuit (a large nation living in the arctic region from greenland and eastern canada to alaska), and métis (a distinct heritage of those of mixed first nation and european settler descent, particularly linked with the fur trade). colonialism and assimilation of indigenous peoples through the removal of people from their land, residential schools, assault on indigenous cultures, and segregating the health care system underlie the many social and health inequities that indigenous peoples experienced and still experience today. it was not until 1979 that the government of canada adopted the indian health policy (1979), emphasizing the responsibility of both the federal and provincial governments to provide health services to first nations and inuit1 and that communities could control any or all aspects of the administration of their 1 under canada’s constitution, health care services fall under the jurisdiction of provincial or territorial governments; however, first nations with indian status and inuit fall under federal jurisdiction in all areas including health care (government of canada, n.d.). peltier et al.: a journey of doing research “in a good way” published by scholarship@western, 2020 3 own community health programs at their discretion and with the support of the department of national health and welfare. the trc calls to action highlight the need to reduce health inequities experienced by indigenous peoples and urge the establishment of measurable goals to identify and close gaps in health outcomes. the trc (2015a) reports call upon research and data collection to uphold high ethical standards, particularly given the historical and ongoing misuse of information about indigenous cultures and communities. these ethical standards began to be articulated in canada in 1998, first by first nation communities as the ocap® principles (first nations information governance centre [fnigc], 2015) and then with equivalent métis (national aboriginal health organization [naho], n.d.) and inuit principles (inuit tapiriit kanatami [itk], 2018), giving voice to a set of standards designating how indigenous data must be gathered, used, and disseminated. the ocap® acronym, which stands for ownership, control, access and possession, demands that first nations communities have protection and control of their information and how it is used. the government of canada followed with guidelines for research involving first nations, inuit, and métis peoples of canada. these guidelines were incorporated into chapter nine of the national guide for all research involving human subjects, tri-council policy statement (tcps2): ethical conduct of research involving humans (canadian institutes of health research [cihr] et al., 2018). this chapter is designed to serve as a framework for the ethical conduct of research involving indigenous peoples in canada, ensuring that it is premised on trusting, respectful relationships, and encouraging collaboration and engagement between researchers and participants. importantly, the tcps2 is published by the government of canada in a spirit of respect and is not intended to override or replace ethical guidance offered by indigenous peoples. methods: storytelling and ceremony unlike most academic papers, this piece was written as an iterative process, bringing together both written and oral contributions based on the co-authors’ ideas and personal experiences. the indigenous methodology of storytelling was used and was an essential component of the journey. indigenous coauthors emphasize that storytelling is a way we share our histories and carry our truths. storytelling is an indigenous way of sharing knowledges and research and is one of many existing forms of knowledge (christensen, 2012; wright et al., 2012). margaret kovach (2009) articulated that “if research is about learning, so as to enhance the well-being of the earth’s inhabitants, then story is research” (p. 102). a story is about much more than the content. it has been used for political, social, and personal growth, and to document and then retell history. as described by kovach (2009), “stories are vessels for passing along teachings, medicines, and practices that can assist members of the collective” (p. 95). they are not only about the knowledges, but also about the teller and the relationship the teller holds with that story. in this story, the co-authors write collectively, all together as storytellers. entwined within the story are the relationships that were formed with this work and with each other. knowledges and experiences conveyed orally by indigenous co-authors were recognized as equal contributions and as an example of doing research “in a good way”; their words were transcribed verbatim and integrated into the paper. in the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.8215 4 this article, the resurgence of history and the story of this journey are shared, and in doing so the coauthors “accept the guardianship of bringing oral story into academia” (kovach, 2009, p. 103) and bestow a responsibility on the readers to honour this story by forming a relationship with it and with the authors while reading (wilson, 2008). incorporating indigenous ceremony was critical to the process, as it must be when conducting research “in a good way.” following a recommendation by doris to integrate indigenous ceremony into this article, opening and closing prayers were provided by mohawk elder mike standup. also, the teachings shared during the indigenous women’s data transfer ceremony by elder mike standup were kindly shared with permission in this article. doris suggested that the story be told as an analogy of a journey of two boats to describe mona and her allied research team in their vessel and doris with indigenous researchers and leaders in theirs; together they journeyed over varied terrain: wide lakes, rough waters, calm streams, and both easy and difficult portages.2 as partners, they move forward together in trust, always aiming to contribute to the healing journey and wellbeing of indigenous women living with hiv in canada, and to support indigenous women in the reclamation of their power. through storytelling, the team’s journey is told: from relationship building at the beginning of the journey, to working together in partnership with a common vision, and then to the indigenous women’s data transfer ceremony, which doris referred to as a portage; then the journey continues with reflections from indigenous and allied researchers. finally, doris felt it would be meaningful to enhance the storytelling aspect of this article by interweaving the “herstory” of an indigenous woman living with hiv and aids (as a way to honour her own way of storytelling and reclaim and resurge herstory) throughout with a beginning, middle, and end. my name is claudette cardinal. i come from enoch and kehewin cree nations of alberta. this is my journey, as an indigenous woman in the process of reconciling with myself. this is my journey as an indigenous woman living with hiv and aids. to reconcile means to coexist in harmony. i reconciled with my culture as an indigenous woman and with hiv. growing up i was judged and made fun of as an indigenous child, and because of it, i learned how to be a runner. when i was diagnosed with hiv, i ran. i feared judgment. i ran away from the life i had in alberta and i went as far west as i possibly could go. i relocated to victoria, british columbia to seek health care because i did not want to be treated in my home province. i was told i had two years to live. now it is my 23rd year of living positive. (claudette cardinal’s story, part 1) 2 a portage is the practice of carrying a watercraft over land, either between two bodies of water or around an obstacle. peltier et al.: a journey of doing research “in a good way” published by scholarship@western, 2020 5 results: the history of our journey the beginning of the journey—building relationships in 2011, three non-indigenous hiv researchers, mona, angela, and alexandra, were awarded a canadian institutes of health research (cihr) grant for a large national community-based research (cbr) project entitled: the canadian hiv women’s sexual and reproductive health cohort study (chiwos; loutfy et al., 2017). this project aimed to characterize women-centred hiv care and its impact on the health outcomes of women living with hiv in canada, initially focused on women in quebec, ontario, and british columbia (bc). in the same year, mona heard doris, an ojibwe woman from wikwemikong on manitoulin island in ontario, present environments of nurturing safety (eons) aboriginal women in canada—five year strategy on hiv and aids (2010–2015) written by caan’s voices of women standing committee (caan, 2011). mona was moved by: (a) eons’ values of freedom, respect, courage, and generosity; (b) the five strategic objectives with the mission to respond to hiv/aids women-specific issues where indigenous women living with hiv are equal partners in decisions that impact their health and the health of their children and families; and (c) the 15 positive aboriginal women statements for the creation of safe spaces where indigenous women living with hiv can begin or continue healing journeys. eons called for equal representation of indigenous women at every table and for the elimination of systemic barriers that hinder their meaningful engagement (caan, 2011). as mona was excited to see the similarities between eons and chiwos, she approached doris and suggested that they partner and work together. with that, they each entered the water—mona and her allied research team in their boat and doris with indigenous researchers and leaders in theirs. entering open waters—working together in partnership to strengthen the partnership between chiwos and eons, doris and her team of indigenous women leaders met with mona in 2011 and asserted that chiwos should have an indigenous advisory board. the group held a retreat, which doris named “n’ginaajiiwimi: the essence of who we are is beautiful.” this led to the formation of the indigenous advisory board to chiwos, named the chiwos aboriginal advisory board—prioritizing the health needs of positive aboriginal women (caabpaw), and the roll-out of chiwos in two additional provinces: saskatchewan and manitoba. in saskatchewan, dr. carrie bourassa, a métis researcher, joined chiwos as the saskatchewan principal investigator, and the roll-out of chiwos is led by her indigenous community-based health research lab, morningstar lodge. in manitoba, allied researchers drs. marissa becker and sharon bruce joined chiwos as the manitoba principal investigators with the essential partnership of ms. laverne gervais, an anishnabe-dakota-french canadian woman from treaty 1 territory in winnipeg who works as the program coordinator at ka ni kanichihk, which means “for those who lead.” described further in detail elsewhere (loutfy et al., 2016), chiwos is a national longitudinal quantitative study that used cbr principles to carry out three peerand ally-administered surveys (kaida et al., 2019) with women living with hiv in bc, ontario, and quebec at 18-month intervals. chiwos used purposive sampling to over enroll harder-to-reach populations of women living with hiv who experience heightened barriers in accessing care and participating in research (e.g., indigenous women). through the connections, trust building, and hard work of the chiwos indigenous research the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.8215 6 assistants (v.l., c.c., k.b., j.c., c.t., c.m.), 318 indigenous women living with hiv (161 from bc, 149 from ontario, and 8 from quebec) were enrolled and engaged in the baseline survey. the chiwos indigenous research assistants obtained informed consent from all participants prior to them completing the survey. for saskatchewan and manitoba, rather than quantitative surveys, the teams of indigenous and allied researchers decided that arts-based and indigenized data collection methods were more appropriate in their contexts to answer the same chiwos research questions. at the early caab-paw meetings, there was a sense of the historical tension described earlier. on one hand, chiwos had an extensive amount of rich quantitative data provided by indigenous women living with hiv; yet the same questions kept resurfacing: “what should we do with the data and how do we handle the data ‘in a good way’?” it was then, after re-reading the trc (2015a), mona had the idea of a ceremony to return the chiwos data to the indigenous communities, indigenous participants, indigenous research assistants, and indigenous leaders. this was in line with indigenous research ethical protocols, such as ocap® and equivalent métis and inuit principles (riddell et al., 2017), and could address the tension and struggle that chiwos was facing (i.e., the impasse, or portage as per the analogy of the boats). the role of the trc is important in this journey because it partly acts as a navigational map for the two boats as indigenous leaders and allied researchers are working together in trust. as outlined on the trc’s website, “the trc hopes to guide and inspire aboriginal peoples and canadians in a process of reconciliation and renewed relationships that are based on mutual understanding and respect” (trc, n.d., p. 1); we used its content, spirit, and calls to action as a guide for doing research “in a good way.” also important was the consideration of the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip, 2007), which affirms the right of indigenous peoples to self-determination, to be treated as respected partners in matters affecting them, and to be able to control and protect their traditional knowledge. additionally, it was acknowedged that the indigenous women living with hiv who agreed to share their data trusted that it would be used “in a good way.” chiwos researchers and partners hold the stories of hundreds of indigenous women living with hiv, including a number who have since died; we feel that we have a responsibility to tell these women’s stories and examine and use the data in a meaningful way that will lead to change and justice for indigenous women living with hiv, their children, and their communities. peltier et al.: a journey of doing research “in a good way” published by scholarship@western, 2020 7 i have been involved with chiwos since the very beginning. in 2011, i became a community advisory board member to inform the chiwos survey and offer my lived experiences as an indigenous woman living in bc and visitor in this territory. once data collection began, i was hired as a peer research associate (pra) in 2013 and have been one for over six years. as a pra, i have witnessed the chiwos study process to be empowering for both the participant and the pra. transitioning from a participant to a pra gives you clarity of who you were, who you are today, and your hopes for who you want to be down the road. during my experience as a pra, the best times are when chatting with another woman during the survey and acknowledging that she does not have to be on guard, reassuring her that she can just breathe and not worry about others hearing the conversation and their judgment. sometimes this was the women’s first conversation of disclosing their status. i try to keep them positive, to reassure them they have done nothing wrong. these connections with the women being interviewed are profound; they share their stories that we intently listen to and we strive to honour them. (claudette cardinal’s story, part 2) the portage—the indigenous women’s data transfer ceremony after six years together, in which time we created a questionnaire (abelsohn et al., 2015), interviewed and analyzed data from 1,422 women living with hiv (see cohort profile for details in loutfy et al., 2017), the journey reached what doris called the “portage”—in other words, the indigenous women’s data transfer ceremony. this beautiful ceremony, which captured both the worldly and spiritual importance of this journey, took place on april 5, 2017, with the chiwos team’s lead researchers, indigenous researchers, and community leaders present. the ceremony was conducted on the unceded territory of the kanien'kehá:ka people. carrie martin, a mi’gmaq woman and team member, helped to organize the event using local protocol. she asked elder mike standup if he would do the honour of delivering the opening and closing prayers. she also asked him to share his teachings on the wampum belt and any teachings that came to him; it was the teachings of the water that he shared. as is customary in first nations communities, the ceremony began with mona making an offering of a tobacco tie to elder mike, which he accepted. in ceremony, it is important to follow proper cultural indigenous protocol, such as providing the offering of tobacco. the offering of tobacco represents an agreement between the elder and the person making the offering that, if accepted, the elder will provide prayer and guidance and deliver on the request. the event started with elder mike at the podium; beside him were the indigenous organizers and team members. at the first table were chiwos principal investigators and allied researchers. the room was filled with approximately 50 researchers, research students, and coordinators who were in attendance as part of the cihr canadian hiv trials network’s annual meeting. elder mike noted that the teachings of the water and the wampum belt go hand in hand. he shared the following: the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.8215 8 a huron man from wendake is very knowledgeable about how to activate the wampum belt by immersing it in water. he would then be the medium through which the wampum would speak and share knowledge from the spirit world when it was asked a question. the water teachings: water is the most important element. it is used in teachings, ceremonies, and can even be used for smudging when you cannot burn medicines [as in the case of most hospitals]. for this, it is suggested to make cedar water and use a spray bottle to smudge. in this sense, it is noninterfering with technology. a japanese man named dr. emoto did numerous studies on healing methods. he determined that the power of suggestion, love, and gratitude being expressed to the water will impress love and gratitude into the water which is then transferred back into the physical body when we drink the water. the molecular structure changes into a crystalline form after passing vibrations to the water. this can enhance and heal the body and also change the molecular structure of the body when we drink it. alternatively, we can conduct a water ceremony and offer the love and gratitude to the water and then pour that water into the river to heal the water. our people always had these teachings, but they were forgotten for a while and are beginning to return to our consciousness because of pollution and the harm done to our waters. we have the power to heal the waters through spirit and promote its return to health. as he spoke, time stood still. the listeners could feel the power of his words and the teaching could be felt in one’s cells. elder mike went on to the teaching of the two row wampum belt treaty: this was a treaty originally signed between the mohawk people and the dutch; they were the first ever european group with whom we made a treaty. to commemorate the treaty, we made a belt with white and purple wampum beads (white background base with purple parallel lines). the purple beads represent the parallel path we are both travelling together in tandem but never interfering with one another. this treaty, although originally made between the mohawk and dutch people, can incorporate all natives of north america and all europeans. it really represents the relations between two nations or even simply two people. the treaty can be applied to any relationship. the wampum belt is a reminder for the need to practice non-interference between two relations. stepping out of your vessel into the vessel of someone else sets both vessels off balance and the relationship begins to disintegrate. the wampum belt serves as a reminder to “mind your own business” and helps to put things back into perspective. it teaches us to deal with peltier et al.: a journey of doing research “in a good way” published by scholarship@western, 2020 9 things by travelling down the same path and in the same direction without getting in each other’s way. next during the ceremony, as is protocol, as a means of honouring those who are part of a gathering, renée, doris, and carrie b. gave gifts to the six present chiwos co-principal investigators on behalf of caan. mona then handed over two usb sticks with the physical raw quantitative baseline data of the 318 indigenous women living with hiv who participated in chiwos; one given to caan represented by renée and one to carrie b., representing the morningstar lodge. in line with protecting participant confidentiality, the quantitative data were de-identified and stored on two encrypted passwordprotected usb sticks. at the institutional level, this transfer of data was approved by research ethics boards. indigenous women living with hiv (val, claudette, and doris) were also invited to be present on stage with renée and carrie b. carrie b. and renée spoke about how this was a historic event and one of the first times that indigenous ethical principles were followed by academic researchers in such a way that the actual raw data was given back to indigenous partners. the return of data to community members reflects a commitment to self-determination of indigenous communities because ownership, control, access, and possession of data is fundamentally linked to self-determination. the ceremony was aligned with the first nations principles of ocap® and equivalent métis and inuit principles and principles laid out in tcps2’s chapter 9, whereby relationships were solidified in trust and reciprocity, indigenous partners gained control, and cultural norms and ethical obligations of knowledge sharing were honoured (moore et al., 2017). in some ways, this was extraordinary and meaningful because the data being returned were quantitative in nature, despite the historical tension in that quantitative data does not easily fit into indigenous approaches to research or knowledge creation. through the data transfer, indigenous partners now physically possess and protect their collective information and have control in ensuring that the data are interpreted and used in strengths-based ways for the benefit of indigenous communities. the event ended with a closing prayer by elder mike followed by singing and drumming of the “strong woman song.” reflections from the indigenous community members and researchers as indigenous members of the chiwos team—investigators, knowledge users, pras, and participants—we see this journey together is a commitment to do research “in a good way.” we have been challenged to learn together, to seek direction from the communities we represent, to support indigenous women through the data collection process, and to bring creativity to the research process. contributing to the design and administration of a lengthy survey has required ongoing reflection on the impact the data will have in our communities. holding the stories of indigenous women and respectfully re-telling them with a collective voice requires careful attention to the great diversity of our peoples and our shared experiences. the potential of chiwos for positive change for indigenous women living with hiv is our motivation and our hope. in addition to the obvious emotional reflections expressed by our indigenous team, we acknowledged that this data transfer ceremony was among the first of its kind and a true reflection of indigenous ethical principles. the significance of this ceremony and the transfer of the data should not be the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.8215 10 understated. in their extensive report, the royal commission on aboriginal peoples (rcap, 1997) presented: the gathering of information and its subsequent use are inherently political. in the past, aboriginal people have not been consulted about what information should be collected, who should gather that information, who should maintain it, and who should have access to it. the information gathered may or may not have been relevant to the questions, priorities and concerns of aboriginal peoples. because data gathering has frequently been imposed by outside authorities, it has met with resistance in many quarters. (steffler, 2016, p. 151) for many years, indigenous communities have not had access to their own data and, as a point of fact, have not been able to control or possess their data. it must be recognized that ocap® is selfdetermination applied to research and is also, in fact, a first nation political response to colonial approaches to research and information management (fnigc, 2015). thus, this data transfer ceremony was much more than a symbolic event; rather, it was a tangible opportunity for indigenous researchers to put self-determination in research into action. in light of the trc calls to action relating specifically to health, the timing of the data transfer was vital. there are five specific calls to action (trc, 2015a) relating to health and one that speaks directly to health research: 19. we call upon the federal government in consultation with aboriginal peoples, to establish measurable goals to identify and close the gaps in health outcomes between aboriginal and nonaboriginal communities, and to publish annual progress reports and assess long-term trends. such efforts would focus on indicators such as: infant mortality, maternal health, suicide, mental health, addictions, life expectancy, birth rates, infant and child health issues, chronic diseases, illness and injury incidence, and the availability of appropriate health services. (p. 161) as a truly emotional event, this ceremony was symbolic of something important to the restoration and reclamation of our cultural traditions as indigenous community members and researchers. prior to colonization, we as indigenous peoples lived autonomously in our territories and respectfully with nature. as researchers, we learned from all aspects of our environment to live well and sustain ourselves. we completed the circle together and brought ourselves back to where we used to be: to a place where we once again are proud keepers of our knowledge and our ceremonies. in completing this circle, information was shared in both directions: in the spirit of reciprocity, we were, and remain, all teachers and students. by coming together as a team of indigenous peoples and nonindigenous allies, we have been able to join hands and do research “in a good way” as equals. together, we were able to realize the good that our ancestors want for us as they join us and help us when we call upon them in ceremony. reflections from the allied researchers and team members as the allied researchers on this team, we are directed by our indigenous partners, apply the trc and its calls to action, and rely on important bodies of indigenous literature (estey et al., 2009; kovach, 2005; kovach, 2009; rozario, 2007; smith, 2013; wilson, 2008) to guide us in doing research “in a good way.” through our work with caan, ka ni kanichihk, morningstar lodge, and our indigenous team members, we as chiwos researchers have committed to a path of reconciliation. being on a path of peltier et al.: a journey of doing research “in a good way” published by scholarship@western, 2020 11 reconciliation is not meant to be a grand statement, but rather one of respect, humility, and constant self-reflection. as non-indigenous women in canada, we acknowledge that we are privileged to live, play, and work on the ancestral and traditional territories of indigenous peoples. wrapped within this acknowledgement must exist a reckoning with how we have benefitted from the legacy of colonization, including how our ways of knowing have been privileged over indigenous ways of knowing, with varied and at times devastating consequences to indigenous peoples. in our role as chiwos researchers, we commit to ethical principles and standards in order to protect the dignity, rights, and wellbeing of all research participants. for example, a key message presented throughout chapter nine of the tcps2 is that community engagement and trust building are integral to conducting ethical research involving indigenous peoples and communities. as allied chiwos researchers, we are indebted to indigenous women, who have trusted and taught us, and emphasized conducting research “in a good way” (wingert & white, 2017). through this journey, we have come to view a commitment to high-quality research practices as much more than a scientific pre-requisite. it is an expression of deep respect for the chiwos participants and collaborators, a demonstration of responsibility for the stories shared, and a sign of accountability to the communities we are meant to serve. we honour the elders, indigenous colleagues, and all our relations for the wisdom they share. it has been a distinct privilege of our professional and personal lives to be granted the gift of such stories, experiences, and relationships that have opened our minds, our hearts, and our souls. reflection from an allied chiwos researcher my name is sharon, and i am an allied researcher. i went to the ceremony with mixed feelings for a couple of reasons. first, i felt as though i did not belong. manitoba was fairly new to the project and we were not included in the data that were being transferred. did we have a place in the ceremony? maybe we should be part of the audience? second, i wondered why such a ceremony was required in the first place. was there not a research agreement that explicitly defined data ownership? were the communities and organizations not already co-owners of the data? my concern was that the ceremony was an enactment of the colonial (power-laden) research relationship (i.e., researchers giving others the data). the imbalance in power seemed inherent in the transfer. but the chiwos team is the most generous group of people i have ever worked with. they are patient, open, and generous. they provide space for doubt and discussion. the ceremony was moving and meaningful. upon reflection, i see that the transfer was a coming together of team members in ceremony to decolonize research relationships and the colonial processes that go with it—for example, where data can be housed. the data transfer ceremony was important because i saw that a written research agreement, something now promoted by funders as a requirement for ethical research, may also be a colonial construct. the transfer was research as ceremony and i am fortunate to have been present, to have been given space to reflect, an opportunity to decolonize my thinking and ways of doing, and to have learned valuable lessons. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.8215 12 the journey continues the storytelling continues as two graduate student team members who joined later on in the journey share their reflections. the continuation of the journey is an important part of this process as it shows commitment to expanding relations and continuing on the path of reconciliation. reflection from an indigenous phd student my name is laura. i am a member of the north bay/mattawa algonquin first nation. i grew up in our ancestral territory in a small community in northern ontario. my indigenous roots come from my mother’s side of the family and my father is of western european descent. due to the intergenerational effects of colonization, my mother did not grow up speaking algonquin or participating in indigenous culture, and by proxy neither did my siblings or i. even though we were not taught our language or introduced to cultural activities growing up, we were taught to have a great respect for mother nature and everything she provides. in this sense, i feel very tied to my culture. while i always knew my indigenous roots and had a value system consistent with indigenous culture, until adulthood i knew very little about indigenous ceremonies and the broader indigenous population. i was raised in the western education system and saw the world through that lens. while completing my masters in statistics, i was given the opportunity to work on a project led by the ontario hiv treatment network to gain a better understanding of hiv among indigenous populations in ontario. this was the beginning of my journey into two-eyed seeing (hall et al., 2015). i have since started my phd in aging among indigenous populations at the university of toronto and continue to work in indigenous hiv research. while i am still relatively new to indigenous ways of knowing, i feel as though i have grown and learned an enormous amount from being part of the indigenous research community. historically, as a quantitative epidemiologist and statistician, i made sense of the world through numbers, paying little attention to the words surrounding them. being a part of this journey has opened my eyes to the story behind the numbers. listening to the emotion, excitement, and enthusiasm of the women telling stories of the data transfer ceremony brought meaning to the numbers. i have learned the vital importance of ceremony and process in indigenous research and switched my thought pattern from a deficits-based model to a strengths-based approach. i am still new to this journey and have much to learn, but i could not be more grateful to be joined on this path by such an incredible group of strong and knowledgeable women. reflection from an allied phd student my name is denise and my journey with chiwos first began when i was a medical resident and i have had the honour of walking alongside an inspiring team of indigenous and allied researchers as i continue my training, now as a phd student. i currently live in northwestern bc, on the territory of the tsimshian nation, where i provide clinical care in parallel with my research endeavours. as a nonindigenous researcher, i have had to carefully think about my own relationship to indigenous health research and, looking back, i can see how much this relationship has changed. i began with naïve optimism that my work would help improve the health of indigenous populations. at that time, i knew a bit about canada’s colonial past, but i am only now starting to understand its presence. this learning has occurred through relationship building, conversations, readings, and courses taught by indigenous peltier et al.: a journey of doing research “in a good way” published by scholarship@western, 2020 13 scholars. i now continue this path but have transformed naivety into thoughtful dedication and critical reflexivity. i constantly ask myself if it is my place to do research with these communities. i ask myself if it is okay to list “indigenous health” as a keyword when i list my areas of interest and expertise. i do not see these inner dialogues as problematic. as a non-indigenous researcher, it is the absence of these dialogues that would be problematic and colonial. it has taken me several years to realize that although i have been graciously welcomed by indigenous colleagues in the field of hiv, i was never invited. when i was first asked to join caab-paw, it was for my experience working with the chiwos data and my role was to support data analysis based on research priorities of caab-paw. i began with some preliminary analyses to provide caab-paw with an overview of the data. approximately six months later, i was on a caab-paw teleconference call explaining the ways i could help out with the analysis and i was politely informed that my help would not be needed because the group wanted an indigenous analyst to do the work. for a moment, i felt hurt and devalued, but i realized that this was not about me. this was about indigenous self-determination in research and real allyship was about supporting indigenous scholars, not doing research about, for, or with indigenous peoples. recognizing that there were several talented indigenous researchers who would be able to support this analysis, i decided to resign from caab-paw. i felt a sense of loss, cried, and then called mona to let her know that i did not want to occupy the space that should be held by an indigenous researcher and to thank her for giving me the opportunity to be a part of caab-paw. we spoke for a long time and together came to the realization that i did still have a role on caab-paw. as a trainee, i was learning how to be an allied researcher and i could contribute by learning to do research “in a good way.” i contacted doris and carrie b., and they were supportive of my ongoing involvement. so now, i continue to feel honoured to be a part of this group, but i know that it is my responsibility, as an uninvited guest, to do research “in a good way.” if i am able to do this, i may earn the title of “ally.” if not, i should leave. the journey’s next steps as described in this article, we prioritized relationship building and the process of following indigenous ways as critical first steps of doing research “in a good way.” through the indigenous women’s data transfer ceremony, the physical raw data of the indigenous participants were given to the indigenous researcher partners. indigenous researchers and community members, through caab-paw, will direct the next steps, which include formulating research questions, analyzing the data through an indigenous lens and by an indigenous statistical analyst, and communicating the stories of indigenous participants from a strengths-based perspective. these are important components of doing research “in a good way” as outlined in walter and andersen’s (2013) indigenous statistics: a quantitative research methodology. as such, no conference abstract or peer-reviewed papers have been published to date with this data. prior to such publications, the results and the accompanying stories developed will be presented at a symposium for indigenous women living with hiv where hundreds of women will be in attendance. the team feels that it is important to present and review the findings and stories with the women that they are telling the stories about. this is an opportunity to ensure the stories resonate with their experiences and gives them control over the stories being told about them prior to publication. throughout the next steps, we take guidance from the trc (n.d.), which explains that reconciliation is an ongoing individual and collective process. we commit to this ongoing iterative process with respect and mindfulness, continuously evaluating our potential impact. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.8215 14 i often think about the 73 women in chiwos that have passed; their stories are still with us. it is an outstanding challenge to honour the women’s stories in the research process. sometimes i wonder if to do this, maybe we need to choose different ways to capture the stories and translate them. traditionally, we don’t use surveys to collect our stories—we sit around, our community elders are present, we have food, we laugh, we tell stories, we feast—this is how our stories were told. for now, we have chosen to honour the quantitative data of indigenous women by gifting them to allied researchers who are on this journey with us—a journey that requires mutual respect from all parties and a deep understanding that women with hiv are more than capable to do more parts of research; it requires a belief that there is always a place for everyone. most importantly we must remember that to do research “in a good way,” a way that is adherent to indigenous ways of knowing and thinking, it cannot be rushed. communities must be first ready and if ready, involved in every step of the way. everyone must be at the table. researchers must learn to see from the participants’ point of view—a role reversal. i just found out that i am from bear clan. this is my journey—a learning process of who i am as an indigenous cree woman. this is our journey—of learning to do research together “in a good way.” (claudette cardinal’s story, part 3) discussion we, as indigenous researchers and leaders and allied researchers, have written this unique process paper using storytelling, and in ceremony with opening and closing prayers. we interwove the herstory of an indigenous woman living with hiv and aids, and we analogized our partnership as a journey of two boats—a journey that is continuing. in addition to relationship building and working together to overcome challenges, which led to the indigenous women’s data transfer ceremony, the reflections captured are an important part of reconciliation, allyship, and doing research “in a good way.” historically, non-indigenous researchers have often carried out analyses themselves, producing conference abstracts and manuscripts, with data that are often out of context and not usable by communities (drawson et al., 2017). we asked how we can decolonize the way that research data are collected, analyzed, interpreted, and disseminated. the participating indigenous women wanted us to know about the hardship that they have endured, but they also wanted us to know about their resilience, magnificence, and beauty. as a response, working together in genuine partnership and following indigenous protocols were important in building the trust needed to allow those stories to be told “in a good way” and to contribute to making a difference. building and nurturing relationships and the partnership itself were critical in doing research “in a good way” as they allowed for meaningful dialogue, listening, and learning about the worldviews, protocols, and priorities of the communities in partnership. ceremony is also critical in decolonizing the research process and doing research “in a good way.” doris, renée, and carrie b. with the chiwos indigenous pras indicated that the indigenous women’s data transfer ceremony was truly a ceremony and was a critical and unique step towards changing the way research is done so as to ensure it is done “in a good way.” a significant aspect was that the elder played a key role in the ceremony, the preparations, and this article. as shared by flicker et al. (2015), “elders often provide the wisdom, knowledge, and ceremonial guidance to assist with research processes that respect the indigenous worldviews” (p. 1149); thus, culturally appropriate protocols involving elders peltier et al.: a journey of doing research “in a good way” published by scholarship@western, 2020 15 should be followed. for example, tobacco ties are used to create relationships and secure a depth of knowledge from elders; they act as a form of consent in the research process, and a way to reclaim the use of tobacco for its original sacred purpose, correcting misunderstandings of non-indigenous peoples (drawson et al., 2017). as argued by wilson (2008) in research is ceremony, engaging elders demonstrates respect for indigenous ways of knowing and is necessary to bridge the divide and build stronger relations. thus, doing research “in a good way” requires genuine respect for indigenous ways of knowing and the engagement of elders and knowledge keepers. further, research done “in a good way” is action-oriented, leading to programming and policies that are owned by and responsive to the needs of communities. in research as resistance, kovach (2005) argued that indigenous methodology is not merely a method, but a philosophical stance—one that is dedicated to the issues of social justice for indigenous peoples. the indigenous women’s data transfer ceremony signified a shift in power—the indigenous researchers taking ownership of the physical data and now positioned to lead the analyses. this shift in power is enacted through ceremony, and other activities such as respecting collective knowledge and worldviews, the meaningful engagement and respect of community members, following of indigenous protocols, ensuring research will benefit the community, the use of storytelling, engaging in research with meaning, and shifting the power of a research team to the indigenous partners (brown & strega, 2005). therefore, collaborative research endeavours, such as those described in this article, will be meaningful and have an impact on programming when they prioritize the needs of the community with the underlying goals of research equity, community control, and social justice. additionally, we reflected on the trc calls to action within the health, business, and education sectors (trc, 2015a), and we acknowledge that action is needed at all levels of research—the funders, research ethics boards, and individual researchers. indigenous ways teach that no one is perfect and there are diverse experiences that inform how to proceed; there are different views from different directions; lessons are important, and reflection is essential for all. for those of us who are privileged enough to work with research data, we must try to be humble, learn, and reflect upon and listen to the teachings and the elders. reflecting on our positionality, relationships, and the meaning of allyship with a commitment to continually learn and improve are essentials to doing research “in a good way.” conclusion: teachings and learnings in conclusion, we are 19 women living on turtle island—first nations, métis, and allied—who have come together with an elder on this journey and are honoured to work together and learn from each other. we learned that doing research “in a good way” requires the following: (a) building reciprocal relationships early in the research process and working together towards true partnership through the ongoing nurturing of those relationships; (b) following indigenous protocols that emphasize selfdetermination and indigenous ways of knowing; (c) coming together in ceremony to decolonize research relationships and colonial processes that go with them; (d) committing to action-oriented goals of research, such as a positive change for indigenous women living with hiv through shifts in power and control; and (d) reflecting critically and continuously to contribute to reconciliation through research. our work honours the seven sacred teachings of humility, respect, wisdom, honesty, love, courage, and truth. we gift you these teachings and learnings from our work so that together our research can be done “in a good way.” the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.8215 16 in closing, i would like to say to everyone involved, from the helpers, to the clients, patients, families, friends, and supporters, to remember that when we are coming together to support our loved ones, our prayers, and our thoughts are the most important ingredient for our wellbeing. to the people, the clients, you are always safe no matter where you go. the illnesses we have are not insurmountable and we can continue on with a good life despite our illnesses. remember to give thanks and gratitude to the forces that surround you. prayer is an act of gratitude towards life and the universe. remember to humble ourselves in helping us to change our state of mind. in the spirit of healing, always walk the good path, always have gratitude, and always with a loving heart. nia:wen kowa closing prayer, elder mike standup references abelsohn, k., benoit, a. c., conway, t., cioppa, l., smith, s., kwaramba, g., lewis, j., nicholson, v., o’brien, n., carter, a., shurgold, j., kaida, a., de pokomandy, a., loutfy, m., & chiwos research team. 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(2017). introduction to the special issue: reconciling research: perspectives on research involving indigenous peoples. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(2). https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.10 8215 cover page.pdf 8215 peltier a journey of doing research rce.pdf policing aboriginal protests and confrontations: some policy recommendations the international indigenous policy journal volume 3 | issue 2 article 1 august 2012 policing aboriginal protests and confrontations: some policy recommendations edward j. hedican university of guelph, ehedican@uoguelph.ca recommended citation hedican, e. j. (2012). policing aboriginal protests and confrontations: some policy recommendations. the international indigenous policy journal, 3(2) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.1 this policy is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. policing aboriginal protests and confrontations: some policy recommendations abstract this paper discusses the role of police forces in aboriginal protests and confrontations. it takes as a case study the report of the ipperwash inquiry, which was released on may 31, 2007. in 1995 dudley george, a member of the stoney point first nation, was shot by an ontario provincial police officer during a protest at ipperwash provincial park. five recommendations are proposed in this paper to reduce the inherent tensions in such protests, focusing on methods of mediation and conflict resolution. in particular, it is proposed that during such protests a more extensive use be made of aboriginal persons with training and skills in mediation and negotiations in order to improve communication between police and first nations protesters. it is also evident that government officials need to become more actively involved in resolving land claims, especially before they become flashpoints for violence, and to remove such disputes from the realm of criminal activity to matters of civil litigation. keywords aboriginal protests, mediation, conflict resolution, policy recommendations creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ policing aboriginal protests and confrontations: some policy recommendations many canadians no doubt wonder why there are so many protests and confrontations involving aboriginal people in this country. hardly a month goes by, especially during the summer, when one does not read about a highway, bridge, or border crossing being blockaded. there are confrontations with police over burial grounds, land claims of various sorts, and construction sites. some of the protesters are armed with rifles, and police are frequently forced to protect themselves and the public with tactical equipment. at times, shots are fired at one another—in canada both police officers and protesters have been killed during these sorts of confrontations. the wider question in these protest cases is: why are there not adequate means of conflict resolution that would avert such violent confrontations, which endanger people’s lives? the political leaders of this country, both at the provincial and federal levels, appear reticent about becoming involved, at least until the confrontation goes too far and results in property damage and personal injury. why, also, are the officers of the various police forces placed in harm’s way without adequate guidelines as to their appropriate conduct in such incidents? certainly, aboriginal protests pose an ambiguous situation for the police who are apt to feel uncomfortable with the idea that they are forced to act as mediators between first nations people and government officials in what are, in many cases, land claims negotiations that are essentially matters of civil litigation. this paper is an exploration of the issue of policing aboriginal protests and confrontations, using the occupation of ipperwash provincial park in 1995 and the events surrounding the death of stoney point resident dudley george as a case study. an investigation into george’s death resulted in the report of the ipperwash inquiry, which was released on may 31, 2007. this report contains many recommendations that are worth considering in relation to the role of police forces in aboriginal conflicts. the purpose of this paper, then, is to engage in a discussion of possible methods of mediation and negotiation that could serve to ameliorate or reduce the potential for conflict in first nations protests. six policy recommendations are then proposed, which have the potential to reduce the inherent conflict between police forces and aboriginal protesters by utilizing methods of mediation, negotiation, and dispute resolution. police-aboriginal confrontations: a brief history anicinabe park, ontario during the summer of 1974 near kenora, ontario, the ojibway warrior society took possession of anicinabe park. about 150 members of the warrior society, many armed with hunting rifles and shotguns, claimed that the department of indian affairs had illegally sold the 14-acre park property to kenora in 1959. the minister of indian affairs, judd buchanan, issued a ruling that the park property, purchased by the department in 1929 from a kenora resident, never constituted an indian reserve. on this basis, minister buchanan indicated that insufficient grounds existed to support the ojibway indians’ claim to the park (“occupation at anicinabe,” 1975). there was a nervous tension among everyone involved. almost 150 members of the ontario provincial police (opp) were poised to enter the park, reinforced by a contingent of the kenora police constabulary. most of the opp officers had been flown in from toronto and thunder bay on chartered flights (“occupation at anicinabe,” 1975). inspector walter mychalyshyn of the kenora police explained, “this is different—this is a confrontation situation and we don’t want a shootout.” lois cameron, one of the leaders of the ojibway warrior society, was joined by dennis banks and a few associates, who had arrived from wounded knee, south dakota, to lend their support. the term “pan-indian” was just coming into use and was meant to imply that cultural differences among the aboriginal peoples of north america are a secondary consideration to the shared experiences of colonial suppression and dispossession of ancestral lands (belanger, 2010). 1 hedican: policing aboriginal protests published by scholarship@western, 2012 eventually, various ontario aboriginal organizations became involved, such as the union of ontario indians, grand council treaty 3, and the association of iroquois and allied tribes, and requested that the province set up a joint committee at the ministerial level to examine the situation. members of the four aboriginal groups met with premier william harris and the ontario cabinet to seek a mechanism for continuing discussions with the provincial government. with these developments, louis cameron and other members of the ojibwa warrior society agreed to end the occupation of anicinabe park when weapons charges against them were dropped and proposals for a negotiated settlement of the land claim were instituted (“davis presented indians’ problems,” 1975). oka, quebec probably the most famous clash between aboriginal protesters and police took place near oka, quebec during the summer of 1990. the so-called “oka crisis” was ostensibly a dispute over a relatively small piece of land designated for the expansion of a golf course. however, as with many of these sorts of disputes, the history behind the oka crisis is a long and involved one (york & pindera, 1991). the disputed area comprising some 40 acres of land was the site of a mohawk cemetery and a portion of pine forest. the dispute emerged in full force when the mohawk decided to barricade the location on july 11, 1990. almost immediately, oka’s mayor, jean ouelette, asked the quebec provincial police (qpp) to intervene in the dispute (ciaccia, 2000). the qpp attempted to storm the barricade but was repulsed by the mohawk protesters who, by this time, had armed themselves. during the attack on the barricade, tear gas canisters were directed at the mohawks and a series of shots rang out—it was never determined from which side—and during the barrage of bullets 31 year old corporal marcel lemay was shot and killed. the police withdrew at this point, abandoning several of their cruisers. it did not take long for the mohawks behind the barricade to be joined by supporters from other aboriginal communities in canada and the united states. before long, the qpp had established their own blockade, which served to curtail access to kenesatake and oka. in addition, other mohawks set up a blockade at the mercier bridge to the island of montreal, which caused huge traffic difficulties and disgruntled drivers. even as far away as british columbia (bc), the seton lake band supported the mohawk cause by blockading the bc railway line, provoking a confrontation with officers of the royal canadian mounted police (rcmp). eventually, the qpp felt that they were losing ground between the disputing parties and called in the rcmp. the mohawk warriors soon overpowered the rcmp, and 14 officers were sent to hospital with various injuries (frideres & gadacz, 2008). further confrontations developed when quebec premier robert bourassa invoked the national defence act and sent federal troops to oka. he argued that the same sort of situation had occurred two decades earlier when the canadian army was mobilized to quell the “october crisis1.” unlike the earlier confrontation with the qpp, no shots were fired between the mohawks and the army. the mohawks eventually dismantled their blockade at oka and returned to their reserve when the expansion of the golf course was cancelled. the standoff lasted 78 days. the monetary costs of the police and military actions were high. the decision to bring in the canadian army cost $83 million and, altogether, the expenditure for the province of quebec amounted to $112 million. of course, the greatest cost of all was the loss of corporal marcel lemay’s life. in june of 2000, the federal government signed an agreement with the mohawks giving them legal jurisdiction 1 the october crisis in1970 involved the kidnapping of two government officials, british trade commissioner james cross and quebec’s minister of labour pierre laporte. the kidnappings occurred in the montreal metropolitan area by members of the front de liberation du quebec (flq). the circumstances culminated in the only peacetime use of the war measures act in canadian history (tetley, 2006). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.1 over approximately 960 acres of property (“oka crisis,” 2000). many were no doubt wondering why this settlement could not have been negotiated in the first place, without endangering the lives of so many people. gustafsen lake, british columbia an armed confrontation between aboriginal protesters and the police occurred in 1995 at gustafsen lake in northern british columbia. this was the site of an aboriginal land dispute that erupted when a local rancher attempted to force members of the secwepemc (shuswap) sundance society, who were participating in a ceremony, off his land. the defenders of the shuswap nation refused to leave the property and, subsequently, the attorney general of british columbia, ujjal dosanjh, declared that the occupation constituted a strictly criminal action, rather than a land claim dispute (lambertus, 2004). what occurred over the ensuing summer months of 1995 was one of the largest police actions ever conducted in canadian history. several hundred rcmp officers confronted the shuswap groups with tactical assault training, two helicopters, and nine armoured personnel carriers. the defender group, led by jones william (wolverine) ignace, consisted of about twenty men and women armed with several hunting rifles. british columbia premier mike harcourt claimed from the outset that the defenders did not have any claim to the sundance site and staff sergeant peter montague, who was the local rcmp commander for the region, offered his opinion that they were nothing more than “terrorists, criminals, and thugs” (milloy, 1995, p. 1). the rcmp cordoned off the area to the gustafsen lake site with a barricade. two officers were shot while attempting to move a log in order to reinforce the barricade but were uninjured because of their chest protectors. with the threat of escalating violence, assembly of first nations grand chief ovide mercredi visited the camp and appealed for calm from both parties. he disputed the bc government and rcmp characterization of the defenders by saying that “the individuals are not terrorists, they are people with strong convictions… they are not criminals” (platiel, 1996). after a standoff that lasted four months and involved a shootout with the police, ignace and his defenders were persuaded to give up their occupation by a stoney point medicine man named john stevens. in all, eighteen aboriginal and non-aboriginal persons were charged following the occupation with various weapons offences; fifteen of them received jail terms of six months to eight years. three of the defendants attempted to appeal their convictions on the grounds that canadian courts did not have jurisdiction over the gustafsen lake property, since it was considered expropriated aboriginal lands, but the supreme court of british columbia refused to hear the appeals. the occupation and subsequent standoff cost $5.5 million of taxpayers’ money (milloy, 1995). caledonia, ontario more recently, the caledonia, ontario confrontation of 2006 received significant media attention. the dispute involved 40 acres of land purchased by henco industries in 1995. the six nations sued the federal government over this land transfer, claiming that they had never surrendered the property. in february 2006, members of the six nations reserve set up tents and a wooden building on the property. various court orders were issued against the aboriginal occupiers, including a contempt of court charge, which lead to the opp arresting twenty-one members of the protest group. with these arrests, even more protesters arrived on the scene and a barricade of burning tires and dumped gravel was erected blocking off the main road into caledonia, a small town situated about 20 kilometres southwest of hamilton (“attempted murder,” 2006). news media flocked to caledonia in 2006 and provided coverage of that summer’s aboriginal protests and occupations in southern ontario. in a cbc interview on april 25th, mayor marie trainer commented that residents of the town were being hurt economically by the occupation because the non-aboriginal citizens did not have money flowing automatically into their accounts, but, rather, had to work for it (“caledonia barricades,” 2006). the aboriginal protesters saw this statement as not only a very insulting comment, but 3 hedican: policing aboriginal protests published by scholarship@western, 2012 racist as well because it insinuated that the aboriginal protesters were all on social assistance. within a day the former premier of the province, david peterson, was appointed to help negotiate a settlement to the dispute (“ontario buys,” 2006). in may 2006, the blockade of the road into caledonia was partially removed to allow emergency vehicles to enter. subsequently, a group of the town’s residents, calling themselves the caledonia citizens’ alliance, confronted the aboriginal protesters at the site of the blockade. the two groups traded insults and punches before the police arrived to break up the skirmish. confrontations continued throughout the day, with injuries being sustained by all parties, including opp officers. the escalation of violence continued when vandals sent a burning truck into a hydro substation, causing a power outage and substantial damage. later, a state of emergency was declared (brown & morse, 2006). several altercations ensued into the month of june 2006, including one involving aboriginal people and caledonia residents in the downtown area in which a police cruiser drove through a line of protesters. at about the same time, protesters assaulted news camera operators when they refused to relinquish their videotapes. in another incident, a united states (us) border patrol vehicle, which had attempted to intervene in what they observed as an assault on opp officers, was attacked by six nations protesters. eventually, six protesters were issued warrants involving 14 charges ranging from attempted murder to theft of a motor vehicle (“attempted murder,” 2006). shortly after that, the provincial government announced that it had negotiated the purchase of the disputed douglas estates property from henco industries at a cost of $21.1 million and would provide $1 million in additional compensation for the caledonia businesses that had suffered losses as a result of the protest (“ontario buys,” 2006). in a further announcement on march 29, 2007, the federal government said that it was contributing $15.8 million to ontario’s purchase of the disputed property. on june 15, 2009, some residents of caledonia announced that they were forming unarmed “militias,” which would attempt to enforce laws that they thought the opp was not willing or able to enforce. caledonia residents also expressed a fear that aboriginal protesters had been digging on the site in an attempt to undermine the town’s water supply (ferguson, 2007). meanwhile, with the disputed property now in the hands of the provincial government, its fate is unclear. in summary, the cases discussed here are meant for illustrative purposes. many more similar instances could also have been presented, such as the teme-augama logging blockade (1988), the innus occupation of the goose bay air base (1988), the lubicon cree confrontation (1988), the burnt church fishing dispute (2002), the grassy narrows blockade of highway 17 (2006), or the akwesasne border confrontation (2009). the purpose of this discussion is primarily to place the following presentation of the ipperwash case in a wider perspective, but also to illustrate several commonalities of the aboriginal-police confrontations that have occurred over the last several decades. all of these cases would appear to follow a similar pattern. first, a frustrated group of aboriginal people lay claim to a particular piece of property, which they suggest has been removed illegally from their possession. confrontations are apt to ensue, leading to conflicts between the protesters, police, and possibly local nonaboriginal residents. at times, firearms are discharged and deaths have occurred in such instances. eventually, with an escalation of violence, provincial authorities intervene and frequently a monetary settlement is reached. of course, the larger question has to do with the matter of why a settlement could not have been negotiated initially to prevent the injurious consequences and ill will that such cases engender. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.1 the ipperwash provincial park confrontation the mandate of the ipperwash inquiry of 2007 was to investigate the events surrounding the death of dudley george, a member of the stoney2 point first nation in ontario, who was shot by an opp officer in 1995 during a protest at ipperwash provincial park.3 the inquiry was also asked to make recommendations that would avoid violence in similar circumstances in the future. commissioner sidney b. linden separated the inquiry into two phases that ran concurrently. the first phase, termed the “evidentiary hearings,” dealt with the events surrounding the death of dudley george, and the second phase, termed “policy and research”, was concerned with finding ways to avoid conflict between the police and aboriginal people in future protests (beare & murray, 2005; hedican, 2008a; hedican, 2008b; ipperwash inquiry, 2007). the confrontation began when a number of aboriginal people gathered at ipperwash provincial park on labour day, september 4, 1995, to protest the refusal of the federal government to return the stoney point reserve to its original inhabitants. this reserve had been appropriated by the federal government under the war measures act to be used as a military training site with the promise that the reserve lands would be returned to the original inhabitants after world war ii (koehler, 1996). however, over the ensuing five decades the appropriated reserve land was not returned. frustrated with the government’s intransigence in returning the land, an occupation of the park was planned by the stoney point residents.4 a confrontation occurred two days later, on september 6, 1995, between the aboriginal protesters and the opp during which dudley george was shot and killed by a police officer named ken deane. at the time of the park occupation, opp officers believed that the protesters were armed, based on information provided by a councillor of the stoney point band, gerald george, who indicated that the camp occupiers were in possession of “ak-47s with 30 round mag duct taped to the back, mini rugers 14s, and hunting rifles” (ipperwash inquiry, 2007, p. 55).5 there was never any evidence produced during the subsequent investigation indicating that the protesters were armed with anything other than some rocks and baseball bats; consequently, the ipperwash inquiry concluded that a “fundamental problem was that the information about guns was not authenticated or verified by opp intelligence officers” (ipperwash inquiry, 2007, p. 56). 2 the report of the ipperwash inquiry uses “stoney point” and “stony point”, often both spellings on the same page. it is not known if the writer(s) of this report were aware of this inconsistency or whether these two terms were regarded as synonymous or interchangeable with one another. the use of the term “stoney point” in this paper is, therefore, of somewhat arbitrary usage. 3 there were no news reporters at the scene of dudley george’s death or at the protest of ipperwash provincial park. subsequent news coverage was based on interviews conducted with opp officers and not with the aboriginal protesters themselves. 4 the promise states that “if, at the termination of the war, no further use of the area is required by the department of national defence, negotiations will be entered into with the department of indian affairs to transfer the lands back to the indians at a reasonable price determined by mutual agreement” (koehler, 1996). in its tabled report in march 1992, the standing committee on aboriginal people recommended that the appropriated lands be returned to its former aboriginal inhabitants. the report indicated that the federal government’s reasons for continuing to occupy the lands were “spurious and without substance” (steckley & cummins, 2008, p. 205; see also hamilton, 1998). in addition, the army cadet camp, which was formerly based on the site, was no longer used after the summer of 1993 because of the growing unrest and the occupation of an adjacent piece of land. the summer training facility was subsequently moved to canadian forces base borden. 5 gerald george’s description of the different firearms apparently possessed by the ipperwash park occupiers was recorded in a notebook by detective constable dew, who referred to gerald george as an “anonymous source.” mr. george was also the source of other misinformation when it was reported to the opp that damage had been done to the band councillor’s car by a group of park occupiers. the damage to the councillor’s car was caused by a rock thrown by one of the occupiers who took exception to an article councillor george had written in a local newspaper disapproving of the occupation. a rumour was also started that the occupiers had smashed the vehicle of a female driver with a baseball bat, but, according to the ipperwash report by justice sidney linden, the information was “false and misleading,” as indicated by a transcript of his comments before the inquiry on september 19, 2007 (ipperwash inquiry, 2007, p. 56). 5 hedican: policing aboriginal protests published by scholarship@western, 2012 another problem stemmed from the lack of knowledge that opp officers had about the reasons for the occupation of the park, which was limited to the vague claim that a sacred burial ground existed on the park property.6 at approximately 9:00 p.m. on september 6th, the opp closed the roads leading to ipperwash park. thirty-two opp officers from the crowd management unit (cmu), an additional eight officers assigned as an arrest team, two canine teams, and two prison vans assembled at the park boundary. the cmu commander and his force were attired in “hard tac” equipment, which included batons, guns, helmets, visors, bulletproof vests, and other protective equipment. as darkness settled in at approximately 10:30 p.m., the unit of 40 officers marched into the park in a tight “box formation.” the aboriginal protesters then began yelling that officers were standing on sacred ground. an aboriginal man struck an officer on the edge of his helmet with a steel pole breaking the plexiglas shield in half. the officer responded by striking the man’s shoulder area with his baton, sending the man reeling to the ground. a number of other confrontations broke out in the virtual darkness. acting sergeant ken deane claimed that he saw a muzzle flash originating from the interior of a bus, driven by a sixteen-year old boy. several officers opened fire on the approaching vehicle, firing rounds into the driver’s compartment. deane also claimed that dudley george shouldered a rifle in a half-crouched position pointed at several opp officers. ken deane then fired three shots at dudley george in rapid succession. ken deane claimed that dudley george’s gun fell to the ground after he was shot, but deane did not attempt to retrieve the rifle despite the danger that such a weapon could have posed for other officers. however, at a subsequent inquiry other officers could not corroborate deane’s version of the events, as they did not see a firearm being carried by george. the ipperwash inquiry (2007) did not accept acting sergeant deane’s version of the events. they concluded unequivocally that “dudley george did not have a rifle or firearm in the confrontation with the police on the night of september 6, 1995” (p. 72). ken deane died in a car accident shortly before he was scheduled to testify at the ipperwash inquiry. in 1997, he was convicted of criminal negligence causing the death of dudley george (ipperwash inquiry, 2007). several of the most prominent recommendations of the ipperwash inquiry deal with matters pertaining to police planning for responding to aboriginal protests and occupations. one, in particular, suggests that in such incidences discussion with negotiators would probably serve to ameliorate the potential for conflict: the ontario secretariat for aboriginal affairs,7 in consultation with aboriginal organizations, should compile a list of available negotiators and facilitators who could assist the government to quickly and peacefully resolve aboriginal issues that emerge. (ipperwash inquiry, 2007, p. 96)8 the issue that prompted the occupation of ipperwash park was not very well understood by the opp. the police were apparently only aware that the aboriginal protesters were in the park illegally and that ontario 6 a ministry of natural resources memo from 1972 claimed that there was no evidence of a burial mound; however, a later memo claimed that the 1972 methodology “does not agree with current archaeological survey standards” (cited in edwards, 2003, p. 249). there are also many government letters from the 1930s mentioning finding graves on the site, in addition to the park superintendent’s wife’s report of finding bones in the park in 1950 7 in june 2007, a stand-alone ministry of aboriginal affairs was created to replace the ontario secretariat of aboriginal affairs. the website (www.aboriginalaffairs.gov.on.ca) has a section on current lands claims and related negotiations. 8 in addition, three other roles are listed: • maintain contact within aboriginal communities throughout the province; • remain current on aboriginal issues; • provide informed advice to opp executive and incident commanders regarding aboriginal issues (opp, 2006, p. 3). 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.1 premier mike harris and his cabinet wanted the occupiers removed in an expedient manner.9 a facilitator or go-between could have communicated to the opp and government representatives the reasons for the occupation of ipperwash park, which, in turn, could have set in motion a series of actions that might possibly have diffused the situation and avoided the tragic consequences. framework for police preparedness for aboriginal critical incidents towards the end of the ipperwash inquiry, the opp (2006) presented its framework for police preparedness for aboriginal critical incidents (referred to below as the framework). the document was said to be a key element of the opp strategy to improve the policing of first nations protests, confrontations, and blockades. the opp has asserted that it had applied the principles of the framework for several years before formally adopting it as policy early in 2006 (opp, 2006). release of the framework document was timely because, although the mandate of the ipperwash inquiry was to inquire into the circumstances of the shooting of dudley george, a more general concern was to investigate the policing of protests and blockades by first nations people in ontario. as such, the mandate of the inquiry was to make recommendations directed at avoiding further violence between the police and aboriginal protesters. however, commissioner linden expressed concern about the sustainability of the framework, adopting a wait-and-see approach to its possible effectiveness as an opp policy initiative (opp, 2006). perhaps the most important question is whether or not the opp sincerely intends to adopt the principles, as set out in the framework, as an official policy proposal for handling native protests – or will the document be used only to appease public concerns and deflect criticism. the proposals set out in the framework are certainly worth noting. the document begins by stating that: the ontario provincial police (opp) is committed to safeguarding the individual rights enshrined within the federal and provincial laws, inclusive of those specifically respecting the rights of aboriginal persons of canada as set out in the canadian charter of rights and freedoms. the opp recognizes that conflicts may arise as aboriginal communities and the various levels of government work to resolve outstanding issues associated with matters such as land claims, self-determination, and aboriginal treaty rights, which may relate to education, hunting, and fishing. (opp, 2006, p. 2) while the framework notes that “critical incidents are often unavoidable,” the document outlines several significant approaches that would serve to diffuse or ameliorate such incidents. the framework does, however, point out that “disputes may, and often do, originate with government agencies other than the police, this framework applies to the negotiation and mediation of police-related issues surrounding a dispute” (opp, 2006, p. 3). in other words, the opp attempts to make it quite clear that it is up to the government and aboriginal communities to solve their problems themselves – these parties should not expect the opp to do such work for them. the role of the opp during aboriginal protests is, therefore, seen as an intercalary one in which they facilitate negotiations, but the opp is not responsible for the outcome. this process, as suggested in the framework, would be facilitated by an aboriginal liaison operations officer who would be a member of the opp reporting to the office of the commissioner. the purpose of this role is: (a) to foster trusting relationships 9 a claim was made that premier harris used derogatory profanity in reference to the stoney point protesters, which the premier denied. the issue over premier harris’ denial became the object of public attention in february 2006 when ctv aired a television movie called one dead indian, which was based on a book by the same name written by peter edwards, a toronto star reporter (edwards, 2003). premier harris’ alleged use of the f-word in reference to the aboriginal protesters of ipperwash park was made, ironically, on valentine’s day. on the date of the release of the ipperwash inquiry report, mike harris referred to the ipperwash allegations as “malicious and petty” (“ipperwash allegations,” 2007). 7 hedican: policing aboriginal protests published by scholarship@western, 2012 between the opp and aboriginal communities; and (b) to assist in facilitating communications during an aboriginal-related dispute, conflict, or critical incident. there is also mention of a critical incident mediator who: (a) meets with aboriginal representatives and communicates police interests; (b) listens for and identifies key issues and interests of the aboriginal representatives; and (c) develops in concert with the incident commander a mutually acceptable and lasting resolution strategy (opp, 2006, p. 4). chiefs of ontario response to the framework for police preparedness for aboriginal critical incidents the chiefs of ontario (coo) organization met in 2006 to provide a critical response to the opp’s framework (chiefs of ontario, 2006). in this response it was made clear that “the chiefs of ontario do not endorse the framework; rather, it is our intent to provide constructive suggestions” (p. 1). the coo response focuses on the critical incident procedures proposed by the opp. the chiefs recognize, as indicated in the framework, that disputes may, and often do, originate with government agencies other than the police. therefore, the framework is limited to the negotiation and mediation of police-related issues surrounding a dispute. a critical aspect of this negotiation or mediation process focuses on the ability of the newly created aboriginal liaison operations officer, the aboriginal relations team, and the incident commander to work in collaboration with one another. the chiefs indicate, however, that the framework only reflects this collaboration at the critical incident level. they suggest that what happens at the pre-critical incident level – the crucial events leading up to a crisis point – is just as important. as the chiefs of ontario (2006) suggest, “local first nation police service must play a lead role pre-critical as they will be in the best position to prevent conflicts from arising, what to look for and what can be done are further articulated with the framework document”(p. 2). in other words, the chiefs are proposing a much more enhanced role for aboriginal police officers than has previously been the case in protests and demonstrations. involving aboriginal people in conflict management the overall point that the chiefs of ontario are making is that, in the future, it is imperative that aboriginal people be involved in the planning process of police action in aboriginal protests so that the situation can be diffused before it leads to the disastrous results that occurred at ipperwash park. in fact, evidence presented at the ipperwash inquiry indicated that negotiators were apparently available on the night that dudley george was shot, but the opp had not asked for their advice or intervention. the base commander at camp ipperwash, captain smith, had made contact with robert antone, a first nations negotiator trained in conflict resolution and crisis management who had been involved in the 1990 oka crisis in quebec. along with bruce elijah, a first nations negotiator and peacekeeper from the oneida first nation, mr. antone had also facilitated a cross-cultural awareness training session with the military on july 12 and 13, 1995, with the goal of building a better relationship between the stoney point people who were occupying the artillery range and military personnel. captain smith made it quite clear that he did not want a physical confrontation with first nations people, so, with the assistance of robert antone and bruce elijah, the military left the camp on july 29, 1995 (ipperwash inquiry, 2007). it was also pointed out in testimony at the inquiry that opp inspector carson did not make an attempt to contact representatives of the assembly of first nations, the chiefs of ontario, or the union of ontario indians for assistance. he also did not ask chief tom bressette if anyone on the stoney point band council could help initiate negotiations with the ipperwash park occupiers. furthermore, inspector carson did not seek out the assistance of the opp’s first nations police branch in an attempt to open communications with the aboriginal protesters. he did approach local opp officers, but they unfortunately lacked the appropriate negotiation skills to become involved (ipperwash inquiry, 2007). the question as to why aboriginal negotiators were not employed to ameliorate the tensions during the confrontations at ipperwash park in september 1995 remains. the inquiry report indicated that cyndy elder 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.1 of approaches mediation called the opp at about 4:00 p.m. to offer her assistance to inspector carson. this first nations mediator explained to sergeant drummelsmith that she had contact with inspector carson in august 1995 after the army camp occupation. at the time, ms. elder was involved with the gustafsen lake protest in british columbia, so her services might have been used to diffuse the tension at ipperwash park. sergeant drummelsmith promised to convey her message to inspector carson. testimony indicated that inspector carson was “too busy to return ms. elder’s call that day…the best i can do is some time tomorrow,” but tomorrow was too late and a significant opportunity to establish lines of communication with the park occupiers was lost (ipperwash inquiry, 2007, p. 36). meanwhile, inspector carson left at 7:00 p.m. on september 6th for dinner at the private home of friends in forest, ontario, with orders to those left in charge to “basically sit tight” (ipperwash inquiry, 2007, pp. 36-37). “project maple”: crisis negotiation at ipperwash park during the ipperwash inquiry, the opp mounted a vigorous rebuttal to the charge that its members were negligent in enacting the role of peacekeepers or negotiators in the dispute at ipperwash park (ontario provincial police association [oppa], 2006). in particular, the oppa vehemently objected to the intercalary role in which its members were placed between the ontario government and the aboriginal protesters. according to the oppa submission, police officers see their role as peacekeepers, but not as land claims negotiators. the officers have no training in dispute negotiation, and conflicts are inherently dangerous to both the police and protesters given the fact that one or both sides carry firearms. as the oppa (2006) submission points out, “many of the police officers who testified expressed their displeasure with the role assigned to them as interveners in what was and continues to be a civil dispute over property rights between first nations people and the federal and provincial governments” (p.14). during the ipperwash dispute, an attempt was made to develop a contingency plan to contain the possible outbreak of violence. in a meeting of senior opp officers on september 1, 1995, a plan called “project maple” was developed to deal with the possibility of an extended stand-off at ipperwash provincial park (oppa, 2006). the primary objective of project maple was “to contain and negotiate a peaceful solution” (p. 15). the project plans included an organizational chart setting out a structure involving the incident commander, senior officers, and other various police units, including the emergency response team and tactical rescue unit. each of the various components of this structure was asked to develop a logistical plan should their participation be required. the oppa submission to the ipperwash inquiry makes it quite clear that the term “crisis negotiation” has a specific meaning as far as project maple was concerned. as explained in the oppa (2006) submission, “police crisis negotiation is not synonymous to land claims negotiation. rather, police crisis negotiations apply only in very specific, limited situations. crisis negotiators may only respond when directed to do so by an incident commander” (p. 46). the incident commander will involve the crisis negotiating team under situations that fit the following criteria: (a) there must be a threat to life, such as when a person is barricaded or in a hostage situation, and (b) the individual refuses to attorn10 to the local police. crisis negotiators are not employed short of a threat to life. according to the oppa submission, therefore, the criteria for the use of crisis negotiators were not met during the events at ipperwash park and as such were not employed. according to this submission, then, the opp has a specific set of terms of reference when it comes to crisis negotiation and this does not apply to land claims negotiations because there is not (usually) a threat to life. however, it is evident from the ipperwash confrontation on september 6, 1995 that there exists a lacuna between the rather strict or specific usage of the opp’s term crisis negotiations and a less circumscribed view 10 the use of the term “attorn” in the oppa (2006, p. 46) submission is puzzling, since it means to “transfer” in some sense, such as its alternative form ‘attorney’ meaning to act on one’s behalf (i.e., to transfer authority). perhaps the meaning intended, given the context, is to acknowledge the police as a higher authority, such as in acknowledging a new landlord. 9 hedican: policing aboriginal protests published by scholarship@western, 2012 of what constitutes a crisis. if the opp was led to believe that on the evening of the confrontation the aboriginal protesters were armed, then one might suppose that such a situation posed a threat to life. the fact that it was never proven that the aboriginal occupiers were armed in any manner, save for several baseball bats and a collection of stones, does not diminish the fact that the opp had grounds to believe that someone’s life would be threatened under such circumstances. otherwise, the opp’s use of such hard-tac equipment, along with their firearms, hardly seems justified in the face of unarmed opponents. furthermore, it is unfortunate that opp personnel highly trained to deal with crisis management were not utilized, regardless of the strict terms of reference under which the negotiation team could be deployed. given the fact that an aboriginal protester was fatally wounded during the confrontation, it would seem highly reasonable that, in the future, the terms of reference regarding “crisis negotiator” be subject to more flexibility and better judgement. certainly, the intent of the crisis negotiation process is not at fault. according to the oppa (2006) submission, “to develop trust with the subject… an effective negotiator receives information directly from the subject of the negotiation process as part of the process of building trust and rapport” (p. 47). what remains to be done, then, is to incorporate these laudable objectives into realistic terms of reference so that in the future unarmed land claims protesters are not shot by the very authorities seeking their “trust and rapport.” dissent and society the shooting of dudley george and the aboriginal protest at ipperwash park brings into question the relationship between the police officers’ behaviour and actions taken by the government in power at the time. beare (2008) observes that “one can trace, for example, the refusal of the conservative party in ontario to hold an inquiry into the shooting of dudley george at ipperwash and the campaign promise made by the liberal party that culminated in an inquiry after their election” (p.19). concerning the relationship between politics and policing, on the one hand, lawyers are apt to point to case law as an interpretation, while, on the other, social scientists, such as criminologists, are more interested in the “working relationship” between the police and government (beare, 2008, p. 26). the ipperwash inquiry, therefore, demonstrates the tensions between social scientific perspectives and the more restricted legalistic view of the events involved in aboriginal protests and the larger arena of dissent and society. james tully’s (2008) discourse on aspects of democracy and freedom offers an enlightening and informative discussion on the relationship between power and governance. tully (2008) suggests, for example, that “from the perspective of the governed, the exercise of power always opens up a diverse field of potential ways of thinking and acting in response” (p. 23). some of the ways of “acting in response,” he suggests, include challenging a relation of governance or entering into negotiation or deliberation with an attempt at problem solving. however, there are instances when institutions of reform are not available or those in power attempt to bypass or subvert them, in which case the governed may engage in acts of civil disobedience or other forms of resistance. a question that emerges from the present discussion concerns whether or not it would be accurate to characterize aboriginal protests as acts of civil disobedience. civil disobedience has been defined as a “deliberate, but non-violent, act of law breaking to call attention to a particular law or set of laws of questionable legitimacy or morality” (burstein, 2008, p. 391). it can also refer to “any type of conduct where the offender has intentionally broken the law for the purpose of trying to affect positive social change” (burstein, 2008, p. 376). in this sense, civil disobedience is a challenge to the justice system because it involves actions by what are usually regarded as law-abiding citizens who seek to change some law or public policy by illegal means and who may unlawfully interfere with the interests of other citizens. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.1 in the case of aboriginal protests, then, there is a question about the extent to which the court should consider the history of frustration over the protracted land claims negotiations or situations in which aboriginal control and possession over land has been removed through illegal or unscrupulous means. in other words, does it matter if a protester’s acts could actually lead to some public good, and should the courts in such instances consider if alternative means could have been used by protesters in an attempt to achieve their goals? as far as the “justifications” for civil disobedience are concerned, burstein (2008) concludes that “while canadian sentencing courts have consistently held that the noble motives behind civil disobedience cannot serve to excuse liability, there is much less agreement on how these motives may affect the punishment which follows the finding of guilt” (p. 380). an important matter relating to police-government relations in the context of aboriginal and treaty rights involves the policing issues that need to be considered. aboriginal protesters feel that they have a right to voice their dissent and the right to peaceful assembly in a democratic society. christie (2007) explains that aboriginal protesters have a “right to free expression [which] is grounded in a conception of a liberal democracy, and of the conditions necessary for the promotion of values and ideals highly esteemed by those living in and through a liberal democratic structure” (p. 156). there is, therefore, a question about the appropriate nature of police activity in relation to aboriginal protests, and about the nature of the relationship between the actions of the police and decisions made by the government, which could be interpreted as a suppression of legitimate dissent. as christie (2007) explains further, “inappropriate police activity, in relation to the aboriginal protest, may lead to questions about the relationship between the police and the government in power (especially… if it appears the government inappropriately directed the police in this matter)” (p. 155). in a concluding statement on the subject of politics and policing, beare (2007) remarks that “the relationship between the police and politics is deep, varied, and sporadic… acknowledging these links is critical to any approach that aims to bring predictability and accountability, let alone independence, to this ongoing interchange” (p. 364). one could, therefore, state that there are wider issues regarding the ipperwash inquiry that are ultimately important to canadian society in a larger context, such as the relationship between the powers exercised by the police and the government and how these interact in situations of aboriginal protests. conclusion the ipperwash land claim was eventually settled in 1998 with a $26 million agreement. each member of the stoney and kettle point first nation received between $150,000 and $400,000. the land of the camp ipperwash military base was cleaned up and returned to the band members. on december 20, 2007, the ontario government announced plans to return the ipperwash park property to its original owners, the chippewa of stoney and kettle point. aboriginal affairs minister michael bryant explained that initially the land comprising the park would be co-managed by the province and the stoney and kettle point first nations with a gradual assumption of control by the aboriginal peoples (gillespie, 2007). ipperwash park was officially turned over to the chippewa on may 28, 2009, when ontario aboriginal affairs minister brad duguid formally signed over control of ipperwash park to the kettle and stoney point band members (mccaffery, 2009). the recommendations of the ipperwash inquiry, if acted upon by the government of ontario, could potentially lead to constructive changes in the laws and public institutions of the province. legislative changes, in turn, might well diminish the need for such enervating protests over land claims and could lead to more peaceful relationships between aboriginal and non-aboriginal people regarding the ownership and control of land. in canada, there are many unresolved treaty and land claims issues because, as the ipperwash inquiry (2007) report reiterates, “nearly all of the lands and inland waters in ontario are subject to treaties between first nations and the british and canadian governments. these treaties are not, as some believe, relics of the distant past. they are living agreements, and the understandings on which they are based continue to have full force of law in canada today” (p. 80). 11 hedican: policing aboriginal protests published by scholarship@western, 2012 under the topic of lessons learned, there is much that could be said concerning aboriginal protests and confrontations. if, for example, the appropriated lands belonging to the stoney and kettle point first nation had been promptly returned as initially promised to the original owners of the ipperwash military camp shortly after the war, it would have saved decades of grief and frustration. instead, the federal government, in particular the department of national defence, went back on its promise to return the disputed lands. as a result, sixty years of needless confrontation between band members and the forces of the canadian military and the opp followed. when the police are involved in aboriginal protests and confrontations over land claims, there will likely be a certain degree of heightened emotion that complicates the resolution of such matters. as far as the ipperwash park confrontation is concerned, we are led to question why our elected representatives did not move towards the eventual settlement in a more expeditious manner. ipperwash is, however, just one of hundreds of land claims, and the track record of the federal government in resolving these claims is not very good, leaving open the potential for further deadly confrontations. the present mechanism for resolving land claims is far too expensive and cumbersome. the federal government made a commitment to spend $355 million on resolving land claims between 1991 and 1995, which amounts to four times the amount spent in the late 1980s (frideres & gadacz, 2008, p. 237). in addition, the department of indian and northern affairs was given complete authority by the treasury board to approve settlements up to $7 million without the board’s approval. the hope was that in the first few years of the new millennium about 250 outstanding claims would be settled. unfortunately, by 2008, fewer than 30 of these land claims had been resolved, with a backlog of new cases mounting in an almost exponential manner. in ontario, for example, it takes an average of 6.5 years to review a claim once all the research is complete. on average, it takes 15 years to settle a claim. if there are further complications, then a claim takes an average of 19.2 years to be resolved (coyle, 2005). clearly, the present approach to settling land claims in canada has little hope of succeeding, guaranteeing further frustration, discontent, and a disaffected aboriginal population. since land claims in canada can be a particularly slow process at times, aboriginal populations have taken to more direct action. every year across canada, there are an ever-increasing number of aboriginal protests over land. roads and railways are blockaded; marches to ottawa take place; and buildings and parcels of land are occupied. in many instances, the protests lead to confrontations with local police, the opp, the rcmp, and the canadian military. these protests sometimes lead to the injury or death of the protesters or those who confront them. rarely during these episodes are proper rules of engagement or conduct utilized. when emotions run high and frustration mounts, the gathered assembly begins to appear like a mob out of control. why do the same unfortunate scenarios play themselves out in canada over and over again without order or resolution? in a civil society that canada purports to be, there should be ways to resolve such disputes other than by the use of force and violence. the ipperwash inquiry reveals in a stark manner the deeply felt anger and frustration that results when provincial and federal governments fail to deal constructively with extant treaty obligations and shows the untenable position that police are forced into when asked to intercede in the seemingly inevitable protests and confrontations that result from this failure. the proposal of the ipperwash inquiry to establish a provincial treaty commission and a ministry of aboriginal affairs has the potential to deal constructively with disputes over treaty rights and other unresolved issues concerning burial and heritage sites. it will be necessary, however, that trust of aboriginal peoples be regained so that they do not feel they are merely land claims adversaries of federal and provincial governments, as has been the case with much previous litigation. if a number of the key ipperwash proposals were implemented, it would serve to mitigate the deleterious consequences of a failure to take seriously canada’s legal obligations towards first nations people. these proposals also have the potential to prevent further needless loss of life, such as the tragic death of dudley george. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.1 it is for this reason that recent government initiatives, such as manitoba’s aboriginal justice implementation commission (n.d.), the ongoing truth and reconciliation commission of canada (n.d.), and canada’s justice at last (aboriginal affairs and northern development canada [aandc], 2007) action plan are particularly welcome. justice at last has been developed under canada’s specific claims policy in recognition that the “crown has sometimes failed to uphold its lawful obligations under historic treaties or has mismanaged first nation funds or other assets for which it is responsible under the indian act” (aandc, 2007, p. 1). the specific claims policy attempts to resolve historical grievances through negotiation. as the canadian government admits, the ongoing specific claims process has been “slow, cumbersome, and costly,” (aandc, 2007, p. 1) and has, therefore, been largely responsible for frustrations suffered by first nations people in resolving their unsettled land claims. the government of canada acknowledges that “the number of unsettled claims in the federal system has doubled since 1993 and there is a growing backlog of claims awaiting attention or action” (aandc, 2007, p. 1). in an attempt to alleviate these difficulties, the justice at last approach will be based on the recommendations of the 2006 standing senate committee on aboriginal people’s special study of the specific claims process. the specific claims process has adopted a four priority approach, involving: (a) the creation of an independent tribunal, (b) a more transparent arrangement for financial compensation, (c) a measure to ensure faster processing of small claims, and (d) better use of current dispute resolution services, such as the indian specific claims commission (iscc). policy recommendations the foregoing discussion of police involvement in aboriginal protests and confrontations suggests the adoption of the following policy recommendations in order to ameliorate conflict. • police should be briefed as fully as possible about the reasons for aboriginal protests in which they are involved. especially important would be information, as in the case of ipperwash and oka, where such protests concern burial sites or other locations considered sacred by first nations people, which could lead to a heightened sense of emotion on the protesters’ part and an intense desire to protect these areas at all cost. • aboriginal persons with training in negotiation and mediation should be utilized whenever possible in first nations confrontations to serve as a buffer between police and protesters and to further communication between the two conflicting parties. • police who are involved in aboriginal protests are advised to wear the customary attire for regular duty and be armed as they would in everyday situations, unless there is verifiable and concrete information that aboriginal protesters are themselves armed. the ipperwash case highlights the tragic results of a reliance on misinformation and hearsay reports. • it is highly advisable that there be on the ground involvement of qualified government officials who have expertise in land claims negotiations in aboriginal protests as a means of diffusing tensions and creating an atmosphere in which there is an expectation of immanent government action on particular claims. such involvement by government officials would also have the tendency to remove the aboriginal protest from the criminal realm to that of civil litigation. • the protest site should be isolated in such a way that the situation is not further aggravated by persons not directly involved in the aboriginal dispute, such as townspeople or even other aboriginal people who have arrived from distant places to give their support to local protests. such additional individuals tend to unnecessarily increase tension and magnify a local dispute into a much larger arena, which becomes virtually impossible to resolve. in other words, the 13 hedican: policing aboriginal protests published by scholarship@western, 2012 smaller the crowd and the more specific the dispute, the more effectively such situations can be managed. • from an international perspective, the circumstance surrounding the aboriginal protest at ipperwash park suggests that legitimate, non-violent dissent should not be suppressed by violent means. when peaceful dissent is suppressed in such a manner, there is a tendency for resistance to counteract this exercise of power. in a liberal democratic state, or in a country which sees itself in this light, reforms need to be instituted that allow for the resolution of dispute through a reasoned interchange of ideas and negotiation, rather than through the exercise of force and power in an attempt to suppress the voice of the dissenters. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.1 references aboriginal affairs and northern development canada. 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(2010). ways of knowing. toronto, on: nelson education. brown, d, & morse, p. (2007, september 14). builder, 52, hurt in caledonia home clash. toronto star. retrieved from http://www.thestar.com/news/article/256577--builder-52-hurt-in-caledonia-homeclash burstein, p. (2008). sentencing acts of civil disobedience: separating villains and heroes. in m. e. beare (ed.). honouring social justice (pp. 350-78). toronto, on: university of toronto press. caledonia barricades go back up. (2006, may 22). globe and mail. retrieved from http://www.theglobeandmail.com/ chiefs of ontario. (2006). a framework for police preparedness for aboriginal critical incidents: critical response. retrieved from http://www.attorneygeneral.jus.gov.on.ca/inquiries/ipperwash/policy_part/projects/pdf/chiefs_of _ontario-framework.pdf christie, g. (2007). police-government relations in the context of state-aboriginal relations. in m. e. beare & t. murray (eds.). police & government relations: who’s calling the shots? (pp. 147-82). toronto, on: university of toronto press. ciaccia, j. (2000). the oka crisis: a mirror of the soul. dorval: maren publications. coyle, m. (2005, february 4). addressing aboriginal land and treaty rights in ontario: an analysis of past policies and options for the future. retrieved from http://www.attorneygeneral.jus.gov.on.ca/inquiries/ipperwash/policy_part/research/pdf/coyle.pdf davis presented indians’ problems. (1975, may 1). times-news [thunder bay]. edwards, p. (2003). one dead indian: the premier, the police and the ipperwash crisis. toronto, on: stoddard publishing. 15 hedican: policing aboriginal protests published by scholarship@western, 2012 ferguson, r. (2007, november 26). caledonia protests greet bryant. toronto star. retrieved from http://www.thestar.com/news/ontario/article/279946--caledonia-protests-greet-bryant frideres, j. s., & gadacz, r. r. (2008). aboriginal peoples in canada. toronto, on: prentice-hall. gillespie, k. (2007, december 21). ipperwash land returned to indians. toronto star. retrieved from http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/article/287702--ipperwash-land-returned-to-indians hamilton, j. (1998, april 4). ipperwash protesters sent to jail, natives angered over “injustice.” london free press. retrieved from http://www.lfpress.com/ hedican, e. j. (2008a). the ipperwash inquiry and the tragic death of dudley george. canadian journal of native studies, 28, 159-73. hedican, e. j. (2008b). applied anthropology in canada: understanding aboriginal issues. toronto, on: university of toronto press. ipperwash allegations “malicious and petty,” harris says. (2007, may 31). cbc news. retrieved from http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/story/2007/05/31/ipperwash-reaction.html ipperwash inquiry. (2007). report of the ipperwash inquiry, the honourable sidney b. linden, commissioner. toronto, on: publications ontario. koehler, h. p. (1996, march 26). stoney point people’s support. retrieved from www.execulink.com/~hkoeler/stonsups.html lambertus, s. (2004). the media and the gustafsen lake standoff. toronto, on: university of toronto press. mccaffery, d. ipperwash park to re-open in 2010. (2009, may 28). london free press. retrieved from http://lfpress.ca/newsstand/news/local/2009/05/28/9601951.html milloy, m. j. (1995, september 7). whose “law” and whose “order”? the siege at gustafsen lake. mcgill daily. retrieved from http://www.mcgilldaily.com/ occupation at anicinabe park won’t recur in ’75. (1975, april 25). times-news [thunderbay]. oka crisis ottawa’s fault: ciaccia. (2000, july 10). cbc news. retrieved from http://www.cbc.ca/news/story/2000/07/10/ciaccia000710.html ontario buys site of disputed caledonia claim. (2006, june 16). cbc news. retrieved from http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/story/2006/06/16/caledonia-bought.html ontario provincial police. (2006). a framework for police preparedness for aboriginal critical incidents. retrieved from http://www.attorneygeneral.jus.gov.on.ca/inquiries/ipperwash/policy_part/projects/pdf/opp_ap pendix_e_framework_for_police_preparedness.pdf ontario provincial police association. (2006). submission to the ipperwash inquiry. retrieved from http://www.attorneygeneral.jus.gov.on.ca/inquiries/ipperwash/closing_submissions/pdf/ontariopr ovincialpoliceassociation_closingsubmissions.pdf 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.1 platiel, r. (1996, august 29). significant differences seen between native standoffs. globe and mail. retrieved from http://www.theglobeandmail.com/ steckley, j. l. & cummins, b. d. (2008). full circle: canada’s first nations. toronto, on: pearson. tetley, w. (2006). the october crisis, 1970: an insiders view. montreal: mcgill-queen’s university press. truth and reconciliation commission of canada. (n.d.). winnipeg, mb. retrieved from www.trccvr.ca/overview.html tully, j. (2008). public philosophy in a new key: democracy and civic freedom. cambridge, uk: cambridge university press. york, g., & pindera, l. (1991). people of the pines: the warriors and the legacy of oka. toronto, on: little brown (canada). 17 hedican: policing aboriginal protests published by scholarship@western, 2012 the international indigenous policy journal august 2012 policing aboriginal protests and confrontations: some policy recommendations edward j. hedican recommended citation policing aboriginal protests and confrontations: some policy recommendations abstract keywords creative commons license microsoft word 307421-text.native.1344541749.doc processes of native nationhood: the indigenous politics of self-government the international indigenous policy journal volume 6 | issue 4 article 4 september 2015 processes of native nationhood: the indigenous politics of self-government stephen cornell university of arizona, scornell@email.arizona.edu recommended citation cornell, s. (2015). processes of native nationhood: he indigenous politics of self-government. the international indigenous policy journal, 6(4). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.4 processes of native nationhood: the indigenous politics of selfgovernment abstract over the last three decades, indigenous peoples in the canzus countries (canada, australia, new zealand, and the united states) have been reclaiming self-government as an indigenous right and practice. in the process, they have been asserting various forms of indigenous nationhood. this article argues that this development involves a common set of activities on the part of indigenous peoples: (1) identifying as a nation or a people (determining who the appropriate collective “self ” is in self-determination and self-government); (2) organizing as a political body (not just as a corporate holder of assets); and (3) acting on behalf of indigenous goals (asserting and exercising practical decision-making power and responsibility, even in cases where central governments deny recognition). the article compares these activities in the four countries and argues that, while contexts and circumstances differ, the indigenous politics of self-government show striking commonalities across the four. among those commonalities: it is a positional as opposed to a distributional politics; while not ignoring individual welfare, it measures success in terms of collective power; and it focuses less on what central governments are willing to do in the way of recognition and rights than on what indigenous nations or communities can do for themselves. keywords self-governance, self-determination, nationhood, indigenous rights, united states, canada, australia, new zealand acknowledgments this paper is one product of a research project on indigenous nation building carried out by the jumbunna indigenous house of learning at the university of technology, sydney (uts) with support from the australian research council (arc). my thanks to both uts and the arc for their support and, especially, to my close colleagues on that project—steve hemming, miriam jorgensen, mark mcmillan, daryle rigney, and alison vivian—for the intellectual teamwork that directly shaped this paper and, indeed, made it possible. i am indebted to the ngarrindjeri nation and the gunditjmara nation for discussions at an inter-nation summit—an integral part of the project—in kingston se, south australia, in october of 2012 that gave birth to some key ideas presented here, and to alison vivian for urging me to put my thoughts on paper and then critiquing the result. her own work (vivian, 2014) has significantly affected my thinking, as have our subsequent discussions. thanks also to angus frith, miriam jorgensen, daryle rigney, and rochelle coté for valuable feedback on an earlier draft, and to joseph kalt and diane smith for numerous relevant discussions. versions of this paper were presented to a workshop on “theorising indigenous sociology” at the university of sydney in july of 2012 and to another on “ethnocultural diversity, governance, and forms of claimsmaking” at the center for american political studies, harvard university, in march of 2014. thanks especially to eve darian-smith and jeff denis for their comments at the latter event. finally, i am grateful to cosima hay mcrae for her assistance—and patience. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ this policy is available in the international indigenous policy journal: http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/4?utm_source=ir.lib.uwo.ca%2fiipj%2fvol6%2fiss4%2f4&utm_medium=pdf&utm_campaign=pdfcoverpages   pro c e s s e s o f n a t i v e n a t i o n h o o d : t h e i n d i g e n o u s po l i t i c s o f s e l f g o v e rn m e n t there is . . . evidence of the inability of human societies in general to accept that different forms of tribal, or even communal, self-government can coexist with the nation state without challenging national sovereignty. this is the essential, and repeated, issue in the relationship of indigenous communities to the larger polity within which they live. (binney, 2009, p. 8) [the australian government] may not recognize us as a nation, but we’re going to act like a nation, in every way we can. (personal communication, senior official of an aboriginal community in australia, may 2012) my interest in this article is in the effort of indigenous peoples in canada, australia, new zealand, and the united states—the so-called canzus group of countries—to assert self-governing power. the logic of this particular set of cases is straightforward. all are primarily english-settler democracies that share, in different forms, english legal and political heritages. they also share histories of organized, sustained efforts to eliminate indigenous populations through either violence or assimilation. in all four cases, these histories led to massive indigenous losses of population, lands, languages, and cultures, with catastrophic socioeconomic effects on surviving indigenous populations. in addition today, to varying degrees, in all four countries those surviving peoples are engaged in organized efforts to reclaim selfgovernment as an indigenous right and practice. those efforts are the latest phase of a broader movement in these and other countries for indigenous self-determination. that movement generally has been directed at national governments and has involved a broad demand for indigenous recognition and rights. organizations central to that movement often have taken supratribal form, acting on behalf of all the indigenous peoples within a particular state.1 while partly an outgrowth of that broader movement, the self-government effort differs in important ways. self-determination in the indigenous case is about the right and authority of indigenous nations or communities to determine their own futures and their own forms of government. selfgovernment is the exercise of that right, recognized or not. self-government, in a sense, is doing it. consequently, this emerging movement for self-government is less concerned with what central governments do by way of the recognition of indigenous peoples or their rights, legislatively or in the courts, and more concerned with what indigenous peoples do with rights, including those that they                                                                                                                 1 canzus country examples include, among others, the national congress of american indians, the american indian movement, and others in the usa; the national indian brotherhood and its successor, the assembly of first nations, in canada; the māori women’s welfare league and the māori congress in new zealand; and the national congress of australia’s first peoples, the aboriginal and torres strait islander commission, and their predecessor organizations in australia. 1 cornell: processes of native nationhood published by scholarship@western, 2015   believe they possess even if other governments disagree.2 additionally, the focus of this movement is less likely to be national than local: it is about distinct groups, communities, tribes, or nations engaging the practical tasks of governing. it pays less attention to overall patterns of indigenous rights than to localized assertions of indigenous decision-making power. despite this localism, the movement has a common theme: the assertion of genuine decision-making authority over lands and other natural resources held to be an indigenous patrimony, over the internal affairs of indigenous communities, over the nature and processes of economic development on their lands, over cultural properties and the management of cultural heritage, over the organization of selfgovernment, and over other matters that directly affect indigenous welfare. this article explores, in general terms, what indigenous peoples in the canzus countries are doing as they struggle to assert and exercise self-governing power. it explores the processes of establishing indigenous nationhood as something more than an idea or a rhetorical construct: as a realized and formally institutionalized political reality. n a t i v e n a t i o n h o o d potentially at least, this raises the question of what “nation” and “nationhood” mean in the indigenous context, and one could spend a good deal of time parsing their various and often divergent invocations. in this article, i’m less interested in definitional issues than in the fact that many indigenous peoples in the canzus countries use these terms to refer to themselves—a usage that, while hardly universal, appears to be growing—and in certain accompanying political processes. at the same time, the use of these terms certainly varies, with different indigenous peoples, both within and across these countries, making their own decisions about how to describe themselves. in the usa and canada, most of the peoples involved in the movement for self-government refer to themselves as nations and pay considerable, explicit attention to processes often described as nation building or, more                                                                                                                 2 central government disagreement with indigenous interpretations of rights is of course common and makes the assertion of such rights exceedingly difficult. nonetheless, a striking aspect of this movement is the search for political strategies that either bypass central government altogether and work directly with local governments and/or corporate actors or, as vivian (2014) pointed out, that take advantage of the fact that from time to time, and regardless of policy and the status of rights, non-indigenous governments and organizations have to interact with indigenous peoples as groups and therefore need group decisions to facilitate those interactions—a kind of de facto recognition of collective political life. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.4   appropriately in many cases, nation rebuilding.3 in australia, while much less common, the term lately has been gaining traction. the exception is new zealand where the language of nationhood is rare.4 but the terminology is less important than the concept behind it: the claim by these peoples, groups, or communities that they not only have distinctive cultures and historical heritages but also constitute—or wish to constitute—distinct political entities that should rightfully exercise control over their lands, over how those lands are used and cared for, over their own internal affairs including how they govern those affairs, and over the definition of their interests and over how those interests are pursued—even as they continue to exist within encompassing states. their agenda is to enact that vision. as hosmer and nesper (2013) put it, indigenous nationhood is both “accomplishment and aspiration” (p. 2). while recognizing the complexities of the term, i use nation here as a general proxy for groups in the canzus countries that are making such claims. where that is happening, five features of indigenous nationhood appear to be particularly prominent.                                                                                                                 3 as oren lyons (2007), an onondaga leader and international activist for indigenous rights, stated, “what we’re really talking about is nation rebuilding. we’ve always been here. we’re not newly built” (p. vii). on indigenous nation building and rebuilding, see jorgensen (2007). 4 the language of indigenous nationhood has been common in north america for a very long time. as early as the late eighteenth century, treaties signed between the united states of america and indigenous peoples often employed the term nation to refer to those peoples (see kappler, 1904-1941 for treaties; and anaya, 2004, chapter 1 for a discussion of the term and its usage in law at the time). thus, it has long been part of indigenous collective identities in the usa, but it has gained increased resonance in recent years (hosmer & nesper, 2013). the term has had similarly long historical usage in canada, where the term “first nations” is now both common among indigenous peoples themselves and formalized in legislation and policy. in australia, the term “first peoples” has lately been popular, but see, among others, bradfield (2006) and barcham (2011) on the emergence of the noongar nation, and also ngarrindjeri nation (2006). referring to the ngarrindjeri nation’s steadfast claim that they have never ceded their sovereignty, alison vivian (2014) noted, “they overtly use the language of sovereignty—nation, citizen, jurisdiction—in active resistance to the limitations that non-indigenous governments would seek to impose” (p. 121). several other australian indigenous peoples have begun to use similar language. recently, the aboriginal and torres strait islander social justice commissioner, mick gooda (2014), commented, “aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples are many unique and individual mobs, with our own identities, languages and cultures. call them what you will: peoples, tribes, clans, language groups, nations, mobs. i like the term ‘nations’ as a representative title for all of these groups” (nation building, para. 1). he went on to say, “i am now attending meetings in new south wales, queensland and victoria where i don’t hear koori or murri. but i am hearing wiradjuri, kamileroi, bunjalang, yuen, kaanju, koombumeri, quandamooka and waayni. this reclamation of nations’ names is a powerful precursor to taking control of their own destinies” (constitutional recognition, para. 14). nonetheless, the use of the term “nation” in australia appears to depend on several factors, among them the specific histories of different indigenous peoples there, audiences’ perceived receptivity to the idea of distinct nations existing within a nation-state, and the conceptual baggage sometimes attached to the term. meanwhile, “nation” is seldom heard among māori in new zealand, where recent organizational efforts among iwi (commonly translated as tribes) often have taken corporate form designed for the management of economic assets reacquired through land and other resource settlements. but see binney (2009, chapter 1) on ngai tuhoe’s effort to regain self-governing power, expressed in part through the idea of the “tuhoe nation,” and i also note my conversations with some ngai tahu representatives who in recent years sometimes have used the term nation to refer to their iwi. 3 cornell: processes of native nationhood published by scholarship@western, 2015   1. the first is topographical, in the old and broad sense of the term and having to do with place and the role of place. these are peoples whose present or historical links—spiritual, cognitive, cultural, economic—to specific lands and places are perceived as fundamental aspects of nationhood. those links typically long precede the coming of colonial powers, and, by virtue of that fact, indigenous peoples often see themselves as entitled to a certain standing within contemporary states. their argument is that the land was and, in at least a moral and spiritual sense, remains their land. 2. a second feature has to do with the claimed role within these communities of bonds of culture and kinship, the claim that an indigenous community shares a distinctive set of cultural understandings and real or assumed kinship ties that in some significant degree have survived the rigors of colonialism and constitute, even today, the binding sinews of a shared consciousness and identity. whether such ties are in fact evident is a separate issue; what matters is the claim and its result: a shared and, for many of those who share it, compelling sense of peoplehood rooted in kinship, past and/or present cultural practice, and history.5 3. a third feature, related to the second, has to do with the narratives at the heart of indigenous nationhood. “the nation,” as john kelly (1997) puts it, “is a narrative,” a story about a collective “we” that articulates and justifies distinction (p. 257).6 in the canzus countries, narratives of indigenous nationhood are diverse but express a broadly common sequence including an original presence in a particular place, european invasion, land expropriation, cultural suppression, and—despite these processes—the collective persistence and agency of distinct peoples with timeless roots. these are narratives of indigeneity, loss, and survival. 4. a fourth feature is explicitly political: the quest for a level of recognized sovereignty that exists in the context of, but is not entirely subordinate to, an encompassing sovereignty. with rare exceptions, indigenous nationhood in the canzus countries is not secessionist; breaking away from encompassing states is not an objective, although the desired level of self-government frequently includes some state-resembling functions. the primary objective is comprehensive decision-making power in those matters that most directly affect the survival of indigenous peoples. however, for the most part, these groups see themselves as nations within nations.7 5. finally, this idea of nations within nations distinguishes these claims from those of other minority populations in the canzus countries. unlike most racial or ethnic populations in                                                                                                                 5 this feature of nationhood is fundamentally cognitive: the issue is not whether such bonds actually exist but the perception or belief that they do (brubaker, loveman, & stamatov, 2004; cornell & hartmann, 2007). 6 narrative as a core feature of nationhood and nation making is one of the themes of foster (1997) and numerous other treatments. see also the discussion of ethnicity and narrative in cornell (2000). 7 indigenous nationhood, according to simpson (2000), “enjoys a diversity of forms and experiences, but because of invasion, conquest and settlement, is necessarily one that is spatially within that of another dominating society” (p. 116). this, like several others of these five points, is not limited to indigenous nationalism. brubaker (2004) pointed out that in some contexts, the nationalist claim “need not involve the demand for an independent state, but it does ordinarily involve at least a demand for an autonomous polity—for a polity that can serve as the polity of and for the putative nation” (p. 116). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.4   these countries, indigenous peoples typically have a positional as opposed to a distributional politics: the pursuit of collective self-governing power. it is not that the distribution of socioeconomic rewards available to many people in highly developed western societies is of little interest to indigenous peoples. on the contrary, most treat extreme unemployment, ill health, inadequate housing, and other forms of social distress as critical matters in urgent need of attention. but these issues are contextualized within a prior and encompassing commitment to the survival of community, nation, people, or tribe as a political entity with substantial control over its own affairs.8 this prioritization frustrates the canzus states, which commonly prefer to focus their relevant policy prescriptions on individual well-being and equality instead of collective aspiration and difference.9 i have called this movement an indigenous politics of self-government, by which i mean a political effort carried out primarily by indigenous peoples themselves and rooted in specific indigenous communities and goals. the word order is intentional, for there also is a politics of indigenous self-government that has to do with the policies of non-indigenous governments toward indigenous peoples. that politics takes place largely in national, state, or provincial forums and in the mainstream courts; it asks what—if any—self-governing powers indigenous nations or communities should be permitted to exercise and how those peoples might help manage the calamitous socioeconomic legacies of colonialism—poverty, ill health, substandard housing, and so forth. it substitutes self-management or self-administration for self-government, and it is a politics dominated by non-indigenous policy-makers in which the indigenous voice is often either muted, limited to those willing to support external priorities, or entirely absent. these two sets of politics constitute distinct but related political fields, each with implications for the other, and the relationship between them is changing. a striking aspect of the indigenous politics of selfgovernment in the canzus countries in recent years is the turn—more apparent in some areas than                                                                                                                 8 as craig calhoun wrote (1993), “a crucial difference between ethnicities and nations is that the latter are envisioned as intrinsically political communities, as sources of sovereignty, while this is not central to the definition of ethnicities” (p. 229; see also the discussion in cornell & hartmann, 2007, chapter 2). chartrand (1999) described an indigenous nation as “a group with a common cultural and historical antecedence” in places now taken over by others, and with “a feeling that we are distinct historical communities, socio-political communities” (p. 104). 9 humpage’s (2002) comment about policies of the new zealand government is illustrative. she noted, “distributive justice, needs and development discourses have been used to support [a] preference for confining māori claims to the domestic, dependent rights of citizenship . . . each of these discourses defines the ‘problem’ largely in terms of māori socio-economic status” (p. 46). 5 cornell: processes of native nationhood published by scholarship@western, 2015   others—away from a focus on changing central government policy and toward indigenous agendas and action: from a focus on changing what “they” do to a focus on deciding what “we” do—and doing it.10 this indigenous politics of self-government is an attempt to give political force to indigenous nationhood. as currently observed in the canzus countries, it appears to involve at least three intentional, core processes: identifying as a nation, organizing as a nation, and acting as a nation. i d e n t i f y i n g a s a n a t i o n the concepts of collective self-determination and self-government imply the existence of a collective “self”: an identifiable community “that aspires to control its own future and in which rights to selfdetermine or self-govern may be vested” (cornell, 2013, p. 42).11 however, while the concepts may imply or even assume such a community, in reality that community has to be realized in the minds of its putative members and given enough significance to sustain allegiance and shape action. the key question has to do with boundaries. what conception of the collective self as an assemblage of particular persons has or could have sufficient resonance and salience in people’s lives to inspire action and sustain allegiance over time? for indigenous peoples in the canzus countries, answering this question can be a challenging task. colonialism had—and continues to have—intentionally transformative effects on many of those peoples, seizing indigenous lands, dispersing or consolidating populations, bypassing and undermining social and political organization, attacking cultural practices, prohibiting languages, and so on. claiming or revitalizing an indigenous nationhood has to confront the embedded legacies of these processes.                                                                                                                 10 a detailed explanation of this turn is beyond the scope of this article, but a combination of political protest and legislation in the united states, political protest and court decisions in the other three canzus countries, and developments in the international human rights arena—also shaped by indigenous actions—led in the last quarter of the 20th century to a changing relationship between indigenous peoples and the canzus states. cornell (2014) provides a brief overview; for more detail on the usa see cornell (1988) and nagel (1996). on the role played by courts and the law in canada, australia, and new zealand, see mchugh (2011); on international law and indigenous rights, see anaya (2004). angus frith (personal communication, 2014) has suggested that another factor may be the entrenchment of neoliberalism’s focus on the individual to the exclusion of the collective. this is manifest in the tendency of central governments to talk about the needs of indigenous people as opposed to indigenous peoples. the indigenous response is to emphasize peoplehood or nationhood. at the same time, this turn from a national to a local politics is by no means complete or exclusive; there are important recent examples of a vigorous indigenous politics operating at nation-state levels, among them the current “idle no more” protest movement across canada precipitated in part by policies of the harper government; the organization in 2010 of the national congress of australia’s first peoples; and issue-based mobilizations such as that of american indian voices and action in support of the violence against women reauthorization act in 2012 to 2013. but over the last few decades, there has been a notable shift in much of indigenous politics from the nation-state level, mounted largely through supratribal organizations, to the local or tribal level, with growing numbers of indigenous nations pursuing their own political goals and engaging in innovative political action and institution building. see for example smith (2010); hemming, rigney, and berg, (2011); cornell (2013); vivian (2014); and the winners of honoring nations awards in the united states at http://www.hpaied.org/honoring-nations/awardees 11 see the related discussions in peters (1999); taylor (2004); hunt and smith (2006); cornell (2007a). 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.4   one of those legacies is disruption in collective self-concepts. prior to european contact, patterns of indigenous identity and social organization were exceedingly diverse. some indigenous boundaries— spatial, political, cognitive (the identity boundary that lies between “us” and “them”)—were well established; others were far more fluid, porous, and multi-layered than those familiar to and demanded by european powers; in some cases, existing cognitive boundaries had no political replication in the sense of established and concomitant decision-making structures. however, imperial designs and the processes of conflict, negotiation, and administration that were involved in their realization required and often assumed a simpler sort of legibility (scott, 1998): bright lines that could distinguish among peoples, territories, and patterns of authority. in north america, the european powers set out to find such lines or—where they did not exist—to create them; in australia, and often in new zealand, they tended to ignore indigenous social organization altogether. at the same time, indigenous peoples, struggling to find effective responses to invasion and confrontation, sometimes initiated change themselves, separating, joining hands, or emphasizing certain boundaries over others. such processes could have significant effects on collective identification. in some cases a powerful sense of peoplehood survived; in others—and in all four countries—colonization variously assumed indigenous boundaries that did not exist, disrupted or ignored those that did, or imposed new boundaries that fit the conceptions and convenience of colonial powers, rigidifying such impositions in administrative structures designed to facilitate external control of the populations involved. the result in many cases was boundaries that were radically at odds with indigenous assumptions and relationships. indigenous peoples reclaiming self-governing powers start with these legacies not only in hand but also frequently in mind. some indigenous populations have been living with imposed or externally fostered boundaries for several generations. while these boundaries may not be the only potential bases of identity on offer, they still dominate the cognitive landscape. furthermore—and there is an irony here—the political quest for self-determination has to deal with contemporary power. in order to achieve some control over their own affairs and to interact productively with the organized powers of the societies of which they are now a part, these nations are having to construct a kind of identificational concreteness or rigidity—a less pliable version of “who we are”—that may have been unknown when they last exercised significant decision-making power.12 identifying as a nation, therefore, often involves interactions among at least three sets of influences: imposed boundaries of various kinds, older but still extant traditions of identity and organization, and the exigencies of asserting self-governing power in contemporary times. such interactions are highly variable, both across these countries and within them. a people or community may have a long-standing sense of self, a collective identity long preceding european contact. that identity may have been sustained through—and even encouraged by—a treaty process or other set of relationships with europeans, and it may have been embedded eventually in the administrative structure of colonial control. such cases offer a ready-made cognitive basis for collective action. in such instances, identifying as a nation may be a non-issue; the nation has a continuing and profound historical presence and prominence in the minds of its people.                                                                                                                 12 paul mchugh (2011) commented that “rights need rights-bearers, and the common-law legal systems have insisted upon clarity of identity. tribes have had to corporatize or at least transform customary rules, a matter of fluid unwritten practice, into textualized codes” (p. 13). 7 cornell: processes of native nationhood published by scholarship@western, 2015   among the canzus countries, this is most commonly the case in the united states, which has a long history of nation-by-nation treaty-making; the confinement of indigenous peoples on reservations, many of them reserved to single nations; and the organization of indian affairs by reservation administrative units—these and other factors in many cases helped to sustain or promote strong tribal identification. there are exceptions, particularly where diverse nations, tribes, or villages were forced together by warfare, euro-american settlement, or the treaty process, as many were in the pacific northwest, or were shredded by forced removals from their lands. nonetheless, for a significant number of american indian nations, to identify as a nation is not a task to be accomplished; it is a long-standing cognitive fact. however, this pattern is not the only one. some indigenous identities were more fluid to begin with or more narrowly focused. regardless of the starting point, it was common for colonial regimes to simply ignore indigenous conceptions, expropriating lands, relocating peoples, forcing groups together or pulling them apart, and imposing their own administrative convenience on the peoples they encountered. one of the stark legacies of colonialism in many parts of the world is this reorganization— or disorganization—of indigenous peoples. such histories, common across the canzus countries but particularly so in australia and parts of canada, complicate the process of identifying as a nation. in canada, colonization fragmented many groups and then embedded the results in the administrative structure of aboriginal affairs, creating multiple first nations out of what were once more unitary—in a cognitive if not political sense— peoples (see, for example, royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996). this presents those trying to revitalize or rebuild their nations with a dilemma: do you accept the fragments and work with nowestablished first nation structures, or do you attempt to reconnect across these imposed administrative boundaries, building on an older, more comprehensive, and perhaps still vital sense of peoplehood? one practical consideration is scale. some first nations have populations in the low hundreds. in such cases, the challenges of self-government may require joining forces with other nations that share culture, history, or situation. in australia, colonialism largely ignored indigenous institutions and identities and refused (and continues to refuse) to recognize indigenous groups as political entities exercising governmental power. many peoples were forced off their lands and moved to missions or social service centers where multiple groups, languages, and cultures were gathered together. what is the appropriate collective basis of political action in such circumstances? kinship? language? cultural practice? geography? shared history or socioeconomic interest? for some groups, such as ngarrindjeri or gunditjmara, such questions may be irrelevant; they have survived as organized groups that can still draw on pre-colonial conceptions of the collective self and can build to some degree on older structures of decision-making (bell, 1998; hemming & rigney, 2008; vivian, 2014). but for others, such as the wiradjuri, dispersed across a vast space dominated by non-indigenous populations, these questions require careful consideration. in parts of the central and western deserts, where collaborative decision-making structures were often very thin or highly localized and political organization above the extended family was rare, collective identity in the sense of a clearly bounded peoplehood may be minimal or even entirely absent (morphy, 2008; myers, 1991; sutton, 1995). 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.4   māori in new zealand face their own challenges. prior to colonization, the hapu—commonly translated as sub-tribe—was in many cases the primary supra-familial unit of māori social organization and political action. however, the colonization process tended, over time, to give prominence to iwi (tribe), which fit with some tribes’ preferences anyway (ballara, 1998; o’regan, 1992). the process of settling land and other resource claims, which began in earnest in the 1980s and 1990s, reinforced that prominence. this is predictable; it has been to the advantage of new zealand governments—and in some cases of māori themselves—to deal with larger units of māori social organization. one result is that today, many māori political assertions are mounted by and through iwi (ballara, 1998; hill, 2009; joseph, 2005; o’sullivan, 2007; poata-smith, 2004; prime, 2011).13 not all māori support this development. some believe the appropriate basis of collective identity and political organization should be the hapu, and there is a substantial urban population whose attachments to either iwi or hapu are tenuous or, in some cases, altogether absent. some of them argue that specific urban populations are taking modern tribal forms and should be recognized as urban equivalents of iwi (macpherson, 2005). again, the question arises: who is the appropriate collective in self-determination and self-government? iwi? hapu? iwi here and hapu there? perhaps the māori population as a whole? something else altogether? despite these differing patterns, in all four countries we are likely to see some groups for whom identifying as a nation is an ancient, taken-for-granted practice; some for whom it involves reclaiming or revitalizing an older identity that was ignored or suppressed by outsiders; and some for whom nationhood offers an unprecedented but potent frame for addressing shared concerns and a vehicle for asserting new political visions. even in the last of these, there typically are cultural, linguistic, ecological, or historical ties on which bonds of collective identity can be built, although doing so may require time, focused work, and a strategic imagination.14 of course time, focused work, and a strategic imagination are elements in many cases of identifying as a nation; alternative bases of identification and action are amply available and in some cases compelling. this is a cognitive process; it involves either strengthening or constructing a frame for interpreting the world and the people’s place within it that group members not only will accept but will come to view (if they do not already) as central to their own self-concepts. while heritage and circumstance can do much of this work, they are not all powerful, and much of this construction process involves intentionality and entrepreneurship: an intentional effort, whether driven by elites or by the grassroots, to give prominence to the nation as a central, personal, and consequential entity in the minds of its putative citizens and in the perceptions of the world at large. those efforts often depart significantly from the colonial legacies they inherit. one of the striking developments currently underway in canada and, to a lesser extent, in australia is just this sort of intentional reconstruction of collective self-concepts, involving boundaries and the meanings attached to them. in british columbia, for example, four first nations that share ktunaxa culture, language, and heritage have joined together in the ktunaxa nation, rejecting the administrative boundaries that                                                                                                                 13 views on this issue vary; see, for example, the discussion of ngai tahu’s representation at the treaty of waitangi in o’regan (1992). 14 there are some as well for whom the idea of nationhood may be alien or problematic thanks to present circumstances or the imposed prescriptions of others. 9 cornell: processes of native nationhood published by scholarship@western, 2015   canada imposed upon them and literally reconstituting themselves as they reclaim an older, indigenous sense of peoplehood (dolan, 2009; ktunaxa, 2015). in the northwest territories, another four first nations, populated by those formerly known as dogrib indians, likewise have joined together to form the tlicho government, redrawing the political boundaries imposed by canada and claiming a comprehensive nationhood (tlicho, n.d.). the gwich’in, widely dispersed athabaskan peoples of canada’s yukon territory and northwest territories and the interior of alaska, are trying to assert a similarly comprehensive nationhood—the gwich’in nation—that straddles the united states–canada border. the organizational structure of their nationhood is modest; both canada and the usa have withheld formal recognition (gwich’in council international, 2010; mccormack, 2014). however, the claim to an indigenous nationhood is clear. in southwestern australia, the noongar nation has used the native title process and land claims to assert the nationhood of a dispersed indigenous population, taking a host of disparate claims and consolidating them under the umbrella of a noongar nation. in the process, they are building on and giving enhanced prominence to older, shared conceptions of peoplehood (barcham, 2008, 2011; bradfield, 2006). regardless of whether such older conceptions ever existed for the wiradjuri, a large and dispersed population centered in new south wales, there is now an emerging and politicized conversation among wiradjuri about a wiradjuri nation (vivian, 2014).15 not all such identifications use the language of nationhood. but all seem to share a common theme: we are not only a people; we are also a political community, and we intend to organize as such and make decisions for ourselves. intentional reconceptions may be expressed in simpler ways as well. in arizona, for example, in the course of indigenous led constitutional reform in 1986, the papago tribe became the tohono o’odham nation, replacing not only its constitution but also outsiders’ naming and terminology with the people’s preferred terms. the crow tribe of montana increasingly refers to itself as the apsáalooke nation, adopting its own terminology. in 2006, the osage tribe of indians of oklahoma adopted a new constitution; article i stated, “this tribe shall hereafter be referred to as the osage nation” (the constitution of the osage nation, 2006, article 1-title).16 such terminological changes are largely symbolic, but the symbolism is powerful. these nations are making claims to a particular political status and to the right of a people to decide who they are, regardless of how external power views them. in new zealand, a police raid on the home territory of ngai tuhoe in 2007 precipitated a flurry of signs and phrases referring to the “tuhoe nation.” while many felt their identity was tuhoe long before the raid, the raid provoked a more emphatic statement of political aspiration. more important than the terminology was the assumption behind it—that tuhoe is simultaneously part of and apart from the rest of new zealand and that it has—and should have—authority over its lands and affairs, including lands taken by the new zealand government to form a national park. similarly, in australia, the ngarrindjeri                                                                                                                 15 anita heiss (2012), a wiradjuri woman and prominent writer, treats the idea matter-of-factly in a glossary entry: “wiradjuri are the people of the wiradjuri nation of central new south wales” (p. 342). 16 see also www.narf.org/nill/constitutions/tohono/constitution.pdf; http://crowlaws.org/2001_crow_constitution 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.4   nation, among others, has no doubt about its own nationhood, both assuming and regularly asserting it (binney, 2009; hemming et al., 2011; masters & gower, 2007; ngarrindjeri nation, 2006).17 the fact that some of these felt identities are or will be unprecedented need not undermine their legitimacy. to reclaim self-governing power through novel allegiances or institutions hardly undermines the claim. the key to legitimacy is not some precursor identity but what diane smith (2004) called “a process of indigenous choice” (p. 27): the freedom of indigenous peoples to decide for themselves who they are, who they wish to be, and what that means for organization, action, and relationships with surrounding political entities. given sufficient freedom, some indigenous peoples may choose simply to sustain or rebuild long-standing cognitive conceptions while others, either divorced by colonialism from those conceptions or facing changed circumstances that compel new imaginings, may choose to innovate. regardless of the choices made, over the long run legitimacy is crucial and needs a potent foundation, something more than convenience or efficacy. to identify as a nation may or may not make circumstantial sense, but to have staying power it needs more. narratives of shared interest can be compelling, but they pale beside those of kinship, shared culture, or a common history of action or injustice. these give native nationhood its power and are often at the center of the process of identification. there are other factors that complicate this process, among them dispersion and diversity—the simple fact that over time many indigenous peoples have become geographically, culturally, and economically diverse. some nations are confronting this head-on: the menominee nation in the usa delivers services to citizens in chicago; the citizen potawatomi nation incorporates communities of its citizens in los angeles, phoenix, and elsewhere into its oklahoma-based governing system; the gunditjmara nation in australia reaches out to its citizens in melbourne and adelaide, some distance from their homeland. as one gunditjmara leader (personal communication) put it, “of course we do that; they’re our people.” the point for indigenous peoples has been to find the social and cognitive connections from which the claim of nationhood can be turned into collective political power. for many nations, those connections have been there all along and only have to be strengthened or mobilized; for some, they have to be rebuilt or even built anew. thus the key questions: what social unit or social boundary is likely (a) to provide an adequate basis for the effective, practical organization of self-government; and (b) to gain legitimacy with the people involved—that is, to be seen as the appropriate unit to carry their sense of a collective self and their political ambitions (cornell, 2007b; cornell & kalt, 2007)? the answers to these two questions have to be balanced with each other; achieving that balance is one of the central tasks facing nascent nationhood. for example, legitimacy may be greater at smaller scales, but larger scales may pool resources, enhance political influence, or otherwise facilitate more effective governance. identifying as a nation takes place within the constraints not only of circumstance, but also of the sometimes divergent needs for both effectiveness and legitimacy. in addition, of course the two may interact: effective self-government, over                                                                                                                 17 recently, ngai tuhoe reached a settlement with the new zealand government that, among other things, restores some of ngai tuhoe’s authority over portions of its ancestral lands within the national park (see cheng, 2014; ruru, 2014). 11 cornell: processes of native nationhood published by scholarship@western, 2015   time, can be a source of legitimacy, and legitimacy with the relevant population can improve the likelihood of effective self-government. o rg a n i z i n g a s a n a t i o n how will these self-identifying nations make the decisions they view as theirs to make? how will they enact the political community they claim? how will they govern? it is one thing to identify as a nation; it is another to create the organizational capacity to make and implement collective decisions, and to do so consistently and effectively. yet this is an essential step. as a leader of an american indian nation (personal communication) said, “the best defense of sovereignty is to exercise it effectively.” strategies of litigation or protest are important, he suggested, but so is defending the right to govern through its effective practice. it also is a more challenging step for at least three reasons. first, organization crystallizes boundary issues. those who identify as a nation may not agree on just where the boundary of that identity lies or what it is founded on: kinship, cultural practice, history, commitment, or something else. however, until they attempt to enact it as an organized phenomenon, their disagreement has limited effect; what matters is attachment to the idea of the nation, and that attachment can have various roots. once the political idea has to be translated into organization and action, boundaries loom large. who is part of the nation and who is not? who should have a voice?18 second, organizing as a nation also raises a host of practical organizational questions. within such jurisdiction as an indigenous nation has been able to claim or control, what should the organization and process of governance look like? who should have authority over what? how should decisions be made? what strategic priorities should shape action? how should disputes be resolved? who deals with other governments and the rest of the outside world?19 and so on. third, because they are nations within nations, operating within often resistant, intrusive, or distracted political regimes, indigenous answers to these organizational questions have to take external perception and prescription into account. in all four countries, to the extent that central governments have either tolerated or encouraged the organizational efforts of indigenous peoples, they have wanted to determine its form, often imposing their own organizational models, moral codes, and assumptions about what “good” governance looks like and how it should work. as paul mchugh (2011) wrote, “increasingly settler-state legalism demands that [tribal] leaders must govern by western principles of transparency and accountability geared more towards displaying those attributes to the outer world than necessarily being an outgrowth of the tribes’ own political agenda” (p. 13).                                                                                                                 18 for an extended discussion of one such case and the challenges this can involve, including those thrown up by distinctive histories, see sturm (2002). on indigenous citizenship issues more generally, see goldberg (2002). 19 as vivian (2014) pointed out, this was one of the key considerations in the ngarrindjeri nation’s decision to develop a narrindjeri regional authority that could speak for the nation and coordinate its various activities and—importantly—with whom outsiders would be required to interact. they thus countered the tendency of government to fragment ngarrindjeri governance and strategy by dealing separately with each program or organization within the nation (see chapter 6). 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.4   these impositions often have had less to do with self-government than with assuring central government control over what indigenous nations do or with promoting assimilation through the adoption of western organizational and cultural templates—or both.20 such impositions also are often characterized by an impoverished notion of governance, limiting it to trivial decision-making and the management of social service programs designed and funded by external governments: models not of self-government but of self-administration or self-management (behrendt, 2003; cornell 2007b). organizations that depart significantly from such external prescriptions may be sanctioned or ignored. nonetheless, a growing number of native peoples have been rejecting such limited and imposed conceptions and models of governance and coming up with their own, but they approach the organizational task from very different starting points. most of those we know of in the canzus countries have some history of governance that long predates the arrival of europeans: unwritten bodies of rules or law, embedded in shared culture, transmitted from generation to generation, that specify relationships, order decision-making, and shape both individual and collective action.21 however, both the movement for self-government and the demands of encompassing states envision something more: a more explicit system of government, of offices and procedures through which the nation will make decisions and get things done. in the united states and canada, treaty processes and the geography of reservation or reserve confinement largely determined the scope of such organization while legislation largely determined its form. in canada, for example, the indian act of 1876 and its subsequent amendments have long dictated the political organization of first nations; only in recent decades have significant numbers of first nations begun to shake off the constraints of the act and choose organizational forms for themselves. in 2000, for example, the nisga’a nation signed a treaty with british columbia and canada that established the nisga’a lisims government, a law-making government of nisga’a design. in the early 2000s, the mohawk council of akwesasne designed its own justice system and adopted its own laws, not as by-laws of the indian act but as products of an indigenous right to make law and enforce it. in 2007, the huu-ayaht people overwhelmingly approved the huu-ay-aht first nations constitution, “a governance regime made by the people and for the people” (tom happynook quoted in maa-nulth first nations, 2007, para. 3). the ktunaxa nation has been using the british columbia treaty process to create a new governing system that reflects its own collective sense of self, values, and priorities. said one ktunaxa leader (personal communication), “i don’t know if we’ll get a treaty out of this process, but we’ll get a government out of it, and it will be a ktunaxa government.”22 in the usa, the indian reorganization act (ira) of 1934, while less universally applied than the indian act, provided an externally generated template for indigenous organization, and while only about half the nations in the country organized under the ira, many more—with strong federal encouragement— took it as a model of how to pursue self-government only to find themselves burdened by its severe                                                                                                                 20 regarding the 1934 indian reorganization act in the united states, for example, which applied a single governmental template across diverse nations, dobyns (1948) pointed out long ago that “in fitting this tribal entity into the larger american framework, the indians will be assimilating themselves” (p. 37). 21 on canada, for example, see borrows (2010, chapters 2 and 3); more generally cornell (2015). 22 on nisga’a, see www.fngovernance.org/toolkit/best_practice/nisgaa_nation; on akwesasne, see brimley, cornell, flies-away, jorgensen, and starks (2007). 13 cornell: processes of native nationhood published by scholarship@western, 2015   limitations. over the last few decades, a growing number of american indian nations have turned away from the ira, searching for more effective and culturally compatible governing structures. some of these have been continuations or formalizations of long-standing indigenous models or have been based upon those models; some have adopted western models or reorganized them to fit indigenous ideas of how authority should be organized and exercised; some have been innovative hybrids or entirely new. all have sought to substantially expand the scope of indigenous governing power. much of this reorganization has taken place over the last two decades through the deliberate reform of tribal constitutions. thus, the apsáalooke nation, the white earth nation, the cherokee nation, the citizen potawatomi nation, and numerous others have been engaged to one degree or another in reorganizing their governing systems through constitutional reform that claims substantial jurisdiction and incorporates their own ideas of the appropriate organization of authority. indigenous peoples in both canada and the united states have benefited from the fact that the treaty process and subsequent governmental actions, for all their shortcomings, at least recognized indigenous peoples as political communities, even as those countries asserted control over those communities and limited their power. central governments have been willing to tolerate and in some cases even encourage native nations in developing indigenous governing systems capable of exercising substantial jurisdictional authority over lands, economic development, internal affairs, and other matters. such political recognition and encouragement has been more rare in new zealand and, especially, in australia. māori in new zealand have long tried to use government-designed organizations such as tribe-specific trust boards, organized to manage māori assets, and government-dictated modes of māori representation as vehicles for their own pursuit of rangatiratanga—autonomy or sovereignty—some of it based on iwi or hapu, some of it embracing a more comprehensive māori community. recent settlements of māori natural-resources claims have given some iwi in new zealand substantial assets that, in turn, can support self-government efforts but also raise questions about the form such efforts should take. while the settlement process has facilitated the emergence of iwi as legal entities, it also has pushed them into a corporate organizational model, treating them more as asset-holding corporations than as governments. the recognition of iwi as political entities with significant self-governing powers— as opposed to recognition of the right of iwi to self-manage assets—has been slow to come (hill, 2009). in australia, organization is complicated by the reluctance of central government to grant indigenous communities recognition as self-constituted political bodies. this forces those groups to incorporate under mainstream legislation so as to gain the legal personality necessary to interact with external entities. this greatly complicates the exercise of culturally legitimate governance. the implicit message is that formal indigenous organization should be accountable first to central government, only secondarily to its own people—hardly democracy in action.23 australian government policy has long been fundamentally assimilationist. it approaches aboriginal persons as individuals; employs individualist metrics of well-being as the only proper measure of policy performance; largely dismisses indigenous culture or collective identity as viable bases for any relationship with the state; and ignores                                                                                                                 23 while the details differ, this also is the case for māori in new zealand. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.4   indigenous visions of self-governing communities—of nations within the nation.24 on top of that is a governmental focus in indigenous affairs on social service provision via a set of distinct social service units that treat indigenous communities simply as collections of individuals who are themselves envisioned as “partible—as consumers” of various program services (morphy, 2008, p. 136). one result is creativity on the part of those indigenous australian communities or peoples whose goals reach beyond self-management to the exercise of genuine governing power. some have tried to take advantage of the organizational opportunities that the australian government, in its manic ricocheting from one policy prescription to another, occasionally throws up, as in west arnhem land (smith, 2008). some have confronted power at the state level, as the ngarrindjeri nation has done in south australia, referencing the instructions of england’s king william iv issued in 1836 under letters patent that guaranteed indigenous rights and governing power (berg, 2010). others, including both the ngarrindjeri nation and the gunditjmara nation, have pushed the jurisdictional envelope through innovative relationships with local governments and other actors (hemming & rigney, 2008; hemming et al., 2011; vivian, 2014). and some have turned to what i and my colleagues call stealth governance: formally complying with external organizational prescriptions but relying on very different processes and structures of their own—that is, on an existing or revitalized indigenous governmental organization that is largely hidden from external view—for major decisions and to get things done.25 organizing as a nation has to address some core functions, among them: a decision-making process capable of responding consistently to needs and issues; the ability to implement those decisions effectively; a means of resolving disputes that avoids pulling the community to pieces; and the ability to sustain productive relationships with other governments and outside entities, both indigenous and nonindigenous. none of these is easy to accomplish, particularly for small nations and for those where                                                                                                                 24 one might argue that the exception is the native title process emerging from the 1992 mabo decision in the australian high court. the native title act of 1993 “created a mechanism under which indigenous people throughout australia could register their assertions of rights and interests over land and waters” (ritter, 2009, p. 16), and could establish a continuing, customary connection to that land or those waters. the process requires the identification of societies bound by traditional laws and customs—“traditional owners”—that give rise to a bundle of native title rights and interests that are cognizable to the australian legal system. lisa strelein (2010) has pointed out, “as a concept, native title is an acknowledgment of the continuation of indigenous society as a source of authority” (p. 128). however, the native title act requires that corporate bodies be created to manage these native title rights and interests. unfortunately, while some indigenous communities have been able to use the resulting corporate bodies for their own political purposes, the formal organization of that authority has to fit governmental prescription, not indigenous preference. māori justice joe williams (2010) argued, in a discussion of australia’s native title process, the surviving title approach . . . requires the indigenous community to prove in a court or tribunal that colonisation caused them no material injury. this is necessary because the greater the injury, the smaller the surviving bundle of rights. communities who were forced off their land lose it. those whose traditions and languages were beaten out of them at state-sponsored mission schools lose all of the resources owned within the matrix of that language and those traditions. this is a perverse result. in reality, of course, colonisation was the greatest calamity in the history of these people on this land. surviving title asks aboriginal people to pretend that it was not. (p. 28) 25 thorburn (2011), without identifying it as such, found something similar to stealth governance in her research in the west kimberly.     15 cornell: processes of native nationhood published by scholarship@western, 2015   external support for indigenous governance solutions is limited or grudging. however, this has not stopped nations from tackling these tasks. the result is a rapidly growing diversity of institutional forms, some written in formal documents, some lodged in the unwritten traditions or newly formed conclusions of the people. they range from the full group meetings of the gunditjmara nation in australia to the theocratic structures of some pueblo peoples in the southwestern usa, from the waikato-tainui parliament in the central north island of new zealand to the gitanyow hereditary chiefs’ ancient decision-making processes for managing traditional lands in british columbia, from the legislature of the citizen potawatomi nation that meets via video conferencing links with its communities across the usa to the ngarrindjeri regional authority in south australia. this is not state-making in the conventional sense—among other things, indigenous nations in the canzus countries lack exclusive jurisdiction—but it is an effort by native nations to carve out political, jurisdictional, organizational, and often geographical spaces within which those nations can make decisions for themselves and engage in state-resembling activities, from law-making and enforcement to resource stewardship to social service provision. they do so not necessarily by replicating contemporary state processes but by creating or restoring institutional vehicles that reflect their values, sustain their preferred relationships and practices, and express their ways of being in the world. it is an attempt to create the institutional foundation for coordinated, sustained, indigenous action on behalf of indigenous goals. a c t i n g a s a n a t i o n in the usa, the navajo nation’s own court system exercises substantial civil and some criminal jurisdiction within navajo lands and processes thousands of cases a year. it does so through two very different judicial approaches. one mimics the adversarial western system; the other—the peacemaking process—is built on traditional navajo methods of dispute resolution that focus not on winners and losers but on the restoration of harmony in relationships. while the overall organization of the navajo nation court echoes other american court systems, it enforces the laws of the navajo nation, including navajo common law rooted in ancient navajo culture (austin, 2009; nielsen & zion, 2005).26 in this exercise of judicial authority, the navajo nation acts as a nation: it asserts substantive jurisdiction over the resolution of disputes; it incorporates its own dispute resolution practices into the process; and it gives to both its own citizens and others the promise of justice and the rule of law—including navajo law. in australia, the ngarrindjeri nation has developed a set of formal agreements—legal contracts called kungun ngarrindjeri yunnan agreements (“listen to what ngarrindjeri people have to say”)—between itself and other governments in the region. the ngarrindjeri approach to negotiations insists on legal contract agreements that provide recognition of ngarrindjeri traditional ownership of lands and waters, and clearly set the terms of any negotiation or program . . . the core principle of this approach is that indigenous people and their culture should not be the subject matter of inquiry for the non-indigenous participants                                                                                                                 26 see also http://hpaied.org/images/resources/publibrary/new%20law%20and%20old%20law%20together.pdf 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.4   in a negotiation or dispute. this takes out of the discussion many of the aspects of the traditional [western] legal system that are abusive to indigenous people. (hemming et al., 2011, pp. 99, 106-107) through this system of agreements, the ngarrindjeri nation acts as a nation: it uses law and negotiation to assert its unceded sovereignty and to protect its interests while building viable relationships with other governments. in canada, the listuguj mi’gmaq first nation took control of the salmon fishery in the restigouche river by insisting on its inherent right to fish, passing a carefully constructed law that specifies how the fishery is to be managed, backing up that law with a technically competent implementation plan, and enforcing that law through its own professional force of rangers. the law now governs the fishery both within and outside reserve boundaries and enforces a fishing regime designed to sustain a fish that is central to mi’gmaq culture and economy (national centre for first nations governance and native nations institute for leadership, management, and policy, 2010). in making and enforcing this law and in the accompanying technical plan, the listuguj mi’gmaq first nation acts as a nation: it takes responsibility for the stewardship of its resources, enacts laws that support that stewardship, and implements the law in ways that win the respect of its own citizens and others. in aotearoa/new zealand, the waikato-tainui iwi, in the context of a claim against the crown for injustices following the treaty of waitangi, negotiated an agreement for co-management of the waikato river, new zealand’s longest and, economically, most heavily utilized river, which crosses through the heart of waikato-tainui’s ancestral lands. the waikato-tainui raupatu claims (waikato river) settlement act (2010) compels co-management by the iwi and the crown in the best interests not of the users of the river but of the river itself, and establishes a co-governance entity called the waikato river authority. the purpose of the authority: “to restore and protect the health and wellbeing of the waikato river for future generations” (section 1.3). through this agreement, waikato-tainui acts as a nation, negotiating a government-to-government relationship for the management of natural resources critical to the identity, culture, and well-being of the tainui people, and establishing its own regulations for the restoration of the river. acting as a nation involves more than organization; it is about accepting responsibility for strategy and its outcomes and for delivering the goods: law, justice, economy, resource stewardship, cultural revitalization, productive intergovernmental relationships, the intergenerational transmission of knowledge, and so forth. it is how a political nationhood justifies itself, not through its claims but through its actions. it is the space where nations eventually have to defend the right of self-government not only through moral or legal arguments, but also through deeds: a track record of responsibility, competence, and success. it also is the place where indigenous nations are most likely to find themselves in conflict with the interests of others, in particular the interests of central governments in maintaining their control of indigenous peoples. action directly tests jurisdictional limits and often either ignores or directly challenges central government policy. such tests and challenges on the whole have fared better in the 17 cornell: processes of native nationhood published by scholarship@western, 2015   usa and canada, where indigenous actions are variously sanctioned by treaties, court decisions, and legislation, than in new zealand and australia, which have been so much more reluctant to recognize the right of indigenous people to genuine self-governing power. but, lack of recognition turns out to have its own limitations, apparent in the determination of some nations to ignore central governments and act as nations regardless: to assume and enact—with strategic acumen and creativity—their claimed rights to self-determination and self-government. this, indeed, appears to be an emerging strategy in australia and, to a lesser extent, in new zealand, and it has a track record in north america as well: instead of responding to what central governments say a nation can or cannot do or be, native nations look for opportunities, for interstices in the constraint regime where, in careful, creative ways, they can act jurisdictionally, build their own institutions, and assert self-governing power. as noted above, the mohawk council of akwesasne in canada has pursued just such a strategy in a number of areas, including the regulation of activity on its waters and the construction of its justice system (see brimley et al., 2007), while the ktunaxa nation is taking advantage of the british columbia treaty process to construct a government of its own design (see dolan, 2009). in new zealand, some iwi are using newfound economic clout to place themselves at the political table, demanding to be treated not only as asset-managers, but as political bodies with at least some governmental power (waikato-tainui raupatu claims (waikato river) settlement act, 2010). in australia, both the gunditjmara and narrindjeri nations “look for opportunities to expand their selfgoverning authority, using whatever tools are available to them to create their own definitions of sovereignty, nationhood and self-determination” (vivian, 2014, p. 159). s e q u e n c e s a n d pro s p e c t s these three core processes appear to constitute a logical sequence—successive phases of political nationhood—and this, indeed, is how they often occur: identify as a nation à organize as a nation à act as a nation figure 1. processes of native nationhood: one pattern. however, this is by no means the only possible pattern.27 these processes may take place more or less simultaneously or in iterative combinations, and we should expect to see feedback loops among them, particularly from the second and third to the first. organizing or acting as a nation, for example, may lead more citizens to view themselves as part of that nation or to give that identity salience in their lives. identify as a nation à organize as a nation à act as a nation figure 2. possible sequences in the processes of native nationhood.                                                                                                                 27 alison vivian first made this point to me. 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.4   this, for example, is part of the nation-building strategy of the citizen potawatomi nation (cpn) in the united states, which reaches out to its people in multiple ways. headquartered in oklahoma but with a population of more than 25,000 dispersed across the country, cpn uses new technologies to incorporate those far-flung populations into its governing structure through the vote, representation in the nation’s legislature (which meets via video conferencing), economic opportunities, the delivery of social services, and celebratory cultural events. as cpn expands its organization to reach more of its citizens, both its connections to them and its significance in their lives increase.28 alternatively, identity may lead first to action and only later, in light of experience and ambition, to focused organizational work. as satsan, a hereditary wet’suet’en leader from british columbia, put it, reflecting on the efforts of first nations to persuade government to deal directly with them, “when the [government] has to consult with us, we have to be organized and capable of consulting. we have to know what we want and be able to make our vision effective. this is a governance issue” (satsan (herb george), president of the national centre for first nations governance, personal communication at a meeting with visiting indigenous australians in vancouver, british columbia, may 29, 2006). as government responds to court decisions precipitated in part by indigenous action, that response may necessitate new organization. in australia, the ngarrindjeri nation, having clawed back a significant measure of decision-making power in several policy domains, now finds itself considering how best to reorganize to more effectively exercise and expand that power. as vivian (2014) pointed out, ngarrindjeri organization “did not emerge by happenstance but from recognition of the need for institutional form to support their governing ambitions” (p. 140). outsiders also affect these processes. acting as a nation, if done well, may encourage outsiders to assume the political nationhood that the nation itself is trying to achieve.29 as outsiders adopt a position based on that assumption, it may encourage the nation’s citizens to see themselves in similar terms. but if done poorly, or irresponsibly, acting as a nation may persuade colonial powers to intervene, rendering political nationhood toothless. what are the prospects for indigenous nationhood in the canzus countries? uncertain. the situation varies across these four countries, but over the last thirty years, building on their own political activism and taking advantage of legislative actions and momentous court decisions, a growing number of indigenous peoples have seized the opportunity to reclaim self-governing power. their actions have not gone uncontested. in the country where native nationhood, as conceived in this article, appears most advanced and where indigenous self-government appears most robust—the usa—changes in the courts and the congress pose growing threats (see, for example, cornell & kalt, 2010; duthu, 2013; williams, 2005). in canada, the harper government apparently set out to reduce the practical powers of first nations, returning to an older assimilationist agenda (diabo, 2013; van loon, 2014). in the                                                                                                                 28 see the report on cpn’s constitutional reform at http://hpaied.org/images/resources/publibrary/citizen%20potawatomi%20constitutional%20reform.pdf 29 this echoes paul chartrand’s (2009) idea, passed on to me by my colleague rob williams, of practices “crystallized into rights” (p. 16). 19 cornell: processes of native nationhood published by scholarship@western, 2015   other two canzus countries, indigenous nationhood is even more of an experiment in process, lacking central government support and with significant challenges to overcome.30 thus, the indigenous politics of self-government and the politics of indigenous self-government ultimately are intertwined. indigenous nations may identify, organize, and act as nations, framing those processes within a sovereignty that predates european arrivals and european-derived law, but they do so within the context of states that have their own conceptions of what and who indigenous peoples should be, and their own multiple forms of power. under such conditions, to identify, organize, and act as a nation is daunting, particularly where colonial legacies are deeply entrenched, where colonial regimes are antagonistic to the idea of indigenous nations as political entities, and where the potential economic foundations of indigenous government, undermined by years of resource expropriation and dependency on outsiders, are so thin. nonetheless, policymakers in the canzus countries are having to confront increasingly assertive policymaking on the part of indigenous nations themselves, whose agendas—more in some places than in others—appear to be shifting from what they can persuade government to do to rebuilding their own capacities for organized, sustained, goal-oriented action. tired of waiting for recognition or rights, many of them are seizing the initiative in indigenous affairs and learning from each other as they go. the result is an emerging, if inchoate, international movement with indigenous nationhood at its center. it lacks the public drama of the activist movements of the 1960s and 1970s out of which, in many ways, it came. but it may do even more to transform relationships between indigenous peoples and settler states.                                                                                                                   30 however, recently the state of south australia has taken action to establish “a series of community driven regional authorities to represent aboriginal communities” (weatherill, 2013, background information, para. 3) in the interest of allowing those communities “to set their own priorities and policy directions” (background information, para. 2). whether this initiative will turn out to be supportive of genuine self-government remains to be seen, but see http://dpc.sa.gov.au/aboriginal-regional-authorities#background 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.4   r e 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(2005). like a loaded weapon: the rehnquist court, indian rights, and the legal history of racism in america. minneapolis: university of minnesota press. 27 cornell: processes of native nationhood published by scholarship@western, 2015 the international indigenous policy journal september 2015 processes of native nationhood: the indigenous politics of self-government stephen cornell recommended citation processes of native nationhood: the indigenous politics of self-government abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license processes of native nationhood: the indigenous politics of self-government implementing indigenous education policy directives in ontario public schools: experiences, challenges and successful practices the international indigenous policy journal volume 8 | issue 3 article 2 july 2017 implementing indigenous education policy directives in ontario public schools: experiences, challenges and successful practices emily milne macewan university, milnee4@macewan.ca recommended citation milne, e. (2017). implementing indigenous education policy directives in ontario public schools: experiences, challenges and successful practices. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(3). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.2 implementing indigenous education policy directives in ontario public schools: experiences, challenges and successful practices abstract the ontario ministry of education has declared a commitment to indigenous student success and has advanced a policy framework that articulates inclusion of indigenous content in schooling curriculum (ontario ministry of education, 2007). what are the perceptions among educators and parents regarding the implementation of policy directives, and what is seen to encourage or limit meaningful implementation? to answer these questions, this article draws on interviews with 100 indigenous (mainly haudenosaunee, anishinaabe, and métis) and non-indigenous parents and educators from ontario canada. policy directives are seen to benefit indigenous and non-indigenous students. interviews also reveal challenges to implementing indigenous curricular policy, such as unawareness and intimidation among non-indigenous educators regarding how to teach material. policy implications are considered. keywords indigenous peoples, educational policy, schooling, ontario, canada creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ i m p l e m e n t i n g i n d i g e n o u s e d u c a t i o n p o l i c y d i r e c t i v e s i n o n t a r i o p u b l i c s c h o o l s : e x p e r i e n c e s , c h a l l e n g e s , a n d s u c c e s s f u l p r a c t i c e s educational disparities between indigenous and non-indigenous peoples in canada have been declared a great social policy challenge in canada (richards, 2008; richards & scott, 2009). a 2012 national survey reported that among indigenous peoples aged 18 to 44 who live off reserve 36% had not completed high school and only 39% had postsecondary credentials (statistics canada, 2013) compared to 11% and 64% of the non-indigenous population, respectively (bougie, kelly-scott, & arriagada, 2013). educational disparities between indigenous and non-indigenous populations are not exclusive to canada: “in most countries, indigenous children have low school enrollments, poor school performance, low literacy rates, high dropout rates, and lag behind other groups in terms of academic achievements nationally” (champagne, 2009, p. 132). research is needed to further understand the factors that limit and encourage indigenous students’ educational experiences. the council of ministers of education (2008) made a commitment to improve academic achievement and graduation rates among indigenous students. in response, many canadian provincial and territorial departments and ministries of education declared a formal commitment to support indigenous students’ success and implemented indigenous education policies and agreements. examples include british columbia’s aboriginal education enhancement agreements (aboriginal education enhancements branch, n.d.a, n.d.b), manitoba’s first nation, métis and inuit education policy framework (aboriginal education directorate manitoba education and advanced learning, 2016), and alberta’s first nations, métis and inuit education policy framework (alberta learning, 2002). ontario is the focus of this study and has a policy: the first nation, métis, and inuit education policy framework (ontario ministry of education, 2007). policy directives include integrating content that reflects indigenous histories, cultures, and perspectives throughout the ontario curriculum. the purpose of this study is to examine educator and parent perceptions of indigenous curricular policy directives in ontario public schooling, as well as challenges that limit and strategies that encourage meaningful policy implementation. l i t e r a t u r e r e v i e w the royal proclamation 1763 initially defined the relationship between indigenous and non-indigenous peoples wherein the crown recognized the exclusive authority, termed sovereignty, of indigenous governments (royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996). education is a treaty obligation (assembly of first nations, 1988) and control over education is a right of indigenous peoples protected within canada’s constitution (see section 35 of the constitution act, 1982). however, in favour of european colonization, existing treaty commitments were displaced as the interests of european settlers in terms of land and resources were given priority (royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996). when confederation was achieved and the british north america act was passed in 1867, all aspects of indian affairs became the responsibility of the canadian federal government (royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996). in 1876, the indian act became the principal framework for federal jurisdiction over status indians (those with registered indian status under the indian act) (government of canada, 1987; royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996). the indian act and 1 milne: implementing indigenous education policy directives in public schools published by scholarship@western, 2017 successive revisions constricted the rights and freedoms of status indians, depriving them of the right to their land, culture, self-governance, political voice, and involvement in the education of their children. the indian act was amended in 1920 (legacy of hope, 2016; truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015b). it became compulsory for indian children between 7 and 15 years of age to attend residential schooling or their parents or guardians would face fines and imprisonment. residential schooling was a powerful mechanism used by european colonizers to assimilate indigenous children to mainstream canadian society (chansonneuve, 2005; legacy of hope foundation, 2014). residential schools suppressed indigenous languages and cultures, imposed christian ideologies and belief systems, and inadequate standards for student health and safety, child labour, and physical and sexual abuse were common (legacy of hope foundation, 2014; miller, 1996; royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996; truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015b, 2015c, 2015d; wotherspoon & schissel, 2003). residential schools wanted indigenous children, “above all,” to be like “the ideal middle-class canadian child” (hawthorn, tremblay, & bownick, 1967, p. 6) and teachers’ role involved “helping children overcome their indianness” (p. 121). over 150,000 indigenous children attended residential schools between 1831 and 1996 (aboriginal affairs and northern development canada, 2012; legacy of hope foundation, 2014; miller, 1996; truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015b, 2015c). in 1951, the indian act was revised and the residential school model was abandoned. indigenous children were to be integrated into mainstream provincial schools. however, many schooling ideas and practices remained predicated on principles of oppression and assimilative control (battiste & henderson, 2009; donald, 2009, 2012; mccarthy, 1990; ormiston, 2002; st. denis, 2011). indigenous peoples’ perspectives on the school system have been negatively affected by residential school experiences, leading to intergenerational distrust of and discomfort with the canadian education system (milne, 2016; perley, 1993; truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015d; wotherspoon, 2006, 2008; wotherspoon & schissel, 2003). in contrast to practices of the past, the ontario ministry of education has declared a commitment to indigenous student success and has advanced education policy frameworks that formally emphasize indigenous inclusion and representation in schooling as a solution to alleviate educational disparities and to improve academic achievement among indigenous students (see ontario ministry of education, 2007). policy objectives include ensuring cultural sensitivity and understanding of indigenous cultures, perspectives, and histories among school and school board staff. the ontario ministry of education committed to support identity building for indigenous students and to ensure all students in ontario know and appreciate contemporary and traditional indigenous cultures. central to this article are policy directives that call for the integration of content that reflects indigenous histories, cultures, and perspectives throughout the curriculum. indigenous content has been incorporated into ontario curriculum in kindergarten, social studies (grades 1-6), history and geography (grades 7 and 8), canadian and world studies (grades 9-12), mathematics (grades 1-11), language (grades 1-8), guidance and career education (grades 9-12), and business studies (grades 9-12) (ontario ministry of education, 2013a, 2013b). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.2 schooling environments that include indigenous knowledge, perspectives, languages, traditions, and cultures are considered to positively influence the academic performance and outcomes of indigenous students (kanu, 2002, 2006, 2007; klump & mcneir, 2005; kostenko & merrotsy, 2009; mckinley, brayboy & castagno, 2009; whitley, 2014). lipka and adams (2004) found that the culture-based math curriculum increased mathematical thinking and performance among yup’ik students from southwest alaska. a study by taylor and wright (2003) found that receiving instruction in traditional indigenous languages provided inuit students in nunavik “significant academic and linguistic advantages” (p.13). powers (2006) found that culture-based programming in schools affected urban indigenous students’ educational outcomes, and there was a stronger association among students who most strongly identified with their culture (see also powers, potthoff, bearinger & resnick, 2003). indigenous curricular content as well as traditional indigenous methods of teaching and learning are also seen to contribute to indigenous student self-confidence, self-esteem, and cultural identity (mcdonald, 2011; taylor & wright, 2003). there is reason to believe, however, that due to various environmental pressures educator practices may be inconsistent with indigenous curricular policies, preventing substantial change at the level of teaching and learning (labaree, 2010; wotherspoon, 2006, 2008). m e t h o d s this study draws on interviews with 100 participants (55 educators and 45 parents) within provincial off-reserve school boards in southern ontario. in this sample, 18 teachers and 18 parents identified as indigenous. among the 37 non-indigenous educators, six had indigenous education as an area of specialization. three non-indigenous parents had children who identify as indigenous. indigenous participants identified themselves as “indigenous,” “aboriginal,” “haudenosaunee,” “anishinaabe,” and “métis”. for the purposes of this article, the term indigenous is used to refer to descendants of the original inhabitants of north america. interviews were conducted from 2012 to 2014 during the months of july and august. this study received ethics clearance from university of waterloo and university of toronto research ethics boards. all names and identifying information have been changed to protect participant confidentiality. i attended school organized parent information sessions and distributed recruitment flyers that invited parents to participate in an interview. at these times, i also distributed recruitment materials to teachers. all interviews were voluntary. interviews ranged from 45 minutes to 3 hours in length and took place at the schools. parent and educator interview questions reflect three key themes. questions explored how participants define: a. parent–school relationships, b. the roles and expectations of educators and of parents, and c. the perceived effectiveness of educational initiatives that aim to boost indigenous student achievement by enhancing family inclusion within children’s education and embedding indigenous culture into student learning. 3 milne: implementing indigenous education policy directives in public schools published by scholarship@western, 2017 interviews were audio recorded and transcribed. data was organized using qsr nvivo 10 and analyzed to draw out patterns from concepts and insights. data coding reflected three main cycles (saldaña, 2013). first, attribute coding was used to code basic descriptive information (e.g., participant characteristics such as educator or parent). second, structural coding was used to code materials based on questions outlined in the interview schedule. third, eclectic coding was used next to refine, recode, and synthesize codes created to this point. i then organized and re-organized the data multiple times according to increasingly specific emerging themes and concepts. based on this strategy, i was able to move to a master code of indigenous content in schooling, which was further sub-divided into responses related to processes of implementation. three themes emerged across the data that informed the question of how indigenous curricular policy directives are perceived and implemented. broadly, statements described general experiences with the indigenous-focused curriculum in classrooms and schools, as well as challenges and successful strategies associated with meaningful implementation. to ensure the trustworthiness of research findings, i spent a total of 18 weeks at the school sites conducting observations and interviews. i also spoke informally with educators about preliminary findings while onsite and i incorporated questions based on preliminary findings into a number of the interviews. participants had an opportunity to disagree or offer additional insight in support of my findings. these efforts facilitated a deeper understanding of schooling dynamics. f i n d i n g s p e r c e p t i o n s o f p o l i c y d i r e c t i v e s p o s i t i v e e x p e r i e n c e s a m o n g i n d i g e n o u s c o m m u n i t i e s . indigenous interviewees shared the perspective, “it’s important for us to rejuvenate our culture and our language” (bella, indigenous parent). interviewees identified public schools as an ideal location for indigenous cultural programming and educational initiatives. ana is an indigenous mother living in an urban setting. she feels she is “failing [her] kid” because she has been unable to provide her daughter cultural learning at home. when we spoke, ana had recently enrolled her daughter into indigenous programming for the first time; the program was offered through her daughter’s school. families may be limited in their ability to pass cultural knowledge on to their children (e.g., because they have limited knowledge and few community connections), and they may “have nowhere else to go but here” to learn about and preserve their cultures and traditions (ava, indigenous educator). alexa, an indigenous parent, explained that indigenous families have realized some benefits from indigenous perspectives and cultural teachings being taught at school. she was thrilled that the indigenous students were sharing what they had learned with their parents: i didn’t get to learn any of this because of issues that my mom and her mom had to deal with when they were kids. so there’s almost three decades of information that was lost. my kids are getting to learn more about it than i am, and they come home and tell me about it . . . so not only the kids are learning, the kids are also teaching the parents. (alexa, indigenous parent) 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.2 others shared this perspective. bella, an indigenous parent, said, “i hardly have any language. my kid is starting to learn [in school]. he can count up to 35 in cayuga; i can barely count to ten. he’s teaching me.” fiona is a non-indigenous mother whose husband and children identify as indigenous. she enrolled her children into an indigenous program offered by the school because “[she] can’t teach [her] kids about who they are.” the indigenous program was helpful because her children shared what they learned with her, enabling them to “learn as a family.” indigenous students may feel more comfortable and accepted in school when indigenous peoples, perspectives, and cultures are respectfully incorporated into teaching and learning. caroline, an indigenous educator, led indigenous cultural programming at her school. she described an indigenous boy who was distant at school, often sitting by himself and choosing not to engage with the other students. however, he became more engaged and felt more confident as a result of participating in the indigenous focused program. once he saw that the [non-indigenous] kids had an interest in the things that we were talking about, the talking stick and the corn spirit, and i was bringing in some artifacts from home, that the kids were interested in that. then i noticed he started wearing his necklace with his bear on it. and the kids were like, “hey, what is that?” and then he said, “my uncle made it.” so, little by little he’s coming out of his shell and he’s saying, “this is me, and i’m proud.” (caroline, indigenous educator) interviewees described the positive experiences that indigenous children had with the indigenousfocused curriculum and school programs. they saw their culture celebrated as part of classroom learning, and they saw non-indigenous students interested, excited, and engaged. according to interviewees, these experiences contributed to positive cultural identity among indigenous students. many interviewees discussed the appropriateness of non-indigenous educators teaching indigenousfocused content. indigenous interviewees were accepting of and open to non-indigenous educators teaching about indigenous peoples, perspectives, and cultures. importance was placed on the fact that material was taught in a respectful way, not on who was teaching it. clara, an indigenous educator, explained, “that’s okay . . . they don’t have to be native to be able to share information that comes from that culture.” she said, “there’s a craving to know and understand more of aboriginal culture and that’s when it's time to teach and share that and explain.” as she explained further: there’s tons of non-aboriginal people out there that just totally get it and understand, and it resonates with who they are as a human being because it feels right . . . whether or not a person identifies or has knowledge of being first nations, if it resonates with that person, that's okay for them to learn as much as they can and share it in a good way. you have to have people that can tell people it’s okay; it’s okay for you to know this and learn and understand it. but understanding it in a way that it's meant to be portrayed . . . whether they're native or nonnative, it's about knowing and understanding and being able to share that with the people who want to learn. (clara, indigenous educator) e d u c a t i n g n o n i n d i g e n o u s s t u d e n t s . indigenous and non-indigenous interviewees saw embedding indigenous cultural content in public schooling as “needed” in order to foster an understanding and awareness of indigenous peoples’ worldviews, cultures, and histories among non5 milne: implementing indigenous education policy directives in public schools published by scholarship@western, 2017 indigenous students in canada. andrew, an indigenous parent and cultural consultant, explained that many non-indigenous people are unaware of or misinformed about indigenous issues. andrew is often involved in cultural events and presentations in public schools; his experience has been that “9 out of 10 kids don’t know what residential schools are.” he said, “the biggest problem is that we’re not educating the non-aboriginal people about what happened.” a number of non-indigenous parents believed that exposing their children to cultural diversity was part of their role as a parent. these parents saw indigenous content in schooling as a means to help their children develop an “expanded worldview” (patricia, non-indigenous parent). mya, a non-indigenous parent, credited indigenous content and programming in school with teaching her son to be more tolerant, empathetic, and respectful towards others. he’s starting to realize that a lot of the ways that aboriginals were treated historically has been not fair. i think it’s helping his gradual development of empathy just to see the beauty of something and how it’s so sad that we’ve done so much to stop that historically. (mya, nonindigenous parent) mya wants her son to understand “our role in the demise of the native culture” because “we’re not gonna prevent things like that in the future if we don’t learn from our past mistakes.” from another perspective, arianna, a non-indigenous mother, said it is “hugely important” for non-indigenous children to learn about indigenous peoples in school. she said, “given the horror that the indigenous community has experienced, [she] really want[ed] [her] children to participate in all of the healing that has to happen.” further, non-indigenous students shared what they learned about indigenous peoples with their parents, contributing to cultural awareness and understanding in the boarder community. aaliyah, an indigenous educator, said, “[they] have [non-indigenous] parents that don’t know about residential schools and [they] have students educating them; their kids are coming home and telling them about it.” l i m i t i n g a n d e n c o u r a g i n g m e a n i n g f u l i m p l e m e n t a t i o n c h a l l e n g e s t h a t l i m i t m e a n i n g f u l i m p l e m e n t a t i o n . indigenous curricular policy directives do not seem to have been implemented consistently or consistently implemented in a respectful and appropriate way. the majority of non-indigenous educators interviewed were vaguely aware of the history of mistreatment and discrimination against canada’s indigenous peoples. a few described only recently learning about this. as one teacher stated, “i was so ignorant to it; why don’t people know more? i can’t believe that i didn’t know” (vivian, non-indigenous teacher). there were similar levels of unawareness among non-indigenous educator interviewees pertaining to knowledge and understanding of indigenous cultures and worldviews which had a direct impact on their ability and willingness to implement indigenous content in their teaching. many non-indigenous educators remain uninformed about the ontario indigenous curriculum policy directives that were implemented in 2007. referring to the official policy documents (ontario ministry of education, 2007), elise, a non-indigenous educator, claimed: the ministry of education came up with an aboriginal curriculum. nobody’s ever opened it. is it an aboriginal curriculum? i’m not even sure what it’s called. it’s an actual separate curriculum 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.2 document. i’ve never actually even taken the initiative to use it and it was never pushed upon us to use that either. it’s an ontario curriculum document. so that’s the sad part about it, right? a number of other non-indigenous educators interviewed shared her perspective. part of the reason that non-indigenous educators are reluctant to incorporate indigenous material in the classroom is because they are intimidated. interviewees explained that educators are uncertain about what to teach and how, and they are unaware of how to access resources and utilize the ontario ministry of education indigenous-focused support documents. when other teachers talk about indigenous stuff they have no idea where to get resources and who to talk to in their board about where they can find those resources. and even if they did, they’re not sure how to implement it into their classroom. i’ve heard that so many times from teachers—the ministry [of education] has documents but they’re so not friendly. it’s like a teacher can’t pick it up and go, “oh, i get it.” they need something that’s tangible. (jocelyn, indigenous teacher) indigenous parents and educators recognized teachers’ apprehension and described being “frustrated” either because non-indigenous educators “fumble around, not knowing what to do” (ryan, indigenous teacher) or avoid indigenous content altogether. as jocelyn (indigenous teacher) further explained: teachers are still not touching it [content about indigenous cultures and heritage]. i know because they tell me that . . . they just don’t include it, so we still have children in this country going through the education system that don’t have a clue. it’s not just about educating our children; it’s about creating a path that every child in canada can have an understanding and perspective on the first people of this country. typical professional development raises awareness but does not necessarily change classroom practices. as one teacher pointed out, “teachers have been to sensitivity training and pd [professional development] . . . but going to them and actually putting into practice what you’ve learned are two different things” (caroline, indigenous teacher). further, indigenous interviewees described feeling uncomfortable with ways that indigenous peoples are often portrayed at school: in stereotypical ways (e.g., “more primitive,” wearing traditional dress), as being “extinct,” and as being “people of the past.” for example, caitlyn is an indigenous mother; she is also employed as a social worker by the school board. she explained that indigenous cultures are often taught in the past tense and as if “obsolete.” oftentimes they present aboriginal cultures as if they’re something that’s obsolete. yes, it’s happened in the past. but, “they used to go to powwows, they used to dance”—no, there’s still a very active aboriginal culture. (caitlyn, indigenous parent and social worker with the school board) sharing this perspective, ryan, an indigenous teacher, said, “as an aboriginal person how are you supposed to progress when everybody thinks you don’t exist because of what they’re being taught or what they’re reading in school?” interviewees shared experiences where non-indigenous teachers have misappropriated or incorrectly presented information about indigenous peoples and traditions to students. non-indigenous teachers commonly blend or lump traditions, practices, and ways of life from 7 milne: implementing indigenous education policy directives in public schools published by scholarship@western, 2017 a variety of different indigenous groups into a single representation about indigenous peoples. this practice of making “blanket statements” or “pan-indianism” may be very offensive to some families. interviewees also expressed concerns that indigenous language or cultural programs are not considered equal to other schooling programs. paul identifies as indigenous and is a high school teacher. he explained how indigenous programs “aren’t being recognized.” paul spoke about an indigenous history course offered at his school. students could enrol in the course and were expected to complete assigned work, but no course credit was associated. they can take it and do all that work but get no credit for it. who's gonna take it? . . .you're already saying it has no value. you're doing systemic damage . . . families and students aren't gonna treat it as an equal because it's not equal to begin with. (paul, indigenous teacher) paul also explained the drawbacks of schooling programs that are offered to indigenous students only— these programs pull students out of class and “segregate” them. paul advocated for inclusive programming where all indigenous and non-indigenous students learn about indigenous culture and heritage together. a s t r a t e g y t h a t e n c o u r a g e d m e a n i n g f u l i m p l e m e n t a t i o n . one school board offered an educational program to students that focused on literacy learning though content based on indigenous cultures, traditions, and teachings. the program ran for 3 weeks in the summer and targeted students in grades 1, 2, and 3 (for detailed information about the program see davies & aurini, 2013; davies, aurini, milne, & jean-pierre, 2015). interviewees credited this initiative with enhancing the capacity of non-indigenous educators to authentically embed indigenous content into their teaching and for overcoming challenges noted above. interviewees identified key aspects of the program that were successful. first, the program maintained a model of learning integration. program facilitators and educators authentically embedded indigenous cultures, perspectives, and heritage into everyday learning, rather than into a theme or unit. second, indigenous educators and community members were directly involved in the development and creation of the program. third, indigenous and non-indigenous students and teachers participated in the program. fourth, mechanisms were put in place to support teaching staff that did not have an indigenous background or an indigenous educational background. staff were provided with an inservice orientation day, as well as a mentor text designed specifically to organize and guide the program. the text included lessons and extension activities, big idea connections to existing curriculum, as well as background information and cultural context. importantly, each school site had an “indigenous coach” or indigenous consultant on-site to support teachers as they integrated indigenous cultural content into their classroom activities. coaches were selected based on their intimate knowledge of indigenous culture and history. this role involved working closely with teachers to support their learning about indigenous culture and to ensure indigenous content was authentically and appropriately embedded into the classroom. despite the fact that this kind of support was only available for the 3-week duration of the summer program, teachers described leaving the program feeling like they had the tools (such as resources to support learning and contacts including members of the indigenous community who could provide 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.2 further guidance and information with schooling activities) to embed indigenous content into their regular classroom teaching. as a result of my involvement with program planning, i had my students participate in an aboriginal art unit. my students loved it and i already have it integrated into my planning for this school year. i now have more people to contact in the aboriginal community that can come into my class and share their experiences and culture like elders and music groups. before this program, i would not have thought to contact anyone from the aboriginal community. (olivia, non-indigenous teacher) non-indigenous teachers described their experience with the summer program as eye opening, as many educators had little or no knowledge of indigenous histories and cultures prior to the program. many shared olivia’s perspective. educators described now feeling more comfortable “jumping in” to the indigenous schooling curriculum because they were able to ask questions and learn firsthand from experts. bianca, a non-indigenous educator, explained, “my comfort level has gone from a 2 to an 8! . . . this program certainly provided us with a wealth of knowledge and understanding of the aboriginal culture!” victoria, also a non-indigenous educator, realized that she previously focused class instruction on “the injustices of their past rather than the positive aspects of the culture.” whereas now she intends to “focus more on integrating the more positive aspects of the culture like oral traditions, environmental stewardship, community teachings, and arts into the curriculum.” according to interviewees, what made the difference was the teacher support provided by the indigenous coach. having a knowledgeable expert on hand offering constant guidance created opportunities for teachers to learn about indigenous cultures, worldviews, and heritage. it also allowed them to practice teaching indigenous material in a “risk-free” environment. for kaden, a nonindigenous educator, having the indigenous coach created an open environment for questions, explanations, and understanding, which led to “break[ing] down walls and mak[ing] teachers more comfortable.” he believed the program provided a professional development experience for nonindigenous educators that they would draw from throughout their careers. abby is an indigenous educator and an indigenous coach for the program. similar to other coaches, she observed non-indigenous educators gain more confidence in their ability to teach indigenous content on their own during the course of the program. on the first day when they had to do it, they were a little apprehensive because they wanted to do it right . . . so i’ve been going into classes and doing the lessons. and little by little, i’ve been able to release a lot of that and they are taking more on . . . they started the three sisters [teaching] without me, which was nice, and i think they are more confident in what they’re doing. (abby, indigenous educator) having the indigenous coach gave non-indigenous teachers what they needed: to acquire cultural sensitivity and understanding; to develop the capacity to authentically embed indigenous cultural content into classroom instruction; and to gain confidence in their ability to continue embedding indigenous content into their regular teaching practice during the school year. non-indigenous educators and students left the program with greater knowledge, awareness, and sensitivity regarding indigenous cultures, histories, and perspectives. 9 milne: implementing indigenous education policy directives in public schools published by scholarship@western, 2017 d i s c u s s i o n the focus now has to turn to teaching the teachers how to teach native curriculum. (ryan, indigenous teacher) through examining educator and parent perceptions of indigenous curricular policy directives in ontario public schools, key findings have emerged. first, participants in this study had positive experiences with indigenous-focused schooling initiatives, and these initiatives were seen to benefit both indigenous and non-indigenous students. schooling initiatives that include indigenous knowledge, perspectives, and cultures are seen to have a positive impact on indigenous students’ educational experiences, indigenous family and school relationships, and the creation of welcoming and meaningful schooling environments for indigenous families (kanu, 2002, 2006, 2007; klump & mcneir, 2005; kostenko & merrotsy, 2009; kovach, carriere, montgomery, barrett, & gilles, 2015; mckinley, brayboy, & castagno, 2009; milne 2015, 2016; whitley, 2014). for non-indigenous students, indigenous infused curriculum and schooling initiatives are seen as a mechanism to generate awareness of indigenous cultures and perspectives, acceptance of cultural diversity, and to fight racism and prejudice (direction evidence and policy research group, 2016; okoye-johnson, 2011; segawa, 1994; unesco, 2003). improved relationships between indigenous peoples and non-indigenous canadians may be a further benefit of non-indigenous students learning about indigenous peoples. second, interviewees identified challenges to implementing indigenous curricular policy. findings suggest that there are large discrepancies between policy rhetoric and schooling reality (labaree, 2010). little understanding and knowledge of indigenous peoples and cultures, as well as the history of residential schooling, were common among the non-indigenous educators interviewed. educators may therefore teach indigenous content incorrectly or avoid it altogether and, in the process, create barriers to indigenous students, parents, and community members feeling comfortable in schools (milne, 2015, 2016). furthermore, non-indigenous students may still go through their entire educational career without learning about indigenous peoples and the history and legacy of residential schooling in canada. wotherspoon (2006, 2008) also found that educators had varying responses to indigenous oriented schooling reform. while some educators increased sensitivity to indigenous students and wanted to implement change in curriculum content and instructional methods, other educators remained fixated on teaching their subject along a universal standard curriculum mandate and believed that all students should be treated the same (see also st. denis, 2011). the findings of this study suggest that indigenous educational policy directives can benefit indigenous and non-indigenous students. therefore, it is recommended that curricula on indigenous peoples’ cultures, traditions, perspectives, and histories be made a requirement for all students in primary and secondary schooling (ontario ministry of education, 2007; truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015a). in support of this effort, it is recommended that indigenous curricular training is made a requirement for teaching certification and that professional development continues to be available. it is also recommended that mechanisms be put in place to ensure indigenous content is being taught and is being taught in an authentic way. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.2 p o l i c y r e c o m m e n d a t i o n in line with the truth and reconciliation commission of canada (2015a) calls to action, ageappropriate curriculum about indigenous peoples’ cultures, traditions, perspectives, and histories (including residential schools or similar assimilative practices relevant to the schooling location), should be a requirement for all students in primary and secondary schooling. to support this effort, indigenous curricular training should be made a requirement for teaching certification. indigenous focused teacher training is needed during initial teacher education and through continued professional development opportunities. further, mechanisms should be put in place to ensure indigenous content is being embedded into schooling curriculum and that content is being taught in an authentic way. this recommendation reflects existing ontario education policy directives: “all students in ontario will have knowledge and appreciation of contemporary and traditional first nation, métis, and inuit traditions, cultures, and perspectives” (ontario ministry of education, 2007, p. 7). however, based on my findings, implementation is inconsistent. in ontario, 92% of provincially funded elementary and 96% of secondary schools have indigenous students; yet, 51% of elementary and 41% of secondary schools offer no indigenous education opportunities such as professional development for teachers or cultural support programs (gallagher-mackay, kidder, & methot, 2013). training strategies have been implemented at the teacher candidate level (e.g., mashford-pringle & nardozi, 2013), which should continue. however, based on my findings, strategies also need to be implemented in schools, on the ground, and with educators who are already teaching. informed by the effective schooling practices described above, i recommend that an “indigenous itinerant teacher (iit)” be implemented in elementary and secondary schools. the role of the iit would parallel the role of literacy coaches, numeracy coaches, or english as a second language (esl) teachers currently working within ontario school boards in terms of providing teachers with guidance and coaching to learn how to effectively embed indigenous content into their regular practice. the iit would provide on the ground support for teachers as they navigate the curriculum and try to connect with indigenous families and communities. the iit role could facilitate understanding and build teacher capacity. the significance and meaning of cultural concepts can be misunderstood by educators and therefore inappropriately conveyed to students during lessons. the iit role would focus on building capacity in schools, vis-à-vis co-planning and co-teaching, modeling the curriculum, and coaching teachers on how to embed indigenous perspectives and culture into lessons in a sensitive and authentic way. the iit would ensure appropriate resources are available for educators (e.g., books, guest speakers and presenters from the local indigenous community), answer questions, address misunderstandings, and ensure appropriate representation of indigenous perspectives, cultures, and histories within classrooms and schools. the iit would initiate and drive an indigenous cultural awareness within the school (e.g., accessing books and materials that reflect the local indigenous communities) and help teachers acquire the tools they need to integrate indigenous culture into the existing classroom and school culture. the iit role has the potential to facilitate positive connections between the school and indigenous families and communities to help support student’s learning, as well as building on those relationships to include teaching and administrative school staff. for example, the iit could work to establish 11 milne: implementing indigenous education policy directives in public schools published by scholarship@western, 2017 relationships with the indigenous families in the school, inviting their participation in schooling and classroom activities. part of the role of the iit would also involve establishing connections between the school community and local indigenous communities. for example, the iit could create a roster of immediate and extended indigenous family members in the school community and indigenous community members willing to participate in school activities, cultural events and demonstrations, and/or to deliver culturally sensitive lessons or teachings. i propose that implementing iit in public schools would contribute to bridging policy rhetoric of cultural inclusion and schooling reality by providing the support needed to facilitate cultural awareness among non-indigenous students and teachers, authentically embed indigenous culture within school communities and teaching practices, and include indigenous family and community in education. c o n c l u s i o n the ontario ministry of education has committed to indigenous student success and has implemented initiatives to support student achievement, including embedding indigenous content into the provincial curriculum. when implemented in a respectful and authentic way, findings suggest that incorporating indigenous content into public schools has the potential to benefit indigenous and non-indigenous students. both indigenous and non-indigenous students may not have opportunities to learn about indigenous peoples, perspectives, worldviews, cultures, and heritage outside of school. among nonindigenous students, indigenous focused curricular initiatives contribute to increased awareness and understanding of indigenous peoples in the past and present, potentially leading to improved relations between indigenous and non-indigenous people in canada. for indigenous students, indigenous parents may not have the personal ability or community connections to educate their children about their cultural backgrounds. indigenous schooling initiatives may serve as an important resource for these families. the concept of “partial compensation” has been used to describe schools’ ability to serve as “equalizers” by compensating for learning losses and different learning environments experienced outside of schools (alexander, entwisle, & olson 2001, 2007; cooper, nye, charlton, lindsay, & greathouse, 1996; davies & aurini, 2013; downey, von hippel, & broh, 2004). schools may also have the potential to partially compensate in a different way by providing indigenous focused learning opportunities that students may not have access to outside of schools. internationally, schooling policies, programs initiatives are being implemented to support academic achievement and outcomes among indigenous students. several countries have implemented regulations associated with culturally and linguistically appropriate education for indigenous students (king & schielmann, 2004). as noted by king and schielmann (2004), colombia, ecuador, mexico, peru, and paraguay have constitutions that recognize their multicultural and multiethnic societies, and a few of these have established “intercultural bilingual education” (p. 22). the united states (united states congress, 1990, 2006), philippines (congress of the philippines, 1997), and australia (australian government, 1989) have also implemented indigenous educational reforms and legislation. in addition, australia (australian education council, 2015) and new zealand (new zealand ministry of education, 2014; pasifika education, 2013) have implemented indigenous education policies that articulate a commitment to the success of indigenous students and culturally responsive education. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.2 these efforts generate public awareness of school action, demonstrating that school systems are committing to the success of indigenous students as well as demonstrating processes of change. however, it is also important to monitor processes of implementation. research is needed to understand how indigenous policy directives are being implemented at the various levels of school systems—school boards, schools, and classrooms—in order to understand how policies are being put into practice and potentially impacting student learning. the current article provides insight into how policy is being enacted in ontario public schools. questions remain: how are policies being interpreted and therefore implemented on the ground? what resources are needed to support meaningful and respectful implementation of indigenous content into classrooms and schools? additional research is needed to explore how indigenous curricular policy directives are implemented in other locations and contexts in order to identify best practices. further, additional research is needed to examine how effective indigenous focused curricular initiatives are and what is the best measure used to determine success or effectiveness. in their review of research literature on the influences of culture-based education on the academic performance of indigenous students, demmert and towner’s (2003) findings reaffirm the importance of including indigenous languages and cultures in the education of indigenous students. however, they point out that existing research tends to be qualitative and more quantitative research is needed. they also question whether it is “scientifically possible to show a direct connection between improved academic performance and culturally based education interventions” (p. 41). 13 milne: implementing indigenous education policy directives in public schools published by scholarship@western, 2017 r e f e r e n c e s aboriginal affairs and northern development canada. (2012). indian residential schools: key milestones. retrieved from https://www.aadncaandc.gc.ca/eng/1332939430258/1332939552554 aboriginal education directorate manitoba education and advanced learning. (2016). first nation, métis and inuit education policy framework. winnipeg, manitoba: government of manitoba. retrieved from http://www.edu.gov.mb.ca/aed/fnmi_framework/document.pdf aboriginal education enhancements branch. (n.d.a). enhancement agreements. victoria, bc: ministry of education. retrieved from http://www.bced.gov.bc.ca/abed/agreements/agreements.htm aboriginal education enhancements branch. (n.d.b). shared practices: enhancement agreement development or implementation. victoria, bc: ministry of education. retrieved from http://www.bced.gov.bc.ca/abed/agreements/sharedpractice/sharedpractice_intro.htm alberta learning. 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(2003). the legacy of school for aboriginal people: education, oppression, and emancipation. don mills, on: oxford university press. 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.2 the international indigenous policy journal july 2017 implementing indigenous education policy directives in ontario public schools: experiences, challenges and successful practices emily milne recommended citation implementing indigenous education policy directives in ontario public schools: experiences, challenges and successful practices abstract keywords creative commons license implementing indigenous education policy directives in ontario public schools: experiences, challenges and successful practices indigenous geographies: research as reconciliation the international indigenous policy journal volume 8 issue 2 reconciling research: perspectives on research involving indigenous peoples—part 1 article 2 april 2017 indigenous geographies: research as reconciliation cindy smithers graeme western university, csmithe3@uwo.ca erik mandawe western university, emandawe@uwo.ca recommended citation smithers graeme, c. , mandawe, e. (2017). indigenous geographies: research as reconciliation. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(2). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.2 indigenous geographies: research as reconciliation abstract employing a reflexive and co-constructed narrative analysis, this article explores our experiences as a nonindigenous doctoral student and a first nations research assistant working together within the context of a community-based participatory indigenous geography research project. our findings revealed that within the research process there were experiences of conflict, and opportunities to reflect upon our identity and create meaningful relationships. while these experiences contributed to an improved research process, at a broader level, we suggest that they also represented our personal stories of reconciliation. in this article, we share these stories, specifically as they relate to reconciliatory processes of re-education and cultural regeneration. we conclude by proposing several policy recommendations to support research as a pathway to reconciliation in canada. keywords reconciliation, indigenous geography, reflexive methods, aboriginal acknowledgments we wish to acknowledge dr. chantelle richmond's early researcher award from the ontario ministry of research and innovation, and canadian institutes of health research new investigator award. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ i n d i g e n o u s g e o g ra p h i e s : r e s e a rc h a s r e c o n c i l i a t i o n according to bloomfield, barnes, and huyse (2003), reconciliation is a process that seeks truth, justice, forgiveness, and healing. it is about co-existing, cooperating, and sharing with the goal of a better life for all. it is about building relationships that are grounded in respect and understanding, with the hope of moving “from a divided past to a shared future” (p. 12). yet, reconciliation is a complex concept, and there is little agreement regarding how to define or go about it. bloomfield (2006) asks, for example: is reconciliation an end goal to be achieved, or is it a process? is it a national, societal, or political responsibility? does it occur at the individual, psychological, or theological level? he suggests that perhaps it encompass all of these things, although different facets require different “approaches, mechanisms and contexts” (p. 4). in this regard, he differentiates between two approaches1 to reconciliation: structural, which focuses on the pragmatic requirements of politics and building adequate working relations from the top levels of political structures downward, and cultural, which happens at an individual or small group level. cultural approaches to reconciliation are often interpersonal and operate from the grassroots level, requiring an emotional interaction between people or groups that is a “fuller and deeper process [than structural reconciliation] . . . which may indeed lead to a meaningful end-state of a wholly reconciled and harmonious relationship” between indigenous peoples and nonindigenous peoples (bloomfield, 2006, p. 28). in this article, we share our experiences as a nonindigenous doctoral student and first nations research assistant working together within the context of an indigenous geography community-based participatory research project with urban first nations men. employing a reflexive approach to conducting research as well as narrative analysis, we discuss how research provided a space for us to participate in cultural processes of reconciliation. we conclude by suggesting several structural processes that might support the reconciliatory potential of research in canada. in the canadian context, the word reconciliation is most closely associated with the legacy of the indian residential school (irs) system. indian residential schools were created by the government in partnership with a variety of churches “for the purpose of separating aboriginal children from their families, in order to minimize and weaken family ties and cultural linkages, and to indoctrinate children into a new culture—the culture of the legally dominant euro-christian canadian society” (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015a, p. v). in the 1980s, survivors of the irs system started to speak publicly about their experiences, which led to the largest class action lawsuit in canadian history. the resulting indian residential schools settlement agreement (irssa) provided compensation to students who attended canada’s 139 residential schools and residences. the agreement also called for the creation of the truth and reconciliation commission of canada (trc), whose 5-year mandate sought to inform canadians about what happened in indian residential schools through documenting the experiences of those affected by and involved with them, including survivors, families, communities, the churches, former school employees, the government, and other canadians. in june of 2015, the trc publicly released a summary of its findings, which included 94 recommendations that sought not only to address the legacy of the residential school system, but also to broadly improve the lives of 1 bloomfield noted that while the two approaches are distinct in their methods, they are complementary and their interaction is vital. 1 smithers graeme and mandawe: research as reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2017 aboriginal peoples, and improve relationships between aboriginal and non-aboriginal peoples in canada (truth and reconciliation of canada, 2015a). within the scholarship pertaining to reconciliation between indigenous and non-indigenous peoples in canada, the words of indigenous scholar and activist leanne simpson resonated with us most. while simpson (2011) supported the broad approach to reconciliation as discussed by the trc, she cautioned that a focus on residential schools alone permits canadians to assume that “the historical ‘wrong’ has now been ‘righted,’” effectively discounting “the broader set of relationships that generated policies, legislation and practices aimed at assimilation and political genocide” (p. 22). while she acknowledged that participation in processes of reconciliation related to residential schools may indeed bring about positive change, she also asked people to proceed critically and to be aware of the need for a much broader and long-term approach to remedying relationships between indigenous and non-indigenous peoples in canada. she affirmed that if reconciliation is to be meaningful for indigenous peoples, then it must be grounded in cultural regeneration and political resurgence while requiring canada to “engage in a decolonization project and a re-education project that would enable its government and its citizens to engage with indigenous peoples in a just and honourable way in the future” (p. 23). globally, discussions and research in indigenous geographies regarding the relationship between research and reconciliation are receiving increasing attention (see coombes, johnson, & howitt, 2012; howitt & jackson, 1998). in the canadian context, however, there is a notable lack of focus on this topic. one exception is castleden, daley, sloan morgan, and sylvestre’s (2013) digital storytelling project, which explored the “geography of ignorance” among graduate students enrolled in a course titled “indigenous perspectives on resource and environmental management” at dalhousie university in halifax, nova scotia, canada. the course required students to participate in a weeklong communitybased field school, which allowed them to interact with and learn from indigenous peoples. by “bringing them out from behind books and lecture halls” to engage with indigenous peoples and spaces, the authors suggested that the students were able to overcome “colonial attitudes and racist mentalities” (p. 488). while the authors concluded that their findings demonstrated the transformative power of community-based research and digital storytelling to unsettle non-indigenous students, we suggest that the field school was, in addition, able to provide a space wherein students could participate in reconciliation by re-educating themselves about indigenous peoples, knowledge, culture, and history. while we acknowledge that such spaces are relatively common in indigenous geographical research in canada, we do suggest that few participants have written about their experiences. i n d i g e n o u s g e o g ra p h i e s a n d r e f l e x i v e m e t h o d s for many indigenous peoples and communities, research has historically been a significant “source of distress” (cochran & marshall, 2008, p. 23). often functioning as an extension of colonial control over cultures, lands, and resources, research has traditionally prioritized western worldviews while positioning indigenous peoples as passive participants and/or problems to be solved (kovach, 2009; smith, 2012; wilson, 2008). geography, as a discipline, has most certainly been complicit in this unequal relationship (coombes, johnson, & howitt, 2014; howitt & jackson, 1998; louis, 2007; shaw, herman, & dobbs, 2006). in this regard, shaw et al. (2006) have claimed, “geography is not politically neutral, and the projects of imperialism/colonialism are far from re-dressed” (p. 267). in response to 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.2 such concerns both within the discipline and beyond, there is a growing recognition of the need to engage in indigenous research in a good way, using decolonizing and indigenous methodologies that prioritize both indigenous control over research and indigenous ways of knowing (kovach, 2009; smith, 2012; wilson, 2008). within indigenous geographies, scholars are increasingly seeking out ways to employ decolonizing and indigenous approaches to research with the hope of contributing to more “just and relevant research” (coombes et al., 2014, p. 845). one example of these efforts is scholars’ growing embrace of reflexive methods (coombes et al., 2014; kohl & mccutcheon, 2015). informed by social constructionism and widely embraced within feminist scholarship (england, 1994; kobayashi, 2003), reflexive methods are congruent with decolonizing and indigenous inquiry through both their recognition of the politics of representation and their highly experiential and relational nature (kovach, 2009). finlay (2002) has defined reflexive approaches as: thoughtful, conscious self-awareness. reflexive analysis in research encompasses continual evaluation of subjective responses, intersubjective dynamics, and the research process itself. it involves a shift in our understanding of data collection from something objective that is accomplished through detached scrutiny of “what i know and how i know it,” to recognizing how we actively construct our knowledge. (p. 532) proponents of reflexive methods contend that they allow the researcher to locate herself or himself within the context of her or his research and to consider how her or his location and privilege shape the resulting knowledge construction. in this regard, reflexive methods have the potential to enhance the research process though improved insight and self-discovery (england, 1994; finlay, 2002; fook, 1999; kovach, 2009). yet at the same time, critics of this method caution that reflexivity runs the risk of being self-indulgent and narcissistic if not done with the intent of applying one’s knowledge to a greater good (aveling, 2013; england, 1994; kobayashi, 2003; pillow, 2003). if it is not “tied to a larger agenda,” preferably one that is “meant to change the world” (kobayashi, 2003, p. 348), then reflexive methods run the risk of becoming nothing more than navel gazing. sharing her growing dis-ease with reflexive practices, kobayashi (2003) has asked: “why the heck should i care about how a privileged, white graduate student felt when she went out into the world to discover oppression and marginalization?” (p. 348). smith (2013) added that, while such reflexive works are not without merit in terms of their ability to contribute to understanding “how the logics of domination that structure the world also contribute to who we are as subjects,” they must also “occur concurrently with social and political transformation” if they are to be truly meaningful (p. 264). we must therefore endeavor to proceed carefully and think critically about what and why we choose to share. while reflexive methods are increasingly employed within indigenous geographies as means to explore the challenges associated with doing indigenous research, such as insider and outside standpoints or navigating institutional constraints, (see for example de leeuw, cameron, & greenwood, 2012; fisher, 2015; hodge & lester, 2006), few have employed them to share their experiences of research as a potential pathway to reconciliation. 3 smithers graeme and mandawe: research as reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2017 m e t h o d o l o g y po s i t i o n a l i t y consistent with the reflexive methods discussed above, “a fundamental principle of indigenous research methodology is the necessity for the researcher to locate himself or herself” (absolon & willett, 2005, p. 97). although some criticize this practice as self-indulgent, especially for non-indigenous researchers (aveling, 2013), we feel it is important for our readers to understand who we are and how we became involved with this research project. we believe that doing this provides a more meaningful background to our findings. c i n d y cindy is a non-indigenous doctoral candidate in the department of geography at western university in london, ontario. she grew up in london, and still lives there with her husband and 8-year-old son. her decision to pursue her doctorate was rooted after hearing justice murray sinclair speak in 2010 about the irs system and the legacy of physical, mental, spiritual, and emotional abuse experienced by so many of the children who attended. as a mother listening to the stories of the survivors of these schools, she felt both heartbreak and anger. she remembers questioning how she, as an educated woman, knew so very little about indigenous culture and history. the experience started her on a journey of wanting to learn as much as she could about indigenous peoples and culture; eventually, she made the decision to return to school and pursue a doctorate in indigenous health geography. at the time of writing this article, she was in the final year of her program. e ri k erik is cree from beaver lake in northeastern alberta. he grew up in toronto, ontario and has lived in london, ontario since 2013. erik was hired to work with cindy to co-conduct interviews as part of her research. his decision to work alongside cindy stems from his interest in returning to academia after being away for 5 years. he holds a b.sc. in medical anthropology (hons.) from the university of toronto. after completing this degree, erik dedicated himself to learning from elders and traditional healers, which led him to work for an aboriginal health centre in london. during this time, he noted differences in the ways that allopathic doctors and traditional healers approached their practices. this prompted erik to consider the need for more first nations allopathic doctors who are both familiar with and practice traditional medicine. erik realized that, to fulfill his purpose as a helper to the people, it was necessary for him to re-enter the academic world, become a physician trained in western medicine, and incorporate traditional indigenous medicine as a central component of his future practice. at the time of writing this article, erik was in the final year of a university post-degree module, and has applied to medical school. d a t a c o l l e c t i o n a n d a n a l y s i s this article is situated within the context of cindy’s doctoral work, a community-based participatory health research project with urban first nations men. erik was hired as a research assistant (ra) to facilitate all of the interviews with first nations men. the rationale for this decision was that the 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.2 participants would likely feel more comfortable sharing their stories with someone from their own community, and that erik would be better equipped to pick up on language, references, and nuances that might otherwise be overlooked by cindy. throughout the research process, we (erik and cindy) met frequently to address any issues or concerns that arose during the data collection phase of the project. during these meetings, we had many conversations about our personal experiences—both challenging and rewarding. ultimately, we became good friends, and we would sometimes reflect upon this relationship, noting our belief that it contributed to both an improved research process and personal growth for both of us. it was during one of these conversations that cindy suggested it might be interesting write a paper together that shared our experiences, and that perhaps it would resonate with others involved or seeking to be involved in indigenous research, especially those working within crosscultural contexts. in terms of proposing an approach to collect, analyze, and share our stories, we collaboratively decided that cindy should put the project together. our rationale was twofold: first, this paper would ultimately become part of her dissertation, and, as such, she should take on the bulk of the responsibility in order to fulfill the requirements of her program. second, in addition to his contract as a research assistant with this project, erik already had a full-time job and was a full-time student. we recognized that with such responsibility, he would have significantly less time than cindy to contribute to the project. however, we both fully committed to ensuring that our thoughts and voices were accurately and authentically represented. we employed reflexive and co-constructed narratives to collect and analyze our experiences. as a family of approaches to data collection within the human sciences, narratives embrace a storied form whereby “events are selected, organized, connected, and evaluated as meaningful for a particular audience” (riessman, 2005, p. 1). per this method, co-constructed narratives are those that “illustrate the meanings of relational experiences, particularly how people collaboratively cope with the ambiguities, uncertainties, and contradictions of being friends, family, and/or intimate partners” (ellis, adams, & bochner, 2011, p. 7). recognizing that this approach fits well with indigenous research paradigms that value storytelling as a means of knowledge creation (kovach, 2009; mcivor, 2010; wilson, 2008), we agreed it would be an appropriate way to collect our experiences. to create our narratives, we responded to three broad questions: 1. what unexpected challenges have you encountered within the research process? 2. what unexpected benefits have you experienced? 3. what would you have done differently and what advice would you give to others? we agreed that these questions would allow enough opportunity for both of us to share our personal experiences without feeling either constrained by the questions or overly guided towards our answers. when we began writing our narratives, we were approximately halfway through the data collection process. we individually completed our reflections over a period of approximately six weeks. 5 smithers graeme and mandawe: research as reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2017 we employed a thematic approach to analyze our narratives. thematic analysis places “emphasis is on the content of the text, ‘what’ is said more than ‘how’ it is said, the ‘told’ rather than the ‘telling’” (riessman, 2005, p. 2). cindy took the lead organizing our narratives into 12 themes, and subsequently grouped them into broad categories based on similarity and overlap. we met to review the narratives and themes to ensure that we were on the same page regarding our terminology and the meanings behind our language. upon completing the data collection process, we revisited our narratives and themes. while we made some additions to the narratives, we felt that these additions only strengthened the existing broad categories that we had identified in our preliminary analysis: conflict, relationships, and identity. r e s u l t s the three broad categories that emerged from our co-constructed narrative analysis were conflict, relationships, and identity. we define each as follows: • “conflict” refers to experiences that evoked thoughts and feelings of unease, confusion, or discomfort during the research process. • “relationships” refers to experiences related to both our relationship and relationships with others involved in the research process. • “identity” refers to experiences that related to our senses of self, our ways of knowing, and our personal growth. below, we present collaboratively chosen excerpts from our narratives as examples of each category. we made edits where necessary to ensure clarity. c o n f l i c t in both of our narratives, conflict arose as we struggled to position ourselves within the research project. in cindy’s narratives, she discusses her feelings of conflict that arose from surrendering full control of the data collection process. she shared that she feared criticism from people within the academy for either not collecting the data entirely on her own, or not getting it done in a timely fashion. this struggle caused her to reflect upon her own ways of knowing and her assumptions about how to approach research with first nations peoples and communities, realizing that such assumptions can conflict with the expectations of an academic institution which values solitary, timely graduate work. as a result, she was forced to both continuously reconsider her approach to the research process and to appreciate the value of erik’s knowledge and intuition with regard to doing research with indigenous communities, specifically with regard to the importance of building and maintaining good relationships within the first nations community. she noted: i have been thinking about working with erik and how that means i need to “surrender control” in parts of my research. he has been amazing in networking, assisting with finding participants, and providing his own reflections on the interviews. yet i feel conflicted by the need to “protect” or “own” the research, like i need to be clear about whose research this [is] and how it 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.2 gets done. i feel like this is in part a result of my own personality, and in part to fend off criticism that i am not actually the one doing my research. unfortunately, i feel like this also results in me making erik feel like i don’t trust his perspective as a first nations man or approve of his work, when in fact, the complete opposite is true. the balance of respecting cultural protocols, being mindful of providing opportunities for erik to gain skills and experience, and getting the research done is sometimes difficult for me, and i am left feeling vulnerable . . . as an example of this, i reflect on a time when erik and i attended a local event at an aboriginal organization. erik knew about the event through his work and suggested i should attend with him as it may be an opportunity to recruit participants. he mentioned he knew a staff member associated with the event who might be able to assist us as well. at the event itself, i recall waiting for what seemed like forever for erik to introduce me to his colleague. it seemed to me that it would be an easy conversation that we could have quickly. yet as the night went on it became clear to me that erik was navigating that relationship with great care. it simply wasn’t a case of showing up, immediately introducing me and requesting assistance with recruiting participants. it had to happen within the context of their relationship. hours into the event, erik introduced to me to his colleague and we spoke briefly. i remember thinking that this person had the potential to be a key contact for helping us with recruitment as his job allowed him to connect with young first nation men every day. i was excited about the prospect and encouraged erik to continue follow up. at the same time, i sensed trepidation on his part. i talked to erik about this, whether or not we should continue to pursue his assistance with recruitment. after a few conversations we decided it was best to leave it alone—erik feared that by pushing too hard we might alienate his colleague completely. i had to put my trust in erik to read the situation and be at peace with it. in erik’s writing, he revealed the conflict he experienced as the result of being involved in an academic research project as a first nations man, which, as noted above, is something that has historically been a source of discomfort within indigenous communities. specifically, he noted that he was unprepared for how participating in the research process would change his image among his peers and within his community. this forced him to question whether such research was something with which he truly wanted to be involved: there were times in this project where i questioned my involvement. these moments were highly reflective, and had to do with self-image and who i wanted to be in the london community. before being affiliated with the project, amongst my peers i was known as a cultural teacher, a volleyball player, a recruiter, and (most simply put) a cree guy from toronto. i noticed that the further we went into this research and in putting myself more into the role of researcher, this perception in the community changed. i felt that my peers saw less of the other things i was involved with (ceremony, traditional teachings, etc.), and more to do with research. that word, “research,” has an inherent negativity in the eye of many who identify as first nations, as it may bring up a history of colonial abuse in both an academic and governmental sense (smith, 2012). i’ve seen firsthand how some community members view “researchers” in the community, and those community members have chosen to share their thoughts and emotions with me—usually nothing overly positive to say, unless they are coming from an indigenous background . . . there were times where i felt, “why am i doing this if it’s making me feel like someone i’m not?” . . . this idea of “who am i and what am i doing?” has been a daily 7 smithers graeme and mandawe: research as reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2017 theme in wearing the researcher hat. cindy has been a great colleague, and more importantly a great friend, throughout this entire process—in way of understanding and allowing me to open up to her and express my innermost feeling about what it is that we’re doing. i feel that this relationship is exactly what has been missing in most of the indigenous community research that currently exists, and it’s something that needs to be better understood shared moving forward. i d e n t i t y within our narratives, we both recognized that the data collection process provided an opportunity for us to grow and to learn. cindy reflected upon how the process forced her to question her own way of knowing and seeing the world, both within and beyond the confines of the research project. she shared that the experience allowed for ongoing self-reflection, and ultimately helped her to find her place as a non-indigenous person doing research with a first nations community: i think for me the research process has been about enlightenment. i was brought up in a western education system and i didn’t really ever think to question it. it has opened my mind to the fact that there are other ways of knowing and seeing the world, and that these ways are no less valid than western ways of knowing . . . erik and i meet frequently to discuss the research, yet often our meetings seem rise to another level where we have discussions about indigenous history, culture, and ways of knowing far beyond the immediate context of the research . . . i feel that these discussions have really helped me in my struggle to position myself within my research. since starting my ph.d., i have had a really difficult time finding my place as a nonindigenous person working with indigenous peoples. by this i mean i seemed to dwell on the difference too much, questioning what right i have to be involved in helping to create knowledge for a community i am not a part of. our discussions really helped me navigate this struggle as i moved towards being ok with the fact that we all have a responsibility in indigenous research, and remembering it’s not so much about who you are as about what is your intent. erik shared how the research process allowed him to find himself as an urban first nations man through connecting with others who have shared similar experiences. these social connections allowed him to experience personal growth and to navigate two different ways of knowing and seeing the world. he commented that the experiences of doing research, both good and bad, ultimately contributed to his understanding of where he wants to go with his life: personally, my lifelong struggle with identity has come to an amazing point through this project. in having those intimate and emotional conversations with participants, it’s more evident than ever that i am not the only one who has struggled with identity and growing up in an urban context. this wasn’t the case when i was younger, as i felt like i had no one to relate to with this struggle. and when i did choose to put myself out there and express my indigenous identity, i was put down. this project has given me context as to why this happens to our young men, and how some of them have chosen to work with this identity struggle. this kind of context has been invaluable to my personal growth … for me, the struggles about identity that i have been going through over the course of this project have truly led me towards knowing what i want to be my personal legend. what i want to do, and how i want to do it. it’s allowed me to realize my 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.2 passion for research and contributing authentic context to real experiences at the community level, in order to better inform community programming. but more importantly for me, i wouldn’t change this process because it’s shown me what i want to do—how i want to help. i’m going back to school next year to take some courses, and will be going to medical school in the next 2 to 3 years. i want to continue on with research, but feel that my true calling has less to do with navigating academic institutions and more to do with helping people with their health and wellness in a westernized sense (i.e., getting my m.d.), as well as in ceremony (i.e., sun dance, sweats, ceremony, balance, etc.). i know that this is what i want to do now, and am going to go through the process of going back to school full time in order to complete my goal. had the process of this project unfolded differently, i’m not sure i could have come to the same realization. r e l a t i o n s h i p s the relationships made within the research process became overwhelmingly important to both of us. cindy shared that the development of relationships with others involved in the research process was rewarding to her both personally and academically, and has only enhanced the research process: an unexpected benefit i have encountered in the research process is the development of relationships with the people involved and how this has contributed to my own learning both academically and personally. i have become friends with many of the people i have met through the research process and expect that these friendships will continue long after it is over. this is also true with erik. he has become what i believe will be a lifelong friend to myself and to my family, and i am thankful for this. in addition, i was surprised by how much i have come to feel connected to the participants in our research study. some i know personally and others i have only read their words, but in all cases i have developed a personal sense of responsibility to them that i was unprepared for. i think constantly about how i will ultimately be responsible for sharing their thoughts and feelings and it weighs heavily on me at times, especially with regard to those participants who i have never met or will have the chance to interact with in person. overall, i have to say that these relationships i have made have become very meaningful to me, and i feel like each person i have met has taught me something both academically and personally. i know that by opening myself up to these relationships i will be questioned with regard to how they will ultimately affect my research, but i have to say that i think they only serve to enhance the process. for example, going into this research project i sometimes felt intimidated by my non-indigeneity. by this, i mean that i found myself at times afraid to ask for clarification or to question something out of fear of saying something culturally inappropriate. i feel that the relationships i have made have opened the door for me to feel more comfortable speaking up, and to be more critical. by building relationships with the people involved in the research process, they have come to know me and my values and intentions, and i have come to know them in the same way. i believe this understanding has provided a foundation for us to work together in a respectful and honest way. for erik, the research process provided an opportunity to create relationships on many levels as well. within his narrative, he discussed not only the importance of our relationship (in terms of navigating the 9 smithers graeme and mandawe: research as reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2017 research process), but also the relationships he formed with some of the research participants, as well as their participation in a men’s drum circle: another example of this would be the men’s drumming group that i helped create and am a member of, known as the purple spirit. through the research, i identified a need for more maleoriented ways for indigenous men to connect to culture and belonging in the city. it just so happened that i had the right network of men in my life that we were able to create and establish a big drum group out of western university. we have some members that occasionally join us from fanshawe college as well—which is a great way of bridging and showing community solidarity regardless of which academic institution you attend. the group is all about providing a place to learn more about drumming—as the drum is great medicine in providing a connection to spirit, identity, and other members of your community (i’m realizing this more than ever since being part of this group). to date, we’ve been playing together for 8 weeks now and have performed at two pow wows, and three community events. we have currently have two parts to our group. as mentioned, many of the men who attend western come from haudenosaunee nations, and will be more involved with water drum and shaker songs. being reflexive of that, we’ve opened up the group to those men who choose to sing only these songs exclusively. it’s amazing to see the power of these songs, and it would be a shame to not allow for this in our group. we share so much good energy, laughs, insight, and wisdom when we meet. and importantly, we learn about the diversity of indigenous culture when we meet and exchange teachings. d i s c u s s i o n this article began as an attempt to explore and share our experiences2 doing research together within the context of a community-based participatory research project. our findings revealed that, for both of us, the research process created experiences of conflict, reflection upon our identities, and the creation of meaningful relationships. these experiences contributed to a more meaningful research process as we built trust in each other and our community partners, as well as in the project’s participants. on a broader level, however, these experiences represented our personal stories of reconciliation. our discussion is presented in three parts. first, we use our own voices to describe how our research experiences contributed to the reconciliatory processes of re-education and cultural regeneration, and how the relationships we made were foundational to these processes. second, we propose that there is a need, moving forward, for researchers to better share their stories, and for all indigenous research in canada to prioritize reconciliation and the relationships that support it. finally, we conclude our discussion by offering policy recommendations to achieve these goals. 2 we recognize that for cindy these themes are consistently presented within the confines of the research process, whereas erik more often related his experiences to the contexts of his community life and personal life. we suggest that this difference may be due to the fact that, as a first nations man, erik possesses a more indigenous and relational way of knowing, not to mention his insider status within the community with which we were working. it may also be a result of the fact that, as a full-time student, cindy is more immersed in the research project and thus focused on her experiences within it. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.2 c i n d y : r e c o n c i l i a t i o n a s r e e d u c a t i o n for cindy, the reconciliatory possibilities of research have related to her re-education. brought up in a middle class family in london, ontario, and schooled within a western education system, cindy’s early knowledge of indigenous peoples was limited to school field trips to ska-nah-doht3 and textbook accounts of peoples who seemed locked in history. she never sought out opportunities to learn more, nor was she given any reason to do so. her doctoral program afforded her the privilege and opportunity to learn about indigenous knowledge and culture, and the impact of both historical and ongoing processes of colonization. she noted that she thinks of this process of re-education as “decolonizing her mind”4: my story is one that i think is actually reflective of many canadians who never had an opportunity or reason to think critically about colonization and the oppression of indigenous peoples. i know this because i hear it when i talk to people in my life about what i am studying. so much of our understanding of indigenous peoples is based upon racist stereotypes perpetuated by the media and what limited accounts we found in our textbooks as kids. i did a community presentation once about what i had learned about residential schools, and i was shocked by how many of my friends told me after that they didn’t know about them. and many of these people have higher education—people like me who i think should know better. i ask myself: why don’t we know better? while she believed that her coursework and reading contributed to her re-education, she credited the people she has met and the relationships she has made through doing research as the most important parts of her learning: early on in my research, i started hanging out at the local aboriginal health access centre and attending teachings and ceremony. one of the healers sort of took me under her wing, and to this day she is still my teacher. she has been so patient and kind. it’s the same with erik—we have so many conversations about indigenous worldviews and culture. in some ways, it’s like we are figuring it out together. i feel like our relationship has provided us with a safe space where we can talk about these things. i have no doubt it has resulted in me being a better researcher, but more importantly, i think it has made me a better person. at the same time, she recognized that this re-education has not always been a smooth process. she reflected that she was initially hyperaware of her non-indigeneity, and that this sometimes made her afraid to ask questions or say the wrong thing out of fear of offending someone: i was helping with a summer camp for kids at the aboriginal health access centre that was part of another research project. all of the kids and counselors were first nations. there were times 3 ska-nah-doht is a recreation of a haudenosaunee longhouse village that existed 1,000 years ago. the museum, located in the longwoods resource centre in mount brydges, ontario, offers interactive exhibits relating to first nations culture and displays artifacts from the centre’s archaeological collection. 4 we borrow this term from ngũgĩ wa thiong’o’s (1994) book decolonising the mind: the politics of language in african literature. 11 smithers graeme and mandawe: research as reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2017 when stuff was happening—like the kids were goofing around and chasing a snake, and i thought i should step in and say something before it got hurt, but i felt like i didn’t have the right to because i wasn’t “part of the community.” this focus on the differences between us took me a while to get over, and i admit i still struggle with it at times. in this regard, cindy believed that one of the most important parts of her re-education was the realization that her job as a researcher and a non-indigenous person is not to “help,” as she believed when she started this journey. rather, it is to shut up and listen, to learn, to be open to other ways of knowing, to be humble, and to bring her knowledge and expertise to the table in order for everyone (indigenous and non-indigenous peoples) to work together towards shared goals and understanding. at the same time, she has learned that being humble does not mean being complacent or not speaking up when she does not understand or agree with something. she is learning to be comfortable with the fact that she is going to make mistakes, and that she will learn from them. indeed, she noted that being surrounded by people with whom she has fostered respectful relationships has made this much easier. however, with these relationships comes responsibility, and she noted that she feels a tremendous responsibility to the people she has met through the research project—her academic colleagues, community partners, the research participants, and, of course, erik. this can feel overwhelming at times, and she questioned if she is doing enough: sometimes i’ll hear derogatory comments about indigenous peoples from others—for example like how they just need to “get over” the whole residential school thing. i do my best to try and explain the greater context about what i have learned with the hope that they will understand and want to learn more too. there have been times when such conversations have turned to heated arguments, and times when i find myself questioning my own logic or struggling to find the words to justify my thoughts. the truth is, i am still learning and figuring it out too. it can be frustrating and emotionally upsetting and i always feel like i am not doing enough. cindy noted that she has learned not to lose sight of the little things that she does beyond her doctoral research. these might include conversations with friends and colleagues that contribute to reeducation, how she decides to vote, the organizations and causes she decides to support with her time and money, what she posts on social media, or simply reading children’s books that accurately portray indigenous peoples to her son, and taking him to teachings and ceremonies so that he will learn what she never did. the other day i was sitting at the table and my son brought me a picture he drew of colonization. i had tried to explain the concept to him the day before—have you ever tried to explain colonization to an 8 year old? it’s not easy. anyway—i can’t remember exactly what it looked like, but it made me happy to know that he is learning this stuff. i know they [children] do learn more in school about indigenous history and culture now than i ever did when i was a kid, but i think it needs to be more than that. at the end of the day, he doesn’t have to agree with my thoughts and ideas, but i do want him to have opportunities to learn and build relationships like i have through the research. i guess in the grand scheme of the broad level political and 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.2 structural changes that reconciliation requires all of this doesn’t seem like much, but i think it’s equally important. e ri k: r e c o n c i l i a t i o n a s r e e d u c a t i o n a n d c u l t u ra l r e g e n e ra t i o n for erik, the research process contributed to his re-education by providing a way to better understand himself—both culturally, as an indigenous person, and academically, within the context of an academic institution, as well as in society broadly. specifically, it validated his experience as an urban first nations man. through participating in our research, erik was able to share his experience, find validation in that experience, and ultimately become more aware and proud of his identity. in terms of cultural regeneration, the research process helped erik to redefine his understanding of what it means to be indigenous. specifically, by considering the historical realities his family had faced that were out of his control, the research process led to a more positive embrace of his urban experience. i used to have confidence in the idea that i could simply “fit in” in a city like toronto where i grew up. when people asked me where i was from, i could say simply say toronto, and no one really cared elsewhere. this was not the case once i reached university, and inquired into the services and supports available at first nations house at the university of toronto. because i did not know my identity, language, or culture growing up, this contributed heavily to my lack of a sense of belonging when interacting with other indigenous students at the university. because there were no other indigenous students at my elementary and high school growing up, being able to interact with other indigenous students was a new (even intimidating) experience for me. i found it difficult to identify with other indigenous students, and as a result, felt shame in the fact that i did not know how to belong. even as an adolescent, i was very familiar with the shame that came from growing up indigenous as a post-residential school era family. as i grew older, and more people (indigenous and non-indigenous) would ask me where i was from, i never really knew how to answer them. i started to question my own indigeneity—and unfortunately, i chose to not validate my experience as an indigenous person at the time. i felt that because i did not grow up on reserve, speak my language, or know my teachings, that i was “less native” than others who did grow up with those experiences and knowledge. what i did not realize, in fact, was that this way of growing up (i.e., in an urban center, rather than on reserve) has become more of a common and normal experience . . . now, the majority of indigenous people are growing up in urban centers, often with parents and grandparents who were residential school survivors that have a detachment from their language, culture, and identity as a result. most of the things around my cultural identity were never taught to me, as my parents favored that it would be best for me to just grow up “mainstream.” this way of growing up had unfortunately led to an intrinsic struggle i would inherently have trying to navigate my identity throughout my life, not knowing where my ancestors come from, and my familial story as to why i grew up how and where i did. erik’s participation in the research process also contributed to his journey of connecting with his cultural identity by virtue of the opportunity to talk to the urban first nations men that were part of the study. after hearing their stories and about their experiences growing up in cities, he realized that his experience was common, which was not what he had originally believed. it was through identifying with 13 smithers graeme and mandawe: research as reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2017 others who had had similar experiences that erik was able to have confidence in his experience and no longer feel the shame that came from not knowing that his experience was common. indeed, having an outlet to share these stories was an important part of his healing, which he had never had an opportunity to experience before. since the research process, he has been able to heal and to grow from historical trauma and shame. this was an unintended but highly beneficial outcome of the research process for him. the most important aspect to my re-education was the ability to have confidence in my experience, and to validate its worth as an indigenous person. in hindsight, the shame that came from others’ opinions about my indigeneity had only limited my growth and understanding of my identity, my purpose, and myself. but, the moment i gave myself permission to accept my experience as valid and indigenous, i no longer feel the shame that has only held me back for most of my lifetime. the relationships that i fostered with other urban first nations men in my community through the research process have given me a network of others to share stories and past experiences with. the ability to laugh, cry, or be angry about a common experience has been one of the most influential components to my healing, as it has created a safe space to process and grow from. for example, a group of men from the project (myself included) is now singing together as a traditional men’s big drum group. there was a time where each of us felt that we did not belong around a big drum singing traditional songs, but we now know that that way of thinking was never warranted, but was only instilled in us through colonial ways of thinking and lateral violence. the drum has also created a safe space for each of us to share stories, teachings, and good energy with all people. interacting with other people has become an important part to the healing process as sharing those stories and realities with others helps each of us better understand ourselves, as well being an opportunity for others who may have similar experiences to know that they are not alone. while our experiences of reconciliation played out in different ways, what was common to both of our narratives was the importance of relationships. this is perhaps not surprising given that relationships are considered a key component of reconciliation (bloomfield et al., 2003; bloomfield, 2006; lederach, 1997). even the trc has described reconciliation as “an ongoing process of establishing and maintaining respectful relationships” (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015a, p. 16). for us, embracing a community-based participatory research approach5 created a space for these relationships to develop. however, we were both unprepared for just how much these relationships would contribute to our re-education and cultural regeneration. reconciliation was not one of our research objectives, but it proved to be a most important outcome for us. it provided us with opportunities to learn, heal, and validate indigenous ways of knowing in ways that have forever changed us. as alluded to earlier, we do not mean to suggest that such relationships and experiences of reconciliation are not already happening in indigenous research and within indigenous geographies—we have no doubt that they are. rather, what we suggest is that researchers need to better share their stories so that 5 for a more in depth review of community-based participatory research in indigenous research, see tobias, richmond, and luginaah (2013) and castleden, morgan, and lamb (2012). 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.2 they may inspire and guide others to be active participants in reconciliation—especially those who are new to indigenous research. reflexive methods, such as the one used in this article, offer a means to do this work. at the same time, however, we are keenly aware of the criticisms of reflexive methods; we must also do the hard work of applying what we have learned in ways that dismantle colonial privilege and support indigenous resurgence. as researchers, we have a responsibility to acknowledge the untold truths of indigenous history in canada, and can no longer remain complacent in a system that has only benefitted western ways of knowing. r e s e a rc h a s r e c o n c i l i a t i o n : po l i c y r e c o m m e n d a t i o n s to support research as reconciliation, we propose that it needs to become a prioritized and funded objective in indigenous research in canada. we suggest that the tri-council (canadian institutes of health research [cihr], natural sciences and engineering council of canada [nserc], and social sciences and humanities research council of canada [sshrc]) funding agencies could facilitate this practice by including reconciliation as a priority stream in the funding application process. for example, researchers could be required to explain how they plan to address one or more of the trc’s recommendations as either theoretical or methodological objectives. tri-council funding agencies could prioritize projects that embrace decolonizing and indigenous methods that promote relationship building, particularly within disciplines that do not traditionally adopt such approaches or engage in research with indigenous communities. extra merit could also be awarded to research housed in institutions that have demonstrated a commitment to fostering a culture of reconciliation and building relationships with indigenous communities (through the provision of indigenous strategic plans or formal responses to the trc’s recommendations, for example). such policies represent a bold decolonizing project, one that will require government, funding agencies, institutions, researchers, and even indigenous communities to rethink how they understand and participate in research. we also acknowledge that these suggestions run the risk of becoming boxes to check on an application, since they are open to the interpretation of a reader. as stiegman and castleden (2015) have pointed out in the context of the tri-council policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans, there exists a danger that such guidelines would look good “on paper,” but lack the institutional support and resources necessary to ensure that they are being done in a good way. however, despite such challenges, we propose that there is much room for conversations about how researchers can do more to support reconciliation in canada through both their research and their relationships. c o n c l u s i o n this article contributes to scholarship within indigenous geographies that employs reflexive methods, and it explores the potential of research to contribute to processes of reconciliation. we hope that this literature continues to grow and to embrace the diverse voices of everyone involved in indigenous research, whether they are indigenous or non-indigenous, researchers, community partners, or project participants. given that the trc has recently released 94 calls to action to advance the process of reconciliation between aboriginal and non-aboriginal peoples in canada, we suggest that now is the time for everyone involved in indigenous research (both within geography and beyond) to step up and consider how they 15 smithers graeme and mandawe: research as reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2017 may better contribute through their work and research. in closing, we leave you with a quote from the final report of the trc: together, canadians must do more than just talk about reconciliation; we must learn how to practise reconciliation in our everyday lives—within ourselves and our families, and in our communities, governments, places of worship, schools, and workplaces. to do so constructively, canadians must remain committed to the ongoing work of establishing and maintaining respectful relationships. (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015b, p. 126) we believe that every person, organization, community, and institution involved in indigenous research in canada has a responsibility to support the practice of reconciliation. it should be a prioritized and funded objective, not a choice. we challenge everyone, across all academic disciplines, who is involved in indigenous research in canada to support this call. much like our experiences discussed in this article, this will require that researchers be open to conflict, to reflecting upon their identities, and perhaps most importantly, to building meaningful relationships. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.2 r e f e re n c e s absolon, k., & willet, c. 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(2008). research is ceremony: indigenous research methods. halifax, n.s.: brunswick books. 19 smithers graeme and mandawe: research as reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2017 the international indigenous policy journal april 2017 indigenous geographies: research as reconciliation cindy smithers graeme erik mandawe recommended citation indigenous geographies: research as reconciliation abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license indigenous geographies: research as reconciliation are they like us, yet? some thoughts on why religious freedom remains elusive for aboriginals in north america the international indigenous policy journal volume 2 issue 4 traditional knowledge, spirituality, and lands article 4 october 2011 are they like us, yet? some thoughts on why religious freedom remains elusive for aboriginals in north america marc v. fonda inac; uwo, marc.fonda@aandc.gc.ca recommended citation fonda, m. v. (2011). are they like us, yet? some thoughts on why religious freedom remains elusive for aboriginals in north america. the international indigenous policy journal, 2(4) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.4 this research is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. are they like us, yet? some thoughts on why religious freedom remains elusive for aboriginals in north america abstract it is well-documented that european culture differs from that of aboriginal culture. perhaps one of the most striking differences is in the relationships and attitudes each group has towards land. for europeans the land is a commemorative gift of the creator there to be exploited for economic benefit; for aboriginal peoples, the land is also a gift but one that a continuing extension of the creator’s immanence in which all things are related to one another. the one is an economic relation, the other a spiritual relation that denotes family. when two very different cultural systems encounter one another, there are bound to be clashes. regardless, it is the overriding interests of the state that take precedence in countries where religious freedoms are constitutionally guaranteed – but such guarantees apply only insofar as the religions seeking freedom mirrors that of the dominate society. this paper explores these differences in relationships to land and how aboriginal religious freedom suffers as a result, which has significant impacts on well-being and cultural continuity. keywords aboriginal, indians, religion, spirituality, religious freedom, sacred land, usa, canada, case law, worldviews. acknowledgments disclaimer the opinions expressed in this paper are solely those of the author. they do not necessarily reflect the views or policies of neither the department of aboriginal affairs and northern development canada nor the government of canada nor any of its agencies. some commentators may wish to point out that the idea of vestigial states is pejorative. indeed it is and it is used here, by me at least, as such and on purpose: it reflects how dominant societies usually look down upon their subaltern others. tonya gonnella frichner (2010) in a recent submission to the permanent forum on indigenous issues at the united nations provides a thorough albeit preliminary exposé of the doctrine of discovery as the foundation of violation of the human rights of indigenous peoples. rooted in two papal bulls from the fifteenth century (dum diversas and romanus pontiex) the doctrine of discovery has since been institutionalized in the usa canada and elsewhere and gave european christian countries the right of conquest, sovereignty, and dominance over non-christian peoples, along with their lands, territories and resources. the doctrine assumed that non-baptised individuals were non-human and thus merited no consideration in regard to their rights to hold land and resources. justice marshall invoked the doctrine of discovery in us supreme court case johnston v mcintosh (1823); in canada johnston was cited as justification as late as 1984’s guerin v. the queen. ross (2005, 69) writes that esson, j,a, in the westar case proposed a general rule derived from the british columbia court of appeals decision in the meares island case that “the court should not grant an injunction if the economic consequences of doing so would have a serious impact upon the economic health of the province, the region of the logging company.” he further proposed as an exception, also derived from the same cased, that the court could nonetheless grant an injunction with regard to “particular sites which have unique qualities.” creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ this research is available in the international indigenous policy journal: http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/4?utm_source=ir.lib.uwo.ca%2fiipj%2fvol2%2fiss4%2f4&utm_medium=pdf&utm_campaign=pdfcoverpages those of us familiar with w.c. smith’s (1981) the meaning and end of religion know that european society only developed a word for ‘religion’ relatively recently. smith describes a process of reification where the latin ‘religio’ progressively was abstracted to mean one of four things today: personal piety; an overt system of beliefs, practices and values as a) the ideal religion of the theologian or b) the empirical phenomenon of the lived tradition; and, c) a universal category such as in ‘religion in general’. none of these understandings really work in the aboriginal context, as opposed to the european one (and it may not work too well there). indeed, for smith, “nothing in heaven and earth” answers to the name ‘religion’ as it has come to be known in european society (smith 1981, 4). what is important for our purpose is that the european category of ‘religion’ developed in part as a means of distinguishing the things in the world that are ‘sacred’ from those that are ‘secular’. this is important in terms of the contrast it helps establish, that is, the contrast between the european and (often idealized) aboriginal worldviews, polemical as this contrast may be. traditionally, many aboriginal peoples did not separate religion or spirituality from the rest of life and, while this may be true also for most other cultures, effective rhetoric suggests a need to overstate to some extent the contrast of aboriginal to european worldviews regarding a separation of sacred and secular. for instance, if a culture holds that the land as a whole is sacred, there would no need to separate out special locations or constructions as the central locus of ritual and practice. many persons of the christian faith are most likely to participate in spiritual activities, communally or as an individual, in a building or some specially sanctified ground like a cemetery. rarely would they, officially at least, consider a mountain as a highly sacred place in need of protection for its spiritual significance alone. and while aboriginal peoples distinguish between places of high spiritual importance from those of low spiritual importance (ross 2005; ruml 2009), ideologically at least they are not well known to suggest that any piece of land has no spiritual significance. my point is that historical aboriginal cultures did not have as marked a conceptual separation between sacred and secular, or between culture, language and identity, or between spirituality and the land on or through which it is expressed as did most european cultures. these things were and, for many contemporary aboriginal peoples, are all interrelated in aboriginal worldviews (mcivor 2009; paper 2007). this was not so for most european colonists. indeed, the colonial enterprise needed to be able to demarcate between what of the world was sacred and secular, civilized and uncivilized, in order to profit from the resources gained by conquest without incurring negative moral currency. there will be more discussion along these lines shortly. what follows is a discussion of a number of complex interrelated issues, including the differences in general (not specific) worldviews, european definitions of what constitutes civilization, the relation of well-being to lands, and relevant jurisprudence in the usa and canada as it pertains to aboriginal freedom of ‘religion’. while it may be true that aboriginal peoples in north america are legally offered the same individual rights to religious freedoms as other citizens, the worldviews of aboriginal peoples with particular regard to their interactions with the land is often, but not exclusively, different from the dominant euro-american ones. this can and does result in legal barriers to aboriginal peoples’ expression of religious freedom especially when it pertains off-reserve lands, despite examples where the state worked more or less collegially with aboriginal groups looking to express their spirituality on non-reserve lands (ruml 2009). this paper proposes that despite the fact that both aboriginal and european worldviews regarding the relationship to land are tied to spiritual or religious histories and trajectories, as are the relative jurisprudence, historically the state-indigenous (legal) dialogue in this area has been mostly one sided, favouring the interests of the state over those of aboriginal peoples. while this discussion covers only two national jurisdictions, given the trajectory of european legal history much of the background to such jurisprudence is generalizable to other national jurisdictions with indigenous populations that were colonized by anglo-european cultures, even if specific state-indigenous relations took different paths. 1 fonda: are they like us, yet? published by scholarship@western, 2011 the aforementioned relative degree of separation between secular and sacred in relation to land is an important point to consider further for several reasons, not the least of which is that those of us submerged in the european world view can best understand it in the abstract. loftin (1989) and ross (2005) inform us that european peoples do not understand or appreciate the centrality of sacred space. for aboriginal persons land is not merely material, and nature is not merely natural. both have spiritual dimensions and make up a sacred substance, which is the source, sustenance, and end of all cosmic life on which everything depends. if the spiritual is not distinct from the land, then taking the land is tantamount to prohibiting traditional spiritual experiences. moreover, aboriginal peoples often see land as both sacred and instrumental in value. (the pluralism project 2005; ross 2005) a further consideration is offered by mcivor who points out that aboriginal concepts allow individuals to gain a deeper sense of identity and live a life of balanced reciprocity according to the traditional holistic cosmologies that still function in the modern age, thereby creating a pathway to health and wholeness (2009, 13). health and wholeness are directly experienced by many aboriginal persons when on the land or in the bush. in reviewing numerous studies related to culture as a protective factor, mcivor (2009) notes that many authors argue that the relationship aboriginal peoples have with the land shapes all areas of their lives (see also ross 2005). moreover, the belief that the land is alive contributes to mental and physical health or that a subsistence lifestyle is the core of wellness. in discussing the relationship between land and mental health of inuit peoples, kirmayer, et al. (2008) for instance notes that inuit are in constant transaction with the environment through mixedeconomy activities. despite exposure to eurocentric views, the central importance of the land and animals in inuit concepts of well-being persist. to the inuit, the environment is not an impersonal, inanimate landscape but is alive and closely linked to personal memories. the land is also a constant reminder of cultural history; illness is perceived as a result of being separated from traditional lands for too long or not eating things of the land. there is broad agreement that being out of the community and on the land has a rejuvenating effect on mind and body. people use hunting, camping, and fishing as ways to regain a sense of well-being. lack of access to the land may cause feelings of distress, disorientation, and anxiety. depression is said to be the result of not being able to eat seal or beluga meat for extended periods of time. being deprived of foods from the land is to be slowly drained of an essential element of health and well-being. it is not only the inuit that hold such views and it is not only health issues that are of concern to aboriginal peoples. government policies of sedentarization, in the name of promoting so-called ‘civilization’ and ‘christianization’ have had innumerable negative impacts on many aboriginal communities. the eastern cree (tanner 2008; adelson 2008; hayes 1995), of quebec’s james bay region, and the stò:lō nation of british columbia (carlson 2008) are but two examples of how such policies have virtually destroyed and supplanted traditional social structures, forms of governance, spirituality, family relations, social stability, and health as a direct result of lost opportunities to interact with the land and live the related spirituality (tanner 2008; adelson 2008; hayes 2005; carlson 2007; see also simpson 2004). when the land is appropriated by state interests (government and corporate) it is ‘humiliated’, and since indigenous knowledge comes from the land, the people suffer. “spiritual places are destroyed and with them…” opportunities to pass along cultural knowledge become fewer (simpson 2004, 379). such desacralisations of sacred sites is at the very least detrimental to the well being of the indigenous communities that find a specific site sacred (ross 2005). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.4 modern nation-states are social and political constructions. reservations in the usa and reserves in canada are but one of the spatial manifestations of how colonial peoples labelled first nations (wilson and peters 2005). in some respects the goal was to maintain a separation between the urban and the non-urban. in other respects it was about clearing the land for exploitation, development, and settlement as europeans understood it – that is, the goal was to civilize the wilderness and the indians living therein (carleson 2007). the idea of a deep interconnection to the land is alien to a society recovering from feudal land systems and informed by lockean notions of property ownership. the spiritual foundations of indigenous knowledge and worldviews are of little interest to the dominant society because they often exist in opposition to its cherished worldviews and values. thus there is little motivation on the part of the dominant culture to ‘decolonize’ relationships with indigenous nations. in general, state powers remain committed to industrial development on indigenous lands (simpson 2004) and thus claims that the land is sacred generally fall on deaf ears. it is an ongoing struggle where encultured persons see their sacred homelands diminished through encroachment, industrial activities, other forms of development (mcivor 2009; ross 2005), and environmental concerns (ross 2005). the european ‘edifice complex’ (beaman 2002) makes it very difficult for those who do not share aboriginal life experiences to understand the notion of sacred space outside of a church (see also ross 2005). while this is a deliciously pithy yet simplistic characterization, it works as a nice segué to my next point. that point is this: in following with the work of timothy fitzgerald (2000; 2007) and colleagues, european colonial powers recognized religions in far flung parts of the world only insofar as local traditions reflected the christian model. in the ideology of religious studies, fitzgerald writes that “the construction of ‘religion’ and ‘religions’ as global, cross-cultural objects of study has been part of a wider historical process of western imperialism, colonialism, and neo-colonialism” (2000, 8). as such ‘religion’ as a construction is considered a category mistake, an over encompassing ‘kind’, developed by a nascent social science that reflects an ideological trajectory of the modern west. it is rooted in a specific historical period and cultural view – as part of the nineteenth century colonial period located in a secularizing enlightenment, with emphasis on individualism and market capitalism. a consequence is that what was recognized as ‘religion’ is limited to specifically christian elements ‘smuggled’ into other cultures. the category of ‘religion’ imposes western categories on nonwestern peoples and societies, transforming them profoundly. what was considered validly religious, and still is – to the extent that the person making the proclamation is sensitized to this issue – is what characterizes christianity as distinct from other religions, including judaism and islam: soteriology, including individual commitment to church and private assent to doctrine; and, an emphasis on the transcendent and transcendental and not on immanence (fitzgerald 2000; 2007). the idea of religion as a private soteriological belief essentially separated from politics, or the idea of religious societies having essentially different purposes and characteristics from political societies, has become institutionalized in western liberal democracies and exported through the processes of colonization to many societies where no such distinction was conceivable in the local language (2007, 235). such views on religion were articulated in english during the seventeenth century. as it developed, it was transformed into a conception of “secular, rational, political ‘man.’” central to this discourse was the development of “a notion of the secular as the nonreligious, the natural, the rational,” which was considered the “superior ground from which to observe and order the world” (fitzgerald 2007, 235). the fantasy of ‘religions’ as being about privatized personal choices is accredited as making possible the idea of making markets from aspects of nature, which was followed by the commodification of religions themselves. 3 fonda: are they like us, yet? published by scholarship@western, 2011 today such discourses on ‘religions’ remain current. they are generally unanalysed in public debates regarding nationalism, minority culture, ethnic identity, and the relation between democracy and non-western world constructions. fitzgerald’s hypothesis is that the term ‘religion’ drifts between these different, contradictory ideas. moreover, such colonial discourses about religions have been appropriated into rhetoric belonging to non-european languages. the consequences of which is an instability that “explains why discourses that represent ‘religion’ and ‘politics’ as natural aspects of all human societies, are not only analytically dubious, but ideologically volatile” (fitzgerald 2007, 35-36). this final point is reinforced by chidester (2007) who notes that the failure to recognize indigenous forms of religion in southern africa was no mistake. rather it was a method used to enter contested territories by representing them as empty spaces open for conquest and colonial domination. this is precisely the summary judgement rendered by columbus upon arrival in north america (beaman 2002; paper 2007): there was no religion and no civilization to be found, as least as defined by european standards. what chidester (2007) suggests fitzgerald (2000, 2007) and others confirm: british colonial policy varied depending on the continent in which it was active. india and japan had developed subsistence, governance, and economic systems more akin to that of colonial europe and, therefore, the people in those societies were ‘obviously’ both more human and closer to civilization than those of the americas, africa, australia, and new zealand. in a yet to be published paper, naomi goldenberg (2010) offers the illuminating metaphor of vestigial states1 the history of christianity is rife with examples of the creation of vestigial states through the displacement of one form of government by another. often we find the old states imitating the newer states in order to gain some intelligibility, rights, and privileges granted by nation-states to what are recognized as ‘religions’. vestigial states support the dominant society in a number of ways and they act as a touchstone from which the dominant society can distinguish itself and, as needs be, imitate. but vestigial states tend to be restless and dissatisfied with the limitations placed on them. they are thus inclined to press the dominant state to cede more recognition and power in the public sphere, the courts, and in schools. goldenberg (2010) goes on to note that often the power that vestigial states receive is similar to the position of women in patriarchal societies. in a sense they are emasculated and wish to assume nostalgia of their former power. as a way of describing what happens to colonized populations as the dominant society sets about its business of subsuming ‘conquered’ nations (or in our case, societies that gave up land in one way or another due to various pressures brought by colonization). the old nations are displaced by newer regimes but continue to function, after a fashion. what makes them vestigial, according to goldenberg is that they have been ‘neutered’ (i understand ‘neutered’ in the sense that many aboriginal societies lost the agency that comes with what some now call self-determination). i agree with goldenberg’s metaphor to this point. however, it is here that i think more nuance is in order. the devolution of power to an emasculated vestigial state may not work so well in the aboriginal context as compared to india and japan, for instance. most aboriginal societies, with the exception of those decimated by the conquistadors, did not command large professional armies following the european model, and did not have similar control over entire continents or significant portions thereof. moreover, while there are similarities in how europeans imagined women and aboriginal peoples (i.e., as closer to nature, naïve, influenced by satan, physical, sexually permissive, etc. [daly 1990]), i argue that it would be more accurate to say that aboriginal people were reduced to a child’s role in european eyes or, at the very least, in its legal systems. yazzie (2007) confirms this when considering justice marshall’s decision in the us supreme court case, cherokee nation v. georgia (1831). marshall wrote that indian tribes were seen as 1 some commentators may wish to point out that the idea of vestigial states is pejorative. indeed it is and it is used here, by me at least, as such and on purpose: it reflects how dominant societies often view their 'others'. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.4 “domestic dependent nations” of the federal government in a “state of pupilage”, whereby the relationship was defined as one between guardian and ward. incidentally, the outcome of cherokee nation v. georgia was to allow georgia’s state laws to supersede those of the cherokee nation and, in fact, abolish its laws. that is, it took away the cherokee’s ability to be self-determining and selfgoverning agents worthy of nation to nation agreements that treaties are by definition; the cherokee nation was reduced to a dependent, agentless child. children and youth in contemporary social science and legal rhetoric are seen as in development and in transition; physically, emotionally, and mentally immature and irresponsible; innocent and incapable of supporting themselves. children and adolescents are seen as undecidables when engaging in activities belonging to adults, like pregnancy, which would make them independent and selfdetermining agents. as such they are seen as category mistakes, neither a child nor an adult, and represent a form of social pollution requiring separation from the rest of society (fonda, et al. forthcoming). in the case of aboriginal peoples this separation has been literal and figural: they have been literally separated from dominant society through forced migration to reserves/reservations put aside for the purpose; and, they have been figuratively separated through stereotypes and discriminatory practices, which included making their spiritual practices illegal for more than half a century (paper 2007), refusing the validity of their ontologies, epistemologies, and worldviews. although paper (2007) claims the law in canada was never repealed, it was, in fact, removed from the 1951 version of the indian act resulting in what could be argued to be the equivalent of repeal. from all this we may conclude that aboriginal nations were vestigial in the eyes of colonial powers and remain so for current authorities, political and judicial: they are seen as small (relative to the general population), of limited use, and rudimentary in terms of their religious, cultural, social, and economic development. more often than not, the dominant society labels them a ‘burden’ (cf., paper 2007). how did this situation come about? there are several different ways to answer this question, but here we will focus on how europeans viewed aboriginal peoples and culture/society from the perspective of jurisprudence. loftin (1989) provides perhaps one of the most comprehensive reviews of american supreme court judgements regarding native american quest for religious recognition up to 1989. in so doing he summarizes some of the dissimilarities between aboriginal and european spiritual traditions. anticipating fitzgerald, loftin justifies his exposé: “these dissimilarities have made the native american tribal quest for religious freedom difficult because historically anglos have not understood religions different from their own” (1989, 5; see also: paper 2007; the pluralism project 2005; beaman 2002; ross 2005). loftin (1989) points out aboriginal peoples do not separate religion from the rest of life or from the world. loftin argues simplistically and strategically that in the christian view the desired goal is achieving god’s kingdom, which is often characterized as located in the heavens, separated from this world, or waiting for jesus to return and construct the kingdom around the time of the apocalypse. many forms of christianity could be said to be confessional in nature, and the church sometimes imagined to be separated from political, racial, or geographical concern with (theological) concerns not often considered to be intrinsically related to other aspects of physical existence. these last two points underscore that the christian focus has often been other worldly and not in the here and now. aboriginal spirituality is often tribal in scope, christianity claims to be universal. rhetorically, this is to say that only hopi can live hopi spirituality, but anyone can be christian – albeit things are much more complicated than this given the adoption practices of some aboriginal cultures (cf,. ruml 2009), the openness of some aboriginal spiritual traditions, and the fact that many aboriginal peoples choose to follow a christian path and others still walk both christian and (neo/pan) traditional spiritual paths. more importantly, though, pre-contact aboriginal spirituality was lived by all members of the group or tribe; it was often communal, whereas christianity historically most often is a personal religion for 5 fonda: are they like us, yet? published by scholarship@western, 2011 individuals, at least since the protestant reformation. the result is that religious freedom claims based on communal considerations are doubly disadvantaged, which is often the case for those aboriginal societies whose lands are legally defined as collectively-owned. nonetheless, communal claims do not resonate with the dominant religious view of the christian mainstream and fall outside the framework for rights articulated in the usa. things are a little different in canada, whose constitution enshrines a notion of collective rights (beaman 2002). as previously noted, christianity tends to be a religion of the word (with some exceptions), whereas aboriginal spirituality is experiential. finally, pre-contact and traditional aboriginal spirituality was mainly pre or non urban and is attuned to the rhythms of nature (loftin 1989; see also yazzie 2007). nature continues to be seen as sacred and attempts are still made to lessen the distance between themselves and the world; christianity, in contrast, is urban – developing as it did along the silk route. in this context, urban life is seen as especially problematic and thus christianity often stresses the next life, after death. such “distinctions have not been noticed by the courts, or when they have, they have been used to deny the legitimacy of native american religions” (loftin 1989, 6; see also ross 2005). in the past, aboriginal religious traditions were typically characterized by europeans as either non-existent or primitive and superstitious. moreover, judeo-christian values underscore much of the anglo-american political order, showing the intimate connection between church and state. the legal, political, and economic north american (including some aboriginal peoples) has adopted values of individualism, competitiveness, profit, speed, and efficiency. the relationship that law has with these ideas is especially close. all major areas of law place great emphasis on economic efficiency or wealth maximization. property law is heavily influenced, too, by ideas of efficient resource use. unfortunately, often angloamerican notions of the public good tend to leave aboriginal peoples out of the picture. “this omission is part and parcel of an ideology that is problematic religiously because it denies the humanity of native americans” (loftin 1989, 8). loftin (1989) offers a critique of modern capitalistic economic theory as developed in adam smith’s the wealth of nations. smith's is an ethnocentric world view that perceived native americans as other than human. his economic theories are based in the notion of human origin and destiny. integral to smith’s economics is his theory of progress, called the four stages theory. this theory reflects an idea new to his time, evolution. smith’s stadial theory of social evolution claims humanity possesses a natural propensity to progress over time through four more or less distinct consecutive stages, each corresponding with different subsistence modes of hunting, herding, farming and capitalistic commerce. for smith, a society based on capitalism had attained the way of life destined by nature and was thus fulfilled. (loftin 1989, 8) it is important to note that smith framed the four stages theory in terms of progress and not merely change. he [smith] felt that society of merchants, governed by democracy and oriented by the sciences, was a better society than one based on hunting, herding and farming, although he did recognize that the world of commerce presupposed an agricultural surplus. such a society was ‘civilized’ in contrast to the ‘primitives’ living in other cultures. (loftin 1989, 8f) in developing his four stages theory, smith relied heavily on the voyage literature of the american indians, who inhabited a land (and its raw materials) ‘discovered’ by europeans. for smith, 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.4 civilization presupposes a division of labour, which presupposes a propensity for exchange born of a desire for material surplus. here the ‘savage other’ comes into play: “smith argues that humans have a natural desire to accumulate economic surplus; therefore, he says ‘savages’ are not fully human for they have not yet progressed into civilization based on desire for surplus” (loftin 1989, 9). adam smith is thus responsible for the view that humans are inherently greedy. however, a major difficulty with modern economics is that it centres on the “premise of infinite desire that is claimed to be shared by all human beings” that “goes hand in hand with the theory of social evolution because economics is a social science and social sciences are supposed to explain constitutive aspects of human beings” (loftin 1989, 9). smith’s argument follows this kind of path: all humans have both infinite needs and greed, which leads to commercial and industrial economics. implicit is the idea that all humans want a surplus of material wealth. but that premise is questionable. for example, marshall sahlins stone age economics (1972) remains a classic statement on the economics of hunting-gathering peoples. it demonstrates that wealth is related to want and that wants can be satisfied in two ways: by producing a lot or desiring little. europeans follow the former theory; ‘primitive’ aboriginal peoples the latter. as sahlins puts it: “‘want not, lack not’” (as cited in loftin 1989, 10). loftin points to two further characteristics of modern capitalism that are problematic from aboriginal worldviews: usury and profit. usury is the practice of lending money at an exorbitant interest. it is a relatively recent innovation with christian communities. in fact, christianity did not sanction it for at least 1500 years – coincidentally, not until the discovery of the new world. martin luther advanced this view for western europeans as a means of promoting economic development. until that time, christians objected to the practice for religious reasons – christian love extended to all persons, even enemies, meaning that every human was a brother. “usury flew in the face of christian brotherhood and created a universal ‘otherhood’ where each person was an other, not a brother” (loftin 1989, 10; see also beaman 2002 who points out that aboriginal peoples are legally constructed as the ‘other’ in the usa and in canada). usury rests on profit. the idea of profit is more or less universal, if we refer to the kind of profit that comes from each party’s gain in acquiring something they need for the exchange of something less needed. traditionally, humans bartered concrete goods with one another with each acquiring something of value. items were made and exchanged directly. this was the case for aboriginal peoples and for much of western europe until the renaissance. modern economics is different: production is much more abstract and impersonal. the volume is incredible and the exchange of goods and services lacks direct consideration of the people who receive them. “production is mathematical; its goal is money, not humanity” (loftin 1989, 10). from aboriginal spiritual perspectives this economics can be “worrisome, incomprehensible and inhumane.” but capitalism has its rejoinder: creatures without infinite desire are not fully human – they represent the ‘primitive’ past on the way to civilization. until humans became ‘civilized’ they were not complete humans. this primitive-civilized dichotomy is another core problem for american indian law. the values inherent to the ideology of civilization are the roots for american jurisprudence. euroamericans often believe that they ‘conquered’ aboriginal peoples absolutely in the sense of “never accepting them in their own terms...as fully human – thus such great efforts to civilize them and convert them to christianity” (loftin 1989, 11). the colonial treatment of land in north america is based in common law considerations of property as set forth by john locke. yazzie (2007) notes that from the beginning colonial powers in the usa (and canada) enacted laws and policies that deprived aboriginal peoples of their lands and limited traditional cultural practices. these laws, based on the doctrine of discovery, give property rights to the country that discovered a piece of land, it was used in the usa and canada as a way of justifying 7 fonda: are they like us, yet? published by scholarship@western, 2011 unilateral state ownership of indigenous lands and guardianship over indigenous peoples “because of assumed racial and cultural inferiority” (3).2 while aboriginal societies had laws concerning property ownership, those laws did not resemble european ones sufficiently to be recognized. for instance, the anglo legal tradition says that the land must have a sovereign who owns all land in the end and even fee simple title is only a possessory interest. the main difference is that europeans possess lands individually and aboriginal peoples communally. the implications of this “difference emerges when we get to the notion of ultimate ownership. indian tribes agree that the sovereign owns the land; the issue concerns who is sovereign. for them, the sovereign is not human” but spiritual (loftin 1989, 4). this is established in us case law (e.g., holden v joy 1872) where supreme court held that natives assert that their title derived from the “great spirit to whom the whole earth belongs” (cited in loftin 1989, 4). because of the nature of this claim, no human being can own the land. for many aboriginal peoples, the land is seen as part and parcel of the creator. it is primarily spiritual, not economic. rather such aboriginal peoples look to the spiritual realm for ultimate significance of their lands, of their relationship with the lands and with themselves. “their relationship with the lands is therefore fundamentally and irreducibly spiritual” (ross 2005, 2). historically at least, aboriginal peoples had a harmonious relationship with the land and many still do, with some notable exceptions such as, possibly, those that promote intensive resource extraction activities. in general, however, a significant number of aboriginal peoples do not seek to use natural resources efficiently, as modern economics might define it, “but rather to unite themselves with the sacred” (loftin 1989, 5). in such cases, the land is not for wealth maximization but for living in harmony. the relationship that most europeans have with land is one of an economic function of exploitation. thus we find that the difference in worldviews, ideas of ‘religion’, social evolution, the notion of what makes for civilization and ultimate ownership of the land, as well as agricultural or industrial use of the land are most often the basis of the courts’ approach to aboriginal calls for religious freedom, which is intrinsic to land use. inevitably, aboriginal peoples’ claims dealing with sacred space have been consistently minimized in the interest of compelling state claims (ross 2005), which has resulted in the diminished interpretation of religious freedoms (beaman 2002). if we were to look at case law regarding the freedom of religious belief and practice in the usa and canada, as loftin (1989), beaman (2002), ross (2005) and the harvard pluralism project (2005) have, we will find that these themes emerge time and again. we will also note the pragmatic character of the courts, that steadfastly side-step the thorny and difficult question of religious freedom in preference to taking paths of lesser resistance by relying on property law and other legal technicalities to resolve such questions, almost always in favour of the state’s economic or environmental interests (loftin 1989; ross 2005; beaman 2002; the pluralism project 2005). as argued above, cases regarding religious freedom as related to lands have been, for europeans, about secular issues such as access to resources, issues of power and control, population control, and social experiments. while some aboriginal peoples may agree with this approach, many others see such questions as being about self-determination, agency, spiritual and cultural freedom, as 2 tonya gonnella frichner (2010) in a recent submission to the permanent forum on indigenous issues at the united nations provides a thorough albeit preliminary exposé of the doctrine of discovery as the foundation of violation of the human rights of indigenous peoples. rooted in two papal bulls from the fifteenth century (dum diversas and romanus pontiex) the doctrine of discovery has since been institutionalized in the usa canada and elsewhere and gave european christian countries the right of conquest, sovereignty, and dominance over nonchristian peoples, along with their lands, territories and resources. the doctrine assumed that non-baptized individuals were non-human and thus merited no consideration in regard to their rights to hold land and resources. justice marshall invoked the doctrine of discovery in us supreme court case johnston v mcintosh (1823); in canada johnston was cited as justification as late as 1984’s guerin v. the queen. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.4 well as identity and community. these goals are important for well-being (ross 2005), especially when considering the findings of chandler (1998, 2004, 2006a, 2006b, 2008) and colleagues regarding the impacts of ‘cultural continuity’ in reducing suicides among british colombian first nations. they also challenge the legal hegemony that supervises aboriginal peoples. moreover, mcivor (2009) reviews other studies that found that aboriginal spirituality is a protective factor in suicide, and waldram (1994; 1993) and others note that aboriginal spirituality has significant impacts on substance abuse and preventing recidivism (see also: fleming and ledogar 2008; brass 2008; torres stone, et al. 2006; whitbeck, et al. 2004, 2002; van sickle, et al. 2003). an ironic example of the anglo-christian-legal bias is the american indian religious freedom act (1978), which was passed by the us congress in recognition of past suppression of traditional native american indian religious rights. it cites ignorance and insensitivity as two major reasons for encroachments on native american indian religious expression and seeks to remedy free exercise infringements within the limited scope of the federal agencies (see ross 2005 for a detailed review of canadian jurisprudence regarding access to sacred lands off reserve since 1982). the majority of suits brought to bear under the act have been concerned with sacred sites; and, “thus far [as of 1989] native american’s have yet to succeed” (loftin 1989, 30). “in all those cases the free exercise claims were defeated on all theories, including appeals to american indian religious freedom act. this has led to the comment that the act is toothless” (cf., beaman 2002; paper 2007; the pluralism project 2005). curiously, this act almost completely ignores scholarly studies of native american religions, which seems strange if the goal is to right past wrongs based on ignorance (loftin 1989). to loftin it may all come down to a question of how creation is viewed differently: as commemorative or as continuing. christians see creation as commemorative; aboriginals as a continuing process in which the creator is immanent (paper 2007). europeans perceive the creator as distinct from the creation. yet this distinction is overdrawn. “and it is precisely the act’s tendency to stress differences over relationships that best reflect the act’s embodiment of civilized ideology” (loftin 1989, 31). the tensions have to do with conflicts between two peoples with different core values, all within the context of conquest and colonialism. part of the problem is different epistemologies: many aboriginal peoples are mythic peoples; many europeans are historical. aboriginal peoples “perceive connections across time and space and give their world a unity and timelessness that modern, civilized humanity does not see” (loftin 1989, 32). other problems include the courts almost total reliance on anglo-american perspective with aboriginal perspectives are rarely heard (ross 2005), that aboriginal peoples must adopt foreign legal categories to adjudicate their claims, and that they are forced to use a language that does not embody their perspective (ross 2005; see also beaman 2002; the pluralism project 2005). there is also poor scholarship in legal circles, especially with regard to native american religions and much of this scholarship is too theoretical does not address contemporary legal issues (ross 2005; loftin 1989). while there is plenty of other scholarly materials that can help, there is generally poor communication across disciplines, which prevents its application in the courts and elsewhere – consequently, legal experts often paint an inaccurate picture of aboriginal religious traditions; and, the historical instability of federal indian policy that has undergone a number of stages, including assimilation, elimination, reserves, and self-determination – leaving a litigation quagmire open to various interpretations (loftin 1989). the point is that statutes enacted during one period often maintain legal consequences in the later periods, even when the perspective on aboriginal issues is very different. moreover, it is quite possible that attempts to protect religious freedom in the usa using the first amendment does as much harm as good to those interests by fixing spiritual practices and beliefs in written documents, subjected to public and often hostile scrutiny (the pluralism project 2005; see also ross 2005 in regard to canada). 9 fonda: are they like us, yet? published by scholarship@western, 2011 in canada the situation is similar, at least in terms of the court’s response to the very limited number of cases based on section 2(a) of the charter of rights and freedoms and petitions for interlocutory protections (ross 2005). as beaman (2002) points out, in canada the tendency has been to characterize aboriginal religious freedom cases in two ways: as either treaty rights pertaining to hunting and fishing or as related to aboriginal title. moreover, in both dick v the queen (1985, 2 scr 309, 43) and in delgamuukw (1997 3src, 1010) the court indulged itself in a debate on the nature of ‘aboriginality’ or indianness, even if the cases were formed around hunting and human rights or aboriginal title, respectively. this led beaman to conclude that the result of this tendency to characterize issues outside of a religious freedom framework is a desacralizing of aboriginal life such that spirituality becomes an ancillary issue, reflecting a common perception of north american society that regulates spirituality and religion to the ‘private’ realm. it also commodifies aboriginal expressions of spirituality by quantifying the amount and value of fish, wildlife, and property involved in the various rituals and practices (2002, 144). michael lee ross (2005) provides an alternate and highly detailed view on recent canadian jurisprudence regarding off-reserve first nations sacred sites. he describes two predominant strategies that have been employed: petitioning for interlocutory protection or for constitutional protections of such sacred sites. unfortunately, first nations’ actions in the canadian courts have not fared well at all, resulting from an apparent bias towards economic and/or environmental interests over the claim of sacredness and potential damages to nation, culture and community well-being. ross does not claim that things are insurmountable. the courts would provide slightly better chances to aboriginal claimants if they indulged themselves, for instance, in developing functionally equal understandings of aboriginal perspectives regarding the sacredness of, use of, cultures attached to, and ethic of sacred sites as well as the potential community harm desacralising such sites may bring. however, the supreme court of canada (scc) took some more steps that may in the long run provide hope for aboriginal claims regarding sacred sites. in the haidia and taku river decisions (2004) and in the mikisew cree decision (2005) the scc held that the crown has a duty to consult when it contemplates activities that may adversely impact potential or established treaty rights. in addition, the more recent scc decisions of rio tinto (2009) and little salmon carmacks (2010) allowed it to explain further that the duty to consult is a constitutional duty that involves the honour of the crown and must be met. “the context will inform what is required to meet the duty and demonstrate honourable dealings” (aandc, 2011). pragmatically, this has resulted in several directives for canadian federal officials in fair dealing with aboriginal peoples: • they must consult and they must do so early in any process. • they must address aboriginal concerns to avoid or minimize impacts on existing or potential claims resulting from federal activities and they must implement mechanisms that seek to address related interests, where appropriate. • consultation and accommodation will be carried out in a balanced manner that ensures timeliness; efficiency and responsiveness; is transparent and predictable; accessible, reasonable fair and flexible; founding in principles of good faith, respect and reciprocation; is respectful to the uniqueness of different aboriginal communities and identity groups; and, includes accommodation, where appropriate. this directive includes consideration of traditional knowledge at least in cases pertaining to the species at risk act and the canada national parks act in regard to environmental assessments and land use disposal. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.4 • they must recognize that consultation is a crown duty and thereby name a lead department or agency. • they must use and rely upon existing consultation mechanisms. • they must coordinate consultation and accommodation activities with its partners (e.g., aboriginal organizations, provinces, territories, and industry). • they must carry out consultation and accommodation in accordance with its commitments processes involving aboriginal groups, including developing and maintaining meaningful dialogue in support of building relationship with its partners (aandc 2011). while these principles are explicitly expected in cases of environmental assessments and regulatory processes, it might well be the case that such ssc directives will mean a wider application that could, at one point, encompass off-reserve sacred site claims. this said, however, historically in the usa and canada the courts isolate aboriginal peoples as an ‘exception’ to be accommodated according to the interests of the state. courts in both countries typically take a narrow view of what constitutes a religion requiring protection and “…first nations people are more likely to be excluded from, than included in first amendment and charter of rights and freedoms protections” (beaman 2002, 135). moreover, while esson’s rule3 beaman also suggests three possible explanations for this state of affairs, which are compatible with those of loftin (1989) and the general thread of discussion in this paper: the aforementioned framing of ‘religion’ based in the underlying christian model (coupled with the fear of wilderness and a fundamental christian belief in humanity’s dominance over animals and nature making it difficult to perceive nature as sacred); the persistent difficulty in expanding the definition of what is religious and spiritual used by the dominant society’s institutions, including the courts; and, the persuasive nature of the colonizing discourses where a benevolent dominant class permits religious freedom to vestigial states within its boundaries and where aboriginal claims are perceived to be burdens on the economic interests of the state, similar to the economic burden of a ward to the guardian, or of a (foster) child to parent. others are more direct in explaining this state of affairs: “the canadian government understood that their bill of rights [sic], with regard to religious freedom, did not apply to native american religions” (paper 2007, 51). allows for exceptions in demonstrating the uniqueness of a specific site, no canadian off-reserve sacred site has been afforded this uniqueness since the rule was established (ross 2005). loftin (1989) provides a related view: the issues are stated within a legal context but ultimately point beyond to the realm of world view[s]. in the end the question is one of truth, reality and power. for native american tribes, truth is mythological; for anglo jurists it is logical. reality is spiritual for traditional native americans, material for anglo legalists. and finally, there is the question of power. it is often said that anglos exercise a ‘might makes right’ philosophy and indeed they do. but the same is true for native americans. however, the two peoples perceive the locus of power to be quite different. anglo legalists emphasize human, political power[,] while native american tribes stress the power of the world that creates and 3 ross (2005, 69) writes that esson, j,a, in the westar case proposed a general rule derived from the british columbia court of appeals decision in the meares island case that “the court should not grant an injunction if the economic consequences of doing so would have a serious impact upon the economic health of the province, the region of the logging company.” he further proposed as an exception, also derived from the same cased, that the court could nonetheless grant an injunction with regard to “particular sites which have unique qualities.” 11 fonda: are they like us, yet? published by scholarship@western, 2011 sustains them. this difference in world view[s] is legally significant because tribes are the politically subordinated party in the dispute over religious freedom and may contest the dominant society only by employing the language of a foreign world (1989, 35). finally, the civilization ideology is paramount and it is divisive. it is “so ingrained as to be embodied almost without reflection, as a self-evident truth” (loftin 1989, 35). yet the fact that many people view aboriginal cultures as inseparable from the land suggests that more research is needed regarding the link between traditional lands and mental and physical health (and not just for aboriginal peoples). federal and provincial/state governments have responsibilities to assist in cultural revitalization (mcivor 2009), responsibilities generated by such things as collusion with the churches to break cultural continuity (simpson 2004; paper 2007) through the residential schools system (mcivor 2009), by making aboriginal spirituality illegal for a time (which has resulted in some cases in an ongoing felt need to keep things ‘underground’, as it were), and through ignorant refusal of access to sacred lands thus limiting traditional aboriginal religious freedoms because they are different from the christian norm. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.4 references aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc). 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(1994). aboriginal spirituality in corrections: a canadian case study in religion and therapy. american indian quarterly, 18(2), spring. whitbeck, l. b., chen, x., hoyt, d. r., & adams, g. w. (2004). discrimination, historical loss and enculturation: culturally specific risk and resiliency factors for alcohol abuse among native americans. journal of studies on alcohol and drugs, 65, 409-418. whitbeck, l. b., mcmorris, b. j., hoyt, d. r., stubben, j. d., & lafromboise, t. (2002). perceived discrimination, traditional practices, and depressive symptoms among american indians of the upper midwest. journal of health and social behavior, 43, 400-418. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 2, iss. 4 [2011], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol2/iss4/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2011.2.4.4 wilson, k., & peters, e. j.(2005). you can make a place for it: remapping urban first nations spaces of identity. environment and planning d: society and space, 23, 395-413. yazzie, v. (2007). the tribal perspective of old growth in frequent-fire forests – its history. ecology and society, 12(2), 21. 15 fonda: are they like us, yet? published by scholarship@western, 2011 the international indigenous policy journal october 2011 are they like us, yet? some thoughts on why religious freedom remains elusive for aboriginals in north america marc v. fonda recommended citation are they like us, yet? some thoughts on why religious freedom remains elusive for aboriginals in north america abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license are they like us, yet? some thoughts on why religious freedom remains elusive for aboriginals in north america ms#1445 wylie coloniallegacies final.doc.pdf the international indigenous policy journal volume 10 | issue 5 december 2019 colonial legacies and collaborative action: improving indigenous peoples’ health care in canada lloy wylie schulich interfaculty program in public health, western university, lwylie2@uwo.ca stephanie mcconkey st. michael’s hospital, unity health toronto, stephanie.mcconkey@unityhealth.to ann marie corrado women’s college hospital, annmarie.corrado@wchospital.ca recommended citation wylie, l., mcconkey, s., & corrado, a. m.(2019). colonial legacies and collaborative action: improving indigenous peoples' health care in canada. the international indigenous policy journal, 10(5). doi: https://10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.9340 colonial legacies and collaborative action: improving indigenous peoples’ health care in canada abstract indigenous people experience significant health disparities compared to non-indigenous people, which are exacerbated by less accessible and poorer quality health care services. this research aimed to understand the specific barriers to health care that indigenous patients and their families face, as well as to explore promising practices and strategies for improving the responsiveness of health services to the needs of indigenous people. through qualitative interviews with indigenous and non-indigenous health care and social services providers, we identified a range of challenges and successful approaches, and developed recommendations for improving policy and practice to address the gaps in culturally safe health care services. our study shows that many of the barriers indigenous people face when accessing health care are rooted in the broader social determinants of health, such as poverty, racism, housing, and education. these are complex problems that are outside of the traditional scope of health care practice. however, this study has also demonstrated that many barriers to equitable care actually stem from within the health care system itself. we found that health care gaps were often attributable to poorly funded on-reserve health care services and culturally unsafe off-reserve services. attitudes and practices among those working in health care and gaps in coordination between mainstream and indigenous services are challenges related to the way the health care system operates. solutions are needed that address these issues. given the multifaceted nature of access barriers, strategies to improve health services for indigenous people and communities require a comprehensive and systemic approach. keywords health care, indigenous peoples, qualitative research, health access, cultural safety, social determinants of health, medical education acknowledgments we express our appreciation to danielle alcock, jasmine fournier, jacqueline kang, and bimadoshka pucan, who provided research assistance for this project. we would also like to thank the indigenous community health care leaders who provided direction for this research, as well as the care providers, leaders, and indigenous people that we interviewed. we would like to acknowledge associated medical services for funding this research, which is part of the engaging for change project, funded as a phoenix fellowship from ams. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. 1 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 published by scholarship@western colonial legacies and collaborative action: improving indigenous peoples’ health care in canada indigenous people’s1 experiences of health and social disparities in canada constitute both a health and social justice concern (browne, 2017; browne et al., 2016; greenwood, leeuw, lindsay, & reading, 2015; howse & dwyer, 2015). these disparities are rooted in both colonial history and ongoing oppressive policies and practices that perpetuate contradictory pressures of exclusion and assimilation (browne, 2017; germove & hornosty, 2012). in canada, indigenous people face significant health disparities and negative experiences with health care that demonstrate an urgent need to act on these inequities (aboriginal women’s health and healing research group, 2005; adelson, 2005; reading & wien, 2009; richmond & ross, 2009). despite significant health care needs, research has shown that indigenous people are reluctant to access health care services due to ongoing negative experiences (allan & smylie, 2015; blumenthal & sinha, 2015; brian sinclair working group, 2017; browne, 2017; browne et al., 2016; de leeuw, lindsay, & greenwood, 2015; fohlich, ross, & richmond, 2006; germove & hornosty, 2012; mccallum & perry, 2018; reading, 2015; wylie & mcconkey, 2019). this research aimed to understand barriers to health care services as well as identify culturally safe practices and strategies for improving health care services for indigenous people. in exploring these challenges in health care, it is first necessary to explore the broader social and political context in which it takes place. colonialism, systemic racism, and structural violence in health care the barriers indigenous people have in accessing health care are structural, established through historical events, perpetuated in current policy, and expressed in behaviours that all interact in ways that inflict violence on indigenous people. structural violence, where large-scale social and economic structures create and perpetuate the conditions of ill health and suffering (farmer, 2004), is a concept relevant to this situation. the colonization of turtle island (also known as north america) and the eventual creation of canada was an act of genocide that attempted to wipe out indigenous peoples who live in these territories (amir, 2018; matthews, 2019). ongoing control and oppression continue through the policies within the indian act of 1876, which created the indian reserve system—a system that continues to this day. the indian act (1985) created the indian register, thus legally classifying some first nations people as status indians based on criteria, such as ancestry and membership in an indian band. this arrangement ensures that governance and services for first nations people are under the jurisdiction of the federal government. federal responsibility for first nations health care in a health care system that is run by provincial governments sets the stage for significant jurisdictional gaps that undermine equitable access to health care for status first nations people in canada (indian act, 1985; lavoie, browne, varcoe, wong, & fridkin, 2015). 1 indigenous peoples of canada include first nations (status and non-status), inuit, and métis, distinct peoples with unique histories, languages, cultural practices, and spiritual beliefs (government of canada, 2018). the terms aboriginal, indian, and native are also sometimes used in canada to describe these distinct nations. in the text, indigenous peoples refer to multiple indigenous communities, whereas indigenous people refer multiple individuals. 2 wylie et al.: colonial legacies and collaborative action doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.9340 to overcome these systemic inequities, approaches to care need to address historic and ongoing inequities in power relations (browne et al., 2016). ongoing canadian colonial policies continue this structural violence and genocide against first nations people through the perpetual underfunding of basic infrastructure in reserve communities that results in poor health and health care (browne, 2017; germove & hornosty, 2012; truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015). health and social programs for indigenous people are often determined by population-level data such as the census and other national data sources (walter & anderson, 2013). this practice is extremely problematic because these data sources do not include first nations people living on reserve and severely undercounts urban indigenous people (rotondi et al., 2017), in turn underfunding health and social programs for indigenous people across the nation. the longstanding underfunding of services delivered on reserves limits the range of accessible health services and undermines the health and well-being of first nations (chambers & burnett, 2017; senate committee on human rights, 2009). funding provided by the federal government to first nations communities is allocated to specific programs, defined by the federal government, and thus may be out of sync with community needs (richardson & murphy, 2018). given the lack of a full spectrum of health and wellness services provided within first nations communities, most first nations people living on the reserve need to access mainstream health services, usually in an urban centre. research in canada has shown that mainstream services are often unwelcoming and hostile places for indigenous people (allan & smylie, 2015; browne, 2017; mccallum & perry, 2018; wylie & mcconkey, 2019). status first nations and inuit can access provincial programs and services through coverage from the non-insured health benefits (nihb) program, run by the federal government; however, eligibility for specific services is dependent on residency status (reading & halseth, 2013; senese & wilson, 2013). nihb also provides extended medical coverage for some health care services provided by the federal government of canada (i.e., health canada). coverage may include prescription drugs, medical supplies, dental care, vision care, and medical transportation (government of canada, 2019). non-status first nations and métis are exempt from nihb and therefore do not have access to the same services as status first nations and inuit. non-status first nations and métis have access to the standard health coverage in their province or territory (reading & halseth, 2013; senese & wilson, 2013). indigenous people who reside offreserve do not have the same access to federally funded health care programs and services (i.e., community or band-run health care services), while individuals living on reserve do not have the same access to provincially funded health care programs and services (i.e., hospital or at-home health care services; snyder & wilson, 2012). this two-tiered and divided system of health care for status first nations in canada leaves people caught between a rock and a hard place, where on-reserve programs are underfunded and not comprehensive, and off-reserve services are often unwelcoming, culturally inappropriate, and lack an understanding of indigenous people’s experiences. disrespectful treatment and the imposition of a western model of care are symptoms of the systemic racism embedded in both policy and practice that negatively shapes indigenous people’s experiences, leading to significant barriers to health equity (eby, 2007; josewski, 2012). the unwelcoming environment in the health care system can make indigenous people reluctant to access care and, when they do, they often encounter discrimination, negative stereotyping, and dismissal of their concerns (wylie & mcconkey, 2019). the result is that indigenous people face a lack of access to quality, comprehensive, and culturally appropriate health care, both within reserve communities and in urban health care services. therefore, neither health system is meeting the complex health and wellness needs of indigenous people, regardless of where they live and access health 3 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 published by scholarship@western care (benoit, carroll, & chaudhry, 2003; browne & smye, 2002; browne, smye, & varcoe, 2005; ramsden, 1993). the high burden of illness facing indigenous people demonstrates a need for services that meet their requirements and incorporate knowledge of social and historical factors shaping experiences of disease (hammod et al., 2017). unfortunately, mainstream service providers often do not understand the issues that many indigenous patients face in everyday life, such as poverty, racism, violence, and a lack of basic services such as clean water (browne et al., 2005; de leeuw et al., 2015; reading, 2015). individuals who are struggling with complex health, family, and socio-economic challenges often experience a disconnection in health systems that is sometimes expressed as a lack of empathy among health care providers. indigenous people often do not feel safe, understood, or cared for within mainstream health care services. when health services are not safe or compassionate, indigenous people tend to only access services in acute situations, rather than for preventive or early diagnostic care (browne et al., 2010; national aboriginal health organization, 2003). as smylie (2000) asserted in a guide for health professionals, “in forging a balanced and positive health care practitioner–patient relationship, it is essential to understand the heritage context of the aboriginal patient in order to negotiate chasms and find common ground” (p. 2). indigenous people value holistic care, which balances physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual health; yet many feel this approach is not respected within the mainstream health care system (belanger, 2010; chandler & dunlop, 2015; dion stout, 2015; israel, checkoway, schulz, & zimmerman, 1994; kirmayer, simpson, & cargo; 2003; makokis & makokis, 2015; polanco & arbour, 2015; scott, 2010; stewart, 2008; tagalik, 2015). different models of care are needed that are relevant for the specific health needs and service preferences of indigenous people and communities. the nuka system of care, run by the southcentral foundation, an alaska native owned and community-driven healthcare organization, offers an effective model that has demonstrated improved health services and outcomes. the nuka system is based on values of customer ownership, relationship-based care, powerful primary care, and whole system transformation that ensures same-day access to team-based compassionate care (eby, 2019). additionally, patient navigation approaches have also been identified as an effective way to facilitate appropriate access for indigenous patients through building positive relationships (whop et al., 2012). when navigators are from the indigenous community and trained through community-led curricula, they have been able to support more effective indigenous patient care journeys (braun, allison & tsark, 2008; warren-mears, dankovchik, patil, & fu, 2013). these models demonstrate a range of practices that can improve the health care experiences of indigenous people—from a communitycontrolled model that promotes full system change to navigation supports that facilitate access and coordination across existing services. solutions need to be tailored to specific contexts to ensure effective implementation. the context of reconciliation the truth and reconciliation commission (trc, 2015), which collected stories about abuses indigenous people suffered as a result of colonial policies, has drawn national attention to canada’s ugly history of racism and genocide, and the ongoing oppression of indigenous people. this reconciliation process and the national dialogue that it set in motion raised awareness of deep-seated issues stemming from racist colonial policies and practices. there is now greater awareness of the colonial roots of health 4 wylie et al.: colonial legacies and collaborative action doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.9340 disparities among indigenous peoples, stemming from intergenerational trauma, systemic poverty, poor community and social infrastructure, and high levels of interpersonal and structural violence. the trc’s recommendations have renewed the call for a multi-faceted strategy to address the wide range of inequities faced by indigenous people in canada. one of the key trc calls to action prioritizes the need to enhance cultural competency in health care and health education, with explicit recommendations that would require cultural safety training for health professionals as well as to increase the numbers of indigenous health professionals working in the health care system (trc, 2015). the context is right for systematically taking on the challenges of racism and discrimination in order to transform an exclusionary health care system into one that provides high quality, respectful, and compassionate health care for all indigenous people. methods research aims this research sought to identify the systemic challenges in providing indigenous people with quality, accessible health care. it also aimed to explore promising practices as well as elicit recommendations for supports and changes. using a qualitative approach, we interviewed providers of health and social services, including indigenous respondents, about their experiences with indigenous people in the health care system. this article presents the perspectives of people working inside the system on the key barriers and facilitators to equitable access and quality health care. respondents discussed both practicelevel changes, as well as policy recommendations for sustainable change, to ensure indigenous people get the health care they need regardless of where they live or which level of government provides their health care coverage. the article then shares recommendations for meaningful change to ensure quality, accessible health care for indigenous people. the article also reflects on the policies and practices of structural violence that perpetuate discrimination and exclusion and presents solutions that both indigenous and non-indigenous health care providers feel will disrupt those norms and produce meaningful change. study design the project, engaging for change: coordinated strategies for improving health services for indigenous people, began with the understanding that health care services were not meeting the needs of indigenous people in canada, regardless of whether they were living on reserve or in an urban centre across the country. the first author had experience with the health system in british columbia, where there is a new tripartite framework agreement on first nations health governance between federal, provincial, and first nations political leaders that aims to tackle health inequities faced by first nations people (minister of health [canada], minister of health [british columbia], & first nations health society, 2011). although the partnerships were sometimes tense, there was a recognition of reciprocal accountabilities, and shared responsibilities and mandates among the players, including health care organizations, such as regional health authorities and hospitals, to address the negative experiences of indigenous people (o’neil et al., 2016). the context in ontario was quite different, where little attention was given to improving the experiences of indigenous people in the health care system. the first author therefore initiated the project to delve into the ontario experience in order to understand the knowledge and commitment to indigenous heath equity in this context. engagement between the 5 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 published by scholarship@western first author and indigenous health professionals working as health directors, managers, and support staff in both first nations communities and urban centres in southwestern ontario identified many concerns. to begin, indigenous health professionals highlighted poor quality and a lack of continuity of care for indigenous people. indigenous health professionals felt there was a general lack of appropriate and compassionate care for indigenous people. the main problems included little engagement between health professionals and indigenous patients and their families; limited, if any, coordination between mainstream and indigenous-run health services; a lack of follow-up care and effective discharge planning; inadequate focus on equity in health services; and an unwelcoming environment. they suggested that research was needed to further explore their concerns, understand the basis of these challenges, and identify how the health care system could improve the care provided for indigenous people. indigenous health care providers noted five priority areas including emergency services, diabetes, maternity, cancer, and mental health. among indigenous patients, there was high usage of health services in these areas and often problematic experiences. the research project was initiated in 2014, focusing on experiences in providing care to indigenous patients in these five priority areas. indigenous and non-indigenous care providers in hospital, public health, and community-based health services were interviewed. the research was carried out in two phases: the first phase focused on interviews with health professionals in mainstream services and the second phase focused on expanding the range of participants to include more indigenous people working within health and social care, both in mainstream and indigenous-run services. there were two indigenous participants in phase 1 and six in phase 2. some of the participants identified that they were from one of the first nation communities surrounding the city where the study took place. some identified which indigenous community they were from or affiliated with, but not all shared their nation, clan, etc. to reduce the risk of participant reidentification, we will not be sharing the names of their nation or clan. this project makes a unique contribution by bringing in the perspectives of front-line care providers and privileging the insider knowledge of indigenous people working at the interface between indigenous people, communities, and the health care system. the research was approved by the health sciences research ethics board at western university and by the ethics review process of the health sciences centre responsible for the hospital and community-based clinics. theoretical framework the research was informed by critical theory, which focuses attention on the broader social, political, cultural, and economic values (lincoln, lynam, & guba, 2011) that underlie the experiences of both indigenous people accessing health services, and the people working within those health care organizations. following the analysis of structural violence, this research focused on the broader social, economic, and political context in which health care reconciliation could take place. critical theory and indigenous methodology were best served through qualitative description, which helped us understand the complex systemic issues that affect indigenous people’s experiences in health care. this approach is particularly valuable for indigenous health research because it facilitates respondents’ use of narratives and storytelling, a traditional way of sharing information and knowledge (laycock, walker, harrison, & brands, 2011). semi-structured interviews supported participants in drawing on their experiences and sharing their stories through conversation with researchers. while semi-structured interviews are a 6 wylie et al.: colonial legacies and collaborative action doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.9340 rigorous method to collect qualitative data, they are additionally relevant for indigenous participants, as the process builds a relationship between the participant and researcher (laycock et al., 2011). participant selection this study employed purposive sampling to recruit participants who hold rich information “by virtue of having direct and personal knowledge” (sandelowski, 1995, p.180); yet, it also allows the researcher to explore maximum variation (lincoln & guba, 1985; sandelowski, 2000). health care provider participants were selected based on their experience working in one or more of the five priority health service areas and their experience in providing service to indigenous people. indigenous care providers also had experience as advocates for indigenous patients, having experience with health care services for themselves or a family member, friend, or client. participants were approached in person or by phone and then sent an email introducing the project and team in more detail. in phase 1, participants included health care providers and decision makers working in emergency, maternal, mental health, cancer, or diabetes care across hospital, public health, and community-based health services in a large city in southwestern ontario. respondents came from a variety of specialties, including physicians, nurses, social workers, patient navigators, patient experience specialists, and departmental leaders, in order to represent the range of health professionals working within the system. in phase 2, additional indigenous participants were recruited from within local health and social care services, in both mainstream and indigenous-run organizations in order to expand the scope of knowledge and bring in more indigenous voices from within the system. indigenous respondents spoke from both their professional and personal experiences as patients, caregivers, care providers, and advocates within the health care system. respondents were selected based on their involvement with various initiatives aimed at improving health care for indigenous people within the city and local reserve communities. the majority of the respondents were women. a total of 31 people were interviewed, including 8 indigenous respondents (2 working for mainstream organizations and 6 working for indigenous organizations with roles that interfaced with mainstream health services), 1 non-indigenous respondent working for an indigenous organization, and 22 non-indigenous respondents working for mainstream health and social care organizations. data collection all interviews were carried out by the first author, a woman with a background in indigenous health research and practice, working as an assistant professor in a health field. many of the interviews also included one of the indigenous female graduate student researchers on the team. respondents selected the location for their interview, including their place of work or at the office of the researcher. interviewees were given information about the purpose of the research, and then they were asked 20 indepth questions about the positive and negative experiences that they saw during interactions between health care providers and indigenous patients within health care settings. questions were related to awareness about indigenous-specific health access barriers, perspectives and understandings of indigenous health and wellbeing, and knowledge of and referrals to existing supports available to indigenous people in the city and surrounding area. interviews and focus groups were audio recorded, transcribed verbatim, and anonymized. 7 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 published by scholarship@western the first data collection phase (completed in 2015 and 2016) focused on health professionals, where 25 individuals participated in semi-structured interviews (n = 21) and two group interviews with two participants each (n = 4), which lasted 1 to 1.5 hours. two of the health provider respondents who participated in one-on-one interviews identified as indigenous. the second phase focused exclusively on interviews with indigenous people working in health and social care in order to add more indigenous voices to the sample, for a total of 8 indigenous respondents. these interviews took place from 2016 to 2018 and included a group interview at an indigenous-run organization (n = 4) and one-on-one interviews (n = 2). the researcher engaged with representatives from several local and regional indigenous health and social service organizations to share and discuss emerging themes to ensure they appropriately reflected common challenges and collective priorities. all respondents were sent copies of the summary reports, including a 5-page report with a detailed summary of the key findings and a single page infographic that encapsulated key findings. respondents were encouraged to reach out to discuss any concerns. the researcher met with indigenous representatives to review their transcripts, discuss the analysis of the findings, and approve the use of their quotes in this article. relationship building is key in indigenous health research (wilson, 2008), as there is a history of mistrust between academics and indigenous communities that continues into the present (castleden, sylvestre, martin, & mcnally, 2015; cochran et al, 2008; smith, 2013). developing trust within relationships can increase the quality of the research and ensure that it is guided by community priorities (laycock et al., 2011). as a result of the ongoing relationship between the researcher and indigenous community organizations, this research has continued into the next phase, which involves collectively addressing health system barriers. data analysis the data was coded on nvivo 10 software using inductive thematic analysis (braun & clarke, 2014) by three researchers. the coding tree emerged from the data in each of the lines of questioning (experiences, resources, relationships, etc.; elo & kyngäs, 2008; hsieh & shannon, 2005). the team discussed emerging codes in order to achieve triangulation (bowen, 2008). the coding of transcripts from phase 1 ceased when data saturation was reached, “when nothing new is being added” (bowen, 2008, p.140). all codes from phase 1 were then reviewed in order to interpret the data and sort it into clusters to generate themes and sub-themes based on their meanings and relationships to one another (dey, 1993; hsieh & shannon, 2005). preliminary data from phase 2 was coded to identify any new themes and add to the existing understandings of challenges, facilitators, and recommendations for change. results the data showed there are many barriers that indigenous people face in accessing health care services, as well as promising practices to mitigate or overcome these barriers. respondents identified many barriers to health care stemming from both within and outside of the health care system. respondents had a variety of recommendations to change the health care system in order to provide better care for indigenous people (see table 1 for an overview of all themes and sub-themes). 8 wylie et al.: colonial legacies and collaborative action doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.9340 table 1. themes and sub-themes themes sub-themes barriers to health care services social determinants provider attitudes and relationships health system barriers promising practices building relationships cultural safety and community-based training connecting with services and transition supports a desire for improvement participant recommendations increase knowledge increase indigenous-specific supports service coordination through navigation supports in summary, many participants spoke about the social determinants of health, such as poverty, rural isolation, physical environments, and racism, having an adverse impact on indigenous people’s health, as well as creating barriers to accessing health care. in addition, respondents identified negative provider attitudes, such as stereotyping and blaming, that result in mistrust and poor relationships with indigenous people, thus creating additional access barriers. indigenous respondents spoke of the different access barriers in on-reserve and off-reserve communities, as well as barriers for those relying on nihb coverage. in phase 1, jurisdictional barriers were discussed. there are ongoing disputes between the federal government and provincial governments over who has fiduciary responsibility for status first nations and inuit health care. one participant shared their experience as an indigenous patient navigator in which they were unable to get supports to provide necessary care for a patient on reserve because the provincially funded health services in the local city would not provide care on reserve. the city health centre claimed that on-reserve services were the fiduciary responsibility of the federal government. other respondents spoke about the challenges of accessing funding for health care they needed through jordan’s principle,2 which says that whichever level of government is first billed for health services will pay and then seek reimbursement from the other level of government if the patient is a child that falls under their jurisdiction. respondents shared examples where first nations people had to pay out of pocket for health care services and supplies, and their claims had been rejected through the jordan’s principle funds, even though it was for eligible expenses. a number of participants in phase 1 also identified that they did not know which services were provided by nihb (federal health care coverage for status first nations and inuit). moreover, most participants were unaware of which services were covered for non-status first nations or métis individuals, and 2 jordan’s principle is intended to ensure that first nations children do not experience delay, denial, or disruption of services because of jurisdictional disputes (for an analysis of this policy, see blumenthal & sinha, 2015). 9 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 published by scholarship@western which health care services could be provided on-reserve versus off-reserve. of those who were aware of nihb funding, they noted that this program did not cover supplies or medications to the same level as the provincial system, which meant that patients had to return to the hospital more frequently. some physicians were also aware of how indian status impacts access and nihb coverage. most respondents spoke more generally about indigenous people, rather than differentiating between first nations, inuit, and métis, although many noted that the access challenges were greater among people living in first nation communities compared to their counterparts living in the city. in terms of promising practices, respondents spoke about the importance of building community-based relationships between indigenous people and health care providers, the benefits of training in cultural safety, the positive outcomes associated with connecting indigenous patients with community services and transition supports, and the desire many health care providers have for improving indigenous people’s experiences. this suggests that, although currently there are significant problems within the health care system, there is great potential to advance improvements that will ensure access to quality and culturally safe care for indigenous people. barriers to health care services respondents identified a range of barriers indigenous people face when accessing health care, including those stemming from social determinants of health, negative health care provider attitudes, poor patient–provider relationships, and problematic issues within the health system around coordination and follow-up care. social determinants. health care providers demonstrated an awareness of various ways that social determinants of health limit indigenous people’s access to health care. the most common barrier noted was poverty, specifically the inability to afford transportation. first nations people living in reserve communities were seen to have the greatest health care access barriers, with notably poorer access to primary care. a family physician stated that if their patients “live on the reserve, they have to get into the city to get care, whether it is in the hospital or specialty clinics, and transportation can be an issue” (h23p). a manager in women’s health shared that to access some services that require frequent appointments, such as obstetrics, meant that people had to travel long distances without their support systems on a regular basis, “which can be an expensive undertaking, to come to the hospital or arrange transportation or for them to arrange daycare for their other kids” (ao3l). as a respondent from an indigenous community agency noted, many indigenous people with health issues are struggling: exhausted from dealing with everyday life. at the thought of having their hydro being cut off . . . food security, housing security, all that pressure. and then to have that energy to advocate for a loved one or family one takes an enormous amount of mental stamina. if you are already pounded down by life in general, then that takes a lot of energy . . . it is too hard to deal with life in general, then to have an added burden to care about a special-needs child or access services. (fg01) respondents also expressed that there is a general lack of knowledge among health care workers as a whole regarding the broader challenges faced by indigenous patients. a leader in the health care system identified this gap in knowledge and its implication in interactions between patients and providers: 10 wylie et al.: colonial legacies and collaborative action doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.9340 i would say the first challenge being recognizing the differences in needs. that core understanding of some of the different social determinants of health and how they influence a population. i would say there is not a lot of appreciation for some of the challenges that aboriginal people face and where that might stem from. that lack of understanding has not always contributed to the best relationships. (h06l) as a result, health care providers make assumptions about what indigenous people should do, particularly around “healthy” behaviours. a family physician noted that indigenous patients are often blamed for their poor health, especially after they have been given advice about health behaviours: i know i have told you to monitor your sugars, what happened? are you eating well and then the patient says, “oh, i can’t afford good, healthy food. it’s expensive, so i can only afford starch or eating pasta, i can’t afford to buy vegetables.” (ah11p) this physician also noted that the precarious housing arrangements many indigenous people have created a significant challenge to follow up: “they don’t have phone numbers even. unless they come and see me, i have no means to trace them . . . even when there is something wrong with the bloodwork” (ah11p). health care provider attitudes and relationships. several health care respondents admitted that neither they nor their colleagues were trained in cultural competency or cross-cultural communication. many identified challenges in developing positive relationships of trust with indigenous people in their care. non-indigenous respondents noted a general lack of awareness of indigenous history, cultural practices, knowledge systems, perspectives of health and wellbeing, and traditional medicines and healing practices. as a physician working in diabetes care noted, “we don’t really understand the issues that people are coming from or why they are different from what we have been taught from our standard educational tools and textbooks” (a13p). as an indigenous respondent stated: they just look at us and see all the friggin’ negatives. they see all the stereotypes. they look at us and think, “they are all the same, they are just drunk, they are just drug addicts” . . . you can be dressed nice all the time and still be accused of things. (fg01) health care providers also noted that widespread discrimination combined with this lack of understanding often leads to mistrust. when indigenous people do not trust health care providers, they tend to not articulate their health issues and they are more likely to discontinue health care services prior to the completion of their treatment (b21lp). as an indigenous respondent shared, “the only time i ever go to the hospital or seek any kind of help is when i think that i am dying, because i know that they don’t care about anything else” (fg01). in addition to limiting service use, bad experiences in health care negatively impacted appropriate follow-up and referrals. health care providers admitted that mainstream health care practices and norms differ from indigenous perspectives and practices. as such, relationships between patients and providers could become strained, as a family physician noted: “particularly in aboriginal communities where understanding their culture in mainstream society has been a challenge” (ah11p). indigenous and non-indigenous health providers alike noted that in addition to poor understanding, indigenous medicines and healing practices were not valued or respected in the conventional health care system. as one indigenous respondent shared, 11 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 published by scholarship@western “don’t think that native people don’t feel the attitude through [health providers’] words, and their stance and their behaviour . . . we’re gonna do whatever it is that we need to, to protect our family members . . . it’s still scary” (cr6s). respondents shared that the establishment of trusting relationships between indigenous people and care providers is critical. a physician working in emergency medicine noted that indigenous people require “long-term, consistent, trusting relationships with people [health providers] that they respect” (a04p). in addition, health care providers discussed the urgent need for physicians to give indigenous people more time to speak and share their health issues during appointments. a leader in the hospital stated, “we don’t make it easy for [indigenous people] to speak up . . . we don’t give them permission or invite them to do so” (a08l). respondents identified that indigenous people tend not to articulate their health problems because they are afraid to ask questions, fearing the judgement of care providers. respondents advocated for health care providers to give indigenous peoples more time to ask questions in an inviting environment. a patient support staff member shared that physicians need to engage in dialogue with indigenous peoples that “allow more reflection, contemplation, discussion, and questions” (a20s). this additional time will result in more appropriate care because recommendations will be based on shared understandings of the problems and priorities. indigenous people would feel more comfortable with their physician’s recommendations and thus are more likely to be able to follow their physician’s advice, if it comes from a relationship and a place of understanding. health system barriers. the structure of the health care system itself is a barrier, as navigating the system can be challenging. this is even more complicated for status first nations people, who have to navigate and piece together federal, provincial, and band-run services. the use of medical jargon also creates misunderstandings and limits patients’ ability to have a say in their care. many respondents felt that indigenous people often do not get the full range of services that would be considered standard practice. some physicians will not take on indigenous patients. as a family doctor shared, some physicians “go ‘wow, you are pretty complicated. i don’t really want to get involved with you.’ and so that exacerbates the whole doctor shortage” (h23p). policies were seen as a potential barrier in ensuring access and appropriateness of health services for indigenous people. as a leader in the health care system shared: there were some policies that actually, i would say contributed to poorer care. for example, not allowing smudging was an issue for a lot of families. there is also issues around how a body was cared for after a person had been pronounced dead. there’s also issues around the inability for families to gather in a hospital room or even have any space within the hospital to accommodate families. (h06l) respondents identified significant gaps in follow-up care. for instance, as an indigenous respondent shared, “why do they never do follow up appointments with anybody . . . there was no other appointment for her to see how it went or anything” (fg01). a leader in cancer care explained that extra effort was needed to ensure proper follow-up care was in place for indigenous people (a02l). despite these efforts, many indigenous people were not getting follow-up care due to jurisdictional issues and systemic challenges. a leader in women’s health care noted that the community care access 12 wylie et al.: colonial legacies and collaborative action doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.9340 centre (ccac), which was responsible for coordinating home and community-based care, would not provide care on reserve for first nations patients leaving the hospital (a03l). difficulties during transition, which encompassed unclear communication, post-discharge issues, and inadequate liaison, undermined coordinated care. a family doctor noted that there was a general “lack of awareness of not just cultural needs, but . . . [that it’s] the health care system that is failing first nations” (h23p). uncoordinated care post-discharge led to negative experiences for indigenous patients. health care providers described that ensuring follow-up care was not a standard protocol. as a women’s health care leader stated: if you have a baby here and you haven’t had any complications and you did a vaginal delivery, you’re here for less than 24 hours. we send you out and we hope that you have been connected with the right supports while you were here. (a03l) furthermore, health care providers identified poor communication within the regional networks that were meant to coordinate home and community care. some respondents noted that they were able to get ccac to provide home care, but when they did, it was poorly coordinated. when indigenous patients “come home from hospital to community, that’s where the disconnect is, because the discharge planner or ccac for whatever reason, they don’t notify home and community care” (h05s). indigenous respondents were keenly aware of those gaps: there is a plan in place but sometimes the plan is not followed. because they said they were going to set up . . . whoever is supposed to be coming out to the reserve. and that wasn’t set up for three days. and my dad’s bandage did not get changed for three days after his surgery . . . they were like “you should have someone there by tonight to change it for you.” and nobody came so i changed it for my dad. (fg01) many indigenous respondents reiterated that the lack of care from the health care system meant that family members had to take on care responsibilities. promising practises despite this range of barriers, respondents were able to identify some positive practices in providing care for indigenous patients. the building blocks for positive health care experiences for indigenous patients included trusting relationships, completing cultural safety and community-based training, connecting services, ensuring transition supports, and a desire for improved quality of care. building relationships. relationship building between health care providers and indigenous people was seen as one of the most successful strategies for creating a welcoming health care system. positive interactions are more likely when trust is established by taking the time to build a respectful relationship. as a physician noted: i think it is the trust building, i think that’s the biggest thing and sometimes that goes well, and other times it doesn’t. there’s no easy way and as i say, it takes time and communication. it takes being with them when they have a need and try to meet it. (a07p) 13 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 published by scholarship@western an emergency physician noted that this relationship can help put patients at their ease: “we were joking around quite a bit through his emerg [emergency department] stay and he wasn’t feeling so anxious about his contact with the medical services as a result of that” (a01p). indigenous respondents also emphasized the value of building relationships to ensure better care: the relationship piece is huge. because it is really getting to know people . . . even just knowing things like when they have certain appointments . . . if they have home care, knowing what hours of the day that happens so that you can schedule around that. if they have special things like social events that they do . . . if they have to go for special treatments on a regular basis, you know what days of the week that is scheduled . . . it’s knowing their long medical and social history . . . it is that relationship piece, and people will want to be able to share with you what support that they need. (cr5s) cultural safety and community-based training. many care providers also expressed the value of the indigenous cultural safety training program, called san’yas, that had recently been initiated with hospital staff. the 8-hour online training program raised awareness of issues that were new to many care providers. as a psychiatrist shared, “i know a couple who found it really helpful as did i” (ab10p). community-based training was also seen as valuable to build an understanding of the context of indigenous people’s lives. as an emergency physician shared: when i was in medical school many years ago i went to [a small town] in northern ontario and that was probably my most valuable clinical experience with meeting and treating the aboriginal population . . . many of the family doctors would helicopter out to the surrounding reserves and as a medical student you would participate in that. and it was very shocking to me at that time. i remember the lack of care and the rampant different conditions on the reserves. so, i was not aware previously from my med school training about that. (a01p) the few physicians who did training in remote indigenous communities noted that they never forgot the experience, and it helped them gain insight into the realities facing their indigenous patients. these physicians expressed the dire need for more community-based training in order to train health care practitioners that provide better care for indigenous patients. connecting services and transition supports. some physicians identified supports for addressing health care needs of indigenous people, including patient navigators and community-based services, such as local aboriginal health access centres. physicians also noted that connecting patients to traditional healing has positive results and try to make space for cultural practices and family gatherings within the hospital space (ab10p). many saw social workers and transition case managers as key liaisons between the health system and community supports. a manager in cancer care stated, “the social workers would have a good sense of what resources are available . . . the communication is between the social workers and the patient navigator” (a02l). indigenous respondents also identified the value of social workers in helping health care providers link indigenous people with community-based services: “social work usually is really good with knowing who to contact. but the medical teams aren’t always aware of what services there are, so they rely heavily on social work to tell them” (cr5s). coordination between acute and community-based services is seen as an important practice to ensure that indigenous people have good continuity of care. 14 wylie et al.: colonial legacies and collaborative action doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.9340 a desire for improvement. despite the lack of knowledge and skills in providing culturally appropriate care, attitudes among health care providers demonstrate a desire to improve their ability to meet the needs of indigenous patients. respondents expressed an eagerness to coordinate with community-based agencies, although they were uncertain of the services available and to whom to reach out. participants wanted more resources, such as indigenous liaisons and/or navigators, culturally appropriate materials (e.g., pamphlets, posters), and a list of contacts (e.g., indigenous health experts) they could access when they needed supports for an indigenous patient. most respondents were willing to participate in cultural safety training, noting that they wanted to gain skills to help them better meet the health care needs of indigenous people. participant recommendations all participants had recommendations on how to improve the health care system to ensure that indigenous people get appropriate, culturally safe access to high quality health care services. the recommendations from both indigenous and non-indigenous health care providers focus on three main themes: increase the knowledge of health care providers about colonial history and its ongoing impacts; provide specific policy, programs, staff, and supports to facilitate indigenous peoples’ access to health care; and improve coordination and navigation through health services across hospital and communitybased services. increase knowledge. all respondents expressed a desire for more training, and health care providers specifically wanted training that would give them concrete tools to improve their skills and practices in order to work effectively with indigenous patients. study participants emphasized the need to teach the history of colonization in canada, including about the indian act and indian reserves, to raise awareness about ongoing, systemic racism in federal policy. indigenous respondents specifically emphasized the need to provide information about the impact of colonial policies and practices on indigenous people and communities today. an indigenous respondent who encouraged their colleagues to take a cultural competency course shared: by providing them the whole historical background where first nations people have come from and where they are today, i think it was a real eye opener. my colleague even said, i am so sorry, i didn’t know and i didn’t understand. (h05s) indigenous people emphasized the need for specific training about local communities: “there’s an assumption indigenous cultural competency is a blanket. if you have done it once then you understand all the needs of the indigenous population of everyone across canada” (fg01). a family physician emphasized that knowledge about the local indigenous communities is essential: “where they come from, what are the main health needs in the community, what are the barriers, what are the challenges” (ah11p). health care providers need to know about the different cultures and issues specific to each of the indigenous communities in the area they serve. having knowledge about local indigenous communities was also a recommendation from an emergency physician, who suggested that the medical schools should identify “reserves in the more immediate area surrounding academic schools and residency training . . . so that people get a better idea of how health services function close by or on reserve specifically and get a better idea of the interactions and the access and how things actually work” (a01p). 15 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 published by scholarship@western increase indigenous supports. a number of recommendations were made about how to increase specific supports for indigenous people to improve their experiences in health care. addressing financial barriers can be done by providing transportation supports, as well as food for family members visiting the hospital. an indigenous respondent identified a comprehensive approach to make a more inclusive space: have somebody who has cultural knowledge, who’s a cultural helper, understands the history, go work in those hospitals. more than one. you need to have male and female, because that is the balance of the way that we are in the world. and them work together to help the rest of that system. and it doesn’t mean just helping native people it means helping all people . . . how different that would be. (cr6s) other respondents emphasized the need for more indigenous staff working in the hospital, specifically noting that having one person was not enough. some suggested having someone on each floor so that they were available any time (fg01). respondents felt that indigenous people need to be in multiple roles throughout the institution, and they need to have space for traditional healers and ceremonial practices. the hospital needed to accommodate large families so they could gather around their loved one in care, particularly at the end of life. lastly, respondents identified the need for policies within the health care system to support culturally safe care. mandates for training as well as standards for practice would be valuable to ensure that the process moves beyond just words to action. at the same time, respondents acknowledged that policy is not always put into practice; therefore, accountability processes need to be put into place: repercussions if you do not treat everybody equally . . . there should be some kind of policy in there . . . because there is racism in the hospitals big time . . .there is racist people on your staff that are dealing with everybody . . . so everyone who comes through that door deserves the same health care. (fg01) service coordination through navigation supports. respondents shared that coordination could be improved if indigenous people had dedicated liaison staff to work closely with families and to help navigate their care plan. an obstetrician suggested to “have a liaison within their own communities, aware of the issues and can counsel them outside of their appointments” (a09p-fg). health care providers also felt that an indigenous community liaison would be beneficial in communicating important information about the indigenous patient to their health care providers, which would improve their care. a leader in family medicine suggested: [it would be helpful] if there was someone who was a point person from the community, almost the liaison or that navigator type of person, who would liaise with the hospital, with the clinic and whether it was interpretation services or just sharing something personal about this person, about how you need to approach working with them. (a18l) all respondents felt that having indigenous staff would be the most effective approach to ensure appropriate, timely, and high-quality health care for indigenous people. community members, who are aware of local community health and wellness issues, should accompany indigenous people throughout their care journey to provide information and support. this navigation role is essential for effective 16 wylie et al.: colonial legacies and collaborative action doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.9340 communication due to ease in building trust: “there’s an instant connection with native people . . . a native person is gonna tell a native person a lot more than they’re gonna tell a white person. no matter how nice you are” (cr6s). therefore, navigators can ensure indigenous patients are able to talk through their issues and share the desires and values important to their care. the navigator would be positioned to ask questions during the appointment, specifically to ensure the care team explains everything and that families are involved in the development of the care plan. ensuring effective knowledge sharing and clear communication is essential for creating patient-centred care. unclear or little communication disempowers families. as one indigenous respondent asserted: [it is hard ] when [care providers] come in and do all the stuff and don’t tell you anything. ‘cause we wouldn’t even know what questions to ask, right? . . . you need to explain what you’re doing . . . no matter how small or how big . . . it’s important to the family members around that person. (cr6s) health care providers believed they were not giving indigenous patients enough notice before discharge from hospital. as a result, patients, their families, and support services were not prepared. as one patient support staff shared: indigenous people don’t get enough lead time or warning of discharge . . . the team may communicate that they intend to discharge somebody at a certain time, but they are not making it as clear as it needs to be so that the patient and their families anticipate it. so, it can seem abrupt and without any prior warning. (a20s) moreover, health care providers shared that information about post-discharge supports was unclear, resulting in underutilization of resources and fragmented care. providers need to tell indigenous people “about the home and community care programs, so they will connect with them when they go home” (h05s). this meant that hospital-based services need to coordinate with community-based services, both on reserve and in urban centres. the navigation role would ensure effective and coordinated planning, so that resources and supports needed were in place. discussion this research aimed to identify systemic challenges in providing indigenous patients with quality health care, drawing on knowledge from indigenous and non-indigenous people working in health and social care settings. what was clear from this study is that there are significant barriers in access to care for indigenous people. status first nations people experience additional barriers due to jurisdictional gaps, which have created ambiguity regarding the level of government that is responsible for delivering health services. a report from the standing committee on indigenous and northern affairs canada (2018) summed up the key challenges: currently, the responsibility to provide health care on reserve is unclear, and the provision of those services is currently shared among the federal and provincial governments, first nations organizations and communities, and third-party services providers, resulting in a complicated 17 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 published by scholarship@western and ambiguous framework. because both levels of government are “passing the buck,” first nation communities have trouble obtaining the support they need to offer health care services on and off reserves. (p. 1) governments in canada have imposed colonial control over first nations health, while at the same time shirking their responsibility to ensure quality, comprehensive care. these jurisdictional divides demonstrate the systemic issues that undermine the ability of first nations on reserve to access the full spectrum of health services that are available to all canadians. transformational change to promote first nations’ control over their health services can better ensure that first nations people get the health care they need. there are some examples of this in canada, including the first nations health authority in bc, and the charter agreement with the nishnawbe aski nation in ontario (richardson & murphy, 2018). a trilateral agreement in 2011 between bc first nations and the government of british columbia and the government of canada created a framework agreement to increase first nations control over health services delivery (minister of health [canada], minister of health [british columbia], & first nations health society, 2011). this agreement transferred responsibility for federally run health services to the bc first nations health authority (fnha), and it required that the bc ministry of health work with first nations to address health service gaps (lavoie et al., 2016; o’neil et al., 2016). in ontario, a tripartite agreement between the canadian ministry of health, the ontario ministry of health and long-term care, and the nishnawbe aski nation (nan) resulted in the signing of the charter of relationship principles. the aim of the charter is explicitly to create a “responsive and system-wide approach to health for the nan territory” in northern ontario (government of canada, government of ontario, & nishnawbe aski nation, 2017, article 1.0). the agreement aims to enhance equitable access to culturally safe care throughout nan territory. it echoes the commitment of jordan’s principle to not let jurisdictional gaps or uncertainties about financial responsibility prevent timely access to health services. these agreements demonstrate policy commitments to systemic change in health care that aim to address the types of jurisdictional issues raised in this article. on the ground, change often is a longer process than the creation of agreements, and implementation challenges and resource constraints mediate the way such commitments roll out. in bc, it took time to create the connections among frontline care providers, but the high-level commitments set the stage to facilitate these connections (o’neil et al., 2016). the charter agreement in ontario was to start by reviewing the needs, prioritizing the actions, and developing an implementation and evaluation plan with shared responsibility for action. the provincial governments in bc and ontario have changed since these agreements were signed, and thus priorities and implementation approaches are also likely to change. given the significant health system gaps, such as poor linkages between acute and community-based care, system integration and coordination will take effort and resources to overcome. even with the best of intentions, health care transformation is a journey that will take time and commitment from all players. it is important to remember that policy goals need to ensure meaningful outcomes in health care practice that result in tangible improvements in indigenous people’s health care experiences. these gaps in health care have created the incentive for new first nations health governance models. at the same time, first nations 18 wylie et al.: colonial legacies and collaborative action doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.9340 people will continue to access care from mainstream health services and, therefore, those services need to address their discriminatory practices that create barriers to accessible and quality health care. our study has shown that respondents identified barriers rooted in the broader social determinants of health, such as poverty, racism, housing and education. these are complex problems that are outside of the scope of health care practice. however, this study has also demonstrated that many barriers to equitable care actually stem from within the health care system itself. attitudes and practices among those working in health care and gaps in coordination between mainstream and indigenous services are challenges related to the way the health care system operates. solutions are needed that address these issues. given the multifaceted nature of access barriers, strategies to improve health services for indigenous people and communities require a comprehensive and systemic approach. the lack of continuity of care is linked with experiences of racism and discrimination within the health care system (allan & smylie, 2015; browne et al., 2010; national aboriginal health organization, 2003), and our study has confirmed this. therefore, addressing racism, both implicit and explicit, must be a key part of the solution. additionally, a holistic approach guided by indigenous people is needed to ensure respectful care is based on indigenous people’s needs and preferences. change is needed that goes beyond just re-modeling the existing health care practices of mainstream services (benoit et al., 2003; lallo, 2014; national aboriginal health organization, 2003). this process of reconciliation within health care requires the identification of measurable targets for change. all respondents identified that current norms and practices within health care undermine patientcentred and culturally safe care. indigenous people had significant insight into the nuanced ways those barriers play out depending on culture, identity, geography (both on and off reserve), as well as socioeconomic status and educational attainment. all indigenous people in this study shared experiences of racism and discrimination within the health care system. many also shared examples of ways that they support indigenous families as advocates and navigators within the health care system. the results demonstrate that many health care access barriers facing indigenous patients can be addressed through a culturally safe approach that ensures respectful behaviours of health care providers combined with supports and partnerships to improve the continuity of care. there is both a need and an appetite for improving the ability of the health care system to meet the needs of indigenous people. respondents felt that all health care providers should go through indigenous cultural competency and safety training. there needs to be mandated training on indigenous health and wellness, and on the true colonial history and its impacts on indigenous peoples. the initiatives cannot just be a one-off tick-box of completing an online training module. developing accreditation standards that align with equity and cultural safety within health professional education and continuing professional development programs can ensure that the training informs specific competencies in practice. additionally, policies that perpetuate oppression and social exclusion need to be replaced with ones that advance equity and inclusion. meaningful change will require commitment to an ongoing journey of learning, based on engagement with local indigenous communities. an important start is for health care providers to spend time sitting with indigenous people, families, and communities. this multi-faceted approach needs to include a range of strategies, such as: (a) addressing provider practice through establishing education and professional standards, (b) hiring indigenous staff to 19 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 published by scholarship@western support access and navigation, and (c) building meaningful relationships and coordinating services between health care staff and indigenous families, organizations, and communities. such coordinated efforts can help advance high quality health care for indigenous people. health care providers with a background understanding of the health impacts of colonization and who have developed relationships with local indigenous people can create a foundation for change within the health care system. these internal champions can tackle the negative attitudes and stereotypes that result in poor care and make health care institutions unwelcoming for indigenous people. the respondents interviewed confirmed that, although online indigenous cultural safety training was valuable in raising awareness, they also needed concrete tools and ongoing supports to make the changes in practice to improve the experience of indigenous patients. educational institutions and health professional associations could be champions in bringing forward best practices in health professional curricula and competency standards, and in ensuring their members meet basic requirements for culturally safe care. nursing scholarship has been leading this work for many years. in the 1990s, a m!ori nurse educator advanced the concept of cultural safety, which focuses attention on the inequities in power and relationships, and away from cultural difference as a reason for health access barriers (papps & ramsden, 1996). work in canada has also advanced culturally safe standards for health care through emphasizing the need to focus on inequitable power relations, discrimination and historical injustices, and seeing the culture of the health care system as the target for transformative change to advance social justice (browne et al., 2016). the indigenous physicians association of canada has also provided recommendations and resources for the medical education curriculum, as has the leaders in indigenous medical education (lime) network. the royal college of physicians and surgeons of canada (2013) mapped indigenous-specific standards onto the canmeds competency standards for medical education. the association of faculties of medicine in canada (afmc, 2019) has recently created a joint commitment to action on indigenous health, calling for a new commitment to implement new curricular frameworks that address the multitude of forms of anti-indigenous racism. structural changes, such as embedding cultural safety and competency norms in curricula, policies, and protocols, and holding organizations and staff accountable to these protocols are required in order to improve outcomes (browne et al., 2010; ramsden, 1993). respondents wanted to see training that was tailored to their reality, including education about and with local communities, and specific education and supports tailored to their own unit (e.g., maternity or cancer care). care providers want to know about other services available for indigenous people and proposed improved communication between hospitals and community services to ensure indigenous people had access to coordinated care. respondents wanted to see change, but they noted that little change happens without mandates. creating navigation supports, standards for coordinated discharge planning, and adequately resourced community services would ensure continuity of care for indigenous patients, to get “the right care, at the right time, in the right place” (ministry of health and long-term care, 2015, p.1), whether that be in the reserve community or in the city. following an indigenous holistic perspective, a comprehensive approach to health and wellness services can be an effective way to overcome the fragmented nature of health services (eby, 2007; ramsden, 1993; scott, 2010). strategies to meet these goals include applying indigenous concepts of health and wellness in health care policy and practice, including integrating traditional health and healing knowledge to inform service delivery, and building collaborative models of care between mainstream and indigenous-focused services (alliance for healthier communities, 2010). as mcintyre et al. (2017) have noted, indigenous people 20 wylie et al.: colonial legacies and collaborative action doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.9340 prefer and are more satisfied with help from traditional healers, and so having traditional healers as a valued part of the care team can assist in ensuring indigenous people are accessing necessary health services. such an approach could support better patient and health system outcomes by redirecting potential hospitalization and readmissions cases to appropriate community services and providing better management of chronic conditions that prevent the need for acute care. the imperative and growing willingness to address the gaps in understanding and addressing indigenous health needs creates a window of opportunity for meaningful change within the health care system in ontario. conclusions to improve health care access for indigenous people, there are many initiatives that need to be put into place. although system navigation and provider training in cultural safety is an important start to this transformative journey, on their own they are insufficient. services and institutions need to be more welcoming and inclusive. this requires a significant shift in the attitudes, knowledge, and skills of health care providers. in addition, it requires a rethinking of the service delivery approaches within health care to ensure linkages between acute and community-based care. real change requires processes of accountability and tracking based on feedback from indigenous people who use those services, so that culturally safe health care is realized in practice, not just rhetoric or policy. actions within a health care institution to address access barriers could have a significant impact on the experiences of indigenous patients. initiatives such as training that increases awareness of indigenousspecific determinants of health can change attitudes and improve relationships between indigenous patients and families and their care providers. resources with information about local indigenous health services could result in discharge plans that ensure access to culturally appropriate community-based services. ongoing supports such as patient navigators can ensure that gaps in knowledge and practices of care providers can be addressed by other experts in the system. these changes in attitudes support the development of new relationships, which in turn create better coordination of care. these simple recommendations suggest that the health care system can and must take on part of the shared responsibility to improve health care access and experiences that ensure indigenous people feel cared for in a system competent in providing appropriate and culturally safe care. references aboriginal women’s health and healing research group. 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(2019). insiders’ insight: discrimination against indigenous peoples through the eyes of health care professionals. journal of racial and ethnic health disparities, 6, 37-45. doi: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40615-018-0495-9 community setting as a determinant of health for indigenous peoples living in the prairie provinces of canada: high rates and advanced presentations of tuberculosis the international indigenous policy journal volume 10 | issue 2 article 5 april 2019 community setting as a determinant of health for indigenous peoples living in the prairie provinces of canada: high rates and advanced presentations of tuberculosis maria j. mayan university of alberta, mmayan@ualberta.ca rebecca jayne gokiert university of alberta, rgokiert@ualberta.ca tristan robinson university of alberta, tristanr@ualberta.ca melissa tremblay university of alberta, mkd@ualberta.ca see next page for additional authors recommended citation mayan, m. j. , gokiert, r . j. , robinson, t. , tremblay, m. , abonyi, s. , morley, k. , long, r . (2019). community setting as a determinant of health for indigenous peoples living in the prairie provinces of canada: high rates and advanced presentations of tuberculosis. th e international indigenous policy journal, 10(2) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.5 community setting as a determinant of health for indigenous peoples living in the prairie provinces of canada: high rates and advanced presentations of tuberculosis abstract indigenous peoples in canada experience disproportionately high tuberculosis (tb) rates, and those living in the prairie provinces have the most advanced tb presentations (health canada, 2009). the community settings (i.e., urban centres, non-remote reserves, remote reserves, and isolated reserves) where indigenous peoples live can help explain high tb rates. through qualitative description, we identify how community setting influenced indigenous people’s experiences by (a) delaying accurate diagnoses; (b) perpetuating shame and stigma; and (c) limiting understanding of the disease. participants living in urban centres experienced significant difficulties obtaining an accurate diagnosis. reserve community participants feared being shamed and stigmatized. tb information had little impact on participants’ tb knowledge, regardless of where they lived. multiple misdiagnoses (primarily among urban centre participants), being shamed for having the disease (primarily reserve community participants), and a lack of understanding of tb can all contribute to advanced presentations and high rates of the disease among indigenous peoples of the prairie provinces. keywords canada, indigenous peoples, tuberculosis, misdiagnoses, community settings acknowledgments funding for this study was provided by the canadian institutes of health research and the first nations and inuit health branch, health canada. creative commons license creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. authors maria j. mayan, rebecca jayne gokiert, tristan robinson, melissa tremblay, sylvia abonyi, kirstyn morley, and richard long http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ community setting as a determinant of health for indigenous peoples living in the prairie provinces of canada: high rates and advanced presentations of tuberculosis throughout the twentieth century, tuberculosis (tb) was considered the most significant health problem facing canadians (canadian public health association, 2009; public health agency of canada, 2014; wilkins, 1996). improvements in living conditions and drug treatments in the second half of the twentieth century led to rapid declines in tb, now relatively rare among the general population (public health agency of canada, 2015). today, tb can be quickly diagnosed, treated, and cured (public health agency of canada, 2015). a number of highly accessible tb educational resources also exist (public health agency of canada, 2014). however, indigenous peoples in canada continue to experience disproportionately high tb rates (public health agency of canada, 2014, 2018). indigenous peoples comprise over 50% of active canadian-born tb cases in the country (long et al., 2013; statistics canada, 1992; waldram, herring, & young, 2006). when compared to other parts of canada reporting high incidence rates among indigenous peoples (for example, inuit nunangat), those living in the prairie provinces have the most advanced tb presentations (health canada, 2009; long et al., 2013; vachon, gallant, & siu, 2018). through qualitative description, we explored how the community settings (i.e., urban centres, non-remote reserves, remote reserves, and isolated reserves) where indigenous peoples live can help explain the advanced presentations and high tb rates among indigenous peoples of the prairie provinces. determinants of tb while the reasons for differences in incidence and progression of tb among indigenous peoples in various regions of canada remain unclear, researchers have identified a complex array of factors that contribute to these disparities (long et al., 2013). among these potential explanations is the hypothesis that tb rates vary inversely with time since first contact with european colonizers (enarson & grzybowski, 1986). although this position helps to explain differences in incidence rates between eastern and western canada, it does not account for the heterogeneity observed across the prairie provinces (long et al., 2013). on the prairies, tb rates increase in a west to east direction: lowest in alberta and highest in manitoba. several factors related to community environment may help to explain this disparity, including access to health care, cultural sensitivity in health services, health care worker staffing and retention, public awareness of symptom recognition and stigma reduction, geographical isolation, socioeconomic conditions, housing quality and crowding, and discrimination (cook, enarson, & buccholz, 2013; government of saskatchewan ministry of health, 2013; long et al., 2013). access to health services in canada, access to health services differs among the community settings in which indigenous peoples live (i.e., urban centres, non-remote reserves, remote reserves, and isolated reserves) and is a significant determinant of health (loppie reading & wien, 2009). most indigenous reserves, with the exception of a few located near urban centres, have on-reserve health services (healy & mckee, 2004). in remote and isolated reserves (south of the 60th parallel), health services are provided through nursing stations and communities have limited and infrequent access to medical specialists, who tend to be flown in for short durations (health canada, 2015). however, challenges have been reported with the level of care and resources in these settings (halseth & ryser, 2006; loppie reading & wien, 2009; office of the auditor 1 mayan et al.: community setting as a determinant of health for indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2019 general of canada, 2015). nursing stations often face staff shortages and high staff turnover rates (public health agency of canada, 2013). weather, proximity, and available transportation also make it difficult for those living in remote, isolated reserves to access health services off reserve, and community members often travel to urban centres to access health services (halseth & ryser, 2006; public health agency of canada, 2013). health services, particularly specialized services, may be more geographically accessible to indigenous peoples living in urban communities (place, 2012). yet, urban centre settings also pose their own set of challenges. in these settings, indigenous peoples may be unable to receive culturally sensitive health services (adelson, 2005; browne, 2005; place, 2012; sookraj, hutchinson, evans, & murphy, 2012; tang & browne, 2008) and often experience overt racism, judgment, and discrimination (denison, varcoe, & browne, 2014; durey, thompson, & wood, 2012), which can result in unmet health needs (tjepkema, 2002). indigenous peoples living in urban communities also commonly experience poverty, social exclusion, homelessness, and limited transportation as barriers to accessing health care (place, 2012). indigenous peoples living in different community settings (urban centres as well as non-remote, remote, and isolated reserves) experience varying levels of access and a range of barriers to appropriate health services (health canada, 2012; loppie reading & wien, 2009; marchildon, 2005). this reality is coupled with the disproportionately high tb rates among indigenous peoples, including those living in the prairie provinces with the most advanced tb presentations (health canada, 2009; long et al., 2013; vachon et al., 2018). therefore, the objective of the present study was to understand how community setting may help explain the high rates and advanced presentations of tb among indigenous peoples in the prairie provinces. methods the determinants of tuberculosis transmission project this study is part of a larger multiple method seven-year research project, titled the determinants of tuberculosis transmission among the canadian-born population of the prairie provinces (dtt project; boffa, king, mcmullin, & long, 2011). the dtt project explored the environmental, biomedical, socio-cultural, and historical determinants of tb transmission. the research team was made up of social scientists, indigenous health researchers, clinicians, and epidemiologists. the dtt study protocol was presented to and approved in writing by all major indigenous organizations on the prairies. this included the network environments for indigenous health research, first nations inuit health in alberta, federation of saskatchewan indian nations and the northern inter-tribal health authority in saskatchewan, and the centre for aboriginal health research and the assembly of manitoba chiefs in manitoba. the project also received ethics approval from the universities of alberta, calgary, saskatchewan, and manitoba, as well as health canada (boffa et al., 2011). consultative committees, named provincial network committees, were established in each province, and they were composed of health professionals, elders, traditional healers, indigenous and government stakeholders, and former lived-experience tb patients. the provincial network committees consisted of over 50% indigenous peoples and guided all aspects of the research, including interpretation of the data. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.5 table 1. definition of community settings urban centre non-reserve areas with a population between 1,000 and 100,000 people or more (statistics canada, 1992) non-remote reserve located less than 350 kilometers from an urban centre (health canada, 2012) remote reserve located more than 350 kilometers from the nearest centre that has year-round road access (health canada, 2012) isolated reserve does not have year-round road access (health canada, 2012) participants were identified and recruited through medical professionals across the prairie provinces and had to be 15 years of age or older, born in canada, and diagnosed with culture-positive pulmonary tb between 2007 and 2008. first, participants were invited to complete a questionnaire, which asked demographic questions (e.g., age, gender, occupation) and questions about their tb (e.g., prior infections, symptoms, where they received their diagnosis). participants who completed a questionnaire and were sputum smear-positive (more infectious) were invited to participate in an interview (n = 112). after 56 smear positive participants were interviewed, data saturation was achieved and no subsequently-diagnosed cases were invited to participate. written consent was provided by all 56 participants; parental consent was provided for participants under the age of 18 living with a parent or guardian. from the 56 interviews, 48 were included in this analysis. eight interviews were removed because they were from a very distinct urban community setting. in this urban community setting, indigenous peoples made up approximately 95% of the population1 and there were significantly high rates of tb, along with high rates of violence, substance use, unemployment, and poverty, which made this setting dissimilar to the communities where the other 21 urban cases were derived. consequently, these participants’ tb stories were overshadowed by other pressing economic, health, and social issues in their setting, and including these interviews would have distorted the data and results. researchers could partner with this community in the future to address the complex environment in which these indigenous people live. table 2 outlines demographic and behavioural characteristics for the participants included in the current study. 1 indigenous peoples make up 4.9% of the total population in canada (statistics canada, 2017). 3 mayan et al.: community setting as a determinant of health for indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2019 table 2. demographic and behavioural characteristics of participants by community type demographic and behavioural characteristics urban centre (n = 21) non-remote reserve (n = 15) isolated or remotea (n = 12) total (n = 48) age (years) 15-34 35-64 5 16 4 11 8 4 17 31 sex male female 9 12 8 7 6 6 23 25 province alberta saskatchewan manitoba 7 6 8 7 4 4 0 6 6 14 16 18 marital status single married or common-law separated or divorced 8 8 5 6 6 3 5 6 1 19 20 9 employment status employed unemployed 5 16 6 9 5 7 16 32 cigarette smoker yes no 14 7 12 3 10 2 36 12 alcohol or substance use yes no 20 1 12 3 9 3 41 7 regular family physician yes no 11 10 11 4 3 9 25 23 note. a there were 10 participants from isolated communities and 2 patients from remote communities. data collection and analysis a qualitative descriptive design was used to understand how community setting may help explain high rates and advanced presentations of tb among indigenous peoples in the prairie provinces. a qualitative descriptive design, as described by sandelowski (2000, 2010), originates from an interpretive paradigm and draws on the “everyday language” of participants (sandelowski, 2000, p. 336) to develop a 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.5 comprehensive, coherent, and useful “description and summary of the phenomenon” (mayan, 2009, p. 53). semi-structured interviews were conducted, and interviews were recorded and professionally transcribed verbatim. data collection and analysis were iterative. data were analyzed among a fivemember research team using qualitative content analysis (mayan, 2009). qualitative content analysis is a data analysis method for interpreting the content of text data “through the systematic classification process of coding and identifying themes or patterns” (hsieh & shannon, 2005, p. 1278). given the descriptive nature of the study design, a conventional approach to content analysis was used where categories were derived directly from the data. transcripts were first read in their entirety to develop an understanding of the content. the team then divided the transcripts by community setting (across the provinces) and subsequently re-read and reviewed the transcripts before beginning line-by-line coding. data were managed and shared among team members through atlas.ti 5.2 (scientific software development gmbh, berlin, germany) and numerous face-to-face and on-line analytic discussions occurred. finally, similar codes were grouped into categories, and descriptions of these categories were created and evaluated to determine internal and external homogeneity (mayan, 2009). at this stage, and according to category, the experiences that were similar across community settings were merged and are discussed together. the results are conceptual descriptions (sandelowski & barroso, 2003) that may assist decision-makers and clinicians in understanding how community setting may help explain high rates and advanced presentations of tb among indigenous peoples. members of the provincial network committees contributed to the evolving analysis and verified the results. findings the community setting (i.e., urban centre, non-remote reserve, remote reserve, or isolated reserve) participants lived in at the time of diagnosis heavily influenced participants’ tb experiences. community setting may help explain the high rates and advanced presentations of tb by (a) delaying accurate diagnoses; (b) perpetuating shame and stigma; and (c) limiting understanding of the disease. delayed diagnosis urban and non-remote reserve participants commonly reported seeking diagnoses through walk-in clinics and hospital emergency rooms, while participants from remote and isolated reserves described visiting their local nursing stations or having nurses come to their homes. the community setting either helped participants obtain treatment relatively quickly, as in the case of remote and isolated reserve settings or, as in the case of urban and non-remote reserve settings, it led to participants returning to health professionals repeatedly due to misdiagnoses and deteriorating health. the delayed diagnoses and, ultimately, delayed treatment often experienced by indigenous peoples living in urban and nonremote reserve settings may help explain the high rates and advanced presentations of tb among indigenous peoples living in the prairie provinces. (i) urban centre and non-remote reserve community settings. a significant frustration noted by several participants from urban centres and non-remote reserves was that they lacked a consistent family physician and consequently relied on walk-in clinics and hospital emergency rooms. nearly half of urban participants did not have a regular family physician (see table 2). while the majority of non-remote 5 mayan et al.: community setting as a determinant of health for indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2019 reserve participants did report having a regular family physician, the interviews indicate that many were not making use of their physicians. participants largely described their experiences of seeking diagnoses through walk-in clinics and hospital emergency rooms negatively. the following comment illustrates the dismissive treatment experienced by some participants in walk-in clinics and hospital emergency rooms: he said, “you should go see your family doctor. this is for emergencies.” i said, “doesn’t this sound like an emergency? it took me three times to come in here and you guys couldn’t prescribe anything right for me. there’s something going on here. first you guys told me it was bronchitis, now it’s pneumonia . . . you’re the third different doctor that i’ve seen in emergency . . .” and he said “yeah, well go see your own doctor next time.” (alberta, nonremote reserve) while participants presented with symptoms commonly associated with tb, including “night sweats,” “chills,” “coughing up phlegm,” “a loss of energy,” and “losing weight”, and sometimes more extreme symptoms such as “collapsing,” “losing bowel control,” and “feeling like [they were] gonna die,” they often received inaccurate diagnoses. many times, participants were told that they likely had “pneumonia,” “bronchitis,” or a “chest infection.” overall, participants explained that doctors would listen to their chest, possibly order a chest x-ray, and subsequently prescribe them with unnecessary medications. the desire to gain an accurate diagnosis and the fear of dying had patients returning to the same walk-in clinics and emergency rooms multiple times. often it was the participant who had to continue advocating for a diagnosis, or mention tb, for doctors to administer the appropriate tests. one patient stated that he saw approximately four different doctors at the same walk-in clinic before receiving an accurate diagnosis: i went to the medi-centre . . . where i usually go and i saw, i don’t know how many different doctors there . . . my . . . sickness was progressing . . . i kept going and i even came to a point asking them if they can check my phlegm . . . i was terrified so the doctors kept telling me that nothing was wrong with me. finally, this one doctor, right away, even before he examined me, he gave me paper towel to cover my mouth. right away he knew. (alberta, urban centre) in addition to misdiagnoses, many of the participants who sought a diagnosis in urban centres believed that doctors viewed them as attempting to abuse prescription medication. one participant noted: i kept going to the doctor. i kept going to walk-in clinics because . . . i just felt like i had the flu all the time, and then my doctor thought it was the flu, and then of course i’d been taking tylenol all the time and if i knew i was gonna run out by the weekend, i’d go to the walk-in clinic. and then they kinda looked at you, kind of funny like, “oh you know, you’re coming here for tylenol.” (saskatchewan, urban centre) many participants also believed that, when they accessed urban health services, they were met by doctors who were indifferent and did not take their concerns seriously. one participant felt that it took a drastic health change for the doctors to believe he was sick: 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.5 i didn’t know what it was, like i thought it was pneumonia the first time . . . i went to the hospital and nothing happened . . . finally, after so many times, trips to the hospital i finally see a doctor who said, “there’s something wrong with you.” i lost 50 pounds you know. (alberta, nonremote reserve) many participants felt frustrated, believing that health professionals need to be more accountable. one participant explained: somebody has to be reprimanded for misdiagnosing people . . . it’s probably other people it’s happened to . . . because you can’t go around misdiagnosing people . . . and thinking that they’ve just got a cold or, he said to me, “it could be a touch of pneumonia.” then i went, i just have to bundle up a little better when i work, that’s all. take more cough medicines, and then it never did get better. i just got worse. (manitoba, urban centre) another participant acknowledged that doctors may lack knowledge about tb and that there was a need for further training. she believed that this would help to ensure that others do not experience multiple misdiagnoses, as she had: well the thing is, like even the doctors, they’re not totally aware of tb themselves. maybe i wouldn’t have been sick so long if the doctors had checked out right from the beginning, when i said i had no energy. (saskatchewan, urban centre) while most experiences shared by urban and non-remote reserve participants seeking a diagnosis were negative, there were a few who spoke about positive experiences in an urban setting. in two urban centres, in two separate provinces, there are health centres that serve large indigenous populations. one participant spoke of seeking a diagnosis in one of these health centres, which he frequented regularly, and where he was immediately given a sputum test after talking to a doctor. this story was similar for a woman living in an urban centre who would commonly access her inner-city health centre. she stated that because they knew her, they had observed her health deteriorate and she received an accurate diagnosis. (ii) remote and isolated reserve community settings. the participants from remote and isolated reserves accessed their local nursing stations when they were ready to seek a diagnosis for their symptoms. while it was noted by one participant that “people in smaller communities have no access to doctors” and that seeing a doctor typically involved a lengthy referral process, community health nurses were invaluable in providing necessary services. the remote and isolated reserve participants reported relationships with local nurses, as described by one participant: this health nurse . . . she works for the nursing station for a long time now, over 30 years now, 20 years . . . every time she sees me then she will just, talk to me even when i feel sad. (saskatchewan, isolated reserve) another participant described the friendship he had formed with the nurses in his community: 7 mayan et al.: community setting as a determinant of health for indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2019 we used to know the nursing station staff by name . . . they’d come over unannounced. they would just walk in and sit down, grab a cup of tea. they were our friends. we would take them fishing in the summer time. (manitoba, isolated reserve) the access to and relationships with local nurses and other employees in the nursing station resulted in quick diagnoses. participants explained that they were given mantoux tests, sputum tests, and chest xrays after seeing a nurse. one participant noted that he had gone “to the nursing station and they just found out right away.” in another case, a young girl who had been experiencing chest pain went to the nursing station and had a chest x-ray. she was then medivaced2 out of her community to a nearby urban hospital to receive treatment. while the results of a sputum sample typically took one or two days to be returned, a nursing station staff member would follow up with participants when their results were available. for the isolated and remote reserve participants, there were few examples of misdiagnoses and prescriptions for antibiotics. shame and stigma shame and stigma experienced after receiving a tb diagnosis may also contribute to the high rates and advanced presentations of the disease among indigenous peoples by deterring individuals from seeking medical attention and treatment. participants described a host of negative feelings about returning home after being diagnosed with tb, including shame, stigma, others’ fear of contagion, and concerns over a lack of confidentiality. although shame over their tb diagnosis was a feeling expressed by many participants, regardless of where they lived, descriptions of stigmatization and a lack of confidentiality were more prominent among participants who lived on reserves. (i) non-remote, remote, and isolated reserve community settings. participants living in reserve communities expressed sadness knowing that others in their communities would treat them differently because they had tb. many participants described feeling “embarrassed,” “ashamed,” and “disappointed” over receiving a tb diagnosis. one participant expressed that she was “hoping for something else” as: people in [my community], when they hear the word “tb” they’re all “oooo…oh my god” . . . cause they are afraid of tb . . . they’re scared they might catch it too, i guess. (manitoba, isolated reserve) participants often believed that their friends and community members would distance themselves from them over fears of catching the disease. one participant explained that news about her tb diagnosis had “spread already,” and that she was going to “hide [her] face” and “not go out” when she returned home. another participant was worried that “people [would] be scared to be around [her],” and stated that she had to “isolate” herself when she returned home. a participant from saskatchewan who, at the time of her interview, had returned home from her treatment, said that people were making comments such as, “don’t go by her.” another participant noted that when word spread about his diagnosis, his coworkers refused to work with him. 2 medivac is the term for an emergency medical evacuation of a patient. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.5 these experiences of shame were explained as ignorance by one participant who was flown out of his community for treatment: the pilot told me to sit in the chair at the back . . . and he said, “now don’t touch anything.” he wouldn’t handle my bag. i tried to give him my travel warrant . . . he held out a paper bag to me and said, “put it in there” . . . he was scared . . . i wasn’t too comfortable with that. not because of what i have but because of his ignorance, i would say. (manitoba, isolated reserve) in addition to feelings of shame and stigma, participants also voiced concerns about the confidentiality of their diagnosis. participants spoke about certain families in the community being granted the privilege of privacy, while others did not receive the same consideration: [i]t’s [tb diagnosis] supposed to be confidential and there’s nothing confidential. everybody knew i had tb. everybody knew i was getting tested . . . i just recently found out that this one certain family is riddled with tb and nobody has heard a word about that, whereas just because of my last name, i’m on a lower class scale and everybody had heard that and then there’s even poorer people than me and my family name and everybody hears all about them. (saskatchewan, non-remote reserve) one of the participants linked the lack of confidentiality to being in a small community where “people talk.” she further expressed fear that if her family turned away from her as well she “would have nowhere to go.” limited understanding of tb finally, limited understanding of tb may influence disease rates and progression among indigenous peoples living in the prairie provinces. participants described varying degrees of available tb information and knowledge depending on their community setting. in this instance, reserve community participants (non-remote, remote, and isolated) had different experiences than those living in urban centres. (i) non-remote, remote, and isolated reserve community settings. community health centres and nursing stations served as a central point of information sharing. through frequent community health meetings, health professionals brought together a large number of people to talk about health concerns impacting their communities. as an example, one participant who had moved into an urban centre acknowledged that his home reserve had taken on the task of gathering people for meetings: i don’t think, well nowadays it’s not hard to deal with it [tb] because there’s help and back home they have a lot of support too, like they’ll have meetings once a month in the town hall and everybody will go there to pray. (saskatchewan, urban centre) in addition, a number of participants noted exposure to tb information through posters and pamphlets located in community spaces such as health centres. many of the participants from remote and isolated reserves also spoke about tv and radio broadcasts that highlighted health topics and encouraged individuals to visit a health professional if they were presenting with tb symptoms. one participant explained: 9 mayan et al.: community setting as a determinant of health for indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2019 the information is there . . . talks were given by public health nurses . . . and i know the information is at the nursing station which hands out pamphlets, and nurses used to have oncea-week, a show on local tv where people call in. (manitoba, isolated reserve) regular testing was also set up in reserve communities to try to diagnose as many people as early as possible. it was because of this routine testing that one participant was diagnosed with tb prior to experiencing symptoms: i didn’t even have any symptoms at all, until the x-ray team came . . . i saw my auntie sitting there and they were still doing chest x-rays so i said to myself, “i go there get this done while i’m in here,” otherwise i probably wouldn’t have done it. (manitoba, isolated reserve) however, having tb information available did not necessarily contribute to participants seeking a diagnosis sooner. as one participant stated, “in the community it is not the lack of information” that causes tb to persist. some participants explained that although workshops were offered in their communities, gathering people together to talk about illnesses was difficult and turnout was often low: they do workshops on it, but . . . very few people go because they either . . . have jobs and they can’t go, and some are elderly and can’t walk or leave their house. (alberta, non-remote reserve) another participant felt that the workshops needed to be promoted more effectively: i’ve never sat and listened to information sessions on anything. like where a qualified person comes in and says, “here’s what tb is all about” . . . and if they did it, it was not very well advertised. there’s gotta be something done. it’s gotta be implemented in the schools or compulsory, something. there’s gotta be more education. (saskatchewan, non-remote reserve) furthermore, some participants explained that available tb information could be hard to understand. one of the participants had seen a tb poster in her community health centre but was still confused about the illness. this was expanded on by another participant who noted, “i went to the meetings and they would talk about tb and my attitude was ‘well i’ll know when i get it.’ i think that’s how most of the people are.” nonetheless, some participants explained that the availability of tb information was not at the heart of the problematic tb rates. despite having information about tb, a number of participants acknowledged that community members continue to hold negative and inaccurate perceptions about tb. (ii) urban centre community setting. in contrast to reserve participants’ experiences, urban participants reported a lack of information and knowledge on tb. one participant emphasized the importance of having more education accessible in all health services facilities, and not just in tb clinics. many participants also expressed the need for increased tb information, not only for those affected, but for the general public as well. one participant explained that because she was not able to identify the illness in others, she became infected with tb: 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.5 tb is not a very glorious disease. i had no idea how bad it was. education doesn’t educate those who are not sick how to look after people who are sick . . . so education is not only improving the well-being of a person in bad health but it’s, you know, pro-active, prior intervention for people who don’t wanna get sick or for people who want to properly care for people who are sick. (saskatchewan, urban centre) other participants lamented the gap between younger generations and their elders. one participant, who had grown up on a northern saskatchewan reserve where tb was more prevalent, explained that there was a common disinterest in tb information by younger generations: the young people, they seem to brush it off . . . but the old people are, it’s almost mythological, how deadly it is, you know. they always make it like a third person. the sickness. it’ll come and get you or whatever . . . because it’s out lurking around there. (alberta, urban centre) for participants from urban centres, a lack of tb knowledge, whether through a dearth of available information or disinterest in learning about the disease, was thought to greatly impact individuals’ capacities to recognize tb symptoms. during the interviews, many participants expressed surprise that tb was still a problem and were unaware that they could become infected. these participants highlighted the need to expand the availability of tb information so more members of the general public could recognize symptoms in others. discussion findings from the current study demonstrate that the community setting indigenous peoples live in can play an integral role in: when people are diagnosed, their hesitation in seeking a diagnosis, and the tb information that is available to them. delays in diagnosis, being shamed by community members, and limited understanding about the disease can all help explain the high rates and advanced presentations of tb among indigenous peoples in the prairie provinces. postcolonial theory can also help explain, and make obvious, indigenous peoples’ experiences by taking the issue of race as a lens through which we can understand the effects of european colonization and the effects of the colonizer on the colonized. in a colonial environment, saturated by inequality, power, and domination (downing & kowal, 2011), race is used in the colonizing process to dictate and structure indigenous peoples’ lives, life opportunities, and identity, as well as their health and well-being. by invoking postcolonial theory, we can begin to understand—through the communities in which indigenous peoples live—how racism and indifference toward indigenous peoples plays into delayed diagnoses, how shame has been internalized and stigma used to perpetuate indigenous identities as being poor and lacking self-care, and how information alone cannot change the course of a disease that is entrenched in colonial perceptions and practices. below we draw heavily on health sciences literature to provide the foundation for needed changes in policy and practice—targeted according to community setting—that will address the high rates and advanced presentations of tb among indigenous peoples in the prairie provinces. we start with summarizing the findings in table 3. 11 mayan et al.: community setting as a determinant of health for indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2019 table 3. content analysis categories across community settings category urban centre non-remote reserve remote reserve isolated reserve delayed diagnosis participants accessed emergency rooms and walk-in clinics. they were often misdiagnosed and often experienced discrimination. even if participants reported having a regular family physician, many still relied on emergency rooms and walk-in clinics. participants accessed nursing stations where they were familiar with nursing staff, received immediate tb testing and a quicker diagnosis. shame and stigma participants had strong feelings of shame, sadness, and fear over returning home and being stigmatized by community members, family, and friends. confidentiality of diagnosis is a large concern for participants in reserve settings. limited understanding of tb limited tb information available. some tb information is available at community health centres and at community meetings, but attendance is low. there are varying degrees of tb information available at nursing stations through tb posters, pamphlets, and charts. community radio and television stations broadcast tb information and information sessions provided. there is a lack of discussion about tb. there is a need for information so people can protect themselves against tb or care for ones that are infected. delayed diagnosis when accessing health services in urban centres, participants described overwhelmingly negative experiences. urban and non-remote reserve participants shared their experiences of repeatedly visiting hospital emergency rooms and walk-in clinics, seeing multiple health professionals (who they viewed as indifferent, lacking diagnostic skills, and discriminatory), being administered various medical exams unrelated to tb, being misdiagnosed multiple times, and being prescribed unnecessary medications. in the current study, not having a family doctor or not seeking care from a family doctor helped explain urban and non-remote reserve participants’ reliance on hospital emergency departments or walk-in clinics as primary sources of health care. these experiences correspond with those of urban indigenous peoples in a study by browne et al. (2011), who reported relying on emergency departments due to barriers (e.g., discrimination, judgement, dismissal of concerns, transportation) to accessing other primary care providers, such as family doctors. however, paradoxically, participants in the study by browne et al. (2011) often described similarly dissatisfying experiences at emergency departments. in another study, tang and browne (2008) found that many canadians and health professionals believed that indigenous peoples overused the emergency room for primary health needs, and they were abusing 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.5 the health care system to access drugs. regardless of where urban indigenous peoples seek care, they often experience discrimination and dismissal of their health concerns. due to their heavy reliance on emergency rooms and walk-in clinics, urban and non-remote reserve participants also lacked relationships with health care professionals and continuity of care. continuity of care is less likely in walk-in clinics and emergency rooms than with a regular family physician (howard et al., 2008), and numerous studies have evidenced the importance of continuity of care for positive health outcomes (hjortdahl & laerum, 1992; pereira gray, sidaway-lee, white, thorne, & evans, 2018). related to a lack of continuity of care, the use of walk-in clinics and emergency rooms may also result in repeat visits for the same concern (howard et al., 2008). in a systematic review of 58 studies addressing delay in diagnosis and treatment of tb, gundersen storla, yimer, and bjune (2008) identified a cycle of repeated visits to health care providers as a core contributor to delayed diagnosis of the disease. accurate and timely diagnosis of tb requires appropriately trained medical professionals and the availability of diagnostic facilities (gundersen storla et al., 2008). although urban health care providers in the present study had access or could refer to diagnostic services, they often did not request the appropriate diagnostic tests. health care providers working in urban communities may not have the necessary education and experience to diagnose and treat tb (gundersen storla et al., 2008; long, 2006). experiences of participants from remote and isolated communities seeking a diagnosis were in direct contrast to most participants from non-remote reserves and urban centres. counterintuitive to what one might expect given the vast disparities in health care resources and personnel compared to urban areas, participants living on remote and isolated reserves received quicker and more accurate diagnoses due to their access to and relationships with knowledgeable local nurses. not only did these participants experience continuity of care, but also a culturally safe environment critical to improving health outcomes for indigenous peoples (durey et al., 2011; world health organization, 2006). implications for policy and practice for urban and non-remote reserve communities. we identify three areas to address diagnostic delays in urban and non-remote reserve communities. first, we need to address how systematic racism is shaping the health care experiences of indigenous peoples. the guidelines document, health and health care implications of systematic racism on indigenous peoples in canada, developed by the college of family physicians of canada’s (2016) indigenous health working group, is a direct response to the recommendations in the truth and reconciliation commission of canada (2015) report. this document suggests actions to start addressing the enduring health inequalities experienced by indigenous peoples, which should be taken-up by all new and established physicians in canada. second, health care professionals working with indigenous patients in urban settings where tb is less common should be taught to consider tb high on the differential diagnosis in indigenous patients that present with respiratory and/or constitutional complaints, particularly those that are subacute or chronic. third, services that specifically support indigenous peoples open possibilities for consistent and appropriate care for the health needs of indigenous patients, which can circumvent the high rates and advanced presentations of tb. it is possible to attain the locally focused practice characterizing remote and isolated reserves in urban settings. just like urban participants in the present study who accessed 13 mayan et al.: community setting as a determinant of health for indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2019 health centres that largely served indigenous populations, macdonald, rigillo, and brassard (2010) found that urban indigenous participants who accessed their local native friendship centre had more positive experiences with health services and viewed their relationships with health professionals more positively. health care professionals interested in working with urban indigenous communities with a willingness to build provider–patient relationships and culturally safe environments need to be identified and supported. shame and stigma tuberculosis has been viewed as a dirty disease, only affecting the poor, the lower class, and those lacking self-care (courtwright & norris turner, 2010; juniarti & evans, 2011; mcewen, 2005). the stigma experienced by participants living on reserves led to feelings of shame and guilt that caused them to isolate themselves from others. these experiences are echoed by atre, kudale, morankar, gosoniu, and weiss (2011), who found that community members were fearful of sharing utensils with tb patients or eating tb patients’ food due to concerns of contagion. some people may also not seek a diagnosis if they witness others experiencing shame, stigmatization, and violation of confidentiality. for those living in small reserve communities, seeking a diagnosis can mean taking a significant risk with respect to one’s reputation. consequently, shame and stigma represent significant barriers to seeking medical care, which can result in diagnostic delays that further contribute to high rates and advanced presentations of tb. this highlights the importance of addressing the shame, stigmatization, and lack of confidentiality experienced by many indigenous peoples living on reserves. implications for policy and practice for reserve communities. to address diagnostic delays related to shame and stigma in reserve communities, we draw on work by long et al. (2012) that promotes the involvement of elders and youth, the latter through the school system and their curricula, as ways forward to break down stigma. promoting educational activities that involve survivors of tb may be especially important for destigmatizing the infection (von delft et al., 2015). limited understanding of tb access to tb information has been widely studied as critical in reducing the spread of the illness (demissie, lindtjorn, & berhane, 2002; gele, bjune, & abebe, 2009; melaku, sharma, & alemie, 2013). the majority of studies in this area have been conducted in africa, where it was found that a lack of tb knowledge coincided with proximity to adequate services (demissie et al., 2002; gele et al., 2009). due to the remoteness of many african communities, medical information is often sparse, which impacts citizens’ knowledge about tb. lienhardt (2001) also found that lack of tb awareness and knowledge significantly impacts tb transmission rates. however, in the current study, proximity to health services was not a significant factor in access to tb information or the subsequent impact on participants’ level of tb knowledge. all the participants in this study were in proximity to different types of health services (e.g., hospitals, nursing stations). the availability of tb information varied across community settings and participants remained confused about tb, regardless of community setting. implications for policy and practice for reserve communities. to improve tb information and education, we suggest using more innovative methods that are effective in reaching target audiences. the use of proactive health campaigns in the fight against tb is supported by alvarez et al. (2014), who used a tb health campaign to encourage individuals living in nunavut to get tested. efforts to improve 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.5 individuals’ understandings of tb should be prioritized according to tb prevalence in communities, as communities vary with respect to the burden of tb. along with providing accurate and relevant tb information, the most effective form of early tb diagnosis may be to establish routine testing in highincidence communities. overall implications for better tb treatment across all communities. delivering tb information and education effectively and appropriately is also critical in fighting stigmatization and addressing diagnostic delays. previous research has shown that poor knowledge about tb can impact patients’ attitudes about the disease, and that stigma can impact health seeking behaviour (abebe et al., 2010; courtwright & norris turner, 2010; tolossa, medhin, & legesse, 2014). policy and practice need to change to enable health care providers to provide better information and education that will improve knowledge about and destigmatize tb. this will require shifting the current inordinate focus on treatment to give greater priority to public health programs and prevention (menzies, lewis, & oxlade, 2008). while tb has historically been constructed as a social disease that requires social, economic, and environmental interventions, current efforts to manage the disease tend to focus on medical interventions (lönnroth, jaramillo, williams, dye, & raviglione, 2009). in canada, tb-related expenditures disproportionately emphasize treatment, with only 40% allocated to prevention and control activities (menzies et al., 2008). this is reflective of canada’s health system overall, which has been described as taking a reactive approach to health (macintosh, rajakulendran, khayat, & wise, 2016). funding for public health, including activities related to health promotion and disease prevention, comprises a small proportion of total national health expenditures, standing at only 5.5% in 2017 (canadian institute for health information, 2017). greater investment in public health efforts that address social determinants and promote early detection in at-risk populations are needed to reduce the burden of tb among indigenous populations (lönnroth et al., 2009; menzies et al., 2008). this includes addressing the root causes of the disease through strategies designed to reduce poverty and improve living and working conditions (lönnroth et al., 2010). conclusions this study presents the realities of indigenous peoples’ experiences in accessing health services for a tb diagnosis. participants who sought a diagnosis in an urban centre had difficulties obtaining an accurate diagnosis when relationships between health professionals and patients were not established. urban participants reported feeling discrimination from health professionals who may not have been fully educated around the illnesses affecting indigenous peoples, causing them to miss opportunities to correctly diagnose tb, and thereby potentially contributing to the advanced presentations and high rates of tb among indigenous peoples. participants from remote and isolated reserves reported far fewer barriers in receiving a tb diagnosis, predominantly due to the relationships between community health nurses and community members. however, participants from reserves reported more shame, stigmatization, and concerns regarding a lack of confidentiality than did participants from urban centres. information about tb varied across community settings and did not seem to help participants identify the disease, which suggests a need for more innovative tb education. thus, the findings from this study highlight the multitude of ways in which community setting can impact the high rates and advanced 15 mayan et al.: community setting as a determinant of health for indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2019 presentations of tb among indigenous peoples in the prairie provinces, pointing to clear implications for improving policy and practice and the need for greater investment in public health. references abebe, g., deribew, a., apers, l., woldemichael, k., shiffa, j., tesfaye, m., . . . colebunders, r. 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(2002). the health of the off-reserve aboriginal population. supplements to health reports, 13, 1-17. retrieved from http://www.statcan.gc.ca/pub/82-003-s/2002001/pdf/82003-s2002004-eng.pdf tolossa, d., medhin, g., & legesse, m. (2014). community knowledge, attitude, and practices towards tuberculosis in shinile town, somali regional state, eastern ethiopia: a cross-sectional study. biomed central public health, 14(804), 1-13. doi: https://doi.org/10.1186/1471-2458-14804 truth and reconciliation commission of canada. (2015). honouring the truth, reconciling for the future: summary of the final report of the truth and reconciliation commission of canada. retrieved from http://nctr.ca/assets/reports/final%20reports/executive_summary_english_web.pdf 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.5 vachon, j., gallant, v., & siu, w. (2018). tuberculosis in canada, 2016. canada communicable disease report, 44(3/4), 75-81. doi: https://doi.org/10.14745/ccdr.v44i34a0 von delft, a., dramowski, a., khosa, c., kotze, k., lederer, p., mosidi, t., . . . zumla, a. (2015). why healthcare workers are sick of tb. international journal of infectious diseases, 32, 147-151. doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijid.2014.12.003 waldram, j. b., herring, d. a., & young, t. k. (2006). aboriginal health in canada. historical, cultural, and epidemiological perspectives. toronto, on: university of toronto press. wilkins, k. (1996). tuberculosis, 1994. health reports, 8(1), 33-40. world health organization. (2006). diagnostic and treatment delay in tuberculosis. an in-depth analysis of the health-seeking behaviour of patients and health system response in seven countries of the eastern mediterranean region. retrieved from http://applications.emro.who.int/dsaf/dsa710.pdf 21 mayan et al.: community setting as a determinant of health for indigenous peoples published by scholarship@western, 2019 the international indigenous policy journal april 2019 community setting as a determinant of health for indigenous peoples living in the prairie provinces of canada: high rates and advanced presentations of tuberculosis maria j. mayan rebecca jayne gokiert tristan robinson melissa tremblay see next page for additional authors recommended citation community setting as a determinant of health for indigenous peoples living in the prairie provinces of canada: high rates and advanced presentations of tuberculosis abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license authors community setting as a determinant of health for indigenous peoples living in the prairie provinces of canada: high rates and advanced presentations of tuberculosis square peg, round hole: first nations drinking water infrastructure and federal policies, programs, and processes the international indigenous policy journal volume 3 | issue 1 article 3 march 2012 square peg , round hole: first nations drinking water infrastructure and federal policies, programs, and processes jason mccullough university of guelph, mcculloj@uoguelph.ca khosrow farahbakhsh university of guelph, khosrowf@uoguelph.ca recommended citation mccullough, j. , farahbakhsh, k. (2012). square peg, round hole: first nations drinking water infrastructure and federal policies, programs, and processes. the international indigenous policy journal, 3(1) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.3 this research is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. square peg , round hole: first nations drinking water infrastructure and federal policies, programs, and processes abstract despite nearly a decade of targeted federal government efforts to provide potable water to first nations communities in canada, drinking water advisories and piped-water infrastructure gaps still persist. an indepth understanding of technical practitioners’ perspectives and experiences with federal policies, programs, and processes (ppp) may provide unique insight into the challenges behind the issues. to meet this objective, we interviewed 16 first nations technical staff within the geopolitical boundary of the province of ontario. results emphasize the role played by federal government-centric principles that shape policy, and the inflexible nature of the program execution format. this study provides a foundation for understanding the policy translation process and indicates action areas to create supportive policy for first nations drinking water service provision. keywords drinking water, infrastructure, policy, first nations, ontario, aboriginal affairs and northern development canada acknowledgments the authors wish to thank the following organizations for their assistance: the aboriginal water and wastewater association of ontario, the ontario first nations technical services corporation, and the assembly of first nations. the authors also gratefully acknowledge the first nations technical practitioners who participated in the study, as well as dr. kim anderson for her guidance and the journal reviewers for their comments. project funding was generously provided by the canadian water network. researcher financial support was generously provided by the natural sciences and engineering research council of canada, and engineers canada. please direct email correspondence to jason mccullough (university of guelph) at mcculloj@uoguelph.ca creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ square peg, round hole: first nations drinking water infrastructure and federal policies, programs, and processes the report of the royal commission on aboriginal peoples (1996) reported, “25 percent of the water systems and 20 percent of the sanitation systems [in first nations communities] are substandard. they either pose a danger to health and safety or they are in need of repairs to meet basic government standards” (p. 179). this concern over access to safe, consistent drinking water in first nations communities in canada has since been reiterated by government and non-government agencies, first nations organizations, and the media (canadian broadcasting corporation [cbc], 2006; chiefs of ontario, 2001; office of the auditor general of canada [oagc], 2005). in the 2000s, the government of canada responded to drinking water concerns by creating a sequence of funding strategies over and above the baseline operating budget for first nations services: the first nations water management strategy in 2003, the first nations water and wastewater action plan in 2008, and, to a certain extent, canada’s economic action plan in 2009 (indian and northern affairs canada [inac], 2009a; inac audit and assurance services branch [inac-aasb], 2009). despite nearly a decade of targeted federal efforts, however, field results indicate that federal strategies have not met the expected improvements (oagc, 2005, 2011). health canada (2009) reported that for the period of 2003 to 2007, an average of 123 drinking water advisories (dwas) were in effect every year in first nations communities1. this concern was compounded by an annual increase in dwas issued over the same period2. similarly, the national assessment of first nations water and wastewater systems, commissioned by indian and northern affairs canada3 (2011), reported that 1,880 homes still remained without in-house piped water in 2009 compared to 5,300 such homes in 2001 (inac, 2003). first nations citizens and politicians have expressed frustration with the current drinking water situation (cbc, 2005; chiefs of ontario, 2001; safe drinking water foundationadvanced aboriginal water treatment team [sdwf-aawtt], 2009), which culminated most recently in a proposal to approach the united nations to investigate potential human rights violations for homes that lack in-house piped water (rabson, 2011). academic literature on first nations drinking water issues remains a sparsely populated field. most data tend to be found in the ‘grey’ literature produced by government agencies or first nations organizations. past areas of study include regulatory framework gaps (swain, louttit, & hrudey, 2006); organizational capacity challenges (chiefs of ontario, 2001; institute on governance [iog], 2006; smith, guest, svrcek, & farahbakhsh, 2006); infrastructure gaps and challenges (oagc, 2005; ontario ministry of the attorney general, 2002); and control, authority, and devolution demands (chiefs of ontario, 2001). yet, other than 10 uncoded community infrastructure profiles presented in the chiefs of ontario (2001) and the polaris institute (2008) publications, there is little in-depth research and analysis on the behaviour and nuances of federal policies, programs, and processes (ppps) that govern drinking water service provision, including the planning, design, construction, and operation of drinking water systems, in first nations communities. 1 a snapshot from may 31, 2011 indicates that 1-in-6 first nations communities (n = 111) were under dwa (health canada, 2011). median dwa duration is 39 days (health canada, 2009). 2 the report notes that analysis of the upward trend is complicated by a concurrent increase in water monitoring, testing, and reporting. 3 the federal ministry responsible for first nations affairs has had many names including: department of indian affairs and northern development (diand), indian and northern affairs canada (inac) and, most recently, aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc). 1 mccullough and farahbakhsh: first nations drinking water infrastructure published by scholarship@western, 2012 the first nations technical context in canada is jurisdictionally complex and is burdened by a colonial history. we approached this complexity through a grounded theory methodology with a focus on the ‘client’ perspective4. this focus on the client is purposeful. the voices of first nations organizations and peoples tend to be found at the margins of the academic mainstream (indigenous peoples’ health research centre [iphrc], 2004; mcgregor, 2008), particularly so in the technical realm. our attempt to define this voice not only provides insight into the technical and policy challenges affecting drinking water service provision, but it also provides a much needed opening for a relatively untapped source of knowledge – the staff that fulfill technical duties for first nations communities and organizations. an in-depth understanding of the ‘ontario experience’ through the eyes of drinking water system operators, circuit rider trainers, tribal council technical advisors, and other technical practitioners may provide a richer understanding of the complex ppps at work in ontario, as well as shed light on what may be occurring in other provinces and territories in canada. policies, programs, and processes: an overview policies the first nations – government of canada political relationship is one of the oldest areas of canadian government policy. the political relationship has evolved over time in response to three policy paradigm periods: the military protectionist paradigm period (first contact – 1812), the assimilationist paradigm period (1812 – 1990s), and the ‘new’ paradigm period (1990s – present) (howlett, 1994). howlett (1994) defined the new paradigm as one of mutual recognition, peaceful coexistence, and first nations self-government. these principles became clearly established in the canadian policy landscape through the 1996 report of the royal commission on aboriginal peoples recommendations (tanner, 2001). throughout the 1990s, new paradigm policy initiatives of self-government, natural resource comanagement, and program service devolution took centre stage in the first nations – government of canada political relationship. outcomes, however, indicate that the new paradigm principles have “yet to be institutionalized in a meaningful sense” (howlett, 1994, p. 641). in one case, innu nation members experienced concerns regarding their community’s capacity to administer the institutional burden of self-government (tanner, 2001). in another case, kluane first nation members perceived that the dall sheep co-management process provided only token decision-making authority (nadasdy, 2003). a final case stems from a policy review of natural resource management devolution to first nations in the yukon territory, which found that the process was in fact one of deconcentration, not devolution5 (natcher & davis, 2007). this dichotomy between autonomy-building initiatives and assimilationist outcomes was anticipated by weaver (1990). she argued that the 1990s would be a transition period in which both old and new paradigms would co-exist, producing a “continuing tension between them, as the old ways of thinking gradually give way to the new” (p. 10). 4 first nations define their relationship with the government of canada as nation-to-nation. this structure is most evident in the case of land claims and self-government agreements (malloy, 2001). in terms of drinking water service provision, however, first nations tend to be recipients, and thus clients, of the federally authored, administered, and ‘owned’ ppp. 5 deconcentration represents a transfer of administrative responsibility to smaller, geographically dispersed government units of the same central government. in this case, it refers to an imposition of western institutions and ideologies on first nations governments. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.3 in terms of drinking water service provision, federal policy was first articulated through a 1977 memorandum to cabinet that proposed providing first nations communities with physical infrastructure equal to that of their non-first nations neighbours (swain et al., 2006). in 1984, first nations policy in canada gained broad legislative muscle through the supreme court’s decision to recognize the federal government’s fiduciary responsibility towards first nations (morse, 1989), with drinking water service provision ostensibly falling within this responsibility (chiefs of ontario, 2001; sdwf-aawtt, 2009). service provision devolution began in the early 1990s with day-to-day management and operation responsibilities being transferred to individual first nations (chiefs of ontario, 2001; swain et al., 2006). policy initiatives built momentum through the 1990s and 2000s by way of a series of federal funding strategies: the drinking water safety program for native people in 1990 (moore, 1999), the gathering strength water and sewer initiative in 1998 (oagc, 2005), the first nations water management strategy in 2003, the first nations water and wastewater action plan in 2008, and elements of canada’s economic action plan in 2009 (inac, 2009a; inac-aasb, 2009). as with other new paradigm initiatives, drinking water service provision devolution has had mixed outcomes. first nations find themselves: (i) working within a patchwork of policies, programs, and funding conditions (chiefs of ontario, 2001; swain et al., 2006); (ii) burdened by the complexity of multiple stakeholders and jurisdictional players (swain et al., 2006); (iii) overwhelmed by the governance and managerial responsibilities (iog, 2006); (iv) challenged by technical duties (iog, 2006; smith et al., 2006); (v) lacking a support system (chiefs of ontario, 2001; iog, 1999); (vi) lacking regulation (iog, 2006; swain et al., 2006); and (vii) ultimately lacking the financial resources to respond (chiefs of ontario, 2001; iog, 1999; swain et al., 2006). the marginal success of drinking water service devolution (oagc, 2005) is evident in a report authored by the safe drinking water foundation advanced aboriginal water treatment team (2009) advocacy group. the report recommends that “[r]esponsibility and liability for providing safe drinking water should be passed back to inac until such time as communities have water treatment plants that can, at a minimum, consistently meet all 56 health parameters of the guidelines for canadian drinking water quality” (p. 3). programs the jurisdictional and operational framework that governs first nations drinking water programs is distinct from its non-first nation counterparts (swain et al., 2006). the framework is rooted in the indian act and is manifested as shown in table 1. the table shows key jurisdictional players and stakeholders, as well as their associated roles in drinking water program implementation. inac and first nations band councils are the dominant players within this framework; these entities are responsible for the funding and execution of drinking water service provision. service provision is dominated by three phases and their associated funding programs (in parentheses): system construction (major capital), minor system repairs and upgrades (minor capital), and system operation and maintenance (o&m). inac serves as the funding agent with funding being provided through annual base funding in the form of inac’s capital facilities and maintenance program, as well as ‘one-time’ targeted funding strategies (e.g. first nations water management strategy) (inacaasb, 2009). all funding amounts are based on funding formulas and level of service standards defined by inac (department of indian affairs and north development: corporate services departmental audit and evaluation branch [diand: csdaeb], 1997; inac-aasb, 2009). the capital facilities and maintenance program is not exclusive to the needs of drinking water service 3 mccullough and farahbakhsh: first nations drinking water infrastructure published by scholarship@western, 2012 table 1 actors and roles in first nations drinking water service provision form organization role jurisdictional authority band council & band administration project deliverya inac fundinga process quality controla health canada water monitoring quality controla service institution tribal councils & ontario first nations technical services corporation project management supportb technical advice to affiliated first nationsb circuit rider training program on-site traininge contractor safe water operations program service providers long-term operations oversightc; d on-site trainingd a inac, 2004; b inac, 2009b; c inac, 2008a; d northern waterworks incorporated, 2010; e ontario first nations technical services corporation, 2010. provision. rather, it provides funding for a range of public works, including wastewater systems, roads and bridges, community buildings, schools and power service (inac-aasb, 2009). processes major capital funding is disbursed to a first nation through the major capital works process. this process is shaped by the treasury board’s policy for federally funded projects, specifically the project approval policy (treasury board of canada secretariat, 2011). the major capital works process consists of the standard sequence of engineering design and construction stages with an overlay of technical and financial review processes. the significant milestones in the review process are the preliminary project approval submission (ppa) and the effective project approval submission (epa). these are ‘go/no-go’ inac reviews that release funding for the subsequent design and construction stages. figure 1 provides a visual representation of the major capital works process adapted from diand: csdaeb (1997) and taylor and hill (2010). figure 1 distinguishes the two parallel process streams according to action agent. the first nation’s project team includes band council representatives, a project manager (often part of band administration), tribal council technical advisors, consultants, contractors, an inac capital management officer, and an inac technical advisor. the federal ministries involved include inac, health canada, environment canada, and human resources and skills development canada (taylor & hill, 2010). inac is the lead action agent representing the government of canada. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.3 figure 1. major capital works process. minor capital and operation and maintenance (o&m) funding is disbursed to a first nation through funding arrangements and provided in ‘block’ funding format. these funds are typically transferred to first nations on an annual basis and, therefore, are not represented in figure 1. block funding provides local discretion over fund usage, provided that funding agreement requirements are met. in terms of o&m, inac provides 80% of a formula-calculated o&m budget (inac, 1998). the case study: the ‘ontario experience’ ontario is home to the largest first nations population within a single province or territory in canada. twenty-three percent of the first nations population lives in ontario, with approximately 80,500 people living in a first nations community6 (diand, 2005). this population is distributed among 127 first nations communities, 34 of which are remote (inac, 2008b). relative to non-first nations 6 an additional 81,200 first nations citizens live outside of a first nations community but within the province of ontario (diand, 2005). in a c a n d o t h e r f e d e r a l m in is t r ie s r e a l m o f i n f l u e n c e p r o je c t t e a m r e a l m o f i n f l u e n c e construction works financial control process implementation stages inac fund acquisition process inac technical review and approval process 5-year capital plan prioritization submission & approval/rejection submission & fund release/denial milestone reviews ppa epa submission & approval/rejection feasibility study preliminary design detailed design construction commissioning and warranty period tender document preparation and tender bidding fund negotiation and elasticity to accommodate tender costs front-end stages 5 mccullough and farahbakhsh: first nations drinking water infrastructure published by scholarship@western, 2012 communities, first nations communities tend to have smaller populations, be more rural, and be less accessible (inac, 2011a). communities in ontario are typically categorized according to geographic location (northern or southern) and road accessibility (accessible or remote). generally speaking, northern ontario has a colder climate, a bedrock geology defined by the canadian shield, and a low population density. in contrast, southern ontario has a milder and shorter winter, sedimentary rock geology, and a high population density (baldwin, desloges, & band, 2000; natural resources canada, 2007). all remote communities are located in northern ontario (inac, 2008b). methods from september to november of 2009, we conducted 13 face-to-face interviews with 16 first nations technical practitioners from the province of ontario. three interviews consisted of two practitioners from the same organization being interviewed at the same time. the face-to-face interview process involved 6,000 kilometres of travel throughout ontario. recruitment included the snowball process and purposeful sampling7 at a first nations technical tradeshow. for our study, we defined a ‘first nations technical practitioner’ as a staff member of a first nations organization that has the professional responsibility for: • operating or managing drinking water systems (operators or public works managers); • training or assisting drinking water system operators (trainers or operator association staff); • administering or advising the implementation of drinking water system projects (tribal council technical department staff or consulting engineers of first nation-owned engineering firms); or • analysing drinking water system policies (policy analysts). by nature of their professional occupation, technical practitioners have varying experiences with ppp. project team members have direct experience in ppp execution, while operators and trainers have direct experience with ppp outcomes. policy analysts, on the other hand, have exposure to the statistics, reports, and government publications on ppp impetus and outcomes. practitioner voice was diverse with professional experiences representing accessible and remote communities, small and large community populations, weak and strong economic conditions, and rural and suburban community development formats. practitioner positions ranged from field-level to policy-level staff. five practitioners were women and 11 practitioners voluntarily self-identified as being first nations. data collection and analysis followed grounded theory methodology from creswell (2007) and was supplemented where necessary by marvasti (2004). briefly, this consisted of: (i) a semi-structured, pretested interview protocol document; (ii) a holistic and exploratory approach to data collection and analysis; (iii) verbatim transcriptions of audio-recorded interviews; (iv) transcription open coding using qsr international’s nvivo 8 software; (v) preliminary coding validation through a participant 7 purposeful sampling was carried out through brochure distribution from a tradeshow booth and subsequent voluntary recruitment. tradeshow delegates were almost exclusively first nation technical practitioners from within ontario, with the majority stemming from the first nations operator community and first nations technical advisory community. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.3 feedback process; (vi) axial coding data analysis; and (vii) selective coding for meaning making. postanalysis validation was completed through a triangulation exercise consisting of a document review of eight uncoded first nations infrastructure case studies and media interviews. the university of guelph research ethics board approved the study. verbal informed consent was provided by each study participant. all efforts were made to ensure confidentiality, as well as accommodate indigenous-authored research ethics and best practices (see for example erasmus and ensign (1991); iphrc (2004); national aboriginal health organization [naho], (2007); & smith (1999). results data analysis identified a dual central phenomenon that defines drinking water service provision ppp. this dual central phenomenon consists of a ppp paradigm and a ppp execution format. ppp paradigm the first component of the central phenomenon reflects the governing principles, collectively called the ppp paradigm, that drive and control the ppp. first nations technical practitioners’ experiences with the ppp ‘in action’ demonstrate a persistence of three principles: financial accountability, macro and micro-control, and frugality. the following sections discuss each principle and provide a supporting table of interview-based, coded data. financial accountability principle. financial accountability structures how inac can respond to and interacts with first nations clients, and provides limits to inac’s use of judgement and subjectivity. the overwhelming need for inac to be accountable to external agents restricts its ability to respond to technical challenges. one participant noted: (…) think outside the box inac! that’s one of the things i like to tell them at meetings is ‘think outside the box’. they don't know how to. they can't. and their only way to defend themselves (…) is to go back to their procedures and guidelines, right? and ensure that they are being followed. (…) and that in itself in essence is the problem, right? because stepping outside that box and trying to do something creative or better or more functional or whatever (…) is...is virtually impossible. (p7) a greater understanding of ‘the box’ that inac must work within is provided in table 2. the coding breakdown shows how the financial accountability principle inhibits inac’s adaptability to the local context through an adherence to a standardized set of rules, guidelines, formulas, and criteria. at the same time, the financial accountability principle burdens the inac – first nations relationship with multiple levels of bureaucracy and external oversight. figure 2 illustrates the direction of funding flow and accountability in first nations drinking water service provision as presented in table 2. the figure shows a stakeholder relationship where first nations are at the start of the accountability chain and at the end of the funding flow chain. accountability mechanisms within a first nation itself were not richly discussed. 7 mccullough and farahbakhsh: first nations drinking water infrastructure published by scholarship@western, 2012 table 2 financial accountability principle breakdown to whom is inac accountable? what is financial accountability? how is this achieved? which mechanism is used? auditor general treasury board general public (canada, not just ontario) no subjectivity reproducible process formula funding consistent approach (i.e. one-size-fits-all) rules and guidelines maximum funding level defined (i.e. standards defined for infrastructure product) funding criteria manuals (i.e. level of service standards) no fund abuse fund only approved tasks technical scrutiny funding criteria manuals (i.e. level of service standards) quality control redundancy multiple agency approvals traceability reporting paper trail minimize mismanagement opportunity out-source to private sector require professional project manager (a pending policy) 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.3 figure 2. funding flow and accountability relationships. macroand micro-control principle. macroand micro-control is inac’s modus operandi. it defines how inac behaves in the course of its regular programming, and how it responds to unplanned situations. one participant discussed the day-to-day impact of this external control: i would like to see the first nation be able to say what their priorities are. to be able to put the resources to where they believe the priorities are. just like any other municipality does in the province; they have that ability. first nations don’t have that ability. the government, for example, with this first nations infrastructure funding [inac special funding program] – they didn’t ask us [first nations band] what the priorities should be. they didn’t ask first nation peoples what their priorities would be. somebody in an ivory tower set those priorities. and when i look at them? they’re the exact opposite of what ours are here. (p3) the various forms of macroand micro-control, as discussed by practitioners, are presented in table 3. the coding breakdown depicts inac as a ministry with a dual role: client funder and project advancement gatekeeper. the breakdown further characterizes the inac – first nations relationship as a one-way relationship, where decision-making authority is maintained outside the first nations’ realm of influence. taxes / canadian public first nations band council federal government / treasury board inac auditor general legend: flow of funds: accountability direction: 9 mccullough and farahbakhsh: first nations drinking water infrastructure published by scholarship@western, 2012 table 3 macroand micro-control principle breakdown whom does inac control? what is control? how is this achieved? which mechanism is used? first nations bands tribal council (indirectly) consultants (indirectly) microlevel fund use control fund only approved components funding criteria manuals (i.e. level of service standards) reporting fund only approved amounts formula funding product control technical review fund release conditional on approval execution control out-source to private sector professional project manager safe water operations program service providers macrolevel fund use control treasury board indian programming budget provided directly to inac approved service categories and funding priorities fund release protocols (i.e. public tender, local hiring clause) product control set design and operation standards funds provided to meet, but not exceed, set standards process control open-ended implementation timeline funding application approval/rejection project ranking placement on 5-year capital plan power centralization (i.e. information imbalance) no decision-process transparency (i.e. inac operates as a ‘black-box’ towards band councils) minimal reporting feedback to band councils compliance with process rules fund flow continuity (i.e. start or stop fund flow) multi-stage approval process (i.e. ppa or epa) 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.3 frugality principle. practitioner ppp experiences indicate how inac consistently gravitates towards frugality in its decisions, actions, and institutional direction. frugality is manifested through costsavings, not necessarily value-maximization (i.e. most ‘bang-for-your-buck’). as one participant noted, cost-saving may come at the expense of product quality: what does it mean to be cost effective? in my mind, yes, there is a term called 'cost effective', where one option is better or just as good as another option that is more expensive. in their [inac] minds, whatever is the cheapest one. to me, that's not ‘cost effective’. (p9) cost-savings, however, are not limited to product selection decisions. it also emerges in the form of delayed spending and low design standards. table 4 presents the findings in greater detail. the coding breakdown alludes to a portfolio management approach to first nations service programs. portfolio management refers to the centralized management of one or more portfolios in order to achieve specific organizational objectives, and where success is measured in terms of aggregate performance (project management institute, 2008). this approach results in a top-down evaluation of a project’s merit and an interconnectedness – and consequent vulnerability – of drinking water service provision to other service programs or portfolios (i.e. housing, health services). this approach, when pressed for funds, exhibits a ‘fund stretching’ phenomenon, which is characterized in the first nations context by a penchant towards studies, piecemeal capital works approval, and bare essentials product design. ppp execution format the second half of the central phenomenon reflects ppp structure and client compatibility, characteristics collectively called the ppp execution format. practitioners characterized the ppp format as ‘one-size-fits-all’ and emphasised the need for the execution format to appreciate and accommodate the diversity among first nations communities, first nations bands, and tribal councils. here, we develop the premise of diversity by looking closer at three dominant themes, and by contextualizing the challenges this poses to the current ppp execution format by looking at a number of examples. the three themes investigated are capacity variations, infrastructure constructability variations, and societal diversity. each theme is elaborated on using interview-based coded data figures or tables. capacity variations. in terms of drinking water infrastructure implementation and operation, capacity refers to the abilities needed to operate and maintain a water treatment plant and distribution system, and complete a major capital works process. for conciseness, capacity elements are grouped into four functional categories in accordance with practitioner comments: • formalized capacity (e.g., education levels, engineering titles, operator certification level); • demonstrated capacity (e.g., credit history, project execution track record, o&m budget control); • support systems (e.g., administrative, technical, financial management); and • financial strength (e.g., internal sources of revenue, community economy). 11 mccullough and farahbakhsh: first nations drinking water infrastructure published by scholarship@western, 2012 table 4 frugality principle breakdown towards whom does inac behave frugally? what is frugality? how is this achieved? which mechanism is used? first nations bands tribal councils consultants (indirectly) contractors (indirectly) conform to annual budget, not annual need (i.e. infrastructure or operational) target abstract costs, not true costs formula funding fixed rate for indian programming increase lack of comprehensive operations and infrastructure needs assessment (i.e. dollar figure) rigid to ppa cost estimates reduce consultant budget reduce construction scope pre or post tender submission centralize funds; allocate indian programming funds to service categories, not individual bands one-pot funding structure (i.e. funding shifts impact other programs, other bands) one-off funding format (i.e. no continuity emphasis) lower instantaneous spending target lower standards subpar design standards subpar o&m standards instantaneous cost evaluation, not lifecycle cost evaluation technical review design changes reduced consultant budget delay spending high report writing requirements deflect to studies risk management approach; act only as necessary band-aid repairs piecemeal community infrastructure development no enforcement or regulations 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.3 interview findings show two general patterns: lower capacity in northern communities, particularly in remote communities, relative to southern communities (macro-level), and random variation of capacity between individual communities, band councils, band administrations, and tribal councils, regardless of location (micro-level). further analysis of practitioner comments indicates: • demonstrated capacity is not restricted to southern communities. northern communities, including remote communities, have shown demonstrated capacity; • support is least available in northern communities where formalized capacity is lowest; and • capacity loss (i.e. retention challenges) is most acute in northern communities, particularly in remote communities. figure 3 illustrates the two capacity patterns and data analysis findings. figure 3. patterns reflecting functional capacity categories as a function of community type. formalized capacity support systems financial strength low demonstrated capacity high high road accessible northern communities remote road accessible southern communities low 13 mccullough and farahbakhsh: first nations drinking water infrastructure published by scholarship@western, 2012 the variation in formalized capacity, demonstrated capacity, support systems, and financial strength demonstrates heterogeneity among first nations communities, first nations bands and tribal councils. as one practitioner indicated, even with the same context (e.g., accessible or remote; northern or southern), heterogeneity challenges the creation of a single definition or ‘snapshot’ of first nations’ capacities: (…) one of the classic things though that i see, say 20 km on the other side of the border of our tribal council, they [operators] are sitting there with no training at all. nothing going on. they are looking over here at my guys getting together every one or two months [for training]. (p11) infrastructure constructability variations. infrastructure constructability variations highlight the logistical differences that affect construction projects in different parts of the province. in short, northern communities, particularly remote communities, have significantly more challenging construction logistics than their southern counterparts. constructability variations noted by practitioners are described in table 5. table 5 constructability variations construction issue southern communities northern communities remote communities construction season all-year (no data) june – august equipment mobilization / demobilization access all-year all-year january – march (winter road) ease of access / proximity to urban centre high medium low skilled-labour pool access high medium low logistical costs average (no data) high geotechnical conditions (no data) possible bedrock possible bedrock simply put, constructability will directly affect the cost and timeline of community infrastructure projects, translating into a sluggish rate of infrastructure development. the construction limitations experienced in remote communities should not be underestimated, as indicated by the following remark: so the only way that they can bring in heavy material or heavy equipment is by winter road. and that winter road is typically open mid-january and closes typically mid-march. if you have a good season, you can start it earlier and extend it longer. if you have a bad season, that window gets smaller and smaller. like, you may only have a four-week period where you haul in stuff. sometimes the winter roads are opened up earlier but it's only to light traffic. so, they 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.3 can bring in half-tons and cars and small trucks. (…) that's also how they get their fuel. it's all hauled in. (p8) societal diversity. although first nations are lumped together as one cultural group and consequently one federal ministry, there are significant variations in societal characteristics between first nations themselves. practitioners indicated that remote communities, relative to road-accessible communities, have a unique social structure in terms of leadership structure, perception and adoption of formal education, and occupational priorities. in many remote communities, traditional leadership8 is very much involved with governance decisions, including the infrastructure development processes (e.g., project meetings, project direction decisions). this is noteworthy as both the engineering consultant and construction contractor professional charge-out structures and specialization-oriented organizational structures are not equipped to deal with direct involvement from traditional leadership. as one participant commented: and it's hard as well, for us from the technical [side]. because we go in looking at more of the technical [aspects] and try to advise them on more of those aspects. versus their cultural or other factors that may come into it, from tek [traditional ecological knowledge] or others, that are unique and different than how we perceive things, from strictly trying to treat that water and making sure it's the safest (…) for consumption by the community. (p5) societal diversity not only exists in organizational structure but also in social norms and practices. in some cases, the existing social structure in remote communities does not readily accommodate the ‘nine to five’ work structure. the following dialogue highlights the convergence of two distinct sets of work structure norms and practices: p8: this fall for instance. hunting season. one community – all the men are gone. p7: they are doing their traditional hunt. p8: for a week...you know? so who runs the water plants, the generating stations, the fuel farms and all that. there's nobody there. everyone's gone. although both quotations reflect remote communities, it does not imply that non-remote first nations communities should be grouped together as one entity. on the contrary, leadership positions on economic development and o&m user-fee systems, for example, were found to vary throughout the province with no observable trend. in the case of user-fees, some band councils and communities have accepted user-fee incorporation into their water management structure, while others view userfees negatively as a form of taxation. societal diversity within the first nations cultural grouping was not pursued to great detail. the brief discussion above merely highlights how different first nations societies express different needs, wants, and political visions through their band councils and political bodies. at a national or provincial level, these may at times appear contradictory or divided, and thus do not speak with one voice. unto themselves, however, these may be entirely consistent. policies, programs, and processes compatibility examples. inac’s policies, programs, and processes are applied in an equal and standardized manner for all first nations clients. the compatibility of this standardized approach, however, varies between first nations communities, first nations bands, and tribal councils. to better understand this, three ppp examples are briefly reviewed. 8 many communities still operate with traditional systems of governance, which function alongside the public elections-based indian act system of chief and council. 15 mccullough and farahbakhsh: first nations drinking water infrastructure published by scholarship@western, 2012 major capital works process. practitioners noted that inac’s major capital works process caters to low capacity bands and inhibits growth in high capacity bands. the following comment reflects the frustration experienced by a high capacity band: their [inac] process needs to be streamlined so that it takes into account the first nations abilities, the first nations priorities. because right now, the way it is …they [inac] have too much control over the funding of projects. and i guess it comes from probably having to deal with first nations that don’t have the capacity. where they have to ‘hold hands’. so they think they got to hold everybody’s hands. and we’re saying [physical gesture of separation], you know? ‘give me the freaking money, and we’ll get the job done.’ never mind trying to tell us what to…every little thing what to do, and putting all these policies and procedures that are…really, hamper the implementation of the project. (p3) even so, the overwhelming nature of the process inhibits low capacity bands, as evidenced in the following quotation: (…) if you're a first nation that doesn't have any technical people, and you don't have a good tribal council to work with, things take a really long time. because the first nation doesn't know what steps to take, doesn't know what questions to ask. and then it just prolongs the process (...). (p8) o&m band contribution requirement. the o&m band contribution requirement (i.e. 20% of the budget) demonstrates a general incompatibility between mandate and reality. band contribution requirement may be theoretically feasible in communities with viable economies; however, many first nations communities face a dire economic reality that is incompatible with the principle of user-fees. this, in turn, sets the stage for two-tier service delivery as shown in the following comment on low operator salaries: so the rest of that money has to come from within the community itself. that's part of the reason why there's a huge parity [in operator salary]. cause it makes it tough for a lot of communities with no...[or] with very little income generation. they have a difficult time topping up that wage. (p14) end-of-fiscal funding opportunity. the end-of-fiscal funding opportunity presents itself yearly between early january and march 31st, and has the unique benefit of being streamlined with a fast turnaround. the driver behind this funding opportunity is the termination of the fiscal year. this deadline prompts federal ministries to utilize the remaining budget in preparation for the upcoming budget request. as funds must be expended by march 31st, bands must have ‘shelf-ready’ designs9 to send out for tender and construction must be completed during winter months. as such, this opportunity favours bands with the internal funds to complete a design and those located in a geographic zone that permits construction during winter. as a result, in decreasing order, this opportunity favours: southern communities, road accessible northern communities, and, lastly, remote communities. one practitioner working with remote communities emphatically remarked on this issue: interviewer: is there anything you could see that would improve project implementation? that would make life easier for you? 9 shelf-ready designs are those that have already gone through the feasibility study, preliminary design, detailed design, and contract document preparation stages. these designs are ready for tender and construction. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.3 p5: number one would be, for my communities, to change the fiscal. that would be number one. remote communities’ incompatibility with the end-of-fiscal opportunity is dramatic. these communities: • have minimal, or no, internal funds (generalized trend); • face a construction shutdown in winter; • have a restricted contractor mobilization window governed by winter road conditions; and • require considerable leadtime for contractors to coordinate equipment mobilization on the winter roads. unfortunately, many special funding programs follow the same end-of-fiscal funding schedule window. as such, remote communities, and to some degree all northern communities, miss out on community infrastructure development opportunities. one practitioner spoke to this limitation: (…) the fiscal timing and everything...just does not work for remote communities. all those initiatives that come out, the stimulus funding with ceap [canada’s economic action plan], and fnif [first nation infrastructure funding], and all that stuff – it's all march 31st dependent. and it's basically stymieing us...we're becoming ineffective in being able to do anything because of the timing. (p7) the three ppp examples provide tangible descriptions of the ppp execution format. inac’s emphasis on reproducibility and equality has resulted in a one-size-fits-all approach to program delivery, which produces ppp with incompatibilities to field conditions – a square peg, round hole phenomenon. the following quotation emphasizes the disconnect between inac’s ppp objectives and the field results: you can work with these policies [first nations content or employment clause in public tenders], if things work right. but for the most part, they are difficult to work with. and a lot of times first nations will just throw up their hands and say ‘ok, that is so much work to do that, let's just tender it out’. (p10) discussion the three governing principles – financial accountability, macroand micro-control, and frugality – depict a ppp paradigm that is inac-centric; one that places inac’s, and by association the federal government’s, priorities first. this is in sharp contrast to inac’s official mandate of “[w]orking together to make canada a better place for aboriginal and northern people and communities” (inac, 2011b, ¶ 1), and further still from a perceived mandate of making safe drinking water in first nations communities a top priority. in terms of drinking water infrastructure, this disconnect is notable for two reasons. first, if inac is not the ‘champion’ of first nations infrastructure needs, then who is? and, how does this gap affect a community’s physical development? second, although federal rhetoric and funding strategies over the past decade appear to be progressive and support autonomy-building initiatives, the ppp paradigm alludes to an institution that in practice is fundamentally unchanged. unless inac’s institutional memory and structure are dramatically changed to yield a first nationscentric institution, federal government efforts will continue to be diluted. 17 mccullough and farahbakhsh: first nations drinking water infrastructure published by scholarship@western, 2012 the other area of concern is the ppp execution format, which is characterized as a one-size-fits-all format that stifles high capacity first nations organizations, overwhelms low capacity organizations, and in general fails to account for the heterogeneity within first nations. as such, rather than provide an equally beneficial operating platform, the net result is an equally unaccommodating one-size-fits-all operating platform to no one group’s benefit. the take-home message is: in order to maximize ppp initiatives in ontario, heterogeneity among first nations must be treated as a dominant, not recessive, trait. consequently, execution format flexibility to accommodate a diverse client base must be central to future drinking water infrastructure ppp. this is particularly critical in the context of drinking water service devolution where each first nation band inevitably exhibits different rates of uptake and success with the devolved responsibilities. should the above changes not be addressed, canada runs the risk of perpetuating the funding cycle of dismay that has been witnessed over the last decade. the government performance audit on the first nations water management strategy alludes to this possibility. the audit found “most high-risk [drinking water] systems have improved to medium-risk rather than to low-risk” (inac, 2007, p. 92). this statement indicates that the strategy has deflected, and not resolved, the first nations drinking water crisis. as a starting point for change, future papers will present the practitioners’ visions for a future working environment, as well as a policy tool to accommodate client diversity. ppp findings within the existing body of knowledge ppp findings contribute to the existing body of knowledge on first nations and indigenous policy as follows: • the ppp paradigm results provide another decade of data to howlett’s (1994) study of first nations policy change, indicating a continued failure to meaningfully implement the new paradigm in drinking water service provision; • the evident competition between new and assimilationist paradigm principles supports weaver’s (1990) prediction of a coexistence of old and new paradigms; • the non-technical factors influencing drinking water program success, such as the lack of first nations control and the underlying institutional paradigm, corroborate nadasdy’s (2003) findings in the natural resource co-management field; • the ppp paradigm provides a lens for analysing federal government responses to first nations issues, such as the 2010 bill s-11 for first nations drinking water regulation (senate of canada, 2010); and • the ppp experience in canada provides a comparison for indigenous policy reform taking place in other colonially structured countries. australia, for example, has: (i) similarly abandoned its assimilationist policy paradigm in favour of a self-determination policy paradigm, (ii) not yet meaningfully implemented the new paradigm, (iii) not yet successfully devolved program services, and (iv) not yet accommodated the diversity in the indigenous population (sherwood & edwards, 2006; turner, 1997). conclusion in this article, we discussed the principles and format that govern drinking water infrastructure policies, programs, and processes in first nations communities, and identified areas for change that otherwise may not be immediately obvious. though findings are based on the ontario context, the federal nature of first nations policy may make these relevant to other provinces and territories in 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.3 canada. this research also opens the door for comparative research with indigenous populations in other colonially structured countries in the policy area of community infrastructure and services. 19 mccullough and farahbakhsh: first nations drinking water infrastructure published by scholarship@western, 2012 references baldwin, d., desloges, j., & band, l. 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(1990). a new paradigm in canadian indian policy for the 1990s. canadian ethnic studies, 22(3), 8-18. 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 1 [2012], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss1/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.1.3 the international indigenous policy journal march 2012 square peg, round hole: first nations drinking water infrastructure and federal policies, programs, and processes jason mccullough khosrow farahbakhsh recommended citation square peg, round hole: first nations drinking water infrastructure and federal policies, programs, and processes abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license microsoft word 287024-text.native.1331217389.docx the streamlining of the kabinakagami river hydroelectric project environmental assessment: what is the "duty to consult" with other impacted aboriginal communities when the co-proponent of the project is an aboriginal community? the international indigenous policy journal volume 6 | issue 3 article 4 june 2015 the streamlining of the kabinakagami river hydroelectric project environmental assessment: w hat is the "duty to consult" with other impacted aboriginal communities w hen the coproponent of the project is an aboriginal community? holly l. gardner university of waterloo, hologardner@gmail.com denis kirchhoff university of waterloo, dkirchho@uwaterloo.ca leonard j. tsuji university of toronto, ljtsuji@uwaterloo.ca recommended citation gardner, h. l. , kirchhoff, d. , tsuji, l. j. (2015). the streamlining of the kabinakagami river hydroelectric project environmental assessment: what is the "duty to consult" with other impacted aboriginal communities when the co-proponent of the project is an aboriginal community?. the international indigenous policy journal, 6(3). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.4 the streamlining of the kabinakagami river hydroelectric project environmental assessment: w hat is the "duty to consult" with other impacted aboriginal communities w hen the co-proponent of the project is an aboriginal community? abstract there is existing tension within many aboriginal communities between economic development and preservation of traditional lands for the continued practice of traditional activities. the "duty to consult" doctrine has has become an important mechanism by which these concerns were identified and addressed (when possible) prior to development. this is a legal requirement that is rooted in the constitution act (1982) and subsequent legal case law that has further defined and outlined requirements under this obligation. this article describes the process that was carried out to advance the proposed kabinakagami river hydro project class environmental assessment in northern ontario, canada with an emphasis on the approach to aboriginal consultation. this project is unique because the co-proponent of the project is an aboriginal community, with several neighbouring aboriginal communities potentially affected by the project. this project raises questions about the approach to carrying out the duty to consult in an effective way. an evaluative framework was developed to examine timeline, information, means, and flexibility and transparency of the process to highlight shortcomings in the process and make recommendations for improvement. keywords environmental assessment, aboriginal, duty to consult, infrastructure, hydroelectric, canada, remote communities creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/   t h e s t re a m l i n i n g o f t h e k a b i n a ka g a m i r i v e r h y d ro e l e c t ri c pro j e c t e n v i ro n m e n t a l a s s e s s m e n t : w h a t i s t h e “d u t y t o c o n s u l t ” w i t h o t h e r i m p a c t e d a b o ri g i n a l c o m m u n i t i e s w h e n t h e c o pro p o n e n t o f t h e pro j e c t i s a n a b o ri g i n a l c o m m u n i t y ? in canada, the aboriginal1 population is 1,172,785 and growing. the largest numbers of aboriginal people in canada live in the area encompassing ontario and the prairie provinces. in ontario, 2% of the population is aboriginal with the majority of people of aboriginal decent concentrated in the north (statistics canada, 2006). inequalities between canada’s aboriginal and non-aboriginal communities in income, educational outcomes, and various other social and economic determinants of health have been reported as substantial (blackstock, 2011; reading & wien, 2009). increasingly in canada, to address these glaring inequalities, aboriginal organizations have been advancing economic development as a road forward in order to enhance employment opportunities and establish greater control within their traditional territories; the end goal is self-determination and equity (anderson, 1997; anderson, dana, & dana, 2006). however, a dilemma exists in that economic development must be balanced with the deep connection aboriginal people have with the environment and their stewardship responsibilities. the tension that exists in many aboriginal communities between economic development and preservation of traditional lands for the continued practice of traditional activities is a significant concern. thus, the “duty to consult” has been an important mechanism by which these concerns are identified and addressed (when possible) prior to development. as aboriginal rights and treaty rights2 were affirmed in the repatriated canadian constitution act (1982) section 35(1)3 and have since been the subject of many canadian provincial and federal court cases4 to establish the extent of these rights—the case law that has followed has served to define the meaning of these rights and is embodied in the duty to consult. as stated by lawrence and macklem (2000), “the nature and scope of the duty of consultation will vary with the circumstances . . . the crown, in most cases, [is required] to make good faith efforts to negotiate an agreement specifying rights of the parties when it seeks to engage in an action that adversely affects aboriginal interests” (p. 252) or, in other words, the duty to consult is triggered when an action would infringe on aboriginal and/or treaty rights. more specifically, threshold conditions have been identified that are: based on a knowledge element, a contemplated crown conduct element, and an adverse effect element. the knowledge element is met when the crown has actual or constructive knowledge of a potential aboriginal rights or title claim or of an aboriginal claim under a treaty. the contemplated crown conduct element is typically met when the crown is considering an administrative decision of some kind. the adverse effect element is met when the decision could adversely affect aboriginal title, an aboriginal right, or a treaty right, with an implicit                                                                                                                 1 in this article, the term aboriginal people refers to first nation, inuit, and métis populations in canada. 2 the british crown recognized that the “indians” in their north american colony had established land rights long before the british arrived (henry, 2006). these existing land rights meant that land had to be ceded or purchased through treaties to facilitate settlement (cauchon & cockburn, 1867). 3 “the existing aboriginal and treaty rights of the aboriginal peoples of canada are hereby recognized and affirmed” (constitution act, 1982, s. 35(1)). 4 the dominion of canada was founded on a federated system of government in 1867. 1 gardner et al.: kabinakagami hydro project environmental assessment: duty to consult published by scholarship@western, 2015   requirement that the adverse effect be genuine and not wholly speculative. (newman, 2014, p. 39) in addition, depending on the severity of infringement, the process can require consent from aboriginal groups impacted by a proposed policy or project (nishnawbe aski nation [nan], 2007; prno & slocombe, 2012). while the doctrine is relevant in defining terms and conditions that inform the consultative process, the approach is not limited to the legally prescribed elements and considers the development of the relationship moving forward. the expectation is that the consultative process be meaningful, transparent, and reflect efforts to reduce the impact on aboriginal and/or treaty rights with an important emphasis on going beyond the legal doctrine towards reconciliation (newman, 2014). in addition, while the crown is responsible for its own actions that may affect aboriginal interests, they are also legally responsible for the actions of third parties if they affect aboriginal interest (newman, 2009). procedural elements of the duty to consult can be delegated to third parties—common practice in environmental impact assessments and environmental assessments (eas)—although ultimately the legal responsibility remains with the crown. additional concerns are related to what constitutes consultation; for instance, when first nations community members engage in discussions with project proponents, they are often surprised when that “discussion” is reported as consultation in ea documents. to help avoid this type of outcome, clear and explicitly defined roles in the consultation process need to be identified with the government carrying out the consultation process (newman, 2009). however, this is not always the most cost-effective approach and proponents are apprehensive of anything that would make the cost of the project prohibitive (newman, 2009). thus, the duty to consult continues to be shaped by these types of issues—but what is clear is that it is necessary that all parties show a willingness to participate in a meaningful way in the consultation activities. lastly, it should be emphasized that the duty to consult framework has been built upon case law where, historically, the proponent of the project has been a non-aboriginal organization and the people to be consulted are aboriginal. in 2008, a partnership was created between constance lake first nation (clfn) and northland power incorporated to develop the kabinakagami river run-of-river hydroelectric project. the kabinakagami river is located in northern ontario, canada (figure 1). the river is a tributary of the albany river, a major river system in the mushkegowuk territory (figure 1), and one of the livelihood aquatic highways of the mushkegowuk cree. the mushkegowuk (or omushkego) cree that inhabit the coastal region of the western james bay region of the mushkegowuk territory occupy four first nations (i.e., moose factory, fort albany, kashechewan, and attawapiskat) and one town (moosonee) (figure 2). the project has proceeded through the feasibility, and class ea process under ontario’s environmental assessment act (2010). while the project has advanced through the required permitting stages, and environmental report and screening, there have been significant challenges with respect to the consultative process (or lack thereof) employed with respect to first nations communities downriver of the proposed hydroelectric development (i.e., closer to james bay on the albany river), scoping inadequacies, and restrictive timelines. this case provides a unique situation in that clfn is both the proponent of the new project and subject to the impacts of the development, which begs the question: what is the duty to consult with other potentially impacted aboriginal communities when the proponent of a project is an aboriginal community? 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.4   figure 1. map showing northern ontario, canada with grey shaded area indicating approximate area of the mushkegowuk traditional territory (revised from gardner, tsuji, mccarthy, whitelaw, & tsuji, 2012).   muskegowuk traditional territory 0 100 200km la ke superior hudson bay james bay alb an y r ive r mo ose r iver s ev ern r iver winisk ri ver attawapiskat river o n t a r i o q u e b e c m a n it o b a m an ito ba ontario quebec hudson bay c a n a d a u s a 3 gardner et al.: kabinakagami hydro project environmental assessment: duty to consult published by scholarship@western, 2015   figure 2. map showing the mushkegowuk traditional territory, including existing development and infrastructure (winter road, debeers diamond mine) as well as the proposed kabinakagami river hydro project components.   manitoba ontario quebec hudson bay c a n a d a u s a 0 100 km m oo se ri ve r a lb an y r i v e r at ta wa pi sk at r iv er hearst constance lake kashechewan first nation fort albany first nation moose factory (moose cree first nation) attawapiskat first nation moosonee otter rapids fraserdale abitibi canyon taykwa tagamou (new post) j a m e s b a y h u d s o n b a y q u eb ec ontario akimiski island chickney point longridge point big piskwanisk point north point chickney point ansi southwestern james bay ansi m iss in aib i river highway 11 k a b in a kagam i r iver winter road existing hydro line to be twinned existing hydro line new hydro line muskegowuk traditional territory ansi location victor diamond mine calstock power plant proposed kabinakagami hydro project substation 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.4   the first part of this article will present the context of the case study (i.e., canadian environmental regulation, hydroelectric development in canada, and historical hydroelectric development in the mushkegowuk territory), followed by a brief description of the study area, first nation governance structure, and consultation expectations; the kabinakagami river hydroelectric project case study; research methods used including the evaluative framework, and primary and secondary data sources. finally, the results and discussion section situates the analysis in the context of the legal and ethical duty to consult for this particular case study whereby a first nation community is the co-proponent of the project. the article concludes with recommendations on how to improve outcomes for future projects based on this case. t h e c o n t e x t c a n a d i a n e n v i ro n m e n t a l r e g u l a t i o n the federated system of governance employed in canada divides the responsibility for administering and enforcing laws and statutes between the government of canada (the federal government) and the provincial governments, as detailed in the constitution act of 1857 (original named the british north american act (bna) of 1867). later, the constitution act of 1982 (section 92a) gave jurisdiction over exploration and development of natural resources to the provinces. nonetheless, certain areas of jurisdiction are shared between the government of canada and the provincial governments, as these areas of jurisdiction were specified as being shared between the two levels of government or were not mentioned in the bna 1867. one of these shared areas of responsibility is for the environment, since the environment was not mentioned in the bna 1867. thus, in canada, ea legislation exists at both the federal and provincial levels and can either be harmonized or reviewed on an ad hoc basis. ontario has two types of eas: individual eas and “streamlined” class eas (reviewed in mceachren, whitelaw, mccarthy, & tsuji, 2011). class eas are used for projects that are routinely carried out with predictable and minimal easily managed environmental impacts (mceachren et al., 2011). there are 11 “parent” class eas for different kinds of projects; each parent class ea acts as a framework for conducting a specific type of class ea. in the present case, the parent class ea is for waterpower projects. satisfying the requirements outlined in the class ea clears the way for the relevant approvals and permitting. in canada, much of the environmental regulation associated with the planning, development, and operation of hydroelectricity has, until recently, been realized through the canadian environmental assessment act (ceaa) (fortin, 2001). the first ceaa was enacted in 1992. it has since been a part of the planning, development and operation of a range of projects throughout the country including: oil and gas, hydroelectric power, mining and exploration, and agricultural developments. the requirements of the legislation have led to the emergence of new partnerships and shared ownerships among industry, government and community stakeholders (fortin, 2001). however, proponents became concerned with the stringent requirements, expanding timelines, and capital requirements for ea; likewise, community and stakeholder groups have been concerned about their ability to participate meaningfully in the ea process (kirchhoff, gardner, & tsuji, 2013). significant changes to the ceaa were enacted in 2012 through two omnibus bills,5 c-38 and c-45 (kirchhoff & tsuji, 2014). many of the changes were meant                                                                                                                 5 omnibus bills package together several measures into one, covering a number of diverse and often unrelated topics (goertz, 2011). 5 gardner et al.: kabinakagami hydro project environmental assessment: duty to consult published by scholarship@western, 2015   to streamline the process by reducing the number of projects that required an ea and limiting the timeline to complete an ea to 365 days (gibson, 2012; kirchhoff et al., 2013; kirchhoff & tsuji, 2014). historically, the navigable waters protection act protected waterways and served as a trigger for federal involvement in the ea process, but this changed with the passing of bills c-38 and c-45 (kirchhoff & tsuji, 2014). the number of waterways that were subject to federal protection was significantly reduced from 40,000 lakes and more than 2 million rivers to only approximately 100 lakes and coastlines and 62 rivers (abouchar & vince, 2012; kirchhoff et al., 2013). two very important issues emerged from these changes in canadian environmental legislation with respect to aboriginal people and hydroelectric development—aboriginal peoples’ opportunities to consider, review, and contribute to the ea process were severely limited due to the reduced ea timeline, and the cutting of funding to aboriginal organizations through the passing of other legislation at the federal level (kirchhoff et al., 2013; kirchhoff & tsuji, 2014)—and very few of proposed hydroelectric projects would trigger federal government involvement (kirchhoff & tsuji, 2014). h y d ro e l e c t ri c d e v e l o p m e n t i n c a n a d a canada’s natural resource-based economy has meant that much of the large-scale development that supports economic growth begins in northern, remote, and sparsely populated regions of the country. because these areas are remote, development brings with it a whole suite of infrastructure needs to service these operations. as such, many of the hydroelectric projects in canada are located in remote areas inhabited by aboriginal groups (fortin, 2001), and paves the way for future natural resource development. hydroelectric generation harnesses flowing or falling water. water movement is used to turn turbines; the greater the volume and/or height the water falls, the more energy is produced. projects differ in scale, capacity, and technology. canada has a long history of hydroelectric production that began in 1881 at chaudière falls, ontario and quebec, canada. further, future hydroelectric development to facilitate development of a region was often provided for in treaties, such as treaty no. 9, or hydroelectric power generation was the actual reason for a treaty (i.e., the james bay treaty 1976). today, more than 70,000 mw of hydroelectric power has been developed in 475 generating plants. the top producers are the provinces of quebec, british columbia, manitoba, newfoundland and labrador, and ontario. globally, canada ranks second, only behind china, for hydropower production with 355 twh/year (canadian hydropower association [cha], 2008). hydroelectric development is often touted as a green energy source—being considered a renewable energy resource with relatively low operational and maintenance costs over a long service life—while offering competitive prices, jobs, and economic growth opportunities (cha, 2008). indeed, hydroelectric development in ontario has often been identified as an effective means of supporting growth of the economy in a sustainable way, establishing a long-term revenue stream through the sale of surplus electricity to surrounding markets (cha, 2008; krupa, 2012a). nevertheless, hydroelectric development also has well-established impacts including: habitat and landscape destruction, environmental mercury contamination that detrimentally impacts food systems, and increased greenhouse gas emissions (rosenberg, bodaly, & usher, 1995; rosenberg et al., 1997). this is why the decision-making process related to the establishment of these projects is often described as inadequate (paterson & sears, 1993). thus, contemporary approaches to hydroelectric energy production must 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.4   consider advanced approaches that may more effectively realize the goal of sustainable development, leading to more effective policy frameworks that ensure the social and environmental impacts of hydroelectric development are weighed effectively. considering this type of development also requires navigating important ethical dilemmas related to tensions between development and preservation, the distribution of wealth, rights holders, and social and environmental standards (klimpt, rivero, puranem, & koch, 2002). the decision must be balanced and the early activities of the impact assessment, such as the scoping exercise and “alternatives to,” “alternative means,”6 and “no-go” options must be informed through public participation, and take into consideration past developments and “established scientific practice,” with an awareness of the long-term costs and benefits of the project (klimpt et al., 2002, p. 1309). clarity about potential benefits of the project in terms of social development must be identified, including an understanding of the rights of those directly and indirectly affected by and benefitting from the development (i.e., local communities and those at the regional or national level) (klimpt et al., 2002). many of the hydroelectric projects that have or will be developed in canada are located in areas that are mainly populated by aboriginal people, who in theory should reap the benefits of anticipated employment opportunities and spin-off activities, but bear all the impacts on their social and cultural way of life (fortin, 2001). this is why over-the-years many different approaches to hydroelectric development have been advanced in hopes of improving the process to ensure that aboriginal perspectives are well represented and considered (fortin, 2001). various partnership and revenuesharing agreement schemes have been developed. the proposed gull rapids, notigi, and gull rapids hydroelectric project in manitoba have prioritized collaboration with local aboriginal communities and undertaken discussions to better understand social and environmental impacts to ensure that benefits of these projects are shared between proponent and impacted communities (fortin, 2001). further, the wisichawayasihk cree and manitoba hydro have established the wuskowatim power limited partnership, a benefit sharing agreement that includes business development, other job opportunities, and dividends to be paid to the community (cha, 2008). h i s t o ri c a l h y d ro e l e c t ri c d e v e l o p m e n t i n t h e m u s h ke g o w u k t e rri t o ry the watershed to the south of the albany river is the moose river watershed (figure 1). the moose river is home to the lower mattagami river hydroelectric complex that includes four generating plants: smoky falls (built in 1931), little long (1963), harmon (1965), and kipling (1966). these facilities are operated by ontario power generation (opg) and are within the mushkegowuk territory. this complex has recently been redeveloped to achieve greater efficiency (opg and moose cree first nation, 2009). the redevelopment was bound by the requirements outlined in the northern rivers agreement, an obligation made by the government of ontario with respect to hydroelectric                                                                                                                 6 scoping is an “early component of the eia process used to identify important issues and parameters that should be included in the assessment” (noble, 2010, p. 267). alternatives to refer “to different ways of addressing the problem at hand or meeting the proposed project objectives; renewable energy, for example, would be considered an ‘alternative to’ a proposed coal-fired generating plant” (noble, 2010, p. 260). alternative means refers to “different ways of carrying out a proposed project—typically alternative location, timing of activities, or engineering design” (noble, 2010, p. 260). 7 gardner et al.: kabinakagami hydro project environmental assessment: duty to consult published by scholarship@western, 2015   development on northern ontario rivers. the agreement required that any consideration of extension of this project be carried out through a co-planning process between the government of ontario and first nations affected by the project.7 any future governments are bound to this commitment in consideration of future hydroelectric development. the agreement also required the initiation of negotiations between ontario hydro (created by the government of ontario) and first nations to reconcile past grievances over the initial development (ministry of environment and energy, 1993). potential hydroelectric development has been identified throughout the province of ontario and includes several high yielding sites throughout the mushkegowuk territory. two sites, hat island and chard river, have been identified along the albany river to have the potential to produce 490mw and 370mw, respectively (ontario waterpower association [owa], 2005). these two sites are considered to be the only feasible sites within the policy constraint area as a result of the northern rivers commitment. the sites remain feasible because they have economic potential, could be designed to operate with minimal flooding, and would require minimal additional infrastructure as a result of proximity to the moose river complex. however, development of these sites would require a discussion with first nations if the projects were to advance (owa, 2005). among the rivers in ontario recently evaluated for hydroelectric development, the albany river has one of the greatest projected potentials of about 2,300 mw (owa, 2005). there have been three diversions of the albany river. the lake st. joseph diversion built in 1935 redirects water from the albany river watershed into lac seul. the volume of water is estimated to be 80 m3/s (lake of the woods control board, 2002; see also george, 2007). in 1939, the long lake diversion was completed. this project diverted the flow of the kenogami river, a tributary of the albany river, from north to south through long lake to empty into lake superior (day, bridger, peet, & frieson, 1982). the ogoki river, another tributary of the albany river, was diverted to flow south to lake nipigon and then into the great lakes basin. the volume of water diverted has been estimated to be 113 m3/s; this diversion became operational in 1943 (day et al., 1982). the development of this project resulted in the inundation of pristine lands up to 40 feet above the natural levels (day et al., 1982).                                                                                                                   7 the northern river agreement applies to the moose, attawapiskat, albany, and winisk rivers and requires a co-planning process between government of ontario and local first nations be carried out for any hydroelectric development greater than 25 mw (ontario water association [owa], 2005). “[o]ur government would agree that there will be no hydroelectric development of greater than 25 megawatts (mw) installed capacity within the basins of the attawapiskat, albany and weenusk [sic] rivers. hydroelectric proposals of less than 25 mw installed capacity would be considered if they were proposed by, or directly consented to, by the potentially affected first nation.” further the letter indicated that the agreement “bind present and future provincial and first nations government” (ministry of environment and energy, 1993, para. 4). this requirement is repeated in ontario ministry of natural resources’ (mnr) site release policy “[a]t this time, individual developments greater than 25mw will not be considered within the basins of the severn, winisk, attawapiskat and albany rivers” (mnr, 2004, section 3.2). 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.4   s t u d y a re a a n d c a s e ba c kg ro u n d t h e f i rs t n a t i o n s the omushkego cree have occupied the mushkegowuk territory of southwestern hudson bay and western james bay for millennia (figures 1 and 2). the omushkego cree signed treaty no. 9 between 1905 and 1906, and the adhesions to treaty no. 9 between 1929 and 1930. this region has a population of approximately 10,000 omushkego cree. locally elected chiefs and councils govern individual first nations communities, with terms of office being determined at the community-level. the communities in the region have road access only during the winter months via an ice-and-snow road, and rely on air transport for the rest of the year, while the river is used throughout the ice-free season for travel. the community that we are focusing on is fort albany first nation, located on sinclair island in the albany river. the community has a population of approximately 950 people. kashechewan first nation is located just north of fort albany, on the north shore of the albany river (figure 2). both communities maintain a traditional lifestyle that depends on the albany river and tributaries as their “highways” for traditional pursuits and the lifeblood of their communities. as mentioned previously, elected chiefs and councils govern first nations at the local level. tribal councils are formed by several regional first nations and represent regional interests; while, supraregional first nation organizations are formed when several tribal councils come together. there are also provincial-level first nations organizations (e.g., chiefs of ontario) composed of these supraregional first nations organization, and the assembly of first nations (afn) represents national interests for most first nation organizations. all of these bodies have a role in advocating for first nation people— contributing to policy development, and representing first nations’ positions at various levels of government—and providing support and leadership among member communities. of relevance to the present case study is one regional first nations organization, the mushkegowuk tribal council or simply mushkegowuk council, and one supra-regional governing body, nishnawbe aski nation (nan). each organization has a well-defined consultation policy that serves to identify the expectations and guiding principles for the duty to consult process. m u s h ke g o w u k t ri b a l c o u n c i l / m u s h ke g o w u k c o u n c i l mushkegowuk council represents the cree communities in the western james bay region including the coastal communities of attawapiskat, kashechewan, fort albany, and moose cree, and the inland communities of chapleau, missinabie, and taykwa tagamou nation (formerly new post first nation). mushkegowuk council’s main purpose is to provide support to member communities through a collective governance structure (mushkegowuk council, 2012). in 2007, the mushkegowuk council chiefs endorsed “the mushkegowuk resource development protocol” with the purpose of outlining the process to identify, track, and evaluate proposed development in their traditional territory. the protocol has since been amended and also affirmed in 2009 (mushkegowuk council, 2009). the principles of the protocol include key points, such as development activities have to be consistent with the continuation of cultural traditions, and values and laws have to be aligned with aboriginal and treaty rights. further, accountability for the range of potential impacts on social, economic, and environmental systems must be built into the development 9 gardner et al.: kabinakagami hydro project environmental assessment: duty to consult published by scholarship@western, 2015   process along with an effective communication system of all those involved. figure 3 shows the cycle for receipt, review, and decision making as supported by the mushkegowuk council protocol. the protocol was designed to reflect the holistic worldview of the mushkegowuk people with the intention of establishing an agreed upon and consistent process throughout their traditional territory (mushkegowuk council, 2009). the protocol considers and incorporates varying levels of complexity within projects. complexities may arise—based on different scenarios—and the protocol provides a centralized application process through mushkegowuk council. this process is meant to allow the facilitation and coordination of technical and other resources at the regional level, allowing for the enactment of regional decisions and the monitoring of projects. the project review is a collaborative process under this protocol including a regional working group made up of mushkegowuk council’s lands and resources staff and representatives from impacted communities. finally, the proponent has the responsibility to cover the costs associated with the application (mushkegowuk council, 2009). since 2009, additional resolutions have been passed by mushkegowuk council to support the protocol in light of ongoing and emerging issues. of relevance to the kabinakagami river hydroelectric project is the issue of development impacts extending into the mushkegowuk territory even though the development may be situated outside the boundaries of the mushkegowuk territory. the mushkegowuk council resolution entitled unity concerning resource development identified key issues important for the advancement of development in the mushkegowuk territory, such as benefits and revenue sharing, and the need to develop a process whereby unity could be achieved with groups outside the traditional territory of mushkegowuk council (mushkegowuk council, 2010). a critical first step to advance inter-jurisdictional cooperation was established through the “joint declaration of the mushkegowuk first nations and matawa first nations,”8 which highlights the interconnectedness of the two groups based on familial relations, shared historical agreements, and shared environment. priorities were affirmed, such as the push for observance of the promises outlined in treaty no. 9; the continued enjoyment of traditional activities; and the advancement of free, prior, and informed consent with respect to development including the sharing of information and strategies to achieve the shared goals of the people (mushkegowuk council, 2011). n i s h n a w b e a s ki n a t i o n nishnawbe aski nation (nan) is a supra-regional organization established in 1973, representing 49 first nations communities that are signatories of treaties no. 5 and 9 in the province of ontario. this organization provides a collective governing body among all of the nan chiefs (of first nation member-communities) and serves as a liaison with other government institutions and offices, at both the provincial and federal levels. the tribal councils counted among the members of nan are as follows: independent first nations alliance, keewaytinook okimakinak, matawa first nations, mushkegowuk council, shibogama first nations council, wabun tribal council, windigo first nations council, and independent bands. the nan territory is vast and encompasses two-thirds of ontario’s landmass (nan, 2007).                                                                                                                 8 matawa first nations include aroland first nation, constance lake first nation, eabametoong first nation, ginoogaming first nation, hornepayne first nation, long lake #58 first nation, marten falls indian reserve #65, neskantaga first nation, nibinamik first nation, and webequie first nation. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.4   figure 3. the resource development protocol framework of the mushkegowuk tribal council including attawapiskat, kashechewan, fort albany, moose cree, chapleau, missinabie, and taykwa tagamou nation (mushkegowuk council, 2009, p. 3). the nan consultation policy was ratified in 2001; it was meant to be used as a guide for both government involvement in policy development, as well as a guide to the way resource development should be carried out by proponents of these development projects (nan, 2007). the nan policy identifies the community likely to be impacted the most as the priority for early contact. the responsibility for consultation is centred on the crown, with the consultation process being advanced in a respectful and meaningful way. the policy also distinguishes between consultation and notification. nan (2007) identified consultation as an “information-sharing and issue-resolution” process carried out in advance of authorizations, approvals, and permits, as opposed to a notification process, which occurs after approvals have been made (p. 18). appropriate consultation is characterized by early notice, and a process that is open, transparent, and inclusive, providing for financial resources to the first nation or organizations to help facilitate meaningful participation; the process is also described as being flexible to reflect community needs whereby rights infringement are adequately considered, accommodated, and reconciled with the responsibility of the process remaining with the government (nan, 2007). august 2009 mushkegowuk council mushkegowuk council forwards the application to potentially impacted first nations review by staff, regional working group and potentially affected first nations communication and input decision point for scenarios 1 & 2 (reject – and state reasons why– or move forward) detailed review for scenario 3 (by staff – all fn have an opportunity to comment) decision point (reject/approve) approval with conditions (especially monitoring) review, modify and enforce post-monitoring external processes (environmental assessments) chapleau cree attawapiskat fort albany kashechewan missanabie cree moose cree taykwa tagamou weenusk one point of entry – application / proposal submitted to mushkegowuk council grand chief’s office figure 1: framework of the resource development protocol 4 key elements of the protocol 4.1 the framework for the resource development protocol is circular and represents the holistic worldview of the mushkegowuk. the protocol process is illustrated in figure 1. 4.2 there will be a clear and consistent application process for all new resource development activities in the mushkegowuk territory. 4.3 there will be different levels of application that will reflect the complexity of the project being proposed. all applications will be submitted through mushkegowuk council. 4.4 applications will be reviewed by a combination of staff, the affected communities and a regional working group with representatives from each first nation. 4.5 technical resources and specialists will be coordinated through mushkegowuk council. mushkegowuk resource development protocol 3 11 gardner et al.: kabinakagami hydro project environmental assessment: duty to consult published by scholarship@western, 2015   taking into account the varying complexity and potential impacts of individual projects requires thorough consideration of the nan protocol, as the proponents of a project need to demonstrate not only meaningful consultation, but also community benefits with limited environmental damage and adequate compensation based on infringement (nan, 2007). the process is concluded when the membership reaches an informed decision and provides consent (nan, 2007). a 10-step process is outlined by nan (2007) that incorporates the above requirements: 1. initiation 2. notice 3. information exchange 4. technical resourcing 5. communication 6. information gathering by first nation 7. analysis 8. negotiation/accommodation 9. impasse or reconciliation 10. benefits. (p. 22) k a b i n a ka g a m i r i v e r h y d ro e l e c t ri c d e v e l o p m e n t the proposed kabinakagami river hydroelectric project is the product of a partnership between northland power inc. and clfn (hatch, 2013b). the physical installation includes access roads and four power-generation facilities—neeskah (goose), peeshoo (lynx), wapeestan (marten), and wapoose (rabbit)—each site would consist of an earth-filled dam with various structures to control flow intake, outlet, and power generation (hatch, 2013b). collectively, the project is designed to produce 26 mw with transmission line installation to connect to the main ontario power grid (figure 3; hatch, 2013b). there are three main environmental approvals required for the project: • class ea for waterpower projects (owa, 2012). • class ea for resource stewardship and facility development projects, which relates to the transmission line that will be located on crown land (mnr, 2003). • a water management plan (wmp) under the lakes and rivers improvement act (owa, 2012). 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.4   initially, the kabinakagami river hydroelectric development project had requirements under the canadian environmental assessment act (ceaa, 1992) requiring a federal-level environmental screening related to the fisheries act (1985) and navigable waters protection act (now called the navigation protection act, 1985). however, changes to the ceaa in 2012 meant that those requirements were no longer a consideration (kirchhoff & tsuji, 2014). nonetheless, the final environmental report for the project addresses both the provincial requirements and the federal environmental screening requirements (hatch, 2013b). the class ea for waterpower projects includes a categorization of the project, concept, definition, assessment, documentation, and implementation requirements (owa, 2012). this class ea allows for integration with other legislative requirements, and is submitted and subject to review under the individual review process (owa, 2012). the advancement of the class ea process is also meant to provide opportunities to incorporate the consideration of other legislative requirements. in addition, the kabinakagami river hydroelectric project proposes the installation of a transmission line that transects crown land and therefore requires a class ea for minor transmission facilities. these two class ea processes are coordinated in one report to improve the transparency and efficiency of the process (owa, 2012). the kabinakagami river project is considered to be within an unmanaged waterway (hatch, 2012)—a category b, class ea that is thought to have the broadest impacts—and therefore require greater aboriginal community involvement and agency interest (owa, 2012). these types of projects require four notifications, which are meant to fit into the targeted final report timeline of 12 to 24 months (owa, 2012): 1. notice of commencement is meant to inform all potentially affected parties, including landowners, aboriginal communities, regional moe, mnr offices, government agencies, municipalities, interest groups, and the president of owa of projects. 2. notice of inspection (to parties who have expressed an interest or participated and additional parties at the discretion of the proponent) for unmanaged waterways provide an additional opportunity to review the environmental report for 30 days (unless extended by the proponent). 3. notice of completion is issued once the input provided has been considered and the environmental report is finalized, a 30-day period for comment follows as well as requests for part ii orders. the proponent can extend this period; they can determine that further consultation is required based on outstanding issues. 4. statement of completion notice includes a description of outstanding issues following the notice of completion 30-day review period. once these issues are addressed, and as long as no part ii order is received, the statement of completion can be submitted and the final environmental report made available. this is the conclusion of the ea process and further permit and approval processes can be carried out. while the above notification forms the basis of the mandatory requirements for the proponents, proponents are also meant to consider the context of the proposed project including the geography and 13 gardner et al.: kabinakagami hydro project environmental assessment: duty to consult published by scholarship@western, 2015   timing. the principles that guide this consultation process should include mutual respect, clarity, transparency, flexibility, trust, and certainty (owa, 2012). r e s e a rc h m e t h o d s the mandatory criteria required for the fulfillment of the duty to consult legal obligation under the province of ontario environmental legislation—and the non-obligatory criteria put forward by the mushkegowuk first nations at the community, regional, and supra-regional levels—form the backbone of our evaluative framework on whether duty to consult was met with the kabinakagami river project. our framework includes two levels of consultation: there is the legal obligation of the proponent whether aboriginal or non-aboriginal, and then there is the ethical obligation inherent in the dealings of one aboriginal group with another. we believe the latter should be at the highest standard, as it is the way that aboriginal people want non-aboriginal groups to interact with them (sistili, metatawabin, iannucci, & tsuji, 2006); these better practices criteria are described in table 1. these criteria (mandatory and better practices) were used to structure our evaluation of the kabinakagami river project. primary information was collected using the culturally appropriate semi-directed interviews (tsuji et al., 2007). interviews were conducted with the current deputy chief and chief of fort albany first nation, and the former chief of fort albany first nation, as communication concerning the kabinakagami river hydroelectric project was always directed toward these community leaders. all participants gave oral consent, and interviews were in english, although the option of an interview in cree was open. all available relevant written documents for the case study were obtained and evaluated. these documents included: ea documents, the record of communications compiled by the community leaders and mushkegowuk council, relevant band and tribal council resolutions, joint declarations, and consultation protocols. a themed deductive analysis of the interview and written record was performed, framed by the criteria (table 1) needed to satisfy the class ea process for this type of development in order to gain government of ontario approval, and the better practices informed from aboriginal organizations. r e s u l t s a n d d i s c u s s i o n the chronology of the major milestones and requirements associated with the kabinakagami river class ea project is presented in table 2. reference is made throughout the ea process to the “aboriginal engagement plan and public consultation plan” (hatch, 2013a). this plan guides the delivery of information, mandatory notification, and what information, if any, will be collected as part of the planning process. the aboriginal communities identified by northland and clfn in the aboriginal engagement plan to be consulted with included: clfn, hornepayne first nation, fort albany first nation, kashechewan first nation, métis nation of ontario, and cochrane northern lights métis council. however, clfn was identified as the community whose traditional lands would be directly affected by the project. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.4   t a b l e 1 . c h a ra c t e ri s t i c s o f a n e f f e c t i v e c o n s u l t a t i o n pro c e s s f o r h y d ro e l e c t ri c pro j e c t s i n v o l v i n g f i rs t n a t i o n s c o m m u n i t i e s c ri t e ri a d e s c ri p t i o n timeline to be initiated and carried out as early as possible in the project planning and assessment process. allow for adequate time for communities to gather additional information and understand the potential impacts of the development on their aboriginal and treaty rights. information respectful, timely, comprehensive, and reciprocal information (indigenous knowledge and “western” science) exchange prior to government decision-making, authorization, permits, or licenses are issued. notification is not consultation. means providing the means to allow for participation in the process. this is necessary to ensure equality between industry, first nations, government, and industry. financial, technical, and human resources are necessary to ensure that first nations are able to fully understand and participate. flexibility/ transparency towards accommodation and reconciliation. a process that shows openness to accommodate additional information requests, communications, and thorough consideration of suggestions brought forward by the first nations to improve the project, achieve greater benefit to the communities or mitigate impacts, or compensate. note. compiled from characteristics used to describe an effective consultation process in the nishnawbe aski nation handbook on consultation in natural resource development (nan, 2007), reaching effective consultation, (anishinabek/ontario resource management council, 2003), the resource development protocol of the mushkegowuk tribal council (mushkegowuk council, 2009), and the ontario water association environmental assessment guidelines (owa, 2012).   15 gardner et al.: kabinakagami hydro project environmental assessment: duty to consult published by scholarship@western, 2015   t a b l e 2 . c h ro n o l o g y o f e v e n t s t o t h e d e v e l o p m e n t o f t h e k a b i n a ka g a m i h y d ro e l e c t ri c r i v e r pro j e c t d a t e m i l e s t o n e may 2007 clfn and northland power inc. commence discussions regarding development of up to 8 waterpower sites on the kabinakagami river. july 2008 clfn and northland power inc. sign first letter of intent to develop a project on the kabinakagami river. november 17, 2008 agreement signed between hatch inc. (consulting company) and northland power inc. (terms and conditions). april 2009 applications submitted to the ontario mnr to obtain rights to pursue development on crown land under the direct site release process for 8 waterpower plants. hatch inc. retained to prepare pre-feasibility engineering study and commence baseline environmental field investigations. november 2009 clfn and northland power inc. sign formal agreement to proceed with the project. november 2009 applications for feed in tariff (fit) contracts for seven (7) sites submitted to the ontario power authority's (opa) fit program. december 2009 hatch inc. prepares prefeasibility study document (design information on project description document is the same from the prefeasibility study). june 2010 mnr provides a site information package (sip), which identifies potential stakeholders. the project description document stated, "aboriginal engagement and public consultation plans have been prepared to identify the consultation processes that will occur" (hatch, 2011, p. 1-2). the project description lists fort albany first nation as one of the stakeholders to be consulted for this ea. it also stated, "all agencies and stakeholders listed in table 1.1 will be sent an introductory letter and copy of the notice of commencement" (hatch, 2011, p. 1-2). june 17, 2010 notification of kabinakagami river hydroelectric project given to fort albany first nation from clfn and northland inc. june 23, 2010 notice of site release (mnr’s waterpower site release process) posted in newspapers. clfn sent notice as part of mnr’s duty to consult during applicant of record review stage. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.4   d a t e m i l e s t o n e june 26, 2010 workshop held at clfn to provide community members with information on the proposed project. july 22, 2010 site release process letter sent from mnr to fort albany first nation, kashechewan first nation, hornepayne first nation, northern lights métis council, and métis nation of ontario. june 20, 2011 all agency kick-off meeting held at the mnr office in hearst, on. federal agencies involved included department of fisheries and oceans (dfo), transport canada (tc), aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc), and natural resources canada (nrc) (hatch, 2012b, appendix c8 included minutes of the meeting). november 11, 2011 public notice of commencement, notice of water management plan. november 2011 open community meeting held at clfn—“community voted to move forward with the project” (hatch, 2012, pp. 2-21). november 21, 2011 notice of public information centre #1 (sent from niagara falls, on, meeting held in hearst, on). december 2, 2011 hatch inc. receives email with “scoping document for federal screening of the kabinakagami river hydroelectric project.” december 6, 2011 first public information centre (pic) held in hearst. december 6, 2011 “all-agency” (federal and provincial) meeting held in hearst (however, only nrc attended, via teleconference, only for a short duration of the meeting due to bad connection). december 11, 2011 follow-up meeting for all-agency meeting (june 2011) mnr, clfn, ontario ministry of environment (moe), northland, and hatch inc. december 13, 2011 teleconference held regarding the scoping document with federal agencies including canadian environmental assessment agency (ceaa), dfo, tc, environment canada (ec), and nrc. mnr and moe also participated in the call. 17 gardner et al.: kabinakagami hydro project environmental assessment: duty to consult published by scholarship@western, 2015   d a t e m i l e s t o n e december 14, 2011 federal notice of commencement under the canadian environmental assessment act (screening environmental assessment (ea))—dfo and tc involved. december 19, 2011 notice of public information center #2 (sent from niagara falls, held january 11 in hearst, on). january 11, 2012 second public information centre (pic) held in hearst. february 1, 2012 the draft er was provided to ceaa, dfo, tc, ec, nrc, and health canada (hc) for review and comments. march 1, 2012 teleconference held with the federal review team to discuss the project and the draft environmental report (er). the draft er was revised to address the preliminary comments received from the federal agencies before issuing the notice of inspection. april 11, 2012 notice of inspection (under the ontario water association class ea) issued including draft ea—30-day review period runs from april 13 until may 14, 2012. july 2012 environmental screening (federal trigger) no longer required resulting from changes to the canadian environmental assessment act (2012). february 5, 2013 final er for the kabinakagami river hydro project was released. february 27, 2013 second part ii order (bump-up) request sent by chief rex knapysweet, fort albany first nation to minister of environment (first request was made in may 2012, following notice of inspection, which was deferred as it was submitted too early in the process and should follow the final er). january 2015 anticipated commercial operation date. note. taken from the kabinakagami river project revised from hatch, 2012, 2013b; ongoing correspondence provided by chief rex knapysweet.   18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.4   table 3 also follows the ea process but is specific to communication between constance lake first nation, and fort albany and kashechewan first nations. the chronology of events shows that the required notifications and information sessions were carried out as a mandatory part of the process. some of the relevant meetings involving responsible authorities and government officials with an interest in the project are also included. it is also important to note that throughout the ea process for this project there were significant issues related to clfn community support and changes in community leadership in clfn and fort albany first nation, as well as kashechewan first nation that further complicate inter-community communication. moreover, there was a majority vote against the project in clfn in august 2010. however, it was not until february 2011, when inac (now known as aandc) indicated that the clfn chief and council could, as elected officials, decide to advance the project irrespective of the community membership vote. in june of 2011, clfn elected a new chief (roger wesley) and replaced three band council members. in the summer of 2012, fort albany first nation and kashechewan first nation elected new chiefs and councils. the new chiefs and councils faced significant challenges in coming up to speed with respect to the various areas of responsibility related to the ea process. c ri t e ri o n 1 t i m e l i n e the class ea guidelines outline a 12 to 24 month timeline to carry out the process. this presents a problem in many communities with the limited resources, both technical and financial, and especially impacts northern canadian communities. geography and timelines are always a complicating factor in remote areas. indeed, the first notification of the project was provided to fort albany first nation and all potentially affected first nation communities in june 2010, while the partnership between northland and clfn was formalized in july of 2008. in addition, fort albany first nation made a request for direct consultation in december 2011 following the first public information session held in hearst, ontario. a meeting with fort albany first nation and kashechewan first nation was held in fort albany on february 21, 2012, and was attended by chief and band council members from clfn, fort albany first nation, kashechewan first nation, representatives from northland, and the mnr. however, hatch inc., the consulting firm responsible for drafting the technical documents and delivering the public information centre (pic) session, was not present. the draft ea was released shortly thereafter in april 2012. fort albany first nation submitted several comments detailing their concerns. while fort albany first nation expressed an openness to host further community consultation, no sessions were scheduled by clfn. a new chief and council were elected in fort albany first nation in august of 2012, and several attempts were made to organize community consultation between december 5, 2012 and february 2013 with clfn. the final environmental report was released on february 5, 2013, ending any opportunity for meaningful consultation. dates for a community meeting in fort albany first nation were finally advanced for the weeks of february 11th and 25th, following the announcement of the final environmental report. 19 gardner et al.: kabinakagami hydro project environmental assessment: duty to consult published by scholarship@western, 2015   t a b l e 3 . c h ro n o l o g y o f c o m m u n i c a t i o n a n d c o m m u n i t y i n f o rm a t i o n w i t h a f f e c t e d f i rs t n a t i o n s date description/notes april – may 2009 traditional environmental knowledge interviews conducted with constance lake first nation (clfn) members. october 2009 through discussions with clfn, it was decided to reduce the number of proposed facilities to 7, due to environmental concerns associated with one of the proposed sites at roger's road landing. august 17, 2010 clfn holds referendum to discuss the project (105 against and 97 for the project). december 2010 aandc, at the time known as indian and northern affairs canada (inac), provides a letter indicating that the referendum could only be classified as an expression of interest, and says that, ultimately, the decision lies with the elected leadership of clfn. february 2011 clfn chief and band council (based on aandc’s letter) decide to move ahead with the project. february 24, 2011 information meeting for clfn members in thunder bay area was held in thunder bay, on. june 2011 clfn local elections—new chief elected (roger wesley) and three new band council members. december 6, 2011 chief solomon of fort albany first nation requests direct consultation with his community and kashechewan first nation, and an additional information session with these communities. december 8, 2011 two open houses held at clfn to provide additional information to the clfn membership regarding the proposed project. january 14, 2012 open house held at clfn school gymnasium. february 21, 2012 meeting in fort albany between clfn chief and band council members, representatives from northland, mnr, and the chiefs and representatives from the band councils of fort albany first nation and kashechewan first nation. march 16, 2012 letter from william armstrong (ontario ministry of environment (moe), southwest region) to noel boucher (hatch inc.) taking issue with geography, language boundaries, and that, so far, the process has not included meaningful or effective aboriginal consultation. 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.4   date description/notes may 11, 2012 chief solomon of fort albany first nation submits a request to minister jim bradley (ontario ministry of environment) for a bump-up to an individual environmental assessment and comments on draft class ea report based on, among other things, the duty to consult not being met. july 12, 2012 letter received from clfn responding to bump up request because it should be submitted once the final environmental report has been submitted. concerns outlined were forwarded to proponents and clfn responded. august 15, 2012 letter to chief andrew solomon of fort albany first nation from jim bradley (minister of environment) declining request for part ii order (bump-up) and indicating that the proponent would consider revising the draft ea and the time to request the part ii order is during the notice of completion public review period. august 2012 election of new chief and council fort albany first nation. december 5, 2012 clfn letter sent to organize an information session in kashechewan first nation and fort albany first nation. december 5, 2012 chief of kasheschewan responds suggesting a meeting in the new year. december 13, 2012 chief rex knapaysweet of fort albany responds indicating open availability for meeting. december 18, 2012 information was requested to determine staff members who could act as point of contact through the information session planning process. response from fort albany making thomas scott (deputy chief) the point of contact. january 15, 2013 clfn suggests advancing to possible dates in february once the ice road along the coast of james bay is operational to hold the information session. january 21, 2013 cfln sends follow-up email expressing some concern over lack of response and suggesting february 11th to the 15th and february 25th to march 1st, 2013. february 5, 2013 final environmental report for the kabinakagami river hydroelectric project was released. february 25, 2013 chief of cfln sends an official letter updating the project. the environmental report had been finalized. describes importance and community consultation and numerous attempts to set up community meetings and requests efforts be made to schedule these. february 27, 2013 second part ii order (bump-up) request sent by chief rex knapysweet of fort albany first nation to minister of environment. note. source hatch, 2012, 2013b; ongoing correspondence provided by chief rex knapysweet. 21 gardner et al.: kabinakagami hydro project environmental assessment: duty to consult published by scholarship@western, 2015   it is clear that fort albany first nation had expressed an interest and an expectation of being consulted as part of this project early on in the process (i.e., before the legislated ea report review period). little opportunity for meaningful consultation was incorporated into the aboriginal engagement plan that also guided information sharing and communication with clfn. the requirements outlined in the owa guidelines as part of the class ea include specific notification timelines for “stakeholders” and aboriginal consultation, which was followed in the case of clfn. aboriginal consultation with clfn in the kabinakagami project meant traditional ecological knowledge (tek) studies, workshops, notifications, meetings for off-reserve members, liaison staff, multiple meetings with chief and council, door-to-door notification of meetings, community information centres, as well as personal notice of commencement, draft report for inspection, and notice of completion. however, when describing the consultation and engagement strategy for “other first nations” (hornepayne first nation, fort albany first nation, kashechewan first nation, métis nation of ontario, and cochrane northern lights métis council) engagement is limited to the mandatory notifications, with an option for additional meetings if requested. the guidelines also recognize the need to consider the context of the project including timelines and geography. the principles that guide the consultation frameworks, for both the nan and mc protocol, highlight the importance of early notice of first nations that may be impacted, so that resources can be made available to participate, with flexibility being incorporated in the process. the location of the information session in hearst, ontario, highlights an existing shortcoming of this class ea process whereby northern first nation people have to fly out of their home communities at great expense and on little notice to attend a consultation session supposedly put on for their benefit. this case clearly demonstrates why class ea frameworks developed and designed in southern ontario should not be applied to northern ontario carte blanche (mceachren et al., 2011). the circumstances related to environmental issues, geographic location, infrastructure, data, and capacity are completely different (mceachren et al., 2011). the strict timelines incorporated into the ea process here are completely inappropriate. at the very least, the proponents must take into account the unique logistical requirements that relate to the geography of the area and provide participant funding, if they want to demonstrate a commitment to meaningful and effective consultation. in moving forward, the minister of environment has yet to respond to the second part ii order (bumpup) request submitted in february 2013. if the minister orders a bump-up, the project would be subject to an individual ea, requiring more time and adding greater uncertainty into the feasibility of the project under the present scheduling. perhaps the ontario minister of environment would require consent for this project by affected downstream communities. 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.4   c ri t e ri o n 2 i n f o rm a t i o n information exchange figures prominently in the advancement of the project with a clear primary purpose in the current case being placed on informing clfn to cultivate community support, solicit input to shape the project, and advance community benefits. prior to the notification of the project being sent, the tek interviews were carried out with clfn members (april to may 2009). the report detailing the process carried out indicated that no responses were received following the notice of commencement from representatives of aboriginal communities (november 2011) (hatch, 2013b (section 2, p. 3). this assertion is not based on facts, as fort albany first nation had already expressed an interest in the project well in advance of the notice of commencement. raymond ferris (clfn) expressed this interest in a meeting discussing the early development of the project (unpublished minutes of meeting between northland power inc. and the ministry of natural resources regarding the kabinakagami river hydro project 2009 field investigation results that was held at the mnr office in hearst, ontario. representatives from the mnr, constance lake first nation, northland power, wesa and hatch (consulting) february 26, 2010; see also hatch, 2013b, appendix c8, p. 63). in addition, the chief of fort albany sent an official request for direct consultation with his community in december of 2011. the leadership of fort albany first nation indicated that they would prefer an initial meeting with clfn leadership, as well as a community information session in fort albany first nation. a meeting was held between northland power inc., clfn, and fort albany first nation leadership on february 21, 2012. the initial meeting would allow the fort albany first nation leadership to evaluate the nature of the project and assess their own needs to effectively participate in future discussions. the draft ea was released on april 11, 2012. immediately following the release, fort albany first nation submitted a long list of questions and concerns as part of a part ii order bump-up request. concerns were related to the following issues: duty to consult; lack of scientific evidence presented describing water quality; lack of mitigation regarding “fish passages;” lack of consideration of water temperature changes and changes in river ice regimes as a result of the development; inadequacies related to consideration of cumulative effects; and approach to boundary selection for study. hatch inc. responded to the concerns indicating that no further study would take place, nor would there be further consideration of changes to the design, or changes to boundary selection. the response did indicate that the proponents would hold one additional meeting with the community members in fort albany first nation and kashechewan first nation. however, efforts to provide information sessions in the communities (december 2012 to february 2013) did not materialize until within weeks of announcing the final environmental assessment on february 25, 2013. information sessions must form an important part of the project development process. as mentioned in the background section of this article, there is a small window of time in the western james bay region where access to the coastal communities is logistically easier and more affordable along a seasonal snowice road that connects the southern terminus of rail transportation in moosoneee, ontario to the james bay coastal communities. notices of public information sessions were all sent within a two-week window of the session, and it must be emphasized that mail (and courier) service is not reliable in this region. this fact would have been common knowledge to leadership of clfn. further, each of the notices was mailed from niagara falls, ontario, so if mail service was good for this particular case, the notices would have arrived before the actual sessions, but the timing would have put notification within days of the information session, which is exactly what happened. this is a very short period of time to 23 gardner et al.: kabinakagami hydro project environmental assessment: duty to consult published by scholarship@western, 2015   arrange and schedule transport for community leadership and membership to the information sessions located in southern ontario. in addition, fort albany first nation and kashechewan first nation are located in a remote area of northern ontario, and travelling to the locations for information sessions in constance lake and hearst, ontario, would represent a significant expense with respect to flights and accommodation, in the thousands of dollars per person range. the cost of travelling is prohibitive for band council and even more so for community members. this limits the ability of community members to attend information sessions outside of the community, which would be known by clfn leadership. there is some dispute related to the degree of impact directly from the project that will be experienced related to traditional activities of first nations people downstream, in this case from the proposed project on the albany river. the proponents have advanced the position that fort albany first nation is 400 km downstream from the project, a distance beyond any possible impacts. in addition, they argued that the water from the kabinakagami river contributes less than 3% of the source water to the albany river (hatch, 2012), though no source for this information is cited in the report. it is well known that fort albany first nation and kashechewan first nation are located a distance downstream of the proposed project, however, the traditional activities (e.g., moose hunting, fishing) of people from this region extends inland to the kabinakagami river. assessing the degree of impact based on the proximity of the settlement area to the sited resource development project is not appropriate, as significant subsistence activities are undertaken all along the albany river. in addition, the tek study for this project was only carried out with a small number of community members and they were all from clfn, further narrowing the information used to inform this report. relevant tek held by members of fort albany first nation and kashechewan first nation was not represented in the report. clearly, the legal requirements of the duty to consult were not met in this process, let alone the higher standards that should be in place where one of the proponents is a first nation organization. the lack of adequate community meetings—the siting and timing of project information meetings—and the advanced state of the project when the other first nations were notified do not even meet the minimum standard for information sharing. it is difficult to understand this oversight when considering the context of the development: a first nation co-proponent of a project with potential impact on treaty rights with respect to neighbouring first nation communities. further, there were two overarching governance structures in place—nan and mc—clfn is not a member but has made joint declarations regarding development impacts, both with established consultation protocols and extensive institutional experience. yet, none of these protocols were implemented nor the first nations guiding principles reflected in the spirit of these documents. this raises serious questions about the comprehension of the nan and mc protocols and their “legitimacy,” if first nations that have supported them in principle do not support them in practice. 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.4   c ri t e ri o n 3 m e a n s outside of provision of information upon request and mandatory notification, there was no provision of financial, technical, or human resources being provided outside of the community of clfn; clfn was even provided a liaison position. indeed, no financial resources were made available to assist community leadership or community members of other first nations to attend public information centres held in hearst, ontario, to receive information, or to provide input regarding ongoing concerns. a digital copy of the information used during the information session was provided to fort albany first nation, but no actual support to understand this information was provided. also, there was no mention of providing means to surrounding first nations to attend or participate in the collection of tek data about areas of cultural, spiritual, or environmental importance to be used to inform the development of the project at the time that these studies were carried out (april to may 2009). c ri t e ri o n 4 f l e x i b i l i t y / t ra n s p a re n c y the aboriginal engagement plan was meant to provide an opportunity for aboriginal communities to be informed about the project, provide tek, identify important cultural and spiritual site information, identify areas of special interest, and communicate issues of concern present in the affected community related to the project. the aboriginal engagement plan for this project described transparency as a guiding principle for aboriginal engagement. the hatch (2013b) report defined “transparency in terms of sufficient information for meaningful and constructive participation and consideration of values, and transparency in terms of how participation informs the outcomes of and the final decisions for the project” (appendix c1, p. 2). there was some flexibility demonstrated with the reduction in the number of sites to be developed as a result of environmental concerns revealed though discussions with clfn community members (see table 4, october 2009), as clfn was a co-proponent. however, the proponents did not elicit or consider input from other first nations downstream of the proposed project. as mentioned, fort albany first nation did submit comments as part of the bump-up request that detailed many concerns with the project including the lack of provision of information in cree and a lack of opportunity for information gathering from the community to inform project design, participation, and consultation. the proponent did indicate a willingness to provide a copy of the executive summary detailing the project in cree (as provided to clfn); however, no changes to project design or additional consultation were carried out. the aboriginal engagement document lists fort albany first nation under “other aboriginal communities” and describes mandatory notification, with additional meetings to be facilitated when requested. fort albany first nation directly requested meetings and consultation with clfn prior to february 2010 and more formally in december 2011. the first and only meeting to be held happened in february 2012. there were some efforts to schedule an additional community information session to take place after that date but it was not pursued after the final environmental report was released. c o n c l u s i o n s the duty to consult is certainly triggered in this area based on treaty rights. however, the process that has been carried out failed to meaningfully consider the impact on treaty rights for downstream communities. tek studies with downstream communities were not contemplated due to the adopting of limited boundaries with respect to project effects. thus, potential cumulative impacts related to past 25 gardner et al.: kabinakagami hydro project environmental assessment: duty to consult published by scholarship@western, 2015   diversions and water impoundment structures on fish populations were not thoroughly considered. the process that was carried out limited opportunities to develop a relationship, did not engage downstream communities in a meaningful way, nor did it reflect the flexibility needed to reduce the impact on aboriginal and/or treaty rights towards reconciliation. beyond the need for consultation that flows from prescribed elements of the legal doctrine, there is a substantial ethical obligation, as there is a history of limited consultation with previous hydroelectric developments in the region (moose river complex), which creates a need for reconciliation. this is evident in the northern rivers agreement between first nations and the ministry of environment and energy (later known as the moe), which requires consent from those communities that would be affected by hydroelectric development then and now. the application of this agreement presents itself in the mnr (2004) site release policy document, which implies shared recognition of this agreement by both the mnr and moe. the class ea guiding document also describes this project as a category b project, requiring greater agency and aboriginal interest. together these elements would suggest that the highest level of consultation with downstream first nations would be expected. however, this process has, at best, demonstrated the minimum standard for “public” consultation by providing notification—which is surprising since a co-proponent was a first nation. or, perhaps because a coproponent was a first nation, the proponents felt no need for extensive consultation. the presentation of this case study has served to highlight the standard for consultation that is expected and some standards that are introduced in this case as a result of unique geographic, cultural, and historical conditions. the evaluation has highlighted significant shortcomings in this case that have resulted in increased conflict and uncertainty related to development. while there has been no response to the part ii order in the first quarter of 2014, the co-proponent, northland power, downgraded the project from “highly certain” of being constructed status. as a result, $5.2 million of previously deferred development costs were written off, meaning that the future of the project is now uncertain (northland, 2014). r e c o m m e n d a t i o n s future approaches would benefit from direct government involvement in early consultation activities to ensure that all involved understand roles and expectations; this approach would contribute to greater awareness of the nature of the project and potential for infringement. proponents should engage with all potentially impacted communities, beyond a simple notification to identify early concerns or policies that would trigger more rigorous consultation processes. this would benefit the process in the long run with a more realistic understanding of time, information, and capacity requirements that would be necessary. in addition, there should be greater oversight by crown representatives throughout the process with the ability to delay or suspend the process, when it becomes clear that requirements for adequate consultation are not being met, to help to ensure that these issues are addressed. there is a need to instil greater awareness of limitations to the consultation process when restrictive project timelines are used, such as in the case of streamlined eas (e.g., ontario’s class ea). limitation will be particularly evident when streamlined eas are applied to remote, predominantly first nations communities, in northern areas for logistical, cultural, and other reasons. in addition, clear guidelines 26 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.4   detailing opportunities for realistically derived participant funding should be implemented, particularly in cases where finances and geography present significant barriers to participation. there was certainly organizational awareness of the presence of requirements for consent that flow from the northern rivers agreement, as evident in the project policy and strategic planning documents. however, this heightened expectation for consent from downstream communities was not carried through in the approval of the aboriginal engagement plan that guides consultation in this case. clearly, more thorough consideration of the degree of consultation is required especially in light of agreements that have been made towards reconciliation of past wrongs related to hydro development in the region. early and meaningful engagement in information exchange related to the advancement of project design, feasibility studies, tek studies, background review by those first nations communities listed under “other” is critical to an effective ea process. the effort to satisfy these requests for further information and consideration of concerns advanced by downstream communities were only prioritized in later stages of the process, arguably, well past the point of influencing the project or advancing mitigation. greater accountability related to flexibility and openness is required to avoid future oversight of these principles meant to guide the process and prevent litigation. a series of training exercises for community leaders and staff introducing the legal (and ethical) requirements of duty to consult, with special emphasis being put on ea scenarios similar to the one that is of particular concern for that community, is necessary. this community engagement is critical to building community-based capacity for participation. there is organizational knowledge that can be shared here by members of the regional and supra-regional first nations governance organizations, along with protocols that can serve as tools at the community level with provision of more overt efforts to knowledge training and support.9 the establishment of a participation strategy within potentially impacted communities to ensure thorough documentation, reporting, and information sharing would enhance the ability of a community to participate within the limited timelines often present in the ea process. this ability to mobilize more readily and engage in the process would ensure that the community meets its obligation to actively participate at every opportunity.                                                                                                                 9 krupa (2012b) undertook an evaluation of the experience of one aboriginal community, pic river first nation (prfn) in northern ontario, who have successfully developed three hydro electric projects: wawatay a 13.5 mw operation, twin falls a 5 mw operation, and umbata falls 24 mw operation. the first, wawatay was developed as a proponent that gained them significant equity; the second, twin falls, employed a financing strategy that led to full ownership; and finally, umbata falls where prfn was the lead developer and owner of majority shares. prfn, a community with a wealth of experience in hydropower development, has gathered a number of lessons and strategies that have helped to maintain continuous improvement in their community with respect to meeting objectives related to social well-being. along the way, they have also met with dissention related to social and environmental impacts. they have incorporated significant opportunities for participation by community members in the planning, environmental assessment, and impacts on daily or subsistence activities. incorporating these mechanisms into the process has improved the efficiency of the process for approvals and permits and also within the community improved the social legitimacy of the ventures (krupa, 2012a). 27 gardner et al.: kabinakagami hydro project environmental assessment: duty to consult published by scholarship@western, 2015   r e f e re n c e s abouchar, j., & vince, j. 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(2006). 2006 census: aboriginal peoples of canada in 2006: inuit, métis and first nations. 2006 census: findings. retrieved from http://www12.statcan.gc.ca/censusrecensement/2006/as-sa/97-558/index-eng.cfm 31 gardner et al.: kabinakagami hydro project environmental assessment: duty to consult published by scholarship@western, 2015   tsuji, l. j. s., manson, h., wainman, b. c., vanspronsen, e. p., shecapio-blacksmith, j., & rabbitskin, t. (2007). identifying potential receptors and routes of contaminant exposure in the traditional territory of the ouje-bougoumou cree: land use and a geographical information system. environmental monitoring and assessment, 127, 293-306. 32 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.4 the international indigenous policy journal june 2015 the streamlining of the kabinakagami river hydroelectric project environmental assessment: what is the "duty to consult" with other impacted aboriginal communities when the co-proponent of the project is an aboriginal community? holly l. gardner denis kirchhoff leonard j. tsuji recommended citation the streamlining of the kabinakagami river hydroelectric project environmental assessment: what is the "duty to consult" with other impacted aboriginal communities when the co-proponent of the project is an aboriginal community? abstract keywords creative commons license the streamlining of the kabinakagami river hydroelectric project environmental assessment: what is the "duty to consult" with other impacted aboriginal communities when the co-proponent of the project is an aboriginal community? microsoft word ms 9348 cover page.docx the international indigenous policy journal volume 11 | issue 4 october 2020 the paths to realizing reconciliation: indigenous consultation in jasper national park jason w. johnston thompson rivers university, canada, jasonjohnstonsedore@gmail.com courtney w. mason thompson rivers university, canada, cmason@tru.ca recommended citation johnston, j. w., & mason, c. w. (2020). paths to realizing reconciliation: indigenous consultation in jasper national park. the international indigenous policy journal, 11(4). https://10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.9348 the paths to realizing reconciliation: indigenous consultation in jasper national park abstract diverse indigenous nations have traditional territories inside jasper national park (jnp), but the park was established without consultation with local indigenous communities. parks were marketed as empty landscapes, which celebrated romantic ideas of european colonial expansion. the current representations of indigenous peoples in interpretive content still reflect this lack of consultation. this research was guided by indigenous methodologies. data was collected through interviews with jasper indigenous forum (jif) members and the jnp management team. findings indicate that jif members want increased representation and greater control over how their histories and cultures are presented. park management needs to work in close consultation with the jif if they want to improve indigenous representations in the park and support processes of reconciliation. keywords indigenous, first nations, métis, parks canada, jasper national park, national parks, protected areas, consultation, representation, interpretation, cultural awareness acknowledgments we want to acknowledge and thank the members of the jasper indigenous forum and the jasper national park management team who contributed their time, knowledge, and insights into this project. this paper benefited from the fine editing skills of josie vayro. this project was funded through the social sciences and humanities research council of canada (sshrc) and the canadian mountain network. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. 1 johnston & mason: paths to realizing reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2020 the paths to realizing reconciliation: indigenous consultation in jasper national park the establishment of canada’s first national parks, including jasper national park (jnp), were motivated by economic objectives. the canadian mountain national parks were designed specifically to protect land, not for conservation, but for tourism development and resource-extraction activities (mason, 2014; zezulka-mailloux, 2007). to access the newly formed national parks, early tourists relied primarily on the railway. since railway companies, like the canadian pacific railway (cpr), held a monopoly on tourists travelling to the parks until the 1920s, they were able to shape the majority of the marketing campaigns promoting the region. this led to the popular belief that places like jasper were empty, untouched wildernesses (maclaren, 2011). however, for thousands of years prior to the arrival of europeans, indigenous peoples lived and thrived in the rocky mountains. in order for park management to promote the idea of pristine wilderness in the park and show tourists these untouched landscapes, indigenous peoples were forcibly removed from their traditional territories in the newly established park boundaries and their subsistence practices became unacceptable, and eventually illegal (binnema & niemi, 2006). presenting parks as “natural” wilderness supported the idea that these are places that humans visited, but do not live, and ignored the fact that diverse groups of indigenous peoples had been living in these areas, in some cases for millennia (snow, 2005). indigenous peoples are negatively impacted by these misrepresentations that disregard their historic and contemporary presences and gloss over the vast diversity of their languages and cultures (mason, 2009). a lack of education about and acknowledgement of indigenous histories in jasper have perpetuated problematic stereotypes about indigenous peoples through the production of programming and signage from eurocentric perspectives. in 2004, the supreme court of canada ruled that the government has a legal duty to consult and accommodate indigenous peoples where there are current or potential outstanding land title claims (langdon et al., 2010; turner & bitonti, 2011). however, the ruling was built on the idea that the canadian government holds the ultimate power to give or remove the rights of indigenous peoples (thomlinson & crouch, 2012; youdelis, 2016). there are currently several active land claims inside the rocky mountain national parks system as indigenous communities continue to assert their rights in their traditional territories (mason, 2014). despite shifting colonial power dynamics, indigenous peoples continue to be represented in ways that support romanticized narratives of colonial expansion in canadian history. park management is long overdue to improve relationships and consultation processes with local indigenous peoples. park management in this article refers to the management staff of jasper national park who work directly with indigenous communities, and those who produce and disseminate indigenous interpretative content. currently, jnp management and operations staff are working on a number of projects in collaboration with many indigenous communities in the region in an effort to work towards increased indigenous participation and representation in park planning. guided by indigenous methodologies (im), we consulted with jasper indigenous forum (jif) members to determine what issues jif communities in jasper face and how they are being, or should be, addressed by park management. jif participants from various first nations and métis communities explained the 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.9348 limitations of park management to address their concerns and incorporate their cultures and histories into the park’s programming and signage content. our study examines the following key questions: a. what are the traditional ties that diverse indigenous communities have with the lands redefined as jasper national park? b. why are the current consultation processes problematic between park management and the jif? and c. what are the barriers and opportunities to achieve respectful representations of indigenous cultures, to improve consultation processes, and to support reconciliation efforts in jasper? we examine the constraints faced by park management that limit their ability to adequately address jif concerns, consider possible solutions, and track their progress in addressing issues. at the centre of the constraints that park management encounter is bringing policy revision at a localized level into conversation with national contexts. for example, we argue that the canada national parks act (2000) requires further revision to account for indigenous management frameworks that are being applied in protected spaces in canada and internationally. contextualizing jasper national park: displacement and indigenous stewardship as the largest national park in the canadian rockies, jasper national park (11,228 km2) supports numerous unique species and ecosystems (see figure 1). humans were also a key component of these ecosystems for millennia. the mountains and valleys of what is now jnp were home to diverse nations of indigenous peoples. their lives, cultures, languages, and traditions are deeply rooted in the rocky mountains, the foothills, and the surrounding landscapes. consequently, indigenous communities are intrinsically connected to these ecosystems. as explained by raymond cardinal, the jif member representing both sucker creek and paul first nation, the rich histories of the diverse peoples who lived, traded, migrated through, and hunted in this place are all but ignored in the park when it comes to signage and programming (personal interview, november 14, 2017). established in 1907, jnp was named after a north west company trading post clerk, jasper hawes. the park was established as jasper forest park, which covered 13,000km2, and officially became a national park in 1930 (maclaren, 2011). as indicated by loretta belcourt, a métis jif representative from lac ste. anne, most early national parks in canada were established without consultation with or consideration for the indigenous peoples who called these lands home. this was also the case with jasper as indigenous peoples were forcibly removed from the park under the guise of conservation concerns by park wardens, deputized non-indigenous locals, and the royal canadian mounted police (personal interview, november 27, 2017). in support of colonial processes of assimilation that were occurring across canada, the forced removals of indigenous peoples onto reserves for first nations, and onto crown lands for métis people, allowed the government to take control of indigenous peoples’ traditional lands, and the repression of their cultural practices ensued (snow, 2005). these removals occurred as a direct result of the creation of the national park system (sandlos, 2008). park management claimed that indigenous hunters were the cause of dwindling wildlife populations in the park, while not acknowledging the role of logging, mining, railways, and tourism on wildlife and key habitats (binnema & niemi, 2006). indigenous peoples were seen as “uncivilized,” their lifestyles backwards, and their presence in the park as an unwelcome detail in the narrative of a pure and pristine landscape that park 3 johnston & mason: paths to realizing reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2020 management was trying to establish (mason, 2014). indigenous peoples living in the park did not align with the colonial park managers’ romanticized notion of an unspoiled wilderness. figure 1. map of jasper national park (canadian rockies, 2015). since the acknowledgement in the 1970s by the supreme court that aboriginal title exists, indigenous peoples have been asserting some measure of control over their traditional lands in jasper and working to incorporate their cultures back into the landscapes from which they were forced out (langdon et al., 2010). this has been a long and tedious process, with marginal progress, as governments are reluctant to give up total control of the lands they manage in national parks. the canadian government’s unwillingness to share control can be seen through the lack of representation of indigenous peoples in places like jasper national park (r. cardinal, personal interview, november 14, 2017). as you travel through jasper townsite and park, the only indigenous content you are exposed to is the haida totem pole in the center of town (johnston & mason, 2020). as pointed out by stoney/nakoda elder john wesley, this display does not have significance to any indigenous peoples that have traditional connections to the lands in jasper (personal interview, october 11, 2017). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.9348 as of 2019, there are 48 national parks and national park reserves in canada. in most of these parks, even where there is a co-management agreement in place, parks canada retains final management-decision authority even for indigenous concerns and ultimately, within the parks, rights are highlighted but not always incorporated or respected (lemelin & bennett, 2010). jasper park management approaches indigenous consultation through interest-based participation (parks canada, 2010), which means management will only engage with indigenous groups who show an overt interest in a development proposal. this is highly problematic because it puts the onus on communities to connect with park management, as opposed to park management being obligated to do research to identify local indigenous communities and work collectively to support their claims to traditional territory. an unofficial indigenous advisory group, the jasper aboriginal forum, was formed in 2006. this group was renamed the jasper indigenous forum (jif) in 2017 to better reflect changing terminology. currently, the jif still remains unofficial. the jif was established to work with jnp management on various projects and consultations (youdelis, 2016). the forum consists of representatives from 26 indigenous communities that have traditional ties to the area redefined as jasper. these include communities from the beaver (dane-zaa), cree, ojibway, secwe̓pemc, stoney/nakoda, sioux, aseniwuche winewak, and métis nations. the formation of the jif helped to form new relationships between indigenous nations who have traditional connections to jasper and the management team of jnp. methodological approaches and methods this research used indigenous methodologies (im), which focus on the research paradigm ideas of trust, respect, reciprocity, and inclusion (kenny et al., 2004; steinhauer, 2002). critically, im also help to highlight unequal power relationships (kovach, 2009; tuhiwai smith, 1999) between, for example, a powerful euro-canadian federal government agency like parks canada and local indigenous communities that have been displaced from and denied access to the region. we worked in collaboration with indigenous peoples and non-indigenous people while privileging participants’ perspectives and knowledge throughout the research (battiste & henderson, 2000; bishop, 2005). this led to qualitative data that provided a deeper understanding of the issues being explored. data collection for this project involved semi-structured, open-ended question interviews with representatives from several indigenous nations and communities with traditional connections to the land in jnp. gathering information through interviews respects indigenous oral traditions (kovach, 2010). a draft interview guide was originally developed by one co-author (johnston) based on issues that he identified over 10 years while working in interpretive programming in several different national parks, including near his home reserve (chippewas of nawash unceded first nation, neyaashiinigmiing, anishinaubae) close to bruce peninsula national park in ontario. due to the open conversational orientation of the guide, each participant informed the direction of questions and the issues that were most pertinent to discuss. this was the case for both jif members and park management, including indigenous staff members. the majority of interviews took place in person, but one occurred over the telephone. jif research participants included band council members, elders, community members, and researchers. in total, 12 jif members were interviewed for this research (see table 1). each interview lasted between 25 minutes and 2 hours. the participants were asked to answer 12 questions that focused on traditional indigenous connections to the lands in and around jasper, their views on indigenous consultation and representation in the park, and their relationships with park management. six interviews were also conducted with jnp management staff (see table 2). jnp 5 johnston & mason: paths to realizing reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2020 research participants were chosen based on their roles working directly with indigenous communities on various projects in the park. each participant worked either directly with indigenous communities or on parts of the programming and signage that represented indigenous cultures and histories. three of the park management participants are also indigenous. the jif interviews are the foundation of the data presented in this article, while the jnp interviews are mostly included to add context. table 1. jasper indigenous forum research participants from the jif name jif nation interview date interview format barry wesley bighorn chiniki stoney/nakoda october 11, 2017 in person john wesley (elder) bighorn chiniki stoney/nakoda october 11, 2017 in person seona abraham bighorn chiniki stoney/nakoda october 17, 2017 in person charlie abraham (elder) bighorn chiniki stoney/nakoda october 17, 2017 in person raymond cardinal sucker creek and paul first nations november 14, 2017 in person christopher gall métis nation of bc november 15, 2017 in person laurian gladue kelly lake cree nation november 16, 2017 in person george lampreau simpcw first nation november 18, 2017 in person christina plante (elder) métis and cree november 27, 2017 in person loretta belcourt lac ste. anne métis november 27, 2017 in person william snow stoney/nakoda nation december 1, 2017 telephone rick ouellet métis descendant of john moberly a december 3, 2017 in person note. a john moberly was the son of the fur trader henry john moberly, who was born in ontario, and suzanne kwarakwante, who was haudenosaunee (iroquois). john moberly was born in the 1860s. he was raised and lived in the athabasca valley in what became part of jasper nation park in 1907. john moberly and his family were one of seven métis families that were impacted by the establishment of the national park. these métis families were removed from the park areas as park officials did not want privately owned land in the park at that time. john moberly and his descendants carried on their traditions of hunting, trapping, fishing, guiding, and outfitting in the areas in and around jasper national park. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.9348 table 2. jasper national park research participants from parks management name jnp position interview date interview format greg deagle (métis) administrative assistant, indigenous affairs unit august 24, 2017 in person mark young (swampy cree) manager, indigenous affairs unit august 28, 2017 in person brian catto interpretation coordinator august 29, 2017 in person joshua ibelshauser (algonquins of great golden lake first nation) information center coordinator (former indigenous interpreter) august 30, 2017 in person alan fehr jasper field unit superintendent september 22, 2017 in person note. research participants were members of jnp’s management team who worked directly with indigenous communities and who produced and disseminated indigenous interpretive content. all of the interviews with jif members were conducted between october 11 and december 3, 2017. the interviews were audio recorded, transcribed verbatim, and analyzed with content categorized into the following key themes: a. traditional connections to jasper, b. incorporating indigenous knowledge into park decision-making, c. barriers to successfully working with park management, and d. recommendations on how to increase indigenous representations and foster reconciliation efforts in jasper. each participant agreed to include their names in this research and publication to support transparency. through including their names, the participants reinforced their views on the various subjects that are discussed, adding validity to those ideas. participants unanimously felt it was necessary to incorporate their voices into the project. in this respect, this project stemmed from concerns articulated by jif members and several layers of consultation were put in place to ensure cultural knowledge was appropriately guarded. each participant was also given the opportunity to edit their transcribed interviews and add, remove, or clarify any portion they felt was necessary prior to incorporation into our analysis. this is also a key process of im, which puts into place a measure of protection for any sensitive cultural information. participants shared information that tended to be widely known among other participants, allowing us to identify the themes discussed throughout our research. the data were analyzed to denote commonalities and divergent patterns. the analysis of the data was guided by content analysis (elo & kyngäs, 2008). the authors both read through each transcript several times using open coding. the authors then jointly discussed the categories and coding to identify relevant themes. trustworthiness of data was established with the collaborative nature of the data 7 johnston & mason: paths to realizing reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2020 analysis through content validation. according to elo and kyngäs (2008), direct quotations are critical to displaying trustworthiness. although supported by the larger im frameworks that we describe above, this project was also sensitive to ocap® (ownership, control, access, possession) principles, which are a set of standards that establish how indigenous data should be collected, protected, used, and shared. tri-council policies for ethical research with indigenous communities also informed our approach on the standards for how to conduct research with indigenous peoples and communities (canadian institutes of health research [cihr] et al., 2014). this research was also approved by thompson rivers university research ethics for human subject board (101601) on july 4, 2017. results the jasper indigenous forum (jif) the establishment of the jif is understood by park management to have been spearheaded by indigenous communities trying to increase meaningful connections to their traditional territories and gain more input into park decisions by improving communication with park management. jnp management presented itself to interested groups as having an open-door policy and when indigenous communities came forward “the park inevitably . . . acquiesced to those [requests] to form a group that has since become the jif,” according to indigenous affairs manager for jasper national park mark young (personal interview, august 28, 2017). the jif is open to any indigenous community that has ties to the jnp land through traditional occupancy and/or usage. as explained by the jasper field unit superintendent alan fehr, there is currently no vetting in place to gauge each group’s strength of claim to the land, and jnp management takes the word of each indigenous community involved that they have a traditional connection to jasper (personal interview, september 22, 2017). the jif member representing the métis nation of bc, christopher gall, indicated that the open-door policy creates a great deal of potential for indigenous nations to work towards re-establishing a connection between their people and the land they were forcibly removed from when the park was established (personal interview, november 15, 2017). however, an open-door policy also invites inconsistency in the jif dynamics. having indigenous groups freely joining, leaving, and sending new representatives to the jif meetings produces constant struggles to remain focused on one objective and see it through to the end. every indigenous community will have different objectives based on the priorities of their community members and leadership. their objectives can change over time, which can lead to communities opting to either join or leave the jif as they see fit. capacity issues around both human and financial resources, which are a constant challenge particularly for rural indigenous communities in this region, can also determine if their leadership deems it necessary to participate in the jif or focus their efforts on other projects. several indigenous communities have been forum members since the jif formed and have strived to remain consistent in their participation and in who represents them at the meetings, while others have been less consistent, according to laurian gladue, the jif representative from kelly lake cree nation (personal interview, november 16, 2017). this creates friction within the jif and ultimately diminishes some of the power that a unified jif would have towards accomplishing shared objectives. friction may arise when a community joins, or rejoins after an absence, and wants to discuss an issue that the other jif members have already agreed on and moved on from. george lampreau, the jif representative from 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.9348 simpcw first nation, explained that in some cases, there is a member who is unwilling to accept a decision made by the jif and insists on remaining on that issue until they are satisfied (personal interview, november 18, 2017). this can derail meetings and shift the focus from issues at hand. a constant theme when speaking with jnp management and jif members was the amount of time that it takes to achieve some objectives (a. fehr, personal interview, september 22, 2017; c. gall, personal interview, november 15, 2017). the jif is not alone in causing delays in decision-making and change-implementation. jasper park management have their own objectives. meetings between jnp and the jif are scheduled to take place on a biannual basis, with additional meetings scheduled as needed, according to greg deagle, the administrative assistant for the indigenous affairs unit in jasper (personal interview, august 24, 2017). as discussed later in this article, slow progress towards addressing various issues has led to the establishment of working groups as offshoots from the larger jif. aside from some ongoing issues, the relationship between the jif and jnp management seems to be improving as progress is made towards increased indigenous representation. some jif members see the work being done in jnp by management as trailblazing. according to brian catto, the interpretation coordinator for jnp, jasper management seems to understand the requests from the jif to some extent and has expressed a sincere desire to make the necessary changes to respectfully include indigenous people and to tell their stories (personal interview, august 29, 2017). however, there is apprehension, says rick ouellet, a descendant of the moberly métis homesteaders from jasper (personal interview, december 3, 2017). some see the work being done as far behind other parks and believe that jasper has a duty to do more to acknowledge indigenous histories, cultures, cultural sites, traditional territories, and rights to the land, according to william snow, a jif member representing the stoney/nakoda first nation at morley (telephone interview, december 1, 2017). intentions, as noble as they may be, are less important to jif members than meaningful action. seona abraham, a jif representative from the big horn stoney/nakoda nation, pointed out that jif members want their histories told, their cultures respected and cultural sites protected, their youth to find pride in the connection to their traditional lands, and to have control over how they are represented within the park (personal interview, october 17, 2017). traditional connections: indigenous ties to the lands in jasper national park the jif has been a way for indigenous peoples to come together and express their connection to jasper through their cultural or historic ties and spiritual practices (c. gall, personal interview, november 15, 2017). each jif community has a connection to jasper. stoney/nakoda elders john wesley (personal interview, october 11, 2017) and charlie abraham (personal interview, october 17, 2017) both spoke to their deep connections to the land in jasper, but also to the canadian rockies and foothills to the east. charlie abraham shared a story about how his grandfather would travel through the mountains to hunt and fish, and how they would live in the winter on dried meats and berries that were collected throughout the summer. barry wesley, from the bighorn chiniki stoney/nakoda nation, consults directly with parks canada as part of his work, and he pointed out that the stoney/nakoda peoples have a connection to all areas within jasper’s boundaries, with some significant ceremonial sites that they would like to have protected 9 johnston & mason: paths to realizing reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2020 from intrusion by the public (personal interview, october 11, 2017). there are many sacred places and burial sites in these areas. wesley went on to say that there are other groups with historical ties to the area even if they did not sign treaties, such as the métis (personal interview, october 11, 2017). christopher gall participates in the jif on behalf of the métis who have strong ties to jasper due to their significant roles in early fur trade economies (personal interview, november 15, 2017). he believes that most métis cultural routes are so strongly tied to fur trade routes, some of which passed through jasper, that the region has historical significance for métis peoples. laurian gladue stated that her people have been in this area since time immemorial—they were always a mountain people and this is their home (personal interview, november 16, 2017). she points out that there are a number of sacred sites for her people in jasper. george lampreau also made clear that jasper was the start of the simpcw traditional territory and that his people were living there prior to the establishment of the park (personal interview, november 18, 2017). forced removals after the establishment of the park had and continue to have tremendous impacts on indigenous communities. according to elder charlie abraham, “you can’t hunt. everything had changed” (personal interview, october 17, 2017). during many forced removals, no consideration by park management was given to the material, cultural, and livelihood losses felt by indigenous peoples. no assistance was provided to find alternatives to the resources that were previously available from their traditional lands (timko & satterfield, 2008). laurian gladue asserts that the removals not only impacted the people who were removed, but also their descendants: it was a huge impact and it is still. it’s a history that we don’t want to be lost. we don’t want it to be lost that we have this presence here. this is the home of my ancestors and i feel like we are respecting our ancestors by acknowledging . . . the biggest part of it is for our ancestors. and for our youth that are coming up. it’s our duty. we are stewards of this land and we’re never going to stop being knowledge holders. we have many knowledge holders of families that used this area. we don’t want it to be forgotten. (personal interview, november 16, 2017) these histories must be remembered and acknowledged. although certainly a dark chapter in canadian history, these displacements are a part of jasper. christopher gall asserts that jnp management must acknowledge the colonial mindset that shaped the creation of the park (personal interview, november 15, 2017). loretta belcourt (personal interview, november 27, 2017) and rick ouellet (personal interview, december 3, 2017) both shared stories of rcmp and police removing indigenous people from their homes within the park boundary under the threat of force or by force. this history of forced removals is mostly understood by park management, but the impacts may not be. as william snow indicates: there are a wide range of impacts. i think the biggest impact was hunting and gathering. from what i recall, i believe, the restrictions around removing first nations from [national] parks happened shortly after the parks were created . . . shortly after the parks were created there is some federal legislation under the indian act that identified that indians could no longer reside or camp or hunt and fish within [national] parks, federal parks [parks canada] . . . that restricts your ability to exercise your aboriginal and treaty rights . . . i’m not sure jnp management is aware of this repressive policy period. (telephone interview, december 1, 2017) 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.9348 more cultural awareness of the history of canadian colonialism and the establishment of parks canada through indigenous led trainings is necessary for jnp staff and management to understand and appreciate the impacts that colonial government policies had and continue to have on indigenous communities. according to brian catto, under the memorandum of understanding with jnp management, jif community members are now officially permitted to harvest plants in the park for ceremonial, spiritual, or traditional purposes (personal interview, august 29, 2017). as raymond cardinal reveals, despite being forcibly removed from jasper and having their cultural practices banned, many indigenous groups continued to utilize their traditional lands in secret: i’ll tell you right up front, that connection was not lost, it just went underground. those practices . . . have continued. it’s just that people are very cautious and careful in terms of them because we do have a connection that we respect and recognize. and the fact that [nonindigenous] people tell us we cannot do it is not grounds enough for us to stop that activity . . . but these kinds of practices have happened, and they continue to happen, and now the park has allowed some limited gathering of plants in the community, we do not expect it to stop. it is just something that should be recognized in your paper, that this continued use of the park has happened and it did not stop because the parks said “no” . . . if you look at our history as a people in this country, where a lot of us have had our ceremonies go underground . . . the same thing with jasper. (personal interview, november 14, 2017) rick ouellet reiterated this point by indicating that while management may claim control over the park, in reality, local peoples always hunted in and accessed the park. this was sometimes a demonstration of resistance, but it was mostly a strategy employed to maintain a connection to their traditional territories (personal interview, december 3, 2017). incorporating indigenous knowledge and histories in jasper throughout jnp there are numerous signs directing visitors to sites of interest. however, there is a lack of indigenous content and limited understanding of indigenous histories. most of this content is presented from a eurocentric perspective (m. young, personal interview, august 28, 2017). while not all jif members are familiar with the interpretive programming in the park, those who are dislike seeing their cultures presented through eurocentric perspectives. the lack of indigenous representation in programs and signs in jnp has contributed to misinformed ideas about indigenous histories, especially for non-indigenous visitors and jnp staff. tourists visiting national parks often want to learn about canada, and indigenous histories are certainly a key part of canada (s. abraham, personal interview, october 17, 2017). of the nine million people that travelled to the canadian rocky mountain national parks in 2018, over two million visited jasper national park alone (parks canada, 2019). many of those tourists know little about indigenous cultures, and many likely view indigenous peoples as being all one people and speaking one language (s. abraham, personal interview, october 17, 2017). it is a struggle to address, even on a small scale, such as representation in a park, the many misconceptions and stereotypes about indigenous peoples that are circulating in canadian society. christopher gall explains: 11 johnston & mason: paths to realizing reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2020 i really think it’s tackling sheer ignorance by the visitors from abroad and especially canadians here at home that just don’t have a clue. so, trying to pick some piece of the story, how do we slowly change that national dialogue on some of these things? never mind even nationally, how do we address people living in jasper talking on facebook and their ignorance? . . . we don’t have to win over the world, let’s win over people living right here who care about this place and are passionate about it. (personal interview, november 15, 2017) many representations of indigenous histories and cultures in the parks are temporalized, or presented as something from the distant past, without recognizing contemporary indigenous lives (mason, 2009). indigenous cultures and traditions are often viewed as artifacts that are frozen in time, something that should be left in the past or in an apolitical present (shultis & heffner, 2016). neither of these juxtapositions are acceptable. barry wesley believes that there are people who do want to hear the histories from indigenous peoples even though some of their stories will conflict with western science and colonial narratives of progress (personal interview, october 11, 2017). as rick ouellet describes: i think the canadian public is slowly understanding the depth of the colonial project, and i think the truth of this story, although ending harshly, is repairable, and it’s an interesting aspect of westward expansion. and i think the canadian public would eat it up as there is a huge appetite for this. (personal interview, december 3, 2017) it is time people began to consult indigenous peoples and value their knowledge (b. wesley, personal interview, october 11, 2017). the idea of reconciliation, a central term used by the canadian government and across the country, including within the parks canada agency, must acknowledge and accept indigenous histories and cultures. parks canada’s definition of reconciliation has three key components: a. strengthening indigenous connections with traditionally used lands and waters, b. expanding and ensuring presentation and commemoration of indigenous histories and cultures, and c. increasing economic opportunities related to indigenous tourism. (parks canada, 2020, para. 4) according to christopher gall, jnp management have a tremendous opportunity to demonstrate to visitors the uniqueness of jasper’s indigenous histories and cultures. he believes it is critically important to recognize how long indigenous peoples have been on this land. it is a part of canadian history and presenting it this way will help support wider public learning around indigenous histories (personal interview, november 15, 2017). general statements about indigenous use of the lands will not suffice; it is necessary to have specific acknowledgements of the indigenous communities who lived on these lands before they were forcibly removed. some jif members feel that incorporating these histories is not seen as a priority by park management. consequently, indigenous communities have not had the opportunity to educate park management about the indigenous histories of jasper (l. belcourt, personal interview, november 27, 2017). william snow believes jnp management should be presenting the park’s indigenous histories regardless of how these histories portray the government’s treatment of indigenous peoples (telephone interview, 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.9348 december 1, 2017). indeed, incorporating some indigenous content can be met with resistance by jnp management and some jif members see this as a reluctance to learn about and share colonial histories. this resistance stems from indigenous perspectives not matching the romanticized ideas of what jasper was and is today. for example, histories of colonial policies that facilitated cultural repression or loss for indigenous peoples in this region are not part of this tidy narrative. rick ouellet elaborates further: they [jnp management] listen to and incorporate the things that they want to and ignore the things that they don’t want to incorporate. (personal interview, december 3, 2017) eurocentric ideas about the park and its histories shape what is presented and how it is presented. mark young (personal interview, august 28, 2017) and josh ibelshauser (personal interview, august 30, 2017), the information centre coordinator, agree that jnp management needs to rethink the park’s representations of indigenous peoples and acknowledge that the current methods may not fit with indigenous ways of sharing knowledge. george lampreau believes that indigenous histories should be presented even if they do not align with the commonly accepted and often romanticized narratives of a place: that is history. that is the truth. those are facts. it would be different if it was embellished . . . but when it is strictly facts, you have to present them as is, no matter what it makes people feel or think. (personal interview, november 18, 2017). park management faces many challenges in adding indigenous content to programs and signage. the inclusion of many different indigenous communities wanting their histories shared is one of these barriers. this stems from past government policies that partitioned indigenous peoples into smaller groups. the history of jasper is complex because there is no pan-indigenous jasper experience from which to base all indigenous content. although having many different indigenous groups in the jif makes incorporating their histories and cultures more complicated, this should not be used as an excuse to limit progress on this objective (c. gall, personal interview, november 15, 2017). while christopher gall believes that park management is working in the right direction in regard to adding indigenous content, he also thinks there is room for improvement in the working relationship between jnp management and the jif. underrepresentation or misrepresentation of indigenous peoples in jasper can be partly addressed through allowing indigenous communities to share their own histories and cultures in the park in a meaningful way. this could include, but is not limited to, consulting directly with indigenous peoples during the development of indigenous-based content, incorporating indigenous languages into signage, and developing cultural awareness training for all jnp staff. raymond cardinal wants park management and visitors to recognize traditional place names, cultures, and histories. as he explains, he believes those should be part of the experience for visitors: this is something where our communities have always struggled over the last 50 to 100 years . . . we are always told we don’t have value, that we lack value. you see that in the substance abuse in our communities, the drugs and alcohol in our communities. in our missing and murdered women. there are a lot of people that can use some positive reaffirmation, like those places were connected to us and they are still connected to us. we have names for them. our identities and 13 johnston & mason: paths to realizing reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2020 our values matter, and they are not ignored or swept under the rug. because that is really how it feels when we go to jasper, you don’t see indigenous anything in the park . . . except on national aboriginal day where all the indians in feathers come out. (personal interview, november 14, 2017) raymond cardinal stresses that what he is asking for is not unreasonable. there was a request made of jnp management by many jif members to place a sign at the entrances of jnp acknowledging that it is the traditional territory of several indigenous groups and list the group names. nothing has been done to address the request says christina plante, a métis and cree elder representative on the jif (personal interview, november 27, 2017). due to the lack of indigenous content in signage and programming, this type of acknowledgement would be the only indication that most visitors to jasper have to understand that these are indigenous lands and that the park’s history is more than the stories of european fur traders, railway workers, and local wildlife. however, according to george lampreau, jnp management appears unwilling to include this type of acknowledgement: our chief put up a sign, “you are entering the traditional territory of the simpcw first nation.” parks took it down and put it away. they don’t do anything with signage. this sign, that we want at either end of the park, would probably be just as easy if we went out and designed one, had it made, agreed upon with the parks, then just told them we are putting this up. to me, that is what is going to have to happen. no matter what they say they are going to drag their feet. (personal interview, november 18, 2017) christopher gall points out that adding an acknowledgment sign is not “a huge ask . . . not a huge expense but . . . a simple gesture” (personal interview, november 15, 2017). jnp management may be apprehensive to erect acknowledgement signs at the entrances of the park because that would admit that indigenous peoples have an inherent right to the land and should have a voice in its management. to achieve more inclusive and respectful indigenous representation in jasper, management should erect signs at the entrances to the park that acknowledge the traditional territories that the park is on. this action would demonstrate that park management is not afraid to embrace these histories of repression and the colonial past that robbed indigenous peoples of their lands, resources, and cultures. this recognition may seem simple, but it would strengthen the relationship between the jif and park management by exhibiting a commitment to own the past, including aspects of colonial violence, as well as a willingness to work with indigenous communities towards a shared future through reconciliation. the addition of their traditional languages on jnp signage is also important for many jif members. having language as part of the stories and histories that are told is crucial for the preservation of culture for future generations: “if i lose my language . . . then my stories won’t be very effective” (j. wesley, personal interview, october 11, 2017). according to raymond cardinal, the inclusion of place names in different indigenous languages has also been requested (personal interview, november 14, 2017). adding indigenous names alongside the english names will show visitors that indigenous peoples are connected to those places. in order to incorporate indigenous languages and histories, it must be stressed that park management needs to work directly with indigenous communities to collect and record that information while following established protocol. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.9348 to address some of these concerns and barriers in incorporating indigenous content and histories into the park, jnp management and the jif have established several working groups to focus on specific areas of interest: environmental monitoring, cultural awareness training, indigenous interpretation, the cultural use area, and the indigenous exhibit (a. fehr, personal interview, september 22, 2017). these small working groups consist of representatives from several jif communities who meet with the appropriate park management teams to concentrate on their specific projects and issues. some members of the jif view the creation of the working groups as a positive and strategic move on behalf of park management (g. lampreau, personal interview, november 18, 2017). having only bi-annual jif meetings makes progress incredibly slow, as there is so little time to discuss issues and solutions (l. gladue, personal interview, november 16, 2017). consequently, the working groups have potential to move more quickly towards viable solutions. the smaller groups with fewer individuals involved can easily centre on specific tasks instead of being distracted by issues that are not directly related to the projects (g. lampreau, personal interview, november 18, 2017). the focus of one working group is developing an indigenous exhibit in the jasper townsite. an outdoor structure is planned that will be located across the street from the haida totem pole in jasper townsite. it will include interpretive panels designed to allow indigenous nations on the jif to share their cultures and histories from their own perspectives. construction of the indigenous exhibit was scheduled to be completed by the spring of 2018 (g. deagle, personal interview, august 24, 2017), but as of winter 2019 construction has not begun. while the exhibit is supported by some local indigenous groups, it is not without controversy. the concept for the exhibit stemmed from the desire of jif members to increase representation and offset some of the misrepresentation issues highlighted above. however, there are some who perceive it as an attempt to fit indigenous peoples and communities into a mold set by park management. barry wesley felt as though he was unable to present his knowledge on his own terms. he expressed that he was forced to make a decision about the creation of the exhibit, but the decision about what the exhibit would look like structurally was already made before he was asked for his input (personal interview, october 11, 2017). raymond cardinal is also apprehensive about the eventual outcome of the exhibit: this is something where i always try to take a cautious approach because what often happens is people will do something slightly different and then you’ll see a lot of press releases that come out telling you how great this new thing is that will radically change the relationships with first nations peoples. then you watch it be implemented and you are like “oh, that didn’t actually do anything.” (personal interview, november 14, 2017) some jif members are frustrated with the length of time it has taken to plan the production of the indigenous exhibit: “take, take, take, but they’re slow at giving. then when they do, they make a big deal out of it” (g. lampreau, personal interview, november 18, 2017). other jif members view the production of the indigenous exhibit as a starting point on the long road towards accurate representation of local indigenous peoples in jasper (l. gladue, personal interview, november 16, 2017). it is important to acknowledge the time and resources that have been put into the jif and the indigenous exhibit by park management. christopher gall thinks park management has done well considering the complexity and the resources required to work with many different indigenous groups to create an exhibit through which they can all share their cultures (personal interview, november 15, 15 johnston & mason: paths to realizing reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2020 2017). this exhibit is an example of a situation in which park management desired to make changes and significant efforts have been made. we feel that this effort needs to be acknowledged. however, it must also be recognized that broader power structures place heavy constraints on jnp management and the amount of progress that can be pursued on certain issues. there are not necessarily the policies, tools, or resources in place to make progress quick enough for many jif members. in these circumstances, the focus remains on improving access and smaller incremental changes to programming as opposed to addressing wider colonial decision-making processes that lack significant methods of consultation. the production of the exhibit is exemplary of these systemic issues. it will take some time to determine what impacts this exhibit will have on the awareness of indigenous issues in jasper and the relationship between park management and the jif. once the exhibit is erected, further research will be needed to determine the impacts of this exhibit on indigenous representation in the park. barriers to success: finding a balance between jnp management and jif objectives in order to successfully integrate indigenous voices into jasper national park’s interpretative representations and management decisions, it must be clear what both the jif and jnp management want to accomplish. jnp management have mandates to work with indigenous communities towards reconciliation and to develop stronger, more effective relationships. the 2010 jnp management plan relied on consultations with “aboriginal people, stakeholders, community residents, park visitors and the general public” (parks canada, 2010, p. 9). together, the jif and jnp management identified six main areas of “common interest” in the management plan: (a) opportunities to influence park management and decision making, (b) traditional knowledge, (c) access to and reconnection with the park, (d) cultural programs, (e) resource and conservation activities, and (f) economic and employment opportunities. with the establishment of the jif, the working groups, and the cultural use area, jnp management has demonstrated an increasing willingness to incorporate indigenous voices in the park; however, many jif members question whether this is enough. while the jif recognizes that progress is being made, certainly more work is required on many of the issues identified in the park’s management plans. an example of progress on access issues is the 2011 cultural use area that was established in jasper. it was considered by jnp management and jif members to be a milestone achievement of the jif (g. deagle, personal interview, august 24, 2017). the establishment of the cultural use area was a reconciliation initiative. local indigenous communities were welcomed back to the park for ceremonial purposes and to gather traditional plants, and no permits are required (b. catto, personal interview, august 28, 2017). the cultural use area, located eight kilometers north of the jasper townsite, is open to all indigenous communities with traditional connections to jnp. it is utilized for indigenous ceremonies and gatherings. the public and jnp staff have been invited to visit this site and to participate in some selective ceremonies that community members have conducted. one of the functions of national parks is to present histories for the world to see, and indigenous peoples are a part of that history (g. lampreau, personal interview, november 18, 2017). indigenous peoples have significantly contributed to canada and their histories predate canada, but those histories are often unrecognized and at times devalued (r. ouellet, personal interview, december 3, 2017). officially acknowledging indigenous historical and cultural connections to jnp could lead to a greater influence 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.9348 over the management decisions in their traditional territories. as cardinal alludes to, this could facilitate less control by park management, which is something they may not be willing to do: part of the challenge is that jasper operates under a specific mindset. they [jnp management] have a specific ideology when it comes to planning the park, and everything gets all muddied up if you recognized that first nations have been there for thousands of years. they don’t want to recognize it because that might limit them in terms of what they are able to do, with respect to certain sites, for locations. they don’t like . . . especially when you compare them to other parks, they don’t like that idea, because a lot of other parks are pushing towards co-management with first nations communities, or indigenous communities. (personal interview, november 14, 2017) there are jif members that believe jnp management is not willing to address some of their concerns because management is worried that they will lose some of their authority (c. gall, personal interview, november 15, 2017). as in other protected areas across canada, jasper’s indigenous histories are intertwined with indigenous rights. if park management acknowledges those histories, they must also recognize indigenous rights (r. ouellet, personal interview, december 3, 2017). not being open to acknowledging certain aspects of indigenous histories within the jnp’s territory allows park management to keep authority over management decisions with the government (l. gladue, personal interview, november 16, 2017). as george lampreau stated: maybe they don’t want the first nations people having more of a say than we are getting now. it is like this reconciliation seems to only go so far . . . that was brought up a few times [at jif meetings]. it always seemed to fall on deaf ears. (personal interview, november 18, 2017) raymond cardinal, who has diverse experiences working with other rocky mountain national parks, views the mountain national parks, particularly jasper, as being the most reluctant to incorporate indigenous knowledge and voices into its management: losing power . . . particularly the mountain parks, have been the most resistant to include first nations, for involving first nations. they have had an authority over everything in the park since their creation, and they don’t want now to have to change that to work with our communities. that is probably the biggest challenge that we have seen . . . jasper is reluctant to deal with any of these issues at all. (personal interview, november 14, 2017) some feel park management decisions are often self-serving: they [jnp management] are still not at a point where it is a friendly and open place for indigenous people, even though they want to have an indigenous story told, but the reason they want to have an indigenous story told is because visitors are demanding it. so, the whole thing that is built off of this . . . how does this serve us? (r. ouellet, personal interview, december 3, 2017) some are of the opinion that park management chooses which communities to work with depending on how it will serve them. based on his own experience with jnp management and the jif, rick ouellet 17 johnston & mason: paths to realizing reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2020 views the jif membership as being comprised of indigenous communities that park management has chosen to work with and that progress, while minimal, made on different projects is something that park management would be working towards regardless of indigenous involvement. he believes park management only wants to work with communities that are accommodating and approve potential project development that the park may be pursuing at any given moment, rather than communities with experience and knowledge of the policies in the park (personal interview, december 3, 2017). the jif is comprised of numerous indigenous communities, each with their own experiences working with jnp management. as within any organization, there can often be different perspectives among members. there are members that see positive results between the jif and jnp management, while there are others who view that relationship as self-serving on the part of jnp management. some indigenous communities still do not have representation on the jif. william snow points out that park management only makes space for two representatives from each jif member community (telephone interview, december 1, 2017). this means that the stoney/nakoda representatives at the meetings do not represent all stoney/nakoda communities because they are from three separate bands who live in three communities in the region. he would like to see two representatives from each of his people’s bands, but at the moment this is not an option. this issue is directly related to colonial government policies and treaty agreements that led to the formation of reserves that separated indigenous communities, and sometimes collective families, into many smaller divisions. incorporating indigenous histories into park programming and signage may be a challenge for management due in part to a lack of research to draw on. research in the park is incredibly expensive and time consuming. greg deagle points out that jasper has only funded two traditional land use studies due to the expense. jnp is currently working on an indigenous territories map, which extends beyond the borders of the park, to include adjacent areas in the provinces of alberta and british columbia (personal interview, august 24, 2017). some indigenous oral histories have been recorded and local geographic information system (gis) technicians will produce a map which will identify first nation reserves, métis settlements, and treaty areas (g. deagle, personal interview, august 24, 2017). this map, however, does not seem to touch on other culturally significant sites. cultural mapping has been an important subject for some jif communities, but there are no processes or resources to support it in federal parks (w. snow, telephone interview, december 1, 2017). the desire for this type of cultural mapping research in jasper is not only to gain more control over how their traditional lands are managed, but also to stop the destruction of cultural, sacred, and ceremonial places within the park (r. cardinal personal interview, november 14, 2017). some jif members question jnp management’s interest in indigenous research in the park and believe park management would prefer to make decisions based on the information they already have (l. gladue, personal interview, november 16, 2017). william snow, who has worked extensively with provincial governments, parks, and on crown (federal) land doing cultural mapping, thinks another factor that limits research is a lack of resources available to support these projects in federal parks (w. snow, telephone interview, december 1, 2017). despite these critiques, barry wesley feels that his community has a good working relationship with jnp management (personal interview, october 11, 2017). there is some acknowledgement by park management of indigenous connections and input by jif communities, such as a traditional land acknowledgement at the beginning of presentations in the park. there are jif members who feel that there is respect from park management as well as genuine 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.9348 attempts to build stronger relationships (l. gladue personal interview, november 16, 2017). while progress may come very slowly, the lack of progress is not always intentional as government employees can be bound by policies and resources that limit what they can accomplish. christopher gall explains: jasper has put a lot of financial resources and staff time into building the forum and the relationships with the communities. i think that’s an important acknowledgement. i don’t for a minute want to say that [parks canada] is perfect and they’ve done everything right. i think that there are staff trying to do the best they can with limited resources and within the bureaucracy of [parks canada]. (personal interview, november 15, 2017) gathering information from many different indigenous groups is a difficult undertaking for park management. the establishment of the jif facilitated a more organized method for park management and jif communities to meet, work together, and to share ideas and information. barry wesley appreciates that since the establishment of the jif, indigenous communities are able to communicate more directly with park management on various issues (personal interview, october 11, 2017). there are jif members who believe park management support the inclusion of many indigenous communities into the jif, despite the many challenges this brings. there must be inclusive approaches to park management decisions in order to build respectful working relationships between jnp management and jif members (r. cardinal, personal interview, november 14, 2017). in addition to recognizing historical relations and contemporary protocol such as territorial acknowledgments alluded to above, another issue in the collaboration between jnp management and indigenous communities is timelines. in jasper, timelines for interpretive content, programs, and signage are often determined by when the tourism season begins or deadlines for funding applications. if timelines are missed by jif members, then they will lose the opportunity to weigh in on certain projects. barry wesley does not believe that this should be the case, as some indigenous cultures do not view timelines and decision-making in the same way as euro-canadian governments. in order for park management to respect indigenous cultures, they must understand cultural differences, which can include how timelines can be perceived by jif members. he feels that park management dictates how they want jif members to make decisions, although they are slowly changing that style of thinking (personal interview, october 11, 2017). different approaches to information sharing can cause conflict between jif communities and jnp management. jif communities are varied and unique and have different protocols for sharing information with those outside their cultures. there can be an unwillingness to share information, for example about sacred sites, with park management because it may be used in the future to assert indigenous rights with the government. due to the colonial legacy of indigenous displacement, which often occurred during the establishment of protected areas, there is a deep mistrust by indigenous peoples towards sharing information with government agencies to be used in protected areas, such as national parks (redford & fearn, 2007). this has also led to indigenous groups not sharing information with one another: all of a sudden, the group that’s got more information has a stronger position and so they don’t want other groups sort of knowing their hand . . . i think in some ways the nature of the relationship between canada and indigenous peoples has pitted indigenous peoples against 19 johnston & mason: paths to realizing reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2020 canada, which [parks canada] is representing as part of the crown, but also then indigenous peoples against other indigenous peoples in close proximity. (c. gall, personal interview, november 15, 2017) jif participation can also depend on the priorities articulated at the indigenous community level and the interest of community political leadership, including chief and council, to involve parks despite active or potential land claims (a. fehr, personal interview, september 22, 2017). for these reasons alone, gathering a variety of information from various indigenous nations makes incorporating it into programming and signage content very difficult in jasper. one of the biggest issues with having so many members is that no group is able to fully raise their comments or concerns at the bi-annual jif meetings because there are so many who wish to have their voices heard in the short amount of time available (r. cardinal, personal interview, november 14, 2017). according to christopher gall, there is never enough time to fully discuss all the issues that need to be raised (personal interview, november 15, 2017). to rectify the issue of time for jif meetings, park management must increase the number of jif meetings each year. as he points out, more meetings would allow the large number of communities to have their voices heard and would lead to greater feedback from jif communities (c. gall, personal interview, november 15, 2017). in addition to more meetings, park management should meet with each indigenous community or treaty group separately: [m]aybe we will bring in all of treaty 7 to jasper, and they have a meeting with jasper on a whole range of issues. and maybe then it is treaty 6 that comes in the next week, and treaty 8 the next week, and the week after the métis nation, and maybe the non-status groups all get together with jasper. have separate meetings for everybody. (w. snow, telephone interview, december 1, 2017) meeting with each group separately would allow park management to achieve a deeper understanding of the concerns of the individual jif communities. raymond cardinal sees the need for a change in the levels of engagement between park management and indigenous communities. the current process is not viewed as very productive by some jif members: all that has happened so far is that first nations raise concerns, the [jnp management] will write it down and then we’ll go back in six months or a year and say the same things all over again, and parks will write it down again . . . so on and so on . . . i’m not seeing a lot of resolve on the part of [jnp management] in jasper to address them. (cardinal, personal interview, november 14, 2017) based on his consultation experience with other parks, he suggests jnp management should engage with indigenous communities in a different way than they currently do. he describes the levels of engagement in terms of three tiers: tier 1 is when indigenous communities meet among themselves; tier 2 is when indigenous communities meet with the federal government; and, tier 3 is when indigenous communities meet with the federal government and industry (r. cardinal, personal interview, november 14, 2017). this tiered process would give the communities more time to discuss the topics together to build a consensus and it could lead to more successful and productive meetings. 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.9348 addressing the gaps in knowledge between indigenous peoples and jnp management will require cultural awareness training developed by indigenous communities. all jnp staff, should learn about the indigenous histories in the park (s. abraham, personal interview, october 17). having this understanding will allow jnp staff to better appreciate the indigenous connections to jasper. frontline staff should have extensive knowledge of this connection to pass it on to park visitors. loretta belcourt stated that if staff do not have that knowledge, they cannot also use it to inform their decisions (personal interview, november 27, 2017). in the spring of 2018, mark young presented indigenous awareness training for jasper’s interpretation staff, giving more detailed histories of indigenous peoples, including their forced removals from the park and contemporary relationship with park management. laurian gladue views cultural awareness training for all staff as incredibly important but explained that park management has said it is too difficult to train all staff, as many of them are seasonal employees (personal interview, november 16, 2017). during its peak season, jnp employs approximately 350 to 400 staff, making it hard to provide all the necessary training (a. fehr, personal interview, september 22, 2017). although providing training for all staff can be challenging, cultural awareness training for staff falls within the federal parks’ definition of reconciliation, and thus should be made a training priority. the cultural awareness working group was established by the jif and jnp management to create the cultural awareness training program. one challenge is determining who will develop the program, although it is understood that the training needs to be produced and presented by the indigenous communities themselves (w. snow, telephone interview, december 1, 2017). rick ouellet discussed solutions for this challenge: although our cultures are different, there is a huge lesson for indigenous cultures to teach canadians. but canada is reluctant, not everyone, and it’s getting better, but reluctant to incorporate that into what is canadian culture. and i think we can do that in jasper. (personal interview, december 3, 2017) educating jnp staff and management about the histories and cultures of indigenous peoples from indigenous perspectives will lead to an increased understanding of the issues raised by jif members. being able to see the concerns of the indigenous nations from indigenous perspectives while understanding the histories that led to those concerns will enable jnp management to appreciate what is at stake for those nations. addressing those concerns in a respectful and meaningful way will benefit indigenous communities and their relationships with park management. making positive, lasting changes to indigenous representation and the relationship between indigenous communities and park management in jnp is a complex undertaking. while there is a desire from park management to address issues and concerns of indigenous communities within the park, there also appears to be a lack of resolve to make the necessary changes. since the establishment of the jif, 14 years have passed and there have only been minor incremental changes made in the park to address issues regarding indigenous representation or the development of better working relationships. these changes have come primarily through the creation of the cultural use area, jif working groups, and traditional gatherings in the park. gathering together in the jif, indigenous communities are sharing their voices, which has allowed some communities to strengthen their relationship to one another while simultaneously reconnecting with their traditional territories (r. cardinal, personal interview, november 14, 2017). while these changes have been comparatively small in regard to the overall 21 johnston & mason: paths to realizing reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2020 indigenous representation issues in jasper, they provide a glimpse of what is possible and how these positive changes can impact the working relationship between jnp management and the jif. misrepresentations of indigenous cultures and bridging the knowledge gaps eurocentric perspectives serve to trivialize many significant aspects of indigenous histories and continue to perpetuate damaging stereotypes of indigenous people. these perspectives often do not acknowledge the vast diversity of indigenous peoples in canada but seek instead to homogenize their histories into one easy to disseminate pan-indigenous experience (mason, 2009; snow 2005). this has further reaching impacts than jnp management may realize. these eurocentric perspectives send the message to indigenous peoples that their cultures and histories are not important enough to share. this in turn impacts the working relationships between park management and local indigenous communities. it indicates that park management is more interested in catering to park visitor expectations and desires than sharing indigenous histories from indigenous perspectives. this focus on catering to visitor expectations “ignores the ways in which first nations continue to be dispossessed from their lands in the name of colonial-capitalist growth” (youdelis, 2016, p. 7). this undervaluing and misrepresenting of their cultures negatively impact how some indigenous people, particularly indigenous youth, view themselves (s. abraham, personal interview, october 17, 2017). it also perpetuates the idea that europeans established parks to manage lands that indigenous peoples could not. early government indigenous policies were firmly rooted in the nineteenth-century european assumption that their civilization was superior to local indigenous peoples (snow, 2005). park management must balance meeting the park’s mandate to work with indigenous peoples while retaining authority over park lands and catering to visitor expectations. erecting traditional territory acknowledgement signs at the entrances of the park or making the jif an official advisory or partner group could potentially lead to indigenous nations being able to legally challenge park management’s authority over park lands (youledis, 2016). to date, these challenges to park management’s authority have occurred as a result of the active land claims in the canadian rocky mountain parks’ system. if the jif remains unofficial and open, potential legitimacy of claims discussions would be avoided. in addition, park management must deal with the complexities of working with numerous indigenous nations and diverse priorities while making their way through the bureaucracy of a government agency. steps forward in their working relationship with local indigenous nations, such as the establishment of the cultural use area, the formation of the jif, and jnp’s open-door policy are touted by management as achievements. these tentative steps on the path to reconciliation are only small pieces to the larger puzzle. what remains is a lack of any notable, visible acknowledgement of jasper’s rich indigenous histories. this absence highlights a lack of understanding on the part of park management of how eurocentric representations negatively impact indigenous communities and how not addressing them continues to marginalize and alienate indigenous peoples. a deeper appreciation for the issues encountered by indigenous peoples due to stereotypes and misrepresentation is necessary before park management is able to address the concerns of the indigenous nations with traditional ties to the lands in jasper. as a federal government agency, jnp management must develop concrete measures to ensure that the indigenous peoples with traditional connections to the lands in and around jnp are treated with dignity. working with jif communities to enact meaningful change and respectfully address their concerns could make that possible. 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.9348 ongoing research should compare indigenous consultation and representation in jnp to other national parks and protected areas in canada to determine how jnp differs from other parks working with indigenous nations. researchers could be supported by indigenous communities to develop metrics for measuring successful working relationships through consultation. greater involvement from the jif in future research in jnp would provide researchers with a wider array of insights into the issues faced by indigenous communities. a higher level of consideration for parks canada policies and bureaucratic systems by jif members would be beneficial to determine how representation issues should be handled by management (r. cardinal, personal interview, november 14, 2017). the parks canada agency, which includes jnp, is a national bureaucratic system, and subsequently changes occur at a slow pace. increasing awareness of parks canada policies and decision-making systems would be beneficial for jif members. however, park management must increase their own understanding of indigenous issues and ways of gathering and sharing knowledge in order to successfully work with the jif to address their concerns in a meaningful way (m. young, personal interview, august 28, 2017). much of the progress with regards to indigenous representation in jasper was a direct result of the pressure put on park management by indigenous peoples themselves. local indigenous nations have been tireless in their pursuit to reconnect with their traditional territories in the park and achieve representations of their histories and cultures—stories told by their own peoples with their own voices. as demonstrated in this article, jif members are motivated to change the eurocentric perspectives that continue to shape how park visitors view indigenous peoples. while an objective of park management is to increase indigenous representation and work towards reconciliation in jasper national park, until that has been achieved to the satisfaction of the local indigenous communities, reconciliation will simply remain an unfulfilled goal. conclusion our findings indicate that jif members want increased representation and greater control over how their cultures are presented and park management must build stronger relations with the jif if they want to improve indigenous representations in the park, develop productive consultation processes, and support reconciliation efforts. major changes to the way indigenous knowledge is gathered and presented in jnp are necessary. through working more closely with local indigenous peoples, jnp management will be able to address some of the issues that arise from the misrepresentation of indigenous histories. a key aspect of this is taking responsibility for the role park management has played in marginalizing indigenous peoples and perpetuating stereotypes of their cultures. incorporating diverse indigenous voices into park consultation processes and management decisions is essential to acknowledge the historical land rights and contemporary presences of local indigenous communities as well as to build the necessary bridges that make policy revision and reconciliation possible. in examining current consultation processes with local indigenous communities in jnp, researcher megan youdelis (2016) advocated for an antipolitical approach to be employed by local jif members and the communities they represent. she asserts that if communities engage in consultation processes like the jif, they are in fact reifying inequitable colonial power structures, which tacitly endorse the federal government as the just decision maker in contested territories. unfortunately, this stance relies on a number of problematic assumptions. firstly, it supports a false dichotomy between engagement and disengagement that positions community members in a simplistic way and devalues their past and 23 johnston & mason: paths to realizing reconciliation published by scholarship@western, 2020 present efforts that simultaneously pursue multiple objectives in their relationships with various levels of government. both in a historical context and in the consideration of contemporary realities, indigenous leadership has sought to best serve their communities and strategically assert their collective rights. for example, nakoda communities who have actively engaged in tourism economies in both banff and jasper throughout the 20th century could be criticized for further entrenching colonial-capitalist power dynamics through their participation (mason, 2015). however, this could not be further from the experiences of nakoda community members who consistently used their role in developing tourism economies to regain access to park spaces, to build key socio-economic and political relations, and assert their presence in their traditional territories (mason, 2014). although not without heavy constraints, all this was achieved while strategizing about how to return to their lands and the submission of multiple land claims in federal park jurisdictions (snow, 2005). in addition, the antipolitical approach, which we consider defeatist, does not account for communities’ urgent desire to return to their traditional territories currently defined as parks. to gain access to sacred sites is paramount for displaced communities. as time is now being measured in generations as opposed to decades, it is an understatement to define the return of community members as pressing. it is of critical importance. if one considers the destructive disruptions in indigenous education, food, and overall well-being that displacement and dispossession have facilitated, the sense of urgency is palpable. while many communities remain resilient in the barriers they encounter, and are hopeful for a return, time is certainly of the essence. how these complexities are accounted for in antipolitical approaches is lost on us and not supported by the research findings presented in this article. jif members clearly want better representation in jasper, although there is a deep lack of understanding by park management of the negative impacts that misrepresentation continues to have on indigenous communities. acknowledging indigenous histories and rights tied to jnp would help to address those negative impacts. government policies, including in national parks, have led to the loss of indigenous lands, rights, lives, languages, and cultures. these losses have had, and continue to have, devastating impacts on indigenous peoples. this contributes to the lack of connection to traditional lands, knowledge, histories, and cultural practices. while indigenous representation in jasper is only one aspect of addressing those impacts, it is significant. as part of a government agency that is responsible for forcibly removing indigenous peoples from their traditional territories, park management has a responsibility to work with indigenous communities to address and resolve their concerns in an appropriate time frame that must be agreed upon by all parties involved. through indigenous peoples presenting their own histories and cultures with their own voices, park management will increase their own knowledge and that of park visitors. while park management sees their progress as on par or above that of other parks in canada, not all jif members agree. the problem with comparing to past relations between park management and local indigenous communities is that there was little representation for the first century of jnp so, by comparison, any progress can be viewed favourably. success must not be continually defined by such troubling standards. we think that jnp should aspire to higher benchmarks in their consultation and collaboration with jif members. they should consider the practices and policies currently being enacted through indigenous park management frameworks in new protected area designations such as the indigenous protected conserved areas (the indigenous circle of experts & parks canada, 2018). it is also pertinent to look further afield at international case studies of indigenous park management frameworks to understand 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.9348 what policies could be applied in canada based on productive examples from other settler colonial states (langton et al., 2014; ruru, 2014; te urewera act, 2014). jif members know what they want and need. they have a deep understanding of the issues that have stemmed from the forced removals from their traditional territories and the continual misrepresentation of their cultures. park management are working with the jif and are willing to listen to the concerns brought forward, but they are hesitant to make changes that could lessen their comprehensive authority over park management decisions. the jif is seeking to reconcile the cultural loss facilitated by policies that the federal government and its agencies, including parks canada, enacted and enforced. they want access to the resources on the land that were taken from them, as well as the support to present their own histories in their own voices. through not sharing indigenous histories, park management is also denying visitors the opportunity to gain knowledge that could challenge stereotypes and simultaneously assert indigenous connections to local lands. the incorporation of indigenous content in other parks and protected areas across canada stems partially from increasing demands for indigenous tourism, paired with pressure from local indigenous peoples (mason 2014; shultis & heffner, 2016). however, tourism demands should not be the determining factor for whether indigenous content is incorporated in jnp. only through acknowledging the rights of indigenous peoples to present their cultures in jasper, access traditional territories, and shape policy can park management claim to be working towards reconciliation. there must be greater emphasis on the incorporation of indigenous knowledge and expertise into park programming and signage, employee training, and 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(2007). laying the tracks for tourism: paradoxical promotions and the development of jasper national park. in i. s. maclaren (ed.), culturing wilderness in jasper national park: studies in two centuries in the human history of the upper athabasca river watershed (pp. 233-59). university of alberta press. ms 9348 cover page.pdf 9348 johnston paths to realizing reconciliation final.pdf “i don't think that any peer review committee . . . would ever ‘get’ what i currently do”: how institutional metrics for success and merit risk perpetuating the (re)production of colonial relationships in community-based participatory research involving i the international indigenous policy journal volume 6 | issue 4 article 2 september 2015 “i don't think that any peer review committee . . . would ever ‘get’ w hat i currently do”: how institutional metrics for success and merit risk perpetuating the (re)production of colonial relationships in community-based participatory research involving indigenous peoples in canada heather castleden queen's university, heather.castleden@queensu.ca paul sylvestre queen's university, paul.sylvestre@queensu.ca debbie martin dalhousie university, debbie.martin@dal.ca mary mcnally dalhousie university, mary.mcnally@dal.ca recommended citation castleden, h. , sylvestre, p. , martin, d. , mcnally, m. (2015). “i don't think that any peer review committee . . . would ever ‘get’ what i currently do”: how institutional metrics for success and merit risk perpetuating the (re)production of colonial relationships in community-based participatory research involving indigenous peoples in canada. the international indigenous policy journal, 6(4). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.2 “i don't think that any peer review committee . . . would ever ‘get’ w hat i currently do”: how institutional metrics for success and merit risk perpetuating the (re)production of colonial relationships in community-based participatory research involving indigenous peoples in canada abstract this article reports on findings from a study that explored how a group of leading health researchers who do indigenous community-engaged research (n = 20) in canada envision enacting ethically sound research with indigenous communities, as well as the concomitant tensions associated with doing so. in particular, we explore how institutional metrics for assessing merit and granting tenure are seen to privilege conventional discourses of productivity and validity in research and, as a result, are largely incongruent with the relational values associated with decolonizing research through community-based participatory health research. our findings reveal that colonial incursion from the academy risk filtering into such research agendas and create a conflict between relational accountability to community partners and academic accountability to one’s discipline and peers. keywords indigenous health, ethics, decolonizing methodologies, community-based participatory research, canada, tenure and promotion acknowledgments the authors would like to gratefully thank the research participants who took part in this study for sharing their knowledge and experiences. the authors would also like to thank the canadian institute of health research (cihr) for providing funding through a catalyst grant. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/   “i d o n ' t t h i n k t h a t a n y pe e rr e v i e w c o m m i t t e e . . . w o u l d e v e r ‘ g e t ’ w h a t i c u rre n t l y d o ”: h o w i n s t i t u t i o n a l m e t ri c s f o r s u c c e s s a n d m e ri t r i s k pe rp e t u a t i n g t h e ( r e ) pro d u c t i o n o f c o l o n i a l r e l a t i o n s h i p s i n c o m m u n i t y ba s e d pa rt i c i p a t o ry r e s e a rc h i n v o l v i n g i n d i g e n o u s pe o p l e s i n c a n a d a the distribution of benefits associated with academic research involving indigenous peoples1 in canada has historically been asymmetrical, privileging the researcher over the researched (battiste & youngblood henderson, 2000), and is persistent today. while indigenous peoples continue to experience gross health inequities, academic careers have been built on extractive approaches to research (castleden, morgan, & lamb, 2012). under a benevolent aegis, researchers have “parachuted” into communities, carried out their conventional research protocols, and returned to the academy to publish their results in scholarly journals, inform policy, and procure additional grants. doing so—by intention or by design—leaves, at best, a dearth of discernable community benefits; more notably, it leaves a legacy of stigmatizing and pathologizing discourses that have perpetuated violence against indigenous communities (humphery, 2001; louis, 2007). more pointedly, māori scholar, linda tuhiwai smith (1999), unequivocal in her indictment of this history, which is evident in the like-settled colonial states of new zealand, australia, and the united states, declared: “the word itself, ‘research,’ is probably one of the dirtiest words in the indigenous world’s vocabulary” (p. 1). the colonizing effects of scholarly research have led to strident demands by indigenous peoples (and their allies) for indigenous control over research and a reformulation of research relationships that is based in respect and reciprocity (humphery, 2001; kovach, 2009; tobias, richmond, & luginaah, 2014). this transformation is perhaps nowhere more important than in health research, where decades of study on indigenous health has yet to address deep and persistent health disparities (adelson, 2005; maar, manitowabi, & corbiere, 2011), which are themselves a product of colonial processes (czyzewski, 2011; reading & wien, 2009). community-based participatory research (cbpr)—which is less a methodology than a philosophical and ethical orientation towards research—seeks to equitably engage research “participants” (formerly known as “subjects”) as collaborative partners in processes of inquiry about the realities that shape their lives (minkler & wallerstein, 2003). in practice, cbpr is relational research. cbpr is predicated on building meaningful relationships—before any data are collected—that seek to breakdown the historical power imbalances between researchers and participants and, in doing so, has been effective in helping to create community centred and community relevant interventions (israel et al., 2010). within the context of indigenous health research, cbpr’s focus on power sharing, co-ownership, co-learning, and co-creating knowledge throughout the research process makes it particularly well-suited as a means of decolonizing research, developing respectful and reciprocal research relationships, and working towards indigenous self-determination (castleden et al., 2012; cochrane et al., 2008; potvin, cargo, mccomber, delormier, & macaulay, 2003). this has led to a proliferation of cbpr projects in indigenous health research (cargo & mercer, 2008)2. while the benefits of engaging in cbpr with                                                                                                                 1 in this article, we use the term “indigenous” to refer to the original inhabitants of the land now known as canada; the canadian constitution collectively refers to this population as “aboriginal” and recognizes three groups: indian (first nations), inuit, and métis (constitution act, 1982, see s. 35). 2 for a discussion on the rhetoric and reality of doing cbpr in a “good (ethical) way,” see castleden et al. (2012). 1 castleden et al.: i don't think that any peer review committee would ever ‘get’ what i currently do published by scholarship@western, 2015   indigenous communities seem to be numerous,3 for academic researchers attempting to navigate the institutional norms and values of the academy while engaging in this form of scholarship can present significant tensions. researchers have been described as “straddling two worlds that are often in collision” (ball & janyst, 2008, p. 37), prompting some to ask how cbpr researchers contend with what seems to be conflicting and incommensurable demands (de leeuw, cameron, & greenwood, 2012). success in an academic career is contingent upon the recognition of a researcher’s merit by peers within one’s discipline. tenure and promotion are the dominant structures on which an academic’s merit is assessed and on which their professional success hinges. given that institutional metrics for merit and success—that is how many papers are published, how many presentations are delivered, how many grants are secured, as well as the quality of teaching and service commitments—at universities are the product of eurocentric (i.e., western) traditions and values begs the following question: are these structures adequate for assessing merit in cbpr involving indigenous peoples when more often than not “success” is based on non-numeric measures? thus, it is worth considering whether the ways in which the requirements of tenure and promotion processes have the potential to create a conflict between researchers’ relational accountability to indigenous community partners, and their academic accountability to their disciplines and peers. the purpose of this article is to report on findings from a study that explored how leading canadian health researchers enact their programs of indigenous health research “in a good way”4 at canadian universities. specifically, we examine how a number of seemingly disparate tensions associated with undertaking ethical indigenous cbpr all find common grounding in deeply embedded institutional values that manifest in sophisticated bibliometrics of merit and success in the academy, which privilege narrow conceptualizations of “impactful” research outputs. we contend that institutional structures rooted in eurocentric or western values—where everything counts, from number of publications to number of grants and from numbers associated with journal impact factors to numbers of citations— seriously disadvantages cbpr researchers and indigenous communities by creating a conflict of interest, whereby the choice between internalizing institutional expectations and values or enacting deeply participative and decolonizing forms of research are incommensurable. as we shall illustrate, choosing the former potentially perpetuates highly problematic research relationships, while opting for the latter can make it so researchers are perceived as less competitive, less valued, and at risk of being denied advancement in their institutions. this has direct implications for indigenous peoples in canada who not only stand to benefit greatly from strong cbpr relationships vis-à-vis improved health outcomes, but also through its promotion of self-determination through the ownership, control, access, and possession (ocaptm) of their health data. while the focus of this study is in the canadian context, its application is transferable to other contexts with similar colonial histories and ongoing colonial relationships (i.e., new zealand, australia, and the united states). we conclude by discussing novel approaches for policy concerning tenure and promotion in academic institutions, which, while                                                                                                                 3 for a discussion on critiques of cbpr, see for example flicker (2008); jacobs (2010); and alcantara, harper, and keys (2012). 4 this phrase is a nod in reference to the work of jessica ball and pauline janyst—specifically their 2008 paper, “enacting research ethics in partnerships with indigenous communities in canada: ‘do it in a good way,’” published in the journal of empirical research on human research ethics. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.2   bolstering cbpr research, may also help in potentially making researchers more accountable to the communities they are working with across multiple jurisdictions. ba c kg ro u n d c bpr a s a m e a n s o f a d d re s s i n g i n d i g e n o u s h e a l t h d i s p a ri t i e s in canada, indigenous peoples are disproportionately burdened with ill health (adelson, 2005). despite decades of biomedical research, there has been little in the way of improved health outcomes, largely because research has typically focused on pathology and dysfunction rather than on understanding indigenous perspectives and the broader social determinants of indigenous health (czyzewski, 2011; maar, mcgregor sutherland, & mcgregor, 2005; martin, 2010; reading & nowgesic, 2002; reading & wien, 2009). colonial approaches to both research and policy have worked to perpetuate rather than alleviate current health inequalities (e.g., lower life expectancy, and higher rates of suicide, mental illness, chronic illness, violent injury, infant mortality, etc.) relative to canada’s national averages (allan & smylie, 2015; czyzewski, 2011; kinnon, 2002; reading & wien, 2009; waldram, herring, & young, 2006). the result has been a legacy of misrepresentation in findings, misappropriation of knowledge, as well as harmful and stigmatizing research outcomes (ball & janyst, 2008; battiste & youngblood henderson, 2000; brant castellano, 2004; glass & kaufert, 2007; svalastog & eriksson, 2010). given these circumstances, indigenous communities have levelled intense criticism at academic institutions regarding the colonial legacy of university research and, moreover, have demanded that research be rooted in collaborative and participatory processes (jacklin & kinoshameg, 2008). echoing demands issued by communities, dr. malcolm king, scientific director of the canadian institutes of health research (cihr) institute of aboriginal peoples’ health, issued a key challenge for canadian researchers concerning current indigenous health: to build and expand capacity in the design and delivery of aboriginal health research by carrying out sound and ethical research together in ways that respect community values and allow communities to stand as true partners in the research process (king, 2008). quoting indigenous elders with whom they had worked, jessica ball and pauline janyst (2008) sum this up as enacting ethical research with indigenous communities, which means that researchers need to “do it in a good way” (ball & janyst, 2008, p. 48). given the primacy placed on relational ethics, co-creation of knowledge, and the equitable distribution of power at every phase of the knowledge-to-action research cycle, cbpr has become a front and centre approach in health research with indigenous people (castleden et al., 2012; tobias et al., 2014). while relatively new to the academy, community-based and participatory forms of inquiry have been employed for decades outside of the ivory tower as a means of working collaboratively with a multitude of non-dominant communities to identify locally relevant issues and develop strategies for social change. the genealogy of the concept emerges from a number of domains. for instance, while wallerstein and duran (2006) connect its roots to kurt lewin’s scholarship in the 1940s on experiential learning, coombes (2012) situates it in paulo friere’s critical pedagogy of the 1970s, and flicker, savan, mcgrath, kolenda, and mildenberger (2007) highlight its connection to more recent feminist, anticolonialist, and constructivist paradigms. central to more recent cbpr scholarship and action is an attention to how power relations mediate collaborative processes, to the necessity of including local 3 castleden et al.: i don't think that any peer review committee would ever ‘get’ what i currently do published by scholarship@western, 2015   knowledge brokers in the defining of local realties, and that change is emancipatory (minkler & wallerstein, 2003). regardless of cbpr’s conceptual genealogy, the belief that communities have privileged knowledge pertaining to their realities and that collaborative research rooted in local experience should help communities to identify, critique, and ultimately dismantle the oppressive structures that shape their realities is a dominant trend in contemporary forms of cbpr (flicker et al., 2007). to avoid research becoming a vehicle through which such oppression can be re-inscribed in community settings, we must move beyond a fixation with positivist and post-positivist epistemologies (durose, beebeejaun, rees, richardson, & richardson, 2011) and engage with counter-hegemonic forms of knowledge (co)production (freire, 2000). as an approach to academic research, cbpr does this by engaging with community representatives at all stages of a research project, from problem identification or development, to data collection and analysis, to the dissemination of results, and the implementation of recommendations (wallerstein & duran, 2003). while community development, capacity building, and knowledge mobilization are important community-centred goals, israel, schulz, parker, and becker (1998) noted that, additionally, researchers stand to gain significantly as well. specifically, their research has enriched processes and outcomes, whereby local contexts and knowledge can ensure greater depth in the interpretation of findings as well as greater relevance in research outcomes (israel et al., 2010). thus at its broadest, cbpr may be defined as community-driven research that is rooted in the coproduction of knowledge between academic and community partners for the purpose of social and institutional change. while having communities develop research agendas and engage in full collaboration with academic researchers throughout the course of the research endeavor is the ideal end result, in practice this can be a challenge to operationalize (castleden et al., 2012; coombes, johnson, & howitt, 2014; kendall, sutherland, barnett, nalder, & matthews, 2011). for many communities struggling to address the immediate needs of their peoples, academic research is often not a priority. lacking the capacity to guide research needs, however, should not exclude people from the benefits of ethical research, leading some to argue that research “for” communities is as ethically sound as research “with” a community— especially when a community gives its overarching approval for the research in question (koster, baccar, & lemelin, 2012). because research is a time consuming process, many have noted that collaboration can place an undue burden on cbpr partners who are attempting to negotiate the needs of research and the demands of busy lives (castleden et al., 2012; flicker, 2008; koster et al., 2012). as a result, cbpr is often viewed as operating along a continuum from consultative, problem-solving orientations (i.e., research for communities) to collaborative and emancipatory approaches (i.e., research with communities) (castleden et al., 2012; wallerstein & duran, 2003) where positioning along the continuum is a function of capacities rooted in local histories and contexts (flicker et al., 2007). the reality is that institutional constraints and norms tend to favour the former approach to research—often due to limited time and resources—and thus make the latter habitually untenable (coombes et al., 2014; kendall et al., 2011) when, we contend, it should be a product of self-determined decision-making on the part of the community partner with respect to their level of involvement. thus, there is an ongoing tension to developing truly collaborative research endeavours. recognizing a gap between theory and practice (flicker, 2008; castleden et al., 2012), critics have also highlighted the persistence of inherently unequal power relationships between academic researchers and 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.2   community partners, (see, for example, flicker, 2008; kesby, 2007; takeda & røpke, 2010) noting that the act of claiming to have overcome power asymmetries may itself conceal the re-inscription of new relations of power, which are actually rooted in old positionalities (de leeuw et al., 2012). in addition, cornwall and jewkes (1995) emphasized that communities have their own complex internal networks of power relations; the idea of “community as one voice” is fraught with tension and the adoption of such a perspective can add to the continued silencing of certain groups within a particular community (cornwall, 2003). equally important to note is that insofar as cbpr with indigenous peoples seeks to decolonize research relationships, we must recognize that cbpr is itself a western approach to research, as it has been largely developed, at least historically, by western researchers often for use with non-dominant communities (see castleden & garvin, 2008, p. 1395). critically engaged methods sensitive to this issue have emerged in the context of indigenous–settler research as responses that embrace researcher reflexivity and challenge the (colonial) subjectification of research participants (see, for instance, grimwood, doubleday, ljubicic, donaldson, & blangy, 2012; koster et al., 2012). be that as it may, as māori scholar brad coombes (2012) noted in his critique of cbpr involving indigenous peoples in the canadian context, the focus on collaboration and co-construction of knowledge, while commendable, does not sufficiently de-center western research paradigms, and rarely questions the necessity of exogenous research. by contrast, māori scholars have been highly successful at moving beyond western collaborative and participatory approaches by re-asserting the centrality and necessity of māori epistemologies for conducting research with māori people (eketone, 2008; mahuika, 2008), so much so that kaupapa māori research (a theory of māori-led research rooted in māori epistemologies) is a dominant theme in the health research council of new zealand’s (2010) guidelines for researchers on health research involving māori. while few would likely discount the benefits of cbpr in terms of working towards decolonizing health research, it is essential that readers and practitioners alike situate it within a broader movement towards self-determination and a reassertion of indigenous epistemologies and methodologies in research involving indigenous peoples. t e n u re a n d pro m o t i o n i n c a n a d i a n h i g h e r e d u c a t i o n the assemblage of policies and guidelines that dictate criteria for tenure and promotion are a reflection of a university’s true values (freeman, gust, & aloshen, 2009). while the institution of academic tenure is centuries old (freeman et al., 2009), its contemporary structure, rooted in institutionalized forms of peer review, emerged in the middle of the 20th century as an explicit means of safeguarding academic freedom and to ensure that a scholar’s merit was adjudicated by experts in his or her field rather than by university trustees (american association of university professors [aaup], 2014). in canada, although universities are under provincial and territorial jurisdiction, academic institutions are responsible for developing their own standards and procedures for quality assurance, with tenure and promotion guidelines typically negotiated between faculty associations and universities’ boards of governors (association of universities and colleges of canada [aucc], 2015; gravestock & greenleaf, 2008). as much as this results in degrees of difference among individual institutions, the general trend is a requirement to demonstrate excellence and productivity in the categories of research (e.g., peer-reviewed articles, competitive grants, invited speaking engagements), teaching (e.g., peer review of course content, students’ course evaluations), and service (e.g., community outreach, 5 castleden et al.: i don't think that any peer review committee would ever ‘get’ what i currently do published by scholarship@western, 2015   participation on academic committees, etc.) (gravestock & greenleaf, 2008) in a manner that aligns with the institution’s mission. clearly, the freedom and security granted by tenure and promotion make it an important safeguard for ensuring that scholarship is (at least somewhat) freed from the influence of powerful interests (ginsberg, 2012). it is, however, not without its challenges. boyer’s (1990) highly influential work scholarship reconsidered: priorities for the professoriate is often credited (for example by brew, 2003; calleson, jordan, & seifer, 2005) with shifting the mission of modern universities to focus on research, integration, application, and teaching in lieu of more ivory tower-esque conceptualizations by virtue of its call to scholars to “not only skillfully explore the frontiers of knowledge, but also integrate ideas, connect thought to action, and inspire students” (boyer, 1990, p. 77). while boyer was advocating a broad re-envisioning of the social contract of universities, what is particularly germane to this discussion was his explicit commitment to a “scholarship of engagement” wherein he advocated mobilizing the considerable resources of universities to respond to the pressing socio-ecological, civic, and social problems that directly affect people and their communities (boyer, 1990). cbpr as both research and mode of action represents exactly the form of scholarship of engagement for which boyer was advocating. although a number of institutions sought to embed these principles into their guidelines for tenure and promotion, calleson and colleagues (2005) noted, “untenured faculty are more likely to receive promotion for publishing articles in peer-reviewed journals than for demonstrating an active commitment to addressing community problems” (p. 317) and focus on such a narrow conception of productivity remains the norm (freeman, gust, & aloshen, 2005). thus, research output that is measured in peer-reviewed publications (particularly in high impact journals) and grants received largely remains the primary benchmark upon which a scholar’s merit is adjudicated. ironically, the “publish or perish” climate engendered by this obsession with narrow benchmarks creates a situation in which the metric rather than the outcomes of one’s work becomes the focus (fischer, ritchie, & hanspach, 2012; jansen & ruwaard, 2012).5 this is particularly pertinent for cbpr scholars whose research projects are relational in nature and take more time, are often more concerned with community relevant benefits than “knowledge frontiers,” and produce a whole host of products outside of traditional peer-reviewed articles. such benefits include, as illustrative examples, knowledge and skills in collaboration, increased networking, the ability to learn from and positively influence multi-sectoral partners, and the production of new perspectives on theoretical, methodological, and substantive insights. for this reason, many have noted the inherent structural disadvantages faced by cbpr researchers who are assessed for tenure and promotion (calleson et al., 2005; castleden et al., 2012; freeman et al., 2009; nyden, 2003). while there has been considerable attention to how this affects researchers’ careers (e.g. calleson et al., 2005; jordan, seifer, sandmann, & gelmon, 2009), with the exception of freeman and colleagues                                                                                                                 5 while the focus here is on tenure and promotion, many academic institutions also rely on annual reviews to determine “merit” pay (raises based on how productive one is in comparison [read: competition] with ones’ colleagues), which is equally problematic. as robert engvall (2010) aptly puts it: “let me oversimplify this . . . ‘if my raise is dependent upon what my president or dean or some other panel of similarly situated individuals finds valuable, isn’t it likely that i will begin to shape my research, teaching, and service in ways that will please them, rather than in ways i believe will advance my profession?’” (p. 3). while engvall’s focus is on the profession and ours is on advancing community agendas, the basic argument is the same. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.2   (2009), we could find little in the way of discussion of how tensions between cbpr and institutional processes for tenure and promotion may negatively affect communities. thus, we hope this article can be used to spur further discussion about how the embedded assumptions, which direct tenure and promotion guidelines, may produce real world consequences in the halls of the academy. m e t h o d s the purpose of this study was to explore the conceptualizations of leading canadian health researchers engaged in indigenous health research regarding the enactment of research with indigenous peoples “in a good way.” we recruited 20 principal investigators from the network environments for aboriginal health research (neahr) who were engaging in health research with or in relation to indigenous peoples, communities, or organizations. the neahr initiative was an evolution of an earlier network launched by the cihr institute of aboriginal people’s health (iaph) in 2001 and resulted in the establishment of nine centres whose purposes were to focus on critical indigenous health issues, develop the capacity of indigenous health researchers, and focus research efforts on the determinants of health in indigenous communities (neahr, 2011). respondents came from a variety of disciplinary backgrounds and demographic characteristics (see table 1). worth noting, cihr recently wound down its support of the neahr centres (and its support for indigenous health research in general) despite a sense of urgency among the indigenous health research community to continue to build capacity in this area to work towards parity and equity (richmond, martin, dean, castleden, & marsden, 2013; see also the indigenous health community’s response to the “cihr crisis” at kahwa:tsire.com). open ended, semi-structured qualitative interviews were used to maximize the depth and breadth of the data collected (denzin & lincoln, 2005). respondents were interviewed via telephone, with interviews lasting between 60 to 90 minutes. interviews were audio recorded and transcribed verbatim. respondents were asked to discuss the following: their programs of research, what indigenous engagement looks like in their research, what they envision it means to enact research “in a good way,” what they viewed as the institutional and community-based tensions associated with enacting research “in a good way,” and advice for novice researchers entering the field of indigenous health research. we employed an inductive thematic analysis using the constant comparative method (charmaz, 2006) and nvivo 10™ (2012) to facilitate the process of analysis. paul sylvestre conducted an initial round of descriptive coding on all transcripts to produce a preliminary analytic scaffold from which a more indepth analysis proceeded (bernard & ryan, 1998; charmaz, 2006). at that point, the research team reviewed the preliminary analysis and discussed initial findings, determining a set of thematic codes that were dependable, credible, confirmable, and transferable (baxter & eyles, 1997). importantly, we considered the dataset as a whole and did not subject it to analysis separated by ethnicity, gender, age, or research pillar (i.e. biomedical, clinical, health service, or socio-cultural); respondents who indicated a desire to see their quotes in context (n = 5) before publication were given the opportunity to do so.   7 castleden et al.: i don't think that any peer review committee would ever ‘get’ what i currently do published by scholarship@western, 2015   t a b l e 1 . pa rt i c i p a n t c h a ra c t e ri s t i c s r e s p o n d e n t m a l e / f e m a l e i n d i g e n o u s / n o n i n d i g e n o u s t e n u re d 1 female non-indigenous professor emeritus 2 female non-indigenous tenured – associate professor 3 female non-indigenous tenured – professor 4 female non-indigenous tenured – associate professor 5 male non-indigenous tenured – professor emeritus 6 male non-indigenous tenured – professor emeritus 7 female non-indigenous tenured – associate professor 8 female indigenous independent scholar 9 female indigenous (métis) tenured – associate professor 10 female non-indigenous tenured – associate professor 11 female non-indigenous tenured – associate professor 12 female indigenous (métis) tenured – associate professor 13 female non-indigenous tenured – professor 14 female non-indigenous tenured – professor 15 female non-indigenous tenured – professor 16 female indigenous (métis) tenured – professor 17 female non-indigenous tenured – associate professor 18 female indigenous (first nations) tenured – associate professor 19 male indigenous (first nations) tenured – associate professor 20 male indigenous (first nations) tenured – associate professor   8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.2   this article sets out to explore emergent themes associated with perceived institutional and communitybased tensions of enacting research “in a good way” that emerged out of collaborative analysis. specifically, we identified themes associated with conflicting conceptualizations of time and productivity, with what constitutes valid rigorous research manifests as tensions between institutional values and norms, and with the requirements of relational research. institutional values, which narrowly frame “good” research and inform academic metrics for merit and success, were also perceived as inherently disadvantaging to cbpr research insofar as they produced asymmetrical power relations, which thus tacitly risk coercing researchers to adopt more colonizing approaches—to do otherwise would put them at risk of becoming marginalized within their departments and disciplines. f i n d i n g s we explored respondents’ conception of, and experiences with, processes of tenure and promotion in the academy and how this relates to their ability to enact research “in a good way.” tenure and promotion committees were perceived as operating within eurocentric or western notions of how best to use one’s time to ensure maximum productivity, as well as ideals as to what constitutes valid and rigorous research. these were discussed by respondents as being largely incongruent with the realities and necessities of indigenous health research that adopts the principles of cbpr. t h e t i m e a n d pro d u c t i v i t y c o n u n d ru m cbpr is relational research. as would be expected, the majority of respondents unequivocally stressed the primacy of relationship building in enacting good ethical research and that this requires a significant investment of time, long before any data are collected, and one that requires attention throughout the life of a project and beyond; it is a lifetime commitment. one respondent encapsulated this particularly well: it's in constant negotiation, and it's a constant attending to and i don't know if that word means anything to you, but it's like you have to feed it, nurture it, love it, water it. and if you don't, you lose it. (r11) while the nature of engagement and relationship building obviously varied among respondents with respect to their community partners, often as a function of different community histories and contexts, several respondents stated that for true collaboration—based on trust—to take place, being physically present and participating in community life was viewed as essential to building those relationships. you need to be visible and present in the communities. they need to get to know you as a person. they need to know you are a person, right? so i think that, to me, is really essential; it's very relational—very relational. (r13) it was in speaking to the importance of building authentic relationships with communities when respondents began to note tensions concerning time and productivity, and how institutional norms framed productivity in a manner that tended to be largely at odds with the values of cbpr. 9 castleden et al.: i don't think that any peer review committee would ever ‘get’ what i currently do published by scholarship@western, 2015   i'd say from an academic perspective, the structures in the world of academia don't account for the amount of time that it takes for relationship building and relationship maintenance to carry out a collaborative research project. (r18) several respondents expressed frustration regarding a perceived lack of understanding of the importance of time spent building relationships as a necessary precursor to enacting ethical relational research and developed dichotomies between their work and what they viewed as more mainstream forms of health research as a means of further illustrating the issues this presents. you're not doing [cbpr] in a damn lab, you know, and whipping off the papers. things take time and because of working the relationships, what you set out to do might not be what you end up doing because you have to change and roll with it. there are pressures of expectations from the community that may not net you a paper in a high impact peer-reviewed journal. (r16) the juxtaposition of cbpr with mainstream forms of knowledge production was a common feature among respondents when they discussed time as a tension and illustrates the perception that their productivity is being judged using criteria that are incongruent with the realities in which they operate, wherein “doing it in a damn lab” and “whipping off papers” are clearly still seen as the norm in the academy. this lack of recognition of relationship building and maintenance as a productive use of time has impacts on a researcher’s career. at an institutional level, i was sometimes getting a lot of pushback about my limited scholarly output. i’m in the college of medicine, by the way. there’s another layer of tension because people here publish a lot and in what are measured as very high-impact journals and next to them, my scholarly output doesn’t look . . . in terms of quantitative measures, it doesn’t match up. (r10) this impact was perceived to be particularly precarious in reference to untenured researchers. for example, participant r19 noted the predicament of early career academics who are faced with a choice between meeting a deadline for a call for papers and going to a community meeting: people are on tenure track. they can't do both, and there is more to be gained by taking the time to be involved with a peer-reviewed journal. the reality is: in academia, if it's not published, it doesn't exist. (r19) discussion of the tenure and promotion process manifested as a perceived asymmetry of power whereby eurocentric notions of academic productivity were placed in direct competition with the relational necessities of engaged and collaborative cbpr. the tenure and promotion committee was viewed as the arbiter of the researcher’s worth. the phrase, “if it’s not published, it doesn’t exist,” captures the ontological privileging of western discourses regarding what constitutes knowledge and how this is (re)produced through the granting or denial of tenure and promotions in the academy. to navigate these challenges, several respondents highlighted the importance of diversifying one’s programme of research so that it does not exclusively focus on indigenous health research. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.2   this is why the earlier advice is "don't do only aboriginal stuff" because you do end up spending saturday at a health fair and learning a great deal about the community by doing that, by being right there, but putting that in a tenure document is pretty lame. (r2) while this was one strategy for coping with the tenure and promotion process, other researchers advanced contrary discourses of productivity; for example, one respondent in particular highlighted an alternative discourse of productive research: i know that one of our [colleagues in the neahr network] was overlooked in tenure for a long time because [he/she] spent so much time in the community. by [the person] doing that, [he/she] was able to develop a very effective research program and a very effective . . . native student retention program. (r8) in some instances (echoing the above quotation), though notably rare, a couple of respondents went so far as to discuss eschewing the pursuit of tenure and promotion as a career goal choosing to instead focus on the needs of communities: to be honest with you, given all the stresses and pressures and the ways we splinter ourselves, i kind of had to decide that it didn't matter to me if i got to be full professor or not . . . so i'm just going to do my work and do it at the pace it goes. (r12) however, in sum, respondents predominantly perceived the importance of productivity for personal career gain vis-à-vis the tenure and promotion process as follows: the sad truth is that publications are the coin of the realm in academia, and researchers do have to think about their own careers. i mean, i've got a [spouse] and . . . kids, a smelly dog, and a mortgage. it's just a reality. (r20) while begrudgingly subscribing to a western discourse of productivity in the academy was rewarded, and it was recognized that a failure to do so might “stall” one’s career and threaten one’s livelihood, this was an unsettling tension that caused many respondents to experience personal internalized conflict. ultimately, however, they also recognized that for many, this power asymmetry had the potential to mediate relationships between communities and researchers—especially for early career researchers. w h a t c o n s t i t u t e s v a l i d a n d r i g o ro u s r e s e a rc h : w h o d e f i n e s k n o w l e d g e ? community-driven research is a key tenet of cbpr. in an institutional context, as with relationship building, a number of respondents discuss the fact that from the inception of a project, this presents several challenges. as one respondent noted: i think one of the most important factors that has to be asked up front in [indigenous] community-based research is, "whose interests are really at play here?" and if the researcher is honest and genuine and says, "it's the community," then that presents a number of difficult challenges for that person's promotion and tenure, acceptance by their peers at the university, etc., etc., because you cannot do it at the pace or necessarily the productivity that your peers think you should be. (r1) 11 castleden et al.: i don't think that any peer review committee would ever ‘get’ what i currently do published by scholarship@western, 2015   discipline-specific and investigator-driven research has been the tradition in academic research. having communities set research priorities represents an inversion of this power structure and is perceived as a form of relational accountability. if what i do is not seen as an important question to communities or as solving an important problem for communities, then i'm doing something deeply wrong. (r20) a number of respondents noted that they have struggled with having their colleagues and senior administration understand and/or value the work they did. struggling with peers viewing work as valid was a persistent issue throughout the research process for many. for instance: i mean, you know, obviously, in the academy your best proof is a randomized clinical trial, and many communities will say, "i don't care about your damn randomized clinical trial.” (r2) what constitutes “the best research” is a value judgment, which is rooted in a western scientific discourse of validity. it implies universalized judgment criteria that are external to the reality in which the research is being conducted. ultimately, a universalized best research practice suggests the ontological privileging of one form of knowledge (academic expert) over another (community expert). this is problematic in terms of a decolonizing agenda for research, as one of the indigenous respondents poignantly illustrated: so much of the research about our lives is based on the standards and the criteria from a world outside of our own and until that starts to change so that we're using our world to research our world, we're not going to gain an understanding. (r18) calling for engagement with indigenous ontologies in health research, while not necessarily the focus of our inquiry and thus not a dominant perspective across the health researchers we interviewed for this study, was raised as a way in which to help interrogate who has the power to define what constitutes valid research. in the academy, it is the discipline, constructed on the opinions of one’s peers that inscribes validity onto research. this is viewed as problematic in indigenous community-based participatory health research since “those peers are not necessarily going to have any sympathies towards the problems that have been encountered because their world does not encompass those understandings” (r1), and, as one respondent explained regarding tenure and promotion processes, “it's our own peers that are telling us that they don't value the work that we're doing.” (r15). these concerns tended to be advanced more by respondents doing participatory community engagement than those who were conducting indigenous health research in communities but not necessarily cbpr. as with discourses of productivity, respondents perceived the ontological privileging of western science’s criteria of validity in research as disadvantageous to cbpr involving indigenous peoples. the mechanisms for the enactment of colonial power structures are also found in the embedded assumptions that direct tenure and promotions processes in the academy. one respondent, a basic scientist whose program of research could be described as fundamentally rooted in ontological pluralism, concisely captures this issue: “honestly, i don't think that any peer-review committee that i've ever experienced would ever get what i currently do. they would simply say i'm not doing anything and i'm certainly not doing research” (r1). by unilaterally enacting the power to define what constitutes research, tenure, and 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.2   promotion, committees are arguably perpetuating western values and quantitative bibliometrics of traditional measures of productivity regardless of the approach to research undertaken. d i s c u s s i o n health researchers seeking to decolonize research relationships and address indigenous health disparities through cbpr must negotiate multiple and competing demands from disparate realities; our focus here has been on the tension of doing such research “in a good way” as it is pushed up against the metrics of academic success. our findings suggest that deepening engagement with a decolonizing, community-driven research agenda (reflecting multiple ontologies and committed to relationshipbuilding and relational accountability, community deliverables, and deep collaboration) poses significant challenges in terms of researchers’ livelihood and career advancement. at the same time, as much as researchers are community-based, they are also university-based. structures for tenure and promotion remain largely steeped in a western ontology that privileges particular discourses of productivity and validity in research that do not necessarily align with the relational ontology that is found in many indigenous worldviews (see, for example, louis, 2007; smith, 1999). as a result, a conflict of interest arises between researchers’ relational accountability to their community partners and their academic accountability to their disciplines and peers. one’s career is a serious motivator when one has “a [spouse] and . . . kids, a smelly dog and a mortgage,” (r20), but tenure and promotion structures incentivize in the wrong direction for those who undertake research “in a good way” (as described earlier by janyst & ball, 2008). our findings align with those of kraemer diaz and colleagues (2015) who discuss how institutional tensions across 25 cbpr studies in the united states were similar to those we explored, and are perceived as impacting scientific integrity in cbpr. while we agree—to an extent—with their conclusions, we attempt to move beyond their analysis by illustrating how these tensions manifest in the context of community-based participatory indigenous health research; rather than just navigating academic structures that disadvantage cbpr, the assumed legitimacy of these structures ought to be seriously questioned. time and productivity, and questions of validity associated with cbpr, are common transactional burdens of this approach (brewer, 2013; flicker et al., 2007); however, we attempt to depart from simply listing these burdens as inevitable costs of doing cbpr “business,” and root them in unquestioned and problematic assumptions that academic authority over research done in partnership with indigenous communities is, in some way, legitimate. this critique could also be levelled at other structures within the institution, including, for example, the role of an institutional research ethics board, which has the power to compromise negotiated research agreements between indigenous communities and their academic partners (see stiegman & castleden, 2015). to respondents, time spent building relationships and earning as well as maintaining trust is framed as the most productive use of their time because it allows research to move forward, often unencumbered with problems that tend to emerge when relational accountability has not been established. congruently, even the canadian tri-council policy statement on institutionally-based research ethics recognizes that research with indigenous people needs to be premised on respectful and reciprocal relationships and “that this process takes time” (cihr, natural sciences and engineering research council of canada [nserc], & social sciences and humanities research council of canada [sshrc], 2010). yet, as respondents noted, the tremendous effort required to develop such relationships is made invisible through academic measures of merit. failing to recognize the time spent co-constructing relationships and co-producing knowledge 13 castleden et al.: i don't think that any peer review committee would ever ‘get’ what i currently do published by scholarship@western, 2015   as a legitimate aspect of the research enterprise is a failure to recognize indigenous ways of being in the world; it is nothing short of a colonial act. metrics for success embedded in western discourses of academic productivity, whereby effort is meted out in the number of peer-reviewed articles, monographs, and conference papers produced to the vast exclusion of anything that is communityrelevant—even end-of-grant reports delivered to communities have been considered “outreach” products because they have not necessarily been subjected to the scrutiny of academic peer review; they have, however, been subjected to a more important measure from a cbpr point of view: community approval—privileges the former to the detriment of the latter. similarly, as much as empowering indigenous peoples through shared ownership of research is an ideal discussed by numerous respondents, our findings illustrate how the institutional criteria for judging the validity of cbpr processes and outcomes remain largely exogenous, whereby tenure and promotion processes are perceived as rooted in eurocentric ontologies defining valid knowledge creation in selfreferential terms, and excluding alternative ontological frames. subsequently, through the granting or denial of tenure, the academy exercises its power to define what constitutes knowledge and valid research in indigenous communities. this too is a colonial act. but when a community “invites you back,” a researcher who truly embraces a cbpr approach has essentially earned tenure in the community. it is this process and outcome, standing up to the scrutiny of community that compels a cbpr researcher to continue along this trajectory despite the colonial mentality they encounter in the academy. as has been made evident elsewhere (e.g., battiste & youngblood henderson, 2000; kovach, 2009; smith, 1999) and here, university research is often the product of colonial processes. tenure and promotion processes assume the universal legitimacy of the dominant western discourse on productivity and validity in research as well as their own legitimacy as the appropriate arbiters of merit and knowledge (shih, 2010). this manifests as a closed, self-referencing system whose own internal logic is mistaken for an objective, singular, and universal reality. paralleling howitt and suchetpearson’s (2006) critique of assumed legitimacy of environmental management as an unequivocal good, we draw on their invocation of rose’s (1999) metaphor of the eurocentric self, positioned in a hall of mirrors, to further illustrate our point: [the eurocentric self] . . . mistakes its reflection for the world, sees its own reflections endlessly, talks endlessly to itself, and, not surprisingly, finds continual verification of itself and its worldview. this is monologue masquerading as conversation, masturbation posing as productive interaction; it is a narcissism so profound that it purports to provide a universal knowledge when in fact its practices of erasure are universalising its own singular and powerful isolation. (p. 177) there are examples of concerted efforts to break away from this hall of mirrors. for instance, in the united states, a working group of the community-engaged scholarship for health collaborative developed a resource guide in 2007 (jordan et al., 2009) for use among community-engaged scholars and their respective review, promotion, and tenure committees. in 2008, a group of canadian universities, research networks, and community organizations launched the pan-canadian coalition on community based research; one of its member institutions also developed a resource for recognizing excellence in community-engaged research (university of victoria, n.d.). however, many still call into 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.2   question the effectiveness of peer review within the processes, noting, first of all, that there is little evidence to support the effectiveness of peer review in general (street, baum, & anderson, 2009), that in many institutions persistent and entrenched standards for accountability continue to narrowly frame acceptable scholarship, and that the process remains (falsely) framed as neutral and objective when in reality it is rooted in context dependent value judgments, which are themselves rooted in deeply held assumptions about the nature of scholarship (gelmon, jordan, & seifer, 2013). if the ideal of cbpr is to be truly emancipatory and decolonizing for indigenous communities (castleden et al., 2012; kraemer diaz, johnson, & arcury, 2015; wallerstein & duran, 2003), then should the power to judge the legitimacy of this form of research reside solely in the hands of individuals whose “worlds do not encompass those understandings” (r1)? moreover, can the “productivity” of such research be justly measured by academic standards for dissemination? this has been soundly rejected elsewhere (see, for example, battiste & youngblood henderson, 2000; coombes et al., 2014; louis, 2007; royal commission on aboriginal peoples [rcap], 1996; smith, 1999). yet, as noted above, this is clearly the case when health researchers who engage in cbpr are confronted with tenure and promotion structures. as a result, the risk becomes, especially for health researchers new to cbpr and/or indigenous health research to shy away from relational authenticity and community-engaged scholarship (de leeuw et al., 2012). unless we continue to identify cracks in the status quo—and propose alternatives, we contend that we will continue to see career-minded researchers who recognize that they stand to gain more (academic success, that is) by engaging less (and failing to build meaningful research relationships with those whose inequitable health status demands our attention). when authentic partnerships do arise despite disincentives, as can be seen in the comments from our study’s respondents, incongruent metrics affect researchers’ careers. while an awareness of these issues has been noted (see ahmed, beck, maurana, & newton, 2004; calleson et al., 2005; flicker et al., 2007; israel et al., 2010; nyden, 2003), the typical response—of making process measures for engagement more central to assessment (calleson et al., 2005), placing cbpr researchers and community partners on tenure and promotion committees (ahmed et al., 2004; nyden, 2003), and having these committees recognize lower impact cbpr journals—though moderately beneficial in the short term, does little to address the central problem of ontological monism. this is not to argue for the dissolution of tenure and promotion processes or the disposing of western approaches to knowledge creation and assessment. rather, we are suggesting that such positionality must be made explicit and that there needs to be recognition of the irrelevance of many traditional metrics of academic merit to, for example, communitybased participatory indigenous health research, as our study highlights. coombes and colleagues (2014) argue that collaborative research with indigenous peoples should not be judged on traditional metrics of productivity but rather on “its ability to transition theory and methods to host communities so that, over time, they generate a base for independent research” (p. 848). institutional structures have allowed the academy’s conventional role as societal knowledge brokers to go unfettered for far too long; these structures have been critiqued for their tendency to produce one-sided university–community partnerships (allahwala, bunce, & beagrie, 2013). as much as reforming systems of merit and reward may reduce power asymmetries that disadvantage indigenous cbpr, privileged and powerful western ideals on which they are predicated remain a persistent issue (hewitt & suchet-pearson, 2006). 15 castleden et al.: i don't think that any peer review committee would ever ‘get’ what i currently do published by scholarship@western, 2015   although this was not reflected in our interviews, it nonetheless behooves health researchers who are considering employing a cbpr approach to reflect on how academic power structures and careerism guide their decisions, making them inadvertently complicit in the colonial enterprise. working with indigenous organizations outside the academy to meet the requirements of institutional eligibility to administer grant funds may be a step in the right direction; the canadian aboriginal aids network, the first to achieve such eligibility, is leading the way here in canada. beyond this, and in line with coombes and colleagues (2014), it is important to consider the legitimacy of exogenous, university-based research over the long term and begin to imagine more radical incentives that “reward” cbpr researchers who are “successful” at researching themselves out of a job. c o n c l u s i o n relationships between academic researchers and community partners do not occur in a vacuum, they are embedded in larger structures of power that mediate the nature and depth of engagement in collaborative research processes—even when ocaptm principles are in place. the purpose of this article has been to highlight and critique one such mechanism. by identifying how tenure and promotion processes disadvantage community-based participatory indigenous health research by privileging a eurocentric ontology, we contextualized these processes and demonstrated how they work to reproduce colonial forms of dominance. we argue that beyond being inappropriate, in their current form, they are unethical in that they place the well-being of communities in direct conflict with a health researcher’s academic career. simply reforming tenure and promotion processes to encompass a broader array of metrics to assess merit fails to address the reality that some things (such as the authenticity of relationships) defy conventional forms of measurement, and attempting to do so is merely a return to the sort of post-positive eurocentrism we have been critiquing. assessing merit is tricky business. if the aim of cbpr in research involving indigenous peoples is to assist in the ongoing project of decolonization, then unsettling the manner in which we understand “productive” research is necessary.     16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.2   r e f e re n c e s adelson, n. 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(2009). health inequalities and social determinants of aboriginal peoples' health. prince george, bc: national collaborating centre for aboriginal health. richmond, c., martin, d., dean, l., castleden, h. , & marsden, n. (2013). transforming networks: how acadre/neahr support for graduate students has impacted aboriginal health research in canada. retrieved from http://ahrnets.ca/files/2013/05/neahrreport_final_4web2.pdf rose, d. (1999). indigenous ecologies and an ethic of connection. in n. low (ed.), global ethics and environment (pp. 175-187). london: routledge. royal commission on aboriginal peoples (rcap). (1996). report of the royal commission on aboriginal peoples. ottawa, on: indian and northern affairs canada. 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.2   shih, c. (2010). academic colonialism and the struggle for indigenous knowledge systems in taiwan. social alternatives, 29(1), 44–48. smith, l. t. (1999). decolonizing methodologies: research and indigenous peoples. london: zed books. stiegman, m., & castleden, h. (2015). leashes and lies: navigating the colonial tensions of institutional ethics of research involving indigenous peoples in canada. international indigenous policy journal 6(3), 2. doi:10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.2 street, j., baum, f., & anderson, i. p. s. (2009). is peer review useful in assessing research proposals in indigenous health? a case study. health research policy and systems / biomed central, 7(2), 1-6. doi:10.1186/1478-4505-7-2 svalastog, a. & eriksson, s. (2010). you can use my name; you don't have to steal my story: a critique of anonymity in indigenous studies. developing world bioethics, 10, 104–110. doi:10.1111/j.1471-8847.2010.00276.x takeda, l., & røpke, i. (2010). power and contestation in collaborative ecosystem-based management: the case of haida gwaii. ecological economics, 70(2), 178–188. doi: 10.1016/j.ecolecon.2010.02.007 tobias, j., richmond, c., & luginaah, i. (2014). community-based participatory research (cbpr) with indigenous communities: producing respectful and reciprocal research. journal of empirical research on human research ethics, 8(2), 129–140. doi:10.1525/jer.2013.8.2.129 university of victoria (n.d.). office of community based research: a pan canadian coalition on community-based research. retrieved from http://web.uvic.ca:8080/~ocbrdev/node/723 waldram, j., herring, d., & young, t. (2006). aboriginal health in canada: historical, cultural, and epidemiological perspectives (2nd ed.). toronto, on: university of toronto press. wallerstein, n., & duran, b. (2003). the conceptual, historical and practice roots of community based participatory research and related participatory traditions. in m. minkler & n. wallerstein (eds.), community-based participatory research in health (pp. 27-52). san francisco: josseybass. wallerstein, n. b., & duran, b. (2006). using community-based participatory research to address health disparities. health promotion practice, 7(3), 312–323. doi:10.1177/1524839906289376 23 castleden et al.: i don't think that any peer review committee would ever ‘get’ what i currently do published by scholarship@western, 2015 the international indigenous policy journal september 2015 “i don't think that any peer review committee . . . would ever ‘get’ what i currently do”: how institutional metrics for success and merit risk perpetuating the (re)production of colonial relationships in community-based participatory research involving indigenous peoples in canada heather castleden paul sylvestre debbie martin mary mcnally recommended citation “i don't think that any peer review committee . . . would ever ‘get’ what i currently do”: how institutional metrics for success and merit risk perpetuating the (re)production of colonial relationships in community-based participatory research involving indigenous peoples in canada abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license â•œi don't think that any peer review committee . . . would ever â•ÿgetâ•ž what i currently doâ•š: how institutional metrics for success and merit risk perpetuating the (re)production of colonial relationships in community-based participatory research inv neighborhood factors and language outcomes of first nations preschoolers living off reserve: findings from the aboriginal children's survey the international indigenous policy journal volume 3 | issue 2 article 6 august 2012 neighborhood factors and language outcomes of first nations preschoolers living off reserve: findings from the aboriginal children's survey leanne c. findlay statistics canada, leanne.findlay@statcan.gc.ca dafna e. kohen statistics canada, dafnakohen@hotmail.com recommended citation findlay, l. c. , kohen, d. e. (2012). neighborhood factors and language outcomes of first nations preschoolers living off reserve: findings from the aboriginal children's survey. th e international indigenous policy journal, 3(2) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.6 his research is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in he international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact nspence@uwo.ca. neighborhood factors and language outcomes of first nations preschoolers living off reserve: findings from the aboriginal children's survey abstract language skills in the preschool period are an important indicator of early development and school readiness for children. however, little is known about the association between aspects of the neighborhood and language outcomes for first nations children. the purpose of the current study was to examine the effects of neighborhood structural and organization features, as well as the mediation of these effects, on the language outcomes of first nations children aged 2-5 living off reserve. data from the aboriginal children’s survey was examined. both neighborhood structure and neighborhood organization were important for language outcomes. in addition, mediation effects were shown, suggesting that family-level as well as neighborhood structural variables are particularly important for the language outcomes of young first nation children living off reserve. keywords language, children, first nations, neighborhood, aboriginal children’s survey acknowledgments this paper was supported by the strategic research directorate at aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc). the views expressed in this document are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the position of statistics canada or aboriginal affairs and northern development canada. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ neighborhood factors and language outcomes of first nations children living off reserve: findings from the aboriginal children's survey language skills are an important indicator of early development for preschool children. lower verbal abilities in the preschool period limit communication with adults and peers and have been associated with reduced school readiness and poor academic performance (duncan et al., 2007; justice, pence turnbull, bowles, & skibbe, 2009; sabol & pianta, 2012; silva, williams, & mcgee, 1987; young et al., 2002), as well as less social competence (longoria, page, hubbs-tait, & kennison, 2009). language problems are among the most prevalent developmental delays facing aboriginal children (findlay & janz, 2012). furthermore, rates of speech and language problems (de leeuw, fiske, & greenwood, 2002; minister of public works and government services, 2000) and risks of decreased school readiness (ball, 2009) are higher among aboriginal children as compared to non-aboriginal children. however, important markers of language ability for aboriginal children, such as mutual understanding (hoff, 2006; kaulbeck, 1984) and storytelling (ball & janyst, 2008; bernacki jonk, 2009; gould, 2007) have not typically been examined. the purpose of the current study is to examine child, family, and neighborhood influences on language outcomes1 for young first nations children living off reserve in canada. correlates of children’s language outcomes in the general literature it is well documented that family disadvantage, including deprived socio-economic conditions, is associated with poorer early childhood outcomes including language (duncan, brooks-gunn, & klebanov, 1994; janus & duku, 2007; leventhal & brooks-gunn, 2000). lower levels of family income and maternal education, single marital status, and a greater number of children in the family have been shown to be significantly associated with lower language scores for children in general (hoffe, 2003; qi, kaiser, milan, & hancock, 2006; taylor, dearing, & mccartney, 2004). in addition to these proximal effects on child development, a growing body of literature has emerged supporting the notion that neighborhood factors are important for young children’s outcomes even after considering family-level socio-economic characteristics (carpiano, lloyd, & hertzman, 2009; kohen, brooks-gunn, leventhal, & hertzman, 2002; lapointe, ford, & zumbo, 2007; leventhal & brooks-gunn, 2000; romano, tremblay, boulerice, & swisher, 2005). neighborhood effects are important since they suggest that the community in which the child resides is also important over and above individual and family level factors. the fact that there are such neighborhood effects may be somewhat surprising since preschool-aged children’s experience with the neighborhood is largely dependent on parental choices for child participation in programs, activities, and childcare (bronfenbrenner & morris, 1998). both structural aspects, as well as neighborhood organization factors, have been shown to impact children’s early outcomes. structural aspects refer to socio-economic characteristics, such as the mean household income of individuals, proportion of unemployed people, and proportion of those with less than high school levels of education within the neighborhood (kohen, leventhal, dahinten, & mcintosh, 2008). organizational aspects of the neighborhood include measures of safety, opportunities for civic engagement, and neighborhood activities and may reflect the social ties, shared values, relationships with others, and network opportunities within the neighborhood (leventhal & brooks-gunn, 2000). effects of neighborhood structure on children’s outcomes previous studies have shown that neighborhood structural features are associated with child outcomes, particularly language outcomes, independent of family-level factors, such as household income and maternal education (barbarin et al., 2006; chase-lansdale & gordon, 1996; oliver, dunn, kohen, & hertzman, 2007). 1 while speaking and understanding an aboriginal language is an important area of study, the focus of the present work is on general language development, thus we consider the development of language skills and abilities in any language (english, french, cree, etc.) and not language skills of speaking an aboriginal language specifically. 1 findlay and kohen: neighborhood factors and language outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2012 studies utilizing the teacher-reported early development index (edi) have shown that children’s language scores are related to neighborhood affluence (i.e., more affluent families within a community are associated with higher language ratings) (carpiano et al., 2009), while an increased proportion of lone parent families and of those unemployed in the neighborhood are associated with poorer preschool language ratings (kershaw, forer, irwin, hertzman, & lapointe, 2007). neighborhood socio-economic factors and male unemployment are also associated with standardized language measures, such as the peabody picture vocabulary test (ppvt) (dunn & dunn, 1981), over and above family characteristics, with low socio-economic status (vaden-kiernan et al., 2010) and unemployment (chase-lansdale & gordon, 1996) associated with low scores. effects of neighborhood organization on children’s outcomes evidence also suggests that it is not only structural features that are influential. neighborhood social organization, such as problems like litter, drugs, and burglaries (romano et al., 2005), as well as safety and a sense of belonging (edwards & bromfield, 2009) have an impact on children’s outcomes, and they are not necessarily proxies of neighborhood structural features (kohen et al., 2002). barbarin and colleagues (2006) found that neighborhood safety remained positively associated with language skills in preschoolers, after considering family-level factors such as marital status and socio-economic resources. furthermore, lower ratings of neighborhood disorder (observer-rated physical and social surroundings of the neighborhood) and higher ratings of neighborhood cohesion have been associated with higher verbal ability scores, even after controlling for family and neighborhood socio-demographic characteristics (kohen et al., 2002). mediated effects for neighborhood factors it is possible, however, that the effects of neighborhood structural disadvantage are mediated or explained by more complex family-level or neighborhood organizational factors. other work has suggested that neighborhood structural disadvantage is not directly associated with verbal scores for preschoolers. rather, these associations are manifested via indirect pathways between neighborhood organization and family processes, such as family functioning, mental health, and parenting behaviors (kohen et al., 2008). this would suggest that the effects of living in a socio-economically disadvantaged neighborhood can be explained by processes within a neighborhood, such as its organization and family-level processes (i.e., parental mental health and parenting behaviors). the neighborhoods where off-reserve first nations children live studies of the impact of neighborhood features on child language outcomes have largely focused on nonaboriginal children. however, it is important to provide a context for the current study by describing the neighborhoods of first nations children. these neighbourhoods are generally distinctively different from those where non-aboriginal children live, in particular with respect to socio-economic characteristics and housing (indian and northern affairs canada, 2010). findings from the 2006 census of canada suggest that, compared to the non-aboriginal population, first nations people living both on and off reserve are more likely to live in over-crowded homes in need of repairs (gionet, 2009). household size, however, may be positively associated with greater use of an aboriginal language in the home (guèvremont & kohen, 2012). evidence also suggests that first nations people are more likely to move, either within the same neighborhood or to a different neighborhood, than are non-aboriginal people (statistics canada, 2008b). high levels of neighborhood mobility are suggested to impede social organization (kershaw et al., 2007) and have also been shown to have a negative association with early language outcomes (oliver et al., 2007). moreover, chandler and lalonde’s (2008) work has pointed to the particular importance of cultural factors in the community (i.e., involvement and cultural facilities) for the well-being of first nations youth, a feature that is largely ignored in studies examining the impact of neighborhoods on children’s outcomes. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.6 while the empirical research examining associations of neighborhood factors on first nations children’s language outcomes is limited, existing evidence suggests that neighborhood features are important. a study by kershaw and colleagues (2007) found that the proportion of people in the neighborhood that identified as aboriginal was associated with an increased teacher-reported edi “vulnerability” in communication and general knowledge. kohen and colleagues (kohen, oliver, & pierre, 2009) also found that teacher-rated language and cognitive development (measured by the edi) was lower if the child lived in a neighborhood with a greater proportion of aboriginal people. in contrast, other studies have not found that the proportion of aboriginal people in the neighborhood was related to preschool outcomes as measured by edi scores (carpiano et al., 2009; lapointe et al., 2007; lloyd & hertzman, 2010) nor to standardized preschool language outcomes (kohen et al., 2009). it is possible, however, that the effect of the proportion of aboriginal people in the neighborhood is confounded by neighborhood disadvantage (lapointe et al., 2007) or by the assessment measures used. for example, standardized language measures have been viewed as being inappropriate for aboriginal children since they were not developed with or validated for aboriginal children in mind nor validated for them (ball, 2007). methods despite the extant literature supporting the associations between neighborhood characteristics and children’s outcomes, less is known about the associations between neighborhood factors (mediated and non-mediated) and outcomes for first nations children living off reserve in canada. thus, the purpose of the current study was twofold: (a) to examine the effects of neighborhood characteristics (structure and organization) on the language outcomes of first nations children living off reserve, and (b) to explore possible mediation of these effects by family-level socio-economic and neighborhood factors (organization, culture). we include two outcome measures especially relevant for first nations children living off reserve: mutual understanding and story-telling. it was hypothesized that neighborhood structural characteristics, in particular, the mean level of household income in the neighborhood, would be positively associated with children’s language outcomes whereas factors such as having less than a high school education, being unemployed, moving frequently, and living in housing in need of repairs would be negatively associated with language outcomes. in addition, measures of social organization, such as perceived neighborhood safety, involved neighborhood members, and the opportunity for aboriginal cultural activities, were anticipated to be positively associated with language outcomes. consistent with existing research (kohen et. al., 2008; xue, leventhal, brooks-gunn, & earls, 2005), family characteristics (i.e., income, education) and neighborhood organization were also anticipated to mediate some of the structural neighborhood-level effects for off-reserve first nations children’s language outcomes. sample data from the aboriginal children’s survey (acs) were used to examine the language outcomes of first nations2 children aged 25 years living off reserve. the acs was developed by statistics canada with input from government departments, as well as aboriginal advisors from across the country. it was conducted by statistics canada and sponsored by human resources and skills development canada to assess the early development of aboriginal children and the social and living conditions in which they are learning and growing. the acs target population consisted of first nations children living off reserve, métis children, and inuit children living in the 10 provinces, as well as all children living in the three territories. the survey did not cover children living on reserves in the provinces; however, all aboriginal children living in the territories and some first nations communities in quebec were included. the sample was selected from children under the age of 6 who were identified in the 2006 census of canada as north american indian, métis, inuit, a treaty or registered indian, a member of a first nation band, or having aboriginal ancestry. the overall response rate to the acs was 81% with a sample size of 12,845 children, representing a population of 2 in the acs, children were identified as north american indian; however, the term first nations is used throughout this report. 3 findlay and kohen: neighborhood factors and language outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2012 approximately 135,000 aboriginal children under age 6 in canada. further information on the sample and survey is available elsewhere (statistics canada, 2008a). for the current study, children who reported single or multiple first nations identity and were aged 2 to 5 were included in the study sample (n =3,622). children living on reserve were not included in the acs sample; thus, the results cannot be generalized to the onreserve population. measures family and child socio-demographic characteristics. the person most knowledgeable about the child (the biological mother or father in 90% of cases and hereafter called the parent or guardian) reported on the child’s age, sex, and status (registered or not registered). the parent or guardian also provided information on the parent’s education (high school graduation or greater versus less than high school graduation) and marital status (single versus dual parent), as well as the region in which they lived (province, urban or rural) and the number of people residing in the household. household income was obtained from the 2006 census of canada. neighborhood structure. information about the neighborhood was available from the 2006 census of canada and is representative at the dissemination area (da)3 level (derived from the child’s postal code). based on previous research (carpiano et al., 2009; kohen et al., 2002; o'brien caughy & campo, 2006; oliver et al., 2007), neighborhood-level socio-demographic characteristics of interest included the following: (a) the proportion of the neighborhood with less than a high school level of education (among those aged 2564 years), (b) the proportion unemployed (aged 25 years and over), (c) the proportion who had moved in the past year, (d) the proportion living in housing in need of minor or major repairs, and (e) mean household income controlling for household size. neighborhood organization. the parent or guardian was asked how he or she felt about the neighborhood: (a) safety, (b) involvement of members, and (c) as a place with first nations, métis, and inuit cultural activities. response options included excellent, very good, good, fair, and poor. as in previous research (kohen & oliver, 2010), due to skewed distributions, responses were dichotomized to reflect high (excellent, very good, and good) versus low (fair and poor) ratings. language. several parent-reported indicators of children’s language outcomes were collected, including expressive language, mutual understanding of language, storytelling, and the presence of any speech or language difficulties. subscales were derived based primarily on a factor analysis of the items, yielding 4 factors (findlay & kohen, in press). for expressive language, parents were asked how often the child used full sentences, two to three words, single words, and sounds (all of the time, most of the time, sometimes, or rarely). these four items were used to create a continuous measure of expressive language with a score of 16 indicating that the child used sentences all of the time and a score of 1 indicating that sounds were rarely used. a mean score of mutual language understanding was generated from three questions, including parent’s responses as to the child’s understanding when the parent speaks to the child, how often the parent can understand the child, and how often other people can understand the child (all of the time, most of the time, sometimes, rarely, or never). story-telling was based on a mean score created from parent’s responses as to whether or not the child had ever told or retold a story using his or her own words and whether he or she had ever drawn a picture and told a story about it. for regression analyses, expressive language, mutual understanding, and story-telling scores were all normalized due to the high mean scores achieved and skewed distributions (i.e., ceiling effects). finally, from a list of chronic conditions known to affect young children, parents were asked whether or not the child had any speech or language difficulties (yes or no). if a speech or language difficulty was reported, the parent was also asked whether or not the child had received a diagnosis from a medical professional. if the condition had been diagnosed, parents were also asked whether or not the child had received any treatment. 3 dissemination areas are small geographic areas with a population between 400 and 700 people and are used as a proxy for neighborhoods (kohen et al., 2002, 2008). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.6 more detailed information on how the language outcomes were derived is available elsewhere (findlay & kohen, in press). analysis descriptive statistics on the family and neighborhood socio-economic characteristics of the sample and the language outcomes were performed. multivariate linear regression was performed for three of the four outcome variables (expressive language, mutual understanding, and story-telling); logistic regression was conducted to examine significant predictors of the presence of a speech and language difficulty. predictor variables of interest for all four outcomes included two sets of variables: (a) neighborhood structural features (proportion with less than a high school education, proportion unemployed, proportion of lone parent families, proportion living in housing in need of repairs, mean household income in the neighborhood, and proportion in the neighborhood who had moved in the past year); and (b) neighborhood organization (ratings of neighborhood safety, actively involved members, and as a place with first nations, métis, or inuit activities). control variables included in the analyses were child-level (child’s sex, age, and registered indian status) and family-level (family type: two parent versus lone parent), parental education (high school graduation versus less than high school), household income, household size, and urban or rural dwelling) variables. for all four outcomes (expressive language, mutual understanding, story-telling, and speech and language difficulties), a series of regression models were performed. child-level variables were included in all models, since factors relating to the child were considered to be unchanging yet important for the outcomes examined. first, in two separate models, we examined associations of neighborhood structural features and neighborhood organization variables on each of the four language outcomes (unadjusted models 1 and 2, respectively). next, family-level variables were added to examine the associations of neighborhood structure and organization over and above the associations of the family socio-economic features (models not shown). in a final model (adjusted), all variables (family, neighborhood structure, and neighborhood organization) were included simultaneously to examine mediation. the final models considered the associations of neighborhood structural factors above all other organizational factors (child, family, and neighborhood)4. survey sampling weights were applied to account for the complex survey design and to render the analyses representative of the off-reserve first nations population in canada. finally, a bootstrapping technique was applied to produce estimates of variance (rust & rao, 1996). results approximately half of the children were male (51%) and 58% had registered indian status. the majority of first nations children aged 2 to 5 living off reserve lived with two parents (60%). approximately 70% had parents who had completed high school or more, and almost 4 out of 5 (78%) children lived in an urban area with a mean household size of 4.38 (se = 0.03) and mean household income of $49,631 (se = 744.61).5 in describing the neighborhoods in which first nations off-reserve children live, on average, 22% of neighborhood members had less than a high school level of education, 7% were unemployed, 18% of the neighborhood had moved in the past year, and 42% of neighborhood members lived in housing that was in 4 additional mediation models examining family, neighborhood structure, and neighborhood organization variables are available upon request. 5 to compare to the national longitudinal survey of children and youth cycle 7 (2006, custom tabulation), 52% of canadian children aged 2-5 were male, 86% lived with two parents, 92% had parents who had completed high school or more, 78% lived in an urban area, and the mean household income was $73,260 (se = 612.35). 5 findlay and kohen: neighborhood factors and language outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2012 need of repairs.6 in terms of neighborhood perceptions, the majority of children had parents who perceived the neighborhood as being safe (77% reported excellent, very good or good) and having actively involved members (78% reported excellent, very good or good).7 however, less than half (43%) of children had parents who felt that the neighborhood was a place with aboriginal cultural activities. in general, first nations children received high scores on expressive language, mutual understanding, and story-telling8 (expressive language: m = 14.97, se = 0.04, range 1-16; mutual understanding: m = 4.48, se = 0.01, range 0-5; story-telling: m = 0.83, se = 0.01, range 0-1). approximately 13% of first nations children aged 2 to 5 living off reserve were reported by their parent or guardian as having a speech and language difficulty. of those who were reported to have a difficulty, about three quarters had received a diagnosis from a medical professional (76%), and, of those diagnosed, just over four out of five had received treatment (83%). regression results socio-demographic variables. across all four language outcomes, boys and younger children were found to have lower language scores (see tables 1-4).9 parental education (high school education or greater) was positively associated with expressive language (table 1), mutual understanding (table 2), and story-telling (table 3) outcomes. household income was positively associated with expressive language (table 1) and mutual understanding (table 2) and with lower odds of a speech and language difficulty (table 4); whereas, household size was negatively associated with language outcomes (see tables 1-3) and also associated with higher odds of speech and language difficulties (table 4). living with a single parent and urban (versus rural) dwelling were not significantly associated with any of the language outcomes. neighborhood structure. the associations of neighborhood-level structural variables and each of the language outcomes were examined, first unadjusted, then adjusted for family-level variables, and finally all factors were included in a full model simultaneously. neighborhood education level. as shown in tables 1-4, there was an association between neighborhood education and first nations children’s language outcomes. children who lived in a neighborhood with a greater proportion of people with less than a high school education had lower expressive language scores and lower story-telling scores. this association remained significant even after controlling for family-level socioeconomic and neighborhood organization variables. neighborhood employment. as shown in tables 2 and 4, contrary to expectations, the proportion of the neighborhood that was unemployed was related to higher mutual understanding scores and fewer reported speech and language difficulties. these associations remained significant in the final model including familylevel and neighborhood organization factors. thus, living in a neighborhood with a greater proportion of people who were unemployed was associated with higher mutual understanding scores and lower odds of speech and language difficulties for first nations children living off reserve. 6 to compare to the 2006 census of canada, on average, 16% of all neighborhood members in canada had less than a high school level of education, 6% were unemployed, 13% of the neighborhood had moved in the past year, and 36% of neighborhood members lived in housing that was in need of major or minor repairs. 7 68% of parents felt that the neighborhood was safe and there were actively involved members in the neighborhood. 8 a by-age examination of the data indicated that mean scores increased with age. this finding suggests that, as expected, older children were more likely to use more complex forms of language, providing some construct validity for the measure. as would be expected, children with speech and language difficulties were reported to have lower scores on all three of the language outcomes. 9 child registered status was associated with some of the language outcomes, with non-status being associated with better outcomes. however, this effect was partially accounted for by family-level variables. further research specifically investigating associations between registered status and language outcomes is warranted. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.6 table 1. linear regression predicting expressive language, first nations children aged 2-5 living off reserve (n = 3,622) model 1 model 2 full model unadjusted unadjusted adjusted beta se beta se beta se child level male -0.25* 0.03 -0.26* 0.04 -0.28* 0.04 age (in months) 0.02* 0.00 0.02* 0.00 0.02* 0.00 status -0.15* 0.04 -0.16* 0.04 -0.10* 0.04 family level single parent -0.03 0.04 high school education or greater 0.19* 0.05 household income 0.02* 0.00 household size -0.05* 0.02 urban -0.02 0.06 neighborhood structure proportion with less than high school education -0.05* 0.02 -0.05* 0.02 proportion unemployed 0.00 0.03 0.01 0.03 proportion of lone parent families 0.00 0.01 0.01 0.01 proportion of housing in need of repairs -0.02 0.01 0.00 0.02 average household income 0.02 0.01 0.00 0.02 proportion mobile in last year -0.01 0.02 0.00 0.02 neighborhood organization community as a safe place 0.11* 0.05 0.07 0.06 community actively involved 0.06 0.05 0.02 0.06 community as a place with aboriginal activities -0.02 0.04 0.01 0.04 source: aboriginal children's survey 2006, statistics canada *p ≤ .05. 7 findlay and kohen: neighborhood factors and language outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2012 table 2. linear regression predicting mutual understanding, first nations children aged 2-5 living off reserve (n = 3,622) model 1 model 2 full model unadjusted unadjusted adjusted beta se beta se beta se child level male -0.25* 0.03 -0.27* 0.04 -0.28* 0.04 age (in months) 0.03* 0.00 0.03* 0.00 0.03* 0.00 status -0.14* 0.04 -0.16* 0.04 -0.11* 0.04 family level single parent -0.01 0.04 high school education or greater 0.14* 0.05 household income 0.02* 0.00 household size -0.06* 0.02 urban 0.06 0.06 neighborhood structure proportion with less than high school education -0.03 0.02 -0.02 0.02 proportion unemployed 0.07* 0.03 0.07* 0.03 proportion of lone parent families 0.00 0.01 0.01 0.01 proportion of housing in need of repairs -0.03* 0.01 -0.03 0.02 average household income 0.02 0.02 -0.01 0.02 proportion mobile in last year -0.01 0.02 0.00 0.02 neighborhood organization community as a safe place 0.16* 0.05 0.11* 0.05 community actively involved 0.01 0.05 -0.02 0.05 community as a place with aboriginal activities 0.07 0.04 0.10* 0.04 source: aboriginal children's survey 2006, statistics canada *p ≤ .05. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.6 table 3. linear regression predicting story-telling, first nations children aged 2-5 living off reserve (n = 3,622) model 1 model 2 full model unadjusted unadjusted adjusted beta se beta se beta se child level male -0.23* 0.03 -0.25* 0.03 -0.25* 0.04 age (in months) 0.03* 0.00 0.03* 0.00 0.03* 0.00 status -0.09* 0.03 -0.11* 0.04 -0.05 0.04 family level single parent -0.06 0.04 high school education or greater 0.12* 0.05 household income 0.00 0.00 household size -0.05* 0.01 urban 0.00 0.05 neighborhood structure proportion with less than high school education -0.08* 0.02 -0.06* 0.02 proportion unemployed -0.04 0.03 -0.03 0.03 proportion of lone parent families -0.01 0.01 0.01 0.01 proportion of housing in need of repairs 0.00 0.01 0.01 0.01 average household income -0.02 0.01 -0.01 0.02 proportion mobile in last year -0.02 0.02 -0.04 0.02 neighborhood organization community as a safe place 0.14* 0.05 0.07 0.06 community actively involved 0.08 0.05 0.05 0.05 community as a place with aboriginal activities -0.03 0.04 -0.01 0.04 source: aboriginal children's survey 2006, statistics canada *p ≤ .05. 9 findlay and kohen: neighborhood factors and language outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2012 table 4. logistic regression predicting speech and language difficulties, first nations children aged 2-5 living off reserve (n = 3,622) model 1 model 2 model 3 unadjusted unadjusted adjusted or 95% ci or 95% ci or 95% ci child level male 2.37* 1.91 2.94 2.46* 1.95 3.10 2.59* 2.02 3.32 age (in months) 1.02* 1.02 1.03 1.02* 1.01 1.03 1.02* 1.01 1.03 status 1.12 0.88 1.42 1.05 0.82 1.34 0.93 0.71 1.22 family level single parent 1.09 0.83 1.44 high school education or greater 0.81 0.60 1.08 household income 0.95* 0.91 0.99 household size 1.10* 1.01 1.19 urban 1.19 0.82 1.72 neighborhood structure proportion with less than high school education 1.10 0.99 1.22 1.08 0.96 1.22 proportion unemployed 0.71* 0.59 0.86 0.72* 0.59 0.89 proportion of lone parent families 0.91* 0.85 0.99 0.90* 0.82 0.98 proportion of housing in need of repairs 1.06 0.98 1.16 1.05 0.94 1.16 average household income 0.89 0.79 1.00 0.95 0.84 1.08 proportion mobile in last year 1.04 0.94 1.15 1.07 0.95 1.21 neigborhood organization community as a safe place 0.99 0.73 1.36 1.03 0.73 1.44 community actively involved 0.91 0.66 1.24 0.91 0.66 1.27 community as a place with aboriginal activities 0.73* 0.57 0.93 0.76* 0.58 0.98 source: aboriginal children's survey 2006, statistics canada *p ≤ .05. neighborhood lone parent families. first nations children living off reserve who lived in a neighborhood with a high proportion of lone parent families were reported to have lower odds of speech and language difficulties (table 4). this association remained even when parental and other neighborhood-level factors were considered in the model. neighborhood housing in need of repairs. finally, living in a neighborhood with a higher proportion of housing in need of repairs was associated with lower mutual understanding (table 2) for first nations children living off reserve. this association remained significant when family-level factors were considered, but the association 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.6 was not significant in the final model, suggesting that living in a neighborhood with a higher proportion of housing in need of repairs was mediated by neighborhood organization variables, such as safety and having aboriginal activities available (see table 2). neighborhood mean household income10 and mobility in the neighborhood did not emerge as significant predictors of children’s language outcomes. neighborhood organization. the final block of variables examined the effect of perceptions of neighborhood organization on language outcomes. safety. parental perceptions of the neighborhood as a safe place was positively associated with expressive language (table 1), mutual understanding (table 2), and story-telling (table 3); however, these associations remained significant in the final models including family-level socio-demographics and neighborhood structure factors only for mutual understanding (table 2). therefore, safety in the neighborhood had a positive association on mutual understanding over and above family and neighborhood factors. for expressive language (table 1), the association with safety was no longer significant once the family-level and neighborhood structure variables were added. for story-telling (table 3), the association with neighborhood safety was no longer significant when neighborhood structure was added to the model, suggesting that storytelling behavior was positively associated with neighborhood socio-economic factors (i.e., education). aboriginal activities. parental perceptions of the neighborhood as a place with aboriginal activities demonstrated a trend towards a positive association with mutual understanding (p=.056; table 2). this association was significant in the final model over and above controls for family socio-demographics and neighborhood structure. parental perceptions of aboriginal activities in the neighborhood were also associated with lower odds of speech and language difficulties (table 4) in both an unadjusted model and over and above family and neighborhood structure variables. these findings suggest that first nations children living in a neighborhood with aboriginal activities have better mutual understanding scores and lower odds of speech and language difficulties. discussion one of the unique features of the present study is that it is one of the first canadian population-based studies to describe speech-language outcomes for first nations children living off reserve. approximately 13% of first nations children living off reserve aged 2-5 years were reported by their parents as having a speech and language difficulty, with three quarters of those children reported as being diagnosed by a medical professional, and just over four out of five of those diagnosed having received treatment. using a different measure, the canadian association for speech and language pathology estimated that 4% of canadian children are reported to have a speech and language difficulty (caslpa-acoa, 2010); in the u.s., the national institute on deafness and other communication disorders (nidcd) estimates the prevalence of speech-sound disorder in young children to be 8% to 9%. the current findings, as well as reports by ball (2006, 2007) and others, suggest that speech and language issues are especially prevalent in first nations children. if one considers potential difficulties in access to diagnosis and treatment, this may suggest an under-estimation of speech and language problems among aboriginal children in this study. information regarding access to speech and language services was not available in the acs, thus further work examining access to services and language outcomes for first nations children is warranted. parental education and income were positively associated with language outcomes; however, household size, or a greater number of children and adults in the household, was negatively associated with language 10 the reader is reminded that a measure of continuous household income adjusted for household size was employed in the current study, which is not intended to indicate affluence or poverty. however, when measures of the proportion that were affluent and the proportion that were living in poverty were investigated, the results remained unchanged. 11 findlay and kohen: neighborhood factors and language outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2012 outcomes. the results of the study suggest that aspects of the neighborhood also have an important association with first nations children’s language outcomes. in terms of neighborhood structure, associations were found for four of the neighborhood-level socio-economic factors. the proportion of the neighborhood with less than a high school education was negatively associated with expressive language and story-telling, suggesting that neighborhood education level has a role in children’s early language outcomes. previous work has not shown particularly strong associations of neighborhood education for children in general (chaselansdale & gordon, 1996; kershaw et al., 2007; lapointe et al., 2007); however, neighborhood education level has been shown to be particularly relevant in studies of first nations children living off reserve (kohen & oliver, 2010). this is an area that warrants further research. additional neighborhood structural features, such as living in a neighborhood with a higher proportion of housing in need of repairs, were associated with lower mutual understanding outcomes for first nations children living off reserve. this association was found to be mediated by neighborhood organization variables (safety and neighborhood as a place with aboriginal activities). additional correlation analyses revealed that housing conditions was negatively associated with both safety (r = -.14, p ≤ .001) and the neighborhood as a place with aboriginal activities (r = -.13, p ≤ .001), suggesting that first nations children living off reserve in poor housing conditions also lived in neighborhoods which were reported as being less safe and less likely to offer aboriginal activities and possibly other social resources (e.g., literacy programs, books, and other learning materials) (ball, 2006). neighborhood unemployment was also associated with two of the language outcomes (mutual understanding and speech and language difficulties), but not in the expected direction. the proportion of the neighborhood that was unemployed was positively associated with mutual understanding and with fewer speech and language difficulties (even after considering family-level and neighborhood organization factors). this finding suggests that having unemployed persons in the neighborhood promotes greater mutual understanding and fewer speech and language difficulties. previous work in the general population has not shown strong associations between neighborhood unemployment and canadian children’s outcomes (kohen et al., 2002; oliver et al., 2007). these differences may highlight particular associations for first nations children for mutual understanding and may reflect the opportunities for additional language interchanges with adult speakers. however, household size (which may include more adults in the household) was negatively associated with language outcomes.11 living in a neighborhood with a higher proportion of lone parent families was also associated with fewer speech and language difficulties. one possible explanation is that the proportion of lone parents and neighborhood unemployment may be associated with barriers to diagnosis or access to health services (bradley & corwyn, 2002). in fact, in subsequent exploratory analyses in which children with speech and language difficulties (n = 462) were divided into those that were diagnosed versus undiagnosed, this was confirmed with results in the hypothesized direction. that is, neighborhood unemployment was higher for those with undiagnosed as compared to those with diagnosed speech and language difficulties and a higher proportion of lone parent families in the neighborhood was associated with undiagnosed speech and language difficulties. this is an area warranting further research. turning to the organizational factors of the neighborhood, several associations with language outcomes were shown, some of which were mediated by family or neighborhood structure variables. perceptions of neighborhood safety were positively related to expressive language, mutual understanding, and story-telling, although the associations were not maintained when family and neighborhood structure factors were included in the model. neighborhood safety was found to be positively associated with parental education and income, and negatively associated with household size and the proportion of people in the neighborhood with less than a high school level of education. this would suggest that parents who rate their neighborhood as being a 11 the correlation between household size and neighbourhood unemployment was relatively small (r =.04 , p ≤ .05). 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.6 safe place are also more likely to have higher incomes, be better educated, and live in smaller households, and these latter factors may explain why children in safe neighborhoods have higher expressive language scores. living in a neighborhood with aboriginal activities available (43% of the sample) was beneficial for both mutual understanding and speech and language difficulties (over and above family-level and other neighborhood variables). it is possible that aboriginal activities not only represent a marker for cultural participation within the neighborhood, but also of neighborhood cohesion for aboriginal people (actively involved members was mildly, but significantly, correlated with cultural activities, r = .27, p ≤. 001). although the current study investigates language use in general, other work has suggested that speaking an aboriginal language specifically may be a critical component of cultural engagement in terms of promoting well-being (hallett, chandler, & lalonde, 2007). the current study extends the importance of neighborhood social organization to the language outcomes of first nations children aged 2-5 living off reserve by suggesting that aboriginal activities within the neighborhood are important, independent from other family and neighborhood characteristics such as family income or neighborhood socio-economic conditions. this unique finding reiterates the association between aboriginal culture and off-reserve first nations children’s developmental outcomes. to our knowledge, only one previous study has examined the effects of neighborhood structure and organization on off-reserve first nations children’s outcomes. also using data from the aboriginal children’s survey, kohen and oliver (2010) found similar results in that neighborhood organizational characteristics, such as neighborhood safety, neighborhood involvement, and the perception of neighborhood facilities, were important for off-reserve first nations children’s mental health outcomes. these associations were also largely mediated by family-level factors, with maternal education being particularly important. in the current study, the overall proportions of the variance explained in the final model for three of the language outcomes were approximately 20% (expressive language 17%, mutual understanding 19%, storytelling 22%). these results are somewhat higher than those reported in the general literature (leventhal & brooks-gunn, 2000; sellstrom & bremberg, 2006). for speech and language difficulties, the explanatory power of the model was lower (overall r2 = 5%). this is not surprising given that we did not account for child health status or cognitive skills, which are particularly relevant to language difficulties. strengths and limitations the current study is unique in that it is the first to examine aspects of neighborhood structure and organization on language outcomes for first nations children living off reserve. these language outcomes are particularly informative in that there were multiple parent-reported outcomes, which are not influenced by non-aboriginal testers nor by the child’s mother tongue being different from the test language (i.e., parents reported on child’s use of any language and not necessarily english or french), and various components of language were targeted. other strengths of this study include the use of a nationally-representative (off reserve) survey, the use of census-based neighborhood variables (i.e., not parent-reported), and the fact that we controlled for several family-level variables. however, several limitations of the current study should be noted. first, it is likely that other family or neighborhood level variables, unaccounted for in the current study, such as parenting behaviors, parental mental health, and family functioning, are important mediators of neighborhood associations on language outcomes (kohen et al., 2008). similarly, while an attempt was made to include factors that would be important for first nations children and families living off reserve, such as cultural involvement, we were limited by the items included in the acs and it is possible that other factors are important contributors to children’s language outcomes. in particular, previous work has shown that cohesion in the neighborhood can have implications for children’s well-being, and, while the current study did include items which tapped into cohesion (neighborhood involvement, safety, and aboriginal activities), future work might further investigate 13 findlay and kohen: neighborhood factors and language outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2012 this concept by including measures such as neighborhood ties and frequency of social interaction (sampson, morenoff, & gannon-rowley, 2002). second, our definition of a neighborhood may be restricted in that census-based dissemination areas, although commonly used, may not adequately represent communities for off-reserve first nations people or may not be a reflection of individuals’ perceptions of their neighborhood. thus, perceptions of neighborhood organization may represent a different physical area than those included in the census measures of neighborhood structure. it is also possible that individuals may have moved (i.e., changed neighborhoods) between the census and the acs data collection, and thus parent-reported neighborhood organization reflects a different neighborhood than the census-based measures of neighborhood structure. also, neighborhood structure variables were census-based, whereas other markers of neighborhood structure (potentially parentrated or observer-rated) might be of interest in future work. finally, a theoretical perspective largely based on the general child development literature was used to frame this study. certainly other frameworks may be relevant and warrant exploration. these findings warrant replication in different countries. for example, in australia the western australian aboriginal child health survey examined similar health factors as those in the acs (e.g., strength and difficulties questionnaire) and is a potential source of information on language outcomes for aboriginal children internationally. the findings also suggest the importance of targeting policies at the neighborhood level which are likely to have an impact on young children’s outcomes. findings from this study reaffirm the importance of neighborhood education and cultural activities as being particularly relevant for language development. conclusions it is interesting that, even in the preschool years, a period during which children are predominantly surrounded by family and are less likely to have direct neighborhood involvement, neighborhood associations are still evident. the results of the current study suggest that both neighborhood structure (e.g., proportion of the neighborhood with less than a high school education) and neighborhood organization (e.g., perceptions of safety and the presence of aboriginal activities) are relevant for the early language outcomes of young first nations children living off reserve. future work replicating these results on different populations (e.g., children living on reserve or in different countries) is warranted, as well as studies investigating other potential mediators of these relationships. in addition, while the focus of the current study was on language outcomes, future work might consider the effects of the language spoken in the neighborhood as a neighborhood-level mediator. for example, it might be of interest to explore the discordance between language spoken in the home and language spoken in the neighborhood as being a potential neighborhood-based effect on children’s healthy development. finally, it would be of interest to explore a more comprehensive aboriginal-specific 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(2008a). aboriginal children's survey, 2006: concepts and methods guide ottawa, on: minister of industry. statistics canada. (2008b). aboriginal peoples in canada in 2006: inuit, métis and first nations, 2006 census (97558-xie). minister of industry. taylor, b., dearing, e., & mccartney, k. (2004). incomes and outcomes in early childhood. journal of human resources, 39(4), 980-1007. vaden-kiernan, m., d'elio, m., o'brien, r., tarullo, l. b., zill, n., & hubbel-mckey, r. (2010). neighborhoods as a developmental context: a multilevel analysis of neighborhood effects on head start families and children. american journal of community psychology, 45, 49-67. xue, y., leventhal, t., brooks-gunn, j., & earls, f. j. (2005). neighborhood residence and mental health problems of 5to 11-year-olds. archives of general psychiatry, 62(554), 563. young, a. r., beitchman, j. h., johnson, c., douglas, l., atkinson, l., escobar, m., … wilson, b. (2002). young adult academic outcomes in a longitudinal sample of early identified language impaired and control children. journal of child psychology and psychiatry, 43(5), 635-645. 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 3, iss. 2 [2012], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol3/iss2/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2012.3.2.6 the international indigenous policy journal august 2012 neighborhood factors and language outcomes of first nations preschoolers living off reserve: findings from the aboriginal children's survey leanne c. findlay dafna e. kohen recommended citation neighborhood factors and language outcomes of first nations preschoolers living off reserve: findings from the aboriginal children's survey abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license microsoft word 311919-text.native.1348153215.doc international disaster risk reduction strategies and indigenous peoples the international indigenous policy journal volume 10 | issue 2 article 2 april 2019 international disaster risk reduction strategies and indigenous peoples simon j. lambert university of saskatchewan, simon.lambert@usask.ca john c. scott centre for public service communications, jcscott@cpsc.com recommended citation lambert, s. j. , scott, j. c. (2019). international disaster risk reduction strategies and indigenous peoples. the international indigenous policy journal, 10(2) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.2 international disaster risk reduction strategies and indigenous peoples abstract with more frequent and more intense disasters, disaster risk reduction (drr) has become increasingly important as a fundamental approach to sustainable development. indigenous communities hold a unique position in drr discourse in that they are often more vulnerable than non-indigenous groups and yet also hold traditional knowledges that enable a greater understanding of hazards and disasters. this article provides an overview of multilateral agreements for incorporating indigenous peoples into wider debates on disaster policies as well as development agendas. essential drr strategies can be adapted for indigenous communities through respect for indigenous approaches in coordinating alliances; culturally appropriate incentives; accurate, appropriate, and ethical data collection; acknowledgment of indigenous land use practices; use of indigenous language, leadership, and institutions; collaboration with indigenous knowledges; and acceptance of traditional healing approaches. keywords disaster risk reduction (drr), disasters, indigenous peoples, indigenous communities, indigenous knowledge, multilateral organizations, united nations acknowledgments i simon lambert is an associate professor in the department of indigenous studies, university of saskatchewan. he is a member of the tuhoe and ngāti ruapani mai waikaremoana tribes of new zealand. simon.lambert@.usask.ca ii john scott is president of the center for public service communications. he is an enrolled member of the tlingit and haida tribes of alaska (tlingit). jcscott@cpsc.com iii daniel cabellollamas is a masters candidate in international humanitarian action at the université catholique de louvain in belgium, and currently interning at the world health organization's south-east asia regional office in delhi, india. cabello87@hotmail.com iv patricia bittner is disaster risk reduction program coordinator at the center for public service communications and formerly with the department of health emergencies at the pan american health organization, regional office for the americas of the world health organization. patricia.bittner@cpsc.com creative commons license creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ international disaster risk reduction strategies and indigenous peoples for millennia, indigenous peoples have used their traditional knowledges to prepare for, cope with, and survive disasters. during the indian ocean tsunami of 2004, for example, the inhabitants of the indonesian simeulue island community managed to survive the catastrophe despite being only 40 kilometers from the epicenter of the earthquake (mcadoo, dengler, prasetya, & titov, 2006). within 10 minutes of the earthquake, 10 meter high waves hit the island; a high-tech early warning system with a 15-minute response time would have been inadequate. a story about buffaloes running to the hills when a tsunami is coming, passed on as oral history, was far more effective (syafwina, 2014; villagran de leon, bogardfi, dannemann, & basher, 2006). while the tsunami killed well over 200,000 people in the rest of indonesia, only 7 of the 78,000 members of the simeulue community died during the disaster (baumwoll, 2008). these types of systems are not only highly attuned to local circumstances but they are also highly cost effective. policy makers have largely ignored this vast body of indigenous knowledge (ik) in favor of science and technology-centric methods of disaster risk reduction (drr). complicating any engagement between drr and ik is the reality that indigenous knowledge is not a monolithic, uniform expression of indigeneity. rather, ik is ineradicably local and, while there are certainly similarities (notably on cosmological themes, environmental interrelationships, practices of reciprocity, and interpretations of well-being), the diversity of indigenous environments and experiences precludes universalism. categorization and interpretation remain intensely grounded in the myriad indigenous communities that exist (agrawal, 2002; ataria et al., 2018; robinson, maclean, hill, bock, & rist, 2016). colonization has, of course, disrupted indigenous strategies of self-determination, and many argue neoliberalization is also a form of neo-colonization (bargh, 2007). knowledge is not a static concept; it is continually being created, discarded, and improved upon, but it is often opaque to outsiders and sometimes even to those within the community. hilhorst, baart, van der haar, and leeftink (2015) argued that all ik should be recognized as being produced in specific social contexts, and that broader social developments need to be understood in relation to indigeneity and modernity. despite these complexities, indigenous practices are now considered important contributions to understanding and preparing for disasters (athayde, baudoin, lambert, okerie, & yin, 2015; howitt, havnen, & veland, 2012; lambert, 2014; mercer et al., 2012; shaw, sharma, & takeuchi, 2009). at the same time, as it is being recognized and valued, ik is under constant threat of being eroded, lost, or misappropriated (drahos, 2014; mead, 1994). indigenous peoples, comprising an estimated 370 million people in some 90 countries throughout the world (united nations, 2009). they face systematic discrimination and exclusion from political and economic power and continue to be overrepresented among the poorest and most marginalized sectors of society (united nations, 2009; wahlstrom, 2013), factors that contribute to greater community vulnerability. the brutal history of dispossession and oppression that indigenous peoples have experienced, and in many cases still experience, limits or deprives them of possession or full access to ancestral lands and resources, further weakening their capacity to deal with natural and anthropogenic hazards. nation states, the primary antagonists of indigenous claims to knowledge, recognition and rights, oppose decolonizing themselves (fanon, 1967); multilateral organizations such as the united nations, some of whose most powerful members 1 lambert and scott: international disaster risk reduction strategies published by scholarship@western, 2019 are settler colonial states, have fraught relationships with indigenous members (dahl, 2012; ewen, 1994; henderson, 2008).1 lately, pre-existing or nascent authoritarian frameworks have increased their surveillance and oppression of actual or imagined political threats (particularly when coming from indigenous environmental activists; see lynch, stretesky, & long, 2018; watt, 2018). as indigenous people often attest when they get to speak within drr debates, indigenous concerns sit within wider political contexts in which indigenous individuals and collectives are ignored, undermined, oppressed, or placed in mortal danger (dahl, 2012; reedy, 1994). with the adoption of the 2030 agenda for sustainable development in 2015, the un general assembly provided an important mechanism through which drr can be implemented. the agenda’s 17 goals and 169 targets are intended to be implemented over 15 years, promising “to leave no one behind and reach the furthest behind first” (secretariat of the permanent forum on indigenous issues, 2017, p. 2). the final resolution makes six references to indigenous peoples, comprising three mentions in the political declaration, two in goals 2 and 4 (relating to hunger and education, respectively), and one referring to indigenous participation. strong parallels between the sustainable development and various indigenous perspectives on the environment have been identified; chief oren lyons of the onondaga nation, speaking at the un general assembly for the opening of the year of indigenous peoples, noted that his ancestors sought “to make every decision on behalf of the seventh generation to come” (lyons jr., 2014, p. 337). while this and other phrases have become common memes that gloss over many complex indigenous issues and often are appropriated by non-indigenous groups (haig-brown, 2010), they do reflect indigenous perspectives. with respect to disaster management, indigenous community leaders and state disaster managers may have opportunities to utilize locale-specific practices that have arisen from a close relationship with the environment and would contribute to our understanding of sustainability and drr. plans, vulnerability maps, legislation, and policy are typically prepared by national or sub-national organizational structures, many of which are dominated by non-indigenous decision-makers (erikson, 1994; hsu, 2016; lambert, 2015). indigenous peoples often do not have adequate opportunities to participate in the design, implementation, monitoring, and evaluation of strategies and policies. rather than the imposition of top-down processes, communities must be involved and empowered in outlining their own drr strategies (ellemor, 2005; scharbach & waldram, 2016; uekusa & meatthewman, 2017). such empowerment would mitigate the risk of misappropriating, misinterpreting, or misusing ik, while also generating more appropriate responses to the dynamic nature of ik and its localized relevance. during the past two decades, efforts in the management of disasters have progressively focused on preparedness rather than relief (unisdr, 2015). this has occurred in the context of understanding and appreciating the increasing vulnerability of disaster-prone regions; the ever-growing impact of natural hazards on livelihoods; the impacts of climate change; and mal-development, including in wealthy states. despite advances in technology and increased investment in disaster management, the human and economic toll disasters take continues to rise (world bank & united nations, 2010). the cause of this is 1 the authors have all participated organizing or speaking in indigenous sessions of the united nations international strategy for disaster reduction (unisdr). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.2 not only the obvious divergence between drr policy and practice, but also changes in people’s social, economic, cultural, political, and environmental contexts (wainwright & mercer, 2009). the colonial imposition of non-indigenous models on indigenous peoples may be one of the most important factors contributing to the increase in vulnerability of indigenous communities (campbell, 2006; dunbarortiz, 2014; howitt et al., 2012; oliver-smith, 1994; smith, 1999). what follows is an outline of how multilateral agreements have incorporated a wider, though still problematic, acknowledgement of indigenous peoples’ needs and contributions in the context of reducing risks of future disasters for indigenous and non-indigenous communities. international drr institutional settings disasters have featured within united nations agreements since the 1960s, when several large-scale disasters were the subject of un resolutions for relief (united nations office for disaster risk reduction, 2017).2 although disaster prevention and pre-disaster planning were a focus, the approach was primarily framed in terms of technical responses. institutional developments culminated with the formation of the un disaster relief office in 1971. severe droughts in afghanistan (un general assembly, 1971) and ethiopia (un general assembly, 1978, 1985a, 1985b) also prompted a multilateral response and, in the case of the 1985 ethiopian disaster, international fundraising efforts that included a music festival (live aid) watched by a television audience estimated at 1.9 billion people (jones, 2005). disasters had transcended local and national concerns. the 1990s was the international decade for natural disaster reduction (idndr), which included the yokohama strategy and plan of action for a safer world (un office for disaster risk reduction, 1994) as the first major international framework for drr. in addition to drawing explicit connections between sustainable development and drr, the yokohama strategy included indigenous non-governmental organizations within those groups promoting hazard management along with environment and related issues. the idndr culminated in the un international strategy for disaster reduction (unisdr) in 1999. the unisdr was to facilitate implementation of the international strategy for disaster reduction through interagency, country-specific, and thematic discussions (united nations office for disaster risk reduction, 2017). now called the un office for disaster risk reduction (mandated by un general assembly resolution 56/195; see un general assembly, 2001), the office coordinates the un disaster reduction programs, including engagement with socio‐economic and humanitarian strategies, and is led by a un special representative of the secretary-general for drr (srsg). the hyogo framework for action 2005-2015: building the resilience of nations and communities to disasters (hfa) was endorsed by un member states in 2005 and guided organizational efforts to reduce losses stemming from natural hazards for a decade (unisdr, 2005). the hfa addressed the roles of states and international organizations, calling on civil society, academia, volunteer organizations, and the private sector to join efforts, and it supported the decentralization of authority and resources to promote local-level drr. hfa priorities for action included: 2 these disasters were two earthquakes in iran and one in yugoslavia, and a hurricane in the caribbean (see united nations office for disaster risk reduction, 2017). 3 lambert and scott: international disaster risk reduction strategies published by scholarship@western, 2019 • build institutional capacity: ensure that disaster risk reduction is a national and local priority with a strong institutional basis for implementation. • know your risks: identify, assess, and monitor disaster risks and enhance early warning. • build understanding and awareness: use knowledge, innovation, and education to build a culture of safety and resilience at all levels. • reduce risk: reduce the underlying risk factors through land-use planning, environmental, social, and economic measures. • be prepared and ready to act: strengthen disaster preparedness for effective response at all levels. the yokohama strategy contained just the single acknowledgement of an indigenous “role,” that of indigenous non-governmental organizations (ngos). the hfa has a single mention of “relevant traditional and indigenous knowledge and culture heritage”; these knowledges and heritages are to be “tailored to different target audiences, taking into account cultural and social factors” (unisdr, 2005, p. 9), consigning indigenous peoples to one of many stakeholders. while there is little explicit leverage for indigenous peoples, there remains implicit levers for localized community approaches within the hfa. first, there is the acceptance of vulnerability as a multi-scalar, multi-faceted expression of age, gender, religion, and ethnicity (section iii/a/13/e); also, the strengthening and development of community institutions and local mechanisms and capacities were seen to contribute to building “resilience to hazards” (section ii/c/12/b). there was an explicit call to accept that the empowerment of communities and local authorities was fundamental to successful disaster management by enabling access to “the necessary information, resources, and authority” (section iii/a/13/f). all these approaches echo indigenous demands within the un and other multilateral systems (for example the world intellectual property organization). a series of workshops in the late 1980s brought together indigenous researchers and practitioners to discuss indigenous drr (delhi in 2007 and 2008, and kyoto in 2008). these workshops led to an edited volume of case studies (shaw et al., 2009) that drew on research from the asia–pacific region. the inaugural global platform for drr in 2007 was followed in 2008 by the third asian ministerial conference on disaster risk reduction (malaysia), which hosted an indigenous knowledge side event that proposed a seven-step path to incorporate and empower indigenous perspectives (shaw, 2009): • the establishment of a resource group; • systematic documentation and research to establish guidelines and create a “validated body of applicable knowledge” (p. 14). robust, secure databases of indigenous knowledge practices is essential; • incorporation into formal and informal education; • engaging in policy advocacy; • enabling an environment that “cuts across the techno-legal, socioeconomic and cultural regimes” (p. 16) and permeates different areas of work; • identification of the right change agents (i.e., local leaders, lawmakers, administrators, etc.); 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.2 • creation of special focus areas such as gender, urban risk, climate change adaptation, and food security. in 2015, the hfa was succeeded by the sendai framework for disaster risk reduction 2015-2030 that introduced a number of innovations as called for during the consultations, and negotiations saw an emphasis on disaster risk management as opposed to disaster management (unisdr, 2015). this paradigm shift in interpreting disasters and hazards saw the “reactive” approach of focusing on disaster relief succeeded by “proactive” approaches emphasizing disaster prevention and risk reduction (see table 1). the scope of drr was broadened significantly in the sendai framework to focus on both natural and anthropogenic hazards and related environmental, technological, and biological risks. seven global targets were identified: reducing disaster risk was elevated as an expected outcome; resilience was to be strengthened; and a set of guiding principles were compiled including a primary responsibility of states to prevent and reduce disaster risk (unisdr, 2015). indigenous peoples are explicitly noted in two sections: section 24 (i): to ensure the use of traditional, indigenous and local knowledge and practices, as appropriate, to complement scientific knowledge in disaster risk assessment and the development and implementation of policies, strategies, plans, and programs of specific sectors, with a cross-sectoral approach, which should be tailored to localities and to the context; 36 (a) (v): indigenous peoples, through their experience and traditional knowledge, provide an important contribution to the development and implementation of plans and mechanisms, including for early warning. the direct incorporation of indigenous perspectives in drr strategies was encouraged in the sendai framework. indigenous speakers and sessions had become regular features of un and other conference proceedings: for example, the regional conference of the international geographical union (2013) that had two sessions addressing indigenous disaster experiences. however, monitoring progress towards appropriate collaboration with indigenous communities remains a significant theoretical and practical challenge. two sustainable development goals (sdgs) have indicators that refer directly to indigenous peoples, and several others are relevant to them (secretariat of the permanent forum on indigenous issues, 2017). however, the question of drr indicators and indigenous communities remains contested; robust metrics for the indicators are still needed, particularly at the national and local levels (see for example molina & neef, 2016), to inform progress within the sendai framework. 5 lambert and scott: international disaster risk reduction strategies published by scholarship@western, 2019 table 1. paradigm shift in un disaster discourse old paradigm hfa new paradigm risk perception exogenous exogenous endogenous problem recognition need for effective response and recovery (burton, kates, & white, 1978) need for disaster risk reduction risk is embedded in development processes (beck, 1992; campbell, 2006) examples of main policy tools contingency plan, emergency training early warning system, engineering solutions (normile, 2004) land-use planning, riskproof investment, ecosystem management (handmer & dovers, 2007) required knowledge technical risk and loss assessment risk, loss and socioeconomic impact assessments (tierney, 2014) actors disaster management agencies disaster risk management throughout government, with public, private, ngo stakeholders wider and deeper stakeholder involvement, especially private sector and local level actors (world bank & united nations, 2010) link internal domestic politics millennium development goals (damman, 2007) sustainable development goals, climate change policy (shaw et al., 2009) note. adapted from unisdr, 2014, table 1, p. xv. however, as tozier de la poterie and baudoin (2015) remind us, the participation of marginalized groups within the united nations system is difficult. transforming strategies, technologies, and practices such that there are positives outcomes for indigenous communities has yet to be achieved. the contested nature of all living knowledges does not doom collaboration between mainstream science and the profuse indigenous knowledges embodied by indigenous communities. from the complete lack of recognition for indigenous peoples within multilateral drr strategies of the 1960s and 1970s, the incremental and often rhetorical advances achieved reflect wider obstacles to political and institutional empowerment for indigenous peoples. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.2 indigenous insights for drr policy many factors play a role in disaster risk and while some are well known to local authorities and targeted by selected risk reduction measures, the knowledge of others is still emerging (handmer & dovers, 2007; matthewman, 2015). research in the report by shaw et al. (2009) classified ik according to four socio-ecological systems and their hazards: mountains (geological and hydro-meteorological hazards); coasts (tsunamis, storm surges, erosion); water management (drought risk); and river basins (floods and erosion). a fifth area identified the role of housing in coping with diverse disasters. contributors emphasized the need for community-led strategies and the importance of “bottom-up” organization. the authors also noted the disjuncture between what indigenous communities know about a hazard, and what was done in response to consequent disasters by state authorities. for indigenous communities, vulnerability is often an outcome, or a symptom, of state-sanctioned oppression and marginalization. for example, hsu (2016) described the complexities of post-disaster taiwan where the relocation of indigenous communities after typhoon morakot, 2009, saw the mobilization of institutional capacity deficits, embedded within taiwanese disaster approaches, directly contributing to the “procedural vulnerability” of wutai rukai communities. the privileging of technical experts and non-indigenous discourses during the recovery and rebuilding marginalised local expertise, indigenous knowledges, and cultural values, reinforcing the loss of autonomy by disaster reconstruction that is “deep[ly] colonising in its operations and affect” (hsu, 2016, p. 159; see oliver-smith, 1994, for the experiences of indigenous communities after the 1970 peru earthquake). likewise, the pre-disaster vulnerability of maori mental health clients (poverty, unemployment, addictions, disrupted family life, as well as delayed or incorrect clinical diagnoses of mental injuries) was exacerbated by the 2011 christchurch, new zealand, earthquakes and saw mentally injured community members suffering from overlapping community disasters and personal emergencies (lambert, 2016). the loss of employment, fracturing of relationships, damage to recreational facilities, ongoing and intrusive bureaucratic processes, and higher demand for mental health services contributed to the re-traumatizing of this isolated community within an indigenous community. shaw et al. (2009) and others (for example, birkland, 1997; matthewman, 2015) acknowledged the large gap between what is known, including people’s own self-protective knowledge, and what is successfully applied and implemented. drr requires more than scientific and technological advances, and the strategic challenge is that not enough attention has been given to grounded implementation in the context of the daily life and routine work of community institutions, especially where those communities are indigenous. the un office for disaster risk reduction cites three major factors that, individually and in combination, drive disaster risk, especially in impoverished communities (unisdr, 2009): vulnerable livelihoods, ecosystem decline, and unplanned development. while each is important and often overlapping, we will touch on these factors by approaching drr as a fundamental component of sustainable development, now explicitly acknowledged in multilateral agreements like the sendai agreement through organizational links to the sdgs. these aim to address (“in order to leave no one behind”) global challenges that include interconnected poverty, inequality, climate, environmental 7 lambert and scott: international disaster risk reduction strategies published by scholarship@western, 2019 degradation, prosperity, and peace and justice; these have corresponding salience in drr (secretariat of the permanent forum on indigenous issues, 2017, para. 1). vulnerable livelihoods many indigenous communities are located within rural contexts, dependent on small-scale agriculture and natural resources, but with access to many subsistence necessities constrained. disaster losses affect huge numbers of people in poor rural areas. historical patterns of land distribution and tenure tend to discriminate against the impoverished, which may only have access to marginal and unproductive land, prone to flooding, or with erratic or minimal rainfall. development has, at times, led to the forced relocation of indigenous communities to these areas (hsu, 2016). rural livelihoods that depend on subsistence activities are vulnerable to even slight variations in weather and are therefore particularly sensitive to climate change. inadequate infrastructure is also too often a fact of rural life and is again exacerbated by disaster. across the united nations system, indigenous peoples have been remarkably consistent in articulating several key issues: the need for food and water security; land rights and resource access; the role for indigenous knowledge; the importance of women and youth empowerment; and representation in key discussions, translating into decision-making roles. issues of food security and water quality are continually raised by indigenous representatives in international fora (notably the united nations permanent forum on indigenous issues [unpfii], 2013). ecosystem decline indigenous discourse on ecosystem management is increasingly collaborating with mainstream science (berkes, 2001; lyver et al., 2016). environmental degradation afflicts indigenous communities that have little input into decision-making and derive little benefit from resource exploitation. particular attention must be paid to climate change adaptation and its impact on increasing disaster risk with more frequent, severe, and unpredictable hazards such as cyclones, floods, and heat waves, (parry, canziani, palutikof, van der linden, & hanson, 2007). in this light, climate change adaptation strategy should be seen as: (a) adapting development to gradual changes in average temperature, sea level, and precipitation; and (b) reducing and managing the risks associated with more frequent, severe and unpredictable extreme weather events. therefore, it can be expected that ik will increasingly be drawn on to inform and implement risk reduction strategies that incorporate holistic ecosystem philosophies. unplanned development the world is undergoing the largest wave of urban growth in history. according to the global assessment report on disaster risk reduction (unisdr, 2009), poor people in urban informal settlements have higher levels of everyday risk. by the year 2050, an estimated 80% of the earth’s human population will be living in urban areas; although still primarily rural, indigenous peoples throughout the world are following suit. like other groups migrating or growing in cities, indigenous communities undergo increased hardship as members migrate to urban areas for work and education, often ending up in already vulnerable neighborhoods. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.2 drr as sustainable development a single hazardous event can take a severe toll on lives and livelihoods. it can destroy social and economic infrastructure that may have taken years and fortunes to develop and upon whose vitality a community depends. a single event can also severely disrupt the systems that provide food distribution, water supply, health care, transportation, waste disposal, and communications. disaster risks can increase or decrease over time according to a country’s ability to reduce its vulnerability and strengthen risk governance capacity. ongoing monitoring and evaluation of existing plans and policies is of paramount importance. drr has, therefore, become an integral component of sustainable development and of making communities resilient to disasters. a unisdr handbook points to social factors (access to services and post-disaster safety nets; allocation of safe land for all strategic activities and housing; multi-stakeholder participation in all stages and strengthening of social alliances and networking) and environmental factors (through ecosystem-based risk management) that help to achieve resilience (unisdr, 2012b). communities that are proactive in their drr through sustainable development efforts can save lives and property in the event of disaster, reducing fatalities and injuries. they may also benefit from: • protected development gains and less diversion of resources to disaster response and recovery. • active citizen participation and local democracy. • increased investment in housing and other properties, in anticipation of fewer disaster losses. • increased investments in infrastructure, including retrofitting, renovation, and renewal. • economic growth and employment. • balanced ecosystems, which foster provisioning and cultural ecosystem services such as fresh water and recreation. • overall better health and wellbeing. • improved education in safer schools. (unisdr cited in scott, cabello-llamas, & bittner, 2013, p. 13) for community leaders, reducing disaster risk can be a legacy opportunity, an opportunity to improve social, cultural, and economic conditions and leave the community more prosperous and secure than before. it is argued that ik has been slow to “infiltrate” disaster management (mcadoo, moore, & baumwoll, 2009, p. 75), despite powerful research increasingly contributing to our understanding of how ik understands and responds to hazards and disasters (lambert, 2014; mercer, kelman, taranis, & suchet-pearson, 2010). we reiterate that as holders of unique locally grounded knowledges, indigenous peoples and their communities must be empowered to formulate their own drr strategies. this position was articulated at the 2017 unisdr global platform (unisdr, 2017); the indigenous peoples statement from that conference is reprinted in the appendix. 9 lambert and scott: international disaster risk reduction strategies published by scholarship@western, 2019 using indigenous knowledge to reduce disaster risk indigenous knowledge includes an understanding of society–nature relationships that have been tested by time, proven to be sustainable, and able to contribute to limiting the effects of hazards. it is sometimes difficult to draw a clear line between local and outside knowledge. however, practices adapted through contact with external sources, if culturally integrated and tested through time, may also be “indigenous” in practice. in fact, the most important elements of indigenous knowledge are its origin in the relation between a community and a unique natural environment, and its relation to a historic continuity in a specific location (developed over several generations). “the process of developing indigenous knowledge, whether incorporating outside knowledge or not, is accomplished solely by the community. a community holds a unique relationship with and an understanding of its environment and knows how to adapt any knowledge or experience to its specific context” (baumwoll, 2008, p. 43). in addition to systemic marginalization by mainstream disaster management institutions, indigenous approaches have also been threatened as a consequence of western influence. dependency on shortterm foreign-sourced humanitarian aid following disasters has led to the abandonment of traditional coping practices (campbell, 2006; mercer et al., 2010). this has sometimes led to a reduced ability of governments and local communities to profit from their own resources and implement (or maintain) positive drr strategies. furthermore, social, political, economic, and cultural changes stemming from colonialism and latter globalization have undermined indigenous drr knowledge and increased vulnerability (mercer et al., 2010). moreover, the wider use of formal education and the exposure to western models, standards, and values can lead to a breakdown of traditional communication networks. other possible negative outcomes include the decline in importance of elders within indigenous communities, allowing their knowledge to die with them. harmonizing modern science and indigenous knowledge the value of incorporating indigenous perspectives in drr has been acknowledged since the 1994 yokohama strategy that acknowledged a role for indigenous ngos. the hfa acknowledged diversity and community movements, allowing some space for indigenous voices, along with its mention of “relevant traditional and indigenous knowledge and cultural heritage.” when the hfa was reviewed, it was observed that over the first five years there had been “a stocktaking of indigenous knowledge and practice in some regions, much of it encouraged by the explicit requirements included to this effect in the hfa” (united nations office for disaster risk reduction, 2011, p. 49). with the sendai framework, this position was somewhat developed by referring to a role complimenting the (still) dominant scientific knowledge and contributing to the development and implementation of plans and mechanisms. while it is clearly useful to take advantage of the scientific and technological advances available— indigenous leaders argue as much, not wanting to eschew external knowledge and tools—strategies and tactics for implementation should be carefully articulated. local approaches, capacities, and resources must be recognized without undermining them, hence the use of the term “harmonizing” in the heading to this section. yet, this knowledge is being eroded, lost, or misappropriated, a factor contributing to 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.2 greater vulnerability to disasters, but it is also an issue across a range of overlapping multilateral accords on indigenous intellectual property, medicinal plants, and art works. unpfii (2013) cites several risks to ik in drr: • dispossession or forced removal from traditional lands and sacred sites has eroded the relationship between indigenous peoples and their environment. when forced to migrate and resettle in new environments, indigenous peoples find that their knowledge and practices have to be adapted to new and often difficult circumstances. • indigenous knowledge may also sometimes be lost as the result of language extinction. • poverty is another threat to indigenous knowledge. it is often the case that when people are poor, conservation is not a high priority, and they will take out of the environment whatever is needed for their survival. • the misappropriation of indigenous knowledge in the form of biopiracy. (p. 94) there are multiple opportunities for the engagement of indigenous peoples in drr strategies and policies, and the integration of mainstream drr practices and mechanisms into indigenous communities. the office of the high commissioner on human rights (ohchr) published a report by the special rapporteur, which made a number of recommendations for member states and indigenous representatives (united nations, 2014). we draw attention to a recommendation that is at the forefront of many indigenous positions: existing treaty relationships and partnerships between relevant government agencies working on disaster risk reduction and indigenous peoples should be pursued in all regions of the world in order to develop disaster risk reduction strategies at the national and local levels that reflect the voices of indigenous peoples. (annex, section b/10) it is worth recalling that despite significant legal standing (see for example asch, 1997; tawhai & graysharp, 2013), modern indigenous treaty discourse remains highly contentious and indigenous voices continue to be sidelined, denigrated, and ignored. the ten essentials for drr and indigenous leverage what might a greater integration of ik at the strategic level of drr look like? the unisdr has developed a 10-point checklist to help local government leaders take steps to reduce their disaster risk (unisdr, 2012a). scott et al. (2013) suggested that “these steps can be modified and/or adopted by indigenous peoples to improve their disaster resilience (see suggestions in italics after each essential)” (p. 10). the 10 points are: • put in place organization and coordination to understand and reduce disaster risk, based on participation of citizen groups and civil society. build local alliances. ensure that all departments understand their role in disaster risk reduction and preparedness. respect the institutions and organizations of indigenous peoples when building alliances and promoting coordination. 11 lambert and scott: international disaster risk reduction strategies published by scholarship@western, 2019 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.2 • assign a budget for disaster risk reduction and provide incentives for homeowners, lowincome families, communities, businesses, and the public sector to invest in reducing the risks they face. design culturally appropriate incentives for indigenous communities. • maintain up-to-date data on hazards and vulnerabilities. prepare risk assessments and use these as the basis for urban development plans and decisions. ensure that this information and the plans for your city’s resilience are readily available to the public and fully discussed with them. disaggregate data by sex and ethnicity. ensure that plans are prepared in different languages and disseminated using traditional means of communication; include non-traditional and cultural concerns in risk assessments. • invest in and maintain critical infrastructure that reduces risk, such as flood drainage, adjusted where needed to cope with climate change. in collaboration with relevant indigenous communities. • assess the safety of all schools and health facilities and upgrade these as necessary. in collaboration with relevant indigenous communities. • apply and enforce realistic, risk compliant building regulations and land-use planning principles. identify safe land for low-income citizens and upgrade informal settlements, wherever feasible. take into account indigenous peoples’ land use practices. • ensure that education programs and training on disaster risk reduction are in place in schools and local communities. take into account languages; involve indigenous leadership; make full use of local indigenous institutions, • protect ecosystems and natural buffers to mitigate floods, storm surges and other hazards to which your city may be vulnerable. adapt to climate change by building on good risk reduction practices. climate adaptation plans and measures should appropriately collaborate with indigenous knowledge. • install early warning systems and emergency management capacities in your city and hold regular public preparedness drills. warning systems should integrate traditional practices. • after any disaster, ensure that the needs of the affected population are placed at the center of reconstruction, with support for them and their community organizations to design and help implement responses, including rebuilding homes and livelihoods. take into account indigenous spiritual healing systems, medicinal practices, etc. (p. 10) conclusions indigenous knowledge has been acknowledged in several multilateral agreements on disasters since the mid-1990s. this acknowledgement has come about slowly, through ongoing attempts by indigenous representatives to assert indigenous rights across all aspects of indigenous lives. however, implementation of drr strategies designed by indigenous communities has been difficult. statesponsored or endorsed racism, historical isolation, ongoing marginalization, and institutional inertia often amplify the risks faced by indigenous communities, negatively impacting on the economic, cultural, and spiritual well-being of community members. indigenous leaders struggle to be heard, and when heard, the struggle continues for the necessary resourcing and decision-making roles. understanding by disaster professionals of the cultural beliefs of communities is a key factor to success. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.2 assessments of indigenous communities must not be limited to attempts to understand how outside messages and practices are perceived and responded to; they must also capitalize on local capacity, resources, and knowledge. considerable opportunities do exist, however, in the areas of mitigating vulnerable livelihoods, addressing ecosystem decline, and promoting sustainable development. these areas can integrate ik and empower communities to reduce their exposure to future risks from natural hazards and disasters. essential drr strategies can be interpreted and adapted for indigenous communities, including respect for indigenous approaches in coordinating alliances; culturally appropriate incentives; accurate, appropriate, and ethical data collection; acknowledgment of indigenous land use practices; use of indigenous language, leadership, and local institutions; respectful collaboration with ik; and acceptance of indigenous healing approaches. by accepting indigenous approaches, collaborating ethically and respectfully with these communities, and when appropriate, applying the knowledges held by indigenous communities, drr policy-makers can help make the future for these and other communities safer for generations to come. references agrawal, a. 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(2009). the dilemma of decontamination: a gramscian analysis of the mexican transgenic maize dispute. geoforum, 40(3), 345-354. doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geoforum.2008.09.013 watts, j. (2018, february 2). almost four environmental defenders a week killed in 2017. the guardian. retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/feb/02/almost-fourenvironmental-defenders-a-week-killed-in-2017?cmp=share_btn_tw world bank & united nations. (2010). natural hazards, unnatural disasters: the economics of effective prevention. washington: world bank/ international bank for reconstruction and development. 19 lambert and scott: international disaster risk reduction strategies published by scholarship@western, 2019 appendix: indigenous peoples statement unisdr global platform 2017 kuiack, t. (2017). joint statement on behalf of indigenous peoples. in official statements from the 5th session of the global platform for disaster risk reduction. retrieved from https://www.unisdr.org/files/globalplatform/indigenouspeoplesstatement2017final.docx indigenous peoples statement unisdr global platform 2017 indigenous peoples around the world have used their traditional knowledge to prepare for, cope with and recover from disasters for millennia. their methods and practices originate largely within the community and are maintained and disseminated through non-formal means developed and refined over generations. however, over time and at an increasing rate, outside development practices are adversely affecting the environment of indigenous people, leading to secondary disasters and at times, making traditional knowledge irrelevant. the value of fora such as this unisdr global platform in disaster risk reduction is that they provide opportunities for indigenous people to access valuable information about the impact of these influences so that they may adapt their traditional knowledge, preparedness and response patterns and minimize the risk of disaster. following are the key messages stemming from the discussion. • traditional indigenous knowledge, values and culture are, in themselves, important risk reduction tools and should be incorporated into national and international drr strategies. indigenous knowledge must be valued and widely disseminated. traditional indigenous knowledge, values and culture are, in themselves, important risk reduction tools, can provide synergies with successful non-indigenous experience, and should be incorporated into national and international drr strategies. indigenous knowledge must be valued and widely disseminated. • indigenous communities have a deep understanding of and respect for the environment. however, outside development practices can adversely affect their environment, leading to secondary disasters and at times, making traditional knowledge irrelevant. indigenous peoples should have access to more information about the impact of these manmade situations in order to adapt their traditional knowledge, preparedness and response patterns and minimize the risk of a disaster. • indigenous peoples must have a voice in order to reduce disaster risk and vulnerability. the practice of imposing centralized solutions to local problems (many of which already have successful local solutions) can lessen the community’s capacity to reduce risk and save lives. they must have opportunities to develop their own strategies as well as participate in the development of national and international policies. • definitions, concepts and standards related to disaster risk reduction and response must reflect both indigenous and non-indigenous perspectives. 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.2 specific recommendations to unisdr for action going forward • recognize and make better use of indigenous perspectives and knowledge by incorporating these in unisdr planning and programs. • support the creation of regional indigenous networking to give voice to indigenous advocates for disaster risk reduction and disaster risk management. • advocate, through its national platforms, for ‘a seat at the table’ and for the inclusion of indigenous perspectives in national disaster risk reduction planning -nothing about us without us! • provide opportunities for indigenous participation in regional and international forums. (p. 1) 21 lambert and scott: international disaster risk reduction strategies published by scholarship@western, 2019 the international indigenous policy journal april 2019 international disaster risk reduction strategies and indigenous peoples simon j. lambert john c. scott recommended citation international disaster risk reduction strategies and indigenous peoples abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license international disaster risk reduction strategies and indigenous peoples microsoft word ms #1478 mcleod bookreview_kinew_rce.docx the international indigenous policy journal volume 10 | issue 3 july 2019 book review: the reason you walk crystal mcleod western university, cmcleo25@uwo.ca nikesh adunuri western university, nadunuri@uwo.ca recommended citation mcleod, c., & adunuri, n. (2019). book review: the reason you walk. the international indigenous policy journal, 10(3). doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8081 book review: the reason you walk abstract this article provides a review of the memoir the reason you walk by wab kinew. keywords canada, first nations, residential schools, intergenerational trauma, reconciliation, memoir, narrative creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. mcleod and adunuri: book review: the reason you walk published by scholarship@western, 2019 book review: the reason you walk kinew, w. (2015). the reason you walk. toronto, on: penguin. 273 pp. $19.99 (paperback). $33.87 (audiobook). isbn: 9780143193555. the reason you walk is the memoir of wabanakwut (wab) kinew. kinew purposes this memoir as a vehicle through which to share the experiences of his father, tobasonakwut, and his own, as father and son rebuild their relationship with one another, other family members, and the wider indigenous community in the wake of personal experiences of colonialism. embracing anishinaabe first nations culture, kinew and tobasonakwut share experiences of indian residential schools, intergenerational trauma, reconciliation, and healing. yet, kinew’s narrative also holds rich and meaningful descriptions of canadian policy by providing insight into how policies have impacted and continue to impact indigenous peoples. past canadian government policy applied to indigenous peoples is widely regarded as discriminatory and oppressive. knowledge of harm related to these policies has often reached the public as a result of strong opposition from indigenous leaders, who began calling for policy reform in the 1960s to obtain equal freedoms for the indigenous peoples of canada (macfarlane & ruffo, 2016). the advocacy of these indigenous leaders was very consequential to the first indigenous policy reforms in canada, but experts observe that indigenous leaders encountered substantial obstacles in having their voices heard (macfarlane & ruffo, 2016). the voices of indigenous people have been, and continue to be, suppressed in mainstream canadian society. indigenous peoples often have inequitable access to multi-media publishing and communication technologies that help to bring attention to indigenous policy issues (macfarlane & ruffo, 2016). across generations, many non-indigenous canadians have silenced and occupied the voices of indigenous peoples, which has led to misrepresentation of indigenous policy issues (macfarlane & ruffo, 2016). subsequently, kinew’s memoir is precious in light of the relative scarcity of authentic indigenous narratives in discussions of policy issues. considering the great breadth of policy, over time and across disciplines, that kinew speaks to, this narrative becomes even more exceptional. for example, kinew discusses the impact of policies that led to the creation of residential schools, the loss of land and minerals in canada and america, a modern public education system that has failed to incorporate indigenous culture, and residential school survivors being mislabelled as “former students.” although a memoir is not a traditional place for researchers and policy makers to gather knowledge, kinew’s narrative has the potential to inform policy reform. he helps us to see the impacts of policies of oppression and the change produced by indigenous leaders. the reason you walk is 273 pages, comprised of 21 chapters, a foreword, prologue, and epilogue. the narrative is divided into three parts: oshkaadizid (youth), kiizhewaadizid (living a life of love, kindness, sharing, and respect), and giiwekwaadizid (the end of life). each of the narrative’s parts capture the experiences of kinew and his father moving through the stages of life, ending with tobasonakwut’s death. kinew (2015) states in the memoir’s foreword, “much of the dialogue in this book is verbatim – these are the actual words spoken by your dedenan [tobasonakwut], documented on video or in written transcripts” (p. xii), which assures the accuracy of tobasonakwut’s narrative posthumously. kinew (2015) describes the period this memoir has been lived and written as a “time of reconciliation,” or during indigenous peoples’ “journey from repression to resurgence” (p. xii). kinew goes on to the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3, art. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8081 2 support this statement by discussing numerous reconciliatory events in canada during the time this memoir was written. for instance, kinew discusses prime minister harper’s apology to survivors of indian residential schools, which acknowledged the suffering of indigenous peoples; the canonization of st. kateri tekakwitha by the roman catholic church, the first indigenous person of north america to be canonized; and the 2012 #idlenomore movement. #idlenomore was a social media protest that began in saskatchewan and grew into a platform for all the challenges faced by indigenous peoples in north america (including reconciliation; kinew, 2015; pierro et al., 2013). however, amid initial truth and reconciliation commission (trc, 2010) hearings, only a small proportion of non-indigenous canadians endorsed the commission and, of all the news coverage from 2010 to 2013, stories related to indigenous peoples only made up 0.28% (flisfeder, 2010; pierro et al., 2013; stanton, 2011). during this time, kinew was actively engaged in reconciliatory events (like assisting his father in providing testimony to the trc), working within a news team covering indian residential school stories, and participating in news coverage on reconciliation (kinew and tobasonakwut were featured in a national news piece), which shaped his view of reconciliation in canada. however, kinew’s enthusiastic outlook on reconciliation may not be ubiquitous throughout canada. an argument could be made that kinew’s memoir builds upon the work of the trc through its goals to “acknowledge residential school experiences, impacts and consequences” and “witness, support, promote and facilitate truth and reconciliation events at both the national and community levels” (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, n.d., p. 1). survivors of residential schools have criticized past narratives, including those taught in canadian history classes, for inadequately acknowledging residential school experiences and the ongoing effects on survivors (gebhard, 2017; shay & wickes, 2017). outside of education settings, even narratives in scholarly literature diminished the horrors of residential schools, such as starvation and abuse, and tend to portray residential schools as a bygone issue rather than an ongoing one (gebhard, 2017; truth and reconciliation commission of canada, n.d.). kinew’s narrative truly acknowledges the horrific experiences of residential schools. he describes the physical and sexual abuse his father experienced in concrete terms, and he explores the ongoing impact as manifest in his father’s substance abuse and strained relationship with his children. finally, this memoir witnesses, supports, and facilitates truth and reconciliation through a publicly available and easily accessible personal history of residential schools, intergenerational impacts, and reconciliation. by detailing his own account of reconciliation and the associated benefits, kinew provides a model of reconciliation that could be replicated by other canadians in order to support the ongoing work of the trc (2015). analyzing the memoir’s content, the transitions between wabanakwut and tobasonakwut’s experiences and perspectives successfully integrate the themes in the narrative without losing clarity. the narrative does not include extraneous experiences, and no content appears missing from the narrative, but kinew does explain one omission he is required to make in the text: “due to its sacred nature,” the ceremonies of the heyookas, clowns with spiritual powers in the lakota sundance ceremony are not described (kinew, 2015, p. 174). this statement is not a true omission; rather, it strengthens the narrative, as kinew’s protection of the traditional ceremonies is a sign of respect and prevents the exploitation of indigenous culture (macfarlane & ruffo, 2016; simonds & christopher, 2013). the memoir does not mention in the main text or acknowledgements, the role, if any, indigenous leaders, elders, and knowledge keepers had in revising and amending the content. mention of this role would have been valuable to the reader in examining the accuracy of the content, as this wisdom enriches and strengthens mcleod and adunuri: book review: the reason you walk published by scholarship@western, 2019 indigenous knowledge (kagan, smith, & chinn, 2014; saini, 2012; wray, 2008). moreover, the experiences of indigenous women are not central in the narrative and, hence, readers are unable to fully consider the influence of gender in the experiences and issues described. although when women are called on, kinew (2015) uses positive language, such as “ . . . you could see how that challenging road had forged within her an exceptional strength” (p. 167), and “there she was, in a crowd of future world leaders, the best and brightest . . . she had fought for a very long time to achieve this . . .” (p.150), conveying respect for indigenous women. the book’s content and the format of the memoir brings the reader closer to indigenous culture. terms, traditions, and ceremonies rooted in indigenous culture are described in detail, making the text accessible to readers who are unfamiliar with them. as well, many nouns throughout the memoir are followed by the anishinaabemowin translation in italics, such as “the anishinaabemowin word for twin is niizhote, or ‘two heart’” (kinew, 2015, p. 8) and “that low-flying cloud. that tobasonakwut” (p. 261). the inclusion of anishinaabemowin in the memoir exemplifies indigenous resilience against colonialism, which sought to eradicate indigenous languages. listening to the audiobook of the reason you walk, read by kinew himself, improves the reader’s perception of anishinaabemowin and aids in understanding the meaning through the tone and emphasis in the author’s voice (alsamadani, 2017; weber, 1986). worth noting, kinew makes no claim that his memoir is intended to inform research or future policy in canada. yet, the authors of this review were compelled by kinew’s narrative and feel that authentic intergenerational narratives, like the reason you walk, have a place in directing future policy research and creation. memoirs in particular enable rich accounts of experiences, including those of marginalized populations, that address experiences over longer periods of time than qualitative interviews. they also grant the narrator autonomy over how knowledge is shared (kagan et al., 2014; mcgannon & mcmahon, 2019; saini, 2012; shay & wickes, 2017). among indigenous peoples, narratives have been especially beneficial in decolonization and identifying intergenerational trauma (fitzpatrick, 2018; hildebrandt et al., 2016; kagan et al., 2014). with colonialism exerting a complex set of influences across generations of indigenous peoples, kinew’s narrative about the life of his father and his own offers researchers, policymakers, indigenous communities, and other stakeholders direction in understanding and undoing this influence (griffiths, coleman, lee, & madden, 2016; hildebrandt et al., 2016; kagan et al., 2014; saini, 2012). colonialism has marginalized and suppressed the narratives of indigenous peoples (hildebrandt et al., 2016; mccallum, waller, & meadows, 2012; saini, 2012). this memoir creates an opportunity to learn from two established indigenous leaders—tobasonakwut and wabanakwut are bloodline chiefs in their community and politicians in canada. today, wabanakwut kinew is well-known throughout canada as the leader of the new democratic party (ndp) of manitoba, and from his past work as a musician and broadcaster (kinew, 2019). criticisms exist for the use of memoirs to inform research and policy. one prominent criticism being that a memoir is the perspective of only one person and, thus, the experiences are not generalizable to larger groups (di summa-knoop, 2017). this criticism stems from western research perspectives, which have marginalized and perpetuated racist stereotypes of indigenous communities in the past (macfarlane & ruffo, 2016; saini, 2012; simonds & christopher, 2013). modern indigenous research must center around indigenous traditions, research perspectives, and methods to improve cultural sensitivity and empower participants (saini, 2012; simonds & christopher, 2013). storytelling or the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3, art. 1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8081 4 yarning is regarded as the cornerstone of indigenous research methods, being a longstanding tradition in indigenous communities to share and learn from the experiences of others (kinew, 2015; macfarlane & ruffo, 2016; saini, 2012). therefore, a memoir, as a written extension of traditional indigenous storytelling, may have more value for indigenous communities than research studies informed by western research perspectives that emphasize large sample size and generalizable findings (saini, 2012). as healthcare professionals, kinew’s narrative struck a deep chord with us about health inequity among indigenous peoples. in the narrative, kinew pledges to his children, “i love you, i value you, and yes, i would die for you. but i would much rather live for you” (kinew, 2015, p. xiii). knowing that indigenous peoples in canada experience, on average, shorter life expectancies and a greater burden of illness and injury than non-indigenous people, kinew’s words exemplify resiliency to overcome colonialism and health inequity (national collaborating centre for aboriginal health [nccah], 2017; reading & wein, 2013). harnessing the characteristics and contributions that have made kinew resilient, as seen in his recovery from addiction and his ability to cope with his father’s death, could make a powerful foundation for future strengths-based indigenous health policy. the same could apply to the fields of education, which is represented through wabanakwut’s and tobasonakwut’s experiences as students and educators, and cultural studies, as kinew and tobasonakwut persistently seek indigenous knowledge, despite geographic and financial barriers, within anishinaabe, mi’kmaq, lakota, and wixarika communities. external to healthcare policy reform, which is only one strategy to improving health inequity among indigenous peoples, health care students and professionals should also find value in kinew’s memoir (goodman et al., 2017). indigenous peoples in australia, canada, and new zealand have reported widespread stereotyping and stigmatization from healthcare professionals (goodman et al., 2017). researchers suggest an improved understanding of indigenous health practices and health inequity, concepts outlined in detail in kinew’s memoir, among individual healthcare professionals could reduce these negative experiences and improve access to healthcare for indigenous peoples (goodman et al., 2017; mills, creedy, & west, 2018). as more post-secondary and continuing education programs for healthcare students and professionals integrate indigenous health content into curriculum, kinew’s memoir should certainly not be overlooked as a source of indigenous knowledge (mills et al., 2018). revisiting the trc through the eyes of kinew and his father deeply humanizes and enriches this work. embedding this personal narrative into social, historical, and political contexts creates new ways of understanding this history, particularly among non-indigenous peoples (fitzpatrick, 2018; hildebrandt et al., 2016). this understanding allows us to recognize why past policy was inadequate and generate support for new indigenous policy agendas (mccallum et al., 2012). none of the limitations identified in this review overshadow the potential benefits of this narrative. having earned immense praise and diverse accolades, the reason you walk has already found a place among the great literary texts of canada (canadian broadcasting corporation [cbc], 2017). let us now find a place for this memoir and future memoirs that share the voices of indigenous peoples in order to inform research, policy, and structural changes in canada and worldwide. mcleod and adunuri: book review: the reason you walk published by scholarship@western, 2019 references alsamadani, h. a. 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(2008). a meaningful exchange: the benefits of aboriginal community participation in the nsw hsc aboriginal studies course. in p. jeffrey (ed.), aare 2008 conference papers collection. retrieved from https://ro.uow.edu.au/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?referer=&httpsredir=1&article=1891&contex t=artspapers data as a strategic resource: self-determination, governance, and the data challenge for indigenous nations in the united states the international indigenous policy journal volume 8 issue 2 reconciling research: perspectives on research involving indigenous peoples article 1 april 2017 data as a strategic resource: self-determination, governance, and the data challenge for indigenous nations in the united states stephanie carroll rainie university of arizona, scrainie@email.arizona.edu jennifer lee schultz university of arizona, jschult1@email.arizona.edu eileen briggs bush foundation, ebriggs@lakotanetwork.com patricia riggs consultant, p.riggs50@gmail.com nancy lynn palmanteer-holder university of washington, nh@uw.edu recommended citation rainie, s. c. , schultz, j. l. , briggs, e. , riggs, p. , palmanteer-holder, n. l. (2017). data as a strategic resource: selfdetermination, governance, and the data challenge for indigenous nations in the united states. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(2) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.1 data as a strategic resource: self-determination, governance, and the data challenge for indigenous nations in the united states abstract data about indigenous populations in the united states are inconsistent and irrelevant. federal and state governments and researchers direct most collection, analysis, and use of data about u.s. indigenous populations. indigenous peoples’ justified mistrust further complicates the collection and use of these data. nonetheless, tribal leaders and communities depend on these data to inform decision making. reliance on data that do not reflect tribal needs, priorities, and self-conceptions threatens tribal self-determination. tribal data sovereignty through governance of data on indigenous populations is long overdue. this article provides two case studies of the ysleta del sur pueblo and cheyenne river sioux tribe and their demographic and socioeconomic data initiatives to create locally and culturally relevant data for decision making. keywords american indian, alaska native, indigenous, data, sovereignty, governance acknowledgments this article had many contributors. primary thanks go to the tribes and authors that shared their experiences in this document, the cheyenne river sioux tribe and tribal ventures, as well as the ysleta del sur pueblo. special thanks are due to stephen cornell, john ehiri, celestino fernández, miriam jorgensen, desi rodriguez-lonebear, douglas taren, and nicolette teufel-shone at the university of arizona; gwen phillips at the ktunaxa nation and the british columbia first nations’ data governance initiative; sarah kastelic at the national indian child welfare association; malia villegas, sarah pytalski, and amber ebarb at the national congress of american indians; staff members and students at the native nations institute; and numerous tribal leaders for frank and thoughtful input and insights. the authors gratefully acknowledge the w.k. kellogg foundation and the morris k. udall and stewart l. udall foundation for their financial support. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ d a t a a s a s t r a t e g i c r e s o u r c e : s e l f d e t e r m i n a t i o n , g o v e r n a n c e , a n d t h e d a t a c h a l l e n g e f o r i n d i g e n o u s n a t i o n s i n t h e u n i t e d s t a t e s indigenous nations, like all communities, require data to identify problems, to develop and prioritize solutions, to make strategic decisions and defensible policies, to influence external entities, and, most importantly, to bring the community’s vision of a healthy and vibrant society to life. yet indigenous nations in the united states (u.s.) face a “data landscape” marred by sparse, inconsistent, and irrelevant information complicated by limited access and utility. while some data collected by others may be useful for tribes, the status quo of data collected about indigenous peoples or communities is not suitable to help address tribally defined needs (cross, fox, becker-green, smith, & willeto, 2004; deweaver, 2010; freemantle et al., 2015; red star innovations, 2013, 2015; rodriguez-lonebear, 2016; tribal epidemiology centers, 2013; westat, 2007). indigenous nations use data internally and externally. for example, tribes use data internally to monitor delivery of services, emerging needs of tribal populations, and the state of tribal lands and resources. externally, tribes employ data to shape federal, state, and local policy and to influence resources management. tribes also use data to apply for external funds from the federal government and others. however, the information that indigenous nations in the u.s. possess or can access too often is gathered and administered not by the tribes, but by others (individuals, organizations, governments) for purposes defined by others (bruhn, 2014; deweaver, 2010; freemantle et al., 2015; red star innovations, 2015; rodriguez-lonebear, 2016; tribal epidemiology centers, 2013). the first part of this article broadly outlines the state of population-based data for indigenous peoples in the united states. the second part provides two examples of tribal data sovereignty and data governance (for the ysleta del sur pueblo and the cheyenne river sioux tribe) where indigenous nations directed their own demographic and socioeconomic data agendas. each case study describes the data challenges the tribe faced, and the resulting initiatives, community engagement and education, and uses of the data. the article closes with a discussion of how data use enhanced the tribes’ self-determination and governance as well as international, national, and tribal policy implications. i n d i g e n o u s n a t i o n s a n d p e o p l e s i n t h e u n i t e d s t a t e s the 2010 u.s. census reported 5.2 million americans of american indian or alaska native (aian) heritages, representing about 2% of the u.s. population (norris, vines, & hoeffel, 2012). the single race aian population, or those individuals reporting aian heritage alone, comprised 2.9 million people, or 49% of those reporting aian heritage. as of may 2016, the federal government recognized 567 tribal nations (bureau of indian affairs, 2016). there are 336 tribes in the lower 48 states with the remainder in alaska. while there are no federally recognized indigenous nations in hawai’i, over 540,000 people self-reported as native hawai‘ians in the 2010 u.s census (hixson, hepler, & kim, 2012). in addition to federal recognition, 11 states recognized the sovereignty of 60 additional tribes in 2016 (national conference of state legislatures, 2016). numerous unrecognized tribes also exist. tribes in the u.s. span varied geographies from coastal ecosystems to desert climes to everything in between. u.s. tribes range in population from under 100 to over 300,000 citizens. the tribes represent a diverse array of cultures and governance styles, including theocracies, executives, and nations with strong regional governments. 1 rainie et al.: data as a strategic resource for indigenous nations? published by scholarship@western, 2017 t h e s t a t e o f d a t a f o r t r i b a l c o m m u n i t i e s based on a review of the literature, we have identified five critical problems with indigenous population data today. data are often: a. inconsistent, b. irrelevant, c. poor quality, d. produced and used within an environment of mistrust, and e. controlled by those external to the native nations. i n c o n s i s t e n t data on indigenous populations in the u.s. are largely collected by the u.s. census bureau, federal and state agencies, tribes, and other entities (cross et al., 2004; deweaver, 2010, 2013; freemantle et al., 2015; todd, 2012; westat, 2007). yet for indigenous populations and nations, standardized data often do not exist (rodriguez-lonebear, 2016; snipp, 2016; tribal epidemiology centers, 2013). where once the u.s. government and others reported data regularly—such as the biennial bureau of indian affairs (bia) labor force reports, indian health service (ihs) statistics every two to three years, bureau of justice statistics (bjs) annual data on american indians and crime—the federal government no longer issues those reports with the same consistency or at all (shalala, trujillo, harry, skupien, & d’angelo, 1997; shalala, trujillo, hartz, & d’angelo, 1999; u.s. department of health and human services, 2001, 2004, 2008, 2009, 2015; u.s. department of justice, 2012; u.s department of the interior, 2015). for example, the indian employment, training, and related services demonstration act of 1992 (1992) mandated at least biennial reporting of bia labor force data on the u.s. indigenous population eligible for services from the u.s. department of the interior. data included enrollment, service population, and labor force presented by state, region, and tribe. tribes submitted data to bia, but because of a lack of resources at the tribal level to collect and transmit data reporting was sometimes incomplete (bureau of indian affairs, 2008; capriccioso, 2012; laverdure, 2012). bia publication of these data occurred steadily from the 1980s until 2007, based on 2005 data (u.s. department of the interior, 2015). the bia did not produce a subsequent report until the 2014 release of the 2013 report based on 2010 data (u.s. department of the interior, 2014). data were not distributed for the years 2006 through 2009 and 2011 through 2016 (u.s. deparatment of the interior, 2015). compared to previous reports, the 2014 release changed methodologies by combining tribally submitted data with u.s. census data. the report also stopped collecting some information, added information, and altered how tribes had to report other information. such changes make it difficult for tribes to rely on these data for decision-making and effectively prohibit analysis of changes over time (u.s. department of the interior, 2014). the department of the interior cited inconsistencies and misunderstandings in reporting requirements and survey methodology errors as the reasons for the gap in reporting (bureau of indian affairs, 2008; capriccioso, 2012; laverdure, 2012). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.1 i r r e l e v a n t most data available to tribes are irrelevant for tribal use. for example, since the beginning of u.s. colonization, the federal government and other outsiders have defined metrics and measurements and collected socioeconomic and health information from and about tribes. data collection in indian country was driven by the administrative needs of federal agencies, not by the governmental needs of indigenous nations. as a result, the data from the u.s. census, administrative databases, and many surveys include self-reports of tribal affiliation, rather than tribal enrollment information or tribally designed specifications. this inadequately characterizes populations and insufficiently informs policy and resource allocation decisions (bruhn, 2014; cross et al., 2004; deweaver, 2010, 2013; freemantle et al., 2015; red star innovations, 2013; rodriguez-lonebear, 2016; snipp, 2016; todd, 2012; westat, 2007). for example, u.s. mortality data derived from vital statistics for indigenous peoples are not always available for tribal jurisdictions (anderson, copeland, & hayes, 2014; freemantle et al., 2015). in addition, collection methods do not allow tribes to assess rates for tribal citizens who live off the reservation. compromising mortality data further, state vital statistics offices often inaccurately record race and ethnicity because it is reported by someone other than the individual or a family member (rhoades, 2006; westat, 2007). in some cases, the individual completing the death certificate makes a guess as to the deceased’s race. to create mortality data that are useful for tribes, freemantle et al. (2015) advocated for partnerships between indigenous nations and government statistics offices, international networking and strategizing among indigenous peoples facing similar challenges, and national plans to address data shortages and inaccuracies. p o o r q u a l i t y data inaccuracies exist across sectors (cross et al., 2004; deweaver, 2010, 2013; freemantle et al., 2015; westat, 2007). in 1928, the meriam report cited the lack of accurate statistics about indians as a major problem and suggested the need for additional questions to better reflect the population (lewis meriam and associates, 1928). almost a century later, this problem persists. the u.s. census bureau, the only nationally comparable socioeconomic data source for jurisdictions including reservations, undercounts federal indian populations to this day (deweaver, 2013; lujan, 1990; passel, 1976; snipp, 1989; u.s. census bureau, 2012). the u.s. census bureau and tribes have taken a number of steps to improve census counts. during the 1980 and 1990 u.s. census processes, the bureau attempted to improve their data on indigenous peoples by directly contacting tribal governments to share information about the decennial census process (u.s. census bureau, 2007). the bureau also hired indigenous peoples to work in its offices and collect data in their own communities. in addition, the bureau distributed public relations information directly to tribes and at indigenous conferences. at the advice of an american indian advisory committee, the bureau implemented a comprehensive enumeration on reservations by oversampling households in reservation communities for the 2000 u.s. census (maury & pemberton, 2009). this process enhanced tribal data and statistical reports. however, with the migration to collecting socioeconomic data using the american community survey (acs) after the 2000 u.s. census, the u.s. census bureau lost ground in their pursuit of improved 3 rainie et al.: data as a strategic resource for indigenous nations? published by scholarship@western, 2017 socio-economic data (deweaver, 2013). for example, the sample size each year is smaller than the previous long-form u.s. census sample size; the acs samples fewer than four million individuals per year while the 2000 u.s. census long-form sampled 17.5 million. the acs methodology resulted in undercounts of reservation populations: in 2010, the acs extrapolation fell 14.8% below the 2010 u.s. census count. the u.s. census bureau implemented changes to the acs in 2011 to address issues of small sample size; the impact of these changes is yet uncertain—only the 2016 aggregated 5-year report will assess the impact of the 2011 change (deweaver, 2013). m i s t r u s t indigenous individuals and communities are often mistrustful of participating in or supporting data collection, not least because data on indigenous peoples have long been used in ways that indigenous peoples do not support (beauvais & trimble, 1992; christopher, 2005; cochran et al., 2008; manson, garroutte, goins, & henderson, 2004). in a contemporary incident, researchers obtained consent and collected blood samples from havasupai tribal citizens in arizona to study the genetics of diabetes. researchers then used these blood samples for purposes not listed on the consent form, such as analyzing the genetics of schizophrenia, and shared the data publicly as well as with personnel outside the research study, which violated the trust between the researchers and participants as well as the tribe (cochran et al., 2008; shaffer, 2004). mistrust also stems from lack of community voice in the data collection process resulting from research conducted and policies made by “outsiders” or non-community members (burhansstipanov & dresser, 1994; cochran et al., 2008; israel, eng, schulz, & parker, 2005; kunitz, 1996; pacheco et al., 2013; roubideaux, 2002). often researchers and policymakers failed to honor commitments related to projects and interventions. in large part, data are only shared with community members in technical language that is difficult understand or not returned at all. further, researcher and policymaker ignorance or disrespect for indigenous cultural practices, beliefs, and knowledge during research and other information gathering efforts led to community distrust of data and data collection processes. e x t e r n a l c o n t r o l external control of data leads to inconsistent and irrelevant u.s. indigenous population data, and indigenous peoples’ mistrust of data. researchers, local, state, and federal governments, as well as for and non-profit entities, create data about u.s. indigenous nations and peoples (bruhn, 2014; deweaver, 2010; freemantle et al., 2015; red star innovations, 2015; rodriguez-lonebear, 2016; snipp, 2016; tribal epidemiology centers, 2013). gathered and administered for purposes defined by others, this information rarely meets tribes’ data needs in two important ways: a. data do not exist to inform tribal needs, and b. existing data cannot be aggregated in ways meaningful to tribes. the united states collects data for monitoring and surveillance purposes (rodriguez-lonebear, 2016; snipp, 2016). often these data inform social, health, and other community services—programs created and defined by the federal government. sometimes these data support less benign efforts to surveil and control populations. either way, the information collected, analysis methods, and data use reflect federal 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.1 government priorities. indigenous nations may have far different information needs that reflect indigenous perceptions of vibrant, sustainable communities and nations. for example, consumption rates of a traditional food may be significantly higher than mainstream rates. contaminant exposure calculations and guidelines are based on mainstream consumption rates. tribal citizens may be at increased risk from contaminant exposure due to higher intake of traditional foods. complicating decision-making further, an indigenous community may not have access to timely or detailed exposure rates. without adequate and timely information, communities cannot make informed decisions about maintaining cultural practices and roles related to the procurement, processing, and consumption of that food. non-tribal data sources rarely inform critical issues such as these. missing are the data—by and for indigenous nations—that empower indigenous nations to transform their communities. data also cannot be aggregated to levels useful for tribes, such as identifying the total population of tribal citizens or the number of tribal citizens and non-citizens in a particular geographic area. the inability to aggregate in such ways results from the plethora of tribal identifiers used by data sources. in her research, rodriquez-lonebear (2016) identified 10 data sources for tribes, from the u.s. census to indian health service to state and county agencies to tribal enrollment data. these 10 data sources had no less than seven ways of identifying tribes. four used u.s. census self-report questions. six others utilized sources that varied form certificate degree of indian blood from the bureau of indian affairs to blood quantum to lineal descent. in sum, the net effect of external control of indigenous data is a complicated data landscape in which tribes must make policy decisions. t r i b a l i n n o v a t i o n s lack of consistent and relevant data that meets the needs and visions of indigenous nations limits the ability of policymakers to make informed decisions, thereby hampering tribal self-determination and capable governance (cross et al., 2004; deweaver, 2013; freemantle et al., 2015; rodriguez-lonebear, 2016; snipp, 2016). the indigenous data landscape stands as a call to tribes to cultivate a strategic relationship with data. in the u.s., strategies employed by, or that can be used by tribes and others, include advocating that federal government and other entities collect and analyze data more frequently (cross et al., 2004; deweaver, 2013; freemantle et al., 2015); creating meaningful partnerships and data sharing agreements with other governments (including other tribes) and data collection entities (cross et al., 2004; deweaver, 2013; freemantle et al., 2015; tribal epidemiology centers, 2013); stewarding research through tribal institutional review boards and research regulations including data sharing agreements (cross et al., 2004; oetzel et al., 2015; snipp, 2016); engaging the community in defining information needs and data indicators (cross et al., 2004; knudson et al., 2012; oetzel et al., 2015; red star innovations, 2013); and identifying needs and planning for the effective collection, management, and use of data at the tribal level as an essential part of everyday governance (cross et al., 2004; deweaver, 2013). t h e i n d i g e n o u s d a t a s o v e r e i g n t y m o v e m e n t a data revolution is afoot in indigenous nations and communities worldwide. positioned within an indigenous rights framework and deriving from tribes’ inherent rights to govern their peoples, lands, and resources, indigenous nations are asserting their rights to the information about their nations, communities, and citizens (kukutai & taylor, 2016). in mainstream data discussions, data sovereignty 5 rainie et al.: data as a strategic resource for indigenous nations? published by scholarship@western, 2017 is the right of a nation to collect and manage its own data (rouse, 2013), while data governance refers to the ownership, collection, control, analysis, and use of data (the data governance institute, 2015). indigenous nations have begun asserting indigenous data sovereignty and instituting governance over their data. rodriguez-lonebear and rainie (2016) noted, “indigenous data sovereignty is the right of a nation to govern the collection, ownership, and application of its own data” (para. 2). critically, these data include information about nations and their communities, lands, resources, and citizens. inherent in indigenous nations’ rights to the information is the implied responsibility to govern data. first, a caveat: technical issues and logistics too often overwhelm the way data is discussed. privileging these nuts-and-bolts kinds of considerations without first deeply considering culture, values, and indigenous nation goals puts the cart before the horse. therefore, this article consciously emphasizes the primary strategic issues tribes might fruitfully consider as they move toward a future vision of indigenous data sovereignty and indigenous nation data governance. indigenous nation data governance represents the comprehensive process by which tribes address the collection, ownership, control, and application of their data (bruhn, 2014). as tribal nations assert their self-determination and governance goals, they have critical decisions to make regarding their long-term investments and prioritization of resources. the responsibility for insuring that the right data is used for all these purposes—obtaining funding, planning tribal facilities and services, and making appropriate decisions at the tribal council level—rests with the tribe itself. tribal use of tribal data, whether collected by the tribe or by others, lies at the heart of tribal data governance (smith, 2016). what does the tribe need to know about its people and its resources that can further tribal development? what does the tribe already know—qualitatively or quantitatively? what does it need to know or know better? indigenous data sovereignty and governance of data for and about u.s. indigenous nations and peoples ensures the purposeful collection and use of data to advance indigenous aspirations for collective and individual wellbeing (rodriguez-lonebear, 2016; rodriguez-lonebear & rainie, 2016; te mana raraunga, 2016). internationally, such as in australia, canada, and new zealand, efforts to respond to tribal data priorities by national statistics offices, regional or intertribal data initiatives, and tribal capacity and capability building abound (kukutai & taylor, 2016). in canada, discussions of data sovereignty and data governance for indigenous nations have resulted in developing indigenous owned and controlled national datasets (first nations information governance centre, 2012, 2016; martens et al., 2010; smylie et al., 2011), as well as community-based, nation-driven data governance (british columbia first nations' data governance initiative, 2015, n.d.; mustimuhw information solutions inc., 2016). māori in aotearoa (new zealand) launched a national effort to assert sovereignty over information about māori via the te mana raraunga— māori data sovereignty network (te mana raraunga, 2016). in addition, iwis (tribes) themselves have exerted control over the data about their peoples, environments, and businesses (hudson, farrar, & mclean, 2016). indigenous nations in the united states have voiced the need for similar tribal control of data (national congress of american indians, 2016; red star innovations, 2015). 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.1 a number of u.s. indigenous nations have built or are now building technical capacities and partnerships designed to meet tribes’ data needs and support their strategic visions (berry, 2009; champagne, 2012; cornell & kalt, 2007; cross et al., 2004; edwards, morris, & redthunder, 2009; galloway, 1995; harvard project on american indian economic development, 2006; krepps & caves, 1994; wakeling, jorgensen, michaelson, & begay, 2001). as we show with two case studies here, u.s. tribes have begun to interact with and embrace indigenous data sovereignty and data governance as a means to assert their rights to create data by and for their nations and peoples. t w o t r i b a l d a t a i n i t i a t i v e s as part of a larger research project on indigenous health and tribal data sovereignty, we examined in detail two relatively recent strategic tribal data initiatives: a demographic and socio-economic data project of ysleta del sur pueblo, and the tribal ventures voices research project of the cheyenne river sioux tribe. both tribes agreed to participate in the research and became partners in the entire process from conception to publication.1 the research involved a review of relevant literatures, interviews and followup communications with ysleta del sur and cheyenne river co-researchers, additional extensive conversations with those involved in these projects, and the analysis of a wide range of relevant documents, including reports and other materials produced by both of the tribal data projects. the three main themes that emerged during the case study process were: these successful data efforts are: a. strategically responding to data challenges; b. engaging with the community to educate leaders and citizens about data; and c. using data to inform policy decisions and resource allocation that strengthen indigenous nation sovereignty. c a s e 1 : y s l e t a d e l s u r p u e b l o ysleta del sur pueblo (hereafter, ysleta del sur), located near el paso, texas, is the southern-most pueblo along the rio grande (ysleta del sur pueblo, 2015a). forced to march 400 miles from new mexico by spanish captors during the pueblo revolt, the ysleta del sur people established the current pueblo in 1682 (ysleta del sur pueblo, 2015d). in 2014, ysleta del sur had about 3,000 citizens; over 1,700 lived on the almost 3,000 acre reservation and the surrounding tribal service area (ysleta del sur pueblo, 2015a). d a t a c h a l l e n g e . in 2007, ysleta del sur recognized shortcomings of the u.s. census bureau’s 2000 decennial census—data used by the tribe, the federal government, and others to set policy, design programs, and allocate resources. the census data failed to reflect the serious decline in the pueblo's economy triggered by the state of texas’ 2002 closure of the ysleta del sur's gaming operations. the 1 the university of arizona institutional review board approved the case study process. appropriate tribal 7 rainie et al.: data as a strategic resource for indigenous nations? published by scholarship@western, 2017 tribe and its economic development department desired, instead, more timely and accurate information to develop a community-driven, nation-based economic development strategy. t r i b a l d a t a i n i t i a t i v e . in 2008, ysleta del sur implemented its comprehensive economic development strategy (hereafter, development strategy). the ysleta del sur economic development department led the process of creating community and economic development goals and objectives to develop a roadmap that would support the nation in its quest to “create jobs, foster a stable and diversified economy, and improve living conditions” (gomez, riggs, & simental, 2008, pp. 1-2). to meet the development strategy goals, ysleta del sur needed demographic and socioeconomic data to establish a baseline, monitor progress toward objectives, and implement changes as needed. ysleta del sur embarked on an effort coined “tiguanomics” (derived from the pueblo’s word for the people, tigua), representing the “pueblo's efforts to transform into a data-driven nation through the enhancement of data collection and statistical analysis to promote informed decision making and improve tribal governance, programs and services” (ysleta del sur pueblo, 2015b, para. 1). m e t h o d o l o g y a n d a p p r o a c h . each year the enrollment office requires ysleta del sur citizens to update their contact information within 10 days of their birthday. in 2008, the economic development department appended a survey to the annual paperwork to collect baseline data for the development strategy. the survey collected data on income, marital status, gender, educational attainment, employment status, job function, employment industry, veteran status, household size, social assistance, as well as household computer and internet access (ysleta del sur pueblo, 2008). the resultant ysleta del sur pueblo 2008 socio economic profile provided up-to-date information that was either previously only available from the 2000 u.s. census or not available at all (ysleta del sur pueblo, 2008). as a result, ysleta del sur decided to collect demographic and socioeconomic data annually through the enrollment process. the ysleta del sur economic development department, enrollment office, and citizens designed and validated the research methodology in partnership with the institute for policy and economic development at the university of texas at el paso (ysleta del sur pueblo, 2008, 2010, 2012b, 2012c). the survey uses a census approach, requiring citizens to respond to the survey as part of the annual enrollment information update. the economic development department manages the survey. an interdisciplinary team informed the creation of survey questions that wove together cultural and local knowledge with western epistemologies. the department’s director, an ysleta del sur citizen, contributed community and cultural knowledge as well as management and business expertise. a master’s-level data specialist employed by the ysleta del sur and university of texas el paso consultants brought western scientific knowledge about sociology and economics to the process. the tribal enrollment office serves as the main data storage facility for all data at ysleta del sur (ysleta del sur pueblo, 2015e). annually, data are collected about population, poverty rates, household incomes, educational attainment, workforce and unemployment, and cultural participation (ysleta del sur pueblo, 2010, 2012b, 2012c). from 2008 to 2014, the survey had an average 90% response rate. the socioeconomic profiles also collected community-level data. the economic development department collaborated with other tribal departments to analyze structural elements internal to ysleta del sur that affected the pueblo’s economy such as the availability of affordable housing and jobs, 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.1 enterprise revenues injected into the economy, and the monetary impacts of economic “leakages.” in addition to these internal inquiries, the socioeconomic profile also assessed external factors affecting the pueblo’s economic performance, including data on the health of the neighboring regional economy, the opportunities and threats to the pueblo’s economy posed by external trends and forces, and the availability of partners and resources for ysleta del sur economic development. c o m m u n i t y e n g a g e m e n t a n d e d u c a t i o n . the success of the socioeconomic profile hinged on community engagement and empowerment. citizens and leaders played a large role in the development of data collection instruments and methods. a committee composed of community members, leaders, and department heads provided guidance to the economic development department staff. the department gathered citizen input through focus groups and planning sessions, and held community meetings to educate citizens and descendants on data terminology, to explain how ysleta del sur’s data differs from and expands on other available data, and to share how ysleta del sur’s government uses the data to make decisions. demonstrating the benefits of data and including the community in the process yielded support from leaders and citizens and trust in the socioeconomic profile plan. i n t e r n a l d a t a d i s s e m i n a t i o n . the ysleta del sur economic development department prepared tailored data products depending on the audience or use: a technical report for such purposes as grant writing and reporting to federal agencies, and a summary for the community distributed by mail and email.2 a d d i t i o n a l s u r v e y s . as a result of the experience collecting socioeconomic data, ysleta del sur initiated other data initiatives to support strategic decisions. for example, the pueblo desired a land-use plan that included non-indigenous land uses, such as economic development and land preservation, as well cultural land uses. ysleta del sur leaders decided that community engagement was key to developing a comprehensive land-use plan for the community. thus, the pueblo engaged community members through a survey about preservation and use of lands. citizens then participated in a community charrette, a meeting of all ysleta del sur community stakeholders, to resolve conflicts and map solutions to plan for the future together. as a result, the land-use plan discusses non-indigenous uses for lands and describes the relationships between people and the land, individuals’ roles in the community, and the importance of land for cultural continuity (ysleta del sur pueblo, 2012a). the pueblo has also gathered information about alternative and renewable energy, created smallbusiness profiles, and explored citizenship and blood quantum via surveys (ysleta del sur pueblo, 2009, 2012a, 2013). the pueblo does not approach each data project in isolation. rather, ysleta del sur collaborates with other entities to validate questionnaires, develop methods, and conduct analyses. these data collections efforts differed from those of the u.s. census bureau, research projects conceived outside of the community, and large national surveys. ysleta del sur determined needs, methods, analyses, reporting, storage, and use of these data. i n f o r m i n g p o l i c y d e c i s i o n s a n d r e s o u r c e a l l o c a t i o n i n t e r n a l d a t a u s e s . the development strategy vision of economic development fostered cultural preservation and improved quality of life. the report’s intent was to create a “community” that would 2 the reports are available on the ysleta del sur website: http://bit.ly/tiguanomics 9 rainie et al.: data as a strategic resource for indigenous nations? published by scholarship@western, 2017 support the pueblo’s ability to keep ysleta del sur citizens together to maintain the vitality of ysleta del sur as a nation (gomez et al., 2008). to enact this vision, the pueblo’s goals included: a. creating a business corporation with an independent board separate from ysleta del sur’s tribal council, b. building the community’s housing inventory, c. increasing the tax base through policy revision, d. supporting workforce development and entrepreneurs, and e. developing a tribal building program (gomez et al., 2008). the strategies to achieve these goals were based on data—socioeconomic, financial, and other— collected and analyzed by the pueblo. seven years after adopting the development strategy, ysleta del sur can demonstrate through data that the strategies were successful: new jobs were created through the development corporation; the housing inventory was augmented making affordable housing more available for citizens; and the pueblo’s youth, citizens, and leaders were educated on nation building strategies (ysleta del sur pueblo, 2015c). e x t e r n a l d a t a u s e s . using its socioeconomic data, ysleta del sur successfully applied for and received funding from the u.s. housing and urban development’s (hud) indian community development block grant program. to encourage business entrepreneurship, the pueblo desired a suitable facility to provide business incubator services such as office and conference spaces, as well as computer services. in 2010, ysleta del sur applied for an indian community development block grant to construct such a facility. initially, hud rejected the pueblo’s application based on u.s. census bureau and bia data that indicated that the project would not primarily benefit lowand moderate-income persons on the reservation. however, ysleta del sur filed a challenge to the hud ruling stating that the census bureau and bia data hud had used to make its determination was incorrect and lacked critical variables. for example, the census bureau data, derived from the 2000 census, failed to reflect the serious downturn in the pueblo's economy that had occurred after the 2002 closure of the ysleta del sur gaming operations (gover, 2002; national indian law library, n.d.). also, the data used by hud did not reflect movement of needy tribal members onto the reservation with the construction of new low-income housing as a result of a previous hud grant (joseph, 2008). ysleta del sur provided hud with the pueblo’s 2010 socioeconomic profile data, as well as information about the survey design and methodology (ysleta del sur pueblo, 2012b). the data showed that the majority of persons to be served by the proposed incubator facility, the tigua technology enterprise center, would be from on-reservation households that were of low-to-moderate income (ysleta del sur pueblo, 2012b). based on ysleta del sur’s data to support its appeal, hud approved the project (office of native american programs, office of public and indian housing, u.s. department of housing and urban development, 2011). 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.1 s u m m a r y . at ysleta del sur, critical demographic and socioeconomic data, once solely gathered and used mainly by outsiders, are now collected and analyzed under ysleta del sur control. ysleta del sur leveraged an existing process, the updating of enrollment contact information, to collect locally relevant data at the community level. these data enhanced self-determination and governance through up-to date, valid information on which the pueblo established culturally relevant economic priorities, strategic orientation, policies, and programs. c a s e 2 : c h e y e n n e r i v e r s i o u x t r i b e the cheyenne river sioux reservation (hereafter, cheyenne river) “is home to the cheyenne river sioux tribe’s four ospaye (bands) of the great sioux nation: the mnicoujou, the siha sapa, the oohe numpa, and the itazipco” (cheyenne river sioux tribal ventures, 2011a, para. 2). the tribe had nearly 20,000 enrolled tribal citizens in 2015 (cheyenne river sioux tribal ventures, 2015d). in 2014, about 10,600 people lived within the cheyenne river reservation boundaries, almost 8,600 of whom were american indian (cheyenne river sioux tribal ventures, 2015d). in contrast to the urban character of the ysleta del sur reservation, the cheyenne river reservation covers a rural and remote area of almost 3 million acres (cheyenne river sioux tribal ventures, 2015d). on average, fewer than two people reside in each square mile of the reservation (cheyenne river sioux tribal ventures, 2015d). d a t a c h a l l e n g e . the cheyenne river reservation suffers from poverty. the 2000 u.s. census recorded the median household income of about $22,100; in 2005, the bia reported 88% unemployment on the reservation (u.s. census bureau, n.d.; u.s. department of the interior, 2005). in response to these conditions, the tribe sought to establish a comprehensive plan to address reservation poverty. to create, enact, and assess the plan, the tribe needed data beyond that provided by the federal government. specifically, cheyenne river needed timelier data aggregated at the reservation level that included locally and culturally relevant variables (cheyenne river sioux tribal ventures, 2014). t r i b a l d a t a i n i t i a t i v e . the cheyenne river 2006 to 2016 poverty reduction plan, a path for our people, in partnership with the northwest area foundation, seeks to create sustainable partnerships and strategies to address poverty on the cheyenne river reservation (cheyenne river sioux tribal ventures, 2015a, n.d.). the northwest area foundation provided seed money to establish cheyenne river sioux tribal ventures (hereafter, tribal ventures), an entity poised to enact the poverty reduction plan through a futureand prosperity-oriented, community-informed, lakota values-based strategy (cheyenne river sioux tribal ventures, 2015a, n.d.). the cheyenne river tribal ventures initiated the voices research project to collect baseline demographic and socioeconomic data to meet the tribe’s needs (cheyenne river sioux tribal ventures, 2015b). m e t h o d o l o g y a n d a p p r o a c h . the voices project used expertise in demography and survey methodology from colorado state university to create a reliable and valid survey and data collection process (cheyenne river sioux tribal ventures, 2014). extensive community engagement through meetings and focus groups guided the selection of survey variables, the length of the survey, question wording, and data collection methods (cheyenne river sioux tribal ventures, n.d.). the research employed a random, stratified, disproportionate sample; researchers contacted every fourth house in each reservation community and surveyed up to five families per structure since more than one family might live in a home (cheyenne river sioux tribal ventures, 2014). 11 rainie et al.: data as a strategic resource for indigenous nations? published by scholarship@western, 2017 the questionnaire, administered in person, collected (via 150 closed-ended questions) information about basic demographics; community characteristics; land use; housing; education; work history and skills; family income and expenses; childcare; saving, borrowing, and credit; microenterprise businesses; shopping; transportation; technology and communication; natural resource consumption; and cultural resources (cheyenne river sioux tribal ventures, 2015b). the survey instrument also allowed researchers to record open-ended responses to the questions (cheyenne river sioux tribal ventures, 2014). voices employed 38 people, nearly three-quarters of whom were tribal members (cheyenne river sioux tribal ventures, 2015b). in 2012 and 2013, the project conducted face-to-face surveys with 819 families living in 547 structures; 150 respondents consented to voice recording of their interviews (cheyenne river sioux tribal ventures, 2014). researchers, in collaboration with sweet grass consulting, llc, employed quantitative and qualitative analysis methods using common coding and software to produce descriptive statistics and cross tabulations (cheyenne river sioux tribal ventures, 2014). the project’s principal investigator and advisory committee reviewed and approved each analysis (cheyenne river sioux tribal ventures, 2014). tribal ventures stores the voices data for future analysis and use (cheyenne river sioux tribal ventures, 2014). c o m m u n i t y e n g a g e m e n t a n d e d u c a t i o n . a critical part of the voices work has been engaging community in the poverty-reduction plan and research process, and sharing data with participants, tribal leaders, and citizens (cheyenne river sioux tribal ventures, 2014, n.d.). a series of community meetings shared project goals, solicited community input, and held discussions concerning how to create data about, by, and for the community (cheyenne river sioux tribal ventures, 2014, n.d.). researchers also described in lay terms the process of data collection, analysis, and use (cheyenne river sioux tribal ventures, 2014). a 14-member advisory committee guided the community-based project, including creation of the research protocol, survey questions, marketing, surveying, data analysis, as well as community and public presentations of project findings in collaboration with voices staff and colorado state university consultants. voices community engagement was successful in building community trust in the research that gathered the many voices of community members that otherwise may not have come together. a d d i t i o n a l s u r v e y s . voices’ success led to an increased interest in additional surveys of populations living on the reservation. voices revealed that 47% of cheyenne river residents were unemployed; 42% of those unemployed were seeking employment (cheyenne river sioux tribal ventures, 2014). with a reservation population over 10,000, this translates to approximately 2,000 adults seeking work, documenting the great need for jobs on the reservation (cheyenne river sioux tribal ventures, 2014). thus, in 2014, tribal and non-profit organizations collaborated to conduct a cheyenne river workforce development survey to gain a better understanding of the work force needs and assets in the community (four bands community fund, 2015). the researchers distributed survey invitations via email, postcards, and at businesses to supervisors, employees, and unemployed individuals. using paper and e-forms, 428 participants responded, “41% were unemployed, 47% were employed, and 12% were employers/supervisors” (four bands community fund, 2015, p. 3). the survey findings informed the development of a reservation-wide strategy to increase the skills of individuals seeking permanent employment, while ensuring that employers build their capacity to effectively hire and retain qualified 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.1 employees. for example, the survey found that the three training areas most desired by those currently unemployed are bookkeeping and accounting, resume writing, and commercial driver’s-license training. the pine ridge area chamber of commerce recently began offering resume-building strategies as part of its job readiness series (four bands community fund, 2015). i n t e r n a l d a t a d i s s e m i n a t i o n . data sharing occurred first with tribal citizens and the community. voices staff conveyed survey results to cheyenne river communities via: a. an executive summary, b. a “data matter” full-page serial in the local paper, and c . community meetings with over 500 community members. the 50-page voices executive summary shared visually appealing infographics and provided photos and narrative explaining the research process, results, and staff roles (cheyenne river sioux tribal ventures, 2014).3 voices also partnered with a local newspaper, the west river eagle, to print a full-page “data matter” section on a bi-weekly basis (west river eagle, 2015). “data matter” presented snippets of the voices research outcomes around various themes such as education, shopping, and leadership. within five months of releasing the voices executive summary the project began a wave of community and tribal organizational presentations that provided an overview of the research results. staff completed 45 presentations in 12 weeks. this step sought to establish the accountability and credibility of the voices research project and its results with the participants and communities first, prior to sharing any findings with other tribes or entities. voices staff used these sessions to highlight data of particular interest to people and educate them about the importance of data and statistics. tribal leaders and community members at the presentations indicated to voices staff that seeing themselves in the data and family photos in the reports and presentations instills confidence in the data and the process. i n f o r m i n g p o l i c y d e c i s i o n s a n d r e s o u r c e a l l o c a t i o n i n t e r n a l d a t a u s e s. voices collected data on employment in categories that the federal government does not assess, such as participation in the arts microenterprise sector. outside data sources had missed a vibrant and active economic sector: 78% of those surveyed by voices participated in traditional arts and crafts sales enterprises as individuals or in groups of five or fewer people (cheyenne river sioux tribal ventures, 2014). the extent of this work had not previously been documented. the data helped to justify a microloan program from the tribe’s community development fund to support the arts and crafts producers and to assist the artists in creating small businesses (cheyenne river sioux tribal ventures, 2011b, 2015e). voices also generated interest in tribal regulation and governance of research and data and in research as an activity by and for cheyenne river people. the tribe has a tribal research review board ordinance in the approval process, and voices staff members have begun conversations with leadership and 3 see http://crtribalventures.org/strategies-initiatives/voices/ 13 rainie et al.: data as a strategic resource for indigenous nations? published by scholarship@western, 2017 departments about improving data stewardship and management. the voices research processes and the move toward creating a tribal research review board are the first steps toward a comprehensive data governance plan. meanwhile, the tribal ventures staff and various organizations—including the oglala lakota college, reservation-based non-profits, the tribal health department, and others—collaborated to host a cheyenne river research symposium (cheyenne river sioux tribal ventures, 2015c). the all-day symposium focused on steps needed to increase the quality and life expectancy for the cheyenne river people through a better understanding of the importance and benefits of research now and for the future (cheyenne river sioux tribal ventures, 2015c). leading researchers from cheyenne river and beyond presented to over 150 participants. the event also included a student research competition for high school and college students to build enthusiasm and experience in collecting, using, and presenting data (cheyenne river sioux tribal ventures, 2015c). e x t e r n a l d a t a u s e s . other primarily reservation-based organizations utilized the voices data for planning, education, grant applications, and to demonstrate need for funding requests and allocations. for instance, the local community development financial institution, four bands community fund, used the data to write grants, relying on information from the voices findings, to secure resources to support local, traditional arts and crafts entrepreneurs in developing their businesses (cheyenne river sioux tribal ventures, 2014). s u m m a r y . the cheyenne river voices research project exemplifies a large-scale, in-depth survey to provide local, relevant population data to guide tribal decisions and to direct funding. voices data aid cheyenne river in knowing who lives in what dwellings, who works where with what skills, and who takes care of children, among many other pertinent issues. through voices, the tribe developed the capacity to collect its own data, to tell its own stories, and to formulate creative solutions for the problems facing cheyenne river communities. the tribe seeks to develop policies to collect, manage, and secure the data. s t r a t e g i c r e s p o n s e s t o c r i t i c a l d a t a c h a l l e n g e s the ysleta del sur and cheyenne river data projects demonstrate that a strategic approach to data sovereignty and data governance begins not with “what can we collect?” but with “what do we want to know?” in the face of inconsistent, irrelevant, and poor quality data, these two tribes mounted inquiries to determine their data needs. the tribes’ processes included data governance considerations such as: • what types of data will best inform that knowledge? • how will we collect, analyze, store, and use that information? • who will we partner with to improve the quality of the data? • how will we engage the community in the process? these questions are not unique to the two tribes or to communities in general. however, the answers may be very different from answers in non-indigenous communities. the ysleta del sur and cheyenne 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.1 river population data projects illustrate that tribes can address the five critical problems with indigenous population data by producing consistent, relevant, high quality data controlled by the tribe. as a result tribal citizens, the federal government, and others trust the tribes collection, analysis, and use of the data to inform policy and allocate resources. i n c o n s i s t e n t data are not regularly collected or may be inconsistent in frequency and variables. ysleta del sur events such as the 2002 casino closure rendered decennial u.s. censuses outdated. ysleta del sur’s annual socioeconomic profile provides timelier data that respond to changes in population and labor statistics. cheyenne river cheyenne river’s voices research collected data on employment in categories that the federal government does not assess (i.e., participation in the arts microenterprise sector). outside data sources missed a vibrant and active economic sector (i.e., some 78% of those surveyed by voices indicated that they participated in microenterprise arts activities). in short, the tribes’ strategic responses to inconsistent and irrelevant data produced higher quality and relevant population data controlled by the respective tribe. i r r e l e v a n t available data do not inform the questions tribes have nor is it available at the level of aggregation that tribes need. ysleta del sur ysleta del sur pueblo land-use survey included questions about land use for cultural practices and desired protection of those lands for such practices, data that is not gathered by outside agencies. cheyenne river cheyenne river did not have access to a broad range of socioeconomic and cultural data aggregated in ways that informed tribal policy. strategic questions guided the creation of voices research and subsequent surveys that provide data aggregated at the reservation level. p o o r q u a l i t y persistent data inaccuracies exist across sectors. in the face of poor quality socioeconomic data as a result of shifting economic conditions, ysleta del sur collected and used their own data to successfully challenge huds reliance on u.s. census data. cheyenne river produced workforce and employment data that illustrated a previously undocumented vibrant traditional arts and crafts sector. non-profits and others validated and trusted these data, providing much needed resources to develop the sector. m i s t r u s t indigenous individuals and communities mistrust of data, its collection, and use is the result of past negative experiences with data collection and research, as well as lack of community involvement in data processes. while neither tribe documented past mistrust of data and research, both ysleta del sur and cheyenne river engaged in community-based education and advisory processes to develop trust in the process and the data. the tribal researchers felt that these methods allowed tribes to gather diverse input from sometimes opposing factions and ask sensitive questions about culture, citizenship, and family life. as a result, the data reflect the broad array of topics relevant to life at ysleta del sur and cheyenne river. 15 rainie et al.: data as a strategic resource for indigenous nations? published by scholarship@western, 2017 e x t e r n a l c o n t r o l much of the data that tribes can access or use has been collected or organized by others. ysleta del sur and cheyenne river previously relied on socioeconomic data collected by the u.s. government, predominantly the decennial u.s. censuses and the american community survey. both tribes needed timelier data aggregated at the nation or reservation levels. ysleta del sur and cheyenne river developed nation-driven data initiatives based on each community’s vision of a healthy, sustainable society. at both tribes, community engagement was an integral part of reclaiming indigenous nation control over data. community engagement at ysleta del sur and cheyenne river extended began well before reporting findings to citizens. the tribes educated the community on data and created community-informed plans, processes, methodologies, and variables. in short, the tribes built community trust in data—from collection to use. ysleta del sur’s land-use survey employed citizen input to create variables, interpret data, and develop a comprehensive land-use plan. the engagement processes resulted in data initiatives that wove together community knowledge and western science, resulting in valid and reliable data. for cheyenne river, through a series of community meetings, voices educated the community about the importance of data, sought input on how the data would be collected (including the design and wording of the survey and questions), and described how the data would be used. further, voices trained tribal members in data collection, analysis, and presentation. l e v e r a g i n g t h e p o w e r o f d a t a f o r s e l f d e t e r m i n a t i o n ysleta del sur and cheyenne river strategically responded to inconsistent, irrelevant, and poor quality data through a community-engaged process. the two tribal data projects resulted in higher quality and relevant population data that their citizens trust and the respective nation controls. at the crux of indigenous nation data governance is data use. when tribes govern data, they begin with the question, “what do we want to know?” once that knowing is in hand, data governance also implies using the information to enhance self-determination. ysleta del sur and cheyenne river utilized their data in many ways. internally, the tribes used these data to inform decision-making about tribal policy, identifying the nation’s assets, allocate resources, track program and project progress, and to tell their own stories about their own peoples. externally, the tribes used their data to access resources, advocate for external policy changes, and to tell their story to others. table 1 provides examples of how strategic engagement with data by ysleta del sur and cheyenne river enhanced self-determination, thereby benefitting tribal sovereignty and governance. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.1 t a b l e 1 . examples of data for tribal self-determination: ysleta del sur pueblo and cheyenne river sioux tribe d a t a p u r p o s e t r i b a l e x a m p l e e n h a n c e d s e l f d e t e r m i n a t i o n i n f o r m i n t e r n a l p o l i c y d e c i s i o n s ( ysleta del sur) the federal government determined ysleta del sur citizen enrollment criteria; citizens needed at least 1/8 ysleta del sur blood quantum. the socioeconomic profile showed that the tribal population was diminishing because tribal descendants were not eligible to enroll as tribal citizens. the data from the socioeconomic profile led to a survey of tribal citizen opinions on membership criteria. these data provided support for the implementation of an enrollment policy modifying past blood quantum requirements to increase enrollment and help secure the future of tribal descendants. i d e n t i f y n a t i o n ’ s a s s e t s a n d a l l o c a t e r e s o u r c e s (cheyenne river) voices research identified a vibrant traditional arts and crafts sector previously unaccounted for in federal government employment data collection efforts. tribal and local non-profit community entities developed support services to provide small business development and financial trainings for arts and crafts entrepreneurs. t r a c k p r o g r a m a n d d e p a r t m e n t p e r f o r m a n c e (ysleta del sur) the tribe assessed citizen knowledge of financial literacy and nation building, used that information to design education programs, and then evaluated the programs using preand posteducation assessments. the data collection and analysis process allowed the tribe to design more effective programs to expand the capacity of individual tribal citizens to support selfsufficiency and self-determination. a c c e s s r e s o u r c e s (cheyenne river) the tribe’s voices and workforce surveys gathered data on citizens’ work training, education, skills, and employment history, providing a more accurate and detailed picture of workforce needs and assets than federal government data. community non-profits, such as the local community development fund and chamber of commerce, used the tribe’s data to create workforce development programs and to apply for and receive grants to help artists establish small businesses. a d v o c a t e f o r e x t e r n a l p o l i c y c h a n g e s (ysleta del sur) the socioeconomic profile and survey of tribal citizen opinions on citizenship criteria provide the most comprehensive available picture of who constitutes the tribe and what their current socioeconomic situations are. presented to the u.s. congress in support of amending the texas restoration act, allowing the tribe to determine citizenship criteria. t e l l t h e s t o r y o f t h e t r i b e t o t h e t r i b e a n d o t h e r s (cheyenne river) the tribe collected locally relevant data on basic demographics, cultural activities, and economic activities via methods that that were both community and scientifically valid. the tribe shared findings with tribal citizens, the local community, and nonprofit organizations through reports, newspaper articles, and presentations. 17 rainie et al.: data as a strategic resource for indigenous nations? published by scholarship@western, 2017 p o l i c y i m p l i c a t i o n s the ysleta del sur and cheyenne river data initiatives included in this article as well as the tribal innovations shared above indicate that as indigenous nations increasingly exert sovereignty over their data and begin to govern their information, the data become more relevant and consistent. these changes lead to better quality data for all data users, from tribal governments to non-profit entities to the federal government. to further support indigenous data sovereignty and invest in institutions for indigenous data governance, the following policy implications arise. c o n s i d e r a t i o n s f o r t r i b e s the exercise of indigenous data sovereignty and the development of indigenous nation data governance capabilities raise the following considerations for tribal governments: • indigenous nation development of institutions to govern the effective collection, management, and use of their data (e.g., tribal data governance policies and procedures, tribal research review boards, and data sharing agreements that protect tribal data), while allowing all those involved greater access to information for policy development and decision making; and • indigenous nation engagement of their communities and citizens in defining information needs, designing data collection tools, and interpreting the analyses. c o n s i d e r a t i o n s f o r o t h e r s indigenous nations, academics, non-profit entities, and others should collaboratively advocate for the federal government, others governments, and private entities to: • acknowledge indigenous data sovereignty; • include indigenous data sovereignty and governance concepts in tribal, federal, and other governments and organizations’ data policies and processes; • invest in tribal institutional capability building to govern data, not just training of individuals to collect and analyze data; and • leverage government-to-government relationships between indigenous nations and other governments to improve data relevance and consistency at federal, state, and other levels (e.g., develop indicators with indigenous nations so the data reflect tribal interests and concerns, collect and analyze data more frequently, develop statistical standards for identifying indigenous peoples to allow for comparison between data sets). 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.1 c o n s i d e r a t i o n s f o r t r i b e s a n d o t h e r s indigenous data sovereignty and effective indigenous nation data governance entails indigenous nation partnerships with other tribes, governments, and entities to leverage existing resources and to build on indigenous aspirations for healthy, sustainable communities. partnerships can be utilized to: • create tribally-driven, community-based data that can be compared across geographies or jurisdictions to inform policy and programming at state, regional, national, and international levels; • access expertise, such as survey methodologies and design, that are not locally available; and • share resources and strategies among indigenous nations locally, regionally, nationally, and internationally to support indigenous data sovereignty and inform indigenous nation data governance efforts. only tribal nations can exercise indigenous data sovereignty and practice data governance. however, tribal sovereignty with respect to data and indigenous nation governance of data includes both data generated by tribes as well as data about tribal nations, communities, and citizens generated by others. increasing data relevance, availability, and quality for all users of data on indigenous peoples, lands, and resources requires broad collaboration. tribes, international indigenous nations, federal and other governments, non-profits, and others must acknowledge indigenous data sovereignty and support and invest in indigenous nation institutions for data governance. c o n c l u s i o n the two tribal data initiatives summarized in these case accounts demonstrate that community-based, nation-driven strategic data initiatives can yield previously unavailable information for policy decisions and resource allocation. both initiatives are examples of indigenous nations asserting data sovereignty. but they also demonstrate that it is not enough for tribes simply to take over data collection, even if they have the resources to do so. indigenous data efforts, as these cases suggest, need to be strategically informed. data methods, design, and collection will need to match the values and vision of the indigenous nation, people, or community. indigenous nations launching such initiatives will need to consider: a. an inclusive visioning and planning process that can establish the nature and purpose of the data that the particular community needs and wants and how the data will be governed; and b. what the nation needs and wants to know about its people, land, culture, resources, and operations. the current data describing tribal communities and indigenous populations in the united states today do not meet the needs of tribal governments and communities engaged in creating policies and programs to bring alive the tribal visions of healthy, vibrant, culturally-rich, and sustainable societies. the tribal data initiatives offered in this article argue for the self-determination, sovereignty, and governance benefits of investing in a different and more strategic approach to data for indigenous 19 rainie et al.: data as a strategic resource for indigenous nations? published by scholarship@western, 2017 nations. such an approach allows for indigenous data sovereignty and control, enhances community trust in data, and may improve data availability, quality, and relevance. 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.1 r e f e r e n c e s anderson, r. n., copeland, g., & hayes, j. m. 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(2015e). tribal records office. retrieved from http://www.ysletadelsurpueblo.org/html_pages.sstg?id=14&sub1=117 29 rainie et al.: data as a strategic resource for indigenous nations? published by scholarship@western, 2017 the international indigenous policy journal april 2017 data as a strategic resource: self-determination, governance, and the data challenge for indigenous nations in the united states stephanie carroll rainie jennifer lee schultz eileen briggs patricia riggs nancy lynn palmanteer-holder recommended citation data as a strategic resource: self-determination, governance, and the data challenge for indigenous nations in the united states abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license data as a strategic resource: self-determination, governance, and the data challenge for indigenous nations in the united states aboriginal language and school outcomes: investigating the associations for young adults the international indigenous policy journal volume 8 | issue 1 article 6 january 2017 aboriginal language and school outcomes: investigating the associations for young adults anne guevremont statistics canada, anne.guevremont@gmail.com dafna kohen statistics canada; university of ottawa, dafnakohen@hotmail.com recommended citation guevremont, a. , kohen, d. (2017). aboriginal language and school outcomes: investigating the associations for young adults. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(1). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.6 aboriginal language and school outcomes: investigating the associations for young adults abstract being taught an aboriginal language at school has generally been associated with positive school outcomes for aboriginal children but not adults. this study attempted to understand this discordance by examining three possible explanations: (a) confounding variables, (b) a cohort effect, and (c) differences in the timing and duration of aboriginal language instruction. confounding variables (school attendance on reserve, parental education, and family residential school attendance) and duration of aboriginal language instruction (six of more grades) were important contributors; whereas the presence of a cohort effect and the timing of aboriginal language instruction were not found to be significant. future studies of aboriginal language instruction should consider family educational experiences, location of schooling, and the duration of aboriginal language instruction. keywords first nations, aboriginal language, high school completion, residential school, parental education acknowledgments the authors would like to acknowledge indigenous and northern affairs canada for their financial support and evelyne bougie and leanne findlay for their assistance in background research and comments on earlier versions of the article. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ a b o r i g i n a l l a n g u a g e a n d s c h o o l o u t c o m e s : i n v e s t i g a t i n g t h e a s s o c i a t i o n s f o r y o u n g a d u l t s language is an important part of aboriginal culture and identity. language “is not only a means of communication, but a link which connects people with their past and grounds their social, emotional and spiritual vitality” (norris, 1998, p. 8). indeed, 67% of parents of first nations children under the age of 6 think it is important that their child speaks and understands an aboriginal language. however, the percentage of first nations people able to converse in an aboriginal language has decreased from 29% in 2006 to 22% in 2011, although the percentage of speakers who learned the language as a second language increased slightly from 20% in 2001 to 22% in 2011 (langlois & turner, 2014; norris, 2007). one of the contexts in which children may acquire language is through their experiences at school. however, education delivery for first nations students in canada is complex. different systems of governance and funding are involved and therefore education can be delivered in different ways (see raham, 2009 for a review). first nations students who live off reserve attend provincial schools serving broader populations. first nations students who live on reserve may attend schools operated by their bands and located in their community (assembly of first nations, 2012); they may also attend provincial schools through educational service or tuition agreements negotiated by their bands or the regional inac offices (drummond & rosenbluth, 2013). the northern territories typically provide education services for their registered indian and/or inuit populations. within these systems, the provision of aboriginal language education within the school curriculum varies widely by location (on reserve versus off reserve; province or territory of residence) (fulford, daigle, stevenson, & wade, 2007; raham, 2009). even on reserve, there are varying degrees of autonomy and responsibility with regards to school curriculum. studies that have examined aboriginal language learning and school outcomes have yielded mixed results. using population-based data, exposure to an aboriginal language at school has been associated with positive school outcomes for first nations children in canada. based on data from the 2001 and 2006 aboriginal peoples survey (aps), guèvremont and kohen (2012, 2017) reported that learning an aboriginal language from school teachers was associated with more positive parental ratings of the child’s school achievement, the child looking forward to going to school, increased school satisfaction, as well as increased parental educational expectations for their child. in addition, a qualitative series of studies produced by the canadian society for the advancement of excellence in education (bell et al., 2004; fulford, daigle, et al., 2007; fulford, raham, stevenson, & wade, 2007) provided case studies of 30 different “successful” aboriginal schools based on high standardized test performance and relatively high graduation rates. these schools were nominated after consultations with knowledgeable informants from departments of education, school districts, first nations groups, and universities. in the majority of schools selected a respect for aboriginal culture and traditions as well as instruction of an aboriginal language were identified as important aspects for successful student outcomes. however, these studies were based on case studies and no comparison schools (without aboriginal culture or language) were examined. aboriginal language programs have also been associated with positive school outcomes for other aboriginal groups and in other countries. wright and taylor (1995) found that instruction in inuktitut to a group of inuit children in kindergarten to grade 3 was associated with positive self-esteem compared to children who were taught in their second language (english or french). a follow-up study 1 guevremont and kohen: aboriginal language and school outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2017 of these children over time showed that children’s proficiency in inuttitut in the last year of the inuttitut program was the best predictor of success in the subsequent year of education in english or french (louis & taylor, 2001). in new zealand, maori students enrolled in maori-medium schools (where maori language made up at least 12% of teaching and learning) scored higher on standardized tests compared to maori students in other schools (new zealand ministry of education, 2009). immersion students in the navajo nation in the southwestern united states performed similarly or better than nonimmersion third graders on standardized math and english assessments (romero-little & mccarty, 2006; rosier & holm, 1980). for example, for math, 68% of navajo immersion students met or exceeded state standards compared to 15% of navajo students in the mainstream english program (romero-little & mccarty, 2006). however, not all studies of aboriginal language programs have reported positive results. the cree school board (2008) reported negative outcomes on standardized tests and curricular learning for children enrolled in the cree language of instruction program. however, the school board also reported numerous challenges faced by the schools of the cree school board, including poor student attendance, high teacher absenteeism with unqualified substitution, inadequate classroom facilities, problems with teacher quality, and inadequate instructional materials. separating the effects of the language program on student outcomes from these other difficulties, in the absence of a comparison group that did not receive instruction in cree, was not possible. furthermore, despite the evidence of aboriginal language programs reporting positive results for children (guèvremont & kohen, 2012; rosier & holm, 1980), similar positive results have not been found for adults. speaking an aboriginal language has been associated with both a lower likelihood of high school graduation (hull, 2015; lamb, 2014; o'gorman & pandey, 2015) and a lower likelihood of obtaining post-secondary education (brade, duncan, & sokal, 2003; hull, 2015). similarly, guèvremont and kohen (2012) found that first nations adults who spoke an aboriginal language were less likely to have completed high school, whether they had learned the language in school or not. yet, this same study found positive results for children using the same population-based dataset, the aboriginal peoples survey (guèvremont & kohen, 2012). several reasons may explain why associations have been found to be generally positive for children and negative for adults. one possibility is that confounding variables that may be associated with both aboriginal language and educational outcomes have not been examined or controlled for, such as parental education or family residential school attendance (brade et al., 2003; hull, 2015). higher parental education has been associated with an increased likelihood of children’s high school completion in both the general (jimerson, egeland, & teo, 1999) and aboriginal populations (arim, tam, bougie, & kohen, 2016; bougie, kelly-scott, & arriagada, 2013). a particular issue for first nations related to educational experiences is the legacy of residential schooling (aboriginal healing foundation, 2002). the experiences of children at residential schools continue to influence the education and development of first nations children and adults (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015). indeed, first nations and registered indian children living off reserve whose parents did not attend a residential school were more likely to be rated as doing well in school compared to their counterparts with parents who attended residential schools (bougie, 2009; bougie & senécal, 2010). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.6 moreover, whether students attended school on reserve could affect their educational outcomes, in particular because first nations people living on reserve tend to live in more difficult socio-economic circumstances than first nations people living off reserve. in 2011, first nations people living on reserve were more likely than first nations people living off reserve to live in a home in need of major repair (43% vs. 15%), to live in crowded homes (28% vs. 7%), and to have no certificate, degree, or diploma (47% vs. 26%) (kelly-scott & smith, 2015). however, schools on reserve may be more likely to offer aboriginal language and cultural programming. in 2011, 88% of first nations schools on reserve offered bilingual programming or indigenous language classes (assembly of first nations, 2012). by comparison, in 2006, of the 8% of 6to 14-year-old first nations children living off reserve who spoke an aboriginal language, 41% reported that they were taught the language in school by a teacher (guèvremont & kohen, 2017). therefore, aboriginal language instruction may be confounded with socio-economic circumstances also known to influence school outcomes. thus, studies must consider which factors may be instrumental in associations between aboriginal language and school outcomes. factors such as parental education, family residential school attendance, and receipt of education on or off reserve, which are not typically included in studies of aboriginal language and school outcomes, have all been shown to be associated with adult educational outcomes. these factors were available on the 2012 aboriginal peoples survey and were considered in the current study. a second possible explanation, which may account for the different associations between language and school outcomes for children and adults, is a potential cohort effect. it is possible that associations between school outcomes and learning an aboriginal language differed for the cohorts of children and adults because each group was born at a different time and was therefore exposed to different demographic and educational societal trends. as an example, our previous study (guèvremont & kohen, 2012) showed a positive association between language and school outcomes for children aged 6 to 14 in 2001, but not for a cohort aged 20 to 34 in the same year. the current study allows us to examine the educational outcomes of the 6to 14-year-old child cohort 11 years later, as an adult cohort, now aged 17 to 25 years, since both the 2001 and the 2012 aboriginal peoples survey included similar content on both speaking an aboriginal language and being taught the language in school. as the aboriginal peoples survey is not a longitudinal study, it is not the same group of children followed over time, but the “cohort” is the same. that is, the participants were born in the same time period and exposed to the same events and demographic trends. so, if previous findings (guèvremont & kohen, 2012, 2017) of positive associations for children but not for adults were attributable to a cohort effect, the negative findings for adults should not be replicated in the present study with a different cohort. if, on the other hand, negative associations are found between language learning and adult outcomes, this study would provide additional evidence of a differential impact of aboriginal language learning on children’s outcomes as compared to adults’ outcomes. a third reason for the different associations between aboriginal language education and school outcomes for children and adults may be differing durations and timing of aboriginal language instruction, factors that have not been considered previously. it is possible that there are greater opportunities for language and cultural immersion programs for younger children (e.g., aboriginal head start) or that young children attend immersion programs for longer periods of time compared to older aboriginal language learners. studies of second language immersion programs for children show that the 3 guevremont and kohen: aboriginal language and school outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2017 length of time in immersion programs (duration) is associated with greater benefits including positive educational outcomes (bialystok & barac, 2012; bialystok, peets, & moreno, 2014). in terms of timing, some advocate that earlier is better, at least in terms of learning a first language (kuhl, 2004); however, older children may learn a second language faster than younger children (macswan & pray, 2005) although they may have more difficulty with pronunciation (collier, 1989). to our knowledge, no studies have examined the role of duration and timing of aboriginal language instruction on school outcomes. the 2012 aboriginal peoples survey asked respondents about aboriginal language learning in school, including in which grades they were taught the language and whether they were taught any other subjects in the language. these additional questions allow for a more detailed analysis of how aboriginal language learning is related to school outcomes. following our earlier work, this article seeks to further understand associations between speaking an aboriginal language, learning it in school, and educational outcomes for young adults aged 17 to 25. a focus on this young adult cohort will provide information on whether positive associations previously reported between aboriginal language learning and school outcomes among members of this cohort during childhood are maintained in adulthood. to shed light on previous findings, the study will also examine whether parental education, family residential school attendance, and receiving education on reserve are associated with educational outcomes and whether speaking an aboriginal language and learning it in school are associated with educational outcomes after controlling for these factors. lastly, this study will examine whether the duration and timing of aboriginal language instruction are associated with school outcomes. m e t h o d s d a t a s o u r c e a n d s a m p l e this study uses data from the 2012 aboriginal peoples survey (statistics canada, 2012), which included first nations living off reserve, inuit, and métis aged 6 and older. this study includes only young adults who identified as first nations (either alone or along with inuit and/or métis identity), and were aged between 17 and 25 years. proxy reporting was used in the 2012 aboriginal peoples survey for youth aged 15 to 17 whose parents did not give approval for the survey to be conducted directly and for adults in certain specific situations (for example, when the selected adult was not able to answer for health related reasons, due to a language barrier, or because the selected respondent was going to be away from home for the duration of the survey) (cloutier & langlet, 2014). the majority of respondents completed the survey themselves (66% of 17 year olds, 84% of the entire sample). d e f i n i t i o n s o f v a r i a b l e s a b o r i g i n a l l a n g u a g e i n s t r u c t i o n a t s c h o o l . all respondents were asked whether they were taught an aboriginal language in school and whether they were taught other subjects in an aboriginal language. respondents who said yes to either of these questions were considered as having been taught an aboriginal language in school. if a respondent said they had been taught an aboriginal language in school, they were asked in which grade they had been taught an aboriginal language. the number of grades of instruction was totalled in order to determine the duration of aboriginal language instruction; a dichotomous variable of 6 or more years was created in order to examine associations between duration of aboriginal language instruction 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.6 and educational outcomes. three dichotomous variables were created to indicate the timing of aboriginal language instruction: taught an aboriginal language in preschool or kindergarten (vs. not), taught an aboriginal language in grades 1 to 6 (vs. not), and taught an aboriginal language in grades 7 to 12 (vs. not). a b o r i g i n a l l a n g u a g e k n o w l e d g e . respondents were asked whether they speak an aboriginal language, even if only a few words. if yes, they were asked how well they speak an aboriginal language. respondents were considered to speak an aboriginal language if they spoke the language with effort, relatively well, or very well (compared to not at all or only a few words). this definition of speaking an aboriginal language has been used in previous research (guèvremont & kohen, 2012, 2017), and aligns with the definition of speaking a language used in the census of canada, which asks in which languages respondents are able to converse (statistics canada, 2013). o u t c o m e s i n o r c o m p l e t e d h i g h s c h o o l . young adults were asked if they were currently in high school or had completed high school. completing high school included both graduating from high school and successfully completing a high school equivalency program. m a i n l y “ a ” s . young adults were asked about either their grades on their last report card or their grades in their last year of school. responses of mainly “a”s were compared to responses of mainly “b”s, “c”s, “d”s, or “e”s and “f”s. f a m i l y s c h o o l i n v o l v e m e n t . young adults were asked about their parents’, guardians’, or any other family members’ school involvement either during this school year (if currently in school) or in their last year of high school (if completed or left high school). the three activities included: a. speak to, correspond with, or visit your teacher (including parent-teacher interviews); b. attend a school event in which you participated (for example, a play, sports competition, or science fair); and c. participate in other school activities? participation in two or three activities was considered family school involvement. c o v a r i a t e s m o t h e r ’ s e d u c a t i o n . participants were asked, “what is the highest level of education that your mother or female guardian has ever completed?” a dichotomous variable was created indicating whether or not the respondent’s mother had completed high school. f a t h e r ’ s e d u c a t i o n . participants were asked, “what is the highest level of education that your father or male guardian has ever completed?” a high percentage of respondents (21%) had missing responses to this item; therefore, three categories were included: a. father did not complete high school, 5 guevremont and kohen: aboriginal language and school outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2017 b. father completed high school, and c. father education information missing. a t t e n d e d s c h o o l o n r e s e r v e . participants were asked whether they had ever attended an elementary or high school located in a first nations community (on reserve), including preschool or kindergarten. responses were categorized as “ever” or “never.” f a m i l y r e s i d e n t i a l s c h o o l a t t e n d a n c e . participants were asked, “were any of the following members of your family ever a student at a residential school or a federal industrial school?” respondents who said that a parent or grandparent had attended residential school were considered as having family residential school attendance. a n a l y s i s descriptive analyses (percentages, means) were used to describe the characteristics of respondents in three separate groups: a. young adults who were not taught an aboriginal language in school, b. young adults who were taught an aboriginal language in school but did not speak an aboriginal language, and c. young adults who were taught an aboriginal language in school and did speak an aboriginal language. differences between the descriptive characteristics for these three groups were assessed with chi-square tests. a small percentage of respondents (2.09%, have estimates to be used with caution due to small sample size) reported that they spoke an aboriginal language, but had not been taught the language in school. they are not included in this study due to low sample size. multiple logistic regression was used to examine the association of being taught an aboriginal language in school, being able to currently speak the language, and school outcomes. for each outcome, two models were assessed. model 1 examined the association of speaking an aboriginal language, being taught the language in school, and school outcomes without adjusting for any other variables. model 2 examined the same associations while controlling for the following factors: age, gender, mother’s education (completed high school or did not complete high school), father’s education (completed high school, did not complete high school, or missing because respondent did not know father’s highest level of education), whether the respondent had ever attended school on reserve (ever or never), and whether the respondents’ parents or grandparents had attended residential school (yes or no). similarly, multiple logistic regression was used to examine the association of the timing and duration of aboriginal language instruction with school outcomes. model 1 examined the association of duration or timing without adjusting for any other variables, and model 2 controlled for family educational experiences and on-reserve school attendance as well as age and gender to see if timing and duration had an impact over and above these additional factors. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.6 analyses were weighted in order to be nationally representative of the off-reserve first nations population. the bootstrap method was used to account for the complex sampling design used by the aps survey (rao, wu, & yue, 1992; rust & rao, 1996). r e s u l t s d e s c r i p t i v e s for off-reserve first nations young adults aged 17 to 25, 36% reported that they had been taught an aboriginal language in school according to the 2012 aps, but only 12% reported that they could speak an aboriginal language. combining these two variables, 62% of young adults could not speak in an aboriginal language and were not taught the language in school (representing 50,212 people), 26% were taught the language in school but were not conversant (representing 18,660 people), 2% (estimate to be used with caution due to small sample size, representing 1,610 people) spoke the language but were not taught it in school (not included in study because of small sample size), and 10% reported that they could speak an aboriginal language and were taught the language in school (representing 6,674 people). for off-reserve first nations young adults, being taught an aboriginal language in school as well as being able to speak the language was associated with different educational experiences for their families (table 1). in terms of mother’s education, 19% of respondents who were not taught an aboriginal language at school had mothers who had not completed high school, compared to 22% of respondents who were taught an aboriginal language at school but could not speak it, and 42% of respondents who were taught an aboriginal language at school and could speak it. father’s education followed as similar pattern— 20% of respondents who were not taught an aboriginal language at school had fathers who had not completed high school, compared to 30% of respondents who were taught an aboriginal language at school but could not speak it, and 33% of respondents who were taught an aboriginal language at school and could speak it. similar trends were observed for attending school on reserve (6%, 47%, 64%), having a parent or grandparent who attended residential school (40%, 73%, 78%), and thinking that speaking or understanding an aboriginal language was important (47%, 75%, 95%), with respondents who were not taught an aboriginal language at school having the lowest percentage followed by respondents who were taught an aboriginal language at school but could not speak it and then the highest percentage for respondents who were taught an aboriginal language at school and could speak it. s c h o o l o u t c o m e s for off-reserve first nations young adults aged 17 to 25, being taught an aboriginal language in school (both for those who did and did not report speaking an aboriginal language) was negatively associated with being in or having completed high school compared to young adults who were not taught an aboriginal language in school (see table 2). however, after accounting for mother’s and father’s education, school attendance on reserve, and family residential school attendance, this association was no longer statistically significant. that is, for young adults who were taught an aboriginal language at school, whether they spoke the language or not, the likelihood of being in or having completed high school was not significantly different compared to young adults who were not taught an aboriginal language in school. 7 guevremont and kohen: aboriginal language and school outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2017 t a b l e 1 . c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s o f o f f r e s e r v e f i r s t n a t i o n s c h i l d r e n a n d y o u n g a d u l t s w h o w e r e a n d w e r e n o t t a u g h t a n a b o r i g i n a l l a n g u a g e i n s c h o o l taught aboriginal language in school and/or speaks language not taught, does not speak (n = 1,397, 62.14%) taught, does not speak (n = 423, 26.11%) taught and speaks (n = 116, 9.56%) chi-square mother’s education mother did not complete high school 18.74% 21.55% 42.36% 3.26* mother completed high school 81.26% 78.45% 57.64% father’s education father did not complete high school 19.65% 30.04% 32.38%e 4.66*** father completed high school 64.63% 45.02% 43.68% father education missing 15.72% 24.94% 23.94%e attended school on reserve never 93.96% 52.98% 35.67%e 46.76*** ever 6.04%e 47.02% 64.33% parent or grandparent attended residential school no 60.24% 26.79% 22.56%e 31.75*** yes 39.76% 73.21% 77.44% aboriginal mother tongue no f 96.81% 77.65% 22.93*** yes f 3.19%e 22.35%e 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.6 taught aboriginal language in school and/or speaks language not taught, does not speak (n = 1,397, 62.14%) taught, does not speak (n = 423, 26.11%) taught and speaks (n = 116, 9.56%) chi-square speaking or understanding aboriginal language somewhat or very important no 53.06% 25.08% 5.17% e 39.52*** yes 46.94% 74.92% 94.83% taught aboriginal language for six or more years no n/a 76.87% 53.43% 12.50*** yes n/a 23.13% 46.57% taught aboriginal language in preschool or kindergarten no n/a 73.38% 70.91% 0.19 yes n/a 26.62% 29.09% taught aboriginal language in grades 1 to 6 no n/a 38.78% 13.87% 18.33*** yes n/a 61.22% 86.13% taught aboriginal language in grades 7 to 12 no n/a 44.22% 30.70% 4.59* yes n/a 55.78% 69.30% note. a small percentage of respondents (2.09%e) reported that they spoke an aboriginal language, but had not been taught the language in school. they are not included in this table because of the small sample size. n/a = not applicable. f = too unreliable to be published. e use with caution. * p < 0.05. ** p < 0.01. *** p < 0.001. 9 guevremont and kohen: aboriginal language and school outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2017 t a b l e 2 . l o g i s t i c r e g r e s s i o n m o d e l s p r e d i c t i n g y o u n g a d u l t s ’ s c h o o l o u t c o m e s in or completed high school mostly “a”s in last year of school family school involvement model 1 model 2 model 1 model 2 model 1 model 2 taught aboriginal language in school and/or speaks language not taught, does not speak ref. ref. ref. ref. ref. ref. taught, does not speak 0.39 (0.28 0.55)*** 0.64 (0.40 1.03) 0.36 (0.23 0.55)*** 0.39 (0.23 0.65)*** 0.98 (0.65 1.47) 0.81 (0.50 1.30) taught, speaks 0.47 (0.28 0.78)** 1.21 (0.61 2.41) 0.61 (0.35 1.08) 0.68 (0.34 1.35) 1.77 (1.00 3.14)* 1.63 (0.79 3.37) age (in years) 0.94 (0.88 0.99)* 1.02 (0.96 1.09) 1.06 (0.99 1.14) male 0.78 (0.55 1.10) 0.53 (0.36 0.77)*** 1.14 (0.81 1.61) mother’s education mother did not complete high school 0.37 (0.24 0.59)*** 0.68 (0.39 1.18) 0.50 (0.29 0.85)* mother completed high school ref. ref. ref. father’s education father did not complete high school 0.57 (0.37 0.88)* 0.94 (0.61 1.46) 1.18 (0.70 1.97) father completed high school ref. ref. ref. father education missing 0.38 (0.24 0.61)*** 0.68 (0.37 1.25) 0.85 (0.52 1.38) attended school on reserve never ref. ref. ref. ever 0.50 (0.31 0.83)** 1.04 (0.63 1.70) 1.07 (0.63 1.82) family residential school attendance no ref. ref. ref. yes 0.63 (0.43 0.91)* 0.75 (0.51 1.12) 1.36 (0.93 2.01) note. logistic regression coefficients with confidence intervals in brackets. * p < 0.05. ** p < 0.01. *** p < 0.001. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.6 in terms of receiving mostly “a”s on their last report card, young adults who had been taught an aboriginal language in school but who did not speak an aboriginal language were less likely to report that they had received mostly “a”s on their last report card, compared to young adults who were not taught an aboriginal language. young adults who were taught an aboriginal language in school and spoke the language were no more or less likely to report receiving mostly “a”s on their last report card compared to young adults who had not been taught an aboriginal language in school. the third outcome this study examined was whether being taught an aboriginal language was associated with family school involvement. young adults who were taught an aboriginal language but did not speak it were not significantly different in family school involvement compared to those who were not taught an aboriginal language in school. however, young adults who were taught an aboriginal language at school and spoke the language were more likely to report family school involvement compared to young adults who were not taught an aboriginal language. after controlling for other factors, this relationship was still positive but no longer statistically significant suggesting that there were other important factors associated with family school involvement. all of the factors included as covariates in the models were associated with the school outcomes examined (table 2). young adults whose mothers had not completed high school were less likely to be in or have completed high school and less likely to have reported family school involvement compared to young adults whose mothers had completed high school. similarly, young adults whose fathers had not completed high school or who did not report the educational status of their father were less likely to have completed high school compared to young adults whose fathers’ had completed high school. ever having attended a school on reserve was associated with a lower likelihood of being in or having completed high school. lastly, family residential school attendance was also associated with a lower likelihood of being in or having completed high school. d u r a t i o n a n d t i m i n g o f a b o r i g i n a l l a n g u a g e i n s t r u c t i o n the association of duration and timing with school outcomes was also examined. about 10% of young adults reported being taught an aboriginal language in school for six or more grades. they were more likely to be able to speak an aboriginal language (42% vs. 7%; χ2 = 27.93, p < 0.001), to have a father who did not complete high school (33% vs. 22%; χ2 = 5.49, p < 0.01), to have ever attended school on reserve (63% vs. 17%; χ2 = 44.76, p < 0.001), and to have a parent or grandparent who attended residential school (73% vs. 50%; χ2 = 18.45, p < 0.001) than young adults who did not report being taught an aboriginal language in school for six or more grades. they also had higher current exposure to an aboriginal language and were more likely to be exposed daily to an aboriginal language at home (32% vs. 11%; χ2 = 18.66, p < 0.001) or outside the home (27% vs. 8%; χ2 = 16.04, p < 0.001). lastly, those respondents who had been taught an aboriginal language for six or more grades were more likely to think that speaking or understanding an aboriginal language was somewhat or very important (84% vs. 57%; χ2 = 35.49, p < 0.001). in terms of the grades in which individuals had been taught an aboriginal language at school (i.e., timing), 9% were taught the language in preschool or kindergarten, 23% in grades 1 to 6, and 20% in grades 7 to 12. these percentages do not add up to 34% (the overall percentage taught an aboriginal 11 guevremont and kohen: aboriginal language and school outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2017 language in school in any grade) because a student could have been taught an aboriginal language in more than one of the above time periods. duration but not timing was associated with off-reserve first nations young adults’ school outcomes after controlling for school attendance on reserve and family educational experiences. young adults who reported receiving 6 or more years of aboriginal language instruction were more likely to have completed high school compared to young adults who had received less than 6 years of aboriginal language instruction (table 3). in terms of timing, there were no significant associations between being taught an aboriginal language in preschool or kindergarten, or in grades 7 to 12 (vs. not) and each of the outcomes examined (table 4). however, being taught an aboriginal language in grades 1 to 6 was negatively associated with being in or completing high school and having received mostly “a”s in the last year of school. once controls were included in the model, being taught an aboriginal language in grades 1 to 6 was not associated with the school outcomes examined, suggesting that timing is not as important as factors such as attending school on reserve, parental education, and family residential school attendance. d i s c u s s i o n the purpose of this study was to examine the educational outcomes for young adults who were taught an aboriginal language at school and did or did not currently speak an aboriginal language. based on findings from previous studies, we attempted to understand why a cohort of young adults did not demonstrate the positive language associations of younger aged cohorts despite using data from the same source: the aboriginal peoples’ survey 2001 and 2006 (statistics canada, 2003, 2008). to do this analysis, we explored several explanations including confounding variables, a cohort effect, as well as the timing and duration of aboriginal language instruction. the first possible explanation was an exploration of confounding variables and the possibility that previous studies on adults did not control for important confounding variables, such as family educational experiences and school attendance on reserve. indeed, in this study, when we controlled for ever having attended school on a reserve, parental education, and family residential school attendance, speaking an aboriginal language was not significantly associated with school outcomes, suggesting that aboriginal language learning per se was not associated with negative school outcomes. this study highlights the importance of accounting for the appropriate variables that may service to confound the associations of aboriginal language learning and school outcomes. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.6 t a b l e 3 . l o g i s t i c r e g r e s s i o n m o d e l s e x a m i n i n g a s s o c i a t i o n o f d u r a t i o n o f a b o r i g i n a l l a n g u a g e i n s t r u c t i o n w i t h y o u n g a d u l t s ’ s c h o o l o u t c o m e s in or completed high school mostly “a”s in last year of school family school involvement model 1 model 2 model 1 model 2 model 1 model 2 taught aboriginal language in school for six or more grades no ref. ref. ref. ref. yes 0.83 (0.55 1.26) 2.30 (1.30 4.10)** 0.67 (0.40 1.12) 0.97 (0.55 1.74) 2.06 (1.21 3.51)** 2.02 (1.12 3.65)* age (in years) 0.92 (0.87 0.98)** 1.02 (0.96 1.08) 1.05 (0.98 1.13) male 0.74 (0.54 1.02) 0.53 (0.37 0.78)** 1.08 (0.77 1.52) mother’s education mother did not complete high school 0.43 (0.29 0.65)*** 0.77 (0.46 1.32) 0.59 (0.35 0.99)* mother completed high school ref. ref. ref. father’s education father did not complete high school 0.48 (0.32 0.72)*** 0.85 (0.55 1.30) 1.09 (0.66 1.81) father completed high school ref. ref. ref. father education missing 0.33 (0.22 0.52)*** 0.62 (0.34 1.14) 0.80 (0.49 1.32) attended school on reserve never ref. ref. ref. ever 0.38 (0.25 0.58)*** 0.70 (0.46 1.06) 0.96 (0.60 1.52) family residential school attendance no ref. ref. ref. yes 0.54 (0.39 0.75)*** 0.66 (0.44 0.97)* 1.21 (0.82 1.80) note. logistic regression coefficients with confidence intervals in brackets. * p < 0.05. ** p <0.01. *** p <0.001. 13 guevremont and kohen: aboriginal language and school outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2017 t a b l e 4 . l o g i s t i c r e g r e s s i o n m o d e l s e x a m i n i n g a s s o c i a t i o n o f t i m i n g o f a b o r i g i n a l l a n g u a g e i n s t r u c t i o n w i t h y o u n g a d u l t s ’ s c h o o l o u t c o m e s in or completed high school mostly “a”’s in last year of school family school involvement model 1 model 2 model 1 model 2 model 1 model 2 taught aboriginal language in preschool or kindergarten no ref. ref. yes 1.19 (0.70 2.04) 1.53 (0.82 2.84) 0.79 (0.42 1.46) 0.78 (0.38 1.62) 1.27 (0.78 2.07) 1.06 (0.61 1.86) taught aboriginal language in grades 1 to 6 no ref. ref. yes 0.53 (0.35 0.80)** 1.03 (0.61 1.74) 0.59 (0.39 0.91)* 0.71 (0.42 1.18) 1.20 (0.83 1.75) 1.12 (0.73 1.73) taught aboriginal language in grades 7 to 12 no ref. ref. yes 0.70 (0.47 1.05) 0.82 (0.52 1.31) 0.69 (0.42 1.11) 0.70 (0.41 1.20) 0.86 (0.58 1.27) 0.99 (0.65 1.52) age (in years) 0.93 (0.88 0.99)* 1.02 (0.96 1.08) 0.99 (0.97 1.01) male 0.74 (0.54 1.02) 0.52 (0.36 0.76)*** 1.17 (0.89 1.53) mother’s education mother did not complete high school ref. ref. mother completed high school 0.45 (0.30 0.68)*** 0.78 (0.46 1.33) 0.68 (0.48 0.95)* father’s education father did not complete high school 0.50 (0.33 0.76)** 0.88 (0.58 1.34) 1.03 (0.69 1.53) father completed high school ref. ref. ref. father education missing 0.34 (0.22 0.53)*** 0.64 (0.35 1.16) 0.99 (0.66 1.47) 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.6 in or completed high school mostly “a”’s in last year of school family school involvement model 1 model 2 model 1 model 2 model 1 model 2 attended school on reserve never ref. ref. ever 0.42 (0.25 0.71)*** 0.93 (0.58 1.50) 1.14 (0.76 1.69) family residential school attendance no ref. ref. yes 0.55 (0.39 0.78)*** 0.71 (0.48 1.04) 0.94 (0.70 1.26) note. logistic regression coefficients with confidence intervals in brackets. * p < 0.05. ** p < 0.01. *** p < 0.001. 15 guevremont and kohen: aboriginal language and school outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2017 specifically, ever attending school on reserve, parental education, and family residential school attendance were associated with school outcomes. ever having attended school on reserve, having a mother or father who had not completed high school, and having a parent or grandparent who had attended residential school were all associated with a lower likelihood of being in or having completed high school. parental education has previously been associated with high school completion in both the general (jimerson et al., 1999) and aboriginal populations (bougie et al., 2013). similarly, family residential school attendance has been associated with children’s school outcomes (bougie, 2009; bougie & senécal, 2010). in this study, children who had ever attended school on reserve attended school on reserve for an average of 4.6 years. first nations people living on reserve tend to live in more difficult socio-economic circumstances compared to first nations people living off reserve, which may be associated with negative school outcomes. the second possibility was the presence of a cohort effect, in which case the negative findings for adults in 2001 would not be replicated with a different cohort who were born at the same time as the children in the previous study. however, similar to the findings using 2001 data, before accounting for covariates, we found negative associations of being taught or speaking an aboriginal language and school outcomes. therefore, we cannot conclude that the differing findings for children and adults are due to a cohort effect. however, it is important to note that the children included in the study in 2001 were not followed longitudinally. although our sample was born in the same time period, they are not the same children, and data from following a sample of aboriginal children longitudinally into adulthood remains an area for future development. lastly, it is possible that differences in the school outcomes could be attributed, in part, to variation in the duration and/or timing of aboriginal language instruction received by children and adults. young adults who were taught an aboriginal language for 6 or more years were more likely to be in or have completed high school and to have reported their families involved in the school. they were also more likely to be exposed to an aboriginal language at home or outside of the home and to think that speaking or understanding an aboriginal language was important. however, the timing of language instruction in elementary vs. high school was not associated with educational outcomes once the covariates were controlled. young adults who had been taught the language at school but could not speak an aboriginal language were less likely to report receiving mainly “a”s on their last report card. language is a subject to be learned, as with any other school subject. students who did not learn the aboriginal language in school with sufficient fluency to converse in the language (more than 2 or 3 words) may have been more likely to receive lower grades in other subjects as well. in this study, they were also less likely to have been taught an aboriginal language for a long time (six or more grades) and also less likely to have an aboriginal mother tongue compared to those who were taught an aboriginal language in school and reported speaking it. there is also the possibility of differences in responding to the survey items. more nuanced questions that could be asked in future studies could further our understanding of the associations for this group. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.6 s t r e n g t h s a n d l i m i t a t i o n s this study has several strengths. the aboriginal peoples survey is a population-based survey that is nationally representative of the off-reserve first nations population in canada. in addition, the breadth of variables available allowed the study to examine both speaking and being taught an aboriginal language while controlling for important factors such as family educational experiences and school attendance on reserve. the consistency of survey content across years of data collection also enabled us to further understand a cohort from 2001. to our knowledge, this is also the first population-based study to examine the associations of the duration and timing of aboriginal language instruction with school outcomes. although the study has many strengths, some limitations must be noted. the study is limited to offreserve first nations young adults. future research could examine these associations for on-reserve first nations young adults and adults of different ages. as well, all information reported is based on selfreport (84%) or proxy reporting (16%). information from multiple sources such as teachers, school report cards, and transcripts would add more information on school outcomes. in addition, school factors such as quality of aboriginal language instruction or training of instructors would be an avenue for future research. lastly, the data source is cross sectional and no assumptions should be made about causality. while examining the cohort at two cross-sectional time-points was a strength of this study, following children longitudinally and acquiring data on children’s outcomes and educational experiences over time would contribute greatly to our understanding of how aboriginal language influences educational outcomes. c o n c l u s i o n in this study, we attempted to understand the discordance in the results of previous studies; that is, why young adults did not demonstrate positive associations between language and education outcomes as did younger aged cohorts. the three possibilities investigated were a. confounding variables, b. a cohort effect, and c. differing timing and durations of aboriginal language instruction. based on findings from the present study, confounding variables and duration of language instruction may contribute to the different findings for children and adults. negative associations of being taught an aboriginal language were not apparent after controlling for confounding variables, including family educational experiences and school attendance on reserve, which were not included in previous studies, indicating that consideration and selection of confounding variables is important. in terms of a cohort effect, before accounting for covariates, similar findings were found using 2012 aps data as had been found previously using 2001 aps data, with aboriginal language negatively associated with school outcomes. therefore, we cannot conclude that the differing findings for children and young adults were due to a cohort effect. lastly, duration was important, but not timing. being taught an aboriginal language for six or more grades was associated with more positive educational outcomes for young adults. future studies examining the association between speaking an aboriginal language, being taught 17 guevremont and kohen: aboriginal language and school outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2017 an aboriginal language in school, and school outcomes should consider family educational experiences, location of the school, and the duration of aboriginal language instruction. 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 1 [2017], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.1.6 r e f e r e n c e s aboriginal healing foundation. 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(1995). identity and the language of the classroom: investigating the impact of heritage versus second language instruction on personal and collective self-esteem. journal of educational psychology, 87(2), 241-252. doi: https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-0663.87.2.241 21 guevremont and kohen: aboriginal language and school outcomes published by scholarship@western, 2017 the international indigenous policy journal january 2017 aboriginal language and school outcomes: investigating the associations for young adults anne guevremont dafna kohen recommended citation aboriginal language and school outcomes: investigating the associations for young adults abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license aboriginal language and school outcomes: investigating the associations for young adults introduction to the special issue: reconciling research: perspectives on research involving indigenous peoples the international indigenous policy journal volume 8 issue 2 reconciling research: perspectives on research involving indigenous peoples—part 1 article 10 april 2017 introduction to the special issue: reconciling research: perspectives on research involving indigenous peoples susan wingert western university, swingert@uwo.ca jerry p. w hite western university, white@uwo.ca recommended citation wingert, s. , white, j. p. (2017). introduction to the special issue: reconciling research: perspectives on research involving indigenous peoples. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(2). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.10 introduction to the special issue: reconciling research: perspectives on research involving indigenous peoples abstract iipj is pleased to publish a two part special issue (volume 8, issue 2 & volume 8, issue 4 [forthcoming]), entitled reconciling research: perspectives on research involving indigenous peoples, that focuses on issues, debates, and best practices in research with indigenous peoples. keywords indigenous research, decolonization, reconcilliation, research ethics creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ i n t r o d u c t i o n t o t h e s p e c i a l i s s u e : r e c o n c i l i n g r e s e a r c h : p e r s p e c t i v e s o n r e s e a r c h i n v o l v i n g i n d i g e n o u s p e o p l e s iipj is pleased to publish a two part special issue (volume 8, issue 2 & volume 8, issue 4 [forthcoming]), entitled reconciling research: perspectives on research involving indigenous peoples, that focuses on issues, debates, and best practices in research with indigenous peoples. the movement to change research from a dark, colonial tool used to disempower and control to one that supports indigenous peoples, their cultures and communities, and indigenous-led movements aimed at social change and social justice has been underway for decades. there are, however, lively and ongoing debates about how to do research “in a good way” when working on indigenous issues and with indigenous peoples and communities. these two issues will be both controversial and ground breaking in their approach to this very important issue as authors take on complex and sometimes thorny issues related to translating the various guidelines governing research with indigenous peoples into real world practice and into methodologically sound findings that can inform policy, programming, and broader social change. they uncover the unexpected consequences and burdens associated with the rigid application of these guidelines. they confront core debates around the compatibility of western and indigenous worldviews and research methodologies, and the roles of insiders and outsiders in the process of conducting research. in the past, iipj has published special issues with themes such as “the governance of indigenous information” and editorials such as “policy research good or bad?” we have also put forward articles before that speak to the notion of incorporating indigenous and western knowledges into research programs, but we have not looked systematically at how this can be done and what can impede the process. it is here that the waters become murky and good intentions don’t always translate into intended outcomes. for example, authors have argued that two-eyed seeing1 is a key way of integrating western and indigenous knowledges (see for example denny & fanning, 2016; hall et al., 2015; marsh, cote-meek, young, najavits, & toulouse, 2016), but we have yet to deeply discuss how this can be done in the best way. some argue that combining a western-based gaze and an indigenous knowledge is insufficient because indigenous knowledge is often undervalued and, because the two emerge from different cultures, they are fundamentally incompatible. some say two-eyed seeing is passé; instead systematic indigenous approaches to research need to be developed in order to prioritize indigenous ways of knowing. there are others who say that two-eyed seeing when done correctly actually creates a new approach entirely. the articles in this first part of the special issue focus on three main themes: (a) what are indigenous methods and how do they shape knowledge about indigenous peoples; (b) challenges in implementing best practices in research with indigenous peoples; and (c) whether positivistic research methods, such as surveys, quantitative analyses, non-community-based approaches, and applying predetermined labels, can be used in ways that are ethical and beneficial to indigenous peoples. 1 two-eyed seeing is an approach put forward by mi’kmaq nation elders albert and murdena marshall. it refers to “learning to see from one eye with the strengths of indigenous knowledges and ways of knowing, and from the other eye with the strengths of western knowledges and ways of knowing . . . and learning to use both these eyes together, for the benefit of all” (“two-eyed seeing,” n.d., para. 3). 1 wingert and white: introduction published by scholarship@western, 2017 i n d i g e n o u s m e t h o d s an area of rapid expansion in the literature surrounds indigenous methodologies (general principles about how research can and should be done in order to generate knowledge) and methods (the actual tools and techniques used to collect and analyze data), which are rooted in the cultures, traditional knowledges, and life worlds of indigenous peoples. however, beyond this general origin—that is, emerging from indigenous cultures—there is little agreement about what constitutes an indigenous method. in this issue, drawson, toombs, and mushquash (2017) catalogue the wide range of indigenous methods that appear in the literature in order to explore the commonalities and differences among these approaches as a guide for researchers and communities. they conclude, “one distinction between western and indigenous research methods lies in this purpose: research done in collaboration with indigenous peoples cannot only reveal knowledge, but also decolonize, rebalance power, and provide healing” (p. 12). within the literature, they found that the use of indigenous methods necessitates the adoption of an indigenous methodology, but an indigenous methodology can be used with western methods, like narrative methods, that are not specific to indigenous peoples but are considered to be compatible with their culturally sanctioned ways of transmitting knowledge. indigenous methods have the potential to transform research from a deficits-based perspective to a resilience perspective and to prioritize indigenous ways of knowing. marlene brant castellano (2004) described it as “an instrument for creating and disseminating knowledge that once again authentically represents ourselves and our understanding of the world” (p. 98). i m p l e m e n t i n g b e s t p r a c t i c e s i n r e s e a r c h w i t h i n d i g e n o u s p e o p l e s internationally, the adoption of the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip) (un, 2007), affirmed, among other things, the right of indigenous peoples to selfdetermination, to be treated as a respected partner in matters affecting them, and to be able to control and protect their traditional knowledge. while undrip is not specific to research, these principles can be found in the various guidelines for ethical research that have been drafted in countries around the world. a number of indigenous organizations have developed guidelines governing research with their people in order to prevent the kind of egregious infringements on their rights that were common in the past when researchers were the “experts” and indigenous peoples were “subjects.” other academic, governmental, and non-governmental organizations involved in research have echoed these principles in their own guidelines for ethical research, as have individual scholars (see for example assembly of first nations, 2009; australian institute of aboriginal and torres straight islander studies, 2002; ball & janyst, 2008; castellano, 2004; chilisa, 2012; first nations information governance centre, 2014; inuit tapiriit kanatami, 2005; katoa ltd., n.d.; smith, 1999). yet, as the authors in this issue highlight, policy must always be informed by practice in order to produce the intended outcomes. riddell, salamanca, pepler, cardinal, and mcivor (2017) review four of the main ethical frameworks guiding research with indigenous peoples in canada: the tri-council policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans (tcps2); ownership, control, access, and possession (ocap®) principles; utility, self-voicing, access, and inter-relationality (usai) framework; and inuit ethical principles. they draw upon their experiences trying to apply these frameworks in their research project, walking the prevention circle: re-searching community capacity building. they note that researchers who want to engage in ethical research with indigenous peoples must follow both the 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 10 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/10 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.10 government’s guidelines (tcps2) and those created by indigenous organizations (ocap®, usai, and/or inuit ethical principles). they see the challenges arising from two main areas: (a) most guidelines are drafted as general principles that do not provide specific advice or examples about how to address issues that arise during research (e.g., what should researchers do if ethical guidelines from external bodies conflict with local indigenous customs and practices?); and (b) members of universitybased research ethics boards (rebs) are generally experts in standard ethics protocols, but not necessarily those governing research with indigenous peoples, which may lead to requirements that are inappropriate and/or at odds with indigenous ethical guidelines. based on their experiences, they see a need for: (a) cultural competence training for researchers, members of rebs, and reviewers of grant applications; (b) the inclusion of indigenous scholars or community boards or organizations who can provide knowledge and guidance about cultural and ethical issues; (c) support from universities and funding agencies, in terms of time and money, that enable researchers to build trusting relationships with indigenous communities and plan and carry out research collaboratively; and (d) flexibility in reb policies and requirements that allow for adaptations in order to incorporate best practices (such as collaborative planning of the research project, joint or community ownership of data, and consent forms that are written in plain language and give participants greater control over how their data can be used and stored). moore, castleden, tirone, and martin (2017) examine the tcps2, which has been developed and adopted by canada’s three largest research funding agencies— the canadian institutes of health research (cihr), the natural sciences and engineering research council of canada (nserc), and the social sciences and humanities research council of canada (sshrc)—in order to ensure researchers and institutions that receive funding comply with their standards for ethical conduct (cihr, nserc, & sshrc, 2014). tcps2 includes a chapter specific to research conducted with indigenous peoples and communities (chapter 9). their study looked at how various stakeholders (community health directors, researchers, financial administrators, and members of rebs) were using and operationalizing tcps2 as part of research with mi’kmaw communities. their findings suggest that tcps2 fosters positive “best practices” in research with indigenous peoples by, for example, encouraging reciprocal and mutually beneficial relationships between researchers and communities, which are the foundation of collaborative research. however, they also found serious disconnections between demands of ethical research in indigenous communities and the policies and practices of research funding agencies, university financial administration, and rebs. some actually hindered the ability of researchers to engage in research that is indigenous-led, advances the goals of the community, produces outcomes that benefit the community, and builds community capacity. for example, funding agencies and academic institutions need to adjust their ethics review and financial administration policies to provide the additional time, money, and allowable expenses that are required develop research partnerships with indigenous communities and support indigenous communities in developing research capacity—without which communities may be overburdened by the demands of a research partnership. they saw a need to provide training about research with indigenous peoples to all parties involved in order to increase the congruence between research best practices and institutional policy and practice. they also saw a need for a standing committee made up of indigenous and knowledgeable nonindigenous advisors to guide rebs in reviewing research with indigenous communities. gokiert, willows, georgis, stringer, and the alexander research committee (2017) share their experiences as members of a community research advisory committee for alexander first nation in 3 wingert and white: introduction published by scholarship@western, 2017 canada. for over a decade, the alexander research committee (arc), made up of academic researchers working in the community, representatives from departments within the community government, and members of the community, has provided guidance to community-based participatory research (cbpr) projects within the community. the cree principle of wâhkôhtowin or “working well together” has guided their work. the authors note that, in order to engage in decolonizing research, a space must be created from which it can arise. the research committee provided this space through which to build strong relationships based on trust and mutual respect in order to learn about the myriad of issues that arise when trying to do research in a good way in indigenous communities. the committee has drafted a guiding principles document that is the foundation for research in the community. it is updated annually in response to developments from within and outside of the community (e.g., the release of tcps2). they attribute the sustainability of the arc to “working relationally, the existence of community champions, committing time, a general willingness to co-learn, and the creation of a safe learning space” (p. 5). in terms of impact, they found that there were improvements in research capacity, the quality of research and its outcomes, and in terms of policy and practice. as a direct result of research and the mobilization of knowledge stemming from it, the community has seen tangible outcomes that support of the well-being of the community. it created the opportunity for university-based researchers to learn the teachings and culture from elders and other community members. they highlight the importance of having funding: “opportunities for employment for community members, the capacity to hire graduate ra’s [research assistants] to gather agenda items and take minutes at each meeting, the resources to travel to the community for face-to-face meetings each month, and the resources to offer a meal each time we gather, has been critical in facilitating opportunities for learning and dialogue” (p. 13). patrick, machial, quinney, and quinney (2017) share their experiences engaging in community-based planning with a first nations community in canada in order to protect the drinking water. the authors note that planning around natural resources is part of traditional first nations culture. however, traditional knowledge and practices were suppressed or disrupted as part of assimilationist, colonial activities. they decided early on to establish a community working committee in order to develop a plan based on the source water protection framework developed for aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc). the collaborative, consensus-based process allowed both western knowledge and indigenous knowledge to be incorporated into the planning process. for example, “the elder on the committee provided knowledge about past land use activities that may affect water quality, as well as the location of private wells, traditional food gathering places, and lake conditions” (p. 8). despite the fact that the members of the working committee represented different interests in the community (e.g., industry, the environment, infrastructure), the common interest in ensuring the community had access to clean, safe water superseded any competing interests. in this case, the process created a plan that reflected the collective perspectives of the committee members; however, the authors note that this type of planning is time consuming and taking the time to build trusting relationships is critical for the success of the committee. the authors argue that opportunities to meet face-to-face are essential. they recommend respecting traditional protocols under the guidance of a community elder. they, along with other authors in this issue, stress the importance of humility—as an outsider you are as much a student and a guest as you are an “expert.” for community members, collaborative planning work is often an add-on to full-time employment for which they are often not paid, which means that overburdening committee members is a concern. they also argue that planning will only produce the intended benefits if there is adequate support for implementation in both the shortand long-term. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 10 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/10 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.10 smithers graeme and mandawe (2017) believe that discussions around research with indigenous peoples must attend to processes of reconciliation, which encompass a range of activities aimed at redressing colonialism in order to create a new relationship between indigenous and settler peoples and nations. they advocate the use of reflexive methods as a tool in the process of decolonizing research. reflexive methods “are congruent with decolonizing and indigenous inquiry through both their recognition of the politics of representation and their highly experiential and relational nature (kovach, 2009)” (p. 3). these methods enable researchers to think about and work through the issues and challenges that arise while engaging in research with indigenous peoples and participating in reconciliatory processes. they used journaling in order to record their experiences and reflections as part of a community-based health research project with first nations men. their analysis highlighted the themes of conflict, relationships, and identity. the use of reflexive methods allowed them to explore how they engage in reconciliation both within and outside of research contexts as a non-indigenous woman (smithers graeme) and a first nations man (mandawe). they argue that reconciliation needs to be adopted as a priority in research with indigenous peoples and the research infrastructure, such as funding agencies, universities, and research institutions, must change to support these processes (e.g., creating funding for reconciliation activities within research grants). p o s i t i v i s t i c r e s e a r c h m e t h o d s pure positivism as a research paradigm has largely fallen out of favor in the social sciences, but many of the methods it championed remain. these include survey methods, quantitative analysis, the classification of things using pre-determined labels that are ostensibly free of bias, and researcher-led studies. it is obvious that these approaches fit less comfortably with indigenous ways of knowing so can they be used ethically in research with indigenous peoples? rainie, schultz, briggs, riggs, and palmanteer-holder (2017) note that quantitative data about indigenous populations is a critical resource used by the leaders of indigenous nations in the united states (and around the world) for strategic planning purposes, to develop and evaluate policies and programs, to negotiate with us governments at all levels, and to apply for external funding. however, much of the data that is held by external organizations, such as government departments and nonindigenous research centres, is “sparse, inconsistent, and irrelevant information complicated by limited access and utility” (p. 1). indigenous peoples’ justified mistrust of research further complicates the collection and use of survey data. the authors present two case studies involving the ysleta del sur pueblo and the cheyenne river sioux tribe, who embarked upon initiatives to collect vital data about their people, communities, and lands. this movement toward indigenous data sovereignty and governance is seen as a key part of the broader indigenous rights movement. the approach used by both communities involved a partnership between community leaders who brought expertise about their communities and university-based researchers with expertise in survey research methods. the ysleta del sur and cheyenne river population data projects illustrate that tribes may collect, analyze, and use distinct data to inform policy and allocate resources. for example, the ysleta del sur pueblo land-use survey included questions about land use for cultural practices and desired protection of those lands for such practices, data that is not gathered by outside agencies. cheyenne river’s voices research project collected data on employment in categories that the federal government does not assess (e.g., participation in the arts microenterprise sector). outside data sources missed a vibrant and active economic sector (i.e., some 78% of those surveyed by voices indicated that they participated in 5 wingert and white: introduction published by scholarship@western, 2017 microenterprise arts activities). in short, the tribes’ strategic responses to inconsistent and irrelevant data produced higher quality and relevant population data controlled by the respective tribe. as is echoed by others in this issue, they assert that resources are needed to ensure communities have the capacity to undertake this type of data collection, analysis, use, and storage in order to meet their community’s needs. in addition, they emphasize the importance of community engagement at all stages of the process. their work demonstrates that survey methods and quantitative analysis can be undertaken according to the best practices of collaborative research described in the qualitative work in the above section. dudley (2017) examines how the library of congress subject headings (lcsh) are assigned to books that cover the genocide of indigenous peoples in north america. he notes that the process used ends up being positivistic—the headings are meant to be applied in a neutral way that reflects an objective, external reality. however, the headings are also intended to capture the intent of the author—which in his sample of books directly address the mass killing of indigenous peoples. the findings of the analysis of 34 monographs concerning the genocide of indigenous peoples in north america reveal that less than half (41%) were assigned the label “genocide.” the remaining books were assigned headings that were vague and non-specific (e.g., treatment of, influence, crimes against, education). books were also assigned a wide variety of call numbers meaning that they were also physically separated from each other. the result is a biased, obscured, and whitewashed view of the genocide of indigenous peoples in canada and the united states. as dudley concludes, “enabling our ability to name and discuss genocide in north america can contribute to a more honest reckoning with our history and hence the basis for reconciliation and social justice” (p. 25). he concludes that in an attempt to be “neutral” and “objective” the library of congress actually ends up creating a very biased view of north american indigenous history. alcantara, lalonde, and wilson (2017) comment that the response to the inadequacies and abuses in research stemming from positivist approaches was to adopt community-based approaches that give greater control to indigenous peoples within the research process, which was an important and positive development. however, they argue that there is still a place for non-community-based approaches that emphasize researcher autonomy and academic freedom and that these approaches can be used in ways that adhere to prevailing ethical guidelines governing research with indigenous peoples, such as tcps2 and the indigenous principles of respect, relevance, reciprocity, responsibility, and relationality. they note that employing a variety of approaches helps build a more comprehensive and nuanced understanding of complex issues. the decision about whether it is appropriate and desirable to use noncommunity-based approaches will depend on the research question and in what capacity indigenous people or communities will be involved. researchers can engage with the indigenous world in ways other than formal research partnerships, which, as others in the issue also noted, may place undue burden on indigenous communities and organizations. they note that there are examples of research with indigenous communities in the past that were based on authentic and lasting relationships with the community based on mutual respect—even if there was no formal research partnership. they also argue that there are less formal ways of engaging with indigenous perspectives in order to inform research including feedback in response to research that is made publicly available; conversations; interviews; visits to communities or organizations; existing relationships with individuals, organizations, or communities; published work created from an indigenous perspective, including work by indigenous 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 10 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/10 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.10 peoples; research led by an indigenous scholar, etc. non-community-based approaches can be undertaken from a social justice perspective. an example of this type of research that comes to our mind is the work around applying the united nations human development index (hdi) to first nations and developing the community wellbeing index (cwb) (see indigenous and northern affairs canada [inac], 2016). canada consistently ranks among the top countries on the hdi, which is “a summary measure of average achievement in key dimensions of human development: a long and healthy life, being knowledgeable and have a decent standard of living” (united nations development programme [undp], n.d., para. 2). for decades in canada, first nations leaders have argued that, overall, conditions in their communities fall below the high standard enjoyed by the country as a whole (see for example assembly of first nations [afn], 2006). politicians have typically responded by citing the amount of money budgeted for first nations communities (without reference to the amount spent for a similar compliment of services to nonindigenous communities on a per capita basis) or by citing how much they had increased spending (again without reference to inflation or other factors that may offset these increases or whether communities remain underfunded even after accounting for these increases) (see for example akin, 2017). the strategic research and analysis directorate (srad) of the department of aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (diand)2 spearheaded an initiative to adapt the methodology of the hdi to generate comparable scores for first nations in canada. given that their goal was to be able to make comparisons between and among first nations communities, nonindigenous communities in canada, canada as a nation, and countries around the world, incorporating indigenous-specific measures would have precluded these comparisons. instead, they used the established measures and techniques developed by the un and data containing socioeconomic indicators for first nations communities that already existed. the results were striking—they unequivocally supported the position of first nations leaders that, on average, there were significant gaps in socioeconomic conditions in first nations communities compared to non-indigenous communities in canada and to the canadian average (cooke, beavon, & mchardy, 2004; o’sullivan & mchardy, 2008). conditions in some communities were comparable to those of countries in the developing world.3 the assembly of first nations (afn), the political organization representing first nations communities in canada, used the results of the hdi and cwb analyses in their reports aimed at lobbying the government of canada to meet its obligations to first nations (see for example afn, 2006). of course, the cwb is not without critics. quinless (2017) described, the registered indian human development index and the work of armstrong provided methodological guidance to the developers of the community well-being index (inac, 2015a; o’sullivan et al, 2007). for over a decade, the canadian well-being index (cwb) has dominated the policy arena as the national wellness index used by the government of canada to 2 renamed indigenous and northern affairs canada (inac) under the trudeau government. it has also been called aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc) and indian affairs and northern development canada (also inac). 3 at the same time, the cwb demonstrated that some first nations communities had socioeconomic conditions that were at or above the canadian average and demonstrated strong regional variation (aandc, 2014). 7 wingert and white: introduction published by scholarship@western, 2017 account for levels of well-being among indigenous and non-indigenous communities across the country. however, the tool is severely limited, in that the knowledge systems used to conceptualize well-being embedded in this framework are reflective of the social and cultural values of the dominant western discourse. (p. 3) so it is clear that this is an important discussion to have and an important investigation to continue as we come to a clearer understanding of how different approaches operate to either further people’s interests or impede them. in this example, non-community-based methods were used in ways that supported first nations in their work to have their constitutional rights upheld. despite the fact that work on the cwb did not involve the kind of long-term, community engagement typical in community-based approaches, the measure was developed with first nations goals and perspectives in mind. of course, “well-being” in both indigenous and non-indigenous conceptualizations is far more complex than this composite quantitative score captures. developing strategies to address gaps in socioeconomic conditions will require a more complete and in-depth understanding to which indigenous methods and community-based methods are better suited. used in this way, contrasting approaches (e.g., quantitative and qualitative, community-based and non-community-based) can compliment one another when used in ways that respect indigenous peoples and their rights. what is clear is that the old approach in which researchers planned and carried out research on indigenous peoples from the ivory towers of the academy and government without regard for their rights, histories, cultures, and knowledges is no longer acceptable, nor does it make for very good science. there has been substantial progress in establishing guidelines for ethical research with indigenous peoples; however, funding agencies and the academy have been slow to bring their own policies and procedures into alignment. there are also likely to be challenges to the scientific establishment as traditional indigenous methods carve out new channels for scientific inquiry. the special edition comes back to the difficult and important processes of decolonization of the research process, giving readers challenging questions to think through including whether the policy research community has really understood what the past approaches meant in terms of creating mistrust and theft of knowledge. have we learned the lesson that including culturally relevant processes in research processes can serve to move us past the data collection to actually building lasting relationships and support autonomy and selfdetermination? the articles in this issue and the one to follow show that while we have many issues to work out, there are many people working in the field, indigenous and non-indigenous, who are committed to using research as part of the process of reconciliation. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 10 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/10 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.10 r e f e r e n c e s aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc). (2014). the community wellbeing index: summary of trends in first nation communities, 1981-2011. retrieved from https://www.aadnc-aandc.gc.ca/eng/1345831790207/1345831913077 akin, d. (2017, january 27). on cross-country tour, trudeau hears growing anger and frustration from indigenous canadians. the national post. retrieved from http://nationalpost.com/news/canada/politics/on-cross-country-tour-trudeau-hearsgrowing-anger-and-frustration-from-indigenous-canadians/wcm/0e90df8a-6982-4703-8843e3b9552abd7d alcantara, c., lalonde, d., & wilson, g. n. (2017). indigenous research and academic freedom: a view from political scientists. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(2). doi: https:// doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.3 assembly of first nations (afn). (2006). submission to the committee on economic, social and cultural rights regarding the 5th periodic report of canada. retrieved from socialrightscura.ca/documents/cescr-submissions/afn.pdf assembly of first nations (afn). (2009). ethics in first nations research. retrieved from www.afn.ca/uploads/files/rp-research_ethics_final.pdf australian institute of aboriginal and torres straight islander studies. (2002). guidelines for ethical research in australian indigenous studies. retrieved from https://aiatsis.gov.au/sites/default/files/docs/research-and-guides/ethics/gerais.pdf ball, j., & janyst, p. (2008). enacting research ethics in partnerships with indigenous communities in canada: “do it in a good way.” journal of empirical research on human research ethics, 3(2), 33 – 51. canadian institutes of health research (cihr), national sciences and engineering research council of canada (nserc), & social sciences and humanities research council of canada (nserc). (2014). tri-council policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans. retrieved from http://www.pre.ethics.gc.ca/pdf/eng/tcps22014/tcps_2_final_web.pdf castellano, m. b. (2004). ethics of aboriginal research. journal of aboriginal health, 1(1), 98-114. retrieved from http://www.naho.ca/jah/english/jah01_01/journal_p98-114.pdf chilisa, b. (2012). indigenous research methodologies. los angeles: sage publications. cooke, m., beavon, d., & mchardy, m. (2004). measuring the well-being of aboriginal people: an application of the united nations human development index to registered indians in canada, 1981-2001. in j. p. white, p. maxim, & d. beavon (eds.), aboriginal policy research: 9 wingert and white: introduction published by scholarship@western, 2017 setting the agenda for change (vol. 1, pp. 47-70). toronto: thompson educational publishing inc. denny, s. k., & fanning, l. m. (2016). a mi’kmaw perspective on advancing salmon governance in nova scotia, canada: setting the stage for collaborative co-existence. the international indigenous policy journal, 7(3). d o i : https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.4 drawson, a. s., toombs, e., & mushquash, c. j. (2017). indigenous research methods: a systematic review. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(2). doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.5 dudley, m. q. (2017). a library matter of genocide: the library of congress and the historiography of the native american holocaust. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(2). retrieved doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.9 first nations information governance centre. (2014). ownership, control, access and possession (ocap™): the path to first nations information governance. retrieved from http://fnigc.ca/sites/default/files/docs/ocap_path_to_fn_information_governance_en_fin al.pdf gokiert, r. j., willows, n. d., georgis, r., stringer, h., & the alexander research committee. (2017). wâhkôhtowin: the governance of good community–academic research relationships to improve the health and well-being of children in alexander first nation. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(2). doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.8 hall, l., dell, c. a., fornssler, b., hopkins, c., mushquash, c., & rowan, m. (2015). research as cultural renewal: applying two-eyed seeing in a research project about cultural interventions in first nations addictions treatment. the international indigenous policy journal, 6(2). doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.4 indigenous and northern affairs canada (inac). (2016). community well-being index. retrieved from https://www.aadnc-aandc.gc.ca/eng/1100100016579/1100100016580 inuit tapiriit kanatami. (2005). checklist: inuit involvement in research projects. itk environment bulletin, 3, 25-26. katoa ltd. (n.d.). kaupapa māori research. retrieved from http://www.katoa.net.nz/kaupapa-maori marsh, t. n., cote-meek, s., young, n. l., najavits, l. m., & toulouse, p. (2016). indigenous healing and seeking safety: a blended implementation project for intergenerational trauma and substance use disorders. the international indigenous policy journal, 7(2). doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.3 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 10 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/10 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.10 moore, c., castleden, h. e., tirone, s., & martin, d. (2017). implementing the tri-council policy on ethical research involving indigenous peoples in canada: so, how’s that going in mi’kma’ki?.the international indigenous policy journal, 8(2). doi: http://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.4 o’sullivan, e., & mchardy, m. (2008). the community well-being index (cwb): well-being in first nations communities, past, present, and future. in j. p. white, d. beavon, & n. spence (eds.), aboriginal well-being: canada’s continuing challenge (pp. 111-148). toronto: thompson educational publishing. patrick, r. j., machial, l., quinney, k., & quinney, l. (2017). lessons learned through communityengaged planning. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(2). doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.7 quinless, j. m. (2017). decolonizing bodies: a first nations perspective on the determinants of urban indigenous health and wellness in canada (doctoral dissertation, university of victoria). retrieved from http://hdl.handle.net/1828/8000 rainie, s. c., schultz, j. l., briggs, e., riggs, p., & palmanteer-holder, n. l. (2017). data as a strategic resource: self-determination, governance, and the data challenge for indigenous nations in the united states. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(2). doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.1 riddell, j. k., salamanca, a., pepler, d. j., cardinal, s., & mcivor, o. (2017). laying the groundwork: a practical guide for ethical research with indigenous communities. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(2). doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.6 smith, l. t. (1999). decolonizing methodologies: research and indigenous peoples. new york: zed books. smithers graeme, c., & mandawe, e. (2017). indigenous geographies: research as reconciliation. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(2). doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.2 two-eyed seeing. (n.d.). retrieved from http://www.integrativescience.ca/principles/twoeyedseeing/ united nations. (2007). united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples. retrieved from http://www.un.org/esa/socdev/unpfii/documents/drips_en.pdf united nations development programme (undp). (n.d.). human development index (hdi). retrieved from http://hdr.undp.org/en/content/human-development-index-hdi 11 wingert and white: introduction published by scholarship@western, 2017 the international indigenous policy journal april 2017 introduction to the special issue: reconciling research: perspectives on research involving indigenous peoples susan wingert jerry p. white recommended citation introduction to the special issue: reconciling research: perspectives on research involving indigenous peoples abstract keywords creative commons license introduction to the special issue: reconciling research: perspectives on research involving indigenous peoples representations of indigenous peoples and use of pain medication in canadian news media the international indigenous policy journal volume 7 | issue 1 article 5 january 2016 representations of indigenous peoples and use of pain medication in canadian news media sarah e. nelson university of toronto department of geography, sarah.nelson@mail.utoronto.ca annette j. browne university of british columbia school of nursing, annette.browne@ubc.ca josée g. lavoie university of manitoba faculty of medicine, josee.lavoie@med.umanitoba.ca recommended citation nelson, s. e. , browne, a. j. , lavoie, j. g. (2016). representations of indigenous peoples and use of pain medication in canadian news media. the international indigenous policy journal, 7(1). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.1.5 representations of indigenous peoples and use of pain medication in canadian news media abstract using media coverage of the withdrawal of oxycontin in canada in 2011 and 2012 as an example, this article describes a systematic analysis of how news media depict first nations peoples in canada. stark differences can be seen in how first nations and non-first nations individuals and communities are represented. in first nations communities, problematic substance use is discussed without considering the context of pain management, broad generalizations are made, and language of hopelessness and victimization is employed. an analysis of the differences in language, tone, sources of information, and what is left unsaid, makes visible the ways in which misinformation about first nations peoples and communities is constructed and perpetuated in media discourses. keywords first nations peoples, media analysis, pain management, opiates, oxycontin, canada acknowledgments the authors are grateful for research funding to support this work provided by the canadian institutes of health research. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/     r e p r e s e n t a t i o n s o f i n d i g e n o u s p e o p l e s a n d u s e o f p a i n m e d i c a t i o n i n c a n a d i a n n e w s m e d i a in canada, the complex history of colonialism, as well as current policies and practices, have resulted in profound social and economic disruptions within many indigenous1 communities. the forms of social and structural inequities and structural violence that shape the experiences of many indigenous peoples and communities are deeply embedded in history, historical and contemporary policies, and pervasive social practices. the consequences of these structural influences are myriad. in 2014, the report of the special rapporteur on the rights of indigenous peoples found: the well-being gap between aboriginal and non-aboriginal people in canada has not narrowed over the last several years, treaty and aboriginal claims remain persistently unresolved, indigenous women and girls remain vulnerable to abuse, and overall there appear to be high levels of distrust among indigenous peoples toward government at both the federal and provincial levels. (anaya, 2014, p. 1) consequently, the health and well-being of indigenous peoples continues to lag behind that of the overall canadian population on virtually every measure. throughout the history of canada, negative images and portrayals of indigenous peoples have been used to justify and support the colonial project. browne (2009) wrote, “as social tensions continue to rise in the competition for diminishing economic resources, misinformation about aboriginal peoples is becoming even more visible” (p. 172). one of the means of propagating images of indigenous peoples is through the media; as such, media items related to indigenous peoples can provide an important starting point for analysis regarding the types of discourse that may be influencing the larger public in canada and elsewhere. in this article, our purpose is to consider the ways in which canadian news media represent first nations peoples and prescription drug use. this analysis was sparked by the media flurry in 2011 and 2012 about oxycontin2 use in first nations communities in canada. we employ critical discourse analysis to consider the ways in which first nations individuals’ and communities’ experiences with opioid pain medication are represented in the media. we do this by examining the language used in                                                                                                                 1 over 1.4 million (4.3%) of canada’s overall population of approximately 32.9 million identify as indigenous (statistics canada, 2013). we use the term indigenous peoples to refer to those who identify as the original inhabitants of the land (united nations, 2008), and within canada, indigenous peoples include first nations, métis, and inuit peoples. in canada, the term aboriginal is also commonly used to refer to indigenous peoples. the colonial term “indian” also continues to be used in federal government policy documents (e.g., the indian act). approximately 50% of indigenous people are registered with the federal department of indigenous and northern affairs canada (formerly aboriginal affairs and northern development canada) and are therefore considered “status” indians (first nations), 30% are métis, 15% are non-status first nations, and 4% are inuit. there are currently 617 first nations “bands” or tribal groups in canada representing over 50 cultural groups and living in about 1,000 communities and major cities. 2 oxycontin is an opioid (narcotic) pain medication used to treat moderate to severe pain. 1 nelson et al.: representations of indigenous peoples and use of pain medication published by scholarship@western, 2016     news reports, looking for silences or gaps in information, and comparing reports on different population groups, such as first nations and non-first nations peoples. for the purpose of this paper, we are dichotomizing the articles into two broad groups: those that directly address first nations peoples, communities, leaders or issues, and those that reflect all other groups of people in canada other than first nations peoples. henceforth, the latter group will be referred to as “non-first nations.” this division is useful for the sake of comparison. analyzing only articles related to first nations peoples and communities would be instructive, but comparing these articles to those that are focused on non-first nations peoples brings further differences in tone, language, and content to light and contributes to a richer and more comprehensive analysis. the entry points for our analysis are the reactions as documented in the canadian news media in 2011 and 2012 to the withdrawal of coverage for oxycontin under public drug plans, and oxycontin’s possible replacement with oxyneo in canada (as discussed below). we compare news articles and broadcasts that focus on first nations communities to those that address the general public (not identified explicitly as first nations). the content and messages of these news articles and broadcasts are analyzed with a view to explicating the similarities and differences in the portrayal of both the experiences of pain and the medications and treatments used for pain management for first nations and non-first nations peoples. l i t e r a t u r e r e v i e w t h e c a s e o f o x y c o n t i n in 2007, the purdue frederick company inc. (hereafter purdue), manufacturer of the opioid pain relief medication, oxycontin, pleaded guilty to charges of misbranding of oxycontin in the us state of virginia (brownlee & coy, 2007; canadian medical association journal, 2012). purdue had claimed that due to its long-acting, slow-release properties, oxycontin was far less likely to create substance use problems than other opioid pain medications. according to united states attorney john l. brownlee, however, “oxycontin was being widely abused and causing harm to [american] citizens” (brownlee & coy, 2007, p. 1). purdue was required to pay over $600 million us in compensation (brownlee & coy, 2007). class action lawsuits have also been launched in recent years in canada based on the same charges of misbranding (canadian medical association journal, 2012). in march 2012, in canada, purdue replaced oxycontin with a new medication called oxyneo, which contained the same formulation but was altered to be tamper-proof by making it more difficult to crush, snort, or inject (canadian medical association journal, 2012). oxyneo replaced oxycontin in canada, but most provinces decided against funding oxyneo so it is not currently available except under private health insurance plans or out-of-pocket payment. in response to the withdrawal of oxycontin, the media reported stories from doctors and community leaders, including the leaders of the nishnawbe aski nation (nan) in ontario, who spoke out about problematic use of oxycontin in their communities, highlighting concerns that abruptly discontinuing oxycontin would result in large numbers of people experiencing devastating withdrawal symptoms (canadian broadcasting corporation [cbc], february 17, 2012a). the nan is an organization representing 49 first nations communities in northern ontario, covering about two-thirds of the land mass of the province (nishnawbe aski nation, 2014). media stories quoted nan leaders stating they had not been given 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 1 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.1.5     enough notice that oxycontin was going to be discontinued, stressing that there were not enough substance use treatment facilities available in nan communities to help such potentially high numbers of people to manage the symptoms of withdrawal (cbc, february 27, 2012a, 2012b). the story of oxycontin as portrayed in the news media provides an important window into the ways in which issues and perspectives related to first nations and substance use are reflected in media discourses. m e d i a e f f e c t s theory on media effects has moved beyond making simple associations between exposure and influence to take into account active participation of the audience in shaping the meaning of messages received in the news and other media, as well as the social, institutional, and political contexts in which information is received (neuman & guggenheim, 2011). still, controlled experiments in laboratory settings as well as analyses of surveys, interviews, and news media content have shown that exposure to the types of information conveyed in news reporting can have a significant effect on the importance that the public places on certain issues (iyengar, peters, & kinder, 1982; mccombs & shaw, 1972; neuman & guggenheim, 2011). as iyengar and colleagues (1982) put it, “media provide compelling descriptions of a public world that people cannot directly experience;” therefore, “by ignoring some problems and attending to others, television news programs profoundly affect which problems viewers take seriously” (p. 855). results from studies of media effects have varied; however, research has continually demonstrated that mass media, and in particular news media, play an important role in shaping public perceptions (iyengar et al., 1982; neuman & guggenheim, 2011). t e r m i n o l o g y in conducting the search of media items for this study, it was necessary to use the term “addiction” in searching news articles because using terms such as “substance use” or “substance use problem” yielded far fewer results. “addiction” is a popularly used term, and one which generally carries negative connotations (national opioid use guideline group, 2010; varcoe, browne, & michaelson, 2014). recognizing the frequent misuse of the term “addiction,” the american psychiatric association (apa) makes a clear distinction between dependence and addiction, noting that “most people link dependence with ‘addiction’ when in fact dependence can be a normal body response to a substance” (american psychiatric association, 2013, p. 1). distinctions between these terms are not merely semantic. as o’brien (2010) argued: the major reason given for the under-treatment of pain with opioids has been the fear that the physician will create an addiction when, in reality, addiction in the course of pain treatment is relatively uncommon. thus patients have been made to suffer by receiving inadequate pain medication doses when there is evidence of tolerance or withdrawal symptoms. (p. 867) the need for clarity related to these terms—which are often used in diagnoses—has underpinned the apa’s revisions in the most recent edition of the diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders (dsm-v). in the dsm-v, only one condition is categorized as an addiction: “gambling disorder” is the sole entry under the category of “behavioral addictions” (american psychiatric association, 2013). further, the dsm-v revised the diagnostic categories “substance abuse” and “substance dependence” from the previous version of the dsm (dsm-iv), combining the previous diagnoses under the heading “substance use disorder” and placing people on a continuum from mild to severe depending on their 3 nelson et al.: representations of indigenous peoples and use of pain medication published by scholarship@western, 2016     experiences of symptoms (american psychiatric association, 2013). in this article, we use the terms “substance use” or “problematic substance use;” however, the continued use of the term “addiction” in the media items analyzed here signals a perpetuation of the stigma associated with the term as well as a failure to convey an understanding of the distinction between addiction and dependence. m e t h o d s m e d i a i t e m s i n c l u d e d i n t h e p r e s e n t s t u d y this analysis included news articles and radio broadcasts, accessible online, published in english within a 13-month period between july 1, 2011 and july 31, 2012. this time frame was chosen to include most coverage of the recall of oxycontin in march 2012, up to the time initial analysis was conducted (in august, 2012). this was considered sufficient to gather the majority of news reports relating to this event, and also to provide enough results for a comprehensive analysis of how the relationship between first nations and pain medication is portrayed in the news media. because of the recent recall of oxycontin in canada, we focused the analysis on media coverage within canada. in order to get an overview of canadian coverage, we focused on news sources that were national in scope. three major national canadian news sources were chosen: the globe and mail, the canadian broadcasting corporation (cbc), and the national post. the globe and mail website and the cbc website both permit archival searching of news reports and broadcasts, but the national post website does not; therefore, national post media items were accessed via the online database proquest. media items from the other two sources were retrieved from their respective websites through a series of searches. media items that did not engage specifically with first nations communities, but addressed issues related to the problematic use and/or the discontinuation of oxycontin, were included in the analysis as points of comparison. several searches, combining different search terms (first nations, native, indigenous, aboriginal, pain medication, pain management, chronic pain, prescription medication, addiction, opiate, and/or oxycontin), of each web site or database were performed and all results that fell within the chosen date range were collected. each result was then read or listened to, to determine relevance. systematic keyword searches for news articles and broadcasts relevant to this study produced no media reports focused specifically on inuit or métis peoples. this is the reason for the focus on first nations peoples in the present article, and also points to a significant gap in the information produced in canadian media. from the globe and mail, 148 media items were found in the initial search. of these, there were four first nations-related media items; 12 media items not specific to first nations communities were retained. from the cbc, there were initially 38 media items; of these, 14 were first nations-related media items, and 15 non-first nations-related media items were retained. from the national post the searches returned 31 media items, with only one explicitly related to first nations and four non-first nations-related media items that were retained. in total, 50 media items were retained for analysis; 19 related to first nations communities and 31 related to non-first nations populations. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 1 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.1.5     the search strategy uncovered articles which generally fell into one of four main categories: a. the kidnapping and murder of 8-year-old woodstock, ontario resident victoria stafford, with a focus on the use of oxycontin by both her murderer and her family;3 b. an increase in problematic prescription drug use in the national hockey league (nhl);4 c. the inquiry into the role of police in the investigation of convicted serial killer robert pickton;5 and d. the replacement in march 2012 of oxycontin with a new formulation called oxyneo. all retained articles (n = 50) fell into this last category. these articles had to do with the replacement in canada of oxycontin with oxyneo in march of 2012, and the problems that surfaced with problematic use of oxycontin prior to its being replaced. table 1 presents a summary of the search results (see appendix a for table listing articles retained). all 19 articles focused on first nations communities were included in the analysis. as mentioned above, articles related to opioid pain medication and substance use, but not specifically related to first nations communities, were included for the sake of comparison. in total, 31 of these articles were retained. these articles were particularly instructive in illustrating the differences between the type of language that is used when portraying first nations peoples and the general public, who, as implicated in the news articles, are assumed to be non-first nations. a n a l y s i s o f n e w s a r t i c l e s a n d b r o a d c a s t s critical discourse analysis was the methodology used in analyzing the media items (see for example fairclough, 1995; gee, 1999). critical discourse analysis “is concerned with ‘understanding the nature of power and dominance’ and how ‘discourse contributes to their production’” (van dijk cited in macmillan, 2005, p. 4). that is, critical discourse analysis takes as its object not merely the text itself, but the ways in which a text reflects, reproduces, or challenges institutions and ideologies of power. in order to achieve this type of analysis, it is important in critical discourse analysis to maintain focus on the text as a whole, rather than focusing on small segments of text, as in coding. as macmillan points out, “critical linguistics and critical discourse analysis differ from traditional linguistics in that textual context is crucial—with the text ‘not the sentence (or the word, or the sound)’ important as ‘the basic unit’ of analysis (kress cited in macmillan, 2005, p. 5).                                                                                                                 3 victoria stafford, an eight-year-old european-canadian girl, was kidnapped and murdered in 2009 in her hometown of woodstock, ontario. during the course of the trial it came to light that both her murderer and her family members struggled with problematic use of oxycontin. 4 several articles described the heavy demands placed on nhl players in terms of teams’ training schedules and high amounts of travel time, and related these demands to a perceived rising trend in addiction to prescription medication among players. 5 robert pickton was convicted of the murder of six women in 2009; later an inquiry was conducted to scrutinize the role of the police in investigating the disappearances of these and other women. 5 nelson et al.: representations of indigenous peoples and use of pain medication published by scholarship@western, 2016     t a b l e 1 . s e a r c h r e s u l t s f r o m s e l e c t e d m e d i a s o u r c e s . s o u r c e n u m b e r o f i n i t i a l s e a r c h r e s u l t s n u m b e r o f r e t a i n e d r e s u l t s w i t h f i r s t n a t i o n s f o c u s n u m b e r o f r e t a i n e d r e s u l t s w i t h o u t f i r s t n a t i o n s f o c u s the globe and mail 148 4 12 the canadian broadcasting corporation (cbc) 38 14 15 the national post 31 1 4 total 217 19 31   therefore, in order to analyze and compare media items related to first nations versus non-first nations, several criteria were used. the language of the media item, including its headline, was assessed. critical assessment of the language was used to determine the media item’s orientation to the subject matter, including implicit assumptions and biases, as well as the media item’s intended audience, and the way it represented different individuals or groups. sources of information used in writing the media items were evaluated, when available, and silences or gaps in information were identified. table 2 offers a summary of these criteria and examples of how they were applied. r e s u l t s upon analysis, three major themes were apparent in the news articles and media broadcasts. these themes were: a. a lack of analysis regarding experiences of pain and pain management in relation to first nations individuals or communities; b. a tendency to generalize first nations individuals as representative of entire communities or populations; and c. a discourse of victimhood and hopelessness, especially striking in media items related to first nations communities.     6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 1 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.1.5     t a b l e 2 . c r i t e r i a f o r c o m p a r i s o n o f m e d i a i t e m s . c r i t e r i o n m e t h o d o f a n a l y s i s language what underlying assumptions are revealed in the choice of language? who is the intended audience? how are the subjects of the media item portrayed or represented? source of information what types of sources are referred to? why might these sources have been chosen? how credible are the sources? silences what is the media item not saying? does the media item present multiple viewpoints on a story?   the first theme had to do with the lack of analysis regarding experiences of pain and pain management in relation to first nations individuals or communities. media items that pertained directly to first nations peoples focused almost exclusively on first nations peoples’ experiences of problematic use of prescription opioids; in general, there was a lack of attention given to individuals’ pain experiences as underlying the need for prescription medication. the second theme refers to the way in which media items representing first nations individuals tended to make claims that generalized broadly to the whole community, in contrast with non-first nations media items, which focused on individual people regardless of their community context. this generalization tended to construct first nations individuals as somehow representing the collective behaviours of an entire community, whereas such generalized representations were not applied to analyses of substance use among people living in non-first nations contexts. the third theme addressed the discourse of victimhood and hopelessness, which was especially striking in media items which discussed substance use problems in first nations communities. first nations communities and individuals tended to be portrayed as caught in a vicious cycle of substance use problems with no way out. o p i a t e s a n d t h e m a n a g e m e n t o f p a i n the news articles and broadcasts analyzed in this article emphasized problems with opioid use in first nations communities, rather than the use of opioids such as oxycontin for the treatment of pain. research shows that self-reported chronic pain levels among first nations populations are high and, in many cases, there is not always a clear organic cause to the pain (browne, varcoe & fridkin, 2011; reading, 2009; wallace et al., 2015). the scientific literature acknowledges that chronic pain is closely tied to issues of trauma, including historical trauma and other psychosocial issues. however, chronic pain is typically quite poorly managed because the only real “tools” available in canada are opiates. however, rather than examining the use of opioids for pain management for first nations peoples, the 7 nelson et al.: representations of indigenous peoples and use of pain medication published by scholarship@western, 2016     media items analyzed here emphasize problematic opioid use. the following is an example of how the use of oxycontin in a first nations community tended to be portrayed: prescription drugs are so pervasive in cat lake first nation, even an 11-year-old interviewed by cbc news casually referred to them as “oxys.” “i see people doing drugs, needles and oxys, any time of day,” the youngster said. “they usually do it at their house. i think it's weird, kind of.” cat lake deputy chief dora leadbeater said it's been painful to see her community slide into the grip of addiction. (cbc, april 16, 2012, paras. 6-8) the use of testimonials from a child and a community leader gives this news report a particular air of authenticity. it is difficult to refute the words of a child who seems in need of protection from what he or she witnesses every day, or those of a community leader who one presumes to be an expert on her own community. however, these types of testimonial can be interpreted as the whole truth, preventing those who might be interested in such problems from looking for more in-depth, contextual information or other data that might demonstrate the extent of the problem, or from investigating the ways in which wider social issues might be contributing to these types of community-wide difficulties. also, using terminology such as “slid[ing] into the grip of addiction” gives readers the impression of an inevitable progression towards substance use problems that the community, including its leader, feels helpless to prevent. it focuses attention on the substances themselves rather than on broader societal conditions influencing problematic substance use or notions of addiction, including social, economic, and historical factors rooted in colonialism and problems stemming from colonialism. the inevitability of such statements perpetuates mistaken messages about first nations communities being inherently susceptible to problematic substance use, rather than appealing to wider social and historical contexts shaping these issues, or calling for actions to ameliorate such problems. of all the media items analyzed that addressed the use of opioid pain medication with respect to first nations populations, only one (paperny, march 5, 2012) actually addressed the issue of pain. all other media items (n = 18) portrayed the use of opioid pain medication among first nations peoples as a substance use problem, rather than as a way of managing chronic pain. claims about opioid use and misuse as abstracted from the prevalence of chronic pain are particularly problematic in the case of population groups, such as indigenous peoples, because of the high rates of chronic pain from various forms of injuries, trauma, and interpersonal and structural violence rooted in many peoples’ ongoing experience of colonialism (barkwell, 2005; elliott, johnson, elliott, & day, 1999; green et al., 2003; haskell & randall, 2009; jimenez, garroutte, kundu, morales, & buchwald, 2011). the silence regarding experiences of pain is especially troubling when contrasted with media items relating to nonfirst nations populations, which focused more often on the use of opioids for pain management than on substance use problems (picard, march 5, 2012; the national post, november 14, 2011; weeks, february 26, 2012). as an example of coverage focusing on non-first nations populations, in an article titled “chronic pain patients collateral damage of drug-abuse policy,” picard (march 5, 2012) wrote: an estimated six million to seven million canadians suffer from serious chronic pain. in the past decade, they have been treated increasingly with opioids, oxycontin in particular . . . [when oxycontin is delisted] patients will be switched to other drugs, like dilaudid, which are just as addictive and far more powerful. these “conversions” are difficult for physicians and patients 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 1 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.1.5     alike; the ontario pharmacists’ association has warned its members that “unintentional dose escalation” is a serious concern. for many patients, the risk of overdose is very real—and one death has already been linked to conversion. (paras. 16, 19) in the articles analysed in this study, first nations populations are rarely portrayed as patients with legitimate needs for treatment of chronic pain. there was one counterexample in these results; that is, an article about a first nations individual that focused on the use of opioids for the treatment of chronic pain rather than as a source of substance use problems. as referred to above, paperny (march 5, 2012), in an article titled, “fatal overdose sparks warning about switch from oxycontin,” described the accidental overdose of a man whose “doctor switched him to a different opioid, and he died of an apparent overdose shortly thereafter” (para. 4). this article expressed concern over the need to manage chronic pain in a similar way to the article described above (picard, march 5, 2012). however, the only way in which the man was identified as first nations (or inuit) is through reference to his coverage through the non-insured health benefits plan administered by the first nations and inuit health branch of health canada (paperny, march 5, 2012). his identity as a first nations or indigenous person was not highlighted in the same manner as in articles discussing problematic substance use (see for example cbc, july 4, 2012; globe and mail, april 16, 2012a, 2012b; porter, april 17, 2012). all of this can be seen as reinforcing mistaken assumptions about first nations peoples’ propensity toward problematic substance use without addressing the root causes of first nations individuals’ pain and its impact on communities. f r o m t h e i n d i v i d u a l t o t h e c o l l e c t i v e the above analysis points to a second important theme, which is the ways in which media contribute to representations of a collective identity for first nations peoples. first nations peoples, as individuals, were most often portrayed in the media items analyzed here as not only part of a larger group, but as representative of that group. for example, in a radio program focusing on problematic use of oxycontin in aboriginal communities in northern ontario, the introduction read as follows: doctors and nurses in some northern ontario communities say they know there's trouble when they hear a newborn's cry . . . frightened, unhealthy babies are just one symptom. to pay for the drugs, crime is on the rise. grocery stores seem strangely well stocked—because so many people are using their money to buy pills instead of food. other research estimates as many as 75percent of adults in the community of fort hope use oxycontin, including young mothers and pregnant women. doris slipperjack is a twenty-two year old aboriginal mother of three. she's in treatment for her oxycontin addiction. she joined us from fort hope, in northern ontario. (tremonti, january 6, 2012, paras. 1-3, 4) through the order in which information was presented in this introduction, from the general (northern ontario communities) to the more specific (the community of fort hope), to the particular (one young woman), doris slipperjack appeared to represent not only all of the “young mothers and pregnant women” in her community, but she was also positioned as someone who can bring insight into the situation in all communities through her own experiences. this had the effect of erasing differences between individuals and nations, as well as perpetuating a colonial imagination that sees first nations as one group instead of many. placing an individual with substance use problems in a position to represent 9 nelson et al.: representations of indigenous peoples and use of pain medication published by scholarship@western, 2016     all first nations individuals in northern ontario also risks perpetuating a view of first nations communities as “damaged,” disordered, or particularly susceptible to problematic substance use (o’neil, reading, & leader, 1998; salmon, 2011; tuck, 2009). further, in the language of the media items analyzed for this study, substance use problems in first nations communities were often referred to as a “crisis” or an “epidemic,” suggesting that the problems were widespread throughout the entire community (see for example cbc, february 17, 2012a; porter, april 17, 2012). media items frequently extended the problem of widespread substance use from one first nations community to first nations communities and populations in general. as an example, the globe and mail (april 16, 2012a) published, “governments and local health authorities are slowly gearing up to deal with the runaway addiction that has slammed communities across the country, but especially first nations” (para. 4). a radio broadcast on problems with oxycontin use noted that “addiction is an especially acute problem in first nation communities” (cbc, february 27, 2012b, para. 3), in spite of the fact that only a handful of small communities in northern ontario were actually named in the broadcast. this same extension—of one small group to represent a larger collective—was evident in the representation of small towns and rural or remote areas, including in media items focused on non-first nations communities (e.g., cbc, march 16, 2012; moore, october 7, 2011). as one article, titled “annapolis valley’s drug crisis snapshot of national problem,” put it: national statistics on opioid abuse are still scant, but the problem has become all too apparent in the annapolis valley, an agricultural belt northwest of halifax with a population of 85,000. officials suspect as many as 14 deaths last year were related to prescription-drug abuse—five times the toll in 2009—but the number has yet to be verified because the provincial medical examiner has not been able to sift through all the cases. (moore, october 7, 2011, para. 6) the author of this article asserted that an “all too apparent” problem existed in the rural areas of the annapolis valley, based on numbers which were unconfirmed—and then, as seen in the article’s headline, extended the problem to canada as a whole, despite “scant” statistics. in contrast, media items focused on non-first nations peoples, especially in urban areas, portrayed problematic substance use as a difficulty particular to individuals who were in some way different or unusual. these media items either included individual interviews with (non-first nations) people who successfully overcame substance use problems, portraying these individual stories as exceptional, or cast substance use as a problem of criminals. for example, one cbc news report began by stating that “oxycontin is no longer manufactured in canada as of today, replaced by a new formulation called oxyneo, but some police forces across ontario are concerned about an increase in pharmacy robberies” (cbc, march 1, 2012c, para.1; see also blackwell, january 23, 2012; moore, october 7, 2011). problematic use of oxycontin was associated with people committing crimes; that is, people who were outside of a presumed “norm” and did not represent a community or racialized group as a whole. nonfirst nations peoples who struggle with substance use problems were portrayed as individuals who not only did not represent a larger racial group, but were specifically excluded from it. their identity as cultural or racialized individuals was not associated with their problems with substance use, whereas for 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 1 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.1.5     first nations individuals experiencing substance use problems, their first nations identity was portrayed as central. the ways in which first nations individuals were portrayed as representing all first nations peoples is problematic in several ways. first of all, it involves a simplification. no one person can embody the qualities of an entire cultural or racialized group, and when such an embodiment is implied in a news article or radio broadcast, the audience can be led to make mistaken assumptions about other first nations peoples based on a representation of one person. more importantly, such portrayals of an individual representing the collective tended to focus on individuals who possessed characteristics that fit with already existing stereotypes of who a first nations person is or what a first nations person does (salmon, 2011); in this case, the ways in which individuals with substance use problems were portrayed can reinforce myths that associate first nations peoples in general with problematic substance use. in the media items analyzed for this study, the portrayal of first nations as deviant contrasted with the ways in which non-first nations individuals were portrayed as deviant: first nations deviance was linked to broader communities, whereas non-first-nations deviance was portrayed as exceptional, or at least not linked to the individual’s cultural background or racialized identity. i m a g e s o f v i c t i m i z a t i o n a n d h o p e l e s s n e s s our analysis identified a third theme reflecting the portrayal of people with problematic substance use as victims, and the situation of first nations communities as hopeless. for example, media items often referred to the “desperation” of being “an addict” (cbc, february 17, 2012a, 2012b, 2012c; cbc, february 20, 2012). the use of these terms implied that people would stop at nothing to get the drugs to which they were supposedly addicted. the sense of desperation linked with addiction was heightened by a projection of the rising cost of such medications as oxycontin (due to a limited supply after its being withdrawn from the market in canada), and detailed descriptions of the horrific effects of opiate withdrawal—described as “a miserable and prolonged illness” in one article (cbc, february 17, 2012a, para. 12). one article described the situation of one community in which 80 percent of adults were estimated to be struggling with problematic use of oxycontin (cbc, april 16, 2012). this community ran its own treatment program for substance use problems, part of which “involves recovering addicts building their own shelter in the bush and hunting for their own food to rebuild self-sufficiency” (cbc, april 16, 2012, para. 23). however, representation of the program’s effectiveness was undermined by an interview with one resident who “turned to his traditional roots and went out hunting,” in an effort to fight his substance use problems, but who immediately “went back to the drug once he returned home” (cbc, april 16, 2012, paras.16, 19). including the story of someone who was unsuccessful in overcoming his substance use problems leads readers to form the impression that existing programs will ultimately be unsuccessful. the sense of desperation related to substance use conveyed in these media items was often accompanied by statements eliciting hopelessness. oxycontin's “extremely addictive properties” (cbc, march 8, 2012a, para. 5) were often cited as what led to substance use problems—addiction was portrayed as a property of the medication itself. thus, substance use problems were portrayed as insurmountable as long as addictive medications, illicit or otherwise, remain available. portraying substance use problems in 11 nelson et al.: representations of indigenous peoples and use of pain medication published by scholarship@western, 2016     this way ignores the effects of centuries of dislocation and repression through ongoing colonialism in first nations communities in canada, and instead conveys the message that first nations individuals are at risk of falling victim to the drug itself. implicit in the ways these media items framed the issues was that prohibition of specific medications would be the solution to problematic use of opiates in first nations communities, rather than attention to other broader contextual and sociopolitical factors. this implied assumption ignores the possibility that, even in the absence of oxycontin, there would still be ways for people to obtain other types of medications or illicit drugs, which may be used as a way of coping with unmanaged pain. portraying substance use problems as a characteristic of a given medication rather than contextualizing such problems as being influenced by broader social factors can lead to substance use problems seeming hopeless or inevitable. further, in many media items several issues remained unaddressed with reference to first nations. for example, media items portraying non-first nations populations often cited doctors' lack of adequate education about opiate use as the cause of problematic substance use, as in mills’ (march 12, 2012) description of an ontario study: a standardized dose [of pain medication including opioids such as oxycontin] is often prescribed regardless of anticipated post-operative pain, the study says. dr. bell [the senior researcher in the study] said improved communication between the surgeon and primary care provider would help to assess anticipated pain level and duration, so that the right prescription is given. (para. 9; see also cbc, february 24, 2012) this contextualizing information was not offered in media items that discuss opiate use among first nations, specifically. media articles and broadcasts related to non-first nations communities and individuals also present the hardships of problematic substance use alongside stories of success. for example, an article in the globe and mail about the death of cbc broadcaster scott oake’s son due to an accidental overdose of opioid medication concludes with the story of an edmonton family: laurie de grace of edmonton, shared her story of first becoming aware of her daughter’s addiction in grade 9. her daughter was diagnosed with a learning disability and suffered from attention deficit disorder. she did drugs, and her parents would often find empty bottles under her bed, ms. de grace said. now, at the age of 23, her daughter has just completed her first year of sobriety. (alphonso, may 1, 2012, paras. 9-10) rather than ending with a return to problematic substance use, which conveys the impression that it is a difficult if not impossible problem to overcome, this article highlights families who have gone through hardship but are seeing successes, leaving the reader with an overall feeling of hope. d i s c u s s i o n based on previous research on the influence of discourses regarding indigenous peoples on health and well-being, as well as the intensive media interest in the recall of oxycontin in canada in 2012, the objective of this study was to analyze canadian media reports portraying first nations peoples and prescription opioid use between 2011 and 2012. based on analysis of 50 media items from three major 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 1 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.1.5     canadian news organizations, results highlighted significant areas of discrepancy between the ways in which first nations and non-first nations populations are represented in the media. in particular, when first nations communities were the subject of a media item, there was a focus on problematic substance use, a tendency to generalize from one individual to entire populations, and a prominent discourse of victimhood and hopelessness. overall, we found that news reports reflected a broader tendency in the media to perpetuate images that, in turn, reinforce stereotypes that often lead to negative consequences for first nations and other indigenous peoples. scholars have demonstrated that media representations of first nations peoples in canada tend to perpetuate colonial stereotypes and negative assumptions (anderson & robertson, 2011; krebs, 2011; mckenzie, 2012; stoneham, goodman, & daube, 2014), such as the portrayal of first nations individuals as living in “sick, disorganized communities,” with high rates of dependence on (and a proclivity to misuse) substances such as alcohol, illicit and prescription drugs (o'neil et al., 1998, p. 230). these stereotypes, in turn, contribute to the significant emphasis in the media and in academic literature on the role of problematic substance use in the lives of first nations peoples. this emphasis can erroneously promote public perceptions that substance use problems are closely or necessarily associated with first nations peoples or first nations cultures, which in turn can negatively influence the quality of care provided in health care settings (see for example browne, 2007; browne & varcoe, 2006; browne, smye, et al., 2011; browne et al., 2012; welch, 2014). a c r i t i c a l e x a m i n a t i o n o f t h e p r e v a l e n c e o f p r e s c r i p t i o n d r u g u s e i n f i r s t n a t i o n s c o m m u n i t i e s according to the literature, there is a severe lack of empirical research on the prevalence of prescription drug use in first nations communities in canada (dell et al., 2012). studies that do exist show little difference between rates of substance use in first nations and non-first nations populations ( anderson & mcewan, 2000; macmillan et al., 2008; wardman & khan, 2004). in some cases that have received a great deal of media attention, the rates of substance use in first nations communities may have been overstated (wale & lavoie, 2015). for example, the october report of the auditor general of canada in 1997 expressed concern that health canada was not tracking or managing prescriptions among first nations individuals, and was not addressing problems of overprescription (auditor general of canada, 1997). this in turn sparked a storm of media reports decrying a system “rife with overprescription and “doctor-shopping” among pill addicts, which allow them to get drugs from a number of sources” (alberts & lowey, october 8, 1997, n.p.; see also bueckert, october 7, 1997). in fact, the media’s reactions to the auditor general’s 1997 report seem out of proportion to the actual figures for prescription drug misuse among first nations claimants, which were relatively low (wale & lavoie, in press), perpetuating assumptions that link first nations peoples and popularized notions of addiction. in the articles and broadcasts analyzed for this study, similar problematic assumptions can be found regarding substance use in first nations communities in canada, in spite of a lack of empirical evidence. l i m i t a t i o n s the present study was subject to two main limitations. the review of the literature was completed by one researcher (the lead author) and therefore is influenced by the approaches used, and her knowledge 13 nelson et al.: representations of indigenous peoples and use of pain medication published by scholarship@western, 2016     and assumptions. the use of online web search tools embedded in canadian news organization websites may have missed some media items that were not kept in the online archive by these organizations themselves. nonetheless, analysis of the available media items suggests a troubling tendency in the national media towards reinforcing stereotypes of first nations peoples and problematic substance use. i m p l i c a t i o n s a n d c o n c l u s i o n s the findings from this study reflect wider scholarship on the representation of indigenous peoples in the media and popular discourse. stark differences can be seen in the ways that first nations and non-first nations individuals and communities are represented in the media items reviewed for this article. in first nations communities, problematic opioid substance use is discussed in the absence of a context of pain management; broad generalizations are made and individuals or specific communities are portrayed as representative of all first nations in canada; and language of hopelessness and victimization is employed, implying that substance use problems are prevalent and will remain the status quo in first nations communities. in contrast, in media items focused on non-first nations populations, discussion of high rates of substance use are considered in the context of peoples’ needs for pain management; individuals are generally not identified as members of a racialized or cultural group, and people with substance use problems are portrayed as individuals rather than as representative of a larger group; and stories of suffering due to substance use problems are countered with success stories of people who overcame these problems. further, the lack of media items related to métis peoples or inuit points to an important gap in information regarding indigenous peoples in canada. differences in language, tone, sources of information, and what is said or left unsaid reveal that the media items analyzed portray many troubling assumptions about first nations individuals and communities. these assumptions reflect wider social discourses in canada that continue to construct indigenous peoples in ways that perpetuate negative stereotypes. this analysis reveals that first nations peoples and individuals are not represented on the same terms as other members of the general population, instead being assigned to racialized categories and assumed to have certain characteristics on the basis of such categories. discourses in canada that reflect colonialism, culturalism, and paternalism with regard to first nations and other indigenous peoples are perpetuated and aggravated, rather than addressed, by such discourses. these discourses can cause first nations peoples to be treated differently than members of the general public, including in health care settings or in policy. this causes a range of problems, from feelings of discomfort and mistrust on the part of first nations peoples accessing health care, especially for pain management, to health care actually being withheld from first nations patients, which has profound negative health consequences (browne, 2007; browne, smye, et al., 2011). recognizing the root causes, both of such negative discourses in the media and of substance use problems that may exist in first nations communities, as well as having an accurate estimation of the actual (rather than imagined) prevalence of substance use problems is imperative if these negative social discourses and negative health outcomes are to be prevented. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 1 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.1.5     r e f e r e n c e s alberts, s., & lowey, m. 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(2011). addressing trauma, violence and pain: research on health services for women at the intersections of history and economics. in o. hankivsky (ed.), health inequities in canada: intersectional frameworks and practices (pp. 295-311). vancouver: ubc press. browne, a. j., varcoe, c. m., wong, s. t., smye, v. l., lavoie, j. g., littlejohn, d. et al. (2012). closing the health equity gap: evidence-based strategies for primary health care organizations. international journal for equity in health, 11, 1-15. http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1475-9276-1159 brownlee, j. l., & coy, h. (2007, may 10). the purdue frederick company, inc. and top executives plead guilty to misbranding oxycontin; will pay over $600 million [news release]. united states attorney's office, western district of virginia. bueckert, d. (1997, october 7). aboriginals misusing drugs says report. canadian press newswire. retrieved from http://www.thecanadianpress.com/ the canadian broadcasting corporation [cbc]. 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(2008). first nations women's mental health: results from an ontario survey. archives of women’s mental health, 11, 109-115. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s00737-008-0004-y mccombs, m. e. & shaw, d. l. (1972). the agenda-setting function of mass media. the public opinion quarterly, 36(2), 176-187. http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/267990 mckenzie, h. a. (2012). the different stories of cree woman, daleen kay bosse (muskego), and dakota-sioux woman, amber tara-lynn redman: understanding their disappearances and murders through media re-presentations and family members' narratives (unpublished master’s thesis). university of regina, regina. mills, c. (2012, march 12). painkiller prescriptions after minor surgery puts patients at risk of addiction: study. the globe and mail. retrieved from http://www.theglobeandmail.com/ moore, o. 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(1998). changing the relations of surveillance: the development of a discourse of resistance in aboriginal epidemiology. human organization, 57, 230-237. http://dx.doi.org/10.17730/humo.57.2.b7628vwvg7q127m8 paperny, a. m. (2012, march 5). fatal overdose sparks warning about switch from oxycontin. the globe and mail. retrieved from http://www.theglobeandmail.com/ 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 1 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.1.5     picard, a. (2012, march 5). chronic pain patients collateral damage of drug-abuse policy. the globe and mail. retrieved from http://www.theglobeandmail.com/ porter, j. (2012, april 17). first nations seek healing by reconnecting to the land: outdoor activities seen as key to ending addiction crisis. the canadian broadcasting corporation. retrieved from www.cbc.ca/news reading, j. l. 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(2012, january 6). oxycontin addiction in northern ontario (parts 1 & 2). the canadian broadcasting corporation. retrieved from www.cbc.ca tuck, e. (2009). suspending damage: a letter to communities. harvard educational review, 79(3), 409-427. http://dx.doi.org/10.17763/haer.79.3.n0016675661t3n15 united nations. (2008). united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples. new york: author. varcoe, c., browne, a. j., & michaelson, l. (2014). substance use in the context of health assessment. in a. j. browne, j. macdonald-jenkins, & m. luctkar-flude (eds.), physical examination and health assessment (2nd ed., pp. 107-119). toronto, on: elsevier. wale, e & lavoie, j. g. (2015). defined by 0.11%: policies delimiting access to prescription drugs for first nations people in british columbia. international journal of indigenous health, 10(2), 150-164. wallace, b., browne, a. j., varcoe, c., ford-gilboe, m., wathen, c. n., long, p. m., & parker, j. (2015). self-reported oral health among a community sample of people experiencing social and health inequities: implications for the primary health care sector. bmj open, 5(e009519). http://dx/doi.org/10.1136/bmjopen-2015-009519 19 nelson et al.: representations of indigenous peoples and use of pain medication published by scholarship@western, 2016     wardman, d. & khan, n. (2004). antidepressant medication use among first nations peoples residing within british columbia. american indian and alaska native mental health research, 11, 43. http://dx.doi.org/10.5820/aian.1103.2004.43 weeks, c. (2012, february 26). oxycontin delisting not the answer to opioid addiction, experts say. the globe and mail. retrieved from http://www.theglobeandmail.com/ welch, m. a. (2014, may 4). sinclair victim of stereotyping, professor says. winnipeg free press. retrieved from http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/ 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 1 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.1.5     a p p e n d i x a a r t i c l e s r e t a i n e d b y c r i t e r i a a n d s o u r c e c r i t e r i a f o r i n c l u s i o n s o u r c e a r t i c l e a u t h o r a n d t i t l e d a t e p u b l i s h e d m e d i u m p r o g r a m • first nations or addictions focus • article or broadcast from a major (national) news corporation • published within canada • published between july 1, 2011 and july 31, 2012 the globe and mail no author, “kids write to drug-addicted parents” monday, april 16, 2012 text no author, “many in remote ontario town addicted to oxycontin” monday, april 16, 2012 video anna mehler paperny, “fatal overdose sparks warning about switch from oxycontin” monday, march 5, 2012 text anna mehler paperny, “treating the tiny victims of canada’s fastestgrowing addiction” friday, january 6, 2012 text the canadian broadcasting corporation (cbc) no author, “take-home methadone falling into wrong hands: chief: leaders of manitoulin island m’chigeeng first nation worry people are selling the pain reliever” wednesday, july 4, 2012 text anna maria tremonti, “checking in: oxycontin update” thursday, june 21, 2012 radio the current jody porter, “first nations seek healing by reconnecting to the land: outdoor activities seen as key to ending addiction crisis” tuesday, april 17, 2012 text no author, “doctor wants action on first nation drug crisis: some first nations say 80 percent of their population is hooked on prescription painkillers” monday, april 16, 2012 text 21 nelson et al.: representations of indigenous peoples and use of pain medication published by scholarship@western, 2016     c r i t e r i a f o r i n c l u s i o n s o u r c e a r t i c l e a u t h o r a n d t i t l e d a t e p u b l i s h e d m e d i u m p r o g r a m no author, “oxycontin reality check” thursday, march 1, 2012 radio superior morning prithi yelaja, “oxycontin replacement may not solve abuse: thousands of addicts face involuntary withdrawal” tuesday, february 28, 2012 text no author, “helping kids kick their oxycontin addiction” monday, february 27, 2012 radio superior morning no author, “oxycontin off the market” monday, february 27, 2012 radio the current no author, “weaning ontario off oxycontin” tuesday, february 21, 2012 text no author, “oxycontin rules” monday, february 20, 2012 text no author, “oxycontin phase-out raises concerns” friday, february 17, 2012 text anna maria tremonti, “oxycontin addiction in northern ontario” (parts 1 & 2) friday, january 6, 2012 text anna maria tremonti, “oxycontin addiction” friday, january 6, 2012 radio the current the national post tom blackwell, “painkillers, pregnancy a tragic combination” friday, july 20, 2012 text 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 1 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.1.5     c r i t e r i a f o r i n c l u s i o n s o u r c e a r t i c l e a u t h o r a n d t i t l e d a t e p u b l i s h e d m e d i u m p r o g r a m • addictions focus • article or broadcast from a major (national) news corporation • published within canada • published between • july 1, 2011 and july 31, 2012 the globe and mail anna mehler paperny, “ontario urges feds not to allow generic oxycontin onto market” friday, july 6, 2012 text no author, “chronic pain patients overlooked in debate about oxycontin abuse” sunday, april 15, 2012 text carys mills, “painkiller prescriptions after minor surgery puts patients at risk of addiction: study” monday, march 12, 2012 text carly weeks, “alternative to methadone shows promise” monday, march 12, 2012 text andré picard, “chronic pain patients collateral damage of drug-abuse policy” monday, march 5, 2012 text no author, “oxycontin’s phase-out” thursday, march 1, 2012 video carly weeks, “the high cost of funding oxycontin” tuesday, february 28, 2012 text carly weeks, “oxycontin delisting not the answer to opioid addiction, experts say” sunday, february 26, 2012 text anna mehler paperny, “saskatchewan joins crackdown on oxycodone prescriptions” tuesday, february 21, 2012 text anna mehler paperny, “n.s. tightens rules on oxycontin” monday, february 20, 2012 text 23 nelson et al.: representations of indigenous peoples and use of pain medication published by scholarship@western, 2016     c r i t e r i a f o r i n c l u s i o n s o u r c e a r t i c l e a u t h o r a n d t i t l e d a t e p u b l i s h e d m e d i u m p r o g r a m anna mehler paperny, “provinces clamp down on oxycontin abuse” friday, february 17, 2012 text oliver moore, “annapolis valley’s drug crisis snapshot of national problem” friday, october 7, 2011 text the canadian broadcasting corporation (cbc) no author, “latest drug bust shows oxy supply shrinking: drug dealers are switching over to cocaine, detective inspector says” friday, july 27, 2012 text no author, “opioid addiction among pregnant women increasing” monday, july 23, 2012 radio morning north no author, “oxycontin addiction” wednesday, april 18, 2012 radio ottawa morning brent bambury, “oxycontin and small towns” friday, march 16, 2012 radio day six no author, “oxycontin marketing blamed for addiction epidemic: critics say misleading marketing drove abuse of painkiller, the fifth estate reports” thursday, march 8, 2012 text no author, “translink, oxycontin, women’s pants” thursday, march 8, 2012 radio the early edition no author, “delisting oxycontin” friday, march 2, 2012 radio ottawa morning anna maria tremonti, “checking in: oxycontin discontinued thursday, march 1, 2012 radio the current 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 1 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.1.5     c r i t e r i a f o r i n c l u s i o n s o u r c e a r t i c l e a u t h o r a n d t i t l e d a t e p u b l i s h e d m e d i u m p r o g r a m no author, “oxycontin officially replaced by new drug: police in ottawa say oxycontin became more popular drug of choice over last year” thursday, march 1, 2012 text no author, “won’t make a difference” wednesday, february 29, 2012 radio metro morning no author, “track prescription drugs, says yukon medical association: association says whitehorse doctors seeing obvious signs of prescription drug abuse, peddling” monday, february 27, 2012 text no author, “finding the root of people’s addiction to oxycontin” friday, february 24, 2012 radio information morning nova scotia no author, “oxycontin concerns” wednesday, february 22, 2012 radio information morning cape breton no author, “no more oxycontin” friday, february 17, 2012 radio here and now toronto no author, “generation rx” (parts 1 and 2) tuesday, december 27, 2011 radio white coat black art the national post tom blackwell, “illegal drugs feeding off pharmacy supply chain: theft increasing” monday, january 23, 2012 text tom blackwell, “addicts subverting methadone treatment: prescriptions for other opioids ‘big hole’ in system” friday, november 25, 2011 text 25 nelson et al.: representations of indigenous peoples and use of pain medication published by scholarship@western, 2016     c r i t e r i a f o r i n c l u s i o n s o u r c e a r t i c l e a u t h o r a n d t i t l e d a t e p u b l i s h e d m e d i u m p r o g r a m no author, “’we’re seeing this abuse and misuse’: painkiller dependency takes toll” monday, november 14, 2011 text tom blackwell, “the marketing of oxycontin” saturday, november 12, 2011 text     26 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 1 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss1/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.1.5 the international indigenous policy journal january 2016 representations of indigenous peoples and use of pain medication in canadian news media sarah e. nelson annette j. browne josée g. lavoie recommended citation representations of indigenous peoples and use of pain medication in canadian news media abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license representations of indigenous peoples and use of pain medication in canadian news media community learning and university policy: an inner-city university goes back to school the international indigenous policy journal volume 7 | issue 2 article 1 april 2016 community learning and university policy: an inner-city university goes back to school lloyd axworthy former president and vice-chancellor, university of winnipeg linda deriviere associate professor, university of winnipeg, l.deriviere@uwinnipeg.ca jennifer moore rattray former associate vice-president of indigenous, government and community affairs, university of winnipeg recommended citation axworthy, l. , deriviere, l. , moore rattray, j. (2016). community learning and university policy: an inner-city university goes back to school. the international indigenous policy journal, 7(2). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.1 community learning and university policy: an inner-city university goes back to school abstract for at least a decade now, the university of winnipeg (u of w), an urban institution on treaty one land in the heart of the métis nation, has challenged existing academic models and practices, and has incorporated strategies that address the social divide between indigenous and non-indigenous peoples in order to more effectively serve the learning needs of its surrounding community. this article demonstrates how an inner-city university has used internal policies and programs to help support the self-determination of indigenous peoples. six community learning initiatives were recently evaluated for impact. this article will provide an overview of the positive outcomes of these learning initiatives on a community of underrepresented learners. keywords university–community engagement; indigenous students; indigenous evaluation acknowledgments a special thanks is due to kris pikl for his excellent research assistance, editing, and invaluable feedback in the preparation of this manuscript. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ c o m m u n i t y l e a r n i n g a n d u n i v e r s i t y p o l i c y : a n i n n e r c i t y u n i v e r s i t y g o e s b a c k t o s c h o o l over the past 15 years, universities and colleges across canada and the united states have responded to the need to modernize pedagogical approaches to their curricula by introducing community learning initiatives, which have taken the form of service learning courses for students (moore, 2014; prentice & robinson, 2010), and an increased emphasis on community-engaged scholarship for faculty (arendt & westover, 2014; nichols, phipps, gaetz, & fisher, 2014;). the impetus for this movement in canada was the establishment of the canadian alliance for community service-learning (cacsl) in late 2004, which supported the expansion of these initiatives in canadian post-secondary institutions (cacsl, 2015). the university of winnipeg (u of w) was at the forefront of these innovations over a decade ago. at the time, a 10-year provincial tuition freeze had little impact on the recruitment of low-income students, as only 10% of them came from high poverty neighbourhoods around the university. u of w’s newlyrecruited president was determined to address this reality, as he recognized that, in order to maintain its relevance as a modern inner-city university, it was essential to remove systemic barriers (academic, financial, social, and cultural) to post-secondary education for low-income students, and particularly to encourage indigenous student participation by incorporating a comprehensive community learning initiative. moreover, consistent with indigenous cultures, community learning had to be a highly social process that involved families in supporting their children’s learning. thus, engaging with the idea of “community as a neighbour” (moore, 2014), u of w reimagined its approach, profoundly changing its relationship to the community, by moving beyond service learning to actively partner with the surrounding community in order to make it easier for indigenous people to access the resources and facilities on the campus. u of w had embarked on its own learning journey. since then, other canadian universities have followed suit, as the truth and reconciliation commission of canada (trc, 2015) and so many other reports have pointed to the need for substantially broadening access to education for indigenous students. in particular, these reports suggest that there is a need for a concerted effort to counter the dropout rate among indigenous students at the grade 9 level. in fact, according to the centre for the study of living standards, the educational parity that served to eliminate the employment rate and income gaps between aboriginal peoples and the nonaboriginal population by 2001 would have yielded an additional $160 billion in canadian gdp between 2001 and 2017 (sharpe, arsenault, & lapointe, 2007). why deny this human potential? the role played by modern universities must evolve to include community-based goals. indeed, a search of 65 university websites1 across canada also showed evidence of universities actively embracing the idea that learning should extend beyond the customary structures of in-class lectures. many universities have established service learning and community outreach offices or centres that focus on building community partnerships for the purpose of providing services to indigenous children and youth. this article is a case study based on a series of evaluations of programs implemented as a result of u of w’s internal policy transformation, which was established to provide innovative culturally-based 1 a research assistant conducted a brief survey of community learning initiatives at approximately two-thirds of canadian universities. 1 axworthy et al.: community learning and university policy published by scholarship@western, 2016 learning opportunities to a local population that has been traditionally underrepresented in the university community, including a significant inner-city population of indigenous people. the promising results of six program initiatives developed for a community of underrepresented learners will demonstrate the long-standing positive interactions between a university and the community it serves. b a c k g r o u n d : c o m m u n i t y c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s of particular relevance to u of w was the fact that its surrounding community was increasingly becoming more diverse as a result of the rapidly growing population of urban aboriginal peoples, primarily first nations and metis, and new canadians—the fastest growing populations in both the university’s immediate neighbourhoods and canada as a whole. aboriginal people represent more than 11% of winnipeg’s population and account for 20.2% of inner-city residents. similarly, new canadians comprise almost a quarter of inner-city residents (city of winnipeg, 2015a, 2015b). despite the local cultural richness and diversity, these surrounding neighbourhoods are high-poverty areas that struggle with inadequate housing, unemployment, a relatively high level of crime and gang activity, as well as other social inequities. moreover, winnipeg is located in a province (manitoba) that is frequently referred to as the child poverty capital of canada, as 62% of first nation children live below the poverty line compared to the non-indigenous child poverty rate of 15% (macdonald & wilson, 2013) in this city, almost 70% of indigenous children under 6 years of age are a part of families with incomes below the low-income cut-off (lico) poverty line (winnipeg harvest, 2015). not only do indigenous youth face enormous economic disadvantages associated with poverty, but they also experience higher school dropout and pushout rates than children and youth in more affluent neighbourhoods. recent statistical analyses in manitoba indicated that high school completion rates in the poorest urban families (i.e., lowest income quintile) could be as low as 55.3% compared to 98.5% in the highest income quintile (brownell et al., 2012). in winnipeg, these are frequently indigenous families who face numerous barriers in the educational system such as an absence of cultural content and high levels of distrust originating from the legacy of residential schools. likewise, in winnipeg, an even larger gap persists in university education completion rates between indigenous and non-indigenous people—12.3% versus 30.4% respectively (hallett, 2006; statistics canada 2010, 2013a, 2013b)—thus resulting in the potential loss of economic and social contributions of a growing segment of the community. families of indigenous youth in high poverty areas can barely afford to fulfill basic needs like food and shelter, let alone post-secondary education for their children, despite the fact that, according to a 2010 environics aboriginal peoples survey, education is a top priority for urban aboriginal families (environics institute, 2010). these challenges are profoundly significant because the number of aboriginal youth under the age of 18 as a percentage of all aboriginal people in winnipeg is more than double that of their nonaboriginal counterparts (35.4% and 17.2%, respectively) (statistics canada, 2013a, 2013b). these persistent poverty-related barriers raise many questions, such as: how, as a matter of ethical responsibility, can the u of w be situated in a neighbourhood with significant social disparities and not consider the wider inclusion of the community, particularly the university’s role in challenging the graduation gap? how could the university partner with its neighbours to improve high school graduation rates and to help increase engagement with the university and other forms of post-secondary education? for indigenous youth, who have been traditionally underrepresented in post-secondary education, which methods of outreach would promote an understanding that the university belongs to them, and that they have the right to benefit from opportunities that higher education provides? in the process of 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.1 integrating community learning initiatives, how can u of w respect the community’s autonomy in developing programs to support the increased participation of inner-city indigenous youth in education (axworthy, 2009)? encouraging the participation of indigenous youth in many culturally-based learning and educational opportunities would be one of many stepping stones to achieving cultural preservation and building resilient and involved communities in the inner city and other high poverty areas of winnipeg. it would also substantially improve their chances of completing a high school and postsecondary education. i n t e r n a l p o l i c y f r a m e w o r k : t r a n s f o r m i n g p o l i c y i n t o p r o g r a m m i n g the community’s reality was a catalyst for the university’s innovative approach to addressing the question of what it means to implement relevant and respectful community learning initiatives. in order to renew the campus in these ways, several internal policies and programs were needed to generate mechanisms of change including: i n t e r n a l p o l i c y # 1 : c o m m u n i t y d r i v e n l e a r n i n g p r o g r a m s l e d b y s t r o n g i n d i g e n o u s l e a d e r s h i p the hiring of indigenous leaders and role models (for instance, an associate vice-president of indigenous, government and community affairs) with authentic relationships to the community and their ability to build on existing collaborative relationships with schools, community agencies, and families was essential to the university’s mandate of generating positive changes in the community by way of after school, summer, and cultural programs. to achieve this particular aim, following a community consultation process, culturally-based programming emerged from a series of discussions that took place at a 2004 aboriginal education working group led by first nations and métis faculty, staff, and students. the working group’s mandate was to examine barriers within the university itself. these discussions produced an indigenous education strategy that extended beyond service learning to a community investment model that adopted a holistic approach to addressing the learning needs of aboriginal members of the surrounding community. one example of the u of w's divergent approach is the free, culturally-based family programming, such as pow wow clubs and not-for-credit indigenous language programs, which are not typically offered at most other universities. as part of the university’s community learning mandate, the introduction of an innovative learning centre in 2006 presented an array of learning opportunities for community members, including an on-campus science program for grade 5 and 6 students from inner-city schools, as well as a summer day camp. the mandate of the latter was to address summer learning loss experienced by students from high poverty neighbourhoods who would not otherwise have an opportunity to attend a summer day camp, and to help these students see themselves as high school and post-secondary graduates. in a further attempt to break down barriers to education, a model school (a high school within a high school) provided students underrepresented in high school and post-secondary graduation rates an opportunity to attend u of w’s collegiate high school at no financial cost to their families, while also providing bursaries toward their post-secondary studies. students who are invited to join the program substantially increase their chances of completing high school and pursuing post-secondary studies (axworthy, 2009, 2013). 3 axworthy et al.: community learning and university policy published by scholarship@western, 2016 similarly, in 2005, the wii chiiwaakanak learning centre—a community centre located on the u of w campus—opened its doors, and is now open 6 days per week year-round. led by first nations management and staff, and guided by a community advisory committee, the centre offers free and open access to computers, after-school tutoring, educational and cultural programs, as well as community meeting spaces. the centre is a safe and friendly environment that encourages residents in the community to expand their knowledge and skills in cultural activities, such as beading, making crafts, the art of traditional pow wow dancing (grass, jingle dress, hoop, round dance, etc.), drumming, and aboriginal language proficiency. the global welcome centre was also established in 2008 to help support new canadians with their learning needs, such as computer and language skills, tutoring, counselling, as well as providing any other required assistance in transitioning to a university environment (axworthy, 2009, 2013). annually, this centre serves 350 to 400 registered clients representing 80 countries; it has recruited 75 to 100 volunteers; and its bridge-to-post-secondary outreach program serves approximately 600 people in the community each year. the president and indigenous leadership within the university recognized that, in order to meet the needs of the community, their approach to community learning must be a highly social process that nurtures family relationships. moreover, learning can be more effective if it is informal and experiential. the role of elders is crucial for passing down cultural teachings to children and youth, and for promoting lifelong learning about oneself, as well as one’s responsibility to family and community. in indigenous communities, social relationships provide the foundation for learning about self-identity through cultural ceremonies and other traditions, but particularly ancestral language. it is alarming then that, according to the 2011 aboriginal population profile, only 6.1% of the aboriginal population in winnipeg had knowledge of an aboriginal language (statistics canada, 2013b). this may be significant with regard to children’s school outcomes, as another study based on the aboriginal people’s survey (aps), found that children aged 6 to 14 years who were supported to learn an aboriginal language had improved school achievement (guevremont & kohen, 2012). i n t e r n a l p o l i c y # 2 : c h a n g i n g t h e g o v e r n a n c e m o d e l to ensure the sustainability of these programs, in 2011, the university integrated community learning into its governance structure by having its board of regents approve a community learning policy that has a mandate to support youth from indigenous and new canadian families in order to increase high school and post-secondary graduation rates. to this end, u of w made community learning a matter of university policy by changing its governance structure to include an indigenous advisory circle to guide its progress, and it established strong relationships with indigenous elders (axworthy, 2013). i n t e r n a l p o l i c y # 3 : p r i v a t e f u n d r a i s i n g in addition, following a commitment by the province of manitoba’s department of education, a primarily private fundraising strategy referred to as the opportunity fund established bursaries and a tuition credit account towards post-secondary education for each student enrolled in the program. the overarching goal of these measures is to reduce the graduation gap (axworthy, 2013). all three centers are funded privately; however, they also rely on resources from u of w in order to implement meaningful learning opportunities. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.1 e v a l u a t i o n m e t h o d s a n d s t u d y p a r t i c i p a n t s in this article, the internal policy framework was based on interviews with key administrators and stakeholders, as well as secondary data sources (e.g., available internal university reports and funding documentation; the former president’s speaking notes, etc.). in regard to programming, although u of w implemented a wide range of initiatives over the past decade, the impacts of six of these community learning programs (appendix a) were recently evaluated, under the direction of one this article’s authors (deriviere, 2014a, 2014b, 2015a, 2015b, 2015c;\ deriviere & rhodes, 2014). these evaluations assessed a science program for elementary school children, summer day camps open to children ages 7 to 15, a high school for socioeconomically disadvantaged students, free culturally-based learning opportunities for families, a healthy teen relationships program, and a summer math camp. in the early stages, an advisory committee that included indigenous community leaders helped to set the direction and questions that the evaluation would need to address, how the evaluations would be used, as well as methods to be used. each individual program’s administrators and staff helped to answer questions about the program’s story, its objectives, cultural values, and success indicators. as shown in appendix a, most programs had been in place for at least two years, and all evaluations were conducted in 2014 and 2015. the university’s human research ethics board (uhreb) approved the research. as shown in table 1, 940 individuals self-selected into a wide range of exercises throughout the evaluation process, including surveys, questionnaires that required short answers, forced-choice likert scale statements, in-person or telephone interviews, and many other instruments. participant groups included children ages 12 and under who participated in programs, such as science kids on campus, sacred seven school presentations, family learning programs (e.g., pow wow club), and as campers at adventure kids summer camp. adolescents and older youths participated as junior and senior leaders at the adventure kids summer camp, sacred seven, and math camp programs, as well as the model school high school program. the majority of participants were indigenous children and youth; however, programs such as science kids and adventure kids also recruited children from new canadian families, and specific data on ethnicity was either incomplete on the registration forms or impractical to capture. interviews were also conducted with participants’ parents and guardians, as well as adult program participants and volunteers in the family learning programs. other evaluation participants included program staff and managers, instructors and volunteers in the science kids and math camp programs, as well as community school teachers, outreach workers, counsellors, and principals. children and youth under age 18 required a parent or a legal guardian’s consent to participate. quantitative instruments were mostly used for younger participants, as the objective was to assess their level of interest in, and enjoyment of, the program, as well as how much they felt they had learned from the experience. the advantage of quantitative data over qualitative data is that one can use comparatively larger samples, and such instruments are frequently standardized and simplistic so as not to be too daunting for young participants. for older youth and adults, the evaluations emphasized qualitative interviews, as the strength of this approach is its ability to capture the participants’ experiences of the programs and clarify the causal pathways of outcomes. 5 axworthy et al.: community learning and university policy published by scholarship@western, 2016 t a b l e 1 . e v a l u a t i o n p a r t i c i p a t i o n i n n o v a t i v e l e a r n i n g c e n t r e m o d e l s c h o o l a d v e n t u r e k i d s c a m p s c i e n c e k i d s o n c a m p u s p r o g r a m s t a k e h o l d e r t y p e o f i n s t r u m e n t n (%) n (%) n (%) children and youth program participants, under age 25 questionnaires and likert scale instruments 26 (76.9) n/a n/a children and youth program participants, under age 25 survey instruments and other evaluative exercises: circle the word, friendship bracelet, and fill in the blanks n/a 308 (76.3) 46 youth, over age 18 (former students) qualitative interviews 4 (100.0) n/a n/a other adult program participants likert scale instrument n/a n/a n/a program staff and faculty, volunteers, instructors, youth leaders, administrators qualitative interviews 6 43 (63.4) 9 parents and guardians of participants and youth leaders qualitative interviews 18 73 2 community schools: teachers, community outreach workers, counsellors, and principals qualitative interviews n/a 17 3 community schools: teachers and principals survey instrument n/a n/a n/a t o t a l p a r t i c i p a t i o n i n t h e e v a l u a t i o n s 5 4 4 4 1 6 0 t o t a l p r o g r a m r e g i s t r a t i o n s a n d p a r t i c i p a t i o n 42a 1,032 campers 45 youth leadersb 70 studentsc note. percentage (%) of indigenous participants in parentheses. the percentage of indigenous students, school stakeholders, staff, and other family participants is unknown in some categories because we did not capture this data. however, it is estimated to be a high proportion. a student registrations for 2014 and 2015. the model school high school has graduated 41 students since 2008. b summer of 2014 registrations and youth leader employment. c 70 students participated in two sessions in 2013 and 2014; 110 students in 3 sessions in 2012 and 2013. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.1 t a b l e 1 . e v a l u a t i o n p a r t i c i p a t i o n ( c o n t i n u e d ) w i i c h i i w a a k a n a k l e a r n i n g c e n t r e s a c r e d s e v e n f a m i l y l e a r n i n g m a t h c a m p p r o g r a m s t a k e h o l d e r t y p e o f i n s t r u m e n t n (%) n (%) n (%) children and youth program participants, under age 25 questionnaires and likert scale instruments 36 (100.0) n/a 10 (100.0) children and youth program participants, under age 25 survey instruments and other evaluative exercises: circle the word, friendship bracelet, and fill in the blanks 222 27 (100.0) n/a youth, over age 18 (former students) qualitative interviews n/a n/a n/a other adult program participants likert scale instrument n/a 27 (92.6) n/a program staff and faculty, volunteers, instructors, youth leaders, administrators qualitative interviews 9 (100.0) 10 (100.0) 1 parents and guardians of participants and youth leaders qualitative interviews 10 (100.0) 8 (87.5) 8 (100.0) community schools: teachers, community outreach workers, counsellors, and principals qualitative interviews 6 n/a n/a community schools: teachers and principals survey instrument 11 n/a n/a t o t a l p a r t i c i p a t i o n i n t h e e v a l u a t i o n s 2 9 4 7 2 1 9 t o t a l p r o g r a m r e g i s t r a t i o n s a n d p a r t i c i p a t i o n 222 students; 71 program participantsd 54 adults and 69 childrene 11 students note. percentage (%) of indigenous participants in parentheses. the percentage of indigenous students, school stakeholders, staff, and other family participants is unknown in some categories because we did not capture this data. however, it is estimated to be a high proportion. d from september 2013 to june 2015, 222 students participated in five school presentations, and 71 students participated in the sacred seven program. e spring session 2014: pow wow club: 15 adults, 36 children from 9 families; let’s speak ojibway: 39 adults and 33 children from 19 families. 7 axworthy et al.: community learning and university policy published by scholarship@western, 2016 questions in the qualitative interviews with youth leaders and other program staff addressed general themes such as program delivery issues, benefits derived from their employment with the program, the ways in which the program impacted their educational and vocational aspirations, and their future plans for both paid and volunteer work. parent and guardian interviews were concerned with the degree to which their children enjoyed attending the program, their perceptions of and satisfaction with the program staff, the benefits derived from their children’s participation, the no-cost feature, and any suggestions for improvement. in their interviews, the teachers and administrators were asked for feedback on recruitment issues, the cultural value and social benefits of the program, and the importance of the program to youth in the community. an indigenous approach to evaluation, which is driven by a strengths-based and empowerment framework, offered a compelling depth for understanding the impact of these programs. by rejecting the negative legacy and colonial agendas of past research and evaluation practices that failed to serve indigenous people, this relatively new approach to community-based evaluation recognizes it as an opportunity for community learning in the interests of indigenous people’s self-determination (lafrance & nichols, 2011). since it was necessary for the research process to benefit those who are most directly impacted, we asked the participants to tell their story about their experiences in the programs and what they thought worked well or needed improvement and why. the evaluator triangulated the data to the greatest possible extent. in triangulation methods, the data are collected and analyzed together to ensure that the findings are corroborated. the objective of this crossreferencing technique is to have the data tell the full story and to identify patterns that increase confidence in the findings, thus improving validity and permitting conclusions. although the data gathering instruments and questionnaires in the six evaluations were uniquely designed for each program, the questions were relatively similar and suitable to the thematic analysis included in this article. for example, while questions posed to youth may have been framed or worded slightly differently in the instruments of each evaluation, they often tapped into similar themes of confidence building, resilience, making positive choices, educational and vocational aspirations, and establishing healthy relationships through cultural teachings. therefore, we aggregated data whenever common lessons learned or themes of best practices could be collated across programs. f i n d i n g s : l e s s o n s l e a r n e d a b o u t e v a l u a t e d p r o g r a m s in this section, we demonstrate how u of w used its internal policies to establish a dialogue and an authentic relationship with the surrounding community. we summarize what we learned from the evaluations about best practices in programming, including the need for holistic educational opportunities and to foster an environment of community capacity-building aimed at lifelong learning. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.1 although these programs affect thousands of students, they are only models that need to be brought to scale in order to meet the enormity of the task. what these u of w community learning opportunities provide through evidence-based evaluations are a large number of outcomes, best practices, and lessons learned that can provide a path towards an effective education strategy not only for the city and province, but also internationally. in narrowing down these best practices, five key themes emerged from the data in support of the university’s indigenous education initiative dating back to 2004. the themes that seemed to cultivate program successes included: a. supporting families by providing culturally-relevant and free learning opportunities to a community of underrepresented learners in all levels of education and, at every possible opportunity, within a wraparound model of free transportation, materials and supplies, and meals or snacks; b. community partnerships that are strengthened by hiring indigenous leaders and role models with authentic relationships to community; c. building social capital among youth through peer mentoring and role modelling opportunities; d. encouraging connections of indigenous youth to education, employment, leadership opportunities, and civic responsibility; e. fostering a sense of belonging to the university community in children, youth, and their families by effectively using its resources and infrastructure to extend its reach into the community. this is enormously important in building trust and support networks among indigenous people in the inner city (see figure 1). the programs discussed in this article only scratch the surface in terms of the huge task undertaken by u of w to provide community learning opportunities. but this research has demonstrated the immense ability of an urban university to effectively use its resources and infrastructure in order to extend its reach into the community and, through a variety of partnerships, to have an impact on the learning experiences of many people beyond the conventional structures of university programming. the evaluations conveyed important narratives about the perseverance of inner-city youth in the face of numerous challenges, improved indigenous academic success, and high parental involvement and turnout in community programs. youth and their families remarked that they felt a sense of belonging to the university community, and that it is not simply an exclusive, closed institution that happens to be situated within their neighbourhood. in fact, recent institutional statistics indicate substantial growth in the representation of indigenous students at approximately 10% and visible minorities at approximately 20% (university of winnipeg, 2015). overall, the reactions of evaluation participants were overwhelmingly positive with regard to their experiences at u of w, which was described as a reputable institution that seemed genuinely interested in getting to know the community. 9 axworthy et al.: community learning and university policy published by scholarship@western, 2016 f i g u r e 1 . b e s t p r a c t i c e s f o r c o m m u n i t y l e a r n i n g i n i t i a t i v e s b a s e d o n e v a l u a t i o n s o f p r o g r a m s o f f e r e d a s p a r t o f t h e u n i v e r s i t y o f w i n n i p e g ’ s i n d i g e n o u s e d u c a t i o n i n i t i a t i v e . b e s t p r a c t i c e # 1 : c u l t u r a l l y r e l e v a n t p r o g r a m m i n g all programs included culturally-relevant educational and learning opportunities with the goal of having families and children learn about the richness of their ancestry, celebrate first nations, métis, and inuit accomplishments and contributions, and increase cultural pride. programs were also consistent with indigenous approaches, such as hands-on or experiential learning opportunities that are relevant to participant’s real lives. family engagement was encouraged at every possible opportunity. the family learning programs were viewed as a family celebration of learning about culture and as an intergenerational transfer of knowledge. interviewed parents or guardians expressed a strong commitment to raising children who were proud of being aboriginal, to keeping them away from the cycle of negativity commonly associated with poverty, and to continue to celebrate their aboriginal heritage by passing along cultural traditions and legacies to their children. as noted by nguyen (2011), b e s t p r a c t i c e # 1 : c u l t u r a l l y r e l e v a n t p r o g r a m m i n g b e s t p r a c t i c e # 5 : f o s t e r i n g a s e n s e o f b e l o n g i n g t o t h e u n i v e r s i t y b e s t p r a c t i c e # 2 : s t r e n t h e n i n g c o m m u n i t y p a r t n e r s h i p b e s t p r a c t i c e # 4 : c o n n e c t i n g y o u t h t o m u l t i p r o n g e d l e a r n i n g o p p o r t u n i t i e s b e s t p r a c t i c e # 3 : b u i l d i n g s o c i a l c a p i t a l a m o n g y o u t h f i v e b e s t p r a c t i c e s 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.1 aboriginal education needs to be reframed in an aboriginal context that will provide aboriginal children with a sense of self-worth. that is, a sense of who they are and where they come from, which will impact community self-government and self-determination. (p. 231) b e s t p r a c t i c e # 2 : s t r e n g t h e n i n g c o m m u n i t y p a r t n e r s h i p s the university’s indigenous leadership cultivated strong partnerships, both internal and external to the university community, with public school stakeholders (principals, community outreach workers, school counsellors, and teachers), community residents, non-profit agencies, program volunteers, and university faculty and instructors. these partnerships have assisted in the development of innovative and culturally-relevant programs, and they have been sustained over the years. for example, each year, it is through a collaborative referral system with community groups and agencies, and public school partners in the inner city that students are recommended to the model school high school. these partners recommend students who show academic promise, but are not realizing their full potential and are at risk of falling behind for a variety of reasons. the community partners also help to facilitate communication between the model school faculty and a student’s parents or guardians. b e s t p r a c t i c e # 3 : s o c i a l c a p i t a l these programs have an added advantage that results from the wide age range of the students they recruit (ages 9 to 24): the younger children and adolescents get a chance to observe the older students and learn what level of commitment is required if they want to succeed academically and personally. for instance, perhaps the most significant feature of the summer camp is that it exposed hundreds of indigenous children to the positive peer influences of the camp’s leaders—nearly two-thirds aboriginal—an exemplary model of youth who are engaged with leadership in the indigenous community and who take their education and future aspirations very seriously. the positive role modelling, peer mentoring, and shared sense of identity helped indigenous children and youth to connect with each other and to be proud of their identity and also to see themselves as high school and post-secondary graduates. similarly, by focusing on physical activities such as the art of hoop dancing and basketball, the sacred seven healthy teen relationships program supported youth in their journeys of personal growth through cultural teachings and understandings, which unquestionably helped to build resilience in these youth. in fact, parents and guardians of children and youth leaders in all programs noted improvements in their children’s sense of responsibility, dependability, and leadership qualities since they began attending these programs. b e s t p r a c t i c e # 4 : m u l t i p r o n g e d l e a r n i n g o p p o r t u n i t i e s all programs employed multipronged educational and learning opportunities for youth. programs encouraged youth to connect to their education, provided summer employment and training, as well as offering opportunities for leadership and engaging youth in ongoing volunteer work in their communities. program developers also recognized the importance of using cultural teachings to help youth to establish better relationships with themselves, their families, and their communities. program resources helped build participants’ self-confidence and resilience as they worked towards discovering their cultural identity and achieving positive life results, including educational outcomes. participants in the model school, sacred seven healthy relationships, adventure kids, math camp, and family 11 axworthy et al.: community learning and university policy published by scholarship@western, 2016 learning programs reported more self-awareness, healthier interpersonal relationships, improved positivity, making better choices, and better decision-making abilities. in interviews and questionnaires, many youth spoke about their strong sense of responsibility to their community and expressed that they wished to be a part of the solution in strengthening their communities. as discussed by grover (2007), a life of service to community can create a self-sustaining model that strengthens its people in countless economic and political ways. some participants indicated that they were the first in their family and peer network to pursue a post-secondary education and, in many situations, they were the first to earn a high school diploma. furthermore, a significant long-run accomplishment is that the model school has produced 41 graduates (a graduation rate of more than 95% in a neighbourhood where a 50% graduation rate is the norm), of which 78% (n = 32) have gone on to pursue post-secondary studies to date. an economic cost analysis determined that the model school program pays for itself. compared to what it cost to educate students, throughout the course of their working lives, model school graduates of postsecondary programs will contribute more than twice as much to the tax base from their incremental earnings than a high school graduate2. this is the tip of the iceberg in terms of their contributions to society. the model school is a preventive investment as its costs are vastly outweighed by its farreaching social and fiscal benefits for society. b e s t p r a c t i c e # 5 : a s e n s e o f b e l o n g i n g t o t h e u n i v e r s i t y c o m m u n i t y access to the campus was key to all programming. nichols et al. (2014) have stated, “universities are difficult for ‘outsiders’ to navigate” (p. 80). nothing could be truer for groups that have had limited exposure to a university campus. by offering access to the university campus, the programs address barriers that often prevent inner-city children, many of whom are indigenous and new canadians, from accessing post-secondary education. all programs showed evidence of improvements in the participants’ sense of belonging to the university community. for instance, the university made space available for the weekly pow wow club and indigenous language programs. coming to the campus was a first occasion for many children, youth, and their families. d i s c u s s i o n a n d p o l i c y l e s s o n s evaluated programs had overall approval ratings of more than 90% by children and youth, parents and guardians, and school stakeholders; the reasons for this large-scale approval were primarily related to the programs’ holistic approaches to addressing the learning needs of indigenous peoples. activities were regarded as creative, culturally-relevant and, where applicable, addressed summer learning loss in an enjoyable way. programs were consistent with indigenous approaches, such as hands-on or experiential 2 net present value calculations: because a dollar amount in the present is worth more than the same amount in the future, a net present value calculation uses a discount rate (8%, as recommended by canada’s treasury board secretariat) to estimate all future incremental earnings in current 2015 canadian dollars and then to compare this value to the 4-year average per student expenditures ($42,000 in 2015 canadian dollars) at the model school. inflation rate: 2% based on conference board of canada estimates. average tax rate: 25% based on estimated average full-time full-year earnings of $65,000 per year (canadian dollars). average public and private wages (fulltime, full-year) by aboriginal status and education are based on the 2011 national household survey conducted by statistics canada. estimated earnings were retrieved from a table prepared in mcinturff & tulloch (2014). 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.1 learning opportunities that are relevant to participants’ real lives. family learning programs helped to build stronger family units and the community’s capacity to see itself as learners. adventure kids, the largest free summer day camp in the inner city, helped to alleviate the social isolation that some children from high poverty families experience during the summer break and who would not otherwise have the opportunity to attend a summer camp. some participants, including program staff, grew up in the university’s surrounding neighbourhoods. they revealed that there were previously no programs that offered cultural teachings, traditional dance, and aboriginal language preservation programs. in particular, the uniqueness of the wii chiiwaakanak learning centre was enormously important in building trust and support networks among residents in this part of the city. participant suggestions of areas for further development typically called for additional funding to expand the duration of programs (i.e., length of time offered or extending daily hours) or adding new programs, such as workshops in traditional ways of parenting. another lesson that was heavily emphasized was the need for all programs to continue their efforts to expand community partnerships. u of w’s model is provided at a relatively low cost compared to the societal benefits that extend beyond the substantive personal and community benefits. this begs the question: should there be public investment funds added to the already strained budgets of the university system? even in times of fiscal austerity, we simply cannot afford not to. if community learning initiatives result in higher graduation rates, fewer unemployed youth, and healthier, more engaged citizens, does this added human potential not enhance the public welfare instead of incurring the extra costs of economic repercussions of a more than 50% high school dropout rate (axworthy, 2009)? the cost analysis offered earlier of former model school student outcomes provides a clear answer that this model is a community investment strategy, which more than pays for itself in the long run. it simply makes sense in terms of prevention and helping young people to see themselves as agents of change in their own lives. the lessons learned from the evaluations present a viable approach to remediating the pervasive social problems in these neighbourhoods. if there are fewer children left on the streets to be recruited by gangs, or if the rates of addiction are reduced and the expense of security and incarceration are positively affected and family life improved, is that not of substantial public value (axworthy, 2009)? referring to the social benefits of the sacred seven healthy relationships program, one basketball coach remarked how most of the programming occurs during the “vulnerable” hours for young people, such as after school and early evening. these are the hours when youth are most at risk of becoming involved in negative behaviours. thus, the university’s recreation facilities and wii chiiwaakanak learning centre function not only as a safe place, but also as a preventive measure. coaching, mentoring, and role modeling mino bimaadiziwin, or a good life—which involves sports, team building, and keeping busy with learning activities—is one method of building belonging and offsetting some of the boredom and potential for youth to engage in high risk activities. these ideas are supported in meta-analyses of afterschool programs for vulnerable youth in the u.s., which suggests that non-academic activities may also have a positive impact on the developmental outcomes of young people (durlak, weissberg, & pachan, 2010; kremer, maynard, polanin, vaughn, & sarteschi, 2015). likewise, in their case studies of indigenous high school students, preston and claypool (2013) posed the question, “what motivates students to learn” (p.259)? their study identified key themes, such as a supportive environment, 13 axworthy et al.: community learning and university policy published by scholarship@western, 2016 relevant curricular content, role models, and many others; but after-school activities, including sports, were viewed as an important motivational aspect of students’ education. these are the kind of questions that the university contemplates as it continues to pursue its community learning strategy to help to slow the cycle of intergenerational poverty in these neighbourhoods. in fact, as many initiatives described herein are transferable to other situations, this university’s vision can help set new priorities for public policy, practice, and university funding models that commit to both the continuity and expansion of these programs. to date, the community learning initiatives described in this article have been largely funded through private sources and not public funds or the university’s operating budget (axworthy, 2009). in fact, most programs’ operational budgets are deeply underfunded, which calls into question the sustainability of private fundraising models since many of these sources of funding are at risk of dwindling over time. moreover, the evaluated programs only scratch the surface in terms of the exhaustive list of u of w initiatives for which private funding was raised, including affordable student residences mixed in with community townhouses, day care spaces, a young entrepreneurs program, and a culturally diverse social enterprise food service. in an effort to address the fact that children in the care of a child welfare agency—87% indigenous in manitoba—are underrepresented in high school and post-secondary graduation rates (brownell et al., 2015), u of w also introduced a tuition waiver program along with wraparound services (housing, textbooks, meal plans) to support the participation of youth in care in post-secondary studies. since the waivers were announced, several universities and local colleges now offer a tuition waiver program to youth in care. in light of the trc’s focus on education, these programs are best practice models that substantially broaden access for indigenous children and counter the dropout rate at the grade 9 level disproportionately affecting indigenous students. furthermore, in recognition of its responsibilities of indigenous inclusion under treaty one, u of w’s senate recently approved a motion that will ensure each graduating student is exposed to indigenous course content, including pedagogy (e.g., experiential learning). in addition, a formalized community charter was developed to govern a new recplex recreation and wellness facility, and it mandates free access for community-based groups to run their programs (axworthy, 2013). as argued by moore (2014), these brick and mortar projects “strengthen relationships of people to the places where they live and among those people who live there” (p. 20). the evidence gathered in our evaluations supports this idea. however, a major shortcoming of this community learning model is the lack of a sustained and coordinated government funding commitment, which could potentially undermine future efforts in the university’s civic mission. c o n c l u s i o n in summary, this research informed our understanding of key guiding principles that post-secondary institutions can implement to positively impact indigenous educational outcomes, including: • visionary leadership as a catalyst for changing the institutional culture in the face of obstacles and resistance. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.1 • equally as important is the recruitment of strong indigenous leadership entrusted to nurture authentic community partnerships and respectful relationships with ongoing, deliberative consultation. • a clear university governance model and formal policy framework for community engagement that makes it an institutional priority. • good fundraising capacity to support low-income students with a program of tuition credits, waivers, and bursaries, as well as ancillary services (housing, meal plans, etc.). • a willingness to listen to and respect the wisdom of the community you are intending to serve. the community knows what it wants and needs. the evaluations showed the transformative potential of community-engaged approaches as having an impact on the learning experiences of many people beyond the conventional structures of university programming. the five themes presented in this article identify some best practices to accomplishing these tasks. for instance, the most significant feature of the peer mentoring approach was that it helped indigenous youth and children to connect with each other and to be proud of their identity and also to see themselves as high school and post-secondary graduates. what is needed now, in light of the recent trc events across the country, is to form a seamless cooperative approach among governments, private sector, and educational institutions toward a community investment model that tackles at scale the literacy and educational outcomes of indigenous children and their families, and particularly the high school and post-secondary graduation gaps. some core principles include: • culturally relevant programming that encourages family and multigenerational engagement at every possible opportunity. • promoting a clear model of civically engaged youth, positive role modeling and mentoring among children and youth through a strong commitment to the leadership development aspects in any programming. this requires a commitment to empowering youth in program decision-making processes. • multipronged educational strategies and learning opportunities to help generate resilience and capacity in youth who may otherwise be poorly prepared to meet the challenges of postsecondary education and the labour market. these include pedagogical changes to include experiential learning, engaging traditional knowledge and cultural teachings, co-curricular activities such as skill-building workshops and employment experiences. the costs of these preventive investments are vastly outweighed by their far-reaching social and fiscal benefits for society. education is the new buffalo. 15 axworthy et al.: community learning and university policy published by scholarship@western, 2016 r e f e r e n c e s arendt, a., & westover, j. h. 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(2013b). winnipeg, cy, manitoba (code 4611040) (table). national household survey (nhs) aboriginal population profile. 2011 national household survey (catalogue no. 99-011-x2011007). retrieved from statistics canada website: http://www12.statcan.gc.ca/nhs-enm/2011/dp-pd/aprof/index.cfm?lang=e truth and reconciliation commission of canada. (2015). truth and reconciliation commission final report. retrieved from http://www.trc.ca/websites/trcinstitution/index.php?p=890 the university of winnipeg. (2015). the university of winnipeg 2015 strategic directions, june 2015 update: what we heard. winnipeg: the university of winnipeg. winnipeg harvest. (2015, february 14). hunger for hope. retrieved from http://www.winnipegharvest.org/hunger-for-hope-2/ 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.1 a p p e n d i x a i n n o v a t i v e l e a r n i n g c e n t r e p r o g r a m d e s c r i p t i o n s m o d e l s c h o o l ( 2 0 0 8 ) . the model school is a high school program accommodating approximately 45 to 50 students in grades 9 to12. it operates in partnership with the university of winnipeg’s collegiate high school (a private, tuition-based school), and addresses the needs of students from backgrounds that have traditionally been underrepresented in high school and post-secondary graduation rates; for example, low-income indigenous students and some new canadians who may have shown academic promise in their public school but were not realizing their full potential and were at risk of falling behind and dropping out of high school for a variety of reasons. the school has been developed as part of the university’s community learning mandate to eliminate barriers to education, and in order to realize this goal, the university of winnipeg provides underrepresented students an opportunity to attend the university’s collegiate high school at no financial cost to their families, as well as providing opportunity fund bursaries for their post-secondary studies. the school takes a holistic approach to its programming and utilizes individualized academic plans that identify and address the unique challenges faced by each student while providing an intensive support structure to help students overcome them in achieving academic success. a d v e n t u r e k i d s s u m m e r c a m p ( 2 0 0 7 ) . this summer camp is the largest free day camp in the inner city and serves more than 1,000 children from more than 40 public schools located in low-income neighbourhoods. the camp offers between 4 to 6 separate one-week programs that aim to address summer learning loss by engaging children in science and environmental activities, as well as helping to alleviate the social isolation that some children from high poverty families experience during the summer break. transportation is provided to get the participants to the camp site, as well as to build and reinforce a positive relationship with the schools and families, and a nutrition program provides healthy snacks and lunches to every participant. the camp employs and provides volunteer opportunities to more than 40 youth leaders between the ages of 14 and 25. the majority of these workers are aboriginal or they are visible minorities from the high poverty areas of winnipeg, and many have a strong interest in careers that deal with social justice issues. through the use of group-centered approaches, the employment experience teaches leaders about teamwork, positive peer influences, and life skills for daily living such as work ethic, leadership, responsibility, commitment, and dedication. s c i e n c e k i d s o n c a m p u s ( 2 0 0 6 ) . three times a year, approximately 50 students in grades 5 and 6 from inner-city schools attend a two-hour long weekly science program for a period of 8 to 10 weeks at the university campus. while on campus, science professors, teachers, and senior level students assist the children in conducting a variety of hands-on science experiments and activities tied to their school curriculum, such as dna sampling, squid dissection, studying how the brain works, and examining owl pellets. the program also focuses on increasing students’ sense of belonging to the university campus— for instance, that university is for them as well, and they have a right to benefit from it. the students take tours of different departments and facilities on campus, which helps to familiarize them with a postsecondary environment as it strengthens their science education and experience. 19 axworthy et al.: community learning and university policy published by scholarship@western, 2016 w i i c h i i w a a k a n a k l e a r n i n g c e n t r e p r o g r a m d e s c r i p t i o n s a professor and elder named the centre, and it means “partners” in the anishinaabe language. although wii chiiwaakanak centre has over 1,000 drop-in visits to its computer lab each month and hundreds more to its other community programming, three of their programs were evaluated: s a c r e d s e v e n h e a l t h y t e e n r e l a t i o n s h i p s ( 2 0 1 3 ) . the wii chiiwaakanak learning centre at the university of winnipeg has offered the sacred seven healthy teen relationships program for students primarily from schools in winnipeg’s high poverty areas (the inner-city, north end, and west end neighbourhoods). divided into two program components, basketball (pride group) and hoop dancing (girls group), the sacred seven healthy relationships program offers resources to indigenous children and youth between the ages of 9 and 19 that allow them to access traditional aboriginal teachings (seven sacred teachings and medicine wheel tool), helps them to feel connected to their ancestry, and to establish better relationships with themselves, their families, and their communities. the youth are also empowered to develop their own code of honour principles for healthy teen relationships, and they integrate these principles into their hoop dancing and basketball drills. the teens serve as role models and leaders by conducting presentations of what they have learned in the program at community public schools in the above noted neighbourhoods. f a m i l y l e a r n i n g p r o g r a m s l e t ’ s s p e a k o j i b w a y t o o u r k i d s ( 2 0 1 2 ) . this weekly multigenerational language program provides families and individuals of all ages a chance to learn about ceremony, the anishinaabe (ojibway) language, and traditional beliefs in a social and family environment. p o w w o w c l u b ( 2 0 1 2 ) . this weekly program provides community members of all ages with an opportunity to learn the art of traditional dancing (jingle dress, fancy shawl, grass and round dance, etc.), along with song and drum teachings. the program is open to families and individuals of all ages, knowledge levels, and abilities. s u m m e r i n d i g e n o u s m a t h l e a d e r s h i p c a m p ( m a t h c a m p ) ( 2 0 1 2 ) . the centre has offered a two-week math camp for 11 students from urban schools in the high-poverty areas of winnipeg. the camp runs from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. each day and, over the two-week period, students are given math lessons, lunches and snacks, and transportation to and from their residence at no cost to their families. the summer math camp provides students between the ages of 13 and 15 with an opportunity to sharpen their math skills (or get caught up) and learn more about the connection between mathematics and aboriginal cultures, while also participating in on-campus outings and off-campus field trips, such as a sweat lodge, smudging ceremonies, and sweet grass picking. the math camp continued over the next three summers (2013 to 2015) with the majority of participants returning each year. in 2015, math camp was expanded in numbers, as well as to include a model of youth leadership through a mentoring approach, as past participants were hired to tutor younger children in grades 3 and 4. 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.1 the international indigenous policy journal april 2016 community learning and university policy: an inner-city university goes back to school lloyd axworthy linda deriviere jennifer moore rattray recommended citation community learning and university policy: an inner-city university goes back to school abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license community learning and university policy: an inner-city university goes back to school microsoft word ms 8192 cover page.docx the international indigenous policy journal volume 11 | issue 4 november 2020 living in the south, caring in the north: exploring inuit women’s care responsibilities magalie quintal-marineau l'institut national de la recherche scientifique (inrs), canada, magalie.quintalm@ucs.inrs.ca pauktuutit inuit women of canada canada, info@pauktuutit.ca recommended citation quintal-marineau, m., & pauktuutit inuit women of canada. (2020). living in the south, caring in the north: exploring inuit women’s care responsibilities. the international indigenous policy journal, 11(4). https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.8192 living in the south, caring in the north: exploring inuit women’s care responsibilities abstract the increased inuit population in canadian metropolitan areas (cma) has recently gained attention among the scientific community as well as within inuit organizations. however, existing literature has overlooked the distinct experience of inuit women and, more significantly, the importance of care responsibilities in understanding women’s mobility. this study examines the relocation experiences of 46 inuit women across five cmas, and the role care sites play in initiating women’s relocation to cities. results show the key role caregiving responsibilities play in inuit women’s decisions to move to southern urban areas, as dysfunctional care spaces in the north push them away from their communities, and the potential for safer care sites in the south act as a pulling factor. keywords inuit women, care, colonialism, migration, gender roles creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. quintal-marineau & pauktuutit inuit women of canada: living in the south, caring in the north published by scholarship@western, 2020 1 living in the south, caring in the north: exploring inuit women’s care responsibilities the increasing inuit population in southern canadian urban centres has recently gained attention as an important focus for policy debate, as well as a research interest in the scientific community and within inuit organizations (kishigami, 2006; patrick & budach, 2014; pauktuutit inuit women of canada, 2017c; tomiak & patrick, 2010; tungasuvvingat inuit, 2016). the number of urban inuit continues to grow with an important increase between 2001 and 2016 (109.6%) that far outpaced national inuit population growth (44.3%; statistics canada, 2007, 2016). the urbanization of inuit has generated a growing body of research investigating inuit urban life and the specific factors that influence the decision to move to southern urban areas as well as the issues encountered by inuit in urban centres. these studies have delved into health issues (mcshane et al., 2006), language practices (patrick et al., 2013; patrick & budach, 2014), identity (budach et al., 2015; patrick et al., 2011; tomiak & patrick, 2010), homelessness (kishigami, 1999, 2008), pregnancy, parenting, and family challenges (mcshane et al., 2009; simonet et al., 2010). while inuit are not the only ones affected by these challenges, studies point to the importance of history, geography, culture, and identity in understanding both individual and collective experiences. it is important to note that the gendered dimension of the inuit urban experience remains understudied and poorly understood (for an exception see kishigami, 2002; pauktuutit inuit women of canada, 2017c), despite the fact that inuit women outnumber men in most canadian metropolitan areas (cmas; statistics canada, 2016). in exploring some gendered aspects of migration among inuit women, pauktuutit inuit women of canada (2017c) found similar mobility patterns and genderdifferentiated “push and pull” factors as first nations women (gerber, 1984; newhouse & peters, 2003). within the literature on the intersections between indigenous migration patterns and gender, research has suggested that women’s experience in cities is shaped both by gender identity and the colonial legacies that tend to marginalize and impoverish indigenous women (peters, 2000a, 2000b, 2006; williams, 1997). however, this scholarship has focused largely on individual pathways, omitting the more complex web of social relations that come into play in the process of relocation and, more importantly, the distinct caring responsibilities assumed by women. to explore inuit women’s role as carers, this article brings into conversation two bodies of research: geographies of care and inuit ethics of care. care as a geographical concept requires that we pay attention to the uneven social relations across space and, conversely, to the power of spaces as they produce relationships (daly & lewis, 2000; massey, 2004). spaces of care exist at various scales, from the individual, home, and local, to national and global (lawson, 2007). feminist geographers have produced a large body of research addressing the space–care–gender nexus. for instance, the global care chain literature addresses issues of female migrants from developing countries relocating to work for high-income families in developed countries to provide care for children, elders, and the whole family (ehrenreich & hochschild, 2003; huang et al., 2012; lutz, 2008; romero, 2018). at the local scale, scholars have examined the shifting geographies of care, from the home (mcdowell et al., 2005; pratt, 2009) to various private or state-run facilities such as day cares and senior homes (milligan, 2003; staeheli & brown, 2003). these complex and multi-scale geographies of caring work (popke, 2006) suggest that care is necessarily relational, in that it involves ongoing responsibility and commitment to an object (or subject) of care (tronto, 1989). the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.8192 2 by considering the connections between relocation and caring responsibilities, this article explores inuit women’s mobility and critically examines the push and pull factors that bring inuit women into canadian cities. specifically, we introduce data on the relocation experiences of 46 inuit women across five cmas and argue that these data raise two issues that feminist and indigenous literatures have overlooked: namely, that women’s caregiving responsibilities play a key role in relocation and that canadian colonial geographies shape social and spatial inequalities directly affecting inuit women’s agency and autonomy. in addressing these issues, we highlight the distinct resources and policies that are required to meet the specific needs of inuit women in urban centres. inuit families and caring approach the inuit nunangat is the inuit homeland in canada, and it encompasses four distinct land claim regions where 72% of inuit live today (nunavut, nunavik, nunatsiavut, and inuvialuit). across these territories, inuit share a common culture tied to the land, sea, and the resources they provide. a brief 60 years ago, the vast majority of inuit were living a lifestyle centered upon nomadic harvesting, hunting, fishing, and trapping (pauktuutit inuit women of canada, 2006). the production and distribution of local resources were socially structured and guided by kinship principles to ensure that everyone had access to food (niutaq cultural institute [nci] & qikiqtani inuit association [qia], 2011; wachowich et al., 1999). as inuit lived in ilagiit-based camps consisting of extended family members, the family was the main social organizational unit. these socially guided systems involved great ingenuity, intimate knowledge of the environment, and piliriqatigiingniq, which is the ability to work together in harmony for common purpose and in cooperation. today, the persistence of traditional sharing practices and associated social values and norms demonstrate and remain key components of the distinct inuit way of life (qia, 2019; searles, 2008). these traditional practices represent and reinforce inuit identity as a distinct group of people whose culture emphasizes togetherness and demonstrates the bonding between relations, households, and community members. similarly, inuit societal values emphasize the importance of generosity, social responsibility, and networks of care. key examples are inuuqatigiitsiarniq (caring for others), and pijitsirniq (serving and providing for one’s community; government of nunavut, 1999; inuit tapiriit kanatami [itk], 2018). these values underline the sharing practices that are undertaken by inuit to foster care and collaborative living and minimize deprivation, especially among vulnerable ilagiit members. while caring is understood as a shared responsibility between individual, family, and community, the labour associated with caring is generally divided along the lines of gender. as “keepers of the camp,” women traditionally held authority within the home and camp, understood as the primary care space, and enjoyed considerable autonomy (pauktuutit inuit women of canada, 2006). their responsibilities included managing camp life and ensuring collective well-being (reimer, 1996). today, inuit women continue to play a central role in organizing settlement life: they identify local issues and undertake social actions to address community needs. women’s caring roles include childrearing, elder care, and tending to the ill. furthermore, their duties often extend to collective well-being through volunteer work and community service (billson & mancini, 2007; guemple, 1986; pauktuutit inuit women of canada, 2006). in inuit culture, distinctions such as workplace, home, and productive and reproductive work are less pronounced, and community and domestic roles carry a different significance that is not necessarily quintal-marineau & pauktuutit inuit women of canada: living in the south, caring in the north published by scholarship@western, 2020 3 less powerful (leigh, 2009). for instance, inuk scholar karla jessen williamson (2011) argued that the correlation between physical work and the ontological and spiritual aspects of labour is highly important to fully appreciate women’s agency and contribution. furthermore, williamson (2011) noted that while activities and tasks performed by men and women might be different in nature, their roles in and contributions to society are of equal importance. to adequately examine inuit women’s social roles and responsibilities, one needs to consider the broader context of colonialism. in the canadian arctic, the modernization agenda of the canadian state has largely focused on transforming northern economic and social landscapes to southern standards. a series of public policy testifies to this aim. the first policy is the relocation and (re)settlement of families into permanent communities where inuit were expected to live according to qallunaat (non-inuit) standards. the family relocation policy aimed to reorganize inuit life according to dominant patriarchal ideas about the family, work, community, and social relations (healey, 2016; tester & kulchyski, 1994). for instance, inuit girls and women were to be trained in domestic sciences and household economics to become housewives, and inuit men were expected to engage in the labour market to fulfill their breadwinner role (awa, 1999). colonial policies introduced a patriarchal cultural bias in the conception of the gendered division of labour which resulted in undermining inuit women’s agency and social position within families and, more broadly, society. second, the restructuring of living arrangements in the new centralized communities favoured the mainstream canadian nuclear family model. indeed, housing policies and house designs reflected eurocanadian sociocultural norms and not inuit social organization (stern, 2005). for instance, houses were assigned to inuit males to enforce a view of families as independent, nuclear, and headed by a male breadwinner (christensen, 2017; damas, 1976; stern, 2005; tester, 2009). many educational materials were developed to promote “a hegemonic view of the sovereign nuclear family” (stern, 2005, p. 71), such as the booklet living in the new houses where typical euro-canadian gendered family roles are displayed: male breadwinner and female homemaker. previously, the traditional economic arrangements placed women in the key economic role of preparing furs for household use or sale. that this work was done at home while undertaking care-taking duties was not recognized under modernization (williamson, 2004). third, the residential school system implemented by the federal government involved removing inuit children from their families to attend residential schools in other communities or regions (pauktuutit inuit women of canada, 2007; qia, 2014; truth and reconciliation commission of canada [trc], 2015). up to three generations of children were required “to leave their families during their formative years and to miss out on inuit skills and knowledge that were so important to survival and cultural fulfillment” (qia, 2014, p. 117). studies have identified changes in family structure and disruption in the passing down of knowledge as key factors in current social problems in northern communities, such as domestic violence and dysfunctional relationships (healey, 2014; kral et al., 2011). racialized and gendered colonial legacies have shaped gender power relations within northern communities and contributed to inuit women’s marginalization from previously shared responsibilities (bodenhorn, 1990; williamson, 2011). while colonialism continues to affect their lives (monture & mcguire, 2009), the academic literature has not sufficiently addressed what this means in terms of inuit women’s mobility and their caring role. furthermore, the relationship between home as a primary care the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.8192 4 site and gendered caring responsibilities suggests differentiated mobility constraints for inuit women and men. in other words, the specific ways in which migration and urban relocation play out differ significantly between men and women. this gendered framework is compounded by the role that colonialism has played and continues to play in shaping social and spatial inequalities among inuit women in canada and elsewhere. in the following sections, we examine the context of inuit women’s mobility in canada and discuss the role care sites play in initiating women’s relocation to cities. methods this research examines inuit women’s experience in five major canadian cities: edmonton, winnipeg, toronto, ottawa, and montréal. these cities were selected because of the significant increase in inuit population in these areas. the design and objectives of the study were developed and conducted by the lead author and researchers at pauktuutit inuit women of canada. prior to conducting this project, pauktuutit’s team had consulted local organizations across these cities to assess specific needs and to initiate collaboration on the emerging priority of addressing the increased inuit presence in urban centres. following these consultations, the research framework was developed in a meaningful collaboration between pauktuutit and the lead author. similarly, the questionnaire and consent form design, data analysis, and report to the funding agency were developed, discussed, and negotiated between them following principles of collaborative research (itk, 2018). the research design was reviewed and approved by pauktuutit board of directors as well as the research ethics board at the university of ottawa where the lead author was a post-doctoral fellow. the research project uses an intersectional approach to identify the multiple and overlapping systems of oppression effecting inuit women’s experience in urban spaces. as kimberlé crenshaw (1991) argued, among black women in the usa, the intersectional experience is greater than the sum of racism and sexism. in other words, it means that inuit identity, female gender, racism, sexism, and poverty are not experienced sequentially: they are lived and experienced simultaneously (culhane, 2009). in conducting this research, we looked at the intersectional effects and consequences of colonial policies of relocations, racism against inuit in urban centres, as well as gender marginalization in urban spaces and its roots in northern communities. furthermore, data were analysed using an inuit gender-based analysis to assess the differential impact of migration and urban life on inuit women. an inuit gender-based analysis is an inuit-specific approach that considers the effects of culture and history on the experiences of men and women (pauktuutit inuit women of canada, 2017a). by considering historical data about inuit and the different roles and responsibilities required of men and women in order to maintain the family, social, and community structure, this article creates a more meaningful and relevant analysis that better reflects historical and contemporary contexts and lived realities (native women’s association of canada, 2007, 2010). a minimum of eight interviews were conducted in each city and informants were recruited using inuit urban networks, social media, and through local organizations that offer resources and support to inuit and other indigenous people. people were contacted through email, phone, or in person. we employed a purposeful sampling approach that consists of including every person interested in sharing their experience (crang & cook, 2007). individual interviews were conducted with participants using a conversational interview approach, which focused on individual stories. similarly, interviews with frontline service providers used a conversational approach and open-ended questions. overall, 68 quintal-marineau & pauktuutit inuit women of canada: living in the south, caring in the north published by scholarship@western, 2020 5 interviews were conducted: 46 with inuit women and 22 with service providers (only 5 of which were inuit). interviews with service providers were conducted to get a better understanding of the inuit presence in urban centres; as many of them were indigenous-focused organizations, we were interested to know for how long the organization had provided services to inuit and how the needs and profile were different from or similar to other indigenous groups. among the 46 inuit women, the vast majority (91%) had relocated to the south during their adulthood, two women (4%) did so as children following their parents, and two others (4%) were born in urban centres. as a whole, the average time spent living in an urban centre was six years. in addition, focus groups were facilitated to accommodate participants and local organizations, with one or two people taking notes to document collective experiences and exchanges between participants. they were structured as informal group discussions and included three main sections for discussions: migration paths, challenges, and family and gender-distinct responsibilities. the consultation process resulted in three engaging sessions with 19 participants (winnipeg, toronto, and montreal). interviews, individual stories, and focus group notes and recordings were transcribed and coded using key themes and concepts from our research objectives (cope, 2005). the first round of coding was done by the first author and then discussed with pauktuutit research team. while coding helped reduce the volume of data into a more manageable format, it also provided a visual organization of the data, wherein repeating ideas and patterns emerged even more clearly. overall, 62 codes were used. we conducted a second round of coding to see how codes appeared in the data, their frequency, and their relations with each other. finally, we grouped codes into larger themes that were meaningful. triangulating all the data allowed us to assess the credibility of the results and ensure that every specific objective was supported by more than one information source. results: a geography of care understanding participants’ motivation for migrating to southern cities provides a framework within which to consider inuit women’s gender roles and caring responsibilities. across all five cities, women participants repeatedly highlighted a series of factors that pushed them away from their communities as well as factors pulling them into urban centres. the women interviewed never identified only one reason for their choice to relocate. rather, women’s stories suggest that multiple and overlapping circumstances prompted their journeys south. through a thematic analysis of women’s narratives, three main factors emerged: opportunities for learning and working, need for services, and dysfunctional homes and relations. in the following section, we present the results from the interviews and focus groups conducted in the five cities. opportunities for learning and working women in all five cities described urban centres as places of opportunity. many of them emphasized a clear distinction between northern communities—where opportunities are limited—and southern urban places, where “opportunities are infinite” (woman, mid-thirties). participants usually considered “opportunity” to mean employment or vocational training and education possibilities. one woman (late forties) described her migration story: the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.8192 6 i’ve been in the (city) area for nine years now. my husband and i, we both moved here for jobs, but mostly my husband because he had an offer. but he is no longer with that job and now it’s me who has a good job. it’s much easier to get jobs, especially interesting ones; in the south, there are more opportunities for employment. while nearly all women had work experience in their hometowns, many felt that the south offered better opportunities. for instance, many young women talked about the lack of job diversity in the northern employment landscape: “you can either be a clerk or cashier, it seems” (woman, mid-thirties). a service provider in an inuit employment centre expressed a similar view: “there is a strong desire for new opportunities in terms of career, especially for inuit women, when they arrive at our offices.” even if urban centres present more employment opportunities than northern communities, women cannot necessarily access these jobs easily. in fact, many women mentioned that although they perceived more opportunities in the south than at home, various structural barriers kept them from obtaining them. among the most common barriers were applicants’ education level and lack of relevant previous experience. very few participants received education beyond grade 12, which only provided them access to low-wage jobs that conferred very little social advantage. a few women also discussed discrimination and racism towards indigenous people as a constraint for employment, especially outside of inuit or other indigenous organizations. nevertheless, employment opportunities, real or perceived, constituted an important factor for women’s migration to the south. an important divide between inuit men and women in urban centres appears in education and training programs. in all five cities, we visited university indigenous student centres or services and reached out to the inuit student community. of the small number of inuit students, the overwhelming majority are female. this statistic, while not new, raises questions over the long term about what inuit women do after graduating, and, more importantly, where they do it. accordingly, during the research process we asked all young female students about their plans after graduating. the vast majority described their stay in southern urban areas as temporary. one woman (an 18-year-old) emphasized that inuit women are strongly committed to their community and that this forms part of their traditional role: i have always been involved in my community—with children at the school, at the community centre, and at the daycare too. i feel this is my place, maybe because we, as women, have always been responsible for teaching the next generation. elders say that women were “guides” for our people. i can relate to that. i know other girls like me who went south for education, like colleges or universities, and then went back north to work either in the school or for the government; like good jobs where you can make a difference. anyway, this is why i am doing it; i think i can change things and make sure that we have access to a better education, one that is truly inuk. one student advisor in a university indigenous centre noted that during the six years she had worked there, 12 inuit female students had been referred to the centre, while no male students had. she also noted that indigenous women (not only inuit) usually undertake studies that are directly relevant and applicable to their home community, such as early childhood education, teacher preparation programs, nursing, or management. these courses of study present them with more options after graduating: the route back home lies open, as does the opportunity to stay in the urban centre. quintal-marineau & pauktuutit inuit women of canada: living in the south, caring in the north published by scholarship@western, 2020 7 furthermore, this case study suggests that women are choosing opportunities that align with their caring role. indeed, in women’s narratives, learning and working opportunities strongly correlate with an increased ability to support their children and families: i came south because of my mom who was sent for a long period for medical issue, but i still had to send some money back home, so i took a job at the health centre. it’s like win-win! similarly, several interviews revealed that the search for better opportunities for their children motivated women’s journeys. in particular, access to higher quality education compelled their moves: every summer we go back home to the northwest territories. and my son sees his cousins and they talk about school. even for him it’s so obvious—the lack of good education; his cousins have no homework, teachers are there half of the time, and there is a lack of motivation. my husband and i moved because of our jobs, but in the end we are not going back because of our son’s education; it’s so much better here. (woman, mid-forties, edmonton) taking part in a learning program or joining the labour force clearly correlated to a positive experience in the urban centres and served as an anchoring factor. while the value of wage work was consistently tied to short-term financial need, and education to future possibilities, women emphasized the social context within which these activities were performed. beyond immediate and future possibilities, work and learning environments offered a “place to go” and “people to be with.” this was especially true for women who worked with other inuit. consequently, women with positive employment or learning experiences were more likely to state a desire to remain in urban centres. accessing services access to services was a common reason for women to move to the urban centres we visited. some of them had no choice (i.e., they were forced to), but others moved in order to overcome personal issues or to support family members. here, again, these reasons often overlapped in women’s testimonies. indeed, in women’s narratives, children’s needs often spurred moves. for instance, three women in our sample had moved to southern cities to access services for their children whose health conditions were not treated properly in their hometown. in one case, the child and her mother had moved three times in ottawa to access services for a period of six to nine months. each time, the mother dealt with finding a place to stay close to the treatment centre, navigating the city to find help and resources, while her other two children were left home: he needs physio three or four times a week and some counselling, and none of that is available in our community. so, doctors suggested that we move here and try it to see if he improves. it seems to help a lot, so i’ll stay at least for a few months, but i miss so much my other children so i don’t think i can stay here for too long. two other women moved to follow children sent into foster homes. throughout interviews, participants repeatedly described the child welfare system as a mechanism that pushed women into cities and sometimes kept them there, since they wanted to be close to their children. indeed, according to a report published by statistics canada in 2016, 51% of inuit foster children were living with non-inuit and nonthe international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.8192 8 indigenous foster parents (turner, 2016). one service provider explained how this situation disproportionally affects inuit women: children are sent into foster care in the south because the welfare system has very strict rules on who can become a foster home. for instance, you need to be able to provide a room for each child. they can’t share the same room if they are not the same sex.1 this makes it very difficult for inuit families in the north; there is a housing crisis! so, what happens? children are being sent south and the mother follows. in the south, she has no roots, no contacts, even for us trying to reach them is hard. their journey in the city is often painful: losing their children, having no place to go and no one to reach out to; on top of that they need mental health support and they need to treat their addiction—because that’s the reason they’ve lost their child in the first place. being forced to access treatment or services was the story of eight women we encountered. one young woman (22-year-old), whom we met at a friendship centre, had just completed an addiction treatment program: i am not sure what i’ll do next. they [social workers] forced me to get into this program so i can get my child back—now he is with my mom. i am not sure what my options are now; if i go back home it’s gonna be all the same again. i have no place for myself up there. so, i am thinking i’ll stay here in the city, get an apartment, and then get my child here. as she described, addiction treatment and mental health support were common reasons for “being sent south.” routes back to the north often proved to be more convoluted, as it often meant going back to the social context that produced the difficult circumstances. she noted being torn between going home where she belongs, but where all her personal issues started, and staying in a city where she had no roots or family. another young mother came to a similar conclusion—there is no safe and easy path back after completing treatment: okay, so they [health workers] tell you now you are recovered, so you can go back home, but don’t take anything [drugs]. but really . . . how do you think this is really possible! there is so much drama in the north. and this drama is never “fixed;” no one is fixing it. it’s like their [health workers] job is to “fix” you but not fix the real problem: trauma. several women expressed similar concerns about the “drama” in their hometown. in all cases, the term “drama” was used to talk about traumatic experiences (past and present) that haunted families and communities and that impinged on both individual and collective well-being. whether women referred directly to intergenerational trauma or used elusive terms to speak about issues related to violence and abuse, all women acknowledge the lack of specialized counselling and support services to address unresolved trauma, which is a persistent infrastructural issue in inuit communities (pauktuutit inuit women of canada, 2016). 1 foster care and adoption standards do not allow a child of a different sex to share a room. quintal-marineau & pauktuutit inuit women of canada: living in the south, caring in the north published by scholarship@western, 2020 9 dysfunctional homes and relationships of the 46 interviews with inuit women, 28 identified issues related to housing as critical to their decision to migrate. these ranged from not being able to access an apartment to homelessness. for several decades, most northern communities have been experiencing a housing crisis that affects individual and collective well-being (christensen, 2017). attempts to solve the housing crisis have remained unsuccessful due to persistent barriers that include limited local economic opportunities, a virtually nonexistent private housing market, insufficient public resources, high building and maintenance costs due to cold climate, costly shipping and transportation of materials, and geographic remoteness (christensen et al., 2017; northern housing forum, 2018). the lack of adequate and affordable housing in the north also accounts for inuit women’s journeys to urban centres. for one woman (midtwenties), home had always been her parents’ house, but her sister who also lived there got into a relationship and now had two kids: i had no place anymore in my parents’ house, with all my sister’s kids. not even an official room for myself. i have been waiting for years to get a place, but when you have no children you are not a priority. when we started talking about her house, she frequently mentioned she had no home but was just living in her parents’ house. by the end of the interview, she explained she had no home anymore in the north, and also could not call the city home, even though she had been living there for three years now. statistics derived by the national aboriginal health organization (naho) further indicate that inuit face the most crowded living conditions in all of canada, which has a direct negative impact on a number of health concerns, such as social relationships, family violence, and children’s ability to learn (knotsch & kinnon, 2011). additionally, considering the age demographics in inuit communities—specifically that 50% of inuit are under the age of 25—access to safe and adequate housing is an even greater priority. this situation has led to a housing crisis in inuit communities, including the constant threat of becoming homeless in the harsh climate of the arctic as well as in urban areas across canada. in women’s stories, the built environment (house) and the caring space it provides (home) were under considerable stress in many inuit families, leading to dysfunctional homes and relations.2 while almost two-thirds (61%) of the interviewees mentioned moving because of the lack of adequate and affordable housing in the north, the turning point for most participants was when their ability to care for themselves, and eventually for others, was affected. home is the primary care site for all participants and is the first space women referred to when they describe their responsibilities towards others. in many women’s stories, what they considered home had shifted over the years prior to their decision to move. no participants mentioned moving because there was no place to live, but rather 2 also, women and children who need to leave because of family violence often experience further harm as a direct result of the lack of alternate housing in the north. in inuit nunangat specifically, there are only 15 shelters in 51 communities, which means that more than 70% of inuit communities do not have a safe shelter for women and children experiencing family violence. homes and friends and families are often also overcrowded, and it can be difficult to ascertain if these homes are free violence. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.8192 10 identified dysfunctional space as the real reason to leave. a young woman described her home as “an overwhelming space” where people screamed at each other; once, her brother in-law got into a fight and punched her friend in the face: “there was too much violence in the house. not towards me or the kids, but between people that would come to my place. the kids could see it, they witnessed it, and i couldn’t stand it anymore,” she said. she first moved to her parents’ place, but again decided it was time to move away from a place where her children were exposed to violence. after moving to iqaluit for a couple months to a friend’s house, she went further south to a larger city. although the first year was difficult, she described her choice as “the best thing that could have happened to my children.” her story is not unique; many participants undertook similar journeys to provide safer homes for their children. furthermore, participants reported unstable relationships and dysfunctional family environments as an important reason for leaving their home. while the women used multiple definitions and perceptions of “instability” and “dysfunctional” environments, a majority of them reported a feeling of exclusion rooted in a lack of communication with their social networks. participants frequently mentioned isolation, gossip, and being looked down on as factors contributing to their feelings of exclusion from their community. indeed, relationship breakdowns and the stigma facing women who left relationships were often turning points in women’s decisions to leave. another woman (mid-thirties) had experienced social pressure to take the blame for breaking up with a boyfriend on two separate occasions. twice she decided to leave her community for a while: he was blaming me and i was blaming him. but he started telling stories about me, personal stuff, so i would be ashamed. this went on for weeks and he wouldn’t stop. at the end i was staying home, ‘cause i didn’t want to see anyone, the way they looked at me. ultimately, she moved away seeking a place to feel safe and care for herself. while the participants described many dysfunctional social dynamics that led them to leave their homes, the cycle of violence was most significant. we found women in each city who had fled violence and sought refuge. behavioural patterns emerged: women tend to escape alone, hoping to find a safe place in a large city that offer anonymity and eventually bring their kids with them. other women reported fleeing with their children, sometimes passing through multiple destinations before ultimately reaching urban centres in the south. in all circumstances, women experienced heavy trauma, remorse, and feelings of inadequacy as a parent. finally, beyond the domestic sphere, women talked about mental health issues as well as emotional and social problems that contribute to the disintegration of the social fabric in some northern communities, burning bridges between families and generations. participants brought up the difficulty of maintaining healthy relationships with people who suffered from addiction or mental health issues, particularly when those people were marginalized by the community (for a broader discussion see healey, 2014; pauktuutit inuit women of canada, 2017b). at the same time, the lack of services to deal with these issues in the community constituted a reason for leaving their hometown. in this regard, women talked about the need for trauma-related healing programs within northern communities to better address mental health needs and prevent migration associated with access to services. quintal-marineau & pauktuutit inuit women of canada: living in the south, caring in the north published by scholarship@western, 2020 11 discussion and conclusion the aim of this research was to examine the gender–migration–care nexus from the perspective of inuit women living in cmas. existing literature on urban indigenous populations has overlooked the distinct experience of inuit women, and more significantly, the importance of care responsibilities in understanding women’s mobility. this study addresses these gaps by examining inuit women’s distinct migration experiences, and the role care sites play in initiating women’s relocation to cities. evidence from this study suggests three key findings. first, inuit women’s experience in canadian urban centres speaks to the significance of caregiving among inuit families, communities, and society. during our interviews, the caregiving role emerges as an important vector for inuit women’s relocation, and family responsibilities deeply influenced their experiences in urban centres. while family plays a central role in inuit society, and women are vital to this institution, women face significant challenges within the family unit. because indigenous women are disproportionately targeted by the current practices of the child welfare system, inuit women can be forced to make difficult decisions regarding their children’s health. in a study conducted in the northwest territories, christensen (2012) found that the child welfare system draws indigenous women into northern regional centres, where they remain to stay closer to their children in foster care. many women we met during the research were mothers and grandmothers; their stories often revealed similar challenges and pathways where the children’s wellbeing had initiated their relocation. according to statistics canada, in 2016, 17% of inuit women aged 15 and above were heading families on their own, compared with 8% of non-indigenous women, with women heading about 8 in 10 inuit single-parent families (statistics canada, 2018). similarly, in 2011, the national household survey identified that inuit children in cmas were twice as likely as non-indigenous children to live with a single parent (36% compared with 18%). these numbers suggest the highly gendered reality of parenting: inuit women, who are more likely to be the primary caregivers, are overrepresented in singleparent families, and are more likely than men to migrate. from a policy perspective, an inuit-specific approach to child welfare and family support is essential both in the north and in the south in order to reflect distinct inuit culture and history. in particular, this system ought to ensure the transfer of inuit children into other inuit families. the women we met in the five cmas are acutely aware of their responsibilities toward family and community; they see their role, in the past and in the present, as tied to the social well-being of their family network and community as a whole. the way they contribute may have changed as a result of their settlement transition, but as reimer (1996) found in pangnirtung, nunavut, women remain the “primary instigators of social action concerning health care, child-care, sexual abuse, suicide, and general family breakdown” (p. 84). as our interviews demonstrate, this is also true across wide swaths of space, with women extending their care responsibilities to people living thousands of kilometers away. this caring geography suggests an embodied consciousness of female roles and responsibilities and a highly gendered ethic of care. the second key finding that emerges from this research is the interconnectedness of northern and southern spaces. indeed, from a geography perspective, the north and the south are highly interconnected in inuit women’s experience. some of the difficulties women face in northern the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi:10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.8192 12 communities (for example the lack of infrastructure and services to address trauma, domestic violence, abuse, and addiction) lead them to urban centres in the south. as a result, many participants and service providers have identified the need for better services in the north. as one woman in ottawa mentioned: we need to heal the north too. our northern communities need healing, otherwise this pattern [fleeing violence] will never stop. other structural barriers, such as the child welfare system, systemic racism, and exclusion, are pervasive in inuit women’s experiences in the south and wend their way into the north. in other words, what happens in one location extends far beyond geographical boundaries—social and material geographies in the north or south are inextricably linked. for instance, social and economic inequalities in northern communities and uneven spatial development were repeatedly mentioned as a policy priority for services providers. addressing the root problems would avoid undesired or “forced” migration. for example, mental health counselling in inuktitut that is available in a timely manner is needed for women, men, and children all across the north. lastly, the third finding points to the legacies of governmental colonial policies as well as the ongoing effects of continued colonial practices on inuit women and communities. research has shown that the long history of colonization, forced relocation, residential schools, racism, and discrimination have had devastating impacts on inuit families (healey, 2014; rae, 2011; trocmé et al., 2004). specifically, the state’s paternalistic policies have led to radical changes in family organization (i.e., from extended family to nuclear family) and the roles of women and men (models of male as breadwinner and female as housewife). these profound transformations imposed on inuit families and communities are all linked to family breakdown, domestic violence, and dysfunctional social relationships, and they play a key role in explaining women’s mobility (guerrero, 2003; haskell & randall, 2009; o'neil, 1986). our research points to the need to support more initiatives that focus on the non-material needs of inuit women and their overall well-being. these include healing from past trauma and experiences, identity building, and empowerment. in exploring inuit women’s migration into canadian cities, we found that dysfunctional care spaces in the north played an important role in pushing women away from their homes, and conversely, the possibility of establishing safer care sites in urban centres pulled women south. this geography of care challenges the organization of services for inuit women and their families because resources do not follow when they move from one location to the other. these dynamics also suggest that housing and care policies in the north play a key role in shaping women’s mobility. in this matter, our findings further suggest that the relationship between housing policies, care spaces, and women’s ability to perform their caring responsibilities merits further investigation. the results of this study add to a growing body of qualitative research that seeks to understand the context in which mobility occurs among indigenous peoples, including inuit, and, more broadly, speaks to ongoing research on the role that colonial policies and practices continue to play in shaping gender inequalities and vulnerabilities among indigenous peoples both nationally and internationally. quintal-marineau & pauktuutit inuit women of canada: living in the south, caring in the north published by scholarship@western, 2020 13 references awa, a. a. 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(1997). canadian urban aboriginals: a focus on aboriginal women in toronto. the canadian journal of native studies, 17, 75-101. williamson, k. j. (2004). gender and equity, the arctic way. in n. einarsson, j. n. larsen, a. nilsson, & o. r. young (eds.), arctic human development report (pp.187-191). stefansson arctic quintal-marineau & pauktuutit inuit women of canada: living in the south, caring in the north published by scholarship@western, 2020 19 institute. https://pame.is/mema/memadatabase/349_arctic%20human%20development% 20report.pdf williamson, k. j. (2011). inherit my heaven: kalaallit gender relations. government of greenland. ms 8192 cover page.pdf ms 8192 quintal-marineau living in the south rce.pdf research as cultural renewal: applying two-eyed seeing in a research project about cultural interventions in first nations addictions treatment the international indigenous policy journal volume 6 issue 2 the future of traditional knowledge research: building partnership and capacity article 4 may 2015 research as cultural renewal: applying two-eyed seeing in a research project about cultural interventions in first nations addictions treatment laura hall ljhall@laurentian.ca colleen a. dell university of saskatchewan, colleen.dell@usask.ca barb fornssler barb.fornssler@usask.ca carol hopkins chopkins@nnapf.com christopher mushquash cjmushqu@lakeheadu.ca recommended citation hall, l. , dell, c. a. , fornssler, b. , hopkins, c. , mushquash, c. , rowan, m. (2015). research as cultural renewal: applying twoeyed seeing in a research project about cultural interventions in first nations addictions treatment. the international indigenous policy journal, 6(2). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.4 research as cultural renewal: applying two-eyed seeing in a research project about cultural interventions in first nations addictions treatment abstract this article explores the application of two-eyed seeing in the first year of a three-year study about the effectiveness of cultural interventions in first nations alcohol and drug treatment in canada. two-eyed seeing is recognized by canada’s major health research funder as a starting point for bringing together the strengths of indigenous and western ways of knowing. with the aim of developing a culture-based measurement tool, our team carried out an indigenous-centred research process with our interpretation of two-eyed seeing as a guiding principle. this enabled us to engage in a decolonizing project that prioritized indigenous methodologies and ways of knowing and knowledge alongside those of western science. by concentrating on indigenous governance in the research process, our project supported efforts at indigenous cultural renewal. two illustrations are offered, our team’s reconceptualization of western derived understandings of data collection through indigenous storytelling and our research grant timeframe with indigenous knowledge gardening. this article contributes to the indigenous research and policy literature which is lacking documentation about how indigenous communities and research teams are benefitting from two-eyed seeing. keywords cutural renewal, two-eyed seeing, cultural interventions, indigenous governance, first nations addictions treatment acknowledgments this work was supported by the canadian institutes of health research [funding reference number ahi – 120535]. our work was inspired by the devotion of elder jim dumont and our treatment centre project partners to walk with first nations’ people on the path to wellness guided by cultural interventions. members of the honouring our strengths: indigenous culture as intervention research team include: nominated principal investigator: colleen dell (university of saskatchewan); co-pi: peter menzies (independent. formerly; centre for addiction and mental health), carol hopkins (national native addictions partnership foundation), jennifer robinson (assembly of first nations. former designate; jonathan thompson); coapplicants: sharon acoose (first nations university of canada), peter butt (university of saskatchewan), elder jim dumont (nimkee nupigawagan healing centre), marwa farag (university of saskatchewan), joseph p. gone (university of michigan at ann arbor), christopher mushquash (lakehead university), rod mccormick (thompson rivers university. formerly; university of british columbia), david mykota (university of saskatchewan), nancy poole (bc centre of excellence for women’s health), bev shea (university of ottawa), virgil tobias (nimkee nupigawagan healing centre); knowledge users: kasi mcmicking (health canada), mike martin (national native addictions partnership foundation), mary deleary (independent. formerly; nimkee nupigawagan healing centre), brian rush (centre for addiction and mental health), renee linklater (centre for addiction and mental health), sarah steves (health canada. former designate; darcy stoneadge); collaborators (treatment centres): willie alphonse (nengayni wellness centre), ed azure (nelson house medicine lodge), christina brazzoni (carrier sekani family services), virgil tobias (nimkee nupigawagan healing centre. former designate; mary deleary), patrick dumont (wanaki centre), cindy ginnish (rising sun), hilary harper (ekweskeet healing lodge. acting director; yvonne howse), yvonne rigsby-jones (tsow-tun le lum), ernest sauve (white buffalo youth inhalant treatment centre), zelda quewezance (saulteaux healing and wellness centre), iris allen (charles j. andrew youth treatment centre), rolanda manitowabi (ngwaagan gamig recovery centre inc./rainbow lodge); collaborators (leadership): chief austin bear (national native addictions partnership foundation), debra dell (youth solvent addiction committee), val desjarlais (national native addictions partnership foundation. former designate; janice nicotine), rob eves (canadian centre on substance abuse. former designate; rita notarandrea), elder campbell papequash (saskatchewan team for research and evaluation of addictions treatment and mental health services advisor); contractors (methodology): elder jim dumont (nimkee nupigawagan healing centre), randy duncan (university of saskatchewan), carina fiedeldey-van dijk (epsy consultancy), laura hall (university of saskatchewan); margo rowan (university of saskatchewan); management: barbara fornssler (university of saskatchewan. former designate; michelle kushniruk). creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. authors laura hall, colleen a. dell, barb fornssler, carol hopkins, christopher mushquash, and margo rowan this research is available in the international indigenous policy journal: http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/4 http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/4?utm_source=ir.lib.uwo.ca%2fiipj%2fvol6%2fiss2%2f4&utm_medium=pdf&utm_campaign=pdfcoverpages       r e s e a rc h a s c u l t u ra l r e n e w a l : a p p l y i n g t w o e y e d s e e i n g i n a r e s e a rc h pro j e c t a b o u t c u l t u ra l i n t e rv e n t i o n s i n f i rs t n a t i o n s a d d i c t i o n s t re a t m e n t this article reflects on the substantial benefits our community-based research team gained by applying two-eyed seeing as a guiding principle in its three-year study. honouring our strengths: indigenous culture as intervention in addictions treatment was launched in 2012 with the ultimate goal of developing a measure to gauge the effectiveness of cultural interventions in first nations alcohol and drug treatment in canada.1 our team’s interpretation and application of two-eyed seeing as a guiding principle has aided us in engaging in a decolonizing project that prioritizes indigenous methodologies and ways of knowing and knowledge alongside western science. two-eyed seeing assisted our team with supporting indigenous cultural renewal by confronting colonial practices via first nations governance in our collaborative study involving indigenous and non-indigenous researchers.2 governance is a large and at times unwieldy concept that draws from diverse disciplines and is interpreted variously. we share with bevir (2009) that “governance includes new ways of thinking about social coordination and patterns of rules as they appear in civil society, political institutions, and the international arena” (p. viii). the concept of two-eyed seeing originated through in the work of mi’kmaq elders murdena and albert marshall from eskasoni first nation, along with dr. cheryl bartlett at cape breton university’s institute for integrative science and health/toqwa’tu’kl kjijitaqnn (iwama, marshall, m., marshall, a., & bartlett, 2009). two-eyed seeing is expressed by elder marshall as: “to see from one eye with the strengths of indigenous ways of knowing, and to see from the other eye with the strengths of western ways of knowing, and to use both of these eyes together” (bartlett, marshall, m., & marshall, a., 2012, p. 335). the canadian institutes of health research’s (cihr) institute of aboriginal peoples’ health has adopted the concept of two-eyed seeing with the goal of transforming indigenous health and figures it prominently in its vision for the future (cihr, 2011).                                                                                                                 1 this study was funded by the canadian institutes of health research (cihr) [funding reference number ahi–120535]. the partners were the assembly of first nations (afn), centre for addiction and mental health (camh), national native addictions partnership foundation (nnapf), and the university of saskatchewan (u of s) among others. 2 we use the term indigenous to replace the use of the common usage of the term word aboriginal, which is limited to north america and is government imposed. according to the united nations, it is estimated that there are more than 370 million indigenous people spread across 70 countries worldwide. practicing unique traditions, they retain social, cultural, economic, and political characteristics that are distinct from those of the dominant societies in which they live. spread across the world from the arctic to the south pacific, they are the descendants — according to a common definition—of those who inhabited a country or a geographical region at the time when people of different cultures or ethnic origins arrived. the new arrivals later became dominant through conquest, occupation, settlement or other means. (masaquiza, n.d., p. 1). although also government imposed, we use the term first nation to specifically distinguish from inuit and métis indigenous peoples in canada. 1 hall et al.: research as cultural renewal published by scholarship@western, 2015       understanding research as cultural renewal, that is, research as inherently beneficial to the healing and wellbeing of indigenous communities, has become increasingly accepted among indigenous researchers seeking to undo the entanglements of earlier colonial research (smith, 1999). research, in the words of elder albert marshall, must attend to the wholeness of a community, the “physical, emotional, cognitional, and spiritual . . . and the individual, yes, but also the collective” (bartlett et al., 2012, p. 338). in many ways, these words build on the vision of the unnamed elder who, at the start of the royal commission on aboriginal peoples, famously shared that “if we [indigenous peoples] have been researched to death . . . maybe it’s time we started researching ourselves back to life” (brant castellano, 2004, p. 98). as a guiding principle, two-eyed seeing is flexible: it offers indigenous peoples across canada the opportunity to tailor a collaborative research process with western science that takes seriously the commitments, responsibilities, and potential of first nations governed research (iwama et al., 2009). to reflect on the benefits of applying two-eyed seeing as a guiding principle in our study, we begin by situating colonialism as a root cause of addictions in first nations communities. our project is premised on the understanding that traditional cultural interventions in treatment can help heal the whole person—spirit, heart, body, and mind—and that western scientific standards for measuring the benefits of culture can be met through the development of a first nations specific cultural assessment tool. next, the role of two-eyed seeing is discussed in our decolonizing project as an aid for prioritizing indigenous methodologies and ways of knowing and knowledge alongside the knowledge garnered from methods common to western science. we then provide illustrations of how our team’s reconceptualization of and engagement with western derived understandings of data collection and our research grant timeframe, supported by the application of an indigenous understanding of storytelling and knowledge gardening, helped to foster cultural renewal. documenting our team’s interpretation and application of two-eyed seeing, and specifically concentrating on first nations governance in the research process, is an important contribution to the indigenous research and policy literature. ba c kg ro u n d in 2011, the assembly of first nations (afn), the national native addictions partnership foundation (nnapf) and health canada (first nations and inuit health branch) released a report on the addictions continuum of care from a nation-wide consultation with the national native alcohol and drug abuse program (nnadap) and the youth solvent abuse program (ysap). the report, titled honouring our strengths: a renewed framework to address substance use issues among first nations in canada, forefronts the prominent role of culture in first nations’ healing from substance abuse (nnapf, assembly of first nations [afn], & health canada, 2011). a key element of the framework is the identified need for indigenouscentred research and performance measurements that honour cultural renewal. cultural renewal, including traditions, ceremonial practices, and sacred roles, is understood to be intrinsic to indigenous healing and wellness (nagel, 1997). in canada, there are 49 federally funded adult and youth nnadap and nine ysap treatment centres. the majority of nnadap centres were founded on western approaches to treatment 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.4       in the 1980s, and later incorporated indigenous understandings of healing and personal growth. culture was foundational to ysap centres from their inception in the mid-1990s. today, nnadap and ysap treatment centres variously apply western therapeutic approaches, such as cognitive behavioural therapies, while increasingly strengthening the use of traditional cultural interventions (dell et al., 2011). our current study team included elders, knowledge keepers, treatment providers, individuals with lived experience, and academic researchers, both indigenous and non-indigenous and academic and community-based. despite our varied backgrounds, we came together and jointly worked from the perspective of an indigenous-centred research process. this process prioritized indigenous methodologies and ways of knowing and knowledge through the application of our team’s interpretation of two-eyed seeing and consequent attention to first nations governance. while our project operated on the premise that applying research tools from western science is necessary, such as particular forms of quantitative data analysis, care was taken that this did not dislocate first nations governance from the research process. without it, research efforts supporting cultural renewal would be significantly hindered, if not impossible. substantial effort was directed toward bringing indigenous and western worldviews together in a way that reclaimed indigenous understandings of evidence-based research and that reinforced the empirical elements of an indigenous worldview, as originally shaped by elders and knowledge keepers. the discussion that follows provides a grounded example by which addiction researchers can learn about how a two-eyed seeing research process can contribute to indigenous cultural renewal. we begin by first situating colonialism as an underlying cause of problematic substance use for first nations peoples and traditional culture as key to healing from its destructive impacts. we likewise acknowledge the historic problem of colonial research. t h e c o l o n i a l pro b l e m : c o l o n i z i n g r e s e a rc h western science’s questioning of culture and indigenous worldviews, and their combined ability to impact healing for indigenous peoples, was understood in our project to be inherently colonial. to explain this process, canada’s colonial history and its ensuing problematic position in research are briefly reviewed. indeed, the relation between culture and wellness has long been acknowledged by cultural knowledge keepers, and more recently has been documented in western scholarship (dell et al., 2011; hopkins & dumont, 2010; kirmayer, simpson & cargo, 2003). historically, however, indigenous wellness has been challenged by colonial efforts and this continues into the present day (hansen & antsanen, 2014; tait, 2008). ongoing colonization efforts, as explained by alfred (2009), can be understood as both dispossession as well as dependency. to provide a clear-cut example of cultural dispossession, consider the constant pressures on indigenous land relationships, as borders both physically (e.g., treaties) and metaphorically interrupt indigenous peoples’ rights and connections to traditional territories. at the same time, indigenous peoples face cultural dispossession through “cultural dislocation” via “pressures exerted . . . from settler society” (alfred, 2009, p. 43). indigenous women, for example, face epidemic levels of violence as a direct outcome of cultural loss and indigenous communities face disproportionate rates of substance abuse and representation in 3 hall et al.: research as cultural renewal published by scholarship@western, 2015       child protective services and the prison system (blackstock, cross, george, brown, & formsma, 2006; demers, 2014; gough, trocme, brown, knoke, & blackstock, 2005). r e s p o n d i n g t o c o l o n i a l i s m : i n d i g e n o u s c u l t u ra l r e n e w a l i n a d d i c t i o n s r e s e a rc h indigenous scholars and communities and those working with them have challenged the assumptions of western researchers and eurocentric notions of western intellectual superiority (blaut, 1993) while creating spaces for collaboration and sharing in ongoing ways (ermine, sinclair, & jeffery, 2004). to illustrate, smith’s (1999) book titled decolonizing methodologies unpacks the many dimensions of eurocentric-western research on indigenous peoples. her recent 2nd edition contributes to a growing record of indigenous-centered research projects and practices that urge the development of long-term indigenous non-indigenous relations as imperative to develop a new research strategy (smith, 2012). terms like “smash and grab” are used to implicate those colonial researchers who have entered communities, taken what they needed, and left damage behind (cleary, 2013, p. 13). the consequent disrespect given to indigenous ancestral remains and cultural and sacred items, for example, are part of a larger pattern of euro-western researchers disregarding indigenous knowledge and appropriating it for their own use (mann, 2003). a range of disciplines have been associated with these kinds of practices, leaving the prospects of collaborative research on shaky ground. some researchers acknowledge the linkage between indigenous culture and healing from substance abuse as rooted with traditional knowledge keepers and communities (dell et al., 2011; kirmayer et al., 2003; mushquash, comeau, mcleod, & stewart, 2010). alfred (2009) shared that the central problem for indigenous health rests on “the effect of colonially-generated cultural disruptions” (p. 42) and he and others (e.g., kirmayer & valaskakis, 2009) connect the subjugation of indigenous cultures, including the exploitation of indigenous lands, specifically to substance abuse. dell et al. (2011) add that ongoing suppression of first nations culture has significantly contributed to the problematic use of substances among recent generations of first nations youth. it is necessary to recognize problematic substance use within this context, including the impacts of residential schooling, the sixties scoop (i.e., state apprehension of a generation of indigenous children), and other legislative, social, cultural, and economic forms of oppression (alfred, 2009; barker, 2009). kirmayer et al. (2003) optimistically offer though that, “indigenous cultures have encompassed healing traditions that were then undermined by missionary efforts, but are now in a process of renewal” (p. 17). mcivor, napoleon, and dickie (2009) outlined the protective effects of culture (including traditional foods and medicines) and language thereby establishing connections between indigenous cultural, economic, and political renewal, and overall health. it has been our team’s experience that culturally rooted addictions research can contribute to indigenous wellness and cultural renewal by bringing awareness to the link between colonialism and addiction and by actively re-centering an indigenous worldview and governance in the research process. it is important to point out that while challenging colonialism is vital, the strength of indigenous culture must be central to the overall project (alfred & corntassel, 2005). indigenous cultures have survived colonial interferences for over a century (monture, 1999; 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.4       simpson, 2011), with possibly the most significant being the continued survival of indigenous languages and ceremonies (regan, 2010). in recent years, reconciliation and truth telling about canada’s colonial history has become central to national healing and renewal efforts. one pathway not often considered as supporting cultural renewal is research. in canada, two-eyed seeing has emerged as a guiding principle for indigenous research and our team’s interpretation and application of it has, in our view, contributed to indigenous cultural renewal. t w o e y e d s e e i n g : bri n g i n g t o g e t h e r w e s t e rn a n d i n d i g e n o u s w a y s o f k n o w i n g the application of two-eyed seeing as a guiding principle in research is intended to bridge the divide of power and understanding between indigenous and western researchers and processes. this translates for some researchers, including our team, into applying the tools of western science from within an indigenous worldview. two-eyed seeing also aligns with decolonizing and indigenous research methodologies (kovach, 2009; smith, 1999; wilson, 2008), governance, and self-determination—that is, the principles of ownership, control, access, and possession (ocap) (first nations information governance centre [fnigc], 2013; national aboriginal health organization [naho], 2005) and research as ceremony (wilson, 2008). there is also a link to western research traditions in community-based, participatory, and action research, which have likewise emerged in response to colonial research practices and paradigms across the globe (minkler, 1997). ultimately, two-eyed seeing is envisioned by our team as a guiding principle for research to support a renewal of indigenous ties to culture, land, and language (iwama et al., 2009). to illustrate, guided by two-eyes seeing from the start, our project undertook an environmental scan in its first year of traditional cultural interventions at 12 nnadap and ysap treatment centres across the country. generally, environmental scans “are used to provide decision makers with knowledge about current social, economic, technological, and political contexts, and to identify any potential shortand long-term shifts” (graham, 2008, p. 1022). our team formulated research questions for the scan that acknowledged the inherent benefits of culture, while seeking community understanding about the nature of these benefits, and also accounting for the limitations that colonization has imposed on indigenous culture. two-eyed seeing offers guidance for managing the contributions and tensions between indigenous and western researchers and processes. it is not simply about bringing the two worldviews uniformly together nor is it about trying to equally balance perspectives or “turntaking.” rather, for our team, it is about making conscious decisions to activate the right lens based on which one is more appropriate to use given the circumstances at hand. in our case, the right fit meant that first nations governance would lead the research process to establish the authority of indigenous knowledge. this re-centering debases enshrined modes of colonial power and governance mechanisms as it brings into question the fundamental role of project team members. for example, principal investigators from academic institutions typically lead federally funded research processes. however, in our project, elder jim dumont largely directed the data collection process. initially, this was not a straightforward undertaking for our team to put into practice because gaps in understanding and tensions in power relations between 5 hall et al.: research as cultural renewal published by scholarship@western, 2015       indigenous and non-indigenous researchers remain very much rooted in historic, and often under-recognized, colonial power relations. in coming to recognize the colonial power relations that a funding award can imbue (e.g., who is considered knowledgeable or what kinds of knowledge are considered eligible to receive funding), our team was then able to negotiate the governance of our everyday work in a less colonial fashion. ultimately, this better facilitated meeting the output and product requirements of the grant funding than holding to one knowledgebase would have allowed. adopting two-eyed seeing as a guiding principle in our study identified early on the individual and collective power differences of our various team members and canada’s colonial history. summarized in the words of one of our team members, “the process of two-eyed seeing teaches western team members to see the whole forest, to see the relationships, the ecologies, before chopping down individual trees to build a house” (fornssler, personal communication, 2014). our interpretation of two-eyed seeing, by emphasizing indigenous governance, enabled us to then prioritize indigenous methodologies and knowledge and ways of knowing. in turn, our research effectively supported efforts at cultural renewal. two illustrations of this are examined—our approach to western-derived understandings of data collection and working within the imposed research grant timeframe. these illustrations conflict with ongoing colonization efforts often evidenced but largely unrecognized in research projects, and which tuck and yang (2012) described as “settler fantasies of easier paths to reconciliation” (p. 4). to apply first nations governance to our research process, our team drew upon two indigenous concepts: storytelling and knowledge gardening. t w o e y e d s e e i n g a s s t o ry t e l l i n g : c o l l e c t i n g d a t a adopting two-eyed seeing as a guiding principle facilitated our team’s application of an indigenous-centred approach to data collection that highlighted storytelling. storytelling is an embodied and interconnected form of knowledge sharing (corntassel, chaw-win-is, & t’lakwadzi, 2009). storytelling in itself is and has innate connections to traditional indigenous cultural practices and ceremonies, oftentimes accompanying or forming elements of them. stories enact living knowledge rooted in animate ecologies (sheridan & longboat, 2006). corntassel et al. (2010) wrote, “indigenous storytelling is connected to our homelands and is crucial to the cultural and political resurgence of indigenous nations” (p. 149). stories themselves are recognized as cultural knowledge. at the start of our project, our western driven commitment to undertake an environmental scan at nnadap and ysap treatment centres was re-conceptualized to emphasize indigenous storytelling. environmental scans are increasingly being used by health researchers to develop evidence-based policies (graham, 2008), although there is no documentation yet in the literature of an indigenous centred environmental scan for data collection of which our team is aware. members of our team visited 12 first nations treatment centres with elder jim dumont as the lead researcher. this meant that when academic researchers attended it was primarily as observers and record keepers. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.4       elder dumont opened each treatment centre visit with the telling of the anishinaabe creation story. when elder dumount spoke to creation, his words honoured the spirits of place and the knowledge of the participants while gifting them with and lifting them through an intellectual, spiritual, emotional, and physical understanding of the wholeness and beauty of indigenous lives, people, and land. to honour the stories and those they were being shared with, our team members shared gifts of tobacco, sweetgrass, and cloth unique to our own territories. community members, elders, and knowledge keepers reciprocally welcomed our researchers in ways that were inclusive of ceremony local to the first nations of the territory or area. gifts came in the form of welcoming ceremonies, sacred foods and medicines, and prayers for wellness, safety, and a good life, and were often spoken or sung in the home dialect of the community. this indigenous centred process not only addressed the problematic “helicopter approach” of research historically undertaken with first nations—where researchers would drop in to collect data and leave with no benefits and too often disruptions to the community—but more important it facilitated community healing and growth (ferreira & gendron, 2011, p. 154). elder dumont’s telling of the creation story, which is shared among first nations across the land but is not universally known, as a part of the environmental scan and with the inclusion of ceremony enhanced indigenous governance through empowerment via the sharing of the knowledge itself and the culturally important form in which it was shared (i.e., storytelling). this is not a common recognized outcome of research other than in some community-based approaches and as continually emerging in indigenous research approaches. our team identified and treated the stories shared with us as indigenous knowledge; that is, complex teachings, humorous additions, historical happenings, and/or sacred tellings depending on the story and the intent for its sharing. we therefore did not “validate” the stories (the data) with western processes and tools, but rather, we applied an indigenous lens on the western scientific research process to maintain cultural continuity in the construction of our culturebased measurement tool as well as to illuminate the gaps in cultural understandings between the two worldviews. for example, our team formed an indigenous knowledge sub-group of elders and knowledge keepers dedicated to ensuring that the information gathered remained rooted in indigenous knowledge and ways of knowing. to illustrate simply, this group identified and explained inaccuracies in the use of terminology by some of our team members: drums and feathers are not “artifacts;” they are sacred items that have an inherent spirit and value in a first nations context. our team’s facilitation of storytelling in our environmental scans, and corollary engagement in traditional indigenous practices and ceremonies, offered us solid insight into how research can contribute to first nations governance and cultural renewal. this happened on several levels. first, the act of bringing storytelling to a community and participating in its related ceremonies and practices supports cultural renewal through traditional knowledge sharing. this ranged in our project from elder dumont’s teachings to the sharing of the good minds and spirits by local elders and knowledge keepers. this was particularly important for community members disconnected from their traditional knowledge. second, by participating in cultural practices and ceremony, such as prayer, our team celebrated an indigenous worldview’s inclusion of the 7 hall et al.: research as cultural renewal published by scholarship@western, 2015       creator in the research process and our project benefitted from the guidance prayer offered. this likewise happened through gift giving, as we recognized the importance of culture and were able to promote its practice. in anishinaabe worldview, gifting is “a gesture of relationship between people, animals, spirits, and other entities in the universe, given in the interests of creating ties, honoring them, or asking for assistance and direction” (doerfler, stark, & niigaanwewidam, 2013, p. xv). for example, members of our team were gifted by a community with a sweat lodge at our first full team meeting. this allowed members of our team to participate in and practice culture. to do so in a context of teachings specific to our project enabled our team to move forward with the project “in a good way.” overall, identifying and treating the shared stories themselves as indigenous knowledge offered our team specific insight into research supporting cultural renewal through first nations governance of the process. t w o e y e d s e e i n g a s k n o w l e d g e g a rd e n i n g knowledge gardening is a concept applied by cheryl bartlett and other members of the institute for integrative science and health at cape breton university, and is described as a dynamic interplay of seeding, nurturing, and growing information just as a traditional gardener of the land would (bartlett et al., 2012, p. 336). knowledge gardening recognizes a consciousness between human and more-than-human environments, and the advantages of recognizing and bringing such knowledge together in timely, patient, and respectful ways (bartlett et al., 2012; karabeg & lachica, 2008). nurturing knowledge, much like seedlings and plants in a garden, supports cultural renewal via its inclusive approach that is respectful of place and territory, culture, and responsibility (bartlett et al., 2012). these ideas were similarly expressed in a teaching by one of our project’s advising elders, gladys wapass-greyeyes. during our initial national team meeting, elder wapass-greyeyes instructed several members of our team in a small group exercise to draw a flower. she shared that the flower represented an indigenous approach to understanding wellness, starting with the roots of a person’s life and lineage, moving upward through their connection with mother earth, and coming to flowering and fruition. the earth and the waterways evoked in elder gladys’ image remind us that health and wellness is dependent on the wellbeing of all elements and members of creation. elder wapass-greyeyes also reminded our team that a plant needs to be nurtured over time for a flower to bloom. attention to knowledge gardening in our project, and more specifically recognizing that consciousness exists between human and more-than-human environments, and the need to bring knowledge together in timely, patient, and respectful ways, aided our team in overcoming the limitations of western understandings of a research grant timeframe. the marshalls, along with iwama and barlett shared how, “[f]rom time to time, we grow anxious about the pace of our journey, what seems to be working and what not” (iwama et al., 2009, p. 9). instead of our project being stressed and limited by its imposed western timeframe, we nurtured patience in our study and its environment, as well as with one another, so we could undertake a research process founded in indigenous governance. this meant that when team members would raise concern over the extra time we allotted to a certain stage of the research process, we would all be reminded of the cultural guidance the project has been offered. it also meant that when western 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.4       research methods were used, a culturally rooted analysis was needed in order to validate the information. though time intensive, it was necessary to sort the data analysis completed by western researchers and coders through a cultural lens with elders and knowledge keepers. without this understanding, our project would not have contributed to indigenous cultural renewal. it seemed daunting at first, with the pressure of the funder’s timeframe always looming, but as our project moved forward the benefits were recognized. in some communities, for example, paid on-site coordinators aided in reformulating our research questions to reflect important cultural nuances and to enrich our collective outcomes. it did add time to our originally envisioned research process, and made the timeline of other parts of the project “tight,” but was nonetheless necessary. the western concept of “time” and working from a set timeline was challenged with indigenous knowledge and ways of knowing governing the process. our team collectively carried the understanding that we would end up where we need to be by following an indigenous-centred process that best fit the project. for example, we collectively understood that ceremonial prayer for the project would guide our team’s work. things did not always move smoothly when two opposing worldviews (the two eyes) approached an issue within the project in divergent ways. however, by the conclusion of the project and the analysis of our data with a primarily western tool (quantitative data analysis), few on the team were surprised that the research techniques that supported an indigenous governed process ultimately developed a measure to gauge the effectiveness of cultural interventions in first nations alcohol and drug treatment in canada that was identified as valid through western statistical techniques. the guidance of prayer and ceremony was near universally accepted among our team members to be a guiding force in all stages of the study. d i s c u s s i o n with two-eyed seeing guiding our team’s experiences with our study and supporting an indigenous-centred research process, we found that this created significant room for dialogue between indigenous and western thought. winder (2005) described the space between the two eyes of two-eyed seeing as a place of potential, of energy, of “schismatic ambience . . . between people and cultures, and in particular whenever and wherever the physical and philosophical encounter of indigenous and western worlds takes place” (p. 305). our team’s focus on indigenous governance enabled us to engage in a decolonizing project that prioritized indigenous methodologies and ways of knowing and knowledge alongside western science. this naturally led to our research supporting efforts at cultural renewal through the application of the indigenous concepts of storytelling and knowledge gardening to re-conceptualize western derived understandings of data collection and a research grant timeframe. we have specifically learned through our research process that our team was able to recognize and engage with indigenous knowledge with attention to cultural understandings, practices, and ceremonies. the need for a new approach, for this kind of approach, about building respectful relationships while ensuring that research adds to the renewal efforts of indigenous communities, is well supported (ermine et al., 2004; smith, 1999). by facilitating indigenous governance in our project, it specifically helped our team to prevent western science from being universalized to the exclusion of indigenous science (peat, 2002; 9 hall et al.: research as cultural renewal published by scholarship@western, 2015       snively & corsiglia, 2000). that is, we confronted in our project the commonly reproduced colonial-based research structure (coulthard, 2007). some communities and scholars are expanding this thinking to the idea of “borrowing back,” as indigenous peoples re-affirm our own scientific processes and initiate partnerships with non-indigenous researchers. scientific inquiry is not a new concept to indigenous peoples. the indigenous societies that europeans first encountered in their post-1492 travels were larger and more developed than is currently understood (mann, 2011). the innovations of indigenous peoples range from permaculture and sustainable food production to democratic thought (weatherford, 1988). while certain technologies, for example in aviation, may seem to be exclusively western, many components of the technology originate in other cultures. for instance, vulcanized rubber was invented by indigenous people in peru (snively & corsiglia, 2000). western scientists are coming to realize the loss that occurs when these innovations are ignored or devalued and some are now seeking to rectify the imbalance (clark, 2002; iwama et al., 2009). canada’s colonial project is currently undergoing challenges on numerous fronts, including research (regan, 2010). in our research team’s experience, the insights we gained from applying two-eyed seeing as a guiding principle weaves together with the efforts of indigenous community-based researchers globally who have called for a decolonizing methodological approach that is both culturally grounded and community controlled (smith, 1999; smith 2012) as well as research that is in essence ceremony itself—renewing, healing, and beneficial to the communities involved (wilson, 2008). at the same time, moving forward will still necessarily require consciousness about the unsettled nature of the western colonial project. keeping this in mind, alongside our team’s insights from applying two-eyed seeing in our project, we suggest the following next steps for research and policy to forefront indigenous governance under the guidance of two-eyed seeing and in support of cultural renewal. first, we suggest furthering decolonizing theory and its translation into research practice. attention to this has the potential to shift research processes and outcomes significantly, as has been demonstrated by the guidance two-eyed seeing offered to our study. decolonizing theory pushes researchers to move knowledge beyond the boundaries of a particular project and as such offers avenues for broader cultural renewal, particularly when the research is community-based. this, in turn, will contribute to the identification of indigenous-governed policy aims, research scope, and community impact. second, we suggest linking with national projects that support cultural renewal and have the potential for significant policy impact. in the case of our project this includes, for example, the first nations mental wellness continuum framework. a linking approach can help to legitimize ongoing indigenous-governed work that is generated from varying perspectives and originating points and with a similar goal. also, by sharing information and resources, researchers and others can work from the most current knowledge base available, ensuring our projects are both relevant and timely. finally, we suggest creating pathways for cultural learning as understanding unfolds. this could mean engaging more casual conversation between team members, facilitating more formal teachings with knowledge keepers and elders, or greater overall research team participation in culture camps and ceremony. it must be kept in mind in any movement forward that two-eyed seeing as a guiding concept is a learning process and not a perfected outcome. it is not a prescriptive list about how to achieve cultural renewal through an indigenous governed research process. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.4       there are two key limitations of this article. first is that our team interpreted two-eyed seeing very specifically as first nations governance of the research process, which in turn, supports indigenous cultural renewal. the scope of our culturally rooted analysis was based on information from first nations elders and knowledge keepers. many would identify this as a strength. second, first nations governance does not just account for indigenous methodologies, knowledge, and ways of knowing. as shared, governance can be an unwieldy term and variously interpreted. for researchers on this project, centering first nations governance, capacity building, and knowledge renewal is also about moving toward decolonization as an ongoing project. c o n c l u s i o n working together, between indigenous and western sciences, necessitates an understanding of indigenous governance, internal dissonance, and resistance within western discourses, and that a distance exists between the two worldviews. resistance to colonial research practices were built into our study from the start alongside a first nations worldview to ensure indigenous governance of the project. happenings such as elder dumont’s gifting of the anishinabe creation story, alongside the gifts of other elders’ teachings, among many others, infused our research with a way of thinking, reflecting, and learning that is rooted in the beauty, creativity, and critical thought of an indigenous worldview. across canada, first nations treatment centres have identified the need for work in addictions and mental health research that clearly and effectively re-centres the cultures and worldviews of first nations peoples (nnapf et al., 2011). we believe that our decolonizing study, through the guidance of two-eyed seeing as we interpret it, has been able to contribute to this goal. we encourage researchers and policy makers alike to renew indigenous governance structures and strategies in lieu of projects that mistakenly centre colonialism in our collective narratives. taking up this challenge has the potential to contribute to national as well as global efforts at indigenous cultural renewal. indigenous peoples are already in the process of reclaiming and renewing culture, identity, and belonging and guidance from two-eyed seeing can help contribute to this specifically in research and policy. 11 hall et al.: research as cultural renewal published by scholarship@western, 2015       r e f e re n c e s alfred, t. 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(2005). integrative research as appreciative system. systems research and behavioral science, 22, 299-309. 15 hall et al.: research as cultural renewal published by scholarship@western, 2015 the international indigenous policy journal may 2015 research as cultural renewal: applying two-eyed seeing in a research project about cultural interventions in first nations addictions treatment laura hall colleen a. dell barb fornssler carol hopkins christopher mushquash see next page for additional authors recommended citation research as cultural renewal: applying two-eyed seeing in a research project about cultural interventions in first nations addictions treatment abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license authors research as cultural renewal: applying two-eyed seeing in a research project about cultural interventions in first nations addictions treatment leashes and lies: navigating the colonial tensions of institutional ethics of research involving indigenous peoples in canada the international indigenous policy journal volume 6 | issue 3 article 2 june 2015 leashes and lies: navigating the colonial tensions of institutional ethics of research involving indigenous peoples in canada martha l. stiegman york university, stiegman@yorku.ca heather castleden queen's university, heather.castleden@queensu.ca recommended citation stiegman, m. l. , castleden, h. (2015). leashes and lies: navigating the colonial tensions of institutional ethics of research involving indigenous peoples in canada. the international indigenous policy journal, 6(3). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.2 leashes and lies: navigating the colonial tensions of institutional ethics of research involving indigenous peoples in canada abstract ethical standards of conduct in research undertaken at canadian universities involving humans has been guided by the three federal research funding agencies through the tri-council policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans (or tcps for short) since 1998. the statement was revised for the first time in 2010 and is now commonly referred to as the tcps2, which includes an entire chapter (chapter 9) devoted to the subject of research involving first nations, inuit, and métis peoples of canada. while the establishment of tcps2 is an important initial step on the long road towards decolonizing indigenous research within the academy, our frustrations—which echo those of many colleagues struggling to do research “in a good way” (see, for example, ball & janyst 2008; bull, 2008; guta et al., 2010) within this framework—highlight the urgent work that remains to be done if university-based researchers are to be enabled by establishment channels to do “ethical” research with aboriginal peoples. in our (and others’) experience to date, we seem to have been able to do research in a good way, despite, not because of the tcps2 (see castleden et al., 2012). the disconnect between the stated goals of tcps2, and the challenges researchers face when attempting to navigate how individual, rotating members of rebs interpret the tpcs2 and operate within this framework, begs the question: wherein lies the disconnect? a number of scholars are currently researching this divide (see for example see guta et al. 2010; flicker & worthington, 2011; and guta et al., 2013). in this editorial, we offer an anecdote to illustrate our experience regarding some of these tensions and then offer reflections about what might need to change for the next iteration of the tcps. keywords indigenous research, community-based participatory research, research ethics boards; relational ethics creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/   l e a s h e s a n d l i e s : n a v i g a t i n g t h e c o l o n i a l t e n s i o n s o f i n s t i t u t i o n a l e t h i c s f o r r e s e a r c h i n v o l v i n g i n d i g e n o u s p e o p l e s i n c a n a d a d o i n g r e s e a r c h “ i n a g o o d w a y ” b e c a u s e o f o r d e s p i t e t h e t c p s 2 ? ethical standards of conduct in research undertaken at canadian universities involving humans has been guided by three federal research funding agencies (canadian institutes of health research [cihr], natural sciences and engineering research council of canada [nserc], and social sciences and humanities research council of canada [sshrc]) through the tri-council policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans (or tcps for short) since 1998; the statement was revised for the first time in 2010 and is now commonly referred to as the tcps2 (cihr, nserc, & sshrc, 2010). in the original version, short shrift was given to research involving indigenous1 peoples despite growing critiques2 of their decades-long involvement as “exotic subjects of study.” a year after the tcps became policy, linda tuhiwai smith (1999) published her seminal book, decolonizing methodologies: research and indigenous peoples, emblematic of a growing movement at the grassroots level and a new generation of scholars, indigenous and non-indigenous allies alike, saying enough is enough: indigenous peoples have been “researched to death” and need avenues for “researching back to life” (see brant castellano, 2004). in response to these critiques, one of the federal research funding agencies, the cihr, undertook lengthy consultations with indigenous peoples, communities, and organizations as well as university-based researchers concerning how best to do health research ethically with this population. cihr produced a well-received policy document in 2007 (cihr, 2007). soon after, it became clear that the tcps needed updating. as a result (though some have criticized the process, arguing that insufficient indigenous community engagement or researcher consultation took place), the tcps2 included an entirely new chapter (chapter 9) devoted to the subject of research involving first nations, inuit, and métis peoples of canada (cihr, nserc, & sshrc, 2010). the intention of this new chapter has been to provide a distinct framework for university-based research ethics boards (rebs) to evaluate research protocols and ensure that they meet the three guiding principles of the tcps2: respect, concern for welfare, and justice—as they apply in the unique context of research involving indigenous peoples in canada. on paper, the tcps2 looks good. in its preamble, it respects the jurisdiction of indigenous communities over research, stating: “it is not intended to override or replace ethical guidance offered by aboriginal peoples themselves [emphasis added]” (p. 105); and encourages researchers to undertake community-based and participatory approaches (i.e., shared decision-making, relationships established before research is undertaken, bi-directional capacity building, etc.) (see castleden, sloan morgan, & lamb, 2012). however, following its acknowledgement of jurisdiction, it does not give any guidelines to rebs or researchers in terms of how to navigate the tensions that arise when the ethical guidance of indigenous peoples contradicts that of a university reb. at the end of the day, the issue appears to                                                                                                                 1 in canada, indigenous peoples are the original inhabitants of the land; according to the canadian constitution, they are identified through the use of an umbrella term “aboriginal,” which includes first nations, inuit, and métis. following alfred (2009), we use “indigenous” as a means of acknowledging the inherent rights and responsibilities of the original peoples of turtle island (north america) that flow from their unique relationship to their traditional territories. we use the term “aboriginal” when quoting official documents, and when describing the interface between indigenous groups and institutions of the canadian settler-state. 2 see, for example, the royal commission on aboriginal peoples (rcap, 1996). 1 stiegman and castleden: leashes and lies published by scholarship@western, 2015   become one of researcher compliance—with the academy as opposed to the ethical directives given by indigenous peoples themselves. specifically, as stated in tcps2: “to be eligible to receive and administer research funds from the [tri-council] agencies, institutions must agree to comply with a number of agency policies [i.e., tcps2] set out as schedules to an agreement between the agencies and institutions” (cihr, nserc, & sshrc, 2010, p. 5). should a researcher comply with ethical guidance offered by indigenous research partners that contravenes that of their university-based reb implementing the tcps2 (or other policies), the researcher is at risk of losing their project funding. in short, they risk their careers in the academy, especially if they are pre-tenure, and their indigenous partners risk losing the benefits of the potential research processes and outcomes that would be taking place in their communities. given these circumstances, the indigenous jurisdiction that the tcps2 acknowledges would seem, therefore, to be token at best; the colonial academy, represented by the reb, retains ultimate decision-making over the research process. while the establishment of the tcps2 is an important step on the long road towards decolonizing indigenous research within the academy, our frustrations—which echo those of many colleagues struggling to do research “in a good way” (see, for example, ball & janyst, 2008; bull, 2008; guta et al., 2010) within this framework—highlight the urgent work that remains to be done if university-based researchers are to be enabled by establishment channels to do “ethical” research with indigenous peoples. in our3 (and others’) experience to date, we seem to have been able to do research in a good way, and at times this has been despite, not because of, the tcps2 (see castleden et al., 2012). the disconnect between the stated goals of the tcps2 and the challenges researchers face when attempting to navigate how individual, rotating members of rebs interpret the tpcs2 and operate within this framework begs the question: wherein lies the disconnect? a number of scholars are currently researching this divide (see for example flicker & worthington, 2011; guta et al., 2010; guta, nixon, & wilson, 2013). in this commentary, we offer an anecdote to illustrate our experience regarding some of these tensions and then offer reflections about what might need to change for the next iteration of the tcps. “ j u s t g o t a n o t h e r r o u n d o f f # * & i n g r e v i s i o n s b a c k f r o m t h e r e b ! ” one of the challenges in (and strengths of) doing community-based participatory research (cbpr), particularly with indigenous communities as described above, is the length of time needed to build the foundations of a collaborative undertaking, namely building trusting relationships, and a common vision for research that responds to community needs and priorities. this opening phase is paramount if real power sharing is to take place; yet, it falls largely outside of established funding structures. in our case, we were able to overcome that initial hurdle thanks to our long-standing and on-going relationships with our first nation research partners that pre-dated the actual research project by several years. a research focus was established through a series of exploratory discussions with community leaders, harvesters,                                                                                                                 3 both authors are non-indigenous scholars. the first author has 10 years of experience engaging in communitybased participatory research (cbpr) involving indigenous peoples and has submitted ethics applications to three institutional rebs. the second author has 15 years of experience engaging in cbpr involving indigenous peoples and has submitted ethics applications to three institutional rebs; she has also served on an institutional reb, assisted with the development of the tcps2 tutorial associated with chapter 9, has been an invited speaker at several academic conference on the topic of ethical research involving indigenous peoples in canada, and has a research trajectory in this area. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.2   and members of the elected band council over the winter and spring of 2013. funding was secured that summer, and planning with a band-appointed community liaison began in the fall of 2013. a research advisory circle was established early in january 2014, and together we began collectively defining the roles and ethical responsibilities of the circle, refining the goals of the project, as well as the logistics of carrying it out. by march 2014, we were ready to go to the university reb, as well as the ethics board of the indigenous nation in question (a process, which in this context, happens in parallel), with our application to approve our research design and protocols. we submitted our application and three weeks later the significant energies that we should have channeled into the community to maintain this exciting momentum (when the real work needed to start in terms of recruitment, training, mentorship, and planning) instead got channeled into interfacing with the university reb when we received a 5-page letter requesting major revisions, and attention to minutia that seemed, at least to our minds, could only rightly be made in collaboration with our partners as the project rolled out in real-time. this, despite the fact we received ethics clearance from the indigenous reb within a month of our submission. in total, it required three rounds of revisions with the university reb over 100 days, which resulted in our project, centered on land-based activities that were entirely dependent on seasonality and guide availability, being postponed for a full year. were we not under the gun, rushing to obtain ethics clearance in order to begin the project in time with the season, we might have picked the battle of demanding the reb respect the jurisdiction of our indigenous research partners and their reb; that is, to not “override or replace ethical guidance offered by aboriginal peoples themselves” (cihr, nserc, & sshrc, 2010, p. 105). instead, we begrudgingly engaged in what guillemin and gillam (2004) have described as “procedural ethics” that seemed to be steeped in a positivist tradition of sanitized laboratories that adhere to a linear scientific method.4 one characteristic of the research design that finally won reb approval was an overly-exhaustive, six-page consent form (complete with a table of activities giving time breakdowns to the half-hour), committing us to a project design so detailed it completely disempowered the ability of our partners to guide the evolution of the research over time, effectively stripping the power we had wanted to reside with our research advisory circle. should our first nations partner want us to make any changes while the project was underway, we would have had to request permission from the university reb to do so,5 reducing the circle to a token advisory role—a move our partners have rightly pointed out undermines the larger political goals of decolonization and indigenous resurgence with which they see our research aligned.                                                                                                                 4 see guillemin and gillam (2004) for a more detailed discussion of the biomedical origins of university reb processes. see denzin (2009) for a rich discussion of the peer-review system (including rebs), which he argued is not an apolitical endeavor; denzin considers the need for space to include moral and ethical criteria in the evaluation of research rigour, and the need to resist “the pressures for a single gold standard” (p. 152). 5 specifically, the reb formally reminds researchers of their on-going responsibilities after an reb has given its approval, one of which is: “prior to implementing any changes to your research plan, whether to the protocol or consent form, researchers must submit them to the research ethics board for review and approval. this is done by completing a request for ethics approval of amendment to an approved project form (available on the website) and submitting three copies of the form and any documents related to the change. please note that no reviews are conducted in august” (personal communication). 3 stiegman and castleden: leashes and lies published by scholarship@western, 2015   a s h o r t l e a s h c a n l e a d t o l i e s : r e f l e c t i o n s o n i n d i g e n o u s a u t o n o m y v e r s u s i n s t i t u t i o n a l o v e r s i g h t while we appreciate the need for ethical oversight on academic research involving human participants, the length of leash the university affords indigenous peoples to determine research conducted with their people, on their territory, is highly problematic. as university-based researchers, we find ourselves in a "catch-22" where we are "damned if we do" the minutia (privileging academic protocols over respect for indigenous jurisdiction and community autonomy) or "damned if we don’t" (thus not getting reb approval to proceed with our research). such a scenario leaves us with two choices: (a) either lie to the university and provide them with an overly detailed and culturally inappropriate research plan while going about “business as usual” with our community partners, or (b) completely disempower our partners by imposing university regulations on them. the latter is a deal-breaker for the cbpr researcher. the former risks getting reprimanded, having grant funding revoked, or even being fired for breaking the tcps2 “code of conduct,” especially for someone on the tenure-track. both israel and hay (2006) and martin (2007) proposed a third option, which we echo here, calling on researchers to critically engage with the regulatory bodies and the structures that govern ethical authority within research. it is absolutely critical for a university reb to compel university researchers to think through the details and potential ethical dilemmas of their research—even in light of the fact that cbpr projects will necessarily deviate from the initial plan on paper. the reb application process ensures we have solid, well thought-out research designs and provides the reb with what they need to evaluate whether our intellectual inquiry meets the minimum ethical standards of the tcps2; that is it: (a) respects human participants and the communities they are a part of, (b) demonstrates concern for welfare, and (c) treats people fairly and equitably. more importantly, from the perspective of cbpr, the reb process serves as a checkpoint; it is the place where we are to demonstrate that we have clearly articulated our research agenda to our community partners in the opening phase of our relationship. it is a place for us to produce the tools our partners need to make informed decisions about whether or not to enter, or continue, a research partnership with us, as well it subjects those tools to the scrutiny of peer-review (the hallmark of maintaining high standards of quality research from the perspective of the academy). perhaps most importantly, it provides our indigenous partners with tools they can use to hold us accountable vis-à-vis the colonial university structures that govern our world. clearly, we support the goals of our institutional rebs to prevent the kind of harmful, disempowering, tokenizing, and pathologizing research that has gone on in the past. but as decolonizing cbpr researchers, we want more than that. we want our rebs to ensure that the kind of community-driven, capacity-building, empowering research that indigenous communities, indigenous scholars, and nonindigenous scholar allies are demanding becomes the norm (brant castellano, 2004; kovach, 2009; smith, 1999; wilson, 2008)—and we want the reb process to enable the kind of cbpr methodologies such an approach often entails, not disable them. from the perspective of ethics, as it is understood in cbpr and in indigenous research, the reb process should be a site of empowerment for indigenous partners within the research enterprise. a central goal of cbpr involving indigenous peoples (and most, if not all, decolonizing approaches to research) is to radically shift, if not invert, the balance of power between the academy and indigenous research partners—and to meaningfully acknowledge indigenous partners as nations, not stakeholder groups—with jurisdiction over research in their communities and 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.2   on their traditional territories (see kershaw, castleden, & laroque, 2014). this lies at the heart of cpbr methodologies and is inseparable from the larger political goals of indigenous self-determination, autonomy, and decolonization that align with our work. our thesis is thus: if ethical research with indigenous peoples hinges on shifting the balance of power, the focus of the reb process should be on evaluating the strength of researcher-community partnerships and structures of mutual accountability that have been established, while acknowledging the jurisdiction of the nation in question and deferring to their authority—especially in cases where an indigenous reb (or the equivalent) is established.6 while it is appropriate and useful for an reb to evaluate the general parameters of a research design, the details belong to the people on the ground. it is unrealistic to expect indigenous community partners involved in academic research to divert their time and resources from the urgent needs and priorities in their communities in order to take on yet another colonial battle to engage in a lengthy negotiation process with a university reb, which (perhaps unknowingly) is questioning their jurisdiction over research conducted with their people on their territory. the existing university reb process assumes a researcher-driven model, and hinges on individual consent of research “subjects” obtained via the individual informed consent form. however, cbpr is defined by its attempt to invert this power dynamic: vulnerable “subjects” become research “partners” who, ideally, are driving the process. such a scenario implies a much different level of responsibility for an reb, and calls for a much different criteria of evaluation in determining ethical oversight. while individual consent in indigenous cbpr research is important, obtaining the relevant collective approval to conduct research is perhaps even more so.7 in such a case, the reb’s focus should then become evaluating the degree of collective ownership over the research, the power-sharing mechanisms and mutual structures of accountability established, the cross-cultural competency of the research team, their knowledge of and respect for local protocols, the arrangements for indigenous control and ownership over data that have been negotiated,8 and the ways the research results will be shared and mobilized in ways that involve and are relevant to both partners. in other words, the reb’s focus should shift to evaluating how researchers demonstrate an understanding of and operationalize what kirkness and barnhardt (2001) have called the “four rs” of indigenous research: respect, reciprocity, relevance, and responsibility.                                                                                                                 6 the akwesasne research advisory committee (see https://reo.mcmaster.ca/download/akwesasne.pdf) and mi’kmaw ethics watch (http://www.cbu.ca/mrc/ethics-watch#.vqbiugb9um0) are both interesting examples of indigenous organizations established to provide ethical oversight and review applications to conduct academic research with their respective nations. 7 the notion of collective approval is often interpreted to mean approval of the chief and council in a first nations context, but there are communities within communities that also have leadership processes and protocols; the tcps2 does recognize this but many researchers (and this includes some reb members) have a flawed understanding as to how to navigate the appropriate “approval” in terms of how to conduct themselves and their research with first nations (see, for example, campbell, castleden, francis, strickland, & denny, in press). 8 see schnarch (2004) for a discussion of the widely recognized benchmark for data ownership and storage within aboriginal research established by the former national aboriginal health organization (naho). 5 stiegman and castleden: leashes and lies published by scholarship@western, 2015   t h e m a s t e r ’ s t o o l s c a n o n l y d o s o m u c h in forging ethical university-based research partnerships with indigenous peoples, is it surprising that the tools the university gives us to work with are not suitable for the task at hand? perhaps it is worth asking ourselves, to paraphrase the now famous words of the late audre lorde (1984/2007), how realistic is it for us to expect that the master’s tools will dismantle the master’s house? rebs are structures and processes deeply embedded in a colonial institution. they were established for good reason: to protect human participants from harm in academic research. but they were also established to evaluate individual researchers (in the classic atomized, rational, self-interested western understanding) with positivist research designs (that happen in controlled laboratory-like settings). this early process has lingering affects, allowing for the production of “knowledge” in a very particular, western, colonial sense (knowledge that can be abstracted and extracted from its context and web of relationships), with individual ownership protected via academic intellectual property “rights” (embedded within the legal structures of the settler-state), and with little concern for the incumbent responsibilities and relational accountability (wilson, 2008) such “knowledge” entails. given all of this, is it realistic to expect that rebs—who are subject to the terms and conditions of the federal funding agencies and who are charged with upholding the principles of the tcps2 in researchers’ everyday practice—are in a position of selfawareness, ability, or autonomy to not only permit, but to enable, decolonizing methodologies? we must not let go of a decolonized academy as a political goal; this includes engaging with and challenging our rebs jurisdictional authority. to do so would ignore the countless demands from our colleagues and indigenous community partners to work together to create and guard a space for indigenous resurgence within the academy. decolonizing the reb review process is a work in progress; it bears recognizing that it is a project with significant gains many of our colleagues have worked long and hard to achieve—both by participating in the tpcs2 process, and by serving on rebs, one of the most time-consuming but fundamentally important university-based administrative committees. at the end of the day, however, even the best-designed “houses” need to be populated by people with the cultural competency and/or lived experience to run them.9 r e c o g n i z i n g j u r i s d i c t i o n , c r e a t i n g s p a c e f o r i n d i g e n o u s r e s u r g e n c e coming back to the notion that the tcps2 is not intended to override or replace ethical guidance offered by indigenous peoples themselves, we noted in our review of chapter 9’s contents there is a section tucked towards the end of a section entitled “interpreting the ethics framework in aboriginal contexts” (cihr, nserc, & sshrc, 2010, p. 109), referring to research involving indigenous                                                                                                                 9 the second author’s ongoing research in this area suggests that rebs are starting to be populated with at least one content or process expert in cbpr involving indigenous peoples. at the same time, this has been identified as a major limitation for many institutionally-based rebs and points to the contradictions and challenges involved in decolonizing university-based research with indigenous peoples in a context where the overwhelming majority of researchers leading and scrutinizing research are non-indigenous and have little to no lived experience working with indigenous peoples. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.2   peoples in other countries.10 here the tcps2 indicates that the guidance articulated in its policy may be usefully applied in other jurisdictions with the caveat that “it is critically important, however, to seek local guidance in the application or adaptation of the policy” (p. 110). it struck us that, here in canada, what the tcps2 fails to fully address (and perhaps many reb members fail to understand) (see for example godlewska, moore, & bednasek, 2010), is we are dealing with nations within a nation. and while the reb can offer us, as researchers bound to institutional policies and procedures, guidance on ethical practice for research involving indigenous peoples, it also has to acknowledge that when we cross jurisdictions into indigenous territories, we are entering more than a community, we are entering places where the aim is decolonization—a project that implicates the very power structures rebs both operate within and operationalize. at the end of the day, who best determines the ethical practice of academic research involving indigenous peoples in canada? indigenous peoples, period. thus, when examining indigenous cbpr projects for ethical rigour, we suggest the reb process should be concerned primarily with ensuring researchers have created meaningful power-sharing arrangements with their indigenous partners, not regulating and limiting their decision-making authority.                                                                                                                 10 while it is beyond the scope of this commentary to provide an analysis of the policy environments and institutional ethics review procedures that govern indigenous cbpr outside of canada, it is worth noting that similar tensions have been described by researchers doing cbpr with indigenous people in australia (couzos, lea, murray, & culbong, 2005), and cbpr with other populations in both the us (martin, 2007) and internationally (israel & hay, 2006). 7 stiegman and castleden: leashes and lies published by scholarship@western, 2015   r e f e r e n c e s alfred, t. 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(2007). cihr guidelines for health research involving aboriginal people. ottawa: author. canadian institutes of health research (cihr), natural sciences and engineering research council of canada (nserc), & social sciences and humanities research council of canada (sshrc). (1998). tri-council policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans. ottawa, on: cihr. canadian institutes of health research (cihr), natural sciences and engineering research council of canada (nserc), & social sciences and humanities research council of canada (sshrc). (2010). tri-council policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans (2nd ed.). ottawa, on: cihr. retrieved from http://www.pre.ethics.gc.ca/pdf/eng/tcps2/tcps ̇2 ̇final ̇ web.pdf castleden, h., sloan morgan, v., lamb, c. 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(2009) indigenous methodologies: characteristics, conversations and contexts. toronto: university of toronto press. lorde, a. (2007). the master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house. in sister outsider: essays and speeches (pp. 110-114). berkeley, ca: crossing press. (original work published in 1984) martin, d. (2007). bueaucratizing ethics: institutional review boards and participatory research. acme: an international e-journal for critical geographies, 6(3), 319-328. royal commission on aboriginal peoples (rcap). (1996). report of the royal commission on aboriginal peoples. retrieved from http://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/webarchives/20071115053257/http://www.aincinac.gc.ca/ch/rcap/sg/sgmm_e.html schnarch, b. (2004). ownership, control, access, and possession (ocap) or self-determination applied to research. journal of aboriginal health, 1(1), 80-95. retrieved from http://www.naho.ca/journal/2004/01/09/ownership-control-access-and-possession-ocap-or9 stiegman and castleden: leashes and lies published by scholarship@western, 2015   self-determination-applied-to-research-a-critical-analysis-of-contemporary-first-nationsresearch-and-some-options-for-first-nations-communities/ smith, l. (1999). decolonizing methodologies: research and indigenous peoples. london, uk: zed books. wilson, s. (2008). research is ceremony: indigenous research methods. halifax, ns: fernwood publishers.   10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.2 the international indigenous policy journal june 2015 leashes and lies: navigating the colonial tensions of institutional ethics of research involving indigenous peoples in canada martha l. stiegman heather castleden recommended citation leashes and lies: navigating the colonial tensions of institutional ethics of research involving indigenous peoples in canada abstract keywords creative commons license leashes and lies: navigating the colonial tensions of institutional ethics of research involving indigenous peoples in canada priority setting in indigenous health: why we need an explicit decision making approach the international indigenous policy journal volume 6 | issue 3 article 8 june 2015 priority setting in indigenous health: w hy we need an explicit decision making approach michael e. otim australian catholic university, north sydney, michael.otim@acu.edu.au ranmalie jayasinha university of sydney, sydney, ranmalie.jayasinha@sydney.edu.au margaret kelaher university of melbourne, melbourne, mkelaher@unimelb.edu.au edward shane houston university of sydney, sydney, shane.houston@sydney.edu.au ian p. anderson university of melbourne, melbourne, ipa@unimelb.edu.au see next page for additional authors recommended citation otim, m. e. , jayasinha, r. , kelaher, m. , houston, e. s. , anderson, i. p. , jan, s. (2015). priority setting in indigenous health: why we need an explicit decision making approach. the international indigenous policy journal, 6(3). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.8 priority setting in indigenous health: w hy we need an explicit decision making approach abstract indigenous australians have significantly poorer health outcomes than the non-indigenous population worldwide. the australian government has increased its investment in indigenous health through the "closing the health gap" initiative. deciding where to invest scarce resources so as to maximize health outcomes for indigenous peoples may require improved priority setting processes. current government practice involves a mix of implicit and explicit processes to varying degrees at the macro and meso decision making levels. in this article, we argue that explicit priority setting should be emphasized in indigenous health, as it can ensure that the decision making process is accountable, systematic, and transparent. following a review of the literature, we outline four key issues that need to be considered for explicit priority setting: developing an indigenous health "constitution," strengthening the evidence base, selecting mechanisms for priority setting, and establishing appropriate incentives and institutional structure. we then summarize our findings into a checklist that can help a decision makers ensure that explicit priority setting is undertaken in indigenous health. by addressing these key issues, the benefits of an explicit approach, which include increased efficiency, equity, and use of evidence, can be realized, thereby maximizing indigenous health outcomes. keywords indigenous peoples, aboriginal people, priority setting, health, decision-making, australia creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. authors michael e. otim, ranmalie jayasinha, margaret kelaher, edward shane houston, ian p. anderson, and stephen jan http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/     p r i o r i t y s e t t i n g i n i n d i g e n o u s h e a l t h : w h y w e n e e d a n e x p l i c i t d e c i s i o n m a k i n g a p p r o a c h b a c k g r o u n d indigenous peoples everywhere—including aboriginal and torres strait islanders in australia, referred to here as indigenous australians—have significantly poorer health outcomes compared to the general population in their respective countries (australian bureau of statistics [abs] & australian institute of health and welfare [aihw], 2010). indigenous australians in particular have significantly poorer health outcomes than other indigenous populations in canada, usa, and new zealand (abs & aihw, 2010; gracey & king, 2009; kunitz & brady, 1995). this can be attributed to socioeconomic status and low utilisation of health care services due to limited access to good quality health care services. even where quality health care services exist, indigenous peoples—especially australian ones—face structural problems, culturally inappropriate services, and institutional racism (henry, houston, & mooney, 2004). further, dispossession and colonisation contribute to the poor health status of indigenous australia through loss of self-esteem and loss of resilience (abs & aihw, 2010). as archibald meston (cited in evans, saunders, & cronin, 1993) described: never before had i seen aboriginal men living under extraordinary terrorism, many of them fine athletic fellows who could in case of a row have settled with their terrorisers in a very summary fashion. but many of them had long been treated as the dogs are treated and were scared into a belief that their employers wielded the power of life and death. (p. 112) over the years, there have been several attempts in australia to improve the health of indigenous peoples through reform of the health system as a means to improve indigenous peoples’ access to health services (aboriginal & torres strait islander commission, 1993; s. richardson, 1997; thomson, 1984). most recently, the australian government pledged in the “close the gap” initiative to close the gap in life expectancy and social indicators between indigenous and nonindigenous people within two generations (council of australian government [coag], 2009). this was followed by more reforms to the funding and delivery of health care services. however, over the years, these reforms have not been effective at achieving the government’s goals (aboriginal & torres strait islander social justice commissioner, 2006). this leaves improving the priority setting process as the key issue to be addressed in order to ensure that the government’s efforts at “closing the gap” can be done efficiently. priority setting can be defined as a non-market based process of making choices in the face of scarcity, which arises from the demand for a good or service. scarcity necessitates making choices, leading to the loss of other opportunities that would have been realised if investment had been done elsewhere (culyer, 2005; earl-slater, 1999). there is therefore an urgent need to improve the current priority setting process in indigenous health so that resource allocation ensures maximisation of health outcome. in the work we recently published elsewhere (otim, kelaher, anderson, & doran, 2014), results indicated that key decision makers from both government and indigenous community organisations involved in indigenous-specific health services in the australian state of victoria value transparent priority setting processes. indigenous respondents revealed the need for such an approach if it allowed them to shift resources between and within programs, and was accompanied by health gains, buy-in from government, and indigenous community involvement (otim et al., 2014). such an approach would encourage accountability and transparency. thus, such results would be useful as criteria for explicit priority setting (maynard, 1996; mooney, gerard, donaldson, & farrar, 1992). 1 otim et al.: explicit priority setting in indigenous health published by scholarship@western, 2015     explicit priority setting is when the choices made by decision makers are publicly known and bases for such decisions are publicly known too (earl-slater, 1999). however, how to implement explicit priority setting in indigenous settings has not been undertaken. the primary aim of this article is therefore to provide a framework for improving priority setting and describe how such a framework can be implemented in practice. we explore the role of criteria or principles that guide the health system and associated weights, engagement of the indigenous community, and the role of shifting resources within and across programs to maximise outcomes. as one government respondent indicated, it is the burden of disease and its distribution that guides his decision making process. when asked if that is enough for maximising population health (otim, et al., 2014), he said, “for me the most important issues would be equity . . . and the size of the health burden would be an issue but not the overriding factor” (otim, et al. 2014, perceptions of the current process of setting priorities section, para. 3). i m p r o v i n g p r i o r i t y s e t t i n g : t h e r o l e o f e x p l i c i t p r i o r i t y s e t t i n g i n i n d i g e n o u s h e a l t h undertaking explicit priority setting to improve decision making in indigenous health requires addressing four key issues, identified from the literature (carter, et al., 2008; earl-slater, 1999; mooney & wiseman, 1999; shiell & mooney, 2002): a. the establishment of an indigenous health constitution; b. strengthening of the indigenous evidence base for decision making; c. the adoption of a decision making mechanism to resource allocation; d. the establishment of an appropriate incentive and institutional structure. d e v e l o p i n g a n i n d i g e n o u s h e a l t h c o n s t i t u t i o n the development of an indigenous health constitution involves establishing the broad principles or criteria that should guide the health system and the trade-offs that indigenous people are prepared to make (shiell & mooney, 2002). these principles or criteria can be used for determining the extent to which programs or interventions should be publicly provided or financed and the relative importance of each criterion and therefore their relative weights. as one indigenous community member expressed her frustration with the way funding agencies allocated resources: “i would be happy to know what reasons the funders use to select programs or services to fund. most importantly, i would like to know the reasons why they have not funded some of our activities” (otim et al., 2014, assessment of the current priority setting process section, para. 2). different countries use different criteria to guide priority setting (kapiriri & norheim, 2004). some of them publish their criteria and others do not (table 1). the publication of nordic countries’ criteria served to address political issues in funding and access to health care services, thus ensuring transparency and accountability by these governments. these criteria also provided guidance to the development of the guidelines for assessing the successes of the different priority setting frameworks that had been employed (sabik & lie, 2008). the literature suggests that successful processes have involved the presence of priority setting commissions (sabik & lie, 2008). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 8 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.8     t a b l e 1 . e x a m p l e s o f c r i t e r i a f o r p r i o r i t y s e t t i n g f r o m s e l e c t e d c o u n t r i e s c o u n t r y o r r e g i o n c r i t e r i a s o u r c e oregon cost-effectiveness; then equity (oberlander & marmor, 2001) netherlands (filter mode) service necessity; effectiveness; efficiency; and personal responsibility (government committee on choices in health care, 1992) sweden human dignity; equal rights; need; solidarity; and cost-efficiency (health care and medical priorities commission, 1993) denmark equality, solidarity, security, and autonomy (danish council of ethics, 1997) new zealand (maori) efficiency; effectiveness; equity; acceptability; and maori health principles (ashton, cumming, & devlin, 2000; tito & kavanagh, 2004) uganda efficiency/ accountability; effectiveness/ quality care; equity/fairness/justice/ethics; and national solidarity/cultural practices (kapiriri & norheim, 2004) canada maximisation; egalitarianism; claims such as severity, human rights, etc. (shiell & mooney, 2002) west australia need; socioeconomic disadvantage; access (mitton & prout, 2004) torres strait, queensland public outrage; burden of disease; cost; preventability; national priorities (mcdermott & mills, 2004) indeed, lessons from previous studies such as those identified above suggest that a set of criteria ought to be culturally or system specific (otim et al., 2014; shiell & mooney, 2002). whilst useful in conceptualising possible criteria, these may be divergent from the experiences of indigenous peoples. in recognition of indigenous values, there have been a few attempts in australia at identifying principles that should guide priority setting and/or resource allocation in indigenous health and research (monk, rowley, & anderson, 2009; national aboriginal and torres strait islander health council [ natsihc], 2003; national health and medical research council [nhmrc], 1993, 2003; otim et al., 2014). results indicate that the key principles include cultural respect, community control, and capacity building within the indigenous community controlled health sector, provider collaboration, localised decision making, accountability, justice, quality of life, and social worth. such criteria highlight the importance that indigenous peoples and decision makers attach to the role of evidence, such as economic evaluation. having an indigenous health constitution would inform the debate on the appropriateness of the criteria and their relative weights for decision making in indigenous health. 3 otim et al.: explicit priority setting in indigenous health published by scholarship@western, 2015     s t r e n g t h e n i n g t h e e v i d e n c e b a s e the second step in the development of explicit priority setting is the strengthening of the evidence base in indigenous health that can be used to guide the process of setting priorities. this is part of the “evidence based policy making” discussion, which has been around for a long time and may be linked to evidence-based clinical decision making. however, several key issues have been identified to explain why policy makers fail to use evidence and why researchers fail to produce useful evidence (banks, 2009; otim, et al., 2014; ross, 1995). these issues include the complex processes involved in policy processes; lack of relevant and timely evidence, such as economic evaluation and epidemiological evidence for decision making; necessary improvement in the quality and the measurement rigour of such evidence; and the need for a holistic approach to indigenous health policy. furthermore, the criteria for assessing the quality of evidence might need to be widened and strengthened. widening the evidence base to guide decision making ought to include a combination of technical rigour and value judgments about what constitutes benefits or costs (mooney, 2006). technical judgements may rely on the availability and quality of data and technical methods for making decisions. value judgements rely on the principles and values of the decision makers and the indigenous population. when data are not readily available, value judgements may be used in the process of assessing the quality of evidence in indigenous health, which would ensure that interventions targeting indigenous health are not penalised for lack of high quality evidence (rychetnyk, frommer, hawe, & shiell, 2002; sibthorpe et al., 2002). s e l e c t i n g m e c h a n i s m s f o r p r i o r i t y s e t t i n g the third issue involves the need for practical decision making mechanisms to ensure that resource allocation decisions are consistent with the principles embodied in the indigenous health constitution and trade-offs can be undertaken. in practice, decision making happens at the margin; small incremental adjustments to an existing plan of action, in accordance with the concept of marginal analysis (mooney, 2002). knowing that marginal analysis is a tool for estimating efficiency of government actions, it is important that a clear specification of the objectives being pursued is made so that an appropriate framework that can address such objectives can be selected. an ideal priority setting framework should be able to shift resources matched with health gain, and be able to have an impact on the health of indigenous peoples (otim et al., 2014). further, such an approach ought to be able to use both technical evidence and due process, which may require resources and structures for collating such evidence and expertise. first, the decision makers have to buy-in to the idea of implementing a priority setting model that has potential to maximise health outcomes. p u t t i n g a p p r o p r i a t e i n c e n t i v e s a n d i n s t i t u t i o n a l s t r u c t u r e i n p l a c e buy-in by funding agencies is important since indigenous providers are already overbudened by limited funding, as well as administrative and multiple accounting requirements from the funding agencies (dwyer, o'donnell, lavoie, marlina, & sullivan, 2009). this would ensure that the priorities identified are acted upon and staff are trained in the chosen priority setting framework to ensure its adoption as a routine decision making tool (shiell & mooney, 2002). thus, funding agencies would need to put in place incentives and institutional structures for indigenous providers. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 8 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.8     incentives can be put in place by funding agencies to encourage indigenous community providers to use the chosen approaches for routine decision making. other requirements would involve ensuring indigenous ownership of the process and the results, organisational stability of aboriginal community controlled health services (acchs), and organisational decision making culture to focus on the costs and benefits. it is therefore imperative for the funding agencies to financially support the implementation of a new way of priority setting in acchs. thus, for indigenous health providers to be able to adopt explicit priority setting, appropriate incentives, and institutional structures would need to be established. the key challenge is how all the above issues can be translated into practice to ensure the implementation of the explicit priority setting in indigenous health. thus, there is a need to invest in the establishment of the institutional structures that are needed to support a systematic approach to priority setting (ham & coulter, 2000). i m p l e m e n t i n g e x p l i c i t p r i o r i t y s e t t i n g : p r a c t i c a l i s s u e s i n i n d i g e n o u s h e a l t h in the following section, we consider some of the challenges that ought to be addressed in order to allow explicit priority setting processes to be implemented in indigenous health. a checklist is later developed to guide such a process and it is summarised in table 2. i d e n t i f y i n g t h e g o a l t h a t i s b e i n g p u r s u e d the first task is to specify what goal is being pursued explicitly, and within a specific context. this will enable priority setting to occur within a pre-defined framework. under economic theory, for example, maximising health should be one of the key objectives, and, under non-economic theories, other objectives exist such as equity, equality, fairness, and need (otim et al., 2014). thus, optimising or maximising health, and improving access and equity, while ensuring indigenous engagement in the process, could be the key goals. the challenge, however, is how to make the objectives as discrete as possible due to the potential for overlap in certain areas, especially in cases where more than one objective may be stated. for example, “equality of health” overlaps with “equality of outcomes” or “equality of use,” but differs significantly. the similarities and differences ought to be reflected and captured in the priority setting approach used for the maximisation of health. thus, the objectives have to be as clearly stated as possible and framed in an answerable manner. e n g a g i n g t h e i n d i g e n o u s c o m m u n i t y the second task is how to engage the indigenous community in the decision making process in a meaningful manner. that is, the indigenous community should be involved in the formulation of the objectives, identification of the priorities, and their implementation. to identify priorities and criteria to be used in priority setting, the key findings of the harvard project, for example, indicate that sovereignty matters in the native american lands development (jorgensen & taylor 2000). further, good governance, cultural issues, and institutions are important pillars for development and sustainability (cornell 2002; dodson & smith 2003). therefore, an approach that ensures the above issues are incorporated in the decision making process can ensure that the indigenous community is likely to accept and/or embrace the choices made by decision makers, and will ensure ownership and sustainability of the selected services or strategies. several authors argue that indigenous australian communities are in crisis and this is widely acknowledged in the literature (dodson 2003; sutton 2001). this crisis is mainly one of governance. from whichever perspective this crisis is viewed, be it anthropological or economic analysis, what matters most is that the health 5 otim et al.: explicit priority setting in indigenous health published by scholarship@western, 2015     outcomes of indigenous peoples must improve to a level that is comparable to the rest of the nonindigenous population. such an improvement can only be achieved with good governance and institutions that are influenced by cultural issues. in australia, several comprehensive primary health care services are aboriginal community controlled. this allows control and engagement of the community in the decision making process. thus, the governance process that allows and incorporates indigenous cultural and other values in the setting of priorities, and aids indigenous institutions to choose and implement those strategies is likely to maximise health gain. from an economic perspective, indigenous values can be incorporated into the health system through empirical ethics (j. richardson, 2000) or a communitarian approach, which emphasises the need to use the preferences of that marginalised group to address their disadvantage (mooney, 1998). this approach classifies reasons for a person’s claim for a good into two groups: “communitarian claims” and “other reasons” (mooney, 1998). to understand individuals in society, especially when undertaking priority setting, one must look at the community from where the individual comes and their communal relationships (avineri & deshalit, 1992). thus, this requires the promotion of community control and self-determination in priority setting. for example, indigenous australian management structures could provide a mechanism for the engagement of the indigenous community in the decision making process. in a study of decision makers from both government and indigenous communities that we undertook, respondents identified cultural security, individual health gain, community gain, and access as important key outcomes of any allocation of resources especially in health (otim et al., 2014). knowing that indigenous peoples everywhere are not a homogenous group, it is important to undertake empirical studies to elicit the broad principles from indigenous peoples and communities that should guide the priority setting process and what weights should be attached to those criteria. e m p i r i c a l e l i c i t a t i o n o f c r i t e r i a t o e s t a b l i s h i n d i g e n o u s h e a l t h c o n s t i t u t i o n the next task involves how to elicit the broad criteria that should guide the priority setting process and the associated weights to be attached to these criteria. in essence, these criteria should include the indigenous values and aspirations (mooney, 2000, 2002, 2003, 2010; mooney & houston, 2004; mooney & wiseman, 1999; shiell & mooney, 2002). eliciting such criteria can be done using empirical ethics (j. richardson, 2000) or communitarian claims approach (mooney, 2002, 2010). these approaches can also elicit preferences for weighting the criteria for their relative importance. publishing such criteria and the associated weights can allow the public to have a debate on the appropriateness and acceptability of each. j. richardson (2000) argued that social ethics ought to guide the decision-maker’s health policy objectives, and these ethical issues should be captured using the “empirical ethics” approach. this would involve ethical values being subjectively derived from a sample of indigenous individuals within the population and these values being subjected to ethical analysis and criticism. these values can then be quantified and converted into a scale that can be used to weight the importance of decision criteria or health outcomes (j. richardson, 2000). in the event that the social values are shown to lead to abhorrent outcomes, such as racism, sexism, or discrimination, then preferences should be “laundered,” and an iterative process undertaken between the ethicist and the public. however, this approach has not yet been applied in indigenous health. the communitarianism claims approach advocates for the use of community preferences as the basis for criteria, and argues that these same members are the most appropriate to determine what weights to attach to these preferences (mooney & russell, 2003). these criteria would be elicited using 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 8 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.8     citizenry workshops (mooney, 2010) and used to inform the selection of the options for change, the weighting of the scores, and interpretation of the findings. thus, the use of ethical values or principles that are carefully inferred from the respondents, and together with evidence, is likely to lead to desirable outcomes from the priority setting process. i n v e s t m e n t i n s t r e n g t h e n i n g e v i d e n c e developing a strong evidence base is another key aspect of explicit decision making, which promotes the systematic collection of data relating to the costs and benefits of interventions or programs. this evidence may be in the form of epidemiology data, economic evaluation evidence, or political incentives. evidence gathered from economic evaluation, for example, ensures that maximising outcomes for a given budget can be achieved (feldman & serrano, 2006; tsuchiya & williams, 2001). in practice, the number of economic evaluation studies has been increasing worldwide since the 1970s (gerard & mooney, 1993). in australia, an increasing number of economic evaluations studies have been adopted for policy purposes. for example, the australian government uses economic evaluation to make choices on what pharmaceutical products or medical devices and procedures it subsidises. this evidence has also been used in other areas such as, breast and cervical cancer screening, organ transplantation, co-ordinated care trials, the cancer council national strategy, and the national tobacco control strategy. however, very few such studies have been done specifically in indigenous health and hence the uptake of economic evaluation evidence in priority setting is not known. alternatively, epidemiologically based studies may include the burden of disease studies, community surveys, and setting goals and targets to be achieved either at an individual or a societal level. however, these data can fail to capture equity and other social justice issues in indigenous health, unless guided by objectives that explicitly promote these principles. whilst each source of data has its own challenges, explicitly accounting for these issues and choosing an appropriate method is important to ensuring the results are relevant to the intervention to be implemented. d e c i s i o n m a k i n g m e c h a n i s m s there are several frameworks for priority setting from both non-economic and economic disciplines. examples of economic-based approaches include the league table approach, the health sector-wide (hsw) model (segal & mortimer, 2006), health benefit groups/health resources groups (hbg/hrg) (beaver, williams, zhao, & weeramanthari, 1999; mcdermott, 2004; mcdermott & mills, 2004), and program budgeting and marginal analysis (pbma) (gruskin & daniels, 2008). whereas, non-economic frameworks include historically based allocations, needs assessments (burden of disease, cost of illness, community surveys, goals and targets), and clinical guidelines and protocols (defining core services, best practice guidelines, and shared protocols) (carter, et al., 2008; mitton & donaldson, 2004; segal & mortimer, 2006). non-economic based approaches emphasise the explicitness of the values and criteria that ought to guide priority setting, and the active involvement of the indigenous stakeholders in the process. for example, ethically based approaches such as the accountability for reasonableness approach and a human rights-based approach have potential to improve priority setting (daniels, 2000; gruskin & daniels, 2008; kapiriri, norheim, & martin, 2007; martin, giacomini, & singer, 2002; mitton & donaldson, 7 otim et al.: explicit priority setting in indigenous health published by scholarship@western, 2015     2004). however, these approaches do not have decision making mechanisms that can be used to maximise health gain. e s t a b l i s h m e n t o f i n c e n t i v e s a n d i n s t i t u t i o n a l s u p p o r t it is vital that the funding bodies create environments that promote the acchs use of priority setting methods if the funders hope to see service providers use formal methods to set priorities (peacock, 1998; shiell & mooney, 2002). this would legitimise the decisions made and increase the potential acceptance and adoption of the results. additionally, buy-in by funders is needed to fund project support. the australian government is increasingly concerned with ensuring the risk management by acchs. dwyer and colleagues (2009) have proposed that long-term contracting for core primary health care services should be the basis for the funder–provider relationship. this would allow flexibility for local priority setting, in accordance with agreed plans, and subsequently reduce transaction costs. the funders would therefore need to establish appropriate incentives and structures within their funding guidelines to ensure that the priorities identified by the organisations are acted upon, the chosen priority setting framework is adopted as routine decision making tool, and such a tool is not a burden to community-based organisations. furthermore, integrating the values of the community and decision makers into the program design and delivery may further support their buy-in to the priority setting process. p r a c t i c a l c h e c k l i s t f o r e x p l i c i t p r i o r i t y s e t t i n g the ideal explicit priority setting framework should be able to shift resources matched with health gain, and should be able to engage indigenous peoples in the process to ensure self-determination. in table 2, we have summarised the key issues for consideration when undertaking explicit priority setting in indigenous health and presented them as brief checklist. the checklist provided is not intended to be exhaustive; rather, it should be viewed as a starting point for considering how an explicit priority setting can be adopted. we recommend that the checklist be modified based on the context of the organisation, so that explicit priority setting can be harnessed appropriately and effectively to meet the goals and objectives of government and indigenous organisations. c o n c l u s i o n explicit priority setting is not necessarily and universally more valid and reliable than implicit judgement. however, we argue that it makes use of both technical information and due process, and has the potential to engage indigenous people for three reasons. first, decisions and the criteria behind decisions will be transparent. second, evidence, such as economic evaluation, is important in assisting decision makers with the selection of interventions that work and also offer value for money. third, in line with the indigenous principle of self-determination, due process enables engagement of indigenous people in the decision making process. this helps to ensure that indigenous values are incorporated in the choices, and that indigenous ownership of the process and the results is achieved. as such, the openness and accountability of the decision making process can be ensured. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 8 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.8     t a b l e 2 . c h e c k l i s t f o r p r i o r i t y s e t t i n g i n i n d i g e n o u s h e a l t h s t e p 1 i d e n t i f y i n g a w e l l s p e c i f i e d a n d a n s w e r a b l e g o a l • are the objectives of the exercise clearly specified? • are comparators specified? • is the perspective for decision making specified? s t e p 2 e s t a b l i s h i n g t h e i n d i g e n o u s h e a l t h c o n s t i t u t i o n • are criteria for making decisions clearly stated and ranked for relative important? • does the framework recognise access issues to culturally appropriate and effective heath care? • are indigenous values embodied in the framework as guiding principles? • does the framework address issues of fairness or equity? s t e p 3 c h o o s i n g a d e c i s i o n m a k i n g f r a m e w o r k • is the framework appropriate to the question and context that is specified? • does the framework allow for a fair and open process to priority setting? • is efficiency and equity an integral rule for making judgment? s t e p 4 s t r e n g t h e n i n g t h e e v i d e n c e b a s e • is expert advice used where data may not be available or of poor quality? • is marginal analysis an integral component of the framework? • are the data needs manageable or tractable? s t e p 5 p r o m o t i n g c o m m u n i t y i n v o l v e m e n t • is the right of indigenous people to control their health care being respected? • are the indigenous community’s decision making, participation and control supported? • are there effective structures and processes to ensure effective indigenous participation? s t e p 6 e n s u r i n g i n c e n t i v e s a n d i n s t i t u t i o n a l s u p p o r t • does the framework contribute to capacity building in indigenous health services? • is the role of judgment recognised in the specification and interpretation of the results? • is there capacity for the implementation of the results? 9 otim et al.: explicit priority setting in indigenous health published by scholarship@western, 2015     we argued that a key challenge is how to translate an explicit approach to priority setting into practice in indigenous health. from normative economic and social justice perspectives, this can be done by using a clearly specified criteria; frameworks that allow maximisation of health outcomes; use of evidence, incentives, and institutional support; and effectively involving indigenous peoples in the process. accounting for these considerations will ensure that the choices made reflect indigenous values and aspirations, and offer value for money; thereby, maximising the health of indigenous australians. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 8 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.8     r e f e r e n c e s aboriginal & torres strait islander commission. 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(2001). welfare economics and economic evaluation. in m. drummond & a. mcguire (eds.), economic evaluation in health care: merging theory with practice. melbourne: oxford university press. 15 otim et al.: explicit priority setting in indigenous health published by scholarship@western, 2015 the international indigenous policy journal june 2015 priority setting in indigenous health: why we need an explicit decision making approach michael e. otim ranmalie jayasinha margaret kelaher edward shane houston ian p. anderson see next page for additional authors recommended citation priority setting in indigenous health: why we need an explicit decision making approach abstract keywords creative commons license authors priority setting in indigenous health: why we need an explicit decision making approach disrupting the continuities among residential schools, the sixties scoop, and child welfare: an analysis of colonial and neocolonial discourses the international indigenous policy journal volume 7 | issue 2 article 4 april 2016 disrupting the continuities among residential schools, the sixties scoop, and child welfare: an analysis of colonial and neocolonial discourses holly a. mckenzie university of british columbia, hollymckenz@gmail.com colleen varcoe university of british columbia, school of nursing, colleen.varcoe@nursing.ubc.ca annette j. browne university of british columbia, school of nursing, annette.browne@ubc.ca linda day aboriginal mother centre society, lindaday.oneida@gmail.com recommended citation mckenzie, h. a. , varcoe, c. , browne, a. j. , day, l. (2016). disrupting the continuities among residential schools, the sixties scoop, and child welfare: an analysis of colonial and neocolonial discourses. the international indigenous policy journal, 7(2). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.4 disrupting the continuities among residential schools, the sixties scoop, and child welfare: an analysis of colonial and neocolonial discourses abstract in canada, it is estimated that 3 times as many indigenous children are currently in the care of the state compared to when the residential schools’ populations were at their peak. it is imperative that action be taken. this article explores the continuities among residential schools, the sixties scoop, and child welfare in canada today. in particular, we examine how colonial and neocolonial discourses operate through and justify these policies and practices. we propose nine policy recommendations, which aim to transform child welfare and support indigenous families to care for their children. although transformative policy change is unlikely within this neocolonial and neoliberal climate, the recent change in federal leadership has made it more possible to move these policy recommendations forward. keywords indigenous, aboriginal, first nations, canada, child welfare, sixties scoop, residential schools acknowledgments the authors thank madeleine dion stout, roberta price, jane inyallie and other members of the canadian institutes for health research-funded team, “addressing the consequences of violence and trauma: a health intervention for women in an indigenous context” for informing this article’s analysis and particularly jane inyallie for her review of and helpful comments about an earlier draft of the paper. development of this paper was supported in part by a fellowship with the above project and a canadian institutes for health research doctoral award held by the first author, and an operating grant from the canadian institutes for health research held by the second and third author. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ disrupting the continuities among residential schools, the sixties scoop, and child welfare: an analysis of colonial and neocolonial discourses over the last 30 years, over-involvement of the canadian child welfare system in indigenous (first nations, métis, and inuit) children’s and families’ lives has been the subject of a number of research and policy reports (e.g., auditor general of canada, 2008, 2011; blackstock, trocmé, & bennett, 2004; first nations child and family caring society of canada, 2005b; johnston, 1983; mandell, carlson, fine, & blackstock, 2007; mckenzie & hudson, 1985; sinha, trocmé, blackstock, maclaurin, & fallon, 2011). although as of 2006 only 3.8% of people living in canada identified as indigenous (statistics canada, 2008), in the 2008 canadian incidence study of reported child abuse and neglect (cis), 22% of substantiated investigations involved indigenous children (trocmé et al., 2010). in other settler–colonial states, such as australia, new zealand, and the united states, indigenous children are more likely to be involved in investigations of maltreatment and placed in out-of-home care. euro-canadian public and government discourses are increasingly focusing on residential schools and their well-documented harmful effects on indigenous communities (bombay, matheson, & anisman, 2011; furniss, 1995; ing, 1991; kirmayer, gone, & moses, 2014; smith, varcoe, & edwards, 2005; truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015; warren, 2008). however, in 2004, blackstock et al. (2004) estimated that 3 times as many indigenous children were currently in the care of the state as were in residential schools during the peak enrolment period in the 1940s, and more recent studies show that this trend persists (sinha et al., 2011; sinha, trocmé, fallon, & maclaurin, 2013; trocmé et al., 2010). indeed, maxwell (2014) argued that a singular focus on residential schools obscures “the myriad contemporary manifestations of colonial dominance and inequities which have profound implications for parenting and family relations” (p. 426). this article analyzes colonial and neocolonial discourses that contribute to the over-involvement of the child welfare system in indigenous families’ lives today. we analyze how colonial and neocolonial discourses position indigenous peoples and communities as inherently sick and damaged and naturalize euro-canadian notions of family. further, we examine neoliberal discourses of risk and how these colonial, neocolonial, and neoliberal discourses operate within society, policy, and practice to contribute to the number of indigenous children in the care of the child welfare system today. throughout, we provide examples from british columbia (b.c.), as a unique case in point, to show how they are informed by the province’s colonial history and present day context. we show the continuities among residential schools, the sixties scoop, and contemporary forms of the state’s over-involvement in indigenous families, and propose nine policy recommendations that aim to disrupt these continuities by (a) transforming child welfare legislation and practice, and (b) supporting indigenous families and communities to care for their children. we conclude by discussing strategies to move these recommendations forward. residential schools, the sixties scoop, and the colonial project colonial interventions have purposely undermined indigenous political, economic, and family formations. the forced relocation of indigenous children to residential schools, for example, is largely accepted as one of the most devastating policies to indigenous communities, affecting not only survivors of the schools, but also survivors’ families and communities across multiple generations (bombay et al., 2011; castellano, archibald, & degagné, 2008; furniss, 1995; haskell & randall, 2009; ing, 1991; smith 1 mckenzie et al.: disrupting the continuities published by scholarship@western, 2016 et al., 2005; truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015). as the federal government began to phase out residential schools after the second world war, the state-led apprehension of indigenous children did not end, but rather shifted and took a new form—the widespread practice from the 1960s into the 1980s of child welfare workers removing indigenous children from their homes and placing them with non-indigenous foster and adoptive parents. johnston (1983) has coined the term sixties scoop to describe this process. residential schools and the sixties scoop emerged within the ongoing project of colonization. as such, these policies, practices, and the identities that they (re)produced emerged, and have to be understood, in relation to britain and other colonies, particularly settler-colonial states (armitage, 1995; stoler, 1995). although colonial disruption of indigenous families predated the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, this was a critical time in the formation of canadian state sovereignty and identity— what would later become the canadian body politic. through cultural practices, media representations, and government policy and practice, the imagined community of canada proper, along with the identity of the patriarchal bourgeois state citizen and family unit, were established and (re)produced. indeed, government, frontier media outlets, and members of the clergy framed the assimilation of indigenous children through residential schooling as a process that was in their best interest (carter, 1997; davin, 1879; de leeuw, greenwood, & cameron, 2010). kelm (1998), referenced the june 1903 department of indian affairs report, to point out: the assimilative intent of this education was apparent, and frank pedley, deputy superintendent of indian affairs, praised the schools in 1902 for ensuring “the removal of pupils from the retrogressive influence of home life.” central to this view was the notion that aboriginal parents were negligent parents and especially that unassimilated native women made poor mothers. (p. 61) importantly, the project to eliminate indigenous people served and continues to serve those who benefit from the appropriation and exploitation of indigenous lands. to gain access to indigenous lands, the canadian government signed numbered treaties with first nations people living in (what is now) the prairie provinces (alberta, saskatchewan, and manitoba), northeastern b.c., and some of the territories during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. during the mid-nineteenth century, the governor of b.c., james douglas, also negotiated treaties with some first nations living on (what is now) vancouver island (fisher, 1971). the canadian government viewed the numbered treaties as real estate deals in which first nations people exchanged their rights to the land for the use of specific reserve lands and other provisions (i.e., education and annual payments of five dollars per person)—and, indeed, the canadian state still holds this belief. however, according to first nations’ oral histories, the crown agreed to share the land with first nations people and made additional promises unrecorded in written accounts. while the canadian government has not upheld the written (much less the oral) treaty agreements (egan, 2012; office of the treaty commissioner, 1998; royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996; truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015; waldram, herring, & young, 2006), the lack of historical treaties in b.c. made it more possible for government officials to reduce and reallocate reserve lands (kelm, 1998). as a result, first nations people’s access to trapping, hunting, and fishing territories was severely constrained and reserve lands “were insufficient to sustain food production through agriculture or ranching” by the late nineteenth century (kelm, 1998, 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.4 p. 27; see also fisher, 1971). first nations in b.c. met these conditions with survival and resistance strategies, such as protesting the reallocation of reserve lands and housing conditions and engaging in paid labour at canneries, on railroads, and on farms (fisher, 1971; kelm, 1998). following the colonial logic invested in appropriating indigenous lands, assimilating indigenous people into the canadian body politic through residential schools and other policies is revealed as part of canada’s ongoing project to assert sovereignty over these lands (thielen-wilson, 2014). colonial education and indigenous resistance although colonial education of indigenous children was a practice present as early as the seventeenth century, the residential school system did not become an instrument of official government policy until the latter part of the nineteenth century. in 1879, the canadian government-funded report on industrial schools for indians and halfbreeds described the u.s. boarding school system and recommended canada take a similar approach by entering into partnerships with churches to fund existing schools and to open new ones (davin, 1879). the government quickly implemented the report’s recommendations (milloy, 1999). davin (1879), the government, and churches argued that indigenous children should be removed from their parents and communities to facilitate their assimilation into euro-western society (milloy, 1999). therefore, while some day schools were created near first nations communities, most children lived away from their communities at industrial or residential schools for at least 10 months per year (milloy, 1999). the 1920 indian act made attendance mandatory for status indian1 children aged 7 to 15 (canada), and in some cases métis, inuit, and non-status first nations children were also recruited in order to bring additional funding (under the per capita formula) and able-bodied workers to these schools (indian act, 1920, see also chartrand, logan, & daniels, 2006; dion stout & kipling, 2003). importantly, the colonial enterprise equated health and development with christianity and whiteness (kelm, 1998). at residential schools, children were forced to attend christian sermons, practice christianity, and follow other euro-western cultural protocols concerning education and behaviour. for instance, when first arriving, children had their hair cut short, and they were often required to exchange their homemade clothing for school uniforms. at most schools either only english or both english and french was spoken, and educational practices were also shockingly different than indigenous practices such as observation and storytelling (furniss, 1995; kelm, 1998; miller, 2003; milloy, 1999; truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015). even though many children arrived at residential schools speaking only their own languages and having been schooled primarily, if not solely, in their own cultural protocols, they were often severely punished when they breached the established euro-western protocols (kelm, 1998; miller, 2003; milloy, 1999; truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015). 1 in canada, first nations people’s actions and identity continue to be regulated through indian act legislation. the indian act first came into effect in 1876 and continues to define who is and who is not a status indian and therefore who can access certain programs and funding and who is subject to the act. 3 mckenzie et al.: disrupting the continuities published by scholarship@western, 2016 informed by colonial assumptions about indigenous peoples’ cognitive (in)capabilities, the schools provided only basic mathematic and literary education (fiske, 1996; milloy, 1999; truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015). these assumptions are evident within the writing of residential school employees, administrators, and advocates at the time. for instance, davin (1879) quoted colonel brown, “one of the seminoles,” as stating: “they never could, in his opinion, cope with the white man in either cunning or industry” (p. 6). many residential school educational interventions and educators focused on shaping indigenous children’s morality to fit euro-western christian standards (fiske, 1996; kelm, 1998; milloy, 1999). in addition, many schools kept children occupied with performing manual labour for long hours, which further compromised their education (fiske, 1996; kelm, 1998; milloy, 1999). racist and gendered myths about indigenous women’s lasciviousness also informed residential school employees’ attitudes and practices. for instance, an oblate priest stated: i also consider a school for the indian girls a far greater benefit here than a school for the boys. both would be required . . . but the girl’s [sic] is undoubtedly the most required. in vain would we teach the boys so long as the girls are ignorant and wicked. (oblate fathers records, james mcguckin cited in fiske, 1996, p. 171) indeed, fiske (1996) stated that at lejac residential school, female students faced more rules and demands of modest behaviour than male students; girls “wore unbecoming uniforms, were denied personal adornment and were subjected to standard hair styles” (p. 172). further, this particular school enforced gender segregation in every possible activity. gendered segregation was common at residential schools, and even brothers and sisters were forbidden from speaking (fournier & crey, 1997; furniss, 1995; milloy, 1999). many indigenous communities supported and even advocated for euro-canadian education for their children, envisioning increased economic opportunities and understanding of euro-canadian culture for their children (miller, 1996). however, at the same time, community members were critical of the inadequate meals children received, the severe discipline and abuse of children, the relocation of children to residential and industrial schools far from home, and other practices (fiske, 1996; furniss, 1995; kelm, 1998; milloy, 1999). as such, parents and children engaged diverse strategies of resistance. for example, parents hid children from authorities despite threats of imprisonment and fines, and they advocated for day schools on or near first nations (armitage, 1995; kelm, 1998; milloy, 1999). children ran away from school, stole food, engaged in distancing techniques, and sometimes simultaneously accommodated the demands of priests, nuns, and teachers (dion stout & kipling, 2003; fiske, 1996; kelm, 1998; milloy, 1999). colonialist narratives framed residential schools as saving indigenous children from unhealthy communities as well as operating as vehicles for transforming these communities (kelm, 1998). analyzing archival sources, kelm (1998) revealed that these schools were sites of public health educational interventions. for instance, some schools had public health clubs and taught public health nursing to some students. newsletters were sent home that persuaded parents to learn proper health practices from their children, to seek euro-western medical doctors to treat illness, and to bring 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.4 students back to school in good health after holidays. however, most the conditions in most of the schools significantly harmed children’s health. the federal government’s per capita funding formula “was inadequate particularly in relation to the funding available to other residential child-care facilities” (milloy, 1999, p. 103). as a result, the schools were chronically underfunded, contributing to overcrowding and inadequate diets, thereby rendering children vulnerable to tuberculosis and other infections as well as contributing to high death rates (fournier & crey, 1997; furniss, 1995; kelm, 1998; milloy, 1999; truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015). in the 1940s, scientists conducted nutritional experiments, which were informed by colonial-scientific “views of aboriginal bodies as ‘experimental materials,’” at six residential schools (mosby, 2013, p. 148). mosby (2013) showed that the “schools had become, through decades of neglect by indian affairs, a possible laboratory for studying human requirements for a range of nutrients as well as the effects of dietary interventions on a group of malnourished children” (p. 160). these experiments were conducted without informed consent from the indigenous children or their parents, and included control groups of children who received (what researchers already knew to be) nutritionally inadequate diets. in addition to spiritual, cultural, and emotional abuse and neglect, many children were subjected to physical and sexual abuse and exploitation. milloy’s (1999) analysis revealed a “dearth of explicit recorded information” within official government files about the widespread sexual abuse of students (p. 296). the truth and reconciliation commission of canada (2015) draws on archival sources to demonstrate that both the government and churches were aware of the risk that staff might sexually abuse students. however, into the late twentieth century, indigenous reports of abuse were dismissed and “[i]n some cases, staff members were not fired, even after being convicted of assaulting students” (pp. 109-110). the federal government, influenced by the power invested in churches, also often overlooked (or used colonial myths to explain) complaints of severe physical punishment, overcrowding, and malnourishment at the schools (furniss, 1995; milloy, 1999). these factors produced conditions of extreme vulnerability for indigenous students, conditions that students and communities resisted and challenged (furniss, 1995; kelm, 1998; miller, 2003). for example, in 1922, members of the haisla nation withdrew their children from the elizabeth long home after several haisla girls attending the school died. despite the violence inflicted on indigenous children and families through residential schools, indigenous people and various scholars concur that the churches and governments failed in their attempts to assimilate indigenous peoples. fiske (1996) argued that many dakelh (or carrier) women who attended the lejac residential school—in spite of the harsh treatment and limited curriculum— employed skills and knowledge they acquired in school to advance their social, economic, and political roles and opportunities within and outside their communities, “including social roles once abhorred by oblate missionaries” (fiske, 1996, p. 176). for these women, residential school paradoxically and unintentionally provided a foundation upon which they could build their own structures of resistance to ongoing colonization. continuing the violence of the residential school system: the sixties scoop 5 mckenzie et al.: disrupting the continuities published by scholarship@western, 2016 although popular discourses in canada often position residential schools as an artefact of the past, the last government-run school did not close until 1996 (castellano et al., 2008). as part of a shift from segregating indigenous communities to integrating them into the body politic after the second world war, the federal government took over the administration of residential schools and moved towards ending the system; however, this movement was slow (castellano et al., 2008; milloy, 1999; truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015). up to this point, residential schools had provided only rudimentary scholastic training, but following this move the schools began to function even less as schools and more as child welfare institutions for first nations children whose families the federal government deemed unable to care for them (fournier & crey, 1997; milloy, 1999; truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015). simultaneously, government-funded social services proliferated across canada and euro-canadian society expressed increasing concern about the disparity between services onand off-reserve. in particular, the canadian welfare council and the canadian association of social workers submitted a joint presentation to the senate and house of commons in 1947 recommending changes to the indian act that would ensure that provincial health, welfare, and education departments could provide their services to indigenous people living on-reserve. johnston (1983) recognized that the “best of intentions” lay behind this recommendation, however, “little attention was paid to the effect that extending provincial services would have on indian families and communities” (p. 3). indeed, the 1951 revisions to the indian act made status indians subject to provincial laws that did not contradict the act, including child welfare laws (indian act, 1951; johnston, 1983), setting the stage for widespread provincial intervention. during the next several years, provincial governments signed various agreements regarding how child welfare services on-reserve would be provided and funded. these agreements differed among provinces and territories (johnston, 1983; sinha & kozlowki, 2013). for instance, from 1962 until the early 1980s, b.c. had an informal agreement with the federal government to provide certain federally funded services (specifically child protection and child-in-care services) to first nations children living onreserve. however, preventative services that supported families staying together (e.g., daycare) were not included in any agreements and were largely unavailable to first nations families across the province (fournier & crey, 1997; johnston, 1983). euro-western ideals embedded within canadian policy, the justice system, and the child welfare system were (re)produced by social workers, administrators, lawyers, and judges who viewed their everyday practices to be in the best interest of all children (kimelman, 1985). indigenous children often were apprehended because of the incongruence between euro-western notions and cultural practices and realities of indigenous communities. a social worker with the ministry in b.c. conceded that provincial social workers would, quite literally, scoop children from reserves on the slightest pretext . . . [and] she and her colleagues sincerely believed that what they were doing was in the best interests of the children. they felt that the apprehension of indian children from reserves would save them from the effects of crushing poverty, unsanitary health conditions, poor housing and malnutrition, which were facts of life on many reserves. (cited in johnston, 1983, p. 47) 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.4 further, johnston (1983) related that these social workers did not take into account the long-term effects of child apprehension on children, their families, and their communities. often, children were placed in non-indigenous foster or adoptive homes (in canada and other countries) where they received inferior care and were subjected to abuse and neglect (badgely, 1991; fournier & crey, 1997). some foster parents took children in because of the modest stipend accompanying each child, as well as for the opportunity to put children to work in the household or farm. some indigenous children were sold to adoptive parents in the united states—many of whom were seeking a source of labour (fournier & crey, 1997). accompanying this shift in responsibility for child welfare from the federal residential schools to provincial child welfare services, some residential schools closed in the 1960s and 1970s. from the mid-twentieth century, the practice of child protection workers apprehending and placing indigenous children in non-indigenous foster and adopted homes bourgeoned (johnston, 1983; hamilton, & sinclair, 1991). in 1955, less than 1% of children in the care of b.c.’s child welfare branch were of first nations ancestry; by 1964, the proportion had increased to 32.2% (johnston, 1983). these practices continued the harms inflicted by the residential school system, whereby children faced numerous losses as they were removed from their families and communities while being immersed in euro-canadian cultural practices and norms, usually without access to indigenous cultural practices or gatherings (badgely, 1991; fournier & crey, 1997; johnston, 1983; hamilton & sinclair, 1991; sinclair, 2007). many survivors of the sixties scoop reported being subjected to spiritual, emotional, physical, and sexual abuse and neglect in the very homes in which the child welfare authorities placed them, reflecting the colonialist and racist dynamics that continue to shape adoptive family relations (fournier & crey, 1997; johnston, 1983; royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996; sinclair, 2007). even when placed in non-indigenous homes with loving, kind people and environments, indigenous children were (and continue to be) often affected by these multiple losses and racialized power dynamics. today, many adopted indigenous people experience intense struggles as they try to come to terms with their indigenous identities in a society that discriminates against indigenous peoples, particularly when they are separated from family and communities who share these experiences (sinclair, 2007; tait et al., 2013). although generations of families and communities have resisted and flourished despite colonial forces, the consequences of these practices are extensive (bombay et al., 2011; bracken, deane, & morrissette, 2009; fast & collin-vézina, 2010; haskell & randall, 2009; jacobs & gill, 2002). the effects shape all aspects of life, including access to education, employment, parenting, and mental and physical health of those apprehended, members of families from whom children were taken, and subsequent generations (bombay et al., 2011; smith et al., 2005). these dynamics continue as part of indigenous communities “lived histories,” perpetuated by neocolonial and neoliberal practices and discourses. lived histories: colonial child welfare policies and practices today past colonial discourses resonate today through popular, medical, and scientific discourses that continue to pathologize indigenous peoples (browne, 2007; browne & fiske, 2001; browne & smye, 2002; browne, smye, et al., 2011; fiske & browne, 2006; tait, 2009; varcoe, brown, calam, harvey, & tallio, 7 mckenzie et al.: disrupting the continuities published by scholarship@western, 2016 2013). much epidemiological and biomedical research, health policies, and media coverage frame indigenous people as a homogenous group with higher rates of health and social problems requiring individualized biomedical or psychiatric treatment. these discourses both overlook the diversity of indigenous communities and render invisible the relationship between indigenous people’s social and health conditions and historical and present-day colonial processes, a relationship indigenous people and allies have repeatedly highlighted (e.g., ing, 1991; kelm, 1998, 2010; kirmayer & valaskakis, 2009). when epidemiological, biomedical, media, government, and broader public discourses acknowledge the relationship between colonialism and indigenous people’s social and health conditions today, colonialism is often constructed as something that occurred only in years past, and solely embodied by the residential school system (and less often, by the sixties scoop). for example, recent epidemiological research exploring the relationship between indigenous people’s health conditions and colonialism uses “residential school attendance” and “removal from biological parent” as the primary indicators of colonial violence and trauma (see for instance cedar project et al., 2008; lemstra, rogers, thompson, moraros, & buckingham, 2012; mehrabadi et al., 2008; spittal et al., 2007). while these indicators are important, given their intergenerational effects, it is equally important to recognize that there is an extensive system of colonial policies, practices, and discourses influencing indigenous people’s lives and their profound material and social impacts (kirmayer et al., 2014; maxwell, 2014; tait, 2009). for instance, maxwell (2014) revealed that mental health and child development discourses often discursively mobilize historical trauma to justify state-sanctioned interventions into indigenous families “on the grounds of children’s needs for ‘protection’ and parents’ needs for clinical intervention” (p. 426). past and present colonial violence directly contributes to the intersecting issues of poverty, unstable and unsafe housing, systemic discrimination, substance misuse, and other individual, family, and community health concerns for indigenous people (commission of inquiry into the circumstances surrounding the death of phoenix sinclair [manitoba] & hughes, 2013]; first nations information governance centre [fnigc], 2012; kashaninia & b.c. stats, 2011; mitchel & maracle, 2005). indigenous families continue to be treated differentially than other, non-indigenous children by child welfare services in canada, and other white-settler states, namely new zealand, australia, and the united states (tilbury & thoburn, 2011). in australia, 5% of children aged 0 to 17 are indigenous, while 24% of the children in care are indigenous; indigenous children are both more likely to be involved in maltreatment investigations and placed in out-of-home care in comparison with non-indigenous children (tilbury, 2009). similarly, sinha, trocmé, fallon, and maclaurin’s (2013) analysis of the 2008 canadian incidence study of reported child abuse and neglect (cis) revealed that, consistent with 2003 and 1998 findings, first nations families were investigated on average 4.2 times more often by child welfare than non-indigenous families (140.6 per 1000 compared to 33.5 per 1000). cases involving first nations children were more likely to be substantiated (sinha et al., 2011), more likely to remain open, and children were more likely to be placed in out-of-home care (sinha et al., 2011) than children and families who were not first nations. further, among those households investigated, first nations households were more often dealing with poverty, substance misuse, domestic violence, and “caregiving resource strain” than non-indigenous households (p. 828), and were most often investigated for neglect (41.0 per 1000 households) or risk of maltreatment (37.8 per 1000 households) (sinha, trocmé, et al., 2013). these rates require some context, however: research shows that child maltreatment, particularly neglect, is strongly linked to 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.4 poverty (drake, lee, & jonson-reid, 2009; trocmé, knoke, & blackstock, 2004). yet, in canada, dominant discourses continue to frame poverty as an individual failing, meanwhile the social safety net continues to erode (redden, 2014; swift & callahan, 2009). persistent discourses framing indigenous peoples as inherently prone to substance use problems and violence shape many service providers’ assumptions about and practices with indigenous mothers and families, often with deleterious effects (browne, 2005; browne & fiske, 2001; browne, smye, et al., 2011; landertinger, 2011; tang & browne, 2008). these effects include stereotyping, discrimination, and erroneous judgments by service providers, leading to avoidance of healthcare (browne, smye, et al., 2011; browne, varcoe, & fridkin, 2011; denison, varcoe, & browne, 2014). browne and fiske (2001) related one first nations woman’s experiences seeking care as follows: i went into the emergency . . . i had my daughter, screaming, fever. her bum was just really red and raw, and they took her away from me. they apprehended her from me right there . . . and i couldn’t believe it. and it just shows you, i said, just because i’m a native person that came in with a black eye, that looked like i wasn’t, you know, because my child had a really bad, severe rash, they just assumed the worse. and i said, “you didn’t even know who i was” . . . it was just because of how i looked, eh? (p. 136) mainstream media, government policy, and some ethnographic research have reified the colonial image of “the drunken indian,” whose drinking is distinct from other groups and inherently problematic (anderson & robertson, 2011; carter, 1997; waldram, 2004). for instance, until the late twentieth century, indian act regulations around first nations people’s alcohol use were much stricter than laws applying to non-first nations people. in 1874, a first nations person’s intoxication was made an offence punishable by jail under legislation incorporated into the 1876 indian act (royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996). the 1876 act also prohibited first nations people’s possession of alcohol onreserve. in 1951, these regulations were loosened, but it was not until the 1970 r v. drybones case that this section of the indian act was eliminated because it conflicted with the canadian bill of rights (royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996). colonial myths of indigenous people’s genetic vulnerability to the effects of alcohol are perhaps some of the most enduring colonial images, which continue to permeate canadian public consciousness (furniss, 1999). furniss (1999) described the extent to which euro-canadians subscribe to misinformed assumptions about indigenous people and alcohol use, and illustrated that people assume that alcohol abuse is an “inherent part of indian culture and/or that aboriginal people are biologically predisposed to alcoholism” (p. 109). these discourses stand in contrast to actual, lived patterns of indigenous peoples. according to the first nations regional longitudinal health survey (rhs), completed between 2008 and 2010, 35.3% of first nations people living on-reserve had not consumed alcohol in the last year in comparison to 23% of the overall canadian population (fnigc, 2012; health canada, 2010). this is not to diminish the issue of substance misuse for indigenous peoples; 82.6% of first nations people completing this same survey reported alcohol and drug use were challenges that their communities were currently facing. rather, our intention is to draw attention to the ways in which colonial myths reverberate through current discourses and underpin assumptions held by many canadians, as well as to consider the implications for human service delivery and interpretation of reports such as the cis. 9 mckenzie et al.: disrupting the continuities published by scholarship@western, 2016 risk assessment: the intersection of neocolonial and neoliberal discourses the shift from overt civilizing discourses to more neutralized language concerning indigenous peoples’ higher rates of health conditions and social problems converged with the increasing focus on risk in the late nineteenth century (douglas, 1992). indeed, risk and risk management have become predominant within child welfare practice since the 1990s (rutman, callahan, & swift, 2007; strega, 2009; swift & callahan, 2009). child welfare workers measure children’s risk of maltreatment using two types of risk assessment tools: actuarial risk assessment tools based on statistical research, which correlate families’ characteristics and history with risk for child abuse and neglect; and consensus-based models, which are based on practitioners’ experience and knowledge. these tools suggest that child welfare workers make standardized, objective judgments of children’s risk of being abused or neglected, even though research indicates otherwise (munroe, 1999; swift & callahan, 2009). indeed, risk assessment tools are founded on eurocentric norms that fail to account for socio-cultural, historical, or local community contexts (gerlach, browne, & suto, 2014; rutman et al., 2007), and like any method, measure, or tool, risk assessments serve as a prism through which particular aspects of children and families come into focus (haraway, 2004). in this case, social and environmental factors that place families at risk are transformed into individual family risks (rutman et al., 2007; strega, 2009; swift & callahan, 2009). in particular, such tools do not recognize how historical and current colonial processes place indigenous families at risk of violence, poverty, substance abuse, and ill-health (yee cited in sparrow, 2013). for instance, because of colonial policies, indigenous families are more likely to have low incomes and live in unstable and insecure housing (aboriginal affairs and northern development canada, 2013; commission of inquiry into the circumstances surrounding the death of phoenix sinclair [manitoba] & hughes, 2013; kashaninia & b.c. stats, 2011; royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996), two factors that are statistically linked to child neglect; therefore, indigenous children are more likely to be deemed at higher risk from their parents than non-indigenous children (drake, lee, & jonson-reid, 2009; strega, 2009; trocmé et al., 2004). further, colonial stereotypes of indigenous communities as spaces of dysfunction, binge drinking, and sickness continue to circulate in euro-canadian society; as such, indigenous children are more likely to be flagged as “at risk” by child welfare workers than eurocanadian children whose families are dealing with the same or similar conditions. in sinha, ellenbogen, and trocmé’s (2013) analysis of the 2008 cis data, among investigations of households in which only neglect was suspected (not maltreatment), if child welfare workers confirmed that one of the parents was problematically using substances, the workers were much more likely to substantiate neglect in first nations households (odds ratio of 19.97) than they were in non-indigenous households (odds ratio of 3.38). this focus on risk within child welfare practice conflicts with holistic indigenous views of wellness, childrearing, family, and community, and many indigenous organizations resist this narrow view of risk, grounding their policies and practices in indigenous community values and realities (mckenzie & shangreaux, 2011; thomas, hummerstey, rutman, hume, & van bibber, 2009; walmsley, 2005b). similarly, indigenous and non-indigenous organizations are also using (and adapting) the strength-based signs of safety assessment approach (caslor, 2011; skrypek, otteson, & owen, 2010; turnell, 2012). this australian-developed, collaborative approach emphasizes critical thinking, a spirit of inquiry, and practicality. the tools and techniques have been developed with on-the-ground service providers and 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.4 are constantly being refined and redeveloped in response to practice realities in different locations (turnell, 2012). as such, it is more consistent with indigenous worldviews than other non-indigenous developed assessment models. universalizing euro-canadian notions of family and children’s “best interests” legislation governing child welfare in b.c. and other locations in canada furthers the over-involvement of child welfare authorities in indigenous families. in b.c., most indigenous child welfare service agencies and provincial agencies must adhere to b.c.’s child, family and community services act, embedded with euro-western notions of families and liberal, individualistic discourse. two exceptions to this trend are the splats’in first nation, which asserted control over their child welfare services in 1980 through a provision of the indian act that decrees bands can make their own by-laws (indian act, 1970; johnston, 1983), and the nisga’a nation, whose members signed a treaty in 1999 with the b.c. and canadian governments asserting the nisga’a’s authority to pass laws concerning child and family welfare on their lands as long as these laws are “comparable” to provincial standards (sinha & kozlowki, 2013, p. 8). within b.c.’s act and legislation from some other provinces, the importance of maintaining children’s cultural identity and kinship ties to extended family are recognized as part of determining what is in indigenous children’s best interest, and provisions are made for the involvement of indigenous communities in decisions (government of british columbia, 1996; sinha & kozlowki, 2013). in practice, judges’ considerations of indigenous children’s culture, identity, and community connections remain limited (walkem, 2015). further, walkem (2015) related that lawyers’ arguments and judges’ decisions often employ essentialized notions of indigenous identity to represent only some indigenous families as authentic, thereby dismissing the importance of certain children’s cultural identities and kinship ties. similarly, indigenous communities’ interests are often constructed as separable from and as conflicting with their children’s interests (walkem, 2015). this contrasts with indigenous relational understandings of family and community (mandell et al., 2007; walkem, 2015). further, legislation and many court cases do not consider past and present colonial violence (de leeuw et al., 2010; walkem, 2015). the consequences of this legislation are extensive. since the early 1980s, indigenous organizations in b.c. and other areas of canada have increasingly taken responsibility for providing child and welfare services for indigenous children onand off-reserve. however, with the exceptions of splats’in first nation and nisga’a nation, b.c. indigenous organizations provide child and welfare services through authorities that are delegated by the province (sinha & kozlowki, 2013). as of 2013, 31 indigenous agencies in b.c. were providing some level of child and family services, and 18 agencies were providing comprehensive child and family services, including child welfare investigations (sinha & kozlowski, 2013). during walmsley’s (2005a, 2005b) interviews, some child welfare workers with indigenous organizations described how indigenous values inform their organizations and practices. however, as mandell et al. (2007) pointed out, while the increasing number of indigenous child and family service agencies provide more families with culturally-relevant options, the requirement to follow provincial legislation has produced a “lack of cultural fit between child welfare ideology, law, and services delivered” (p. 152) to indigenous peoples. for instance, a non-indigenous employee working with an indigenous child welfare organization stated that people in the organization: 11 mckenzie et al.: disrupting the continuities published by scholarship@western, 2016 do perceive this as a branch of the ministry because we are mandated under the family and children services act and so although we try and maybe incorporate some of the native teachings into it, when it comes right down to it, that's what we're living by and that . . . [is a] . . . very white piece of legislation. (walmsley, 2005a, p. 105) neo-colonial resentment and the underfunding of indigenous child welfare the colonial relations of the child welfare system are further perpetuated by inadequate funding provided to on-reserve child welfare services, in tandem with colonial myths that distract public consciousness from this underfunding. for example, it is common for euro-canadian people to express resentments about indigenous people’s relationship with the federal government, claiming that indigenous peoples receive free housing and university education, do not pay taxes, and are provided with an abundance of government payments on-reserve (furniss, 1999). these “common criticisms” reveal how discourses of egalitarianism operate simultaneously with settler-colonial denial of indigenous presence, history, and rights in order to construct euro-canadian society and governments as the victims of indigenous people’s entitlements and “special treatment.” at the same time that eurocanadian resentment towards indigenous peoples’ “special treatment” permeates public discourse (browne, 2005; fiske & browne, 2006; furniss, 1999), research continues to document the underfunding of first nations child welfare services, housing, education, and other social services on-reserve (first nations child and family caring society of canada, 2005a, 2005b; mcdonald & ladd, 2000). in the first nations child and family services joint national policy review final report, macdonald and ladd (2000) stated that as of march 31, 1999, the federal government spent $34,600 annually for each first nations child in care on-reserve (through the directive 20-1 funding formula)2 while b.c. provided $54,331 for each child in care (including first nations children living off-reserve, métis, and nonindigenous children). in response, a national advisory committee was formed in 2004 and a three-phase research project was commissioned to investigate how to improve the funding of first nations child and family service agencies (first nations child and family caring society of canada, 2005a, 2005b). the first nations child and family caring society (fncfcs) recommended immediately revising the directive 20-1 formula so it could more effectively take into account inflation and remoteness and increase resources for preventative services. fncfcs (2005b) also recommended developing a new funding formula grounded in first nations communities’ needs and realities. in 2007, the federal government started signing agreements with some provinces to implement a new funding model, the enhancedprevention-focused-approach, which addressed some of directive 20-1’s shortcomings and perpetuates others (auditor general of canada, 2011; first nations child and family caring society of canada et. al. v. attorney general of canada [for the minister of indian and northern affairs canada], 2016). 2 directive 20-1 was established in 1988 and is based on the number of children living on-reserve. it assumes that 6% of the children from each community are in care and 20% of families are receiving services of some kind. it has not been changed in response to legislation and practice standards revisions, nor does it take into account differences between communities (such as support services available) (auditor general of canada, 2008; first nations child and family caring society of canada et. al. v. attorney general of canada (for the minister of indian and northern affairs canada), 2016). 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.4 furthermore, as of 2014, b.c., new brunswick, newfoundland and labrador, and the yukon still received funding through the out-of-date and much-criticized directive 20-1 formula. the underfunding of first nations child welfare services has been challenged repeatedly. for instance, in the canadian human rights tribunal case, first nations child and family caring society of canada et al. v. attorney general of canada (for the minister of indian and northern affairs canada) (2016), aboriginal affairs and northern development canada was ordered “to cease its discriminatory practices” and reform the first nations child and family services program (p. 168). with this decision in mind, we propose the following nine recommendations. transforming euro-centric policy to support indigenous families: recommended policy approaches these recommendations take into account the impacts of colonial relations and processes on indigenous communities, accountability to indigenous communities, and indigenous peoples’ rights to selfdetermination. these recommendations involve significant upstream investments, but would contribute to downstream savings for the child welfare system. first, we make five recommendations addressing child welfare, social service, and health care practice. then, we make four recommendations to increase resources for indigenous families, communities, and child welfare agencies as well as to support indigenous communities’ self-determination. these recommendations will work most effectively together. for instance, providing equitable funding for first nations child and family services will facilitate the transformation of practice standards and foster culturally safe practices, as defined below. furthermore, if governments increase resources for first nations child welfare services but colonial discourses continue to shape child welfare legislation and practice, the overrepresentation of indigenous children in the care of the state is bound to continue. the recommendations are as follows: a. transform child and welfare legislation and practice standards across the provinces so they reflect indigenous values and are responsive to community contexts (commission of inquiry into the circumstances surrounding the death of phoenix sinclair [manitoba] & hughes, 2013). b. improve training to foster culturally safe practice by social workers and other providers. cultural safety engages a complex understanding of culture (as shaped by historical and socio-political factors, ethnicity, socio-economic conditions, gender, sexuality, etc.) and emphasizes critical self-reflexivity by providers. it also recognizes and addresses power inequalities between care providers and clients (gerlach, 2012; gerlach, sullivan, valavaara, & mcneil, 2014; harding, 2013; health council of canada, 2012; josewski, 2012; papps & ramsden, 1996; varcoe & browne, 2015). cultural safety requires attention to the impacts of colonial processes and practices. as such, enhanced training that fosters culturally safe practices will enable social workers and others, such as health care providers, to better support indigenous families. 13 mckenzie et al.: disrupting the continuities published by scholarship@western, 2016 c. increase the availability of culturally safe early childhood support services and programs that are grounded in indigenous communities’ contexts and draw on indigenous knowledges. d. increase culturally safe primary health care services for indigenous peoples, particularly women-centred, family-centred, and child-centred services. these services require organizational support (browne, varcoe, ford-gilboe, wathen, & equip research team, 2015; browne et al., 2012). e. move from the current models of risk assessment to holistic strength-based assessment models, which emphasize collaboration and are consistent with indigenous worldviews, particularly indigenous community models and the signs of safety approach (caslor, 2011; skrypek et al., 2010; turnell, 2012). f. fund community development initiatives and provide everyone with a minimum income comparable to a living wage so people have more resources to provide for themselves and their families. g. increase affordable, safe housing and reduce barriers to affordable housing. h. provide equitable funding for first nations children on-reserve and children living offreserve. a new, flexible funding formula that emphasizes improving family support services should be developed in consultation with organizations providing services to first nations children onand off-reserve (blackstock, 2007; first nations child and family caring society of canada, 2005b; mandell et al., 2007). i. support indigenous communities’ right to self-determination (particularly regarding child welfare services). although these policy recommendations may seem unrealistic in the neoliberal, neocolonial context we are working in, with a new liberal government and a prime minister who speaks to renewing a nationto-nation relationship between canada and indigenous peoples, transformative policy change is more possible now than in recent public memory. it is critical to use creative and multiple actions to move these recommendations forward, ranging from public education and advocacy to public protests and direct action resisting colonial systems. whatever strategies engaged and whether governments implement these policy changes, indigenous people and allies will continue to resist neocolonial and neoliberal violence and build decolonized futures through numerous practices, including: destabilizing eurocentric health and social service practices, revising standards of practice and policies to take into account indigenous contexts, familial relations, and knowledges, and working together to envision what decolonized relationships and structures might look like on turtle island/the land (now) called canada. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.4 references aboriginal affairs and northern development canada. 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(2008). physician advocacy essential for canada's first nations. cmaj: canadian medical association journal, 179(7), 728. doi:10.1503/cmaj.08129 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.4 the international indigenous policy journal april 2016 disrupting the continuities among residential schools, the sixties scoop, and child welfare: an analysis of colonial and neocolonial discourses holly a. mckenzie colleen varcoe annette j. browne linda day recommended citation disrupting the continuities among residential schools, the sixties scoop, and child welfare: an analysis of colonial and neocolonial discourses abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license place bridging parallel rows: epistemic difference and relational accountability in cross-cultural research the international indigenous policy journal volume 6 issue 2 the future of traditional knowledge research: building partnership and capacity article 7 may 2015 bridging parallel rows: epistemic difference and relational accountability in cross-cultural research nicole latulippe university of toronto, nicole.latulippe@mail.utoronto.ca recommended citation latulippe, n. (2015). bridging parallel rows: epistemic difference and relational accountability in cross-cultural research. the international indigenous policy journal, 6(2) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.7 bridging parallel rows: epistemic difference and relational accountability in cross-cultural research abstract to what extent are non-indigenous researchers invited to engage the knowledges of indigenous peoples? for those working within a western paradigm, what is an ethical approach to traditional knowledge (tk) research? while these questions are not openly addressed in the burgeoning literature on tk, scholarship on indigenous research methodologies provides guidance. reflexive self-study what margaret kovach calls researcher preparation subtends an ethical approach. it makes relational, contextual, and mutually beneficial research possible. in my work on contested fisheries knowledge and decision-making systems in ontario, canada, a treaty perspective orients my mixed methodological approach. it reflects my relationships to indigenous lands, peoples, and histories, and enables an ethical space of engagement through which relational accountability and respect for epistemic difference can be realized. keywords indigenous research, mixed methodology, two row wampum treaty, fisheries acknowledgments i gratefully acknowledge the financial support of the social sciences and humanities research council of canada, and the fish-wiks partnership. i would like to thank dr. deborah mcgregor and also one anonymous reviewer for constructive feedback. i would also like to acknowledge the mentoring support of the union of ontario indians and to thank nipissing first nation for the invitation to participate in communitybased research. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ b r i d g i n g p a r a l l e l r o w s : e p i s t e m i c d i f f e r e n c e a n d r e l a t i o n a l a c c o u n t a b i l i t y i n c r o s s c u l t u r a l r e s e a r c h the knowledge held by indigenous peoples as it relates to the environment is increasingly valued for its potential to contribute to sustainable natural resource management. in canada, interest in what is often termed traditional knowledge (tk) emerged out of the land claims process (nadasdy, 1999; usher, 2000) and as a result of court decisions that call for consultation and the involvement of first nations in resource management and environmental decision-making (menzies & butler, 2006; wiber & milley, 2007). increasingly, provisions for the consideration of tk are being incorporated in the environmental and natural resource regulatory regime,1 while top granting agencies fund tk research.2 in this context, government agents, resource managers, industry proponents, academics, and other researchers continue to seek information from indigenous elders, knowledge holders, and practitioners. but, to what extent are non-indigenous researchers invited to engage the knowledges of indigenous peoples? how can researchers working from a western methodological framework respectfully engage indigenous communities in the field of tk? these and other related questions are not openly addressed in the tk literature, however vital they are to ethical research practice. i address this gap through a discussion of my approach to community-based research on the relationship between knowledge and governance systems in the context of fisheries management. the central problematic is the ongoing legacy of harmful research whereby external interests drive extractive research on the knowledge of indigenous peoples (smith, 2012). intended for researchers and indigenous communities involved in collaborative research, in this article, i posit that an indigenous research paradigm (irp) offers guidance from which to construct cross-cultural research methodology. it centers the relationships and responsibilities researchers carry with respect to indigenous lands, peoples, and systems of knowledge and governance. researcher preparation (kovach, 2009) integral to an irp, helps researchers to navigate the politics of knowledge production in the field of tk. it fosters respect for difference, builds relational accountability into all stages of the research, and allows an ethical space of engagement to take shape (ermine, 2007). in my mixed methodology, the treaty relationship emerged as a powerful orienting device. for all treaty people, the nation-to-nation relationship offers an invitation to engage knowledge systems in a spirit of respect and reciprocity. beginning with the research context, i discuss the politics of knowledge production in relation to tk and the situated geographies of settler-colonialism. then, as a way of negotiating fraught terrain, i explore entry points through which western-trained scholars might engage indigenous research methodologies in their work with indigenous peoples. i ground conceptual tools and practical mechanisms in examples drawn from my own experience and conclude with general comments about research design and implementation.                                                                                                                 1 for instance, the canadian environmental protection act (1999); species at risk act (2002); canadian environmental assessment act (2012); ontario great lakes strategy (2012); and ontario’s provincial fish strategy (2014). see also mcgregor (2009). 2 for instance, the social sciences and humanities research council of canada funds my involvement in fishwiks, a multi-sited research project on indigenous knowledge systems, discussed below. 1 latulippe: bridging parallel rows published by scholarship@western, 2015 r e s e a r c h i n c o n t e x t my research is part of a larger project called fish-wiks (2015), which seeks to understand how western and indigenous knowledge systems can improve the sustainability of canadian fisheries. knowledge systems include the principles, ethics, and values underlying processes by which decision-makers acquire, value, and share knowledge. the project involves indigenous communities from each of canada’s coastal region (pacific, atlantic, arctic, and inland), indigenous governance and research institutions, and indigenous and non-indigenous researchers. the research team, led by principal investigator dr. lucia fanning, argues that current national level decision-making processes, premised on western knowledge systems, have been inadequate for effective fisheries governance (pauly et al., 2002). the current hierarchical governance regime is at odds with the expressed goal of both the federal and ontario provincial governments to implement holistic, placebased ecosystem approaches to fisheries management (o’boyle & jamieson, 2006; ontario ministry of natural resources, 2014). in contrast, indigenous knowledges are rooted in place-based worldviews and shared histories; they are holistic, experiential, and transmitted through means that are culturally dependent. decision-making authority within indigenous governance systems rests at the community or individual level (berkes, 2012; mcgregor, 2004a, 2009). accordingly, the fish-wiks team hypothesizes that indigenous knowledge systems (ikss) offer a better framework for the implementation of ecosystem-based management of fisheries (fish-wiks, 2015). by understanding how ikss can enhance the current regime for decision-making, the project seeks to provide mutually beneficial outcomes to indigenous and non-indigenous communities, improve the sustainability of fisheries, and, through the design of alternative governance models, enhance the processes by which decisions are made (fishwiks, 2015). the project does not seek to collect or distil discrete pieces of indigenous knowledge, but rather to address knowledge gaps in fisheries governance (food and agriculture organization of the united nations [fao], 2009; white, 2006) and the role of indigenous knowledge in decision-making (king, 2004; mcgregor, 2009). yet, the desire to know and to catalogue ikss on a comparative register could be interpreted as another expression of colonial ambivalence that leaves fundamentally uneven relations of power intact (simpson, 2007).3 the study of knowledge systems inevitably encounters tk, a relatively recent construct of nonindigenous origin (mcgregor, 2004a). in fisheries, tk is regarded as a “tool to help revamp environmental management practices” (shackeroff & campbell, 2007, p. 344). given the shift to ecosystems-based approaches, the dearth of historical marine ecological data, and recognition of the need to engage across disciplines, cultures, and multiple environmental perspectives, fisheries biologists and ecologists are turning to tk to “fill in the gaps” (shackeroff & campbell, 2007, p. 344). globally, tk has received attention since the 1980s. it is valued for its potential to contribute to sustainable natural resource management, the conservation of biological diversity, protection of rare species and                                                                                                                 3 fish-wiks aims to understand the western and indigenous knowledge systems that subtend fisheries management, as well as the commonalities and differences between distinct indigenous knowledge systems in four coastal regions of canada (fish-wiks, 2015). see howard and widdowson (1996) for an example of epistemic racism in the field of tk. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.7 habitats, and the enhancement of adaptive capacity in the face of climate change (johnson, 1992; united nations, 1987; united nations, 1992). yet, what occurs when holistic indigenous knowledges, underpinned by cosmologies that recognize humans as “part of the land, part of the water” (nadasdy, 1999, p. 4), are integrated with conventional, dualistic environmental and resource management regimes (howitt & suchet-pearson, 2006)? narrowly ecological perspectives on tk (latulippe, forthcoming) reinforce the ontological dissonance that renders ikss unintelligible and conceals mechanisms that maintain dominant resource governance (nadasdy, 1999; usher, 2000). reduced to three of six “faces” (houde, 2007), holistic indigenous knowledge is often subjected to distillation, compartmentalization, and distortion; misappropriation; theft, and commodification (berkes, 2012; mcgregor, 2004a, 2009; nadasdy, 1999; turner, boelscher ignace, & ignace, 2000). critical scholars ask whether or not the knowledge of indigenous peoples should be integrated with conventional models of resource management (shackeroff & campbell, 2007). the same could be said of research—consider fish-wiks. the project narrowly avoids the pitfalls of depoliticized research on tk. in its desire to improve the sustainability of canadian fisheries, the project could be interpreted as yet another effort to tap into, capture, and harvest indigenous knowledge (mcgregor, 2004a) primarily for the benefit and according to the normative standards of non-indigenous populations (mcgregor, 2004b). it works to consider fish-wiks and the politically fraught nature of research on the knowledges of indigenous peoples in a situated research context. g r o u n d i n g r e s e a r c h i n p l a c e the inland fish-wiks research partnership is comprised of nipissing first nation, the assembly of first nations, and researchers, including myself, from the university of toronto and university of guelph. nipissing first nation is located on the north shore of lake nipissing in northeastern ontario, along a historic trade route linking nipissing and algonquin traditional territories. nipissing peoples have always depended on the fishery for trade and self-sufficiency (leatherdale, 2010). it continues to be an important part of the community. traditional fishing practices are protected within the robinson huron treaty of 1850, and, in 2005, under its authority as a nation, nipissing first nation passed its fisheries regulations (fish-wiks, 2015). nipissing first nation cooperates with neighbouring jurisdictions on fisheries management (ontario ministry of natural resources, 2014), and participates in the lake nipissing summit, an annual event designed to create awareness and consensus on the need for shared ownership towards the future of lake nipissing. yet, not unlike other indigenous fisheries in ontario (koenig, 2005), the nipissing people have been subjected to decades of state-led antagonism, conflict, and criminalization (ball, 1985; boldt, 1971; cowan, 1997; “enough is enough,” 2005; “indians’ right to hunt,” 1938; lamarch, 1985). the indigenous fishery has been adversely positioned against the non-native sport fishery on lake nipissing. further, the community is situated within a regulatory framework that excludes first nations from decision-making that impact lands and resources within their traditional territories (linden, 2007). subtending this exclusion are competing treaty interpretations, the foremost source of conflict between the crown and first nations (linden, 2007). 3 latulippe: bridging parallel rows published by scholarship@western, 2015 in such a political context, and considering the insidious politics of recognition (coulthard, 2014), the inclusion of tk within the environmental and natural resource regulatory framework can be read as an appeasement strategy that works to reconcile indigenous claims to crown sovereignty without addressing fundamental conflict over jurisdiction and the violation of treaty agreements (chiefs of ontario, 2006; king, 2014; koenig, 2005). even if ikss offer a better framework for the implementation of ecosystem-based management, as fish-wiks pre-supposes, critical theorists would suggest that uneven relations of power render dissonant worldviews wholly unworkable. the comparison of knowledge systems is ill equipped to wrestle with settler-colonialism as an ongoing structure of dispossession (wolfe, 2006) reinforced by patriarchy and gendered expressions of violence (lawrence, 2003; smith, 2010), private property and other spatial technologies of settler-colonialism (harris, 2004), the cultural politics of race and nature (baldwin, kobayashi, & cameron 2012; thorpe, 2012), and the putative power of settler-state sovereignty (rifkin, 2009). research like fish-wiks that seeks to improve governance through increased interaction and policy recommendations is always already circumscribed by the structural imperatives of settler colonialism. it is unlikely to alleviate racist contempt for gillnetting on lake nipissing (hamilton-mccharles, 2014), or equip nipissing first nation with greater decision-making authority at the provincial level. ultimately, fish-wiks embodies some of the tensions that characterize tk research; however, it also takes seriously the call to forge collaborative research partnerships with indigenous organizations and communities and to follow their lead (coombes, johnson, & howitt, 2012; whyte, 2013). to navigate such contradictions, critical researchers must consider the power-laden field within which knowledge systems—as field of study and way of life—are embedded. simultaneously, researchers are challenged to suspend damage-centered research and capture desire instead (tuck, 2009). indigenous communities sometimes choose to work with outside agents and researchers, to enact their vision and work through the “growing pains” of new institutional landscapes (bowie, 2013; whyte, 2013). as a researcher invited into a research partnership with nipissing first nation, it is my responsibility to avoid extractive research practice and to ensure that indigenous knowledges are not uncoupled from social, political, and cosmological contexts. the subsequent section explores concepts and approaches that factor such considerations into research design, implementation, and interpretation. it privileges indigenous methodology as an ethical basis from which to engage tk research in a cross-cultural context. e x p l o r i n g a n i n d i g e n o u s r e s e a r c h p a r a d i g m the articulation of an indigenous research paradigm (irp) emerged in the wake of linda smith’s (2012) seminal work, decolonizing methodologies (see kovach, 2009; wilson, 2008). unlike research on and for indigenous peoples, indigenous scholars are now driving research, shaping ethical protocols, and defining culturally relevant methodologies that are accountable to communities. pushing back against extractive research, irps reflect and provide for the needs of indigenous people (wilson, 2008). a set of underlying beliefs that guide actions, a research paradigm is broad, made up of ontology (the way we view reality), epistemology (how we think about or know this reality), axiology (ethics and morals), methodology (how we go about gaining more knowledge about reality), and tools (wilson, 2008). indigenous ontology is relational. the world is seen as a “web of connections and relationships” (wilson, 2008, pp. 73-74). in this reality, ideas exist in a relational context. they develop through the formation of relationship and lose their integrity when taken out of context. there is no one fixed, 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.7 external reality or truth, only “different sets of relationships” (wilson, 2008, p. 8). indigenous axiology is based on relational accountability, or “being accountable to your relations” (wilson, 2008, p. 77). in a research context, researchers fulfill their roles and responsibilities through their methodology, which is described simply as “the building of more relations” or constructing more “knots” in the web of relationships that produce knowledge (wilson, 2008, p. 79). relationships uncovered or constructed through research methodology coalesce into theory. the elements of an irp are not discrete, but form a circle, which provides a useful metaphor. relationality “encircles” the elements of an irp (wilson, 2008). as wilson (2008) stated, just as the components of the paradigm are related, the components themselves all have to do with relationships. the ontology and epistemology are based upon a process of relationships that form a mutual reality. the axiology and methodology are based upon maintaining accountability to these relationships. (pp. 70-71) wilson’s conceptualization is derived from a cree worldview and the influence of other indigenous peoples’ perspectives. margaret kovach (2009) employed indigenous methodology, research framework, and inquiry interchangeably to describe “the theory and method of conducting research that flows from an indigenous epistemology” (p. 20). far from homogeneous, diverse indigenous peoples nevertheless share values and socio-cultural perceptions “driven by an intimate relationship with the natural environment” (kuokannen, 2007, p. 7; see also royal commission on aboriginal peoples, 1996). a common epistemological standpoint—that “everything is understood to be alive,” imbued with spirit or energy, and “connected in dynamic, interactive, and mutually reciprocal relationships”—roots diverse indigenous perspectives (shaw, herman, & dobbs, 2006, p. 270). accordingly, the objective of knowledge is not to explain an objectified universe, but to understand one’s responsibilities and relationships and to engage in mutual reciprocity in the place in which one lives (shaw et al., 2006). other indigenous peoples share forms of wilson’s (cree) relational accountability; for instance, whanaungatanga is described as kinship, relationships, or connectivity in a māori research context (mane, 2009). respecting commonalities, from an irp, knowledge is relational, neither static nor objective, and shared by all of creation, the cosmos, animals, plants, and the earth. c r o s s c u l t u r a l r e s e a r c h at first glance, an irp seems like an appropriate methodological basis from which to appreciate, on its own terms, the breadth and depth of indigenous knowledge. but the foundation of indigenous research is the lived indigenous experience (weber-pillwax cited in wilson, 2008). wilson (2008) wrote that indigenous ontology, epistemology, and axiology need to be “followed through” at all stages of indigenous research design and implementation (p. 15). like tk itself, an irp is lived; it is something one does (mcgregor, 2004a). with this in mind, to what extent can the non-indigenous, westerntrained researcher engage an irp and forge a cross-cultural or mixed-methodological approach? the extent to which researchers engage an irp relates to the nature of the inquiry and to the researcher’s relationship to tribal knowledges (kovach, 2009). also informative is the relationship between indigenous and post-positivist western qualitative research paradigms. these research paradigms share important philosophical assumptions; both are relational, interpretive, and interactive (creswell, 2007; 5 latulippe: bridging parallel rows published by scholarship@western, 2015 kovach, 2009; mansvelt & berg, 2005; wilson, 2008). they share conceptual space. yet indigenous methodologies originate from distinct indigenous epistemologies that are constituted by relationships to and with indigenous lands (kovach, 2009). they are holistic, experiential, and related to place and person, whereas western qualitative research derives from individualistic and essentialist western thought, which propels the desire for standardization and universal application. critical, less oppressive western qualitative methodologies align with elements of indigenous inquiry, but they are not based in indigenous ways of knowing; for instance, in spirit and where spirit derives (kovach, 2009). as such, kovach (2009) writes that an indigenous methodological approach, rooted in distinct epistemologies and relationships to land, is not appropriate for all research. it depends on the purpose of research and is contingent on relationships. but kovach also writes that research is fundamentally about learning. in this way, there is space for mixed methodology. in a context where indigenous communities continue to be researched by non-indigenous scientists pursuing western research on western terms, the appreciation of tribal epistemologies and indigenous research methodologies on their own terms works to unsettle white privilege and the marginalization of alternative ways of knowing within the academy (kovach, 2009). non-indigenous scholars are invited to engage in reflexive self-study and to consider a research paradigm outside of the western tradition. like ahmed’s (2004) double turn—to turn away from oneself towards others—and kuokkanen’s (2007) epistemic decolonization, kovach (2009) compels the non-indigenous scholar to “adjourn disbelief and, in the pause, consider alternative possibilities” (p. 29). as borrows argued with respect to indigenous law, in order to thrive, indigenous research “must live in many sites” (cited in kovach, 2009, p. 12). what determines respectful engagement with indigenous research? how is the distinction maintained between learned indigenist philosophy (wilson, 2012) and lived indigenous methodologies (martin & mirraboopa, 2003)? kovach (2009) suggested that researchers practice epistemological transparency in order to avoid subsuming indigenous methods under western ways of knowing, and vice versa (kovach, 2009).4 she also suggested that mixed research methodology meet three criteria: it should be accountable to indigenous communities, appreciate indigenous epistemologies as distinct, and work to bridge epistemic difference. observing these conditions, in the next section i work through whether, the extent to which, and how i engage irps. i draw on my own experience to illustrate conceptual tools and community-based mechanisms that can be applied in other research contexts. m i x e d m e t h o d o l o g y r e l a t i o n a l a c c o u n t a b i l i t y enacted through methodology, relational accountability first requires reflexive self-study. this rings true for all researchers, regardless of the extent to which they are grounded in indigenous ways of knowing. similar to positionality and reflexivity in qualitative western qualitative inquiry (mansvelt & berg, 2005), reflexive self-study or researcher preparation takes up more space within methodologies that respect indigenous epistemologies (kovach, 2009). it involves reflection on self-location, purpose, and sources of knowledge (geniusz, 2009; kovach, 2009). naming relationships and accounting for the                                                                                                                 4 as one anonymous reviewer noted, attempting to infuse one methodological approach into the other is like making rabbit and moose stew. the flavour of the moose overwhelms the rabbit. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.7 coming-to-know process prepares the critical researcher for the possibility of working with indigenous peoples on contested indigenous lands. it reveals privilege and fosters humility, responsibility, and accountability. reflexive self-study compels important questions such as to whom am i accountable? to what extent have i been invited to engage indigenous knowledges and for what purpose? what limits my ability to know? researcher preparation helps to establish what and how we know, and how relationships can be enhanced across difference. in other words, researcher preparation fosters and strengthens relational accountability. negotiating my self-directed research in relation to the fish-wiks project provided me the opportunity to explore my relationships to nipissing and anishinabek nation lands, peoples, and histories. linked to the fur trade and the métis through my paternal lineage, i grew up on land adjacent to a historically significant trade route connecting georgian bay and lake huron to the ottawa river watershed via lake nipissing and the french river. my maternal ancestors are french canadian and indigenous from the quebec side of the kiji sibi, or great river of the algonquins, misnamed by the english as the ottawa river (lawrence, 2012). while i carry historical and genealogical connections, my socio-cultural and political belonging to anishinaabe communities has been fragmented, severed by the institutions of indigenous removal and elimination including the church, racist and sexist legislation, dispossession, and propertization (simpson, 2014). given the relationship between positionality and methodology (jankie, 2004), this gave rise to questions about the basis from which i could respectfully approach an irp. here, a treaty perspective became generative. the lands and peoples with whom i am connected in a myriad of complex ways are party to a number of historic, mutually agreed upon covenants between sovereign nations, including the robinson huron treaty, treaty of niagara, great peace of montreal, and pre-contact treaties such as the dish with one spoon (corbiere, 2013). rooted in the land itself, these living agreements embody indigenous law and diplomatic protocol signifying respect for autonomy and the stewardship of shared lands (graham, 2002; hallenbeck, 2015; union of ontario indians, 2014). treaties have been violated, but as indigenous formulations of sovereignty, they continue to be held up as a “path forward” by indigenous peoples (hallenbeck, 2015, p. 4), including the anishinabek nation (“canada keeps forgetting,” 2012).5 while there is much to learn, a treaty perspective offers rich grounds from which to ethically approach the place, people, and politics of my research site. r e s p e c t i n g a n d b r i d g i n g e p i s t e m i c d i f f e r e n c e reflecting my social location, motivations, and teachers (kovach, 2009), a treaty perspective encourages relational accountability, acknowledges difference, and bridges interpretive communities. as a treaty person, i carry multiple obligations. on the one hand, i have been invited to work with nipissing first nation to understand the knowledge systems informing decision-making in fisheries management. it is fitting that i would privilege and seek to employ (not adopt) anishinaabe ways of knowing. but, i am also driven to challenge the entitlement and assumed jurisdiction of the settler-colonial state. here, a critical western qualitative methodology would be productive. to orient my work in both directions, a                                                                                                                 5 incidentally, i gained this perspective while employed with the union of ontario indians, secretariat and political advocate for the anishinabek nation, with its head office on nipissing territory. 7 latulippe: bridging parallel rows published by scholarship@western, 2015 treaty perspective allows me to pick up these twin threads in a spirit of respect and reciprocity. a treaty perspective orients my research through a conceptual framework, a useful organizational device. a conceptual framework reflects the knowledge one privileges and gives focus to research methodology (kovach, 2009). rendering one’s epistemology visible through a conceptual framework makes it possible to consider all research choices against it—to align objectives, methods, and interpretation with a particular way of knowing; orient the reader; and mitigate power differentials. the two-row wampum treaty belt serves as my conceptual framework. the historic kaswentha, or two row wampum, is discussed in the findings of the ipperwash inquiry (linden, 2007), foundational to my understanding of indigenous–settler-land relations.6 the beaded belt describes part of a friendship treaty between the dutch and haudenosaunee (see figure 1): it consists of two rows of purple beads separated by rows of white beads. the purple rows represent the different vessels of the dutch (a ship) and the haudenosaunee (a canoe) travelling side-by-side down the “river” of existence (the white beads). while the two vessels remain separate (i.e., the cultures remain distinct), the people from each vessel are meant to interact and assist each other as need be. (mcgregor, 2004b, p. 63) f i g u r e 1 . k a s w e n t h a ( t w o r o w w a m p u m t r e a t y b e l t ) . s o u r c e : “ t h e t w o r o w w a m p u m b e l t : a n a k w e s a s n e t r a d i t i o n o f t h e v e s s e l a n d c a n o e , ” b y d . b o n a p a r t e , n . d . , h t t p : / / w w w . w a m p u m c h r o n i c l e s . c o m / t w o r o w w a m p u m b e l t . h t m l some erroneously view the agreement as a form of mutual isolation (see cairns, 2000; usher, 2000); however, the two vessels, representing distinct polities, share the same space. they are “inextricably entwined in a relationship of interdependence” (turner, 2006, p. 54). three rows of white beads between the vessels have very specific meaning: peace, respect, and friendship. according to haudenosaunee philosophy, reciprocity and the renewal of ongoing relationships form the basis of communal notions of respect (turner, 2006). interaction, assistance, and reciprocal relations are meant to support peaceful coexistence and to facilitate mutual benefit.                                                                                                                 6also discussed in the royal commission on aboriginal peoples (rcap, 1996), it encourages mutual recognition, knowledge sharing, and collaboration for reciprocal benefit. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.7 applied methodologically, separate rows signify epistemic difference, while the shared space—the bridging rows of peace, friendship, and respect—mirrors the conceptual space shared by indigenous and western qualitative research methodologies. as a conceptual tool, the two row wampum facilitates kovach’s criteria for ethical engagement with indigenous methodologies: relational accountability, respect for epistemic difference, and bridging work. as such, it guides my research objectives, theoretical framework, and research implementation. r e s e a r c h o b j e c t i v e s a n d t h e t w o r o w w a m p u m . battise and henderson (2000) wrote, “eurocentric thought must allow indigenous knowledge to remain outside itself, outside its representation, and outside its disciplines” (p. 38). they argued that indigenous knowledge can only be understood through traditional pedagogy, including apprenticeship, ceremony, and practice. disconnected from anishinaabe ways of knowing and cultural frameworks, i am limited in what i can know. without disavowing my own social location, how can i transcend my worldview and regard ikss as sui generis? enacting a double turn, what is knowable? my conceptual framework provides guidance. the two row wampum is regarded as a viable model for environmental co-governance (berkes, 2012; mcgregor, 2004b). it is employed contemporaneously by a coalition of haudenosaunee nations in the us and canada to facilitate collaborative environmental protection based on mutual respect and cooperation (ransom & ettenger, 2001), and it carries meaning on anishinaabe territories (borrows, 1997), where i live and work. it encourages the exploration of ongoing commitments (hallenbeck, 2015), long-term relationships, and collective processes needed to guide appropriate knowledge sharing and decision-making that engenders peace, friendship, and respect, while maintaining the integrity of each system. thus, the two-row wampum frames my primary research objective: to explore the relationships between knowledge holders, resource users, and decision makers involved in the lake nipissing fishery and to understand how the current inland governance regime can it be enhanced to reflect a treaty partnership of sharing healthy ecosystems.7 my research objective (and proposed research outcomes) aligns with community priorities, which include responsible stewardship, protection of natural resources, and enhanced governance capacity. it reflects the call for bridging work to link western and traditional ways of knowing and allow for the development of bi-cultural resource governance models (colorado, 1988). it also builds on recent scholarship by potawatomi scholar kyle whyte (2013) on the progressive nature of tk: “care must be taken to show that [tk] invites participation to a long term process of mutually respectful learning. and more effort needs to be taken to understand what these processes should look like” (p.10). based on the strengths and limitations of my research relationships, it expresses respect for indigenous research methodologies.                                                                                                                 7 my research sub-objectives are to: understand lake nipissing fisheries within historical, cultural, socio-economic, political and regional contexts; explore the interface between knowledge systems and fisheries decision-making between and across jurisdictions; identify barriers and opportunities for the expression of ikss in fisheries governance; and identify governance mechanisms or models that reflect a nation-to-nation, or treaty, relationship. proposed research outcomes are education and awareness, enhanced governance in the spirit of the treaty relationship, and the advancement of academic discourse and praxis. at the time of writing, i am at the data gathering and preliminary analysis stage of research. 9 latulippe: bridging parallel rows published by scholarship@western, 2015 t h e o r e t i c a l f r a m e w o r k a n d t h e t w o r o w w a m p u m . reflexive self-awareness emplaces the researcher in the research context, motivates research design, and also provides a theoretical tool, “a tool for meaning making” (kovach, 2009, p. 50). my social location, motivations, and sources of knowledge align with a decolonizing or transformative theoretical base as centering epistemology. a decolonizing theoretical lens effectively analyzes power disparities, offers hope for transformation, and makes room for structural change and individual agency in resistance. it is an “integral component” of indigenous inquiry, though not its epistemic basis (kovach, 2009, p. 81). one of three possible ways of situating decolonizing theory within an indigenous research framework,8 a decolonizing theoretical approach draws on critical theory, “an allied western conceptual tool for creating change” but does not attempt to integrate or appropriate distinctly indigenous epistemologies (kovach, 2009, p. 48).9 a decolonizing theoretical approach reflects the two row wampum as decolonizing political practice (hallenbeck, 2015) and, through the shared space or bridging rows, facilitates ahmed’s double turn. it allows me to draw on critical colonial geographies and postcolonial theory to deconstruct the intersecting symbolic and material practices that reproduce state access to resources and settler resource entitlement, delegitimize indigenous fisheries, and render indigenous governance systems unintelligible. then, to balance critical theory’s persistent focus on the “colonial impact” (kovach, 2009, p. 48) and the “settler dilemma” (p. 80), i turn to indigenous scholarship. transcending damage-centered research, indigenous theories, teachings, and cartographies reflect and prioritize distinct ways of knowing and being, and offer a viable basis from which to contemplate the historically, geographically, and spiritually embedded nature of indigenous self-determination, which is central to the study of indigenous knowledge (mcgregor, 2004a). employed together, critical and indigenous theories empower powerful counter stories (mutua & swadener, 2004). l e s s o n s l e a r n e d research on tk can perpetuate resource inequity and dispossession. within this power-laden field, indigenous and decolonizing methodologies help to foster accountability to indigenous communities and respect for epistemic difference and relationality. guided by inward reflection, the two row wampum treaty belt orients my research. an “alternative structure of law and sovereign authority” on contested indigenous lands (coulthard, 2014, p. 179), treaties and a treaty perspective politicize tk research. i have illustrated its utility given my particular social location, but a treaty perspective is not the only viable framework for cross-cultural research. different socio-political contexts and research relationships warrant their own conceptual tools. the point i wish to stress is that those pursuing research with indigenous communities must be prepared to “do the work” required to honour tribal knowledges (kovach, 2009, p. 38). they must be cognizant of tk as a contested field of study and living system of knowledge, practice, and belief (reo, 2011). this means actively working to transcend extractive research practice through appropriate                                                                                                                 8 other orientations are tribal and tribal-centered methodologies. both draw on distinctly indigenous epistemologies separate from western ways of knowing. neither centers the colonial relationship. for my purpose, both are inappropriate, as i am not rooted in the tribal worldview of anishinaabe epistemology. 9 it is possible to situate decolonizing methodologies under the “umbrella” of an indigenous research framework, but it is aligned more closely with western critical research methodologies (kovach, 2009).   10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 7 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.7 engagement with irps. researcher preparation and a critical, decolonizing lens are essential prerequisites. understanding whether, the extent to which, and how one might ethically employ indigenous methodologies positions the researcher to “stay implicated” (ahmed, 2004, p. 59) in what they critique, and to build research relationships, negotiate objectives, and develop mutually beneficial outcomes with indigenous research partners. my final comments concern the link between researcher preparation, community engagement, and the implementation of ethical research conduct. relational accountability and respect for epistemic difference are not achieved through a sole principal investigator model (kovach, 2009). rather, ethical practice necessitates a research strategy based on collaborative partnership, similar to the fish-wiks model, transparency, accountability, and trust. literature on ethical research with indigenous peoples speaks of the need to mitigate power differentials (kovach, 2009), avoid harm (shackeroff & campbell, 2007), protect tk from exploitation (assembly of first nations [afn], 2009), and reciprocate learning (weber-pillwax, 2001). theory, as well as policy statements, directives, and guidelines abound, but what does ethical research look like? how is it carried out? research agreements are one way to formalize partnerships and operationalize partnership-based research strategies. they prioritize the need to give back to communities in ways that are relevant, grounded in existing needs, and accessible (canadian institutes of health research, natural sciences and engineering research council of canada, & social sciences and humanities research council of canada, 2010; kovach, 2009). they facilitate informed consent and help researchers gain an awareness of local norms and values (shackeroff & campbell, 2007). their implementation encourages ongoing engagement and accountability at the community level. grounded in pre-existing research protocol, cultural norms, standards of engagement, and priorities, i worked with nipissing first nation to establish a collaborative research agreement.10 it was an appropriate research implementation strategy given my outsider status and nascent research relationship, but formal agreements are not the only way. ultimately, communities and knowledge holders themselves set the “rules” for research through established standards of practice and research protocols (mcgregor, 2009; shackeroff & campbell, 2007). researcher preparation—involving reflection on the politics of knowledge production on contested lands, relationships to indigenous epistemologies and methodologies, and one’s limits to knowing (simpson, 2014)—creates a solid foundation from which to engage indigenous research partners and participants. in my case, a treaty perspective affords the space from which to decolonize research practice, make connections, and develop mutually beneficial outcomes through the respectful and reciprocal interplay of distinct knowledge systems. a powerful representation of indigenous sovereignty and law that is rooted in the land, the treaty relationship is a compelling invitation to all treaty people to engage indigenous peoples, their knowledges, and methodologies in a spirit of respect and reciprocity.                                                                                                                 10 based on a national aboriginal health organization (naho, 2007) template, it describes the research purpose and objectives, scope, methods and procedures, provisions to obtain informed consent from research participants, expected outcomes, benefits and risks, obligations and responsibilities of both the external researcher partner and the community partner, the dissemination of results, data ownership, communications, and dispute resolution. 11 latulippe: bridging parallel rows published by scholarship@western, 2015 r e f e r e n c e s ahmed, s. 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(2006). settler colonialism and the elimination of the native. journal of genocide research, 8(4), 387-409. 17 latulippe: bridging parallel rows published by scholarship@western, 2015 the international indigenous policy journal may 2015 bridging parallel rows: epistemic difference and relational accountability in cross-cultural research nicole latulippe recommended citation bridging parallel rows: epistemic difference and relational accountability in cross-cultural research abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license bridging parallel rows: epistemic difference and relational accountability in cross-cultural research elders' teachings about resilience and its implications for education in dene and cree communities the international indigenous policy journal volume 7 | issue 1 article 2 january 2016 elders' teachings about resilience and its implications for education in dene and cree communities john g. hansen university of saskatchewan, john.hansen@usask.ca rose antsanen university of saskatchewan, roa353@campus.usask.ca recommended citation hansen, j. g. , antsanen, r. (2016). elders' teachings about resilience and its implications for education in dene and cree communities. the international indigenous policy journal, 7(1). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.1.2 elders' teachings about resilience and its implications for education in dene and cree communities abstract this study developed out of a need to discuss eurocentrism in indigenous education and to provide what the elders describe as an appropriate educational experience. the purpose of the study was, within a northern context, to discuss indigenous education, and how educators and elders perceived their cultural models, values, and aspirations of indigenous resilience. this study deals with indigenous resilience based on knowledge held by indigenous educators and elders with respect to the traditional teachings and values within indigenous cultures in northern manitoba. we present the perspectives held by these constituents with respect to the notions of indigenous resiliency. two indigenous researchers of dene and cree nations share their perspectives based on interviews with indigenous elders about traditional education in northern manitoba. interview results demonstrate that a traditional, culturally appropriate model of education is significant to indigenous resilience development. keywords eurocentrism, dene and cree culture, indigenous resilience, northern education, traditional knowledge acknowledgments to the elders of the university college of the north. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/     e l d e rs ' t e a c h i n g s a b o u t r e s i l i e n c e a n d i t s i m p l i c a t i o n s f o r e d u c a t i o n i n d e n e a n d c re e c o m m u n i t i e s this study developed out of concern that there is a need to discuss the concept of resilience in indigenous education and to provide what the elders describe as an appropriate educational experience. such appropriate education assumes that western eurocentric education has had some inappropriate and detrimental effects on indigenous people. some scholars observe that indigenous students underachieve in school because a eurocentric curriculum alienates them (adams, 2000; hesch, 1999; silver, 2013). therefore, it is understandable that the elders advise that educational programming ought to incorporate traditional knowledge and culture in order to make schooling more relevant and culturally appropriate to practical life in the community. although this article deals primarily with dene and cree culture, the experiences relating to colonization and resilience apply to many other indigenous peoples in canada. the motive for dealing with the dene and cree of northern manitoba is our cultural affiliation with the people of that region. we were born and raised in northern manitoba are of biracial identity and cultures: the first author is cree–danish; and the second author is dene–german. each of us has an indigenous mother and a non-indigenous father. since we are providing an interpretation of the elders’ teachings, we have developed the cultural discussion from our own indigenous vantage points as much as possible. we hope that our interpretation will contribute to the literature on dene and cree culture and resilience. the purpose of this article is to explore educational approaches that support resilience among indigenous learners in modern education systems. these approaches are grounded in the notion that resilience was a foundational part of indigenous education; however, it has been undermined, or challenged by a history of colonialism and eurocentrism. therefore, this article provides considerable discussion on fostering educational approaches that support resilience. the first section of the article provides a general discussion of how resilience was understood and developed in traditional indigenous cultures, and will lead into the broader literature on resilience as it relates to traditional understandings. the second section discusses how colonialism, including residential schools and eurocentrism, erode the foundation on which resilience is cultivated in traditional cultures. section three introduces the elders and the research methodology, which develops the foundation for the elders' discussion of how to reclaim and incorporate components that support resilience as part of formal and informal education systems in the modern context of cree and dene communities. the final section concludes the article as a whole, and provides policy recommendations. h o w r e s i l i e n c e i s u n d e rs t o o d i n i n d i g e n o u s c u l t u re s there is a debate surrounding the concept of resilience. the notion that resilience is a quality that some people have and others have not is not only incorrect but misleading because it implies that nature alone is responsible for resilience. the reality is that resilience is a process that can be acquired and developed. understood this way, resilience is a process that practically any person can learn to develop. according to wieland and wallenburg, (2013) resilience is the “ability to cope with change” (p. 300). scholars who have studied indigenous peoples have made attempts to describe how traditional teachings and culture play an important role in the development of coping strategies and resilience among indigenous 1 hansen and antsanen: elders' teachings about resilience published by scholarship@western, 2016     peoples (chandler & lalonde, 2008a, 2008b; hansen, 2015a; silver, 2013; waldram, 2004; wastesicoot, 2015). indigenous concepts of resilience can be understood as arising out of the ability to be flexible and having a vision about how to succeed. as valaskakis, stout, and guimond (2009) advised: resilience is the polar opposite of rigidity. it provides an alternate perspective to the more usual scenarios that emphasize indigenous disadvantage and allows the indigenous challenge to be reconfigured as a search for success rather than an explanation of failure. (p. 42) this passage illustrates that having a positive self-concept and a sense of culture have been major factors in the development of educational success. however, indigenous identity has been constructed alongside stereotypes, “often marked with negative undertones, and the images of the ‘drunken indian’ and/or ‘indian outlaw,’ which have dominated society for so long [they] are now recognized as colonial stereotypes” (hansen & antsanen, 2015, p. 84). these stereotypes serve to encourage indigenous learners to internalize negative and shameful feelings toward themselves. therefore, resilience among indigenous students in education is manifest in their ability to balance negative and positive feelings about the way they perceive and feel about themselves and the world (adams, 2000; commission on first nations and métis people [cfnmp], 2004; hansen, 2015a). indigenous interpretations of resilience involve “the capability of individuals to cope and flourish successfully in the face of significant adversity or risk” (reid, stewart, magnum, & mcgrath, 1996/1997, p. 84).therefore, traditional teachings and culture are linked to indigenous resilience. hansen and antsanen (2015) described such traditional teaching, specifically recognizing the spiritual dimension to living well in dene culture: living well together is a commonly held notion in dene culture and this concept is expressed in the language. for example, “dene dewh doli dene hina” conveys a message about the history of the hardship of the people. for example, the dene word “dene dewh doli”, usually conveys the ability to live even in the face of adversary, “dene hina,” the people survived. the dene believe that survival was possible because of their belief in “dedi yeh,” the great spirit, or “ne whol shi ni” the creator. (p. 62) dene culture’s spiritual dimension has been used to inspire and develop learners. although these traditional teachings were suppressed for generations, indigenous people must be credited with the ability of ensuring the continued existence of their traditional cultures and ways of knowing. however, relatively recently there has been an increase in both indigenous and non-indigenous scholars who are producing favorable interpretations of indigenous people and culture, which contribute to indigenous peoples’ psychological well-being, or mental health. for example, waldram (2004) composed a fitting interpretation of the matter between traditional knowledge and modern day applications: indigenous conceptualizations . . . tend to define what types of knowledge and behaviors are necessary to function within specific cultures . . . an expert inuit hunter will be lauded for his skills at survival and tracking animals . . . similarly, the courtroom skills demonstrated by an aboriginal lawyer will also be celebrated, a fact which confounds those who see indigenous knowledge and skills as oriented only to the past. (p. 95) 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 1 [2016], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.1.2     this passage by waldram indicates that indigenous knowledge is not a relic of the past, but rather it still exists as an adaption to life in a changing world. indigenous people adapt to stress and adversity through indigenous knowledge, which emphasizes the need for balance. d e c o l o n i z a t i o n a n d r e s i l i e n c e there is a growing awareness that decolonization of indigenous education and culture is linked to indigenous resilience. according to smith (1999) indigenous education is part of a decolonizing movement that seeks to restore the cultural ideas and practices of dominated peoples. smith (1999) notes that, “cultural survival, self-determination, healing, restoration and social justice are engaging indigenous researchers and indigenous communities in a diverse array of projects” (p. 142). decolonization promotes an indigenous model of resilience in a very real sense: it is not just a set of beliefs. it has developed into a finely tuned model of indigenous resiliency. as chandler and lalonde (1998) noted, those indigenous communities “that have taken active steps to preserve and rehabilitate their own cultures are shown to be those in which youth suicide rates are dramatically lower” (p. 191). therefore, indigenous communities do well when they restore their cultural traditions from a history of colonial suppression. according to wesley-esquimaux (2009), resiliency is “the ability to rebound from challenges one encounters in daily life” (resiliency and recovery section, para. 1). however, indigenous peoples are nations within a colonial state who have a different experience than other canadians. therefore, resiliency has a much broader meaning in the indigenous world. as mcguire–kishebakabaykwe (2010) observed: whole generations of children were taken away with some anishinaabe families having multiple generations of children removed. yet, in spite of these overwhelming challenges, anishinaabe still maintain their identities, languages, and cultures. this continuity is community resilience . . . indigenous place-based resilience requires understanding the traditions and sustained relationships with the land. relationships are embedded in the land. (p. 122) this passage illustrates that anishinaabe languages and cultural understandings are still alive. parenthetically, in canada, the anishinaabe are indigenous peoples who are also known as ojibwa and/or salteaux and they live throughout alberta, saskatchewan, manitoba, and ontario. consistent with the anishinaabe teachings is the spiritual connection to the land, and this relationship is reflected in the dene language. the dene word “ne holt hi ne” translates as the “one who created the land,” which suggests the spiritual relationship the dene people have with the land (antsanen, 2014). the old dene people still teach us that the land should not be sold or destroyed. to our way of thinking, the denesuline have developed coping strategies that enable them to overcome crisis and be a resilient people. traditional knowledge has allowed the people to effectively thrive on the land for thousands of years. therefore, it is understandable that the land is vital in many indigenous cultures. the dene kede (1993) stated, “our continued survival requires us to be respectful in a respectful relationship with the land, all its animals, the spiritual world, other people and ourselves” (p. 3). these teachings harmonize with the dene concept “a si ho roe e sah,” which connotes the importance of being humble; that is, seeing oneself as a steward of the land rather than having dominion over it. the dene kede (1993) curriculum model advocates that the younger generations perpetuate the traditions: 3 hansen and antsanen: elders' teachings about resilience published by scholarship@western, 2016     there is a need to root ourselves in tradition, not for the sake of the past but for the sake of the future. our children, with the gift of their culture, can work towards ensuring our future survival as well as the survival of human kind. this became our vision statement and we started creating a curriculum to this as being the central vision. (p. 3) this passage illustrates the importance of respectful interaction between people, the land, and the animals. in the context of dene kede cultural teachings, the four specific orientations are ideas that relate specifically to the land, the self, the people, and the spiritual world. these holistic teachings integrate the dene worldview into the curriculum: spiritual: these expectations help students in understanding or connecting with the spiritual understandings that the dene have with respect to fish; land: these expectations help students develop the skills and knowledge that the dene have with respect to the physical aspects of fish and fishing; other people: these expectations help students understand how the dene relate to each other, as determined by activities associated with fish or fishing; self: these expectations help students reflect on the significance of the spirituality, knowledge and skills. (dene kede, 1993, p. 3) such teachings demonstrate a pedagogy that advocates respect for all life. it teaches us that all life is connected and that the fish are an integral part of existence. as with the dominant culture, indigenous peoples such as the denesuline want to reproduce our culture and traditions for future generations. the dene word “dene ho roe ee sah” connotes that self-respect is connected to respecting others; it takes into account that if one harms others, harm will come to them. it is to express that the energy you send out comes back to you—a sort of karma. this reciprocal concept helps to explain why the dene and cree perceive the relationship with the spirit, the people, the community, the animals, and the land as interconnected (antsanen & hansen, 2012; campbell, 1973; hansen, 2015c). to our way of thinking, having a non-eurocentric understanding of indigenous identity and an optimistic outlook on life is a characteristic of resilience. h o w c o l o n i a l i s m a n d e u ro c e n t ri s m e ro d e t h e f o u n d a t i o n i n d i g e n o u s r e s i l i e n c e in canada, the criminal justice system has been used to colonize indigenous ways of thinking and being, often by laws that outright discriminate against indigenous peoples. sutherland (2002) claimed that “any resistance to these laws were made illegal and contributed to eroding indigenous political structures” (p. 6). she observed: it was illegal for first nations people to go to court to sue the government of canada without previous permission from the government . . . some laws and policies were directed at the heart of first nations’ culture and spirituality. for example gatherings such as potlatches were outlawed while christmas celebrations were encouraged . . . it was illegal to practice traditional healing . . . when attempts to disrupt economic, political, and spiritual infrastructures did not sufficiently assimilate “indians,” children became the targets. (p. 6) these kinds of strategies demonstrate the nature of colonialism’s erosion of indigenous culture. a dominant discourse has largely ignored indigenous perspectives and culture until relatively recently. historically, school textbooks and curriculum have devoted very little discussion to the indigenous 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 1 [2016], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.1.2     experience (adams, 1975; hansen & antsanen, 2015). although the indigenous community received some attention, it was largely as the scene of colonial activities—such as residential schools—and most of what was mentioned about indigenous societies was from a eurocentric point of view1. however, because indigenous identities have been constructed negatively by eurocentric thinkers, historians, academics, and writers, racial stereotypes penetrated deeply into the mainstream society. such eurocentric interpretations and stereotypes have played an important role in the development of socioeconomic disparities between indigenous peoples and the dominant group. the present educational disparities cannot be understood without examining eurocentric education and its ideology. as a rule, indigenous learners are schooled in an education system that is grounded in the interests and ideals of the colonizer. it reflects what hesch (1999) called “settler interests” (p. 3). as a result, indigenous learners are positioned at a disadvantage while members of the dominant group are at an advantage, which creates and sustains prevailing educational disparities between the indigenous peoples and the dominant group. for instance, eurocentrism creates or perpetuates inequality in education and in the wider social and economic conditions through evaluation standards that are culturally biased in favour of the dominant group. according to sensoy and diangelo (2012) schools reproduce inequality in the following ways: mandatory culturally biased testing; “ability” tracking; a primarily white teaching force with the power to determine which students belong in which tracks; cultural definitions of intelligence, what constitutes it, and how it is measured; and standards of what constitutes good behaviour as determined by white teachers and administration. rather than serving as the great equalizer, schools function in actual practice to reproduce racial inequality. (p. 129) this educational set-up illustrates some of the ways in which racial disparities in society are created and sustained, resulting in further racial inequality, as picard (2012) observed: the unemployment and poverty rates are five times those in the non-aboriginal community . . . only 4 per cent of natives have a university education, one-quarter the rate in mainstream society. one-third of aboriginal people do not graduate high school, three times the rate for non-aboriginals. (p. 1) not only are indigenous people underrepresented in educational achievement, but they also suffer from unemployment and poverty to a much higher degree than others in canada. therefore, indigenous students demonstrate resilience when they succeed in education. perhaps the most stressful or adverse experiences that colonized peoples must cope with is eurocentrism. this is no small task: eurocentrism is embedded within the culture and discourse throughout the western world, particularly educational curriculum. it promotes myths that serve to oppress indigenous peoples. such eurocentric and dominant discourse has been used to colonize indigenous ways of thinking (adams, 2000; blaut, 1993). according to adams (2000), many of the indigenous elite have become collaborators with the oppressor and “some native academics write indian and metis history with a strictly eurocentric interpretation” (p. 51). therefore, eurocentric                                                                                                                 1 this is the notion that indigenous peoples are racially and culturally inferior to western european colonizers (adams, 2000; blaut, 1993; hansen & antsanen, 2015). 5 hansen and antsanen: elders' teachings about resilience published by scholarship@western, 2016     education is a powerful way of colonizing indigenous ways of thinking. it does this in various ways, but most significantly it teaches the values, language, culture, and history of the colonizer. as a result, the colonized come to understand the world from a eurocentric point of view (adams, 2000; blaut, 1993). in his book, the colonizer’s model of the world, blaut (1993) claimed that eurocentrism is more than a concept; it is “a label for all the beliefs that postulate past or present superiority of europeans over noneuropeans (and over minority people of non-european descent)” (p. 8). since eurocentrism views europe as the intellectual centre of the world, it asserts that innovation spreads from europe (the centre) to the outside indigenous world, which blaut (1993) called “eurocentric diffusionism” (p. 1). as a result, indigenous peoples are viewed as “naturally inferior to europeans, naturally less brave, less freedom-loving, less rational, and so on, and progress for them depended on the acceptance of european domination” (blaut, 1993, p. 20). according to the theory of eurocentric diffusionism, the indigenous community does not contribute valid knowledge to the western world. eurocentric education therefore, does not value indigenous culture and language. even today, when a dene or cree student has, for example, an accent, the teacher may assume that the student is “backward” and inferior (adams, 1975; hansen & antsanen, 2015). these eurocentric perceptions serve to marginalize indigenous students. although the student demonstrates an understanding of the topic, the teacher may rate their performance as substandard and thereby thwart the student’s success (adams, 1975; cfnmp, 2004; hansen, 2015b). unfortunately, many indigenous peoples are familiar with the negative constructs associated with indigenous identity—lazy, drunkards, unintelligent, having an accent, and so on. of course, all of this contributes to the alienation of indigenous peoples. despite their racialization, indigenous students are able to cope with negative experiences and some succeed in a western education system. t h e e l d e rs five omushkigo (swampy cree) elders in northern manitoba contributed to this study. the swampy cree, or omushkegowuk (which means “people of the muskeg”) are the cree people who live throughout northern ontario (along james and hudson’s bay) and northern manitoba. the language spoken by the omushkegowuk people is the “n-dialect”; this group also refers to themselves as the inninew, which means the people. stella neff, a respected elder from misipawistik cree nation or grand rapids first nation, a cree community approximately 400 kilometers north of winnipeg, manitoba on highway 6. stella did not attend indian residential school, and grew up with traditional teachings, and spent a substantial amount of time on the land. the elders in her community taught her lessons for life in relation to the traditional teachings of her people. sylvia hansen is a respected elder born on the opaskwayak cree nation in 1937 and for the most part grew up in her home community. although sylvia experienced two years in residential school, she continues to identify with the culture and worldview of the omushkegowuk. she continues to speak the language of the people despite the fact that the residential schools suppressed the language. sylvia is knowledgeable about the stories, unspoken nuances, and values within omushkegowuk societies. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 1 [2016], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.1.2     william g. lathlin is a respected elder who sits on the opaskwayak restorative justice committee of opaskwayak cree nation. he is a residential school survivor and a former chief of the opaskwayak cree nation who has much knowledge of the people of opaskwayak. he knows the families that comprise opaskwayak, and he is highly respected by the people in the community. william has a sense of humor and he is a good speaker in both the cree and english languages. john martin is recognized by many as a traditional elder. he is the resident elder at the university college of the north in the pas, manitoba, and he performs ceremonies. he was born and raised on the mosakahiken cree nation or moose lake reserve. like many indigenous children of his generation, he was sent to residential school during the 1950s. having survived the ordeal, he was taught traditional teachings from his elders, and has earned the respect of his community. john performs sweat lodge ceremonies, feasts, and traditional weddings. dennis thorne, an elder of mixed indigenous ancestry—cree and ojibwa—was born in 1939 in wanless, manitoba, a small métis community located about 50 kilometers north of opaskwayak cree nation on highway 10. dennis did not attend indian residential school and was taught traditional teachings by his elders. during the early 1980’s, dennis helped build some of the first sweat lodges behind canadian prison walls. m e t h o d o l o g y this section discusses the research methodology that applied tools of qualitative research. the participants are indigenous elders from northern manitoba and they were interviewed to understand how the elders perceive and understand traditional indigenous education. creswell (1998) advised that qualitative research is suitable when the major research question asks “how” (p. 17). the elders, for example, were asked, “can you tell me about traditional cree education systems, and how traditional cree values are passed on?” therefore, this study is suitable for a qualitative research. as creswell (1998) notes, in qualitative research, “the researcher builds a complex, holistic picture, analyzes words, reports detailed views of informants, and conducts the study in a natural setting ” (p. 15). the participants were interviewed on opaskawayak cree nation at a time and place of their choosing. more specifically, using the research questions, researchers asked participants to discuss the way they see and understand the world as it relates to the traditional cree education systems, how traditional cree values are passed on, and the teaching of appropriate behaviour. d a t a c o l l e c t i o n data was collected via ethnographic methods that utilized traditional protocols for knowledge gathering. these traditional protocols included offering food, cloth, tobacco, and sweetgrass out of respect for the community researched. the ethnographic research methods incorporated into the data collection process include open-ended interviewing techniques, field notes, audiotaped conversations, and general observations. the on-site interviewing conversations were tape recorded with permission and were conducted in the traditional omushkigo territory of northern manitoba. 7 hansen and antsanen: elders' teachings about resilience published by scholarship@western, 2016     d a t a a n a l y s i s in keeping with an indigenous holistic philosophy, in our analysis we organized the data into themes based on the teachings the elders shared. thus, we present a holistic analysis of indigenous educational concepts and practices. during the analysis, we searched for ideas and themes in relation to how the elders discuss traditional teachings. together they suggested that the ideological foundation for indigenous education model emphasizes traditional teachings and culture. the knowledge the elders shared provides a model that could contribute to decolonization of a traditional indigenous education system from a history of colonialism. decolonizing indigenous education, therefore, involves researching the oral stories, histories, and teachings of our elders. the participants expressed that notions of holism, the land, indigenous languages, animals, stories, and spirituality are intrinsic to indigenous education. education among the indigenous peoples has been principally connected to the land. pre s e n t i n g t h e d a t a when asked, “can you tell me about the traditional cree education systems? how traditional cree values are passed on?” stella responded as follows: the education systems that we had wasn’t confined to sitting on the floor and sitting on the desk, it was by example and when my grandmother sat down by the stove with the moose meat and gave me a little knife to teach me how to make meat for the rack and she would gently show me and i must have been very small because my grandmother passed away when i was 8 and i was copying her and that was the system by example the same with talking about things like misbehavior it was by example and that was how we were taught gently we didn’t get the stick like what was introduced, or like a strap like we got in school. it was by a gentle teaching and these values were passed on like respect and love for land and honesty and good behaviour . . . so the values were priceless for me and i’m so sorry that the system is gone. stella described the traditional education system as based on teaching by example and being taught gently. it speaks to the indigenous principle of teaching gently and in doing so reciprocity occurs; that is, gentleness is returned. such teachings diverge from the colonial public education stella experienced. in her response, sylvia mentions that the education she received in the opaskwayak community was largely related to living off the land. she stated: the men used to teach the boys how to do the moose hunt, fish, and other work like cut trees, and they were experienced, they were very experienced in things like that type of work. and trapping [pause] . . . at that time, when we went to school there was no running water. we had to melt the snow for water in the winter, and the river, ice, we had to go to the river and get some ice and then we had to cut down the wood for the stove. and the boys used to look after the horses, so all the kids seemed like they were working. the above statements by sylvia and stella suggest that experiential teachings are a major aspect of indigenous education. john martin described such experiential teachings in his response: 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 1 [2016], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.1.2     well, when we hear something we have to see it and experience it at the same time. that’s the way our old people used to teach us about things you know. how you snare rabbits, something that’s easy is things that they can tell you. how to hang your snare or how to make something, but the main thing was to do something, that’s how i learned it, by doing. and when you make a mistake, like you might be putting the snare to close to the trees or to low or to high you learn from them. the old people might ask you why you never caught a rabbit and these are the ways in which the old people taught you: they might ask you what’s wrong? how come you’re not catching anything? or why you’re not snaring anything? so we have to figure it out ourselves, that’s the way they used to teach us about everything, you do it and they’ll find questions for you. what’s wrong? how can you make it better or right? that’s part of the way, i guess to educate us, because it was different in that time, to survive was important and if you didn’t learn the person could freeze to death or starve if he doesn’t know. so that was the main thing. this passage illustrates that indigenous education is connected to the land. such education provided everything a learner needed to know in order to survive. william responds by expressing that the language of the people is significant and that he was learning about the medicines found on the land: our first teachers were our parents, and then our uncles, and then our grandparents. in my case i had the opportunity to learn the language from my grandfather from my mother’s side. and then my grandmother on my dad’s side and she began to teach me the medicine things. william’s grandmother was influential in teaching him the medicines. it was the grandmothers who usually taught young children about the medicines. this teaching is significant because medicine and healing are one of the same, and healing is significant to resilience. in terms of the women’s actual roles, both males and females contribute to educational development in accordance with the learner’s gender. as dennis described: our mother was our first teacher healer and counselor. she fed us, doctored us, and made us happy. and as we grew older depending on whether we are male or female, our education was turned over to our uncles or aunts, our sisters or brothers, our older brothers . . . our grandparents to take over the education. this quote reveals that the responsibility for educating the young is principally that of the mother—she is the first teacher, though the uncles, grandparents, and relatives also play a role in traditional education. however, the elders, both male and female, together guided the education process. in terms of traditional education, the indigenous worldview is echoed in william’s response when he spoke about the indigenous worldview and traditional teachings: those teachings about how to make fish, how to make a fire without no matches and things like that. i learned all that, i had to as a man child. and because those are the things that you need to learn. but then the other teachings like being a parent, i didn’t learn those because that’s when i went to residential school. and those are the key teachings that i missed. william reveals the eurocentrism ingrained in the indian residential school system; these schools destroyed the language of the people so that we could not communicate with each other, suppressed the 9 hansen and antsanen: elders' teachings about resilience published by scholarship@western, 2016     culture, and used physical punishment for overwhelming control. william suggests that the most devastating effects of the eurocentric residential schools was the damage done to the family unit: the impact of it has split up families, took away the children, and so some of the parents didn’t really know the rules anymore. because the state more–less invaded the home; it affected how the parents raise the child, and the responsibilities of how to raise the child and the consequences of their action or inaction. so those things changed. the elders illustrate that the suppression of language and culture devastated indigenous families. they also show that eurocentric education is detrimental to indigenous communities. forced changes to indigenous culture are seen in william and stella’s perception of the eurocentric indian day and residential schools. in other words, eurocentric education devastated children, the family unit, and the indigenous way of life was changed forever. john also stated that: a lot of a time when they’re teaching you the person that knows a lot of things about life you need to respect that person. the way you need to respect these people who are teaching you like the instructors or the professors or whoever, you have to respect that person that’s teaching you . . . you see in our life we are very spiritual people, this is very important, and when we think of animals, little rabbits, we ask that little rabbit to give its life for us. it’s a spiritual thing, for us we connect that spiritual thing to what we learn in education. because to relate those things that are being taught to us, we have to be able to listen, but when you know already, spiritually when you know, that’s what i meant when i said “inninew,” a person of the four directions. so i use my mind, physically, emotionally, and spiritually that’s what it means in cree, cree culture . . . in education you see, they only cover the two, knowledge and the physical. when you’re teaching the students learning skills and you make them do the work, work skills is what you’re teaching them, but sometimes people forget, and so people try to figure out why this person is not doing so good, why they don’t know that or they forget that. but when you don’t look at the emotional, spiritual part, because those two parts are not covered, and when we cover the emotional part and the spiritual part we understand. for john, balance is important, and emotions as well as spiritual understanding are paramount in the traditional education system. he suggests that the emphasis on the mental and physical aspects in the mainstream education system results in learning difficulty because half of human existence is excluded. therefore, indigenous education includes the feelings and spiritual understandings (e.g., the effect on the environment). as stella concurred: my mother, i came from a family of 13 children i’m the oldest sister and my mother was always busy tending to the babies, and so i and my grandmother, my grandmother was noreen from easterville and then there was nancy, and sarah and we looked after the children. i was the oldest sister, so there was a responsibility of looking after and so the teaching of appropriate behaviour. stella’s statement concurs that our mothers are our first teachers and that teaching the children appropriate behaviour was vital. however, sylvia stated: 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 1 [2016], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.1.2     well, some of those old people that i noticed in the pas were over protecting their kids. at that time, if a kid did something wrong . . . [pause] . . . but not always, but i did see that they were over protecting their kids. they didn’t send them to the boarding school those ones. so i guess in a way, at that time it is something the way we are now. if somebody did something wrong, they really weren’t sent to jail. at that time, there weren’t a lot of people like there are now. it is interesting to note that at that time and place sylvia mentions that the people did not rely on jails as a method to teach appropriate behaviour, which is understood as protecting the children. the concept of trust was expressed when william was asked about worldview differences that relate to the teaching of appropriate behavior. indeed, he was developing trust in his life on opaskwayak until he was imprisoned in the residential school: when i went to residential school my life got all mixed up. i lost the trust i had for the people . . . [pause] . . . because they sent me to this horrible place. but it wasn’t their fault and i found that out later but it was too late. i had already . . . [pause] . . . thought it was their fault eh, but it was not really their fault. they were forced to do it . . . when my language was trying to be washed away with soap, i didn’t know what they were doing. all i knew was that they gave me soap whenever i spoke, so i learned not to speak when they were around. so the first year 1950 was bad, the second year was all right, the third year and the fourth year was so-so, but this first year was so terrible. william and stella’s testimonies both discuss the damage caused by the eurocentric indian residential and day schools including the destruction of the language of the people so that we could not communicate with each other. in the process, william speaks of how he lost that sense of “trust” in the residential school that is so central to a functioning family. william is not alone in his perception. stella, sylvia, dennis, and john also recognize that the suppression of language and culture resulted in much of the social disarray of indigenous families and communities. thus, eurocentric education played an important role in the development of trauma. it has prevented the indigenous foundation of holism from continuing in the indigenous world. the concepts of spirituality and balance are recognizable when one considers the indigenous view that plants and animals like humans have a spirit. it is a manifestation of the holistic worldview. as john martin described it, the spirit is inherent in all that surrounds us—the trees, grass, rocks, etc.—which expresses the idea that existence is interconnected. john martin also mentioned the spiritual dimension of traditional teachings: everything is spiritual, the trees are alive, the grass, the rocks, they have a spirit. the animals they have a spirit and so the ceremonies are based on those teachings . . . but when we do it our way, the proper way, the way of smudging, using the rock or the feather, the purpose is spiritual. for john, an omushkegowuk way of perceiving and understanding the world suggests that everything is alive, with spirit, feelings, and consciousness. the trees, plants, animals, grass, and water are alive and have a spirit. stella, william, dennis, and sylvia also identified holism and spiritual beliefs and, like john, they understand the spiritual dimension in the traditional belief system. this was a common theme in the elders’ accounts of justice, in which they indicated that prayer is a crucial aspect of the culture. the 11 hansen and antsanen: elders' teachings about resilience published by scholarship@western, 2016     elders demonstrate that spirituality is important in the education process, and consequently education involves the spiritual, emotional, physical, and mental aspects of the human being. the experience, in other words, is holism. i d e n t i f y i n g t h e t h e m e s in the table below, indigenous teachings and the effects of eurocentrism identified by the elders are organized into themes. t a b l e 1 . i n d i g e n o u s t e a c h i n g s a n d t h e e f f e c t s o f e u ro c e n t ri s m i n d i g e n o u s t e a c h i n g s t h e e f f e c t s o f e u ro c e n t ri s m • teachings from the elders • first languages • spirituality • traditional teachings • holism • the land • community • identity • residential school or public (day) school effects • loss of language • erosion of traditional teachings and values • physical punishment • colonial education • social exclusion d i s c u s s i o n o f t h e m e s there were several negative effects of residential and public (day) schools: eurocentric education was identified as major factor in the loss of language, traditional teachings, and values. participants agreed that the estrangement from traditional values, teachings, and languages has negative effects on the indigenous community. the result of such estrangement is a decrease in the capacity for resilience. eurocentrism plays an important role in the subjugation of traditional teachings, language, and culture. the thematic factors that can assist in promoting resiliency are traditional teachings, culture, community, first languages, spirituality, and identity. although there are other ways of developing resiliency that do not come from traditional indigenous culture, the participants indicated that a sense of positive indigenous identity—that is not eurocentric—is valuable. indigenous knowledge is not simply a relic of the past. it involves a complex of factors—indigenous identity, values, languages, natural law and approaches to justice, and healing, all of which reinforce a culture and people. indigenous knowledge is holistic knowledge, which shapes the current models of most indigenous adult education programs available today (hansen & antsanen, 2015; silver, 2013). t h e m o d e rn c o n t e x t o f c re e a n d d e n e c o m m u n i t i e s a n d t h e u s e o f i n d i g e n o u s k n o w l e d g e many people have heard of indigenous knowledge as being grounded in the experiences and cultures of indigenous peoples. in northern manitoba, for example, the university college of the north (ucn) claims to be committed to enhancing the use of indigenous knowledge as a way to restore indigenous 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 1 [2016], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.1.2     identities and communities. according to the ucn (2015) academic calendar, indigenous knowledge is now integrated into all of its programs: university college of the north is committed to providing all students with stimulating, supportive, relevant, and culturally grounded learning experiences. we acknowledge and celebrate the aboriginal culture, traditions and spiritual values that are the root of the communities and people of northern manitoba. students in certificate or diploma programs will all have the opportunity to participate in a course entitled, “tradition and change: an aboriginal perspective” and in doing so, will gain an understanding of how culture in general influences thought, behaviour, values, and attitudes. (p. 25) while all types of new and innovative research arrives in classrooms and on university bookstore shelves every year, indigenous knowledge has always been in the indigenous community. some scholars claim that indigenous knowledge will not fade away as long as indigenous peoples continue to exist as indigenous peoples (adams, 1975; ermine, 1995; wotherspoon & hansen, 2013). indigenous people have a holistic way of knowing. according to castellano (2000), indigenous knowledge is grounded in holismand, as such, “all of the senses, coupled with openness to intuitive or spiritual insights, are required in order to plumb the depths of aboriginal knowledge” (p. 29). the holistic interpretation contained in indigenous knowledge draws together experience, spirituality, and what is observed in the world. castellano (2000) further explained that “knowledge in aboriginal societies derives from multiple sources, including traditional teachings, empirical observation, and revelation. these categories overlap and interact with one another, but they are useful for examining the contours of aboriginal knowledge” (p. 23). therefore, one of the main characteristics of indigenous knowledge is that it emphasizes a holistic view of the world, and looks at things as a larger whole. in indigenous education, the more a program or course is looked at holistically the more culturally appropriate it becomes, which promotes student success and this development is reflected in current research. as silver (2013) maintains: various adult education strategies that are generally consistent with this broad theoretical approach have emerged in recent years in winnipeg’s inner city. although each is slightly different from the other, they all use a curriculum and a way of teaching that is culturally appropriate and consistent with the experience and the needs of those who have lived lives of poverty and social exclusion. additionally, they produce graduates whose lives have been transformed by the experience and a high proportion of whom become active in producing positive change in their inner city communities. (silver, 2013, p. 12) our adventure into indigenous adult education at the university has inevitably influenced our way of thinking and being. it is important to note that both authors have graduated from post-secondary programs that are grounded in strong indigenous teachings—specifically, saskatchewan indian federated college, now called first nations university of canada. these post-secondary programs were instrumental in developing our resilience. 13 hansen and antsanen: elders' teachings about resilience published by scholarship@western, 2016     c o n c l u s i o n s this study discussed the concept of resilience in indigenous education. drawing on the wisdom of the cree elders and our own personal frame of reference and experience, we have presented an example of indigenous culture in northern manitoba. such teachings advocate respect for the land, the self, the people, and the spiritual world. resilience in education can be developed through indigenous constructs such as identifying and reexamining traditional teachings, which can be accomplished by discussions with elders. for the elders, culture and language are crucial to indigenous resilience in education. our ancestors were resilient, and they taught us to respect ourselves and others, as well as the land and the spiritual world. the teachings described by the elders resonate with the northern dene kede model of education. such indigenous teachings enabled the people to live well in the past and they are what we should continue to practice in order to promote indigenous resilience and wellbeing in the present day. po l i c y r e c o m m e n d a t i o n s a. this study recommends that federal governments increase support for indigenous education. more specifically, indigenous education requires significant increases in core funding to provide culturally appropriate and successful educational outcomes. b. this study recommends expanding indigenous teachings devoted to raising awareness of social and cultural issues to the nonindigenous community who could also benefit from a non–eurocentric indigenous education curricula. without these governmental supports , indigenous people will continue to experience racial stereotyping, social exclusion, and marginalization in the wider society. c. this study recommends that national and provincial governments review the funding process for indigenous communities and increase core funding measures to cultural programs that have demonstrated success in indigenous communities.   14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 1 [2016], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.1.2     r e f e re n c e s adams, h. (1975). prison of grass: canada from the native point of view. toronto: general publishing. adams, h. (2000). challenging eurocentric history. in r. laliberte, p. setteee, j. waldram, r. innes, b. macdougall, l. mcbain, & f. l. barron (eds.), expressions in canadian native studies (pp. 40-53). saskatoon, sk: university of saskatchewan press. antsanen, r. (2014). a dene manifestation of education for social justice. in j. g. hansen (ed.), exploring indigenous social justice (chapter 7). vernon, bc: j. charlton publishing ltd. antsanen, r., & hansen, j. g. (2012). stories of culture and justice in the north. in s. matheson & j. butler (eds.),the fictional north: ten discussions of stereotypes and icons above the 53rd parallel (pp. 7-16). newcastle: cambridge scholars publishing. blaut, j. m. (1993). the colonizer's model of the world: geographical diffusionism and eurocentric history. new york: the guilford press. campbell, m. (1973). halfbreed. toronto, canada: seal books. castellano, m. b. (2000). updating aboriginal traditions of knowledge. in g. j. s. dei, b. l hall, & d. g. rosenbury (eds.), indigenous knowledges in global contexts: multiple readings of our world. (pp. 21-36). vancouver, bc: ubc press. chandler, m. j., & lalonde, c. (1998). cultural continuity as a hedge against suicide in canada's first nations. transcultural psychiatry, 35(2), 191-219. chandler, m. j. & lalonde, c. e. (2008a). cultural continuity as a protective factor against suicide in first nations youth. horizons, 9(4), 13-24. chandler, m. j. & lalonde, c. e. (2008b). cultural continuity as a moderator of suicide risk among canada’s first nations. in l kirmayer & g. valaskakis (eds.), the mental health of canadian aboriginal peoples: transformations, identity, and community (pp. 221-228). vancouver: university of british columbia press. commission on first nations and métis people [cfnmp]. (2004). legacy of hope: an agenda for change (final report vol. 1). retrieved from www.justicereformcomm.sk.ca cresswell, j. w. (1998). qualitative inquiry and research design: choosing among five traditions. newbery park, ca: sage publications. department of education, culture, and employment. (1993). dene kede: education: a dene perspective. yellowknife: government of the northwest territories. ermine, w. (1995). aboriginal epistemology. in m. battiste & j. barman (eds.), first nations education in canada: the circle unfolds. vancouver, bc: ubc press. 15 hansen and antsanen: elders' teachings about resilience published by scholarship@western, 2016     hansen, j. g. (2015a). indigenous–settler incarceration disparities in canada: how tribal justice programming helps urban indigenous youth. indigenous policy journal, 25(3), 1-16. retrieved from http://www.indigenouspolicy.org/index.php/ipj/article/view/290/281 hansen, j. g. (2015b). decolonizing indigenous histories and justice. in m. neuburger & h. p. dörrenbächer (eds.), nationalisms across the globe (vol. 16). on the trail of rebirth: nationalism and identity among the native americans: case studies from north america (pp. 15-30). new york: peter lang international academic publishers. hansen, j. g. (2015c). the autonomous mind of waskechak. the quint: an interdisciplinary quarterly from the north, 7(2), 25-43. retrieved from: https://www.ucn.ca/sites/academics/facultyarts/programofferings/arts/humanities/the%20 quint/the%20quint%20v7.2.pdf hansen, j. g., & antsanen, r. (2015) urban indigenous people: stories of healing in the city. vernon, bc: j charlton publishing ltd. hesch, r. (1999). culturally relevant teacher education: a canadian inner-city case. canadian journal of education, 24, 369–382. doi: 10.2307/1585892 mcguire–kishebakabaykwe, p. d. 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(2002). colonialism, crime, and dispute resolution: a critical analysis of canada’s aboriginal justice strategy. retrieved from http://www.mediate.com/articles/sutherlandj.cfm university college of the north (2015). academic calendar. retrieved from www.ucn.ca/sites/enrolment/academic%20calendar/ucn%20academic%20calendar%2020 15%20-16.pdf 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 1 [2016], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss1/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.1.2     valaskakis, g. g., stout, m. d., & guimond, e. (2009). restoring the balance: first nations women, community, and culture. winnipeg: university of manitoba press. waldram, j. b. (2004). revenge of the windigo: the construction of the mind and mental health of north american aboriginal peoples. toronto: university of toronto press. wastesicoot, j. (2015). tapwetamowin (unpublished doctoral dissertation). university of manitoba, winnipeg. wesley-esquimaux, c. c. (2009). trauma to resilience: notes on decolonization. in g.g. valaskakis, m. dion stout, & e. guimond (eds.), restoring the balance: first nation women, community and culture. winnipeg: university of manitoba press. wieland, a., & wallenburg, c. m. (2013). the influence of relational competencies on supply chain resilience: a relational view. international journal of physical distribution & logistics management, 43(4), 300-320. doi: 10.1108/ijpdlm-08-2012-0243 wotherspoon, t., & hansen, j. (2013). the “idle no more" movement: paradoxes of first nations inclusion in the canadian context. social inclusion, 1(1), 21-36. doi: 10.17645/si.v1i1.107 17 hansen and antsanen: elders' teachings about resilience published by scholarship@western, 2016 the international indigenous policy journal january 2016 elders' teachings about resilience and its implications for education in dene and cree communities john g. hansen rose antsanen recommended citation elders' teachings about resilience and its implications for education in dene and cree communities abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license elders' teachings about resilience and its implications for education in dene and cree communities the validity of self-report measures in assessing historical knowledge: the case of canada’s residential schools the international indigenous policy journal volume 8 | issue 3 article 3 july 2017 the validity of self-report measures in assessing historical knowledge: the case of canada’s residential schools greg d. b. boese simon fraser university, gboese@sfu.ca katelin h. s. neufeld university of manitoba, umneu275@myumanitoba.ca katherine b. starzyk university of manitoba, katherine.starzyk@umanitoba.ca recommended citation boese, g. d. , neufeld, k. h. , starzyk, k. b. (2017). the validity of self-report measures in assessing historical knowledge: the case of canada’s residential schools. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(3). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.3 the validity of self-report measures in assessing historical knowledge: the case of canada’s residential schools abstract the truth and reconciliation commission of canada (trc) strives to increase public education regarding residential schools. a baseline measure of the public’s residential school knowledge could be useful to evaluate the progress of the trc. the national benchmark survey, urban aboriginal peoples study, and canadian public opinion on aboriginal peoples report are three existing surveys that provide such a baseline, though each use only self-report measures. we measured residential school knowledge of 2,250 non-indigenous canadian undergraduate students through self-report (subjective) and multiple-choice (objective) measures. analyses revealed a statistically significant correlation between self-reported and objective knowledge of residential schools. keywords residential schools, historical knowledge, public opinion, self-report measures acknowledgments we thank drs. stacy sasaki and jacquie vorauer and their research assistants for helping to collect data for this research. we also thank drs. danielle gaucher and stephen wright for their comments on an earlier draft of this manuscript. the social sciences and humanities research council of canada supported this research in the form of joseph-armand bombardier canada graduate scholarships (767-2012-1748 to g.b.; 766-2012-0101 to k.n.) and a standard research grant (410-2009-2183 to k.s.). additionally, the university of manitoba supported this research in the form of an aboriginal issues press scholarship and a raymond f. currie graduate fellowship to g.b.. the funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ t h e v a l i d i t y o f s e l f r e p o rt m e a s u re s i n a s s e s s i n g h i s t o ri c a l k n o w l e d g e : t h e c a s e o f c a n a d a ’ s r e s i d e n t i a l s c h o o l s beginning in the mid-1800s, the government of canada operated church-run residential schools for the purpose of “civilizing” the indigenous peoples of canada (legacy of hope foundation, 2009; miller, 1996; milloy, 1999). as part of a larger colonial agenda, the government used these schools to attempt to extinguish indigenous peoples’ culture, language, and way of life. this assimilative and destructive process involved abuse, neglect, disease, and death. although the last residential school closed in 1996, the schools continue to affect survivors and their communities deeply (fontaine, 2010) and are largely responsible for the striking inequalities facing indigenous peoples today (truth and reconciliation commission of canada [trc], 2015a). despite the widespread impact, many canadians are unaware of the systems and consequences of residential schools. from its establishment in 2008 under the indian residential schools settlement agreement, until its close in 2015, the truth and reconciliation commission of canada (trc) strove to educate the canadian public about the legacy of residential schools (trc, 2012a, 2015b). the trc viewed public education as “the key to reconciliation” (trc, 2012a, p. 117) and continuously called on various bodies to increase public education, including provincial, territorial, and federal governments, grade schools, post-secondary institutions and programs, churches, and museums, among others. during its existence, the trc delivered over 200 public presentations and numerous press releases, held youth conferences, and held annual national events (trc, 2012b), reaching vast audiences. without question, the trc successfully prompted the education of many canadians about residential schools. for example, the 2010 winnipeg national event attracted approximately 100,000 indigenous and non-indigenous attendees each day, and it marked the first time that many of the attendees learned about residential schools. the trc webcasted this and other national events, which were collectively viewed over 93,350 times by canadians and others worldwide (trc, 2015b). despite these laudable public awareness efforts, many canadians, especially non-indigenous canadians, still do not know or correctly understand the history of residential schools and their devastating intergenerational effects (trc 2012b, 2015a). as a result, they are frequently disrespectful toward residential school survivors, often telling them to “get over it” (trc, 2012b). presumably, such attitudes are at least partially due to misconceptions and a lack of knowledge regarding residential schools. indeed, until very recently canadian schools have typically taught little, no, or inaccurate information about residential schools (trc, 2015a). this is unfortunate because there is evidence that increasing awareness, understanding, and knowledge regarding residential schools can contribute to the reconciliation process. for example, a quarter of non-indigenous canadians reported that their impressions of aboriginal peoples have improved over the past few years, and a third of these attributed it to learning about the residential schools legacy (environics institute for survey research, 2016); nonindigenous canadians who were aware of residential schools and the trc strongly believed that each canadian has a role to play in reconciliation (environics institute for survey research, 2016); and nonindigenous canadians who are knowledgeable about residential schools are more likely to understand the schools’ current impact and have greater optimism for the healing role of the settlement agreement and the trc (environics research group, 2008). 1 boese et al.: historical knowledge published by scholarship@western, 2017 in order to assess whether the efforts of the trc, governments, and other bodies are in fact increasing public awareness about residential schools (and if so, to what extent), it is necessary to establish an initial baseline understanding of the public’s knowledge of residential schools. we have identified three nationally representative surveys that can help establish such a baseline: the national benchmark survey (environics research group, 2008), the urban aboriginal peoples’ study (environics research group, 2010), and the canadian public opinion on aboriginal peoples report (environics institute for survey research, 2016). each of these surveys assessed knowledge of residential schools by asking respondents, “have you read or heard anything about residential schools” (yes/no)? the national benchmark survey surveyed 1,503 non-indigenous canadians and found that 51% reported reading or hearing something about residential schools. the urban aboriginal peoples study surveyed 2,501 nonindigenous canadians and found that 54% reported reading or hearing something about residential schools. finally, the canadian public opinion on aboriginal peoples surveyed 2,001 non-indigenous canadians and found that 66% reported reading or hearing something about residential schools. a common and notable feature of these surveys is that they each assessed knowledge of residential schools using self-report measures (i.e., measures that respondents answer by offering their subjective feelings and opinions). such self-report measures may be valid in a variety of contexts, but in this case may be problematic because respondents may not be able to accurately estimate what they know about residential schools. specifically, some respondents may incorrectly estimate what they know because over-confidence and reliance on cognitive heuristics (i.e., mental shortcuts) affect even relatively simple judgments in everyday life (chabris & simon, 2011; taleb, 2010; tversky & kahneman, 1974). for example, relatively naïve respondents may report feeling knowledgeable because they do not understand the complexity of the issue and fail to account for the many details they have yet to learn. in contrast, other more knowledgeable respondents may report knowing less than they actually do precisely because they are aware of the truly broad scope of the issue. other respondents may overestimate what they know because they want to appear informed. such a reaction could be motivated by social desirability bias, which is the tendency to want to provide favorable answers in order to be perceived positively by other people (beins, 2009). social desirability bias occurs through impression management and selfdeception. impression management is the tendency for respondents to purposefully answer in ways they believe will lead the researcher to view them favorably—even if that means answering dishonestly. impression management is particularly likely when the issue is politically sensitive, as in the topic of residential schools. by contrast, self-deception occurs without awareness, when people view themselves more positively than they should (beins, 2009). self-deception is more likely to occur with issues that are important to respondents because they are, for example, relevant to their values, aspirations, or ideology, as may be the case for canadians and the issue of residential schools. for these reasons, in this article, we sought to investigate the extent to which a self-report measure provides a valid estimate of what people objectively or factually know about residential schools. m e t h o d pro c e d u re at the beginning of the 2011 to 2012 academic year, we surveyed 2,452 non-indigenous first-year students from the university of manitoba. all respondents completed our measures as part of a larger omnibus survey for their introductory psychology course. we excluded 202 respondents who did not 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.3 complete any of our measures or filled out the answer sheet incorrectly. thus, our final sample consisted of 2,250 students (m = 19.00 years old, sd = 2.60 years; 58.1% female, 36.0% male, 5.9% undeclared; 60.3% white/european, 13.1% undeclared, 9.4% filipino, 5.9% chinese, 3.6% south asian, 3.1% black, <1% each arab/west asian, japanese, korean, latin american, and south east asian). m e a s u re s we assessed respondents’ self-report knowledge of residential schools with the item, “how much do you feel you know about the indian residential school system in canada?” (1 = nothing, 10 = everything).1 we assessed respondents’ objective knowledge of residential schools using 15 multiple-choice items (cronbach’s α = .42). for example, “when did the canadian government begin operating indian residential schools?” (a = 1600s, b = 1700s, c = 1800s, d = 1900s; see table 1 for complete list of items). we constructed these items by identifying details or facts that seemed “testable” (i.e., associated with discrete, uncontroversial answers) and collectively provided a reasonable summary (e.g., who, what, when) of the history of residential schools. although indigenous peoples were not directly involved in constructing the items, our initial pool of potential items was explicitly derived by reviewing materials developed by indigenous organizations such as the legacy of hope foundation (2009) and the trc (2012b). r e s u l t s the average response on the self-report knowledge scale (i.e., “how much do you feel you know about the indian residential school system in canada?” 1 = nothing, 10 = everything) was only 3.38 (sd = 2.29; min = 1, max = 10). the average score on the 15-item objective knowledge test was a mere 32.0% (sd = 15.1%; min = 0%, max = 86.7%) and, in fact, the vast majority of respondents (88.4%) ultimately “failed” the test by conventional (< 50%) standards (see table 1 for item-by-item results). the correlation between self-reported knowledge and objective knowledge was positive and statistically significant (r = .25, p < .001) and of small-to-medium size according to conventional standards (cohen, 1988). 1 we chose to use a continuous rather than a dichotomous scale because we believe the former possesses more desirable psychometric properties. for example, the national benchmark survey (environics research group, 2008) also asked respondents, “how familiar are you with the issue of residential schools?” (1 = very familiar, 4 = not at all familiar). compared to the 51% of national benchmark survey respondents who reported hearing or reading something about residential schools, only 30% of national benchmark survey respondents reported being somewhat familiar with the issue of residential schools among aboriginal peoples, and a mere 6% reported being very familiar with this issue. thus, it appears that simply asking whether or not someone has read or heard anything about residential schools (i.e., yes or no) may not adequately capture the variability in people’s awareness and therefore may potentially inflate the observed proportion of knowledgeable respondents (owen & froman, 2005). in fact, the national benchmark survey did include an open-ended measure that assessed the number of details about residential schools each respondent could recall. the data was analyzed in terms of how many respondents mentioned each specific detail (e.g., 37% could recall abuse or molestation of aboriginal students; environics research group 2008). although this sort of analysis does provide a holistic understanding of how residential schools are represented in the public eye, it fails to tell us how much the average nonindigenous canadian knows about residential schools. 3 boese et al.: historical knowledge published by scholarship@western, 2017 t a b l e 1 . i t e m b y i t e m r e s u l t s o f t h e r e s i d e n t i a l s c h o o l o b j e c t i v e k n o w l e d g e t e s t responses (%) item a. b. c. d. dk itc 1. when did the canadian government begin operating indian residential schools? a. 1600s b. 1700s c. 1800s d. 1900s 6.1 15.1 40.0 33.7 5.1 .03 2. in total, how many indian residential schools were established in canada? a. 25 b.130 c. 640 d. 1,180 14.5 42.2 30.9 6.8 5.6 .19 3. what was the name of the report that led the canadian government to ultimately adopt a residential schools system? a. davin report b. gladue report c. royal proclamation report d. midwest report 15.7 15.5 38.3 21.8 8.8 .00 4. what was the most common cause of death in the indian residential school system? a. measles b. tuberculosis c. influenza d. diabetes 19.6 32.6 33.6 7.6 6.6 .05 5. when did the last indian residential school close? a. 1850 b. 1923 c. 1972 d. 1996 3.6 17.7 44.0 27.5 7.2 .19 6. which former head of indian and northern affairs was famously quoted as wanting to "get rid of the indian problem?” a. duncan campbell scott b. neil walker c. sir charles metcalfe d. david mills 30.4 16.2 28.7 15.5 9.3 -.02 7. mortality rates in some indian residential schools reached what percentage? a. 10% b. 25% c. 50% d. 80% 6.8 33.1 34.6 16.9 8.6 .09 note. correct answers are bolded. dk means the respondent did not provide an answer; in such cases, the item was scored as incorrect. itc is the corrected item-total correlation. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.3 t a b l e 1 . i t e m b y i t e m r e s u l t s o f t h e r e s i d e n t i a l s c h o o l o b j e c t i v e k n o w l e d g e t e s t ( c o n t i n u e d ) responses (%) item a. b. c. d. dk itc 8. which former national chief of the assembly of first nations brought issues in indian residential schools to light by publicly sharing his own personal stories of abuse and sexual assault? a. shawn atleo b. ovide mercredi c. matthew coon come d. phil fontaine 16.8 15.6 21.0 37.4 9.1 .11 9. which canadian prime minister offered the first official apology for survivors of indian residential schools? a. sir john a. macdonald b. stephen harper c. jean chretien d. pierre elliot trudeau 15.2 28.5 18.7 30.7 6.8 .01 10. what is the value of the indian residential schools settlement agreement? a. 1 million b. 150 million c. 2 billion d. 5 billion 11.6 38.1 31.2 10.3 8.8 .15 11. which of the following churches was not involved in the operation of indian residential schools? a. anglican b. catholic c. mennonite d. united 10.6 14.5 45.5 21.7 7.7 .10 12. in all, approximately how many aboriginal children attended indian residential schools? a. 10,000 b. 80,000 c. 150,000 d. more than 400,000 10.3 23.4 32.3 25.8 8.3 .24 13. which of the following aboriginal groups did not attend indian residential schools? a. first nations b. inuit c. me ́tis d. they all attended 3.9 27.7 18.0 42.9 7.5 .09 note. correct answers are bolded. dk means the respondent did not provide an answer; in such cases, the item was scored as incorrect. itc is the corrected item-total correlation. 5 boese et al.: historical knowledge published by scholarship@western, 2017 t a b l e 1 . i t e m b y i t e m r e s u l t s o f t h e r e s i d e n t i a l s c h o o l o b j e c t i v e k n o w l e d g e t e s t ( c o n t i n u e d ) responses (%) item a. b. c. d. dk itc 14. approximately how many indian residential schools survivors are living today? a. less than 1,000 b. 10,000 c. 80,000 d. more than 250,00 34.4 32.5 17.1 7.5 8.6 .19 15. as part of the indian residential schools settlement agreement, the truth and reconciliation commission of canada will be holding a series of national events to engage the canadian public and provide education about the history of the indian residential schools system. the first of these national events took place in june 2010. in which canadian city was the event held? a. ottawa b. toronto c. winnipeg d. vancouver 50.5 11.7 22.5 6.7 8.6 .06 note. correct answers are bolded. dk means the respondent did not provide an answer; in such cases, the item was scored as incorrect. itc is the corrected item-total correlation. d i s c u s s i o n the purpose of this research was to assess the validity of a self-report measure of historical knowledge; specifically, we wanted to investigate whether people’s self-reports of residential school knowledge accurately reflect how much they truly know about residential schools (i.e., their objective knowledge). among a large non-indigenous canadian student sample, we observed a statistically significant positive correlation between self-reported and objective knowledge, suggesting that in this context a self-report measure does seem to reflect—at least to some small extent—factual or objective knowledge. l i m i t a t i o n s one limitation of this research concerns the content of the multiple-choice test used to assess respondents’ knowledge of residential schools. although we based our items on materials developed by the legacy of hope foundation (2009) and truth and reconciliation commission of canada (trc, 2012b), our questions may not fully or accurately represent what happened in residential schools, especially because some details are still being documented and debated (e.g., how many residential schools existed). further, the multiple-choice test focused on objective knowledge, such as statistics and dates, which reflects a western epistemological perspective. the test did not assess knowledge typically associated with indigenous ways of knowing, such as storytelling or experiential knowledge, which are undoubtedly an important piece in understanding the residential schools experience. that said, we consciously constructed our test to focus on objective knowledge of residential schools so as to maintain consistency with previous national surveys, which also focused on objective knowledge. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.3 a second limitation of this study concerns the representativeness of our sample. given the nature of our sample (i.e., a student sample), we must acknowledge that our conclusions might not be generalizable beyond this particular cohort of first-year university of manitoba students who took introductory psychology during the 2011 to 2012 academic year. however, we see this as only a minor limitation because the foremost purpose of this research was to assess the relationship between self-report and objective measures of knowledge, which is ultimately an issue of internal rather than external validity and therefore less affected by our choice of sample. further, we find that the proportion of self-reported “unknowledgeable” respondents in our sample is similar to those observed in region-specific subsamples in previous nationally representative polls. in our study, 28% of respondents reported they knew “nothing” about residential schools. this value is close to that of the urban aboriginal peoples study winnipeg subsample (24% said they had not read or heard anything about residential schools; environics research group, 2010) and the national benchmark survey western canada subsample (28% said they had not read or heard anything about residential schools; environics research group, 2008). thus, our findings may be at least somewhat representative and therefore of direct interest and use to educators and policymakers, at least at the regional level. it is also worth noting that even if our young, university educated sample is not representative of the entire canadian population, advocates and policymakers may still care about these results given that public education is often aimed explicitly at reaching the “next generation.” that said, it would be important to replicate our findings using a more representative sample. from a theoretical standpoint, it would also be important to replicate our findings in differing social and political contexts to examine whether our conclusions generalize to other historical and current events. c o n c l u s i o n a n d r e c o m m e n d a t i o n s by monitoring the success of public education, we can ensure that we are continuously moving towards reconciliation. in this article, we observed a statistically significant positive correlation between selfreported and objective knowledge about residential schools. this observation allows us at least some confidence in the validity of the data produced by the relevant knowledge questions included in the national benchmark survey (environics research group, 2008), the urban aboriginal peoples study (environics research group, 2010), and the canadian public opinion on aboriginal peoples report (environics institute for survey research, 2016). in other words, it suggests that those interested in tracking the progress of public education efforts (e.g., the trc and provincial and territorial governments) could rely, at least to a small extent, on the data provided by the self-report questions included in these surveys. it is critical to emphasize that the correlation we observed between self-reported and objective knowledge was nonetheless of only small-to-medium size, meaning self-report measures are certainly not a perfect substitute for objective, fact-based measures. to have more confidence in interpreting trends over time, it may be useful for groups tracking public opinion and awareness to consider more 7 boese et al.: historical knowledge published by scholarship@western, 2017 objective ways to measure the public’s residential schools knowledge.2 for example, it might be helpful to use multiple-choice questions that require respondents to identify details about residential schools, as we did in this study. an alternative strategy might be to use open-ended questions that require respondents to recall details about residential schools; however, as our respondents were barely able to accurately identify details about residential schools, it might be unreasonable to expect them to be able to accurately recall specific details or facts. one can also imagine many other indices of public education that are important to measure and track. for instance, some have called for measures of relationships that emerge between indigenous peoples and non-indigenous canadians, or non-indigenous canadians’ empathy towards indigenous peoples (starzyk, 2016). another potentially important indicator of public education is canadians’ acknowledgement of the harm done by residential schools, which is likely related to but different from knowledge of residential schools. indeed, there are many canadians who know relatively little about residential schools, yet still acknowledge that history and are fully supportive of reconciliation. others may know the facts yet deny their relevance and the need for redress. it might also be important to measure knowledge of the underlying colonial mentality ultimately responsible for the residential school system. regan (2010), for example, challenges canadians to “confront the indian residential school narrative as part of a broader decolonization project without falling into the multiple traps that replicate colonizing attitudes and behaviours” (p. 13); we challenge ourselves and readers to do the same. 2 if a self-report measure is necessary, due to time or space concerns for example, we recommend phrasing the question in a way that primes respondents to be as objective as possible. for example, “if you were given a test about the details of residential schools, what percentage of questions do you think you could answer correctly?” 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.3 r e f e re n c e s beins, b. c. (2009). research methods: a tool for life. boston, ma: pearson education. chabris, c. f., & simons, d. j. (2011). the invisible gorilla: and other ways our intuitions deceive us. new york, ny: random house digital. cohen, j. (1988). statistical power analysis for the behavioral sciences (2nd ed.). hillsdale, nj: lawrence earlbaum associates. environics research group. (2008). 2008 national benchmark survey. ottawa, canada. retrieved from http://www.nrsss.ca/irsrc%20trc%20national%20survey%20final%20report.pdf environics research group. (2010). urban aboriginal peoples study: main report. retrieved from http://www.uaps.ca/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/uaps-main-report_dec.pdf environics institute for survey research. (2016). canadian public opinion on aboriginal peoples report. retrieved from http://www.environicsinstitute.org/uploads/instituteprojects/canadian%20public%20opinion%20on%20aboriginal%20peoples%202016%20%20final%20report.pdf fontaine, t. (2010). broken circle: the dark legacy of indian residential schools: a memoir. toronto, canada: heritage house publishing. legacy of hope foundation. (2009). where are the children: residential schools as policy. retrieved from http://www.wherearethechildren.ca/en/blackboard/page-7.html miller, j. r. (1996). shingwauk's vision: a history of native residential schools. toronto, canada: university of toronto press. milloy, j. s. (1999). a national crime: the canadian government and the residential school system, 1879 to 1986. winnipeg, canada: university of manitoba press. owen, s. v., & froman, r. d. (2005). why carve up your continuous data? research in nursing and health, 28, 496-503. doi: https://doi.org/10.1002/nur.20107 regan, p. (2010). unsettling the settler within: indian residential schools, truth telling, and reconciliation in canada. vancouver, bc: ubc press. starzyk, k. b. (2016, june). reconciliation barometer. discussant (with co-participants a. craft, j. mohamed, r. moran, c. o’neil, d. peachey, & p. regan) in roundtable conducted at the inaugural pathways to reconciliation conference, university of winnipeg, winnipeg, canada. taleb, n. n. (2010). the black swan: the impact of the highly improbable. new york, ny: random house publishers. 9 boese et al.: historical knowledge published by scholarship@western, 2017 truth and reconciliation commission of canada (trc). (2012a). our mandate. retrieved from http://www.trc.ca/websites/trcinstitution/index.php?p=7 truth and reconciliation commission of canada (trc). (2012b). truth and reconciliation commission of canada: interim report. retrieved from http://www.attendancemarketing.com/~attmk/trc_jd/interim_report_english_electronic _copy.pdf truth and reconciliation commission of canada (trc). (2015a). honouring the truth, reconciling for the future: summary of the final report of the truth and reconciliation commission of canada. retrieved from http://nctr.ca/assets/reports/final%20reports/executive_summary_english_web.pdf truth and reconciliation commission of canada (trc). (2015b). truth and reconciliation commission of canada: calls to action. retrieved from http://nctr.ca/assets/reports/calls_to_action_english2.pdf tversky, a., & kahneman, d. (1974). judgment under uncertainty: heuristics and biases. science, 185, 1124-1131. doi: https://doi.org/10.1126/science.185.4157.1124 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 3 [2017], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.3.3 the international indigenous policy journal july 2017 the validity of self-report measures in assessing historical knowledge: the case of canada’s residential schools greg d. b. boese katelin h. s. neufeld katherine b. starzyk recommended citation the validity of self-report measures in assessing historical knowledge: the case of canada’s residential schools abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license the validity of self-report measures in assessing historical knowledge: the case of canadaâ•žs residential schools book review: daschuk, j. (2013). clearing the plains: disease, politics of starvation, and the loss of aboriginal life the international indigenous policy journal volume 7 | issue 1 article 6 january 2016 book review: daschuk, j. (2013). clearing the plains: disease, politics of starvation, and the loss of aboriginal life godfred o. boateng cornell university, ithaca, gboaten@gmail.com recommended citation boateng, g. o. (2016). book review: daschuk, j. (2013). clearing the plains: disease, politics of starvation, and the loss of aboriginal life. the international indigenous policy journal, 7(1). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.1.6 book review: daschuk, j. (2013). clearing the plains: disease, politics of starvation, and the loss of aboriginal life abstract this article is a critical review of james daschuk's book, clearing the plains: disease, politics, starvation, and the loss of aboriginal life. keywords dominion of canada, first nations, diseases, famine, treaty, oppression creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/     ` bo o k r e v i e w d a s c h u k, j . ( 2 0 1 3 ) . clearing the plains: disease, politics of starvation, and the loss of aboriginal life. s a s ka t c h e w a n , c a n a d a : u n i v e rs i t y o f r e g i n a pre s s . 3 3 4 p p . $ 1 7 . 5 2 ( pa p e rb a c k) . i s bn 1 0 : 0 8 8 9 7 7 3 4 0 8 supported by archaeological, historical, and other empirical evidence, james daschuk’s clearing the plains provides a rich account of the political, ecological, and economic systems that have led to disparities between non-indigenous canadians and the indigenous people of the plains. the author addresses distortions in the existing literature that attributes the precarious position of aboriginal peoples in canada to cultural attributes of indigenous peoples themselves. challenging such approaches, the author describes the history of aboriginal peoples as one characterized by struggle in the face of infectious diseases, starvation, suppression, and displacement by settler populations. this compelling book contains nine chapters, each exploring a theme that reveals the historical and ecological antecedents that spawned the present predicament of aboriginal peoples in canada. the introduction clearly lays out the argument of the book, and its conclusion gives the reader a cogent summary of the issues, which together create a powerful account of the assault on the viability of indigenous people’s health and livelihood. the author’s thorough knowledge of environmental change and the health of indigenous peoples inform the critical analysis that is brought to bear in his discussion. chapters 1 through 5 highlight the challenges faced by first nations in western canada, as well as their survival strategies before the takeover of their territories by the dominion of canada. in the first chapter, daschuk describes the population growth and economic well-being among first nations on the plains during periods with favorable climatic conditions (900-1300 bce), as well as the misery and pain they endured during times of protracted inclement weather and during outbreaks of contagious diseases. in chapters 2, 3, and 4, he connects the drastic, cataclysmic decline in first nations populations, and corresponding changes in the social, cultural, and physical environment of indigenous communities, to diseases, harsh weather conditions, and influences stemming from colonial encounters. in chapter 5, daschuk explores the interaction between economics and health outcomes during the time when the hudson’s bay company (hbc) controlled rupert’s land (a territory in british north america) in the mid-1850s. according to daschuk, the development of a wider transportation network, expanded economic development, and the invasion of indigenous lands by europeans became vectors for the spread of measles, tuberculosis, and small pox—which together precipitated a dramatic downturn in the health and well-being of first nations peoples of the plains. chapters 6 through 9 highlight the takeover of indigenous lands by the dominion of canada and the unparalleled changes it brought to first nations on the plains. in chapter 6, daschuk describes the negotiations that went into the signing of various treaties that ultimately gave the crown control over lands that were the traditional territory of first nations. he then describes how these treaties quickly became dysfunctional as the crown failed to honour its promises outlined in the treaty agreements leading to an increase in famine and pestilence. in chapters 7 and 8, the author further illustrates the egregious misconduct of the canadian government and the hardships meted out to first nations that contributed to great famine and destitution. daschuk posits that any response given by the crown was 1 boateng: boateng: book review published by scholarship@western, 2016     intended to further its own interests. moreover, he explains how issues of food insecurity, malnourishment, and the deprivation of micronutrients made indigenous peoples more susceptible to both human and zoonotic diseases. the most heinous of the crown’s deeds that daschuk lays bare is its practice of storing food until it rotted away while aboriginal peoples starved to death. daschuk describes how the severity of famine resulted in the exhibition of depraved acts, increased sexually transmitted diseases, and a revolt against government officials. these effects are dire when one compares these examples to the success story of the dakota (sioux) who never signed a treaty with the crown and experienced good health and economic growth in a time of severe famine and disease outbreak. in chapter 9, daschuk assays the impact of excessive measures of control implemented by the crown on the well-being of first nations. for instance, he illustrates how the institutionalisation of a pass system, which confined first nations peoples to reserves, later became a vector for the spread of infectious diseases. he describes how the expansion of transportation networks induced large-scale migration among settlers and also facilitated the spread of infectious diseases, bringing indigenous populations to a demographic nadir. daschuk also highlights the deleterious effect of indian residential schools on aboriginal populations. taken together, these factors contributed to the near extermination of first nations from the canadian plains. daschuk affirms that “the collective subjugation, hunger, sickness and death [are] the origin of the chasm that exists even today between health conditions of mainstream canadians and western canada’s first nations population” (p. 172). generally, this book epitomizes the very best of canadian history without dint of bias; it shows through a very careful historical analysis how established political and economic structures suppressed and regulated the less privileged and relatively powerless first nations to the benefit of non-indigenous canadians. the author provides readers with a comprehensive understanding of the intersecting factors that have contributed to the comparatively poor health and poor living conditions experienced by indigenous peoples—conditions which continue to brew in many reserve communities. it also throws into question canada’s eighth place ranking on the human development index (hdi)—especially considering the fact that scores among aboriginal peoples continue to lag behind much poorer nations in terms of life expectancy at birth, years of schooling, and per capita gross national income (gni) relative to non-indigenous canadians. daschuk’s analysis suggests that unless the canadian government tackles the social determinants that create vulnerabilities among first nations peoples, progress will neither be equitable or sustainable (united nations development programme [undp], 2014). clearing the plains represents a major contribution to the literature on the history of aboriginal health and well-being, adding to a growing and impressive body of literature that puts into perspective the plight of indigenous peoples in canada (asch, 2014; king, 2013; miller, 2009). ideologically, it reorients the reader away from seeing first nations as dependent on the canadian government, and towards seeing them as a people whose culture, land, and well-being have been threatened—and in some cases appropriated—in the bid to create a new country. daschuk’s book echoes the need for government to return to and honour the terms governing the treaties that were negotiated with indigenous peoples and signed by the crown. this, i hope, will bridge the inequality created as a result of the failure of the canadian government to honour those terms even after confederation. although the book is focused on deprivations among indigenous populations caused by the settler groups, it would also be interesting to know a bit more about the origins of the settlers themselves, as this will inform the ideology behind their merciless system of governance and domination. also, while 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 1 [2016], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.1.6     ample evidence is provided to account for the famine and disease that were experienced by many first nations of the plains during the 18th and 19th centuries, the author fails to compare what was happening to first nations to those of the white population at the time. concentrating on first nations alone raises doubts about some of the conclusions reached in this book. a more comprehensive narrative would have emerged if a comparative discussion was presented for both first nations and the white settlers. the only exception is the outbreak of influenza between1889 and 1890, which daschuk notes was a global pandemic —affecting both first nations and the settlers. these shortfalls notwithstanding, the author shows in chapters 8 and 9 how throughout history the resistance and consciousness raising of first nations and their chiefs have positioned them in a space where they can bargain for better services and living conditions. this is most evident in the call of the national chief of the assembly of first nations, perry bellegarde, for the canadian government to invest more in education, training, and housing for first nations in order to bring conditions in line with the rest of the country (mackrael, 2015). this and many other calls for parity seem to have finally gotten the attention of the current canadian government. the new liberal government, unlike past liberal and conservative governments, has responded more positively to such issues, with the appointment of two indigenous members of parliament into the cabinet, including the naming of jody wilson-raybould, who is first nations, as the justice minister. these two stand in influential positions from which to create the possibility of negotiating for the well-being of aboriginal peoples in canada. more impressive is the promised funding to improve first nation’s education and the vow to launch an inquiry into missing and murdered indigenous women and girls (the early edition, 2015). these current changes signify the rebuilding of relationships, which have the potential to improve the conditions experienced by first nations peoples. clearing the plains is an invaluable resource and reference for politicians, policymakers, scholars, researchers, journalists, students, and health administrators who seek to understand the enduring and complex inequalities that persist between non-indigenous canadians and first nations peoples. daschuk’s well-researched account provides relevant information and new insights to researchers and scholars of canadian history and health.     3 boateng: boateng: book review published by scholarship@western, 2016     r e f e re n c e s asch, m. (2014). on being here to stay: treaties and aboriginal rights in canada. toronto, on: university of toronto press. daschuk, j. (2013). clearing the plains: disease, politics of starvation, and the loss of aboriginal life. regina, sk: university of regina press. king, t. (2013). the inconvenient indian: a curious account of native people in north america. toronto, on: anchor canada. mackrael, k. (2015, may 16). close the gap between canada and its aboriginal people: afn chief. the globe and mail. retrieved from http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/close-thegap-between-canada-and-its-aboriginal-people-afn-chief/article24430620/ miller, j.r. (2009). compact, contract, covenant: aboriginal treaty making in canada. toronto, on: university of toronto press. the early edition. (2015, october 21). liberal mp-elect jody wilson-raybould talks aboriginal issues. cbc news. retrieved from http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/liberal-mpelect-jody-wilson-raybould-talks-aboriginal-issues-1.3282730 united nations development programme (undp). (2014). human development report: sustaining human progress: reducing vulnerabilities and building resilience. retrieved from http://www.undp.org/content/dam/undp/library/corporate/hdr/2014hdr/hdr-2014english.pdf 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 1 [2016], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss1/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.1.6 the international indigenous policy journal january 2016 book review: daschuk, j. (2013). clearing the plains: disease, politics of starvation, and the loss of aboriginal life godfred o. boateng recommended citation book review: daschuk, j. (2013). clearing the plains: disease, politics of starvation, and the loss of aboriginal life abstract keywords creative commons license book review: daschuk, j. (2013). clearing the plains: disease, politics of starvation, and the loss of aboriginal life microsoft word 8623 cover page.docx the international indigenous policy journal volume 11 | issue 4 november 2020 the impact of training indigenous facilitators for a two-eyed seeing research treatment intervention for intergenerational trauma and addiction teresa naseba marsh northern ontario school of medicine, canada, temarsh@nosm.ca david c. marsh northern ontario school of medicine, canada, dmarsh@nosm.ca lisa m. najavits treatment innovations and university of massachusetts medical school, united states of america, director@treatmentinnovations.org recommended citation marsh, t. n., marsh, d. c., & najavits, l. m.,(2020). the impact of training indigenous facilitators for a two-eyed seeing research treatment intervention for intergenerational trauma and addiction. the international indigenous policy journal, 11(4). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.8623 the impact of training indigenous facilitators for a two-eyed seeing research treatment intervention for intergenerational trauma and addiction abstract intergenerational trauma in indigenous peoples was not the result of a targeted event, but rather political and governmental policies inflicted upon entire generations. the resultant effects of these traumas and multiple losses include addiction, depression, anxiety, violence, self-destructive behaviors, and suicide, to name but a few. traditional healers, elders, and indigenous facilitators agree that the reclamation of traditional healing practices combined with conventional interventions could be effective in addressing intergenerational trauma and substance use disorders. recent research has shown that the blending of indigenous traditional healing practices and the western treatment model seeking safety resulted in a reduction of intergenerational trauma (igt) symptoms and substance use disorders (sud). this article focuses on the indigenous facilitators who were recruited and trained to conduct the sharing circles as part of the research effort. we describe the six-day training, which focused on the implementation of the indigenous healing and seeking safety model, as well as the impact the training had on the facilitators. through the viewpoints and voices of the facilitators, we explore the growth and changes the training brought about for them, as well as their perception of how their changes impacted their clients. keywords post-traumatic stress disorder, ptsd, substance use disorder, intergenerational trauma, blended implementation, two-eyed seeing, seeking safety, indigenous healing and seeking safety, traditional healing practices, elders, sharing circles, decolonizing methodologies creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. 1 marsh et al.: the impact of training indigenous facilitators published by scholarship@western, 2020 the impact of training indigenous facilitators for a two-eyed seeing research treatment intervention for intergenerational trauma and addiction it is a known fact that indigenous peoples are the most disadvantaged group in canada. indigenous peoples in canada have generally poorer physical and mental health; are less likely to complete primary, secondary, and tertiary education; and do not have the same employment opportunities as nonindigenous canadians (chansonneuve, 2007; hart, 2007; kirmayer et al., 2000, 2009). furthermore, indigenous peoples are affected by high rates of suicide, homicide, substance use disorders, accidental deaths, community and domestic violence, child abuse and neglect, poverty, as well as other complex social problems. most, if not all, of these issues have been attributed to the impact of ongoing colonization (waldram, 2008). these factors have strongly contributed to the multigenerational grief and loss associated with intergenerational trauma (igt; brant castellano, 2004; smith, 1999; waldram, 2008; waldram et al., 2006; wilson, 2008). for the purposes of this article, the term aboriginal peoples refer to first nations (status and nonstatus indians), métis, and inuit as referenced in the canadian constitution. aboriginal peoples is used as a way to respect and acknowledge their shared values, historical residential school experiences, and contemporary struggles in the aftermath of colonization and oppression. indigenous peoples will also be used interchangeably with aboriginal peoples. the former term is most recognizable within international contexts. to be properly understood, the escalation of mental health challenges and substance use disorders (sud) in indigenous communities must be viewed through a historical lens and the unique historical experiences of indigenous communities (evans-campbell, 2008; kirmayer & valaskakis, 2009; linklater, 2010; macaulay, 2009). in canada, indigenous communities exhibit the impacts and symptoms of colonization and the residential school system—such as sud; anxiety; violence to self, family, and communities; and youth and adult suicide (chandler et al., 2003; marsh, cote-meek et al., 2016; menzies, 2014). also, the disproportionately high prevalence of mental health problems and sud in indigenous communities can be linked in part to a history of cultural disruption, oppression, marginalization, and the impacts of ongoing colonization (hart, 2007; menzies, 2014; waldram, 2008). the complexity of symptoms that accompany igt and sud represent major challenges in the treatment of both. today, western medicine is struggling to reduce the death toll from the overdose crisis across all of canada and elsewhere. many treatment programs for mental health and sud lack an understanding of the cultural needs of indigenous peoples (bishop, 1999; hill, 2009). stewart (2008) suggested that these contemporary treatment issues exist for aboriginal peoples because western treatments and conventional psychology have failed to understand holistic indigenous wellness, spirituality, and traditional healing methods (cote & schissel, 2008; evans-campbell, 2008; poonwassie & charter, 2005; stewart, 2008). today, many indigenous peoples are now turning toward traditional healing and culturally appropriate treatment to help them recover from this deadly disease, which is claiming many young lives. unfortunately, there are currently few culturally appropriate, evidence-based, and integrative treatments for both conditions available (kirmayer & valaskakis, 2009; menzies, 2014; stewart, 2008; thatcher, 2004). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.8623 evidence from a recent study demonstrates benefits from the blending of indigenous traditional healing practices with a western treatment model called seeking safety (marsh, cote-meek et al., 2016; marsh, young et al., 2016; najavits, 2002). the blended model was call indigenous healing and seeking safety (ihss). this integration of western and indigenous approaches can enhance the health and well-being of indigenous people with igt and sud (marsh, cote-meek et al., 2016; marsh, young et al., 2016). one of the key components of the ihss implementation was the presence of trained indigenous facilitators who facilitated the ihss sharing circles. this component was important because, according to the first peoples, second class treatment reports (allen & smylie, 2015), coupled with the release of the truth and reconciliation commission of canada’s (trc, 2015) calls to action, there is an urgent need to bridge the gap between indigenous clients and non-indigenous health care providers. across the board, many first nation, métis, and inuit people have reported being ignored, discriminated against, mocked, and belittled by mainstream canadian health care providers (allen & smylie, 2015; kirmayer et al., 2009). while the broad set of indigenous healing practices utilized in the study of ihss are described elsewhere (marsh, coholic et al., 2015; marsh, cote-meek et al., 2015; marsh, cote-meek et al., 2016), this article explores the six-day training provided to indigenous facilitators on the implementation of ihss and the impact on these indigenous facilitators. also, through the viewpoints and voices of the facilitators, we will explore the growth and change the facilitators experienced through the training, as well as the healing that took place. literature review there is a strong relationship between childhood stressors and sud (anda et al., 2002), and many individuals who experience traumatic events or are under chronic strain turn to alcohol or drugs to selfmedicate their pain and distress (carpenter & hasin, 1999). among indigenous peoples, those with a history of childhood neglect, sexual, and physical abuse; violence victimization; or family substance use consistently show higher levels of sud (brave heart, 1999, 2003; chansonneuve, 2007; duran, 2006; marsh, young et al., 2016). there is also a cyclical nature to this relationship, as prospective studies have indicated that individuals who abuse alcohol are also more likely to encounter a range of stressful events (lukassen & beaudet, 2005). many different terms have been used to describe the multigenerational nature of distress in indigenous communities, including collective trauma, igt, multigenerational trauma, and historical trauma. intergenerational trauma is most often used by the indigenous peoples in canada and this term is conceptualized as a collective complex trauma inflicted on a group of people who share a specific group identity or affiliation, such as that based on ethnicity, nationality, or religious affiliation (hill, 2009; kovach, 2010; marsh, coholic et al., 2015)). the legacy of traumatic events includes numerous losses experienced by a community over generations and encompasses the psychological and social responses to such events (brave heart, 1998, 1999, 2000). the western treatment model, seeking safety is an evidence-based, manualized counseling model originally developed in the united states as an integrated treatment for ptsd and sud (najavits, 2002). it is also now used for any form of trauma and/or addiction (i.e., for either issue or for those with no formal diagnoses). the model is present focused and designed to teach coping skills to attain safety from trauma and/or addiction in an optimistic, inspiring way. it can be conducted in group or individual modality and does not require any formal training or certification, making it the lowest cost evidence3 marsh et al.: the impact of training indigenous facilitators published by scholarship@western, 2020 based1 ptsd model available. it can be conducted by anyone, including professionals, peers, paraprofessionals, advocates, and case managers. the evidence base for seeking safety includes over 40 published empirical articles (najavits & hien, 2013). the treatment has shown positive results and is the only model for ptsd and sud thus far to improve both ptsd and sud compared to a control (najavits & hien, 2013). also, seeking safety has been implemented with indigenous peoples in canada and showed positive results (marsh, young et al., 2016). the perspective of seeking safety is convergent with aboriginal traditional methods. because of the content and delivery method of seeking safety, the program complements traditional teachings such as holism, relational connection, spirituality, cultural presence, honesty, and respect (gone, 2008; lavallée, 2009; menzies, 2014). specifically, this model was chosen because it offered an individually empowering approach to the treatment of trauma and suds (najavits, 2002). the seeking safety model includes an inspiring quotation at the beginning of each session (najavits, 2007; najavits & hein, 2013), as well as discussions about safety, gentle language, and teachings about the genesis of igt and sud (najavits, 2002; najavits & hein, 2013). it is a highly culturally sensitive model that encourages adaptation based on culture, age, setting, gender, etc. seeking safety addresses behavior, thinking, and relationships as well as a focus on case management, including utilization of community resources. these are all the strengths that the western model brings. jiwa et al. (2008) examined the development of cultural and community-based programs for first nation peoples to address sud. they found that the key components of success in sud treatment for this population appeared to be community engagement and strong leadership from chief and council. they noted the importance of viewing sud through a sociocultural lens and advocated for a traditional cultural component in the treatment of sud. along these lines, several researchers agree that culturally sensitive assessment tools and interventions are needed to enhance healing from sud in indigenous peoples (duran & duran, 1995; kirmayer et al., 2000; whitbeck et al., 2004). it is also important to consider treating sud and the effects of trauma concurrently, since they are so closely connected (kirmayer, et al., 2000; whitbeck, et al., 2004). two-eyed seeing is a decolonizing methodology that blends aboriginal and western research methods, knowledge translation, and program development (bartlett, 2005; bartlett et al., 2012; iwama et al., 2009). according to stewart (2007), blending aboriginal and western treatment methods involves the incorporation of aboriginal traditional healing practices and traditional healers; the presence of elders in treatment programs; the involvement of local communities, drumming, smudging, and sweat ceremonies; and the participation of non-aboriginal treatment providers in community events and ceremonies (see also gone, 2008; menzies, 2014; stewart, 2008). creating a blended model of care has the potential to increase the rate at which aboriginal peoples access mental health services and decrease program dropout rates. furthermore, a blended approach could encourage cultural understanding and strengthen relationships between aboriginal and non-aboriginal service providers (gone, 2008; menzies, 2014; poonwassie & charter, 2005; robbins & dewar, 2011). the two-eyed seeing framework was utilized in this research because it recognizes indigenous knowledge as a distinct epistemological system that can exist side by side with mainstream (western) 1 based on published outcome research. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.8623 science (bartlett, 2009; bartlett et al., 2012; iwama et al., 2009). the application of the concept of twoeyed seeing advocates for inclusion, trust, respect, collaboration, understanding, and acceptance of the strengths that reside in both western and aboriginal worldviews (iwama et al., 2009). two-eyed seeing encourages aboriginal peoples, healthcare providers, and researchers to develop a relationship of mutual cultural respect, wherein the benefits of both worldviews are acknowledged as beneficial in the healing process (bartlett, 2009; bartlett et al., 2012; iwama et al., 2009). currently, indigenous workers, helpers, and clinicians know about the many obstacles that stand in the way of indigenous peoples’ healing journey (linklater, 2010). linklater’s (2010) research, which explored healing and wellness within indigenous communities on turtle island, showed that indigenous workers and indigenous strategies for helping and healing are vitally important to trauma work. as igt continues to increase, these communities are confronted with complex health issues, including high rates of violence, sexual abuse, substance abuse, addiction, suicide, unresolved grief, and poverty. workers are not just dealing with past traumas but also with the traumas that happen on a daily basis (tousignant & sioui, 2009). mehl-madrona (2009) pointed out that the overall sense of community “is hampered by deteriorating social structures, thereby forcing its members to look after their own individual needs and survival, which undermines traditional values and stories that put the needs and survival of the group above that of the individual” (p. 21). as a result, many indigenous people, including workers, experience extreme stress and multigenerational trauma with little or no support. it was clear as i embarked upon this research project using a blended approach based on two-eyed seeing to help indigenous peoples heal from igt and sud that there had to be a place where the facilitators could receive the help, training, and support (marsh, coholic et al., 2015; marsh, cote-meek et al., 2015, 2016; linklater, 2010). methods background in past research, ihss was found to be feasible, suitable, and beneficial for the treatment of igt and sud in indigenous women and men (marsh, cote-meek et al, 2016; marsh, young et al., 2016). the results of research looking at the qualitative and quantitative outcomes of ihss among clients are described in prior papers (marsh, cote-meek et al., 2016; marsh, young et al., 2016). close attention and respect to cultural ethics and protocols guided the mixed-methods approach, utilizing both quantitative and qualitative inquiry to evaluate ihss implementation (marsh, cote-meek et al., 2015). this article draws from the qualitative interviews conducted with the indigenous facilitators who were recruited and trained to implement ihss sharing circles. a holistic view of mental health and sud includes connection to community so many indigenous protocols were incorporated into the sharing circles. elders are the key to the healing process, as they are considered wise and responsible for educating the people (colomeda & wenzel, 2000). elders’ skills, knowledge, and ability in helping individuals restore balance in their lives have earned them significant roles within aboriginal communities (menzies et al., 2010). furthermore, this research was conducted in an honest, respectful, and humble manner. knowledge keepers and wisdom carriers from various indigenous communities (elders, an indigenous advisory group, indigenous scholars, and facilitators) were invited into this process as consultants and experts. 5 marsh et al.: the impact of training indigenous facilitators published by scholarship@western, 2020 the study was approved by laurentian university research ethics board in may 2013. written informed consent was obtained from all participants (both clients and facilitators). data collection while the detailed methods used in the ihss study are reported elsewhere (marsh, coholic et al., 2015), the approach used for generating qualitative data on the training of the facilitators is briefly described below. as part of a study evaluating the ihss approach in the treatment of igt and sud, 25 sharing circles were offered over a 12-week period to gender-specific groups of 12 men and 12 women. the elders advised that the facilitators should be indigenous, have experience working with indigenous people, and that groups should be divided by gender to ensure that participants felt comfortable and safe during the sharing circle sessions. all six facilitators had previous experience working with women and men who experienced igt and sud. four facilitators and two students were selected to lead the ihss sharing circles. each of the sharing circles was co-facilitated by two indigenous healthcare workers and one student. for the male circle, we had one métis male and two female facilitators, one métis social worker and one indigenous social work student. unfortunately, we could not find three indigenous male facilitators. all of the women who facilitated the female sharing circles were from the anishinabek nation in sudbury. three of the women were recruited from the n’swakamok native friendship centre and one was a social work student and a frontline worker. this study explores the impact of facilitator training and implementation of the ihss two-eyed seeing approach. the facilitators offered 5 to 6 hours weekly to facilitate these circles, and elders and the indigenous advisory group provided supervision and interaction to the facilitators. the indigenous advisory group consisted of one indigenous physician, three elders, two intake workers from the n'swakamok native friendship centre in sudbury, two indigenous social workers, an indigenous social work student, and one indigenous university faculty member. an elder was present every second week for the sharing circles, which provided connection to important healing practices as part of two-eyed seeing. aboriginal peoples have long recognized the role of the elder as integral in the healing process. the elder’s presence in the sharing circles was reflexive and culturally adaptive. they taught about two-eyed seeing, while also focusing on the positive identity of each person in the circle. they also helped to develop a connection to the spiritual world through their teachings. each sharing circle was opened and closed with smudging, ceremonial drumming, and singing. tobacco, a plant recognized in indigenous culture for its healing powers, was prepared in bundles in advance of the sharing circles. it was offered to each participant for protection and healing. participants were also invited to participate in three sweat lodge ceremonies held in weeks 3, 9, and 12 of the intervention period. all six facilitators entered the training with different but experienced backgrounds in mental health and sud, as well as an understanding of and personal experiences with igt. they all reported histories of trauma and a few were in recovery from sud during their interviews. also, most expressed that they felt anxious because this experience could activate and trigger their past traumas. they were reassured that they would receive support from the first author. it was thus possible to build on their existing knowledge and insight and introduce them to the knowledge they would require for the implementation 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.8623 of the ihss intervention. both male and female facilitators received the same training, but at different times. most of the facilitators had an excellent understanding and knowledge of indigenous traditional healing practices. facilitators understood that they were expected to use an indigenous decolonizing methodology and teach cultural practices. the first author, who had several years of experience delivering and providing training in the seeking safety approach, trained all the facilitators over a period of six days for eight hours per day. choice of outcome qualitative tools for the facilitators the indigenous decolonizing approach of two-eyed seeing was interwoven through the selection of tools and during the data collection phase for facilitators. numerous discussions were had with the indigenous advisory group, elders, and the research committee about appropriate measures for the facilitators. the post-treatment semi-structured instrument was presented, and teachings were provided about how to make this process culturally safe. initial individual 90-minute meetings were conducted with the six facilitators in their place and time of choice. during these meetings, facilitators received information about seeking safety, traditional healing, sharing circles, the process, and the program details. they had lots of time to ask questions and tell their stories. for example, some of the facilitators would start off the interview through storytelling about their families, communities, ceremonies, and cultures. some meetings spanned several hours, as respect and listening to stories are part of the decolonizing approach in two-eyed seeing. also, during this period, facilitators shared many painful stories about their own trauma and the impact of substance use on their lives. all facilitators signed a consent form that outlined their responsibilities. they were informed about their weekly supervision sessions as well as an end of treatment semi-structured interview with the first author. these individual meetings and supervision sessions with the facilitators occurred twice monthly over three months. we also met as a group with the elders present at least once a month. at the end of the training, all the facilitators completed an end of treatment semi-structured interview with the first author. training of the facilitators the six days of training on ihss incorporated all the elements of an integrative, two-eyed seeing blended approach. the training consisted of didactic, experiential, and small-group learning. during the training, the facilitators engaged in ihss sharing circle sessions on seeking safety topics such as ptsd: taking back your power, setting boundaries in relationships, healing from anger, and taking good care of yourself. during the sharing circles, the elder offered one of the seven grandfather teachings, indigenous spiritual and traditional sayings, smudging, and/or prayers during the sessions. the teachings of the seven grandfathers, also known as the seven teachings, address human conduct toward others including the concepts of wisdom, love, honesty, respect, bravery, humility, and truth (benton-benai, 1988). the first two training days included topics such as understanding trauma and becoming trauma informed, somatic experiencing trauma work, safety and stabilization during trauma work, and treatment of trauma. each day began with didactical presentations until lunchtime and in the afternoon the participants would engage in an actual ihss sharing circle facilitated by the lead researcher and an elder. the elder would support and teach as well as bringing the traditional teachings to life. for 7 marsh et al.: the impact of training indigenous facilitators published by scholarship@western, 2020 example, seeking safety consists of up to 25 treatment topics, each a safe coping skill (see marsh, cotemeek et al., 2015 for further details on the ihss intervention). the facilitators had time and opportunity to ask questions and engage in in-depth discourse. days 3 and 4 focussed on sud and an exploration of information in the seeking safety manual. in-depth discussions helped participants understand how the seeking safety sessions are offered as well as how traditional healing practices can be integrated. the last two days of training focussed on vicarious traumatization, practice sessions, planning, and implementation. the practice sessions encouraged the facilitators to explore their strengths and weaknesses in sharing circle facilitation. for example, sometimes the content on intergenerational trauma brought up past painful experiences. all facilitators were encouraged to burn sacred medicines and to place it at the feet of the participant to offer strength. the facilitators understood and valued the ritual of burning sacred medicines as essential to this approach. discourse on group methods, group processes, therapeutic use of self, and expectations were practiced during these sessions. a unique outcome of facilitator training was the formation of a community built upon trust, laughter, and feasting. these are respectfully consistent with the indigenous cultures in this area. during the study, the lead author provided twice-monthly clinical supervision to the facilitators. one-on-one consultations were also available on an ad hoc basis. during supervision and the ad hoc meetings, we focused on their mental wellbeing, the regulation of their nervous systems, the impact of the ihss sessions on themselves, and how they were doing in the sharing circles. also, if triggers occurred for them, they had an opportunity to explore and understand how to cope with these triggers. finally, the supervision focused on support and teachings about their own safety and self-care. this was a very powerful learning time for the facilitators and the first author, as the seeking safety content informed them in ways that supported indigenous ways and teachings. in accordance with the recommendations of the elders who guided this study, the sharing circles were offered separately to male and female participants. the men’s sharing circles took place at the rockhaven recovery home for men, located in sudbury, ontario. rockhaven delivers a recovery program that empowers aboriginal and non-aboriginal men to develop a personal program of recovery from substance use disorders. approximately 40 percent of the men served by rockhaven are of aboriginal ancestry (patricia delyea, personal communication, april 15, 2013). the female sharing circles took place at the n’swakamok native friendship centre in the same city. the n’swakamok native friendship centre assists aboriginal peoples by providing programs that serve the social, cultural, and recreational needs of the urban aboriginal community. each of the sharing circles were cofacilitated by two aboriginal healthcare workers and one student (now called facilitators). these facilitators organized and led sharing circles twice a week for 13 weeks. each weekly sharing circle was two hours long. the facilitators, while covering the seeking safety topics (e.g., when substances control you, dealing with anger, setting boundaries in relationships, and taking good care of yourself), used the culturally relevant method of storytelling. they incorporated teachings about the history of the aboriginal peoples, as well as the seven grandfather teachings that discuss human conduct with an emphasis on wisdom, love, honesty, respect, bravery, humility, and truth (benton-banai, 1988). one elder was also present at most sessions to help participants develop a connection to the spiritual world through traditional teachings (menzies et al., 2010). the elders taught about two-eyed seeing while also focusing on the positive identity of each person in the circle. two of the facilitators were also traditional 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.8623 healers at the friendship centre. therefore, their presence as both facilitators and healers was powerful in the sharing circles. their skills included abilities to promote psychological and spiritual healing and complement the elder teachings (gone, 2008; menzies, 2014; najavits, 2002; restoule, 2004). data analysis the data analysis approach and results of the ihss intervention are published in an earlier article (marsh, cote-meek et al., 2016). all discussions from the end-of-treatment sharing circles and the semistructured interviews with the facilitators were audiotaped and transcribed verbatim. each facilitator was assigned a number to maintain confidentiality. after transcription, a qualitative thematic analysis was initiated to examine the data. this method was selected to be consistent with cultural data analysis models that require more involvement and interpretation from the researcher (bernard & ryan, 1998; denzin & lincoln, 2005). first, the text was read and re-read to identify and describe implicit and explicit ideas within the data (creswell, 2009). next, codes were developed to represent the identified themes and link the raw data as summary markers. code frequencies and code occurrences were then compared and the emerging relationships between the codes were graphically displayed. finally, four emerging themes were identified (bernard, 1998; creswell, 2009). feedback from facilitators was essential to two-eyed seeing and the indigenous decolonizing methodology; thus, all facilitators received a copy of their transcripts and were encouraged to make additions and deletions. all six facilitators were interviewed at baseline and at the end of the training and also completed a semistructured interview to elicit their experience of what it was like to facilitate the sharing circles. results analysis of the facilitators’ qualitative responses the following four core themes were identified: (a) healing through traditional aboriginal healing methods; (b) impact, education, and knowledge through sharing circles; (c) awareness, understanding, and the link between trauma, substance use, and the impacts of colonization; and (d) integration and application of knowledge. the facilitators are identified below as f1, f2, and f3 of the female group and m4, m5, and m6 of the male group. healing through indigenous traditional healing methods the sharing circles and the presence of elders, indigenous facilitators, sacred bundles, sacred teachings, sacred medicines, and ceremonies strengthened the experience for the facilitators. all the facilitators reported that the inclusion of traditional healing approaches and the presence of elders brought them back to their roots and strengthened their own spirituality. m4 noted: one thing that was very helpful was having an elder come in to give a teaching. i think those were very helpful along with the topics we were covering with the participants. all the men really enjoyed any traditional knowledge that we as facilitators were sharing. i shared my experiences with them as a facilitator, taught the traditional way, and the men enjoyed all these teachings. 9 marsh et al.: the impact of training indigenous facilitators published by scholarship@western, 2020 m5 reported: i believe that part of the reason why these traditional healing approaches were so helpful for me as a facilitator is that it helped us all to reconnect with our identities as indigenous peoples. colonizers have been attempting to remove the identities of indigenous peoples for centuries now and in doing so have caused a great deal of damage. this has led to many indigenous peoples to not know their own customs and traditions that lead to further issues of identity. many people believe, including myself, that returning to the traditions and customs is a way of healing aboriginal people. there was a consensus amongst all six facilitators about the impact of the traditional healing practices on the lives and health of the participants and themselves. some participants indicated that because of the spiritual aspect of the program, they felt more empowered and supported. they shared that they had their own challenges because of their own pain and intergenerational trauma but, as they led the circles and learned more about trauma, it helped them with their own healing. for example, m5 stated: i greatly appreciated the spiritual aspect of the program as a facilitator. the use of spirituality in social work practice is not widely accepted nor practiced; yet i believe that it is vital in a person’s recovery. this strengthened me all the way. furthermore, he commented: i also enjoyed being given the opportunity to be a facilitator while using an indigenous approach. it was clear to note the changes in the health and well-being of all the facilitators. although, i’ve spent quite a bit of time studying indigenous perspectives in the helping profession, my work experience has been limited to working within conventional models, which confine facilitators to their offices. i feel as though my role has afforded me the opportunity to work more creatively and intuitively. this freedom of these circles has allowed me to feel more effective as a facilitator. for instance, community is an essential facet of the indigenous perspective and thus i was able to attend community events, such as drumming workshops and indigenous plays, to connect with the participants in the group. here i observed how the facilitation of the ihss helped this facilitator to feel safe and appreciated. the facilitator’s experience highlights the impact of identity and culture loss. this finding is supported by the work of mccormick (2009), who confirms that “one of the roles of therapy for traditional indigenous society has been to reaffirm cultural values and helping find meaning and identity” (p. 340). m6 stated: i’ve learned a lot about the indigenous healing model, and i really appreciate the teachings around being a human being, as a facilitator. it sounds silly but this was one of the biggest insights for me. this is a very powerful statement. yalom and leszcz (2005) talked about the power of the shared testimonies of traumatized individuals and specifically of the moment when two people compassionately respond to the needs of the other. yalom and leszcz agreed with other scholars that trauma destroys 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.8623 faith, decency, courage, and connection. the power of the sharing circles resulted in a reawakening that can occur through common altruism by others (brave heart, 2003; drake, 2003; duran, 2006; herman, 2006; marsh, 2010; yalom & leszcz, 2005). impact of the education and knowledge through sharing circles all of the facilitators appreciated the training and the wisdom the seeking safety model offered them, and all agreed that it helped them be better helpers and healers. one of the most outstanding characteristics was the guidance and support the model offered facilitators. as f1 so eloquently stated: everything was clearly put out for us, we just had to use ourselves to get the information across. it’s an excellent model and i learned and grew so much. this learning and taking in of new wisdom helped me to become more trauma informed and, in this way, i could support myself and the participants to self-regulate. f3 commented: i just love seeking safety and i learned so much as a student about trauma, addiction, and the connection. every topic was bang on and powerful. this connection allows clinicians to tie into their own spirit and helps with vicarious trauma (pearlman & saakvitne, 1995). m6 added: i found the topics to be so practical and grounded in the realities of day-to-day living for those dealing with substance use and trauma. there was so much wisdom in each session, and i would say . . . i think the piece that stands out the most is around self-care, and that being one of the guiding principles . . . is coming back to yourself, and what is healthy for you now, what is safe for you to do now. vicarious trauma and burnout are often discussed as an occupational hazard for helpers (pearlman & saakvitne,1995). all the facilitators agreed that the sharing circles helped them with their own self-care and health. awareness, understanding, and the links between substance use, trauma, and the impact of colonization most of the facilitators stated that the 25 seeking safety topics added to their existing knowledge about sud and igt and helped them understand trauma, the impact of colonization, sud, and their interrelatedness. they felt that they learned with the participants. just as the participants expressed their learning and understanding through “aha” moments, so did the facilitators. as f3 stated: what i found the most helpful about the sharing circle topics was the many different areas of ptsd [and] sud. every week we explored a different topic that gave us a different perspective of the depth of ptsd [and] sud. the actual materials itself [book and handouts] have tools and strategies that are useful in helping people manage their symptoms and substance use issues. 11 marsh et al.: the impact of training indigenous facilitators published by scholarship@western, 2020 m5 added: members of the circle had topics given to them and an emphasis on self-care was provided. i thought that this was important, as many people suffering with ptsd only know how to cope with their symptoms by using substances. the topics that were covered not only shed light on their illness but also gave them the tools to be able to cope with it. this vicarious learning and healing that happened in these circles remind us as helpers that the helping process is reciprocal (duran, 2006; marsh, 2010). integration and application of knowledge when facilitators were asked about their experiences in the sharing circles, they valued both traditional healing elements and the seeking safety topics. they expressed that they felt confident in talking, practicing, and teaching about their culture as well as informing participants about the connection between sud and igt and their impacts. they continued to intimate how much they have gained and healed themselves, and all praised the integration of mainstream and traditional practices. for, example m6 stated: i really felt that i was healing along with the men. i felt like i knew my role very well, and yet i could see the reciprocal nature of healing. and for all of us, even the other facilitators, we were all in it together. and i can say too that even the experience being with the elders and the sweat had a profound impact on me. i had experienced tremendous insight, personal and spiritual insights. duran (2006) and herman (2015) validated this statement in their work and research. f3 shared: seeking safety allowed me to do it through some of my own experiences in my life teachings, i guess, and doing the medicine wheel teaching with the women, and how it helps us to look at that, to reflect on how we can better our lives. f5 concurred: the passing of the eagle feather signified the sacredness of that person’s time to be able to speak. i also enjoyed the smudges before the circles as i believe that it helped people to “cleanse” and ground themselves before they started to speak. discussion this study, as part of a larger study, explored the six-day training and supervision provided to indigenous facilitators of ihss, as well as the impact this training and the sharing circles’ facilitation had on these facilitators. the larger study identified whether or not indigenous traditional healing practices implemented with the seeking safety treatment model would be a feasible, suitable, and beneficial group implementation project for igt and sud in indigenous women and men (marsh, coholic, et al., 2015; marsh, cote-meek, et al., 2015; marsh, young et al., 2016). 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.4.8623 the ihss 12-week program and the training, supervision, and support the facilitators received had a tremendous impact on the wellbeing, spirituality, confidence, knowledge, growth, and confidence of the facilitators. there appears to be a scarcity in the literature and research on the impact of training and support for group facilitators and research clinical staff. the work of carl rogers (1951, 1992) on the role of the facilitative conditions that placed the therapeutic relationship at the center of the healing process, led researchers to embark on a quest for factors, common to all psychotherapies, that are responsible for the benefits of such treatments (frank & frank, 1991; lambert & barley, 2001; lambert & bergin, 1994; luborsky, 2000). emphasis was thus given on the therapeutic relationship as an integrating therapy factor (yalom & leszcz, 2005). najavits (2000) described the essential qualities facilitators require to conduct the seeking safety treatment: (a) they want to work with this patient population, (b) willingness to use the treatment manual, (c) ability to maintain fidelity to seeking safety while also adapting it as needed (e.g., in this study, to apply culturally sensitive material and in this case traditional healing practices). seeking safety is an ideal manualized treatment for incorporation into this research study for many reasons, one being that there are no strict criteria about credentials for the therapist selection. also, the seeking safety model’s teachings and focus is on stabilization, education, and compassion rather than trauma processing. this approach facilitated safety. it also supported the facilitators’ willingness to commit to the training, which required hours of their time during the 12-week intervention period. seeking safety incorporates attention to thinking, behavior, and relationships and focuses on optimistic messages toward healing, as well as encouraging utilization of community resources (najavits, 2002). all the above-mentioned attributes of the seeking safety model inspired and facilitated growth and healing for both the sharing circle participants and the facilitators. lintlater’s (2010) research into healing and wellness within indigenous communities on turtle island (i.e., north america) shows that bringing forth indigenous strategies for helping and healing is a vitally important contribution to the field of trauma work, as well as to the workers’ wellbeing. it is well documented that the igt experienced by indigenous peoples is linked to experiences at residential schools (gagné, 1998; kirmayer et al., 2000; menzies et al., 2010; waldram, 2008). all six facilitators reported a history of igt and two are in recovery from sud. the facilitators understood the suffering and struggles of their clients and worked hard to bring forth self-care not just for the participants, but for themselves as well. this was evident in the qualitative data. najavits (2000) encouraged training for facilitators who lacked knowledge in sud, ptsd, and cognitive behavioral therapy (cbt). the training offered to the facilitators represented an opportunity for growth, team building, community engagement, and support among community members (najavits, 2000). lambert and barley (2001) indicated that 40% of the improvement in outcomes among psychotherapy clients could be attributed to extra-therapeutic factors; 30% to common factors, including the client– therapist relationship; 15% to specific interventions; and 15% to expectancy or placebo effects. also, many researchers have identified converging themes across therapies, such as the significance and importance of the therapeutic relationship, therapist and client variables, specific therapeutic techniques, as well as common mechanisms of change (beitman, 1992; goldfried & davila, 2005; wampold, 2007). all the facilitators discussed feeling a sense of empowerment, freedom, and satisfaction as they witnessed many positive changes in the participants and themselves. disconnection and isolation are the hallmarks of trauma and these were clearly counteracted during the sharing circles as the facilitators and participants built interpersonal connections. some talked about the healing that took place during the 13 marsh et al.: the impact of training indigenous facilitators published by scholarship@western, 2020 sharing circles. the activated nervous system is often experienced and described by survivors as living in a prison. when people finally begin to heal, a sense of safety and freedom returns (haskell & randall, 2009; herman, 2015; marsh, 2010). this aspect of healing was beautifully depicted through the viewpoints and voices of the facilitators. it has been noted that there is a higher percentage of sexual abuse survivors among the population of therapists than is found in the general population (dunkley & whelan, 2006; pearlman & saakvitne, 1995; schauben & frazier, 1995). the empathic resonance such workers can offer their clients can be a source of hope and validation, and it may also leave counselor-survivors at greater risk of vicarious traumatization (mccann & pearlman, 1990). all six facilitators reported a history of childhood trauma and therefore the training and weekly supervision played an important role in support throughout the research process. when asked about the impact of supervision, all six facilitators agreed that the education, support, and supervision helped them to function at their best and experience transformation rather than vicarious trauma. limitations the findings in this study have been very positive and healing in a holistic way as reported by the quotes and viewpoints of the facilitators; yet some of the limitations in the education and supervision should be noted. first, our data is solely self-reported. second, the facilitators are not representative of all indigenous facilitators. there is a scarcity in the literature on training and supervision of indigenous research staff; thus, future studies in this area are needed to further shed light on the needs of facilitators and research staff. conclusion the facilitators who attended this training and supported this research project reported profound, empowering, and transformative moving experiences, including spiritual, emotional, and physical growth, and confidence working with clients with igt and sud. furthermore, the training and supervision experiences promoted a deep connection for the facilitators in relation to themselves and the participants. the seeking safety material and the indigenous traditional healing practices enhanced their interactions with each other, themselves, and the participants. the support and teachings by the elders and the researcher were appreciated by the facilitators throughout the research period. finally, it was clear that education, support, and supervision are key aspects that enhance empathic engagement with self and recipients of care and treatment. the reclamation process was enhanced through the indigenous traditional healing practices and the 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(2005). theory and practice of group psychotherapy. basic books. 8623 cover page.pdf 8623 marsh the impact of training rce.pdf indigenous young people transitioning from out-of-home care (oohc) in victoria, australia: the perspectives of workers in indigenous-specific and non-indigenous non-government services the international indigenous policy journal volume 7 | issue 3 article 2 july 2016 indigenous young people transitioning from outof-home care (oohc) in victoria, australia: the perspectives of workers in indigenous-specific and non-indigenous non-government services philip mendes monash university, australia, philip.mendes@monash.edu bernadette saunders bernadette.saunders@monash.edu susan baidawi susan.baidawi@monash.edu recommended citation mendes, p. , saunders, b. , baidawi, s. (2016). indigenous young people transitioning from out-of-home care (oohc) in victoria, australia: the perspectives of workers in indigenous-specific and non-indigenous non-government services. the international indigenous policy journal, 7(3). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.2 indigenous young people transitioning from out-of-home care (oohc) in victoria, australia: the perspectives of workers in indigenous-specific and non-indigenous non-government services abstract indigenous children and young people are overrepresented in the australian out-of-home care (oohc) system. to date, specific research has not been undertaken on workers' perspectives regarding the indigenousspecific and non-indigenous supports and services available to indigenous young people exiting the system. this exploratory research involved focus group consultations with workers from seven child and family welfare agencies to examine the current support services available to indigenous young people who are in or will be leaving out-of-home care in the state of victoria. findings suggest that aboriginal community controlled organisations (accos) play a positive role in working with non-indigenous agencies to assist indigenous care leavers. participants identified some key strategies to improve outcomes, such as facilitating stronger relationships between indigenous and non-indigenous services, and improving the resourcing of accos. keywords out-of-home care, foster care, child protection, cultural support, indigenous, aboriginal acknowledgments this study is supported by a grant from the lord mayor’s charitable foundation (australia). the project involves a partnership between monash university and a consortium of child and family welfare agencies: the victorian aboriginal child care agency, wesley mission, jesuit social services, berry street victoria, mackillop family services and the salvation army westcare. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ indigenous young people transitioning from out-of-home care (oohc) in victoria, australia: the perspectives of workers in indigenous-specific and non-indigenous non-government services indigenous children and young people are overrepresented in the child welfare systems in a number of jurisdictions, including new zealand, canada, and the united states (thoburn, 2008; u.s. department of health and human services, 2011). for example, an analysis of provincial and territorial data in canada suggested that the rate of first nations children in out-of-home care (oohc) is 3 to 7 times higher than that of the general population. identified risk factors include substance use, poverty, limited housing, family violence, lack of social supports, and the caregiver’s own history of time spent in state care (sinha & kozlowski, 2013; sinha et al., 2011). similarly, a new zealand study found that maori children comprised 51.7% of those in oohc in december 2012, despite totalling only 15% of the general population (fernandez & atwool, 2013). the overrepresentation of indigenous children in the australian child welfare system is particularly high. they are far more likely to be the subjects of substantiated child abuse and neglect, and also far more likely to be under care and protection orders. as of june 30th, 2014, indigenous children and young people were estimated to comprise just over one third (n =14,991) of the total 43,009 children and young people in oohc nationwide, despite numbering only 5% of the australian population up to 17 years of age. they are 9 times more likely than their non-indigenous peers to be in oohc, and their rate of placement has doubled over the past 10 years (australian institute of health and welfare [aihw], 2015; productivity commission, 2015). oohc in australia is the responsibility of the community services or child welfare department of each state and territory, and each has its own legislation, policies, and practices. consequently, in-care or leaving-care standards are not uniform across the states and territories—although the national out-ofhome care standards, introduced in december 2010, suggest minimum benchmarks (such as the requirement for each care leaver to have a transition out of care plan commencing at 15 years of age) (department of families, housing, community services and indigenous affairs [fahcsia], 2010). various systemic factors have been identified as causes of the ongoing overrepresentation of indigenous children in the australian child welfare system, including the consequences of past policies of forced removal of indigenous children from their cultures and communities, intergenerational trauma arising from these policies, and the resulting socio-economic disadvantage (australian human rights commission, 2015; department of premier and cabinet, 2015; lonne, harries, featherstone, & gray, 2016). these factors are often reflected in instances of substance misuse, violence, and mental illness within the family. another contributing factor appears to be the child welfare system’s overreliance on issuing statutory child protection orders and associated oohc placements rather than offering preventive family support services—especially given that neglect (often linked to poverty and poor housing) is the most common type of substantiated abuse that indigenous children experience. additionally, there seems to be a lack of “cultural competence” within child protection services concerning indigenous family dynamics, cultures, and traditions (community affairs references committee, 2015; fejo-king, 2015). this study uses tong and cross’ understanding of cultural competence as “a set of congruent behaviours, attitudes, and policies that come together in a system, 1 mendes et al.: indigenous young people transitioning from out-of-home care (oohc) in victoria, australia published by scholarship@western, 2016 agency, or among professionals that enable them to work effectively in cross-cultural situations” (cited in libesman, 2004, p. 15). leaving care is formally defined as the cessation of the state’s legal responsibility for young people, between 15 to 18 years of age, who are living in oohc. in practice, however, leaving care is both a major life event and a process that involves transitioning from dependence on state accommodation and supports to self-sufficiency (cashmore & mendes, 2015). it has been estimated that 3,124 young people aged 15 to 17 years were discharged from australian oohc from 2013 to 2014, with the figure for victoria at 857 (australian institute of health and welfare [aihw], 2015). some of these young people remain in existing foster or kinship care placements, others return to their families of origin, and many appear to move into independent living. this study was carried out in the state of victoria, which has legislated via the children, youth and families act 2005 (vic) for the provision of leaving care and after-care services for young people up to 21 years of age. the children, youth and families act 2005 appears to oblige the government to assist care leavers with finances, housing, education and training, employment, legal advice, access to health and community services, and counselling and support, depending on the assessed level of need. it also requires consideration of the specific needs of aboriginal young people. for young people transitioning from care, the government has established: • mentoring programs; • post-care support and placement services; • specific supports for aboriginal young people; • specialist programs, known as springboard, for young people leaving residential care; and • housing supports. in principle, these services are intended to meet the needs of all care leavers in the state of victoria but, in practice, they remain discretionary rather than mandatory, and many care leavers experience difficult transitions in key areas such as housing, access to health care, education, and employment. because australian jurisdictions do not officially trace or monitor care leavers’ progress, precise figures indicating how many young people fall into each identity category are elusive. indigenous young people appear to form 13% of all care leavers in victoria (approximately 111 of a total of 857) (cummins, scott, & scales, 2012). furthermore, indigenous care leavers seem to face particular challenges, including poor educational experiences, disproportionate levels of involvement with the youth criminal justice system, high levels of early pregnancy, varying levels of connection to their cultures and communities, and a loss of identity (baidawi, mendes, & saunders, 2013; baldry, trofimovs, brown, brackertz, & fotheringham, 2015; commission for children and young people, 2015). policies introduced in victoria to address these deficits include the aboriginal child placement principle (acpp). this policy advocates placing aboriginal children according to following hierarchy: 1. the child’s extended family, 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.2 2. the child’s indigenous community, 3. other indigenous people, and 4. non-indigenous people, as a last resort (monohan, 2002). this principle aims to protect indigenous children’s right to be raised within their culture, and acknowledges the importance of family and kinship networks in the lives of indigenous young people (monohan, 2002). in accordance with the placement priorities of acpp, national data indicated that, in 2014, 67.4% of indigenous children in out-of-home care were placed with relatives or kin, other indigenous caregivers, or in indigenous residential care (aihw, 2015). however, significantly, in 14.8% of these cases, indigenous children and young people were in the care of non-indigenous relatives or kin (aihw, 2015). additional policies include: a. a requirement for cultural support plans that identify strategies for maintaining connections with family, community, and culture. b. the aboriginal leaving care support initiative, which funds an aboriginal community controlled organisation (acco) in each region to support indigenous care leavers. c. the appointment of a victorian commissioner for aboriginal children and young people who is undertaking an audit of all indigenous children in care. d. the establishment of partnerships between indigenous and non-indigenous child and family welfare agencies (baidawi et al., 2013; department of premier and cabinet, 2015). to date, there has been no research addressing either indigenous-specific or non-indigenous supports and services that are available to indigenous young people as they transition from care. methods purpose the purpose of this exploratory study was to examine the current leaving care and post-care supports that are available to indigenous care leavers, including the inter-relationship and consultation process between indigenous and non-indigenous agencies delivering services to this group, as well as differences in approach or service delivery between indigenous and non-indigenous leaving care and post-care services and processes. 3 mendes et al.: indigenous young people transitioning from out-of-home care (oohc) in victoria, australia published by scholarship@western, 2016 other aims of this study were: • to expand on existing knowledge regarding indigenous care leavers’ backgrounds, care experiences, and post-care trajectories, including differences in the needs and experiences of indigenous and non-indigenous care leavers. • to understand the access of indigenous care leavers to leaving care and post-care services. • to identify any barriers or hindrances to accessing supports and services. • to enhance existing knowledge of current and potential programs or strategies that assist indigenous care leavers so that it can be translated into changes in policy and practice. this paper reports on phase one of the study, which involved focus groups with individuals from indigenous specific and non-indigenous services working with indigenous young people in and transitioning out of oohc. it examines the strengths and limitations of existing services, and the extent to which they address young people’s cultural supports and connections. phase two of the study involved individual semi-structured interviews with indigenous care leavers, conducted with an aim to understand their experiences of out-of-home care, leaving care, and their post-care outcomes— including their experiences of cultural connection or disconnection. partnership and ethics this exploratory research project involved a partnership between monash university and a consortium of child and family welfare agencies. a partnership was formed between researchers at monash university and the victorian aboriginal child care agency (vacca), the lead statewide aboriginal child and family welfare agency. additionally, five non-indigenous child and family welfare organisations were also partner agencies in this research project: wesley mission, jesuit social services, berry street, mackillop family services, and the salvation army westcare. in line with national guidelines for research with indigenous peoples (australian institute of aboriginal and torres strait islander studies, 2012), ongoing collaboration and consultation with indigenous partner agencies occurred throughout the study. vacca collaborated with the researchers on the development project’s design from its outset and allocated a representative to provide ongoing feedback in both the project governance committee (comprised of the researchers and staff from vacca) and the broader project advisory committee (comprised of the researchers, and staff from vacca and other partner agencies). additionally, the inaugural victorian commissioner for aboriginal children and young people was a lead partner for the project, hosting the meetings of the advisory committee and providing feedback concerning various components of the study’s findings (questionnaires, for example). the monash university human research ethics committee approved this research. the researchers advertised the study to partner agencies and other organisations, who invited staff to be involved in semi-structured focus groups, which were lead by the researchers. data were gathered around seven key issues relating to indigenous care leavers: • the strengths and limitations of leaving care and post-care systems; 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.2 • the strengths and limitations of collaboration and consultation mechanisms between indigenous and non-indigenous services; • the use and relevance of the acpp with indigenous care leavers; • the strengths and limitations of cultural support plans and planning; • strategies for improving connection to communities and to one’s sense of identity, as well as challenges faced in this area; • post-care outcomes; and • experiences and ideas about, and good practice in relation to, indigenous care leavers. these topics were developed based on a review of the existing literature (baidawi et al., 2013) and a consultation forum attended by both the commissioner for aboriginal children and young people and 16 representatives from two indigenous and 10 non-indigenous child welfare agencies. existing literature notes that focus groups are an effective method for qualitative data collection in social work research (linhorst, 2002). this study’s methodology aimed to stimulate discussion among agency staff about key issues in order to generate responses that individual participants may not have previously considered outside of a group setting (alston & bowles, 2003). the focus groups were recorded (audio only) and transcribed, and the data were then entered into nvivo10 for coding. thematic analysis was conducted by categorising recurring ideas within the transcript data (specifically instances wherein a response or concept was raised on three or more occasions) in order to identify key themes. multiple coding by two members of the research team was utilized to check inter-rater reliability of the coded themes on a selection of transcripts. these methods have been suggested for enhancing rigour in qualitative data collection and analysis (barbour, 2001; mays & pope, 1995). a total of 32 individuals from seven agencies participated in seven focus groups during the data collection phase. all agencies involved deliver child and family services, primarily in the out-of-home care and leaving care sectors. one of these agencies was an acco. the remaining agencies were mainstream child and youth welfare services. the focus group participants held a range of positions, such as caseworkers, support workers, case managers, program managers, team leaders, and regional directors. the majority worked within the out-of-home care and leaving care sectors including in kinship, foster, and residential care programs, as well as lead tenant and post-care services, leaving care housing and mentoring, and youth justice support programs. while participants were not asked about their indigenous status, during the focus group consultations a total of four participants (two from the acco and one from each of two other focus groups) voluntarily identified as indigenous. participants also had experience in a variety of past roles that had brought them into contact with indigenous care leavers, including work in kinship, foster, and residential care, lead tenant and post-care services, adult and youth justice, aboriginal specific programs, aboriginal legal services, employment services, alcohol and other drug services, housing programs, and delivering individual and family counselling. 5 mendes et al.: indigenous young people transitioning from out-of-home care (oohc) in victoria, australia published by scholarship@western, 2016 results nature of systems and processes the focus groups did not identify any major differences in the leaving care services delivered by accos and mainstream child welfare agencies in terms of supporting indigenous care leavers. it appears that both types of service providers adopt a voluntary model and support indigenous care leavers in identifying their needs. the service providers attempt to access appropriate supports and resources to meet these identified needs primarily through post-care services (such as housing, for example). many respondents from mainstream services were not aware of any specific programs available to indigenous care leavers, nor were they aware of any differences in leaving care and post-care processes and services available to indigenous care leavers. however, it should be noted that, in some of these services, respondents had not worked with indigenous care leavers as clients in their programs. one participant, for example, explained: so we [agency] are not an indigenous-specific service. however, from time to time we do have indigenous clients. i have to say that, even as the [manager], i’m actually not familiar [with] any specific indigenous care leaver programs. my understanding is that it’s all the same, so i would be interested to see with the . . . outcomes of this research, if there is something different that we don’t know about. (focus group 4, participant 1) other participants indicated that secondary consultation with accos (for example, accessing acco specialist advice in care teams and case planning processes) would ideally occur for indigenous care leavers, and that this was the main difference between leaving care planning for indigenous and nonindigenous care leavers—at least from the perspective of mainstream services. however, it was not clear whether secondary consultation with accos was standard practice for mainstream services in situations where indigenous care leavers opted to not to be directly involved with accos. in areas where acco service provision was available, indigenous care leavers could opt to receive leaving care and/or post-care services either from an acco or a non-indigenous service. aboriginal child placement principle (acpp) when discussing the acpp, focus group participants pointed out the shortage of indigenous carers (particularly in metropolitan victoria). furthermore, they noted the difficulty in balancing the principle of placing sibling groups together with the priority of finding an indigenous carer or placement, as the following caseworkers’ comments indicate: we have such a small proportion of indigenous people who identify as indigenous living in our area . . . that we probably have six or seven indigenous kids on our list, but only one indigenous carer . . . there’s a disconnect. because there’s so many children who are indigenous in care, and [they are] five times as likely to be in care, but then you don’t have any of the foster carers. (focus group 3, participant 2) 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.2 you have your best interests framework, which [means] kids should be placed together in a sibling group. then you’ve got the indigenous framework. they have to be placed with an indigenous carer. when you’ve got three siblings, you just find whatever you can get to keep them together. if there was an option for an indigenous carer, [and] she only had capacity for one child, i wouldn’t be putting one child in there and splitting up with the others. it’s sort of like what . . . you can find. (focus group 3, participant 2) the first thing you’re thinking when you’re on duty . . . is where can i put these kids? where can i keep them together? where’s closest to their school? so there’s all these competing priorities of where the location is, [and] can they keep doing their extra-curricular activities? because unfortunately if they want to play basketball, that sits higher than, for them, sometimes their culture. so it’s finding all these things. it’s just not realistic that you find an indigenous carer when you’re factoring in all these other things. it’s just impossible. (focus group 3, participant 2) in the leaving care and post-care periods, respondents commonly reported that finding any placement or housing option for young people was the most pressing priority, rather than placement with indigenous carers or within indigenous communities. some participants also pointed out that although the acpp continues to guide practice in the leaving care and post-care periods, there is not a legislative requirement to consider these issues after a young person leaves care. a strong value placed on the work of accos the other major theme to emerge from mainstream agencies regarding relationships with accos was a strong value placed on the work of accos, including both consultation and direct work with indigenous young people. this appreciation of these services was articulated alongside frustration about the perceived under resourcing of accos: i’m just really aware that they are pretty under the pump, and understaffed and overworked and have . . . all of victoria to cover. so that’s a really difficult sort of environment to be working in and . . . it’s been my experience that that’s been a real sort of impediment to doing the good work. and i think that yeah, in my experience, [acco] workers have been absolutely fantastic. (focus group 5, participant 3) they barely come to a case plan, really. you’re lucky to see them at a case plan, but then they don’t know the kid, because they’ve got a caseload of like 60 or something, you know? you can’t get onto them. they don’t respond to emails. (focus group 3, participant 1) the main strength that workers identified in current leaving care and post-care systems for indigenous young people was the availability of accos to provide specific services for aboriginal young people in out-of-home care. dedicated workers in the leaving care and post-care service system were also seen as a key asset in these systems—both mainstream staff and indigenous staff working in either mainstream agencies or indigenous-specific services. two participants noted: many of our aboriginal staff . . . work 24/7. it just so happens we pay them between 9 and 5. (focus group 2, participant 5) 7 mendes et al.: indigenous young people transitioning from out-of-home care (oohc) in victoria, australia published by scholarship@western, 2016 if our [indigenous] staff didn’t have a job tomorrow, they would still be doing things through obligation. (focus group 2, participant 3) our study’s findings concerning cultural support planning have been reported elsewhere (baidawi, mendes, & saunders, 2016). increasing cultural awareness and sensitivity though acknowledged as a work in progress, participants of some mainstream agencies identified as a key strength the increasing cultural awareness and sensitivity of their organisations in their work with indigenous communities, organisations, and young people. this included basic initiatives such as the provision of cultural training for agency staff and, in a minority of cases, the hiring of indigenous staff to work in mainstream services. actions taken at a strategic level were also cited as examples of these organisations’ cultural awareness and sensitivity. participants, for example, mentioned organisations issuing formal apologies to aboriginal and torres strait islander communities and the development of strategic plans concerning reconciliation and working with indigenous communities. two participants explained their organisations’ efforts invested in such work: one thing that our agency here does is that they do offer, i think it’s once or twice a year through [an acco] they run . . . an indigenous cultural awareness one-day training. and i’ve done a couple of them through here, and that’s where actually i’ve sort of learnt more about the history, and then my own sort of research. (focus group 4, participant 3) so one of the things that we’re doing at the minute, and i’m not sure about the model, but the intent i think is a good thing, is around the idea of putting together a reconciliation action plan. and really, the question in regard to this is not just about the issue of young aboriginal people leaving care. it’s about our experience of care and about our experience of family systems, and what we consider to be the solution, and how you marry that with where aboriginal people are at in that respect as well. so you can’t build relationships, and you can’t build trust unless you’re prepared to put your own cultural values on the line as well. (focus group 2, participant 3) one focus group participant indicated that a young indigenous client had become aware of the agency’s public apology to aboriginal and torres strait islander communities: that was really important as well. because this young person knew about that, had read about it in the paper and we got to talk about that. she was like, “oh, [the agency] apologized!” (focus group 5, participant 3) however, all focus group participants did not espouse this positive perspective. some believed that their workplaces’ cultural sensitivity and awareness initiatives were somewhat tokenistic: i know at [agency office] . . . probably about three years ago i approached someone to put up some [indigenous artwork] . . . there was no indigenous artwork anywhere. and the person, well two people i sort of approached just went, “oh god, he’s one of those.” it’s like, well, “nah, i’m not ‘one of those’ but it would be nice to see some indigenous art in here.” so just to please me they went and got on the internet and googled some aboriginal flag, printed it off and 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.2 laminated it and stuck it up, and there you go. and i was just like, “really?” to me . . . that says to me a lot about their attitude towards indigenous culture. (focus group 3, participant 4) limitations of leaving care and post-care systems six key themes emerged when respondents were asked to identify any limitations of leaving care and post-care services for indigenous care leavers. the main theme that emerged from mainstream services was that the limitations of leaving care and post-care systems for indigenous care leavers were largely similar to those experienced by non-indigenous care leavers, and that these arose from these system’s general shortcomings. in particular, the limited human and financial resources available to support care leavers in the post-care period were acknowledged, alongside the compressed and early transitions to independence that is expected of care leavers. respondents highlighted some care leavers’ lack of developmental readiness to negotiate, with limited supports, the tasks expected of them, including the capacity to engage with a voluntary post-care service system. the inflexibility and limited resources of “overwhelmed” leaving care and post-care systems were seen as a limitation for all care leavers, regardless of their indigenous status. most leaving care and post-care services were seen by participants to be equally accessible to indigenous and non-indigenous care leavers. although access to identity documents is a central concern for all care leavers, focus group respondents in non-metropolitan locations noted, anecdotally, that a high proportion of indigenous care leavers may not have birth certificates or a registration of birth, and many had arrived from other locations, including interstate, which thus complicated the process of obtaining these documents. this in turn created difficulties for care leavers seeking to access services such as support payments. a second identified limitation of leaving care systems expressed by participants of the focus groups was that many indigenous young people were believed to leave or abscond from care prior to becoming eligible for leaving care supports. this theme was mainly raised by respondents in non-metropolitan areas, who gave anecdotal evidence of indigenous young people, who had been in care for many years, either absconding from placements to a homeless situation (for example, couch-surfing), or returning to kinship placements deemed as stable prior to age 16. participants observed indigenous young peoples’ orders lapsing after being placed in kinship arrangements that later broke down, or after absconding from placements after the age of 15. participants explained that such situations created challenges to the engagement of young people in leaving care planning and service provision. for example, some young people became ineligible for leaving care services if they were not under a care and protection order, as per legislative stipulations, or if they could not be located to engage in leaving care planning. respondents observed these young people returning to youth services via homelessness or youth justice service pathways when their circumstances degenerated, and they were identified as care leavers through these services. participants also noted that it could be difficult to access proof of a young person’s eligibility for leaving care services under these circumstances. the third theme that emerged concerning limitations of leaving care and post-care systems centred on the observation that cultural considerations were not a priority in the leaving care and post-care period. many indigenous care leavers, particularly those transitioning from residential care or lead tenant 9 mendes et al.: indigenous young people transitioning from out-of-home care (oohc) in victoria, australia published by scholarship@western, 2016 placements, were perceived as facing immediate concerns (most prominently housing and financial issues) which took precedence over cultural considerations. one participant noted: a significant number of young people that approach post-care are in crisis. and i think that when a young person is in crisis they don’t have any space for their cultural needs. they’re focusing on “i have nowhere to sleep tonight,” or “i can’t pay my bills and i’m about to be evicted,” or “my relationship has broken down” or “i’m experiencing family violence.” (focus group 5, participant 1) a fourth theme centred on the limitations of child welfare systems to facilitate connections with families. participants believed that indigenous care leavers would benefit from systems that were better able to facilitate connections with their extended families and communities, and to encourage family work, even in situations wherein children had been removed from their families: but it’s interesting because we’ve had referrals where workers have said, “don’t go near the mum,” you know, “she’s really dangerous, and just don’t have anything to do with her,” whereas we tend to always work with the families. and in both those situations the workers have engaged with the mum, and it’s turned out really well. (focus group 2, participant 5) a minority of respondents embraced a broader worldview, and their remarks comprise the study’s fifth theme. they observed that out-of-home care systems (and their post-care extensions) are underpinned by principles, definitions, and understandings that are at times antithetical to indigenous traditional practices, understandings, or value systems: when you take a culture and a people outside of their own systems, so family and community, and no matter how well-intended we are in terms of trying to provide . . . foster situations or aboriginal-specific out-of-home care circumstances, those young people still are in a system that’s alien to their own family and extended family systems . . . we fail in the primary acknowledgement, which is to acknowledge individual aboriginal people in a family system. and in a family system that has an extended framework that promotes solutions that our system doesn’t look at. (focus group 2, participant 2) respondents gave various examples illustrating this theme in relation to the acpp. difficulties were described in balancing this principle with other best interests principles in out-of-home care, including keeping sibling groups together and prioritising placement permanency. in other examples, various participants raised the idea that indigenous and non-indigenous cultures understood the concept of family differently: “where are you from?” is the question, more than “who are you?” so i belong in swan hill. so someone from swan hill will have a connection to you that’s nothing to do with attachment— they don’t know you, they may never have met you . . . the system’s not good at facilitating those familial pathways in the same way as more traditional family, which is all about person and emotion and connection. (focus group 5, participant 2) 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.2 a further notable example offered by participants was the concept of “leaving” or transitioning from care: in a sense that really illustrates the difference around, you know [the] service system that’s mainstream, even if it is aboriginal people running that, there is a leaving component. whereas if you’re an aboriginal person, and you live in this community, you always care, and you’re always interested in what happens to your people. so there’s no leaving anything. (focus group 2, participant 3) another example concerned financial management post-care, which is often only regarded from an individualistic perspective when considering economic outcomes for care leavers: often for young people there’s a responsibility or an expectation by community . . . that their funds are pooled. so you know, part of our process when we’re looking at approving applications for young people leaving care is, “what is their contribution?” so they might say we need a household set up. well, you know, “what is the young person’s income? what are their expenses? are they able to contribute towards something? what’s a reasonable cost?” but for some young people, all their money is pooled. and so they don’t have the resources, you know, like you go, “oh well . . . they’ve got a part-time job” or “they’ve got youth allowance” or whatever. and they should be able to afford such and such. but often we’ll get feedback from the [acco] worker that the young person is supporting their extended family or, you know, this is post-care, so they haven’t got any money. even though they might have an income, their income is . . . being guarded by . . . or they’re helping to support their younger brother or whoever. (focus group 5, participant 1) related to this was the sixth and final theme, which concerned limitations in cultural competency among mainstream child welfare agencies. this limitation was primarily recognized by agency staff who were concerned about their level of knowledge and their capacity to work with indigenous young people and agencies. additionally, although it was recognized as a key asset, some respondents identified difficulties in recruiting and supporting indigenous staff to work within mainstream non-government agencies. indigenous care leavers’ transitional needs and experiences many respondents believed there were few differences between the transitional needs and experiences of indigenous and non-indigenous care leavers. others did note differences, particularly concerning some indigenous care leavers’ identity confusion and the development of their sense of self. respondents noted that this could be particularly challenging for young people with weaker connections to their culture. the needs of aboriginal children leaving care are the same, but then i think the negotiation of your identity and some of the things that we’ve, when i say we, the system’s done to children in terms of not knowing who they are, in a worse way, from coming into a substitute family . . . and then really hard to engage with the services, because the services also [question], “who are you? you’re now a white girl. we used to know you, you used to be a family name that we know.” do you know what i mean? and now it’s a whole process of reconnection with that, which is 11 mendes et al.: indigenous young people transitioning from out-of-home care (oohc) in victoria, australia published by scholarship@western, 2016 nothing that other cultures have to negotiate. now leaving care’s hard enough, it seems to me that that’s a layer and a dimension that’s an added. (focus group 5, participant 2) while the parents of non-indigenous young people were also commonly noted as having had involvement with child protection as children, respondents indicated that the added dimensions of history and culture resulted in a different experience of these transgenerational effects when working with indigenous young people, particularly those living in non-indigenous placements: we had [a young girl] in the residential setting, and i remember dealing with her family, her mother specifically. and it was very different. it was very different dealing with her than dealing with, say, kids that you know aren’t aboriginal. and there were a number of comments that she made over the time that the young girl was in care, around racism and, you know, being white and i guess, maybe reverse racism, as in being white and . . . not understanding the culture. (focus group 4, participant 1) other barriers to engagement with culture and community and indigenous-specific services were noted for indigenous care leavers. most commonly, participants reported that some indigenous young people did not want to engage with culture and community for various reasons, including culture not being a priority to them, and a general lack of experience and familiarity with traditional culture. speaking of one indigenous youth in care, a participant noted: we would encourage him. but we sort of found that this wasn’t something that his parents, like he was indigenous but his parents hadn’t actually sort of . . . he’d never done these things before. so we started introducing this to him, and he was like, “oh this . . . this isn’t me. this isn’t . . . you know i might be indigenous, but that doesn’t mean that i want to do this indigenous service that you’ve then, you know, now recommended that i do.” (focus group 4, participant 3) some young people preferred to fit in or identify with non-indigenous carers’ culture, or actively avoided reconnection with their indigenous cultures due to previous, negative experiences of community, or concerns about engaging with their birth families. additionally, in some cases, carers lacked knowledge, support, or the willingness to assist indigenous young people to engage with their own cultures. focus group participants from mainstream services reported a need for greater support, knowledge, and guidance in helping indigenous young people to connect to their cultures and communities, and participants from accos similarly recognized a need to resource activities promoting cultural connection. in terms of post-care outcomes, respondents observed that many indigenous children (similar to their non-indigenous counterparts) return to their family post-care. reunion was often seen to fail, however, in the absence of any interim family work or support to negotiate these attempts at re-connection. they go back to family in the end sometimes anyway, and yet there still hasn’t been that building of capacity for family for them to go back. it’s just remove them, artificial supports in place for 10 years, and then, “oh crap, you’ve got nowhere to go.” put them back into family and let them go. and that’s not going to work. (focus group 2, participant 1) 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.2 after leaving care, indigenous young people were often seen to take on caring responsibilities for siblings, parents, and their extended families. whether by choice or due to cultural expectations, these responsibilities were seen to place additional stress on care leavers, including on their post-care accommodation and finances, as the following two participants explained: we housed one boy who was leaving care with youth justice . . . his older partner moved in, his older partner's sister moved in, her partner moved in, and mum moved in. so we housed one indigenous leaving care boy and we ended up supporting four other people, ranging from the age of 53 down. and there was another brother in [regional town] that used to come over and stay for extensive periods of time as well. so you don't just look after one, you look after everyone. (focus group 7, participant 1) we've got a young couple that have been, she was in care, he actually wasn't, but they quite successfully had their first child and they're doing really well. but the only time they access our service is when they've got family staying with them, because often it's an elder that will be staying with them. they will not ask them to contribute financially [for] being in their property. they will feed them . . . everything is provided for the older aunty or you know cousin whatever. they will provide for them, and they won't ask them to contribute to the support of themselves. so you know two young people on parenting payments with a small child may have three elder relatives staying with them. they can become responsible for feeding them, and caring, like providing for their needs for whatever period of time they're staying there. so they can be doing really well with . . . because you say to them, “do you need a hand with your budget?” “oh no. we do really well, but aunty mary's down from canberra and she's staying with us.” “well maybe aunty mary could buy a couple of meals?” “oh no we can't do that. you can't do that. you just can't.” (focus group 7, participant 1) although it is common among the leaving care population broadly, focus group participants often remarked on homelessness as a common post-care outcome for indigenous care leavers. a number of focus group participants also commented on many indigenous care leavers’ poor educational outcomes. a further post-care outcome, noted in focus groups, was the disproportionate number of indigenous care leavers having involvement in the youth and adult justice systems. at the same time, multiple respondents spoke about indigenous care leavers who demonstrated high levels of resilience and experienced positive outcomes with regards to housing, education, and relationships. recommendations for improving outcomes for indigenous care leavers focus group participants generated a number of recommendations for improving indigenous care leavers’ outcomes. the most prominent suggestion was to have a cultural support worker in the care team. a second recommendation was to match indigenous care leavers with mentors throughout the leaving care period from 15 to 17 years, whether from indigenous communities or not, as an added layer of support. the value of staff training within non-indigenous child welfare agencies was also strongly endorsed by participants. training was not only seen to benefit staff in working with indigenous children, young people, and families, but also in working in partnerships with accos. others suggested that the format of training should be regular, and could include participation in relationships and partnerships with accos, indigenous communities, and activities. a fourth recommendation was to 13 mendes et al.: indigenous young people transitioning from out-of-home care (oohc) in victoria, australia published by scholarship@western, 2016 increase the resources targeted at indigenous young people (both in-care and post-care). additionally, participants emphasized engaging in family work, both prior to and to support reunification attempts— including supporting connection with extended family members. strengthening the partnerships between accos and mainstream child welfare agencies was also put forward as a potentially helpful strategy for improving outcomes for indigenous care leavers. discussion this study’s initial phase involved exploratory consultations with the staff of mainstream and indigenous child and family welfare agencies in order to understand the relationships between these agencies, the nature of services delivered to indigenous care leavers, as well as the experiences and needs of indigenous young people transitioning from care. the focus groups uncovered a number of findings, some of which were consistent with previous literature, and others that enhance previous understandings in this area. in terms of systemic issues, the findings point to a degree of inconsistency in the working relationships between mainstream and indigenous services delivering services to indigenous care leavers in victoria. the rapport between individuals and agencies appeared strong in some cases, but other consultations revealed limited connection between services in terms of trust, understanding of roles and services provided by other agencies, and collaborative practice. effective relationships between indigenous and non-indigenous child welfare agencies form a critical component of the overall system’s aim to support indigenous young people in care, as identified in previous victorian literature (bamblett & lewis, 2007; halcrow, 2014). this is equally true of current victorian leaving care policy pertaining to indigenous care leavers (e.g., the aboriginal leaving care support initiative), which largely relies on collaborative relationships between these services for the delivery of culturally-appropriate support to this group of young people. there is therefore a primary need for ongoing attention to the relationship between services. similar to prior reports, the respondents suggested that attention to these relationships at the strategic level, as well as cultural training for staff of mainstream agencies, and improved resourcing of accos were helpful approaches to enhance the agencies’ capacity to work collaboratively with indigenous care leavers (bamblett & lewis, 2007; halcrow, 2014; victorian aboriginal community controlled organisations and community service organisations [vaccocso], 2013). it is interesting to note that some respondents from mainstream agencies did not perceive any differences in the service delivery approach to, or the experiences and needs of, indigenous and nonindigenous care leavers. these respondents generally expressed the view that the most profound difficulties inherent in leaving care and post-care systems (for example, limited services and housing options, and the voluntary nature of services) applied equally to all care leavers regardless of their cultural backgrounds. furthermore, considerations of cultural identity and connectedness were not seen as a priority in transitioning from care, whereas other issues (particularly access to affordable housing) appeared to dominate respondents’ concerns. it is unclear whether such findings are reflective of few differences between these groups, however, or whether such impressions are the result of staff having had limited experience with indigenous care leavers. in contrast, other respondents saw the broader oohc system as being inherently inappropriate to aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples, primarily owing to its operation from a largely western 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.2 individualistic paradigm. such observations reflect findings of previous australian and international reports that draw attention to this cultural dissonance (see for example bennett, 2015; halcrow, 2014; higgins et al., 2005). notably, carrière and richardson (2009) described cultural connectedness and identity as more appropriate than attachment theory for guiding practices with indigenous young people in care. attachment theory describes the instinctive need of infants to form intimate emotional bonds, or attachments, with a primary caregiver (or attachment figure) as a function of psychological and biological survival (bowlby, 1988). child and family welfare practice primarily guided by attachment theory is at risk, for instance, of prioritising a child's connection to a foster parent over enhancing connections to their indigenous community, if the two needs were to come into conflict. respondents’ insights enhanced this finding by providing examples of how conflicts between indigenous people’s understandings and the non-indigenous leaving care systems approaches manifest in the leaving care and post-care periods. for example, current systems tend to consider housing and income as belonging to an individual, while some indigenous cultural understandings may view these as shared family resources. in the area of leaving care and post-care support, respondents from mainstream services again suggested that the main shortcoming of current systems supporting indigenous care leavers was the underresourcing of accos, which limits their capacity to offer direct service delivery and secondary consultation (for example, involvement of accos in care team meetings). echoing previous suggestions from australian indigenous peak bodies (secretariat of national aboriginal and islander child care [snaicc], 2011), earlier leaving care planning commencing at age 14 was also identified by participants as potentially useful, particularly given anecdotal reports of indigenous young people leaving care at a young age. the potential utility of family work for indigenous young people transitioning from care has also been raised in previous studies (higgins et al., 2005). these two points are further highlighted by another of the study’s key findings: whereas previous leaving care research has emphasized that many care leavers can call on little, if any, support from family, and some care leavers will have children of their own, this study has raised anecdotal information that indigenous care leavers adopt caring and helping roles within their extended families. indigenous care leavers’ cultural obligations or expectations regarding sharing and pooling finances and other material resources, caring or providing for siblings and elders, and travelling to visit community and family (including attendance at funerals) were all discussed in the focus group consultations. yet the systems aiming to support care leavers are broadly targeted towards supporting individuals, rather than seeing care leavers within their broader family contexts. finally, the findings relating to the involvement of indigenous care leavers in the youth justice system are supported by previous research, which indicates that indigenous young people involved with youth justice are more likely to have had child protection involvement or a state care background than nonindigenous young people involved in youth justice (aihw, 2012). some of the recommendations of a previous victorian study focusing on care leavers dually involved with youth justice and child protection are also applicable to the current study, such as focusing on trauma-informed and family-based therapeutic approaches to practice (mendes, baidawi, & snow, 2014). while participants were unanimous in their declaration of the need for, and value of, cultural support and connectedness, a subtle though noteworthy divergence in belief systems emerged among participants. the majority of participants from non-indigenous organisations appeared to espouse the 15 mendes et al.: indigenous young people transitioning from out-of-home care (oohc) in victoria, australia published by scholarship@western, 2016 view that cultural connectedness and support is one of many hierarchical needs of indigenous care leavers, but not necessarily the primary need. conversely, the alternative position that many acco workers, and some non-indigenous staff from mainstream agencies, described is that cultural connectedness is a primary and fundamental need of indigenous care leavers, through which their other needs may be fulfilled. native american child welfare expert terry cross (2007) elegantly discussed this discord, reinterpreting abraham maslow’s hierarchy of needs (1943) through an indigenous lens. interestingly, maslow’s work was apparently informed by time spent with the blackfoot indians of canada (blackstock, 2011), though these understandings were interpreted through his own male, eurocentric perspective (cross, 2007). in contrast to maslow’s hierarchical structure, beginning with physiological needs, cross (2007) described a more holistic approach that considers physical, physiological, and other needs to be met through spirituality and relationship rather than independently of these. he stated: when i grew up i was taught that if i maintained a proper relationship with the creator, i would eat. so that came first. i was also taught that if i maintained a proper relationship with my family i would eat. so that came first as well. then come food and water, shelter, all of those things that emanate out of my proper relationships. safety and security come out of my proper relationships, out of my spirituality. self-actualisation comes from role and service, giving back to the community, and that’s where my esteem and my identity come from; from my relationships, from my service. (p. 43) this difference is perhaps a point of distinction between indigenous and many non-indigenous conceptions of leaving care and post-care support. yet, the perspectives of the study’s key stakeholders seemed to suggest that both approaches are helpful to supporting indigenous care leavers, and need not be conceptualised as incompatible. implications the findings of this initial phase of the study suggest a need for ongoing reconciliation and relationshipbuilding between indigenous and non-indigenous child and family welfare services and systems so they might more fully recognize and embrace their different ways of thinking (fejo-king, 2015). more importantly, the findings raise questions about if and how leaving care and post-care services and programs could be modified to better suit indigenous care leavers’ needs, particularly in terms of being able to better promote care leavers’ connectedness and belonging to their communities and cultures. these findings appear to suggest that many indigenous care leavers may receive the same leaving care services as non-indigenous young people, thereby leading to an inadequate level of attention to the development of cultural identity and connection. it seems that more effective responses are likely to be achieved by better resourced accos leading service design and delivery for indigenous care leavers. the enhanced allocation of resources and stronger emphasis upon connection to culture, family, and community are likely components of a more effective, supportive approach to indigenous care leavers. future research could examine the longitudinal trajectories of a large group of indigenous care leavers from 16 to 21 years of age. it would be beneficial for such a study to examine the experiences of young indigenous people who have experienced a range of out-of-home care backgrounds (for example, foster, kinship, and residential care) and various post-care outcomes. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.2 our future consultations with individual care leavers will enable our better understanding of the nature of their connections to culture and community during their time in care and post-care, and the factors that facilitate and influence these connections. furthermore, such consultations facilitate a more detailed awareness of post-care outcomes for indigenous care leavers, particularly any caring and helping roles undertaken, and how these might impact their transitions out of care. limitations the study has some methodological limitations. the respondents were drawn from a non-representative sample, and were primarily from non-indigenous child and family welfare services. unfortunately, there was limited representation of accos in the data collection. the findings must therefore been seen to mostly represent the views of non-indigenous practitioners and stakeholders. further, jurisdictional differences in policy and practice, and cultural differences among aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples, mean that findings cannot be generalized to other states and territories, though they could present a useful basis for comparative studies. it will be beneficial for further research to include indigenous care leavers’ perspectives, including some comparison of the outcomes for those young people who receive culturally appropriate support to those who do not. 17 mendes et al.: indigenous young people transitioning from out-of-home care (oohc) in victoria, australia published by scholarship@western, 2016 references alston, m., & bowles, w. 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(2011). addressing racial disproportionality in child welfare. washington, dc: child welfare information gateway. retrieved from https://www.childwelfare.gov/pubpdfs/racial_disproportionality.pdf 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.2 victorian aboriginal community controlled organisations and community service organisations (vaccocso). (2013). koorie kids: growing strong in their culture: five year plan for aboriginal children in out of home care. melbourne, au: vaccocso. retrieved from http://www.ccyp.vic.gov.au/downloads/submissions/submission-koorie-kids-growing-strongin-their-culture-nov13.pdf 21 mendes et al.: indigenous young people transitioning from out-of-home care (oohc) in victoria, australia published by scholarship@western, 2016 the international indigenous policy journal july 2016 indigenous young people transitioning from out-of-home care (oohc) in victoria, australia: the perspectives of workers in indigenous-specific and non-indigenous non-government services philip mendes bernadette saunders susan baidawi recommended citation indigenous young people transitioning from out-of-home care (oohc) in victoria, australia: the perspectives of workers in indigenous-specific and non-indigenous non-government services abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license indigenous young people transitioning from out-of-home care (oohc) in victoria, australia: the perspectives of workers in indigenous-specific and non-indigenous non-government services microsoft word coverpage 9341.docx the international indigenous policy journal volume 12 | issue 1 march 2021 book review: global indigenous health: reconciling the past, engaging the present, animating the future chris battiston women’s college hospital, canada, chris.battiston@wchospital.ca recommended citation battiston, c. (2021). book review: global indigenous health: reconciling the past, engaging the present, animating the future. the international indigenous policy journal, 12(1). https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2021.12.1.9341 book review: global indigenous health: reconciling the past, engaging the present, animating the future abstract literature about indigenous health has dramatically increased over the past few years, which has made it difficult to stay current—this is a good thing. this uptick indicates that this work is getting attention it deserves. however, every so often a collection comes along that provides an essential overview of the work being done, and global indigenous health: reconciling the past, engaging the present, animating the future is one such book. it examines the impacts and effects of health determinants on indigenous peoples from across the globe, including micronesia, alaska, and canada. keywords data collection, determinants of health, indigenous peoples, colonialism, health, health policy, indigenous health, decolonization creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. 1 battiston: book review: global indigenous health published by scholarship@western book review: global indigenous health: reconciling the past, engaging the present, animating the future henry, r., lavallee, a., van styvendale, n., & innes, r. a. (eds). (2018). global indigenous health: reconciling the past, engaging the present, animating the future. university of arizona press. 352 pp. usd$40 (paperback or ebook). isbn: 9780816540204. https://uapress.arizona.edu/ book/global-indigenous-health literature about indigenous health has dramatically increased over the past few years, which has made it difficult to stay current—this is a good thing. this uptick indicates that this work is getting attention it deserves. however, every so often a collection comes along that provides an essential overview of the work being done, and global indigenous health is one such book. it brings together authors from around the world and covers a variety of topics ranging from residential schools to the bcg immunization experiments. the editors have done a thorough job in encompassing diverse and varying perspectives. the authors come from a variety of disciplines and backgrounds, including māori (simon lambert), abenaki and french canadian (judy dow), and caribbean indian and scottish (david macdonald). they are all members of the native american and indigenous studies association (naisa). in addition, the book draws upon a range of academic and lived-experience perspectives, which add to the breadth and allows for a more impactful reading. the book covers and aims to highlight issues from indigenous peoples from the settler nations of canada, the us, micronesia, and others. a key theme of this book is the vast and significant health disparities faced by indigenous peoples across the globe—from métis in canada to sámi of northern europe. the book also explores the resiliency and adaptability of indigenous peoples. although each chapter focusses on a specific population or group of people, the themes of racism, inequity, and governmental roadblocks are counterbalanced by the stories of reconciliation, accountability, and working together with governments. this book directly addresses many challenging subjects, such as overall lower average levels of education (largely due to significant systemic barriers) to mercury-tainted drinking water and scientific experimentation without consent. the authors provide detailed accounts of the travesties these groups have faced historically, continue to face today, and the ways in which these factors will impact their health and well-being into the future. when the author is from the community that they are writing about (for example, judy dow and paul depasquale), the chapter ties the issue back to their own traditional healing methods and practices. the book focusses on four key themes using a social determinants of health approach: ethics and history; environmental and ecological health; impacts of colonial violence and indigenous kinship; and indigenous knowledge and health activism. always keeping colonization and the ongoing and lasting effects of settler colonialism as focal points, the editors overall and the authors in each chapter spotlight the legacy of trauma. the fact that indigenous people around the world still face these issues is evidence of ongoing governmental and societal genocide. despite this seemingly overwhelming negativity, the editors have illustrated throughout the book how indigenous communities and advocates are working to bring health equity to indigenous people. because of the work done by these authors and many like-minded others, there are significant changes being made to policies and perspectives—and that is a definite positive. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 1 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2021.12.1.9341 in the introduction, the point is raised that, even though the un has clearly called for countries to recognize and acknowledge indigenous communities and their rights, many are not officially recognized or are lumped under umbrella terms and categories, “which affects how data and information, specifically related to health and well-being, is collected and collated” (p. 8). the editors refer to the example of the métis in canada, where research is “almost nonexistent because provincial health data about the métis are not collated as such” (p. 8) because the group is often merged under the term indigenous peoples (which is officially comprised of first nations, inuit, and métis). this is an example of epistemological violence and epistemic colonization (for detailed discussion see shepherd, 2018; teo, 2008, 2010). epistemological violence can be defined as the “othering” of someone as a result of how questions are asked or how data are collected and, by doing this, the person’s identity is effectively “washed out.” epistemic colonization is a similar phenomenon, but at a higher level: it is the effective erasure of cultural or other forms of knowledge. canada has over 600 recognised first nations, comprising over 1.6 million people (indigenous and northern affairs, n.d.; statistics canada, n.d.) across all parts of the country. although colonization and the ensuing racism have some common effects on indigenous communities, there are going to be some key and critical differences. for example, despite the fact that both are in ontario, the community of mississaugas of the credit first nation, which is located near a major urban center, will have different concerns than attawapiskat, which is one of the most northern communities. there will also be key differences between people living on reserve versus those living in an urban setting; however, colonization is still the root cause, and the differences and commonalities need definition in order to develop a deeper understanding, beyond just a superficial or academic one, of the impacts that colonization and systemic racism have had on the two groups. someone living in the innu community in nain, newfoundland, will have very different needs and requirements than someone living in downtown toronto, ontario, and this understanding is an important part of decolonization. part i—ethics and history the first chapter in this section, david macdonald’s “indigenous health in the aftermath of genocide,” details the history of the residential school system in canada. almost 150,000 children were taken from their homes from the 1880s right up until the last institution closed in 1996, violating and devastating countless families and the collective consciousness of many communities. the system caused lasting and long-term trauma for survivors and their families (see also allan & smylie, 2015). the impacts on families includes higher rates stress-induced abuse; suicide and attempted suicide; and psychological issues, including anxiety, distress, and post-traumatic stress disorder (see also bombay et al., 2014). tying back to a social determinants of health perspective, there are cascade effects within these communities and people who have faced significant trauma often carry these impacts forward. without proper social supports to bolster community healing, reconciliation and decolonization will not happen in an effective manner. healing, decolonization, and reconciliation are linked because they cannot occur in isolation—they are interconnected, and settlers must participate in work on all three simultaneously. settlers must learn about indigenous communities and how ongoing racism is continues to affect indigenous people today. seth adema’s chapter, “helping his brothers and sisters heal,” focuses on the life and work of art solomon, an anishinaabe man, of whom most settlers would not have heard, but who needs to be 3 battiston: book review: global indigenous health published by scholarship@western recognised. he dedicated his life to improving the lives of indigenous people in canada, working tirelessly to decolonize and expose the impact of settlers on indigenous people in the canadian prison system. his focus on indigenous people in the prison system is important because it laid the groundwork for indigenous-specific supports to be available in prisons. in an interview, ryan beardy, a cree/saulteaux man from lake st. martin first nation who was sent to a youth detention center when he was 13, said, “when i took a good hard look at my values and belief systems and realized how wrong and off i was . . . the culture really helped me” (cited in monkman, 2018, para. 12). indigenous youth make up 46% of incarcerated young people in canada, while making up only 8% of the youth population, so providing them with supports and mechanisms for connecting back to their community is essential (monkman, 2018). eleanor louise hadden’s chapter, “bcg tuberculosis vaccine experiment on southeast alaska natives,” hit particularly close to home for me as i received the bcg vaccine (although a different type than what was tested) when my family was living in the middle east in the late 1970s. the history of the vaccine parallels other stories in medical research that are more commonly known (for example, henrietta lacks,1 and the medical experiments by the nazis). the granddaughter of the study’s original author was doing a 56-year follow-up and, like others in the medical community, assumed that the people in the community had consented to participate in the experiment, but they had not. i cannot imagine the psychological dissonance that she must have felt when she realised what had actually transpired and how it contributed to feelings of abandonment and resentment within the community. the regularity with which settlers assume that indigenous people are there for whatever settlers have deemed necessary is a theme this book regularly revisits—arrogance, racism, and blatant disregard for any ethics create a clear pattern within colonialism. eugenics, the “scientific” attempt to show racial and ethnic superiority, has been used to justify a wide range of racist and colonial laws from south africa to canada. judy dow writes about the vermont eugenics study (ves) in her chapter, “understanding the vermont eugenics study and its impact today.” the ves was instituted in 1925 by a zoology professor who hired social workers to collect data on families living on the outskirts of burlington, vermont, whose lifestyle and culture he found “repugnant” and that he believed was hereditary. the study disrupted the lives of thousands of french, catholic, and indigenous people living in the area and, as dow finds through her research, her family was directly impacted. it is critical to note that the ves, although started in 1925, continues to be used as a justification for a wide range of political and other colonizer-favoured goals. part ii—environmental and ecological health the first chapter in part ii is the first that does not focus on north america. simon lambert’s “introduced biotechnologies, traditional lands, and indigenous well-being” looks at the māori experience resisting expanding neocolonization, in which the new zealand bioeconomy is absorbing and taking over māori land and produce. using the potato as an example crop, lambert touches on how the introduction of the tuber in the late 1700s brought with it effects of colonization: certain crops were 1 henrietta lacks was an african american woman who was diagnosed with cervical cancer in the late 1940s. during the diagnostic process, doctors found that her cells had a unique ability to live for extremely long periods. without her knowledge or consent, these cells then became an integral part of medical research. this research continues to this day (“henrietta lacks: science must right,” 2020). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 1 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2021.12.1.9341 grown specifically to trade with the europeans, rather than be eaten by the māori. the potato then became a staple of the maori economy, and they have now taken the production of the tuber to new levels. in this way, the maori took something that was brought by the settlers and absorbed it into their culture—culminating in the incorporation of tāhuri whenua, or the national maori vegetable growers collective, in 2004. lambert refers to the “humble spud” as an “innovation matrix that incorporates policy and technological and institutional innovations to enable the delivery of unique goods and services to a market economy” (p. 114). the second chapter in this section, “usda foods, indigenous health, and self-sufficiency on pohnpei, micronesia” by josh levy, highlights the legacy of colonialism in the oceanic region and the recent increases in non-communicable diseases such as diabetes, heart disease, and chronic kidney disease. micronesia is, at the time of the chapter’s writing, an independent country in “free association” with the united states (meaning the us provides annual funding, access to certain federal programs, and free immigration in exchange for land that they use for military purposes and to ensure there is no foreign military within the borders). the population was approximately 102,000, and pohnpei, being the second most populated state, had 36,000 residents on 130 square miles of land; there is a high main island and seven populated outer islands. overall, 32.1% of the adult population had diabetes, and 73.1% of the adult population was either overweight or obese. pohnpei declared independence from the free association with the us in 1983, and the formulation of food sovereignty (through the work of johnny hadley and others) represents a model of indigenous-centered community activism. this chapter exemplifies the effect of indigenous-centered activism—pohnpei is an example of what happens when the system is allowed to reset itself, allowing for the indigenous population to be free of colonization. no longer reliant on the us, the people’s health improved, which in turn affected all other aspects of their lives. paul depasquale’s chapter, “manitoba hydro’s promotional materials as colonialist discourse,” highlights how manitoba hydro, a crown corporation that has actively worked against the best interests of indigenous people, uses images of them as tools in a marketing campaign. depasquale provides examples of advertisements (e.g., billboards, bus shelter advertisements) featuring indigenous people and symbols (the eagle in particular) to make the campaign appear to have “approval” from indigenous communities. the last line of the chapter highlights that “. . . thinking critically about the stories these images tell to and about indigenous peoples is particularly important in the context of manitoba hydro’s capital expenditure plans to spend $33 billion on hydroelectric generating stations and transmission lines over the next two decades” (p. 145). colonialism at its finest— appearing friendly and supportive on the one hand, while moving forward with the project on the other. indigenous people in manitoba must deal with provincially instituted racism, which increases stress and its chronic effects. part iii—impacts of colonial violence and indigenous kinship the language is lovely. the language in child welfare is that the duty of care of a child welfare authority is to act in the capacity of a wise and compassionate parent. a wise and compassionate parent doesn’t do all the things that happens to these kids. (p. 151) this chapter, “child welfare: a social determinant of health for canadian first nations and métis children,” written by caroline tait, robert henry, and rachel loewen walker, uses the example of 5 battiston: book review: global indigenous health published by scholarship@western saskatchewan’s child welfare services as a model for agencies in canada. the above quote, from joan glode, former executive director of mi’kmaw family and children’s services, highlights that the welfare authorities who are supposed to be acting as surrogate parents instead allow for the continuation of systemic and systematic racism. emphasising that colonization is a social determinant of health, the authors show that “indigenous status” should not be used as a determinant of health; rather, government and researchers should focus on “. . . the impact of those government policies enacted on indigenous peoples [emphasis in original] that perpetuates health and social disparities” (p. 153). child welfare services (theoretically) use a “threshold” model to apprehend children who have been abused and/or neglected. however, in practice, child welfare systems focus on first nations and métis groups, about whom they have preconceived misconceptions that assume they are less able to parent their children. the “benevolent culture of care” (p. 157) assumes that children taken by the state and put into foster care are put into environments that allow them to flourish. the respective life history research performed by tait et al., however, showed that the effects of abuse and neglect carry forward for at least two generations, increasing the likelihood that they will become adults with various social and health issues. “oh, i think i will be a prostitute, break the law and go to prison!” (p. 174). this is how the chapter, “they stole my thunder,” by sharon leslie acoose and john charlton, starts off. the colonial perspective seems to be that indigenous women somehow want and plan to become prisoners, whereas white women have “poor circumstances” and are “victims of their environment” (see also gilchrist, 2010; jiwani & young, 2006). as a woman who has been imprisoned, acoose is able to provide an account that is both very personal and evidence-based. she describes her journey from the stigmatized “criminal indian woman” (p. 189), to finding other women from which to gain strength and support, to finally being able to say to themselves and to the world: this is who i am; i have re-found my thunder. this chapter brings attention to the needs indigenous women in the penal system have, which can be addressed by supporting and collaborating with them to ensure their health. given the complex treatment needs that many indigenous women have during their incarceration, these needs are often inadequately addressed by the supports provided to the general population (see adema’s chapter in this volume for a culturally appropriate treatment program). margaretha uttjek’s chapter, “preventative efforts to address violence against sámi women and children,” looks at how the indigenous people in northern europe (including sweden, norway, finland, and russia) are impacted by and deal with violence toward their women and children. covering areas such as cultural and religious violence, uttjek’s research highlights that, even in a situation where indigenous people are superficially similar to the colonizing race (in this case, generally having white skin and blonde hair), they face clear and deep effects of colonialism and oppression. uttjek’s research touches on psychospiritual violence, in which the indigenous person’s holistic identity is violated—this is something that other indigenous groups face; yet, it was the first time i have seen it described in this way. the chapter provides seven systemic and governmental recommendations for dealing with the ongoing issue of violence against the sámi, including a hotline, employing sámi with social work education as experts (with associated pay increases), educating healthcare providers about the sámi, and ensuring representation from sámi scholars on research ethics and review boards. “uschiniichisuu futures,” ioana radu’s contribution to the book, focusses on research conducted in the cree nation of chisasibi, exploring the concept of healing as a way for the youth of the community to 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 1 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2021.12.1.9341 navigate identity. radu highlights how current research on cree youth focuses on, and amplifies, the racist colonial perspective of dysfunction, such as alcohol and drug abuse, dropping out of school, interpersonal violence, etc., but in fact research looking at strengths and resiliency also needs to be supported. highlighting examples that are counterpoint to the colonial perspective of cree youth, radu shows that the majority are actually contributing members of their society, and how activities that are both youth and culturally focussed (e.g., ceremonial participation, rap battles, and spending time in the bush) can contribute to the healing within the community. part iv—indigenous knowledge and health activism the first chapter of the last section touches on the theme of systemic racism as it relates to health policy, which was covered in a previous chapter in this volume, but this final section takes another approach. alicia powell and chelsea gabel’s chapter, “addressing inequalities,” discusses disparities between settlers and indigenous people within health policy by digging into service-level issues, from hospitalbased discrimination to inadequately supplied medical clinics on reserves and in northern communities. the authors provide numerous examples of these incongruencies, but the one that sticks out for me is the case of brian sinclair, an indigenous man who died in the waiting room at winnipeg health sciences center. he died as a result of a bladder infection, without receiving any treatment, because hospital staff thought he was intoxicated and not sick. this is an example of the implicit racism and severe biases in clinical reasoning that indigenous people face on a regular basis and that healthcare systems need to address. the chapter touches on urban indigenous health and how it differs from that on reserve in terms of healthcare providers’ perceptions (ill versus intoxicated), inclusion of traditional and culturally safe options, and the likelihood of experiencing discrimination. “wic̨ozani wašte (good life)” is mark ruml’s fascinating analysis of “indigenous religious traditions” (p. 257). he uses his personal experience of being mentored by arthur amiotte, a lakota man, and how this mentorship completely re-directed his path in life. out of respect to the teachings in this chapter, i will not go into specifics, but there were things that i learned in this chapter that changed my perspective on life in a profound way. the chapter reinforces why the conversation around decolonization of healthcare needs to include all aspects of indigenous culture, including spiritual traditions. for example, when writing hospital policy, understanding the importance of indigenous traditions would require consideration about how tobacco could be burned if requested by an indigenous person. this approach is important because psychospiritual (to use uttjek’s term) well-being is part of being healthy and providing supportive health care. the second last chapter, lisa tatonetti’s “carole lafavor’s indigenous feminism and early hiv/aids activism,” brings attention to the life and work of carole lafavor, an anishnaabe hiv/aids activist, novelist, and nurse. when the us government sent out a mass mailing entitled “understanding aids” to every residence in the us, it contained lafavor’s words. she was not only a key voice in queer indigenous literature, but also in the rise of indigenous-centered hiv/aids education and activism. lafavor’s work in healthcare ranged from sending medical supplies to wounded knee to speaking out about the issue of missing and murdered indigenous women. she spoke often about the ways in which settler colonialism infiltrates all aspects of indigenous women’s lives, and she explored this theme into her fiction: her characters often faced violence that was overlooked and ignored by authorities. through the chapter, lafavor’s “fight for indigenous health sovereignty” (p. 24), particularly in the context of 7 battiston: book review: global indigenous health published by scholarship@western hiv/aids in indigenous communities, is an example of the tireless, constant fighting that has to be done to make sure indigenous people’s needs are taken care of. this is a fight that in an ideal world people would be unnecessary because people would be treated equitably within health systems and the broader society. in 2011, lafavor passed away; yet her fight for indigenous health autonomy continues to this day. the final chapter in the book, “traveling the möbius strip” by barbara fornssler et al., is possibly the most important chapter in the collection as it is a reflection on the “thoughts, concerns, responses and visioning of indigenous and non-indigenous members of a research team” (p. 295) working on a decolonization project. a key concept in the chapter is two-eyed seeing, which the authors describe as the weaving together of local indigenous knowledge with western scientific knowledge, while keeping the integrity of the indigenous methodologies and knowledge intact. the authors touch on how nonindigenous people can ally themselves with indigenous communities in the short term, as well as strategies for supporting the development of non-indigenous research accomplices over the long term. these strategies include encouraging honesty, maintaining separateness, and extend gifts. this chapter is one i will refer to often and repeatedly, looking for its wisdom and teachings. conclusion as a privileged settler working as a database administrator for a hospital-based research institute in toronto, canada, this book’s themes opened my eyes to the need to be more aware of data collection methods, including more inclusive demographic questions, cultural and racial sensitivity, and how to be a better ally overall. this is the type of book that i simultaneously want to rush through to pick up the key pieces without being impacted by the constant barrage of trauma and racism, and to read slowly, methodically, and carefully in order to ruminate on and honour those that have lived these experiences. intersectionality looks at various demographic features of a person and allows for the full understanding of that person, both as an individual and within the community or population being studied (crenshaw, 1989; hankivsky et al., 2014). having this framework as a component to this book would have elucidated and disentangled some of the issues and provided an interesting perspective by examining different impacts on women as compared to the men, for example. the inclusion of a chapter on food deserts, perhaps using the canadian far north as an example of a place where food prices are significantly higher than the rest of the country (e.g., $45 for half a watermelon) and yet many people do not have the economic resources to offset these costs, would be valuable. both intersectionality and food deserts play a part in determining a person’s health status but are discussed less often in healthcare literature. i believe an intersectionality-based framework should be implemented as a standard practice to ensure information like this is not only collected but appropriately analysed and reported. intersectionality is not a solution—it is a tool for looking at an issue, so it requires active engagement on the part of the author or researcher. i believe it is for this reason that intersectionality is overlooked or ignored for most issues, which is unfortunate as it would provide a clearer picture of what is happening. although the title of this book is global indigenous health, covering places such as canada, the us, micronesia, new zealand, and northern europe, to be truly “global” chapters on african, central and south american, and middle eastern decolonization and indigenous health are needed. having said 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 12, iss. 1 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2021.12.1.9341 that, this book has successfully contributed to the literature advocating for fundamental change, and i hope that healthcare researchers, practitioners, and administrators will add this book to their repertoire. overall, i found this book to be an important read that has expanded my understanding of the ongoing effects of colonization. this book should provide a starting point for anyone working in healthcare to grasp why colonialism, racism, and the settler mindset need to be discussed, understood, and dismantled in order to achieve health equity. references allan, b., & smylie, j. (2015). first peoples, second class treatment: the role of racism in the health and well-being of indigenous peoples in canada. the wellesley institute. http://www.wellesleyinstitute.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/summary-first-peoplessecond-class-treatment-final.pdf bombay, a., matheson, k., & anisman, h. (2014). the intergenerational effects of indian residential schools: implications for the concept of historical trauma. transcultural psychiatry, 51(3), 320338. https://doi.org/10.1177/1363461513503380 crenshaw, k. (1989). demarginalizing the intersection of race and sex: a black feminist critique of antidiscrimination doctrine, feminist theory and antiracist politics. university of chicago legal forum, 1989(1). http://chicagounbound.uchicago.edu/uclf/vol1989/iss1/8 gilchrist, k. (2010). “newsworthy” victims? exploring differences in canadian local press coverage of missing/murdered aboriginal and white women. feminist media studies, 10(4), 373-390. https://doi.org/10.1080/14680777.2010.514110 hankivsky, o., grace, d., hunting, g., giesbrecht, m., fridkin, a., & rudrum, s. (2014). an intersectionality-based policy analysis framework: critical reflections on a methodology for advancing equity. international journal for equity in health, 13(1), 119. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12939-014-0119-x henrietta lacks: science must right a historical wrong [editorial]. (2020, september 1). nature, 585(7). https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-020-02494-z indigenous and northern affairs canada. (n.d.). welcome to first nation profiles. https://fnpppn.aadnc-aandc.gc.ca/fnp/main/index.aspx?lang=eng jiwani, y., & young, m. (2006). missing and murdered women: reproducing marginality in news discourse. canadian journal of communication, 31, 895–917. https://doi.org/10.22230/ cjc.2006v31n4a1825 9 battiston: book review: global indigenous health published by scholarship@western monkman, l. (2018). indigenous incarceration rates: why are canada’s numbers so high and what can be done about it? cbc news. https://www.cbc.ca/news/indigenous/indigenous-incarcerationjustice-system-panel-1.4729192 shepherd, n. (2018). epistemic decolonization. in c. andersen, b. t. knudsen & c. kølvraa (eds.), keywords: anthology exploring the keywords of colonial heritage. http://keywordsechoes. com/ statistics canada. (n.d.). statistics on indigenous peoples. https://www.statcan.gc.ca/eng/subjectsstart/indigenous_peoples teo, t. (2008). from speculation to epistemological violence in psychology: a critical-hermeneutic reconstruction. theory & psychology, 18(1), 47-67. https://doi.org/10.1177/ 0959354307086922 teo, t. (2010). what is epistemological violence in the empirical social sciences? social and personality psychology compass, 4(5), 295–303. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1751-9004.2010.00265.x coverpage 9341.pdf ms9341 battiston book review rce.pdf problems of defining and validating traditional knowledge: a historical approach the international indigenous policy journal volume 6 issue 2 the future of traditional knowledge research: building partnership and capacity article 2 may 2015 problems of defining and validating traditional knowledge: a historical approach kenichi matsui university of tsukuba, kenichim@envr.tsukuba.ac.jp recommended citation matsui, k. (2015). problems of defining and validating traditional knowledge: a historical approach. the international indigenous policy journal, 6(2). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.2 problems of defining and validating traditional knowledge: a historical approach abstract the united nations’ agencies and many scholars have regarded traditional knowledge as an alternative to science for the purposes of managing the environment. many countries have adopted this line of approach and formulated some policy strategies. a number of scholars also have engaged in traditional knowledge research and published their works. despite a large number of publications on traditional knowledge, there seems to be little consensus about the definition of what traditional knowledge is and how it can be useful for environmental management. this article first approaches this definition problem within a historical context in order to clarify the core issues surrounding the definition of traditional knowledge. it then discusses how traditional knowledge can be validated among parties with different interests so that traditional knowledge research and policy can be more effectively implemented in policy-making arenas. keywords traditional knowledge definition, knowledge validation acknowledgments this article is based on the colloquium presentation at the rachel carson center of ludwig-maximilian university in munich. the author would like to acknowledge the generous fellowship the center provided to conduct this research from april to july in 2013. the author also would like to thank dr. arthur j. ray and dr. christopher pastore who generously gave their valuable comments on this article. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ p r o b l e m s o f d e f i n i n g a n d v a l i d a t i n g t r a d i t i o n a l k n o w l e d g e : a h i s t o r i c a l a p p r o a c h in the 1980s, topics germane to traditional knowledge captured growing interest among those concerned about environmental problems and agricultural sustainability (warren, 1989). the reason was partly that scientific and technological advances did not appear to have ameliorated environmental problems (agrawal, 1995; brook & mclachlan, 2008). given the so-called “wicked” or complex nature of environmental issues (balint, stewart, desai, & walters, 2011), critics emphasized the limited capacity of governments and scientific experts operating within narrow disciplinary confines to fix them (jamieson, 2003; ludwig, 2001). the solution, some believed, might be found by adopting ecosystem approaches and the policies of devolution and local government or community empowerment (karkkainen, 2004; warren & issachar, 1983). some looked to traditional or “old” knowledge that had been sustained for generations in local ecological conditions as yet another alternative to science. united nations’ agencies (e.g., united nations environment programme [unep], united nations development programme [undp], united nations university-institute for the advanced study of sustainability [unu-ias]) have spearheaded this line of alternative argument in proposing their ideas for sustainable development. when the united nations’ world commission on environment and development met in the 1980s to discuss the future outlook of sustainable development, it was briefly noted that indigenous peoples and tribal people “can offer modern societies many lessons in the management of resources in complex forest, mountain, and dry land ecosystems” (world commission on environment and development [wced], 1987, p. 12). acknowledging that traditional peoples had experienced political and economic marginalization, it was also stated that “their traditional rights should be recognized and they should be given a decisive voice in formulating policies about resource development in their areas” (wced, 1987, p. 12). these points were reiterated in agenda 21 and the convention on biological diversity in the early 1990s. chapter 26 of agenda 21 called for the “involvement of indigenous people and their communities at the national and local levels in resource management and conservation strategies … to support and review sustainable development strategies” (united nations conference on environment and development, 1992, 26.3.c). article 8(j) of the convention on biological diversity promoted the wider application of knowledge, innovations, and practices of indigenous peoples and local communities to conserve and sustain biological diversity under the proper mechanism of protection from exploitation. in implementing this policy, the signatories of the convention vows to “respect, preserve and maintain” traditional knowledge, innovations, and 1 matsui: defining and validating tk published by scholarship@western, 2015 practices. they would also equitably share the benefits arising from the use of traditional knowledge, innovations, and practices (convention on biological diversity, 1992). this decade also turned out to be particularly fruitful in producing case studies on traditional knowledge in academic journals and popular publications (agrawal, 1995; ellen, parkes & bicker, 2000; posey, 1999; sillitoe, 2000). however, some scholars have become increasingly suspicious about the usefulness of traditional knowledge in dealing with environmental problems (bohensky & maru, 2011; usher, 2000). after decades of discussion and debate over the usefulness of traditional knowledge, scholars could not reach consensus on its definition. furthermore, few works have given careful consideration to the ways scholars, and indigenous peoples and local communities have validated traditional knowledge. as i will discuss, many scholars and indigenous representatives have contributed to this discussion to some extent, but the world intellectual property organization (wipo), which has devoted much of its activities to dealing with these problems, still acknowledges in its homepage that “there is not yet an accepted definition of tk [traditional knowledge] at the international level” (wipo, 2015, para. 2). the purpose of this article, therefore, is to examine some core problems of defining and validating traditional knowledge. this task is important for both scholars, and indigenous peoples and local communities to begin negotiations for collaborations and partnerships. it is also relevant to environmental policies and indigenous policies in general as the vague understanding of these definition and validation problems has led policymakers and scholars to heavily rely on the personal assumption of what the definition of traditional knowledge is supposed to be and how traditional knowledge should be validated. wipo and other organizations do provide their working definition of traditional knowledge, but, after examining a large number of scholarly articles on traditional knowledge, i still find it important that we examine these definition and validation problems in this special issue, “the future of traditional knowledge.” as this issue strives to establish partnerships between indigenous peoples and local knowledge holders, and scholars and policymakers, it is essential that all stakeholders can recognize some pitfalls they may fall into in attempting to obtain mutual understanding about the validity of traditional knowledge. as the scope of this article is very broad, some scholars have suggested adopting the specialized or compartmentalized definition of traditional knowledge: for example, by focusing only on traditional ecological knowledge or any specific type of knowledge. however, after working with indigenous knowledge holders for more than 25 years, i argue that traditional knowledge cannot be simply compartmentalized by academic disciplinary categories. indigenous and traditional ecological knowledge, for example, can be interrelated with religious and spiritual knowledge as well as rights to 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.2 land, harvesting, and cultural practices at large. we need to grasp traditional knowledge within an interdisciplinary and interconnected context to better understand the problems of defining and validating traditional knowledge. in this sense, i largely agree with the working definition of traditional knowledge by wipo that encompasses not only ecological knowledge but also other types of traditional cultural expressions. currently, it defines traditional knowledge as “knowledge, know-how, skills and practices that are developed, sustained and passed on from generation to generation within a community, often forming part of its cultural or spiritual identity” (wipo, 2015, para. 1). in the process of tracing the history of defining and validating traditional knowledge among scholars and others, this article attempts to examine two open-ended questions: first, what is the definition of traditional knowledge? second, how can one validate traditional knowledge? examining these questions is important to clarify the ethical and legal implications of collecting, using, publishing, or commercializing traditional knowledge. this point is important partly because, as i argue, debates over the usefulness of traditional knowledge have been largely affected by the lack of in-depth understanding about what constitutes “tradition” and “knowledge.” in policy implementations, these questions also have affected traditional knowledge holders who want to maintain control over their own knowledge and protect it from exploitation or misappropriation by researchers and business speculators. finally, my investigation of these questions leads to the recognition of one neglected but salient aspect in previous traditional knowledge discussions: a clearer definition of traditional knowledge can help us better understand the scope of indigenous rights and governance. p r o b l e m s o f d e f i n i t i o n the most contested aspect of the definition of traditional knowledge is related to how scholars and others have perceived “tradition.” many australian anthropologists who are experts on aboriginal cultures have persistently argued that the term traditional knowledge is archaic or obsolete (anderson, 2009). it is not, they claim, relevant to the contemporary knowledge aboriginal people hold. partly because of this concern, they have proposed to abandon the term “traditional knowledge” and instead use “indigenous knowledge.” for example, jane anderson (2009), a legal scholar on aboriginal intellectual property rights, contends, the insistence on the “traditional” as the key marker of difference obscures contemporary indigenous practice and the reality that indigenous knowledge also undergoes transformation overtime in usage and circulation both within family or community contexts and/or between families, the community and external parties. (p. 11) 3 matsui: defining and validating tk published by scholarship@western, 2015 for anderson, the term “traditional” evokes a romanticized notion whereas the term “indigenous” does not. australian scholars are not only the ones to claim that term “tradition” is archaic or obsolete and reifies indigenous knowledge production. for a long time, this understanding has been shared by those—in the fields of literature, politics, philosophy, and other genres—who have argued that scientific knowledge and modernity are antithetical to traditions. two major ideas have evolved here (although these two are not entirely separable).1 similar to the proposals of alexander hamilton, adam ferguson, max weber, and john miller, the first idea celebrated the advancement of industry, scientific knowledge, modernity, and economic efficiency (shils, 1981). as thomas hobbes (1651/1909) expressed in leviathan, this group also identified traditional societies as feudalistic, undemocratic, primitive, or savage. according to clifford davidson, even hostility and impatience for tradition developed among a certain group of intellectuals (davidson, 1992). the other group, represented by j. hector st. john crevecoeur, thomas jefferson, and francis parkman, yearned for yeoman ideals and deplored the negative ramifications of mechanization and urbanization, such as poverty, crimes, and other social problems (matsui, 2009). they romanticized traditional societies like those of native americans as simple, innocent, but ecologically ideal. both approaches were essentially based on the assumption that “traditional” is antithetical to modernity (bendix, 1967). from the late nineteenth century to the early twentieth, cultural and social anthropologists popularized the notion of traditional culture and society as something old, pre-modern, primitive, and static. in general, anthropologists at this time did not use the term “traditional” in describing “primitive” people, but their studies of them have strongly influenced the discussion of contemporary scholars. edward b. tylor’s primitive culture (1871) laid the foundation for later anthropologists to conduct research among “primitive” cultures as a way to understand the early stage of human society. tyler (1871) proposed that the savage state in some measure represents an early condition of mankind, out of which the higher culture has gradually been developed or evolved, by processes still in regular operation as of old, the result showing that, on the whole, progress has far prevailed over relapse. (p. 28) 1 it is important to acknowledge that some critics were ambivalent about both the destruction of tradition and the dominance of modernity. walter benjamin’s writings show this ambivalence (mccole, 1993). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.2 he then explains how mythology, language, and other cultural elements may help anthropologists better understand the “primitive” stages of culture. in doing so, tylor did not pay much attention to historical changes or continuities in “primitive” cultural elements. in the early twentieth century, the methods of field work and direct observation became standard practice and gave scientific characteristics to anthropological works.2 in doing so, anthropologists adopted tylor’s approach and continued to treat cultural and traditional elements as something frozen in time. for example, bronislaw malinowski, raymond firth, and a. f. radcliffe-brown ventured into the remote islands of the oceania. radcliffe-brown also published influential works on australian aboriginal society, which later laid the foundation for social anthropologists in australia. they chose these areas because they had perceived them to be typically “primitive” and least influenced by civilizations.3 what malinowski postulated on culture as a result of years of fieldwork did not leave much room to consider historical changes in society. radcliffe-brown dichotomized science and history and regarded the latter as unverifiable speculation or illusion of explanation (kroeber, 1952). malinowski and radcliffe-brown theoretically opposed each other in advocating their theories of “primitive” society, but both presented their studies with little consideration of historical change (radcliffe-brown, 1949). a group of prominent american cultural anthropologists such as franz boas, alfred kroeber, ruth benedict, and julian steward examined various cultural groups in north america to identify patterns of culture or cultural ecology (moore, 2009). in theorizing ethnographical data, boas (boas, 1911/1938) and benedict (benedict, 1934/1961) attempted to characterize cultural patterns and behaviors to understand what they called “culture-wholes.” on this point of picturing the entire culture, kroeber began to distance himself from boas and benedict by emphasizing the importance of considering historical contexts. in his nature of culture, kroeber (1952) advocated to extend benedict’s static theory of a whole culture by adding historical depth. in doing so, he emphasized stylistic features and identified historic “configurations” of a culture (see also steward, 1962). boas later acknowledged the growing trend of historicizing anthropology, but he still sided with benedict, who primarily examined the socio-psychological aspects of culture (benedict, 1934/1961). nevertheless, it was largely a historical model for studying “primitive” culture and society that shaped the ways anthropologists understood “traditional” society and knowledge in the late twentieth century (peterson, 2010). 2 alfred kroeber (1952), for example, regarded studies of culture as part of the natural sciences. 3 in describing the scale of civilization, tylor (1871) wrote, “few would dispute that the following races are arranged rightly in order of culture—australia, tahitian, aztec, chinese, italian” (p. 24). 5 matsui: defining and validating tk published by scholarship@western, 2015 there is another notable aspect of anthropological and ethnographical works from the early twentieth century. in collecting and recording knowledge in indigenous societies, many studies omitted, for example, commercial trading activities and the ownership of land and intellectual properties. part of the reason was that most anthropologists believed that “primitive” peoples, who were supposedly living in communal, egalitarian, and simple societies, did not have the idea of commerce, division of labor, or law. although malinowski (1926) did recognize the existence of “primitive” law among the trobriand islanders in crime and custom in savage society, he nevertheless portrayed the islanders as lacking the authority to enforce it. their understanding of individual rights was similarly unstructured. the principle of communal reciprocity dominated much of their activities and behaviors (conley & o’barr, 2002). this recognition of law in “primitive” society was met with criticism by anthropologists like radcliffe-brown (1949) and william seagle. seagle (1937) argued that malinowski’s use of the term “law” stretched its definition. for him, the law existed in a society with political and legal organizations that enforce written codes. he argued that the islanders in malinowski’s descriptions had customs but not law. after the 1950s, however, a group of anthropologists, sociologists, and theologians began expressing their opposition to the antinomy of tradition and the modern. sociologist reinhard bendix (1967), for example, examined modern european societies and emphasized the continuity of some traditional elements in these societies before and after the industrial revolution and the french revolution. he said, in most european countries there is evidence rather of the continued social and political pre-eminence of pre-industrial ruling groups even when their economic fortunes declined, as well as of the continued, subordinate social and political role of the ‘middle class’ even when their economic fortunes rose. (p. 338) some of the binding elements between the pre-modern and the modern also included kinship ties, religious beliefs, linguistic affiliations, and territorial communalism. bendix (1967) also reminded the reader that “modern” elements existed long before the so-called modern era. clifford davidson (1992), a literary critic who studied theatrical traditions in western societies, similarly emphasized the continuity from pre-modern to modern periods. for example, he explained that some typical modern technological advances derive their foundation from the accumulation of knowledge, innovations, and practices from the pre-modern period. for example, the technology of building automobiles became possible only after the pre-modern inventions of not just the wheel, but also the moveable front axle and the four-wheeled wagon. in a similar vein, the computer is the 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.2 result of thousands of years of development in mathematics as well as the technology of using electricity. another prominent sociologist edward shils (1981) in his book, tradition, also emphasized the continuity of pre-modern european traditions in the modern period, including scientific and intellectual ones. for shils, traditions are associated with beliefs, including knowledge, that have been passed through generations. the substance of traditions can be transmitted not only orally but also through texts, symbols, and other objects. this point gave him enough reason to investigate traditional elements in scientific and intellectual societies. he contended that both scientists and traditional people developed ideas on the basis of what was established in the past even though they used different processes to acquire them. much of what a scientist produces is based on what his or her colleagues in the same traditional discipline have written about. this means that a scientist “confirms his confidence in the reliability of the scientific community and it thereby sustains his morale as a scientist and his confidence in the integrity of the scientific enterprise” (shils, 1981, p. 113). this point resonates what thomas s. kuhn (1962) earlier pointed out about the progress of science as a product of the accumulated knowledge development. shils (1981) also argued that traditions are not frozen in time; instead, they evolve by adapting to changes. he said, “the rules which survive as tradition are those which have made the most successful adaptations to changes in the environment; they have shown their efficacy” (p. 205). these changes come from both endogenous and exogenous sources. traditions exist within a person, community, or nation. traditions, through changes, have to be “routinized” by people, and this process normally takes “three generations” to be accomplished. shils did not clarify why he set out this minimum requirement to validate traditionality of a tradition, but he did acknowledge that the length of one generation is difficult to determine. in a study of madras in india, anthropologist milton singer (1971) reiterated some of shils’ points by examining how traditional madras society responded to modernity. like shils, he did not believe that tradition and modernity are antithetical; rather, for singer, modernity existed within traditions. he contended that modernity was “a permanent layer or dimension of indigenous culture and not simply a collection of recent foreign imports or the fashionable life-style of a privileged class” (singer, 1971, p. 175). singer showed how madras society incorporated “modern” elements into its traditional “cultural protoplasm.” when the new and the foreign are introduced, madras society first compartmentalized it in what he called a “cultural enclave.” then the compartmentalized new or foreign was selectively integrated into indigenous traditions, slowly diluting the alien aspects of the new or the foreign (singer, 1971). in order for the new to become fully validated as traditional, 7 matsui: defining and validating tk published by scholarship@western, 2015 according to singer, it had to become “old,” conform to customary or scriptural norms, and have an origin myth, in which it is linked to a great traditional set of ancestors or precedents. in madras society, tradition also was connected to morality, enabling some to claim ancient affiliation and help validate one’s present status in society (singer, 1971). shils (1981) also similarly argued that traditions provide guiding principles to good governance of a society. in the 1980s, post-modern interpretations entered the discussion. a new generation of scholars agreed that tradition is not something frozen in the past: it is not archaic or obsolete. rather, tradition commands one’s consciousness in the present. anthropologist jocelyn linnekin (1983) argued that: “the selection of what constitutes tradition is always made in the present. tradition is somewhat associated with the past, but this ‘past’ is equivocal: it does not correspond to the experience of any particular generation” (p. 241). terrence tilley (2006) in religious studies even goes further and argues that “traditions are simply not found” (p. 252) because traditions “are neither fixed nor given, but in some ways fluid and made up by the participants” (p. 247). for theologian kathryn tanner (2006), “tradition is invented rather than found because it is a matter of human attribution” (p. 237). these interpretations met criticism from anthropologists like marshal sahlins (1993), who warned that the overemphasis on the presentness and constant changes of traditions slight the fact that some cultural elements do persist and continue through time. beginning in the 1970s (especially the 1990s), indigenous writers joined the discussion and clarified their perceptions of tradition. historian donald fixico (2003), for example, emphasized the circular notion of time and space in discussing traditional knowledge of native americans—that is, the past, the present, and the future are not clearly separable. traditions and traditional knowledge also evolved as traditional people selectively incorporated something new and foreign. these points sound somewhat similar to what post-modernists have said of tradition, but for fixico and others traditions do exist in a historical or circular context and interact with both one’s consciousness and external worlds. native american writer, thomas king (2003), similarly emphasized the culturally persistent notion of traditional worldviews and wisdom that exist both within one’s consciousness and communal commons. in other words, traditional knowledge and wisdom in many indigenous societies have developed by taking endogenous and exogenous influences. also, as anthropologist keith basso (1996) pointed out in his wisdom sits in places, indigenous knowledge and wisdom are situational or location specific and interconnected with stories of the past with the present and future ramifications. according to indigenous authors, indigenous peoples transmit their traditions through traditional ways of knowing, most typically through narratives. narratives are enhanced through seeing some 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.2 landscapes and places and carved and painted objects (basso, 1996). fixico (2003) said, “seeing and understanding things in a visual context is the basis of receiving information or the processing of information” (p. 6). in canada, some first nations peoples (e.g., haida, gitxsan, and tsimshian) on the west coast of british columbia have carved totem poles that enhanced and visualized family or community history. similar to the points milton singer (1971) made regarding madras society, storytellers in haida and kwakwak’waku societies told and retold stories and origin myths that connected people in the present to the past. by doing so, storytellers reasserted their status of being properly connected to the past. the history that is engraved in totem poles includes not only human relations, but also relations between human and non-human ancestors as well as supernatural beings. various traditional social events in the northwest coastal regions of north america often offer venues to the transmission of knowledge and wisdom. the narratives that are presented in these events sometimes clarify the territorial boundaries of the family or community (mills, 1994). these narratives and performances are usually witnessed and validated by both communal members and non-communal members (bringhurst, 2011). indigenous peoples’ writings also serve to convey traditions to non-native audiences. fixico (2003), king (2003), deloria (1973), and other native american writers commonly emphasize that traditional people and western scientists or religious people acquire and transmit knowledge in fundamentally different ways. in his controversial book4 on traditional knowledge, the american indian mind in a linear world, fixico (2003) frequently discusses his personal observation of the very different perspectives that he and non-native people held. recollecting his grade school days, for example, he says, “i often wondered why i thought in a different way than my classmates, and why i did things differently from a mental point of view” (fixico, 2003, p. xi). throughout his book, he attempts to clarify the differences of native worldviews from linear western scientific views of the world. in fact, many native leaders have expressed similar sentiment as early as the early twentieth century (matsui, 2009). one of the reasons for emphasizing the differences was that traditional knowledge holders did not appreciate the linear ways of managing environmental matters. anthropologist d. michael warren (1989) found that in developing countries educated individuals began to challenge western scientific control over environmental management in their nations. although some non-indigenous critics challenged the essentialized notion of indigenous–european cultural dichotomy, especially concerning the portrayal of indigenous peoples as ecologists (krech, 1999), 4 historian frederick e. hoxie criticized fixico’s discussion about essentializing native behaviors and minds (hoxie, 2000). 9 matsui: defining and validating tk published by scholarship@western, 2015 marshall sahlins (1993) and others look at this phenomenon as part of natural cultural responses. sahlins sees the claim of “ecological” natives as the emergence of the “proxy critics of western society” rather than the creation or invention of myths. the process of essentializing traditionality is also akin to the self-conscious effort to establish a “differentiated cultural space” (pp. 19-20). legal scholar karen engle (2010) also observed a similar phenomenon in her book about the indigenous movement in the americas after the 1970s. she recognized that the indigenous peoples were not naïve about claiming differences. she instead treated the phenomenon as “strategic essentialism,” with which native peoples attempted to advance their status in a political and legal arena. in the midst of rising political power among indigenous peoples, non-native scholars revisited the definition of traditional societies. in discussing the potential use of traditional knowledge in environmental governance, these scholars separated the notion of tradition from modernity by corresponding with the “differentiated cultural space” expressed by indigenous writers. for example, in promoting indigenous knowledge, anthropologist stephen brush (1996), defined indigenous knowledge as “the systematic information that remains in the informal sector, usually unwritten and preserved in oral tradition rather than text” (p. 4). ecologists fikret berkes, johan colding, and carl folke (2000) similarly believed that traditional ecological knowledge is a way of knowing that exists in “nonindustrial or less technologically advanced societies, many but not all of them indigenous or tribal” (p. 1252). in their influential definition, traditional ecological knowledge is “a cumulative body of knowledge, practice, and belief, evolving by adaptive processes and handed down through generations by cultural transmission, about the relationship of living beings (including humans) with one another and with their environment” (p. 1252). here berkes and others were careful not to treat traditional knowledge as something archaic or static. they also emphasized the evolving and adapting aspects of knowledge transmission among traditional knowledge holders (butler, 2006). however, berkes’ definition and its analogs do not include space for innovation, whereas the convention on biological diversity (1992) recognizes it as integral to indigenous and local cultural expressions. most scholarly definitions, berkes’ included, do not pay much heed to international legal discussion about traditional knowledge. for example, the working definition of the wipo, which was released in 2007, sounds more broad and inclusive than the ones discussed above. article 3(2) of the wipo statement reads that traditional knowledge is: … the content or substance of knowledge resulting from intellectual activity in a traditional context, and includes the know-how, skills, innovations, practices and learning that form part of traditional knowledge systems, and knowledge embodying traditional lifestyles of indigenous and local communities, or contained in codified knowledge systems passed 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.2 between generations. it is not limited to any specific technical field, and may include agricultural, environmental and medicinal knowledge, and knowledge associated with genetic resources. (cited in antons, 2009, p. 2) this wipo definition acknowledges that the substance of tradition includes not only knowledge but also skills, innovations, practices, and learning. here the types of knowledge are varied, whereas berkes, colding, and folke only acknowledge oral and “nonindustrial” forms of knowledge. the discrepancy in the definition of traditional knowledge between the wipo and those in academic works can be attributed to different reasons for defining the term. berkes, colding and folke wrote their articles on the premise of using traditional ecological knowledge for environmental management. the definition of traditional knowledge in the wipo statement and the convention on biodiversity took shape because drafters were interested in promoting, not only the use of traditional knowledge, but also its protection from the overexploitation and misappropriation by scholars and the corporate sector. as mentioned elsewhere (matsui, 2012), national legal systems in canada, for example, established traditional knowledge policy for conservation purposes. but they did not develop laws to protect the knowledge, innovations, and practices of indigenous peoples and local communities. it is also important to note that the issues related to biodiversity and the traditional ecological knowledge of indigenous peoples are not regarded as an integral part of indigenous rights and governance. p r o b l e m s o f v a l i d a t i o n in promoting the use of traditional knowledge, berkes and others have faced suspicion and criticism from some scholars about its usefulness. frances widdowson and albert howard (2008), former traditional knowledge consultants in canada, are arguably the most vocal skeptics about the use of traditional knowledge in environmental management. in their book, disrobing the aboriginal industry, they contend that indigenous peoples’ ecological observation is “junk science” (p. 242). some ideas that are derived from indigenous observation or expression, they conclude, require scientific testing before they are accepted as knowledge. for them, knowledge represents rationality and empirically tested ways of knowing, and indigenous peoples’ ways of knowing do not conform to this category. ultimately, they argue that there is no way traditional knowledge can be validated with scientific knowledge because these two knowledge systems are fundamentally different (widdowson & howard, 2008). 11 matsui: defining and validating tk published by scholarship@western, 2015 berkes, colding, and folke (2000) similarly emphasize fundamental differences between traditional and scientific ways of knowing, but they still believe that some types, if not all, of traditional knowledge are compatible with scientific knowledge. however, they make a cautious statement that the traditional knowledge system does not always convey ecologically wise information to ecologists, and, therefore, “traditional ecological wisdom requires a reality check” (berkes et al., 2000, p. 1260). peter usher (2000), historical geographer and consultant in canada, similarly recommends in his study on traditional knowledge policy in northern canada that scientists validate certain types of traditional knowledge indigenous peoples possess, especially concerning the knowledge related to the observation and uses of natural resources. other scholars express suspicion about the possibility of “validating” traditional knowledge by scientists. philosophers and scientists have argued that validation, which denotes the recognition of legitimacy, cannot be logically established in scientific models, which may be found only temporarily plausible. they believe that the scientific processes of validation or verification leave out many uncertainties, and, no matter how plausible, once-validated findings can still be contested later by other scientific observations. ultimately, scientific models cannot validate or verify what is real in the environment (oreskes, shrader-frechette & belitz, 1994). so far, anthropologists, not natural scientists, have discussed the methods of validating cultural knowledge (broom & kitsuse, 1955; handwerker, 2002). if natural scientists were to validate traditional knowledge and wisdom, as berkes and usher suggest, there is no other theoretical support than anthropological works to establish the scientific criteria of intercultural knowledge validation. then the questions arise: is this interdisciplinary validation effort by both anthropologists and natural scientists possible and workable? or given that validating traditional knowledge by scientists is possible, what are the scientific criteria to do so? so far, we do not have any scientific theory or model that could help answer these questions. instead of exploring the possibility of validating traditional knowledge, some scholars have argued that attempting the unilateral validation of traditional knowledge by scientists and other scholars poses the risk of disempowering knowledge holders and marginalizing traditional societies. also, giving the authority to government-hired scientists to legitimatize traditional knowledge could be regarded as another form of colonization (butler, 2006). others added that validation from western knowledge systems is not necessary as traditional knowledge itself holds its own intrinsic value in environmental governance. christoph antons (2009), legal expert on traditional knowledge in asia, argued that traditional knowledge “should not be interpreted as limiting or seeking externally to define the diverse and holistic conceptions of knowledge within the traditional context” (p. 2). 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.2 one study on fish management in australia, however, provides a window into indigenous peoples’ perspectives on this question. the researchers in this study asked aboriginal people if the scientific validation of their indigenous knowledge on fish was disrespectful to them. the result of their interview showed that aboriginal people, both co-researchers and elders, were generally positive about the validation process because, once validated by scientists, their knowledge would become legitimized in mainstream society. the researchers also found that the validation process may improve the mutual understanding of each other’s value systems that eventually may lead to the better collaborative relationships between aboriginal communities and researchers. they believe that promoting mutual cross-cultural understanding through the validation process can lead to a change of social values in natural resource use activities, which embraces both indigenous and scientific views (gratani et al., 2011). anthropologist paul nadasdy’s (2006) study on the traditional ecological knowledge policy in yukon, canada, however, shows strained and frustrated relationships that developed after some years of “cooperation” between indigenous knowledge holders and scientists in wild game management. the government policy was laid out under the premise of “trust” and “co-management,” but biologists and indigenous peoples developed their arguments by using their own sources of information without much exchange. nadasdy (2006) observed that “the integration of science and tek is hampered by the difficulty of collecting tek and by qualitative differences in the form of scientific versus traditional or local knowledge” (p. 129). similar adversarial relationships developed in court after some effort for cross-cultural communication. since the 1970s, as arthur j. ray details in this special issue, an increasing number of native traditional knowledge holders have testified in court and revealed their knowledge about traditional land use and harvesting activities. the legal process has improved the understanding of indigenous rights, but it has also strained cross-cultural relations (ray, 2003; ray, 2010; thuen, 2004). for example, during the land title case of the gitxsan and wet’suwet’en in northern british columbia, which began in the 1980s and lasted until the 1990s, alan mceachern, the trial judge, heard voluminous testimonies by native elders and academics. the elders and chiefs of the gitxsan and wet’suwet’en decided to share their knowledge in court with the good intention of educating and creating better cross-cultural relationships (monet, 1991). in rendering his decision, mceachern dismissed all oral testimonies by elders as hearsay. he stated, “to quote hobbs [sic], aboriginal life in the [gitxsan-wet’suwet’en] territory was, at best, ‘nasty, brutish and short’” (cited in ridington, 1992, p. 18). however, according to his interpretation, this “primitive” state of the gitxsan and wet’suwet’en people faded away when they moved away, at least partially, from 13 matsui: defining and validating tk published by scholarship@western, 2015 trapping and hunting occupations by participating in a cash economy. this erosion of traditionality among native witnesses made their testimonies less authentic. in addition, mceachern regarded the native origin story and other historical evidence as fallacy. for example, he found the story that emphasized that their ancestral root in their traditional territory “not true” because it did not conform to the available archaeological studies (ridington, 1992, pp. 18-19). mceachern’s judgment is one of the most extreme versions of skepticism that does not recognize the validity and authenticity of traditional knowledge that is expressed in the present context. also, mceachern’s perception of native testimonies and their traditional life challenged the authority of traditional chiefs and humiliated many native witnesses, who took the risk of revealing in court the knowledge that was not supposed to be shared to outsiders and then paying the price. elders did not expect that the court would validate the knowledge they presented, either. they meant to share the knowledge so that the court would have a better understanding of their ancestral connection to their traditional territory (monet, 1991). in mceachern’s decision, even expert witness reports by renowned cultural anthropologists were almost entirely dismissed as he found the reports politically biased because those anthropologists conducted research and wrote their reports on behalf of native peoples (culhane, 1998; ray, 2011; ridington, 1992). the report of one historian, who had not had contact with native peoples and whose analysis was based solely on archival documents was admitted as evidence (ray, 1991). the outright dismissal of native testimonies and anthropological evidence was later reversed by the supreme court of canada, which deemed native testimonies as valid evidence (delgamuukw v. b.c., 1997). more recently, the protection of traditional knowledge against bio-piracy has also posed legal and ethical questions (balick, 2007; de carvalho, 2007; mackey & liang, 2012; oguamanam, 2006; sarmiento, 2009;) and cultural appropriation (brown, 2003; coombe, 1998; tsosie, 2002; young, 2010). pharmaceutical companies or agro-biological institutions have located specific traditional knowledge that is related to the medicinal quality or genetic diversity of plant species and varieties. once placed in a laboratory setting, the collected sample can be developed into a pharmaceutical product, a plant variety or genetically modified organisms with patent without paying the original knowledge providers any royalty (king, carlson, & moran, 1996). in this process, scientists often validated the usefulness of the knowledge of indigenous peoples and local communities in their own value systems. but neither this knowledge nor the people who produced it gained meaningful recognition (curci, 2010; de carvalho, 2007). much of legal and ethical discussion so far to prevent these appropriation practices has focused on the protection of rights for indigenous peoples and local communities to cultural and spiritual 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.2 activities, land, and natural resources. this discussion, however, has not yet clarified how scholars and policymakers recognize the validity of traditional knowledge in implementing basic principles for collaborations and partnerships. numerous ongoing cases of commercializing indigenous and ethnic cultural objects and symbols in popular culture, businesses and activities such as movies, plays, literature, and tourism (brown, 2003; matsui, 2013) testify to the limit of current ethical principles and legal frameworks to fully acknowledge the knowledge of indigenous peoples and local communities. the wipo, various other united nations’ agencies (e.g., unesco, unep, undp, unu-ias), and legal experts have extensively discussed the extent to which indigenous peoples and ethnic communities can be protected from these problems by revising international intellectual property law (oguamanam, 2006) or revisiting the concept of cultural rights (alderman, 2008; carpenter, katyal, & riley, 2009; carpenter, katyal, & riley, 2010). the result was partly shown in the refined definitions of traditional knowledge in article 8(j) of the convention of biological diversity (1992) and the wipo draft document of 2007 (see wipo, 2008). in discussing these legal implications of using traditional knowledge, many legal experts expressed the need to establish dispute resolution mechanisms in both legal and ethical areas. in fact, as i discussed elsewhere (matsui, 2012), in the latter half of the twentieth century, scholars and international organizations have established many non-legal or ethical principles to provide a better protection to traditional knowledge holders from biopiracy and cultural appropriation (bannister, 2009). various academic organizations, such as the international society of ethnobiology (ise), the american anthropological association, and numerous other academic organizations, followed by refining and improving the contents of their ethical principles. other than these rights-based approaches to the validation of traditional knowledge, what is missing is the ethical approach that guides scholars and policymakers to understand the validity of indigenous and traditional knowledge in culturally sensitive manners. for example, the code of ethics for the members of the ise, which is regarded one of the most dedicated and detailed ethical codes to date in protecting rights of indigenous peoples and local communities, is surprisingly silent about how ethnobiologists may recognize the validity of traditional knowledge. along with several other codes of ethics, the ise code does promote respect for the indigenous knowledge system and relevant research; yet, it is not yet clear how, for example, a young, inexperienced scholar can recognize the validity and value of traditional knowledge in conducting research among indigenous peoples. in fact, this aspect of validation is the weakness of many academic communities today. studies on organizational knowledge sharing and validation processes have only recently emerged. one study on knowledge sharing and management found that the criteria of validating knowledge in a narrative are normally implicitly applied through the action of knowledge transmission without any 15 matsui: defining and validating tk published by scholarship@western, 2015 conscious reflections (geiger & schreyögg, 2012). this implicit knowledge sharing, i argue, has affected the ways scholars have discussed the definition and validation of traditional knowledge. the implicit nature of knowledge validation poses some challenges for many scholars in their attempts to understand other culture’s implicit knowledge validation processes. and the extent to which ethical principles and law can guide scholars and policymakers to better understand knowledge validation as cultural process can help shape more cross-culturally sensitive research ethics guidelines in the future. c o n c l u s i o n given the adversarial conditions of recent cross-cultural debates over the definition and validation of traditional knowledge, the question is: how can scholars, politicians, indigenous peoples, local communities, and international organizations agree on how to define and validate traditional knowledge? in this article, i have clarified the problems that have risen from defining and validating traditional knowledge. the discussion above should help us better understand some problem areas in defining and validating traditional knowledge. however, there are still other problem areas that cannot be clearly answered. we must still connect traditional knowledge issues to those of indigenous peoples’ governance and sovereignty. in implementing traditional knowledge policy for biodiversity conservation and environmental assessment, canada, for example, has promoted the policy implementation mechanism of stewardship, in which local people can be active participants in planning, executing, and evaluating environmental management measures (matsui, 2012). although indigenous peoples are included in this process, their sui generis rights as indigenous peoples and their sovereignty in their traditional territories have not gained much attention. this may sound strange if one understands the existence of the traditional knowledge of indigenous peoples within locally specific environmental settings. while there is much discussion about the extent to which indigenous peoples have rights to their land and resources, we do not yet have a clear idea about how the protection of traditional knowledge can be part of indigenous rights. ultimately, we must grapple with the question of whether indigenous peoples should have governing rights to biodiversity and natural resources in general. in connection to the issue of indigenous rights and sovereignty, the questions of definition and validation also require the establishment of better cross-cultural processes for reconciliation in building trust for collaborations and partnerships in scientific, artistic, and business endeavours. for this, more political scientists, legal scholars, historians, and anthropologists, among others, can 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.2 contribute to an in-depth understanding of how indigenous peoples and local communities have historically defined, validated, and managed environmental knowledge within their communities. the findings of these studies should be able to help establish reconciliation processes by creating new value. 17 matsui: defining and validating tk published by scholarship@western, 2015 r e f e r e n c e s agrawal, a. 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(2010). cultural appropriation and the arts. chichester, uk: wiley-blackwell. 25 matsui: defining and validating tk published by scholarship@western, 2015 the international indigenous policy journal may 2015 problems of defining and validating traditional knowledge: a historical approach kenichi matsui recommended citation problems of defining and validating traditional knowledge: a historical approach abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license problems of defining and validating traditional knowledge: a historical approach laying the groundwork: a practical guide for ethical research with indigenous communities the international indigenous policy journal volume 8 issue 2 reconciling research: perspectives on research involving indigenous peoples—part 1 article 6 april 2017 laying the groundwork: a practical guide for ethical research with indigenous communities julia k . riddell york university, jriddell@yorku.ca angela salamanca york university, angela_salamanca@edu.yorku.ca debra j. pepler york university, pepler@yorku.ca shelley cardinal canadian red cross, shelley.cardinal@redcross.ca onowa mcivor university of victoria, omcivor@uvic.ca recommended citation riddell, j. k. , salamanca, a. , pepler, d. j. , cardinal, s. , mcivor, o. (2017). laying the groundwork: a practical guide for ethical research with indigenous communities. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(2). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.6 laying the groundwork: a practical guide for ethical research with indigenous communities abstract although there are numerous ethical guidelines for research with indigenous communities, not all research is conducted in an ethical, culturally respectful, and effective way. to address this gap, we review four ethical frameworks for research with indigenous peoples in canada. drawing upon our experiences conducting a transformative social justice research project in five indigenous communities, we discuss the ethical tensions we have encountered and how we have attempted to address these challenges. finally, drawing on these experiences, we make recommendations to support those planning to conduct research with indigenous peoples in canada. we discuss the importance of training to highlight the intricacies and nuances of bringing the ethical guidelines to life through co-created research with indigenous communities. keywords research ethics, indigenous communities, community-based research acknowledgments we are deeply grateful to our partner communities who have walked beside us on our research journey. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ laying the groundwork: a practical guide for ethical research with indigenous communities in this article, we use the term indigenous with reference to the original inhabitants of the territory now known as canada and other places around the world that share similar experiences of colonization. in canada, the term indigenous includes first nations, inuit, and métis peoples. the goal of this article is to provide an overview of practical ethical considerations for conducting research with indigenous communities. we describe a number of ethical principles, derived from diverse policies, and some of the challenges that we have faced when applying these principles to a multi-site indigenous communitybased research project. we begin by locating ourselves and then describe the research project that provided us with the opportunity to address and engage these ethical principles and their attendant challenges. self-location all of the authors of this article are involved in a research project called walking the prevention circle: re-searching community capacity building. before exploring what we have learned about practical ethical considerations for conducting respectful research with indigenous communities, we believe that it is important to first locate ourselves and describe the project. we are a group of five researchers who have all received graduate education. julia riddell is a young, euro-canadian woman currently in the third year of her doctorate. due to her rural upbringing, she developed a deep connection with the land that has inspired her to work in solidarity with indigenous communities. angela salamanca is a mixedrace, immigrant woman from colombia who identifies as an uninvited guest and settler on indigenous territory. debra pepler is a mother and grandmother who has focused her teaching and research on child and youth development in family and peer relationships. her european ancestors came to canada as visitors over a century ago. she has been on a learning journey to understand the strengths and challenges of indigenous children and youth, particularly in the context of families and communities. muskwas nitanees, the daughter of little bear, also known as shelley cardinal, is cree and mennonite. she was raised with stories of both cultural strength and the harm that indigenous peoples have endured. from a young age, she knew her life’s work would contribute to addressing such harm. today, she contributes to this vision through her violence prevention work with the canadian red cross. onowa mcivor is cree and euro-canadian. her ancestors come from the land surrounding what is now known as the hudson’s bay and southern saskatchewan. onowa developed a love for research early in her academic life as a master’s student in the early 2000s. her love for her people and her belief in the potential for healing led her to a life devoted to indigenous education and language revitalization, which she engages through teaching and shared research projects with indigenous communities. project description walking the prevention circle: re-searching community capacity building (the wtpc research project) is a transformative social justice research project, which arose from a partnership between the canadian red cross respect education programs and the promoting relationships and eliminating violence network (prevnet). shelley cardinal has been working in the area of violence prevention with the canadian red cross since the 1980s and co-created the wtpc program in partnership with indigenous communities. this program aims to address the historical and contemporary challenges of 1 riddell et al.: ethical research with indigenous communities published by scholarship@western, 2017 indigenous communities by promoting a systemic understanding of the impacts of colonization and supporting culturally-appropriate services and programs which promote healing and wellness (fairholm, fearn, & ross, 2010). as an indigenous-specific program, the wtpc is embedded within a larger community mobilization process that has been developed by the canadian red cross, called ten steps to creating safe environments. the ten steps program supports the creation of safe environments for children and youth, promotes community capacity, and provides resources for healing and preventing violence. per this program, community leaders identify up to 20 key community members across diverse systems (e.g., health, education, police, social services, elders). these members then work through the ten steps to develop an action plan and to mobilize other community members to implement the plan. the wtpc research project focuses on working with communities to study the change that occurs through both the ten steps process and the implementation of communities’ action plans. to initiate the research, we partnered with a number of indigenous governing bodies (e.g., chiefs of ontario, prince albert grand council) that represent numerous smaller communities—such as first nations or hamlets—which helped us identify communities that might be interested in participating in the project. shelley cardinal then connected with the leadership in four different communities and one urban indigenous organization. if the community or organization was interested in the ten steps program and the associated research, then a memorandum of understanding (mou) outlining the research partnership was developed collaboratively. the community leaders identified research advisors, who then suggested potential community members who could be hired as community-based researchers. these indigenous community-based researchers collaborated with university-based researchers to create a starting point story—aided by a blueprint developed by indigenous scholars kathy absolon and susan dion—as a baseline for each community before the implementation of the ten steps. during and after the program, the community-based researchers gathered data to describe the process of change and community mobilization with ongoing support from the university-based researchers. in the first section of this article, we discuss four ethical guidelines for conducting research with indigenous peoples that have been developed by either government funding agencies or indigenous governance organizations within the area now known as canada. we highlight the similarities and differences between the key principles that form the foundation of these four guidelines. in the second section, we review the literature on both the ethical ways of doing research with indigenous communities as well as the literature on the challenges of applying the principles of ethical research. in the next section, we draw upon our experiences to discuss some of the ethical tensions that we have encountered when applying foundational principles of conducting ethical research with indigenous communities. specifically, we discuss how we have attempted to address these challenges. finally, drawing on these experiences, we make recommendations about how to support those planning to conduct research with indigenous peoples. principles to guide ethical research with indigenous communities when conducting our research project with indigenous communities in canada, we have deeply considered the ethical principles governing such research. the distinction between research conducted by euro-western, non-indigenous researchers on indigenous communities, for the benefit of nonindigenous scholars and agencies, as opposed to research that is conducted with indigenous 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.6 communities for their benefit, has been a matter of ongoing concern (ball & janyst, 2008). santos (2008) has described euro-western research as extractive, insofar as universities and governments “send their ‘experts’ to a community, extract information from ‘subjects,’ and take away the data to write their papers, reports and theses with no reciprocity or feedback to the community” (p. 321). to ensure that such unethical research is not repeated, several indigenous researchers, organizations, and funding agencies have articulated principles of ethical engagement for research with indigenous communities. to this end, canada’s three research councils (referred to as the tri-council)—the canadian institutes of health research (cihr), the natural sciences and engineering research council (nserc), and the social sciences and humanities research council (sshrc)—have included specific chapters in their established guidelines for conducting ethical research that are specific to aboriginal peoples (cihr, nserc, & sshrc, 2010, 2014). indigenous governing bodies and organizations have also authored numerous research guidelines. however, in this article, we focus on the guidelines that are relevant to or have been adopted by the indigenous communities with whom we partner on research, which we describe in the next section. based on these guidelines, we have identified 13 key principles for conducting research with different groups of indigenous peoples in a canadian context, which are summarized in table 1. tri-council principles one of the earliest documents created to address and prevent issues of unethical research with indigenous communities in canada was the tri-council’s 1998 policy statement ethical conduct for research involving humans (cihr et al., 1998). however, concerns were raised about these guidelines due to the lack of formal consultation with indigenous communities during their development (israel & hay, 2006; stiegman & castleden, 2015; weijer, goldsand, & emanuel, 1999). in response to these critiques, cihr engaged in consultations with indigenous peoples, communities, and organizations, as well as university-based researchers, concerning ethical research with indigenous communities. cihr (2007) produced a policy document in 2007, which was updated in 2010 in collaboration with the other two national research councils (cihr et al., 2010). the document was further revised in 2014 (cihr et al., 2014). the 2010 and 2014 versions of the document, the statement on ethical conduct for research involving humans (tcps 2) (cihr et al., 2010, 2014), contain a chapter outlining a policy for conducting research with indigenous peoples. the chapter “research involving the first nations, inuit and métis peoples of canada” (chapter 9) provides a framework that university-based researchers and research ethics boards (rebs) can use to evaluate research protocols, thereby ensuring that they meet the three guiding principles of the tri-council guidelines—respect, concern for welfare, and justice—in the context of research with indigenous communities (cihr, 2014; stiegman & castleden, 2015). the tri-council guidelines also highlight the importance of respectful relationships, collaboration, engagement, and co-creation between researchers and indigenous communities and their members. when working with community leaders, community-based research advisors, communitybased researchers, and key community members involved in the ten steps program, we have collaborated during every stage of the research process with as many community members as possible. for example, in developing each community’s starting point story, the community research advisor and community-based researchers identified those who held knowledge that was essential to the project. 3 riddell et al.: ethical research with indigenous communities published by scholarship@western, 2017 chapter 9 of the tri-council guidelines begins by explaining how the three general ethical principles that apply to all research (respect for persons, concern for welfare, and justice) are interpreted in the context of doing research with indigenous communities. the first general principle, respect for persons, holds that consent to participate in research is to be free, informed, and ongoing. as opposed to considering only the individual participants involved in a study, this principle requires researchers to consider how the knowledge gained from their research will impact both the social and physical environment, as well as future generations. the second general principle, concern for welfare, involves considering the physical, emotional, social, cultural, and spiritual wellbeing of individual research participants, as well as the wellbeing of the broader community. this principle suggests that research should enhance the capacity of indigenous communities to maintain their cultures, languages, and identities. the third general principle, justice, acknowledges the harm that has been done to indigenous communities by researchers, both intentionally and unintentionally, which requires researchers to take time to develop trusting relationships with communities and collaborate with them at every stage of the research process (cihr et al., 2014). chapter 9 also lists 22 specific articles that explain how to apply the provisions of the tri-council policy when working with indigenous communities. these requirements specify that the nature and extent of community engagement be negotiated between researchers and communities, as well as between researchers and all relevant indigenous organizations. as such, the nature of community engagement must be described in all applications to university rebs. furthermore, researchers are required to have learned about community authority structures and respect local indigenous governing bodies, such as formal leadership as well as traditional knowledge keepers (e.g., elders, confederacy councils, hamlet councils, etc.). before recruiting participants, a formal research agreement must be signed that clarifies: • the nature and extent of community engagement, • the process for individual consent, • privacy and confidentiality, • responsibilities regarding data collection and management, • intellectual property rights, and • plans for the dissemination of results. researchers are expected to recognize the diverse interests and perspectives within communities and conduct themselves in ways that respect community customs and codes of practice. finally, the guidelines express an expectation that the research process will be collaborative, participatory, of benefit to communities, and strengthen communities’ capacity for research. ownership, control, access, and possession (ocap®) principles the ownership, control, access, and possession (ocap®) principles were developed to address the history of disrespectful, exploitive, and oppressive research carried out in indigenous communities 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.6 without members’ informed consent or benefit. this response to the history of such research was the result of two converging factors: “1) an increase in first nations’ research capacity and involvement and 2) a widely-shared core value of self-determination” (first nations centre, 2007, p. 8). the ocap® principles offer an indigenous approach to all aspects of research, including consultation, decision making, research methods, data storage, and knowledge mobilization. furthermore, the principles support indigenous self-determination by offering a framework through which indigenous communities can determine whether research will be of benefit to them. the development of the ocap® principles resulted from a meeting held in 1998 by the national steering committee—later the first nations information governance centre (fnigc)—of the first nations and inuit regional longitudinal health survey (first nations centre, 2007). during this meeting, the first three principles of the guidelines were articulated: ownership, control, and access. the principle of possession was added later to recognize the importance of first nations’ ownership and physical possession of data (first nations centre, 2007). in our project, we specified in the consent forms that while the university-based researchers would only possess the data for 7 years, the community would possess it indefinitely. therefore, participants were given a choice to provide consent for the ongoing use of their data by their communities and knew that the communities had control, ownership, and access to their stories and any other information that they shared. utility, self-voicing, access, and inter-relationality research framework (usai) the utility, self-voicing, access, and inter-relationality (usai) framework was developed by the ontario federation of indian friendship centres to guide research processes and decisions within urban indigenous communities and organizations. the principle of utility refers to research being relevant and of direct benefit to communities. the principle of self-voicing affirms that communities must be fully recognized as authors and knowledge holders. the principle of access recognizes that “all forms of knowledge including local knowledge, lived experience, community narratives, personal stories, and spiritual expressions are reliable and valid forms of authored research” (ontario federation of indian friendship centres, 2012, p. 10). in the context of the wtpc research, these types of knowledge are what comprised the starting point story, which was developed as the baseline data for each community. access also means ensuring that research findings are presented in accessible language. finally, the principle of inter-relationality refers to the understanding that research always occurs within historical and relational contexts. with this project, we have supported communities in understanding this context through the development of their starting point stories. more broadly, the ten steps program focuses on the historical and relational context within canada and within the community itself. although participatory action research (par) emphasizes the importance of collaborative relations in research and the use of multiple sources of knowledge, it does not “go far enough to recognize local systems of knowledge and practice as fully authoritative and competent to design, conduct, and evaluate their own research” (ontario federation of indian friendship centres, 2012, p. 7). in contrast, the utility, self-voicing, access, and inter-relationality framework provides principles for engaging in research and forming research partnerships in ways that recognize indigenous partners as holders and authors of knowledge, not simply as “trusted informants, confidants, and advisors” (ontario federation of indian friendship centres, 2012, p. 8). the national association of friendship centres (nafc) and the urban aboriginal knowledge network (uakn) include both the usai framework and the 5 riddell et al.: ethical research with indigenous communities published by scholarship@western, 2017 ocap® principles in their guiding ethical principles (uakn, 2015), a policy document that they have created to guide urban indigenous organizations and their research partners. the ethical principles in the guiding ethical principles document complement the tri-council principles and include an emphasis on community-driven research that addresses community priorities and protects the wellbeing of communities, organizations, and individuals. the document also emphasizes the importance of ongoing negotiations of consent, as well as ensuring fairness, respect, and honesty at every stage of the research process (uakn, 2015). moreover, it stresses that researchers must respect communities’ or organizations’ ownership of and intellectual property rights to data resulting from a research process, and it states that any profit stemming from a research project driven by the community should be given to the partner community (uakn, 2015). inuit ethical principles the inuit nipingit (national inuit committee on ethics and research) was formed as an advisory group in 2008 to develop and recommend guidelines regarding how to improve the processes and practices of research conducted with communities in the arctic. two organizations, the inuit tuttarvingat and the inuit tapiriit kanatami, supported the inuit nipingit’s mandate and operations (inuit tuttarvingat, 2010). the inuit tuttarvingat (2010) outlined four key principles of importance for researchers seeking to conduct work with inuit: 1. respect of intangible cultural property in the form of language and traditional knowledge. 2. empowerment of the community and positive outcomes for regions and communities involved. 3. mutually beneficial research through knowledge sharing with individuals, regions, and government. 4. respecting animals through the research process and methods. for example, we are studying the ten steps program, which is designed to increase capacity in communities and mobilize them toward increasing safety for children and youth. inuit communities have identified this area as a priority due to the high rate of youth suicide in their communities. another source of guiding principles for conducting ethical research with inuit communities is the inuit tapiriit kanatami and the nunavut research institute’s (2007) negotiating research relationships with inuit communities: a guide for researchers. intended largely for non-indigenous researchers, the guide has highlighted the considerations integral to negotiating respectful and mutually beneficial research partnerships with inuit. in addition, the guide outlines the application process researchers must complete in order to secure a license to conduct research in the arctic (inuit tapiriit kanatami & nunavut research institute, 2007). the inuit tapiriit kanatami and government of nunavut (2002) have also put together a guide for communities: negotiating research relationships: a guide for communities. this guide describes how communities can engage with research projects in ways that honor their rights and autonomy, while ensuring that the research is beneficial and relevant to them (inuit tapiriit kanatami & nunavut research institute, 2002). 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.6 table 1. key principles for conducting research with different groups of indigenous peoples in canada principle tcps 2 (chapter 9) usai inuit-specific perspectives ocap® research benefits and supports community research efforts and builds local capacity. x x x x access by members of the community to knowledge collected about them. x x x community ownership over process, data, and results. x x x community control over research: “clear understanding and agreement on the control of data and research results, their storage and release” (itk & nri, 2007, p. 9; see also itk, 2010). x research is relevant to community needs and priorities and increases positive outcomes. x x x x opportunities for co-creation: sharing of decision making, data management, and sharing of knowledge (community engagement). x x x x honoring traditional knowledge and knowledge holders and engaging existing knowledge and knowledge keepers. x x opportunities for self-voicing: “research, knowledge and practice [that] are authored by communities, which are fully recognized as knowledge holders and knowledge creators” (ofifc, 2012, p. 9). x respectful relationships (respect for cultural norms, knowledge systems, and the sharing of knowledge). x x x culturally appropriate research methods. x x power balance (collective decision making as a complement to individual consent); respect for indigenous governing authorities. x x x inter-relationality: research must be “historicallysituated, geo-politically positioned, relational, and explicit about the perspective from which knowledge is generated” (ofifc, 2012, p. 10). x ethical treatment of animals in the research process. x x note. itk is the inuit tapiriit kanatami. nri is the nunavut research institute. ofifc is the ontario federation of indian friendship centres. 7 riddell et al.: ethical research with indigenous communities published by scholarship@western, 2017 ethical guidelines articulated by individual scholars in addition to the documents discussed above, a number of indigenous and non-indigenous researchers have proposed their own sets of ethical principles and guidelines for conducting research with indigenous peoples. kirkness and barnhardt (1991), for example, have articulated “the four rs” of indigenous research: respect, reciprocity, relevance, and responsibility (p. 6). tobias, richmond, and luginaah (2013) have identified that the foundations of ethical research partnerships with indigenous communities are “relational accountability” and “mindful reciprocity” (p. 130). relational accountability acknowledges the importance of relationships, as they exist through all aspects of the research, thereby requiring that researchers pay extra attention to these relationships throughout the entire process (see kovach, 2009; tobias et al., 2013; wilson, 2008). mindful reciprocity challenges researchers to participate in thoughtful and compassionate relationships with community collaborators (see pearson & paige, 2012; tobias et al., 2013). similarly, marsh and colleagues have proposed six core principles of ethical health research with indigenous communities (marsh, cote-meek, toulouse, najavits, & young, 2015), which include open and honest communication, inclusion, community connectedness, and the involvement of elders, the aboriginal advisory group, and the research committee. marsh et al. (2015) have explained that these principles seek to enhance respect and encourage equality in relationships, which is essential for doing ethical work in indigenous communities. anishinaabe scholar kathy absolon (2011) has asserted that an integral part of carrying out ethical research involves the self-location of the investigators within the research relationship. she affirmed, “in indigenous contexts location does matter. people want to know who you are, what you are doing and why” (p. 73). self-location also identifies the power differentials between researchers and participants and “prompts awareness of the extractive tendencies of research” (kovach, 2009, p. 112). the strongest theme in the literature on indigenous research ethics is that every stage of research relies on relational processes—from the researchers' own intentions in seeking particular knowledge, through the design and implementation of methodologies and gathering of consent, to the analysis and dissemination of knowledge (absolon, 2011; kovach, 2009; michell, 2012; smith, 2012; wilson, 2008). this relational approach to conducting research also highlights the importance of reciprocity, insofar as participating communities and individuals should benefit from research throughout the process, not just at the knowledge-sharing stage. for example, researchers are often encouraged to hire researchers locally and to assist with capacity building and skill development by offering lectures and workshops in the community (inuit tapiriit kanatami & nunavut research institute, 2007). challenges associated with the application of ethical principles researchers wishing to engage in research relationships with indigenous people must follow both the tri-council principles and the relevant ethical guidelines created by indigenous organizations and governments with whom they wish to work. although such guidelines provide a strong foundation, conducting ethical, culturally respectful, and effective research with indigenous communities remains challenging (bull, 2010; green & mercer, 2001; laird, 2002; piquemal, 2000). there appear to be two main reasons for challenges associated with conducting ethical research with indigenous communities. first, there are few examples of ethical guidelines in practice within research projects; therefore, indigenous communities continue to be negatively impacted by some contemporary and current 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.6 research projects (taniguchi, taualii, & maddock, 2012; tobias et al., 2013). to address this problem, researchers have called for more guidance regarding specific aspects of the research process, such as explicitly addressing how informed consent can be effectively and appropriately obtained in indigenous communities in accordance with both research ethics guidelines and community customs and practices (sherman et al., 2012). respecting individual confidentiality in small, connected communities and protecting research sources, sacred places, and traditional knowledge continues to be a challenging issue (tobias, 2015). regarding this challenge, tobias (2015) has suggested that researchers ensure that participants and communities are given an opportunity to review the research findings (which must be presented in an accessible way) and to consent to the use of their knowledge as it has been presented. second, individual members of university-based rebs do not consistently interpret and apply the guidelines discussed above when they are reviewing researchers’ project proposals (castleden, morgan, & lamb, 2012; flicker & worthington, 2012; guta, nixon, & wilson, 2013; guta et al., 2010). this inconsistency has resulted in rebs acting as a barrier, rather than a support, to researchers conducting ethical community-based research with indigenous communities (stiegman & castleden, 2015). for example, for her dissertation, moore (2015) worked with mi’kmaw communities in nova scotia, as well as health directors, financial services administrators (who are responsible for funding decisions), and reb representatives, to examine each group’s perceptions of the ethical guidelines governing research with indigenous communities. moore found that health directors and financial services administrators had limited knowledge of the tri-council’s guidelines for research involving the first nations, inuit, and métis peoples of canada. she also discovered that reb representatives and financial services administrators lacked an understanding of ethical principles of research in mi’kmaw communities. the researchers she interviewed reported that the tri-council guidelines were vague, had confusing wording and/or content (e.g., they were unclear about what constituted community consent), and did not provide enough instruction about how to ethically conduct research with indigenous communities. the researchers and reb representatives conceded that the tri-council guidelines needed to be further developed with real examples of how researchers engaged the various guidelines (moore, 2015). in this article, we aim to address this knowledge gap by providing examples of ethical issues that we have faced in our research, as well as how we have used available guidelines to inform our responses to ethical dilemmas. as such, we bring together multiple sets of ethical principles to “think through” how they together inform the research practices of investigators engaging with indigenous communities and individuals. ethical principles in action—considerations from the walking the prevention circle project concurrent with our analyses of the diverse ethical policies governing research with indigenous communities, we have been working with communities to bring ethical principles to life through the wtpc research. in the following section, we describe the challenges that we have faced engaging with communities and how we worked to ensure that we upheld the multiple principles relevant to our diverse partner communities. we also provide a description of how we overcame these challenges, with the hope that such a description of real contexts might be useful for other researchers facing similar challenges. 9 riddell et al.: ethical research with indigenous communities published by scholarship@western, 2017 1. applying multiple sets of ethical principles the ownership, control, access, and possession (ocap®) principles were created by first nations leaders, and thus they are central to conducting ethical research with these communities. these principles, however, are inappropriate for conducting research with inuit communities. the framing of co-creation and data-sharing agreements as ownership and control is problematic when working with inuit communities, which value the practice of sharing within the community (pauktuutit inuit women of canada, 2006). as such, we adjusted the language of our project’s agreement for each community to reflect their ethical principles and values. the value of non-interference means that most inuit “place a high regard on the right of individuals to lead their lives free from interference from others” (pauktuutit inuit women of canada, 2006, p. 40). this value can lead to discomfort when an inuk is put in a position of power or authority. in our project, we tried to ensure that the community-based inuit researchers were comfortable in their roles, and we worked to help them find ways to have power with others in the community as opposed to power over them. in this respect, it is essential that researchers understand not only the ethical principles of research, but also the cultural norms and values held by the community with whom they partner. moreover, it is essential that researchers adapt ethical principles for different communities. in addition, it is important to understand how cultural protocols may impact the nature of relationships. for example, in many traditional inuit communities, a young person would never speak after an elder or mentor has spoken, even if the young person disagrees with him or her or has something to add. understanding this norm is essential to every stage of the research process, from discussing the research agreement to collecting data. in our project, for example, we had been training community-based researchers how to ask follow-up questions during interviews and after listening to the stories of community members so that they could gather the information needed for the starting point story. when one of the university-based researchers was discussing how to ask follow-up questions with two of the community-based researchers, they explained that this practice would be disrespectful. as such, the research team worked together to develop an interview guide that asked different questions and did not use follow-up questions as a method of data collection. to support researchers’ learning about the ethical principles and cultural norms of the communities within which they work, it would be valuable for federal funding agencies to employ informed indigenous scholars who can suggest resources for researchers to educate themselves and become culturally competent. another means of support could be workshops where researchers can learn about both ethical principles of conducting research and the norms of the communities in which they hope to work. ideally, communities and indigenous leadership organizations would create these workshops with financial and technical support from an institution committed to promoting ethical research (such as the tri-council). 2. building trusting relationships and addressing harm it is important for researchers, boards, and review panels to be cognizant of the exploitative and violent history of research with indigenous communities (cochran et al., 2008; mosby, 2013). beginning by discussing this topic fosters an understanding of the resultant legacy of distrust and the general reticence of indigenous peoples to engage in research projects. approaching a research project with the 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.6 acknowledgement of the shameful history of colonization and the harm experienced by communities because of research can form the foundation for relationships that are based on open and honest communication, inclusion, and community involvement (marsh et al., 2015). during our project, we began a meeting with members of a partner community by acknowledging this history and talking about the research team’s foundational values: respect, working together in a decolonizing way, open communication, ensuring learning in all places, responsibility, and accountability. by discussing these values, we hoped to express our desires to engage in an ethical relationship with our community partner—with specific, quantifiable parameters for trusting, collaborative work. the research team’s emphasis on the necessity of responsibility and accountability comprised a critical aspect of this conversation with the partner community’s members. moreover, these values clarified the role of ethical guidelines and principles as designed to serve the community’s interests; the community understood they could hold us accountable as researchers. 3. the time and funding required to co-create the research with indigenous communities in 2011, a group of researchers, including debra pepler and shelley cardinal, submitted a proposal for wtpc, which was not granted. the letter of intent for the project’s current grant was submitted the same year and the wtpc project received funding in 2012. unlike some granting mechanisms, the funding for this project was released prior to the project obtaining ethics approval. this was essential in allowing us to develop strong and respectful research relationships with indigenous governing bodies and the communities. further, this funding was sufficient to support the iterative and collaborative nature of this project. we anticipated that the process of engaging governing bodies and then individual communities would take approximately six months, as this was the timeline that the canadian red cross followed to secure the agreements to deliver the ten steps program to indigenous communities. however, with the research part of the program, this process took 2 to 3 years. shelley cardinal of the canadian red cross visited each community once the community leadership had agreed in principle to participate in the ten steps program and its associated research. this visit was followed by numerous phone calls aiming to develop a partnership and research agreement and in some cases an additional visit to the community was required. these visits—to one urban and four remote communities—were funded from the research budget. in addition to the amount of time necessary to initiate research partnerships, delays in the project may have been related to some communities’ deep distrust of research and researchers. there were also delays caused by unexpected crises in the community. due to these significant delays, the funding organization withdrew one fifth of our funding, which had been allocated to knowledge mobilization during the last year of the project. 4. challenges with the ethics review process at the beginning of an indigenous community-based research project, difficulties can arise from the order of operations, developing consent forms with clear language, and indicating how contributions from community members will be used. to protect research participants, some funding agencies require ethics review prior to transferring funds and beginning to work with communities. for the initial application to a university reb, we needed to submit specific details of our planned engagement with communities, our methods, and the consent forms for the project. the initial consent form was a 11 riddell et al.: ethical research with indigenous communities published by scholarship@western, 2017 template and was submitted simply to satisfy the requirements of the application. since the communities with which we worked were full research partners, we subsequently co-constructed the consent forms with input from the communities’ leadership, research advisors, and community-based researchers. as the project unfolded, we continued to adapt the consent forms to reflect our ongoing learning about the community’s language, literacy, and cultural norms. consequently, we have submitted numerous amendments to the university reb, which required significant amounts of time and labour. furthermore, when creating our initial consent forms, it was challenging to balance two conflicting requirements. on the one hand, we were given requirements from our university that specified the information and wording that was required to receive reb approval. on the other hand, we had a responsibility to provide accessible, plain language explanations in the invitation to community members to participate in the research. part of that responsibility necessitated that our invitations were not excessively complex or legalistic. in particular, we wanted to ensure that our consent forms helped participants understand the nature of the research, how their contributions would be used, and the relative risks and benefits of their participation. we also wanted to ensure that participants understood all other aspects of free and informed consent without having to parse a lengthy or confusing, jargonfilled consent form. finally, we considered it essential to have resources available to translate the consent forms and other materials into each community’s traditional language. with the first community partnership, 10 researchers and research advisors helped shape the various iterations of the consent form. these individuals highlighted the shortcomings of the university-based descriptions of how the data would be used. rather than being concerned about the security of data storage (which was included in our original consent form), community members wanted to know how the knowledge they shared would be used. therefore, it was important for us to articulate how the knowledge would be both interpreted and shared by researchers. we explained this to potential participants in the following way: researchers working with indigenous communities often require multiple amendments to standard institutional ethics applications to reflect the process of co-creation with communities, which must be factored into consideration for research timelines. to support researchers during this process, we recommend that, in collaboration with indigenous communities, institutions, such as the tri-council, develop a standard initial consent form for research within indigenous communities with the expectation that it will be adapted once engagement with the community begins. in addition, we what will happen to the knowledge shared? the knowledge you share is going to be put together with other people’s knowledge. the research team will work together to find common themes from everyone’s answers. we will then return to your community to tell you about what we have found and ask for your help making meaning from these themes. the overall knowledge gathered in this project will be shared with many people who work with indigenous communities across canada. resources will be created to help with the canadian red cross and other community program development, the education of professionals, and to support respectful research and work within communities. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.6 recommend that federal funding agencies employ informed indigenous scholars who can provide guidance throughout this important and complex ethical process. the arm’s length perspective that externally employed indigenous scholars might bring to the discussion, alongside the multiple lenses that researchers and community members bring, could greatly assist the ethical considerations within the project. 5. balancing community and individual interests and rights at the beginning of our research process, initial conversations with each community included discussions about rights and responsibilities around data stewardship and use. while researchers and communities both share responsibility for data produced by a research project, all parties need to consider participants’ rights to confidentiality. thus, the consent form is an agreement that the community and researchers must follow with respect to the storage and sharing of confidential information. both research partners are accountable to participants for the terms of consent that are accepted either in writing or verbally. in our consent forms, we outlined the following rights and responsibilities of participants, communities, and researchers: • participants who consent have the right to choose to remain anonymous or to be credited for their perspectives and knowledge. • participants must have the option to choose whether to grant their community permission to use their data only for the specific project or for future research projects as well. • the consent form should indicate the researchers’ responsibility to destroy the original data in a specified number of years. • with participants’ consent, the community may keep the original data indefinitely. • figure 1 provides an example of the form detailing the levels of participant consent. based on each participant’s choices on the consent form, the research team created a corresponding dataset for partner communities. that is, the community is given a copy of the data without identifying information for participants who want to remain anonymous and with clear identification of those who consent for their data to be used in future projects. in our consent form, we specified that the data will be kept for 7 years by the research team; however, each community can decide how long to keep their copies of the data (with participants’ agreement). 13 riddell et al.: ethical research with indigenous communities published by scholarship@western, 2017 figure 1. example of participant consent questions. conclusion the numerous ethical guidelines for conducting research with indigenous peoples highlight the complexities of such research processes and the critical role of communities in shaping every aspect of indigenous community-based research. the four main guidelines we used (tri-council, ocap®, usai, and inuit-specific) emphasize that all research needs to benefit and support communities and that communities co-own all data collected through research. one challenge of ethically conducting research with indigenous communities is that there is scant literature available to inform the process of making ethical principles directly actionable. as such, we have written this article with aim to begin a conversation with other researchers, community members, rebs, and granting agencies. in addition, we offer recommendations to support co-created research with communities, to address their questions, and to address their concerns. based on the challenges we faced conducting this project, we have four main recommendations for how to support those conducting research in partnership with indigenous communities. first, we recommend that funding agencies employ indigenous advisors at the federal, provincial, and/or territorial levels to guide researchers in their efforts to acquire cultural competence. these advisors may provide arm’s length perspectives on the multiple outlooks that researchers and community members bring to the ethical considerations within projects. second, we recommend that a federal agency—such as the tri-council—in collaboration with indigenous communities, develop a standard initial consent form for research within indigenous communities. this initial consent form should then be adapted once researchers begin to engage with communities. would you like to participate in the project? □ gave approval □ declined invitation audio-recording i agree to be audio-recorded yes □ no □ i agree for my audio-recordings (which can identify me) to be included in what is shared with my community yes □ no □ confidentiality (please choose one statement) □ i agree to be identified by name/be credited in writings and/or presentations or □ i prefer not to be identified by name, please use_______________________ or □ i prefer to be identified as “community member” and a code chosen by the team. future use of what you share today: i consent to the use of the knowledge i shared today in future research: yes □ no □ i consent to be contacted again if the knowledge i shared today is requested for use in future research: yes □ no □ 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.6 third, we recommend that there be active and consistent participation of indigenous community members and researchers on rebs and grant review committees. members of indigenous ethics boards and review committees could assist with any necessary overhauls and/or rewritings of institutional ethics applications and review processes so as to better serve indigenous communities. for situations in which it is not possible to have the constant presence of community members or indigenous researchers on boards or review committees, we recommend including an indigenous ombudsperson, advocate, or consultant who can advise on decisions related to research with indigenous communities. in addition, we believe that institutions, such as universities, must respect any decisions made by indigenous governing organizations to ensure protection and self-determination. fourth, we believe that it would be helpful for a federal granting agency—such as the tri-council—to collaborate with indigenous leaders and develop workshops for individuals conducting joint universityindigenous community projects. given that the tri-council already has an online ethics tutorial, the agency could create additional online workshops specific to co-creating research with indigenous communities. we suggest that researchers, university reb members, grant review panelists, and indigenous community members could participate in these workshops to further develop their abilities to navigate ethical guidelines for co-creating research. these workshops could form the foundation of our understanding of ethical research relationships by including case studies or examples of how the tricouncil principles and the relevant guidelines created by indigenous organizations and governing bodies can be applied. to this end, we have created a list of seven topics that might be included in these workshops. this list has been informed by our experiences applying relevant ethical principles and engaging with partner communities during the research process. organized in order of the research process, these topics include guidelines for researchers to educate themselves on: a. the traditions, protocols, and norms of potential partner communities, b. the exploitive and violent history of research with indigenous communities and how to discuss research values at the beginning of a project, c. how to form initial agreements for the collaborative research project, d. the nature of co-creation or collaborative research relationships and how to engage in this process, e. how to co-create consent forms, f. how to make meaning of research findings based on the community’s interpretation of the findings, and g. how to establish agreements about how to best share research findings. writing this article has given us the opportunity to analyze the points of intersection between diverse ethical frameworks. our intentions in writing this article were to support other researchers and decision makers in their efforts to apply ethical principles to their everyday decisions in research processes with 15 riddell et al.: ethical research with indigenous communities published by scholarship@western, 2017 indigenous communities. we see this work as an incremental step toward improving ethical research practices for working with indigenous communities. we look forward to the contributions of other researchers to this discussion regarding how to make such ethical principles actionable, common, and widely adopted. we are deeply grateful to our partner communities for showing us both the gaps in our understandings and what we needed to consider in order to do our work in a better way. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.6 references absolon, k. 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(2008). research is ceremony: indigenous research methods. halifax, n. s.: fernwood. 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.6 the international indigenous policy journal april 2017 laying the groundwork: a practical guide for ethical research with indigenous communities julia k. riddell angela salamanca debra j. pepler shelley cardinal onowa mcivor recommended citation laying the groundwork: a practical guide for ethical research with indigenous communities abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license laying the groundwork: a practical guide for ethical research with indigenous communities cultural continuity as a determinant of indigenous peoples’ health: a metasynthesis of qualitative research in canada and the united states the international indigenous policy journal volume 7 issue 4 social determinants of indigenous well-being : building a more complete understanding article 3 october 2016 cultural continuity as a determinant of indigenous peoples’ health: a metasynthesis of qualitative research in canada and the united states monique d. auger simon fraser university, moniquea@sfu.ca recommended citation auger, m. d. (2016). cultural continuity as a determinant of indigenous peoples’ health: a metasynthesis of qualitative research in canada and the united states. the international indigenous policy journal, 7(4). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.4.3 cultural continuity as a determinant of indigenous peoples’ health: a metasynthesis of qualitative research in canada and the united states abstract as a strengths-based alternative to western notions of enculturation and acculturation theory, cultural continuity describes the integration of people within their culture and the methods through which traditional knowledge is maintained and transmitted. through reviewing relevant, original research with indigenous peoples in canada and the united states, the purpose of this metasynthesis is to describe and interpret qualitative research relating to cultural continuity for indigenous peoples in north america. this metasynthesis was conducted through the selection, appraisal, and synthesis of 11 qualitative studies. across the selected studies, five key themes arose: the connection between cultural continuity and health and wellbeing, conceptualizations of cultural continuity and connectedness, the role of knowledge transmission, journeys of cultural (dis)continuity, and barriers to cultural continuity. keywords cultural continuity, cultural connectedness, indigenous peoples, social determinant of health, health and wellbeing creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ c u l t u ra l c o n t i n u i t y a s a d e t e rm i n a n t o f i n d i g e n o u s pe o p l e s ’ h e a l t h : a m e t a s y n t h e s i s o f q u a l i t a t i v e r e s e a rc h i n c a n a d a a n d t h e u n i t e d s t a t e s numerous research studies have identified culturally specific risk and protective factors for health through quantitatively examining the effects of culture, historic trauma, and various health outcomes within indigenous communities in north america (currie et al., 2011; walters & simoni, 2002; whitbeck, chen, hoyt, & adams, 2004). while these studies, which rely on validated quantitative scales built around enculturation and acculturation theory,1 have been instrumental in building an understanding of indigenous resiliency as a protective factor that offsets the impacts of historical trauma, oppression, and discrimination (tousignant & sioui, 2009; whitbeck et al., 2004), few studies have sought to contextualize the meaning of these social constructs from community-based perspectives. alternatively, cultural continuity and cultural connectedness are emerging areas within indigenous health research. in their research, snowshoe, crooks, tremblay, craig, and hinson (2014) defined cultural connectedness as “the extent to which a fn [first nations] youth is integrated within his or her fn culture” (p. 249). this construct is measured by survey items within three dimensions: identity, traditional and cultural activities, and spirituality. cultural continuity, which has also been increasingly conceptualized within indigenous health research (greenwood & de leeuw, 2012; kirmayer, tait, & simpson, 2009; loppie reading & wien, 2009), builds on cultural connectedness to emphasize the importance of “intergenerational cultural connectedness, which is maintained through intact families and the engagement of elders, who pass traditions to subsequent generations” (loppie reading & wien, 2009, p. 18). cultural continuity also situates culture as being dynamic through the maintenance of collective memory, which may change over time (larocque, 2011). within the larger body of indigenous health research, there is a lack of shared understanding or common conceptualization of cultural continuity. the recent shift from acculturation to enculturation within research has been an important step in recognizing both indigenous resilience and the systemic impacts of colonialism (weinreich, 2009; zimmerman, ramirez-valles, washienko, walter, & dyer, 1996). however, there is also a need to find common ground between enculturation theory and alternative constructs, such as cultural connectedness and continuity, which have been supported by indigenous communities (snowshoe et al., 2014). further, there are well-cited examples that provide alternative understandings to cultural continuity as a determinant of health. for example, chandler and lalonde (1998) have produced a body of research under the umbrella of “cultural continuity” and their work is highly revered. their research examines the correlation between six “markers of cultural rehabilitation” and youth suicide rates in bc first nations communities. the independent variables examined in this research included community involvement in land claims processes (i.e., securing aboriginal title), involvement in self-government, control of police and fire services, establishment of local cultural facilities, youth attendance in band-administered schools, and control over health services (chandler & lalonde, 1998). chandler and lalonde found that the presence of each variable in communities was associated with lower rates of suicide. while chandler and lalonde’s research is undoubtedly important, and provides insight into the importance of self-determination in community health and well-being, it does not actually measure cultural continuity; rather, they examine the impact of community control and local administration on first nations youth suicide rates. among the critiques of this work, 1enculturation refers to the degree to which an individual is connected or integrated within his or her culture. conversely, acculturation is the extent to which a person has assimilated into a “dominant” culture (fleming & ledogar, 2008). 1 auger: cultural continuity and indigenous peoples’ health published by scholarship@western, 2016 kirmayer and colleagues (2009) noted, “the involvement of aboriginal people in contemporary institutions like municipal government or formal school systems can hardly be viewed as cultural traditionalism” (p. 19). they also highlighted protective factors that have been overlooked in past research, specifically citing the role that self-esteem, community organization, and youth leadership can play in improving mental health for first nations youth. more recently, snowshoe and colleagues (2014) demonstrated that cultural connectedness is associated with pro-social behaviours, increased engagement in school and community, and lower rates of substance abuse among first nations high school students in saskatchewan and southern ontario. cultural continuity has also been identified as a social determinant of health2 for indigenous peoples in canada, with the development of explanatory models for proximal, intermediate, and distal determinants (greenwood & de leeuw, 2012; loppie reading & wien, 2009). however, few research studies have sought to build on this understanding through working with indigenous communities. the aim of this metasynthesis is to describe and interpret qualitative research relating to cultural continuity for indigenous peoples in north america. this review of relevant, original research concerning indigenous peoples in canada and the united states will (a) position cultural continuity within a framework that considers social determinants of health, and (b) aim to understand the gaps in conceptualizing cultural continuity, while respecting diversity across indigenous nations. m e t h o d s r a t i o n a l e f o r c o n d u c t i n g a q u a l i t a t i v e m e t a s y n t h e s i s qualitative research requires that the researcher become deeply immersed in the research field, usually a naturalistic setting, to ensure that the research question is explored in depth (crouch & mckenzie, 2006). this research design often allows researchers to form close relationships with the research participants, or the larger community. these relationships are often of great benefit to both the participants and the researcher, as they can facilitate bilateral knowledge translation. moreover, within the area of indigenous health research, it is widely accepted that these designs are “more conducive to a holistic worldview and oral tradition . . . add[ing] fluidity and flexibility to the research process and utilizes the art of traditional storytelling” (struthers, 2001, pp. 129-130). in this same sense, open-ended questions encourage the development of rich data and allows for the researcher to be responsive to participant cues, which can broaden the scope of the data (crouch & mckenzie, 2006). in this way, qualitative research plays an integral role in understanding cultural continuity as a determinant of indigenous peoples’ health. in building on the value of qualitative research, a metasynthesis was chosen as the most appropriate way of summarizing the body of work that has been produced with respect to cultural continuity for indigenous peoples. starting in 1985, when qualitative metasyntheses were first utilized, they have aimed to develop and understand complex theories through interpreting and synthesizing a body of findings from qualitative studies (walsh & downe, 2004). in this way, the goal of metasynthesis is to create a product that both combines and interprets a number of works into a whole. 2 broadly, the social determinants of health are defined as the environments and circumstances that shape the health and wellness of individuals, families, and communities. this includes social and economic conditions, which are “shaped by the distribution of money, power and resources at the global, national and local levels” (greenwood & de leeuw, 2012, p. 381). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 4 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.4.3 t w o e y e d s e e i n g a s a c ri t i c a l l e n s as a métis woman, i have a clear and vested interest in indigenous conceptualizations of cultural continuity and i carry this passion throughout the research process. two-eyed seeing, which is an ontology and way of life that aims to bring together western and indigenous knowledge (iwama, marshall, marshall, & bartlett, 2009), was used throughout this research. this approach is used to honour both indigenous and western ontologies and methodologies, as well as to draw attention to the relational aspects of diverse understandings of complicated issues. in this way, this article aims to honour the teachings of elders albert and murdena marshall by weaving back and forth between multiple forms of knowledge, with the goal of replacing a hierarchy of knowledge systems with a process of walking forward together (bartlett, marshall, & marshall, 2012). s e a rc h s t ra t e g y with the goal of understanding the meaning of cultural continuity for indigenous populations in canada and the united states, combinations of terms for the phenomenon and population were used (table 1). a cross-discipline approach was taken to review articles published from 1990 to 2016, through searching medline, psychinfo, social sciences full text, and open access theses and dissertations. a manual search was also conducted, using reference lists from included studies and their forward citations, in addition to hand-searching relevant research journal titles, online conference materials, and government report documents. s t u d y s e l e c t i o n a n d a p p ra i s a l the inclusion criteria included qualitative research studies, or a significant qualitative component within mixed methods; studies that address cultural continuity for indigenous peoples in canada and/or the united states; and articles that were published between january 1990 and january 2016. articles were excluded if they had a quantitative study design, did not include primary data collection (e.g., literature reviews, editorials, opinion articles), were non-english articles, or used a priori analytic categories (e.g., pre-developed indicators used in mixed method questionnaires). initially, each record title that arose in the search was reviewed for relevance by applying the inclusion and exclusion criteria. following this, abstracts were reviewed, and any records that were deemed relevant were read in full. articles that met the inclusion criteria were then critiqued for methodological rigour, using the critical appraisal skills programme (casp). the casp appraisal tool assesses the research aims, methodological approach, qualitative methods, ethical concerns, and findings (figure 1; casp, 2013). each of the 11 studies that were assessed for methodological rigour met at least nine of the ten casp criteria (table 2). for those that only met nine criteria (n = 7), this was due to a lack of discussion around the ethical issues in the research (n = 5) or the relationship between the researchers and participants (n = 2). while both of these components are important within qualitative studies, the overall quality of these seven studies was still deemed to be adequate for inclusion within this metasynthesis. in addition to assessing the overall rigour of the research articles, of considerable importance in this assessment was evidence of relationship building with community, in light of past mistakes that have been made by utilizing authoritative and non-collaborative research methodologies with indigenous communities (brant-castellano, 2004). 3 auger: cultural continuity and indigenous peoples’ health published by scholarship@western, 2016 t a b l e 1 . k e y s e a rc h t e rm s ph e n o m e n o n po p u l a t i o n cultural continuity cultural connectedness acculturation enculturation indigenous people aboriginal people first nations métis inuit native american american indian alaska native figure 1. c o m p o n e n t s o f t h e c a s p t o o l ( 2 0 1 3 ) . 1. clear, relevant, and important research purpose 2. appropriate methodology to address the purpose 3. appropriate research design 4. appropriate recruitment methods 5. justified and explicitly stated data collection methods 6. critically examined relationships between research and participants 7. ethical issues are considered 8. rigour in data analysis 9. clear presentation of results 10. overall value of the research 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 4 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.4.3 table 2. appraisal of qualitative research studies based on casp criteria (casp, 2013) article research purpose methodology research design recruitment data collection relationships ethical issues data analysis results overall value brunanski, 2009 yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes drywater-whitekiller, 2006 yes yes yes yes yes yes no yes yes yes flynn, olson, & yellig, 2014 yes yes yes yes yes yes no yes yes yes hunter, logan, goulet, & barton, 2006 yes yes yes yes yes no yes yes yes yes iwasaki, bartlett, & o’neil, 2005 yes yes yes yes yes no yes yes yes yes long & curry, 1998 yes yes yes yes yes yes no yes yes yes lucero, 2010 yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes lucero, 2014 yes yes yes yes yes yes no yes yes yes oster, grier, lightning, mayan, & toth, 2014 yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes smith, varcoe, & edwards, 2005 yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes wexler, 2014 yes yes yes yes yes yes no yes yes yes 5 auger: cultural continuity and indigenous peoples’ health published by scholarship@western, 2016 d a t a a n a l y s i s a n d s y n t h e s i s a p p ro a c h the analysis was conducted through multiple reads of the selected research studies with attention to the context and themes that arose across the studies. each study was thematically analyzed using a contentdriven codebook. studies were re-read multiple times and re-coded when necessary, using the constant comparative method (sapsford & jupp, 2006), involving the continual clarifications of the data, the assigned codes, and the overarching themes. despite this process of compartmentalization, attention was paid to the context in which each of the findings is presented (e.g., the populations involved, settings and methods used), through the creation of multiple tables to provide context for each of the studies included. methodological information was added to table 3, while rough notes on themes and concepts, as well as quotes, were added to a second table. in a review of common themes across all of the selected studies, table 4 was created. further, an audit trail of explanatory notes was recorded with respect to decision-making for screened studies that were not included. r e s u l t s s e a rc h r e s u l t s figure 2 depicts the process of article identification, screening, and inclusion, with the number of articles that were maintained throughout each of these steps. the initial database search revealed a total of 771 records across four databases. after screening the articles by title and abstract, 26 were identified that met the inclusion criteria. a deeper read excluded half of these records, as they did not fully meet the relevancy criteria with respect to addressing cultural continuity. of these articles, two were excluded based on the critical methodological assessment. although a second search was manually conducted and initially revealed 32 records, none of these articles passed the screening stage. this process led to a total 11 articles for inclusion in this metasynthesis. s t u d y c h a ra c t e ri s t i c s a matrix summarizing the study characteristics for each of the 11 articles (table 3) includes each citation, country, participant characteristics, inclusion criteria, research design, methods, and discipline. the studies were conducted between 1998 and 2015, within different disciplines, including health sciences (n = 3), social work (n = 3), nursing (n = 3), and psychology (n = 2). nearly equal, six of the studies were conducted in the united states and five were conducted in canada. while many of the articles specified the specific nations or tribal affiliations with which participants identified, all of the articles worked with a diverse sample where multiple groups are represented. sample sizes ranged from 4 to 57 participants, with a range of subgroups, including youth, adults, and elders. as a key inclusion criterion, nearly all of the studies were solely qualitative, while one study included a formative qualitative step as part of a mixed methods design. when further specified, qualitative study designs included phenomenology (n = 2), ethnography (n = 2), participatory action research (n = 2), grounded theory (n = 1), narrative inquiry (n = 1), qualitative description (n = 1). all of the studies used types of purposive sampling approaches. data collection methods included interviews (e.g., exploratory, open-ended, semi-structured, or structured) and focus groups. typically, data was analyzed thematically using software (e.g., nvivo, atlas.ti, ethnograph) or understood through narrative analysis, and studies commonly used a number of rigour checks, including member checking, journaling, and critical reflexivity. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 4 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.4.3 table 3. matrix of included research records article country participants inclusion criteria study design methods discipline (1) brunanski, 2009 canada 4 participants; youth (aged 1824); first nations women; previously street involved 1. qualitative study 2. aboriginal people in canada 3. cultural connectedness narrative inquiry purposive sampling through agency partnerships; in-depth, conversational interviews; narrative analysis (story-telling) psychology (2) drywaterwhitekiller, 2006 usa 19 participants (11 females, 8 males); native american 4th year undergraduate students 1. qualitative study 2. native american 3. enculturation ethnography criterion-based and snowball sampling; one-on-one structured interviews; personcentred, narrative analysis social work (3) flynn, olson, & yellig, 2014 usa 42 participants (18 men, 24 women), including american indian university students (n = 25) and their family members (n = 12), and administrators (n = 5) 1. qualitative study 2. american indian 3. acculturation grounded theory criterion-based and snowball sampling; interviews and focus groups, with presentation of digital photos (i.e., artifacts); grounded theory analysis; “trustworthiness procedures” (e.g., reflexivity, journaling, member checking) psychology (4) hunter, logan, goulet, & barton, 2006 canada 8 participants (3 men and 5 women); first nations people in an urban area who access the health centre 1. qualitative study 2. aboriginal people in canada 3. assimilation ethnography convenience sampling; individual, semistructured interviews; thematic analysis concurrent with data collection, conducted until saturation; various credibility checks nursing (5) iwasaki, bartlett, & o’neil, 2005 canada 26 participants living with diabetes: first nations men (n = 9) and women (n = 8), and métis women (n = 9) 1. qualitative study 2. aboriginal people in canada 3. enculturation qualitative study with a phenomenological analysis framework voluntary sampling; 3 focus groups; team approach to thematic analysis using a phenomenological analytics framework, participants validated data interpretations health sciences (6) long & curry, 1998 usa 57 participants; native american elders (n = 22) and young women (n = 35) 1. qualitative study 2. native american 3. acculturation qualitative; exploratory snowball sampling; focus groups, field notes, and journals; all data coded using ethnograph software; member checking nursing (7) lucero, 2010 usa 7 participants (2 men and 5 women); american indian adults who have lived in an urban area since childhood 1. qualitative study 2. american indians 3. cultural connectedness descriptive phenomenology purposive sampling for maximum variation; open-ended interviews to elicit personal narratives; phenomenological data analysis social work (continued) 7 auger: cultural continuity and indigenous peoples’ health published by scholarship@western, 2016 table 3. matrix of included research records (continued) (8) lucero, 2014 usa 14 participants, members of 5 families; american indian adult women living in an urban area 1. qualitative study 2. american indians 3. cultural connectedness descriptive phenomenology purposive sampling; conversational interviews; phenomenological data analysis; narrative synthesis social work (9) oster, grier, lightning, mayan, & toth, 2014 canada 10 participants; first nations band council leadership (past and present) 1. mixed methods study (qualitative component) 2. first nations peoples 3. cultural continuity mixed methods – with formative “qualitative description” purposive sampling; semi-structured interviews; thematic analysis using atlas.ti; reflexivity and rigour checks health sciences (10) smith, varcoe, & edwards, 2005 canada 16 participants; communitybased stakeholders for aboriginal prenatal and parenting services 1. qualitative study 2. aboriginal people in canada 3. cultural continuity participatory research; case study design; critical postcolonial lens snowball sampling; exploratory interviews and small group discussions; thematic analysis using nvivo; critical reflexivity nursing (11) wexler, 2014 usa 25 participants; inupiaq elders (n = 7), adults (n = 7), and youth (n = 11) 1. qualitative study 2. alaska natives 3. enculturation community-based participatory research; intergenerational dialogue exchange and action purposive sampling, youth co-researchers helped to recruit adults and elders; both interviews and focus groups; thematic analysis using nvivo health sciences 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 4 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.4.3 figure 2. s t u d y s e l e c t i o n a n d a p p ra i s a l p ro c e s s . records identified through databases (n = 771) including: • medline (pubmed) (n = 524) • social sciences full text (n = 119) • psychinfo (n = 77) • open access theses and dissertations (n = 51) of the 771 articles originally identified, 26 met the inclusion criteria records were then screened more deeply for relevance and 14 were excluded. following this, 1 record was excluded based on its use of a priori analytic categories a manual search recovered 32 records, but none met the criteria for inclusion. the manual search included the reference lists of screened papers, a forward citation search, and a search of the grey literature. a total of 11 articles were included in the metasynthesis id en tif ic at io n sc re en in g m an ua l s ea rc h in cl us io n 9 auger: cultural continuity and indigenous peoples’ health published by scholarship@western, 2016 participant groups were primarily made up of american indian or native american (n = 5), or first nations people (n = 4). one study was conducted in alaska with inupiaq participants and another study included a sub-group of métis participants (in addition to first nations participants). finally, one study took a pan-aboriginal approach and did not further identify participants by nation. t h e m e s t h a t a ro s e f ro m t h e a n a l y s i s the analysis to distil key themes and subthemes from each of the 11 original articles led to five overarching themes (table 4). the first theme suggests that cultural continuity is interconnected to health and wellness for indigenous populations, as a number of health and wellness outcomes arose across nine of the reviewed papers. the second theme involves conceptualizations of cultural connectedness and continuity, which nine of the papers addressed. the topic of knowledge transmission also arose many times across eight of the papers as an integral component of cultural continuity, and is discussed as the third theme. participants’ narratives also commonly spoke to experiences with both cultural continuity and disconnection—this theme arose across seven of the papers reviewed. the final theme that arose was barriers to cultural continuity, which were discussed in six of the reviewed papers. these themes are described in more detail in the sections to follow. h e a l t h a n d w e l l n e s s o u t c o m e s . nearly all of the reviewed papers found that there were health and wellness outcomes connected to cultural continuity for indigenous peoples. most commonly, wellness outcomes were associated with a sense of cultural identity (i.e., being proud of who you are), a positive identity, and strong self-esteem (brunanski, 2009; drywater-whitekiller, 2006; lucero, 2010; oster et al., 2014; smith et al., 2005; wexler, 2014). wexler (2014) positioned this concept through a life course3 perspective: cultural understandings, including those related to historical trauma and current strengths, can provide platforms for mutual affinity and shared meaning-making. these perspectives inform ideas of selfhood, and can define youth pathways into adulthood. this orientation can provide a sense of self-worth, social belonging, and purpose to help youth overcome challenges. (p. 86) the research reviewed also discussed increased senses of community, belonging, and social purpose as outcomes of being connected to culture (drywater-whitekiller, 2006; iwasaki et al., 2005; lucero, 2010; wexler, 2014). specifically, wexler (2014) discussed youth outcomes in this way: “having a strong sense of identity was seen as essential for youth well-being . . . [it] gives a sense of pride and belonging, but also provides a vantage point to take action and move into the future” (p. 83). cultural continuity was also described as an integral component in participants’ healing journeys from their past experiences and from trauma (brunanski, 2009; iwasaki et al., 2005; lucero, 2010; smith et al., 2005). additionally, empowerment arose as a wellness outcome across papers. related to this, increased resistance to colonialism was also discussed (lucero, 2014; wexler, 2014). as lucero (2014) noted, practicing “spirituality [was] a way of resisting assimilation and cultural dislocation” (p. 15). 3 a life course perspective contextualizes an individual’s experiences within the structural, historical, and cultural contexts that impact that person across the different stages of their development (i.e., gestation through death) (loppie reading & wien, 2009). 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 4 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.4.3 t a b l e 4 . t h e m e s a n d s u b t h e m e s t h a t a ro s e f ro m t h e m e t a s y n t h e s i s derived analytic themes and subthemes paper representation (# as listed in table 1) health and wellness outcomes (n = 27) cultural pride, esteem, and strong sense of identity 1, 2, 7, 9, 10, 11 healing from past experiences or trauma 1, 5, 7, 10 a sense of community, belonging, social purpose 2, 5, 7, 11 empowerment 4, 5, 11 healthy and strong communities and families 9, 10, 11 helps to cope with stress, grief, and loss 4, 5 holistic health and balance 4, 9 increased resistance to colonialism 8, 11 linked to diabetes, cancer, heart disease, oral health, stds, addictions and alcoholism, and mental health 9 components of cultural connectedness and continuity (n = 16) practicing spirituality and ceremonies 1, 3, 4, 7, 8 respect (e.g., culture, elders) 2, 9 connection can be seen as relationships between other members of community (in an urban sense as well) 3, 8 relational (social, behavioural elements) 3, 8 holism (e.g., connection to earth, interconnectedness with language) 3, 9 attending cultural events, participating in activities 5, 8 importance of traditional healing practices (western practices not effective) 3 connection to home 11 (continued) 11 auger: cultural continuity and indigenous peoples’ health published by scholarship@western, 2016 t a b l e 4 . t h e m e s a n d s u b t h e m e s t h a t a ro s e f ro m t h e m e t a s y n t h e s i s (continued) derived analytic themes and subthemes paper representation (# as listed in table 1) knowledge transmission (n = 16) importance of passing on knowledge inter-generationally (e.g., teaching youth) 4, 5, 6, 9, 11 influence of elders, grandparents, and teachers in sharing knowledge 1, 2, 4, 6 sharing knowledge of history and traditions with others in general 1, 8 death of elders as a challenge in knowledge transmission 2, 6 a sense of being part of intergenerational cycles, self-positioning as “cultural bearers” 2, 11 responsibility for passing on culture and knowledge to future generations 2 shared by modeling behaviours 4 journeys of cultural (dis)continuity (n = 10) making a conscious choice to re-connect with community and identity 1, 4, 7 forgiveness 10, 11 childhood experiences of “othering” and cultural disconnection 1, 7 walking in two worlds —balance in navigating indigenous and western society 2, 3 making conscious efforts to incorporate traditional teachings into everyday life 2, 3 continual process, personal journey 4 barriers to cultural continuity (n = 8) historical trauma (e.g., assimilative policies, residential schools, etc.) 4, 6, 9 pressures or institutions that impose acculturation (e.g., postsecondary) 3, 9 discrimination, ignorance, micro-aggressions 3, 9 lack of funding for cultural programming and services 9 youth apathy (as described by youth) 11 toxicity in home community damages connections 3 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 4 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.4.3 direct connection to specific health outcomes were discussed less commonly, but were prominent topics in three papers. in these cases, health outcomes included holistic health and balance (hunter et al. 2006; oster et al., 2014), and increased coping skills for managing stress and grief (hunter et al., 2006; iwasaki et al., 2005). oster and colleagues (2014) also illustrated the positive impact that cultural continuity has with respect to specific health issues (e.g., diabetes, cancer, heart disease, sexual health, mental health, and addictions). c o m p o n e n t s o f c u l t u ra l c o n n e c t e d n e s s a n d c o n t i n u i t y . findings from the reviewed papers commonly included a discussion of cultural connectedness and continuity. in conceptualizing these phenomena, the findings often emphasized the importance of practicing spirituality and ceremonies (brunanski, 2009; flynn et al., 2014; hunter et al., 2006; lucero, 2010; lucero, 2014). for instance, brunanski (2009) spoke about the importance of healing ceremonies, such as yuwipi ceremonies, sweat lodge ceremonies, and smudging, which resonated for the first nations women with which she spoke. ceremony is one aspect of traditional healing, which promotes holistic health and balance. similarly, some studies also cited that attending cultural events and participating in activities were important aspects of cultural continuity (iwasaki et al., 2005; lucero, 2014). in one study, métis women spoke about the important role that activities, such as group projects in métis history and genealogy, and participation in craftwork, have in their coping and healing (iwasaki et al., 2005). these examples demonstrate the importance of traditional healing practices as a significant aspect of cultural continuity, particularly as western healthcare methods may be ineffective in some cases (flynn et al., 2014). more broadly, the concept of holism (flynn et al., 2014; oster et al., 2014) was described with respect to an innate connection with the earth and the interconnectedness of language and culture. in a more detailed description, first nations leaders defined culture as being inclusive of “traditions, values, knowledge, hunting and trapping, living off the land, traditional food, medicines, games, sweats, spirituality, ceremonies, celebration, praying and language” (oster et al., 2014, “conceptualizing cultural continuity”, para. 1). the value of respect, including respect for elders and respect for culture, was also discussed in the literature (drywater-whitekiller, 2006; oster et al., 2014). connection was also described in terms of the relationships between members of the community, a component in both urban and reserve communities (flynn et al., 2014; lucero, 2014). in this sense, lucero noted, “it was common for participants to refer to their relationships to, and social interactions with, other american indians as their ‘connection’” (p. 16), while a study of acculturation for native american students more broadly spoke to the importance of family support and community connection for students living away from home (flynn et al., 2014). cultural continuity was also described as a relational phenomenon, with social, intellectual, and behavioural elements (flynn et al., 2014; lucero, 2014). k n o w l e d g e t ra n s m i s s i o n . in the reviewed papers, the transmission of knowledge was commonly described as an integral component of cultural continuity; more specifically, the topic of intergenerational knowledge transmission arose (hunter et al., 2006; iwasaki et al., 2005; long & curry, 1998; oster et al., 2014; wexler, 2014). for example, teaching youth was described as an important part of “cultural rehabilitation” (oster et al., 2014) and, more broadly, “the intergenerational transmission or ‘passing down’ of cultural wisdom about beliefs and practices among native american women was recognized as an important strength among native american women” (long & curry, 1998, p. 213). 13 auger: cultural continuity and indigenous peoples’ health published by scholarship@western, 2016 the influence of elders, grandparents, and teachers in sharing traditional knowledge was also a frequent subtheme (brunanski, 2009; drywater-whitekiller, 2006; hunter et al., 2006; long & curry, 1998). for example, hunter et al. (2006) found that “relating, sharing, and learning in the circle of life were accomplished with the help of counselors and elders . . . guides to the knowledge” (p. 18). participants spoke about growing up and hearing about traditional ways and forming their cultural identities through sharing knowledge of the language, traditional songs, and traditional foods (drywater-whitekiller, 2006). related to the importance of elders and grandparents, the death of elders was discussed as a challenge in knowledge transmission (drywater-whitekiller, 2006; long & curry, 1998) and participants spoke about a sense of responsibility for passing on culture and knowledge to future generations and keeping traditions “alive” (drywater-whitekiller, 2006). in addition to passing on knowledge to future generations, several articles also discussed lateral knowledge transmission (brunanski, 2009; lucero, 2014), which occurs through the sharing of traditions with other members of one’s community. participants also spoke about being part of intergenerational cycles and understanding their role in passing on knowledge, as “adult narratives described coming to terms with the cultural oppression experienced by elders, and repositioning themselves as strong culture bearers” (wexler, 2014, p. 86). j o u rn e y s o f c u l t u ra l ( d i s ) c o n t i n u i t y . findings across the reviewed studies also provided narratives around journeys of cultural continuity and discontinuity. this included experiences of “othering” and cultural disconnection during childhood and adolescence (brunanski, 2009; lucero, 2010), which were coupled with emotional struggles of feeling lost, detached, and isolated, as well as attempts to reject indigenous culture and question cultural identity (lucero, 2010). participants also spoke about making a conscious choice to re-connect with their communities and identities (brunanski, 2009; hunter et al., 2006; lucero, 2010), where they made references to going home or “returning to the people” (lucero, 2010, p. 332). in a more general sense, cultural re-connection involved a process of “learning about traditional ceremonies and then by using ceremonies to understand and become a part of aboriginal culture” (hunter et al., 2006, p. 17). similar stories also included the role that forgiveness plays in connecting with culture, with respect to healing past trauma and as an aspect of cultural resilience (smith et al., 2005; wexler, 2014). the concept of “walking in two worlds” also arose as a metaphor for indigenous peoples’ journeys in balancing and navigating both western and traditional ontologies as well as making conscious efforts to incorporate traditional teachings into everyday life (drywater-whitekiller, 2006; flynn et al., 2014; oster et al., 2014). further, these journeys were also noted to be continual, self-directed, and specific to each individual (hunter et al., 2006). ba rri e rs t o c u l t u ra l c o n t i n u i t y . to a smaller extent, when compared to other common themes that arose across the literature, barriers to cultural continuity were also discussed. historical trauma was most commonly discussed as a challenge, which includes, but is not limited to, the negative impacts that assimilative policies and residential schools have had on indigenous communities (hunter et al., 2006; long & curry, 1998; oster et al., 2014). pressures and institutions that impose acculturation were also discussed (flynn et al., 2014; oster et al., 2014); this included a prominent study that described the predominantly white, non-inclusive post-secondary setting as an “acculturation gateway” (flynn et al., 2014, p. 286). challenges were also described as motivations to acculturate, which were rooted in toxicity in communities (e.g., alcoholism, gossip), as well as challenges with racism, ignorance, and microaggressions (flynn et al., 2014; oster et al., 2014). for example, this included negative stereotypes in society and the media, feelings of being invisible, and tokenism of indigenous students (flynn et al., 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 4 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.4.3 2014). additional barriers include a lack of funding for cultural programming and services (oster et al., 2014), and youth apathy toward cultural continuity (wexler, 2014). d i s c u s s i o n as a whole, the literature demonstrates that cultural continuity is associated with a number of health and wellness outcomes in indigenous communities, both in canada and the united states. in their proposed models of social determinants and indigenous peoples’ health, loppie reading and wien (2009), and greenwood and de leeuw (2012) position cultural continuity as an intermediate determinant of health, in that it provides a connection between the distal and proximal determinants of health. the reviewed studies align with this conceptualization in that cultural continuity was described as a phenomenon that shapes a number of proximal, or psychosocial, determinants, including self-esteem, cultural identity and pride (brunanski, 2009; drywater-whitekiller, 2006; lucero, 2010; oster et al., 2014; smith et al., 2005; wexler, 2014), and coping skills (hunter et al., 2006; iwasaki et al., 2005). this aligns with a larger body of research that speaks to the importance of enculturation as a psychological asset or protective factor (mcivor, napoleon, & dickie, 2009; whitbeck et al., 2004). distal determinants, or colonial forces, including assimilative policies and historical trauma from residential schools (hunter et al., 2006; long & curry, 1998; oster et al., 2014), as well as racism, discrimination, and microaggressions, also shape cultural continuity (flynn et al., 2014; oster et al., 2014). there is also a considerable amount of research that explores these pathways through the development of anthropological and sociological theory within the area of acculturation (keen, 2001). despite the common tendency to compartmentalize determinants of health and explore specific pathways to health, the findings from this metasynthesis demonstrate the interconnectedness of all social determinants of health (greenwood & de leeuw, 2012). this is consistent with related research in the field of indigenous health, including studies addressing canada’s colonial legacy (czyzewski, 2011; peters & self, 2005), and research that addresses the negative health impacts from racism and discrimination, ranging from microaggressions and historic trauma to systemic racism (paradies, 2016; senese & wilson, 2013; walters et al., 2011). colonization is often understood as a distal determinant of indigenous peoples’ health, which has had significant and pervasive impacts on indigenous peoples across canada (czyzewski, 2011; loppie reading & wien, 2009). while many aspects of colonization are framed in a historical context, it is important to note that colonization continues to place indigenous peoples within a bureaucratic framework that politically controls communities and devalues traditional forms of knowledge (alfred, 2009). alfred (2009) noted that the degradation of traditional knowledge and ongoing oppression of cultural identity has led to the creation of “colonial mentalities,” a term for the “mental state that blocks recognition of the existence or viability of traditional perspectives . . . prevent[ing] people from seeing beyond the conditions created by the white society to serve its own interests” (p. 94). further, paradies (2016) noted that colonial mentalities involve tolerance of historical trauma and ongoing oppression, and therefore have been connected to a number of mental health concerns (e.g., anxiety, low self-esteem, emotional distress). colonization has had profound effects on individual notions of identity, collective memory, and community cohesion (kirmayer et al., 2009), thus impacting cultural continuity for indigenous communities. despite these challenges, indigenous peoples have continually proven to be both resilient and resourceful (kirmayer, dandeneau, marshall, phillips, & williamson, 2011), and while resilience was only directly cited in two of the reviewed papers, there is a strong body of literature that demonstrates the critical role that cultural continuity plays in 15 auger: cultural continuity and indigenous peoples’ health published by scholarship@western, 2016 indigenous narratives of resilience (fleming & ledogar, 2008; tousignant & sioui, 2009). additionally, pearce and colleagues (2015) have moved beyond individualist, western measures of resilience, and demonstrate the integral role that traditional culture, spirituality, and language play as buffers to adversity, as “cultural resiliency.” cultural continuity was described as a dynamic concept, through participant narratives that contextualize cultural disconnection and reconnection as an ongoing journey (brunanski, 2009; flynn et al., 2014; hunter et al., 2006; lucero, 2010) that is highly personal to each individual (hunter et al., 2006). despite these characteristics, cultural continuity is also holistic: it encompasses individuals, families, and whole communities (flynn et al., 2014; lucero, 2014), as well as a connection to earth and language (flynn et al., 2014; oster et al., 2014). the selected literature defined community in different ways. for some, community was referred to when speaking of a defined space, such as participants’ reserve communities (wexler, 2014), and for others, particularly from an urban indigenous perspective, community meant a network of connections to family, friends, and other indigenous peoples in the city (flynn et al., 2014; lucero 2014). related to this, cultural continuity was often associated with a sense of community and belonging (drywater-whitekiller, 2006; iwasaki et al., 2005; lucero. 2010; wexler, 2014), which is interconnected with the health and wellness of both indigenous individuals and communities (goudreau, weber-pillwax, cote-meek, madill, & wilson, 2008; senese & wilson, 2013). the qualitative findings from this study also demonstrated that cultural continuity plays a role in maintaining healthy and strong communities and families (oster et al., 2014; smith et al., 2005; wexler, 2014), as well as being part of larger, intergenerational cycles (drywater-whitekiller, 2006; wexler, 2014). these outcomes move beyond the dominant body of quantitative research on enculturation as a buffer for adverse health outcomes, which has largely focused on individual-level indicators, such as stress (walters & simoni, 2002; wolsko, lardon, mohatt, & orr, 2007); alcohol and substance abuse (currie et al., 2011; fleming & ledogar, 2008; walters & simoni, 2002; whitbeck et al., 2004; wolsko et al., 2007; zimmerman et al., 1996); depressive symptoms (bals, turi, skre, & kvernmo, 2011; fleming & ledogar, 2008; walters & simoni, 2002; whitbeck, mcmorris, hoyt, stubben, & lafromboise, 2002); suicidal ideation (yoder, whitbeck, hoyt, & lafromboise, 2006); externalizing behaviours (bals et al., 2011; fleming & ledogar, 2008); and impacts of discrimination (whitbeck et al., 2002; whitbeck et al., 2004). in their research with the maori, houkamua, and sibley (2011) found that while increased enculturation was associated with both increased individual well-being and decreased community well-being; however, their study illustrates the complexity of community health and wellness within a context of ongoing oppression and colonialism. while the authors were unable to understand both individual and community wellness beyond the measures of life satisfaction and well-being (houkamua & sibley, 2011), their work represents an important step in moving beyond strict psychosocial models of cultural continuity. the findings from this metasynthesis suggest that conceptualizations of indigenous cultural continuity are much more nuanced and complex than what is offered by the mainstream definitions of enculturation. deductive approaches to operationalizing enculturation are often limited to these definitions, which look at the level to which an individual is connected to their cultural identity, traditional activities, and traditional spirituality (e.g., bals et al., 2011; fleming & ledogar, 2008; snowshoe et al., 2015). indigenous conceptualizations build on these components, both relationally and holistically, providing insight to both individual and community components and outcomes of cultural 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 4 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.4.3 continuity. further, knowledge transmission is a central component of maintaining and strengthening the inter-generational components of cultural continuity. traditional knowledge, which is made up of cultural values, lessons, and worldviews, has been transmitted inter-generationally as a way of connecting past and future generations, as well as strengthening connections between people and the land (smith, 1999). the transmission of traditional knowledge was a common theme across the reviewed papers, emphasizing the importance of sharing cultural practices, indigenous epistemologies, and oral traditions with future generations to maintain cultural continuity (hunter et al., 2006; iwasaki et al., 2005; long & curry, 1998; oster et al., 2014; wexler, 2014). similarly, larocque (2011) speaks about the importance of oral and written forms of communication in indigenous communities in the renewal and maintenance of cultural continuity and fluidity. the reviewed studies also highlight challenges that indigenous peoples have faced with respect to the maintenance, transmission, and practice of their culture. these challenges were often specific to single studies, which suggest the heterogeneity of barriers to cultural continuity. these diverse barriers and challenges include issues of youth apathy (wexler, 2014), toxicity in communities with respect to addiction and gossip (flynn et al., 2014), a lack of funding for cultural programming (oster et al., 2014), and acculturative pressures within western institutions (flynn et al., 2014; oster et al., 2014). while it is important to understand these barriers in an effort to improve policies and programs that recognize and enhance cultural continuity, it is promising that they arose as one of the less common crosscutting themes in this metasynthesis. the stronger focus on strengths-based interpretations of cultural continuity represents a shift away from deficit-based models of indigenous health and toward promoting community empowerment. additionally, despite the method of knowledge compartmentalization, through thematic analysis, these components of cultural continuity and connectedness cannot be interpreted individually. rather, they are understood to be relational and interconnected (mcguire, 2010). for example, while divided by subthemes, relationships with the land and language are inseparable from community cohesiveness, as mccormick (2000) stated, “connection to traditional aboriginal culture and values means that a person must become connected to extended family, community, the natural world, the spirit world, in essence, all of creation” (p. 28). as well, knowledge translation is not separate from other components of cultural connectedness and continuity. in this sense, while the division of themes by subthemes (table 3) puts forward an understanding of some of the individual components of cultural continuity and connectedness, it also creates an overly neat representation of these concepts. despite the limitations of the thematic analysis, this synthesis summarizes a small body of literature that represents the voices of indigenous peoples in canada and the united states. far too often, quantitative scales for enculturation and acculturation are put forth without a qualitative component that seeks to understand the meaning of these constructs from perspectives that are rooted in lived experience. for example, in working with maori peoples, te huia and liu (2012) came to a similar conclusion around the lack of indigenous voices in acculturation theory. when this research is put forward it masks the voices of indigenous peoples and can actually cause further harm; a key example of this is when acculturation theory is used to disprove indigenous title (ankler, 2004; keen, 2001). cultural continuity as a research program was co-opted by chandler and lalonde (1998), whose measures of community control (lacking any solid connection to culture) were based solely on archival research. despite new 17 auger: cultural continuity and indigenous peoples’ health published by scholarship@western, 2016 and emerging research on cultural continuity, given that this research was the first of its kind, it has been a primary source with widespread application.4 over the past few decades, numerous documents have encouraged the participation of indigenous communities in health research projects; however, “until very recently, aboriginal people were seldom invited to participate in health research beyond their role as data sources” (loppie, 2007, p. 278). helicopter research, as it is termed by vine deloria (1991), illustrates a common approach to research with indigenous communities, where researchers would swoop in as experts in health, history, and culture; they would promise benefits from their research to the communities that they were researching—yet, they would often leave the community and never return. this symbol for unethical research has been fulfilled throughout much of the work on acculturation theory, which has involved quantitative research on (rather than with) indigenous peoples. as a result, this research has produced deficiency-based models, programs, and policies, which are often rooted in the notion that indigenous peoples have poor health and lack the capacity to address health issues. despite a shift toward a strengths-based paradigm through the use of enculturation measures, much of this research still lacks indigenous involvement. to move forward, there is a need for increased community-based participatory action research; indigenous peoples understand the issues in their communities and should play an active role in designing the research projects, and translating them into program implementation, policy development, and social change. it is critical to produce culturally responsive research and policy, as greenwood (2006) noted, “non-aboriginal research, policy, and practice are too often applied— ineffectively—to aboriginal contexts. evidence-based public health in aboriginal communities should not be sought through a ‘one size fits all’ application of non-aboriginal research” (p. 67). the research reviewed in this metasynthesis represents a range of levels of engagement with indigenous peoples, where two of the studies explicitly used participatory methods (smith et al., 2005; wexler, 2014). while the use of participatory methods, compared to other qualitative approaches, did not appear to impact the quality or scope of the qualitative findings on cultural continuity, the benefits of meaningfully including indigenous peoples throughout research design, delivery, and implementation has been widely stated (loppie, 2007; smith, 1999). snowshoe and colleagues (2015) also demonstrated that community-based methods can be applied to quantitative research, given the integral role that indigenous voices played in shaping the development and appraisal of a culturally responsive, strengths-based scale to measure cultural connectedness. in using two-eyed seeing and mixed methods approaches, there are opportunities to strengthen community conceptualization of cultural continuity, which can inform and create empirical measurement of cultural continuity as a determinant of indigenous health. while this metasynthesis presents a broad overview of common themes in qualitative research on cultural continuity, it is integral to understand the diversity between indigenous nations throughout canada and the united states, where nations are culturally heterogeneous, with vast differences in language and cultural practices, as well as unique political, social, and economic structures (voyageur & calliou, 2000). however, many indigenous peoples do have shared worldviews and experiences with colonialism, which are interconnected with conceptualizations of cultural continuity. in this sense, it is 4 chandler and lalonde’s (1998) research around “cultural continuity” is often the sole reference used within mainstream documents that address the social determinants of health (e.g., csdh, 2008). 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 4 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.4.3 interesting to note that there were no noticeable differences in comparing the findings from research conducted with american indian populations and those conducted with first nations peoples in canada. overall, the research articles included in this synthesis presented an understanding of diversity across indigenous nations, through working with specific communities, identifying participants’ nations (to an extent where their identity was still protected), and avoiding creating pan-indigenous generalizations for cultural continuity. however, given the small body of qualitative research on the subject, it was not surprising that considerable gaps in the body of cultural continuity literature arose. the majority of research has focused on the perspectives of american indian people in the united states (drywater-whitekiller, 2006; flynn et al., 2014; long & curry, 1998; lucero, 2010; lucero, 2014) and first nations people in canada (brunanski, 2009; hunter et al., 2006; iwasaki et al., 2005; oster et al., 2014), demonstrating a clear need for increased community-based research with métis, inuit, and alaska native communities. l i m i t a t i o n s this metasynthesis was limited by the author’s inability to review studies in languages other than english. studies that were selected on the basis of their relevance and quality were given equal weight in the analysis of crosscutting themes; this is a potential limitation, given that the studies ranged in qualitative design and sample sizes, suggesting different levels of generalizability. further, there were a number of subthemes that arose in isolation, meaning that they are rooted in single research studies. however, noting that there were a total of only 11 research studies that met the inclusion criteria for this metasynthesis, the findings do not represent saturated themes. c o n c l u s i o n there is a small body of qualitative research that has sought to conceptualize cultural continuity for indigenous peoples in canada and the united states, yet this synthesis provides a formative understanding of its role a determinant of indigenous health. the findings across the synthesized research articles speak to the importance of cultural continuity in shaping positive health and wellness outcomes for indigenous peoples. it is also clear that intergenerational knowledge transmission is a central component of renewing and maintaining cultural continuity for indigenous peoples. increased research that explores community driven conceptualizations for cultural continuity can help to inform the development of culturally responsive quantitative scales and practical assessment tools, as well as effective health services and programming for indigenous communities. 19 auger: cultural continuity and indigenous peoples’ health published by scholarship@western, 2016 r e f e re n c e s alfred, t. 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(2006). suicidal ideation among american indian youths. archives of suicide research, 10, 177-190. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13811110600558240 zimmerman, m. a., ramirez-valles, j., washienko, k. m., walter, b., & dyer, s. (1996). the development of a measure of enculturation for native american youth. american journal of community psychology, 24(2), 295-310. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/bf02510403 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 4 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.4.3 the international indigenous policy journal october 2016 cultural continuity as a determinant of indigenous peoples’ health: a metasynthesis of qualitative research in canada and the united states monique d. auger recommended citation cultural continuity as a determinant of indigenous peoples’ health: a metasynthesis of qualitative research in canada and the united states abstract keywords creative commons license cultural continuity as a determinant of indigenous peoplesâ•ž health: a metasynthesis of qualitative research in canada and the united states ms#1452 baijius planningandreservations final.pdf the international indigenous policy journal volume 10|issue5 november 2019 planning around reserves: probing the inclusion of first nations in saskatchewan's watershed planning framework warrick baijius university of saskatchewan, warrick.baijius@usask.ca robert j. patrick university of saskatchewan, robert.patrick@usask.ca recommended citation baijius w., & patrick, r. j.(2019). planning around reserves: probing the inclusion of first nations in saskatchewan's watershed planning framework. the international indigenous policy journal, 10(5). doi: https://10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.8502 planning around reserves: probing the inclusion of first nations in saskatchewan's watershed planning framework abstract watershed-based planning in saskatchewan began in earnest after 2006 under the auspices of the saskatchewan watershed authority. within a decade, a dozen watershed plans were produced following a planning framework that included technical and watershed resident committees. first nation communities, or "reserves," exist within these watershed areas. this article probes the inclusion of first nations in those plans. using document analysis and keyword search, our analysis explores any spatial relationship that may exist between first nation inclusion and the amount of reserve land in a watershed. the results of this research show that first nation inclusion is limited in watershed planning in saskatchewan. we see opportunity for more effective watershed planning through greater collaboration with first nations. keywords watershed planning, first nations, indigenous, saskatchewan, canada acknowledgments funding for this research was provided from the canadian pacific railway partnership program in aboriginal development creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0license. baijius & patrick: planning around reserves published by scholarship@western, 2019 1 planning around reserves: probing the inclusion of first nations in saskatchewan's watershed planning framework the colonization of indigenous peoples in what is now canada became institutionalized through the federal government’s indian act of 1876. the indian act (1985) set out to control all aspects of indigenous people’s lives including, but not limited to, land occupation, resource access, education, cultural traditions and practices, religion, individual mobility, language, and the right to vote (see also arsenault, diver, mcgregor, witham, & bourassa, 2018; truth & reconciliation commission of canada, 2015). the federally controlled system of indian reserves, a creation of the indian act, served to concentrate and constrain indigenous people on “federal lands” with the purpose of severing indigenous peoples’ long-held relationship with the land—a relationship that included resource sharing, seasonal habitation and migration, as well as communal clan, or family, structures (arsenault et al., 2018). the broad powers of the indian act impacted the health of indigenous peoples in multiple ways, including through restricted movement of indigenous peoples outside of reserves, prohibition on cultural practices, and the imposition of european land management and planning practices. collectively, these impacts resulted in what has been termed today as cultural genocide (wolfe, 2006). one of the many outcomes of colonization was the creation of dependency on the state to provide for all aspects of indigenous life—from land use planning to housing and community infrastructure (mcgregor, 2014; patrick, machial, quinney, & quinney, 2017). the state system of indian reserves not only removed indigenous people from the landscape but also excluded them from state-based institutions of decision-making, such as community development and planning. colonialism and settlement also imposed an individualist notion of property and ownership on the landscape (krueckeberg, 1995), dividing it up into discrete parcels from which people and activities could be excluded. this contrasts with pre-settlement indigenous relations with the land, in which indigenous people belonged to and emerged from an ecological context, practising an ethic of sharing with humans and other-than-human beings (belanger, 2010). with colonialism, not only were indigenous peoples physically excluded from participating in resource management and other decision-making venues, but so too were their philosophies, knowledge, and laws excluded from defining “what is to be managed” (borrows, 2002; howitt & suchet-pearson, 2006; natcher, 2001). participation in resource management and planning evaluation of participation in resource management, planning, and governance can address process, final outcomes, and intermediary outcomes (carr, blöschl, & loucks, 2012), but the time scale of participation in planning and management may not be easily reconciled with the length of time it takes for the environment to respond to various interventions. similar issues of attribution are recognized when assessing indigenous inclusion in forestry management in canada (wyatt, merrill, & natcher, 2011). regardless of evaluation and attribution, it is evident that having meaningful and efficient engagement in planning and management, especially when aboriginal and treaty rights are involved, will require early and on-going participation of indigenous peoples (noble, 2016; udofia, noble, & poelzer, 2016). assessments of plans and processes for indigenous engagement are ongoing in the canadian forestry sector (fortier, wyatt, natcher, smith, & hébert, 2013; wyatt et al., 2011), but there is a notable lack of the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.8502 2 similar approaches being used for the assessment of watershed plans. in addition to that mentioned above, prior research into the participation and inclusion of indigenous peoples in canadian resource management consistently identifies social factors such as financial and capacity constraints (lebel & reed, 2010; morrison, bradford, & bharadwaj, 2015; rizvi, adamowski, & patrick, 2013; walters, spence, kuikman, & singh, 2012). it also identifies fundamental political or structural issues that lead to institutionalized inequity and injustice (basdeo & bharadwaj, 2013), and the differing perspectives of those involved in planning and management (ferreyra, de loë, & kreutzwiser, 2008; montgomery, xu, bjornlund, & edwards, 2016; morton, gunton, & day, 2012). other research has examined the impacts of land management and property classification on drinking water outcomes for on-reserve communities (baijius & patrick, 2019). often, researchers suggest that inclusion of indigenous peoples in water governance is more important than in water management (bradford, ovsenek, & bharadwaj, 2017; castleden, hart, cunsolo, harper, & martin, 2017), eschewing their potential role as citizen stakeholders within provincial processes (porten, loë, & plummer, 2015). although participation in state-based management and planning processes has some barriers and opportunities, as recognized in the literature cited above, it may be that a strategy of pragmatism that includes consensus, conflict, social protest, and participation is more effective than other approaches in isolation (borrows, 2005; hanna, langdon, & vanclay, 2016; maclean, robinson, & natcher, 2015; wanvik & caine, 2017). while participation in watershed planning by indigenous peoples can be part of a broader strategy, it may also be a reflection of shifting social norms regarding the recognition of the rights and responsibilities of indigenous peoples to the land and water, and to inclusion in governing how we relate to land and water (clogg, askew, kung, & smith, 2016). the purpose of this article is to examine the extent to which contemporary provincial watershed-scale planning processes in saskatchewan have engaged, and been inclusive of, indigenous peoples. we use the content of watershed plans as evidence of indigenous participation. to conduct this study, we completed a detailed analysis of existing watershed plans, tallied evidence of indigenous presence, and explored the thematic context of keywords within the plan document using manifest and latent content analysis.1 themes are identified inductively to provide insight into the issues, concerns, and interests recognized by the planning process that (potentially) result from indigenous engagement. as well, we explore any correlation that may exist between the content of watershed plans (keywords and thematic diversity) and the number and size of first nation reserves within the watershed. watershed planning in saskatchewan in 2002, the provincial government created the saskatchewan watershed authority with the goal of managing and protecting water quantity and source water quality in saskatchewan. to achieve this goal, a planning model was created, and responsibilities and roles were defined for three committees: watershed advisory committee, technical committee, and planning team (saskatchewan watershed 1 in some places throughout this article, we use the term indigenous inclusively to refer to individuals and groups who selfidentify as indigenous. we also use the terms aboriginal, first nations, or métis to refer to specific groups of indigenous peoples and communities as a legal entities created through the constitution acts (government of canada, 1982). baijius & patrick: planning around reserves published by scholarship@western, 2019 3 authority, 2003). under this model, a combination of 11 source water protection plans and watershed plans were produced between 2006 and 2014, all in the southern half of the province. in 2012, the saskatchewan watershed authority was renamed the water security agency and it released the 25 year saskatchewan water security plan—a document enabling both source water protection plans as well as comprehensive (water) plans (water security agency, 2012). in saskatchewan, watershed planning does not occur with the same frequency as, for example, forestry planning, nor is the same degree of engagement legislated. the lack of multiple iterations of watershed planning in saskatchewan makes it difficult to assess change in indigenous engagement within specific watersheds over time. however, it is possible to gain insight into how inclusion has changed over time and across space by way of manifest content analysis of plan documents (mcleod et al., 2015). the roles of space and place are significant in watershed planning and, by association, so is the notion of property, including tenure, zoning, and land use (blomley, 2016). water governance in the canadian prairies tends to privilege participation by way of property, especially in a rural context (cuvelier & greenfield, 2017; stewart & bennett, 2017). citizens of rural municipalities, often farmers or resource workers, are represented by their local elected officials, who advocate for the interests of their electorate and are paid by their taxes. these representatives, as well as those of industry associations who benefit from specific types of public and private land uses, are dominant voices for the “propertied” (hurlbert & andrews, 2018; krueckeberg, 1995). the articulation of concerns about on-reserve water issues becomes subject to federal action, bringing additional complexity into the ways in which first nations are included in water management and planning. the constitution act provides for the division of powers between the two recognized levels of government in canada, provincial and federal (government of canada, 1982; see also irvine, 2002). “lands reserved for the indians” (constitution act, 1867, s. 91(24)) as specified in the indian act (1985) are considered federal, and thus outside provincial jurisdiction. at the same time, jurisdiction over water is within the power of the individual provinces, except for water within federal jurisdiction, including those “lands reserved for the indians,” or reserve lands (bartlett, 1988). by implication, these lands and the watershed-based interests of those who live on “reserve” lands are not considered within the domain of provincial watershed planning. this jurisdictional divide potentially excludes first nations from provincial planning practices due to the partitioning of watershed planning according to political boundaries and property lines (patrick et al., 2017). with changing social norms (political recognition of difference, indigenous rights, innovations in epistemology and methodology, participatory governance) come increased expectations and desires to include indigenous peoples in watershed planning (mcgregor, 2014; patrick, 2014). however, without a strong structure of legislation and policy, as well as sufficient funding, the ability of planning to meaningfully engage with indigenous peoples on a nation-to-nation basis is limited (phare, 2009; simms, harris, joe, & bakker, 2016). considering watershed planning as a negotiation of interests amongst stakeholders in governance, we can expect to see representation of propertied interests (landowners, including private, public, and civil society environmental non-governmental organizations [engos] and corporations) in watershed the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.8502 4 planning processes. arguably, first nations are “represented” by the federal government, but this does not provide indigenous people a direct voice in matters of resource governance (cairns, 2000). methods in order to examine the extent to which the contemporary provincial watershed-scale planning processes in saskatchewan has engaged with, and been inclusive of, indigenous peoples, we reviewed published government of saskatchewan watershed plans for indigenous content. we employ manifest content analysis, tabulating the occurrence of keywords and identifying the context in which the keywords are used. the findings reveal a wide variation in the number of keywords present in the plans as well as the context in which they are used. the mere presence of specific keywords, such as first nation or indigenous, may not signify any form of meaningful engagement. however, through manifest content analysis, the context in which these keywords are present may provide greater insight into the extent of indigenous engagement and inclusion in provincial watershed planning. in seeking an explanation for this variation between the watershed plans, we combine the results from the manifest content analysis (counts, themes, and diversity) with a geospatial analysis. specifically, we look for a relationship between the two content variables and four spatial variables: watershed extent; reserve land extent, including first nation reserves and treaty land entitlement (tle) parcels; proportion or the relative percentage of reserve land in a watershed; and the number of first nations with land in that watershed. document review and content analysis following mcleod et al. (2015), plummer, grosbois, de loë, and velani!kis,(2011), and wyatt et al. (2011), we conducted a combination of manifest and latent content analysis. manifest content analysis involves a keyword search to identify indicator terms (mcleod et al., 2015) that may then be numerically tabulated into a frequency count. this level of document analysis provides one aspect of indigenous inclusion, but it is a very shallow accounting, as keywords may be counted multiple times in a plan document without any record of context. we extend our analysis beyond keyword counts to include the context in which the keywords are used: this is the latent phase of the analysis. plummer et al. (2011) assessed the integration of land use and watershed planning by analyzing the number of references to integration in policies, plans, and reports, and the context in which those references occur. where they looked for the degree of explicitness for integration statements— "focus[ing] specifically on measuring the presence and extent of policy statements as opposed to gauging the effectiveness” (p. 4)—we look for diversity in the forms and types of engagement documented in the watershed plans. in mcleod et al.’s (2015) analysis of the intersection between ontario’s “land use and resource management policies” (p. 1) and first nations, the authors similarly included a wide range of documents, including legislation, regulations, and policy statements, as well as plans and associated texts. their latent phase of the analysis examines the context of the keywords, looking specifically for mention of rights and specific indigenous–state relations (consultation, duty to consult, accommodation, baijius & patrick: planning around reserves published by scholarship@western, 2019 5 consent). documents were then ranked according to evidence within the text of direct recognition, acknowledgement of rights (treaty and aboriginal), and honouring the past in different ways. we similarly seek to understand the differences between the frequency and use of keywords in the plan documents, but choose to develop and refine our types or forms of inclusion from the data (the context in which the keywords are found), rather than establishing all categories beforehand. this approach allows us to remain analytically open to the presence of different forms or types of inclusion and for diversity in those forms or types of inclusion between the plan documents. our review emphasizes text content rather than text coverage: we identify forms of inclusion within the plan, rather than calculate the page space allocated to first nations or métis issues and concerns. to do this, we use a computer-based qualitative data analysis package to analyse the content of the plan documents. first, we conducted a manifest analysis by a keyword search, identifying all sections of the documents where those keywords were found. these results were followed by latent analysis, where thematic codes were applied to larger blocks of text according to the way in which the keyword was incorporated into the text. for example, “first nation” might have been mentioned in the context of rights or participation on a committee. sub-codes were also developed to provide richer detail of nuances in the evidence of participation, inclusion, and voice within plan documents. the caseinsensitive text search was conducted with characters appropriate for the software search engine to identify variations and, for some terms, to exclude partial matches. for example, this string was used in order to be inclusive of indigenous cultural groups that may be present or discussed in the context of resource management in saskatchewan: “first nation?” or “indig*” or “aborig*” or “m?tis” or “cree” or “dene” or “dakota” or “nation” geospatial analysis to provide further context for the analysis, we identified the number of registered first nations with reserve land and the area of reserve land in watersheds with plans. using the lens of land use and property (blomley, 2016; krueckeberg, 1995; valverde, 2005) to interpret the plan documents, we sought to identify potential factors in the distribution of indigenous keywords within and across plans. the proportion of reserve land in a watershed provides another way to analyze first nations and métis inclusion in the plan documents. a tenet of democratic participation in contemporary planning is that those who are impacted by planning should be included in it (hodge, hall, & robinson, 2016). we might expect that, with more land in a watershed, the potential for impacts from actions related to watershed planning increases. that is, people with more land are more likely to be affected by the decisions taken in the planning process. assuming that first nations are representing themselves in the process and speaking to issues that affect their reserve lands, we sought to identify any relationship between the spatial extent of first nation land tenure (reserve and tle) in a watershed and the frequency and type of indigenous keywords within the plan document. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.8502 6 materials & methods vector data from the provincial government were used to count and calculate the extent of reserve parcels2 in each watershed3 (information services corporation of saskatchewan, 2015; saskatchewan watershed authority, 2013). some parcels are jointly held by multiple first nations; this dataset does not fully disaggregate title holders of these parcels, making it difficult to identify the actual number of first nations with a stake in land use planning and management. we note this in the appropriate tables by counting the minimum number of first nations with land in the watershed, based on the total number of individual first nations with one or more reserve parcels in those watersheds. the number of first nations with land in a watershed provides us with a benchmark of the minimum number of first nations who might have an interest in watershed planning. the actual number who do participate or have an interest may vary—community capacity and resources to participate, perceived impact, and perceived efficacy of participation can be reasons for opting out (nadasdy, 2004). conversely, indigenous communities who do not have reserve land in the watershed may still lay claim to traditional territory and use in the watershed. ultimately, reserve land must not be the sole factor used by planners to justify the inclusion of indigenous peoples, but it does provide a way to identify possible relationships between reserve land and representation in plan documents and planning processes. our analysis proceeds without knowledge of traditional land use and occupancy in saskatchewan, as these data are often still stored in land-based knowledge and oral history and thus not available to us for analysis. as a preliminary study on a small dataset, the purpose of the analysis is to roughly characterize the relationships between the four spatial attributes of each watershed (total extent of watershed, total extent of reserved land, proportion of reserved land, number of first nations with land), and plan content (keyword occurrences and thematic diversity). to do so, we look for linear correlation (r) between pairs of variables.4 for some relationships, we further calculated the coefficient of determination (r2), a percentage value that describes the significance of the independent variable in explaining the variation in the dependent variable (samuel & okey, 2015). using this approach, we can better understand the relationships between contents of plans (keyword occurrences and themes) and the spatial context in which they are produced (extent and proportion, number of first nations with land). these calculated values tell us how linear a relationship is between two variables and the relative influence of the independent variable on the dependent one. it does not explain causality, nor any non-linear relationships that may exist. 2 reserve parcels are “polygon entities that depict the administrative boundaries (extent) of lands where the title has been vested in specific aboriginal groups of canada or lands which were set aside for their exclusive benefit” (information services corporation of saskatchewan, 2015, metadata). 3 watershed polygons are derived from a geographic information system (gis) dataset of gross and effective drainage areas (agriculture and agri-foods canada, 2013). 4 the correlation coefficient is “[a] measure of the strength of linear association between two variables. correlation will always fall between -1.0 and +1.0 . . . a zero correlation indicates that there is no relationship between the variables . . . if the correlation is positive, we have a positive relationship. if it is negative, the relationship is negative . . . [and the] strength of the relationship . . . could be strong [ r > 0.8], moderate or weak [0.5 > r]” (samuel & okey, 2015, pp. 23-24). baijius & patrick: planning around reserves published by scholarship@western, 2019 7 results document review and content analysis latent analysis of the text search results was used to develop themes that represent specific aspects of indigenous inclusion in the plan documents. seven major themes were identified, with the indigenous committee membership theme providing insight into the distribution of participation between first nations and indigenous organizations as evident in the plan document. below, tabular counts of the plans and content codes are followed by descriptions of the themes. table 1 shows the themes, the number of plans in which they appear, and the number of times they were found across all documents. keyword occurrences ranged from 0 to 39, with an average of 12 per plan. note that total keyword occurrences do not equal total theme instances. in some plans, keywords appeared in close proximity and in the same context, that is, multiple indigenous keywords used in a paragraph defining first nation. these individual instances were grouped together into a text “block,” with the text block assigned to a single thematic instance. table 2 lists the plan documents, counts of the total number of keyword occurrences, number of occurrences within each theme by plan and in total, and a calculation of the theme diversity.5 of the 11 completed watershed plans, all but one included an indigenous keyword. three plans appear as outliers (north saskatchewan river, upper souris, carrot river) and account for the majority of keyword counts in the data set (95/133 or 71%). of the six themes, indigenous committee membership and plan implementation were by far the most common across all plans. table 3 provides detail on indigenous inclusion with respect to committee membership. the first two columns show the watershed name and year the plan was completed. the next three columns list the number of times a keyword appeared in the context of committee membership— (column 3) generally, with a statement of participation lacking names of individuals and their affiliation; or specifically, (column 4) with the mention of an individual and their affiliation with a first nation or (column 5) indigenous organization. in some plans, first nations had more than one representative listed; the final column (column 6) shows the total number of first nations specifically and explicitly included in the plan. theme 1: indigenous committee membership indigenous voice is linked to participation. planning committee membership determines who gets to participate—and thereby represent—indigenous issues, interests, and rights within the watershed (cairns, 2000). where plan documents indicate indigenous participation in the planning process by way of membership on a committee, the text was assigned to the indigenous committee membership theme. this theme was further differentiated in order to identify the number of indigenous participants, as well as their affiliation. 5 theme diversity is calculated by taking the total number of themes and subtracting from that the number of themes in a plan that have keywords. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.8502 8 within the plan documents, indigenous participation on watershed planning committees (often technical and steering committees) was indicated in two ways: generally, with a statement such as “[t]he committees’ broad membership included representatives from urban and rural municipalities, industry, conservation organizations, agri-environmental group plan (aegp) committee, and first nations” (carrot river valley watershed association, 2012, p. 3) or, specifically, by way of listing an individual’s name and affiliation in a committee’s membership. in total, five plans had general statements of inclusion, and seven plans had details about specific membership. of those seven with specific details, six included first nations and three included organizations. sub-themes of the indigenous committee membership theme and their counts, by watershed plan, are listed in table 3. both general and specific, as well as nation and organization, appeared in various combinations across plan documents: three plans included both a general statement of inclusion and a specific list of committee members where first nations had one or more representative(s); three plans had specific membership but no general statement; one plan had a general statement with an organizational representative; and one plan had a general statement but no specifics about representation. table 1. list of themes and subthemes with counts of plans and occurrences thematic codes # of plans (n = 11) occurrences indigenous committee membership 8 37 general 5 6 specific 7 31 first nation 6 27 indigenous organization 3 4 definition 5 7 history 1 4 plan implementation 4 21 rights 4 5 spatial location, map 3 12 values, interests 4 9 total 95 note. subthemes are indented, with their occurrences aggregated in the parent theme (i.e., specific tallies the number of plans and occurrences for both first nation and indigenous organization; indigenous committee membership tallies the number of plans and occurrences for both general and specific). the total coding count (bottom row) tallies only parent themes. baijius & patrick: planning a round r eserves published by scholarship@ w estern, 2019 9 t able 2. t otal and t hem atic k eyw ord o ccurrences, and t hem atic d iversity by w atershed plan d ocum ent w atershed (year) t otal k eyw ord o ccurrences t hem e 1: c om m ittee m em bership t hem e 2: d efinition t hem e 3: h istory t hem e 4: im plem entation t hem e 5: r ights t hem e 6: spatial, m ap t hem e 7: v alues, interests t hem e d iversity low er souris r iver (2006) 2 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 u pper souris r iver (2010) 28 7 2 4 2 1 0 0 5 o ld w ives lake (2014) 3 0 0 0 0 0 3 0 1 sw ift c urrent c reek (2009) 2 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 2 a ssiniboine r iver (2006) 6 5 1 0 0 0 0 0 2 low er q u'a ppelle (2013) 12 2 0 0 2 2 0 2 4 w ascana/u pper q u'a ppelle (2008) 8 1 2 0 0 0 0 0 2 m oose jaw r iver (2006) 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 south saskatchew an (2007) 5 3 0 0 0 0 1 1 3 c arrot r iver (2012) 28 2 0 0 9 1 8 5 5 n orth saskatchew an (2008) 39 15 1 0 8 1 0 0 4 w ater security a gency (w sa ) 25 year plan (2012) 30 0 0 1 3 4 0 1 t hem e totals 37 7 5 27 9 12 10 n ote. t he final colum n, t hem e d iversity, represents the num ber of them es w ith codes in each docum ent (total # them es # them es in plan). r esults for the w sa 25 year plan are included for reference only. t he international indigenous policy journal, v ol. 10, iss. 5 d o i: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.8502 10 t able 3. t allies of c om m ittee m em bership o ccurrences by w atershed plan d ocum ent specific o ccurrences of individuals a ffiliated w ith: w atershed y ear g eneral m ention of inclusion first n ations indigenous o rganizations n um ber of first n ations d irectly r epresented in plan low er souris r iver 2006 1 1 0 1 u pper souris r iver 2010 1 6 0 3 o ld w ives lake 2014 0 0 0 0 sw ift c urrent c reek 2006 0 0 0 0 a ssiniboine r iver 2006 0 3 2 3 low er q u'a ppelle r iver 2013 1 0 1 0 w ascana c reek-u pper q u'a ppelle 2008 0 1 0 1 m oose jaw r iver 2006 0 0 0 0 south saskatchew an r iver 2007 1 2 0 2 c arrot r iver 2008 2 0 0 0 n orth saskatchew an r iver 2012 0 14 1 7 w sa 25 year plan 2008 0 0 0 0 t otal 6 27 4 n ote. t he g eneral m ention of inclusion colum n indicates keyw ords associated w ith a general statem ent of participation. t he tw o o ccurrences colum ns separate specific keyw ord occurrences according to w hether individuals included in the plan are affiliated w ith a first n ation or an indigenous organization. t he n um ber of first n ations colum ns on the right of the table represents the num ber first n ations explicitly represented in the plan. g eneral and specific o ccurrences are not m utually exclusive and can appear together in the sam e docum ent. r esults for the w sa 25 year plan are included for reference only. baijius & patrick: planning around reserves published by scholarship@western, 2019 11 theme 2: definition where the search keywords (indigenous, aboriginal, first nation) were defined somewhere in the plan, the text was coded as a definition theme. definitions were largely consistent across plans that included a definition, though inconsistent in their inclusion. overall, 5 of the 11 plans included a total of 7 instances where terms specific to indigenous peoples were defined: five first nation, one métis, and one aboriginal. further, 2 of the 5 plans included multiple definitions: one with first nation and métis (upper souris), and the other with first nation and aboriginal (wascana-upper qu’appelle). first nation was defined as “an indian band or an indian community functioning as a band but not having official band status, not including inuit or métis peoples” (north saskatchewan river basin council, 2008, p. 78). métis was defined as “a person who self-identifies as métis, is of historic métis nation ancestry, is distinct from other aboriginal peoples and is accepted by the métis nation” (upper souris watershed association, 2010, p. 38). aboriginal “as identified in s. 35, constitution act, 1983, includes the indian, inuit and métis peoples of canada” (upper qu’appelle river & wascana creek watersheds advisory committees, 2008, p. 59). theme 3: history where the plan text referenced indigenous peoples in relation to the history of human habitation and settlement of the watershed, the history theme was applied. only one plan (upper souris) included reference to historical indigenous occupation, with four occurrences in the document. the history of indigenous relationships with the land and with settlers that are included in this document narrate the treaty signing process, european cultural influences, and the history of métis in the region. theme 4: plan implementation where indigenous interests were associated with a plan objective, or indigenous communities and organizations identified as partners or participants in the implementation of plan actions, this theme was applied. within this theme are general descriptions of inclusion in implementation activities, as well as specific actions, objectives, and partnerships. an example of general text from the lower qu’appelle document states: the activities described within the watershed plan will be implemented in a manner that respects local values and the input, the mandates and the responsibilities of the various levels of government (federal, provincial, municipal and first nations). all parties will supply resources and collaborative efforts to implement the plan. (lower qu’appelle watershed stewards, 2013, p. 33) from the carrot river plan, the intent is to “[d]evelop a stronger relationship between the carrot river valley watershed association, red earth cree nation, aboriginal affairs and northern development canada and watershed authority to investigate flood protection measures” (carrot valley watershed association, 2012, p. 17). overall, 4 of the 11 plans included indigenous communities in plan implementation, either generally or in relation to specific actions, with a total of 24 instances. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.8502 12 theme 5: rights indigenous rights, including sui generis (inherent rights), human, treaty, and aboriginal rights, may be impacted by actions associated with the implementation of a watershed plan, such as through water allocation, land use planning, or environmental and hydrological management. where a document recognizes this, or discusses the historical context of indigenous rights, the text was coded under the rights theme. in the plans, rights were typically discussed in a discursive manner, using general language such as pointing out differing perspectives on these rights by “understanding of the range of interpretations of treaty and aboriginal rights in first nations, métis and non-first nations communities” (lower qu’appelle, 2013, p. 36). in contrast to the lack of discussion in any of the plans, the saskatchewan wsa 25 year plan includes language about consultation: where water management decisions may have an adverse impact on the exercise of treaty and aboriginal rights and pursuit of traditional uses, consult with first nations and métis in accordance with the first nations and métis consultation policy framework and the legal duty to consult (ongoing). (wsa 25 year plan, p. 37) indirect recognition of rights also exists, such as this statement in relation to forestry: “commercial harvesting can also occur on private and indian reserve lands, which are not subject to the saskatchewan ministry of environment’s licensing requirements” (north saskatchewan river basin council, 2008, pp. 63-64). three documents mentioned indigenous rights a total of four times, always in terms of treaty and aboriginal rights, and never in terms of international law or human rights. theme 6: spatial location, map where the keywords were in text describing the spatial location of a first nation, métis settlement, or reserve land, or where those nations or lands were depicted on a map, the text was assigned to this theme. three plans referenced some spatial aspect of indigenous lands or communities, such as describing a general location, explaining a map feature, or identifying indigenous communities within the watershed. a total of 12 instances of this theme were identified. theme 7: values, interests values and interests include text that explicitly mentions indigenous values or interests in relation to watershed management. nine instances were identified, with one additional in the wsa 25 year plan relating to traditional land and resource use. some of the values and interests are general statements of inclusion (multiple), or more specific interests such as flood mitigation (carrot river), wastewater (lower qu’appelle), and drinking water (south saskatchewan river). geospatial results with our focus on the content of watershed plans, we include in the spatial analysis only those watersheds in saskatchewan with a plan, as indicated in figure 1. the year of plan completion, the total baijius & patrick: planning around reserves published by scholarship@western, 2019 13 watershed area (km2), total reserve land (km2), the proportion of watershed as reserved land, and the number of first nations with reserve land in the watershed for each of those plans are presented in table 4. of the 12 watersheds included, 2 are combined under a single management plan (wascana creek and upper qu’appelle river), resulting in 11 watershed plans. plan completion years range from 2006 to 2014, with most plans completed prior to 2010. watershed extents vary significantly, as do extent of reserve land within each watershed. the locations and distribution of reserve parcels, and both planned and unplanned watersheds, are depicted in figure 1. the plan for old wives lake, despite three nations having land in the watershed, shows no evidence of indigenous involvement. the lower qu’appelle watershed plan, where at least 16 nations have land in the watershed, did not mention any first nations but had did have one indigenous organization listed as a participant. figure 1. distribution of catchments (planned and unplanned) and reserves in saskatchewan. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2019.10.5.8502 14 table 4. extent of watershed, reserve land, and number of first nations with land by watershed with a plan document watershed year watershed area (sq. km) reserve land (sq. km) % reserve land # of first nations with land lower souris river 2006 9,165.11 706.32 7.7% 4 upper souris river 2010 20,136.86 823.83 4.1% 6 old wives lake 2014 24,477.93 271.28 1.1% 3 swift current creek 2006 3,932.90 118.48 3.0% 1 assiniboine river 2006 17,694.91 765.97 4.3% 8 lower qu'appelle river 2013 17,147.41 2,266.59 13.2% min. 16 wascana creek (*) 2008 3,865.43 518.55 13.4% 6 moose jaw river 2006 9,424.52 297.18 3.2% 1 south saskatchewan river 2007 39,397.15 672.5 1.7% 9 upper qu'appelle river (*) 2008 19,577.10 727.79 3.7% min. 3 carrot river 2012 17,522.39 264.86 1.5% 6 north saskatchewan river 2008 37,700.08 2,564.15 6.8% 22 total 220,041.79 9,478.95 4.3% note. watersheds with an asterisk (*) are combined in a single plan; 11 plans cover 12 watersheds. coefficient values for all watersheds are shown in table 5, while table 6 excludes previously identified outliers (north saskatchewan, upper souris, and carrot river). these tables show the correlation coefficient of pairs of variables discussed above. we focus on variable pairs showing moderate and stronger relationships (r > 0.50) and calculate the r2 value for those pairs to better understand the relationship between the variables (to what degree the change in one variable leads to change in the other). results in the tables are shaded to indicate three groups: content (between keyword occurrences and theme diversity); spatial (between the four spatial variables); and combined (between content and spatial variables). content the single coefficient in this group is for the relationship between keyword occurrences and theme diversity. it is a strong relationship and in a positive direction with (r = 0.83, r2 = 0.68) and without (r = 0.85, r2 = 0.72) outliers that suggests the number of keyword occurrences is associated with an increase in thematic diversity within plans in a linear way. the closeness of their values indicates that outlier plans do not significantly alter the relationship between keyword occurrences and theme diversity values within a plan. spatial the spatial group has six pairs of variables, with moderate to strong relationships between most but not all variables across all plans. the only strong relationship is between the number of first nations and baijius & patrick: planning around reserves published by scholarship@western, 2019 15 reserve land extent (r = 0.93, r2 = 0.86). excluding outliers does not significantly change the strength of that relationship (r = 0.90m, r2 = 0.81), but does reveal another strong positive relationship between reserve extent and reserve proportion (r = 0.87, r2 = 0.76). considering all plans, moderate strength relationships include the number of first nations and both watershed extent (r = 0.63) and proportion of reserve land (r = 0.58), as well as reserve extent and proportion of reserve land (r = 0.59). excluding outliers, the strength of the relationship between number of bands and watershed extent weakens (r = 0.42), number of first nations and proportion of reserve land strengthens but stays moderate (r = 0.70), and reserve extent and proportion reserved becomes strong (r = 0.87). combined with all plans considered, there are no strong relationships between content and spatial variables. relationships of moderate strength are: number of first nations with keyword occurrences (r = 0.65) and theme diversity (r = 0.55); and theme diversity and reserve extent (r = 0.53). excluding outliers changes the relationships considerably. three strong relationships appear between: number of first nations with keyword occurrence (r = 0.91, r2 = 0.83) and theme diversity (r = 0.87, r2 = 0.75), and reserve extent and keyword occurrence (r = 0.93, r2 = 0.86). as shown for each of those strong relationships, the independent variable explains most of the variation in the dependent variables. table 5. matrix of correlation values for content and spatial variables keyword occurrences theme diversity # of first nations with land watershed area (sq. km) reserve land (sq. km) % reserve land keyword occurrences 1 theme diversity 0.825 1 # of bands with land 0.652 0.553 1 watershed area (sq. km) 0.448 0.371 0.634 1 reserve area (sq. km) 0.527 0.411 0.928 0.469 1 % reserve land 0.116 0.174 0.575 -0.101 0.768 1 note. values that exceed our threshold of moderate strength (r > 0.50) are emphasized in bold, and further discussed in the text. shading is used to visually distinguish the content variables (top left), spatial variables (right), and combinations of content and spatial variables (lower left). the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 16 table 6. matrix of correlation values for content and spatial variables, excluding outliers keyword occurrences theme diversity # of first nations with land watershed area (sq. km) reserve land (sq. km) % reserve land keyword occurrences 1 theme diversity 0.848 1 # of bands w/ land 0.909 0.868 1 watershed area (sq. km) 0.357 0.401 0.423 1 reserve land (sq. km) 0.925 0.730 0.899 0.179 1 % reserve land 0.677 0.522 0.696 -0.261 0.873 1 note. values that exceed our threshold of strength (r > 0.50) are emphasized in bold, and further discussed in the text. shading is used to visually distinguish the content variables (top left), spatial variables (right), and combinations of content and spatial variables (lower left). analysis this analysis is exploratory in seeking to understand how indigenous content of watershed plans relate to the four spatial variables discussed above. there are two assumptions with this analysis. first, if there is more total reserved land in one watershed than another, then those lands—and the first nations for whom they are reserved—are more likely to be impacted by changes in surrounding land use or water management. if this is so, we expect to see more indigenous issues, interests, and values documented in the plan with more reserve land. second, the more individual first nations with land in a watershed should increase the number and diversity of first nations’ issues, interests, and values documented in the plan. even if there are similarities between first nations in their values, interests, and concerns, we would still expect to see some diversity in the evidence of their inclusion and participation in the plans. content with higher rates of keyword occurrences, we could expect to see a greater diversity of indigenous interests and knowledge addressed and included in a plan, although there are still other factors at play. the influence of the outlier plans on r and r2 values for these variables also appears to be minor. it is possible that the relationship between these two variables is non-linear, at least with regard to the keywords used and themes developed in the content analysis. further differentiation of themes into subcategories could be used to further identify potential drivers of variation between the plans in terms of indigenous engagement. baijius & patrick: planning around reserves published by scholarship@western, 2019 17 spatial there are strong relationships between the number of first nations with land in a watershed and the extent of reserve lands, as well as between the extent and proportion of reserve land in the watersheds. further statistical analysis could be used to tease out the nuances of these three variables to better understand how different configurations of land, title, and watershed extent influence indigenous engagement, but there are other considerations that may not be statistically evident. if the extent of reserve land is dependent on the number of first nations with land in the catchment, understanding the nature of that relationship is complicated by the historic treaty process (ray, miller, & tough, 2000), and by ongoing tle processes and acquisition of urban reserve land. some reserve land parcels are very large, and some (urban) very small. and so, increasing the extent of reserved land in a watershed is not solely contingent on having additional first nations with land in the watershed. conversely, many first nations may have land in a watershed, but if they are mostly urban parcels, the extent of reserved land will only increase fractionally. we can imagine an upper bound to the number of first nations that would have land in a watershed, in accordance with traditional territory for normative claims for inclusion and tle or other settlement agreements. but we can also speculate that such a limit would not necessarily constrain increases in the proportion of additional land in a watershed that first nations and their members are able to purchase, although the parcels may not be reclassified as reserve land. combined of most significance here is the effect of the outliers in our interpretation. given their contribution to each dataset, removing outlier plans from the analysis leads to significant changes in some of the relationships within the spatial data (reserve extent and proportion reserved), and between spatial and content variables. for the combined relationships, removing outliers increases the strength of the relationship between the number of first nations with land in a watershed with both keyword occurrences and theme diversity. considering all watershed plans, we conclude that the extent of reserve land within a watershed has the strongest relationship with keyword occurrences, and that the number of first nations with land in a watershed has the strongest relationship with theme diversity. by excluding the outliers, we find that the number of first nations with land has the strongest relationship with both keyword occurrences and theme diversity. in both cases, the number of first nations with land has the strongest relationship with theme diversity, but for keyword frequency, extent is more strongly related than the number of first nations. distribution of reserve land across watersheds and between first nations is a consideration that is not fully captured in this analysis. uneven distribution, combined with uneven participation, can significantly affect the amount and type of indigenous content in a plan if first nations with a greater proportion of the reserved lands (and thus a higher chance of being affected by water management) are not included in the planning process. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 18 limitations these findings are a preliminary description of relationships between the variables identified. we cannot extensively generalize or extrapolate beyond the dataset, since the number of bands with time and resources to participate in watershed planning will vary, along with their respective issues and interests. though we do not consider it here, land use or cover within or near reserve land will likely also influence inclusion to some degree, as direct or proximate interests in water and land will likely vary by ecological and geographic context. similarly, proximity of reserve lands to water features might influence participation, especially in the context of development activities impacting indigenous rights or lands. discussion under the saskatchewan watershed planning model (saskatchewan watershed authority, 2003) watershed planning progressed rapidly, albeit unevenly, between 2006 and 2014 (11 watershed plans). the more populated, warmer, and drier southern part of the province—predominantly privately held agricultural land but also including some public pastures—has significantly more completed watershed plans compared to the north, which includes forestry and mining interests, as well as significant areas of crown-owned lands. most of the rivers also flow north, resulting in an emphasis on water allocation and drinking water protection. this framing may have an impact on indigenous engagement by bracketing out other concerns that are deemed beyond the scope of the planning process. the saskatchewan watershed planning model (saskatchewan watershed authority, 2003) notes that “social priority and watershed health ranking [will be used] to assist in focusing efforts on those watersheds most needing attention” (p. 10). how those criteria interact with indigenous issues, given the fragmentation of jurisdiction and responsibility between the provinces, federal, and first nation governments, needs further investigation. given that most of the plans (n = 9) were completed prior to the release of the 2012 planning policy, this study provides a baseline of indigenous inclusion according to the 2003 planning model. the manifest and latent content analyses provide insight into the frequency of keywords and variety of thematic contexts in the plan documents (mcleod et al., 2015; plummer et al., 2011; wyatt et al., 2011). with the keywords counted and themes tallied, we sought some explanation for the variation across and within these planning documents. to do so, we considered the role of land use and property, and the concept of stakeholder participation, by way of a spatial analysis. by spatializing our content analysis, we revealed the extent to which two factors might drive some of this variation: the percentage of reserve land in a watershed, and the number of first nations with land in a watershed. evidence of inclusion in watershed plans—as keyword occurrences and theme diversity— does appear to increase in a positive relationship with the number of first nations with land, and to a lesser degree the total extent of reserve lands in a watershed. however, the three watershed plan outliers (in terms of keyword frequency and thematic diversity) challenged the spatial relationship found in the other plans, increasing the strength of some relationships while reducing others; further research is necessary to understand why. interviews with planners, committee members, and community leaders may help to identify potential factors in the significant baijius & patrick: planning around reserves published by scholarship@western, 2019 19 variation in documented evidence of indigenous engagement across, and diversity of engagement within, plan documents (montgomery et al., 2016; morton et al., 2012). this will provide further insight into the barriers to and opportunities for indigenous participation and inclusion in the planning process. additionally, we need to consider the potential role of the water security agency 25 year plan on future involvement of indigenous peoples in watershed planning. only two plans (lower qu’appelle in 2013 and old wives lake in 2014) have been completed since the release of the 25 year plan in october of 2012. consultation under the constitution act (1867) section 35 is not required for indigenous engagement in the new planning model, but it is still identified as a goal within the 25 year plan, where guidance is given as to how the planning system should interface with indigenous peoples and governments. if we consider this as a policy document, if not a successor of the 2003 planning model, then future researchers should conduct a similar analysis for subsequent plans in order to assess the outcomes of and outputs from the 25 year plan’s approach to indigenous engagement. considering how indigenous communities were historically placed and/or relocated by the dominion and federal governments, as well as the contemporary economic drivers of land acquisition, reserve land extent may not be the most appropriate criteria for inclusion in watershed planning (nadasdy, 2002; natcher, davis, & hickey, 2005; usher, tough, & galois, 1992). using the concepts of property and ownership to compare indigenous engagement across watershed plans may at first appear problematic, since those concepts have been used to displace and dispossess indigenous peoples, foster settlement, and to exploit the land and environment. traditional territory and historic use, as identified through traditional land use and occupancy studies or other community-based research formats, would provide a better basis than reserve land to ensure adequate recognition and inclusion of indigenous interests in watershed planning. even so, this research shows a relationship between property ownership by first nations and inclusion in watershed planning, both procedurally as participation, and substantively as inclusion in implementation. as an analysis of indigenous participation, this study offers a glimpse of the dynamics of watershed governance, especially for indigenous engagement. for a more holistic view, this type of analysis could be extended with a number of other approaches to research. these include an assessment of participation by other industry, government, civil, and private interests (ferreyra & beard, 2007; montgomery et al., 2016; morton et al., 2012), as well as the consideration of other social and demographic dimensions of indigenous and watershed communities (rural and urban, status and nonstatus, educational achievement, income; basdeo & bharadwaj, 2013; cairns, 2000; lukasiewicz & baldwin, 2014; reed & mcilveen, 2006). future research on committee membership, inclusion in implementation and discussion of rights would be fruitful to clarify the extent to which indigenous peoples are included in watershed planning and how their interests are balanced against others in terms of frequency, coverage, and type of interest. a gendered analysis would also provide insight into representation and voice of women—indigenous and non-indigenous—as well as other communities (urban), in provincial watershed planning (anderson, 2010; anderson, clow, & haworth-brockman, 2013; lawless, taylor, marshall, nickerson, & anderson, 2013; zwarteveen, 2010). the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 5 20 conclusion through the saskatchewan watershed authority and then the water security agency, the government of saskatchewan embarked on an ambitious watershed planning program between 2006 and 2014. in total, 11 watershed plans were developed for the southern, more populated half of the province. this research set out to determine the degree to which indigenous peoples (as individual and community members of first nation and métis communities) have been engaged and included in those watershed plans. to do this, we conducted content analysis within each of the 11 plans looking for keywords that would indicate some degree of involvement, or interaction, between the plan or the planning process and indigenous communities. next, we identified themes that emerged from keyword context within the text of the plan. last, we explored the extent and number of first nations with reserve lands in a watershed, and the frequency and context of keywords in the plan documents. the results of this research show that, on average, indigenous engagement is limited and minimal in watershed planning in saskatchewan, but three of the plans are an exception to this pattern. arguably, the indian reserve system was purposefully designed by the state to disconnect indigenous peoples from active livelihoods, cultural practices, and family kinship (patrick, grant, & bharadwaj, 2019). by extension, the reserve system has also served to exclude indigenous peoples from active participation in watershed planning by privileging land ownership over land use (krueckeberg, 1995; natcher, 2001). as a function of policy and protocol, the prior watershed planning process in saskatchewan provided little space for inclusion of indigenous voices, values, and perspectives. the current approach, under the 25 year plan, will need to be further analyzed as more plans are completed. we view the absence of indigenous inclusion and engagement in watershed planning as a missed opportunity on several fronts. first, while watershed planning requires participation of multiple partners, stakeholders and rights holders (montgomery et al., 2016), there is a strong normative emphasis on the inclusion of indigenous voices, knowledge, and interests in water governance more generally (bradford et al., 2017). second, water (and land) management to control for water quality and quantity within a watershed will be more efficient when coordinated between and among watershed groups, actors, and organizations, including first nations, métis, and indigenous organizations (noble, 2016; udofia et al., 2016). last, and perhaps most significant, watershed planning provides a pathway toward reconciliation (castleden et al., 2017; truth & reconciliation commission of canada, 2015; zurba, 2014). the potential for trust and reciprocity between engos, government, industry, and indigenous communities remains largely unexplored under both of saskatchewan’s watershed planning models. this research has shown that, while the amount and type of indigenous content in watershed plans is related to the amount of reserve land and the number of first nations with land in a watershed, these are not the only factors. increasing indigenous land holdings is no guarantee of future engagement, nor is it the sole explanation for past engagement. there are opportunities not only for greater participation and partnership with first nations and métis in saskatchewan watershed planning, but also to further examine the relationships between physical factors and the amount and types of indigenous content evident in watershed plans. given the deterioration of many streams and water bodies across canada, including cumulative impacts from past and present development, as well as future water scarcity and climate uncertainty, there is no better time than now for cross-cultural collaboration in watershed planning. baijius & patrick: planning around reserves published by scholarship@western, 2019 21 references agriculture and agri-foods canada. 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(2010). a masculine water world: the politics of gender and identity in irrigation expert thinking. in r. boelens, d. getches, & a. guevara-gil (eds.), out of the mainstream: water rights, politics and identity (pp. 75-98). london, uk: earthscan. indigenous research and academic freedom: a view from political scientists the international indigenous policy journal volume 8 issue 2 reconciling research: perspectives on research involving indigenous peoples—part 1 article 3 april 2017 indigenous research and academic freedom: a view from political scientists christopher alcantara the university of western ontario, calcanta@uwo.ca dianne lalonde the university of western ontario, dlalond3@uwo.ca gary n. wilson university of northern british columbia, gary.wilson@unbc.ca recommended citation alcantara, c. , lalonde, d. , wilson, g. n. (2017). indigenous research and academic freedom: a view from political scientists. the international indigenous policy journal, 8(2). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.3 indigenous research and academic freedom: a view from political scientists abstract over the last several decades, scholars working on indigenous topics have faced increasing pressure to engage in research that promotes social justice and results in formal partnerships with indigenous communities. in this article, we argue that non-community-based research, in which the researcher exercises academic autonomy over the project, still has a role to play in indigenous-focused research, depending on the research question, topic, and situation at hand. we explore this argument from the perspective of political scientists who study indigenous–settler political relations in canada. keywords methodology, political science, autonomy, academic freedom, ethics acknowledgments the authors would like to thank the managing editor and the two anonymous reviewers of this journal for their helpful comments and suggestions on an earlier version of this manuscript. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ i n d i g e n o u s r e s e a rc h a n d a c a d e m i c f re e d o m : a v i e w f ro m po l i t i c a l s c i e n t i s t s the question of how to conduct ethical social science research involving indigenous peoples and communities has been a topic of international academic debate for some time (ferreira & gendron, 2011; porsanger, 2004; rigney, 1999; smith, 1999; zavala, 2013). in previous decades, indigenous peoples were often not part of the research conducted within universities, which were comprised overwhelmingly of white settler scholars. as such, the majority of university-based professors designed, conducted, and published their studies on indigenous peoples with little regard to what participants and communities wanted. researchers were encouraged to exercise their academic freedom to pursue research questions that interested them, using methods that privileged one or more of the following principles: objectivity, neutrality, autonomy, generalizability, reliability, and falsifiability. the results have been mixed. some of the research has been beneficial, helping to contribute to settler understandings of indigenous peoples and, in many cases, to promote indigenous cultures, histories, and place within canadian society. this research has also been employed by indigenous and non-indigenous leaders and policymakers to tackle the many challenges facing indigenous communities (asch, 2014; kulchyski, 2005; miller, 2000; russell, 2005; slowey, 2008). on the other hand, some research has been harmful and exploitive of indigenous peoples, with some academics profiting from indigenous traditional knowledge, spreading stereotypes and negative images of their communities and lives, and even directly harming them through health and nutrition experiments (gaudry, 2015). as a result of these negative outcomes and a number of other developments within and beyond the academy, there has been a strong push from governments, funding agencies, ethics boards, and indigenous communities for university scholars to form research partnerships with indigenous communities that promote social justice (castleden, morgan, & lamb, 2012; louis, 2007; tri-council, 2014). within universities, scholars and scientists have slowly begun to recognize that in the past some of their studies had harmful effects on indigenous communities and that new approaches were necessary for research involving indigenous topics, or what some might refer to as settler or societal issues projected onto indigenous contexts (gaudry, 2015; smith, 1999). outside of these institutions, some political elites and members of the general public have begun to acknowledge their place and role in the exploitation and oppression of indigenous communities. they are slowly realizing that they must change how they interact and work with indigenous peoples if they want to establish a more just relationship. all of these trends have been driven by several high profile commissions and inquiries on indigenous issues, as well as enhanced coverage in the popular media of the problems and challenges facing indigenous communities in canada and in other settler countries (australia & wilkie, 1997; crichton, 2012; royal commission on aboriginal peoples [rcap], 1996; treaty of waitangi act, 1975; truth and reconciliation commission of canada [trc], 2015; un permanent forum on indigenous issues [unpfii], 2015). consequently, there has been an increased demand for community-based research focusing on partnership and a corresponding decline in non-community-based approaches that emphasize the autonomy of researchers. an important consequence of these trends is a decline in the diversity of perspectives as researchers are putting aside their academic freedom to share authority over the research with participating communities. should researchers writing about indigenous topics today abandon non1 alcantara et al.: indigenous research and academic freedom published by scholarship@western, 2017 community-based approaches and principles in favour of community-based participatory research models? in this article, we investigate this question by looking at the conditions under which non-communitybased research, with its emphasis on academic freedom and autonomy, should be used in research projects involving indigenous peoples and how it can be used ethically. we approach this issue mainly from our perspectives and experiences as non-indigenous political scientists who write on issues related to indigenous–settler political relations in canada. we are thus engaging in a broader theoretical and methodological discussion regarding ethical research with indigenous peoples. although the topic we address in this article is one that is occurring in other countries and more broadly at the international level, we approach this debate by focusing on canada, which is our area of expertise. our analysis suggests that non-community-based research, by which we mean projects in which the researcher exercises his or her autonomy rather than sharing authority through formal partnership with the community, may still have an important role to play, depending on the research question, topic, and situation at hand; in short, not all indigenous-focused research should use a community-based research partnership model. the organization of our article is as follows. we begin with a brief yet broad overview of noncommunity-based social science research and community-based models in order to provide some context and to help explain why the latter models have become more prominent in university-based research projects. next, we focus on the questions of when, why, and how non-community-based approaches might be ethically used in research projects involving indigenous communities from our perspectives as political scientists. finally, we end by outlining some of the methodological and theoretical implications of our arguments for scholars interested in conducting research with indigenous communities. h o w ( m o s t ) po l i t i c a l s c i e n t i s t s s t u d y t h e w o rl d : a bri e f o v e rv i e w generally speaking, social scientists have long been interested in generating descriptive and causal inferences about the world in which they live. social science research has traditionally relied upon a wide range of theories and tools to describe how the world should (normatively) and does (empirically) work, and the forces that underpin the various phenomena that we see or experience across time and space. in political science, scholars have developed a variety of theories that focus on ideas, interests, institutions, and human behaviour, as well as a wide range of quantitative (surveys, content analysis, experiments) and qualitative (interviews, focus groups, field observation, archival research) methods. most political scientists use what we term a non-community-based approach in which the researcher exercises sole authority and autonomy over a project to generate theories and empirical findings that are reliable, falsifiable, and broadly applicable and generalizable across communities, cases, and phenomena. although many political science researchers adhere to the scientific method and these associated principles, some only do so partially while others do not at all, believing that post-positivist approaches and qualitative methods produce equally valid research results to those produced by scientific ones (brady & collier, 2010; king, keohane, & verba, 1994). in canada, political science researchers working on indigenous issues focused much of their early work on the legal aspects of indigenous rights and citizenship, describing and analyzing canadian laws, 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.3 constitutions, and legal judgments (boldt, 1993). however, as time progressed, they became more normative in their approach, providing philosophical arguments for and against the recognition of certain types of political, legal, and economic rights, sometimes perpetuating colonialism and racism, and sometimes resisting these phenomena (borrows, 2002; cairns, 2000; flanagan, 2000; macklem, 2001). these legal and normative perspectives continue to dominate the literature (alfred, 2008; asch, 2014; coulthard, 2014; turner, 2006), but have been augmented by a new generation of scholars interested in explaining variation between communities as well as stability and change as they relate to indigenous political mobilization, public policies, and institutions (alcantara & wilson, 2013; morden, 2013; papillon, 2012; slowey, 2008). at the heart of almost all of this non-community-based work is the notion of autonomy. that is to say, it is likely that the majority of these researchers exercised their academic freedom to study an important political phenomenon from a perspective that is outside the object and community of study. while the range of control exercised by indigenous peoples has varied across these studies, from passive participant to full partner, most non-community-based studies have involved researchers having significant and final control over the project. this control has in many cases empowered the researchers to produce a diversity of perspectives and arguments about the place of indigenous peoples in canada. it is precisely this diversity of perspectives and approaches that have helped advance knowledge and understanding of indigenous–settler relations in canada. for instance, the publication of books and articles that have been critical of indigenous rights, self-determination, and studies has opened up space to directly and effectively challenge that work and the colonial nature of canadian laws and mainstream political thought (asch, 2014; flanagan, 2000; timpson, 2009; turner, 2006). without the inclusion of diverse views formulated by researchers exercising their academic freedom and autonomy, widespread yet unarticulated colonial and racist opinions are more likely to fester and remain unchallenged among unengaged academics (e.g., academics who do not specialize in indigenous issues) and the general public. while creating space for a diverse range of perspectives to emerge, including ones that perpetuate colonialism and racism, may have short-term effects that are harmful, but in the long run may have greater positive effects by providing an intellectual foil, which social justice minded scholars can criticize and engage. in that sense, the work of tom flanagan (2000), and widdowson and howard (2008), for instance, may have unwittingly and unintentionally advanced the decolonization movement further than if such work had never been published in the first place. despite these advances, there has been a slow but persistent shift away from non-community-based methods towards new models that more thoroughly locate or share power with the community of study. in the next section of the article, we provide a brief outline of the most prominent of these models, community-based participatory research, and how it has been used to guide researchers in their work with indigenous communities in canada and elsewhere. c o m m u n i t y ba s e d pa rt i c i p a t o ry r e s e a rc h a n d i n d i g e n o u s c o m m u n i t i e s community-based participatory research (cbpr) first emerged out of anti-colonial and feminist projects in south america, asia, and africa during the 1970s (darroch & giles, 2014; minkler, 2004; zavala, 2013). cbpr focuses on recognizing and fostering the autonomy of the community that is participating in the research. meredith minkler (2004) defined cbpr as: 3 alcantara et al.: indigenous research and academic freedom published by scholarship@western, 2017 a collaborative process that equitably involves all partners in the research process and recognizes the unique strengths that each brings to the table. cbpr begins with a research topic of importance to the community with the aim of combining knowledge and action for social change. (p. 686) this sharing of power between the researcher and the community necessitates a certain amount of flexibility since the researcher and the community may have different conceptions of what is good research and what would benefit the community (stoecker, 1999). reflecting that flexibility, there is no hegemonic or dominant methodological tool in cbpr—projects can be qualitative, quantitative, or mixed method. many scholars and community leaders see cbpr as being uniquely situated for research with indigenous peoples due to its relational and decolonizing focus (castellano, 2004; castleden et al., 2012; holkup, tripp-reimer, salois, & weinert, 2004; laveaux & christopher, 2009). however, some express doubts about the application of any western research paradigm to indigenous matters (coombes, 2012; kovach, 2009). margaret kovach (2009) argued that indigenous research should not exclusively use cbpr nor should it be subsumed under cbpr because of two important difficulties. first, indigenous languages cannot easily be translated into other languages without a subsequent loss of meaning.1 second, western research, including cbpr, is not built upon a tribal epistemology and so it tends to miss or understate important concepts that are relevant to indigenous peoples, such as the relationality between humans, animals, and nature. given these challenges, “indigenous methodologies and qualitative research at best form an insider/outsider relationship” (kovach, 2009, p. 17) in that cbpr researchers may sometimes have difficulty in giving up control of the research and fully engaging their indigenous partners. yet, there are some scholars who disagree and suggest that indigenous methodologies and cbpr are in fact compatible. according to kathy absolon (2011), areas of commonality include the use of focus groups and talking circles and the likeness between storytelling and personal narrative. these and other commonalities have encouraged researchers to find new and innovative ways to link indigenous and cbpr methodologies through a number of guiding ethical principles. the most common set of principles is the four rs of research: respect, relevance, reciprocity, and responsibility. these principles have been used by a variety of indigenous and non-indigenous scholars in their research with indigenous communities (canadian institutes of health research [cihr], 2009; carjuzaa & ruff, 2010; castellano, 2004; harris & wasilewski, 2004; kirkness & bernhardt, 2001; smithers graeme, 2014).2 being respectful involves earnestly listening to the desires of the community, while recognizing their right to decide on the nature of their involvement in accordance with its traditions, laws, and procedures. in respecting the community’s autonomy and power, the researcher recognizes the rich knowledge that the community already holds and its right to deploy that knowledge as it sees fit. 1 there have been several efforts to create a mixture of english and indigenous languages (absolon, 2011; cole, 2006). 2 there are some who define the 4 rs differently from kirkness and bernhardt (2001). harris and wasilewski (2004), for example, described the four rs as relationship, responsibility, reciprocity, and redistribution. in comparison, renee louis (2007) defined the four rs as relational accountability, respectful representation, reciprocal appropriation, and rights and regulation. while there are differences between these authors, they are all fairly similar in goal and method. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.3 the principle of relevance recognizes that indigenous communities are likely to know what is relevant to them and that they do not need a researcher to determine for them what kinds of research questions and topics are pertinent to their members. instead, research topics should emerge out of a shared discussion and vision between the researcher and the community. cbpr aligns very well with this principle given its focus on including the community in conceptualizing, actualizing, and sharing research results (christopher, 2005; letiecq & bailey, 2004). reciprocity addresses the importance of having the project benefit both the researcher and the community (bishop, 1996; irwin, 1994). instead of producing gains for only one side of the research partnership, ethically sound research should involve the research partners “going back and forth between the problem, the practice, and the community” (hermes, 1997, p. 23). doing so ensures that the needs and desires of all are always “top of mind” and that power is diffused among all partners and participants. responsibility entails honouring the promises and commitments made to the community throughout the project. looking further toward action and research outcomes, a responsible researcher will promote the goals of indigenous self-determination within and outside of the community throughout the entire process. again, these principles are also at the core of cbpr given its focus on action and social justice (ferreira & gendron, 2011; minkler, 2004). an underlying, but not explicitly noted element of ethical research with indigenous peoples is a fifth r— relationality. carjuzaa and ruff (2010) noted, “[t]he four rs, as discussed earlier, are practices that provide entry to the relationship building process; however, it is relationality that . . . is the key to understanding and embracing indigenous ways of knowing” (p. 76). indeed, relationality is seen by many to be at the core of indigenous knowledges (chilisa, 2012; gaudry, 2015; wilson, 2008). inclusive of our relations are human bonds, but also our relations to the land, spirits, and the universe. one can build relations through a variety of means, such as by attending cultural events, visiting the community, speaking with community members, and learning about the community. building these relationships can require a lot of time and energy for both the researcher and the community members (castleden et al., 2012; israel, 2005). according to proponents of cbpr, many of whom are based in disciplines such as anthropology and sociology, and whose research has been based around strong, grassroots connections at the community level, it may be necessary for researchers to spend significant time in the community before the study begins given that indigenous consent is sometimes provided on the basis of knowing people in the community, as opposed to seeking permission through non-community-based means such as “cold calling” participants (smith, 1999). however, this reality may not be the case for some research projects. t ra c ki n g t h e t re n d t o w a rd s c bpr m o d e l s i n c a n a d a community-based research as it relates to indigenous communities in canada has become more prominent over the last 10 years for two main reasons. first, previous research on indigenous communities was viewed by some as being exploitative, harmful, or indifferent to indigenous participants. second, canadians, including researchers, policymakers, and citizens have started to become more aware of and accept the reality of their colonial history and to recognize that they must fundamentally change how they view and relate to indigenous communities across a variety of settings (national centre for truth and reconciliation, 2016). 5 alcantara et al.: indigenous research and academic freedom published by scholarship@western, 2017 it is true that some academics have exploited indigenous peoples by treating them as mere objects of study (smith, 1999). rather than empowering them and their interests, some researchers have used indigenous peoples to further their scholarly careers and the broader colonial and racist interests of settler society (battiste & youngblood, 2000; harvey, 2003; porsanger, 2004). ian mosby (2013), for instance, has cast much needed light on the highly exploitive and damaging nutrition experiments conducted by canadian researchers within residential schools and indigenous communities during the 1940s and 1950s. in these experiments, malnourished children and adults were subject to study without their knowledge or consent, and left in deplorable conditions while researchers presented papers and posters at academic conferences. in another case, a researcher stole haida texts and published them without the community’s consent (davis, 2004). although these are just a couple of extreme examples of academic researchers exploiting indigenous communities for their own interests, we feel it is important to make a distinction between these types of invasive, racist, and even criminal activities, and the majority of the research, both community-based and non-community-based, that has been conducted by academic researchers in the name of advancing knowledge for building public understanding and informing public policymaking by indigenous and canadian leaders. at the same time that these studies were being produced and shared within scholarly circles, canadian society was beginning to change in ways that would encourage researchers to recognize their sometimes exploitative practices and to shift how they conducted research with indigenous communities. in some respects, researchers were key drivers of these changes, both through their privileged place as educators within canadian academic institutions and as so-called “experts” in the popular media. for much of our country’s history, canadian federal policy has focused on two main goals: assimilating indigenous peoples into mainstream society and dispossessing them of their lands for economic development. according to some scholars, historical treaties and modern treaties were designed to dispossess indigenous communities of their traditional territories and convert them into land tenures that were recognizable under canadian law (alcantara, 2009; alfred, 2008; coulthard, 2014). other government initiatives, such as the residential schools system, the 1969 white paper (formally known as the statement of the government of canada on indian policy, 1969), and the 1876 indian act, were disguised as means to socialize and integrate indigenous communities into the political, economic, and social structures of canada. in reality, they were colonial policies that perpetuated racism and practices of cultural genocide. the indian act and the various amendments to it over the years imposed quasi-western property rights, membership codes, and government structures (e.g., municipal-style band councils), among other things, on indigenous communities across canada in hopes of preparing them to eventually become fully integrated into canadian society (flanagan, alcantara, & le dressay, 2010; poelzer & coates, 2015). residential schools, for instance, involved indigenous children being removed from their homes to learn western values in settings where physical, emotional, and sometimes sexual abuse were common. in 1969, then prime minister pierre trudeau hoped to wipe away longstanding political and legal differences between indigenous and non-indigenous peoples with the now infamous white paper. ironically, this proposal was one of the factors that mobilized indigenous peoples and their supporters, and set the stage for a decades-long struggle for self-determination. as these developments were occurring, non-indigenous canadians and governments began to recognize that a new approach was needed to repair their relationships with indigenous peoples. this new attitude among canadian elites, including many academics and citizens, was the result of international norms 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.3 relating to human rights, indigenous participation in world war ii and in canadian society during the post-war period, as well as a variety of constitutional and legal developments in canadian courts and at the constitutional negotiating tables during the 1980s and 1990s. major government studies and reports by the royal commission on aboriginal peoples (1996) and the more recent truth and reconciliation commission of canada (2015) (see also abele, 2000) reflected and entrenched this attitudinal change. these various developments have encouraged researchers to pay attention to the forces that are shaping indigenous communities and societies, as well as to explore new models of research that privilege indigenous power and authority at the expense of their own. one of the most important developments for the rise of community-based or similarly inspired models was likely the tri-council3 policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans (tcps2), which has the guiding principles of respect, concern for welfare, and justice at its core (canadian institutes of health research [cihr], the national sciences and engineering research council of canada [nserc], and the social sciences and humanities research council of canada [sshrc], 2010). in particular, there is a chapter on research involving the first nations, inuit, and métis peoples of canada (cihr, nserc, & sshrc, 2014). although the provisions in this chapter were technically guidelines rather than requirements, researchers quickly realized that their grant applications to the social science and humanities research council had to abide by these rules if they wanted to increase their chances of receiving funding. as a result, some academic researchers have started to move away from non-community-based methods towards community-based models or ones inspired by them (castleden et al., 2012; kovach, 2009; minkler, 2005). control over academic involvement with indigenous peoples is enshrined in a larger political struggle by indigenous peoples for self-determination (stiegman & castleden, 2015). as such, the shift towards ethical relations with indigenous communities is more than a matter of method. instead, it is part of a broader movement towards political equality, indigenous difference and autonomy, and/or solidarity. harmful research in the past stemmed from the belief that indigenous peoples were passive subjects with no power. in comparison, cbpr is part of a broader change wherein the balance of power is recognized and the involvement of indigenous peoples is required. nonetheless, cbpr has been seen by some as only one option when ideally indigenous peoples should hold greater control over research affecting their interests (koster, baccar, & lemelin, 2012; smith, 1999). this turn towards cbpr has been a welcome development that continues to offer an important perspective when used ethically and for appropriate research topics. in particular, the five principles of ethical indigenous research are a valuable gain for the research community. while these principles align nicely with cbpr, they may also be applied to other approaches. as such, we do not believe that cbpr is always necessary for any and all research projects involving indigenous communities, or that noncommunity-based approaches should be abandoned altogether. indeed, there may be certain instances or cases where non-community-based research methods, in which the researcher exercises autonomy rather than engages in a partnership with the community, may be more appropriate or useful, depending on the research question, topic, and situation. below, we investigate these issues based on our 3 the tri-council is made up of three federal granting agencies that fund research in the social sciences and humanities, the natural sciences and engineering, and health. the first edition of the policy was published in 1998 (tcps). the policy was revised substantially for the second edition, released in 2010 (tcps2) and subsequently updated in 2014. 7 alcantara et al.: indigenous research and academic freedom published by scholarship@western, 2017 experiences working with indigenous communities on topics related to indigenous–settler political relations in canada. t h e c a s e f o r n o n c o m m u n i t y ba s e d a p p ro a c h e s cbpr and indigenous approaches have played an important part in redressing the imbalance between researchers and communities, and are part of a broader political and social process of empowerment and decolonization. at the same time, however, it should not necessarily be a foregone conclusion that academic researchers should abandon non-community-based approaches in favour of cbpr models when working with indigenous communities. while there are a number of reasons (which we discuss below) why researchers might choose non-community-based approaches over community-based ones, we also think that non-community-based research can be done ethically in accordance with the tcps2 and the five indigenous principles of respect, relevance, reciprocity, responsibility, and relationality. we focus on these five principles because the tcps2 states that its guidelines are not meant to “override or replace ethical guidance offered by aboriginal peoples themselves” (cihr, nserc, & sshrc, 2010, p. 105; see also stiegman & castleden, 2015). although the literature is replete with criticisms of noncommunity-based research and support for community-based models, there has yet to be any work that we know of that tries to defend the use of non-community-based approaches (e.g., projects in which the researcher exercises his or her autonomy rather than engaging in partnership with the community) for indigenous research. in the next section, we attempt to clarify why non-community-based approaches should still have a place in the toolkit of researchers despite the rising popularity and demand for formal research partnerships with indigenous communities. r e s p e c t a n d r e l a t i o n a l i t y two of the most important principles underlined by cbpr and some indigenous methodologies are respect and relationality (gaudry, 2015). in many regards, these two principles go hand in hand. in the not too distant past, certain academic researchers often had little respect or concern for the needs of the communities they studied. but it is important that we do not paint all academic researchers with the same brush. many researchers spent decades “studying” communities while exercising their academic freedom and, in the process, developed strong and lasting relationships (but not formal partnerships) with community members (hicks & white, 2015; russell, 2005). most contemporary academic researchers, who do not necessarily consider themselves to be adherents of the cbpr or indigenous approaches, have a much deeper respect for the communities where they work while at the same time exercising autonomy over the research question, data collection, analysis, and publication. moreover, this respect should not solely be measured in terms of the amount of time a researcher spends in a community. indeed, depth of engagement, perhaps measured in terms of transparency, humility, trust, and/or respect, can be equally as important as length of engagement. even though some non-community-based researchers do not forge formal partnerships or spend long periods of time in the urban and rural communities where they work, they can still be transparent about their research questions, theories, methods, and goals. they can still approach community leaders and members with humility, acknowledging that they are not the experts on the issue or community but instead bring different yet important knowledge and expertise to the table. they can earn trust and respect by conducting themselves and their research in a way that is consistent with what they said they 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.3 would do and the attitude of humility that they demonstrated at the beginning of the project. they can also earn trust and respect by becoming attuned to the problems and issues these communities face by accessing the wealth of information online (e.g., community newsletters, minutes of meetings, and annual reports) and in existing studies. academic researchers can furthermore get a good sense of community needs and desires from the interviewees themselves.4 actualizing respect and relationality additionally mean that researchers must recognize the fact that indigenous leaders and community members lead very busy lives. accordingly, research relationships must take into account this reality. the same might be said about indigenous community members, as research for them may be labour intensive and so they do not have the time for or interest in a formal partnership with the researcher. instead, they may prefer delegating or simply providing information to the researcher rather than participating as co-investigators. maguire (1987) noted, “while researchers may be able to invest their total work time in a pr [participatory research] project, participants continue their regular life activities” (p. 46). respect and relationality in this context, therefore, means understanding that relationships must be tailored to the realities of the day-to-day lives of the participants and this may mean fostering brief relationships, rather than long-term partnerships. respect and relationality can also mean fostering a much more passive relationship than the one typically embodied in community-based research. according to stoecker (1999), “as a graduate student academic . . . when community members first got me thinking about pr, i was of little use to them. i had no expert knowledge in anything that they did not have more of. how i ended up being relevant was in documenting the neighborhood's struggle and spreading the word of what happened so that the neighborhood could remember itself and others could adapt their model” (p. 851). as opposed to a community-based approach, the role of non-community-based academics in these situations is to simply document the struggle or provide criticisms and lessons learned for that community and others in their current and future efforts. formal partnership may not be necessary or desirable in these situations. in short, academics can employ non-community-based research approaches in ways that embody the principles of respect and relationality. surveys, archival research, and one-off elite interviews conducted autonomously by the researcher, but which are sensitive to indigenous goals and perspectives, may be the most appropriate methodological approach for those community members and leaders who are too busy to engage in a formal partnership. the same may be true for research topics where communities prefer someone who works passively in the background to provide an outsider’s perspective to an ongoing political or social process. in these cases, non-community-based research approaches may be more useful and appropriate than cbpr. 4 we should note that all research involving human beings must go through some sort of ethical oversight. we are not arguing that non-community-based research should be exempt from ethical review prior to the research taking place. 9 alcantara et al.: indigenous research and academic freedom published by scholarship@western, 2017 r e l e v a n c e a n d r e c i p ro c i t y in many respects, relevance and reciprocity go hand in hand. they both speak to the notions of balance and mutual benefit for all concerned. the overriding question is: are the goals of communities and academic researchers compatible? there are a lot of misconceptions about what academic researchers do. much academic research is perceived to be esoteric and largely irrelevant to non-specialists or the public at large. indeed, the commonly used phrase, “it’s academic,” reinforces this notion in popular discourse. academic research in the social sciences, as well as in other disciplines, can be roughly divided into two camps. the first is theory-driven and seeks to advance knowledge by confirming, disconfirming, or modifying theories and hypotheses about different phenomena that have been developed over time and through the observation and study of many cases (alcantara & nelles, 2016; morden, 2013; papillon, 2012). the second is more practical in orientation and seeks to describe and effect change, mainly through a social justice agenda (alfred, 2008; coulthard, 2014; turner, 2006). both approaches have their merits and both make a significant contribution to our collective understanding of the world around us. the production of knowledge thus benefits from a plurality of perspectives and approaches, including those provided by cbpr and non-community-based approaches. non-community-based academic research tends to fall into the theory-driven camp. in this sense, the research is driven by broader debates within academia, rather than the concerns identified by a particular community (macklem, 2001; turner, 2006). ideas are the key points of contention. this does not mean that researchers are blind or inconsiderate to the practical needs of the community or that the research they conduct has no relevance to the community; on the latter point, hegemonic and/or transformative ideas such as neoliberalism, indigenous resurgence, and nation-to-nation relations have had a powerful effect on the lives of individuals and communities. theory driven and ideational work provides policymakers and practically-oriented scholars with an overarching framework for evaluating and generating useful policy and political solutions for a variety of real world problems (alfred, 2008; poelzer & coates, 2015; slowey, 2008). academic researchers are constantly criticized for churning out academic publications that no one outside the academic community reads and so academics are painted as irrelevant or out of touch with reality. cbpr arose partly in response to these criticisms as the close partnership between community and researcher was meant to ensure that relevant results reached the community. yet, academic publications, whether they are produced through non-community-based, cbpr, or indigenous methodologies, serve as an important means for disseminating information, not only within the academic community, but also to key decision-makers within governments and society. politicians, civil servants, non-governmental organizations, students, and the media look to academics to help them understand the processes and issues that are shaping the world around them. academics will typically produce shorter summaries of their research and share those summaries through newspaper columns, television and radio interviews, presentations at conferences and at other public venues, and sometimes through more unconventional means such as social media and animated videos. through these various mechanisms, academics receive and address feedback from a variety of sources and through a variety of mediums. many academics receive letters in the mail or emails from citizens reacting to research results and these reactions can and should drive our future research in these areas. engaging in these various 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.3 dissemination practices is a way of ensuring that researchers respect the principles of relevance and reciprocity even if formal partnerships are not at the heart of the research project. non-community-based research approaches also foster relevance and reciprocity by encouraging graduate students and non-tenured faculty members to engage with and focus on the issues facing indigenous communities. one of the difficulties inherent within cbpr is that it requires a significant time investment before researchers can produce outputs that are valued by the academic community (castleden et al., 2012). in today’s academic job market, candidates are expected to publish articles and book chapters early in their academic careers if they want to have any hope at a tenure-stream position. the disincentives to pursue indigenous topics are significant unless early career researchers can turn to non-community-based approaches and employ them in respectful ways. encouraging graduate students to use non-community-based approaches in an ethical way, therefore, may be one way to foster more research that is relevant and useful to indigenous communities. r e s p o n s i b i l i t y as noted above, most academic researchers, whether they employ non-community-based or cbpr approaches, feel a degree of commitment and responsibility to the communities and regions they study. visits to communities can make a deep impression on researchers, regardless of whether that visit lasts three days or three months. the responsibilities to a community and to the research do not end as soon as researchers leave the community. for the responsible researcher, they continue into the classroom or in conversations with the media, government, and non-governmental organizations about the research that they are undertaking. what is the responsibility of researchers to the communities in which they work? proponents of cbpr argue that their primary purpose should be to advocate for a particular community and seek to help solve the problems that the community faces. a strong current of “social justice” underlies the cbpr approach in which academic researchers become part of the process of seeking action to redress harms committed against a community or people. however, many academic researchers who have employed noncommunity-based approaches feel that they have a responsibility to remain an “outsider,” as in someone not working in formal partnership with the community, when conducting research. while it is true that all academic researchers have agendas, biases and preconceived notions about the topics they study, trying to remain autonomous and view all sides of an issue is a critical part of academic research. the outsider will never be completely objective or all-knowing, but they will bring different and comparative perspectives to the issue based on their observation, data, and past experiences. doing so not only advances the goals of the researcher and the wider community, but also benefits the community by providing new and diverse perspectives rather than simply reflecting what the community already knows about itself and the issue under investigation. academic researchers walk a fine line between getting to know the communities and regions they study (and supporting those communities and regions by trying to understand and reflect on their issues and problems) and maintaining a sufficient distance from those communities so that they can preserve a level of autonomy and reflection that is important to producing diverse and useful knowledge (hicks & white, 2015; kulchyski, 2005; sider, 2014). it is completely understandable that indigenous peoples are wary of past outsiders who unethically engaged in “soaking and poking” around and in their communities. 11 alcantara et al.: indigenous research and academic freedom published by scholarship@western, 2017 however, ethical engagement using an outsider perspective generates greater understanding of what is going on in those communities and, by extension, greater appreciation for the opportunities and challenges facing those communities; in this sense, the long-term benefits could be significant. a good example would be the issue of the division of matrimonial real property on canadian reserves where indian act rules relating to property ownership and patriarchal forms of power combine to disempower indigenous women from being treated equitably during divorce proceedings. in these types of cases, research partnership with communities may be impossible; for instance, there were some indigenous women and women's groups that wanted certain canadian laws to apply so as to protect their matrimonial property interests. some indigenous leaders, however, opposed these demands because acting on them would have violated their communities' rights to autonomy and self-determination. outsiders contributed to overcoming this impasse by pointing to various causes and solutions that were being overlooked in the rhetoric (alcantara, 2006; cornet & lendor, 2002). policymakers and leaders did not adopt these outsider perspectives wholesale, but they contributed to broader thinking about how to address this problem at multiple levels. outsider perspectives have long been valued across the disciplines of social science. outsiders, such as alexis de tocqueville (2000) on american democracy, gunnar myrdal (1995) on race in the united states, and seymour martin lipset (1991) on canadian political culture, have provided valuable insights into domestic phenomena in ways that domestic scholars had yet to provide. indeed, the subfield of comparative politics within political science is premised on the idea that important insight can come from direct or indirect comparison of countries. the comparative work of john borrows (2010) on indigenous constitutionalism within canada clearly falls into and supports that tradition. as academic researchers, embedding oneself too deeply in a community can interfere with one’s ability to critically5 assess a topic. in some cases, communities may be divided along gender, age, economic, family, and/or political lines. these lines are particularly clear, for instance, in issues relating to membership, status, and the division of matrimonial property as it relates to indigenous women. in those situations, an embedded scholar may find that a cbpr approach can only tell one part or a version of a larger story. in reality, there is room (and a need) for a diversity of approaches to research. however, as the pendulum swings towards cbpr approaches, the danger is that only a partial picture will be produced and crucial knowledge and perspective about the policy issue or problem will be overlooked and missed. in short, there is value in encouraging multiple perspectives, something which non-community-based academic research is well positioned to provide, as long as it is done in accordance with the tcps2 and the five principles of ethical indigenous research. taking into account the needs of the community requires flexibility for how the community prefers to be involved, which may be limited due to the need for an outside perspective or due to a lack of time. another relevant consideration is the research topic at hand, such as when a research design is comparative in nature or limited to particular interviewees. noncommunity based approaches are well situated to addresses these situations. 5 the term “critically” or “critical” as used in this context should not be interpreted as “negative.” it simply means the ability of an academic researcher to view an issue or topic perspectives that might be different from those held by the community. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 8, iss. 2 [2017], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol8/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2017.8.2.3 c o n c l u s i o n in this article, we have argued that non-community-based research approaches can and sometimes should be used when conducting research with indigenous peoples. the decision to use a noncommunity-based approach depends partly on the research question and the nature of the participating individuals and communities, but there is also value in the approach in and of itself. in particular, noncommunity-based research approaches are desirable because they tend to generate a plurality of perspectives, which is useful for spurring and advancing academic and political debate and for producing a broader range of knowledge and understanding for policy and political action. although the emergence of research driven by a social justice perspective is a welcome development, researchers should be cautious about homogeneity and instead embrace the inevitable discourse, debate, and benefits that come from adopting a plurality of approaches. however, as history has taught us, these approaches must respect and acknowledge the kinds of concerns emerging out of the literature on cbpr and indigenous methodologies. in that sense, ethical oversight and guidelines such as those found in the tcps2 and the five principles of ethical indigenous research are still necessary for all research involving indigenous communities. our point is simply that such oversight and guidelines should permit and encourage researchers to use both community and non-community-based approaches. 13 alcantara et al.: indigenous research and academic freedom published by scholarship@western, 2017 r e f e re n c e s abele, f. 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(2013). what do we mean by decolonizing research strategies? lessons from decolonizing, indigenous research projects in new zealand and latin america. decolonization: indigeneity, 2(1), 55-71. 19 alcantara et al.: indigenous research and academic freedom published by scholarship@western, 2017 the international indigenous policy journal april 2017 indigenous research and academic freedom: a view from political scientists christopher alcantara dianne lalonde gary n. wilson recommended citation indigenous research and academic freedom: a view from political scientists abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license indigenous research and academic freedom: a view from political scientists solution model for enhancing the experiences of urban first nations and métis patients accessing and navigating the health system for inflammatory arthritis care the international indigenous policy journal volume 10 | issue 2 article 3 april 2019 solution model for enhancing the experiences of urban first nations and métis patients accessing and navigating the health system for inflammatory arthritis care cheryl barnabe university of calgary, ccbarnab@ucalgary.ca jean miller o'brien institute for public health, jeanleighton@shaw.ca sylvia teare o'brien institute for public health, teares@shaw.ca casey eaglespeaker alberta health services, ceaglesp@hullservices.ca see next page for additional authors recommended citation barnabe, c. , miller, j. , teare, s. , eaglespeaker, c. , roland, b. , eshkakogan, n. , crowshoe, (. , lopatina, e. , marshall, d. (2019). solution model for enhancing the experiences of urban first nations and métis patients accessing and navigating the health system for inflammatory arthritis care. the international indigenous policy journal, 10(2) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.3 solution model for enhancing the experiences of urban first nations and métis patients accessing and navigating the health system for inflammatory arthritis care abstract health system innovations that better support indigenous patients, particularly in urban settings, exist in primary health services, but this has not been translated and integrated into specialty care. we sought to identify the experiences of urban first nations and métis patients with inflammatory arthritis in accessing and navigating the health system. we used a qualitative research method called patient and community engagement research program (pacer) led by patients using an iterative three phase process: set, collect, and reflect. initial access and continuity of specialty care can be facilitated with collaboration between primary and specialty care in an urban indigenous health service model, where health system change was built on culturally responsive models of care. keywords inflammatory arthritis, models of care, indigenous, urban indigenous health clinics, pacer creative commons license creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. authors cheryl barnabe, jean miller, sylvia teare, casey eaglespeaker, brenda roland, nicole eshkakogan, (lynden) lindsay crowshoe, elena lopatina, and deborah marshall http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ solution model for enhancing the experiences of urban first nations and métis patients accessing and navigating the health system for inflammatory arthritis care inflammatory arthritis conditions are highly prevalent in indigenous (first nations, métis, and inuit) populations in canada (mcdougall, hurd, & barnabe, 2017), with double the general population prevalence estimates for conditions such as rheumatoid arthritis (barnabe, elias, bartlett, roos, & peschken, 2008; barnabe, jones, et al., 2017) and spondyloarthritis (barnabe, jones, et al., 2017). in addition, the phenotype of inflammatory arthritis conditions is described as more severe among indigenous peoples: rheumatoid arthritis is characterized as presenting at an earlier age, having an increased frequency of seropositivity, and having extra-articular features associated with both a more severe prognosis and a predilection for large joint involvement affecting mobility to a greater extent (hurd & barnabe, 2017; peschken et al., 2010). even under what are considered ideal circumstances of rheumatology specialty care, with facilitated access to diagnosis and targeted medical treatment in high volume centers, indigenous patients in canada are less likely to experience improvements in disease activity measures (barnabe et al., 2018; nagaraj et al., 2018). inflammatory arthritis complications result in higher hospitalization rates for first nations populations in canada and are potentially related to insufficiently treated disease as specialty care services are less frequently accessed (barnabe et al., 2015; barnabe, jones, et al., 2017; loyola-sanchez, hurd, & barnabe, 2017) and barriers to receiving diseasemodifying medications exist (barnabe et al., 2016). the status of determinants of health vary for urban indigenous patients in relation to their non-urban counterparts (place, 2012; tjepkema, 2002). in particular, urban indigenous patients face disparities in housing, income, and access to services (firestone, smylie, maracle, spiller, & o'campo, 2014; ontario federation of indian friendship centers [ofifc], ontario metis aboriginal association, & ontraio native women's association [onwa], 2007)—all of which impact arthritis management plans. access to health services is regarded as a critical determinant of arthritis outcomes. although there is an impression that health service access is most difficult for indigenous patients from remote locations, especially in terms of the logistical barriers around accessing providers for diagnosis and management, there are nonetheless specific concerns for indigenous people residing in urban centers who both experience jurisdictional barriers to care and may experience unacceptable care (thurston et al., 2014). these concerns are amplified by the perception of mainstream specialty services placing emphasis on technological and biomedical solutions and neglecting the management of complex social situations that are the reality for urban indigenous patients (mcdonald, 2011). primary health services have adapted to better serve the urban indigenous population through the establishment of multidisciplinary urban indigenous healthcare centers, which incorporate care for physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual wellness (health council of canada, 2012). these centers play an essential role in helping patients navigate complex networks of health and social services, with service delivery based on indigenous approaches to health and healing (browne & elliott, 2009). they also deliver high-quality service through prioritizing culturally safe and relevant care. however, patients with inflammatory arthritis would still be required to access their rheumatology care at a separate center, where these principles will not necessarily be recognized or supported, which could ultimately result in care disengagement. in light of these issues, the purpose of this research is to inform specialty care systems and providers about the situations urban indigenous patients face when they access 1 barnabe et al.: arthritis care access for urban first nations and métis patients published by scholarship@western, 2019 inflammatory arthritis care so they can better respond to patients’ needs, develop care alliances with patients and primary health service providers, and ultimately resolve care gaps. this study focuses on understanding the experiences of urban first nations and métis patients accessing and navigating the health system for inflammatory arthritis care. specifically, it focuses on the experiences of patients engaged in a model of care where specialty rheumatology care is provided in the context of an urban indigenous primary health service. for this study, we employed an innovative qualitative research method called patient and community engagement research (pacer). pacer researchers are individuals who have completed a formal 12-month training program to design and conduct qualitative health research relevant to the health condition they have. as part of their research process, these individuals engage other patients using an established protocol of qualitative inquiry (marlett & emes, 2010; marlett, shklarov, marshall, santana, & wasylak, 2014; miller, teare, marlett, shklarov, & marshall, 2016; shklarov, marshall, wasylak, & marlett, 2017). this approach, driven by patients working with patients, brings a collective patient voice to health system change. it results in a shared collective understanding of the research issue that is solidly grounded in patient experience. methods methodologic framework and study setting the pacer research method (marlett & emes, 2010) has 3 phases: set, collect, and reflect. in the set phase, patients clarify the scope and direction of the study, generally using focus groups. data are then acquired (the collect phase) from patients using focus groups, narrative interviews, observation, or questionnaires. in the reflect phase, patients participate in a final focus group to arrive at a common understanding of the findings from the collect phase and then make suggestions about future research directions and knowledge dissemination. as described above, the pacer method is rooted in the pacer researchers’ experience with their respective conditions, which helps them identify with the patients they engage during the research process. however, at the time of our study, none of the pacer researchers had inflammatory arthritis, and none were from first nations or métis populations. instead, two certified and experienced non-indigenous pacers with osteoarthritis (jm & st), who had led a full set, collect, and reflect process in a group of patients with rheumatoid arthritis (lopatina et al., 2018), were brought on to the research team. they joined two non-indigenous academic researchers who had previously worked with the pacer research method (el & dm), and two indigenous academic physicians (cb & lc) who practice at the elbow river healing lodge, which is an urban indigenous primary health service in calgary, alberta, canada. these members partnered with two first nations health professionals (br & ne, also a graduate student) from the indigenous health program of alberta health services and an elder (ce), who was recognized by the urban indigenous community in calgary and chair of the alberta health services wisdom council, to implement a modified pacer research process at the elbow river healing lodge. the elbow river healing lodge is administrated by the indigenous health program of alberta health services. within the elbow river healing lodge, a monthly arthritis specialty clinic accepts referrals both through a triage process (hazlewood et al., 2016) and self-referral processes (barnabe, lockerbie, erasmus, & crowshoe, 2017). self-identified urban first nations and métis patients with inflammatory arthritis conditions were recruited from this clinic for the study by a research assistant. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.3 ethics approval and consent to participate the university of calgary conjoint health research ethics board approved this study (reb 14-0478). a formal research agreement set out the roles and responsibilities of the investigators to the urban first nations and métis population and the indigenous health program of alberta health services on behalf of the elbow river healing lodge. individual patient consent was obtained. reflect phase with first nation and métis patients with the urban first nations and métis patients recruited from the elbow river healing lodge, we explored experiences accessing and navigating the health care system for their arthritis using an adapted interview guide from the non-indigenous rheumatoid arthritis study that had previously been conducted (lopatina et al., 2018). this guide addressed topics relating to the impact of inflammatory arthritis on the participants’ lives, self-management strategies, their journeys to inflammatory arthritis diagnosis, and their experiences with medication. themes that had been identified in the nonindigenous study were specifically explored with the participants of this study. these themes included challenges in: a. initial access to rheumatology care; b. ongoing access to rheumatology care; c. information about the disease and resources for those living with arthritis; d. fear of the future; and e. collaborative and continuous care (lopatina et al., 2018). individual face-to-face interviews were led by the indigenous health professionals and the elder and were audio recorded. the pacer researcher was present in the room and recorded notes as the interviews proceeded but did not lead the questioning. the interviews were 0.5 to 2 hours in duration and were held in a meeting room at the elbow river healing lodge. analysis and validation first, the pacer researcher conducted preliminary coding on the interviews and field notes based on both elements of glaser and strauss’s (1967) grounded theory method (hallberg, 2006) and the framework developed in the non-indigenous study (lopatina et al., 2018). these preliminary codes were reviewed with a second pacer researcher who has osteoarthritis. then, the resulting preliminary analysis was presented to the first nations health professionals and the elder who conducted the interviews; they provided further contextual clarity regarding both the content of the interviews and the interpretations of them. next, the pacer researchers summarized these findings, with further feedback and revision from the first nations health professionals and the elder, who confirmed that the synthesis reflected the interviews. recommendations were then drafted by the whole group. finally, the results and recommendations were reviewed with leadership from the pacer program and the broader research team, which includes two indigenous faculty members and an indigenous graduate student. these multiple rounds of review were conducted to ensure authentic representation of identified themes and incorporation of indigenous perspectives in the research. 3 barnabe et al.: arthritis care access for urban first nations and métis patients published by scholarship@western, 2019 results participants in total, 18 people with inflammatory arthritis accepted the invitation to participate (14 women and 4 men). in total, 11 people were interviewed and the remaining 7, who had accepted the invitation to participate, did not arrive for the interview. the 11 participants were all female, ranged from 39 to 70 years of age, and all were first nations or métis. the participants reflected a spectrum of arthritis conditions, ranging from recent onset to established inflammatory arthritis diagnoses. their experiences of having inflammatory arthritis, of self-management, and of their journeys accessing and navigating the healthcare system for the management of their conditions are summarized below. experience of inflammatory arthritis inflammatory arthritis was seen to impact all aspects of the participants’ lives, from how they managed daily tasks to how they managed their relationships with others. one participant described the allencompassing nature of living with inflammatory arthritis as something that “takes up space in her brain” (participant c5), as she always needs to plan ahead. the pain, fatigue, and immobility of inflammatory arthritis affected her ability to prepare meals, maintain personal hygiene and cleanliness in the home, maintain employment, and have restful sleep. one participant described her fatigue as feeling like “a balloon that got punctured” (participant c11). participants also spoke of how inflammatory arthritis had impacted their relationships with family members and friends. one participant reflected on her personality changing, noting that she had become more reclusive; another stated that she was reluctant to even enter a romantic relationship, as “sex is not an option” (participant c8). one participant expressed guilt and a feeling that her younger children were being “cheated” (participant c10), since she was neither able to complete activities she had done with her older children nor able to care for her younger children without relying on her older children’s help. self-management strategies participants discussed a variety of modalities to manage their symptoms, including topical and thermal therapies, aromatherapy, massage, and vitamins. several people spoke of meditation and rest, eating a healthy diet, and getting regular exercise. one participant said her self-management strategy was to “live differently and naturally” (participant c8). the journey of accessing and navigating the healthcare system for inflammatory arthritis initial access to rheumatology care. many participants had received an inflammatory arthritis diagnosis prior to engaging in care at the elbow river healing lodge, which meant that their experiences were of being referred through the usual care pathway of primary to specialty care in a general population clinic setting. participants perceived delays in accessing care as related to either primary care providers’ unfamiliarity with inflammatory arthritis conditions or a general reluctance to refer patients to rheumatologists. for participant c3, when asked to speculate why she had not been referred to a rheumatologist, she thought it might have been because, at the time she was diagnosed, doctors did not know about rheumatoid arthritis and there were few doctors on reserves. participant c6 recalled that her 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.3 family doctor said she likely had the onset of rheumatoid arthritis but was not certain and did not refer her to a rheumatologist to confirm the diagnosis. access to rheumatology care was further complicated by participants’ experiences of discrimination and racism. participants perceived that providers did not believe patients’ reports of pain or the inflammatory arthritis diagnoses that were previously made in other care settings. participant c8, for example, had been treated for over 10 years for rheumatoid arthritis in another province, but during a hospitalization her diagnosis was revised to fibromyalgia; following this, her medications for rheumatoid arthritis were discontinued for a full 2 years until she could re-engage with rheumatology care at the elbow river healing lodge and have her treatment re-initiated. another complication was patients’ own reluctance to seek care. participant c6, who had not been referred to specialty care despite the suspicion of inflammatory arthritis, stopped going to her primary care provider because she thought they were too eager to give her prescription pain medication without addressing her main concerns. participants reported downplaying their pain and just putting up with their symptoms, which was something they had witnessed their family members do in order to avoid contact with the health system. participant c5 noted, she “just keeps going,” and participant c9 said that she “forges on.” some participants reported masking their pain with other substances or ascribing their pain to another cause. participant c1 addressed pre-existing joint pain with alcohol and drugs; participant c8 attributed her pain to previous motor vehicle collisions. some found that health professionals assumed their symptoms were caused by addiction problems. participant c9 described her experience: “i don’t like it when you go in and you have a problem and they assume you have an addiction problem.” for participants who had accessed inflammatory arthritis care through the elbow river healing lodge, their model of care facilitated referral to the arthritis clinic, which resulted in negligible wait times for appointments (barnabe, lockerbie, et al., 2017). when asked about navigating the health care system through this model of care, participant c3 said: “actually i just kind of zoomed through it. i’m very grateful for that, (i was) one of the fortunate ones … just zoomed through the system: the doors just opened for me.” racism and stereotyping were not perceived in this model of care. ongoing access to rheumatology care. participants spoke highly of the ongoing access they had to clinical services at the elbow river healing lodge. patients felt welcome to return as frequently as they needed and were appreciative of both the multiple modes of communication with the health professionals (e.g., email) and the primary health care providers’ availability when the rheumatologist could not be immediately accessed. one participant (participant c11) stated, “the help i’ve gotten and the access has been very good.” information about disease and resources for those living with arthritis. few first nations and métis participants expressed need for additional knowledge about their disease or additional resources for disease management. participants spoke of receiving support and information from their family members, friends, and their faith, as well as gathering information from participating in community programs or searching the internet. when asked what else could help her deal with her arthritis, participant c3 said: “god the creator: i can’t think of anything else.” similarly, participant c2 said, “if there is such thing as a god, then he/she should show up and just take the pain away. he should be like a 5 barnabe et al.: arthritis care access for urban first nations and métis patients published by scholarship@western, 2019 parent and not want to see you in pain.” two participants expressed interest in the supportive and traditional wellness practices provided at the elbow river healing lodge. fear. in the non-indigenous study, this theme reflected patients’ fears about future disease management, such as which medications might be required and their potential side effects, medication options becoming exhausted, or not receiving the best medications for their arthritis. in this study, first nations and métis patients said they experienced difficulties with incomplete pain relief, perceived ineffectiveness of arthritis therapies, unwanted side effects, and a fear of becoming addicted to their medications. participants’ experiences with medication effectiveness were reflected by one participant’s observation that “medications are sort of trial and error” (participant c5). this participant stated that she knew her arthritis would progress and all she could do was “just cope and hope.” other participants said their medications would simply take the edge off their pain and, in some instances, were ineffective, causing them to either take excessive doses in hopes of obtaining relief or to abandon therapy entirely. one participant noted her prior experience with a physician who, when she revealed that she had discontinued or self-titrated the physician recommended medication, was frustrated with her because it put continuity of care at risk. participants also perceived discrimination as a threat to ongoing medication access; one participant felt that, based on her race, her previous health care provider had withheld medications. she explained her understanding of the provider’s mindset: “we won’t give you something because we don’t want you to become addicted to it” (participant c9). issues of medication access were also brought up by the urban first nations and métis participants. several expressed their frustration at delays instigated by federal government processes for medication approvals, as well as what they perceived as inconsistent lengths of review for medication approvals based on the type of medication prescribed—which delayed access to necessary treatment.1 medication costs were still a relevant factor, with one participant stating that if her medication costs were not covered, she would have to do without treatment and endure increased pain. collaborative and continuous care. the care model at the elbow river healing lodge fosters collaboration and continuity across the system; these kinds of experience dominated participants’ discussions within this theme. the direct relationship between primary and specialty care, together with the approach to care delivery at the elbow river healing lodge, was perceived to be a critical component of continuity of care. participant c11, for example, stated that once she started coming to the elbow river healing lodge, “everything levelled out and everything was ok.” another participant, participant c9, said, “when i’m feeling overwhelmed, i come here.” she reported feeling safe at the clinic, noting that the staff were like family. she said the staff are honest with her and “they go out of their way to make you feel good.” participant c9 went on to say that she can express herself freely and without 1 in canada, first nations with indian status and inuit persons receive medication coverage through the federal government’s non-insured health benefits (nihb) program (government of canada, n.d.). the nihb program is the payer of last resort; thus, any other private or public sources of funding for medications must be accessed prior to nihb providing coverage. the formulary for first-line disease modifying anti-rheumatic drugs is open benefit and can be dispensed from pharmacies without prior approval. however, biologic medications are “limited use” and nihb will request additional information from the treating physician, as well as confirming the stated medication history, prior to approving a claim for these agents. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.3 judgment at the clinic. she was given the time she needed to address her concerns and felt the clinic staff “always want to help you go in the right direction.” an additional element brought up by urban first nations and métis patients was a requirement for the health system and providers to provide culturally appropriate care. participants expressed great interest in having the health system bridge traditional and western medicine paradigms. many of the participants expressed their disconnection from traditional practices; as one participant put it, she was “raised white” (participant c1). participants were eager to bring the spiritual, emotional, and physical aspects of their lives together to achieve health. participants who engaged in traditional practices were appreciative of the support that the elbow river healing lodge staff expressed for these practices. discussion this article presents the experiences of urban first nations and métis patients who accessed an indigenous-focused health service for inflammatory arthritis care. through our study, we were able to highlight positive patient experiences within a model of care that involves the provision of rheumatology specialty services in an urban multidisciplinary indigenous primary health service. this supportive model of care facilitated access to care, continuity of care, and collaboration, all while addressing care needs and recognizing the value of traditional approaches to health and wellness. in prior research, we worked with first nations and métis people from rural and urban centers with either osteoarthritis or inflammatory arthritis in order to better understand the processes, barriers, and facilitators in order to inform an arthritis care framework (thurston et al., 2014). these patients proposed a model of care that embodied culturally appropriate practices and provided innovative services to resolve care barriers. this finding appears to hold true based on our data from the study discussed in this article, as well urban indigenous primary health services are models of care developed to provide high quality care grounded in the social and cultural realities of indigenous patients. structural adaptations within the clinical model are at the core of providing culturally competent and safe care that is responsive to the needs of urban indigenous patients. an ethnographic study of urban indigenous primary health care centers by browne et al. (2016) found contextually tailored, culturally safe, traumaand violenceinformed, and inequity-responsive care to be essential in achieving equity-oriented and effective services. models of care in rheumatology in canada have been widely discussed in recent years for two primary reasons. the first is the shortage of rheumatology specialists (barber et al., 2017). the second is the large body of evidence informing current treatment guidelines, which supports early diagnosis and institution of appropriate therapy, along with frequent and systematic disease activity monitoring to identify when and if treatment needs to be escalated (bykerk et al., 2012). in 2014, the arthritis alliance of canada (2014) defined a pan-canadian approach to inflammatory arthritis models of care, which is heavily weighted towards navigating patients to specialty care through which a rheumatologist will provide ongoing management and patients will be responsible for adhering to the prescribed treatment. the novelty of our work is that it combines these approaches in an environment that is supportive to urban indigenous patients (barnabe, lockerbie, et al., 2017), and it is one proposed strategy to resolve existing inflammatory arthritis care gaps. it is acknowledged, however, that beneficial models of care developed in small scale must ultimately be shown to meet the health service needs of the larger population base (henderson, montesanti, crowshoe, & leduc, 2018). 7 barnabe et al.: arthritis care access for urban first nations and métis patients published by scholarship@western, 2019 despite the overall positive experiences of the model of care reported by participants, there was still evidence for tension and discomfort around individual decision-making for pharmacotherapy for inflammatory arthritis. specifically, participants shared experiences of incomplete therapeutic effect, the occurrence of side effects, and fears of addiction. in the field of diabetes research, a qualitative study of indigenous patients linked doctors being overly prescriptive with experiences of authoritarianism encountered in the residential schools, or as an indication of the physician’s unwillingness to communicate or interact deeply with the patient (jacklin et al., 2017). this negative association with traditional western medical practice requires further exploration specifically in the treatment of inflammatory arthritis conditions because it is commonly treated with several medications concurrently and chronically, including those with immune-suppressive effects and those providing acute symptomatic relief. an emerging literature specific to indigenous populations has suggested solutions to the problems encountered in health care settings through health literacy innovations (crengle et al., 2018; lambert et al., 2014) and patient-centered care plans that involve shared decision-making strategies (jull et al., 2013; jull et al., 2015). these may be beneficial in the context of inflammatory arthritis and should be the subject of future studies. based on what participants noted, we propose solutions in table 1 that could support inflammatory arthritis care access and health system navigation for urban first nations and métis patients. these solutions may be applicable to urban indigenous populations internationally who face similar issues in accessing specialty care. these solutions encompass indigenous patient priorities and the evidence base of rheumatology practice regarding: • the importance of early diagnosis and treatment of inflammatory arthritis and facilitated referral mechanisms to specialty care; • the continuity of specialty care provision, especially in collaboration with primary care teams; • the accessibility of traditional health and wellness strategies; • the enhancement of discussions around pharmacotherapy; and • advocacy for improved medication access. for urban first nations and métis patients, it is critical that these elements of inflammatory arthritis care are provided in culturally appropriate environments with services and systems that embody cultural safety. limitations of this study include the adaptation of the pacer methodology so that the initial set and collect research phases were first informed by a western lens from the set, collect, and reflect steps carried out by non-indigenous pacer researchers with the non-indigenous rheumatoid arthritis patients. subsequently, the non-indigenous pacer researchers were partnered with first nations health professionals and an elder through an indigenous health clinic in order to conduct interviews with first nations and métis patients and interpret the results collaboratively. the patients participating in the research were reflective of the first nations and métis patients engaged in rheumatology care in an urban indigenous clinic, but our results may not be generalizable to other settings. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.3 table 1. summary of experiences of urban first nations and métis inflammatory arthritis patients in accessing and navigating the health system, and proposed solution model for existing challenges themes experiences of urban first nations and métis inflammatory arthritis patients solution model initial access to rheumatology care reluctance on the part of patients to seek care delay in recognition of inflammatory arthritis in primary care provider and public awareness program of the importance of early diagnosis and treatment wait time for initial appointment discrimination and experiences of racism positive experience with no perceived racism and stereotyping among participants who had accessed inflammatory arthritis care through the urban indigenous primary health service and its model of integrated specialty care facilitated mechanism of referral from primary to specialty care, and alternative models of direct access to specialty care culturally appropriate and racism-free services ongoing access to rheumatology care positive experience with continuity of access in their model of care team approach to care multiple modes of contact information about the disease and resources for those living with arthritis familial support interest in supportive and traditional wellness practices education and resource coordination within the community and medical home fear incomplete pain relief perceived ineffectiveness of arthritis therapies unwanted side effects enhanced communication and shareddecision making strategies culturally appropriate and racism-free services fear of addiction to medications delays in the federal processes for medication approvals medication costs as a barrier to treatment discrimination as a perceived threat to ongoing medication access physician advocacy to payers for timely access to advanced therapies cost coverage for medications collaborative and continuous care positive experience of collaborative and continuous care in the care model requirement for the health system and providers to incorporate culturally appropriate care specialty care integrated in primary health service culturally appropriate and racism-free services patient empowerment availability of traditional wellness strategies 9 barnabe et al.: arthritis care access for urban first nations and métis patients published by scholarship@western, 2019 in summary, we have shared the positive results and impacts of a culturally responsive model of care to facilitate access and continuity of specialty care for indigenous patients with arthritis, while highlighting the need to improve decision-making support around pharmacotherapy to optimize inflammatory arthritis management. we share positive results on the impact of a culturally responsive model of care to facilitate access and continuity of specialty care for indigenous patients with arthritis, while highlighting the need to improve decision support around pharmacotherapy to optimize inflammatory arthritis management. culturally appropriate and racism-free services, team-based care approaches integrating primary and specialty services, and strategies to enhance knowledge about arthritis and its’ management can support optimal patient care. references arthritis alliance of canada. 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(2013). interventions for indigenous peoples making health decisions: a systematic review. pimatisiwin: a journal of aboriginal and indigenous community health, 11(3), 539-554. jull, j., giles, a., minwaashin lodge, the aboriginal women's support centre, boyer, y., & stacey, d. (2015). cultural adaptation of a shared decision making tool with aboriginal women: a qualitative study. bmc medical informatics and decision making, 15, 1. doi: https://doi.org/10.1186/s12911-015-0129-7 lambert, m., luke, j., downey, b., crengle, s., kelaher, m., reid, s., & smylie, j. (2014). health literacy: health professionals’ understandings and their perceptions of barriers that indigenous patients encounter. bmc health services research, 14, 614. doi: https://doi.org/10.1186/s12913-014-0614-1 lopatina, e., miller, j. l., teare, s. r., marlett, n. j., patel, j., barber, c. e. h., … marshall, d. a. (2018). the voice of patients in system redesign: a case study of redesigning a centralized system for intake of referrals from primary care to rheumatologists for patients with suspected rheumatoid arthritis. health expectations, 1-16. doi: https://doi.org/10.1111/hex.12855 loyola-sanchez, a., hurd, k., & barnabe, c. (2017). healthcare utilization for arthritis by indigenous populations of australia, canada, new zealand, and the united states: a systematic review. seminars in arthritis and rheumatism, 46(5), 665-674. doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.semarthrit.2016.10.011 marlett, n., & emes, c. (2010). grey matters. calgary, ab: university of calgary press. marlett, n., shklarov, s., marshall, d., santana, m. j., & wasylak, t. (2014). building new roles and relationships in research: a model of patient engagement research. quality of life research, 24(5),1057-1067. doi: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11136-014-0845-y mcdonald, h. l. (2011). arthritis, aches and pains, and arthritis services: experiences from within an urban first nations community (doctoral dissertation). university of british columbia, vancouver. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.3 mcdougall, c., hurd, k., & barnabe, c. (2017). systematic review of rheumatic disease epidemiology in the indigenous populations of canada, the united states, australia, and new zealand. seminars in arthritis and rheumatism, 46(5), 675-686. doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.semarthrit.2016.10.010 miller, j. l., teare, s. r., marlett, n., shklarov, s., & marshall, d. a. (2016). support for living a meaningful life with osteoarthritis: a patient-to-patient research study. patient, 9(5), 457-464. doi: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40271-016-0169-9 nagaraj, s., barnabe, c., schieir, o., pope, j., bartlett, s. j., boire, g., … canadian early arthritis cohort study investigators. (2018). early rheumatoid arthritis presentation, treatment, and outcomes in aboriginal patients in canada: a canadian early arthritis cohort study analysis. arthritis care & research, 70(8), 1245-1250. doi: https://doi.org/10.1002/acr.23470 ontario federation of indian friendship centers (ofifc), ontario metis aboriginal association, & ontraio native women's association (onwa). (2007). urban aboriginal task force final report. retrieved from http://ofifc.org/sites/default/files/docs/uatfontariofinalreport.pdf peschken, c. a., hitchon, c. a., robinson, d. b., smolik, i., barnabe, c. r., prematilake, s., & elgabalawy, h. s. (2010). rheumatoid arthritis in a north american native population: longitudinal followup and comparison with a white population. the journal of rheumatology, 37(8), 1589-1595. doi: https://doi.org/10.3899/jrheum.091452 place, j. (2012). the health of aboriginal people residing in urban areas. retrieved from https://www.ccnsa-nccah.ca/docs/emerging/rpt-healthurbanaboriginal-place-en.pdf shklarov, s., marshall, d. a., wasylak, t., & marlett, n. j. (2017). "part of the team": mapping the outcomes of training patients for new roles in health research and planning. health expectations, 20(6), 1428-1436. doi: https://doi.org/10.1111/hex.12591 thurston, w. e., coupal, s., jones, c. a., crowshoe, l. f., marshall, d. a., homik, j., & barnabe, c. (2014). discordant indigenous and provider frames explain challenges in improving access to arthritis care: a qualitative study using constructivist grounded theory. international journal for equity in health, 13(1), 46. doi: https://doi.org/10.1186/1475-9276-13-46 tjepkema, m. (2002). the health of the off-reserve aboriginal population. health reports, 13, 1-17. retrieved from https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/82-003-s/2002001/pdf/82-003s2002004-eng.pdf 13 barnabe et al.: arthritis care access for urban first nations and métis patients published by scholarship@western, 2019 the international indigenous policy journal april 2019 solution model for enhancing the experiences of urban first nations and métis patients accessing and navigating the health system for inflammatory arthritis care cheryl barnabe jean miller sylvia teare casey eaglespeaker see next page for additional authors recommended citation solution model for enhancing the experiences of urban first nations and métis patients accessing and navigating the health system for inflammatory arthritis care abstract keywords creative commons license authors solution model for enhancing the experiences of urban first nations and mã©tis patients accessing and navigating the health system for inflammatory arthritis care collaborative public health system interventions for chronic disease prevention among urban aboriginal peoples the international indigenous policy journal volume 6 | issue 4 article 3 september 2015 collaborative public health system interventions for chronic disease prevention among urban aboriginal peoples piotr wilk western university, piotr.wilk@schulich.uwo.ca martin cooke university of waterloo, cooke@uwaterloo.ca recommended citation wilk, p. , cooke, m. (2015). collaborative public health system interventions for chronic disease prevention among urban aboriginal peoples. the international indigenous policy journal, 6(4). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.3 collaborative public health system interventions for chronic disease prevention among urban aboriginal peoples abstract urban aboriginal peoples are at higher risk to a variety of chronic diseases, compared with other canadians. social determinants of health, socio-ecological approaches to health, and life course perspectives can identify some of the various factors that contribute to this excess risk. the complexity of these factors suggests that an effective strategy for reducing this risk might be to focus on improving the capacity of the local public health system that serves aboriginal people and families, rather than on interventions aimed solely at individual health behaviour change. this article uses the healthy weights connection intervention as an example of one of several systems-focussed and collaborative approaches to improving the health of urban aboriginal people. despite their potential utility, we suggest that there are unique considerations for implementing and evaluating such interventions in an urban aboriginal context. keywords urban aboriginal health, chronic disease, public health system, public health intervention, health evaluation, health policy, collective impact acknowledgments this project is funded by the public health agency of canada (phac) innovations strategy: achieving healthier weights in canada's communities. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/   c o l l a b o ra t i v e pu b l i c h e a l t h s y s t e m i n t e rv e n t i o n s f o r c h ro n i c d i s e a s e pre v e n t i o n a m o n g u rb a n a b o ri g i n a l pe o p l e s improving the health and wellbeing of aboriginal people is a major policy challenge in canada. first nations, inuit, and métis are at higher risk than are other canadians to a number of poor health outcomes, including preventable chronic diseases such as type ii diabetes and some cancers. although the most proximate causes are usually disease-specific, most of these chronic diseases have in common a web of causal factors that operate at different socio-ecological levels, including individual health behaviours, family conditions, neighbourhood and community characteristics, all conditioned by the macro-level context of historical colonization, and aboriginal–settler relations, including forced assimilation (gracey & king, 2009). these health inequities are experienced not only by people in discrete aboriginal communities such as first nations but also by those living in cities and towns, now a majority of the aboriginal population. in an urban context the various components of this causal web are affected by the activities of a wide range of organizations and institutions, including schools, health centres, social services, and local government. these organizations can therefore play a role in preventing chronic diseases and can be thought of as composing the local public health system (centers for disease control and prevention, 2014). these local systems are increasingly the focus of public health intervention efforts that aim to improve their overall operation, instead of focussing directly on providing specific health education or health promotion services to individuals or families (roussos & fawcett, 2000). a key component of many of these efforts is collaboration, particularly between sectors and across domains of public health and social service provision, to increase the potential for “collective impact” on a particular health or social problem and to increase the overall capacity of the public health system to provide these services and to respond to needs of the local community (kania & kramer, 2013). in this article, we argue that collaborative approaches or cross-sector collaboration may be particularly well suited to enhancing the ability of the public health system to address the excess risk of chronic disease among urban aboriginal peoples. the complexity of the factors affecting these populations and the similarly complex and often fragmented nature of the public health systems that serve them strongly indicate to us that collective efforts are more likely to be successful than individual programs or policy changes. promisingly, there are several examples of these collaborative initiatives that are currently underway in ontario. however, there are also characteristics of urban aboriginal communities, including the political and historical contexts, which should be considered in attempts to promote concerted action to prevent chronic disease. below, we briefly describe some key characteristics of urban aboriginal populations in canada and the public health systems that serve them. the article presents some of the conceptual frameworks that we think should inform chronic disease prevention among these populations. we use an intervention promoting healthy weights among urban aboriginal children and youth, the healthy weights connection, in which we are involved, as an innovative example of “system-level” public health interventions to improve aboriginal peoples’ health. using this and other examples, we explore some of the challenges for systems-level and collaborative interventions in urban aboriginal contexts. 1 wilk and cooke: collaborative urban aboriginal health interventions published by scholarship@western, 2015   ba c kg ro u n d : u rb a n a b o ri g i n a l c o m m u n i t i e s a n d c o m p l e x h e a l t h s y s t e m s the urban aboriginal population is large and growing. in the 2011 national household survey, 1.4 million canadians identified themselves as members of an aboriginal group (first nations, inuit, or métis), 56% of whom were living in an urban area at the time of the census (aborignal affairs and northern development canada, 2013). this proportion is increasing rapidly: between 1996 and 2011, the urban aboriginal population grew at a rate of more than 4.7% per year (aborignal affairs and northern development canada, 2013), due mainly to a combination of a higher fertility and a greater tendency for people to identify themselves as aboriginal in the census (guimond, robitaille, & senécal, 2014). part of the reason for this growth is that this is a young population. forty-six percent of urban aboriginal people were under age 25 in 2011, compared with 29% of the canadian population (aborignal affairs and northern development canada, 2013). this means more women in childbearing ages and therefore continued high fertility. the sizable aboriginal youth population also contributes to it being a very mobile population. young people in general are more likely to change communities than are older people, mainly for work or education, although aboriginal people tend to be more mobile than nonaboriginal canadians at any age (clatworthy & norris, 2014). in the case of first nations, a substantial proportion of this mobility is between first nations communities and urban areas. contrary to some popular beliefs, there is no research evidence of large-scale migration into cities. instead, in most recent census periods roughly as many have moved from cities to first nations as in the other direction, suggesting a considerable amount of circulation or multiple moves between the two types of community (clatworthy & norris, 2014). urban aboriginal populations are also diverse, in terms of cultural affiliation, legal status, and socioeconomic position (see ghosh & spitzer, 2014). they typically include first nations, métis, and inuit people whose cultural connections may stretch across the country, as well as those who live within what they consider to be their traditional territories. they include people with and without “status”, or registration under the indian act, people who may have recently moved to the city from first nations or other aboriginal communities, and those whose families have lived in the city for generations. cities are home to people with deep personal connection to indigenous cultures and languages, and those for whom an aboriginal identity may be important, but who have not been raised or educated in a first nations, métis, or inuit environment. among those might be some of the many mixed-ancestry people who identify as aboriginal, or who are married to or living with non-aboriginal family members (see robitaille & guimond, 2003). although higher rates of low income and unemployment continue to be problems for urban aboriginal people, these communities are far from economically homogenous, and there is also evidence of a growing “urban aboriginal middle class” in some cities (fitzmaurice, mccaskill, & cidro, 2012). like people living in rural or remote aboriginal communities (first nations information governance centre, 2012), urban aboriginal peoples face disproportionate risks of chronic disease and related conditions. a major concern is diabetes. based on the 2009 to 2010 canadian community health survey, the age-standardized prevalence was 7.3% among métis and 10.3% among first nations living off-reserve, compared with 5.0% in the non-aboriginal population (public health agency of canada, 2012). recently conducted links between health and administrative data sources have identified high or 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.3   rising rates of other chronic conditions among urban aboriginal populations. among métis, the most urbanised aboriginal group, a high risk of cardiovascular disease has been identified in ontario (métis nation of ontario, 2013). a rising risk of cancer has been found among first nations (kewayosh, et al., 2015). the reasons for the high rates of chronic disease among urban aboriginal peoples are complicated and multifactorial. in historical and epidemiological terms, aboriginal populations in general might be through of as at a mid-way point in an epidemiological transition (omran, 2005; romaniuk, 2014). aboriginal peoples continue to experience higher rates of death and illness due to infectious diseases than do non-aboriginal canadians, but are now also at higher risk of the “lifestyle” related chronic diseases that have become the leading causes of death among canadians. these trends are related, albeit in a complex way, to health behaviours. aboriginal people are more likely to smoke and to have body mass index (bmi) scores in the ranges considered “overweight” or “obese” than are non-aboriginal canadians (gionet & roshanafshar, 2013), although there is also evidence that aboriginal adults are more physically active than are non-aboriginal canadians (findlay, 2011). the relationships between these behaviours and socio-economic factors also may be different in aboriginal and non-aboriginal populations. whereas the rise of “delayed degenerative diseases” among canadians and other citizens of wealthy countries has come as a result of higher standards of living, the excess risk among aboriginal peoples coincides with higher rates of low income, food insecurity, unemployment, and other symptoms of social and economic marginalization (gracey & king, 2009). the public health system of organizations and institutions that serve urban aboriginal people, and which may be used to address these inequities, is also complex. healthcare may be provided by non-aboriginal clinicians and universal organizations or by aboriginal-specific health centres such as the aboriginal health access centres located in some ontario communities, some of which provide both western biomedicine and traditional healing. in urban areas, local public health authorities are often the main source of health promotion and health education activities for the majority of the population, and they might or might not provide programming specifically targeted to aboriginal people. a range of other institutions might provide more culturally specific health promotion services. these include local aboriginal organizations, such as friendship centres and aboriginal health centres, as well as nonaboriginal community health centres that serve neighbourhoods with high needs, often coinciding with concentrations of aboriginal populations. local aboriginal organizations are often the providers of provincial or federal programs aimed at improving health outcomes. since 1995, the canadian government has provided maternal and child health services in urban communities through urban and northern aboriginal head start, delivered in urban areas by friendship centres and other aboriginal organizations (public health agency of canada, 2010). in ontario, the provincial government funds a number of programs through the aboriginal healing and wellness strategy (ahws), including various community wellness and health education and health promotion programs. these are delivered in urban areas mainly though the service offices of the métis nations of ontario (mno), the ontario federation of indigenous friendship centres (ofifc) and their member centres, and the ontario native women’s’ association (onwa) (ontario ministry of community and social services, 2012a). these provincial or regional organizations often also support health promotion or health education efforts targeting aboriginal people by producing health education materials, cultural competency materials or training, workshops, and other resources 3 wilk and cooke: collaborative urban aboriginal health interventions published by scholarship@western, 2015   that are used by local service providers. in ontario, they are aided by other provincial-level initiatives, such as the southern ontario aboriginal diabetes initiative (soadi), funded by the ontario ministry of health and long-term care (mohltc) for the “development and enhancement of programs and services focusing on the education, prevention, and management of diabetes in aboriginal communities, both on and off-reserve” (southern ontario aboriginal diabetes initiative, 2015, para. 1). urban aboriginal people do not only access services or participate in health promotion or health education programs that are provided by aboriginal organizations. the activities of universal service providers or clinicians, as well as schools, municipal planning and recreation departments, service organizations such as the ymca and ywca or boys’ and girls’ clubs, and a range of other organizations can also affect the health of local aboriginal people. these organizations may have varying levels of experience and expertise addressing the specific needs of aboriginal people, but whether they recognize it or not, are integral part of the public health system that affects urban aboriginal peoples’ health. c o n c e p t u a l l e n s e s o n a b o ri g i n a l pe o p l e s ’ h e a l t h over the past few decades, public and population health researchers and practitioners have developed a number of conceptual lenses that help us to identify and understand the various factors that affect the health of aboriginal peoples, and which identify targets for intervention efforts. although there are other perspectives on aboriginal peoples’ health, including culturally-specific frameworks, we think that three of these perspectives—social determinants of health approaches, socio-ecological frameworks, and the life course perspectives—are particularly important for informing efforts to reduce chronic disease among urban aboriginal peoples. perhaps the most influential perspective in health promotion of the past 50 years has been the “social determinants of health” approach, focusing on the “upstream” factors that affect health outcomes. this well-known framework tends not to elucidate the mechanisms that underlie these determinants, but does point to the role of social and economic inequalities in generating health inequalities, as well as some of the intermediate factors, such as food insecurity, housing quality, and employment conditions. critically, it also identifies race and ethnicity as separate determinants, and canadian versions of this approach have included indigeneity as a determinant, conceptually separate from race or ethnicity (canadian public health association, n.d.; public health agency of canada, 2011). some scholars have worked on identifying specific determinants that affect aboriginal peoples’ health, separately from or in addition to the effects of poorer average conditions on the other determinants, such as income and housing (czyzewski, 2011). although more research is required to understand these mechanisms, particularly among urban aboriginal communities, it has been suggested that these “aboriginal-specific” determinants of health may include access to traditional knowledge and culture, language, access to traditional lands and waters, and “life balance” (greenwood & de leeuw, 2012; richmond & ross, 2009). these various determinants of health can be thought of as operating at different conceptual levels, with some more proximate to health outcomes and others more distal (greenwood & de leeuw, 2012). “socio-ecological” frameworks, the second approach we think is important to consider, make explicit the “levels” at which these factors act, thereby providing a better guide for intervention efforts (mcleroy, 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.3   bibeau, steckler, & glanz, 1988). contextual factors that affect individual health-related behaviours and decision-making can include aspects of families or households, neighbourhoods and communities, as well as those that operate at the regional policy or macro-social levels. by targeting these aspects of the social environment, for example by improving opportunities for physical activities available in schools, health promotion programs may be better able to support individual behaviour change (mcleroy, et al., 1988). however, in the case of aboriginal peoples, health-affecting conditions at the macro-level include colonial histories and continuing discriminatory policies, which continue to shape their experiences of other levels of context, including neighbourhoods, families, and school experiences (willows, hanley, & delormier, 2012). finally, like socio-ecological and social determinants frameworks, the life course perspective offers a standpoint on health inequities that can incorporate many different mechanisms of action, and which mainly helps guide research and practice to ask particular questions that might not otherwise be asked. by adding a temporal dimension, the life course directs us to the conditions early in life that affect health in later life, as well as to the interrelationships among trajectories in health, work and education, and family and community life (halfon & hochstein, 2002). loppie reading and wein (2009) have proposed an “integrative” life course and social determinants framework that considers the specific factors and contexts experienced by aboriginal people, and their effects on health trajectories. this approach attempts to combine the general and aboriginal-specific determinants in order to reflect the “dynamic interplay of social, political, historical, cultural, environmental, economic and other forces that directly and indirectly shape aboriginal health” (loppie, reading, & wein, 2009, p. 26). be n e f i t s o f s y s t e m s l e v e l a p p ro a c h e s taken together, we think that these three frameworks strongly suggest the need for systems-level approaches to reducing chronic disease risk among urban aboriginal peoples, and they reinforce a holistic approach to chronic disease prevention that is generally congruent with indigenous perspectives on health (greenwood & de leeuw, 2012). the social determinants of health perspectives remind us that, although many of the proximate causes of chronic disease may be related to individual behaviours, those behaviours are strongly conditioned by social and economic environments, as well as by the unique factors that affect aboriginal peoples. a socio-ecological framework point to the specific contexts in which these factors operate, and at which particular interventions might be aimed, such as individual families, schools, neighbourhoods, communities, or broader social, economic, or legal conditions. life course perspectives emphasize the importance of considering the conditions early in life, including maternal and child health, which are particularly important given the youth of the aboriginal population. considering these perspectives, it also seems clear that no single intervention approach is likely to be sufficient to address the inequities in risks for any particular chronic disease among urban aboriginal peoples. in particular, individual-level programs implemented without attention to the contexts that affect health behaviours may not be able to overcome the barriers that operate at various socioecological levels. those may be best addressed by the activities of particular organizations or institutions in the system—aboriginal and non-aboriginal organizations that serve aboriginal families, schools that provide programming during or after classes, municipal planners who consider the placement of recreation facilities and urban walkability, pubic health authorities that provide a variety of health education and health promotion materials, and others. the aboriginal-specific determinants of health 5 wilk and cooke: collaborative urban aboriginal health interventions published by scholarship@western, 2015   remind us that these risk factors might not be the same for aboriginal people and other community members, and effective health promotion will often require culturally-specific approaches. at the same time, the diversity of urban communities means that one cannot assume that any particular cultural approach or intervention will meet everybody’s needs, or even that all urban aboriginal people will necessarily prefer services delivered by aboriginal providers. the case of programs aimed at reducing obesity among aboriginal children is illustrative of the difficulty of addressing these complex problems. in canada and the us, there have been several large communitybased health promotion projects that have attempted multi-level interventions in first nations or american indian communities, with components that have promoted healthier diets and physical activity within families, in schools, as well as implementing changes that affect whole communities such as improving walkability or access to healthy foods. although community-based programs have generally been more successful than standalone interventions targeting only children, even these programs have had difficulty showing sustained improvements in children’s behaviour and health outcomes (towns, cooke, rysdale, & wilk, 2014). considering the relatively high degree of control that first nations have had in implementing these large scale programs in their communities, the diverse and fragmented nature of urban communities and the health systems that serve them suggests that engaging the system as a whole through inter-sectoral collaboration (midgley, 2006; trickett, deutsch, et al., 2011) is necessary in an urban context. in the following section, we present the healthy weights connection (hwc), an intervention to reduce obesity and overweight among off-reserve aboriginal children funded by the public health agency of canada’s innovation strategy: achieving healthier weights in canada’s communities, as an example a collaborative system-level intervention. t h e h e a l t h y w e i g h t s c o n n e c t i o n ( h w c ) i n t e rv e n t i o n the project began as a pilot in 2010 in london, ontario, as an outgrowth of a canadian institutes of health research’s institute for aboriginal peoples’ health—a funded investigation of determinants of obesity among off-reserve aboriginal children and youth. the original intention of this investigation was to identify opportunities for individual-level interventions to reduce obesity risk. consultations and focus groups with both aboriginal-specific and universal service providers, revealed several local individual-level programs already in existence. these programs were often of short duration because of the available funding, and organizations implementing these programs were sometimes unaware of complementary or related programs offered by other organizations. moreover, it became clear that among universal public health and social service providers there was a strong desire to serve the local aboriginal population, but that these practitioners often lacked institutionalized connections to aboriginal organizations who might be able to provide advice and knowledge about cultural appropriateness, or to whom patients or clients could be referred. in response, the hwc intervention was reconceptualized as a systems-level intervention with the broad goal of improving the ability of local public health systems to serve aboriginal children and families. the main mechanisms of the intervention are the activities of a site coordinator. working out of a local aboriginal organization or health centre, the site coordinator is first responsible for undertaking a system scan to identify the local organizations who are providing healthy weights programs, as well as 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.3   services or programming that address other determinants of childhood obesity, including food security and food literacy. making use of publicly available information, as well as formal and informal inquiries with key informants, the system scan also identifies local child and youth health initiatives, whether or not they specifically target aboriginal children, and provides the foundation for understanding the existing relationships among organizations. the next task of the site coordinator is to connect personally with the actors in the system and to look for opportunities for collaboration. this involves arranging introductory meetings to learn about the activities, mandates, and challenges of individual organizations, and to understand their relationships to one another. this “active engagement” is time consuming but important—forming relationships with individual service providers is more likely to result in meaningful partnerships than relying on more passive knowledge translation approaches such as newsletters or internet-based communication, although those are also elements of the intervention. this engagement approach is also strengthened by the fact that the site coordinator is hosted by a local aboriginal organization with existing relationships with other institutions. this can provide the “foot in the door” with managers or staff at other centres or local government organizations. at the same time, it can also be useful that the site coordinator is able to identify herself as somewhat separate from the local organizations, helping her to bridge existing political divisions in the community. having established some connection with many of the important organizations and actors in the system, the primary role of the site coordinator is to actively look for opportunities for collaboration and resource sharing. this involves exchanging knowledge among local organizations, sometimes by simply passing information about new initiatives or programs and sometimes by taking a more active role in organizing meetings among partners to discuss potential collaborations. the site coordinator also convenes forums on particular issues, inviting speakers from outside the community to share information on successful programming or interventions and other topics related to the health of aboriginal families and children. the site coordinator may help partners apply for funding for collaborative projects by identifying funding opportunities and assisting in proposal development or program design, and generally supports collaborative efforts among local organizations. expected outcomes include more local programming and initiatives aimed at improving the health of aboriginal children and youth, better participation and uptake of the available services, and improved cultural content in those programs and services that already exist. these activities are further supported by a “backbone organization” (turner, merchant, kania & martin, 2012). backbone activities include the production of newsletters and a website, assistance with the system scans and proposal development, and the production of resources such as “fact sheets” that condense and translate scientific research regarding healthy weights interventions into forms that are more accessible by staff and managers working at local organizations. the site coordinator and the backbone organization thereby facilitate the translation and exchange of knowledge from outside the community to actors within it, as well as between institutions within the community. the hwc intervention has been running in this revised form in london since 2011 and in midland, ontario since 2013 and is being evaluated to assess its impact in each community. the intervention is expected to result in change at the level of the system, including more collaboration related to aboriginal children’s health and more local programs and services available to address the issue. among individual 7 wilk and cooke: collaborative urban aboriginal health interventions published by scholarship@western, 2015   organizations, the program expects to result in better knowledge of the needs of local aboriginal families and more cultural awareness, as well as improved attitudes toward collaboration and working together. taking a realist approach to evaluation (pawson, 2013), the project is being evaluated from the perspectives of local organizations and service providers and first nations and métis community members, using qualitative methods and quantitative network surveys, as well as website and social media analytics. o t h e r s y s t e m s l e v e l i n t e rv e n t i o n s t o i m p ro v e u rb a n a b o ri g i n a l h e a l t h the hwc is one of several examples of systems-level and collaborative approaches to improve the health of urban aboriginal communities and first nations. through ontario’s aboriginal healing and wellness strategy (ahws) (ontario ministry of community and social services, 2012a), community wellness workers, health outreach workers, and community development support workers have been placed in communities across the province, working from local aboriginal organizations, with funding flowing through the ontario federation of indian friendship centres, the ontario native women’s association, the anishnabek nation of ontario, the métis nation of ontario, the association of iroquois and allied indians, as well as other organizations and tribal councils (ontario ministry of community and social services, 2012b, 2012c). although these roles differ, they all include activities that are intended to improve links among aboriginal organizations and between aboriginal and universal service agencies, increasing the representation of aboriginal people on local health decisionmaking bodies and facilitating information sharing between service providers in the community. in particular, the goals of the aboriginal health outreach worker program include improving relationships among service providers, increasing the number of aboriginal-specific health care initiatives in the local community, and providing links to cultural resources, as well as to agencies providing universal health services (can-am indian friendship centre, 2014). there are many other examples of collaborative systems-level interventions outside aboriginal communities. systems approaches have become important in lowand middle-income countries, in which existing systems have clearly limited resources and infrastructure, but are also seen in countries such as the us and canada. they may be based on various conceptual frameworks and refer to somewhat different literatures, such as “collective impact” (kania & kramer, 2013) or communityor system-level interventions (trickett et al., 2011), but they generally share the perspective that complex or “wicked” public health problems must be addressed by multiple actors through coordinated approaches rather than by single, targeted intervention programs. these approaches have the potential advantage of addressing problems at different socio-ecological levels, rather than focussing on individual behaviour change, and hopefully result in increased community capacity that is maintained after the end of the program. c h a l l e n g e s f o r c o l l a b o ra t i v e s y s t e m s i n t e rv e n t i o n s i n u rb a n a b o ri g i n a l c o n t e x t s given the current level of interest in collaborative approaches to public health improvement, it seems likely that this will be increasingly attractive as a direction for improving the health of aboriginal people in canada, particularly in urban areas. however, there are two main considerations that we believe those taking a collaborative or systems-level approach should keep in mind when designing an intervention for 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.3   urban aboriginal peoples’ health: the unique elements of an urban aboriginal context and the identification of outcomes and ways of measuring them. t h e i m p o rt a n c e o f c o n t e x t the development of successful collaborations is difficult in any context, and needs to overcome different organizational cultures, mandates, entrenched interests, and other barriers to concerted action. the evaluation and research questions presented by these collaborative interventions therefore tend to focus on understanding the strategies and conditions that lead to the successful mobilization of community actors and resources to address public health problems (babiak, 2009; darnell et al., 2013; lucidarme, marlier, cardon, de bourdeaudhuij, & willem, 2014; roussos & fawcett, 2000; sanson-fisher, d'este, carey, noble, & paul, 2014). aspects of the context that might matter include the characteristics of stakeholders, the range and capacity of institutional actors, the presence of “champions” or leadership groups, and the funding environment. there are unique aspects to urban aboriginal communities that might affect the success of collaborative systems intervention, and which require efforts to overcome. the complexity of relationships within mixed urban aboriginal communities, including cultural differences and political histories, may present barriers to concerted efforts by the local community. colonial history has also resulted in what can be deep mistrust of universal organizations by aboriginal communities and aboriginal organizations. “collaboration” with universal organizations may be seen by aboriginal organizations as attempts to control, and they may feel that self-determination and autonomy are threatened. funding models that are based on client numbers may also exacerbate tensions among aboriginal organizations, particularly in the context of limited financial resources. projects attempting to improve collaboration within this system should begin by accepting that the existing set of relationships have been shaped by broader political and social forces, acknowledging that this is the context in which they are trying to promote new collaborations. i d e n t i f y i n g s u c c e s s the second challenge is measuring effectiveness of these projects, and setting reasonable expectations of program outcomes. merzel and d’affitti (2003) have pointed out that community-based public health promotion programs have often had poor results, partly due to an inability of their evaluation designs to detect changes. part of this problem is identifying the level at which we expect the change to occur, as many have focussed their evaluations at the level of individual behaviours, rather than at aspects of the systems. although most or all of these collaborative programs, such as the healthy weights connection or the various components of ontario’s ahws are expected to ultimately result in reduced risk among individuals, collecting data with sufficient power and controls to identify these changes is difficult and expensive, and those changes may take a long time to manifest (merzel & d'afflitti, 2003). in addition to these “ultimate” individual-level outcomes of reduced health risks, we propose that it is important for an evaluation of a systems-level program to identify systems-level change. these could include measures of community capacity or the presence of infrastructure, as well as changes to organizational policies or behaviour. it is these changes that are generally hypothesized to be the intermediate mechanisms that will ultimately affect individual health behaviour and health outcomes, so 9 wilk and cooke: collaborative urban aboriginal health interventions published by scholarship@western, 2015   attention to these levels is important, and such change may be more likely to be seen within the length of a typical evaluation project. finally, we suggest that the evaluation of these projects should focus as much on understanding what works to promote collaboration and in what circumstances, as on ultimate outcomes. the complexity of local health systems serving aboriginal peoples indicates to us that there is unlikely to be any single best approach to improving collaboration among system actors. moreover, the variability among urban aboriginal communities, including the many ontario communities in which ahws programs are delivered, makes it important to understand how these variations in context may affect the operations of these programs and the effectiveness of particular collaborative strategies. dimensions of difference include community size and the resources and capacity of local organizations, but also may include the unique histories of these communities, including the outcomes of previous collaborations and local politics. understanding what these factors are and how they might be implicated in program effectiveness is an important evaluation research goal. c o n c l u s i o n s the risk of chronic disease among aboriginal people living in urban areas is shaped by an array of factors, and these are themselves affected by the activities of various local organizations, including public health, education, social services, municipal governments, and other actors in the local public health systems. there seems to be considerable potential for interventions targeting these systems, rather than individuals, to reduce this risk effectively. there are several examples of programs in ontario and elsewhere that are attempting to improve operation of these systems by promoting collaboration and resource sharing among system actors and, given the popularity of social determinants, socio-ecological, and life course frameworks for understanding health disparities in other contexts, we expect that these may increase. in designing and evaluating these programs, sufficient attention should be paid to the complexities of urban 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(2012). understanding the value of backbone organizations in collective impact: part 1. stanford social innovation review. retrieved from http://www.ssireview.org/blog/entry/understanding_the_value_of_backbone_organizations _in_collective_impact_1 willows, n. d., hanley, a. j., & delormier, t. (2012). a socioecological framework to understand weight-related issues in aboriginal children in canada. applied physiology, nutrition and metabolism, 37(1), 1-13. doi:10.1139/h11-128 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.3 the international indigenous policy journal september 2015 collaborative public health system interventions for chronic disease prevention among urban aboriginal peoples piotr wilk martin cooke recommended citation collaborative public health system interventions for chronic disease prevention among urban aboriginal peoples abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license collaborative public health system interventions for chronic disease prevention among urban aboriginal peoples transforming tourists and "culturalising commerce": indigenous tourism at bawaka in northern australia the international indigenous policy journal volume 6 | issue 4 article 6 september 2015 transforming tourists and "culturalising commerce": indigenous tourism at bawaka in northern australia kate lloyd macquarie university, kate.lloyd@mq.edu.au sandie suchet-pearson macquarie university, sandie.suchet-pearson@mq.edu.au sarah wright university of newcastle, sarah.wright@newcastle.edu.au matalena tofa charles darwin university, matalena.tofa@cdu.edu.au claire rowland macquarie university, claire.rowland@mq.edu.au see next page for additional authors recommended citation lloyd, k. , suchet-pearson, s. , wright, s. , tofa, m. , rowland, c. , burarrwanga, l. , ganambarr, r . , ganambarr, m. , ganambarr, b. , maymuru, d. (2015). transforming tourists and "culturalising commerce": indigenous tourism at bawaka in northern australia. the international indigenous policy journal, 6(4). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.6 transforming tourists and "culturalising commerce": indigenous tourism at bawaka in northern australia abstract there is currently an increasing interest in indigenous tourism in australia. policies in australia often use the rhetoric of sustainability, but position indigenous tourism as a means for economic growth and development (whitford & ruhanen, 2010). this study shows that interpersonal relationships, cultural and social interactions, and learning are key to achieving the goals of indigenous tourism providers or “hosts,” and to the experiences of tourists. this article explores tourist experiences of activities run by the indigenous-owned tour company bawaka cultural enterprises (hereafter bce) in north east arnhem land, northern territory. bce is an example of an indigenous tourism business that aims to achieve social change by sharing of indigenous ways of being, knowledges, and practices with non-indigenous people during tours, whilst also ensuring that the business is sustainable and manageable for the family who runs it. in this sense, bce’s tourism activities can be understood as an attempt to “culturalise commerce,” rather than commercialising culture (bunten, 2010). in this article, we contribute to growing literature on transformative learning theory and tourism by considering tourists’ narratives of their experiences with bce. we focus on the way in which tourists are transformed by an increased connection to their hosts and their country. we argue that bce’s activities consciously introduce different ways of being to tourists and visitors. a growing awareness, understanding, and respect for these ways of being can inspire a sense of collective purpose and identity, and a deep emotional response to tours. connection, however, is not always smooth and easy. central to the process outlined in mezirow’s (1978) transformative learning theory are encounters and engagements with other people and different and unfamiliar contexts, which may lead to disorienting feelings and experiences. we argue that the practical aspects of being at bawaka, combined with the new skills, task requirements, and political realities that commitment to new ways of being bring, can be disconcerting and disorienting for tourists. the availability of spaces and processes to reflect on these points of disorientation may determine whether these experiences challenge and/or contribute to personal transformation. these factors highlight areas for further exploration in developing a theory of transformative learning in the indigenous context, and a need for policies to move beyond a narrow focus on economic aspects of tourism to consider the social and educational aims of both tourism ventures and tourists themselves. keywords indigenous tourism, transformative learning theory, bawaka, north east arnhem land, australia acknowledgments we wish to acknowledge bawaka country and yolngu people both past and present. we also thank the australian research council for financial support in undertaking this research. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ authors kate lloyd, sandie suchet-pearson, sarah wright, matalena tofa, claire rowland, laklak burarrwanga, ritjilili ganambarr, merrkiyawuy ganambarr, banbapuy ganambarr, and djawundil maymuru this research is available in the international indigenous policy journal: http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/6?utm_source=ir.lib.uwo.ca%2fiipj%2fvol6%2fiss4%2f6&utm_medium=pdf&utm_campaign=pdfcoverpages t r a n s f o r m i n g t o u r i s t s a n d “ c u l t u r a l i s i n g c o m m e r c e ” : i n d i g e n o u s t o u r i s m a t b a w a k a i n n o r t h e r n a u s t r a l i a the future—protect our family, our land, our culture, our stories and our sacred places. working together, raising the children together where the land can be part of their mind, spirit and soul. so one day, when we are gone, the responsibility passes onto our children. and respecting the land, the people and the bawaka home. we could understand both worlds and learn from each other. in your world and our world, we share together in this place. (bawaka cultural experiences [bce] website [inactive]; see www.lirrwitourism.com.au for current information) this is the vision behind bawaka cultural experiences (hereafter bce), an indigenous family-run tour operation located in north east arnhem land in australia’s northern territory. bce is an example of an indigenous tourism business that aims to achieve social change by sharing indigenous ways of being, knowledges, and practices with non-indigenous people during tour experiences, whilst also ensuring that the business is sustainable and manageable for the family. for bce, a conscious objective is to introduce different ways of being in the world to tourists and visitors. central to this approach is the practice of introducing visitors to the concept of “country.” country is a term used in aboriginal english to refer to aboriginal homelands, a rich and intensely meaningful concept that encompasses the human and more-than-human, and tangible and intangible forces that shape, create, mutually care for, and become together in, with, and as place or space (for a detailed discussion of country and “becoming together” see bawaka country including wright et al., 2015). within australia, there is an increasing interest in indigenous tourism. policies in australia often use the rhetoric of sustainability, but position indigenous tourism as a means for economic growth and development (whitford, bell, & watkins, 2001; whitford & ruhanen, 2010). while the success of indigenous tourism ventures can be stated in terms of visitor numbers, profit, and employment (lirrwi yolŋu tourism aboriginal corporation, 2014), achievements related to using tourism as a social force are also important and yet harder to capture. indeed, limited literature is available that explores the effectiveness of tourist “products” seeking to achieve social or cultural transformation goals and identify specific aspects of tour experiences that lead to positive behavior changes in tourists (caruana, glozer, crane, & mccabe, 2014). this article demonstrates how an indigenous-run tourism venture that is based on yolŋu1 teaching methods and worldviews can successfully achieve its objectives and create a viable and culturally appropriate alternative tourism business. we do this by drawing on both tour operators’ as well as tourists’ perspectives. in doing so, we contribute to growing literature on transformative learning theory and tourism by considering tourists’ narratives of their experiences. we focus on the ways in which tourists are transformed by both increased connection to their hosts and their country. we argue that bce’s activities consciously introduce different ways of being in the world to tourists and visitors. a growing awareness, understanding, and respect for these ways of being can inspire a sense of collective purpose and identity, and a deep emotional response to tours. connection, however, is not always smooth and easy. central to the process outlined in mezirow’s (1978) transformative learning theory are encounters and engagements with other people and different and unfamiliar contexts, which may lead to disorienting feelings and experiences. we argue that the practical 1 the yolŋu people from north-eastern arnhem land in the northern territory of australia are the custodians of the land. yolngu means "person" in the yolŋu languages. 1 lloyd et al.: indigenous tourism at bawaka in northern australia published by scholarship@western, 2015 aspects of being with country, combined with the new skills, task requirements, and political realities that a commitment to new ways of being bring, can be disconcerting and disorienting. the availability of spaces and processes to reflect on these points of disorientation may determine whether these experiences challenge and/or contribute to personal transformation. we conclude with a discussion of the need for policies to move beyond a narrow focus on economic aspects of tourism to consider the social and educational aims of both tourism ventures as well as tourists themselves. in addition, we make recommendations that focus on how indigenous tourism enterprises would benefit from using processes that assist tourists to deconstruct their experiences and thereby achieve more transformative outcomes. before we begin, however, we need to make clear who “we” are. the authors of this article are both yolŋu and non-yolŋu. we have worked together as part of an innovative 9 year indigenous– academic research collaboration that has focused on communicating indigenous yolŋu knowledge to non-indigenous people (bawaka country including wright et al., 2015; burarrwanga, ganambarr et al., 2013; burarrwanga, maymuru et al., 2012; lloyd, wright, suchet-pearson, burarrwanga, & bawaka country, 2012; suchet-pearson, wright, lloyd, burarrwanga, & hodge, 2013; wright et al., 2012). one aspect of this work has been looking at the role of the tourism business in achieving this objective (wright, suchet-pearson, lloyd, burarrwanga, & burarrwanga, 2009). t o u r i s m f o r s o c i a l j u s t i c e , e d u c a t i o n , a n d r e c o n c i l i a t i o n tourism is widely understood as an industry, and its benefits are frequently stated in financial terms; yet, it is also a potential force that can be utilized for social justice and reconciliation (higginsdesbiolles, 2006; wright et al., 2009). indeed, the notion that travel is personally transformative is widespread (reisinger, 2013; sampaio, 2014), and many authors argue that tourism may engender transformations that support social justice precisely because they are premised around “encounters across difference”(coghlan & gooch, 2011; knollenberg, mcgehee, boley, & clemmons, 2014; reisinger, 2013; walter, 2013). these “encounters”—and their emotional, affective, and sensory aspects—have the potential to unsettle established habits of thought and to open new ethical and moral relations between peoples and places (caton, 2012; gibson, 2008, 2009). recent research documents a growing range of “alternative” tourism ventures, such as ecotourism, cultural tourism, voluntourism, and pro-poor tourism, that seek to harness the potential of tourism for such purposes as addressing inequalities, facilitating understanding across differences, and motivating attitudinal or behavioural change (barton & leonard, 2010; cohen & cohen, 2012; higgins-desbiolles, 2006; mcgehee, 2012; reisinger, 2013). however, the impacts of tourism for social justice are not well understood. authors have noted that tourism—regardless of its claims to social responsibility—can work to reinforce and reproduce inequalities between tourists and their “hosts” (barton & leonard, 2010; higgins-desbiolles, 2006; hueneke & baker, 2009; mcgehee, 2012; sin, 2010). further, little is known about tourist motivations for and understandings of their alternative tourism experiences (caruana et al., 2014). this is significant as transformative tourism requires a willingness among tourists themselves to reflect, consider alternatives, and change (barton & leonard, 2010; coghlan & gooch, 2011). in this article, we contribute to growing literature on transformative learning theory and tourism by considering tourists’ narratives of their experiences at bce, with a particular focus on their learnings, understandings, and transformations. we argue that bce’s activities deliberately move beyond providing a voyeuristic glimpse of indigenous culture, consciously introduce different ways of being in the world to tourists, and build connections between hosts, visitors, and places. in the following 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.6 section, we discuss the ways in which indigenous communities are engaging in tourism to pursue social justice, co-learning, and building connections. this provides an insight into the ways in which indigenous tourism organisations are already challenging australian policies’ narrow focus on tourism for economic growth and development by instead focusing on both connections with country as well as valuing indigenous tourism models. i n d i g e n o u s t o u r i s m e n t e r p r i s e s the relationship between the tourism industry and indigenous communities has historically been characterised by exploitative practices that have exoticised, objectified, and commoditised indigenous culture and cultural artefacts (bunten, 2008, 2010; hollinshead, 1996). indigenous ownership and control over tourism sites, narratives, products, and activities is thus a key issue both for indigenous communities as well as for academic analyses of tourism and indigenous peoples (butler & hinch, 2007; colton, 2005; parker, 1993; pratt, gibson, & movono, 2013). indeed, definitions of “indigenous tourism” typically identify indigenous control over tourism products that are based on their culture as a key criterion (colton, 2005; lynch, duinker, sheehan, & chute, 2010). indigenous tourism ventures are often simplistically labelled as eco-tourism and cultural tourism (clark, 2009; fennell, 2008). critics have observed that the notion of “ecotourism” often presumes indigenous ecological nobility and a shared understanding of “nature” between indigenous hosts and tourists (cater, 2006; hinch, 1998). further, cultural tourism may serve to reinforce both lingering orientalist representations of indigeneity and a sense that indigenous tourism must at once perform “otherness” and “difference” and conform to stereotypes (bunten, 2010; lynch et al., 2010). recent growth in indigenouscontrolled tourism ventures reflects a diverse range of factors, including neoliberal policies, improved communication technologies, and indigenous self-determination and activism (bunten, 2010; butler & hinch, 2007; wright et al., 2009). the promise and/or presumption that indigenous tourism will create economic development for marginalised or remote communities is also influential, particularly in the context of australian policy (whitford et al., 2001), but scholars caution that tourism in isolation cannot resolve long-standing economic and social inequalities, and that collaboration between indigenous organisations and other agencies remains important to creating viable and appropriate tourism ventures (dyer, aberdeen, & schuler, 2003; fuller, buultjens, & cummings, 2005; notzke, 2004). in seeking understandings of indigenous tourism that move beyond tropes of ecological stewardship and profit-driven motivations, recent work highlights how indigenous tourism ventures can be profoundly shaped by local cultural value systems, and typically pursue multiple goals, such as community development, cultural education, and cross-cultural understanding (bunten, 2008; clark, 2009; higgins-desbiolles, 2009; pratt et al., 2013; wright et al., 2009). colton (2005), for instance, suggested that the woodland cree first nation pursue tourism as a strategy by which to regain autonomy over its lands and economic future. likewise, lynch and colleagues (2010) identified a focus on “social sustainability of a community” and “nation building” in indigenous tourism, rather than simply jobs, income, and profits. further, clark (2009) argued that for rripangu yidaki, an indigenous tourism business also in north east arnhem land, the concept of ecotourism is not easily reconciled with indigenous ontologies and relationships with country. similar to bce, the business is more usefully understood as one that is shaped by aboriginal social frameworks that ensure knowledges and practices are shared with tourists in appropriate ways, and that the business is sustainable and manageable for the family. in this sense, indigenous tourism 3 lloyd et al.: indigenous tourism at bawaka in northern australia published by scholarship@western, 2015 ventures can be understood as “culturalising commerce,” rather than commercialising culture (bunten, 2010). notably, indigenous tourism is a niche market (ryan & huyton, 2000, 2002). previous research suggests that, among tourists who seek out indigenous cultural tours, notions of personal interaction, “genuine” and “authentic” experiences, and informal learning about culture and history are often highly valued (mcintosh & zahra, 2004; zeppel, 2002). this suggests the potential of tourism to function as a vehicle for educating non-indigenous visitors and improving cross-cultural relationships. as mentioned above, education is frequently identified as an important goal of indigenous tourism ventures. lynch, duinker, sheehan, and chute (2011), for example, argued, “providing an educational aboriginal tourism experience is of utmost importance when attempting to dispel inaccurate images of aboriginal culture and ultimately educate tourists on the reality of historic and contemporary aboriginal life” (p. 978; see also hollinshead, 2007). hammersley, bilous, james, trau, and suchet-pearson (2014) identified that indigenous tour operators in the north of australia see raising awareness as a key part of their motivation to run a tourism business, pointing to their desire to change tourists’ attitudes and understandings of indigenous culture and issues. bunten (2010) further noted that tourism provides “inward” education to community members to ensure cultural perpetuation, and “outward” education to tourists to challenge stereotypes and historical inaccuracies. scherrer and doohan (2013) argued that the act of tourists asking permission to access and use country could create an inter-cultural environment with spaces for transformative learning, mutual respect, and negotiation between cultural groups. they claim that the very process of asking permission without qualification signifies a recognition of indigenous knowledges and cultural practices, and serves to unbalance existing power relations that preference non-indigenous worldviews and practices. whilst a space for negotiation and learning may be created, however, the extent to which educational goals can be advanced through indigenous tourism enterprises is relatively unknown, in part because there has been little research on tourist perceptions of their experiences at indigenous tourism sites (lynch et al., 2011). the next section draws on the concept of transformative learning theory to unpack current thinking about the steps involved in attitudinal and behavioural change. t r a n s f o r m a t i v e l e a r n i n g transformative learning theory describes a process through which one’s worldviews are challenged, and then through deep, critical reflection, transformed (addleman, brazo, & cevallos, 2011; taylor, 2008). as proposed by mezirow (1975, 1978), this shift in consciousness begins with a “disorientating dilemma”—a critical incident that in some way exceeds or disrupts one’s frames of reference—which is followed by reflection, discussion, exploration, and testing of new modes of understanding, and finally an enduring shift in one’s habits of thought and perspective (coghlan & gooch, 2011; taylor, 2008). while mezirow’s theory deals primarily with individual, cognitive transformation, recent work proffers variations and alternatives that consider such topics as the embodied nature of knowledge construction and learning (freiler, 2008), the emotional and spiritual aspects of learning and transformation (dirkx, 2008; tisdell, 2008), and the socialemancipatory potential of transformative learning (taylor, 2008). the connection between physical and inner or personal journeys is widely recognised in, and used in marketing for, diverse tourism activities such as pilgrimage, volunteer tourism, and ecotourism 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.6 (morgan, 2011; sampaio, simoni, & isnart, 2014), and transformative learning theory is now increasingly used in tourism research to explore and better understand the links between tourism and personal transformation (coghlan & gooch, 2011; reisinger, 2013). importantly, tourism can be a potent prompt for the kind of “critical incidents” or “disorientating dilemmas” that are central to the process outlined in mezirow’s (1978) transformative learning theory because it often involves encounters and engagements with other people and with different and unfamiliar contexts (morgan, 2011; walter, 2013). recent work examining indigenous tourism shows that disorientation does play a role in changing tourists’ attitudes. wright and hodge (2012) examined the potential for transformative learning with university students in the northern territory. their study found that “attentiveness to discomfort and disorientation may lead to a radical openness as students learn and respond in new and unpredictable ways” (pp. 365-366). bilous (2015), in her study of indonesian language teachers’ experiences with bce, concluded that the teachers wanted to make changes as a result of their time with bce. she found that although people came back very committed to the idea of living differently in the world, they struggled with how to keep that transformation alive. in the following sections, we turn to bawaka cultural experiences (bce) as an indigenous tourism business, founded on principles of cultural and educational tourism, to explore the impacts of tourism activities on visitors and the extent to which these create lasting changes in their attitudes and behaviours. we argue that the practical aspects of being with country, combined with the new skills, task requirements, and political realities that commitment to new ways of being bring, can be disconcerting and disorienting. we argue that bce’s activities consciously introduce different ways of being in the world to tourists and visitors. a growing awareness, understanding, and respect for these ways of being can inspire a sense of collective purpose and identity in tourists, and prompt a deep emotional response to tours. connection, however, is not always smooth and easy. b a w a k a c u l t u r a l e x p e r i e n c e s : e x p e r i e n c i n g t w o w o r l d s bce’s vision is for its business to be a vehicle for the family’s social, cultural, political, and broader development aims. the business’ mission statement includes aims to: 1. share the significant way of life of yolŋu people with others and to teach them to respect the environment, culture, and sacred areas. 2. provide an experience with the land and the people in order to promote cultural understanding to the wider world. 3. provide opportunities for employment and training for yolŋu people at home and to teach them to take responsibility for their rights and their future, so we can grow together. (bce, 2006, p. 3) established in 2006 by laklak burarrwanga and her family, who are caretakers for bawaka country, bce runs a range of tours both on bawaka country and around yirrkala community (see figure 1). bce’s tours are largely targeted towards small groups of non-indigenous tourists (typically between 8 and 20 participants per tour) and involve the sharing of culture, family life, and local history in a range of one, two, and four-day tours. bawaka is remote; permits are required and travel to the 5 lloyd et al.: indigenous tourism at bawaka in northern australia published by scholarship@western, 2015 location is made by small plane and 4-wheel drive vehicle, or helicopter. overnight tourists stay at bawaka in basic, shared accommodation, sleeping on swags.2 in 2014 to 2015, bawaka country was 1 of 15 de-centralised homeland communities involved in tourism in east arnhem land in the northern territory. together, these communities attracted approximately 400 tourists including 38 group tours. tourists were drawn from educational groups (universities and schools), corporate tourists participating in cultural awareness and corporate social responsibility programs, independent travellers looking for adventure and cultural awareness, and special interest groups interested in particular natural or cultural features of the area (lirrwi yolŋu tourism aboriginal corporation, 2014). f i g u r e 1 . m a p o f n o r t h e a s t a r n h e m l a n d s h o w i n g t h e l o c a t i o n o f b a w a k a ( m a p c r e a t e d b y o l i v i e r r e y l e s c u r e , 2 0 1 2 ) . according to laklak, bce’s business goals are a natural extension of the yolŋu people’s desire to teach and learn: “the business is about bawaka people sharing knowledge with the world. it’s how bawaka people are, sharing knowledge with the world, learning from each other, indigenous and non-indigenous” (cited in suchet-pearson et al., 2013, p. 27). for members of the burarrwanga family, the land-seas-windscape of bawaka has special significance; places are alive with story, law, power, and kinship relations that join not only people to each other 2 a swag is a portable sleeping unit. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.6 but also link people, ancestors, place, animals, rocks, plants, stories, and songs to multiple spiritual and symbolic realms (burarrwanga et al., 2012; magowan, 2001). in bawaka, country is alive and active; it can be talked to, it can be known, it can itself communicate, feel, and take either benign or non-benign action. protected by the spirit woman bayini, country is a sapient presence. this concept is a foundation of yolŋu worldviews, and is deeply embedded in tour experiences. visitors are welcomed by country, are taught to understand the history of connections between country and community, and are introduced to the ongoing reciprocal rights and responsibilities held by those living on (or visiting) country. ongoing engagement with country through the tours enables visitors to become known to it, and increasingly cognisant of the inter-connectedness between humans, animals, the landscape and seasons, and the responsibilities these relationships confer. greater understanding of this inter-connectedness is encouraged by bce, which asks tourists to watch for and learn to identify signs that reveal changing seasons, the availability of food sources, and the activities necessary to ensure food supply, safety, and the continuity of the community. an example of knowledge embedded within changing seasons is described in wright et al. (2009): when yolŋu people, as one agent in the cosmos, see gaypal (yellow wattle) in flower, they know that the fish are fat and it is time to hunt miyapunu (sea turtle) and minhala (freshwater longneck turtle) and time to collect miyapunu mapu (turtle egg). the educational and communication-centered approaches used within the tours are an extension of yolŋu practices and beliefs. engaging and learning from country is presented as a whole of body experience, rather than as an intellectual exercise. tourists are encouraged to open their eyes, ears, and hearts and “sit quietly with us and listen to the sound of nature—the land is talking to you” (d. burarrwanga, bce website [inactive]). laklak explains how bce’s approach to assisting tourists to understand and connect with country—through embodied experiences—is an extension of the education methods that are commonly used with yolŋu children as they grow up on country: it is easy to learn when you learn in place. when we teach children the yolŋu way, we take them out and show them. we walk them through. they learn the seasons, the winds, they learn what to feel and how to do. for example, when it is the season rrarrandharr,3 they see how dry everything is, they feel the hot sand and learn to feel the fruits ripening. this is how we teach and how we learn. this is how we will help you learn too (cited in burarrwanga et al., 2012, p. xiii) for many tourists, this approach to tourism is likely to represent an entirely different way of being, one that draws from the yolŋu’s ontological connection between country and community. the ongoing popularity of bce tours indicates the tour experiences are attractive for non-indigenous tourists. what we explore here is whether the educational goals of bce to share and promote cultural understanding are being achieved, and, in particular, the extent to which they lead to changes in tourists’ attitudes and behaviours. 3 the yolngu people generally recognise six major seasons in the yearly cycle of natural events. august– september–october is known as rrarrandharr. this is a hot, dry season, the time of year when your feet burn when you walk on the sand. 7 lloyd et al.: indigenous tourism at bawaka in northern australia published by scholarship@western, 2015 b c e t o u r i s t e x p e r i e n c e s in this section, we explore the ways in which a yolŋu ontology of connection to country shapes and structures bce tour experiences through the eyes of tourists, particularly their responses to these disorienting experiences, and broader transformative changes linked by interviewees to the tour experience. tourists and industry professionals that have either attended or witnessed one or multiple bce tours took part in our study exploring the impact of bce’s tourism activities, resulting in 12 interviews and three surveys. for the purposes of this article, we draw from two of these survey responses and nine of the in-depth interviews. two of the interviews focused on bce tours hosted through the garma festival; the remaining tours discussed were held on bawaka country itself. the sample is not designed to be comprehensive or representative. the selection process itself has given preference to participants with positive and/or transformative experiences during their tour. the sample allows for an exploration of the conditions specific to bce’s tours, and highlights what can lead to transformational change, pointing to the potential for indigenous-led tourism more broadly to generate these positive outcomes. interviewees were initially approached on the basis of their ongoing connections to bce after their tourist experiences, from contact sheets at bce related events, and through word of mouth (i.e., established interviewees suggested other participants). four interviewees continue to have an ongoing professional relationship with bce through their work roles (including as government staff members and as members of the tourist industry) and two were involved in education or academic fields of work. interviews were conducted via phone and surveys were taken online. both explored non-indigenous tourists’ prior knowledge of indigenous culture and peoples, and perceived changes in their attitudes, understandings and behaviours as a result of the tour experience. by asking participants to reflect on aspects of the tour that they felt were meaningful, the research also attempted to uncover components of the tour experience that had catalysed personal transformations. interviews were conducted with the participants who identified themselves as having gained something from the experience—even if many mentioned their inabilities apply these changes to their lives after the tour. c o n n e c t i n g t h r o u g h n e w e x p e r i e n c e s o f c o u n t r y a n d c u l t u r e introducing different ways of being in the world to tourists and visitors by “just being with country,” while building connections between hosts, visitors, and country, are conscious objectives and outcomes of bce. these goals are evidenced through the tour program, in which country, community, and family priorities direct tour activities and focus. the emergence of “nike,” bawaka’s resident crocodile, the play of children, or the marriage or death of a relative could shape the day’s activities, as could the presence of certain family members, or the connection between the hosts and their guests. this fluidity or responsiveness to country and community is critical to the tour experience, according to tourists interviewed. one explained, for example, how the tour “was just about being there and letting the stories happen as we walked around” (interview 1). not only were the visitors immersed in the day-to-day activities, but the ways in which visitors were situated relative to their hosts and country was an unexpected experience for many, challenging many assumptions of difference. guides were described as treating guests with the openness and generosity of close family members rather than replicating the more commonly experienced dynamic of tour guide and participant. this open and caring relationship between tourists, guides, and country was often established at the outset of the tours through ceremony. according to one 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.6 tourist, the smoking ceremony used to welcome guests to country created a bond with their hosts and a sense of common purpose: it’s like, we're all here and we're all the same. that's a powerful thing. (interview 11) instead of being treated as observers looking in from the outside at yolŋu culture, bce tourists were invited to establish a deeper connection to country and community that emphasises mutual interest, common purpose, identity, and responsibility. when writing about women’s weaving knowledge and yolŋu stories, for example, laklak explains: our stories are stories about connections between all women. it doesn't matter which colour, we are all the same. some women, when they hear this, they cry. (burarrwanga et al., 2013, p. 21) tourists described experiencing a sense of awe and honour at gaining access to privileged spaces, knowledges, and ceremonies on what were perceived to be very generous terms. tourists were clearly overwhelmed by their treatment, and felt a deep sense of gratitude for the opportunity to gain a rare insight into the lives and experiences of indigenous families and communities living on country. i just felt like they just accepted . . . i guess they were so welcoming and so accepting, they were just wonderful. there's no other way to put it, they were just the most welcoming, accepting people of any of the people i've met. (interview 12) . . . it was such a privilege to sit and learn. (survey respondent 1) . . . it was the fact that we were on their land, hearing their stories, told their way in their time and having being invited to be part of that. you know, i really felt they were sharing something very important and special to them with us. (interview 1) the intensity of the emotional connection felt by tourists towards their guides and country was documented in numerous tourist interviews. experiences ranged from heartfelt and teary exchanges between tourists and guides, to tourists being awed and extremely moved by ceremony, to the following departure stories, in which the act of leaving the tour became a painful experience: you feel really attached to people . . . i think the ceremony at the end, i guess what is hard about that is it's breaking an attachment . . . it doesn't have to be a breaking of an attachment but that's what it is, so it is like saying goodbye to people, like leaving on a train, or whatever. that experience is painful. (interview 9) going back to work was pretty tough. i cried on the plane home. (survey 2) d i s o r i e n t a t i o n i n c o n n e c t i o n despite the deep emotional connections formed between tourists, country, and community described above, experiences of learning and connecting were not inherently smooth and easy. instead, as mezirow’s theory suggests, some encounters and engagements were profoundly disorienting. for example, exploring country in bawaka prompted some tourists, when interviewed, to reconsider their perceptions and understandings of australia. one respondent explained feeling “a strong sense of being a visitor in my own country” (survey 1), and another affirmed: 9 lloyd et al.: indigenous tourism at bawaka in northern australia published by scholarship@western, 2015 i mean, when you go out there and you see what australia really is like and what it's all about, it's just so different. (interview 12) in the following sections, we explore the discomfort faced by tourists, arising in part in response to the practical aspects of being with country, combined with the new skills, task requirements, and political realities that commitment to new ways of being bring. these are broadly categorised into four areas: the practicalities of relinquishing control, new knowledge and skills, unfamiliar communication protocols, and political content. r e l i n q u i s h i n g c o n t r o l bce’s focus on creating tours that actively engage in and contribute to the lives of family members whilst reflecting yolŋu’s worldviews and educational and communication protocols reveals an alternative, specifically indigenous model of tourism. according to one interviewee, this approach, an example of what bunten (2010) might describe as “culturalising commerce,” has significant power or impact on tourists: that's one thing that they've managed to do fairly well, is keep it normal, and that's why every tour is different; it's not a performance—it's not, now we do this, now we do that. it's a little bit structured but it's also very loose, so it remains real. (interview 11) in order to engage in the tour experience, and fulfill a collective responsibility to community and country, tourists were effectively required to “let go” of any attempt to control the program, as well as any expectations about what they would be doing. activities often arose in response to factors outside tourists’ (and guides’) control, without a schedule or timetable. a number of activities took considerable time, involved repetitive actions, and emphasised collectivity and cooperation. group outcomes were often valued over individual acquisition of skills, and participants were expected to take the tasks seriously and learn through observation: “you don't ask a lot of questions; you watch” (interview 9). this necessarily required a change of pace and attitude for many tourists, one that was not always welcome. according to one interviewee, this is a challenging component of the tourism approach used by bce, as learning opportunities and experiences are subject to country rather than schedule, and collective rather than individual experiences are emphasised: we've heard some more feedback at other times as well, that you are stepping into someone's life, but you are also paying for an experience so you expect to receive that. (interview 3) what is clear from interviews is that the process of letting go was critical for some tourists when gaining an embodied understanding of country and day-to-day life with the burarrwanga family. whilst challenging, the processes of letting go and being directed led to opportunities to better understand yolŋu worldviews. the process of weaving, for example, was described as having an effect on tourists’ moods, insofar as it calmed the weaver into a peaceful, almost meditative state through the loss of individual focus and concerns—in part due to joining a collective project, and in part from engaging in a process involving repetitious steps and a quiet focus. as described by one tourist: 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.6 i was immersed in an experience, and that's what i mean about i probably reflected less. so i was a person doing things, and that i think is quite a peaceful way to be. you just connected to people or things, or weaving. i suppose we might understand it as quite zen or something. (interview 9) tourists’ personal boundaries were directly challenged by group expectations that they undertake a number of activities that they might normally avoid, such as dancing. dancers were also admonished on occasion for adopting their own style of dancing; the expectation was for individuals to adhere to the style, pace, and structure of existing collective routines. while discomforting, these experiences helped tourists to understand the nature of interconnectedness and responsibility inherent within yolŋu worldviews, whereby family members are beholden to each other and to country in a complex weave of shared responsibility. and i thought the dancing is great, especially the men, because my husband normally wouldn't choose to dance and he got up there and he had a good time. (interview 12) i do think there's something great about being castigated for our bad dancing. it stops it turning into some sort of . . . it's a discipline, you have to dance properly. you dance properly because it's a manifestation of country. they don't just flap around. so in that sort of sense you do things properly. and i think that probably for a lot of people a bit shocking. (interview 9) l e a r n i n g a n d s h a r i n g n e w k n o w l e d g e a n d s k i l l s in a context where tourists have limited experience with indigenous cultures and peoples, exposure to the guides’ deep knowledge can make an enormous impression, as one tourist explained: he was one of the most intelligent—and his mother too, barbara—gentlemanly, well educated person; maybe not educated in our traditional sense of universities, but they were the most intelligent and, just amazing people that i'd come across. so it was really quite special. (interview 12) for others with some prior exposure to indigenous peoples and knowledges, the depth of yolŋu knowledge of country can serve to be both intriguing and humbling. through hands-on activities such as weaving and hunting, tourists became aware of the difficulty of yolŋu skills. these activities served to strengthen tourists’ respect for the skills of the host community, and some tourists also expressed a small sense of disquiet over the difficulty of mastering these skills: . . . you feel a little bit of a klutz because you can't really do their little things straight off; you actually have to concentrate and think about it, so you have a better appreciation of, you know, what they're doing. (interview 12) a collective responsibility for valuing and sharing new knowledge acquired through tours is made clear for tourists from the outset. as laklak described in her book, weaving lives together at bawaka: when my grandmothers collected food, they saved it in a basket and shared it. now we are putting our knowledge in the basket and we share it—mother to grandchild—and now you have to share it with your family (burarrwanga et al., 2012, p. 7). 11 lloyd et al.: indigenous tourism at bawaka in northern australia published by scholarship@western, 2015 the expectation that tourists should share this knowledge can be new for tourists who may have previously seen responsibility for this as something lying with indigenous communities: i found the openness of the yolŋu people to share their stories and to encourage people who heard the stories to go further and share them; i found that really interesting because i don’t remember getting that feeling as i was growing up from aboriginal groups here in south australia . . . i’ve never had that sentiment that this is our story and this is everybody’s story and you must go out and share it but that came across so strongly on the day. (interview 1) u n f a m i l i a r c o m m u n i c a t i o n p r o t o c o l s yolŋu ways of being were also clearly manifest in communication styles. whilst the main tour guides, with experience of non-indigenous communication protocols, were open and very friendly, within the group context and the broader family indigenous community members were described as quiet, and often did not respond to direct questioning. information was often not presented to tourists in a linear manner with reference to dates or other events of the time; an industry professional explained that stories can sometimes evolve between tours. the communication style is non-direct. for example, one tourist with prior experience with indigenous communities talked of embedded messages in stories told by hosts that may have been missed by other tourists due to their lack of familiarity with the communication style. another spoke of the importance of having a tourist in their group with experience with indigenous cultures, as well as the ability to ask questions and direct conversation to unpack meanings that would have been lost without his or her assistance. according to one industry professional: all the information's there, but for me, and i know other people have commented on the same thing, you still can't quite get it because you don't know how to put all the different pieces together. (interview 11) according to some tourists, deeper meanings embedded in conversation might require multiple encounters to grasp, and more direct western style communication techniques. however, for others, it was the experience of uncovering and exploring different verbal and non-verbal cues that, while confusing, resulted in achieving a deeper sense of meaning from communication: we have a lot in common as women; and what’s not in common is not an issue for the short period of time we are together; there's a number of different ways communication is occurring including non-verbal [sic]. so learning to read those signs is part of the experience. it's an informal process between the two cultural groupings and of course there is much laughter in the learning exchange. (interview 10) p o l i t i c a l c o n t e n t for the burrawangas, the act of undertaking tourism is a deliberate and political act. in particular, connection to country is political in light of the australian government’s northern territory intervention policy, removal from homelands, lands rights issues, control of language and bilingual education, access to health and education, and rights to country within indigenous law and systems. however, political discussion about these issues was confronting and disquieting for some tourists. as described by one observer, the introduction of a political discussion—whereby tourists were asked how they had allowed the northern territory intervention to take place—into one tour 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.6 clearly made some tourists uncomfortable. tourists felt that politics had no place in the program, and in fact detracted from their connection to country and the burrawangas: so it was quite clear that it was very uncomfortable, and then i spoke to a few people after to try to make sure i've actually got this right. and they were uncomfortable about it and would say things like, it's not about politics, it's about . . . oh, it's just that it became political and it shouldn't be about politics, it should be about connection to country. (interview 9) tourists in this context appeared to be searching for a spiritual connection with country, without necessarily recognising their own roles in the ongoing oppression faced by indigenous communities, and without recognising how for yolngu people it would inconceivable to “have an attachment to country without politics being involved” (interview 9). this highlights a critical issue within indigenous tourism: the disconnection between romanticised views of indigenous cultures and the reality of life within australia for indigenous communities. politics are often missing from the tourist agenda. what are the limits to educational tourism and transformative learning if tourists only want experiences on or with country that are disconnected from controversial and political issues? these questions are explored in the conclusion and policy recommendations. e n d u r i n g s h i f t s i n o n e ’ s h a b i t s o f t h o u g h t a n d p e r s p e c t i v e s despite not engaging specific methods to promote reflection, discussion, and exploration, bce tours were reported to have left a lasting impression on participants. for those with limited exposure to indigenous peoples and cultures prior to attending a bce tour, the potential for transformation appeared to be greatest. in the vignette below, a tourism sector worker explains her impressions of the impact of one-day tours on somewhat disinterested local mining workers: . . . they were mainly men, there were some women on those early day tours—but you'd get at least two or three who would arrive and get in the four-wheel drive with their arms folded. they were going because it was something to do on the day off, not that they were interested in the least but it got them out of the camp for the day. and to see them over the day interact with timmy, and particularly the women, that the barriers came down and by the end of the day these people would be hugging and kissing the family and going, “oh my god, i can't believe this, i'm so ashamed of myself. i'm ashamed of what i thought about you and your family; i'm ashamed as an australian that i didn't know about this.” i think this is a really common thing; i felt the same myself when i first went over there—shame that you have this vision that what you see on tv and in the media all the time, drunken indigenous people and family violence and all that kind of thing, but when you go to bawaka, it's a side that not very many people get to see of how functional their lives actually are, and how caring they are. (interview 11) for others with prior experience with or exposure to indigenous communities, the experience— although not an isolated learning opportunity or the stimulus for a new way of thinking and being— still reinforced their current understandings, and they contributed ideas: there are many experiences in my life that have deepened my understanding of the indigenous cultures. this was an important one but not the only one. (interview 10) 13 lloyd et al.: indigenous tourism at bawaka in northern australia published by scholarship@western, 2015 the post-tour outcomes on the lives of tourists interviewed can be loosely grouped into three main categories. the first involves greater interest and intellectual engagement in indigenous affairs. as a result of their tour experiences, these tourists reported a greater interest in news stories and literature involving indigenous issues and communities; an enhanced understanding of how policy issues may affect indigenous communities living in east arnhem land; and an increased willingness to share their perspectives and insights on indigenous communities and worldview with others in social situations: it [the tour] gave me a better . . . a different way of looking at it [indigenous issues], or a more insightful way of looking at it. which if i hadn't had that experience i would have been ignorant. (interview 12) the second category of perceived change was in relation to worldviews. numerous tourists mentioned how their tour experience acted to reinforce and build on their existing commitment to social justice, indigenous rights, and/or to their relationship with nature, as described in the quotations below: well i've always respected nature and everything else, but i really appreciated their take on everything. it probably deepened my own ideas i had already. (interview 12) the bawaka tour reinvigorated the way i relate to the natural world and people. it did not change me, but reinforced the path that i was on. (survey 1) the third group of personal changes discussed by tourists involved taking direct action, utilising professional roles (such as those of teacher and academic and tourism sector worker) to pursue outcomes that fulfilled a desire to act on injustice, and to carry forward perceived collective responsibilities that were initially instilled within the tour setting. some examples of change reported as a result of the tours include taking on new research projects that progress the aims of reconciliation, writing a book for educational purposes about the bawaka experience, and taking a long term commitment to working in indigenous tourism and economic development: i think it made me quite materially think about what is my role in this, and one can be charged with this. people are right to charge people and other australians. you can't just be an intellectual engagement. (interview 9) it was being put in the situation that i was, and once i became aware of it, you couldn't not do something about it. most people, they just want a hand; they just want people to understand; they just want it to be fair; they just want the best for their children. (interview 11) this change in belief, attitude, or behaviour demonstrates the powerful impact bce has on tour participants. for many who came to the tour with a social justice perspective, the tour built on and confirmed their perspectives, and may have acted a little like a tipping point in their journeys of change. however, upon leaving bawaka, the lack of constant reminders and a community of practice made it difficult to sustain different perspectives and ways of thinking: i guess that's an experience of how one might want to be in the world, and that you can bring a little bit of that home. but i'm not the dalai lama, so i'd have to practice that for some time. . . slow it down would be one way [i want to change my behaviour]. or just being 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.6 aware of getting stressed at the desk, so that you can consciously intervene. but i'm usually caught up in it before i can wind myself back down again. i guess in that sense being one of those experiences, and a very, very deeply embodied experience, which is different than someone telling you that you need to be mindful. what the hell is mindfulness? i don't know. you have to experience it. so i think i'd have to go there for quite some time. (interview 9) one interview with a person who had extended engagement with bce shows more signs of achieving longer-term change: i've learned to appreciate it more. i've actually slowed down, if you know what i mean— stopped and smelled the roses more. timmy used to often say to me, why are you rushing? why are you driving so fast? why do we have to have this done today? [laughs]. and when you're out with them you're there but you're not seeing; and barbara would often say that— you need to open your eyes and see. you're not really looking; be aware of everything around you. (interview 11) c o n c l u s i o n s a n d p o l i c y r e c o m m e n d a t i o n s we were once indigenous people but we have disassociated from our indigenous roots about 4,000 or 5,000 years ago. yet we still do have a deep knowing that once we have reexperienced the closeness to country, the stories of the landscape with contemporary indigenous people we have a sense of being at home within ourselves again. it's profound really, and you never forget it. it's just one of those things that happens. it is a gift. it's remarkable. (interview 10) a yolŋu way of “doing tourism” is clearly a viable, culturally appropriate, empowering, intriguing, and successful form of educational tourism. the very act of yolŋu-led educational processes is social, cultural, and political for the host family, with beneficial results regarding for self-esteem, “inward education,” and ongoing work and respect within the community. bce’s venture is an example of a tourism model that deliberately goes beyond economistic understandings of tourism and interactions between hosts and visitors. this is at odds with mainstream conceptualisations of indigenous tourism in australian policy, which tend to position tourism as a “product” or “service,” and emphasise job creation and economic development. therefore, policies that are cognizant of the diverse aims and conceptualisations of tourism are needed. this article demonstrates that tourism can be a vehicle for encouraging new understandings and connections among tourists. tourists clearly had profound and meaningful experiences on bce tours and left with greater appreciation for yolŋu skills and knowledges. while confronting and disconcerting for some, we argue that the experiences embedded within yolŋu ontology that underpin tour experiences are the very foundation for tourists’ potential learning outcomes. they can contribute to change and often have the most impact when they come as part of multiple engagements in which the experience with bce is but one of many experiences that together seek to change tourists’ beliefs, attitudes, or behaviours. we also found that while the indigenous tourism model used by bce provides a range of disorienting dilemmas for tourists, the transformational impact of these experiences may be limited by the short duration of tours, lack of structured processes, the challenges of new learning experiences, and the lack of opportunities to implement changes upon returning home. only a few tourists reported changed behavior over the medium term, although all felt profoundly affected at 15 lloyd et al.: indigenous tourism at bawaka in northern australia published by scholarship@western, 2015 the time of their experiences. mezirow (1975) argued that for transformational learning to occur, a disorientating dilemma needs to be followed by reflection, discussion, and exploration and testing of new modes of understanding. perhaps the lack of opportunity to unpack this discomfort (particularly in regards to political content) in a group-facilitated context meant that tourists were not able to critically reflect on their responses to the context and learn from them. structured reflection and discussion processes are neither actively integrated into bce tours nor facilitated by bce guides. this is perhaps a missed opportunity to take these dilemmas and promote enduring shifts in thoughts and perspectives. a facilitated discussion could make an alternative analysis possible, and promote a growing awareness of the interconnectedness of politics and country. an increased focus on structured reflection and discussion, however, needs to be done with care, and should not entail changing the nature of the tours. changing tour structures to remove or alter these experiences could unintentionally remove the very fabric of the tour that leads to positive change. moreover, an attempt to fit indigenous-led tourism into the western tourism model may in fact unintentionally contribute to colonising practices and undermine the impact of the tour itself. the very nature of indigenous businesses requires the use of locally constructed protocols to operate successfully; hence, the policy challenge around reflection-for-change is perhaps one for broader organisations and networks to consider, asking: how do state-based support agencies, corporate entities, and educational institutions encourage spaces and opportunities for post-tour reflection and connection to enhance the impact of such transformational experiences? 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.6 r e f e r e n c e s addleman, r. a., brazo, c. j., & cevallos, t. 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(2013). a footprint in a rock: entwining lives and co-constructing 'the field' in australia. in j. t. johnson, & s. c. larsen (eds.), a deeper sense of place: stories and journeys of collaboration in indigenous research (pp. 21-40). corvallis: oregon state university press. taylor, e. w. (2008). transformative learning theory. new directions for adult and continuing education, 2008(119), 5-15. doi: 10.1002/ace.301 tisdell, e. j. (2008). spirituality and adult learning. new directions for adult and continuing education, 2008(119), 27-36. doi: 10.1002/ace.303 walter, p. g. (2013). catalysts for transformative learning in community-based ecotourism. current issues in tourism, 1-16. doi: 10.1080/13683500.2013.850063 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.6 whitford, m., bell, b., & watkins, m. (2001). indigenous tourism policy in australia: 25 years of rhetoric and economic rationalism. current issues in tourism, 4(2-4), 151-181. doi: 10.1080/13683500108667886 whitford, m., & ruhanen, l. m. (2010). australian indigenous tourism policy: practical and sustainable policies? journal of sustainable tourism 5(1), 475-496. doi: 10.1080/09669581003602325 wright, s., & hodge, p. (2012). to be transformed: emotions in cross-cultural, field-based learning in northern australia. journal of geography in higher education, 36(3), 355-368. doi: 10.1080/03098265.2011.638708 wright, s., lloyd, k., suchet-pearson, s., burarrwanga, l., tofa, m. & bawaka country. (2012). telling stories in, through and with country: engaging with indigenous and more-thanhuman methodologies at bawaka, ne australia. journal for cultural geography, 29(1), 3960. doi: 10.1080/08873631.2012.646890 wright, s., suchet-pearson, s., lloyd, k., burarrwanga, d. & burarrwanga, l. (2009). 'that means the fish are fat': sharing experiences of animals through indigenous tourism. current issues in tourism, 12(5), 505-527. doi: 10.1080/13683500903042907 zeppel, h. (2002). cultural tourism at the cowichan native village, british columbia. journal of travel research, 41(1), 92-100. doi: 10.1177/0047287502041001011 21 lloyd et al.: indigenous tourism at bawaka in northern australia published by scholarship@western, 2015 the international indigenous policy journal september 2015 transforming tourists and "culturalising commerce": indigenous tourism at bawaka in northern australia kate lloyd sandie suchet-pearson sarah wright matalena tofa claire rowland see next page for additional authors recommended citation transforming tourists and "culturalising commerce": indigenous tourism at bawaka in northern australia abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license authors transforming tourists and "culturalising commerce": indigenous tourism at bawaka in northern australia genocide against indigenous peoples: the experiences of the truth commissions of canada and guatemala the international indigenous policy journal volume 10 | issue 2 article 6 april 2019 genocide against indigenous peoples: the experiences of the truth commissions of canada and guatemala emmanuel guematcha university of french guiana, guematcha@hotmail.com recommended citation guematcha, e. (2019). genocide against indigenous peoples: the experiences of the truth commissions of canada and guatemala. the international indigenous policy journal, 10(2) . doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.6 genocide against indigenous peoples: the experiences of the truth commissions of canada and guatemala abstract the truth commission of guatemala stated that a genocide was committed against indigenous peoples in guatemala. the truth commission of canada concluded that a cultural genocide was committed against aboriginal peoples in canada. the article questions the contribution of the truth commissions of guatemala and canada to the recognition of a genocide. their contribution is analyzed in two areas. the article argues that the work of the two truth commissions shows that the context of a country and the perception of the crime influence the findings on genocide. it also states that the work of the two truth commissions on genocide is part of a movement towards an evolution of the 1948 united nations genocide convention. keywords genocide, cultural genocide, indigenous peoples, aboriginal peoples, international law, truth commissions, canada, guatemala acknowledgments i would like to thank the robson hall law school, the national centre for truth and reconciliation, and the persons who help me to conduct my research during my visiting scholarship at the university of manitoba: professor andrew woolford, raymond frogner, matthew renaud, donna sikorsky, helen fallding, and gail mackisey. creative commons license creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ genocide against indigenous peoples: international law and the experiences of the canadian and guatemalan truth commissions truth commissions are temporary, official, and non-judicial bodies set up by states to examine past violations or crimes, generally to foster lasting peace and/or reconciliation (freeman, 2006; hayner, 2011; united nations secretary general, 2004). they are considered a tool of transitional justice, defined by the united nations secretary general (2004) as “the full range of processes and mechanisms associated with a society’s attempt to come to terms with a legacy of large-scale past abuses, in order to ensure accountability, serve justice and achieve reconciliation” (para. 8). the mechanisms of transitional justice, which apart from truth commissions also comprise tools like prosecutions, reparations, reforms, or vetting (united nations secretary general, 2004), are generally created in order to deal with the past in states that are emerging from armed conflict and/or dictatorships. however, the success of truth commissions has led to their use in many states that are not stricto sensu [in a strict sense] in transition or emerging from armed conflict or dictatorships (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015e; greensboro truth and reconciliation commission [north carolina, usa], 2006). truth commissions, created in a transitional or non-transitional period by states struggling to overcome a violent past, have sometimes dealt with indigenous peoples (chilean national commission on truth and reconciliation, 1993; comisión para el esclarecimiento histórico [commission for the historical clarification, guatemala], 1999a; comisión verdad y justicia [truth and justice commission, paraguay], 2008; comisión verdad y reconciliación [truth and reconciliation commission, peru], 2003; the timor-leste commission for reception, truth, and reconciliation, 2013; truth and justice commission [mauritius], 2011; truth, justice and reconciliation commission of kenya, 2013; truth and reconciliation commission [sierra leone], 2004; truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015e; truth and reconciliation commission of liberia, 2009; truth and reconciliation commission of south africa, 1998; see also john, cunningham, & pop, 2013).1 this article explores the role that truth commissions have played in cases of genocide against indigenous peoples. genocide, a concept introduced by raphael lemkin (1944), is a well-recognized crime, defined in the united nations convention on the prevention and punishment of the crime of genocide (ungc, 1948) as: any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such: (a) killing members of the group; (b) causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; (c) deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; (d) imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; (e) forcibly transferring children of the group to another group. (article 2) despite this legal definition, there is a difference between genocide as a phenomenon analyzed and experienced in many societies or states and genocide as a crime defined by the ungc. indeed, understandings of genocide can sometimes differ from the international legal definition. some states have their own definitions (schabas, 2009) and many scholars have also constructed definitions of genocide that broaden the scope of the crime—for example, by including groups that are excluded from 1 in this article, i refer to indigenous peoples and aboriginal peoples synonymously. 1 guematcha: genocide against indigenous peoples in canada and guatemala published by scholarship@western, 2019 the ungc—or restrict it—by limiting the definition to mass murder, for instance (totten & bartrop, 2008). despite these differences, the ungc has remained the most important legal instrument pertaining to genocide and the centrepiece of its recognition. consequently, any discussion of genocide should not ignore the ungc. truth commissions are no stranger to the debate on genocide, either as a phenomenon or an international legal concept. one aspect of this has been their contribution to the recognition of genocide against indigenous peoples. where truth commissions have addressed the perpetration of genocide against indigenous peoples, there are questions to ask regarding how they have dealt with the crime and to what extent they have either used the ungc or gone beyond international legal concepts and norms. the paraguayan truth commission, the truth and justice commission (comisión verdad y justicia, 2008), paid attention to genocide in the context of repression in that country and implicitly followed the ungc definition of genocide. it failed to find evidence to prove that acts committed against indigenous peoples amounted to genocide. after reporting acts committed against an indigenous people (the aché people), including extrajudicial executions and forced sterilization, it stated that even if some of the acts could fall into the category of genocidal acts, the commission was not able to prove one of the core elements of genocide: the perpetrators’ intention to destroy the group. however, the commission asserted that the crimes committed constituted crimes against humanity because of their general and systematic character (comisión verdad y justicia, 2008). unlike the paraguayan truth commission, truth commissions in canada and guatemala used the concept of genocide in different ways to characterize violations committed against indigenous peoples. the truth and reconciliation commission of canada (trc) called what happened to aboriginal peoples (first nations, métis, and inuit) in canadian residential schools a cultural genocide (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015e)—a crime not explicitly recognised in the ungc, as will be discussed in the second section of this article. while in guatemala, the commission for historical clarification (comisión para el esclarecimiento histórico [ceh]) reported that genocide was committed against many groups of mayan indigenous peoples in guatemala (comisión para el esclarecimiento histórico,1999b). these two truth commissions’ conclusions can be studied comparatively for four main reasons: a. in the histories of both guatemala and canada, indigenous peoples have faced many problems, including poverty, marginalization, and discrimination (carter, 1999; salazar, 2012; woolford, 2015). b. in both countries, the truth commissions tried to address the issue of indigenous peoples’ rights. c. these two truth commissions, unlike others, used the terminology of genocide to name violations committed against indigenous peoples. d. in their reports on genocide against indigenous peoples, the canadian and guatemalan truth commissions insisted on elements that are not included in the ungc’s definition, as will be discussed in the third section of this article. truth commissions are not, of course, the only bodies that have dealt with indigenous peoples and genocide. in australia, the national inquiry into the separation of aboriginal and torres strait islander 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.6 children from their families, which was not stricto sensu a truth commission, published a report that used the terminology of genocide (national inquiry into the separation of aboriginal and torres strait islander children from their families, 1997). in guatemala, a document compiled by the catholic church’s proyecto interdiocesano de recuperación de la memoria histórica [the recovery of historical memory (remhi)], which likewise was not stricto sensu a truth commission, analyzed violations committed by the country’s military government, including those against indigenous peoples, and concluded that what happened had certain genocidal characteristics (proyecto interdiocesano de recuperación de la memoria histórica, 1998). however, while the work of these two inquiries is important, they will not be analyzed in detail here because they fall outside the scope of this article, which is focused mainly on truth commissions. thus, this article focuses on the cases of guatemala and canada as the only truth commissions to date to have extensively considered and examined the perpetration of genocide against indigenous or aboriginal peoples. these cases illustrate the contribution truth commissions can make to both the recognition of genocide against indigenous or aboriginal peoples and the discussion of genocide as a phenomenon and a legal concept. relying mainly on the guatemalan and canadian truth commissions and on the development of international law in the area of genocide, this article draws two lessons that pertain to the differences between genocide as defined by the ungc and genocide as a phenomenon experienced by different societies. first, the work of the two truth commissions shows that the specificities of a country, including the context and the perception of genocide, influence findings on genocide. consequently, the findings of truth commissions on genocide against indigenous peoples may vary. second, despite their differences, both truth commissions tended to insist on elements not included in the ungc and to understand genocide as a phenomenon that does not always fit international legal conceptions. the work of these two truth commissions involving indigenous peoples suggests that it may be appropriate to consider an evolution of international law regarding the crime of genocide to include new elements. after presenting an overview of the guatemalan and canadian truth commissions, this article examines these two lessons. then, the article analyzes developments in the understanding of genocide in each of the two truth commissions’ final reports and underlines their specificities, including the influence of context and the perception of genocide against indigenous peoples on the commissions’ findings. finally, with regard to genocide against indigenous peoples, it examines the potential for an evolution of the ungc based on the findings of the canadian and guatemalan truth commissions. overview of the guatemalan and canadian truth commissions guatemala: the comisión para el esclarecimiento histórico the creation of the guatemalan truth commission was the result of peace negotiations, under the auspices of the united nations, between the guatemalan government and the armed rebel group guatemalan national revolutionary unity [unidad revolucionaria nacional guatemalteca, urng], which had engaged in the civil war that ravaged guatemala from 1962 until 1996 (agreement on a firm and lasting peace, 1996; tomuschat, 2001). before the conclusion of the final peace agreement, both parties signed agreements on several matters (agreement on a firm and lasting peace, 1996). in 1994 in one of those agreements, the parties agreed to establish a truth commission (agreement on the 3 guematcha: genocide against indigenous peoples in canada and guatemala published by scholarship@western, 2019 establishment of the commission, 1994). the truth commission received the name comisión para el esclarecimiento histórico [the commission for historical clarification]. it was created “to clarify past human rights violations and acts of violence that have caused the guatemalan population to suffer” (agreement on the establishment of the commission, 1994, p. 13). the guatemalan truth commission had three members. a german professor of international law, christian tomuschat, was appointed by the united nations secretariat (comisión para el esclarecimiento histórico, 1999a). tomuschat subsequently appointed two other members, alfredo balsells tojo, a guatemalan lawyer, and otilia lux de cotí, a guatemalan human rights defender (comisión para el esclarecimiento histórico, 1999a). the guatemalan truth commission started its activities in 1997. it examined documents, conducted field research and interviews, and collected testimonies from thousands of victims and witnesses (comisión para el esclarecimiento histórico, 1999a). relying on these elements, the commission wrote a final report, which was published in february 1999. this report, memoria del silencio [memory of silence], emphasized the crimes and violations of both human rights and international humanitarian law that were committed during the armed confrontation and made recommendations to the guatemalan government. among the crimes reported by the commission was the crime of genocide committed against mayan groups, which it identified as indigenous peoples (comisión para el esclarecimiento histórico, 1999b; higonnet, 2009). canada: the truth and reconciliation commission sixteen years later, a canadian truth commission also dealt with genocide against indigenous peoples. the truth and reconciliation commission of canada (trc) is unique because its creation was the result of a lawsuit (niezen, 2013), not government-driven action. the decision to create the trc came after a legal battle engaged by former students in the canadian residential school system against the canadian federal government and the churches involved in administrating the schools (nagy, 2014). many former students and organizations had been criticizing the residential schooling policy whereby aboriginal children were removed from their families by canadian authorities and placed in the schools. these civil legal claims and later class action lawsuits sought to obtain reparation for the harm caused by residential schooling (buti, 2001; cassidy, 2003; olthuis kleer townshend llp, 2012; truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015b). in 2006, the government of canada, the involved churches, the plaintiffs, and representatives of aboriginal peoples signed an agreement (indian residential schools settlement agreement, 2006a). intended to be implemented under court supervision, the agreement set rules regarding the compensation of aboriginal individuals affected by the federally run residential schools.2 the creation of a truth and reconciliation commission was one of the provisions and commitments listed in the 2006 agreement (indian residential schools settlement agreement, 2006b). an order-in-council of the governor general, on the recommendation of the canadian prime minister, established the indian residential schools truth and reconciliation commission in 2008 (order-in-council, 2008a), subsequently known as the truth and reconciliation commission of canada. 2 it is worth noting that the limited scope of the compensation set up by the agreement, which did not cover all aboriginal groups, communities, and family members, has been criticized (see henderson & wakeham, 2009). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.6 three canadian commissioners were appointed by orders-in-council as members of the trc for a fiveyear term. justice harry laforme, a judge of the ontario court of appeal, was designated chair of the commission (order-in-council, 2008b); claudette dumont-smith, a health expert; and jane brewin morley, a lawyer, were the other commissioners (order-in-council, 2008c, 2008d). shortly after the three commissioners began their work in june 2008, laforme resigned in october 2008, and the two other members resigned in january 2009 (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2012). a selection panel chose three new commissioners, who were appointed for a five-year term. justice murray sinclair, a judge of the court of queen’s bench of manitoba, was appointed chair of the trc (order-incouncil, 2009a). dr. marie wilson, a journalist, and chief wilton littlechild, a lawyer, were appointed as commissioners of the trc (order-in-council 2009b, 2009c). they took office on july 1, 2009. in 2014, at the end of their five-year term, the commissioners were reappointed for an additional year to complete their work (order-in-council, 20014a, 2014b, 2014c). the task assigned to the canadian truth commission was mainly to document and establish an historical record on what happened in the residential schools, including consequences and impacts, in order to foster reconciliation (indian residential school settlement agreement, 2006b). the trc conducted research on canadian residential schools, organized national and community truth and reconciliation events, and collected thousands of documents and testimonies from aboriginal victims, survivors, and witnesses (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015e). it rendered its final report in 2015. in its report, the trc stated that canada committed cultural genocide against aboriginal peoples in the context of residential schools (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015e). because of their different contexts, the creation of the canadian and guatemalan truth commissions took different paths. the two truth commissions shared a common commitment to shedding light on violations of indigenous peoples’ rights that have progressively drawn the attention of international law (anaya, 2009; saul, 2016; thornberry, 2005). in doing so, they mobilized the terminology of genocide to draw different conclusions because of the different contexts of the two countries and their understandings of genocide. the influence of context and understanding of genocide on the characterization of abuses: cultural genocide and genocide the guatemalan and canadian truth commissions used the word genocide to characterize what happened to indigenous peoples in the two countries, and both referred to the ungc. however, in canada, the trc referred to cultural genocide, while in guatemala the ceh referred simply to genocide. in the same vein, the two truth commissions did not use the same reasoning, nor did they give the same importance to the ungc. these differences are rooted in the context of the two states and the understanding of genocide in the two cases. canada: cultural genocide against indigenous peoples in the context of residential schools the canadian truth and reconciliation commission’s relation to genocide can be understood through two main conclusions: first, the trc did not rely explicitly on the ungc to draw its main conclusions about the violations committed against indigenous peoples in the context of residential schools in canada. in the summary of its final report, the trc wrote that canadian federal government’s policies 5 guematcha: genocide against indigenous peoples in canada and guatemala published by scholarship@western, 2019 regarding aboriginal peoples, including residential schools, amounted to cultural genocide. according to the commission: for over a century, the central goals of canada’s aboriginal policy were to eliminate aboriginal governments; ignore aboriginal rights; terminate the treaties; and, through a process of assimilation, cause aboriginal peoples to cease to exist as distinct legal, social, cultural, religious, and racial entities in canada. the establishment and operation of residential schools were a central element of this policy, which can best be described as “cultural genocide.” (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015b, p. 1) going further, the trc defined cultural genocide. it stated, “cultural genocide is the destruction of those structures and practices that allow the group to continue as a group. states that engage in cultural genocide set out to destroy the political and social institutions of the targeted group” (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015b, p. 1). in these strong statements, which are at the heart of its final report’s main conclusions, the trc’s lack of reference to the ungc is consistent with international law. indeed, the ungc does not recognize cultural genocide. cultural genocide, whose definition stresses the intent to destroy the culture and language of a protected group, was discussed during the drafting process and negotiations which led to the adoption of the ungc.3 but states rejected the idea of incorporating cultural genocide in the convention (schabas, 2009). by not relying on the ungc, the trc implicitly confirmed what had already been established in international law. however, some parts of the trc’s report question whether the non-recognition of cultural genocide is in conformity to international law. this is the second conclusion: in some segments of its report, the trc appeared to conclude that what happened in the context of residential schools in canada could fall under the ungc’s understanding of genocide. in the fifth volume of its report, while criticizing the refusal of the canadian courts to acknowledge wrongdoings committed against aboriginal peoples in canada, the trc wrote: it is difficult to reconcile the refusal of courts to acknowledge the loss of language and culture as being compensable with the very important principle that such acts could constitute acts of genocide, an acknowledged crime against a racial group in breach of the un convention on genocide. (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015c, p. 125) 3 see, for example, the proposition of the ad hoc committee: article iii (‘cultural’ genocide) in this convention genocide also means any deliberate act committed with the intent to destroy the language, religion, or culture of a national, racial or religious group on grounds of national or racial origin or religious belief of its members such as: 1. prohibiting the use of the language of the group in daily intercourse or in schools, or the printing and circulation of publications in the language of the group; 2. destroying or preventing the use of libraries, museums, schools, historical monuments, places of worship or other cultural institutions and objects of the group. (united nations secretary general, 1947, p. 17) 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.6 the trc recognized explicitly that cultural genocide was rejected during the drafting process of the un genocide convention (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015c). however, it noted, “nonetheless, while the term genocide generally refers to the physical destruction of members of a racialized group, the convention [the ungc] contains provisions that appear to contemplate criteria other than immediate physical destruction” (p. 125). after quoting article 2 of the ungc, which defines genocide, the trc report asserted that “articles 2(d) and 2(e) do not require that the victims themselves be ‘destroyed’ but that the measures taken against them be intended to result in the destruction of the ‘national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such’” (p. 125). referring to one of the genocidal acts outlined in article 2(e) of the ungc, the trc added: the forcible removal of children from their racial community in order to be indoctrinated into another racial community and thereby “destroy” their original group would likewise be an act of genocide, even though the children themselves continued to live as members of the new group. (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015c, pp. 125-126) moreover, it argued that it is its view “that if canada were to attempt to do today what it did in the nineteenth century through residential schools, it could face severe international consequences” (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015c, p. 126). elsewhere in the same volume of its report, the trc continued in the same vein by indicating: considering that one element of the un convention on genocide involves recognizing that the forcible removal of children from one group to another group for the purpose of wiping out the racial identity of the children is a crime, it is difficult to understand why courts have not been more willing to recognize at least intentional acts of cultural and racial destruction or deprivation as a compensable tort. (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015c, p. 206) more explicitly, in the sixth volume of its report, the trc made a connection between article 2(e) of the ungc and the canadian state’s policy of removing children from their family. it indicated: it is difficult to understand why the forced assimilation of children through removal from their families and communities—to be placed with people of another race for the purpose of destroying the race and culture from which the children come—is not a civil wrong even though it can be deemed an act of genocide under article 2(e) of the united nations convention on genocide. (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015d, p. 48) this statement by the trc resembles the conclusion of the australian commission of inquiry set up to investigate the transfer of aboriginal children from one group to another—even if, unlike the canadian truth commission, the australian commission was addressing the permanent transfer of children. in its 1997 report bringing them home, the australian commission stated that the removal of aboriginal children from their families constituted genocide, basing its statement on the ungc (national inquiry into the separation of aboriginal and torres strait islander children from their families, 1997). the opinion of the truth and reconciliation commission of canada is also akin to the views of some scholars who suggest that article 2(e) can be interpreted as a recognition of cultural genocide (saul, 2016; thornberry, 2005). 7 guematcha: genocide against indigenous peoples in canada and guatemala published by scholarship@western, 2019 it seems clear that in the fifth and sixth volume of its report, the trc’s statements converge around the point that the forcible transfer of children, which took place in the context of residential schools in canada, amounts to genocide according to the ungc’s definition—even if the members of the group were not physically destroyed. thus, the canadian trc made two arguments that can give the impression of a contradiction, raising a legitimate question: why does one part of the report state strongly that what occurred was a cultural genocide, a crime not recognized in the ungc, while another part of the report states that some actions directed against aboriginal peoples could fall under the ungc? one could assume that the use of the term “cultural genocide” was meant less as legal term than as a phrase directed towards victims and their process of mourning. to this end, akhavan (2016) sought to understand why aboriginal victims and survivors applauded during the final ceremony of the trc when what happened to them was characterized as a cultural genocide, and to answer the question of whether cultural genocide is a “legal label” or a “mourning metaphor” (p. 245). after examining the complexity and fate of cultural genocide in international law, he concluded that “for the survivors that applauded in ottawa, cultural genocide is above all a song of bereavement, a metaphor for mourning, rebuilding a shattered self-conception through the power of words” (p. 270). indeed, beyond the legal matters that may interest scholars and experts, the stigmatization of past wrongdoings is very important for victims of atrocities. the worse and more profoundly negative the words used to describe the past, the better it may be for the victims. the use of the word “genocide,” sometimes commonly referred to as “the crime of crimes,” alongside the word “cultural” follows this rationale. however, one could legitimately wonder whether most of the survivors at the trc’s final ceremony were applauding the word “genocide” or the word “cultural,” and whether many of them thought that cultural genocide was in fact equivalent to genocide. this question is not irrelevant, since certain facts show that the word “genocide” has been at the heart of discussions regarding aboriginal peoples in canada and beyond: first, some confusion appeared in public discourses in canada about the distinction between genocide as defined by the ungc and cultural genocide. for example, in a 2011 speech canada’s then-minister of aboriginal affairs and northern development canada john duncan declared that “the history of residential schools tells of an education policy gone wrong” (duncan, 2011, para. 7). he also reportedly said: “i don’t view it that way [as an act of cultural genocide], but it was certainly very negative to the retention of culture and if it had extended for another generation or two it might have been lethal, yes” (“saganash calls on duncan,” 2011, para. 6). taken as a whole, this statement by the former canadian minister leads to some inconsistency. cultural genocide does not necessarily imply deaths. genocide, in the ungc definition, implies physical and/or biological destruction, and it has been interpreted in that manner (international law commission, 1996). consequently, without contravening this rationale, one cannot reasonably assert or suggest that a policy could have become a cultural genocide only if deaths occurred. if one looks carefully at the statement of the former minister, one may assume that he meant to say that what happened to aboriginal peoples in canada in the context of residential schools was not a genocide, but that it might have become one had the policy continued for one or two generations with widespread fatalities. in actuality, the former minister’s statement implicitly equates genocide and cultural genocide. it could also be taken to mean that cultural genocide does not always fall under the legal definition of genocide, but 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.6 that sometimes it does. the statement drew criticism; many individuals denounced it for diminishing the violations committed and refusing to name what happened as cultural genocide (“saganash calls on duncan,” 2011). the debate that followed, however, was oriented around understanding genocide, with some condemning the statement by relying on the ungc and linking what happened to aboriginal peoples in canada to its definition of genocide (palmater, 2011). this orientation is questionable, since the ungc does not deal with cultural genocide, the expression used in the statement that caused the controversy. one could consequently conclude that the discussion was not actually about cultural genocide, but about genocide as defined and recognized by the ungc. for the people who condemned the minister’s statement, his refusal to accept the terminology of cultural genocide was seen as minimization. for them, keeping a connection to the legal definition of genocide was important in order to uphold the accuracy of characterizations of the violations committed against aboriginal peoples. rhetorical reference to genocide in discussions about indigenous peoples’ rights is also recurrent at the international level. the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (2007) states that indigenous peoples “shall not be subjected to any act of genocide” (article 7). an observation of the discussions held across many sessions of the united nations permanent forum on indigenous issues shows that the issue of genocide against indigenous peoples was very often emphasized (united nations permanent forum on indigenous issues, 2008, 2011). second, in canada the word “genocide,” without the adjective cultural, had been circulating in debates among aboriginal peoples for several years. before the trc’s work and report, many scholars, indigenous peoples, residential school survivors, and others had been using the word to characterize canadian policy regarding aboriginal peoples, including residential schools, as one of its core elements (akhtar, 2010; “manitoba first nation organization,” 2013; macdonald, 2014; robinson & qinney, 1985; truth commission into genocide in canada, 2001). even the chair of the trc, justice murray sinclair, used the word “genocide” several times in public to characterize the canadian policy regarding residential schools (macdonald, 2015; puxley, 2012). so why did the trc refer to cultural genocide instead of genocide, given that (a) its chair used the term several times in public, and (b) it seemed to fit the perception of aboriginal peoples in canada? pragmatic reasons guided by the canadian context certainly influenced the trc’s decision. as macdonald (2015) has explained, the trc did not conclude that a genocide had not happened, while “invoking genocide would have opened the commission to attack from right-wing activists, armchair lawyers, and others” (para. 9). the trc chose the expression “cultural genocide” so as to avoid harsh criticism and controversies that would have hampered reconciliation. indeed, while the trc was conducting its activities, canada faced multiple challenges around reconciliation. reconciliation between aboriginal peoples and non-aboriginal people in canada was at the heart of the commission’s activities and goals. for many years, canadian federal authorities have been reluctant to use the terminology of genocide to describe the residential school policy. on the one hand, then, the canadian authorities would have been opposed to the qualification of what happened in the context of residential school as genocide. on the other hand, however, aboriginal peoples in canada have been stressing the use of the word “genocide.” 9 guematcha: genocide against indigenous peoples in canada and guatemala published by scholarship@western, 2019 as such, the expression “cultural genocide” appeared to be the best compromise. aboriginal peoples in canada would find in the expression a recognition of the violations they endured, even if it was reduced and restricted by the designation “cultural.” it would be very difficult for the canadian government to oppose the expression, which has no legal consequences either in canadian law or in international law, without seeming either legalistic or minimizing. here it is worth recalling that canada contributed to the exclusion of cultural genocide from the ungc. according to schabas (2009), during the negotiations for the adoption of the genocide convention, “canada declared that, if the committee were to retain the cultural genocide provision, the canadian government would have to make certain reservations ‘as the canadian constitution limited the legislative powers of the federal government to the benefit of the provincial legislatures’” (p. 212). canada’s delegation to the negotiations was instructed to work towards the suppression of article 3 of the draft genocide convention, which recognized cultural genocide, and eventually to vote against the whole convention if the issue was not resolved (schabas, 2009). with this in mind, one could legitimately wonder if, in 1948, canada was afraid of the legal consequences that the recognition of cultural genocide by an international instrument could have had regarding its own policies against aboriginal peoples. as discussion of whether or not a genocide has been committed against aboriginal peoples is an established national debate in canada, this core fact could not have been ignored by the trc when it wrote its report. guatemala: a genocide against indigenous peoples in the context of a civil armed conflict unlike the trc, the guatemalan commission for historical clarification (ceh) did not encounter large-scale national debates and controversies over naming genocide against indigenous peoples. unlike the trc, the scope of the ceh’s mandate was not limited. it was set up after a bloody civil war in order to examine violations of human rights and acts of violence. the united nations played a role in its establishment, and it had a somewhat international dimension. this context can be considered an element that freed the commission from the kind of concerns that could have led its members to refrain from qualifying the crimes committed as genocide. the perpetration of a genocide against indigenous peoples in guatemala was related to the guatemalan civil war, which broke out in the context of the cold war between the government of guatemala, an ally of the united states of america, and the urng, a leftist armed opposition group. during the armed conflict, mayan groups—indigenous peoples in guatemala who were already both historically discriminated against and victims of racism—were viewed by the government as sympathizers of the urng and thus enemies (comisión para el esclarecimiento histórico, 1999b). government armed forces targeted mayan groups, escalating between 1981 and 1983 (especially in rural areas). many mayan groups were subjected to killings, massacres, torture, mistreatment, forced displacement, and other abuses (comisión para el esclarecimiento histórico, 1999b). in its examination of what happened to indigenous peoples of guatemala during the civil war, the ceh explicitly stated that a genocide was committed against four mayan groups between 1981 and 1983 (comisión para el esclarecimiento histórico, 1999c). the ceh dealt with genocide in two main ways. first, it deliberately based its findings on the ungc and placed the abuses committed against guatemalan indigenous peoples in the context of international norms. the wording of the ungc and international norms were important in the ceh’s report. relying on the definition provided by the 1948 genocide convention, and in an effort to bring its 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.6 conclusions close to its provisions, the ceh both explained why it characterized indigenous groups as victim groups under the protection of the convention and gave explanations of how the guatemalan authorities intended to destroy that group in part or in whole. in identifying the victim group, the ceh faced the challenge of establishing that indigenous peoples fall under the groups named in the ungc. indigenous peoples are not explicitly listed among the protected groups identified by the ungc, which are restricted to national, racial, religious, and ethnic groups. as such, the ceh decided to characterize mayan groups as ethnic groups (comisión para el esclarecimiento histórico, 1999b), strategically using the identification criteria that had been instrumental in determining the existence of a protected group in international criminal law. it affirmed that this determination depended on objective and subjective elements, with the objective elements being stable ones such as language and culture and the subjective elements being the group members’ self-perception of belonging. the ceh accordingly underlined that the constitution of guatemala and one of the agreements signed in the course of the peace negotiations, the accord on the identity and rights of indigenous peoples, recognized mayan indigenous groups as ethnic groups. it also addressed the self-identification criterion, stating that the members of the indigenous mayan groups identified themselves as ethnic groups. the ceh concluded that, in its understanding, mayan ethnic groups were among the indigenous peoples in guatemala, that they identified themselves as such, and were identified as such by others (comisión para el esclarecimiento histórico, 1999b). beyond these legal grounds, the ceh’s decision to assert that indigenous peoples were an ethnic group protected under the ungc can also be viewed as a way of rejecting the narrative from former government officials that identified the groups as political threats to justify targeting them. regarding the determination of the authorities’ intent to destroy, the ceh analyzed and reported the abuses committed between 1981 and 1983 against four mayan peoples in four regions. it selected these regions on the basis of elements such as the availability of information, the identified victim groups, and the intensity and patterns of violence. its analysis found that the guatemalan government had acted with genocidal intent. according to the commission, the discriminatory nature and repetition of the attacks against members of the mayan groups were evidence of intent to destroy the groups (comisión para el esclarecimiento histórico, 1999b; perlin, 2000). the guatemalan commission strongly stated: considering the series of criminal acts and human rights violations which occurred in the regions and periods indicated and which were analyzed for the purpose of determining whether they constituted the crime of genocide, the ceh concludes that the reiteration of destructive acts, directed systematically against groups of mayan population, within which can be mentioned the elimination of leaders and criminal acts against minors who could not possibly have been military targets, demonstrates that the only common denominator for all the victims was the fact that they belonged to a specific ethnic group and makes it evident that these acts were committed “with intent to destroy, in whole or in part” these groups (article ii, first paragraph of the convention). (commission for historical clarification, 1999, p. 39, para. 111; for the original version in spanish, see comisión para el esclarecimiento histórico, 1999c, p. 49, para. 111) the ceh then categorized the genocidal acts under consideration. it wrote that the acts reported amounted to violations of sections (a), (b), (c), (d), and (e) of article 2 of the ungc. for example, the 11 guematcha: genocide against indigenous peoples in canada and guatemala published by scholarship@western, 2019 ceh linked massacres committed against mayan group to “killings” as mentioned in article 2(a); torture, cruel, and inhumane actions to “serious bodily and mental harm to members of the group” as described in article 2(b); and raids on mayan villages and the bombing of displaced persons to “deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part” in article 2(c) (comisión para el esclarecimiento histórico, 1999c, pp. 49-51, paras. 112-122). although the ceh did not refer to acts that violate article 2(d and e) in the conclusion of its report—for reasons that are unclear—other segments dealt with acts that can be linked to article 2(e). for example, it reported the forced transfer of children in its analysis of violations committed in the area it identified as region ii (maya achi; comisión para el esclarecimiento histórico, 1999b). however, in a second argument, the guatemalan truth commission went beyond the ungc. the ceh wrote that acts not listed in the ungc, but which were part of the same plan, are relevant because they reinforce evidence of the intent to destroy (comisión para el esclarecimiento histórico, 1999b). the ceh included the destruction of goods and crops, forced displacement, and the destruction of cultural elements. it reported attacks against the identity of the maya and the destruction of sacred mayan sites that obliged them to stop their traditional rituals. it pointed out the persecution of mayan priests as part of the destruction of culture and identity. it also considered the killing of a priest as an attempt to destroy the material and physical aspect of the mayan culture (comisión para el esclarecimiento histórico, 1999c). in stressing the destruction of cultural elements of indigenous peoples in its 1999 report, even if it did not say that that destruction amounted to cultural genocide, the ceh was not far from the conclusions drawn many years later by the trc. thus, the work of both commissions shows that the context of the state where the commission occurs influences its findings on genocide. this difference of approach is also based on a dual understanding of genocide, a crime that is both a phenomenon perceived differently by different societies and a notion strictly defined by the ungc. these differences aid in unpacking the dynamic behind identifying genocide or cultural genocide. moreover, the fact that both commissions insisted on elements not included in the ungc shows their participation in a movement towards an evolution of international law in the area of genocide. a new consideration of genocide on the basis of the reports of the two truth commissions the inclusion of culture in international law, the destruction of cultural elements in cases of genocide are only admitted as evidence of the intent to destroy a protected group when such acts have been committed alongside the physical or biological destruction of the protected group (schabas, 2009). the case of guatemala fulfilled that requirement, since the destruction of cultural elements of the mayan indigenous peoples went alongside the physical destruction of the members of the groups. the guatemalan truth commission provided substantial detail about the destruction of mayan culture and the killing of mayan individuals (comisión para el esclarecimiento histórico, 1999b). the canadian case was different, because the mandate of the trc was restricted. the trc analyzed the destruction of the culture of aboriginal peoples of canada in the context of residential schools. it did not examine the question of an intent to physically or biologically destroy aboriginal peoples of canada. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.6 however, both commissions shared a common interest in revealing the truth about the destruction of culture in situations of genocide. they also shared the will to place culture, an element not recognized in the ungc, at the heart of the crime of genocide, following a trend that seeks to include culture in international case law and doctrine around genocide. by doing so, they gave weight to culture, an element that was already relevant in raphael lemkin’s (1944) work on genocide (see also woolford, 2015). in this regard, the late international criminal law scholar and judge antonio cassese proposed the deletion of “racial groups” from the definition of genocide in the ungc and the inclusion of “cultural groups.” according to cassese (2009): it would be necessary to delete the old-fashioned and scientifically wrong reference to “race” as the connotation of one of the targeted groups and add instead a reference to “cultural groups.” it should be specified that those attacks on such groups should be banned which are carried out with the intent of destroying the cultural traditions of a group. this ban would aim at protecting the fundamental hallmarks that characterize the habits, rituals, traditions, artistic manifestations etc. of a group, in particular of aboriginal groups of latin america, africa, canada, and australia. (p. 541) similarly, the international criminal tribunal for the former yugoslavia (icty) relied on the destruction of elements of culture in order to prove the intent to destroy a national group before reaching the conclusion that a genocide was committed. it wrote: the trial chamber is aware that it must interpret the convention with due regard for the principle of nullum crimen sine lege [no crime without a law]. it therefore recognises that, despite recent developments, customary international law limits the definition of genocide to those acts seeking the physical or biological destruction of all or part of the group. hence, an enterprise attacking only the cultural or sociological characteristics of a human group in order to annihilate these elements which give to that group its own identity distinct from the rest of the community would not fall under the definition of genocide. the trial chamber however points out that where there is physical or biological destruction there are often simultaneous attacks on the cultural and religious property and symbols of the targeted group as well, attacks which may legitimately be considered as evidence of an intent to physically destroy the group. in this case, the trial chamber will thus take into account as evidence of intent to destroy the group the deliberate destruction of mosques and houses belonging to members of the group. (prosecutor v. radislav krstić, 2001, para. 580) many scholars have called for the recognition or acknowledgement of cultural genocide in international law (see for example novic, 2016). the two truth commissions’ insistence on including culture in their accounts of genocide supports the argument for such an evolution. the relevance of reparations the canadian and guatemalan truth commissions also dedicated segments of their reports to the reparation of the harm caused by cultural genocide and genocide against indigenous peoples (comisión para el esclarecimiento histórico, 1999c; truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015a). in doing so, they considered an important element not included in the ungc. indeed, the ungc does not contain any provisions on reparations. just as in the case of culture or cultural genocide, the states 13 guematcha: genocide against indigenous peoples in canada and guatemala published by scholarship@western, 2019 involved rejected the idea of integrating a provision on reparations for victims. the draft convention initially contained an article 8, which stated: when genocide is committed in a country by the government in power or by sections of the population, and if the government fails to resist it successfully, the state shall grant to the survivors of the human group that is a victim of genocide redress of a nature and in an amount to be determined by the united nations. (united nations secretary general, 1947, p. 47) the provision was rejected because, among other reasons, some states held that reparations must be set through judicial proceedings (schabas, 2009). the absence of a reparation provision in the convention has led some scholars to call for the revision of the ungc to include reparations (cassese, 2009). in their reports, both the canadian and guatemalan truth commissions stressed the need for symbolic, individual, and collective reparations. in canada, the trc’s calls to action, which sought “to redress the legacy of residential schools and advance the process of canadian reconciliation” (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015a, p. 1), pointed out measures that the canadian authorities need to implement in the area of reparation. most of the recommended measures amounted to collective and/or symbolic reparations. financial and individual reparations were already a part of the agreement that created the commission, which stipulated that financial compensation would be allowed to victims (indian residential schools settlement agreement. (2006b). several of the trc’s recommendations can be categorized as satisfaction, a form of reparation recognized in international law that includes, among other things, apologies, commemoration, and the search of truth (basic principles and guidelines on the right to a remedy and reparations, 2005). among the reparations proposed were, for example, various educational measures to be taken in favor of aboriginal peoples; measures pertaining to memorialization, notably in archives and museums; and an apology from the pope, to follow the apology made by the prime minister of canada on june 11, 2008 (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015a). rehabilitation, which includes “medical and psychological care as well as legal and social services” (basic principles and guidelines on the right to a remedy and reparations, 2005, para. 21), was also an important element in the trc’s calls to action. the document called for health and legal measures to be implemented in order to improve the living conditions of aboriginal peoples in canada. in guatemala, the ceh’s recommendations included many reparatory measures. but unlike in canada, the guatemalan truth commission dealt with victims of an armed conflict. for that reason, the ceh’s recommendations are not specifically dedicated to indigenous peoples. the guatemalan truth commission prescribed the creation of a national reparations program that included restitution, financial compensation, rehabilitation, and satisfaction for all victims (comisión para el esclarecimiento histórico, 1999c). mayan victims were entitled to the proposed global reparations program. however, the ceh also took into account the particularity of the victimization of indigenous peoples as a collective group. it recommended the active participation of indigenous peoples of guatemala in the “definition, execution and evaluation” of the reparations program (comisión para el esclarecimiento histórico, 1999c, p. 63). in the same vein, as in canada, some reparatory measures amounting to satisfaction were set for indigenous peoples as a collective group. the ceh insisted on memorialization, recommending: 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.6 that the commemorations and ceremonies for the victims of the armed confrontation take into consideration the multicultural nature of the guatemalan nation, to which end the government and local authorities should promote and authorize the raising of monuments and the creation of communal cemeteries in accordance with the forms of mayan collective memory. (commission for historical clarification, 1999, p. 49, para. 5; for the original version in spanish, see comisión para el esclarecimiento histórico, 1999c, p. 62, para. 5) the commission also recommended “[t]hat the sacred mayan sites violated during the armed confrontation [be] reclaimed and their importance highlighted in accordance with the wishes of the communities affected” (commission for historical clarification, 1999, p. 49, para. 6; for the original version in spanish, see comisión para el esclarecimiento histórico, 1999c, p. 62, para. 6). the work of the canadian and guatemalan truth commissions on genocide against indigenous peoples demonstrate that reparation is an important element to consider in a state after findings of genocide. the need for reconciliation reconciliation is at the heart of the activities of many truth commissions, including those conducted in canada and guatemala. after compiling information about the genocidal abuses committed against indigenous peoples, the canadian and guatemalan truth commissions insisted on the need for reconciliation. yet while the crime of genocide is always a dramatic sign of a deep social split and the disruption of a state’s social fabric, states did not consider reconciliation in the ungc. one could respond that reconciliation is hard to define, that it has a certain degree of abstraction that law cannot easily capture, and that it is characterized by continuous individual and social effort. but still, without reconciliation, a society that has faced large-scale crimes and abuses cannot effectively recover from the past. contrary to the lack of recognition in international law of the importance of reconciliation after a genocide or cultural genocide, reconciliation between indigenous peoples and non-indigenous peoples was at the heart of the work of the canadian and guatemalan truth commissions. in canada, where the commission had the word “reconciliation” in its name, this was a core issue. the trc pointed out in many parts of its report the need for reconciliation in canada between aboriginal and non-aboriginal peoples (truth and reconciliation commission of canada, 2015d). the guatemalan parliament adopted a national reconciliation law in 1996, before the truth commission released its report (decreto del congreso n°145-96, 1996). even if the matter of reconciliation between indigenous and non-indigenous peoples was not part of its mandate, the truth commission insisted on it in its recommendations. the ceh’s report rooted the guatemalan armed confrontation in, among other things, the “racism, inequality and exclusion” that it said characterized the relationship between the guatemalan state and indigenous mayan peoples (commission for historical clarification, 1999, p. 55; for the original in spanish, see comisión para el esclarecimiento histórico, 1999c, p. 68). it called for the achievement of “national harmony and reconciliation” by the means of “cultural change…through an active policy of education and peace” (commission for historical clarification, 1999, p. 55; for the original in spanish, see comisión para el esclarecimiento histórico, 1999c, p. 68). fundamentally, examining these commissions and how they examined genocide points to gaps in the ungc. the reports of the canadian and guatemalan truth commissions insist on elements such as 15 guematcha: genocide against indigenous peoples in canada and guatemala published by scholarship@western, 2019 culture, reparations, and reconciliation, which are important and could be included in the ungc in the future. however, it is not certain that such a reform, in the light of the two truth commissions’ examinations of genocide against indigenous peoples, could realistically take place today. states, especially those with indigenous peoples in their populations, would surely be reluctant to embrace a such a reform of the ungc that uses the terminology of genocide to describe abuses committed against indigenous peoples. even beyond these states, it is not certain that there would be consensus within the states parties of the ungc for a reform. in light of this, a potential strategy could be the adoption of specific legislation on genocide at the national level, which, among other things, could involve the inclusion of indigenous peoples as a victim group and policies around culture, reparation, and reconciliation. in conclusion, the canadian and guatemalan truth commissions contributed to the recognition of genocide against indigenous peoples in several ways. they reached different conclusions because of their different understandings of genocide and the contexts in which they operated. however, both commissions provide a perspective on elements of genocide that remain to be considered in international law. in the area of genocide, international law is still mainly based on the ungc. today, it is difficult to imagine that states will revise the ungc to include new elements. however, the work of the trc in canada and the ceh in guatemala shows that the scope of the ungc is too restrictive, and there is room for changes. references agreement on the establishment of the commission to clarify past human rights violations and acts of violence that have caused the guatemalan population to suffer, the government of the republic of guatemala–the unidad revolucionaria nacional guatemalteca general command, june 23, 1994, a/48/954, s/1994/751. retrieved from https://peacemaker.un.org/sites/peacemaker.un.org/files/gt_940623_establishmentcommi ssionclarifypasthumanrightsviolations.pdf agreement on a firm and lasting peace, feb. 7, 1996, a/51/796, s/1994/114. retrieved from https://peacemaker.un.org/sites/peacemaker.un.org/files/gt_961229_agreementonfirma ndlastingpeace.pdf akhavan, p. 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(2011, may 25). forum should consider what role it can play in support of indigenous communities trying to resolve land, rights conflicts, says chair, opening day-long debate [press release, hr/5062]. retrieved from https://www.un.org/press/en/2011/hr5062.doc.htm united nations secretary general. (1947, june 26). draft convention on the crime of genocide (e/447). retrieved from https://digitallibrary.un.org/record/611058 united nations secretary general. (2004). the rule of law and transitional justice in conflict and postconflict societies (s/2004/616). retrieved from https://www.un.org/ruleoflaw/blog/document/the-rule-of-law-and-transitional-justice-inconflict-and-post-conflict-societies-report-of-the-secretary-general/ 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 2 [2019], art. 6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.2.6 woolford, a. (2015). this benevolent experiment: indigenous boarding schools, genocide, and redress in canada and the united states. lincoln, nb: university of nebraska press. 23 guematcha: genocide against indigenous peoples in canada and guatemala published by scholarship@western, 2019 the international indigenous policy journal april 2019 genocide against indigenous peoples: the experiences of the truth commissions of canada and guatemala emmanuel guematcha recommended citation genocide against indigenous peoples: the experiences of the truth commissions of canada and guatemala abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license genocide against indigenous peoples: the experiences of the truth commissions of canada and guatemala partnerships between aboriginal organizations and academics the international indigenous policy journal volume 6 issue 2 the future of traditional knowledge research: building partnership and capacity article 9 may 2015 partnerships between aboriginal organizations and academics clément chartier métis national council, clemc@metisnation.ca recommended citation chartier, c. (2015). partnerships between aboriginal organizations and academics. the international indigenous policy journal, 6(2). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.9 partnerships between aboriginal organizations and academics abstract the article addresses the importance of the partnership between university professors and the métis community. the métis are a distinct nation and people that emerged in the northwest of what is now canada and a bit into the united states through a process of ethnogenesis. the métis nation expressed its nationhood and defended its territory militarily in 1870 and again in 1885. subsequently, canada dealt with the métis as individuals by implementing a scrip system, which displaced the métis from their lands. in the 1980s and 1990s, the métis nation, along with other aboriginal peoples, engaged in a constitutional process that witnessed limited success. following that process, in 1993, the métis moved their fight to the courts as many of their citizens were being charged with hunting and fishing infractions. this process necessitated the need for historical research and expert testimony, so the already emerging relationships with academia became more pronounced with progressive professors engaging in preparing expert reports and testifying at trial. outside of the courts, research alliances were also engaged in. the outlook for the métis nation is more and more positive. the partnerships with academia has been a key contributor to this movement forward. keywords métis rights research, partnerships, aboriginal rights creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/   p a r t n e r s h i p s b e t w e e n a b o r i g i n a l o r g a n i z a t i o n s a n d a c a d e m i c s with the recognition and affirmation of aboriginal and treaty rights in the constitution act 1982 (constitution act, 1982), there has been a heightened awareness of the rights of indigenous peoples within canada. this has not only occurred in the political and judicial systems, but also within the academic community. while appreciation of the rights of aboriginal peoples no doubt existed and was supported by many in academia prior to 1982, their elevation to constitutional status has provided a firmer basis upon which to address them. this is also true with respect to the aboriginal communities themselves. armed with this new acknowledgement of their rights, coupled with the constitutional conferences between 1983 and 1987, along with the charlottetown accord in 1992 (see gall, 2014), aboriginal leaders and communities have taken stronger and further steps to conduct research that strengthens their legal positions and bargaining power. with the failures of the constitutional conferences in the 1980s and in 1992, many aboriginal communities turned to the courts for a resolution on their respective rights: some forced to do so through hunting and fishing charges by the state, and others through self-initiated statements of claim seeking court pronouncements on their rights. regardless of how they ended up in the courts, aboriginal litigants increasingly turned to academia in search of expert witnesses who would be able to provide objective and credible evidence in search of the truth. in other cases, while litigation was not a motivating factor, many aboriginal communities turned to academia to assist in historical research, as well as to modern day land use studies in order to assist their communities in asserting their customary practices over traditional territories—often in cases where the duty to consult and accommodate were triggered by industry moving into their traditional territories. the cornerstone for this interaction is reflected in the partnerships that have emerged between aboriginal communities and academia and, for the purposes of this article, the partnerships between the métis nation and academia. this article introduces some key aspects of my involvement in this partnership effort as the president of the métis national council (mnc). in so doing, i want to shed light on the roles indigenous leadership may play in establishing mutually beneficial partnerships between aboriginal communities and academics. u n d e r s t a n d i n g t h e m é t i s n a t i o n a n d i t s c h a l l e n g e s in order for the reader to better understand the significance of the newly emerged and/or emerging partnerships between the métis nation and academia, an understanding of the métis nation itself is both important and necessary. t h e d e f i n i t i o n o f t h e m é t i s a n d m é t i s h o m e l a n d the following definition was adopted by the métis national council general assembly in september 2002 (métis national council, 2015): 1. “‘métis’ means a person who self-identifies as métis, is distinct from other aboriginal peoples, is of historic métis nation ancestry, and is accepted by the métis nation” (para. 7). 1 chartier: aboriginal-academic partnerships published by scholarship@western, 2015   2. "historic métis nation" means the aboriginal people then known as métis or half-breeds who resided in the historic métis nation homeland. 3. "historic métis nation homeland" means the area of land in west central north america used and occupied as the traditional territory of the métis or half-breeds as they were then known. 4. "métis nation" means the aboriginal people descended from the historic métis nation, which is now comprised of all métis nation citizens and is one of the ”aboriginal peoples of canada” within the meaning of s.35 of the constitution act 1982. 5. “distinct from other aboriginal peoples” means distinct for cultural and nationhood purposes. although we are still undertaking extensive research to determine more precisely our historic and traditional homeland boundary for present purposes, we have been using a general description, subject to refinement, based on that research. at our march 2013 general assembly, we asserted our traditional territory. it includes the three prairie provinces (manitoba, saskatchewan, and alberta) and extends into a contiguous part of british columbia, ontario, and the northwest territories as well as into an adjacent portion of the united states of america. at the general assembly, on march 24, 2013, the métis national council re-affirmed “that there is only one métis nation” and “that the geographic homeland of the métis nation is the historic northwest which entered into confederation in 1870 through the negotiations of the métis provisional government led by president louis riel” and that the term “west central north america” in the 2002 definition of métis means the “historic northwest”(métis national council, 2013, para. 31). d i f f e r e n t t r e a t m e n t b y c a n a d a : t r e a t y v e r s u s s c r i p under s.31 of the manitoba act (1870), the negotiations leading to the formation of the province of manitoba under a provisional government headed by louis riel included a commitment to set aside 1.4 million acres of land for the métis in exchange for the extinguishment of their indian title (manitoba act, 1870). ultimately, the métis were not successful in acquiring this land and it became the subject of litigation, culminating in a decision by the supreme court of canada in manitoba métis federation v. canada and manitoba (2013), which held that the honour of the crown was not met in fulfilling its obligations under s.31. the manitoba métis federation is currently in dialogue with the federal government—seeking a just implementation of the court’s decision. in short, with its subsequent actions, the federal government began a process of dealing with the citizens of the métis nation as individuals, while at the same time dealing with the indian nations through treaty as collectivities. in 1879, the dominion lands act (1879) was amended to provide for the distribution of scrip to the citizens of the métis nation living outside of the original postage stamp province of manitoba. the process for distributing scrip under this amendment did not begin until after an 1885 armed struggle in the saskatchewan river valley near present day duck lake/batoche, saskatchewan. scrip was a process used prior to this time in the united states and eastern canada, and was generally valued at 240 acres (land scrip) or $240 (money scrip) good for the purchase of open or surveyed dominion land. a number of scrip commissions traveled throughout western canada 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.9   (manitoba, saskatchewan, alberta, and the northwest territories). later ones (1899, treaty 8 and 1906, treaty 10) served as both the treaty commission and scrip commission. p o l i t i c a l o r g a n i z i n g since 1885, after the creation of other territories and provinces beginning in 1870 (e.g., the province of british columbia and the northwest territories that included present-day alberta and saskatchewan) and the expansion of manitoba and ontario, “outsider boundaries” were imposed on our people, who nevertheless have retained their sense of nationhood and identity. at the same time, our people have organized politically and administratively within those provincial boundaries, especially since the 1930s. métis organizations admitted non-status indians into their membership; both groups faced similar social and economic problems: lack of housing, educational opportunities, employment, medical care, and so forth. the métis, as seen above, were stripped of their rights by the infamous scrip system and the non-status indians through loss of registration under the indian act (indian act, 1985). in the early 1970s, the métis of the prairie provinces formed the native council of canada (the presentday congress of aboriginal peoples), which by the late 1970s covered all of canada and included many non-status and status indians in its membership through organizations and members from outside the métis nation homeland. with patriation of the constitution in 1982, the negotiations leading up to and after patriation, and especially with the march 1983 first ministers conference (fmc) on aboriginal issues, the leadership of the métis nation realized that the métis nation’s aspirations, recognition, accommodation, and rights could only be pursued through a métis nation-specific representative body to create a métis voice for métis people. in early march 1983, the métis national council was established and, through a successful out-of-court settlement, it forced the federal government to invite the métis nation to the constitutional talks (métis national council, 2015). this included an agreement to add métis self-government and a land-base to the agenda. in the process leading up the march 1983 fmc, the native council of canada (ncc), the inuit committee on national issues (icni), and the assembly of first nations (afn, which is the aboriginal title group) had successfully, at the last ministerial–aboriginal leaders meeting, removed any reference to the métis from the fmc agenda. this exclusion from the agenda resulted after it became clear to the above named parties that the métis nation was approaching the fmc on the basis of the right of self-determination and the right to a landbase as universal rights, and not based on the narrower legal concept of aboriginal or indian title. the mnc leadership had consciously decided that it would engage in political negotiations based on the right of self-determination and, if necessary in the future, it could fall back on the narrower s.35(1) aboriginal rights provision. with the limited success of the 1983 fmc, and the failures of the fmcs of 1984, 1985, and 1987, the métis nation continued its pursuit of rights through the political process. with the full engagement of aboriginal peoples in the 1992 charlottetown round, the métis nation decided to pursue its political agenda through its own métis nation-specific process. while fully engaging in the multilateral process and with of the working groups, the métis nation was able to convince the right honourable joe clark (representing the federal government) and the provincial governments of ontario to british columbia and the northwest territories to engage in parallel negotiations with the métis national council. 3 chartier: aboriginal-academic partnerships published by scholarship@western, 2015   the charlottetown accord of 1992 also had a companion document in the same year, known as the métis nation accord (1992). while it was a hard fought battle, with several indian leaders attending one of our sessions and speaking out against an amendment that would include all aboriginal peoples within s.91(24) of the constitution act (1867) regarding indians and the lands reserved for the indians, the accord was successfully negotiated by the métis national council. the inuit suggested that the amendment should not be métis-specific as they wanted to be included as well, even though, in the reference case re eskimos (1939), the supreme court of canada had already ruled that they were included under s.91(24). in order to achieve consensus, the federal government insisted that the provinces agree that they would not reduce services to the métis and that they would make lands available to the métis under the agreed upon land process (except for alberta, which had already provided land to the métis). in exchange, the provinces received a commitment that the federal government would not reduce services to the indians. in the end, the métis nation ensured that no one’s rights or services would be affected. although a slight majority of canadians voted against the charlottetown accord, thus ending both it and the métis nation accord, the process was a good experience for the métis nation, particularly with respect to the métis nation-specific process with the relevant provincial and territorial governments and the federal government. this has been a process engaged in by the métis nation since then, and it was particularly effective in the years leading up to the 2005 kelowna first ministers meeting (fmm). this type of process was also adopted during that time by the inuit tapiriit kanatami (itk). in may 2005, we (the mnc, itk, and afn) each respectively signed bilateral agreements with the federal government—in our case, the métis nation framework agreement (2005). this was a process document, which would have addressed métis nation-specific agenda items, including the resolution of outstanding legal issues. with the election of a conservative federal government in 2006, the kelowna accord and the métis nation framework agreement went “by the wayside.” however, continuing on the road of a distinctions-based approach, in 2008, the métis national council and the federal government concluded a métis nation protocol (2008). this protocol paved the way for an engagement by the parties with the five westernmost provinces, from ontario to bc, in a métis economic development symposium (meds) process. the objective of the meds process is to formulate a national métis economic development strategy. the métis nation protocol (2013) was extended for another five years on april 29, 2013 with a formalized process of meetings at the political and official levels. also signed on that day was a governance and financial accountability accord (2013) under the protocol, which is to lead to federal block funding to the mnc, as well as a commitment by the mnc to post its financial documents on its website. f a i l u r e o f t h e p o l i t i c a l p r o c e s s with the demise of the charlottetown accord in the fall of 1992, and with the provincial governments laying more wildlife and fisheries charges against our people, the métis nation leadership decided that it was time to move forward based on the inherent right of self-government and other rights guaranteed in s.35(1) of the constitution act (1982). with the failure of the political process, it seemed opportune to 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.9   fall back on the legal protections afforded by s.35, even though they were viewed as limited and limiting rights. charges against métis harvesting (primarily hunting and fishing) throughout the métis nation homeland produced a concerted and strenuous defense from 1990s to the present time. as part of the decision to defend our citizens in the courts, we also felt that it was necessary to test the legitimacy of the scrip system. in response to the federal government’s conclusion that our aboriginal rights and title were extinguished by s.31 of the manitoba act (1870) and by the scrip system under the dominion lands act (1879), in 1981, the manitoba métis federation had initiated an action on section 31. in 1994, a statement of claim was filed in court of queens bench in saskatoon, saskatchewan by the métis of northwest saskatchewan, the métis nation of saskatchewan, and the métis national council, which claimed existing aboriginal title to the lands and resources in the northwest quarter of the province of saskatchewan, to aboriginal harvesting rights and for the inherent right of self-government. the case has not yet made it to trial. to date, the supreme court of canada has only dealt with two métis hunting cases: r. v. powley (2003) and r. v. blais (2003). the supreme court, in finding a s.35(1) aboriginal hunting right in sault ste. marie and environs, set out a 10 point test to guide future s.35(1) aboriginal harvesting litigation (r. v. powley, 2003). in r. v. blais (2003), the court held that mr. blais, as a métis in manitoba, did not fall within the term “indian” in paragraph 13 of the natural resources transfer agreement of 1930 (constitution act, 1930) between the federal government and the province of manitoba. in so doing, the court made it clear that this did not affect the question as to whether the métis fell under the term “indians” in s.91(24) of the constitution act, 1867, whereby the federal government has jurisdiction for “indians and the lands reserved for the indians” (constitution act, 1867, s.91(24)). while the métis nation had, and continues to have, reservations about using the courts to determine or define métis rights and, more importantly, who the métis are, the powley decision on the whole was positive and helpful to the métis nation. like any case, it leaves many issues unresolved but has been instructive as to how we can potentially craft future cases to meet our rights and existence as a people. the métis nation is particularly pleased with how the supreme court dealt with the existence of the métis as a distinct people—as a people who emerged post-contact but pre-effective control. this is a fact that cannot be disputed. it is historically correct and irrefutable. it is also true that the métis, as a distinct people from our indian ancestors, while having many similar cultural practices and attributes, possess our own culture, heritage, practices, and language. our rights are “inherent” to our existence. they are not dependent on or “inherited” from our indian ancestors, except for the fact that the origins giving rise to our aboriginality comes from them. however, through a process of ethnogenesis, we are now “us.” while it is also true that many of the citizens of the cree, ojibway, and dene peoples are now of mixed ancestry (as are other indian peoples), what makes them who they are, and makes us who we are, is not the mixed ancestry per se, but our respective cultures, persevering identities, and sense of belonging. while we were also very apprehensive as to how the supreme court of canada would deal with “who are the métis,” in the métis national council and métis nation of ontario interveners’ brief of law, we cautioned against the courts defining our people or any people, asserting that it is only the people themselves who can define or determine their citizenship. we were pleased that the criteria used by the 5 chartier: aboriginal-academic partnerships published by scholarship@western, 2015   court mirrored what we put forward as our definition. this of course remains an open question, and the courts may one day take it upon themselves to put forward a definition, which the métis nation may or may not accept as defining its citizens. with respect to aboriginal title, we are left pondering: what will be the test for establishing our métis aboriginal title? based on the reasoning by the supreme court in powley for the establishment of aboriginal harvesting rights (r. v. powley, 2003), it cannot be other than the same reasoning that was applied in the case of aboriginal title to the lands and resources. as these rights inhere in a people (aboriginal), they cannot inhere until the people themselves come into existence. where this has happened pre-sovereignty, this will accord with the test laid down in delgamuukw v. b.c. (1997) and tsilhqot’in nation v. b.c. (2014) for indian peoples. it will only become an issue if the date of sovereignty is established to be earlier than the emergence of the métis, in which case the existing date of the sovereignty test for establishing aboriginal title to the land and resources may have to be readdressed for the métis nation, and perhaps modified, as in the case of r. v. powley (2003). t h e m é t i s n a t i o n a n d a c a d e m i a while some universities and individual academics have produced various studies, reports, and theses prior to 1982, the work was often undertaken in the absence of partnerships or collaboration with aboriginal communities, including the métis. although much of this work was positive and respectfully done, in some instances, the studies were viewed in a negative light by the aboriginal peoples who were the subjects of such initiatives. some of the earlier work also proved to be of benefit in the courts when individual métis charged with a hunting or fishing without a license were able to establish their s.35(1) aboriginal harvesting rights based upon such work. this is especially so with respect to the early to mid-1900s research reports by universities. in the mid to late 1970s, academia also began to play a positive role in newly funded research programs made available to aboriginal peoples based on land claims and aboriginal rights-funded processes established by the federal government following the landmark calder v. a.g. decision rendered in 1973 by the supreme court of canada (calder v. a.g. (b.c.), 1973). while the above developments were taking place so too did the evolution of various research ethics policies of universities. institutions such as the social sciences and humanities research council (sshrc), which provided funding to the academic community for varied research projects, also funded projects that involved aboriginal peoples. i n t e r a c t i o n b e t w e e n t h e m é t i s n a t i o n a n d a c a d e m i a in addition to the constitutional conference processes following the patriation of the constitution in 1982, the work of the royal commission on aboriginal peoples (rcap) in 1996 (canada, 1996), provided a vehicle wherein further research connected to the métis nation could be undertaken. this triggered a new era of engagement with academia, with whom the métis national council collaborated on research in preparation for submissions to rcap. professors from various universities, including the university of saskatchewan and the university of manitoba, were engaged in this process. this provided 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.9   the springboard for a greater relationship with the university of saskatchewan and the university of alberta, leading to actual partnerships between those two universities and the métis. in 1999, with financial contributions from the federal and saskatchewan provincial governments, the métis nation of saskatchewan, where i served as president from february 1998 to january 2004, entered into a contractual arrangement with the university of alberta to conduct research with respect to the statement of claim filed in 1994. this work was led by professor frank tough who was the principal researcher and also a prospective expert witness in the case. the project was entitled métis aboriginal title research initiative x (matrix), since almost all the 1906 scrip recipients in northwest saskatchewan signed their scrip applications with an “x” because they could not write their names. following this time, the métis of northwest saskatchewan, through the north west saskatchewan métis council (nwsmc), entered into a partnership with the university of alberta and the university of saskatchewan and were successful in securing a community–university research alliance (cura) grant from sshrc. the six-year project was directed by a committee composed of the three partners, with an executive committee composed of one representative from each of the three partners. the nwsmc was also able to receive a grant from the aboriginal healing foundation (ahf), which was used for that component of the partnership cura project dealing with traditional resource use mapping and community interviews. all of this work was premised on community ownership, with use and access by the university partners guided by the research ethics policies of the universities. this initiative has resulted in numerous traditional resource-use maps being digitized through the university of saskatchewan partner, and will also see the production of an atlas of the métis of northwest saskatchewan. another partnership project involved the university of alberta, the manitoba métis federation, the métis nation of saskatchewan and the métis nation of alberta. this venture witnessed a successful application for a standard grant under sshrc, which provided a grant over a three-year period that was matched by the above three named organizations. the result was the retrieval and data-basing of hundreds of scrip documents issued under the dominion lands act 1879. in 2004, after the powley decision, the federal government provided research and registry funding to the mnc and its governing members: métis nation of ontario, manitoba metis federation, métis nation of saskatchewan, métis nation of alberta, and métis nation british columbia. based on the ruling in the powley case (r. v. powley, 2003), the federal government provided this funding to enable the métis nation and its institutions to identify citizens deemed to possess these rights as well as a registry of such rights holders. in order to accomplish this task, it was also necessary to identify historic métis communities to which the respective citizens could trace their métis ancestry. the process of identification accorded with both the criteria set out in the powley decision as well as the national definition adopted by the métis nation itself. based on this research and rigorous application of the mnc definition, the governing member registries of métis nation citizens are objectively verifiable and will withstand the scrutiny of governments and the courts. through the above-mentioned financing, some of which is still ongoing, the mnc was able to retain academics from various universities, including the university of ottawa and the university of british columbia, which undertook the work assigned by a research team of which they formed a part, as well as 7 chartier: aboriginal-academic partnerships published by scholarship@western, 2015   the métis rights panel established by the mnc in 1997. the body of work produced further research and data-basing of scrip related documents, census records, voyageur contracts, and the economic history of the métis nation. the majority of this work has been carried out at the university of alberta through the métis archival project (map) lab. another example of a partnership involves the métis nation of alberta and the university of alberta, which last year created the rupertsland centre for métis research, jointly funded by the partners. the centre is housed in the faculty of native studies and will engage in research exploring métis rights, land use, history, and contemporary issues affecting métis education and health. the centre has a strong basis from which to move forward as it has the benefit of the years of work of the métis archive project lab through the on-going relationship with the métis national council. the centre and mna’s education and training arm, the rupertsland institute, will also serve as a think tank to guide and address métis research and explore policies that have an impact on the métis nation. s i g n i f i c a n c e o f t h e p a r t n e r s h i p s for many years, the métis nation was marginalized within the overall relationship between the federal government and aboriginal peoples. while some of this persists to the present, radical changes have taken place, especially with the inclusion of s.35 in the constitution act 1982, including s.35(2), which clearly identifies the métis as one of the three aboriginal peoples in canada (constitution act, 1982)— a significant departure from past federal government practice. in the continuing struggle for the recognition of land and self-government rights, as well as for the provision of services, the research taking place through the partnerships between the métis people and academia has provided the métis leadership with a firmer base from which to launch their assertions of those rights. building on the powley decision, the research, undertaken by credible academics, cannot be discounted by the federal bureaucracy. this is one of the ways that the métis community has benefitted from the relationship. as the research is conducted by objective and highly educated academics who are experts in their respective fields, it provides a greater credibility in the eyes of the government and general population than if the research was conducted solely by the métis community. the research has also been of significant value as some of it has formed the basis of expert reports and oral testimony in several hunting and fishing rights cases, made possible in part by a litigation fund available through funding to the métis national council from the federal government between 1999 and 2006. c o n c l u s i o n while research partnerships between first nations peoples and academics are relatively new, the partnerships and research relationships between the métis nation and academia has already proven to be of significant value to the métis and, i would hope, to the canadian public as well. the métis have struggled for many generations to have their real story heard, and their rights recognized and accommodated. it has been my contention that through sound and credible research and 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.9   dissemination of reports, books, and other media, this story should be told. partnerships with academics have proved to be beneficial, leading to various improvements in the formulation and clarification of métis policies and rights (as, for example, in the powley decision). while much of the research-based story telling has already been accomplished, there is still a great deal more to be done. it is through strategic partnerships between the métis nation and academia that progress has been made, and i hope that further progress will be made by the métis leadership in the future. the continuation of these partnerships bodes well for the métis nation’s quest for justice and rights, based on the education of the general public, the sensitizing of government bureaucracies, and future successes in the courts. 9 chartier: aboriginal-academic partnerships published by scholarship@western, 2015   r e f e r e n c e s calder v. a.g. (b.c.), 1973, s.c.r. 313. canada. (1996). report of the royal commission on aboriginal peoples. ottawa: minister of approvisionnements et services of canada. constitution act, 1867, (u.k.), 30 + 31 vict., c. 3. constitution act, 1930, r.s.c. 1985, app. ii, no. 26 (20 + 21 geo v, c. 26 [u.k.]). constitution act, 1982, r.s.c. 1985, app. ii, no. 44, being sched. b to the canada act. delgamuukw v. b.c., 1997, 1 cnlr 14 (s.c.c.). dominion lands act, s.c. 1879, c.31, s.125(e). gall, g. (2014). the charlottetown accord, 1992. in the canadian encyclopedia. retrieved from http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/the-charlottetown-accord/ governance and financial accountability accord. (2013). retrieved from http://www.aadncaandc.gc.ca/eng/1367255035279/1367263630298 indian act, r.s.c. 1985, c. i-5. manitoba act, 1870, r.s.c. 1985, app. ii, no. 8. métis nation accord. (1992). native studies review, 8(2), 134-140. retrieved from http://iportal.usask.ca/docs/native_studies_review/v8/issue2/pp134-140.pdf métis nation framework agreement. (2005, may 31). retrieved from http://www.albertametis.ca/getdoc/f815451c-2749-4247-9ec11543942dfe2a/mnframework-agreement.aspx métis nation protocol. (2008). retrieved from http://www.metisnation.ca/wpcontent/uploads/2011/02/metis-nation-protocol-signed.pdf métis nation protocol. (2013). retrieved from http://www.aadncaandc.gc.ca/eng/1367254952723/1367264603176 métis national council. (2013). mnc marks 30th anniversary in fiery display of métis nationalism. retrieved from http://www.metisnation.ca/index.php/news/mnc-marks-30th-anniversary-infiery-display-of-metis-nationalism métis national council. (2015). citizenship. retrieved from www.metisnation.ca/ manitoba métis federation v. canada and manitoba, (ag) 2013, scc14. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 9 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/9 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.9   r. v. blais, 2003 s.c.c. 44 (s.c.c.). r. v. powley, 2003 s.c.c.43 (s.c.c.). re eskimos, 1939, s.c.r. 104. tsilhqot’in nation v. british columbia, 2014, s.c.c. 44.   11 chartier: aboriginal-academic partnerships published by scholarship@western, 2015 the international indigenous policy journal may 2015 partnerships between aboriginal organizations and academics clément chartier recommended citation partnerships between aboriginal organizations and academics abstract keywords creative commons license partnerships between aboriginal organizations and academics traditional knowledge and social science on trial: battles over evidence in indigenous rights litigation in canada and australia the international indigenous policy journal volume 6 issue 2 the future of traditional knowledge research: building partnership and capacity article 5 may 2015 traditional knowledge and social science on trial: battles over evidence in indigenous rights litigation in canada and australia arthur j. ray university of british columbia, skipray41@gmail.com recommended citation ray, a. j. (2015). traditional knowledge and social science on trial: battles over evidence in indigenous rights litigation in canada and australia. the international indigenous policy journal, 6(2). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.5 traditional knowledge and social science on trial: battles over evidence in indigenous rights litigation in canada and australia abstract traditional knowledge and oral traditions history are crucial lines of evidence in aboriginal claims litigation and alternative forms of resolution, most notably claims commissions. this article explores the ways in which these lines of evidence pose numerous challenges in terms of how and where they can be presented, who is qualified to present it, questions about whether this evidence can stand on its own, and the problems of developing appropriate measures to protect it from inappropriate use by outsiders while not unduly restricting access by the traditional owners. keywords aboriginal law, historical evidence, expert witness, aboriginal claims disclaimer this manuscript was written by the author, who is responsible for the contents of the manuscript entirely. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ t r a d i t i o n a l k n o w l e d g e a n d s o c i a l s c i e n c e o n t r i a l : b a t t l e s o v e r e v i d e n c e i n i n d i g e n o u s r i g h t s l i t i g a t i o n i n c a n a d a a n d a u s t r a l i a aboriginal rights litigation raises various questions concerning historical and traditional knowledge. the reasons are that aboriginal title claims are based on plaintiffs’ ancestors’ traditional use and occupation of specific tracts of land before and after european contact. treaty rights litigation raises similar issues, but the relevant timeframe is determined by the date when the treaty at issue was signed. in canada, the métis, who are of mixed european–aboriginal descent, base their rights claims on traditional cultural practices at the time when effective sovereignty (control) was established by the british crown, or the canadian government. all of these instances call for information that indigenous claimants possess as oral history and oral tradition. use of these types of information raises several questions. how do western courts, commissions, and tribunals deal with this sort of evidence? what protocols have they developed to accommodate traditional modes of presentation? how do they assess traditional knowledge (tk) against other lines of evidence that are introduced in claims disputes? how do they deal with issues of proprietorship? my discussion of these issues, with a focus on australia and canada, is intended for non-legal specialists who are not familiar with the extent to which western courts have addressed issues that tk evidence poses. l i n e s o f e v i d e n c e a n d k n o w l e d g e normally courts only accept evidence from eyewitnesses because of the “hearsay rule.” this rule precludes judges from receiving evidence from individuals who have obtained it “second hand.” the problem in aboriginal and treaty rights litigation is that the historical questions that inevitably arise call for the gathering of evidence from a time period that lies beyond the direct experiences of living people (i.e., the current generation). this fact has forced the courts to relax the hearsay rule so that they can deal with “ancient times.” in legal circles, the latter is defined as the period beyond thirty years ago. in aboriginal and treaty rights litigation, there are two broad categories of evidence about ancient times: one is oral evidence, which is obtained mostly from elders or those who have been designated in their societies as keepers of traditional knowledge and stories; the other category of historical information consists of an array of evidence about the past that is obtained from documentary sources or is data generated by physical and social scientists, particularly anthropologists, archaeologists, linguists, and paleontologists. sometimes these diverse sources of evidence clash, forcing the courts to make decisions about the relative weights they should assign to the various lines of evidence when adjudicating claims. t h e c h a l l e n g e s o f o r a l h i s t o r y a n d o r a l t r a d i t i o n s oral evidence presented by elders often poses the biggest challenge to the courts given that judges normally do not deal with this type of evidence, nor are they familiar with the aboriginal protocols that are associated with it. elders provide two types of information—oral history and oral traditions. in his classic work on this topic, oral tradition as history, jan vansina (1985) differentiated these two types of knowledge noting that oral histories are “reminiscences, hearsay, or eyewitness accounts about events and situations which are contemporary, that is, which occurred during the lifetime of the informants, but oral traditions are no longer contemporary. they have passed from mouth to mouth, for a period beyond the lifetime of the informants” (pp. 12 13). in other words, oral traditions reach beyond the current generation. he noted that they could be transmitted in statements, as songs, and as chants. some oral traditions are about the past, others may not be. in the federal court of canada, winona wheeler, an expert on plains cree oral history who appeared on behalf of the petitioner victor buffalo, used the term “oral traditions history” to refer to oral traditions that deal with unwritten accounts of past events, which occurred beyond the current generation (figure 1) (buffalo v. canada, 2005). in his extended essay on the use of oral history evidence in litigation, oral history on trial, bruce miller (2011) noted that the boundaries between oral history and oral tradition cannot be sharply drawn. there are many reasons for this. of particular importance is the fact that there is such diversity in these narratives in terms of the ways that they are structured, the purposes they serve, who can relate them, and the circumstances in which they are retold (miller, 2011). f i g u r e 1 . r e l a t i o n s h i p b e t w e e n o r a l h i s t o r y a n d o r a l t r a d i t i o n . keith carlson, who has done extensive research on the stó:lõ of the fraser valley of british columbia, has shown that these people had two types of oral histories. the first were personal stories, which are called sqwelqwel or “true news” about people. typically, these were narratives about oneself or about someone that the individual knew personally. the broader “official histories,” which are referred to as sxwoxwiyam, relate myth-age transformer stories, flood stories, and origin stories (carlson, 2010). wheeler noted in her testimony in buffalo v. canada (2005) that the plains cree also have many different types of stories. one category is the family story, or family story bundle, which contain accounts of significant past events. some of these become officially sanctioned versions that only designated family members have the authority to recount. the sanctioning process depends on the community and the cultural context. often it is an informal process that involves reaching a general agreement in the community. in most indigenous societies, certain individuals are designated as the carriers of official stories and they are carefully trained for that purpose. for example, among the plains cree of the treaty 6 area of alberta, canada, communities have treaty 6 stories that are protected by ceremony and protocols. treaty 6 story-keepers have apprentices and the process of teaching them takes years. very few in the community are considered official keepers or historians of treaty 6. communities have various methods for verifying the accuracy of the telling of these histories. often they accomplish this by having the keepers of the stories relate them in appropriate public settings where knowledgeable elders can make corrections and provide commentaries. sometimes mnemonic devices ! time passing ! oral tradition beyond current gene ration oral history current gene ration are used as memory prompts. the winter counts of the plains tribes of north america are probably one of the best-known examples. in these counts, key events from a series of years are represented pictorially. the landscape is also an important memory prompt. many stories are tied to place and can only be told in their entirety at the appropriate location. in contrast to “official histories,” those of a more personal nature are not normally subject to the same scrutiny by other members of the local native community. oral tradition evidence differs from that of oral history, although the boundary is not sharp, in that it primarily is concerned with transmitting information about cultural practices from one generation to another. as with oral histories, the mode of transmission can be by apprenticing and through storytelling, chanting, singing, and/or performances. of relevance to aboriginal claims, oral traditions are a key source of indigenous information about economic, cultural, and spiritual land use practices. in many aboriginal societies, some traditional knowledge is not shared universally. rather, specialized knowledge can only be shared among those of the same gender, or among members of a particular social group. these aspects of oral traditions can pose significant challenges for claims adjudication procedures and for the aboriginal witnesses who are involved. for example, problems of gender-specific knowledge arose in land claims in northern australia in the 1970s and 1980s. in 1976, australia passed the aboriginal land rights (northern territory) act (1976), which established a land claim commission to adjudicate the land claims of aborigines in the northern territory. in these societies, local patrilineages had strong ties to the land through a series of sacred sites and dreaming tracks. adult men and women are carriers of sacred and special knowledge, which they were barred by tradition from sharing with members of the opposite sex. from the outset, the first northern territory land claim commissioner, justice john toohey (1982), understood that this cultural reality would have major implications for receiving evidence in claims hearings: the question of material of a secret and sacred nature should be seen in perspective. for the most part claimants, men and women, are content to present the evidence in support of their claims without seeking to impose any restrictions upon it. where they do feel obliged to take this course they should be permitted to do so so long as it does not unduly prejudice others participating in the inquiry. there are competing interests to be weighed. i do not think claimants should feel obliged to speak of matters they regard as secret. on the other hand it would be unreal to deny the impact that witnessing aspects of ritual and ceremonial life has in establishing traditional ownership and traditional attachment to land. (p. 88) in other words, toohey weighed the concerns of aborigines as dictated by their cultural traditions against the general “rules of natural justice as they have developed in regard to administrative enquiries, which dictate that those participating in an inquiry ought to be given the opportunity to dispute testimony and make comments about it” (toohey, 1982, p. 88). in the end, justice toohey decided to accept some evidence on the basis that only a limited number or class of people would have access to it. as it happened, this did not prove to be a major problem because the greatest part of the sensitive evidence concerned men’s knowledge and most of the legal counselors were male. in the key exception that justice toohey dealt with regarding secret women’s ceremonies, the claimant women were willing to let the commissioner, female counsel, and female anthropologists read the reports about the ceremonies in question (toohey, 1982). the issue of the gendered nature of tk came to the fore in land claims in australia beyond the northern territory beginning in the early 1990s. most notably, perhaps, was the hindmarsh island claim that was put forward in 1994 by a group of ngarrindjeri female elders from goolwa, south australia. they opposed the building of a new bridge in the murray river delta area on the basis that it would interfere with traditional religious practices, in particular “secret women’s business” that took place on the island. their claim, which became the subject of the hindmarsh island royal commission (1996) and civil litigation, was remarkable not only because it focused on questions about women’s links to the land, but the secret nature of the practices served to raise questions among proponents of the project and another group of ngarrindjeri women about whether the traditions asserted were fabrications (gelder & jacobs, 1997). in canada, problems also have arisen concerning telling oral histories and relating oral traditions in the public forum of the courtroom. delgamuukw v. british columbia (1997) was the landmark title suit of the gitxsan-wet’suet’en of north-central british columbia. at trial in the supreme court of british columbia (1987-1991), the gitxsan-wet’suet’en presented evidence that showed that they had divided their traditional homelands into house territories. houses were the residences of local lineages (an extended kinship group). thus, the “house” simultaneously refers to a dwelling and a landowning kinship group. a hereditary chief served as the custodian and manager of a house territory. each house kept a “box” of traditional knowledge about its history, rights, and customs. this knowledge is known the kungax amongst the gitxsan and the ada’ox amongst the wet’suet’en. elders only “opened their boxes” in the appropriate setting of a longhouse. typically, they did not share their knowledge with outsiders. for the gitxsan and wet’suet’en, this practice meant that they had to make the painful decision to share their kungax and ada’ox with outsiders in the alien setting of the courtroom in order to take their claim to court. it also meant their traditional stories and knowledge would be subject to evaluation procedures that would be foreign and painful to them. in particular, the adversarial approach for the testing of evidence that is practiced in western courts meant that the hereditary elders would be subjected to harsh cross-examination. this procedure does not afford the elders the respect that they are accustomed to receiving in their own societies. in many aboriginal societies, elders are not interrupted, questioned, or “directed.” in court and commission hearings, this often meant that elders’ testimony did not seem to be directly relevant to the questions they were asked. as anthropologist nancy lurie observed many years ago with respect to united states indian claims commission (1946 1978) hearings, the tendency of elders to “wander off point” was one of the reasons commissioners preferred to deal with anthropologists as surrogates for indian witnesses. anthropologists were accustomed to providing direct responses to questions. p r o t o c o l s f o r p r e s e n t a t i o n introducing oral histories and traditions in litigation proceedings has raised additional problems for courts, commissions, tribunals, and indigenous witnesses. during the trial of delgamuukw, chief justice of the supreme court of british columbia, alan mceachern, made a brief visit to the plaintiffs’ territories and he opened the trial in may 1987 in a nearby courthouse in smithers, british columbia. soon, he found the location inconvenient and he relocated the proceedings to courtroom 53 of the british columbia supreme court at the concrete and glass law courts building in vancouver. this location was a three-hour flight from the rural, largely forested lands of the elders’ traditional territories. the distance and high cost of flying meant that very few members of their community were ever present to lend moral support and bear witness to their elders’ testimony and cross-examination. for these reasons, appearing in courtroom 53 proved to be an extremely stressful, even debilitating experience, for many of the more elderly witnesses. since delgamuukw v. regina (mceachern, 1991), canadian courts have taken steps to address this problem. these steps were taken in buffalo v. canada (2005), which was a lawsuit that the samson cree first nation of alberta, canada filed in the federal court of canada against the federal government for alleged breach of fiduciary responsibilities toward them arising from treaty 6 (1876). in this instance, federal court justice max teitelbaum temporarily relocated the hearings from the courtroom in calgary, alberta to the samson cree reserve for the presentation of the elder’s testimony. this venue provided a more comfortable and familiar environment for the elders to present their testimony. nonetheless, they were subject to normal court proceedings for the testing of evidence. when the trial resumed back in calgary, justice teitelbaum sought to further accommodate the cree by allowing them to offer an opening prayer and place a sweetgrass bundle in the courtroom. in taking these small steps, justice teitelbaum unknowingly was following a precedent set over two decades earlier by land claims commissioner justice toohey (1979) in the northern territory of australia. as commissioner, toohey, who was also a member of the supreme court of the northern territory, was expected to rigorously test the evidence that he received in public hearings. accordingly, he applied many standard litigation procedures. quickly, however, toohey also decided to hold his hearings both in the formal settings of the courtrooms in darwin and other towns in the northern territory, in the communities of the plaintiffs, and sometimes at sacred sites and other special places. he met at the latter places because some stories and certain ceremonies could only be told or performed at appropriate locations. toohey relaxed proceedings in other ways. he allowed groups of aborigines to provide testimonials via videotapes so that more witnesses could be heard in a reasonable length of time. however, this approach precluded lawyers from cross-examining the witnesses who appeared using this format (toohey, 1979). also, during the public meetings that he held in the aborigines’ communities, toohey allowed those present to prompt and correct each other and thereby reach consensuses on important points. normally, in court proceedings such practices would be regarded as leading a witness and would not be tolerated. it was in these ways that toohey had relaxed the rules of evidence considerably to accommodate aborigines’ traditional ways of transmitting and verifying traditional knowledge. he believed he was able to get closer to the “truth” by doing so. to date, canadian courts have not been willing to accommodate traditional western practices of testing evidence to this extent, but they are making efforts toward that end. for example, the federal court– aboriginal law bar liaison committee (2009) developed practice guidelines that were intended to make the federal court more “user friendly” for aboriginal litigants. the guideline, adopted by the court, addressed a wide range of issues. it recommended that portions of trials ought to be held in aboriginal communities and that the courts accommodate appropriate traditional ceremonies (federal court–aboriginal law bar liaison committee, 2009). the same committee has drafted a discussion paper dealing with most aspects of elder testimony. an additional problem the courts face when dealing with oral history and traditional knowledge relates to the manner of presentation. sometimes the tellers are supposed to deliver their stories in chants, songs or other performances wearing appropriate regalia. some of the kungax and ada’ox of the gitxsan and wet’suet’en, for example, are supposed to be presented as chants. when elders attempted to do so in delgamuukw v. regina, british columbia supreme court chief justice alan mceachern objected, saying that chanting violated the decorum of the court. as i discussed in telling it to the judge, a similar issue arose several years later during a métis fishing rights trial in saskatchewan in 2007 (ray, 2012). in this instance, the centrality of fiddle music to métis culture was an issue at trial. accordingly, the lawyers for the defendants called expert métis fiddler oliver boulette to testify. when he proposed to play some key métis songs on his fiddle, the lawyer for the crown objected strenuously. he stressed that “this is a court of law, we’re here to deal with legal issues, it’s not a concert” (ray, 2012, p. 116). the judge overruled the crown’s objection. in october 2012, the federal court–aboriginal law bar liaison committee (2012) issued revised aboriginal litigation practice guidelines that addressed most of these issues.1 the committee emphasized that: reconciliation requires the courts to find ways of making its rules of procedure relevant to the aboriginal perspective without losing sight of the principles of fairness, truth-seeking and justice. this can be accomplished by adopting an approach rooted in respect and dignity. one way to show respect and enable aboriginal witnesses to be heard is to have regard for aboriginal ceremony and protocols. (p. 11) in making this observation, the liaison committee noted that aboriginal ceremonies may be part of the process of presenting oral history and evidence. e v i d e n t i a r y b o u n d a r i e s a r e b l u r r e d before discussing the ways courts assess oral evidence about aboriginal history and traditions, and other lines of evidence, it is important to note that the boundaries between them are not as distinct as the courts often seem to imagine. for instance, oral histories and eyewitness evidence can be included within an archival document. the reason is that the latter sources often include information that native people provided to european traders and explorers. a notable example is the narrative of 18th century trader and explorer david thompson. in 1797, he provided an account of the earlier separation of the siouan-speaking assiniboine from their yankton relatives in the northern area of present-day minnesota. thompson had obtained his historical account of this important incident from a native elder (cited in glover, 1962). in other words, thompson’s written narrative contains this and other snippets of oral tradition histories as well as eyewitness accounts of his travels and interactions with various aboriginal groups. as the hudson's bay company expanded its trading empire across the continent, beginning in 1670, most of the information it obtained about areas that lay beyond the range of its posts and the travels of its servants was obtained by post managers interviewing their native customers. one of the most important examples is found in the hudson’s bay company records for fort kilmaurs (old fort babine), which had been established on the northern shores of babine lake, british columbia on the edge of gitxsan-wet’suet’en territory. in his district report for 1822 to 1823, brown described the social 1 in september 2011, the federal court–aboriginal law bar liaison committee issued a discussion paper entitled: elder testimony and oral history, which addressed most of these issues (see federal court–aboriginal law bar liaison committee, 2012). structure of the wet’suet’en in accurate detail even though he had not yet visited their territory. there is little doubt that he would have obtained this information from a local native informant, who likely was from the wet’suet’en’s principal village that lay over the mountains to the west in the bulkley valley. the information in brown’s reports provided independent corroboration of the oral testimony of the elders in delgamuukw v. regina (ray, 2012).2 after the company established a post in an area, its officers and servants did not remain resident “outsiders.” rather, usually they married into the local population “a la façon du pays.” they did so partly because these “country marriages” served to cement trading relationships with first nations according to aboriginal customs. they also had the effect of making insider–outsider distinctions of dubious merit. for example, hudson bay company chief factor james isham wrote one of the first “amateur” ethnographies about first nations of the canadian central subarctic. he was in charge of york factory during the early 18th century when it served as the company’s chief gateway to the interior of present-day central canada. in his observations on hudson bay (from 1743 – 1749), isham (1743/1949) provided a wealth of information on all aspects of cree life and culture. in his capacity as a hudson's bay company officer, he had the viewpoint of a european outsider; as the spouse of a cree woman and the father of her children, he also had an “insider’s” perspective (see figure 2). f i g u r e 2 . n a t u r e o f h u d s o n ’ s b a y c o m p a n y d a t a c o l l e c t i o n a n d t r a n s m i s s i o n d u r i n g e x p a n s i o n . archaeological data provides yet another example of how the boundaries between the different lines of evidence can be blurred. physical artifacts are given meaning in terms of current anthropological theoretical models and through methodologies used for interpretation. ethnographic analogy and the so-called “direct historical approach,” are two key ways archaeologists give meaning to excavated artifacts. the former involves ascribing behavior to an assemblage of artifacts based on the similarity of the latter to an assemblage associated with historical cultures elsewhere. our knowledge of the latter usually is based partly, if not largely, on ethnography, which entails making field observations and conducting oral interviews with indigenous people. the “direct historical approach,” one the other hand, involves reading the archaeological record of a particular place backward in time from the documented 2 i edited and reproduced these reports in telling it to the judge: taking native history to court (ray, 2012, see pp. 161 – 202). indirect knowledge in direct knowledge written records for headquarters • daily journals   • account books   • correspondence books   • reports   trading post historical period to the pre-contact (pre-recorded history) era. in other words, it entails using documentary records. w e i g h i n g t h e e v i d e n c e a n d w a y s o f k n o w i n g once oral histories and traditional knowledge are entered as evidence, claims commissioners and trial judges face the difficult task of deciding how much weight they should give this information when reaching their decisions. in the land claims cases of the northern territory of australia during the late 1970s and 1980s, tk was the primary evidence and often there was no contrary data of significance that the commissioner had to consider against it. the problem of competing evidence subsequently did arise elsewhere in australia, however, after murray islanders and aborigines took their land claims to court. these problems escalated after the landmark murray islanders’ title claim, mabo v. queensland (no 2) (1992), when the high court of australia recognized aboriginal title for the first time, but also ruled that the state could extinguish it without paying compensation. this decision led the federal government to pass the native land title act (1993), which created the native title tribunal to adjudicate claims nationally. in 1998, parliament amended the act and added a clause that detailed how the federal courts were supposed to weigh aboriginal evidence. the clause stipulated: “in conducting its proceedings, the court may take account of the cultural and customary concerns of aboriginal peoples and torres strait islanders, but not so as to prejudice unduly any other party to the proceedings” (government of australia, 1998, 82.2) this amendment was the federal government’s specific response to the land title case of the wik peoples v. queensland (1996). in this litigation, the high court determined that pastoral leases on crown land, which take up almost half of the country, do not extinguish native title. of particular relevance here, the amendment of 1998 reflected federal politicians’ fear that the courts’ efforts to accommodate aborigines’ perspectives were becoming prejudicial to the interests of other australians. so, the revised legislation specified that evidence pertaining to aborigines use and occupation of land had to be considered in relation to information about the historical land use of other local stakeholders. this development serves to highlight the reality that courts face real constraints when attempting to accommodate aboriginal traditions without provoking a strong political backlash from the dominant settler society. the first land claims ruling of the high court of australia following the revisions to the native title act was that of the yorta yorta people who live along the goulburn and murray rivers in the northeastern area of the state of victoria. the trial of this claim had taken place in the federal court on the eve of the passage of the revised act, but the trial judge allowed interested parties to make post-trial submissions that addressed the changes. at trial, the petitioners had the burden of proving that at least some of their named ancestors had occupied the claimed territory prior to 1788 and that one or more members of the claimant group were descended from such ancestors. the petitioners placed heavy reliance on oral and anthropological testimony. they and the respondents also introduced extensive documentary evidence. the trial judge found considerable problems with all of these lines of evidence (yorta yorta aboriginal community v. victoria & ors, 1998). regarding oral history, he concluded that some of the aboriginal witnesses were not reliable. complicating matters, opposing anthropological experts put forward conflicting interpretations of the ethnographic information that was contained in oral and written sources. the trial judge concluded that he lacked the expertise to resolve their differences. regarding some of the key historical documents pertaining to the early nineteenth century, the trial judge noted that these records did not directly address the key issues before his court. consequently, he thought that the testimony of experts who had relied on these records was speculative. in the end, the trial judge put more weight on the documentary records and dismissed the claim. in upholding his decision, the high court concluded that the aboriginal claimants’ ties to the land had been broken by “the tides of history” (yorta yorta aboriginal community v. victoria, 2002). in canada, the problem of weighing aboriginal oral history and tk evidence against other kinds of knowledge came to the public’s attention in the late 1990s. the issue arose in an important aboriginal fishing case in british columbia remembered as regina v. van der peet (1996). this involved the stó:lõ of the fraser river who contended that they held an aboriginal right to operate a commercial salmon fishery. at trial, the presiding judge had to consider an array of cultural and historical evidence. he downplayed the oral evidence. on appeal, the supreme court of canada warned: a court should approach the rules of evidence, and interpret the evidence that exists, conscious of the special nature of aboriginal claims, and of the evidentiary difficulties in proving a right which originates in times where there were no written records of the practices, customs and traditions and customs engaged in . . . the courts must not undervalue the evidence presented by aboriginal claimants simply because that evidence does not conform precisely with the evidentiary standards applied in other contexts. (regina v. van der peet, 1996, the aboriginal right section, para. 9) it was the delgamuukw trial that captured the public’s attention about this issue. in this trial, the plaintiffs and the crown confronted justice mceachern with a massive amount of archaeological, cartographic, ethnographic, geological, genealogical, geographical, historical, and historical geographical evidence in addition to the many months of testimony that he received from the elders. in the end, justice mceachern gave little weight to the latter’s testimony, which led him to reject their claim. his decision was appealed to the supreme court of canada. the latter court faulted him for not giving the traditional oral evidence proper weight and ordered a new trial. regarding oral evidence, the supreme court stated: the factual findings made at trial could not stand because the trial judge’s treatment of the various kinds of oral histories did not satisfy the principles laid down in r. v. van der peet. the oral histories were used in an attempt to establish occupation and use of the disputed territory which is an essential requirement for aboriginal title. continuing to fault justice mceachern, the supreme court added: the trial judge refused to admit or gave no independent weight to these oral histories and then concluded that the appellants had not demonstrated the requisite degree of occupation for “ownership.” had the oral histories been correctly assessed, the conclusions on these issues of fact might have been very different. (delgamuukw v. british columbia, 1997, the ability of the court to interfere with the trial judge’s factual findings section, para. 1) rather than settle the issue of oral evidence, delgamuukw merely intensified the battles in the canadian courts about this line of evidence. the results have been mixed as two relatively recent examples serve to illustrate. one was the massive trial of chief victor buffalo, which dealt with the treaty rights claim of the samson cree of alberta, canada (buffalo v. canada, 2005). after the elders had testified in this trial, the plaintiffs and the crown called experts to give their opinions about the nature of traditional oral evidence including its strengths and weaknesses. winona wheeler appeared for the plaintiffs and she emphasized the positive aspects of this line of evidence. archaeologist alexander von gernet testified on behalf of the crown. he asserted that, notwithstanding the supreme court’s delgamuukw ruling, oral evidence cannot stand alone. according to von gernet, it must be corroborated with other lines of evidence and by using approaches to evidence commonly applied in the social sciences. in the end, justice teitelbaum discounted the many months of oral testimony by the elders and put forward a long rationale for doing so in the reasons for his judgment. he began with a review of the supreme court’s van der peet and delgamuukw decisions and the subsequent supreme court ruling in mitchell v. m.n.r. (2001), as they related to this topic. teitelbaum observed: the scc’s [supreme court of canada] decision in delgamuukw, supra, does not mandate blanket admissibility of oral history or oral tradition evidence; nor does it establish the amount of weight that should be placed upon such evidence by a trial judge. the decision merely speaks of “due weight.” this does not amount to equal weight, an interpretation which the plaintiffs seem to suggest. he continued: in mitchell, supra, mclachlin c.j. held that “due weight” meant that oral tradition evidence is entitled to “equal and due treatment.” it should neither be undervalued, nor artificially constrained to carry more weight than it could reasonably support. (buffalo v. canada, 2005, para. 451) justice teitelbaum then turned his attention to the main points of wheeler’s testimony about nature of cree “oral history traditions.” he noted that she had faulted historians for treating oral history as though it was like any other documentary source, which entailed sifting the stories for facts while stripping them of any of their mythical aspects and disregarding their original intent and cultural context. justice teitelbaum recalled wheeler saying that cree histories “distorted time,” when viewed from a western perspective because the cree conception of time was constructed in terms of “spirals in an unbroken chain, linking past, present, and future together.” he noted that wheeler had added that to understand how cree viewed time it was necessary to have an intimate knowledge of the local land and environment because they determined time by linking it to season and climate (buffalo v. canada, 2005, para. 306). on the crucial issue of verification, justice teitelbaum recorded that: she believed that verification must occur within the context of the oral tradition histories; one must be aware of the internal checks and balances within the cultural context. foremost, however is the storyteller’s reputation. elders are held in high esteem and are expected to be truthful. elders may assist each other in ensuring that a proper rendition of a story is given. repercussions result also from any break in protocol. (buffalo v. canada, 2005, para. 301) in light of her testimony, justice teitelbaum asked wheeler how the court should evaluate cree oral evidence. she replied: somebody trained in oral histories research can provide you with the interpretation, the full contextual reading you require to see the transcript beyond a literal reading . . . the transcript is a representation of the original full story, and to get a full understanding of the meaning, we have to go back there. and that’s what the local experts, i guess, who are not considered experts by the court—they are the key. they are the ones that i go to for assistance to help me understand transcripts and oral histories that have been taped. so the local experts are in the best position to do that, because they can provide the context i need to be able to read that document more completely and more fully. (buffalo v. canada, 2005, para. 311) von gernet, who testified after wheeler, put forward the view that oral histories were merely “oral documents.” based on this outlook, he provided the judge with a much simpler approach that did not require the court to take into account cultural differences nor turn to aboriginal experts for help when analyzing and interpreting this source. justice teitelbaum wrote: with regard to his methodology, dr. von gernet testified that other versions of an oral tradition by the same informant allow for testing of internal consistency and range of variability. these versions can also be compared with traditions told by other storytellers about the same historical events. the final step involves looking for independent evidence and assessing it against the oral tradition. he testified that he would also look for evidence of feedback—subtle influences from the written record—as well as conflation. (buffalo v. canada, 2005, para. 314) in the end, justice teitelbaum thought that wheeler’s recommended approach of going back to the elders for guidance was impractical for a court. he explained that wheeler’s approach might well be suitable for scholars, but: it is simply not feasible, nor is it realistic, for a trial judge. the court cannot embark upon independent fact-finding investigations into evidence tendered at trial. the court must rely upon the parties for the evidence and any assistance from experts. and while dr. wheeler offered some interesting insights into the nature of oral traditions and oral histories, she did not present the court with any analysis of the oral traditions tendered at trial. (buffalo v. canada, 2005, para. 453) from 2002 to 2007, another massive trial took place in the supreme court of british columbia. this involved the land title suit of tsilhqot’in nation v. british columbia (2007). it unfolded in 339 trial days that were spread over seven years in victoria and tsilhqot’in territory. as in delgamuukw and victor buffalo, the trial judge had to confront massive amounts of diverse cultural and historical evidence. once again, a central issue concerned the weight the court should give to oral tradition. yet again, von gernet appeared for the crown. he presented two briefs. the first was his general assessment of oral history as a line of evidence. the second report specifically evaluated tsilhqot'in oral history. based on his reading of the first brief, justice vickers concluded that von gernet held that oral history evidence could never stand on its own. justice vickers flatly rejected this presumption. in his reasons for judgment the justice vickers wrote: i was left with the impression that von gernet would be inclined to give no weight to oral tradition evidence in the absence of some corroboration. his preferred approach, following vansina, involves the testing of oral tradition evidence produced in court by reference to external sources such as archaeology and documentary history. in the absence of such testing, he would not be prepared to offer an opinion on the weight to be given any particular oral tradition evidence. if such testing did not reveal some corroborative evidence, it is highly unlikely that he would give any weight to the particular oral tradition evidence. (tsilhqot'in nation v. british columbia, 2007, para 154) justice vickers pointed out that von gernet’s methodology flew in the face of the jurisprudence that had developed in canada since delgamuukw: this approach is not legally sound. trial judges have received specific directions that oral tradition evidence, where appropriate, can be given independent weight. if a court were to follow the path suggested by von gernet, it would fall into legal error on the strength of the current jurisprudence. (tsilhqot'in nation v. british columbia, 2007, para. 154) justice vickers thought that von gernet’s basic attitude toward oral history undermined the credibility of his assessment of tsilhqot'in oral histories of events relevant to their claims. in this way, justice vickers judgment reflected changes that had taken place in canadian jurisprudence about oral history evidence since teitelbaum’s ruling. i s s u e s o f t h e p r o p r i e t o r s h i p o f t k given the importance of tk (broadly defined) in litigation and its centrality to the maintenance of aboriginal cultures, it is inevitable that proprietorship issues arose from the outset. this can best be illustrated by returning to the work of the northern territory land commission. as noted, in aborigines’ societies, classes of people (adult men and women) held exclusive rights to certain stories, ritual secrets, and practices, artifacts, and regalia. out of respect for this customary practice, from the outset, toohey restricted access to this type of material. in 1985, one of his successors, justice j. maurice, placed restrictions on exhibits and sections of the transcripts regarding the waramungu peoples’ land claim (neate, 1989). in 1987, the federal government amended the land rights act (northern territory) to give the commissioner the specific authority to prohibit or limit the access to and/or publication of material provided to the commission under the act. these revisions also empowered him or her to bar specific persons or classes of persons from being in the vicinity of the place where information is to be given in the course of a traditional land claim hearing (neate, 1989). the amendments to the act gave the land commissioner the right to make a number other restrictions on submitted materials based on the form of presentation and the conditions under which it had been tendered. these are summarized in table 1. t a b l e 1 . r e s t r i c t i o n s o n t h e d i s s e m i n a t i o n o f e v i d e n c e p r e s e n t e d t o t h e l a n d r i g h t s c o m m i s s i o n o f t h e n o r t h e r n t e r r i t o r y a f t e r 1 9 8 7 f o r m c o n d i t i o n s o f s u b m i s s i o n a c c e s s r e s t r i c t i o n s tape recording and transcription tendered as restricted exhibit available only to those present when evidence was given oral testimony summarized in writing tendered as restricted exhibit available only to those present when evidence was given written notes given to those present on the condition that it not be marked as an exhibit be returned to the claimants before the conclusion of the hearing oral submission not recorded in anyway tendered in secret session only referred to in general terms by counsel in final addresses and by the commissioner in his or her report videotape (with or without a transcript) prepared outside the hearing of a claim hearing showing meetings of claimants or claimants at sites speaking about them restrictions on who can view the tapes and/or read transcript sound recordings of ceremonial singing, etc. tendered as restricted exhibit available to a restricted group of listeners diagrams (of ceremonial grounds, etc.) tendered as restricted exhibit available for viewing to a restricted group photographs (of ceremonies, etc.) tendered as restricted exhibit available for viewing to a restricted group reports on direct observation of ceremonies tendered as restricted exhibit available to be read by a restricted group evidence given solely to the commissioner tendered as restricted exhibit restricted note. source: neate (1989). although these measures were intended for the benefit of the aborigines who took part in land claims hearings, subsequently it has created problems for them and for the federal court that has to administer the land claims records, including the restricted reports. according to australian anthropologist nicolas peterson, who was a participant in some of the early hearings, lawyers for land claimants played the politics of knowledge hard and, in the end, most of them argued for restricting all of the documentation, including the claim books. today, only the transcripts are readily available. the irony is that originally the northern and central land councils, which represented claimants, sold copies of these books to people. the books had nothing restricted in them and do not include sensitive genealogies, which were presented in separate bound books. after a few years of selling the claims books, the councils stopped doing so and eventually these documents also became restricted. the irony in this, according to peterson, is that aboriginal people now want access to these claims books as they are a repository of a good deal of their cultural history that is otherwise unknown or not available to them. gaining access is not an easy process, however, and will prove to be a drawn out effort (nicolas peterson, personal communication, july 21, 2012). in canada, the superior courts can seal sensitive material in a file, making it inaccessible to the public. also, the federal court can bar the use of traditional knowledge by those who are not members of the aboriginal group who provided it. c o n c l u s i o n traditional knowledge and oral traditions history are crucial lines of evidence in aboriginal claims litigation and alternative forms of resolution, most notably claims commissions. these lines of evidence pose numerous challenges in terms of how and where they can be presented, regarding who is qualified to present it, concerning the question of whether this evidence can stand on its own, and developing appropriate measures to protect it from inappropriate use by outsiders while not unduly restricting access by the traditional owners. given that the land claims commission of the northern territory of australia, australian courts, and canadian courts have struggled with these issues since the 1970s due to the complexity of the issues, which are compounded by the cultural diversity of aboriginal peoples, makes it unlikely that final resolutions will be reached. rather, ongoing dialogues involving commissions and courts and aboriginal people will be required and case-by-case solutions needed. r e f e r e n c e s aboriginal land rights act (northern territory) 1976 no. 191. buffalo v. canada, 2005 fc 1622. retrieved from http://decisions.fct-cf.gc.ca/fccf/decisions/en/item/46344/index.do carlson, k. (2010). the power of place and the problem of time: aboriginal identity and historical consciousness in the cauldron of colonialism. toronto: university of toronto press. delgamuukw v. british columbia, [1997] 3 s.c.r. 1010. federal court–aboriginal law bar liaison committee. (2009, november 5). aboriginal litigation practice guidelines. retrieved from: http://cas-ncr-nter03.cas-satj.gc.ca/fct-cf/pdf/practiceglphase1-05-11-09eng.pdf federal court–aboriginal law bar liaison committee. (2012, october 16). aboriginal litigation practice guidelines. retrieved from: http://cas-ncr-nter03.cas-satj.gc.ca/fctcf/pdf/practiceguidelines%20phase%20i%20and%20ii%2016-10-2012%20eng%20final.pdf gelder, k., & jacobs, j. m. (1997). promiscuous sacred sites: reflections on secrecy and scepticism in the hindmarsh island affair. australian humanities review, 6. retrieved from http://www.australianhumanitiesreview.org/archive/issue-june-1997/gelder.html glover, r. (ed.). (1962). david thompson’s narrative 1784 1812. toronto: champlain society. government of australia. (1998). native title amendment act 1998 (no. 97). retrieved from: http://www.comlaw.gov.au/details/c2004a00354/html/text hindmarsh island royal commission. (1996). transcripts of proceedings. retrieved from https://digital.library.adelaide.edu.au/dspace/handle/2440/5127 isham, j. (1949). in e. e. rich (ed.), james isham’s observations on hudson’s bay, 1743 and notes and observations on a book entitled: a voyage to hudson’s bay in the dobbs galley 1749. london: the champlain society for the hudson’s bay record society. (original work published in 1743). mabo v. queensland. (no 2) [1992] hca 23; (1992) 175 clr 1 (3 june 1992). mceachern, a. (chief justice) (1991). delgammukw v. regina: reasons for judgment. vancouver: supreme court of british columbia. miller, b. (2011). oral history on trial. vancouver: university of british columbia press. mitchell v. m.n.r., [2001] s.c.r. 911. native title act 1993 no. 110, 1993. neate, g. (1989). aboriginal land rights law in the northern territory. chippendale: alternative publishing company. ray, a. j. (2012). telling it to the judge: taking native history to court. montreal: mcgill-queens university press. regina v. van der peet, [1996] 2 s.c.r. 507. toohey, j. (1979). borroloola land claim: report by the aboriginal land commissioner. canberra: australian government publishing service. toohey, j. (1982). daly river (malak malak) land claim: report by the aboriginal land commissioner. canberra: australian government publishing service. tsilhqot'in nation v. british columbia, 2007 bcsc 1700. retrieved from http://www.courts.gov.bc.ca/jdb-txt/sc/07/17/2007bcsc1700.pdf vansina, j. (1985). oral tradition as history. madison: the university of wisconsin press. wik peoples v. queensland [1996] 187 clr 1. yorta yorta aboriginal community v. victoria & ors [1998] fca 1606 (18 december 1998). yorta yorta aboriginal community v victoria [2002] hca 58; 214 clr 422; 194 alr 538; 77 aljr 356 (12 december 2002). the international indigenous policy journal may 2015 traditional knowledge and social science on trial: battles over evidence in indigenous rights litigation in canada and australia arthur j. ray recommended citation traditional knowledge and social science on trial: battles over evidence in indigenous rights litigation in canada and australia abstract keywords disclaimer creative commons license traditional knowledge and social science on trial: battles over evidence in indigenous rights litigation in canada and australia ms# 1441 berge pedagogical pathways proof.pdf the international indigenous policy journal volume 11 | issue 1 january 2020 pedagogical pathways for indigenous business education: learning from current indigenous business practices simon t. berge university of winnipeg, s.berge@uwinnipeg.ca recommended citation berge, s. t. (2020). pedagogical pathways for indigenous business education: learning from current indigenous business practices. the international indigenous policy journal, 11(1). doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.9374 pedagogical pathways for indigenous business education: learning from current indigenous business practices abstract business is one of the fastest growing areas in post-secondary education, but there is little understanding of indigenous business practices. this article looks at three arctic communities in the yukon, the northwest territories, and nunavut, and their associated co-operative businesses. i examine how these businesses express cultural values, as well as the business skill needs within these communities. key informant interviews were conducted in each of the three arctic communities, and three conclusions were made: (a) co-operatives act as links between communities and their economic activities, (b) business skills within communities need to be developed, and (c) business skills need to include cultural components, as co-ops represent cultural economic expressions. keywords indigenous, first nations, inuit, business education, co-operatives, entrepreneurship, arctic acknowledgments i would like to thank arctic co-operatives limited for their support and commitment to this work. the arctic communities and co-operatives that engaged with this research project were welcoming and encouraging. finally, this research was supported by the social sciences and humanities research council of canada. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1 published by scholarship@western 1 pedagogical pathways for indigenous business education: learning from current indigenous business practices there is a growing population of indigenous youth preparing for post-secondary education (assembly of first nations education, jurisdiction, and governance, 2012; macdonald & wilson, 2013). business education is one of the highest enrollment areas in canadian universities, but the information on indigenous business practices are scattered across disciplines (klinga, 2012; statistics canada, 2014). due to the lack of indigenous content in textbooks and case studies used in business courses, brown, tulk, and doucette (2016) began to consolidate indigenous business knowledge as part of their recent collection of essays. this lack of indigenous content in business education limits exposure to and understanding of the challenges faced by indigenous business leaders as they attempt to work within the restrictions imposed by colonial systems in canada, such as the indian act. through its restrictions on land ownership and use, the indian act hampers community development and discourages private investment as well as business activities. in order to develop community businesses in indigenous communities, business leaders must first gain access to land designated for commercial use. under the indian act (1985), land for designated for commercial use can be leased to the business but is owned by the reserve. the lack of ownership of land means indigenous businesses have limited access to capital; this results in higher risk and thus higher start-up costs. the inability of indigenous business leaders to access the stored capital within reserve lands results in a place-based character to indigenous business that can constrain business development. in addition to the capital access issue for indigenous businesses, there is a cultural link to place that needs to be captured when considering indigenous businesses. as battiste (2010) stated, “each group develops expertise in their ecosystem that spans trans-systemic approaches to knowledge, which animate and manifest in languages, communication forms, ceremonies and teaching” (p. 31). siebers (2004) discussed the need to understand the aspirations and interests of the people within their lifeworld, referring to the place-based knowledge embedded in transformational activities, which include business practices. this article will examine three themes: a. co-operatives act as links between community and their economic activities, b. business skills within the community need to be developed, and c. business skills need to include cultural components as co-ops represent cultural economic expressions. information will be presented on the business culture and place-based nature of indigenous businesses in rural and remote communities based on the findings from a social science and humanities research council funded project to canada’s arctic. the information synthesized from the indigenous businesses will be consolidated with the existing literature on indigenous place-based economic knowledge (chambers, 2006; korteweg, gonzalez, & guillet, 2010; scully, 2012; van der wey, 2001). many indigenous arctic communities occupy their traditional lands in rural and remote geographic areas that are distant from non-indigenous communities located in the same territory (elias, 1996). the vast indigenous traditional lands provide a range of resources through hunting, fishing, and trapping that support local community economies (lemelin & dawson, 2014; stabler, tolley, & howe, 1990). the berge: pedagogical pathways for indigenous business education doi: https://doi.org/ 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.9374 2 inclusion of traditional activities in mixed local economies is partly due to the isolated, inaccessible nature of the communities. according to elias (1996), the mixed economy includes domestic production, commodity production, employment, enterprise, and transfers, and they have been seen as a means for financing domestic production. human interactions with and within the natural environment as a form of cultural economic expression becomes the focus of economic activity as a result of the unreliability of non-domestic production, leading to economic uncertainty within the community (fall, 1990; lowe, 2015). the focus on traditional activities, such as hunting, fishing and trapping, as the economic foundation in the community creates a need for a unique set of business skills that cooperatives can help to develop and to which business education can be more responsive. literature review according to madden (2015), pedagogical pathways for indigenous education are considered to be configurations or approaches that guide the learner’s movement towards understanding concepts. madden’s configurations are assumptions about education and teaching including the purpose, goals, central themes, and pedagogical methods, which make up a pedagogical pathway that shapes, but does not determine, the learning journey. four pedagogical pathways reflect the diversity of theories and approaches to indigenous education: a. learning from traditional indigenous models of teaching (anuik & gillies, 2012), b. pedagogy for decolonization (chinnery, 2010), c. indigenous and anti-racist education (james, marin, & kassam, 2011), and d. indigenous and place-based education (scully, 2012). gruenewald (2008) suggested that pedagogy of place, including reinhabitation, is a means to move education toward an ecologically and socially sustainable decolonization of place. pedagogy of place refers to the education of citizens so that they might have a direct effect on the well-being of the social and environmental components of their community (gruenewald, 2008). decolonization of place, according to gruenewald, refers to reflecting on one’s situation, which includes a reflection on the space(s) one inhabits or reinhabits. berg and dassman (1990) define reinhabitation as “learning to livein-place in an area that has been disrupted and injured through past exploitation” (p. 35). the action within a person’s situation often corresponds to changing the relationship to a place, which in this article can be seen in the co-operatives reflecting on the community’s needs and its actions to address them. indigenous and place-based pedagogical pathways need to be incorporated into business education as a means of addressing gruenewald’s (2008) objective of reinhabitation as outlined in his article on critical pedagogy of place. addressing gruenewald’s pedagogy of place can be seen through the economic activities associated with rural and remote co-operatives linking community’s needs to economic activity. as will be seen, there is a need to enhance business skills in order to achieve the community’s full cultural economic expression. this place-based indigenous pedagogical approach incorporating reinhabitation is different from the western approach to indigenous education, which battiste and henderson (2008) have characterized as “add and stir” (p. 13). their characterization suggests that the western educational system simply incorporated indigenous history into the existing narrative of canadian history. from a business education perspective, curricula presented to students has typically not included knowledge about the many traditional indigenous economies or place-based relationships in canada such as the gift and subsistence economies that existed prior to colonialism (brown et al., the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1 published by scholarship@western 3 2016). the current business curriculum focuses on the capitalist system of profit accumulation and ignores the challenges of place-based economies, in which many indigenous communities and business leaders operate. business education is a key component of interaction with the ecological and social environments through localized social action, and thus must be guided by a placed-based pedagogical pathway. ignoring place-based relationships is tantamount to going back to the “add and stir” educational approaches used in the past, which ignore indigenous culture, values, and place-based relationships. in order to examine a place-based pedagogical pathway, three communities in canada’s north were visited for this study: (a) old crow, yukon territory; (b) naujaat, nunavut; and (c) ulukhaktok, northwest territory. old crow, yukon is a vuntut g’witchin first nation community that is selfgoverned, while naujaat and ulukhaktok are inuit communities governed through hamlet offices. each of the three communities host community led co-operative businesses that are part of the arctic cooperatives limited service federation. each community co-operative within the arctic co-operatives limited follows the international co-operative alliance’s seven principles (international cooperative alliance, n.d.), which affirm the autonomy and independence of each community co-operative. as each community co-operative is autonomous and independently run by the community in a place-based environment, these organizations can be considered representative of each indigenous community’s business practices. the major goal of this project has been to mobilize existing indigenous business knowledge in community-centered co-operatives in canada’s arctic. northern indigenous communities have developed innovative business practices to improve their community’s economic status that need to be incorporated into current post-secondary business curriculum guiding current pedagogy through a place-based pedagogical pathway. this project provided the first step in examining the role of an indigenous, community centred, and place-based co-operative business. method arctic co-operatives limited assisted in asking three indigenous businesses to participate in this project. arctic co-operatives limited is based in winnipeg, manitoba and has had a close partnership with the university of winnipeg and the researchers associated with this study. the researchers engaged with this study include faculty professors, and graduate and undergraduate students from the university of winnipeg. artic co-operatives limited was one of the founding members of the business chair of cooperative enterprises established at the university of winnipeg in 2012. the three co-operative businesses, which are part of the 32-member arctic co-operatives limited service federation, were chosen to ensure the widest geographic coverage, so that all aspects of place-based business practices were captured. a community-based participatory approach was utilized throughout this project. researchers engaged with the co-operative board of directors, managers, staff, and membership throughout each step of the project to ensure full participation by the community. community members were engaged in the development of the interview questions, identifying key informants for the interviews, data analysis, and review and approval of conclusions for the study. the key informant interviews included staff, managers, directors, and members of the community co-operatives. each individual interviewed, however, has berge: pedagogical pathways for indigenous business education doi: https://doi.org/ 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.9374 4 many roles in their community. some of the directors for the co-operative act as community government leaders working in the hamlet offices or in other positions within the community’s government. co-operative members represent a large cross section of the community including teachers, cashiers, cleaners, priests, and many other occupations within the community. this broad cross section of the community strongly indicates that the co-operative is integrated into community life and place. as basso (1996) indicated, place is where wisdom sits, and the community co-operatives integrate their business operations within the confines of place, including dealing with the rural and remote nature of the community. this project utilized semi-structured video interviews with key informants to capture information on indigenous business practices. directors, managers, and staff participated in the interviews to provide a thorough review of the business practices. interviews were completed with 15 people: 5 with directors, 3 with managers, and 7 with staff. arctic co-operatives limited assisted in arranging the interviews on site in collaboration with the local community, including elders, and the co-operative board of directors. questions focused on governance, and management and human resource training and needs. the questions for the semi-structured interviews were developed in partnership with arctic co-operatives limited and the communities involved. examples of questions include: a. please explain the current governance structure of your business. b. as a director/manager/staff, please describe a typical day/month/year. c. as a director/manager/staff member, what skills would you like to develop? all activities completed during the course of this study received ethics approval from the university of winnipeg human research ethics board prior to beginning the research. the semi-structured interview method allowed participants to discuss any and all aspects of the business that they felt were relevant. in-person video interviews allow for the collection of data about the placebased context of the indigenous businesses. skype or other distance interviews techniques are not effective because rural and remote communities do not have access to broadband connections. one member of the research team was tasked with collecting the interviews, and a second with transcription and analysis of the responses. responses were transcribed and time stamped to allow for quick review of specific sections of the interview. utilizing a cross-case comparison analysis, two randomly selected interviews were analyzed to identify categories based on responses by the interviewees. utilizing glaser and strauss’ (1967) grounded theory, four stages of analysis were completed on the interview data: 1. comparison of responses to each category, 2. integrating categories and their associated properties, 3. delimiting the theory, and 4. writing the theory. based on the initial analysis of the first two interviews, tentative categories were developed. in line with dye, schatz, rosenberg, and colemand’s (2000) method, this initial category identification of the cooperatives based on interview data underwent continual refinement throughout the data analysis process and the feedback was used to refine the categories. once the categories were identified, based on the the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1 published by scholarship@western 5 initial two interviews, the remaining 13 interviews were analyzed, and responses were placed into one of the identified categories. by categorizing responses from each interviewee, we are able to reduce the overall complexity and organize the responses based on the conceptual nature of the response (dey, 1993). with the responses categorized, the theory was delimited. aspects of freire’s (1970) pedagogy of the oppressed were deemed to be explanatory: the co-operative acted as the community’s response to “perceived social, political, and economic contradictions, and [that enabled the community] to take action against the oppressive elements of reality” (p. 35), a process termed conscientizacao by freire. many of the responses provided by the interviewees harkened to freire’s approach to popular education as a means of transformation through economic action, much like the educational approach utilized by the highlander center founded by myles horton, which promoted civic participation and social action organization within communities (see horton & freire, 1990; horton, kohl, & kohl, 1998). freire’s approach encourages the use of existing knowledge—in this case, the knowledge of place—to overcome oppressive or dehumanizing structures. the capitalist economic system can be seen as an oppressive or dehumanizing structure that the community’s social action seeks to overcome. results old crow—vuntut g’witchin first nation old crow, yukon territory, is an isolated community located on the banks of the porcupine and crow rivers just above the arctic circle within an area known as old crow flats. the community, the river, the mountain, and surrounding area of old crow were named in honour of chief deetru `k`avihdik, who died in the 1870s. his name means “crow may i walk.” the community of old crow is a small community of approximately 221 vuntut g’witchin. the average age is 39.6 years, with a median age of 38.7, which makes this community the oldest of the communities in this project. of the 215 individuals who completed the 2016 census, 210 (the majority) indicated that they spoke english, and 10 indicated that they spoke both french and english. the mother tongue for most community members is english (n = 170 individuals), followed by g’witchin (n = 30), then french (n = 5). at home, 200 individuals indicated that english was the language most often spoken, followed by g’witchin (n = 10), then french (n = 5; statistics canada, 2016). the community sits within a periglacial environment, which means old crow has a cold climate and the land is subjected to frequent freezing and thawing cycles. the annual temperature average for daily highs is 20.2°c (68.4°f) in july, and average daily lows of !33.5°c (!28.3°f) in january (environment canada, 2018). being located above the arctic circle, there are days in the summer when old crow sees the midnight sun, also known as the polar day. typically, between may 5th and august 8th, the sun will be shining on old crow at midnight local time, which is why it is referred to as the midnight sun. during the winter, between december 14th and december 29th, the sun will hide from old crow during what is known as the polar night. as the most northern community in all of the yukon territory, old crow does bring unique challenges and opportunities for its residents. for example, old crow cannot be accessed by road, making transportation of goods and services difficult and costly. the vuntut g’witchin first nation community, berge: pedagogical pathways for indigenous business education doi: https://doi.org/ 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.9374 6 however, took this transportation difficulty and made it into an opportunity by investing in the local airline: “this initiative is unique, just as the relationship between air north and the yukon is unique,” said board director greg charlie, who is also a member of the vuntut g’witchin first nation, which owns a 49% stake in the airline. “it is rare to find a bond between a business and a community as strong as the one our airline shares with yukoners. we don't take that bond for granted; we cherish it” (air north airline, 2017, para. 2; theme: co-operatives act as links between community and their economic activities). the community of old crow maintained a single store, the north west company store (also known as the northern store). the north west company inc. is a canadian multinational grocery and retailcompany, which operates stores in western canada, northern canada, alaska, hawaii, and several other countries and us territories in oceania and the caribbean. the north west company profiles itself as a leading retailer to underserved rural communities and urban neighbourhoods. typically, the northern store signs multi-year leases that grant them the exclusive right to sell goods to these underserviced communities (north west company inc., 2017). some in the old crow community believed that profits were being taken from the community through the north west company arrangement: we had northern in our community for about 25 years and they wanted to sign a second 25year lease. the thing with northern is i didn’t see any benefits coming to the community. one day they boosted how much of a profit they made out of the communities and old crow was third on the list with $1.8 million dollars. to see that and not to see it in the community i didn’t like it. from the general assembly, the people directed our leadership to start looking for something else to provide our groceries. (old crow interview #1, 2017; theme: co-operatives act as links between community and their economic activities) the northern store opened in old crow in june 1999 with its first 25-year lease. in 2015, the community of old crow declined to renew the multi-year lease, and the northern store closed in midnovember (north west company inc., 2017). for approximately six months, the community was without a primary grocery store (dolphin, 2014). vuntut g’witchin first nation set up a temporary store where residents could get staple foods and basic supplies. for a more permanent solution, the old crow community looked to arctic co-operatives limited. arctic co-operatives limited is a co-operative federation owned and controlled by 32 community-based co-operative business enterprises located in nunavut, the northwest territories, yukon, and northern manitoba, canada (arctic co-operatives ltd., 2017). by becoming a member of this federation of cooperatives, old crow felt they could provide the goods and services the community needed and, at the same time, keep profits from leaving the community. in addition, the leadership of the community felt that, by working together within the federated co-operative structure, they could provide lower prices on goods and services in the community: “we put our buying power with one store together with 32 other stores across the north and canada . . . we can get reduced costs on groceries and our produce has never been greener” (old crow interview #2, 2017; theme: co-operatives act as links between community and their economic activities). the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1 published by scholarship@western 7 the establishment of the co-operative store in old crow not only assisted in reducing the cost of groceries and improving the quality of products, it also ensured that money remained in the community to improve the community. during its first seven months of operations, the new co-op grocery store made an impressive $1.2 million in sales (“old crow grocery store,” 2016). what people like about the co-op is . . . 100 percent of the profit from the co-op gets invested back into the community . . . because we can’t solely depend on our first nation government to fund everything that we want to see in our community, so this will be another business where we can invest in our community. (old crow interview #1, 2017; theme: co-operatives act as links between community and their economic activities) the additional funds generated by the co-operative allow the vuntut g’witchin first nation to plan for the future of their community: we are planning for our future. we have a winter road that is coming. we will bring in a new pickup truck for the co-op. the first nation, the vuntut g’witchin, they own half the airline that brings that food in, air north airline. so, i think they see a bit of a break. everybody works together and we try to bring the cost of groceries down as much as we can for the people of the community. (old crow interview #2, 2017; theme: co-operatives act as links between community and their economic activities) planning for the community requires knowledge of the governance established within the community. interviewees indicated that they needed to have knowledge and skills related to self-governing communities within arctic co-operatives limited: “big learning curve for arctic co-ops as it was the first time they have dealt with a self-governing nation” (old crow interview #5, 2017; theme: business skills within community need to be developed). the interview quotes presented here are a sample of the interviews that make up 82 video clips totaling over 30 gb of high definition video recordings for old crow, yukon. naujaat, nunavut—inuit naujaat in inuktitut is ᓇᐅᔮᑦ and translates into “seagulls’ nesting place.” the name seagulls’ nesting place comes from a cliff 5 kilometers north of the community where seagulls migrate every june. the community itself is located on the arctic circle, allowing naujaat to claim the distinction as the only community located on the arctic circle. the community experiences 24 hours of sun in june and 24 hours of dark in december. the climate of naujaat ranges from an average annual high of -8.7°c (17.6°f) to an average annual low of -15.5 (5°f), with temperatures reaching below -30°c (-22°f) in the winter months (environment canada, 2014). along with cold temperatures, naujaat also resides on the canadian shield and has a very thin layer of topsoil over bedrock, known as arctic tundra. according to the 2016 census, there are approximately 1,082 people living in the community of naujaat, 47.7 percent of whom are female, and 52.3 percent of whom are male (statistics canada, 2016). the population has increased of 14.5 percent since the 2011 census (n = 925; statistics canada, 2011). the median age of residents in naujaat is 18.2 years, making it the youngest population base within this study. even with a young population, the majority of individuals (93%) identify their mother berge: pedagogical pathways for indigenous business education doi: https://doi.org/ 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.9374 8 tongue as inuktitut. english is spoken by 90 percent of the population alongside inuktitut (city data.com, 2017). as part of this project, seven individuals in naujaat associated with the co-operative, including a manager, members of the board of directors, and staff. with 110 individual film clips totaling over 51 gb of hd video recordings, this project was able to capture a significant amount of raw video from the community for data analysis. for a number of years, naujaat maintained a single store, the northern store. in 1968, the co-operative retail store opened in the community (arctic co-operatives ltd., 2007c). from 1968 until now, the cooperative has expanded its services for the community: we have quite a few business entities. we have a retail store, a 20-room hotel. we have a convenience store and restaurant. we are the agent for the local airline, calm air. we run the gas station and fuel delivery. we do construction. we have about 10 to 12 rental units that we rent out to various governments and teachers. (naujaat interview #1, 2017; theme: cooperatives act as links between community and their economic activities) much like old crow, naujaat found a need to involve themselves in the transportation industry by working with calm air. by establishing a link to the airline industry, naujaat maintains its supply lines and connection to the south. it should be noted that, due to the terrain found in naujaat, the community has the smallest runway in the north, making it exceedingly difficult to land in the area. in addition to the link to the airline, the co-operative in naujaat works with arctic co-operatives limited to bring in supplies twice a year via sea freight. freight service to co-op stores in the north is a major factor in our business. nunavut sealink and supply incorporated (nssi) was established in the year 2000. nssi is a partnership formed by arctic co-operatives limited, desgagnes transarctik inc., qikiqtaaluk corporation, sakku investments corporation, and kitikmeot corporation to provide door-to-door transportation and supply services in nunavut. each of our 32 co-ops is owned by its members—who collectively own 37.5% of nunavut sealink and supply inc. profits from this business are returned to members through arctic co-ops’ patronage dividends. the main services are product supply and sea freight that include warehousing, product sales, maritime packaging, containerization, sale and repair of containers, transportation of all commodities, and cargo insurance. (arctic co-operatives ltd., 2007a, para. 1; theme: co-operatives act as links between community and their economic activities) the link to a transportation industry is not the only similarity between old crow and naujaat. much like old crow, the people in naujaat feel the co-operative offers the community more than a standard store found in the southern part of canada. it provides for the needs of the community including jobs, housing, and sponsorship for community programs. seeing how the co-op fits in the community. how they give back to the community. different things they are providing. obviously, jobs for the locals. they also have housing out there. many different things in the different community they sponsor. that they offer. they try to make available. they try to make the community better. (naujaat interview #3, 2017; theme: cooperatives act as links between community and their economic activities) the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1 published by scholarship@western 9 while the co-operative was seen as giving back to the community the discussion on human resource issues provided information on the need to understand cultural differences within the community: there are many culture differences that you must adjust to. some are easy to adjust to; some are very hard. you have to be very sensitive. coming from a southern atmosphere retail business it’s quite a bit different. you have to open your mind to so many different changes. i love the community. i love the people. i wish to stay because of the people. the people make it better. i have been to some places down south that you are just a guy, that has a tie on, that goes to work and you’re a number. here you’re somebody. the people respect you and you give respect back. they make your day better, especially the elders. the elders in the north are some of the most wonderful people i have ever met. people can make it or break it, but in this community they make it. (naujaat interview #1, 2017; theme: business skills within community need to be developed) the need for the co-operative to interact with the community requires skills development beyond traditional business acumen. as indicated by interviewees, there is a need for both business skills and a sense of the community: “the co-operative management needs good business skills and a sense of community responsibility” (co-op staff member interview, 2017; theme: business skills need to include cultural components as co-ops represent cultural economic expressions). to develop these business skills and sense of community, staff and managers outlined the need for linkages between different communities: “visit other communities to learn from their success and mistakes. be part of a larger community of co-ops. get involved in co-op committees, events, initiatives” (co-op member interview, 2017; theme: business skills need to include cultural components as co-ops represent cultural economic expressions). ulukhaktok, northwest territories—inuit the traditional spelling of ulukhaktok is ulukhaqtuuq and is translated to “the place where ulu parts are found.” an ulu, ᐅᓗ, is a traditional crescent-shaped, all-purpose knife used for skinning and cleaning animals, cutting hair, food preparation, and as a weapon. ulukhaktok does go by many names including holman and ulu. ulukhaktok is home to 396 people. the climate in ulukhaktok is much like naujaat with an average high temperature of -8.1°c (17.6°f) and a low of -15.5 °c (5°f), with temperatures reaching below -30° c (-22°f) in the winter months (environment canada, 2014). as with the climate, the topography of ulukhaktok is similar to naujaat; the two communities both reside near the arctic circle with ulu enjoying full day sun in july. the people who live in ulukhaktok’s climate and topography have a median age of 28.4 years, putting the population in the middle of the three communities studied (statistics canada, 2016). english is the language most often spoken at home by 390 of the 396 residents of ulu (statistics canada, 2016). the language spoken and identified as the mother tongue by 130 of the residents of ulu is known as inuinnaqtun (inunvialuktun; statistics canada, 2016). while in ulukhaktok as part of this project, we were able to interview five individuals associated with the co-operative, producing 91 video clips and a total of 26.4 gb of hd film. berge: pedagogical pathways for indigenous business education doi: https://doi.org/ 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.9374 10 the co-operative in ulu was founded in 1961, making it one of the oldest co-operatives in the study (arctic co-operatives ltd., interview, 2007b). much like naujaat and old crow’s co-operatives, the cooperative members in ulu focused on the role the co-operative plays in the community: it feels a lot better to serve in a co-operative environment as opposed to a company where you send all your profits out to shareholders in other countries and things like that. to be able to be in a community that is as isolated as it is, it is difficult to have the stability of regular income and regular price food these kinds of things. to be in a business that does what it can to put it back into the community, that is the biggest benefit. (ulukhaktok interview #1, 2017; theme: cooperatives act as links between community and their economic activities) “it makes me feel good that i am now working with them as a board member trying to help out the rest of the community” (ulukhaktok interview #4, 2017; theme: co-operatives act as links between community and their economic activities). other similarities between the co-operatives include the involvement in multiple sectors within the local economy, including transportation. aklak air maintains a strong relationship with ulukhaktok’s cooperative—the co-operative acts as the airline’s agent. ulukhaktok’s co-operative, similar to old crow and naujaat, also operates the local hotel and restaurant. one unique sector that ulukhaktok operates in is telecommunications, which provides 45 cable channels to the community. we have the retail operations here where we sell everything from food to snowmobiles, furs, guns, bikes, absolutely everything we can get that people want. whenever people are looking for new things we try to bring it in however we can. we have the hotel and the restaurant that are doing fantastic. we have cable tv with 45 channels. we do the post office, which is in the co-op store. we are the agent for aklak air, so we are out at the airport three times a week for them. doing bookings here at the co-op as well. (ulukhaktok interview #1, 2017; theme: business skills within community need to be developed) the multiple sectors in which the co-operative operates provide unique opportunities and challenges for the co-operative and community. in addition, ulukhaktok maintains two competing firms, a northern store and a convenience store. it is, however, the co-operative that offers multiple services over and above basic retail. the distinction between community and co-operative does become blurred in the eyes of board members and management as they see the two entities as somewhat interchangeable: “the decisions that you make can impact the co-op or the community. either good or bad. your voice can be heard and you can make an impact on the co-op and your community” (ulukhaktok interview #4, 2017; theme: business skills need to include cultural components as co-ops represent cultural economic expressions). the voice that the community members sought to hear in the co-operative, however, was the local language to include more people from the community: “more people that can speak the local language so you can have better interaction with elders and not just the young people”(co-op member #3 interview, 2017; theme: business skills need to include cultural components as coops represent cultural economic expressions). in addition to the co-operative using the traditional language, the membership indicated a need for cultural training for management: “proper training for management and the employees. i believe that management should go through a ‘culture day’ to better understand the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1 published by scholarship@western 11 the community and the people, culture and lifestyle”(co-op member #2 interview, 2017; theme: business skills within community need to be developed). to provide this cultural training, there was an emphasis on direct learning pathways such as on-the-job training, and direct observation with limited lecture-style education: “allow younger people to observe, teaching people new skills, give a good, not toolong, lecture [or] presentation with examples” (co-op member #3 interview, 2017; theme: business skills within community need to be developed). discussion this participatory research project with three indigenous communities in the arctic revealed the following themes related to their experiences with community co-operatives: a. co-operatives act as links between community and their economic activities. b. business skills within the community need to be developed. c. business skills need to include cultural components as co-ops represent cultural economic expressions. co-operatives act as links between community and their economic activities throughout the cases presented in this study, community co-operatives acted as links between community needs and economic activities to meet those needs. as seen in all three case studies, each community has established a management structure over their supply chains through purchasing shares in transportation industries that service their communities. these share purchases gave the communities the authority to override traditional economic activities focused on profit maximization in order to create a secure supply chain. the ability of the co-operatives to link community needs to economic activities is a key component in the reinhabitation process for these communities. business skills within the community need to be developed in order to ensure the reinhabitation process is successful, however, the economic activities must be managed with effective business skills. as discussed in this article, the traditional business curriculum lacks indigenous content, or the content is included through an “add and stir” approach, that is not representative of the place-based challenges faced by these communities. it is thus important to build business skills within communities to ensure the place-based nature of business operations are considered. the rural and remote place-based nature of these communities has the co-operatives offering multiple services from transportation, telecommunications, retail, fuel, housing, and others that require a broad spectrum of business skills. business skills need to include cultural components as co-ops represent cultural economic expressions given that place-based business skills are required within these communities and that these business skills lead to economic activities that represent community expression, there needs to be a cultural component to business skills education for these communities’ business leaders. as a result of the need berge: pedagogical pathways for indigenous business education doi: https://doi.org/ 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.9374 12 for a cultural component or understanding incorporated into business activities, there is a need for business education to include local cultural understandings. managing a symbiotic relationship between co-operative and community requires education that includes place-based knowledge. the history, geographic location, isolation, environment, and culture of the community must be understood to effectively manage an economic actor within this environment. as was seen in the old crow case study, when these characteristics are not incorporated into the management of a local business, traditional economic motivations override community need. in the case of old crow, the community was left without a grocery store for six months, leaving the community without access to healthful foods. the co-operatives within these communities represent more than just a supplier of goods and services; these co-operatives represent a means to reinhabit place in order to pursue social action that improves the social and ecological life of the community. economic action by the co-operative is seen as a means of community development in opposition to traditional social, political, and economic motivations and activities that do not incorporate an understanding of place. as each of the communities involved in this research is extremely isolated, the inability of a globalized market economy being able to effectively meet the community’s needs is clearly evident. the cooperatives formed in response to community opposition to the mainstream economic system and perceived market failures, which allowed the co-operatives to take over the management of resources that were seen as being mishandled by the previous system. the co-operative represents a community response that creates a pathway to learning that is not based on conventional business educational practice. community members see a new way of understanding economic actions within their community and developed a co-operative business based on this new understanding. the new understanding of business includes the incorporation of traditional activities, such as hunting, fishing, and trapping, on traditional lands to supplement the co-operative business operations. this inclusion of traditional economic actions helps create the mixed economy of the north, which requires a cultural understanding in business practice. as a result, a symbiotic relationship between co-operative and community must develop to incorporate cultural, traditional economic actions. the symbiotic relationship between co-operative and community needs to be encouraged as a component of a community development plan that allows for reinhabitation of place. the co-operative provides a means for the community to plan for their future, incorporating many and varied businesses to meet the needs of the community it serves. to ensure an educational pathway for future business leaders within this symbiotic system, a pedagogy of place “must address the specificities of the experiences, problems, languages, and histories that communities rely upon to construct a narrative of collective identity and possible transformation” (mclaren & giroux, 1990, p. 263). this pathway would allow the community to respond to its economic and natural environment through effective resource management, moving away from traditional understanding of primary business goals such as profit maximization. unlike the current business educational pathway that focuses on profit maximization and shareholder value, this place-based pedagogical pathway would incorporate existing indigenous knowledge of place to effectively manage local resources for these isolated communities. as seen in this study, by not incorporating an understanding of place in the business activities of an economic actor, the community is left to the whims of a system focused on profit. all three communities faced intermittent supply chain interruptions or removal of profits from community, hampering the community’s ability to plan for their future. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1 published by scholarship@western 13 this economic empowerment allows communities to consider what they want their community to become (the narrative of the community) through the goods and services the co-operative supplies. in the case of old crow, the co-operative has allowed the community to begin planning to build a winter road1 to better serve their community’s needs. it is not even the action, but the planning, the visioning, and the dreaming that helps to define a community. without a symbiotic relationship between the economic actors within a community and the community itself, it is not possible for communities to see themselves as empowered to dream and plan for the future. the basic democratic nature of cooperatives allows these communities to have a say in the economic activities of the organization. cooperatives operate on a one member, one vote principle that ensures membership is the driver of economic activities and shareholders and their capital interests. the business operations of the community co-operatives represent civic participation and social action by these communities. williams (2001) presented the following equation in his book: “place + people = politics” (p. 3). the relationship between place and the people inhabiting it form the political reality. it is suggested here that economics be added to the equation. thus, place + people = politics + economics represents communities, in situ,2 finding the means to govern themselves and manage their resources to ensure a sustainable ecology. it is the incorporation of the economics of resource management into williams’ equation that lead us to the need to oppose the existing assumptions in the education system that support individualistic and nationalistic competition in the global economic in favour of cooperative, local action for community development: “place-based pedagogies are needed so that the education of citizens might have some direct bearing on the wellbeing of the social and ecological places people actually inhabit” (gruenewald, 2008, p. 309). as will be shown in the next sections, freire’s (1998) critical pedagogy of the oppressed placed in an arctic rural context leads us to a revision of williams’ place + people = politics to include economics that supports, and further emphasizes, gruenewald’s critical pedagogy of place within rural and remote communities emphasizing social transformation and reinhabitation of place. thus, by opposing the current economic paradigm that focuses on individual needs, these communities establish co-operatives that add economic action in order to developing a stronger symbiotic relationship with place. the specific management and governance skills are required in order for the community co-operatives to provide economic empowerment. crome and o'connor (2016) suggest that skills in these areas alone are not enough to manage a co-operative; co-operation is a core virtue. in a genuine system of cooperation, people see the virtues associated with it as part of their deepest sense of themselves, and these virtues are what ties them to their community with enduring bonds of mutual support. these cooperation skills are “fundamentally different from the ‘social skills’ that serve the short-term interests at issue in temporary contracts that hold sway in what is nowadays known as ‘team-working’” (crome & o'connor, 2016, p. 30). given that co-operative members within these isolated communities need these management and governance skills, they first need educational pathways that will fulfill these requirements. as with any 1 isolated communities in canada’s north lack paved roads, so snow is pilled and compacted to make temporary roads, called winter roads, to enable transport trucks to access the community, allowing for less expensive shipping of products to the community. 2 meaning in their original place. berge: pedagogical pathways for indigenous business education doi: https://doi.org/ 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.9374 14 business firm, building the necessary skill set in these areas is an ongoing process. what is unique about these arctic communities is their need to not only develop training plans for management and governance, but to create cultural development education tools that encourage the training of “culture workers” within their economic activities (freire, 1998). cultural development tools are needed to integrate the co-operatives’ management and governance activities into the community culture and community narrative. the co-operative business represents a key economic actor within the community that is governed by the community and is a key part of the community’s story. this symbiotic relationship between an economic actor and the community emphasizes the need for cultural development training within the co-operative. the business activities of the co-operative need to focus on community development, including cultural economic expression. unlike standard firms that focus on profit, the co-operatives’ actors in these arctic communities help to define the community. it is difficult for the managers of these co-operatives to effectively meet the needs of their communities if they lack an educational pathway to understand and meet those needs. simple economic actions focused on individual profit maximization are insufficient to address the symbiotic relationship between the coop, the community, and the place. managers and directors of the co-operative interact with community leaders and, in some cases serve in both roles, making the need for political and cultural understanding all the greater. post-secondary institutions do not currently teach the relevant business skills to meet the needs of these communities, including cultural and political content. courses on cultural heritage, placebased history, or even the nature of rural or northern life would assist in building a better understanding of the role of business in these communities. reliance on an understanding of capitalist economic theory focused on profit is a contradiction for these rural and remote arctic communities and, as a result, community action through co-operative development supplants this goal. the co-operatives’ economic actions lead to a need for education in relation to place, of which culture is a key component for these communities. the development of expertise within the ecosystem of these communities is needed, as opposed to the individual-focused business paradigm currently being taught in most postsecondary institutions. business leaders must be capable of managing under the influence of place, which can galvanize people in political and economic action aimed at community development. to ensure the social and ecological sustainability of these co-operatives and the wide range of services that they offer, an educational pedagogy of place must be developed and form the basis for business education for these communities. the isolated nature of these communities does make interaction with post-secondary educational institutions difficult. standard delivery methods such as in-class lectures and seminars, or even distance education, would be ineffective in delivering a place-based businesses education to people in these communities. the development of a knowledge-sharing exchange program between post-secondary institutions and indigenous communities could be an effective way to impart the place-based business education needed. students from isolated communities and urban centres could trade places for a semester. the students could video record their reflections in order to share their experiences with a wider audience, including their fellow students. a student perspective would encourage knowledge dissemination to future business leaders through a peer-to-peer format rather than a traditional lecture format. this form of student exchange would lead to a better understanding of the role of business in isolated communities and the need to include a cultural component to business studies that does not currently exist in traditional business schools. this would require a partnership between communities and post-secondary institutions to assist in the successful placement and education of students. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 1 published by scholarship@western 15 the results of this study point to a need to further understand the cultural sensitivities that a community-based business must consider when working for and with the community it serves. within these rural and remote northern communities, the co-operative businesses take on multiple serviceprovider roles, making them a key actor, not only in the economic activity of the community, but in the social and cultural life of the community. further study into the integration and interaction of these firms into indigenous communities is needed in order to provide educational and business tools guided by a place-based pedagogical pathway that are best suited to the community’s needs. policy recommendations as a community development organization, arctic co-operatives limited and other community cooperatives need to work together in partnership with post-secondary institutions to develop business education curricula that include a place-based cultural component in order to enhance the cultural economic expression of the community through its co-operative. each co-operative is an autonomous entity that is owned and operated by the indigenous community, which means that the membership of the co-operative would ensure that local, indigenous people’s needs are met. each community cooperative would work with a post-secondary institution through arctic co-operatives limited, as their federated service co-operative, to develop a business educational exchange program that would meet their community’s specific needs. the community co-operatives would take the lead in identifying the community’s needs. the post-secondary institution would provide academic support and direction for the program, and arctic co-operatives limited would assist with the logistics of the program, given their expertise in this area. it would be detrimental to treat arctic community co-operatives like a standard firm requiring standard business education to function properly. these arctic co-operatives are economic expressions of culture within the community, which are based in a rural and remote environment. a business educational policy that builds business skills at the local level is required to ensure that the place-based cultural component of these co-operatives is not lost. indigenous culture is linked closely to place-based understandings of sustainability and ecology, which means there is a need to develop educational policies that focus on reinhabitation of place, rather than individual profit maximization. encouraging the development of business educational policies that include a focus on place and culture as drivers of cultural economic action will lead future business leaders down a pedagogical path that differs from the existing profit maximizing paradigm of business education. any business educational policy developed for these communities must focus on innovative, local, hands-on approaches to business skills development that include the training of culture workers so that the narrative of the community can be transmitted through economic actions. standard in-class lecture pedagogy does not allow for cultural economic expression, nor does it actively engage young entrepreneurs within community. while business educational policy must ensure that basic business skills such as accounting, marketing, logistics, governance, and entrepreneurship are effectively taught, there is an additional place-based cultural economic expression requirement within these arctic cooperative firms that must be addressed. cultural economic expression must be encouraged at the local level through skills development within the community that focuses on how to live within the community and how to tell the story of the community. teaching basic business skills can readily override cultural expression through the focus on profit. teaching business skills within community and berge: pedagogical pathways for indigenous business education doi: https://doi.org/ 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.1.9374 16 including cultural economic expression as a priority of a business entity will ensure future indigenous entrepreneurs can express their cultural identity based on place while engaging in economic activity with the end goal of reinhabitation. conclusions the vuntut g’witchin first nations community of old crow adopted the co-operative for their community as a means of managing their economic sustainability. money moving out of the community made it difficult for the community to plan for its future and provide quality goods and services for their residents. much like the partnership with air north airline, the partnership with arctic co-operatives limited and vuntut g’witchin first nation looks to build a community rather than take from the community. the partnership aims to tell the economic story of the community, rather than silence the economic ability of the community. the ability of the co-operative model provides democratic economic empowerment to the membership because it allows communities to determine where and how funds will be spent in order to improve their community for future generations. the community of naujaat, nunavut has also developed a strong link between community and the cooperative. members of the co-operative leadership also work as leaders in the local government. the management, directors, and staff of the co-operative see the role of the co-operative as one of providing for the community. that being said, management noted that there are cultural sensitivities that need to be understood to function effectively in the co-operative and the community. the co-operative members and leaders could benefit from training that incorporates cultural sensitivity and an understanding of the significance of the land as a spiritual, social, and cultural connection to the community. as the community, the land, and the co-operative are inextricably linked, it is not reasonable to work in the one without understanding the significance of the other. much like naujaat, ulu presents a picture of a community-focused firm that offers a multitude of services for the community. however, ulu is a small community in comparison to naujaat, which means there is a smaller pool of people who can meet the skill requirements of the co-operative. while the lack of skills capacity has not stopped the co-operative from successfully offering their community multiple services, providing skills training within the community could improve the co-operative’s business and the opportunities available to current residents. the three co-operatives that participated in this study maintain three key ideas or themed categories in common: a. there is a link between the community and the 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(2001). red: passion and patience in the desert. new york, usa: pantheon books. acknowledging and promoting indigenous knowledges, paradigms, and practices within health literacy-related policy and practice documents across australia, canada, and new zealand the international indigenous policy journal volume 10 | issue 3 article 2 july 2019 acknowledging and promoting indigenous knowledges, paradigms, and practices within health literacy-related policy and practice documents across australia, canada, and new zealand gordon robert boot charles darwin university, australia, gordonrboot@gmail.com anne lowell charles darwin university, anne.lowell@cdu.edu.au follow this and additional works at: https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj part of the critical and cultural studies commons, health communication commons, health policy commons, and the public health education and promotion commons this research is brought to you for free and open access by scholarship@western. it has been accepted for inclusion in the international indigenous policy journal by an authorized administrator of scholarship@western. for more information, please contact swingert@uwo.ca. recommended citation boot, g. r . , lowell, a. (2019). acknowledging and promoting indigenous knowledges, paradigms, and practices within health literacy-related policy and practice documents across australia, canada, and new zealand. the international indigenous policy journal, 10(3) . retrieved from: https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8133 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj?utm_source=ir.lib.uwo.ca%2fiipj%2fvol10%2fiss3%2f2&utm_medium=pdf&utm_campaign=pdfcoverpages https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10?utm_source=ir.lib.uwo.ca%2fiipj%2fvol10%2fiss3%2f2&utm_medium=pdf&utm_campaign=pdfcoverpages https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss3?utm_source=ir.lib.uwo.ca%2fiipj%2fvol10%2fiss3%2f2&utm_medium=pdf&utm_campaign=pdfcoverpages https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss3/2?utm_source=ir.lib.uwo.ca%2fiipj%2fvol10%2fiss3%2f2&utm_medium=pdf&utm_campaign=pdfcoverpages https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj?utm_source=ir.lib.uwo.ca%2fiipj%2fvol10%2fiss3%2f2&utm_medium=pdf&utm_campaign=pdfcoverpages http://network.bepress.com/hgg/discipline/328?utm_source=ir.lib.uwo.ca%2fiipj%2fvol10%2fiss3%2f2&utm_medium=pdf&utm_campaign=pdfcoverpages http://network.bepress.com/hgg/discipline/330?utm_source=ir.lib.uwo.ca%2fiipj%2fvol10%2fiss3%2f2&utm_medium=pdf&utm_campaign=pdfcoverpages http://network.bepress.com/hgg/discipline/395?utm_source=ir.lib.uwo.ca%2fiipj%2fvol10%2fiss3%2f2&utm_medium=pdf&utm_campaign=pdfcoverpages http://network.bepress.com/hgg/discipline/395?utm_source=ir.lib.uwo.ca%2fiipj%2fvol10%2fiss3%2f2&utm_medium=pdf&utm_campaign=pdfcoverpages http://network.bepress.com/hgg/discipline/743?utm_source=ir.lib.uwo.ca%2fiipj%2fvol10%2fiss3%2f2&utm_medium=pdf&utm_campaign=pdfcoverpages acknowledging and promoting indigenous knowledges, paradigms, and practices within health literacy-related policy and practice documents across australia, canada, and new zealand abstract enhancing health literacy can empower individuals and communities to take control over their health as well as improve safety and quality in healthcare. however, indigenous health studies have repeatedly suggested that conceptualisations of health literacy are confined to western knowledge, paradigms, and practices. the exploratory qualitative research design selected for this study used an inductive content analysis approach and systematic iterative analysis. publicly available health literacy-related policy and practice documents originating from australia, canada, and new zealand were analysed to explore the extent to which and the ways in which indigenous knowledges are recognised, acknowledged, and promoted. findings suggest that active promotion of indigenous-specific health knowledges and approaches is limited and guidance to support recognition of such knowledges in practice is rare. given that health services play a pivotal role in enhancing health literacy, policies and guidelines need to ensure that health services appropriately address and increase awareness of the diverse strengths and needs of indigenous peoples. the provision of constructive support, resources, and training opportunities is essential for indigenous knowledges to be recognised and promoted within health services. ensuring that indigenous communities have the opportunity to autonomously conceptualise health literacy policy and practice is critical to decolonising health care. keywords aboriginal, australia, canada, health literacy, health policy, health promotion, indigenous, indigenous knowledges, new zealand acknowledgments charles darwin university, vice-chancellor's office for providing the vice-chancellor's international high achiever's scholarship, which contributed financially towards successful completion of the honours research degree. robyn williams, college of health and human sciences, charles darwin university for serving as deputy supervisor and providing guidance and critical feedback on approach, study design, and findings. sharon k. chirgwin, menzies school of health research for providing structural support and formatting of the article. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. this research is available in the international indigenous policy journal: https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss3/2 http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss3/2?utm_source=ir.lib.uwo.ca%2fiipj%2fvol10%2fiss3%2f2&utm_medium=pdf&utm_campaign=pdfcoverpages acknowledging and promoting indigenous knowledges, paradigms, and practices within health literacy-related policy and practice documents across australia, canada, and new zealand the health promotion sector is increasingly recognising that developing and improving individual, population, and provider health literacy (hl) is an important and effective strategy to enhance health and wellbeing, as well as to improve safety and quality in healthcare (australian commission on safety and quality in health care [acsqh], 2014; centre for literacy, 2011; johnson, 2014). integral to hl is the capability of individuals and the wider community to take active control and participate in addressing their healthcare needs (acsqh, 2014, johnson, 2014, nutbeam, 2008). health outcomes can be improved through hl competencies that enable self-care and self-advocacy, development of mutual trusting relationships with health professionals, more effective access to and navigation of the healthcare system, as well as the ability of service providers to communicate effectively (paasche-orlow & wolf, 2007, sørensen et al., 2012). recent studies have highlighted that inclusion and promotion of indigenous health knowledges within health promotion practices can enhance overall indigenous health outcomes through mutual recognition of differing worldviews (smylie, kaplan-myrth, mcshane & métis nation of ontario-ottawa, 2008; vass, mitchell, & dhurrkay, 2011), improved health communication (lowell et al., 2012), and through strengthening cultural safety within culturally diverse healthcare systems (rowan et al., 2013; nielsen, alice stuart & gorman, 2014). however, representation of indigenous health knowledges and practices within health literacy-related policy and practice documents does not appear to have been investigated in previous research. the overall purpose of this paper is to present selected findings of a larger study (boot, 2016), which has sought to address this knowledge gap by exploring the extent and means by which indigenous knowledges, paradigms, and practices are recognised, acknowledged, and promoted within hl-related documents across australia, canada, and new zealand. this article focuses on two themes from the findings that have particular relevance: acknowledging cultural beliefs, practices, and norms, and promotion of indigenous cultural health knowledges, paradigms, and practices (boot, 2016). the next section of this article explores definitions and context encompassing indigenous health and health literacy. the methods section describes in detail the exploratory research approach, document selection, and content analysis process. the findings section illustrates prominent examples from within the two themes that are represented within this article. the relevance and implications of these findings are further explored in the concluding discussion, and recommendations for future research are presented. background many countries, including australia, canada, and new zealand, are considered to have world-class healthcare systems (organisation for economic co-operation and development, 2017). extensive efforts are made by governments and the health promotion sector to improve overall health and quality of life outcomes within these populations (organisation for economic co-operation and development, 2017). the majority of people living within these countries have reasonably good health and enjoy an average life expectancy of 78 to 82 years of age (australian bureau of statistics [abs], 2015b; statistics canada, 2015; statistics new zealand, 2015). all three countries have a similarly rich history of 1 boot and lowell: indigenous knowledges within health literacy policy documents published by scholarship@western, 2019 indigenous cultures, knowledges, and languages, but life expectancy for many indigenous people within these countries remains significantly lower, ranging from 69 to 80 years of age, in comparison with the national average (abs, 2015a; statistics canada, 2015; statistics new zealand, 2015). the health inequities indigenous people experience today are predominantly linked to the effects of colonisation and persistently unfavourable social determinants (dudgeon, milroy & walker, 2014; griffiths, coleman, lee & madden, 2016; sherwood, 2013). governments and frontline health services aim to overcome these inequities by developing and implementing a variety of policies, strategies, and evidence-based approaches. defining health literacy the concept of health literacy originates from the field of education and has in recent years expanded to include a wide range of skills and knowledges. health literacy is commonly defined as the abilities and skills of an individual or community to access, appraise, and communicate health-related information, to navigate and engage with the healthcare system, and to advocate and maintain personal and community health and wellbeing (centre for literacy, 2011; nutbeam, 2000; sørensen et al., 2012; world health organisation, 2016a). governments and scholars advocate that developing and enhancing hl within populations supports the process of empowerment thereby enabling the individual, community, and society to take control over their healthcare needs and engage in collective action to promote health (acsqh, 2014; estacio, 2013; freedman et al., 2009; johnson, 2014; kickbusch, 2009; ministry of health, 2015; mitic & rootman, 2012; nutbeam, 2008; sykes, wills, rowlands, & popple, 2013). health literacy skills develop across the lifespan, are context specific, and influenced by social, cultural, and political contexts (centre for literacy, 2011; kickbusch, wait, & maag 2006; mitic & rootman, 2012; paasche-orlow & wolf, 2007; vass et al., 2011; zarcadoolas, pleasant, & greer, 2005). zarcadoolas et al. (2005), for example, asserted that cultural health literacy needs to be inherent within health literacy models. this is defined as having “the ability to recognize and use collective beliefs, customs, world-view and social identity in order to interpret and act on health information” (p. 197). in addition, ewen (2011) argued that health professionals need to obtain and effectively utilise cultural literacy skills in order for them to be culturally competent in their service delivery. cultural literacy is considered a skill-set that encompasses awareness, respect, and responsiveness to cultural differences and needs (ewen, 2011). these abilities become critical within culturally diverse healthcare environments where worldviews, values, approaches to communication, and conceptualisations of health and wellbeing differ significantly from those endorsed by the dominant culture. more recent conceptualisations of hl are increasingly recognising the significance and complexity of the health literacy environment: that is, “the infrastructure, policies, processes, materials, people and relationships that make up the health system and have an impact on the way in which people access, understand, appraise and apply health-related information and services” (acsqh, 2014, p. 10). the global conference on health promotion in shanghai in 2016 also identified hl as a critical social determinant of health that needs to be developed and strengthened within populations (world health organisation, 2016b). enhancing hl skills within indigenous populations, however, requires sophisticated cultural literacy and a collaborative, comprehensive, and empathetic approach 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3 [2019], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8133 due to the diversity in worldviews, perceptions of health and wellbeing, as well as complex sociocultural factors (ewen, 2011; smylie, williams & cooper, 2006; vass et al., 2011). indigenous concepts of health and wellbeing indigenous populations across and within each of the three countries that are the focus of this article (australia, canada, and new zealand) are diverse in terms of languages and their physical environment (urban, rural, level of remoteness, and climate), as well as political and social relationships, ancestral heritage, and cultural knowledges and practices (dudgeon et al., 2014; greaves, houkamau & sibley, 2015; stephenson, 1995). although indigenous peoples share some common health beliefs, their health knowledges and healing practices are diverse due to the unique social, cultural, political, and environmental circumstances within which they have developed and continue to exist (dudgeon et al., 2014; durie, 1994). despite this diversity, indigenous people across all three countries tend to regard health and wellbeing as a holistic, multidimensional, and interconnected concept that cannot be separated from other aspects or fragmented into distinguishable individual units (durie, 1994; morgan, slade & morgan, 1997; stephens, porter, nettleton & willis, 2006). health and wellbeing incorporates physical, psychological, social, ecological, spiritual, and cultural aspects and is sustained by nurturing and attending to all these relational aspects regularly in an appropriate and meaningful manner (campbell, 2002; durie, 1994; morgan et al., 1997; vukic, gregory, martin-misener & etowa, 2011; wilson, 2008). individual studies within all three countries similarly highlight how positive strengthening and maintaining of those interrelated aspects can provide preventative and long-lasting health benefits (colles, maypilama & brimblecombe, 2014; dockery, 2010; hopkirk & wilson, 2014; lambert et al., 2014; lowell, kildea, liddle, cox & paterson, 2015; smylie et al., 2008; wilson, 2008). previous research addressing indigenous health concerns have identified hl-related barriers and challenges including racism, communication and language barriers, poor relationships, and culturally associated misconceptions (durey & thompson, 2012; lambert et al., 2014; lowell et al., 2015; vass et al., 2011). such challenges can significantly obstruct access to and provision of effective primary healthcare services, inevitably influencing health outcomes (lambert et al., 2014). the need for healthcare systems to adequately acknowledge and incorporate indigenous health knowledges within health promotion practices has also been identified (hopkirk & wilson, 2014; liaw et al., 2011; lowell et al., 2015; nielsen et al., 2014; priest, mackean, davis, briggs & waters, 2012; rowan et al., 2013; vass et al., 2011). incorporating and promoting indigenous knowledges within an indigenous healthcare environment has the potential to strengthen culturally safe practices and opportunities for self-determination, enhance health communication, and to foster relationships that are built on trust and mutual respect (colles et al., 2014; dockery, 2010, hopkirk & wilson, 2014; lambert et al., 2014, lowell et al., 2015). however, the majority of current conceptualisations of hl are commonly confined to western pedagogies and paradigms. as such, they frequently disregard the significance of indigenous cultures, languages, and knowledges as strengths, with potential health benefits (akena, 2012; barwin, 2012; durey & thompson, 2012; lambert et al., 2014; priest et al., 2012; sherwood, 2013; smylie et al., 2006; vass et al., 2011). 3 boot and lowell: indigenous knowledges within health literacy policy documents published by scholarship@western, 2019 ingleby (2012) suggested that every person has some form of hl that is intrinsic to their personal and cultural beliefs. enhancing hl within diverse populations can therefore only be achieved when distinctive personal and cultural beliefs are taken into account and appropriately acted upon (ingleby, 2012). indigenous concepts of holistic health and associated knowledges and practices have developed over millennia, ensuring individual and community survival, health, and well-being prior to colonisation and beyond. for example, indigenous-specific hl includes knowledges and practices related to bush medicines and sourcing traditional food (ewen, 2011) and the interconnectedness of language, physical, emotional, environmental, and spiritual aspects that as a whole contribute to health and wellbeing among first nation people (smylie et al., 2006). methods research approach the aim of this study was to explore the ways in which indigenous knowledges and practices are recognised, acknowledged, and promoted within hl-related policy and practice documents originating from australia, canada, and new zealand. as no previous studies on this topic were identified, an exploratory qualitative research design was considered appropriate to achieve the aim of this study. the research approach was informed by critical theory (denzin & lincoln, 2011) and used inductive content analysis methods (cho & lee, 2014; mayring, 2000). the aim of inquiry from a critical theory perspective, used within this study, is to identify and critically consider existing culturally dominant structures that may influence the ways in which indigenous knowledges, paradigms, and practices are acknowledged and promoted within hl-related policy and practice documents. critical theory emphasises that the present reality needs to be understood within context of historical events (such as the history and legacy of colonisation) as these have shaped the current existing social, political, cultural, economic, ethnic, and gender values and power relationships (denzin & lincoln, 2011). these existing values significantly influence how social determinants, including hl, are perceived by individuals and cultural groups within culturally and linguistically diverse environments, and which affect overall health and wellbeing. data selection publicly available health literacy policy and related practice documents originating from australia, canada, and new zealand were identified from a 10-year period, ranging from january 2005 until december 2015. the majority of these documents were sourced through the broader public internet domain, using search engines google and yahoo, in addition to websites from governments and relevant primary healthcare organisations. this approach was appropriate for identifying relevant policy documents and resources that are less likely to be located through searches of academic databases. the search terms used were “australia,” “canada,” or “new zealand” combined with “health literacy” and “policy” or “framework” or “guidelines” or “action plan” or “position statement.” a systematic screening of the first 200 search results was conducted. an additional search specific to australia and canada was also conducted in order to capture region-specific hl relevant documents. within this process the countries were replaced with either a state, province, or territory, such as “western australia” or “northern territory,” and “british columbia” or “new brunswick,” and the first 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3 [2019], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8133 100 search results were reviewed. from these reviews additional relevant documents were also identified. documents were purposefully selected when these influenced, explicitly articulated, or implied concepts and approaches related to hl in health services and programs in australia, canada, and new zealand. selected documents included strategic plans, policies, frameworks, initiatives, guidelines, policy-related reports, and discussion papers. hl-related promotion materials for service providers were only included when these were specifically cited or promoted within policy and related documents, and they considered relevant to the research question. health promotion materials needed to provide references on aspects such as indigenous knowledges, practices, and languages, or service-provider cultural competencies within an indigenous health context in order to be included within the study. the selected documents were divided into two groups. the first group comprised governance documents, as in policies, strategic plans, frameworks, action plans, or guidelines that explicitly influence operational processes of health services. supportive documents, such as discussion papers, reports, resources, and promotion materials, comprised the second group. these were included when they connected to relevant governance documents and specifically addressed hl concerns of indigenous peoples. the majority of documents within the selected study sample originated from australia, followed by canada and new zealand (see table 1). additionally, the majority of selected documents addressed indigenous populations either directly or had substantial chapters or references on indigenous-specific health topics. documents addressing the general population, for example national strategies and frameworks, were also included to broaden and diversify the study sample (see table 2). data analysis an in-depth analysis of 107 systematically selected documents was conducted in order to explore the extent and ways in which indigenous health knowledges are recognised, acknowledged, and promoted within key hl-related policy and practice documents. the number and type of documents selected for this study are highlighted in table 3. these documents were analysed with the assistance of qsr (2012) nvivio10 software. this study applied an inductive qualitative content analysis approach (cho & lee, 2014; mayring, 2000) using a systematic iterative analysis of hl-related documents included within the study sample. all relevant documents were analysed and coded to identify emerging themes, and illustrative quotes were selected related to key themes (cho & lee, 2014; mayring, 2000). the frequent implementation of feedback loops when reviewing the data made certain that the emerging codes, categories, or themes were revised and if necessary amended (see figure 1), and it also ensured accuracy and trustworthiness within the process (mayring, 2000). 5 boot and lowell: indigenous knowledges within health literacy policy documents published by scholarship@western, 2019 table 1. number of documents by country of origin total australia canada new zealand n0 = 107 n1 = 47 n2 = 32 n3 = 28 100% 44% 30% 26% figure 1. step model of inductive theme development adapted from mayring (2000). research question determination of category of the main theme definition (criterion of selection) and levels of abstraction for inductive categories, themes, and sub-themes. step-by-step formulation of inductive themes and sub-themes out of the analysed material, regarding category of theme definitions and level of abstraction. reintroducing old themes and sub-themes or formulating new ones. revision of categories, after 10%-50% of the material final working through the text interpretation of results and extraction of key quotes from documents that illustrate the identified themes and sub-themes, and which highlight similarities or differences. formative check of accuracy and trustworthiness summative check of accuracy and trustworthiness 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3 [2019], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8133 table 2. number of documents by population group total specific to indigenous populations general population with substantial reference to indigenous people general population n0 = 107 n1 = 39 n2 = 27 n3 = 39 100% 36% 28% 36% table 3. number of documents within the study sample by type type of document number of documents (n = 107) strategic plan 13 policy 5 frameworks 29 action plan 7 guidelines 7 initiatives or interventions 13 report or discussion paper 20 position statement 4 promotion materials or resources 8 curriculums 1 the process consisted of three distinctive coding waves with the second and third wave including all selected documents. the first wave of coding reviewed one-third of documents within the study sample in order to identify and extract phrases, common topics, themes, and considerations relevant to the research question. the second wave of coding included all selected documents, reviewing and where necessary amending initially identified themes and topics, as some were considered too broad, inconclusive, or irrelevant. the third wave of coding aimed to review the selected themes with regard to consistency and accuracy. this stage also conducted a final clustering of codes into sub-themes and border key themes. expert and peer advice was sought from a number of academics with experience in indigenous health and research practices. one of the advisors identifies as an indigenous person from australia (far north queensland) with a background in psychology and clinical sciences. all advisors provided support and feedback during the research process through discussion of the emerging themes and sub-themes and their meaningful presentation, in response to which revisions were made. 7 boot and lowell: indigenous knowledges within health literacy policy documents published by scholarship@western, 2019 findings after an in-depth analysis of the 107 systematically selected hl-related policy and practice documents from australia, new zealand, and canada, six main themes were identified: 1. acknowledging cultural beliefs, practices, and norms; 2. promotion of indigenous cultural health knowledges, paradigms, and practices; 3. accommodating language diversity; 4. cultural responsiveness; 5. participation, self-determination, and sovereignty; and 6. approaches to measuring health literacy (boot, 2016). table 4 highlights the total number of documents for each theme with reference to the intended population group. this article focuses on two of these themes: acknowledging cultural beliefs, practices, and norms; and promotion of indigenous cultural health knowledges, paradigms, and practices. these two themes were selected as examples that best illustrate how indigenous knowledges, paradigms, and practices are recognised, acknowledged, and promoted within hl-related policy and practice documents across the countries investigated. table 4. number of documents by intended population and theme main themes specific to indigenous populations general population with substantial reference to indigenous people general population theme 1: acknowledging cultural beliefs, practices, and norms 26 11 2 theme 2: promotion of indigenous cultural health knowledges, paradigms, and practices 19 3 2 theme 3: accommodating language diversity 17 16 15 theme 4: cultural responsiveness 32 24 19 theme 5: participation, self-determination, and sovereignty 33 27 39 theme 6: approaches to measuring health literacy 3 5 3 total 39 29 39 note. n = 107. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3 [2019], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8133 theme 1: acknowledging cultural beliefs, practices, and norms acknowledgement of cultural beliefs, practices, and norms was evident within 39 documents from across all three countries (see table 5). governance documents originating from australia and new zealand in particular acknowledge and demonstrate substantial recognition of indigenous cultural diversity. in contrast, limited acknowledgement of indigenous cultural diversity was found in governance documents originating from canada. supportive documents, such as reports and discussion papers addressing hl, were instead more likely to highlight issues of indigenous cultural diversity within canada’s population. within this theme, four sub-themes emerged, illustrated in table 6. table 5. number of documents by type and country of origin for theme 1: acknowledging cultural beliefs, practices, and norms document type australia canada new zealand strategic plan 5 1 3 policy 1 0 1 frameworks 3 2 2 action plan 0 0 1 guidelines 0 0 2 initiatives or interventions 0 0 2 report or discussion paper 2 3 5 position statement 0 1 0 promotion materials or resources 2 2 0 curriculums 0 1 0 total within theme (n = 39) 13 10 16 note. n = 107. 9 boot and lowell: indigenous knowledges within health literacy policy documents published by scholarship@western, 2019 table 6. number of documents by sub-theme for theme 1: acknowledging cultural beliefs, practices, and norms sub-theme number of documents (n = 39) 1.1) recognition of indigenous holistic health 34 1.2) indigenous social networks and support systems considered a health resource 14 1.3) indigenous culture and languages considered a health asset 10 1.4) recognition of cultural protocols 4 note. n = 107. sub-theme 1.1: recognition of indigenous holistic health. the most prominent sub-theme identified was the recognition and acknowledgement that many indigenous people view health and wellbeing as a holistic concept (sub-theme 1.1). all levels of health governance from australia, canada, and new zealand are increasingly acknowledging that holistic health concepts are pivotal to many indigenous people and, when integrated within health service delivery, can potentially enhance indigenous health outcomes. recognition of the interconnectedness of physical, social, cultural, emotional, and environmental factors, including language and spiritual connections or relationships, are illustrated by examples below. the framework for comprehensive primary health care services originating from south australia health (2011) illustrates this recognition: the importance of a holistic approach to health (i.e. attending to the physical, spiritual, mental, cultural, emotional and social wellbeing) and their role in contributing to health outcomes for aboriginal peoples; including the environmental determinants of health such as food, water, housing, and unemployment; including the social determinants of health and wellbeing, such as racism, marginalisation, history of dispossession and loss of land and heritage. (south australia health, 2011, p. 5) the example above also indicates a gradual acceptance that indigenous holistic health concepts may extend beyond the commonly identified social determinants to include, for example, deeper spiritual aspects and ancestral connections to a particular country or place of significance. such statements can prompt service providers to consider essential aspects of indigenous health and wellbeing. however, further scrutiny of the core elements within this document revealed no further promotion, support, or guidance on how integration of such indigenous health concepts can be implemented in practice. similar evidence of recognition of comprehensive holistic health concepts can be found within the new zealand government document: rauemi atawhai: a guide to developing health education resources in new zealand (ministry of health, 2012). māori perceive health in a holistic way where good health is dependent on a balance of factors affecting wellbeing. wairua (the spiritual), hinengaro (mental), tinana (physical), te reo rangatira (language) and whānau (family) elements interact to produce actual wellbeing. the 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3 [2019], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8133 wellbeing of te ao tūroa (environment) contributes also. this approach requires that māori health be understood in the context of the social, economic, and cultural position of māori. (p. 28) the canadian report, evaluation of the first nations and inuit home and community care program 2008-2009 to 2011-2012 (health canada & the public health agency of canada, 2013), illustrates how indigenous community-controlled health services recognise and include holistic health aspects within their service delivery. home and community care services that are delivered and managed by communities are more likely to appropriately reflect cultural aspects such as language, holistic nature of services, access to both mainstream and traditional care, and emphasis on traditional diet, lifestyle and relationship to the land. (p. 13) the majority of documents, however, present simplistic, brief, or selective definitions of what comprises indigenous holistic conceptualisations of health. for example, the australian government discussion paper, health literacy: taking action to improve safety and quality, states: “key to addressing health literacy within aboriginal and torres strait islander communities is ensuring that strategies to address literacy and health literacy build on indigenous understandings and perspectives, including language and worldview” (acsqhc, 2014, p. 25). such broad statements provide limited guidance on how to effectively identify and integrate these concepts within services. sub-theme 1.2: indigenous social networks and support systems considered a health resource. the second sub-theme related to the increasing recognition of indigenous social networks and support systems as a beneficial health resource (sub-theme 1.2). documents at all levels of health governance from australia, canada, and new zealand were identified that promote the inclusion of indigenous family and social networks within healthcare. the majority of these documents refer to indigenous family and social networks within the context of understanding health holistically, for example: family and community connectedness are some of the most important factors enabling individuals to recover from the damaging affects (sic) of adversity. family and community connectedness are acknowledged strengths of aboriginal communities. (new south wales health, 2007, p. 5) the role of the doula is to build on the more traditional role of aunty; a lay woman recruited from the community who bridges language and cultural barriers and provides the woman, her partner and family with continuous emotional support, physical comfort and assistance in obtaining information before, during, and just after childbirth. (ministry of health british columbia, 2012, p. 14) involving whānau in support for self-management increases the likelihood that healthy behaviour will be adopted. since family and whānau members are likely to have similar risk factors to the person with the chronic condition, involving family/whānau is a sound preventative approach. (health improvement and innovation resource centre, 2010, p. 8) 11 boot and lowell: indigenous knowledges within health literacy policy documents published by scholarship@western, 2019 however, these documents rarely elaborate on how these relationships and social networks influence health and wellbeing within families, communities, or populations. documents that do cite the significance of family and social relationships acknowledge that a sharing of health-related information is common practice within these relationships and considered important by many indigenous people across all three countries. sub-theme 1.3: indigenous culture and languages considered a health asset & sub-theme 1.4: recognition of cultural protocols. consideration of indigenous culture and languages as a health asset (sub-theme 1.3) was infrequent and recognition of cultural protocols (sub-theme 1.4) was rare within governance and associated supportive documents. however, the importance of a strong cultural identity for indigenous people’s health and the value of local indigenous languages were recognised in some governance documents from all three countries. statements within these documents demonstrate the significance and relevance of cultural awareness with regard to health and wellbeing. in turn, they prompt health services to recognise and accommodate social, cultural, and language factors at a local level, for example: services at the local level should recognise the protective factors of culture, and the strong connection between culture and positive wellbeing, to help improve aboriginal and torres strait islander people’s access to timely and culturally appropriate mental health care. (australian government department of health, 2015, p. 21) the northwest territories attaches a strong value to self-identity, traditional culture, and language, as being important and integral to lifelong learning. it is reasonable and obvious in the minds of the elders that language is very much a part of who aboriginal people are as people and can only enrich the learning environment as an important asset. (government of the northwest territories, 2008, p. 65) māori perceive health in a holistic way where good health is dependent on a balance of factors affecting wellbeing. wairua (the spiritual), hinengaro (mental), tinana (physical), te reo rangatira (language) and whānau (family) elements interact to produce actual wellbeing. the wellbeing of te ao tūroa (environment) contributes also. this approach requires that māori health be understood in the context of the social, economic, and cultural position of māori. (ministry of health, 2012, p. 28) the premises were blessed by our kaumatua before it re-opened. (cultural literacy is an important contributor to health literacy). (new zealand guidelines group, 2011, p. 30) theme 2: promotion of indigenous cultural health knowledges, paradigms, and practices active and consistent promotion of indigenous cultural health knowledges, paradigms, and practices was found to be less substantial within hl-related policy and practice documents when compared to the acknowledgement of cultural beliefs, practices, and norms. only 24 documents within the sample promoted an inclusion of indigenous knowledges, paradigms, and practices in health services, acknowledging their significance to culturally competent health literacy environments as well as potentially having long-term health benefits. table 7 highlights the number of documents by country of 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3 [2019], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8133 origin. the theme promotion of indigenous cultural health knowledges, paradigms, and practices is comprised of five sub-themes (see table 8). table 7. number of documents by country of origin for theme 2: promotion of indigenous cultural health knowledges, paradigms, and practices document type australia canada new zealand strategic plan 2 0 1 policy 1 0 0 frameworks 3 0 0 guidelines 1 0 1 initiatives or interventions 0 1 0 report or discussion paper 1 3 4 promotion materials or resources 1 5 0 total within theme (n = 24) 9 9 6 note. n = 107. table 8. number of documents by sub-theme for theme 2: promoting indigenous cultural health knowledges, paradigms, and practices sub-theme number of documents (n = 24) 2.1) acknowledgment and promotion of indigenous paradigms 9 2.2) indigenous healing and medicinal practices 10 2.3) indigenous food practices 8 2.4) indigenous traditional and contemporary cultural practices 7 2.5) indigenous birthing and childrearing practices 2 note. n = 107. the majority of documents represented within these sub-themes were supportive documents, as in reports, discussion papers and resources, and they originated predominantly from canada and new zealand. in contrast, governance documents originated mostly from australia and to some extent from new zealand, but they were underrepresented within this theme. acknowledgment and promotion of indigenous paradigms (sub-theme 2.1) and indigenous healing and medicinal practices (sub-theme 2.2) were identified as the most prominent sub-themes across all types of documents. the promotion of indigenous food-related knowledge and practice (sub-theme 2.3) and traditional and contemporary 13 boot and lowell: indigenous knowledges within health literacy policy documents published by scholarship@western, 2019 cultural practices (sub-theme 2.4) were less frequent. promotion of indigenous birthing and childrearing knowledge and practice (sub-theme 2.5) was only evident within discussion papers: these stated that policies should give more consideration to the issue. sub-theme 2.1: acknowledgment and promotion of indigenous paradigms. some governance documents from australia and new zealand explicitly suggested that service providers working in indigenous healthcare environments should consider incorporating indigenous paradigms and approaches within service delivery. the need to incorporate and build on indigenous worldviews, knowledges, and concepts of health and wellbeing within hl was highlighted within some documents (illustrated in examples provided above). approaches that embrace the principles of self-determination, autonomy, and sovereignty, and that focus primarily on consumer needs rather than provider concerns were also sometimes advocated: key to addressing health literacy within aboriginal and torres strait islander communities is ensuring that strategies to address literacy and health literacy build on indigenous understandings and perspectives, including language and worldview. (acsqh, 2014, p. 25) māori community development models offer another route to wellbeing. these approaches use māori strengths and assets to develop their own initiatives tailored to meet their own health needs. this includes support to develop programmes and interventions that incorporate māori models of health and wellbeing, rongoā (traditional healing) and innovation. services should also be organised around the needs of māori consumers and their whānau rather than the needs of providers. (ministry of health, 2014a, p. 10) sub-theme 2.2: indigenous healing and medicinal practices. inclusion and promotion of indigenous healing and medicinal knowledges and practices were explicitly suggested within some governance documents (strategic plans and frameworks) from australia and new zealand. these documents recognised the importance of such practices and their need to be considered as an integral part of an indigenous holistic view of health and wellbeing. in contrast, emphasis on the utilisation of indigenous healing and medicinal practices was identified only in supportive documents from canada. examples illustrated below highlight the similarity across all three countries with some excerpts providing examples of different indigenous healing and medicinal practices: ngangkari traditional healers have been practising for thousands of years, and are respected by aboriginal communities throughout australia as traditional doctors. ngangkaris play a vital role in shaping the lives of aboriginal people and influencing and managing a person’s spiritual and physical wellbeing. this skill has been passed down to them through their ancestors and in by practising traditional health healing. where aboriginal people request the support of a ngangkari sa health staff must respect the wishes of a patient and facilitate access to a ngangkari. (south australia health, 2010, p. 20) an example of a community-based approach utilizing cultural and spiritual methods as healing practices can be found in alkalki lake, british columbia. dances, ceremonies, and spiritual practices, such as pow-wows, sweetgrass ceremonies, sweat lodges, and drumming circles were used by traditional healers to try and treat the substance-abuse issues of some of its members. (centre for suicide prevention. 2013, para. 4) 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3 [2019], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8133 several of the gps and nurses acknowledged the preference māori often express for natural herbal remedies or traditional māori medicines (rongoā). several provider staff noted the role that such traditional therapies may play in their patients’ wellbeing and were able to negotiate taking western medicines alongside rongoā. (jones et al., 2015, p. 50) includes support to develop programmes and interventions that incorporate māori models of health and wellbeing, rongoā (traditional healing) and innovation. (ministry of health, 2014a, p. 10) sub-theme 2.3: indigenous food practices. the promotion of traditional food-related knowledge (sub-theme 2.3), such as traditional food sources, hunting, gathering, and processing, was limited or absent within governance documents. health promotion materials and resources, predominantly from canada, were the main documents that included such knowledges and practices. through a partnership with the canadian diabetes association and dietitians of canada, a tool kit was developed to assist with disseminating the products, including adapted resources for use with inuit populations in the north and first nations communities. this tool kit included the development of picture-based nutrition fact sheets that incorporate traditional “country” foods and cooking practices. (canadian public health association, 2006, p. 4) documents from australia rarely acknowledged the value that traditional indigenous food knowledges and practices may have for health and wellbeing. nonetheless, some documents identify that traditional food practices are intrinsic to the holistic concept of health for some indigenous people and can potentially provide food security and physical, spiritual, and environmental health and wellbeing, for example: traditional foods still require some physical effort to obtain (fishing, hunting, gathering fruit) but assisted by outboard motors, cars, guns and thus not as active – however these activities are often considered to also contribute significantly to spiritual, physical, mental and social wellbeing as well as providing food. (colles et al., 2014, p. 35) the only reference found to māori food-related knowledge and practices from new zealand was in a document related to cultural competence of health services that suggested that denying māori people traditional foods may create a culturally unsafe environment for some. table 4: search #1 identify barriers that inhibit utilisation of palliative care services for māori: not being permitted to bring traditional food to comfort the dying person. (kidd et al., 2014, p. 85) sub-theme 2.4: indigenous traditional and contemporary cultural practices. the promotion of traditional and contemporary cultural practices (sub-theme 2.4) was infrequent within hl-related documents across all three countries. recognition of the significance of incorporating and promoting such practices to ensure a more responsive health literacy environment was evident only in supportive documents. cultural practices and interconnected relational aspects, for example the ancestral and spiritual connection indigenous people may have to a specific part of the country or the interpersonal 15 boot and lowell: indigenous knowledges within health literacy policy documents published by scholarship@western, 2019 and spiritual relationship between people, are commonly recognised and promoted within australia and new zealand in association with palliative care: aboriginal people are to be supported to ‘return to country’ to die if requested. (south australia health, 2011, p. 28) kinship groups are to be permitted to remain with a person during inpatient care and management and recognition of post-death practices are to be permitted. (south australia health, 2011, p. 28) whānau participating in the waikato project described the last days and hours spent with a dying whānau member or friend as a spiritual experience, and emphasised the critical role of tikanga (cultural practices). they specifically discussed the importance of waiata (song) and karakia (prayer) in managing pain and facilitating the dying person’s spiritual journey through making connections between the spiritual and material worlds. these cultural practices were an expression of māori beliefs and values and often involved strengthening interpersonal relationships (including spiritually) between the person dying and whānau members, and among whānau members. (ministry of health, 2014b, p. 50) in contrast, documents from canada promote the utilisation of cultural practices more broadly in order to develop culturally safe environments for interaction and to establish new, or maintain existing, important relationships: a more formal approach involves a traditional talking circle where a sacred object (such as a feather or rock) is passed from grandmother to grandmother. the one holding the object speaks without interruption by others, creating a respectful and safe environment for all. teachings are based on the four domains of the traditional medicine wheel and the alignment with aspects of human behaviour: mental, emotional, physical and spiritual. (canadian public health association, 2014, p. 20) sub-theme 2.5: indigenous birthing and child rearing practices. similarly, the recognition and promotion of indigenous traditional childrearing and birthing practices (sub-theme 2.5) as beneficial appears to be rare. only two supportive documents originating from australia and canada were found to explicitly endorse or promote indigenous approaches to birthing and childrearing practices. the discussion paper from australia in particular details the potential benefits of traditional indigenous childrearing and birthing practices. it also recognises the development of indigenous family and social networks in supporting the development of a healthy and strong indigenous cultural identity across the lifespan: birthing on country [is defined as] . . . maternity services designed and delivered for indigenous women that encompass some or all of the following elements: are community based and governed; allow for incorporation of traditional practice; involve a connection with land and country; incorporate a holistic definition of health; value indigenous and non-indigenous ways of knowing and learning; risk assessment and service delivery; are culturally competent; and developed by, or with, indigenous people. the term boc should be understood as a metaphor for the best start in life for aboriginal and torres strait islander babies and their families, an 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3 [2019], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8133 appropriate transition to motherhood and parenting for women, and an integrated, holistic and culturally appropriate model of care for all. (thoms, mohamed, & grant, 2015, p. 13) this discussion paper, addressing the national framework for health services for aboriginal and torres strait islander children and families, proposes that more consideration be given towards women living in remote areas with regard to giving birth on country. having to relocate mothers well in advance of giving birth in larger, sometimes unfamiliar, urban areas may disrupt traditional cultural birthing practices and can result in an emotional and spiritual disconnect from the wider community, their homelands, and cultural identity and affecting the emotional and physical health of mothers and their babies (thoms et al., 2015). in summary, the findings from this study illustrate that a wide range of indigenous knowledges and practices are acknowledged within many hl-related documents to varying degrees. indigenous knowledges and practices related to birthing and child development, traditional foods, healing, and medicine, as well as understanding of the relationship between health and cultural strength, identity, and language can be considered legitimate elements of hl. the study findings suggest, however, that recognition of such indigenous knowledges within conceptualisations of hl rarely goes beyond acknowledgement. little practical guidance on how indigenous knowledges and practices could be integrated within service delivery and models of care was identified in the documents analysed in this study, even though many of the documents addressed issues of service delivery, health communication, and community engagement. discussion the findings of this study suggest an important distinction between passively recognising and acknowledging the existence of indigenous diversity, knowledges, paradigms, and practices and actively promoting these within hl-related documents across australia, canada, and new zealand. health knowledges, and the methods of disseminating and communicating health-related information, are predominantly confined to those derived from western pedagogies, paradigms, and practices in governance documents (e.g., policies, strategic plans, frameworks, action plans, and guidelines) from all three countries. those documents that do acknowledge and, less often, promote indigenous health knowledges were more likely to refer to these unobtrusively by providing marginally descriptive or generalised references. promotion and advocacy for inclusion of indigenous knowledges and practices based on indigenous ontologies, epistemologies, and values were rare and occurred mostly within supportive documents (e.g., discussion papers, reports, resources, and promotion materials). these documents were more likely to provide practical examples or detailed descriptions of specific local indigenous knowledges and customs, including traditional healing, food, cultural practices and to elaborate on holistic health concepts. not surprisingly, it has been suggested that services and agencies working specifically within an indigenous healthcare environment are more inclined to advocate and presumably incorporate and promote such knowledges and practices as they are more likely to recognise their significance and value (health canada & the public health agency of canada, 2013). the significance of holistic health concepts and understandings within indigenous cultures in australia, canada, and new zealand is becoming increasingly acknowledged across all levels of health governance; 17 boot and lowell: indigenous knowledges within health literacy policy documents published by scholarship@western, 2019 this was evident within approximately one-third of all hl-related policy and practice documents. recognising and incorporating indigenous understandings of holistic health has been persistently advocated within relevant research literature (colles et al., 2014; dudgeon et al., 2014; durey & thompson, 2012; vukic et al., 2011). healthcare providers delivering services to indigenous people are increasingly prompted by policy, frameworks, action plans, and guidelines to reflect on existing paradigms and approaches, and the need to consider alternative approaches that are deemed meaningful, relevant, and culturally safe, to enhance hl skills of indigenous populations. despite an increase in promotion of indigenous holistic health conceptualisations within governance documents, which nonetheless is a positive and necessary step forward, the study findings suggest that indigenous knowledges, understandings, and practices are rarely recognised and promoted as legitimate elements of hl. whilst it is justifiable for the majority of hl-related documents to broadly acknowledge the diverse languages, cultural practices, and views on health that many indigenous peoples share without detailing specifics, more specific guidance and resources are needed when aiming to enhance the cultural competence of services and service providers. numerous studies from australia, canada, and new zealand have cited similar culturally associated misconceptions, communication and language barriers, and prevailing poor relationships between indigenous people and the health service sector as common and persisting challenges (colles et al., 2014; durey & thompson, 2012; freeman et al., 2014; lambert et al., 2014; lowell et al., 2015; lowell et al., 2012; richardson, 2012; vass et al., 2011). disregarding, diminishing, or discrediting indigenous health knowledges and practices within an indigenous health literacy environment by another culture can be perceived as maintaining structures of cultural bias and dominance (connell, 2014; durey & thompson, 2012). incorporating indigenous holistic views of health and wellbeing within an indigenous healthcare environment, as well as within mainstream services that frequently provide care and services to indigenous people, is essential in order to address the extensive and complex health problems many indigenous people face (dudgeon et al., 2014; durey & thompson, 2012; keleher & macdougall, 2016). considering indigenous-specific social determinants is critical (dudgeon et al., 2014; keleher & macdougall, 2016), and culturally sensitive and safe practices need to be evident within the wider health literacy environment, including policies, service providers, processes, and resources (durey & thompson, 2012; lambert et al., 2014; lowell et al., 2012; vass et al., 2011). however, language barriers, poor use of interpreter services, inadequate or no cross-cultural health education for service providers resulting in culturally inappropriate care jeopardise improving hl and health outcomes for many indigenous people (durey & thompson, 2012; lowell et al., 2012; vass et al., 2011). consequences may include indigenous patients refusing and abandoning treatment, having a limited understanding of prescribed medications, and receiving inequitable treatment regimes compared to non-indigenous people (durey & thompson, 2012; lowell et al., 2012). a study by lambert et al. (2014) recommended the development and provision of adequate hl training for healthcare professionals and illustrates that implementation of government frameworks and policies needs to be supported through provision of constructive resources, guidelines, and training opportunities. considering ingleby´s (2012) proposition that every person develops varying concepts, understandings, and levels of hl throughout the life-span, then indigenous peoples will have developed unique forms of hl throughout their history. taking such understandings into account will likely enhance both provider 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3 [2019], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8133 and consumer hl skills (ingleby, 2012) and contribute to developing culturally safe spaces as relationships and health communications are improved. for example, adopting the concepts of holistic health that are a key element of hl therefore supports the process of establishing culturally safe healthcare environments for indigenous peoples, an issue that has also been frequently raised (colles et al., 2014; dudgeon et al., 2014; durey & thompson, 2012; hopkirk & wilson, 2014; vukic et al., 2011). a prerequisite to establishing culturally safe environments is the identification, acknowledgment, and elimination of institutional and personal cultural biases or prejudices (dudgeon et al., 2014; durey & thompson, 2012; lambert et al., 2014). this also requires a decolonisation of conceptualisations of hl as well as the healthcare environment and the development of strong and trusting relationships between providers and service recipients (durey & thompson, 2012; richardson, 2012). there is a risk that indigenous people will potentially avoid healthcare environments that are considered culturally unsafe, due to fear of discrimination and culturally insensitive treatment (barnett & kendall, 2011; durey & thompson, 2012; lambert et al., 2014). as a result, the effectiveness of health promotion, health communication, and disease prevention efforts are diminished and treatment for acute or existing health conditions can be compromised (barnett & kendall, 2011; colles et al., 2014; lambert et al., 2014). however, health services that recognise, value, promote, and incorporate indigenous knowledges and practices are more likely to establish culturally safe and supportive environments as they mitigate the risks of misinterpretations, misunderstandings, confusion, and potentially adverse outcomes (colles et al., 2014; dudgeon et al., 2014; lowell et al., 2012; vass et al., 2011; wilson, 2008). culturally safe and supportive environments are fundamental to enable empowerment, selfdetermination, and autonomy. durey and thompson (2012) and richardson (2012), for example, assert that it is imperative to acknowledge and address existing power differentials within these relationships. according to these authors, this process requires critical reflection, cultural competencies, and a genuine commitment to change (durey & thompson, 2012; richardson, 2012). many of the current definitions of, and approaches to, hl endorse concepts of empowerment, self-determination, and self-efficacy with an overall aim to enable populations to take control over their healthcare needs (acsqhc, 2014; estacio, 2013; kickbusch, 2009; ministry of health, 2015; mitic & rootman, 2012; nutbeam, 2008; sørensen et al., 2012). the concept of empowerment is concerned with the removal of formal or informal barriers within existing political, social, economic, cultural, and personal environments (hennink, kiiti, pillinger & jayakaran, 2012; wallerstein, 2006). in order for indigenous people to become genuinely empowered and to take control over their own health concerns, they need to be able to negotiate and determine what comprises a culturally safe environment: one that they perceive as providing a sufficient and culturally responsive physical and psychological space (akena, 2012; huia, 2014). decolonisation of conceptualisations of hl is a necessary first step in the process of ensuring the value of indigenous knowledges, paradigms, and practices is fully realised in health policy and practice. it is therefore critical that governments, policymakers, and health services acknowledge and integrate indigenous health knowledges and practices within the health literacy environment. 19 boot and lowell: indigenous knowledges within health literacy policy documents published by scholarship@western, 2019 conclusion and implications acknowledging and promoting indigenous knowledges and practices as legitimate elements of health literacy is imperative and integral to cultural literacy. it provides the foundation for governments, indigenous communities, academics, and service-providers to work collaboratively within a culturally diverse healthcare system, and to explore, develop, and enable avenues for indigenous selfdetermination and greater control at a local level. findings from this study, supported by other research, suggest that there is limited support, guidance, or provision of effective resources and training for services to effectively incorporate indigenous health knowledges, paradigms, and practices. effective identification and removal of the formal and informal barriers to incorporating indigenous health-related knowledges and practices would support decolonisation efforts and contribute towards establishing culturally safe environments. culturally safe and supportive environments are compromised or unachievable without recognition and integration of indigenous health knowledges, paradigms, and practices. consequently, any attempts to enhance health literacy of both health professionals and consumers are jeopardised, and opportunities for indigenous peoples to drive the change they consider positive and beneficial will remain limited. limitations a limitation of this study was the sole focus on analysis of documents, without the opportunity to investigate the formal and informal processes that develop and influence the construction of such documents. as such the study was unable to shed light on the underpinning processes and powerrelationships that affect the construction of knowledge and current policy outcomes. although this study comprised of only one research method, which may have restricted the interpretation, discussion, and conclusions drawn, the study was strengthened through investigator triangulation. three experts and one peer advisor individually provided critical feedback as they assessed and evaluated the research process and content, as well as data readability, trustworthiness, and credibility in response to which revisions were made. additionally, extensive and detailed authentic illustrative references have been presented throughout this article to support subsequent interpretations. a further constraint was that the study was only able to include readily accessible documents. although a thorough and systematic search was conducted within the most common and popular internet search engines and government databases, it is likely that some key documents may have been missed. for example, discussion papers that significantly debate and influence the inclusion of indigenous knowledges within policy, as well practice-related documents are not necessarily accessible through publicly accessible databases. such documents could provide additional valuable insight into the current discourse on how indigenous knowledges are portrayed and valued, and potentially highlight any contrasting viewpoints on the issue. policy and practice documents from local indigenous and nonindigenous community-controlled health organisations are also commonly not available to the general public. however, accessing and analysing such documents could provide valuable knowledge on how indigenous languages, knowledges, and practices are valued, acknowledged, integrated, and promoted at the grassroots level and may be significantly stronger than in those documents that are readily accessible within the public domain. in order to mitigate these risks, a large and diverse sample of publicly available 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3 [2019], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8133 sources was chosen which is believed to accurately reflect of the current progress on incorporating indigenous knowledge practices within the health literacy environment. suggestions for future research future studies could consider a distinctions-based approach whereby specific indigenous cultural and language groups, as well as different geographical regions, are examined to explore whether local distinct health literacy strengths and needs are addressed within health systems through incorporation of locally relevant indigenous knowledges and practices. such clarification could be achieved by conducting case studies. additionally, such research could be supported by conducting a mixed-method approach using statistical text analysis combined with more conventional qualitative methods. for example, interviews with health delivery providers and healthcare users would gain a broader and deeper sense of how indigenous knowledges, paradigms, languages, and practices are incorporated and promoted within the local health literacy environment. the limited acknowledgement and promotion of indigenous knowledges and practices within hl policy and related practice documents, also raises questions regarding the involvement and influence of indigenous communities and peak organisations in the process of their development. an investigation into these processes could help identify systemic barriers and challenges as well as draw attention to personal opinions, perceptions, and experience of the significance of indigenous knowledges and language within current policy discussions and the health literacy environment. similar suggestions for additional research have also been proposed by smylie et al (2008). such studies could collectively contribute towards decolonising healthcare systems, improving cultural respect, and could provide practical constructive guidance for effectively enhancing health literacy within culturally and linguistically diverse populations and healthcare systems. references akena, f. a. 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(2005). understanding health literacy: an expanded model. health promotion international, 20(2), 195-203. doi: https://doi.org/10.1093/heapro/dah609 28 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 10, iss. 3 [2019], art. 2 https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol10/iss3/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2019.10.3.8133 the international indigenous policy journal july 2019 acknowledging and promoting indigenous knowledges, paradigms, and practices within health literacy-related policy and practice documents across australia, canada, and new zealand gordon robert boot anne lowell recommended citation acknowledging and promoting indigenous knowledges, paradigms, and practices within health literacy-related policy and practice documents across australia, canada, and new zealand abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license acknowledging and promoting indigenous knowledges, paradigms, and practices within health literacy-related policy and practice documents across australia, canada, and new zealand indigenous adoption of internet voting: a case study of whitefish river first nation the international indigenous policy journal volume 7 | issue 3 article 3 july 2016 indigenous adoption of internet voting: a case study of w hitefish river first nation chelsea gabel mcmaster university, gabelc@mcmaster.ca nicole goodman university of toronto, nicole.goodman@utoronto.ca karen bird mcmaster university, kbird@mcmaster.ca brian budd university of guelph, buddb@uoguelph.ca recommended citation gabel, c. , goodman, n. , bird, k. , budd, b. (2016). indigenous adoption of internet voting: a case study of whitefish river first nation. the international indigenous policy journal, 7(3). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.3 indigenous adoption of internet voting: a case study of w hitefish river first nation abstract indigenous communities and organizations are increasingly using digital technologies to build community capacity, strengthen community consultation, and improve political participation. in particular, internet voting is a type of technology to which first nations have been drawn. this article explores whitefish river first nation's (wrfn) experience introducing internet voting in the course of ratifying a new matrimonial real property law (mrp). specifically, we examine the implications of internet voting for political participation and electoral administration at the community level. although community members’ uptake of internet voting was very modest, we find the experience of adoption had other subtle impacts on community capacity, specifically in terms of empowering the community to pass its own laws and connecting youth and elders. with respect to administration, internet voting provided an opportunity to connect with community members using technology, to modernize voting processes, and to better accommodate community members needs. keywords internet voting, participation, self-determination, community-based participatory research, election administration, community capacity acknowledgments the research that supported this article was funded by the social science and humanities research council: july 2014 –“the impact of digital technology on first nations participation and governance.” we would like to thank the community of whitefish river first nation for their support and participation in the research. specifically, we would like to thank chief franklin paibomsai, nishin meawasige, and our youth research assistants justin mcgregor, kylee laudree, nicole mcgregor, and theron mcgregor. we would also like to thank our interpreter miriam mcgregor for her help and kindness throughout the research process. finally, we would like to thank our mcmaster research assistants stephanie plante, theo nazary, matt mcmanus, and marissa matthews. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ i n d i g e n o u s a d o p t i o n o f i n t e r n e t v o t i n g : a c a s e s t u d y o f w h i t e f i s h r i v e r f i r s t n a t i o n indigenous communities have long sought strategies to improve community engagement, build capacity, and work towards self-determination. recently, a number of first nations governments have turned to digital technology as a means to engage community members. specifically, first nations are deploying digital technology for elections and voting, community consultations, and to transform community members’ interaction with local governments (see for example krebs, 2011; lavoie, 2012; mcmahon, 2014; mcmahon, o’donnell, smith, walmark, beaton, & simmonds, 2011). internet voting, in particular, is one type of technology that communities have been drawn to. approximately 15 first nations in canada have used internet voting, and other indigenous communities are also considering adoption (see the appendix for a complete list). first nations governments are optimistic about the potential improvements to accessibility and participation that this technology might provide. however, there has yet to be any systematic analysis of the effects of internet voting in indigenous communities.1 this research examines whitefish river first nation’s (wrfn) experience deploying internet voting for the ratification of a new matrimonial real property law (mrp) in march 2015. using the experiences of wrfn as a case study, this article contributes to current understandings of the ways in which internet voting can affect the participation and administration of votes in first nations communities. observations of the wrfn experience provide a point of departure for ongoing analyses of the effects of internet voting and other digital technologies on the quality of local democracy, as well as the potential impacts of such technologies on self-determination and aspirations of self-governance. e l e c t o r a l p a r t i c i p a t i o n a n d i n t e r n e t v o t i n g l i t e r a t u r e o n i n d i g e n o u s p a r t i c i p a t i o n most research on indigenous voter participation has focused on low turnout in federal and provincial elections. the main debate is whether low indigenous turnout in federal elections can be best accounted for by an “individual resources” model, or by an “aboriginal politics” explanation. according to the individual resources model, indigenous peoples vote or do not vote for the same reasons as nonindigenous voters, such as low social, economic, and political resources that would otherwise facilitate their engagement and mobilization (bargiel, 2012; fournier & loewen, 2011; harell, panagos, & matthews, 2009). in contrast, the aboriginal politics explanation focuses on factors and circumstances affecting voting that uniquely affect indigenous peoples and that might account for their lower electoral participation. this includes indigenous peoples’ distrustful and contentious relationship with the canadian state, and their suspicion about the legitimacy of electoral outcomes over which their peoples can have no real impact (belanger, 2009; cairns, 2003; dalton, 2007; jacobs, 2009; ladner, 2003; ladner & mccrossan, 2007). 1 we prefer to replace the use of the word “aboriginal” with the more uniting and less colonizing term “indigenous” to refer to first nations, inuit, and métis peoples of canada. 1 gabel et al.: indigenous adoption of internet voting published by scholarship@western, 2016 far less attention has been paid, however, to voter participation in band council elections. while turnout in some communities rarely exceeds 10 percent, others regularly achieve participation rates of about 90 percent (bedford & pobihushchy, 1995; bedford, 2003). the causes of such differences in turnout are not well understood; however, the enormous spatial variation suggests that it has much to do with the distinctive internal politics and social geographies of each first nation, and with each community’s unique history and relationship with the canadian state. similar to the aboriginal politics explanation discussed above, low voter participation in many band council elections can be attributed to organized resistance to the legitimacy of governing bodies elected under the terms of the indian act (senate of canada, 2010).2 low turnout may also be related to geography, especially in cases wherein communities encompass vast territories and significant land and water barriers. the size of on-reserve and off-reserve populations also differs between communities. finally, the matter of “membership” and who should have voting rights to participate in band council elections may be more contentious in some communities than others. all of these characteristics likely contribute to lower rates of voter turnout in many communities. alport and hill (2006) echoed the above sentiments and suggested: voting abstention among aboriginal people seems to have a number of sources; it may be a form of protest or a function of disinterest, low external efficacy, cultural difficulties, underenrolment, language literacy problems, practical or ergonomic obstacles or the result of insufficient civic education . . . e-solutions that optimise the opportunities for voting engagement may be apposite and welcome. (p. 6) all of these factors and suggestions cause us to question the usefulness of conventional metrics of voter turnout for evaluating the impact of internet voting on first nations. if we do not understand what is a positive level of electoral participation, or even whether increased turnout (in general, or among offreserve members) is acceptable as an appropriate goal across first nations, then this makes the selection of benchmarks for new voting technologies additionally challenging. l i t e r a t u r e o n i n t e r n e t v o t i n g research on internet voting and voter participation in non-indigenous contexts has yielded mixed results. in canada, a study of ontario municipal elections found that internet voting was associated with a 3.5 percent increase in turnout in 2010, but over time the results were inconclusive (goodman & stokes, 2014). studies in other jurisdictions have found increases of about 10 points (spada, mellon, peixoto, & sjoberg, 2015) or more modest increases of close to 3 points (trechsel, schuman, & vassil, 2010), while others have found no effect, or attribute fluctuations in turnout to other factors (bochsler, 2 a noteworthy example is the history of band council elections for the six nations of the grand river first nation. in 1924, the federal government used its power under section 74(1) of the indian act to replace the traditional haudenosaunee confederacy council that had been selected via customary traditions, with a chief and council elected under the indian act. this action continues to be vehemently opposed by haudenosaunee leadership (see for example hill, 2013), and by a large number of six nations members. consequently, even today, six nations voter turnout is exceptionally low, with roughly 6 to 10 percent of eligible voters taking part. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.3 2010; segaard, baldersheim, & saglie, 2013). part of the difficulty in assessing whether internet voting affects voter participation is that many studies typically examine a single electoral event, or different level elections (e.g., local and national), but data from the same government elections over time has been more challenging to obtain. this is due partly to the novelty of the voting method, and also that many jurisdictions pilot internet voting programs only to suspend or terminate them shortly thereafter. some descriptive analyses based on survey research found that the option of internet voting positively affected respondents’ propensities to vote in the 2007 estonian general election (vassil & weber, 2011), and canadian survey-based studies examining ontario municipal elections found that the option of casting a ballot by internet encouraged only a very modest proportion of non-voters to participate (goodman, 2014; goodman & pyman, 2015). studies in other countries have also observed that a modest segment of less committed voters were inclined to vote when internet voting was made available (chevallier, 2009; madise & martens, 2006; trechsel, 2007; trechsel et al., 2010). despite these analyses, we are not aware of any examination of the effects of internet voting on first nations elections or votes, either descriptively or substantively. the adoption of internet voting technologies by first nations is a new practice and thus data regarding the topic is hard to come by. furthermore, it is likely that the potential impact of the technology on voter participation in indigenous communities will be mediated by a variety of contextual factors, such as community cohesiveness, size, and geographic dispersion. in some communities, a key issue is how to encourage participation among youth, while for others a primary issue is how to facilitate the participation of off-reserve members. in addition, differences in geographic remoteness and overall levels of poverty among first nations have a direct impact on voters’ potential access to both personal computers and quality broadband, which could mean that internet voting may not be a viable strategy for every community. finally, unique contextual factors surrounding particular votes (e.g., issue salience) may impact members’ willingness to vote whether internet voting is offered or not. c o m m u n i t y c a p a c i t y beyond impacting voter turnout, perhaps the most promising area for improvement that internet voting offers to indigenous communities involves the potential development of community capacity and improvements to electoral administration. building community capacity is understood as a necessary precondition for the effective development and administration of community programs, as well as for fostering political participation and citizen engagement (goodman et al., 1998; liberato, brimblecombe, ritchie, ferguson, & coveney, 2011; scully & diebel, 2015). community capacity building refers to the “identification, strengthening and linking of [a] community’s tangible resources, such as local service groups, and tangible resources like community spirit” (ontario healthy community coalition, 2015, para. 1). it can be observed along a number of social and political dimensions, including citizen participation, leadership, social and intergenerational networks, and sense of community (goodman et al., 1998). with respect to the relationship between internet voting and community capacity, our research addresses how internet voting can contribute to building community capacity for first nations, so they might thereby enact a greater degree of local control (e.g., self-determination) over the development and administration of their own affairs. in this context, the use of internet voting by wrfn to ratify its mrp legislation offers some insight. 3 gabel et al.: indigenous adoption of internet voting published by scholarship@western, 2016 in addition to contributions to community capacity, a small body of research has examined the impact of internet voting on electoral administration. in canada, election administrators have reported benefits of cost savings, compliance with accessibility requirements, and counting efficiency, but have also cited concerns about security and electoral fraud (goodman & pyman, 2015). these are important issues, as first nations communities are tasked with running elections and referenda on an increasing number of high-stakes issues that are important for the development of self-governance. some challenges are the needs for both the presence of a supportive legislative framework and the necessary development of a sufficient regulatory framework to implement the technology (alvarez, hall, & llewellyn, 2009). the absence of a legislative provision has posed a problem for canadian municipalities wanting to adopt the technology (pammett & goodman, 2013), and presents an issue for first nations, such as wrfn, whose elections are governed by the indian act. such communities are authorized to use internet voting for referenda and consultations, but not for band council elections.3 w h i t e f i s h r i v e r f i r s t n a t i o n whitefish river first nation is a rapidly growing community of 1,200 members of ojibway ancestry with approximately 440 members living on the first nation. it is located on the shores of georgian bay and the north shore channel to manitoulin island, ontario. there are 185 homes in the community, with about half of the members owning their individual homes and half accessing social housing (whitefish river first nation, 2014). wrfn is governed by the indian act and holds its band council elections every 2 years, with the most recent election being held in february 2015. over the past few elections, voter turnout in wrfn has averaged approximately 57 percent of members. this level of turnout may be related to a level of community well-being that is high compared to other first nations in ontario.4 like many first nations, however, political participation in wfrn is challenged by multiple factors. almost two-thirds of community members live off-reserve, which can make it difficult to equally engage community members in decisions regarding band affairs. further, communities such as wrfn that are required to hold elections every 2 years under the terms of the indian act tend to experience voter fatigue and frustration as well high levels of political churn, turnover, and family competition (senate of canada, 2010). all of these factors can contribute to instability and unpredictability in governance, along with the politicization of public service. while these do not appear to be intense problems in wrfn, they are nevertheless challenges that require considerable resources and competent leadership to overcome. in addition, wrfn is a small community, and yet is tasked with the delivery of an enormous range of services including education, health and social assistance, housing, policing, natural resource and environmental management, and economic development—among others. finally, while communities like wrfn face a large reporting burden to the federal government, they lack the 3 first nations with custom community election codes or self-government agreements can use internet voting for their local elections (goodman & pammett, 2014). 4 in 2011, wrfn was tied for fourth highest among 85 ontario first nations in “community well-being” (indigenous and northern affairs canada, 2015). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.3 necessary funding and capacity to develop their own laws and administrative structures (see palmater, 2010). m a t r i m o n i a l r e a l p r o p e r t y l a w in december 2013, the federal government passed the new family homes on reserves and matrimonial interests or rights act (2013).5 this legislation is intended to fill a policy gap created by the indian act (1985), wherein matrimonial property rights respecting spouses have not been fully applied on first nation reserves. off-reserve, there are laws in each province and territory that protect the matrimonial property rights of both spouses in a manner that respects the equality of men and women. this protection is available both during marriage and after a separation, and applies equally to married and common-law couples. however, the indian act did not provide rules to deal with matrimonial property issues on reserves, and also did not recognize first nations’ law-making power in relation to matrimonial property matters. in two decisions reached in 1986, the supreme court of canada determined that provincial matrimonial property law does not fully apply on indian act reserves (derrickson v. derrickson, 1986; paul v. paul, 1986).6 since that time, organizations representing first nations women have urged the federal government to take action to address matrimonial real property issues on-reserve. the act sets out criteria and guidelines for the enactment of first nation laws regarding on-reserve matrimonial real property. it also provides provisional rules to fill the legislative gap until such time as individual first nations enact their own laws. in addition, the government established a $5 million dollar centre of excellence for matrimonial real property that is operated at arm’s length by the national aboriginal lands managers association. while many indigenous communities in canada are keen to create and adopt their own legislation, there are significant hurdles to doing so. each community must hold a ratification vote on their proposed laws, with a quorum requirement of 25 percent. this is the penultimate step that follows the extensive work of drafting the law and engaging in community consultation. support for mrp law within communities is not self-evident given significant differences in the status and rights of members, citizens, and nonmembers residing on first nations in relation to the land, access to land, and residence. critics further argue that the mrp law is flawed both with respect to property issues and women’s rights (see cornet & lendor, 2013; palmater, 2010; ridgen, 2014). 5 the act went into force officially in december 2014. 6 both of these cases involved marriage breakdowns involving couples living on-reserve. in the first case, mrs. derrickson asked for the application of provincial matrimonial property law to declare that she had a half interest in the reserve land allotments held in her husband’s name. in the second case, mrs. paul requested a temporary order granting her exclusive possession of the family home on-reserve since she was caring for the couple’s three children. the supreme court applied the same reasoning in both cases, denying the requests on the grounds that provincial law could not be used to determine possession of matrimonial real property that is situated on reserve land. 5 gabel et al.: indigenous adoption of internet voting published by scholarship@western, 2016 c o n t e x t a n d m e t h o d the mcmaster research ethics review board (mreb) approved our research in february 2015. in addition to mreb approval, we also obtained ethics review and approval from the manitoulin anishinabek research review committee (maarc), and by local leaders and administrators in the whitefish river first nation.7 our engagement with wrfn was grounded in principles of communitybased research, including involvement with, control over, and ownership of the research. the four first nations principles of ownership, control, access, and possession (ocap® ) governing data collection and use were adapted to fit the context of our research. with respect to ownership and control, our approach emphasized consensus between involved parties in all aspects of the research process, rather than a power relationship between community and university stakeholder. access to research results took the form of research reports, and follow-up discussions and presentations. survey and interview data were held in the possession of the university researchers and the wrfn band office. a research agreement was put in place with the community partner incorporating the four principles mentioned above. in our research, community members, leaders, and administrators informed the research process at every stage and helped guide the translation and application of the project’s research findings at the community level. additionally, the research created an opportunity for elders and youth to spend time engaged in activities that, from their perspectives, are important and contribute to the well-being of the community. given that our engagement with wrfn was grounded in principles of community-based involvement, and control and ownership of research, a considerable process of trust building, information sharing, and consultation undergirded our entry into the community, as well as our efforts to assist with and observe their internet voting pilot project. this community-based approach is especially appropriate for this project given the need to learn from indigenous peoples about how they experience electoral politics. indigenous peoples are often excluded and disengaged from research processes (castellano & reading, 2010; jackson, 1993; mitchell & baker, 2005; porsanger, 2004; smith, 2006; wilson, 2008). community-based participatory research (cbpr) addresses this imbalance by creating bridges between researchers and communities through the use of shared knowledge and experiences. finally, cbpr establishes a mutual trust between researchers and communities that enhances both the quantity and the quality of data collected. although our interaction with wrfn predates the mrp ratification vote, our discussion focuses on this one event, which took place over a period of 5 days from march 2 to 6, 2015. the advance voting period (march 2 to 5) was hosted entirely online, while in-person paper voting was an option on the final day (march 6). data collection took place over 2 days of preparation for and observation of in-person voting on the mrp law proposal. we also conducted “exit polls” to gauge voters’ satisfaction or lack thereof with the voting process. once community members had cast their paper ballots, the youth community research assistants approached voters to complete a survey about their voting experiences. voters had the option to complete the survey via paper or on a tablet, and could also do so orally with the assistance 7 information on this ethics committee is available at http://www.noojmowinteg.ca/sitepages/manitoulin%20anishanibek%20research%20review%20committee.aspx 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.3 of an interpreter. the survey probed voters’ awareness of the internet voting option, their intentions to vote using the internet in future elections, and their socio-demographic characteristics. a total of 123 surveys were completed, resulting in a response rate of 81 percent. while the entire project followed a cbpr approach, these 2 days of data collection were based on methods of participant observation, as researchers observed and interacted with various members of the community involved in the voting process, which included the permanent administrative staff who organized the election, two representatives of the internet voting firm, a local translator, a “driver” (available to help members get to the polling station), four youth who were hired to assist in electoral observation and exit-survey administration, as well as community members who either arrived to vote on the proposal or accompanied other voters. we were careful not to interfere with individuals as they voted, but our presence was very visible and consequently many community members approached us after casting their ballot to share their views and ask questions. we also set up a lunchroom during voting day, which provided further space for interaction and exchanges among band administrators and community members. these situations resulted in numerous serendipitous encounters and observations within and around the band council offices. in addition, we conducted 14 semi-structured interviews with a (nonrandom) sample of community members. these interviews were non-standardized and of varying length. to ensure that the data collection process was as natural and non-intrusive as possible, we did not use any kind of electronic data recording devices. rather, each member of the research team kept detailed field notes throughout the day, recording their observations and interview data. field notes were both descriptive (e.g., recording the number of women and men who voted) and analytic (e.g., what symbols or devices were used to signify the integrity of the electoral process, and how effective were these). all interviews with community members were fully transcribed within hours of voting day, based on written notes and memory. a research team debriefing meeting was held at the end of each day; each member shared his or her field notes and discussed his or her interpretation of what had been observed. descriptive and analytic field notes and transcribed interviews were then entered into a single chronological data log. using this source, we subsequently applied an iterative process of open and focused coding to establish patterns across the data. following analysis and preliminary write-up, short interviews were also conducted by telephone with band administrators to verify specific information. this research approach afforded us an expansive and in-depth understanding of both the electoral administration process and the diverse perspectives of community members regarding the legitimacy and appropriateness of internet voting in wrfn. following a rigorous method rooted in cbpr, participant observation, and systematic recording and analysis of naturalistic data, our research findings illuminate the key issues and challenges confronting this community in its adoption of internet voting. they also speak, with considerable nuance and depth of understanding, to perspectives within the community on the substantive matter—matrimonial real property law—that their leadership has put to it. of course, our findings are intrinsic to this community’s particular experience; we make no claims as to their generalizability to other first nations or other local policy decisions. nevertheless, the validity of the findings obtained from this approach—especially the development of valid concepts and their inter-subjective meaning—is superior to what could be gleaned a more “contrived” closed-ended, large sample survey approach. 7 gabel et al.: indigenous adoption of internet voting published by scholarship@western, 2016 f i n d i n g s w h a t d i d t h e v o t e o n m r p l a w m e a n t o c o m m u n i t y l e a d e r s a n d m e m b e r s ? the specific features of mrp law are complex and potentially controversial, and thus necessitate extensive community consultation in addition to the strict requirements of the ratification vote. community leaders were excited to be one of the first communities in ontario to seek ratification of their own mrp law and to adopt internet voting. for wrfn leaders, this represented an important step toward self-government, allowing them to be removed from provisions of the law imposed by the federal government. according to the wrfn band manager: the assertion of creating our own laws is very important . . . it is the principle of it being “our law” rather than the federal government’s law. we also want to have a community-based approach [to resolving matrimonial property conflicts], to be able to deal with it locally rather than having to go through the provincial courts, or the federal government. (field interview, march 6, 2015) the ratification of the mrp law had symbolic importance, tied to the achievement of self-government. one of the councilors explained that, for her, adoption of the new law meant: we are literally stepping from one world into another world. (field interview, march 5, 2015) several members of the community spoke about the particular importance of this vote for women. one described her efforts to inform other members: people don’t know what the vote is about. i tell them it is about getting out from under [the] indian act, which does not give women rights. (field interview, march 5, 2015) another community member described in personal detail why she supported the law: i married in. i was not status, but i married during those years when you could gain status by marriage. what if my husband had died? could the chief come and tell my kids to get out? could it happen to my son? he’s engaged to be married to a non-status girl; what would happen to their kids? (field interview, march 6, 2015) chief and council identified three interconnected strategies for taking on the challenge of ratifying their own matrimonial real property law through the use of internet voting. first, they relied on their partnership with the union of ontario indians, which has provided considerable legal and policy advice to their 39 first nation members in the development of mrp law. second, they drew on funding from the first nation market housing fund (fnmhf) to support the community consultation and ratification phases. finally, the community, in collaboration with technology vendor scytl, used this opportunity to implement an internet-based electronic voting process for the very first time. chief and council anticipated several advantages from the deployment of internet voting for the proposed mrp law. first, due to a funding window with the fnmhf, the mrp ratification vote was scheduled at a somewhat sub-optimal time—just one month following the most recent band council 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.3 elections. it was therefore hoped that the introduction of internet voting would help to distinguish this vote and to thereby raise attention to the mrp issue. second, it was anticipated that internet voting would help the community achieve the required 25 percent quorum. third, wrfn administrators viewed internet voting as a strategy to improve overall outreach to the community, especially to offreserve members. fourth, personnel from the technology vendor would spend time in the community to consult and provide technical guidance with the hope that this process would raise community members’ interest in and awareness of the mrp vote. d i d i n t e r n e t v o t i n g i n c r e a s e t u r n o u t ? in a word: no. in total, 51 people registered to vote by internet and, of those, 21 voted online. quorum was met, barely, with an overall turnout of 27 percent, and the mrp law was approved by a wide margin: 136 (yes) to 38 (no). our research suggests that a lack of awareness of internet voting was not a problem. rather, community members’ low uptake of internet voting appears to be related to the twostep process that required self-registration prior to voting. in addition, community members reported technical impediments to accessing the online registration and voting portal, including lack of familiarity or comfort with the internet voting process, and a lower sense of urgency to participate online (given that paper ballot voting was available). on-reserve members do, for the most part, have the necessary hardware to access online voting. according to data provided by wrfn band administration, 160 of 185 households have internet access, and most community members have mobile phones with internet access. older members may have faced technical challenges to a greater extent than younger ones. older members were also more likely to use indigenous languages, and while an interpreter was available to assist voters at the physical polling station, the internet voting system was entirely in english. for wrfn’s first experience with internet voting, it was critical that voters retained the option to vote by paper. also, challenges in use for off-reserve members were likely quite different than those faced by on-reserve members. given the higher proportion of young members living off-reserve, and the fact that they typically reside in urban areas, it is unlikely that technical barriers were an impediment to online voting for them. rather, the challenge here—much as with ordinary voting methods—lay in communicating the issues and details of the vote to those living off-reserve. while some members were keen to see the community adopt internet voting, others, particularly older community members, were less certain that the voting method was the right fit for wrfn. for example, one community member, angus, though clearly supportive of the community passing its own mrp law, felt that internet voting was not culturally appropriate: it’s not “our way”—it’s not traditional. (field interview, march 6, 2015). he explained that the traditional voting method for the people of wrfn involved people lining up behind whichever candidate they supported, so that “everything was completely transparent” (field interview, march 6, 2015). he also felt that there needed to be more time for community consultation. the lack of understanding of the complex issue, he felt, made internet voting less desirable. his opinion was that coming in person to the band office to vote by paper offered people “the opportunity to discuss 9 gabel et al.: indigenous adoption of internet voting published by scholarship@western, 2016 the issue with each other, to ask questions; people don’t have that same level of discussion when they vote by internet” (field interview, march 6, 2015). the low number of votes cast online and the reticence toward it voiced by some members of the community raises questions about the usefulness and cultural appropriateness of remote voting methods in first nation communities. however, there are three caveats to this pessimistic conclusion. first, there was strong support for the mrp law, particularly among the women we spoke to, and some linked the innovation of the community passing its own mrp law to the innovation of internet voting. for example, a community member named margaret talked to us about the need for advancement in technology use (especially among older members), and in the same breath spoke of the need to modernize first nations’ laws. concerning the certificate of possession in her family, she explained: my husband’s name is on it, not my name. it was passed down to him from his father. so it is something that is 100 years old. and today, people are getting wills. we didn’t do that before, and they need to learn to put girls on the will. so that’s why we need this law. we need to change some of our attitudes and behavior. (field interview, march 6, 2015) second, exit poll data from paper voters suggests that more voters may opt for internet voting in a future vote or election for reasons of accessibility and convenience. when asked if they would be likely to make use of internet voting in a future vote, 60 percent of paper voters said they would. twenty-two percent said they would do so “no matter what” and 38 percent commented that they would under certain circumstances, such as in the case of illness or inclement weather—instances when remote voting from home could promote access to the ballot box. of course, these individuals are already voters, so their use of internet voting would not increase participation, but it could promote voting in the future. preserving current voters is equally important for electoral legitimacy and maintaining turnout levels as attracting new ones. in terms of satisfaction with traditional voting, a majority (51%) of voters reported being dissatisfied with the paper voting process. this represents a sizable segment of voters, and speaks to an important undercurrent of dissatisfaction with current voting methods. it suggests that there is a need to improve the voting process, and it raises questions as to whether alternative methods such as internet voting may provide a more satisfactory election experience for voters. it is important to note that neither the technology vendor nor the band leadership appeared particularly concerned about the low uptake of internet voting. though reaching quorum was a critical issue for both parties, they felt that the experience with internet voting on mrp was good practice, and that the community would become increasingly comfortable with it over time. when asked for his view, the chief said he had no regrets adopting internet voting and explained: this is the future for us. (field interview, march 6, 2015) 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.3 c a n i n t e r n e t v o t i n g b r i n g a d v a n c e s i n e l e c t o r a l a d m i n i s t r a t i o n a n d c o m m u n i t y c a p a c i t y ? among the potential benefits for wrfn election administration was the opportunity to: a. connect with community members through technology, particularly email; b. improve and modernize electoral administration and voting processes; and c. engage off-reserve members. first, with respect to community capacity, although votes cast by internet were modest, officials also observed subtle impacts on community dialogue, specifically the discussion it stimulated between elders and youth about technology and the mrp law. band administration hoped to use internet voting deployment to collect email addresses to build an email directory of community members. the exercise helped band administration to gather some additional email addresses for the directory, and officials continue to look for opportunities to gather more. email is seen as an especially useful form of contact since some community members keep email addresses longer than mailing addresses, some members (such as students, for example) have multiple mailing addresses throughout the year, and mail is becoming increasingly costly. registering voters online to vote by internet made a small contribution to a centralized email list. second, the adoption of internet voting was also a step toward modernizing the election and voting process at wrfn. it was an exercise in learning how band officials could accommodate technology in votes and how they might better adapt electronic voting in future events. the introduction of an alternative, remote method of voting was also a step toward improving access to the voting process for all community members. while there are clear benefits of accessibility and convenience for off-reserve members, the additional voting method was also an improvement for on-reserve inhabitants should they not be able to leave the house, or simply “want to stay and vote in their pyjamas.” it presented the community with more choice and control with respect to electoral involvement. as one administrator observed: the use of internet voting in the mrp referendum is a step toward modernizing our voting processes and showing our community members we are working on new ways to engage them in case they can't make it out to a physical poll. it also got us thinking about how we can better accommodate electronic voting in the future. (interview, march 6, 2015) third, internet voting deployment is seen as a vehicle of inclusion for off-reserve members who may not be able to travel the distance required to cast a vote at a physical polling location on-reserve. in wrfn, the process for plebiscites used to involve going from door-to-door to explain the issue and parameters of the vote to community members. as one community member commented: there would be a whole system in place. the office would drop all other work, and focus on this, so that everyone in the community was aware. if no one was home, then the package of 11 gabel et al.: indigenous adoption of internet voting published by scholarship@western, 2016 information would be dropped at the door, and in the office they would keep a record of who was to be contacted. contact them, talk by phone, record their questions, cross them off the list. make sure that everyone in the community was reached. all the concerns and question would be collected, and we would have a full sense of what aspects of the issue people had problems with, so that we could tweak the proposal. all that changed once the federal government said that offreserve people had a right to vote. then it was impossible to drive 5 hours to toronto, or to sudbury, to talk to everyone. (interview, march 1, 2016) leveraging technologies such as internet voting is one way of adapting to changes in the voting rights of off-reserve members and is also a step toward working to promote inclusion in the voting process. from a policy perspective, if uptake of internet voting among off-reserve members improves over time it could be a means of bringing a broader segment of community voices into the voting arena to take part in the decision-making processes surrounding community policies and laws. potential engagement of off-reserve members also speaks to the development of community capacity. increased member participation in community processes and events will ideally promote further engagement and strengthen the participatory richness of the community. once it is complete, using the email directory to reach members with important updates and information is another tool to reach members and enable their engagement in community life. in the wrfn case, band administrators observed that internet voting had a positive impact on the on-reserve community. specifically, it opened up dialogue regarding technology that brought youth and elders together in new ways and enabled conversations about the content and substance of the mrp law. youth in particular were interested in how internet voting was being set up and how it worked. in this way, the adoption of technology stimulated conversations about the issue being voted on. as noted by band administration: the implementation of internet voting provided an opportunity to engage with community members in a different way, which opened up new dialogue. youth were excited about the initiative and youth and elders engaged in discussions they might not have otherwise. (interview, march 1, 2016) interest in the technology and the new dialogue it stimulated were seen as positive outcomes. despite that fact that internet voting uptake was not high, its deployment had more nuanced impacts on discussion and intergenerational engagement. c o n c l u s i o n our findings suggest that the implications of internet voting for participation in this community are far from straightforward. while a large increase in voter participation—the conventional metric for assessing the success of internet voting—was not observed, wrfn realized some advancement to community capacity. specifically, the deployment of internet voting empowered the community to pass their own laws and sparked community dialogue regarding the mrp law and technological adoption, particularly between youth and elders. with respect to administration, internet voting provided an opportunity to connect with community members using technology, to modernize voting processes, and was a means of better accommodating and engaging community members. it further shows a willingness 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.3 to harness digital technology in a manner that is respectful and consistent with the political, social, and cultural goals of this community. internet voting was one digital experience, much like the email address directory, aimed at fostering community engagement by reaching members in different ways. with specific reference to policy, the wrfn case suggests that indigenous governments in canada and abroad could leverage internet voting in order to achieve the following outcomes related to engagement and policy adoption: • internet voting can be a useful tool for ratifying and passing important policies and laws at the community level that may contribute to self-determination. • internet voting has the ability to engage off-reserve members in important votes pertaining to policy, especially considering that the time required to travel to a physical poll location when living outside the community can influence an off-reserve member’s decision to vote. this is intended to better enable their voting rights and broaden the breadth of voices consulted in the policy adoption process. • internet voting, in this case, fostered new opportunities for dialogue within the community by bringing together different types of people, namely elders and youth. as a result of excitement and discussion related to internet voting, community members also discussed the merits of the mrp law. this brought different voices into the dialogue to share their perspective and could be a benefit for other policy issues or laws where community approval is sought. finally, this exercise was a first step at modernizing government service for the community. wrfn administration plans to use internet voting in a future referendum and eventually in elections and other areas. as indigenous communities deploy technology as part of their electoral institutions, it is likely that digital policies will be adopted elsewhere in government as part of community modernization. while this research is limited to canada, specifically wrfn in northern ontario, we know of only one other indigenous experience with voting technologies in another jurisdiction. the mohawk council of akwesasne in the united states has deployed internet voting to ratify their own property laws, a court law, and for a plebiscite on an island corridor. the property law vote in particular had considerable uptake among members and increased voter participation (simply voting, n.d.). given that more indigenous communities and organizations are experimenting with technology, our current research considers internet voting and its compatibility with traditional decision-making. community leaders need to be part of larger policy structures to ensure that indigenous voices are heard and traditional values are upheld. future research might consider examining the potential for technologies beyond internet voting to address the problem of political exclusion among indigenous groups and other excluded groups of voters.8 it is important to understand the impacts of internet voting on voter 8 our current research is exploring the use of kiosks in indigenous communities. alport and hill (2006) suggested that kiosks could provide instructions in local languages, thereby overcoming minority language and literacy or numeracy issues that impede participation. 13 gabel et al.: indigenous adoption of internet voting published by scholarship@western, 2016 participation in indigenous communities and to work with communities to explore how technologies can be leveraged to both serve and connect members, and to widen the scope of voices included in votes, public consultations, and decision-making regarding policies and laws. there is also a need to better understand what full participation means in an indigenous context, and how, or if, digital technologies can be harnessed to achieve these goals. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.3 r e f e r e n c e s alport, k., & hill, l. 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(2008). research is ceremony: indigenous research methods. halifax, ns: fernwood publishing. 19 gabel et al.: indigenous adoption of internet voting published by scholarship@western, 2016 a p p e n d i x t a b l e 1 . f i r s t n a t i o n s i n c a n a d a t h a t h a v e u s e d i n t e r n e t v o t i n g p r o v i n c e c o m m u n i t y y e a r ( s ) t y p e o f v o t e t o p i c on whitefish river first nation 2015 referendum matrimonial real property on nipissing first nation 2014 referendum constitution on shawanaga first nation 2015 agreement vote land codes on mississauga first nation 2014 2015 election (2014) referendum (2015) first nations education act (2014), election (2015) on batchewana first nation 2015 referendum matrimonial real property law bc talthan first nation 2011 2014 2015 agreement vote (2011), agreement vote (2011), election (2014), referendum (2015) transmission line (2011), impact benefit agreement (2011), central council election (2014), comanagement agreement (2015) bc huu-ay-aht first nation 2012 general assembly general assembly bc squamish first nation 2013 referendum membership amendment bc ucluelet first nation 2015 election election bc tla’amin (sliammon) first nation 2015 referendum constitutional amendment vote bc shxwowhamel first nation 2015 ratification vote mutual benefits agreement bc uchucklesaht first nation 2015 election election bc saulteau first nation 2015 referendum impact benefit agreement 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.3 the international indigenous policy journal july 2016 indigenous adoption of internet voting: a case study of whitefish river first nation chelsea gabel nicole goodman karen bird brian budd recommended citation indigenous adoption of internet voting: a case study of whitefish river first nation abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license indigenous adoption of internet voting: a case study of whitefish river first nation aboriginal homelessness: a framework for best practice in the context of structural violence the international indigenous policy journal volume 7 | issue 2 article 5 april 2016 aboriginal homelessness: a framework for best practice in the context of structural violence nelly d. oelke university of british columbia, okanagan, nelly.oelke@ubc.ca wilfreda e. thurston university of calgary, thurston@ucalgary.ca david turner first peoples group, alberta, turnerconsulting@shaw.ca recommended citation oelke, n. d. , thurston, w. e. , turner, d. (2016). aboriginal homelessness: a framework for best practice in the context of structural violence. the international indigenous policy journal, 7(2). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.5 aboriginal homelessness: a framework for best practice in the context of structural violence abstract homelessness among indigenous peoples is an important issue in canada and internationally. research was conducted in seven metropolitan areas in the four western provinces of canada to explore current services with the aim of developing a best practices framework to end homelessness for aboriginal peoples. sequential mixed methods were used. key results found agreement that aboriginal peoples were overrepresented among the homeless and policy determined the approach to and comprehensiveness of services provided. funding, lack of time, and lack of resources were highlighted as issues. gaps identified included a lack of partnership, cross-cultural collaboration, cultural safety, and evaluation and research in service provision. best practices included ensuring cultural safety, fostering partnerships among agencies, implementing aboriginal governance, ensuring adequate and sustainable funding, equitable employment of aboriginal staff, incorporating cultural reconnection, and undertaking research and evaluation to guide policy and practices related to homelessness among aboriginal peoples. keywords aboriginal, best practices, homelessness, mixed methods, western canada acknowledgments funding for this study was provided by human resources and skills development canada, national housing secretariat. we would like to thank the participants in western canada who are committed to ending homelessness: lloyd ewenin, jr. (elder), and our community partner, the aboriginal friendship centre of calgary. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ a b o r i g i n a l h o m e l e s s n e s s : a f r a m e w o r k f o r b e s t p r a c t i c e i n t h e c o n t e x t o f s t r u c t u r a l v i o l e n c e homelessness for aboriginal peoples is a serious issue in many urban centres in australia, canada, new zealand, and the united states. despite the significance of this issue, the needs of homeless aboriginal peoples are often overlooked in research and in policies. this study focused on seven metropolitan areas in four western provinces in canada and included four phases, with the goal of developing a best practices framework to work towards ending aboriginal homelessness. this article provides a description of the study’s methods, its key results, and an explanation of the best practices framework derived from the study, with a final discussion of the study’s implications for policy and practice. b a c k g r o u n d as mentioned above, aboriginal homelessness is a major and pressing issue in large urban centres in canada (belanger, weasel head, & awosoga, 2012; calgary homeless foundation, 2011; chopin & wormith, 2008; hanselmann, 2001; hwang, 2001), australia (memmott & chambers, 2012), new zealand (collins, 2010), and the united states (whitbeck, devan, & hartshorn, 2012). aboriginal homelessness is particularly relevant in western canada. aboriginal peoples represent only 4% of canada’s population and about 6 out of 10 live in the four western canadian provinces—british columbia, alberta, saskatchewan, and manitoba (statistics canada, 2013). in these provinces, aboriginal peoples make up between 35% and 60% of the homeless population in western cities (belanger et al., 2012). urban aboriginal homelessness occurs in the context of what is referred to as structural violence, which is “built into the [social] structure and shows up as deeply unequal life chances” (dominguez & menjivar, 2014, p. 186; see also thurston & montesanti, 2015) and structural racism, whereby it is the “economic, social and political institutions and processes of a society that create and reinforce racial discrimination” (loppie, reading & deleeuw, 2014, p. 4). first nations communities in the western provinces, for instance, are socio-economically disadvantaged, possessing the lowest community wellbeing index1 scores compared to those in other provinces (strategic research directorate, 2015). as with the rest of canada, indigenous peoples’ mobility from reserves to cities in western canada has been high and has contributed to increasing homelessness rates; yet, little is known about urban aboriginal peoples (environics institute, 2010). we do know that aboriginal peoples’ experiences of homelessness are rooted in historic and systemic factors that differ on a population level from those of the settler population (patrick, 2014). structural violence imposed by reserve systems, residential schooling, and the state’s broader project of cultural genocide has increased aboriginal peoples’ risk of becoming homelessness and experiencing other health and social challenges (distasio, sylvestre, & mulligan, 2005; jim ward associates, 2008; menzies, 2006); this occurs through several intersecting factors, such as multigenerational trauma, addictions, interpersonal violence, poverty, and the lack of educational and employment resources on reserves. intergenerational trauma in particular is a major factor complicating healing and recovery processes (brave heart & debruyn, 1998; sotero, 2006; williams, 2015). despite the extent of social 1 the community well-being index is a measure of community socio-economic well-being based on indicators related to education, labour force participation, income, and housing. 1 oelke et al.: best practices for aboriginal homelessness published by scholarship@western, 2016 and health problems faced by aboriginal peoples, however, they have created and maintained strong social identities, advocacy roles, and governance institutions, while the “gaze” of settler researchers has often remained on their deficits (kirmayer, tait, & simpson, 2009). furthermore, jurisdictional issues and policies not only impact aboriginal peoples’ abilities to obtain services related to homelessness, but also their abilities to access other social and health services. health and social services for aboriginal peoples with treaty status are the responsibility of canada’s federal government; yet, provinces or municipalities normally provide these services in all off-reserve jurisdictions. on the other hand, aboriginal peoples without registered indian status, including métis, inuit, and non-status first nations) do not necessarily receive coverage for certain services, such as access to funding for post-secondary education and uninsured health benefits, for which treaty status is required. in the context of addressing structural violence, it is clear that aboriginal peoples have different needs for service delivery than non-aboriginal peoples living in canada, but this has often been overlooked by research and policy (bird et al., 2010; thurston, soo, & turner, 2013), which, in turn, creates another experience of structural violence. given the expressed desire to end homelessness, aboriginal needs must be addressed; however, in order for such efforts to succeed, the development of services to meet the needs of aboriginal peoples must recognize structural violence, and not unintentionally or blindly replicate inequities as has happened with other issues (see tait, 2009). r e s e a r c h o b j e c t i v e s the aim of the study reported here was to ascertain which policies and practices were most effective in working with aboriginal people who are homeless. we studied services in large census metropolitan areas2 in western canada, and identified the best practices and exemplary organizations in order to contribute to creating a best practices framework for planning culturally safe aboriginal services in urban settings. c o n c e p t u a l f r a m e w o r k this study and our overall program of research on aboriginal homelessness is directed by a conceptual framework that incorporates a critical examination of inequities and recognizes that historical influences continue to be felt by aboriginal peoples today. health and social issues such as homelessness are often addressed through an individual focus as opposed to collective, population-based approaches to understanding health. using an individual approach disregards structural violence and cultural safety. cultural safety is defined as effective practice determined by the individual or family, while “unsafe cultural practice comprises any action which diminishes, demeans or disempowers the cultural identity and well-being of an individual,” (nursing council of new zealand, 2005, p. 4). furthermore, it is important to note that an aggregate of individuals also differs from a population, and exploring factors that describe both individuals and populations results in better definitions of problems and solutions (rock, 2003). homelessness, like illness and other social problems, is not determined by choice nor is it 2 a cma is an “area consisting of one or more neighbouring municipalities situated around a core. a census metropolitan area must have a total population of at least 100,000 of which 50,000 or more live in the core” (statistics canada, 2015, part a—short definition, para. 1). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.5 a lifestyle issue, but results from “power—or, more specifically, the various ways in which capacity develops and is exercised” (rock, 2003, p. 133). given the overrepresentation of aboriginal peoples within homeless populations, the negative impacts of having less power, being marginalized, and experiencing racism are evident for aboriginal peoples as a group. as such, a collective focus on homelessness for aboriginal peoples is necessary, as opposed to “treating one person at a time.” we also recognize that services and programs arise from policy decisions or policy voids, and there currently exists a continuum of approaches to issues such screening for homelessness and the provision of affordable housing. hence, the scope and availability of such services and programs in any jurisdiction will depend on the particular policy environment and the participants in policy development in that locale. when we refer to policy, we mean “a course of action or inaction chosen by public authorities to address a given problem or interrelated set of problems” (pal, 2010, p. 2). in this respect, policies regulate and shape social, economic, and cultural components of our society and are implemented through instruments such as programs, services, regulations, and tax cuts (pal, 2010). policies, whether explicit or implicit, governmental or non-governmental, are generally considered proactive approaches to address issues; on the other hand, inaction or the absence of written policy is also a policy decision (bacchi, 1999; pal, 2010). m e t h o d s d e s i g n a n d m e t h o d s a sequential mixed method design (j. morse, 2010) was used to address this study’s research aims. the study was conducted over four phases and gathered both quantitative and qualitative data in order to understand the policy environments surrounding aboriginal homelessness in western canada. the study was conducted in seven census metropolitan areas in four provinces in western canada: winnipeg in the province of manitoba, regina and saskatoon in the province of saskatchewan, edmonton and calgary in the province of alberta, and vancouver and victoria in the province of british columbia. in the context of this study, vancouver included both the city of vancouver and north vancouver given the accessibility of services in these areas (as opposed to the greater vancouver area). the sample and data collection approaches for each research phase are outlined below in table 1. other aspects of the larger project have been reported elsewhere (see thurston, oelke, & turner, 2013). for the purposes of this article, however, we will focus on the results that informed our understanding of best practices in aboriginal homelessness and our recommendations for policy. e t h i c s a p p r o v a l s our study followed the tri-council guidelines for research with aboriginal peoples (government of canada, 2015). we worked with an urban aboriginal organization, the aboriginal friendship centre of calgary, to ensure that the study addressed the principles of community engagement, collaborative participation, and ownership. throughout the project, we consulted with an elder who held a sweat lodge ceremony for research team members at the beginning of the study. the conjoint health research ethics board of the university of calgary also reviewed and approved the study. 3 oelke et al.: best practices for aboriginal homelessness published by scholarship@western, 2016 t a b l e 1 . m e t h o d s b y r e s e a r c h p h a s e m e t h o d s a m p l e d a t a c o l l e c t e d d a t a a n a l y s i s n phase 1 development of a database of organizations • internet searches • review of publically available lists • validation via email and phone • housing organizations for individuals with mental health concerns and/or disabilities, addiction and rehabilitation facilities, and safe homes or shelters for various populations including aboriginal peoples • organizations providing referrals and advocacy for housing or homelessness • 29 data components (e.g., housing information, population served, organization size) • 2006 statistics canada data (statistics canada, 2010) • contextual data from targeted websites (e.g., government, national housing research committee) • descriptive statistics • chi square 129 organizations phase 2 seeking best practices • semi-structured phone interviews • stratified and random sample of 20% of organizations from phase 1 • three categories: children and youth, seniors, and other populations • best practices for aboriginal peoples in their organization • governance, funding, sustainability, partnerships, cultural competence • identified organizations in their city providing the best services for aboriginal homeless with rationale • thematic analysis 64 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.5 r e s u l t s results have been organized around the framework that emerged from the study for best practices to address homelessness for aboriginal peoples. seven components for best practices were identified, and they are illustrated below in figure 1. these components intersect; for instance, aboriginal governance increases the likelihood of employing aboriginal staff. if each service in a city addressed each component, a homelessness services sector that is effective for aboriginal peoples could exist. each component can be taken as an entry point into best practices, but on their own these components cannot transform a program, service, or sector. f i g u r e 1 . k e y c o m p o n e n t s o f t h e b e s t p r a c t i c e f r a m e w o r k . best practices for homeless services for aboriginal peoples cultural safety partnerships/ relationships aboriginal governance/ coordination adequate/ equitable funding aboriginal staff research/ evaluation on best practices cultural reconnection 5 oelke et al.: best practices for aboriginal homelessness published by scholarship@western, 2016 mandates among the exemplar cases differed, but all had a common theme insofar as they all provided care and advocacy for homeless individuals including aboriginal homeless peoples. there was a focus therefore on the community well-being of the individuals served. these organizations were flexible enough to be able to respond to the often-changing needs of the homeless community, and more specifically to those of aboriginal homeless peoples. engagement of the community of homeless peoples, and in this case aboriginal peoples, and their participation in organizations was evident in exemplar cases. this occurred in a variety of ways, including: • seeking feedback from individuals who were receiving and had in the past received services at their organization through both formal and informal evaluation processes, • seeing input regarding service delivery and activities, and • having representatives on organizations’ boards. furthermore, past clients and those who had previously been homeless were occasionally hired as staff or could volunteer as peer mentors. this high degree of engagement from participants increased the credibility of these organizations and the programs they offered to their clients, other organizations, and funders. coupled with culturally safe practices, these organizations were considered to be highly respected and trusted by aboriginal homeless individuals and by the aboriginal community. as a result, their engagement meant they had “street cred” among aboriginal peoples. c u l t u r a l s a f e t y as a concept and framework, cultural safety was not well understood and was underutilized when delivering care for aboriginal homeless peoples. some participants talked about the value of cultural safety in homelessness programming; that is, they emphasized the importance of understanding the historical and cultural experiences of aboriginal peoples to support healing relationships with individuals. most non-aboriginal organizations focused on superficial activities as symbols of their sensitivities (e.g., attendance at public events for aboriginal peoples, crafts, and having an elder come for weekly visits). aboriginal peoples were often included under a multicultural, umbrella-like structure that included all ethno-cultural populations (meaning non-caucasian). one participant remarked, for example: i think it is with any visible minority too. we see a lot of asian people here in our drop in center. we see a lot of people who are stigmatized in their cultures, especially because of mental illness, so it’s a real focus for us to make sure that we are being culturally sensitive to people. (phase 2, participant 68) approximately one third of organizations (36%) did acknowledge the need for their staff to undergo cultural training, but it was not clear whether this training ever occurred, and whether it would focus on providing an in-depth knowledge of cultural safety and their own organizational cultures and the attendant impacts on practice. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.5 p a r t n e r s h i p s a n d r e l a t i o n s h i p s the need for partnerships was overall well supported by the organizations we interviewed due to both the scarcity of resources and the fact that most organizations were not able to provide all services for all of the types of clients entering their organization. partnership was most often practiced through client referrals, to apply for funding, and, to a lesser extent, to create collective resources. the development of formal partnerships, however, was limited by the mandates of the organizations, the specialized services provided by the organizations, and the local governance structures within organizations. even though partnership was identified as an important factor regarding organizations’ success or lack thereof, most providers of services to the homeless operated in isolation and focused on specific demographics and social and health issues. few participants from organizations could name other organizations with whom they partnered, for example. given the complexity of homelessness, particularly for aboriginal peoples, a greater degree of partnership between these organizations and others would be necessary to address the issue; thus, implying that the needs of aboriginal homeless individuals were not well addressed. partnership was, however, the foundation for success among exemplar organizations interviewed in phase 3 of the study. as one participant noted, it all comes from years of working together and building those partnerships because getting that trust and the commitment and having co-operative partnerships, and of course we definitely need the funding from the government . . . it took years to do that and i think that’s a big piece of why we’re where we’re at today. (phase 3, participant 61) this participant identified partnership in a number of different forms, including participation in community committees and cooperation with specific organizations to serve the needs of their clients. cross-cultural collaborations between aboriginal and non-aboriginal organizations and funders were evident but limited. a number of challenges were identified by participants regarding potential crosscultural collaboration. working across jurisdictions (e.g., first nations reserves) made partnerships more difficult, for example, and a competitive funding environment often had a negative impact on the possibility of collaboration. differences in language and cultural understandings were cited as common. furthermore, lack of information of important issues (e.g., history and intergenerational trauma) and of aboriginal cultural backgrounds (e.g., social and cultural norms, protocols, and expectations) were commonly identified by participants as barriers to aboriginal and non-aboriginal organizations working together. finally, perceived and/or real racism impacted working together. one participant stated, you know it’s very difficult for indian organizations to get proper partnerships in the city and i’m hoping that’ll change. i kind of think it’s due to the discrimination. (phase 2, participant 84) participants reported that the development of cross-cultural partnerships required a great deal of time and were most successful when the focus remained client-centred. nearly all of the staff (92%) from calgary-based organizations in phase 4 of the study revealed an interest in collaboration, and 61% felt they had the capacity to collaborate. interest in collaboration arose either from a belief that, given the high numbers of aboriginal peoples they were serving, it was the right thing to do, or from already having collaborative partnerships in place. several of the informants 7 oelke et al.: best practices for aboriginal homelessness published by scholarship@western, 2016 interviewed recognized the importance of providing aboriginal-specific services, but felt that their organizational mandates restricted them in terms of their ability to offer such services. many informants were interested in collaboration, but were cautious of to their ability to participate given the demand that such an initiative would place on their organization’s resources (including staffing and funding). as one interviewee expressed, it would depend on the intensity of it [collaboration] (phase 4, organization 6). thus, while partnership and collaboration were identified as being important components of best practices in providing services for the homeless, participants stated that they were generally underfunded and understaffed and therefore had limited capacity to complete additional work, even though they considered it to be important. a b o r i g i n a l g o v e r n a n c e a n d c o o r d i n a t i o n overall in this study, there was a limited recognition of the need for aboriginal leadership and governance in the area of homelessness and housing to ensure the needs of aboriginal homeless individuals were being met. furthermore, few people discussed the necessity of aboriginal leadership for successful collaboration between organizations. evident in exemplar cases, however, was the inclusion of aboriginal peoples at all levels of the organization. positions for aboriginal people were included on boards and upper level management where they had an influence on leadership within the organization. a d e q u a t e a n d e q u i t a b l e f u n d i n g service and program funding was a major concern for organizations. short term project funding—as opposed to longer term funding—for comprehensive services presented a variety of issues for organizations, making it difficult for organizations to provide continuity in terms of their services and staffing. with an increase in short term funding availability, organizations spent many hours writing grants as well as focusing on fundraising to bridge funding gaps. specific, specialized funding for aboriginal clients also posed problems. funding criteria and mandates were not always well aligned. organizations had to tailor their applications for funding to existing criteria, and ensure it was commensurate with their mandates and to the populations they already served. one participant said, now, over the last 10 years, [our] focus has shifted somewhat and a lot of it has to do with the funding that is available. (phase 2, participant 70) specialized funding was characterized by competition and conflicts between organizations. funding was also very competitive due to funding caps, geographic distribution, and issue focused funding. organizations vying for the same funds, for example, would not know from year to year where and to whom contracts would be awarded, or if there would even be enough funding to maintain their programs. although these issues are not specific to organizations providing services to aboriginal homeless peoples, they are particularly relevant given the high number of aboriginal people who are homeless, the complexity of their needs, and the additional inequities they face (e.g., racism in seeking rental units). 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.5 a b o r i g i n a l s t a f f some of the people interviewed in phase 2 prioritized hiring staff who self-identified as aboriginal in order to reflect the population their organization served, believing this would better serve the needs of aboriginal homeless individuals. one third of organizations interviewed described the valuable skills and knowledge that aboriginal staff brought to their organizations. most importantly, these individuals brought with them contacts and networks to address the needs of aboriginal homeless people. for example, one participant described the contributions of an aboriginal staff member by saying, it makes a huge difference . . . for our clients . . . for example, our housekeeper, she would be just one of our many aboriginal staff, but she’s a really good example because even from that standpoint we’ll often have women in our detox who are aboriginal and i will see [the housekeeper] sitting down, you know, on a bed or whatever talking to an individual because they feel like they can connect with her even though she’s not in a counselling capacity, she’s also a support person. (phase 2, participant 137) even one aboriginal staff person at an organization was often enough to increase the trust and comfort level of aboriginal help seekers. challenges were also discussed; in particular when non-aboriginal staff or organizations assumed that a single aboriginal person on staff would be able to accommodate all of the duties of offering aboriginal cultural support within an organization. one participant described the situation by saying, i know that that’s a big concern in the community as well, you might have 300 workers at one shelter but why is there only one aboriginal worker? they can’t do all of it. (phase 2, participant 45) such beliefs and policies represent the level of tokenism and exploitation evident in some organizations based on participants’ responses. unfortunately, organizational policies regarding procuring aboriginal funding were sometimes based on having at least one aboriginal person on staff in an organization. c u l t u r a l r e c o n n e c t i o n most organizations surveyed in phase 1 did not provide services specifically for aboriginal homeless individuals despite the high numbers of aboriginal people using their services. in saskatoon and winnipeg, approximately one third of organizations did provide cultural services for aboriginal people, but the proportion was lower in other cities. despite the high number of aboriginal individuals served by homeless organizations, the results were similar for non-aboriginal organizations interviewed in phase 2— although cultural reconnection to promote well-being for aboriginal peoples was an important component identified in aboriginal organizations interviewed in phase 2 of the study, as demonstrated by this participant: well it’s part of the tool kit . . . i mean we have people on staff who are pipe carriers. we can call on a range of cultural resources that are outside the agency because . . . some of our staff have personal connections but as an organization, as a practice as an organization, it’s something we very much encourage for those links to be developed because it’s critical to the success in many cases to retaining housing. (phase 2, participant 131) 9 oelke et al.: best practices for aboriginal homelessness published by scholarship@western, 2016 building trust and peer mentoring were used by aboriginal organizations to meet this need to promote and develop well-being amongst aboriginal help seekers. cultural continuity was also a key component of effective organizations. all successful cases in phase 3 had specific policies and activities in place to address the needs of aboriginal peoples. they were sensitive to the challenges experienced by aboriginal individuals who were homeless and the important healing that cultural connection could provide to them. this could include practices like regular access to elders and access to activities (such as traditional craft classes) within the context of receiving broader support for their aboriginal identities and for cultural safety. in this way, organizations avoided the potential tokenism that might accompany their efforts to offer these resources (instead of more in-depth efforts to be inclusive, for example). aboriginal individuals working at all levels of an organization increased the comfort levels of aboriginal clients and addressed their complex needs. r e s e a r c h a n d e v a l u a t i o n o n b e s t p r a c t i c e s most organizations interviewed in phase 2 of the study did not conduct evaluation of their services. evaluation may be conducted when required by a funder for a specific project, although participants found the prescribed outcomes not particularly meaningful when it came to understanding the effectiveness of the services they provided. most participants (74%) shared information about effective organizational policies and practice. when we sought clarification about these, they described specific individuals or programs as effective without providing a lot of specificity to their answers. for example, one participant said, i’m not sure [what creates effectiveness], she’s just got a good reputation, she keeps her buildings full and she’s getting people off the street. (phase 2, participant 138) participants also noted that these evaluations required resources, like time, that were limited in most organizations. this was particularly relevant for aboriginal organizations because they were often small and had even fewer resources. formal follow-up with clients occurred very rarely. some informants did suggest that improvement in the capacity to carry out evaluation was important to better understand the effectiveness of their services, but they had little access to research and other resources that could help them to design effective services for aboriginal people who are homeless. participants were particularly interested in obtaining information, and they welcomed guidance and support for the delivery of services for the homeless. d i s c u s s i o n by including seven cities, this study contributed to the comparative research called for by collins (2010)3; however, because of this study’s breadth there is no single policy environment to describe and thus no pan-indigenous policy or program that can be implemented. our framework calls for sensitivity to local contexts and local peoples. public policy directly affecting aboriginal peoples who live on 3 this comparative approach included the comparison of homeless counts across three urban centres (vancouver and edmonton [canada], and auckland [new zealand]), analysis of homeless counts from the perspective of the public and as reflected in policy, and comparing commonalities and differences in policies from these urban centres (collins, 2010). 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.5 reserves in canada is solely the responsibility of federal governments, although the implementation of these policies is often shared with band councils and provincial governments (e.g., child welfare and health care). aboriginal people who live in cities, which is about half of the population, are impacted by another jurisdiction: that of the municipal government. in fact, there is no uniform system of policymaking for urban aboriginal peoples across canada, even though the federal government introduced the urban aboriginal strategy in 1998 4(b. morse, 2010). in light of this, our framework for best practices addresses common processes that have worked, rather than suggesting specific policy decisions that may or may not fit the context of a given urban setting. as we have mentioned, cultural safety is important for all organizations and their staff in order to provide a foundation for respectful and appropriate services for aboriginal homeless people. cultural safety training is needed at all levels of organizations (e.g., all levels of leadership and service) to facilitate culturally safe care for aboriginal peoples (oelke, thurston, & arthur, 2013). cultural safety training for all staff and board members will facilitate cultural safety in organizations. similarly, assessing the cultural safety of settings where services are delivered also needs to be addressed (oelke, 2010); participants discussed this when they referenced aboriginal art and other visuals in facilities where services were offered. reviewing organizational policies, practices, and the environment is an important first step in providing culturally safe services for aboriginal homeless peoples. other sectors (e.g., the health care sector) are also dealing with the issue of cultural safety, and collaborations may be encouraged in order to share resources and opportunities. cultural safety training needs to start in professional schools, including universities and colleges, that educate future professionals who may one day work with those who are homeless. these institutions need to assess whether they are welcoming to aboriginal peoples as students, as well as whether their curricula prepare graduates for non-racist, culturally safe service delivery. partnerships were identified in all phases of our study as a critical factor for creating collaborative structures and processes to address the varied needs of aboriginal homeless individuals. partnerships with aboriginal organizations to facilitate both cultural safety and collaboration between aboriginal and non-aboriginal organizations were noted as being essential to the delivery of appropriate services. resources to support collaboration in the form of funded personnel with allocated time are critical, as many organizations spoke of struggling with limited resources. those involved in organizations need to consider whether referring aboriginal clients to aboriginal-specific services is an appropriate response to the issue of aboriginal homelessness. likewise, funders need to ask if there is sufficient support provided for leaders in cultural safety to enable them to provide mentoring and consultation to those services entertaining organizations’ readjustment towards effecting greater cultural safety. in canada, for instance, friendship centres are an urban resource that could be funded to provide consultation with non-aboriginal services. 4 “the urban aboriginal strategy (uas) was developed in 1997 to respond to the needs of aboriginal people living in key urban centres. through the uas, the government of canada provides flexible seed funding and seeks to partner with other levels of government, aboriginal and community organizations, and the private sector to support initiatives that increase the economic participation of aboriginal people living in urban centres” (aboriginal affairs and northern development canada, 2014, para. 9). 11 oelke et al.: best practices for aboriginal homelessness published by scholarship@western, 2016 given the gross over representation of aboriginal peoples among the homeless population and the desire for self-determination, aboriginal leadership is essential. at the time of this study, the importance of aboriginal leadership in organizations related to homelessness and housing was not recognized. since there were so few programs governed by aboriginal people, it was impossible to determine where they were most important. aboriginal self-determination in both policy and strategic planning may help answer these questions about efficacy. certainly, as the term implies, the “token” representation of aboriginal peoples in governance and co-ordination was insufficient; however, no city included in our study was in a position to address what a balanced approach (e.g., representative numbers of aboriginal decision-makers and staff working in the homeless sector, proportionate funding) would look like, given that up to 60% of the homeless population was aboriginal individuals. fear of losing control among nonaboriginal people working in the sector may result in inadvertent racism and stereotyping, and working to prevent this potential backlash should be considered in future strategic plans. similarly, adequate funding for aboriginal-specific services for the homeless could be considered equivalent to the proportion of the homeless population that self identifies as aboriginal. the issue of equity in terms of funding distribution needs to be considered as we ask for time and resources to be put into relationship building, problem solving, and organizational and personal change. one-size-fits-all is not an equity model; rather, it avoids doing the hard work of defending the shortand long-term benefits of investing more money in one area or another. our research found that there were few aboriginal staff members working with the homeless population in these seven cities. to ensure that greater numbers of qualified aboriginal staff are working in this area, training opportunities—including cultural safety training—should be made accessible to aboriginal individuals. a partnership with community colleges could expedite this approach insofar as community colleges and employers could work together to address a community’s vocational and educational needs (orr, 2001). staff ratios could thus be expected to reflect the number of aboriginal people that are homeless; however, aboriginal peoples have expressed that in a culturally safe service, this is less of an issue. indeed, the notion of optimal representation among staff may change as systems change and become more culturally safe. the inclusion of aboriginal peoples in service delivery in part addresses the importance of cultural reconnection when addressing the needs of aboriginal homeless peoples. it has to be recognized, though, that not all urban aboriginal people have a connection to aboriginal culture or know their own histories (henderson, ireland, & thurston, 2015), so there may be a need for various forms of cultural healing. the specific local aboriginal community in a given context or locale is best positioned to identify and address these needs. our study found that the incorporation of cultural services with traditional elders was a valuable addition to existing programming; elders provided important connections to indigenous knowledge and networks. our research also found that an informal aboriginal street network was often used to identify which services were culturally safe, and thus this network’s input would be invaluable in assessing the impact of future strategic plans. plans to end aboriginal homelessness can benefit from research, especially evaluation, as the need for best practices across the continuum of prevention and services for aboriginal peoples continues to develop. opportunities need to be explored proactively. partnerships between aboriginal organizations and academic researchers, similar to those used in this study, must be developed and nurtured, and 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.5 indigenous research methodologies embraced (ball & janyst, 2008; wilson, 2008). certainly, academics and community researchers also have a role to play in creating culturally safe environments. c o n c l u s i o n this framework for developing best practices in homeless services for aboriginal peoples provides a starting point for communities to begin a process that is, we believe, necessary if homelessness rates are to be reduced provincially, nationally, and internationally. the results of the study discussed here provide a baseline for seven cities in western canada, and could be replicated to assess how movement towards recognizing the needs of aboriginal peoples has occurred. the barriers and challenges to delivering homeless services—particularly for aboriginal peoples—identified by participants in this research can be addressed by governments and program funders. a desire and a commitment, a “political will,” to address these issues is required; national and international networks addressing homelessness must be assessed in terms of ending structural violence. the truth and reconciliation commission canada (trc) has described the work that needs to be done to bring aboriginal and non-aboriginal peoples together in order to solve problems such as homelessness (trc, 2015). we hope that our arguments compel those in the homeless sector to take a stand and ask if they are perpetuating structural violence when it comes to their work with aboriginal peoples. the trc (2015) final report urged non-aboriginals to “demonstrate real societal change,” be allies in “the revitalization of aboriginal laws and traditions,” and to accept traditional aboriginal knowledge including ways of resolving conflict (pp. 16-17). at the same time, in conducting this study, we have stood back and want to acknowledge “the strength, compassion, courage, and humanity” used by people in the homeless serving sector to “endure or help make bearable the hard journey of others” (kleinman, 2014, p. 120). there are no silver bullets for ending homelessness: neither at the individual level, nor at the level of community. as such, the struggle for solutions to this issue must remain dependent upon developing good relationships within and among communities, and embracing the essence of partnership, collaboration, and cultural safety. 13 oelke et al.: best practices for aboriginal homelessness published by scholarship@western, 2016 r e f e r e n c e s aboriginal affairs and northern development canada. 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(2015). honouring the truth, reconciling for the future: summary of the final report of the truth and reconciliation of canada. retrieved from http://www.trc.ca/websites/trcinstitution/file/2015/findings/exec_summary_2015_05_31 _web_o.pdf whitbeck, l. b., devan, m. c., hartshorn, k. j. s. (2012). correlates of homeless episodes among indigenous people. american journal of community psychology, 49, 156-167. doi:10.1007/s10464-011-9446-x williams, i. j. (2015). the intersection of structurally traumatized communities and substance use treatment: dominant discourses and hidden themes. journal of ethnicity in substance abuse, 15(2), 85-126. doi:10.1080/15332640.2014.1003671 wilson, s. (2008). research is ceremony: indigenous research methods. black point, ns: fernwood publishing. 17 oelke et al.: best practices for aboriginal homelessness published by scholarship@western, 2016 the international indigenous policy journal april 2016 aboriginal homelessness: a framework for best practice in the context of structural violence nelly d. oelke wilfreda e. thurston david turner recommended citation aboriginal homelessness: a framework for best practice in the context of structural violence abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license aboriginal homelessness: a framework for best practice in the context of structural violence gender, justice, and the indian residential school claims process the international indigenous policy journal volume 7 | issue 1 article 3 january 2016 gender, justice, and the indian residential school claims process cindy hanson university of regina, cindy.hanson@uregina.ca recommended citation hanson, c. (2016). gender, justice, and the indian residential school claims process. the international indigenous policy journal, 7(1). doi: 10.1854/iipj.2016.7.1.3 gender, justice, and the indian residential school claims process abstract survivors of indian residential schools in canada are involved in one of the largest compensation processes in the world. a significant component in the indian residential school settlement agreement (irssa) is the independent assessment process (iap), an out-of-court process aimed at resolving claims related to serious physical and sexual abuse suffered at residential schools. this article discusses a community–university research collaboration, which set out to explore how women involved in the iap, including survivors, support workers, lawyers, and adjudicators, understood the capacity of the model to facilitate healing. the results suggest attention to several aspects of policy development including representations of the body and sexuality, impacts of child abuse and trauma, and colonial histories of power and control, in addition to healing and training strategies. keywords sexual abuse, gender analysis, indian residential school, independent assessment process, survivors, legal settlements, indigenous policy, community-based research, truth and reconciliation, aboriginal women acknowledgments the participation of the saskatchewan aboriginal women's circle corporation and judy hughes, elders, survivors, joanne farmer, and the study participants are gratefully acknowledged. disclaimer trigger warning: this article describes cases of physical and sexual abuse that some readers may find distressing. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ g e n d e r, j u s t i c e , a n d t h e i n d i a n r e s i d e n t i a l s c h o o l c l a i m s pro c e s s c o m p e n s a t i o n f o r i n d i a n r e s i d e n t i a l s c h o o l a b u s e s the history of the indian residential school system, which began officially in canada in 1879, is marked by the persistent neglect and abuse of children and, as a result, of aboriginal communities in general (funk-unrau & snyder, 2007, p. 285) the indian residential school claims process in canada is a striking example of why a gender and diversity lens or an indigeneity-grounded framework1 must inform government policy. this article highlights how one policy, the independent assessment process (iap)—a model used as an out-of-court process for the settlement of claims of serious physical and sexual abuse suffered at indian residential schools in canada (aboriginal affairs and northern development canada [aandc], 2013)—is experienced and understood by female survivors involved in the process.2 the community–university research study, who benefits: compensation and women’s experience of healing from indian residential schools, worked in partnership with elders and an aboriginal women’s organization to explore how issues of gender and race were presented and understood in the compensation of abuse claims through the iap. there are few models of compensation or policies that take into account interlocking representations of gender, race, and cultural differences among canada’s indigenous peoples. the study discussed in this manuscript will suggest both a rationale and a statement about the need for taking gender and other aspects of diversity into account in the development of policy frameworks. first, the iap compensation model is explained in the context of the whole indian residential school claims process. with close to 38,000 claims (indian residential school adjudication secretariat, 2014), the iap is one of the largest claims processes in the world and it is part of the multi-faceted indian residential school settlement agreement (irssa). the irssa resulted from a series of large class action suits that put increased pressure on the government of canada to address the injustices suffered by indigenous peoples at the hands of church-run and state-run schools. initially, claims regarding indian residential school abuses were dealt with through the alternative dispute resolution (adr) process, which attempted to resolve claims of physical and sexual abuse outside of the court system. complications with the adr process, including an inability to address survivors’ needs, led to the irssa, which came into effect in 2007 (stanton, 2011). the irssa included the creation of compensation schemes such as the iap, the common experience payment (cep, for loss of culture and language), along with the accompanying truth and reconciliation commission (trc), all of which were set up to respond to the litigation challenges facing the canadian government. while a number of indigenous stakeholders were involved in the process, the reaction by the state to these abuses as a result of litigation concerns, not to outcries from the public, created a reconciliatory response different from other reconciliation processes globally (stanton, 2011). despite the language of “healing and reconciliation” in the irssa and, as promoted in canadian government propaganda, the iap was designed to focus solely on assessing survivors’ financial compensations for claims of sexual and physical abuse (funk-unrau & snyder, 2007). the iap model was negotiated with representatives of all the parties involved including the canadian government, national 1 fleras and maaka (2010), for example, discuss an indigeneity-grounded framework to be used in developing policy around indigenous issues as a way of eliminating historical and systemic bias, and providing a post-colonial perspective on policy-making. 2 the data gathered was gender-specific as explained later in the article. 1 hanson: gender, justice, and indian residential school claims published by scholarship@western, 2016 indigenous organizational representatives (for example, the assembly of first nations), and the churches involved in the operation of residential schools. they also agreed to a larger settlement process in order to deal with the severity of the claims that were coming forward in the adr process. many survivors transferred from the adr to the iap and, in certain circumstances, parts of old adr claims were re-opened and heard under the iap (e.g., serious sexual abuse, student-on-student abuse cases), and some aspects of loss of opportunity because that compensation category was expanded under the iap). the iap is an out-of-court settlement following a hearing where the survivor is usually supported by legal counsel, a regional health support worker, and, optionally, a family member and/or a translator. preparation for the hearing and the scope of what it will include varies from case to case. a representative of the government of canada, sometimes a church representative, and an adjudicator hear the case of the survivor and, using a scale of harms, losses, and other wrongful acts, determine the level of compensation for which the survivor is eligible.3 survivors are also eligible for future care plans as part of the compensation process. in the indian residential school settlement model, the colonial history of canada’s residential schools is not challenged because the stories of survivors “are not part of the public record in the same way as an official court transcript or judgment” (llewellyn, 2002, p. 286). however, addressing colonial injustices using sovereign law makes the process problematic (green, 2012). a more restorative, multi-faceted approach would ultimately recognize that harms are related to “the relationship(s) between and among individuals, communities, and institutions” (llewellyn, 2008, p. 288), whereas the iap model uses an individual, private conception of harm. according to monture (2014), “the impact of individualization of our legal relations moves aboriginal nations further away from our traditions, which are kinship-based and collective. that women are the focus of these trends cannot escape our attention” (p. 71). the following literature review situates aboriginal women and the iap model within the broader context of canada’s colonial strategies and history. c o l o n i a l i s m , a b o ri g i n a l w o m e n , a n d i n t e rg e n e ra t i o n a l i m p a c t s by the time the indian residential school system began forcibly removing aboriginal children from their families, the indian act had already formalized male–female inequalities into law and stripped aboriginal women of any involvement in the political processes of their nations (maracle, 2003; native women’s association of canada, 2010). the indian residential school system was, like other colonization programs and strategies through the indian act and the department of indian affairs, purposefully gendered to undermine and remove indigenous women’s traditional authority, agency, and roles within families, clans, and traditional governance systems (maracle, 2003; olson harper, 2009). agents for canada’s department of indian affairs regularly reported on reserve activities in derogatory ways, but they were particularly disparaging in their portrayals of aboriginal women, who were slandered as bad mothers (anderson, 2011; olson harper, 2009; wolski, 2009). aboriginal women and men traditionally shared responsibility for the governance of their nations and for handing down tribal laws, customs, and cultural 3 compensations vary, but are supposed to be based on a point system against which the survivors’ testimonies are assessed. the categories and point system are problematic for several survivors, as discussed later in this article. an outline of the iap system is available online (see http://www.residentialschoolsettlement.ca/schedule_diap.pdf). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 1 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss1/3 doi: 10.1854/iipj.2016.7.1.3 knowledge (anderson, 2011; wesley-esquimaux, 2009). although gender roles varied from nation to nation as well as within nations, the majority of the literature on this subject suggests that men and women were equally valued for their contributions to the strength and survival of their nations, with aboriginal women being highly esteemed for their central role in securing the health and well-being of their families and communities (brant castellano, 2009; olson harper, 2009). as colonization policies were imposed, all aboriginal peoples experienced the systematic denigration of their cultured gender roles and identities (wesley-esquimaux, 2009; wolski, 2009). however, given the patriarchal and eurocentric worldviews of the colonizers, “it can be argued that aboriginal women’s fall from grace was more devastating and widespread” (wolski, 2009, p. 273). the indian residential school system significantly contributed to this “fall from grace” through its mandate to entrench patriarchal values into aboriginal children (martin-hill, 2003) and with curricula that espoused the euro-colonial vision of civilizing aboriginal women by enforcing upon them concepts of submissiveness and servitude toward both the colonial class and aboriginal men (de leeuw, 2007). colonial policies left traumatized women severely impacted and marginalized in both aboriginal and nonaboriginal societies (wolski, 2009). aboriginal women then lacked legal protection, and were often without the support of their communities (olson harper, 2009). aboriginal women were not complacent in the imposition of these policies, but their lack of available sources of recourse and support affected their abilities to act with agency and to resist the onslaught of colonial values. the indian residential school legacy of intergenerational trauma ensued as students already suffering from the pain of residential school abuses returned home to the pain of dysfunctional mothers and fathers, many of whom were unable to cope with the heartbreaking loss of their children (anderson, 2011). the aboriginal justice inquiry of manitoba (government of manitoba, 1999) reported that: the victimization of aboriginal women accelerated with the introduction of residential schools for aboriginal children. children were removed from their families and homes at a young age, some to return eight to 10 years later, some never to return. the ability to speak aboriginal languages and the motivation to do so were severely undermined. aboriginal students were taught to devalue everything aboriginal and value anything euro-canadian . . . that [parenting] learning process was denied to several generations of aboriginal parents. in addition to the physical and sexual abuse that canadians are now hearing took place in residential schools, emotional abuse was the most prevalent and the most severe. we believe the breakdown of aboriginal cultural values and the abuse suffered by aboriginal children in the schools contributed to family breakdown. this began a cycle of abuse in aboriginal communities, with women and children being the primary victims. (chapter 13, para. 15) intergenerational legacies and trauma continued to weave their way into subsequent generations as indian residential school survivors became mothers and fathers whose parenting skills had been shaped in residential schools that demeaned and abused them (harrison, 2009; martin-hill, 2003) and in homes that could no longer model indigenous childrearing practices. a focus group participant in the study about the iap model of compensation explained the impact in the following way: like the impacts of residential school—you have alcoholism, you have marriage break ups, like, you know. you have all these kinds of impacts, but a lot of us don’t understand the impacts of residential school. when you’re going to that adjudication hearing they ask you that question— 3 hanson: gender, justice, and indian residential school claims published by scholarship@western, 2016 what do you feel? how was the impact on your life? and a lot of our people won’t speak up because they don’t understand them. they don’t have that knowledge to be able to speak to the adjudicator and say look i’ve been drinking for 40 years, my family’s suffering from depression, i’ve been depressed all my life, i haven’t been able to go to work. as indian residential school survivors returned to their communities, nurturing and non-coercive childrearing environments wherein the community took responsibility for the child’s well-being were lost (monture, 1995). the sense of balance between personal autonomy and responsibility to family and community that traditional practices taught children was lost (anderson, 2011). after years of living in residential schools, where they suffered neglect, hardship, forced labour, loss of culture and language, disruption of family and community, and physical and sexual abuse (funk-unrau & snyder, 2007), indian residential school survivors often internalized their experiences of abuse and re-entered their communities with negative learned behaviours (harrison, 2009; maracle, 2003). the support and validation that these students needed to resolve their painful experiences and reconnect with traditional teachings were often not available from parents, who were themselves dealing with the trauma of residential schools (anderson, 2011). indian residential school students were left ill equipped to interrupt the legacy of intergenerational trauma that had begun with their parents, and “subsequent generations of children were left with the consequences of what happened to their parents and grandparents” (aboriginal healing foundation, 2002, p. 6). the legacy of intergenerational trauma was thus unleashed upon communities. moreover, devastating consequences of intergenerational trauma were learned helplessness and self-hate— the direct result of colonization and the powerlessness experienced by aboriginal peoples as their lands, children, and cultural ways were taken away with no recourse to address these and other injustices (anderson, 2011; government of manitoba, 1999). since colonization was itself gendered, intergenerational trauma and learned helplessness can be more deeply understood when viewed through a gender lens. as institutions backed by both the state and the church, residential schools were used to intellectually, emotionally, spiritually, and psychologically entrench patriarchal western values into aboriginal children. for female students, this meant learning to be subservient and submissive to male authority (martin-hill, 2003). consequently, learned helplessness increased women’s dependence upon men, decreased their agency, and silenced many voices. female survivors often found themselves marginalized in both mainstream society and their own communities (olson-harper, 2009) because, as euro-colonial institutions designed to subjugate girls and women, the residential school system had left them vulnerable to discrimination on the basis of gender, as well as race and class. while both male and female survivors were traumatized by their indian residential school experiences, the loss of parenting skills and indigenous childrearing practices were particularly devastating to women. as female survivors became mothers, they found themselves dealing with overwhelming responsibilities and challenges directly linked to their residential school experiences. moreover, aboriginal men, who were also dealing with the loss of their traditional roles, began to adopt the patriarchal ways of the colonizers that they had learned in residential school, including the exercise of power through control, violence, and intimidation; a lack of respect for both equality between men and women and the nurturing of women; and, finally, abandonment of family and responsibility (anderson, 2011; wesley-esquimaux, 2009). consequently, many young aboriginal mothers became the sole providers and protectors for their children, despite no longer being respected for their traditional roles. according to brave heart (as cited in wesleyesquimaux, 2009), the consequences for aboriginal women were devastating: 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 1 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss1/3 doi: 10.1854/iipj.2016.7.1.3 faced with being victims of abuse and abandonment, women turned to substance abuse, suicide, and hopelessness. in trying to provide for and protect children alone (as well as coping with traumatic events in their lifetime such as past sexual, physical and emotional abuse), native women found themselves and their children in poverty, and many times, unable to cope with all the stressors involved with going it alone. (pp. 21-22) the most devastating consequence faced by female survivors was the removal of their children by child welfare authorities. monture (1999) explains that the historic experiences of the schools “have spread and multiplied within society to other social correctional systems such as child welfare, young offenders, and criminal justice” (p. 26). while this new generation of mothers unquestionably faced significant parenting challenges as a result of their residential school experiences, a record number of aboriginal children were also being removed from their families and communities from 1960 to 1980, in what was known as the “sixties scoop” (anderson, 2011). anderson (2011) described the child welfare system as another colonial tool that continued the residential school’s systematic process of assimilating aboriginal children, thereby dismantling traditional kinship systems and more equitable gender roles. there continues to be disproportionate numbers of aboriginal children in the care of child welfare agencies, illustrating wolski’s (2009) observation that colonization “is perceived by many to be an historical event; however, it must be understood as a current phenomenon” (p. 275). furthermore, colonization as a current phenomenon continues to have gendered outcomes, and, like other historic colonizing policies, the indian act and the indian residential school system impacted men and women differently. some of these differences were apparent during the analysis of the data from the study. w h o be n e f i t s : c o m p e n s a t i o n a n d w o m e n ’ s e x p e ri e n c e s who benefits: compensation and women’s experience of healing from indian residential schools was a community–university collaboration between the community organization saskatchewan aboriginal women’s circle (sawcc) 4 and a university scholar with a lengthy history of gender equality advocacy and work as an indigenous rights educator and ally. it was funded by the indigenous peoples health research centre and the university of regina. the study explored how one specific model for compensation, the independent assessment process (iap), was designed and implemented through a gender-specific lens.5 the study examined ways in which gender relations were understood in the iap compensation model and the degree to which the model could actually lead to healing if gender relations had been considered. the model was examined from the perspective of culturally relevant, gender-specific analysis, which framed the study around the particular experiences of aboriginal women and their particular colonized experiences of gender (wolski, 2012). the university researcher had previously assisted status of women canada and representatives from national aboriginal women’s organizations to develop a framework for a culturally relevant gender analysis (hanson, 2008). 4 according to its website the saskatchewan aboriginal women’s circle corporation is dedicated to promoting and enhancing the status of aboriginal women through education, advocacy, research and resource sharing (see www.sawcc.sk.ca). 5 a gender-inclusive analysis examines how a policy or program affects both men and women (including difference representations of men and women) and provides a more accurate analysis of how specific factors can affect anticipated outcomes. due to funding limitations, this study only looks at gender-specific factors—that is, factors in the iap model that affect outcomes for women. 5 hanson: gender, justice, and indian residential school claims published by scholarship@western, 2016 the response from indian residential school survivors to the call for participation in this study far exceeded the initial expectation of 8 to 10 participants. the research data was collected from two focus groups with 23 survivors who had completed their iap claims processes. seventeen women attended the first focus group in saskatoon, saskatchewan, prompting calls for a second focus group in regina, saskatchewan, which was attended by six participants. the participants were welcomed to the focus groups by an elder, who was in both cases an indian residential school survivor, and by a member of sawcc (the community group involved in the study). also in attendance at the focus groups was a regional health support worker who was a residential school survivor. along with the 23 female survivors, the research team held key informant interviews in person and by phone with five lawyers, five iap adjudicators, and one iap deputy chief adjudicator. all of the interviews and focus group conversations were recorded and then transcribed and sorted into themes that emerged from the raw data. a document analysis was also part of the study’s process. the study and data analysis were informed by post-colonial methodologies. for example, relational aspects were fundamental to the research process (kovach, 2005; tuhiwai-smith, 1999) and both an elder and a community organization were part of the process from the onset. the research process also drew attention to power relationships in the research, an understanding of the wider colonial and gendered history of canada from which it emerged, and attention to methods that honoured indigenous epistemologies and increased comfort levels for study participants. for example, both meetings with survivors began with an elder speaking followed by research questions posited by the community collaborator. sitting in a circle and using the principles of a sharing circle, survivors then responded to the questions. according to lavallée (2009), methods like sharing circles encourage participants to identify, represent, and engage in approaches that connect cultural memory, collective history, and personal narrative. the inquiry also included a position of engagement with survivors, the elders, and the community organization, and the recognition of the historically and racially constructed positions from which the research relationships emerged (anderson, khan, & reimer-kirkham, 2011). results were shared in publications, conference presentations, and in a public meeting. in reporting the results, the terms claimants and survivors are both used: lawyers and iap adjudicators often used the term “claimants,” while “survivors” was more widely applied to those who survived the tragic legacy of the schools. at least one focus group participant used the term “victims.” the themes that emerged from the study and which follow here are supported by quotations from study participants. pseudonyms are used to protect the identity of the speakers, or they are identified as fg (focus group) participants. h a rm s , l o s s e s , a n d o p p o rt u n i t i e s there are three main areas for compensation in the iap model, and each of these areas is divided into levels of harms and losses. iap claimants are compensated for specific physical or sexual abuses that they suffered in residential schools, as well as for the consequential harms of post-traumatic stress disorder, anxiety, depression, or a physically disabling injury through a point system that defines levels of abuse or harm. in addition to the abuses and consequential harms, survivors can also be compensated for what is referred to by the iap as “consequential loss of opportunity.” according to the irssa’s (2013) iap website, “loss of opportunity means that you have had fewer chances (less opportunity) to become as educated/trained or as fully employed as you might have been because of the effects of the abuse you experienced at indian residential school” (section 5, question 4, para. 2). 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 1 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss1/3 doi: 10.1854/iipj.2016.7.1.3 each level of harm in the model corresponds to an economic value of compensation. under this model, a loss of opportunity would include the chance to complete a post-secondary degree or attend training that may have advanced a career. however, female survivors who had their children taken away by social services and put into foster care, and therefore lost the opportunity to parent due to dysfunctional behaviors that can be linked to physical or sexual abuse suffered at residential school, were not eligible for compensation in that category. the iap compensation model, like other canadian legislation, does not place value on what traditionally is considered women’s work—that is, the invisible, unpaid work that sustains families and communities. women’s organizations have long lamented the need to include hours of unpaid work in national accounts and the development of laws and policies. despite the worldwide recognition canada received when it became the first country to include “unpaid household activities” in its national census, measuring unpaid work as marginalized and indigenous women experience it remains understudied (armstrong & armstrong, 2001; hanson & hanson, 2011). in relation to the iap, one adjudicator similarly explained the relationship between women and unpaid work: this process is really based on what the common law is. traditional work such as hunting, trapping is recognized… that’s easier to recognize because there is a proven history, but women’s work is not. it’s not different from other cases, where women’s work is not valued. (kate, interview) study participants in the sharing circle focus groups offered many examples of the kinds of work they did that might be considered traditional women’s work. they spoke with pride about cooking, snaring rabbits, identifying edible plants, picking berries, and so on, but they also lamented that this work was neither valued nor understood in the iap compensation model. in this quote, one of the study participants explains: and you guys talked about [compensation for lost education and paid] employment. the women were the nurturers, the caregivers and they’re not being compensated for that. the education part of it is… like i went to school in grade 11 and i got my grade 12 later on in years. i got my university way later on. they never took that into consideration… so i lost out back over here when i was raising my kids and i didn’t have the education. so they didn’t even look at that at all. (saskatoon fg participant) many of the participants also shared personal stories in relation to how their experiences in residential school affected their ability to parent, and the negative intergenerational impacts that followed. here are two examples from survivors who participated in the study: we came out of residential school with all this shame and guilt and everything. i held it in for so many years—that’s how i lived. like her [pointing to another focus group participant], i turned to alcohol and intravenous drugs. you know, it was horrible. (regina fg participant) i know when i finished residential school after year [i.e., age] 16 i was full of anger and bitterness. when i started having my children, i turned to alcohol. i didn’t know what love was all about. now i can hug and love my children, but then i couldn’t hug them at all. we didn’t even like ourselves, you know. for me, i didn’t like myself one bit. (regina fg participant) while housework and caring for children and the elderly is not solely defined as women’s work, the reality is that the majority of unpaid work in the home is still done by women (hanson & hanson, 2011; milan, 7 hanson: gender, justice, and indian residential school claims published by scholarship@western, 2016 keown & robles urquijo, 2011). this unpaid work is not only unrecognized in the iap model, but costs associated with it are also not reimbursable to indian residential school survivors who attend an iap hearing. for example, survivors are reimbursed for expenses incurred in order to attend an iap hearing, including travel costs, food, and support persons, but despite the fact that several study participants remarked that within their families they are the primary caregivers for their grandchildren, childcare expenses are not reimbursable when they attend iap hearings. consequently, the iap as a compensation model continues to devalue women’s work and experiences. ironically, while the indian residential school system trained aboriginal girls to work as domestics (million, 2000), this work was not recognized as having value in the iap compensation model. similarly, the iap model used colonial constructions of sex and sexuality to define abuse by treating the male body as the norm. using a postcolonial research position, this brings into question why the iap, as a negotiated settlement agreement, failed to address serious issues of power and abuse, most obviously the impacts of colonialism and conceptions of sexual abuse. t h e f e m a l e bo d y , s e x u a l i t y , a n d a s s a u l t a review of the iap forms and documents that were part of the data collection suggested that in many descriptions of sexual abuse the typical body is characterized as male (for example, breasts are not mentioned) and the wrongful acts (language in the model) describe anal or vaginal intercourse or penetration as the highest levels of harm. moreover, anal or vaginal penetration with an object is considered to be more harmful than both digital penetration and oral intercourse. these descriptions are also used to determine the amount of compensation, if any, to be awarded to an iap claimant (indian residential schools adjudication secretariat, n.d.). by privileging the male body and penetration as the norm in defining sexual abuses, many harms and abuses experienced by female survivors are discounted, such as female-on-female abuse, oral intercourse, and digital penetration. an emphasis on hetero-normative sexual relations is also apparent in these descriptions emphasizing, yet again, the privileging of dominant (colonial) narratives (bruzny, 2011; foucault, 1978; yep, 2003). while taking part in study interviews, two of the iap adjudicators, sadie and railie, shared biases against women they observed during their experiences at iap hearings when compensation for sexual abuses was being determined. railie noted that the iap descriptors for sexual abuse make it more difficult for women to qualify for compensation. according to railie: the reason that most women don't qualify for that [compensation] is that it has to be anal or vaginal intercourse, which is impossible for two girls together, or situations of anal or vaginal intercourse with an object, that's also very rare. it could happen but it's also very rare. most of the time it will be digital penetration, which is easier because you don't have to get an object or oral sex or masturbation. (interview) in the iap model violence is viewed as direct and physical, and sexual abuse is measured by privileging the male body with penetration as a norm. the word breast is not even mentioned in the model. this also presupposes and ignores the perpetuation of female-on-female violence and abuse. sadie, an iap adjudicator, further described the iap compensation model as missing key understandings about femaleon-female abuse. the other problem is that some of the model comes out of our understanding of abuse by male pedophiles which is about sexual gratification . . . i don’t think female pedophiles or women who 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 1 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss1/3 doi: 10.1854/iipj.2016.7.1.3 abuse sexually are well understood and haven’t been incorporated into the model. (sadie, interview) sadie described the ambiguity that accompanies attempted anal or vaginal penetration, and how abuses are overlooked when the emphasis for sexual abuse is on penetration. she began by stating what the model reads: one or more incidents of attempted anal or vaginal penetration [reading from the iap model]. it excluded digital penetration. so attempting to penetrate vaginally or anally was not included. but what is interesting is when is an attempt proven? an attempted penetration? how far or how close to when that is happening do you have to be to prove [it]? so some of the traditional views on how a rape might be occurring, like pants removed or stuff like that, you can have a narrow interpretation come out [where] there might have been an attempted rape, but it is the penetration that’s the object of that section [of the model]. the actual penetration matters, not the precursor to it. i’m not saying that if it was defined differently that we wouldn’t have had difficulty applying it, but i think that’s definitely very much a male model of the penetration being the sexual act or assault, [and] not something that could come before it. (sadie, interview) the iap’s interpretation of what constitutes sexual assault was also questioned by some of the iap adjudicators who were interviewed for this study. some adjudicators expressed concerns in relation to the steps or levels that the model used to describe sexual assault, such as this example: they didn’t just say “sexual assault” and let the adjudicators decide it was a sexual assault based on 1, 2, 3, 4 steps, right? they didn’t do that because they had to create a chart that differentiated different sexual acts. the law doesn’t do that. the damages, or the outcome, comes as a determination by the judge after determining sexual assault has occurred. in this case, because they tried to create the chart . . . i suspect, [to create] more uniformity in people’s compensation. but by that, you’re creating a model that doesn’t exist in the law and i think it needed more thought and conversation about sexual acts. (sadie, interview) there were also concerns expressed about how the process had in some ways gone from being one concerned with reconciliation to one that was more adversarial in nature. one adjudicator stated that: although it was intended to be a process that didn’t mirror the courts, [it] ended up being a process that is, primarily because [legal] counsel has made it this way. (kate, interview) other concerns that came up during study interviews were related to the diverse ways in which different cultures and languages describe sexual assault. for example, more than one adjudicator mentioned that a northern cree woman might have more difficulty describing sexual assault than a woman of mohawk or blackfoot ancestry because of her exposure to dominant cultural ideas. comfort in describing sexuality was considered important. the adjudicators felt that specific cultural analysis might be useful, but the need for a skilled adjudicator and strong interpreter could not be overlooked. 9 hanson: gender, justice, and indian residential school claims published by scholarship@western, 2016 c h i l d a b u s e , po w e r, a n d t ra u m a many study participants were critical of the way the iap model seemed to interrogate memories from childhood experiences that were associated with trauma. survivors often spoke about feeling violated yet again during the iap hearings. lawyers and adjudicators were critical of this process for several reasons: one of which was that of power and control. so what we’re seeing, the parts of the model i struggle with when i have to apply them [is] definitions of words. we’re supposed to use the plain and simple meaning of a word but fondling [emphasis added] is the best example: fondling cannot mean a gentle caress only. i’ve said that the model does require a contextual approach. the context is sexual abuse. sexual abuse is about power and control, therefore fondling can’t simply be a caressing touch. i’ve found that it can be a very rough grabbing, or punching, it could be a harsh action toward genitals [goes on to describe a student being washed with a wire brush]. (sadie, interview) there were other ways in which power was exercised and understood in the iap adjudication process. one focus group participant described power in relation to the traditional role of aboriginal women when she said: we were teachers and the residential school took that away from us . . . we lost all that power, you know. we had more power before, and they took that away from us. (fg participant) several adjudicators and survivors in the study mentioned that some lawyers, health support workers, and adjudicators exercised too much power over survivors during hearings. during the focus groups, several participants alluded to the ways in which they were treated by lawyers and the government of canada’s legal counsel, with greatly varying experiences. an iap adjudicator who participated in the study also voiced several questions in relation to power and control that seemed relevant to points raised by other study participants. she asked: how are power, racism and sexism played out? how were lawyers and adjudicators selected and trained? how are supports set up and by whom? (raina, interview) one iap adjudicator said she is even careful about what she wears and that she does not sit across the table—that is, in a position of confrontation—from the claimant. such practices of power, however, were unlikely to be part of an iap adjudicators’ training and, consequently, would only be observed among adjudicators who are conscientious about how sexism and issues of power get played out in such contexts. iap adjudicators who participated in the study also expressed concern about how lawyers or canada’s counsel understood child development, childhood trauma, and the relationship between trauma and memory. consequently, as one participant stated: it doesn’t seem to me that some of the lawyers who are there as part of the reconciliation process understand the basic development of a child. so it becomes more adversarial than reconciliatory. (pat, interview) 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 1 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss1/3 doi: 10.1854/iipj.2016.7.1.3 many of the study participants were critical of the way in which adult survivors were interrogated about their experiences of abuse as children. some felt the process exceeded what would be asked in the court system. study participants shared the following examples: on top of that, you take these really young children, and you add to that all the trauma. like just the trauma of being taken away from their family, scared all the time, all the bullying they went through, all the psychological . . . to put the sexual abuse on top of that, trauma can affect your memory, your ability to see what's happening around you, and also when people go into a big trauma like that, some clients would say “i was like drunk” you know? because your body has an adrenaline rush, and your mind is not there, and i know because i've had that in my life. i've had situations like that when big traumas . . . i try to go back there but i can't remember, and i was an adult. you don't remember everything. so, unfortunately sometimes in the process, adjudicators do not have the background to work in these files. some of the adjudicators who have done, for example, work in corporate law, or they worked maybe with native groups, but not necessarily sexual abuse, children's sexual abuse. sometimes they don't have that information. and they are given some training, but i think it’s only a few days. so you have these adjudicators who are looking into the process very mathematically, which is really not appropriate for these kinds of files. and also, they will ask a lot of questions. it's impossible for that person to remember what you're asking them to remember. (raina, interview) well let’s say you have a five-year-old child who says that she was sexually abused by a supervisor and then the lawyer for canada wants specifics, you know. they want to know exact numbers, they want to know very minute details. whereas a child of that age, never mind the fact that this is 65 years later, a child of that age would have difficulty even responding to those kinds of questions. (pat, interview) although both male and female survivors were questioned about details related to trauma they experienced and memories from their childhoods, the study demonstrated differences in the ways that issues of control and power are experienced in the lives of vulnerable women. as one adjudicator stated: if the person’s not able to tell their story in a safe way, or comfortably, because of all these dynamics, it’s going to impact the level of compensation that they get because they can’t tell their story. (pat, interview) adjudicators were especially critical of lawyers or representatives for the government of canada who listened to the experiences of survivors and then made comments along the lines of: it’s not possible because my son is the same age and he would never do that. (liz, interview) survivors who were interviewed also explained how adjudicators sometimes made them relive a trauma. here is one example: yeah, there was others there, but the adjudicator began to feel that she was like a prosecutor. it was like, over and over again, and asking me, and i began to see, i was starting to see what was, i could see what was happening to me. like i could see this person, what was happening, and then she [the adjudicator] just kept asking me over and over again about that. about incidents that happened in school. (saskatoon fg participant) 11 hanson: gender, justice, and indian residential school claims published by scholarship@western, 2016 while the iap compensation model was designed to exclude the personal opinions of those overseeing the process, several adjudicators felt that such a model was not always followed. in the context of vulnerable populations, this is particularly problematic. several survivors made requests for female adjudicators or aboriginal lawyers, but there were mixed sentiments from study participants about whether this made a notable difference. moreover, many of the study participants believed that survivors’ experiences during this process depended upon whether or not they felt that those involved in the process believed their stories of abuse. be l i e v e rs , s u p p o rt e rs , a n d h e a l i n g the survivors in the focus groups who felt that the iap process had been one of healing acknowledged that being able to tell their stories and feeling as if they were believed in the process was indeed a therapeutic experience. these survivors stated that supports in their families and communities and feeling supported by their lawyers (and adjudicators) did make a difference. some of the survivors were very grateful because the process helped them vocalize experiences that were very painful; they expressed that their personal feelings of shame and guilt were lessened when they were able to express what had happened to them in residential schools. furthermore, several also acknowledged that it was the first time they had ever told these stories. participants viewed this as an important component in lessening the intergenerational effects of residential school. one of the survivors explained this in the following quote: well, being able to bring it [i.e., the abuse] out for the first time in my life about what happened to me when i was 8, 9 years old . . . it was a, it was, it was healing for me because all these years i’ve kept it inside. i never ever told anyone, my first husband, my second husband, my family. and then, after that, i started talking about what i experienced with my family. it was the first time they’d ever heard about what i went through . . . they kept hearing—they were starting to hear—but they didn’t know. they didn’t understand. and because both my parents also went to residential school, my mom was very strict. you know, she never hugged. never. even when she was in her late eighties—she still shrunk back when i tried to hug her. and so, i didn’t do that with my children when they were younger. now every time i see them, you know, we’re more open to that, and that’s how far we’ve come. yeah, it did open up . . . for me. (fg participant) a health support worker, based on her experience supporting claimants, offered the following observation: i think that they, (the adjudicators, government of canada, lawyers) for this process, maybe they need to get educated a little more about the survivors’ feelings . . . there are a few aboriginal adjudicators and they’re excellent, so that makes a big difference. and i can tell the claimant lawyer you’re fortunate today, you know, you’re gonna have an easy hearing. like she was saying, there’s some adjudicators that will ask you a question over and over again cause i’ve had one claimant that got up and said that’s it, you don’t want to believe me. you know, he was swearing . . . so there is a difference with the adjudicators. some of them need to, i don’t know what they need—to let them know they’re not in the court. (fg participant). at least two adjudicators commended the way the iap attempted to resolve the claims in a less adversarial manner than the court system. in practice, however, it was not clear whether this was actually achieved. although feelings of being believed and supported did not always have a clear gender difference in the 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 1 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss1/3 doi: 10.1854/iipj.2016.7.1.3 process, the frequency with which study participants mentioned it was significant in regards to reaching the iap’s goals of encouraging healing and reconciliation. c o n c l u d i n g r e m a rks the findings of the who benefits study support the idea that avoiding the errors of canada’s colonial history in the present means attending to issues of gender equality, and how aboriginal cultures and histories are lived and experienced. given the recent conclusion of the trc, the release of its recommendations (trc, 2015) and the impending publication of its final report in 2016, demands for a national inquiry into missing and murdered aboriginal women in canada, and outstanding cries for justice to address the sixties scoop cases (massive state-supported adoptions of aboriginal children to nonaboriginal homes), this message retains its urgency and relevancy. specifically, this study highlights elements of the iap model that can influence other models in the future. future compensatory models for similar abuses should restructure how harms, losses, and consequential losses of opportunity are defined and compensated. first, an acknowledgement of the socially constructed and colonial position of aboriginal women and unpaid work would be valuable. second, future models could develop a more inclusive understanding of the representations of the body and sexuality in order to ensure that multiple perspectives are represented. for example, privileging the able-bodied, male body as the typical body that receives abuse and using penetration as the primary norm by which to determine the occurrence of sexual assault does not adequately address the multiple ways in which sexual abuse is perpetrated and experienced. third, compensation must address the lasting impacts of child abuse and trauma, including a wider acknowledgement that even though the claims process is currently dealing with adults, the experiences of abuse are constructed from memories during childhood and are often associated with trauma. as such, professionals who deal with trauma and child abuse and child development might assist in informing this process. additional research into how this process is experienced is also recommended. fourth, a healthy policy would address how issues of power and control are practiced historically and within different dimensions of socio-cultural identity, and advocate for healing strategies that are founded on believing and supporting those who are impacted by abuse. training for legal counsel, for example, could include ensuring that traditional methods of healing are recognized so that in the development of future care plans attending a sweat lodge ceremony, for example, would be considered a legitimate process of healing. study findings also suggest that though the training and selection of legal counsel, adjudicators, and others involved in the process is critical, so too is it critical to involve the perspectives of professionals working on child abuse cases who are familiar with issues of interlocking oppressions, such as race, culture, and gender inequality. the indigeneity-grounded framework discussed by feras and maaka (2010) may support such culture-specific and indigenous understandings around policy development. additionally, compensation practices should be developed with the involvement of all stakeholders, including survivors, so that they might be more reflective of lived reality. finally, other models of reconciliation—such as those suggested by llewellyn (2002, 2008)—might be considered. although the iap model of compensation is nearing its completion in canada, the examples provided from this study demonstrate how future policies, programs, and compensatory models can move toward more reconciliatory methods and, ultimately, toward healing practices for survivors. 13 hanson: gender, justice, and indian residential school claims published by scholarship@western, 2016 r e f e re n c e s aboriginal affairs and northern development canada. 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(2003). the violence of heteronormativity in communication studies. journal of homosexuality, 45(2-4), 11-59. doi: 10.1300/j082v45n02_02 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 1 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss1/3 doi: 10.1854/iipj.2016.7.1.3 the international indigenous policy journal january 2016 gender, justice, and the indian residential school claims process cindy hanson recommended citation gender, justice, and the indian residential school claims process abstract keywords acknowledgments disclaimer creative commons license gender, justice, and the indian residential school claims process ms#1474 jull a principled approach rce.pdf the international indigenous policy journal volume 11|issue2 may 2020 a principled approach to research conducted with inuit, métis, and first nations people: promoting engagement inspired by the cihr guidelines for health research involving aboriginal people (2007-2010) janet jull queen's university, kingston, ontario, canada, janet.jull@queensu.ca alexandra king university of saskatchewan, saskatoon, saskatchewan, canada, alexandra.king@usask.ca malcolm king university of saskatchewan, saskatoon, saskatchewan, canada, malcolm.king@usask.ca ian d. graham university of ottawa, ottawa, ontario, canada, igraham@ohri.ca melody e. morton ninomiya wilfrid laurier university, waterloo, ontario, canada, mmortonninomiya@wlu.ca kristen jacklin university of minnesota medical school duluth, duluth, minnesota, usa, kjacklin@d.umn.edu penny moody-corbett northern ontario school of medicine, thunder bay, ontario, canada, pmoodycorbett@nosm.ca julia e. moore centre for implementation, toronto, ontario, canada, julia.moore@thecenterforimplementation.com recommended citation jull, j., king, a., king, m., graham, i. d., morton ninomiya, m. e. jacklin, k., moody-corbett, p., & moore, j. e. (2020). a principled approach to research conducted with inuit, métis, and first nations people: promoting engagement inspired by the cihr guidelines for health research involving aboriginal people (2007-2010). the international indigenous policy journal, 11(2). doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2020.11.2.10635 a principled approach to research conducted with inuit, métis, and first nations people: promoting engagement inspired by the cihr guidelines for health research involving aboriginal people (20072010) abstract research to address the health burdens experienced by indigenous populations is essential. in the canadian context, the truth and reconciliation commission of canada determined that these health burdens are the result of policies that have undermined opportunities to address community-level health needs. the canadian institutes of health research guidelines for health research involving aboriginal people (2007-2010), or “cihr guidelines,” were prepared in a national consultation process involving inuit, métis, and first nations communities, researchers, and institutions. this article asserts that the principles espoused in the cihr guidelines hold ongoing potential to guide research with indigenous people in ways that promote equitable research partnerships. we encourage those in research environments to engage with the spirit and content of the cihr guidelines. keywords ethics, guidelines, research, cihr guidelines, tcps2, inuit, métis, first nations, indigenous, engagement, equity acknowledgments we are grateful for the important contributions to this paper by our valued colleague dr. jaime flamenbaum. drs. alexandra king, malcolm king, and ian d. graham are senior authors on the paper and provided important guidance and mentorship. we are grateful for and thank the elders, knowledge holders, and community members who contributed to the development of the cihr guidelines for health research involving aboriginal people (2007-2010). funding details: this work was supported by the ontario spor support unit under grant #60152 ossu por. idg is a recipient of a cihr foundation grant (fdn# 143237). creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0license. jull et al.: a principled approach to research conducted with inuit, métis, and first nations people published by scholarship@western, 2020 1 a principled approach to research conducted with inuit, métis, and first nations people: promoting engagement inspired by the cihr guidelines for health research involving aboriginal people (2007-2010) research is essential to address health inequities experienced by indigenous1 populations (united nations, n.d.). inuit, métis, and first nations populations have the highest rates of health burden in relation to the general population living in canada (reading, 2009). these health burdens are the direct result of previous canadian government policies that have undermined opportunities for inuit, métis, and first nations populations to address community-level health needs and improve outcomes, as stated in the truth and reconciliation commission of canada (trc, 2015a) call to action #18 (see also government of canada, 1996; ly & crowshoe, 2015; o'neil, 1995). inequities in health between indigenous and general populations extend beyond canada (wilk, cooke, stranges, & maltby, 2017) and are evident in other colonial nations such as australia, new zealand, and the united states (axelsson, kukutai, & kippen, 2016; czyzewski, 2011). these inequities are reflected in the determinants of health (king, smith, & gracey, 2009; reading & wein, 2009). western-oriented2 views and values have been and continue to be privileged in colonial nations and are perpetuated by westernoriented ways of knowing and doing (akena, 2012; smith, 2012). western-oriented knowledge not only dominates research, it also drives the development of knowledge that is used in policy to structure health and social systems. the history of research demonstrates an imbalance of power between western-oriented researchers and their academic institutions, and the individuals and communities who attempt to engage in the research process. such power imbalances in mainstream academic research systems typically characterize research as a process done “on” people, which has been described as distorting indigenous knowledge, and viewed as “inquiry conducted by outsiders, harvesting information that is translated into distorted representations”(brant castellano & reading, 2010, pp. 2-3). western-oriented research processes have contributed to the formulation of policies that are limiting and which undermine self-determination by indigenous peoples and their communities alike (brant castellano & reading, 2010). deeply embedded in both health and social systems, the legacy of western-oriented colonial practices and their ongoing perpetuation of inequity has had the effect of limiting opportunities for community members to 1 we use the term indigenous to refer to first peoples internationally and as defined by united nations (united nations, n.d.): indigenous peoples are inheritors and practitioners of unique cultures and ways of relating to people and the environment. they have retained social, cultural, economic, and political characteristics that are distinct from those of the dominant societies in which they live. despite their cultural differences, indigenous peoples from around the world share common problems related to the protection of their rights as distinct peoples. (para. 1) the term aboriginal peoples refers to the indigenous inhabitants or the first peoples of canada including inuit, métis, and first nations peoples, without regard to their separate origins and identities. for this reason, when referring to indigenous people in canada, we choose to convey the distinct origins and identities of inuit, métis, and first nation groups. 2 we use the term western to refer to a worldview that is originally a product of european culture. western is representative of an “ . . . ‘archive’ of knowledge and systems, rules and values” (smith, 2012, p. 44). the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.2.10635 2 be full and active participants in research and to contribute to research knowledge (ball & janyst, 2008; boffa, king, mcmullin, & long, 2011; jacklin & kinoshameg, 2008; smith, 2012). to address these inequities and to take the kind of meaningful action called for by the trc, western-oriented research processes must evolve and create space for indigenous knowledge and include roles for knowledge holders, healers, medicine people, and others in indigenous communities. further, research processes must avoid tokenism and begin to see these contributions as having equivalent value to westernoriented ways of knowing. if we are unable to foster inclusivity in partnered knowledge creation, we will continue to fail to adequately explore and address indigenous health and wellness3 knowledge and to understand the health needs of indigenous people in society. the aim of this article is to assert that the principles of the cihr guidelines for health research involving aboriginal people (2007-2010) hold ongoing potential to provide a practical guide in research conduct with indigenous people, in ways that promote equitable partnerships within western-oriented academic settings (canadian institutes of health research [cihr], 2007). we are a team of indigenous and non-indigenous scholars who share a deep concern for the ways in which research often fails to consider the perspectives of indigenous people, perpetuates injustice in our health and social systems, and contributes to health inequities. as researchers, we have been active in partnered research for many years. some of our team were involved in the development of the cihr guidelines and have continued to further the development of ethical thought and practice with the objective of bringing forward indigenous perspectives in research. our goal in this article is to recognize the value of the principles espoused in the cihr guidelines. we present the practical guidance offered in the cihr guidelines as a useful option for indigenous community members and western-oriented researchers to engage with in spirit and content, should indigenous communities not have guidelines to structure equitable research relationships. background the cihr guidelines for health research involving aboriginal people (2007-2010): a strengthsbased approach in a partnership with the institute of aboriginal peoples’ health and the cihr ethics office, the cihr guidelines were developed “to assist researchers and institutions in carrying out ethical and culturally competent research involving aboriginal people” (cihr, 2007, p. 2). the cihr guidelines were prepared by a collaborative working group composed of first nations and métis elders as well as indigenous researchers. the creation of the guidelines included a national consultation process involving inuit, métis, and first nations communities, researchers, and institutions. the guidelines themselves consist of 15 principles described through articles. together, they provide clear guidance on how to conduct research that reflects, advances, and meets expectations for ethical, collaborative, and culturally supportive engagement with inuit, métis, and first nations individuals and 3 well-being is a western construct and more individualistic than the interconnected and wholistic wellness as conceptualized by many indigenous people. there has been a gradual movement from wellbeing or well-being or well being to wellness (a. king & m. king, personal communication, january 2019). jull et al.: a principled approach to research conducted with inuit, métis, and first nations people published by scholarship@western, 2020 3 communities. the purpose of our article is to encourage all those in research environments to engage with the principles of the cihr guidelines to: (a) operationalize required regulatory policy requirements and research directives; (b) ensure equitable inclusion of indigenous and westernoriented knowledge in research systems; and (c) in the case of indigenous-specific enquiry, to privilege or to give primacy to indigenous ways of knowing and doing (gaudry & lorenz, 2018). drawing on current and past research studies, we provide examples of the principled research practices described in the articles of the cihr guidelines. we present the cihr guidelines as a useful option for indigenous community members and westernoriented researchers to use, should communities not have guidelines to structure equitable research relationships. the intent of the cihr guidelines is to promote research that is “in keeping with aboriginal values and traditions” (cihr, 2007, p. 2). the cihr guidelines provide foundational principles to guide the conduct of research, which may be of use to all researchers and researchers-intraining who engage in partnerships with indigenous communities. the guidelines were prepared as an active response to the historical legacy of research, to address the need for greater community selfdetermination to achieve better health, and to redress the inappropriateness of many western-oriented research approaches in indigenous contexts. these factors historically contribute to ethical dilemmas and ineffective research outcomes (warry, 1990). furthermore, the cihr guidelines present an approach to research that upholds the strengths-based practices that are prevalent in indigenous societies. the cihr guidelines were originally developed to encourage and clarify the conditions for ethical research conduct, and to strategically inform the revision of the 1998tri-council policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans (tcps; cihr, natural science and engineering research council [nserc], & sciences and humanities research council [sshrc], 1998; see also brant castellano & reading, 2010). the tcps is the joint research ethics policy statement of the federal research agencies, cihr, nserc, and sshrc, referred to as “the agencies.” in 2010, cihr’s governing council approved the newly revised tcps2 (cihr et al., 2010). cihr subsequently took the position that the tcps2 had precedence over the cihr guidelines, and the cihr guidelines were archived. in lieu, researchers were directed to the tcps2 chapter 9 that is described as drawing on the work from the cihr guidelines (cihr et al., 2010). as will be discussed in more detail below, the focus of tcps2 is on policy; that is, adherence to a set of ethical standards. it is not intended as a framework for how ethical and culturally appropriate research should be conducted. in other words, tcps2 articulates what standards research must meet, but it does not inform researchers on how those standards should be attained. we argue that the cihr guidelines help to address this gap by providing a framework of principles for how ethical research can be conducted with indigenous partners. the aim of our article is to highlight the guiding principles of the cihr guidelines. inuit, métis, and first nations populations have strengths and continuity within their societies (cash, de oliveira, garrick, & hemi, 2014; smylie, olding, & ziegler, 2014); yet, these strengths are rarely acknowledged within mainstream academic research systems. when indigenous knowledge is acknowledged, it is often from a western-oriented perspective or interpretation. additionally, westernoriented knowledge is often considered more valid than other forms of knowledge, including knowledge arising from indigenous experience (akena, 2012). healthcare rights and treaties need to be respected (aboriginal affairs and northern development canada, 2007), and changes need to be made to health the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.2.10635 4 and social systems to foster greater inclusiveness of knowledge, including indigenous knowledge. to improve the health and wellness of indigenous communities, researchers must critically examine their own assumptions and biases in the process of knowledge development and consider their role in the interplay of power relationships in society (jull & giles, 2012; tobias, richmond, & luginaah, 2013). when considering the conduct of research, there are important guiding documents: the truth and reconciliation commission of canada (trc, 2015b) final report, united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip; united nations, 2007), and cihr guidelines (cihr, 2007). there are two key documents that assert the need to address societal imbalances of power that undermine opportunities for indigenous peoples’ health and wellness, and which are relevant to the cihr guidelines. these are the trc (2015a, 2015b) reports and undrip (united nations, 2007). the mandate of the trc was to reveal the history of colonialism and its effects, which perpetuate to this day in canada within inuit, métis, and first nations contexts. the trc (2015a) also made recommendations for reconciliation. created by the indian residential schools settlement agreement, the trc involved three commissioners who spent six years listening to over 6,500 witnesses, which included inuit, métis, and first nations people placed as children in residential schools under the direction of the canadian government. the government’s aim in creating the residential school system was to separate children from their families and communities with the purpose of indoctrinating children into the dominant euro-canadian culture (trc, 2015b). in existence for over 100 years, residential schools have had a deleterious impact on many generations of inuit, métis, and first nations people. a final report of the trc (2015a) made recommendations for reconciliation that are framed as 94 calls to action. of these, seven (calls to action #18-24) relate specifically to health (trc, 2015a). the aim of the trc is to promote the establishment and maintenance of respectful relationships that can lead to societal change. reconciliation is framed as a process of healing relationships that requires action. it is only through actions that we can address the ongoing legacy of colonial structures and processes to create an equitable and inclusive canadian society (trc, 2015b). another important document is undrip (united nations, 2007). undrip promotes the individual and collective rights of indigenous people and sets out the minimum standards for survival, dignity, and wellness. it promotes the rights of indigenous people to have self-determination and to achieve the highest attainable health, in addition to other rights such as culture, identity, language, employment, and education (inter-parliamentary union, 2014). as a guiding document, the undrip encourages nations to work with indigenous people in appropriate and culturally resonant ways to design legislation, policies, and programs to stop the perpetuation of inequity and the further marginalization of indigenous people (assembly of first nations, 2017). both the trc and undrip stress that it is important to promote actions that do not risk perpetuating or reproducing existing colonial structures in research. as well, these documents explain why it is important to take action in the area of research in ways that indigenous people identify as respectful and inclusive. the cihr guidelines have been identified as upholding the spirit and intent of the undrip (taniguchi, taualii, & maddock, 2012) and supporting processes that structure action to address trc recommendations. the cihr guidelines were developed by and with indigenous-led scholars, organizations, and community members who envisioned opportunities for societal change through the ethical conduct of research. jull et al.: a principled approach to research conducted with inuit, métis, and first nations people published by scholarship@western, 2020 5 analysis ethical conduct of research with indigenous people: a need for practical guidance the imposition of western-oriented approaches to research “on” indigenous groups is coming under increasing scrutiny by those in mainstream academic research systems, including researchers and those who are impacted by research, such as members of the public, health systems policy and decision makers, and care providers (akena, 2012; brant castellano & reading, 2010; jacklin & kinoshameg, 2008). this scrutiny has led to greater efforts to accommodate diverse conceptualizations of knowledge in health and social systems, including indigenous knowledge systems fostered by participatory processes and resulting in research collaboration. collaborative research is defined as a genuine, meaningful partnership between researchers and the community and its members affected by the research; collaborative research promotes a partnership within a framework of mutual trust and cooperation throughout the entire the research process (cihr, 2007). evidence indicates that the use of participatory processes in research is linked to increased collaboration among community partners and researchers (israel et al., 2006). participatory processes in research prioritize partnerships with people for whom the research is ultimately meant to be of benefit. the use of such processes in research have been identified as a means to address power inequities while also generating research findings that are more likely to produce useful outcomes (jull, morton-ninomiya, compton, & picard, 2018; masuda, zupancic, crighton, muhajarine, & phipps, 2014; tobias et al., 2013). despite the imperative for collaborative research, practical guidance on how to conduct research that is inclusive of indigenous communities and their members, or how to incorporate the perspectives of inuit, métis, and first nations groups remains limited (morton ninomiya & pollock, 2017). there is an urgent need for increased knowledge of ways to operationalize principled research practices that engage indigenous groups, reconceptualising and transforming our approaches to research with indigenous people and shifting the balance (gaudry & lorenz, 2018). public policy is a powerful lever for change, and it can be used to address the imbalances that exist in society, including our research and health systems. a principled approach to research that is consistent with contemporary ethics policy, may lead to genuine, meaningful partnerships between researchers and those whom the research is meant to benefit. it is from within these genuine relationships that opportunities emerge to redistribute power and allow those who hold knowledge to lead change, wherever they might be positioned in the research relationship. in canada, research designs that involve humans must demonstrate adherence to policy for ethical standards articulated in the tcps2 (cihr et al., 2018). the tcps (cihr et al., 1998) promotes the ethical conduct of research involving humans: “it outlines standards and procedures for research involving humans and applies to those conducting, participating in, or reviewing human research in institutions funded by the agencies” (para. 1). the tcps document is a policy statement on the ethical conduct of research involving humans. in 2010, the second version of tcps, referred to as tcps2, was released (cihr et al., 2010). tcps2 introduced a new chapter, chapter 9 “research involving the first nations, inuit and métis peoples of canada,” about indigenous research. the aim of tcps2 chapter 9 is to provide specific governance for research that involves first nations, inuit, and métis people and to be used with any codes of research practice established by indigenous communities themselves. the tcps2 (2010) was further revised in 2014 without changes to chapter 9, and the tcps2 (2018) is now the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.2.10635 6 the official research ethics policy of the agencies (cihr et al., 2010, 2014, 2018). policy-based research guidance, such as the tcps2, primarily outlines criteria for ethical conduct. it offers little to guide researchers on approaches that promote and support ethical behaviour in the conduct of their research. the approach of the tcps2 is in contrast to the cihr guidelines: the cihr guidelines, as a guiding document developed by and for indigenous communities, demonstrates steps in how to conduct research that is beneficial for indigenous communities (brant castellano & reading, 2010). the tcps2 articulates what researchers must do, but it is limited in that it does not help researchers understand how to do research in a way that is beneficial for indigenous communities. to ensure that community members and research collaborators are not undervalued in western-oriented and biased health and social systems, it is critical that researchers develop understandings of how to use ethically sound approaches in the conduct of their research. one other limitation inherent in the sole use of a policy that articulates ethical standards is that such a policy may not go far enough to address the balance of power in research partnerships (brunger & wall, 2016; moore, castleden, tirone, & martin, 2017). the failure to address the balance of power in the conduct of research is of tremendous importance given the history of inequity for indigenous people in research (allen & flamenbaum, 2013). there is a need to facilitate respectful research processes of knowledge development that are inclusive of and centred on indigenous ways of knowing and doing. this may require expanding upon the limits of western-oriented approaches to research. awareness has grown within the indigenous and western-oriented academic research community about historical and ongoing injustices associated with research involving indigenous people. each community has a unique local culture and research needs, from which meaningful research relationships may be built (baydala et al., 2014; pahwa et al., 2015). there are examples of research guidance developed to structure the ethical conduct of research with indigenous people internationally and more locally in canada with inuit, métis, and first nations populations. many indigenous communities and organizations in canada are at various stages of creating their own independent research ethics guidelines and protocols that explain an ethical approach to the conduct of research (see examples in table 1). the cihr guidelines were designed for use by locally established indigenous ethics review committees, western-oriented researchers and research ethics boards, as well as individuals and communities, to know what to expect of a research partnership. they are described as “intended to promote ethics review that enables and facilitates rather than supresses or obstructs research” (cihr, 2007, p. 12). the cihr guidelines were intended to provide a template for an ethical approach to research when communities do not have their own guidelines in place, and for those who use the cihr guidelines to reach consensus on research protections that are appropriate to the context (cihr, 2007). jull et al.: a principled approach to research conducted with inuit, métis, and first nations people published by scholarship@western, 2020 7 table 1. some examples of international, national, and local (within canada) research ethics guidance international indigenous people and participatory health research (world health organization, n.d.) national tri-council policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans (chapter 9; cihr et al., 2018) ethical conduct in research with aboriginal and torres strait islander peoples and communities: guidelines for researchers and stakeholders (national health and medical research council, 2018) guidelines for researchers on health research involving maori (health research council of new zealand, 2010) indigenous research protection act (indigenous peoples council on biocolonialism, 2000) the first nations principles of ocap®* (first nations information governance centre, 2018) national inuit strategy on research (inuit tapiriit kanatami, 2018) negotiating research relationships with inuit communities: a guide for researchers (inuit tapiriit kanatami & nunavut research institute, 2007) principles of ethical métis research (national aboriginal health organization, 2010) proposal for ethical guidelines for sámi health research and research on sámi human biological material (samediggi, 2018) local (examples from canada) guidelines for ethical aboriginal research (noojmowin teg health centre, 2003) protocols and principles for conducting research with yukon first nations (yukon research centre, 2013) guidelines for community engagement with nunatukavut (nunatukavut community council research advisory committee, 2013) kahnawake schools diabetes prevention project (ksdpp): code of research ethics (revised 2007; ksdpp, 2007) sturgeon lake first nation research protocol (sturgeon lake health center centre, personal communication, march 2019) note. *ocap® is a registered trademark of the first nations information governance centre (fnigc). the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.2.10635 8 the benefits of a principled approach to research the cihr guidelines were developed to engage indigenous communities and community members and western-oriented researchers in the collaborative design and conduct of research to best meet the needs of those engaged in or affected by the research endeavour. there are examples of research studies that have used a principled approach with success. for instance, there are major gaps in health data of indigenous groups, and the collection of health data of indigenous people has a history of colonization and discrimination (national collaborating centre for aboriginal health, 2012). recently, the environment of health data has been changing to reflect principles of good governance of indigenous data. there is an emerging data sovereignty movement that maps onto the first nations’ principles regarding the collection, use, and disclosure of data or information regarding first nations. ownership, control, access, and possession (ocap®) principles, for example, articulate key principles for first nations’ data governance (first nations information governance centre, 2018; walker, lovett, kukutai, jones, & henry, 2017). guided by the principles of good governance of indigenous data, a study linked the indian register to routinely collected provincial health administrative data for first nations individuals living in the province of ontario, canada. the data made it possible for indigenous organizations and communities to identify and take ownership of the data and ask questions of researchers that are important to them, such as cancer survival rates and child wellness indicators (walker et al., 2017). principled approaches to research can lead to research practices that are truly collaborative, strengths based, of mutual benefit, and culturally appropriate. as the cihr guidelines promote inclusion of indigenous knowledge in research systems, they support the use of ocap® and other indigenous-developed approaches critical for self-determination and self-governance. the cihr guidelines hold ongoing potential to guide research with indigenous people in ways that indigenous groups themselves have identified as able to promote equitable partnerships. the use of the cihr guidelines as a complement to policy and to guide research action the ways to develop and sustain partnerships with inuit, métis, and first nations groups with westernoriented academic research partners in such ways that all members of the partnership can define as ethical and equitable are not yet clear. it is important to find common ground on ways to talk about research conduct and to enact policy that promotes equitable partnerships. we must better understand how to operationalize research principles that align with and uphold indigenous values and traditions in western-oriented academic settings. these principles must be strengths based, of mutual benefit, and able to be identified as culturally appropriate and safe by those participating or affected by research partnerships. inuit, métis, and first nations people must be able to identify research as done by and with their communities and be fully confident that research aims are addressing priorities that are of importance to each community. the cihr guidelines are “not regulations nor are they meant to be of general application. rather, they are guidelines that should be followed by anyone who carries out research involving aboriginal people in canada” (cihr, 2007, p. 2). an established cihr working group called the aboriginal ethics working group (aewg) prepared the cihr guidelines. the aewg included elders as well as indigenous researchers. together with leaders from a range of academic disciplines, they provided advice and support during a broad national two-year series of consultations to develop research ethics guidelines for inuit, métis, and first nations people in a process that has been described elsewhere (brant castellano jull et al.: a principled approach to research conducted with inuit, métis, and first nations people published by scholarship@western, 2020 9 & reading, 2010). the national aboriginal capacity and developmental research environments (acadre) network also informed the work. the national consultation process with inuit, métis, and first nations elders and communities, researchers, and institutions resulted in the cihr guidelines that promote “ethical and culturally competent” research involving inuit, métis, and first nations people (cihr, 2007, p. 2). some of the authors of this article were active in the process of developing the cihr guidelines. the cihr guidelines were designed to promote particular research actions, as well as: • be applicable to researchers funded by cihr who were carrying out research involving inuit, métis or first nations people in canada; • be voluntarily implemented by the researcher, in return for cihr funding; and • be a complement to the mandatory use of tri-council and funding agency policies as well as any other applicable legislation such as the canadian charter of rights and freedoms. cihr guidelines: potential to guide research conduct following the release of tcps2 in 2010, cihr archived the cihr guidelines and made the tcps2 the sole policy on indigenous research among the federal funding agencies. as a team of indigenous and non-indigenous scholars, we believe that the articles and principled approach promoted in the cihr guidelines continue to have value as a complement to policy governing ethical standards. moreover, they provide pragmatic and practical guidance for researchers and indigenous communities who are interested in how to conduct research that is strengths based, of mutual benefit, and culturally appropriate. researchers who are unfamiliar with the conduct of collaborative research with indigenous communities may benefit from the application of the cihr guidelines. the cihr guidelines may help to prepare researchers to create opportunities to respect, honour, and utilise indigenous knowledge when conducting research with indigenous people. for instance, as there are new research methods that seek to include indigenous and western-oriented approaches together, researchers must be particularly attentive to ensure that they care for and protect sacred knowledge, which may include ceremonial knowledge. in some cases, indigenous ways of knowing and doing may not be openly shared. for instance, current knowledge holders may be uniquely responsible for the intergenerational transmission of knowledge or practices from ancestors to future generations within a given community. the cihr guidelines promote approaches to research with indigenous people that stress the need to identify, care for, and protect sacred knowledge. further, the cihr guidelines more fully respect indigenous ways of research—“research is not only ceremony, but also ceremony can be research” (a. king, personal communication, october 2018). the conduct of research that leads to knowledge development to support the health and wellness of indigenous people must adopt an approach that is led by indigenous people—and western-oriented academics must respect indigenous partners’ guidance. the cihr guidelines, with its principled approach, sets the conditions for equitable relationships, so that indigenous ways of knowing are honoured and respected in forums that might otherwise be dominated by western-oriented academic ways of knowing. we assert that the principles of the cihr guidelines hold the potential to guide research with indigenous people in ways that promote equitable partnerships within western-oriented academic the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.2.10635 10 settings. we encourage all those in research environments to engage with the principles of the cihr guidelines as an approach to (a) operationalize required regulatory requirements and research directives (that is, policy), and (b) ensure equitable inclusion of indigenous and western-oriented knowledge in research systems. drawing on current and past research studies, we provide examples of the principled research practices described in the articles of the cihr guidelines (cihr, 2007; table 2). table 2. cihr guidelines: demonstration of principled research practices described in articles with examples cihr guidelines key features: possible ways to demonstrate principles examples principle #1: reconciliation of ethical spaces “protecting aboriginal ethical space involves a series of stages of dialogue beginning with the conversations prior to the design of the research, through to the dissemination of results and perhaps even afterward. fundamental to this process is an ongoing respect for both parties’ ethical spaces and a continual questioning of ‘is this ethical?’” this requires a dialogue about intentions, values and assumptions throughout the research process” (cihr, 2007, p. 17). principle #2: sacred space and traditional knowledge article 1: “a researcher should understand and respect indigenous world views, including responsibilities to the people and culture that flow from being granted access to traditional or sacred knowledge. these should be incorporated into research agreements, to the extent possible” (cihr, 2007, p. 17). • spend time in the community: volunteer, attend community events, meet with elders, demonstrate intent to form longerterm relationship (extends before and after the research). • establish common ground: make efforts to understand what matters to collaborators, including what and how knowledge can be collected and shared. • show public accountability: articulate why the research is urgently needed, with clear implications for the future. it is important to do this research for now and the future. in a paper by baydala et al. (2014), the ways in which co-learning, cocreation, and community-based participatory research are used in a partnered research project is presented. authentic partnering in research (if not already formed) often requires significant amounts of time building relationships, trust, and developing a research plan in which the community is invested. jull et al.: a principled approach to research conducted with inuit, métis, and first nations people published by scholarship@western, 2020 11 table 2. cihr guidelines: demonstration of principled research practices described in articles with examples (continued) cihr guidelines key features: possible ways to demonstrate principles examples principle #3: community control and approval process article 2: “a community's jurisdiction over the conduct of research should be understood and respected. this article should be read in the context of the discussion in section 1.5, which addresses the application of this document” (cihr, 2007, p. 18). • identify community processes: who decides and guides research data responsibilities and processes? • develop agreement(s): memorandum of understanding (mou), terms of reference, traditional agreements, or other ways to explicitly demonstrate consensual agreement between parties. • be open to an evolving process: a community may not have a specific research protocol, but members may want to explore, consult, and guide research. in a study by pahwa et al. (2015) that explored respiratory health of first nations people living on reserves, housing inadequacies were identified to be a key underlying determinant of respiratory ill health. as a result, the research agenda turned to addressing housing design issues. principle #4: participatory research article 3: “communities should be given the option of a participatory-research approach” (cihr, 2007, p. 19). • ensure opportunities for communities to define what is participatory: communities decide how much community participation is desired and reasonable, especially human and in-kind resources. researchers bring some skills and knowledge, but they rarely have expertise on context and values. • show clear evidence of collaboration and partnership in the research process: there must be a shared responsibility in identifying the importance of an issue as well as planning, conducting, and disseminating results. • show respect for community and other stakeholder values: this can include revisiting and checking in on the research process, and adherence to and respecting local traditional values in the research work. • develop capacity for community and others to be partners if desired by community: ensure others benefit from research, and plan to share gains from work fairly. jull, giles, minwaashin lodge, the aboriginal women’s support centre, boyer, and stacey (2015) described the process by which a predetermined collaborative research approach was established. this demonstrated the terms of the research study in multiple ways, including through an ethical framework, research agreements, inclusion of minwaashin lodge on ethics, and a co-published protocol. in addition, the researcher was encouraged to be an active member of the community and hired a community-recommended member as research assistant. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.2.10635 12 table 2. cihr guidelines: demonstration of principled research practices described in articles with examples (continued) cihr guidelines key features: possible ways to demonstrate principles examples principle #5: community and individual consent article 4: “a researcher who proposes to carry out research that touches on traditional or sacred knowledge of an indigenous community, or on community members as indigenous people, should consult the community leaders to obtain their consent before approaching community members individually. once community consent has been obtained, the researcher will still need the free, prior, and informed consent of the individual participants” (cihr, 2007, p. 20). • identify local community governance structures and processes for gaining approval for engaging community members. • present research idea(s) to community leaders. • create opportunities for community leaders and members to learn about the researcher(s) and the research as well as respond. • articulate how research and researchers aim to have the process and outcome(s) benefit the community or individuals involved in a study—a higher bar than the common favourable risk–benefit expectation in research involving people. brunger and wall (2016) critically examined the ways in which researchers who follow research ethics guidelines can reinforce colonialist power relations through taken-forgranted assumptions. in this paper, the findings from a research study that engaged southern inuit and nunatukavut members are used to describe and operationalize the concept of research collaboration. principle #6: confidentiality and privacy article 5: “concerns of individual participants and their community regarding anonymity, privacy and confidentiality should be respected and should be addressed in a research agreement” (cihr, 2007, p. 21). • identify concerns around individual and community protections of information. • ensure agreements are stated and addressed, ideally in research agreements. in a study to evaluate potential health determinants, a project was conceptualized and developed through two years of dialogue with participating first nations communities. an agreement was created that addressed issues such as researcher and community coownership of data and how confidentiality and privacy would be respected (pahwa et al., 2015). jull et al.: a principled approach to research conducted with inuit, métis, and first nations people published by scholarship@western, 2020 13 table 2. cihr guidelines: demonstration of principled research practices described in articles with examples (continued) cihr guidelines key features: possible ways to demonstrate principles examples principle #7: inclusion and protection of cultural knowledge in research article 6: “the research agreement should, with the guidance of community knowledge holders, address the use of the community's cultural knowledge and sacred knowledge” (cihr, 2007, p. 22). • discuss and agree on co-authorship and acknowledgments in academic forms of dissemination early in the study: dissemination may include papers, reports, and other forms. • come to agreement with community stakeholders on how and who to acknowledge in future work by researcher. in a study by castleden, morgan, and neimanis (2010), 15 researchers at canadian universities who conducted community-based participatory research with indigenous communities were interviewed. the study reported on the diverse practices of acknowledgments and coauthorship, including the benefits and risks of co-authorship with collectives or community partners. article 7: “aboriginal people and their communities retain their inherent rights to any cultural knowledge, sacred knowledge, and cultural practices and traditions which are shared with the researcher. the researcher should also support mechanisms for the protection of such knowledge, practices, and traditions” (cihr, 2007, p. 22). • be transparent in the use and development of knowledge (include community partners on or provide them with access to ethics applications, academic and community papers, reports, and presentations). • agree on co-authorship and other research and community-based opportunities (for example, engage a community-based research assistant, conduct community presentations, et cetera). • demonstrate evidence of guidance about knowledge use— knowledge holder or elder consultations and/or participation to ensure ongoing permissions; community guidance on use of knowledge. in a paper by kelley belcourt-dittloff, belcourt, and belcourt (2013), the tribal board protocols for reviews of how indigenous knowledge is used, shared, and incorporated into research practices in the united states are examined and discussed. written documentation between researchers and a tribal board include (a) clear language descriptions of the study, (b) how cultural knowledge, language, and practices are to be incorporated into the study, and (c) the resource allocation to support the involvement of tribal community elders and community members. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.2.10635 14 table 2. cihr guidelines: demonstration of principled research practices described in articles with examples (continued) cihr guidelines key features: possible ways to demonstrate principles examples principle #8: intellectual property rights and indigenous knowledge article 8: “community and individual concerns over, and claims to, intellectual property should be explicitly acknowledged and addressed in the negotiation with the community prior to starting the research project. expectations regarding intellectual property rights of all parties involved in the research should be stated in the research agreement” (cihr, 2007, pp. 22-23). • plan for outcomes (products, sustainability) clearly articulated at start of research. • ensure there is evidence that community wishes were sought and honoured. • confirm and re-confirm permissions and keep community collaborators informed. • explore using a participatory research approach—fair benefits in sharing of research. baydala et al. (2014) culturally adapted a life skills training program aimed at school-aged children and youth in a first nation community, which was then evaluated using community-based participatory research methods. in the paper that describes the positive aspects of the program, the authors highlight the ways in which elders were central to the program adaptations, and how the process of evaluation involved community researchers in all phases, from data collection to dissemination. principle #9: benefit sharing article 9: “research should be of benefit to the community as well as to the researcher” (cihr, 2007, p. 23). • specify who the beneficiaries of research will be. • assess importance of the health issues investigated and prospective values of research for beneficiaries. • enhance value of research for each of the beneficiaries through discussion of knowledge, products, long-term research collaboration, health system improvements. in a study by tobias et al. (2013), a community-based approach revealed environmental and health issues among anishinabe communities in a region of ontario, canada. the authors described how commitment to reciprocity and relational accountability meant making all attempts to meet community needs throughout all stages of the research process. jull et al.: a principled approach to research conducted with inuit, métis, and first nations people published by scholarship@western, 2020 15 table 2. cihr guidelines: demonstration of principled research practices described in articles with examples (continued) cihr guidelines key features: possible ways to demonstrate principles examples principle #10: empowerment and research capacity development article 10: “a researcher should support education and training of indigenous people in the community, including training in research methods and ethics” (cihr, 2007, p. 23). • explain how research benefits community and researcher. • researcher(s) spend time in the community and with community members, evidence that they build their understandings of community and readiness. • researcher(s) build capacity in the community, for example, by hiring community research assistant and training community members. • publish and disseminate research findings in accessible ways to community, such as publishing in open access journals and using different formats (such as in-person communications) that suit different communication styles. a study by allen et al. (2006) described how alaskan native coresearchers without specialist research training were involved in all stages of the study. as a result, the coresearchers insisted on effective ways for research findings to be shared within the community, co-researchers with new skills were valuable to the community, and academic researchers benefitted from having credible and valid findings that were valued by the alaskan native communities and other researchers alike. principle #11: cultural protocol, language and communication article 11: 11.1 “a researcher has an obligation to learn about, and apply, indigenous cultural protocols relevant to the indigenous community involved in the research.” 11.2 “a researcher should, to the extent reasonably possible, translate all publications, reports and other relevant documents into the language of the community.” 11.3 “a researcher should ensure that there is ongoing, accessible and understandable communication with the community” (cihr, 2007, p. 24). • reflect community communication preferences and include evidence of application of local cultural protocols and language. • facilitate accessible and ongoing communications with community partners. in a study called the indigenous red ribbon storytelling study by nowgesic, meili, stack, and myers (2015), small tobacco bundles were offered to each research participant in addition to hosting a traditional indigenous feast as part of a sharing circle of participants. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.2.10635 16 table 2. cihr guidelines: demonstration of principled research practices described in articles with examples (continued) cihr guidelines key features: possible ways to demonstrate principles examples principle #12: initial and secondary use, proprietary interest, storage, and transfer of data and biological samples article 12: 12.1 “a researcher should recognize and respect the rights and proprietary interests of individuals and the community in data and biological samples generated or taken in the course of the research” (cihr, 2007, p. 24). 12.2 “transfer of data and biological samples from one of the original parties to a research agreement to a third party requires consent of the other original party or parties” (cihr, 2007, p. 24). 12.3 “secondary use of data or biological samples requires specific consent from the individual donor and, where appropriate, the community. however, if the research data or biological samples cannot be traced back to the individual donor, then consent for secondary use need not be obtained from the individual. similarly, if research data or biological samples cannot be traced back to the community, then its consent for secondary use is not required” (cihr, 2007, p. 24). • show evidence of agreed-upon approach such as a set of criteria or agreement (for example, ocap®). • have evidence that agreements are adhered to and, if changed, there is evidence that agreements were adjusted (including changes related to publications, use of reporting guidelines, et cetera). • demonstrate respect for recruited participants and study communities by developing and implementing procedures to protect confidentiality; provide participants with information that arises in study; ensure enrolled participants cared for, mitigating harms from the study; inform participants and community of results. • concepts of data sovereignty are explicit and adhered to. • provide description of anonymization process. • provide documentation such as reports to institutional and community ethics boards. • document evidence that the consultation took place. a study with m!ori by hudson et al. (2016) explored how to consider and include m!ori rights and interests in research that involves biobanking and genomics. in their paper, the authors highlight six key areas of consideration regarding biobanking and genetic research—with particular emphasis on m!ori participation in research governance, transparency, and accountability to communities— and they share how m!ori rights and interests are to be protected. jull et al.: a principled approach to research conducted with inuit, métis, and first nations people published by scholarship@western, 2020 17 table 2. cihr guidelines: demonstration of principled research practices described in articles with examples (continued) cihr guidelines key features: possible ways to demonstrate principles examples 12.4 “where the data or biological samples are known to have originated with indigenous people, the researcher should consult with the appropriate indigenous organizations before initiating secondary use” (cihr, 2007, p. 25). 12.5 “secondary use requires reb review. the guidelines set out basic principles for the collection, disclosure, use, and transfer of data and biological samples” (cihr, 2007, p. 25). • document evidence of process and agreements, such as meeting notes and agreements. • make reference to processes (such as ocap®) or other community-endorsed policies. principle #13: biological samples on loan article 13: “biological samples should be considered “on loan” to the researcher unless otherwise specified in the research agreement” (cihr, 2007, p. 25). • evidence of data sharing agreements and reference to the use of process that follow community endorsed policies and principles. a paper by kowal, pearson, peacock, jamieson, and blackwell (2012) presents a review of the literature and ethical issues relevant to genetic research in indigenous populations. the ways in which these issues are negotiated within a particular genomic research project that involves the rural community of aboriginal and torres strait islanders are discussed. outlined in the paper is the process for developing a detailed mou between the research team, aboriginal health services, and a communityowned education group. the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.2.10635 18 table 2. cihr guidelines: demonstration of principled research practices described in articles with examples (continued) cihr guidelines key features: possible ways to demonstrate principles examples principle #14: interpretation and dissemination of research article 14: “an indigenous community should have an opportunity to participate in the interpretation of data and the review of conclusions drawn from the research to ensure accuracy and cultural sensitivity of interpretation” (cihr, 2007, p. 26). • encourage co-authorship/copresentations to community, researcher, and other identified stakeholders (by indigenous and western-oriented research partners). • ensure evidence that final results were viewed and agreed upon by all in the research partnership. • show evidence that, at the start of the project, all in the research partnership understood that they would have the opportunity to be involved in data interpretation. • confirmations with indigenous community partners for permissions, during data interpretation, dissemination. in an evaluation study on how a community action research team (cart) and mentors experienced their role in a study addressing the high rates of sexually transmitted infections in four communities within northwest territories, hopkins (2012) described that a model for place-based knowledge exchange was developed. the work of the cart is community driven, builds capacity, and offers mutual support, and originally comprised of young t"#chǫ parents who wanted to improve the health and well-being of t"#chǫ community members. article 15: “an indigenous community should, at its discretion, be able to decide how its contributions to the research project should be acknowledged. community members are entitled to due credit and to participate in the dissemination of results. publications should recognize the contribution of the community and its members as appropriate, and in conformity with confidentiality agreements” (cihr, 2007, p. 26). • ensure that dissemination is planned by and with community (for example, in research agreement, protocols). • identify and document clear roles for those in the research partnership identified. • offer opportunities for community stakeholders involved in research to copublish, co-present, and use research. in a study by bisset cargo, delormier, macaulay, and potvin (2004), indigenous co-researchers played a key role in ensuring that research findings led to applied practice. the study was on the prevention of type 2 diabetes and used a participatory action research approach that involved many key community stakeholders throughout the study. principle #15: memoranda of understanding and research agreements “where a researcher does not have a prior relationship with an aboriginal community, the latter may have expectations regarding what the researcher should do in order to be prepared for, and to be accepted by, the community—prior to negotiation of a formal research agreement. the expectations of the community and of the researcher may be appropriately addressed in a non-binding memorandum of understanding, which would also include the steps to be taken to reach a binding research agreement. however, the relationship-building process is contextual and community specific, and there is no set formula for building such a relationship” (cihr, 2007, p. 260). jull et al.: a principled approach to research conducted with inuit, métis, and first nations people published by scholarship@western, 2020 19 discussion western-oriented academic research groups and institutions need to have guidance about how to expand their approaches to research so as to value and respect inuit, métis, and first nations leadership, governance, decision-making, and knowledge systems. the cihr guidelines promote the use of indigenous and western-oriented knowledge systems together and serve as a resource to support the development and conduct of participatory research. a number of research studies have been conducted between indigenous and western-oriented partners since the development of the cihr guidelines. cihr guidelines promote the use of indigenous and western-oriented knowledge systems together research is essential to guide improvements in health systems and develop new initiatives. when done in ways that those in the partnership can identify as ethical and equitable, participatory research (research that promotes collaboration) can promote a democratic approach to co-creation of evidence (jull, giles, & graham, 2017). dialogue that aims to promote respect for differing worldviews and address colonial structures in knowledge production has been defined as an ethical act (ermine, sinclair, & browne, 2005). mi’kmaw elders murdena and albert marshall, with dr. cheryl bartlett, introduced the concept of “etuaptmumk two-eyed seeing” (bartlett, marshall, & marshall, 2012). etuaptmumk is the mi’kmaw word for two-eyed seeing and “refers to learning to see from one eye with the strengths of indigenous knowledges and ways of knowing, and from the other eye with the strengths of western knowledges and ways of knowing” (institute for integrative science & health, n.d., para. 1). two-eyed seeing has been described as a theoretical framework that includes both indigenous and western-oriented worldviews. the two-eyed seeing approach incorporates and acknowledges diverse perspectives that honour and accept many forms of knowledge (martin, 2012). the respect and inclusion of different forms of knowledge creates an “ethical space” for many forms of knowledge, including indigenous knowledge (coleman, battiste, henderson, findlay, & findlay, 2012; wilson, 2008). the term “ethical space” was originally conceived of by roger poole (poole, 1972) to identify an abstract space in which there is an interaction of different groups and worldviews. ermine, sinclair, and jeffery (2004) write about the importance of creating an ethical space in which disparate cultural practices and ways of knowing and being can bridge the divide between indigenous and western knowledge. according to ermine et al. (2004), ethical space as a concept is a process that occurs throughout the research process: “each played out in many different codes and relationships at the level of research practice” (p. 21). ethical space is also described as requiring affirmation to confirm acceptance of cultural differences. another important feature of ethical space is open discussion about intentions, values, and underlying and explicit assumptions of research that can lead to agreement to interact across a cultural divide (ermine et al., 2004). two-eyed seeing is expressed as a first nations concept; other groups express similar concepts of bringing indigenous and western-oriented knowledge together, using different terms (cihr, 2016). the intent of the cihr guidelines is to promote health through research that aligns with indigenous values and traditions. descriptions of the guiding principles for research conduct are included within the text of the articles. the cihr guidelines therefore support the use of principles that engage indigenous and western-oriented forms of knowledge in research and promotes “products or outcomes, based on the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.2.10635 20 [indigenous] input plus the academic knowledge, tools, or techniques contributed by the researcher” (cihr, 2007, p. 22). as well, the cihr guidelines support opportunities for those conducting research to be mutually responsive to one another’s contexts, needs, and knowledge systems within the research partnerships. the process of using the cihr guidelines may also help identify and put into place plans that create opportunities for research conduct, such as the costs associated with participatory research. for this reason, the use of the cihr guidelines can lead to actions that support the expansion of knowledge systems (figure 1). figure 1. the cihr guidelines describe principled research practices. examples that explain the importance of engagement in research fundamental to the cihr guidelines is the principle that people with community knowledge have opportunities for engagement in all stages of the research. the opportunities for engagement include defining the need for the study, the approach to the study, the collection of data, the interpretation of results, and the dissemination of findings. for example, in a study conducted about smoking among métis populations, there was a failure to engage people with relevant community knowledge and this undermined the outcomes of the study. in the example, people with appropriate socio-cultural knowledge were not involved in the interpretation of culturally meaningful data. the non-participatory research approach led to potentially negative consequences for application to policy development and future participation by communities and community members in research (king, 2015). jull et al.: a principled approach to research conducted with inuit, métis, and first nations people published by scholarship@western, 2020 21 the damaging effects of failing to engage indigenous people with relevant expertise in research is evident in another example involving a saskatchewan-based study of hiv susceptibility conducted by western-oriented researchers. the study concluded that the hiv strain circulating in the province of saskatchewan could lead to more rapid development of aids-defining illness due to the resistance of the hiv strain that had adapted to common host immunity profiles (brumme et al., 2018). despite anonymization of the data, it is well known that close to 80% of the hiv cases in saskatchewan occur in the 16% of the population that identify as indigenous (government of saskatchewan, 2016). in the study, a clearly identified and reported-on indigenous population did not have opportunities for engagement in any aspect of the study. as a result, those conducting the study may have further stigmatized indigenous people living with hiv and increased the distrust of medical and research communities. the issues with the study are multiple and include problematic de-identification, a need for meaningful research ethics board review that balances researcher and community and collective interests, and scientific rigor when studying indigenous peoples’ health (chelico et al., 2020). in this example, those who conducted the study missed an opportunity to engage the groups who the research impacted through the interpretation and dissemination of the study results, which would have helped ensure that the research findings were conveyed in non-stigmatizing ways. the example provides an opportunity to understand research ethics as an “ongoing and changing process” (chelico et al., 2020, p. 3). research that is done “to” indigenous people fails to uphold indigenous self-determination (chelico et al., 2020). to avoid potential research harms, it is imperative that participatory approaches are used to foster collaboration in research with indigenous people. there are examples of communities and researchers working in the collaborative manners promoted by the cihr guidelines to develop research agendas and then co-create and disseminate research knowledge in beneficial ways, as promoted by the cihr guidelines. one example is a research study conducted by a community-based and academic team that used a two-eyed seeing approach to develop dementia fact sheets for indigenous populations that blend indigenous understandings of illness and caregiving with a western-oriented disease framework (jacklin, warry, blind, webkamigad, & jones, 2017). in another example, the water journey project was conducted by a research collaboration of elders, indigenous people with lived hiv and/or hepatitis c experience, and academically trained community-based researchers. together, the members of the research collaboration defined and implemented a research study that met community needs and was trauma-informed and interwoven with ceremony. the members of the research collaboration developed and approved the final research results (kallos et al., 2017). collaborative research practices can create opportunities and space within institutional academic settings for different knowledges to coexist and improve health and social systems (jull et al., 2018). a principled approach to research supports opportunities for development of knowledge that is useful, relevant, and applicable. cihr guidelines require regular review for relevance innovations on research models and approaches that address power balances mean that, while the principles of the cihr guidelines are relevant today, they may require updating. in addition, the original plan was that the cihr guidelines would require regular review for relevance (cihr, 2007). there is a growing number of community-based researchers and community-engaged research projects that include elders and indigenous people with experiences as active members of research teams, knowledge holders, et cetera (see table 2 for examples). there are also ongoing challenges in the the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 11, iss. 2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2020.11.2.10635 22 conduct of these studies, for example within larger epidemiological studies, and there is a need for the recognition of the diverse and multicultural nature of indigenous communities. indigenous and western-oriented researchers are still operating in predominantly western-oriented academic research systems (morton ninomiya & pollock, 2017). for this reason, there may be a need to review and update the principles and content of cihr guidelines for relevance to better meet the needs of indigenous and western-oriented researchers and support a principled approach to change in research relationships. we have included examples of studies that demonstrate principles of research defined in the cihr guidelines (cihr, 2007) in table 2. we propose that the approach to research by western-oriented researchers or institutions in the area of indigenous health and wellness be contextualized and responsive to individual and community ways of knowing and doing. the cihr guidelines describe how to conduct research that demonstrates an ongoing commitment to debate and reflection upon research processes in ways that bring forward the unique needs of indigenous communities, research team members, and local contexts in an ever-changing society. the principles and content of the cihr guidelines provide a foundation from which research efforts in canada and internationally can advance in collaborative and strengths-based ways to ensure inclusion and respect for indigenous individuals and communities. conclusion we assert that the principles of the cihr guidelines hold the potential to guide research with indigenous people in ways that promote equitable partnerships within western-oriented academic settings. as well, the cihr guidelines may serve as a central document in discussions about the theory and practical approaches to research conducted by and with inuit, métis, and first nations people. expectations for ethical, collaborative, and culturally supportive research with indigenous groups have continued to advance and the cihr guidelines provide the foundation to continue the development of clear directives on how, exactly, to conduct research that reflects these advances. the principles described in detail across the articles of the cihr guidelines can be used to further research agendas, and (a) draw upon the knowledge and expertise of inuit, métis, and first nations community members and groups, and (b) support opportunities to address issues identified in research collaborations by communities and community members in ways they can define as best. the conduct of participatory research that can promote health and wellness requires equitable research partnerships between indigenous and western-oriented team members. it is time to advance and document principled research practices throughout research 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(2013). protocols and principles for conducting research with yukon first nations. retrieved from https://www.yukoncollege.yk.ca/sites/default/files/inlinefiles/yrc_fn_initiatives_no_photos_inside_final_print_0.pdf improving business investment confidence in culture-aligned indigenous economies in remote australian communities: a business support framework to better inform government programs the international indigenous policy journal volume 6 | issue 3 article 5 june 2015 improving business investment confidence in culture-aligned indigenous economies in remote australian communities: a business support framework to better inform government programs ann e. fleming aquaculture unit, northern territory government, australia, annfleming2@bigpond.com recommended citation fleming, a. e. (2015). improving business investment confidence in culture-aligned indigenous economies in remote australian communities: a business support framework to better inform government programs. the international indigenous policy journal, 6(3). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.5 improving business investment confidence in culture-aligned indigenous economies in remote australian communities: a business support framework to better inform government programs abstract there is significant evidence that culture-aligned economies are more effective in engaging remote-living indigenous australians in work long-term. despite this evidence, governments remain resistant to investing substantially in these economies, with the result that low employment rates persist. this article argues that governmental systems of organisation are not designed to support non-mainstream economies and this position is unlikely to change. similarly, the commercial sector lacks confidence that investing in culturealigned economies will generate financial returns. this article presents a localised, pragmatic approach to indigenous business support that works within existing systems of government, business and culture. most unsuccessful programs fail to recognise the full suite of critical factors for sustained market engagement by both business and indigenous people. this article reports on work to bring all critical factors together into a business support framework to inform the design and implementation of an aquaculture development program in a remote indigenous australian community. keywords indigenous, policy, culture, economic development, systems, business, aquaculture acknowledgments the author wishes to express her gratitude to the people of warruwi community for their participation and support, in particular jenny inmulugulu and bunug galaminda. also key partnership colleagues wayne tupper, will bowman, luke turner, linda ford, lisa petheram, daniel costa, chadd mumme, owen stanley, ziko ilac, andrew bates, natasha stacey and in particular my dedicated staff at the darwin aquaculture centre and my supervisor glenn schipp. thank you to jim grant for invaluable guidance and discussion on systems thinking. i thank colleagues, particularly julian gorman, for valuable feedback that improved the paper. this work was funded by the fisheries research and development corporation (project number 2010/205). creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ i m p ro v i n g bu s i n e s s i n v e s t m e n t c o n f i d e n c e i n c u l t u re a l i g n e d i n d i g e n o u s e c o n o m i e s i n r e m o t e a u s t ra l i a n c o m m u n i t i e s : a bu s i n e s s s u p p o rt f ra m e w o rk t o be t t e r i n f o rm g o v e rn m e n t pro g ra m s s u c c e s s f u l i n d i g e n o u s e c o n o m i e s — s h i f t i n g t h e f o c u s f ro m “w h a t e c o n o m i e s t o s u p p o rt ” t o “h o w t o s u p p o rt t h e m ” public sector managers tasked to address economic development in remote australian indigenous communities face a highly complex network of interrelated problems and competing value perspectives. indigenous social and economic disadvantage has long been considered australia’s most intractable and shameful of societal problems. indigenous health is, on average, poor across the entire life span, contributing to a life expectancy that is 11.5 years less for indigenous men and 9.7 years for women compared to non-indigenous australians (australian bureau of statistics [ abs], 2012; australian institute of health and welfare, 2014). those living in remote locations are the most marginalised and the most disadvantaged people within australia (australian commonwealth government, 2014; steering committee for the review on government service provision [ scrgsp], 2011; sutton, 2009). in 2011, there were close to 143,000 indigenous people living in remote or very remote regions of australia, representing just 22% of the total indigenous population of about 670,000 (abs, 2012). economic development and employment equity are just one of a suite of strategic areas that successive state, territory, and federal governments continue to pursue to address this highly complex and challenging problem. other strategic areas range across child development, education, health, and community functioning (head, 2008). despite these sustained and seemingly holistic and collaborative efforts, employment rates remain low. in remote areas of australia, the indigenous employment rate in market-based jobs is estimated to be 38.9% for males and 30.7% for females (gray & hunter, 2011), while 82% of indigenous youth (15 to 24 years old) are not engaged in either work or education (forrest, 2014). over the past decade, a vast body of knowledge has been generated about what type of economies are commercially viable in remote regions of australia and what type of work opportunities are effective in engaging indigenous people and lifting employment rates (see fleming, petheram, & stacey, 2014). the barriers to establishing viable market-based businesses in remote indigenousowned estates are similar to many other remote areas of australia, such as long distances to market, low productivity of the land, lack of skilled workers, and inadequate infrastructure (dillon & westbury, 2007; gorman, whitehead, griffiths, & petheram, 2008). both the australian and international literature on indigenous participation in work and entrepreneurship for small business development has highlighted how culture, and the associated worldviews and values that are framed by a person’s culture, impacts on engagement in economic activity (fleming et al., 2014). success has occurred where culture and market align, and where effort has focused on small business creation within indigenous communities (ord & mazzarol, 2007). examples within australia include the indigenous land management initiatives (working on country, indigenous rangers, indigenous protected areas) (altman & kerins, 2012; bauman & symth, 2007) and the indigenous visual arts sector (acg, 2013). stand-alone indigenous-run businesses also tend to be successful when integrated with culture, such as the cultural tourism sector (whitford & ruhanen, 2009) and some wildlife harvest enterprises (zander, austin, & garnett, 2014). given the significant focus over the past decade on suitable economies for indigenous australians living remotely, it is surprising how little attention has been given to how government, business, and other stakeholders can best support indigenous economic development. a significant body of literature advocates the need for various organisations to change to better support indigenous 1 fleming: improving business investment confidence in indigenous economies published by scholarship@western, 2015 development initiatives, but these changes require a concerted commitment and resourcing, which generally does not eventuate. for instance, governments are asked to significantly change either their organisational structure, service delivery, consultation processes, collaborative arrangements, or funding provision strategies (dillon & westbury, 2007; hunt, 2013a, 2013b; trudgen, 2000), and increasingly, businesses are asked to change their organisational culture to better accommodate indigenous participation in the workforce (forrest, 2014; jordan, 2010, 2011). conversely, calls are made for indigenous people to change, to various degrees, their culture (jordan, 2011; sutton, 2009) and/or lifestyle (forrest, 2014; n. pearson, 2010) to better align with mainstream australian economies. in the past two decades the new zealand, united states, and canadian governments have raised indigenous participation in economic activity through a shift in government policy that encourages self-directed advancement (within a politically supported move to reassert indigenous nationhood) and accommodates non-economic motivations (cultural and social) for engaging in the economy (hindle & landsdowne, 2005; hindle & rushworth, 2002; wilkins, 2007). that is, these governments have both (a) adapted to support the types of economies known to promote indigenous advancement (and thus lever the cultural and social motivators essential for engagement), and (b) adapted to the processes of advancement needed to successfully facilitate indigenous economic development. such policies have leveraged partnerships between indigenous communities and businesses through foundational programs aimed at supporting labour market development, business development, and community economic development (government of canada, 2009). this has led to an emergence of alternative business models that deliver solid financial returns while at the same time meeting indigenous aspirations for community development through social entrepreneurship (namely, enterprises that aim to raise the socioeconomic status of communities and preserve cultural heritage) (anderson, dana, & dana, 2006). rather than seek to change the systems of government and business to align with indigenous culture, or vice versa, these governments have provided an enabling environment for business and culture to co-produce mutually beneficial commercial arrangements without compromising the motivators and value systems of either. although australian state, territory, and federal governments invest to a degree in culture-aligned economies, most notably the indigenous land management initiatives (zander & garnett, 2011) and the regional indigenous art centres (acg, 2013), the level of investment is grossly inadequate given the magnitude of the demand for jobs in remote australia (forrest, 2014). to substantially grow and expand these employment sectors would require concerted investment by both governments and the commercial sector. it seems that governments have supported these programs to the extent that market and culture mesh with existing systems and processes of governmental organisation, but those systems and processes are not able to adapt to the extent required to fully support non-mainstream, culture-aligned economies as a primary policy platform. businesses are similarly not able to adapt to suit indigenous ways of doing business and being employed, and generally will only engage with the indigenous sector to the extent that mainstream commercial principles of profit and employment arrangements apply. programs that rely only on cooperation and compromise (from either culture, commerce, or government, or mixes of each) do not generally lead to lasting success. similarly, there are many examples of small indigenous organisations and individual managers that achieve local employment success by establishing government subsidised economies, but the effort is not generally sustainable and often leads to burnout and eventual failure once key drivers move on (mahood, 2012). clearly, rather than peripheral or transient players driving development, existing systems must drive the process—in particular, market forces for 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.5 supply and demand, and indigenous motivations for self-determination through economic independence. i m p ro v i n g i n v e s t m e n t c o n f i d e n c e — u s i n g a f ra m e w o rk t o a d d re s s k e y s u c c e s s f a c t o rs to improve governmental and business investor confidence in culture-aligned, market-driven economies, governments and the business sector need a better understanding of the factors critical to achieving success within indigenous businesses, and a development framework that ensures all success factors are addressed. ord and mazzarol (2007) highlighted the need to create effective indigenous enterprise and entrepreneurship frameworks that can be used to facilitate partnerships between business and indigenous communities, but at the same time recognise and accommodate the significant differences between indigenous and non-indigenous motivations and capacities for engaging in entrepreneurship. similarly, a canadian review of the literature into best practice in indigenous economic development noted the lack of a cohesive theoretical and practical frameworks for determining what works and what does not (first people group, 2009). use of such a framework to inform indigenous business development would allow evaluation of both program design and the process of program implementation. if programs fail to address just one success factor then they are likely to be unsuccessful, unless action is taken to address this failure point. such an approach would provide government and the business sector with greater certainty that investment in culture-aligned economies will deliver commensurate financial returns and sustained indigenous employment results. e f f e c t i v e pro g ra m d e s i g n — i d e n t i f y a n d e n g a g e w i t h k e y s y s t e m s i n v o l v e d i n s u c c e s s the key to success is to design programs where existing systems involved in effective program delivery drive the development programs, particularly market forces aimed to generate profits and indigenous drivers for self-determination through economic independence. the challenge is to (a) gain an understanding of the key factors that are critical to success, (b) identify the existing systems that influence and/or drive development, and (c) engage with these systems (and associated success factors) when designing and implementing programs. the definition of “systems” used here refers to large and complex organisational systems of government and business, made up of interrelated parts or components (structures) that cooperate in interdependent processes (behaviours). such systems generally involve people, processes, and technology (head, 2008). in the context of this article, systems also include indigenous political, economic, and social systems, made up of groups of people involved in persistent patterns of interpersonal relationships (social relations), who share the same geographical or social territory and share distinctive institutions of governance, political authority, and dominant cultural expectations (wikipedia, 2014). for indigenous peoples, such systems typically involve individuals who belong within a complex kinship network, in addition to their lands and seas and the resources contained within them—which are inseparable from the people, their culture, and their identity (anderson et al., 2006; ganesharajah, 2009). 3 fleming: improving business investment confidence in indigenous economies published by scholarship@western, 2015 head and alford (2013) proposed that systems thinking allows a holistic and interactive approach to analysing policy solutions to “wicked problems”1 as it can be used to search for factors that may contribute to their nature. policy makers can then identify both the core processes within an organisation that are essential to addressing a wicked problem, as well as the auxiliary or parallel processes outside each organisation, or in the wider society, that needs to be engaged with. this article examines the process of formation of an indigenous economic development policy and implementation of its programs through the systems lens. it seeks to engage with existing systems (and address associated success factors) that drive the development process, but require little or no change to achieve success. from this analysis, a business support framework was designed to bring together these systems into a collaborative, multidisciplinary arrangement between key stakeholders. in doing so, this brought together a collection of key knowledges from each discipline that allowed for collective enquiry, learning, and decision-making across all key success factors. a case study was used to test the framework at the coal-face of implementation— that is localised, place-based programs and activities to support indigenous economic development based on current knowledge of what works in terms of remote economic development, community development (with a focus on both economic and social entrepreneurship), and effective engagement with indigenous political, economic, and social systems. it reports on a program to support sea-based aquaculture enterprises implemented by the northern territory government in partnership with key stakeholders and the indigenous community of warruwi on goulburn island, located in the western arnhem land region. the term “enterprise” is defined here as small businesses aimed at profit but with a broader focus on political, social, cultural, environmental, and economic goals. this article focuses on the first 4-year evolution of program implementation from an initial pragmatic focus on technical and commercial success factors to a suite of programs to address the technical, commercial, managerial, social, and cultural constraints identified through the systems approach to designing programs. pro g ra m d e s i g n i d e n t i f y t h e k e y f a c t o rs f o r s u c c e s s i n i n d i g e n o u s e n t e rp ri s e d e v e l o p m e n t over the past decade a number of attempts have been made by various government agencies and consultants to establish commercial aquaculture enterprises and businesses in northern australian indigenous communities. fleming et al. (2014) reviewed the failure points associated with these projects, which include technical and commercial issues that pose a risk to commercial viability as well as significant social and cultural barriers to engagement, participation, and control by the indigenous clients. in 2011, this ongoing failure prompted the aquaculture unit of the northern territory government’s fisheries division to conduct a literature review of the key success factors for viable community-based enterprise development and indigenous engagement. in august 2011, a stakeholder workshop was held in darwin and was attended by about 30 practitioners involved in 1 wicked problems are seemingly intractable problems characterised by their problem complexity (where every problem interacts in a system or network of interrelated problems) and stakeholder divergence (arising from competing value and interest perspectives). wicked problems are also generally associated with institutional complexity (and inflexibility) in the context of inter-organisational cooperation and multilevel managerial governance (head & alford, 2013). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.5 indigenous development programs in remote communities across northern australia. the aim of the workshop was to draw directly from practitioners’ experiences and learnings in the field. tables 1 to 3 summarise the three key success themes that emerged from the workshop and from key australian and international studies and policy analyses. these are cultural engagement, business development, and market drivers. within each of these themes, three key elements for success emerged, giving a total of nine success factors to guide the design of policies and programs. within cultural engagement the three main determinants of indigenous participation in business development programs were: a. effective cross cultural communication and relationship building; b. effectively clarifying community aspirations and goals; and c. valuing both traditional and western knowledge as an important engager of indigenous people in enterprise development processes. within the business development theme the three main determinants of economic viability were: a. provision of research and development (r & d) that improves entrepreneurial opportunity, and economic viability and certainty; b. capacity building both of individuals employed by the enterprise and of community organisations responsible for community governance, and business planning and management; c. ensuring access to physical infrastructure, land tenure, and availability of adequate financial resources over realistic timeframes. within the market driver theme the three key elements for success were: a. identifying viable internal (community-based) and external (mainstream) markets; b. recognising the impact of government policy on program viability and the ability of communities to focus on planning and development; and c. deeply appreciating that cultural primacy and the goal of self-determination and economic independence are the foundations that underpin all development aspirations for indigenous people. 5 fleming: improving business investment confidence in indigenous economies published by scholarship@western, 2015 table 1. success factors that impact on effective cross-cultural engagement communication & relationshipa clarifying aspirationsb (motivations for entrepreneurship) valuing both traditional & western knowledgesc governments and other stakeholders: • engage in local, authentic communication and consultation • engage in strategic, partnership-based collaborative approaches with communities • ensure communities are engaged in priority setting and actively leading decision-making in program design, development, and implementation • responsive to indigenous priorities • committed to long-term sustainable relationships based on trust and integrity • plan for timelines set according to cultural protocols • design processes that build local capacity • ensure effective communication and knowledge transfer to key sectors of the community • appreciate the influence of the historical and social context of communities on program design • have cultural knowledge and understanding of each place • recognise the contemporary fluidity of community life • seek to build a “shared understanding” and build agreed meanings and ways forward • work with local governance structures and, in particular, with local traditional owners, elders, and organisations • use culturally appropriate communications methods that enable local people to be fully informed governments and other stakeholders: • understand the extent that social and cultural norms impact (positively or negatively) on engagement in entrepreneurship • understand that the prime motivation for indigenous entrepreneurs globally appears to be for selfdetermination through preservation of heritage, customs, and traditions • recognise the dynamic potential inherent in culture, rather than seeing it as a problem blocking commercial development • recognise that indigenous entrepreneurial activities are often embarked upon to achieve desired social outcomes, rather than just economic goals • recognise that globally social entrepreneurship has an important role to play in the process of addressing the socioeconomic circumstances of indigenous peoples • ensure flexible work arrangements to allow indigenous employees to meet their work, family, and community obligations • ensure continual improvement of policy is achieved through adequately funded evaluation programs • ensure evaluation programs align with indigenous aspirations and wellbeing governments and other stakeholders: • recognise and value the cultural knowledge and skills of community organisations and indigenous people • recognise that valuing indigenous knowledge and building it into the “business” model engages the local community and promotes a strong sense of community ownership of the enterprise • recognise that aboriginal leaders perceive that the preservation of knowledge and the development of mechanisms (including economic activities) that perpetuate this knowledge are of highest priority • appreciate that gaps in existing scientific knowledge may be filled by knowledge about the local ecology and species held by the indigenous communities • recognise that strong community engagement can be aided by increasing the use of local knowledge and expertise a australian institute of aboriginal & torres strait islander studies [aiatis], 2007; christie, 2013; g cole consulting, 2014; hunt, 2013a; nikolakis, 2008; puszka, greatorex, & williams, 2013. b aiatis, 2007; l. dana & dana, 2005; hindle & rushworth, 2002; nikolakis, 2008; nguyen & cairney, 2013; wood & davidson, 2011; wood, davidson, & fielden, 2012. c anderson et al., 2006; fordham, fogarty, & fordham, 2010; hunt, 2013a; morley, 2014; nguyen & cairney, 2013. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.5 table 2. success factors that impact on effective indigenous business development enterprise research, development, & engineering (identifying and developing sociocultural and economic opportunities)a entrepreneurial capacity building (developing capacity for community governance and business management & individual worker skills)b infrastructure, supply chain, land tenure, capital, & fundingc governments and other stakeholders: • appreciate the importance of r & d in facilitating the growth and viability of new business opportunities • ensure r & d reduces the production and market risk for emerging businesses • ensure r & d includes investigations into socio-cultural requirements • ensure r & d is readily available to new, small, and growing businesses governments and other stakeholders: • recognise that successful community-based enterprises are underpinned by good governance. it is the key ingredient—the foundation stone—for building sustainable development in communities • recognise that engagement is the first hurdle. using activities like “working on country” projects will more effectively engage people and achieve work readiness • recognise that for community-based enterprises having culture embedded within the business and its operations is vitally important for success • recognise that communities often lack social, human, and organisational capital as well as financial capital • ensure community-based enterprises have good organisational governance, business planning, and financial literacy • recognise the importance of access to business expertise, advice, and mentorship, particularly early on in the business proposal (networks) • ensure the quality, relevance, and depth of training is at the desired standard to effectively increase the skill level of indigenous people via formal education and training • ensure timeframes and funding for external support, training, and mentoring programs are adequate • ensure business support staff are competent and appropriately skilled in business management and development • ensure that communities have access to financial and business advice and ongoing support • recognise that financial literacy is the platform for improvements in indigenous self employment • recognise that women may be crucial to the success of businesses as they tend to have a holistic view, are able to maintain systems and processes, and build self-esteem governments and other stakeholders: • ensure access to physical infrastructure— communications, utilities, transportation, land • ensure people can raise finance on their land to create a business • ensure availability of financial resources, equity, and debt for new and growing businesses, including grants and subsidies • assist indigenous people to access finance that has otherwise not been available through commercial avenues • recognise that start up funding to assist businesses needs to be coordinated and based on long-term commitment a hindle & rushworth, 2002; hunt, 2013b; morley, 2014. b aiatsis, 2007; forrest, 2014; hindle & rushworth, 2002; morley, 2014. c aiatsis, 2007; hindle & rushworth, 2002; morley, 2014. 7 fleming: improving business investment confidence in indigenous economies published by scholarship@western, 2015 table 3. success factors that impact on market drivers for indigenous business development internal & external market demanda government policy & programsb indigenous self-determination & primacyc governments and other stakeholders: • assist indigenous people identify and develop economically viable, culturallyembedded businesses • assist indigenous people engage with the mainstream commercial sector to identify mutually beneficial business opportunities • identify economically and logistically viable external markets for product export • recognise the opportunity to develop local markets as well as export markets (national and global) governments and other stakeholders: • ensure policies encourage and facilitate new and growing businesses • provide direct government programs to assist businesses at the national, regional, and municipal level • ensure that existing commercial/institutions do not prevent the emergence of new or growing businesses • recognise the impact that poor indigenous development policy can have on programs and community engagement governments and other stakeholders: • recognise that one of the prime motivators for indigenous people globally is the desire to rebuild their nations and their communities primarily by exerting control over traditional territories and, in doing so, improve their socioeconomic circumstances • recognise that a significant motivator for indigenous people to engage in entrepreneurship is the desire for self-determination and financial independence (particularly from welfare), rather than acquiring wealth • recognise that the cardinal principle is to motivate and equip people to take control of their own lives and their contemporary living environment • recognise that some of the key drivers for indigenous entrepreneurship is the desire for future generations not to have to experience the same hardships as their predecessors, to escape, individually or communally, from poverty, and to provide for family needs • address power inequalities • recognise that families and small legally incorporated groups are more successful in enterprises than larger community groups • where land and environmental issues are concerned, plan at the scale of each group’s “country” • understand that aboriginal communities are not homogenous but are composed of different language and kinship groups, often with different interests in land so factional disputes are common a austin-broos, 2011. b fordham et al., 2010; hindle & rushworth, 2002. c double w associates, 1998; hindle & lansdowne, 2002; morley, 2014; trudgen, 2000; wood et al., 2012. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.5 i d e n t i f y a n d e n g a g e t h e s y s t e m s t h a t i n v o l v e t h e n i n e s u c c e s s f a c t o rs the three themes that emerged from the review process were used to identify and articulate the systems that drive business development. to effectively design policy and programs, three key systems must be engaged: indigenous cultural systems to direct all planning and implementation activities; business systems to respond to economic opportunity and generate human capital, and resources for all business development needs; and market systems to drive commerce. figure 1 shows how these external systems (and associated success factors) are brought together within a business implementation framework that can be used by external facilitators to support and drive development programs. the framework also guides the long-term development of indigenous-run businesses by building capacity for internal (community) systems of indigenous governance, business management, and communication. c re a t i n g a c o l l a b o ra t i v e pa rt n e rs h i p f ra m e w o rk ba s e d o n t h e s e s y s t e m s the next step in program design was to identify and engage with the indigenous clients and key stakeholders (including businesses, government agencies, non-government service providers, and the wider community) that are involved in, or have a stake in, the three systems. these clients and stakeholders can be divided into social and commercial groupings (figure 2). within the commercial grouping are the technical r & d providers and businesses. within the social grouping are those responsible for community planning and development (for both human capital and resource provision) and those responsible for socio-cultural research to facilitate cross-cultural communication, knowledge transfer, understanding, and negotiations. the community straddles both commercial and social groupings as they provide cultural, social, and economic knowledge to both, and partner with stakeholders within each grouping. underpinning effective collaboration are clearly articulated and informed community aspirations and goals, clarified through culturally appropriate social research investigations. outcomes are community-identified, but the terms are negotiated between the community and the commercial sector. pro g ra m i m p l e m e n t a t i o n t h e c a s e s t u d y s i t e a n d r e g i o n a l i n d i g e n o u s f i s h e ri e s i n i t i a t i v e s program implementation was carried out at warruwi, a small settlement of about 390 indigenous people on south goulburn island, located 280km northeast of darwin and 3km off the west arnhem coast (figure 3; see fleming et al., 2014 and gould, 2010 for further detail on the historic, cultural, and economic context of the study site). people from goulburn island belong to one of five major clan groups. they follow a patrilineal descent system, which gives clans ownership of particular areas of land, estuaries, beaches, sea, and offshore reefs and islands (gould, 2010). rights to sea country are also obtained through matrilineal affiliations where people are classified as “managers” for particular estates. both owners and managers (sometimes called traditional owners and senior elders) are responsible for that land and its resources. 9 fleming: improving business investment confidence in indigenous economies published by scholarship@western, 2015 figure 1. i m p l e m e n t a t i o n f ra m e w o rk f o r c ri t i c a l s u c c e s s f a c t o rs f o r i n d i g e n o u s e n t e rp ri s e d e v e l o p m e n t . 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.5 figure 2. c o l l a b o ra t i v e p a rt n e rs h i p f ra m e w o rk t h a t e n g a g e s a l l ke y s y s t e m s f o r s u c c e s s f u l b u s i n e s s f a c i l i t a t i o n . 11 fleming: improving business investment confidence in indigenous economies published by scholarship@western, 2015 figure 3. l o c a t i o n o f s o u t h g o u l b u rn i s l a n d , n o rt h e rn t e rri t o ry . people from goulburn island have a deep connection with their sea country and continue to practice customary harvesting of marine foods and coastal fishing. they have a long history of participation in economic activities with external parties. as early as the mid-1700s, the people of goulburn island worked and traded goods with the macassan seafarers from indonesia who visited the coast seasonally to fish for sea cucumber (clark & may, 2013). contact with european settlers was limited until a methodist mission was established on the island in 1916 and continued until about 1974. during this period, a range of horticultural, agricultural, fishing, and natural harvest enterprises generated food for self-sufficiency as well as funds through sales (of sea cucumber, oysters, mussels, dugong, turtle, and fish) into darwin markets (mckenzie, 1976; northern territory administration, 1968; stanley, 1985). in the early 2000s, two attempts to set up aquaculture enterprises were unsuccessful; one focused on the technical aspects of sea farmed bath sponges (dobson, 2001, 2003) and another on a significant investment proposal for sea ranched sea cucumbers (gould, 2010). in 2010, the aquaculture unit of the northern territory government’s fisheries division and the warruwi community commenced sea farming trials for sea cucumbers (holothuria scabra; common name sandfish; local name trepang) as well as grow-out trials for cultured blacklip tropical oysters (striostrea mytiloides) and the fluted giant clam (tridacna squamosa). the following reports on the partnerships, programs, and activities to address the nine key success factors for indigenous business success. where possible, the report is presented chronologically, but in some instances it is presented to best convey the work achieved and the strategies and learnings behind the work. ideally, program implementation would begin with clarifying aquaculture development aspirations by the broader community. at the time, sufficient funds were not available for an extensive 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.5 consultative phase, and, as was the case generally, factors were addressed as opportunity, funding, and human resources became available. initially, the focus was on addressing the technical and market success factors—through r & d programs conducted by the aquaculture unit and through analysis of market viability by the commercial sector. as funding was secured, the focus broadened to address the key social, cultural, and managerial success factors. the work presented here shows the progress achieved within the constraints faced at various implementation phases, and the gradual engagement with all three key systems within and outside the community—through cultural engagement, business development, and engaging with market drivers. over time all nine success factors were addressed, as described in sections 1–10 following (note, the report on business development—capacity building is reported in two sections: community and individual). 1 . m a rke t d ri v e rs — i d e n t i f y i n g i n t e rn a l a n d e x t e rn a l v i a b l e m a rke t s in 2010, the aquaculture unit identified potential marine aquatic animal candidates for farming on indigenous communities that met key criteria for indigenous business viability—including social, cultural, economic, and environmental viability. selection criteria were based on the findings of a review into past failure points associated with indigenous aquaculture enterprise projects in northern australia (fleming et al., 2014). in relation to business viability, past projects generally lacked robust market research and supply chain analysis and were dependent on significant start up capital for both production systems and supply chain needs. in addition, failure to engage early with the commercial sector often led to program failure during transition from the r & d phase to business start up. this was likely due to a general lack of business capabilities and resources, such as access to market and supply chain intelligence, financial literacy, business management capacity, access to capital, and lack of financially sound business plans. for these reasons, the aquaculture unit recognised that market systems must be engaged early to drive the development process and provide industry knowledge, capacity, and investment certainty while indigenous capacities for business management are being developed. based on this, the ability to engage and partner early with the commercial sector was a very strong criterion when selecting candidate aquaculture species in the current program. markets and supply chains for successful candidate species were either (a) established, and the business partner actively investing in industry development (as was the case for the sea cucumber ranching program), or (b) preliminary market analysis and supply chain analysis performed by the business partner and the product found to have strong market acceptance, be sufficiently high in value, and have viable supply chain requirements (as was the case for blacklip oysters and fluted giant clams). a single company owns all six wild fishery sea cucumber licences in the northern territory and has invested in sea cucumber ranching and stock enhancement r & d since 2004 (bowman, 2012). since the 1980s, the company has operated in the wild harvest of sea cucumber across northern australia, developed processing methods to produce high-value product and established supply chains into chinese markets via hong kong (fleming, 2012). currently, indigenous communities that aim to develop sea cucumber ranching enterprises are dependent on this company for the supply of juveniles and for second stage product processing (both of which are highly skilled and capital intensive technical operations), and for distribution into international markets. as such, it is necessary that, for the foreseeable future, the company and indigenous communities negotiate mutually acceptable business arrangements that meet the commercial needs and development objectives of both parties. the aquaculture unit identified this as a critical element of success in the program and, in 2014, secured funds for a business consultant to work with the warruwi community and the company to produce a business plan for sea cucumber enterprises. this plan identifies the 13 fleming: improving business investment confidence in indigenous economies published by scholarship@western, 2015 most suitable business arrangements to support sea cucumber (and other fisheries) enterprises and progressed negotiation for the terms of agreement between the sea cucumber company and the goulburn island community (discussed further in section 2). this natural transition into a business planning and start up phase follows the initial 4-year r & d phase to develop suitable farming methods that were operationally feasible (technically, socially, and culturally), and biologically and economically viable (discussed further in section 5). a major seafood wholesale distributor in darwin conducted market research into the blacklip oyster and fluted giant clam. in 2011, he visited goulburn island with aquaculture staff, and met with senior authority figures to gauge the community’s commitment to supplying oysters and clams (and fish) into darwin restaurants. he was supportive of a supply model where small volumes of product were sent when in season and when community commitments allowed. this aligned with the high value, “unique cuisine” experience that he planned for darwin restaurateurs and was keen to explore with the community branding opportunities for indigenous produced seafood. in darwin, he distributed oyster and clam samples to top restaurant kitchens so the chefs could handle the product and assess its placement in the restaurant trade. they were very positive about the potential to offer international tourists an exclusive, indigenous produced, uniquely australian, seafood cuisine experience. ord and mazzarol (2007) highlighted the choice indigenous communities have when developing an economic development strategy to target either internal markets that address the market needs of the community, and/or to engage with external mainstream economies. the goulburn island community are planning to engage in both types of economies. in addition to the external seafood economies described above, warruwi people aspire to use their fisheries resources to develop internal markets to meet demand for fresh nutritious seafood. fleming et al. (2014) found that one of the reasons indigenous women on goulburn island aspired to engage in fisheries activities was to minimise reliance on store purchased foods, and to improve people’s diet and nutritional status. the high cost of store purchased foods and the frequently poor quality of fresh product has been cited as a factor in the poor nutritional status of indigenous people living remotely (browne, laurence, & thorpe, 2009). internal economies are an obvious and relatively easy enterprise opportunity for indigenous communities as they require little investment in market development and supply chain infrastructure. equally importantly, such enterprises offer opportunities that people feel are familiar, realistic, and achievable in terms of the skills, concepts, and education required. establishment of local markets can be seen as a stage towards engagement with more mainstream markets, offering opportunity for people to develop their capacity at their own pace. the “warruwi women’s healthy tucker program” was used as a vehicle to meet women’s entrepreneurship aspirations to improve the availability of fresh seafood on goulburn island (discussed in sections 3 and 4). in 2011, the warruwi community established its own not-for-profit community governance organisation (yagbani aboriginal corporation), which is run by a committee comprising representation from each of the five main clan groups living on the island. yagbani is planning to establish an independent corporate entity to support commercial enterprises and businesses for the benefit of the community. yagbani’s aim is to develop social and cultural programs (art centre, market garden, building and construction, women’s projects, aquaculture and coastal line fishing). as such, it targets a diversified portfolio of small business investments that collectively will generate modest profits to support local employment needs. during the period of program implementation on goulburn island, the northern territory government’s fisheries division secured funds to support east arnhem indigenous people establish 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.5 fisheries businesses (in the region around yirrkala shown in figure 3). the garngirr fishing aboriginal corporation was formed in 2012. garngirr’s indigenous board plans to develop a seafood co-operative (similar to goulburn island’s plans—see section 2) to accommodate the different opportunities and aspirations of the clans living in the east arnhem region. licensed indigenous fishers will decide amongst themselves where they fish within their traditional sea country system of authority, selling their catch to the co-operative. in the first instance, fresh seafood will be sold locally in east arnhem. when the initiative moves to a commercial phase, the co-operative will take a percentage of sales, and potentially use this revenue to provide boats and fuel for fishers, as well as coordinate processing and marketing (norwood, 2013). through this initiative, the fisheries division is also supporting the goulburn island community to establish a coastal line fishing enterprise. an indigenous fishing mentor visits the island regularly to train the local men participating in the aquaculture program. he trains them in a range of fishing industry skills, such as net manufacture and use, seafood handling, processing, and packaging to maintain shelf life. as the goulburn island and east arnhem fisheries co-operatives develop across the northern territory (and potentially additional indigenous fisheries initiatives), collaborative opportunities will emerge to achieve economies of scale through regional programs, such as collective marketing and operational support systems, as well as shared capital investments. 2 . m a rke t d ri v e rs — c u l t u ra l pri m a c y , s e l f d e t e rm i n a t i o n , a n d e c o n o m i c i n d e p e n d e n c e for many indigenous australians—and for most indigenous people globally—the primary driver to engage in commercial enterprise and employment is the desire for economic independence and the benefits that this may bring, such as autonomy, self-determination, personal accomplishment, lifting socioeconomic disadvantage—particularly for their families and children; correcting negative social perceptions and social stratification based on race; and preserving heritage, culture, and tradition (wood & davidson, 2011; wood, et al., 2012). coastal dwelling indigenous australians seek from non-indigenous australians recognition that they have “certain recognised rights associated with and based on the prior and continuing occupation of country and water and activities (e.g., fishing, gathering) associated with the use and management of these” (fisheries research and development corporation [frdc], 2012, p. 1). they seek economic development opportunities arising from their cultural marine assets and associated access rights by engaging “in economic activity based on the use of traditional aquatic biological resources and/or the right to share in the benefits derived from the exploitation of aquatic biological resources” (frdc, 2012, p. 2). indigenous australians also recognise they need significant capacity building opportunities to further their aspirations in the use of aquatic biological resources, and seek to engage with the commercial sector and build their general understanding of fisheries industries (frdc, 2012). the people of goulburn island have expressed similar aspirations. their motivations for setting up fisheries (and other) businesses are to achieve a degree of economic independence through engaging in culture-aligned employment, and, in so doing, to achieve autonomy over their lives and futures and maintain their cultural heritage (fleming et al., 2014). for a long time past, goulburn islanders have responded to opportunities to engage in fisheries commerce: from the very early contact and trade with the macassan sea cucumber fishermen who visited the northern australian coast seasonally from the mid 1700s to the early 1900s, to the mission era from 1915 to 1974 when the community exported seafood under missionary control and management, to the community’s current work towards ownership and control of their own fisheries-based businesses. 15 fleming: improving business investment confidence in indigenous economies published by scholarship@western, 2015 the strongly expressed motivation by indigenous australian people to engage with the business sector is a powerful enabler and driver for market development in remote australia. the challenge is to equip people with the necessary skills and capacities so that cultural drivers can be mobilised under their own direction and control. to support the warruwi community in achieving this, the aquaculture unit sought to implement key strategies to engage local people in entrepreneurial activities across a number of sectors of the community (senior school students, women, men, and the community organisation). underpinning all activities was a deep appreciation of cultural primacy and self-determination as key motivators for people’s engagement. for example, facilitators sought to understand indigenous ways of doing business and sought to incorporate these into business arrangements. in this way the program supported indigenous and commercial partners to negotiate at the interface of culture and commerce, to build business partnerships that accommodated the needs of each, and to jointly develop business models underpinned by the motivational drivers of each. the business model proposed for the warruwi community is a foundational step towards the community achieving self-determination and economic independence. initially, a fisheries cooperative will be established (as a business arm under the yagbani aboriginal corporation) to support the sea cucumber ranching industry, rather than developing a stand-alone seafood business (ambrose business solutions, 2014). clan-based ranching micro-businesses will be established under the co-operative to allow family groupings (based on traditional kinship relations) to conduct sea ranching (and other aquaculture activities) on their sea country and supply product to the cooperative. the ranching and harvesting stage will be undertaken by the local clan-based microbusinesses, while the processing stage will be undertaken by the co-operative. the co-operative will also provide operational support along with training and mentoring to the micro-businesses. the cooperative model is structured so that the central business operation (yagbani aboriginal corporation) assists with the development, marketing, and support of established and emerging clan-based sea cucumber farming ventures. the co-operative model recognises that many indigenous people do not currently possess the fundamental skills and capacities required to work in today’s competitive business environment. lack of strong governance creates a dual barrier as indigenous people lack the ability to run businesses independently (and so cannot realise their aspirations for self-determination and autonomy) and they lack legitimacy of governance necessary for investor surety and economic development. the proposed business model allows the provision of support from government (and industry) of operational assistance and with training and mentoring (ambrose business solutions, 2014). in this way, the model manages business investment risk by addressing the current barrier posed by limited business capacity of indigenous people and at the same time puts in place the foundations to achieve their goal of operating and managing stand-alone businesses. it is anticipated that by year 5 and through to year 10, the co-operative will have a number of indigenous fisheries businesses established and operating on goulburn island. however, this is dependent on both direct and indirect funding support from relevant government agencies and a commitment from these agencies for a minimum of 5 years, and potentially up to 10 years. the capacity to effectively engage in business with each other—the capacity of both the mainstream fisheries sector and indigenous communities—has been identified as critical in achieving successful indigenous fisheries businesses (frdc, 2012). as such, useful learnings (models, processes, and templates) will flow from this work that will benefit other indigenous communities (and the fisheries sector) when negotiating mutually beneficial terms of agreement. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.5 3 . c u l t u ra l e n g a g e m e n t — c ro s s c u l t u ra l c o m m u n i c a t i o n a n d r e l a t i o n s h i p bu i l d i n g the traditional owners and elders of goulburn island had, for many years, expressed a keen interest in sea cucumber farming and other fisheries activities, and had participated in trials and plans during the early to mid 2000s that were unsuccessful. in early 2010, aquaculture research staff were advised by international expert scientists that the marine habitat surrounding south goulburn island was potentially suitable for sea cucumber ranching. these considerations led the aquaculture unit to select goulburn island as the most suitable trial site for its sea cucumber research. aquaculture staff sought to follow cultural protocols when first engaging with the warruwi community and were assisted in this by the northern land council (nlc)—the representative body for indigenous people in this region under both the aboriginal land rights (northern territory) act (1976) and the native title act (1993). the nlc introduced staff to the appropriate traditional owners and elders with authority to speak for the sea country surrounding south goulburn island. these authority figures confirmed their support for fisheries development on the island and directed aquaculture staff to work with the local rangers in fieldwork. staff worked with the rangers for a period, and then in 2011 they began working with the community development employment projects (cdep)2 team, facilitated by the enterprise development officer for the region who ensured aquaculture activities were formally included in the cdep work schedule. during this time, senior authority figures on goulburn island supported an expansion of the aquaculture program to include grow-out trials for tropical blacklip oysters and fluted giant clams. in 2011, the aquaculture unit sought to engage more broadly with the warruwi community and approached the local school principal to include aquaculture in the school teaching program. aquaculture research staff worked with the senior class teacher to give the senior students an understanding of the current aquaculture activities on the island and the future employment opportunities to which they may aspire. the teacher also incorporated the sea cucumber trials (and the island’s long history of contact with the international sea cucumber trade) into the class curriculum, teaching across a range of subjects with sea cucumber as the focus. experiential learning was used where possible. for example, a classroom-based aquarium was set up to allow students hands-on experience in caring for marine animals and understanding husbandry needs. field trips to the research site also allowed students to learn first-hand about sea farming methods and interact with aquaculture staff. in 2012, a small social research project on women’s views on aquaculture development opportunities, conducted by charles darwin university (cdu) and commissioned by the aquaculture unit, highlighted the community’s view that the aquaculture staff needed to improve communication and knowledge exchange with a broader sector of the community (fleming et al., 2014). research participants (female and male) were generally supportive of aquaculture enterprises and the economic and social benefits it may bring, but some lacked knowledge about what the aquaculture work and the proposed business entailed. they also expressed a desire for their traditional sea country knowledge to be valued and used in decision making within the aquaculture program. it 2 cdep is an australian commonwealth government funded initiative that provides activities for unemployed indigenous people to develop work skills. the australian bureau of statistics classifies participants in cdep as employed because some activities provide essential services that would be considered employment in mainstream communities (scrgsp, 2011). 17 fleming: improving business investment confidence in indigenous economies published by scholarship@western, 2015 became apparent at this stage of program implementation that cross-cultural communication and knowledge exchange was such a critical element in program success that it required a dedicated staff position. the aquaculture unit re-allocated funding from its staffing budget for a dedicated indigenous aquaculture program coordinator, tasked to focus fulltime on community engagement, cross-cultural knowledge exchange, and communication. although at the time of writing this position is not filled, it continues to be viewed as a critical element of successful project implementation. in 2013, funds were secured to engage a female indigenous academic researcher from cdu to trial various enterprise engagement strategies in the warruwi community and to further build relationships with specific sectors of the community. one strategy was to engage with warruwi women to help them establish the “warruwi women’s healthy tucker program.” this initiative emerged from the earlier women’s study (fleming et al., 2014) of the potential for women to take a leadership role in driving development in their communities through a desire to improve the lives of their families and children. for a number of years prior, the women of warruwi expressed a keenness to establish a healthy food enterprise (supplying wild bush foods and seafood to the community) but had not been able to progress its development. by harnessing women’s aspirations to engage in enterprises, the aquaculture program sought to engage a broader sector of the community in fisheries activities (see also section 1 and 4) (ford & fleming, in prep). 4 . c u l t u ra l e n g a g e m e n t — c l a ri f y i n g c o m m u n i t y a s p i ra t i o n s a n d g o a l s from the start of the implementation process, the aquaculture unit recognised that the community needed to make informed decisions regarding the type of aquaculture enterprises developed on their island and an understanding of the likely financial and social benefits. key community leaders had some previous experience of aquaculture industries. for example, a few community members had attended a study tour of māori-owned aquaculture businesses to new zealand and others had participated in previous aquaculture projects on the island. in the early stages of the program, these community leaders were instrumental in advocating for fisheries development on the island and facilitating the partnership with the aquaculture unit. as discussed in section 3, it was not until 2012 that funds were secured to conduct a small study to ascertain community (particularly women’s) views on the preferred types of aquaculture enterprises and the flow of benefits they sought. some women attended training in “participatory action research” techniques to allow them to be directly involved in the research process. the study focused on women’s views as these are often underrepresented in development initiatives, particularly within past fisheries projects. the findings confirmed that the aquaculture species and farming methods being trialed at the time on the island met the community’s development aspirations (fleming et al., 2014). this was partly due to the early literature review process and the stakeholder workshop that allowed an informed selection of species and farming methods. as reported in fleming et al. (2014), in general, women’s reasons for supporting aquaculture in their community were the diverse social and cultural benefits it may bring, in addition to improving work participation. female traditional owners and senior elders strongly advocated for generating jobs within the community to engage the younger generations in work. they saw this as an essential aspect of addressing the youth’s general disengagement with community life and considered aquaculture a way to encourage greater involvement of the younger generations in sea 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.5 country management, to build their capabilities and improve employment opportunities. (p. 169) in addition, women participants believed aquaculture could strengthen links and improve access to sea country, and improve diets and nutrition, particularly for their own family groups and the elderly (see also sections 1 and 3). these findings support international reports that indigenous people seek to engage in entrepreneurship within their cultural worldview and value system. the flow of benefits they seek are likely to be for a range of perceived cultural, social, and/or economical benefits rather than solely for personal economic gains (p. dana, 1996; c. pearson & helms, 2012; wood & davidson, 2011). the information gained from the study into women’s preferences was used to inform development pathways in terms of sea farming methods, engagement strategies, employment arrangements, business structures, and flow of benefit (as reported throughout this article). it is important to reassess people’s aspirations throughout the development process as their views may change over time as they gain a better understanding and as needs and priorities change. in particular, young people’s motivations and preferences for working in aquaculture need to be better understood so that employment programs can be tailored to effectively engage this sector. 5 . bu s i n e s s d e v e l o p m e n t — pro v i s i o n o f r & d t o i m p ro v e e c o n o m i c o p p o rt u n i t y the suite of r & d trials conducted on goulburn island since 2010 aimed to identify suitable growout sites and farming systems, and generate production data to conduct economic assessments for the three species under investigation. table 4 outlines the trials conducted during this period in partnership with indigenous communities, research partners, and the commercial sector. in 2010, the aquaculture unit partnered with a sea cucumber company to conduct research at the aquaculture unit’s research facility, the darwin aquaculture centre, into hatchery and nursery methods to mass-produce many hundreds of thousands of sea cucumber juveniles annually. during this period, the aquaculture unit also undertook collaborative research (both with the sea cucumber fishing company and with international sea cucumber research agencies in the philippines and vietnam) to investigate sea ranching methods and allow comparison of data across trial sites. the company conducted comparable ranching trials at little lagoon, on groote eylandt in east arnhem land. an equally important objective of the technical research was to develop socially and culturally suitable grow-out methods and husbandry protocols that met the preferred farming practices and employment arrangements of the community. the research done in 2012 into women’s preferences for aquaculture reported that women preferred the concept of low maintenance, simple infrastructure, sea-based aquaculture, carried out in a way respectful to culture and directed by community (fleming et al., 2014). women were keen to explore ways that aquaculture employment could accommodate cultural commitments and family obligations. they proposed job sharing between the men and women as a potential solution to this tension. in addition to flexible work arrangements, women wanted work opportunities that allowed the youth to regularly visit sea country, learn traditional knowledge, and be involved in healthy (mentally and physically) activities. the sea farming systems developed on goulburn island met these work preferences. the research has further refined the farming methods to provide flexible, low maintenance farming systems and husbandry methods that meet people’s preferred development pathways, safety concerns, and work practices. 19 fleming: improving business investment confidence in indigenous economies published by scholarship@western, 2015 t a b l e 4 . o u t l i n e o f t h e t ri a l s a n d r e s e a rc h c o n d u c t e d d u ri n g pro g ra m i m p l e m e n t a t i o n t o d e v e l o p v i a b l e a q u a c u l t u re f a rm i n g o p p o rt u n i t i e s f o r i n d i g e n o u s c o m m u n i t i e s time objectives location farming methods partnerships (in addition to the community partners) funder sea cucumbers 2010 − 2012 growth/ survival/ economic viability goulburn island groote eylandt ranching: hand seeding of 3 5g juveniles into intertidal seagrass beds during low tides. hand harvest during extreme low tides. commercial partner philippines and vietnam research partners australian centre for international agricultural research/ worldfish 2012 − 2014 hatchery and nursery juvenile production methods darwin aquaculture centre • commercial partner australian seafood centre for cooperative research 2013 − 2015 juvenile release methods/ suitable site indicators/ non-diving harvest methods goulburn island groote eylandt ranching: release from boat via chute of 3 5g juveniles into intertidal seagrass beds during neap tides. harvest during extreme low tides (or by boat when technology is developed). commercial partner philippines research partners australian centre for international agricultural research/ worldfish blacklip oysters 2011− 2013 suitable sites/ suitable farming methods/ growth/ survival/ economic viability goulburn island tiwi islands initially in baskets attached to racks in intertidal areas; access only during extreme low tides. in 2013, moved to floating baskets on long line; allows access at any time from a boat. commercial partner northern territory government 2010 − current hatchery methods for oyster seed production darwin aquaculture centre • commercial advisor northern territory government 2012 − 2013 assess heavy metal content of oysters goulburn island • • charles darwin university fisheries research & development corporation 2014 − 2015 develop quality assurance protocols for shellfish production goulburn island • • charles darwin university northern australian marine research alliance fluted giant clams 2011 − current suitable sites/ suitable farming methods/ growth/ survival/ transport methods/ economic viability goulburn island groote eylandt initially in cages secured to sea floor. in 2013, moved to open ranching among suitable reef. commercial partner northern territory government 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.5 an example of the importance of choosing appropriate farming systems to suit indigenous preferences was highlighted during the review of failure points of past aquaculture enterprises (fleming et al., 2014). an extensive 5-year program into the viability of farming sponges on goulburn island did not adequately address the fact that most indigenous people were not prepared to dive to manage stocks (due to the risk of crocodile and shark attack). in the current trials, sea cucumber farming was initially targeted for intertidal areas where people could seed the juveniles by hand and harvest farmed stocks during extreme low tides. but limiting sea cucumber ranching to intertidal areas constrains the profitability of the business as suitable ranching sites are limited (in terms of presence of seagrass, sediment characteristics, protection from currents, etc.) and stocks tend to migrate to deeper water over time. research by the aquaculture unit led to the development of a successful juvenile release technique conducted from a boat during neap tides, allowing releases at any time of the year. in addition, the commercial operator is trialing a scoop-like harvesting device towed from a boat that aims to improve access to deeper ranching sites and offer safe harvesting throughout the year. for indigenous communities to sell shellfish into australian seafood markets the product must meet the food standards set by the australian shellfish quality assurance program (asqap), a national program that requires shellfish harvest areas be classified on the basis of a sanitary survey and the results of an ongoing water-sampling program. this precautionary measure is required as shellfish bio-accumulate pathogens, chemicals, and toxins derived from surrounding waters, and because they are often eaten raw or only lightly cooked with the gastrointestinal tract intact. all australian oyster farmers must routinely monitor potential contaminants to minimise the risk to human health. to address this farming requirement, a yearlong monitoring program was conducted in 2012 to 2013 to measure the heavy metals in tropical oysters and assess the implications for placement of oysters into the australian seafood market (fleming, gibb, campbell, fortune, & birch, 2015). in 2014, this work was expanded to include all potential contaminants listed under the asqap food standards. the resulting database will be used to establish a quality assurance protocol for commercial shellfish production in goulburn island waters. 6 . c u l t u ra l e n g a g e m e n t — v a l u i n g bo t h t ra d i t i o n a l a n d w e s t e rn k n o w l e d g e indigenous people place a very high importance on their traditional knowledge being recognised and valued by non-indigenous people (frdc, 2012; northern land council, 2004). recognition and appropriate use of traditional knowledge can be an effective way to engage the community in development programs (morley, 2014). the 2012 study into warruwi women’s aquaculture preferences highlighted the desire for their traditional knowledge to be respected, valued, and used within the current programs on goulburn island (fleming et al., 2014). as discussed in sections 3 and 4, in 2013, funds were secured to engage a female indigenous academic researcher from the cdu to trial various enterprise engagement strategies on warruwi and to further build relationships with specific sectors of the community. one of the engagement strategies sought to gather and document traditional sea country knowledge about the shellfish species being trialed for potential sea farming enterprises on goulburn island. it was anticipated that the local knowledge might inform various shellfish farming development decisions by the community and supporting partners. for example, local knowledge may identify the best sites for farming oysters, the best harvesting times for optimal taste and nutritional value, and may also identify environmental cues for times when oysters may be unsafe to eat. the warruwi community’s traditional ecological knowledge was documented on a website, together with western research conducted in the region on potential shellfish contaminants (ford & fleming, in prep). 21 fleming: improving business investment confidence in indigenous economies published by scholarship@western, 2015 7 . bu s i n e s s d e v e l o p m e n t — c a p a c i t y bu i l d i n g — t h e w o rke r in 2011, the aquaculture research staff began a successful collaboration with the local cdep team (which consisted of about 15 men) to conduct the aquaculture field trials. this arrangement continued until the federal government ceased funding cdep as an indigenous employment strategy in mid-2013. after this time, the aquaculture unit sourced funds to pay the indigenous aquaculture team hourly wages for their work supporting research staff in the field. management of the indigenous aquaculture team’s work program and their work skills development was the responsibility of the community development officer. this officer engaged the cdu’s vocational education and training program to provide locally delivered aquaculture training to the men. for the past two years, a cdu trainer has visited every 4 to 6 weeks to develop the skills needed for the current research work as well as employment skills for the future aquaculture operations. the trainer also provides additional literacy and numeracy education where needed. the aquaculture research staff provide support to the trainees to ensure their skills are practiced during fieldwork. when completed, the men will hold a certificate ii level vocational qualification in aquaculture. an indigenous coastal line fishing mentor and seafood processing trainer (employed by the northern territory government’s fisheries division) also provide periodic fishing and seafood processing training to the men, who also gained their restricted coxswains certificates. an indigenous coastal fishing licence was also issued during this period. in 2014, the vocational training program was expanded to include senior students at the local school. the new principal was keen to implement a formal aquaculture school-to-work transition program into the school’s curriculum. this program will give senior students formally recognised credits towards a vocational qualification in aquaculture as well as skill sets required for employment in future aquaculture businesses and enterprises on goulburn island. a successful funding application by the yagbani aboriginal corporate (which was facilitated by the aquaculture unit and cdu) secured resources for the women’s healthy tucker program (to purchase a boat, trailer, bus, and tractor), and included funds for women to gain qualifications in food handling and boat handling. along with recent access to facilities to house a women’s centre, it is anticipated that the warruwi women will now have all the necessary resources and support to progress their healthy tucker enterprise. capacity building of the future workforce for aquaculture enterprises on goulburn island progressed well over the 4-year implementation period. both men and women developed work skills that will allow them to enter into paid work when fishing and aquaculture operations begin. future capacity building should focus on engaging additional sectors of the community, in particular young adult male and female school-leavers and underemployed young adults who choose to remain living on the island. the senior authority figures constantly advocate for the need to provide employment opportunity for the youth in the community. this is one of the primary community drivers for economic development on goulburn island. however, many of the younger generations on goulburn island who have expressed aspirations to engage in culture-aligned work on sea country have often experienced challenges in making positive lifestyle choices on a daily basis when provided with such work opportunities. such responses arise from the effects of decades of welfare dependency (and associated poor lifestyle opportunities, capacities, and personal choices) and limited understanding, experience, and role models for paid work practices (and associated learnt responsibilities and lifestyle disciplines). further investigations into the motivators and drivers of young adults (both male and female) to engage in work in general— and fisheries enterprises in 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.5 particular, are critical to further improve work engagement models and strategies on goulburn island. 8 . bu s i n e s s d e v e l o p m e n t — c a p a c i t y bu i l d i n g — t h e c o m m u n i t y the 2012 study into women’s aquaculture development preferences reported that all project participants (both male and female) were very keen to see locals run their own businesses and, especially the older generation, saw this a very important criterion for future development (fleming et al., 2014). when the aquaculture program began on goulburn island in 2010 there was no governance body and consequently residents relied on the regional shire council to manage all town services and community programs. residents felt frustrated with the lack of control over their own affairs and lack of focus on community development programs, especially for economic development. to address this issue, residents put plans in place to set up their own corporation. as discussed in section 1, when the enterprise development officer (employed by west arnhem shire council) began work on goulburn island in 2011, he assisted the community in establishing its own not-for-profit community governance organisation (yagbani aboriginal corporation) run by a board comprising representation from each of the five main clan groups. in 2012, board members undertook preliminary governance training provided by the office for the registrar of indigenous corporations, but required extensive ongoing training in governance and business management. the 2012 study into women’s aspirations for aquaculture enterprises also reported that all participants (male and female) placed a lot of faith and confidence in the newly established community board to make decisions and manage future businesses. despite people’s desire for community independence, they acknowledged the need, at least for the foreseeable future, for sustained external support at most levels of enterprise function, such as management and financial capacities, technical training, mentoring, funding, and resourcing (fleming et al., 2014). it was clear to all facilitators that developing the capacity of yagbani’s members for governance and business management was critical to ensuring planned aquaculture ventures were viable into the future. it was also clear that, in the interim, a manager sourced from outside the community was required to assist yagbani to continue its community development work. in 2013, the enterprise development officer secured funds from the investment arm of the northern land council to continue his work supporting yagbani and was formally elected as manager by the yagbani board in late 2013. in 2014, the aquaculture unit secured funds to employ a business consultant (who specialised in indigenous-appropriate training methods) to provide the yagbani board with further governance training and business management training (as well as produce a business plan and other documents required to progress aquaculture business development initiatives—see sections 1 and 2). a critical next stage of program implementation on goulburn island is to adequately resource this essential work—and over a sustained period—to develop local capacity for business planning and management. the impost on facilitators to constantly secure financial and human resources for indigenous business capacity development is significant. not only are the timeframes set by many funding providers inappropriate given the task at hand, but also sourcing sufficient funds for key programs is often very difficult. given the long timeframes required to achieve viable businesses on remote indigenous communities—likely 5 to 10 years—a more strategic approach is needed, such as regional strategies (10 to 20 year plan) for indigenous business development that provides business education, training and mentoring, as well as business advice, industry specific training, and industry mentoring programs (see also section 2). 23 fleming: improving business investment confidence in indigenous economies published by scholarship@western, 2015 9 . bu s i n e s s d e v e l o p m e n t — i n f ra s t ru c t u re , f i n a n c i a l r e s o u rc e s , a n d l a n d t e n u re early market analysis done by the aquaculture unit highlighted the potential barrier to investment caused by unsecured land tenure and lack of adequate capital for supply chain infrastructure. also, timeframes for delivery of these assets is critical as protracted delays can stall development momentum and compromise investment interest (fleming et al., 2014). during 2013 to 2014, the yagbani aboriginal corporation secured a number of town leases from the local council so that the corporation had access to suitable land and facilities for their suite of development objectives, including a site suitable for a seafood processing facility. in recent years, the federal government has introduced land tenure reforms to encourage indigenous people to enter into 99–year leases over indigenous owned lands (which under the aboriginal land rights [northern territory] act (1976) can be leased but cannot be sold or individually owned). these reforms are said to provide options to leverage greater investment opportunities in indigenous communities (scullion, 2014). from late 2013 onwards, the yagbani manager also secured funds for administrative and management support for yagbani and staff positions to support a range of development initiatives. in late 2013, the yagbani aboriginal corporation sought funds (supported by the cdu and aquaculture unit partners) from the aboriginal benefits account (which invests mining royalties into businesses to benefit indigenous australians) to build a seafood facility on goulburn island for first stage sea cucumber processing (gut, boil, and freeze), as well as for shellfish and wild-caught fish. the funding bid was unsuccessful but a further submission is planned. this new submission will be strengthened by a business plan for sea cucumber ranching and a formal business agreement between the yagbani board and the commercial partner (see also section 1 and 2). the next 5 to 10 years are critical to the future of the aquaculture program on goulburn island and will depend on future actions of all stakeholders to build community capacity and secure sufficient financial resources (for staffing, operational, and infrastructure provision) over this extended period. the realistic timeframes required to support business development in remote communities pose a significant challenge to facilitators, given most funding cycles fall far short of this. longer-term funding commitments are required that recognise both the importance and challenge of building local community capacity for business planning, management, and operations. as the fisheries businesses transition into the early business start-up phase, investors and funders must be convinced of the community’s legitimacy in managing businesses before they commit significant financial investments. such legitimacy will come from sound business plans, supported by a demonstrated commitment by the community to development activities and a track record by the governance body in maintaining efficient and accountable financial, administrative, and management systems. 1 0 . m a rke t d ri v e rs — i m p a c t o f g o v e rn m e n t po l i c y impact of government policy is included within the list of success factors as government economic indigenous development policy has significant potential to facilitate and support business partnerships between the commercial sector and remote communities, if designed and implemented well. to do this well, governments must provide strategic and effective programs that equip indigenous people with the necessary business capabilities to independently engage and negotiate 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.5 with the business sector. governments must also provide an enabling regulatory environment to attract investment in indigenous estates (see also section 9). impact of government policy is also included within the list of success factors to highlight the significant negative impacts it can have on program implementation. unlike the other success factors, this factor is outside the control of the community and program implementers. this constant threat to program viability requires resilience by all participants to sustain effort and create innovative solutions to maintain program momentum. impacts to program viability can occur in various ways. the most significant during the 4 years of the aquaculture program on goulburn island were from the constant, and poorly implemented, changes by the federal government to their remote indigenous employment programs and associated employment funding strategies. in late 2013, the government phased out the last of the cdep program and the indigenous aquaculture team was left unemployed and without an income. tensions and mistrust by community members arose over the following months as aquaculture research staff sought to engage the local support team but locals saw this as unpaid labour. funds were eventually sourced by the aquaculture unit to provide hourly wages. in the meantime, aquaculture research staff worked on the trials without community input. in mid-2014, the new form of indigenous employment program, the remote jobs and community program (rjcp), was implemented. the manager of yagbani has negotiated for this employment program (and associated employment work plans) to be managed by the yagbani board. these constant changes to government policies and programs, and slow, inefficient, and often confusing transitions from one program to the other, severely impacted the progress of the aquaculture development program and threatened to erode relationships that had taken time and resources to build. the community’s ability to fully attend to, and participate in, development programs is constantly compromised as their time and energy is focused on attending to daily crises and demands brought on by government actions. at these times the influence of key drivers to sustain programs is critical. indigenous people’s enduring drive to create a better future for the next generation and the commercial sectors’ drive to generate new market opportunities both must sustain effort, despite the impact of poor government policy. d i s c u s s i o n e f f e c t i v e n e s s o f t h e bu s i n e s s s u p p o rt f ra m e w o rk i n g u i d i n g d e v e l o p m e n t o n g o u l b u rn i s l a n d use of the business support framework proved highly effective in enabling the commercial sector to invest with greater surety in indigenous businesses on goulburn island. the framework was used to ensure that equal importance was placed on delivering both corporate and cultural economic goals, needs, and processes. most importantly, it clarified the need for both indigenous and business parties to directly negotiate development pathways that accommodated the different ways that business and culture engage in and do business, their disparate goals regarding desired flow of benefits from employment programs, and their differing drivers for market engagement. in practice, this was achieved by the government sector forming collaborative partnerships with both the commercial sector and the social sector to inform, facilitate, and support engagement between potential business partners and the community. viewed through the framework, the two key systems for driving economic development in remote communities—business and culture—proved responsive to market opportunity and so were effectively engaged in the business development process on goulburn island. the fisheries sector 25 fleming: improving business investment confidence in indigenous economies published by scholarship@western, 2015 sought to generate business profits through increased access to seafood product. similarly, indigenous people sought self-determination through indigenous-run businesses utilising their natural marine resources. interestingly, drivers for indigenous business development occurred at two levels: at the community level (to provide operational and business support for fisheries enterprises) and at the clan level (to work in sea-based fishing and aquaculture operations within traditional land and sea ownership structures). such arrangements accommodate both cultural aspirations for flow of benefit based on ownership of lands and seas, in addition to community aspirations for employment and social benefits. as the framework outlines, indigenous people’s strong motivation for self-determination and control is a powerful force that can drive remote economic development, if people can be equipped with the business skills to realise their vision. this is where concerted effort must now be focused within the development program on goulburn island. a c h i e v e m e n t s o f t h e a q u a c u l t u re pro g ra m t o d a t e although this program is only part way to achieving economic outcomes for the warruwi community, significant progress was achieved within the first 4 years. at the time of writing, the aquaculture program is transitioning from an r & d phase to a business planning and enterprise start up phase. all aquaculture and fisheries enterprises trialed in the program proved biologically and economically viable. as part of the diversified business portfolio proposed by yagbani, fully operational enterprises will collectively generate sufficient profits to support local wages. a number of male and female community members are now employed under the new indigenous employment program (managed by yagbani) to conduct aquaculture and fisheries work, and as coordinators for the various enterprises. in early 2015 yagbani and the sea cucumber industry partner conducted their first joint harvest of wild stocks and the company provided training in product processing on board a commercial vessel. the local aquaculture team will soon take responsibility for independently setting up and managing a small-scale oyster farm and the warruwi women have begun harvesting seafood and will soon be employed by yagbani to sell product into local markets. the various aquaculture and fisheries enterprises under development on goulburn island have delivered significant outcomes in terms of capacity development, strategic business planning, engagement and employment of young adults (both male and female) in culturally and economically viable activities, and renewed community optimism for the future in terms of culturally-aligned employment and business prospects on goulburn island. u s e o f t h e f ra m e w o rk t o g u i d e a n d a n a l y s e pro g ra m s m o re bro a d l y the framework proved to be an effective tool to guide indigenous business development on goulburn island and may prove to be useful across all government agencies tasked to improve economic outcomes in remote indigenous communities. it can be adjusted to suit different indigenous groups, both within australia and, potentially, internationally. it can be used to assess proposed development initiatives, and evaluate and troubleshoot existing programs. current indigenous employment programs and policies can be analysed retrospectively through the implementation framework to better explain their success. for instance, the indigenous land management initiatives (working on country, indigenous rangers, indigenous protected areas) successfully integrate cultural value systems and employment aspirations with western market demand for the services they deliver. the employment arrangements these programs offer suit indigenous capacities, draw on their cultural knowledge and strengths, enhance connections to country, and accommodate lifestyles centered on culture and family. such employment programs bring together both the customary and the mainstream market into a mutually beneficial economic 26 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.5 arrangement, but rely on ongoing government support as they deliver “public good” services (altman, 2005, 2007, 2012). indigenous culture-aligned economies that deliver high-value commercial products or services should, theoretically, not require ongoing government support once the business makes a positive return on investment. the indigenous art industry matches indigenous aspirations for culturally aligned, flexible work opportunities with a strong global market demand. the global demand for high-value indigenous australian art suggests that market and cultural drivers should be sufficient to sustain this industry. viewing the indigenous art sector through the framework suggests that, for some communities, limited capacity to craft innovative business models and targeted marketing strategies that fully harness potential global market drivers have hampered their ability to operate without government support. similarly, the number of successful stand-alone indigenous-run cultural tourism businesses is surprisingly low, given the very strong demand by international tourists for cultural tourism experiences in australia (acg, 2013). again, the framework highlights the lack of business innovation to successfully craft new ways to expand the tourism product and its appeal for domestic and international tourists, particularly through product development and business strategies that target sophisticated eco-cultural branding and marketing (whitford & ruhanen, 2009). the northern territory’s indigenous pastoral program demonstrates a highly effective collaborative partnership between indigenous land councils and government. the program effectively engaged the northern territory cattle industry with indigenous landowners to develop pastoral businesses on indigenous lands and provide employment opportunities for indigenous youth as stockmen (department of primary industries, fisheries and mines, 2005). viewed through the framework, this program has addressed many of the success factors, although the challenge in the coming years is to improve capacity for indigenous landowners to take a lead role in managing a greater proportion of those pastoral businesses set up on their lands. viewing mainstream industries through the framework also offers a greater understanding of their continual failure to engage indigenous people living remotely. industries such as mining, agriculture, construction, retail, and transport offer no cultural connection nor accommodate flexible employment arrangements around a lifestyle centered on culture; that is, they fail to recognise the critical role the indigenous cultural system plays as a market driver. interestingly, indigenous people in canada living on their traditional lands have devised new development pathways in partnership with mainstream industries where they have negotiated entirely new organisational arrangements to ensure wealth is generated to fund social objectives (anderson et al., 2006). in australia, where mainstream industries (mainly in the mining sector) have been set up on indigenous owned lands, there has been very little economic benefit for the neighbouring indigenous communities despite many hundreds of millions of dollars in royalties being paid. rather than well-advised investment in infrastructure and capacity development, private sector investment has generally resulted in an exchange from government welfare to corporate welfare (ord & mazzarol, 2007). this highlights the critical need to assist indigenous communities in building leadership and governance structures to ensure economic development is driven by indigenous leaders and organisations that are empowered to negotiate and manage beneficial agreements in accord with local and regional indigenous aspirations. the successful business partnerships achieved between indigenous peoples in canada and the business sector show that such effectively negotiated business arrangements (supported by enabling government policy and empowered community leaders) can result in profitable mainstream industries delivering culturealigned economic development objectives for indigenous communities. 27 fleming: improving business investment confidence in indigenous economies published by scholarship@western, 2015 u s e o f t h e f ra m e w o rk t o i d e n t i f y l i m i t a t i o n s o f k e y i n t e rn a l ( c o m m u n i t y ) s u p p o rt s y s t e m s the use of the framework highlighted the limitation of some key internal systems on goulburn island that will require sustained additional effort and resources to address. limited local capacity for community leadership, governance, and business planning and management is likely to limit, for some time to come, the warruwi community’s ability to independently operate community-based businesses. the capacity of indigenous australian people to engage in entrepreneurship generally is very low (6% for males, 4% for females) compared to similar indigenous people globally (wood & davidson, 2011). frederick and foley (2006) contend that australian indigenous disadvantage is so entrenched and pervasive that entrepreneurial activity will remain the exception, rather than the norm, for some time to come. for example, many of the 5,000 indigenous aboriginal corporations registered across northern australia have very limited capacity to independently operate and manage their own community-based businesses (michelmore, 2013). a significant body of policy research has been published in australia on contemporary indigenous governance and how best to facilitate pragmatic but effective, legitimate governance arrangements and capabilities within indigenous communities (hunt, smith, garling, & sanders, 2008). as a result, there are many competent australian indigenous organisations that have secured community legitimacy by successfully balancing their cultural imperative and practice with the demands of legal incorporation and government funding regimes. t h e n e e d f o r a m o re s t ra t e g i c a p p ro a c h t o i n d i g e n o u s bu s i n e s s c a p a c i t y d e v e l o p m e n t in contrast to the concerted efforts to improve indigenous governance systems, there is a general lack of formalised and strategic programs to develop remote-living indigenous people’s capacity for small business entrepreneurship. reporting on the low entrepreneurial activity by indigenous australians within the broader context of the annual global entrepreneurship monitor project, hindle and rushworth (2002) recommended that national, diversified indigenous entrepreneurship education, training, and mentoring programs are a priority. the canadian government has established such a program with numerous regional service centres (in partnership with program delivery providers and aboriginal financial institutions) to provide a range of services and investment capital for indigenous peoples in canada living remotely (government of canada, 2014). for remote-living indigenous australians a similar regional business development program is needed, delivered locally in communities and offering a range of services, such as business planning, business support, business-related training, financial services, and mentoring services. provision of such a program in australia needs to be delivered within a formalised, and targeted structure, informed by community strategic development plans (or preferably regional ones), drawing expertise from the tertiary sector on indigenous education and training and providing linkage with relevant industry and small business sectors. this could be supported by a mentoring scheme with support networks offering greater involvement by the private sector in indigenous organisations (ord & mazzarol, 2012). the program would require surety of funding over a decadal timeframe and include similarly structured and targeted programs to build the capacity of workers. t h e n e e d f o r pra g m a t i c i n d i g e n o u s bu s i n e s s s u p p o rt m o d e l s i n t h e i n t e ri m until indigenous people’s capacity for entrepreneurship is increased, viable alternative models for local business management must be adopted. some communities may choose to employ (mostly) non-indigenous business managers directed by an indigenous-run corporation, or they may 28 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.5 negotiate joint venture arrangements where corporate partners take responsibility for business management and provide employment and/or financial returns to the local indigenous people to invest in their community programs. these are viable, pragmatic models that must, for the present, be used to engage remote-living indigenous people in equitable partnerships with the market sector. if the terms of engagement are negotiated with equal power on both sides, such models can meet both cultural drivers for self-determination and corporate drivers for profit. if they are implemented and managed well, indigenous australians can design their own economic futures—within the framework of their own political, economic, and social systems—to innovate new ways of engaging with the commercial sector. c o n c l u s i o n the business development framework identified key systems for driving economic development in remote indigenous communities, and the key success factors necessary for viable businesses. this in turn identified the partnerships and processes that were required to ensure key systems were engaged and key success factors were addressed during each of the pre-commercialisation phases of business development. use of the framework during program implementation allowed continual analysis of program progress and highlighted problem areas where further or alternative actions were needed. it also identified critical barriers to achieving fully independent indigenous entrepreneurship in the longer term, highlighting where targeted, long-term indigenous business support programs are needed. the use of the business development framework will ensure governments can more effectively support indigenous economic development and employment programs to an investment ready stage where the commercial sector can engage with more confidence in economically viable, culturealigned businesses. this study showed that pragmatic, place-based approaches are the most likely development model to succeed in remote indigenous communities, but only if all key success factors are addressed and all key drivers are engaged. 29 fleming: improving business investment confidence in indigenous economies published 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(2014). indigenous peoples’ interest in wildlife-based enterprises in the northern territory, australia. human ecology, 42, 115-126. 36 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.5 the international indigenous policy journal june 2015 improving business investment confidence in culture-aligned indigenous economies in remote australian communities: a business support framework to better inform government programs ann e. fleming recommended citation improving business investment confidence in culture-aligned indigenous economies in remote australian communities: a business support framework to better inform government programs abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license improving business investment confidence in culture-aligned indigenous economies in remote australian communities: a business support framework to better inform government programs “wolves have a constitution:” continuities in indigenous self-government the international indigenous policy journal volume 6 | issue 1 article 8 january 2015 “ wolves have a constitution:” continuities in indigenous self-government stephen cornell university of arizona, scornell@email.arizona.edu recommended citation cornell, s. (2015). “wolves have a constitution:” continuities in indigenous self-government. the international indigenous policy journal, 6(1). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.8 “ wolves have a constitution:” continuities in indigenous selfgovernment abstract this article is about constitutionalism as an indigenous tradition. the political idea of constitutionalism is the idea that the process of governing is itself governed by a set of foundational laws or rules. there is ample evidence that indigenous nations in north america—and in australia and new zealand as well—were in this sense constitutionalists. customary law, cultural norms, and shared protocols provided well understood guidelines for key aspects of governance by shaping both personal and collective action, the behavior of leaders, decision-making, dispute resolution, and relationships with the human, material, and spirit worlds. today, many of these nations have governing systems imposed by outsiders. as they move to change these systems, they also are reclaiming their own constitutional traditions. keywords self-government, governance, constitutionalism, indigenous nations, tradition, customary law acknowledgments this article is part of a research project on indigenous self-determination, governance, and development in the united states, canada, australia, and aotearoa/new zealand, being carried out by the university of arizona’s native nations institute in conjunction with international partners. my thanks to steve hemming, miriam jorgensen, joe kalt, mark mcmillan, regis pecos, ian record, daryle rigney, grant rigney, diane smith, ron trosper, alison vivian, and rob williams for relevant conversations and helpful comments, to cosima hay mcrae for her assistance, and to the ngarrindjeri nation for its partnership in this research. work with the ngarrindjeri nation was supported by an australian research council (arc) grant to the jumbunna indigenous house of learning at the university of technology, sydney (uts). i am indebted to the arc and uts for their support of that work. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/   “w o l v e s h a v e a c o n s t i t u t i o n : ” c o n t i n u i t i e s i n i n d i g e n o u s s e l f g o v e rn m e n t we were in australia, four of us, sitting in an indigenous nation’s rural cultural center, talking with one of the nation’s leaders—an elder—about self-government. the day before, in a meeting with other leaders of the nation, the elder had noted that their most active decisionmaking body had a written constitution. he pointed out, however, that this constitution reflected australian government requirements. if an indigenous community wants to build an organization that can receive and use government funds, then it must meet the australian government’s organizational criteria having to do with officers and boards, frequency of meetings, reports, and so forth. in other words, the constitution was an australian government product. “it’s not our constitution,” the elder said. “it’s theirs. i want our own constitution. i want a constitution that reflects our values.” others in the room agreed. now, the next day, he wanted to talk more about constitutions. he told us that constitutions are important for the successful functioning of human communities. he thought for a moment or two and then said, “you know, wolves have a constitution.” we must have looked mystified. “the wolf pack has rules,” he explained. “each wolf knows its role and respects the rules. that makes the pack effective. when they follow the rules, the system works.” 1 this article is about constitutionalism as an indigenous tradition. it is occasioned both by the conversation related above and by the recent experience of a colleague. he was talking with managers and elected leaders from some american indian nations in the midwestern united states. the topic was governance: how indigenous nations could reclaim self-government as an indigenous tradition, right, and contemporary practice. at one point the subject of constitutions came up. should these nations revise their existing, written constitutions, many of which were products of u.s. government impositions? there was some skepticism in the room about the worth of constitutions. eventually, one of the skeptics said, “we need to decide whether to be traditional or constitutional.”2 the point of this article is that this choice—between being traditional and being constitutional—is unnecessary. the two are not in conflict. i argue—as have others such as borrows (2002, 2010) and fletcher (2011), albeit in different terms—that most indigenous nations, by their own traditions, are constitutionalists. as the comment by the indigenous australian elder suggests, constitutionalism is deeply embedded in long-standing indigenous understandings of how the world works and should work. my focus is north america, but as suggested at several points in what follows, i believe the argument has wider relevance.                                                                                                                 1 the late matt rigney, ngarrindjeri elder, in conversation, june 2011; i have used his words and name here with the permission of his sons. on social order and roles in wolf packs, see mech (1981) and halfpenny (2003), and on native american relationships with wolves, lopez (1978) and marshall (1995). richard nelson (1983) wrote that for the koyukon people of interior alaska, “the wolf . . . is the master predator among animals of the north, possessing intelligence and strength, keen senses, and above all the ability to hunt cooperatively” (p. 159). 2 related to me by ian record, in conversation. 1 cornell: continuities in indigenous self-government published by scholarship@western, 2015   c o n s t i t u t i o n a l i s m what is a constitution? i’m not talking here about a paper document—what one might call a constitution with a big “c.” i’m talking instead about the generic meaning of a constitution—think of it as constitution with a small c3—as a set of basic principles and rules by which members of a community cooperate, make decisions, engage with each other and the world around them, distribute and exercise authority, and set about trying to get things done. a constitution is a blueprint for collective action. i assume here that all human societies—at least those that last for very long and that are not completely dominated by an external power—govern. in one way or another, they make binding decisions on their own behalf across the range of matters that have significance to them. in some cases, those decisions may be made in an ad hoc fashion by community members following no consistent guidelines other than their own inclinations or the pressures of the moment. in others, those decisions may be made by dictators or ruling cliques whose authority comes solely from their willingness to use violence to enforce their will. but in many cases, decision-making is guided by broadly understood, fundamental, and more or less stable and predictable rules that specify who is part of the nation or community, what the nation or community values, what its purposes are, who has authority over what, and how various kinds of decisions will be made. this is a constitution. it is a set of guidelines for community decision-making and action, providing what joseph kalt (2007) calls an “overall architecture” for governance (p. 79). these rules or guidelines may be written or unwritten; they may be taught in school or taught by elders, parents, and medicine people; they may be recorded in honored books and documents or deeply embedded in the often unspoken but shared understandings that make up a people’s culture; they may be drawn from hard-won experience, given to the people by spirit beings, or invented in response to new needs or conditions that compel new ideas or forms of action. and they may change over time. regardless of origin, they form a body of norms or laws that fundamentally shape the processes of government. this is the heart of constitutionalism: the idea that the process of governing is itself governed by a set of known, foundational laws or rules. it is the idea that government—the persons and positions that hold decision-making power in various aspects of group life—is limited by those rules; it cannot simply do whatever it wishes. in the constitutional world, government is held to a higher law than itself. that higher law is a constitution, and its existence distinguishes such forms of government from a number of other forms including, for example, absolute monarchies in which royalty need answer only to itself and can do whatever it wants, or dictatorships of force where rulers’ willingness and capacity for violence give power to their decisions, allowing them to behave as they please. constitutionalism refers to the generic idea “that government can /should be limited in its powers and that its authority depends on its observing these limitations” (waluchow, 2014, constitutionalism: a minimal and a rich sense section, para. 2). this conception embraces a broad range of phenomena: from “ancient” constitutions based on custom and tradition to contemporary constitutional governments (tully, 1995). it resonates with lord bolingbroke of england’s idea, in 1733, that “by constitution we mean . . . that assemblage of laws, institutions and customs . . . according to which the community hath agreed to be governed” (cited in                                                                                                                 3 my thanks to duane champagne and joseph kalt, in conversation, for suggesting this distinction. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 8 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.8   mcilwain, 1947, p. 1), and it departs from a separate tradition in political thought that limits constitutionalism to those forms of government that include differentiated branches. many commentators on constitutionalism assume that this higher law will be written, but there is no reason to think it must be. an unwritten constitution can be as powerful as a written one, and a written one can be ignored as much as an unwritten one. the stanford encyclopedia of philosophy entry on constitutionalism states that “long standing social rules and conventions are often clear and precise, as well as more rigid and entrenched than written ones, if only because their elimination, alteration or reinterpretation typically requires widespread changes in traditional attitudes, beliefs and behaviour” (waluchow, 2014, writtenness section, para. 2). in short, the idea of constitutionalism makes no assumption about form. the signers of the american declaration of independence claimed that what is now the united states of america had a constitution—with a small c—before it produced its written constitution. douglas ginsburg, chief judge of the united states court of appeals for the district of columbia circuit, pointed out that the declaration of independence, which preceded the us constitution by more than a decade, complained that the king of england and others had “combined to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution . . .” (cited in ginsburg, 2002-2003, p. 7). there was no written us constitution at the time, nor even a united states. this statement, said ginsburg (2002-2003), used the word constitution “in its underlying sense, as referring to the natural structure of a thing” (p. 7). the declaration asserted the existence of such a structure—a shared understanding of what was appropriate and just—that england had violated. even a written constitution may not fully capture that shared understanding; it may be only a partial constitution. akhil amar (2012) has argued recently that behind the us constitution lies an unwritten constitution, composed of principles and norms, that has compelling force in judicial and other decisions, indicating “how various rights are embodied in citizens’ daily rhythms and embedded in powerful customs” (p. 97). in effect, he argues that there is a constitution as well as a constitution, and both have to be taken into account in understanding the foundations of us government and law. the fact that a constitution represents a higher law is not to award it any particular moral value. by higher, all i mean is that it has a higher standing than either decision-makers or their decisions. but constitutions, written or unwritten, may be good or bad, effective or ineffective at achieving the goals of the society they govern. critically, however, constitutionalism includes the idea that this higher law embodied in a constitution—written or unwritten—has real power. it shapes how government behaves and what government does. not all constitutions—neither the little “c” nor big “c” kind—necessarily have such power. a constitution compels compliance not through force but through the perhaps unspoken agreement—the cultural understandings—of those who live and act under its provisions. we might create a constitution—an agreed upon set of rules by which we will operate—that those in positions of power then choose to ignore and make meaningless: a rejection not only of the constitution but of constitutionalism, a claim that the decision-makers are above the rules. referring to work by brown and amit (1995), who describe egypt’s modern history of numerous constitutions, each successively abandoned, modified, or suppressed by sitting or insurgent governments, franklin and baun (1995) 3 cornell: continuities in indigenous self-government published by scholarship@western, 2015   argued that some countries are “rich in constitutions yet poor in constitutionalism” (p. 221). another scholar points out that some constitutions are “nominal, sham, fictive, or façade constitutions” (hemberger, 1993, p. 190). their effects on those who govern are negligible. in such cases there may be a constitution, but there is little commitment behind it. by constitutionalism, then, i mean not only the idea but also the fact: not only the idea that there is a higher law that governs government but the practical realization of that idea in how a nation, people, or community actually governs itself. constitutionalism refers not to the existence of a particular kind of constitution but to its effect: the subjection of government to some set of laws or principles that limit its freedom to do as it pleases. a n i n d i g e n o u s c o n s t i t u t i o n a l t ra d i t i o n were the indigenous peoples of north america constitutionalists? ample evidence indicates that they were, but we should begin with a prior question: did they govern? this may seem an unnecessary inquiry. prior to european invasion, indigenous peoples had survived as coherent, sustained, identifiable collectives over multiple generations. that in itself is evidence of organized and sustained cooperation among persons—that is, of effective governance. most also exhibited more or less formally organized authority structures—governments—that distributed decision-making responsibilities and processes across activities and persons (cornell, curtis, & jorgensen, 2004). the primary exception is perhaps some arctic peoples who engaged in sustained collaborative activity and depended on each other for survival in a harsh environment but had little in the way of institutionalized authority structures, being characterized by what brody (1987) described as egalitarian individualism. but even they had shared rules and obligations, described by borrows (2010) in the inuit case as “legal traditions.” nonetheless, many early european invaders of north america had their doubts. despite repeated encounters with the outcomes of indigenous governance—in trade relations, diplomacy, warfare, treatymaking, and other activities that were manifestations of various forms of collective decision-making— early europeans often concluded that the continent’s indigenous peoples had no governments, or at least no governments that they could recognize as such. the forms and processes of indigenous governance were unfamiliar—often invisible—to newcomers from the continent of kings and queens. so indigenous nations governed, but the more interesting question is: did they have constitutions? in the sense of written documents, no, but in the sense of a body of principles or values or law that gives stable shape to a polity, consistently organizes or shapes the processes of governing, recognizes a distribution of rights and duties, and to which all persons are subject, including those holding governmental authority, the answer in most cases is almost certainly yes. as far as we can tell, the organization and exercise of authority typically rested on a body of law, unwritten but known, shared, and transmitted orally from generation to generation, that ordered processes of decision-making and both individual and collective action. that law might have had diverse roots, from group deliberations to 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 8 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.8   spirit teachings to the accretions of long experience. but whether we call it law or lore, political culture or a constitution, it had the power to shape the behavior of leaders and other citizens.4 there are numerous examples of such law. thomas tso (2005), first chief justice of the navajo nation supreme court, has written: when people live in groups or communities, they develop rules or guidelines by which the affairs of the group may proceed in an orderly fashion and the peace and harmony of the group may be maintained. this is true for the navajos. (p. 30) another navajo jurist, raymond austin (2009), who served for more than 15 years as a justice of the same court, provides a relevant account of the origin of some of these guidelines in his partial summary of navajo creation narratives. after creating the diné (the navajo), the holy beings then established several foundational laws for the diné, including those on language, natural environment, spirituality, kinship, and knowledge, to ensure their perpetual growth and prosperity in all their humanity and guide them on maintaining right relations with all their relatives (all “beings”) in creation. (p. xvii) he goes on to quote from the 1990 decision of the navajo nation supreme court in bennett v. navajo board of election supervisors, in which the court wrote: the navajo word for “law” is beehaz’aanii [which] actually refers to higher law. it means something which is “way at the top;” something written in stone so to speak; something which is absolutely there; and something like the anglo concept of natural law. in other words, navajos believe in a higher law, and as it is expressed in navajo, there is a concept similar to the idea of unwritten constitutional law. (cited in austin, 2009, p. 40; for original source see bennett v. navajo board of election supervisors, 6 nav. rptr. 319, 324 (nav. sup. ct. 1990)) “traditional navajos,” wrote austin (2009), have an understanding of these foundational principles or law “as values, norms, customs, and traditions that are transmitted orally across generations and which produce and maintain right relations, right relationships, and desirable outcomes in navajo society” (p. 40). these kinds of understandings, regardless of the group involved, may vary and may change over time, and consequently may be the subject of internal discussion and debate, even as they are put to use. richland (2008) provides an excellent example of this in his exploration of how hopi custom and tradition are interpreted, argued over, and invoked in legal proceedings of the contemporary hopi tribal court.                                                                                                                 4 for an extended discussion, see borrows (2010), especially chapters 2 and 3. a cogent early discussion of this idea in regard to property is hallowell (1943). ronald trosper has reminded me of pierre clastres’s argument that power in these societies was commonly non-coercive; it rested on the consent, in effect, of the governed. clastres (1977) wrote, “it is society as such—the real locus of power—that exercises its authority over the chief” (p. 175). 5 cornell: continuities in indigenous self-government published by scholarship@western, 2015   such rules or prescriptions for a good life typically included expressions of both value and process, indicating what matters to the people and how such things are to be protected or sustained: in short, the outlines of a system of governance. thus, long before europeans appeared in their lands, the iroquois confederacy, the haudenosaunee, an alliance of five nations and then later six nations living around the eastern great lakes and portions of today’s pennsylvania, new york, ontario, and quebec, had an elaborate, multi-level political system that operated according to guidelines given in the great law of peace, itself recorded in wampum belts. these guidelines had real power, specifying distributions of authority among the member nations and citizens, how leaders would be selected and dismissed, and procedures for decision-making, all organized in the service of security and peace among the member nations.5 later, when the iroquois and other nations of the woodlands region entered into agreements with europeans, their actions, according to rob williams (1997), were fundamentally constitutional. drawing on jennings’s (1984) description of a constitution as “a whole body of traditions, customs, and practices basic to the polity” (p. 368), williams (1997) pointed out that “a treaty required treaty partners to acknowledge their shared humanity and to act upon a set of constitutional values reflecting the unity of interests generated by their agreement” (p. 99). a typical treaty both reflected an understanding of how nations might lawfully interact with each other and put in place rules intended to govern certain subsequent actions of the participating governments. prior to warfare with euro-americans and eventual confinement on reserved lands, the lakota people had a governing system that combined fluidity—individuals and families who were dissatisfied with how things were done could leave one group or camp and either start their own or join another—with clear lines of authority, for example, vesting certain decision-making powers in chiefs and councils and enforcement powers in warriors or marshals. there were clear expectations of how chiefs, marshals, and ordinary citizens should behave; those who could not or would not subscribe to the accepted rules could “vote with their feet” (biolsi 1992, p. 36; see also demallie, 1971; wissler, 1912). in a discussion of both historical and contemporary wet’suet’en governance in what is now british columbia, antonia mills (1994) wrote, the witsuwit’en often talk about their law. they speak of it as the principles which govern not only human relations but the relations of humans to the land, to animals, and to the spirit world which sustains them all. the expression the witsuwit’en use most commonly for law is yinkadinii’ ha ba aten (“the ways of the people on the surface of the earth”) . . . the principles of witsuwit’en law define both how the people own and use the surface of the earth when they are dispersed on the territories and how they govern themselves and settle disputes when they are gathered together in the feast . . . (p. 141) as the above examples suggest, such systems not only organized collective action and the processes of government; they also shaped personal behavior. pilsk, record, and cassa (2007) argued that western                                                                                                                 5 for a translation of the great law of peace, see “the constitution of the iroquois nations” (n.d.). see also wallace (1969, pp. 39-44) and borrows (2010, pp. 72-77) for some summary discussions. bradley (1987, chapter 5) explored some of the changes the iroquois made in their political organization and practice as the world around them changed in the mid-17th century. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 8 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.8   apache governance was in part an “ecocracy . . . a society governed by the laws and powers of the natural world” (p. 2). they go on to say, western apache ecocracy was, in every sense, a basic form of common law. it demanded of its adherents not only close personal engagement with and a comprehensive understanding of the natural world, but the ability and willingness to make decisions based on a stringent complex of environmentally sound rules. for example, rigid rules governing hunting, such as prohibitions on hunting deer during times that might jeopardize reproduction, ensured the sustainability of the game upon which the people relied. (p. 2) ronald trosper (2002, 2003) makes a still more comprehensive argument that the multi-millennial cultural resilience of indigenous nations in the pacific northwest of north america was dependent on sets of indigenously generated “rules” governing such things as territoriality, exchange, and the behavior of leaders. these rules in turn supported accountability, organized collective action, and facilitated sustainability in the face of ecosystem change—in short, a governing system of understood and enforceable law (see also trosper, 2009, pp. 163-168). such systems of law were not only a north american phenomenon. in what is now south australia, the ngarrindjeri people were divided into a number of subgroups known as lakalinyeri, each with a distinct territory around the lower lakes of the murray river region. each lakalinyeri had its own chosen council, called a tendi, which served as a governing body when needed, addressing issues affecting the group and providing justice in disputes. the tendi in turn selected a leader, called a rupelli. the tendi could establish laws governing the actions of the people. when needed, a grand tendi representing all the lakalinyeri met to consider issues affecting the nation as a whole. many of the core values and principles of ngarrindjeri life were given to the ngarrindjeri by ngurunderi, “our spiritual ancestor,” who long ago roamed through the region, giving each lakalinyeri its identity and teaching the people how to live in their lands and waters and with each other, giving them the “traditional laws” they must follow, laws that supersede the rights and authorities of those who sit in positions of power (ngarrindjeri nation, 2006, p. 8; see also bell, 2014).6 anthropologist fred myers (1991) writing about the pintupi people of the western desert of australia, says that as the pintupi see it . . . consensus is maintained by common adherence to a shared, external, and autonomous code: the dreaming. what they call “the law” is not something made by humans. not the creation of any person or group, the law is outside human control and cannot be a vehicle of any private interests or selfish pursuits . . . all submit . . . to the same transcendental moral imperative . . . (p. 125) prior to the european colonization of aotearoa (new zealand), much of māori life was organized by collectively recognized values and practices that hirini moko mead (2003), using the term tikanga māori, described as, among other things, a system of social control. “‘tika’ means ‘to be right’ and thus tikanga māori focuses on the correct way of doing something. this involves moral judgements about                                                                                                                 6 thanks also to daryle rigney, grant rigney, the late matt rigney, steve hemming, the late tom trevorrow, and clyde rigney for illuminating conversations about the ngarrindjeri system. 7 cornell: continuities in indigenous self-government published by scholarship@western, 2015   appropriate ways of behaving and acting in everyday life” (p. 6). tikanga māori, mead (2003) wrote, “controls interpersonal relationships, provides ways for groups to meet and interact, and even determines how individuals identify themselves” (p. 5). mead described tikanga māori as fundamentally a normative system that can be viewed as a system of customary law. according to eddie durie (1994), chair of the waitangi tribunal, “maori norms were sufficiently regular to constitute law, in this context a social norm being defined as legal if its application or neglect provoked a predictable response” (p. 4). writing about māori social organization and the descent-based social units called hapū, angela ballara (1998) added that “the course of action of their chiefs, which usually bound the members of the hapū, were chosen according to a code of customary behavior or understood rules for any set of circumstances” (p. 192). durie (1994) emphasized that such codes were not rigid, had some flexibility, varied to some degree across māori groups, and doubtless changed across time and circumstance.7 nonetheless, they can be seen as having constitutional standing in the sense that they carried a recognized authority that was typically greater than that of any person or office. stories have often been the vehicles by which the law, rules, or moral order of the society are communicated across space and time, from community to community and generation to generation. for example, according to richard nelson (1983), stories told by the koyukon people of the interior of alaska “provide an extensive code of proper behavior toward the environment and its resources. they contain many episodes showing that certain kinds of actions toward nature can have bad consequences, and these are taken as guidelines to follow today. stories therefore serve as a medium for instructing young people in the traditional code as an infallible standard of conduct for everyone” (p. 18). he goes on to say that “the environment is like a second society in which people live, governed by elaborate rules of behavior and etiquette, capable of rewarding those who follow these rules and punishing those who do not” (pp. 225-226; see also borrows, 2010). in the indigenous world, by such accounts, both people and animals have freedom of choice—they may do as they please—but there is a higher law to which, by virtue of their citizenship in a particular community, they are obligated. choosing to ignore that law can be risky. in his narrative of the 1997 hunt for an amur tiger that had killed two men in the forest of remote southeastern russia, john vaillant (2010) refers to an ancient view held by the indigenous peoples of the region—the nanai and udeghe peoples—who had long lived with tigers: “it was believed . . . that if you killed a tiger without just cause, you in turn would be killed. likewise, if a tiger were to kill and eat a human, it would be hunted by its own kind. both acts were considered taboo and, once these invisible boundaries had been crossed, it was all but impossible to cross back. there was an understanding in the forest then—an order” (p. 31).                                                                                                                 7 wrote durie (1994/2013), “ . . . while custom was posited as finite law that had always existed, maori customary policy was in fact pragmatic and able to adapt, but change was effected with adherence to fundamental principles and beliefs” (p. 10). durie argued that custom was not “rule-like” insofar as rules are rigid while custom, as he describes it, could be interpreted “according to circumstances” and changed “without institutional intervention” (p. 4). my own use of the term “rule” is not intended to suggest rigidity but instead to acknowledge prescription: collectively acknowledged, prescribed ways of doing things. departure from such prescription, while certainly possible, is not done lightly and typically requires justification. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 8 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.8   russian colonization disrupted that order, upsetting the constitutional basis of nanai and udeghe relations with the natural world. this has been one of the heavy costs of colonialism: the disruption or suppression of the constitutional foundations of indigenous societies and their relationships with the world around them. these foundations may be general or specific: as general as the instruction to treat various classes of persons, places, or spirits with exceptional respect or as specific as the elaboration of complex rules for how certain decisions should be made. in other words, they may range from core values and interpretive schemes to details of governmental, economic, or ceremonial practice. to be a member or a leader of the group was to accept responsibility for observing such rules and enacting them in daily life. constitutions, in this fundamental sense, are not “western” or colonial creations. they are the work of human communities of many kinds attempting to create stable polities and find effective ways of organizing themselves to achieve the things they value. indigenous peoples, like others, engaged in just such work. they were accustomed to the idea of a basic set of rules indicating values, responsibilities, obligations, and protocols that, if followed, were keys to a good life. t h e c o n t e m p o ra ry r e l e v a n c e o f i n d i g e n o u s c o n s t i t u t i o n a l i s m i have called this indigenous constitutionalism: the self-imposed subjection of indigenous government, leadership, and citizens to an overarching set of laws, rules, or principles—a constitution—to which they are accountable and that limits and shapes what they do. but what relevance does this constitutional tradition have today? across north america native nations are engaged in a sustained effort to regain self-governing power over their lands, communities, and affairs. in the process, they face the organizational legacies of colonialism, in particular the institutional mechanisms or tools set up by central governments—the tribal governing systems established under the indian reorganization act of 1934 in the united states and, in canada, the governing structures imposed on first nations by the indian act of 1876 and its subsequent amendments. for the most part, the governments set up under these legislative provisions were not (and are not) indigenous creations but western impositions that reflect western expectations, needs, and convenience. many depart not only from the values and organizational principles that underlay their indigenous predecessors but from contemporary ideas within indigenous communities about how authority should be organized and exercised. in a series of papers on indigenous governance and development, cornell and kalt (1995, 1997, 2000) have pointed out that these governments are often characterized by organizational weaknesses and, in addition, a potentially crippling legitimacy problem: their provenance means that indigenous populations often do not see such governments as truly theirs. therefore, those populations fail to support those governments.8 in his critique of tribal governments in the us, duane champagne (2006, 2007) explored these and related issues. he noted that while many indigenous governments historically involved high levels of local or subgroup autonomy, the creation of these new governments usually involved centralization. such power as they had usually was vested in a central set of structures such as a council or other quasi                                                                                                                 8 janet hunt and diane smith found a similar problem with externally designed or imposed governing systems— such as they are—among indigenous communities in australia (hunt & smith, 2006; smith, 2008). 9 cornell: continuities in indigenous self-government published by scholarship@western, 2015   legislative body, itself often unprecedented in that particular people’s history. individual members of that new body might have accountability to citizens via elections, but the body as a whole is seldom accountable to the social or political units that traditionally had exercised authority in local matters, or to the principles or values that governed earlier, indigenous forms of government. at the same time, older organizational structures may have to change in the face of contemporary circumstances. champagne (2006) pointed out that native communities in the united states, like all contemporary governments, are confronted with globalized markets, politics, and culture . . . if native peoples are going to assert their nationalities and maintain their cultures they will need to have strong leadership and government organization capable of representing and defending their interests at local, state, and national government levels. furthermore, native peoples will need to develop a degree of economic development capable of supporting their assertions of sovereignty and selfgovernment while loosening their dependence on federal funds and administration. (p. 11) he goes on to say, “many tribal governments lack checks and balances, cultural and institutional support from their communities, active executive powers and leadership, and general administrative capability” (p. 21), hindering their capacity to adequately serve their peoples in contemporary times. governments established under the indian act in canada suffer from similar shortcomings. they, too, represent outsiders’ ideas of how indigenous peoples should govern themselves. furthermore, while the original 1876 legislation has been modified since its original passage, its ideas come from another time. frances abele (2007) described the indian act as “a legislative fossil” that: . . . reflects administrative and organizational practices that were characteristic of public institutions in the early and mid-twentieth century, but that have been modified and superseded in other governments. the act relies upon regulation, top-down authorities, fiscal control, and enforcement. today most canadian governments and other organizations rely upon collegial decision-making and policy development, policy research, human resource development, management accounting systems, and citizen engagement. the indian act does not mention these things, and the basic provisions do not leave much room for them. (p. 3) john borrows (2008) offered a more fundamental critique. the federal government of canada, he wrote, benefits from legislating over indians because it allows them to set the parameters of our lives. the indian act makes it easier to control us: where we live, how we choose leaders, how we live under those leaders, how we learn, how we trade, and what happens to our possessions and relations when we die. (p. 5) one result of these issues is a radical discontinuity, in many indigenous nations, between the written constitutions under which, supposedly, they govern and what rob williams (personal communication) calls “the ‘real’ constitution, unwritten but grounded in customs, norms, and traditions; that is, the ‘way we've always done things around here,’ that's still alive although significantly suppressed until certain types of ‘troubles’ or conflicts show that it's the constitution that everyone pays attention to.” 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 8 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.8   driven by such discontinuities and the inadequacies of imposed governing structures, and building on long-standing indigenous traditions of adaptation and innovation, a growing number of indigenous nations in north america are experimenting with alternatives to those structures, with or without central government sanction. over the last few decades a wave of creativity has been moving through native north america, much of it in the form of constitution-making or reform or other kinds of institutional development. native nations are variously turning to these still surviving—if often fragmented or suppressed—normative systems or “real” constitutions, resuscitating past practices, inventing new ones, borrowing ideas and models from each other, or even adopting non-native structures in search of governing systems and strategies that can protect the things they care about while engaging productively with the world around them and addressing the contemporary challenges they face. success in these efforts has come not from the adoption of any one-size-fits-all institutional structure or strategy but through the revitalization, discovery, and creation of diverse solutions. for example, the ktunaxa nation in southeastern british columbia is using the british columbia treaty process to reorganize its governing system, linking four ktunaxa bands that had been treated by canada as separate first nations and specifying the division of authority between the nation as a whole and its constituent communities. in effect, the ktunaxa are reconstituting themselves, replacing the fragmented administrative structure that canada put in place with their own conception of who they are and how they should organize to pursue a ktunaxa vision of the future. according to the nation, its elders “often refer to the past hundred and fifty or so years as a time when the nation ‘went to sleep’ . . . the process of building a modern ktunaxa government is likened to ‘waking up’ . . .” (ktunaxa history timeline, n.d., pp. 25-26; see also dolan, 2009). in 2007, the white earth nation in minnesota launched a constitutional process; its stated goal: “the creation of a constitution for the white earth nation that would enact anishinaabe values and envision a perpetual future as well as create an effective governance structure . . .” (janis & doerfler, 2013, para. 3). over the next couple of years, the nation held four constitutional conventions, all open to the public, with delegates from each white earth community engaged in intensive discussions on major governance issues. delegates eventually ratified a draft constitution that the nation put to a vote in 2013; white earth citizens overwhelmingly approved it (janis & doerfler, 2013; see also vizenor & doerfler, 2012). there are numerous other examples of north american nations replacing current governing structures with indigenously generated alternatives that variously mix old and new (see, for example, alcantara & whitfield, 2010; cornell, 2013; cornell, jorgensen, & kalt, 2013; dennison, 2012; jorgensen, 2007; kalt, 2007; lemont, 2006; national centre for first nations governance, 2009; and, for numerous examples of actual constitutional provisions, tatum, jorgensen, guss, & deer, 2014). similar efforts are happening elsewhere. in both aotearoa (new zealand) (cant, 2005; durie, 2012; goodall, 2005; hill, 2009; o’regan, 2001; wetere, 1999) and australia (barcham, 2008, 2011; hemming & rigney, 2008; hunt, garling, & sanders, 2008; hunt & smith, 2006; maddison & brigg, 2011; vivian, 2014), indigenous peoples are attempting to organize governing structures capable of the effective pursuit of their own political, social, and economic goals. among the challenges some of these efforts face is persuading central government to recognize indigenous groups as collective political actors, to treat indigenously generated or determined governing structures as legitimate, and to grant to those structures enough jurisdiction so that the communities they serve have real power. 11 cornell: continuities in indigenous self-government published by scholarship@western, 2015   particularly in australia, indigenous efforts proceed under conditions that are significantly more hostile to substantive indigenous self-government and jurisdiction (as opposed to indigenous selfadministration or self-management) than those in north america. but this has not stopped some nations from pursuing their own approaches to governmental tasks. in australia, for example, the ngarrindjeri nation, whose pre-invasion governmental structure i referenced above, has developed “a ngarrindjeri strategy for survival and positive transformation, with governance, caring for country, and economic development at its centre” (hemming, rigney, & berg, 2011, p. 99). that strategy includes a carefully worked out set of governmental initiatives designed—despite the constraints imposed by the dominant system—to expand ngarrindjeri control over lands and other matters of essential value to them. in a sense, it seeks recognition as a result of the capable exercise of governmental power and practice, not governmental power as a result of recognition. in effect, the ngarrindjeri are attempting a version of paul chartrand’s (2009) idea that indigenous practices can crystallize into rights. in this case, capable indigenous governmental action may lead eventually to outsiders’ at least implicit recognition of ngarrindjeri governmental authority.9 what has all this to do with constitutionalism? as they search for new systems of governance and new governing tools, indigenous nations are faced with fundamental, constitutional questions: what is the nation? what does it value? what is it trying to protect? what kind of future is it trying to create? what kinds of relationships does it wish to foster among its citizens, with its neighbors, with other governments, and with the natural and spirit worlds? and what kinds of governing tools—structures, systems, laws, processes—will such visions, priorities, and concerns require? answering these sorts of questions requires constitutional thinking: what do we expect our governors to protect, sustain, and exemplify, and how do we make that happen? how do we constitute ourselves as an effective polity in contemporary times? the results vary. some contemporary american indian nations have no written constitutions yet have built contemporary records of robust, innovative, and effective self-government. as a leader of one such nation argued, his nation has a constitution; it exists not on paper but in the heads and hearts of the people, learned from parents and elders and from living in a community that shares a common understanding of how things should be done.10 other nations have written constitutions, but they vary as well: some express long-standing indigenous governance traditions while others adopt what are generally viewed as western ideas or structures. and, as one should expect, some constitutions work better than others, reflecting both inherent design issues as well as matters of provenance: rules that are freely chosen—even if borrowed—generally work better than rules that are imposed from outside. constitutions gain strength through the free consent of the governed. to think constitutionally is not the same thing as writing a constitution. it is a search for that set of core values, governing principles, and processes of government that are both an expression of the nation’s will and a means of achieving its vision. whether the nation chooses to write its answers down is a separate question that has less to do with whether the nation has a constitution than with how it wants to communicate that constitution to its own people, to future generations of its citizens, and to outsiders. the hereditary chiefs of the gitanyow nation in british columbia govern traditional gitanyow lands                                                                                                                 9 my thanks to rob williams, in conversation, for bringing professor chartrand’s concept to my attention. 10 personal communication. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 8 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.8   according to long-standing practices embedded largely in kinship structures. as a result of gitanyow involvement in the british columbia treaty process and partly to help outsiders understand their governing system, the hereditary chiefs eventually decided to write down their constitution, which had been functioning effectively in unwritten form for generations (peeling, 2004). the writing may be important for other reasons as well. especially where the nation’s population is geographically and culturally diverse and where the ways of the people are no longer easy to transmit by traditional means, a written constitution can provide citizens with a critical reference point, a map of meanings and methods on the road to self-determination. but it is the thinking, not the writing, that counts. po l i c y i m p l i c a t i o n s there are implications for policy-makers at both central government and native nation levels. one lesson for central governments is that many indigenous nations have governance traditions of their own that are ancient, deeply rooted, and fundamentally constitutional. many produced, in their original contexts, highly successful governments. those traditions do not necessarily provide all the answers to today’s indigenous governance challenges, but policies that simply reject such traditions or insist on western replacements invite rejection in turn, for those who wish to govern themselves typically want to choose the tools for the job. the choices made are important, but so are the freedom and ability to choose. as diane smith (2004) has written, the legitimacy of indigenous governance solutions depends substantially on “a process of indigenous choice” (p. 29). on the other hand, policies that not only recognize indigenous aspirations for self-governing power but encourage indigenous efforts to build capable governments that express indigenous values and purposes are more likely, in turn, to win indigenous support. in the effort to address long-standing grievances and difficult socioeconomic problems, such support will be crucial; the record of top-down policy-making designed to improve the welfare of indigenous peoples is largely a record of failure. indigenous communities also have to pay attention to process. how constitutions are made or reformed is nearly as important as the constitution itself. the “how” will surely vary, reflecting both the contemporary circumstances and the distinctive cultures of the nations involved, but there are some critical considerations. written or not, if it is to survive as an effective instrument of genuine selfgovernment, a constitution has to have broad support. this argues for extensive community participation in constitutional processes, as time consuming as those may be. clarity of purpose matters as well: a constitution is an instrument for realizing the collective will of a people. the task, therefore, is to figure out what forms of governance are likely not only to have legitimacy with the community but to be capable of effective pursuit of community goals in contemporary times. miriam jorgensen has argued that the relevant question for indigenous constitution-makers is not “how did we govern ourselves 150 years ago?” but “how would we have changed our governing system over the last 150 years if we had been free to change it to meet the new circumstances we have experienced?”11 adequately answering such a question may take time; getting it right the first time around is by no means easy, particularly for nations or communities that have been denied decision-making power for generations. but this is part of                                                                                                                 11 this is a paraphrase based on several conversations, but see jorgensen (2014). 13 cornell: continuities in indigenous self-government published by scholarship@western, 2015   what self-determination means: indigenous nations deciding for themselves how to govern, and learning as they go. both deciding and learning are happening now as more and more indigenous peoples in north america and beyond not only assume self-governing power but address the task of forging capable governing systems in which core values, principles, and governing mechanisms guide leadership, decision-making, and collective action. in the process, many of them are continuing—in new forms for new times—their own constitutional traditions. for them, to be traditional is to be constitutional: to subject themselves to a set of rules designed to lead to a good life. this, indeed, may be the tradition that matters most. the point is not so much the specific governmental arrangements that generations ago guided the nation in response to the circumstances of the time. what matters instead is the constitutional tradition itself, embedded in the histories of indigenous peoples— the idea that effective self-government depends on a set of foundational, indigenously generated principles and prescriptions that tell both governors and citizens how to make decisions and what to value and protect in the process. that is an indigenous tradition with both relevance and power today. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 8 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.8   r e f e re n c e s abele, f. 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(2014). constitutionalism. in e. n. zalta (ed.), the stanford encyclopedia of philosophy (spring 2014 ed.). retrieved from http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/spr2014/entries/constitutionalism/ wetere, k. t. (1999). interim te kauhanganui executive chairman’s report (annual report. in tainui tribe, he riipoata-a-tau, new zealand. williams, r. a., jr. (1997). linking arms together: american indian treaty visions of law and peace, 1600-1800. new york: oxford university press. wissler, c. (1912). societies and ceremonial associations in the oglala division of the teton dakota. anthropological papers of the american museum of natural history, 11(1), 1-99. 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 1 [2015], art. 8 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss1/8 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.1.8 the international indigenous policy journal january 2015 “wolves have a constitution:” continuities in indigenous self-government stephen cornell recommended citation “wolves have a constitution:” continuities in indigenous self-government abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license â•œwolves have a constitution:â•š continuities in indigenous self-government life satisfaction among aboriginal peoples in the canadian prairies: evidence from the equality, security and community survey the international indigenous policy journal volume 7 | issue 2 article 2 april 2016 life satisfaction among aboriginal peoples in the canadian prairies: evidence from the equality, security and community survey christopher p. barrington-leigh mcgill university, chris.barrington-leigh@mcgill.ca sabina sloman recommended citation barrington-leigh, c. p. , sloman, s. (2016). life satisfaction among aboriginal peoples in the canadian prairies: evidence from the equality, security and community survey. the international indigenous policy journal, 7(2). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.2 life satisfaction among aboriginal peoples in the canadian prairies: evidence from the equality, security and community survey abstract subjective measures of overall quality of life are built in to numerous surveys in canada and around the world, and are increasingly analyzed and used as indicators of human well-being and social progress. yet, even in canada, federal surveys exclude aboriginal peoples on-reserve and, in general, there are very few data sources on life satisfaction among aboriginal respondents. we report on two exceptional surveys that do solicit life satisfaction assessments from aboriginal respondents, and compare inferences from these data to the general canadian population. we generally find comparable effects of objective life circumstances for the two groups, and use these to explain some of the advantages and disadvantages affecting life satisfaction in each sample. on the other hand, we find an unusual coefficient on the survey income measure for on-reserve aboriginal respondents, likely indicating that total income is not appropriately measured by the standard income question. we propose that policy interest in life satisfaction measures for gauging effective avenues for improving lives is appropriate in the case of aboriginal groups in canada, just as for other populations in canada and around the world. keywords life satisfaction, subjective well-being, social determinants, aboriginal, canada acknowledgments we are grateful to stéphanie laroche-pierre for editing help. this research was supported by the social sciences and humanities research council of canada, and by the fonds de recherche du québec – société et culture. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ l i f e s a t i s f a c t i o n a m o n g a b o r i g i n a l p e o p l e s i n t h e c a n a d i a n p r a i r i e s : e v i d e n c e f r o m t h e e q u a l i t y , s e c u r i t y , a n d c o m m u n i t y s u r v e y in 2010, the canadian government endorsed the un declaration on the rights of indigenous people (undrip), “reaffirm[ing] its commitment . . . to improve the well-being [emphasis added] of aboriginal canadians” (aboriginal affairs and northern development canada [aandc]1, 2010, para. 16). formally adopted by the un general assembly in 2011, undrip has the potential to have significant and far-reaching implications for indigenous communities globally. undrip recognizes that the rights enumerated by the 1948 un declaration of human rights (undhr) extend to indigenous communities and further entrenches rights that “constitute the minimum standards for the survival, dignity and well-being [emphasis added] of the indigenous peoples of the world” (un general assembly, 2007, p.11). among undhr rights is “the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being [emphasis added] of himself [the global citizen] and of his family” (un general assembly, 1948, article 45). on top of its international commitments,2 indigenous and northern affairs canada (inac), a department of the federal government of canada, has an explicit mandate to “ [support] aboriginal people (first nations, inuit and métis) and northerners in their efforts to improve social well-being [emphasis added] and economic prosperity” (aandc, 2015, mandate section, paras. 1-2). the undhr, undrip, and official canadian public policy all hold well-being as a standard for achievement. it is therefore of obvious and primary importance to understand well-being, its determinants, and the aspects of well-being that transcend cultural, ethnic, and geographic dimensions—and those that do not. on the other hand, among these bodies, or more broadly among thinkers on the subject of human welfare, there can be little expectation of a firm consensus on a single definition or even defining features for an empirically accountable meaning of well-being. ideally, aboriginal communities like all others should be able to define their own overarching concepts of well-being. indeed, if these concepts are to be meaningful and actionable, societies must define corresponding measurements for them as well. in this article, we embrace a prominent development among economists, psychologists, and policy makers, which is to use a single, well-specified measure of well-being—individuals’ self-reported overall satisfaction with life (swl)—and bring the available evidence to bear on the issue of well-being among aboriginal peoples in canada. this measure is narrow in its specification because it consists of the data generated from responses to a single survey question; yet, it is broad in scope because it encompasses anything and everything that is salient to whoever is answering the question. in fact, assessing human well-being or social objectives through swl is, in principle, the most accommodating method of all for letting societies self-define their criteria for progress or what has been called “thriving,” because it leaves that task up to each individual to carry out, independently, when responding to the question.3 1 note that at the time of writing the federal department was named aboriginal affairs and northern development canada (aandc). it was renamed indigenous and northern affairs canada (inac) in november 2015 by the newly elected government. these names refer to the same federal department. 2 it should be noted that canada subsequently failed to ratify the 2010 declaration in 2014. 3 see diener, inglehart, and tay (2013) for more on the validity of life satisfaction as a measure of the quality of respondents’ lives. 1 barrington-leigh and sloman: life satisfaction among aboriginal peoples published by scholarship@western, 2016 the next section further introduces the swl approach and contextualizes our study within the literature. we then provide a detailed overview of the data used in this analysis and describe its limitations. afterward, our model is explained, followed by the results of our estimates of general swl trends among aboriginal peoples based on the available data. we compare these to trends within the general canadian population and use them to explain differences between groups. finally, we conclude with suggestions for future research. s c o p e a n d c o n t e x t the canonical life satisfaction question, as stated in the surveys we used, is the following: “now a question about life satisfaction. on a scale of 1–10 where one means dissatisfied and ten means satisfied, all things considered how satisfied are you with your life as a whole these days?” responses to this single question are obtained from large surveys and, when aggregated, constitute a subjective but quantitative measure of participants’ cognitive evaluations of their lives. unlike measures of psychological affect, mood, or happiness, responses to cognitive life evaluation questions capture not only an individual’s assessment of these somewhat involuntary emotional states but also any and all more cognitive experiences, judgments, and aspirations that an individual may deem relevant to the superlatively broad question. l i f e s a t i s f a c t i o n a s a n o v e r a r c h i n g m e a s u r e o f w e l f a r e in recent years, there has been a high level of interest among policy makers around the use of an overarching measure of subjective well-being, and in particular with satisfaction with life as a selfreported quantitative measure, to complement existing metrics of economic welfare and social progress. evidence of this trend includes prime minister cameron’s well-being initiative in the u.k. (cameron, 2010; uk office of national statistics, 2011); stiglitz, sen, and fitoussi’s (2009) report commissioned by president sarkozy of france; the organization for economic co-operation and development’s (oecd, n.d., 2011) better life initiative; the u.n.’s (2012, 2013, 2015) world happiness reports; u.s. federal reserve chair bernanke’s (2010) speech on well-being; and a growing number of more local initiatives in which subjective well-being is measured and targeted at the civic level. in line with these developments is a large and rapidly growing academic literature on the measurement of the subjective well-being and its determinants among individuals and populations at the community, city, and national levels (see for example overviews by dolan, peasgood, & white, 2008; frey & stutzer, 2002; j. helliwell & barrington-leigh, 2010). in economics, this topic began to gain attention in the 1970s with dick easterlin questioning whether economic growth led to increased happiness and with the leyden school in the netherlands investigating the relationship between subjective assessments and income (van praag, 1971). a number of the grounds for natural scepticism about the interpretation of such data have, after numerous studies as well as some philosophical treatments, been relatively well addressed. above all, the now vast empirical experience with these data is a basis for considerable confidence that respondents are doing what one would hope they might be doing, and indeed the data show many robust and intuitive relationships between important life circumstances and individuals’ swl reports. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.2 as the availability of data and analysis on life satisfaction has increased, an interpretation in line with aristotle’s original thoughts on comprehensively evaluating a life has become attractive. moreover, as globally comparable data have come to light, so have the most important findings of all for interpreting swl responses. these relate to the universality of how people respond to the question and, by implication, its meaning across cultures and translations. as described by j. helliwell, barrington-leigh, harris, and huang (2010), the factors accounting for variation among individuals’ responses to cognitive evaluation of life questions are remarkably consistent among countries and world regions. the variation in average response to the question is enormous (with country means ranging from ∼3 to ∼8) while the statistically inferred importance of different economic and social variables appears to be similar everywhere one interpretation is that this coherence reflects the degree to which psychological well-being appears to be driven and mediated largely by (universal) social factors (see for example aknin et al., 2013). this finding that we are highly social creatures in terms of our experienced well-being (as well as our behaviour) stands in some contrast to the more material consumptive focus that commonly emerges from economic analyses. in addition, the large variability of responses and their predictability from measurable and varying conditions addresses another natural concern—that because aspirations should affect satisfaction, those living in difficult circumstances may hold lower aspirations and therefore not exhibit lower satisfaction. judging from data at all geographic levels, this appears not to be the case. on the other hand, a great deal of effort goes into ensuring that welfare comparisons are made on objective bases, and the support for using swl would not be nearly so strong if not for the intuitive and consistent (though arguably not dominant) relationship found between swl responses and traditional economic indicators. a b o r i g i n a l p e o p l e s i n c a n a d a clearly, both objective and subjective metrics of well-being are useful. there is a large body of research on the objective well-being of the aboriginal community in canada, most of which paints a discouraging picture. the evidence that the aboriginal population suffers from disproportionate levels of discrimination and socioeconomic disadvantage in comparison to the rest of the canadian population is undisputed (abele, 2004). the risk of avoidable death for first nations adults is twice that of nonaboriginal adults (park, tjepkema, goedhuis, & pennock, 2015). a 1999 to 2003 study by health canada (2009) on first nations and inuit health shows that among those living on-reserve the rate of unemployment during that four-year interval was 4 times that of the overall canadian population, the median annual income was less than half that of the overall canadian population, and almost a quarter of first nations housing units have water supply deemed “inadequate.” cognitive life evaluations are now measured every year in most countries and, in some like canada, are a feature of a number of major government surveys. nevertheless, while there are now hundreds of thousands of canadian respondents to the swl question, the samples do not properly represent those who identify as aboriginal. the role of this article is to begin to fill this important gap using a small survey conducted on-reserve and off-reserve in the prairies. although the survey was carried out in 2003 and the data are relatively small, the well-being responses have remained unreported, as well as being 3 barrington-leigh and sloman: life satisfaction among aboriginal peoples published by scholarship@western, 2016 unique. because of the growing importance of the swl approach, we investigate them here and compare them to some larger surveys, which excluded reserves. below, we find that aboriginal respondents have tended to report surprisingly high life evaluations given their lower average scores on objective measures. given the increasing importance of subjective wellbeing as a policy direction and in broad discussions on the nature of social progress, it is important to assess what the data show for aboriginal peoples because they are an under sampled population within canada, even if those data are yet sparse. in light of this and of the stark objective challenges mentioned above experienced by many aboriginal communities, we remain cautious and sceptical in our interpretation of our own findings. this study is intended to complement the existing literature on aboriginal well-being and its various indicators. below, we refer specifically to chandler and lalonde (1998), who looked at suicide rates among aboriginal groups in british columbia; kirmayer, boothroyd, tanner, adelson, and robinson (2000), who examined the determinants of psychological distress among the cree of james bay using an index created by santé québec; whitbeck, mcmorris, hoyt, stubben, and lafromboise (2002), who looked at depressive symptoms among american indians in the upper midwest; and wingert (2010), who used the community well-being index and individual scores on the psychological well-being manifestation scale as indicators of well-being. p o p u l a t i o n s c o p e below, we address a number of dimensions on which the samples we used are limited in comparison with any complete representation of aboriginal populations. as wingert (2010) explained, “aboriginal is a social construction that encompasses a diverse group of people with vastly different ancestry, histories, colonial experiences, contemporary conditions, and cultures” (pp. 141–142). however, as with national-level analyses, a certain amount of aggregation allows us to establish a basis from which more culturallyand identity-specific analyses can proceed. this article focuses on the subjective well-being of a small sample of on-reserve and off-reserve first nations and métis peoples in the canadian prairies. d a t a a n d m e t h o d s the data used in this analysis is drawn from two components of the equality, security, and community survey (esc) project, and occasionally from the general social survey, cycle 24 (gss24). the esc project was a two-part project run by the institute for social research at york university. this analysis is based on wave 2 of the esc, which was completed between 2002 and 2003, and sampled 5,654 canadians from all 10 provinces (hereafter referred to as the general esc sample). households were chosen via a random digit dialling mechanism, and one adult respondent within each household was randomly selected using the “next birthday” mechanism (northrup, 2002). from 2004 to 2005, an additional subsample of 6084 self-identifying aboriginal respondents from manitoba, saskatchewan, and alberta were given an almost identical version of the esc questionnaire, modified only slightly to be reflective of dynamics specific to the aboriginal context (hereafter referred to as the aboriginal esc sample) (harell, matthews, & panagos, 2009). according to a document published by the institute for 4 after dropping all observations where the respondent’s aboriginal identity was unclear, the effective sample size was 604. see the section on aboriginal identity for details. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.2 social research at york university (2004), respondents in this subsample were selected via a mechanism similar to that used in the general esc sample—the distinguishing characteristic of the aboriginal subsample being that phone numbers eligible for random dialling were limited to census tracts in alberta, manitoba, and saskatchewan containing an aboriginal reserve or a relatively concentrated urban aboriginal population. we also make occasional reference to data from the gss24 from the year 2010 (social and aboriginal statistics division, 2011). like the esc sample, the gss sample consists of randomly selected canadian households (n = 15,390). the gss24 also includes an aboriginal identification indicator, so an effective aboriginal subsample can be pulled from the gss24 data (n = 579). we hereafter refer to these samples as the general gss sample and aboriginal gss sample, respectively.5 we use these samples for comparative testing of the robustness of trends found in the aboriginal esc sample. esc data from both the general and aboriginal samples are weighted according to number of adults in the household. gss24 data are weighted according to the “person weight” constructed by statistics canada (social and aboriginal statistics division, 2011). p o p u l a t i o n d e f i n i t i o n s it is important to keep in mind that the data used are by no means fully representative of the aboriginal population of canada. this section will briefly highlight some of the gaps and biases of this data set. a b o r i g i n a l i d e n t i t y . aboriginal identity is derived from a respondent’s answer to the identityscreening question. this question asks: “the study we are conducting today is designed to ask aboriginal people how they feel about social, economic, and political issues affecting their communities, so could you please tell me if you are an aboriginal person, that is, a north american indian, métis or inuit?” (institute for social research at york university, n.d., p. 1). in an effort to confine our sample to self-identifying aboriginal persons, we drop the four observations where a respondent identified as “not an aboriginal person” or “don’t know.” of those who responded “yes” to the aboriginal identity indicator (n = 302, or 50% of respondents), 55% of the sample (n = 167) identified as north american indian and 9.6% (n = 29) identified as métis (the remaining 35% responded “other”). we can assess the representativeness of this distribution using data from the 2001 census of canada, which indicated that 62% of the aboriginal population identified 5 when we refer to the general gss sample, we refer to the sample of all gss respondents (n = 15,390). this includes the 579 self-identifying aboriginal respondents. we do not exclude the aboriginal gss subsample from what we refer to as the general gss sample. since the general esc questionnaire does not include an aboriginal identification indicator, we cannot control for the possibility that the general esc sample includes self-identifying aboriginal people. therefore, excluding the aboriginal subsample from the general gss sample would add nothing to comparative analysis between the two general samples. we also speculate that since the aboriginal gss subsample accounts for less than 4% of gss respondents, this decision does not have a significant statistical impact on our results. 5 barrington-leigh and sloman: life satisfaction among aboriginal peoples published by scholarship@western, 2016 as north american indian, 30% as métis, and 4.6% as inuit (statistics canada, 2003).6 we can see that our sample is heavily skewed towards north american indian respondents, and that both métis and inuit peoples are significantly underrepresented. g e o g r a p h i c a l l o c a t i o n . this sample is confined to manitoba, saskatchewan, and alberta. data from the 2001 census show that these provinces contain approximately 45% of canada’s total aboriginal population (statistics canada, 2003). this research is thus missing what could be valuable insight into distinct and relevant differences between this sample and the remaining 55% of the aboriginal population in canada. the sample is also limited to census tracts identified as having a relatively concentrated aboriginal population. the analysis therefore also lacks any insight into the effects of being isolated from a larger aboriginal community on swl. r e s e r v e s t a t u s a n d t h e u r b a n – r u r a l d i v i d e . after weighting, the sample population is 70% on-reserve. a total of 84% of the sample were living on-reserve and/or in a rural location, leaving only 16% living off-reserve in an urban centre (see table 1). however, again using 2001 census data, siggner (2003) found that approximately only 1 out of 3 self-identifying aboriginal persons lived on a reserve, with 51% living on a reserve and/or in a rural area. this heavy bias towards on-reserve and rural respondents provides an extremely valuable snapshot of swl when these conditions hold, but results may not be further generalizable. we often differentiate between the on-reserve and off-reserve subsamples in the aboriginal esc sample. it is important to note that the data treat reserve status and urban–rural location as two separate variables. therefore, on-reserve status should not be taken to be indicative of rural location, and vice versa (see table 1 for details on the reserve status and urban-versus-rural distribution of our data). the urban, on-reserve cell is small because urban reserves are rare in canada (although they may also be growing in number; see peters, 2007). p h o n e o w n e r s h i p . the random dialling method of selection introduces a sample bias against those without telephones. the issue is well-articulated by carson and martin (1999): “random digit dialing could be seen to discriminate against those without a telephone (the lowest socioeconomic groupings), those unwilling to be forthcoming, and groups with fewer telephones per person” (p. 91). it is important to remember that these data may not be representative of the most critical and pervasive socioeconomic divides between on-reserve aboriginal communities and the general population. in future research, other random sampling methods should be explored. as mentioned in the introduction, we choose to focus our analysis on responses to the swl question, to the exclusion of other swb measures (for a comprehensive discussion of swb measurements, see oecd, 2013). the wording of the question, given earlier, is identical in the two surveys, so differences in question wording of the swl question are not an issue in comparative analysis. however, the wording and order of other survey questions is not identical. these differences in the question context or antecedents could shift mean responses or even cause a priming bias, in which certain salient aspects of life feature more prominently in respondents’ estimates of their overall satisfaction as a result of being 6 2001 census data are used here in favour of more recent census data because they are the last census data collected before the aboriginal oversample project began in 2004. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.2 recently mentioned in the survey. for descriptive purposes, we proceed using ordinary least squares (ols) regression models with swl as the dependent variable. t a b l e 1 . r e s e r v e s t a t u s a n d u r b a n – r u r a l d e m o g r a p h i c s i n t h e a b o r i g i n a l s a m p l e u r b a n r u r a l t o t a l % on-reserve 2 (n = 12) 68 (n = 412) 70 (n = 424) % off-reserve 16 (n = 95) 14 (n = 85) 30 (n = 180) total 18 (n = 107) 82 (n = 497) 100 (n = 604) m o d e l this analysis draws from research done by j. f. helliwell, barrington-leigh, harris, and huang (2009) on variables that have a consistent impact on swb in data simultaneously covering most countries of the world. while there are now numerous studies following this basic method on other national data sets, many with a similar or overlapping set of explanatory variables, we refer in particular to j. f. helliwell et al. (2009) as an internationally valid reference model. drawing from the findings of this study, nine variables strongly predictive of swl were identified or derived from the esc responses. we have added three variables to capture labour market status because unemployment is one of the strongest predictors of life satisfaction in the broad literature; yet, it is absent in the gallup world poll used by j. f. helliwell et al. (2009). inclusion of these labour market indicators had little effect on the coefficients for income or any others. a weighted ols model using these variables was then applied to the aboriginal subsample. a comparative analysis between our model and the international findings of j. f. helliwell et al. (2009) is detailed in the next section. the base model describing swl for individual i is a linear combination of the predictive factors, along with an idiosyncratic error ε: swli = β0 + β1femalei + β2agei + β3agei2 + β4married + β5divorcedi + β6healthi + β7asinh(hh income)i + β8familyi + β9friendsi + β10studenti + β11workingi + β12unemployed (1) + β13(institutional trust)i + β14(household size)i + β15log(number of children)i + εi e q u a t i o n 1 . o l s r e g r e s s i o n e q u a t i o n . v a r i a b l e s d e f i n e d b e l o w . 7 barrington-leigh and sloman: life satisfaction among aboriginal peoples published by scholarship@western, 2016 as mentioned above, these data are unique in that they provide a lens into various aspects of life on-reserve in the canadian prairies. however, it is a narrow lens, and due to the small sample size, we rarely distinguish between the on-reserve and off-reserve aboriginal populations in our main analysis. suggestive but generally statistically insignificant differences do arise between the two populations. for completeness, relevant models that differentiate between the two subsamples are included in appendix b. household size is included in all models for weighting purposes. it should be noted that the household size variable in the gss24 is capped at six household members. below is a brief summary of our hypotheses based on the relationships of variables to swb in the study by j. f. helliwell et al. (2009), and a description of how each variable was constructed from the esc data. additional tables of weighted mean levels of the model variables are included in appendix a. g e n d e r j. f. helliwell et al. (2009) find a significant positive coefficient associated with being female. we constructed a dummy variable indicating female identification. a g e age is included in the model in a quadratic form to allow for the ∪-shaped variation of swl over the life course found in numerous studies (e.g., blanchflower & oswald, 2008; j. f. helliwell et al., 2009). research shows that swl tends to decline with age until some time in middle age, and then steadily increases into old age. to be consistent with this trend, the age coefficient in this model is expected to be negative, while the age2 coefficient is expected to be positive. for more convenient scaling, we follow j. f. helliwell et al. (2009) and calculate the age2 variable as (age/100)2. m a r i t a l s t a t u s j. f. helliwell et al. (2009) find a significant positive correlation between swb and being married, and a significant negative correlation between swb and being divorced, separated, or widowed, as compared with being unattached. in the esc survey, respondents were asked their marital status. a dummy variable married is coded 1 if a respondent is married, and 0 otherwise. for model conciseness, we have coded a dummy variable divorced as 1 if a respondent identified as divorced, separated, or widowed, and 0 otherwise. h e a l t h meta-analyses have shown that there is a significant and persistent positive correlation between subjective health measures and swb (okun, haring, haring, & witter, 1984). j. f. helliwell et al. (2009) regress swb against national average life expectancy, and find a positive correlation. respondents gave a personal assessment of their own health rated on a 5-point scale ranging from poor 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.2 to excellent. we recoded responses into a discrete 5-point scale between 0 and 1, with 0 indicating a response of poor health and 1 indicating a response of excellent health.7 h o u s e h o l d i n c o m e j. f. helliwell et al. (2009) find a significant positive coefficient on the log of household income variable in their swb model. household income is included in the model after a log-like transformation,8 in order to reflect research that shows that income yields diminishing marginal utility to economic agents. the esc survey asked respondents for an estimate of total household income to the nearest thousand. however, a significant number of respondents chose not to respond to this question. a follow-up question asked respondents which income bracket includes their household income. income brackets are defined in increments of $10,000. for example, the lowest income bracket a respondent can choose is “less than $20,000,” the subsequent is “$20,000–$29,999,” and the highest is “$100,000 or more.” it is difficult to choose which household income variable to use in modelling. using the precise income value variable gives more precise information on the relationship between income and other variables. however, a respondent’s income bracket can be inferred from his or her precise income value, while the reverse is not the case. a model using the precise income variable implies the loss of all observations where the respondent chose not to respond to the precise income question. this is potentially problematic not only because of the loss of confidence in a model associated with a smaller sample size, but also because there may be a bias inherent in a sample that does not include respondents who do not know or choose not to report their precise household incomes. because of these advantages, the household income variable used in this analysis is an indicator of a respondent’s income bracket. the household income variable is defined using the midpoint in each $10,000 income bracket.9 responses to the precise income value question were recoded to be included in the income bracket sample. to avoid a significant decline in sample size due to a lack of response to the household income variable by many respondents, missing observations have been recoded to the arithmetic mean of asinh(household income). a similar process was followed for the gss data. 7 personal assessments of health from respondents in the general esc sample have been recoded under the assumption that the initial observations were coded in reverse—for example, a label of “excellent” has been coded “0” for the purposes of analysis, while a label of “poor” has been coded “1.” this is due to properties of the health variable in this sample that strongly suggest that the variable was miscoded in the first place. for example, health is much more similarly distributed to the health variable in the gss data set if it is recoded as suggested. similarly, a highly significant yet negative correlation between the swl and health variables persisted in the general esc sample, despite consistent evidence from other data sets used in this study and other literature that health is strongly positively correlated with swl. if labels are re-interpreted as suggested, the correlation coefficient reflects the highly significant positive relationship consistent with the empirically validated trend. 8 rather than using the standard natural log function, we used an inverse hyperbolic sine transform, similar to log() for large values, in order to accommodate 0 income values in the gss. our treatment is consistent with other published analyses using the esc survey (e.g., helliwell & putnam, 2004). 9 the exceptions are the top and bottom categories. where a respondent reported total household income in the “less than $20,000” category, a value of $10,000 was coded. the “above $100,000” category was coded as $100,000. 9 barrington-leigh and sloman: life satisfaction among aboriginal peoples published by scholarship@western, 2016 s o c i a l s u p p o r t j. f. helliwell et al. (2009) find a significant positive correlation between swb and reports of “having someone to count on,” demonstrating the value people place on a strong social support network. to highlight this, the esc-based model includes both friends and family variables. family is included to reflect an intuitive sense of the importance of family to the canadian population and literature that confirms its especial importance in the aboriginal context (castellano, 2002). indeed, family is shown to be very significant in the general esc model. family is coded by the response to the question, “how often do you see family members who do not live with you?” it takes a value between 0 and 1, with 1 indicating every day and 0 indicating less often to never. friends is coded by the response to the question, “how often do you see close friends—not your husband or wife or partner or family member, but people you feel fairly close to?” and was coded on the same scale as family. similar variables are not readily available in the gss data. family and friends are thus necessarily excluded from the gss model, and any results obtained about the role of social networks in swb assessments is based solely on the esc data set. in addition, it should be noted that, as in most surveys, the available social support measures does not do justice to its multidimensional nature, especially given the empirical importance of social supports for life satisfaction. i n s t i t u t i o n a l t r u s t finally, the model looks at institutional trust within the two populations. j. f. helliwell et al. (2009) showed that there is a negative correlation between swb and perceived corruption in business and government at the country level. this study uses the sum of the response to two questions to generate an institutional trust variable: • how much do you trust the government in ottawa to do what is right? do you trust it almost always, most of the time, only some of the time, or almost never? • how much do you trust the government in [province] to do what is right? do you trust it almost always, most of the time, only some of the time, or almost never? responses to either question range from almost never (0) to almost always (3). similar variables are not readily available in the gss data. n u m b e r o f c h i l d r e n although not examined in j. f. helliwell et al. (2009), the variable log(child) has been included after preliminary analysis showed that the coefficient contained explanatory power. plenty of other studies have also included this variable, sometimes with a particular focus on the effect of having more children on life satisfaction (see for example myrskylä & margolis, 2014). in the esc samples, the variable number of children is coded as a participant’s response to the question: “how many children do you have, including any no longer living with you?” 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.2 a natural logarithmic transformation is applied to the variable to reflect a theoretical assumption that children produce diminishing marginal returns, an assumption that is encouraged by more significant results when log(child) is used in place of the untransformed number of children variable. as with the household income variable, missing observations have been recoded to the arithmetic mean of log(child) to avoid a significant decline in sample size. the gss variable conveying number of children takes values only until 4, with 4 corresponding to “4 or more children.” because of this, we do not apply the logarithmic transformation to the number of children variable when working with the gss data. e s t i m a t i o n r e s u l t s one might expect that lower objective well-being indicators (discussed in brief in the introduction) are reflected in lower swl levels amongst aboriginal peoples. table 2 shows that the mean self-reported swl scores in each sample are strikingly similar, especially between the two subsamples in each data set. in other words, the mean swl score in the aboriginal esc sample is closest to the mean score in the general esc sample, and the same is true with respect to the two gss subsamples.10 figure 1 illustrates the distribution of swl responses among the four subsamples. in each case, there are familiar modal points at 1, 5, and 10, in addition to the value of 8, which is most common in canada. we can see that the distributions of responses from the general esc, general gss, and aboriginal gss samples are quite similar. however, the distribution of responses from the aboriginal esc sample has an extra enhancement of response 5 and above all an enhancement at the top value (10). except for this modal category of 10, the aboriginal esc responses have a flatter distribution compared to the others, even though the means are similar. are similar swl means indicative of similar socioeconomic circumstances between the general and aboriginal esc samples? this is not the case (see table 3). it is apparent that respondents in the aboriginal samples tend to have lower incomes than respondents in the general samples.11 the unemployment rate in the general sample is 5.9%, while it is 19% in the aboriginal sample — almost 4 times higher (table 4). also remarkably, the high school completion rate of the general esc sample is 84%, while it is only 50% in the aboriginal esc sample. 10 this is consistent with some degree of priming bias, mentioned in the data and methods section. 11 although indicative of a pervasive socioeconomic divide, these estimates are rough. the calculation rounds down to the nearest $10,000 per year the incomes of respondents who chose to report an income bracket, as opposed to a precise estimate—22% in the general esc sample and 41% in the aboriginal sample (these proportions do not include respondents who did not include any kind of household income estimate). the calculated averages are therefore likely significantly below their true values. 11 barrington-leigh and sloman: life satisfaction among aboriginal peoples published by scholarship@western, 2016 t a b l e 2 . w e i g h t e d m e a n l e v e l s o f s e l f r e p o r t e d s w l i n e a c h s u b s a m p l e f i g u r e 1 . h i s t o g r a m o f l i f e s a t i s f a c t i o n r e s p o n s e s i n e a c h d a t a s a m p l e . t o t a l c a n a d i a n a b o r i g i n a l e s c g s s e s c g s s satisfaction with life (swl) 8.0 7.6 7.9 7.4 standard error .03 .02 .11 .11 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.2 t a b l e 3 . m e a n h o u s e h o l d i n c o m e i n e a c h s u b s a m p l e t o t a l c a n a d i a n a b o r i g i n a l e s c g s s e s c g s s household income (cad $100,000) 57 73 34 56 standard error (cad $100,000) .5 .5 1.4 .3 t a b l e 4 . u n e m p l o y m e n t / n o n e m p l o y m e n t a n d h i g h s c h o o l c o m p l e t i o n r a t e s i n e a c h s a m p l e t o t a l c a n a d i a n a b o r i g i n a l esc gss esc gss unemployment/ non-employment rate (%)a 5.9 36.0 19.0 42.0 high school completion rate (%) 84.0 75.0 50.0 59.0 a the unemployment rate in the esc data is derived from the number of respondents that identify explicitly as unemployed. the gss does not ask explicitly for a respondent’s employment status, so we present the nonemployment rate from the number of respondents that reported not having a job in the last week. here attention should also be brought to the differences—or lack thereof—between the general and aboriginal gss24 samples. unlike with the esc samples, differences between the two populations, in terms of income, employment, and education, are much smaller (again refer to tables 3 & 4). in fact, mean weighted household incomes and rates of employment are essentially identical between the two populations. high school completion rates in the two populations do differ, albeit by much less than in the two esc samples. these similarities should be stressed. they suggest that the aboriginal population sampled by the gss is much more similar to the general canadian population with regards to important socioeconomic indicators than is the primarily rural, on-reserve aboriginal population sampled by the esc survey. in the rest of this section, we discuss ways in which coefficients estimated using data from the aboriginal gss sample mirror coefficients estimated using data from the general gss sample much more closely than do the coefficients estimated using the esc counterparts. differences between the explanatory power of variables in the aboriginal and more general esc data are discussed in the context of objective differences between the esc aboriginal and broader canadian populations. that these objective differences do not characterize the gss populations is consistent with the remarkable similarity across the gss aboriginal and general samples. we next discuss the base model estimates. all final models are included in appendix b. 13 barrington-leigh and sloman: life satisfaction among aboriginal peoples published by scholarship@western, 2016 h o u s e h o l d i n c o m e the estimated coefficient on asinh(household income) is .30 (p < .0005) in the general esc sample, which is consistent with the findings of j. f. helliwell et al. (2009). however, in the aboriginal esc sample, the income coefficient is estimated to be −.37 (p < 0.10). this negative relationship between swl and income persists even if especially high-income/low-swl observations are removed from the sample. when a similar regression is run on the general gss sample (n = 14,895), we find an income coefficient of .12 (p < .0005).12 when the same regression is run on the aboriginal gss subsample (n = 569), the estimated income coefficient is insignificant and constrained to be significantly more positive than the value found in the aboriginal esc sample. it is, however, important to recognize that the gss24 gives no information about the on-reserve status of aboriginal respondents, and therefore does not capture differences in on-reserve and off-reserve dynamics. table 5 presents estimates for the differentiated on-reserve and off-reserve aboriginal esc samples, none of which are statistically significant. a non-parametric investigation of the bivariate relationship between income and swl is shown in figure 2. there appears to be some consistency in slope among three of the four samples, while the aboriginal esc group is, with weak statistical significance, divergent from the normal upward trend. could the weak or negative swl–income trend be indicative of an absent regressor? in both esc samples, there is a highly significant positive bivariate relationship between household income and a high school completion indicator for the category high school. it is easy to speculate that what appears to be an income–swl relationship in the aboriginal esc models is actually an education–swl relationship. if the high school completion indicator is included in the models, its coefficient is insignificant in the general and on-reserve samples; yet, is −.58 in the off-reserve model with a p−value of .088 (see table 6). although this finding in the off-reserve sample is interesting in and of itself, the inclusion of the high school variable has little to no impact on the other regressors; most notably, the household income coefficients remain well within one standard error of their original values. these results do not change if log(household income) is deleted from the projected model and replaced with high school. education in itself cannot explain the inverse swl–income relationship in the aboriginal esc sample. 12 the reader is reminded that the gss model omits the family, friends, and trust variables. any comparisons with the magnitude of the household income coefficient in the esc models are therefore misguided. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.2 t a b l e 5 . h o u s e h o l d i n c o m e c o e f f i c i e n t s i n a b o r i g i n a l m o d e l s o f s w l ( e s c ) c o e f f i c i e n t p v a l u e s a m p l e s i z e total sample -.232 .807 559 off-reserve sample -.046 .871 166 on-reserve sample -.244 .274 393 f i g u r e 2 . k e r n e l w e i g h t e d l o c a l p o l y n o m i a l s m o o t h i n g o f s w l v e r s u s h o u s e h o l d i n c o m e . 15 barrington-leigh and sloman: life satisfaction among aboriginal peoples published by scholarship@western, 2016 t a b l e 6 . c o e f f i c i e n t s o n a h i g h s c h o o l c o m p l e t i o n i n d i c a t o r m o d e l o f s w l , e s t i m a t e d u s i n g a b o r i g i n a l e s c d a t a c o e f f i c i e n t p−v a l u e s a m p l e s i z e total sample −.052 .807 559 off-reserve sample −.584 .088 166 on-reserve sample .077 .760 393 g e n d e r the coefficient estimate on the variable female in the general esc model is .20 (p < .0005). interestingly, the female coefficient in the aboriginal model is almost twice as high, with an estimated value of .48 (p = .038). however, the general estimate falls within the 95% confidence interval of the aboriginal estimate, although the converse is not true. interestingly, we note a significant difference between the coefficients for female in the on-reserve and off-reserve aboriginal esc samples. the two samples are compared in table 7. a g e in the general esc sample, the estimated coefficients on age and age2 are consistent with the trend identified in j. f. helliwell et al. (2009). a negative coefficient of −4.1 on the linear age term, and a positive coefficient 5.7 on the quadratic age term (p < .0005 for both coefficients) suggest that swl is ∪-shaped with respect to age. more specifically, the data suggest that, controlling for all other regressors, swl levels tend to decrease with age until approximately age 36, and to increase thereafter. age curves estimated for both the general and aboriginal gss samples are similarly shaped. while the estimate for age in a quadratic form in the aboriginal esc model is not inconsistent with those of the esc general sample or gss subsamples, the coefficients are also not statistically different from zero. estimates for the aboriginal gss data are drawn from a similarly sized sample (n = 569, while in the aboriginal esc sample n = 559); yet, the coefficients reach a higher level of statistical significance. removing the age2 term to yield a model that is linear in age gives a more significant and positive coefficient from the aboriginal esc data (see appendix b for a model of swl in the aboriginal esc sample incorporating age in a linear form). to investigate the evolution of swl over the life course in more detail, we estimate the nonparametric, unconditional (i.e., without controlling for other variables, as is done in the regressions described above) dependence of swl on age in figure 3. separate estimates for each of the four samples show that the aboriginal sample relationships are consistent with their general population counterparts for each survey. while the ∪-shape is less distinct in the esc data, a consistent pattern is the rise in reported satisfaction in older years, at least until retirement age. 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.2 t a b l e 7 . c o e f f i c i e n t s o n v a r i a b l e f e m a l e i n a b o r i g i n a l m o d e l s o f s w l ( e s c ) c o e f f i c i e n t p v a l u e s a m p l e s i z e p e r c e n t a g e i d e n t i f y i n g a s f e m a l e total sample .447 .038 559 51% off-reserve models .643 .073 166 57% on-reserve models .402 .127 393 49% f i g u r e 3 . k e r n e l w e i g h t e d l o c a l p o l y n o m i a l s m o o t h i n g o f s w l v e r s u s a g e . 8.5 17 barrington-leigh and sloman: life satisfaction among aboriginal peoples published by scholarship@western, 2016 m a r i t a l s t a t u s the married and divorced coefficients are similar in the general and aboriginal samples, and reflect the findings in j. f. helliwell et al. (2009). that is, being divorced, separated, or widowed is predictive of being significantly less satisfied as compared with those who are single or married, and that being married is generally predictive of a significantly higher life satisfaction than being single. like other results we report in this section, these relationships hold after controlling for the other characteristics in the model. h e a l t h meta-analyses have shown that there is a significant and persistent positive correlation between subjective health measures and swb (okun et al., 1984). estimates from all samples are consistent with this finding. interestingly, the coefficient estimate on health for the aboriginal esc sample is almost twice as high as the coefficient estimate in the general sample. however, there is significant overlap between each of their respective 95% confidence intervals. s o c i a l s u p p o r t coefficient estimates for family and friends in the aboriginal esc sample are significantly higher than in the general esc sample. family in the general sample has a coefficient of .37 (p < .0005), while friends has a coefficient of .64 (p < .0005). in the aboriginal esc sample, the estimated coefficient on family is .93 (p = .020), while the estimated coefficient on friends is 1.1 (p = .011). in other words, among the aboriginal esc sample, respondents that see their family or friends more often have a swl level on average a whole point higher. this is consistent with literature that suggests that family (both immediate and extended) and community are central aspects of aboriginal lifestyle and identity (castellano, 2002; chandler & lalonde, 1998). also indicative of the importance of social support to well-being: in a study of psychological distress on the james bay cree, kirmayer et al. (2000) found that having fewer than five close friends was significantly associated with a higher level of psychological distress. here we also note differences between the on-reserve and off-reserve aboriginal samples. amongst the off-reserve subsample, the friends variable has a higher and more significant coefficient estimate than the family variable. the reverse is true for the on-reserve population. from table 8 we can see that estimates for family are similar in magnitude in the on-reserve and offreserve populations (although substantially different in significance). the highest and most significant estimate is in fact in the smallest subsample—the estimate on friends in the off-reserve subsample. refer to table 9 to see that differences in the arithmetic means of the social support variables are insignificant. here we also mention the potential explanatory power of geography. restricting the general esc sample to respondents in alberta, saskatchewan, and manitoba leads to an increase in the estimated coefficient of friends to .93 (p < .0005), although a decline in magnitude and significance in the estimated coefficient of family. 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.2 t a b l e 8 . c o e f f i c i e n t s o n f a m i l y a n d f r i e n d s i n a b o r i g i n a l m o d e l s o f s w l ( e s c ) f a m i l y f r i e n d s c o e f f i c i e n t p v a l u e c o e f f i c i e n t p v a l u e n total sample .927 .020 1.07 .011 559 off-reserve .957 .106 1.77 .004 166 on-reserve .957 .056 .802 .137 393 t a b l e 9 . m e a n l e v e l s o f s o c i a l s u p p o r t i n d i c a t o r s i n t h e d i f f e r e n t i a t e d a b o r i g i n a l e s c s u b s a m p l e s f a m i l y f r i e n d s off-reserve .71 (several times per week) .72 (several times per week) on-reserve .73 (several times per week) .74 (several times per week) note. descriptions in parentheses correspond to the response option that is numerically closest to the sample mean. i n s t i t u t i o n a l t r u s t the institutional trust coefficient is positive, consistent with the findings of j. f. helliwell et al. (2009), and has a similar estimated coefficient in both models. n u m b e r o f c h i l d r e n using the general esc data, the estimated coefficient on log(child) is .13 (p = .021). using data from the aboriginal esc sample, the coefficient on log(child) is more than three times as high (.46, p = .022, see table 10). estimated coefficients on number of children in both gss samples are statistically insignificant.13 13 this may be because the variable number of children in the gss data literally conveys less information, since it is capped at four. 19 barrington-leigh and sloman: life satisfaction among aboriginal peoples published by scholarship@western, 2016 t a b l e 8 . c o e f f i c i e n t s o n l o g ( c h i l d ) i n a b o r i g i n a l m o d e l s o f s w l ( e s c ) c o e f f i c i e n t p v a l u e n total sample .457 .022 559 off-reserve .399 .248 166 on-reserve .513 .043 393 l a b o u r m a r k e t s t a t u s three dichotomous (indicator) variables capture some information about the labour market status of respondents, namely whether the respondent is a student, is unemployed, or is working (either employed or self-employed). the omitted category includes all other out of the labour market statuses, including retirement, child-raising, and home production. as mentioned earlier, inclusion of these indicators did not affect the estimates of any other coefficients, including income, much. however, as with income, labour market indicators present interesting contrasts between the aboriginal populations and the general population, especially within the esc survey. in the general population samples, unemployment has an enormous negative effect beyond that associated with any loss of income. this finding is nearly universal in the broader literature. in addition, working in the labour market and being a student are both predictive of significantly lower life satisfaction than being out of the labour market (largely through retirement or home production). the picture in the aboriginal esc estimate tells a different story. we find an insignificant (and smaller than for the general population) coefficient on unemployment for aboriginal respondents in the esc, and a highly positive effect of paid work. these differences may reflect the differing objective conditions in the population, since nearly a fifth of aboriginal respondents report being unemployed, as compared with 6% in the general population, and only 47% of aboriginal respondents report having a job, in comparison with 62% of the general population. similarly, the proportion of respondents reporting retirement is nearly 3 times as high among the general population as in the aboriginal esc sample. while there is other evidence for and against the contextual effect of higher unemployment rates mitigating the harm of individual unemployment (chadi, 2014; clark, knabe, & rätzel, 2010; oesch & lipps, 2013), we have not modelled the endogenous reference effects explicitly. instead, a simpler interpretation of estimated coefficients is that in both cases they give the best estimate of the marginal benefits of changing our independent variables, such as individual employment status. statistically, the magnitudes of coefficient estimates are not inconsistent across samples, but they are suggestive of a 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.2 larger benefit of having a job and lower cost of being unemployed for the aboriginal sample, as compared with being out of the labour force.14 d i f f e r e n c e a c c o u n t i n g differences in attributes and circumstances between two groups can be used to explain the difference in an outcome such as life satisfaction using a blinder-oaxaca decomposition (blinder, 1973; j. helliwell & barrington-leigh, 2010; oaxaca, 1973). this model separates differences in swl into those due to differences in average group attributes and those due to differences in the importance (i.e., coefficients in equation 1 of those attributes. figure 4 illustrates the first of these two contributions, known as the “explained” component. using a common set of coefficients for the explanatory variables,15 the decomposition accounts for the significantly lower mean swl amongst the aboriginal esc sample as compared with that of the general population esc sample. the difference, shown as a dark green bar with 95% confidence interval indicated by whiskers, is approximately 0.13 on the 11-point swl scale. the remaining bars illustrate the interpretation of a number of features of our results so far, as well as introducing new insights. while the model correctly predicts, based on differences in mean attributes between the two groups, that the mean aboriginal swl is lower than that of the general sample, it actually greatly overestimates this difference, predicting a ∼0.48 point lower response from the aboriginal survey. this reflects one of the more surprising findings of the present investigation: that aboriginal people in the survey report a relatively high swl in both the esc and the gss. the values shown by blue bars disaggregate the predicted difference according to contributions from each explanatory variable or group of variables. they have the following interpretation. given the importance of self-reported health in explaining life satisfaction responses generally, the considerably lower average health status reported by aboriginal people gives rise to a large predicted negative impact on their swl. similarly, other objective differences predict lower swl for aboriginal peoples: lower incomes, a higher unemployment rate, lower marriage rates, younger average age (see figure 3), and lower levels of reported trust. on the other hand, these detractors from life satisfaction are offset, in the blinder-oaxaca decomposition, by three factors predictive of higher aboriginal swl. aboriginal respondents reported a significantly higher frequency of visits with family and with friends, both of which are strong supports for swl, and they reported having more children, which in our model was also predictive of higher swl. the other factors included in our estimates did not significantly contribute to explaining the observed swl gap. 14 employment and unemployment are not in general simply related because they both omit potential workers who are out of the workforce and not looking for a job, for instance because they are discouraged from trying, or are retired, disabled, or studying. indeed, the state of unemployment, or “looking for a job,” is a subjective one and its meaning may vary with the context. in the present case, heterogeneity within the omitted category across our two samples may also be contributing to different baselines. the gap in coefficients between unemployed and employed is not statistically different between the two samples. 15 this decomposition is computed using a model estimated on a pooled set of the two esc samples. this gives coefficient values very close to those discussed above and reported in table b1. 21 barrington-leigh and sloman: life satisfaction among aboriginal peoples published by scholarship@western, 2016 f i g u r e 4 . c o e f f i c i e n t s f r o m a p o o l e d e s t i m a t e o f e q u a t i o n 1 s h o w i n g d i f f e r e n c e s i n m e a n a t t r i b u t e s a m o n g a b o r i g i n a l r e s p o n d e n t s a s c o m p a r e d t o t h o s e f r o m t h e g e n e r a l p o p u l a t i o n t o p r e d i c t d i f f e r e n c e s i n m e a n l i f e s a t i s f a c t i o n ( s w l ) r e s p o n s e s b e t w e e n t h e g r o u p s . the estimation results section focused on differences in the size of effects estimated in our model. by contrast, the blinder-oaxaca decomposition interprets the two populations using a common set of coefficients. the discrepancy between observed and predicted ∆swl in figure 4 is largely a result of the inconsistency of estimated coefficients. note that, in particular, the large explanatory contributions of income and unemployment in figure 4 reflect the general population effect strengths, while based on the estimates from the aboriginal 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.2 respondents, these conditions (curiously) have little impact. on the other hand, the socially-related factors, namely contact with family and friends, marital status, number of children, and trust, would have quite similar predictive contributions under the alternative coefficients, as would both health and age. in addition, the effect of differences in the other levels of labour force statuses would mirror, with a similar magnitude, that of unemployment in our analysis. in the present context, employment and unemployment may amount to two sides of the same coin. the view from this accounting thus presents a way to understand the observed difference in life satisfaction as an outcome of differing objective and subjective life conditions, while also highlighting the surprisingly small scale of that observed difference. the difference between the top two bars in figure 4 may be said to quantify the “surprisingly high” average swl response among aboriginal respondents. c o n c l u s i o n in summary, we find generally consistent patterns in the relationship between marginal differences in individual characteristics and reported life satisfaction between the aboriginal and general population samples in the esc and gss. these findings are therefore consistent with the standard interpretation of models of swl like those presented here, implying that small changes in life circumstances may be expected to lead to changes in experienced well-being that are similar across groups. it also supports the kind of analyses done in the previous section and elsewhere in the literature, in which differences in life satisfaction among two or more groups is accounted for using their observed attributes and conditions. these conditions are possibly more directly or meaningfully amenable to influence through policy than life satisfaction itself, and thus both the blinder-oaxaca accounting and the baseline estimate coefficients may generally be interpreted as providing an indication of the well-being benefit of pursuing different proximate policy objectives. on the other hand, not all marginal effects were estimated to be the same for the two groups. the primary factor in these differences was undoubtedly the small sample size available for aboriginal respondents. while the point estimates of the effects of several variables—family, friends, gender and number of children—in the aboriginal esc sample are on the order of twice as large as those in the general population, these differences are only marginally significant statistically, and must therefore be subject to verification in larger studies. however, we find a significant distinction between the general and aboriginal esc samples with regards to the importance of household income, employment, and unemployment. a negative relationship between household income and swl among on-reserve aboriginal respondents is in stark contrast to the persistent positive coefficient in the general canadian population sample and the existing literature. similarly, the data provides no evidence for any normal positive conditional relationship between income and swl among the off-reserve aboriginal peoples in the gss and esc. one may react with two classes of response to such discrepancies. the first is to suspect that there is a problem with the swl measure, in particular in its comparability across the differing circumstances faced by different communities and cultures. in this view, if the responses given by aboriginal respondents are nearly as high as for the non-indigenous canadians, who have, on average, better 23 barrington-leigh and sloman: life satisfaction among aboriginal peoples published by scholarship@western, 2016 material conditions, then the swl measure is not to be trusted. less dramatically, if the importance of different life circumstances in supporting high life satisfaction varies with context, it is difficult to use them to inform policy priorities and to make benefit-cost judgments. also, in this case, the inferences made from measurements on the lives of the general population should not be used to make normative judgments about priorities for aboriginal communities. indeed, the aboriginal experience in canada is unique on several dimensions, including political, interpersonal, cultural, and socioeconomic dimensions. the reduced-form estimates used here and in many analyses of swl are always subject to the caveat that causality almost certainly runs two ways between swl and many of our “explanatory” variables. we can in this work shed only limited light on the nature of missing variables—or unique causal pathways among available variables—which are particularly important for our small and geographically restricted sample of aboriginal communities. one particular feature is unusual in the swl responses from aboriginal respondents and relates to possible measurement challenges and cultural norms. as shown in figure 1, there is an enhancement at the three round-number focal points—1, 5, and 10—in the two aboriginal samples as compared with their general population counterparts. although the effect is hard to quantify without making assumptions, this focusing on the extremes and midpoint of the scale could be sufficient to account for the “surprisingly high” mean swl response in these samples. the other possible reaction is also cautious, and consists in looking for reasons to doubt the completeness of the limited set of explanatory variables on hand. this outlook is inspired by the remarkable consistency among coefficients estimated for swl models across more than 150 countries around the world (j. f. helliwell et al., 2009). in addition, as mentioned above, the statistical inconsistency in coefficients measured in the present study is actually quite limited; larger samples are needed for better resolution. not only is the linear, stylized, and “reduced form” model of equation (1) only a working model of how one might bring different conditions together to explain variation in experienced life quality (swl), but it also reflects the limited set of variables at hand in the surveys. there may, for instance, be unmeasured aspects of life that are positive for aboriginal peoples and would go further towards explaining the relatively high swl reports from aboriginal respondents. as an example, the negative coefficient on income for on-reserve respondents suggests that some substitution is going on between market income and some other benefit. indeed, the formal, or market, orientation of the standard income question is not appropriate for respondents with substantial direct natural resource income, such as subsistence hunting, or substantial non-market trade. going further, less reliance on market income may even be associated with higher swl, in accordance with the negative sign on the income term. more broadly, a repeated lesson from quantitative studies on swl is the importance of social supports over material ones. our findings support this intuition, in that five social factors loom large in the accounting of figure 4 and can explain both part of the swl deficit in the aboriginal sample as well as some of the advantage that comes with more frequent social and family interactions. other social dimensions are important and may be particularly important for the aboriginal population, but are not measured. for instance, the degree of cultural continuity has been shown to be protective against suicide chandler and lalonde (1998), but is not available in our model. 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.2 as promised at the outset, we remain somewhat agnostic on the interpretation of the patterns and apparent anomalies that the esc and gss data present. the analysis provided here may be evidence for bringing the increasingly ubiquitous swl approach to populations who have so far been under-sampled. this method is established and standardized enough for evaluating human outcomes and experience in the broadest sense that the biggest anomaly in the canadian data appears simply to be the near lack of measurements for some of the most disadvantaged in canada. therefore, the policy implications from our findings, with all of the above caveats, may be stated as follows: in accordance with a trend among other populations and governments around the world, aboriginal peoples in canada might consider embracing the measurement of life satisfaction as an overarching measure of well-being that does not impose external priorities nor outside concepts of development. second, any group doing so must also emphasize the measurement of a diverse set of measures, objective when possible, of the social supports of well-being, including measure of interactions and links, of trust in institutions and various groups, and of belonging and social identity. third, and tentatively, our findings suggest that these social supports should possibly rank higher in current development priorities than the huge and possibly more obvious material deficits faced by the aboriginal respondents in our sample. of course, these social supports are in principle, and also empirically based on international data, rather interwoven with material supports, but estimates like ours are meant to disentangle the marginal benefits of improving each. the swl approach consists in finding things that matter and have variation, and in then measuring those and evaluating their potential to improve life. if this approach to policy has the potential to be useful for aboriginals, surveys asking about swl must also cover the dimensions of people’s lives that are most significant to those being surveyed. such dimensions cannot be identified in advance; as well, doing so will always be an incomplete and ongoing task, and the details may vary with the population being surveyed. above all, that insightful task will ultimately lie in the hands of the populations themselves. 25 barrington-leigh and sloman: life satisfaction among aboriginal peoples published by scholarship@western, 2016 r e f e r e n c e s abele, f. 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(2010). social determinants of mental health and well-being among aboriginal peoples in canada (doctoral dissertation). retrieved from electronic thesis and dissertation repository: http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/etd/61/ 29 barrington-leigh and sloman: life satisfaction among aboriginal peoples published by scholarship@western, 2016 a p p e n d i x a t a b l e a 1 . p e r c e n t a g e o f r e s p o n d e n t s i d e n t i f y i n g a s f e m a l e i n e a c h s u b s a m p l e t o t a l c a n a d i a n a b o r i g i n a l e s c g s s e s c g s s 53% 51% 51% 55% t a b l e a 2 . m e a n a g e i n e a c h s u b s a m p l e t o t a l c a n a d i a n a b o r i g i n a l e s c g s s e s c g s s age 44 43 38 37 standard error (years) .24 .19 .72 .89 t a b l e a 3 . m e a n s e l f r e p o r t e d h e a l t h l e v e l i n e a c h s u b s a m p l e . t o t a l c a n a d i a n a b o r i g i n a l e s c g s s e s c g s s health .72 (pretty good) .62 (good) .49 (fair) .56 (good) standard error <.005 <.005 .01 .01 note. descriptions in parentheses correspond to the response option that is numerically closest to the sample mean. 30 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.2 t a b l e a 4 . m e a n l e v e l s o f s o c i a l s u p p o r t i n d i c a t o r s i n t h e e s c s a m p l e s t o t a l c a n a d i a n a b o r i g i n a l family .53 (at least once a week) .72 (several times a week) friends .64 (at least once a week) .73 (several times a week) note. descriptions in parentheses correspond to the response option that is numerically closest to the sample mean. t a b l e a 5 . m e a n l e v e l s o f i n s t i t u t i o n a l t r u s t i n d i c a t o r s i n t h e e s c s a m p l e s t o t a l c a n a d i a n a b o r i g i n a l trust 2.3 1 standard error .02 .07 t a b l e a 6 . m e a n h o u s e h o l d s i z e i n e a c h s u b s a m p l e t o t a l c a n a d i a n a b o r i g i n a l e s c g s s a e s c g s s household size 3.6 3.0 4.8 3.2 standard error .11 .01 .12 .08 a the variable indicating household size in the gss data is capped at six household members. 31 barrington-leigh and sloman: life satisfaction among aboriginal peoples published by scholarship@western, 2016 t a b l e a 7 . m e a n n u m b e r o f c h i l d r e n a m o n g a b o r i g i n a l r e s p o n d e n t s ( e s c ) note. standard errors are in parentheses t o t a l f e m a l e m a l e total sample 2.7 (.12) 3.0 (.16) 2.5 (.17) off-reserve 2.6 (.24) 3.1 (.34) 1.8 (.30) on-reserve 2.8 (.13) 2.9 (.19) 2.6 (.18) 32 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.2 a p p e n d i x b : o l s r e g r e s s i o n s o f s a t i s f a c t i o n w i t h l i f e i n e a c h s a m p l e a b o ri gi n al e s c o ff -r es er ve o n -r es er ve a b o ri gi n al e s c g en er al e s c e s c ( a b , s k an d m b ) g s s (a b o ri gi n al ) g s s (1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6) (7) (8) female .48** .61* 0.43 .48** .20**** 0.023 0.11 -0.005 (0.21) (0.36) (0.26) (0.22) (0.05) (0.1) (0.21) (0.036) age/100 -4.0 -1.79 -4.2 2.7*** -4.1**** -0.23 -6.2* -6.1**** (3.8) (5.8) (5.1) (0.94) (1.04) (2.1) (3.7) (0.67) (age/100)2 7.6* 7.8 7.1 5.3**** 2.1 10.2** 7.6**** (3.9) (5.6) (5.3) (1.01) (2.0) (4.2) (0.69) married .43* 0.035 0.39 0.35 .32**** .52*** -0.11 .25**** (0.26) (0.47) (0.32) (0.25) (0.069) (0.16) (0.23) (0.049) divorced -0.36 -1.12 -0.2 -0.36 -.44**** -0.28 -1.35*** -.37**** (0.34) (0.72) (0.4) (0.34) (0.098) (0.21) (0.47) (0.076) health 1.95**** 2.9**** 1.77**** 1.97**** 1.18**** .69** 2.3**** 2.2**** (0.38) (0.62) (0.48) (0.39) (0.14) (0.32) (0.38) (0.076) seeing family .85** 1.00* .83* .82** .37**** 0.18 (0.39) (0.59) (0.49) (0.39) (0.092) (0.2) (0.076) seeing friends 1.05*** 1.74*** 0.81 1.09*** .65**** .91**** (0.4) (0.62) (0.52) (0.39) (0.11) (0.21) trust .20*** 0.15 .21** .21*** .092**** .17**** (0.073) (0.13) (0.087) (0.074) (0.018) (0.038) log(number of children) .47** 0.37 .53** .41** .12** 0.05 0.18 -0.018 (0.2) (0.35) (0.25) (0.19) (0.057) (0.13) (0.15) (0.032) employment .82** -0.0007 .98** .72** -.14* -0.12 0.15 -.15*** (0.34) (0.42) (0.43) (0.34) (0.076) (0.14) (0.29) (0.05) unemployment 0.043 -0.004 -0.02 -0.038 -.82**** -.89** -0.31 -1.21**** (0.39) (0.63) (0.47) (0.39) (0.15) (0.35) (0.52) (0.17) student 0.53 0.58 0.57 0.55 -.27** -0.02 0.17 -.28*** (0.43) (0.57) (0.53) (0.43) (0.13) (0.26) (0.41) (0.086) asinh(household income) -.37* -0.014 -.41* -.39* .30**** .22** 0.029 .11**** (0.2) (0.3) (0.25) (0.2) (0.049) (0.1) (0.074) (0.023) household size 0.002 -0.16 0.046 0.011 0.002 0.004 -0.003 0.009 (0.056) (0.1) (0.066) (0.056) (0.005) (0.012) (0.12) (0.027) constant 5.6**** 3.5 5.9**** 4.5**** 5.5**** 4.9**** 6.3**** 5.9**** (1.18) (2.2) (1.47) (0.97) (0.34) (0.71) (1.3) (0.31) n 559 166 393 559 5428 1252 569 14895 33 barrington-leigh and sloman: life satisfaction among aboriginal peoples published by scholarship@western, 2016 a b o ri gi n al e s c o ff -r es er ve o n -r es er ve a b o ri gi n al e s c g en er al e s c e s c ( a b , s k an d m b ) g s s (a b o ri gi n al ) g s s (1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6) (7) (8) r2(adj) 0.191 0.297 0.16 0.188 0.11 0.116 0.145 0.146 note. regression coefficients with standard errors in brackets. *p < .1. **p < .05. ***p < .01. ****p <.001 34 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 2 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/2 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.2 the international indigenous policy journal april 2016 life satisfaction among aboriginal peoples in the canadian prairies: evidence from the equality, security and community survey christopher p. barrington-leigh sabina sloman recommended citation life satisfaction among aboriginal peoples in the canadian prairies: evidence from the equality, security and community survey abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license life satisfaction among aboriginal peoples in the canadian prairies: evidence from the equality, security and community survey indigenous engagement in tropical river research in australia: the track program the international indigenous policy journal volume 6 issue 2 the future of traditional knowledge research: building partnership and capacity article 3 may 2015 indigenous engagement in tropical river research in australia: the track program sue e. jackson australian rivers institute, griffith university, sue.jackson@griffith.edu.au michael douglas michael.douglas@cdu.edu.au recommended citation jackson, s. e. , douglas, m. (2015). indigenous engagement in tropical river research in australia: the track program. the international indigenous policy journal, 6(2). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.3 indigenous engagement in tropical river research in australia: the track program abstract the literature on scientific-indigenous ecological knowledge collaborations rarely analyses programmatic efforts undertaken by multi-disciplinary research groups over very large geographic scales. the track (tropical rivers and coastal knowledge) research program was established to provide the science and knowledge needed by governments, industries, and communities to sustainably manage northern australia’s rivers and estuaries. a number of policies and procedures were developed to ensure that the needs of indigenous people of the multi-jurisdictional region were addressed and to enhance the benefits they might derive from participating in the research. an overarching indigenous engagement strategy undergirded the program’s engagement activities, providing guidance on matters relating to the protection of intellectual property, negotiation of research agreements, remuneration for indigenous expertise, and communications standards. this article reviews the achievements and shortcomings of the track experience of indigenous engagement and highlights lessons for researchers and research organisations contemplating applied environmental science initiatives of this scale and scope. keywords indigenous ecological knowledge, research partnerships, indigenous collaboration acknowledgments we thank the many indigenous people with whom the track program has collaborated with for their willingness to engage in this program and to share their country and knowledge with the researchers. we thank mona liddy, lizzie sullivan, marciel lawrence, and ruth link for many discussions and debates about indigenous engagement in the track program and joe morrison, who was an author on the track ies review. j. and r . coutts, dermott smyth, and kate golson are acknowledged for undertaking the reviews that underpinned the track ies review. track receives major funding for its research through the australian government commonwealth environment research facilities initiative, the australian government’s raising national water standards program, land and water australia, the fisheries research and development corporation, and the queensland government’s smart state innovation fund. we also thank the journal’s reviewers for their helpful comments. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ i n d i g e n o u s e n g a g e m e n t i n t ro p i c a l r i v e r r e s e a rc h i n a u s t ra l i a : t h e t r a c k pro g ra m the challenges and ethical implications of conducting research at the community level are well rehearsed within a number of social science disciplines (holcombe & gould, 2010; kobayashi, 2001; newton, franklin, middleton, & marsden, 2012). many authors have commented on the tensions between the research sector and local communities, often in relation to the demands of participatory research and the limitations of circumscribed and rigid funding cycles and programs (clark, 2008; ens, preuss, finlayson, jackson, & holcombe, 2012; newton et al., 2012). cloke, for example, noted that “the unwillingness to promote and fund long-term, longitudinal research has created the conditions for ‘flip’ ethnographies by which researchers too often breeze in and out of research situations, with insufficient commitment to the people and issues concerned” (cited in newton et al., 2012, p. 588). in australia over the past two decades, the social impact of academic research on indigenous communities has been the subject of considerable attention as indigenous organisations and individuals voice concerns about research ethics and the practices of research organisations (barbour & schlesinger, 2012; henry et al., 2002; humphrey, 2000; orr et al., 2009). a parallel discussion has been occurring within the broader knowledge literature that seeks to better understand the similarities and differences between local knowledges, indigenous knowledges, and traditional ecological knowledges (berkes, colding, & folke, 2000; sillitoe, bicker, & pottier, 2002). indigenous societies are recognised as the holders of indigenous ecological knowledge (iek), defined by berkes et al. (2000) as a cumulative body of knowledge, practice and belief about the relationships living things (including people) have with each other that is handed down through generations by cultural transmission. iek forms part of governance and cultural systems that encompass language, naming and classification systems, resource use practices, rituals, spirituality and worldviews. surveys of the literature on iek emphasise the means by which it is transmitted and the longevity of its utility; there is an emphasis on continuity and cumulative acquisition of knowledge generated by communities heavily reliant on natural resources. knowledge is passed down through generations over many hundreds of years, although many authors stress its dynamic nature in response to populist images of traditional knowledge as static or unchanging (butler, 2006; hill et al., 2012). since the mid-1990s, international and interdisciplinary scholars have been writing about indigenous perspectives on research as the number of studies that apply iek to contemporary resource management problems increase globally (bohensky & maru, 2011; stephenson & moller, 2009). a range of collaborative methods are now being utilised by government agencies, universities, research institutes, and ngos to recognise and harness indigenous knowledges and deliver benefits from research to indigenous experts and their communities (e.g., cullen-unsworth, hill, butler, & wallace, 2011; garnett et al. 2009; louis, 2007; woodward, jackson, finn & marfurra mctaggart, 2012). hviding (2006), for example, sees great value in partnerships that seek an understanding of similarities, differences, and complementarities between knowledge systems, arguing, “where there is contrasting knowledge, there is also potential for dialogue and convergence” (p. 71). in melanesia, where he has conducted decades of research, hviding observes a strong interest in living things that is representative of a regional cultural preoccupation and suggests that “scientists, managers, and environmentalists engaged in biodiversity conservation are well advised to engage in such fields of potential epistemological convergence and everyday enthusiasm” (p. 82). otherwise, he argues, we deny ourselves a “mutual engagement with the people of the place” in a “deep empirical quest” in 1 jackson and douglas: indigenous engagement in river research published by scholarship@western, 2015 which “local knowledge and western science have a potential for convergence in their shared interests in different and yet, complementary classifications of that which constitutes biodiversity” (p. 85). with collaborative partnerships growing in number so too has the quantum of ethics resources, particularly resources pertaining to protecting indigenous knowledges when applying them to land and natural resource management (australian institute of aboriginal and torres strait islander studies [aiatsis], 2003; holcombe & gould, 2010; janke, 1999). holcombe and gold (2010) define ethics resources as tools such as “guidelines, protocols, agreements, memorandums of understanding (mous) and strategic plans that seek to ensure an equitable and negotiated approach to research and/or working with indigenous peoples” (p. 108). this article contributes to the growing literature on ethical engagements in research but with a focus attuned to the programmatic scale. the bulk of iek analyses derive from project level case studies or single issue inquiries. this article, however, describes the efforts of a large, ambitious multidisciplinary, multi-site research program involving over 80 researchers to effectively and ethically engage with indigenous communities in research on the tropical rivers region of australia’s north. the track (tropical rivers and coastal knowledge) research hub was conceived in 2005 to provide the science and knowledge needed by governments, industries, and communities to sustainably manage northern australia’s rivers and estuaries.1 engaging with indigenous australians was a critical feature of track. the original track funding proposal acknowledged that indigenous knowledges are vital to the management of northern australia and that research investment has not been at a sufficient scale to fully address the multi-faceted challenges facing the remote north. the commitment manifest in the track program aligns with international acknowledgement of the important influence of indigenous people’s knowledge and their profound relationship to land on the sustainability paradigm. it also directly responds to australian environmental policy imperatives. conserving biodiversity in the tropics in ways that sustain and improve indigenous livelihoods is one of this century’s foremost challenges. the significant role of indigenous land owners and managers is reflected in australia’s key piece of environmental legislation, the environment protection and biodiversity conservation act (1999), which acknowledges “a partnership approach to environmental protection and biodiversity conservation,” and promotes “indigenous peoples’ role in, and knowledge of, the conservation and ecologically sustainable use of biodiversity” (s 3(2)(g)(iii)). more recently, focus has turned to the water management sector and the need to ensure that the public mandate for aquatic biodiversity conservation reflects indigenous values and perspectives. the track program sought to contribute to the “research–implementation gap” as it is experienced in north australia (knight et al., 2008; shackleton, cundill, & knight, 2009) by redressing the historical legacy of low rates of indigenous participation in research and state environmental management processes. track researchers set out to gain a much better understanding of indigenous interests in tropical rivers and discussed ways to collaborate with indigenous people to ensure their research needs were addressed and that their knowledge contributed to research projects. in a manner consistent with other research efforts designed to improve collaboration between researchers and indigenous people (davidson-hunt & o’flaherty, 2007; ens et al., 2012), track placed considerable emphasis on procedural issues regarding ethics, !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 1 for more information see www.track.org.au 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.3 participatory methodologies, and intellectual property rights. track’s efforts were guided by an indigenous engagement strategy (ies) (see jackson, golson, douglas, & morrison, 2013). the article is structured as follows. first, we provide introductory and background descriptions of the context and the tropical rivers research agenda. the track program’s objectives, governance, and research structures are then briefly described before turning to the program’s ies. the key findings of an evaluation of the strategy are then presented. the implications for research programs of this kind are drawn out in the final section where we consider lessons that should be of interest to researchers new to collaborative research efforts and/or those considering expanding and scaling up their efforts to a multi-site, multidisciplinary program of relevance to indigenous peoples. t h e t ro p i c a l r i v e rs r e s e a rc h a g e n d a due to the fact that the aquatic ecosystems of northern australia contain one of the last major networks of free-flowing tropical rivers on earth (vorosmarty et al., 2010), these landscapes are of particular scientific interest to conservationists, aquatic ecologists, and non-government organisations (blanch, 2008; kennard et al. 2010). the region’s 56 river systems (see figure 1) are of high conservation value because the vast majority are unregulated (not having been dammed) and important ecological connections between the catchment, the river, the floodplain, and the estuary remain intact (douglas, bunn, & davies, 2005). northern river systems are considered to be the most biologically diverse and healthy aquatic ecosystems in australia (australian tropical rivers group, 2004; national land and water resources audit, 2002). australia’s tropical rivers flow through the customary estates of scores of indigenous language groups and in any catchment there may be numerous indigenous language groups with rights and interests in particular river locales, and a high reliance on riverine environments and aquatic resources (jackson, finn, & featherston, 2012; jackson, stoeckl, straton, & stanley, 2008); a reliance that langton (2002) attributed to the “multivalence” of water in indigenous traditions (p. 46). water supports the material needs of many indigenous communities and it is a key constituting feature of indigenous cultural landscapes. indigenous people conceptualise water sources and rivers, as with the land, as having derived from the actions of mythic beings during the dreaming, when the world attained its present shape and the socio-cultural institutions governing water use were formed (langton, 2002; toussaint, sullivan, & yu, 2005). australia’s common and statutory laws have recognised customary tenures for over 20 years such that more than 20% the continental land mass has been returned to indigenous ownership (altman & jackson, 2014). a large proportion of that land base is in the tropics and controlled by indigenous institutions under programs that give effect to local priorities for land and water management (altman & kerins, 2012) and contribute local ecological knowledge to solving environmental problems (hill et al., 2012; jackson, finn, & scheepers, 2014; storrs, yirbarbuk, whitehead, & finlayson, 2001). 3 jackson and douglas: indigenous engagement in river research published by scholarship@western, 2015 figure 1. m a p o f t r a c k re g i o n ( l i g h t g re y ) s h o w i n g f o c a l c a t c h m e n t a re a s ( d a rk g re y ) . indigenous resource management practices draw “mostly on long-standing customary knowledge and skills” (altman & whitehead, 2003, p. 3) and are inspired by obligations to care for country (jackson & palmer, 2014). practices include living on customary estates (on country) at small settlements referred to as “outstations” and utilising the landscape to exploit resources, hunting and gathering, conducting ceremony and ritual, fire management, and obtaining and distributing resources according to local rules. some management activities may be unrecognised by the formal resource management sector and indigenous communities face significant and entrenched impediments to having their knowledge accepted by management and scientific institutions and the wider society (see howitt et al. 2013; jackson & barber, 2013; muller, 2014; palmer, 2007). multiple methodological and epistemological barriers to integrating indigenous knowledge are evident in the region in which our study is located and as a result, a general scepticism towards research can be found in some sectors of the indigenous community. although indigenous people have been managing the northern australian landscape for millennia, european settlement introduced many of the processes that now threaten global freshwater ecosystems. overgrazing by cattle, altered fire regimes, feral animals, and weeds threaten north 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.3 australian river systems, and combined with increasing water resource development and climate change, the future of these river systems is certainly in question (pusey et al., 2011), as are the livelihoods that depend on their health. freshwater systems are particularly vulnerable to humaninduced changes, and are regarded as the most threatened ecosystems on the planet (postel & richter, 2003). research is needed because the tropical river region’s socio-ecological systems are not well understood by scientific institutions or management organisations and because significant, pervasive threatening processes are well entrenched in the region (douglas et al., 2011). furthermore, indigenous communities are looking for ways to retain and valorise their knowledge in the face of massive social change brought about by colonisation (barber, jackson, shellberg, & sinnamon, 2014; hill et al. 2012). loss of ecological and ritual knowledge is a significant issue that confronts possibly every language, clan, or family group (bradley, 2001; ens et al., 2012; jackson, finn et al., 2014). t r a c k : a i m s , g o v e rn a n c e s t ru c t u re s , a n d r e s e a rc h a c t i v i t y a i m s in 2005, track established a collaborative consortium of over 80 of australia’s tropical river and coastal researchers from 18 institutions and disciplines including law, hydrology, economics, geography, geomorphology, and ecology. it took two years to consult indigenous communities, government agencies, and other stakeholders and develop the research program (2004 2006). over $20 million was secured to support five years of research (2006 2011) into the assets and values of tropical rivers and the ecosystem processes that underpin them. when formed, track aimed to: • increase understanding of the environmental, cultural, economic, and social benefits provided by tropical rivers and coasts; • develop methods and tools for assessing the implications of current use and potential developments; • identify opportunities to develop sustainable enterprises; and • build the capacity and knowledge of the community to manage australia’s tropical rivers and coasts. track’s program of research had seven interconnected themes as a means of organising and coordinating 27 research projects. the key guiding questions for the research were: • why do people value tropical rivers? • how do tropical rivers differ across the region? • how do tropical rivers work? • what are the economic opportunities for indigenous people? • how can we make good decisions about managing tropical rivers? 5 jackson and douglas: indigenous engagement in river research published by scholarship@western, 2015 g o v e rn a n c e the research consortium was led by charles darwin university, the university of western australia, griffith university, land & water australia (lwa), the commonwealth scientific industrial research organisation (csiro), and an indigenous ngo, the north australia indigenous land and sea management alliance (nailsma). a memorandum of understanding guided the parties in the consortium as did contracts between research organisations and funding bodies. these documents demanded compliance with the standards of indigenous engagement adopted by track and outlined in its indigenous engagement strategy (ies). a project management committee (pmc) comprised of major funding partners, one indigenous representative and an independent chair, was formed to monitor progress against contracted milestones. the scientific program was led by a research executive committee (rec), comprising the principal researchers with an elected chair. this committee reported directly to the project management committee and led the development and delivery of the research program. an indigenous engagement strategy committee made up of three rec members was set up after the strategy was endorsed. its role was to assess projects and advise on the appropriate level of indigenous engagement for each project. after fulfilling this initial task, it rarely met, but proved valuable on two occasions in the resolution of conflict between researchers and indigenous community members. t r a c k ’ s i n d i g e n o u s e n g a g e m e n t s t ra t e g y d e v e l o p i n g t h e s t ra t e g y with nearly 30 interrelated projects it was apparent to research leaders that track needed an indigenous engagement policy statement that expressed its objectives and was transferable across the program area. researchers planned to draw on indigenous knowledge and perspectives on the region’s ecology to better understand how changes brought about by water resource development could affect indigenous values and livelihoods in the region, either positively or negatively. furthermore, much of the research would be conducted in places where indigenous people maintain customary ties to their estates and some of it would be carried out on tenures under the legal control of indigenous people. the rec agreed that every track project was required to engage with local communities. engagement was expected to benefit the affected communities and also provide researchers with local geographical and historical knowledge that would help them tailor their research to meet local needs. a workshop was held in september 2006 (in darwin) to obtain indigenous perspectives on the strategy, which was later adopted at the first full meeting of the track consortium in december 2007. in preparing the ies, principles from the guidelines for ethical research in indigenous studies, authorised by aiatsis (2003), were consulted. these guidelines provide a coherent and clear national standard and were endorsed by track and its indigenous partner, nailsma. an implementation plan was appended to the strategy to ensure ongoing oversight from the rec. efforts were made to develop resources to assist in implementing the strategy (e.g., copies of standard research agreements were made available to researchers, information on cross cultural 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.3 courses was provided, as were examples of completed applications for approval for research under national human research and ethical conduct protocols). although the rec sought transferability of principles and of approach across all northern jurisdictions, it did not want the approach to be overly prescriptive or to encourage researchers to merely comply with rules or “tick the boxes.” with such a diverse program of research encompassing markedly different disciplines, the rec appreciated that there were considerable differences in project objectives, methods, scales of operation, and information sources, and that these had a bearing on the level of engagement that could be anticipated. for example, most of the social science projects drew on survey or interview methods that required community consent to the research setting and were designed to meet community information needs, whereas a similarly high level of indigenous engagement was not warranted in projects that were based solely on desktop studies of existing biophysical or socioeconomic data (e.g., the projects investigating river classification systems). projects therefore needed to tailor their efforts to meet reasonable expectations while taking into account other pressures on communities and their likely levels of interest in the underlying research questions. the rec believed that more would be achieved from an approach that sought dialogue and negotiation than mere compliance with procedure. the ies sought high standards, provided resources to assist researchers to achieve or surpass the standards, and oversight of project implementation as projects progressed. attempts were also made to build indigenous engagement requirements into the research projects as early as possible. project plan templates were made available on the track intranet in 2006 and researchers were required to report against the strategy’s objectives in their initial funding proposals. all projects were required to allocate a portion of their funding for indigenous engagement and report on progress in each six-month milestone report. implementation of the strategy was given a high priority at all levels of track governance and constant attention was given to the objectives by the track leadership. r e v i e w o f i n d i g e n o u s e n g a g e m e n t s t ra t e g y o u t c o m e s in 2011, by the end of the program’s first phase, the rec was aware from informal and formal feedback that a relatively high standard of indigenous engagement had been achieved (coutts & coutts, 2011). to evaluate performance in this area, the authors undertook a review of strategy implementation and achievements (jackson et al., 2013). track’s pmc also saw value in a systematic understanding of indigenous engagement believing that it would serve to promote insights and lessons to other researchers, and government research and development agencies undertaking or contemplating similar initiatives. by this time, many of the partners had been successful in attracting funding under a new federal government environmental research program and the need to adapt the lessons from track provided further impetus for the review. the review examined the model of indigenous engagement applied during track’s first phase (2006 2011) and • identified key success factors, constraints, and areas for improvement; • analysed track’s funding arrangements, protocols (e.g., employment and training), relationships with indigenous organisations and communities, research experience; and 7 jackson and douglas: indigenous engagement in river research published by scholarship@western, 2015 • sought the views of indigenous participants in track projects. track documents (project proposals, policies, communication products, research outputs) were reviewed and compared against the objectives of the ies (see table 1). two small independent consultant reports were commissioned, one by smyth (2012) and one by golson (2012)2. for smyth’s review, the ies steering committee nominated for interview 14 indigenous participants or representatives of track partner indigenous organisations. the 14 were chosen on the basis of a high level of involvement in track research. efforts were made to contact participants by phone and/or email and similar efforts were made to contact project research leaders (jackson et al., 2013). interviews followed a semi-structured format based on the five objectives of the ies listed above. efforts were made to contact a total of 24 people, resulting in 12 successful interviews. golson’s review is based largely on an assessment of the track milestone reports, pmc minutes, an evaluation of the entire track program (coutts & coutts, 2011), knowledge and adoption documents, and workshop notes that formed the basis for the track ies. golson undertook five interviews, two with biophysical researchers and two with social researchers from projects covering all the research themes except theme 6 (sustainable enterprises). the fifth interview was with a member of the group that sought to communicate research findings. the questions focused on the ies objectives and the perspectives of the researchers. r e s u l t s from the accounts recounted by the consultants, track achieved a high level of indigenous engagement in its program (jackson et al., 2013). in summary, independent reports offered overarching observations of the program’s record: the indigenous engagement protocols established by track have demonstrated their effectiveness in achieving a degree of indigenous participation in research that otherwise would not have occurred, given the current focus within research institutions on measuring research success primarily through monitoring academic publication outputs, with little emphasis on monitoring social impacts and benefits of research. the overall response from interviewees was very positive. indigenous participants and representatives of indigenous partner organisations reported multiple benefits in participating in track research, including opportunities to return to country, exchange traditional and scientific knowledge, learn new skills, strengthen pride in culture and identity, and stimulate interests in strengthening indigenous involvement in researching and managing country. track researchers reported largely enthusiastic responses from traditional owners who participated in the projects, including a desire for extending the partnerships beyond the life of track. (smyth, 2012, p. 3) the summary of performance against the objectives and outcomes (table 1) supports the overall comments about the program’s success and helps to identify areas where there was a high level of performance. !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 2 the consultants’ reports are available from the authors. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.3 table 1. objectives, outcomes, and performance measures of the track indigenous engagement strategy objectives and outcomes performance measures summary of performance 1. ensure track research is relevant and beneficial to indigenous communities and organisations—to build the capacity of indigenous people to undertake research that will answer important questions being posed by indigenous communities. number of indigenous people leading the development of research. nailsma led the indigenous livelihoods theme, which included 5 projects: 2 led by indigenous people or organisations, and 2 directed by nailsma’s indigenous water policy group. two other projects provided high levels of indigenous input to their direction although were not entirely led by indigenous organisations. number of people (both nonindigenous & indigenous) acting as mentors to local indigenous researchers. difficult to quantify but there were numerous examples reported of mentoring through participation in research activity and joint conference presentations, and informal training on monitoring. number of researchers engaged by indigenous people to support their local initiatives. more than 20 researchers were involved in supporting the establishment of local catchment groups; providing technical support and training for recording of indigenous knowledge and monitoring of river and wetland health; supporting livelihoods planning, governance training, and developing research protocols. 2. ensure track research is conducted according to the highest ethical standards—all track research projects will be conducted with an appropriate level of indigenous involvement and undertaken according to written research agreements. number of research projects initiated by indigenous parties. 5 projects in livelihoods theme initiated by nailsma or partners, 2 major components of other projects initiated by indigenous parties. number of indigenous co-authored papers, reports, and presentations. 6 co-authored journal articles or book chapters, 2 co-authored articles in track newsletter; an indigenous engagement guide developed in collaboration with over 30 traditional owners from north queensland, 12 co-authored conference presentations. 9 jackson and douglas: indigenous engagement in river research published by scholarship@western, 2015 the proportion of track projects with indigenous collaborators operating under a written research agreement. all projects with indigenous collaborators were operated under written research agreements. 3. provide opportunities for indigenous employment, and to transfer skills, share knowledge, and increase cultural awareness amongst all parties—greater understanding and acceptance by non-indigenous researchers of indigenous people’s knowledge systems, cultural values, perceptions, and rights; and greater understanding by indigenous people with insight into and understanding of research methods and institutions. majority of indigenous partners remain interested and committed to the project after the first year of project operation. nailsma and its affiliate partner organisations remained partners in track for the duration of the program. all other indigenous organisations involved in projects remained partners through to completion. at an individual level, there was a very high level of continuing interest and involvement at the project level. number of jobs stays constant or increases. no evidence of major increases in the number of jobs over time. types of jobs and roles that indigenous partners are fulfilling are increasing in variety, complexity, and responsibility. most employment remained as short-term contracts as field assistants and cultural advisors. in year two, two indigenous leaders were employed to lead the indigenous livelihoods projects and, in the third year, an indigenous co-ordinator position was created in the knowledge and adoption team. perceptions and attitudes amongst indigenous people towards research are increasingly positive. many examples of positive attitudes towards research. number of non-indigenous people completing a cross-cultural awareness course. 21 researchers completed cross-cultural awareness courses. 4. effectively communicate research results and share knowledge with indigenous people—establish robust & longstanding relationships between indigenous & nonindigenous research communities & universal application of appropriate indigenous communication strategies. number of joint projects & co-authored publications. 6 co-authored journal articles or book chapters, 2 co-authored articles in track newsletter; an indigenous engagement guide developed in collaboration with over 30 traditional owners from north queensland, 12 co-authored conference presentations. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.3 number of collaborations that lead to additional externally funded projects. at least 8 additional external projects arose from collaborations developed through track. number of projects undertaken by same collaborators over a period of time. 4 projects had sustained collaborations that extended beyond track resources or timeframes. uptake of communication products. evidence of a high level of uptake of communication products. number of projects completed on time. most projects with indigenous collaboration experienced delays due to research agreement negotiations or delays in project scoping and approval. all projects met their revised project timelines. 5. ensure meaningful indigenous participation in track governance—indigenous participation in track governance. number of indigenous people represented in track governance structures. 1 indigenous person out of 7 on the research executive, 1 indigenous representative out of 7 at the program management committee level, 2 out of 30 project leaders was indigenous. 11 jackson and douglas: indigenous engagement in river research published by scholarship@western, 2015 the following comment on the ies illustrates a researcher perspective: . . . in hindsight we can say these protocols were good (if overly bureaucratic). we had good leadership on indigenous engagement in track, which made all the difference. (smyth, 2012, p. 19) perceptions and attitudes amongst indigenous people towards research were reported to be positive, according to smyth (2012): at the heart of successful indigenous engagement in research is the nature and strength of the relationships between researchers and indigenous people—individuals, communities, and organisations. interviewees by and large reported that relationships between track researchers and their indigenous partners were and are very sound, respectful, harmonious and productive. factors contributing to these successful relationships, as reported by interviewees, included: • appropriate time and effort devoted to communicating and developing rapport with potential indigenous partners—including making several trips to visit a community prior to commencing research; • building in components or outputs of research of particular relevance to the indigenous partners, including assisting with school projects, developing traditional calendars, and communicating the outcomes of research through appropriate mechanisms, such as community visits and posters; • transferring scientific and technical skills to rangers3 as a lasting legacy of the research experience; • offering joint authorship of publications with indigenous partners; • maintaining relationships beyond the life of the project, including, for example, sharing photographs of family. (p. 5) table 1 also highlights a number of areas for improvement. of particular note is the conclusion that there are overarching challenges for indigenous engagement in north australia that centre on capacities and priorities: the challenges reported by interviewees relate one way or another to the capacities and priorities of researchers, the capacities and priorities of indigenous partners, or the capacities and priorities of both parties. (smyth, 2012, p. 6) !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 3 an indigenous person employed by a community-based organisation to manage indigenous land. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.3 these capacity and priority issues are elaborated in the following comments: • researchers funded to achieve specific research aims have limited capacity to substantially achieve employment, training, and other community development aspirations—potentially leading to frustration and disappointment for some indigenous partners; • by and large, recognition of research achievement with research institutions does not encourage researchers to devote time and effort to indigenous engagement and preparation of effective communication tools, such as plain english reports of outcomes; • researchers may not have the capacity or priority to provide long-term support to local governance arrangements established during a project —again potentially leading to frustration and disappointment for some indigenous partners. meeting these challenges in a research program of the size and scale of track requires that expectations are realistic. where possible, efforts were made to coordinate the employment activities undertaken within the research program with the requirements of vocational education courses. building capacity, however, takes many years and, in the case of training in research skills, there are a number of pre-requisites that are largely beyond the control of a research program such as track. first, building research capacity requires a standard of education that is not widespread amongst the regional indigenous population: a long educational pathway culminating in research expertise is not present in many remote areas. second, it requires specialist training skills within the researcher community that are not likely to be held by every research leader or their staff (garnett et al., 2009). although overall the track research was considered relevant and beneficial to indigenous communities and organizations, this observation is qualified. one of smyth’s (2012) interviewees made the important point that there is never perfect alignment between community interests and academic interests: for us and our indigenous partner (kowanyama aboriginal land and natural resource management office), overlap in interest occurred in understanding impacts of cattle and pigs on wetlands, in understanding the importance of floods to ecosystem functioning, and in determining whether mercury was an issue for fish consumption. beyond that, they are concerned with many other issues, including weeds, which we did not cover very well in our research. (p. 19) from the outset we were aware of misalignment of various kinds between researchers and community priorities or objectives. for example, community interests were sometimes much broader than the scope of the research program, which was to some extent constrained by the priorities of funders and of the expertise in the consortium. notwithstanding efforts to shape the research to maximise its relevance to indigenous people, by the time that projects were finally approved the program was somewhat constrained by funding agency priorities. researchers faced a “chicken or egg” situation: in order to attract funding for the entire program, the project scope and impact had to be agreed upon, but this restricted the extent to which indigenous people could subsequently shape project objectives and design. 13 jackson and douglas: indigenous engagement in river research published by scholarship@western, 2015 there were sometimes major differences in the spatial scale of community interests, which were often local, whereas the scale of research programs focused on the wet-dry tropical region. differences also arose in the topics that were considered to contribute to theoretical questions and therefore capable of advancing the research discipline, compared with those topics that might address a localized problem. in other cases, there was a lack of alignment between the need for livelihoods research compared with the community need for funding to develop livelihood opportunities like small enterprises. the track approach focused heavily on procedural issues, an approach that is common to reforming research practices, according to davidson-hunt and o’flaherty (2007). less effort was given to epistemological inquiry within the program’s research projects, although efforts were made in two projects with varying rates of success. with the benefit of hindsight, it would have been very worthwhile to have included more ethnographic studies of indigenous ecological knowledge and to have explicitly examined the challenges of knowledge integration in project design (bohensky & maru, 2011; jackson, douglas et al., 2014). however, giving knowledge production and integration a more explicit focus would have been risky if not quite difficult for track for two reasons: (a) for many of the researchers, this was their first experience working with indigenous people, and (b) the skill base of the consortium did not lend itself to a strong sociological and philosophical approach. on a more practical level, it is important that researchers and indigenous organisations are aware that research collaborations may be accompanied by expectations for ongoing support that may be difficult to deliver. whatever the current level of capacity, the process of collaboration undertaken by track has shown that research can provide a catalyst for positive change—in knowledge, relationships, opportunities, and visions. although hard to measure, it appears that the process of carrying out the research should be regarded as potentially as valuable as the findings (newton et al., 2012) and can in themselves generate further positive impacts. rather than nurture unrealistic expectations, all parties should encourage honest discussions about what is practicable and achievable given the constraints that they all face. there is a particular need to consider the capacities of indigenous people to engage with and benefit from proposed research collaborations and to tailor the level of engagement accordingly. there is also a need to build the internal capacity of indigenous organisations to engage more effectively in the governance and management of research programs like track. the employment of indigenous people in the program occurred across a large number of projects in all three jurisdictions including beyond the focal catchments. another study from this region argues that community employment in research provides direct and indirect benefits and is essential to collaborative projects (garnett et al., 2009). the main opportunities that the track program offered for the employment of indigenous people were as cultural advisers and field research assistants. however, the field research conducted by the majority of projects was short and sporadic and did not necessitate longterm work contracts. the typical duration for a contract was a week or less on one to two occasions over the life of the project and this often involved different individuals on each trip. therefore, the program generally provided short-term employment of a relatively large number of people, rather than a small number of full-time positions. this was the case even for projects that undertook field activities over a longer period in one or a few locations—mainly the social research projects. for example, in the project that worked most intensively with indigenous research participants (project 2.2), researchers engaged 144 indigenous informants and research assistants over 3 years. the 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.3 research assistants helped in the face-to-face delivery of household surveys in the daly and fitzroy river catchments, as well as establishing contacts, facilitating introductions with researchers, setting up interviews, and facilitating discussions. there were exceptions. indigenous researchers leading the two indigenous livelihoods projects held fulltime contracts for the duration of their projects. two other projects (scenario planning and indigenous participation in water planning) employed an indigenous research associate for 3 years. in addition, the “knowledge and adoption theme” employed an indigenous coordinator for the mitchell river catchment initially part-time and then full-time for a year. the ies aimed to increase the variety, complexity, and responsibility of the jobs and roles filled by indigenous partners but this proved difficult to achieve given that most positions were short-term rather than continuous over an extended period. there were, however, a few examples where this did occur (described above). otherwise, the research imperatives of the majority of projects provided few opportunities for skills development and further employment in more challenging roles within the program, which demanded extended formal training and technical skills (see also garnett et al., 2009). research, like that conducted by track, generates many benefits for indigenous people, and not all benefits are realised through employment. for example, smyth (2012) concluded that research practice that involves and respects indigenous knowledge provides a means to give contemporary value to cultural traditions, knowledge and practices, and in doing so supports their maintenance and transmission between generations. field-based research methods in particular can provide welcome opportunities for custodians to visit country, demonstrate knowledge, transfer understanding to young people, and in doing so help strengthen attachments to significant landscapes. all projects should be able to undertake activities that can allow these processes to occur, no matter what their scientific focus. the depth of the interaction may well differ depending on the level of interest expressed by the community, but gains can be made in visiting country with traditional owners, allowing for exchange of information, and considering the contributions local knowledge can make to addressing research questions and management implications. the following comment by smyth (2012) illustrates this point: while each interviewee reported a unique combination of issues, central to each of them was the opportunity the track projects provided to enable traditional owners to return to country. for remote, low-income communities with little access to transport and other resources where there were logistical barriers to returning to country, field-based research trips involving traditional owners bring immediate benefit to them, independent of the purpose of the research. that this benefit is regarded as such a significant one is an indication of how rare the opportunity to return to their country is for many traditional owners, and how little policy and financial support is available to meet this aspiration. (p. 4) a traditional owner offered this comment: working with track was a good experience—it was an opportunity to tell my stories about my country. i only got a chance to tell some of my stories about some of my country—i’d like the 15 jackson and douglas: indigenous engagement in river research published by scholarship@western, 2015 opportunity to tell more of my stories to the researchers if they come back. stories about my country are part of my heritage, and it’s my job to keep the stories strong. (smyth, 2012, p. 18) d i s c u s s i o n it is from these comments and other reported outcomes that we can see that track worked widely with community members to build capacity and ensure that the research was relevant and useful to indigenous people. for the reasons outlined above, track was less successful in achieving a high degree of indigenous control of the projects but nonetheless it is clear that respectful and trusting relationships were the hallmark of most interactions. institutional structures resulted in some barriers to research, however. the authors found that the negotiation and execution of research agreements usually required more time than was reasonable. track researchers accepted that the process of relationship building and negotiating over research scope and goals would take time, but they were not prepared for delays of up to 2 years to execute research agreements with legally incorporated bodies. although the points of resistance in concluding research agreements were eventually overcome, as newton et al. (2012) experienced in securing access to communities in the uk for sustainability research, success was not the result of a linear process, “rather, it required continuous attention to the building and maintaining of relationships, with regular reinvestments of time and effort” (p. 589). good rapport needs to be maintained throughout the project and there is evidence that track projects were able to sustain successful communications over a number of years and, in some cases, build on relationships in the interests of addressing new and emerging goals. as should be expected in any social interaction, some researchers developed strong connections with community members as evidenced by assistance with higher education course work and personal job references. a number of track researchers attended community events such as a regional festival on the weekend to support the event and be seen doing so: not for cynical reasons of gaining and maintaining access to the community, but rather out of a sense of reciprocity and ethical commitment to the community’s interests. spending significant periods of time “hanging out” proved essential (newton et al., 2012). relationships were not always harmonious. in two cases, there was conflict over researcher conduct. one case related to the commencement of research before the agreement was signed (although it had been finalised and the researchers were invited by the representative body to commence research) and, in the other, an indigenous casual employee felt that another member of the project team had not shown sufficient respect for other individuals in planning and conducting field work. in both cases, the track indigenous engagement committee met and recommended an appropriate response to the project leaders involved. the first case, for example, resulted in the immediate cessation of fieldwork and withdrawal of the research team, despite substantial cost to the project. further effort was put into rebuilding these relationships and they remain very sound. this observation points to the need for research programs to aim for a high standard of indigenous engagement and to actively seek to improve on what has been achieved. review and evaluation are key steps in this process. during the lifespan of the track program, the track indigenous engagement committee did not formally review performance against the indicators identified in the indigenous 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.3 engagement strategy. instead, milestone reports to the funding agencies included progress against key performance indicators in the strategy and these were monitored by the rec and the pmc on a six monthly basis. regular review of progress against the strategy by the iec would have been helpful in identifying broader issues in indigenous engagement and for discussing approaches to resolve these. future programs should regularly review strategies and report and reflect on the impacts of research collaborations, including immediate positive and negative impacts, as well as longer term catalytic impacts that lead to changed visions, expectations and opportunities. researchers and indigenous collaborators should share results to encourage reflection on this issue amongst researchers at annual meetings and to provide opportunities for indigenous partners to participate in discussions and publish papers on engagement methodologies and practice. the track experience confirms holcombe and gould’s (2010) observation that reliance on institutional regulation and codification alone are unlikely to generate or sustain ethical and collaborative relationship with indigenous peoples. in the “intimate” ways described above, track researchers were involved in processes of continual dialogue and genuine negotiation that extended beyond mere adherence to procedure: formal instruments (e.g., a research protocol) are needed to confront power relations in research, but achieving intimacy also requires researchers and their indigenous colleagues engage in the difficult work of establishing and maintaining trusting relationships that will enable the effective coproduction of knowledge. (davidson-hunt & o’flaherty, 2007, p. 294) the authors found these experiences very satisfying and have used the insights gained from the track experience to effect change in other scientific institutions. as noted above, institutional capacity to engage effectively with indigenous peoples has been a significant constraint in the environmental management field (howitt et al., 2013). concerted efforts are required to address the legacy of dispossession and marginalisation that settler nations face in their land restitution, environmental management, and restoration efforts. the first author, sue jackson, played a key role in the development and implementation of the indigenous engagement strategy for australia’s largest national research organisation, the commonwealth scientific industrial research organisation (csiro). that national strategy, which included employment targets and iek integration initiatives, ran in parallel with the track program. it was endorsed at the highest corporate level, signalling to organisation’s 6,000 scientific staff that indigenous knowledge and partnerships were valued by the organisation. the experiences gained from developing and implementing track’s ies and collaborating with indigenous people in its research projects had an important influence on the second author, michael douglas. track provided michael douglas with his first experiences of the benefits and the challenges of indigenous engagement and the positive experience has encouraged him to become active in promoting indigenous engagement among other biophysical scientists and their institutions. douglas has used the track experiences to foster indigenous engagement at charles darwin university among members of his research group and more widely through his positions as director of the national environmental research programme (nerp) northern australia hub, which succeeded 17 jackson and douglas: indigenous engagement in river research published by scholarship@western, 2015 track (> 80 researchers from 13 organizations across australia). under his direction, the nerp hub has provided cross-cultural training for researchers from the hub and for the broader freshwater research community via courses run after national conferences. in concert with indigenous collaborators, he also been involved in organizing some of the first indigenous sessions at national freshwater science meetings and has presented at graduate student session at national conferences to promote indigenous engagement among early career researchers. c o n c l u s i o n s a n d r e c o m m e n d a t i o n s this article has described the efforts of a large research consortium to engage ethically with indigenous communities across a large region and to generate lasting benefits from an improved understanding of tropical rivers socio-ecological systems. in the interests on improving standards of ethical research, we reiterate the key recommendations jackson et al. (2013) made to researchers, funding bodies and indigenous communities considering improvements to their indigenous engagement activities. these were: (a) provide more support for indigenous leadership of research projects; (b) explore ways of retaining flexibility to respond to indigenous research priorities that may emerge during the course of the research; (c) allow plenty of time for research protocols to be negotiated and finalised with potential indigenous partners; (d) ensure ethics approval is granted before the research starts and allow time and funds for communities to influence research design; (e) investigate and support opportunities for longer term employment and skills development; and (f) insist that cultural training for researchers is an essential part of future research programs. where possible, this training should be delivered by local indigenous groups involved in the research. the lessons learnt from the approach to indigenous engagement adopted by the track program have influenced the conduct of publicly funded environmental research in australia and, for this reason, should be of interest to other initiatives of this scope and scale. following the completion of track, the authors and other researchers involved in the program now lead the northern australian hub (nah), one of five research hubs established under the national environmental research programme (nerp, 2011 2015). the nah developed an indigenous engagement strategy based on the track strategy and the recommendations from smyth (2012) and golson (2012) described in part above. this strategy guides the hub’s 13 research projects, which involve more than 80 researchers conducting terrestrial and aquatic biodiversity research across northern australia. it was endorsed by the federal environment minister’s indigenous advisory committee and was recommended to all other hubs across this national programme, forming the basis for an indigenous engagement strategy developed by one other hub in the program and adopted as part of standard research protocols for kakadu national park, australia’s largest national park. an evaluation of the nerp highlighted the benefits of indigenous engagement in environmental research. the australian government’s current environmental research program, the national environmental science programme (2015 2021), now requires all research hubs to develop an indigenous engagements strategy as a condition of funding. 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.3 r e f e re n c e s altman, j. c., & jackson, s. 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(2012). utilising indigenous seasonal knowledge to understand indigenous aquatic resource use and inform water resource management. ecological management and restoration, 13(1), 58-64. 23 jackson and douglas: indigenous engagement in river research published by scholarship@western, 2015 the international indigenous policy journal may 2015 indigenous engagement in tropical river research in australia: the track program sue e. jackson michael douglas recommended citation indigenous engagement in tropical river research in australia: the track program abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license indigenous engagement in tropical river research in australia: the track program the intergenerational effects of residential schools on children’s educational experiences in ontario and canada’s western provinces the international indigenous policy journal volume 7 | issue 3 article 5 july 2016 the intergenerational effects of residential schools on children’s educational experiences in ontario and canada’s western provinces donna l. feir university of victoria, dfeir@uvic.ca recommended citation feir, d. l. (2016). the intergenerational effects of residential schools on children’s educational experiences in ontario and canada’s western provinces. the international indigenous policy journal, 7(3). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.5 the intergenerational effects of residential schools on children’s educational experiences in ontario and canada’s western provinces abstract the intergenerational effects of canada’s indian residential schools have been widely discussed, but limited empirical work exists. i use the confidential wave of the 2001 aboriginal peoples survey of children and youth (apscy) to study the association between mothers’ residential school attendance and their children’s educational outcomes and experiences in ontario, manitoba, saskatchewan, alberta, and british columbia. holding a number of factors constant, i demonstrate that children whose mothers attended residential school are more likely to be suspended or expelled and have worse school experiences on average than children whose mothers did not. children are also more likely to live off reserve and less likely to speak an aboriginal language if their mothers attended a residential school. i also examine some contextual factors that may influence the relationship between mothers’ residential school attendance and their children’s educational outcomes. these findings suggest that dealing with the intergenerational legacy of residential schools is necessary for improving the educational outcomes of today’s aboriginal youth. keywords education, intergenerational, residential schools, indigenous peoples, canada acknowledgments i thank statistics canada for access to confidential data. i also thank chris auld, pascal courty, nicole fortin, david green, rob hancock, anke kessler, krishna pendakur, david scoones, linda welling, and graham voss for their valuable comments. i would also like to thank linda voss for her excellent research assistance. i would also like to thank two anonymous referees whose comments substantially improved this work. all shortcomings of this work are my own. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ t h e i n t e r g e n e r a t i o n a l e f f e c t s o f r e s i d e n t i a l s c h o o l s o n c h i l d r e n ’ s e d u c a t i o n a l e x p e r i e n c e s i n o n t a r i o a n d c a n a d a ’ s w e s t e r n p r o v i n c e s [residential schools'] impact has been transmitted from grandparents to parents to children. this legacy from one generation to the next has contributed to social problems, poor health, and low educational success rates in aboriginal communities today. (truth and reconciliation commission of canada [trc], 2012, p. 1) throughout the twentieth century, registered indian children in canada were compelled to leave their homes to attend assimilative boarding schools known as indian residential schools. the mistreatment of children within these schools has induced a national apology (harper, 2008) and resulted in the largest class action settlement in canadian history (reimer, 2010; trc, 2015). residential schooling’s historical prevalence and relatively recent end implies that thousands of modern aboriginal youth in canada are potentially affected by the intergenerational consequences of these schools. while many authors suggest that aboriginal youths’ current educational struggles are part of the intergenerational fall-out from residential schools,1 few authors have explored this possibility statistically. using the confidential wave of the 2001 aboriginal peoples survey of children and youth (apscy), i examine the intergenerational correlations between aboriginal mother’s residential school attendance and their children’s current school experiences. the trc2 identified the educational differences between aboriginal and non-aboriginal people as a necessary area of research in order to heal the legacy of residential schools (trc, 2015). results from the 2006 census suggested that those between the ages of 20 and 24 who identified as north american indian (or more commonly first nations) had a high school graduation rate of 50 percent, while other canadians had a graduation rate of 90 percent (richards, hove, & afolabi, 2008). these educational differences are substantially correlated with later life employment and earnings (feir, 2013; george & kuhn, 1994; sharpe, arsenault, lapointe, & cowan, 2009). understanding the legacy of residential schools in generating this educational divide is necessary to move forward in reconciliation and aboriginal economic inclusion (trc, 2015). an empirical literature on the educational legacy of residential schools has emerged with the work of bougie and senécal (2010) and o’gorman and pandey (2015). while neither paper focuses on residential schooling as the main independent variable of interest, both sets of authors find that a family member attending residential school is correlated with poorer educational outcomes. bougie and senécal (2010) focused on off-reserve registered indian children and find a negative association between parental residential school attendance and parental perceptions of how well their child is doing in school. o’gorman and pandey (2015) focused on the probability of high school graduation in northern aboriginal communities and found a negative association between the probability of graduating from high school and having a family member who attended a residential school. i make three contributions to this literature. 1 see haig-brown (1988), deiter (1999), aboriginal healing foundation (2002), smith, varcoe, and edwards (2005), chrisjohn, young, and maraun (2006), barnes, josefowitz, and cole (2005), stonefish (2007), smith (2009), richards and scott (2009), gauthier (2010), and the trc (2012, 2015). 2 the trc was created as part of the indian residential schools settlement agreement and their mandate was to compile as complete as possible documentation of the history and legacy of residential schools. 1 feir: the intergenerational effects of residential schools published by scholarship@western, 2016 first, i examine the correlation of mother’s residential school attendance with four additional educational outcomes: a. expulsion or suspension, b. repeating a grade, c. winning an award for grades, and d. winning an award for other activities. i also examine two child attitude and experience indicators: how well children get along with their teachers and how often they look forward to going to school. while these outcomes likely have a complicated relationship with academic performance, suspension and expulsion, grade repetition, and poor school experiences at an early age are important predictors of dropping out of high school (de witte, cabus, thyssen, groot, & van den brink, 2013; tobin & sugai, 1999) and are significantly correlated with other educational outcomes (abu-hial, 2000; ford & harris, 1996; marks, 1998). the fact that residential schooling is correlated with these extreme early educational outcomes and negative school experiences suggests that the intergenerational impacts of residential school extend further than the poorer academic performance found by bougie and senécal (2010) and could partly explain o’gorman and pandey’s (2015) findings. second, i expand on previous literature by including a selected sample of children who live on reserve. i do this using the confidential wave of the 2001 apscy. while there are possible limitations to the generalizability of the findings of the on-reserve sample, i argue that the inclusion of this population can potentially provide important insight into the intergenerational effects of residential schools. specifically, the inclusion of the on-reserve population allows me to show that mothers’ residential school attendance is associated with being less likely to reside on reserve in adulthood, conditional on a set of observable factors. conditional on these same factors, i also demonstrate that children of mothers who attended a residential school are less likely to be able to speak or understand an aboriginal language. the fact that children are less likely to live on a reserve if their mothers attended a residential school implies that the children of residential school survivors are more likely to attend a provincial public school than children whose mothers did not, all else equal (richards & scott, 2009). since indigenous children often feel marginalized in provincial schools,3 the correlation between mothers’ residential school attendance and place of residence may imply the children of residential school survivors are more exposed to marginalization in school. this marginalization may be compounded by the fact that those who have family members who were affected by residential school are more negatively impacted by discrimination (bombay, matheson, & anisman, 2014). these findings motivate me to test whether the intergenerational correlation between residential school attendance and educational experiences varies by where the child lives. while my estimates are imprecise, the point estimates suggest place of residence may be an important factor in the intergenerational effects of residential school. 3 see aman, (2009), gunn, pomahac, stricker, and tailfeathers (2011), mcbride and mckee (2001), silver, mallet, greene, and simard (2002), bell and anderson (2004), and white, maxim, and spence (2004). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.5 my final contribution is to examine whether the effect of a mother’s residential school attendance depends on whether she had siblings who also attended residential school. previous work has suggested that siblings can play an important protective role in traumatic or marginalized situations (bank, 1992; bank & kahn, 1982; dunn & kendrick, 1982; farver, 1993; hetherington, 1989; rutter, 1990; sandler, 1980). even if siblings were separated during residential school, having a sibling experiencing the same events may provide additional support relative to those who attended residential school alone (avioli, 1989; milevsky, 2005). if school experiences were significantly worse for those who did not have siblings attend residential school, then the negative consequences of residential school may be magnified for this group and for their children. i find evidence in favour of this hypothesis. in the next section, i provide a brief history of residential schooling, focusing on the later era of the system. i then discuss the data and the methodology i use in this work and present the results. the last section summarizes my findings, re-emphasises the limitations, and suggests avenues for future research and possible policy responses. a ( v e r y ) b r i e f h i s t o r y o f r e s i d e n t i a l s c h o o l i n g i n c a n a d a it is estimated that at least 150,000 aboriginal children in canada attended residential schools between 1867 and 1996, with 80,000 former students still living as of 2012 (trc, 2012). residential schooling is still very much a salient aspect of the aboriginal experience in canada: as of 2001, nearly 50 percent of individuals who identify as north american indian reported that at least one family member attended residential school (statistics canada, 2003a). as a consequence, understanding the intergenerational effects of residential schools is a necessary part of understanding the aboriginal context in canada. the discussion of residential schools often provokes strong negative reactions. numerous authors have argued that the residential schooling system was an attempt by the federal government at cultural genocide (assembly of first nations [afn], 2002; chrisjohn et al., 2006; hudson & macdonald, 2012; trc, 2015). however, the positive experiences of residential school survivors should also be acknowledged (trc, 2015). some academics have even argued that the residential schooling system generated an educated elite with a strong aboriginal identity who spent their careers fighting for aboriginal legal rights and cultural preservation (glenn, 2011; gresko, 1979; miller, 1996; szaz, 2006). while the earliest residential schools existed in new france in the 1600s, they became more established after confederation with missionary establishment and government funding. the number of children and the number of schools grew further after a 1920 revision to the indian act (miller, 1996) requiring all children between the ages of 7 and 15 attend the closest school “of the kind required” (an act to amend the indian act, 1920, see section a10(1)). this legislation resulted in many children being forcibly removed from their families and being taken extraordinary distances to attend a residential school. some of these children did not see their families for years (aboriginal healing foundation [ahf], 2002; mcfarlane, 1999; miller, 1996). the school system was described throughout its existence as strict and austere, and for a long period the curriculum included explicit cultural and religious training. children were not permitted to speak their native language and, before 1951, manual labour by the students was used to fund the activities of the schools. the health conditions of the schools were substandard and in many cases appalling in the earlier years, and residential schools are now notorious for the abuses children suffered when attending (assembly of first nations, 2002; milloy, 1999; royal commission on aboriginal peoples [rcap], 1997). 3 feir: the intergenerational effects of residential schools published by scholarship@western, 2016 however, there was significant change in the residential schooling system over its long lifetime. the average age of mothers who attended residential school in my sample suggests that they would have attended during the final era of the system—as early as the 1960s until approximately the mid-1980s. this period was significantly different from the early era of residential schools in many ways. for example, manual labour was legally mandated out of residential schools starting in 1951; increased health, nutrition, and treatment regulations mitigated the severity of conditions in the schools in 1957; and the religious organizations that ran the schools were entirely relieved of their official role in the system in 1969. the 1960s also saw the formation of residential school committees that allowed aboriginal parents to be involved (hawthorn, 1967). in addition, in the later years of residential schools, some children could engage in extracurricular activities such as brass bands, cubs, brownies, scouts, girl guides, and cadets (miller, 2004; trc, 2015). this engagement may have been difficult if the children had been attending a public school because of the possibly very long commutes between their communities and the school or more general feelings of marginalization (government of ontario, 1976; hawthorn, 1967). during public school integration, the residential schools were also beginning to be converted from schools to hostels to facilitate children’s integration into the provincial school systems (hawthorn, 1967; milloy, 1999). by the late 1960s and early 1970s, the remaining residential schools primarily acted as hostels and schools for children whose home environments were deemed “unsuitable” (milloy, 1999; presbyterian archives, 2010). in addition, the uprising at blue quills residential school in 1970 and the eventual transfer of the school to the first nation marked a substantial change in aboriginal education more generally (rcap, 1997; national indian brotherhood, 1980). by the 1980s, only a dozen residential schools operated by either the federal government or first nation governments were left in existence. the last government-run school closed in 1996, and the last band-run school in 1998. the outside options for schooling also changed. rather than children attending residential school, an onreserve day school, or nothing, children started to be integrated into public schools starting in the 1950s. at the time of integration, aboriginal children faced numerous challenges in the public system such as the distance to the school, racism, and cultural and economic divides (government of ontario, 1976; hawthorn, 1967; miller, 2004; trc, 2015). thus, given my sample, i examine the intergenerational effects of residential school for children whose mothers were exposed to a less harsh version of residential schools than in the past. however, there is still significant reason to think that residential schooling retained much of its abusive essence over this time period. before the late 1960s, the official government view was that “indians took no part in the processes of education,” (hawthorn, 1967), and many aboriginal parents felt the advisory councils established in the 1960s were impotent and ineffective. in addition, many of the same employees who worked at the residential schools before the changes worked there afterwards, and some of the worst abuse cases documented were over this time period (feir, 2015). studies by the cariboo tribal council and nuu-chah-nulth tribal council in the early 1990s recounted stories of deprivation, neglect, and abuse (cariboo tribal council, 1991; nuu-chah-nulth tribal council, 1994). the 1991 royal commission on aboriginal people (rcap) concluded, after hearing professional historical testimony and speaking with former students, that despite department efforts to establish guidelines for punishment in federal schools, abusive treatment existed through the history of the system (rcap, 1997). thus, while i suspect the intergenerational effects of residential school may be less dramatic in 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.5 the group in my sample than in earlier generations, there is still substantial reason to think these schools significantly affected mothers. d a t a a n d m e t h o d o l o g y d a t a s o u r c e i use the confidential wave of the 2001 apscy. the apscy is a post-census survey whose target population was children under the age of 15 who were identified as either métis, north american indian, or inuit by the head of household in the canadian long form census questionnaire. the long form census was distributed to 20 percent of households off reserve, and 100 percent of the households on reserves that participated in the census. some of the excluded reserves are quite large including, for example, the largest reserve in canada, six nations 40 in ontario with approximately 20,000 residents. statistics canada estimated the on-reserve population not included in the census was approximately 34,500 in 2001 with most of this missing population being in ontario (statistics canada, 2006). because of the high cost of sampling, the 2001 apscy only surveyed 123 of the largest first nations communities (reserves) that participated in the census. in most provinces, these communities covered between 50 to 55 percent of the on-reserve population. however, of the communities included, the global response rate was quite high, 87.9 percent (statistics canada, 2003b). it is important to note that because the sampling strategy focused on larger reserves in each province, the information collected from these communities is not designed to be representative of the entire on-reserve population. these limitations should be kept in mind when considering the findings here. the apscy includes a rich set of demographic, health, and educational information. the questions about the child were asked of the person “most knowledgeable” (statistics canada, 2003b). overwhelmingly, the individual who knew the child the best was the birth mother (approximately 80 percent of the total sample, after excluding missing observations). the apscy has a limited set of information about individuals in the child’s household including the number of individuals in the household, whether the child belongs to a two-parent family, the education level of the person who knows the child best, and the child’s paternal and maternal ancestral origins. uniquely, the survey also includes information on the residential schooling status of the individual who knew the child best as well as that individual's siblings’ residential school status. t a r g e t p o p u l a t i o n i restricted the sample to individuals whose birth mother was “the respondent who knows the child best” in order to have a clear understanding of the effects i am estimating.4 i also restrict the sample of children to those living outside of the atlantic provinces, quebec, and the territories, because these areas had much different levels of exposure to residential schooling than the rest of canada.5 finally, i restrict the sample of children to those between the ages of 7 and 14 at the time of the survey since i am 4 in the other cases, the respondent was predominately a female family member such as grandmother or a foster parent and the results are qualitatively similar if i include these children in the sample. 5 the federal government only started to provide education to the inuit beginning in 1955 and the residential schools in these regions of the country acted only as hostels (king, 2006). in addition, only one residential school was opened in the atlantic provinces and it was predominately an orphanage (milloy, 1999). 5 feir: the intergenerational effects of residential schools published by scholarship@western, 2016 interested in schooling outcomes. i also limit the sample to individuals who do not have missing information for any of the dependent or key independent variables of interest. this reduces the sample significantly. i discuss how below. d e p e n d e n t v a r i a b l e s : s c h o o l e x p e r i e n c e s i used several measures of students’ schooling experiences.6 i use questions on whether the child had ever been suspended or expelled where the respondent can answer “yes,” “no,” or “don’t know” (“don’t know” answers are counted as missing). i aggregated these responses to construct an indicator variable equal to 1 if the child was suspended or expelled and zero otherwise. similar questions ask whether a child has ever repeated a grade, has ever received an award in school for their grades or hard work, and whether he or she has ever received an award for another reason (for attendance or participation in sports, for example). generally, children of mothers who attended residential school seem to perform worse along these schooling dimensions than children whose mothers did not. children whose mothers attended residential school are more likely to have reported repeating a grade by approximately 6 percentage points and being suspended or expelled by 5 percentage points. children whose mothers attended residential school are half as likely to win awards for their grades. the two other questions i use to measure children’s school experiences are (a) how often they look forward to going to school, and (b) how well they get along with their teachers. the categories for how often the child looks forward to going to school are “almost never” and “rarely” (11 percent of the sample of children whose mothers did attend residential school and 6 percent for those whose mothers who did not attend residential school), “sometimes” (approximately 13 percent for both samples), “often” (15 percent of the sample of children whose mothers did attend residential school and 18 percent for those whose mothers who did not attend residential school), and “almost always” (approximately 63 and 61 percent of the sample respectively). the two-sample wilcoxon rank-sum (mann-whitney) test does not reject the null hypothesis that the distribution of these frequencies is the same (with a p-value of 0.388 with a corresponding test statistic of 0.863). the possible answers to how well the child got along with his or her teachers since starting school are “very well, no problems” (50 percent in each group); “quite well, hardly any problems” (approximately 30 percent among those whose mother attended residential school and 32 percent among those whose mothers did not); “pretty well, occasional problems” (approximately 11 percent for both groups); and “not too well” or “not well at all” (approximately 1 percent among children whose mothers did not attend residential school and 2 percent for those whose mothers did attend residential school). the two-sample wilcoxon rank-sum (mann-whitney) test has a p-value of 0.218 (test statistic of 1.232), suggesting we cannot reject the null hypothesis that the distributions of these frequencies are the same for each group. from these two questions, i created one indicator for whether the child looks forward to going to school “often or almost always” and one for getting along with his or her teacher “almost always.” i choose these thresholds somewhat arbitrarily, but largely because this is where the threshold divides the responses 6 while i do not report the results here, i have also examined the measure of school performance used by bougie and senécal (2010). i find results qualitatively similar to theirs but less precisely estimated. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.5 somewhat symmetrically between the variables. i have tried changing the threshold by including and excluding additional categories with little effects on the results. i also show the results from treating each of these variables as continuous, or as ordered categorical variables.7 all these measures of child school experiences are reported by their mothers. if mothers suffer from substantial recall bias in whether her child has won an award, repeated a grade, or been suspended or expelled, or has incorrect perceptions of how well their child gets along with their teachers or how often they like school, then the results will not reflect actual child experiences, but rather parental perceptions.8 i n d e p e n d e n t v a r i a b l e s : r e s i d e n t i a l s c h o o l i n g a n d f a m i l y b a c k g r o u n d c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s the main independent variable of interest is whether “the respondent who knows the child best” attended residential school. approximately 9.3 percent of the weighted sample of mothers attended residential school. however, a significant number of mothers do not provide an answer as to whether they attended residential school—about 450 individuals are excluded from the original sample of approximately 6,750 for this reason.9 the apscy data used in this article also includes rich information on the aboriginal ancestry of the children in the sample. i can use this information to potentially mitigate the role of unobservable factors in biasing the estimated effects of residential school attendance. specifically, i propose that i can use information on the ancestral origins of each child’s maternal grandmother, maternal grandfather, paternal grandfather, and paternal grandmother to account for a mother’s possible eligibility to attend residential school. for each of these ancestral origin possibilities, i constructed indicator variables that take the value of 1 if this relative had aboriginal ancestry and zero otherwise. i can summarize these variables by an indicator of whether a child has “only aboriginal” ancestry. i also use information on whether the respondent had a brother or sister who attended a residential school. a respondent will not have a sibling who attended a residential school if either they have no siblings, or they have siblings, but their siblings did not attend residential school. somewhat expectedly, this varies substantially depending on whether a mother herself attended residential school. if a mother did not attend residential school, only approximately 7 percent of mother’s siblings attended. however, a substantial number of mothers who attended residential school did not have a sibling that attended. only 73 percent of mothers that attended residential also had a sibling attend. there are a number of reasons i would expect intra-family variation in residential school attendance. as mentioned, mothers in my sample who attended residential school were attending residential school in an era when the residential schools were closing down. if children were of different ages, a local residential school may have closed before the younger child entered. there is also evidence that at times parents resisted the taking of their children by hiding them (haig-brown, 1988; milloy, 1999). if some children were more efficiently hidden, then they might not have attended. finally, if a mother did not have siblings, then obviously her (non-existent) siblings would not be able to attend. a non-trivial number of cases are 7 see appendix table 1a. 8 it is possible parents with bad school experiences project them on to their children. there is little i can do to separate this hypothesis from others as i discuss below. 9 all numbers here are approximate because of statistics canada’s guidelines for confidentially using the apscy. 7 feir: the intergenerational effects of residential schools published by scholarship@western, 2016 excluded from the sample because of missing sibling information (approximately 650) or missing ancestry information (approximately another 650). thus the final sample is approximately 5,000 children and mothers. all of my models have been re-estimated excluding these variables as controls and adding back the sample that was excluded due to missing information on these variables. the results in these models mirror those in the tables below. however, the issue of nonresponse is an important one. to the extent to which individuals who did not respond to the questions above are different than the population that did respond, my results will not be reflective of the total population of interest.10 a complete list of variables and their construction is given in appendix table a1. e s t i m a t i o n a n d u n o b s e r v a b l e v a r i a b l e b i a s i will show that there are large, significant differences in background between mothers who attended residential school and those who did not. i will attempt to account for differences in obvious observable factors and regional differences using a multivariate probit model. however, the systematic selection of children into residential school on unobservable factors may be more problematic. there are a number of ways that children were selected into residential school. first, a child needed to be covered under the indian act in order to be compelled to attend residential school.11 this implies that whether their mother was a registered indian is important for her attendance. second, even if the child were covered under the indian act, the clause added to the act in 1920 left a substantial amount of discretion regarding which children could be forced to attend: children were compelled to attend the closest school of “the kind required” (an act to amend the indian act, 1920). what determined whether a school was of the kind required depended on the other schooling options and the perception of the indian agent regarding the “desirability” of the child’s life at home. confidential reports in the 1960s suggested that more than 50 percent of children in residential schools fell into the category of “neglected”; the percentage was over 70 percent by the late 1970s (milloy, 1999). a set of authors have argued that many of the children sent to residential schools were not sent because they were neglected, but rather because their parents were in poverty or the authorities misunderstood aboriginal culture (jacobs & white, 1992; johnston, 1983). elsewhere i provide statistical evidence that aboriginal children were heavily selected from the most culturally traditional homes (feir, 2015). in addition, while parents had very little say as to where their children went to school, at times successful negotiation or resistance was possible. it is plausible that the influence of parents over where their children went to school was greater in the later era of the residential schooling system (haig-brown, 1988; miller, 1996). the fact women who attended residential school may come from significantly different family backgrounds than those who did not implies that any statistical correlations between residential 10 it seems plausible that those who did not respond to the aforementioned questions may be the most mistrusting of data collection. to the extent this is correlated with residential school attendance, my results showing negative possible effects of residential school may be underestimated. 11 while the métis could attend residential school, they were not under the authority of the indian act and could not be compelled to attend. the inuit were exposed to the system beginning in the 1950s and have had a complicated relationship with their coverage under the indian act and whether the federal government was responsible for their education. given they are a relatively small part of my sample, i have omitted discussion of them here. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.5 schooling and the educational outcomes of their children may actually be due to these differences in backgrounds rather than residential schooling itself. however, if i can observe a set of variables that are highly correlated with childhood legal status of the mother and her family environment, i may be able to control for some of this unobserved variable bias. i propose that i can use information on the ancestral origins of each child’s maternal grandmother, maternal grandfather, paternal grandfather, and paternal grandmother, and whether a mother’s siblings also attended residential school, as proxy variables for how “culturally close” an individual may have been perceived to be in childhood or how likely they were to be a registered indian. while of course these variables are at best noisy proxies for those unobservable factors or for whether a mother was a registered indian, they may aid in mitigating the bias. below i provide suggestive evidence in favour of these proxies. r e s u l t s s u m m a r y s t a t i s t i c s table 1 presents the summary statistics. if the variable of interest is binary, then the table shows the proportion for which the variable equals one. if the variable is continuous or categorical, the table shows the mean of the variable with its standard error in brackets. the first column presents the statistic for children whose mother attended residential school and the second column presents the statistics for the children whose mothers did not. the third column presents the p-value of pearson’s chi-squared statistic under the null hypothesis that the values are the same between groups if it is a binary variable, and the p-value for a t-test that the mean is the same between the two groups if the variable is continuous. in all estimates and statistics presented here, i use the sample weights provided by statistics canada and restricted my sample to observations that have non-missing information for all variables reported in table 1. missing data is a non-trivial problem as discussed in the last section. it can be seen from table 1 that there are notable differences in the ethnic ancestry of children whose mothers attended residential school and children whose mothers did not: children who have mothers who attended residential school are more likely to have a father with aboriginal origins, more likely to have maternal grandparents with aboriginal origins, and substantially more likely to have paternal grandparents with aboriginal origins. while residential school attendance by the mother may affect her likelihood of out-marriage, her attendance at residential school will not affect her own ancestry (92 percent of mothers that attended had a father who was aboriginal while only 69 percent of mothers who did not attend residential school did). table 1 summarizes a child’s ancestry by the variable “only aboriginal” ancestry: of children whose mothers attended residential school, 87 percent have only aboriginal ancestry while only 57 percent of children whose mother did not attend residential school do. the results in table 1 suggest that the children of mothers who attended residential school are different in other significant ways. first, those children whose mothers attended are likely to have older mothers (by approximately 2 years) and are far more likely to be located in the manitoba or saskatchewan than those whose mothers did not. given the geographic and temporal distribution of residential schools, these patterns are expected. these children are also far more likely to live on reserve. approximately 36 percent of the sample lived on reserve if their mothers attended residential school, while only 24 percent of children whose mothers did not attend live on reserve. this fraction of the sample living off reserve is low compared to the general population, but not unexpected, since the sample only includes a selected sample of the on-reserve population. 9 feir: the intergenerational effects of residential schools published by scholarship@western, 2016 t a b l e 1 . s u m m a r y s t a t i s t i c s s t a t i s t i c a m o t h e r a t t e n d e d r e s i d e n t i a l s c h o o l b m o t h e r d i d n o t a t t e n d r e s i d e n t i a l s c h o o l c s t a t i s t i c a l s i g n i f i c a n c e d d e p e n d a n t v a r i a b l e s repeat a grade p̂ 0.226 0.146 *** award for grades p̂ 0.698 0.306 ** award for other p̂ 0.679 0.738 suspended or expelled p̂ 0.151 0.106 *** get along with teachers very well p̂ 0.604 0.636 likes school often or more p̂ 0.755 0.815 i n d e p e n d e n t v a r i a b l e s mother’s sibling attended residential school p̂ 0.736 0.071 *** child speaks or understands an aboriginal language p̂ 0.453 0.335 *** mother believes aboriginal language knowledge is very important p̂ 0.623 0.382 *** child’s mother tongue is an aboriginal language p̂ 0.132 0.069 * child speaks an aboriginal language at home p̂ 0.038 0.025 child is a registered indian p̂ 0.83 0.48 *** (continued) 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.5 t a b l e 1 . s u m m a r y s t a t i s t i c s (continued) statistica mother attended residential schoolb mother did not attend residential schoolc statistical significanced child has only aboriginal ancestry p̂ 0.868 0.576 *** mother has a high school diploma or more p̂ 0.34 0.328 mother has a bachelor’s degree or more p̂ 0.057 0.052 *** child lives on reserve p̂ 0.358 0.243 *** child is in a two parent family p̂ 0.642 0.672 * six or more live in same house as child p̂ 0.453 0.274 *** dwelling of child in need of repair p̂ 0.623 0.574 *** child eats breakfast every day p̂ 0.811 0.773 child is female p̂ 0.585 0.489 * child’s paternal grandmother is aboriginal p̂ 0.755 0.628 *** child’s paternal grandfather is aboriginal p̂ 0.717 0.566 *** child’s maternal grandmother is aboriginal p̂ 0.737 0.625 *** child’s maternal grandfather is aboriginal p̂ 0.925 0.686 *** child lives in ontario p̂ 0.019 0.035 *** child lives in manitoba p̂ 0.151 0.118 (continued) 11 feir: the intergenerational effects of residential schools published by scholarship@western, 2016 t a b l e 1 . s u m m a r y s t a t i s t i c s ( c o n t i n u e d ) statistica mother attended residential schoolb mother did not attend residential schoolc statistical significanced child lives in saskatchewan p̂ 0.415 0.212 *** child lives in alberta p̂ 0.208 0.339 *** child lives in british columbia p̂ 0.208 0.299 ** number of siblings of child m 3.289 2.519 *** se (0.138) (0.042) economic family income m 34,899 43,802 *** se se (1670) (1085) age of child m 9.955 9.945 *** se (0.147) (0.066) age of parent m 36.895 34.867 *** se (0.392) (0.168) n ~900 ~4,100 note. this table reports means of each variable with the standard error below in parentheses if the variable is continuous. if the variable is binary, the proportion of the sample for which the statement on the left is “true” is reported. the sample of individuals includes only those who had valid responses for all answers. all variable are weighted using the census weights provided in the apscy. the sample sizes are approximate because of confidentiality requirements of canada’s research data centers. a the sign p̂ denotes a proportion is being reported (for whom the statement on the left is true). the sign m denotes a mean of a continuous variable and se is its standard error. b this column presents the value for child whose mother attended residential school. c this column presents the value for the children whose mothers did not attend residential school. d the pearson chi-squared test was used if the variable was binary to test whether the values are the same between groups. a t-test was used if the variable was continuous to test if the means are the same between the two groups. an f-test was calculated for the continuous variables to determine the significance level. the asterisks indicate the level of significance: * p < .10, ** p < .05, *** p < .01 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.5 second, mothers who attended residential school have lower socio-economic status than mothers who did not: for example, mothers who attended residential school are far more likely to live in a dwelling with six or more people (45 percent versus 27 percent), and on average have approximately one more child in the household. the average income of households where mothers attended residential school is approximately $10,000 lower than that of households where the mother did not. this difference is significant in economic and statistical terms. the average household income and the educational attainment of mothers are approximately what we would expect from the census (feir, 2013), although directly comparable information on average characteristics of mothers of aboriginal children is not readily available. this suggests the missing data discussed above may not bias the sample in significant, observable ways. n o n r a n d o m s e l e c t i o n i n t o r e s i d e n t i a l s c h o o l a n d u n o b s e r v e d v a r i a b l e b i a s in table 2, i provide suggestive evidence that the proxies i used for unobservable differences in family background mitigate the bias discussed in the methods section. the marginal effects of each independent variable listed on the left hand side of the table and its standard errors are reported for each specification. the heading of each panel is the name of the dependant variable of interest. each column includes different specifications of the model, controlling for different combinations of the ancestry and sibling attendance variables. each specification conditions on the age of the mother, the child’s age, gender, and region of residence. the region of residence is divided into northern and southern regions of each province in order to account for population dispersion in northern areas (approximately those census divisions above the 52-degree latitude and those below; i also include an additional category for the coastal region of british columbia). the first row of estimates in the table reports the effect of a mother attending residential school on the dependant variable listed in the first row, holding all other factors in the specification constant. the base category in the first column, conditional on age of the child and mother, are male children in the northern region of british columbia. as the other variables are added in the next three columns the base category becomes male children in the northern region of british columbia with mothers whose siblings did not attend residential school and children who have ancestry attributable to none of the grandparents mentioned. the first panel of table 2 reports the association of a mother attending residential school with her child being a registered indian. there is a large positive association conditional on region and reported aboriginal origins of the child. however, once i account for a mother's siblings’ residential school status and ethnic ancestry, the association becomes small and insignificant. this result suggests that a sibling's attendance at a residential school is highly correlated with the family characteristics that would cause someone to be selected into residential schooling (we can also see this from the positive and significant coefficient). similar results are seen in the second panel that reports the marginal effects of a mother attending a residential school on whether a child is reported to speak an aboriginal language or live on reserve. prior work has demonstrated that residential school attendance increases assimilation (feir, 2015), so a future mother’s attendance at a residential school should not make her child more likely to speak an aboriginal language or live on reserve. once the child’s ethnic ancestry is controlled for, there is no association. when the mother’s siblings’ residential school attendance is controlled for, there are assimilative effects in line with previous literature. in particular, children whose mother attended residential school are approximately 5 percentage points less likely to speak an aboriginal language and 4 percentage points less likely to live on reserve. this provides suggestive evidence that i am capturing at 13 feir: the intergenerational effects of residential schools published by scholarship@western, 2016 least part of the unobserved family background characteristics that could influence both mothers’ residential schooling status and the outcomes of interest.12 m o t h e r ’ s r e s i d e n t i a l s c h o o l a t t e n d a n c e a n d e d u c a t i o n table 3 reports the main education results for four different specifications of the probit model. all other aspects are the same as table 2. the educational outcomes considered in table 3 are ordered as follows: repeating a grade, expulsion or suspension, winning an award for grades, winning an award for something else, getting along very well with teachers, and liking school often or more. the first thing to note is that controlling for age of the mother, age of the child, region of residence, and gender of the child results in the same patterns as in table 1. children are more likely to have repeated a grade and be suspended or expelled, but not any more or less likely to have won awards, got along with their teacher very well, or look forward to going to school often or more. as i progressively control for more observable factors, the correlation between mother’s residential school attendance and children’s likelihood of repeating a grade becomes weaker. however, even in the most stringent specification, children whose mothers attended residential school are approximately 4.5 percentage points more likely to be suspended or expelled (t = 2.15). these effects are substantial. to give an idea of how large this correlation is, consider the fact that 7.7 percent of all students in ontario schools had been expelled or suspended from 2003 to 2004; whereas the proportion of aboriginal children expelled or suspended was 13.7 percent in 2001 (ontario ministry of education, 2011). if these ontario numbers were representative of my sample, given the proportion of children with mothers who attended residential school, this intergenerational correlation could explain approximately 20 percent of this suspension and expulsion difference.13 from the third panel and fourth panel, children who have a mother who attended residential school are about 14 percentage points less likely to win awards for their grades (significant at the 1 percent alpha level) or about 12 percentage points less likely to have won awards for other activities (significant at the 5 percent level). 12 it is likely that this does not entirely mitigate the unobserved variable bias due to non-random selection into residential school attendance. this qualifier should be kept in mind when interpreting the results. 13 it is unclear whether the ontario numbers are generalizable. to my knowledge, national data on expulsion and suspension rates in canada are not available. the suspension and expulsion rate in the united states is about 7 percent so the ontario numbers may indeed be similar to the national numbers (wald & losen, 2003). however, my sample is not representative of the total aboriginal population in canada. thus this back-of-the-envelope calculation is at best an illustration of the plausible importance of the correlation. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.5 t a b l e 2 . m a r g i n a l e f f e c t s f r o m p r o b i t m o d e l s f o r p r o x i e s f o r u n o b s e r v a b l e f a m i l y b a c k g r o u n d c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s a n d m o t h e r ’ s r e s i d e n t i a l s c h o o l a t t e n d a n c e r e g i s t e r e d i n d i a n s t a t u s o f c h i l d s p e a k a n a b o r i g i n a l l a n g u a g e (1) (2) (3) (4) (1) (2) (3) (4) mother attended residential school 0.354*** (0.046) 0.271*** (0.052) 0.129* (0.073) 0.055 (0.068) 0.097*** (0.034) -0.005 (0.028) -0.009 (0.035) -0.051* (0.029) child is female -0.022 (0.026) -0.017 (0.028) -0.027 (0.026) -0.021 (0.028) -0.015 (0.021) -0.01 (0.021) -0.016 (0.021) -0.01 (0.021) age of child -0.002 (0.005) 0 (0.006) -0.001 (0.005) 0.001 (0.006) -0.001 (0.004) 0 (0.004) -0.001 (0.004) 0 (0.004) age of mother -0.007*** (0.002) -0.002 (0.003) -0.009*** (0.002) -0.003 (0.002) -0.004*** (0.002) -0.001 (0.002) -0.005*** (0.002) -0.001 (0.002) child’s maternal grandmother is aboriginal 0.354*** (0.035) 0.345*** (0.034) 0.173*** (0.034) 0.169*** (0.035) child’s maternal grandfather is aboriginal 0.208*** (0.039) 0.210*** (0.039) 0.153*** (0.029) 0.151*** (0.029) child’s paternal grandfather is aboriginal 0.276*** (0.035) 0.275*** (0.036) 0.141*** (0.028) 0.140*** (0.028) child’s paternal grandmother is aboriginal 0.312*** (0.034) 0.298*** (0.034) 0.122*** (0.034) 0.118*** (0.034) mother's sibling attended residential school 0.391*** (0.033) 0.345*** (0.038) 0.167*** (0.031) 0.081*** (0.028) pseudo r-squared 0.126 0.349 0.161 0.367 0.128 0.217 0.135 0.219 model chi-squared 396.1471 781.3893 396.3195 782.5356 563.7485 622.9725 567.4309 625.8172 log likelihood -3465.9 -2580.45 -3326.23 -2508.37 -3217.02 -2888.67 -3193.14 -2882.96 n ~5,000 ~5,000 ~5,000 ~5,000 ~5,000 ~5,000 ~5,000 ~5,000 (continued) 15 feir: the intergenerational effects of residential schools published by scholarship@western, 2016 t a b l e 2 . m a r g i n a l e f f e c t s f r o m p r o b i t m o d e l s f o r p r o x i e s f o r u n o b s e r v a b l e f a m i l y b a c k g r o u n d c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s a n d m o t h e r ’ s r e s i d e n t i a l s c h o o l a t t e n d a n c e (continued) l i v e o n r e s e r v e (1) (2) (3) (4) mother attended residential school 0.100*** (0.025) -0.003 (0.015) -0.019 (0.023) -0.040*** (0.013) child is female -0.021* (0.012) -0.012 (0.01) -0.022* (0.012) -0.013 (0.009) age of child 0.000 (0.003) 0.001 (0.002) 0.000 (0.003) 0.001 (0.002) age of mother -0.004*** (0.001) 0.000 (0.001) -0.005*** (0.001) -0.001 (0.001) child’s maternal grandmother is aboriginal 0.132*** (0.011) 0.128*** (0.011) child’s maternal grandfather is aboriginal 0.149*** (0.014) 0.146*** (0.013) child’s paternal grandfather is aboriginal 0.131*** (0.015) 0.131*** (0.015) child’s paternal grandmother is aboriginal 0.136*** (0.011) 0.133*** (0.011) mother's sibling attended residential school 0.198*** (0.026) 0.078*** (0.019) pseudo r-squared 0.125 0.33 0.139 0.334 model chi-squared 703.8115 1568.275 741.4379 1564.556 log likelihood -2536.24 -1941.1 -2494.95 -1929.55 n ~5,000 ~5,000 ~5,000 ~5,000 note. this table reports the marginal effects of each variable on the left either on the probability of the child having registered indian status, speaking an aboriginal language, or living on reserve. the effect's robust standard error is given in parentheses. all specifications include a set of dummy variables for the child’s region of residence. the region of residence is divided into northern and southern regions of each province in order to account for the different geography in the more northern area of provinces, which tend to be more remote. this division groups together census divisions above the 52-degree latitude and those below. i also include an additional category for the coastal region of british columbia, so there are 11 regions in total and the omitted category is the northern half of british columbia. the estimates of the geography variables are not reported. the asterisks indicate the level of significance: * p < .10, ** p < .05, *** p < .01 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.5 t a b l e 3 . m a r g i n a l e f f e c t s f r o m p r o b i t m o d e l s f o r s c h o o l o u t c o m e s a n d e x p e r i e n c e s o f c h i l d r e n a g e s 7 t o 1 4 f r o m t h e 2 0 0 1 a b o r i g i n a l p e o p l e s s u r v e y o f c h i l d r e n a n d y o u t h r e p e a t e d a g r a d e s u s p e n d e d o r e x p e l l e d (1) (2) (3) (4) (1) (2) (3) (4) mother attended residential school 0.068*** (0.022) 0.036* (0.019) 0.01 (0.024) 0.025 (0.027) 0.042** (0.018) 0.042** (0.019) 0.046** (0.022) 0.045** (0.021) child is female -0.084*** (0.014) -0.08*** (0.013) -0.08*** (0.013) -0.09*** (0.014) -0.07*** (0.012) -0.07*** (0.012) -0.07*** (0.012) -0.07*** (0.012) age of child 0.018*** (0.003) 0.017*** (0.003) 0.017*** (0.003) 0.018*** (0.003) 0.030*** (0.003) 0.030*** (0.003) 0.030*** (0.003) 0.030*** (0.003) age of mother -0.001 (0.001) 0.000 (0.001) -0.001 (0.001) -0.002 (0.001) -0.003** (0.001) -0.002** (0.001) -0.002** (0.001) -0.003** (0.001) child’s maternal grandmother aboriginal 0.041* (0.024) 0.039 (0.024) 0.01 (0.018) 0.01 (0.018) child’s maternal grandfather aboriginal 0.035 (0.031) 0.035 (0.031) 0.033* (0.017) 0.033* (0.017) child’s paternal grandfather aboriginal 0.061** (0.03) 0.060** (0.029) 0.009 (0.019) 0.009 (0.019) child’s paternal grandmother aboriginal 0.021 (0.023) 0.019 (0.023) -0.025 (0.02) -0.025 (0.02) mother's sibling attended residential school 0.041 (0.029) 0.063** (0.029) -0.005 (0.013) -0.003 (0.013) pseudo r-squared 0.105 0.13 0.131 0.108 0.144 0.152 0.152 0.144 model chi-squared 252.3558 296.7791 348.3252 301.032 322.0947 329.2618 329.5909 322.653 log likelihood -2198.93 -2137.84 -2134.12 -2191.26 -1689.42 -1672.42 -1672.32 -1689.40 (continued) 17 feir: the intergenerational effects of residential schools published by scholarship@western, 2016 t a b l e 3 . m a r g i n a l e f f e c t s f r o m p r o b i t m o d e l s f o r s c h o o l o u t c o m e s a n d e x p e r i e n c e s o f c h i l d r e n a g e s 7 t o 1 4 f r o m t h e 2 0 0 1 a b o r i g i n a l p e o p l e s s u r v e y o f c h i l d r e n a n d y o u t h (continued) r e c e i v e d a n a w a r d f o r g r a d e s a w a r d s f o r o t h e r (1) (2) (3) (4) (1) (2) (3) (4) mother attended residential school -0.011 (0.039) -0.009 (0.040) -0.13*** (0.049) -0.14*** (0.049) -0.061 (0.051) -0.051 (0.052) -0.112** (0.052) -0.120** (0.052) child is female 0.097*** (0.051) 0.099*** (0.052) 0.099*** (0.052) 0.097*** (0.052) -0.021 (0.051) -0.02 (0.052) -0.021 (0.052) -0.021 (0.052) age of child 0.008* (0.051) 0.008* (0.052) 0.008* (0.052) 0.009* (0.052) 0.015*** (0.051) 0.014*** (0.052) 0.014*** (0.052) 0.015*** (0.052) age of mother -0.001 (0.051) -0.001 (0.052) -0.002 (0.052) -0.001 (0.052) 0.000 (0.051) 0.000 (0.052) 0.000 (0.052) 0.000 (0.052) child’s maternal grandmother aboriginal -0.016 (0.052) -0.025 (0.052) -0.030 (0.052) -0.035 (0.052) child’s maternal grandfather aboriginal 0.003 (0.052) -0.001 (0.052) -0.027 (0.052) -0.028 (0.052) child’s paternal grandfather aboriginal 0.041 (0.052) 0.036 (0.052) 0.05 (0.052) 0.047 (0.052) child’s paternal grandmother aboriginal -0.01 (0.052) -0.021 (0.052) -0.019 (0.052) -0.024 (0.052) mother’s sibling attended residential school 0.167*** (0.052) 0.165*** (0.052) 0.086*** (0.052) 0.079** (0.052) pseudo r-squared 0.021 0.023 0.032 0.03 0.026 0.029 0.031 0.029 model chi-squared 74.98267 77.26974 103.4433 99.4829 91.48752 98.29998 103.933 95.88382 log likelihood -3438.42 -3432.56 -3399.17 -3405.62 -3236.68 -3229.07 -3220.06 -3228.87 (continued) 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.5 t a b l e 3 . m a r g i n a l e f f e c t s f r o m p r o b i t m o d e l s f o r s c h o o l o u t c o m e s a n d e x p e r i e n c e s o f c h i l d r e n a g e s 7 t o 1 4 f r o m t h e 2 0 0 1 a b o r i g i n a l p e o p l e s s u r v e y o f c h i l d r e n a n d y o u t h (continued) g e t a l o n g w e l l w i t h t e a c h e r s l i k e s c h o o l o f t e n a n d m o r e (1) (2) (3) (4) (1) (2) (3) (4) mother attended residential school -0.052 (0.047) -0.028 (0.05) -0.068 (0.049) -0.079* (0.048) -0.090* (0.051) -0.102** (0.052) -0.137** (0.052) -0.136** (0.052) child is female 0.089*** (0.024) 0.090*** (0.024) 0.089*** (0.024) 0.089*** (0.024) 0.108*** (0.051) 0.111*** (0.052) 0.111*** (0.052) 0.107*** (0.052) age of child -0.03*** (0.005) -0.03*** (0.005) -0.03*** (0.005) -0.03*** (0.005) -0.03*** (0.051) -0.03*** (0.052) -0.03*** (0.052) -0.03*** (0.052) age of mother 0.003 (0.051) 0.002 (0.052) 0.001 (0.052) 0.003 (0.052) 0.004** (0.051) 0.004** (0.052) 0.004** (0.052) 0.004* (0.052) child’s maternal grandmother aboriginal -0.013 (0.052) -0.016 (0.052) 0.01 (0.052) 0.008 (0.052) child’s maternal grandfather aboriginal -0.083* (0.052) -0.084** (0.052) -0.035 (0.052) -0.037 (0.052) child’s paternal grandfather aboriginal 0.049 (0.052) 0.048 (0.052) 0.107*** (0.052) 0.106*** (0.052) child’s paternal grandmother aboriginal -0.090** (0.052) -0.09*** (0.052) 0.002 (0.052) -0.001 (0.052) mother’s sibling attended residential school 0.063* (0.052) 0.04 (0.052) 0.043 (0.052) 0.054** (0.052) pseudo r-squared 0.03 0.038 0.039 0.031 0.052 0.063 0.064 0.054 model chi-squared 83.96365 107.4775 109.9798 85.24711 86.12395 105.6421 111.1879 93.322 log likelihood -3649.15 -3620.55 -3616.85 -3647.61 -2636.87 -2606.09 -2603.11 -2631.96 n ~5,000 ~5,000 ~5,000 ~5,000 ~5,000 ~5,000 ~5,000 ~5,000 note. this table reports the marginal effects of each variable on the left either on the probability of the child repeating a grade, being suspended or expelled, winning an award for their grades, winning an award for other activities, getting along very well with their teachers, and looking forward to going to school often or more. the effect's robust standard error is given in parentheses. all specifications include a set of dummy variables for the child’s region of residence. the region of residence is divided into northern and southern regions of each province. this division groups together census divisions above the 52-degree latitude and those below. i also include an additional category for the coastal region of british columbia, so there are 11 regions in total and the omitted category is the northern half of british columbia. the estimates of the geography variables are not reported. the asterisks indicate the level of significance: * p < .10, ** p < .05, *** p < .01 19 feir: the intergenerational effects of residential schools published by scholarship@western, 2016 the last two panels of table 3 contain the marginal effect of mothers’ residential school attendance on the likelihood of their children getting along with their teachers very well and liking school often or more. there is a negative correlation between children getting along very well with their teachers and liking school often with mothers’ residential school attendance. this correlation is always statistically significant for liking school often or more. however, in the case of both dependent variables, the negative correlation becomes larger as more family controls are added, suggesting that these ancestry characteristics are positively associated with these positive school experiences. in my preferred specification (specification 4), children whose mother attended residential school are about 8 percentage points less likely to get along with their teachers and nearly 14 percentage points less likely to enjoy school almost all of the time. if these school experience variables are treated either as continuous or categorical variables, these negative correlations are even more precisely estimated and robust (these results are presented in appendix table a2). from these models, the findings of both looking forward to school and getting along with one’s teachers are more precisely estimated and again, a robust negative relationship between school experiences and residential school attendance is found. taking all these findings together, a mother’s residential school attendance and her child’s educational experiences are negatively correlated.14 this implies on average mothers who attended residential school may have had poorer educational experiences than those who had not attended residential school, but there still may be substantial heterogeneity in experiences. in addition, given the historical context in which the mothers in my sample attended residential school, these negative experiences might reasonably be assumed to be less negative than in earlier eras. as shown by the statistics in table 1 and 2, there are significant differences in parental characteristics. while i cannot completely test the hypothesis, i can look for evidence that differences in a mother’s socio-economic characteristics and cultural connectedness explain the correlation between mother’s residential school attendance and child school experiences.15 the socio-economic factors i include are whether the child lives in a two-parent household, whether there are more than six people in the home, whether the dwelling is in need of repair, the number of siblings in the home, economic family income, and whether the child eats breakfast every day. i also condition on whether the mother has a high school diploma or bachelor’s degree or higher, and whether the child lives on reserve. finally, i condition on several cultural outcomes including whether the child has only aboriginal ancestry, whether they are a registered indian, whether they speak an aboriginal language at home, whether speaking an aboriginal language is important to the mother, and whether the child speaks an aboriginal language. i present models that control for these factors in table 4. if adding these factors causes the marginal effect of a mother’s residential school attendance on her children’s outcomes to significantly reduce in size, then it is common to view this as evidence that these factors explain or mitigate the effect of residential school attendance. 14 again, caution should be taken in interpreting this correlation is causal, as the controls here may not fully address the non-random selection of mother’s into residential school. 15 previous work has shown that cultural connectedness can support resilience (berry, 1999), but other work has shown cultural divides between families and the education system (such as language barriers) can result in worse child school performance (barnes et al., 2005; battisti, friesen, & krauth, 2014) so the impact of aspects of a child’s environment on the educational outcomes is not clear. 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.5 t a b l e 4 . t h e m a r g i n a l e f f e c t o f r e s i d e n t i a l s c h o o l a t t e n d a n c e o n c h i l d r e n ’ s s c h o o l e x p e r i e n c e s c o n d i t i o n i n g o n p a r e n t a l a n d o t h e r c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s r e p e a t e d a g r a d e s u s p e n d e d o r e x p e l l e d a w a r d s f o r g r a d e s a w a r d f o r o t h e r g e t a l o n g w e l l w i t h t e a c h e r l i k e s c h o o l o f t e n o r m o r e mother attended residential school 0.010 (0.023) 0.042** (0.021) -0.130*** (0.050) -0.104** (0.051) -0.069 (0.047) -0.138** (0.056) gender of child -0.078*** (0.012) -0.067*** (0.01) 0.100*** (0.023) -0.019 (0.021) 0.095*** (0.024) 0.114*** (0.02) age of child 0.016*** (0.002) 0.027*** (0.003) 0.010** (0.005) 0.015*** (0.004) -0.030*** (0.005) -0.022*** (0.004) age of mother 0.000 (0.001) -0.002** (0.001) -0.001 (0.002) -0.001 (0.002) 0.001 (0.002) 0.004* (0.002) mother has a high school diploma or higher -0.001 (0.014) 0.012 (0.014) 0.000 (0.028) 0.066*** (0.025) 0.016 (0.031) 0.012 (0.025) mother has a bachelor’s degree or higher -0.081*** (0.015) -0.036** (0.016) 0.066 (0.057) 0.004 (0.06) 0.007 (0.063) 0.034 (0.047) two parent household -0.024* (0.013) -0.008 (0.011) -0.008 (0.026) -0.03 (0.023) 0.024 (0.027) 0.023 (0.023) child lives in home with six or more 0.022 (0.016) -0.022** (0.010) 0.007 (0.025) -0.011 (0.026) -0.048 (0.03) 0.006 (0.02) child lives in dwelling in need of repair 0.016 (0.013) -0.002 (0.011) 0.034 (0.024) 0.034 (0.022) 0.001 (0.026) 0.033 (0.022) number of siblings of child 0.009*** (0.003) 0.005** (0.002) -0.005 (0.006) -0.008 (0.005) -0.007 (0.006) -0.007 (0.005) economic family income of child (1,000s) -0.003 (0.002) -0.003 (0.002) -0.001 (0.004) 0.005 (0.005) 0.004 (0.005) 0.008** (0.004) child eats breakfast every day -0.035** (0.018) -0.060*** (0.016) 0.044 (0.029) 0.000 (0.025) 0.075*** (0.028) 0.083*** (0.023) (continued) 21 feir: the intergenerational effects of residential schools published by scholarship@western, 2016 t a b l e 4 . t h e m a r g i n a l e f f e c t o f r e s i d e n t i a l s c h o o l a t t e n d a n c e o n c h i l d r e n ’ s s c h o o l e x p e r i e n c e s c o n d i t i o n i n g o n p a r e n t a l a n d o t h e r c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s ( c o n t i n u e d ) r e p e a t e d a g r a d e s u s p e n d e d o r e x p e l l e d a w a r d s f o r g r a d e s a w a r d f o r o t h e r g e t a l o n g w e l l w i t h t e a c h e r l i k e s c h o o l o f t e n o r m o r e child is a registered indian 0.013 (0.029) 0.024 (0.02) -0.04 (0.042) -0.002 (0.039) 0.004 (0.051) -0.003 (0.035) child has only aboriginal ancestry -0.006 (0.03) -0.018 (0.02) 0.036 (0.043) -0.045 (0.038) 0.021 (0.051) 0.049 (0.043) mother and child on reserve 0.017 (0.014) 0.009 (0.011) 0.048** (0.023) 0.065*** (0.022) -0.012 (0.025) -0.026 (0.02) the child speaks an aboriginal language -0.001 (0.013) -0.002 (0.011) 0.086*** (0.024) 0.111*** (0.02) 0.043 (0.026) 0.026 (0.018) mother thinks her child learning an aboriginal language is very important 0.029* (0.016) -0.001 (0.011) 0.051** (0.025) 0.025 (0.022) 0.063** (0.026) 0.006 (0.02) the child’s first language was an aboriginal one -0.030** (0.013) -0.016 (0.012) -0.085** (0.033) -0.104*** (0.033) 0.029 (0.029) 0.013 (0.022) the family speaks an aboriginal language at home -0.042*** (0.016) 0.042 (0.031) -0.053 (0.05) -0.110** (0.046) 0.004 (0.046) -0.016 (0.047) pseudo r-squared 0.155 0.178 0.048 0.057 0.05 0.085 model chi-squared 476.9861 419.654 142.3232 174.2869 142.6746 165.381 log likelihood -2075.61 -1622.66 -3345.18 -3134.85 -3574.68 -2545.8 n ~5,000 ~5,000 ~5,000 ~5,000 ~5,000 ~5,000 note. this table reports the marginal effects of each variable on the left either on the probability of the child repeating a grade, being suspended or expelled, winning an award for their grades, winning an award for other activities, getting along very well with their teachers, and looking forward to going to school often or more. the effect's robust standard error is given in parentheses. all specifications include a set of dummy variables for the child’s region of residence. the region of residence is divided into northern and southern regions of each province. this division groups together census divisions above the 52-degree latitude and those below. i also include an additional category for the coastal region of british columbia, so there are 11 regions in total and the omitted category is the northern half of british columbia. the estimates of the geography variables are not reported. the specifications include the dummy variables for a child having aboriginal ancestry from the maternal grandmother, grandfather and paternal grandmother and grandfather as well as for whether the mother’s sibling also attended residential school. the asterisks indicate the level of significance: * p < .10, ** p < .05, *** p < .01 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.5 the first thing to note is that the coefficients on the socio-economic variables and mother’s characteristics are of the expected sign in general and a number of the coefficients are statistically different than zero. having a higher number of siblings tends to increase the probability of repeating a grade or being suspended. eating breakfast every day is the most consistent predictor of better educational outcomes for children. if the child was reported to eat breakfast every day they were 3.5 percentage points less likely to repeat a grade, 6 percentage points less likely to be expelled, and nearly 8 percent more likely to get along very well with their teachers or like school often or more. the results also suggest having a better educated mother is generally associated with better educational outcomes for her children.16 if a child’s mother has a bachelor’s degree, the child was about 12 percentage points more likely to be reported to like school almost always and to win awards for their grades. these children were also 15 percentage points more likely to have won an award for something other than academics. the children of mothers with a bachelor’s degree were also 4 percentage points less likely to be suspended or expelled. economic family income was not significant in most specifications, but was positively and significantly associated with looking forward to going to school. if i were to exclude the grandparent ancestry questions, then increases in income would be significantly associated with a decreased likelihood of expulsion. whether the child was a registered indian and having only aboriginal ancestry are not significantly correlated with children’s outcomes. while living on reserve is not statistically significant in other specifications, children living on reserve were more likely to win awards for their grades and for other activities. this may be due to the types of school children on reserve attend on average—for example, perhaps on-reserve schools have more awards to give or one’s mothers notice or care about more. it could also be that children are more likely to apply themselves or be involved in activities in these schools (richards & scott, 2009). the variables indicating aboriginal language knowledge, use, and importance have mixed effects. while none of these factors are significant in how often the child looks forward to going to school, children whose mothers believe that knowledge of an aboriginal language is very important are more likely to get along well with their teachers and are more likely to win awards for their grades. if the child’s first language was an aboriginal one, or the family speaks an aboriginal language at home, the child is less likely to win awards, but they are more likely to win awards if they can speak an aboriginal language. this may suggest aboriginal language knowledge encourages good outcomes in school, as long as it is not correlated with lack of full fluency in standard english (battisti et al., 2014; o’gorman & pandey, 2015). the correlations of aboriginal language knowledge with the likelihood of repeating a grade seem inverted to what one would expect given the signs in the other models. this is somewhat difficult to explain. however, despite the fact many of the variables in the model are significantly correlated with children’s educational outcomes, from the first row of table 4 it can be seen that the negative correlation between a mother’s residential school attendance and her child’s educational outcomes and experiences remains with little reduction in magnitude. in estimates not reported here, i show that if i condition on a set of 16 this is in line with previous literature (see currie & moretti, 2003 for an example). 23 feir: the intergenerational effects of residential schools published by scholarship@western, 2016 child health characteristics17 or add the same measure as bougie and senécal (2010) for food security the intergenerational effect of residential schooling remains (see feir, 2015).18 the another possible explanation for the negative correlation between mother’s residential school attendance and her children’s outcomes is the negative effect of residential school on a mother’s parenting skills, mental health, or perceptions about aboriginal and non-aboriginal people and societies. while i cannot empirically investigate many of these factors directly, prior literature suggests each of these explanations is plausible. many of the educational outcomes studied here are not discrete events, but rather the culmination of a number of a child’s experiences. for example, suspension or expulsion is likely influenced by poor school experiences and attendance, their parents’ ability to act as advocates for their children, alienation from the school, or perceived behavioural problems (morrison et al., 2001; tobin & sugai, 1999). many other factors, including being identified as having behavioural problems, are often highly correlated with unstable home lives (mcbride & mckee, 2001). while the evidence is mixed, there is a building empirical literature that finds negative correlations between residential school attendance and mental health (bombay, matheson, & anisman, 2011; cariboo tribal council, 1991; elias et al., 2012; nuu-chah-nulth tribal council, 1994).19 there is also qualitative evidence that suggests residential schooling leads to cooler, harsher or violent parenting styles (evans-campbell, 2008; stonefish, 2007; stout & peters, 2011; trc, 2015, pp. 218-219). residential schooling could impact children is through parental perceptions. residential school survivors have been shown in some samples to be less likely to trust the government (bombay, matheson & anisman, 2013). since trust attitudes are intergenerationally correlated (dohmen, falk, huffman, & sunde, 2012), the residential school attendees and their children may be less likely to trust and invest in western school institutions. aboriginal children and their parents’ reporting of their school experiences have been summarized by numerous authors as embedding a cultural and experiential divide and a lack of trust of the school institutions more generally (bell & anderson, 2004; gunn et al., 2011; mcbride & mckee, 2001; silver et al., 2002). previous literature has also demonstrated that those people whose family members attended residential school are more likely to view their aboriginal heritage as an important aspect of their identity and thus more negatively experience discrimination (bombay, matheson, & anisman, 2014).20 these previous findings suggest that residential school attendance may magnify negative child school experiences in western educational settings. it may also increase the probability of expulsion or suspension because parents are less willing to act in advocacy roles for their children because of a mistrust of the school system more generally. while i can see no way 17 child health could affect educational outcomes by increasing the likelihood children would be absent from school or their ability to focus on their studies (currie, 2008). the measures of child health were height, body mass index, birth weight, and a dummy variable indicating the mother reports the child was in excellent health. 18 this finding contrasts with the results of bougie and senécal (2010) who found the effect of residential schooling from the parents to be negatively correlated with parental perceptions of child academic performance. this remains the case if i control for exclusively all the variables they investigate (including excluding all ancestry and sibling residential schooling variables). the difference in these findings could be due to differences in methodology, sample composition, and/or dependant variable. 19 mota et al. (2012), for example, do not find a negative correlation between residential schooling and health. 20 it is possible that these findings are due to the selection of families into residential school so all findings here could simply be due to unobservable variable bias. 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.5 to test this directly using the data i have available (nor can i test changes in parenting style or parental mental health), i can test a possible implication of this effect of residential schools. t h e i n t e r g e n e r a t i o n a l e f f e c t o f r e s i d e n t i a l s c h o o l o n r e s e r v e a n d o f f r e s e r v e the plausible change in parental attitudes discussed above would be in line with theories of cultural discontinuity (kanu, 2007) combined with theories that link historical trauma, identity centrality, and perceived discrimination. increased identification with ethnic minority ancestry has been shown to be correlated with a greater probability of perceived racial discrimination, which is associated with physiological stress (sellers & shelton, 2003). living off reserve and attending a public (nonaboriginal) school may increase the probability that children experience discrimination and this could worsen their experiences at school (bell & anderson, 2004; gunn et al., 2011; mcbride & mckee, 2001; silver et al., 2002). i provided evidence in table 2 that mother’s residential school attendance may make children more likely to live off reserve conditional on a set of observable factors. of all students who live on reserve in this age range, only 60 percent attend school on reserve (richards & scott, 2009), so place of residence has meaningful implications for type of school a child will attend. while the results in table 4 suggest this difference in place of residence (and thus possible type of school attended) does not explain the negative correlation between parental residential school attendance and children’s educational outcomes, the theories discussed above suggest that parental residential school attendance may affect their children differently depending on their social and educational context. table 5 reports results of the same models estimated as in table 3 but the relationship between mother’s residential school attendance and her child’s educational experiences is interacted with whether a child lived on reserve or not. the sign and statistical significance of this interaction term indicates whether the residential schooling has a different relationship with educational experiences on or off reserve.21 while the coefficients on the interaction term between mother’s residential school attendance and onreserve status are not statistically significant, the point estimate for the likelihood of winning awards for grades (the negative correlation between parental residential school attendance was 3 percentage points smaller) or other activities (4 percentage points smaller) is not economically small, possibly suggesting the conditional probability function for these outcomes is different depending on reserve status. however, these results are noisily estimated and the sample of reserves included here is highly selective. this noisy estimation could be partially due to the fact that place of residence is not a perfect predictor for the type of school a student attends. while the results are not completely clear, these findings may suggest that future research into both the cultural discontinuity and identity hypothesis is warranted with more precise data on type of school attended and more representative data of the on reserve population. 21 it should be noted that interaction terms and their interpretations can be problematic. for those wishing an in depth discussion of these issues, please see ali and norton (2003), greene (2010), and karaca-mandic, norton, and dowd (2012). 25 feir: the intergenerational effects of residential schools published by scholarship@western, 2016 t a b l e 5 . m a r g i n a l e f f e c t s f r o m p r o b i t m o d e l s f o r d i f f e r e n t i a l c o r r e l a t i o n o f m o t h e r ’ s r e s i d e n t i a l s c h o o l a t t e n d a n c e b y r e s e r v e s t a t u s r e p e a t e d a g r a d e s u s p e n d e d o r e x p e l l e d a w a r d s f o r g r a d e s a w a r d s f o r o t h e r g e t s a l o n g w e l l w i t h t e a c h e r s l i k e s s c h o o l o f t e n o r m o r e mother attended residential school 0.014 (0.024) 0.044 (0.03) -0.137** (0.065) -0.125* (0.065) -0.082 (0.072) -0.164** (0.079) child is female -0.080*** (0.013) -0.066*** (0.012) 0.100*** (0.023) -0.02 (0.022) 0.090*** (0.024) 0.111*** (0.02) age of child 0.017*** (0.003) 0.030*** (0.003) 0.008* (0.005) 0.014*** (0.005) -0.033*** (0.005) -0.025*** (0.004) age of mother -0.001 (0.001) -0.002** (0.001) -0.002 (0.002) 0.000 (0.002) 0.001 (0.002) 0.004** (0.002) child’s maternal grandmother is aboriginal 0.035 (0.025) 0.009 (0.018) -0.033 (0.035) -0.041 (0.032) -0.016 (0.039) 0.01 (0.033) child’s maternal grandfather is aboriginal 0.013 (0.024) -0.027 (0.02) -0.03 (0.033) -0.032 (0.032) -0.095*** (0.036) 0.000 (0.032) child’s paternal grandfather is aboriginal 0.030 (0.031) 0.031* (0.018) -0.010 (0.038) -0.036 (0.038) -0.085** (0.043) -0.036 (0.033) child’s paternal grandmother is aboriginal 0.054* (0.03) 0.007 (0.02) 0.026 (0.038) 0.038 (0.037) 0.047 (0.041) 0.106*** (0.034) mother’s sibling attended residential school 0.037 (0.029) -0.006 (0.012) 0.162*** (0.025) 0.080*** (0.031) 0.062* (0.033) 0.043 (0.028) mother and child live on reserve 0.035*** (0.014) 0.011 (0.012) 0.064*** (0.022) 0.055*** (0.02) 0.003 (0.024) -0.012 (0.02) o n r e s e r v e x m o t h e r a t t e n d e d r e s i d e n t i a l s c h o o l 0 . 0 0 4 ( 0 . 0 2 9 ) 0 . 0 0 5 ( 0 . 0 2 7 ) 0 . 0 3 0 ( 0 . 0 5 7 ) 0 . 0 4 3 ( 0 . 0 5 6 ) 0 . 0 3 8 ( 0 . 0 7 5 ) 0 . 0 5 5 ( 0 . 0 4 6 ) pseudo r-squared 0.133 0.153 0.034 0.034 0.039 0.065 model chi-squared 365.9598 342.4851 109.8844 110.3902 110.7191 111.5724 log likelihood -2129.53 -1671.52 -3391.4 -3212.66 -3616.4 -2601.64 n ~5,000 ~5,000 ~5,000 ~5,000 ~5,000 ~5,000 note. this table reports the marginal effects of each variable on the left either on the probability of the child repeating a grade, being suspended or expelled, winning an award for their grades, winning an award for other activities, getting along very well with their teachers, and looking forward to going to school often or more. the effect's robust standard error is given in parentheses. all specifications include a set of dummy variables for the child’s region of residence. the region of residence is divided into northern and southern regions of each province. this division groups together census divisions above the 52-degree latitude and those below. i also include an additional category for the coastal region of british columbia, so there are 11 regions in total and the omitted category is the southern half of british columbia. the estimates of the geography variables are not reported. the asterisks indicate the level of significance: * p < .10, ** p < 0.05, *** p < 0.01 26 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.5 m o t h e r s ’ s i b l i n g s ’ r e s i d e n t i a l s c h o o l a t t e n d a n c e the final possibility i explore is the extent to which the intergenerational effects of residential school may have depended on the mother’s experiences at residential school. while i have very little information on mothers’ residential schooling experience directly, i do know whether their siblings also attended residential school. while it was not uncommon for siblings to be separated in residential schools, they were not always. in fact, former students who told their stories to the trc often mentioned sibling support (trc, 2015). these stories of support may be relevant in understanding how residential school experiences affect future generations, especially since previous literature suggests that siblings may play an important protective role in stressful or traumatic environments. milevsky and levitt (2005) showed, in their sample of 11to15-year-olds, sibling support was associated with higher self-esteem, more positive school attitudes, increased school adaptation, and that sibling support could potentially compensate for absent parental support. in addition, siblings may serve an important role in the upbringing and teaching of younger siblings (farver, 1993). other work suggests that siblings being present may aid in moderating the stresses experienced by socio-economically disadvantaged families (hetherington, 1989; rutter, 1990; sandler, 1980). there is also evidence that in extreme circumstances of parental unavailability or trauma, siblings can compensate for these parental relationships (bank, 1992; bank & kahn, 1982; dunn & kendrick, 1982). even if siblings are separated during their schooling year, siblings experiencing the same events may give them additional support later in life (avioli, 1989; milevsky, 2005). if mothers were protected from the more negative possible impacts of residential school because their siblings shared similar experiences or were present while they attended school, their children may be less negatively affected as well. to explore the possibility that the residential schooling experience may have varied significantly depending on whether someone attended residential school with other members of their family, i allow the conditional probability of each of the educational experience outcomes to be differentially affected by a mother’s residential school attendance depending on whether she had a sibling that also attended residential school. i do this by estimating the same model in table 3 but now including an interaction term. the sign and statistical significance of this interaction term is informative as to whether the negative educational experiences correlated with mother’s residential school attendance are different if a mother also had one of their siblings attend residential school. while the results in table 6 are again noisy for many of the educational outcomes, the signs are largely in the anticipated direction with the exception of getting along very well with teachers. however, there is a significantly smaller negative correlation between receiving an award for other activities, and liking school with mother’s residential school attendance. these findings are consistent with siblings playing some mitigating role in the effects of the residential schooling system. 27 feir: the intergenerational effects of residential schools published by scholarship@western, 2016 t a b l e 6 . d i f f e r e n t i a l c o r r e l a t i o n o f m o t h e r ’ s r e s i d e n t i a l s c h o o l a t t e n d a n c e b y s i b l i n g ’ s a t t e n d a n c e r e p e a t a g r a d e s u s p e n d e d o r e x p e l l e d a w a r d s f o r g r a d e s a w a r d f o r o t h e r g e t a l o n g w i t h t e a c h e r s l i k e s c h o o l o f t e n o r m o r e mother attended residential school 0.030 (0.039) 0.051 (0.036) -0.192** (0.08) -0.217*** (0.073) -0.03 (0.062) -0.211** (0.093) child is female -0.081*** (0.013) -0.066*** (0.012) 0.099*** (0.023) -0.021 (0.022) 0.090*** (0.024) 0.111*** (0.02) age of child 0.017*** (0.003) 0.030*** (0.003) 0.008* (0.005) 0.014*** (0.005) -0.033*** (0.005) -0.025*** (0.004) age of mother -0.001 (0.001) -0.002** (0.001) -0.002 (0.002) 0.000 (0.002) 0.001 (0.002) 0.004** (0.002) child’s maternal grandmother is aboriginal 0.039 (0.024) 0.01 (0.018) -0.024 (0.035) -0.033 (0.032) -0.017 (0.039) 0.009 (0.033) child’s maternal grandfather is aboriginal 0.018 (0.023) -0.025 (0.02) -0.02 (0.033) -0.023 (0.031) -0.095*** (0.035) 0.000 (0.032) child’s paternal grandfather is aboriginal 0.035 (0.031) 0.033* (0.017) 0.000 (0.038) -0.027 (0.038) -0.085** (0.043) -0.036 (0.033) child’s paternal grandmother is aboriginal 0.059** (0.029) 0.009 (0.019) 0.037 (0.037) 0.048 (0.037) 0.047 (0.041) 0.106*** (0.034) mother’s sibling attended residential school 0.049 (0.036) -0.003 (0.014) 0.143*** (0.026) 0.044 (0.034) 0.078** (0.032) 0.014 (0.026) m o t h e r a t t e n d e d & h e r s i b l i n g a t t e n d e d r e s i d e n t i a l s c h o o l 0 . 0 2 8 ( 0 . 0 4 ) 0 . 0 0 7 ( 0 . 0 3 ) 0 . 0 9 9 ( 0 . 0 7 ) 0 . 1 4 1 * * * ( 0 . 0 5 5 ) 0 . 0 6 6 ( 0 . 0 9 ) 0 . 0 8 9 * ( 0 . 0 5 3 ) pseudo r-squared 0.131 0.152 0.033 0.033 0.039 0.065 model chi-squared 350.2897 329.6633 106.1703 109.182 112.2169 113.7786 log likelihood -2133.7 -1672.29 -3397.02 -3214.01 -3618.2 -2599.67 n ~5,000 ~5,000 ~5,000 ~5,000 ~5,000 ~5,000 note. this table reports the marginal effects of each variable on the left either on the probability of the child repeating a grade, being suspended or expelled, winning an award for their grades, winning an award for other activities, getting along very well with their teachers, and looking forward to going to school often or more. the effect's robust standard error is given in parentheses. all specifications include a set of 10 dummy variables for the child’s region of residence. the region of residence is divided into northern and southern regions of each province using census divisions above the 52-degree latitude and those below. i also include a category for the coastal region of british columbia. the omitted category is the northern half of british columbia. the estimates of the geography variables are not reported. the asterisks indicate the level of significance: * p < .10, ** p < .05, *** p < .01. 28 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.5 obviously, information on sibling residential school attendance is very crude measure of sibling support during residential schooling years and interpreting interaction terms in non-linear models is difficult. for example, if a child had numerous siblings it would be more likely that at least one of her siblings attended residential school. in fact, it is possible that the differing intergenerational effects of residential schooling by siblings’ residential school attendance may be due to a spurious correlation between residential schooling, parental family size, and children’s educational outcomes. it is also possible that mothers who attend residential school and who did not have siblings who attended are a more non-randomly selected group of mothers than the mothers who did have siblings attend. it could also be possible that mothers in these groups attended different types of residential schools than those who attended residential school with their siblings. all of these alternative explanations for my findings are at least equally as plausible as siblings acting as a mitigating force against the negative effects of residential school attendance. future work should investigate the plausibility of each of these alternatives. d i s c u s s i o n a n d c o n c l u s i o n i have presented empirical evidence that suggests residential schooling has negative intergenerational consequences on children’s educational experiences, such as suspension and expulsion, and winning awards in school. i have also demonstrated—conditional on a set of observable factors—that the children of women who have attended residential school are less likely to look forward to school and are less likely to get along with their teachers. these findings are not explained by the socio-economic characteristics of their households that i included in my models. this could imply that the intergenerational correlation may be explained by unmeasured factors such as parental mental health, attitudes towards education, or parenting style. i demonstrate that mother’s residential school attendance is correlated with living off reserve, conditional on set of observable background characteristics. this motivates me to investigate whether the intergenerational correlation is different on and off reserve. while the point estimates suggest the negative intergenerational correlation of residential school attendance and educational experiences (such as liking school) differ by reserve status, the results are noisily estimated and warrant further study. i also demonstrate that the intergenerational negative correlation between mother’s residential school attendance and her children’s educational experiences seems to be mitigated for mothers whose siblings also attended residential school. while there are many possible interpretations of this finding, it may be that siblings played an important role in mitigating the negative influences of residential schooling. there are a number of limitations to the results presented here that have been discussed throughout the article. the first is that unobservable variable bias may be a problem and could be driving the correlations i observe. in addition, the reserves included in my sample are not representative, and my measure of whether a mother attended residential school with her sibling is only a rough proxy of sibling support. in addition, all my variables are responses from the mother about the child and may measure parental perceptions rather than child experiences. missing data due to non-response is also a non-trivial problem. however, while the work done here is preliminarily, my results suggest several avenues and policy options that should be explored more thoroughly. first, my results suggest that early intervention may be necessary to combat the intergenerational legacy of residential schools. before children graduate or 29 feir: the intergenerational effects of residential schools published by scholarship@western, 2016 drop out of high school, they are more likely to be suspended or expelled, and to have less positive school experiences before the age of 15. the intergenerational consequences of residential school on current students’ educational experiences may be deeply embedded in the ways they experience school and how they may engage with the school system. policies should be sensitive to this legacy of the residential schooling system and should take it into account the higher rates of expulsion, and differential school experiences of youth. second, the results suggest there are possible gains from preserving family units as much as possible through a child’s educational years. many registered indian children must still leave their reserves if they wish to attend high school (mackay & myles, 1995; talaga, 2015). the fact that i find evidence (albeit noisily) that the negative intergenerational correlation of residential schooling seems to be greater for mothers who did not also have siblings that attended residential school may suggest that siblings provide an important source of support during these transitionary and potentially difficult times. this is also in line with the literature on the importance of sibling support discussed above. in addition, this finding may have implications for the child welfare system where aboriginal children are overrepresented (sinha & leduc, 2011). however, the modern schooling and child welfare context have significant differences from the context i study and my extrapolation should be taken with caution. a third possible policy avenue for future research is to examine the differential effects of residential schooling based on current schooling contexts. when combined with other literature, this work (inconclusively) suggests that the intergenerational correlation of residential school and education may be magnified off reserve. if this is true, educators may want to ensure that they create environments that are supportive of aboriginal cultural retention (berry, 1999; mcbride & mckee, 2001). school environments that promote aboriginal cultural retention, possibly by offering language courses, may mitigate some of the negative school experiences of aboriginal children that could be exacerbated by parental residential school attendance (o’gorman & pandey, 2015). the inclusion of culturally relevant curricula has also been shown in other minority groups to significantly increase school retention and performance (dee & penner, 2016). it has been shown that teachers with similar characteristics to their students (such as race or ethnicity) are associated with improved student outcomes (fairlie, hoffmann, & oreopoulos, 2011; hoffmann & oreopoulos, 2009) and this has been shown in aboriginal contexts as well (o’gorman & pandey, 2015). in addition, friesen and krauth (2010) suggested that aboriginal children living off reserve, if anything, perform better when they are educated with aboriginal peers. kanu (2007) also suggested that integrating aboriginal cultural perspectives and knowledge into the classroom may improve academic achievement and silver and colleagues (2002) suggested similar policies may increase school retention. berry (1999) and kirmayer, brass, and tait (2000) have argued that aboriginal cultural retention is preventive against the negative impacts of colonization more generally. these policy avenues may be more or less effective depending on family histories with residential school exposure. another possible implication may be the extension of additional support services for mothers that attended residential school. while the indian residential school settlement agreement (irssa) did establish the former aboriginal healing foundation (ahf) for a time and provided funds for healing through the common experience payment (cep) (trc, 2012), more support may be necessary. some survivor services do exist (such as those provided by the indian residential school survivor society or health canada though the indian residential schools resolution health support program), additional 30 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.5 programming to cope with the negative educational intergenerational effects may prove useful. support services for other family members who play active roles in supporting children perhaps should be made as available as well. further work should be done to investigate the roles of these other family members in the intergenerational effects of residential school. the last policy implication is that we require more complete data collection. the results i presented suggest that context may matter substantially for the intergenerational effects of residential schools, although the ability to learn about this context is currently limited. the apscy 2001 does not have extensive information on a child’s school environment, and more recent waves of the apscy do not contain children who live on reserve as 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(2006). through a wide angle lens: acquiring and maintaining power, position, and knowledge through boarding schools. in c. e. trafzer, j. a. keller, & l. sisquoc (eds.), boarding school blues: revisiting american indian educational experiences. omaha: university of nebraska press. talaga, tanya. (2015, october 7). thunder bay high school is home away from home for first nations students, inquest told. the star. retrieved from: http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2015/10/07/thunder-bay-high-school-is-home-awayfrom-home-for-first-nations-students-inquest-told.html tobin, t. j., & sugai, g. m. (1999). using sixth-grade school records to predict school violence, chronic discipline problems, and high school outcomes. journal of emotional and behavioral disorders, 7, 40-53. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/106342669900700105 truth and reconciliation commission of canada (trc). (2012). they came for the children: canada, indigenous peoples, and residential schools. winnipeg: author. 38 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.5 truth and reconciliation commission of canada (trc). (2015). honouring the truth, reconciling for the future: summary of the final report of the truth and reconciliation commission of canada. retrieved from http://www.trc.ca/websites/trcinstitution/file/2015/findings/exec_summary_2015_05_31 _web_o.pdf wald, j., & losen, d. j. (2003). defining and redirecting the school-to-prison pipeline. new directions for student leadership, 99, 9-15. white, j. p., maxim, p., & spence, n. d. (2004). an examination of educational success. in j. white, p. maxim, & d. beavon (eds.), aboriginal policy research: setting the agenda for change (vol. 1, pp. 129-145). toronto: thompson educational publishing. 39 feir: the intergenerational effects of residential schools published by scholarship@western, 2016 a p p e n d i x t a b l e a 1 . v a r i a b l e l i s t a n d d e s c r i p t i o n v a r i a b l e l i s t e x p l a n a t i o n d e p e n d e n t v a r i a b l e s repeat a grade equals 1 if the child has ever repeated a grade and zero otherwise award for grades equals 1 if the child has ever received an award for their grades and zero otherwise award for other equals 1 if the child has ever received an award at school for something other than his or her grades and zero otherwise suspended or expelled equals 1 if the child has ever been suspended or expelled and zero otherwise get along with teachers very well equals 1 if the parent answered that the child got along with his or her teachers "very well, no problems" and zero otherwise likes school often or more equals 1 if the parent answered the child looked forward to going to school "often" or "almost always" i n d e p e n d e n t v a r i a b l e s mother’s sibling attended residential school equals 1 if the mother had a sibling that attended residential school and zero otherwise child speaks or understands an aboriginal language equals 1 if the child speaks or understands an aboriginal language and zero otherwise mother believes aboriginal language knowledge is very important equals 1 if the mother responded that her child knowing an aboriginal language is "very important" and zero otherwise child’s mother tongue is an aboriginal language equals 1 if the child's mother tongue is aboriginal language and zero otherwise child speaks an aboriginal language at home equals 1 if the child speaks an aboriginal language at home and zero otherwise child is a registered indian equals 1 if the child is registered under the indian act and zero otherwise the child has only aboriginal ancestry equals 1 if the child's ancestry is only aboriginal and zero otherwise (determined using a derived variable in the apscy on aboriginal ancestry) mother has a high school diploma or more equals 1 if the mother's highest level of schooling is a high school diploma or more and zero otherwise mother has a bachelor’s degree or more equals 1 if the mother's highest level of school is a bachelor’s degree or more and zero otherwise child lives on reserve equals 1 if a child lives on a reserve and zero otherwise child is in a two parent family equals 1 if a child has two parents in the household and zero otherwise six or more live in same house as child equals 1 if six or more people live in the same house as the child and zero otherwise dwelling of child in need of repair equals 1 if the child lives in a dwelling in need of repair and zero otherwise child eats breakfast every day equals 1if the child eats breakfast every day and zero otherwise (continued) 40 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.5 t a b l e a 1 . v a r i a b l e l i s t a n d d e s c r i p t i o n ( c o n t i n u e d ) v a r i a b l e l i s t e x p l a n a t i o n child’s paternal grandmother is aboriginal equals 1 if the child's paternal grandmother is aboriginal child’s paternal grandfather is aboriginal equals 1 if the child's paternal grandfather is aboriginal child’s maternal grandmother is aboriginal equals 1 if the child's maternal grandmother is aboriginal child’s maternal grandfather is aboriginal equals 1 if the child's maternal grandfather is aboriginal child lives in ontario equals 1 if the child lives in ontario and zero otherwise child lives in manitoba equals 1 if the child lives in manitoba and zero otherwise child lives in saskatchewan equals 1 if the child lives in saskatchewan and zero otherwise child lives in alberta equals 1 if the child lives in alberta and zero otherwise child lives in british columbia equals 1 if the child lives in british columbia and zero otherwise number of siblings of child the number of siblings that the child is living with economic family income of child the economic family income (census defined economic family) age of child age of the child age of parent age of the mother child is female equals 1 if the child is female and zero otherwise 41 feir: the intergenerational effects of residential schools published by scholarship@western, 2016 t a b l e a 2 . s c h o o l e x p e r i e n c e o f c h i l d r e n w i t h e x p e r i e n c e t r e a t e d a s c a t e g o r i c a l o r c o n t i n u o u s v a r i a b l e o r d i n a r y l e a s t s q u a r e s g e t a l o n g w e l l w i t h t e a c h e r s l i k e s s c h o o l (1) (2) (3) (4) (1) (2) (3) (4) m o t h e r a t t e n d e d r e s i d e n t i a l s c h o o l 0 . 1 1 8 ( 0 . 0 7 3 ) 0 . 0 9 5 ( 0 . 0 7 8 ) 0 . 1 5 3 * ( 0 . 0 7 9 ) 0 . 1 6 2 * * ( 0 . 0 7 8 ) 0 . 2 3 9 * ( 0 . 1 3 1 ) 0 . 2 6 3 * ( 0 . 1 3 6 ) 0 . 4 2 4 * * ( 0 . 1 7 1 ) 0 . 4 2 1 * * ( 0 . 1 7 2 ) gender of child 0.154*** (0.037) 0.155*** (0.037) 0.154*** (0.037) 0.154*** (0.037) 0.287*** (0.055) 0.293*** (0.055) 0.291*** (0.055) 0.285*** (0.055) age of child -0.061*** (0.008) -0.062*** (0.008) -0.062*** (0.008) -0.061*** (0.008) -0.076*** (0.011) -0.077*** (0.011) -0.076*** (0.011) -0.075*** (0.011) age of mother 0.005* (0.003) 0.005 (0.003) 0.004 (0.003) 0.005* (0.003) 0.009** (0.005) 0.01** (0.004) 0.009** (0.004) 0.008* (0.005) child’s maternal grandmother is aboriginal 0.047 (0.065) 0.042 (0.064) 0.048 (0.081) 0.034 (0.082) child’s paternal grandfather is aboriginal -0.077 (0.063) -0.078 (0.063) -0.103 (0.099) -0.107 (0.098) child’s paternal grandfather is aboriginal 0.056 (0.057) 0.053 (0.057) 0.278*** (0.09) 0.27*** (0.09) child’s maternal grandfather is aboriginal -0.162*** (0.06) -0.168*** (0.061) -0.031 (0.086) -0.047 (0.083) mother’s sibling attended residential school 0.095* (0.054) 0.069 (0.053) 0.264*** (0.096) 0.284*** (0.1) adjusted r-squared 0.048 0.054 0.054 0.055 0.056 0.066 0.066 0.071 (continued) 42 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.5 t a b l e a 2 . s c h o o l e x p e r i e n c e o f c h i l d r e n w i t h e x p e r i e n c e t r e a t e d a s c a t e g o r i c a l o r c o n t i n u o u s v a r i a b l e (continued) o r d e r e d p r o b i t g e t a l o n g w e l l w i t h t e a c h e r s l i k e s c h o o l o f t e n o r m o r e (1) (2) (3) (4) (1) (2) (3) (4) mother attended residential school -0.171 (0.108) -0.128 (0.118) -0.220* (0.117) -0.237** (0.114) -0.231* (0.136) -0.246* (0.14) -0.445*** (0.171) -0.447*** (0.17) gender of child 0.241*** (0.058) 0.243*** (0.057) 0.242*** (0.057) 0.240*** (0.058) 0.348*** (0.064) 0.356*** (0.064) 0.354*** (0.063) 0.346*** (0.064) age of child -0.091*** (0.012) -0.093*** (0.012) -0.093*** (0.012) -0.091*** (0.012) -0.090*** (0.013) -0.092*** (0.013) -0.091*** (0.013) -0.090*** (0.013) age of mother 0.009* (0.005) 0.007 (0.005) 0.006 (0.005) 0.008 (0.005) 0.012** (0.006) 0.013** (0.006) 0.011** (0.006) 0.011* (0.006) child’s maternal grandmother is aboriginal 0.037 (0.102) 0.029 (0.102) 0.021 (0.096) 0.003 (0.096) child’s paternal grandmother is aboriginal -0.148 (0.103) -0.151 (0.103) -0.129 (0.115) -0.137 (0.115) child’s paternal grandfather is aboriginal 0.101 (0.093) 0.098 (0.093) 0.303*** (0.105) 0.295*** (0.106) child’s maternal grandfather is aboriginal -0.255*** (0.099) -0.263*** (0.1) -0.04 (0.100) -0.058 (0.098) mother’s sibling attended residential school 0.150* (0.087) 0.104 (0.084) 0.334*** (0.111) 0.348*** (0.113) last cut off constant -3.492*** (0.240) -3.751*** (0.261) -3.786*** (0.264) -3.502*** (0.240) -2.098*** (0.232) -2.059*** (0.253) -2.138*** (0.246) -2.138*** (0.228) fourth cut off constant -2.639*** (0.217) -2.897*** (0.239) -2.931*** (0.241) -2.649*** (0.217) -1.790*** (0.223) -1.747*** (0.244) -1.823*** (0.239) -1.827*** (0.220) third cut off constant -1.677*** (0.210) -1.930*** (0.235) -1.963*** (0.238) -1.686*** (0.210) -1.101*** (0.227) -1.051*** (0.250) -1.125*** (0.246) -1.135*** (0.225) (continued) 43 feir: the intergenerational effects of residential schools published by scholarship@western, 2016 t a b l e a 2 . s c h o o l e x p e r i e n c e o f c h i l d r e n w i t h e x p e r i e n c e t r e a t e d a s c a t e g o r i c a l o r c o n t i n u o u s v a r i a b l e (continued) o r d e r e d p r o b i t g e t a l o n g w e l l w i t h t e a c h e r s l i k e s c h o o l o f t e n o r m o r e (1) (2) (3) (4) (1) (2) (3) (4) fourth cut off constant -0.942*** (0.213) -1.191*** (0.237) -1.224*** (0.239) -0.951*** (0.214) -0.536** (0.225) -0.483* (0.247) -0.556** (0.244) -0.569** (0.223) pseudo r-squared 0.025 0.030 0.030 0.026 0.027 0.031 0.034 0.030 model chi-squared 114.6614 139.1055 140.8254 115.4781 114.2142 133.3376 151.0993 133.5584 categories 5 5 5 5 5 5 5 5 log likelihood -40053.7 -39874 -39850 -40041.9 -43886 -43713.9 -43600.3 -43758.9 n ~5,000 ~5,000 ~5,000 ~5,000 ~5,000 ~5,000 ~5,000 ~5,000 note. this table reports the coefficients associated with each variable on the left either on the measures “getting along with teachers,” and “looking forward to going to school.” higher numbers associated with these numbers means either more frequently gets along with teachers or looks forward to going to school more often. the effect's robust standard error is given in parentheses. all specifications include a set of dummy variables for the child’s region of residence. the region of residence is divided into northern and southern regions of each province in order to account for the different geography in the more northern area of provinces, which tend to be more remote. this division groups together census divisions above the 52-degree latitude and those below. i also include an additional category for the coastal region of british columbia so there are 11 regions in total and the omitted category is the northern half of british columbia. the estimates of the geography variables are not reported. the asterisks indicate the level of significance: * p < .10, ** p < .05, *** p < .01 44 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 5 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/5 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.5 the international indigenous policy journal july 2016 the intergenerational effects of residential schools on children’s educational experiences in ontario and canada’s western provinces donna l. feir recommended citation the intergenerational effects of residential schools on children’s educational experiences in ontario and canada’s western provinces abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license the intergenerational effects of residential schools on childrenâ•žs educational experiences in ontario and canadaâ•žs western provinces renewing "that which was almost lost or forgotten": the implications of old ethnologies for present-day traditional ecological knowledge among canada's pacific coast peoples the international indigenous policy journal volume 6 issue 2 the future of traditional knowledge research: building partnership and capacity article 6 may 2015 renewing "that w hich was almost lost or forgotten": the implications of old ethnologies for present-day traditional ecological knowledge among canada's pacific coast peoples dianne c. newell university of british columbia, dnew@mail.ubc.ca recommended citation newell, d. c. (2015). renewing "that which was almost lost or forgotten": the implications of old ethnologies for present-day traditional ecological knowledge among canada's pacific coast peoples. the international indigenous policy journal, 6(2). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.6 renewing "that w hich was almost lost or forgotten": the implications of old ethnologies for present-day traditional ecological knowledge among canada's pacific coast peoples abstract the pressure on traditional ecological knowledge (tek) to solve socio-economic issues globally begs the question: what is the state of tek today, given the economic, social, and cultural ruptures it has endured during the past 200 years? the author traces how historical collaborative work between ethnographic pairings of “insiders” and “outsiders” created partnerships between some prominent anthropologists and local indigenous research collaborators. indeed, most of the ground-breaking anthropological work of franz boas and others concerning canada’s pacific northwest coast culture area depended on collaborations with george hunt and other trained indigenous field workers. much of their long-standing fieldwork data collection and writings involved their female relatives and anonymous women’s collaboration, lending an accumulated, but unacknowledged, thoroughness to present-day tek. future policy concerning collaboration between nonindigenous academics and indigenous communities should take into account the lessons to be learned from these historical practices. keywords ethnology, traditional ecological knowledge, indigenous peoples, canada's pacific coast acknowledgments dianne newell wishes to acknowledge the support of the stellenbosch institute for advanced study, stellenbosch, south africa, where as a stias fellow she completed and presented an earlier draft of this article. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/     r e n e w i n g " t h a t w h i c h w a s a l m o s t l o s t o r f o r g o t t e n " : t h e i m p l i c a t i o n s o f o l d e t h n o l o g i e s f o r p r e s e n t d a y t r a d i t i o n a l e c o l o g i c a l k n o w l e d g e a m o n g c a n a d a ’ s p a c i f i c c o a s t p e o p l e s indigenous policy rarely operates with a sophisticated understanding of either traditional ecological knowledge (tek) or the anthropological record, which, i will argue, forms an integral component of present-day tek. the unrealized societal and commercial potential of tek, what fikret berkes, johan colding, and carl folke (2000) define as “a cumulative body of knowledge, practice, and belief, evolving by adaptive processes and handed down through generations by cultural transmission, about the relationship of living beings (including humans) with one another and with their environment” (p. 1252), fuels global interest in tek today. acquiring tek is internationally desirable for reasons ranging from policy development around climate change and the achievement of sustainable resource development practices, to the protection of biodiversity and rare species, and to the creation of novel commercial products for pharmaceutical companies, health food enterprises, and eco-friendly clothing and cosmetics manufacturers. not surprisingly, tek has become an especially “hot” issue in the realm of intellectual property (ip), with ip vis-à-vis pharmaceutical companies being the extreme case. for these reasons, many indigenous communities, no matter how isolated from “modernity” they might have appeared to be in the past, are now confronting, resisting, but often also accommodating, incursions of multinational corporations of all sorts into their ancestral territories. numerous indigenous communities find themselves engaged in difficult, mainly legal, struggles for land and the protection and renewal of their traditional resources and cultural identities, including their indigenous languages, which, like their territories and traditional resources, are vital to the cultural transmission of tek. thus, indigenous communities everywhere have a real stake in understanding, recording, negotiating, and protecting their storehouse of increasingly valuable tek. because indigenous communities throughout the world have experienced the effects of industrialization for over a century, most of them have suffered major ruptures in their ability to participate not only in the intergenerational, oral transmission of tek but also in its practice. this article seeks to contribute to these contemporary discussions around the present and future of collaboration concerning tek by asking: what is it that survives? how has it survived? it suggests that the historicization of tek is necessary for understanding its worth both to the indigenous communities, families, and the individuals to whom it belongs, and to the outsiders who covet access to it. thus, i turn to anthropology, which as a field of knowledge and practice has a long history of collecting, recording, transcribing, and publishing snapshots of traditional knowledge passed down from the ancestors of current indigenous societies. it is inevitable that the body of anthropological knowledge social scientists have acquired over years with the participation of, and frequently in collaboration with, anthropologists and indigenous peoples has become incorporated into the contemporary tek of descendent communities. i use as a leading case of historicizing tek, the north american northwest coast culture area, a designated ethnographic area, which occupies an influential place in the history of north american anthropology. c a n a d a ’ s n o r t h w e s t c o a s t c u l t u r e a r e a the northwest coast (nwc) culture area, extensively surveyed in wayne suttle’s massive volume (1990) in the smithsonian series on north american indians, encompasses the 1,500 mile long stretch of southeast alaska, british columbia, washington, oregon, and northern tip of california that is 1 newell: ethnologies for present-day tek published by scholarship@western, 2015     situated between the coastal mountain ranges to the east and pacific ocean to the west. ninety-five percent of the culture region so identified is located in canada’s province of british columbia. marking the fjorded coastal area of british columbia are scattered islands, numerous bays, sounds, and deep inlets, soaring coastal mountains, dense temperate zone (northern) rainforest, and major rivers that penetrate the coastal mountain ranges into the high ranges that separate the coast from the highlands of the interior. until recently, this area was host to massive wild runs of five species of pacific salmon (genus orcorhynchus), which together with ancient stands of western red cedar (thuja plicata) forests shaped and defined the lives and livelihoods of northwest coast aboriginal peoples. the intricate social and cultural strategies for resource exploitation, preservation, and redistribution enabled northwest coast peoples to live at a level and population density well above the average of the world’s non-agricultural indigenous societies. ceremonial and oral traditions and cultural practices were strongly preserved and maintained through the potlatch: the central institution, government, identity, and cultural and social connections common to all northwest coast groups, but unique to this culture area. the potlatch continues in its modern iterations to be a complex, prolonged public feast at which events of social importance are proclaimed and validated, with ceremonials, story-telling, gift-giving, and the redistribution of wealth (jonaitis, 1991). the language variety of northwest coast peoples have created major linguistic groupings with kin groups occupying dispersed villages in separate, distinct territories. for most northwest coast peoples, direct contact with europeans occurred only at the end of the 1700’s, and wholesale and longstanding involvement with european newcomers unfolded throughout the area only within the context of the industrial fisheries during the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries (newell, 1993). indigenous families and communities were already engaged in this industry when anthropologists first arrived on the scene in the mid-1880s, a significant point to which i will return. e t h n o g r a p h i c f i e l d w o r k : p a i r i n g s o f “ o u t s i d e r s ” a n d a b o r i g i n a l “ i n s i d e r s ” north american and european museums from the earliest days of the discipline of anthropology sponsored ethnographic explorations into the nwc culture area. the area seemed ideal for the salvage ethnologists, who in the later 1800s and early 1900s wanted to rescue pristine cultural elements before they were swept away, as already appeared to have happened elsewhere on the continent under the spread of modernity (cole, 1995). anthropological research on the northwest coast not only involved the usual recording of informants who were insiders, but was a collaborative activity involving “outside” anthropologists pairing with skillful “insider” aboriginal translators and interpreters, some of whom developed into specialized and independent-minded ethnographic and linguistic assistants or consultants. it was long thought that the use of aboriginal collaborators to write ethnology was a seldom-used method, but in truth, individual studies of particular indigenous collaborators reveal that their direct, voluminous contributions quickly became commonplace on the northwest coast (clifford, 1988; cole, 1999). the best-known example of such collaborations is the fieldwork pairing of german-born and educated american anthropologist, franz boas, with george hunt. hunt (maxwalagalis, q’ixitasu’) was a son of a tongass tlingit noble woman of southeastern alaska, mary ebbetts (ansnaq), and a white trader who 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.6     moved to fort rupert, the site of the ancient kwakiutl village of tsaxis. there, through marriage and adoption, hunt became an expert on the traditions of the kwakiutl (today, kwakwaka’wakw) people. hunt produced for boas over 10,000 pages of kwakwala text with english interlineations. due to the breadth, the depth, and the thoroughness of his contributions to the work of boas over a 40 year period, almost full-time from 1891 until hunt’s death in 1933, hunt has been recognized by the anthropological community as an exceptional ethnologist and a linguist in his own right (berman, 1996, 2002; cannizzo, 1983; jacknis, 1991). other significant pairings on the nwc include marius barbeau, a british-trained french canadian anthropologist and folklorist, paired with william beynon. beynon’s father was a welsh-born master of coastal steamers and sealers, and his mother was niska (nisga’a) from the nass river village of gitlaxdamks. a hereditary chief, beynon married a high-ranking woman from the coastal tsimshian village of kitkatla. like george hunt, he was belatedly recognized as an accomplished ethnographer (anderson & halpin, 2000; halpin, 1978; nowry, 1995). by the time of his death in 1958, beynon had worked for three decades with barbeau and supplied him with 3,000 hand-written pages, totalling almost 750,000 words, of field notes. charles f. newcombe paired with charlie nowell, a kwakiutl born at fort rupert who was married to the daughter of nimpkish (‘namgis) chief, and edward sapir of canada’s national museum, the foremost linguist of his generation, paired with alex thomas for work among the nootka (nuu-chah-nulth) of vancouver island. like hunt and beynon, thomas collected copious amounts of texts in his own language (wright, 2012). thomas mcilwraith did not exactly pair with or develop aboriginal ethnographic assistants in the way that boas and barbeau had when he studied the bella coola people (nuxalk) of the central coast in the early 1920s. mcilwraith’s (1948) informants were nevertheless deeply involved in field observations for the bella coola indians, a comprehensive, massive two-volume study not published until 1948. some regard this work as one of the finest ethnographies ever written about a northwest coast people (barker & cole, 2003). james pollard (kixlanae) came closest to serving as an indigenous field assistant. a former chief of the kimsquit tribe, pollard had a reputation for giving the most number of potlatches among his people, which to mcilwraith (1948) meant pollard “could validate very fully his ancestral myths and the names embodied therein” (p. 340). mcilwraith (1992) also considered pollard to be more worldly and up-to-date than the others, “keeping abreast of changing conditions” (p. 525). while mcilwraith employed a handful of bella coola men and their wives, it was pollard who transcribed and translated all the nuxalk texts that appear in volume two of bella coola indians (mcilwraith, 1948). collaborations between “insiders” and “outsiders” were not necessarily exclusive arrangements. before he worked with boas, george hunt had earlier served in the area as an interpreter for missionaries and colonial officials and with museum collectors and ethnologists such as the j. adrian jacobsen expedition for the museum of ethnology in berlin, in1881 to 1882. boas himself engaged several aboriginal field assistants in addition to hunt. in the 1890s he employed odille quintal morison, who was a respected tsimshian healer, translator and interpreter, collector of ethnographic objects, and recorder of texts. the daughter of a tsimshian woman, mary quintal/curtis (later mary weah) and a french canadian hudson’s bay employee, morrison taught boas tsimshian and for six years collected tsimshian artifacts and texts for him (atkinson, 2011). henry wellington tate worked for boas as field correspondent for tsimshian material in the early twentieth century. a high-ranking fort simpson tsimshian, tate collected, transcribed, and translated a total of 2,017 manuscript pages of narratives from 1903 until his death in 1914. this impressive body of ethnographical data was central to boas’ (1912) bilingual 3 newell: ethnologies for present-day tek published by scholarship@western, 2015     tsimshian texts and to his monumental compilation, tsimshian mythology published in 1916 (maud, 1989, 2000a). boas also worked closely with barbeau’s former collaborator, william beynon, after hunt’s death in the 1930s, receiving from beynon an extensive body of narratives, and translations from and photographs of tsimshian peoples. t h e f r a n z b o a s a n d g e o r g e h u n t p a i r i n g , 1 8 8 6 t o 1 9 3 3 . it was largely through his various pairings and late nineteenth century research trips to the northwest coast culture area that boas eventually gained his reputation as one of the “fathers” of americanist anthropology and the most influential anthropologist who worked among the northwest coast peoples prior to the mid-twentieth century (darnell, 2000; mauze, harkness, & kan, 2004). among the collaborations, it is hunt’s work with boas, and the seminal contribution of hunt’s female relatives, that stands out both for the quality and quantity of contributions. boas began grooming hunt to be an ethnographer in the late 1800s. hunt learned to write kwak’wala in phonetic transcription; learned the meaning of texts, and how to take them down; learned how to conduct fieldwork, to observe culture, and to photograph (jacknis, 1984); and learned how to collect and document objects (jacknis, 1991). this early training, together with his skills and social standing, enabled hunt to play in a major role in generating ethnographic data for boas for four decades, from the 1880s through to the 1920s. boas set the tone for recording tek throughout the northwest coast culture area by insisting that transcriptions be taken in the original native language—which were spoken, not written, languages— before translation into english, so he taught hunt to use orthography, a standard alphabet for ethnographic transcription that boas and his former student, sapir, had jointly developed. hunt followed this approach, as did odille morison, although henry tate did not. ralph maud’s examination of the original tsimshian manuscript material indicates that tate always took down the information in english (maud, 1989, 2000b). barbeau, following boas’ lead trained beynon in the art of phonetic transcription of native language from the outset (nowry, 1995). standardization of practice is what allowed all of these anthropologists to engage trained indigenous assistants to work directly with informants on their behalf: “[beynon] records myths quite successfully and with good speed. he has them recited in tsimshian and writes them in english at once, sentence by sentence. the work could not be done better if i were working with them,” wrote barbeau to sapir in 1915 (nowry, 1995, p. 158). or so boas could only hope. the “kwakiutl indians” were from the beginning the centerpiece of boas’ northwest coast anthropology. ronald and evelyn rohner (1969) estimate that hunt contributed the data for over twothirds of boas’ 5,000 pages published on this group. a major step for boas was his single occasion, over the winter of 1894 to1895, of participant observation on the northwest coast, when, thanks to the arrangements of hunt and hunt’s sisters, boas witnessed and recorded a portion of the songs and customs of the winter ceremonials at the traditional kwakiutl village of fort rupert (tsaxis). boas worked hand-in-hand with hunt, the two of them fleshing out boas’ shorthand notes each morning (jacknis, 1996). after boas left fort rupert, hunt stayed on to supply him with a continuous stream of notes on the remainder of the event. the winter ceremonials figure prominently in boas’ (1897) pathbreaking 425-page ethnographic study, the social organization and the secret societies of the kwakiutl indians, with george hunt being fully credited. after his own name as author, boas added, “based on 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.6     personal observations and on notes made by mr. george hunt.” the contribution certainly warranted this intellectually generous acknowledgement. according to ira jacknis (1996),“these bits of indigenous verbal data [collected and recorded by hunt]—myth, song, or speech—were . . . integrated into the ethnographer’s explanatory prose, producing one of boas’ most complex, variegated pieces of ethnographic writing” (p. 208). boas also trained hunt as a collector of ethnographic objects, an area in which hunt would excel. hunt taught boas early on about the futility of simply presenting his kwakiutl informants with representations (photos, sketches) of specimens from museum collections and expecting to receive information on their cultural meaning, use, and iconography; according to their own customs, informants needed to have owned the piece or have “relevant ancestral privileges” in order to discuss them (jacknis, 1996, p. 202). in the course of undertaking this novel area of ethnographic work for boas, hunt both developed a working collection of ethnographic objects, collecting in the indigenous language an accompanying tradition or story for each one, and consequently became a major collector of objects for sale to museums—to the point, ira jacknis (1991, 1996) argued, that hunt eventually identified himself first and foremost as a collector. boas and hunt continually negotiated various points around hunt’s independent collecting and transcribing practice. boas, operating within the salvage paradigm of the late nineteenth century, repeatedly probed hunt’s texts for clarification. at the beginning of the collaboration, boas insisted that ambiguities among different narrators be resolved. a particular story collected by hunt, although it matched an earlier version collected by boas, differed in certain respects from both that version and the one that he and hunt had already published. regna darnell (2000) observed that boas fully expected in the early years, “that there would be a single correct version and that hunt could identify it for him” (p. 45). hunt wrote to boas as early as1895 about difficulties he had in writing what hunt termed “the indian ways of speaking” and explained, "as i told you before [sic] no matter if you ask ten indians about one history [sic] not two of them would speak . . . the same” (darnell, 2000, p. 44). but it seems that different versions were nevertheless always tracked down and preserved, or at the very least incorporated into an integrated version, by hunt. it was an approach that over time boas learned to value. writing to hunt in the early 1920s, for example, boas suggested that where conflicts of opinion existed among the various accounts, hunt should not try to make things “uniform but simply say what everyone tells . . . although of course, we ought to know what is considered by the owner as the right way” (darnell, 2000, p. 46). by now, the twenties, with the rapid social and economic change that had occurred in northwest coast aboriginal communities, boas was likely grateful for whatever could be salvaged, and perhaps hunt was too. yet another point of negotiation around stantardized ethnographic practice for boas and hunt was boas’ insistence on verbatim transcripts. despite hunt’s re-assurances that when transcribing from dictation he was writing down the stories word for word (darnell, 2000) from his field correspondence it is clear that hunt often simply listened intensely and then reconstructed narratives later in his own words. furthermore, it seems that henry tate when collecting and recording stories for boas probably never produced verbatim transcripts, either. in his review of boas’ (1916) monograph, tsimshian mythology, marius barbeau (1917) blamed tate’s flawed data for problems with the book: tate had in his interviews mostly listened to the telling and then only later wrote down whatever information he had absorbed. tate was, according to barbeau (1917), simply “loath to divulge to other natives that he was 5 newell: ethnologies for present-day tek published by scholarship@western, 2015     really writing them down at all” (p. 561). william beynon, on the other hand, sympathized with tate’s practice: “tate did not have the full confidence of all of his informants . . . nor the money to pay them” (cited in maud, 2000a, para. 5). there may also have been other reasons this particular breach in scientific practice; dictation taken by insiders like hunt and tate may in some circumstances have seemed rude or implied lack of trust in the indigenous speaker. in boas’ correspondence with hunt, we learn of the even deeper concerns of both men and of hunt’s attempts to explain and resolve his breaches, when it came to applying scientific methodology. to boas’ blunt question in 1918: "did you get these meanings [of indian names] from the old people, or do you translate them from your own knowledge of the language?" (cited in darnell, 2000, p. 46). hunt replied that when necessary he used his own judgement, drew on his own expertise. writing phonetically, hunt explained: “and if i am not pleased the way they translate the names then i translate them the way i see it right way to put it. for it is not so hard for me. because i know one thing that lots of middle age men comes to me, and ask me about the history of there family and even there names [sic]” (p. 46). once again, while boas was instructing and supervising hunt in the science of ethnography, hunt was instructing boas in the cultural ways and changing realities of the kwakiutl. jeanne cannizzo (1983) and judith berman (1996; 2002) have argued that in the end it was hunt, not boas, who created the representation of kwakiutl culture that continues to shape, reflect, and constrain anthropological views of the northwest coast up to the present. and certainly that sort of influence on the part of the “insider expert” hunt evolved quickly once boas relied almost completely on hunt’s fieldwork for his reports and papers; once, as the correspondence between boas and hunt just quoted suggests, the people whom hunt interviewed looked at hunt as the essential expert on their culture, history, and language. this does raise the question: how much tek collected by hunt was actually that of hunt and of his relatives’? e m p h a s i z i n g w o m e n ’ s t e k : s a l m o n c a n n e r i e s a n d t h e h u n t s ’ k w a k i u t l “ r e c i p e s ” in most areas of salvage anthropology, it is a case of white men talking to indigenous men, who are usually high-ranking and elderly. the names, knowledge, and actions of women are less seldom recorded. it is understood today, however, that traditional knowledge held by women in indigenous cultures is for a number of reasons special and often unique, and, as with men’s tek, does not always circulate across gender lines. in most indigenous communities, women were the primary harvesters of medicinal plants, berries, and vegetables; trappers of small animals; gatherers of shellfish and mollusks; makers of basketry and clothing; processors of food, hides, and bark, roots, grasses, and so on. women are, in the words of the alaska native science commission (2012), “keepers of the knowledge about significant spheres of biodiversity in their own right, and as such, are the only ones able to identify environmental indicators of ecological health in those spheres” (“role of women and children” section, para. 1). franz boas knew, of course, that indian women were the mainstay of the salmon cannery workforce and cannery villages. it was a reality he observed each field season. boas conducted fieldwork in many coastal villages in which salmon canneries operated either on site or nearby (rohner, 1969, see appendices 2 & 3), and mostly during the summer canning season. he usually stayed with cannery owners and enlisted their assistance in finding and meeting with aboriginal informants and translators. during the week, when the indian men lived in their boats on the fishing grounds and the women worked in the plants, 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.6     women were practically the only indians around the cannery villages. simply put, boas had to talk to the women most of the time. this female-dominated environment was not without consequence for his research findings, as his contact with mrs. spencer (annie hunt) of alert bay makes clear. annie hunt was boas’ prime informant and contact in the early years of his fieldwork because she was kwakiutl, a member of the well-connected hunt family, and married to the equally well-connected, nonindigenous cannery owner and storekeeper at alert bay, stephen spencer. george hunt was her bother. from his first contact with her, in 1886, boas considered annie hunt the “real find” at alert bay; she was, it is reasonable to infer, his inspiration for continuing to record women’s knowledge. to his parents, boas wrote in october 1886: “[mrs. spencer] relates well and is very gracious. i have obtained much about the usages of women from her. this is now an important part of my collection” (cited in rohner, 1969, pp. 46-47). by the 1900 field season, which he devoted to alert bay, boas’ afternoons were fully occupied with interviewing women, “on the gathering and preparing of food, and having them tell me about their medicines,” and with collecting texts on menus and food preparation (rohner, 1969, pp. 254-255). boas worked especially closely that season with george hunt’s first wife, lucy homiskanis (t’lalili’lakw), a kwakiutl woman from hope island from whom boas learned so much that he acknowledged her in the preface to his great tome, ethnology of the kwakiutl (boas, 1921). in ethnology of the kwakiutl, there are individual sections on “industries” (the minutia of working cedar, for example, and making of everything from wicker baskets for wild carrots to digging sticks for clover, watertight boxes for boiling dried salmon to hooks for picking elderberries and frames for drying berries, to elaborate traps for catching migrating salmon); “hunting, fishing, and food gathering” (basically, using all of the products described in the “industries” section); “preservation of food” (various techniques for cutting, roasting, smoking, drying, pickling, boiling); “beliefs and customs,” and “recipes” (an ethnology of kwakiutl cooking and eating practices). each section contains a wealth of women’s traditional knowledge, specifically referring to what it is that women do, and how and where in their territories they do it, and how all this meshes with the roles of the menfolk. hunt collected from both of his wives, lucy, who died in 1908, and francine (tsukwani, t’lat’lalawizamga), a ‘nakwaxd’xw woman, material for the recipes section. thus, aside from the anthropologist boas learning to care about collecting women’s knowledge because of the salmon-canning setting of his ethnographic fieldwork, he had an aboriginal assistant who collected from his wives, sisters, mother, and other female relatives as a matter of course. t h e h u n t s ’ s a l m o n r e c i p e s . the plan for the seventeen-year research project on recipes that dominated part one of boas’ 1400-page study, completed in 1916 and published in 1921 as ethnology of the kwakiutl, was briefly sketched out for hunt in 1899: “when you continue writing for me, i would ask you to write first of all what i suggested to you last summer, namely, the cooking-book of the kwakiutl, and then you might also study [sic] write down all the curious ideas they have about cooking” (cited in berman, 1996, p. 236). in the end, “recipes” constitutes an impressive 300 published, bilingual pages of details. in it we learn, for example, that only “old men,” or only men of the “highest” rank or of “high” rank, or only the “old chiefs,” or “chiefs,” were invited to eat specific types of prepared food such as halibut skin; blistered, half-dried halibut; the roasted pectoral fins of salmon; and dishes of mashed currents and salal berries. also detailed are discriminatory practices concerning butchering and serving of specific sea foods and the distribution of certain vegetables at meals, even the time of day certain 7 newell: ethnologies for present-day tek published by scholarship@western, 2015     foods could be eaten, and by whom, and whether with or without drinking water, and with or without dipping the food in oil. while the interpretive value of the extensive cultural data that boas (and also on his behalf, george hunt) collected from kwakiutl women merits future study, we already have an inkling of the influence on later-day anthropologists of the large section on salmon recipes, beginning with helen codere in the 1950s. codere’s (1957) essay, “kwakiutl society,” takes as its focus the hunts’ exhaustive study of “recipes” because, she explains, they exposed the everyday life of the kwakiutl (the family meals), as well as the large gatherings and ceremonials (the feasts), and contained a wealth of detail “in context” (pp. 475-476), “minutely descriptive of social procedures as well as steps in food preparation” (p. 485). sidney mintz and christine du bois (2002) argued in their extensive literature review on the anthropology of food and eating that a re-reading of helen codere’s 1957 paper on boas’ “salmon recipes” suggests “just how much could be learned about social organization and hierarchy by carefully reading about how to cook salmon” (p. 100). approaching at it from a different angle, the eminent french anthropologist claude levi-strauss has revealed in an interview his indebtedness to boas for “the kwakiutl recipes . . . they gave me the key to certain mythological problems by revealing relationships of compatibility and incompatibility among foods, relationships that are not solely a question of taste,” he said (cited in mauze, 2004, pp. 78-79). although mintz, du bois, and levi-strauss all credit boas for the work, codere recognized the contribution of hunt and his wives, something she pursues in her own celebrated fieldwork among the kwakiutl. codere’s (1957) fieldwork among the kwakiutl in 1951 and 1955 gave her the opportunity to learn from the community how george hunt had collected these recipes on the ground: “how he consulted with his wife on those details of food preparation that he as a man would be ignorant about; how he would occasionally have difficulty in recording how a certain thing was done and would take a walk, check with various people, and refresh his memory” (p. 476). t h e s o c i a l a n d c u l t u r a l i m p l i c a t i o n s o f o l d e t h n o l o g i e s f o r i n d i g e n o u s p o l i c y : r e n e w i n g “ t h a t w h i c h w a s a l m o s t l o s t o r f o r g o t t e n ” by the time boas was writing up and editing hunt’s material for ethnology of the kwakiutl in 1916, the rapid expansion of the industrial fishery had already adversely affected the wild salmon stocks and would soon bring “scientific management” and commercial fishing practices into conflict with traditional knowledge about salmon and traditional fishing technologies, such as the use of fish barricades, which the state ordered destroyed. the state also created legally enforceable dichotomies that broke with the local indigenous practices of producing for consumption and exchange and instead reserved most of the fish stocks for non-aboriginal use. northwest coast peoples wanted their traditional ways respected; the newcomers wanted them displaced. this was in addition to an 80 to 90 percent decline from pre-contact levels of the bc indian population (estimated to have been as high as 180,000) by the early twentieth century. in addition, the northwest coast peoples experienced the culturally damaging effects of a government ban on the central social, political, and economic institution of northwest coast communities—the potlatch. other adverse conditions included the forced attendance of aboriginal children at church-run residential schools, with their severely assimilationist agendas; clear-cut logging and large-scale mining developments; and by the 1980s, ocean ranching of salmon in open pens, which 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.6     threatened the traditional resources, livelihoods, cultural identities, and store of traditional knowledge of northwest coast aboriginal communities, now self-identified (since the 1980s) as first nations. for northwest coast first nations, old ethnographic accounts, such as those collected with indigenous field assistance by boas, barbeau, mcilwraith, and others, as well as the testimony of present-day anthropologists and historical experts, are critical to the defense of first nations territorial claims in court. the accounts are also used by first nations in land claims negotiations with government commissions and in seeking moratoria on natural resource development that threatens the livelihood and identities of their communities. a crucial necessity in laying aboriginal claim to land and resources for the claimant group is to prove the land use and occupancy—which are core elements of tek—of their ancestors at the point at which outsiders first arrived. but those same accounts can be, and are, also used to deny rights and claims. taking indigenous claims (and the old ethnographies and understandings of tek) to court has only been legally possible since the 1950s, and only practically feasible under canada’s constitution since the 1980s, but has, together with the decriminalization— hence the revival—of the potlatch in the 1950s, contributed immeasurably to the cultural and economic renewal of all northwest coast first nations communities. one of the strongest, clearest, and most fulsome expressions of contemporary community respect for and appreciation of early ethnographic fieldwork, and of its origins in the community itself, is to be found in the nuxalk nation’s “foreword” to the reprint of mcilwraith’s (1992) the bella coola indians. this study is for them “like fuel to a fire,” and they go on to explain, “mcilwraith’s recording [in the 1920s] of our history continues to affect our people today and will lead to better understanding tomorrow. we have been given a tool with which to rebuild and renew that which was almost lost or forgotten” (p. vii). the nuxalk are not just talking about a “gift” from an anthropologist, for they recognize the input of their own ancestors in the generating of this valuable “tool”; they acknowledge that the book “is interwoven with the history, feelings, and spirituality of a strong people. [mcilwraith] listened and practiced, learned and understood the rich remnants of our people’s oral history. we thus have these volumes” (p. vii). the community members do not suggest that everything in the book is written in stone; they simply claim it as theirs: it is of their past and their present. most poignantly, they write that the study is about their future and, i would add, it provides the underpinnings of their tek. among other nuxalk nation cultural initiatives, the house of smayustya, created by nuxalk hereditary chiefs, is a learning centre for the nuxalk that collects published and unpublished writings, archival materials, and sound recordings and images, all of which underpin their contemporary struggle for land and resources and the revival of traditional knowledge in which the bella coola indians, first published in 1948, has had a central role (barker & cole, 2003). similar to the conclusion that anthropologists and historians have drawn about george hunt’s substantial contribution to the old kwakiutl ethnologies published by franz boas, barker and cole (2003) concluded that “the nuxalk elders,” and previous generations of nuxalk back to the time of creation, are the true authors of the bella coola indians” (pp. 25-26). c o n c l u s i o n most indigenous peoples today have suffered deep ruptures to their ability to participate not only in the intergenerational, oral transmission of tek, but also in its practice. this was certainly the case for the 9 newell: ethnologies for present-day tek published by scholarship@western, 2015     peoples and cultures of the north american northwest coast culture area. from its earliest days of development in the nineteenth century, anthropology as a discipline in north america has been heavily engaged in an interactive relationship with the peoples and cultures of this region. this engagement began right after the arrival of the industrial salmon fishery on the coast in the 1880s. because of the nature of the salmon-canning industry, much of the tek gathered by the durable pairing of franz boas and george hunt appears to have come from female informants, including hunt’s two wives, his sisters, and other female relatives, as well as anonymous female cannery workers. we have a sense that mothers, wives, and various female relatives of other aboriginal assistants working in the northwest coast may also have played an influential role in field studies elsewhere on the northwest coast. today, this anthropological legacy from the late nineteenth century and early twentieth century stands as a rich source for tek in this culture area, but how are we to evaluate it in terms of authorship, the nature of its content, and its validity and universality at present for the future? for convenience i have framed my cursory examination of anthropological data gathering in terms of the insider/outsider dichotomy. insiders were helping the salvage ethnologists transform tek and the way it is transmitted through relationships of collaboration. yet, it is clear from the discussion in this article that such an approach is problematic. first, there is a substantial indigenous investment in the anthropological record of the northwest coast culture area, as informants, translators, and interpreters, and, importantly, as family members of ethnographic fieldworkers who collected, transcribed, and interpreted narratives. transmission became increasingly a written rather than an oral process that was documented or illustrated with collected artifacts. and yet, it would be wrong simply to search for the tek captured in the published ethnographic record (or, conversely, to dismiss the ethnographic record as having been collected strictly by outsiders). the indigenous field assistants such as george hunt, henry tate, and william beynon also made personal adjustments to the training that franz boas and fellow anthropologists had given to them; as fieldworkers they developed (often informally) personal approaches to collecting, transmitting, and translating ethnographic information, including tek. in these various ways, tek in the northwest coast culture area has been subject to different types of transformations and filtering, not only by the western scientists who conducted and supervised the fieldwork, but also by their indigenous field assistants. this history of insider–outsider pairing means that questions about the purity of tek for the northwest coast culture area make little sense. it would be more useful to study closely the sifting and winnowing that has gone on for over a century: what implications does the independence of aboriginal fieldworkers have for determining authorship, and perhaps ownership, of contemporary tek? what does it tell us about the completeness and depth of our knowledge base? what implications does it have for future efforts to access tek from this region? we need to know more about the aboriginal engagement in the transmission of tek through past anthropological projects in the northwest coast culture area. future investigations would need to build on the current trend that shifts the focus from the well-known figures of the field of anthropology to their interactions with their aboriginal fieldworkers, and from the published ethnographic record to the surviving field notes, field letters, and original manuscripts shaped and often generated by those who also worked in the field, the ancestors of contemporary first nations of the northwest coast culture area. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.6     r e f e r e n c e s alaska native science commission. (2012). what is traditional knowledge? retrieved from www.nativescience.org/html/traditional_knowledge.html anderson, m., & halpin, m. m. (eds.). (2000). potlatch at gitsegukla: william beynon’s 1945 field notebooks. vancouver: university of british columbia press. atkinson, m. l. (2011). the ‘accomplished’ odille morrison: tsimshian cultural intermediary of metlakatla, british columbia. in s. carter & p. a. mccormack (eds.), recollecting: lives of aboriginal women of the canadian northwest and borderlands (pp. 135-156). edmonton: athabaska university press. barbeau, m. (1917). review of franz boas, tsimshian mythology. american anthropologist, new ser. 19(4), 548-563. barker, j., & cole, d. (2003). introduction. in j. barker & d. cole (eds.), at home with the bella coola indians: t.f. mcilwraith’s field letters, 1922-4 (pp. 3-27). vancouver: university of british columbia press. berkes, f., colding, j., & folke, c. (2000). rediscovery of traditional ecological knowledge as adaptive management. ecological applications, 10(5), 1251-1262. berman, j. (1996). ‘the culture as it appears to the indian himself’: boas, hunt and the methods of ethnography. in g. w. stocking, jr. (ed.), volksgeist as method and ethic: essays on boasian ethnography and the german anthropological tradition (history of anthropology, vol. 8, pp. 215-256). madison: university of wisconsin press. berman, j. (2002). george hunt. in w. h. new (ed.), the encyclopedia of literature in canada (pp. 521-522). toronto: university of toronto press. boas, f. (1897). the social organization and the secret societies of the kwakiutl indians: based on personal observations and on notes made by mr. george hunt. in report of the us national museum for 1895 (pp. 311-738). washington, dc: smithsonian institution. (reprinted from landmarks in anthropology series, 1970, new york: johnson). boas, f. (1916). tsimshian mythology. thirty-first annual report of the bureau of american ethnology, 1909-1910. washington, dc: smithsonian institution. boas, f., as told by g. hunt. (1921). ethnology of the kwakiutl (bureau of american ethnology, 35th annual report, pt. 1). washington, dc: smithsonian institution press. cannizzo, j. (1983). george hunt and the invention of kwakiutl culture. canadian review of sociology and anthropology, 20(1), 44-58. 11 newell: ethnologies for present-day tek published by scholarship@western, 2015     clifford, j. (1988). on ethnographic authority. in j. clifford (ed.), the predicament of culture: twentieth-century ethnography, literature, and art (pp. 21-54). cambridge, ma: harvard university press. codere, h. (1957). kwakiutl society: rank and class. american anthropologist, 59(3), 473-486. cole, d. (1995). captured heritage: the scramble for northwest coast artifacts. vancouver: university of british columbia press. cole, d. (1999). franz boas: the early years, 1858-1906. vancouver/toronto, seattle and london: douglas & mcintyre and university of washington press. darnell, r. (2000, spring/summer). the pivotal role of the northwest coast in the history of americanist anthropology. bc studies, (125/126), 33-52. halpin, m. m. (1978). william beynon, ethnographer, tsimshian, 1886-1958. in m. liberty (ed.), american indian intellectuals: 1976 proceedings of the american ethnological society (pp. 140156). st. paul: west publishing. jacknis, i. (1984, winter). franz boas and photography. studies in visual communication, 10, 2-60. jacknis, i. (1991). george hunt, collector of indian specimens. in a. jonaitis (ed.), chiefly feasts: the enduring potlatch (pp. 177-224). new york, seattle/london, and vancouver: american museum of natural history and douglas & mcintyre. jacknis, i. (1996). the ethnographic object and the object of ethnography in the early career of franz boas. in g. w. stocking, jr. (ed.), volksgeist as method and ethic: essays on boasian ethnography and the german anthropological tradition (history of anthropology, vol. 8, pp. 185-214). madison: university of wisconsin press. jonaitis, a. (1991). chiefly feasts: the creation of an exhibition. in a. jonaitis (ed.), chiefly feasts: the enduring potlatch (pp. 21-70). new york, seattle/london, and vancouver: american museum of natural history and douglas & mcintyre. maud, r. (1989). the henry tate–franz boas collaboration on tsimshian mythology. american ethnologist, 16 (1), 158-162. maud, r. (2000a). henry wellington tate. in dictionary of canadian biography: 1911-1920 (vol. xiv). toronto and quebec city: university of toronto and laval university. retrieved from http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/tate_henry_wellington_14e.html maud, r. (2000b). transmission difficulties: franz boas and tsimshian mythology. burnaby, bc: talonbooks. mauze, m. (2004). when the northwest coast haunts french anthropology. in m. mauze, m. harkness, & s. kan (eds.), coming to shore: northwest coast ethnography, tradition, and visions (pp. 6385). lincoln: university of nebraska press. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 2 [2015], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss2/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.2.6     mauze, m., harkness, m. e., & kan, s. (eds.). (2004). coming to shore: northwest coast ethnography, tradition, and visions. lincoln: university of nebraska press. mcilwraith, t. f. (1948). the bella coola indians. (vol. 1 & 2). toronto: university of toronto press. mcilwraith, t. f. (1992). the bella coola indians, with an introduction by john barker. (vol. 1 & 2). toronto: university of toronto press. mintz, s. w., & du bois, c. m. (2002). the anthropology of food and eating. annual review of anthropology, 31, 99-119. newell, d. (1993). tangled webs of history: indians and the law in canada’s pacific coast fisheries. toronto: university of toronto press. nowry, l. (1995). man of mana: marius barbeau, a biography. toronto: nc press. nuxalk nation. (1992). foreword. in t. mcilwraith (ed.), the bella coola indians (vol. 1, p. vii). rohner, r. p. (ed.). (1969). the ethnography of franz boas: letters and diaries of franz boas written on the northwest coast from 1886 to 1931, with an introduction by ronald p. rohner and evelyn c. rohner, and translated by hedy parker. chicago and london: university of chicago press. rohner, r. p., & rohner, e. c. (1969). franz boas and the development of north american ethnology. introduction. in r. p. rohner (ed.), ethnography of franz boas (pp. xxii-xxx). chicago and london: university of chicago press. suttles, w. (ed.). (1990). northwest coast (vol. 7). handbook of north american indians. washington, dc: smithsonian institution press. wright, r. (2012). alexander thomas. the canadian encyclopedia. retrieved from http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/alexander-thomas/ 13 newell: ethnologies for present-day tek published by scholarship@western, 2015 the international indigenous policy journal may 2015 renewing "that which was almost lost or forgotten": the implications of old ethnologies for present-day traditional ecological knowledge among canada's pacific coast peoples dianne c. newell recommended citation renewing "that which was almost lost or forgotten": the implications of old ethnologies for present-day traditional ecological knowledge among canada's pacific coast peoples abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license renewing "that which was almost lost or forgotten": the implications of old ethnologies for present-day traditional ecological knowledge among canada's pacific coast peoples engaging maori in biobanking and genetic research: legal, ethical, and policy challenges the international indigenous policy journal volume 6 | issue 3 article 1 june 2015 engaging maori in biobanking and genetic research: legal, ethical, and policy challenges angela beaton te tari hauora me te tari tikanga-ā-hapori, centre for health and social practice, waikato institute of technology, angela.beaton@wintec.ac.nz barry smith lakes district health board, rotorua, barry.smith@lakesdhb.govt.nz valmaine toki te piringa, faculty of law, university of waikato and united nations permanent forum on indigenous issues, valmaine@waikato.ac.nz kim southey te kotahi research institute, university of waikato, ksouthey@waikato.ac.nz maui hudson maori and indigenous governance centre, faculty of law, university of waikato, maui@waikato.ac.nz recommended citation beaton, a. , smith, b. , toki, v. , southey, k. , hudson, m. (2015). engaging maori in biobanking and genetic research: legal, ethical, and policy challenges. the international indigenous policy journal, 6(3). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.1 engaging maori in biobanking and genetic research: legal, ethical, and policy challenges abstract publically funded biobanking initiatives and genetic research should contribute towards reducing inequalities in health by reducing the prevalence and burden of disease. it is essential that maori and other indigenous populations share in health gains derived from these activities. the health research council of new zealand has funded a research project (2012-2015) to identify maori perspectives on biobanking and genetic research, and to develop cultural guidelines for ethical biobanking and genetic research involving biospecimens. this review describes relevant values and ethics embedded in maori indigenous knowledge, and how they may be applied to culturally safe interactions between biobanks, researchers, individual participants, and communities. key issues of ownership, privacy, and consent are also considered within the legal and policy context that guides biobanking and genetic research practices within new zealand. areas of concern are highlighted and recommendations of international relevance are provided. to develop a productive environment for "next-generation" biobanking and genomic research,"‘next-generation" regulatory solutions will be required. keywords indigenous, maori, biobanking, genetics, ethics, policy, law creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/   e n g a g i n g māo r i i n b i o b a n k i n g a n d g e n e t i c r e s e a r c h : l e g a l , e t h i c a l , a n d p o l i c y c h a l l e n g e s research involving human biospecimens and genetic data analysed in conjunction with personal or health information is becoming increasingly important for the understanding of complex diseases, and associated applications for their prevention, diagnosis, and treatment. there is consensus in the scientific community that further progress will depend on access to larger numbers of biospecimens. as a result, there have been moves in new zealand and elsewhere towards harmonization of biobanks (du plessis, 2007; maschke, 2005). most commonly this involves the adoption of evidence-based standards for the collection, storage, and handling of biospecimens. however, the ability to establish and harmonise biobanks will depend in part on participants’ willingness to contribute. it is essential that māori and other indigenous populations share in health gains derived from biobanking and genetic research. this review describes relevant values and ethics embedded in māori indigenous knowledge, and how they may be applied to culturally safe interactions between māori communities, participants, biobanks, and researchers. key issues of ownership, privacy, and consent are also considered within the legal and policy context that guides biobanking and genetic research practices within new zealand. there are a number of formal (and informal) biobanks currently operating in new zealand1 that provide researchers with necessary access to specimens for ethically approved research. these entities tend to have well-established governance procedures that serve to protect participants’ interests, including the requirement that all proposed research seeking access to biospecimens and relevant data be reviewed by a human research ethics committee. formal biobanks generally have clear and transparent processes for the access to and use of samples in their collections; however, there are also numerous collections of samples held by research groups who conduct studies that may obtain consent for the future use of the samples. these samples are available for future research and, while the samples can only be used for ethically approved studies, the processes for access to and use of the samples are often less clear. biobanks provide researchers with access to biospecimens usually directly linked to clinical and other personal information. this function immediately attracts questions of ownership of the biospecimens and derived data, consent of the donor, the extent to which the donor can share in the results, and privacy and ethics, particularly when the material is derived from vulnerable populations. the issues of appropriate governance and donor rights thus become vitally important. it is not clear that existing regulatory solutions will meet the governance challenges presented by “nextgeneration” biobanking and genetic research involving extensive networks of collaborating institutions and large international data sets (fullerton, anderson, guzauskas, freeman, & fryeredwards, 2010).                                                                                                                 1 examples are middlemore tissue bank (auckland), cancer society tissue bank (christchurch), new zealand rare diseases biobank (dunedin), the new zealand neurological foundation human brain bank (auckland), and melanoma tissue bank (dunedin). 1 beaton et al.: engaging maori in biobanking and genetic research published by scholarship@western, 2015   māo r i p e r s p e c t i v e s tikanga māori refers to culturally grounded processes and practices that draw on the values and ethics embedded in matauranga māori (indigenous knowledge). for māori, the issues of ownership, privacy, and consent can be informed by tikanga māori (hudson, 2004a). similarly, tikanga can also inform the research process by ensuring culturally safe interactions with participants and communities (jones, crengle, & mccreanor, 2006). from a traditional māori perspective, the concepts that most closely relate to ownership are concerned with control over access and use of a resource. the resource, for instance tissue, is recognised as a taonga2 protected by kaitiaki (guardians) who mediate the relationships between that resource and people. to maintain the mauri (life force) of that resource (marsden, 2003), māori developed customs to ensure that the resource would be available to the next generation (taonga tuku iho). the value of human tissue in a traditional context is reflected in the tikanga (correct practice) applied to activities involved with healing (jones, 2000; mark & lyons, 2010) or death (barlow, 1991; nikora, marsters, & te awekotuku, 2012), including pure/tohi (positive spiritual intervention), mākutu (negative spiritual intervention), tangi (funeral process), and hāhu (process of interring bones). tikanga were developed to moderate the potential use and misuse of human tissue and limit the risks for people, their whānau, and their communities (roberts, 2005). while the nature of potential uses and misuses has changed in contemporary times, the basic recognition of human tissue as a taonga, belonging to both the person and their communities, remains (cram, pihama, & barbara, 2000). all are relevant to understanding why māori prioritise a duty of kaitiakitanga or “obligated stewardship” (ministry for the environment, 2002). for māori, the notion of privacy is complicated by a value system that prioritises collective good over individual autonomy. traditionally, most healing would be done in a community setting so that community members would be aware of the issue and contribute to its solution (port, arnold, kerr, glavish, & winship, 2008). in this regard, the privacy of health information restricts the ability of the extended family and wider community to fulfil this function (hudson, 2004b). nevertheless, the concept of restricting access to sensitive, or potentially dangerous, knowledge was known to traditional communities. tohunga (experts) were the stewards of information that was considered inherently special or personally sensitive, which they retained on behalf of the collective (boulton, hudson, ahuriri-driscoll, & stewart, 2014). similarly, the interrelationship between individuals and family or kin groups also affects the manner in which consent is constructed. the importance of community support and engagement in construction of research has been argued for theoretical (e.g., kaupapa māori, community based participatory research) (pihama, cram, & walker, 2002; smith, 1998) and functional (integrated knowledge translation) (canadian institutes of health research [cihr], 2012) reasons. this type of engagement addresses issues relating to the safety of the study for the community (hudson, 2004b) and forms the cornerstone of establishing a “collective” consent for the project (hudson, 2009; hutchings, 2009). the concept of collective consent is complementary to an individual consent as it indicates community support for a study within which an individual can consent to participate (hudson, 2004b). similarly, collective decision-making, where significant others (family, authority figures) support an individual to make decisions about participation, also contributes to how māori consent to genetic research (hutchings, 2009; tupara, 2012).                                                                                                                 2 the term “tissue” generally applies to a group of cells that perform a specific function. for māori, it is suggested that tissue, as a discreet component of the tinana (body), has always been a taonga (treasure). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.1   identifying a māori view on biobanking and genetic research is challenging as there are a number of views and perspectives evident across this community (cram et al., 2000; te momo, 2007). as with all new technologies, there is limited opportunity for māori to critique or explore the risks and opportunities. however, when given the space to consider how their interests are related to specific contexts (cram, phillips, tipene-matua, parsons, & taupo, 2004; hutchings & reynolds, 2007), māori have demonstrated the ability to identify and conceptualise māori values (tupara, 2012) and to adapt relevant tikanga to these new situations (hudson, roberts, smith, tiakiwai, & hemi, 2012). genetic engineering and modification is inconsistent with tikanga māori in that it seeks to change whakapapa (genealogy or the ways by which people come into relationship with the world, people, and life). this, in turn, will disturb the mauri and balance of the individual and the community (cram et al., 2000). nonetheless, in the health context (roberts & fairweather, 2004), some māori do give support to the notion of genetic research (hudson, ahuriri-driscoll, lea, & lea, 2007; tawhara, 2005; tipene-matua, 2006), genomic research (ahuriri-driscoll et al., 2007), and biobanking (tipene-matua, 2006). tikanga has been adapted in a number of hospitals for dealing with tissue in clinical settings (auckland district health board, 2003) and research laboratories (cheung, gibbons, dragunow, & faull, 2007; hudson, allan, bedford, buckleton, & stuart, 2008). in these settings, the integration of tikanga māori, such as the use of karakia (prayers), cleansing with wai (water), and the eating of kai (food), within standard processes provides a level of cultural safety for both the whanau (family) and the researcher/clinician (cheung, 2011). tikanga also provide guidance around appropriate restrictions of use, access for families, and methods of disposal (auckland district health board, 2003). these applications provide a foundation for identifying issues of significance that are likely to have relevance for genetic research and biobanking. tikanga māori is flexible (hemara, 2006). if we consider that some māori actively participate within the area of genetic research, this would lend support for the use of tikanga concepts (mead, 2003). taonga, kaitiaki, and rangatiratanga (the right to exercise authority, autonomy, selfdetermination, self-management, and ownership) are primary considerations when reflecting on the relationship between tikanga māori, tissue, and using tikanga concepts, and implications for māori of tissue use in the context of genetic research and biobanking (cheung, 2011). the obligation of kaitiaki to ensure the viability of taonga (in this case, tissue) would suggest that a meaningful governance role is required within the employment of a biobank (ministry of health, 2014; health (cervical screening (kaitiaki)) regulations, 1995). the concept of rangatiratanga would then support the rights of māori to make decisions over their taonga and ensure that the mauri (essence, vitality) of the taonga remains strong (tupara, 2012). if an approach that recognizes tikanga māori is taken, then processes that set standards of behaviour such as governance, regulation, and ethics will need to be consistent with principles of taonga, kaitiaki, mauri, mana (control), and rangatiratanga. the development of culturally grounded processes for biobanking and genomic research would have to consider how māori principles and values are operationalised alongside existing principles, a process which is likely to highlight normative, epistemic, or preference differences (hope, molster, & o’leary, 2009). 3 beaton et al.: engaging maori in biobanking and genetic research published by scholarship@western, 2015   b i o b a n k i n g a n d g e n e t i c r e s e a r c h : r e l e v a n t n e w z e a l a n d l e g i s l a t i o n in new zealand, the health act (1956), human tissue act (2008), health and disability commissioner act (1994), guidelines on the use of human tissue for future unspecified research purposes (ministry of health, 2007), code of health and disability services consumers’ rights, the privacy act (1993), and the health information privacy code (1994) and regulations, provide the relevant legislative framework for researchers and biobanking. however, a recent law commission report observed that this current legislative framework is not very coherent and requires review (office of the privacy commissioner, 2013). internationally, the emergence of consortia conducting collaborative genetic population research involving large-scale data sharing has highlighted a number of challenges for governance, and inadequacies and conflicts between this existing legislation and research ethics, policy, and practices. in new zealand and more widely, this is particularly evident in the context of ownership, privacy, and consent as these principles are commonly considered by researchers in relation to the individual rather than to a population or a community. b i o b a n k s a n d i s s u e s o f p r i v a c y . the new zealand bill of rights act (1990) does not provide an express right to privacy. however, the privacy act (1993) does contain regulations applicable to health information. the relevant regulation, the health information privacy code (1993), was issued in as a regulation under the privacy act (1993) and is administered by the privacy commissioner. ultimately, if there is a breach of the specific privacy principles, a complaint can be made to the privacy commissioner and the human rights review tribunal. the health information privacy code regulates how health agencies collect, hold, use, and disclose health information about identifiable individuals. there are two key concepts in the code. first, the purpose: agencies must know why they are collecting health information and collect only the information they need. once health information has been collected from a patient for a particular purpose, it can be used or disclosed for that purpose without additional consent. second, openness: agencies need to inform patients how their information is going to be used and disclosed so the patients can make decisions about whether to provide it. the health information privacy code contains various rules relating to the purpose of collection of health information, source of health information, collection of health information from an individual, manner of collection of health information, correction of health information, storage and security of health information, access to personal health information, retention of health information, limits on use of health information, sufficient safeguard against potentially controversial research, and limits on the disclosure of health information and unique identifiers. these rules came into force before the emergence of large-scale biobanks, and the applicability and fit of these privacy rules to biobanking and protecting health information is at best tenuous. areas of concern include the lack of discretion between basic and research health information, the current limits on the use of health information, the discretion of biobanks to disclose information to third parties, and the restriction on the use of unique identifiers (lee, 2012). the interplay between various documents and mechanisms, such as the guidelines on the use of human tissue for future unspecified research purposes (ministry of health, 2007) and the code of health and disability services consumers’ rights that seek to protect health information may provide added protection for donors, other than that set out in the health information privacy code (1993). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.1   b i o b a n k s a n d i s s u e s o f o w n e r s h i p . internationally, it is not uncommon for the ownership of stored specimens to be a matter of litigation (moore v. regents of the university of california, 1990), and various efforts to clarify the ownership of physical samples and custodial rights within a legislative framework have been pursued. in 2008, iceland promulgated legislative provisions3 (act on health sector database, 1998) to capture the ownership of physical samples stored by biobanks. ownership was retained by the donors whilst the custodial rights were vested in the icelandic government. the legislation provided for the establishment of a database to store the present, past, and future health information of the icelandic population. this database encompassed a separate bank to store dna and another to store genealogical information. the intention was that this super biobank would provide a research tool for the entire population of iceland. however, when a single license was granted to a commercial operator and subsequent court cases (gudmundsdottir r v. the state of iceland, 2003) highlighted the movement away from informed consent, the automatic inclusion of participants, and no right of family members to opt out on behalf of deceased family members (lee, 2012), the icelandic super biobank failed (palsson, 2008). for similar reasons, biobanks in tonga and estonia, where the ownership was to be vested in the government with legislation providing protections to the donors, also failed. the uk biobank is the first successful dna biobank and is subject to the oversight of an independent ethics and governance council that adheres to the comprehensive uk biobank ethics and governance framework (uk biobank, 2007). there are a number of biobanks in new zealand that store a variety of human tissue and samples. these are relatively small scale and held by clinicians and research groups for the purpose of researching a particular disease. although new zealand has yet to establish a legal framework that adequately addresses issues of ownership for biobank samples, a raft of legislation, regulations, and codes collectively apply to biobanking and privacy, and also to consent and ownership issues. b i o b a n k s a n d i s s u e s o f c o n s e n t . in new zealand, the code of health and disability services consumers’ rights (health and disability commissioner act, 1994) provides that no health care procedure shall be performed without informed consent. rights 54, 65, and 76 of the code reflect the elements of informed consent. a biobank provides a service to promote health together with protecting health and preventing disease for populations over an extended timeframe and, in these terms, can be classified as a health care provider for the purposes of the code and the rights that relate to informed consent. whether or not a biobank complies with the code of health and disability services consumers’ rights regarding informed consent is complex, primarily because the nature of the research can be difficult to determine and foresee, and the elements that form the basis of the informed consent are also complex and not universally agreed upon. if the biobank takes all reasonable steps to give effect and comply with the code of health and disability services consumers’ rights then this effectively provides an escape clause7 when it is not possible to obtain informed consent without compromising the scientific value of the biobank (caulfield, 2007). in this regard, mongoven and solomon (2012)                                                                                                                 3 on december 17, 1998 the health sector database act was passed. 4 right to effective communication. 5 right to be fully informed. 6 right to make an informed choice and give informed consent. 7 clause 3 of the code. 5 beaton et al.: engaging maori in biobanking and genetic research published by scholarship@western, 2015   suggest donors are not really “informed” since the specific goals, risks, and benefits of future research are not known at the time of tissue donation. further, since decisions regarding the specific use of samples ultimately will be made by the biobank, donors are not really providing “consent.” e t h i c a l o v e r s i g h t o f r e s e a r c h i n n e w z e a l a n d the guidelines on the use of human tissue for future unspecified research purposes issued by the ministry of health is intended to provide guidance for ethics committees when considering applications involving human tissue research (lee, 2012). these guidelines sit below the statement of procedures for ethics committees (previously the operational standards for ethics committees) and guide the health and disability ethics committees when considering applications for research.8 this combined guidance is flexible and creates a standard that is amenable to future research. however, compliance with the guidelines does not always result in ethics approval because the ethical review process considers the balance of potential benefits from the research against the potential risks to the participant or donor. together, the code of health and disability services consumers’ rights and the statement of procedures support biobanking and the use of human tissue for unspecified research. however, the absence of any legislative framework to directly address the range of issues noted above means that the health and disability ethics committees do not have the degree of clarity to enable them to deal consistently and robustly with research involving the use of tissue from established biobanks. this broad concern is compounded by the changes to the health and disability ethics committee (hdec) structure and process introduced in july 2012 after a government assessment of the 2010 report from the health select committee (health select committee, 2011), who were investigating the means to potentially expand the number of clinical trials in new zealand. the resulting changes included: a reduction in the number of committees from seven to four, a reduction in the number of members from twelve to eight, the development of new statements of procedure (sop) to replace the previous operational standard, a loss of responsibility for peer review, the removal of the requirement for student research less than doctoral standard to have ethical review, and the introduction of an online application system. more important has been the introduction of the 35day clock, which is aimed at speeding up the review process, but with the potential that adherence to this requirement becomes the prime focus in the work of committees. sops provide procedural guidance only and are intended to be read in conjunction with two other guideline documents published by the national ethics advisory committee: ethics guidelines for observational studies; and the ethics guidelines for intervention studies, both of which were revised in 2012 to align them with the new hdec structure (national ethics advisory commitee, 2012a, 2012b). of more serious concern in the context of biobanking and genetic research is the requirement for hdecs to focus their attention on the ethics and not the science of research application. this ignores the fact that, commonly, the most serious ethical matters arise from the way in which proposed methodologies are applied in practice. the interaction among the research question, the process of data collection, and method of analysis is directly related to the outcomes the study produces. as māori and indigenous communities are particularly interested in cultural protocols for data and tissue collection as well as the outcomes and potential benefits of the project, the research                                                                                                                 8 see section 11 of the new zealand health and disability act 2000, which contains provisions for the minister of health to establish an ethics committee and terms of reference. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.1   methods need to be rigorously scrutinised (hudson, milne, reynolds, russell, & smith, 2010). a second concern is the sense that, in the latest iteration of the hdecs, issues of relevance to māori are being “dropped off the agenda.” this is primarily because the matter of māori membership is not explicitly defined even though the ministry of health’s (informal) view is that this element of membership is still considered to be an important dimension in the composition of ethics committees. in summary, these changes have resulted in the perception that the degree of protection afforded research participants by the ethics review process is now not as robust as it once was (gillett & douglass, 2012). a manifestation of this perception is that key organisations in health, such as district health boards (dhbs), are setting up parallel structures (such as māori research review committees) as a way of reducing this “risk quotient” to the organisation while drawing attention away from the risk associated with being a participant or donor. in summary, the environment of ethical oversight has become more structurally complex and the current hdec system has been somewhat disempowered. this makes it critical that issues around the relationships between māori and the agencies involved in genetic research and biobanking are clarified through the development of cohesive guidelines that protect māori interests and marry these with the goals of the health researcher community. e n g a g e m e n t w i t h māo r i i n t h e e t h i c s r e v i e w p r o c e s s the perspective held by many māori, especially those involved in health research and including those who sit as māori members on ethics committees, is that engagement with māori should be a requirement except in very specifically defined circumstances. however, the view that instances of non-consultation should be rare is one that provokes a range of reactions within the health research community at large. the negative reaction to this tenet is generally couched in terms of criticism of the added cost and time arising from the supposed difficulty of finding suitable parties with whom to consult and then having to wait for responses that are said to be slow in coming. the extent of the general relevance of this process is also questioned. one possible solution is that consultation would only be required as a part of the ethics approval process when the research is clearly “māori centred.” alternatively, if research participants are recruited from the general population, then an ethics committee could be asked to deal with this category of research on paper much as is the practice now. this perspective is a long way from the opinion regarding te tiriti o waitangi (“the treaty”) responsibilities that softening the requirements for māori consultation should be the exception and never the rule (treaty of waitangi, 1840). such a position is derived from the view that, in terms of the treaty, all health research will be of relevance to māori. whilst approaches described in applications to hdecs lie somewhere between these two stances, the annual reports from these committees express concern about the way researchers deal with māori consultation and cultural matters generally, which suggests that hdecs tend to favour a more broadly defined consultation requirement. comments such as “some researchers pay no more than lip service to the cultural requirements” confirm a degree of dissatisfaction with the status quo (northern y health and disability ethics committee, 2008, p. 17). moreover, a related argument also points to the concern that any relaxation of the requirement to consult with māori may potentially reduce the amount of research activity focused on māori issues, particularly in the area of personal and population health. moreover, the current system is not consistent in the way it deals with issues pertaining to māori, and because there is an absence of nationally sanctioned guidelines (notwithstanding the utility of te ara tika) ethics committees have been left to improvise in dealing with matters of relevance to māori. this situation may lend itself toward a focus on cultural dimensions while ignoring critical 7 beaton et al.: engaging maori in biobanking and genetic research published by scholarship@western, 2015   issues such as impact on māori and the reduction of health inequalities. the modus operandi regarding treaty responsibilities has not been observed to have changed over the past decade but, more importantly, has been made possibly worse in the latest iteration of the ethics review system. a statement which describes this approach can be found in the annual report of the multi-region ethics committee (2006) where it is suggested that: more often than not where consultation has occurred, it is framed around the need for cultural sensitivity and understanding with much less energy given to exploring the possible paradigmatic and research issues relating to māori that may be implicated in the project. while matters of culture are important in the research process, there is a need for greater thought to be given to conceptual issues and questions, along with the shape of research outputs, if the results from health research are to contribute more positively to the health status of māori. (p. 8) currently, researchers are required to outline: (a) how their study might benefit māori; (b) what the main cultural issues are that māori may face if they participate in the study; and (c) whether they have read the health research council’s guidelines for researchers on health research involving māori (which contains te ara tika as an appendix). unfortunately, the responses to these questions, and how a study might impact health inequality, historically and consistently have been answered poorly. the uni-dimensional focus along with the uneven stance taken by the current ethics committees in respect to these questions does not augur well for the creating of ethics review processes that keep māori participants safe in the context of genetic research and biobanking. e n g a g e m e n t w i t h māo r i t h r o u g h r e s e a r c h p a r t n e r s h i p s a recent comprehensive international review and comparative analysis of indigenous research guidelines in new zealand, australia, canada, and the united states (us) identified a number of areas of concern and a need for further work in developing research policy that promotes respectful engagement with indigenous communities (taniguchi, taualii, & maddock, 2012). in new zealand, australia, and the us, there is currently no direction to seek community engagement during the development of research protocols as there is in canada, although all countries did provide some guidance in other areas of community consultation (taniguchi et al., 2012). and unlike canada’s tri-council policy statement: ethical conduct for research involving humans (canadian institutes for health research, national sciences and engineering research council of canada, and social sciences and humanities research council of canada, 2010), new zealand’s guidelines for researchers on health research involving māori (health research council new zealand, 2008), does not provide guidance on the use and storage of biological materials, prioritization of research uses, or post-research obligations (other than community review of study findings before release). more specifically, new zealand research guidelines do not stipulate a requirement to define potential uses prior to sample collection, to make provision for individual or community withdrawal of samples, to discuss secondary uses with contributing individuals or communities, or to obtain community approval for secondary uses of material or the resulting genetic data (taniguchi et al., 2012), although researchers may opt to do so. furthermore, there is no direction around prioritization of research uses such that the research should benefit the contributing population, or a requirement that a clear position on commercial applications be disclosed. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.1   thus there is much to learn from the experiences of indigenous people in other countries. the national congress of american indians (ncai) policy research center (prc) has made an important commitment to education through the provision of specific resources that address unique considerations in conducting research with american indian and alaska native (ai/an) communities. toolkits are freely available to communities and individuals who may have questions about genetic research including frequently asked questions; common concerns regarding stigmatization, data sharing, and strategies for addressing these concerns; and sample consent forms and research agreements for tribal communities (national congress of american indians, 2014a). information is also available to researchers who have questions about how to effectively partner with ai/an communities covering information about indigenous knowledge, ethics, research policies, and protocols, and negotiation of research relationships with communities (national congress of american indians, 2014b). in canada, tribal governments have the legal authority to regulate research that is conducted on their lands and with their citizens (deloria, 2003) and tribes as a result have employed a variety of research review processes (sahota, 2007). these range from the involvement of tribal councils to the establishment of tribal research review boards and/or partnerships with others to review protocols that are presented to the community. if an ai/an community does develop formal guidelines for research that is undertaken with their tribal members, researchers may be required to provide a written commitment to abide by these policies. penalties may also be applied if researchers conduct unapproved research or violate other agreed terms for conducting research (sahota, 2007). this is not currently the case in new zealand. e n g a g e m e n t w i t h māo r i i n t h e p o l i c y d e v e l o p m e n t p r o c e s s in terms of satisfying crown responsibilities under the treaty, it is pivotal that māori, in partnership with the crown, participate meaningfully in any policy or legislation that would shape the context of biobanking and genetic research for māori in a way that augments potential benefits while controlling the level of risk and giving protection to taonga. the treaty can be viewed as “the founding document of new zealand” (mcdowell & webb, 2006) and “a constitutional document” (palmer, 2002), that many māori see as “the most important document in new zealand’s history” (cooke, 1990). it provides principles that include protection, partnership, and participation; however, there is no reference to the treaty or the principles of the treaty either within the privacy act (1993) or the health information privacy code (1993). there is also insufficient provision to adequately support and promote māori approaches within the decision-making around these issues. the treaty clearly recognises the right of self-determination or tinorangatiratanga for māori.9 kaitiakitanga (a way of managing the environment) is inherently linked to rangatiratanga (the right to exercise authority, autonomy, self-determination, self-management, and ownership) and rights of action over those taonga as they are used in genetic research (treaty of waitangi, 1840). in this way, māori should be involved in the governance and regulation of biobanks and in the development of ethical standards for research and biobanking practices. this concept has been increasingly brought                                                                                                                 9 see the māori text that enables continuing rangatiratanga of māori tribes over their possessions and taonga and asserts that the crown would protect that rangatiratanga. this includes the right of self-determination and the right of development. the crown receives the right to govern, a delegated power, subject to continuing māori authority. 9 beaton et al.: engaging maori in biobanking and genetic research published by scholarship@western, 2015   into new zealand public policy on trusteeship or guardianship, especially in relation to environmental and resource controls under the resource management act (1991, see section 7a). while it has been acknowledged that māori have an individual right to participate in biobanking and genetic research, the collective may assert its authority to protect their whakapapa as a taonga under article 2 of te tiriti o waitangi (henagan, 2006). by paying regard to the benefits that could be associated with biobanking, this hurdle could be surmounted through creating a practical balance between the rights of the individual and those of the collective. the united nations (2008) declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples confirms the right of māori to maintain control and protect their genetic resources. article 31 provides: 1. indigenous peoples have the right to maintain, control, protect and develop their cultural heritage, traditional knowledge and traditional cultural expressions, as well as the manifestations of their sciences, technologies and cultures, including human and genetic resources, seeds, medicines, knowledge of the properties of fauna and flora, oral traditions, literatures, designs, sports and traditional games and visual and performing arts. they also have the right to maintain, control, protect and develop their intellectual property over such cultural heritage, traditional knowledge, and traditional cultural expressions. 2. in conjunction with indigenous peoples, states shall take effective measures to recognize and protect the exercise of these rights. (p.11) intellectual property is also of relevance to the protection of māori interests in biobanking and genetic research. the world intellectual property organization (wipo) is the global forum for intellectual property services, policy, information, and cooperation. the wipo inter governmental committee (igc) was established by the wipo general assembly in 2000 to provide a forum for states to discuss intellectual property issues in relation to traditional knowledge (tk), genetic resources (grs), and traditional cultural expressions (tces or "expressions of folklore"). in 2009, the wipo general assembly authorized the igc to undertake negotiations with the intention of reaching an agreement on the text of an international instrument to protect traditional knowledge, genetic resources, and traditional cultural expressions. the wipo igc is currently drafting three texts to encapsulate and control the use and dissemination of tk, grs and tces. if the text on grs is ratified, by the general assembly of states, this could potentially become binding on new zealand and provide further protection for māori (wipo igc, n.d.). in summary, te tiriti o waitangi and the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples provide clear support for māori, as indigenous people, to govern their own process of collection, storage, and use of genetic material. whether māori participate in existing biobanks in new zealand or seek to govern their own, it is important for māori that their agency in processes that affect them is enhanced, in order to achieve population-level health outcomes (fullerton, knerr, & burke, 2012). m o v i n g f o r w a r d there are a number of steps māori could take to protect individual participants and communities participating in biobanking and genetic research. based on the “gaps” in the framework of current legislation, policy, and practice in new zealand, a number of practical recommendations of 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.1   international relevance are suggested to afford protection to māori who choose to engage in biobanking and genetic research. 1. engage māori, the medical, and the scientific community and government agencies to inform the development of cultural guidelines for biobanking and genetic research in new zealand and elsewhere to ensure culturally safe interactions with participants and communities can occur. 2. make educational resources available to researchers about how to effectively partner with māori communities covering information about indigenous knowledge, ethics, research policies and protocols, and negotiation of research relationships and priorities with communities. this information could be available on a website for the scientific community at a national and international level. 3. support māori communities to develop their own research strategy; criteria for the assessment and evaluation of research proposals; and formal guidelines for research that is undertaken with them, which could include restrictions on the future use of biospecimens collected for specific research projects. 4. provide “toolkits” for māori, available collectively and individually, about biobanking and genetic research including frequently asked questions, common concerns regarding data sharing, and strategies for addressing these concerns. sample consent forms and research agreements and contracts should also be made available to communities. 5. communities may consider applying penalties (for example, rejection of future research requests with māori communities) if researchers conduct unapproved research or violate other agreed terms for conducting research. this notion could be extended to ethics review and research funding mechanisms. 6. promote forums for māori communities to share best practice examples of how communities are already participating in genetic research and biobanking to effectively build capacity and to ensure māori interests are better protected. moving forward, “next-generation” regulation that provides more cohesive policies and legislation will be needed to inform the development of national and international systems equipped to deal with the challenges of biobanking and associated large-scale, population-level genomic research. beyond continued engagement in the ethics review process, accompanying sustainable mechanisms that enable māori participation in policy development and build trust, support and effective research partnerships between māori communities and researchers must be established and sustained. a strong commitment to education that bridges cultural and communication differences and builds the capability of all stakeholders will be required. 11 beaton et al.: engaging maori in biobanking and genetic research published by scholarship@western, 2015   r e f e r e n c e s ahuriri-driscoll, a., hudson, m., foote, j., hepi, m., rogers-koroheke, m., taimona, h., & symes, j. 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(2006). having honest conversations about the impact of new technologies on indigenous people’s knowledge and values. in j. s. te rito (ed.), mātauranga taketake: traditional knowledge indigenous indicators of well-being: perspectives, practices, solutions (pp. 155-166). retrieved from www.maramatanga.ac.nz/sites/default/files/tkc2006.pdf treaty of waitangi (1840). retrieved from http://www.treatyofwaitangi.maori.nz/ tupara, h. (2012). ethics and health research: decision making in aotearoa new zealand. ajob primary research, 3(4), 40-52. doi: 10.1080/21507716.2012.714834 uk biobank ethics and governance council. (2007). workshop report: involving publics in biobanks. united kingdom, uk biobank ethics and governance council. retrieved from http://www.ukbiobank.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/egf20082.pdf united nations. (2008). united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples. retrieved from www.un.org/esa/socdev/unpfii/documents/drips_en.pdf world intellectual property organization (wipo). (n.d.). intergovernmental committee. retrieved from http://www.wipo.int/tk/en/igc/ 17 beaton et al.: engaging maori in biobanking and genetic research published by scholarship@western, 2015   a p p e n d i x s u m m a r y o f l e g i s l a t i o n , p o l i c y a n d e t h i c a l p r o t e c t i o n i n b i o b a n k i n g a n d r e s e a r c h māo r i • te tiriti o waitangi (the treaty of waitangi) (1840) • united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (2008) • guidelines for researchers on health research involving māori (2008) g u i d e l i n e s f o r r e s e a r c h w i t h māo r i • health research council new zealand guidelines for researchers on health research involving māori (2008) • te ara tika: guidelines for māori research ethics—a framework for researchers and ethics committee members (2010) p r i v a c y • privacy act (1993) • health information privacy code (1994) i n f o r m e d c o n s e n t • health and disability commissioner act (1994) • code of health and disability services consumers’ rights (1996) e t h i c a l a p p r o v a l f o r r e s e a r c h • new zealand public health and disability act (2000) • operational standard for ethics committees (2006) • national ethics advisory committee ethical guidelines for observational studies (2012a) • national ethics advisory committee ethical guidelines for intervention studies (2012b) b i o b a n k i n g a n d r e s e a r c h • health act (1956) • human tissue act (2008) 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 3 [2015], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss3/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.3.1   • guidelines on the use of human tissue for future unspecified research purposes (2007) 19 beaton et al.: engaging maori in biobanking and genetic research published by scholarship@western, 2015 the international indigenous policy journal june 2015 engaging maori in biobanking and genetic research: legal, ethical, and policy challenges angela beaton barry smith valmaine toki kim southey maui hudson recommended citation engaging maori in biobanking and genetic research: legal, ethical, and policy challenges abstract keywords creative commons license engaging maori in biobanking and genetic research: legal, ethical, and policy challenges past and present perspectives on indigenous tourism in the pastaza province of ecuador: the case of kapawi the international indigenous policy journal volume 6 | issue 4 article 7 september 2015 past and present perspectives on indigenous tourism in the pastaza province of ecuador: the case of kapawi bernardo peredo environmental change institute, university of oxford, bernardo.peredo@ouce.ox.ac.uk andres ordóñez universidad de especialidades turísticas del ecuador, andresenquito@hotmail.com viola belohrad forest peoples programme, v.belohrad@gmail.com recommended citation peredo, b. , ordóñez, a. , belohrad, v. (2015). past and present perspectives on indigenous tourism in the pastaza province of ecuador: the case of kapawi. the international indigenous policy journal, 6(4). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.7 past and present perspectives on indigenous tourism in the pastaza province of ecuador: the case of kapawi abstract ecuador has a wide range of ecotourism initiatives throughout the country. since the 1990s, many indigenous communities have started to organize themselves in order to run their own ecotourism programs. as a result, scholars have suggested that indigenous ecotourism in latin america started in ecuador with the advent of community-owned projects, particularly in the amazon. one of the first initiatives was kapawi, located in the achuar territory of pastaza province. the project was initiated by a private tour operator through a joint venture with the achuar indigenous organization. a transfer process started in 2008 and kapawi is now managed by the achuar communities, with a new set of opportunities and challenges. this article uses data collected from extensive fieldwork to examine the evolution, lessons learned, dynamics, and perspectives of the kapawi enterprise. keywords ecuador, kapawi, indigenous tourism, sustainability acknowledgments the authors are grateful to the achuar communities and kapawi staff. support from the skoll centre for social entrepreneurship and the environmental change institute at oxford university is gratefully acknowledged. disclaimer the opinions and points of view in this paper remain the sole responsibility of the authors and do not necessarily represent the views of the institutions involved in this research. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ p a s t a n d p r e s e n t p e r s p e c t i v e s o n i n d i g e n o u s t o u r i s m i n t h e p a s t a z a p r o v i n c e o f e c u a d o r : t h e c a s e o f k a p a w i indigenous tourism ventures are largely a response to the spread of ecotourism into remote natural areas, including indigenous territories and national parks in different ecosystems that are traditional living areas for many indigenous communities in developing countries in africa, asia, and latin america (epler, 2008; johnston, 2000; peredo, 2008; weaver, 2001), but also in developed countries such as australia, new zealand, and canada (nepal, 2004; parker, 2002). the term indigenous tourism has emerged since the mid-1990s to describe community-based tourism projects developed on indigenous territories in latin america while the term aboriginal tourism is generally used in australia and canada. the emergence of ecotourism in tropical developing countries in recent decades has brought hopes of integrating local development with environmental conservation as ecotourism may help protect rainforests while also meeting the economic needs of local residents (cater & lowman, 1994; goodwin, 2011; mitchell & ashley, 2010). these hopes are commonly expressed in academic, non-governmental organization (ngo), and governmental circles, while indigenous peoples are becoming more involved in the ecotourism industry worldwide (hinch, 2004; johnston, 2006; notzke, 2006; stronza, 2007). however, the global expansion of ecotourism into natural areas and indigenous lands, mostly in developing countries, has also raised some doubts. scholars have expressed concerns about the impacts of ecotourism by suggesting that it will contaminate the cultural identity of local people. in addition, ecotourism is seen as a kind of imperialism that can overpower traditional institutions. it is also asserted that resulting benefits of ecotourism are unequally distributed (duffy, 2002; gerberich, 2005; honey, 1999; mowforth & munt, 2003; ryan & aicken, 2005; sofield, 2003). in addition, the literature also suggests that the participation by local community members and local ownership are key governance principles underlying the success of community-based tourism (johnston, 2006; peredo, 2010; zeppel, 2007). land rights and tenure are indispensable requirements for success in community-based tourism because indigenous ventures should only be considered successful if indigenous peoples are allowed to take control despite the forces that often work against them (fennell, 2006; litvinoff & griffiths, 2014). land tenure insecurity has been identified as a driving factor behind the failure of indigenous ecotourism projects (coria & calfucura, 2012). aware of the reality affecting other indigenous groups in the amazon since the 1990s, the achuar, whose ancestral lands are located in a remote region along the ecuador–peru border, have been supporting the development of alternative sustainable activities, including ecotourism, to generate a source of income, preserve their ancient customs and traditions, and protect their natural resources. this activity gained the interest of an ecuadorian tourism operator, canodros, in the early 1990s, which was working in the galapagos and aimed to start activities in the amazon region. an initiative was developed in the context of increased community-based tourism ventures in ecuador, as the country is considered in existing literature as a pioneer in indigenous tourism projects in latin america. the kapawi ecological reserve was created in the mid-1990s for the purpose of contributing to the economic, social, and cultural development of the achuar indigenous community. the tour operator initially managed the project and, a decade later, it was transferred entirely to the achuar. since 2008, the achuar people have managed their own project, which is currently one of the oldest indigenous 1 peredo et al.: kapawi: perspectives on indigenous tourism published by scholarship@western, 2015 tourism enterprises in the amazon. after 20 years of implementation, kapawi has provided several benefits to the achuar, but still faces important challenges that are similar to other challenges indigenous enterprises face in the region. given its considerable length, a number of lessons have been learned, which could help other indigenous tourism projects in the amazon and elsewhere. this article is structured in five parts: the first and second parts are a descriptive examination of the origins and evolution of kapawi from the early 1990s to 2005, and the transition period and current achuar management (2008-2015), respectively; the third part provides an economic and market analysis for the last period to assess the enterprise’s current situation in terms of market flows and financial sustainability, while the last section provides an analytical revision of kapawi’s challenges, benefits, and lessons learned. i n d i g e n o u s t o u r i s m a n d i t s e m e r g e n c e i n e c u a d o r the more focused study on indigenous tourism, in its various forms, has been characterized by four general phases: a. legitimization as a subject of scholarly study; b. critical advocacy for indigenous peoples; c. pragmatic cross-cultural education; and d. analysis from a policy and economic development perspective (see butler & hinch, 2007). studies by schaller (1996), wesche (1996) and wunder (1996) have suggested that the phenomenon of indigenous ecotourism in latin america started in ecuador with the advent of community-owned projects. in contrast to other latin american countries, ecuador had a small tourist industry in the 1980s and it played only a minor role in the economy. the most popular tourist destination was the galapagos islands, but concerns over the delicate environment limited large-scale tourism in this region. however, with the development of the galapagos as a flagship destination since the mid-1980s, overall tourism in ecuador, particularly to natural areas, has been increasing (drumm, 1998; epler, 1993). as a result, ecuador has long been a major destination for nature tourists for the last 25 years. between 1987 and 1990, the number of visitors to protected areas in the ecuadorian amazon increased by 50 percent and the lodging capacity rose by 40 percent (epler, 2007). for this rise, the international ecotourism society called ecuador, “a living laboratory of ecotourism and community development issues” (cited in epler wood, 1998, p. 2). according to drumm (1991), the different provinces in the ecuadorian amazon have been an established tourism destination since the 1970s (see figure 1), attracting tourists with its diversity of indigenous groups and large tracts of primary forest with opportunities for viewing wildlife. a study by epler wood (1998) suggested that, by that time, ecuador represented one of the most exciting countries for investigating appropriate community participation in ecotourism development. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.7 f i g u r e 1 . t h e e c u a d o r i a n a m a z o n ( s o u r c e : e x p l o r i n g e c u a d o r , 2 0 1 4 , h t t p : / / w w w . e x p l o r i n g e c u a d o r . c o m / e s p a n o l / a m a z o n _ e c u a d o r . h t m ) . there are a wide range of ecotourism initiatives in this country, from high-end to rustic lodges and river adventure trips to national parks and indigenous territories (peaty, 2007). indigenous people were initially antagonistic to the development of nature tourism in their regions because enterprises were developed without local involvement (wesche, 1995; wesche & drumm, 1999). however, during the 1990s, many indigenous communities have run their own ecotourism programs motivated generally by the increase of indigenous tourism projects, the availability of economic resources for such projects by national and international donors, and the opportunities for income generation through ecotourism ventures. some have effectively organized at the community level to receive independent travelers and tourists interested in indigenous culture, either directly or in partnerships with private tour operators (braman & fundación acción amazonia, 2001; jarrin, 2009; wesche, 1993; wunder, 2000). according to cabañilla (2004), while some indigenous tourism projects were conceived in the late 1980s, the decade of 1990 marks the boom for community-based tourism in ecuador as more than 40 projects initiated operations (see figure 2). wesche and drumm (1999) counted more than 30 community-owned ecotourism projects in the amazonian region of ecuador alone. these village-based operations varied considerably. some catered to backpackers in search of a rustic hut in the rainforest; others appealed to high-end ecotourists wanting a well-catered rainforest vacation complete with english-speaking guides (drumm, 1998). these initiatives were especially related to community3 peredo et al.: kapawi: perspectives on indigenous tourism published by scholarship@western, 2015 operated tourism projects in the ecuadorian amazon, particularly those of ricancie (quichua network of nine communities geared towards serving the mid to high-end market segment) and kapawi (achuar partnership with a tour operator). however, there was a reduction in community-based projects during the first half of the 2000s, mainly because additional funding for this kind of project was not sufficient as the multiplication of projects led to a saturation of ventures and activities with mixed results. while many communities have developed their own tourism operations, and have been heralded in ecotourism literature, they often have struggled to attract enough tourists to make their programs viable (wesche & drumm, 1999). f i g u r e 2 . c o m m u n i t y b a s e d t o u r i s m p r o j e c t s i n e c u a d o r . despite these challenges, kapawi has been operating for almost 20 years becoming one of the oldest ventures in the amazon.the community of kapawi and its ecological reserve are located at 250 km southeast of quito in the remote upper amazon rainforest just inside ecuador's border with peru. kapawi’s lodge is located on the southern bank of the pastaza river, a major tributary of the amazon. the region has a typical equatorial climate, constantly humid. mean annual daytime temperatures average 25°c. the annual average low temperature fluctuates between 19 and 20°c, and the average annual high temperature is between 29 and 31°c. the average annual rainfall is no more than 3,000 mm for the highest latitudes, and not less than 2,000 mm for the lowest (colding, 1998; ordóñez, 2012). however, rainfall varies from year to year. the habitats surrounding kapawi are diverse and include terre firme forests, swamps, oxbow lakes, and rivers; this is one of the most secluded and pristine areas of ecuador, still untouched by logging, mining, or petroleum extraction (carpentier, 2014). the achuar are a group of indigenous peoples of the amazon basin, currently numbering around 6,000 and their ancestral lands straddle the modern borders of ecuador and peru, a remote area that has allowed them to preserve their way of life with little outside influence or colonization (ifad, 2012; trujillo, maldonado, rodriguez, & montalvo, 2008). throughout their history, the achuar have been 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.7 self-sufficient and autonomous, sustaining their family groups through hunting and gardening. once semi-nomadic people, most achuar now live in small villages, as a result of contact with christian missionaries in the 1960s (descola, 1989). the achuar are a people rich in customs, traditions, and beliefs and still maintain many practices of subsistence hunting, gathering, forest extraction, and smallscale planting (descola, 1994; taylor, 1996). this way of life has been cultivated over the course of centuries and is now combined with the development of ecotourism in kapawi, offering excursions in which they disseminate part of their ancestral knowledge and the natural diversity located in the achuar territory, covering an area of nearly two million acres. approximately 1,000 achuar inhabit the area surrounding kapawi eco-lodge (impulsa, 2012; trujillo et al., 2008). the territory where kapawi is located belongs to the achuar asociación matsatkamu achuar nunken ayamprin [maana] association, which currently encompasses seven communities: kapawi, warchirpas, wayusentsa, sharamentsa, ishpingo, suwa, and kusutkau (figure 3). the closest road is a 10-day walk from the amazon lodge and its nearest river is connected neither to roads or paved airstrips. kapawi is accessible only by air; small planes are located in a little airport in the town of shell, located near the amazonian frontier town of puyo. it is the headquarters for the achuar people outside of their rainforest territory. f i g u r e 3 . m a p o f k a p a w i ( s o u r c e : k a p a w i , 2 0 1 4 ) . 5 peredo et al.: kapawi: perspectives on indigenous tourism published by scholarship@western, 2015 m e t h o d s fieldwork was carried out in the kapawi offices, the ecolodge, and achuar communities in the pastaza province, and the cities of quito, puyo, and shell for the period from 2011 to 2013. fieldwork involved semi-structured interviews, first-hand accounts, and participant observation. in total, 65 semi-structured interviews were carried out targeting the following groups: kapawi staff (including the director, managers, employees, and freelance workers); achuar leaders and community members (including the achuar president, other nae representatives, and community authorities); government and nongovernmental organizations that have been collaborating with kapawi, including the ministry of tourism and civil society organizations such as rainforest alliance; and tourists visiting the lodge at the time of the fieldwork. to increase context validity, five of the six communities working with kapawi were visited and for two months the interactions between the communities and the enterprise were observed. fieldwork was complemented with the revision and analysis of primary and secondary documents about indigenous tourism in ecuador, as well as institutional documents and information provided by kapawi. these included annual documents, memoirs, tourism flows and statistics, internal procedures and guidelines, strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats [swot] analyses, financial balances, theses, and analysis of quality control processes and documents based on international norms. these revisions were developed in 2014 and early 2015 to include kapawi’s latest developments and accounts. p h a s e 1 : t h e o r i g i n s a n d e v o l u t i o n o f k a p a w i ( e a r l y 1 9 9 0 – 2 0 0 5 ) kapawi’s origins are linked to the ecuadorian tour operator canodros, which started operations in galapagos in 1987 and had become a well-known tour operator in this region. interest in expanding operations in other mainland ecuadorian regions motivated the company to look for other options, particularly in the amazon as an add-on to galapagos.1 contacts between the tour operator and the achuar organization were made by an amazon guide working in a local operator. discussions to establish a partnership between the achuar people and the tour company began. the meetings were fruitful and achuar leaders supported the idea to participate in an ecotourism project. despite some initial doubts about the proposal given its novelty, the communities were interested in ecotourism (bennet, 2001). in 1993, canodros and the achuar organization signed the agreement in which canodros would finance kapawi, and the achuar would participate fully in the operation and management (stronza, 2005; trujillo et al., 2008). with this agreement, the first ecotourism initiative in the achuar territory was the concept of the kapawi ecolodge. the project has been named after kapawi community, which provided part of its territory to build the infrastructure. according to the agreement, canodros agreed to co-design, construct, and operate a well-equipped lodge for 40 guests in the achuar territory. the terms of the 15-year agreement stipulated a monthly rent to the achuar federation of us$2,000, with an increase of 7 percent per year, based on the banks’                                                                                                                 1 a businessman from guayaquil, carlos perez perasso, owned canodros and was also the owner of el universo, one of ecuador’s largest newspapers. he was the promoter of canodros’ expansion in the amazon. the company hoped that 40% of its market from the galapagos operation, around 2,800 passengers per year, might have an interest in visiting the amazon, and decided to build an ecolodge in kapawi (rodríguez, 1999; stronza, 2003). 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.7 interest rate on the us dollar (koupermann, 1997; rodríguez, 2008). in addition, a us$10 fee was charged to every visitor for the exclusive benefit of the achuar community. it was estimated that the monthly rent paid by canodros to the national achuar organization for the use of their land would total over us$600,000 and the $10 fee charged to every visitor would add an estimated additional us$150,000 (rodríguez, 2007; stronza, 2003; trujillo et al., 2008). it was also agreed that the lodge was to pass entirely to the achuar by 2011 and that indigenous participation would be integral to every step of the process. canodros committed to employ a majority of achuar people and to purchase supplies for the lodge, including food, wood, palms, and fibres, from the community. canodros also agreed to transfer know-how to the achuar co-owners through training in all aspects of lodge management and operation (koupermann, 1997; rodríguez, 1996). all of the financial capital came from the tour operator and all of the traditional architectural standards and labour came from the achuar, as they agreed to provide traditional techniques for building the lodge and access to their existing airstrip. all materials, including palm and thatch, were purchased from the achuar communities. they also assented to restrict hunting in the areas within the ecotourism zone through the implementation of an integrated resource management plan for their territory (morales, 2012; stronza, 2005). the overarching goal of this plan was to ensure the long-term wellbeing of the achuar, and establish their right to self-determination. four general areas of action were defined to support this goal: a. developing sustainable economic enterprises; b. recording traditional achuar knowledge and practices; c. strengthening their ability to defend their lands against outside encroachment; d. building up their governing achuar federation and its leadership (rodríguez & santacruz, 1997). since kapawi’s inception, one of its main goals, therefore, has been to provide support for the achuar community. the objectives of kapawi were twofold: a. to implement a two million-dollar project in an indigenous territory, by leasing their land, sharing benefits, and passing the know-how and installations to the achuar; it was also stipulated that at the end of a 15-year period (the year 2011), the project will be owned and managed by the achuar;2 and b. to facilitate the achuar's request for partnership by contributing to the creation of a nonprofit organization that provides access to technical expertise and funding for a variety of achuar projects (rodríguez, 1996). also, kapawi defined its overall mission to provide for quality tourism services in the ecuadorian amazon that promote responsible enjoyment of nature, environmental education, and cultural                                                                                                                 2 meanwhile, kapawi sought to recover the investment and to obtain a profit. 7 peredo et al.: kapawi: perspectives on indigenous tourism published by scholarship@western, 2015 dissemination of the achuar people. much attention was thus placed on training and efforts that support the achuar's governing federation and leadership. in order to maintain high standards of service, canodros created a structure to train the achuar personnel, ranging from biology to carpentry (rodríguez, 1996). construction began in 1993 and lasted for more than two years given several delays, including the war between peru and ecuador. the lodge and row of cabins that stood on stilts along the shore of a lagoon were constructed entirely in the achuar tradition, using wood, palm leaves, and twine. the walkways connecting the individual cabins were all made of natural products from the rainforest, which led to the motto found in the lodge, stating that there is "not a nail in the place." the raised boardwalk also connected large communal buildings at kapawi, all of which rest on stilts around the edge of a lagoon crowded with plant and bird life. the infrastructure was built by 120 community members from 20 different communities. the achuar also provided knowledge about their culture and environment, which, although not measurable, has been a valuable contribution to the development of the facility. each of the thatched roof guest cabins was designed as an expression of authentic, traditional achuar design concepts, providing a spacious, sustainable, and well-ventilated infrastructure. twenty-one cabins were built to accommodate a maximum of 70 people, including guests and staff; not coincidentally, it is about the size of a typical achuar village (morales, 2012; trujillo et al., 2008). the lodge also included environmentally friendly conveniences: solar energy, biodegradable soaps, recycling systems, and specially made sun-powered bags for shower water. the kapawi project opened for operations in april 1996 as a partnership between canodros and the achuar people. this ecotourism project had the highest capital investment of us$2 million in the ecuadorian amazon (stronza, 2003). in 1997, the management plan was produced for the achuar territory and in 1998 the operation won the british airways award “tourism for tomorrow” for protecting the environment for tourism in the future. in 2000, it also received conservation international’s “ecotourism excellence award.” kapawi has also been the subject of articles in national geographic traveller, wildlife conservation, and audubon magazine, among others (stronza, 2003). by 2002, the number of personnel in kapawi totalled between 55 and 60, including sales, reservations, and logistics assistants based in offices in quito, guayaquil, and shell, as well as cooks, administrators, guides, boat drivers, maintenance workers, and housekeepers. tourists per year averaged 1,000 (kane, 2002; stronza, 2003). the same year, the monthly rent was renegotiated at a slightly higher and fixed rate; the achuar witnessed an increase in tourism and tourists to kapawi as it became a well-known and prime destination in the amazon. this increase was apparent to the achuar before statistics were provided to them. this prompted achuar leaders to demand an increase in economic benefits. for the company, it was necessary to accept the demands and the proposed increase to maintain the positive relations with the achuar because both parties realized that the flow of tourists to kapawi had increased. in 2002, another important event occurred, which marked the history of kapawi. the owner of canodros passed away and his son took over the company. the new management had a different business vision and made the pragmatic decision to transfer ownership to the achuar by 2008, instead of 2011. pursuant to the agreement between canodros and the achuar, the tour operator officially moved the transfer of the lease forward to january 2008. this decision was represented by a property transfer 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.7 plan, which included the creation of a trust of us$100,000 and a technical commission, as well as specialized training for young achuars in universities in quito (trujillo et al., 2008). with this transfer, kapawi was fully handed over to the achuar and all of the facilities became the property of the achuar organization—achuar nationality of ecuador (nae).3 the transfer of ownership of the kapawi ecolodge to the achuar was completed and a new management and organizational structure was created. p h a s e 2 : t r a n s f e r p r o c e s s a n d n e w m a n a g e m e n t s t r u c t u r e s ( 2 0 0 8 – 2 0 1 4 ) as part of the canodros’ transfer, kapawi is currently being managed and operated by the achuarowned tourism operator complejo ecoturistico kapawi sociedad anonima (ceksa). this indigenous enterprise was created in 2005, with the agreement of the nae, as a limited company that holds the legal structure of a tour operator, and is responsible for the ownership, operation, and management of the lodge. ceksa initially employed more than 50 people in the indigenous territory and in two urban offices—one in quito, and the other in the town of shell. the kapawi office in quito is composed of a general manager, financial manager, sales manager, operations manager and sales agent, lead accountant, assistant accountant, messenger, and a marketing department, which is currently working in a limited manner given some financial constraints. an operations office in shell is responsible for organizing flights and logistics for the operation of the lodge. ceksa’s management structure is composed of a shareholder board with three main members: the nae (52%), the community of kapawi (24%), and the maana association formed by other six communities (24%) (figure 4).4 according to the nae, 121 families and 683 people live in the maana association communities, which would make for an average family size of 5.6 people (impulsa, 2012). ceska regulations state that the representatives on the shareholder board are the presidents of each of the nae, the kapawi community, and the maana association. the shareholder board also elects a board of directors, which meets every six months with the goal to approve every year´s budget, and other managerial and operational aspects. the board of directors is established in ceksa´s statutes and is composed of five representatives: the president of nae, one representative of the pastaza province, one representative of the morona santiago province, one representative of the kapawi community, and one representative of the maana association, who is currently from the kusutkao community. according to trujillo and colleagues (2008), this set a new standard in community-based tourism in latin america.                                                                                                                 3 the achuar people and communities are organized and represented by their own indigenous organization, the achuar nationality of ecuador (nae), which is a self-sufficient non-profit organization that was founded to fortify the identity, language, customs, worldview, and laws of the achuar nation. it manages projects that are intended to benefit the communities. 4 the nae is organized into ten regional associations, which consist of 68 communities and approximately 8,000 achuar people distributed in an area of over 7,000 square kilometers. each community elects a head, or president, who is responsible for coordinating the work and needs of their community over a two-year term.   9 peredo et al.: kapawi: perspectives on indigenous tourism published by scholarship@western, 2015 f i g u r e 4 . s t r u c t u r e o f t h e a c h u a r t o u r i s m e n t e r p r i s e u n d e r c e k s a . the transfer was officially made effective in january 2008. since that time, the achuar have been responsible for the ownership, operation, and management of the lodge. however, the communities were not fully prepared after the transfer process to handle the management of the enterprise because the achuar did not have intensive training in managerial skills despite their interest in managing the lodge. at the beginning of the project, the achuar were trained mainly in operational activities and positions, including unskilled labourers such as boat drivers, waiters, cookers, and maintenance and housekeeping activities, mainly because most of the achuar young people who worked at the lodge were not able to finish school due to limited access to education in the region, and lacked skills for managerial positions. in addition, high job rotation levels impeded some achuar who received basic training from continuing their professional development in order to participate in managerial positions. some achuar returned to their communities or were involved in different activities and did not continue with more advanced training. despite positive intentions or preliminary agreements during the transfer process, the company did not implement a comprehensive training plan for managerial positions. this shortcoming resulted in administrative and commercial problems, and negative impacts in the local ecotourism market. the achuar community began facing the challenge of administration and total operation of the kapawi project by its own means. during the time with canodros, the preparation for the transfer of ownership of the project was not entirely complete; some achuar leaders waited mainly for the rental and visitors fees without being fully involved in the operations. many communities did not know much about the enterprise and just waited for the benefits to come.   the aspiration for achuar leaders to manage their own tourism enterprise was contrasted by concerns and fears about the challenges under their own responsibility, and some uncertainty about how to manage and resolve administrative issues. several expectations about the future were present, but concerns were predominant, which limited the realization of full community involvement during the early stages of the transfer. this was coupled with the lack of detailed knowledge, which was necessary for the management of the tourism business and the enterprise, as the achuar generally knew about 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.7 operational activities at the lodge. these were the main reasons that prevented the achuar’s complete engagement in the management of the enterprise. the transfer process was slow because many communities did not engage in the responsibilities of ownership of kapawi in the first stages of the transition. however, throughout this process, community members observed that their decisions have repercussions in the enterprise’s management and, consequently, assumed progressively greater responsibility over the project. a main institutional and social difference between this initiative and other ecotourism ventures is that kapawi is not owned by just one indigenous community or a group of communities, but by all of the ecuadorian achuar. initially, after the transfer of kapawi, the achuar decided that it would belong to all achuar in equal parts. however, this did not sit well with the maana communities, who have to bear the costs of the ecotourism activities in the form of hunting restrictions and timber provision. misunderstandings and lack of trust were present among community members, which jeopardized the continuity of successful operations. in addition, community representatives demanded the exit of the former lodge administration. in order to overcome such misunderstandings and solve emerging issues, a new payment and benefit-sharing system was established in 2008, known as the “payment workshop.” with the help of an ngo, a new system of accountability and planning was designed. this was constructed through the implementation of a participatory budget, which was approved by leaders and members of the involved communities in a participatory manner. the “payment workshop” scheme is calculated every quarter and also represents an accountability mechanism and a system to evaluate and measure the efficiency, results, and quality of the enterprise (trujillo et al., 2008). information about the number of passengers, the daily costs, and income generated for each passenger, and profits obtained by kapawi is publicly made available (belohrad, 2013). at the beginning, the payment mechanism was made through the presidents of each participating community. currently, this process has been expanded and refined in a community public hearing in front of indigenous peoples who are interested in participating in this open workshop. once the income is distributed, all the community representatives sign an official minute, with all the participants to the workshop as witnesses. these workshops have achieved considerable importance, as it is not only the time where benefits are shared in a transparent manner, but it is also a good opportunity to share information and discuss key aspects of the enterprise among community leaders and members. the workshops led to a strengthened participation in and ownership of the enterprise by all the communities. it also helped to reinforce decision-making processes in a traditional and communal manner because all members of the community were involved in the meetings and decisions were made with the participation of all (belohrad, 2013). with the aim to increase the surrounding communities’ support and solve potential inequalities in the benefit-sharing scheme, the share of other communities was increased and additional benefits were provided in the form of an achuar tax, which is directly related to the number of tourists visiting the lodge. this scheme changed from the previous fee of us$10.00 to enter kapawi plus an additional 11 peredo et al.: kapawi: perspectives on indigenous tourism published by scholarship@western, 2015 us$2.50 per passenger per night to a new fee of us$35.00 per person visiting the kapawi territory, independent of the number of nights that a visitor stays in the lodge. the payment workshop helped to address conflicts and to improve relations between the communities and the lodge. this scheme was expanded to avoid misunderstandings and lack of trust. however, some lingering tensions remain, which are linked to the general reduction of tourist numbers and the competition for tourist visits between the communities, especially since some of the communities are closer to the lodge and put more effort into collaborating with kapawi. another aspect not addressed during the first management phase was the implementation of an environmental impact assessment (eia). after the transfer from canodros to the achuar in 2008, the achuar communities conducted an eia. the study analyzed the areas that would be directly affected by the ecolodge. this activity led to the implementation of a zoning plan for improved territorial management of ecotourism and to reduce potential negative impacts to the natural ecosystem. this zoning process led also to the establishment of a territorial management plan. this was a significant step, and was a joint decision by ceksa and the achuar leaders. the participatory mapping of the maana territory allowed communities to map their lands and resources and to identify the areas and paths most suitable for ecotourism. it was essential to complete this assessment in a participatory manner, as ecotourism zoning also requires that certain hunting restrictions will have to be followed, directly impacting community livelihoods. the participatory zoning helped to prevent conflicts around hunting restrictions and made communities more aware of the importance of wildlife viewing for ecotourism. in the years after the transfer, kapawi continued to receive international attention and recognition. in 2009, national geographic adventure magazine named the enterprise one of the 50 best ecolodges in the world. also, in recognition of its efforts to conduct its work in a manner that reduces the impact of tourism on biodiversity to a minimum, kapawi has received environmental stewardship certification from several organizations, such as smart voyager, a program initiated by the ecuadorian citizen’s group conservation and development, which credits operations that meet a set of strict conservation standards. in 2010, kapawi was also certified by the rainforest alliance, which denotes that the organization complies with the provisions of good practices in sustainable tourism. during this same year, kapawi’s achievements were internationally recognized: it was selected as winner of the equator prize, a well-known worldwide united nations development programme (undp) initiative that aims to shine a spotlight on outstanding local efforts to reduce poverty through the conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity (undp, 2012). kapawi has been also certified by best eco lodges, which selects organizations that provide ecologically and environmentally friendly accommodation. in 2011, this indigenous enterprise was also given an award by the german deutsche gesellschaft für internationale zusammenarbeit/german chamber of commerce [giz/ahk] for its corporate social responsibility programme, “ideas that help our community,” and by ecuador’s ministry of tourism.5                                                                                                                 5 the most recent award for kapawi’s “green community projects” was given by premios latinoamerica verde in 2013. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.7 in terms of the institutional structure, the steps to formally assume the management of the enterprise by the achuar had a first milestone almost three years after the transfer; at the end of 2010, the management office in quito appointed a young achuar leader as the first lodge administrator. both the communities and managers were aware of the potential risks for the transition period if this appointment was not successful. however, this step was widely supported by the enterprise, the nae, and the board of directors, suggesting that trained achuar leaders should manage the enterprise under the new structure. at that moment, four young achuar were studying university degrees in hotel management supported by a ngo. two of them concluded the studies, which motivated achuar leaders, and a public call for proposals was completed for the position of lodge administrator. by 2011, the first achuar lodge administrator was in the post, including other important positions such as heads of logistics and procurement; as such, the majority of the ecolodge staff and all of the staff working in the office in shell are achuar. in addition, in 2014, a decision to appoint an achuar leader to manage the enterprise was taken by the indigenous authorities; the selection of the candidate was made through a public contest to all achuar people jointly with a transition plan, which included an eight-month support in marketing, sales, accounting, and financial areas. this process was officially completed in april 2015 with the selection of the achuar lodge administrator as general manager. this event completed the initial aspiration of achuar leaders; 20 years after the creation of kapawi, an achuar general manager is currently responsible for the indigenous enterprise. however, despite these achievements, the new management will have to face the challenge of financial sustainability. after the transfer to self-management was completed, the number of visitors has dropped from the canodros period, which is currently one of the main sustainability challenges of this venture. the following section examines the economic results and performance during the second phase of kapawi. e c o n o m i c a n d m a r k e t a n a l y s i s kapawi´s financial results are based on commerce generated via tourist demand, the sale of tourist packages, as well as sales of food and beverages at the lodge. also included in the financial results are programs for the production of crafts and, to a lesser extent, organic agriculture. through these means, the goal is to provide economic alternatives to the communities and to relieve pressure on the area’s natural resources. however, after the transition process, the number of visitors decreased mainly due to the lack of new commercialization channels and marketing for which canodros was completely responsible. this was coupled with the reduction of international travellers, due to the global economic conditions at the time. marketing was developed and strongly supported during the canodros partnership, given the tour operator’s reputation and experience in marketing in the galapagos island and the availability of human and financial resources for such activity. during the time of the partnership with canodros, on average, the number of visitors reached 2,000 to 2,400 tourists per year at its highest peak. after the transfer, the number of visitors dropped significantly. in 2008, the number of tourist visiting dropped to 400: their lowest level since the beginning of operations. in less than 6 years, tourism flows decreased from a couple of thousands to an average of 700 to 800 visitors per year. in 2010 and 2011, the number of visitors had a yearly average of 800. however, 13 peredo et al.: kapawi: perspectives on indigenous tourism published by scholarship@western, 2015 since 2012, the number of tourists annually has declined from 780 in 2012, to 745 in 2013, and 618 in 2014. during the period between 2010 and 2014, more than 34 percent of tourists visited kapawi in the high season, which runs from june to august (figure 5). the largest proportion of visitors during this period came from the us; on average, they made up more than one third of visitors to kapawi (figure 6). when canadian visitors are included, north american tourists are the most important segment for kapawi, with a peak of 45 percent of visitors in 2011. the second most important national source of visitors is belgium with an average of 13 percent, followed by ecuadorian tourists, who represent 11.5 percent of total visitors during this period. these numbers show the importance of domestic and foreign markets for kapawi. these tourist segments are similar to other indigenous tourism ventures in the amazon, which is important to consider for marketing strategies and commercialization channels. in terms of age groups, the largest proportion of visitors are in the 41 to 60-age range, making up an average of 30 percent of visitors during the study period (figure 7). visitors in the 21 to 40-age group, especially couples, are becoming an increasing larger segment of visitors because of kawapi’s reputation as a top natural destination and their interest in learning about other cultures and nature. retired professionals among the 61 to 80-age set comprised a sizable segment of visitors to kapawi, particularly because they are better able to afford the cost of the trip and have more time for travel. from 2011 to 2013, the majority of visitors to kapawi, nearly 60 percent, stay for a 4-day programme, followed by an average of 35 percent staying for a 5-day programme (figure 8). the minimum 3-day programme is the least favoured choice; the time and cost to reach kapawi makes it difficult for many tourists to justify such a short stay. this factor is important to consider for marketing options, as visitors with more time will be inclined to choose a longer length of stay and, therefore, backpackers or tourists with less available time in mainland ecuador may not choose to visit kapawi as a complementary destination if they are already undertaking internal tours, even to other natural destinations closer to main cities, as a second option besides the galapagos islands. in the period from 2011 to 2013, as an average, almost two-thirds of sales were made through travel agencies, both national and international, which currently represent the main commercialization channels for kapawi. the remaining 35 percent are managed by direct sales through the internet or the offices of kapawi in ecuador. the data presented in this section suggests that strengthening marketing strategies aimed at the age groups described above and with travel agencies is an important strategy to overcome the current reduction in visitors. management must take this compulsory step for the enterprise’s financial sustainability and the continuous provision of benefits to the achuar communities. 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.7 f i g u r e 5 . v i s i t o r s t o k a p a w i b y m o n t h a n d y e a r ( 2 0 1 0 2 0 1 4 ) . f i g u r e 6 . v i s i t o r s t o k a p a w i b y c o u n t r y o f o r i g i n ( 2 0 1 1 2 0 1 3 ) . 15 peredo et al.: kapawi: perspectives on indigenous tourism published by scholarship@western, 2015 f i g u r e 7 . v i s i t o r s t o k a p a w i b y a g e ( % ) . f i g u r e 8 . l e n g t h o f s t a y i n k a p a w i b y y e a r . 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.7 b e n e f i t s before ecotourism, the achuar had very few sources of economic development and income generation. after the transfer process, 65 percent of the lodge's employees were from the achuar communities. for the communities near the lodge, it is estimated that up to 60 percent of their total income comes from direct employment. research by ordóñez (2012) suggests that jobs for achuar people increased from 66 percent in 2009 to 80 percent in 2010. according to the enterprise's management in quito, full-time and eventual employment6 for the achuar increased to 85 percent in recent years, which includes both trained staff—especially guides, chefs, administrative assistants, and the lodge manager—as well as unskilled positions such as laundry or cleaning. achuar people are given priority when employment opportunities are available, and such opportunities are communicated through high frequency radio in achuar and spanish. currently, kapawi staff includes around 40 workers in both the operations and administrative areas of the enterprise. some 71 percent of these employees are persons of achuar nationality, while 28 percent of employees are nonachuar inhabitants of the region (belohrad, 2013). the larger number of achuar people working in kapawi led to improved relations with participating communities. the fact that lodge employees come from all the participating communities has increased transparency and trust between the communities and the hotel. also, employees keep their respective communities informed of what is happening at the lodge, thus improving communications between all the parties. yet, if economic conditions deteriorate and fewer staff are needed, some discord between the communities would result. in addition, people in the communities of the maana association consider that ecotourism has helped to revitalize the production of achuar handicrafts because more achuar handicrafts are produced nowadays than they would do without tourism. several interviewed community members said that the handicraft production has increased with tourism. during fieldwork, it was also observed that tourist groups seem to purchase significant amounts of handicrafts during the cultural visit to the community. in addition, besides direct income from the lodge revenues, handicraft sales represent 21% of income for the communities of the maana association (impulsa, 2012). this led to an increase of handicraft production, particularly by women, which was not the case before tourism. arts and handicraft products are one of the most important sources of direct revenues, especially for women. this activity is highlighted in kapawi, which provides specific benefits not only in terms of monetary resources, for other achuar community members not working in the lodge, but also for cultural revalorization. these activities also have a gender dimension: women receive direct benefits from sales and produce authentic handicrafts. achuar women are also teaching their young teens traditional methods of handicraft production, which conserves traditional knowledge and techniques. therefore, young women are motivated to produce local handicrafts that reflect the cultural values of the achuar people. this is an important strength of kapawi—visitors can appreciate and learn about the achuar spiritual values and culture, can participate in handicraft making, and can provide direct economic resources to the artisans, mostly achuar women. women also benefit in gastronomy areas through training and employment in the lodge, including the opportunity for other women to sell their food products to the lodge, especially fishing and certain crops. although no collective productive system has been                                                                                                                 6 employment on an occasional basis, both full-time and part-time. 17 peredo et al.: kapawi: perspectives on indigenous tourism published by scholarship@western, 2015 established yet to supply the lodge, individual achuar families sell agricultural produce and other goods to the hotel. accordingly, tourism has had a positive impact on women by providing them with new opportunities. currently, there are more women working at the lodge, and many achuar men have started encouraging women to take up employment, given the benefits not only for the individual employee but for the whole family. several achuar women commented that, within the family, women tend to be the better financial managers because they are more likely to save and plan a family budget. also, the money earned through products produced by the women (handicrafts or food products) is directly paid to the women. this revenue therefore makes it possible for women to increase their engagement and influence in their families and communities. however, working at the lodge is not generally easy for the women as achuar men would still expect them to comply with achuar cultural norms, which would, for instance, involve not speaking to male tourists. in addition, kapawi has primarily provided collective benefits and has contributed to six different achuar communities besides kapawi. these are the communities of wachirpas, ishpingo, kusutkau, wayusentsa, sharamensa, and suwa. kapawi provides a direct contribution of us$35 per passenger to the communities, known as the achuar contribution. this is distributed to the maana association. the community of kapawi delivers the resources, which amounts to around us$500 per year for the kapawi community while the other communities receive us$400. the decision to invest and spend the money vested in each community, which reaches consensus in the quarterly meetings—the workshop payments. the enterprise leaves this to the community’s own decision. such resources are usually spent on education, health, and travel support to leaders and community members that need to participate in meetings in other regions or in emergency situations. health and transportation benefits are critically important given the remoteness of this region. even though health care is free in ecuador, transportation costs to health centres or hospitals are high and a big share of a family’s income is spent on travel costs. hence, the main costs for achuar families are transportation and medical emergencies. in case of a medical emergency, kapawi provides free air transport. furthermore, income generated from tourism has been invested in continuous training programs for the achuar communities in the form of volunteer projects, exchange programs, specialized courses, and study agreements with universities. beyond contributing income to the communities of the maana association, a further 7,000 achuar people benefit collectively from the enterprise because kapawi has also helped protect achuar territory from encroachment. the objective of the association is to protect achuar rights and land; revenues and support from kapawi helped in the process of land titling and legal tenure. the achuar territory was legally titled by the state in 2010. this has allowed for the creation of an achuar reserve with an extension of 681,218 hectares, which is protected and managed by the communities. for this purpose, kapawi has supported the implementation of a territorial development plan and land zoning, based on local traditions as achuar´s culture and beliefs stress the value of maintaining their land, their forest, and their own way of life. the only extractive activities that are carried out in the area are those necessary for the subsistence of the surrounding achuar communities and for some resources 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.7 that the lodge needs, including wood for repairing cabins and walkways. large-scale extractive activities—such as oil, mining, and commercial logging—are prohibited in the achuar territory. this is a decision that the achuar organization and communities maintain due to persistent fears around the negative impacts of extractive industries on the culture and the environment. one of kapawi´s objectives is to reduce poverty and social exclusion in the achuar community in order to transform the socioeconomic conditions and employment generation, with different positions at kapawi held by achuar people. community leaders generally perceive that these opportunities also provide positive impacts for young people who can work in the enterprise and the lodge instead of having to migrate to other provinces to find jobs that do not value the achuar culture or contribute to the sustainable management of their territory. kapawi provides opportunities for young people to stay in their own communities and engage in economic activities, training, and, in many cases, work in the lodge. given that economic options for indigenous young people may be scarce, many young achuar have left the communities to find jobs in more urban settings and never come back to the community. this migration is a trend shared by several communities in the amazon. however, young people, especially from the maana association, can now work in their own community-based tourism enterprise and manage their own resources. in addition, besides winning several national and international awards for its success, kapawi has helped to stimulate and replicate similar projects with the nae in other communities beyond the project area. due to kapawi’s success, many achuar, including the nae leadership, are very committed to tourism. as a result, two other communities are now developing tourism activities in their own communities. this has led to replication: kapawi´s achievements have supported the development of new projects. one of these new initiatives is the tiinkias ecotourism center, which promotes cooperation and complementation with other achuar communities based on the example set by kapawi. c h a l l e n g e s despite the individual and collective benefits produced by kapawi during the last 20 years, a number of challenges remain that could affect not only the relations between the communities and the enterprise but also the operations and sustainability of the indigenous venture. economic and financial sustainability are the main challenges in a medium and long-term scope for the enterprise, which are determinants for the provision of continuous benefits to the achuar communities. kapawi’s challenges are summarized below: a. cultural deterioration is one of the main challenges, which has been present throughout the last few decades. partly due to the remoteness of the achuar territory, the achuar culture is quite distinct with several traditions present and maintained in the communities. consequently, not all of the changes introduced by kapawi have been easily assimilated by the achuar, especially at the early stages of the enterprise. kapawi, since the beginning, has been a test for canodros. they have had to mix and manage two very different cultural modes and perspectives into one ecotourism operation. this challenge remains to date, even after the transfer of control to the achuar; several achuar leaders have expressed their concerns about losing their culture. 19 peredo et al.: kapawi: perspectives on indigenous tourism published by scholarship@western, 2015 b. another negative cultural impact of tourism has been the increased materialization and westernization of the achuar culture. for instance, in one of the communities that has been dealing intensively with tourism, the women started to charge for the chicha7 offered to their non-tourist visitors. the free offering of chicha is a very important part of the achuar culture and, therefore, the achuar themselves organized an intervention in the community and emphasized that the achuar have to clearly separate what is acceptable in dealing with tourists and what is expected in receiving other visitors. yet, this cultural impact is not always linked to ecotourism; the achuar, in recent times, have increased contacts with the outside world. for example, young people travel to other regions and cities in ecuador where they have access to western products and culture. c. in some cases, achuar goods have been substituted with outside products. for instance, many achuar had replaced their handmade pinink8 bowls with plastic cups. revenues received by tourism activities have provided some achuar families with the opportunity to spend their resources on other western products instead of maintaining traditional ways of producing goods. d. another social challenge is the separation of the lodge workers from their families and the disruption of traditional structures. given the distances between the lodge and the communities, some of the workers are away from their homes for up to four weeks, with very limited opportunities to contact their families. this can be very hard for families because roles and responsibilities are generally gender specific. when the men are gone, the women may have no one to provide them with meat or fish, which is why the achuar workers take every opportunity to send food back to their families. this isolation from the family is also the reason why no married achuar woman has ever worked at the lodge. being gone from the family would be incompatible with the role of wife. e. in terms of training, kapawi requires support to strengthen its existing capacity-building and training plan, which is largely focused on achuar workers. even though more achuar people are working in the lodge, managing and providing more advanced managerial training is still a challenge. another challenge is to include training that reduces asymmetries between trained and new staff. the lodge uses a rotation scheme, in which staff change every two years, in order to avoid the creation of inequalities and to give fair opportunity to achuar members from different communities. this practice requires continuous training in order to avoid the instability as a result of changing well-trained staff with inexperienced ones every couple of years. f. an on-going challenge involves the distribution of benefits among communities (e.g., in the form of job opportunities or tourist visits) and communication, which is not only essential for maintaining the operation but also for fostering positive relations between the quito                                                                                                                 7 chicha is the traditional beverage consumed by the achuar. it is an alcoholic drink made out of fermented yucca, which the achuar drink during the whole day. 8 pinink are traditional achuar hand-crafted, earthen bowls, which are used to drink chicha and often feature beautiful paint designs.   20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.7 office, the lodge, and the communities. ensuring fair distribution of benefits remains challenging due to the remoteness of kapawi and the vast distances separating the lodge and several of the communities. the different communities of the maana association receive different amounts of revenue from ecotourism, but three of the communities closest to kapawi generally receive the highest income. however, other communities that do not receive the same level of funding are questioning the value of supporting the enterprise, which could lead to new challenges in the future. it is not a homogenous territory: some communities are a relatively short walk from lodge, while others are five days away. one of kapawi’s most complex aspects is that it is not run by a single community; each community has different issues and different perspectives. g. financial sustainability and low-occupancy are currently the main institutional challenges for kapawi since the number of visitors and revenues have dropped since 2008. given the remote location, transportation and operational costs are higher compared to other lodges in the ecuadorian amazon, which affect kapawi’s financial situation. therefore, marketing becomes an essential process that is increasingly needed to address the recent reduction in tourism flows to kapawi. h. another management challenge is the financial, human, and technical resources for marketing strategies that could reverse the financial situation and recover tourism flows as described in the market analysis section; this is currently perceived as one of the main problems by kapawi’s management. marketing programmes and strategies have been reduced since canodros’ transfer to the achuar and even recently, given the reduction of resources available to kapawi. finding a new partner to market kapawi after the transfer process could have been a way to overcome these challenges. however, it was essential for the achuar to maintain their confidence in the lodge management during the transition and bringing in more “outsiders” could have been problematic at the time. i. currently, significant marketing tools for kapawi are the awards they have received and certifications by recognized entities such as rainforest alliance and others. yet, participation in international fairs and events are not always possible, as it generally includes high costs and sometimes dependency on other institutions. j. commercialization is another challenge and alliances are needed, particularly to reach new tourism segments through promotional strategies and marketing, especially because twothirds of kapawi’s sales are made through travel agencies, as detailed in the market analysis. in addition, national markets and age segments are relevant considerations for strengthening commercialization channels. given the reduction in tourism flows after the transfer process, kapawi needs to work on recovering previous levels while staying within current optimal carrying-capacity levels to avoid further environmental and cultural impacts. this is a concern expressed by several community members and by workers at the lodge. also, for other indigenous tourism projects, marketing and commercialization programmes should be addressed at the very beginning of the projects, even though the attention at early stages is focused on infrastructure, training, services, and products. 21 peredo et al.: kapawi: perspectives on indigenous tourism published by scholarship@western, 2015 l e s s o n s l e a r n e d kapawi is one of the first ecotourism enterprises in the amazon. this venture was created for the purpose of contributing to the economic, social, and cultural development of the achuar, as ecotourism is one of the few sustainable development options for this indigenous group. for the achuar, kapawi represents an adaptive livelihood strategy, an alternative to other more deleterious economic activities viewed as potential threats to the achuar culture and biodiversity. looking at kapawi’s evolution in the last 20 years, eight main lessons for managing an indigenous ecotourism enterprise can be learned: a. community ownership and appropriation are essential to maintain the communities’ support even in difficult financial and institutional times. one of the most remarkable achievements in kapawi is the strong sense of ownership among the achuar of the maana association over the enterprise. it is highly unlikely that the achuar communities would have been willing to tolerate a reduction in jobs and profits associated with the decrease in tourists if they did not believe kapawi was their own enterprise, which can provide benefits to their communities. this is a continuous process that entails permanent communication between the enterprise and the communities. b. the ecotourism experience offered needs to meet a market demand. despite being one of the most well known indigenous ecotourism enterprises in ecuador and the amazon, kapawi has been struggling for a number of years with low occupancy and needs to start a process of reorienting ecotourism activities towards a more high-end market. despite the fact that an indigenous enterprise has social, environmental, and cultural goals, the bottom line is that such a venture is still a business. even though it incorporates development and non-profit goals, the enterprise should generate revenues and profits to be sustainable and achieve other goals that are inherently related to its functioning, such as environmental conservation, cultural revitalization, and social development. indigenous ventures and projects have to compete with other tourism initiatives, which means these enterprises need to be market-oriented, performance-driven, and competitive to produce sustainable results aiming to address social, economic, and environmental issues in the indigenous communities where they are located. furthermore, an indigenous enterprise can promote networks and alliances with other social, economic, and environmental sectors and should be accountable to their own indigenous communities through transparent mechanisms to produce tangible results and individual and collective benefits. otherwise, the benefits and positive impacts that the enterprise could produce in the long run will be undermined and could be minimized. c. building positive relations between the indigenous communities and the enterprise is critical to prevent internal conflicts and impacts, and to avoid mistrust related to benefit sharing. maintaining good communications between the involved parties is crucial in order to provide transparency and accountability to the communities. the reduction of tourist numbers after the transfer process reduced the ecotourism derived income available to communities, which understandably caused concern. to increase transparency, the new payment system established in 2008, known as the payment workshop, involved direct engagement among the communities, the general manager, and the lodge administrator. 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 6, iss. 4 [2015], art. 7 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol6/iss4/7 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2015.6.4.7 this new system has greatly improved communication and trust between the lodge staff and the communities. the general manager takes the opportunity to visit each community to conduct a payment workshop, which involves discussing issues relevant to the lodge operations. the payment workshops conducted by the enterprise are attended by community members who actively engage in discussions about the future of their venture and the lodge, which strengthens communications between the enterprise and the communities. payment workshops have contributed to the reduction of some conflict, especially given the number of communities involved in kapawi. this could be a lesson learned for other communities in the amazon and similar schemes could be developed and replicated in other indigenous tourism enterprises and projects. however, we also note that a reduction in revenues, and therefore payments, could also affect the contentment with such methods. d. indigenous tourism enterprises need to actively and continuously manage their impacts. just like other projects, kapawi has had several unintended impacts in the surrounding communities, which have only been resolved through strong achuar leadership in the communities and mechanisms such as the payment workshops. it is kapawi’s responsibility to proactively tackle issues related to their activities, such as increased competitiveness between communities, growing dependency on outside goods, and waste generation. clear social and environmental indicators and continuous impact monitoring systems are essential for any indigenous tourism enterprise. e. providing community training in participatory budgeting is also essential to ensure that community members receive tangible benefits and avoid expropriation by community leaders. participatory budgeting means that spending decisions have to be authorised beforehand with full community involvement. this ensures that community leaders are being held accountable for the spending of tourism income. such training and participatory budgeting has been very important to increase the capacity of the achuar communities to manage the ecotourism revenue and ensure that benefits are shared fairly within the community. f. in order for benefit-sharing systems to be perceived as fair, the enterprise needs to include community concerns and needs. as such, benefit-sharing systems should be developed in a participatory manner. kapawi shows that this development incorporates two levels. first, negotiations between the tourism enterprise and the involved communities need to establish a fair allocation of benefits and responsibilities; in the case of kapawi, this meant allocating bigger shares to communities that have to bear the costs of ecotourism activities (e.g., in the form of hunting restrictions and timber provisions). second, deliberations and agreements on how to manage ecotourism revenue should achieve consensus within the communities to ensure a fair distribution of benefits; in some communities, misspending of funds was common with community members claiming to have received little benefits. in accordance with the deliberative nature of decision-making in the achuar culture, the management of kapawi involves a constant dialogue with the surrounding communities to receive feedback on benefit-sharing developments. 23 peredo et al.: kapawi: perspectives on indigenous tourism published by scholarship@western, 2015 g. respect for traditional structures and decision-making processes is also important. traditional achuar governance structures facilitate deliberative decision-making processes. in order to reach decisions, issues are discussed in lengthy meetings and then voted on. major decisions can only be taken if consensus between all the communities is reached, which can also take a lot of time. in addition, the achuar strongly value equality and fairness. for that reason, all political representatives in the nae and also in the communities are democratically elected and the people filling those positions generally change with each vote to give opportunities to other achuar. kapawi’s management reflects and incorporates those beliefs and norms. as a result, the communities democratically elect the director of ceksa. also, employment at the lodge reflects the achuar belief in equal opportunity; only a limited number of positions are available at the lodge so those positions are generally rotated. h. training in financial management and other managerial skills is vital from the beginning of any indigenous tourism project and venture. kapawi has shown that training and scholarship opportunities are essential in order to ensure that indigenous peoples can take up positions at all levels of an ecotourism venture, but particularly in managerial positions. the management of a high-end tourist lodge like kapawi requires skills and experience. kapawi’s management provides training opportunities not just in the lodge but also by organising visits to and training at other hotels. it also facilitates a volunteer english teaching programme for lodge staff. to also address the wider need for educational opportunities, the nae has given several young achuar scholarships to complete university degrees and other technical education; among them, the former lodge administrator who was recently appointed as kapawi’s first achuar general manager. these steps are needed to ensure members of the indigenous community benefit from job creation and are qualified to fulfill jobs at all levels of the enterprise. as a result, since 2010, young achuar with studies and training are assuming managerial roles and are becoming a new generation of community leaders. within this process, a 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(2007) indigenous ecotourism: sustainable development and management. wallingford, uk: cabi.   29 peredo et al.: kapawi: perspectives on indigenous tourism published by scholarship@western, 2015 the international indigenous policy journal september 2015 past and present perspectives on indigenous tourism in the pastaza province of ecuador: the case of kapawi bernardo peredo andres ordóñez viola belohrad recommended citation past and present perspectives on indigenous tourism in the pastaza province of ecuador: the case of kapawi abstract keywords acknowledgments disclaimer creative commons license past and present perspectives on indigenous tourism in the pastaza province of ecuador: the case of kapawi a mi’kmaw perspective on advancing salmon governance in nova scotia, canada: setting the stage for collaborative co-existence the international indigenous policy journal volume 7 | issue 3 article 4 july 2016 a mi’kmaw perspective on advancing salmon governance in nova scotia, canada: setting the stage for collaborative co-existence shelley k . denny dalhousie university, sdenny@dal.ca lucia m. fanning dalhousie university, halifax, lucia.fanning@dal.ca recommended citation denny, s. k. , fanning, l. m. (2016). a mi’kmaw perspective on advancing salmon governance in nova scotia, canada: setting the stage for collaborative co-existence. the international indigenous policy journal, 7(3). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.4 a mi’kmaw perspective on advancing salmon governance in nova scotia, canada: setting the stage for collaborative co-existence abstract issues related to fisheries governance are a source of debate and tension between the indigenous mi’kmaq people of nova scotia and the canadian department of fisheries and oceans (dfo) in matters concerning atlantic salmon, salmo salar. within the context of the existing governance regime, this analysis compares the concept of salmon conservation and management from a mi’kmaq perspective and proposes a collaborative co-existence approach for effective salmon governance in nova scotia. this approach begins by using comanagement as a process, two-eyed seeing as the design, and treaties as the model to achieve shared objectives of maintaining and improving abundances of salmon populations, in spite of differing mechanisms for addressing the interwoven complexities of multiple realities, conservation, and cultural identity. keywords conservation, salmon, mi’kmaq, governance, two-eyed seeing, treaties, co-management acknowledgments the authors would like to acknowledge with thanks the willingness of all participants who agreed to share their knowledge for this study. this study was supported by the social sciences and humanities research council (sshrc) partnership grant #895-2011-1007 and the 2014-2015 nova scotia graduate award. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ a m i ’ k m a w p e r s p e c t i v e o n a d v a n c i n g s a l m o n g o v e r n a n c e i n n o v a s c o t i a , c a n a d a : s e t t i n g t h e s t a g e f o r c o l l a b o r a t i v e c o e x i s t e n c e conservation is a critical issue for both aboriginal fisheries and state management of fisheries; it has been established as “valid legislative objective” that can be used to justify infringement on existing aboriginal and treaty rights in canada (king, 2011; r. v. sparrow, 1990). for the mi’kmaq, the indigenous people of atlantic canada and eastern quebec whose territory is known as mi’kma’ki, the use of management and conservation objectives as a justification for infringing on aboriginal and treaty rights is respected because conservation is a shared philosophical approach. however, issues of fisheries governance, such as the power of the state to evaluate stock status, allocate shares of the resource, and implement conservation and management measures for fisheries, as specified in section 91(12) of canada’s constitution act (1982), are a source of debate and tension between the mi’kmaq of nova scotia and the canadian department of fisheries and oceans (dfo). this tension and debate is evident in atlantic salmon management, particularly when it comes to issues of access and allocation of salmon for food, social, and ceremonial (fsc) needs in nova scotia (barsh, 2002; wildsmith, 1995, 2001). within the context of the existing governance regime that determines the underlying principles governing decision-making, the aim of this article is to compare the concept of conservation within atlantic salmon management from a non-aboriginal state perspective with a mi’kmaq perspective, and offer recommendations on how to further develop governance initiatives related to atlantic salmon based on these perspectives. b a c k g r o u n d before comparing different perspectives on management and conservation, it is important to discuss the underlying worldviews that influence the governance or the steering mechanisms (rosenau, 1995), which the two societies—aboriginal and non-aboriginal—use to guide decision-making in nova scotia’s salmon industry. this is discussed first by examining the mi’kmaq relationship to salmon and the legal relationship of the crown to the mi’kmaq people, followed by a discussion of a non-aboriginal or “western” worldview in relation to decision-making and this perspective’s influence on management. to aid in readability, the following list of key acronyms used in the article are listed in the appendix. r e l a t i o n s h i p b e t w e e n t h e m i ’ k m a q a n d m o t h e r e a r t h mi’kmaq epistemology, also referred to as its worldview, is understood in the context of their relationship to the land and is best expressed by the mi’kmaq phrase, msit no’kmaq, which means “all my relations.” in an interview, elder albert marshall (personal communication, november 16, 2014) shares: mi’kmaq carry a great sense of responsibility. as all life is our relations, any loss of life is a loss of kin and spirit. the unintentional eradication of species is deeply connected to loss in cultural identity. time on earth is merely borrowed from future generations. as such, the mi’kmaq have the inherent responsibility to ensure all of nature’s gifts are there for the next seven generations. 1 denny and fanning: a mi'kmaw perspective on advancing salmon governance published by scholarship@western, 2016 this belief and connection is not only physical but also metaphysical. all relations are either present, past, or yet to be. humans are thought of as merely another but equal part of mother earth and their existence is interconnected to their interactions and relationship to plants, animals, water and earth that sustain them. in the eyes of the mi’kmaq, “spirit life is everywhere” (a. marshall, personal communication, november16, 2014). these ways of knowing were derived from the relationships mi’kmaq hold with the world in which they exist, considering all life and objects as kin (berneshawi, 1997; prosper, mcmillan, davis & moffitt, 2011; robinson, 2014). mi’kmaq people: lived and died within the constraints of the world as they found it. they made no attempt to change the natural order to suit the convenience of human beings, for man was only one part of a totally interdependent system that saw all things, animate or inanimate, in their proper places. (upton cited in berneshawi, 1997, p. 120) elder albert marshall elaborates this idea, stating that the mi’kmaq believe that all life has spirit and all lives are of one origin, all of which are gifts from the creator. msit no’kmaq connects mi’kmaq people not only to each other but to the land from which they were created and exist today. in addition, another related concept that underpins the mi’kmaq worldview is netukulimk, which is used to convey the notion of sustainability. prosper and colleagues (2011) described it as “a complex cultural concept that encompasses mi’kmaq sovereign law ways and guides individual and collective beliefs and behaviours in resource protection, procurement, and management to ensure and honour sustainability and prosperity for the ancestor, present and future generations” (p. 1). linguistic analysis of the term translates it as “avoiding not having enough” (barsh, 2002, p. 17). mi’kmaq elders understand the concept of netukulimk as “take only what you need” (barsh, 2002, p. 17; l. marshall, personal communication, november 11, 2014; robinson, 2014), but within self-imposed limits to avoid waste (prosper et al., 2011). the concept implies interconnectedness of sustainability between mi’kmaq and their environment (berneshawi, 1997; prosper et al., 2011; wiber & milley, 2007). salmon, or plamu as it is known to the mi’kmaq, are one of many animals that contributed to mi’kmaq sustainability. historically, salmon were a staple food that was dependable, predictable, and could be found in most rivers in nova scotia (parenteau, 1998). as one of the last fish harvests of the season before travelling inland to escape winter, the women would preserve the salmon through smoking over an open fire using heated rocks (a. marshall, personal communication, november 15, 2014). today, because of a lack of abundance and concern for local populations, it is often reserved (though not exclusively) for special occasions such as pow-wows1 or other large gatherings where the serving of a large fish such as salmon is preferred. 1 pow-wows, or mi'kmaq mawio'mi as it is often known in the mi'kmaq territories, is an important annual celebration that allows the mi’kmaq to express and share their culture, pride, and identity. it is a unifying ritual of the young and the old, a recollection of the past, and a celebration of the future (see http://www.benoitfirstnation.ca/mikmaw_article31_powwow.html). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.4 l e g a l f r a m e w o r k the mi’kmaq of eastern canada have both aboriginal rights and treaty rights. aboriginal rights (including aboriginal title) are the inherent rights of the aboriginal people of canada that emerge from prior use and historical occupation of the lands and waters of what is now known as canada. treaty rights are negotiated rights and arise from formal agreements between european heads of state (and canada) and aboriginal leaders (harris & millerd, 2010). the right to fish for food, social, and ceremonial needs is an aboriginal right, while the right to fish for a moderate livelihood is a treaty right. treaties signed with mi’kmaq are unique; they emphasized peace and friendship, as well as recognizing them as a sovereign people (king, 2011, 2014). both aboriginal and treaty rights are recognized and affirmed by section 35(1) of the constitution act and, as such, cast canada’s aboriginal people “in a different legal relationship to the fisheries than non-aboriginal canadians” (harris & millerd, 2010, p. 82). three court cases are of particular significance to describe the legal relationship between the crown and the mi’kmaq, and the aboriginal right to fish (and hunt): r. v. denny, paul and sylliboy (1990), r. vs. simon (1985), and r. v. sparrow (1990). r. v. simon (1985) confirmed that established treaties with the mi’kmaq did not extinguish aboriginal rights; thereby confirming the co-existence of aboriginal rights with treaty rights, including the right to hunt and fish. in the nova scotia supreme court, denny, paul, and sylliboy were acquitted of illegal fishing and possession of salmon, since the regulatory regime for fisheries management was inconsistent with their aboriginal right to fish (r. v. denny, paul, & sylliboy, 1990). the outcome of the case prioritized aboriginal fishing—after needs related to conservation had been met—over other interest groups. sparrow too argued that restrictions imposed by the federal government through the fisheries act were inconsistent with his right to fish for food and ceremonial purposes (r. v. sparrow, 1990). in recognition of the existing aboriginal right to fish under the protection of the constitution, the crown must consider whether existing limitations or regulations infringe on aboriginal rights. if so, justification of the infringement must be demonstrated by the crown, such as the need to comply with a valid legislative objective regarding the conservation of the species. the government also has a responsibility to act in a fiduciary capacity with matters concerning governmental decisions and policy (harris & millerd, 2010; wildsmith, 1995). furthermore, the supreme court stated that aboriginal people’s food requirements must be met and must take priority over other users (wildsmith, 1995). the supreme court further argued that “the burden of conservation measures should not fall primarily upon the indian fishery” (r. v. sparrow, 1990, p. 115). other court cases providing further recognition of aboriginal peoples right to have involvement in natural resource management are those in which the “duty to consult,” the process for consultation, and potential for accommodation are emphasized: r. v. haida (2004), r. v. mikisew cree first nation (2005), and r. v. taku river tlingit first nation (2004). in r. v. haida (2004), the court ruled that canadian federal and provincial governments must consult with aboriginal peoples prior to making decisions that may have an impact on aboriginal rights and title (r. v. haida, 2004). consultation is a commitment to engage in a meaningful process and does not necessarily imply agreement but may include accommodation that “require good faith efforts to understand each other’s concerns and move to address them” (r. v. haida, 2004, s.49). r. v. taku river tlingit first nation (2004) furthered the conditions for the consultation and accommodation process by expanding the duty 3 denny and fanning: a mi'kmaw perspective on advancing salmon governance published by scholarship@western, 2016 to consult as proportional to “the strength of the case supporting the existence of the right or title and to the seriousness of potentially adverse effect upon the right or title claimed” (p. 552). the crown, including its provinces and territories, must provide notice and consultation through direct engagement. furthermore, project information must be provided to stakeholder first nations and attempts must be made to address expressed or anticipated concerns about potential adverse impacts through mitigation (r. v. mikisew cree, 2005). w e s t e r n p e r s p e c t i v e s u n d e r l y i n g n a t u r a l r e s o u r c e m a n a g e m e n t current fisheries management is based on western epistemology that relies heavily on single sector and single species assessments to inform decision-making (hollings, 2001). under this worldview, decisionmaking is generally hierarchical, “command and control,” and paternalistic (fanning, mahon, & mcconney, 2011). knowledge about the resource is science-based using a process that follows a systematic method to test questions from observations and is designed to reduce bias (hurlbert, 1984). this approach follows what has become commonly referred to as the scientific method in which an underlying principle is falsification or the ability to test the fallibility of acquired knowledge (pierce, 1877; popper, 2002). the approach is heavily dependent on the acquisition of data and information to advance knowledge. thus, the hierarchical concept of sequentially moving from data to information to knowledge to wisdom can be found both explicitly and implicitly in western knowledge systems (rowley, 2007). this approach is most commonly presented in stock assessment and research documents upon which governmental policies, frameworks, and management decisions are expected to be based. however, despite the criticisms that have been directed at the scientific method since it gained prominence over a century ago, it remains the dominant paradigm for enhancing understanding of the natural system across temporal and spatial scales, as well as the resulting consequences of these changes to society at local, national, regional, and global levels (bauer, 1992). western society often accepts scientific ideas and their proponents above other sources, considering science-based knowledge to be fully objective and indisputable (emerson & gerlak, 2014). yet, like all systems of knowledge, scientific practices are similarly governed by values and beliefs. c u r r e n t a t l a n t i c s a l m o n m a n a g e m e n t i n n o v a s c o t i a atlantic salmon in nova scotia are managed by the federal (dfo) and provincial governments (nova scotia fisheries and aquaculture). the authority and responsibility for management resides with the minister of fisheries and oceans. the provincial government—responsible for input into conservation measures, issuing fishing licenses, and public dissemination of regulations for salmon—have limited authority when fish are in the water. management of salmon in nova scotia falls under two federal management regions: gulf (eastern nova scotia) and maritimes region (western nova scotia). the regions are divided at the most northern point of cape breton island, nova scotia (see figure 1). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.4 f i g u r e 1 . s a l m o n m a n a g e m e n t f i s h i n g z o n e s i n n o v a s c o t i a (source: dfo, 2015). a t l a n t i c s a l m o n a s s e s s m e n t m e t h o d s i n n o v a s c o t i a each of the two regions utilizes different quantitative methods for estimating salmon populations in salmon fishing areas (sfa). in the maritimes region (sfa 19-22), data are collected from dive counts of adult salmon, electrofishing surveys, smolt (young salmon migrating to the ocean to feed in the ocean) assessments, and fishway counts on index rivers in each of the sfas. these data are coupled with catch information from the “catch and release” fishery and removals from permitted mi’kmaq food, social, and ceremonial salmon fisheries. estimation models are then used to determine the probability of a river meeting or exceeding the desired harvesting criteria (dfo, 2014a). in contrast, the gulf region had a retention fishery until 2015, and relied on electrofishing surveys and catch records from the recreational fishery to develop its index of abundance for the assessment. however, regardless of the region, assessments rely primarily on quantitative data collected and scientific knowledge to help understand current population abundance (dfo, 2012). there is commitment in canada’s policy for conservation of wild atlantic salmon to incorporate aboriginal knowledge in the assessment process (dfo, 2009). this implies that aboriginal knowledge is and can be used in a similar manner to determine whether salmon populations are above or below dfo defined assessment criteria. while the intent is to use aboriginal traditional knowledge and local knowledge to inform management decisions, it has been a challenge to make such knowledge fit into current quantitative assessment frameworks and advisory reports. c o n s e r v a t i o n e f f o r t s salmon in atlantic canada have been in decline since the early part of the 19th century (king, 2014). salmon in nova scotia have been independently assessed by the committee on the status of endangered wildlife in canada (cosewic) and designated as either endangered, as in sfa 19, 20, 21, 5 denny and fanning: a mi'kmaw perspective on advancing salmon governance published by scholarship@western, 2016 and 22, or special concern in sfa 18. only sfa 22, inner bay of fundy population, is protected under the legislative authority of the canadian species at risk act (sara) since 2003. the purposes of the act are to prevent species and distinct populations from becoming extirpated or from going extinct, and also to provide for the recovery of endangered or threatened species. sara also encourages the management of other species to prevent them from becoming at risk (dfo, 2014b). while ongoing public consultations to list salmon populations in other sfas under sara are underway, conservation measures have been implemented for other populations. conservation, as described in kalland (2009), “is designed to regulate people’s relations with their physical environment to optimize resource use while at the same time safeguarding species, habitats and biodiversity” (pp. 5-6). in canada’s policy for conservation of wild atlantic salmon, the dfo defined conservation in relation to salmon as “the protection, maintenance, and rehabilitation of genetic diversity, species, and ecosystems to sustain biodiversity and the continuance of evolutionary and natural production processes” (dfo, 2009, “goals and guiding principles,” textbox, para. 2). while the dfo maintains that conservation is the highest priority in resource management decisions, it also specifies that “resource management decisions will consider biological, social, and economic consequences; they will reflect best science including aboriginal traditional knowledge (atk) and local knowledge, and they will maintain the potential for future generations to meet their needs and aspirations” (dfo, 2009, “goals and guiding principles,” textbox, para. 4). the dfo further clarified their terminology in a side box and offered the following definition of sustainable use and benefits: “the use of biological resources in a way and at a rate that does not lead to their long-term decline, thereby maintaining the potential for future generations to meet their needs and aspirations” (dfo, 2009, “goals and guiding principles,” textbox, para. 4). the department also stated its commitment in relation to sustainable use and benefit of wild salmon resources and protection of biodiversity to humans: as a resource management agency, dfo is committed to the sustainable use and benefit of wild salmon resources. the intent of this policy is to protect the biological foundation of wild atlantic salmon to provide the fullest benefits now and for future generations. in the long term, protection of biodiversity will provide the greatest opportunity for maintaining sustainable benefits to canadians. (dfo, 2009, “goals and guiding principles,” textbox, para. 5) conservation measures in place for salmon, as determined by dfo and implemented by the provincial department of fisheries and aquaculture, are a reflection of differences in population status in each region and guiding principles of conservation, sustainable use, and benefits. catch and location restrictions are communicated in the provincial nova scotia fisheries and aquaculture 2014 salmon fishing regulations (dfo, 2014a). sfa 18 is the only salmon management area in which the population is not assessed as “endangered” by cosewic, and a recreational retention for salmon less than 63 cm (also referred to as grilse) was permitted prior to 2015. in this sfa, the retention of salmon was reduced from eight grilse per license to four per license per season in 2008, and from four to two grilse per license per season in 2014, and further reduced to zero retention (catch and release only) in 2015. no salmon fishing for retention or catch and release is permitted in sfas 20, 21, and 22 as all are assessed as endangered by cosewic, with the sfa 22 population in the inner bay of fundy being 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.4 protected under sara. salmon fishing area 19 shares the same endangered designation as these three sfas but three rivers within the area are subjected to a 31-day catch and release fishery with barbless hooks. catch and release recreational salmon fisheries take place on rivers that meet or exceed 25% of the conservation requirements (g. stevens, personal communication, 2014) and are limited to the three rivers on eastern cape breton island (sfa 19)—middle, north and baddeck. the maritimes region of dfo enforces a zero removal of salmon from any of the rivers by non-mi’kmaq in the maritimes region. the north river is the only river in sfa 19 to be assessed as slightly above the criteria used to determine whether there is a surplus of fish but non-mi’kmaq retention fishery is not permitted. m i ’ k m a q p e r s p e c t i v e s u n d e r l y i n g n a t u r a l r e s o u r c e m a n a g e m e n t in essence, the use of traditional knowledge encompasses assessment, management, and conservation within the worldview of the mi’kmaq. however, for the purpose of this article, mi’kmaq traditional knowledge was compartmentalized into sections for comparison with the western perspective. c u r r e n t m i ’ k m a q s a l m o n f i s h i n g a n d m a n a g e m e n t p r a c t i c e s to ensure a mutually beneficial relationship with natural resources, considered “gifts,” the mi’kmaq had their own governance. ladner (2005) summarized mi’kmaq governance as a “complex system of territorially defined relations and responsibility, multilevel governance, ethics and law [that] was and remains an effective means of managing a people, a territory and the relationship with other beings” (p. 941). the existence of distinct political districts within mi’kma’ki (figure 2) sustained a certain number of families and allowed for intimate knowledge about movements of animals to be observed. this suggests that districts were not only political districts, but ecological districts as well. the mi’kmaq interacted with the availability of resources in the area. often they would move between districts, living a nomadic existence that ensured renewal of the land and gifts. this philosophy was not only for salmon, but also for all animal and plant beings that contributed to the survival of the mi’kmaq people (berneshawi, 1997; a. marshall, personal communication, november 15, 2014). salmon fishing rivers were shared among families, and sometimes other tribes, and fished on a rotational basis (ladner, 2005; l. marshall, personal communication, november 11, 2014). the delicate nature of too many fishers on one river and the population of salmon were recognized long before european arrival. 7 denny and fanning: a mi'kmaw perspective on advancing salmon governance published by scholarship@western, 2016 f i g u r e 2 . t r a d i t i o n a l p o l i t i c a l d i s t r i c t s o f t h e m i ’ k m a q i n t h e n o r t h e a s t e r n r e g i o n o f n o r t h a m e r i c a , i n c l u d i n g t h e m a r i t i m e p r o v i n c e s o f n o v a s c o t i a , p r i n c e e d w a r d i s l a n d , a n d n e w b r u n s w i c k ( s o u r c e : h t t p : / / w w w . d a n i e l n p a u l . c o m / m a p m i ' k m a q t e r r i t o r y . h t m l ) salmon populations declined rapidly in the early half of the 19th century and mi’kmaq were “legislated out of the fishery” through harvesting bans and creation of a licensing system (king, 2014, p. 946). many mi’kmaq continued to fish for food, confident in the existence of their right to fish and hunt from stories passed down from their forefathers. following court decisions such as r. v. denny, paul, and sylliboy (1990) and r. v. sparrow (1990), the federal government created a new strategy, known as the aboriginal fisheries strategy (afs), to deal with the outcomes of these court decisions. while these agreements are negotiated with mi’kmaw communities and are “without prejudice”, there are restrictions on where salmon can be fished, how many can be taken, and how they can be removed. some first nations did not enter into arrangements with the federal government but have dfoimposed licenses for salmon. those communities that did enter into arrangements have unique, community specific agreements with specific quotas or allocations for harvest. the harvest of atlantic salmon by the mi’kmaq is regulated, for the most part, through the use of these agreements. fishing of atlantic salmon is both contemporary and traditional for the mi’kmaq. salmon were, and are today, fished using netukulimk as the guiding principle and fishers govern themselves in accordance with their interactions and relationships with their environment (giles, fanning, denny & paul, 2016). salmon are caught using hooks, snares, or spears that allowed fishers to select fish to be captured without first harming the fish. traditionally, all parts of the salmon were used and great care was taken to bury the unusable portions of salmon so that the spirit and body of the salmon would be recycled (prosper et al., 2011). 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.4 today, many still take part in the traditional ceremony and return eggs to the water as food for other aquatic life and to thank the creator for the gift of salmon. common methods for salmon fishing included spear, snare, seine, angle, and fly. in addition to retaining salmon under 63 cm (grilse), the mi’kmaq are the only group permitted to access multi-sea winter salmon (salmon > 63 cm, mostly female) and post-spawning salmon (kelts). these are harvested in several, but not all, rivers in which there is an allocation. from a management perspective, the mi’kmaq strive to fish for balance. this balance is not only relevant to achieving a balance in nature; it reflects a fishery that is balanced in spirit. the mi’kmaq believe that salmon fishing is reciprocal and that selection of grilse over multi-sea winter salmon is not always possible. the harvest of salmon has as much to do with mi’kmaq spirituality as the skill of the fisher. the availability of salmon is considered an offering from mother earth and the mi’kmaq acknowledge the offering by taking part in ceremony, preventing waste, and returning what is not consumed to the earth. as such, not all fishers target or retain the same life stage of salmon as regulated in the non-mi’kmaq recreational retention fishery. furthermore, many of the fishing strategies are individualistic rather than a single approach adopted by the entire tribe. this makes it difficult to impose a universal, westernbased approach to managing fish declines and achieving conservation objectives, especially when the imposed strategy is at odds with mi’kmaq epistemology and practice (giles et al., 2016). m i ’ k m a q a s s e s s m e n t o f p l a m u traditional knowledge served the purpose of locating and quantifying populations to determine how many, and which ones, could be removed. not all members were hunters or fishers. providing was left to those who were especially gifted to hunt and fish, not only for their family but also for others who could not provide for themselves. care was taken to conserve the ecological integrity of the districts and to preserve habitats as mi’kmaq survival depended upon their relationship to and treatment of the land and water. traditional knowledge is not only information about species or habitats. it is the collective knowledge derived from a lifetime of observing and interacting within the natural environment. it is more than knowing about nature: it is about knowing how to interact with nature to ensure co-existence and survival for humans and animals (a. marshall, personal communication, november 15, 2014). m i ’ k m a q p e r s p e c t i v e s o n c o n s e r v a t i o n o f p l a m u the mi’kmaq concept of conservation is engrained within netukulimk and has been described as the “traditional mi’kmaq idea of conservation” (king, 2011, p. 3). conservation connects “the wellbeing of the fish stocks. . . to the economic, political, and spiritual wellbeing of the larger community” (king, 2011, p. 3). the complete absence of fishing for salmon as a conservation practice is, and was, thought of as something that is needed when very few of those species are in existence. the word conservation evokes images of extinction—the last tree or fish—and is taken very seriously. managing for conservation is believed to be for the benefit of the salmon and not for humans; there are no exceptions (a. marshall, personal communication, november 15, 2014). mi’kmaq are in general agreement that salmon populations have been in decline and there are certain rivers in which there is concern for its populations. the application of the english word “conservation” to salmon is confusing as salmon are still observed in many places. they may not be present in historical 9 denny and fanning: a mi'kmaw perspective on advancing salmon governance published by scholarship@western, 2016 numbers, but they are there, and there are far more than one salmon per pool. scientific assessments are met with scepticism because many mi’kmaq have their methods for assessing and managing salmon based on traditional knowledge. for the mi’kmaq, it is the initial quantity of salmon in the pool that determines whether or not salmon will be removed and, if present, how many. only a certain number of salmon will be harvested from a pool and, once fished, the pool will not be fished again that season. fishers move from pool to pool, carefully selecting their catch and moving on to a new pool if more salmon are required. there is no set removal rate. there is an understanding that not all salmon are to be removed from the pool, and only to remove what is needed. the mi’kmaq were, by nature, sustainable users rather than conservationists unless it was necessary to do so. the needs of the species must be met in order for it to recover and this includes more than restricting further declines in their population. conservation includes a holistic perspective that includes maintenance of habitats and ensuring food availability for salmon (a. marshall, personal communication, november 15, 2014). for the mi’kmaq, if conservation were the guiding principle for management, all sfas designated as “endangered” should be subjected to the same conservation management regime. it is evident that the concept of management and conservation of salmon by the federal government is very different from the mi’kmaq perspective. these differences, which were discussed above, are summarized in table 1. d i s c u s s i o n an attempt to align a mi’kmaq perspective of salmon management and assessment with that of the federal and provincial governments in nova scotia can be described by the idiom “square peg in a round hole.” while not strictly dichotomous, mi’kmaq spiritual elements of fishing for balance and traditional practices of sharing catch communally are at odds with the dfo’s regulation of removals of multi-sea winter salmon and limiting catch per licence. similarly, mi’kmaq traditional teachings related to taking only what is needed while preventing waste is contrary to the dfo’s control in limiting removals of salmon. the catch and release salmon fishery promoted as a conservation measure is also at odds with the mi’kmaq belief and practice of respectful treatment of animals, with conservation focused on the benefit of the species, without exceptions. these differences are not unique to the mi’kmaq and federal management but are common conflicts and tensions among other indigenous management initiatives as well (berkes, 1989; notzke, 1994). mi’kmaq and federal perspectives both acknowledge the decline in atlantic salmon, but differ in the approach needed to address the problem. how do groups move forward to reconcile perspectives and still retain values of conservation, the need for consumption, and recognition of the spirituality and cultural identity through salmon harvesting? despite the dissimilarities, the common element connecting perspectives is, at least partially, concern for salmon populations. both perspectives include conservation and sustainable use as demonstrated in dfo policy statements and the mi’kmaq guiding principle of netukulimk. however, given the complexities surrounding the two groups’ differing worldviews and partially shared philosophy, we explored whether or not a mutually beneficial solution can reasonably be expected. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.4 t a b l e 1 . s u m m a r y o f d i f f e r e n c e s b e t w e e n t h e p e r s p e c t i v e s o f t h e f e d e r a l a n d p r o v i n c i a l g o v e r n m e n t s a n d t h e m i ’ k m a q i n t h e m a n a g e m e n t a n d c o n s e r v a t i o n o f a t l a n t i c s a l m o n t h e m e d o m a i n w e s t e r n ( d f o / p r o v i n c i a l ) p e r s p e c t i v e m i ’ k m a q p e r s p e c t i v e worldview epistemology • western, “command and control,” scientific, reductionist based approach • judeo-christian belief of human superiority above everything else • application of single rule to multiple watersheds • multiple ways of knowing • equality of life where humans are part of the ecosystem • mi’kmaq knowledge is holistic and varies depending on place management philosophy philosophy • conservation and sustainable use and benefits • netukulimk (sustainability, take what you need) beneficiary of salmon resource beneficiaries • salmon exist to benefit canadians • biodiversity and ecosystem • common property • salmon and mi’kmaq benefit from relationship; • role of salmon extends beyond human needs; • communal property management structure • written regulations rooted in written policy • hierarchical and segregated structure of science and management • focused on limiting removal of salmon • prescriptive • oral knowledge reflected in fishing practices and rooted in interactions with natural world (mi’kmaq knowledge) • responsibility driven • inclusiveness of fisher, naturalist, and manager in one individual • holistic view of conservation • preventative salmon access • privilege • provincial license regime for individuals • constitutionally protected aboriginal right • negotiated federal communal allocations through afs agreements, assertion of 11 denny and fanning: a mi'kmaw perspective on advancing salmon governance published by scholarship@western, 2016 t h e m e d o m a i n w e s t e r n ( d f o / p r o v i n c i a l ) p e r s p e c t i v e m i ’ k m a q p e r s p e c t i v e aboriginal right or imposed licenses • collective • sfa 18 open to retention for recreational catch and release fishers • reduced number of grilse allowed per license from 8 to 0 over 7 years • issued approximately 2,500 licenses annually • one area in the margaree river closed to catch and release fishing • imposed and negotiated and community specific • restriction to certain rivers • not all rivers available to non-indigenous recreational fishery are available to mi’kmaq because of mi’kmaw preference to harvest large salmon over the grilse, belief in taking what is offered by mother earth, and limited availability of large salmon in rivers that met or exceeded conservation egg requirement • shared within community conservation measures retention rules • fishery takes place on estimated surplus population prior to 2015 • catch and release in rivers with populations ≥ 25% conservation egg requirement (cer) • management based on previous year’s assessment • retention/fishing strategy determined at the time of fishing • based on knowledge gathered in real time (adaptive management) catch and size limits • retention limit based on regulations • retention fishery permits only grilse (mostly, but not entirely, male < 63 cm) • preservation of large salmon for spawning • retention limit rooted in netukulimk • retention of mswa, grilse and kelt • fish for “balance” catch and release fishery strategy • practiced in areas allowing zero retention as of 2015; river must meet ≥ 25% cer • opposed to perceived harmful and disrespectful treatment of salmon 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.4 t h e m e d o m a i n w e s t e r n ( d f o / p r o v i n c i a l ) p e r s p e c t i v e m i ’ k m a q p e r s p e c t i v e • restricted to 3 rivers in sfa 19 and open in all rivers in sfa 18 method of capture • angle, fly with barbless hooks • spear, snare, angle, fly, seine, hooks (barbed and barbless) knowledge base to inform decision making source of “data” • collection and use of quantitative data for scientific assessments • use of recreational fishery advisory boards and consultation with mi’kmaq • atk, biological, social and economic consequences • atk and scientific assessments • use of both qualitative and quantitative data sources application of alternative knowledge atk • information to feed into science, which feeds into management • mi’kmaq knowledge is specific to the mi’kmaq and to the place from which it was derived • inclusive of observations and fishing practices rooted in guiding principle of netukulimk note. a msw refers to “multi-sea winter” or large salmon. msw salmon spend more two or more years after migrating from the rivers as smolt to feed at sea before returning to their natal rivers to spawn and describe those salmon that have a fork length of 63 cm or greater. the terms “large salmon” and “msw salmon” are used interchangeably (dfo, 2008). 13 denny and fanning: a mi'kmaw perspective on advancing salmon governance published by scholarship@western, 2016 we argue that while it is in the interest of the governments and the mi’kmaq to find acceptable solutions, this is extremely challenging for a number of reasons. some scholars have noted that a solution-based approach is not possible, or even preferred, when dealing with such complex and radically different ways of being, knowing, and interacting (jentoft, bavinck, johnson, & thomson, 2009). salmon management in this case is embedded within cultural and legal pluralism and can be described as a “wicked” problem, according to jentoft and chuenpagdee (2009). wicked problems are complex problems. they have no technical solutions, no indication of when they are solved, and no right or wrong solution (jentoft & chuenpagdee, 2009). the authors described the process for tackling wicked problems as not focused on defining solutions but rather engaging in “interactive communication and learning among stakeholders, where norms and values are played out and where different ethics and ideologies, and epistemologies are active” (p. 555). in the case of salmon management in nova scotia, it is a call for a conversation about conservation (king, 2014; jentoft & chuenpagdee, 2009). the conversation will provide the opportunity to engage in discussion on topics that recognize multiple realities (king, 2014; jentoft et al., 2009) to develop an interdisciplinary approach and cross-cultural conservation ethic or goals (berkes, 2004) as a means to move forward. however, the process to move forward is not through conversation exclusively. many scholars have suggested that co-management is the process in which conversations about conservation can take place, by providing a forum to address issues surrounding legal pluralism and develop cross-cultural conservation ethics or goals (berkes, 2004; jentoft et al., 2009). as noted by jentoft and colleagues (2009), in the context of wicked problems and situations embedded within pluralism and conflict, comanagement may be “an essential path to legitimacy” (p. 36). conservation, although utilized by the federal government as a valid objective to justify infringement of aboriginal rights to salmon, has been used by first nations as a political framework to contest the government’s position on the fishery (king, 2014). conservation becomes the platform from which to be heard and for which conversations transpire. in nova scotia, the platform for conversation between the mi’kmaq of nova scotia and the federal and the provincial departments currently exists through a tri-partite agreement known as the terms of reference (tor) for a mi’kmaq-nova scotia–canada consultation process: the consultation process under this terms of reference is available whenever canada or nova scotia wishes to conduct consultation on the record and with prejudice with one or more mi’kmaq bands respecting established or asserted mi’kmaq aboriginal or treaty rights, including consultation in respect of a decision or activity concerning crown land, water, or a natural resource. (kwilmu’kw maw-klusuaqn negotiation office [kmkno], 2014, para. 1). conversations about conservations are consultations—structured, formal dialogue, agenda dependent, on the record and often without solution, although improvements to recreational salmon fisheries management have resulted. consultation topics to date have been about aboriginal rights, conservation, allocation, and governance that largely remain unresolved. however, we suggest that consultation must be combined with other modes of participation; otherwise, there is no assurance that concerns and ideas will be influential in decision-making (arnstein, 1969). as such, for meaningful progress to be made, the consultation focus of the tor (kmkno, 2014) needs to be revisited to negotiate power to something more than what arnstein (1969) described as a degree of tokenism. what ought to be considered by 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.4 both the governmental and mi’kmaq negotiators is a step towards moving up arnstein’s “ladder of participation” to a more meaningful process that incorporates approaches leading to the sharing of power, responsibility, and clearly defined conflict resolution mechanisms (arnstein, 1969; jentoft et al., 2009). one such rung up the ladder to self-governance is co-management. co-management is a prominent governance arrangement especially in the context of indigenous peoples and natural resource management (berkes, 1989; castro & nielsen, 2001; doubleday, 1989; emerson & gerlak, 2014; morrell, 1989; richardson & green, 1989). a concept with many definitions, comanagement refers to a suite of governance arrangements to find solutions to many of the pressing problems in natural resources management (armitage, berkes, & doubleday, 2007; berkes, 2009; carlsson & berkes, 2005; castro & nielsen, 2001; jentoft & chuenpagdee, 2009; pomeroy & berkes, 1997). co-management regimes attempt to alter the relationships between the public (state) and private (non-state) actors for the benefit of those involved (carlsson & berkes, 2005; pinkerton, 1989). natcher, davis, and hickey (2005) described co-management as a way of managing relationships rather than managing resources. more formalized than other forms of participatory or network governance, co-management links different levels of political and institutional arrangements in relation to the resource system (armitage et al., 2007; carlsson & berkes, 2005). co-management arrangements generally focus on the element of sharing decision-making power between the state and citizens (bevir, 2009; castro & nielsen, 2001; gray, 2005) and responsibility (fanning, 2000; rettig, berkes, & pinkerton, 1989). co-management arrangements generally focus broadly on the spectrum of the three p’s: participation, partnerships, and power (castro & nielsen, 2001). co-management can be initiated by the state, community-level agencies, or both (thomlinson & crouch, 2012), but develops over many years (berkes, 2009, 2010). a precursor to co-management regimes is “real or imagined stock depletion” (pinkterton, 1989, p. 27), social movement (kearney, 1989), court decisions (castro & nielsen, 2001), research (chuenpagdee & jentoft, 2007) and resource conflicts such as perceived inadequacies in resource management (morrell, 1989) and structure (chuenpagdee & jentoft, 2007), unfairness in fisheries access (richardson & green, 1989), and title to land (doubleday, 1989; richardson & green, 1989). co-management arrangements between indigenous peoples and the state often arise out of conflict (castro & nielsen, 2001), as legal obligation by the state to consultation in matters of natural resources (r. v. haida, 2004, r. v. mikisew cree first nation, 2005; r. v. sparrow, 1990; r. v. taku river tlingit first nation, 2004), resource management issues (castro & nielsen, 2001), need for an innovative management approach (notzke, 1994) and/or are explicitly stated in land claims agreements (castro & nielsen, 2001; pomeroy & berkes, 1997). as governance, co-management is an approach, and the contexts of issue (berkes, 2009), place, willingness of the state to facilitate co-management (pomeroy & berkes, 1997), and commitments to long-term institution building are important drivers for success (armitage, berkes, dale, kochoschellenberg, & patton, 2011). power sharing is a result rather than the starting point, and a more realistic view of its application as a governance approach is that co-management is the arena for the process (armitage et al., 2007). while co-management may be seen as a potential process to solve problems, share knowledge, learn and adapt, and as a legal battlefield (armitage et al., 2007;berkes, 2010; emerson & gerlak, 2014) for the multi-faceted challenges faced in society, distinct cultural backgrounds, colonial histories, conflicting values and lack of shared management perspectives may hinder the co-management process (natcher, davis, & hickey, 2005). 15 denny and fanning: a mi'kmaw perspective on advancing salmon governance published by scholarship@western, 2016 however, given the parties involved, any co-management approach being discussed must acknowledge and recognize the value of multiple realities. pluralism in this case refers to the multiple realities related to views on allocation and access, provincial and customary laws, traditional knowledge and science, values and economics, and natural and legal relationships to salmon, all of which can offer depth and insight in the design of co-management (jentoft et al., 2009; king, 2014). the concept of two-eyed seeing may be useful in this situation. two-eyed seeing, also referred to as etuaptmumk, was developed by mi’kmaq elder albert marshall (see for example bartlett, marshall, & marshall, 2012; hatcher, 2012) who explained that it “refers to learning to see from one eye with the strengths of indigenous knowledges and ways of knowing, and from the other eye with the strengths of western knowledges and ways of knowing . . . and learning to use both these eyes together, for the benefit of all” (marshall, 2004, para. 3). two-eyed seeing is interdisciplinary, cross-cultural, and pluralistic. it is a potential approach for working on wicked problems. two-eyed seeing can be the framework for approaching such problems, especially those in which there seems to be little common ground from which to advance. it provides the design for social learning through sharing management perspectives, cultures, and colonial histories. the co-existence of both perspectives for the benefit of all is a process with no pre-existing guidelines; rather it is dependent on the personalities at the table and their receptiveness. it is a fitting process for the unique approach required in addressing wicked problems. within the design of two-eyed seeing, there are other opportunities to further improve management. the use of the strengths of both the indigenous and western worldviews for the benefit of all may offer creativity in both management and assessment to improve current conservation strategies, given the current environmental challenges in the 21st century (bartlett et al., 2012). the application of aboriginal knowledge to management rather than as simply information to complement the science that informs governmental decision-making is possible through two-eyed seeing. often in resource management traditional knowledge is taken out of context, made to fit into current scientific assessments based on dfo criteria, and little value is given to the practical, qualitative application of the knowledge. fishing strategies employed by the mi’kmaq people, derived from lessons learned over generations of interactions and interdependence, have withstood the test of time (giles et al., 2016). while two-eyed seeing may be a useful approach for wicked problems within the co-management process, the question of who implements the plan and how they do it, requires a different approach. governance may be addressed through a true co-management process where there is sharing of power and responsibility, both of which are appealing and relevant to the mi’kmaq, but has yet to be applied in nova scotia. however, peace and friendship treaties can serve as a model for improved fisheries governance (king, 2014). peace and friendship treaties were negotiated between the mi’kmaq and the crown in the latter half of the eighteenth century as an attempt to create new relationships and political order for the co-existence of the british and mi’kmaq nations by creating a “plural place” (king, 2014, p. 160). king (2014) explored the plural place as a way to “preserve multiplicity” (p. 266), and to uphold and renew the relationships that were intended in treaties, rather than the typical practice of interpreting and reframing within existing laws or management frameworks. pluralism provides an opportunity to incorporate 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.4 traditional law and practices into state law, or even to replace it, as has been demonstrated in the case of the listuguj salmon fishery. in listuguj, quebec, community members who fished salmon according to their traditional values and harvesting practices for both food and sale on the restigouche river came into conflict with commercial and recreational salmon fishing interests. after mi’kmaq fishers were charged for failing to comply with provincial laws that did not have jurisdiction over them and their land, and that failed to recognize the sacredness of mi’kmaq values and traditional teachings, the listuguj and quebec governments collaborated to establish governing rules for the salmon fishery. quotas (subsistence and sale combined) were issued to listuguj community members in exchange for training as quebec-hired listuguj conservation officers. tagging requirements were agreed upon as necessary for off-reserve transport of salmon, and financial compensation ($3/lb) was paid to fishers who did not reach the quota, possibly as incentive to refrain from catching the entire quota. discontent arose, after many years of attempting to compromise, upon learning that competing interests sport fishery rather than conservation was at the root of a large quota reduction. as a result, the community asserted its right to fish and govern its people, land, and waters in its own ways. listuguj mi’gmaq nation government law on fisheries and fish for the restigouche river watershed is an assertion of self-determination over fishing activities and the use of the resource based on targets. community leadership, in collaboration with community members, agreed to “assert and exercise mi’gmaq2 self-governance over fishing activities and fishing resources” (national center for first nations governance native nations institute for leadership, management and policy, 2010, p. 12) by balancing rights and responsibilities through competent management and imposing their own rules in the form of laws that were enforceable by their own community (cornell, 2015; national center for first nations governance native nations institute for leadership, management and policy, 2010). by 1993, the listuguj mi’gmaq first nation law on fisheries and fishing that defined its governance had been presented to the quebec government. it outlined the territory, beneficiaries, responsibilities of the management regime, issues related to compliance, resource allocation, use of the resource, and created fishing plans, identified special areas for protection, mapped fishing and non-fishing areas, and set rules governing monitoring by the rangers (national center for first nations governance native nations institute for leadership, management and policy, 2010). without federal jurisdiction over the mi’gmaq, there was little the provincial body could do. however, there was willingness by both parties to collaborate to establish conservation targets. the law provides for co-management agreements with the federal and provincial departments (national centre for first nation governance native nations institute for leadership, management, and policy, 2010). in 1995, the community received the award for the best managed river in the province by the atlantic salmon federation (national center for first nations governance native nations institute for leadership, management and policy, 2010). while this is on a smaller scale (i.e., one community, one watershed) than the scale of salmon management explored in this article, and represents a unique situation in canada where marine fisheries are regulated provincially, it is an example of the willingness to collaborate while respecting aboriginal rights and 2 different orthographies may be used. in the gaspé region of quebec, gespe’gwa’gi (the seventh district of mi’kma’ki), the listuguj orthography is used. “mi’kmaq” is spelled “mi’gmaq.” in nova scotia, the francis-smith orthography is used. the santi mawio’mi declared the smith-francis orthography is the official orthography of the mi’kmaq nation (see http://www.muiniskw.org/pgculture4b.htm). 17 denny and fanning: a mi'kmaw perspective on advancing salmon governance published by scholarship@western, 2016 responsibility, cultural and legal pluralism, and co-management. based on the practice demonstrated by the province and the mi’kmaq in the listuguj example, it would appear that the state would benefit from learning to be pluralistic, which involves a recognition of multiple realities, the mi’kmaq right to selfdetermination, and confidence in the capacity of the mi’kmaq to “manage” salmon. c o n c l u s i o n it is evident that perspectives on how to achieve conservation through salmon management in nova scotia are quite different between the mi’kmaq and dfo. both groups share and respect the idea of conservation. however, differences in underlying worldviews, management philosophies, beneficiaries of the salmon resource, management, conservation measures, knowledge to inform decision-making, and application of atk to achieve conservation are “governability issues” (jentoft & chuenpagdee, 2009, p. 553). these all make for a wicked problem embedded in cultural and legal pluralism. on-going consultation between the groups remains valuable. while consultation may be considered a degree of tokenism, it is an essential step towards implementing co-management and has been referred to as “step zero” in the process by chuenpagdee and jentoft (2007). given the legal responsibility of the government of canada to engage first nations in resource management (r. v. haida, 2004; r. v. mikisew cree first nation, 2005; r. v. sparrow, 1990; r. v. taku river tlingit first nation, 2004) and the “wickedness” of the problem, the use of co-management to develop shared goals of conservation of species and conservation of mi’kmaq identity may be the only way to further governance of salmon in nova scotia that does not involve loss of cultural identity or replacing one belief system in favour of another (notzke, 1994). co-management for complex issues must be approached with multiple realities in mind, incorporate shared decision-making, and develop rules for conflict resolution. this includes the recognition of salmon access priorities (jentoft et al., 2009), such as the priority of aboriginal food fisheries over other user groups, and incorporation of diverse perspectives on conservation and management. the use of two-eyed seeing is both interdisciplinary and pluralistic. its use as the design to develop cross-cultural conservation ethics or goals, creative management, and appropriate assessment will be challenging but is necessary to maximize the effectiveness of a co-management approach to salmon conservation in nova scotia. from an application perspective, the use of peace and friendship treaties to further the governance of resources related to salmon management and conservation may be more appropriate than attempting to reframe the square peg of mi’kmaq salmon fishing into the round hole of existing regulations, scientific assessments, or the current management framework in nova scotia. given the experience on a smaller scale in quebec, there may be much to learn about the process and potential application to mi’kmaq governance of atlantic salmon in nova scotia. in conclusion, we suggest that an essential first step in the effective management of atlantic salmon is to begin the process of adopting a co-management approach that incorporates two-eyed seeing as the design and treaties as the model to achieve a collaborative co-existence approach for salmon governance in nova scotia. such an approach would be based on the shared objectives of maintaining and increasing salmon populations; yet, allow for differing mechanisms to address the 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(2014). fishing in contested waters: place and community in burnt church/ esgenoôpetitj. toronto, ontario: university of toronto press. 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.4 kwilmu’kw maw-klusuaqn negotiation office [kmkno]. 2014. terms of reference for a mi'kmaqnova scotia–canada consultation process. retrieved from http://mikmaqrights.com/uploads/tordocument.pdf ladner, k. l. (2005). up the creek: fishing for a new constitutional order. canadian journal of political science, 38(4), 923-953. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0008423905040539 marshall, a. (2004). two-eyed seeing. retrieved from the institute for integrative science and health website: http://www.integrativescience.ca/principles/twoeyedseeing/ morrell, m. 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(2002). the logic of scientific discovery. new york, ny: routledge. 23 denny and fanning: a mi'kmaw perspective on advancing salmon governance published by scholarship@western, 2016 prosper, k., mcmillan, l., davis, a., & moffitt, m. (2011). returning to netukulimk: mi'kmaq cultural and spiritual connections with resource stewardship and self-governance. international indigenous policy journal, 2(4). doi: dx.doi.org/10.18584.iipj.2011.2.4.7 rettig, r. b., berkes, f., & pinkerton, e. (1989). the future of fisheries co-management: a multidisciplinary assessment. in e. pinkerton (ed.), co-operative management of local fisheries: new directions for improved management and community development (pp. 273-289). vancouver, bc: ubc press. richardson, m., & green, b. 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(2007). the wisdom hierarchy: representations of the dikw hierarchy. journal of information science, 33, 163-180. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0165551506070706 r. v. denny, paul, and sylliboy, 1990 s.c.r.1 1075, 1990 s.c.r.3 697 (1990). r. v. haida (2004) 3 scr 511, 2004 scc 73 (canlii). r. .v mikisew cree first nation (2005) 3 scr 388, 2005 scc 69 (canlii). r. v. simon (1985) 2 scr 387, 1985 canlii 11 (scc). r. v. sparrow (1990) 1 scr 1075, 1990 canlii 104 (scc). r. v. taku river tlingit first nation (2004) 3 scr 550, 2004 scc 74 (canlii). thomlinson, e., & crouch, g. (2012). aboriginal peoples, parks canada, and protected spaces: a case study in comanagement at gwaii haanas national park reserve. annals of leisure research, 15(1), 69-86. doi: dx.doi.org/10.1080/11745398.2012.670965 wiber, m., & milley, c. (2007). after marshall: implementation of aboriginal fishing rights in atlantic canada. the journal of legal pluralism and unofficial law, 39(55), 163-186. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/07329113.2007.10756611 wildsmith, b. (1995). the mi'kmaq and the fishery: beyond food requirements. dalhousie law journal, 18, 116-140. wildsmith, b. h. (2001). vindicating mi'kmaq rights: the struggle before, during and after marshall. windsor yearbook of access to justice, 19, 203-240. 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 4 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/4 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.4 a p p e n d i x atk aboriginal traditional knowledge cosewic committee on the status of endangered wildlife in canada dfo department of fisheries and oceans fsc food, social, and ceremonial kmkno kwilmu’kw maw-klusuaqn negotiation office sara species at risk act sfa salmon fishing area 25 denny and fanning: a mi'kmaw perspective on advancing salmon governance published by scholarship@western, 2016 the international indigenous policy journal july 2016 a mi’kmaw perspective on advancing salmon governance in nova scotia, canada: setting the stage for collaborative co-existence shelley k. denny lucia m. fanning recommended citation a mi’kmaw perspective on advancing salmon governance in nova scotia, canada: setting the stage for collaborative co-existence abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license a miâ•žkmaw perspective on advancing salmon governance in nova scotia, canada: setting the stage for collaborative co-existence the nagoya protocol and indigenous peoples the international indigenous policy journal volume 7 | issue 2 article 6 april 2016 the nagoya protocol and indigenous peoples maria yolanda teran the university of new mexico, mteran@unm.edu recommended citation teran, m. y. (2016). the nagoya protocol and indigenous peoples. the international indigenous policy journal, 7(2). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.6 the nagoya protocol and indigenous peoples abstract this article is about indigenous peoples’ involvement in the nagoya protocol negotiations from 2006 to 2010, as well as in its implementation to stop biopiracy in order to protect pachamama, mother earth, and to ensure our survival and the survival of coming generations. the nagoya protocol is an international instrument that was adopted in nagoya, japan in october 2010 by the conference of parties (cop 10) and ratified by 51 countries in pyeongchang, south korea in october 2014 at cop 12. this protocol governs access to genetic resources and the fair and equitable sharing of benefits arising from their utilization (access and benefit sharing [abs]). it has several articles related to indigenous peoples and traditional knowledge, as well as: • the interrelation and inseparable nature between genetic resources and traditional knowledge; • the diversity of circumstances surrounding traditional knowledge ownership, including by country; • the identification of traditional knowledge owners; • the declaration of indigenous peoples' human rights; and • the role of women in the biodiversity process. in addition, this protocol lays out obligations on access, specifically participation in equitable benefit sharing, the accomplishment of prior and informed consent, and the mutually agreed terms and elaboration of a national legal abs framework with the participation of indigenous peoples and local communities in order to have well-defined roles, responsibilities, and times of negotiations. keywords nagoya protocol, genetic resources, traditional knowledge (tk), biopiracy, indigenous peoples, human rights, mother earth’s rights, prior and informed consent (pic), mutually agreed terms (mat), contracts, access and benefit sharing (abs), monetary and non-monetary benefits, national and international laws, customary law, sui generis protection, code of ethics, bio-cultural community protocols acknowledgments i would like to thank the elders of my community for guiding my way of feeling, thinking, and being that allowed me to participate with a clear mind and respect at international meetings on genetic resources and traditional knowledge. my deepest thanks to the indigenous international forum on biodiversity (iifb) and the indigenous women network on biodiversity from latin america and the caribbean (iwnb-lac) for being together all these years to defend our resources and life through an organized and documented effort. i would also like to acknowledge the moral and financial support from the vice-president of the equity and inclusion division and the director of native american studies department at the university of new mexico. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ t h e n a g o y a p r o t o c o l a n d i n d i g e n o u s p e o p l e s indigenous peoples, through the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (undrip), have been granted the right to "full and effective participation in all matters that concern them and their right to remain distinct and to pursue their own visions of economic and social development” (“united nations adopts declaration,” 2007, para. 5); yet, the experience of indigenous peoples participating in the drafting and implementation of the nagoya protocol shows that there are still obstacles to achieving this goal. this article explores indigenous peoples’ involvement in the nagoya protocol negotiations from 2006 to 2010, as well as in its future implementation to stop biopiracy, to protect pachamama (mother earth), and to ensure our survival and the survival of the coming generations. the purpose of this article is to highlight the necessary conditions to have full and effective participation from indigenous peoples in policy processes that affect them, as well as to share with indigenous youth the indigenous peoples’ strategies and protocols used during the negotiations of the nagoya protocol, an international instrument that was adopted in nagoya, japan in october 2010 by the conference of parties (cop, 2010b) and ratified by 51 countries in pyeongchang, south korea in october 2014 at cop 12 (cop, 2014). this protocol concerns access to genetic resources, and the fair and equitable sharing of benefits arising from their utilization, termed “access and benefit sharing” (or abs). it has several articles related to indigenous peoples and traditional knowledge, as well as recognizing: • the interrelationship and inseparable nature of genetic resources and traditional knowledge; • the diversity of circumstances surrounding traditional knowledge ownership, including across countries; • the rights of traditional knowledge owners; • undrip (un, 2008); and • the role of women in the biodiversity process (secretariat of the convention on biological diversity, 2011). this protocol is important to indigenous peoples because it lays out obligations in terms of access: specifically, it requires equitable benefit sharing, the accomplishment of prior and informed consent (or pic), and mutually agreed terms (or mat), and the elaboration of a national access and benefit sharing legal framework with the participation of indigenous peoples and local communities in order to have well-defined roles, responsibilities, and participation in negotiations. i am from the kichwa nation from ecuador. i am the education and culture coordinator of andes chinchasuyu indigenous organization from ecuador and an active member of the indigenous women network on biodiversity for latin america and the caribbean (or in spanish, red de mujeres indígenas sobre biodiversidad de américa latina y el caribe [rmib-lac]). since 2006, i have been following the processes involved in protecting biodiversity and participating in several national and international meetings related to the convention on biological diversity (cbd). in particular, i was following the 1 teran: the nagoya protocol published by scholarship@western, 2016 issues that concern traditional knowledge, indicators, agriculture, and education on biodiversity. i was not participating fully in the initial discussions about the international regimen on access and benefit sharing (later adopted as nagoya protocol) due to its heavy technical language and to its different view of the meaning of mother earth, pachamama, and her beings. most of the abs meetings were in english, which was a problem for the indigenous participants from latin america who are spanish speakers. they were able to follow the discussions thanks a sister from almaciga, a non-governmental organization (ngo) from spain, who translated. i, personally, witnessed how difficult it was to follow the discussion of technical terms. afterwards, when indigenous peoples had to provide positional papers on a draft of the international regime, i organized three international meetings at the university of new mexico (unm) to write our position papers collectively, following comprehensive analysis and discussion among indigenous peoples from new mexico and abroad. i made the decision to follow the abs process having in mind my combined roles as a woman and a community member, and that unm would be a potential resource to give support to our people. i educated myself on this subject, which resulted in my nomination as one of the negotiators from latin america and the caribbean. currently, i am still following the nagoya protocol, which now is in the implementation stage, as part of the informal advisory committee on capacity building for the implementation of the nagoya protocol. b a c k g r o u n d t o t h e n a g o y a p r o t o c o l : t h e c o n v e n t i o n o n b i o l o g i c a l d i v e r s i t y ( c b d ) the cbd (1992) is an international agreement that was adopted in 1992 with signatures from 168 countries. it entered into force on december 29, 1993. every 2 years, this convention has a meeting known as the cop, the first of which was held in 1994 in the bahamas from november 28 to december 9 (cop, 1994). this first convention recognized the vital worldwide importance of conserving biological resources for economic and socially sustainable development that benefits all of humanity (cop, 1994). the cbd (1992) has three main objectives: a. the conservation of the biological diversity, b. the sustainable use of its components, and c. the fair and equitable benefit sharing arising from the use of genetic resources. (article 1, para. 1, p. 3) the cbd’s (1992) preamble recognized indigenous peoples’ close relationship with and dependency on biological resources—in terms of their traditional knowledge, the role of women in biodiversity conservation, sustainable use of biological diversity, and use of biodiversity in the eradication of poverty. article 8(j) cites: each contracting party shall, as far as possible and as appropriate: 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.6 subject to its national legislation, respect, preserve and maintain knowledge, innovations and practices of indigenous and local communities[1] embodying traditional lifestyles relevant for the conservation and sustainable use of biological diversity and promote their wider application with the approval and involvement of the holders of such knowledge, innovations and practices and encourage the equitable sharing of the benefits arising from the utilization of such knowledge, innovations and practices. (cbd, 1992, p. 6) article 10(c) stated: “protect and encourage customary use of biological resources in accordance with traditional cultural practices that are compatible with conservation or sustainable use requirements” (cbd, 1992, p. 8). article 15 is specifically concerned with state access to genetic resources following the obtainment of both prior and informed consent and mutually agreed terms: 15.1. recognizing the sovereign rights of states over their natural resources, the authority to determine access to genetic resources rests with the national governments and is subject to national legislation. (cbd, 1992, p. 9) 15.4. access, where granted, shall be on mutually agreed terms and subject to the provisions of this article. (p. 10) 15.5. access to genetic resources shall be subject to prior informed consent of the contracting party providing such resources, unless otherwise determined by that party (p. 10). despite recognition of indigenous peoples and identification of issues of relevance to them, indigenous peoples were not invited to attend these initial biodiversity meetings. nevertheless, in 1996, several indigenous brothers and sisters from latin america and the caribbean created the international indigenous forum on biodiversity (iifb, 2016), and started to participate in these international meetings. considering the fact that the nation states involved in these meetings were discussing different themes regarding indigenous peoples, genetic resources, traditional knowledge, and intellectual property, the participation of indigenous peoples was paramount in ensuring their perspectives were represented. after some years of national and international political lobbying, a working group was created on article 8(j) at cop 4 in 1998 in bratislava, slovakia (cop, 1998). in addition, there were three other important events during the fourth cop (1998): a. the recognition of the international indigenous forum on biodiversity as the advisory body for the cop; b. the recognition of the international indigenous forum on biodiversity as the advisory body for the subsidiary body on scientific, technical, and technological advice (or sbstta); and 1 the cop 12 in south korea adopted the use of the terminology “indigenous peoples and local communities” (iplcs), instead of “indigenous and local communities” (cop, 2014). as such, this article will use the terminology “indigenous peoples and local communities.” 3 teran: the nagoya protocol published by scholarship@western, 2016 c. the establishment of an ad hoc open-ended inter-sessional working group on article 8(j) and related provisions. the international indigenous forum on biodiversity delivered to the states their own terms of reference and related provisions for the future implementation of article 8(j) to avoid the subsidiary body on scientific, technical, and technological advice’s “non-indigenous” reinterpretation of those terms (coica, omaere & opip, 1999, p. 70). at the same cop 4 meeting (cop, 1998), the indigenous women’s network on biodiversity was created with the intention of including women’s voices in biodiversity discussions. afterwards, this network expanded to africa, the arctic, asia, latin america, and the caribbean. since 1998, indigenous peoples’ participation has increased thanks to the indigenous permanent lobby. in may 2000, at cop 5 in nairobi, kenya (cop, 2000), the role and contribution of indigenous women in the cbd process was recognized (tauli-corpuz, 2000; m. e. choque, personal communication, april 12, 2010). the newly established 8(j) working group was very active in bringing forward indigenous views in the elaboration of bonn guidelines (cbd, n.d.b) on monetary and non-monetary benefits (cop, 2001)— for example, the ake:kon guidelines (cbd, 2004) on the evaluation of cultural, environmental, and social impacts on indigenous peoples and their lands, the tkarihwaié:ri code of ethical conduct (cop, 2010b), and the access and benefit sharing negotiations (cbd, n.d.c), among other topics. t h e n a g o y a p r o t o c o l o n a c c e s s t o g e n e t i c r e s o u r c e s a n d t h e f a i r a n d e q u i t a b l e s h a r i n g o f b e n e f i t s a r i s i n g f r o m t h e i r u t i l i z a t i o n t o t h e c o n v e n t i o n o n b i o l o g i c a l d i v e r s i t y ( c b d ) the third objective of the cbd (1992) refers to fair and equitable sharing of benefits arising from genetic resource use. in september 2002 in johannesburg, the world summit on sustainable development called for the negotiation of an international regime within the cbd to promote and safeguard this sharing of genetic resources among stakeholders (un, 2002). the 2004 cop (the seventh such conference) mandated the following: the establishment of the ad hoc open-ended working group on access and benefit sharing (or abswg), the elaboration and negotiation of an access and benefit sharing international regime (which would work towards the implementation of article 15 of the cbd outlining access to genetic resources), and the implementation of article 8(j) of the cbd on traditional knowledge and its three objectives (cop, 2004). the nagoya protocol sought to internationally regulate bioprospecting activities undertaken for commercial and non-commercial purposes, as well as to regulate the privatization and marketization of new medicines that are based on discoveries from natural products and traditional knowledge (secretariat of the convention on biological diversity, 2011). in many developing countries, traditional medicines are used for the population’s primary healthcare needs. according to the world health organization (who, 2002), in india 65 percent of the population uses traditional systems of medicine, and in africa the number is 80 percent. presently, these natural products play an important role in the development of new drugs, making significant contributions to large pharmaceutical companies’ development of modern medicines, such as cancer drugs, for example (laird & wynberg cited in bavikatte & robinson, 2011). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.6 authors ten kate and laird (1999) have estimated the annual value of products derived from genetic and biological resources—including extracts, combination molecules, and enzymes that are used in pharmaceutical products, botanical medicines, agro-industrial crops, horticulture, cosmetics, and crop protection products—at approximately $500 billion to 800 billion usd. if, hypothetically, 10 percent of this amount derives from the use of traditional knowledge, then the original, traditional products and indigenous peoples’ traditional knowledge would have an approximate value of $50 billion to 80 billion usd per year. calculating 10 percent of the $50 billion usd as the value of indigenous knowledge at the global level would add up to $5 billion annually from gross sales. in a commercial scenario, if indigenous peoples were paid even 10 percent of this $5 billion usd, it would add up to $500 million a year from net sales, an amount that would be useful in solving the basic needs of indigenous peoples (ruiz müller, 2006). to cite a specific example, avon is a company based in the united states that specializes in personal care products (i.e., skincare and beauty products) using a direct sales approach in which the company’s representatives, who are primarily women, sell products to their friends and acquaintances. afterwards, some of their customers in turn become salespeople—thereby building and perpetuating the chain business in living rooms and street corners rather than in avon stores. avon is estimated to have earned approximately $333 billion in annual sales in 2015. its skincare products alone, which have been made with medicinal plants from asia, earn the company $90 billion per year (global industry analyst cited in hammond, 2013). given the profitability of products made from natural products and using traditional knowledge, many in the international community recognized the need for regulation in order to protect less wealthy and powerful stakeholders. over the course of 6 years, the ad-hoc working group on access of benefit sharing had several meetings trying to attend to and balance the variety of interests involved in biodiversity—such as commercial exploitation, sustainable use, and conservation through the lens of bioprospecting. the adhoc working group on access of benefit sharing solicited input from indigenous peoples and local communities through the ad-hoc open-ended inter-sessional working group formed in article 8(j) of the cbd and related provisions that focus on traditional knowledge (bavikatte & robinson, 2011). the nagoya protocol was adopted at the cop 10 on 29 october 2010 in nagoya, japan (cop, 2010a), and ratified at cop 12 in south korea in october 2014 (cop, 2014). it aims to provide legal certainty and transparency for users and providers of genetic resources, specific obligations for compliance, a framework for domestic legislation or regulatory requirements such as the prior and informed consent and the adherence of contracts to mutually agreed terms. compliance with the provisions of the protocol and its required conditions for access to genetic resources ensures fair and equitable benefit sharing with the provider party and with indigenous peoples when accessing their traditional knowledge, innovations, and practices that are associated with genetic resources (secretariat of the convention on biological diversity, 2011). indigenous peoples participated in the international regime on access and benefit sharing meetings. the international indigenous forum on biodiversity and the indigenous women’s network on biodiversity from latin america and the caribbean (or iwnb-lac), asia, africa, and the arctic, in partnership with some friendly parties and alliances with non-governmental environmental organizations, universities, and research institutes developed strategies to defend indigenous peoples’ 5 teran: the nagoya protocol published by scholarship@western, 2016 bio-cultural rights. this defense is being accomplished with the consideration that our survival and cultural diversity depends on our lands, territories, waters, resources, traditional knowledge, and ecosystems, and on the balanced relationships between human beings and mother earth, pachamama. with this background in place, then, let us discuss the outcomes that resulted from the participation of indigenous peoples and local communities in access and benefit sharing meetings—meetings in which the environment was structured unequally in terms of negotiations and power. i n d i g e n o u s p e o p l e s ’ p a r t i c i p a t i o n i n t h e a c c e s s a n d b e n e f i t s h a r i n g i n t e r n a t i o n a l r e g i m e n e g o t i a t i o n s the nagoya protocol began with the decision taken at cop 7 in 2004 in kuala lumpur: … [the cop] decides to mandate the ad hoc open-ended working group on access and benefit sharing with the collaboration of the ad hoc open-ended inter-sessional working group on article 8(j) and related provisions, ensuring the participation of indigenous and local communities, nongovernmental organizations, industry, scientific and academic institutions, as well as intergovernmental organizations, to elaborate and negotiate an international regime on access to genetic resources and benefit sharing with the aim of adopting an instrument/instruments to effectively implement the provisions in article 15 and article 8(j) of the convention and the three objectives of the convention. (cop, 2004, d1, p. 5) the international indigenous forum on biodiversity, the indigenous women’s network on biodiversity (iwbb), and indigenous women’s network on biodiversity from latin american and the caribbean participated in several access and benefit sharing international regime negotiations from 2006 until 2010 when it was finally adopted as the nagoya protocol. during this period of time, the discussions centered on: • the nature of the international regime either as a legally binding instrument or another voluntary instrument; • the scope of access to genetic resources; • traditional knowledge and benefit sharing; • establishing objectives aimed at facilitating access to genetic resources and that guarantee benefit sharing; • the required elements to facilitate access to genetic resources, and to guarantee prior and informed consent of the provider party, benefit sharing with mutually agreed terms, and documents to endorse the certificate of origin; • disclosure of the origins of resources in requests for patents; and • the participation of indigenous peoples in benefit sharing when their traditional knowledge is used. 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.6 the states represented at the cbd had divergent positions at the initial meetings. for instance, the countries from the “south” considered themselves as “provider countries” or “countries of origin” for the resources in question. these are very diverse countries that are located in latin america and southern asia, which, together with the african group, desired to have an access and benefit sharing international regime that was legally binding for the cop 8 (cop, 2006). the united states and canada from the “north” as well as australia, new zealand, and the european union considered themselves “users” of resources and have tried to pursue a non-legally binding protocol in alignment with those by the world business organization (wbo) and by the world intellectual property organization (wipo) (indigenous peoples council on bio-colonialism, 2006; terán maigua, 2014). in 2008, the lack of agreement among the cbd state parties changed in bonn, germany when cop 9 took the decision ix/12 on access and benefit sharing and reached an agreement on four important points, which were: a. the agreement on the annex 1 of the decision ix/12 that, for the first time since 2004, provided the frame and the elements for the access and benefit sharing international regime; b. the agreement to begin the negotiations based on texts; several organizations including indigenous peoples and local communities were invited to present operative texts for the elements mentioned in the annex 1of the decision ix/12; c. the establishment of three groups of technical and legal experts (gtle) to advise the access and benefit sharing world group on the concepts, terms, functional definitions, and sectorial focus of the agreement, as well as sharing expertise on issues related to compliance and traditional knowledge associated with genetic resources; and d. the agreement to have three access and benefit sharing world group meetings, each for 7 days, with the goal to conclude the negotiations before the cop 10 in nagoya (cop, 2008; see also bavikatte & robinson, 2011). in hyderabad, india in july 2009, the indigenous peoples and local communities had the first opportunity to give their input on traditional knowledge associated with genetic resources to the access and benefit sharing working group. from their involvement, the group of technical and legal experts accomplished five important achievements, which expanded the interpretation of article 8(j) and the inclusion of indigenous peoples and local communities in the nagoya protocol: a. the inseparable link between the genetic resources and traditional knowledge was established; b. the need for prior and informed consent and benefit sharing arising from any use of indigenous peoples and local communities’ traditional knowledge was mandated; c. compliance with community laws and procedures in accessing resources and knowledge was specified; 7 teran: the nagoya protocol published by scholarship@western, 2016 d. the “subject to national law” component of article 8(j) was substantially weakened by interpreting it as indicative of a state’s duty to facilitate the rights of indigenous peoples and local communities rather than giving states the discretionary power to decide whether or not to uphold these rights; and e. the importance of undrip in interpreting the provisions of the cbd for the purposes of the protocol was enshrined (bavikatte & robinson, 2011). following this meeting, from july 2009 to october 2010, there were several reunions, such as the working group on access and benefit sharing meetings, the friends of the co-chairs meetings, the inter-regional negotiating group (ing) sessions, and the co-chairs informal inter-regional consultations. at all these meetings, indigenous peoples and local communities strategically used the achievements of the group of technical and legal experts meetings on traditional knowledge to their benefit. during the negotiations, indigenous peoples developed a variety of strategies to defend their views through lobbying indigenous and non-indigenous delegates, working closely with governments that supported indigenous concerns, and networking worldwide with indigenous peoples. in march 2010, at the ninth meeting of the access and benefit sharing working group in cali, colombia, the co-chairs provided attending parties with a co-chairs text, which tried to balance the interests of the stakeholders. this text was the basis for the meeting’s discussions and negotiations. from the inter-regional negotiations group that met in montreal came a text in brackets that was negotiated at the second meeting of the group in october 2010 in nagoya. in the final negotiations in nagoya, indigenous peoples and local communities tried to secure five key positions for inclusion within a potential access and benefit sharing protocol. these positions were: a. to eliminate the article 8(j) term “subject to national law” from the protocol provisions dealing with the rights of communities over their bio-cultural jurisprudence related to access and benefit sharing, traditional knowledge, and genetic resources before it became a legal “term of art” and started to be used in other cop resolutions; b. to retain references to compliance with customary laws and local community protocols in the text of the protocol to secure respect for community systems of governance by nation states; c. to secure the rights of indigenous peoples and local communities over their genetic resources in the protocol; d. to ensure reference to undrip in the preamble of the protocol; and e. to prevent the forum from shifting to the wipo’s conception of compliance relating to traditional knowledge, and to affirm that the protocol is the main instrument to enforce the cbd in relation to rights over genetic resources (bavikatte & robinson, 2011). next, i look at how indigenous peoples participated effectively in these meetings despite unfavourable and complex circumstances. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.6 i n d i g e n o u s p e o p l e s ’ p a r t i c i p a t i o n s t r a t e g i e s i n t h e a c c e s s a n d b e n e f i t s h a r i n g i n t e r n a t i o n a l r e g i m e m e e t i n g s i was part of several access and benefit sharing meetings and made note of their complicated processes. the indigenous peoples and local communities had to overcome confusion, fear, and disappointment in order to finally converge to support the urgent need for national and international instruments to defend our right to have our vision and input represented at meetings where key concepts, articles, and negotiations were discussed (y. terán, personal testimony, january 25, 2006). many indigenous peoples felt that the access and benefit sharing international regime was written from a western perspective. in our vision the plants, animals, rivers, everything is related and interconnected. we believe that the resources from mother earth are for the well-being of humanity. consequently, it was very painful for us to understand these initial discussions on the commercialization of our resources and to put a price on genetic resources and traditional knowledge. (n. reyes, personal communication, january 25, 2006) at the international indigenous forum on biodiversity, we2 demanded consistent indigenous participation in the discussions and the creation of a working group on access and benefit sharing, a request that was denied several times. however, indigenous peoples and local communities were present in the forum’s access and benefit sharing meetings and gave their declarations, which included clear recommendations. in 2006, for example, the international indigenous forum on biodiversity pointed out that our knowledge has an intrinsic link to our resources; therefore, our rights over our genetic resources will be recognized and protected, and the states will recognize indigenous peoples’ own systems of protection that are embedded in our traditions and indigenous laws. we demanded from the states the recognition and protection of our human rights concerning the lands, territories, and waters traditionally occupied by indigenous peoples as well as rights over our traditional knowledge. we emphasized that any regime must recognize indigenous peoples’ rights in a manner that is consistent with the international system of human rights and the customary law of indigenous peoples (international indigenous forum on biodiversity, 2006). the international indigenous forum on biodiversity, the indigenous women’s network on biodiversity, and the indigenous women’s network on biodiversity from latin american and the caribbean participated in access and benefit sharing discussions as observers. in order to have our comments included in the operative texts, we needed the support of a convention on biological diversity state party. usually, we were supported by the african group or by norway, and a few times we were support by ecuador, bolivia, panama, mexico, and peru. as indigenous peoples, we made the firm decision to participate in the whole access and benefit sharing process. a young indigenous woman, who is a lawyer from argentina and a member of the indigenous women’s network on biodiversity from latin american and the caribbean, carried out capacity building activities on access and benefit sharing among indigenous women of the latin american and the caribbean region. in simple terms, she explained to us what a genetic resource is and how, from each organ of a plant (e.g., leaf, flower), there 2 as an indigenous person, i have included myself as one of the members of the group representing indigenous peoples; based on the community-based protocol used, it is appropriate to say we. 9 teran: the nagoya protocol published by scholarship@western, 2016 comes the potential for development of different products that can be sold in international markets in order to generate profits. this money, however, stays only with the transnational corporations, pharmaceutical companies, and researchers prospecting the resources without any benefit to indigenous peoples—despite the fact that we are the ancestral guardians and keepers of biodiversity (terán maigua, 2014). from the beginning, the international indigenous forum on biodiversity and the indigenous women’s network on biodiversity from latin american and the caribbean faced difficulties following the access and benefit sharing discussions because there were conducted in english, whereas in latin america and the caribbean region the most common language spoken is spanish. nevertheless, indigenous peoples tried to participate in the access and benefit sharing meetings, which were held after 6 p.m. and included no officially provided translation services. the almáciga foundation group of intercultural work from spain provided translation from english to spanish. during these 6 years of negotiations, the international indigenous forum on biodiversity, together with the indigenous women’s network on biodiversity and the indigenous women’s network on biodiversity from latin america and the caribbean, developed several strategies in order to be able to follow and participate at access and benefit sharing meetings: • local, national, and regional training. the indigenous women’s network on biodiversity from latin america and the caribbean played a critical role in capacity building in latin america and the caribbean concerning themes related to the cbd, article 8(j), article 10(c), traditional knowledge, prior informed consent (pic), mutually agreed terms (mat), community protocols, and political lobby. from 2009 to 2013 indigenous women’s network on biodiversity from latin american and the caribbean trained several indigenous peoples from communities in latin america and the caribbean, 80 percent of whom were women and 20 percent of whom were men. this capacity building was carried out thanks to a memorandum of understanding (mou) signed by the indigenous women’s network on biodiversity from latin american and the caribbean and cbd secretariat, with financial assistance from the governments of spain and japan, and with technical support from the cbd’s program on article 8(j) and access and benefit sharing indigenous focal point, which was created with financial resources from the government of spain to provide indigenous participants with tools for more complete and effective participation at cbd as well as access and benefit sharing meetings. the workshops resulted in more visibility for indigenous women, the elaboration of the cbd gender plan with the participation of two members of the indigenous women’s network on biodiversity (one from philippines and other from south america), an increase in participation by indigenous peoples and local communities, and an increase in their awareness of and education about the cbd. • revision of official texts to include written comments from indigenous peoples and local communities to be presented at national and international meetings. • skype meetings to divide the revision of the texts, to clarify doubts, and to strategize about the participation of women. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.6 • creation of an indigenous access and benefit sharing negotiators’ group, which was composed of 10 indigenous brothers and sisters from different geographical areas of the world. i was one of the negotiators for the latin america and the caribbean region. the international indigenous forum on biodiversity group had a number of discussions before arriving at a solid and coherent position within the access and benefit sharing process. we had to negotiate among ourselves first to get a working environment based on trust, respect, and solidarity, and to forward a common position to the cbd state parties about the official texts. then, we continued negotiations among the international indigenous forum on biodiversity and some state parties (y. terán, personal testimony, april 12, 2010). • indigenous peoples’ caucuses, indigenous women’s meetings, indigenous youth caucuses, and preparatory meetings for the cop were conducted, as well as meetings with particular states’ parties to discuss and defend specific issues, such as genetic resource and traditional knowledge rights, or to explain the significance for indigenous peoples regarding the importance of lands, territories, and waters for our survival and cultural diversity. • participation in several sessions such as the working group on access and benefit sharing meetings, the friends of the co-chairs meetings, the inter-regional negotiating group sessions, the co-chairs informal inter-regional consultations, and in the inter-sessional meetings. these meetings were held until late at night with no translation from english to spanish. • careful follow-up on negotiations and preparations to make rapid collective political decisions during the access and benefit sharing meetings. for instance, at the montreal meeting in 2010, the international indigenous forum on biodiversity negotiators on access and benefit sharing, together with other international indigenous forum on biodiversity participants, decided to abandon the meeting because the protocol for participation had been changed and the indigenous negotiators did not have the opportunity to speak. afterwards, we returned to the conference room and presented our concerns with the support of the african group. the two negotiators from latin america and the caribbean (one from mexico and one from ecuador) were responsible for writing the international indigenous forum on biodiversity position, and i was nominated to read it in english. however, in this political venue, a few members of the international indigenous forum on biodiversity from latin american and the caribbean and the indigenous women’s network on biodiversity from latin america and the caribbean played a crucial role: we were inside the room forming a semi-circle to support our negotiators. when the tranquility and the order returned to the meeting, the other members of the international indigenous forum on biodiversity came back into the room. one member described the experience by saying: indigenous brothers and sisters from latin american and the caribbean participated in the whole access and benefit sharing process with honesty, consistency, perseverance, and decision. we put our hearts and minds into each meeting and received the guidance and spiritual strength from our elders, families, and communities. our ceremonies, offerings, prayers, chants, reciprocal support, and tears helped us, the indigenous women from latin america and the caribbean to continue calmly in these tiring, 11 teran: the nagoya protocol published by scholarship@western, 2016 technical, and difficult dialogues under an umbrella of western paradigms. (f. lópez, personal communication, april 12, 2010) • lobby the delegates during the negotiations and work closely with governments that understood and supported indigenous issues, while also writing paragraphs, declarations, articles for publication, correcting documents, and attending consultations. the process of lobbying took some time to be more fluid and inclusive, as the states’ representatives wanted to consult only with specific indigenous delegates. • organize side events to discuss indigenous peoples’ concerns using prepared powerpoint presentations, and to train and guide youth and new participants. • create worldwide networking among indigenous peoples to convince them to lobby their own governments about indigenous concerns over access and benefit sharing or to prepare written documents outlining indigenous peoples’ positions to guide the access and benefit sharing discussions at an international level. in 2009, the indigenous women’s network on biodiversity from latin america and the caribbean made alliances with the universidad particular de loja from ecuador and with the university of new mexico (unm) through several departments such as el centro de la raza, native american studies, the latin american and iberian institute, indigenous law faculty, indigenous planning, iberian science, technology and education consortium, and the ortiz center. unm, together with the new mexico acequias association, the indigenous yánesha organization from peru, and the kichwa indigenous organization andes chinchasuyu from ecuador, created an advisory group for the indigenous women’s network on biodiversity from latin america and the caribbean in the cbd process. this advisory group provided the international indigenous forum of biodiversity with three documents: two on the indigenous position on access and benefit sharing and the third related to the adoption of indigenous peoples’ terminology (instead of indigenous peoples and local communities) in future decisions and secondary documents under the cbd, as appropriate. the first meeting at the university of new mexico (unm) was held in november 2009 in collaboration with an indigenous expert from mexico. the second took place in december 2009 with the support of an indigenous woman expert from peru, and the third meeting occurred in february 2013 with the support of unm’s indigenous law faculty and natural justice. several delegates from the universidad intercultural de mexico; universidad fray lucca de cuernavaca, mexico; indigenous leaders from bolivia, peru, ecuador, venezuela, and the united states; indigenous experts on access and benefit sharing from peru and mexico; lawyers from natural justice (a non-governmental organization); and unm. indigenous and non-indigenous professors participated in meetings held at unm. documents were collectively written, corrected, and submitted to the cbd secretariat. the second document, titled “culture and knowledge are not negotiable,” was the basis for the international indigenous forum on biodiversity to start the access and benefit sharing discussions in cali, colombia in 2010. the third paper on the justification to change the terminology to “indigenous peoples” instead of “indigenous peoples and local communities” was considered during the meetings of the conference of parties (cop 11 and cop 12) (cop, 2012, 2014). we received financial support to cover the cost of logistics from some unm departments and from people who were sympathetic to our goals. we made a 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.6 minga3, or collective work, to defend our life, resources, and traditional knowledge (terán maigua, 2014). the rights of indigenous peoples in the nagoya protocol are a result of hard fought battles by the international indigenous forum on biodiversity over every comma and word. with strong support, especially from the african group and from norway, indigenous peoples and local communities gained significant ground on their rights over traditional knowledge, genetic resources, and the recognition of their customary laws by giving more content to article 8(j) and 10(c) of the cbd (bavikatte & robinson, 2011). through these discussions to defend the conservation of biodiversity; ecosystems; indigenous ways of life; land tenure and use; the right to culture, knowledge and practices; food; and economic security, indigenous peoples generated the “bio-cultural rights” that have an explicit link to conservation and sustainable use of biological diversity (bavikatte & robinson, 2011), which were advocated during international biodiversity negotiations as a defense against “biopiracy” of knowledge and resources (bavikatte & robinson, 2011). n a g o y a p r o t o c o l o n a c c e s s a n d b e n e f i t s h a r i n g a n d i n d i g e n o u s p e o p l e s a n d l o c a l c o m m u n i t i e s what did indigenous peoples and local communities achieve during these 6 years of intense and difficult negotiations? the nagoya protocol is the first piece of international law that was negotiated after the adoption of undrip. the protocol has a preamble—36 articles—and one annex on monetary and non-monetary benefits. indigenous peoples and local communities lobbied governments during these years of negotiations to ensure inclusion and recognition of their rights. the preamble of the nagoya protocol has seven paragraphs relevant to indigenous peoples and local communities and their traditional knowledge. they refer to article 8(j); the interrelation and the inseparable nature between genetic resources and traditional knowledge; the owner or holder of traditional knowledge, including countries; indigenous peoples and local communities’ right to identify within their communities the rightful holders of traditional knowledge; undrip; and nonextinguishment of existing rights. the vital role of women in access and benefit sharing, and their full and effective participation in biodiversity conservation policymaking and implementation, is also recognized in the preamble. the protocol has obligations and regulatory requirements on access and benefit sharing to provide legal certainty, such as: • access to genetic resources; • the fair and equitable sharing of benefits arising from the utilization of genetic resources and obligations of compliance, such as prior and informed consent (pic) and mutually agreed terms (mat); 3 a kichwa word meaning “collective work” where all community members participate to achieve several things. examples of such communal labour include cleaning and repairing roads, which all people participate in, including children, youth, women, men, elders, and community leaders. 13 teran: the nagoya protocol published by scholarship@western, 2016 • the monitoring of genetic resources use and the designation of checkpoints and reporting requirements for access, including prior and informed consent; and • the establishment of a certificate of compliance recognized at the international level given by the providers of genetic resources to the clearing house of the protocol on access and benefit sharing. the protocol also has articles related to traditional knowledge associated with genetic resources held by indigenous peoples and local communities, as well as to genetic resources themselves including where indigenous peoples’ rights over those resources have been recognized. in these cases, informed consent with indigenous peoples and local communities should be sought prior to participating in access and benefit sharing in accordance with mutually agreed terms, domestic legislation, and indigenous peoples and local communities customary laws, community protocols, and procedures. the protocol also has articles on awareness raising and capacity building with the participation of state parties, including women and indigenous peoples and local communities, that will be carried out with sustainable financial mechanisms and resources. the protocol seeks the technology transfer, collaboration, and cooperation in technical and scientific research. during the negotiations, indigenous peoples and local communities exerted great effort and used intercultural protocols for lobbying, as well as several strategies to reach a final protocol text that recognized our rights, genetic resources, and traditional knowledge’s link to genetic resources, equal benefit sharing, women’s participation, and prior and informed consent and mutually agreed terms that would be obtained through culturally appropriate methods. f. lópez (personal communication, october 29, 2010) described it by saying: for six years we defended with love and passion the sustainability of our mother earth to ensure our life and the survival of the coming generations. indigenous peoples will continue to be the guardians and protectors of mother earth, pachamama, and all her beings in the same way that our ancestors did. t h e i m p l i c a t i o n s o f n a g o y a p r o t o c o l o n i n d i g e n o u s p e o p l e s ’ l i v e s an ecuadorian elder reacted in this way to the nagoya protocol implications: since ancestral times, mother earth has been cared for, protected, and respected by indigenous peoples as a living being and life giver. she is the basis for human and cultural development. since our childhoods, we have learned how to treat the plants, the animals, and all resources that are forming the ecosystems. we were taught how to talk to the plants and how to ask permission before using them either as medicine or protection. in that regard, our grandparents shared with us that the resources are for the benefit of all humanity free of charge in accordance with our ancestral values of sharing and caring for one another, reciprocity and protecting our sacred land, pachamama. indigenous peoples have land, territories, and waters surrounded by medicinal plants and herbs that we use only whenever necessary. they grow freely for our collective well-being. we never put a price on a plant. we never have the idea that outside our 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.6 communities there are people and organizations that are making a profit from the use and commercialization of our plants. this contemporary world is going against the natural laws that our ancestors transmitted to us orally from one generation to the next. i do believe that the nagoya protocol is going to change our life. we will be forced to think and act in a new way. it will not be easy to change our thinking, feeling, and acting concerning our mother earth and her beings. we need to understand clearly the content, significance, and impact of this new international document in our lives. i already have several questions and contradictory feelings: are the involved states willing to respect our rights, our intellectual property? are they willing to work with indigenous peoples side-by-side within a framework of mutual respect and understanding? do the states know that we, the indigenous peoples, have practiced traditional knowledge since ancestral times? do they know that our resources and knowledge are secret and sacred? this is like a puzzle, and together we need to work on the nagoya protocol implementation with honesty and transparency. then we must talk and exchange thoughts, respecting the diverse ideas and cosmos visions. we need to construct a clear, legal, technical, and institutional framework to deal correctly with this new type of business regarding our resources and traditional knowledge. (a. m. guacho, personal communication, march 16, 2015) the core of the nagoya protocol is contradictory to indigenous peoples’ way of life due to the fact that it has to tackle complex technical issues and commerce. one participant described this phenomenon by saying: generally speaking, transnational companies have the economic and political power to establish a business and solve problems according to their interests. they have the human and technical capital to carry out commercial and non-commercial research, to establish various products from medicinal plants, and to sell these products worldwide. the millionaire earnings are only for the benefit of companies, for the researchers, for some universities and institutes. oftentimes there is a lack of benefit sharing with the owners of the resources and traditional knowledge linked to them. (j. c. sarango, personal communication, march 16, 2015) in this regard, access and benefit sharing businesses are unequal because there is no balance and justice in the development of these companies. on the contrary, indigenous peoples become the poorest of the poor. their life paradigms are completely opposite. whereas indigenous peoples see the earth as a mother to be cared for, respected, and loved, the western world views the earth as full of resources to be used for monetary purposes without caring for her natural assets and humanity. new challenges are coming for indigenous peoples, especially those related to a national access and benefit sharing framework in order to have legal certainty regarding traditional knowledge protection, prior and informed consent, mutually agreed terms, and acceptable research and business processes. the implementation of the nagoya protocol needs to be accomplished with the full and effective participation of indigenous peoples and local communities in order to ensure the inclusion of our rights and customary laws. furthermore, we urgently need technical, intercultural working teams in areas 15 teran: the nagoya protocol published by scholarship@western, 2016 concerning access and benefit sharing in order to participate under equal conditions and from a real understanding of access and benefit sharing issues. i described the information required for benefit sharing by stating: researchers will need precise information regarding financial resources, procedures, dates, type and number of researchers, type of benefits, the duration of benefits, ways to co-publish, how many chapters, pages, and individual or collective authorship. (y. terán, personal testimony, march 16, 2015) how technical capacity building will occur and the ways in which technology will be used also needs to be well defined. in business, indigenous peoples must be considered as partners, as friends, and not as competitors. we are ready to work with states, investors, national and international companies in the achievement of a sustainable development that will respect indigenous protocols; codes of ethics; customary laws; individual and collective rights; our right to self-determination; ancestral ownership over our lands, territories, and waters; and our right to say no if the project is not beneficial to us (terán, 2008). states themselves are facing problems in the implementation of the nagoya protocol; some are still working on the access and benefit sharing national framework. according to participants at the workshop on biodiversity held in cochabamba, bolivia in 2013, the design of the legal framework needs more discussion to better understand the implications and facilitate political decision-making, and it is still necessary to clarify several access and benefit sharing issues with participation from indigenous peoples. states will need to define which ministry or department is going to handle access and benefit sharing requests, ensure adequate staffing, and allocate sufficient financial resources to create a sustainable budget. states are conscious that every case is unique and different. with respect to traditional knowledge associated with genetic resources, when drafting domestic laws based on the nagoya protocol, states need to take into consideration customary law, access and benefit sharing community protocols, prior and informed consent, minimum requirements for mutually agreed terms, as well as creating a model outlining necessary clauses in contracts concerning benefit sharing arising from traditional knowledge associated with genetic resources (f. lópez, personal communication, december 12, 2013). there are good and bad access and benefit sharing examples, but in any case indigenous peoples must be ready with their own access and benefit sharing community protocols in order to make sound business decisions. e x a m p l e s o f a c c e s s a n d b e n e f i t s h a r i n g the nagoya protocol is quite complex, and its implementation will mostly depend on the political will of states to work within a clear access and benefit sharing legal framework and to include all social actors in the negotiations. the main purpose of the protocol is to stop biopiracy and to develop business relationships based on mutual respect and understanding. for all indigenous peoples around the world, this protocol is a new challenge to deal with at both the national and international level. intercultural capacity building will be needed to understand the content and consequences of the nagoya protocol on humanity and life—especially on indigenous peoples and local communities whose survival depends mainly on biodiversity and resources within their local ecosystems. the interchange of information will play a crucial role in following the best examples of access and benefit sharing and to avoid those that do 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.6 not accomplish these goals. let us now look at some cases of biopiracy and access and benefit sharing in south america. these examples demonstrate the need for the nagoya protocol in order to prevent these vulnerabilities to biopiracy. on may 10, 1993, ecuador signed an agreement with the national cancer institute of the united states of america through the indigenous federation of awa centers of ecuador (located in the provinces of esmeraldas, carchi, and imbabura) and colombia to allow the study of medicinal plants that are found in the awa territory that may be used for the prevention and/or cure of cancer and aids. as a result of this study, the new york botanical gardens now has 4,500 specimens of medicinal plants. the ministry of environment of ecuador is required to monitor this project, as well as submit an accountability report on behalf of the institute (de la cruz, 2006). the patent for “ayahuasca,” a sacred plant found in the amazon river basin of brazil, colombia, ecuador, guyana, peru, surinam, and venezuela that is used in ceremonial and spiritual rituals and respected by some 390 indigenous nations, was revoked. after living 8 years with the indigenous cofan and siona, mr. loren miller, an american citizen, took specimens from their territory and patented the species banisteriopsis caapi in june 1986. he never deposited a botanical sample in a herbarium in ecuador. in 1994, the coordinadora de las organizaciones indígenas de la cuenca amazónica (coica), together with the amazon alliance and the center for international environmental law (ciel), filed a complaint with the registrar of patents and trademarks in the united states, which succeeded in overturning the patent because mr. miller did not meet the novelty requirement. the patent, which had been granted for 17 years, expired on june 17, 2003 (de la cruz, 2006). ecuador implemented the first pro-benefit project on access and benefit sharing with the participation of the federation of organizations of the napo kichwa nationality (fonakin) and the german pharmaceutical firm schwabe s. l. on may 5, 2005 in archidona, ecuador, an agreement was signed and from march to may 2006, a training course was conducted entitled, commercial use of medicinal plants and traditional knowledge: risks and opportunities. however, the project was not completed (de la cruz, 2006). in costa rica, there was also a case involving the instituto nacional de biodiversidad (inbio), a nongovernmental organization created in 1989 to support the biodiversity conservation in costa rica. this institute works in five thematic areas: national inventory of biodiversity, bio-informatics, communication and education, biodiversity management and bioprospecting, and in the establishment of north-south contractual cooperation. inbio has more than 50 agreements with industry and the academy for projects involving high technology, laboratory equipment, and personnel training. it has vast experience in access and benefit sharing and has worked with several academic institutions and centers for research, creating a link between science and legislation. for instance, inbio worked on the project, medicines discovered based on natural products from the costa rican biota. this venture was proposed by inbio, sponsored by the international cooperative biodiversity group, and financed by the united states’ national institutes of health (nih). the research was carried out by harvard university (the principal researcher), the university of michigan, and inbio. in this case, the institute has developed with clarity among the research team in terms of access, bioprospection, and contractual obligations, including benefits and other results referred to in the nagoya 17 teran: the nagoya protocol published by scholarship@western, 2016 protocol. it has clearly defined the types of research that may be undertaken; the amount of money and time allocated for research; time allotments for capacity building; requirements for scientific data sharing, monitoring, and reporting; as well as creating an addendum in the event that changes need to be made to the original contract. inbio institute achieved positive results during this access and benefit sharing case, which included: • finances to cover four years of research; • workshops to improve knowledge about biodiversity research; • capacity building among inbio scientists at the labs of the university of michigan and harvard university, and at the businesses within the consortium; • interaction with senior scientists who used new techniques and technologies that will be useful for future project development; • workshops on conservation for the scientist and conservationist communities; • funding for the acquisition of books and materials about costa rican biodiversity for distribution in rural educational centers and other interested parties; • business experience on issues related to biodiversity; • agreements with third parties (i.e., companies); and • scientific publications in partnership with the inbio institute. despite these positive experiences, inbio still faces legal problems in relation to the implementation of the nagoya protocol, such as difficulties meeting the requirements of the three organizations involved and the use of federal funding from the united states. the majority of negotiations are carried out over the internet and by telephone, thus requiring more time to reach an agreement and increasing the time needed for parties to sign the documentation giving prior informed consent. moreover, the transfer of samples to places that are not specified in the initial contract requires written authorization from the providers (inbio)—which implies yet more time and effort. the same written procedure is necessary with research results and bio-prospecting activities, and their economic applications. the auditing of contracts, however, does not have specific protocols and, in the case of a party’s non-compliance, it will be necessary to have legal counsel abroad, which may prove costly. inbio’s experience is a good example of what is needed in terms of contracts and regulations in order to encapsulate transparency in the research and development process (cabrera medaglia, 2013). on the other hand, however, there are also access and benefit sharing examples that fail to comply with the requirements for success. this was the case of the expedición de muestreo oceánica global at the national park of galapagos in ecuador. between 2003 and 2004, j. craig venter, a scientist and entrepreneur, and his team of researchers collected more than 150 samples of 200 liters of seawater every 200 miles. the samples were collected from the waters of the national park of galapagos in 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.6 ecuador. this collection was for a scientific study examining the microbiological diversity in the galapagos, aiming to examine the impact of humans on the environment and to better understand the evolution life on earth. a memorandum of understanding was signed between the institute for biological energy alternatives (ibea), which venter founded, and the ministry of environment from ecuador (mea), but unfortunately this memorandum did not precisely state the quantities that would be collected, and did not provide a complete description of the samples that would be taken from the water. by 2004, it was already known that some of these marine microorganisms have potential for use in industry, including as biofuel (nemogá-soto & lizarazo cortés, 2013). in this case, the samples of seawater were collected from international waters without following access and benefit sharing rules—samples came from 17 countries in central and south america (ecuador, mexico, panama, and honduras), canada and the united states, oceania, the south pacific, europe, and the united kingdom. the estación científica charles darwin gave permission to carry out the research in ecuador, and the national park of galapagos gave authorization to collect the samples for two years with the option to renew if mutually agreed upon. a researcher from the universidad de guayaquil in ecuador provided technical advice. the memorandum of understanding did not have a paragraph related to benefit sharing; however, clause 5 referred to the publication and diffusion of information from the project. all the analyzed data were to be archived in public repositories and published in scientific forums as a way of recognizing that the information comes from the genetic patrimony of ecuador. ibea and mae, together with the national park of galapagos, will work together on one or more publications to analyze the genomic information collected during this study. the involved parties also agreed that other international collaborators and scientists will be recognized as authors of these publications. finally, this information will be shared with public and educational institutions, especially those from ecuador, taking into consideration the scientific use of this information (i.e., it is not for commercial use). in 2004, the first results from this expedition were published in science (venter et al., 2004) . in 2007, other data was published in a series of eight articles in the open access publication plos biology, where three of the articles were catalogued as scientific (kannan, taylor, zhai, venter, & manning, 2007; rusch et al., 2007; yooseph et al., 2007). none of these articles included an ecuadorian as either a researcher or a collaborator. the j. craig venter institute indicated that it would not claim patents or other intellectual property rights over the genomic dna and sequenced data (nemogá-soto & lizarazo cortés, 2013). this example from ecuador offers multiple lessons to be learned for future access and benefit sharing cases, such as: • the need for public policy related to accessing genetic resources and the contracts required for scientific research on biodiversity; • the elaboration of a model requiring researchers to indicate the origin of collected samples (this is both a legal and political issue); • enforcement of international standards by patent offices and scientific journals; 19 teran: the nagoya protocol published by scholarship@western, 2016 • the creation of a model for digital genetic information and for scientific interchange purposes to have clear rules on where and how to archive the genetic digital information coming from this scientific study, as well as clear decisions on the purposes of the scientific interchange within a frame of mutual scientific understanding and acknowledgment among the involved researchers and in accordance with the signed mou; • the establishment of checking points for compliance according to the abs national regulatory framework; • the need to ensure adherence to bonn guidelines, and • the implementation of the nagoya protocol, taking into consideration other related international instruments such as the cbd and the united nations convention over the sea rights and exclusive economic zone (rimmer, 2009). moreover, involved parties need to consider the development of regional co-operation and common guidelines to deal with this type of project. when formulating the terms of the memorandum of understanding—as was the case in latin america and the south pacific where the memorandums were poorly structured—there need to be specific parameters to define what is and is not permissible under the agreement. while on the other hand, the agreement signed between the j. craig venter institute and australia had rigorous terms governing benefit sharing that implied a strong national regime on access to genetic resources in australia (rimmer, 2009). it would also be important to proceed cautiously in the creation of a model for the dissemination of results in accordance with intellectual property and bio business, as well as the establishment of better communication among the authorities in each country and at other institutions, such as the ministry of environment, national parks, and universities, among others. in the case of the galapagos park, there were several gaps in abs compliance and, for this reason, we recommend creating a model for the promotion of results in accordance with the rules and procedures related to intellectual property nationally and specifically for bio-business (e.g., access, pic, mat, veto). this communication will aid in the formulation of public policies that address issues in a reasonable timeframe, taking into consideration the complex and novel situations in terms of both legal and technical elements. there must also be specific documentation on the administration of research, bio-prospection, and access and benefit sharing (nemogá-soto & lizarazo cortés, 2013). from the aforementioned examples, one can see the complexity involved in resolving cases of biopiracy, as each case has its own specific circumstances and a variety of considerations must be weighed using human and technical resources. patents and their revocation require the investment of considerable financial and legal capital that are often more readily accessible to transnational corporations, pharmaceutical companies, research institutes, and universities than to individuals and communities. indigenous peoples and local communities have had unequal participation in the implementation of the nagoya protocol; therefore, it is compulsory for us, as indigenous peoples, to understand this protocol and to develop capacity within our communities at all levels in order to protect our rights. the biocultural community protocols will play a crucial role in the world of business and within indigenous communities (j. males, personal communication, march 16, 2015). 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.6 b i o c u l t u r a l c o m m u n i t y p r o t o c o l s indigenous peoples and local communities are developing more relationships with external actors such as governmental offices, researchers, companies, and non-government organizations. these relationships demand follow-up on protocols in order to have norms, rules, and customary laws related to indigenous peoples’ governance and administration of their lands and territories respected, including the role of traditional knowledge in the conservation and sustainable use of biological diversity. therefore, it is necessary to invest time and resources in developing bio-cultural community protocols in order to have a clear understanding of the rules, norms, and unique regulations for internal and external interactions between indigenous peoples and researchers. furthermore, these protocols must provide information about rights, responsibilities, and cultural norms that will maintain social cohesion and strengthen rights, values, and customary processes in decision-making. these bio-cultural community protocols should be linked to national and international legal frameworks related to indigenous peoples’ rights (shrumm & jonas, 2012). the implementation of the nagoya protocol has been in place since 2014; yet, indigenous peoples still need to be creative when it comes to adopting and implementing these protection mechanisms related to genetic resources and the traditional knowledge associated with them. it is essential to have our community protocols prepared in different formats through video, photos, theater, and/or roleplaying—because indigenous peoples come from oral tradition, we must design our community protocols in practical, approachable forms, such as audio or visual mediums. in the past, we experienced success using this approach to include more indigenous participation in a united nations program where, after several meetings, they decided to accept the grand proposals in different formats, and even in indigenous languages. community protocols are built and validated collectively over a number of years with participation from men, women, youth, and elders. they are holistic and, in the access and benefit sharing process, they will set the tone, conditions, and aspirations of indigenous peoples regarding research, negotiations about local resources and knowledge, or the misuse of our resources and/or traditional knowledge. the kuna author lópez miro (2014) said that in panama’s pueblo guna region, the communities have the right to approve or not approve research. if the research goes against their customary laws or cultural and spiritual values, then they have the right to veto it. depending on the circumstances, some parts of the community protocol would be delivered to the relevant authorities. these community protocols are crucial to protect the traditional knowledge. if there is a case of acess and benefit sharing, in the initial conversations about gaining to access to genetic resources, if indigenous peoples have their community protocols ready, they would deliver relevant information related to that specific case to the representatives of the company, usually to inform them of the community’s views, rules, and expectations. the access and benefit sharing community protocols determine who owns the genetic resources and associated traditional knowledge, how prior and informed consent and mutually agreed terms will be obtained, how access should be accomplished, and how benefit sharing will occur. in the words of a. m. guacho: the protocols are in the oral memory of our peoples, but we need to remember, re-learn and rework them according to current needs. it is important for us to gain internal strengthen of our governance systems, local authorities, and all indigenous peoples and have new leadership with a renewed and strong indigenous spirituality. (a. m. guacho, personal communication, april 18, 2013) 21 teran: the nagoya protocol published by scholarship@western, 2016 the process of the elaboration of community protocols will help us to understand what prior and informed consent is in a practical way, and it would provide us with the ability to analyze information, especially before consenting to or denying involvement from indigenous peoples in any particular negotiation or when signing a contract. for this reason, as a. guamán explains: it is expected that while the implementation of the nagoya protocol is in progress, the indigenous peoples, through formal and informal training, gain a full understanding of the various issues and working groups on biodiversity and access and benefit sharing. they can later participate in meetings knowing beforehand the issues pertaining to biodiversity and related topics. women play an important role in creating new capacities, because they are the cultural pillar of indigenous peoples and the main transmitters of knowledge, language, and culture. (a. guamán, personal communication, april 18, 2013) indigenous peoples must build technical and political teams, strengthen their alliances, and consolidate their connections with academia, as this may serve to support the design and implementation of capacity building, technology adoption, the transfer of knowledge about biodiversity from past research, and the discovery of its potential uses in order to valorize community assets and work in partnership on publications in order to disseminate collective knowledge (cabrera medaglia, 2013). j.c. sarango suggests that, through an honest analysis, indigenous peoples can assess the use of traditional knowledge in research in terms of risks, challenges, benefits, and necessary safeguards. there should be time allotted to acquire a shared agreement on the mechanisms needed for its protection. each member of the community must give his or her ideas on cataloguing and registering traditional knowledge, and his or her agreement or disagreement with these mechanisms. from these steps, it would then be decided how to handle on-going follow-up on the use of genetic resources and associated technical knowledge by outside institutions, and how to halt the access to and use of sacred and secret plants. (j. c. sarango, personal communication, march 16, 2015) indigenous peoples need to make important decisions to keep and protect our traditional knowledge. our self-determination will determine the elaboration of sui generis systems of traditional knowledge protection and the creation of a council of elders to give input on and guide the critical issue of traditional knowledge protection following customary law and national law. in this regard, indigenous peoples should build their capacity to catalogue traditional knowledge in order to understand the process, and thereby identify, collect, organize, register, and record traditional knowledge so they may maintain and protect it, and participate in benefit sharing both now and for future generations. this catalogue could be made in both indigenous languages and other languages using traditional and modern technologies. this process of cataloguing must be achieved with consultation, prior and informed consent, mutually agreed terms, and the full and effective participation of indigenous peoples and local communities. the protection of traditional knowledge could be made in two types: a. preventive protection to avoid the illegal use of intellectual property and traditional knowledge, and 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.6 b. positive protection in which indigenous peoples promote their traditional knowledge, control its utilization, and receive benefits from its commercialization (organización mundial de la propiedad intellectual [ompi], 2012). several articles of the national constitution of ecuador (tribunal constitucional, 2008) relate to the rights of mother earth and the rights of indigenous peoples related to land, resources, and prior and informed consent. articles 71 to 74 specifically refer to the rights of nature or pachamama, and article 57 recognizes 21 collective rights for indigenous peoples, among which the following stand out: article 5: to keep ownership of ancestral lands and territories and to obtain free awarding of these lands. article 6: to participate in the use, usufruct, administration, and conservation of natural renewable resources located on their lands. article 7: to free prior informed consultation, within a reasonable period of time, on the plans and programs for prospecting, producing and marketing non-renewable resources located on their lands and which could have an environmental or cultural impact on them; to participate in the profits earned from these projects and to receive compensation for social, cultural, and environmental damages caused to them. the consultation that must be conducted by the competent authorities shall be mandatory and in due time. if consent of the consulted community is not obtained, steps provided for by the constitution and the law shall be taken. article 8: to keep and promote their practices of managing biodiversity and their natural environment. the state shall establish and implement programs with the participation of the community to ensure the conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity. article 12: to uphold, protect, and develop collective knowledge; their science, technologies and ancestral wisdom; the genetic resources that contain biological diversity and agricultural biodiversity; their medicine and traditional medical practices, with the inclusion of the right to restore, promote, and protect ritual and holy places, as well as plants, animals, minerals, and ecosystems in their territories; and knowledge about the resources and properties of fauna and flora. all forms of appropriation of their knowledge, innovations, and practices are forbidden (tribunal constitucional, 2008, pp. 36-37). at the regional level, article 7 of decision 391 of the andean community of nations (can: bolivia, colombia, ecuador and peru) adopted on july 2, 1996 stated that member states “recognize and value the rights and decision making powers of indigenous, afro-american, and local communities over their traditional knowledge, innovations, and practices associated to genetic resources and derived products” (p. 57). article 35 mentions "the conditions for access and use of this knowledge should be determined by the indigenous peoples and those interested in a contract for access (to genetic resources)” (p.58). the eighth temporary provision calls for the establishment of a “special regime or a harmonization regulation, as applicable, aimed at reinforcing the protection of know-how, innovations, and traditional practices of native, afro-american, and local communities” (cited in ruiz müller, 2006, pp. 57-58). considering national and regional legislation, however, several questions arise from this: 23 teran: the nagoya protocol published by scholarship@western, 2016 a. how would access and benefit sharing and biopiracy cases be addressed and solved in countries that are still waiting for the ratification of the nagoya protocol by their national government? b. how will the nagoya protocol enter in force in countries where indigenous peoples are still not recognized as indigenous? c. will such countries have an access and benefit sharing national framework in the short-term and mid-term? d. how will indigenous peoples’ prior and informed consent and mutually agreed terms be obtained? e. what access and benefit sharing procedure will be followed in the andean community? 4 f. in which ways are states going to involve indigenous peoples on access and benefit sharing matters? g. are states and companies willing to share their assessments of the social, cultural, and environmental impacts on indigenous peoples and mother earth as a result of an access and benefit sharing project? h. how will indigenous participation in the benefits be determined? i. what will be the percentage, conditions, and duration of the benefits? j. are indigenous women going to participate as co-researchers and in benefit sharing? k. how will traditional knowledge be protected? l. will indigenous peoples have adopted access and benefit sharing community protocols before the development of projects? m. will indigenous peoples, including women, be able to participate in future meetings of the nagoya protocol? n. will indigenous peoples have sustainable financial resources for capacity building on the nagoya protocol? 4 i refer specifically to the andean community because i come from that area. in latin america, bolivia, colombia, ecuador, and peru we deal with genetic resources, traditional knowledge and benefit sharing, biopiracy cases, and a variety of development projects. i ask this question also considering the political circumstances of the region. in order to apply the nagoya protocol, it will be necessary to have the political will to build a clear national regulatory framework and to have the full and effective participation of indigenous peoples from that region. 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.6 c o n c l u s i o n the nagoya protocol is about the access to genetic resources and the fair and equitable sharing of benefits arising from their utilization. as indigenous peoples, all of us must remember that our resources are our relations, the relationship between men and women with mother earth, and that among indigenous peoples, a song, story, or medicinal knowledge has a reciprocal relationship and connection with particular human beings, animals, plants, and places. (cajete, 1986, p. 187) the nagoya protocol is in the process of being implemented in the countries that already ratified it at cop 13 in south korea. there are several legal and institutional challenges to overcome in order to have a clear process with legal certainty for providers, users, companies, researchers (both for commercial and non-commercial enterprises), universities, institutes, and for indigenous peoples and other stakeholders. there are compliance requirements that need to be achieved, such as a legal framework for access and benefit sharing in the execution and enforcement of the nagoya protocol. therefore, all stakeholders involved in the negotiation will need to: • know their specific roles, responsibilities, and should follow indigenous protocols to schedule appropriate negotiation times, respecting cultural needs such as allowing time for the community to review negotiation materials, and scheduling around seasonal cultural activities; • acquire prior and informed consent and mutually agreed terms using culturally appropriate methods and tools. in ecuador, for example, the instituto ecuatoriano de propiedad intelectual (iepi, 2011) elaborated written guidance for obtaining prior and informed consent in the kichwa and shuar indigenous languages; • have in place a certificate of origin process, equal benefit sharing requirements in accordance with real indigenous needs and priorities, sustainable funds for capacity building at all levels, intercultural teams working on access and benefit sharing, protocols that include indigenous peoples as co-researchers and co-publishers on projects, an indigenous code of ethics and bio-cultural community protocols; and • consider the collective intellectual property of indigenous peoples and the full and effective participation of indigenous negotiators,5 including more women and international indigenous forum on biodiversity members, in the next meetings on the nagoya protocol. in terms of capacity building on nagoya protocol issues, the indigenous women’s network on biodiversity’s experience could be used to achieve the necessary knowledge and strategies for ethical participation in access and benefit sharing negotiations, ensuring they occur within a framework of 5 two indigenous representatives were selected by the international indigenous forum on biodiversity in south korea at cop 13. initially, the author of this article was nominated for the latin america and caribbean region. she declined the nomination due to health issues. the final representatives were two males, one from panama and one from the united states. 25 teran: the nagoya protocol published by scholarship@western, 2016 understanding, friendship, and mutual respect. anaya (2013) recommended, for example, that companies exercise due diligence by dialoguing with indigenous peoples prior to the beginning of research, and informing and consulting with indigenous peoples about any business development. anaya also recommended that both parties explore the possible benefits and harms of any business development from the beginning, obtain prior and informed consent, reach mutually agreed terms, and ensure the adoption of formal policies and practices that enshrine respect for indigenous peoples’ rights. this due diligence would minimize the potential for misunderstandings, lack of trust, and the loss of time, energy, and resources. compliance with the nagoya protocol will necessarily be in line with the cbd (2003), undrip (un, 2008), the international labour organization (ilo) convention, the aichi targets (cbd, n.d.a), national strategic plans and sustainable development goals prepared by the parties of the convention on biological diversity (cbd), national and international instruments, access and benefit sharing community protocols, and customary laws. the nagoya protocol should be for the benefit of all—for humanity and mother earth, pachamama—in the protection of genetic resources and traditional knowledge. in this way, ecosystems would be used with care, always taking into consideration the wellbeing, the sumak kawsay, of present and future generations. we need to understand and implement the nagoya protocol, follow its technical and legal requirements, and include all interested stakeholders, including having the full and effective participation of indigenous peoples and local communities, on an equal footing. nevertheless, this international instrument shall pursue social justice and be monitored periodically to ensure its goals of ensuring reasonable expectations of life and the survival of humanity and real care for mother earth, pachamama are being achieved. 26 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/6 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.6 r e f e r e n c e s anaya, j. 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(2016). indigenous inclusion in public policy: a comparison of urban aboriginal peoples in canada and travellers in ireland. the international indigenous policy journal, 7(3). doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.6 indigenous inclusion in public policy: a comparison of urban aboriginal peoples in canada and travellers in ireland abstract to what extent are voluntary organizations included in the policy processes that make decisions regarding the needs and interests of indigenous groups? as politically underrepresented groups, both urban aboriginal peoples and travellers rely on voluntary organizations to provide culturally appropriate programs and services and to advocate on their behalf. applying a scalar analysis, this project isolated three key concepts that are critical to their inclusion in policy processes. first, is the incorporation of their issues and interests in cultural programs and services. second, is group representation in policy processes. and third is their collaboration with government. on balance, it appears that urban aboriginal peoples in canada have moved closer to inclusion in policy processes than travellers. keywords policy, representation, urban aboriginal peoples, travellers acknowledgments the author would like to thank catherine frost, karen bird, and peter graefe, and the journal's anonymous reviewers for their comments on this manuscript. creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ i n d i g e n o u s i n c l u s i o n i n p u b l i c p o l i c y : a c o m p a r i s o n o f u r b a n a b o r i g i n a l p e o p l e s i n c a n a d a a n d t r a v e l l e r s i n i r e l a n d does the inclusion of underrepresented indigenous groups in policy processes facilitate outcomes that address their individual and community needs and interests? this question is based on the premise that choice—in terms of adhering to traditional or to mainstream lifeways, to varying degrees—is crucial to “build the case that a secure sense of personal and cultural continuity are necessary conditions for personal or cultural identity” (chandler & lalonde, 2009, p. 223). securing cultural continuity is challenging for marginalized, politically underrepresented groups. government agencies tend to rely on leaders of voluntary organizations to represent their indigenous communities in decision-making processes. in turn, the voluntary sector adjusts the levers so that policy accommodates these groups by (a) articulating their specific issues and interests, and (b) designing programs and services that meet these criteria. in other words, this article asks: in the process of providing programs and service delivery, how and to what extent is the voluntary sector included in policy processes whose decisions impact politically underrepresented indigenous groups? it is only when members of these groups have their issues and interests addressed that they will secure a sense of personal and cultural continuity. the study of public policy for aboriginal peoples in canada and travellers in ireland (see for example lewis & may, 2007) does not involve comparing the two groups that are indigenous to their respective countries; rather, it involves comparing the engagement of these indigenous peoples with their respective governments and with the efficacy of the voluntary sector in defining and achieving their policy needs. the comparison of two specific cases broadens our ability to consider certain phenomena in each instance, specifically, the accommodation of issues and interests of urban aboriginal peoples and travellers and the availability of opportunities for these groups to secure cultural continuity. the article commences with background context for urban aboriginal peoples in canada and travellers in ireland, followed by a justification of the urban sites selected for the comparative analysis. it then tests laforest’s (2011) concept of scale to explain how opportunities available to indigenous voluntary organizations to secure policy aligns with levels of interaction available, using the following systems: a. the micro scale lays out the cultural component of programs and services provided by voluntary organizations. b. the meso scale reports on the relationship between voluntary organizations and government and the inclusion or exclusion of these groups by government in policy processes. c. and the macro scale reveals the extent to which broad state and societal forces impact on the capacity of voluntary organization to secure the needs and interests of both groups. the discussion compares the opportunities and obstacles faced by both groups regarding their inclusion in policy processes. the conclusion recommends specific criteria necessary for the inclusion of groups in policy processes. 1 heritz: indigenous inclusion in public policy published by scholarship@western, 2016 u r b a n a b o r i g i n a l p e o p l e s a n d t r a v e l l e r s u r b a n a b o r i g i n a l p e o p l e s i n c a n a d a the term urban aboriginal peoples refers to political and cultural entities of the original peoples of north america, which include first nations, inuit, and métis peoples, who reside in urban centres (royal commission on aboriginal peoples [rcap], 1996). in canada, “indian” is also a legal term to signify those people the government recognizes as having indian status and are recognized under the indian act. the term “non-status indian” refers to people who lost their status, and who do not have the same rights under law as status indians (warry, 2007, p. 9), and both of these groups may be included as urban aboriginal peoples. this article uses andersen’s (2013) definition of “urban aboriginal—as a distinctive and equally legitimate form of aboriginal identity” (p. 47) based their distinctive social context, which includes economic marginalization, growing professional and middle classes, racism and social exclusion, legal diversity, status blindness, urban aboriginal institutions, distinctiveness of urban aboriginal policy ethos, the character of informal networks, attachment to non-urban communities, struggles over the political representation of urban aboriginal peoples, and places of aboriginal women in urban aboriginal social relations. most major canadian cities developed in locations used by aboriginal peoples as gathering places in the period before european settlement. over time, these most of these people were systematically dislocated from urban centres and moved to reserves, most of which were located considerable distances from urban centres and original habitations. the métis were dispossessed from their settlements near urban centres due to expropriation to accommodate spreading urban boundaries (newhouse & peters, 2003). having been segregated from urban centres, the notion of an urban aboriginal person became incompatible with images of aboriginal peoples. those who returned to cities were often regarded as individuals “who had turned their backs on their culture” (newhouse & peters, 2003, p. 6) even though they were traveling within their traditional territories. in accordance with the indian act 1876, first nations were sequestered on reserves, located far away from urban centres (peters, 2001). in the present day, there is significant movement of aboriginal peoples between reserves and cities; therefore, the two populations are not completely disparate (maxim, keane, & white, 2003). according to the census (statistics canada, 2011a), over 1.4 million individuals, or 4.3 percent of canada’s population, identify as aboriginal, more than half of whom live in an urban setting. the aboriginal population is expanding more rapidly than the non-aboriginal population. between 2006 and 2011, the aboriginal population grew by 20 percent compared to 6 percent for the non-aboriginal population in canada (statistics canada, 2011a). when compared to the non-aboriginal population, aboriginal peoples are disproportionately poor. aboriginal unemployment rates are more than double non-aboriginal rates (peters, 2011). among those who are employed, aboriginal peoples have lower incomes than non-aboriginal peoples and they have been declining relatively over time. food insecurity is much higher among aboriginal households (harell, soroks, & ladner, 2014). aboriginal peoples fare lower on indicators for longevity and have higher rates of suicide (kirmayer et al., 2007), addictions, and incarceration (cardinal, 2006) than the general population. aboriginal people elicit more negative stereotypes when compared to whites or visible minorities: “explicit racism stereotypes such as poor, ignorant, dirty, stupid, unfriendly are associated with aboriginal peoples as a group, and the public often blames aboriginal people for the problems they face” (harell et al., 2014, p. 2586). 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/6 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.6 the urban aboriginal experience is as varied as the urban centres themselves, but they do share commonalities (lawrence, 2004; silver, 2006). first, status and benefits for first nations people living on reserve are applicable to each reserve only and are not transferable to urban centres. second, urban centres may present challenges in connecting to traditional sources of aboriginal culture, including contact with the land, elders, aboriginal languages, and spiritual ceremonies (peters, 2002). third, although there are aboriginal peoples in the middle and professional classes, the fact remains that lower income groups include a disproportionately high number of aboriginal peoples (parriag & chaulk, 2013). and fourth, some regard input in policy processes as tokenistic rather than genuinely consultative (nguyen, 2014). t r a v e l l e r s i n i r e l a n d the government of ireland defines travellers as “ . . . the community of people who are commonly called travellers and who are identified (both by themselves and others) as people with a shared history, culture and traditions, including historically, a nomadic way of life on the island of ireland” (government of ireland, 2002a, p. 7). as a group, travellers were excluded from national stories of irish history and culture. even those that examine the role of ethnicity and social diversity in ireland often fail to mention travellers (fanning, 2009, pp. 17-18). struggles for independence from great britain led to the easter rising in 1916 and the acceptance of the anglo-irish treaty in 1921, which established ireland’s dominion status within the british empire. the identification of travellers provided a way to uphold gaelic society and culture and downplay the role of the anglo-irish in irish cultural development in newly independent ireland. macgréine was the first folklorist to collect information directly from “tinkers” and became the first to refer to them as “travellers” and he credited them for the spread of folk tales as “important repositories of irish tradition” (cited in helleiner, 2003, p. 47-48). although travellers made gains in cultural notoriety, they were increasingly othered and separated from mainstream society over time. there are approximately 30,000 travellers in ireland, slightly less than one percent of ireland’s population of almost five million (central statistics office, 2012). the traveller health study placed the traveller population at closer to 40,000 (all ireland traveller health study [aiths], 2010). their culture, values, language, customs, family economy, oral traditions, and nomadism all separate them from mainstream society (binchy, 1995; ó floinn, 1995). travellers disproportionately rely on state resources due to their status as a vulnerable group. they rank high in terms of health risks including a suicide rate 3 times that of the national rate (royall, 2010) and have lower average levels of educational attainment and employment (“report of the task force,” 1995). as fay (2001) noted, [travellers’] experience of low social status and exclusion . . . is mostly due to the widespread hostility of settled people towards them. this hostility is based on prejudice, which in turn gives rise to discrimination and affects travellers in all aspects of their lives. (p. 99-100) travellers seek housing that accommodates their preference for either living on the road or living in close proximity to their extended families, or both (kenny & binchy, 2009). living on the road has become increasingly difficult since the passing of the trespass law in 2002 (government of ireland, 2002b), which severely curtails parking on private and public property. currently, 12 percent of travellers live in caravans and mobile homes while the majority of travellers reside in group or standard 3 heritz: indigenous inclusion in public policy published by scholarship@western, 2016 housing schemes (central statistics office, 2012). standard housing (single family units in multiple storied buildings) is the accommodation most readily accessible to travellers because it is available to the general public. however, standard housing runs counter to the preferences many travellers have for living in group housing (kenny & binchy, 2009). m e t h o d case selection involved choosing two types of urban centres within each country. one larger urban centre was chosen to provide access to government as a national or provincial capital and as access to the headquarters of voluntary sector organizations. a second satellite urban centre was chosen for three reasons. first, these urban centres have significant indigenous populations. second, a satellite location tests whether the balance of advocacy, service delivery, and specialization of services varies from one urban centre to another. and third, from a scalar perspective, a satellite location is helpful in assessing whether opportunities for action for voluntary organizations exist in policy processes or whether these opportunities are isolated by locale. toronto and thunder bay were the two urban centres selected as cases for urban aboriginal peoples in canada for the following reasons: the province of ontario (where toronto and thunder bay are located) has the largest aboriginal population (statistics canada, 2011b). toronto and thunder bay are among the 10 major urban centres with the highest percentage of people identifying as aboriginal (vancouver, edmonton, calgary, regina, saskatoon, winnipeg, thunder bay, montreal, toronto, halifax, and ottawa) (environics institute, 2010). toronto, with an aboriginal population of 36, 990,1 is the capital of ontario, and provides a concentration of contact nodes that include provincial ministries and provincial aboriginal organizations. thunder bay, located 1,400 kilometers from toronto in ontario’s more sparsely populated northern region, was selected as a satellite case because its aboriginal identity population of 11,675 comprises almost 11 percent of thunder bay’s overall population of 108,359 (statistics canada, 2011a). dublin and galway were the two urban centres selected as cases for travellers in ireland. as the capital city of ireland, dublin (with a traveller population of 5,935) provides a concentration of access to policy actors at both national and local levels of government and their respective departments. as an urban centre with a significant traveller population, dublin also provides access to local traveller organizations. galway, located 200 kilometres from dublin, on the west coast of ireland, has a traveller population of 1,667 and the largest proportion of travellers at 22 percent (central statistics office, 2012). forty-nine confidential interviews were conducted in canada (29) and ireland (20) between september 2010 and june 2011. the interviewees consisted of voluntary organization representatives, government officials, and scholars whose mandates or research interests included urban aboriginal peoples and/or travellers. organizations contacted included national, provincial, and/or local organizations. key organizations in areas of health, justice, housing (which included shelter for the homeless), and children’s and family services were contacted. participant selection focused mainly on education, health, and housing programs and services that aligned with the needs of marginalized members of 1 local agencies estimate the aboriginal population to be 70,000 (mccaskill, fitzmaurice, & cidro, 2011). 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/6 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.6 communities in crises. correctional services (even though members of these groups have higher incarceration rates) and employment services (despite high unemployment rates for members of both communities) were not as easily identified because organizations were not identifiable in all of the four urban centres or they were integrated into the mandates of other indigenous organizations. the aim was to identify the points of negotiation for these groups when it came to impacting policy development in order to more fully understand the setting for advocacy activities in the two cases, including the role of advocacy groups, the voluntary sector, and systems of government representation. qualitative methods, including data collected using open-ended questions in semi-structured interviews with key informants in aboriginal and traveller organizations and with government officials, were used to analyse program, service delivery, and advocacy activities of aboriginal and traveller organizations (see appendix a). participants were not selected from specific indigenous communities. rather, indigenous identity was used as a variable to determine the extent to which aboriginal peoples or travellers have input in policy processes. participants were not compensated for the interview. they were recruited based on their employment in voluntary organizations and government, and were interviewed at their place of employment during working hours. these interviews provided information regarding the engagement of urban aboriginal peoples and travellers in the very policy processes that define and work to achieve their needs. the information gathered from notes taken during interviews, from organizational documents, and from personal observations were thematically coded and analyzed using a scalar approach that examined the opportunities available to voluntary organizations to advocate for policy that aligns with the needs and interests of the underrepresented groups they represent. rather than adhering to a method that isolated analysis of policy activities at each level of government, this constructivist approach defined the overall scope of the space in which voluntary organizations manoeuvre. while the scalar approach is useful in illuminating various policy processes within multigovernance frameworks, it is also flexible as an analytical tool that has been adapted for this comparison. the theoretical framework for the analysis of minority group representation in policy processes is a model that assesses the various scales of social action. understanding the importance of scale in politics is challenged by a pre-existing scalar vocabulary that spans from the smallest to the largest, namely local, regional, national, and transnational levels of government. for this analysis, scale should be considered as a dimension of social processes rather than as a fixed unit. applying scale to social movements reveals that groups organize and mobilize at different geographical scales, therefore, they “actively make and remake the scales of collective action” (masson, 2006, p. 4). political opportunities create scales of action. laforest (2011) used the concept of scale to recognize new governance relations that take place at different levels of analysis, ranging from the micro to the macro in processes that construct social relations. due to varying governance relations for the voluntary sector, more emphasis is placed on scales of human life as the spatial construction of social groupings, such as gender, race, and voluntary associations (laforest, 2011). a scalar approach is useful in a comparison of least similar cases to understand how and why one group experiences more successful inclusion in policy processes than the other. the micro scale, the meso scale, and the macro scale are applied where policy for indigenous groups takes place, and is used to evaluate the extent of their inclusion in these processes. the micro scale focuses on organizations and the processes that are unique to their organizational design. the meso scale locates the dynamics of organizational participation within the policy community (laforest, 2011) by addressing relationships that shape and affect policy at the macro and micro levels (evans, 2001). 5 heritz: indigenous inclusion in public policy published by scholarship@western, 2016 the macro scale embodies the broader interaction between the state and the voluntary sector. organizations that are representing themselves to the state devise strategies for issues that are important to them. this collective action influences the dynamics within the policy field from which emerges a distinct representation of the sector. these interactions and processes are unique to the policy issue, the actors, and the sector (laforest, 2011). there are additional aspects of interaction that contribute to scale that are not confined to the micro, meso, and macro structure, but may influence this model. first, the struggles that governance arrangements place on voluntary organizations are not isolated from each other. the governance process influences the structure for collaboration between the state and the voluntary sector. actors make decisions regarding policy issues in relation to their unique experiences and also in relation to their locational understanding of governance processes within their policy field or their organization. second, dynamics at one scale may influence political struggle at another, and even isolated events may have an impact on the capabilities of the voluntary sector. a third aspect to understanding scale is that place matters. this means that the nature of relationships and their outcomes have different results that are unique to each locale. scales of action may diverge not only across policy fields, but also across geographic space, for example, from one city to another. challenges at the meso scale may span across spatial scales to sub-state and local networks (laforest, 2011). next, the findings of this research project reports on interviews with voluntary organizations and government officials to determine the extent to which voluntary organizations are included in policy processes, that is initially identifiable on micro, meso, and macro scales. however, additional aspects of interaction demonstrate how policy networks influenced by broad state and societal norms impact within and between these scales to highlight why and how urban aboriginal peoples are better represented in policy processes when compared to travellers. f i n d i n g s v o l u n t a r y o r g a n i z a t i o n s a n d o p e r a t i o n s the micro scale focuses on the nature and range of the actual programs and services undertaken by voluntary organizations for urban aboriginal peoples and travellers. when asked about types of programs and services they carried out, voluntary organizations reported significant efforts in the areas of housing, health, education, justice, family (which includes domestic violence and other services for women) and cultural awareness programs for urban aboriginal peoples in canada and travellers in ireland. toronto and thunder bay provided similar programs to meet the needs of urban aboriginal peoples. a representative of an aboriginal organization explained: because we incorporate culture and spirituality a lot of aboriginal people have moved forward in their lives. (thunder bay, interview 7) as much as organizations in these cities work independently, their leaders are involved in networking with other aboriginal organizations and the aboriginal community. perhaps due to the smaller geographical area of ireland as a whole and the distance (4 hour commute by train) between dublin and 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/6 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.6 galway, there appeared to be more contact regarding the daily transactions of representatives of irish national and local organizations. for example, staff from local traveller organizations across ireland are occasionally invited to national traveller organizations in dublin for the day to participate in a meeting or a special event. homelessness and access to suitable housing are major issues for both groups because their accommodation may be points of contestation for mainstream society. some aboriginal organizations assist clients in finding housing. a number of aboriginal organizations in toronto and thunder bay provide refuge from domestic violence for aboriginal women and their children, and shelter for homeless aboriginal men. local traveller organizations assist travellers in finding housing, which may include accompanying them to city council (city hall) to complete the required paperwork to apply for group or standard housing. urban aboriginal peoples and travellers experience shorter life expectancy, and a higher prevalence of disabilities and mental health related illnesses (kirmayer et al., 2007; royall, 2010). aboriginal health programs incorporate indigenous traditional practices that provide aboriginal peoples with choices regarding their health and healing. aboriginal health incorporates a holistic approach (which includes mind, body, spirit, and emotion) to develop traditional programs and services dealing with all aspects of health issues, which may include healing circles, for example. traveller health programs are specifically designed to bridge access to mainstream health and addiction services rather than accommodate cultural difference. the primary health care workers program is designed to train and employ travellers nationwide as health care workers to conduct diagnostic testing (such as diabetes assessments). community health workers provide health information for travellers and arrange for their medical appointments. an interviewee explained that not all travellers have telephones and traveller sites don’t have postal delivery because of the fear [that letter carriers have] of going to halting2 sites. (dublin, interview 14) education programs address low educational attainment and low literacy rates found in both groups. education programs for urban aboriginal peoples in thunder bay collaborated with school boards to provide elementary school children with food security (lunch and snacks) and an afterschool program that could include mentorship, drumming, singing, and stories. the eight step yellow flag program has been instituted and monitored by a national traveller organization to challenge racist attitudes by addressing issues of equality and diversity in elementary schools. stay in school programs are also offered in response to the disproportionate dropout rate among traveller youth. traveller organizations offer education programs to adult travellers that range from teaching literacy to assisting learners to access secondary school qualifications. across ireland, 36 centres for the education and training of travellers operated in conjunction with the department of education. in keeping with the national policy of integrating travellers into mainstream education, these adult training centres closed in 2012 and their responsibilities were integrated into the department of education. one interviewee explained: 2 halting sites are spaces allocated by local authorities for travellers to park caravans (trailers), and graze horses. 7 heritz: indigenous inclusion in public policy published by scholarship@western, 2016 this has seen the erosion of . . . traveller specific supports and services under the camouflage of integration and inclusion. (dublin, interview 10) marginalization encountered by both groups impedes their access to the justice system and is exacerbated by disproportionally higher incarceration rates compared to the general population (cardinal, 2006; royall, 2010). an aboriginal legal organization in toronto provides assistance to aboriginal victims and offenders that include gladue services (which provide judges with contextual information about the systemic discrimination of aboriginal peoples in canada in order to better understand the background factors that affect an offender). in contrast to these established aboriginal legal services, travellers are not represented by any culturally specific legal services. traveller organizations provide legal advocacy services wherein staff will write letters or accompany a traveller to court to assist in explaining the proceedings. aboriginal organizations provide programs and services that help their clients cope with family crises, which have a greater gendered impact on women. both toronto and thunder bay have aboriginal women’s shelters to accommodate victims of domestic abuse and their children. aboriginal organizations have also found that aboriginal men are victimized by society, so their approach to domestic violence includes facilitating programs for men: we have to heal men. (toronto, interview 5) aboriginal children and their families are assisted by an aboriginal organization that has authority over aboriginal child protection in toronto. aboriginal women’s and men’s organizations provide a range of life skills programs and services for clients of all ages and all walks of life, including literacy and life skills, detoxification programs, applying for continuing education programs, and addressing residential school or adoption experiences. they also assist with court advocacy by accompanying clients to court to assist with the legal jargon or “just to be there” (toronto, interview 15). traveller organizations deal with domestic crises and design programs and services that encompass the family rather than separating service provision for women and men. in contrast to aboriginal women’s shelters in canada, shelters specifically for traveller women and their children seeking refuge from domestic violence do not exist in ireland. although there is a national travellers women’s organization, it is proportionately smaller in size than similar women’s aboriginal organizations in canada. a representative of a traveller organization explained the reluctance to talk about domestic violence: people are more clear on issues. naming sexual violence. two years ago you would never talk about it. this is a huge area of progress. (dublin, interview 12) to overcome discrimination, stereotyping, and general misunderstandings regarding their culture, both urban aboriginal and traveller organizations are facilitating cultural awareness programs. urban aboriginal organizations participate in awareness programs with the ontario public service, toronto district school board, metro children and youth services. national and local traveller organizations provide traveller cultural diversity training for garda síochána (national police), national health service (hse), and universities. 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/6 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.6 v o l u n t a r y o r g a n i z a t i o n s a n d g o v e r n m e n t d y n a m i c s the meso scale locates the dynamics of voluntary organizations and analyzes how they represent indigenous communities in policy processes that take place within and between multiple levels of government. interviews with representatives of urban aboriginal and traveller organizations and government officials clarified, a. the extent to which these communities are represented by voluntary organizations, b. the individuals who represent voluntary organizations and government, and c. the relationship of voluntary organization actors and government actors within governance structures mandated for these groups. in both toronto and thunder bay, there is cooperation between government and aboriginal organizations to establish advisory bodies within municipal government. in toronto within the office of equity, diversity and human rights, the aboriginal advisory committee was founded in 1999 to advise toronto city council on aboriginal affairs in addition to acting as a liaison between the aboriginal community and city council. in 2008, the city of thunder bay created an aboriginal liaison position within the office of the city clerk that facilitates the engagement of the city of thunder bay with the aboriginal community in policy development and cultural planning development, and is in contact with indigenous and northern affairs canada (inac) and provincial departments. as a government representative explained: aboriginal people would have never gone to city hall, but now they know about the aboriginal liaison as the person to go to. (thunder bay, interview 4) in contrast to the response by municipal government in toronto and thunder bay to establish a liaison with aboriginal communities, traveller input is restricted to legislated participation in housing policy at the local level. the local traveller accommodation consultative committee (ltacc) consists of elected local officials, city or county council staff from the traveller accommodation unit, traveller advocates, and traveller representatives who meet quarterly at city hall or county hall. a traveller member of a ltacc observed that their participation over time is decreasing because of councillors’ lack of respect for travellers. a representative of a traveller organization noted that councillors make disparaging remarks against travellers to raise their own profiles: the local councillors have been overheard to say during meetings that travellers live a dysfunctional way of life. (galway, interview 1) the interviewee also observed that the meetings “can be fairly volatile” and do not follow the agenda (galway, interview 1). in one case, when a ltacc traveller representative requested the key to access the community centre on his halting site because “no one has ever been inside” (galway, interview 1), he was instructed to bring plans of the proposed activities. when he asked to present his plans at the following meeting, the traveller was informed that the meeting was over. a representative of a traveller organization explained that the ltacc undermines traveller participation because they feel travellers lack the education to deal with councillors. finally, traveller needs and interests are not acknowledged 9 heritz: indigenous inclusion in public policy published by scholarship@western, 2016 or implemented. a representative of an organization affiliated with travellers observed that grouphousing schemes for travellers are poorly planned. for example, a housing scheme was inaccessible because it was built in a hollow. the representative went on to say that even though 70 percent of travellers are in standard housing in galway, there are some travellers who would not choose standard housing because they say they get too claustrophobic. explain that to an official here. (galway, interview 4) most of the representatives of voluntary organizations, government officials, and scholars in canada identified as aboriginal compared to travellers in ireland as shown in table 1. only one organization in canada with a non-aboriginal representative had a large aboriginal client base, but was not considered an aboriginal organization. in contrast to canada, just fewer than half of the representatives interviewed from traveller organizations in dublin and galway identified as travellers. employment with aboriginal organizations ranged from 2 to 22 years, in various leadership and staffing positions as shown in table 23. government officials interviewed in canada were employed with the public service for 3 to 10 years. as with the canadian case, the majority of traveller organization representatives have considerable years of service, ranging from 7 to 25 years. government representatives—none of whom identified as a member of the travelling community—have been affiliated with traveller affairs less than 5 years. both groups require substantive representation by members of their community to best articulate and advocate for the interests of their community within and between policy networks. a major impediment to employment in voluntary organizations is that members of these groups may not have the educational qualifications for various positions. urban aboriginal peoples in canada have significantly higher representation by the aboriginal community in voluntary organizations and government than travellers. aboriginal individuals, who have expertise and years of experience in representing their community, hold most of the leadership positions in aboriginal organizations. also, approximately half of the interviewees in government positions identified as aboriginal. 3 scholars were consulted for their expertise, rather then their actual employment with voluntary organizations; therefore, they were excluded from table two. 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/6 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.6 t a b l e o n e . i d e n t i t y o f i n t e r v i e w p a r t i c i p a n t s canada ireland aboriginal non-aboriginal traveller non-traveller voluntary organizations 16 4 5 5 government officials 5 1 0 8 scholars 2 1 0 2 total 23 6 5 15 t a b l e 2 . y e a r s o f s e r v i c e a m o n g i n t e r v i e w p a r t i c i p a n t s canada ireland aboriginal non-aboriginal traveller non-traveller voluntary organizations 2 22 10 20 7 25 4 15 government officials 3 10 3 0 3 5 in contrast, travellers are underrepresented in voluntary organizations and government. although one traveller was identified in a national government bureaucratic position, as was one elected official at the local level, none of the government officials interviewed for this specific research project identified as a member of the travelling community and these officials had less than 5 years experience in a department mandated specifically for travellers, which implies higher staff turnover rates. although royall (2010) stated that by “the 1990s pro-traveller organisations were run and staffed in the main by travellers” (p. 162), this could not be verified in the present day. rather, observations made while conducting interviews with traveller organizations found a significant complement of their staff were non-travellers. the only significant representation of travellers in voluntary organizations was among those employed as primary health service providers. travellers have yet to be appointed to chair government bodies that specifically address traveller issues. substantive traveller representation in government bureaucracy would overcome a major hurdle in the historical othering4 of travellers from mainstream society. it would also facilitate inclusion of travellers within various government departments and throughout policy networks that pertain to the affairs of the traveller community. 4 othering refers to “the perception or representation of a person or group of people as fundamentally alien from another, frequently more powerful, group” (oxford dictionary, 2016). 11 heritz: indigenous inclusion in public policy published by scholarship@western, 2016 s t a t e a n d s o c i e t a l s e t t i n g s the macro scale determines the success of both groups in taking advantage of any opportunities to be included in policy processes. recognition of these groups on this scale may indicate political incorporation into government institutions that locate processes of inclusion as well as exclusion. this is significant because most liberal democratic governments are dependent upon mainstream society for their mandate, and to this extent mainstream preference may dominate processes or create obstacles to impede the political incorporation of indigenous groups in policy processes. challenges to inclusion and exclusion also reveal the extent to which government shapes and reshapes policy through legislated structures and through conventional practices. another significant aspect to inclusion on the macro scale is the extent to which policy processes that include voluntary sector representation facilitate linkages to government during times of increasing accountability and austerity. my initial presumption was that the inclusion of urban aboriginal peoples and travellers in policy processes would be sufficient to achieve positive outcomes for each group. in reality, the actual outcomes of policy processes are the real test of success in addressing the individual and collective issues and interests for each group. so far this analysis has reported on the micro scale that assessed program and service delivery of voluntary organizations and the meso scale that located the representation of members of indigenous groups in policy processes. these findings now facilitate a deeper analysis of intraand intergroup struggles over cultural identity on the macro scale and its focus on broad state and societal influences that impact on their capacity to secure favourable policy outcomes for their groups. negativity toward urban aboriginal peoples was not as evident during interviews in toronto or thunder bay as they were with travellers and representatives of traveller organizations who reported that they face discrimination in all aspects of their lives. the following nuances of othering and microaggressions5 were observed during interviews in ireland. a representative of a church-based traveller organization observed: people who arrive in the parish do not get the same welcome because they are travellers. (dublin, interview 13) another representative of a traveller organization reported: travellers are required to sign an agreement with the local gardaí [police] that they will not engage in anti-social behaviour with the settled community. (dublin, interview 14) a government official explained that the standard handbook distributed to all renters living in social housing schemes was rewritten for travellers: we dumbed it down. (dublin, interview 11) and a representative of a traveller organization reported that the lunch for the approximately 12 traveller men, women, and children who participated in a local st patrick’s day parade had to be held at 5 microaggressions refer to “a statement, action, or incident regarded as an instance of indirect, subtle, or unintentional discrimination against members of a marginalized group” (oxford dictionary, 2016). 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/6 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.6 their traveller office because the group “would be refused entry to any of the local pubs” (galway, interview 1). in canada, collaborative linkages have been established between the voluntary sector and government through the urban aboriginal strategy (uas) (inac, 2014). what is significant about the uas is that, while the federal government has devolved its responsibility to aboriginal peoples in urban centres, it now uses a collaborative approach to bring together urban aboriginal organizations to recommend and develop pilot projects that would locate needs that currently are not being met. in thunder bay, for example, the uas committee included over 25 representatives from aboriginal organizations, elders, youth and ex officio members from the public and private sectors that are in direct contact with inac. the devolution of jurisdictional responsibility from national governments to provincial and/or local government creates multiple points of contact for voluntary organizations. despite aboriginal-specific government departments at the federal and provincial level, program and service delivery for urban aboriginal peoples is still associated with multiple federal and provincial government departments. a government representative observed that within the federal government there is an attitude that “[inac] is first nations only” (toronto, interview 19) and this attitude of exclusion of urban aboriginal issues impacts on working across other federal departments. inac’s direct contact with the urban aboriginal community is mainly through community work conducted through the uas. at the provincial level, the ministry of aboriginal affairs (maa) does not have a specific mandate for program and service delivery for urban aboriginal peoples in ontario. an interviewee explained: most aboriginal people in ontario don’t live on reserve . . . we need to address those who do not live on reserve. (toronto, interview 6) however, the maa collaborated with provincial-level friendship centres6, as well as women’s and métis organizations to produce the five volume urban aboriginal task force and the domestic violence action plan for ontario in 2005. furthermore, in collaboration with ontario’s ministries of community and social services, health and long-term care, and women’s issues and children and youth services, the maa produced the aboriginal healing and wellness strategy (ahws) to reduce violence against aboriginal women and children (ahws, 2016). in actuality, although federal government responsibility for aboriginal peoples has in many cases been devolved to the provinces, aboriginal organizations continue an intergovernmental collaboration with the federal uas to coordinate programs and services. and policy networks have been established with aboriginal organizations and various provincial government departments. in ireland, equality authority (ea) legislation was passed in 2002 to uphold equal status and protect against discrimination based on nine criteria (civil status, family status, age, disability, race, sexual orientation, religious belief, and membership in the traveller community) (ea, 2012). as previously noted, when equality legislation was put into place in 2002, travellers brought the majority of 6 friendship centres are non-profit community centres that were established to assist indigenous newcomers during their urban transitions through programs and services. 13 heritz: indigenous inclusion in public policy published by scholarship@western, 2016 complaints. under the ea, travellers were able to file a complaint and be heard by the equality tribunal when they were asked to leave shops or pubs. in the early years there was a heavy focus on equal status and discrimination. travellers filed complaints about pubs. (dublin, interview 5) this procedure did not require a solicitor because they could make their own case to the tribunal or have an advocate speak on their behalf. in 2004, the vintners lobby was instrumental in launching an amendment to the intoxicating liquor act where any complaints against vintners and publicans would be heard by the local district courts (where liquor licences are issued and renewed for pubs). afterward, if a traveller were asked to leave a pub, they could no longer file a complaint of discrimination with the equality authority at minimal cost, but would have to make their case before the district court and incur significant costs for legal representation. for travellers to get their claims heard there is a high bar to overcome. there is a huge barrier for travellers because they are seen negatively. (dublin, interview 5) in contrast to canada, the government in ireland is composed of multiple departments that more narrowly address specific traveller issues as legislated. at the national level, housing for travellers is located within the national department of the environment, community and local government in the traveller accommodation unit (tau), which is legislated to finance and administer local accommodation committees. the tau operates as a board consisting of 12 members that include representatives from government and national traveller organizations. other obstacles to secure housing for travellers are located in local government processes. a representative of a traveller organization observed: councillors who did nothing for travellers got re-elected, while there were repercussions for those who advocated for travellers. (dublin, interview 2) policy for travellers is monitored at the european union level by the council of europe’s committee of ministers high level group on traveller issues as set out in the framework convention for the protection of national minorities (aka framework convention). the national traveller monitoring advisory committee (ntmac) was established by the irish government in 2007 in response to the eu’s framework convention. the ntmac is chaired by an appointee of the irish government and is composed of representatives from government departments, national traveller organizations, the catholic church, and individual travellers. the ntmac’s mandate is to produce a biennial report on issues of ongoing concern for travellers (department of justice, equality and law reform, 2009). although this body has been in place since 2007, the ntmac published its biennial report in 2009, and the traveller organizations interviewed are representative members of the ntmac, only one individual referred to participation in the ntmac when asked about the level of government with which their organization has contact. moreover, none of the representatives of traveller organizations interviewed referred to the ntmac or its reports. although traveller issues are of concern at the eu level, there appears to be limited engagement in the ntmac by traveller policy actors in ireland. for example, regarding the 2004 revisions to complaint procedures for travellers evicted from pubs, the ntmac biennial report in 2009 broadly acknowledged these changes in discrimination complaint procedures for 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/6 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.6 travellers but responded only by indicating that it would continue to monitor the revised discrimination policy (department of justice, equality and law reform, 2009). at the macro level there are broader commitments by government, and more extensive opportunities for action for urban aboriginal voluntary organizations in ontario. the following key factors have proven crucial for the recognition of urban aboriginal peoples as a sector. first, acknowledgement has been crucial for policies to move forward to accommodate the group. second, significant numbers of voluntary organization staff and government representatives working in the area identify as members of aboriginal communities. while working within policy networks and representation admittedly occur on the meso scale, without a prior commitment in principle by the state, these practices would not be possible at the macro level. third, federal, provincial, and local levels of government are crucial to efforts to assist urban aboriginal peoples through the uas. although there are no specific branches within departments assigned to urban aboriginal affairs in the federal inac or ontario’s maa, there are vertical and horizontal collaborations to coordinate programs and services. although it cannot be directly attributed to the establishment of aboriginal committees at the local level, we can pinpoint areas where collaboration and consultation between government and voluntary organizations are taking place. in contrast, travellers face significant struggles in securing commitments from government and in securing acknowledgment for their sector at the macro level. this is indicated by the following factors that contest opportunities for action for travellers by the organizations that represent them. first, travellers willingly report that they are intimidated by the settled community in policy development settings, which makes it difficult for travellers to participate in housing policy proceedings. second, the inaction by government to establish a national traveller agency is instructive in assessing the extent to which traveller organizations are struggling to make a major impact on the national agenda. third, traveller organizations are critical of the success of the vintners lobby in overturning equality authority procedures. fourth, at the eu level, the framework convention on the protection of national minorities (aka framework convention) has proven weak in monitoring the affairs of the traveller community. and fifth, the low profile of ntmac activities among representatives of traveller organizations interviewed indicates its minimal significance to traveller representatives. the biennial reporting of the ntmac to the irish government also indicates that it is a weak monitoring instrument of government. d i s c u s s i o n a scalar approach facilitates an analysis that assesses the inclusion of both groups in policy processes. scale is employed to identify three levels of action that locate the dynamics of opportunities in policy processes and are identified as micro, meso, and macro. at the micro level, the model examines the role and function of voluntary organizations that serve indigenous groups, and can identify the structure and nature of the program and advocacy activities in which these organizations engage. the meso level locates the nexus of activity among representatives of voluntary organizations as actors in a policy field or policy community, and can reveal their inclusion in or exclusion from these processes, as well as the extent to which policy actors avail themselves of opportunities to take action. the macro level examines how broad state and societal forces not only impact the capacity of these organizations but also impinge on relationships at the meso and micro levels. moreover, place matters—relationships and their outcomes are unique to each locale. it should be noted that while these scalar divisions start off being 15 heritz: indigenous inclusion in public policy published by scholarship@western, 2016 relatively precise, the policy areas, issues, and events may overlap, or be reported as located in more than one of these divisions. this should not distort the overall analyses as the summaries of each scalar section. on the micro scale, urban aboriginal organizations are moving closer to political incorporation by introducing aboriginal culture, healing, and capacity-building into their approaches to health services; using gladue reports in the justice system; asserting authority over the care of aboriginal children in the child welfare system in toronto; providing health services choices for traditional healing and wellness; providing shelter for aboriginal women and their children experiencing domestic violence, and healing services for men. traveller organizations, on the other hand, provide family counselling services, but do not provide shelters for traveller women, even though domestic violence is prevalent in the traveller community. traveller health organizations are instrumental in bridging access for travellers to national health services. however, these services align with policies to bring travellers into mainstream health programs and services, rather than accommodating their cultural preferences. the cancellation of education programs for travellers in order to align with integrationist policies also illustrates diminished consideration for the needs and interests of the traveller community. on the meso scale, organizations that represent urban aboriginal peoples are included in local government advisory committees that liaise with various municipal departments. the majority of voluntary organization and government representatives identify as aboriginal and both groups have substantial experience in aboriginal policy networks. in contrast, travellers are underrepresented among voluntary organization representatives and are not represented in government departments. non-travellers assigned to traveller policy have mandates of less than 5 years. members of the traveller community also have limited access to representation in housing advisory committees, where they are generally underrepresented. travellers reported that official meetings often did not adhere to rules of order, or follow an agenda, which makes it difficult for travellers to participate, especially given that they reported the settled community intimates them. despite the consultation of traveller organizations regarding education and housing, policy outcomes indicate they are ineffective in countering changes in education and housing policies that are moving toward the integration of travellers into mainstream society. on the macro scale, urban aboriginal peoples in canada have encountered more success when it comes to establishing themselves as a policy sector compared to travellers in ireland, who are experiencing struggles in countering broad state and societal preferences that fail to commit to them either as a sector or as an ethnic minority. travellers have minimal opportunities for action, and struggle to be recognized as a policy sector both on a national front and at the eu level. societal othering of travellers and feeling intimidated by the settled community are contributing factors that allow the government to resist new principles or changes to legislation that support travellers. this in turn clarifies why travellers lack voice to counter the cancellation of traveller education programs or counter changes in procedures for filing complaints regarding equality legislation. c o n c l u s i o n what has this comparison of the inclusion of urban aboriginal peoples and travellers in policy processes taught us? the overarching lesson is that the inclusion of indigenous groups in policy 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/6 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.6 processes does not adhere to a “one size fits all” pattern where positive outcomes for one group translates into success for the next. since urban aboriginal organizations have had more success comparatively achieving inclusion in policy processes, it is worthwhile to ask: what can traveller organizations learn from urban aboriginal organizations? urban aboriginal organizations are able to collaborate with government to achieve outcomes that assist their community. travellers, on the other hand are struggling with inclusion in policy processes, which would require travellers to counter state and societal attitudes against them in order to secure the right to participate in policy processes. as travellers are now beginning to attain higher levels of education, this will qualify them to secure employment in traveller organizations and in government to substantively represent and advocate for travellers. cultural awareness programs can also assist in breaking down barriers between mainstream and indigenous communities by extending these programs to government officials and the broader public service. regarding their organizational advocacy, another strategy for traveller organizations to consider is affiliation with transnational indigenous networks with success in countering societal biases and othering. thus, travellers may consider the potential of aligning with other indigenous groups in addition to their affiliation with roma7. one major prescription for traveller success in advocating for their community is to implement guidelines of acceptable behaviour for government and the voluntary sector. “standards of advocacy” would incorporate guidelines that would ensure their equal participation in policy processes that would include, but not be confined to zero tolerance of defamation of an individual or group by government officials; allowing all members of government sanctioned committees a voice in proceedings; and penalties for members who do not adhere to these guidelines. while the state eventually sets the rules and constraints for the engagement of groups in policy and in government, it is possible to create and implement a code of conduct that would grant equal access to all participants in these processes. one potential critique of the success of urban aboriginal organizations compared to traveller organizations is that there are simply a larger number of urban aboriginal peoples than travellers, which enables them to have more representation and therefore more services and better influence. yet, the comparative success of urban aboriginal organizations in policy processes is a fairly recent phenomenon—organizations for both groups shared comparable development since the middle of the twentieth century. rather than a size argument, in comparing urban aboriginal organizations to traveller organizations, i would stress that aboriginal representation in policy processes and their collaboration with government is the deciding factor in their relative success. even if traveller organizations grew in comparable size to urban aboriginal organizations, mainstream preferences would likely prevail in ireland, and travellers would continue to be excluded from policy processes. moreover, it must be remembered that both groups experience comparable levels of disadvantage. this indicates that despite the relative success of urban aboriginal representation and collaboration with government compared to travellers, there is still a lot of work to be done to increase the well-being of both groups, and to provide them with the authority to secure their cultural continuity. 7 many comparative studies of indigenous peoples overlook the inclusion of irish travellers because they are a small minority group, and there is a tendency in the eu to group them with the larger roma communities across europe, which fails to capture their irish indigeneity. 17 heritz: indigenous inclusion in public policy published by scholarship@western, 2016 in conclusion, the inclusion of indigenous groups in policy processes is crucial for the acknowledgement of these groups, addressing needs and interests that may not align with those of mainstream society, and assisting them as communities in crises (ladner, 2009; royall, 2010). systems of domination determine the manner in which society influences the state, and vice versa, to recognize these groups and allocate resources to assist them. these systems show strong tendencies towards aligning policy decisions with those of mainstream stakeholders. as a consequence, the marginalization of indigenous groups is exacerbated. allowing these groups to facilitate their cultural choices require the following: broad societal adoption and enforcement of non-discrimination practices to protect minority groups, substantive representation and standards of advocacy that uphold fair access to policy processes whose outcomes make decisions that facilitate the needs and interests of these groups, ongoing allocation of resources to assist them in building their communities in urban centres. the ability of the state to acknowledge and accomplish these challenges is a crucial test of accommodating indigenous cultural continuity in liberal democracies. 18 the 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(2011). toronto aboriginal research project (tarp): final report. toronto: toronto aboriginal support services council (tassc). 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/6 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.6 newhouse, d. & peters, e. (2003). not strangers in these parts: urban aboriginal peoples. retrieved from nguyen, m. t. (2014). consulting whom? lessons from the toronto urban aboriginal strategy. the international indigenous policy journal, 5(1), 1-29. doi:dx.doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2014.5.1.3 ó floinn, b. (1995). irish travellers and the oral tradition. in a heritage ahead: cultural action and travellers (pp. 63-83). dublin: pavee point publication. oxford dictionary. (2016). retrieved from www.oed.com parriag, a. & chaulk, p. (2013). the urban aboriginal middle-income group in canada: a demographic profile. aboriginal policy studies, 2(2), 34-63. doi:dx.doi.org10.5663/aps.v2i2.19005 peters, e. (2001). developing federal policy for first nations people in urban areas: 1945-1975. the canadian journal of native studies, xxi(1), 57-96. peters, e. (2002). aboriginal people in urban areas. in c. andrew, k. a. graham, & s. d. phillips (eds.), urban affairs: back on the policy agenda (pp. 45-70). montreal: mcgill-queen’s university press. peters, e. (2011). aboriginal public policy in urban areas: an introduction. in e. peters (ed.), urban aboriginal policy making in canadian municipalities (pp. 3-32). montreal: mcgill-queen’s university press. report of the task force on the travelling community. (1995). dublin: stationery office. royal commission on aboriginal peoples (rcap). (1996). report of the royal commission on aboriginal peoples. ottawa: canada communication group. royall, f. (2010). organisation, mobilisation and marginalisation. in d. chabanet & f. royall (eds.), mobilizing against marginalisation in europe (pp. 1-8). newcastle upon tyne: cambridge scholars publishing. silver, j. (2006). in their own voices: building urban aboriginal communities. halifax: fernwood publishing. statistics canada. (2011a). 2011 census: aboriginal population profile. ottawa, on: statistics canada. retrieved from http://www12.statcan.gc.ca/nhs-enm/2011/dppd/aprof/index.cfm?lang=e&fpv=10000e statistics canada. (2011b). aboriginal peoples in canada: first nations people, métis and inuit. retrieved from https://www12.statcan.gc.ca/nhs-enm/2011/as-sa/99-011-x/99-011x2011001-eng.cfm warry, w. (2007). ending denial: understanding aboriginal issues. peterborough: broadview press. 21 heritz: indigenous inclusion in public policy published by scholarship@western, 2016 a p p e n d i x a q u e s t i o n s t o p a r t i c i p a n t s q u e s t i o n s r e l a t e d t o p a r t i c i p a t i o n • do you consider yourself an indigenous person? • how long have you been affiliated with this organization/government position? t h i r d s e c t o r a d v o c a c y f o r i n d i g e n o u s o r g a n i z a t i o n s • does your organization produce (publish in print or on the internet) policy documents for public awareness? • has your organization increased or decreased (in size, funding, and/or advocacy) over time? • what progress has your organization made in accommodating the needs and interests of urban aboriginal peoples/travellers? • what would you consider the major achievements of your organization in regard to urban aboriginal peoples/travellers? c o m m u n i c a t i o n b e t w e e n t h e t h i r d s e c t o r a n d g o v e r n m e n t • which level of government does your organization have contact with? (which third sector organizations does your department have contact with?) • who are the third sector organizations that are included in the policy process? • has this changed over time? • what are your achievements with government (third sector organizations)? • what setbacks have you experienced with government (third sector organizations)? p e r c e p t i o n s o f t h i r d s e c t o r a n d g o v e r n m e n t a c t o r s r e g a r d i n g t h e p o l i c y p r o c e s s f o r i n d i g e n o u s g r o u p s • what would you consider your major achievement in regard to urban aboriginal peoples/travellers? • what are the major obstacles that government faces in accommodating aboriginal peoples/travellers? 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 3 [2016], art. 6 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss3/6 doi: https://doi.org/10.18584/iipj.2016.7.3.6 p o s s i b i l i t i e s a n d o b s t a c l e s f o r t h e r e a l i z a t i o n o f a c c o m m o d a t i o n o f i n d i g e n o u s g r o u p s • do policies for urban aboriginal peoples/travellers facilitate or undermine selfdetermination/nomadism? • to what extent are international actors involved in advocating for indigenous minorities? p o l i t i c a l i n c l u s i o n • are urban aboriginal peoples/travellers included in policy processes regarding their needs and interests? 23 heritz: indigenous inclusion in public policy published by scholarship@western, 2016 the international indigenous policy journal july 2016 indigenous inclusion in public policy: a comparison of urban aboriginal peoples in canada and travellers in ireland joanne m. heritz recommended citation indigenous inclusion in public policy: a comparison of urban aboriginal peoples in canada and travellers in ireland abstract keywords acknowledgments creative commons license indigenous inclusion in public policy: a comparison of urban aboriginal peoples in canada and travellers in ireland indigenous healing and seeking safety: a blended implementation project for intergenerational trauma and substance use disorders the international indigenous policy journal volume 7 | issue 2 article 3 april 2016 indigenous healing and seeking safety: a blended implementation project for intergenerational trauma and substance use disorders teresa naseba marsh laurentian university, thunzi@me.com sheila cote-meek laurentian university of sudbury, scotemeek@laurentian.ca nancy l. young laurentian university, nyoung@laurentian.ca lisa m. najavits boston university, najavits@bu.edu pamela toulouse laurentian university, ptoulouse@laurentian.ca recommended citation marsh, t. n. , cote-meek, s. , young, n. l. , najavits, l. m. , toulouse, p. (2016). indigenous healing and seeking safety: a blended implementation project for intergenerational trauma and substance use disorders. the international indigenous policy journal, 7(2). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.3 indigenous healing and seeking safety: a blended implementation project for intergenerational trauma and substance use disorders abstract background: as with many indigenous groups around the world, aboriginal communities in canada face significant challenges with trauma and substance use disorders (sud). treatment for intergenerational trauma (igt) and sud is challenging due to the complexity of both disorders. there is strong evidence that strengthening cultural identity, incorporating traditional healing practices, encouraging community integration, and inviting political empowerment can enhance and improve mental health and substance use disorders in aboriginal populations. methods: the purpose of this study was to explore whether the blending of indigenous traditional healing practices and the western treatment model seeking safety, which is used to treat post-traumatic stress disorder (ptsd) and sud, resulted in a reduction of igt symptoms and sud. twelve aboriginal men and 12 aboriginal women were recruited into this study—all of whom resided in northern ontario and selfidentified as having experienced igt and sud. the indigenous healing and seeking safety (ihss) group (conducted as sharing circles) were offered twice a week over 13 weeks. data was collected via semistructured interviews as well as an end-of-treatment focus group. a qualitative thematic analysis was performed to depict themes. results: out of the 24 aboriginal people who entered the program, nine women and eight men completed the program. analysis from the qualitative thematic data identified four core themes. furthermore, the sharing circles and the presence of elders and aboriginal helpers increased the benefits of the blended approach. conclusion: evidence from this qualitative study suggests that it could be beneficial to incorporate indigenous traditional healing practices into seeking safety to enhance the health and well-being of aboriginal people with igt and sud. this implementation project, if replicated, has the potential to enhance the health and well-being of aboriginal peoples. the use of blended implementation can be an important option for clinicians and health-care professionals when working with aboriginal populations. only the qualitative results will be discussed in this article; quantitative results will be published separately. keywords ptsd, substance use disorder, intergenerational trauma, blended implementation, two-eyed seeing, seeking safety, traditional healing practices, decolonizing methodologies, indigenous worldviews, sharing circles, elders creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ i n d i g e n o u s h e a l i n g a n d s e e k i n g s a f e t y : a b l e n d e d i m p l e m e n t a t i o n p r o j e c t f o r i n t e r g e n e r a t i o n a l t r a u m a a n d s u b s t a n c e u s e d i s o r d e r s many indigenous researchers, traditional healers, and elders agree that interventions that treat intergenerational trauma (igt) and substance use disorders (sud) in aboriginal peoples should involve cultural interventions (brave heart, 1998; duran, 2006; hill, 2009; mccormick, 2009; menzies, 2014; nabigon, 2006; waldram, 2008). this approach is critical in facilitating healing and fostering positive identity for aboriginal peoples (gone, 2009; hill, 2009; kovach, 2009; mehl-madrona, 2009). in this article, the term aboriginal refers to first nations (status and non-status indians), métis, and inuit peoples, as consistent with the canadian constitution’s legal definition. the word indigenous will be used interchangeably with aboriginal, as it is the most identifiable within international contexts. indigenous peoples currently face challenges such as substance use and high rates of mental illness, which are directly related to social determinants of health (sdoh) (atleo, 2011; brascoupé & waters, 2009; menzies, 2014). these sdoh include, for example, poverty, unemployment, poor education, poor nutrition, poor housing, and unclean water (atleo, 2011). in closing the gap in a generation: health equity through action on the social determinants of health, the world health organization’s (who, 2008) commission on social determinants of health highlights that social justice is a matter of life and death because social injustice affects the way that people live, their chance of developing illness, and their risk of premature death (who, 2008). it is imperative that healthcare professionals, universities, medical schools, hospitals, clinics, schools, aboriginal organizations, and communities advocate for changes in policy to address these substantial disparities between indigenous and non-indigenous peoples (abdullah & stringer, 1999; armitage, 1995; atleo, 2011; cornell, 2006; fast, 2010). disparities between indigenous and non-indigenous peoples are well documented. according to the united nations’ human development report, aboriginal peoples in canada currently rank 48th out of 174 countries in terms of their overall development, and 71st for education. in contrast, the rest of canada ranks in the top five (un, 2006). furthermore, the community well-being (cwb) gap between first nations and non-aboriginal communities is substantial: in 2011, the average cwb score for first nations communities was 20 points lower than the average score for non-aboriginal communities. this gap is the same size as it was in 1981 (aboriginal affairs and northern development canada [aandc], 2015), which indicates that there has been no progress in improving the well-being of first nations communities in more than two decades. in addition to these more commonly used measures of well-being, aboriginal peoples in canada are currently struggling with very high rates of suicide and substance use disorders (assembly of first nations [afn], 2007; kirmayer, 1994). for example, the 2010 regional health survey (rhs) identified that almost two thirds of first nations adults who drink meet the criteria for heavy drinking, with first nations males appearing at higher risk of engaging in heavy drinking (and related harms) when compared to females. since heavy drinking is associated with a range of harmful effects—including a variety of health conditions and traumatic injury, for example—it is clear that greater efforts to encourage moderate drinking among first nations adults who choose to consume alcohol are necessary, as are abstinence programs for those who have already developed alcohol dependence (first nations information governance centre [fnigc], 2012). 1 marsh et al.: indigenous healing and seeking safety published by scholarship@western, 2016 this study was created in response to the difficulties that exist in the current health status of aboriginal peoples, and the lack of treatment models that address igt and substance use disorders. throughout the research process, we utilized an indigenous decolonizing approach. decolonization is a process whereby indigenous peoples reclaim that which was lost or degraded as a result of colonialism through indigenous traditional healing, rituals, and ceremony. in other words, the effects of colonial expansion, genocide, and cultural assimilation are mitigated through the reclamation of indigeneity (hart, 2010; kovach, 2005; wilson, 2008). the process of decolonization requires critically evaluated methodologies, as well as ethically and culturally acceptable approaches to the study of issues involving indigenous peoples (smith, 1999). this study seeks to address the question: can the integration of indigenous traditional healing practices into najavits’ (2002a) seeking safety model produce a feasible, suitable, and beneficial group treatment for igt and sud in aboriginal women and men? a qualitative indigenous decolonizing methodology was used during this project (marsh, coholic, cote-meek, & najavits, 2015a; najavits, 2002a). in sum, the purpose of this study was to explore whether the blending of indigenous traditional healing practices and a western treatment model, seeking safety, could feasibly address both trauma and addiction. l i t e r a t u r e r e v i e w c h a l l e n g e s o f s u d a m o n g a b o r i g i n a l p e o p l e s many aboriginal leaders and communities in canada are at present strongly concerned about the increase in substance use and the spread of hiv and hepatitis c virus among young aboriginal people (spittal et al., 2007). for example, the cedar project (2003 2007), a prospective cohort study involving aboriginal people in vancouver and prince george, british columbia, found that injection drug use accounts for the majority (70% 80%) of hepatitis c infections in aboriginal people under the age of 24 in canada. in addition, the same study found that over half (59%) of hiv infections among aboriginal peoples are also caused from injection drug use (spittal et al., 2007). many aboriginal communities agree that suds are a health challenge with which they continue to struggle (kirmayer, trait, & simpson, 2009; maté, 2009; menzies, 2014; waldram, 2008). according to the results of the first nations and inuit regional health survey, the majority of survey respondents saw no improvement in the reduction of suds despite numerous efforts (svenson & lafontaine, 1999). for example, according to a report from health canada (2005), in first nation communities, 73% of community members considered alcohol a problem in their communities, and 59% considered drug use to be a problem. moreover, 1 in 5 aboriginal youth reported having used solvents; of these, 1 in 3 were under the age of 15, and over half had started using solvents before the age of 11. furthermore, these suds also co-existed with behavioural addictions such as gambling, compulsive eating, shopping, and sex (chansonneuve, 2007; chrisjohn & young, 1997; corrado & cohen, 2003; linklater, 2010). according to whitbeck, adams, hoyt, & chen, (2004), aboriginal and non-aboriginal scholars agree that the high rate of substance use, suicide, and self-harm are related to the impact of residential school abuse and resultant igt among aboriginal peoples (duran, 2006; evans-campbell, 2008; gone, 2008; kirmayer et al., 2009; waldram, 1997; wesley-esquimaux & smolewski, 2004). furthermore, behaviour disturbances associated with igt (e.g., ptsd, depression, anxiety disorders, self-harm, suicide, and suds) are coping mechanisms prevalent among aboriginal peoples (bombay, matheson, & anisman, 2009). in this study, we use the term igt rather than post-traumatic stress disorder (ptsd); brave 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.3 heart (2003) stated that although ptsd is adequate to describe the depth and effects of cumulative trauma, it has limitations in that ptsd does not address the transmission of trauma from generation to generation. h i s t o r i c a l a n d i n t e r g e n e r a t i o n a l t r a u m a the term “historical trauma,” also referred to as cumulative trauma (brave heart, 1998), soul wound (duran, 2006), and igt (oliver, 2003; whitbeck et al., 2004), originated from research into the experiences of holocaust survivors and their families (danieli, 1989; erikson 1963; fogelman 1991; van der kolk, 1987). igt refers to the cumulative emotional and psychological harm experienced throughout an individual’s lifespan and through subsequent generations (brave heart & debruyn, 1995; gagné, 1998). brave heart and debruyn (1995), gagné (1998), and menzies (2014) agree that igt occurs when the impact and damaging effects of traumatic experiences are left untreated in one generation. the term was identified to have significance for aboriginal populations when brave heart (1998) applied the concept of igt in her study of the lakota people, concluding that most participants in the study displayed symptoms related to trauma such as depression and anxiety. brave heart (1998) agreed with other researchers that trauma experienced by more than one generation becomes internalized within families and the community more broadly (brave heart, 1998). further research has shown that many aboriginal people suffer igt as a result of more than 400 years of systematic marginalization (abdullah & stringer, 1999; armitage, 1995; couture, 2000). it is well understood that at the core of aboriginal family and community issues in canada—including multiple mental health challenges, suicide, and suds—is the impact of colonization generally and, in particular, the impact of experiences at residential schools (chansonneuve, 2007; fontaine, 2010; menzies, 2014). inspired by the work of judith herman (1997), wesley-esquimaux and smolewski (2004) introduced a new model for trauma transmission and healing. they suggested that the presence of complex or endemic post-traumatic stress disorder (ptsd) in aboriginal cultures originated as a direct result of historic trauma transmission (htt). they described their model of trauma transmission as follows: the trauma memories are passed to next generations through different channels, including biological (in hereditary predispositions to post-traumatic stress disorder), cultural (through story-telling, culturally sanctioned behaviours), social (through inadequate parenting, lateral violence, acting out of abuse), and psychological (through memory processes) channels. (p. 76) haskell and randall (2009) claimed that wesley-esquimaux and smolewski’s finding is very significant because it “delineates a connection between the use of alcohol as a form of coping or numbing feelings by people attempting to deal with overwhelming current and/or historical traumas” (p. 71). i n d i g e n o u s h e a l i n g p r a c t i c e s t h a t t r e a t i g t a n d s u d according to existing literature, the key to healing from igt lies in reclaiming one’s identity (gone, 2008; kirmayer et al., 2009; smith, 1999; waldram, 1997). in this context, reclaiming aboriginal identity means recovering traditional values, beliefs, philosophies, ideologies, and approaches, and adapting them to contemporary needs (menzies, 2014; proulx & perrault, 2000). this reclamation process encompasses both individual and collective identity, and can be sought by way of traditional healing methods. to encourage the reclamation of identity, aboriginal health access centres and 3 marsh et al.: indigenous healing and seeking safety published by scholarship@western, 2016 friendship centres were established across canada, and they worked to revive traditional healing practices through the teachings of elders and traditional healers. they also offered physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual support to aboriginal peoples, as well as support for education and learning indigenous languages (blum, 2005; couture, 2000). these efforts have been employed to encourage resiliency (the capacity of an individual or culture to cope successfully in the face of significant adversity or risk), which many aboriginal communities (both rural and urban) agree is crucial to developing a central strategy to reclaim aboriginal identity (frideres & gadacz, 2008; norris, 2000). in a recent study that reviewed the literature on the use of interventions to treat suds in indigenous populations, rowan et al. (2014) found 19 studies in the united states (58%) and canada (42%) that integrated both western and indigenous culture-based services in both residential and outpatient programs. the authors reported that the results showed benefits in all areas of wellness, as well as a reduction in substance use by 74% of the studies (rowan et al., 2014). in response to this aboriginal identity renaissance, many health-care professionals have moved toward more holistic, culturally sensitive approaches to care. in addition, many health-care professionals have endeavoured to blend mainstream health-care practices with traditional aboriginal healing practices (martin-hill, 2003; poonwassie & charter, 2005; rojas & stubley, 2014). t h e t w o e y e d s e e i n g a p p r o a c h the blending of indigenous and western research methods, knowledge translation, and program development is a concept called two-eyed seeing (iwama, marshall, marshall, & bartlett, 2009). twoeyed seeing recognizes indigenous knowledge as a distinct and whole knowledge system that exists sideby-side with mainstream (western) science (iwama et al., 2009). in a recent literature review, rowan et al. (2014) agreed with other researchers’ claims (duran, 2006; hill, 2009; kovach, 2009; menzies, 2014) that the utilization of the two-eyed seeing approach in treatment and research was useful for supporting healing in indigenous communities. the search for a respectful research paradigm for this project led to the selection of a two-eyed seeing approach because it is an example of the application of an indigenous decolonizing lens to contemporary research. therefore, two-eyed seeing provided valuable guidance in the blending of seeking safety with indigenous healing practices (iwama et al., 2009). the application of the concept of two-eyed seeing incorporates and encourages inclusion, humility, honesty, trust, respect, collaboration, understanding, and acceptance of the strengths that reside in both western and indigenous worldviews (iwama et al., 2009). two-eyed seeing encourages indigenous peoples, health-care providers, and researchers to develop a relationship of mutual cultural respect, wherein the benefits of both worldviews are acknowledged as beneficial in the healing processes (bartlett, 2009; bartlett, marshall, & marshall, 2012; iwama et al., 2009). two-eyed seeing has been integrated into some forms of research and clinical practice and appears to be well suited to sud treatment for aboriginal adults. it is important to note that a thorough review of the literature did not identify any examples of the integration of indigenous traditional healing practices and mainstream treatments for substance use and igt, indicating a critical gap in both practice and research. as such, this research sought to explore the potential of such an approach in the treatment of igt and sud in an aboriginal population. 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.3 t h e e f f e c t i v e n e s s o f t h e m a i n s t r e a m s e e k i n g s a f e t y m o d e l the mainstream intervention chosen for this research was the seeking safety model, which has been found to be effective in a variety of settings (najavits & hien, 2013). the perspective of seeking safety is convergent with indigenous traditional methods and, because of the content and delivery method of seeking safety, the program complements traditional teachings such as holism, relational connection, spirituality, cultural presence, honesty, and respect (gone, 2008; lavallée, 2009; menzies, 2014). specifically, this model was chosen because it offered an individually empowering approach to the treatment of trauma and sud (najavits, 2002a). the seeking safety program is a well-researched, psycho-educational individual or group counselling intervention that targets the unique problems that result from substance use and post-traumatic stress disorder (ptsd). the model has been translated into numerous languages with implementation internationally (najavits, 2002a, 2007, 2009; najavits, & hein, 2013) and, in addition, has been used successfully among many minority populations, including african-americans, hispanics, and asian americans, as well as with women and men in prison, adolescents, and men returning from combat (najavits, 2009). gatz and colleagues (2007) reported that adult women who participated in seeking safety (in the context of additional substance use disorder and mental health services) demonstrated a greater reduction of their ptsd symptoms as well as improved coping skills compared to women who participated in traditional residential treatment programs for substance use. similarly, hien, cohen, miele, litt, and capstick (2004) compared the effectiveness of seeking safety and relapse prevention with non-standardized community care treatment for 107 urban, low-income, treatment-seeking women. they noted that participants' substance use and ptsd symptoms improved in seeking safety and relapse prevention, but not in the community care treatment. in their review of the literature on treatment studies for co-morbid substance use disorder and ptsd, najavits and hien (2013) showed positive outcomes on multiple domains, and found that the seeking safety program was the only treatment outperforming the control condition on both ptsd and substance use disorder (najavits & hien, 2013). indigenous research frameworks, methodologies, and approaches were applied throughout the entirety of this project. these included: • the application of two-eyed seeing; • consultation and collaboration with elders; • the establishment of an aboriginal advisory group; • the incorporation of indigenous traditional healing practices (marsh, coholic, et. al., 2015). this article explored the use of the seeking safety treatment model in combination with indigenous healing practices. this implementation project was co-created with aboriginal elders, who also collaborated on the development of the medicine wheel (see figure 1). 5 marsh et al.: indigenous healing and seeking safety published by scholarship@western, 2016 f i g u r e 1 . p a r t i c i p a n t m e d i c i n e w h e e l . adapted from vickers (1992-1993). 6 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.3 various aboriginal, culturally-based methods were used during the application process and during the traditional ceremonies. these ceremonies included: • sweat lodge ceremonies: a cultural practice performed in a heated, dome-shaped shelter that uses heat and steam to cleanse toxins from the mind, body, and spirit; • smudging: the burning of sacred herbs in a small bowl to purify people and places; • drumming: the use of ceremonial drums and songs as a way to connect with the creator and spirit; • sharing circles: a healing method in which all participants, including the elders, are viewed as equal and information, spirituality, and emotionality are shared; • sacred bundle: a very precious possession that represents a person's spiritual life; • traditional healers, who use a wide range of activities for the promotion of psychological and spiritual healing, such as herbal medicines; and • elder teachings (marsh et al., 2015a, 2015b; menzies, bodner, & harper, 2010; robbins & dewar, 2011). an elder is someone who is considered exceptionally wise in the ways of their culture and teachings (aboriginal healing foundation, 2005). they are recognized for their wisdom, their stability, their humour, and their ability to know what is appropriate in a particular situation. elders are the carriers of knowledge in both physical and spiritual realities, have been educated through the oral tradition, and carry credentials that are recognizable in aboriginal society. a traditional healer may not necessarily have all of these qualities, but their role in aboriginal society is to help people back towards health and wellness by the use of sacred plants, medicine, prayers, and ceremony. (duran, 2006; nabigon, 2006; mehl-madrona, 2009; menzies, 2014). m e t h o d s the process of decolonization requires ethically and culturally acceptable approaches to the study of issues involving indigenous peoples (menzies et al., 2010; smith, 1999; wilson, 2008). decolonization is further described as indigenous peoples embracing an understanding of the history of colonization and rediscovering their ancestral traditions and cultural values (duran, 2006; hart, 2010; wilson, 2008). it is a healing journey that involves painful emotions such as grief, anger, rage, depression, shame, and guilt (liamputtong, 2010; smith, 1999; wilson, 2008). to be consistent with a decolonization approach, it is important to honour cultural informants and knowledge. since this study incorporated aboriginal traditional healing practices, the elders, an aboriginal advisory group, and aboriginal scholars and clinicians (also called cultural informants) were consulted throughout the entire research process. four facilitators and two post-secondary students were selected to lead the seeking safety groups, which for our purposes were called sharing circles. the elders advised that these individuals should be indigenous and have experience working with aboriginal peoples. all four facilitators had previous 7 marsh et al.: indigenous healing and seeking safety published by scholarship@western, 2016 experience working with women and men who have experienced trauma and suds. as a competent practitioner in the western seeking safety model, the first author trained the facilitators in group facilitation and the delivery of the sharing circles. the training lasted for one week, comprised of 8 hours per day, and consisted of didactical, experiential, small-group learning, and practice sessions. the training was video recorded so that facilitators could critically reflect on their techniques. furthermore, the training included discourse on group methods, group processes, therapeutic use of self, and expectations. p a r t i c i p a n t s participants were recruited by counsellors and health-care workers from the following locations: n’swakamok native friendship centre, iris addiction recovery for women, salvation army addiction treatment centre, waters of change counselling centre, rockhaven recovery home for men, shkagamik-kwe health centre, and ontario addiction treatment centres (oatc) sudbury. in addition, participants were also recruited via workers on reserves in the surrounding area of sudbury, ontario. referrals were sent to the first author, who then held appointments with prospective participants. a convenience sampling approach was used to recruit 24 participants (12 women and 12 men) who selfidentified as aboriginal. all participants were willing to accept a method of treatment that incorporated aboriginal traditional healing practices. in addition, all participants resided off reserve in northern ontario and were between the ages of 24 and 68 years (with an average age of 35 years). of the 24 participants, 16 identified as ojibway, two as cree, and six as métis. furthermore, all participants selfreported that they struggled with igt and substance use (either actively using or not), that they had no active psychosis, no acute withdrawal, and no current suicidality or homocidality. as well, some participants (5 men and 7 women) reported substance use in the past 30 days. the cultural informants deemed self-reporting culturally appropriate for identifying substance use and trauma symptoms. the laurentian university research ethics board approved this study in may 2013. written informed consent was obtained from all participants. t h e a p p l i c a t i o n o f s h a r i n g c i r c l e s the seeking safety model can be conducted as a group or individual treatment method. for the purposes of this project, it was offered as a group treatment. this choice was made deliberately to allow the sessions to be offered via sharing circles, a practice that is well known among aboriginal peoples in canada and is generally considered to be comforting. in northern ontario, sharing circles are often used in aboriginal communities as part of ceremonies and as a way of healing (restoule, 2004; stevenson, 1999). the seeking safety program consists of up to 25 treatment topics that aim to teach participants a variety of skills. the majority of topics address the cognitive, behavioural, interpersonal, and case management needs of persons with substance use and post-traumatic stress disorder (ptsd) (najavits, 2002a). also, the seeking safety treatment model in the sharing circles included topics such as “when substances control you,” “dealing with anger,” “setting boundaries in relationships,” and “taking good care of yourself.” all of these topics were coupled with assisting participants in coming to understand the symptoms that plague them and offering them tools to manage those symptoms—as well as helping them to stay safe and to take good care of themselves (najavits, 2002a). 8 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.3 in accordance with the recommendations of the elders who guided this study, the sharing circles were offered separately for male and female participants. the elders advised that gender division was important to ensure that participants felt comfortable and safe during the sharing circle sessions. the men’s sharing circles (n = 12) took place at the rockhaven recovery home for men, located in sudbury, ontario. rockhaven delivers services that empower aboriginal and non-aboriginal men to develop a personal program of recovery from suds. forty percent of the men served by rockhaven are of aboriginal ancestry (patricia delyea, personal conversation, april 15, 2013). the female sharing circles (n = 12) were held at the n’swakamok native friendship centre, also in sudbury, ontario. the n’swakamok native friendship centre assists aboriginal peoples by providing programs that serve the social, cultural, and recreational needs of the urban aboriginal community. each sharing circle was cofacilitated by two aboriginal health-care workers and one student (hereafter called facilitators). these facilitators organized and led sharing circles twice a week for 13 weeks. each weekly sharing circle lasted two hours. the facilitators, while covering the seeking safety topics (e.g., when substances control you, dealing with anger, setting boundaries in relationships, and taking good care of yourself), used the culturally relevant method of storytelling. they incorporated teachings about the history of aboriginal peoples, as well as the seven grandfather teachings that discuss human conduct with an emphasis on wisdom, love, honesty, respect, bravery, humility, and truth (benton-banai, 1988). one elder was also present at most sessions to help participants develop a connection to the spiritual world through traditional teachings (menzies et al., 2010). the elders taught about two-eyed seeing while also focusing on the positive identity of each person in the circle. two of the facilitators were also traditional healers at the friendship centre. therefore, their presence as both facilitators and healers was powerful in the sharing circles. their skills included abilities to promote psychological and spiritual healing and complement the elders’ teachings. to encourage a holistic view of mental health and substance use (which includes connection to community), many indigenous protocols were incorporated into the sharing circles. each sharing circle was opened and closed with smudging, ceremonial drumming, and singing. tobacco, an herb recognized in aboriginal culture for its healing powers, was prepared in bundles in advance of the sharing circles, and it was offered to each participant for their protection and healing. participants were also invited to participate in sweat lodge ceremonies. d a t a c o l l e c t i o n the first step in the data collection process was the initial meetings with the 24 participants, each of which lasted approximately 90 minutes. in these meetings, participants were briefed about the sharing circles, specifically regarding the process and how the program would be offered. participants were given information about the duration of the program, the methods that would be used, and their role in the treatment. it was important in terms of respect that participants knew what to expect throughout their involvement in this research process. in the second step of the data collection process, all 24 participants were given an end-of-session seeking safety questionnaire to complete, which had to be completed each time they attended a sharing circle. this questionnaire was designed as part of the seeking safety program (najavits, 2002a) to capture the 9 marsh et al.: indigenous healing and seeking safety published by scholarship@western, 2016 immediate and specific reaction of participants to the seeking safety content of the program (najavits, 2002a). the third step of data collection involved conducting end-of-treatment sharing circles for each group— that is, the nine women and eight men who completed the program. this qualitative data was specifically collected via a 90-minute end-of-treatment sharing circle with participants. one end-of-treatment sharing circle was held for each of the two treatment groups, and both of the sharing circles were held within two weeks of the group’s last treatment-related sharing circle (see appendix a for the question guide). as the fourth step of the data collection process, 75-minute semi-structured interviews were conducted with each of the 17 participants who completed the program. these semi-structured interviews were also carried out with each of the four facilitators (see appendix b). d a t a a n a l y s i s all discussions from the end-of-treatment sharing circles and the semi-structured interviews were audiotaped and transcribed verbatim using pseudonyms to maintain participant confidentiality. after transcription, a qualitative thematic analysis was initiated to examine the data. this method was selected to be consistent with cultural data analysis models that require significant involvement and interpretation from the researcher (bernard & ryan, 1998; denzin & lincoln, 2005). first, the texts were read and re-read to identify and describe implicit and explicit ideas within the data (creswell, 2009). next, codes were developed to represent the identified themes and link the raw data as summary markers. code frequencies and code occurrences were then compared and the emerging relationships between the codes were graphically displayed. finally, four emerging themes were identified (bernard & ryan, 1998; creswell, 2009) (see figure 1). these themes were shared with the 17 participants, and they all confirmed that the depiction of their experiences during the implementation of the project were accurate. during data analysis, the elders who guided this research process explored the four core themes and confirmed that these themes connected with the teachings and four quadrants of the medicine wheel. the elders recommended that the results be depicted through the lens of the medicine wheel in order to authenticate the project’s use of two-eyed-seeing specifically and an indigenous decolonizing methodology generally (j. ozawagosh & f. ozawagosh, personal conversation, january 5, 2014). r e s u l t s the following four core themes were identified: a. healing through traditional indigenous methods; b. impact, education, and knowledge through the seeking safety sharing circles; c. awareness, understanding, and the link between trauma, substance use, and the impact of colonization; and 10 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.3 d. integration and application of knowledge. the participants will be identified as male or female participant 1, 2, or 3—and so forth (p1, p2, p3). h e a l i n g t h r o u g h t r a d i t i o n a l i n d i g e n o u s m e t h o d s in this section, we describe how the traditional indigenous healing methods impacted the participants. the sharing circles and the presence of elders, aboriginal facilitators, sacred bundles, sacred teachings, sacred medicines, and ceremonies strengthened the experience of participants, and most reported that the inclusion of traditional healing approaches and the presence of elders were helpful to them. seven of the participants explained that they had lost their traditions by growing up off reserve, or that their families did not follow the traditional way. p4 of the female group noted, it was really good to be brought back to my own traditional ways; i have never attended an addiction program that included my cultural beliefs and values; i could see how it helped all of the women. similarly, p16 of the male group reported that, all the ceremonies helped me so much; it really grounded me when i felt scared; i could see how the spiritual and the presence of creator was bringing the healing to others that really struggled. many of the participants reported similar experiences during the sharing circles. several participants said that all aboriginal programs should include traditional practices because they facilitated culturally meaningful healing. p13 male explained, i loved it when the elders came [and brought all the sacred teachings and healing]; i wanted them to come to every session; the elders facilitated the healing power of the smudging, drumming songs and the sacred bundle; the elders brought the spirituality to the circle; the elders gave everyone and me in the circle that connection [with the sacred medicine]. participants also remarked on the benefit of the sweat lodge ceremonies. most who attended the sweat ceremony claimed that they felt the healing happening in their bodies and minds. for example, one participant said: as i was sitting with the elders in the sweat ceremony, i could see my addiction and trauma pains melt away in the heat; the ceremony brought healing for us all and it is so powerful; i have not attended a sweat ceremony in many years. [p19 male] similarly, p2 female said, i really liked it when the facilitators brought in the traditional ways; they were so good to us and never judged us, even when we told them we used. as the participants talked about their experiences with traditional healing practices, many of the participants said “miigwetch” (which means “thank you” in ojibway) to the facilitators and the elders 11 marsh et al.: indigenous healing and seeking safety published by scholarship@western, 2016 for respecting their traditions and bringing them to the treatment program. also, most of the participants praised the fact that the treatment was offered in sharing circles. p8 female said, it was good to come and sit in the circle every week; the circle is the way we do ceremony and i felt safe knowing i am in ceremony. all the participants affirmed that the elders and facilitators helped them to heal and rediscover their identities. for example, in the female group, the facilitators decided to invite the women to take turns setting up the sacred bundle. this aspect of the treatment was highly praised by the female participants. p1 stated, i felt so honoured when i was asked by the facilitators to set up the sacred bundle and medicine; i felt valued, trusted, and respected, as i was never asked to do this before. additionally, several of the participants, both male and female, commented on the power of the singing and drumming. p15 male reported, whenever i heard the song and drum, my pain would go away, my fear would leave my body; it was so powerful. many of the participants shared their feelings about the loss of their land and tradition. these conversations emerged during the initial intake sessions and during the completion of the historical loss questionnaires. as p15 male stated, nobody ever asked me this question about how i felt about losing my land; i did not even know that i thought about it so often; my grandfather took me hunting when i was a boy, and i feel that happiness now, in these circles with the elders. likewise, p4 female shared: i love the bush; when i am in the bush i feel strong and whole; when i feel sad, i go to the bush. many indigenous peoples realized that loss of identity caused many problems, such as sadness and low self-esteem, leading to self-harm with alcohol and substances. today, many find healing as they become rooted in their cultural communities (brave heart, 1998; duran, 2006; kovach, 2009; menzies, 2014). this was reported and expressed in the qualitative data by both the men and the women. they found this connection and sense of self and belonging through participating in the sharing circles, smudging, drumming, sacred bundles, presence and teachings of the elders and facilitators as well as in each other through their stories and sharing. as many of the participants reported, sitting in these sharing circles, looking at the sacred items, and listening to the drum and the words of the elders makes me so happy, i felt so strong and connected to my culture. [p21 male] words like these came through over and over in the transcripts. the connection and healing was evident and present week after week. 12 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.3 i m p a c t , e d u c a t i o n , a n d k n o w l e d g e t h r o u g h t h e s e e k i n g s a f e t y s h a r i n g c i r c l e s in this section, we discuss how the seeking safety information and the presence of the facilitators enhanced understanding and brought healing for participants. most of the participants identified that the information in the seeking safety handouts was written in a way that they could understand. they also reported that the language was clear, sensitive, positive, and supportive. the participants thanked the facilitators for working through all of the topics in such a systematic and gentle way, and described the facilitators as caring, compassionate, and kind. several of the participants revealed that they now understand the role that their symptoms play in their lives, and how trauma and addiction affect them daily. as some participants noted, at this point in the program, i have been able to relate my experiences on ptsd and honouring myself through the culture and the support of people. [p12 female] today was a real eye opening experience realizing how substance abuse is connected to [my] trauma. [p12 female] it was such an eye opener to realize that all these symptoms i’ve had all my life are a normal result of my childhood trauma. [p3 female] i am very thankful. [several participants] furthermore, participants began to articulate how the growing knowledge of their symptoms empowered them. for example, most participants expressed how the sharing circles, handouts, and content brought a deeper understanding about the pain and suffering caused by trauma and substance use. p7 female stated: i finally found my voice; i can be safe doing my healing work and i need not be re-traumatized; my workers understand that my addiction and trauma must be treated at the same time; i now know how to ask for help; i realized in this circle that i was never alone and i have all the resources that i need; i now understand how that addiction and trauma work together. most participants appreciated the binder of seeking safety materials that they received, which included all the seeking safety topics and highlighted the benefit of being able to go back to the material at any time. the information about safety in the circle was taught through safe coping skills, a safe coping sheet, a safety plan, and a report of safe and unsafe behaviours at each session. most of the participants said that these topics helped them to feel safe in the sharing circle and that they could begin to apply this safety in their daily lives. for example, p15 male explained: i really like this seeking safety stuff; it’s so easy to understand it; i leave the binder on my coffee table and i see how my 17 year-old son reads the handouts; it’s so good for my children to know that i am healing. many participants reflected on how powerful it was to understand how they brought substances into their lives to help them deal with the pain and suffering of trauma and abuse. they stated that this new 13 marsh et al.: indigenous healing and seeking safety published by scholarship@western, 2016 knowledge helped them to feel strong again, and to feel confident that they could heal and get better. others reflected on how difficult it was to hear some of the topics. p2 male reflected, if only i knew this then, i could have been better already, because i hurt myself so much over the years. the facilitators always reminded the participants that they have to be in the present moment and to give thanks for the knowledge that they are receiving now. some participants reported that sitting in the circles was hard sometimes, but that they were always there for each other and they bonded, connected, and became like a family. chansonneuve (2007) explained that some residential school survivors express their grief as lateral violence directed toward family and community members; thereby creating intergenerational cycles of abuse that resemble many of the experiences at the residential schools (chansonneuve, 2007; mccormick, 2009). a tangible example of lateral violence is evident in the fact that half of the women involved in this research had lost custody of their children who were then placed in the care of the children’s aid society (cas). they expressed how painful, shameful, and emotional it was for them to have lost their children because of their substance use, and they began to make the connection between their continued use of substances and the pain of missing their children—the substances help them to numb themselves to this pain. p5 female stated: i feel a pain deep here in my heart when i think of my babies; it is not right what they did; the residential school is just still here and now it’s called cas; i feel sometimes like just dying, but then i drink to stop the pain. five of the women regained custody of their children during the second and third months of the program. when the women reported this in the sharing circle, it was a powerful moment that was empowering for all the women in the circle. for example, when the first woman regained custody of her two daughters, she shared the news in the sharing circle and encouraged the other women who lost their children not to give up. this became an inspiration for the other women to embrace the program and their healing journeys. during this time, the elder gave the women a teaching about taking good care of their children and encouraged the women not to give up hope. most of the participants appreciated the fact that the facilitators handled substance use relapses compassionately. participants knew that they could come back to the circle and be honest about their use without judgment. this was extremely transformative for both the men and the women, who felt that the supportive nature of the facilitators helped them to heal. for example, one participant stated, the facilitators, oh man they’re awesome; you can’t say a bad thing about them, it’s unreal; they helped us all; they never judged the ones that used; they always just welcome them back, man; they helped p18 quite a bit too because he had lots of problems. [p1 male] participants also reported that they had received much wisdom from the seeking safety topics. for example, one participant said, 14 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.3 i experienced more peace; i am more peaceful, more joyful; that’s how much this program affected me; just by hearing those others, with their problems, growing up and their childhood traumas, helped me a lot; and every one of those sessions i attended changed me somewhat; and after the sessions, it’s like a new you coming out of those sessions; that’s how much it affected me. [p7 female] this sentiment was echoed by some of the other participants as well. frequently mentioned topics that were identified as particularly helpful to participants included honesty, red and green flags, integrating the split self (a condition in which a person experiences different parts of herself—for example the angry self or harsh self), and coping with triggers. furthermore, most of the participants reported feeling safe, cared for, and empowered. both male and female sharing circle participants reported how powerful it was to share their stories with others who had similar experiences. p8 female shared, i am not alone; i am not the only one going through this; seeking safety taught me that i started to use alcohol because of my trauma and that i can heal from both [the trauma and the addiction concurrently]. most of the participants reflected on things that they internalized through learning about the seeking safety topics, including morals, values, culture, and language. for example, p17 male stated, this program is amazing; i want to share it with my family because now i understand why i was so hard on myself and why i hurt my family; this is good stuff. others shared the connections they made regarding why and how they had feelings of shame, guilt, pain, and disconnection, and why they hated themselves. p2 female noted, seeking safety language is so soft and gentle, and it helped me to forgive myself for things i did in the past. many stated that the topic on commitment gave them knowledge about taking responsibility. most participants reported that the language used in the seeking safety model was similar to the seven grandfathers teachings because it focused on respect, honesty, love, and compassion for self and others. a w a r e n e s s , u n d e r s t a n d i n g , a n d t h e l i n k b e t w e e n s u b s t a n c e u s e , t r a u m a , a n d t h e i m p a c t o f c o l o n i z a t i o n in this section, we clarify and discuss how understanding the link between igt and suds brought relief and healing to all the participants. this theme emerged very powerfully in both male and female sharing circles, as well as during the semi-structured interviews. most of the participants stated that even though all the seeking safety topics were different, each of the sessions and topics helped them to understand trauma, the impact of colonization, suds, and their interrelatedness. participants expressed their learning and understanding through “a-ha” moments, and they remained in awe of this new knowledge and understanding as they began to realize that they could control their self-destructive behaviours. both male and female participants began to understand their trauma and substance use as they began to identify when they needed to self-medicate with substances (triggers). they could feel their dependence 15 marsh et al.: indigenous healing and seeking safety published by scholarship@western, 2016 during the times they craved substances. they also learned that they experienced physical changes in the body during these times and, because of this new insight into their behaviours and physical reactions, they learned to put words to their feelings. for example, p4 female stated, i feel that same [wanting to drink when i am sad] feeling and hurt and i know exactly what you [the other participants] mean, because it [the cravings when i am sad] happens to me all the time. this statement suggests that p4 developed a better understanding about how her sadness makes her to feel the need to remove it by using substances. participants reported that when they began to understand the information and connection between substance use and their trauma, they could make healthier decisions in their lives. in both male and female sharing circles, the teachings about safety, self-care, and acknowledgment of their trauma and their use of substances had a profound impact on their day-to-day lives. these teachings were reported in almost every circle through the participants’ statements. an illustrative example of this comes from p18 male, who explained, when i completed that historical loss scale, i realized that i never thought about these losses in this way; yet now that i am asked about it, i realized that it had a profound effect on me and my family; i understand now why i get so very angry, because we are still living it [the historical trauma]; we live it every day. likewise, p17 male also shared the impact of these realizations: i can see now why it is so important for me to have compassion for my trauma and addiction; i witnessed how my parents used alcohol and how they hurt themselves; both my parents went to residential schools and they never talked about it; they only drank, and hurt us and themselves and they died when i was a boy. stories like the ones above often emerged during the circles. during the sharing of such a painful story, the facilitators would burn sacred medicine and place it at the feet of the speaking participant to help with her or his self-regulation of the pain. the presence and the teachings from the elders assisted with bringing clarity and awareness to the participants, and the knowledge and teachings also connected the participants to their traditions and spirit. i n t e g r a t i o n a n d a p p l i c a t i o n o f k n o w l e d g e in this section, we explore how traditional healing and seeking safety simultaneously brought healing for participants dealing with both igt and suds. when participants were asked about their experiences in the sharing circles, both men and women discussed the traditional healing elements and the seeking safety topics. these elements included smudging, drumming, teachings by the elders, the seven grandfather teachings, and the sweat lodge ceremonies. participants discussed how the seeking safety topics informed them about trauma and the use of substances. they further stated that they could use this new knowledge to continue their healing. for example, p11 female explained, 16 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.3 i realized that i was healing and that i can heal; as i heal, my children will heal also; as my children heal, my family will also heal; as my family heals, so will my community. other participants said, when i was in the circle, i was held [feeling safe and supported] by all the ceremonies, the sacred medicine, the teachings by the elders, and the love of the facilitators. [p10 female] other aspects that i found helpful were that we were given tools to help us in our recovery; we were given topics that helped us with self-care; i thought that was important, as many people suffer with trauma and only know to cope using substances; the topics that were covered not only shed light on our illness, but also gave us tools to cope with it. [p10 female] these types of statements continued throughout the transcripts and were also present in the end-ofsession questionnaires. the words and stories of the participants provided a clear indication of the impact of sharing circles. many of the participants reported that they felt they could connect with their identity through ceremony and understanding trauma, their symptoms, and their behaviours. this acknowledgement from the participants of the impact of integrated implementation is supported by the work of mccormick (2005), who confirmed that “one of the roles of therapy for traditional aboriginal society has been to reaffirm cultural values” (p. 298). therefore, the integration of indigenous traditional healing practices and the seeking safety model encouraged participants to consider different core components of the healing process than would typically be available. d i s c u s s i o n this study set out to identify whether or not indigenous traditional healing practices, blended with the seeking safety treatment model, would be a feasible, suitable, and beneficial group implementation project for addressing and dealing with igt and suds in aboriginal women and men. this study found that blended implementation project profoundly affected the symptoms and behaviours related to igt and addiction in the participants, particularly for the 17 completers. i n t e g r a t i o n o f t h e c o r e t h e m e s i n t o t h e m e d i c i n e w h e e l brave heart (1998) duran (2006), hill (2009), marsh et al. (2015a) and menzies (2014) agree that restoring indigenous traditional healing practices and knowledge is a pathway to both empowerment and health for aboriginal peoples and communities. however, to achieve this goal, the traditional knowledge once practiced in aboriginal societies also needs to be restored. in addition, traditional knowledge must be included in intervention measures aimed at substance use, trauma, and the epidemics facing aboriginal peoples (marsh et al., 2015). the proposed descriptive framework of this study brought together the following four core themes: a. healing through traditional indigenous healing methods; b. impact, education, and knowledge through sharing circles; 17 marsh et al.: indigenous healing and seeking safety published by scholarship@western, 2016 c. awareness, understanding, and the links between trauma, substance use, and the impact of colonization; and d. integration and application of knowledge. the medicine wheel was used as a visual tool to conceptualize the integrative process and the two-eyed seeing approach, and figure 1 illustrates how the components of the medicine wheel and the sharing circles influenced the participants’ learning, healing, and growth. this medicine wheel was adapted from an article by j. r. vickers (1992-1993) and, in addition, the framework is based on the work of duran (2006), martin-hill (2003), nabigon (2006), and nabigon, hagey, webster, and mckay (1999). there are many interpretations of the medicine wheel; however, for this research, an outer circle was added to depict the seven grandfather teachings that contributed to the participants’ learning, guidance, and growth throughout this implementation project. t h e m e d i c i n e w h e e l a n d t h e f i r s t q u a d r a n t the color yellow is in the east. it represents spring and the spiritual aspect of the mind. the elders have taught that the spring in the medicine wheel represents beginnings, sunrise, and a new dawn, children, change, new ideas, and a new light (menzies, 2014; menzies et al., 2010; nabigon, 2006; nabigon et al., 1999). this quadrant depicts the core theme of healing through indigenous traditional practices. the evidence supporting this statement comes from the voices of the participants themselves who concluded that the following aspects, listed below, supported their healing during the program: • the teachings from the elders and participants, • the healing power of drumming, • smudging, • sweat lodge ceremonies, • the sacred bundle, and • the sacred medicines. many participants discussed feeling a sense of freedom in themselves and feeling connected with others in the circle. some talked about the healing that took place during the sharing circles. for example, participant 15 male stated, it was nice to see that all the spiritual stuff was incorporated, because growing up i never had that type of experience [with the traditional practices]; i enjoyed the elders coming and teaching us; [the elder’s] body language was warm; she would sing and pray and i felt moved by the spirituality of it. this sense of freedom is often discussed by trauma survivors (duran & duran, 1995; herman, 1997). it is understood that trauma or ptsd takes away one’s connection to self, others, and the world. the 18 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.3 activated nervous system is often experienced and described by survivors as a felt sense of living in a prison. when people finally begin to heal, this sense of safety and freedom returns (haskell & randall, 2009; herman, 1997; marsh, 2010). duran (2006) wrote that indigenous spirituality is closely linked with culture, connection to land, and ways of living in indigenous communities (duran & duran, 1995; duran, 2006). loss of land, culture, and spirituality, as well as the effects of colonization and oppression negatively influenced the well being, strength, and courage of aboriginal peoples. it is therefore critical to reclaim culture, employ traditional methods, and integrate spirituality in order to promote community empowerment and healing (brascoupé & waters, 2009; brave heart, 1998; crazy bull, 1997). t h e m e d i c i n e w h e e l a n d t h e s e c o n d q u a d r a n t the color red, in the south, represents summer and the emotional mind. the elders taught that the south in the medicine wheel represents maturing and growing into adulthood. it also reflects the direction of the fire, rising from the flames, transformation and integration, and a time to accept change and to learn (menzies et al., 2010; 2003; nabigon, 2006; nabigon et al., 1999). this quadrant depicts the core theme of the impact of education and knowledge through the sharing circles. the new, selfidentified coping skills that emerged from the participants included finding their voices, getting clarity about the role of their symptoms, knowing that they are not alone, and understanding trauma and substance use. as one participant said, what i found most helpful was the grounding; i never knew anything about that; i would always think that it was real [the flashbacks]; it felt real to me; but then we got these tools from seeking safety; now i ground myself and tell myself it is not real [the flashbacks and nightmares]; that’s what i found most helpful. [p8 female] another stated, the most rewarding thing in the sharing circle was being able to witness the changes in the women, from when they came the first time through the doors and when they left, their facial expressions, their body language; just seeing the transformation in them was so healing. [p12 female] some of these types of participant responses are discussed in the literature on group psychotherapy. for example, yalom and leszez (2005) have written about the power of shared testimonies of traumatized individuals. they specifically refer to the moment when two people compassionately respond to the needs of the other. they agree with other scholars that trauma destroys a person’s faith, decency, courage, and connection. the power of group sharing or sharing circles resulted in a reawakening of the feeling of connection with others through relationships that were the result of altruism by others in the group (brave heart, 2003; drake, 2003; duran, 2006; herman, 2006; marsh, 2010; yalom & leszez, 2005). yalom and leszez (2005) also stated that individuals in groups mirror the actions of others and, in so doing, the survivor recognizes and claims a lost part of himself or herself. in that moment, the survivor begins to re-join the human community (marsh, 2010; yalom & leszez, 2005). many traumatized individuals lose their sense of connection to other people, and often move into isolation. 19 marsh et al.: indigenous healing and seeking safety published by scholarship@western, 2016 therefore, communal connection, as was displayed in the sharing circles, was reported to be highly effective for the participants’ healing (marsh, 2010). t h e m e d i c i n e w h e e l a n d t h e t h i r d q u a d r a n t the color black is in the west. it represents autumn and the physical body. elders taught that the west in the medicine wheel represents later adulthood, sunset and twilight, new awareness, time to prepare and finish things, and family and responsibility (menzies, 2014; menzies et al., 2010; nabigon et al., 1999; nabigon, 2006). the third quadrant represents the core themes of awareness, understanding, and the link between substance use, trauma, and the impact of colonization. participants in this study reflected upon healing stories, listening, laughter, and understanding the connection of body and mind. i liked the topics where we worked with emotion, especially anger, because in my journey, i got myself into trouble because i did not know how to express myself; i did not know there were other feelings under the anger and i learned that in the circles. [p24 male] there was no hysterical screaming or yelling or vomiting or any of that violent stuff in this program, just gentle release of tears; i really loved that; so i have been able to use some of the stuff i learned in the groups; i have been able to be with my emotions and check in during the day. [p24 male] all the themes reflected in the quotations from the participants refer to elements that contributed to learning, growth, insight, and healing. furthermore, the blue arrows facing in both directions show the power of integration and connection to self, others, and their identities. the arrows also illustrate how well the learning and teaching were integrated by participants, demonstrating the concept of the twoeyed seeing decolonizing approach. western and indigenous traditional healing practices are joined together in respect and acceptance in the sharing circles (bartlett, 2005; bartlett et al., 2012). t h e m e d i c i n e w h e e l a n d t h e f o u r t h q u a d r a n t the fourth quadrant is white and represents the north, winter, and the mental and intellectual mind. the elders taught that the north in the medicine wheel represents purity and wisdom, healing, dreamtime, growing and reflection, understanding wisdom, and listening (menzies, 2014; menzies et al., 2010; nabigon et al., 1999; nabigon, 2006). this quadrant depicted the core theme of integration and application of knowledge. the themes that emerged via the quotations from the participants included connections to their children, the land, their cultures, and the elders. for example, as these participants reported, we looked forward to seeing each other each week; we were worried about others, when they did not make it to the circle; we would say a prayer, like we became connected like a family. [p10 female] “i liked everything in the circles; we became like a family, we were always thinking about the other person [the no-shows]; to be dedicated two times a week for three months was a big thing, but we came, we made it and it was good. [p15 male] 20 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.3 the women were all very helpful, being open to each other, trusting each other, and talking about their souls, because i can relate to a lot of these stories of theirs; i know now that i am not alone. [p8 female] i did not know that i was so affected by the loss of my land; i knew about the loss of my culture and now i see that i really miss being on the land and the elders taught about this [connection to the land and culture]. [p15 male] traumatized people often lose their senses of the meaning of life, perceive that they are hopeless, and experience periods of time in which they feel de-humanized. some authors refer to this condition as a spiritual crisis or soul wound (duran & duran, 2006). this disconnection has an even greater effect on their senses of community and belonging, moving them further into feelings of isolation, shame, guilt, and self-blame (drake, 2003; duran & duran, 1995; herman, 1997; marsh, 2010). while participants often reported these emotions and feelings in the beginning of their involvement with this study, their symptoms lessened as the treatment progressed. furthermore, it is well documented that connection to land, the physical environment, cultural practices, and spirituality enhance community well-being (colomeda & wenzel, 2005; duran, 2006; kirmayer, simpson, & cargo, 2003; menzies, 2014; thatcher, 2004). the loss of land, culture, and language through colonization left many communities in turmoil with no strategies to enhance their healing (brave heart-jordan & debruyn, 1995; duran, 2006; gone, 2009; smith, 1999; waldram, 2008; warry, 2008). these connections and powerful moments of seeing and connecting came through very clearly in all four themes. t h e m e d i c i n e w h e e l a n d t h e c e n t e r c i r c l e finally, the center circle honours the resiliency of aboriginal people (including the participants and facilitators). it represents how well they are doing in spite of all of the losses they have endured. the elders and the aboriginal advisory group placed the self, family, community, elders, and healers at the center to represent that anything is possible when people are connected and united. although seeking safety was originally developed to address the concurrent treatment needs of clients with both ptsd and sud (najavits, 2002a), it had never been combined with indigenous traditional healing practices. it is important to note that the diagnostic and statistical manual-v (dsm-v) criteria for ptsd were not used here as this study focused on symptoms of igt (american psychiatric association, 2014). the reduction of these debilitating symptoms after the sharing circles implementation, as reported by the participants, was remarkable. most of the participants repeatedly described how powerful it was to experience a program that integrated both the teachings of seeking safety and traditional indigenous healing practices. participants indicated that the seeking safety information helped them understand their behaviours with substances, while the traditional healing practices helped them to connect with their inner spiritual selves. the traditional practices also helped them to restore their connections to their identities, their families, communities, their cultures, and the elders. the participants stated that the presence of the elders and the caring and supportive facilitators further enhanced their positive, healing experiences. 21 marsh et al.: indigenous healing and seeking safety published by scholarship@western, 2016 t h e i n d i g e n o u s h e a l i n g a n d s e e k i n g s a f e t y i m p l e m e n t a t i o n p r o j e c t ( i h s s ) over the three-month implementation period, 17 participants completed the indigenous healing and seeking safety (ihss) implementation project. participant retention was addressed by the number of sessions they attended (10). seven participants did not complete the program. participants with more severe problems related to drugs as detected by the asi-lite composite scale were more likely not to complete the program (marsh et. al., in press). at the end of the implementation project, all 17 participants showed significant improvements in reported substance use and igt symptoms. many experienced relief from their symptoms, which included feeling less angry, being able to self-regulate negative emotions and behaviours, and being aware of and attending to difficult emotions. all of these changes were experienced during the ceremonies, singing, drumming, the teachings of elders, and sharing circles. in a recent study, patitz (2011) examined the efficacy of seeking safety by analyzing the historical records of 23 women who had completed the seeking safety program. the study found a reduction in the severity of trauma symptoms following seeking safety treatment, and reported similar results to those reported in this article. at the completion of the implementation project, all of the eight male participants who completed the study were by their own report substance free, as were six of the nine women. the three women who did not succeed in staying clean had mild slips back to using alcohol and opiates. however, they reported being back on track after these brief relapses. a study by lowe, liang, riggs, and henson (2012) found that culturally based interventions with native american adolescents were significantly more effective at reducing substance use and related problems than non-culturally based interventions. in a recent randomized controlled trial, hien et al. (2015) tested the benefits of combining seeking safety with sertraline, a frontline medication for ptsd shown also to affect drinking outcomes. both groups demonstrated significant improvements in ptsd symptoms (hein et al., 2015). a profound outcome of this implementation project was that five women regained custody of their children. this took place within the third month for some and, for others, toward the end of the implementation project. to date, these five women are substance free and fully engaged parents. while these women were in the program, the first author of this study wrote letters to cas to explain how the loss of their children impinged on their healing. the first author also explained the impact of igt on the women’s well-being, and how well they were doing in the sharing circles. during the early data collection period, six female participants shared many painful stories about trauma and the impact of substances on their lives and their children. these six women were highly emotional as they reported losing their families to cas. furthermore, the women reported how they had numbed themselves with substances to ease the pain of missing their children. indeed, this outcome speaks to the success of sharing circles implementation project, as these women reported that the two-eyed seeing approach for igt and sud helped them to understand their pain and dependence. with the understanding of why they were using substances, coupled with support and healing ceremonies, they were on a journey of healing. the teachings and healing that occurred in the sweat lodge significantly added to the healing power of the blended implementation project. sweat lodge ceremonies represent returning to the womb of mother earth. in these ceremonies, participants were encouraged to release the pain of the past and present and claim back the spirit. through the presence of the elders, the creator, and the ancestors, healing was reported at a deep level by all of the participants. 22 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.3 the hallmark of seeking safety is to encourage safety and self-care so that a space can be created for healing from both igt and sud (najavits, 2007). all of the core content in the sharing circles was delivered to promote knowledge and understanding so that the cause of participants’ problems could be addressed. the sharing circles came from the same premise. it was implemented to encourage participants to heal from internalized oppression, which was causing participants to self-harm (gone, 2009; hill, 2009; kovach, 2009; najavits & hein, 2013; patitz, 2011). during their time in the program, participants experienced growing support from their families, friends, and community members. as the reputation of this research and implementation project spread in the aboriginal communities and treatment agencies, the authors were not surprised when health sciences north, the regional hospital in sudbury, ontario, started a seeking safety sharing circle in their healing lodge. the iris addiction recovery for women centre and the n’swakamok native friendship centre followed suit. currently, six other agencies in sudbury are in the planning stages of implementing the sharing circles as an ongoing element of their treatment programs. l i m i t a t i o n s participants perceived that seeking safety was enhanced with traditional teachings and methods. however, this study did not have a control condition for seeking safety alone (without the traditional teachings and methods), and thus there is no way to draw conclusions about the relative impact of using these traditional methods. various other projects affirm the positive impact of incorporating traditional healing methods, but those projects also did not have a control condition. thus, further research is needed to evaluate the empirical impact of studies with and without such methods. in a recent study, oulanova and moodley (2010) found that integrative efforts of mental health professionals in their practice proved extremely helpful for clients. kirmayer and colleagues (2003) have further affirmed the value of offering such access to traditional ways of healing, stating, “recuperating these traditions reconnects contemporary aboriginal peoples to their historical traditions and mobilizes rituals and practices that may promote community solidarity. more broadly, the recovery of tradition itself may be viewed as healing” (p. 16). the representativeness of participants in this study is of potential concern. for example, the sample population was small and confined to two specific agencies in northern ontario. a future study with a larger sample size and a recruitment strategy designed to generate a more broadly representative sample may increase the generalizability of these findings. another limitation is that the experiences and views of the participants may not be representative of aboriginal people elsewhere across different regions or provinces. in addition, the data on substance use, mental health, and igt was self-reported. therefore, variables such as lifetime diagnosis of a mental disability or disorder may be imprecise. in addition, there is a possibility that participants may under-report experiences and behaviours that are too painful to recall, or are absent from memory. however, in spite of the limitations, the key strengths to this study continue to be: • the authenticity and cultural sensitivity of the indigenous decolonizing methodology and the two-eyed seeing approach; 23 marsh et al.: indigenous healing and seeking safety published by scholarship@western, 2016 • the academic rigor of the project due to the inclusion of elders, community informants, an aboriginal advisory group, an indigenous supervisor, and an aboriginal committee member; • the voices of indigenous peoples through the qualitative research approach; • the historical lens used throughout the project; and • the presence of indigenous facilitators and students in sharing circles. c o n c l u s i o n this study provided the perspectives of aboriginal peoples in sudbury, ontario, who reported devastating symptoms of igt, substance abuse, and loss of culture that signify continuing trauma. aboriginal peoples continue to struggle with the compounding impacts of igt, colonization, the stolen generations,1 racism, discrimination, and cultural dislocation (brave heart, 1998; marsh et al., 2015a; menzies, 2014). a dynamic, multilevel approach is necessary to address historical trauma among indigenous peoples at the individual, family, organizational, community, and policy levels (spittal et al., 2007). in addition, collaboration with traditional helpers and elders is integral to improving mental health care for indigenous peoples (duran, 2006; hill, 2009; mehl-madrona, 2009; menzies, 2014). in discussing the role of traditional practices in aboriginal health in canada, waldram, herring, and young (1995) stated, “at the heart of the matter is the need for increasing dialogue between healers and physicians, including the possibility of collaboration” (p. 247). the key to success for healing could come from changes in policy for the treatment of igt and substance use in aboriginal peoples. furthermore, through their resilience and hope, aboriginal communities have proven that healing is possible, but it requires an understanding of the decades of struggle. this article has presented qualitative findings that indicate the strong and positive impact of seeking safety when combined with traditional healing methods. future research is encouraged to replicate this work in other aboriginal populations to add evidence to the benefits of such an approach (gone, 2009; hill, 2009; kovach, 2009; mehl-madrona, 2009; menzies et al., 2010). in addition, future studies could focus on the importance of collaboration between mainstream and indigenous healers. 1 children were forcibly removed from indigenous australians as young as possible for the purpose of assimilation and suppression of their aboriginal culture (read, 2002). 24 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.3 r e f e r e n c e s abdullah, j., & stringer, e. 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(2005). the theory and practice of group psychotherapy. new york, n.y.: basic books. 33 marsh et al.: indigenous healing and seeking safety published by scholarship@western, 2016 a p p e n d i x a p o s t t r e a t m e n t s h a r i n g c i r c l e s q u e s t i o n g u i d e f o r p a r t i c i p a n t s 1. what did you find most helpful about the seeking safety group topics? 2. least helpful? 3. what aspects of the traditional healing approaches did you find most helpful? 4. least helpful? 5. is there anything in the sharing circles that influenced you in a positive way? 6. in a negative way? 7. what do you remember most about the sharing circles? 8. how can you apply and use the knowledge and skills gained in your day-to-day life? 9. can you describe any changes that you experienced within yourself during the sharing circles? 10. is there anything in the sharing circles that can be done differently in the future? 11. would you recommend this treatment to others? 12. is there anything else that you would like to tell me about your experience in the group? 34 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 2 [2016], art. 3 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss2/3 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.2.3 a p p e n d i x b e n d o f t r e a t m e n t i n d i v i d u a l s e m i s t r u c t u r e d i n t e r v i e w w i t h p a r t i c i p a n t s a n d f a c i l i t a t o r s 1. what did you find most helpful about the seeking safety group topics? 2. least helpful? 3. what aspects of the traditional healing approaches did you find most helpful? 4. least helpful? 5. is there anything in the sharing circles that affected you in a positive way? 6. in a negative way? 7. what do you remember most about the sharing circles? 8. how can you apply and use the knowledge and skills gained in your day-to-day life? 9. can you describe any changes that you experienced within yourself during the sharing circles? 10. is there anything in the sharing circles that can be done differently in the future? 11. would you recommend this treatment to others? 12. is there anything else that you would like to tell me about your experience in the group? 35 marsh et al.: indigenous healing and seeking safety published by scholarship@western, 2016 the international indigenous policy journal april 2016 indigenous healing and seeking safety: a blended implementation project for intergenerational trauma and substance use disorders teresa naseba marsh sheila cote-meek nancy l. young lisa m. najavits pamela toulouse recommended citation indigenous healing and seeking safety: a blended implementation project for intergenerational trauma and substance use disorders abstract keywords creative commons license indigenous healing and seeking safety: a blended implementation project for intergenerational trauma and substance use disorders daphne odjig: a great indigenous artist and humanitarian has passed the international indigenous policy journal volume 7 issue 4 social determinants of indigenous well-being : building a more complete understanding article 1 october 2016 daphne odjig: a great indigenous artist and humanitarian has passed jerry p. w hite western university, white@uwo.ca recommended citation white, j. p. (2016). daphne odjig: a great indigenous artist and humanitarian has passed. the international indigenous policy journal, 7(4). doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.4.1 daphne odjig: a great indigenous artist and humanitarian has passed abstract on october 1st, an exceptionally talented and important indigenous artist passed away at the age of 97: daphne odjig. keywords daphne odjig, indigenous art, aboriginal art, culture creative commons license this work is licensed under a creative commons attribution-noncommercial-no derivative works 4.0 license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ d a p h n e o d j i g : a g r e a t i n d i g e n o u s a r t i s t a n d h u m a n i t a r i a n h a s p a s s e d on october 1st, an exceptionally talented and important artist passed away at the age of 97: daphne odjig. it would be impossible to recount to you how revolutionary she was, how much she contributed to building understanding between indigenous and non-indigenous peoples, and how much she gave to our collective culture through her amazing art. daphne: chi-miigwech for being a mentor. chi-miigwech for lending your artwork to our books and publications.1 chi-miigwech for what you have given everyone in this country and beyond. i had the privilege to nominate and introduce her for an honorary doctorate at the university of western ontario eight years ago, in june 2008. as history would have it, at the same time the prime minister of canada would deliver a long overdue and much anticipated apology for the history of forcing indigenous peoples of canada into residential schools. below i have reprinted the introduction i gave when she received the honorary degree because it was a time of happiness and acknowledgement, which i feel is respectful of this great human being, someone i think of as friend and mentor. j u n e 2 0 0 8 “mr. chancellor, honored guests, distinguished colleagues, graduates and families, dearest daphne odjig, the museum of civilization calls daphne odjig one of canada’s most influential artists, instrumental in the development of contemporary aboriginal art. we would add that she is a quintessential narrator of canada’s cultural history. she was born in 1919 and grew up in wikwemikong, or wiki as the people call it, describing herself as someone born with a paintbrush in her hand. “i lived for the friday art classes at school,” she says. originally, daphne had hoped to be a teacher, but rheumatic fever cut her studies short. this was a life course event that was to give canada, and the world, a truly a great artist. odjig has gone through several artistic phases: beginning in the early days with realism, she quickly moved away from what she called the “rigid rules of this form” in order to paint more as she felt. she is described by vanderburgh and southcott as moving from a self-taught realism to cubism, then to abstract expressionism, and the bold outlines of cloisonnism (odjig, southcott, & vanderburgh, 1992). for those of us who have had the opportunity to view some of her magnificent achievements, we know she has been influenced by several schools including the art of the indigenous west coast and the styles 1 some of daphne’s works appear as covers in our 10 volume series, aboriginal policy research (see http://thompsonbooks.com/higher-ed/aboriginal-studies/). 1 white: daphne odjig published by scholarship@western, 2016 of the anishinabek. her work is also influenced by picasso2 and incorporates unique features that link these diverse approaches and forms to the life breath of her aboriginal roots. but, personally, i see a powerful sense of women and family that tells us of cultures and understandings that we must embrace and come to comprehend. many of her works portray visions of her peoples’ history, which seem to be deeply personal expressions of her understanding of human truths in the context of her feelings of pain, anger, and hope—emotional experiences shared by her and this country’s aboriginal peoples. sometimes history intervenes and circumstances demand that the best laid plans be set aside. this is one of those instances and i must ask your indulgence while i take a moment to make some remarks that are not originally part of my citation. i want to take you across three times in history: the late 19th century, 1978, and yesterday. since the late 1800’s, many generations of aboriginal children were taken from their homes, from their family, from their circles of care and cultures. why? why forcefully remove children from their rich and vibrant cultures and place them in the residential schools? these schools were often places of abuse and fear. the aim was to “take the indian from the child” and in this way our country did terrible harm to first nations, inuit, and métis peoples of canada. now let me take you to 1978 when daphne odjig finishes a work entitled, “the indian in transition” (figure 1). this is a monumental work both in scope and size—at more than 8 feet by 27 feet—it hangs in the museum of civilization (ottawa). “the indian in transition” covers a sweep of history from pre-european contact to times still to come.3 daphne first gives us a vision of an aboriginal person playing a drum under the protective watch of the great thunderbird. the image represents a strong aboriginal culture held in place by collective understanding. a boat with europeans arrives and the bow of their boat has turned into a serpent, which is an image of what is to come, but is also a bad omen in daphne’s anishinaabe culture. 2 picasso once called her “a remarkable artist,” and she was asked paint a memorial to picasso by the picasso museum in antibes. 3 please note that the description of the painting above is not original to the author. it is borrowed from lee-ann martin, the curator of contemporary aboriginal art at the canadian museum of civilization. she also holds a position at the university of ottawa. lee-ann’s interpretation has been printed in jann bailey’s (2011) essay. 2 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 4 [2016], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.4.1 f i g u r e 1 . t h e i n d i a n i n t r a n s i t i o n b y d a p h n e o d j i g . as history passes, the painting depicts aboriginal people seemingly trapped in a swirl of dramatic and unsettling change. changes in governance, livelihood, social custom, and culture wreak havoc. four otherworldly figures rise above a broken drum and a fallen cross. out of this chaos, which depicts lost cultures and false or misguided religions, an aboriginal person emerges, as in the beginning, holding and protecting a drum. as this person breaks free we see they are again protected by the thunderbird. now let me take you to yesterday, where an apology was delivered in parliament. an apology for the indefensible actions of forced assimilation that have led to pain, hurt, and misery for first nations, métis, and inuit people across canada. let us all hope we can begin now to move to the last panel of your incredible work, “the indian in transition.” may we see the optimistic vision you have given us become a widespread reality. i want to return to my prepared citation now. this great canadian, known affectionately as the grandmother of aboriginal art, has many honors. i could not begin to list them. she was inducted into the order of canada in 1986, the same year she was chosen to be one of only four artists worldwide to paint a memorial to pablo picasso. she has been elected to royal canadian academy of art, has won the canada silver jubilee medal in 1977, a national aboriginal achievement award in 1998, and last year a governor general’s award in visual and media arts. she has been honored by several provinces and her own communities, and has been the subject of more than 10 books and films. i came to know this “grandmother of art” in more detail through my research partnership and friendship with her stepson, dan beavon. she has graciously allowed us to use her works on the covers of our books. daphne, with respect, i say thank you for bringing so much to all our lives, aboriginal and nonaboriginal. thank you for founding art galleries, starting schools, expressing our histories, and inspiring young and old. thank you for looking this country in the eye and daring us to understand. 3 white: daphne odjig published by scholarship@western, 2016 mr. chancellor, on behalf of the vice chancellor and in the name of the senate, i ask you to confer the degree doctor of laws, honoris causa upon daphne odjg.” jerry p. white a c k n o w l e d g e m e n t s a n d r e f e r e n c e s the above is not original work. this citation writer wishes to acknowledge that there are many texts, books, speeches, and tributes that provided the information used in this citation. particularly influential were: bailey, j. (2011). daphne odjig. herizons. retrieved from http://www.herizons.ca/node/481 boyer, b., & podedworny, c. (2002). odjig: the art of daphne odjig, 1960-2000. toronto: key porter books. odjig, d., southcott, b., & vanderburgh, r. m. (1992). a paintbrush in my hand. toronto: dundurn. special thanks for information provided by lee-ann martin, curator of contemporary canadian aboriginal art at the canadian museum of civilization (quoted in bailey, 2011), describing her interpretation of “the indian in transition.” see also native online (http://www.nativeonline.com/daphne_odjig.htm) and art encyclopedia (www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/odjig_daphne.html) 4 the international indigenous policy journal, vol. 7, iss. 4 [2016], art. 1 http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/iipj/vol7/iss4/1 doi: 10.18584/iipj.2016.7.4.1 the international indigenous policy journal october 2016 daphne odjig: a great indigenous artist and humanitarian has passed jerry p. white recommended citation daphne odjig: a great indigenous artist and humanitarian has passed abstract keywords creative commons license daphne odjig: a great indigenous artist and humanitarian has passed